of the opportunities we have to expand the economic pie. and then we must help those who are struggling by ensuring they have the educational skills, the incentives and the opportunity to share in that prosperity. many other nation haves stumbled along the path of redistribution and government dependency. they have promised equality of outcome. and there is a cost that they followed that was doomed to fail. what would we ever want -- why would we ever want to go down that road? why would we want to follow those people to a course that you can look out in europe -- america's promise is one of equal opportunity, not outcome. the real challenge is how to give those who have been left out of the real chance to choose their own path and rise on their own efforts, the help that they need. economic growth is absolutely critical. but it is not a panacea. i've talked in positive terms about america's energy revolution. well, we need a positive revolution in american education and training as well. it is beyond me how this nation can be so complacent while 30 plus percent of our young people don't even graduate from high school. millions who do graduate have not even learned to properly read, comprehend, write and count. and tragically, that can be the prescription for permanent inequality. where is the outrage? where is the you aurgency? where is the political courage to really challenge the status quo if our educational establishment. the severe skills gap we face today is a challenge that could unite us as a nation, as political parties and as a society. of course, the state should adopt and implement the common core educational standards which the chamber significantly supports. but that's just the start, teachers parents, school districts, businesses, community leaders and institutions of higher education must all get directly and personally involved inside crisis. we must ensure that every young person learns basic skills and is properly equipped for jobs and careers that are actually going to exist in the 21st century. immigration reform is important to expanding those opportunities. why? because throughout history, immigrants have brought innovati innovation, ideas, investments and dynamism to american enterprise, and in terms of demographics, we need immigration. in fact, we must do more to encourage all of our young people and many others to participate in american free enterprise system. in a growing economy, with the proper schooling and skills, there are many opportunities to raise, by one's own efforts, to places you hadn't even dreamed of. even if you don't have a lot of fancy degrees or rich relatives. if you've heard nothing else today that i've said on the subject of equality, think of that twentyone. please hear this. if our nation doesn't get damn serious about the millions of young people who drop out of school or who graduate unable to master the basic skills and work habits, nothing else we do is going to set this country on the right course. for their sake, and ours, we can't afford to fail. ladies and gentlemen, the chamber's job growth and opportunity agenda is built on the belief that our nation's best days are not over, they are still to come. no other country, no other people, no other society's starts from such a position of strength and advantage as we do. by making the right decisions and adopting the necessary reforms, we can usher in a new era of economic prosperity and extend its benefits to all americans. i think you can tell i'm basically an optimistic fellow. so let me tell you what i worry about most. i worry that for the first time in our history, we're in a situation where america is taking from the young in order to support the old. we're doing this by continuing to ignore the entitlement crisis. by piling up trillions and trillions of dollars of new debt. by trapping so many of our young people in failing schools, and therefore denying them the fair shot of the american dream. the promise of america has always been that the older generation will leave to the young a stronger, better and more hopeful country. this is a promise we can still keep. and we must keep. but it all comes down to leadership. leadership in our government. leadership in our business. and leadership in every sector of american life. leadership that puts our country and our future first. thank you very much. [ applause ] remarks from the president thomas donahue. and speaking to reporters about the state of the business address from this morning. this is just getting started. >> well, good morning again, everyone. and, you know, a few minutes ago, most of you were there, i delivered the chamber's annual state of american business address in the next room. and if you missed it, there's a copy of the speech on your place. joining me to answer questions today as a bit of a change is marty regalia, our senior vice president and chief economist. where is bruce johnston? well, bruce can't be with us this time. he was so engaged and busy in what he was doing, he ruptured his appendix. and he's doing very well. he's on the mend. you'll see him here next time, and you'll be able to talk to him in the next few days. but he sends his best and has challenged marty to do as well as he could. we'll see. there are also a number of our senior advisers here who can help us -- our staff guys -- can help us with any questions that get particularly complicated. you know, as i said in the speech, the chamber believes that the american economy is improving and that it's gaining momentum. we expect, as i said, growth to accelerate to about 3% by the end of this year. but doesn't mean at all that we're out of the woods. 21 million americans are still unemployed, underployed or stopped looking for work. american workers have not seen substantial increases in pay in recent years. obamacare, dodd-frank and other laws and regulations still creating a lot of uncertainty. our challenge now is to keep and expand the growth we have finally ae chiefed to create millions of jobs we still badly need and to extend those benefits and opportunities of the recovery to all americans. and, you know, the issue is how do you do this? first, by passing trade promotion authority and then moving forward on the free trade agreements that we have underway. second by accelerating the energy revolution with millions and millions of americans to work. and it's bringing manufacturing back to the u.s. and if you ask me some questions about that, we have a lot of things to tell you. and the passage of common sense immigration reform will clearly add jobs. it won't at all take away jobs. it'll provide a lot of innovation and investment. monetizing the regulatory system and informing government process, that's an ongoing issue, but i think we can make some progress there. and getting our fiscal house in order is absolutely critical to us. by the way, you heard me talk about all that entitlement stuff. there's a series of charts on your place that make it crystal clear. they're not our charts. they're charts provided by the government of the united states of america. we have to also address the flaws in obamacare. it's a mass itax bill, a massive rules and regulation system. a lot of people are wondering how to get the health care. we're going to talk about that. we're not going to get rid that have bill. so we have to devise ways to make it work. let me drive this point home. and i said this inside, there's a lot we can do to make a bigger pie and put more people to work. but if we don't get real serious about the millions of young people that we're leaving out of the system, if you can't read and you can't comprehend, if you can't write and you can't communicate, and if you can't count and you can't deal with some modest technology, you can't work. and we -- many of the jobs we had before are not available yet. now. we have taken 44% of the jobs out of manufacturing, and we'll get more. they're gone. we don't need them. we have computer technology and robotics and engineering and supply-chain management. all of that means you have to be educated if you want to go to work here. so before i take your questions, just one other point, you may have noticed there are going on some elections, and you may have noticed that we plan to be involved. we've started preparing for 2014 on election day 2012. and we strengthened this institution. we have put more people in the field, we have strengthened many, many of the visions of the chamber. we're prepared for this election. we're focusing intently on candidate selection. early involvement in the primaries is where we're going. early voting we're dealing, positively shaping races right from the begin. you know, we won in alabama, thank god, but there's a lot more to come. and our response to this will be very significant. and having said all of that, i'll be very happy to take all your questions -- whoops. remember, i told you a couple of times before i even knew the answer i made it up. i'll give it to the marty or one of the other. who's first. why don't we go right here on the aisle. yes. >> hi, this is jessica with modern health care. could you just be a little more specific about the fixes to the health care, the health care taxes, the medical device tax? the delay, it's already delayed for the mandate, how much longer? >> the issues here are in four or five buckets. the tax and expense issues are very significant. second, the questions of -- remember, everybody was going -- and by the way, i'm not playing a political game here. i'm talking about what we have to deal with. one of the reason all the costs are going up is all the requirements that must be in every plan. now if anybody ever thought that we could fundamentally tell the health insurance people, or whoever's running even the government, that you could provide all those things at the same cost, no way to do that. and the individual mandate and the -- and the corporate mandate, each one of them come with very significant challenges that we didn't know were going to be there. and so when you put all this together, people are now getting plans that say, hey, now you're deductible has got to be bigger, your co-pay has got to be bigger, and you're limited on which doctors you can go to and which hospitals and so on. and why is that? it's because of all the requirements. and so i'm not so sure it's a matter of taking a, you know, a sisser ises a si sor and cutting out whole segments of the obamacare process, it's what the requirements are, who's paying for it, how do i get my health care? i was talking to -- this is a bad idea to always go to personal things. i was talking to my daughter-in-law last night who was told -- they belong to kaiser -- they'll be at least -- she wanted to change an address -- it'll be at least a month before they can do that because they have so many backed up issues. and i think what we have to do is delay whatever we have to delay for short periods of time where we look these things over, go through all the stuff serve talking about, keep what works fix what we can fix and get rid of some things that might not fit. now i'm being a little broad in those comments, but you know exactly what i'm talking about. and we would be very happy afterwards to have all the people sit down and talk to you. the bottom line is the way the system is now, it's not the computers that are problems because you can fix problems in computers, it's what you're putting in it. okay. go ahead. >> hi, abc. you said 2014 is the year for immigration reform. can you outline what you plan to do either differently or the same from 2013 to actually get things done this year? >> 2013 we liked. you know, we made a deal in the senate. we did that with the cooperative basis with the afl-cio and lots of other people. and then we started working in the house where i believe we have received very positive response. 485 people, not just a hundred of them, and we brought in 600 people to one group, we brought in faith-based and -- and folks from all sorts of social activities, you know, people, community leaders. we're going to -- and we brought business people in who see opportunities to create jobs and to bring companies here. we may not be otherwise bringing here. and what we're going to do is a lot more of the same. and we're going to do it back home as well. and you see my own view, i think democrats and republicans alike would like to go home and run for office with something they got done that's significant. and i believe we're two-thirds of the way there. i've been encouraged by a lot of the noise and soundings out of the house. and i'm not discouraged -- every now and then wake up in the morning and see a story about some reason it's not going to work. 435 people have to go home and run for office, and i think we're going to get this done. yep? >> hi, andrew ackerman with the wall street journal. you said on the regulatory side that you wanted changes to the dodd-frank law, and i was wondering on what specific parts you don't think are workable and what might be changed or what you might push to be changed. >> i think there's a little history here. you had this dodd-frank legislation was written in a hurry and written by people that were mad. and written by people that didn't want to have responsibility for why it happened. and -- and so we have been at this now for almost three years. and we have been -- had made great success in negotiations with the sec and the other agencies. we have had great success in the courts. our real concern now is, you know, more than half of those rules three years into this deal haven't been done. so what we're trying to do is bring common sense to this. to -- we have all the issues on corporate governance, that's one bunch, we're working on those. we've had all the issues on the requirements on the financial institutions, and now we're in a sort of a difficult area. we're looking at insurance companies and other investment groups, by some of these regulators are being treated like banks when they don't do anything of the things that banks do. we have got -- we have got the volcker rule now. which bit way, remember what happened, five agencies collectively set up a whole series of questions and sent them out to everybody who is being affected or might be affected. they took back all the responses. they didn't send out a proposed rule then, they just sent a rule out and said this is what it's going to be. well, where we are there, because this -- this originally, the volcker rule was originally snended for the large financial institutions to raise the question about what investment they could do with their own funds and so on, and now it appears that it affects every small mid-size bank and financial institution in the country. i'll let marty talk to you about that in a second. but the bottom line is we have to sort our way threw this. some of the dodd-frank stuff's fine. some of it, as i said, was written in a hurry. and we're going to have to sort it out. the basic issue is you want to get a mortgage. and your brother-in-law who has a small company wants to be able to get a loan. and people want to be able to invest their funds and plan for their retirement. and if you go to every bank in this country and you have five regulatory agencies living there with one of them telling let's get the money back and lock it in the safe, and the other saying let's get the money out and lend it. this is a very complicated time. we'll be working on that. marty? >> the access to capital for small businesses is at primary concern. health care is there, they have to deal with it. but they don't know if they can get the capital to operate the business. the dodd-frank rules and the fed in the allocation in the system is a brand new ball game. we want clarification on where it's going, how to administer it. the fed is very good with banks and they're very good at kind of looking at the world through a central banker's eyes. but they really have to develop a different view to determine what is the best allocation, the best flow of capital. where should they intercede because there's an excessive risk, and where should they let the free market innovate and two in that direction? i think that's one area where we watch very closely on the implementati implementation. >> and we have a lot of new people at the fed. i worry that marty would go and run the fed. but we're glad to keep him. >> just aside from adjusting the contours of the volcker rule, is there specific legislation you are going to push for to eliminate portions of dodd-frank that haven't been implemented yet? >> i think i'd stay tuned on that. >> kevin hall. i'll try to get a question with a marty angle in there. you talked about income inequality, and it sounded like you were calling into question in your state of the business the concept. i think you said opportunity, not outcome, is what you're after. how would you assess outcome since the whole debate on income inequality is because it's skewed. you have several republican candidates, paul ryan, rand paul, pushing things, we're going to hear from marco rubio today. it's resonating with republicans as well. where would you see the areas you would focus on? >> i think you have the short-term issues and the long-term issues and they're both important. i really believe that there are great opportunities to drive this economy forward in the short-term. the energy revolution, which we all see and appreciate, the question that this administration in their second term has become very, very aggressive, and i congratulate them on the trade side, which will create a good deal of economic growth and opportunity. the reality that -- that we -- we are finally facing up to the fact that there are many, many job opportunities if -- if -- if we can get the government to -- to help make it happen. and that's, you know, as i said, energy, trade, the whole question of investment and where it's going. so i think we're going in the right direction, right? and now what's happening, and the reason you're going to see three speech this is week and what i said on the question of opportunity or inequality, is because the white house has chosen, it appears to us, to make this their approach over the next year. and i think the real problem, if there is an inequality, is the -- the economy has -- the recession was over in 2009, and we have been sitting on our heels since then because the view across the street is that more government programs are going to create more jobs. our view is more freedom for the job creators is going to create more jobs. and that means dealing with some of the regulation issues, clearly dealing with the questions of capital markets, and how can we get capital into the hands of the people that will create jobs using the energy situation to move forward capitalizing really big-time on the questions of what an immigration policy would do, and on and on. that's it. in the long run, though, in the long run, if we don't do something about the nation's education policy, if we don't do something about our job training after that, i -- i think we've got a real problem. you know, the core standards simply say three things, they say, okay, here's the deal. if you want to go to college, this is what you have to do. if you want to go into a community college and learn a skill, this is what you have to do, and if you want to just go get a job, this is what you have to do. and i'm telling you right now that we're leaving 30% of the people in a position, maybe more, where they just don't qualify for any of that, and if that keeps going for a long period of time, that is denying people opportunity. that is creating inequality, and that's something this country ought to do something about. oh, by the way, it all takes money, and we need to deal with entitlements, because entitlements are going to eat all the money. i'll listen to them, but i'll get them all. >> it was clear from your speech, mr. donahue that trade is important for the chamber this year. i was wondering what you think is the likelihood for the trade promotion authority, and signals from the white house that the president is willing to expend the kind of political capital that is going to be necessary to get it through congress. thanks. >> the trade promotion authority will pass. it will be introduced sometime in the near future. it will pass. take a while to do it. it will have a little debate. it's the one thing that puts the congress in the game. and they're going to want to do this. and by the way, why all this trade? 95% of the people you want to sell something to don't live in this country. next? right there. >> -- as a retirement crisis, and if so, what should the federal government and they do? >> the first retirement crisis is the entitlement programs are going to bankrupt this country if we don't do something about it. and i believe there are going to be so many people retiring, it will create lots of new industries, by the way, that's good, but we're going to have to look at the implications and what adjustments, not taking these things away, that we can make that'll make it palatable for those that are retiring and for those that have to pay. and you heard me at the end of the speech, this is the first time that we're basically calling on the young to pay for the old and we need to think our way through that. next. okay. >> thank you. ben with national journal. you mentioned the support for energy exports broadly. is the chamber looking to lift the ban of the export of crude oil and will that be a lobbying focus for the chamber this year? >> the re strikss we were put in on the oil crisis, when cars were lined up to get to gas stations around the block. marty and i are old enough to remember that, maybe he isn't. and we need to take another look at those restrictions. obviously we want to use the energy at home first, but, you know, we don't restrict people from exporting airplanes we make, or exporting food products we produce or exporting technology. there are a few things you can't export. but i think it's important to look at energy as the next great american revolution that has the potential to help us on national security, oil and energy independence. to do it in a way that has extraordinary environmental benefits. and i think you'll see us negotiating and working our way through that during this year. >> doesn't sound -- >> oh, i want to lift the ban. i just want to get it done in a reasonable sequence and i think everybody would be happy with getting the -- it's not going to happen overnight, but it's going to happen. all right, go ahead. >> rich with fox business network. a couple of questions, first, do you think congress should extend extended unemployment benefits, and be secondly, when you say you want to play in the primaries, how much do you want to play and pro-business candidate, is that anti-tea party? >> okay, let me start the first one. i think congress will extend it. they'll look for ways to pay for some of it. and even the president's chief economic -- the head of the council of economic advisers believes that the extended use of unemployment -- the kind of unemployment insurance we talk about does not help create jobs as well. and marty has a word on that. but my view is we'll pass -- find a way to keep it going for a while. you can't talk out of both sides of your mouth. keep it going until we start to create jobs. now starting to create jobs, so shouldn't be put in for a long time. you want to say something about that? >> just quickly, on the issue of urn employment insurance, minimum wage, we are seeing a more disparate income destruction, but not as bad as the statistics show. when you adjust and use the right statistics, you see a much less onerous shift. so there's something that has to be done. but use the right number if you're going to affect the right cause and fix. secondly, you can do short-term redistributions to affect the distribution after the fact, and if you're going to do that, then the earned income tax credit are the best way to go, not minimum wage. and extending unemployment insurance is not likely to help the distribution in any kind of long-term sense at all. and finally, if you want to fix the problem, virtually everybody that's studied it has come back to the education, training and skills and providing the opportunity for people to get on the band wagon and advance and move up. i think when you get into the whole distribution issue and the unemployment insurance, minimum wage and those kind of issues, you have to define the problem properly. decide if it's short-term, redistributive fixes, the symptomic relief, or cure the problem. we and thomas focused on trying to cure the problem. in order to do that, it is education, training and human capital. and virtually all the economic studies show that. >> with all the unemployment we have right now, we could hire a million and a half people in the manufacturing business if we have the people with skimlls. we have to get them. we will be involved in the election and the primaries. right now -- open seats or whatever they happen to be. for the fundamental reason, the people that run have a chance of winning. we should get the very best candidate representing both parties for the purpose of ending up with the best result. we -- we probably now have a good half a dozen places that we're looking at in open seats and in primaries where people are trying to challenge -- particular lly long-serving and smart-voting people. and we'll be there in both the house and the senate. now you asked about the tea party, let me make my -- if you're resting a minute, wake up. i have a very, very clear view about this. when the tea party first came out with who they were and what they believed, they talked about things that the chamber very much supports. sensible tax policy, they talked about reasonable -- reasonable control of federal costs, they talked about trade, the opportunity to create jobs and all of that stuff was pretty good. and then we had a lot of people that came along that had different views, and they tried to hitch their wagon to the tea party engine. and those were the people that wanted not to pay the federal debt and to shut down the government and to take more radical approaches to trying to get where we all to get where w wanted to get. i think they're well-intentioned people, except when they get to washington they won't believe what we believe they need do, so why should we help them get here and help protect the people who are here. don't line me up as attack the tea party, because i'm not. >> tom, it's brian with bloomberg news. can you say specifically what elections you'll be focusing on and will tea party candidates be among those that you just mentioned? >> the first answer is no because what am i sending a lot of announcements out for? stay tuned, news when you see it. will tea party candidates -- i just segmented between the original -- i'm not trying to be difficult. this is a place i got to be very careful. i want -- you know, if -- i know a whole lot of tea party folks. if a lot of them are running, i'm going to support them. the question is who are we talking about when we absolutely get there? and what do they want to do? people that walk into the -- announce i'm going to run for the house or senate, my idea is to burn down -- i'm hyperbolizing, my idea is to burn down the town, i won't support them. people who believe in the things we talked about will likely to get our support. one little refinement there, if we have somebody that is an 85%, 95% voter with the chamber, we're certainly going to support them over a challenger. >> sir, sir, this is kevin baum from cnn. following up on that point, you are also entertaining supporting challengers to incumbents who have not been supportive of the tea party versus just supporting people who have been supportive of the tea party? >> take the tea party out of that question, say will we support folks that challenge people we think vote wrong and have not been helpful? sounds like a good idea. >> so are you committing to do that or are you looking at it. >> sounds like a good idea. yeah? >> jim with a.p.. >> nice to see you. >> regarding the upcoming debt ceiling debate, you said the nation cannot default on its debts, you also said there's a demand to address entitlements, do you see dealing with entitlements as a precondition of that debt ceiling debate, or do you see it moving on a separate track? i had a follow up. >> that was a good question. we'll have a debate on the debt. so we did a little research. and round numbers, you know, in the last 30 years, we had 50 -- over 50 deals where they had go out and fix the debt. and in more -- more than half of those it became a debate among the house and the senate and the administration. and, they ended up more than half of those deals where they made some accommodation on spending or taxing, or other issues. even the president of the united states who doesn't believe there should be any discussion about it voted against the debt ceiling increase about something he felt very strongly about when he was a senator, dealt with iraq war, i think. but the point is, you have to start out -- there is going to be a discussion on this issue, and the implications of spending, taxing, budgeting, expanding the economy and all of that as a part of what are we going to do about the debt? i do not believe we will default on the debt. i do not believe we will close the government. i believe we will move forward on this deal and find an amicable way to get it done. >> as you know -- >> he -- >> entitlement reform is a difficult thing to accomplish. do you think it -- they can come to some time of agreement? >> i will tell you where i am on entitlement reform. they may put a couple of dollars in there to say they're doing it entitlement reform will not get done in a serious way for a couple of years yet. we have to own up to this. we have go and have a conversation with the american people. we don't want to scare them. we want to explain to them what the reality is. what it means to them and their children. find a way do it energy is part of that. the one thing i say is that sometime between now and we make a deal somebody will make a decision. are we going to use the energy or are we not going use it? if we're not going to use it, you have a real problem. i don't think in the next deal that we'll have great debate about entitlements. so maybe a little fix there, but when you look at the total numbers, it will be very small. >> thank you. >> hi, katie o'donnell, cq. do you think tax reform is at all possible this year? would you support what some lawmakers have said which is the only feasible option, to separate out corporate reform? or do you think that punishes small business owners? >> what happened the last tax deal, which was at the end of 2012, is we -- we came up with an agreement to go forward -- the congress did. but the sub-s and llc folks got hurt. and i don't think anybody's of the mood to go do that again. would you think? >> no. in fact, we have tax principles that our board has adopted that call for comprehensive reform. so -- >> now, can i answer your first question? the answer is no. i don't think -- i think -- by the way, there could be -- they could be this tax or that tax or something dealing with issues that come up. i don't think you'll get comprehensive tax reform in this election year. >> hi, doug palmer with politico. you just said you were confident that trade promotion authority would pass this year. i wondered are you at all concerned that some tea party conservative republicans might be inclined to vote against the legislation because they would want to deny president obama a victory? do you see that as a big impediment to its passage? and should it fail, are you worried that that would have a chilling effect on the trade agreements that the administration is trying to conclude? essentially making it impossible to conclude those agreements? >> well, the last part was exactly right. if you don't have at some point tpa, the people we're negotiating with are not going to agree to a deal without the understanding of how the congress will participate. by the way, you mentioned am i worried about others going against it. not particularly because i have been astounded to hear my colleagues tell me there are a whole lot of people in that category that are coming out very much in support of it. look, it's going to -- you know, when will they send it up? send it up today? tomorrow? next week? how long we discuss it. it will take a little while. but we'll get it. the votes are there. we'll get that done. i'm doing this one right here. go ahead. what's the point in being up here if i can't -- >> i'm from the business times. [inaudible question] as you know many foreign countries come to america to seek u.s. investment, but now that the time that come that you want to show that the u.s. its n attractive investment destination. in south asia they are interested in investing into america. can you shed some light on how america is, despite national debt, despite deficits, that america is still a safe investment heaven? >> the question is basically why is america still the safe investment, the favorable investment place it is despite our economic circumstances. i thought about that a lot and i talked to people around the world on it. if you just open the paper, any day you turn through it, there are a lot of problems around the world. very concerning, and if you want to put your money someplace, you would probably put them in some of those places. probably want to put it someplace where it's safe, where it can be profitable, and where it will be protected. i think america meets that point. >> you got strong growth. you got a stable currency. a strong currency. your investment is going to retain if it's a good investment. it's going to retain its value. it's not going to lose it returning it to the home currency. you have a situation, we have a strong court system. we protect property rights, and we protect the right to earn a legitimate profit. that makes the u.s. the primary destination for capital in the world today. >> see why he probably should have run the fed? where we going? i'll do this. go ahead. i'll get you if you speak up. >> my name is karen thurmur with the financial times publication foreign direct investment. my question actually is similar to his, but a little different. i knows there a lot of promotion for fdi both here and abroad. i'm wondering if you can tell me what the appetite u.s. companies have for foreign expansion? i'm not just talking about the big mega companies, but mid size and such. >> first of all, marty might have a word on this, too. first of all, the -- 95% of the people we want to sell something to, as i said before, don't live in the united states. so there is a lot of appetite in small, medium-size and large companies who sell abroad. and therefore that includes some investment abroad because in a lot of places to sell it behooves you to make investments there, open plants do that sort of thing. and i think -- i think the appetite is strong, but there's one issue -- they're getting much more selective. if you sit down at a board meeting or in a senior staff meeting or you sit down with the two partners in a small company and you say we have x dollars to invest, this product or this service to sell, where will we do that? you draw a line don't middle of the page, you say the ones on the left side look like places we ought to think about. all the ones on the right side, let's not go there. let's not go there because they may take our intellectual capital and not treat us well. let's not go there because our currency won't be safe, whatever it happens to be. so i believe we have the same excitement and even more attitude for trade and investment around the world, but in a much more selective basis. >> the big companies have always understood the value of selling abroad and feeding the markets abroad. we're finding the smaller companies, it's a more daunting task. it's complicated. it's complex. and many of them have done it, in the past. chamber has had a program here for years called trade routes where we go into the smaller companies in areas around the country and try to help them with their trade issues. so they become more involved. i think one of the areas in our tax reform principles is clearly that we have to have international competitiveness in the tax code in order to foster more of that. because it creates good jobs at home. it creates income flow at home. it makes for more stable corporations, it makes for stronger economic growth in general. so we espouse it. we push it. we try to help those not now doing it get into it in a bigger wa way. >> john with cq. how would you like to see medicare changed to ease burdens on the young? >> that is a -- something we're talking a great deal about. talking a lot of people about it. think there are three or four issues. first of all, medicare costs are unbelievable for a lot of reasons. we have to find ways to provide the services that medicare provides with three or four changes. you're probably going to have to do something a little more on the copays. you have to look

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