9UNP0203SD_David_Broder_WordPress

- Oh, you are so good, and quiet down without me saying a word. Thank you for coming this evening. I'm Margaret Lewis, the executive director of the Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts and Letters. We are pleased to have such a wonderful turnout for our kickoff of our Fall Series, "Getting to Purple, Beyond the Red and Blue of Partisan Politics." Tonight, David Broder will share the "View From Washington, Best Prospects For Progress in Bridging Political Divides." If you are joining us for the first time, it's an opportunity to learn a little bit about the Wisconsin Academy. We're an independent non-profit organization, operating since 1870, and governed by a statewide council and foundation board. A number of those folks are here today. And I'd like to ask them to stand and have you appreciate them with me. The president, Tom Boldt, the president-elect, Jim Perry, and past-president, Jim Haney. 

And I know there are other council members here that I hope will stand, as well. All of you shouldn't be shy. The Wisconsin Academy's mission is to bring the public together with some of the leading thinkers in our state, and nation, to shed light on important issues on a wide range of issues in the sciences, arts and letters. We try to provide the very best knowledge available in a respectful, civil environment. On the table outside of the theater, you can pick up a season schedule, or take a copy of a recent magazine, to learn more about our programs. But one of the best things is probably just to go to our Web site at WisconsinAcademy.org You can learn more about us, and I hope you will consider becoming a member tonight, or any time soon, so that we can continue to offer these free programs to the public. You can also do that very easily online at our Web site, www.WisconsinAdademy.org Very important is that we want to hear from you. We'd like to hear your thoughts about our programs, and about this "Purple" series. Usually, our series topic for the year comes from you, that come and attend our events. We want to know what topics you would like to see us cover in future mini-series of this kind, and we want you to help evaluate the impact of these programs. 

I think many of you have received a purple sheet on your way in, evaluating the programs. And for those that listen to this program, rebroadcast, we hope you'll come to our Web site and fill out a survey. So please, help us by turning those in on your way out. Your input is very important to us. Just one more thing. I have to thank some very important sponsors. I'd like to thank first, Pleasant Rowland, the Pleasant T. Rowland Foundation, which provided the vision for the Academy Evening program series. And Pleasant, I hope you'll stand and give us a wave, and let us appreciate your vision. 
(applause)

The Rowland Foundation makes it possible for us to hold this series of Academy Evening events throughout the year, in this really marvelous facility. Next, I'd like to add my special thanks to Kathleen White, and the board of the Madison Community Foundation for realizing the potential and timeliness of this topic with their Legacy Grant. Their grant allowed us to bring you someone of David Broder's caliber to launch our series of public conversations this evening. Before I call upon Kathleen to introduce our speaker, and say a few words about the Madison Community Foundation, I'd like to appreciate our other Academy Evening sponsors. The Evjue Foundation, the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation, the UW-Madison Chancellor's Office and Wisconsin Idea Project, the M&I Foundation, the John and Sally Mielke Family Fund, and many individual donors, like you. I also wish to thank in-kind contributors, Jeff Mayers, president of WisPolitics. Jeff, do you want to raise your hand? I know you're out there. And Peter Fox, executive director of the Wisconsin Newspapers Association, for assistance in publicizing this event and our cartoon contest. Other media partners, who help make this program available around the state are Wisconsin Public Television, Wisconsin Eye, Cable Channel 12, and Portal Wisconsin. 

Please note that you can participate in the cartoon caption contest by visiting our Web site until September 19, 2008. And I think you've seen some of the cartoons out in the lobby. But vote on our caption. It'll be a lot of fun. And we need a little more fun in politics. Now, let me thank Laurie Dies, of our staff, for the arrangements for tonight's events. She helps them run so smoothly. And let me invite Kathleen White to join me here, president of the Madison Community Foundation, with community building always on her mind. Kay will tell us a little bit more about the Community Foundation, and introduce our speaker. Thank you, again, everyone for coming. 
(applause)

- Thank you, Margaret. I'm honored to be here, to represent the Madison Community Foundation and our board. As Margaret said, we did give a Legacy gift this evening, because we wanted to build on the vision that Pleasant Rowland had with the board of the Academy. By looking at what we could do to kick-off the series tonight. And from the looks of things, it's going to be very exciting. The grant to support tonight's "Getting to Purple" kick-off was made possible through the Foundation's unrestricted, competitive grant process. Now, on to David Broder. David Broder, as you know, is a national political correspondent with the Washington Post. He writes a twice weekly column, which is carried by more than 300 newspapers across the world. 

He was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1973, for his distinguished commentary. A recent survey done by the Washingtonian Magazine found that David was rated Washington's most highly regarded columnist by both editorial page writers and members of Congress. Pretty good batting average, David. David is known by all of us for his overall integrity, factual accuracy, and very special insight. David has won numerous awards, including the prestigious Fourth Estate Award, from the National Press Foundation in 1990. The same foundation honored him again in 1993, with the Distinguished Contribution to Journalism Award. Before joining the Washington Post in 1966, David covered national politics for the New York Times, the Washington Star, and the Congressional Quarterly. This is an amazing fact, David. You have covered every presidential election, and convention, since 1960. I'm ready to give you a hand for that. 
(applause)

 David is a regular commentator on CNN's Inside Politics, and makes regular appearances on both Meet the Press and PBS' Washington Week. He has authored or co-authored seven books. He's a Midwesterner, just like we are. He was born in Chicago Heights, Illinois, and received a Bachelor's and Masters degree in Political Science from the University of Chicago. He has been a fellow of the Institute of Politics of the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. And a fellow of the Institute of Policy Sciences and Public Affairs at Duke University. Happily, there will be time for questions following David's presentation. It is with great personal admiration and pleasure, I welcome David Broder to Madison this evening. 
(applause)

- Thank you very much for that generous introduction and thank you all for coming this evening. This is my first time in this wonderful new building. And I'm so pleased to be part of what I know is an exciting set of lectures and discussions coming up here in Madison. It's a great treat for me also to be back in Madison. I've been coming here, I think the first time was in the 1960 campaign. And I've been here in practically every election cycle since then, because the politics in Madison and this area is so wonderful that you just want to keep coming back for more and more of it. 
(applause)

 In the 1972 presidential campaign, I brought my oldest son out here to Wisconsin, and we spent several days covering the candidates in that primary. And then I said to him, you ought to swing over to Madison while we're here and check out that university. 

It's a great university, and you might be interested in going there. He learned on that first visit that you could drink beer in the student union. 
(laughter)

 So he promptly enrolled. 
(laughter)

 He graduated from there. And now the most wonderful thing has happened, his daughter is now a sophomore at the University of Wisconsin. 
(applause)

 So I feel we have real ties back here. I also expect to be back in Wisconsin because of this campaign, because from everything I've heard since I got into town this afternoon, Wisconsin is once again going to be a real battle ground in the Obama/McCain race. 

And I'm glad to hear that, because I like coming back out here, I like talking to the voters in this state. I've got a couple of precincts over in La Crosse that I'm especially fond of, that I've gone back to several times. And I look forward to doing that again this year. Both the conventions where I spent the last two weeks, really did their work of unifying their party coalitions, and bringing their nominees out in better shape than they were when they walked into the convention city. And now that the party coalitions have, I think largely coalesced, the fight will turn to the independents. And independents, of course, have been the backbone of politics in this state of Wisconsin for a very long time, so you can expect to see a lot of these four candidates as time goes on this fall. I'm sure that when we get into the questions and answers, we'll talk more about the campaign and the candidates, but I want to follow my directions from your committee and shift the focus slightly to this intriguing question that they have posed about getting to purple. I think we've all become familiar with that red and blue dichotomy over the last 12 or 15 years, since the television networks decided that was the way to draw the country. But getting to purple is a rather new concept, I think, for many of us who kind of think well, what's wrong with red and blue? I think the answer to that question was given to me many, many years ago by a man named Thurston Ballard Morton. 

Senator Morton was a republican senator from the state of Kentucky who, for his sins, did two different stints as chairman of the Republican National Committee. Even while he was serving in the United States Senate. And as a political reporter, I heard him make his basic stump speech many times. And the line that leaps out of that speech for our purposes tonight was when Senator Morton used to say to audiences across the country, "The purpose of politics is the establishment of government." Now that sounds like the dumbest cliche you could ever utter. I mean, what else would you say is the purpose of politics? But in fact, a lot of politicians tend to forget that the purpose of politics is not winning the election, is not putting down the other candidate, but, in fact, is the first stage in what we need to do in any self-governed country, namely establish the government. And that line of Thurston Morton's is, I think, probably the take-off point for our discussion this evening. What do we mean when we talk about establishing a government? A government, as I would understand it, is a collection of people chosen by others with common values, and a set of policies or purposes that they intend to carry out. 

Now that is again, kind of a textbook definition. But often in recent years, that kind of government has barely been able to exist by that definition in the city of Washington, or the District of Columbia. Instead, in Washington, and I suspect increasingly in many of our states including this one, the narrative of governing has become one of mutual frustration. Not carrying out agreed upon policies, but instead denying your political adversaries the possibility of carrying out their policies. Political parties and individual politicians have developed great skill in blocking whatever initiatives come from the other side. And it matters not for this purpose, whether the initiatives are liberal or conservative, all of them in turn are blocked. That applies particularly to those initiatives which are launched by the highest elected official in our government, the president of the United States. Think about the experience of our last two presidents. Bill Clinton as a newly elected president in 1993, offered to a democratic Congress a proposal to expand the healthcare programs in this country to insure all Americans. In a democratic Congress, under a democratic president, that proposal never came to a vote in either the House or the Senate, because the political opposition, the un-numbered republicans, so skillfully used their leverage that they blocked that proposal from ever coming to a floor vote. 

Jump forward now to the reelected George W. Bush. As his first initiative after his reelection, President Bush offered a republican Congress a proposal to reform and expand the coverage of the Social Security system. That proposal in a republican Congress, never came to a vote in either the House or the Senate, because the democratic minority, having observed the tactics used by their opponents, became so skillful in blocking the initiative of that president, that they kept it from ever reaching a floor vote in either the House or the Senate. What we have seen in those two examples has become, sadly, the commonplace of what happens now in Washington. Presidents offer proposals, but they die in Congress. Parties offer proposals, but they die at the hands of the opposition. And as a result, on the large systemic questions that cry out for action and change in our national government, I'm thinking of things like the way in which we acquire and distribute energy in this country, the way in which we operate our immigration laws and system. Our education system. Our healthcare system. 

And even the very basics of governing. Passing the bills that will raise revenues and decide how those revenues will be distributed and used. The budget bills. Those basic elements of government, and those major challenges facing the country are in each of them in turn stymied by the inaction and the inability of legislators and presidents to agree and to act. The public, which watches this spectacle, I think, with increasing impatience is understandably frustrated. They do not send their elected representatives to the seats of government, whether in Washington or the state capital, in order for them simply to fuss and fight with each other. They send them there with the hope and the intention that they will deal with those issues which only the government can deal with. Many things we can do for ourselves, but we cannot protect our borders by ourselves. We cannot organize our legal, or healthcare, or other systems for ourselves. We have to have a government capable of doing that. 

And this government, in its recent manifestations, at state and national levels has increasingly failed to do that basic work. Why has this happened? If we're going to try to change it, we have to have some notion as to what it is that has caused this persistent partisan gridlock in our capitals. I would say that the beginning point probably goes back now three or four decades, maybe even longer. Perhaps even to the period right after World War II, when those young veterans came back from having liberated Europe, defeated Japan, came back to a country that clearly was in need of new leadership, and many of them set out to win public office for themselves for the first time. They did it in a way that was very different from what their fathers and grandfather's generations had done. They did not, for the most part, apply to the local party headquarters and ask the local political boss, "Would you offer me an opportunity to run for office?" They simply set out and ran for the office that they wanted to occupy. That was true of Gerry Ford in Grand Rapids. It was true of Jack Kennedy in Boston and Cambridge. 

It was true of Richard Nixon in southern California. All of those young veterans came back and said, "I'm not going to ask permission from my party to run. I'm simply going to run." And they put together their own campaigns. They raised their own funds. They organized their own volunteers. And time after time, they took the old machines to the cleaners and won those offices by themselves. And for themselves. And that new kind of entrepreneurial politics, a carryover from our great economic system of starting out your own small business and pushing it as far as you can push it. That became the new pattern of political ambition in our country. 

It was wonderful, because it brought in all of these new talents into our system. And goodness knows that they were talented, those young men and few women who actually broke through, even that far back against all of the odds. But entrepreneurial politics has its costs, because unlike the economic sector where individual firms and enterprises can do extraordinarily well in competition with everyone else, in government the competition at some point has to merge into a kind of cooperative venture, or there can be no group decisions that are supported by a wide enough array of people to carry with them the force of public opinion and consensus. The entrepreneurial politics bred very few bonds and few loyalties. And we began to see a pattern of voting, where instead of it being party line votes, we saw in effect 535 separate political parties in the Congress of the United States, 435 representatives and 100 senators, each of whom had a platform, a program and an agenda of his or her own, and was pursuing that almost to the exclusion of anything else. I have to say that as this new style of politics developed, the media world of which I am a part was also changing radically. Instead of the media being dominated by two or three major voices, the three networks, the two major national newspapers, and within them the anchors who were kind of overall the spokesmen for the whole country in a real respect. Instead of that kind of concentrated media organization, we developed at the same time, thanks in part to changing technology, the thousand voices, or the million voices that make up today's media. And again, as with the politicians, every single voice in that media saw its own role as being unique to it, in competition with every other voice. So the country instead of hearing a few common themes in its mass media, now was hearing a million different voices, each singing its own tune, its own lyrics, and adding, I suspect, to the confusion and the sense of disorganization that the public had when they look at the public sector. 

There's one other element that I think has contributed to the impasse that we now have widespread in our government. And it is, if you will permit a kind of generational problem that has emerged among the baby boomers, who for the last decade or more have been occupying the principle positions of power in our national government, and also in many of the state and local governments as well. I'm thinking of the generation that includes Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Newt Gingrich, Al Gore, all of them in both parties who came to power in the '90s and the '00s have one thing in common. They came of age politically in the 1960s, at a different kind of decade from that which had preceded it. Their predecessors in government, the so-called greatest generation, and the World War II vets, who occupied the White House from Dwight Eisenhower right through Gerry Ford, and on down to more recent presidents than that. All of them had grown up in an America marked by two great enterprises, the Great Depression, which we survived, because Americans pulled together to help each other survive, and World War II, which we won, because that generation sacrificed and pulled together, as no other generation before it. Those experiences, the Depression, World War II, pulled America together, because without being pulled together we would not have survived as a nation. The experiences that shaped those who came of age in the 1960s were very different. It was an exciting and turbulent time in this country. 

It was the time of the civil rights revolution, of the women's rights revolution. It was the time when the abortion issue came front and center in our politics. And most of all it was the decade that was marked by Vietnam. A struggle which divided families, and which divided that generation in ways that I think it's fair to say now looking back, they probably never recovered from. That generation has had a terrible struggle coming to terms with itself. Those who were on one side particularly in Vietnam, those who fought that war, and those who protested that war, have really had a struggle finding agreement on anything afterwards. And that division, along with the other factors that I mentioned, I think has been, at bottom, what has been plaguing our government in recent generations. Now those are big forces not easily overcome. The changes in the media, not going to be changed by some political decision. The changes in the way in which people run for office, that kind of entrepreneurial style of candidacy, which we've seen again this year at the highest level. 

Nobody in the Illinois democratic organization said to Barack Obama, "It's your turn." Barack Obama decided it was his turn. And certainly nobody in the republican party establishment said to John McCain, "John, we want you." John wanted it. And that's how people win even the highest offices today. So those forces are not likely to be overcome very easily. But there are changes. And this is what I want to conclude with, because I believe, with fingers crossed, that I see the beginning of changes that perhaps, perhaps will give us a better, a more productive, and a more purple, if you will, kind of political future. Let me start with those two presidential candidates. Obviously, they are self-motivated. 

They wouldn't be where they are today if they weren't powerfully ambitious, highly motivated individuals. But their life histories is quite different from that of the typical boomer politician. John McCain, 72, is almost, almost but not quite, a throwback to the greatest generation that Tom Brokaw wrote about. Particularly with the added culture of that military family, of which he is now the third generation to reach high office in this country. The other two, admirals, now presidential candidate. With that factor, and with the searing experience, that we all know about, that he had as a prisoner of war in north Vietnam. John McCain has a concept of national interest and national purpose that is very similar to that which motivated the greatest generation, the generation in which outstanding republicans like Frank Knox and Henry Stimson served willingly and admirably in the administration of a democratic president Franklin D. Roosevelt, and thought nothing about it, because the national need, the national purpose was what was motivating them. Barack Obama, now 47, is almost old enough to be a boomer. But because of where he grew up, in Hawaii and Indonesia, and because his life experiences were really separate from the mainland institutional experiences of those his age, or a few years older, not part of the civil rights revolution, not really part of any of the other great debates that mark the 1960s. 

Barack Obama has fewer scars on him from the 1960s, even though he was born in that generation, than any politician we have seen up to this point. And the result of that is that when he talks about how we need to be reach beyond the borders of one party to find solutions to our problems, when he reaches out, as he has done in the Illinois legislature, and now in the United States Senate to partner with prominent republicans, it is not a strain on his psyche or system. It feels perfectly natural to him. As for a different reason, it feels natural to John McCain to reach out to democrats, whether it's Ted Kennedy or Joe Lieberman, as he has done for years in his work in the Senate. So we have different kinds of people now, one of whom is going to move into the White House and begin to set a different kind of pattern. And I think there is a chance that the pattern of bipartisanship or nonpartisanship may become a prevailing pattern even in Washington, in the next cycle. I say that because what has become increasingly clear to those of us who report there is that the frustration that the public feels about the non-performance of Washington, its inability to come to grips with any of the major challenges facing the country, that frustration has now found a strong echo inside the government itself. I'm not speaking so much now about the permanent government, the bureaucrats. I think their frustration has been there for a long time. But within the ranks of elected officials, and particularly the younger elected officials, in the last two to four years, I have begun to see a real change. 

It's most visible at this point in the United States Senate. You remember when the Senate, two years ago, was facing what was for the Senate a real institutional crisis. There was so much anger and frustration over filibusters of judicial nominees, that the Senate was seriously contemplating, the republican majority in the Senate was seriously contemplating shutting off the filibuster, which had been historically the great tool for protecting minority rights and minority viewpoints in the United States Senate. And what happened was, John McCain and several others put together the group for the Gang of 14. Republicans and democrats, seven of each, who began meeting privately and negotiated among themselves, not with the Senate leadership of either party, but just 14 back bench rank and file republicans and democrats, put together a compromise which they then took to the floor, which averted the crisis, and which allowed the Senate to preserve what historically has been one of its great unique features, the right of an individual to filibuster, to slow down the process and force more consideration of an issue. That was done then. Now we have another group. This time, ten senators equally divided between the two parties who have put together an energy package, which they will try to take to the floor either later this week or next week. Several of the instigators of these movements, these informal movements in the Senate, happen not by coincidence, to be former governors of their states. And that is significant, because what they have brought to the Senate is the kind of consciousness which I see twice a year, and only twice a year when I go to the annual and semiannual meetings of the National Governors Association. 

There, state officials of both parties sit together, not identified by party, and talking about their common concerns which are, of course, the public's common concerns. How are we going to improve our education system for all of our children? How are we going to help those who were on welfare find a way into productive jobs in this economy? That's the kind of thing that makes governors' jobs serious these days. And the governors talk about these issues together, not as partisans, but as fellow executives wrestling with a common agenda. And when governors move then from that environment to the United States Senate, and found, as they did when they first came, that the party's caucus separately and democrats and republicans never sit together to talk about a common agenda. What that group of governors did was to say let's begin to have some cross party conferences. Let's begin to talk with each other, and see where the common ground may lie. It's beginning to change the Senate. I have to tell you candidly, I don't see that kind of change taking root as yet in the House of Representatives, but it may take longer there because party structure has become so powerful in the House now, under first Newt Gingrich and now Nancy Pelosi, and response to that kind of disciplined republican operation, that it may take much longer to break down the party lines in the House. 

But the other significance about the role of governors is that in state after state, you are beginning to see this change, not just from the top, from the governor's office, but in some cases even among the legislatures. I think, for example, of what has happened in California, our largest state, since Arnold Schwarzenegger became the governor. His first effort, after the recall got rid of Gray Davis and installed him in office, his first effort was totally partisan and top down. He wanted to change the Constitution of the state of California to increase the power and leverage of the governor's office so that he could govern on his agenda, even if republicans were only a minority in the legislature, which they had been for many years out there. He was rebuffed by the voters. He put four propositions on the ballot which would have made him, perhaps, the strongest governor constitutionally in the country. The voters said, we wanted you in as governor, but we didn't want you as dictator. And we're not going to pass those constitutional changes. Rebuffed in that effort, he turned 180-degrees and began reaching out in a cooperative way to the democratic leadership and membership of the legislature. And while they're hung up at the moment in a bitter battle over the state budget, because they can't find any republicans who will vote for any new taxes of any kind in the state, by and large it has been a much more productive relationship. 

I would also call to your mind the example of New York City where Mayor Mike Bloomberg, who was elected as a republican, though he had been a life-long democrat, he chose to run as a republican, because the democratic party would not give him its nomination. Mike Bloomberg, now an independent, has run what is in effect a completely independent, nonpartisan administration that I think at this point probably most New Yorkers would say we like it well enough that we might even consider ending the term limits that we've imposed on the mayor of New York, and keep this fellow around a little longer. All of this suggests to me that without being Pollyanna-ish about it, I do think I see signs of a change, both internally in the political system and personalities, and externally in the pressure that the public is putting on politicians that may, may over the next decade, give us something that you could once again call a government: a set of people with enough willingness to listen to each other and enough common values and common agendas to be able to advance on our problems. Thank you, very much. 
(applause)

- Okay, thank you, David. Thank you very much. We'll let you catch your breath. We invite the audience to come forward and ask questions. I have a microphone right down here, so feel free to line up. 

And there is a microphone. I can see it up there. So feel free to line up and ask questions. And we'll take as many questions as we have time for.

- Yes, please, go ahead. Oh, good. Warming up the microphone is very good activity.

- How about if I start up here?

- Okay, I can't see you...

- Yeah, I'm up here.

- But I can hear you.

- I'm just wondering your views on how do we get our politicians to move away from these tactics of degrading each other? You know, it really became obvious to me that the tactics that were used in the last election really created an environment that almost made it impossible to coalesce around a president. And I'm not trying to be partisan, but there were tactics that were used. I think we have a history of coalescing around an elected leader. I think we've gotten away from that, because of personal attacks. How does this play into your sense that things are changing? How do we move beyond that, because it's kind of human natured things that are also are part of the ingredients that will move us in the right direction.

- Good question. The question is how do we coalesce, if the campaign itself is so nasty and negative, as many campaigns have been. 

I throw up my hands in despair when it comes to how we change the behavior of politicians when they are candidates. One of the changes, another change that's taken place in our politics is the increasing role of political consultants. These are skilled professionals who make the ads, and in many ways run the campaigns now. They make their living by winning the election. And they have no responsibility, most of them, for what happens in governing the day after the election. So in their world, anything goes. And anything that works is worth trying. I don't know how we do that, unless and until you find somebody who's going to negotiate a real agreement among the candidates themselves about the tactics that will and will not be acceptable. I don't think that happens in the real world. And so I personally give up on the notion of how are we going to improve our campaigns. 

I think we missed a great opportunity this year. I say this not as a partisan, but because I thought there was a chance for something of great significance to happen. When John McCain offered Barack Obama the option of joining with him for ten consecutive Thursdays during this past summer in town meetings, which would be populated by uncommitted voters, and the questions would come strictly from those voters, I thought this was a historic opportunity to change the character of the campaign. I think when people are standing next to each other in a town meeting, they are less likely to tell lies about each other, and to talk about all kinds of impossible charges. I think that would have been a wonderful way to launch this campaign. It would have set a precedent for future campaigns that might have, in fact, become institutionalized. But it was turned down. So what we're going to have now is, I'm afraid, the same kind of nasty campaign and negative campaign that we've all seen much too much of.

- You mentioned the Senate as a place where things seem to be getting a little bit better. You mentioned the Senate as one of the main places where you thought reform was getting, or was coming, or you thought things were getting better in terms of bipartisanship.

- Yes.

- But I was thinking about the Illegal Immigration Bill of 2007. I think it was June that it completely fell apart. And I was wondering if-- That's kind of a more big thing. I'm asking if this bipartisanship can extend towards things like that, because we still haven't seen it extend there to beyond filibusters, you know, judicial employments. Can it get to the really big issues, because that would be really fantastic, if we could get to the point where they would be dealing with energy and illegal immigration.

- Well, you're quite-- I'm sorry, the comment was that we may have seen bipartisanship on things like the filibuster rule, but not on the big issues that people really care about. You're absolutely right. I mean, there are very few examples to date of real bipartisanship producing significant action on the issues that the people really care about. We certainly didn't get it on healthcare. 

We certainly didn't get it on immigration. And the list goes on to almost all the major institutional needs that this country faces. We didn't get it when it came to the war in Iraq at all. So you're absolutely right. It's a hope that I have that we will begin to see change. It's partly based on my understanding of the character, and personality of the presidential candidates that we were lucky enough to end up with, and partly based on what I think is a more substantial bottom-up kind of a push from the voters themselves, and from governors, local officials, and increasing small cadres of people in the Congress, to really begin to talk to each other. That's the key thing. Will they actually talk to each other? The Congress today is so isolated by political party that you cannot imagine the price that people pay when they simply walk across the aisle to have a conversation with a member of the other party. They are likely to be challenged, particularly in the House of Representatives, by a fellow partisan who will say to them, "What the hell are you doing talking to those people?" 

It's that kind of atmosphere today. And when you don't talk to people, obviously, you don't hear anything from their point of view, and you operate totally blindly in terms of your own preconceptions and biases.

- I have a question up here.

- Yes.

- Two things that you didn't mention that it seems to me keep us from getting to purple. One of those is corporate globalization. And you have the people who want to privatize, deregulate and cut government spending, and use their money instead to pay for campaigns, and for issue ads, and for an army of lobbyists. And the other thing is the right wing religious fundamentalists, who are quite sure God has told them what is right, and therefore they don't have to compromise with anyone. I'd be interested in your comments on both of those things.

- Well, I think the phenomenon that you've described. 

Did you all hear the comment? 
(applause)

 Good. The phenomenon you describe have been two of the forces that really have been driving our politics in the direction that I gather most of the people in this audience lament, namely toward a kind of a hyper-partisanship that frustrates any ability to deal with the nation's problems. I think those are real, you're not imagining those problems. I don't know whether we can address complex economic questions, like regulation and deregulation in a serious way in this environment. That's why I focused first, on how do we change the environment. And I would say the same thing is true about your second issue. It is a tough issue to deal with substantively. And an almost impossible issue to deal with if people are not listening to each other and talking to each other. 

Yes?

- You suggest that the two presidential candidates are of almost a special quality relative to this time and this place. And then you also suggest that you see a hope for the coming together. And it seems to me, that one of the big issues in this election is the third branch of government, the Judiciary, and the almost certain expectation that the next president will appoint at least two new justices to the Supreme Court. I'm wondering if what you see in Washington, and what you see in these candidates is that they will move away, or will they move away from the kind of partisan litmus tests that have been applied to judicial candidates, and will they look to, what you suggest is their high quality, and in the appointees that they make to that very important branch of government, the Judiciary.

- Thank you for that question. Did everybody hear that? Good. I'm optimistic up to a point. But I'm not so optimistic as to believe that we have seen our last fierce battle over Supreme Court appointments. 

The chances are that the democrats will come out of this election as the majority party in the United States Senate. Which means that if Senator Obama is the next president, he will be dealing with fellow partisans on any judicial appointments that he makes. It is possible but not certain that he would find somebody who could be confirmed relatively easily by a democratic Senate. I think it is unlikely that Senator McCain would find somebody who would be easily confirmed by a democratic Senate. It's possible that there are lawyers who could, by their own eminence and reputation, bridge that gap. But that's more optimistic than I can honestly be with you tonight. 

An example of this is the abortion debate, which we've abandoned to the extremes. We have people on one side questioning even the right to birth control, or the right to a medical abortion to save a mother's life. And on the other end, you have people demanding a right to abortion up to a due date. I have gotten a lot of joy in hearing Obama say that he wants compromise, and that there are lots of areas we don't agree on, but we can find the ones that we do agree on. I don't expect this from Governor Palin, given her stand on abortion. But what about McCain? Is there any hope there? And do you think Obama is sincere? 

- The abortion issue is obviously one of the most difficult facing our country. And I will mention that it was one of the polarizing experiences of the 1960s, that has made it very difficult for that generation to agree with, among themselves, as to what should be done. 

There appears to be a slow change taking place, on generational lines, on abortion and some of the other social issues, like gay marriage and so on. Young people have, if you will, a more tolerant attitude toward those who disagree with them on those issues, or practices different from their own than people of my generation do. It is possible, possible, that over time, the generations may solve at least some, and take some of the rancor out of that debate for us. But I think, unless and until, science comes along to find some more broadly acceptable standard and solution, that issue will continue to roil our politics. 

- You've been observing and writing about government for several years, and politics you mentioned tonight, before you went into journalism as a profession. I wonder if you can give us any instruction about how we might think about the parties in the Congress, as they dialogue with each other, because from my vantage point, in the Congress, there's quite a lot of division within each party. There are several subgroups within each party who disagree with other subgroups within the same party. And here, I'm talking about issues that they feel very passionately about. Funding for the war in Iraq, as well as social issues. And there are at least two members I know of, one in the House and one in the Senate, who caucus with one of the two parties, but they are officially listed, I believe, as independents. 

And then finally, I would mention that the data suggests that an increasing number of Americans identify themselves, in polls of prospective voters, as independents. So could you help us think about, over your professional life span of a few decades, what do you see in the role of the two parties in our Congress and Senate? Is it fraying? Is it getting more disciplined or less disciplined, or does it come and go? I just find that quite confusing. 

- Well, I thank you for the question. And I should warn you that you may now get an answer that's as long as what you've already endured. 
(laughter)

 This is one of my favorite topics, as well. Here's what I've seen. 

When I came to Washington a hundred years ago, the democrats normally controlled both houses of Congress. And the margin of their control was provided by the solid south, which sent solidly democratic delegations to the House and Senate. Now, that did not mean that the democrats had a working majority in those years. In fact, they rarely did. The problem was that southern democrats, who caucused with the democrats, but voted with the republicans on many of the fiscal issues and some of the social issues, as well. At the same time that the democrats had that kind of internal division. The republicans had a division of their own, made up of representatives and senators, elected as republicans, from the states that bordered on or were close to Canada, all the way from New England out to Washington, Oregon and including this state of Wisconsin. Those republicans called themselves moderate republicans, progressive republicans, liberal republicans in some cases. And they were quite comfortable voting with the democrats, particularly on issues like civil rights. In fact, that's how we got the great civil rights bills of the 1950s. 

Northern republicans voting with northern democrats, against the southern democratic opposition. Now, jump forward to today. Most of the seats that once were held by conservative, southern democrats are now held by republicans. Most of the seats that were once held by moderate or progressive, northern republicans are now held by democrats. There is only one republican House member left in New England. All the others are democrats. There are very few white democrats in left in the south. What you had, over time, is a polarization of the parties, where the republican party has become internally much more consistently conservative. The democratic party has become internally much more consistently liberal. And the space between the parties has become much, much wider. 

That's what makes it very difficult, particularly in the House of Representatives, with those gerrymandered districts, to put together a bipartisan coalition of any kind. That's why the House will be the last, toughest point of resistance to any change toward a more purple kind of government in Washington. McCain or Obama will have allies in the Senate, if they try to govern on a bipartisan basis. They will have opposition in the House of Representatives, and they'll have to figure out how to either beat that opposition, or finesse it over time. I don't know that they'll be able to do that. That's what's going to make it very difficult in the short-term, to really have purple government in Washington. 

- David, I'd like to thank you for such a non-partisan presentation. My question is that it appeared your thrust was that being a governor influences your ability to compromise. 
(laughter)

Do you feel that it is the experience of being a governor, and the responsibilities therein, or will the type of individual who's elected governor that makes this possible? 

- I have to think it's their experience. I mean, politicians are politicians. They adapt to the environment in which they're working. Governors tend, when they're dealing with each other, to be very non-partisan. And at their state level, some of them at least have figured out that it behooves them to work across party lines with their own legislature. It's not universally the rule, by any means. But you find more of that among the governors, certainly, than you do among the federal legislators. 

- I was wondering, you know, here in Wisconsin, we've been treated to a variety of political advertisements on both sides of the presidential race. And in these advertisements, they make lots of claims. And many of them are half-truths or partial-truths. 

My question is, what role does the media play in bringing us to purple, if that's the way of saying that, when they just report what the candidates are saying without fact checking what the truth is? 
(applause)

- Our challenge is not simply to report what the candidates are saying. When Richard Nixon of blessed memory was running for governor of California, in his famous "last" press conference, he asked the Los Angeles Times to put one reporter out there who will just report what I say. And that's, of course, every politician's dream. They all would like you just to write down what they say. But that's the beginning of our job, not the end of it. Our job is to report what they say, because people have a right to know what the candidates are saying. But it's also our job to try to give people the perspective that puts today's statement in the context of yesterday's statement, and both statements in the context of whatever the record has been of the candidate who is making that declaration. 

So we don't discharge our responsibility when we simply report what the candidates say. The media, I think, as I tried to indicate earlier, have been a significant part of the problem of the breakdown of our efforts at governing this country. 
(applause)

 Now you don't have to be that enthusiastic! 
(laughter)

 I will beat up on us, but you don't have to! 
(laughter)

 No, we have been part of the problem, because particularly in the so-called new media, the non-traditional media, there is a clear tendency to do two things. One, to pick as the political spokesman those who are the most flamboyant and often at the most extreme edge of the debate. And to let them frame the alternatives in their incendiary language. 

The second thing that the new media has done is to try to turn journalists into political players, by creating forums where journalists argue with each other, as if they were politicians arguing with each other. That's not helpful to either advancing public understanding, and certainly not to the cause of the purple government. 

- So what do you think is the place of political parties these days? Does each candidate, for any office, have a platform of its own? How do you know when you vote for a democrat what that means? And have we produced a political class that makes the decisions, leaving the people out? 

- That's another wonderful question. The honest answer, I think, is we don't know in advance what these candidates are going to do. I mean, as often as I have packed a bag and trekked around the country following presidential candidates, I have still been surprised, sometimes astonished at what those candidates have done once they were behind the fence at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Often, I think the truthful answer is they don't know themselves what they are going to do until they get into that situation that a president faces, when suddenly there is a decision that is forced on him to make that nobody else can make on his behalf. 

And we are surprised. I am constantly surprised. Where do you go to get clues? I think the best clues come from studying what they did in their earlier responsibilities. Most candidates have had histories, some more than others, obviously, in the case of Governor Palin. But we know there is a record there in her home city, in her home state, that we can examine. And a lot of reporters are in fact in Alaska doing that right now. With the other three candidates, we have longer records. And a good deal has been written already that helps give voters clues about what makes John McCain tick, what makes Barack Obama tick, what makes Joe Biden tick. And where have they been on the issues. 

That's certainly something that we can deliver to people. Now, I don't want to pretend to you that all voters sit there with a checklist of 100 issues that they are comparing the candidates on. That is not how normal people work. They try to form a picture in their mind of what this person is likely to do if they're entrusted with this kind of leadership responsibility. They base that in part on their judgment about character, veracity, friends, allies, enemies, and issues. All of that enters in to the voter's judgment. And I will say to you, without I hope being totally Pollyanna-ish, I don't think the voters make very many big mistakes when they've had a chance, really, to examine these candidates. In the next two months, people will be paying attention, will be paying close attention. And I'm perfectly comfortable, myself, with whatever judgment the American people come to. I think people have pretty damn good sense about what they're looking for, what they think the country needs at any given moment. 

- Mr. Broder, I just want to first of all say thank you. I've admired your work for many years because you're able to write about serious issues without becoming very emotionally partisan. And there are very few of you left. As you described how the two parties have moved further and further apart, I think that's also mirrored in the media. And it's becoming harder to find people who write about politics without becoming partisan. And I'm curious as to what you would recommend that we could do that would help encourage more journalists to behave and to report as you do. 
(applause)

- That's flattering, but it's also impossible. 

Look, I have been very lucky to work for a long time at a newspaper which has a real commitment from the top down, from the publisher down, to try and deal with politics seriously, substantively, and as fairly as we possibly can do. God does not grant us such publishers everywhere. And I don't know of any one place where publishers get trained in that kind of tradition. I think where you find it, grab onto it. That's all I can tell you. Where you find it, encourage it. Tell people that you appreciate their efforts to play it straight, and to give you the information that you're entitled to. Be aggressive in going after that information, but not imagine that they have the responsibility to tell you what to think. When you find that kind of journalism being practiced, cherish it, support it. That's all I can tell you. 
(applause)

- I have a question. I'm a peer, and it's a privilege to be able to speak to you face-to-face. I watch you on television. My question is about the health of the fourth arm of government, the media. Truthfully, how healthy is investigative journalism in the face of media consolidation and the threat of more media consolidation, and the importance of money interest in swaying the public opinion through the media? Is the media really informing the public, and shining the light of scrutiny on the truth and on the politicians in government? And why, I mean, over the last few years, I learned the truth from small publications. And two years later, or three years later, it came out in the major media. 

And it's very frustrating. And even the run up to the war, it was sadly, I felt hard questions weren't asked. And they definitely weren't answered. There's just, I mean, a whole list of subjects that I could add. I'm asking this question because I think it is, the media is so important. And I'm afraid of the money influence. That's why I'm asking. 
(applause)

- Thank you for that question. 

The big challenge that we are facing now as you know, is an economic challenge. The whole model of journalism has shifted with the Internet. And we are trying to find out how we can finance the kind of news gathering operation that most of us have been working in for recent years. The Internet is a wonderful tool. It brings you so much information. It is so much more accessible. It's made it possible for people who were frustrated because they couldn't get their letters to the editor into the Washington Post. They don't have to send letters to the editor now, they simply start their own blog. And they express themselves to a much larger audience than ever before. That's a wonderful tool for a society like ours. 

But it's had real consequences for those of us in the media. Because our audience has migrated, for the most part now, from the old print version of the newspaper to the new Web version of the newspaper. And we are not reaping anything like the revenues from the Web, since we're giving it away for free, that we once got from advertisers and circulation of the old newspaper. Good journalism, particularly investigative journalism which you asked about, is very expensive, because it is very labor intensive. Two women reporters at the Washington Post spent four months reporting the story about what was happening to veterans at Walter Reed Hospital. Once that story was in print, all kinds of consequences. People were fired from major jobs. The place was cleaned up finally, and so on. But that was four months of work for two highly paid professional journalists. That's what investigative journalism is about. 

And it takes a certain model of journalism to be able to afford it. You have to have a publisher with goals of the publisher of the Washington Post. And you have to have advertisers and readers who are prepared to pay something for that kind of journalism. If we don't have that, then the future is very bleak. But I am contentedly, I guess, optimistic. I don't believe that this country wants to sacrifice the access to that kind of journalism. So I'm operating on the assumption that one way or another, we're going to continue to have that kind of serious investigative journalism. 
(applause)

- We have time for one more question. 

- Thank you, Mr. Broder. I'm old enough to remember the good old days, whatever they were. But we seem to be at a crossroads in this country where things seem to be breaking down and facing some real challenges. We're at a point in this country where we have to make some very critical decisions about what's going to happen in the future with this country. Do we have time for the electoral process, for the political process to reinvent itself, to come together? Aren't we facing a clock, and that clock is the world? And we're facing world market and world competition. And looking through the world through a political prism. 

- We are certainly facing the world and challenges in the world, and challenges here at home. 

But I don't know any alternative to the electoral process that I would want to see us try. I go back to something that I said a moment ago. The founders of this country were right in putting their trust in the people. They knew better than they possibly could have known. The American electorate has the gift of figuring out what their country needs. I believe the people will use that gift to make the selection of the next president, and the others who will serve with that president. I am not pessimistic about the outcome of this election. I don't believe it's going to get us all the way to purple, or all the way to Nirvana. But I do think there is a decent chance that it will be seen, historically, as a step forward. Not a guarantee, but I do think we may be at a turning point that we can look back on with some pride and pleasure, as being a good election for the country. 

I certainly hope so. Thank you very much. 
(applause)

- Thank you, David. Thank you very much. And thank you all for joining us at our "Getting to Purple" series. I hope you will join us next Wednesday, September 17, when we have George Mason University Professor Dr. James Conant speaking about "Wisconsin as America's Laboratory of Democracy. Please check out our Web site: WisconsinAcademy.org for future events. 

And please share with us your survey, and the door prize card on your way out. We want to hear from you. Thank you and have a good evening.