joe. but i want to talk a little bit about enthusiasm, energy; why you need to work for joe; why, between now and november, i need everybody here to knock on some doors, and write some more checks, and make some more phone calls, and talk to your neighbors about joe. that's what we need. [applause] and you need to do this because the choice in this election could not be clearer, and the stakes could not be higher. on the one hand, we have a candidate in joe sestak who is not a career politician. everybody has been talking about insiders in washington. well, joe is not one of the insiders who's been part of the problem. instead, he's been solving problems in washington. [applause] he didn't go there with a

liberal agenda or a conservative agenda. he went to serve the people of pennsylvania, just like he's served his country for the last three decades. [applause] this is somebody who's always working for you; whose door is always open; who's helped pass 10 pieces of legislation in just three years - the first new federal funding for autism treatment in 12 years; student loan assistance for u.s. troops called to active duty; support for troops who come home with ptsd; more help and more contracts for pennsylvania's small businesses. [applause] he has been doing the work. in washington, you know, they make the distinction between show horses and work horses. and joe is a work horse. [applause] he's been working, not talking. [applause] and this is somebody who's

been pragmatic. he will work with democrats, he'll work with republicans, he'll work with independents. he's willing to work with anybody who's interested in actually getting the job done, and that's the kind of person you want representing you in washington. that's who joe sestak is. [applause] that's why you need to work for him to make him your next senator. [applause] on the other side, we've got a candidate who was in washington for years, ran a special interest group whose main function has been to pull the republican party to the right -- even farther to the right. [laughter] i guess you could say they've done a good job -- [laughter] -- at that. this is somebody who, when he had a chance, voted to cut help for small businesses; who wants

to make trade deals that send jobs out of pennsylvania; who seems more concerned about the folks he used to trade with on wall street than the pennsylvanians here on main street. it's someone who is telling us he'll do everything he can to return to the exact same policies that led us to this horrible recession that we're in, in the first place. we can't afford to let that happen. we cannot afford more of the same rigid ideology that led us in this place. we can't afford to go backwards. we've got to move forward. we need joe sestak to move forward. that's the choice in this election. [applause]

i want to set the context for this, because for the last decade, a very specific philosophy reigned in washington. and it does have the advantage that it's simple to describe. you cut taxes, especially for millionaires and billionaires. you cut regulations for special interests. you cut back on investments in education and clean energy and research and technology. the basic idea was that if we put blind faith in the market, and if we let corporations play by their own rules, and we leave everybody else to fend for themselves, that somehow america would grow and prosper. we know how that philosophy worked out. it didn't work for middle-class families who saw their incomes go down and their costs go up. there was a report -- this isn't from me -- this is the wall street journal, not known for -- [laughter] -- you know, pushing the obama agenda. [laughter] the wall street journal said

that from 2001 to 2009, when the other side was in power, the average wage for middle- class families went down 5 percent. that's before the crisis hit. so your wages and incomes flat- lined. your costs of everything from health care to college tuition, sky-rocket. their philosophy didn't work for an economy that experienced the slowest job growth of any decade since world war ii. they took record surpluses, turned them into record deficits. and then finally recklessness on the part of some on wall street led to the worst economic crisis since the great depression. that's their track record. now, i ran for president because i had a different idea about how this country was built. [applause]

and it was an idea rooted in my own family's story. my parents, grandparents, they never had much. i was raised by single mom who worked tirelessly so that i might have a better life. her and my grandparents, they believed in the american values of self-reliance and individual responsibility, and they instilled those values in their children. but they also believed in a country that rewards hard work and rewards responsibility, and a country where we look after one another, where we say i am my brother's keeper, i am my sister's keeper. they believed in that america. [applause] they believed in an america that gave my grandfather the chance to go to college because of the gi bill. an america that gave my

grandparents the chance to buy a home because of the federal housing authority. an america where a rising tide really does lift all boats, from the ceo to the newest guy on the assembly line. that's the america i believe in. and that's the america joe sestak believes in. [applause] i had a town hall on the economy today on cnbc. and i explained to people we don't believe government has all the answers to our problems. we don't think government's main role is to create jobs or prosperity. joe, i know, believes this, that government should be lean. it should be efficient. but in the words of the first republican president, abraham lincoln, we also believe that government should do for the people what they can't do better for themselves. [applause]

and that means a future where we encourage american innovation and american ingenuity. that's why we want to end tax breaks going to companies that are shipping jobs overseas and start giving those tax breaks to companies that are investing in jobs and research and plants and equipment right here in the united states of america. [applause] that's why we're investing in research and technology and a homegrown, clean energy industry, because i don't want solar panels and electric cars and advanced batteries manufactured in europe or in asia. i want them made right here in the united states of america, in the usa by american workers. [applause] we see an america where every citizen has the skills and training to compete with any

worker in the world. that's why we've set a goal to once again have the highest proportion of college graduates in the world by 2020. we used to be number one; we're now number 12. we are going to get back to number one because that is our future. [applause] that's why we're revitalizing our community colleges, and reforming our education system based on what works best for our children, not what works to perpetuate the status quo. that's why we're fighting to make our new college tax credit permanent - a tax credit that will mean $10,000 in tuition relief for each child going to four years of college. [applause] most of all, we see an america where a growing middle-class is the beating heart of a growing economy. that's why i kept my campaign promise and gave a middle-class tax cut to 95 percent of working americans. [applause] that's why we passed health

insurance reform that stops insurance companies from jacking up your premiums at will or denying you coverage because you get sick. [applause] while i was over at reading terminal, a woman came up to me. she says, thank you so much for health care reform. i've got two young people graduating from college. my children right now, they don't have health insurance, but because of your bill, they're going to be able to stay on my health insurance until they're 26 years old. and i told them, it was the right thing to do then. it's the right thing to do now. and we've got to keep it in place for the future. [applause] that's why we passed financial reform -- to end taxpayer bailouts, but also to stop credit card companies and mortgage lenders from taking advantage of the american people by jacking up rates without any notice. that's why we're trying to make

it easier for workers to save for retirement, fighting the efforts of some in the other party to privatize social security, because as long as i'm president, nobody is going to take the retirement savings of a generation of americans and hand it over to wall street. we're not going to do that. [applause] this is the america we see. this is the america we believe in. that's the choice in this election. now, we've been through an incredibly difficult time as a nation. when i walked into the white house, preventing a second depression was not what i expected to be at the top of my "to do" list. [laughter] and even though we've done that, even though the economy is now growing again, and we're adding private sector jobs again, the hole was so deep that

progress has been painfully slow. you still have millions of americans who are unemployed. millions more who can barely pay the bills. hundreds of thousands of families who have lost their homes. these aren't just statistics. behind each of those numbers, there's a face, there's a story. there's heartache. there's struggle. i see it in the letters i receive each night. i see it when i have town hall meetings or i travel around the country. so i know people are frustrated and they're angry. and they're anxious about the future. and i also know that in a political campaign, the easiest thing for the other side to do is not to put forward any specifics, not to put forward any plans, but just try to ride that anger and fear all the way to election day. and that's what's happening right now. i mean, look, it'd be one thing if joe's opponent, the other republican candidates had looked back on the last decade and said to themselves, "you

know what? our policies didn't work. we ended up in a terrible recession. we need to try something new." but that's not what they're doing. they are not offering any new ideas. they're not offering any new policies. we're not engaged in some honest debate where they say, oh, we're going to get control of government spending and we're going to create jobs, and here's how we'll do it, we're going to do it one, two, three, four, five -- that's not what they're doing. the chair of one of their campaign committees said that if they take over congress, they will pursue -- i'm quoting now -- "the exact same agenda" as they did before i took office. the exact same agenda. i think you guys will understand it. they drove the economy into a ditch. and so me and joe and others,

we went down into the ditch and we put on our boots. and it's muddy down there and slippery, and it's hot and there are bugs. and we're pushing and we're shoving to get the car out of the ditch. and the whole time, the republicans are standing up there comfortable, sipping on a slurpee, watching us. [laughter] they're saying, you got to push harder. [laughter] you're not pushing the right way. but we keep on at it. every once in a while we ask them to come down and help, and they say, no, no, we're not going to help. finally, we get this car back on level ground. it's a little dented. you know, it's got -- it's got a few holes in the fender. but we're finally moving in the right direction. and suddenly, we get a tap on the shoulder. and they say, excuse me, we want the keys back.

[laughter] you can't have the keys back [applause] -- because you don't know how to drive! they don't know how to drive the car. they can't have the keys back. [applause] you can't have it. [applause] and i just want to point out, when you want to drive and you want to go forward, what do you do? you put the car in what? in d. if you're going backwards, what do you do? you put it in r. [laughter] that's not a coincidence. [laughter and applause] they have told us exactly what they would do if we give them the keys back. credit card companies -- they'll be able to jack up the rates without reason. insurance companies can deny you coverage because you're

sick. they want to stand by and do nothing when states are forced to lay off teachers or firefighters or cops. according to the republican leader of the house, those are just "government jobs" that presumably aren't worth saving. they want to give more tax breaks to companies that ship jobs overseas. and they want to borrow $700 billion -- $700 billion that we don't have -- to give a tax break that is worth, on average, $100,000 to every millionaire and billionaire in america. now, these are the folks who are lecturing us on fiscal responsibility. the same folks who refused to pay for two wars, two tax cuts for the wealthy, left me a $1.3 trillion deficit all wrapped up in a bow when i walked into the oval office. now they want to spend another $700 billion that 98 percent of americans will never see.

i believe we need a serious plan to reduce our deficit - that's why i've already proposed a three- year freeze on all discretionary spending outside national security it's why we've already identified $300 billion worth of tax loopholes that aren't serving our economy well, that could be closed, and a couple hundred billion dollars worth of cuts that we could make in programs that aren't working anymore. that's why we launched a bipartisan fiscal commission to come up with real solutions to reduce our long-term deficit. but these folks aren't serious about the deficit - not if they want to spend another $100 billion [sic] without paying for it, to give tax breaks to folks who don't need it and weren't even asking for it. that's their agenda. that's what they're offering the american people - a future that looks like a recent past that did not work for you. one more special interest got reign to play by their own rules and where middle-class

families were left to fend for themselves. philadelphia, that is not a future i accept for the united states of america. that is not a future joe sestak accepts for the united states of america, and if you do not accept that future, if you do not think the stakes are large, i want you to consider this -- this is worth thinking about. right now all across this country, special interests, running millions of dollars of attack ads against democratic candidates. last year's supreme court decision in citizens united which basically says the special interests can gather up millions of dollars, they are allowed to spend as much as they want without limit, and they do

not ever have to reveal who is paying for these ads. and that is what they're doing all across the country. they are doing it right here in pennsylvania, millions of dollars being spent. and the names always sound very benign -- it's americans for prosperity, committee for truth and politicians, americans for apple pie. [laughter] i made that last one up. none of them will disclose who is paying for these ads. you do not know whether it is some big financial interest, you do not know if it is a big oil company or an insurance company. you do not even know if it is foreign controlled. we tried to fix this. the leaders of the other party would not even allow it to come up for a vote. they want the public to be in the dark. we cannot allow a special interest takeover of our democracy. we cannot go back to the days where just because you had a

lobbyist, you could write the tax code the way you wanted it, taking advantage of main street families, middle-class families. we're not going to go back to the days when insurance companies wrote rules that said if your child had a preexisting condition, you might never be able to get him health insurance. we're not going back to the exact same agenda because we know what happened. a lot has changed since this last election, but what has not changed is the choice that we face in this country. it is still fear versus hope. it is still past versus future. it is still the choice between sliding backwards or moving full word. that is what this election as of what -- is about. that is the choice you will face in november. [applause] let me close by saying this. this is not going to be easy. electing joe is not going to be

easy. he is going to be outspent not just by the other candidate but by these special interests, but also, because it is never easy. the challenges we are facing are not easy. but you did not elect me to do what is easy. you did not let me just to read the polls and figure out how to keep myself in office. you elected me to do what is right. that is why i ran. [applause] that is why joe sestak is running. that is why you've got to work hard in these next few weeks, and knocking on doors for joe, and talking to your friends and neighbors about joe, and making phone calls for joe, and writing some checks for joe. we need you to do this here in pennsylvania and all across the country because we can defeat those millions of dollars if we got people power on our side, millions of americans making their voices heard. and if we do that, then hope

will beat fear every time. in the future will beat the past. that is what this election is about. we need to come together around the great project of american renewal. we will restore our economy and rebuild our middle class and reclaim the american dream for the next generation. thank you very much, everybody. god bless you. god bless the united states of america. [applause] ["stars and stripes forever" playing] th [captioning performed by national captioning institute]

[captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2010] ♪

>> joe sestak voted for the most extreme parts of the health-care takeover. >> it puts the health care between patients and doctors. i tried to discuss basic reform to my congressman, joe sestak, but i could not get an appointment. pat timmy has the best plan for health care.

>> >>, service -- joe sestak has led his life by those factors. 31 years protecting americans, leading the fight against terrorism, trusted and command. now he is running to serve pennsylvania. standing up to the bosses of both parties, admiral joe sestak. >> i am joe sestak and i authorized to this message. >> more about this year's election from the center responsive politics. this is 40 minutes. ann toth. >> "washington journal" continues. host: sheila krumholz joins us to talk about campaign raising in 2010. begin with a talking about by 27. guest: -- 527.

guest: that refers to the cota " charities. five to seven groups -- 527 group are not supposed to be saying vote for or against this candidate, but they are supposed to educate people about a specific topic. host: so they can run and had about an issue, like health care, but they cannot mention a candidate's name. guest: right. their roles have changed dramatically with the ruling in the supreme court and other judicial rulings. there's a lot of confusion and there will be a lot of envelops pushing this cycle, i think. host: confusion comes from what is a 527 and what is a 5 01-c4.

not report itseed na donors. it means that we are going to see a lot of money going toward our elections, trying to influence our elections, but we will not see who is bankrolling the effort. host: according to "time" magazine these groups were able to do that anyway. they were able to donate to a 501 c4 and they did not have to report it. guest: citizens united released unlimited contributions to these organizations and they can now spend that money on direct

advocacy, independent expenditures on behalf of the candidates. as long as it is not coordinated with a candidate, they can't accept a million-dollar donation from a corporation and a turnaround and say it is adding for a candidate. host: "time" magazine says -- its spinoff group defines itself as a nonprofit organization in the the tax cut. the irs is that such groups may intervene in piper to political campaigns as long as its primary

purpose is the promotion of social welfare. that means a group like crossroads gps conducts what it calls hard-hitting issue advocacy. that means thinly veiled hats on behalf of republican candidates. guest: that is exactly true. and crossroads gps has pledged to raise and spend $52 million for this election. that is a huge amount of money to be addressed at elections, at influencing the public vote on election, and really, it is disingenuous for anyone to suggest that this is simply a good government information campaign. it is clearly money that is directed at us. host: there is also the action network, the american action network, which is run by former

aenator norm kohlman and republican from minnesota as well. guest: american crossroads is one of the biggest stories outside these interest groups. also, the american cent -- the center for american progress is another such organization. a 501 (c)3 and 501(c)4 organization. they can spend their money kind of publicly, openly, showing who is going to -- giving them money, but if there is any problem were the donor is going to be under a microscope, they can have it go to their hidden harm, the 501(c)4 and spend that

money -- raise that money again for the candidates. these are kind of exhibit a end of exhibit the for what is happening -- exhibit a" and exhibit "b" for raising money for these candidates. other organizations on the right are american family organization, move on, some we have heard of. we have the unions and the unions themselves have said our spending will not match the spending that is already been pledged on the right. but a lot of the other organizations that are organizing are also union

funded. i think there is a more limited amount of money on the left then there is on the right. host: and in the "time" article it says that labor is set to put about $150 million of their own money into the fall elections. other groups such as emily's list and the league of voters will kick in even more. you have seen groups like moveon.org form a 501(c)4, so they can do some of the same efforts that republicans do. guest: right they have 501(c)4 and american crossroads has a 527 and a 501(c)4. it is considered to be like a

super pak. it is so designed for expenditures on individual candidates, but independent of their campaign. here they have one of each. it is kind of a collect them all the election cycle. they're being sent abroad in as many ways as they need to to achieve their goals. host: take a call. palin on the democratic line, good morning. caller: my question is concerning the supreme court ruling and one man, 1 vote. as an individual i can vote and also as a member of a union i can vote. is that true? guest: i think the reference here is that corporations have been given the same first amendment rights as individuals. you has an individual can go vote for the candidates of your choice, but if you are a business owner, you can then use

that vehicle to raise and spend money independently of the candidates in a very influential way. if you have the resources of.com view can muster -- if you have the resources, you can muster hundreds of millions of dollars and make a huge impact. caller: money to buy votes? >> no, but essentially, that is what they are being accused of, or those who have been supporting the citizens united decision -- rather, those against that decision have said this is allowing those with more money to, in effect, buy more votes, influence for the candidate of their choice. money is outweighing the free speech of ordinary citizens. host: let's take a look at some of these issue advocacy ads that these groups are putting together. first the one against senate

majority leader harry reid. >>, harry reid says no one can do more than he can. really, harry? >> only 26,000 people lost their jobs today, which is really good. >> really, harry? no wonder nevada has the highest unemployment in the nation. deficits, obama care -- no one can do more. really, harry? for nevadans haven't you done enough? host: that was an ad put out there by a group called ameri

do you think she would be on your side? host: what type of groups have put this together? is that a 527 or is that the 5 01? guest: either one can run these ads. and you can achieve the same goals. saying vote for or against. that is why they are thinly veiled electioneering. everyone on the kerridge is going to understand either for -- ever won on the couch is going to understand these are directed the therefore against. host: is it just because they did not say the words?

guest: it goes beyond to savsay that if it goes in support or against the candidates issues it is deemed in support or against. but the gates are wide open. these organizations can achieve -- can raise and spend money and achieve much the same goal and there will not be much better to police them -- much effort to police them because it is clear that the supreme court has ruled in their favor and they can spend the money as they see fit. host: republican in georgia, good morning. caller: i would like to ask how come it was ok for the obama administration to use corporations to raise millions of money -- millions of dollars

monthly when he was running and there was no push back for that? i mean, all these global warming donations coming in from different corporations, how come that was ok? but now that the republicans are running, all the push back is about corporations coming in at, barney in money -- bringing in money. there were billions of dollars spent to get obama have elected. host: are you critical of how much money was spent on the candidates in the election? guest: and we do not actually take a position. there was a lot of criticism for the left rejecting the campaign finance money and pursuing hundreds of millions of dollars over and above what the mccain campaign could spend because he mccain did accept the pope --

that partial public financing. there was a lot of concern about the three-quarters of a billion dollars spent by the obama campaign that was spent in the last cycle and, in a way, that did undercut his credibility host: virginia beach, mark, independent line. caller: i am starting to get involved in politics and things like that i am finding it hard to comprehend because you're saying you cannot talk reveal private investments that you are getting of millions and millions of dollars, but again, you owe so much money and [unintelligible] and the federal government goes

and punishes because they've made their money probably and kept it to themselves. where are you getting all of this money from? host: michael, we've got your point. let me show the viewers the headline in "usa today." ehab line is that mid debt -- midterm campaign war chests are crammed. guest: we were looking at a billion dollars election cycle back in march and that was kind of a trajectory of spending in the elections of a last several cycles, not taking into account the fact that the recent decision could unleash a far more money in the election cycle. we were looking at a baseline

spending, which would still be 30% above the previous midterm with the success by the candidates and these interest groups. i think the press will be far higher. -- the costs will be far higher. i think it was $8.5 million for a winning senate seat. your average american does not have access to the kind of wealth. host: and you are on track for this cycle to cost 30% more than in 2008 and you can reasonably predict that the house and senate seats will go up 30%? guest: the senate on depends on which raises are up. we only have one third of the

seat coming up in any election cycle. it would depend on where they have big media markets. of course, there is california, sort of think that would have a big impact. host: next call from texas. caller: i am a 74-year-old man and this is the first time i have done any of this. who isn't watching the lobbying efforts toward our supreme court judges -- who is watching the lobbying efforts toward our supreme court justices? guest: there is lobbying at the federal level, but there is none reported for the supreme court. of course -- host: they do not have to run for term. they are appointed for life. guest: i'm sure there are a

advocates hoping to impress supreme court justices, but we do not have any way to track lobbying efforts for the supreme court. host: stan diego, good morning. cut -- san diego, good morning. caller: i am a 62-year-old veteran and i'm very happy about these young people who are getting involved. to the 18-year-old who called earlier, i would say, keep at it, young fellow and remember, the bigger government gets, the fewer rights you have. thank you, c-span. host: but go on to lincoln, nebraska. lincoln, neb., you're on the air. caller: guess, i have a question for --

i have a question for -- host: we are born to put you on hold so you can clear that up. -- going to put you on hold so you can clear that up. remember to turn your tv down. washington d.c., good morning. caller: my concern is of of money -- new york, good morning. caller: my concern is aipac being treated as a human being. -- a pac being treated as a human being. how do we get corporations to not be treated as a human being. corporations do not have a finite life span expectancy.

the cubans do. over the long term, they can save -- humans do. over the long term, they can say what they want and what can stop them? guest: i think that is a good point. the balance that this decision gave individual americans and corporate entities is, i think, one of the most controversial and, for many, a very troubling decision. this is going to be the thought in legislative proposals to try to balance what this decision has done for years to come. unfortunately from our perspective, we cannot do what we do, researching the money behind politics with our? texting -- without accessing that information. an incredibly troubling aspect of this is the and our ability

of these organizations to raise money in secret and spending it with our anyone really knowing who the interests are behind these ads and expenditures. host: in georgia, cindy, independent line, good morning. caller: i have been curious about this question, and maybe that followed just asked a question. host: go ahead. the we can hear you. caller: i have gotten the impression that once the supreme court ruled on citizens united that it would be up to congress to refine that decision, to change it to be more equitable. what kind of progress -- is that true? and are there any groups that are supporting that effort in congress? because i think that is the only way we will be able to turn that off. guest: the caller is perhaps

referencing the disclose act, which was legislation proposed by the democratic leadership. there were many facets to the legislation. there are still proponents pushing for it, but nothing is going to happen in time for these elections. i think the 2012 elections will be the next target to put in -- to create legislative change. and again, one of the major pieces of the legislation was to create disclosure of these outside interest groups, to know where the money was coming from. that was one aspect that the supreme court said we have got covered, we have got fixed, and we have great disclosure now. that is a combination of the work by the federal election commission. hundreds of millions of dollars may be pouring in and we have no

idea where it is coming from. host: a tweet comes in -- guest: that is interesting because there is an inherent conflict between the members of congress writing these laws and making them such that they are not benefiting the incumbents themselves, and creating an solidifying an incumbent's advantage. it is really of to was to hold barack -- to hold cowart incumbents accountable. -- to hold our incumbents accountable. host: ohio, go ahead. caller: is there a resource that we can take advantage of that would give as a nonpartisan comprehensive list? i know they say that these donations are secret, but is there a place we can go to that

would give as a comprehensive list of who is donating money? guest: that is what our organization is trying to do. we are at an opensecrets.org. we are trying to track or the money is coming from and going to in the federal elections. you can see that all of the money going into the candidate'' coffers and party committees, categorized by industry and interest group and standardized by organizations so that you can see who the major organizations are that are bankrolling campaigns. but we are also tracking independent expenditures. you can see which organizations like crossroads gps, like others, are spending. in some cases, tens of millions of dollars, and all told, hundreds of millions of dollars. the kinds of money and that you

can see on our side barack 527 -- on our website are 527 groups, and independent organizations, these new super acs.p host: and those are 501(c)4? guest: no, they report to the commission instead of the irs. but they can raise unlimited funds from unregulated sources and spend it on behalf of the candidates. many of those ads will be very negative and coming in at the last minute we saw some of that kind of money flowing into the alaska senate race and the delaware senate race.

very effective at dropping hundreds of thousands of dollars in just the last few days of the elections. host: a lot of the leadership on both the democratic and republican side have leadership political action committees. they funnel the money to one place and they can sort of pull it out to separate entities? kalisha pacs are kind of -- guest: right, the leadership pacs have money that is under their control and they use it in ways to free up -- it frees up more money that they can spend on their own election effort. but also, those who are supporting a more junior candidates who were struggling with their leadership pacs, they

are pushing for a jump to higher office. host: if you go to the web site opensecrets.org, on the lower bottom half of the website they have the campaign cost clock. you can see it taking away right now. host: let's go to a call from oklahoma. good morning. caller: my question is more of a personal question. what you think is a citizen and roll to make sure that -- what do you think is the citizen's role to make sure that they do not exceed the lead? guest: thank you for that question. we think it is an essential for people to get involved. unfortunately, there's a lot of discomfort with recent judicial decisions.

is seen as secondary to all of this money coming in, but from our perspective, we see it as our job to hold them accountable at every level to the real constituents and not to the cash constituents instead. host: 8 week from a viewer's your -- -- a tweet from a viewer here. san francisco, go ahead. caller: people would call our founding fathers, even into the 19th century, and were very weak wary of corporations. i think part of that was having been under the thumb of british monopolies and hudson bay trading and all of that.

they limited the corporate charters usually to about a 10- year life span and would only renew the charter is the corporation had, in the course of business, also contributed to the general welfare. i think that is something that we may have been losing in the last 50 or so years of what has pretty much become corporate america. guest: the caller makes an excellent point. there is a growing sense of clout and power, certainly in washington, but all levels of political life. at corporations, of course. unions have also held sway and those that are spending are often at the top of the political contributors cycle after cycle. all told, however, corporations

far exceed contributions to candidates and parties and unions do. there is a huge gap in resources for corporations verses unions. and i think the cloud of corporations -- clout of corporations, to give the and this supreme court decision, is one of the concerns, particularly on the -- particularly the supreme court decisions is one of the concerns, particularly on the left in this election cycle host: another tweet from a viewer. national, judith, republican line. good morning. caller: i have a comment about the influence that unions have that necessarily their members do not agree with. i have several friends who are quite conservative and they find

it extremely upsetting that they do not have a choice. in other words, the union's collective dues and then they support the liberal agendas and they have no say about it. having the corporations, having the ability to do the same just kind of levels the playing field. although, i just heard the last comment about the corporation's will have more clout. that is my comments. guest: corp. -- the corporations have resources that far exceed the unions. of course, there is the argument about individuals being forced to give the contribution. we have often heard comments, often anonymous, from people working at corporations that there was pressure for them to give or they were not going to get that rates or the bonus at

the end of the year, or they were perhaps not going to keep their jobs. there is often the same pressure to give in a certain way. host: tony allen, you are on the air with sheila krumholz. caller: this new law, doesn't that open it for foreign governments to give money into our election, something we have fought against? and anytime someone from another country has donated they have raised all that gain, the democrats. but now all of this money is going to come from corporations we do not have control over? guest: that was a concern that a democrat put forward in this last few months and the caller is absolutely right. because we cannot know where

the money is coming from for these 501(c)3 tax-exempt organizations, we cannot know whether it is coming from domestic sources. in our system of campaign finance, foreign corporations are unlimited. foreign entities can be influential, but they have to have operations in the united states. the money has to come from those u.s. plants and companies, the subsidiaries of foreign corporations. it is much more removed. but with the loophole currently in disclosure, we really cannot know whether money is coming from foreign entities and whether or not they may be foreign government controlled. host: are you seeing any like this that is happening, any hints of this leading up to november? guest: not recently, but we have

in the past. there was a campaign finance scandal in the '90s were there were efforts and there were connections to a foreign government-backed organizations to try to influence our elections through campaign donations. there was an investigation of that and a lot of serious concerns and allegations were, in fact, founded. i think there is a real need for us to close this loophole so we can see where the money is coming from because otherwise, we can on know whether it is domestic or foreign. host: folks like charlie cook has said -- he does not think we are going to see corporations flooding this campaign cycle. they're hoarding their money right now and not spending it on anything he does not think corporations are going to pay -- play that much of an influence

in campaign 2010. those democrats that view the democratic majority or vice versa as a threat, they may be jumping in, but he does not see the corporations as playing a big role. guest: i think he is referring to the idea that a major multinational corporations, maybe fortune 500 makacompanies, will not be spending a lot of money directly. did not want to risk offending their customers by taking a partisan side. on the other hand, where customers -- corporations have an interest in supporting one candidate versus another, particularly where they can contribute anonymously, i think there is concern that there could be sizable sums of money directed at a particular candidate.

furthermore, those who have fought against the citizens united decision have made the point that all it takes for a corporate representative to go into an office of a member of congress could really dingell the threat of spending against that members should they not agree with their legislative agenda. i think the money is spent in directly at, giving money to those things, but also this threat of spending money against a candidate. host: david on the independent line. caller: can you hear me? host: we can. caller: i recently turned 40 and

i have been listening to c-span for quite some time. i can't really remember how long and i love listening to it. thanks for that. but the types of reforms that we are talking about here, as far as how it really is not reform as i would define reform because it turns are to be typical government increased of regulation and more complicated laws. things just get more complicated and nothing really changes. and the whole process around specifically donations just get bigger and bigger. from what i can tell, we really should be doing is removing money as much as we can from the process of who gets elected. host: that brings up public financing. can you talk about that? guest: we are not a reform

group, so we do not support any particular platform for financing, but that is one of the key solutions put forward by many organizations to remove all the private money from the process and to show a wave that is -- to bring money into the system to support candidates with good ideas in a way that is corrupting and also in a way that is not just candidates with wealth. the recent court decision in citizens united in particular is a fundamental change. and really, this reverses a decade, if not a century of precedent in proceed

our elections are funded and wage. -- waged. it is a good idea and many do support public financing for this. from our perspective, we advocate to this -- to close that gap in disclosure. host: maryland on the republican line. caller: mrs. krumholz was talking about corporations and twisting the arms of their employees and the threat of being fired is not contributing to certain campaigns. i wonder she has more qualms with the unions for the fact that with the exception of the least 30% of union members are registered republicans, and yet, 90% or better of union money goes to the democratic

party. do you have a problem with the fact that they are taking people's views without their consent and taking it to candidates they do not support? guest: the center for american politics does not take a position on that, but i was referencing them both as equivalent concerned, that anyone should not be forced to give money to candidates they do not support. if that were leveled through our taxpayer dollars, people would be forced to find support. this is the debate both in our union pacs are funded, howow co

>> c-span's local content vehicles are traveling the country as we look at some of the most closely contested house races. ♪ [drum cadence] >> we have two candidates for the u.s. house. i want to ask them to introduce themselves. [applause] >> [inaudible]

we don't have all the amenities of a large city like charlotte, but we have hospitality. >> congressman spratt is one of only two democrats from south carolina. the other is jim cliburn. this would be a huge pickup opportunity for republicans, which explains why they devoted so much attention to this race. he is one of nancy pelosi's keep people in this house and one of the top democrats on the armed services committee. with his leadership he has been a high-profile congressmen. it would be a blow to the democrats to lose him. he has been in congress for 28 years. he is the longest serving congressman in south carolina, is chairmandf of the budget

committee -- he is chairman of the budget committee. he has carved a reputation as the budget bureau -- budget guru in the house. he is now serving on president obama's deficit commission. congressman spratt one pretty handily in the last several elections. his most serious challenge came in 1994. he won by four points against a well-known businessman who later challenged him again two years later. spratt won that race. he had a serious challenge in 2006 from a state rep. he has not had a serious challenger sense. >> we went to a launch in bishopville. i spoke to 65 people at a

republican club. i began by saying i did not think there were 65 republicans in lee county. someone said there are not. >> senator mulvaney who is a state senator decided to challenge him. he attended a town hall meeting on healthcare last summer and saw the level of concern people have about health care reform and decided that he needed to run for congress and challenge congressman scrap -- challenge congressman spratt. he lives in the northern section of the district. he has an interesting background. he attended georgetown university and a law degree from the university of north carolina. he ran for the statehouse in 2006, worked there for two years and moved to the state senate.

now he is involved in this run from congress. he said he wanted to keep it focused on three issues, one was health care reform, tcap and trade, and the stimulus package. he wanted to run a campaign based on his opposition to those initiatives. healthcare has emerged as the most high-profile issue. senator mulvaney said this district did not want the health care reform. congressman spratt voted in favor of health-care reform and has had to defend his vote along the way. the fifth district stretches across 14 counties in the upper portion of south carolina and is divided into three regions.

you have the charlotte suburbs and the northern part of the region, the midland region in the center and then they river area which is more agricultural. congressman spratt likes to call a three ring circus because you have to keep projects going in each of the districts in order to satisfy each. the fifth district has been hard hit by the economic downturn. they once relied on the textile industry. textiles began fading away in the 1980's. now they are almost completely gone. many parts are still trying to make the transition. the economic downturn did not make that any easier. south carolina is one of the

most conservative states. the fifth district is considered more moderate than the rest of south carolina, but it's still leans conservative. john spratt has been an anomaly for south carolina, a democrat and a conservative state. he is very conscious of budget, spending discipline thought. a lot of people in the district are upset about the health care reform and the bank bailouts, the stimulus package. and what they see as reckless government spending. we covered several t party rallies outside his district office. we have not seen this level of engagement in quite awhile. that is what congressman spratt is having to contend with. >> c-span's local content vehicles are traveling the country visiting congressional

districts as we look at some of the most closely contested house races. for more information on what the local content vehicles are up to , visit our web site at c-span.org. >> error few moments, her form of torture was in a broader issues with comments from self carolina's afghanistan paulson, president obama campaigns for the democratic senate, sestak. >> of washington journal tomorrow morning, the president of the national small-business assertion addition, told the court will recall about the

small business blow >> 48 hours of people and events telling america's story. eyewitness accounts of events that shaped our nation. visit museums, historical sites and college campuses as taught history professors and leading historians still into america's past. that is on c-span3. >> now, republican senator lindsay gramm of south carolina

on the afghanistan war and counterterrorism strategy. he is a colonel in the air force reserves and just returned from afghanistan where he served as legal advisor. this 1.5 our discussion is from the american enterprise institute. >> -- >> ladies and gentlemen -- ladies and gentlemen, if i can ask you all to be seated and end your conversations, please. we would like to get started on time. it is not that i am not grateful that you are having a very nice time. good afternoon, everybody. welcome to the american enterprise institute. welcome to the american enterprise institute. i am the vice-president for foreign and defense policy studies. thanks a for joining us today. we are very proud to have senator lindsey graham here today. he will give a short talk this

morning or this afternoon which will be followed by a session of "q&a" with the audience. after that, we will do a short and sweet roundtable, something we have not done in the past. no set piece presentations. i am pleased that we are able to have senator graham ought back here. he haseally given it back one of the most interesting and well received talks here in many years last time he spoke. he has a very illustrious resume which is online at r you to read and its full form. he served for 6.5 years as an active duty air force lawyer. after leaving the air force in 1989, he joined the south carolina air national guard where he served until his election to the house of representatives in 1994. he serves as the south carolina state in the house of

representatives since 2003. he was called to active duty in the first gulf war. he continues to servin the reserves. he recently returned from reserve duty in afghanistan. i hope he will talk about that as well. he is one of the most articulate natnal-security experts in the senate and has been outspoken in suppo of their troops, their mission, and the importance of understanding what is at stake in the war on terror. hecondemned the new found process of setting arbitrary deadlines for troop drawdowns and said it would be a mistake to leave iraq with about maintaining a military presence. earlier this year, if he passed the terrorist retention review act which seeks to resolve some of the habeas issues. talk about that bill, afghanistan, and anything else he would like to talk about, let me welcome senator lindsey graham. [applause]

>> without food, i would have been worried. if you came here to figure out how al green paid his filing fee in south carina or whether or not it is a good idea to dabble in witchcraft, whether obama was born in america, or whether the dream act will help senator harry reid in the upcoming election, you have come to the wrong place. we will talk for about 35 minutes. at that point in time, pulled the of this place. i believe in the geneva convention. one of the rolls is for politicians to talk over 35 that

it violates the rules. i will talk about afghanistan. the fact that you came here says a lot about you. i think it is good. it is 12:30, and a beautiful day or making money. but you decided to come here and have a discussion with me and others about our national security. and we are what? how many days before the election? i am not good at math. that is why i am in the senate. some days left. in the finish line, in the last lap. would you know that we are at war listening to the political discourse? has there been a serious exchange between any candidate, tea party, democrat, republican, libertarian, vegetarian on what we should do with iran? have you seen one commercial about whether or not our afghan strategy is good or bad? we are within days, literally,

of a major shift in power in washington and you would never know that this nation is involved in two wars and a oming threats facing us all that could change the course of humanity and mankind. and i say that knowing that everybody in america cares about our troops and every candidate for office is patriotic. what i do not understand is how in the world did this happen? how did america of get herself into two warsr? ? where are we going in the war on terror nine years after 9/11 and no one seems to want to talk muchbout it? i would argue that it would take a dramatic event for that to change, unfortunately. and i hope and pray that it will not require an attack on the country bere we talk about the things that we should have been talking about when it comes to

our national security. from the republican point of view, a that is an unusual term now, there are about five camps in the republican party, is the july withdrawal date by president obama of fatal flaw in the afghan strategy? from my point of view, additional troops were needed in afghanistan and without them it would have been impossible to change the momentum that had been lost to the taliban, so i applaud president obama for doing something that was exceedingly on popular with his base, and that is to plus up trooops. i am here to knowledge that our efforts in iraq did hurt our efforts in afghanistan. that we have a limited, all voluntary military, and as resources are dedicated to iraq, afghanistan them became the

forgotten war. and as we try to a guy with the performance of our commanders before general petraeus, i would say one thing -- they held it together with wire and duct tape. and now, for the first time, i believe we have the right amount of resources and the right strategy that could lead to success, and that is a very difficult for america to hear six or seven, eight years after the war started. all that time has gone by and, really, we are just beginning to get it right. i am sorry to tell you that, but i believe it. now, this new strategy that involves do troops has a decent chance of success, but the outcome by no means is certain. the parties are pretty solid

about where we should go and how we should get there. our tea party friends have done the country all lot of good by focusing on our part of control spending in washington and the imbalance that we have at the federal level, that we have gone too far and we have overreached. but when we talk abo foreign policy, i do not hear much coming from either party or the tea party. now, ron paul, who i can align with in fiscal matters, has been consistent. he believes wehould withdraw from iraq and that we should stop being involved in anlace wars. endless wars. and dennis kucinich would agree. what about the rest of us? and there is a lot between ron paul and dennis kucinich.

what about the rest of us? my view is that i do not want to be involved in endless wars anymore than they do, but i do insist that we win wars we cannot afford to lose. now, the left and some of our libertarian friendbelieve we cannot afford this war and they are ready to leave. what happens if leave and does it really matter? all of you are smart. you can answer that question probably better than i can. i can tell you what i thi and that is probably why you came. if we lose in afghanistan, whatever that may be, it will matter. and what is losing? i think losing would be allowing the taliban to come back in power in portions or all of the country. i have one simple thought- the taliban running anything is not

a good idea. particularly if you happen to be a young woman and you believe in religious freedom and tolerance. but what does it really matter? their places -- there are places on the planet where women are treated horribly and we do not have one troop. so this is not just about righting wrongs that may come towards young women. i would argue that within a decade of 9/11 our efforts in afghanistan result and having to do a deal with withthe taliban where they are back in power, at least in part, then our national security has not been well served. on september 12, 2001, how many of us in washington would have ever envisioned of negotiating with the taliban so that we could come home from afghanistan? ladies and gentlemen, if we

leave afghanistan in a chaotic state, where the taliban he much say and control, it will be a matter of time before the forces they gathered before 9/11 gather again in that same country. but i would argue that there he is -- there is even more at stake since 9/11. how in the world are we going to persuade rogue regimes to do the right thing when it comes to our national security interests if we lose to the taliban? do you believe iran is watching? i do. do you believe iran is getting bolder when it comes to supplying the taliban efforts that disrupt our strategies in afghanistan? i do. so too are libertarian and

democratic friends who say this is an endless war and we need to leave, i ask one simple question -- what happens when we leave? to my hawkish brothers and sisters, what is our plan "b"? plan "b" for the left and the libertarian movement is to leave. plan "b" for the right is see plan "a." i do not know what we can do after the strategy efforts, i just know what we cannot allow to happen. the july, 2011, a withdrawal date, ladies and gentlemen, i think is a mistake. is it fatal? i don't know. i envision a scenario next summer were some parts of afghanistan can be turned over to afghan ctrol, transitioned

without compromising the overall war effort. next july inisenvision afghanistan that does no seek -- need an enormous amount of american military support. i have heard from people on the ground in afghanistan that the july withdrawal date is confusing and is creating uncertainty. do not misunderstand what it means. the president said, we are going to be wrote -- begin to leave next july. the only question is, how people will begin to leave and at what pace? i do think it is a mistake, but it is a policy we will have to live with. but i did not come here just to talk about afghanistan. i am going to ask you a question to try to keep you away. how many people believe the attacks on our country on 9/11 were an act of war? how many people believe it was a crime?

manmade disaster? does it matter if you treated as a crime obverses an act of war? yes, it does matter. i would argue that we have drifted away from treating the attacks of 9/11 as an act of war and we are going back to the law enforcement model, not just here but throughout the alliance that we have enlisted to help fight the enemy. who is the enemy? and how you engage them? does it matter if you resort to all law enforcement model? i think it matters greatly. ladies and gentlemen, the difference between it fighting a crime and a war is enormous. and i believe we are at war. the enemy has declared war on

us. the question is will we declare war on them? here is the state of play in america in september, 2010. the cia is out of the interrogation business in the war on terror. i say that boldly and prove me wrong. the cia, after the debacle we have had over a ghraib, guantanamo bay, water boarding, you name it, is now in a position by executive order they cannot use the tools that congress authorized in the detainee treatment act to deal with war terror prisoners. the enhanced interrogation techniques that was overwhelmingly passed by congress in the detainee to treatment act have been disallowed by the obama administration. that makes us less safe. to my friends on the right,

there has to be something other than water boarding. there has to be some middle ground between the army field manual and water boarding. the army field matter was never written to be the end all of american interrogation. it was written for the army. that is why we call it the army field manual. and those in the army to capture prisors on the battlefield need to have guidance as to what to do with those prisoners so they doot get court-martialed. it was never meant to be the exclusive ability, techniques available to the country to deal -- to be ableo interrogate a prisoner, but that is where we are at. i would ask you if you are a cia agent, but you should not raise your hand. put yourself in the shoes of the cia, director leon panetta.

what do you do? how do you go forward? what do tell your agent? to those who advocate water boarding, is it a violation of the geneva convention? yes. ask any military lawyer if water boarding violates that the articles that are written to protect enemy prisoners from abuse. this is not even an honest debate on the military side. does it violate the war crimes act that i helped write? yes, it does. does it violate the convention against torture, which has now been codified in terms of the criminal cents? yes, it does. can we be safe without engaging in water boarding? yes, we can. but it has got to be something other than the army field manual. another question for thought.

should the united states abandon the geneva convention? it now applies to the war on terror because our supreme court hasuled so. and to those who keep advocating techniques like water boarding, have the courage of your convictions to say that we intend by our actions to withdraw this naon from the geneva convention. because that exactly is what you will have done. i do not believe that is the right course to take. what i believe it is that the world needs to come together and re-lo at the geneva convention. the geneva convention has served the world well even though the worst among us will never comply with it. it really is about who we are. not about our enemies. but the truth of the matter is that the geneva convention is a

warehousing agreemen that basically says the falling- you catch my pilot, i will treat them well. iatch your pilot, we will treat him well. we will leave it civilians alone and when the war is over we will swap prisoners. that is not the world we are in. the world we are in depends on intelligence gathering, not combating a nation-stat that means a good, sound, for interrogation techniques that are not available to this country right now. nine years after 9/11, we do not have the ability, in my view, to effectively interrogate in enemy prisoner. i know that is not as exciting as talking about delaware. but i think it is important. we do not have one black site. maybe that is a good thing.

maybe we should look at that because we are not using gitmo. we are a nation without a present in all war. guantanamo bay has not had a new prisoner in years and is not likely to be used when it comes to future captures. what does it mean to be a nation without a present? ison? what happens if we capture someone in somalia tomorrow that is a high-value target? what do we do with him? after we have to use the law enforcement model? do we have to take them to court? do we have to take them to american federal prison because we a not using guantanamo bay? can we take them to afghanistan? how long can we do that before it brings the afghan government down. > ? not very exciting. unless you are a special forces operative in your face wit

capturing someone or killing them. we have put ourselves out of the detention business as well as the interrogation business because the parties cannot find a way forward. i happen to be in the middle on this issue where you always ge run over. now i know why the road is littered with dead animals in the middle of the road. i happen to believe that, on balance, closing guantanamo bay would be good for america in terms of the ideological struggle we are facing. we are not in a war with the nation-state. we do not have a cital to conquer, and air force to shoot down or nab to sink. we have an ideology to defeat and our enemies have used guantanamo bay against uass. that does not mean we let the enemy defined our policy. does mean we need to eject our policy when it makes sense.

president bush thought it made sense. senator mccain it who was running for president thought it made sense. senator obama thought it wamade sense. the one thing that did not make sense is announced that we will close guantanamo bay without a planned to do it. they may have been sharing in france within 48 hours of his becoming president, president obama announcing the closure of guantanamo bay. but they were not sharing in south carolina, because they did not know what it meant -- not cheering in south carolina, because they do not know what it meant. i will not support closing guantanamo bay unless he could do it safely. this is football season. we keep punting on the hard issues surrounding guantanamo bay and the war on terror in general. talk a bit more about that and a

minute. nine years after 9/11, we have had to attacks that failed and where did they come from? -- two attacks that failed and where did they come from? they came from homegrown terrorism. so the war has shifted. what do we do it nine years after 9/11 when someone tries to blow up an airplane over detroit? we read them their miranda rights within 50 minutes. wh do we do with the times square bomber? we read him his miranda rights. nine years later, we have not figured this out. we cannot rely on the fact that the parents of the christmas day 0-- day bomber workedth th with the fbi.

this country, working to the congress, needs to come up with national security exceptions to miranda rights because we are fighting a war not a crime. this is not kandaharsi. we are talking about finding people i the homeland, on the homeland, a our law enforcemt model we are relying on makes us less safe because, when you capture a terrorist, the one thing you want to know -- what is coming next? where did you train? what got you involved? that, to me, is in intelligence gathering activity, not a law enforcement activity, and our laws are such that our intelligence community cannot do their job. i know that is boring, but i think is important. so, congreshas been awol.

democrats are scared to death to talk about this, and most republicans just demagogue. other than that, things are going great. iraq? remember iraq? it is now in the classified ads section. remember iraq? remember the iraq that harry reid said was lost? i do. iraq can teach us a lot in terms of how to get it right and what not to do. is it a part of the war on terror? how many believe that going into iraq was a sensible extension in the war on terror? how many think it was a blunder? how many people believe that now is a part of the war on terror? i do. i think that unites us all. we can have that debate.

historians and people who are really smart and choose to come here instead of play golf on a pretty day, you can figure that out, but i would argue it is now part of the war on terror and it could have a huge impact one way or the other, and it is not over. we are inside the tent, but we have not scored. the one thing that i can tell you about the war in iraq from conservative's point of view, our aversion to nation-building made as irrational when it came to how to secure the country. that it could not come out of the conservatives a lead that we were there to build the institutions. this idea of nation-building was some left idea, some liberal idea, and if we embrace it, that would be a cardinal sin. and i probably was in at cam quite frankly. and i am here to tell you i have learned. the only possible way, when you

try to replace the nation state in the grips of terror, whether it be saddam hussein or the taliban, to be successful, is to leave behind institutions that work for the people andot against them. and that is hard. and we finally understood how to get that right in iraq, but before we understood, a lot of people died and a lot of people were seriously injured. and for that, i will be forever saddened. but in 2007, we changed strategies, the counterinsurgency strategy will have proven to be successful and it focused on securing the people and improving institutions. it focused on the idea at you need more troops living with the forces you are trying to help and get out behind the wall. you need to build our role

stem where the judges can administer justice without being killed. you need a detention policy that understands just parking the people and letting them get worse in a jail is not a very smart idea. as a reservisterving in iraq, i went to a camp in 2007 where there were about 18,000 sunnis in the shia desert that d been captured by u.s. forces and had not seen a human being and three years, and surprisingly, they were getting discontented and they were not being turned around. it was about to blow up. they had all right. along comes a lieutenant general -- that had a riot,. . he took that prison and he instituted educational programs so every prisoner would be educated at the fifth grade level. he brought in moderate imams to

teach them what the koran said it once they read it. and he built a brick factory so they could have a job when they get out. in the 26,000 people that were held in the desert in the camp have gone back to the province with about 80% recidivism ra. -- a 2% recidivism rate. that was smart. we are not doing that in afghanistan. in iraq, the iraqi legal system allowed the national security tension word you could grab someone, park them for a while without a criminal trial, and in during the confinement you try to rehabilitate them and you understood the difference between it reconcilable and irreconcilable and you had a strategy. it worked. we are about to wind down in

iraq. i support reducing our forces to 50,000, but i do not support breaking our ties with the iraqi people when it comes to a military presence. i am hopeful the administration will negotiate post-2011 an agreement that will allow not onlyraining troops but enough's presence militarily to prevent a conflict between the kurds and sunni arabs. our troop presence has made a big difrence there. it is a comforting president. and at least a brigade or two would be smart in my view to lead them in iraq -- to leave them in iraq if the people want them to secure the gains we have. if we do not form this government soon, then i think the chances of the count going

back into a chaotic state grow by the moment. i appreciate the efforts of the vice president, but it is now time for the president, in my view, to personally get involved and bring the factions together to form a new government. to get it from the 10o the al line. long story short is that we did not understand how important institutions of work to providing security to the people you are trying to liberate. our initial mistakes in iraq, where we had an aversion to nation building, wouldn't it be a shame if in the last minutes of the game we have an aversion at the end as we did in the beginning? our national security presence, our national security interests will not be judged by the day we

le completely in iraq but by what we left behind. afghanistan. the troops are beginning to provide security that was never known, but we have no law in afghanistan, ladies and gentlemen, that will allow american soldiers with afghan help or vice versa to detain someone being a national security threat. if it re not for the ality to have 28,000 people from anbar taken out of that province, we would have never been successful with the surge in iraq. right now we have that space for 2800 people. you will never convince me that 2800 people are the only ones that need to be taken out of these villages. so we need a detention system that will allow us to detain people who are creating problems for a period of time so that counterinsurgency will work in

afghanistan. it is one thing to liberate a village. it is another thing to hold and a bill that. and if the people who caused the problem for the village are not removed more than two week s, the local vilgers were never come on our side. the rules of engagement that we used in nader now work law enforcement rules. holding someone 96 hours is probably good law enforcement policy. it is a lousy military policy. nato, we need to look long and hard at nato. it has cold war capability but with a law enforcement mentality. that will not be a formulfor success in the war on terror. they are about to meet in lisbon. they are trying to define how to win in afghanistan. i would argue that nato needs to define their role in the war on terr. to are we fighting and how you play in that war? what are you willing to do?

because it is more than just about afghanistan. change your capabilities. to be relevant in the war on terror. i am not worried about russian tanks coming through the gap. i am worried about international terrorism. so should naida have morto havee unmanned vehicles? startd the nato and aneu talking to each other? the eu provides the nation building capacity and nato provides the armed services capacity, and 21 nations are members of the votes and there really is no discussion between the two organizations. -- and 21 nations are members of both and they're really is no discussion between the t organizations. and national caveats that have crippled the mission need

to be replaced by a nato war fighting caveats. if you are now willing to go to war with a war fighting mentality, do not go. we are not trying to convict the taliban and al qaeda, we are trying to defeat them. iran. ahmadinejad says the sanctions are heing. secretary clinton says they are crippling. congress has given tools to this administration that if used could be crippling. how many people believe that sanctions will deter the iranian regime from getting a nuclear weapon? how many people they will not -- how many people believe they will not? if they do not, what do we do next? i am with you. i think they could, but they have been not -- they have not been used t. if the russians and chinese keep back filling, there will never be successful. so we are 40 something days

before an election and not one person is talng about how america or the world changes if the iranian government gets a nuclear weapon. that is just stunning. it is going to change the course of history. every sunni arab state will be less than enthusiastic about the iranians having a nuclear weapon. why don't we have an ambassador at large for them golf estates? they can form a buff against a riranian ambitions. we let them fight amongst themselves. why don't we have an ambassador? whyh don't we trade more with th e mid east? why we have a responsibility to our? her? theseon't we push

governments to be more responsive to their people? why don't we ask the arab world to give as much to the palestinians as we do? because it wou really matter. but is anybody talng about that? no. in conclusion, i am going to keep talking about. ar. talk doesn't win of i am going to introduce legislation that perform -- reforms are habeas procedures. under law now, every enemy combat and has their day in federal court were the judge will determine whether not the evidence supports the finding that you are a member of al qaeda. we have a case before us, the case, where the judge let him go because they could not be proven to be an active member of al qaeda.

my statute would change that. it would put the burden on the detainee to prove you are no longer part of al qaeda once you prove they were. a common standard for all judges to use. the courts are trying out-- crying out for help. the courts are very much worried they have no legislative guidance and they are having to do this on their own and making up as they go. so habeas reform is a national curity imperative. we need exceptions to our miranda warnings. i propose that if the high value interrogation team is assigned a case where we believe the person in question is involved in an act of terrorism in the united states, that within a couple or three days, they ought to be able to go to a federal judge and say we have probable cause to believe this was an act of terrorism, all law

and terrorism -- interrogation go forward without miranda warnings, because i will argue to you forcefully that if we continue to read every terrorist their miranda rights, weill shut down intelligence gathering. we need to repeal the executive order and allowed the cia to get back and to the interrogation business without going down the water boarding road and get our agents some immunity from lawsuits that are surely to follow. ere are things that we should do on indefinite confinement th need to be done. we have 48 people in guantanamo bay that have been held for years after being determined to be an enemy combat and with no process as to an annual review. that congress should work with the administration to come up with some logical rules concerning the law of war confinement and detention. i will do everything in my power to make sure khalid sheik

mohamed never sees the inside of a federal court. the reason being that i am very worried about the president you are setting when you hold someone seven years under the law of war and then all the sudden you introduce them into the american criminal-justice system. where you use a theory of law of war detention to hold them for years without trial, and all of a sudden you give them the rights that come with the american constitution in federal court. i have no problem with the christmas and a bomber. the times square bomber being in federal court. that is a goodse of federal court. i have no problem with financiers of qaeda being charged under domestic federal law. i have real problem with taking the mastermind of 9/11 and saying that you get the same rights of an american citizen under the constitution because of then you are destroying the theory that is essential to being at war, that you can be an

enemy combatants. if he is not an enemy combat, who the hell is? and what does a federal judge to do with a speedy trial issue? so we are at war, but it is a hybrid, where you mix the system. i know there will never be as surrender signing ceremony. an enemy combat a decision could be a life sentence. and i am willing to provide more process then we provided in any other war. and i do not want my country to go down that torture road because that is the road that makes it more like the enemy, not less. there is a way to move this nation forward, but it has got to be bipartisan and it needs to happen quickly. we are about to run out of time. if we do not and did well in

iraq, and if things do not change on the corruption front in afghanistan by september of next year, i worry greatly for the security of our country, your family, and the world. this effort to fight corruption in afghanistan is on even at best. and this change in strategy where you fight low level corruption and maybe leave karzai alone, i really worry about that. we will never win this war in afghanistan and we proved the act -- proved to the afghan people that the culture of impunity is gone or at least on the wrong. the taliban are half the problem. corruption is the other half. i hope and pray that our efforts with the major crimes task force ll not be undercut because of politics in afghanistan. i know tt is boring to talk aboutt, but that can be outcome determinative. thank you for listening. thank you for coming. and we are 40 something days

away from election. you would never know from the political exchange between candidates seeking office. tomorrow to o'clock 15, we will vote on the defense authorization bill -- at 2:15. and the issues we are talking out are whether or not we should expand abortion services in military hospitals, whether or not we should repaeal the "don't ask don't tell" policy, and whether or not we should the dream act on the defense bill. if you follow the debate on the floor of the united states senate tomorrow on the defense authorization bill, you would believe that the biggest naonalecurity threat facing america is what to do about gays in the military, the dream act, and abortion. very sad.

very unacceptable. thank you very much. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2010] >> i think everybody is familiar with our rules. the senator has graciously agreed to take some questions. i will call on you. identify yourself first and put your short statement in the form of a question. this gentlem right here. >> senator, to was a much for your presentation. thank you for this session. -- thank you so much for your presentation. i need your help, senator. i have a question in two halves.

king abdullah has served arabia 0-- a charitable foundation, from the seven newspapers. i am quoting no -- whose objective is to support the construction of mosques and islamic centersnd support muslims all over the world. the question, the second part is, two months ago, they sent about 150 members of al qaeda in afghanistan --[unintelligible] agree with you. this is war. question, sir -- you served in

the ay. my son served in the army. do we have 100,000 military personnel in afghanistan to qaeda people, or are we engad in a war of ideology which is the rule of law versus totalitarianism? >> very good question. about funding mosques. i have been throughout the mideast many times, we are not at war with islam. present obama is right to me that statement. president bush was right, and as we debate the new york mosque location, while a lot of us

believe it should be moved i really fear that we are going to allow our enemies to drviive wedges between people who can live together peacefully and safely. while i would like to see reform in the mideasti know particularly in the gulf arab states, there are many people we can live with and do business with. i have known many patriots in afghanistan and iraq who have been killed trying to bring the rule of law. many of the judges i got to meet as program, several of them have been killed in iraq. several of my friends have been killed in afghanistan fighting al qaeda. so do we need this many people to fight 450? no. but we need to make sure that afghanistan does not fall into the hands of people who are sympathetic and will align with al qaeda, because then 450

becomes a lot bigger number. the reason there is only 450 is we killed a lot of them. i forgot to mention this, but should we be condering going across the border in pakistan? i think we should. their network is as big a threat to the future of afghanistan as and bu anybody is. within 30 kilometers of the border, they live in a small town, they are had ordered their. and i would like to see some effort by the u.s., pakistan and afghanistan to go across the border after them. to our pakistan allies, thank you for your help, but in many ways, with friends like this, you do not need enemies. the pakistanis are looking at the july, 2011, deadline differently than we are. and i am very disappointed in

the new intelligence that shows a wider cooperation between isi and afghan taliban then we have seen in recent times. how do wwin this war, sir, if the people on the pakistan side, the taliban, the al qaeda network's really cannot be controlled? safe havens have to be dealt with for us to be successful. so i hope the congress will pass benchmarks and measurents not only on the congress with there's it -- not only on afghanistan with their security forces, but of pakistan. hold pakistan accountable. so we are there and large numbers in iraq and afghanistan because replaced nation states that were in the hands of thuggish people that were aligned with terrorism with terrorist organizations to present a threat to our country and the world at large is a very labor intensive effort.

how many times didou hear from 2003-2006, we are down to a few dead aenders? the truth is we do not know how many al qaeda are there with any great certainty. i am sure it is smaller. but at the end of the day, if afghanistan is not secured, then everything we have worked for is going to go back in the wrong direction and 98,000 troops, in my view, are a must and the nato presence should grow not shrink because we are trying to build a nation state that will align with us and not go back into the hands of the taliban. very good question. >> senator graham, thank you for taking the time and effort to focus on national security, with

our bureaucratic dinosaurs and the national security departments of the executive branch, we need all the leadership from congress we can get. the question is on what aears elementtaliban's key to the rise to power is their success in providing "law and order. what is the most effective way to counter that strategy? >> great question. how did the taliban come back in afghanistan? it does not fit into 32nd sound bite, but i will giv it a whirl. the way they came back from near extinction was poor governance and a lack of security. as we directed resources from afghanistan to iraq, the security environment deteriorated. the rules of engagement that nato had to operate with a lot

of people to go in and out of the jail. once you capture a bad guy or an alleged bad guy, 96 hours, you had to turn them over to the afghans or release them. sohe detention policy is allow people who were disruptive to never be isolated from the population, so they went back into the villages and to create an intimidating environment. the tribal system that had administer justice for thousands of years was eventually replaced by a taliban-type system because they killed the tribal leaders and they put a cleric in charge. as we ear the village of out of the taliban presence, we will never hold and build unless you can have some sense of government and justice. so the big issue in afghanistan is a were does formal justice began and informal justice end? and i would argue, we do not

have a coherent policy yet, b we are getting there. and general petraeus is on the case here. good example. the taliban were able to provide remedies to people's problems that would seem to be less corrupt than the afghan government or there was no afghan government. so they got a foothold there. they were very intimidating. if we want to hold d build, we need to provide justice, something other than the taliban way. i believe the people in afghanistan was a justice system not run by the taliban, and it does not all have to come out of kabul. quite frankly, i do not care who gets the vote when there is an argument aut the goat. if you can do it to a tribal justice, fine with me. so there has to be some understanding by us and the afghan government of were formal

and informal justice lies, and if we do not get that piece of the puzzle right, we are going to go right back into chaos. the biggest dispute in kandahar is over land rights. there are no court rooms. there is a big dispute of who owns the land. there is a way to do land litigation without having a trained lawyer or judge because there are so few. general petraeus understands this, but it is it time intensive. and here's what we have to let our afghan partners know. be more open-minded to tribal informal justice then you he been in the past, but we cannot as a nation turned over rape and murder cases to a system that i think is stuck in the 12th century. that is how we hold and bud. you drive the bad guys out. you put them in a prison.

you do not let them go in 96 hours. you give them judicial hearings, not under a criminal justice model but in the law of war model. you keep them in a jail where you learn them to read. you give them a job skill. you teach them about the koran and when they come home, someone signs for their behavior. that is what needs to happen to hold and build. >> over here. >> and how do you do that if there are safe haves in pakistan? -- safe havens in pakistan? >> you seem to think that sanctionwill not work. there are two alternatives. one is working for inchregim regime change -- >> sanctions and aid together

can be good tools and the war on terror. the right amount of aid to the right people on the right time can prevt people from going the wrong way. i believe and all of the above approach to energy, and i believe in the all of labeouf approach to terrorism. you do not send 150,000 to fight 450 people. you do need that type of people to turn state's around. when it comes to iran. the sanctis that we have available have not been used in force. i hope the congress will soon have hearings about the administration's game plan to impose nctions that congress has passed. they are deep on financial service interruption, on petroleum. you want to make sanions bite ? deal with petroleum. 1/3 of petroleum products -- come from china.

i think it will hurt the people, but they will welcome the intervention. i do believe that sanctions and aid can result in an power in the right people and deterring the wrong people, but they have to be used rbustly, and if the chinese and russiansnterfere, they will fail. how do get sanctions to work if people in iran believe we will never use military force? statesnni gulsf arab need to be bigger partners in dealing with this issue. how'd you get anybody to change their thought process if they are not your nationural friends? well, they have to believe that the upside and downside do not come together. if you are the prime minister of israel, a hall long the wait? how many people lieve that iran is trying to get a nuclear weapon?

everybody in the room that i could see raised their hand. so, when i clicked on the judge says they do not want a weapon, we all believe he is like -- when ahmadinejad says they do not want a weapon, we all believe he is a line. when secretary clinton said she thinks the sanctions are working, she may be right. they have not been useful yet. there are tools available that were not available on a month ago. let's try and see what happens. if they fail, here is what i believe military should be available to us. if you use military force against iran, you open the pandora's box. of the people agree with that? if they get a nuclear weapon, you empty pandora's box? how many people agree with tha nobody knows. i think if they get a nuclear weapon, you have emptied pandora's box. i would rather open it up then

empty it. and that is a lousy choice. but that is why we areere at lunch. at least we are talkingbout. i cannot get anybody else to talk with me about it. thanks for coming. so, if we use military force, is to beat us not the israelis. if the israelis their biggest airplane is an f- 15. military strike against hardened nuclear sites is a complicated endeavor. from their point of view, it is better than doing nothing. from my point of view, if we engaged in military operations as the last resort, the united states should have a goal of

changing the regime. not by invading the country, but i wanted military strike from land and sea -- but from launching a military strike from land and sea and that the revolutionary guard ceases to be an effective organization to punch back. if you have to use military force, i think our goal should be not only to neuter their clear program, but to destroy the regime's ability to fight back against our troops in the region hand against our allies. th, ladies and gentlemen, is no small matter to contemplate. that is a very serious escalating step that i would now like to go down the road as much as anybody in this room. thatf you'll believe sanctions will not work, i am

here to tell you that i have no belief that containment will work. so you have a month -- she will have a military action before the given nuclear weon or after they get a nuclear weapon. if that is my option, then i would rather do it before. next question. >> you said that dennis kucinich and brand paula gray agree.granrand paul you give us an interesting speech today. i guess thi is the republican party. maybe you're running for the president. >> no, no.

>> will you start another patriot act ii, which will be the new american apartheid system, one which -- >> this is a good way to end. i forgot to mention that. [laughter] the patriot act is due to what? it is due to expire. by the end of the year, the patriot act expires. do you think that is worthy of discussion? have you seen o added? hey, you know that the patriot act will expire been by the way, here it is. have you heard any candidates running for office talk abo a question? i know that witchcraft is intrigui, but come on here and we need to get our candidates who will be in charge orur partners in national security to

step up to the plate and talk about these boring things. natalie do i think it needs to be reauthorized for a longer time, but we need to add tools -- not only do i think it needs to be reauthorized for a longer time, so we need to add tools to it. we have seven different bills in the congress that would give the authority to deal with cyber terrorism to four different agencies. how many believe that cyber- terrorism is a real problem? they could put us out of business. the chinese are playing in this area every day. what if they came up withhe ability to shut down wall street? a review of like that to a certain extent, unless you have money there. i think the patriot act needs to be reauthorized and we need to add new tools. having said that, i hope i have left one person with you. i do believe and our values -- i

do believe in our bellies. i and not a fan of getting out of the geneva convention. -- i am not a fan of getting out of the geneva convention. i am confident we can winhis war within our value system. but we have to adjust to the fact that we are at war. this country has overreached at times. we put ery japanese-americs in prison. that is what happens when good people who are afraid -- that is what can happen. good people can do some things that are not so smart. i nt to make good decisions about miranda warnis. i want judicial checks and balances. i do not want to give the cia were the interrogation team the right to hold someone forever. i like checks and balances. and they need to be in place,

even when you are at war. i believe that our military commissions system is one of the best in the world. not only because i helped write it, but because we got 86 votes. i have been a military lawyer all of my adult life. the same men and women who led mr. justice in military commissions will be the same ones -- who administer justice in military commissions will be the same onesn court marshals. i would endith thisne thought. the civil liberties which make us difrent than our enemies need to be cherished. but we also need to understand that, in a free and open society, they exploit that freedom and th openness and this is a thinking enemy without boundaries. they use young boys and girls as shields in afghanistan. they would kill us all if they

could. and now is the time to understand the difference between citing a crime and citing a war. my goal is to be at war with our enemies, but also to be an american. thank you very much. [applause] >> thank you very much, senator gramm. folks, we will let senator gramm takeoff. we'll take just a few minut to talk about this. i would invite everybody to be seated, please.

> >> we're trying to do something in little bit different. normally, i would not give a set piece presentation on what we heard today. rather than do that, we thought we would take a couple of minutes and talk about some of the issues that senator gra ham brought up today. if you want to get involved, raise your hand. do not yell at us. hamhought that senator gra had a lot of provocative things to say.

he likes being provocative. and there were few striking elements among the things and he suggested. the first when he mentioned is is the july 1 deadline for withdrawal in afghanistan a fatal flaw? >> even as things go as well as can be imagined, as he mentioned, it is a question for our own forces in the region and what we do for 2011. i know that they are preparing for that. nobody wants to be the last person to bugout before the americans but that or to be there after the americans of the doubt. but for the -- after the

americans bug out. since the president's speech, the first talking point, both internationally in the region d in afghanistan, the biggest fear the people who are on our side in afghanistan is what happens after rigo. to raise that question has been debilitating and crippling, if not fatal. >> has the not lock themselves into a box with the july deadline? what the president need to discuss this two-step -- to stick with the deadline? >> when general petraeus, a couple of weeks ago when he did the rounds of the tv talk shows, he fairly carly raise the that he would make the best recommendation he could to the president about whether there should be troop withdrawal or

drawdown at all. what i was surprised by was that the white house did not send out a bunch of people the next day or later that afternoon saying that the general misspoke, that the july ddline really is wt it is. i think there are mixed signals being made. it makes it seem that the white house has not made up its mind. >> this is something you have written a lot abo, mark. i guess the obama administration would say, hey, we have two wars going on. we are training a whole bunch of folks in yemen and in africa. we are knocking people off left, right, and center with drones tracks. -- with drone strikes. >> the obama's administration

is, quite frankly, i schizophrenic. on the one hand, we do not do predator strikes in downtown d.c. at the same time, the captured terrorist to just tried -- it was not a home-run attack. they may have been homegrown terrorists, but he may have been wrong about that. that was the biggesthreat to the homeland that we have had since 9/11. and then when they get him, they give him -- they read him his miranda rights. that is treating him like a criminal. as a result, their policy when it comes to detentn and interrogation is completely paralyzed. the cra is not interrogating anybody. that is true. -- the cia is not interrogating

anybody. that is true. there has not been one high- level attention since president obama came to office. if we found some like the leader of al qaeda in east africa, we would kill them. it is very dangerous. we are put in a position where we have the choice between capture or kill. we kill. that is a very dangerous position to be in. >> one of the things i thought was really interesting in that speech was that the senator focused on the detention. particularly in washington, we tend to be assessed with high- valu targets and the question of interrogation. -- we tend to be obsessive with high-rally targets and the question of interrogation. for the most part, a lot of them have very ephemeral intelligence. detaining a bad guys, getting them off the streets, and even allowing for some of the abuses

remaining an imbalance, that is a counter-insurgency efforts. we have a particularly bad with detention policies going back even to the bush administration, goinshying away and creating the ability -- shying away from creating the ability to get the bad guys off the streets. detaining insurgents, taking them out of the equation as a tool to create a domestic security, is critical. i was glad to see the senator stressed that because that gets swept under the carpet a lot. >> the senator also talked about the tension here in the united states. on that point, -- about the

tension here in thunited states. on that point, he made the case the senator also talked about detention here in the united states. on that point, he made a good case. people should remember that ran the rights are not written in the constitution. >> i want to come back to something that still does not make much sense to me. without having a big fight about waterboarding, i question how it

is that we set in place and effective set of interrogation methods that are codified and not a liability to the individuals who are doing the interrogation? it does seem like a very nice goal to set out there. but how can have something tt will work, especially since we have taken off the table the things that everybody has agreed are unacceptable in one view or another? >> not only is it doable, but we obamad it over to the bus administration which did not inude waterboarding. how many of you think that obama ended waterboarding? mike hayden and waterboarding.

obama wanted to -- hayden wanted a design for both democtic and republican presidents. i am sure that the makers of liquid ensure would be fascinated. the reason it works is because they did not know that this was all they would face. when barack obama released all these documents, he not only through things that no one would consider torture off the table, but he released all those documents and gave the enemy the secret to defeating them. there is a limited field of techniques between waterboarding and miranda rights, where you can use 7 there would be affected hand haveipartisan support.

-- we can use them and there would be effective bipartisan support. >> there is still a broad range of techniques in the army field manual, including appendix them, which is used for high-value detainee coitus sleep deprivation, stress positions, and a lot of different kinds of fear techniques which allows a lot of broad range of interrogation techniques. those have not been eliminated. >> do you support all of those techniques? course we do not. -- >> we do not. it tends to produce false confessions. that is not what we are interested in. we are interested in getting intelligence. but intelligence can be done and effectively both by the fbi and

the cia without those techniques. so i am not sure what you mean by all of them being thrown out. >> the army field manual is made available. first of all, the techniques are quite limited and they all have to -- they are ones you would be able to use against a prisoner of war with the full protection of the geneva convention. you have to use psychological coercion, part of which is not knowing what you will say. barack obama could solve this very quickly. mike hayden suggested to craig craig to change the executive orders and you do a classified

appendix to the army's field manual. it could be a blank page. then he would restore some of the mystery behind what the terrorists would face. th wld make it much more effective. >> i would just say that the senator's point that there could be space where the army field manual and some were tortured begins is worth more intelligence. i think what market is trying to get at, especially when you're talking about critical intelligence and senior enemy operatives who have been captured who would traditionally be handled by intelligence agencies and terriers, the senator is correct that they are not doing in interrogations' at all. the is clearly a loophole

that, one, we are not doing anything. if we are not doing any interrogations' of any sort, then we're not getting any intelligence. but it was never intended that the army's field manual should be the operative set of guidance for every seven stance. >> a very large signal was sent to the bureaucracy that you don't to think about going down certain roads. even ithere is some possibility under the army field manual for more arduous interrogation techniques, the larger political signal is there is no way we will stand behind you with this goes wrong. >> there is a lot of talk about

talking with the taliban. but the senator does not distinguish between the taliban and al qaeda. >> i would certainly say that, when you're talki about -- the taliban is such a catchall phrase to begin with. but, for example, when the senator talk about the high connie network, he did not -- when the center talked about -- when the senator talked about the hakani network, he didn't meion another group.

i think the tendency has been to be rather loose in the done definition. >> keep in mind that the terrorists around the world who attacked us -- uma omar is the top of the mountain. there are important distinctions. this is the group that harbor al qaeda in afghanistan to attack us. after 11, if you had said to people that we would be negotiating with the taliban so that we could leave afghanistan, they would be shocked. >> the model that is most often used when they talk about reconciliation and these kinds

of talks, for example, in northern ireland, the argument is that is the talks that ended at brokering the peace. it may be breaking down as we speak. but it is often held up as the example of how you reconcile positions and people and put them together in some sort of way that you can have peace in the end. there's a lot more available from the british archives now that shows that the reason why the ira conceded to talk was precisely because they were beaten on the battlefield. why it was to the point where they had no alternative and they knew they had no alternative. we're nowhere near that in afghanistan. it does nomean it cannot be getting to the very top of the taliban would drive the insuency.

until we are further along on the ground militarily, talks are pointless. >> two more things. one was about nato. there were interesting to for its -- there were interesting viewpoint with nato. he said, "if you're not willing to go to war with a war mentality, do not go." that is pretty tough. [laughter] >> in the time that we handed things ever to nato, afghanistan s not i such a bad situation. a lot of other cntries moved into afghanistan, like the germans, and it was in a peacekeeping role. they were not prepared for what happened. i would suggest that the holding

action that the senator talk about, when we were busy in iraq, would not have been possible without the tens of thousands of allied troops there. could they have done more? yes. wasn't critical -- was it critical for us to make progress at the time? yes. absolutely. >> all the criticism of the administration, we turned down data support. we wanted to go it alone. then all of a sudden, we turned to nato and said, we wanted you to fight. they did not have the capability at the time. they did not have the debility a few years later. but then we'd be criticized for being unilateral. >> on iraq best first strategy is probably -- an iraq-first

strategy is probably theetter strategy. the germans were fighting, but there were not prepareand there was no reasonable germanation that the bundy si guard would be taking the territory. to blame nato -- it is not like we are not part of nato, for crying out loud. >> we also wound up having several parts of terrible terrain. the british and the canadians, to their credit, they did not have the capabilities, but they moved to tried to build up those capabilities.

the canadiens went from being a force that was not particularly useful in military affairs to being a real military force. >> our posture in kandahar, it was like we had it heavily ocpied and turnover rates stabilize region. >> the last thing, i wanted to talk about this and we have not done enough talking about it today. the senator asserted that have the problem in afghanistan is corruption. i know this is a huge issue, especially in "the washington post" and "the new york times." is there corruption in afghanistan? you know where that ends. there is no question about that. is it half a problem? is it as big a part of the problem thats made up to be? or is this a pretext?

i didn't think it is a pretax from the senator. i know he wants a serious and solid country. you guys are not standing up and we're fighting for you and you guys stink and we're leaving. am i wrong? [laughter] >> yes. but what is the fundamental issue? who has the control of the means and violence? the number one complaint of afghans is there room corruption. >> there is not just one complaint. there are nigerians and somalis and people in chicago. [laughter] >> yes, but makes it -- but what makes it different is the localism immerses a top-down national approach.

the hemline goes up and down according to the section or the season. but there is a question about what you can get with a gun at your back in afghanistan. the ability of the taliban is not simply to decide who gets the gun, but to slit the throats of those who disagree with the decision. that is a critical factor. >> the problem i have is that it very much challenges the legitimacy of a duly elected government. a. it may not be perfect -- it may not be a perfect election set of happened, but karzai has been elected twice. having this cements focus on corruption fix with the

legitimacy -- having this immense focus on corruption takes away the legitimacy of that government. we told carsick, want you to be -- we told karzai, we want you to have a nation government. if you are going to tie a government together, the old fashion way is through corruption. we built the scheme that karzai is exploiting and now we want him to back away from it. that may be reasonable to do, but we should not be so shocked that this is the situation we find ourselv in. >> one good part of the conversation was the notable absence of national security discussion in our body politic. we are about to have a midterm election. there could be a potential change in the reins of the house of representatives, maybe the senate. it will be a real challenge to

see whether a different party is going to set up -- going to step up on this issue and see if they have some ideas and enough leadership to end of those things we talked about today. that will be the challenge for them over the next two years. thank you for sticking around. i am very grateful to you. [laughter] if you like it or you did not like it, i would like to hear any mail. i'm always interested in the opinions of our audience, c-span included. thank you all very much. thank you to my college for doing this. goodbye. [applause]

>> in the few moments, an advisor to stanley mcchrystal. in a little more than an hour, president obama campaigns for the democratic senate can paint -- candidate in pennsylvania, just sestak. just before 6:00, we will run this form again.

a couple of blood evidence to tell you about tomorrow morning. the senate impeachment trial of the thomas porteous continues on c-span3. here on c-span, distracted driving. our coverage begins at 10:00 a.m. eastern right after "washington journal." >> this c-span video library is a great resource to see what is happening in washington. find the most recent events all three. the c-span video library. watch what you want when you want. >> now all looked at the u.s. policy in afghanistan. this if it was hosted by the indiana council on foreign

affairs. it is about one hour and 15 minutes. >> i'm going to start my presentation with a couple of caveats. the first is that i broke my leg a few weeks ago playing rugby for my beloved boston irish rugby club. that should cause you immediately to doubt my sanity to play rugby at the age of 30. the second is that i will be speaking on the war in afghanistan but i will be very clear, especially since i'm so

close to indiana university, that i am not myself and afghanistan expert. my only claim to fame is that i regrettably told our local paper that i meant expert on mountainous regions plagued by religious fundamentalists. quite frankly, we presbyterians are a lot more scarier in boston. let me outline what i hope to do here tonight. how will say some ridiculously crazy things in the new and ask questions. personal statements, they said no personal statements, but if you want to impugn my integrity or my intelligence, those tend to be the most interesting comments, so please do that. a better title for this feature would have been obama's 4.

einkorn the outline the how the policy has had five -- i am going to outline how the policy has evolved since the president has come to the office. i'm an informed of external observer of policy development, the same as you. i will and talking a little bit about where i see the policy going. it is true that has once an advisor to general stanley mcchrystal. so i have to ask -- are there any reporters from "rolling stone" here tonight? fantastic. let me start out with the events of 2009. i believe it was november of 2008 and october, we knew there was going to be a new president. we did not know whether of the

the current occupant of the white house or senator john mccain. however the situation in afghanistan is quite unlike that in iraq where we see levels of sectarian violence, in 2007. afghanistan was worsening. the first administration took the proactive view of calling in both campaigns and exposed to them what they were getting into. the message was this -- i do not care which one of you guys comes into office in january, but you're not coined have time to sit back and think about, what do i need to do one afghanistan? the ball is already rolling. the situation is not very good. that having been said, when the obama administration did take office in january, they did wisely take a step back and think about the conflict and

all -- the february-march review that took place set the tone for the obama administration stance on afghanistan. by the way, if i pull this chair up and sit down, it is because i might fall over and collapse. all right. the obama administration released this march review. it allowed -- the political, the strategic, the operational, and the tactical. my experience on the ground up until this point is limited to the tactical and a little bit to the operational. but not much big picture stuff when you were leading a platoon of army rangers. you do not want army rangers to think deeply about anything. in the march review, the

president basically decided but the court goal of united states in afghanistan is, to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat al qaeda and to prevent their return to pakistan or afghanistan. that is his articulation of what the u.s. interests are and what our policy is. the way it is supposed to work is that you set a policy, you create strategic goals, a key figure out how to operational lies those goals -- operational ize those goals, and the tactics are getting things done on the ground. at the same time, that the president did this, he set out the following five strategic goals. first, to stripping terrorist networks and afghanistan, and pakistan, to degrade any ability

to plan and the launch international terrorist attacks, to put in a more capable and accountable government in afghanistan to sever the afghan people with respect to internal security. developing an increasingly reliant -- self-reliant afghan security force. help a stable constitutional government in pakistan. involve the international community to address these objectives for afghanistan and pakistan could import and leadership roles in the united nations. so no small task there. what we arrived at the that the president has a limited political objective to disrupt and dismantle afghanistan -- al

qaeda. but strategic goals. he had to figure how he was going to do that. the current commander in afghanistan, by all accounts a confident field commander, would not be the -- was not the varsity team, so to speak. that was the judgment of the secretary of defense and the president. i'm sorry. i know, i get week. so they replaced him with stan mcchrystal, ma last boss in the army. he spent most of his live in the u.s. army's special operations communities, especially the rangers. he was a career special operator. he said, figure out what is going on in afghanistan.

he is the best -- they looked throughout the summer of 2009 and arrived at his strategic assessment of how he thinks the war is going, plus a minute a resource request to the president. in the end, they decided that they could be severed. the resource request is all that anybody really cared about. but we ended up working on was the strategic assessment looking at how the war was going. and the translation was not very well. we saw a resurgence haqqani network, the taliban and growing in strength, and not just in the helmand province but also can are -- kandahar. are -- kandahar.