What's going on everyone? Got a brand new movie review for you guys today and today we're discussing Boy Erased Erased is about the son of a Baptist preacher who is forced to participate in a church supported gay conversion program after being forcefully outed to his parents now This is a biography. This is based on a true story It's very much a drama and it's directed by Joe Egerton the man who did the gift Which I'm a big fan of Joe Egerton I think he's one of the most underrated actors in Hollywood today and he did such a phenomenal job with the gift I was looking forward to whatever the guy was gonna direct and write next This is obviously a sophomore outing and man, it's brilliant I I fell in this film to capture so many different lights and levels and what I think this film did so well is that it is Very much based on this true story. It's telling this story. It's very much this drama But the film is also an informative piece about this issue That's going on that the fact that this gay conversion centers are real and there's still a thing of today And that they're still legal and I think 23 or even more than that state That is ludicrous to me. I'm pretty maybe it's even 32. I'm not a hundred percent sure But it makes you want to dive in after watching some and look into more of the subject matter And what's going on after seeing what this character and what this person dealt with Lucas Hedges does play the main kid in here and he is so good I mean Lucas Hedges when he showed up back in Manchester by the sea that film blew me away And he was the big standout for me personally in that film and again I think Lucas Hedges adds another film to his resume of being a fantastic actor He's a young up-and-comer, but he has so much emotion to show There's a scene in here where he is being outed to his parents We he has to tell his parents his parents who are big Christian parents He's to tell him that he's gay and it is one of the most emotional scenes in the whole entire film And one of the biggest reasons that it's so emotional is just how all the actor and actresses play it off You look at Lucas Hedges how he plays it off But might I say Russell Crowe who plays the Baptist preacher who plays his father in this film? I gotta say I think this is Russell Crowe's best performance of his career And I've seen a lot of crow performances don't get me wrong I know he's one of the best actors working today, but my god He is so phenomenal in this movie it blew me out of the water How damn good Russell Crowe was in this movie and how he just emphasized I always say this is that actors can speak they can do monologues They can do all that stuff they can lose weight they can do this But a lot of emotion can come from their eyes and I do say that Russell Crowe a lot of his emotions are within his eyes Not just within the monologues in the way that he speaks, but he became this Baptist preacher I never saw Russell Crowe in this role. I saw the man who he was portraying Cole Kidman is a knockout star in this film She is always so good in the last few years She's been finding her niche in the supporting roles and she is so damn transformative also in here I think her and Crowe really steal the whole show and overall all the performances are great Eggerton also stars in the film as one of the conversion center therapists And he has a very interesting past and the thing that I loved about boy races that tackles everyone's point of views on this thing It tackles everyone's central morals and that not everyone's perfect Everyone has issues that's going on within their own lives the parents do Lucas Hedges's characters Doesn't even therapist that Joe Eggerton plays has his own issues too And it's just cool to see all the different Elements of each character where in a sense this film could have came off really one noted for a lot of the characters It doesn't it's little manners or even looks and you get these from the other kids that are in the conversion center One of the most brilliant parts about boy erase though is the way that Joe Eggerton directed this film He obviously we saw a style of directing in the gift and it was very Tension-filled it was thriller ask it had a horror tone to it But it really much was a thriller at the heart of it the thing about boy erase those yeah You expect the true story. Yeah, you expect the drama and you expect that yeah It's gonna have some informative pieces in there, but Eggerton directs this film with so much tension-filled in it. There's so many thrilling moments in here There's a couple moments where Hedges's character is at a college campus and getting to know some of the kids there And there's one moment in particular that I don't want to spoil but I Was gripping my knuckles just going I know what this is gonna go and man Eggerton knows how to linger on that camera and how to linger on a shot so well where it doesn't feel like it's overly Drafted and overly too long but just perfectly subtle to where it fits and it's getting what is going right And it makes you feel cringy and makes you feel uneasy, but that's what the gift did And I think boy erase does the same thing it does that with a lot of the parents It does that with the therapist it does that with the conversion center and one thing I'm so appreciative that when he was writing this film he didn't make the parents be out to be a villain They are having their own moral issues. They don't understand this And seeing their character arc as the story progresses is so wonderful and going from Hedges's character to you understand his moral Stuggers and even with the therapist who at times. Yes is one note He pretty much is that in stuff the whole entire film you get to know him a little bit Especially some of the montagey things that towards the end you get to know a little bit even more of him And that's where I like this film. I think boy erased is a brilliant Informative true story drama that is such a needed film that needs to be seen The fact that these conversion centers aren't more on the news is utterly insane to me But this is a film that needs to be watched it needs to be seen It carries some of the best forms of the year and I wholeheartedly hope this film does not get trampled under All the other oscar films coming out. It needs to be pushed For cons though. I will say this um some of the song choices were a little bit Too cheesy a little bit too cheesy, but I thought the score was billion in a lot of parts And the film does drag in some moments But I thought the dragging needed to be there to get you invested and it got me invested in the story A little bit one too many flashback moments, but those are really just nitpicks. I I wholeheartedly recommend boy erased It's easily one of us films of this year. So with all that said, I'm gonna get boy erased an a minus Guys, what are your thoughts on boy erase? Have you heard of this true story? Have you read the book? Have you seen this movie? Let's talk about it down below in the comments because that's what we're here for We're here to talk movies We're here to interact and have just a lively discussion down below in the comments Tell me what your guys thoughts are and of course guys If you guys are new here consider hitting that like button and even consider subscribing So you guys never miss out on a movie review Plus if you guys want to check out some movies early hit up sandwich on films also because right down there Again, you guys can go see movies early and check out some movie news and even some movie reviews But guys of course until next time Stay classy


What are some of your thoughts on the league?   We have to come back and prepare better. We have to play better. We have to communicate better. I guess they, you know, props to them. They came to play at quarterback. He had two good runs, I guess. We have to do a better job of containing the quarterback. When we know we're playing against the Scramming quarterback, we knew that Tyrone Taylor is a hell of a player coming to the game. We knew that he could win games. Like I said, he got outside of the pocket twice. He scored it twice. So we have to just be better. So I mean, I guess that's the message coming in Tuesday. Get the correction and move on. They got rid of it very quickly, obviously. Can you see opportunities there where you guys might have influenced the game more, or did they kind of take it out of the quarantine?  They got the ball all quick. We just got to run it to the ball. We got a bit of great turnover about running to the ball and trying to punch the ball out, whatever it may be. You know, when we do get opportunity, when the quarterback holding the ball, we got to win. So I think you said it. They got the ball out quick a lot. Just on those two sprangles with Tyrone, right? It wasn't nothing more than to it. The first one, for one, we got to communicate. I think it was me and Nico to that side. And I'm a three. He on the edge. If we, you know, if he thinking about doing something, if I'm thinking about doing something before the snap, we just have to communicate. So once we see film, we'll make the correction. Like I said, but we just got to be better off front. Because like I said, when the quarterback scramble, the rush lanes is on us. So, you know, if the edge guy, the inside guy, we all got to be on the same page. The type of team, Jeffery, that you guys needed to jump on early to kind of make them less interested in being here, and how much you think you're failing to do that? Our message was, you know, to make them not interested in to playing this game. And I said, I came to play. We didn't execute our keys. And that was, you know, create the urgency, create the juice, and we have to walk into this game. Like, you know, we wanted to win. And like I said, we started off slow. Like I said, with the quarterback scrambles and all that, like I said, we didn't come into this game like we plan on coming into this game. So I said, next week, we'll get the correction Tuesday. Next week, we got to be better because we're playing another great team with another good quarterback. So I think the focus on getting the corrections and moving on. When there's five turnovers and as a defense, you're constantly having to put out fires on a short field, things like that. How much does that kind of take you out of what you really want to do defensively? Don't who cares? We have to go out and compete. We have to go out, you know, make them feel goals.  So, you know, our offense have five turnovers. So what? We have to go out there as a defense.  No matter how many times we go in the field, you know, we have to respond. Sudden change, as we call it.  So I mean, defense just got to play better on that. You know, we made them kick field goals. That's kind of what we want in the red zone. We'll make our offense and make team kick field goals. So I don't think it's a, we don't panic. We don't panic because our offense turned over the ball. We have to go out and play the next night. I mean, we just come and play ball.  I mean, of course, we wish everyone was healthy. We wish everyone out there playing ball. But, you know, we don't come into this game saying, we've got to play, you know, this way because of certain guys not here. It's the next man up mentality.  You know, like I said, it's the next man up mentality. How can we win this game? How can I already laugh and be on the same page?


But despite these challenges, prospects continued to improve for Haiti in 2013. To address some of these challenges and highlight the successes we have the Prime Minister today, we're very happy to have him. As many of you are probably aware, he became the youngest Prime Minister in Haitian history when he was confirmed in May 2011 after briefly serving as the Minister of Foreign Affairs. Prior to that, he gained widespread attention serving as the Co-Chair for the Presidential Advisory Council for the Economic Development and Investment of Haiti with former U.S. President Bill Clinton. Everyone should have received a handout with the Prime Minister's full bio, so let me stop there to allow us plenty of time for his remarks and the Q&A session. But before we begin, I just want to mention a few housekeeping matters. Today's session is being webcast live and recorded so it can be placed on our website following the event. So please use the microphones that will be passed around by our interns during the question and answer period. And when asking questions, please identify yourself and your affiliation. Last, once again, I want to thank you all for joining us today in this very important discussion. And with that, Prime Minister, the floor is yours. Thank you very much. Thank you for hosting me today. This is my second visit to CSIS. Carl, thank you very much for organizing this event. We had a great working relationship with Steve Johnson, and I'm sure we'll continue to work well together. I'm in Washington this week for a special education summit conveyed by the former PM, Gordon Brown, who is working as the UN Special Envoy on Education. And as you know, education is a cornerstone of the Marateli Lamot administration. Before I get into the details of my speech, I was not going to address this issue that is on everyone's mind and is now considered as a recent success. As you know, the president finalized the formation of the Electoral Council, and we are waiting for that council to convene and to be sworn in to be able to provide the date of the election, as you mentioned in your inaugural remarks. We are working to have elections before the end of this year as election is essential to a well-functioning democracy. So we are committed to it, and in order to get to the election, we had to go through several huge steps, time-consuming steps, before we get to where we are today. So we're very happy that this Electoral Council was formed, and we're very happy to move forward on that. Over the past nearly two years since taking office, President Marateli has been hard at work. Most of you are familiar with the long litany of generally negative description that prevails in journalistic accounts about Haiti. I will not repeat them tonight, but it is true that negative descriptions are recurrent, and more so since the earthquake. The reality is that we inherited a problem that is not at all easy to fix, and addressing it will take many years of dedication, many years of resolve on our part, and by future governments. I'm not here, however, to dwell on the past, but rather to focus on the future. So let me tell you that in just 23 months of government, we've made significant advances considering our starting point and the great challenges that we're facing on a daily basis. I will share some of the gains we've made, but before I do, I want to tell you that we are not pursuing isolated initiatives. We're working from a blueprint that we call the strategic plan for the development of Haiti, which has established long-term goals for year 2030, sort of a master plan. Under the terms of this strategic plan, we are focusing on four major pillars, or action areas. Those include one, territorial rebuilding, two, economic rebuilding, three, social rebuilding, and four, institutional rebuilding. For each one of those areas, we've developed specific programs aimed at addressing specific development challenges. In the next few minutes, I'd like to share with you some of our success as we pursue the goal of our vision for 2030. Number one, education. At the outset, let me note that our commitment to fundamentally transforming Haiti's educational system so that we can soon count on an able workforce that can make our country more competitive. We have begun at the very bottom of the system addressing the basic problem to access to education. When we took office, approximately half a million children had no access to education, taking into account that our constitution mandates basic education and our belief that the only way to overcome poverty is through the eradication of illiteracy in Haiti. We launched a program called SUGO, universal free schooling program, whose overall focus is to promote access to free basic education to all of Haiti's children in the 10 departments. Specifically, the program aims to facilitate access to free basic education to children aged 6 to 12, provide free basic education in public schools by waiving the school fees, creating 800 new public schools, and recruit up to 8,500 new teachers. We are pleased to announce the results so far. 1.3 million children aged 6 to 12 will be positively affected by the program of free education by 2013. We've so far have recruited thousands of school teachers and are training them. We've set up a database to facilitate the management and monitoring of the program. New managers have been recruited to strengthen program coordination. New classrooms have been rehabilitated. In 2013, we'll be teaching 300,000 older people to read and write. To establish sustainable funding for education initiatives, we have put in place new legislation that is expected to raise up to $100 million a year. It includes a surcharge on phone calls and remittance, and also taxes on sin taxes and different other taxes in order to raise the necessary amount to fund our education system. 23 million is earmarked for teacher training as part of the administration's effort to elevate the overall quality of learning, equipping our children with the tools to become self-sustaining. Productive participants in the new Haiti and the modern world, infrastructure development. Since taking office, our government has invested heavily in strengthening critical infrastructure, the backbone of economic development. Today, hundreds of miles of new roads link our cities and Hades other regions. We are building over 735 kilometers of roads, which also create jobs for many Haitians and are helping to advance our goals for decentralization. We have constructed two new airports, have refurbished the Port-au-Prince Airport and are working on finalizing the construction of the Cap-Haitian Airport, again supporting our vision for moving development away from the capital to populate and develop Hades other regions. By 2015, we hope to have a total of seven new airports in the country. Our tourism future looks bright. Hades tourism infrastructure has grown significantly and continues to expand. We have a number of new luxury hotels that have just opened, such as the Royal Oasis, which opened in December 2012, the best western that opened this month, and more coming. In order to have tourism development, it's important to have hotels, nice hotels to receive them. And I invite all of you to come to Haiti. We have comfortable hotels, we have beautiful beaches, we have hospitable people and people that want to do better. The country wants to do better. The country wants to move forward. And of course, in order to do so, we need the support and solidarity of all of you, the international community, world leaders, and the government is doing its part in order to move Haiti forward in the right direction. Social programs. One of the stark realities we face in Haiti is the vulnerability of people to extreme poverty. Our goal is to live as many people as possible out of poverty, to set up a social safety net that will guarantee acceptable living conditions for most Haitians. We believe that we are laying down the initial foundations toward achieving that goal through a social assistance program. In Creole, the name for our new social assistance program is called Help the People. Our goal is to assist more than five million people, five million of the most vulnerable, the most needy citizens by the end of the term of President Maitali. This encompasses the elderly, the physically and mentally challenged, impoverished mothers, struggling students, and others. This is a program that ranges from conditional cash transfers to non-conditional cash transfers to emergency cash transfers to the elderly and disabled, to hot meals and subsidies for students and farmers. This is the largest most structured social assistance ever implemented in Haiti. Already millions of dollars have been directed to the program, with a million people benefiting to date. Our goal, as I said, is to reach five million people by the end of this term. Under this program, action is underway to regularly transfer cash to a first group of 25,000 handicapped and people that were hurt during the earthquake, and 25,000 elderly Haitians in need. This is a small token of what should be done, but this is a beginning, and this shows the government resolve and leadership into that sector. As part of a plan to assist 100,000 destitute mothers this year, more than 57,000 have already received cash transfers. Over 22,000 students are receiving subsidies, while 60,000 farming kids are being distributed to farm workers in rural areas. More emergency coupons after the two disasters were distributed. Nearly half a million hot meals are being distributed. We have mobile kitchens that are going into the poorer district, assisting the poorest of the poor. Many of them spend days without having access to a decent meal. And this, in 2012, is not acceptable. We will do what we can with the means that we have to take care of our own, to take care of the voiceless, to take care of those that have absolutely no financial means and are in financial distress. We understand that the long-term strategy, the mid-to-long-term strategy, is to create an environment of job creation for them to get them out of the poverty cycle. But while we get there, we must have a mechanism to support them with the means that we have, and this is what we're doing right now. This government is committed to social reforms and is committed to investing in the poor. And we are committed to lifting as many Haitians as possible out of the condition of extreme poverty. Today, over 50 percent of the population is living in extreme poverty. And the new social assistance program is an important step toward establishing that much-needed social safety net. As Carl mentioned, before corruption is still a problem in Haiti. Not only in Haiti, but in many other countries in the world, especially challenging and developing nations. Underlying all that we are doing to modernize Haiti and build a stronger, more resilient economy is the commitment of this government to fight and end and do what we can to reduce corruption in the country. Combatting corruption, however, is an enormous challenge faced by all countries in the hemisphere. In the case of Haiti, corruption has the potential to undermine our process of recovery and to interfere with the consolidation of democracy. Our administration has taken a firm stance on this problem and is establishing policies and procedures to prevent it. We're working diligently to achieve transparency in all contracting practices and to ensure that Haitians are not victimized by dishonesty or bribes. To ensure foreign investors feel confident about investing in our country, this government has moved decidedly towards the implementation of a national strategy to fight against corruption. Already, the government-sponsored anti-corruption unit, ULCC, has piloted efforts that led to the arrest and prosecution of those involved in the misappropriation of some education funds that amounted to about $250,000 of which $100,000 have been recovered. The ULCC is now working on 150 presumed corruption cases and will soon issue reports on investigations that are nearing conclusion. Our administration is providing full financial, logistical, political support to the anti-corruption unit. We have increased their budget by 40% and are ready to provide additional resources to facilitate the creation of a new anti-corruption task force. To help improve governance and guarantee accountability, we have called on the unit to work closely with national and international anti-corruption watchdogs, such as the local chapter of Transparency International. When we took office in 2011, Haiti ranked 175th on the Corruption Perception Index. We've gained, since then, 10 points and we now occupy the 165th place. This is still not acceptable. We're working and we're doing what we can with the help of many international partners to try to improve Haiti's score on the Perception Index of corruption. Aligned with that goal, in my role as Prime Minister, I personally have instructed all Ministers, Secretary of State or State Fund Managers to declare all their personal assets to relevant authorities to the ULCC, this to prevent any illicit enrichment. Our anti-corruption stance underscores how serious we are about creating a new Haiti. A new Haiti where all Haitians find themselves, find a place for themselves, a place to be proud of. A new Haiti where investors can come, invest freely and make a profit. A new Haiti where local investors invest and can make a profit. A new Haiti that's business-friendly. A new Haiti where people want to do good for the population, where people can find jobs, where to have a society that's more just. So we understand that to bring investment, we need to fight corruption and we are doing so. But it's not something that's going to happen overnight. It's going to be a process and that process has started. Direct foreign investment is the strategic platform for significantly improving Haiti's business environment and creating the long-term jobs our people so desperately need. The success of our efforts for Haiti to be open for business can be seen in the number of successful projects now underway. These include the 617 acre, 257 million caracal industrial park recently completed in Northern Haiti. This project underwritten with funds from the U.S. government is an excellent example and IDB also is an excellent example of what can be achieved through partnerships between the public and the international institutions. Caracal is aligned with our plans for decentralization. At the same time, it is a showpiece for job creation. Our government has committed to creating over 60,000 jobs in the Northern area and the park's anchor tenants will be generating 20,000 new jobs and has already created 1500 jobs so the work is underway. The second tenant in Caracal is a Haitian company, the third business is a Dominican Republic company and others are negotiating with others to have new tenants in the park. This park we have a lot of hope will be a success and will be a job creator. The second industrial park expected to create about 350 jobs is being developed in the Northern part of Port-au-Prince. With an investment totaling about 58 million, this park has a planned completion date of January 2014 and will provide housing for industrial workers and clinics, schools, sports centers and about 3,000 housing for the people. You know, it's exciting to me to see so much development in progress all over Haiti. It's challenging and it's exciting. Over the last 12 months, Haiti's Interministerial Commission on Investment approved 11 new hotel projects, totaling 161 million. As I said before, if you come to Port-au-Prince today, you will find much better hotel accommodations. You will find new hotels, existing hotels are expanding and you will find hotels are opening in other cities. And most of all, you will feel the energy moving towards status quo to a country that's wanting to develop. You're starting to feel the energy happen where the country is moving on the right path of development. By hiding hundreds of needed hotel rooms, these projects give impetus to our vision for Haiti as a top tourist destination in the Caribbean. As importantly, the construction of these hotels will create 1600 direct jobs and 6,500 indirect jobs. The largest investment is a $47.2 million seven-unit project by Haiti Hotel Corporation. And more hotels are coming. The Marriott is coming. That's an investment with DigiCell. We have a fusion between El Rancho Hotel, which was an existing hotel, and Vila Creole. That should be a very excitement investment as well. The Royal Oasis is a success story right now. So if you take where we were three years ago, right after the earthquake, where everything was destroyed in terms of hotel accommodation, to where we are today, we are in much better shape today than we were three years ago and that we were even before the earthquake. And the goal is to continue the slow path to recovery to build a more resilient country. The Marriott and DigiCell will build a 173 room hotel in Tugeot area of Port-au-Prince. So we're not only open for business. We're also open for tourism as certainly we don't get the credit for that. But Haiti has one of the nicest beaches in the Caribbean, some of the nicest islands around. Il Havash is certainly a gem. It's the pearl of the Caribbean. And it's, you know, when you go there, you will see that it's paradise. So I invite you all to come to Haiti and see for yourself. As I said in the beginning of my presentation a few days ago, President Martelly finalized the formation of the Electoral Council. One of the most important goals of this government is to work toward the consolidation of democracy. Order and fair elections are an important part of the long-term progress and process. We have been committed to seeing parliamentary and local elections go forward and have done our utmost for that to happen. However, things take time and we have to give time to time in Haiti. And we have, and we've achieved it, and now we're going to continue to support the financing of the elections and everything that's necessary for that to happen this year. To achieve all the goals that we set forward, our government is committed to the establishment of institutions that efficiently perform the job of organizing and implementing a credible electoral process. Our government worked very hard toward establishing this council so that elections, so that Haitians can soon elect new senators, new mayors, and new local representatives that are democratic institutions can work toward the approval of legislation that is vital to the development of Haiti. Even though we come from a great distance, from where we started to where we are today, we inherited a nation shattered by the devastating earthquake. We have a lot of work still in front of us. Step by step, however, we will complete the journey to our goal of bringing Haiti as an emerging country into the global economy, achieving emerging nation status as a prosperous and self-sustainable country. We are committed to it. We are dedicated to it. And we will do everything that's in our power for this country to rise again. Thank you. So thank you very much, Mr. Prime Minister, for those remarks. I'm going to open it up now to some Q&A. As mentioned before, I want you to identify who you are. I'm looking for brief questions, not long statements. So I'm going to go first right here in the middle. Good morning. My name is Stephanie Benham. I am a program analyst at the National Institutes of Health. I wondered if you could address this administration's prioritization of health care and if you could talk about some of the inroads that you've made there in that sector. Could you be a little louder? Sure. I apologize. My name is Stephanie Benham. I work at the National Institutes of Health. And I was wondering if you could talk about this administration's prioritization of health care and any inroads that were made in that sector. The health care sector has been one of the most challenging sectors for us, Albrecht of Collera, the destruction of most of the hospitals after the earthquake. We've had, you know, vaccination campaigns for children that were on the way. So this particular sector, however, is one of the sectors that's moving most positively from the earthquake to today. We have several hospitals that are being built. We have a trauma center that we are wanting to build in the next few months. We are working. The Collera numbers have gone down significantly compared to where they are. And we're working with the CDC, you know, on vaccination campaigns that are having a very positive effect. So generally, it's been a sector that's moving. We started renovating the emergency rooms of the Northern Hospital. We completed the bid on the general hospital in Port-au-Prince. In the next few months, we're going to start the building with the help of the USAID and the French Development Agency. So it has been, of course, a great challenge in order to, with all the priorities that we've had on top of the Collera that came to our country, to bring changes into that sector. But we've progressed significantly. And this is one of the sectors, of the leading sectors in terms of our progress in the country. Thank you. Joe Hanna? Thank you, Mr. Minister, for being here again. I'm glad you mentioned your campaign against corruption, because there hasn't been pretty news in the papers about some of the comments made by a former presidential advisor, Richard Morse, about things going on. But the one thing you didn't mention in your otherwise excellent overview was the state of security in the country. And Minousta is still there. It'll be there, of course, until UN approves another resolution. But it's been a point of contention over recent years. And the task of completing the police force, as I understand it, will be done by 2014. Would you comment on the link between security and your goals of tourism and foreign direct investment? Thank you. Excellent question. We have put in place the Police Development Plan 2012-2016 that calls for an increase of police officers to have more officers on the streets. And we understand that the UN forces, they're not there eternally. They were there during an emergency period. We are working diligently so that we can increase our force while Minousta is reducing theirs. So that plan calls for increase of police. It calls also for a career plan, a career plan for police officers. We've taken great strides into improving the country's security. Right now, according to several institutions, like, for example, the UNODC, we have a crime rate of eight for every 100,000 people, which is equal to Long Beach, California right now for violent crimes. The kidnapping rate has significantly decreased. The homicide rate has significantly decreased. The police are better equipped now. We are working to have a special task force within the police, which is a work in progress, which would have sort of a reinforced SWAT team, if you want, to address specific problems when the regular police officers are outgunned, that group could intervene. So where we were before to where we are today, there's been great improvement into the overall security of the country. And we're going to continue to work on that because, as you said, corruption is one, security is another, rule of law is a third. There is many priorities that we have to address. But we've been addressing the security situation and the situation in the country. The security situation is much better today than it was, certainly, 12 months ago or in the past years. But there is a lot of work to be done still. Thank you. I'm Jean-Bélior Vissier from African Caribbean Radio and Television. Mr. Prime Minister, you've been very vocal about fighting corruption in Haiti. However, the general perception is that you're presiding over a very corrupt administration. The recent departure of the finance minister, coupled with the declaration of Mr. Moss, former advisor and cousin of the president, siding corruption, what are you going to do about this? Are you going to continue simply talking about corruption or are you going to take significant steps to resolve corruption? Also you mentioned that you are business-friendly, that your government is business-friendly. We have the situation of a company like Hytale being struggling to come back to business. Are you willing to work with them, similar to the way the American government worked with them, administration of companies that had problems in 2008 to try to create more jobs in the country? Thank you. Thank you. That's a very good question. I thank you for it. I cited some of the steps that we've taken against corruption. I don't think this administration, like I said, this corruption is a problem not only in Haiti, but in many developing countries. And it's what you do about it that counts. We've had 65 arrests in the past three months. We're going to continue. We're prosecuting 152 cases of corruption. We're going to continue to do so. We've increased the budget of the entire corruption office. We are putting more officers on the streets in order to fight the problem. We understand that it's a problem that's not going to go away overnight. This is a problem that's going to take time to resolve. But we have the commitment to doing so. Some of the comments, and I did comment myself on this same article that Mr. Morris commented on, it's one case. It's one case of one person that he was alluding to. So that person is going to be put under investigation to find out the allegations that Mr. Morris was saying. And of course, you have to be innocent until proven guilty in that sense. So we have to investigate the case. And then if guilty, then we'll take the necessary actions. The point is we're not denying the existence of corruption in Haiti. We're not denying that. What we're saying is it exists. What are we going to do about it? What have we done about it so far? In terms of that, we're working with the local chapter of Transparency International. They've presented 22 cases that were identified. Three of the cases people have been there in jail now. For example, the former mayor of Patreonville, he's in jail. And we're going to continue putting pressure on that. So simply because it's the right policy for the country. But it's not something that's going to disappear overnight. It's going to be a process. Now, saying that Haiti is open for business about the high-tail situation, we are open to any company that does business in Haiti. So whether it's high-tail and any other company, we are open to resolving any company's problems. In a specific case of high-tail, there was several issues. One of the issues is a very large debt to the government that was unpaid. So taxes, the license fee for the telecom license also was unpaid. So the government had to do what any governments do when there is no taxes paid for a certain period of time. So it's not against high-tail or against any other company. What we want, we want to have a business environment where the investor comes, he opens the company, he pays his taxes, and then he operates, creates jobs, that's what we want. So we don't have any particular issue against one or another company. What we want is to have an environment that everybody can work in as well as pay your taxes. Chairman, with the red tie right here, let's see if it's right. Thank you. Sure. Am I on? Yeah. Ernie Preig, Chairman of Haiti Democracy Project, Mr. Prime Minister, welcome back to Washington we met during your first visit. As you know, we've had election observer teams for six elections, including 10 and 11, and we're planning to organize another initiative this time. Your objective will be a thorough assessment of the performance of the new electoral council in having fraud-free elections. And my question is, in addition to the electoral council, will your government be taking specific steps to ensure a free and open election this time? The short answer is absolutely. We'll do whatever we can, because without having a fair process, the vote of the people are not respected. We want the vote of the people to be respected, and we want the winners, the true winners, to come out. That's the only way to ensure political stability in the country. Mr. Prime Minister, in the beginning of your presentation, you have said that you built schools in Haiti. Can you please tell us how many schools did you build already? Where did you build them? And why don't you show one of them in your slide? Talking about corruption, Mr. Prime Minister, is it true that you and President Martelly have pressured the Minister of Finance to resign? Is it true? The Minister of Finance, like I said, in any country, in any government, you have ministers that come in, ministers that go out. So that minister was working based on a government plan. She was given tasks to follow with results to achieve, and she decided to resign. So just like in any government, somebody resigns, we have to replace the person, and we did so the same day. And like I said, we have a lot of respect for that minister. However, she's not in the government anymore. We move forward to having a new, very competent new minister. Now, in terms of the schools, the Minister of Education is here. He can get into the details as to how many schools where they were built, et cetera. So I'll give you the floor in a little bit to describe that. But anyways, in order to put 1.2 million people in schools, you need to have schools to put them. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you Minister, good evening, everyone. We have to go and get out of the way. I need your microphone. We'll just do that. Good evening, everyone, and for the construction of the schools. Good evening, everybody.  Do you want to do school, the BNB out? Hold on, why don't you say it for, why don't you do a sentence and then he'll translate it so we can do it together. Trying to go at the same time. Exactly. So why don't you start slowly and he'll fill you in. For the simple case of the Central Plateau, concerning the Central Plateau is one of the 10 partners of Haiti, 20 schools are being built, secondary schools, many of the schools are being built, and I believe that the cost of building a school is 1 million dollars. Because to build a school, a lesson, is a million dollars. And for primary schools, depending on the environment, the environment, there are six or nine classrooms. Schools of six rooms from six to nine rooms. That's across. That's across. That's across. Schools are being built across the country. Just give me your email address and I'll send you all information related to that. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. The lady over here in the front. Good morning, Prime Minister. My name is Per Petchwa. I'm with Search for Common Ground and I'm also a member of the Haitian diaspora. Question for you is, we all know the toll that the rice subsidies of the early 90s had on the agriculture sector of Haiti and also the impact it had on the migration towards Port-au-Prince away from the provinces. My question for you is, does the government, does the current government have any plans to reform or revamp the agricultural sector in order to help decentralization? Thank you. We need to be able to be self-sufficient and feed our population. As you said, in the 90s, in the 80s, we used to do so. However, because of a change of policy, we basically are a net importer of rice today. Haiti consumes close to 400,000 tons of rice per year and we produce locally 25% of that, about 100,000 tons in change. Out of that, we have losses that account for about 8% to 10% of that. So it is critical and we're working towards Haiti improving our production from 100,000 to 200,000 to double the production. As we're working on that, we also realize that because of how critical rice is to the daily nutrition of our people, we wanted to make a short-term policy of reducing the price of rice by having agreements with large rice producers to compensate for the complement between the 100 and the 300 because we import 300,000 was to lower the price. As we're working on increasing production, reducing price. Because as you know, the Haitians are very price sensitive, extremely price sensitive, I would say the price of a pound increases by 10 cents and you have thousands of people that cannot afford the extra in order to feed themselves. So we're working on a structure of price to reduce as much as possible the price to increase the access as we're working on improving the rice production in the country. Also we're working with farmers in order to purchase some of the productions that they're producing and then that's part of the social safety net program. We buy from some of the rice agricultural farmer associations and then we distribute to areas that are in the red zone which is that are suffering from food insecurity. So that's a program that we started that we are completing and of course, you know, I mean, Haiti is in order for us to stimulate jobs most of the jobs there in the agricultural sector. So this is a sector of priority for this government. The woman with the teal top here, Kaki. Kaki, can you go? Thank you. Thank you very much. Prime Minister Lamotte to pick up on the very first question. Could you identify yourself, ma'am? Yes, I am Kate Dixon and I am with the Pan American Health Organization the deputy director's office and we have been working hand in hand with your government, the Ministry of Health and Dinepah, the Department of Pudable Water and Sanitation to really support your government in the elimination of cholera so that it does not remain on the island of Hispaniola. We would like to very much congratulate your government in its leadership and its vision in establishing the plan of action that you developed for $400 million. Now, what we would very much request in terms of the governance to maintain that initiative is that you would encourage Minister Guillaume of Health to establish an inter-departmental monitoring committee led by the government so that we can continue to support and mobilize international donor support towards the objective of investing in water and sanitation in the country which in turn will improve the productivity of your workers and tourism. So governance question and a request that this be allowed to be moved forward so that we can continue to support you and your government in that regard. Thank you. Well, thank you very much for the positive comments. As I said, this was a sector of great progress and also we need to do more. And what you suggested is definitely going to be. And we need it not only in the health sector, we need it in every sector which is better coordination of assistance, whether it's in education, in health, in social services. And this is what we have between the 8th and 10th of May, the donor coordination, the new donor coordination mechanism that will be discussed to improve the efficiency of the aid going to Haiti because as you rightly pointed out, the plan, the health plan was developed by the government. So it was country led and then the results should be country owned as well. And we're going to do this for every sector and providing you with the exacts in terms of steering committee, in terms of where we want it, how we want it, according to a plan of action that everybody agrees to, everybody signs off and then we move forward. So I will definitely transmit that information, that request to the minister is going to receive a positive feedback because again, we have a lot of countries that want to help and one of the challenges for our country has been to how do we coordinate the aid into implementation because a lot of time the aid stays and then doesn't, you know, when it comes to implementation, it doesn't get implemented in the schedule that everybody wants. So that's one thing that we've been working feverishly at solving as to implementation of the efficiency of the assistance as there is a lot of energy, a lot of good will for Haiti, a lot of people want to help, you know, whether it's in different sectors. So this new mechanism will specify the priority projects, will specify based on the national development plan of the country and will clearly specify the priorities of the government and from there move the country forward with better aid coordination. Alright, so I see that there are many questions out there. A member of my staff came up to me to tell me that the prime minister graciously told us that he can go on a little bit longer. So I think I'm going to do three more questions and then we're going to wrap it up. The gentleman here in front, yeah. My name is Dr. Patrick Richard, and I'm a professor at Uniform Services University. Also affiliated with Hopkins and George Washington University. But I'm not here on behalf of the US government. I want to congratulate you for really trying to invest in human capital in Haiti. And I'm referring more specifically to some of those, the safety net that you're trying to build and also by investing in education and so on. Have you given any thoughts or any guarantees or any safeguards to make sure that the next government doesn't do away with those programs? Well, we recognize the need to, like I said, take care of our own. Because a lot of times past governments felt that it was not their responsibility to take care of the poorest. It was NGO's responsibility. It was for other governments' responsibility. So we recognize that need to invest in the poorest of the poorest. Sometimes people, because it's unacceptable. It's simply unacceptable in 2012 to have mothers not being able to eat for two days, for example. So the government needed to give some type of response to that. Although the response, we would want the response to be wherever there is that issue. We have a limited response because we have little means for the response. So we will continue with these programs while we continue also to attract investment and to push for wealth creation strategies and on top of continuing the social safety net. And we also believe that it will be the right thing to do. The humane thing to do is for any government in Haiti feels that taking care of mothers that go hungry, of elderly, of victims that don't get accompanied find some type of help. In the United States, for example, what we're talking is not foreign. In the United States, you have food stamps for people. In Haiti, you don't. And if you look at where there would be more need for it. So now you do. On a limited basis, we want to extend it. And we feel that any government that will come, we hope would continue with this type of social programs. And these programs, they're not only unique to Haiti. If you take a country like the Dominican Republic, they have over two million people on conditional cash transfer program, non-conditional cash transfers, on food vouchers, et cetera. So as Haiti is a, you know, we have 52% of our people, you know, living in extreme poverty. This was a problem that we could not ignore. Because we want to have a society that's more just. There's a lot of inequalities in the society and very little opportunities for people that don't have any means. And for people, you know, the opportunities, they're a lot of the time restricted to a small group of the society. So we have to open up that group. And that's why we're talking about giving better access to credit. That's why we're talking about education. That's why in our facility we are supporting some of the college students. It's to put people in a better position than they were before. With the means that we have, of course. As you know, we have very limited means. But you know, we have the will, the dedication, and we are committed to that. Woman in green, please stand up. Maureen Chappatt Morales, Congressional Research Service. I had just two quick questions regarding rule of law and human rights as related to the Trial of Former Dictator Jean-Claude Duvalier. And the first is the president, Martelly, had spoken in the past about a possible pardon for Duvalier as a means toward national reconciliation. And UN officials have called for a Truth in Reconciliation Commission instead, or have suggested one. So I wanted to know what the government's stance was on a Truth in Reconciliation Commission. And then the other is just that the UN Human Rights Specialist in Haiti recently said that despite assurances from the highest level that the executive branch would not interfere with the judicial process, that in actuality that was not the case. So I wanted to know if the government has made any changes in how they're handling the case since then, and whether or not your government has accepted the UN offers or other international offers of help in prosecuting the Duvalier case. Well, thank you for the question. In terms of human rights, this government has, we take it very seriously. One, we have a minister in charge of human rights, in charge of all the issues that surround it, and we are committed to that. In terms of the trial of Mr. Duvalier and Haiti today from where we were coming from before, today we have most of the former presidents living in the country. In the case of Mr. Duvalier, there is a case going on right now, and if you follow the latest news, Mr. Duvalier himself had to go and answer questions from judges. This is an ongoing case. This is also a case where, as prime minister, the judiciary is an independent body, and they are prosecuting a case. And they have all the latitude to prosecute the case as they see fit. There will be no political interference in the case in order for the outcome to be based on whatever decision the judiciary takes. And we left it with the ongoing case right now. So we'll see what comes out of it. But at the end of the day, in order to have true democracy, you need to respect the separation of powers. So in either way, when the parliament has its prerogative, the executive has, we have our prerogative, and the judiciary has their prerogative. So the Duvalier case is a case where we showed, we're not talking about a pardon for Duvalier. What we're talking about is allowing the case to go forward and the outcome to be whatever it is with the judiciary. Last question, the gentleman in the back. Very enthusiastic gentleman in the back. Thank you, Mr. Mincham. Mr. Prime Minister, my name is Albert Decadi. I'm an attorney and I represent the Haitian, I make an intellectual property association and the green investment group. I have one request from the Haitian community. You've been to the DC area a couple of times, we would like you to give us some time as a Haitian community to come and talk to us as well. My questions regarding your four pillars that you discussed, you did not go into one of the biggest problems that I think Haiti has is environment. What is the government plan to address the deforestation of Haiti and plans to actually start that process? Second, aside from building schools, we would like to hear what kind of infrastructure are being created in those schools for these kids to be educated in the 21st century, such as access to computers, access to labs, and maybe to distance learning as well. I know the Haitian community here has a lot of professors, has a lot of professionals that could be contributed to, say the universities of Haiti through long-distance learning. What kind of infrastructure are being planned in that environment to make those things possible? Thank you. Thank you very much. On the first point, I'm going to tell the ambassador to organize the visit with the community so that I can come and have an exchange with you as I enjoy to do that, to get your perspectives and your contribution to the development of our country because what we all want to see as Haitians is a country that all of us can be proud of, those that support the government and those that oppose the government. Our goal is to have an inclusive society, is to have an inclusive approach, and for that, we need the input of all, whether you support Martelly Lamotte or whether you don't. So on the environment, the president has declared that this year was the environmental year. We have significant challenges in the deforestation that cause all types of, that cause a ring to create flooding and natural disasters. We have over 98% of the country that's deforested and simply it goes back to economic reasons and survival if you want because then the people are cutting the trees and they're cutting the trees to do charcoal and the charcoal is... So basically it's a chain event that leads to deforestation, that leads to overpopulation in cities, that leads to demographic explosion. So it's a chain of events. So in terms of the environment itself, we are working on different projects. One of them is with Professor Mohammed Yunus and Richard Branson to take a swat of land and start the deforestation there. We're working to build the Basse Versa. I don't know how you translate that. Water sheds. Water sheds around the country in order. And as well, working on unclogging of the drainage system, the sewage system in Port-au-Prince is all clogged, for example. We're working as we speak right now to unclog it and the judging of the Port-au-Prince to allow when there is a rain so that you breathe in flooding in the town. Right now it's a little rain. Any rain you have flooding and people are greatly affected by that. So the Minister of Environment is currently working on a plan to curtail some of the settlements that are happening on protected areas of Port-au-Prince, Mon Loup-Ital, for example. As you know, the mountain is almost all filled with townships. So we're building a demarcation in order for the construction not to continue and would cover all the wall. So deforestation, you know, it's a significant challenge that we're tackling. Watershed. And also a general policy to educate the people. So we're looking at also substitution to charcoal in order to provide to the people to cook. But it's a very challenging topic. But one that we're actively working on. And also I invite you to, those of you that are interested, of course, the government has, on Wednesdays, every two Wednesdays we have our Council of Government that's projected live on the internet and live on TV. I think we probably, I don't know, many other governments that do their Council live on TV. And you can see some of the strategies that are being used. For example, last time we had an environment action plan as to what the Ministry of Environment was doing, how it was doing it, where it would attack first, what it would do for some of the different challenges that you cite there. So this is an excellent source of information as to what the government is doing and having the information from the government itself and with pictures as to the progress reports of what's happening on the ground. Which is significant. In terms of reconstruction, we are rebuilding, the country is a huge construction site now. We have from the communal projects, we have 170 communal projects planned, we have 103 that are being done right now. In terms of reconstruction of public buildings, we are rebuilding 10 of them right now. Building roads. In Port-au-Prince, we are, of course, we renovated the airport. We did 15 sports centers for our youth to have areas to play. When we took over, we had 1.5 million people living, basically almost 50% of the residents of Port-au-Prince were homeless and living in camps. Today, 80% of them have been relocated and their rights respected because we had rental subsidies for them. We have a situation, you know, we're installing in country-wide over 7,000 solar lamps in order to provide lights in areas where light never existed before. The electricity company is fixing their substation and distribution lines to provide more power. We went from 8 to 18 hours and my objective, and the objective of any government is to provide 24-hour day power. That should be basic. But when I said it, a lot of people took that side and tried to say that we're making unrealistic promises.  The objective needs to be to provide it now. And we want to do it as soon as possible. So, all this, you know, all this that we're talking about is not easy and will not happen overnight. So I want to point that out and I want to also point out that we are working day and night, day and night, to make Haiti a better place. Make Haiti a place for all Haitians to be proud of their country. Thank you. I want to thank the Prime Minister. I want to thank the Prime Minister for coming for choosing the America's program here at CSIS. It was an enlightening session. I want to thank you all for coming. And thanks for your applause at the end. I was going to hit, but you did it on your own. So it was a good session. Thank you.


The world increasingly recognised the need to dramatically reduce greenhouse gas emissions for a safe and liveable planet. 151 countries have committed to achieve net zero emissions and are now starting to talk about a transition away from fossil fuels. But when it comes to actual plans and policies in place under their national energy outlooks and strategies, in aggregate, governments are still planning to reduce more than double the global levels of fossil fuels in 2030 that will be consistent with limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius. This misalignment is called the production gap. The persistence of the global production gap puts a well-managed and equitable energy transition at risk and clashes with expectations that global demand for coal, oil and gas will peak within this decade even without new policies. Meanwhile, the need to limit warming and reduce global reliance on fossil fuels grows more evident in our everyday lives. The 2023 production gap report shows the need for a near-total phase-out of global coal production in use by 2040 a combined reduction in global oil and gas production in use by three quarters between 2020 to 2050 and countries with greater capacity to lead this transition and support others with limited capacities. The world is at a tipping point. The window of opportunity is closing. The time to back words with actions is now.


Today is being observed as safer internet day. It is set aside to sustain efforts and advocacy for safe use of the internet for children and young people. As child online protection champion, I help and make this call for action. ITU members states and center members are requested to build expertise to develop educational programs and curricula to address the safe and responsible use of the internet. Develop practical tools to help minimize risk to children and put in place measures that can address online safety. Put in place and Latin mechanisms to tackle the growing threats to children as they browse the internet and assess information online. Balance privacy issues and policies related to freedom of speech with implementation of measures that can address online safety and establish policies and appropriate effective frameworks which protect the use of private data and intelligent approaches and discourage online criminal activities. I call on stakeholders to restate their commitments to further promote international and domestic policies to improve child online safety. As a passionate advocate of the weapon of women and children, I believe that the safety of our children and youths requires us to work collectively considering their strategic importance in the future of our society. This is a call to play a key role on the global stage in the fight to protect our children from harmful practices in the suburbs. Thank you.


So it varies by geography, obviously, which country you're talking about. So China is obviously a rising language. And if you were to go to Japan, you'd find that China is the second most important language being studied after English. Here in the United States, not surprisingly, it's a lot about Spanish, especially Latin American Spanish. And yet, at the same time, there are also other languages that are becoming increasingly popular that aren't studied so much in school like Italian. We just released Irish Gaelic. And some of those languages are either related to aspirations of travel or actual need to travel to a country, very often on vacation or for fun. But also, there's a sort of increased interest in people's heritage. I think as we become more of a blue jeans, white t-shirt kind of society where we all kind of blend in in this modern world, we're also kind of longing for some sort of tie-back to our own identity and where we come from. And many people are next generation and therefore curious about that. And also, of course, we see a lot of increased interest in languages like Arabic and Chinese and Russian, where obviously those languages are spoken in countries that have tremendous economic growth and vitality these days. So sometimes people wonder about why it's so important to study foreign languages when so many people speak English. I think that to truly engage with the culture, you should speak in a foreign language. Because as you do that, you essentially go through some sort of cultural journey and you discover something about another culture. And I think that's important for your own personal self development. But it's also, I think, important in showing respect for other cultures. And from my experience, when I've been to, I speak some languages, but not all languages by any means. So when I go to a culture and I don't know that much about the language, showing that you're interested in having a few phrases makes all the difference in the world. And yes, you very often speak English. But many of us have sat in social environments in different countries and felt somewhat out of place when they suddenly turn to Italian and we're sitting there and can't really engage and be part of the conversation. So in terms of what the most important languages are for Americans, I would say obviously Spanish is important because there are many people here in the United States that speak Spanish first or grow up speaking Spanish. But I would say beyond Spanish, I would actually urge people to pick something out of the ordinary. So if everyone is studying Spanish, you can find that you develop an edge by maybe learning Japanese or Korean or some other language that's maybe not taught as much. And it's also very interesting to discover a whole culture through your own exploration like that. So I'd say look at world economic trends if we all rush and learn Chinese. And so the only two languages people speak are English and Chinese. That's not very smart. And at the same time, if we're only learning Spanish, there won't be that much differentiation because the biggest trading partners of the United States will not necessarily be Spanish speaking and global trade is developing a lot with Asia and other countries. But I think it's really up to each person to discover what they're passionate about. I often find that when we are talking to customers and we say, hey, why don't you learn a language? It's a redundant conversation if we don't have the language that they're interested in. People have a reason for learning Hungarian or Hebrew or Irish or whatever language. It's a very deep emotional tie that they've already established with that language. So it's not so much as sitting and thinking, what language should I be learning for many people? What do I find interesting? And what do I have some sort of cultural connection? Which language do I want to learn? I mean, it's in a way, it's a moment of self-expression. You can sort of show your colors and show what you're about.


For me, I'm on that fence for it. I almost want to leave stuff up, right?  Well, I know why. One of the reasons I'm doing it is because I believe that if I don't delete these comments, censor tube will put a strike against my channel saying I'm not moderating my own content, right? Which is their job really, right? In large part. That's the responsibility they took on. That's why they're getting the big bucks, right? The other reason is I don't want to treat the audience on censor tube as if they are alphabet ink. They are the company. They're not. There's a tremendous amount of amazing people on censor tube that have been following my work for a number of years. There's a handful of people that are supporting my work on censor tube through a YouTube censor tube membership, and I appreciate that very much. So the work I'm putting in is not for censor tube. The work I'm putting in is to make sure the people that want to follow my work don't get exposed to the BS, right? So I'm filling in the gaps where censor tube is dropping the ball hardcore. I've done work for companies like this. Those companies don't last very long, okay? They lose their foothold in the industry because people don't trust them anymore. People move on.


do arguments count as evidence? They have to, if and only if, all possibilities can be exhausted and presented by points like it's something infinite or finite, it's something independent or independent. If you can negate all the possibilities by the principle of contradictions, you remove the ones which produce self-contradiction and you're left with only one answer, then that's when argument becomes definitive evidence. No arguments aren't evidence. They're assessments of evidence. They're constructions that take evidence and get to conclusions. So they're not evidence, but they're the only way evidence winds up having value.


Hello and welcome to NewsClick. The draft of the defense production policy for 2018 was recently released for public comments. This draft, according to the government, is focused on making defense production industry friendly. And to do this, it also lays out certain goals and objectives which can be seen as a little too ambitious to discuss what the policy says and how the government is really planning on achieving these goals we have with us today, D. Raghunandan from the Delhi Science Forum. So, Raghun, firstly, we see that the policy is very much focused on partnering with the private industry to achieve a lot of goals and objectives and in pretty much all aspects, right, from manufacturing to research and development. So, what do you think about this route to achieving the goals? Two aspects, I think, come up most in my mind. The first is that I think the defense production policy in laying out a framework appears to look at defense production more or less like any other industrial sector. And I think the two are very different. So, a lot of the defense production policy speaks of measures in manufacturing, in innovation, et cetera, like it would for any other industrial sector. Whereas in defense, I think the methods, the structure of the industry and its relationship to your military and its requirements works in a very different way. In normal industry, you would get companies who design a product which would get launched into the market and either succeed or fail in the competition. Defense industry is not like that. One has to define the product first and work towards designing it in such a way that it fits the requirements of the user agencies, the defense forces. So, whereas the defense production policy speaks of creating an environment of competition and competitive industry which would throw up these good technologies and good products, that's not the way the defense industry works. The defense industry does not have different companies making different products, designing them, spending its own money, and then floating it to the user industry with the Air Force of the Army then choosing A, B, C, or D. It's a joint exercise to develop systems that the user services want. This, I think, makes the entire overview of the defense production industry very different from the way this document approaches it. So that's one part. The second part of it, I think, is that the defense production policy lays out some ambitions, goals, if you like, from a starting point where it says, despite all the many years of experience of the defense public service, public sector undertakings and investment in research by the DRDO, India is still the largest importer of military hardware in the world. Now, instead of diagnosing why this has happened or arriving at a proper diagnosis of this, it proceeds to then say we will do these various measures to create a competitive environment, create a military industrial complex, if you like, which will then make India self-sufficient. And it puts forward the rather fantastic goal of achieving this self-sufficiency in five years. Apart from self-sufficiency, they also want to have huge turnovers and investments and exports. And it lists about a dozen or more armament systems in which it states its goal as wanting to become self-sufficient, again in five years. And these weapon systems range from aircraft to small arms. I think for a country which, in terms of defense production and research and self-reliance, has struggled to meet these goals, the task should have been to achieve these step-by-step, rather than putting forward these highly overambitious goals of covering all sectors of the industry and saying we will achieve all this in five years. Interesting way that the policy proposes to go about this is also by, of course, the ease of doing business, increasing the ease of doing business, increasing the ease of doing business. Where they say that the startups and these MSMEs, they will not be, there won't be any restrictions on the basis of their prior experience or turnovers and it'll be more focused on the, if the technical and functional requirements are being met, then they will be allowed. So how does that fit into the defense industry as well? Is that level of competency, is that sufficient? Let me put it like this. There are weaknesses in the Indian manufacturing sector itself, with the exception of a few industries, even in the large sector, forget the small sector, very few have the kind of experience, either in precision manufacturing, in high-tech manufacturing, or in working with the kinds of materials that are used in the defense sector. So much of this capability will have to be built from scratch. If you ask me, the way this is to be done is to build around the existing defense public sector undertakings, the ordinance factories, et cetera, encourage the design development and manufacture of systems and then link MSMEs with these as subcontractors or sub-assembly manufacturers and gradually build up their capability. This is what has been done in our space sector for the rocket satellites. It's being done in missiles. It's been done in atomic energy. Whereas what the defense production policy seems to suggest is working at this backwards to develop the capabilities of the MSMEs and then aggregate those to form larger systems. This is not going to work either. Once again, I think that the priority for a defense production policy which has set itself the goal of attaining self-reliance and self-sufficiency is to sit down with the user services and this is not expressed in any institutional manner in the defense production policy. How does India go about defining its goals of military hardware? You've just listed a whole lot of hardware which everybody wants. But what is needed is for research organizations, manufacturers and the military to sit together and fix their goals. We want to make such and such aircraft in the next 15 years. We want to make armored carriers or tanks in the next 15 years with specifications which match those of what the military wants and then in a mission mode style, you go about setting yourself targets of reaching it through a mix of the large public sector undertakings with ancillaries in the MSME sector. To me, the defense production policy is putting the cart before the horse and approaching this the other way around. So what do you think about what the policy says about bolstering the growth of public sector undertakings in the public sector?  And what we've seen is the government wishing to shift from a public sector manufacturing base to a larger, more widespread private sector manufacturing base for the military. To me, there are two issues with this. One is it begs the question of where is the design development capability coming from? Manufacturing capability is one. Design and development of advanced systems of this kind is something else entirely. The government seems to have put its faith in a policy of import of technology, if not of systems, inviting original equipment manufacturers from other countries to set up bases here by which they think technology will come. All experience hitherto has said, foreign equipment manufacturers will come in to manufacture but will never part with the technology. Technology is something you have to acquire on your own. That's one. The second aspect is I believe there is a gross overestimation of the role of competition in the sector and what can be achieved. If you look at the international experience, whether it's in the United States, the UK, France, Russia, who are the major defense equipment manufacturers, you will see that it is not as if various private sector players have engaged in a thinking exercise, have developed at their own cost different kinds of equipment and then the government has chosen between them. It's always been an exercise where the government, the military and large manufacturers, private sector, public sector really doesn't matter. In the US, they are private sector. In Europe, it's a mix of the private and the public sectors. In Russia, it's all state sector. But in all these, the way it's been done is for government, the military and major equipment manufacturers sit together, draw up a mission as to what is required. Then you can have competition between two industries, three industries as to which comes out with the better design. You choose those and then manufacture it. That's the way it has always been done and that's the way we should be approaching it in India as well. But this perspective seems to be completely missing from the defense production policy, which looks as if it's like an automobile manufacturer, you call 10 manufacturers, they'll set up ancillaries and supply chains and come out with new models which may work or may not work in the environment. So thank you, Raghu, for joining us in this discussion and thank you for watching News Clicks.


As each DNA fragment reaches the end of the gel, a laser excites its fluorescent dye. A camera detects the color of the emitted light and passes that information to a computer. One by one, the machine records the colors of the DNA fragments that pass through the gel. A single sequencing reaction can reveal the order of several hundred DNA bases.


Just got done seeing Bridge of Spies. Well, I didn't just get done him. This is the next morning. I'm on my way to work It was a solid film by Steven Spielberg who I wish would do bigger-scope pictures again This is the second movie in a row I went in fresh without seeing a trailer not even a scent of a trailer I had no idea what Bridges Spies was about and I have no history background I know nothing about history in America let alone in Russia So Bridges Spies was a fresh tale for me It takes place in the 1950s It's America and Soviet Russia are very much on the brink of nuclear war although there is some good supporting staff This is really a Tom Hanks vehicle basically he takes on the case. He's not familiar with he's defending a spy from Russia in America so a lot of the rules don't apply and really there's a huge amount of judgment on behalf of everybody in America they want this guy to fry they want him to hang for what he's done and Donovan's very much playing the justice system card You know he says the only thing that separates Americans from anybody else is the law. It's our Constitution Mark Reilis says Rudolph Abel gives a very understated performance here. It kind of smells of Oscar bait I don't know if he's gonna get that though. There's a lot of good contenders coming out this year What did I just run over is the loudest railroad tracks on the planet does a very good job I don't know if it's anything that you know I didn't stop watching the movie and think wow what a terrific performance But you never know with the Oscar crap that goes around who's gonna get nominated I'm still pissed that Jake Gyllenhaal didn't get nominated for nightcrawler last year Still but heard about that or Lego movie. Where was Lego movie? I haven't seen a Steven Spielberg film in a long time and it was very refreshing to see again He just has that old-school Film approach to it everything so cinematic without being just in your face The everything from the rain and the set pieces in the city It just all has this kind of surreal yet brilliant feel to it I don't know if that description makes any sense at all or if it even makes sense to me But that's what I'm going with so just let's just roll with it Is it saving private Ryan? No, is it Schindler's list not even close the story is just not that scale It's not that scope. This is a very you know It's still a very impactful and important story, but it's not something that like I said at the intro of this video I just Spielberg is just so good and so Confident and confident as a director. I want him to stick with these bigger grander things I'm very excited for ready player one this very well could have been handled by Ben Affleck Who's proven that he knows what he's doing behind the lens this reminded me of Argo a lot There was a lot of funny moments that I wasn't expecting.  This is a Disney PG 13 vehicle Just as entertaining though. I enjoyed it. I enjoyed myself though. It runs a bit long It's two hours and 15 minutes or something like that. I think it easily could have been two hours There's some subplots early on that don't get resolved. I mean, they're not really open-ended I guess but they there's just characters that are introduced early in the game that you never see again And it's just kind of puzzling It's like, okay Here's this kind of sidekick in the picture and then he's just gone for the last hour and 15 minutes You don't ever see him again not even a not even a picture in a picture frame So there's definitely some loose change that I don't know if it got cut on the on the floor room or in the editing room Or if it's just that's just the story and that's it I'm gonna leave it there There's some weird dude looking at me because I'm at the gas station talking to a camera and yeah Score time 8 out of 10 Seems seems appropriate for this one. Nothing really bad to say. It's just not the hard-hitting kind of exciting story I expect from Steven Spielberg or just in movies in general. It's it's very well done. It's competent But now there's another sketchy dude walking up to me. It's just what is happening here. All right I'm gonna talk to you later