Assuming that theres Nothing Congress can do. But its wrong and that it needs to change. Fortunately theres bipartisan support to start that. It is encouraging to see that across the partisan spectrum and i think that has everything to do with the outside of the internet and i think that young people are not learning about constitution in gradeschool and high school and probably not plausible either. Definitely not law school is. I suspect thats why you wrote this book because this is an engaging story about why the rules matter. We always talk about the rule of awe. I suspect that young people dont understand when we talk about the constitution. And to the words of the document itself and to the stories. That is why i wrote this book when people focus on it and where they come from. It comes to life and it becomes relevant. And it was not just something that was written by a bunch of dead white guys back in the late 1700s, it becomes real and tangible and concrete for today. That is sort of a challenge for this book are you let me ask you the obvious question, why did you write this book. I wanted to make the u. S. Constitution and i want the constitution to become part of our National Political discourse. We need to be inserted into our National Political discourse as it was at that time of the founding as it has been through most of our history. But it would always remain to remain in protecting the constitution and from time to time they would see that it would be interpreted and implemented in a manner not consistent in that way. The people would and that cant happen. It certainly cannot happen at the effectively. You want people to sit down at the dining room table, to sit down with neighbors and to talk about the constitution and the roadmap that makes america a great place and that is to offset that earlier. Whereby it is a tyranny of expertise that has crept into the political culture. We have assumed that the constitution is a court saying anything for the courts and what the Supreme Court says is the beginning and the end of constitutional analysis. Therefore theres not really much ownership. And when individual senators have all taken an oath to uphold and protect and defend the constitution, that means they are required to engage in their own analysis. Its almost interesting to see it as a political football. When it comes to the rule and everyone watching this program and that is the egos of the modern american political system. We all have to own it and protected and defended. And everyone is entitled to their own opinion about it but not everyone will always come to the same conclusion that you will or that i might. And you do need to understand where it came from. So this book is designed to start a discussion and facilitate a discussion about language and the constitution and why it matters and where we go from here. This was released recently. When did the book come out . It came out april 7 and its available on amazon and barnes and nobles and many other places where books are sold. Its the most readable even though im not a lawyer. And just to clear my conscience, its a readable set of stories about why these old principles apply today and i want to thank you for writing this book. Thank you. Saturday, august 29, marks the 10th anniversary of hurricane katrina, one of the five deadly storms in u. S. History on wednesday night at 8 00 p. M. The 2006 tour of hurricane damage coverage and wheezing enough. And now the family and friends you dont see anymore i mean, how does it feel . You dont forget it. [inaudible] i know all of this is statelevel and all other levels. And i voted for you. To represent you on a local level. I dont know what else to go. Thursday night at 8 00 oclock, we will show you president obamas trip to the region as well as remarks on the effort 10 years after hurricane katrina. Anniversary coverage all this week on cspan. President obama travels to new orleans to make the president s 10 years after hurricane katrina. The white house says they he will deliver remarks on the rebirth and we will have live coverage at 5 00 p. M. Eastern on cspan. Coming up next we have questions from it viewers for about 20 minutes. As a member of the republican rtisansh leadership, what kind of winecoe did you have to walk between partisanship and what you i hader to be the correct way to go . If i disagree with the leadership, i did something else. Ie. Al the idea that when you are in the house you must go along isis nonsense. One of the things you talk about is the partys versus the hoing it people. Wire those important . Ng the idea originally was that inal the purpose of the congress is to be a great the liberating organization. Lls to theloo and he would bring bills to the floor and offer an immense toerh make them better. T use ro so inbe the house when they dons use the rules of order, openopn rules mean this is the bill, lets hear them, lets debate them. A closed rule which has beenthe more common over the years, isi. That here is the bill, the leadership is bringing you this bill to take it or leave it. And we shut down alternatives and made them over too much or too little and doesnt allow you to work religiously. The filibuster serves a useful purpose because if you see that your colleagues are gettingreadd ready to do something thats unconstitutional that you think is bad, you can tie things up and you can say, dont go there. Thats become something that they do all the time. Sed. Ave to sit or stand on the floor, talk about the issue, you can just send a note to the majority leader and say consider is a filibuster and it brings Everything Else to a halt. He reports that when you 1st started in congress 70 percent of the legislation was be a open rule down to about 13 percent, particularly for the major built. Again, going back, if you were in the Republican Leadership in the majority, would you have encouraged bringing, lets say, an immigration bill to the floor under an open rule . Absolutely i would have come although i must say that it is selfserving by telling you what i think because i think because every single they are serving congress i was in the minority. We had no say. I believe in open rules. I believe in allowing people one reason i am so strongly against fasttrack trade authority was thpresident its ridiculous, so you have trade agreements that affects working conditions for americans or whatever then you are saying to the congress this is our legislative branch or were not allowed to change it, take it and leave it so i was always breaking rules on everything. Host fg Left Congress in 1993 where did you go . Guest i went to teach. I taught for 11 years at Harvard Law School and i taught at princeton and now i am a person of Aspen Institute where would i do is work and creating a less partisan kind of politics. Host and you work with walter isaacson. Disco is husband mick edwards is our guest in the first call comes from joseph and mt. Vernon new york. Good afternoon you are on the air. Caller how are you . Congressman im glad to hear youre a straight shooter as far as i can tell which are teaching should have been done in congress. What did you do to change whats going on when you are in it . Guest one of the things, it was different when i was there. We have strong disagreements. There were partyline votes even in those days but there was not the demonization. There were a lot of people to Work Together across the aisle and you would make your case and argue it as well as she could and at the end of the process you would hit a Conference Committee and you would say lets get together. We have got to keep the bridges from collapsing and keep the government running. Thats whats missing today is people are unwilling to compromise but it was just different. The problems that exist today were not nearly the same. Host another joseph and bernard l. Michigan, you are on a former congressman Mickey Edwards. Caller good afternoon congressman. You just talked about the primary process. Would you agree that the primary process is broken because they dont allow people the opportunity for lots of third parties that exist here in the country that in effect are diluting our democracy by not allowing equal voices in the primaries . Guest well i mean its worse than that because what happens now is in 46 states you have what is called the sore loser ball that means if you ran for your parties will nomination he didnt win it even if you would been the first in the state you are not allowed to be on the ballot because whoever won the nomination and the endorsement gives to be the only person on the ballot so what i favor is what california did in Washington State data which is to have open primaries where every candidate from the same offices on the same ballot in every voter regardless of how they are registered not registered and voted in every election. We are talking with former congressman Mickey Edwards about his recent book the parties versus the people how to turn republicans and democrats into americans. Jack in new york city please go ahead. Caller good afternoon. My question for you with all this talk about limiting dark money and the people who currently run the system. I believe it would be a good idea to limit the number of terms that the congressional representatives can have. What are your thoughts on that as well sir . Guest we actually do that. We make everyone in the house for example you make everybodys term and after two years and they are out of office unless the voters say we are going to send you back so the voters are the best term limit mechanisms. There is a lot turnover in allos great democracy of ours to function as though is a Football League . The nfl, the for the cowboys against the eagles every week instead of let sit down together. Rather than working as americans in congress so thats our biggest problem. Host the next call is that verizon tucson. Hi sack of rice. Caller thank you for taking my call, appreciated. Congressman can you please tell me when we care about dark money and usually is associated with the republican party. Can you talk about the dark money thats also alive and well in the Democratic Party . Amongst the panel heard a lot of ports like rightwing, koch brothers, paul Ryan Heritage foundation but i heard nothing on and what hes doing with dark money that Democratic Party and i want the listeners to walk away that this is not a republican conservative problem but its also a democratic problem. Can you please speak to that . Guest bless you. Let me tell you before you use tom sires name i was going to use it. So we have all this corporate money to come since the election. You also have Labor Union Money and a Labor Union Money is even worse because with the labor unions you have spending money from people who dont want to be contributing. They are forced to contribute to the labor union which uses it for political purposes. And its against their will so yeah there is a serious dark money problem. Theres a serious problem with all the wealth that pours into these campaigns but its a problem of the system. Its not a problem of democrats or republicans and the people on the more liberal side like to say if the republicans were just saying that would end the problem. Thank you, you are absolutely right it comes from both sides. Host ron l. Is calling from Pawtucket Rhode island. Renaldo . I dont think she is here. We will move onto anne. Anne in phoenix. Go ahead and go. Caller hello, thanks for taking my call and congressman im happy to talk to you. Its a really great panel. I just noticed that i have two points to make now that ive heard the last caller talk about the insistence on dark money always being referred to as republican which of course we know it isnt. Of course you are calling from a university or speaking and the university and i guess there is a bias. Most universities, anyhow my question has to do with i thought at some point there was a rule having to do with congresspeople either senators for legislators overstaffed having restrictions placed upon them as to how long they must wait before they became a lobbyist. Guest thats still the case. I dont remember now whether its a year or two years but you are not allowed to just go immediately from congress into lobbying and some people get around it. What they do is they go to give internal advice about how to do something and later they moved to lobbying but that rule is still in effect. Host why did you retire . Guest i got that because voters gave mower votes to the other guy and i thought that was unfair. Host who was it that beat you . Guest it was a republican primary. There were a lot of different issues. There is an orthodoxy and among republicans like term limits which i disagreed and line item vetoes which i agreed with him on. He did not go over well. Host would you consider going in the lobbying direction . Guest i never thought about it. I was offered a position as a lobbyist but i never made money in my life and i was going through the conversation i decided they want to do it. I believe in lobbying, its constitutionally protected that i want to be in a position of calling on people i worked with, my colleagues trying to get them to do something. I thought it was demeaning to me to do that and i wouldnt be comfortable doing it. Host as a freshman congressman what kind of pressure did you get to go along get along or whatever . Guest i guess the kind of pressure we get, and when i was in leadership i was on the committees that decided what Committee Assignment you might get and i would see it where somebody would say we are not going to let you be on this committee unless you promise you are going to go with us. Something i never would have done but you know the most important thing, two words for every member of congress to learn is when their leaders start from either party start leaning on them they cant take away my parking place pretty cant take away my salary. You cant take away my office. I was elected by the people to do what i thought was right and thats thats what i only stated. Host paula that in link in michigan you were on with Mickey Edwards and his most recent book is the parties versus the people. Caller thank you. I have two questions actually. Why cant we limit the amount of money the same for everybody and that way they would take away all this like jeb bush made the remark that he already has enough money to win the election why would we want to go out and vote if all it takes is his money and the other one is would that help go back to one vote for one person and do away with the Electoral College . Guest well you now first of al in order to write a paragraph. I dont remember enough about mccainfeingold. Are you need is a way that have transparenc guest i mentioned the panel when i was in office i couldnt take corporate money. Everything was reportable, everything was limited so 1000 in the election cycle or 2000 so that is what we need to go back to. What i propose in my book is no contributions from anybody except the human being so no corporate money no Labor Union Money no pac money and no Political Party money. Host lawrence is calling in from mel hall pennsylvania. Hi lauren. Caller hi. I want to go back to the question on the panel about gore vidal. I believe we should go back and read corporate dolls essays. Congressman edwards, you were in congress i believe during the insanity of the nixon reagan drug war and now we have got the biggest myths in our history. What would you suggest on how to get her way out of this . Its just absolutely ridiculous things going on for 70 years. Guest first of all i wasnt there during the nixon years but i was there during the reagan years. I think there is a movement away from