Provider. Watch us on h. D. , like us on facebook and follow us on twitter. The House Intelligence Committee today held a hearing with top officials from intelligence and Law Enforcement agencies. Heres what the chairman of the committee, mike rogers, had to say about the obama administrations approach to counterterrorism operations. Decision on key covert action activities have had serious consequences to the National Security of the United States. When it comes to americas current approach to National Security, there is only one thing that is certain and that is our allies have no clue what our policy is from one day to the next. We just return from the munich security conference, we had roughly 10 bilateral meetings in a bipartisan delegation. To the individual who expressed frustration over the lack of clarity in u. S. Policy when it comes to engagements in rough parts of the world. As a matter of fact, one particular very senior official highlighted the confusion when he stated that on serious policy matters, very recently received direction from the pentagon that was different from the same direction he got from the state department, that was different from the direction he got from the white house. You can imagine the frustration of our allies in a very troubled time. Talking about the problem, reviewing the problem, assigning a task force to think about the problem is causing serious problems. Our adversaries completely see it as weakness. And we look to see how the world has evolved in response to these last five years. Americas strength and stature in the world has diminished. Thats just not one members opinion. That is the opinion of our International Partners who we meet with frequently. Terrorists are emboldinned and grabbing land around the world. Rowing nations are only more bellicose. Our adversaries like russia an china capitalize on our indecision and be a sebs from the world stage absence from the world stage. When policymakers embrace National Security policies based on what sounds good in a speech, those left to untangle the mess are those gentlemen you see sitting before us today and the very courageous men and women who work for those agencies. So i thank you, all of you, for the work that you do. Not only with the good work youre doing now, but for the years you have spent defending the country. For making the arguments for standing up what is right and needed in one of the most challenging times i argue in our National Securitys history, our countrys history. But i also fear that this lack of leadership has created growing risk aversion within our intelligence agencies, as al qaeda has morphed and spread throughout yemen, syria, and africa. We have piled on here in washington, d. C. , even more bureaucracy on our intelligence agencies. Today individuals who would have been previously removed from the battlefield but u. S. Counterterrorism operations for attacking or plotting to attack against u. S. Interests remain free because of selfimposed red tape. While were busy pondering more transparency, our intelligence professionals are left paralyzed because of the are left paralyzed because of the totally incoherent policy guidance. Let me be the first to say publicly, the president s may, 2013, policy changes for the u. S. Targeted strikes are an utter and complete failure. And they leave americans lives at risk. Those changes, while sounding nice in a speech, are today right now endangering the lives of americans at home and our military overseas in a way that is frustrating to our allies and frustrating to those of us who engage in the oversight of our classified activities. As to afghanistan, last year at this same hearing, i asked whether we had the conviction to cement our gains and achieve a lasting victory. Or would we just walk away. A year later we seem even more focused on leaving the war before victory has been won. Yet we have already learned what happens after a hasty exit in iraq, instability in these countries gives al qaeda and other terrorist groups their most valued asset, ungoverned space, to plan, train and conduct terrorist activities against the west and indeed our homeland. Such operational freedom results in the loss of hardfought gains. Our policy should be dictated by what best protects america and not what is politically expedient. Americas adversaries are not slowing down. Now is not the time to disengage from the world. The drip of classified information designed to undermine u. S. Interests will continue, but we must move past false accusations and feigned outrage. We need leadership and Clear Thinking in a very difficult time. We must get back to business of protecting america and we must give our Intelligence Services the clarity and certainty and the tools to be successful in that effort. Thats why we look to you, heads of our intelligence agencies, to find innovative ways to make sure that you have the ability to impact potential terrorist operations targeted at the United States and our allies and collect the information for policymakers to make the right decision in difficult places of the world. It certainly is no small task. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2014] the head of the Defense Intelligence agency testified at todays House Intelligence Committee. Heres what he had to say about the leaks of edward snowden. I have a lot more questions, then we have a lot of members. I want to get general flynn to the Defense IntelligenceAgency Report that was issued recently and made available to the committee, which i think is the first agency to complete its review of the stolen information by the n. S. A. Contractor. In your professional opinion, do you believe these leaks will cost american lives on the battlefield, either now or in the future . I do. Did the compromise make it harder to counter the threat from i. E. D. s used against our forces in afghanistan . I believe that we will face problems with the i. E. D. Threat because of these leaks, whether its in afghanistan or on some future battlefield. Yes. So that has a fairly immediate threat level to our soldiers, marines and other military forces in the field . In my judgment it does. Has the safety of u. S. Government personnel throughout the world been put at risk by these leaks . In other words, have you had to alter any assignments as a result of this compromised material . Let me just say for the purposes of our task force snowden, ssume that everything that he touched we assume that he took. Stole. And so we assume the worst case in how we are reviewing all of the defense departments actions, you know, events, exercises around the world. So, to sort of cut to the chase of your question, i believe that we will have to make adjustments in the future based on those assumptions. What particular military services have been impacted by this stolen material . All of our services. Army . Army, navy, air force and marine corps. And so, there will be changes necessary to mitigate the theft of this material in order to maintain security of operations and the safety of the United States military personnel, is that correct . I believe there will have to be, yes. Do these leaks give our adversaries insights into how we about how we crack them and what their military vulnerabilities are and how they might look at what might be some vulnerabilities from the United States military . I mean, yes they do. What i dont want to do, chairman, is i dont want to get two far, you know, in front of where the investigations going on, on this issue, and also there im just talking about the material that was stolen. Im just talking about the material that was stolen. I dont know how you read that report and dont come with the conclusion that if our adversaries are looking at them, like many believe they are, that has gives the enemy or adversary, is probably a better word today, it gives them operational and strategic advantage when it comes to military Service Operations around the world. Yes, it could. Ok. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2014] i came to washington to conduct investigations. The department of f. C. C. Conducted investigations for a year and a half, five or six days a week, eight, 10 hours a day. In the field of finance and reorganization of receiverships and i had a great galaxy of people like john foster on the stand. We never, never, never would even call a man if we knew that he wouldic advocate the fifth amendment. Friday, cspan radio continues our series of oral history interviews with former Supreme Court justices. This week from 1967, Society Justice william o. Associate Justice William o. Douglas. The new cspan. Org website makes it easy for you to find and watch all of cspans extensive coverage of official washington. Look for it on our home pages in a space called federal focus. Each day youll find comprehensive coverage of house and senate debates, Congressional Committee hearings, events with the president and members of his cabinet, press briefings from the white house, capitol hill, the state department and the pentagon. Plus, selected Supreme Court oral arguments and appearances by the justices. Watch live or on your own skeds, federal focus on cspan. Org. Making it easy for to keep tabs on whats happening in congress, the white house and he courts. A Congressional Budget Office report released today shows the federal budget will decrease in the shortterm but increase over the next decade. Tomorrow morning c. B. O. Director Douglas Elmendorf testifies before the House Budget Committee about that report. You can see that live at 10 00 a. M. Eastern on our companion etwork, cspan2. Jason furman, the chairman of the White House Council of economic advisors, spoke to reporters today about that c. B. O. Report. He answered questions in the White House Briefing room for about 45 minutes. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. I hope you all are well. Thanks for your patience. As you can see, i have with me today jason furman, the chairman of the president s council of economic advisors. Because i know theres interest in todays c. B. O. Report, i asked jason to join me. He will say a few words at the top, then take questions from you on that subject and others elated to his expertise. I enjoy having other people making sentences for me so its good to have jason here to do this work and i will stand by for questions on other subjects. So if you take all your questions related to matters that jason handles at the top, ill be here for when he goes. Thanks. Thank you very much, jay. Wanted to start with the main thing with the c. B. O. Report, which is about the federal budget. And it confirms the very substantial nearterm improvements that the United States has made in its deficit. In particular, it finds that the deficit last year was 4. 1 4. 1 of g. D. P. Thats cutting the deficit the president inherited in half and the fastest pace of deficit reduction since the demobilization from world war ii. The c. B. O. Report also finds that the deficit will continue to decline in the near term, falling by another 200 billion in the next two years, falling to 2. 6 2. 6 of g. D. P. That numbers important because from the very beginning, the president s Economic Team and the president thought that the most important goal in fiscal policy was to ensure that your debt was falling as a share of the economy. And having deficits below 3 of g. D. P. Are consistent with that goal. C. B. O. Does also find and confirm that there is over the medium and long term still a substantial deficit challenge and thats why youre going to see the president s budget once again as it has in previous years continue to propose deficit reductions over the medium and long run, as it makes investments in jobs and priorities as well. Turning now to appendix c of the report. Since that seems to have attracted some interest from some people. I can give you a little bit of context for the impact the Affordable Care act has had on labor markets and will have on labor markets and the economy going forward. First, since the Affordable Care act has passed, the private sector has added 8. 1 million jobs. Thats the fastest pace of private sector job growth since the late 1990s and i think that fully puts to rest a lot of the more overwrought predictions about how the sky would fall and the economy would be deeply damaged by the Affordable Care act. Turning now to this report, c. B. O. Itself says that in a very important way, the Affordable Care act today right now is helping labor markets, is helping businesses, and is helping jobs. And in particular, what c. B. O. Finds is that the tax credits for health coverage, medicaid, will help put more money in peoples pockets, help them able to spend more and that will provide a boost to the economy, to give you the full quote, quote, the expanded federal subsidies for Health Insurance will stimulate demand for goods and services and that affect will mostly occur over the next few years effect will mostly occur in the next few years. Help employers hire more workers or increase employees hours during that period. Weve seen claims that the Affordable Care act is impacting the job market today. For example, numerous allegations that its increased parttime employment. C. B. O. Refutes that, saying, quote, in c. B. O. s judgment, theres no compelling evidence that parttime employment has increased as a result of the a. C. A. That is what the a. C. A. Is doing to labor markets in the near term, right now, the economy today. Finally, the report talks about what happens to labor markets over time. Which the report defines as 2017 through 2024. That too refutes one of the main attacks and criticisms against the Affordable Care act, which is that it would lead employers to shed jobs, that it would lead employers to dramatically cut back on hours, and increase the Unemployment Rate. In fact, what c. B. O. Found, and this is their summary quote, near the top of appendix c, again, quote, the estimated reduction, this is the reduction in the total quantity of labor that all of you have seen and talked about, quote, the estimated reduction stems almost entirely from a net decline in the amount of labor that workers choose to supply, rather than from a net drop in businesses demand for labor. Whats relevant about that is the word itself is choose. This is a choice on the part of workers. And i have no doubt that if, for example, we got rid of Social Security and medicare there are many 95yearolds that would choose to work more to avoid, you know, potentially starving or to give themselves an opportunity to get health care. I dont think anyone would say that was a compelling argument to eliminate Social Security and medicare. Similarly here, c. B. O. s analysis itself is about the choices that workers are making in the face of new options afforded to them by the Affordable Care act, not something about firms destroying jobs. The final thing id like to say is that c. B. O. Themselves stress that their analysis is not complete. It doesnt reflect the full set of factors. And that theres substantial uncertainty around their analysis. In particular, i think theres three very important ways that the Affordable Care act is and will continue to improve labor markets that werent reflected here. The first is an increase in the productivity of workers, because of fewer sick days, less disability, and generally improved productivity as a result. The second is something that council of economic advisors has done a report on, which is contributing to the slowest pace of per Capita Health spending growth in the last 50 years. That slowest pace since the last 50 years is a fact. We documented the ways in which the Affordable Care act is one of the important factors that has contributed to that slowdown. What that does is it helps employers in the short and medium run. It lowers some of their compensation costs, helps them higher more workers hire more workers. And then finally, by giving people more security in terms of their health care, it reduces what commifflets call job lock or gives more opportunities for entrepreneurism and moving from job to job. In addition to that, as i said, theres a lot of uncertainty. I think economists would debate some of the assumptions here and id expect there to be a robust debate around things like how much workers respond to a set of phaseouts that in other parts of social programs you generally havent seen people respond to and some of the degrees assumed here. But regardsless of that, as i said, this report confirms the. C. A. Is has is making positive impacts today in very important ways, it refutes some of the arguments about how it has hurt the labor market today, or will hurt it in the future. And it confirms what weve all known, which is when you do Something Like that gives people more choices and more options and people will sometimes make different choices in the face of new choices and new options. I guess that you think this report refut