Transcripts For CSPAN Inequality In America 20151206

Violence and some of the issues before his community, including immigration and sentencing reform legislation. 10 00 a. M. And 6 00 p. M. Eastern on cspan. All persons having business before the Honorable Supreme Court of the United States are admonished to draw near and get their attention. Announcer monday on landmark cases, we will look at the case of acre versus car baker vs. Carr. Chief Justice Earl Warren called ofthe most important case his tenure on the court. These 11 tennessee v oters live in five of the largest cities in tennessee. They are the victims of a reducesy scheme which their right to vote to about 1 20 of the value of the vote given to certain rural residents. Announcer by the early 20th century, population shifts in states like tennessee had voters from rural areas move into the yet those world districts with smaller populations held voting power equal to the urban districts. So a group of voters challenged the disparity and took their case all the way to the Supreme Court. The case became a major milestone in Supreme Court activism, and has relevance today as the term one person, one vote is still being debated today. And join us for the inside story of how the Supreme Court brou ght one person, one vote to the United States. That is monday at 9 00 p. M. Eastern. For a copy of the landmark cases companion book, it is available cspine. Org cspan. Org landmarkcases. Next, a discussion on inequality in america. After that, Donald Trump Holds a Campaign Rally in virginia. Now former labor secretary robert reich, former white house jobs Advisor Grant van jones, and others discuss inequality in america. Posted by the nation, this is one hour and 40 minutes. Post thank you, can you hear me . It is terrific to be in San Francisco. Soontobeders and readers, subscribers in this gorgeous theater. This is the last stop on our trip. 2015 march the 150th birthday of the nation 2015 marked the 150th birthday of the nation. It is daunting. [applause] t this is our last stop in introducing a new generation to the next generation. People come to the nation now every week in different forms, so we are proud of that. Tonight we have gathered some of on great thinkers, activists issues of fairness, fighting inequality. For a panel, i think that is vital at this time, at any time. It is a transcendent issue of our time. Let me introduce our great moderator, and we shall begin. Cordell is ard retired judge of the superior court of california and former independent Police Auditor. Foris a long time advocate repairing transparency when it comes to police misconduct. She was assistant dean at the stanford law school, where she helped develop a program to increase increase minority improvement. During her tenure, it went to first place for africanamerican and hispanic students at law schools. She has received prizes for breaking race and gender barriers. Was the first female africanamerican judge in , the firstlifornia female africanamerican superior court judge in santa clara county, california. Please welcome george judge cordell. [applause] host its like you dont need it. [applause] judge cordell thank you. Thank you so much. Good evening, and welcome to todays special program of the Commonwealth Club of california. Tonights program is cohosted by the nation magazine. I am ladoris cordell, former judge of the superior court of california, former Police Auditor of the city of san jose, and your monitor moderator for this program. 150th birthday of the nation magazine. To commemorate this historic anniversary, we are proud to present a conversation about our , antrys inequality crisis pressing issue impacting millions of americans, and a core nation issue on which the magazine has long been sounding the alarm. Topwealth controlled by the ofof the top 1 top tenth the top 1 has more than doubled thehe past 30 years in United States, approaching unprecedented levels. San francisco most certainly symbolizes the inequality issue. The city has been wracked by , atles over Development Homeless population that spills onto its sidewalks, rocketing housing costs, and increases in crime. With its gleaming New Buildings and influx of Silicon Valley wealth, San Francisco has the Fastest Growing income inequality gap in the nation. So what does this inequality mean for the political process . For the environment . Living wages and immigrant rights . And in turn, for Civil Society and the future of our democracy . Tonight you will have a conversation with four prominent experts about key problems afflicting america, through the lens of the on resident at of wealth in the United States today. Concentrationed of wealth in the United States today. First, a senior fellow at the blum center for developing economy. Served as secretary of labor in the Clinton Administration and was named by Time Magazine as one of the 10 most effective cabinet secretaries of the 20th century. His latest book is saving capitalism for the many, not the few. Please welcome robert reich. [applause] sec. Reich oh, wow. [applause] judge cordell aijen poo is director of the National Domestic workers alliance. She was a 2014 macarthur genius and was named one of the worlds most 100 influential people by Time Magazine. She is the 2013 World Economic forum young global leader, an dignity the age of preparing for the elder being in change of america. Please welcome aijen poo. [applause] judge cordell van jones is an environmental advocate, civil rights activist. And he is the cofounder of four nonprofit organizations, including rebuild the dream, of which he is president. He is also a cnn political contributor. Van is a yale educated lawyer, and in 2009 worked as the green jobs advisor to president obama. He is the author of the New York Times bestselling book, rebuild the dream. Please welcome van jones. [applause] judge cordell our final panelist, katrina vanden heuvel, ofthe publisher and editor the nation. She is a frequent commentator on tv and radio and the author of numerous books. Her blog appears at thenation. Com. Heuvel. Elcome katrina [applause] judge cordell we are going to start our conversation with a question i am going to throw out for all of you. A 2014 survey, inequality was the top choice for greatest threat to the world. All of the president ial candidates are talking about inequality. I give you a quote here, the rich have gotten richer, income inequality has gotten worse, and there are more people in poverty than ever before. Those words are the words of mitt romney. [laughter] judge cordell so panelists, are we finally at the Tipping Point . Are americans left and right, rich and poor, all in agreement that our economic and political systems are rigged and have to change . Has all of the anger about become a great unifier, or are we about to tip . [laughter] judge cordell step in. No. [laughter] [applause] explain . Ld i [laughter] after years of seeing inequality widened, the median range median wage stagnates. With the rich getting richer, finally we are getting to a Tipping Point, even among republicans, where it is expected to be fashionable to Say Something about it, but we are not anywhere near doing anything significant about it. There is one candidate who is talking seriously about it, and a few others who are being influenced by him [applause] sec. Reich but i dont want to make this into a partisan forum. My biggest fear is that we may be as a nation heading into a world war. Bring out either the best or the worst in nations. It sometimes can lead to a great deal of social solidarity, and some very good things can come out of the horrors of war in terms of the issue of any quality, but it also inequality, but it can also bring out ugliness. We have to watch that. Judge cordell anybody else . I think there is other good news, which is that everywhere i turn, i see lowwage workers in motion. I see incredible organizing along fast and workers, health care workers, Domestic Workers. Fight for 15. Walmart workers, retail workers, even the baristas at starbucks. People are coming together, and i think that combined with the vibrancy of the movement for black lives, there is a sense of collective selfconfidence that people who are on the frontlines lines of inequality in this country are starting to express. We actually can turn the tide on this, and we are going to come together and build the kind of movement necessary to do so. That to me is the best news in this situation. A great historian of social movements told me not long ago that she does believe we are in the early stages of what will be the next great social protest movement of this country that will fundamentally transform democracy for all of us. She is right about a lot of things, so i am going to go with that. [laughter] [applause] van first of all, congratulations. I think that you are right, there is an agreement about the problem, not the solution. But there are rightwing populisms that are very interesting now. In their willingness to take this on. They use terms different than are familiar to us, but you hear rightwingers now talking about what they call crony capitalism, and that is their way of talking about the way that the government has been captured to protect big corporations at the expense of working people. I think there is a growing militancy on the right and the. Eft i also think that when you listen to the orange guy, trump. [laughter] judge cordell john boehner is the orange guy. Who else did you have in mind back of in mind . Van when you listen to him, Something Interesting where there is a style of politics that could be a precursor to something. In other words, i just dont give a dad gum anymore. There is something that is happening where people who felt nottrained, there is just enough cookies on the table now for people to be polite. The temperature is going up on both the right and left, so i do think the income inequality debate is something we should be of forservant opportunities on the right. Katrina i think the rules are being written in different ways on the left and right. It, we aret of experiencing a failed status quo of deregulation, of corporate trade agreements, of failure to investments, of mandatory sentencing. All of this is coming under scrutiny and questioning. You see it in Bernie Sanders campaign and Donald Trumps. Around the world, there are movements like you are describing, both hopeful and not hopeful, whether it is in spain or canada, where it will end will require political power and movements. Judge cordell lets pick up on the political power issue. First of all, this talk about inequality has been around for years. Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis once noted, we can have a democracy or great wealth in the hands of a few, but we cannot have both. Publishedhe nation an article written by w. E. B. Dubois that says we turn over funds to National Profit and for few funds left over education and health. If we talk about politics, there is a boatload of money left in the lobbying industry. In 2013, apple spent 3. 3 million in lobbying. Amazon, 3. 4 million. Facebook, 6. 4 million. Microsoft, 10. 4 million. 15 million, all to lobby. Dont we have to hit lobbying to equality, and how do we do that . Sec. Reich clearly we do, and we have to get money out of politics. We have to reverse Citizens United. [applause] surereich we have to make there is Public Financing of all campaigns and make sure there is full disclosure of where the money is coming from. It is easy to say what we should be doing. It is extremely hard to get the power to do it because it paints a chicken in a problem. Gg problem. Ande the people in power do not want to lose power, and it they fear that any fundamental change would be a threat. Lets go back to the issue of populism, because it is the core question. We see on the right and left of on the right and the alst of peoples, upheav and angry people, all around the world. This is not just an american problem. Anger utilized . What Political Organization will do with that anger . This is a great challenge, it seems, because if we are facing a Common Threat in the form of radical jihadists and, whatever you want to call it, that anger can be turned into something positively creative, or it can be turned into fierce xenophobia and racism. And ethnic exclusivity. We have got to take a leadership role in making sure that anger is child channeled in a positive direction. Everybody this fall has to do exactly the same thing. Van anyone else judge cordell anyone else you . Van first of all, from an ,fricanamerican perspective the conversation about inequality starts with mass incarceration. It star star. Starts there [applause] and then moves to the rest of it. Mentioned black lives, i think this is the most Important Development of our time. A lot of people got mad because kids grabbed their microphones, and that is their only point of reference, missing the entire movie. You now have a generation of African Americans who are coming on the scene, they were 12 years old when obama got into office. They are not impressed with having a negro president. Withare not impressed having a Democratic Party that will say stuff. They are facing incarceration rates that are six time their peers when they are doing the same things. In other words, black kids and white kids do drugs the same amount, but black kids go to prison six times more than their white peers and no one is saying anything. Stateu have a view of the that it does a better job of punishing men protecting. Van van this date does a better job of hurting people van helping people. Mass see it in deportation. And many see it beyond the u. S. Border and militarization in militarization. You have a seamless web of violence from the government fromdoes not protect street level violence, it enhances it and nobody is speaking for them. Andy Democratic Party and a Democratic Party that wants to talk about equality. But want wont speak of these issues as enter goal to the fight integral to the fight. You cannot have a quality if you are labeled a felon. For doing what you are doing right now or what some of you were doing this weekend. [laughter] you cannot have incoming equality if you cannot get a job , a student loan, a business license. So for those young people to hear a Democratic Party still not dealing with it. I was very impressed, by the way , the only force besides Hillary Clinton that both Political Parties had to address in their debate was black lives matter. Which was started by three and women young women, with forced but a and they both parties to deal with them. We should celebrate that. [applause] [applause] judge cordell it appears that race is the weapon of choice for those who want to maintain a status quote and draw attention away from any quality. If you look at donald trump and making America Great again, that is politics, that is code for lets make America White again. So the question is, is the black lives Matter Movement focusing enough on income and wealth inequality, should it be doing more in that area . This is for anybody. Sec. Reich no. No. You have a Democratic Party. Judge cordell i think what has emerged katrina i think what has post obama, occupy, there has any war within the Democratic Party, the wall street wing and the corporate establishment wing, which often both have failed to take that into account, you could argue sticks apply rightly to Bernie Sanders. And consciousness raising done for senator warren, people are speaking in new ways. That battle goes on and it will determine the inequality discussion in this country. It is thaty i see the visible fight of the party is between the wall street wing and white economic populists, i ,ean if you look at reality there is a white reality. The problem you have is that at the end of the day the republicans and rightwing democrats want black people to settle with trickle down economics and the left wing wants us to settle for trickle down justice. In other words, you shut up, we will not say black, we will not talk about your issues. Shut up and we will talk about taxing wall street, Social Security and income inequality youll get years and youll get yours, dont worry. Katrina and not schools. Judge cordell and not raising the slogans of mass incarceration and as a result you have a third leg in the progressive movement, the Racial Justice leg emma which has no home and no candidate and you are talking about dreamers on the latino side, the black lives Matter Movement, native americans, you have a third wing of the party that no candidate and no voice, not even the pretense of a black candidate can have that and they have exploded into view and they have brought out the best of both wings and i was proud of those young people and how Bernie Sanders righted himself and responded with compassion. He was taken aback. I think that these young people have brought out the boast of both parties and best of both parties, this is a healthy thing they achieved. [applause] sec. Reich i think what has happened, again i do not know precisely what is going inside in a campaign or the washington precinct of a party, but i think gradually this is occurring, if you have progressives, white progressives, that they cannot maintain or get an electoral majority. But if you have progressives along with people of color, latinos and blacks, you can create a majority in america and that coalition, if you can generate it, is a Winning Coalition. What the democrats have done since Franklin D Roosevelt was to exclude africanamericans, very consciously and carefully. That was fdrs coalition, that was the White Working Class and elseevery and everyone you could find in a very direct seclusion of southern africanamericans and blacks. That has been the policy of the Democratic Party up in till bill clinton until bill clinton. He tried to have a larger coalition, but the error of bill clinton was making alliance with wall street democrats and that undermined everything else, making it difficult to create a new progressive movement. So the question for the democrats and for Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders and Martin Omalley is whether they are willing to abandon the wall join a newition and Winning Coalition with people of color . That is the central strategic question and to my mind the only way we get any kind of change in america is the latter, not the former. If we canell so actually get people together, voting is the bottom line. Voting is critical to society and in america, low voter turnout is the rule, not the exception. Bernie sanders wants everybody to be automatically registered to vote at age 18, but that does not address the issue of getting people to actually vote. In australia, people are find for not voting fined for not voting. So given how low our voter turnout is in this country, should we do the same . Should we penalize people for not voting or are there other ways to get people to the polls . It, ia i would flip think the crisis we are looking coalition, the rising american coalition, the republican right sees that and they are doing everything to suppress the vote. To suppress this coming shift in our countrys democracy, destiny, politics. The money pouring into suppressing the vote is toggering and i can akin a poll tax, to jim crow. I think it will take movements to get out and vote. In favor of mandatory voting. But i am thinking, moral mondays in North Carolina come they have made a commitment to get out and vote, multiracial, multiissue, multijustice and toward a three reconstruction third reconstruction. In the third reconstruction, rallying people not only in North Carolina, but he will travel to speak about health minimums todatory mass incarceration. So there is something and that motion that we should be aware of the money that has been pumped in. My last point, i think all contributions to super pacs should be 100 taxable and it should go to voter registration. [applause] anyone think does that voting should be mandatory . Sec. Reich i certainly dont. I think that people will vote when they have something to vote for. Aijen poo i think part of it is the question of agenda, if we could create an agenda for the future of the country where the full diversity of who we are as andtion and our interests how they are interconnected could be articulated and reflected back in a compelling agenda that is not imprisoned by the politics of the impossible, but actually what people need in this country to not only survive but to thrive. And not just some people, all people. And i think when we have that agenda we will see a desire to engage in a different way. [applause] both of myll grandmothers were the help. They had low wages, no health care, one day off a week. Days. These lomnng includeDomestic Workers mostly women. Aijen, your focus and vans as well has been a long grassroots organizing. Some people think this is the wrong approach and the way to think about eradicating inequality is by looking down, not up. So a conservative pundits recently said, the problem in america is not wealth, but persistent poverty. Do not punish the rich, help the poor become richer. Like the song we heard, make the idle poor become the idle rich. Again, what is your view aijen, is grassroots going about it the wrong way . Aijen poo so, ever since the weres when our labor laws put into place as part of the ,ew deal and the deal was cut southern members of congress refused to sign on in the fair labors standards act, including farmers and Domestic Workers, robert mentioned this. And those bills were passed within those exclusions in place and concession to other members of congress, so for more than 75 years Domestic Workers and farmworkers have been excluded from the Core Foundation of labor protection and the only thing that has changed that over time, more than seven decades, the only thing that has changed that is Domestic Workers organizing at the grassroots level. [applause] aijen poo yes. The first round was in the 1970s, a Domestic Worker from atlanta, a black woman, courageous, a national heroine. She led the Workers Union and one won minimum wage protections and this generation of Domestic Workers organizing and 30 cities today has one Domestic Worker bills of rights in six states in the last five years. So we are indeed changing policy and the course of history through grassroots organizing and that has been the only thing that has worked. That is what i would say. Judge cordell van . Van first of all, i think that we should give aijen a round of applause for her work. [applause] wouldnt dare i to add to what she said. S not going to be even liberal elites like ourselves just dont have the fingertips for what is really going on all too often. So we are often trying to follow the wrong problems at the wrong time. When you talk about occupy wall street or black lives or the new labor movement, breaking all the rules. Not defending oh defending everybody, but you are not the darling of progressives a few years ago when young, brown immigrant women were coming into the halls of power. That was very weird. [laughter] people do not know what to make of it. They were patronizing and all of a sudden you one in three or four states and extended the rights of more people, your movement, quicker than anything else in the past 40 years with possible exceptions of the farmworkers. This is what happens when the people who are at the bootheel stand up. Ofi think, we have a bunch young people here from human rights and other places, young and kissed off and with dreadlocks pissed off and with dreadlocks, my ideas were much more militant. Myselfm on tv and i find ,ind of in a very frustrating on the one hand, these black you. Kids, they say screw i think there is something to be said for the contribution made by people who have a dog in the race. [applause] judge cordell Hillary Clinton does not want a system that will provide Free College Education for everybody. She said, i do not want to take the education of Donald Trumps children. Is she on to something or should college and Vocational Education be free for all . Other countries do it, why not here . Sec. Reich i think it is very important in building the coalition that were talking about and the grassroots we are ofking about, to seek a kind system in which not only is Public Higher Education free, and i do not think that Donald Trumps children would go to public higher institutions, but single tier have a health care system. This is very important. [applause] sec. Reich we may not be able to do this next week or next year, but it is something to aspire to. It builds and enlarges social solidarity. And it creates the kind of links between the poor and the upper class, blacks and whites and latinos, between americans generally that can support this kind of set of institutions. And the fight is going to be long and difficult, but building on something, i have just returned from several weeks in red america, red cities, red state. You may wonder what i was doing there. [applause] sec. Reich i was trying to flog a book. I did not do well in red states, but what i did discover, i had a meeting with some farmers in missouri who were organizing against some of the big agricultural businesses and factory farms. They call themselves republicans , but they were organizing against what they consider to be and were in fact some of the forces that were systematically eating away at the profits and destroying the environment. I met a Small Business leader, not only in stature, they were tall. But they were Small Business leaders in cincinnati and they were organizing against big businesses, big franchisors, that were undermining their profits and monopolizing. And across red america, i kept running into people who were organizing against the powerful, the wealthy, the monopolists. And the fight for people that i met in st. Louis and kansas city are doing the exact same thing and these people need to be linked up. People who iday met in raleigh, they are beginning to link up with groups about the same issues of power and wealth. Sec. Reich so i think there is a transpartisan movement. Judge cordell you have been writing about it. Katrina there is so much about history we can retrieve, radical history, which is what when Bernie Sanders talks about denmark, but the idea of trustbusting, we need to revise that. If you recall years ago in the fight against media concentration and for media democracy, the fight the Media Central to, you had because both did not like bigness, they wanted diversity and local. Bigness, soporate if the tea party had not been so racist, you could have found some alliances there. You have read about this written about this. That the antiestablishment and establishment, within sec. Reich there are two antiestablishments now. Workwe are finding in the i do, the Green Tea Movement. [applause] [laughter] katrina is that right . I have heard about the coffee part. Van the coffee part is liberal. [laughter] van no, there is a group, the Green Tea Movement and the argument they make is very compelling. Shouldnt every american have the right and liberty to power their own homes with their own power, without being dictated to by companies that will tell you, when you are going to pay your howbill, it will cost much it will cost, and yet you do not have that right in america. So people are saying we are tired of being dominated by Power Companies telling us that homes andhave our own to sell power on the grid. It is important to understand this. We are working very closely with the far right on criminal justice issues. Newt gingrich and i told p ulled together a summit. We said if we can get 100 liters leaders together for one hour on criminal justice, we could change of name. We got change everything. We got 700, this was in march, including 10 congresspeople, to cabinet secretaries and others. In march this happened, so in february people said this was impossible, but as it turns out as there is a critique that bureaucracyent gobbles up money. In a christian view, they do not treat with respect. And a libertarian point of view, they are the enemy of liberty. So, you say, i do not trust these guys. Who do you trust . I can point to three republican texas,rs, in ohio, in closing prisons. Democratnot think of a governor in the country that is closing prisons. And screaming, a compromise that would have been leadr if he let on it on it. Even jerry brown. My point is, im just going from earlier, there is in the temperature is rising. The liberty and justice for all moment here, liberty, that is andblicans, the Liberty Justice for all moment is coming. Judge cordell so you are listening to the commonwealth program, this is presented by the nation in commemoration with their 150th anniversary and are discussing any quality inequality in america. Jones a former white house adviser and commentator. The and and van den heuval. On the can hear programs radio, catch up with us on viewook and twitter and a us on the youtube channel. We now want to go to questions submitted by the audience, but before that, we will do a quick inequality jeopardy round. I will give a quote about inequality to you all and you tell us who said it. And remember, you need to answer in the form of a question. [laughter] if you do not know the answer, take a good guess. First quote, a republican is for both the man and the dollar, but in case of conflict, the man before the dollar. Ted cruz. [laughter] carnegie. Judge cordell abraham lincoln. Almost ted cruz. Judge cordell next. He cannot get rich dealing with politicians, then there is something wrong with you. Willie brown. [laughter] judge cordell willie brown he says. Be careful, you know what city you are in. Judge cordell donald trump. Majestic equality for bids of the rich as well as the poor from sleeping under bridges, bending on the street and stealing bread. Anatole frances. Judge cordell bingo. Those are my principles and if you do not like them, well, i have others. [laughter] nixon. Ard judge cordell groucho marx. [laughter] judge cordell now we will turn to questions from you all. How do we give individuals enough power to be effective but not enough to be corrupted . Can we give a lifeline . Van we should give a round of applause. [applause] judge cordell who is the academy of justice that itimy of justice. An it is all in balance this is ending and make dynamic system, people want to 2008e out i voted in and everything did not get fixed , i quit. System this is a dynamic we will continue to interact with and learn from and hopefully for another 1000 years. There is no single answer, even if you fix it today, with new notnology tomorrow, it is in interstate. Judge cordell you write that it really is not corruption, it is people making rules . Sec. Reich the new form of corruption is big institutions, large corporations, wall street, and also some very wealthy individuals who are buying their way into american politics in the form of changing the rules the way that the market functions. They do not think of themselves as corrupt, they think of themselves as the way they have to lobby to maintain themselves of they obey rules obligation, but it actually undermines the system. But back to your question, your honor. May i call you your honor . Judge cordell i appreciate it. Sec. Reich well, why we are handing out appreciation. You have been exemplary. [applause] van and you are both great artists, i didnt realize that artist,an accomplished so maybe the left brain and the right brain are working together. Judge cordell back to our question. Aijen poo i think if you look at the healthiest democracies around the world one thing may have in common is vibrant social movements. One thing, one of the most important things we can do is add oxygen to social movements, because that creates the context for Good Governance in my view. Sec. Reich i think youre absolutely right and the greatest enemy of social movements is cynicism. [applause] sec. Reich and every single time anybody detects a degree of cynicism about politics in our democracy to function as it , they are it can contributing to a self of filling prophecy self fulfilling prophecy. Judge cordell it is tricky in terms of media coverage. Katrina we do a lot of investigation and you expose corruption in the hope that wrongs will be righted, but it can also lead to cynicism so there is a balancing act. Is only is it cynicism, it cynicism about the role of government. I have heard so many people and they are right, the government is not working on behalf of the people. But to throw it out is the wrong way to go, you want to take it show thean it up and most important thing you can do, movement in politics, to show that you can improve the condition of peoples lives. Years,agnation, 4050 you know, africanamerican communities, it has been brutal and not much attention paid until the last years. That turned people away from politics and government, from a belief that the government can work on behalf of a too often cited common good. Out i think she is holding on us. We were talking about right and left stuff. You have been able to get people to come together on your issues in a way that i think is shocking a lot of people. Insight . Ou have any aijen poo i did, i was actually going to say, i have been so inspired by all the work you have been leading on mass incarceration and i think that we have to get smarter and more creative about how we are connecting the dots between and across the kind of pain people feel in this economy. And one thing that we think that a lot is the fact this country is actually aging, the baby boom generation is reaching retirement age at a rate of a person every eight seconds, 10,000 people turn 55 per day. Some people call it the silver soon on the tsunami. Sec. Reich i regret that. [laughter] aijen poo um. [laughter] sec. Reich why did somebody give me a microphone . [laughter] aijen poo so. In, alsois resulting because of advances, people are living longer, so my grandmothers demographic is the fastestgrowing in the country, 85 and older. So we will have the largest older population we have ever had in the history of this country. [laughter] yay [laughter] [applause] aijen poo it is a good thing. Living longer is loving longer, learning longer, connecting longer, if we have the right support in place and because of the huge demand, the need for caregivers is going through the roof. And we represent caregivers, the fastestgrowing occupation in the nation is home care and the average annual Median Income for them is 13,000 per year. So you have a situation where millions of people, 27 million to be precise, by the year 2050 will need care just to meet basic daily needs and you have an incredibly counted but overstretched and undervalued workforce. If we could connect the dots where we actually invest in a new care infrastructure and the ability for people to be able to afford the care they need to they can live independently, remain connected to communities, and a workforce that can support that gets invested so that these jobs become good jobs. It is a winwin. People get to age in place and people get good jobs. Winwin, right . [applause] this is the kind of agenda that create connects people across generations and we need that any conference of way. Aijen poo so that instead of becoming increasingly polarized along the lines of race and generation, we are turning towards each other and finding solutions. Judge cordell why do the working class, the working poor, so often vote in defense of the 1 , against their best interests and how might we change that . Van i want to Say Something about that question. I think that this is a question that i went at, one favorite question among and i do not like it. I will tell you why. There are people who vote against their economic selfinterest. Room,e people in this liberals voting for higher taxes to help poor people are voting against their economic interest, but nobody calls them stupid. They say, it is because we care so much about our values. Great. Up on southerner, i grew the edge of a small town, went to church every sunday. I am much more comfortable in red state america than anywhere else. And that white guy that looked against our liberal programs is voting against his economic selfinterest and for a set of values. If you listen to what he says, he will say, i know that this may wind up hurting me, but i do not want you taking somebody elses money. And trying to bribe me with their money so you can undermine my parenting decisions, i want my children to be independent and i do not want you taking money to bail them out. Respect and i of do not like you stealing peoples money to undermine my parenting decisions. That is value. It is not hope you with china healthy with china. But when you come to people and say you are too stupid to know your own interests and us smart liberal folks are going to tell you what your interests are it also makes it impossible to if you insultse somebody, do not matter if you are right or wrong. If you have offended them, i go the other way. I understand and i believe you are making decisions that both reflect your economic interest and your value. So lets talk about values and how we can make the family stronger. I will tell you, the one thing you can do to somebody is tell them they are stupid. The liberal elite, i cannot tell you how many times, i will go on about this. This is important. [laughter] 2004 i had aer, in he was little at the time. I was with other progressive folks, they had just reelected george w. Bush and they had called the middle of the country, dumb. And everybody laughed. Dumb led it done and i knew in that moment that i was not part of some important thing on the left. [applause] katrina as a nation i remember that moment, but blaming the people is a politics dead on arrival. People are not the ones to blame. You are absolutely right, but we have seen a moment, there is the gop crackup where you have the country Club Establishment republicans not clear about what is going on with the populace base. You are talking about social values, but i guarantee that donald trump can go to ohio and talk trade and do well with a whole set of people, right, left, center transpartisan, it is an interesting moment where there are people within the Republican Party who would vote against self interest who are waking up and saying, wait a minute, i am not getting my share from the country club republicans. I agree with you, politics blames people first. It is not going anywhere. Van i do not think this is painful for me. I just dont think you can lead a country you do not love. And there is a part of the left rhetoric that does not love the middle of the country, does not see them in their pain. Out in at cast them way. And that is painful. Katrina ok. S and are different leftt a different rights. My husband is from kentucky, we went down there couple of years ago, owensboro. Of cars at the museum and i was worried. Part of what happens, very briefly, as we talk to people you find common interests. The idea that everybody has to agree on everything i have never believed in. You are able to talk. So much of media does not talk to people. It makes them spectators, it makes them feel cynical, it cuts them out. I am saying there is a lot swirling around in this issue. Was told the reason i got a microphone is because my mic was not working, so you have not heard anything i have said this evening. [laughter] sec. Reich i would like to introduce myself. There are a few things i want to get off my chest. Van, i would like to speak on behalf of coastal liberals. [laughter] [applause] sec. Reich because i am sure there are some who feel better perhaps ban people than people in the great middle, but actually my experience is there is a widespread sense, whether coastal liberals or southern conservatives for midwestern tea partiers, are powerless. And that sense of powerlessness is almost universal right now, except for a small elite. I would also like to put in a good word on behalf of the baby boomers who have also come into discussion tonight. I was born in 1946. [laughter] clintonch so was bill and george w. Bush, so was donald trump, anybody who is anybody was born in 1946. [laughter] [applause] sec. Reich and a lot of the boomerspolitical learnings and political leaders were not about powerlessness, they were about power. We learned that through organizations, the civil rights movement, we could actually make change. And i think that what americans need more than ever before and it certainly sense in 1960s, is can make athat they difference. I have been teaching young people between ages of 1825 and i have never encountered a young generation that is more determinedand more to give back to this country than the current one. [applause] so i am very optimistic, but i think we can build the coalition we have been working around, but it needs to be based on a sense of mutual interdependence, the need for us to have a voice, to overcome a power structure that is becoming completely unconnected. Disconnected from almost everyone, including coastal liberals. [laughter] sec. Reich did you hear me . [applause] sec. Reich sometimes i feel like i do not have a voice. Judge cordell another question. Of successe metrics that you look for in tax reform . For example, ted cruzs proposal for a flat tax. [laughter] sec. Reich go for it. There are a number of tax proposals out there, any time of raging inequality, so extraordinarily stupid that almost words fail me. [laughter] sec. Reich the idea of a flat tax. A flat tax necessarily means that a high income people will play will pay less and low income people will pay more. So do not have anybody tell you differently, that will aggravate any quality. It is as bad as trickle down economics. Doodooother version of economics. [laughter] [applause] [laughter] sec. Reich have i found my voice . [laughter] katrina i think on the more positive side, i did love it when Bernie Sanders said that president eisenhower was far more radical than he was when you consider the tax rate on people, making over 400,000, the equivalent of 3 million today. I and passionate and i and passionate about the tax, it is not new. Tax ona of it is small speculation, stocks, trade, currency and take that and reinvested in mainstream, rebuilding the middle class. Work,e other thing, tax unearned income at the same rate or higher than work. It is in saying that you have Hedge Fund Tax loopholes still in the system. Bob could come forward with a manifesto, but quickly, we all know what the solution is. It is the inequality of political power that holds back what could be done to make this a far more rational and fair system. Judge cordell we have received a number of questions about capitalism and a capitalist system. Is income a quality any quality just the unfortunate result of a capitalist system . At some level, but you can get to a level where the system evens out and you can have that probably is where we are. I want to say that something is happening in Northern California that i think we have not discussed. We are moving into a digital age now. ,nd it is not unusual to see talking about millennials, it is not difficult to see these 23yearolds, 26 euros, multimillionaires wandering around here. In the district. [laughter] van for people who are listening on the radio, that district was a working class latino neighborhood or i was in where i or i was was in my 20s. Now it is not. So there is this Technology Dimension and i do not think that our construction of the liberal conception has caught up. I still think we primarily think of the state as a redistribute or redistribute her, that we are thinking like the Industrial Age capitalism like production is in the hands of a certain set workerse and there is and the environment and the state will step in along with popular movements to redistribute wealth. And i just look at what is actually happening in the economy and the one thing i can say is that the future is not being written in laws in washington dc, it seems to be written in the code of Silicon Valley and it is shipped very fast. The ability of the state to catch up and keep up is dubious. So the popular movements become much more important to me and how we actually get change. I do not mean popular movements to elect candidates, i mean popular movements to Deploy Technology on a daily basis, to connect on a daily basis and compete inside the actual moment where changes coming. I do not think that the left should say, we are trying to make change. We sound weird when we say that. Silicon valley is making change, you have revolutions happening in biotech and nano tech and smart screens, youre going to be able to pick you prick your finger and put it on a slide and print out your liver in four years. Change is coming faster than we know. Our goal should be, making change work for our people. To find a way where we can use the government or not, whether we can get the government on our side or not, to find ways for popular movements to make change our friend. I do not think we should lead communities to the tender mercies of the market or the state in an age like this. [applause] the talk about capitalism makes me think about why bob has been going to the heartland. Your book is about capitalism, so i would love to hear your thoughts. Many kinds of capitalism, so thatreich the point is there really is not a division between government and free markets and if we accept that division we have given away most of our pertinence. Government has created the market. If there was not a patent system that is enforced by the government, where trademarks and patents continue to get longer and it is harder to litigate against them. Where intellectual property is a central subject of the Transpacific Partnership, where the power over networks in terms of standard platforms and Standard Software portals is getting larger and larger and in the hands of a smaller number of companies and antitrust is not being used, these are all very central questions that have to do with the structure of markets. So i do not draw this tension between government and markets and part of empowering people is understanding how government is shaping the market and it is not a question of the size of government, a large or small government, is whether the government is working for us. Or it is working for a smaller minority of people who have a greater power over it. Judge cordell does that mean lobbyists . Sec. Reich this is a big piece of inequality, because lobbyists and also political contributions and also the power of a relatively small minority, to get experts, University Experts and think tank experts to substantiate whatever they want in congressional hearings and elsewhere. That power, all of that has a compounding effect on the way that the market is organized, it tilts the market in the in theon increasingly direction of the wealthy and wealthy institutions. Consequence is for the wealthy to have even more power and a large institutions, corporations, wall street again even more power over the market. And that compounding gets worse and worse, it is a vicious cycle. Unless we understand it and attempt to reverse it through countering that power, we are not going to accomplish much. I could not agree with you more, all of you about the importance of grassroots organization, but that is no substitute for recapturingg and the central institutions of our society. [applause] judge cordell so one of the questions follows on. Corporations united, i mean Citizens United. [laughter] judge cordell we have a couple of questions about what is to be done to reverse that decision, do we need a constitutional amendment . And what is the possibility of getting support from republicans to overturn that decision . So john nichols argues that the movement to appeal Citizens United is one of the most vibrant movement in the country. Katrina many states and countries have issued repeal to amend Citizens United. Obviously we need a different Supreme Court. [applause] isrina and this election critical, the next president will have power most likely to appoint justices and john nichols writes we must move immediately. I said, john, we need to give people points along the road. ,n my city, Public Financing 61 has not only elected a mayor ambitious agenda, he is having trouble, but he has done good things. An the city council has africanamerican woman leader, there are several women, radical voices who would not have been elected and so i think public. Inancing empowers people it empowers people who may not be able to run. Sheriff,s in maine, a not a sheriff, but people from movements in anticorruption trust funds, those running with gavelittle money and andrew como a run for his money. The Citizens United decision, others that have now compounded and dismantled what remains, has left us in a place where 150 halfies have contributed of the Campaign Funding so far in this election. So power inequality, you need to begin with Public Financing. And i think there are many states in this country that can chip away at Citizens United. Van our opponents have one strategy. Big money in, Little People out. That is the approach. Where you havet one part of our movement that talks about big money and the other part talks about voting rights. We do not talk about if anybody what to go see the movie selma, that legislation is based on how it was destroyed by the Supreme Court. So you have us marching for our basic right to vote and others talking about big money, we have got to pull that together. Bighould have one agenda, money out and Little People in. [applause] [applause] the Supreme Court, remember we are talking about the time of nine justices who have been response before the shameful shelby decision you just referred to, for Citizens United and lets not forget, not many years ago where the Supreme Court found money is equal to free speech. To conceive that corporations about the, talk triumph of big corporations over Little People. , weave got to get one vote have to get one vote changed. This is not impossible. You are 100 right, the next president , one of the big issues in this election is who is going to be president , i dont tests that yourt can only be a Supreme Court justice if you stand for this one thing or promise this one thing. But i do believe that the next spring Court Justice has to repeal Citizens United. [applause] lets talkll minimum wage. Are you in favor of raising minimum wage, and if so, what should it be . 15. Poo nation ofell a interns making 15 per hour. Hillary clinton side with alan krueger in the debate. Regional debates about numbers. I dont know your latest thinking. I think 15 is the way to go, and we see it moving. And we have not talked about the power of cities and states, at a time when washington is in gridlock. The coalition in seattle and other cities, it has moved like wildfire. Statesich cities and are moving on minimum wage, and they are also moving on Public Financing. Maine, ohio, connecticut, they are moving on antigerrymandering. California, one of the great things we did in california was get districting out from under the politicians. Im proud to be the chairman of a National Organization called common cause, which has done a lot of work [applause] sec. Reich and is now focusing on the states on many of these issue. With regard to 15 per hour minimum wage, let me just say this i understand the position that says, well, cost of living is different in different parts of the country. But we dont make that kind of distinction when it comes to worker safety, minimum standards, or child labor minimum standards, or any other moral issue with regard to minimum decency in america. I think that given the minimum wage 1968, adjusted for inflation, would be 10. 60, and that is not adjusting for the increased productivity. Dramatic increase in productivity, including lowwage workers. If you adjust both inflation and productivity, the minimum wage would be far higher than 15 per hour now. Be a nationally minimally decent wage for americans. [applause] ms. Poo there are still some workers were excluded from minimum wage. 2 million healthcare workers were excluded from minimum wage protections because of the 1930s legacy of racial exclusion and the labor loss. This department of labor actually moved forward on a rule change that brought those 2 million workers under protections. [applause] ms. Poo i think it is one of the most important victories for lowwage workers of the obama administration, actually. But there are still workers, people with disabilities who are working who are essentially still excluded from minimum wage protections. There is a little clause called 14c which allows for some nonprofits to pay people with disabilities below minimum wage. And we have a tip minimum wage, which i dont like as increased. I believe thats 2. 90. So there are still lots of ways in which we need to also fix the swiss cheese of what is minimum wage and secure it, in addition to raising it to 15. Is a campaign led by the restaurant Centers United called fair wage, to remove the tip to minimum wage altogether. [applause] judge cordell katrina, there was some reference made to the Transpacific Partnership agreement, for which president obama is campaigning. You have called it antiamerican. Why . Ms. Heuvel this is a question robert reich should be addressing. I think one of the unamerican aspects in the way the treaty was sold was how secretive it was. This is how trade treaties have been sold through time. Secretive, nontransparent, the incentives for corporations to be nonpatriotic and move out of this country. Alwaysroot what i have fought against is the view the Progressive Left is anticompensation. Its not. We covered seattle, we covered the fights against a beauty oh, we covered the fights for fair globalization. It is for whom, whose behalf, how. Bob referred to the patent laws. The intellectual property protections, the arbitration secrecy, the lack of access for ordinary citizens to know how they are being shafted by these trade deals that have contributed to the stagnation of wages over the last, 40, 50 years. I dont know its antiamerican, but is the worst of america. Its not the best of our traditions. I think the fight still goes on, but this was a case where we saw its street exerted strength, its power, and the present worked hard and over time to sell it. And got into a fight, with i if Bernie Sanders is contending for this title, the leader of the populist wing of the party for stop senator ren did not back down and spoke articulately and effectively about the reasons why she could see other kinds of trade agreements. Judge cordell we have time for one last question. We have come to the end of the program, so i will pose one last question. If you were elected the next president of the United States, within your first 100 days, name one thing that you would do to and or wealth inequality in america. Who wants to go first . Bob . Sec. Reich get big money out of politics. [applause] judge cordell you have to give us a little more. Sec. Reich oh. [laughter] sec. Reich the key to all of this, from the standpoint of what this nation can be and what we want, whether we are talking about a coalition of populist, left, right, whether we are talking about a new set of grassroots initiatives, or whether we are talking about reclaiming our democracy, we can only do it if we get big money out of politics. This is the keystone. It is not the be all, end all, but it is the first preliminary step. If we want to do anything on the orher issues, single payer free public education, minimum wage, whatever you want to begin looking at, you cannot do it if the game is rigged, and it is rigged. Ive been there. Ive seen the rigging. Ive tried to fight against the rigging. I started out in 1967 as an intern for robert f kennedy. There was not all that much rigging then. Washington was a rather poor and seedy place, but it has gotten progressively wealthier. Of the five counties surrounding the district of columbia, three of them are among the wealthiest in the United States. When i started in washington, ofy 6 of retiring Members Congress went on to become lobbyists, because there was not that much money and being a lobbyist. Now 50 of retiring members of congress, half of them, become lobbyists because theres so much money. Washington is a glimmering emerald city. We have to get egg money out of that city and out of every state capital. We have to get a good money out of that city and out of every state capital. [applause] judge cordell if we could hear from the rest . Ms. Poo family care. A new system to support the families that of would allow them to be more affordable and also improve the quality of caregiving jobs. [applause] judge cordell van . Mr. Jones i know we only have one minute left. Incarceration is the most important thing, i think, that could be done to make it for 40 million africanamericans to even have a shot. We have not spoken as much about it as i think we should in these discussions about the economy. I just have to say this you hear over and over again, 5 ofwth in appellation, 25 the world. That means one out of every four people on planet earth are locked up tonight. Onlye United States, we have 5 of the worlds population. Those are disproportionately at non american, latino, africanamerican, latino, minorities. Innocent. Better to be those numbers do not tell the full story. One out of every four africanamerican men now is predicted to have a prison record by the time they are an adult. Its actually one out of three. That is a repeat of the dehumanization, of enslavement, of jim crow. The idea this could be happening in our country and we continue to act like it is ok or normal i think is something we have to dialogue opposition to. There are safe, smart ways to roll back mass incarceration. This has become i want to be ther this has become signature, defining issue for the Africanamerican Community, period. Ad you are talking about population, if you are a democrat, in order for any president ial candidate to win as a democrat, African Americans have to support that candidate 60 . No, im sorry, 70 . No, im sorry, 80 . No, im sorry, 90 . 4 . Im sorry, 92 to 9 a political party, the Democratic Party, that needs near new unanimous support from our community, and we have to climb over obstacle after obstacle to vote. Africanamericans are standing in long lines in the rain to vote. And we elect a party that until recently would not even brea its breath to talk about the issue. In fact, was on the wrong side of the issue for way too long. Clearly, for very the Latino Community, immigration is number one. For women, choices number one. The africanamerican humidity has a thousand problems, but for us mass incarceration, where you stand on locking up an entire generation of africanamericans for something we know kids are doing right now, is the number one issue. Anybody i dont care who you are, i dont care what you did in 1963 or 2009 or yesterday if you grab a microphone and you say you are a progressive and you dont speak about this issue with some passion and some heart as ifme concern and care, it were your children under this level of threat, you cannot and should not count on the quiet support of africanamericans. The obama era of black silence is over. Its over. [applause] [cheers] mr. Jones look, i feel horrible , personally horrible. I started my career working on years and for decades, and we have failed over and over again to challenge the democrats to do better. To force the democrats to stop chasing after fear mongering and racism and support the political points off of our communitys backs. That is why you are going to see more not less more africanamericans asking these questions, more african murk and scholars asking these questions, and i big everybody in this room if you hear somebody saying when your thread or anything else, what are these people doing, they are ungrateful, they are uppity, never again, we are not going quietly. This is getting worse, not better. We have been there. The Africanamerican Community has been their own immigrant rights. It was very easy for black folks to come out and say these immigrants are stealing our jobs. You have not heard that. The Obama Coalition includes Latino Community and black leadership. They defend immigrants. The black community could have easily been moved against the lgbt movement. Thechurches are not on right place on this, but youre not seeing any prominent africanamerican leadership attacking lesbian and gays 10 years because the black , we say, shut up, these people are part of the coalition. Latinos, and the in farm bill issue. And the environmental issue. The entire Congressional Black Caucus footed for cap in trade. Have been there for every contingency down the line. And we insist that people leave their