Partners. The irony is where brazil and india governments are, the bottom line is reforms need to happen internally that are about legal questions, but theres also a strategic level of interest that needs to go on here. [inaudible] do you think there is a possibility of a parallel within the United States . Great question. In the book, there is a chapter on the chinese approach. One of the key aspects besides the Massive Campaign of intellectual property theft, you have how this links into an assassins doctrine where youre looking at a potential enemy and saying, im going to turn their strengths into a weakness. The ability to mobilize massive Human Capital behind it. This is used to describe the internal selfcensoring model, the human flesh Search Engine is how it translates. When you talk about the number of folks involved, a mix of cyber militia and patriotic hacker communities, the scale is enormous. It is measuring and hundreds of thousands of folks. Most of those are people who are not all that talented. When you combine the massive scale and weak defenses, it is a dangerous mix. It is challenging for the Chinese Government because how it controls it is challenging it. That is why we stop the hacker communities rolled into militias. What is the u. S. Approach to it . We do have a patriotic hacker community. It has been mostly focused in recent years on counterterrorism. One of my favorite stories in the book, which shows the power of cyber counterterrorism, one of the best folks at going after terrorist websites that post propaganda and videos and the like is a private citizen who is better known for his day job. He was the gentleman who invented the housewife nextdoor genre of internet porn. For the most part, we corporatized it. A lot of those capabilities in other nations are held within patriotic hacker communities or in the case of russia, you have a mix of organized crime and cyber which has been deployed in operations against estonia or georgia. And there is a good and a bad. On the one hand, it means it is more organized. On the other hand, maybe it cost you a lot more and you have the strange market incentives that play. Just like there is a management problem that china ran into during there was the episode in 2001 where one of our Navy Patrol Planes bumped with a hot dogging chinese fighter and there was an online back and forth between communities and how you control that. How do they rein in that nationalism side . On the corporate side, the recent proliferation of hacked back as a Business Model. The best way i will protect you is by hacking back the people going after you. It is a great Business Model for that company. It is not a good Business Model for the clients and it may be even worse for the nation. For the client, you are paying someone to go after an attacker. For the nation, you could have companies for private reasons getting involved in things with political ramifications. A lot of lessons to learn from the real world side of private military firms. Peter, thank you very much. Thank you. [applause] [inaudible] thank you. You have written a book. We have another one for you to read as a token of our appreciation for you being here. Those of you who are interested, peter has a box full of his books back there if you would like to get an autograph and write him a check. Thank you. Thank you. [applause] coming up on cspan, tom friedman talks about National Security and freedom of the press. President obama is traveling to mexico today. On washington journal, we look at the impact of the north American Free trade agreement. Washington journal is live each morning at 7 00 eastern. This morning, the Farm Foundation has a discussion about food safety and the food safety modernization act. Live coverage at 9 00 a. M. Eastern. Later, deputy secretary of state will talk about americas relationship with arab countries in the persian gulf. That is at the center for strategic and international studies. The creation museum, we are only too willing to admit our beliefs are based on the bible. The difference between beliefs and what one can observe. Peopleve we are teaching to think critically and think in the right terms about science. I believe it is the creationists who should be educating the kids out there because we are teaching them the right way to think. We are based upon the bible. I am challenging evolutionists to admit the belief aspects of evolution. I encourage you to explain to us why we should accept your word for it that natural law changed just 4000 years ago, completely, and there is no record of it. There are pyramids that are older than that. There are human populations that are far older than that with traditions that go back farther than that. It is not reasonable to me that everything changed for thousand years ago. Species, the surface of the , and, the stars in the sky the relationship of all of the other living things on earth to humans. It is not reasonable to me. Evolution versus creationism. Ye and ken hamm debate wednesday night. Next, Thomas Friedman talks about National Security and freedom of the press. The three temple at surprise d. Nner was interviewed by cohosted by George Washington university and harvard university. From the National Press club in washington dc. [applause] hello and welcome to the National Press club. A conversation with New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman about freedom. Over the past 20 years i have had the pleasure and privilege of speaking with some of the best herbalists in the country. Some have even won a pulitzer prize, which is the highest compliment in the newspaper world. None, except our guest tonight, has ever won three pulitzer prizes, two for his reporting from the middle east and one for his commentary. Tom friedman joined the times in 1981. He was bureau chief in beirut and jerusalem. He has been the chief Diplomatic Correspondent and chief white house correspondent. Columniste became a a Foreign Affairs columnist for the paper. He does that twice a week. And somehow, he still finds time to write six bestselling books, to host Six Television documentaries, numerous seminars, and conferences, and to be with us here tonight. Thank you. Thank you. [applause] are subject is freedom. A big word. I would like to start by asking what is your definition of freedom . It is granted to be with you. You and your brother, bernie, were always great. People i admire as a young journalist. A treat to be with you here today. You know, let me think. I am not a philosopher, i am a journalist. Let me answer your question in the context of journalism. If you started this story this evening by asking me, what was the greatest story you ever told . I just turned 60 and i have been at a few times for 33 years. What was the one that really the most amazing . I would tell you it was tire your Square Tahrir square for the original revolution that overthrew president mubarak. When i came home and people asked me about it and i would say this was the most amazing story i ever covered and they will say why . Because it was the most apolitical political event i ever covered. Meaning . Meaning that at some level, it was about this very deep Human Emotion of im somebody i am somebody. If you ask me what is freedom . The ability, desire, aspiration to live in a context where i can realize my full potential as a human being. I think what the square was about it is very grouped root was a political aspiration, young people where they can see how everybody was living in wanting to live in a contest where they could relies their full potential. It had to do with mubarak and corruption and a context that have been built where they cannot realize their full but tension. They lived in a rigged game. Freedom is not just about the ability to write or say anything or travel. There is something deeply personal. To live in a situation where i can be the fullest person. Do you feel people all over the world share the same sentiment . It is a very interesting question. I have thought about a lot as an arab spring. One of my teachers, you know, the freedom of from and freedom to, positive and negative. So much of the arab spring was about initially was freedom from. People wanted their freedom from the various autocratic regimes. What often happens in the next stage was freedom from a was great, but there is freedom to, too. What did you want to be free to do . You have to build a context to enable people to be free. It turned out some people wanted to be free to be more islamist. Some people wanted to be free to be more sectarian. Some people wanted to be free in the democratic cents to be equal citizens with equal rights and responsibilities. Or is this something that we acquire because we live the United States with the idea of freedom . Im trying to get from you a sense of the majesty of freedom, not a choice. I do believe that everybody wants to live in a context that enables and powers that allow them to realize their full potential. The aspiration for freedom to live in a context where i can do all of those things is universal. As you said before, some people in the middle east today would have a quarrel about that in the sense that in the United States we grow up believing it is due us. The people in egypt and yemen do not grow with that. It is not universal. You can also fall into the opposite trap, to think that somehow we have got a and it is unique to us, and it is not an aspiration that other people necessarily want. I am only speaking from my own expense. Experience. Once we lifted the lid in that part of the world, it turned out that people wanted to be free. Maybe it was to live more within their own sect. So it is going to be different for different people, but ive found in my own travels and experience there, it remains a very, powerful and deep emotion. The First Amendment lays out certain principles. Congress cannot to do anything to abridge our freedom of religion, spree each speech, press, peaceably assemble, and petition our government. They are laid out there. They are large concepts. The underpinnings for the society. They have been described as godgiven. Im wondering if you share that view. Gosh, i confess i have never thought about, you know, whether they are godgiven, but again, when i think of our own society i will give you the journalistic response. Thats a duck. No, it is because i am not a philosopher. I always, when ever people tell me chinas stealing our secrets, my answer always is, look, i dont encourage industrial theft or cyber theft, but only when they still a bill of rights. Tell me when they steal the constitution. Tell me when they steal the words off the lincoln and jefferson in washington memorials. Then they will have stolen something. All the things that are worth stealing in this country are hiding in plain sight, because as long as we have got those, we can always come up with another secret, another industrial advance, another innovation and breakthrough. And so those are the things that i think are of great value. And we sometimes, i find myself bristling at times when i hear our own lawmakers trashing our institutions. What would people in russia today give for one day of the sec . What would people in china today give for one day of the Justice DepartmentHuman Rights Division . You know, we kick this country around like it is a football sometimes. It is not a football. It is a faberge egg. And it is one that a lot of people around the world would appreciate in terms of these bureaucrats washington, d. C. These institutions are precisely what enable our freedom to, to do all these things. How do you think we got those . And this takes me to to origin once again. How do you think it happened that this country has the First Amendment that it does . Does it have anything to do, for example, with the fact that there is written into the First Commandment of the bible the idea that i am the lord who brought you out of the house of bondage. That there is something there having to do with an almighty force, liberating people from bondage, from bondage to what . You are talking about fromto. The early settlers in many ways were reenacting their own version of the exodus story. In leaving what they thought was a tyranny, a monarchical tyranny in europe and coming to the shores as part of our core dna. And so in terms of origin you are not going to go with me to any particular path . Im going to stay away from that path. Is it really possible in this country and in others to separate church and state . You know, that reminds me, that question, marvin, of is it possible to be an objective journalist . I am not dodging your question. Because whenever i am asked that, i always answer, i havent asked that. I have gotten that. Question before i will go to the next one then. And the answer to me is always that objectivity is not the thing. It is attention. The tension between understanding and disinterest. I cannot possibly write an objective story about you unless at some level i really try to understand you almost see the world through your eyes. At the same time i cannot write an objective and story if i were to only see the world through your eyes. Objectivity is a tension. Sometimes in the middle east you have to think about these things a lot. And sometimes i may be a little bit too understanding of you, sometimes too disinterested. Judge me over a period, but its a tension. In a country like ours founded by people escaping religious freedom but also inspired by their own religious ethic, there is always going to be a tension between church and state. You hear in the state of the union when the president says God Bless America and whatnot. As long as there is a tension, i have no problem with it. Since 9 11, there has been a lot of tension certainly in this country and in other parts of the world as well. Do you feel, as both a journalist and a citizen of this country, that since 9 11 you have lost any of your freedoms . Gosh, i i dont feel that. But i do feel that, um, i feel that, and what i wrote about 9 11 at the time was i do believe it was one of the most, maybe the most dangerous challenge to our open society in this sense that what this generation of terrorists were doing were taking objects from our daily life the backpack, the car, the airplane and turning them into weapons. And when you take objects from daily life, literally human beings at the end and turning them into weapons, what you do is you erode the very thing that keeps an open society open and that is trust. We trusted that everyone came in this room tonight, was not wrapped in the suicide vest or carrying a bomb in their shoe or purse, in their pen. Trust is the very lifeblood of an open society. And what is so dangerous about this generation of terrorism is that what it tries to do is attack that very thing. So that we close ourselves off. We search everybody. I went to a lecture this morning at Johns Hopkins on tunisia. It was just a lecture. I had to show my drivers license to sign in. Show my drivers license to a private security guard. There are those kinds of things that i find them they are still at the level of annoyance. Because you have written that if there were another 9 11, you would fearful that that would be the end of the open society. What i deeply worry about is another attack on the scale of 9 11. Because i fear then Many Americans would say, do whatever you need to do, do whatever you need to do. And i think our response to 9 11 in many ways has been remarkably restrained. Lets remember, how many years was that after 9 11, we elected an africanamerican whose middle name was hussein, whose grandfather was a muslim, who defeated a woman to run against the mormon. [laughter] ok . Who does that . Ok . [laughter] that was an amazing thing. Now, we have learned since then that we still have a lot of work to do, you know. When you see some of the racial antipathy that has been subtly and overtly directed at the president , but in many ways, the fact that we did that was the greatest repudiation of bin laden. And yet, the tools that the bin ladens use remains such a threat that you can imagine and and to our society as we know it, were there another major attack. I do not think it is a joke. Before i came over, i was reading the news. It is an amazing, perverse, bizarre story a suicide bomber trainee in iraq blew himself and 22 other trainees up, blew up 22 trainees who he was teaching and preparing how to build a suicide vest. This is not a joke. You know, there were things that we see in the middle east in the last five or six years that that kind of thing, that you have to take it seriously. Absolute. Ly. Lets talk a little bit about modern technology, of which i am not an expert. Then you have really got the wrong guy. You are pretty good at this stuff. But a number of people of my point of view might look at all of that modern technology and say, ech, leave me alone. I want to go back to an old typewriter. Modern technology to you is a good thing, and inspiring thing, and uplifting thing, or is it simply too heavy to lift . What is your sense of it and what is it doing at this point in our national lives to the issue of privacy, which i would like to get your gut feeling about . Oh, so i do not know where to dive in exactly. Due to privacy. Do the privacy. I read the israeli newspaper i read the israeli newspaper every day, and as some of you may know, i am a golfer. A couple months ago i buy golf clubs online occasionally. I pick up the israeli newspaper and there is an ad for golf clubs in the middle of the front page. How did that get there . You put it there. How did that get from golf smith threw some cookies onto my front page . And so i find that a little creepy. They knew you were a golfer. That somehow golfsmith sold my data, so when i went to the israeli newspaper an ad for a golf swing comes up on the front page. I am