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% of cases are decided by a plea bargain between the prosecutor and the defense lawyer. and i said, what kind of a system is that? it is not a perfect system. system. there are problems. the important thing for us, i think, is keep working on them. your job is to go participate and take part. if you do not like it, it convinced the majority to go your way. if you do not like what is going on, there are legal aid societies. go into a courtroom. it is a messy system. it is not terribly efficient. hamilton and the others hoped it would be a kind of guarantee for certain basic liberties. i believe in that or would not spend so much time added. -- or i would not spend so much time at it. yes? >> thank you. i write the mitchell report. as i was listening to the beginning of this conversation, i was reminded of a wonderful conversation that took place probably 30 years ago between bill moyers and a former justice talking about the constitution. this question goes to what is at the heart of constitutionalism and the rule of law. in the course of that conversation, after a long discussion about consti
chairman of the entire committee? >> i would speak directly of my work as chairman of the defense subcommittee that appropriates all the money for the national defence. one of the first things we did was to recognize with the advice and counsel of people within the military that we were on a pathway to build three different lines of tactical aircraft for the future, and a lot of money would be wasted unless you got a handle on it. the company that was involved was talking about the f-22 and procurement for the first aircraft. when they were talking about going forward, they had not tested whether the wings were ready yet. the whole program will have fallen off a cliff if we had not insisted we go back to the drawing board and do more testing and look again. because of that, the congress being directly involved, saying they may not be right on this one, we were able to move ourselves in the direction and make sure it would be the cutting edge for decades in the future in terms of america's air strength. >> we often hear who is right and who is to blame for the wasteful spending. so
a personal touch. he had goals like the strategic defense initiative. i was the first one who defended him against a guy named al gore and tom downey. i went after them for about an hour. reagan wrote me a nice personal letter the next day. he was very committed to what he wanted -- mr. gorbachev, tear down this wall. once he made up his mind he was very strong in his position but he was also very amenable to dealing with people where he could. he was not so hard knows that he was not willing to try to find a way to solve problems. he worked with tip o'neill, a very strong democrat, in order to solve the social security problem and i am not sure any other president would be able to achieve what he did. plus the economic growth with his tax cuts. i think he had that real nice, soft personality, a very warm guy who knew what it was to be poor and to fight your way out of difficult things. but he was also a man who had convictions. he was willing to go to the mat if he had to. a good man. the best i knew. >> does the presidential nominating process bring candidate in to this system with convi
of the defense side. and we have to look at the mandatory program. i think we do have to make some tough choices. bui also believe that getting that done will provide tremendous certainty for businesses in this country, for families so they know what we are expecting. and that that will really give our economy a shot in the arm, and get money off the sidelines and allow business to invest in with that creates jobs. that is what we need to do for the future. the other party that i have been working on and that we have made so progress but we will continue is the country's energy policy. my foc has been on energy efficiency. energy is the first fuel -- every gallon we don't have to spend up oil, not only saves us money, but also on emissions and helps us reduce our dependence on foreign oil and that is good for our national security. i think we need a comprehensive energy policy in this country in order to protect our national security, in order to ensure that we begin to clean up our environment better, and in order to make sure that we're not sending men and women overseas in harm's way for fore