My fellows reads your buck general writes an essay seven o are a star in the book. There is a whole chapter. Is mostly observation i had this breakfast in january january 1989. Said you were coming friday . The correct . Great. Because that is the pits tebet. I had a piece in the magazine today some of that was the promotion of it. Good. So youll have to follow me. I got on twitter. How were you . Good to see you. I think most of these are presigned. But i can. Family okay . We but they are fine. My daughter just got married my daughter reintroduce husband they just got back from their honeymoon your coming down. And civic i decided one year ago i go to the gym every day. Just in my basement. I just cut al bred a and car. Bread and cards. Go ahead. Go by as many as you can. I will bring them all to you. I cannot remember if it was in the book but your story in 2000 as one of the Great Stories of all time about Election Night 2000. [laughter] the first light of my book is Election Night. Actually it was 1980 spee best buy sorry. Election night 1980. Because everybody has lost your job. But then went the election was over we goodleaf we would leave. About an hour and a half i was thinking of the transition. That did not make it. Do you remember him . Working hard. How how are you . It is a pleasure. We are on cspan now. But you have to talk about what we talked about yesterday. The new plan. I love it. I looked through the box the book. I love it. It is so interesting in all the personalities. I am really glad you wrote this book. You know, this because you live in North Carolina but it is so easy to forget. It is so easy to forget. The other thing that drives me crazy is todays politics nobody cares about ideas or performance. Owe you were very important because you are all of those for clinton stare i cannot tell you times tell you how many times. It is of very good book. It was so much fun to write. There is nothing more fun. I am glad because it is so easy for people to forget. Obama and his tweets were interesting today. But we believe in the activist government but because of that to make the Health Care Bill work. They just have to make it work. I hope so. Thank you very much. Congratulations. It is fantastic. I tried to work out every day. This has been great for me. Writing the book is a lot of fun in a broad apple lot of memories. But i dont want to be in the Business World i want to do what are you going to do. You did this very well. Tell all of your friends and never realized again dead better deal for me on amazon kendall so i hope we sell a lot of these books. I will catch you later. [inaudible conversations] i will bring that back. I will bring it to you on friday. [laughter] so the you are big parts of the story i have almost one a whole chapter just on you. I am not kidding. In january 1989. I remember the breakfast. July 14, 1987. That was the hidden day for the movement. We will see one friday. It is already signed but i will personalize. I know that you are not dead. [laughter] not yet. [inaudible conversations] good evening. The thank you all for coming. Good evening. I am pinch hitting as a host for the hostess with the mostest and her wonderful husband. We are incredibly grateful for connie and everything she has done for this city, country, the new democrat movement, she is a magnificent philanthropist and a great citizen with the biggest heart and a laugh washington has seen in a long time. It is a shame she could not be here tonight because of data for remarkable projects she has embraced this may be her favorite. The moment she met al from the week that he was the brightest political might of our time and when she bought this hotel it would not surprise me to change the name to the from. [laughter] but that they ought not only hurt thats staff but that virginia and marshall. But so many people hope to make this event possible. All these years at al from made a name for himself as the alltime great troublemaker and it is wonderful to see him surrounded by coconspirators. For two decades i have made a living off of one joke of which tonight i will tell one more time. [laughter] i was born with the ultimate washington curse i look like ralph reed and i think like al from. [laughter] but it could be worse second half and the other rare around. I think by now the shelf life would have run out and a place in washington that people cannot remember anybody in fault but today i was walking back to my office and the white house and a republican from across the street waved and said hi ralph. Till death do us part. But thinking like al from is an honor and privilege of a lifetime luckily i am the only one cursed to look like ralph reed the world as a vastly better place because so many have come to think like al from and the amazing story he tells bring subtle back we taken for granted that although we should not forget just how hard it was to freeze new life into an old party when al from was started in the 80s and as congresswoman schroeder used to audiences democrats just need to do three things unfortunately no one knows what they are. [laughter] but tain i do a and he understood to lead the party out would take at a different kind of democrat and we have a different type of Democratic Party as a result. Few have forgotten what the political wilderness was like take a look across the ipo at the end we constructed state of the Republican Party today. We have been there but thanks to bill clinton and Hillary Clinton and barack obama and joe biden and al from those that have worked their way up the ranks. A lot of people in this room made his vision come true he would not be here if not for the woman he met at the Civil Rights Movement and worked with him and the love of his life in virginia. [cheers and applause] of the coconspirators thank you for the lessons he taught us that ideas matter and obstacles dont. He is thinner than when he started but we are stronger because of his thick skin when the party had to break china he was the dont the in the china shop and what meant the most to lobby is he always reminded me the fickle fashion of washington doesnt matter he will get up every morning determined to fight for the same principles that he believed in the night before and it is a rare man to stay true to his heart. We are forever grateful to him for that. The Democratic Party has always been able to have the generation to build the better poillon but were better off than we were three decades ago and a rising star. [laughter] and the Democratic Party has seen a parade of praising stars in it is now my privilege to introduce the governor progress the last three years as a joe biden chief of staff i of an honorary citizen of the states of delaware everytime the firstaid does something amazing to the grand opening down the streets. For the past five years at delaware has been blessed one of the smartest and innovative person in the country. Making tremendous progress and it is just fish finished a run as chair of the National Governors association. The kind of leader we look to for ideas and the person that makes you proud to work in this business and a democrat that al from had in mind all along. [applause] i would ask you to join me to express our appreciation to bruce for his service for the white house and in the obama blighted whiteouts sandy has one week before he heads out to the west coast we are excited to see what he does of the grants you will make. [applause] by the way there is more room up french. It is tight back their programs thrilled to be here tonight with my wife to on terror to a guy who has made so many contributions to is this country over the last 25 years. I will not go through the full list of the programs whether the tax credit or National Service or welfare reform, such a long list of ideas that those polls team have to be and for so long. Who would never forget in 2000 when president clinton spoke to a gathering at hyde park new york. As so fortunate to be there that day and i got to listen to president clinton speak for about 45 minutes and you will remember for 45 minutes straight at the end of the administration of the accomplishments they had achieved over the eight years and the entire speech would tie back to the work of the entire democratic leadership council. Of course, he concluded by talking all about al from. He said at the time there has not been anyone else who has made a bigger contribution to this country during these last couple decades. That it is to a9. But i believe his contributions bill beyond that. There are thousands of people like me, the elected officials, appointed officials across the country who oh, in large part, much of our own political success to al from. It is literally true for me april grabher not the governor roy thought him because i burned ideas are supposed to be about ideas. I decided to run for the governor back in 2008 and i knew my only chance of winning a very competitive race would be to offer bold ideas. That is what i did. Leer we are, you know, decades later, so many of us recognizing that what al said, that politics is supposed to be about ideas. Politics is not to be about personality, and sometimes pundits dont get that, and so much of the focus from date is about the personalities in politics rather than the ideas. We have continuing work to do to put the focus where it ought to be, which is on the ideas. You know, at the beginning of als book, chapter 1 begins by him saying he threw away party on Election Night of 1980 and nobody showed up. He went to work. For the next 25 or 30 years, and here we are tonight to celebrate the booing that chronicling the rise of the new democratic movement, the movement that brought our party back. Tonight theres a party and a lot of people showed up. Lets hear it for al. [cheers and applause] wow, thank you very much, jack, and bruce, i like him to warm up the crowd to get you laughing, and im serious. One of those remarkable young politicians, and asked where are the new democrats . Where are the great leaders . Everybody focuses on the shan nangans in washington. They are in places like dover, delaware and annapolis, in albany, new york and denver, colorado. The governors, great democratic governors all over the country. They are the future leadership. I look over the room and its whole lifetime, most everybody in the room is part of the story, and i thank you for that. I lot of you are in the book, and i hope i didnt embarrass you. [laughter] i think he left now, but greg was here who led the first trip to florida, and when we started the dlc, we were called a lot of things, including democrats of the leisure class, and melissa proved that because at the first breakfast in tallahassee, we had quiche. [laughter] in any event, melissa brought elegance and style to the dlc. That lasted, really an important contribution. I just want to thank so many people, not going to name everybody, but a few people deserve special thanks. First is ginger, and when i wrote the book, i i thank her for not only putting up with me when i wrote the book, it was seven days a week, not talking to anybody for about four months, but when i wrote the book and pulled out all the old schedules, and i just cant imagine that anybody could have withstood all that, and, i mean, you take off on a sunday night, and you go to four or five state, and on friday night, if youre lucky, but often saturday morning, you come home, and if you couldnt get in those days, we didnt have Public TransportationLike Air Force 1. We had to fly on small planes or wherever we could get a flight. [laughter] you come home on saturday morning when youre lucky and sometimes you wouldnt get back until late saturday because you couldnt get a flight, and you were out on the road again sunday night, and we raised two wonderful daughters, one of whom, sarah, is here, newlywed sarah in front, and her husband, rusty, thank you, all. [applause] returned from their honeymoon, and thank you for coming. I want to say a special word as well about alice who is over here, right behind next to melissa. Alice was my partner in the book, and she just i cant say enough for what alice did to get this book done, and, n. , many many ways, she help me come up with a concept that allowedded me to write. So and she had to put up with my writing of a book that was three and a half times as long as the publishermented and cut it down, but alice, thank you very much for a wonderful [applause] a bunch of people are here tonight, days of the House Democratic caucus, and then the days of the dlc. Thank you very much for making this story possible. I dont know if hes here yet, here later, a conflicting event hes sponsoring, but will marshall, the brains of this place with bruce for a long time, the dlc, will be here, and, again, with at, you know issue Everybody Knows about the public figures who made such a big impact on this country, but if it werent for guys like will and bruce and rob and elaine and bill and a bunch of others who are here, terrorist always its always dangerous to Start Talking about people, we wouldnt have had this done. I could go on forever. I dont want to because but what i would like to do briefly is tell you three things. One, is why i wrote this book. Second, just very basics about whats in the book because i want you to read it, buy it, buy it, buy it, and read it. [laughter] third, i just think theres lessons for both parties as we look ahead for what we did, and i want to talk briefly about this. Why did i write the book . Jack hit on it. Memories in the political world are very short, and he took my first line of the book on Election Night, 1980, i held a party and nobody came, and the reason was we lost our jobs. [laughter] i was working the carter white house, most of the friends were in the senate or the hill, on capitol hill, we lost the senate. Jeff peterson, had to leave, but he was here, and peterson, he was the poster child. He made the today show the next morning because he was working in the senate, i think, for the Senate Finance committee. I think his wife was working for the committee too, and his son was a page so they lost three jobs in one night. The you know, its hoard to remember 25 years ago, the roles were reversed, and, actually, our position was worse than the republicans are now. In the three elections of the 1980s, we won a smaller percentage of electoral votes than any Political Party in the history of the country had won in three consecutive elections. We were the Weakest Party in the history of the country. Theres no doubt, and i remember talking to clinton about this one time on one of the trips to one of our retreats. He said, if we dont win in 1992 or 1996, well go the way of the wicks. People dont remember that, and its important we do because things could reverse. Right now, we have a demographic advantage, and the reason, in part, because republicans, in the 1980s, michael called us the stupid party. Lightly using the term, but they are the stupid party now because they tell hispanic voters and activist women, most among the important constituents in the electoral, we dont want you in the party, senning them away, but they will not be stupid forever, and when they change, and if i were a republican, i could tell a lot of reasons why hispanic voters ought to sport them. Take this into account, if mitt romney won the same percentage of hispanics in 2012 that bush won in 2004, bruce wouldnt be working for the vice president. [laughter] because we would have had a different vice president. I want people to understand that it was really important to modernize our party. The way we did it, a lot of you here were in new orleans and in cleveland and youll remember, chairman of the drc, the intellectual resur jensz of the party have to proceed the political resurgence. Well, the republicans ought to listen to that, but thats the second reason i wrote the book. What we did is we brought our party back, not by fancy messaging. I mean, in todays politics, its all about how you can communicate with true believers and, you know, all of your core supporters, and nobody worries about solving problems of the country. We brought this party back around ideas, and i think its important because ideas that help move this country forward are the only hope, really, for bringing this country together, and for tackling big problems, and, you know you know, a bunch of people are carrying on the dlc closed its doors in 2011, now part of the clinton foundation, but will is still battling every day at ppi, john colin here working at third way, and so there are groups carrying on the tradition, and its very, very important that we do that because ideas are too important in politics. If you think about the ideas, we got, you know, many of you were in a lot of the fights, and clinton in the introduction of the book says we were not very popular when we started the dlc. Well, it depends who you listen to. If you listened to the late jack, you would have had to read our obituary three times in an 18month period, and theres no doubt that a lot of forces in the party didnt want us to succeed. We were a real threat. We were a threat because with our ideas, we were going to change the power arrangements in the party, and thats something people in politics do not understand anymore. If you talk to this or that group, thats great, and it works on politics because they are gerrymander, and in a republican district, you cant beat them, got a million more votes for congress that time than they did, and they still have the majority. The only challenge is not, i mean, the challenge is never to work with the other party. Its to its to hold the party line, move towards the extremes because if you dont, you get primary, and thats just such a terrible thing for the country, so the second reason is, i just wanted to focus op ideas. Yall have. Part of the movement. Im not going to go into the ideas, yall know have opportunity and responsibility and community, many of you at cleveland when i was a pinata for a few people in the party, and bruce reid made his greatest contribution ever, and hes made a lot of big contributions to this movement. When we reprinted clintons speech for cleveland, and which was if you read cline tops book, hell say its the best speech he ever gave, and we also, in the same little pamphlet, all the resolutions passed, all the ideas that changed america, bros put three words on the cover, opportunity, responsibility, and community, and from that day forward, those three words were the montra of the new democratic movement, and not really only changed american politics bringing democrats back, but changed politics all over the world. Im not going to talk a lot about that. I just wanted to say one thing. One of the things that a lot of people dont know about me is that, you know, everybody used to call me a person who tried to move the party to the right. I never believed that. I believed what we were trying to do was reconnect our party with the great with the First Principles including principles for mr. Jefferson, but jacksons credo of opportunity, kennedys ethic of responsibility, civic responsibility, roosevelts thirst for innovation, and my first job is where i learned all this, that those principles really worked. There was a war on poverty, greatest job ever. They didnt trust bureaucrats telling him what was going on around the country, so 4e he hired young reporters, i was out of graduate school of journalism to go around the country and write about these what was happening in the programs, and long New York Times type pieces. He sent me to a lot of places, mostly in the south where Civil Rights Movements and war on poverty were joined during that period. I knew everybody in the Civil Rights Movement. I met ginger in alabama working for the fclc trying to teach 4yearold kids how to say their name. Think about it. One of the poorest counties in the country where when the fclc went in to Wilcox County, camden, alabama in 1965, not one black was registered to vote. Imagine that. President obama could not have voted in the county. I just want to tell you the story of the two jesses because its not the jesse who im intertwined with in american political history. [laughter] its jees rei jesse brooks is a poor sharecropper in Wilcox County alabama. When he went to work there for the summer, he was her protecter. He had a truck. It was so old that it didnt have any floor boards. You could see the cement, the pavement through the truck. Dont forget this is the county where nobody no black could vote two years earlier. We were married in 1968, and jesse brooks came up to visit us in 1969, and because of the war on poverty and the voting rightings act, jesse brooks was the Tax Collector duly elected by the people of Wilcox County. Government can play an important role. [applause] then theres the story of banks, i was sent down to Holmes County mississippi, and in the heart of the mississippi delta to work at a Work Experience program, and i wrote this one report about how the young black kids in Holmes County were getting their Work Experience by building segregation academies for the white citizens counsel. They and other people who lived through that peer in the south remember those things. Most people dont. Well, fast forward 25 years later, and mike, i think his daughter is here tonight, and wilson would know that, and mike and i and wilson and a bunch of other people were in one of those bashtons, tilled with constituents from the delta to launch the dlc chapter, and so when i made remarks, i said, you know, i just want you to know how historic it is for mike to represent you, and i told the story about going to Holmes County. After my speech, a woman who im sure wilson knows, came up, probably in the early 70s at that time, saying my names jesse banks, mayor of hoasms county, and that family, white fan that ran the chevrolet dealership and built segregation academies were run out of town, and thats why, no matter what all the furry over obamacare and how its administered, not only a good program, but its the right design, but despite all that, its really important for us to focus on making this government work. Elaine did reinventing government for al gore for a long time. Now doing it at brookings. Its really important because if we want liberalism to last in america, weve got to make government work. It just its that simple. Im not going to talk. I just get me started on stories, and i will never [laughter] ill never quit. [laughter] the my great friends and my surrogate daughters, the moore sisters, and remember this well, and i think glen da and deb were on this trip. We were having breakfast a monday morning in in louisville, kentucky, and he mentioned they were playing in chapel hill that night, basketballing against the university of North Carolina. I dont know, bruce, you may have been op that trip, im not sure, but the [inaudible] right. [inaudible] but, so, clinton just turns to me immediately and says, lets go to the game. I called david price and arranged to get take into accounts, and as his im sure its the custom when a governor visits another states, the host governor sends a police car to take him around, and so we had a police car, and we had another car that was for linda and, i think craig smith and clintons people and the rest of the entourage, and clinton and i get in the police car, they in the other car, drive up to the dome, and they say, park your car right here, next to the door of the dome. We watch the North Carolina beat kentucky, come out, and Campus Police towed our car. [laughter] so for those people who think we always travel on air force 1, it was not quite the way, and linda, and i think deb was there, we spent two and a half hours at the Campus Police station because clinton would in the leave until the guy who owned the car got his car back. [laughter] thats what travel in those days were, but the main thing was it was about ideas. Let me quickly move very fast forward and for those of you who want to know what the republicans could do, lessons learn, read my piece in politico magazine, but i want to say a thing about what we need to do because we are not going to have these demographic advantages forever. Its very important, to me, any way, that we make liberalism and progressive government work again, and so, to me, we should have two priorities. One, we need more than anything else a new round of reinventing government, the fixed government. In the 1980s, people lost faith in government and our ability to govern, and thats why we have the three worst elections ever. We cant afford that again. So as i said, obamacare is a good structure, and that i could explain it simply, which would be if everybody should have insurance. Basic plan if you cant afford it, government helps you pay for it, which it should, and if you want more, you pay for it. Thats not very complicated to me m i dont know why its hard for people to explain, but in any event, it is critical that we fix, critical that we fix obamacare and fix the website. I mean, im helping a private Sector Company that could have done this turnkey, and its just incredible, but we cant afford to have government lose celt in the country. The second thing, rob is there behind elaine, and hes the architect of all this, read a lot about rob in the book, and we need a growth strategy. As a young man, paul, when i worked in the carter white house, which he didnt know about growth strategies, didntly incidentally. [laughter] paul was the chair of a Sub Committee we reported to on the hill. He pulled me aside saying the problem with the party is were so interested in passing out the egg, we forget to worry about the goose. If we dont worry about the health of the goose, theres not enough eggs to pass out. This is a problem on both sides of the aisle because everybody wants to take from government, but nobody wants to give. The only way to have a pie that we can expand and, you know, lord knows where we believe in redistribution, we believe in a progressive income tax. We believe that people who need help should get it, but the only way to do that, and incidentally, it is pervasive to think what happens to the stock market every time ben bernanke even pretends he might cut off subsidies to the bond market, i mean, you know, those advocates of the free market are just as tied to the federal gold as anybody else. Its incredible. The but if were going to have enough money and enough resources to brung out our country, we have to grow the pie. To me, if theres a shortcoming in the Current Administration is we dont taring enough about that. That ought to be, that, and making sure Government Works ought to be the singular focus of this administration. They could go to governors around the country who understand that, but its really important. As i said, in 1992, we saved progressive government by trimming its excesses, and i think were going to have to do it again. Well going to look to guys like jack to do it. Thank you, all, again for coming. It was great fun writing the book. I hope you buy many copies. I dont know if lainny is here, but elaine and others who wrote books probably have gone through this, but theres a phenomena on amazon that keep, rob, you probably have a best seller, and bruce went up a million points with chief of staff, but every hour they rate the books, and if there is if youre on television, something happens, you go from 500,000 out of a million books to 30,000, and youre up in the top 20 or 40 in political books, and you get addicted to that. Go buy it. [laughter] then i dont have to go on detox. Anyway, thank you, all, for coming. [applause] [inaudible conversations] if i were to identify the singular most important challenge to overcome as muslims, it would be that, that notion that ifs just as available to muslims. The truth of the matter the reason why we are here today is because of this inclination which i read somewhere that its not only antihistorical because it denies centuries of islamic theology and tradition and morality. Hundreds of years of diversity and so its the idea to be a muslim, you just have to follow its antics from the first from the 7th century and very limited short period of time, and i think our journey as americanmuslims have to be about refusing to being told by clerks who speaks for us that islam, in its ideals, is a 7th century reality. We are americans and muslims who need an islam of the 21st century. Being muslim in america, sunday night at nine on after words, part of booktv this week on cspan2, and online for the book club, well be discussing liberty amendments, read the book and join the conversation. Go to booktv. Org and click on book club to enter the chat room. Chris matthews, the host of msnbcs hardball recalling the working relationship between reagan and form earn speaker of the house. Chris matthews was an aid to the former speaker saying despite the political derchs between the speaker and president reagan, they worked towards compromise. This is about 45 minutes. [applause] hi