We are a lot further i touch this for all but over the last 10 years, senator, and were finally now starting to work on concrete, moving forward with a plan. I feel much better than i have in recent years. Thank you. I want to switch to follow on the question centered king had talked about in terms of the arctic. I will be a little more blunt. We have a dod 13 page Arctic Strategy and get when you look at what the russians are doing in the arctic, its actually quite president. Impressive but disturbing. So im sure you gentlemen are somewhat familiar, but general dempsey mentioned in testimony with the secretary of defense last week the russians are looking at for new arctic combat brigades. I think that would give Vladimir Putin a lot of joy. They are building new airfields 13 airfields. They are conducting Long Range Air patrols off the coast of alaska again. They have incredibly six to icebreakers coming, five more planned to add to their fleet of 40. Meanwhile, the United States is thinking about an additional one to our fleet of five. Does it concern you particularly when we talk about keeping ceilings open theres going to be a very very important ceiling thats developing in the Northwest Arctic passage of there . And has the navy given any thought to the terms of particularly adding icebreakers to the navys shipping fleet if were going to be remotely, remotely competitive with the russians in the arctic that they have stood up a new arctic command . And they are all in and the arctic and its not 13 pages of paper. Its concrete its ships its airfields. And we are thinking about removing forces from alaska and we dont even have i think were number five or six in the world in terms of a icebreakers. It seems to me a ludicrous situation that the navy should be concerned about. Well, the purview of the icebreakers is the department of Homeland Security, the coast guard. So if we split that then well be clobbering our strategy. Although it sounds like a petty answer, somebody has to be in charge here. Right now he resides with the department of Homeland Security the department of Homeland Security. And my concerned . Yes, i am concerned because for us to take our combat ships up their we have to work in conjunction with that and make sure that we can get up there as well. So we have to look at hardening of our holes and will look towards that and also its not just surface ships which we tend to focus on. Its a aircraft and the undersea dooming. As i mentioned earlier weve increased i directed the increase in exercise capacity up there and our activity up their, and were spending a little bit more, its modest right now, exercising with the norwegians, with the scandinavian countries and with canada to get used to operating up there. Mr. Secretary, any thoughts . We, as the ice felt in the arctic our responsibility are clearly going up. We just see, we issued a new navy roadmap for the arctic we updated it. I stopped through the university at Fairbanks University of alaska at fairbanks in terms of its not just platforms and its not just capability. Its what we are facing up there. We not only have less ice but its freezing in different ways. And so as we send our submarines up their they dont have a whole lot of clearance, both above or below. And the ice is forming in different ways that are beginning to be a hazard to navigation. But as the cnn center, we are upping our cnl said we are upping our research into the area. We are moving in terms of hardening hulls, in terms of war fighting capabilities. As you know we have a Field Training on kodiak specifically focused on cold weather combat. Every seal goes through it right after the out. We are concerned about it. Were trying to move on it at it again is one of these things that in this budget situation you have to make some very very hard choices. And we dont have the capability that we would like to have in the arctic. Thank you. Thank you mr. Chairman. On behalf of chairman mccain let me thank the witnesses for their excellent testimony and for the service to the nation and the navy and the marine corps. The hearing is adjourned. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] the Senate ForeignRelations Committee examines the president s request for authorization to use force against isis today. Secretary of state john kerry defense secretary Ashton Carter, joint chiefs chair general Martin Dempsey will testify. Live coverage starts 9 30 a. M. Eastern on cspan. Secretary of defense Ashton Carter and the United Kingdom secretary of state for defense Michael Powell and hold a press briefing debate about u. S. Uk relations. You can see it live starting at 2 30 p. M. Eastern on cspan. The Political Landscape has changed with 114th congress. Not only are the fortitude and republicans and 50 new democrats in the house and 12 new republicansrepublicans and one the democrat innocent theres also 108 women in congress including the first africanamerican republican in the house and the first woman veteran for the soon to keep track using congressional chronicle on cspan. Org. The congressional chronicle page has lots of useful information including Voting Results and statistics for each session of congress. New congress, best access on cspan, cspan2, cspan radio and cspan. Org. Monday at the National Press club, vermont senator Bernie Sanders discussed the state of wall street, the middle class, and the possibility of him running for president in 2016. This is one hour. Good afternoon and welcome. My name is john hughes. Im an editor for bloomberg, the breaking news desk here in washington and president of the National Press club. The club is the worlds leading professional organization for journalists. We are committed to our professions future through programs such as this, and we work for a free press worldwide. For more information about the club, visit our website, press. Org. To donate to programs offered through our clubs Journalism Institute visit press. Org press. Org institute. On behalf of our members worldwide i would like to welcome our speaker and those of you attending todays event. Our head table includes guests of the speaker as well as working journalists who were club members. Members of the public attend our lunches, so the applause you hear is not necessarily evidence that journalistic integrity is lacking. I would also like to welcome our cspan and public radio audiences. You control the action on twitter if using the hashtag npc lunch. After our guests speech well have a question and answer period. I will ask as many as time permits. Now its time to introduce our head table guests. I would ask each of our guests to stand briefly as their names are announced. From your right, the director of Public Affairs at the National Conference of state legislatures. John, reporter for american banker, covering the fed and the fsoc. Bryant harris washington correspondent for japans largest newspaper. Had defined, a political consultant and a friend of senator sanders. Christopher, journalist and former politics editor at huffington post. James sanders, the senators wife jane sanders, the senators wife. [applause] donna reporter at usa today, former National PressClub President , and vice chair of the club Speakers Committee. Speaking over our speaker for a moment reporter for Bloomberg News and the Speakers Committee member who organized todays event. Thank you. [applause] senator sanders chief of staff. Derek wall bank, Congress Report for bloomberg first word. Lacey crawford junior, q. Mutation structure for Social Security works. And philip, Vice President and chief analyst at box office. Com. [applause] senator Bernie Sanders is widely known in vermont simply as bernie. He began a life of activism as a student at the university of chicago where he led a sit in to protest discriminatory housing policy. After graduating and living on an israeli kibbutz, sanders moved to vermont and had a series of jobs in areas ranging from filmmaking to carpentry. He ran and lost as a Third Party Candidate for several offices before winning the race for mayor of burlington in 1981. His margin of victory was 10 votes. Sanders gained popularity by promoting burlingtons local businesses fixing potholes and bringing a minorleague Baseball Team to town. Vermonters elected him to the house in 1990, and to the senate in 2007. When sanders arrived on capitol hill, he was the only independent in the house. He has gone on to become the longestserving independent in congressional history. He caucuses with democrats and is become the Ranking Member of the Senate Budget committee. Sanders speaks out frequently on issues he is passionate about, such as cutting military spending taking action to protect the environment, and working to reduce income inequality. In 2010 he conducted a nearly nine our filibuster against tax cuts for wealthy americans. So many people follow this effort online that the senate video server crashed. These days centers is considering a bid in the 2016 president ial election. And what better place whether the to announce says such a big event in National Press club . [applause] not that we are suggesting anything here, senator. Sanders has also been tinkering with his crusty persona. As the boston globe recently wrote, sanders is a. Quote issues oriented class warrior who, quote, has begun to loosen up on the stump, softening his curmudgeonly demeanor with an occasional joke. [laughter] we at the National Press club have also been known to relax our curmudgeonly demeanors from time to time. We want to do that right now by giving it will to vermont senator Bernie Sanders. [applause] thank you very much. John, thank you very much for inviting me, and let me thank all of you who are here this afternoon. Before i begin my remarks let me give you a very short thumbnail sketch of my political life, because my journey here to washington, d. C. Has been a little bit different than many of my senate colleagues. As john mentioned i was born in brooklyn, new york in 1941. My father came to this country from poland at the age of 17 without a pin in his pocket and without much of an education. And i always think back about the extraordinary bravery that was his as well as many other millions of people who came to this country with so little. My mom graduate high school in new york city. My dad worked for almost his entire life as a paint salesman and we were lower middle class. My parents my brother and i lived in a small rent controlled apartment. My mothers dream was to move out of that small apartment and own a home of her own. She died young and she never fulfilled that dream. As a kid in many many ways i learned what lack of money means to a family here and that is a lesson ive never forgotten. My wife, jane, and i have been married for 27 years. We have four great kids and seven beautiful grandchildren. And without trying to be overly dramatic about it what motivates me politically, why i do what i do is to make sure that these kids and all of our children can live in a wonderful country and a wonderful world. Representing the great state of vermont, as john indicated, im the longestserving independent in american congressional history. I served 16 years in the house, and has vermonts lone congressman. In 2006 i was elected to the senate and reelected in 2012. I began my rather unusual political career back in 1971 as a candidate for the u. S. Senate on a small third party called the liberty union. And i received 2 of the vote. Not dissuaded iran a year later for the governor of vermont and received 1 of the vote last night not being the brightest light on the blog of the vote. [laughter] iran again for the senate and received 4 in two years of later ran for governor and received 6 of the vote. I thought that would give the people of vermont a break and i retired from politics in 1976. Remembering one particular guy who said, bernie i will vote for you if you promise me you will never run for office again. [laughter] in 1981 i was persuaded by some friends to run for mayor of burlington, the largest city in our state against a feisty democrat, democratic mayor. Iran as an independent. Nobody, but nobody thought that we had a chance to win. We did. Endeavor remarkable election we put together an extraordinary coalition of workers and trade unionists, environmentalists, of neighborhood activists, of low income organizations, of womens groups, of college students. And that type of Coalition Politics of bringing people together around a Progressive Agenda shapes might be a politics today. In a campaign which cost about 4000, i and the people who supported me knocked on thousands of doors in the city. And let me tell you, it gets cold in vermont in march. On Election Night when the votes were counted, we won the workingclass wards by Something Like two to one, and won the election but all of 14 votes. It was the biggest political upset in modern Vermont History and after the recount the margin of victory was reduced to 10 votes. Without going into any great list here, i took office with 11 out of 13 those of the city council, democrats and republicans, in very strong opposition to my agenda. And trust me if those of you industry think that president obama has gotten a rough time from republicans, that was nothing. That was nothing compared to what i and my supporters experienced during my first year in office. But one year later in strong support of what we were attempting to do and what we wanted to do a slate of candidates working with me defeated a number of the incumbent obstructionists. The year after that in an election in which the voter turnout was almost double from what it was when i was first elected, i easily defeated a democratic and republican candidates, continue to get reelected and to my last election defeated a candidate from both political parties. 1988 iran for the u. S. Congress in a threeway race. I came in second with 38 of the vote. Two years later i won that election by a 16 winning with over 16 more than my opponent. In 2006 with the retirement of senator jim jeffords and with the support of democrats, i won the Vermont Senate seat against the wealthiest person in the state of vermont, a candidate who spent three times more money than anyone had ever spent before in our States History and ran a very, very negative race. I won with 67 of the vote and in 2012 i won reelection with 71 of the vote. As mayor of burlington, my administration took on virtually every special and powerful interest in the city and in the state. Against the wishes of developers and the railroads we created a Beautiful People oriented waterfront at the bike path along lake champlain. We developed the first Municipal Housing interest in the country for affordable housing. We won National Recognition for urban beautification by planting thousands of trees throughout the city and we made major improvements under streets and sidewalks. We come to the largest Environmental Program then in the States History i building a new wastewater facility that kept untreated waste and going into the lake. We start a youth office which created a Day Care Center completely program, Afterschool Program and the teenage center all of which continue to exist today. We were the first city in vermont to break into this on the regressive property tax. We made major changes in Burlington Police department moving in the direction of community policing. We started active and successful arts program and womens council. The results for the last several decades, burlington has been considered to be one of the most beautiful and livable small cities in america, and i invite all of you not only to visit burlington but to visit our beautiful state of vermont. In 1990 a became the First Independent elected to the u. S. House in 40 years, and during my first year is there a long with all ofall of the house members we formed the congressional progressive caucus which stands today as one of the largest and most important caucuses in congress doing the great job representing the working families of our country. One of the first votes in the house that i cast was against the first gulf war. I believe that history will record that that was the right vote, as was [applause] as was the vote i cast years later against the war in iraq a war which i consider to be one of the worst Foreign Policy blunders in the modern history of our country. [applause] that more that war and its because the former chairman of the