But one of the many things that we can look at as legislatures and governors is licensing as a barber or a mechanic you have to get licensed and you cant get a license if youve been in prison. Its just seriously broken trying to help these people when they get out. Why should the fact when youre prison years ago prevents you from being a barbers license. What about the permanence of guest as many of you point out, you go away from five or 10 years, and you missed the digital revolution. You may not know how to use the web, any things all of us take for granted. The world has passed you by. It is it it is a difficult thing to try to gure out how to catch up. Host what is available in the prison system, it goes to that idea. To help that transition out. Guest a lot of the money being spent to build new prisons could be spent on helping these people get back into the community and earn a job. Points. E some good i was in the womens prison a few months ago. The woman i was in there with, she told me the nice building across the street, it used to be a college library. She was allowed to go there for 15 minutes once a week. How is that going to help her get back into the community . Guest richard is with the group right on crime. Were also joined by mark bauer of the sentencing project, he serves as their executive director. In light of announcements made by the attorney general this week. Lidia is on our others line from maryland. Is a godsend. 16 years ago, i had a son who started using drugs after the death of his son, but he was gainfully employed the whole time. The first time he attempted to sell a 10 bag of drugs, he sold it to an undercover officer, who was also a godsend. He was arrested. In the district of columbia. His case was sent to the drug courts because he was a first time offender. After the probation report, the officer came and spoke to me he was ordered into drug treatment at second genesis for six months, and after 30 days, he was allowed to have visitors every week. Therapy, group therapy. When he was released, he still had continuous therapy. He got a job. He went to the court every week for drug treatment. The judge told him that he found if he found him using drugs one time, he would be sent back to jail. He has been clean ever since, gainfully employed, and a productive member of society. I think god for the drug court. Host that was from lidia in maryland. Trenton, michigan, christopher, good morning. Caller good morning. Yes, i just wanted to talk about education and programs available. I was previously incarcerated michigan, andin there were no programs available. I was the only person that i had ever met that had done this. I switched around for prisons in two and a half years. Four prisons in two and a half years. You could take college courses, but you would have to have the money to do so. You guys have already talked luckily i had a good family who helped me out, and i was able to take University Courses and continue my education when i got out. However, i did not have a drug crime. That ifanted to note you do have a drug crime, especially nowadays, everyone is going for some kind of secondary training or Post High School training there are no industrial jobs left. They really do not exist. It is like 8 of the jobs available. Host thank you. I wanted to bring out a graphic in the wall street journal pose quote that talks about prison populations compared to other countries. Journal thatt talks about prison populations compared to other countries. How do other countries deal with this . Guest the United States has become the world leader in how we use incarceration. Underlined by our greater crime rates. Other countries have less long term prison sentences. They still send people to prison. Generally speaking, they do not send them for nearly as long as we do here. The average burglar, car thieves, drug possession case is going to get less time in canada, england, france, and this is not a scientific process necessarily where we have determined exactly five years or 10 years the appropriate amount of time. It is cultural and political. Other nascent nations have taken a very different approach. Host jan is up next from irving, texas. Caller good morning. Thank you for taking my call. When did we start taxpayers start paying for private prisons . Who started that program . Since we have a lot of people in jail from smoking pot, which is now becoming legal, it seems kind of silly. That population could be reduced. The private prison industry started in the mid 1980s when prison operators came to state and local governments. It has actually been much more the growth has been with the federal government rather than the states. Democratice for both and republican administrations, very rapid growth. There is not a lot of people in prison for smoking pot. A lot of them get arrested for possessing or selling marijuana, but the drug offenders in most ,risons are there for cocaine crack, heroin, methamphetamine. It doesnt necessarily mean they need to be there. We do need to separate out how we look at these issues. Guest before our time is up, i wanted to make one important point which ive talked about. We have identified many areas that we can agree on, republicans and democrats, conservative and liberal, and we do not need to identify the difficult issues that are going to divide us, but there are so many issues one of my issues that i keep thinking about 37 states right now have on the books a lot that if you are a woman in prison giving birth, you must he shackled. Your hands must be tied. Your feet must be tied. How dare barrick is that how barbaric is that . It is barbaric. 37 states have it on the books. Guest it is security. Guest thats right. We can all agree on that. But get rid of those rollout lets get rid of those laws. There are many issues where we can come together and move this process forward. It is a humane thing to do. Host does this issue affect the juvenile Justice System as well, as far as overcrowding . Guest it is very similar. There have been harangued us conditions in the many juvenile institutions. The good news is there has been quite a bit of Movement Among juvenile justice professionals, the advocacy community. The number of kids that are held in secure institutions has actually been declining what substantially over the last decade. A reduction of about one third overall nationally. I think it is because people are coming together, both looking at the research, looking at Brain Development issues, looking at what works with kids. As harmful as institutional life can be for adults, it is probably much worse for kids in their development the Years Development oh years. We have seen the development of communitybased approaches, no adverse affect on public safety. Much better outcomes. Host one more call from tucson, arizona, from i can caller from a corrections worker. Caller good morning. I will try to be brief. My 30 years, recently retired as an administrator with the department of justice, federal bureau of prisons real quick the majority of inmates i have seen in federal prison system, the majority of inmates are illegals, aliens that have been caught transporting drugs into the United States from mexico, thats one, and the other ones are native americans that commit crimes on reservations. Those are the majority of inmates you will see in the federal prison systems. I have rarely ever seen an individual who is caught with a couple of grams of anything and sent to a federal prison. If they do, they have a rap sheet as long as my arm. They have committed armed robberies, home invasions, everything you can think of and they have committed a federal offense. Host any comments . Guest there are many people in prison who have long rap sheets and many things have happened. Maybe we did not do good interventions early on. Not everybody in prison is a low level drug offender. Weve gotten to the point that by focusing resources inappropriately, i think, and excessively, we have not given ourselves the opportunity to make distinctions between people who present a truth that to the community and people who can be handled better through other means. Host as we stop this discussion today, where do we go forward as far as the populated as far as the prison population . What should be next . What should we look out for . Guest the legislators at the local level, city, county, state officials should begin to look at these issues and begin to address them. Thats where the Real Progress is going to be made. We have talked about only 14 of the federal prisoners are in federal prisons and they are in there for pretty serious things. There are not a lot of low level drug users in federal prisons. The progress will have to take place at the state level and we need to move forward. You talked earlier about the juveniles in prison a well known motivational speaker years ago said the person you are right now, you will be that same person in 10 years except for two things the books you read and the people you associate with. We send these 18yearolds in for one offense and they will come out in five or 10 years far worse than when they went in. Guest the attorney generals call is a rallying cry for the whole country and initially for congress to do with they should be doing but around the country as well. To hear this message coming from the top and building on a decade or more of change and reconsideration of policies, i think, should give us hope we can move forward in the next decade and achieve fewer people in prison and continued reductions in crime. Host we have been talking with marc mauer and richard vigueire, thank you for your time. On the next washington journal, discussion about the political unrest in egypt with jon alterman of the center for strategic and international studies. Then taxpayers for common sense Vice PresidentStephen Ellis talks about the National FloodInsurance Program and how a new law is causing rates to rise. After that, we look at how social media might be used to help predict the outcome of u. S. House elections with Indiana University professor five io fabio rohas. Your calls, tweets, and emails along with calls beginning live at 7 00 a. M. Eastern here on c span. , ours weeks newsmakers guest is the ceo of Heritage Action for america. He talks about his organizations agenda and its position on issues pertaining to health care and immigration. Heres a preview. [video clip] in this environment right now, it is very difficult to handle immigration the way we should be. Which is bypassing piecemeal pieces of legislation, getting the border secure. We also have a gigantic imbalance between labor supply and labor demand. All of those questions do not require amnesty. You can get all of the economic benefits that people talk about in fixing our broken immigration system without giving amnesty at this time. That is the position we support. Unfortunately in this environment right now, the moment something passes the house, the pressure on immigration, which has dissipated over the last couple of weeks and months, will immediately be back in the forefront. You can watch the entire interview with Michael Needham of Heritage Action form for america on newsmakers on newsmakers sunday at 10 00 a. M. Eastern and 6 00 p. M. Eastern here on cspan. What is interesting about washington in this age is that once you have that title, even if it is a very short title, even if you have been voted out after one term, you can stay in as a former chief of staff, a former congressman, former chief of staff to congressman x or y, and that itself is marketable. You are in the club. Departurestriking from the days in which people would come to washington to serve, serve a little bit, and then go back to the farm, which is how the founders had intended it. There is a new dynamic now. A lot of it starts with money, and the money available, and Resources Available for people to do very well. Sunday night Mark Leibovitch with an insiders look at government and media in washington at 8 00 on cspans q a. A discussion about intelligence gathering and counterterrorism efforts with former National CounterterrorismCenter Director the collider. And Matthew Olsen who currently serves in the position. They were part of last months annual aspen security form in colorado. This is an hour. We are probably at that point in the day where everything has been said that not everybody has said it. Hopefully we will try and move over for two topics we have not and mix it up a bit. Very excited to moderate this with two of the best in the matt here. Matth ols olson is the current director of ct. Nt foras been general counsel the nsa, acting assistant attorney general for National Security, and special counsel to the fbi director. His predecessor at the end ctc the nctc is mike leiter. He was the second director of the National Counterterrorism center until 2011. He is now senior counselor to the ceo of the Data Analytics alantir technologies. He is also a National Security analyst for nbc news. Why dont we begin with a very ,road question, and that is what is the current state of the threat from terrorism . Where does it emanate from and how serious is it . Why dont we start with you . It is great to be here. It is daunting to talk about it. We have talked about a lot of subjects today. I will give it a shot. I would say right off of the top the threat is very different now for what it was 10 years ago and even 4 years ago. Thinking at a couple of different levels. As have been noted, the threat from al qaeda and afghanistan is really significantly degrading. We do not face the same rate as the same attack as 9 11. The group is really struggling to survive to recruit and train and operate. It still is it remains at the vanguard of the movement. Is still looks to for leadership and guidance from the affiliate groups and to mention the one that concerns us most. That group in yemen has the capability and intent to carry out attacks against us. They have tried three times to take out airlines over the last few years. Beyond that, beyond the affiliated groups, we talked about this, the whole expense of unrest and turmoil in north africa and parts of the middle east have led to the rise of the Loose Network and temporary groups like benghazi to carry out the group that carried out the attack against our facility in benghazi last year. Those types of groups deftly pose a threat was in the region. They are less a threat here at home. The final group to mention it is very quick answer is the threat from homegrown extremists. The attack on boston is the more clear example. The challenge for us as individuals like the tsarnaevs is and they do not hit our radar. They do not travel and communicate in the same way learn what they need to learn the internet and become radicalized of the internet. From that perspective, it poses a real challenge. As would brief the threat, overall, i would say it remains persistent. It is increasingly complex and diverse bit and diverse. First of all, always good to be here. Thank you for another great event. I want to commend matt for the great job he has done. But also, i think people should understand modern government. It is a really big deal for a current and former to sit next to each other. A lot about matts confidence as sit next to a guy who can say anything the hell he wants. I agree with his assessment of the threat. I would add a couple of small items. We have actually done, wouldve talked about the threats and other places that are terrible in the world. We have to remember how successful the counterterrorism activities have been over the last 12 years. If i asked a group like this on september 12, 2001, and the americans will be killed in the United States i al qaeda my guess is that answer would be about 1000, 10,000. I am almost certain nobody was a 18 house and which was the 18,000 which is the total number of People Killed by al qaeda in the u. S. In the past 12 years. 18 which is the total number of thele killed by al qaeda in u. S. In the past 12 years. The threat is accurate. We also have to look at this and understand that we are never going to see any of these threats entirely but prevent a catastrophe. Will be susceptible to the smaller scale attacks we see like in boston. I would add we are always focus mostly on outlook item. Al qaeda. People started to be, slightly more aware of the threat of extremism mostly from has below qudsmely from the iranian force and hezbollah. If we approach a conflict with iran, we will undoubtedly face a renewed and invigorated shia inspired terrorist threat. We have seen some of that already, the plot against the saudi ambassador in washington, and other attacks overseas. The hunterething for Terrorism Community we have to make sure that we keep our eye on. In addition to what mike said, it will encapsulates the complexity of the challenge but to focus on syria. In syria, we have the opposition to the assad regime. In the opposition, a growing Extremist Group that is seeking to become an official affiliate of al qaeda. It is probably the most capable fighting force within the opposition erie it opposition. We have a shiite Extremist Group, hezbollah. Then, within that, we have the existence of chemical weapons. On top of that, the biggest concern is the flow of foreign fighters to syria. It has become the dominant battlefield in the world. We see foreign fighters one from western europe and in some cases to the United States to syria to fight as part of the opposition. The concern Going Forward is these individuals traveling to syria, become radicalized, trained, and returning as part of a Global Jihadist Movement to western europe and potentially the United States. It really elucidates th