people people from all over the country come here. he was quoting risk gaidar -- ruth bader ginsberg. when asked about a country that was to form a constitution, her advice was "if i was you, i would not look at the united states constitution. i would look at the constitution of south africa." i heard earlier speakers talk about how important this who serves us on the supreme court, and the supreme court justices need to understand that our constitution is our constitution, and it means what it says, and we have to protect it and we have to defend it. [applause] and the owes the that i take as a senator and the oath that they take as the justice of the supreme court to defend the constitution means just exactly that. it does not mean to rewrite the constitution. it does not mean to stake out something you like better. it means to defend our constitution. the constitutional government in the country today almost has ceased to function. this is a big generational election, a big debate about who we're going to be for a long time. i am in the minority in the senate. i would like to be in the majority of the senate. we're looking at programs that have not been done for 1000 days. the regulators are fully functional. i do not know anywhere in the state or the country where i do not hear about raising our utility bills or the silly regulation the labor department recently proposed for the labor department was going to decide what form kids to do on a farm. my mom and dad were dairy farmers, and as i recall, the rule was i to do anything i was big enough to do as long as my mom or dad said i was big enough to do. -- big enough to do its. and another rule -- i did do things that i did not want to do yet, if they thought i was big enough to do it. we do not need the department of labor deciding whether farm kids are big enough to drive a tractor on the farm. there is one rule about getting together the livestock. i do not recall my father ever saying "let's go gather the livestock. you could not gather the livestock until you're 18. mostly, they are ready to be gathered by someone who was not 18 yet, or we were not able to emotionally gather them. and then the department of epa not only has will after will that makes it impossible for us to do the right thing from the environment -- for the environment, but also, they talked for a long time about fugitive dust, where farmers could not let the dust from their farm go to the next farm. just one level of -- fast and furious, by the way, would be a fast and furious example of the regulators. the regulators are not only fully functional, they are beyond hyper functional. in that great movie "spaceballs" that many of you have seen more than once, and i have, too, and there is a scene at abouthypersp -- about hyperspeed. someone just said "it is ludicrous speed." the regulators are at lucre speed, and we need to get them under control. about once every generation, we decide who we are going to be for a long time. this is one of those times. matt mentioned thomas jefferson earlier. when thomas jefferson saw the government different than adams and washington had. that was a big moment. and such a big moment for a generation where 28 years after that, we refer to the country, if you remember your high- school history, as jeffersonian america. it was not just an idea about who we were going to be in government, but it was an idea about who we were going to be overall. there are touch points in history that once in a generation, we have a big debate. jackson, lincoln, roosevelt, franklin roosevelt, lyndon johnson, ronald reagan, and that clock has come around again. in fact, president obama when he was senator obama said almost exactly four years ago, he said "reagan was a much more consequential president then clinton." now, the clinton folks did not like that at all, but it happens to be the one statement that president obama has made that i agree with most completely. reagan was a more consequential president, partly because he was reagan and he was going to be consequential. but partly because 1980 was one of those moments when we decided to we were going to be for a long time. and that is what we're doing right now. no matter who was president, whether it is reagan or president bush or president clinton or president bush again, the side panels of who we were going to be was established in 1980 in a way that define the debate for a long time. and we are doing that again right now. essentially, we are deciding, are we going to be europe or the united states of america? let's hope we're going to be the united states of america. [applause] the lines are clearly divided here. one side believes the government can make any decision for you and your family, and the other side does not. it is a traditional and age-old american idea. on theake sure we stay side of more freedom and less government. let's not be like everybody else. let's not go down that path where we decide the constitution does not matter, the amendments don't matter. the second amendment matters. the first amendment matters. we just had a pretty good debate in washington about whether the government can make you do a health care things that violate your faith principals. not that violate my faith principles, but someone else's faith principals. and the answer is no. thomas jefferson -- we will mention him for the third time in about 10 minutes -- thomas jefferson wrote the "new london methodist" in 1789, and he said as all the freedoms we hold most dear, we should hold the freedom of conscience most dear. we should not have a government that makes you violate what you believe. for those who believed in the second amendment, we also have to believe in the first amendment. for those to amend it -- who believe in the amendment, we also have to fight for the constitution. are we going to be like everybody else? or are we going to be the united states? one of my favorite stories from the senate campaign was in 2009. i was outside the iron county courthouse, not too many miles south of here, and cannonballs were shot into it in the civil war and not in a friendly way. my coordinator, who was the farm bureau chairman and mostly tree trimmer. i had lunch with him one day this week. he said "when i leave at i it fromyard after the trees, i like to leave it like no one has been there, except the trees look better. if there is a rut, we roll the rut in the yard." as i said earlier, my mom and dad were dairy farmers, so i have always had that involuntary servitude thing. one of my boys said, "why do we do with this way? nobody else does it this way." and he said, every time they said that to me, i said "son, if you do it like everybody else does it, you're just everybody else." [applause] we do not just want to beat everybody else. that is the decision we want to make in this country right now. before the convention, i saw the ."ticle headlined "all in this debate may come around for another 25 or 30 years. i may not be as vigorous as i am now. but i intend to be all in. we intend to be who we are -- the greatest, freest country in the hysteria of the world -- in the history of the world, the united states of america. thank you for being here. [applause] >> thank you, senator. all of us who value our freedom and sovereignty over the next speaker a debt of gratitude. when the u.n. wanted to got our second amendment rights, this man reminded them the right to keep and bear arms is not negotiable or subject to the whims' of anti-gun eurocrats'. -- bureaucrats. today, he continues to speak out for our sovereignty. we are proud of his contributions to this country and we miss him dearly these days. ladies and gentlemen, please give warm welcome to our dear friend, ambassador john bolton. [applause] >> thank you very much. thank you. well, it is great to be here with you again. you heard from some of the earlier speakers what an incredibly important election this is. i agree entirely with that. i want to talk a little bit about what i think we need desperately in foreign policy is of ronald reagan approach to foreign policy. [applause] there are a lot of similarities between this year and 1980. remember jimmy carter told us we were suffering. we were suffering from a malaise. it turned out the only malaise we were suffering from was jimmy carter. [laughter] and for all reagan took care of that. -- and ronald reagan took care of that. i think we will take care of another malaise this november. [applause] what was it at the center of ronald reagan and his foreign policy that made it so successful? first, ronald reagan was proud to be an american. how about that in a president for a change? [applause] we have got instead today, we have got our first post- american president in barack obama. you know, he is above all that patriotism stop. he does not believe in american exceptional is a. he says he does, but he does not. it is a profound impact on the way he conducts foriegn policy. it shows in another difference between him and ronald reagan. ronald reagan believed deeply in american sovereignty. in his administration, u.s. foriegn policy was not made at the united nations. that is not the approach of president obama or to days left in america. they are constantly talking about giving up our sovereignty, pulling our shared sovereignty with others. they do it almost expressly to undercut our constitution. they have done it on the mexican international issues, if you think of the copenhagen conference on climate change, the ec treaties on the back door way to get that, -- the sea trees on the back door way to get that. and the obama administration has planned carefully for one of their highest priorities, which is negotiate an arms trade treaty that has been deep in their agenda for a long time to have a profound negative impact on our second amendment rights. they have done this in a very still the fashion, but this summer, there is little doubt they intend to make all the progress they can come up either to ram this through, or if governor romney is elected, in hopes that the new administration is not well organized to stop it. we have another big battle coming up on this this summer. it is very important to oppose in the most strenuous fashion. you know as well as i do, once obama is reelected, if that happens, and never has to face the voters again, it is going to be all about his efforts to undermine our sovereignty. ronald reagan also understood peace through strength was absolutely critical for a successful american foriegn policy. he understood it that you could not have a sustained american economy without having a strong american presence internationally, and you could not have a strong national defense without a strong economy. reagan understood what adam smith, the author of "the wealth of nations," told us so many years ago -- the duty of the sovereign is to protect us from the violence and invasion of another independent society, which can be performed only by military force. what is the state of our defense budget today. under barack obama, he has cut $1.5 trillion from our defense budget. it will cripple the united states internationally. right now, ladies and gentlemen, we have and maybe that has 285 ships at sea, -- we have a navy that has 285 ships at sea. that is the lowest number since 1916. we have the lowest number since the first world war. and every prospect is it will continue to decline. the obama administration has essentially gutted our national missile defense program. you know, we all watched that north korean missile explode after 60 or 90 seconds in flight and were happy that was the outcome to be sure. [applause] but you know, ladies and gentlemen, it is not a defense policy to hope that your adversary's missiles do not work. [laughter] and that appears to be the core of obama's missile defense policy. one of the reasons that i endorsed governor romney many months ago is because of strong missile defense system to protect us, to protect american citizens from rogue states with nuclear weapons, absolutely critical for us going forward. the problem with obama is ec's american strength -- he sees american strength as provocative. when in fact, it is the opposite. it is american weakness that is provocative and we have a president that specializes in that. [applause] not only that, ladies and gentleman, he confides more in our adversaries than the american people. you love heard governor romney referred to that famous conversation with the russian president dmitry medvedev where our president says "give me some space before the election, and once that is over, i can be more flexible on missile defense and a whole host of other issues." well, thanks for sharing, mr. president. this is not leadership. this is the antithesis of leadership. this is a performance by our chief executive that weakens the united states in the eyes of our friends and adversaries alike. we have seen that in a whole host of issues. how he deals with russia. how he deals with china. how he deals with nuclear for the operation for north korea and iran. how he treats close allies like israel. if you watch how the obama administration has been born with respect to iran and its support for terrorism compared to our president has treated israel, it is very clear. if you want to know how to treat a close ally, low-cal barack obama has treated israel and duty -- look at how barack obama has treated israel and to the exact opposite. the mask is off, ladies and gentlemen, when it comes to iran's nuclear-weapons program. barack obama fears an israeli exercise of their legitimate right to self-defense against that nuclear weapon spread more than he fears and iran with nuclear weapons. is the opposite of what america's interests are. amazingly, the president and his advisers talk as though foreign policy and national security are a strength for this president. they have various examples. they cite the killing of osama bin laden. other things. i am delighted osama bin laden got exactly what was coming to him, no question about that. but that is not the same thing as the president deserving credit for it. let me explain it this way. osama bin laden was killed while barack obama was president. he was not killed because barack obama was president. [applause] and the rest of the world knows that. think about this. in his eight years as president, ronald reagan brought us to the brink of victory of the cold war. by contrast in three years, barack obama as broad as to the brink of iranian and north korean deliverable nuclear weapon capability and dangerous proliferation worldwide. he has brought us dramatic insecurity and instability in the middle east, growing threats to israel, and he has brought us to the brink of paralysis by reductions in our intelligence budget, and for all this, he has the chutzpah to say he has a policy similar to ronald reagan. let me make this clear, in case he has not gotten the point. president obama, you are no ronald reagan. [applause] we need to preserve our national sovereignty. we need to preserve our constitutional rights. we have to replace this national security policy of the theism with a reagan-like foriegn policy right across the board this november. thank you very much. [applause] [cheering] >> please turn your attention to the video monitors. >> dad taught me how to fish. started the business in 1977. have always believed in the nra and the second amendment. today, your helping us insure our children and grandchildren will enjoy the rights to keep and bear arms. visit midwayusa.com. thank you for your business. [applause] >> representing the 2012 at nra annual meeting as the official sponsor, our next guest created the friends of nra roundup programs in 1992. since then, they have raised more than $200 million. heat one our nation's highest honor for innovation and performance. est founder and ceo of midway usa, of which is celebrating his 35th anniversary. he and his wife linda have been honored for their contribution to the nra and the shooting sports industry. ladies gentlemen, please welcome our friend larry potterfield. [applause] >> are there any midway usa customers out there? [applause] >> thanks for your business. i want to tell you that i love america and i know that you do, too. my vision for america is that we will always be the greatest nation on earth. we will be first in freedom. first in democracy. first in education and productivity. we will be first in ethical conduct and dealings and we will be first in generosity. that is my vision for america. i know you share it with me. [applause] i know it sounds like something from an election-year speech. i am not running for office. i do believe to achieve this vision, america needs the national rifle association of america and america needs each of us to generously give our time and money for those causes we believe in to help ensure america will always be the greatest nation on earth. i am larry ptterfield with midway usa. and that is the way it is. >> we have a little more to do. if you will hold on for a minute. i have asked larry tuesday because i think we have a presentation to make -- to stay because i think we have a presentation to make. i would like his family to join us on stage. >> good afternoon. we believe in the second amendment. and we believe, like you, that it is going to take our dollars and support to keep the second amendment strong for our children and our grandchildren. so, we present this check today to the nra from our customers for the second amendment. thank you. [applause] >> thank you. >> thank you very much. spots to but to all three generations -- thank you to all three generations. friends, and it comes to the second amendment, no governor has done more to protect our freedoms in the next speaker. many of you remember the aftermath of hurricane katrina when government officials confiscated firearms from law- abiding citizens when they needed them the most. but this man said never again. so, he brought democrats and republicans together in congress to make it illegal for government officials to confiscate legally-owned firearms. i was there from start to finish. i saw him leave, and i saw him succeed. -- i saw him lead, and i saw him succeed. he has been a true warrior limited constitutional government. he decrees to louisiana budget and cut burdensome business regulations that discourage economic growth. louisiana has had a 20 consecutive months of private sector job growth. as a result, the unemployment rate has been lower than the national average every month since he took office in 2000 a. and he got all of that done in four years. it is no surprise he was reelected last november in a landslide. this great patriot has demonstrated a government can and should be more efficient, more effective, and less- expensive. that is exactly the type of leadership american needs right now. ladies and gentlemen, please join me in giving a very warm welcome to our next speaker, louisiana gov. bobby jindal. [applause] >> thank you very much. thank you for that very, very generous introduction. i want to thank chris and the leadership of the nra. they do a terrific job for us every day, fighting for our fundamental rights. let's give chris and the entire team around of applause. [applause] i had the privilege of meeting him at eight years ago when i was first elected to congress. we have become great friends. i am a great fan of the entire team here at the nra. they do a great job in washington. they do a great job across this country. i have listened to the speakers today and one thought has gone through my mind. as we think about who we elect to office, we need leaders who are thinking not about the next election, but we need leaders who were thinking about the next generation in america. [applause] we are here today to talk about american values. i want to share with you where i got my appreciation for american values. it starts for me with my father and my mother. mark twain said this better than i could. he said "the older you get, the smarter your parents become." you know what i mean. look, i have three young children. i find myself behaving more and more like my dad everyday. i say things i swore i would never say when i was a child. how many times have you looked at your children and said "because i am your father, that's why." "this is not a democracy." all those things i hated when my dad would tell me when i was a little boy. but you know, my dad would say several things that would drive me crazy. i remember when we were young people at the dinner table. my dad would say to my brother -- hey, look. there are starving children in china. you should eat your vegetables. i never understood that. i said, let's send them my vegetables. they can have them. i do not want them. there is something else my dad would say to me every single day. my dad would tell my brother and me every single day. he would say, you should give thanks to god that you were born in the greatest country in the history of the world. be grateful that you are americans. [applause] when dad would say that, i really did not understand then what he was trying to teach us. the reality is, i will my eyes and i said, what else would i be? of course i am american. my parents, they have lived the american dream. they came to louisiana so that my mom could go to lsu. my dad did not want a handout. he simply wanted a job. he opened up the yellow pages and called company after company until he could get a job to feed his family. he wanted to live the american dream. and then when i was born, they did not have insurance to cover me. i was what they would call "a pre-existing condition." [laughter] back in those days, there was not a lot of paperwork. my dad just shook hands with the doctor and agreed to pay the bill every month until he paid the bill keeping that is how you did things in. i asked my dad, how did that work? if you skip a payment on a baby, what are they going to do? can they take the baby back? >> he said "son, if they would have taken the baby back, i would have skipped a couple of payments." i grew up in a house without electricity or running water. i have heard these stories every single day of my life. if you ever complained to my dad about anything -- you tell him that life is too large, all you would get would be a lecture. my dad would say "and allowance? how much do you think you should be paying me for the food you eat and clothes to wear? " he would tell you that you were lucky. apparently when he was going to school, he had to walk up hill to get to school and walk uphill to get home as well. they could not afford it downhill, much less school buses back then. [laughter] there is someone in every family that has lived that story. that has lived the american dream. my dad would always tell us this. he would say "there are no limits to what you can accomplish in this great country. i am not going to give you a famous last name. i am not going to leave you an inheritance. if you work hard, if you get a grade education, there is no limit to what you can accomplish in the united states of america." [applause] and to me, that is the american dream. guys have itoccupiy all wrong. the american dream is not that you're entitled to your neighbor's property. american dream is you can work hard and achieve and do better for your children. every generation once that. [applause] the dream that each of us has come a we are willing to work hard to achieve our goals. at the core of the nation's soul, it is not words on a piece of parchment. it is not our great natural resources. what makes america great is our people. our people are the bedrock of our republic. if we rely on each other, to protect our friends and neighbors of their freedoms may be preserved, that is what it means to be an american and that is why we are an exceptional country. the freedom and the security that freedom in shores is that the core of my political philosophy. it is the reason i pushed as hard as i can to protect our second amendment rights. chris told you about the work we did on the bill after katrina to ensure that never again would citizens have to fear their own government would take away their weapons and so they could protect themselves. during my first term as governor, early in that term, we have another opportunity. our legislature was attacking the rights of law-abiding gun owners to keep their weapons in their cars. i had debates with two allies of my. it was not a hard decision for me. i told my friends i would take the side of freedom every time. in louisiana, freedom 1. we passed that bill into law. [applause] i want to tell you about a fight we're having right now. we just passed a piece of legislation in the senate. is going to the house. here's the challenge for the 49 other states. i think every state needs to do this. we are going to adopt the strongest constitutional protection for law abiding gun owners you can find anywhere in the country. is our on second amendment. it is a constitutional provision to repair the damage done by misguided judges. i want to share the text of this amendment. the right of individuals to acquire comity, possess, transport weapons to defend life and liberty and all other legitimate purposes is fundamental and shall not be denied or in french. any restriction on this right must be subject to strict scrutiny. i am no attorney. [applause] in no attorney. but i do not think even the liberal judges can screw that one up. is seems it would be pretty hard for the liberal judges to find a loophole in that language. by the way, unlike -- unlike our president, i am not a constitutional attorney. i respect the constitution on like our president, but i am not a constitutional attorney. i am amazed by a man who is so smart to miss such an obvious, clear, black-letter lot in the second amendment. if i were him, i would ask harvard for a refund for his tuition for whatever he paid for his degree. [applause] we are serious about protecting our rights in the louisiana. unfortunately, our president is just as serious about eviscerating that right. he appointed two justices to the supreme court that are dead wrong on this issue. you cannot make this up. he appointed an attorney general who allowed guns to be smuggled into mexico to bolster his case for gun-control at home in the united states of america. you all know that as operation fast and furious. at the next operation we need is operation fire eric colder. -- eric holder. [applause] i was one of the first and few to call for his resignation after this debacle. people started calling me up, saying, you were just going to irritate the president. you will not accomplishing anything. just leave it,. why you want to make the attorney general mad at you? defending our fundamental freedoms is not above anybody's pay grade in america. every governor, every citizen should stand up for our rights. [applause] it is a duty of every one of us. president obama's assault on our second amendment freedoms is one of the reasons we have to make him a one-term president come this november. [applause] so often people say this is the most important election of our lifetimes, but this one really is. he is diminishing the economic freedoms of every american by raising the debt burden. he is diminishing our second amendment rights. his budgets do not stop borrowing. not now, not ever. they do not reduce the size of our government. not now, not ever. this president ran on a campaign of hope and change. instead he has given us to borrow and spend. my little girl brought home a button from school. is says "nobody better tell president obama what goes after a trillion." we cannot afford any more spending and borrowing. [applause] if you look at this residence -- at the president felt policies on every single issue, one thing -- at the president's policies and every single issue, one thing is clear. he does not believe we can trust ordinary americans to make smart energy choices. that is why he shuts down the keystone pipeline. you know what? bills it from oklahoma to tx. that's great. someone needs to buy our ivy league-educated residents a map to show him more the rest of that pipeline needs to be built. [applause] in addition to getting his law school tuition back, he may want tuition dollars back for any geography class is. he does not believe we can make our own health care decisions. that is what he once obama carew -- ants obamacare. and he certainly does not believe we can trust americans with firearms. that is why he has given us kagan and sotomayor and dozens of liberal judges. someone said, maybe this president has been such a disaster the first four years because of its inexperience? maybe he was not ready to be president? that is true. he has not run any thing before he was president of the united states. i think that is not quite right. i do not think it is true that he simply was not ready. i think the reality is there's a fundamental disagreement in our country today. the selection is not about who looks the best and tv. i think from tv, he looks like he is a fine husband, a fine father. i really only have two fundamental disagreements with the president. only two things i dislike. 1, the fact that he has been the most incompetent president since jimmy carter to live in the white house. [applause] the second, that he has been the most radically liberal president since jimmy carter to live in the white house. you take away his incompetence and his liberal ideology, the rest of him is fine. this election is about a fundamental debate, a choice for america. you'll hear from the occupy wall street crowd that we are entitled. nobody in america is entitled to equal results. you are not entitled to your neighbor's property. you're not entitled to your neighbor's car, boat, anything. no one is entitled to a fancy vacation. you are entitled to equal opportunity. our philosophy says no, you do not have a right to your neighbor's car or house, but you do have an equal opportunity to fundamental freedom. the promise of america is your last name, your zip code, your gender, your race to not determine your outcome in this great country. that is not true in every country. here, we believe your decisions determine the outcome is in america. that is the reason everyone in this room defense freedom. that is why a bunch of brave men and women broke away from england it suit found this great country. the reason we must prevail in this debate about the future of america. it is about leaving our children more freedom and opportunities than we inherited from our parents. i want to leave you with one final thought. our greatest asset as a country, the provider of our future -- is not our natural resources, as great as they are keeping it is not our beautiful nation. is not even our incredible military or our economy. the strength of our country is our people. every great american value, from government to free enterprise, to personal responsibility to write to bear arms is depending on people willing to fight for the. we must educate our young people. yes, we must teach them to read and write. we must teach them so they understand the principles on which this great country was founded. i think america should remain the greatest country in the history of the world. by the way, when i was a kid, that was a safe thing to say. america should never apologize. we should never be content to settle. we should never be ashamed to be the greatest country in the world. i am proud we are exceptional. [applause] and i know in my bones, our role as a local leader must be cherished. they know in their heart of hearts they are safer with the peaceful, stronger america. we have a moral responsibility to make our country stronger and unashamedly export our ideals of freedom, democracy, and self- determination, all to fill the divinely-inspired potential of every living soul on this planet. i am willing to stand and fight for that freedom. i am asking you this. i am asking you to stay in that fight. i am asking you to stay vigilant. the hearts and minds of this country. let's leave our children the opportunity to pursue the american dream. as our parents did for us, let's leave them a legacy that is rightfully their. not a great welty inheritance, but the opportunity to live in the greatest country in the world. thank you for the terrific work the nra does. god bless you. god bless the united states of america. [applause] >> thank you, gov.. before i join our -- introduce the next speaker, one of the greatest honors i have is to present the harlan b. carter award. this award is given to individuals who have shown outstanding achievement on behalf of gun owners. this recipient has gone all in as legislator and as governor. he stood strong in the face of protests, citizens, -- sit-ins, and millions of dollars of attack ads. most would have cut and run. even faced with the threat of a recall at election, he worked with the legislature -- a recall election, he worked for the legislature. [applause] the day he signed this landmark legislation into law, it is a huge victory for every gun owner. we then signed the legislation into law to protect our self- defense. this is a perfect example of why we were to let the right men and women in every state. please give a warm welcome to this year's recipients, the governor of wisconsin, scott walker. [applause] >> we are with you, scott. >> thank you. first off, i want to sit thanks, not just for this tremendous award. i have talked to a lot of people. i get asked all the time -- how do you put up with that? chris talk about all the protests. in front of our time, we have thousands of people bust in. for every one person like that, there are 10 full people out there who say "governor, we are praying for you and your family." and i want to thank you for that. [applause] yeah, i want to thank chris and dave and wayne. affleck, wayne and dave and of wisconsin roots. they are part of the cheesehead revolution. sooner or later, we will take over the world. you have great members. i am proud to be one myself. i just want to tell you about a couple of things we're doing in wisconsin. as chris mentioned, we're fighting force and -- first and foremost to protect public safety in our state. we knew after years of trying, because we had a governor and legislature that did not understand the value of a personal protection act, we are ahead of illinois. was able to sign into law of the personal protection act so the people of our state could protect themselves. along with that -- so, that -- so that law-abiding citizens to protect themselves against those who are not law-abiding. we want to make sure you can not only protect your home and property, but most important, your family and loved ones. and we signed a bat into law as well. -- we signed that into law as well. this past year, we have focused on protecting our heritage as well. hunting, fishing is a key part of our heritage. i am proud not only to be an nra member. i have a shotgun and even up 0. we have worked hard to protect that heritage, to do more hunting. to promote respect for hunting and make sure it you have a good hunt in all sorts of areas of our state, to make sure that we have people who have active licenses in hunting, fishing, and trapping in our state. i signed a law that gives us our rights to hunt wolves in our state. there were a lot more walls in our state than the federal government but there were -- more wolves in our state and the federal government thought there were. we ended a program called earn a buck, which was a failure in the past. i asked dr. james kroll -- many of you know him as the deer doctor -- to design a program. most importantly, we are working to protect something more important than our heritage. we are fighting to protect our freedoms. i think the battle we face in wisconsin is similar to the battle we face across this country. there is a clear choice. our opponents believe success in government is determined by how many people are dependent on government programs. i, and i think all of you here, believe success in government is not how many people are dependent on government programs. [applause] that is why i have become a target. if we have a recall election -- even though i kept every one of my promises, even though we balanced a $3.6 billion budget without raising taxes and even though we ultimately put in place a government that protected the people we were elected to serve, i will be facing a recall election in june of this year. they want to take me out, and they want to take me out for anyone across america tears take them on when it comes to big government. that is why need your help. join us at scottwalker.org because you can carry that message for. now, there are a number of people here from wisconsin. i will tell you why this is important. you see, our opponents are targeting me because i stand in the way of getting their hands on their money in their power. and instead, what i look at instead of money and power is i look at ways to provide freedom and prosperity for our people. this is what this is all about. they feel threatened. because they are worried it might help and elsewhere -- and might help and -- it might happen elsewhere. is not just about freedom and prosperity. when we prevail, we will send a powerful message -- not just in my state house, but in statehouses across america and most importantly the nation at's capital. lord knows we need more courage. if people stand up and do what they say, that ultimately there will be people standing up to move forward. that is what this is all about. [applause] lord help us if somehow we fail. if somehow we fail june 5th it sets us back at least a decade, if not a generation. that is why we must not fail. i believe we won't fail. i will tell you why -- because i believe failure is not an option in america. i believe in our country, not just in my state of wisconsin. but i believe all across america that what makes us great, about our d.n.a., is something that allows us to focus in on greater freedom and prosperity for our people. i will tell you why, i grew up in a small town. my dad was a preacher. we didn't have a lot of money. our idea of a good vacation was how long we can jump in the station wagon and travel for a day and find our way back. i didn't go to places like washington or philadelphia. last september we had a chance to speak at a governor's association meeting in philadelphia. being a kid, i loved -- i loved growing up, i loved history and i loved founders. in fact for people like washington and jefferson and madison and franklin, to me they were like superheroes. they were bigger than life. when we went to philadelphia, i got up early in the morning. went to the national park service and saw the liberty bell. most impressively, we went to independence hall. if any of you who have been there, really it's smaller than the stage is right up here. i stood up that morning and looked out, it donned on me looking at the chairs and desks like you're sitting at now and look at the chair with the top, the chair that george washington sat in with the half rising sun in it, it makes you realize these were ordinary people like all of us here this afternoon. ordinary people who did something quite extraordinary. they didn't just risk their political careers. heck, they didn't even just risk their businesses. they risked their lives. bet franklin appropriately said if we don't hang together, surely we'll hang separately. these were the people willing to lay it on the line for freedoms we hold dear today. too many take for granted, they were laying it on the line. moments like that, in places like that, it reminds me in the fight we have not just between now and june 5 but now and november this year that we will prevail. the reason i believe that is because in moments like that it reminds me what has made this country great, moments of crisis being economic orifice cal, military or spiritual, what has made america exceptional, arguably the greatest nation in the history of the world, what has made our country so great has been in times of crisis, we've had men and women of courage who have been willing to stand up and think more about the future of their children and their grandchildren than they thought about their own political futures. along the way there have been men and women with them ho w.h.o. had been willing to stand up and support them and see them forward. this afternoon i asked for your help because i asked this to be a call to action. call to action not just between now and june in wisconsin but call to action all across america. let this be the moment in time. let this be the moment we can tell our children and grandchildren, we stood up, stood for freedom and prosperity and in doing so we ensured a greater future for the next generation. let this be that time. thank you so much for this award. thank you for being here and god bless each and every one of you. [applause] >> thank you, governor walker. everybody having a good time so far? good. we still have terrific speakers lined up. i know there's a few people who couldn't be here with us today but who wanted to send a message. please turn your attention to the video monitors. >> hello to my fellow n.r.a. members. i wish i could be there with you in st. louis. my good friends, wayne and chris cox have an action-packed weekend in store for you. and just by coming to the annual meeting, you have already shown that you're on board and part of the team. for my part i'm proud to continue serving as honorary chairman of trigger the vote. the n.r.a. freedom action foundation, nonpartisan voter registration program. we've got a great website at triller the boat.org. please log on for a visit. even if you're already registered to vote, and i sincerely hope you are. we all know someone isn't registered. because they think they're vote won't make a difference. i'm here to tell them otherwise. the website has plenty of materials to help you convince people that their vote does count. please visit the next time you're online. that's trigger the vote.org. as you know, our second amendment rights are constantly under attack. if we don't do all we can to protect them, we won't have them for much longer. it's up to us to preserve the freedoms handed down to us from the leaders of our great nation. if you want to protect your second eafment rights, it won't be enough to do your own part. we have to multiply our force. it's not enough to be registered to vote. this year we all need to recite someone new to the battle. better yet, five new people or even 10. find the people in your own community who aren't doing their part. and send a message on my behalf. if there's even one gun owner, hunter or shooter out there who isn't registered to vote, then i say to them, watch out for that roundhouse kick. do your part to help trigger the vote today. thank you. >> hi, i'm jim gilmore, the former governor of virginia and member of your n.r.a. board of directors. i'm glad you're here for our celebration of american values. one great american value is our right to keep and bear arms under the second amendment. that right, which is preserved every day by the national rifle association, allows us to participate in a sport that exemplifies our american pass, present and future. shooting is a wonderful way for families to come together to enjoy the great outdoors. but the right is more than recreation. it's one way that we define american citizenship. a trust and confidence in american citizens that's often lacking in other countries and cultures. firearm ownership stands for the empowerment of people. it's an acknowledgment that almost all citizens can behave responsibly with firearms. there will always be examples of the misuse of guns and other types of crimes. that's why we have the rule of law to protect the public. especially crt law with courts and juries and right to be innocent until proven guilty. the right to keep and bear arms is a reaffirmation of our american duty and obligation which goes with our right to live as free citizens. this is the absence of our american values. as the head of the free congress foundation, i want to speak to you about another challenge to american values. today too many americans are out of work. their careers cut short by layoffs or an inability to find a job. too many americans are employed in jobs inappropriate to their education, skills and experience or are in dead-end jobs. at the same time gas prices and groceries just keep on growing up. the answer to this challenge is create a growing and vibrant economy to produce opportunity, wage growth and real future for every american. the best way to do this is to encourage and create incentives for americans to start and invest in their businesses. we have to get more people investing in their businesses to become prosperous and hire more workers and employees. more investment means more and better jobs. we at the free congress foundation, nonpartisan group that proposed a growth code plan to change our tax laws to spur investment. this starts with more people being able to keep more of what they earned so they can do more in their businesses, hire more people and get our country going again. you can read it on our website, free congress.org. look up the growth code on the website. under our plan, everyone will have to give something up. some will have to suspend their dislike of american business. otherless have to acknowledge a need for a cushion for our poorest citizens, aging and disabled. but everyone should pay taxes and have skin in the game for america's future. with the right plan building on american aspiration and ambition and confidence in the future, american success is assured. growth must become our national mission. we can control our own destiny. once we start, no one in the world with stop us. it's always been this way in america. this is the greatest celebration of american values i can imagine. thank you for your commitment to the n.r.a. and your commitment to america. have a great weekend here in st. louis. [applause] >> our next speaker is a key leader in the u.s. house of representatives. during its decade of service in congress, he's voted with n.r.a. members, you all 100% of the time. this includes supporting national right to carry, stopping the obama administration from imposing gun registration. expanding right to carry in national parks and ending the reckless lawsuits from america's firearms industry. now he's the sphere heading the effort to pass the sportsman heritage act and a scheduled hr 04089 for a vote in the house next week. his support for the second amendment became even more influential in 2010. when republicans gained majority in the house and elected them as his majority leader. he's been called a thorn in the side of president obama and i think for that reason alone he deserves a standing ovation. ladies and gentlemen, please join me in welcoming virginia congressman and u.s. house majority leader eric cantor. >> chris, thank you very much. good afternoon. it is great to be here among friends. the n.r.a. is a friend of freedom at a time when freedom in america needs all the support it can get. i want to thank you very much for your patriotism. all of us have come here joined in a common cause, to stand up and fight for one of the greatest documents in history, the united states constitution. but let's not forget that we do so against the head wind of an administration which seems willing to try to override that sacred document. the tactics include judicial activism, executive orders and, yes, sad to say, a belief that they know better than our founding fathers what kind of country this should be. the tradition and gumption of n.r.a. mean you fight for freedom and you fight for constitutional rights like the second amendment. [applause] the message to washington's got to be this, a right to bear arms include those fingers you use to vote and all of us will vote in force this november. as so many have said this afternoon, this upcoming election will determine the direction of our country. it will determine whether power keeps growing with big government or shifts more in favor of the individual. now, it's clear the president's policies have signaled an administration wants more control over your life and all you do. according to their thinking, your choices, your money and your rights reside with the president in the oval office. and with his elected, appointed and special interest allies. but what if this president gets a second term? his comments to russian president, the russian president a few weeks ago said it all. the president said, this is my last election, and after my election, i'll have more flexibility. i shutter to think what that could mean. while the president is trying to take back of meaning of his remarks, our job is to take back the white house and the senate come election day. working together we can also add to the conservative republican house majority and restore the meaning of a stronger, safer, freer america. the issue is important to all of us, issues of defense, protection, freedom and upholding the rule of law must remain embedded in the fabric of america's culture and values. if they don't, we have seen what can happen. back in 1992, i was first elected to public office then serving in the virginia house of delegates. it was also the year of the los angeles riots. i vividly recall the scenes of looting and violence. with their lives and their property at risk, some merchants took up arms. now tv cameras showed small bezz owners firing shots into the ground and in the air. in an attempt to ward off roving looters. now predictably the news media and many on the left sensationalized the situation, portraying it as vidge lantyism. -- vigilanteism. but with law enforcement unavailable or otherwise engaged, those merchants were exercising their right to defend themselves, their families and their property, and that right is sacred to all of us. [applause] it reflects the priority we as americans place on freedom. it's part of what sets america apart from the rest of the world, and that freedom is partly the reason why so many people want to come here. my grandmother came to the country from russia at the turn of the last century. until her generation longed to escape the band from marauding murders who terrorized innocent people in villages and towns throughout eastern europe. she settled in a working class section in richmond, virginia, where she and my grandfather opened a smullgrorgery store. widowed at an early age, my grandmother raised my father and uncle in a tiny apartment above that store. she was able to achieve the american dream of lifting herself up into the middle class and sending her two boys to college. as far as i know, my grandmother didn't own a gun but knowing her as i did, i'm sure she would have taken up a rolling pin, coke bottle or anything else she could grab if someone tried to rob her store, threaten her sons or attempt to take her life and all that it stood for. now people who are hard working, honest, law abiding, and who believe in faith and family like my grandmother are an inspiration to me. they are models for us that goodness can triumph. that freedom allows you to flourish. that responsibility fosters fulfillment. and that what we hold dear must be protected and defended. so all of these values are interrent in the beliefs of the n.r.a. and i'm proud to stand before you as a recipient of an "a" rating from the n.r.a. [applause] and i want to salute you. i want to salute the n.r.a. for helping republicans win back a majority in the house in 2010. we could not have done it without you. now, the privilege of holding a majority in congress means foreign just having 218 votes on a bill. it's about having leadership that shares in your cause and is willing to bring legislation to the floor so that it can receive a fair up-or-down vote. now, in the house you have that kind of leadership and i'm proud to be part of a team that's been able to advance across the house floor. the n.r.a.'s priorities. most recently reciprocity for concealed carry permits. now unfortunately -- [applause] unfortunately many of the n.r.a.'s priority bills are stuck in the senate. but if you and all of the n.r.a. members across america rally behind our party in november, together we can flip the senate to a majority of allies. [applause] now we all know the stakes and we all know why this has got to happen. we watch as the obama administration and its attorney general have played fast and furious by sending guns to drug dealers in mexico, all while it prevents american citizens perfect carrying and concealing their weapons for the purpose of protection in the district of columbia. and that is why i fully support the continued investigation of operation fast and furious by your next speaker, chairman darrell issa, our chairman of the house oversight committee and activities of oversight of our chairman of the judiciary committee, lamar smith. the causal factors behind the death of border patrol agent brian terry must come out of the dark, an attorney eric holder and department of justice must come into the light. [applause] now, article one, section eight of the constitution empowers congress among other things to repel invasions. we need a president, we need a senate and we need a white house united in securing our borders. our borders must repel invasions whether they involve people or tracking of guns. we need a president who doesn't think people are bitter when in his words they cling to guns or religion. we need a president who recognizes that the ultimate bearers of arms, our military, must be right size to efficiency but not downsize into inadequacy. we need a president who understands that instead of taxing and spending, it's the cause of, not the solution, to our physical problems. we need a president who have if given the chance to nominate new supreme court justices chooses strict constitutional constructionists. and we need a president who advocates american sovereignty and exceptionalism, not giving away control of our cherished governance and rights to global organizations like the u.n. and those rights include the constitutional freedom of american gun owners. now we need a president who recognizes that an organize like the n.r.a. is a special interest group whose special interest is to make america stronger, safer and freer. we need president mitt romney. i will tell you, among the acres of second amendment supporters here in st. louis, i have seen symbols and words that remind me of the america we need to restore. one of those items is the t-shirt showing the don't tread on me flag. depicted a coiled rattlesnake. it was the first flag ever carried into battle by the u.s. marine corps during the american revolution. as described by benjamin franklin, the coiled rattlesnake on the flag is a symbol of the american colonies, an emblem of vigilance. now franklin wrote in an essay that the rattlesnake, quote, never begins an attack nor when once engaged ever surrenders. he added that the rattlesnake never woos until she has generously given notice even to her enemies and cautioned him against the danger of stepping on her. franklin called this a strong picture of the temper and the conduct of america. it is also a strong picture of the temper and conduct of the n.r.a. so in 2012 it's not just the republican party that needs the activism of the n.r.a. and your members, our country needs you. this november 17 will mark the n.r.a.'s 141st anniversary, just 11 days before that is election day. the n.r.a. has never failed to heed the call of our nation. so on november 6, i look forward to marching with you in a crusade of don't tread on me and fight for a stronger, safer, freer america. thank you all very, very much and god bless. thank you. [applause] thank you very much. thank you. >> thank you, leader. ladies and gentlemen, it's an honor to introduce our next speaker. he's a true champion of freedom and works around the clock to make government more accountable to the people. at the end of 2010 we learned the sad news border patrol agent brian terry was killed in the line of duty defending our southwestern border in arizona. but that wasn't the end of the story. when the facts came out about agent terry's death, they revealed one of the biggest scandals in american history. fast and furious. and the sad truth is we wouldn't even know about this scandal if it were up to most of the establishment media. that's why our next speaker decided to lead the fight in the house to uncover the truth and make sure fast and furious would never happen again. as chairman of the house government reform and oversight committee, he has demanded that obama administration officials come clean about this deadly scheme. but despite countless road blocks and endless stonewalling, our next speaker hasn't backed off one inch in his quest for truth and justice. ladies and gentlemen, please join me in welcoming our good friend and chairman for freedom, congressman darrell issa. [applause] >> thank you. following my leader and classmate coming to congress in 2000, eric cantor, needless to say is a tough act to follow. but when he mentioned that the 1992 riot, i'm a san diegan. i lived threw it. i watched the circuit city store that didn't have a small merchant on the roof be looted. i watched it when law enforcement was unable to take care of the need of the people of los angeles. that was a failure of law enforcement. but what i'm going to tell you about is a failure of law enforcement's leaders, of political leaders that we count on. i come here today to deliver you but a single message, the investigation of operation fast and furious will not end until the full truth is exposed to every american. and that -- [applause] and that the senior officials at the department of justice are held appropriately accountable and, yes, that includes eric holder. [applause] when i became chairman of the house oversight and government reform committee, i knew what to expect. my job is in fact to be the chief investigator of the congress, the chief investigator in the congress to investigate the administration's wrongdoings, to look for it and to root it out. vigorous oversight was the requirement of the job of accepted. what i did not know but i now know is that the left wing in the obama administration and supporting it would gear up -- the administration would gear up with lawyers rather than accountants so they could give non-answers rather than real answers. and the outside media would attack the credibility of myself, my committee officials, and those who support us, but in fact, because of courageous patriots like you here today, it has failed. because of people like you who insist that the truth be known and support us every minute along the way, they have not succeeded in silencing our committee or even senator grassley's minority position in the senate, and for that, i thank you. [applause] like you, i believe the checks and balances that our founding fathers enshrined in the constitution are critical to our liberty. i believe congress is constitutionally mandated and we have a duty to enforce all of sorry,s against -- i'm all of our laws that the executive branch is required to enforce and enforce them fairly. the fact is the executive branch under this president, has done, as we said in the 1960's, has done its own thing. they have been wasteful at a level we never expected. they have been disingenuous in their answers. they have in fact ignored the exactly what this president promised not to ignore. remember, this president ideally was going to be the president of our dreams because he promised that we would have the most open and transparent government ever and that he would embrace the reforms that our committee is required and constitutionally mandated to do. unfortunately, our oversight efforts have met a president and his administration that is hostile to us and that in fact will not even answer subpoenas with answers but rather with silence. president obama has launched an unprecedented attack on the constitution. we have already seen his blatant disregard for the first amendment, effectively trampling on freedom of religion. we have seen it with obamacare, his poster child for government overreach that at this moment is before the men and women of the supreme court. i myself have been able to see him insult the justices while i sat there on able to say anything on the house floor where the president was an invited guest of the congress, as were the justices. so it should come as no surprise to us that the president then would further charter ridiculed the court by interpreting as a professor that they had no such right to reach this decision or that decision. with that attitude by the chief executive, if he is given four more years, do you have any doubts what kind of decisions the court would make? when the facts began to cambridge to come out about fast and furious, and no surprise -- democrats in washington -- not around the country, but in washington -- immediately seized on the opportunity to talk about the need for additional gun control laws. it comes as no surprise to me because i hear it every day, but the american people and all of you in this room must scratch your head. what possible justification would come for more gun control when in fact existing laws were thwarted? existing laws were essentially not just ignored but overwritten. understand that federally licensed gun dealers warned agents about wrongdoers, expressed their concerns, and were ordered to sell anyway. you might be surprised and say it has to be hard to follow 2000 weapons that literally walk over the border, and you would be right, except it was not 2000 weapons. 1400 of those weapons left with but four buyers. they are not hard to follow. in fact, political appointees were ordered -- ordered the atf and the rest of the team to let them walk. it comes as a surprise to me because every atf agent, every fbi agent, even secret service agents i have had an opportunity to speak to have all said they would never do that. yet, in operation fast and furious, they did that. the mexican government has reported to us that at least 200 of their citizens have been killed with the weapons that were allowed to walk as a result of fast and furious. these deaths on top of border patrol agent brian terry's tragic death were, in fact, anticipate will -- anticipat able, and preventable. when i was able to partner with senator grassley in the investigation, i was given the opportunity because we in 2010 were honored by the voters to be in the majority, and senator grassley had written just a letter asking for more details of an administration that had promised to be open and transparent. he was rebuffed because he was in the minority and did not have subpoena power. he came to me, and i agreed to help. at the time, i thought it would last but a few days, maybe a few weeks. we could not have imagined that the administration would deliver to us a document and live testimony that was in fact an outright lie. we could not imagine that a department with stonewall us all along the way. we could not imagine that they would say that they never let guns walk when in fact the few e-mails some 7000 out of 80,000 documents known to exist, made it clear that fast and furious was an organized program from the start designed to walk guns into the hands of the drug cartels in mexico. these questionable tactics cannot be explained. when i come to you here today, i do not come here to explain how in fact this came to be. i will rely on you to understand that if there is no explanation that makes good sense, it can only be an explanation that makes the sense of ulterior motives of unthinkable proportions. that is our job, to get to the bottom of it, and i promise you we will. [applause] we know for one thing that people should be held responsible who sit in the office of attorney general eric holder. and let me make one thing perfectly clear -- eric holder's contempt for congress and his failure to comply will not go unanswered. [applause] and you can count on me. many will say in the weeks to come that in fact, this is now a political season. all of you know that we have asked and worked diligently to get this concluded long before the political season. so the question is -- as they continue to stonewall, am i not doing the american people's greatest justice to bring this to a quick closure in the next few weeks? and that is what i promise you i will do. [applause] the department of justice believes that it gets to decide what congress gets or does not get. in the next few weeks, we will come to a conclusion of deciding whether in fact the constitution -- it's compelling of us to do oversight is our decision or is an unelected bureaucrat such as attorney general eric holder. many will say this is a witch hunt. i will tell you, brian terry's family has told me just the opposite. they have told me that they cannot believe they cannot get their answers about this. they cannot believe that a family dedicated to law enforcement cannot in fact get the truth from his own country. jaime zapata, an agent not so often talked about killed in mexico with weapons not of fast and furious but that knowingly should not have been in the hands of the drug cartel they're either gets even less answers. i commit to you today i will not quit until both families get the answers they deserve. [applause] i pledge you today i will not stop investigating the waste, fraud, and abuse in government ever, but most importantly, our constitutional liberties must be defended first and foremost. fast and furious can be seen as nothing else but in fact a needless attack on our right to keep and bear arms because, as you promote the lawlessness with weapons knowingly, you can reach no conclusion but that the american people will be asked again and again to give up their right to keep and bear arms because lawless individuals are using weapons ill-gotten. i will never, never give up my right to keep and bear arms and i will never failed to hold those accountable who would try to take hours away. thank you, and god bless. [applause] >> congressman, if you will wait with us just for a moment, one of the great privileges i have is to present the defender of freedom award. this award is given each year to a person who shows exceptional leadership in defense of american freedom. congressman, we could not be more thankful for your serious investigation into the fast and furious scandal. you have led this fight with courage and conviction, and i have seen firsthand how you have been a tremendous allied to the legislative efforts on capitol hill. on behalf of all of us that the nra, it is my honor to present you with the defender of freedom award and this beautiful replica of the original bill of rights. thank you. [applause] [applause] >> ladies and gentlemen, it is an honor for me to introduce our next speaker, a true american hero. he is the winner of two reports, the bronze star, and the silver star. not only calls for more freedom on the battlefields of war but continues to fight for us today on the political battlefield, taking on congress, the obama administration, and anyone else who threatens our constitutional rights. we first got to know him when he stood up for congress in defense of american efforts to defeat communism. he is part of the reason we won that historical struggle. my friends, no one defends our brave men and women in the military more than this man. he is the founder of the freedom alliance, which honors and encourages military service, defends american sovereignty, and promotes a strong national defense. we're proud to have him serve on the nra board of directors and our privilege to have him here today. ladies and gentlemen, lieutenant-colonel oliver north. [applause] >> thank you all. thank you for the kind introduction. i want to tell you how grateful i am to be here today because the option fox news gave me was to be here or in mogadishu, and there is nothing like a trip to somalia to make you really glad to be an american. it is a privilege to be here today to do two things. one, my mission is to get us back on schedule. two is to report to you as the chairman of your military affairs investments committee from your board of directors on how we are doing in recruiting military veterans and active duty personnel. let me get right to that. i am pleased to tell you this afternoon that since we last met in pittsburgh, thanks to measures like our life of duty website and the cement it all possible to get it started, we have signed 35,000 new nra members who are members of our armed forces or recent veterans. [applause] since i work in television, it is also now time for us to take a commercial. i know wayne did this several hours ago, but i have the veterans of the army, navy, air force, marines, coast guard, or in world war ii, the merchant marine, please stand and be recognized by everyone here. the rest of you may stand as well because i know you have been sitting for a long time. [applause] thank you. thank you for your service. thank you for the sacrifices you and your families have made. i tell my colleagues at fox news that i have the best job in all broadcasting. hannity thinks he does. i do. my job is to keep company with heroes. i tell my colleagues that to some a hero is a person wearing a spandex suit and a cake, but my heroes where combat boots and flight suits and go to places that are difficult and dangerous every single day. [applause] i am often asked if i have learned anything about the media business over the course of the last 11 years of broadcasting from this war. i tell them i have learned two very important lessons, even in my advanced age and decrepitude. first of all, i'm not as fast as i once was as a 25 year-old. i also learned i can still keep up with a sergeant when he yells run. [laughter] it has been my great blessing to spend my entire life in the company of heroes. my perspective was shaped very much like governor jindal was describing by his parents. my mother and father met at a uso dance in 1940. all of my uncles served in world war ii or korea or growth. tom brokaw described it as the brick -- the greatest generation, and indeed it was. a country with a population of less than 200 million with 16.5 million men and women in uniform. some of you are here today to serve our country in the pacific. today, i had the privilege of covering the best and bravest of this generation and to make them members of this great organization as well. i call them the warriors of 9/11. i have been blessed to be able to cover them in the land between the rivers, the tigers, the euphrates, the shadows of the hindu kush, and faraway places, some of which we cannot name. my job at fox news is to let them tell their story, and we have been given special access to do so in large part because we make a commitment up front that we will not show the faces or identities of those who would be put at greater risk if we put them on television, and we will not reveal unique weapons and tactics techniques and procedures. but i would not be fair to bring you all the way and make use it this long if i did not show you a little bit of what we do put on the air. for you, about a minute and 30 seconds. of those with whom we get to keep company. mo ♪ i do not think i missed any of them. [applause] those are the sons and daughters of america that we are trying to sign up to become future leaders in this great organization that continues to protect the liberties of all americans. critics have criticized shows like "war stories" and our books like those of special operations that i will be signing out here tomorrow because they say it glorifies war. i beg to differ. there's nothing that should be done to glorify war, but it would be terrible to dishonor our heroes. for a nation without heroes will cease to be. that is what we did with vietnam, and what happened to the veterans of vietnam should never ever happen again in america. [applause] more than 2.4 million young men and women have served america in this faraway wars in this long 5 cents 911. unfortunately, too many of my colleagues do not know who they are and do not understand what they do. it is foreign to them to go out in the field and be able to show footage like we took on some of those many missions out there. that did not happen before. some of you may know that 67 years ago today, the last battle of world war ii was being fought. it was on an island called okinawa. by the time it was over, there were 68,000 dead americans. 9000 of them died when their ships were hit with kamikazes. over 600 of those. this is also the anniversary of the battle on porkchop hill in 1953 in a place called korea. and at this very minute, there are young americans in kandahar province inhelmand province who are also in harm's way. notably, there has never been a military force in the history of the world as competent, as well- educated, as bright, as well- trained, were equipped as the one we have today. [applause] they deserve that. though our media is not as vicious as that which covered the war in vietnam, the potentates of the press still try. i thought wireless summarized with these youngsters are we're trying to bring into this organization, you should take a picture of the warriors who fought. these are some of the thousands of miles of footage and frames that we shot of these youngsters. they came into this war because of what happened on 9/11/01. they all saw happening what you see on this screen. the carnage of 9/11/01 motivated those who were already in the service tuesday, and literally millions more to come. they truly are volunteers in a war because they knew they were going to war, and they go off to fight it in an 8-pound kevlar helmets, 45-pound black jacket and do so in 120 degrees. they use their weapons like they are part of their bodies, their bodies as weapons, and they can take a life or save one with it because they are so remarkably well trained. i used to ask this question until betsy caught me -- how many of you ever raised a teenage boy? betsy caught me raising my hand one time and she said, "you did not do that. i did that. you were gone." that is one of the reasons she likes firearms. she says they are more reliable than men. the thing about trying to raise a teenage boy -- they get up in the morning and everything that needs to be done around the house. prepare food for others, clean up the house. often spend 18 hours at work, come back and do the same thing day after day after day. mission impossible. yet, that same teenage kid who once would not share a candy bar with his little brother now has become the protectors of muslim women and children. we've shown a culture that never understood how to do it. -- that never understood it how to do it. he has become an example of what the best of america really is, and he has gone out and done it day after day, some of them repeatedly for over 10 years. a soldier in the third infantry division could easily have spent at this 0.45 months at war. for the first and third marine division, in as many as 77-month deployments. the remarkable thing about them is that these are, to an extraordinary extent, young americans who know where they are going and why they are going there, and i want you to recall those words in just a moment. they exhibit the qualities of courage and integrity and loyalty and tenacity, the likes of which i in my now 60 years have never seen elsewhere. with us here at this wonderful gathering of american values are the widows of those who went down in a helicopter on the sixth of august, u.s. navy seals and special operators. on august 23, i went to the funeral of the team leader. his widow victoria is with us this weekend. it was the day of the earthquake in virginia. i know if you are from california, a 5.8 earthquake is not much, but for us, it was a pretty big deal. many of you may have seen in this paper the next day, the front pages had pictures of people running out of buildings in washington, d.c., and philadelphia, and as far away as detroit because of the way the ground shook. during the ceremony for the funeral, that earthquake hit. i thought when i first heard it it was a car bomb going off somewhere in alexandria, virginia. it turned out it was an earthquake, and the church began to shake. the chaplain was standing there before that flag-draped caskets as it was happening. no one in that church and got up and ran. they ran out of buildings all over the east coast of the united states in richmond and in washington and baltimore, but nobody in a church got up and bolted. nobody screamed. nobody yelled. the commandant of the marine corps was sitting right in front of me, and he turned to me and said, "north, there is a message in this. no one is running." the navy seal next to him said, "we do not have to run. we know where we are going." what a wonderful tribute to the face of these young americans -- the faith of these young americans. those are the ones we want to recruit to become part of the next generation of leadership to this great organization. there are those who have put themselves at enormous risk for the benefit of us all, which, after all, is the definition of a hero. in addition to putting themselves in harm's way, of sending themselves from their families and loved ones, being literally as far as you can get from home and still be on the planet earth, these youngsters know what it means to sacrifice, and they have been to parts of the world where they learned that in the united states, you can turn on a faucet and drink the water, but you cannot over there. in america, you can be taken to a hospital and expect to live. you can flip a switch and the lights go on. in america, still to this day, you take more than a credit card and driver's license and not have to check your transportation papers. when i was coming back a few weeks ago, i had to show my passport and give it to the clerk at the desk. i did not have to do that in st. louis because this is america. [applause] my challenge here today is to remind you about those who have given so much for this country, to encourage those, if you have not already done so, to go to the strike, to know that you are recruiting somebody who has proven by their competency and courage and integrity that they belong in this organization, and know this -- they deserve to have a commander in chief who embodies those same virtues of integrity and courage, and who can say the word victory and mean it. [applause] they deserve to have a commander in chief who, like the president i had the great privilege of serving, who reminded everybody in a campaign 40 years ago for the presidency -- he warned against the risk of appeasement and being weak and from within spiritually, morally and economically. he challenged us then that we, as a people, have a rendezvous with destiny. well, ronald reagan was right. [applause] so i challenge you here this afternoon -- it is time for us to have a commander in chief who bows down before god and no one else. it is time for us to have a commander-in-chief who never apologizes to anyone for what america is and has done. and it is time for us to pray for those who have sacrificed so much that this country can still be the land of the free because it is still the home of the brave. god bless you and thank you for being part of this great celebration of american values. [applause] >> we are honored to have our next speaker with us today. he served america courageously as a combat fighter pilot and was twice named top gun. he was awarded the air force commendation medal and the air medal for combat in iraq. his outstanding service also earned him the international guard distinguished service medal and the presidential volunteer service award. today, he continues to serve our country in a nonprofit organization that provides scholarships to the spouses and children of military members who have been disabled or killed in the line of duty. we are privileged to have him with us. he is a great guy, also a professional golfer. ladies and gentlemen, major dan rooney. [applause] >> thanks. one of my favorite terms in life is synchronous city. i define it as a chance with a purpose. we're at these moments where we are in an exact place as an exact time. mine has been changed by the force of synchronous city in amazing ways. you see things that are forever burned in your soul. freedom is not free. the men and women, the heroes, the army, marines on the ground and give their lives -- their lives and limbs in defense of this great nation. i was a vampire for most of my tours over there. i flew with another guy who happened to also be a great golfer. f16 has a top speed of about 1,500 miles an hour. we could move around iraq, and on that night, the environmental, the dust was really thick in the sky, and we generally fly in formation, about two miles, and we were forced to swing back in a rear- assisted trail. so a rookie was back at 6:00. when we finished the mission, we air refueling for the last time in southern iraq and we pushed back and checked in with kuwait center. i was out in front. set the autopilot at about 31,000 feet. i laid my head back on the headrest, and was just exhausted. i mean, everything i had, i had given at that moment. ricky comes over the radio between the two jets and says, " hey, noonan," which is my call sign, by the way. it is from the movie caddy shack. side note, if you ever meet someone with the call sign iceman or maverick, he is a complete tool. anyway, he said to turn the lights down, so i'd see this green glow like the death star. total blackness. silicide my lights are down, and he says to look up. i saw the most explosive natural display of beauty i have ever witnessed in my life. i looked off to the east, and there was this galactic purple and blue, millions of stars looking through, and off to the west, you could literally see the top of the milky way. it was so frothy, it looked like a starbucks cappuccino. it was unbelievable. as i sat there in this moment of secrecy, i asked myself -- how is it possible to go from that place of combat and all the terrible things that happen to this pure moment of peace? i started to reflect on all the things i had seen. it was my second to last mission over there. all the sacrifices i had witnessed, and i felt this strong calling from god in my life to do something outside of the cockpit. for these men and women on the ground over there. in life, inspiration is only as good as the action that you take. i would love to say that i did something right away, but i did not. i came home and got back into my life, my routine, with my the for your kids and my wife and the things that keep us busy in light. it was about six months later that i had a moment of synchronous city that i could not run -- ignore. it was on a commercial airline flight from chicago to grand rapids, michigan. delay, a spring night. it was united flight 664. as i walked through first class, there is a young soldier, a corporal, i address on the greens, sitting there. i figure somebody swap seats with him, and i went and sat in my seat in coach. we took the short hop into grand rapids. it was after midnight at this point. we landed and as we pulled into the gates, the captain came over the epa and informed us that we were carrying an american hero on board. it was just enough of a pause for me to think, "with this kid in first-class do?" he continues and says we have the remains of corporate rock buckland on the flight who was killed in iraq, and his twin brother was in first class and brought him the 7,000 miles home that night. just by chance, i sat on the right hand side of the airplane, and i watched what i wondered about, the other side of war, the book once, his brother, sister, parents, his four-year- old son as they sat on the tarmac, and that flag-draped coffin inched its way down. the real price of freedom. the captain that night had made a request that everybody stay in their seats, despite it being after midnight, to honor the sacrifice that brock had made. as i watched the ceremony wind itself up and i made my way back, i looked back at that airplane and was as shocked as i had ever been in my life to see that more than half the people had gotten off the airplane. nowhere to go except that blanket a free and we will all sleep under tonight as americans. they could not spend the 20 minutes sitting on that airplane. i knew with every fiber of my being at that moment that bought had given me a mission, and it was not to be a fighter pilot or a golf pro. these things had combined in a unique way. i called my wife four and a half years ago and said, "my job in life is to reach out to this family by sought tonight and reach out to those people that got off the airplane that do not understand the price of freedom. where do you start? we started. we hosted a little golf tournament in grand haven, michigan, and raised $8,000. a drop in the bucket. for a half years later, we have raised over $16 million. [applause] absolutely. it is unbelievable. more importantly, than that, we have awarded over 2600 scholarships, and that is what we do. we provide scholarships to the spouses and kids of our kiaed and disabled. thank you so much. the shocking statistic as we have over 1 million dependents in this country now, 1 million spouses and kids who have had a loved one killed or disabled in iraq and afghanistan. over 87% of those do not qualify for federal education assistance. is that wrong? absolutely, but there's 99% of this country that are free courtesy of the 1% that serve it, and we all owe it to them. thanks to great partners like the nra, like budweiser lite bushnell the support the folds of on a foundation, we about to leave no family behind on that field of battle. it is up to each -- [applause] thank you. it is up to each of us, as americans, to join the fight with the folds of on a foundation and continue to support great organizations like the nra so we can ensure each one of these kids has the opportunity to pursue a dream of an education. in the last four and a half years, i have certainly changed as a human being. as you meet these families and to understand the sacrifices they have made. i will leave you with one lesson that has been burned into my soul, and i feel it stronger and stronger each and every day. in our short little run in life which will be over before we know it, and the lights go out, we are going to ask a question, and it will not be the metals on our chest, the money in our bank account, the awards we have one. it is going to be the you were given certain time and talents in your life, and what did you do? how did you use those to positively impact the people and the world around you? thank you all very much. please support the folds of honor foundation, and god speed. [applause] >> thank you, major realty, for your service and your leadership. ladies and tillman, since we are in missouri, i wanted to take the time to recognize two of our great gentleman in the state. the first is representative of the eighth congressional district. during her service in the u.s. house, she has been a tireless leader for our right to keep and bear arms. her support for the second amendment has never wavered, which is why she has always received an a rating from the national rifle association. please welcome congresswoman joanne emerson. [applause] the sec has been a leader in the business community and served as ambassador under president george de b. bush -- the second served as ambassador under president george w. bush. the nra is officially endorsing both of these great leaders. leeson tillman, please welcome ambassador and wagner. [applause] -- ambassador ann wagner. [applause] >> thank you so very, very much for your endorsement. i am very honored, and it is something that means an awful lot to me and to the constituents i represent in south-central missouri. thank you again for coming to st. louis. it is great for our state, great for our economy, and i hope you have a wonderful weekend while you are here. thank you. [applause] >> i am running 4 missouri second congressional district, and i want to thank you for coming to my home town of st. louis, missouri, to celebrate this wonderful nra convention. i am grateful for your endorsement, your support, and for all that you do, all that each and every one of you do to defend our freedom and our liberties. thank you again. [applause] >> you are going to be glad you state. we are down to our final two speakers, but we saved the best for last. our next speaker has been a strong voice for gun owners over his many years of public service, from his days as a member of the cincinnati city council to mayor to his service as ohio's treasurer and secretary of state, he has always maintained a strong allegiance to the principles of liberty and the second amendment. he currently serves as a senior fellow at the family research council, and on the board of the national taxpayers union. he is also a member of the nra board of directors, and it is always exciting to hear from him. ladies and gentlemen, can -- ken blackwell. [applause] >> thank you, and good afternoon. ladies and gentlemen, we are heirs to the legacy of liberty. for 236 years, america has been an exceptional nation. this is no accident. it has been said that thomas jefferson once said that a government big enough to give you everything that you want is a government enough to take everything that you have. ladies and gentlemen, you end up in the nra are here in america today to put the harness bask on the growth of government and to take back our liberty. [applause] we are motivated by our understanding, as has been said by many speakers, that our freedom, our liberty, our rights, our basic human rights, are not grants from government. they are gifts from god. there is not a government on the face of the earth that can give us our rights. government can only protect and promote those rights, then you and i are here to make sure that government respects those rights. [applause] we are faced with an administration that is hell bent on growing government, increasing its muscle, extending its reach, into every aspect of our lives. two years ago, the nra had its annual gathering, and i have authored a book entitled "the blueprint: obama's plan to subvert the constitution and build an imperial presidency." last year, we wrote a book which will be on sale tomorrow entitled "resurgence: how constitutional conservatism can save america." ladies and gentlemen, you and in the nra and other constitutional-loving organizations can save america, but we cannot just do it by giving the constitution with service. let me tell you a story -- when i was 15 years old, i was an amateur boxer. i won my first five bouts. the sixth time, i got hit so hard in the nose that i had to go home and tell my dad who was a meatpacker that i was going to find a more scholarly career to pursue. stayed away from boxing arena until i was a freshman in college when a 72-year-old jesuit, a marine, it took me and a jewish friend of mine to the golden gloves amateur bouts with him at the old cincinnati guard. we watched 10 bouts. the 11th-hour, a young boy, also of irish catholic heritage, and before his fight, he made the sign of the cross. benji, who was jewish, though both the father and asked him the significance of that. the father said, "come to class and i will explain it to you." let me say right here, ringside, it is not enough if he cannot fight. [laughter] i want to tell you that it is not enough for us just to give the constitution live service. those of us who are the heirs to the legacy of liberty must take a stand. we must take a stand on the streets. we must organize and demonstrate. we must take people to the polls. we must take a stand before the represented the bodies of our communities and our states and our nation. the congress, the state legislatures, the city council. we must be engaged. we must take a stand in the courts. we must acquit our organization with brilliant lawyers and excellent defenses and offenses to protect our liberty in the court. it has been said that what is at stake in this next presidential election is just not the presidency and all that entails, but it also entails which direction the court will take. ladies and gentlemen, i want to go further and say it is not just about protecting the five- person majority that we have now on some issues. it is to make sure that we have a court that respects the original intent on the constitution on all issues, so that means we have to make sure that the next president gives us justices that respect the constitution. [applause] but more importantly, we must win the hearts and minds of our fellow citizens, and that means that we must engage. i had a grandmother that when she set me off to college, she said, "look, i told this to your mom and to your dad and i'm telling you -- there are four books that better guide you in all that you do. the first is your date book. it tells how you spend your time and with whom you spend it. the second is your checkbook. it tells how you spend your resources, no matter how abundant or how meager. the third booked is the good book. it keeps you on the path of conviction and off of the path of convenience." ladies and gentlemen, i have amended my grandmother's lesson. the fourth book is the constitution. but the constitution grows out of a world view that is steeped in our judeo-christian heritage, and while our constitution does not mention the word god, the declaration of independence that surrounds it, that frames it, does. we are told that our rights are not collective rights, but they are individual rights. let me tell you this, ladies and gentlemen -- there are a lot of americans who are not of my ideological persuasion, but i will defend their constitutional right to be theologically wrong. [applause] going back to that third book, the good book, in hebrews, we are told that there is a cloud of witnesses watching how we run the race set out before us. we cannot just talk about the heroes and the freedom fighters of 100 years ago, of 200 years ago, of 250 years ago. we must talk about what we are planning to do to run the race and to meet the challenge set out before us. my message to you today is simple -- it is an encouraging. make sure that we do not forget to prate of -- pray up, that we do not forget to pay up. those membership dues go to good use. let us not give up, but let us stand up for the constitution, for freedom, and for american exceptionally some. let us take a stand for liberty and crossed the finish line and make that crowd of witnesses proud that we are the freedom fighters that they fought to give birth to. god bless you all. [applause] >> to help introduce our next speaker, i want to bring out another great american. he served in the iowa state senate for six years before winning election to congress in 2002. he has earned solid a ratings from the nra throughout his career for his hard work and leadership in defense of our gun rights. ladies and gentlemen, we are glad he could be with us today. please give a warm welcome to iowa congressman steve king. [applause] >> thanks very much for the welcome, the introduction, and the chance to be here at the nra convention in st. louis. i have had an opportunity to listen to a lot of the other speakers, and each of them inspired me in their own way. i would submit this is what comes to my mind, and that is we really have not very well answer the question of why we have the second amendment today. we all know we have not answered it very well. our founding fathers laid it in there for the reasons that i will get to, but first, i want to tell you that we do not have the second amendment, our right to keep and bear arms, in order to have guns for a target. we do not have the second right to even their arms in order to have guns for hunting. we do not have the second amendment for self-defense among people that might threaten us. those are all residual benefits that fall from the real reason why we have the second amendment, and that is to protect us from tyranny. that benefit that protect us from tyranny -- our founding fathers understood the threat because that threat lived among them, and they wanted to eradicate the threat with a well-regulated militia, and they knew we could not defend ourselves adequately if we did not have a populace that was on, that was proficient, that utilize our second amendment. our constitution -- our constitution would be defined away by now if we did not exercise our rights. think what would happen if we somehow give lip service to freedom of speech by saying that we have that right but did not exercise it. think what would happen if freedom of religion -- we said we had it, but we did not worship freely. what if we never really a symbol to petition the government for redress of grievances? sooner or later, the leftists in the world, the liberals in the world would redefine our constitutional rights away from us if we fail to exercise them. that is why it is so important that you are here today. it is important that you raise your children and we always our grandchildren and future generations not just to understand the constitution, not just to understand the second amendment that is there to protect us from tyranny, but we raise them to exercise our second amendment rights so that they are connected, so that they live and breed and feel that obligation. i look back on our generation's in my family, and i have the shotgun that i learned to shoot with my grandmother shop prairie chickens with. my father bought a brand-new remington we master in 1951 and carry that out to the duck blind and me when i was two years old, to make sure that i grew up with a tradition for the outdoors and a respect and love for firearms , and the shotgun today is in my possession, nearly finished, and it has my father's name inscribed on the receiver, and it will be an heirloom for coming generations. that is how you defend the second amendment and the right to keep and bear arms. you do it every day, in ways around the coffee shop. you go to the field, to the shooting range, you pick up your guns and clean and lovingly and put them back on the racks again. part of the american tradition and part of defending against tyranny. another thing that we get to do -- for example, in my role in life, i get to support legislation that defense our second amendment right. today, i can tell you that in congress, we have passed out of the house the national right to carry legislation, which is the reciprocity legislation that would allow you -- [applause] which would allow you to take a little card like -- i'm sure it is in here somewhere -- like this, your concealed weapon permit, and go from state to state as long as you are in compliance of the laws within your state. that is something that should have been done a long time ago and needs the past the senate. our nra's pushing it, and we will eventually get that done, i think with the next president. [applause] when i think of the oath of the constitution that the president takes, i think many of us have taken an oath to the constitution. among those folks are senator chuck grassley. chuck grassley and i have both taken the same oath to the constitution. he has done it over and over again. he is my senior senator. he is a pretty noble bad. he gets out there on twitter on a regular basis. you want to know what he is doing, he gets on his tour count and picks up some pop cans along the road to clean up the litter. i will also when he does not agree with the president. for example, the president's analysis of whether the supreme court has anything to say about the constitution itself. i do not know how you put that when you think of a president who is critical of the supreme court trying to maneuver it differ decision out of the supreme court. when you want to disagree with the president in reference, the ex-constitutional and he's also the number one lead on whistleblowers here in america. he's entrusted whistleblower legislation and when i look at what has been saved the taxpayer, it's at least $28 billion back into the treasury because of the whistleblower legislation that chuck grassley advanced and when you're the lead on the whistle blowers in america, he does a lot of research on his own. i can tell you by the wournls -- "wall street journal"s that be be on him. also, he has the kind of intelligence necessary to uncover things like fast and furious. and we might not know about things like fast and furious if not for chuck grassley. when he wrote the letter to the department of justice to ask about fast and furious and they said it wasn't happening, there was no gun running going on, it didn't take him very long to push in harmeder and today we have a national scandal that reaches as far as eric holder himself at the attorney general's office who refuses to answer direct questions that are asked of him. i've known senator grassley for a long time. he goes to all 99 counties in iowa every year. he remembers where hent and what he said and what you said to him and he's here today to speak to you but i'm glad that i can introduce my senior senator from iowa, senator chuck grassley. [applause] >> thank you very much for the kind introduction. and i appreciate serving with congressman king. fellow patriots, it's a great honor for me to be with you here today and particularly with my good friends from iowa, who are here and, of course, kearnings who's an officer in your organization. i'm here to tell that you federal borrow accurate are the greatest threats to our freedoms. we all know that freedom is not free. it takes diligence and hard work to maintain our freedom. the constitution provides protection from the government to ensure individual liberty and most importantly, the second amendment. as americans, we must do the hard work to ensure that individual liberties like the second amendment are preserved, are strengthened and unabridged. the american experiment, as envisioned by our founding fathers, is about ordered liberty. ordered liberty requires respect for constituted authorities and the rule of law. the founders recognize the importance of due process. the rule of law, and self-government in preserving our liberty. that's why the right to keep and bear arms is a fundamental individual right, period. george mason, the co-author of the second amendment once said, "to disarm the people is the best and most effective way to enslave them." i agree and i know you agreement i've co-sponsored numerous bills that support the second amendment respecting states rights and conceal carry resi porosity act, the veterans day second amendment protection act. i also offered an amendment to the health care reform which prevented and will prevent the federal government from collecting data on guns and ammunition. of course, the health care law is flawed. but we were able to ensure that it didn't infridge on the second amendment rights. in 2008, in 2009, i signed amikus briefs in the landmark cases of district of columbia verses haller affirming that gun control laws violate the constitution. [applause] of course, they show just how fragile our second amendment rights are. it highlights the importance of vetting every nominee for courts to ensure that they support the second amendment. thomas jefferson once said that "the greatest danger to american freedom is a government that ignores the constitution." now, politicians and brew accurate prefer to talk about anything but the constitution because you know what that constitution zphuzz it playses inconvenient restrictions on their ability to concentrate more power in government. they even blame the second amendment for their own failure to enforce law. the gun grabbers in our government exploit any examples of lawlessness and violence as an excuse to infridge on the rights of law abiding citizens. that's why the second amendment defenders are often the most outspoken advocates for law and order. it's hard to imagine a more dangerous threat to liberty than blaming our constitutional rights for violence and blood shed. yet, that has been tried repeatedly, as you know, during my investigation of the a.t.f. my investigation began when i took over as ranking member of the judiciary committee. a.t.f. whistle blowers told my office a story that seems too outrageous to believe. they said government was intentionally allowing straw buyers to transfer guns to mexican cartels. i received an internal a.t.f. document from confidential sources that supported the story of whistleblowers. the dealers who sold the guns were cooperating with the government. the dealers had expressed concerns to the a.t.f. about the dangerous of selling to straw buyers. the a.t.f. and the u.s. attorneys office had urged the dealers to keep on selling anyway. tragically, two of those guns out of 2,000 were found at the scene of the murder of border patrol agent brian terry. so be i sent a letter asking the a.t.f. if there was any truth to the allegations. i indicated that i had documents backing up those allegations. now, amazingly, the justice department responded with a flat-out letter of denial. now, i responded, as you would expect me, to attaching some of the documents that i'd gotten clandestinely. i asked the department how to square its denial with the evidence that i presented. now, that's when the stonewalling started. but i promised the family of brian terry that i'd do everything possible to get to the bottom of it. as you heard chairman isaiah speak today -- iza speak today, thank god he joined us in that investigation soon afterwards. after two from his committee to the justice department and dozens of witnesses of interviews, we have learned a lot. this is despite the justice department opposing and under mining our work. and i'll give you an example. and it's a quantity final example. you know what, the department provided 80,000 pages of documents that we wants to the inspector general but provided only 6,000 pages to congress and congress is doing nothing more than what the constitution requires to us do, to be a check on the executive branch. there are two -- subpoenas from chairman iza's committee. those subpoenas make the department legally obligated to comply. it's not optional. instead of providing the documents, the department denied and stonewalled for 10 months, then the department finally withdrew its denial letter citing "unacrossies." in other words, the justice department lied to us. it is a -- it was a major victory for those whistle blowers that had come forward and for the truth that these whistleblowers so bravely revealed. holder himself admitted that fast and furious was, in his words, fundamentally flawed. well, obviously that's very much an understatement. let me explain some less understood facts of fast and furious. it was not a bombed operation. it was not an undercover operation. it was not a sting. simple fact -- fast and furious was built on a strategic decision to gather information rather than to enforce the law. it was a direct result of a policy decision to wait and watch. to watch criminals break the law for months on end rather than to disrupt the illegal activity. why? all in the service of making a big headline-grabbing case. well, they got the headlines but not the kind of headlines that they wanted. tragically, the headlines involve the death of this brave federal agent terry. amazingly, agent terry's death was exactly what was feared by the very gun dealers six months earlier as they warned the justice department in an email to a.t.f., the leaders expressed concern that his cooperation -- that that dealer's cooperation might get someone killed. now, you know, a.t.f. said well, don't worry. just keep selling. defenders of this case point to so-called weak gun laws as the real culprit. they claim that the justice department was powerless to stop the crime going on right under their very nose. they failed to point out that straw purchasing is already a crime. it's a felony when somebody bias firearm for someone else and lies on the forms. whenever someone agrees to pay straw buyers to lie on that form. that's even a separate crime. a crime of conspiracy. whoever intends to export the guns without a license is guilty of yet another felony and all are purble with heavy fines and jail -- presidential with heavy fines and jail time. so there are laws to deal with this problem. and, of course, any law-abiding gun dealer is going to notice when a suspicious character nervously puts down $30,000 in cash to purchase guns. in this case, the dealer suspected something wasn't right with some people who repeatedly bought guns. a.t.f. had a cooperating relationship with those dealers. the cooperation, however, only one -- went one direction. the dealers helped the a.t.f. by providing information on the suspicious buyers. however, the borrow accurate at a.t. -- brew accurate at a.t.f. -- brue borrow accurate at a.t.f. new much more. the d.e.a. already had a discussion about the price of guns and delivery across the border. it also enlisted the u.s. attorney's office to help convince dealers to keep selling, but the a.t.f. kept gun dealers in the dark by what it knew from the d.e.a. wire. the gun stores were told that their cooperation was necessary to get to the bottom of the a.t.f. case. without that assurance, dealers would have stopped making the suspicious sales, but gun deerls depend on the a.t.f. for their license, and, of course, their livelihood so when the a.t.f. asks for help, there isn't much choice for the gun dealer but to cooperate. now, the a.t.f. assured the gun stores that it was taking care of everything on its end but what was really happening? they could have used the information to stop the bad guys right now. instead, a.t.f. let the straw buying ring operate and grow for months and months, yet this isn't just my after-the-fact opinion about what happened. it was a conscious strategy in this case. it was written down. in fact, it was written down in a briefing paper that was going to the deputy attorney general. it said, "currently our strategy is to allow the transfers of arms to continue to take place to co-conspirators who would continue to operate and illegally traffic firearms to mexico." now, that's not the end of the briefing paper. it also talked about the a.t.f.'s effort to "slow down the pace of these firearm purchasers." however, it also noted that those efforts would "continue, but not to the detriment of the larger goal of the investigation." a.t.f. supervisors and the u.s. attorney repeatedly used this excuse of "protect preb -- protecting the larger investigation." they didn't want to take action to disrupt and deter the straw buyers. but the whistle blowers wanted to disrupt and deter. instead, the whistle blowers were ordered to just watch and wait. a.t.f. identified over 60 individuals associated with the purchasing ring. the ringleader was known not late in the game but from the very beginning. those straw buyers spent over $1 million in cash. 15 of them bought over 1,300 guns and it was all after a.t.f. started its surveillance. with the kind of information the gun stores were voluntarily giving the a.t.f., there was no reason for these guns to have walked in the first place. ironically, the government has tried to use fast and furious as a justification for more gun control. or, in this case, more reporting requirements. in fact, the cooperating gun dealers were giving a.t.f. all of the entire information that a.t.f. needed to identify and stop these byears. however, for -- buyers. however, for over a year, a.t.f. fail told arrest them. the a.t.f. knew one buyer, one straw purchaser, bought over 660 guns, paid for in cash. that was after a.t.f. started watching him. that was after the a.t.f. knew that he was working with the leader of the buying ring. that was after the a.t.f. knew that he previously transferred weapons to other traffickers. it's clear that the a.t.f. had every opportunity to stop the flow of weapons long before a.t.f. did. for some reason, they decided to keep it going. a government then that is unwilling or unable to enforce the law is the biggest threat liberty faces. an inept and ineffectual government always asks for more power and for more money. bureaucrats always have an excuse but it will never make a difference if the government refuses to enforce existing laws. a.f. -- a.t.f. and justice department are too focused on justicing more regulatory authority over guns. these gun stores voluntarily cooperated with the a.t.f. out of a patriotic duty and an obligation to do what was right and what they thought was told by their government was right. despite the cooperation, someone at a.t.f. apparently leaked trace data to the press. that data unfairly tainted some of those very same cooperating dealers. the date implied that these dealers put profit ahead of public safety. of course, in this leak, the a.t.f. left out the part of the story about its own role in encouraging sales to help with some big investigation. that brings me to another major threat to our liberty -- misinformation. we like to think that the truth will eventually win out, but as the old saying goes, a lie is halfway around the word before the truth gets its boots on. so it takes hard work to get the facts out. this administration likes to toss around statistics about how many guns in mexico came from the united states as an excuse for more gun control legislation. in 2009, they claimed that 90% of the guns in mexico were from the united states. then last year, the claim shrunk to 70% of the guns submitted by the mexican government for tracing. so you can ask what are the real numbers? in june 2011, i sent a letter to then-a.t.f. acting director nelson pointing to solid evidence that even the lower 70% number is very exaggerated. first, there are tens of thousands of guns confiscated at crimes annually across the river in mexico. however, only a portion of the guns recovered in mexico are actually submitted to our country for tracing. the truth is that mexico only sends the guns they expect to trace back here. a.t.f. has acknowledged that the 70% number was generated using the u.s. source firearms. that definition includes guns manufactured in the united states or imported through the united states. so that 70% number doesn't mean that those guns were purchased at the u.s. stores and then smuggled across the border, as this administration would like to have you believe. the number of guns actually traced to an american gun dealer were shockingly low by comparison to that wild claim of 90%. for 2009, only 25% of those guns mexico submitted to the united states for tracing were sourced to an american dealer. the misleading rhetoric used by the obama administration to argue for more onerous gun laws aimed at law-abiding citizens is a threat to individual liberty. it diverts attention from the real issues putting criminals behind bars. so how do we defend against these threats from this bureaucracy? what do we do with a government that doesn't enforce laws? the answer is congress doing a better job of oversight. the founding fathers envisioned checks and balances among the branches of government in order to preserve freedom. we have the tools to get the facts and to shine light on what the executive branch is doing. if we're afraid to demand answers to tough questions, then we are not doing our job. if we accept the spin, the talking points, and the stonewalling without digging deeper, we aren't doing our job. consider if we had stopped digging on fast and furious when i first received the justice's department's denial letter the first time? then where would we be? by continuing to dig, we know that the failure to stop illegal gun trafficking has nothing to do with a lack of information. the a.t.f. knew exactly who the bad guys were and they knew their activity. so more reporting requirements are not the answer. and when i started my investigation of fast and furious, i had three goals. three goals. one, to get answers for the terry family. they still do not know. two, to hold accountable the highest ranking person in government who knew that the federal government was walking guns and get them fired and three, to make sure that this stupid program like this never happens again. [applause] after 14 months and still going, i've come to a couple of conclusions. first, laney brewer, the assistant attorney general has to go for lying. as the head of the criminal division. [applause] as head of the criminal division, he knew that government had walked guns long before he admitted it publicly before our committee. he did nothing to hold anybody accountable. he kept quiet as the gun-walking controversy grew. he received drafts of that letter to me, the one denying that the a.t.f. ever walked guns. then he claimed that he had not reviewed the letter when we got plenty of evidence that proves otherwise. he needs to take responsibility for his part. my second conclusion is that either eric holder isn't doing his job or his staff isn't serving the attorney general very well. the justice department is refusing to comply with the house subpoenas. the attorney general is facing a real test of leadership. he has a choice to make. he can force the department to come clean before the house brings contempt charges to enforce its subpoenas, or he can keep ignoring the subpoenas and force a high-stakes political conflict between the legislative and executive branches of government. now, it's pastime to hold accountable these public officials responsible for our own government's role in walking guns to criminals. the family of agent terry can rest assured that i will keep doing my constitutional duty of oversight to get answers for them. i will also keep pushing for transparency throughout government. everyone should see the truth about what has been going on here for the last two or three years before we started our investigation. it puts people in a position to defend their rights. our republic depends upon oversight on transparency and accountability in government that comes with oversight and transparency. i will keep pushing for sunshine. i will keep doing my duty of oversight and i will do my best to defend this freedom that you and i enjoy and have a right to. thank you. thank you. >> senator, your exceptional leadership in investing the fast and furious scandal makes you a worth recipients to this award. you've been an invaluable member over the years and your help in exposing this scabble has helped restore the sacred trust that we the people deserve in our government. on behalf of[applause] >> thank you. >> ok, folks. you will be glad you state. our final speaker is an unapologetic pro-gun governor. it is the greatest achievement to be elected government wants. in each election, he has had the unwavering support of gun owners. he is a gun owner and a hunter who never fails to go all in with us when we need him the most. he has reformed the gun laws in his state by broadening the recognition of carry permits and limiting the restrictions on where permit holders can carry. he practices his right to carry. i know there is at least one coyote that learned that the right -- the hard way when they got too close to the family dog. please welcome our good friend, the governor of the great state of texas, rick perry. [applause] >> howdy. chris, thank you for your continued support of us who believe in the second amendment. as chris shared with you, i am a frequent practitioner of it as well. ever since the campaign ended, the coyotes are a lot more nervous in texas. as a matter of fact, ruger ceo told me the coyote special has gone on back order. let me address the elephant in the room, my recent campaign for president. being the republican front runner was three of the most exciting hours of my entire life. [applause] i have come to grips with it. the only lasting effect is that i refused to go on a stage that has more than one podium on it. officially, i have only suspended my campaign. i never really quick. technically, i am still in the race. except, i get to go home and get to go hunting. i still do about as well. the governor of texas is certainly no consolation prize. it still remains a great platform for addressing the issues of our time, taking a stand for those causes that we hold dear. standing up against the federal government that encroaches upon our freedom. what the obama administration cannot accomplish by legislation, they do by regulation. the power of the presidency involves the encroachment of federal agencies into everyday activities of our citizens. they could not get congress to regulate greenhouse gases. the epa took it upon itself to declare carbon dioxide a pollutant. it is not just the epa that is raining down these new regulations to control human activity being politically incorrect. it is the department of interior, which often stands in the way of energy exploration. it is the u.s. department of fish and wildlife services. it advances an extremist agenda that impacts regulation -- impacts conservation activities. i take issue with the regulation that requires a federal permit breed oricks. in 1979, there were 70 -- 32 of these animals. but the federal definition of the word taking, which requires a permit, it is so broad that these conservation efforts will be undermined as renters now decide against to cut the -- against cutting the red tape to agree this unique animal. with the new rule taking place nine days ago, common sense has given away to extremism. i let the interior secretary know this full well in a letter recently. they are not just messing with texas. they are messing with the american tradition of hunting and ranching. if you are a capitalist or an outdoor enthusiast, the federal government has you in their sights. the same federal government that would limit our right to hunt was secretly arming and drug cartels in this ill-conceived operation called fast and furious. i am not going to accuse attorney general holder of malicious intent. but i will accuse him of sheer incompetence. [applause] letting guns walk on the streets in order to trace them back to high-level drug cartel operatives, they engaged in reckless disregard for the safety of our own citizens. a federal agent is dead. now instead of taking responsibility, mr. holder is claiming ignorance. i am not sure which is worse. authorizing such a reckless operation or not knowing about it. either way, it is time for eric holder to step aside. resign. , mr. attorney general. border security is one of the most basic obligations about our federal government. our federal agents put their lives on the line every day to stop the trafficking from people and drugs. we need the federal government to stand between the men and women who wear the badge. secure our border. washington would rather middle with our individual freedom -- mettle with our basic freedom instead of meeting its constitutional requirement. what would explain a government that wants to regulate your health care, control your classrooms rather than uphold the second amendment. the bill of rights is not a cafeteria plan where you can pick and choose the amendments you like and discard the ones you don't. [applause] i do not care if the second amendment and the 10th amendment are inconvenient for your bureaucratic schemes. we are not going to negotiate away our freedoms. i happily cling to my guns and mine -- my god even if president obama thinks that is a simple minded thing in his elitist heart. in the minds of the liberal, guns are responsible for evil, instead of the perpetrators of evil. criminals are not bound by our laws. that is why they are criminals. when the criminal breaks into your home, i will let the liberals called the lawyers. i will call smith and wesson. [applause] armed and law-abiding citizens are a greater deterrent to violent crime than 1000 laws passed by congress. your involvement of the national rifle association -- you are what keeps congress on this. they cannot infringe on our freedom when citizens are well- informed. let them know you care and you cast a ballot. those are your two greatest constitutional weapons. tell them in 2012 you will not stand for bureaucratic meddling or bureaucratic bungling of border security operations. we will do it by making barack obama a one-term president. a lame duck obama administration is a scary thing. in the words of nancy reagan, just say no. god bless you and thank you for coming out and being a part of this great american organization. god bless you. [applause] >> thank you, governor rick perry. let's give a big round of applause to all of our terrific speakers today. i hope you enjoyed it. it has been a great celebration of american values. i hope you enjoyed the program. let me leave you with one final thought. it is not enough to celebrate our values. we must also defend them. we will defend the freedoms that make america the greatest nation on earth. we will see you tomorrow at the meeting. thank you. ♪ [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> the annual meeting of the nra just wrapping up. earlier, we heard from mitt romney, newt gingrich, and rick santorum. we will sell their speeches tonight on c-span. you can watch them on line -- we will show their speeches again tonight on c-span. tomorrow on "newsmakers," a look at the 2012 senate race -- senate races. 32 seats are up for reelection this fall. >> our specific issue is to work to see that human rights remain an essential component of american foreign policy and that when we are evaluating our foreign-policy moves globally, human-rights can never be the only consideration. it has to be part of the dialogue. >> the president and ceo of the lantos foundation for human values. >> the policy with russia and the upcoming issue of whether the next congress should pass the -- whether or not we are going to stay on record to say human rights matter. >> more sunday night at 8:00 p.m. on c-span's "q & a." >> april 15, 1912, nearly 1500 paris on a ship called, -- perished on a a ship called unsinkable. >> was an object ahead. it does not say what kind of object. after he struck the bell, he went to a telephone and called down to the officer on the bridge to tell them what they saw. when the phone was finally answered, the entire conversation was, what do you see? the receipt -- the response was, icebergs right ahead. the response from the officer was, thank you. >> the truth and minutes of that night. part of american history weekend on c-span 3. >> next, a discussion about u.s. airlines in their performance from washington journal. >> "washington journal" continues -- host: you are likely to find stories in newspapers this morning similar to these. let's show you some airline- related stories today. the stories come out of studies done -- done by our guest who is the director of bureau of transportation statistics. what job you do for the government on behalf of the american people? guest: as a statistical agency that is designated to compile transportation statistics, we collect information to inform the public will make informed decisions. for this particular effort, we are collecting airline information on time, performance, luggage loss and other things. this is so the department can set rules and the public can be informed. guest: andy is at "aviation week." how the airlines use this information? gut: this is information they release every month in the aviation consumer reports. it is more for consumers. host: don't check on their competition? guest: they do and it is important that many have rewarded pilots for being on time and there are incentives because they know that consumers look at the report. it is important for their image and performances. it is more economical for them to be on time. host: how longas the government been tracking airline performance? guest: [inaudible] host: how did it get stted? guest: there are concerns about the performance of airlines. host: theublic wantto know how they were doing? guest: started to collect the data in 1995. we collect four buckets of intermission for airline. the traffic, the volume, the origin and destination, where you come from and where you are going to handle traffic volumes between pairs of cities and financial information of the airline's and would also collect an operating characteristic of the airline. host: i will start with the first chart we have. before i do that, i need to welcome the audience into this discussion. we will divide the phone lines between eastern and central time zones. if you live in the mountain or pacific time zones -- you are welcome to make a comment or ask a question about the airline industry. there is lots of debate and discussion and the government has been involved in policies. the role of the tea s.a. and on- time flights through the security process is all on the table as we look at the numbers that give you a report on how the airline industry is doing. you're welcome to send us a tweet. the big number here is that a lot more people are flying. guest: correct, the reason we show you this is because when we talk about on-time performance, there are two contributing factors that drive on-time performance. one is the weather and the other is the demand on travel. this chart shows you that since 1990-2010, the passengers increased by almost 17%. host: there was a dip in the economic downturn? guest: it is around 2007-2008 recession and the dip in 2007 is due to reduced flights. host: the numbers are beginning to come back up. were the causes for the growth of people flying more? guest: two decades ago, deregulation was a huge factor because that brought the price of the tickets down. host: me people can afford to fly? guest: the economy is more global so people fly to get to their business contacts and that has driven a lot of this because a lot of this is business traffic. people earn more income and are more able to fly and people are looking for more experiences in an interconnected world. host: how does the number of airlines affect the number of flights people take? there has been consolidation in the industry. guest: if you look at t numbers, there have been many airlines that went bankrupt. in thes a lot of churn industry because it is a low- margin industry. the trend line is steadily up all those years. host: there might be fewer choices but people are still flying more. look at the first number which is on-time performance for the airlines. how do you measure on-time performance? guest: thank you for asking. it is important to define how we measure on-time performance. performance is measured against the scheduled -- the airline scheduled arrival time. there is a 15-minute window to measure that. you have a flight that does not reach its ge within e 15 minutes of its arrival time, then we call it a late arrival. we use the same 50 minutes to define the late departure. host: what happened that there was such a dip in on-time performance in 2007 tax gues? guest: the major driver for on- time performance is the number of flights on the weather. you can see the recession there which is the aronsar highlighting -- the orange bar where the recession started in the reduced number of flights contribute to the improved on- time performance. st: what brought it down before that? guest: that was because of weather. hosright after 9/11, it is becae the reduced flights and then it started going back to the previous level. host: there has been a passenger bill of rights and a push in congress for better performance from the airlines. when did that happen? guest: this really happened over the last decade. the airlines did some voluntary commitments and congress was not satisfied. the dot has put out passenger regulations and they are about to do the third round scheduled to come out in august. the last few years have gotten more aggressive host: can we see a change in the results based on the regutions? guest: based on on-time performance, i don't think you will see the change in results. the drivers the weather and the number of flights. there is a debate over the tarmac-delay role and whether that is increasing flight ncellations. there is more congestion at airports. host: when we look at the on- time performance of varying by month, what makes the difference from month to month? guest: again, it is the weather. the height of the bar shows the perctage of on-time flights, rivals. the three months we circled reflect the mild winter in 200011-2012. if you look at the same three month one year ago, you can see the on-time performance is almost 10% over. it was a much milder winter this year. host: let's take our first telephone call from south carolina. caller: hello. i have a comment and maybe a question. it is a political question. i am a disabled got from south carolina. i don't hardly ever fly anymore. if you could comment about this political question about the decision that the president and then made about the south carolina boeing plant. i'm sure they know about that but do they have a comment about that? can they shed light on what happened there? i can't remember the name of the board but it was a recess host:: i know you can't comment on this but do you have any light to shed on the boeing decision? guest: boeing had move some production to south carolina and the union argued that they were penalizing the union because of some labor action they had taken. they said that was against lot. there is a big huge fight over that and congress got involved and there was some very political -- that got result because boeing and the union came to an agreement and that dropped as an issue. that was a huge political fight for a long time. host: back to the statistics -- this is essentially a report card for individual companies. airline on-time arrival rankings, the top five and the bottom five. who are the five highest? guest: for 2011, if you look at this chart, the top box shows the top five in 2000 and the top five in 2011. the hawaiian airlines is number one in terms of on-time performance. host: #two alaska, number 3 air trend, number for mesa, number 5 continental. who are the five lowest? guest: the atlantic southeast, american eagle, delta, expressed jets, and tblue. host: there are changes from year to year. in the year 2000, continental, nohwest, were all in the top five. these are now smaller airlines. guest: this reflects the weather. the weather as a major factor in on-time performance and it is reflected in this on-time performance. host: when consumers get this information, does it have an economic impact on the airlines? guest: no one has ever measured directly whether there is an impact there was a change in the dot testing rules on the website where the airlines have to put the on-time performance for a specific flight. before you had to ask the airline. the airlines argue that no one really asks that question. i, personally, i host: checked and this is required for the airlines to report this. this week in washington, there is a chamber of commerce annual aviation summit yesterday. guest: i was part of it. host: richard anderson was one of the speakers. he talks about the future of the airline industry. [video clip] >> i think gold will be a natural -- as the industry evolves the way allonsumer industries evolves, when was the last time you looked at all the options to buy a personal computer or an automobile? more and more merchandising as this industry evoes into a typical consumer-light industry, there will be this propensity to regulate more. we should avoid that let customers decide whether the light to travel on an airline that charges for overhead space. it is another product in the market. there are plenty of choice in the market. consumers have more perfect information about buying air transportation than a other industry in the wld because the internet and their sights and search engines that they have given every consumer virtual shelf space on every single price option and availability for any ticket virtually anywhere in the world at any time. let the consumer decide. they are host: smarsmart. guest: there are a few things driving that. there was the second airline that charge for carry-on bags and wind spirit airlines started this, there is a big outcry in congress. dot is considering a rule that would require airlines to give their optional information to travel agencies to book airline so that total price comparisons can be conducted. the airlines say let the consumer decide. they say not to regulate that. host: are fees and satisfaction any part of your measurement? do you measure the fees and customer satisfaction? guest: we don't measure that. we measure the levels of revenues that come in from baggage. host: we might talk about that later on. let's take our next phone call from manhattan as we talk about the airline industry, regulation, and how the government measures performance. go ahead, please. caller: i have two specific questions. mr anderson talked about the internet and all the statistics that are published. he said air travel is a product like buying a television. the consumer can state pretty well informed. isn't the bureau of statistics on air flight something that could be very well automated without having a bureau? all of those fligh are scheduled on computers aeady. we could just program than to have that information available. host: guesyou had a second question? guest: i think ms. hu incorrectly addressed a question you asked and just gave up. there was a big drop in on-time rformance. she said it is whether or the volume of people who are flying. then she started to say that the recession was a factor unless people were flying. then she fell back and said maybe because it followed 9/11. i believe when everything was less on time coincided with when we had the world wideolcanoes and all those flights were delayed and rerouted across the atlantic. host: that would be a weather events. if all of the airline data is computerized, his question is why do we need you and your colleagues? why can't be colcted by servers? guest: i guess we could but we are also collecting a lot of different data from the airlines. on-time performance may be as one of the factors that we could consider collected through the web service. host: i guess other services are not so easilcollected. guest: finances are not available in the web and other factors. guest: it used to be dot was the only place to get this. this does not include international. host: the airlines themselves have an incentive to report status guest: they are required. there are some private companies that started collecting financial information. host: our phone lines are open and we are talking about airline performance and other statistics gathered by the government measures in your use and satisfaction of the airlines. the lines are divided by geographical region. next up is a call from pennsylvania, hello caller: i think the problems could be eliminated if we would have just pne flying trans oceanic and transcontinental and try to develop a high-speed rail system for shorter distances. i think that would eliminate a lot of problems. our train system in this country is a disgrace. that is my comment. host: what has happened to the short-haul airline industry? are there more flights between the shorter hauls? are there many options these days? is that -- as that industry disappeared? guest: after 9/11, the short haul traffic went down as far as the hassle of going through airports. it is still there and the other problem from the smaller cities is that the smaller regional aircraft are not becoming economical because of the higher fuel price. small community trouble might become an issue. host: if the fuel is more expensive, they charge more for the tickets? guest: if you are on a 50-seat jet, you can only charge for 50 people. you cannot distribute the cost is widely and they are not as fuel-efficient. host: you also measure airport on time arrival. let's look at the 2011 statiscs. and how airports to do. salt lake city is number one this time around and phoenix is number two. guest: seattle is number 3, portland, oregon and then minneapolis. four out of the top five are in the west coast. host: are there factors that contribute to that? guest: weather is a major contributor. on the bottom,t is quite a contrast pretty btom five is jfk, boston, according, san francisco, and new work. most of the airports are in the northeast. host: san francisco is on that list. guest: san francisco is a very popular airport. the number of flights impacts overall performance. host: new hampshire, barrie, good morning. caller: i'm a retired airline pilot and want to comnt on the impact on safety that forced retirement has had. we're familiar with the recent novel accident where we had a young inexperienced pilot flying great aviation is one of the few fields where people are forced to retire whether they want to or not. many people would like to retire early and get out of the business. it is not what it used to be. if you're going in for brain surgery or heart surgery, you would not necessarily what a sharp young guy who just get out of medical school and got good grades. i think we need to do away with mandatory retirement and that would increase safety quebec. -- safety quite a bit. that may be a little bit of subject. guest: they have recently increased their retirement age for pilots and there was a big debate because it brought up the safety issue and what age is too old to be flying. they just increase the retirement age a couple of years ago. from his perspective, i don't think they will bring up that issue again anytime soon. host: these are the busiest airports in the united states? they account for 1/3 of all air passenger travel? number-one guest: atlanta followed by chicago, los angeles, dallas/fort worth and denver are the top five. in 2011. i would like to point out that the top 10 busiest airports if you look at 2011 from 1990 which is on the right hand side of your chart, almost all the airports have increased traffic. if you look at the number one airport in 2011, that traffic is 60% greater than the top one airports in 1990. every airport is getting busier. host: let's see if we can see the comparison it was in the number 3 spot in 1990 and only serving 23 million passengers. the increase is huge. how do airports account for that increase in airport traffic? where the money come from from building out? guest: the money comes from the federal government and the paenger facility charge per seat. that they put on every ticket. most of the airlines charge that very big debate on that is whether airports in should be able to increase that beyond the maximum which is $4.50 per segment. the airports nt that to be increased as another source of funding for expansion and renovation and the airlines do not because they say that will reduce the demand for tickets. they say it is hard to raise fares. host: we pay $4.50 for each segment of a flight that guest: it is a limit to two segments. host: so the most would be $9, is that right? guest: yes, the maximum per airport is $4.50 and i believe it is two segments reported host: airports would like to raise that? guest: they say they are underfunded for expansion and the system is congested. the airports that have room to expand want more money for that. it will come from the federal government or money they raise themselves. they want this to be an option. host: texas, hello to steep -- caller: i have two questions. i fly quite ait and i'm more concerned about on-me arrivals. what about departure times it is understanding that the departure time means degette pulls away from the gateway makes it onto the tarmac for several minutes but is considered a departure once it leaves the gate. that is my first question as to how that is measured. i had not heard anything recently about the air traffic controller computer system. i heard they have quite a bit of upgrades coming in is at still on track? host: do you measure on-time departures? >>es, we do. since the arrival is more important for the passengers, many of us are worried about making our connection so for today's presentation, we are mainly focused on a rival's. host: is there a correlation between the rivals and the departures? guest: yes, a major factor for delay is aircraft arriving late so if i making a conneion, my flight came in from some place else was late, and that contributes to the on time. host: the other question was on the air traffic control of dating. guest: next generation is an ongoing probe longtime bear there have been updates to the system and people say they are still using a 1940 system but that is not correct. there is a big move in next generation to make a satellite- based system rather than a ground-based system. that would have more control over the flight route and decisions that are made. you'll have more direct routes to the airport. he will save fuel and time and the missions which is an environmental issue. the faa had their ducks line up but they are getting better at this and is a question of funding and the cystic a a long tim -- and this has taken a long time. host: next is a call for more than in vermont. caller: good morning. i'm sorry if i digress a little bit. -- would you please get your people to open their lives so they can understand them? host: you are having difficulty following the discussion? caller: when they close their teeth, absolutely, and you don't understand them well. host: do you have a question on the airline industry? caller: not really. host: nice to have you with us. you mentioned earlier that there are regulations regarding tarmac delays. bring us up to speed on that debate. guest:the dot put in rule that if you are stuck on the tarmac, it is not really the tarmac, but a few left the gate and you are stuck on the ground and not a signal for three hours, the airline has to bring it back to the gate and give you the option to get off the plane. that got expanded. it used to be just the larger airports and that extended to all airports. it includes a four-hour limit for international flights for the big debate is the airline industry says there is a threat of a fine of up t $27,000 per passenger if you violate the rule. it could amount to millions of dollars of the airline say we're caeling more flights because we are afraid if it is not our fault, will exceed the limit and the penalized. -- and be penalized. host: what is in the public's better interest? a delayed flight? you have been measuring tarmac delays. what do the numbers tell us? guest: the tarmac role has significantly reduced delays on the tarmac. this chart is showing the last 13 months in terms of the number of tarmac delays. these of the number of flights that sit on the runway far more than three hours. host: this is international and domestic-guest: the red is international and they are required to start reporting next year. the rule took effect in april of 2010. the xt chart we will see is the impact. this chart shows you the large delays are almost all related to weather events. host: let's look at the next one before and after the 2000 aid to tarmac role. guest: the rule took effect in 2010 and before and after impact is clear. before the rule, there were many tarmac delays. the width of the bar is basically the number of tarmac delays para host: this is the more recent times from and are hardly any delays. the discussion is delays vs cancel guest:. the number of flights that are affected that had this for very smallercentage-wise. the airlines brought this on themselves because they had a lot of years to voluntarily deal with the problem and they did not that is why the regulations happened. i have a 3-year-d son so i don't want to be stuck on the ground for more than three hours. it would be a nightmare. it is very hard and there are a lot of horror stories. how many more cancellations does it cause and is it worth it to have that many more cancellations to avoid that scenario? can you adjust the rules to make everyone happy? host: does communications technology have a role to play? people sitting on the tarmac may be using their cell phone score hand-held devices. real-time information going out from the public about how long they are setting on airline runways. guest: that is how the regulation can about. there was a passenger who was stuck on a flight. this was when the internet and facebook was not around. there was social media and blogs and she used that to organize and became a big campaign that eventually forced the dot to implement a rule. she had a hot line set up so people could call in and they send in pictures. airlines -- the public response is more widespread and faster and that is somethingirlines have to deal with. host: this next part looks of the number of flights canceled. guest: this is for the last 12 months. each bar represents one month. the blue bar shows the percentage of canceled flights. the red line shows the number of passengers that are impacted by the cancellation. for the last 12 months, 1.7% of flights were canceled. that amounts to 100,000 flights and almost 7.5 million passengers were impacted. host: what was the cause of the spike in august? guest: i do not know. i'm sorry. host: last year there was a spike and it came down dramatically by september of the following year. guest: the weather has significant impact. host: if you too this chart back farther in time, would you be able to assert the increase of flight cancellations before the tarmac law went to play guest: stacks we have a chart on that. this is how it related to before and after the tarmac delay rule took effect host: what did you learn from that? guest: immediately after the rules had taken effect, we see some correlation. with time, the data is not conclusive and terms of the relationship. host: sarasota, fla., you are on the air. caller: i want to mention a quick thing about the older gentleman that called about speaking clearly. i have a lot of older clients and that feedback is very important. sometimes they don't have a heing aid and a read by lips. anyhow, it is not just these guests. host: thank you very much caller: as and listening this morning, i think of my sister and how i have to tell her a half-hour early to arrive on time. sometimes i laughed but most people, at least i think most people, look at times when they are booking flights as the travel time. sometimes those troubled times are four hours or less. they say i will only take one stopped and that the time i will have. do you have any statistics on just selection alone? i think airlines post those times with a higher price because they know the consumer. the consumer does not want to wait in the airport and they don't want to make three or four stops for a cheaper flight. that was one of my queions. my other question is south west is a wonderful airline. they do not charge baggage fees. years ago, they tag on those fees because they said we had this gas price. southwest is very successl. i had a family fly down from toronto and i cannot tell you the thousands of dollars they spent not only on their fares but also host: their: what is the question? caller: why did the airlines still charge for baggage and do they take the statistics on the total te? host: thanks very much. guest: it helps them make money. that is the short answer. southwest does not. they get more business out of that but it is not taking a big chunk out of anyone carrier. airlines are moving toward more fees and more ala cards. te. host: i have a bag fee revenue charge. what can learn from that step guest: it shows the back of the revenues are increasing over time. host: quite a bit between 2009- 2010 guest: many of the airline started collect the fees in 2009. host: more and more carriers were adding them on. we're just about out of time. we will say thank you. for people interested in the airline industry, the biggest debate this year in the airline industry is what? is there anything in congress they are facing as an industry? guest: the airline in next gen funded, more passenger rights rules, regulations is always a big issue. there is a lot of issues. host: next gen is budget- related. were the costs associated with those? guest: billions of dollars, i think $20 billion. it is not all in one year. it is a lot of money to change a whole system over. and also the airlines have to equip their aircraft and who will pay for that? that is a big issue host: thank you for being here. the department transportation and their statistics bureau will continue to >> you are part of the dialogue. >> the president and ceo of the lantos accommodation for justice. >> other we are talking about torture as it relates to the war on terror or the policy with russia. the upcoming issue of whether or not u.s. cruisers should -- whether we are going to stay on record saying human-rights matter. >> more on sunday night at 8:00 p.m. on c-span's." >> we asked students to submit a video telling us what part of the u.s. constitution was most important to them and why. we are going to visit tennessee to visit with an eighth grader. why did you choose gender discrimination as a topic for your documentary? >> had already narrowed it down to the 14th amendment. i found a specific article about gender discrimination and how it relates to the 14th amendment. i thought it was interesting and we should build upon it because of the controversial topic and the different perspectives we could use and how it might affect us in the future while sharing the knowledge we have learned and preventing problems that our generation may face in the future. >> the workforce investment act. can you explain what that is? >> it is a law passed in 1998. it helps create new work force and investment systems. it helps businesses create job opportunities by educating them an increase job-training programs that are available to men and women in the united states. >> you also discussed the equality clause of the 14th amendment. what is the debate surrounding its? >> are different interpretations of the equality clause. justice scalia does not believe women are protected by the constitution because there is no mention of it and know what has -- no one has voted for it. it says no state shall deny any person equal protection of the law. this may mean there is equal protection of both men and women under this legislation. >> how have supreme court decisions affected this issue? >> women were excluded from the bill of rights. after the amendment was passed, this was extended to women. it reflects on how big supreme court justices have voted in the past. >> what was the most important thing you took away from this experience? >> i learned a lot of things over the course of the making of the documentary. the constitution does impact to me at the factory every day. the commitment you have to make during the course of a project and team work. you learn about the wide scale of the effect on every single citizen in the united states. >> what do you want others to take away after watching your video? >> our purpose is to inform people about gender discrimination. just to present a problem in the u.s. today and raise awareness about problems we may face in the future. >> thank you for joining us and thank you for joining us on your win. here is a portion of katherine's documentary. >> gender discrimination is being discriminated against based on gender. >> congress has put two laws on the books to combat such discrimination. the equal pay act of 1963. >> future legislation regarding gender discrimination will be effective in the theater. some people find it comforting. >> does the equality clause protect women from discrimination? >> you can watch this video and others on our website. continued the conversation on our facebook and twitter pages. >> next, president obama talking about trade and then mitt romney and newt gingrich and rick santorum speaking at the nra annual meeting. afte

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