Transcripts For CSPAN Washington Journal 20140402 : comparem

ryan's budget proposal unveiled yesterday. we will of live coverage on c-span 3. we want you to weigh in on the budget blueprint. republicans, (202) 585-3881. democrats, (202) 585-3880. independents, (202) 585-3882. send this a tweet or post your comments on facebook. you can also e-mail us. to give us more details about the budget unveiled by house budget chairman paul ryan, lauren french is joining us. she is the congressional reporter with "politico." $5 trillion over the next decade. how does he propose saving that much money? >> it is kind of a hodgepodge of savings. interests that the government will not save. >> we missed that little bit -- we have an audio hick up. -- hiccup. >> the budget does call for a full repeal of the health-care law. that will bring in about $1.2 trillion of savings. there will be savings from medicare changes. he is counting interest the government will not pay on the debt. there is a hodgepodge, but the big bulk of it does come from repealing the health-care law. >> how does that save so much money of democrats have said that obamacare actually reduces the deficit? i do you save money by getting rid of it? >> there will be a difference between how democrats and republicans view the savings. paul ryan says if you are not giving up the subsidies, there will be savings. the subsidies are for lower income workers. the government will give them tax credits. to offset the cost. by repealing obamacare, paul ryan said that they are saving all of that money. democrats are charging back that he is keeping all of the revenue raisers. he is going with the current revenue baseline. he is keeping obamacare revenue accounting the cost. there will be a lot of debate. whether he is counting the medical device tax, the bellybutton tax. >> i'm sure the debate will happen this morning when the house budget committee marks up this blueprint. given that the administration announced yesterday that 7.1 million americans signed up yesterday. what does paul ryan propose to do on the big entitlement programs like medicare? >> medicare is one of his biggest changes. he is re-upping a proposal he wanted to do last year, but eventually backed up on. he is going to change it to that voucher, the buy-in program. anyone who is 55 or younger will cap wrought into that -- will get brought into that. anyone 56 and over will be grandfathered into the old system. this is something that republicans have long backed. this is something that paul ryan has specifically long back. he is finally making the change of putting it in his budget. host: what about social security? guest: not mentioned much in this budget. he said that this is the republican budget, not necessarily his plan. he wanted to do broad changes that most republicans agreed on. the focus is on medicare and medicaid. host: if it is not his plan what does that mean for prospects of a getting through the house? when will that happen? guest: the markup will be this morning and it is expected to clear committee without a lot of hassle and then it will go to the floor. they expected to come up next week. they have another bill coming up this week that does budget things and then they will move to paul ryan's next week. it does look like they could possibly clear the floor. it depends on how much republicans on the really conservative side of the party throw up their arms about the spending cuts. a lot of republicans on the conservative side really did want to see higher cuts. jeff kingston came out and said he could not come out in support it yet. if they cause a little bit of a hitccup, it could cause a problem for it passing. last year, a number of republicans did not vote for the budget. it depends on what those 62 republicans do. the leadership is confident right now. you will see today how many republicans truly do have an issue with it. no one in the democratic party is going to move to support this. they have big problems with spending cuts to snap food stamps programs, to education. >>host: we are talking about the budget debate. paul ryan unveiling the republican proposal yesterday. we want you to weigh in on what you think about the numbers. republicans, (202) 585-3881. democrats, (202) 585-3880. independents, (202) 585-3882. join us on social media. twitter. post your comments on facebook. e-mail us, journal@c-span.org. it is expected to clear committee today. it goes to the house floor. not sure what the conservative house wing will do. if it does clear the house floor, what happens in the senate? >> it is doa in the senate. it does not go anywhere. even if you suspend reality and see it going forward in the senate, president obama -- that is something that would not go through the white house. it is a budget resolution. it could not actually become law. it is much more of a symbolic document, a political document for paul ryan looking to establish republican priorities and ahead of the november election. once it passes the house, it is possible that patty murray would call a vote on it. seeing that she is not even putting up budget alternative out this year, it will probably peter out. democrats will go with the agreement that paul ryan and patty murray made last year. the topline budget agreement. patty murray has said that they do not need to put out a budget because they do not need to relitigate the numbers. paul ryan and the republicans feel differently. they say they are legally obligated to put out a budget each year. host: we talked about some of the entitlement programs. what about the domestic side? guest: he is re-upping a lot of past policy proposals. there are big changes to snap programs, the food stamp programs. he is trying to change the number of students that can be on the pel grant system. he is making sure that you are more than a half-time student. education programs for research are being changed. then there is the defense spending -- which increased and this budget. he criticized the president for not reacting to the defense concerns that are still there. he has mentioned the carrier fleets and naval fleets that would be decimated if the president's budget went forward. he offered more than what was allocated in the 2011 budget control act for defense spending. host: we are getting comments on twitter. and whenedwin tweets in this. ron says -- does paul ryan tackle tax reform in his budget proposal? guest: he does. he offers a number of tax proposals. he wants to bring down top rates. he gets rid of the alternative minimum tax. he will try to make the tax filing system easier. he is condensing individual brackets. there are a lot of changes. he does not take the proposal from dave camp -- he goes a little bit differently and does drive down the rates to 25%. dave camp was unable to do that because he kept a number of deductions. you will see a number of changes to the tax code. host: here is reaction from members of congress. james clyburn said -- debbie wasserman schultz leading the effort to get democrats reelected tweeted this -- tom price, a republican from georgia who worked with paul ryan on this budget briefed reporters yesterday. here is a picture. the speaker did something a little bit different yesterday. he put this together on buzz feed. let's turn to our viewers. joe is in georgia. republican. caller: i have been calling c-span for 35 years. the problem is that we need to cut spending. our governor will cut spending in georgia and cut taxes. we are putting pressure to cut spending more. that is the problem. host: what do you think? paul ryan's budget? is that enough? caller: i think it needs to be more. republicans need to do a better selling job. we owe $17 trillion for our children and grandchildren to pay. it is good, but it is not enough. that is what we need to do, cut spending more. host: should they vote no on the house floor? caller: i think they should. we need to get a lot more spending cuts. that is what i hear from americans. cut spending. we need to cut spending a lot more. host: springfield, virginia. democratic caller. caller: hello? host: you are on the air. caller: yeah, i will say that paul ryan's proposal is a joke. it tells you everything about the republican party. they have not done anything for this country. this is what they have been doing. it always takes a democrat to save this country. host: what specifically are you saying here that you don't like? caller: you can't create a budget and undercut the same people that this budget is supposed to help. the poor, the needy. there are two things that bring a nation into livelihood. education and health care. let me tell you one thing about this president. when obama said he was running for president, they say he is too black to be president. he ran against all the odds. don't tell him he can't do anything. they said, he can't get health care passed. now we have health care. one thing i would ask for the president to focus on is education. republican cutting has nothing to do with it for this country. all they do is go to war. they will bring this country to its knees. host: charlie in maryland. caller: good morning, ladies. i wanted to point out that after lauren said that the conservative wing of the party would not like the spending cuts , that that is one of two reasons that the conservative wing does not like ryan's budget. the second reason is that the ryan budget is a gimmick. who puts out a ten-year budget and who will commit to that? it is not much different than the attempts to repeal obamacare. the conservative wing was greatly against those attempts because they were a façade, a gimmick, a trick to get reelected. host: on twitter -- brooklyn, new york. republican caller. caller: yes hi. paul ryan did not mention anything about reopening the white house to visitors and the children. i think it is kind of important. i was thinking maybe he can hire the navigators that he hired for the aca to come in there and do some work and get it open. host: robert, houston, texas. caller: good morning. i would like to make some comments about the paul ryan budget. i think that, as usual, the republicans are going to defend the people at the top and take money from the people at the bottom. why he wants to reduce food stamps, but at the same time we out to be looking at why the tax code is so set up that it reflects the problems that we have with respect to collecting enough taxes. 25 years ago, corporations used to generate 20%-25% of the taxes collected. today, they generate less than 10%. it is paul ryan and his friends -- if they had anything to do with it, they would like to reduce it farther. host: lauren french, back to you. does paul ryan talk about poverty issues in the budget? does he talk about corporate taxes? guest: he does mention a few policy oriented programs, as well as corporate taxes. he wants to and corporate subsidies for energy producers. the governments pence $200 billion on tax credits for corporations. he wants to cut back on those due to nuclear energy. he has various other proposals aimed at poverty. proposals on the earned income tax credit. he has talked heavily about that. making it so that more people can claim that tax credit, which is one of those that republicans and democrats do agree lifts children out of poverty. there are some proposals and their about the tax could. the bulk of this budget does focus more on medicare and the banner numbers driving the top rates down to 25% and making the rest of the rates more compact. host: here is what nancy pelosi had to say yesterday after the unveiling of the republican budget. [video clip] >> today, the republicans put forth their budget. it is not about growth, it is not about job creation. it voucher rises medicare -- voucherizes medicare, weakening that opportunity for america's citizens. as we go forward, we will talk about the affordable care act. the question now is about the president's budget, which is about education and job growth and the future and the investment for the future and science and technology and the rest versus a budget that takes us backwards. it has a poverty of ideas that is really stunning. host: nancy pelosi outside the white house yesterday talking about paul ryan's budget. republicans will use this as a political document to run on for the next round of elections. the democrats plan to use it as well? guest: absolutely. their economic message will be their strongest going into the midterm elections. they plan to focus on how democrats are better for the economy, job growth, middle and lower income workers. that is going to be an essential argument for there's in the midterm election -- their's in the midterm election. medicare will be a big talking point for democrats. they view privatization is selling out older americans s. you will hear those talking points as you head into the midterms over and over again. they are looking to hold onto vulnerable seats and possibly pick up seats. they want to double up on the success they had last year. they want to protect the senate. the best way they feel they can do that is really hammering republicans on the economic message. guest: paul ryan puts out the budget every year because he is the house budget chairman. for those who know him, he is a very wonky guy. he loves getting into the details. he really enjoys doing it. it is not a shock to any of us. he is going after the ways and means committee next. he likes the numbers and likes making them fit. he is absolutely an expert on capitol hill. democrats might agree with his opinions, but when it comes to budget, he does know his stuff. because of his chairmanship, that is why it is always paul ryan. host: we are getting your thoughts on paul ryan's budget proposal unveiled yesterday. $5 trillion over 10 years. it will be marked up today in the house budget committee. we have 20 minutes or so left. the "wall street journal" editorial board weighs in. his budget highlights the fiscal damage from slow economic growth. the big and the bad news has been the downshifting economic growth estimates. cbo predicted average annual growth of 3% per decade. they cut the growth to 2.9%. it is also a reflection of the new normal of obama-nomics. the other notable difference is on defense. ryan's budget has enough to keep the army at current strength instead of cutting it by 80,000. the "wall street journal" applauding ryan's budget. "the new york times" also weighs in. host: glenn in lancaster, california. caller: good morning. i think we should raise tariffs on everything coming in from foreign countries and stuff the black market. we should create american-made jobs for the american citizens and help all american people with raising tariffs up to about 48% from what it is now. the american people can do it, we are not lazy, we work hard. i have forked hard all my life. host: danny in south carolina. caller: how are you doing? good morning. host: you are on the air. caller: i was calling about paul ryan. i totally disagree with them. i am a man who has done pretty good in life. he want to cut programs that hurt the poor people. he wants to cut food stamps. people need food stamps. what he want to cut things that hurt people that need help? that is all the republicans want to do. republicans want to cut and hurt poor people. host: montgomery, alabama. caller: i am calling to talk about the budget. the gop does ocp. if anybody has ever seen "robocop." they privatize everything. they try to take all of our money and give it to the rich people in subsidies and tax cuts. i have been saying this for years now. that is all they have been trying to do. stop voting for them. don't let them fool you. they're all for the same thing. do not vote for the gop members. period. host: the paul ryan budget includes repealing some of the benefits under the affordable care act. president obama yesterday announced that 7.1 million americans have signed up in the first enrollment period. "the washington post" has a map inside the newspaper. the 25 cities the obama administration targeted for the affordable care act. the green states are on the federal exchanges. the gray states are state run exchanges. you can see the major cities that the obama administration focused on to try to reach this number. "the new york times" says this about the affordable care act. that is from "the new york times" this morning. we will talk about that coming up with lawmakers on "washington journal." a little bit from president obama yesterday at the white house talking about the new numbers. [video clip] >> i want to make sure that everybody understands that in the months and years ahead, i guarantee you there will be additional challenges. there will be days when the website stumbles. i guarantee you. press, i want you to anticipate there will be some moment when the website is down and i know what will be on all of your front pages. it is going to happen. it won't be news. [laughter] there will be parts of the law that will stoneleigh to be improved. -- that will need to be improved. if we can keep this from being gridlock, we could make the law work better for everybody. [applause] we are excited about the prospect of doing that. we are game. host: president obama talking about 7.1 million americans who signed up for health insurance on healthcare.gov. he will be traveling to michigan today to push for a hike in the minimum wage. "the washington times" front page has this headline. this will be added to the debate about whether or not to increase the minimum wage. we are getting your take. we have 15 minutes left on the budget proposal. paul ryan says it will say $5 trillion, repeal the affordable care act. frank in north dakota. democratic caller. caller: this guy has not done anything for five years. what has he done? repeal, repeal repeal. get rid of him. the bastard. host: edward. caller: i have been listening to comments about the paul ryan budget. the president has been in charge for5 five years. the stock market is doing great. the people getting wealthiest of the wealthy. they are not being penalized or suffering anything from what policies are coming down the line. but it is making the middleman the one that does the hiring and firing, real skittish. paul ryan's budget would be better if the government said, if you pay taxes fine. if you don't pay any taxes, you will not go and get a refund from the government. since the government is $17 trillion in debt, the earned income credit -- if you did not pay anything in the, you should not be getting anything back. i mean, obama, his policies tend to be helping the really really, really rich than the poor or the middle class. host: vivian in tennessee. democratic caller. caller: over the last five years, they promised to create jobs. they have not created one job. they are taking away from the average person. if we get a petition to cut congress' salary and let them live on minimum wage and see how it helps -- they want to take away from people. when it comes up for war, they are ready to send money to ukraine. they do not want to help the people who work for unemployment. that is the money the people work for. the budget does not do anything to help the average person. it is time america wake up. poor republicans, poor democrats, poor independents. they do not care about you. they only care about the rich. host: the house approved money for aid to ukraine yesterday. 378-34 approved a measure that passed in the senate and will go to the president's desk for his signature. $1 billion in loan guarantees and new sanctions on russia. the bill authorizes $50 million to support fair elections and to support the fight of corruption in the ukraine. silver city, nevada. independent caller. caller: thank you. i will tell you the truth, it does not matter. republicrat or democron -- nobody is talking about ending the government welfare program for our nation's program. nobody is seriously considering not playing the world's police force in bringing our military back to the u.s., where it belongs. these alone would get us out of this economic crisis. i don't see it happening. thank you. host: mississippi, democratic caller. caller: thank you for taking my call. i just want to bring up a fact that the republicans should have learned from the last election. if you mess with people's social security, you lose elections. fact number two is that if the republicans were to view the past history of countries who suppress the poor and the working poor to the point of starvation and deny them human treatment, it ended up in revolutions. example, the french revolution. take a look at the history. host: twitter -- we are getting your thoughts this morning. keep calling in. republicans, (202) 585-3881. democrats, [indiscernible] ♪ ♪ ♪ (202) 585-3880. independents, (202) 585-3883. what this paul ryan say in his budget on medicare? guest: medicare, he proposes broad changes to how it is operated. in 2024, when his changes would go into place, it would make it so that anyone 55 and younger would buy into a private medicare program. it would no longer be government run. they would be selecting from voucher programs, private programs. anyone 56 and over would be grandfathered into the program. that is a big change for republicans and democrats. this was a focal point in the 2012 election. you had barack obama and mitt romney debating the social programs for this country. democrats it republicans about wanting to privatize medicare. democratic leaders are hoping to improve on and use this in the 2014 midterm elections, talking about republicans wanting to privatize medicare. they will pounce on this proposal from paul ryan. right now, the budget -- everyone it knowledge is that this program needs to be reformed. paul ryan is taking that first step, in his opinion. when it comes to seniors, you have aarp coming out against the paul ryan budget because there is so much political hay around changing medicare and it is such a vulnerable program and it is one that so many seniors rely on and people accounting to rely on. low and middle income earners who do not have enough saved for retirement really count on that. it is a very emotional issue for democrats and republicans. the caller was right that in 2000 well president obama made a lot of political headlines saying that -- bashing romney and ryan for wanting to privatize obamacare. host: speaking of wall street, here is a story from the associated press. goes on to for those of you that lived through that, remember the keating fives, it cost taxpayers $2.6 billion. back to the ryan budget. maryland, democratic caller. caller: excuse me. good morning. thank you for taking my call. it is funny that paul ryan has come back with the same budget that was dead on arrival with more than half of the country and the democrats. here we are again. this one will not get resolved until the next election. what a really think is that the other caller stated before is that poor americans, whatever party, need to be prepared. this thing over in russia with putin acting like hitler taking over countries is going to start a war. the rich need to accept the fact that you need to raise the taxes to start having a positive cash flow and orprepare to stop the next war in europe. host: larry. last caller. caller: i keep hearing these people calling and they keep talking about republicans want to cut medicare and social security. i have been on this earth a long time and the only time i have ever seen medicare and social security cut we had a democrat president, barack obama, a democrat congress and a democrat senate. we did not get a raise on social security for two years and the cup medicare to pay for these illegal aliens to have insurance. thank you. host: lauren french. what we you be watching for today? guest: i will be watching for how many republicans on the budget committee talk about the spending cuts. if there is anyone with -- and was uncomfortable with how low the cuts are. there are some republicans who will want more. on the democratic side you will see them testing outlines for the midterms and testing out response lines for the response to the paul rudd should buy it -- paul ryan budget. host: lauren french congressional reporter with "politico." thank you very much. host: thanks for having me. --guest: thanks for having me. host: we will have coverage on c-span 3 today if you want to watch that debate. that is this morning at 10:30 a.m. eastern time. we will continue talking about this and other issues with representative tim griffin. then we will talk with ben cardin. first, we want to show you a little bit of yesterday's hearing with mary barra. that is the front page of "the wall street journal." the front page of "the richmond times dispatch." also, the business day section of "the new york times" says this. mary barrara offered scant new information. here is a little bit of yesterday's testimony of the gm ceo, mary barra. [video clip] >> thank you. my name is mary barra and i and the chief executive officer of general motors. i appreciate the opportunity to be here today. more than a decade ago, gm embarked on a small car program. sitting here today, i cannot tell you why it took so long for safety defects to be announced for this program. i can tell you that we will find out. this is an extraordinary situation. it involves vehicles we no longer make. it came to light on my watch, so i am responsible for resolving it. when we have answers, we will be fully transparent with you, with our regulators, and with our customers. while i cannot turn back the clock, we acted without hesitation. we told the world we had a problem we needed to fix. whatever mistakes were made in the past we will not shirk from our responsibilities now and in the future. we will do the right thing. that begins with my sincere apologies to everyone who has been affected by this recall. especially the families and friends who lost their lives or were injured. i am deeply sorry. >> we have to remember two things, i think. we are there because we were attacked in new york city and 3000 americans were murdered. that is why we went to afghanistan to get those people who were killing us. second president obama has said there is a limit to this. i agree with you that at some point you have to let them do it. but our first goal, if we get away from the afghans and look at what our first goal was, if i had told you or any of the listeners that in 2001, that we would not be attacked again in the united states of america for the next decade, none of us would have believed that. at that point, al qaeda had more of the advantage. now we really have al qaeda and the terrorists on the defensive. we can, at this point, get out most of our forces from afghanistan. i agree with you. but we have been successful in what we really wanted to do as a country. and that is to protect ourselves. >> vietnam veteran bing west will take your questions. "in-depth depth" live for three hours on sunday. >> "washington journal" continues. host: we are back with congressman tim griffin, a republican from arkansas on the ways and means committee. let's talk about paul ryan's budget. it included a repeal of benefits under the affordable care act. that unveiling comes as the president announced 7.1 million americans signing up in the and roman period. i want to get your reaction to what the president had to say. guest: if you look at what he had to say, the bottom line is that this has made health care better. that is not what i am hearing in arkansas. we have had numerous witnesses before our committee, including the head of cms, secretary sibelius, when we asked questions about the number of enrollees, they had no idea. they could not provide us any information. i don't know who the 7 million includes or who it doesn't. it does not surprise me that when people are required to sign up, that they'll timidly sign up. the problem with obamacare is that instead of just addressing the people it needed access to health care. in the process of doing that, it messed it up for a bunch of other people. i was getting on a plane in chicago last week on thursday and as i got on, the guy standing near the entrance to the plan where you leave your carry-on bags, he was grabbing the luggage and taking it down and putting it under the plan. i guess he recognized a pen or something and we started talking about what i do and he said keep fighting in there. he said, my health care has doubled in cost. i did not know the guy. i suspect that he is not getting rich doing the job that he is doing. he is getting hit by this. of the 7 million, the question is how many of these people are ones that did not have access to insurance in the first place? there is a study out today. forbes reported that may only one third of these people did not have health care in the first place. the administration took away people's health care so that they could get them to sign back up and claim credit for the success. that is ridiculous. at the end of the day, this is a washington -- we're going to organize it from washington, dictated, go top down -- that is what this approach is. fundamentally, that is the core problem. i am happy to talk more about it. host: let's hear what the president had to say yesterday at the white house. [video clip] >> wire folks working so hard for people not to have health insurance? why are they so mad about the idea of people having health insurance? many of the tall tales that have been told about this law have been debunked. there is still no death panels. [laughter] armageddon has not arrived. instead, this law is helping millions of americans. in the coming years, it will help millions more. i have said before, i will always work with anyone who is willing to make this law work even better. but the debate over repealing this law is over. [applause] the affordable care act is here to stay. host: congressman tim griffin. he says the debate over repealing it is over. paul ryan's budget would repeal it, but does not replace it. guest: lots to talk about there. let me roll through some of these. first of all, he said that people are mad, they are angry him of they are against people having access to health care reform. that is completely ridiculous. i would go so far as to say the president of the united states is just unserious with a comment like that. that is best placed between the ferns on saturday night live. he wants to posit a false choice. obamacare were nothing. -- or nothing. if you are not for obamacare, in his mind then you are for nothing. that is a false choice. there are many, many different options. we have several bills and the house, one by chairman tom price , who is a physician. the republican study committee has a bill. there were over 200 health care related bills. he said something in that quote which he needs to be called out on. the president has said that he will meet with anybody, do anything at any time to improve the law, to improve health care. he made that comment back in december. i wrote a letter and i got 33 of my colleagues to sign onto it. we did not talk about repealing anything in that letter. although i am for repealing obamacare. the letter was about a number of things that we can do on health care, expand the use of hsa's, competition across state lines, high risk pools, etc. we sent that letter and said, mr. president, you said you will meet with anybody at any time. we sent a letter in december, we give the president until after christmas, came back from christmas, not one word from the white house on it. then, the president reiterated almost that exact same quote that is a talking point, as part of the politics. he used that same quote in the state of the union. almost precisely the same quote. what did we do? every day, we put out a press release. we said we want to hear. we are up to 113 days since he first made that offer. he made it again yesterday. i understand that as long as there is an individual with the last name obama, that he is not going to sign a repeal of obamacare. i understand that. i have voted numerous times to repeal it. i understand that he is not going to sign that. the bottom line is that he has made this offer, but he has not been willing to me with me or any of the other 34. host: let's talk about the budget proposal put out by chairman paul ryan yesterday. most of the savings are coming from the repeal of the affordable care act. doesn't go far enough? guest: sure. i will support this budget. i have supported every one of them. the first question is, what are the alternatives? the senate does not have a budget. the president's budget has garnered either the exact budget or a form of it that was voted on the house or senate. it has gotten a grand total of zero votes, combining the democrat senate and the republican house, maybe one or two, hero there. as a general matter, the president's budget is not an option. this is a budget we will pass. this is a responsible budget. i heard some of the calls people talking about this and that. that they don't like. i really believe that the worst thing, the worst thing we could do for folks who are struggling, the worst thing we could do for the job market, the worst thing we could do for this country is to say, you know what, budget still matter, let's just spend whatever it takes and when things crash, they crash. that is what a lot of those folks that i heard calling in -- it seems to me that that is the only other alternative. because the amount of flexibility that we have -- i brought a little chart -- the amount of flexibility we have within the budget shrinks every year because what we call mandatory spending continues to grow. i call it the pac-man problem. i haven't pac-man chart. -- i have a pac-man chart. that chart shows that the investment money, the money we call discretionary spending, is under intense pressure because of the yellow. the yellow is composed of mandatory spending. the interest on the debt continues to grow. we are at basically zero interest rates and it is still $250 billion per year in interest. this budget increases spending. and medicaid, medicare. what it does only in washington is an increase in spending to cut. where i am from, if you have more in each consecutive year, that would not be a cut, that would be an increase. in washington, if the increase is not as big as people thought it might be, that is a cut. that is ridiculous. what this does is it slows the increase. there is a continued increase on the budgets. host: the new york times editorial board says this about the proposal on medicare. it would become a voucher program by 2024. it would allow them to choose between a fixed payment and a private plan. guest: a couple of things. first of all, it does not surprise me they do not like the republican budget. they made their views clear on this ryan budget and all the other ryan budget. the bottom line, the first of all call it a voucher system. ever since premiums for came out from the republican side, it has been called a voucher system. it is not a voucher system. premium sport is what federal employees have. it is where there is a system generally managed by the federal government but a certain part of the premium is paid for. that is what we have advocated for all along. a lot of folks i talked with have not heard this but, if you go back to the clinton medicare commission in 1998 and 1999, it was headed by senator john breaux of louisiana, a democrat. and congressman bill thomas, a republican of california. there is a now famous op-ed for people who follow medicare reform. it basically said premium support is the way to go, and premium support is not a voucher system. i have seen journalists lazily call it a voucher system. it is not. it is a system that has worked for federal employees until obamacare came along. they had the same federal employee health care plan, that structure, where you choose the private market. it is only the private market that is this a premium -- private market plan. you can see it in use everyday. >> let's go to calls. a republican caller from north carolina. caller: my husband and i reapplied under the health-care law. [indiscernible] only family. the joke is on them. i hate to say it, osama bin laden had his last last speech. i think obama is the huge surprise. guest: i do not know about your particular health care situation. i hear from constituents, eyelids and represent central arkansas. i can find and you could find individuals who have had really bad experiences on this. the president said they are not true or made up. he should visit arkansas. he has not once. he ought to come down and see senator pryor, who voted for it, and some others here it you can certainly find people who do not have -- find health care and now have it. in his pursuit of helping that relatively small percentage, it messed that up for so many other millions. you do not judge whether this multitrillion dollar law is a good law bad law, because you found somebody who is helped. the point is there are ways to lower calls and expand access to health care without messing it up for everybody that liked what they had. that is the core problem. that is before you get into things like -- and maybe we will talk about this -- the 30 hour work week. 50 employees and above requirement under the law before the mandate. that is before you get into those in the impact on the job market. >host: you shouldn't be talking about reducing debt and spending -- guest: i do not know what subsidies. i was looking at the facts on our budget and there was no one and more corporate welfare than pauline -- paul ryan. he takes it on we take it on, i do not know if yes then following -- he has been following. one of the key components of our tax reform is to eliminate a bunch of the provisions for special interests in an attempt to streamline and simplify the task. i do not see that as a valid point. in terms of reducing the spending again, from a washington perspective, it is a reduction in spending. in real terms, it is not a reduction. it is a slowing of growth. i was talking to one of my staff guys on the way over here. we have been talking about the problem with our debt, the out of balance of our budget, for years. we have been talking about this. we have been talking about the consequences. we have been seeing the consequences. that is part of the reason we are lagging behind economically. do we really believe all these fundamentals can be the way they are and there would be zero impact to spending and our economy? that we can just keep on going? i have a four-year-old and a six-year-old. plenty of blame to go around over the last 10 or 20 years or whatever. this president has taken it to the major leagues. since i got here, we have reduced spending for the first time since two years straight since the korean war. that is something to be proud of because we are in a situation where if we do not address this, our interest rates will go up credit ratings could potentially be lowered, interest rates go up, which makes housing harder to buy, which makes the economy slowdown, which makes job growth more difficult. we get so focused on the washington part of the debate. if we do not fix these fundamental problems, it will impact our jobs. i would ask the caller, have you been seeing what is going on in other parts of the world? the number one priority of the federal government is to protect its citizens. national security. if you are looking at the slides from a few minutes ago we always need to be looking for places to do better with spending. the autopilot spending is what jives the debt, ultimately. we always need to be looking anywhere to spend more wisely. no doubt about it. this federal government spends on wisely in many years. i have been vocal about the department of defense having to spend more wisely. i believe we need to also be ready to protect the country. host: we will go to steve next in hartford, connecticut. a democratic caller. caller: how long can congress turned its back on americans who know -- destroyed building seven on 911 2001 and who are demanding a new invest gauge and into the evidence that is doses brought the building down. host: this is part of a group of people who do not believe the investigation into what happened on september 11, 2001, they do not trust what the government has put out. have you looked into it and do you want to respond? guest: i was an american in america on 9/11 and have read every article and everything i could since it happened that i remember it everywhere i was. i saw the planes go into the building spirit i served in iraq. in 2006. i'm still in the armed forces. a lieutenant colonel in the army reserve. with all due respect to this gentleman, i disagree with him. host: trisha, indiana independent caller. caller: good morning. i would like to have questions -- concerning health care, our insurance is getting to the point where the premiums were going to be affordable very quickly year after year after year, before the affordable health care went into effect. what are you going to do to help the situation of ever increasing costs of health care. what is congress doing to take on that problem? how can we afford -- i know we need to support the people of crimea -- but how can we afford if our budget is in such a mess how can we afford to spend money over there when we are finding ways to cut from americans who need our help? guest: i will take the second one first. it sounds like you believe this and i certainly believe every single dollar we spend on any type of or and eight has to be looked at with increased scrutiny. when you look at foreign aid some were spent wisely and some were not. the foreign aid to israel, for example, that is money well spent. the investment in our strategic partner defense, to our benefit many times over. that is actually a good investment. in that case, we are talking about billions of dollars through an agreement with israel. in the ukraine if you are talking about the package last night, those are called loan guarantees him a which would not mess fairly result in spending. minimal compared to the foreign assistance budget. some direct assistance, 150 million within m which is certainly a lot of money to me. put in the broader context, that is money wells and considering what is going on in the ukraine. we have to look at every dollar spent on foreign assistance and we cannot group it all together and say it is all good or all bad. you have to look at each individual use and say, is this a good use or not. the entire foreign affairs and foreign assistance budget is about one percent. we certainly need to spend wisely, but it is not what is driving the debt. in terms of health care and making health care more affordable, a lot of is argue the reason some individuals did not have health care before the affordable care act is because -- there were a number of people who could not afford it. instead of saying, we are going to give you access to expensive health care that costs more than it should, and we will do that by making other people pay for it and increasing their premiums, what we should have done is look for ways to reduce the cost and by reducing the costs, you automatically increase access. that is what a lot of us have been talking about. also, giving people more choice. a lot of the stuff we advocate for is not going anywhere as long as the president is in the white house. one of the things we have talked about, instead of having three or four or five insurance options in your state where you cannot choose an option outside of your state line, we talked about having interstate competition, so if you are at your home, not only would you have the option of looking at insurance plans in your state which may be relatively limited in terms of the number of insurance providers, but you can sit back and say, wait a minute. there is a plan in oregon. there is a plan in california, connecticut, or wherever. that fits my particular needs. we have long advocated for that sort of competition, which a lot of us believe would be one way to help. a lot of it, too, is preventative care. there is a small percentage of americans that drive a very large percentage of the health care cost. that is a well-documented fact. i think you are absolutely right to be focusing on the cost element. if we reduce the cost element then you automatically make health care more accessible. >> judy next, a republican caller. go ahead. caller: can he tell me how many presidents in the past have acted like obama, forcing the government people to take his way or hit the road? when are we going to stop putting up with his lies? demanding the american people, his way or hit the road. thank you. guest: thank you for your call. one thing i left out of the last thing, i want to mention, the lady specifically mention the cost of medical devices. i would point out to her, and there have been a lot written on this, one of the boneheaded ideas, it may have come out of congress, at some point was this idea of medical device taxes. eventually, it ended up in the affordable care act. i am not sure whose idea it was. what it ultimately does is raise the cost of medical devices. we, republicans and democrats, have talked about repealing that. at some point, there may have even been some voices at the white house who favored some sort of deal that would repeal that in exchange for something else. there is widespread recognition that raising taxes on medical devices increases the cost and may decrease the research and innovation. as to the last caller, i think while it is true all presidents want to use the executive powers given to them, and some more than others push the envelope, i think this president has pushed it beyond tearing. i will give you one example, not even related to obamacare. last summer, the administration decided they would waive the work requirement in the welfare law signed into law by president clinton. bipartisan piece of legislation. they did it unilateral. without congress being involved. a lot of us said, wait a minute we looked at it and it was interesting. his own motors -- lawyers had previously said in a legal opinion we do not have the legal ability to do that. if we do that without congress, we are violating the law. that was thethat was the obama administration's own attorneys. at some point, they decided, it was something they wanted to do. they just proceeded with it. we passed a bill to correct that. it is one example. it is hard to count, thirtysomething or whatever it is, there have now been administrative changes to obamacare. i have to of can we say -- i have to and -- i half jokingly say people repealing obamacare is president obama. he has done it in chunks and a little bit here and a little bit there. he is not doing it does he want to repeal it permanently. he is trying to repeal it before the election temporarily. so the elections go more smoothly for him. that is why these are temporary a year postponement, an extension here and there. there may be a few of those that they have the administrative power to do without congress but the vast majority of them are being done without authority and are illegal. host: on twitter -- guest: it respects the caps that were set. that is the other thing. i know the democrat talking points are trying to demonize paul ryan, paul ryan is one of the nicest, kindest, most genuine and knowledgeable folks you will meet. he was obviously able to work across the aisle. it was not perfect but it was a bipartisan budget in a divided town. that is a big deal. he did that last year. but it does respect that. i am going to stay out of that fight for now. at least one other fend -- france -- i do not want to speak out of turn, but i think it was subcommittee chairman brady who indicated an interest in it. i think that is right. that is something that will happen later on. i and not running for reelection i am running for lieutenant governor in arkansas. i will not be a part of that on the committee. it has been the honor of a lifetime to serve in congress. and to serve on the house ways and means committee with dave camp. hopefully, we will get to say a few words about them before i get out of here. >> npr has the story since you're running for lieutenant governor. to raise the minimum wage in that state, the state has one of the lowest minimum wages in the country. guest: from a federal perspective, i have been outspoken because study after study, -- a lot of times a right-leaning group will say this. this is an area where it is pretty wide agreement that you have a trade-off with raising the minimum wage. you may raise the wage for some individuals, but you also may decrease the number of jobs. we have seen a cbo report out on that recently. they basically came out and said, one of the ideas floated by the president yes it will give people more change in their pocket but some people will end up with no change in their pocket because it will reduce jobs. ultimately, the cure for our fiscal problems certainly we need to be more responsible with our spending but the cure to our fiscal problems and the cure to the many folks unemployed and long-term unemployed is growing. in both instances, the same principles apply. host: in the ryan budget, -- because of the changes to the system? guest: no, i think you would still have to pay is my understanding. you would still be in medicare. you would just have the option between traditional medicare and a premium support model. he took a lot of living for this after he did it. a democrat last congress reached out or have been working with congressman ryan. and endorsed some of these ideas. he signed onto a bill was chairman ryan and basically said hey, some of the ideas on medicare reform are good ideas. my position, personally, has been medicare is going bankrupt. we know that. it is not debatable. i asked myself, what are the options? i concluded the only thing completely off the table for me is the status quo. the status quo means bankruptcy of medicare. when you hear people say, so and so -- and you will see the ads -- so and so wants to change medicare as we know it, well, if you are not for changing medicare as we know it then you are advocating for the bankruptcy. the only way to save it is to change it. senator lieberman, a longtime democrat nominee, became an independent and the president in july 2011, basically said, we have two make a change to medicare. the bottom line is tom a i am happy to talk about any ideas you have on how to save medicare. one thing that is completely unacceptable is to do nothing, to just say to leave it as it is. if you leave it as it is, you've declared war on medicare, it will go bankrupt, and. host: i want to get your thoughts on the safe american workers act. that is expected to go to a vote this week there what will it do you go? guest: obamacare basically sets a full work week at 30 hours. last time i checked, 30 hours is not a full work week in american culture and in most cases of american law. even in france, 35 hours is a full work week and they are thinking about moving it to 40. the obama administration set a full work week at 30 hours for obamacare. we had a stanford x for -- expert and i asked him where the 30 hours came from and he said i think he picked it out of the air. we would move it to 40 and make it work week truly 40 hours. the problem is, we had some really insightful hearings on this. the obama administration with obamacare, they profess by moving a full work week to 30, the stated goal was to give more people insurance. what they ended up doing is getting people moved to 29 hours, because these were part-time people anyway. they do not have insurance and they're losing their jobs. host: a piece where they cite a cbo report where they found in conjunction with the joint committee in taxation, reported that one million workers under the save american workers act would lose their work based insurance policies and half would be forced into either an ac a plan, medicaid -- talking about how they had to lay people off. because of all of the benefits that came with hitting 30 hours a week, and basically what they said was, we had people we were providing some assistance to and they had a job. and now they will be out of a job. you have an instance where you are trying to help the person a little bit and the unintended consequence is to get them laid off. i think if you peel back the numbers, you will see this has actually hurt jobs. lots if they want 30, why not 20? why not 10? in what world is 30 hours a full work week? i grew up thinking it was 40 and are never heard anyone say it was 30. if they think 30 is helping, why not make it 10 hours a week. there is a reason. they tried to get away with whatever they would get away with. we know traditionally 40 hours beyond 40 hours, and you get overtime. this is what people dislike about washington. washington will tell you this guy is -- the sky is red when we all say it is blue. washington says 30 hours is a full work to get every american most around, going, 30 hours is a full work week? welcome for the purposes of this law. let's have a little common sense. >> thank you for your time this morning. appreciate it. >> thank you for your time this morning. appreciate it. coming up next, we will talk with the maryland democratic senate were -- senator ben cardin. later, we continue to look at the news with peace, folks in alzheimer's disease. all that after a news update from c-span radio. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2014] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] >> violence in afghanistan today. six police on that after a suicide bombing officials say the senator ben cardin suicide bomber struck the entrance gate of a compound. it is the latest in the wave of violence as the taliban threatens to disrupt this week elections. turning to the ukraine, congress sent president obama a drill for $1 billion. it also takes punitive measures against russia for annexation as part of the soviet republic. the bill passed with bipartisan support. the russian price increase for natural gas supplies for the ukraine is bringing pledges of help for the united states and the european union. the west is vowing to help the ukraine reduce its dependence on russia for energy supplies. they're trying to provide alternate gas sources. this just in, they ousted ukrainian president yanukovych is calling crimea a tragedy. those are some of the latest headlines from crimea. >> sometimes we spend so much time line nine the wizard -- the winners and labeling the losers, we lose the victory we all share. the power belongs not to a political party but the people. the margin, no matter the majority. all across the world from bosnia to south africa, people laid down their lives for the kind of void we take for granted. a transfer of power is an act of pain and carnage not one of peace and decency. here in the house of representatives, for 219 years longer than any democracy in the world how we heed the people's voice of peace and civility and respect, faith and friendship, and the deepest respect, you're now my speaker and let the great debate begin. i have the distinct privilege to present to the house of representatives our news feed there, the gentleman from georgia, new anchorage area -- newt gingrich. [applause] >> find more highlights from 35 years of house coverage on our faith. c-span, rated by america's cable companies 35 years ago. washington journal continues. host: senator ben cardin back at our table this morning. the white house yesterday announced this 7.1 million signed up for this enrollment time. what is your reaction? >> the numbers are good. it is unusual to hit the projected numbers in enrollment in the first year. the numbers are still coming in and many people are still in line. it is not include the medicare to -- expansion. many more people have quality health coverage that did not have it. affordable health coverage. i think it is working. we are now seeing more people benefiting from the affordable care act. class vocal on health care, the congressman focused seeing more people benefiting from the affordable care act. class vocal on health care, the congressman focused his attention on it. he tweeted -- guest: more and more people who have enrolled, there were people who did not have insurance before. some people improve their coverage and that is true. people paid their premiums. more and more people are paying. we will see the exact numbers as time goes on, but clearly, as the problems were worked out in the rollout of the exchanges more and more people have found that the information about the exchanges, found out they are affordable recognize they can get restrictions on pre-existing conditions, and there is no risk of bankruptcy. as more people found out about it these people are a lot of younger people enrolled, and people are paying premiums and are thankful for the coverage. host: your colleague tweeted this out -- guest: i find it amazing. the opponents of president obama and the affordable care act, we need to move on. we should celebrate it is working. we should all be together to say we want to get more people affordable quality and health coverage. we want people to benefit and we want the system to work. why aren't we working to help americans and help reduce the cost of health care and keep people well? host: there is a new step they say needs to be focused on. they say this -- guest: the baltimore sun had a great editorial. it is great people are in rolled but the costs, can we get a delivery system that makes sense. can we keep people from readmissions to hospitals. the strength of the affordable care act, we now have more people in the system, less people who have to use emergency room's, more people who can get wellness and preventive care it produces the highest quality of care reduce it for all americans in a more affordable way. that is the real challenge. host: what is going on with the maryland exchange? a state run exchange. after two years and millions of dollars, and instead go with a new one. guest: the rollout was terrible. governor o'malley acknowledged that. i think it makes sense. they waited for the open enrollment time to end. they will now put in a platform that provides better and friendlier service. it makes sense to change. host: maryland was one of 14 states that decided to create their own exchange. it what gives you confidence scrapping it and starting new will work? guest: i was at a fair over the weekend where people were signing up and growth for the system. we were hit in our overall numbers because of the medicare expansion. we will get people not covered before, but a lot more people in maryland really need to be covered and need a more friendly way to get their information and people now in the exchange will need information in a friendlier way than our current website allows. host: how much more money do you expect the state to spend? guest: i do not know. there will be accountability and litigation as to the performance under existing contracts that have to be sorted out. there is time for us to figure out whether we should have done things better earlier. that is an issue that is a legitimate issue. the important point is to get people covered. we have got tens of thousands of maryland is covered who were not covered before. a lot of people were currently in line as of march 31. we will make sure their coverage is as effective as possible and we need a friendlier way to provide services to marylanders. host: sitting on the finance committee and the health and subsidies committee, i want to go overseas with the headlines in the new york times's morning. as it holds cooperation in russia, what did you make of the news yesterday? historically significant? guest: it was printable violating the integrity of the ukraine. doing that even though they had signed international commitments . what russia did is brute aggression and violence international commitments so nato, the united states, europe, they are speaking with a unified voice. the legislation is very much with the president has already done and is willing to do. we are together in saying we will isolate russia for the aggressive action. russia will not have a seat at the table the people responsible for this will not be able to use the international banking system or visit other countries are that is speaking with a unified voice. we wanted to be clear what russia did is wrong and we want to be sure they do not do anything more. there are now threats to the eastern ukraine and other threats and we follow the example russia didn't crimea, it would be extremely unstable into europe. host: let's get to phone calls. in tennessee, a republican caller. you're on the air. caller: thank you for taking my call. i want to correct some things he said. if we take the $7 million enrollees, only about 30% of those were uninsured to begin with your to call that about 2 million, and of those, only half of those paid their first in you. we have gone through all of this, trillions of dollars of spending four one million participants so this is all political. it does nothing to reduce our cost, and you have to look at this in a prism of politics and not health care. host: i want to know where you cited those numbers. those are the questions people are asking. how many of the 7 million did not have insurance before. where did you find the numbers? caller: the rand corporation study. the question you're asking is what is more credible, he who is a political person and the obama administration and/or the rand corporation. i will go with them everyday area -- every day. guest: i have gotten so many letters and e-mails from people who did not have coverage and now have coverage, were denied coverage and now they can get full coverage and cover entire amount. people who could not afford coverage but with subsidies now, they can afford it. people who had to drop employer-based plans because they could not afford the premium and now, they can. people will say they use emergency care centers because they could not afford it here they cannot afford to get the care they need and now they can get that care. a lot of families, they are at all children. people are getting for their insurance lands, they were overcharged him and now getting the means back. it is not just the 7 million. i do disagree with your numbers. we know the reason getting people, many percentages and much more of those who did not have insurance him a lot of younger people waited until the end before they unrolled. we will see what the exact numbers will be but they will be much higher than the numbers you cited. it is more than the 7 million. it is those who now had full coverage. it is now seniors who have access to preventative care and cannot get that before. there are millions of americans who benefited from the affordable care act. it is working and would pervert that reduce huge benefits for our country. chrysler with the numbers come from as far as who did not have insurance before and are now signed up and are part of that 7 pervertmillion? guest: the private insurance companies -- it does take time for people to pay premiums. the purple -- people and rolled may not have paid their premium yet. they have a certain time to pay their premiums. insurance companies have raise premiums in the past if you look what has happened over the course of our health-care system. the cost has gone up a lot faster than the cost of our economy. we are trying to slow that down. i believe in the people who evaluated this one on an objective basis believe the affordable care act will help slow down the cost of health care in the country. host: that is the question on twitter -- guest: the bill has pluses and minuses. it is interesting the scorekeepers who projected cost are now seeing more savings at the national level than we predicted originally. we already saved taxpayer money and slow down the cost of the health care country. host: on the exchange, -- guest: the state is responsible for that. i know there is now discussions and litigation between maryland and the contractors that maryland does not believe they have got value for the money being spent. that issue is still being litigated or negotiated. ultimately, we will know the cost very this is a matter that i is an open transparent reveal. host: frank is an independent caller. caller: thank you for taking my call. i do not get it, where are the 35 million people that will be so willing to jump on this. when you are giving free cell phones away, they were all over the place giving them. when you work of the food stamps, it comes to affordable health care, where of 35 million people so eager to jump onto this. as far as the ukraine that is just watched his hand over here while you have turkey go over here. nobody is reporting that. they only reported a shutdown youtube. that turkey did, the prime minister. it did not say if they about the flag. guest: when the affordable care act was passed, those who did the review had projected we would enroll somewhere around 7 million in the first year and it would take some time before we got the vast majority of people in the system that would benefit from the exchanges. when we passed medicare part d, the prescription jug benefit under medicare, the projections made on how many seniors would enroll in medicare part d, in the first year, we hit 70% of the objective number. here, we are hitting 100%. we are enrolling as predicted. those who were outside of the system are now coming into the system. it will take many years before we get everyone in the system. that is our goal, to get everyone in the system. it takes time. we still have the struggle of young people. young people think they are invisible and they will never need health insurance. it is not the cost issue so much air in it is more that they do not and they need health insurance. they then get sick or injured and their families know they needed health insurance and did not have it. we think the message is getting out there. it will take time. we are on schedule on the number of people we hope would sign up. host: on ukraine, the caller asked that. guest: i do not follow question. they are an independent country. they have a primary border issue with russia. i did not quite understand the turkey connection with the ukraine. i apologize for that. i am not aware of the problem there. host: the new york times has this headline russia pressures ukraine with the rising gas prices. what do you think of that move? guest: russia charges the ukraine more them a should for their energy. they make a lot of money off of the gas they sell to ukraine. russia continues we want to provide other sources of energy for the ukraine. not only will they did -- will they be dependent on russia, they will do it at much cost to their economy. part of the economic reforms the ukraine is going through that the international community is helping is to deal with a more reliable and less costly source of energy for ukraine and fairer pricing of energy within the ukrainian economy. host: cincinnati, ohio, independent caller. caller: good morning. senator, a couple of things i want to say. i never hardly hear this. everybody talked about the good parts of obamacare. i have benefited from it. immensely. my wife just had a recent stay in the hospital in cincinnati. i probably should give the name. the bill rounded off was hundred $2000. -- 102,000 dollars. they paid everything but $1500. the bottom line is the hospital got paid 102,00 about 100,000 $100,500. if i got -- if i did not have insurance or she did not have insurance, which we got through obamacare am a the hospital would not have gotten a da,mmn dime. i do not have $100,000 to pay them. i will pay off my part. the providers of the ones doing the best. i'm grateful as hell. i never hear the providers jumping up and down for more people to have insurance. aboutguest: thank you for telling that story. as a result of the affordable care act, millions of americans today are no longer in fear the one injury or one illness away from -- bankruptcy. millions of peoplethe emergence of the convicted spy as a bargaining chip. peace negotiations, a lamentable sign of america's desperation to keep oath sides talking. peace can be achieved only if they want for themselves something that is very much in doubt right now. you then have the front page of the new york times this morning with the headline about mideast talks. john kerry has canceled his trip . the palestinian authority seeks to join a number of international agencies. what is happening here? guest: the case should be considered on its own merits. a person can -- committed crimes against his country, no question about it. serious crime. his penalty has been much harder -- harsher than similar types of violations. his case should be determined on its own merits. many of us think it has been singled out for harsher treatment than the crime would normally have been dealt with. at issue needs to be dealt with separately. as far as the israeli-palestinian -- host: not part of the negotiations. it should not be used as a bargaining chip. guest: it should be considered and not part of a negotiation, i agree with you there. as far as the peace process itself is concerned the israelis and palestinians need peace. the palestinians, the two state solution is what needs to be done. the parties need to sit at a table like this and negotiate a peace agreement. i applaud the obama administration and secretary kerry doing everything they can in the discussions. i was extremely disappointed by the leader of the and secretary kerry doing everything they can in the discussions. i was extremely disappointed by the leader of the palestinians decision to sign treaties inconsistent with the negotiations for peace. he even technologies that. every time we seem to be making progress, there seems to be some steps going in the wrong direction. the leader of palestinians made a huge mistake. host: why should they not try to seek recognition from international agencies? guest: the way is to negotiate a peace agreement with the israelis, acknowledge israel's right to exist, sit down and negotiate. you cannot do it unless you are at the table. palestinians will not sit at the table. that is a mistake. host: a republican caller. caller: i have a different opinion about the affordable care act. my insurance went up about three months ago 150 a month. it went from 1100 to 6500. we seem to be getting a lot of sketchy numbers from washington as far as who has paid and who has not paid. it seems like a bunch of rhetoric. if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. if you like your plan, you can keep your plan. it all seems to be just lip service. guest: look at the last 10 or 15 years of health care in america, the last 20 years. the number of premium increases have been dramatic. companies, if you have 40 or 50 employees and one of your employees got sick, premiums would double. insurance plans were canceled in great numbers. coverage was reduced as far as covered up bulls and continue to be increased. profits by the private insurance companies were going through the roof. it many cases, they were making 20, 30, 40% on the premium dollar. the days are over. the affordable care act has ended that type of practice by private insurance companies and small plant in particular are protected in regard to someone who may have had adverse health conditions during the year. we will see a lot more stability in the insurance market. premiums will go up over time. overtime premiums will go up. they clearly will. is going up because of technology. people want that technology. health inflation is higher than general cost-of-living increases. we are trying to get those numbers down. the economy, because the demographics of america is changing, as you get older you use the health care system more. as people live longer they use the health-care system longer. we are trying to reduce the growth rate that was built into the system well before the passage of the affordable care act. the affordable care act has helped to reduce the cost the growth -- the cost of the growth of health care, including your premium. those are the facts. take a look at what has happened in america over the last two years. we have seen a reduction to the cost of care in this country. that is going to have an impact on your premium. i cannot tell you each individual case. we have to take a look at it. i will tell you this, your insurance company must return 80 to 85% of your premium dollar in benefit. that is now the law under the affordable care act. if they overcharge you, it goes to rebate. there has to be broad coverage. you need to have insurance that will be there if you have a catastrophic illness or injury. that is the law. we have put protection in the law so that you get a quality product, value for your premium dollar, and we have set up a framework for a delivery system to help manage high-cost health care and bring down the growth rate of health care costs. i think that that is the right formula. >> a tweet from one of our viewers. -- we have it host: we have a tweet from one of our viewers. guest: that will be an issue that will be brought up in this campaign. what most democrats believe is not only do we celebrate the affordable care act, we want to improve it. there has never been a major bill passed in congress that did not need further attention. let's build on what is working right and what we need to and if it is not working let's fix it. >> frank is next. >> good morning, senator. going back to the numbers again, i just think you won't be shocked that there is a republican disinformation campaign going on on the numbers . steve ducey, fox news this morning, reported that the rands corporation had done a survey finding that only 850,000 new people who had not been insured before were insured. well, i went and looked and that is a complete lie, of course. i am looking at a los angeles times article entitled obamacare has led to health coverage for millions of people. it says that according to a rand corporation survey, reveals the uninsured people, there are now more than 9.5 million more people who are covered that were not before. even moving into an analysis of it, talking about the republican myths and rebutting them i am always shocked and disappointed by the out and out lies. they were repeated again by tom coburn on fox news this morning. then repeated again by these poor idiots. sorry, the previous colors repeating this stuff because they are in their little isolation bubble. guest: the facts of the facts. we will get the exact numbers. but we do know that the number of people now covered under the exchanges have exceeded the projections on the affordable care act when it was passed. that is a fact. we know that a large number of these individuals would not have been able to get health insurance but for the health exchanges. we know that area that is a fact. i can tell you the numerous letters i have received from the people of maryland to have verified what i have just said. i intend to read these on the floor of the senate. these are real people, real lives that have been affected. the affordable care act allows for a fair shot for americans to get affordable thomas quality health insurance. that is what this is about. host: staten island, republican caller. caller: good morning, senator. going on myself i got an increase on my insurance as well. i got my medicare and it was $90 per month. now it is $150, ok? my co-pay from the hospital was $150 per day. my medications were five dollars per month, when i take them. co-pay is $950, ok? i have eczema, my body is all itchy. now it is $250 co-pay. now you tell me how i can afford it? ok? i get the medication, but i pay 250 dollars for premium and i used up a co-pay $80. >> what do you do for living? >> i am a senior citizen. guest: what you're talking about is not a result of the affordable care act. much of what you are talking about has nothing to do with the affordable care act. the affordable care act eliminated the copayments on preventative health care. before the affordable care act you had deductibles, now you don't. before you had what was known as the doughnut hole, the coverage gap of prescription drugs. we are now closing that doughnut hole. there is stronger coverage for prescription drug costs. the issues you are raising have been made that her as a result of the affordable care act. what you are complaining about is not a result of the affordable care act. host: wireless prices going up? guest: i don't understand that. this is much stronger prescription coverage for better health care. the premiums she is referring to are not the cost of health care, those are income related premiums that were put into place before the affordable care act based upon her income. that was an issue brought to the table frankly by republicans. they wanted to have a more means tested medicare system where we impose the premium based upon a person's income. that was not initiated under the affordable care act. host: catherine the senator says that this is not because of the affordable care act. caller: the thing is, they want everybody in the same boat, ok? i don't want to leave my doctors. i like the one that i have. host: i guess she is gone. that is the story you are hearing a lot. because of the affordable care act, this has gone up, this has gone up. guest: from seniors i have not heard that, frankly. around the state, frequently seniors seem to understand that they have benefited from the affordable care act and are now getting much better benefits and are clearly -- the solvency of the medicare trust fund was extended by a decade. so the issue as regards the medicare benefits and costs have been friendly to our seniors. host: because the affordable care act included changes to medicare? guest: changes that included prescription drug coverage and eliminating copayments on preventative health care. that was in the law before the affordable care act. host: another provision of the law. roger weighs in from twitter -- guest: yes. what we have built along with the current system, primarily an employer provided health benefit for those who work and are subsidized, the older people disabled people, and low income families, there were government insurance programs available. we had to make the determination on where the employer responsibility should start. we would have chosen 40 hours and you could see that it would have been easy for lawyers to use 39 hour work weeks to avoid their responsibility. at 30 we hit the spot that is higher than what you would call part-time workers, which are normally lower than full-time. it is used as a barometer as to where the requirements are for employers to start. frankly, employers under 30 hours per week, we hope that they will through the health benefits, but it is not a requirement. for companies under 50 employees, there is no requirement. we hope that you will, because this law provides affordable coverage for all of your employees. host: we will go to john, next. alexandria, virginia. independent caller. caller: thank you for taking my call. how are you, senator? guest: good, how are you? caller: fine. but the government -- the government meddled in my past job as a salmon farmer. i work within the health care industry now. what i see is a lot of stress on the industry now. the nurses do not have time to do their job. they are sitting behind a desk, writing paperwork to fill federal requirements and other government requirements for nursing. i spend about one quarter of my time filling out paperwork for d.o.t. and other federal requirements. what i think is that you people are systematically dismantling the greatest health care system in the world. washington needs to give control back to the local people. they have no clue what is going on in washington and they are stressing the hell out of us. host: we will have the senator respond. guest: these are valid points. i do not think that this call is about the affordable care act. we do believe in federalism that is why the affordable care act allows the states to run the exchanges and regulate the health insurance products sold in their state. that was maintained under the affordable care act. i do think that there is too much paperwork today in health care and i hope we could work together to streamline that. that is why earlier i said that rather than just saying repeal the law, why not sit down with democrats and republicans and try to make a system that works better than it works today? one of the things we need to take a look at is the cost of the administration of our health care system. it is not the federal government causing all that paperwork for the nurses. talk to them about what they have to do with these private insurance plans. the paperwork they have to fill out there. there has to be a better way, a less costly way. we are hoping we can work together to try to figure out how to get it done. we do believe that the affordable care act, to a certain degree, will make that easier. there are a lot of provisions to streamline the process. we have to make sure that works and we need to work together on that. host: on the 7.1 million that have signed up, we have heard a lot of people citing these numbers. want to go to los angeles times story that was published on march 31, that a february survey by mckinsey found 27% of new enrollees were previously uninsured. newer survey date -- newer survey data and reports for marketplace officials in several states suggest that that increased in march. at least 4.5 million previously uninsured adults have signed up for state medicaid programs according to their unpublished survey data, which was shared with "the los angeles times." >> a lot of these --guest: a lot of these surveys were done early, they do not reflect current enrollment at all. early you saw a lot of people who had insurance ruddock's shop for better insurance products and saw that in the single market. those who bought their individual plans on the approved market were able to get a much better quality plan and a much less costly plan through the exchanges. that was the early action within the exchanges. as time went on, we found more and more people who had no health insurance enter into the exchanges. you are correct, this represents a younger group, a group who had been less likely to have health insurance before. let me also point out that these numbers do not include medicaid expansions, which are millions of people. most of the people covered under medicaid did not have insurance before. so, the number of people who now have coverage that did not have coverage will be in the multimillions. close to that 7 million mark thomas when you include the medicaid expansion. host: mike is our last caller from wisconsin. hello, mike. you're on the air. caller: if the laws of physics are sound, when will congress do the right thing and acknowledged that only preplanned explosives could have caused tilting sevens freefall when it was destroyed on 9/11? guest: i heard that question was likely to be asked here on c-span. it is a regular question that is asked. i read with you on that point. all the information i have seen with regards to these episodes come to a different conclusion than you have, but i understand and respect your judgment on that and i will yield to the scientific information that has been made available to us. host: senator, thank you so much for spending time with our viewers this guest: morning. appreciate it. guest:good to be here. -- this morning. appreciate it. guest: good to be here. host: up next, alzheimer's disease, lack of funding but first an update from c-span radio. >> adp says that u.s. jobs market is recovering from a brutal winter. the private survey shows private employers adding 191,000 jobs in march. the numbers suggest that the government jobs report for march, to be released on friday will be a healthy one. president obama travels to michigan today to talk about increasing the minimum wage to $10 10 cents per hour. the associated press says that it is part of the president's election-year economic agenda focused on working families. joining the president will be senate candidate gary peters the first senate candidate to embrace the president's message. c-span is covering the afternoon event. luke johnson of the huffington post reports that march was the first time since july of 12 -- july of 2002 that there were no u.s. combat fatalities anywhere in the world. those are some of the latest headlines, on c-span radio. >> if the reader knows exactly what your politics are, and he or she can predict how you are going to describe a politician ahead of time, then you have not done your job. you should be a little bit obscure to the reader. you definitely should not be partisan. it eliminates the ability of people to be interested in what you have to say. you cannot be protectable. if you give in to one side, you have to give in to the other side and use exactly the same techniques that you would use for democrats that you would use for republicans. i think that that is something that modern audiences really respond to. especially now, when they see the news landscape being fractured more and more overtly into row republican and pro-democratic camps. >> what makes a good journalist? matt taibbi's latest explores this, sunday at 8:00. on "q&a." >> c-span, for 35 years bringing public affairs events for washington directly to you. putting you in the room, offering complete gavel-to-gavel coverage of the u.s. house. all as a public service a private industry. c-span, created by the cable tv industry 35 years ago, brought to you as a public service by your local cable or satellite provider. like us on facebook, follow us on twitter. >> "washington journal" continues. host: we continue with our ongoing series, spotlight on magazines. today we have a recent magazine article that was published on newsweek online. alzheimer's is expensive deadly, and growing. where is the research money? joining us from new york abigail jones. ms. jones, let's just begin with who is getting alzheimer's disease and how it is growing. host: --guest: thank you for having me. those are important questions. alzheimer's affects 5.2 million americans these -- today. the majority of people who develop the disease are 65 years old or older. this is a disease that, right now, there is not a single treatment that prevents, stops or slows or reverses the damage. without medical advances for treatments, we are set to have as many as 60 million americans with alzheimer's disease by the year 2050. host: you cite that figure in your story. 4 million in 2014 could grow to 16 million by 2050. how is that? why is that? host: -- guest: advanced age is the number one risk factor and we have a gigantic baby boomer population that is now reaching the age of 65 and older. the point of onset of all timers disease. that is a huge factor. couple that with the fact that, as i just said, there is not a single treatment out there to prevent, cure, or stop alzheimer's disease. there are a lot of other things going on that we will get to in the next 45 minutes or so around the lack of funding -- maybe not a lack of funding, but less money going towards funding for alzheimer's research compared to other diseases to help push along the research side of it. a lack of awareness about all timers disease? a lot of people still associate it with their grandparents, their great-grandparents. grandma lost her memory. she started to forget things. alzheimer's disease is a truly debilitating disease. you don't just lose your wallet. you don't just where mismatched socks. you eventually lose the ability to talk walk, dress yourself, brush your teeth, feed yourself. and it is fatal. there are a lot of misconceptions out there that really, by raising awareness, we can help families. >> from the alzheimer's association website here are some numbers. more than 5 million americans are living with the disease. every 67 seconds someone in america develops all timers. and it is the sixth leading cause of death and the united states with approximately 500,000 people dying each year because they have alzheimer's disease. that is the topic here this morning. we have a fourth line for those who have been impacted by the disease. we want to hear your stories as well. of course, we have got the lines otherwise divided. republicans 202, host: abigail johnson -- abigail jones, wrote you quoted a doctor in your story who said that everyone knew that there was an impending crisis 20 years ago. so, what did they know 20 years ago? how did the medical community -- what did they do, then? >> i interviewed a number of researchers, leading doctors in the alzheimer's and dementia fields. what they all talked to me about was the fact that research for alzheimer's disease is really relatively new. it has only come along in the last 20 years to 30 years. someone i spoke to yesterday before coming on the show reminded me that the american cancer society recently celebrated its 100th anniversary. compare that to alzheimer's which is again the past two or three decades. until recently the only way that doctors could tell for sure whether a person had alzheimer's disease, which to do a bit of science for a minute, alzheimer's develops these telltale signs in the brain. they affect the important work that sells do in the brain. the only way that doctors can tell if someone had those was upon autopsy. it is only recently that they have developed you know, technology to be able to look at spinal fluids. to do brain scans. to be able to tell of someone who is still living has those telltale signs of alzheimer's disease. that was a great breakthrough. alzheimer's is incredibly complex to understand. for a disease that is so hard to kind of break down and figure out how it works much less how to prevent and treat it, the answers are just going to be unfolding on a longer trajectory. >> if they saw this impending crisis 20 years ago how has the medical community and federal agency responded since then with research funding? >> sure. that is a really important question. just to throw out some statistics to lay the groundwork, last year the nih dedicated just over $5 billion to cancer research. $3 billion to hiv and aids. around $1 billion to diabetes. compare that to just over 500 million given to alzheimer's research. take that 500 million in research money and compare it to the fact that this year, the cost of alzheimer's in the united states is set to reach $214 billion. and that does not even include the 220 billion dollars in unpaid care that family members loved ones, and caregivers are providing two people with alzheimer's disease. so, that funding gap is really critical in terms of understanding, you know, where we are, medically, in terms of finding a treatment and hopefully, one day finding a cure. host: what about the attention that has recently been put on this issue? recently on capitol hill, seth rogen am a comedian, testified about this. when someone like him goes to capitol hill, what does that do for research funding? research funding on the issue to put it at the forefront of americans minds. guest: as much as we may or may not want to admit it, today marketing, celebrities, these things actually matter. you haven't actor like seth rogen go to washington, d.c. to advocate for alzheimer's disease, that was really important. he was able to talk about something that is very serious very hard, often times unwieldy to understand, by injecting a bit of levity, some comedy. he was able to drill down to the important issues, the fact that his mother-in-law was diagnosed with early-onset alzheimer's in her mid 50's. he himself talked about his own misperceptions about the disease. he thought that it meant that she would lose her wallet or her keys. in fact she lost the ability to do all the things that make us human. walk talk, eat. to basically care for herself. cancer, for example, has many, many public faces. celebrities, like katie couric, angelina jolie, putting a public face behind the disease. michael j fox has been able to do the same thing for parkinson's. alzheimer's is a different challenge. by the time people are diagnosed, they sooner start to forget. it is a much higher -- much harder mountain to climb in terms of raising awareness for the people who are very accessible to the masses. >> i want to show our viewers --host: i want to show our viewers a bit from seth rogen's testimony. it has been an extremely popular view viewing, on our website. a lot of people have gone to see this on our website, seth rogen testifying and clips of that. here is a little bit of his testimony. [video clip] >> i came here for a few reasons. one, i am a huge fan of "house of cards." [laughter] marathon the whole thing, had to be here. two is to say that people need more help. i have personally seen the massive amount of financial strain that this disease causes and if the american people decide to reject a genitalia driven comedy, i will not be able to afford it. please don't. i can't begin to imagine how people with more limited incomes are dealing with this. studies show that this is one of the most costly conditions in the united states. yes, more costly than heart disease in a country where for one dollar 29 cents you can get a tocco made out of doritos. they are delicious, but not healthy. deaths from other major diseases like heart disease, hiv, and stroke continue to design, death from alzheimer's continues to decrease. over 5 million americans have alzheimer's and at this rate over 35 years as many as 16 million will have the disease. the third reason i am here is simply to show people that they are not alone. so few people share their personal stories. so few people have something to relate to. i know that if me and my wife saw someone like me talking about this, it would make us feel less alone. americans whisper the word because their government whispers the word. although a whisper is better than silence, the alzheimer's community has been facing silence for decades, but it is still not enough. host: that was seth rogen testifying on alzheimer's disease on capitol hill. we are joined by angelica jones, who recently wrote an article about the disease and his testimony. what impact have he and others had on the amount of research money? >> i think it is probably too soon to tell in the few weeks that have passed since he gave his testimony, but i can say that he has had a huge impact in the general conversation around alzheimer's disease. you know if you use twitter facebook social media in general, he blew up the internet, and away. i had been working on this story for a couple of months. all of a sudden i wake up one morning and there is seth rogen. the topic of this article is plastered all over the internet. it was a great thing to see. a celebrity diagnosis is alzheimer's disease is no more important, no more serious or devastating than anyone else's diagnosis. but what someone like him has the ability to do is raise awareness and draw attention to the staggering numbers he was talking about. he mentioned that between 2000 and 2010, the number of deaths due to cancer, heart disease decreased, while at the same time the number of deaths due to alzheimer's disease increased 68%. 68% between 2000 and 2010. that is the staggering number and it is just another piece of evidence to support the fact that the funding dollars need to grow. >> seth rogen tweeted this after he testified saying -- not sure why only two senators were at the hearing. very symbolic of how the government views alzheimer's. seems to be a low priority. however, at the beginning of the hearing, we cover the whole thing, you hear the chairman, democrat of iowa say that this was the sixth hearing that his committee had held on this issue. abigail jones? >> yes. his tweet was important, it got to the heart of some of the issues that are felt, generally. a few of the doctors i interviewed talked a lot about how alzheimer's disease is whispered about. as he himself said it is a silent epidemic that no one is really talking about. at the same time, work has been done in the last few years. the national alzheimer's project act was passed in 2011 which created a national plan with the goal to both effectively treat and prevent alzheimer's disease by 2020 five. so that is important to know. jenny where he of this year alzheimer's funding received an additional $122 million. there have been steps in the right direction, however that additional $122 million, it is a step but it is not the giant leap forward that the council said they needed. they needed $2 billion to reach their goal of prevention and treatment by 2025. >> gail, florida, democratic caller. go ahead. caller: very good topic. i have been a nurse of 24 years working with alzheimer's victims. it is not really an old-age disease. those of us who have been working in the profession for a long time know this. this disease starts as early as the age group of 30. linda haywood a well known actress from years ago, was the first diagnosed of alzheimer's case in america. i think she was in her 40's. by the time you get into your 60's and 70's, you are more likely to show signs of the disease. one of the things that is causing such a roaming -- such a huge rate of this disease, a lot of times when people come up for assistance, they have their private care physicians who really want to sort out proper care for this disease. back in the day, remember when someone had a suspicion, they had to be seen by a neurologist. it was definitely a disease that someone who knew the brain and understood the brain completely had to look at with proper dedication. what i am finding as a nurse is that a lot of people are taking their loved ones to primary care physicians, putting them on psychotropic medication, creating more of a problem because there are major signs that psychotropic medication does not even really treat the disease of the alzheimer's person. host: we will have abigail jones respond. guest: dale, thank you so much for calling in. something that you said early on in terms of the age that it affects people, i think that that is an important point. you are right, it is not just an old person's disease. by the time someone is diagnosed, they could live from four to eight years, some as many as two decades. that is a long time. the disease is not just difficult on the person who has it, but also on his or her family loved ones, friends and caregivers. a lot of family members become the primary caregiver for someone with alzheimer's. that person has often been doing that work out of love, but they can also increase their levels of anxiety depression, isolation. one of the things i wrote about in the article is a documentary film called the genius of marion. it was the first thing that turned me onto this topic in the beginning. it follows the story of pam white, a wife and mother in the suburbs of boston diagnosed with early-onset alzheimer's at the age of 61. the film, done by her son, a documentary filmmaker, it follows not only the harrowing and challenging aftermath on pam herself, but also her family. host: we are showing our viewers a bit of this documentary. who is featured in this? talk about it a little bit more. when does it start? how does it track, the development of this disease? host: alzheimer's disease can feel so enormous and unwieldy. this film really brings you inside the every day, hour to hour, day to day experience of a family. this family could be my family any of yours out there listening to this conversation. the film begins in the very early stages of her diagnosis. it does not hide anything. you go with pam and her husband to the doctor. you witness her conversations. you see her talking with her other son, who is a psychiatrist , about the medications the doctor is giving her. she does not want to take them. she forgets, sometimes that she has alzheimer's disease. the film humanizes what this experience is like for the person with the disease and for the people caring for her. host: we have a tweak here -- host: explain the stages of alzheimer's. guest: alzheimer's, as i said, a person can live for years to eight years, a longtime in itself, as many as 20 years. what begins as just kind of forgetfulness -- when i interviewed the fit -- interview the filmmaker about his mother he talked about it in the beginning, the changes were almost unknown -- unnoticeable. her cooking seemed off. she was buying books she already had. getting lost driving places she knew how to get to. gradually, those changes just started to multiply. in her case, her mother had died of alzheimer's at the age of 89. there was already a first-degree relative who had the disease at a much older age. in time, pam, for example, she is a good example, talked about her ability to walk and move and dress yourself changing. as i said before, the disease is fatal. i think that that is something that people do not understand. the effects on caregivers are many and can be extreme. host: our spotlight on magazine series, we are talking about a recent article from abigail jones about alzheimer's disease. the headline is that it is expensive, deadly, and growing so where is the research money? this tweet -- host: abigail jones, talk about the prescription drugs available. guest: that is a good question and i will preface my answer with the fact that i am a journalist, not a doctor or a scientist. i will share with you what some of the doctors and scientists i interviewed told me. i would say that the first line of defense is talking to your doctor, going to the alzheimer's association. they are a wonderful and very important organization with outreach, support groups education, 24 hour colin lyons that are free seven days per week, where you can get answers to these questions. so, those are important resources to know about in terms of better understanding the diagnosis, medication, and treatment. now, something the doctors spoke to me about, the further along alzheimer's gets, that does not mean the person is immune to developing other illnesses. a stroke, for example. anything else. part of the challenge, for doctors, is diagnosing all of those other diseases on top of alzheimer's. oftentimes a patient will be taking medication to address agitation, which is a common side effect of alzheimer's disease, as well as underlying other medical conditions. kind of juggling that kind of medication can be hard, you are right. i am not sure what the answer is, but i know that there are experts and doctors out there that can speak to it erie it host: another tweet from a viewer -- host: joann, abilene, texas what is your story? >> my mother -- caller: my mother died of alzheimer's. my sister has it right now. i have cancer. our situation is so bad -- was so bad -- i would rather die of cancer right now then to have to go through alzheimer's. she has been saying it, it is a dreadful disease in our family. we have not had the resources that so many people have to do other things. we have to go with whatever we can get. >> joann, talk about the resources needed. the money, the time, etc.. host: -- caller: if you don't have money enough to hire someone, bring someone in, the family has to do that. if you cannot do those things, that person is put into a nursing home. the care in many nursing homes are not -- is not what it should be. i mean, you know, it is so bad that the people there at the nursing homes, they do as much as for all the patients, but it just goes from bad to worse. host: abigail jones? guest: thank you for sharing your story. i am so sorry to hear about what your family has gone through. i am sure that all of us listening are feeling the same way. i think that you are touching on something that affects so many families out there. the challenge of figuring out how to care for your loved ones when it is so expensive and the disease is so complicated, there just is no treatment and no cure. you know, nursing homes are the answer for so many families with loved ones who have alzheimer's disease. the alzheimer's association puts out a report every year, the annual facts and figures report. the new report just came out within the past month. you know, one of the statistics said that when they interviewed people, more people were afraid of dying -- i don't remember the exact numbers, of developing alzheimer's disease than they were of cancer and numerous other illnesses. so, while this is the disease that people may still be whispering about, it is one that americans have so much fear about. the idea of developing a no miss where you literally lose yourself is terrifying. host: amy, next, illinois democratic caller. amy, your mother has alzheimer's? caller: my mother died about one year ago and had alzheimer's. a for -- a few points i want to make. first, thank you for writing the article. my mother actually died from sepsis, from taking a medication that burned a hole in her stomach. so, the actual figures from people dying from alzheimer's are, i think, under what they actually are. her dementia meant that she did not take her medication with food and it essentially burned a hole in her stomach, caused sepsis, she died from an infection. although on her death certificate says that she died from sepsis, it was actually the dementia from alzheimer's that caused her to miss take her medication. the other point i want to make about the research, i think that part of the problem we are having with the research and the funding is that about 20 years ago, i think it was, the nih began giving, rather than doing its own independent research, was coupling with pharmaceutical companies and people who had a financial stake in developing pharmaceuticals with the research money from the nih. this has led to a lot of research being geared towards finding a cure or a test something to do with diagnosing or treading alzheimer's, that will give them financial gain. i think there is a problem in that in that it will only cause you to look at certain areas of research. if it is not financially viable or gives you a good return, they are going to ignore that research. they are not going to find the answers to the problem if you are only gearing your research towards what is financially gainful for you. i think part of the problem has to be that we have to get the nih funding and government dollars uncoupled from pharmaceutical and other companies who are looking to make money on the answer that they find in their research. i also want to reiterate my support for the caller from florida, the nurse who said that i had to argue with my mother's primary physician, and a small little town in massachusetts for several years before he would even recommend that she see a neurologist. of course, when he kept telling my mother -- your memory problems are just normal aging nouns are the first thing to go he would say. i called him up and said that this is not a problem of forgetting nouns. i experience this every day, where she calls me several times her day to tell me the exact same thing. that is not a problem of forgetting your keys or your nouns. this is more serious. he kept arguing and saying that no, it wasn't. the lack of knowledge of primary care physicians, the first people to see a patient who may have this, is a problem here. they need to be educated. there needs to be a broad outreach to bring them up to speed. host: all right. abigail? guest: thank you for calling in. i think that to respond to a couple of the things that you said, in the beginning, the death of your mother, there was a study that came out very recently that said that alzheimer's disease is the cause of far more deaths than actually goes reported. alzheimer's is officially the sixth leading cause -- fifth leading cause of death and may be the cause of death of much much higher. the challenge around reporting these debts is bubbling up in the news and hopefully those numbers will start to change as awareness changes. to your later point, you know about the lack of awareness, i certainly can't speak to doctors and their knowledge, but i would hope and assume that most are as knowledgeable as they can be about this disease. what you were talking about goes to this general kind of cultural misperception about alzheimer's disease. i interviewed dr. ron peterson at the mayo clinic. he is the chair of the advisory council. he talked to me about how decades ago, cancer was not cancer, it was the c word. a lot of work, great research, and education has been done to raise awareness. alzheimer's disease is now caught in that c word moment. and a lot of work needs to be done to raise awareness for everyone. families, spouses, educators doctors, everyone out there, to better help people understand the warning signs. what the genetic possibilities are in terms of your mother or father having the disease. " you can do to live a healthy lifestyle to try to prevent it. host: this from twitter -- guest: a great question. i don't actually know the answer. i know i have mentioned the alzheimer's association a few times, but they really do have such a robust amount of information. not just on warning signs and stages of the disease, but on trials going on, funders, and how all of that works. >> by the way, --host: by the way, the website is alz.org. ron, essex junction. caller: i have a son with schizophrenia. as it turns out, he got cured through up valve brain connection. i am wondering -- it must take years and years to develop. i believe that if you look at russell blaylock, a neurosurgeon retired, he believed it was just a body burden of neurotoxins that we take in. aspartame, things like that. the earlier that one ingests these things, a person's genetics actually change and the genes switch on and off. if you get that condition early enough before you have children then you pass that on to your children. i guess my bottom line here is -- you really need to eat well take care of yourself in the early stages of your life. to prevent these things. i really believe that that is why we are having exponential growth in all of these neurological diseases. host: abigail jones? guest: thank you for calling in. one of the things that doctors talked to me about is the importance of living a healthy lifestyle and that what is good for your heart is also good for your brain. a healthy diet, regular exercise , doing mental exercise, social engagement, these are all things that done throughout your life will help your brain stay healthy. you know, on the flipside, obesity, smoking, high cholesterol, these are all things that not only put your heart at risk, but your brain. host: sean, lincoln, nebraska. go ahead. caller: i think it has been very underreported for years. my grandfather died in 1981. they called the dementia. i guarantee it was alzheimer's. now my mother has been diagnosed and she is just fading away. [crying] they don't have no cure or nothing for it erie it is tearing us apart. my dad passed away, my mom is all by herself. it is just tearing the family up. host: i am so sorry to hear about your father, and now your mother. abigail jones, he said there is no cure. you have talked to the doctors. did they say that there could be a cure? guest: john, i am deeply saddened and sorry to hear about your family. what i can say is that every doctor and researcher i have interviewed, they are doing this work because they believe there is an answer. whether it is a treatment to prevent or slow the development of the disease, to cure it -- they believe that that is out there and that it will take hard work more dollars, and it will take raising awareness. you know, john, i think that the experience you're having is one that so many out there are having. just to go back for a moment to the film, "the genius of marion," one of the things that everyone in the family has spoken to me about with their three children is that the process of creating this film and getting their story out there has been extraordinarily helpful to them. they have been able to talk to other people in their situation. just having that kind of social support -- people, friends or complete strangers, just having them show up and say -- sorry you are going through this here's my story, those types of things make a huge difference. families, caregivers can feel incredibly isolated. even the best of friends sometimes don't know how to respond or what to do. sometimes it is easier to do nothing. that is one of the things that the folks at the alzheimer's association have been talking to me about in terms of support groups and educational tools. really not only helping the person with the disease, but creating a strong support group for the family. host: abigail jones, do the doctors or the agencies researching this, do they put a timeline on drugs for combating it? slowing it down, or curing it? guest: you know, no. not that i'm aware of. in none of my conversations did anyone ever say to me -- you know, in this many years we will have an answer. again, you know, they have set 2025 is the goal for effective treatments and prevention, but as we have talked about, a lot of work has to be done to get there. the fact that that goal is out there, you know, is important. certainly, with, you know, americans living longer than ever before, we are getting very good at treating other diseases. with baby boomers aging we need to now get very good at treating alzheimer's. >> you mentioned the figure before that people say -- this much money is needed. what is that? >> sure. $2 billion is the number that the advisory council feels they need to be able to be equipped to try to meet that deadline in 2025. again, $2 billion seems like a huge amount of money. compare it to, you know, the over $5 billion that went to cancer last year. the $3 billion that went to hiv and aids last year. a lot of the doctors and researchers i talk to say -- they are very clear, they are not trying to take money away from other diseases, but they need the same resources available to them to try to find treatments and prevention's for alzheimer's disease. host: erin, smithsburg, maryland, hello. caller: first, my heart really goes out to the previous caller. i wanted to bring up, you know, the previous caller mentioned about 80% of your immune system and your immune system make up, there is a big connection between your brain and your stomach. i am a sufferer of late stage lyme disease and i have read a lot about autism as well. some of the surveillance and research they have done seem to be in these endemic areas where they describe multiple sclerosis and autism. of course, alzheimer's. these peoples brains, they are finding things that look like spirochetes, like with lyme disease and these other nasty bugs and viruses. i wanted to know if you could comment. you are talking about this research going into all of these diseases, but what about the cause? someone gets bit by a tick or a mosquito 10 years before? it has already activated in our body. there has to be a first line of defense somewhere. >> a true -- a tweet --host: a tweet here from another viewer, it will be interesting to know the chemical and environmental effects on signal receptors. not only for the natural environment around us, but the chemicals that are around us. guest: those are important questions. i wish i had the depth of background to be able to answer them scientifically. but i can say is that the doctors i interviewed, the main thing they talked about in terms of understanding exactly how alzheimer's disease develops goes back to the telltale tack -- plaques and tangles the developing your brain. we all have them as we age. people who develop the disease simply have far more than anyone else. it may seem like a simple definition of the disease, but just understanding that took time. that is how complex alzheimer's disease is. how complex it is when it develops. i cannot speak to environmental factors. i would say, again, gail z.org is a great place to go to answer those kinds of questions. what i can say an interesting statistic that we have not discussed is that by the time women reach their 60's, they are twice as likely to develop alzheimer's disease as they are to develop breast cancer. by the time a woman is 65, her lifetime risk for alzheimer's disease is one in six. for men it is one in nine. host: as you are talking about that i was on the alc.org website -- alz.org website. women are primarily at the epicenter of the crisis. do they know why? host: the numbers seem to stand for themselves. been twice as likely to develop alzheimer's than breast cancer, those are really important numbers. there is another whole side of this we have not spent much time talking about, the caregiving side. women are also far more -- they act as caregivers for those with alzheimer's far more than men. what does that mean? it means managing family finances. it means grocery shopping, preparing meals, finding doctors, overseeing treatment. everything that is involved in caring for a spouse family, loved ones, on top of caring for the person who is sick, you know a lot of caregivers have to go part or leave their jobs altogether. if they can afford to do that at all. that side of this is really important. it is one of the things that "the genius of marion," the film, really shines a light on. host: abigail jones, we have to leave it there. the houses coming in. thank you for talking to our viewers this morning. guest: thank you for having me. i hereby appoint the honorable glenn thompson to act as speaker pro tempore on this day. signed, john a. boehner, speaker of the house of representatives. the speaker pro tempore: pursuant to the order of the house of january 7, 2014, the chair will now recognize members from lists submitted by the majority and minority leaders for morning hour debate. the chair will alternate recognition between the parties with each party limited to one hour and each member other than the majority and minority leaders and the minority whip limited to five minutes, but in no event shall debate continue beyond 11:50 a.m. the chair now -- the chair now recognizes the gentleman from oregon, mr. blumenauer, for five minutes. mr. blumenauer: thank you, mr. speaker. throughout american history the path to prosperity has been infrastructure. it's been building that path paving that road. constructing the transcontinental railroad, improving water systems extending electrification to rural america dams, flood control, sewer systems, each and every one of these initiatives were key to improving the quality of life for americans, enacting business opportunities and putting millions of americans to work. they were all public-private partnerships primarily paid for with public investment. creating these infrastructure marvels which for most of our history were for the envy of the world and put millions of americans to work. sadly, that's not the case. the united states has fallen behind the global leaders. our infrastructure is mediocre, according to expert reports. the american society of civil engineers has given our infrastructure a d-plus rating, and identified over $3.5 trillion of investments that are going to be necessary just to bring it up to standard by 2020. that's how far we've fallen, a d-plus rating and needing billions of dollars just to prevent further deterioration and decline. the failure to act carries significant costs in and of itself. there's more wear and tear on vehicles. there's more delays and congestion. there's safety problems associated with inferior infrastructure and poor maintenance. it's going to cost the average american family over $1,000 per year in actual damage to say nothing of the millions of hours lost to congestion. it hits business especially hard. a five-minute delay costs u.p.s. $50 million additional costs each year. 10 years ago there was a blue ribbon report to then-president bush about transportation and transportation funding alternatives. it identified over $375 billion as necessary to fund an appropriate six-year program. that was 10 years ago. we are now spending at a rate 10 years later of about $275 billion a year at current levels, but the highway trust fund is only going to produce about $200 billion during that same period of time. both chairman camp in his tax reform proposal and president obama in his infrastructure proposal identified ways to close this gap, to be able to fully fund a six-year transportation re-authorization that would help meet america's funding needs for projects of national significance, that are in many cases multistate and are part of a national system. we all depend on the pieces of the system to be in place, in good repair and working together. sadly, the republican budget sentences us to decline and then locks in a 30% reduction from these current inadequate levels over the next 10 years. it pretends the federal commitment can be downsized and outsourced. although i would note in a letter signed by 31 executives of statewide chambers of commerce, they point out that, quote, even with increased state revenues and innovative mechanisms such as public-private partnerships, there are projects that cannot be completed without federal assistance. i will be offering today a proposal in the budget committee to at least allow the capacity to respond to these needs, to meet the request of 17 bipartisan governors, including republicans from north carolina, from wisconsin and pennsylvania and the 31 state chamber executives from alabama, arizona and arkansas to tennessee, virginia and wisconsin. we need these federal partnerships. now while this proposal won't commit anybody to a specific path forward, it does provide the capacity to get us unstuck and out of this sad state of decline. in other words, a true path to prosperity, putting millions of people to work, jump-starting the economy and strengthening communities from coast to coast so that our families can be safe, healthy and economically secure. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back. the chair now recognizes the gentlewoman from florida, ms. ros-lehtinen, for five minutes. ms. ros-lehtinen: thank you mr. speaker. i rise today to address the crisis in ukraine, putin's rising aggression and intransigents in the face of increased international -- and the failure of american leadership that's allowed these recent events to transpire. this is yet another example of vladimir putin looking at president obama's foreign policy and making the calculation that he can do whatever he wants without fear that the white house will react with anything other than empty threats. we've seen this time and time again. so much so that the president's lead-from-behind policy has not only eroded our influence and credibility around the world but it has hurt our relations with other countries and it has shown tyrants like putin, assad maduro, khomeini and the castros that we lack our courage of convictions. putin has annexed crimea and we would be foolish to think that he will stop there as he seeks to re-establish russia as more than just a regional power. and the obama administration has misguidedly dismissed putin and his provocations as those of a weakened russia acting out. this is an astonishingly dangerous feud to take, one that will harm our national security interests if we continue to downplay these threats. in 1994, the united states, along with ukraine and russia, signed the budapest memorandum. in that agreement, all sides agreed to respect ukraine's territorial sovereignty if ukraine returned the nuclear weapons it inherited after the fall of the soviet union empire. we promised to protect the borders, a message that we did not keep. what kind of message are we sending again? you can bet that they are sitting in iran and paying close attention, mr. speaker. they are making the calculations right now and they are betting that perhaps they will face no repercussions if they abandon the negotiations and actively and openly pursue nuclear weapons. president obama's lack of leadership and strength has shown that the umbrella of u.s. security that so many have relied upon is not as wide nor as durable as they once thought. the house and the senate have acted to pass sanctions legislation against putin over his actions in crimea, but it is clear that putin is not going to be deterred by this. it may be a kess of too little too late -- case of too little too late because the administration failed to take decisive action from the git-go just like it had in iran and syria before this and just like it is now failing to do in venezuela. while obama threatens consequences for putin over his crimea provocations and failed to act on these words, he hasn't mustered up the fortitude to even feign strong condemnations from ma dura and his -- maduro and his thugs in venezuela. the opposition in venezuela that's calling for reforms and democracy. and mr. speaker, i have here a poster of maria machado, a valiant human rights leader in venezuela, and she is just one of the many victims of maduro's thuggery. there have been 30 people killed as a result of his violent attempts, opposition leaders like leopold lopez and maria corina machad oo has been revoked of her -- the goons will be soon be taking her away to marlte prison. yet again president obama chooses to lead from behind. the administration has said we need to work with the organization of american states to hold maduro accountable, but that body is even afraid to call out maduro than this administration. mr. speaker, five years of failed foreign policy from this administration is really coming home to roost, and that means dire consequences for the american people, for the people of venezuela, for the people of ukraine and for freedom-seeking people throughout the world. it is time for the administration to take an active role in foreign policy, for the sake of american national security and for the sake of the future of democracy, it is time to quit this leading from behind. it is time to restore american leadership, and that is the only way to make the world a safer place. i thank the speaker for the time and i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady yields back. the chair recognizes the gentleman from maryland mr. hoyer, for five minutes. mr. hoyer: i ask unanimous consent to revise and extend my remarks. the speaker pro tempore: without objection the gentleman is recognized for five minutes. mr. hoyer: thank you, mr. speaker. mr. speaker, the baseball season begins this week, so i'll quote the great yogi berra who said, it's deja vu all over again. this year's republican budget, which chairman ryan unveiled yesterday is more of the same we've unfortunately come to expect. it's an exercise in partisan messaging. not a serious and honest attempt to invest in our priorities and pursue compromises toward a sustainable fiscal outlook. their budget reflects the balanced -- does not reflect the balanced approach of spending reforms, new revenues and investments in our economy called for by both the bowles-simpson commission and the domenici-rivlin commission and also the gang of six in the united states senate. and also by almost every economist. the ryan budget cuts $5 trillion without a single penny of new revenue. not even a hint of balance. moreover chairman ryan's budget once again relies on the magic ast rest of hundreds of -- ast rests of hundreds of billions of cuts to domestic programs. he doesn't say which programs we're going to cut. he simply says we're going to get the money. he said that last year of course, and it didn't happen. but he gives virtually no details about the policies he expects to achieve these savings. to that extent it is radically different than the chairman of the ways and means committee tax reform plan which made real choices, showed real courage and was a real document. the republican budget continues their obsession with repealing or undermining the affordable care act. 53rd attempt to do so. however, of course, they keep all the savings and revenues that the affordable care act is scored as giving. it would furthermore kick millions off their health insurance and turn medicaid into a capped block grant decimating the program and making life more difficult for all those millions who rely on it. once more, they are seeking to end the medicare guarantee as we know it. now they will say it's a choice that at 55 you can make a choice whether you want to have private insurance with a voucher you get from the federal government, or go into medicare. that's what they say. the reality is, however they would make traditional medicare far, far, far more expensive driving people out of that program and eliminating it over time. their budget, in addition would make it difficult, if not impossible, for congress to invest in our economy and our people by driving domestic discretionary spending well below the sequester's harmful level. the american people ought to be outraged but not surprised. we've seen this movie before. . and it never ends well, for republicans or tragically does it end happily for the american people. the new plot twist in this year's budget is chairman ryan is going where no budget chairman has gone before relying on the spurious gimmickry of so-called dynamic scoring to pad his numbers -- we talked about this a lot. the 1981 tax cuts was supposed to boom the economy. in fact we increased the national debt by 187%. in 2001 and 2003, we were promised that the tax cuts would grow the economy. in fact, during those eight years of the bush administration, we had the worst economy that anybody in this chamber has experienced. and indeed i would presume in the galleries as well. while chairman ryan claims his budget balances in 10 years, in reality his projection for revenues in 2024 is less than his projection for outlays. in other words, no balance. that's the simple budget math. the only way chairman ryan can pretend his math works is by using republicans' dynamic scoring trick. this is the same trick that paved the way for the bush tax cuts to turn record surpluses into record deficits, as i said. it's sort of like a family making its budget and projecting, well, we are going to get a big raise because the boss is going to be doing better, and the economy will do better, and we'll get a big raise so we'll budget as if we had already gotten the raise. what happens is you don't get that raise and you are deeply in the hole. americans get that. it's a shame their congress doesn't get that. republicans have a bill on the floor this week to force the nonpartisan c.b.o. to use the republican math. by virue of the -- virtue of the congressional budget office, nonpartisan was that it would give us honest numbers. now the republicans want to force them to give them their numbers that they want that make it easier for them to pretend that things are going to get better with their policies rather than putting their policies in place and then seeing if it does get better and if it does, we have a bonus. of course if it doesn't, we run up large deficits that we did in the last administration, as we did in the reagan administration, as we did in the first bush administration, and yes, slightly, in the clinton administration, but in the clinton administration over every republicans' objections we balanced the budget in four years. we need a budget, mr. speaker, that reflects our real challenges and recognizes that we must compromise to make the difficult choices necessary to meet them. the american people deserve a budget this focuses not on gimmicks but one that promotes opportunity growth, and security. compromise not confrontation. privatism, not partisanship. what works note what sounds good. our budget proposal should reflect our priorities and enable us to rise to meet our challenges. the republican budget that's going to be voted on today in the budget committee does not do that. the wall street jurem, mr. speaker, wrote an editorial about the ryan priorities, most of which i disagree with. because i think they are reliant, as ryan does, on dynamic scoring. is a fool's errand, has been proved to be such over the years that i have served in congress over the last 33 years. but i do agree with their conclusion and they say this that the ryan outline does the service of showing the policy direction in which the republicans would head if they regain control of the senate next year. i agree with that. i think this is a litmus test for the american people. they can review the ryan budget. they can review its consequences to them themselves their families, their children, their community. they can see the adverse consequences of a plan that will not work, and i predict as i predicted last year, mr. speaker, the appropriations committee headed by hal rogers, republican chairman, will not bring appropriation bills to the floor that will pass on this floor that will implement the ryan budget, notwithstanding the fact that ryan's party controls this house. i predicted that last year and i was right. as a matter of fact, no bills passed this house at the ryan budget numbers last year. none. not one. sadly, i think that's what's going to happen this year. sadly for the american people. sadly for this congress. sadly for our children. mr. speaker, we can do better. we can be real. we ought to do the job that the american people expect us to do. and get this country on a fiscally sustainable path. not with smoke and mirrors but with sincerity and courage. i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the chair recognizes the gentleman from pennsylvania, mr. thompson, for five minutes. mr. thompson: thank you, madam speaker. madam speaker, if you listened i think to probably the majority of the speeches provided on this house floor, they clearly indicate partisan bickering. you listen to many of these speeches and it's easy to find out what we disagree upon, and there are some great divides and beliefs and opinions. i think that reflects one of the things that's wonderful about this house, this is the people's house. it reflects a very diverse nation, and we have diverse opinions here on the house floor. but at the same time there are individuals here that i work with, both sides of the aisle, that i think that want to be problem solvers. they are willing to not talk about what we disagree about we don't even need to do that. we just turn on the news. that's what's highlighted as what we disagree upon. but the fact is we do have individuals here that have the courage and willingness to come to the table and that's step one, to sit at the table and define properly what the problem is, because without defining the problem you really aren't going to come up with effective solutions that work. and third be willing to agree -- to state what do we agree upon? what can we agree upon and make that the beginning point the foundation for cost-effective solutions. now, i'm here today as a part of a group that really does that. i rise today as co-chair of the bipartisan congressional career and technical education caucus. this is a group of members that both sides of the aisle, diverse routes through the united states, who care about investing in tupets for individuals, to be able to do better in life through education and my opinion not so much important where you start in life, it's where you end up. the key to that, that stair or ladder or path is education. and the career and technical education caucus really focuses on that in a bipartisan way. it's about america's competitiveness. america does not have a qualified trained work force, america doesn't have a future. so it's appropriation season upon us, we in the career -- congressional career and technical education caucus encourage our colleagues to continue this body's united commitment to ensuring that america remains competitive through an adequately trade work force. this can be achieved through an existing program, we don't have to create a new program. no need to reinvent the wheel. it's the carl d. perkins career and technical education act. it provide federal support for program improvement and helps to strengthen the academic career and technical education at boast the secondary an postsecondary solutions. during these fiscally challenging times we must invest in c.t.e. programs. we must also recognize that any reduction to perkins funding would affect millions of career and technical education students. the business community that relies on qualified work force, and the future competitiveness of this country. the going into the fiscal year 2015, the fiscal year and technical education caucus, is putting together a modest request for level funding for this program. i encourage my colleagues to support the efforts of the caucus and join in sending this important message this important request to the appropriations committee. thank you, madam speaker. i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from pennsylvania yields back the balance of his time. the chair recognizes the gentleman from illinois, mr. gutierrez, for five minutes. mr. gutierrez: thank you, madam speaker. madam speaker, on june 27 we will mark one year since our friends on the other side of the hill in the united states senate passed a bipartisan immigration reform bill. four senators from each party worked together to get a bill intertuesdayed on april 16 of last year. by may the judiciary committee was debating and marking it up, by june it was headed to the senate floor. then after debate and many, many amendments it was voted on by the full senate. 68 out of 100 senators voted to replace illegal immigration with legal immigration. legalize millions of people who live and work in the u.s., and secure our immigration system in the workplace, and yes, at the border. madam speaker, almost a year with no serious movement forward on immigration reform in the house, i'm beginning to wonder whether republicans will get serious about immigration before they run out of time. well i want to be helpful he so i have done a little calculating. including today we have 34 legislative days before the july 4 recess. and, madam speaker, let's be honest if republicans have not gotten an immigration bill seriously rolling down the track by the time we break for independence day, republicans might as well just fold up the tent. they are always talking about. one thing's for sure, republicans won't be pitching a tent at 1600 pennsylvania avenue any time soon. i talk to republicans and they know the truth, if republicans don't work with democrats and bring an immigration bill to the floor, they are giving up on a chance to stand for justice and a sense of peace and fairness for immigrants until after the 2016 presidential election. that means republicans will have to head into 2016 presidential election as the party that blocked immigration reform that would have finally brought justice to immigrant communities across our nation. you would have said no to the dreams of dreamers, and no to millions of families, and no to communities in every city across our country. oh and mr. speaker, if you think the republican party alone controls the future of 11 million undocumented immigrants, you will be sadly disappointed. if you don't act in the next 34 days, if you refuse to give the president a bill he can sign because you say you don't trust him to enforce immigration law, even though he has spent more money and deported more people than any president before him i believe he will act without you. he has alternatives under existing law. there are concrete ways within existing law to help keep families together and spare u.s. citizens from losing their wives, their husbands, and their children. to deportation. in spite of your lack of action. i believe the president is going to use those tools. i saw it in his eyes when i met with him. he didn't run for office so he could deport two million people and put thousands of american children in foster care. he's heartbroken by the pain deportations cause. do you think he will simply sit by and do nothing because you refuse to act? the republicans threaten lawsuits and even impeachment if the president acts to spare american families being broken apart by deportation. but this president will act if you refuse to. and the country will rally behind him because that's what americans do in the face of humanitarian crisis. and the republicans threaten to immeach the -- impeach the president? what's new, mr. speaker, you got to remember for the first three or four years he was president, leaders in the republican party, presidential candidates, an entire cable tv networks questioned the president's own immigration status. we have birthers denying the president was born in america. they question whether he he was an undocumented immigrant himself. they demanded to see his papers. now we have deportation deniers falsely suggesting president obama is not enforcing the law. he's really not deporting people. that's fake. that's something they cooked up. the president knows the kind of pain that congressional inaction has caused for families and children. the president wants to be an epans pator and not a deporter, and he will act if he has to. if you give him no choice, this president is going to take charge himself as well he should once again mr. speaker, we offer a lifeline to republicans. let's work together to pass a bill before the president faced with no other choice takes action himself. you have 34 legislative days left until july 4. you better make good use of them. the american people are waiting. . the speaker pro tempore: the chair recognizes the gentleman from florida, mr. bilirakis, for five minutes. mr. bilirakis: i rise in support of autism awareness month. april is autism awareness month, and today is april 2 autism awareness day. autism is serious, mr. speaker. it does not discriminate. people in all racial, social economic -- socioeconomic and ethnic groups are impacted. one in 68 children are diagnosed with autism. let me say it again. one in 68 children. it this

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