A booklet as well. Thanks for being with us on booktv. Thank you very much. Chapman hall in a half hour and he is going to talk about his newest book. First we will talk with congressman deb host representative wassermanschultz, you said in your presentation three years writing this. Guest yes. Host why . Guest well, about four months after i diseased to decided to move forward with writing the book, president obama asked me to take on another fulltime job in chairing the Democratic National committee, and i felt like in order to really do the book justice and do my job justice, coming out with a policy book during the president ial campaign probably wasnt the best idea, so we pushed the book forward a year. And writing and came out in october. By the time this book is published you write i hope we will look back on the Health Care Reform and debt ceiling and knowledge it was rock bottom. I dont want to imagine how it would get worse. Well, just when you thought it could not get worse, we end up having the republicans and tea party stopping the government to stop people from getting quality, Affordable Health care. Who is the next generation . That is our children. I wrote thigs through the lens f being mother. Even though politicians talk about the next generation, it isnt abstract concepts for me. I have one in the back of my car. I wrote the book to say we have to measure the success by how well our children are doing. And we have to get engaged in issues that matter to us. Representative will we with us for the next 25 minutes. The numbers are on the screen and if you would like to call. 2025853890 for those of you in the eastern. And 2025853891 in the mountain time. And you can send a tweet at booktv if you cannot get through on the phone lines. You talk about the patriot act and spying. In 2011, when passed, most of the congress voted for it. How would you have voted . I happ i know it isnt a fair question. I was in congress when we vote for the reauthorization and i voted against them. They didnt strike a balance between protecting our privacy and security. There were versions i voted for. It is hard to see how i would vote in 2011. But we have to find the balance and we need to continue our quest to strike it because i am not sure we have there. Edward snowden, has he done the nation a favor . He is a trader. He has dramatically damaged our country and shouldnt be looked out as a patriot. He compromised National Security and violated an oath he took and did serious damage in the United States of america. One of the terms you use, bipartisanship, in your presentation earlier, you talked about the dinners and things you do, but how do you maintain bipa bipa bipartsenship . The easy thing to do is default to our respective corners and dig in. As the chair of the Democratic National committee, i support my partys agenda, but i recognize it cant be my way or the highway. We dont have enough people that believe that. So it is my responsibility to reach congress the aisle and find republicans we can work with. But there are a precious few. Many are worried about loosing their elections. You cannot have people in congress that care more about power than the right thing. Are they suspiuspicious of y . There are some. But we hold dinners to clear away perceptions that our roles create. One thing you wrote in the book is that Obamacare Affordable Care act can be altered. Is that a Fair Assessment . Like any legislation. What i wrote about the Affordable Care act obamacare in the book is that just like legislation we have had for more than 200 years, when there are problems we need to sit down and Work Together. We dont need to go through 43 different attempts to repeal or deny people the access to health care. The Affordable Care act is a bill that was passed by both houses, sieb signed by the president and upheld by the Supreme Court. As problems arise, we should sit down and commit to Work Together. But republicans have to agree on the basic premises that health care is a right, not a privilege. Other other issue energy independence. What did you propose that is different . We have to wean off fossil fuels. Investing in alternate Energy Resources while engaging in an all of the above strategy. We are getting to the point where we are exporting natural gas. But we have to have the all above strategy. Not drill baby drill. Who is the next generation of leaders in congress . Would you like to be speaker of the house . I am focused on what is in front of me and that is doing the best i can for the 23ered congressional district. Who is the next generation of leaders in the house . On both sides. There are a number of members on both sides of the aisle that are building toward positions of leadership but i think probably better to leave that question to others. I know nancy has her list and i was included in and pleased to be asked to be a part of the leadership and serve. So you know, right now, we have to focus on working together and getting things turned around. First elected congress in 2004. First call from collene. Go ahead. Yes. I would just like to ask, or maybe make a statement, i would like to know why republicans think that everybody in this country wants to think like them. Why they cant figure that some people dont want their opinions or actions especially whether the came to choking the country in the name of the Affordable Care act because they didnt like it and figured that would work. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much. That is one of the points i make in the book. And that we have to stop with the my way or highway politics. Even as chair of the dnc, i support my partys agenda and fought like heck to make sure week get it adopted, but i recognize there are other people that have valuable opinions and it is important to reach across the aisle to get common grounds. We need more people on the other side to embrace that conflict and i think well be able to get more done who are your best friends on the republican side . Lamar smith. He is amazing. I am surprised you and smith. We have been the cospon ser of many bills. You couldnt be more polar opposites, but there are a few should see that matter to both of us. I invited him and he came to my district in south florida and we did a round table on child protect and did a property tour to learn about the import ps of protecting property. Have you visit him in texas . We enjoy working together and set aside the issues that we dont agree on. Next call comes from neal in wellington, florida. You are on booktv. Hi. Thank you for taking my call. I wanted to say debby you have to best smile of anyone i know in congress. Keep it up. And visit wellington. Okay . Thank you. Thank you. You are welcome. Thank you. That was it. Richard in pleasant grove, utah. What is your question . My question is how come obama and the Democratic People are writing us down with the social plan to take aware our children, shove health care down our throat we cannot afford and tell us we have to take care of everybody. Maybe you people need to read the book and see what hitler did to his people. I am very upset about it. Lets get a response. Obviously, i dont share richards view. And what we are trying to do as democrats under president obamas leadership is focus on what most peoples priority is which is creating jobs and getting the economy to turn around and longterm issues and get a handle on the safety net programs like Social Security and medicare. That is the appropriate role for the government and i think most americans agree. Which is why they reelected president obama. Do you think richards concern . He feels it is being put on him. Is that a fair concern . I really dont. In this case, accusations like he unfortunately chose to do isnt constructive. I wish folks like him would step back, listen and engage in dialogue and understand the other sides point of view. When you here talk like his, it is evident he is watching fox news and gets the information mostly from rightwing conservative sources and isnt open to other points of view. And that is why i wrote the book. Hopefully someone finds a way to see we have to try to Work Together and not dig in so hard and accept everything we hear from one side or another. Putting on your political hat for a moment. The rollout of the Health Care Website has it hurt democrats polytically . That is not a political issue. It is critical. And obama believes that we have to get the website on so people can get on and comparison shop. So, what it does to us polpoin favor isnt the issue. I believe democrats, because of the benefits, that the Affordable Care act provided to many, we will run as candidates on obamacare as an advantage in the 2014 election. This is john and for the next generation. I just want to know two questions. What is the difference between daniel osburg and snowden. And how do you determine a right to get health care through working which you neglected in the concept of health care being a right. It is great if we can provide the right for health care to know acquired but when you throw it out there for others to pay and not have to do anything for a product service. If you could explain that, that would be fantastic. Sure. I think you have a misconception of what the Affordable Care act does. We are paying right now without the Affordable Care act we are paying for millions of people who show up at the emergency room that are so sick. The Affordable Care act care allows them to get the coverage and go to the doctor without the need of the a copay. And stay well instead of going to the emergency room and costing us more. My parents raised me if you dont have your health, you dont have anything. So making sure we can insure everybody has the ability to stay healthy makes us a stronger a better country where did you grow up . On long island and lived there till 18 and moved to florida to go to the university of florida. Go gators what did your parents do both of them live in my hometown now. But my mom was in retail and managed greenhouses for many years. My dad is a cpa. And they are down in florida . They moved to south florida when the twins were five months old. And i dangled them in front of them and it was an easy choice when i took them home after four days next call from kathy in new hampshire. Hi, i am calling hello, kathy. I am calling with an idea and i dont know if it would work, but it might. Say you had a 45 percent National Sales tax on all goods and services and you use this money totally to pay for medicaid. Now medicare is taken care of it. So you would cap all of the people not on medicaid and medicare. You would cap the rates that Insurance Companies could ask of them and lower the price for all of the people that are inbetweens. I wondered what you thought of that idea. Kathy, why do you think that is a good idea . Because i think it it would be a fair way, and it would bring the rates down, and it would be people could make the choice if they didnt want to pay a National Sales tax and if they didnt want to they would not by the skis or the new dress or whatever. And it would just i think it would lower the rate of people between medicare medicaid. Thank you very much. Lets see what congresswoman thinks about that idea. Thank you. Well, kathy, i really feel like the Affordable Care act was important because it focused beyond just medicare medicaid. Medicaid was expanded in the states where you have governors and legislative members that accepted the funds. And we allowed people that slipped in the gaps between qualifying and getting coverage at work. You have a big number of people, almost a million in florida, who fall into the that void. Unfortunately our legislators and governor refused to accept the fund sews funds so they will not get covered we have an individual requirement for Health Insurance that puts everyone into the pool. Adding Healthy People wloo whoo are not covered who are not and we need to work rwaro host for the next generation came out in october with Julie Spencer as coauthor. Whos Julie Spencer . Guest julies a New York Times bestselling author who was a wonderful person, helped folks me as we focus me as we wrote the book, and i tried to tell my story and how i thought we could make the most difference. Host whered you write . Guest i did it in new hampshire, believe it or not. We have a family ohm in new hampshire, so when we go up there on breaks, especially in the summer, i would spend a lot of time on that. But with always jobs i have, i had to cram in that time anywhere we could, so we would schedule a specific time so we could focus on it. Host have Political Parties become less significant in the last 30 years, and what do you think about that . Guest um, in what way . Host do they matter as much . Do people care about the Democratic Party and the Republican Party like they used to . Besides the conventions, what are parties for . Guest oh, sure. I think parties absolutely matter. They matter in a different way than perhaps decades ago. Now they matter because, as always, people who dont have a lot of time and arent necessarily focused as much researching individual candidates, if they know that they generally identify with one party or another, then supporting that partys candidates is, you know, a safe pathway for making sure they elect people who share their views. But years ago, you know, parties had a more significant role because the Campaign Finance laws were quite a bit different. Unfortunately, the Citizens UnitedSupreme Court decision has really changed the impact that Political Parties have because now you have this unaccountable, opaque, corporateinfused invasion of corporate donations where theyre drowning campaigns and candidates in unaccountable money, and its really unfortunate. Its actually, puts campaigns up for sale even more than Campaign Finance left host does that hurt the dnc and the rnc when it comes to fundraising . Guest no. I think we are i know at the dnc weve just had our best two months in Online Fundraising in our history, and thats particularly because i think people are really tired of the gridlock, tired of the tea party being allowed to control the agenda, shutting the government down, being willing to hold the economy hostage all in the name of getting their way on the issues that they care, you know, that matter to them like repealing the Affordable Care act. I think people look at them as irresponsible because they know that we take a more balanced approach, and were focused on making sure that everybody has an opportunity to join the middle class and that if you want to succeed, you get a fair shot and a fair shake and the Democratic Partys policy is focused on that. Host another call for Debbie Wasserman shults, this is marilyn in zahn rafael, california. Articulating clearly about the health care act. There is no such distortion going on. And ink yee caller we need to explain to people what it means. Im a retired nurse, means a lot to me. I ordered a book for my young physician daughter who is the next generation just like you, and my other question for you kind of goes to just what was said. How are you going to withstand the pressure to become subdued, to give up your ideals, to stay in politics like ive seen over these generations happen more and more to amazing startup politicians . How are you going to not have something happen to you . Because i think you have an amazing future. Thats it. Guest oh, thank you so much. Well, this is my, actually, my 21st year in office. I was elected to the Florida House of representatives when i was 26 years old, and i knocked on 25,000 doors in my be first race, and all the good old boys here told me it wasnt my turn, and i kind of went around. So they keep me grounded. I share your concern. There are too many politicians that forget where they came from, and im really committed to making sure that, you know, you dance with the one that brung ya, as they say. And the people down here in south florida have definitely given me their support, and im so appreciative of it. Host and Debbie Wassermanschultz is the author as well of this book, for the next generation. St. Martins press is the publisher. Thank you for your time. Guest thank you so much. Is there an author or book youd like to see featured on booktv . Send us an email or tweet us at