Transcripts For CSPAN Washington Journal 20140201 : comparem

that decision is expected in the coming months. thank you for joining us. we turn our attention to another topic, something that caught our interest when it comes to the world of college sports, which has been looked at by congress in a variety of ways. this comes with the idea of should college players be allowed to unionize? this deals with college players at northwestern, issuing or making plans. northwestern players are beginning the process of forming a labor union. according to espn's outside the lines -- another reason we caught interest on the story was the reaction of legislatures. the folks at roll call were asking some legislators who sit on a variety of committees about collegetion of whether athletes should be allowed to unionize treat hears from toator john mccain -- unionize. here is from senator john mccain -- "i don't see unionize nation getting that far but they want to try that is fine. as far as college athletes are concerned, should they be allowed to unionize? here are how you can get your thoughts this morning. effort,upport such an 202-585-3880. if you oppose the effort, 202-585-3881. anwj.e on twitter, @csp you can also send this e-mail, [email protected]. about 15 people commenting on our facebook page -- a couple of comments of people. for our first 45 minutes, when it comes to the world of college athletics and the players that are involved, should college athletes the allowed to unionize the echo -- to unionize? you heard the name -- during the reading of the articles. he is the president of the college athletes players association. us andou for joining tell us ultimately what these players are looking for. this is about having a seat at the table. it makes multimillion dollar salaries for cultures -- for coaches and athletic directors and commissioners. too little resources have been erected to provide protection for these players be -- for these players. they can lose their scholarships if they are injured. on the concussion issue, it has been absolutely awful. nfl players association has made a lot of progress in minimizing the risk of brain damage. ncaa has run from the issue. the only way for athletes to dutchute copperheads of institute comprehensive reform is to get it seat at the table. intensivete conduct -- institute comprehensive reform is to get a seat at the table. i think you just read off a couple of sentences from a commentor -- they are paid in the form of tuition and scholarship. conditional upon their continued provision of athletic services. it is very lucrative for the schools. the labor board will be looking at what is the primary purpose on campus. it is very clear. they spent 40 hours per week on this sport alone paid -- sport alone. they are subject to extensive control by the university. football is completely unrelated to academics. these are the issues the national relations board will be looking at. we encourage them to see that -- william gold projects athletes will be successful in this argument. if you go to school to play football, that is done on a voluntary basis. otherwise employees are hired to be a part of that organization. the argument that it is a voluntary sport but not necessarily a -- make the connection. guest: this is america and every job is voluntary. it is not relevant in this issue. the fact is the compensation is conditional upon athletic services. if a regular student gets an academic scholarship, they are not required to give so much in unrelated areas. they get good grades they will be fine for scholarships. down to what they can say on social media and where they can eat or live, these are extensively controlled and the primary purpose is to produce exposure for the schools. responded, this is the chief legal officer -- guest: i think there's a lot of mischaracterization in that statement. they knew they could be classified for employees -- classified as employees. they invented the words "student athlete," and wrapped it in amateurism. ncaa has absolutely no authority in defining who is an employee and who is not an employee. eventually turn into an effort to get money out top of the scholarships they have already received the october -- already received? increaser goal is to -- the scholarships are capped below the cost of attendance. the players still have out-of-pocket expenses in order to have these opportunities. any discussion about finances, the player needs a seat at the table. player needs to be able to be in the discussion. policymakers paid a lot of money to keep the status quo. what are the next steps he echo guest: -- next steps he echo guest: -- next steps? take: our next step is to the argument to the labor board. after that it is looking at the profits. from there it could be an appeal to the national board in d.c. and to the federal courts. this is going to be a long fight. we did not chose it because -- we did not choose it because it would be easy. host: do you think this could be a supreme court issue? guest: they could. president tohere talk about that she is the president to talk about student unions. to talk the president about student unions. if you support the proposal, 202-5-85-3880. caller: good morning, pedro. this is michael. hy not allow them do a union? without an athlete, the ncaa is nothing. they need to figure out some -- some way to and send these players to stay in school. studentsentivize the to stay in school. wouldn't the scotia be incentive enough? -- the scholarship be incentive enough he echo= -- incentive enough? caller: why wouldn't we share that cake he echo -- that cake? there's too much cake not to share. selective schools and2010 and -- for 2011 2012. that informding ation. jeddah from south carolina, hello. the first thing i would like to say is the unions are , they inflateupt prices, and everything. any student in every school voluntarily goes to that school. bethe college is going to good enough to give them a scholarship to where they do not have to pay the bill then they ought to accept that for gratitude and not try to get more to where the work begins with. orollege football player college class -- or college basketball player -- if they are going to sit there and play a sport they can do for free other places and has done for free for places, why should it be compensated to begin with he echo -- to begin with? academically capable of sustaining their grades, they should not be there anyway. the first caller plus the phone interview we did, they both brought up the fact of the makes and the total the student would make an scholarship alone. theer: that is true but thing is since are not associated with each other. the student is there to get an education. if they are not there for that purpose than they do not belong there anyway. are is what colleges therefore, education. not for job placements in the pro bowl arena. off of twitter -- this is jane from indiana on the support line. caller: i have a few things to say. you are old enough to go to prison or go to the war then you have a skill in which people are going to pay you millions of dollars, you should not be able to -- you should not be obligated to go to college. are you look at people who living in poverty to be school, i think it is not right. when you take the major sports like football and basketball, the majority of the people come from poverty and are making enough money for a university to buy horses for the quest he and team, tooth -- for the equestrian team, to financially support the swim team. if they have the ability to make that money in the professional league, they are employees of the school and give the schools revenue to be able to finance other athletic adventures that are not making money athletically. they need to revisit this. the ncaa is not making money. times have changed and they need to change the way they do business. college sports is basically a business and the kids are the commodity that generates the revenue. when you look at a college football or basketball game, the arena is packed and they don't have to pay the players. they get billions of dollars from tv networks and coaches make millions of dollars. the: this effort on football players, jen off of twitter -- is tim from kansas city, kansas. he is opposing the effort. caller: thank you for taking my call. i belong to the most prestigious unions in this country. my work history is 37 years. the point i want to make is they would no longer be student --letes by the time athletes. -- union would back them up we have a union saying you no longer have to go to class. au don't have to be student/fleet -- a student athlete. it would just be like pro ball. -- we areheard from bringing in another voice. he writes about sports for the chicago tribune and is joining us on the phone. his piece on this has the headline -- tell us a little bit why. on one hand it is very admirable that came coulter has become the end of independent thinking young man. is taken thehe initiative to stand up for something he believes in. it on the other hand you find some false and that. an gratitude -- smacks of little gratitude. i think we are to valuing an education without realizing the value or taking into account education costs $250,000 for graduation. you are exposed to travel. they get free clothes and their meals and books and all things that come with the scholarship. i think those are being overlooked here. college football, playing the sport is still a privilege. it is not a right. college football player i feel that is what struck me about this. it is a very fine line between .riticizing and applauding with theou see here northwest situation there is a lot of gray area. what you think about the case be made to the national labors for that students can be classified as employees? is an interesting argument. if they want to classify them as employees, employees pay taxes. opens a can of worms. how are you going to address that he echo -- address that? bit thated me a little they were working in line with the steelworkers union. i think there is a lot of differences between what a steel worker goes through and what a college football player goes through. you would have a difficult time having a college football sits next tote someone who attends the same university that does not play college football. plates --re that the the player is worse than the regular student. that is why i think it would be difficult to accept the idea that these are employees. thaty dismisses the idea compensation and a stipend are things that need to be discussed . i think we still need to be patient. even though the ncaa deserves your skepticism, accept the fact that these things are being addressed and see where this leads us. i don't think the answer is unionizing. trying to find creative ways to address this problem. stipends and compensation are real needs. is the ncaa considering this idea of compensation? guest: it has been under discussion for several years. i think at the most recent convention i was told that this is something that is definitely at the forefront. the seats that the players wanted, they are making a seat at the table. this is not happening as fast as they want this. maybe this will spur action. create a more sense of urgency. i was just to the players -- the ncaa is not addressing the things and is not considering stipends and compensation is inaccurate. david haugh joining us. thank you for your time. you can have a chance to participate and give your thoughts on the college athletes and if they should be allowed to unionize. the phone lines will be on your screen -- here is jesse on our support line. go ahead. it is so top heavy is ridiculous. feel like the players just want to be recognized and their .fforts are being devalued they need a seat at the table and how the money is broken down. norman is from michigan and opposes. showed then you graphic about the money that the universities make, people forget that that money pays for all the revenue generating sports that universities provide. somebody said earlier that all unions are bad. he should read his history to find out that unions aren't bad. that is all i would like to say. host: why do you oppose the effort? haugh, i agree with mr. these educations cost a ton of money. if you break it down per year, it comes down to $50,000 per year. they are already being highly compensated. up next on our support line. caller: good morning, america. i do support this young man's efforts. if something is not pushed in that direction nothing will ever be done. look at all the students who have to pay back loans. if they could at least bargain want to unionize. maybe some of that money -- couldn't maybe some of that money be put aside to support other students on campus and pay back some of these college loans he echo it seems like a win-win for the student athlete and their fellow students. and if they should be allowed to unionize, that is our topic. "the star-ledger" reports on the latest concerning chris christie. it involves letters sent by the port authority. read porting -- reporting -- "the new york times close quote following up, with adding this -- of information, saying "new york times" following up, with adding this bit of information, saying -- antioch, california. on the topic of whether or not athletes should unionize. caller: i support the effort. my suggestion would be the money generated should be put into an account until the athlete is actually done through that process. there is a lot of money generated in college sports. based upon which sports generate the most income, that is how it can be based out. i do think an athlete playing in school as an athlete regardless to what it is. it should be based on the percentage of how much money in the coming years. they all have minor league. there is a lot of money being generated. it is done on the back of the athletes. are you leery of the term "employee?" when you start generating the word like "employee" then you have to thisw the structure in country, which would be to pay tax. it would be no different than a trust or any other mechanism of savings that is put up for someone read in the end they would have to pay taxes on it unless they chose to roll it over into something that can make the money later on. havesupport the ability to a seat at the table and to be .ompensated place -- it in a host: richard rogers off of twitter says -- tom follows up on the phone on our oppose line from virginia. go ahead. caller: good morning, pedro. the cost of college is outrageous these days and keeps climbing to begin with. there is one big pool of money at a school. what this would have the effect of doing is raising tuition for all the non-athlete players. the second point is what about the small schools that have college athletic programs that do not generate the kind of money that were cherry picked in the graphic you have on your screen. where is the money going to come from those players? come from raising tuition and other costs. i think the whole concept is ridiculous. these kids are getting an education, they are getting a chance to make it into the pros. i would be so thankful to have been in that position instead of not being a college athlete and having to pay for my education. this is another sign of our country moving in the wrong direction. people wanting more from government and from unions and from others. host: that is tom from virginia. environmental impacts of the keystone xl pipeline released yesterday from the state department. peter nichols and others writing that -- that is from barbara boxer. , gonta georgia, supporter ahead. i support the college athletes that want to unionize. these players suffer concussions and all types of things that happen to them. the coaches are making millions of dollars getting contracts. why not spread it to? -- spread it? if they have some support or incentive to keep them in school -- that don't go to the pros, they still have an education provided by the college. caller: look at the cost they have left from the school, the bills they have to pay. some end up in corrupt. it wouldn't be fair to the players. they need some money. jeff is from pittsburgh, pennsylvania. on our oppose line, hello. caller: i have two degrees, one from a school that could afford to do this and one that could not. i think there are 120 schools the pay division i football, maybe 30 could afford this. what else do you do to generate the revenue gecko if only one percent or two percent of these players is going to the nfl anyway, the other 98% are obviously not. and you have all the other sports like swimming and golf. it is a lot of moving parts. the majority of schools cannot afford to do it anyway. host: most football athletes are definitely not getting an education. what comes first, football or trigonometry? we will talk about this topic again. give you a sampling of what happens this weekend on booktv and american history tv. washingtonlympia, focus. we take you to some places with historical and literary background. you can see this all week long on american history tv and booktv. today at noon, we will show you our olympia literary programming. the author talks about the early explorers of the area. [video clip] nation was founded in 1776 -- bama -- >> when our --ion was found and 7076 found in 1776, the exploration was going on very quickly after we became a nation. >> the original residents for the indian population. the first british explorers came here in 1792. it was a very important area for settlement, for trade, and for the establishment of force for trading. forts for s -- of trading. >> we became the offshoot of the gold rush in california of 1889. these were basically spinoffs of the gold rush of 1849. a lot of the ships that came from the atlantic coast of the pacific coast to bring gold arers and the people who going to find their fortunes eventually came north with cargoes from here. should college athletes be allowed to unionize? a supporter on the line, tell us why. hard to believe that universities, colleges, educators, professors, could not figure out a way to pay these student athletes and to disburse money even when you are dealing with small schools. they can figure out how to pay themselves. that is a ridiculous statement to make. they do stuff with the images. ea sports, they sell them. if your coach does not do well and a new coach comes in, these are year to year. players that suffer thestrophic injuries, school is only going to support you up to a certain point. wayols cannot figure out a for the money to be disbursed among the players or figure out a way they can be compensated. it is billions and billions of dollars being poured in. the only other place i can think where people don't want to pay them is prostitution. next caller opposes. a caller: the operative word is play. someone should not get union benefits for just going out and playing around. there is no place for athletics and academics. college, theyo are supposed to work and keep their nose to the grindstone. this is totally out ethics. these athletes are also involved in education. caller: they are there primarily to pay sports. host: here is chuck from indiana on the support line. you are on,e you go go ahead. i don't agree with unionizing. the union has been the death of the industrial united states. college athletes are compensated -- it is ones that aspire to go on to be football players such as the nfl and such. there should be some kind of injury compensation set aside for these people, these young men and women. if they are injured they have something to take away with them. football is very hard-hitting and we know injuries are just phenomenal. the boston globe has a follow-up on the boston marathon bombing. frederick from midland texas opposes. caller: i think we are being shortsighted when we think about stipends. what about title ix a? what about small schools? what about predominantly black colleges? when you start to unionize schools are going to start getting rid of non-revenue producing sports. they are going to sue. when you look at the eight institutions like texas, there are hundreds of institutions in my state who barely get through every year with their sports programs. just looking at the big institutions, they are not think about the thousands of institutions we have. michael bloomberg is the envoy for cities and climate change. here is bill from south carolina. i definitely support it. the issue is very complicated. you actually have to go back into the history of college sports in general. should they be allowed to unionize or nazi echo -- to unionize or not? once they unionize they change the actual product and it certainly won't work. i applaud their efforts. they need to get what they can. maybe long-term health care or benefits -- maybe what they to put more a play leverage on the universities to get more than an education that a lot of these players -- if they secure a job it will be with a so-called college degree, which is good. the college sports -- it functions as a professional sport and is a psychological trick to have college mercenaries come in. host: on the oppose line, carl. waser: what i called about this.ave been watching it is a matter of competitive sports and competitive anything in the united states. the liberals cannot stand competition and they want to do away with it. the spelling bee is now too competitive. they know the only way they can is -- is if they our competitive spirit. host: off of facebook -- you can make your thoughts known, facebook.com/cspan. larry from tennessee is on our support line. i believe in america, the home of the free, the citizens should have the right to unionize. is look at the pros. they get compensation with injuries they have gotten. if the unions are benefits -- are benefiting those who participate, that is what people are missing a bunch of. the teachers unions have benefited the students. the list goes on and on and on. the unions benefit those that participate in it. that is fine and dandy. host: from facebook -- the beauty of on facebook is you can comment on other peoples comments as well. as we finish off this topic a little bit, just recently college athletes were looking to unionize in an effort that has responded to by the nca and others. frome getting comments those on our support line and oppose line. lauren is from illinois on our oppose line. good morning. i believe first of all ncaa rules say they are not supposed to take anything if they so much are is granted a t-shirt -- anything. if they grant -- if they are granted a t-shirt they lose amateur status. if they want to get paid and unionize, then i think it's no longer becomes a college sport or bhey are sort of in a a status come amateur or professional football. what makes football so special more than any other sport. half the people who come out of college playing football can't read or write. it is all about money for the college's. lee is from arkansas on our support line. caller: basically millions of dollars are made by the colleges. they get in trouble for getting a t-shirt or anything like that. for the sports that don't make that much money, they don't share anything. it is embarrassing for colleges to make millions of dollars off of these mostly poor young men and not compensate them. this has been due for a long time. "the new york times" weighing in -- he goes on to make other thoughts known in the pages of "the new york times." sally is from michigan. it is amazing to me how people can be so afraid of unions. a it is not about money or anything else. it is about representation. they are represented by their money. students do not have that opportunity. it is about the billy to be represented -- the ability to be represented. i don't know why it is always equate it with something they did. it is about collective bargaining. floyd from new jersey on the support line. i support the unionize nation. unionization. . don't agree with unions but the athletes should be paid. colleges are making money. they are one of the biggest entity making money in the united states. they should make money. more call, michael from cleveland, ohio on the support line. caller: i support all unions. it unions give fair wages. they get i love my. i don't understand what i'm being greedy. have a nice day. is the last call we will take on that topic. it is february, meaning it starts up african history month. -- african-american history month. later, a discussion on the mining process known as fracking. you to ourt to point newsmakers program this week. a michigan democrat, whose chairs -- who chairs the academic mission. she talked about meat labeling. are [video clip] >> one of the last-minute battles that erupted was over with me to labels that over me to labels. -- was over meet labels. labels.meat your meatpackers would really like to see a relief on these labels so they don't have stringent requirements. they the last minute looked for assistance. eliminated labeling for meat. there was not a supported by a majority of democrats or republicans to eliminate the labeling for meat. we worked with them to try to find some way to address this in a compromise paid and they took the position of all or nothing. we said we would prefer to leave it to the wto. there is a 50-50 chance they will win. label u.s. loses, that will be gone or change anyway. the if they win we will -- if they win we will have to address it. do not want us to grown orething that is processed in the united states. labele a united states and these folks are fighting and asking that we have no label whatsoever. it is not within the jurisdiction of the "farmville". we would be happy to work with them in some way to solve their problems. it was very disappointing to see decide thiseople after we have met their top priorities. they were not successful. it was not as -- there is not support. >> he was badly burned by the bay of pigs experience. chief -- the joint went tof staff -- he see the goal in france. he did that in may or june of a -- of 1961. surround himself with the smartest possible people, hear what they have to the day at the end of you have to make up your own mind. he remembered what harry truman said, the buck stops here. after the bay of pigs he was determined to make of his own mind. at the end of the day he was going to make the judgment and he was the responsible party. clear whenundantly you listen to all of those and read the transcripts of all of those tapes. at arms length he held the joint chiefs. they wanted to bomb and invade. at thes an inside look kennedy administration sunday night at eight on c-span's q and a. >> "washington journal" continues. us is sophia nelson and sheryll cashin. month, itgo to this comes and goes. what is the value, especially from your perspective, about the monthly echo -- of the monthly echo -- of the month? i didn't know that "washington journal" would have an explicit conversation about the history of this month. i think it is a good thing. host: where are we as far as knowledge of history not only in this month but the month going forward? there is never enough knowledge about history in this country, of all kinds, including african-american history. think these conversations are useful, particularly for the next generation of people that come up. i hope we have a good sense of why, this month. having an african-american as a first lady is a wonderful contribution. for young people in high school, there is a sense that they are disconnected. you will get black kids that ask you, why are they still talk about that kind of thing? that is why these compositions are useful for our young people. it helps keep them connected to history. host: what would you say to them as far as what to pay attention to? guest: everything. we can download something instantaneously. we couldn't do that. it is critical they not just look at videos of what justin , they need tog pay attention to who they are, what their journey is. they look at the road very differently. they have a rainbow of friends. they don't see the need for this conversation. it is still very important. host: on the younger generation she spoke about -- raises an important point. it is critical for all children to have a sense of your legacy. the idea that african-american begins -- this month -- it is very very critical to instilling habits of success. host: ara guest are with us -- our guests are with us until 8:45. in -- call since we talked before the start, it has been a long time since you have been on the program. tell us who you are. atst: i am a professor georgetown, and author, i have a book coming out in may. it is about affirmative action and higher education. i am arguing that affirmative action should be reformed to low people who disadvantage opportunity settings. on my secondorking book due out this fall. you know what it's like by the deadline. book is called "the woman the code -- the woman code here woman code." my firstwoman that "black my first book woman" did really well. i was telling her i enjoy my life, i get paid to do what i love, which is pretty exciting. you brought up affirmative action. we are talking about issues that are important. what is the main topic of discussion the echo -- of discussion? guest: i think it is the same for all americans, jobs and economic security. like to talkdo not about this issue solely in terms of black folks. out of the problem in terms of getting policies that will make a difference for african-americans, like a higher minimum wage, is that we have a very divided politics. all of this research shows when you leave with racial disparities what happens with that focus is nonblacks shut down. they hear an accusation when you talk about disparities. i am arguing for a discourse where we look at how all people are affected by this economy. i think the number one issue for most black people is economic security, fairness, incarceration is a huge issue -- it is the case, including for a person like myself who comes family,ell educated there are only two degrees of separation. they know of a relative caught up in this system. the war on drugs has ravaged black communities and harmed taxpayers. those are the top issues. also, education -- the ability to have access to a high-quality , free education with excellent teachers and school books. those issues hit home. host: the latest numbers show among african-americans the in employment rate is almost 12%. guest: higher than that if you put those numbers into some context. i agree. two issues strike me as huge going forward for black communities. one is the wealth gap. there have been conversations about that. it is wanting to have economic challenges, everybody does, but that disparity in terms of wealth accumulation -- even hispanics have surpassed african-americans in that area, which is interesting because they have not been in the economy as long. that is an issue of concern. there is the issue of the innovation and tech gap. you have to be highly educated, highly skilled -- those jobs and opportunities are not coming into the interest -- inner cities. they are leaving. history month,ck i am not afraid to say there are a lot of issues black folks have to deal with. there is the issue of poverty. report was out, and she focused on women, but that will disproportionately impact black women and women of color. i do not think we are having some of the conversations we need to have. we talked around it because we do not want to offend. we want to be pc. i think we need to talk about some stuff. host: when the government brings up income inequality -- is it a federal issue, state issue, personal issue? guest: we all have responsibility. the government service a role, but not the only role. the public-sector serves a role. the people need to start working on behalf of the people. guest: i agree with that. i do not deny that there are disparities. what i am saying and what i say thatis book is it is clear sophia and i are committed to the same things -- we want to see gaps of inequality closed. we want to see if there are nation, one where a person who can put their nose to the grindstone can get ahead regardless of what their race is. social science research suggests that if you lead with disparities, begin the conversation same black people have twice the unemployment, triple the poverty -- that is not a good entry point if your goal is to build a multi-racial coalition then can coalesce around policies like raising the minimum wage. we need is that i think to -- in order to get success in politics, in congress, we need to have a conversation that talks about, and harms. you know, there is a lot of commonality between the daily lives of struggling white folks color,uggling people of and unfortunately we have divisive politics where politicians play on and spark racial resentment, and if you look at the numbers, whites lean and latino'slack -- you get a gridlock politics that makes it difficult to pursue the common good. guest: i agree. as someone who does corporate training leadership, we were talking about this. ago, -- "your company is racist. let's put money in that it, but i do not want to be engaged. -- engaged here: you have to bring -- engaged." you have to bring people to the table under things they can unite with. your boss sees you as someone you can relate with, and then you are more likely to work up the ladder. i agree, you cannot just talk about everything that is wrong, but i do not want to talk those conversations -- duck those conversations either. host: let's it to some calls. pamela. illinois. go ahead. caller: i want to bring up the point that it is less likely the past apology that was left from slavery. slave" we see how the classes continue to have overwhelming not dealing with disparities from racism. if we could get that address, we would not have it so much in our politics. armed i am so glad to be with these ladies because they are my heroes. .uest: thank you host: change the pathologies, change the politics. guest: you cannot talk about changing negative disparities as are dealing with the context from which you come. she is right. we have not had that conversation. i do not know if we are going to have that conversation. eric holder said we are a nation of cowards when it comes to race. people said it was strong. i agree with him. remember katrina. that was the most vivid example of the legacy of slavery. atlanta, we saw major issues with snow. the poor areas were left out. we still see remnants of this thing that we do not deal with. guest: let me take a little bit of a different perspective to the caller. if you look in any neighborhood in america that has high concentrations of poverty, and i do not care whether it is in appellation, or in the inner- find behaviorsu -- you use the word "apologies." -- "pathologies." you find behaviors that are not considered middle-class, mainstream, high levels of , a lot ofn, drug use decline in marriage, or no marriage -- things like this. it is a poverty thing. it is a concentrated poverty thing. it is not just a legacy of slavery. and, i have to say, concentrated poverty results from intentional government policies, choices about -- well, i do not want to take up too much time, but urban renewal, concentrating all housing project in one place, discriminations in terms of residential markets. my first book talks about this. the urban ghetto is a government -created institution and i would blame that for the so-called pathologies even more than slavery. host: steve is up. virginia. republican line. are you there? caller: yes. i would just like to make a comment and put a spin on the black history. i love history. i have had the opportunity to be able to work on an old home that -- built byslaves slaves, and me, myself, being a carpenter, i have been overwhelmed with the type of work that those people did back then. we hear a lot about slaves in the field and how they were mistreated, but i have been able to see some of this work and i am proud of the work those people did in those days. see. just overwhelming to i do not know how they were able to make some of the things they did. even with modern equipment that we have nowadays, they turned out and produce work. i wanted to share this with the other people. i am proud of what those people , andack in those days everyone else should be proud of the product they produced also. host: ms. cashin, is there a take away guest: -- takeaway? guest: thank you for the call. there is a church in savannah, georgia, or you can go and see the -- where you can go and see the insignia from the tribe. if you look at the history, many of the ivy league universities in this country were built by slaves. the white house, built by slaves. it is interesting history. for honoring that legacy and i also want to add african-americans continue to make wonderful contributions, not just in carpentry, but other ways. thank you for that call. guest: i appreciate the sentiment. church inn to the savannah. it is very moving. host: south carolina. john. democrats line. caller: good morning, ladies. it is amazing. i sit here and listen to you talk about, you know, the subject -- first of all, i consider myself an american because i know nothing about africa. skinr as color of the -- they do not consider ormselves african-american black pair to take the president. they say he is black, but his mother is white. chasel cashin, it if they your history, nine times out of 10, your grandfather was a black man -- a white woman. you are shaking your head, and i like that. i do not consider myself african-american or whatever but i consider myself an american because i was born here. i know nothing about africa. let's get off of that. thank you. shake mye reason i researchedt i have the history and i do descend from a white slave owner, and i wrote a book "the educator's agitator's daughter." it was complicated. he sent his children norton gave them a classic education. careful what you wish for, anyone that looks back in the history. guest: no comment. host: scott. sierra vista, arizona. independent line. caller: good morning, everyone. good morning, america. i am so happy that we have the ability to allow everyone to have a voice. analyst,vid reader and and a couple of points of interest that i would like to share -- one of them is i think we have a false bill bill ofand a false hope. the emancipation proclamation said you are free, so a certain segment of society says you cannot be sold again. that was great. then there was a false bill of hope for those that could not be sold again that they hoped this was the time of the new beginning, but history has been recorded. not only has the i view my lifeow -- that is opportunities might have passed me by, but i have never passed opportunity. the significance of that is another step. we talk about education. you, not education in the number of degrees. host: thank you. sophia nelson? there was anot sure question. i think he was just making a statement about how he views things. i appreciate the comment. --t: the false sense of hope guest: i am mulling that over in my mind. i think hope comes from within your soul. i think our people have shown from slavery forward, as you mentioned, the contributions we have made have been enormous despite unbelievable harms and obstacles. lives here.rs, -- it comes from you and i think our people have shown that. guest: that is true, but i do think it is fair to say there are a lot of people in american society today without hope of all colors. they are in a hopeless situation. they might be long-term unemployed. they may be homeless. important -- is what you say is right. i am a huge believer and i talk about it in the book, of reenergizing the tradition of african-american striving. or ever your situation is, there is something you, individually, working with your god and your spirit can do to make it better. i also do believe that better government policies can bring all people along and give them hope and a chance to uplift themselves. host: as far as government policies, one of the things that came up this week was the idea of a minimum wage. do you tackle this from your perspective? guest: i think reasonable people can disagree about this. i think a living wage is something that is important. i think it is the collaboration from states and businesses that need to sit down and figure out -- you do not want a federal meette and say i cannot this, but you want to raise the wage, so it is a tricky conversation. guest: well, there is no question that wages have people,d for average and average wages, median wages are less than they were when you account for inflation 30 years worker payhile ceo-to- has increased 1000%. something is out of whack in terms of the allocation of profits from employers to workers, and we have had a decline in the labor movement. i do think we need to put more pressure on employers. intentionally aid his workers a very good wage because he wanted them to be able to afford to buy the products he was selling. i am not an economist, so i do not want to speak passed my expertise, but i do think without a strong, multiracial coalition that puts pressure on pressure on puts employers, we will continue to get growing inequality. host: both of you mentioned congress. the topic that started late last year was that of unemployment insurance, still not resolved. what are your takes on a topic and what congress should do about it? guest: whether or not they should extend it? host: yes. guest: that is a tough issue. you have people that have been long-term unemployed, two years or maybe more, and they have stopped looking. there has to be a social safety net. i agree with that. on the other hand, you get the balk from industry, where does it stop? it is a tough conversation to have. guest: i do not profess to know what all of the policies -- right policies are. i do know that if progressives or conservatives who care about the decline of opportunity for average people in this country do not start to build a more cohesive politics were people of color are coalescing and coming sanity and common sense, it is not going to get better. host: peter. germantown, tennessee, republican line. caller: thank you so much. i believe ms. cashin is touching on what i was going to get to. the problem with these disparities and inequalities, they have root causes in a pathologic lifestyle, wherein the black community you have a 70% illegitimate birthrate that has developed in the last 50 years because of the rise of the welfare state. if you have higher and higher loss of family structure like this, you get two things -- instability and chaos. that has been spreading through and gives rise, ultimately, to these inequalities and disparities. you cannot fix any of that -- those problems -- with the government policies unless you fix the high illegitimate birthrate. you need to have family structure. you need parents and family. that is the foundation of a society, and that is the root cause, and that is what the focus needs to be on. if you rely on policies, minimum wage, or changing schools, it will not fix it. no government policy to fix this problem. it has to come from the individual within. with everything he said except for pathological lifestyle. i do not think i would use "pathological." run off numbers and driver everybody crazy. the reality is, he is right. we have a problem in the disintegration of the black family. it goes back to daniel patrick .oynihan's report in the 1960's we are living it out. the irony of an african-american president, a first lady, very successful, and we have elements of real success in the black community, the way you look at the real black community, it is in distress. i agree. but you cannot pro-government out. throw government out. it does have a role. host: how much of a role? guest: i think it has contributed. the welfare state -- if that is a term you want to use, you can trace the numbers. inn my parents got married 1966, something like 80% of black people were married. that number has dropped to something like 37%. that is almost 50 years. something is wrong. say this to the caller. i am perfectly willing to -- and i write very frankly and all of about you being responsible for your personal behavior. i am married. i waited until i got married to have kids. i am raising my kids. the tv is off. i have my foot in there but. they are learning spanish and mandarin. generationd valedictorian. you are going to be a valedictorian, or i am going to die trying. that is my household, and those are my values. some of those values have been lost. where i disagree with you, caller, is to suggest it is all about personal behavior. --re is a relation ship relationship to policy. beyond the welfare state, we started a war on drugs that overly incarcerated people -- black people do not use drugs at a higher rate than white people, whites uset, i think drugs a little bit more, but black people are much more jail. to get thrown in possession of marijuana -- you can have your life ruined. mightof black men, who have been, if not incarcerated, not prosecuted, been able to go to school, finish school, get a degree and mary somebody, they are behind bars. that is one example. another example of what has happened and that is very different in the last three decades -- economic segregation has taken off in this country. only 42% of all americans of all colors today live in a middle- class neighborhood. that is down from 65% in the 1970's. by the way, marriage rates and -- marriageck birth rates are declining with whites and out of wedlock births are rising with white folks. my point about the neighborhoods, what is happening in american society -- if you are affluent enough to be able into a high-ay quality neighborhood with low poverty and excellent schools, the system works for you very well. you are set up very nicely -- educationelected k-12 that sets you up to going to college and do well, and everybody outside of that my little gets a different deal. if you go into some of the schools in these high poverty neighborhoods -- you can find rats, no textbooks. so, you could be the most motivated kid in the world, but surrounded by dysfunction. it takes enormous fortitude to overcome that by yourself. costsimum, government has stateobligation -- every constitution in america says the state has the obligation to provide an adequate education, and at minimum, government should be doing that. we should be putting excellent teachers in high-poverty neighborhoods, so that the people who are taking responsibility for themselves have a fair shot. guest: i want to speak to her point. i live in loudoun county, virginia, the wealthiest county in the country. we are richd said out here. i looked at with the kids had -- kids rooms,age, play rooms, state-of-the-art everything, from interactive to just see the could wealth of where we live and the children being impacted in positive ways versus where if you just go up to d.c. 30 miles up the road in some areas it is a different ballgame. guest: it is not just lack people -- black people. there are more increases in poverty in the next -- last decade in suburbs. you can find a lot of struggling, poor, formally middle-class white people in suburbs where poverty is increasing rapidly. ofre is a lot of commonality experience. host: our guest, by the way, are sheryll cashin, the author of "place not race -- a new vision for opportunity," and sophia nelson, author of "black woman ."defined judy. indianapolis, indiana. democrats line. caller: hello. i want to know what the ladies -- i think the country -- people are going crazy over ideology and greed. it is all about money. i think this country was set up, and people were put in slavery because they wanted free labor. free labor is what built this country. bigink the ideology of a business and companies now is to continue to have cheap labor. cheap labor is driving everything, i think. it is causing companies to be more concerned about their shareholders, and about their own personal wealth. personaleep their wealth, they have to hire people at low wages. they are not really concerned. i think the people in american know-how to solve this. these problems are not difficult to solve because we have done them in the past, and they need to be brought forward. host: caller, thank you. guest: she makes a powerful point. outsourcing is a real issue. good jobs leaving and going overseas because of lower wages, less regulation, etc.. it is a serious situation. she made me think of wall street, greed is good. we are in that place with technology, the instantaneous "i want it now." we are disconnected. the stuff does not connect us. i hate to break it to you. i think what she says is true. there is a decline in wages and the standard of living because we are focused on shareholder profit and corporate wealth and we're forgotten about america and workers. host: it goes to the immigration debate going on in congress as well. guest: sure. guest: yeah. host: chris. independent line. caller: how're you doing, sir, and how are you doing, lovely ladies. this is an intense conversation. you have me bubbled up here. guest: hopefully in a good way. [laughter] caller: i am a college graduate businesses. own two the topic is about racial relations, and it should be about capital and labor. if you listen, you are talking about emigration, and going back if you and color, but really listen to what you are talking about, you are talking about the relationship between capital and labor. from eric williams about capitalism and slavery, you are talking about white supremacist constructs that are serious all over the world. it, you really get down to we are trying to make a more perfect union in the united states, and the people is what i love. if you look at what just happened with the president -- we had our union, and everybody soldier.for the great we have some great people in this country, who would die for this country, for the ideals of this country, but if you look at our leaders, they are nothing. they are a piece of crap because they have sold us out, they have sold our labor out. guest: let me say this. as a former lobbyist in a fairly big law firm in the city, one of the reasons i stopped by the same law and became so stopped practicing law and became so disengaged is i saw what he is talking about. it is not that you give up. you make it a decision to remove yourself from the process he is talking about. our leaders -- republicans and democrats are the same, america. you might not know it, but they are. they are the same in the sense of what is the next office -- what is the campaign -- they have to raise millions of dollars to run for office. i have always believed we need public funds for elections. broken because of money. it makes leaders less engaged with us and less engaged with what they need to do to keep what they have. he is right. guest: you had that from me. i did not know you are a republican. [laughter] [no audio] guest: it is interesting. the caller said a couple of things. i think america, pre-civil rights, and organizing rentable was white supremacy. thank god we had a civil rights movement. i do not think capitalism is built on white supremacy, not anymore. but i do think corporate, economic elites, they have captured this town, you know, and there is a history in this of using race to divide people. we talk about corporate and labor. there is a division there. there is currently an unequal allocation of profits that come from corporations. you know, how we get back to -- it was great to be middle-class from post-world war ii to about .he mid-1970's i was a great time to be middle- class. wages rose because corporations shared more. olderick douglas, a good republican -- [laughter] my great-grandfather was a radical republican. guest: of course she was, come on now. is not for a person with power and influence to decide voluntarily to act -- allocate more power -- you do not have pressure points to pay people more. guest: look at south africa. i have a bracelet on that one of my sorority sisters gave me, it was when he -- winnie mandela's bracelet. africa, they will not give anything up without a revolution and without having to be made to right the situation. to your point, caller, it is time for america to rise up. i am not saying over to the government or anything like that, but americans are disengaged. we are selfish. good,suv, my driveway is my family is good, we are ok. that used to be the mentality, where we looked out for the lady down the street, make sure had blackwas ok, you lawyers, engineers, sanitation workers living in the same neighborhood. we do not have that anymore. there is a disconnect. guest: what also is missing is for organizations or political parties, or, you know, politicians to consciously develop a discourse that is designed to bring people together as opposed to a discourse that is designed to pull people apart. host: i want to take a call, but you said earlier eric holder said we are still cowards about race. we have an african-american president. what has he added to the contributions? president obama backed off. when he waded into that water as a black man, and i do not think he was thinking about it consciously. they took into town on that one. i have not seen him weighed into until --discussion since his speech before became president and this cap gave -- skip gate. guest: i do not think it is the president's job to have conversations about race. not to say there is not an appropriate time. whatever he does, it just seems to rile people up. what he said about trayvon martin was a modest statement, but some people really jumped on him. to try to bring people together and lead. i do think other organizations, and perhaps this is not the work of political parties, but whether -- other organizations and what i write about in my place not race, out in may -- [laughter] i read about -- right about examples from so-called red states where coalitions that have included latinos, republicans, blacks and whites, came together to coalesce around a public policy that made things better for average people. host: john. florence, wisconsin. good morning. caller: good morning. it will be interesting to see willkind of heat sophia take for coming out of the closet here and being a republican. that, everybody knows come on. caller: i am kind of serious because every conservative that has apt off of the plant -- stepped off of the plantation is aeen vilified, and it shame because if you have a way to view that disagrees with democrats talking points, you are thrown under the bus, and if you really want to change things and get off of the plantation -- i am a poor white man. my parents, great-grandparents, never owned slaves. entertainers, football players, basketball players, millionaires, billionaires, it's still we want to get dragged into this conversation that the war on drugs is unfair against black people. how about the war on poverty. host: ok. .uest: wow everybody in washington knows i have been republican for a long time. jack kemp was my mentor. i am in the moderate wing that really does not exist anymore. i am not worried about that. one of the reasons i do not take slack in my community for being a black republican is because i am in my community, i am invested. i am engaged. myody engages -- questions blackness. this country is a democratic republic. this country needs a good democrats and good republicans, and they need to work together. anybody that can step up and do that, whether they be blacks, whites, hispanics, etc., should do that. i gave up the thought of running for office. mind later.ge my frank wolf, who is my congressman is retiring in my district. if this was a couple of years later, i would do it, but i cannot do it now. i get your point, but i do not think you should use words like "plantation." they are inflammatory and ridiculous. we need to figure out ways to be more monolithic -- less monolithic and more diverse in our politics and have leaders that are different, who are republicans, that speak to the interests of the community. i think it is damaging to the black community to be wedded to one political party because no other racial group in america, none, does that, but us, and it makes us foolish. guest: let me say to the caller and to sophia, first of all, i know quite a few black republicans. married into a family with quite a few of them. there are actually more out there than you might realize. situation, i do not see black republicans vilified. the word "plantation" it is a divisive word. i think all of us, individually, have to work at creating a discourse that is civil and tries to bring people together. i do not know if you came in late, but from the top of the hour, the first thing i said was i do not think it is healthy to leave with -- lead with racial disparity, but anybody who honestly looks at the so-called criminal justice system and system of mass incarceration, to suggest that that system is racially fair is just not true. it is not a racially fair system. guest: i agree. invoke race or use the word racism lightly, but it is not racially fair, and also, it is not fiscally sound. it does not make a lot of sense for taxpayers. guest: absolutely. guest: if reducing the use of drugs is why -- what you want to do, it is cheaper to have drug prevention programs. guest: i cannot wait to read her book. guest: i want to have a discourse when we get to public policy that is good for everyone of all colors and good for the common good. the last point that i want to make is i dissent from a radical republican. the republican party has a gorgeous tradition. it was founded on anti-slavery pledge. it was a party that represented freedom and force this country in reconstruction to do something different. that is a proud legacy, right? i were a republican, and i am not, i would tell that legacy, but i have to tell you, the republican party is not competing -- guest: absolutely. black andpeting for brown votes, and i am not sure they want them. black people are actually conservative people in a lot of their values and those votes are there. me and "thee -- i have inst" writing this for a number of decades. you had me on. i was talking about this. the republican party had better take a long look. two turns later, they still have not figured it out they cannot have a majority party without having brown and black people in it. they will have to deal with this issue and 2016 will be interesting to see who the candidate is because i think chris christie is damaged. host: the number one way to make that outrage -- outreach? --st: have people like me you cannot just have people that are black. herman cain, and with all due respect, there is not a connection to the black community. somebody like you, if you are running, your credibility, your history -- the same with me, a black person who happens to be a republican, i will do well with black voters. there are very few republicans that can say that. want for this country is we are a party system, and it does not have to be a two-party system, but where all political parties compete for the votes of all people. that would be a better america. teresa. illinois. independent line. caller: good morning. i just wanted to say that me, myself, i do not party identify, republican or democrat because i know they both work for corporate america, and if you look at what corporate america is doing to the world, that says it for itself. back to the topic, i think it is important for black people to understand history. that is part of our problem. we do not read. we have to understand european history and ancient african and egyptian history. it is important. the civil rights movement -- the only thing the civil rights movement did was give by people the opportunity to go to the courts and fight racism. it did nothing to address the mental enslavement that was taught throughout the existence of black people in this country, and there was a caller before that said there -- he is an american and does not know anything about africa. well, black people's history did not start in america. it started on the continent of africa for 80% of us. also, what marcus garvey said was forget about racism -- we need to teach your kids math, science, how to build things. we forgot about all that stuff. host: caller, thank you. guest: that was loaded. guest: caller, you said so much. the point that i agree with you .n -- well, i disagree with you the civil rights movement was a proud, wonderful movement that did miraculous things for this country. it took us in one generation from a country where a majority of people believed in racial hierarchy and the inferiority of one group, to where a majority of people did not. it also did open up jobs and povertyand the black rate was 72% in 1950. it came down dramatically. i disagree with what you say about the civil rights movement. i do agree, though, that in black homes it is very important for black folks to be instilling in children the proud history that we come from, you know? we are not just former slaves. we are people who, you know, have accomplished a lot. we come from -- you are right -- ancient africa. there are civilizations there, writing there. all of that should be shared. -- guest: my niece had to do a report. she is biracial. fromother's family is nathaniel hawthorne, and all of that is laid out, and when she was asking about our family, there was a spider. -- sputter. it kind of stalls. we could not spit that history out the way her mother's side of wasfamily could, which challenging. we are well-educated, but we are a first-generation family in law school. we have to emphasize to our children that there is another side to you and it does start in africa. have been joined by two guests, sophia nelson, author of "black woman redefined," currently working on a new book, and sheryll cashin, the author of "place not raise." -- race." guest: thank you for having us. host: we will talk about ofcking with nathan holtman the university of maryland as washington -- as "washington journal." a discussion with nathan hul "man as "washington journal continues. >> watch our program on first lady hillary clinton today at 7:00 p.m. eastern on c-span and live monday night, the series continues. >> i was in a car wreck that i wrote about extensively in my book," and i was in the hospital , not injured, at a cut on my broken ankle, and i was praying the other person in the car would be ok, and the other person in the car was one of my best friends, which i really did not know. i did not recognize that at the site of the crash. i think because i prayed over and over for him to be ok, and he was not, i thought god was not listening. my prayer was not answered. i went through a very long time of not believing and not believing that players can be it took me a long time, really, and a lot of growing up to come back to faith. bush, monday laura night at 9:00 p.m. eastern live on c-span and c-span3, also c- span radio and c-span.org. >> this is what remains at the state library of the territorial collection. these volumes were selected 1857, and manyo- of them personally selected by governor stevens. his goal -- he was a very well- read individual with multiple language skills, and is feeling was the best way to establish a legislative body was to have by the a well-read group standards of that time. it is a very diverse offering of materials. it covers many foreign languages. writtenthings that are in german and dutch, and latin, and italian. there are histories, discoveries and voyages, encyclopedias, philosophy, poetry. after we separated from the oregon country and the oregon territory when oregon obtained statehood, it is important to see what was on the minds of the people organizing the government, and this is just one special collection among many here at the state library. this one has the primary import of showing what, outside of the political concerns, is of interest to lawmakers of that time. >> this weekend, booktv and exploren history tv" the history and literary life of olympia, washington. >> "washington journal" continues. host: joining us now nathan hult man. he will discuss fracking. -- the decision ,ot regarding the keystone xl what is important? guest: the reason the state department had to do it is because it crosses a boundary with canada, and their charge was to investigate whether the pipeline might impact local environmental areas and went -- whether it might contribute a large amount to our greenhouse gas imprint. host: what did they find? guest: that in neither case would it be a large imprint. many havel because looked for it to be stopped, and many have looked for it to go forward, and this opens for a finding that this might be a national security interest. host: what happens now going forward that this decision has been made? guest: the state department will take that in consultation with other organizations in the government, take comments on the environmental report, that is the next step. people will be allowed to comment on it, agree or disagree, the comments will be digested, and in a final step, the state department will look at all of the evidence across the environment, national security, economy, and a number of other provisions and say on balance is this in the u.s. national interest? host: ultimately, the secretary of state and secretary john kerry has to make the decision. where is the president? guest: the president has delegated the authority to secretary john kerry for now. host: talk about where we are as ,ar as the keystone xl pipeline and if you think it would be authorized. guest: i would not say automatically, but the fact the report came out relatively benign, that means there is not that much support from the environmental signed to reject the pipeline proposal. it could still haven't. -- happened. this was an important step in the process. most observers would look at this and say given that the report came out relatively benign, it seems more likely that it will be approved. joins us,an hultman it and you heard him talking about the keystone pipeline. we brought you want to talk about fracking. what is it? guest: it is a process to get natural gas. normally, you find natural gas with oil deposits. it is fairly straightforward. there are other kinds of natural gas that can be embedded in a much more difficult way in rocks that are not permeable. in order to get the natural gas out -- we know that it is there, but in order to get it out, you have to put hydraulic fluid in, fracture the rock, and allow the natural gas to flow out. that is what fracking is. connectionis the between that and finding natural gas and these pockets of natural gas? guest: we know these resources have been out there for decades, but it is in the last 10 or so years that the technology has evolved to the point where it can be extracted at a relatively economic level. that has revolutionized how we get natural gas in the united states. we have heard a lot about it from both the white house and congress looking at the question of energy security, energy independence. over 30% ofitutes our total gas resource. that has led to a number of developments in the gas market. one that people will notice is that gas prices have dropped substantially from where they were a decade ago, and that is because of this new supply. industry has the ability to take advantage because of the abundant gas we have now, and they are looking to take advantage. host: the numbers are on ours gains -- on our screen if you want to ask our guest about the impact. are there environmental concerns? guest: there are several environmental concerns with fracking. they divide into global and local concerns. the local concerns involve effects that the cracking process, the fracturing process might have on local resources, in particular water. the question is whether the fracking fluid, which contains toxic compounds, might leak out and get into groundwater, or when they actually pull the fracking fluid out, they have to store and dispose of it. there are a couple of processes where you might see spills and people are concerned about that because we have not investigated it to some degree fully enough. the second piece is the global question. people have wondered whether the emissions from this initial fracking process might lead to additional release of methane into the atmosphere. gas, ands a greenhouse that might increase the amount of global warming we might see as a result of the fracking process. issued to the course of the morning, not only will we hear about -- host: through the course of the morning, not only will we hear from our guest, but we will hear from reports -- reporters, and one of those reporting -- joining us is kevin begos of the associated press from pittsburgh. talk about pittsburgh in the areas around. taking placeng is all across the country, mostly on both corners of pittsburgh -- a pennsylvania. dry gases in the northeast and the so-called wet gas is down along west virginia and western pennsylvania border. map from the a energy information administration and it shows an lis and it'ss marsa a pretty wide area. guest: it stretches from parts of new york through most of pennsylvania and a little bit of ohio and a lot of west virginia and a little bit of maryland. -- that has turned the northeast and shoo-in energy producing area which it has not been for about 100 years. host: when it comes to pennsylvania and ohio, how receptive are these to the -- are they to this process? guest: there is a split and other parts of the country in pennsylvania, the latest polls are consistent with a few years are about 64% of people are in favor of the drilling. they have environmental concerns. people are worried about some of the other things you mentioned like air and water. it is overall in favor but with significant pockets of people who are strongly opposed. host: as far as legislators and how they handle the situation, what has been the talk amongst them? guest: governor tom corbett, republican, has been tremendously in support of the industry. some say far too much. even his predecessor a democrat was essentially in favor of drilling in all seven or eight democrats who are now challenging corporate c --orbett for the election are all in favor of drilling. they want more regulation but not too many politicians want to stop it or been it. host: in that area where fracking has been done, has there been any incident? yes, there have been more than 100 confirmed cases of water well contamination. these are private water wells and most of the time it involved methane. contaminating the water, not the actual chemicals from the fracking. that has led to a lot of uncertainty and fear. there have been far more complaints, over 1000 complaints in the last two years. the issue is how many problems are being caused and how severe are the? host: we are taking a look at fracking, thank you. anything to take away from that? guest: it's very vivid to understand what the individual people are going through at the local level. that's really the root of some of this opposition. kevin mentioned there is a bifurcation of people who are in favor seeing it as a boon to the local economy but that an individual people who are fearful of the impacts on their own resources were actually have direct impacts on their own resources and that's the issue we need to think about as a nation and think about how this interfaces with our state and national regulations to ensure that certain people do not get unreasonably harmed by the development of this resource. from our first call is richmond, virginia, democrats line. hello, i have read quite a bit about fracking. as farstion i have is -- as i know, the chemicals that actually break through theshale have not been disclosed by the company's that do the fracking. i was wondering of those chemicals will ever be -- if we will ever be told what those are. another question i have is -- once the natural gas has been extracted from the shale, what takes the place of the natural gas? would that possibly contribute to earthquakes and things like that? the first question about chemicals, the fracking process relies on injecting a hydraulic fluid into this shale formation and pressurizing and making the shale crack so you can extract the natural gas. you're correct that a lot of are seenid compounds as proprietary by the companies using them. they make the argument that they spent a lot of intellectual effort and investment in developing these concoctions of fluids. that has been their line about this. this is a proprietary concoction and they don't have to share. --hink this is something it's a discussion we should have as a country. is doing an investigation into the empire mental impacts of the fracking and one of them is through the toxicity of these fluids. we will see that report released in 2014, hopefully. we might learn little more about the various suite of compounds. mightcond part is that we think about regulating these fluids and a more vigorous way. we always have the option to do that. that is something we could in fact have a discussion about in congress or with the government as well as with the industry. that is one part of that but you are right, we don't know everything about what is going into those fluids. the second question was about the natural gas and whether the fracking process might create earthquakes. has has been something that definitely been discussed a lot. there seems to be some evidence cities can seismi result from fracking prosody's. -- processes. they would be low magnitude earthquakes but the general thought is it probably won't be a problem but the technology is relatively new. it's another area where we could , in fact, benefit from more research into that question. frombarry is mechanicsburg, pennsylvania, on a republican line. caller: you are talking about the environmental impact on the keystone pipeline. i have never heard anybody that the other pipeline has ever had any impact on the environment. do you know anything about that? guest: what i know about the environmental impact for keystone is they did a relatively quite rigorous assessment of other pipelines. usingry to extrapolate categorization of large events and medium events and small events. this was about leakages from existing pipeline and they use that as a way to assess how likely risks of bigger moderate size events would be from keystone xl. host: ogden, utah, here is john. fracking willk destroy our planet. the chemicals that we put into these wells, millions of gallons of toxic chemicals, to pressurize and break the rock, 50% of every well that is drilled fails on the first attempt. alone, seeping into the groundwater and making so many holes in the shale that earthquakes are happening in places that never happened before. they have stopped fracking around the world because of this. -- we., on the fault line are not even protected by the safe drinking water act on this. there's so much wrong with fracking and nobody is coming out, like your guest here, to say what this is doing. in texas, everybody has to move because of the toxic air. guest: i think that there is a good question here. the question i see is as i mentioned, the technology for fracking is relatively new. went throughry, we a big process in the 1960s and 1970s thinking about what the impact of our economic activity would be on environmental and public health. as a result of that, we created a number of acts. those were hard fought discussions that we had and they were resulting from previous experience with introducing new technologies and new kinds of processes in the economy that we did not fully understand. we essentially let go in an unregulated way for too long. fracking is another such technology that may or may not have such risks. it's very important that we are mindful of our historical experience with environmental regulation and we carefully roll it out and we have industry discussing what they are doing natural -- as a national interest rate we want to economic benefits of resources but we also want to do it in an environmentally and public health sound way. that means that as we are moving forward over the next 3-5 years, the industry is maturing, it is the time to start looking at the impacts of the industry in a much more detailed way and have the conversations that the caller mentioned and see if we can regulate this process in a more sound way. from texas is up next, independent line. sir, what principle is the kiss method? that means keep it simple, stupid. all of our founding fathers group hemp and until oil was discovered, that's what oil companies did, they came in and they legalized it. it burned for pennies on the dollar and there was no pollution from it. i think we should be looking at methods like that. there are certainly -- the point that i see in there is that we can look at different sources of energy in terms of our energy mix. hempot sure where the argument comes in in modern times. that might be interesting for other areas of politics as we talk about in the country but in terms of energy, that is not a big issue now. the question of switching between different resources is fair. what we are seeing now is a gradual shift in this country and perhaps worldwide from dirtier sources of full -- of fuel like coal to cleaner sources like natural gas and fracking is an element of that. host: have other countries used this process? guest: the u.s. is seen as the leader in the fracking technology. the industry here developed the technology and developed the process. we have a geology that seems to be more suitable than many other places around the world. because of our success, number of other countries are showing great interest in developing their own resources in a similar way. host: tom from michigan, republican line. i was: good morning, curious about the chemicals if you can delve further into that. why are they needed? how can they be fully extracted after being pumped in by high- pressure. , what arem michigan the possible implications of contaminating the great lakes in the future? is that where a fracking operation is taking place is antrim? guest: i was just going off of the map. guest: we are investigating this. why are they needed and what are they? this is ary says that set of chemicals each of which has its own role in the fracturing process. it has the right compressibility and the right features to push out and:. they're selecting the chemicals on the basis of how well they can deliver the gas out of the well in the end. that is their priority right now. is how weon understand what is genuinely needed as a regulatory mechanism and how we can have a regulation within the industry to ensure whatever is going in is reasonably safe. conversation that will require some transparency and discussion. host: we showed you a map from the energy administration and new york state is quite a bit covered according to the map. joining us on the phone to talk about the new york experience is john campbell. thanks for joining us. guest: thank you for having me. host: talk about how governor cuomo and his approach to fracking. guest: he has taken the opposite approach of what you heard in pennsylvania. we have not seen it in new york at this point in terms of large- scale high-volume hydraulic fracking. was when governor patterson in the governor's office in 2008, the department of environmental conservation made the call to put it on hold as it studied the environmental impacts and came up with permitting guidelines. that review was expected to be completed in 2010 but it is still ongoing. referred to the state health department for further review. at this point, the review continues. we really don't know a whole lot about when it will be completed. the state's environmental commissioner this week said he does not expect any permits .efore april, 2015 which we have not seen anything in new york at this point it does not look like anything is coming until governor cuomo paused reelection bid is up at the end of 2014. host: the large concerns about the environmental impact, are there other concerns? guest: it is generally environmental and the hubble ehealth concerns. -- and the public health concerns. because the review process has taken so long, the anti-fracking movement in new york is really. to a very strong level. they are well organized. they protest outside of nearly every event the governor has in the state. i don't think there is any question that the large movement has had an impact on the debate and has held off for quite some time. host: the map we have been showing shows a large shell area that covers most of new york. some people want to tap that. guest: absolutely, the sweet spot of the marcellus in new york is in the elm myra /binghamton area. you're in a situation where you can go just across the pennsylvania border and you are allowed to use fracking but north of the pennsylvania/new york border, you can't. those areas in the " sweet spot" have dealt with the economic issues for quite some time. they are economically troubled. there is a large coalition of landowners that are seeking to lease their land for royalty payments and for bonus payments to allow drilling on their land. threatenedeek, they to sue the state on february 14 if a timeline for approving fracking is not sent out. energy,company, norse they have already sued the state to force a decision on hydro fracking. host: as far as the public is concerned, what are you hearing ? guest: if you look at public opinion polls for the last five years or more, they have been generally favor split about 40% in of fracking and 40% opposed. the remaining 20 undecided. it has not fluctuated a whole lot. there are spikes from time to time. shownlly, the public has to be police -- to be pretty split. there is a push at the local levels to try to get localfans on fracking in towns and villages and cities and you have seen more than 150 of those pop- up. that is being challenged in the court. so far, the courts have found that the local governments to have the ability to bend or place a moratorium on fracking. the state's highest court, the court of appeals, is expected to hear arguments on that and decided that issue once and for all later this year. host: thank you for being with us. i think it's a fascinating situation that new york and pennsylvania are taking such different approaches to this issue. differentrs philosophies you can see across a wide variety of new technologies in the energy area. there is one up or caution versus reasonable approach. the precautionary approach says we don't understand what we're doing with these chemicals and understand they could create problems. it's better for us to learn about them first and then open once we are satisfied in the political process that we have investigated the problem fully. pennsylvania and new york represents an interesting cases to watch. especially over the next year as new york prepares plan. it will be fascinating to see what they come out with. host: we're from pat next from texas, democrats line. caller: good morning, i am trying to figure out -- during the last campaign, i heard about the war on coal. is natural gas the real war on coal? using a term like the word implies there is some kind of organized intention to eliminate the resource and you mentioned coal insightful question because natural gas potentially could be the end of coal or at least the beginning of the decline of coal in this country not because anybody wants to eliminate it but because the resource by virtue of economics comes in much cheaper. for the uses we have usedcoal for like electricity generation, natural gas through combustion turbines have been very efficient and relatively low- cost and easy to install for utilities. natural gas is a big advantage over coal for many reasons. deliberatewar, i think abundant natural -- we will probably see less: the long run being installed. -- less coal being installed. has other options. they can export coal. many other places in the world are growing quickly that actually need more coal and are importing. by 2040, we could become a major exporter of natural gas. guest: that's entirely possible. if we continue on the trajectories that they have estimated, what we expect to see happen is the fracking gas will come online and -- in increasing quantities and will have more abundant natural gas at moderate prices. what happens then is if you look at the prices -- natural gas is based continental because of pipeline distributional systems. it is not shipped internationally but what we have is a lower price in north america for natural gas than what you would see in asia which might be four times as expensive. that creates a market opportunity for people who own natural gas resources here. if they can come up with a way to export that guest to asia, they can make a good profit or . we see the possibility of taking putting itnt gas and in liquid gas form and shipping it to areas that have a higher price. host: how much regulation is there on the fracking process? guest: there is some regulation already. the epa has established some regulations in the industry works under regulations that were predating the fracking process. right now, we are looking at possibilities to increase regulation on the chemicals but also on the fracking process. one of these concerns is the concern about emissions that cause global warming or climate change. problemane leakage is a that has been identified in a number of wells. we are still having an argument about how many wells and how about that problem is. that is step one is to figure out what is the problem we are dealing with. step two is that if we find there is a problem that is manageable through technological change and improve technologies, that might be something that is required of the industry to use the best available technologies to do their fracking process, much like in many parts of the country when you fill up your gas tank. there is different kinds of controls you put on the nozzle that goes into your gas tank. it is that time of approach. it's possible for some of the problems we are seeing. it's a question of investigating the problems we are looking at an assuring ourselves that we can manage them. host: where he are talking about the process known as fracking. david is from pennsylvania, good morning, from our independent line. caller: good morning and thank you for taking my call. petroleumired geologist and have done a lot of fracking across the country. there seems to be a little bit of a problem. we have been fracking wells for well over 50 years. the horizontal drilling is really new but the fracking process has been pretty well established. the one thing i would like to say is that the businesses themselves have been very disappointing as far as supporting local community efforts and really giving back to the committees. a lot of these people have come up from texas and they bring in texas folk with them and that's no problem area but they need to get out and they need to interact and may need to support the communities. they have been very poor at ,oing that so far in my opinion even though i am with them as far as fracking. the one thing i would say also is that it's very difficult to do this and do it properly without excellent supervision. regulatory bodies need to be top quality people and they need to really know what they are doing and it's very difficult when somebody gets out of college nowadays with a masters in geology and can't get -- at an oil company oil company. you can go to the state with the same qualifications and be responsible for regulating these activities and only get paid $30,000 as opposed to getting paid $100,000 privately. guest: i affirm those points made. the involvement of industry is something that i should not comment about, that is up to the industry and the local communities to hash out. it brings out a bigger question which is, looking back to other examples of rolling out new technologies and new systems into our economy and environment, what we found before is a more transparent and open this process is, generally the better it rolls out. part of the openness is engagement like this, the company to community engagement, the openness about the process, it can be other ways of reaching out and making sure that if the industry believes this is safe, they take the appropriate steps which i think they are trying to do to some degree to reach out and make that clear to the communities they are interacting with. i will leave it there. next,harry is up republican line pittsburgh. caller: get some friends together and watch "frack n ation." feetegulations are eight high. as far as the methane, there are people who did wells for water. a lot of it is caused by rotten vegetation. george washington set an area on .ire in the 1700s a railroad tanker car caught fire a couple of weeks ago and i found that warren buffett on this. that's what's stopping this pipeline. host: what would you like your guest to address? either question. caller: guest: let's talk about the methane question. a lot ofee here is concern and questions that are raised by individual cases that are anecdotal that seem to be related to the fracking process whether it is methane and water or finding contamination in groundwater. shows that this these are real problems people are having and it's important for us as a country to figure out was the source of these problems and how pervasive are they? if they are a function of the actual processes, it's a big deal. if they are a function of process that have been done incorrectly or not with best practices, that something we need to regulate. there's a couple of dimensions to this and a lot of it requires more information and study about what the frequency of these problems are. kings mountain, north carolina, next, democrats line. callerhello? go ahead. caller: i've got a different approach. trucks have a system that works on batteries but they also have hydraulic accumulators to use a hydraulic pump motor. how come we cannot go more to an efficiency approach rather than all natural gas or all fossil fuel? eventually, fossil fuels will run out. if we are using it for everything we do, it seems like it makes common sense to take an approach of fuel efficiency, job creation, and use this technology that has been developed by the epa and others. guest: that's a great question. when we look at energy security in the country, it has got to stem from maybe expansion of one resource like natural gas. that has been on its own. domesticast-growing resource that has provided some benefits and concerns our country. the real question for the national energy policy is where are we going? you have appropriately identify the big issue which is what do we want our energy mix to look like and how do we want to balance the supply side of energy with what we do to use it more efficiently and effectively? efficiency does not necessarily mean un economic. it can mean doing more with less. sometimes we find that the efficiency can go up from switching from one technology to another. we don't have time to get into it in great detail but i think it's important when we talk about fracking in our country to also put on the table the question of what can we do to use the resources we have more effectively. host: we will take one more call from bill in johnstown, new york, independent line. caller: this week, we are ourning the death of pete seeger. he sang at the president's initial inauguration with bruce springsteen, the old woody guthrie song," this land is your land. " if he were able to sing it to the president today, he would add a new verse. he did it in one concert and it had to do with fracking. e, farm google youtub aid, pete seeger expressing his opposition to fracking. would be toibute continue this fight against fracking. he realized there were many reasons it was dangerous for groundwater and for climate change. maybe the biggest danger with fracking is that maybe the thing that slows down the switch to renewables more than any other fuel because it is mistakenly being pushed by companies likebp which is the biggest gas reducer and halliburton which is the biggest fracture. --fracker. host: what about that last point? guest: i have given the perspective of looking at get a big -- at getting better information on the fuel. we are in that stage of the process now. it's a very important stage to go through. we have to make sure that people who have concerns including myself about some of the potential damages from fracking can see data and see evidence to show that it's not only safe but also manageable with a solid regulatory approach. he added a second question that is very beautifully dovetailing with the previous caller about efficiency. what impact does this have on renewables? we don't know yet. it's a very important question for how we think about our energy supply in the coming decade. some people have talked about this natural gas being a bridge to renewables for it we will use natural gas in the short term and as the renewables mature in the longer term, we will start to install them. he brought up a good alternative possibility which is rather a bridge to renewables, it's a bridge to nowhere. by having the same low-cost, you make it less profitable for renewables to make them into the market. with that, there is a good policy question of how we think about the mix of natural gas with potentially other costs along with renewables and efficiency. can support the different technologies as a country and that's where we have to start talking in the next year or so. host: nathan hultman, thank you for your time. time,e remainder of our we talk about the state department's review of the xl pipeline. itre is low impact when comes to environmental concerns pray we want to get your thoughts on g stone xl for the remainder of our time. if you have lots to share, you can give us a call. if you support the pipeline this is the number. if you oppose the pipeline, this is the number. go ahead and start making those calls now, we will get those comments and some reaction to the release of the state department report. we also want to talk about the travels of the c-span bus in college station, texas, making a visit that the george h bush presidential library and museum. joining us from the bus is warren finch who served as the director. good morning, sir. guest: good morning. host: talk a little bit about the opening of the library. have you seen a change of the 17 years? guest: it was a great day here. it seems like yesterday but it -- 1997.ack in 19 we did a does we completely redid the museum about seven years ago. we added new technology. mrs. bush have been keeping scrapbooks as she and president bush were first married emily is and we firstoks -- use those scrapbooks to redo the museum. host: if someone were to visit them all kind of information about the president with a find? unique in museum is that it talks about his entire career. we start off with his childhood, his mother and father, talk about his service in world war ii, the fact that he had so many , ambassador to the united nations, director of central intelligence, head of in the, he was in china u.s. liaison's office as we were beginning to reestablish our relationship with china, vice president, and president. about his richs and varied career. a visitor here will learn a lot about the history of what was going on in this country from before world war ii to his presidency. host: does the museum handle the gulf war? guest: we have an exhibit on the gulf war and talk about president bush building the coalition. we have a great letter he wrote to his children on the eve of the gulf war talking about how hard that decision was. he reflects about his own thoughts as a veteran of world war ii. host: as far as the actual material is concerned, how much access to the president did you in mining his past and papers for inclusion in the museum? guest: he gave us almost complete access. we were able to go through the letters he wrote home to his mom and dad during the war. we have all of his presidential and vice presidential records, his records from the rnc, his records when he was director of central intelligence a we have almost complete access. there's is not anything he told us we could not use. if we have questions, we asked him and he was happy to help in the process. host: it seems like the president has chosen the museum to be the site of his future gravesite. guest: correct, his gravesite is located here at the library. their daughter robin who they lost prior to her fourth earth day of leukemia is already buried here. host: why did the president choose to make that choice? i think he feels very comfortable here at texas a and m. although it's only a small part of the university now, it still has that military tradition. this is a great school. i have been very impressed with the students, the faculty and we have been very welcome here as has the president. of the that feeling welcoming of the university, i think that's why he wanted to be buried here. host: warren finch is the director of the bush presidential library. he is talking to us about it as part of our c-span tour bus travel. thanks for your time. guest: thank you. host: as we go back on our remaining time, we are going to talk to you about the keystone xl pipeline, your thoughts, especially in light of the review from the state department being complete. if you support the pipeline, called the top number. it, choosese the other line. it is an 11 by an environmental review of the pipeline. the bottom line is that it concludes -- oppose the xl or pipeline, we have chosen to talk about that and you can make your comments on the lines and make your comments known on twitter. up first,ou are somerset, massachusetts, good morning. morning, i am in huge support of the pipeline for many reasons. i believe our country needs to diversify energy sources. that weall, i realize are not gaining anything. some of the smog or a great deal of it that is covering los angeles comes from china. fired take down our coal- power plants, they buy them. they actually buy them and take some of the controls off if there are pollution controls on the older power plants. they dismantle those and resurrect them in china. host: cindy, illinois, opposed -- caller: good morning, i am opposed to the pipeline. from what i can see, it would have no environmental impact on the air quality. what happens when it leaks and it will leak and what will they do about that? i know of a woman in nebraska that has an organic farm and the pipelines run right over her farm. that is not fair to these people that work so hard to keep their ground natural and organic. why should we take dirty oil from canada? what don't they refine their? they can find a way to do that. i don't see any reason for us chance thing polluting our ground and groundwater. host: one of the responses was from the out knowing representative henry waxman of california. we will hear from the republican point of view later on. from laurel, maryland, the support line. caller: i believe the decision is political. like the irs, i think it has been worked. -- worked -- warped. i hear it is called the koch brothers pipeline. an from hastings, michigan on our opposed line. the reason i oppose it and i think most americans should look into this is what they will do with the oil when it is refined. almost all of it will get shipped out of this country. in 2012, the number one export out of the united states was refined gas. i live in the middle east and surges in price because i refinery shut down. are they being shut down for the exports? i agree with the previous caller. if you want to refine the oilest oil -- the dirtiest which istar sands, what if they do it in canada? because canada does not want his. people should realize this is not going to benefit the price that you pay at the pump or anything. it will benefit the oil companies for export. if they want to take canada's oil and export it that's fine, but don't drag it through the u.s. and dirty of our country. ,ost: next up is eugene philadelphia, ohio, support line. are you there? caller: yes. i support the line because of canada does not wanted, it does not matter. someone will refine it and if it goes out of the country, good, its profit for the oil companies and you don't want the rich companies to go broke because then nobody is working and nothings happening. let's get off this kick about the rich giving everything to the poor. there is no way. that's the way this country functions and it works well . nothing will hurt the environment whatsoever because if they bring it down on trains, it's more dangerous than in the pipeline. thank you. host: there are numbers being released about the republicans and democratic money being raised or the professional contest in 2014. caller: i agree completely with representative henry waxman. because tar sands is such a horror. toould like everyone to go national geographic, march, 2009 inue, all about tar sands which it is stated by scientists that after tar sands extraction, wide areas are utterly destroyed, not even a microbe can survive. immoral,ntirely wrong, unethical, and we must go green and do much more conservation. thank you. host: representative waxman is the ranking member on the energy and conservation committee. we hear from the chairman of that committee when it comes to the review -- lee is next in oklahoma, support line. caller: hello? pipelinesupport the regardless of whether this pipeline coaster or not, this oil will be used. torica needs to secure this have a more secure energy future. the reason this pipeline has not gone through is it's another nail from our president into the future of this country. i think you know what i mean. regardless, the environmentalists don't understand that they will use the oil anyway. host: yonkers, new york, matthew, opposed line. caller: thanks for taking my call. the reason why i oppose the pipeline is since the turn-of- teslantury, nicole at give us the ultimate current and said we have free radio and energy that can be extracted from anywhere. i believe that is running the earth into the ground. the baby boomers have done such a good job at digging into the ground for oil that we don't need when we can have free energy for the whole world. if there is no profit in it, companies won't allow it. for our remaining time, your thoughts on the keystone xl pipeline. this is because of the release of the environmental impact study by the state department, a decision is still yet to be made by secretary kerry on the pipeline. if you support or oppose it, let us know. we have special lines set aside. house republicans attending a retreat this week are talking about immigration. there was a release of principles when it comes to future legislative efforts and immigration. paul from iowa, support line. caller: good morning and thank you for taking my call. one thing we need to worry a little about his prioritizing our different energy sources. jimmy carter with during the first oil embargo was to prioritize coal because of its abundance. we need to use coal and oil and i think we need to use gas and i think we can use them all safely. there is always some environmental concerns in anything we do in life but i think we have to deal with those and use the resources we have and use all the resources we have. host: if you have not seen it, our story this morning about the federal report that was released by the state department. you will find that in "the new york times" this morning. up next is mitchell, san diego, california, opposed line. caller: i oppose the transportation of putrid chemicals through our heartland straight down tornado alley. we have a foreign contractor down in the gulf. we know what bp did to our golf. they are going to do the same thing in the heart of our land. we've got the canadians destroying our heartland. they are causing all kinds of problems. we have all kinds of stuff going on. i oppose this pipeline 100%. the same thing will happen that happened with bp in the gulf. braden 10, florida, support line. caller: i supported on the assumption they will lower the gas prices at the pump for the consumer. it is one thing to benefit the with ourtry and help dependency but it has yet to be seen at the pump. until gas goes down under two consumersr gallon, need relief. they have all these plans going forward and there is no results for us at the pump. that's my comment. host: the president is planning a trip to europe in march and part of that trip includes a trip to saudi arabia. johnny, from gulfport mississippi. opposed line. caller: i oppose it. i do not believe that it will lessen the gas price this year in the united states. for the most part, it will be shipped overseas. beginning,, in the they tried to excite the people of this country saying that if you don't allow the pipeline to come south, it will go through canada and be sent to china. let's send it to china like they said it was going to happen. i would love to see it go that way. thank you. host: according to "the new york times" - the decision on the process could take as long as one year. dennis from texas, support line. caller: good morning, it has been proven to have no noticeable environmental impact beyond what would happen if they don't have a pipeline. the only reasons to not build are ideological. if people don't think the government policies and policies specifically don't slow down business and cost jobs and cost this economy, look at the very nature of this process. it has taken over twice as long to approve this pipeline is any of her -- as any other pipeline and it will take another year. somebody said send it to china. that does not make any sense. this is the ideology that make no sense. will costing jobs and it slow down business and this is just a microcosm of the effect of the federal regulations, overregulation and ideology. the gentleman you had on earlier had ae discussion wonderful conversation and he made a lot of sense. it was an intelligent conversation. educational to listen to the pros and cons. there are arguments to be made on both side but ideology has no place in this. it's been a great morning on c- span. o'keefe writing about unemployment benefits -- dan from wisconsin on our opposed line. caller: thank you for taking my call. i would oppose it big-time. i oppose the use of all fossil fuels. god has given us a plant called -- the hemp plant. it produces biodiesels and would positively take us off of all fossil fuels that have destroyed our oceans and our air and destroyed our earth. nobody isinsane that talking about this. because big oil and bigp-harma have created this on thisng -- war planet. it is a non-toxic vegetable that can save our planet. all this talk about oil - host: i apologize for cutting you off. that will be the last call. leave, i want to prompt you to our first ladies series which currently runs on mondays here on c-span. the topic will be laura bush monday live at 9:00 as part of the series. we had a chance to sit down and talk with the first lady personally about life in the white house and outside. she talked about living a normal life in the white house. [video clip] >> what do we not know about the first lady and her role that you think the american -- the american public should know? guest>> i think the american puc sees the first lady and very glamorous circumstances in a state dinner at it -- with a beautiful gal or at some stage where the heads of state are -- whatever. what they may not imagine looking at the white house from the outside is that it is actually a very normal life floorss on those two that are the white house residence. first ladies actually lie on the couch and read a book. in my case, my cat would curl up next to me next to the window that everyone associates with the side of the white house. it's wonderful to sit in that window in the late afternoon when i would be waiting for george to come home from work. the sun would come in and pour across the cash. it is a nice catch to lie on and read a book. host: you will find him more during our first ladies series this coming monday on c-span live at 9:00. you can tune in and find out more on our website about the first ladies series overall. temple -- a, around roundtable discussion. we will talk about the use of executive powers by the president. at 8:45 a.m., matthew siegal, the cofounder and president of " our time." young voters in the state of the union, all that and a look at the papers and your phone calls at 7:00 tomorrow. see you then. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2014] >> today on c-span, officials testifying about worldwide security threats to the united states. the eric holder appearing before the senate judiciary committee about oversight at the justice department. later, a joint hearing of the details of the iran nuclear agreement reached in november. >> watch our program on hillary clinton today at 7:00 p.m. eastern on c-span and live monday night our series continues. >> i wrote about this extensively in my book. the whole time i was in the hospital, not injured, i had a cut on my leg and a broken ankle, i was praying t

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