Transcripts For CSPAN2 2017 Miami Book Fair 20171119

Welcome back to miami and date to a booktvs live coverage of the Miami Book Fair. Charlie sykes, van jones gumshoe atkinson are some of the authors you will hear from today and have the opportunity to talk with. The full schedule for the day is available booktv. Org. If you dont already follow us on social media, on twitter, facebook and instagram. Faster behind the scenes videos and photos booktv is her handle. Well, how the right lost its mind is a type of charlies new book indicates of the fair today from the campus of Miamidade College. Live coverage on booktv on cspan2. [inaudible conversations] and, unfortunately, we are experiencing [inaudible conversations] good morning, miami. Good morning. It is the 34th annual book fair. Lets give the book fair a round of applause. [applause] i am the dean of the Honors College at Miami Dade College and is an absolute pleasure to have the chance to share today with you if we are so fortunate in our community to have this extorted it but it would not be possible without sponsors like the Knight Foundation Apache Foundation of course the group foundation. Lets give them a round of applause. [applause] and hes acknowledged would not be complete unless we recognize all the friends of the fair which are here in this room right now. Please give yourselves a round of applause. [applause] as you know the date is filled with a series of extraordinary authors, and we have a pretty tight schedule some going to ask a couple things of you. First and foremost, please turn off your cell phones. If you would come just take a moment and leave them off for the rest of the day, let your brains soar. Secondly, i will ask that when we have q a will be asking you to line up behind the microphone. As mentioned with a fairly tight schedule, so when it appears as if were running out of time, i will appear so please know its not personal but it is limited based on our time schedule. And, of course, the room will be switching over what the time the program is over you can exit. The book signing off and he is in the green area to the right of the rescue should you wish to have your book signed. At this point i have a wonderful pleasure of welcoming our very own local hero, host of facing south florida. [applause] good morning. You can respond, good morning. Good morning. Get the blood pumping. This is a sunday so a revival church. I get honor of introducing charlie sykes. Charlie was born in seattle, grew up in new york and for some reason decided to settle in wisconsin. Maybe the weather in south florida will convince them to relocate down here. He once ran for office as a prolife democrat but lost but yet set some, a bar and was a revolutionary race at a think we did find lot of things in wisconsin. Hes also a journalist i background. He covered the Milwaukee City Hall for the milwaukee journal and begun to become the editor in chief of milwaukee magazine. Most folks know them today for his stint on msnbc but before that of course he was a powerhouse radio host in wisconsin hosting a conservative talk radio show for 13 years that was highly influential and did a a great deal. Was basically he want to win office in wisconsin, you came through charlies grills. He became famous as a never trumper. At of course book today is how the right lost its mind, and im going to kindly suggest that as a followup book in it, the title would be an arrest of us soon followed. Ladies and gentlemen, its my honor to introduce charlie sykes. [applause] yes, i think there would be followup books. First of all i want to thank the host of the Miami Book Fair for inviting me here today and the folks from cspan, too. Believe it or not i dont want to spent most of my time talking about donald trump today. I want to talk what donald trump is doing to us, you know, including were all living through this together. 2017, damn, we have hurricanes, full eclipse of the sun, wildfires, Aaron Rodgers is injured. Its almost like the universe or god is trying to tell us we did something wrong. [laughing] i would suggest that if you ask yourself what would jesus do . The edge would not be elect roy moore to the senate. [laughing] [applause] but i may be in the minority among conservative republicans on that issue. Were going to find out. I want to start off by just getting a bit of background, i i was conservative talkshow host for 23 years and i thought he understood what the Truth Movement was about. I thought i knew who conservatives were, and then along came donald trump. This is what i wrote just to set the record straight. In august 2015, which was a few months after donald trump descended that gold escalator to announce is going to run for president , and i wrote donald trump is a Cartoon Version of every media stereotype of the reactionary nativist misogynist right. Except is not a cartoon. Hes the leading gop candidate for president at the moment. To be clear, trump is not only a cynical opportunist, and inchoate ideologue but it generally repelling human being. Even leaving his tweets makes you dumber. Donald trump is an caricature of a a real candidate which makes his current post successful all the more baffling troubling. So point number one, republicans were warned. And not just by me. People keep asking the question what does donald trump had to do . What mine does he have to cross republicans to break within . And my answer is, whatever the light is come hes already trusted. Hes already broken the door. This is not new. So in may of 2016, after trump had successfully nailed down the republican nomination, i was on fox news. I believe this was the last time that i was on fox news [laughing] which means it it would be the last time ill ever be on fox news. Megyn kelly asked me a question, why are you not join anybody else in the Republican Party into the onboard . And i said, donald trump is a serial liar, a convent mocks the disabled women, hes a narcissist and a bully, a name no fixed principles rest of the candidate of emotionally insecure nineyearold. So no, i do want to get him control of the attack of the rs and the nuclear codes. Thats just me. I dont want but my confession is that trump does not bother me as much as what he has done to us, and to my fellow conservatives who, one after another, look at him and said, okay, we can support them to be the president of the United States. And i have compared it to, and i part this line from jonah goldberg, compared it to watching invasion of the body snatchers, one after another people who i knew did not disagree with me about my assessment, i decided in our physical error in this political age, from this moment we are in right now, that it was essential for them to get in line to capitulate to him, to enable him, to rationalize his behavior, to defend the indefensible. So i am, if you follow me on twitter, you know i am horrified by a lot of whats happened with what the president does, and it is not surprising if you paid any attention in 2015 or 2016 what hes done as president , but its still shocking to see it taking place from somebody with the mantle of power of the presidency of the United States. Now, and my one and only conversation with donald trump on the air, actually said to them, i said, mr. Trump, you are running for the office once held by abraham lincoln. You know, is this language appropriate . Of course we know what the answer is. So what i want to do in my brief comment, im going to open it up to questions can what i tried to do in the book is to take the focus off trump, our obsessive focus on the orange god king, which is so riveting, and to turn it around to us, how did we elect him president . How did the conservative movement go from william f. Buckley to ann coulter next how do we go from Ronald Reagan to donald trump . How do you go from edmund burke to sean hannity . What happened to us . And, of course, one of the key things when i started writing the book was to figure out what just happened to us. Was this a oneoff . Was a onetime thing . Wasnt something we missed in the conservative movement . Did donald trump just parachute in and take over an otherwise Healthy Movement . Or was Something Else going on . I concluded reluctantly, very reluctantly, that donald trump is not merely a cause. He certainly makes things worse but is also a symptom. The dysfunction was a preexisting condition which will also not be covered by Republican Health care plans. [laughing] what weve also learned, and you think this is the shock that a lot of us are experiencing, and i have described it, and debate on our politics with different reactions. For me 20152016 was a soul crushing, disillusioning slog as i watched this habit. I think was a shock to other folks who are realizing that this was something i think new in our politics. Its a reminder of our fragility that our system and our democracy is more fragile than we thought, that a lot of what weve taken for granted in terms of the democratic norms, things like, for example, checks and balances, that these are not to be more metaphors and hard and fast rules, that our government and our system has really been based on an honor system with the assumption was that the man or the woman in the oval office was a reasonably honorable person. And now we are trying to find out what if that is not the case . How we react as a democracy . We are also realizing i hope, im not going to try to be too dark here, that america, the United States of america, this shining city on a hill, this great rest of the community is not in fact, immune to history. That we in fact, can squander our democracy, that we can take the path that other democracies have taken. That were not necessarily entitled to simply go on by violating these norms. Because we are living through a time now where i dont think is going to be specifically defined by donald trump and by that i mean even after he leaves, the damage is going to remain because of what has happened to us and is happening and is accelerating, this rise of win at all cost partisanship, this tribal identity, the posttruth society that we live in, our post ethical society, our post knowledge politics. Now, i argue in the book that one of the things, i argue because, for me, one of the most troubling parts was, was watching the repudiation of the conservative mind. All throughout 2016 we heard that this was an assault on the establishment, or the elites. Was actually an assault on a lot of things. There is an establishment, there are elites but it was an assault on decency. It was an assault on traditions of thought, coherence, that we are still living through right now. Somebody asked me earlier today, so what about the conservative thought leaders . You know, the people who care about some of these ideas. And my answer is, well, most of those are in exile. Most of them have been labeled have been excommunicated from the movement. One of the stories i tell in the book is about william f. Buckley, jr. , the godfather of the modern conservative movement who, in the mid1960s, understood that if conservatism was ever going to be taken seriously it had to clean its own house. It had to get rid of the bigots, the crackpots, the lunatics. It had to expel the john birch society. Society. Had to make it clear that the ku klux klan was beyond the pale. He didnt do that because he was anticommunist or because he was a squish. He realized if you ever want to be taken seriously you need to drain your own deeper swap. And was successful fever they never went away because when they made their comeback in 2016, we found there was no william f. Buckley, jr. Who had the moral and intellectual and Political Authority to say stop, to expel you again. In fact, what we saw was the rise of these forces, the empowerment and the emboldening of folks that i will confess, you may think i am 90 for this, i thought wed marginalized didnt do we always knew that the angry drunk at the end of the bar wasnt there, right . Your bigoted uncle at thanksgiving, right . The one you take and images tun the television and stop talking about politics. But it turns out that it was a huge mistake to ignore the existence of these folks, to push back. Now, ive tried to go back and look at the key moments how and when this happened. Theres no definitive answer. Ive had interesting conversations. You know, was it when sarah palin was nominated to be Vice President . Was at a key moment, or was before the . Was it when Newt Gingrich weaponized politics act in the e 1990s, or was before that . Was it when Richard Nixon adopted the southern strategy . Was of a recently . When the drudge report, by the way, how many people are familiar the drudge report is basically a website that for many years was the assignment editor for much of the conservative media. Every conservative talk shows, every conservative person within the first hour of the day would read the drudge report which was a series of links to various things. Sometime in the last ten years i was never able to identify the exact moment, drudge again linking to alex jones from info wars. Alex jones, i can tell somebody of your family, is not your garden variety conspiracy theorist. This is a most toxic part of the paranoid fever swamps. 9 11 9 11 was an inside job, buo was sandy hook. That was staged. This is sick stuff, but he was injected into the mainstream come into the bloodstream of the conservative movement. If you want to know what happened with this explosion of fake news and propaganda, how was the immune system of the Consumer Movement destroyed . That was one of them. You can go back to what happened with the tea party, which i have a somewhat competent relationship with your the tea party more into this perpetual outrage machine that i think was taken over by drifters and charlatans, but also that the conservative movement into this place we are in now, where, its kind of a shock of realization that conservatives are not the clear what they are for. They are very clear what they are against. And who they hate. To a certain extent politics today, conservative politics can, and i will be of course criticized for this, but can be summed up in whatever makes liberals upset. As long, excuse me, but as long as i pissed off liberals, and it must be good. As long as i make liberals their heads explode, then it must be good. No matter what that is, it is essentially a form of negative tribalism that is incredibly powerful and important to understand. The other thing that i think were going to have to grapple with is the rise of the alternative reality silos in our media. And this is this is a very dift thing for me because i was, i was part of the conservative right wing media for two decades, but i thought, perhaps naively, that we were presenting a different point of view, not that we were creating an alternative reality. I knew that this was morphing into an echo chamber, but what we found in 2016 is the silos become impenetrable, that information could not penetrate in, and that all kinds of bizarre, sick and twisted stories would circulate, and were impossible to refute. A lot of my year in 2016 which i recount in about is pushing back the people that i had known for 20 years, 20 years, and in the past i would be able to say you know thats a hoax, thats not true, or heres the actual facts of this. And people would say okay, thank you, charlie, for point that out. But in 2016 that changed with the explosion of facebook, wih the rise of the breitbart media infrastructure. And i would point out, look, this is not true and i will send you a link to the Washington Post or the New York Times. The response i got increasingly was all, those liberal rags. They wouldnt bleed anything outside the bubble. Thats the moment we realize we have succeeded in delegitimizing, not just criticizing the media but delegitimizing all factbased journalism. And i think that we have seen the consequences of that, and i think that the fact that the president of the United States is weaponizing that particular phenomenon is a real and present danger to our democratic discourse. So for me writing this book was a bit cathartic because its asking the question, as a conservative, who are we . Who do we really believe in . What is really important to us . And what did we miss . What did we adore . What were the failures to take the stand at the right moment . And i will be honest with you that im still wrestling with all of this. Still wrestling with the power of tribalism. And i dont think that weve actually plumbed the bottom of it yet. If you ask the question, what you been . By the way, a lot of conservatives, understand theres an alternative reality. A lot of considered safe the title of my book is ridiculous how the right lost its mind, are you kidding me . We won the election. Being crazy doesnt mean you wing election. We have a Supreme Court justice, were about to get this wonderful tax cut bill, all of these things. My answer to how did the right lose its micro look at alabama right now. Look where were going. Im going to wrap up because of what to get to your questions in a moment, but you almost get the sense that even in the heart of trump world, they realize that they cannot fully control all of the forces they have unleashed. They had been nourishing this, alligator in the bathtub. The alligator has grown and its loose and it is still angry. Republicans are fine with one another to be the last one eaten buying to borrow a phrase from winston churchill. But you are seeing this, the tribalism was having to evangelical christians and the notion that this character action matter anymore. Im going to wrap up on this and say one last thing. We are more polarized than ever. If we had a diagram of the left and the right, theres not a lot of overlap. But the part that there is an overlap, that small sliver is intensely important. What is that overlap . Decency, truth, constitutional limits, the rule of law. All of those things i think are absolutely crucial, and that the dialogue that i think that we urgently have to have if we are willing to break out of our own bubbles. Thank you very, very much. [applause] we are going to take questions now. Light up your im going to become the bad guy because im going to just, please come well have about 20 minutes for questions. Get to a question. No speeches. [applause] right . All right. Be respectful. A lot of people want to ask questions, so go ahead. Thank you. I never thought i would be admiring a conservative talk host. [laughing] and this show, how can we get back . It was fantastic and i sent emails. I just dont know how to make it happen. You referring to the show that we did out of wnyc raqqa simple greater stations across the country. We had house from across local spectrum and it was an extraordinarily interesting express for me in the first 100 days of the trump administration, but i will say my very first show on public radio in january of this year where i am a in a strange place. You have to understand, having been a conservative talkshow host to be on npr station, i had a great deal of fun but it do think, i do think the folks at the grade are looking for ways of can to get dialogue and to continue to work with those folks that the it will take a different form, but those kinds of conversations are so rare but they are so valuable. I think we have devolved into a red state blue state society, and so my question is, how has the Electoral College fair . Most people in the world look at our elections as being unfair because they dont understand the system, and i guess im not sure i understand why we have an Electoral College and what the reason we continue to have it. Wouldnt it be better if our candidates went to all the states and not just the states that they think they can win or a borderline close states . Yeah, that would be. Let me answer your question this week and is you said we become a red state blue state, you know, divided country. Its way worse than that. It is fundamentally worse. We are becoming too separate societies. Its obvious what happened on social media, and i get to this point in the moment, that we live in completely different worlds. When i was still doing my conservative talkshow i really got a sense of that here in the morning i was in the conservative bubble or trying to break out of it. In the evening doing msnbc which by the way the left has its own bubbles as well. But increasingly its not just on the states. We are sorting ourselves out geographically. There was a book called the big sort written back in the 1990s, his track the way were actually choosing to live in places that, based on lifesty, based on politics. This edition is getting worse. Its actually manifesting itself physically. You can see in the maps, not just the statements. Look at the county maps of whats happening to the country. So frankly any of the policy answers, including changing the Electoral College or even redistricting, not saying these are not legitimate but they dont go to the heart of the division that were having right now, that we are idolizing ourselves. That is the fundamental issue tribal icing. In a lot of ways the other physical dimension of that is really just an outcropping. Thank you. And democrats, next time when the Electoral College. [laughing] unser, i was in wisconsin and it would be nice if hillary would have come once. I mean we have cheese and beer and stuff. Sometimes you have to show up. How can we get out from under this . I acted with my local aclu chapter of my route counter Democratic Party. Were always looking for ways to get people in and educate, but usually were preaching to the choir. How can we get out from under this . Well, i used to address this question of preaching to the choir, you know why we preach to the choir . So they will sing. [laughing] but you do need, this is one of the things i think is happening on the right, and i will tell unlikely to try to judge dodger answer honestly right now the problems of the left of the democrats, they put that in the box i call not my problem. Its your problem. But to understand the trump campaign, theyve stopped talking to people outside of their tribe. Almost everything they are doing is throwing red meat to the base. You see that in the congressional vote for everything is being done on the narrowest of partisan majorities. You see the president unwilling to break with his base anyway which by the way explains why he is not rescind his endorsement of an accused pedophile run in alabama. So this may be an opportunity is, in fact, trump conservatives have stopped talking to moderate and independent and people across the aisle. This is an opportunity, but and again, why should democrats taking it my advice . You scare the crap out of us. Part of it is understand there are a lot of voters who want the democrats not to force them to vote for donald trump i understand how sensitive that is for some people but in this binary world, that was the essential dynamic at the end, that no matter how awful donald trump was, remember, he was elected like a 60 disapproval rating, and yet yet hes running against somebody who was regarded as even worse. Whether thats true or not, this is part of the thinking in american politics. Whos going to talk to people outside the bubble . So you think we should reach out to those republicans . I would think so, yes. The Virginia Election i think was an indication. You had a moderate centrist democrat, i will get criticized for that as well, but who did not frighten wing voters and if the democratic can win in alabaa it will be for the same reason. Okay, thank you. Politics have become about entertaining and social media and 50 years ago before the rise of social media, would trump have even gotten off the ground . Know, those points are outstanding. Theres a relationship between culture and politics, obviously, that i think was dramatically on display. Virtually no one in political journalism have watched the apprentice i knew. They didnt understand how powerful reality tv was as a nonpolitical event. So yes, our politics is about entertainment. Visual media has changed the flow of information dramatically but also the way we interact with politics. Heres a more fundamental band, by the way, the terrible failure of the media and giving so much free airtime to donald trump , we will go back and say what will or you thinking . They put him on on edited and you see the chart of how much more air he got in any other republican candidate. How he sucked allthe oxygen out of the room. The answer to that is twofold. One widget, perhaps one illegitimate. One obvious one was about what got ratings and they take the ratings. The other was he was seeing so many horrible things that people would hear this and be horrified and theresno way that he would be to survive and of course we all lived through this. He insults them, he brags about sexual assault. Still gets elected. Thats not about him. Thats about us. One more point about our politics, guys like you and i , we i think have brought politics in terms of ideas, policies and accomplishments when in fact politics is now more about attitude. Its about your identity. It is about why the entertainment quality becomes so much more important so people out there in the world, like senator marco rubio or Hillary Clinton were thinking i need to come up with detailed position papers. Donald trump is going, people dont want any of that stuff. They just want bread and circuses. They want things that will make liberals cry. They want all of that and i think he had an insight into what happened to our politics. Trump seems tohave a solid support of about 35 percent. Can you imagine any tweets that he might send or that is so outrageous or any action that you might take that is so horrific that might cause that 35 percent number two decline and part b for that would be when any of those things make any difference to the republicans in congress . That are now supporting him . Let me answer the second part first. When are republicans going to break with trump and the answer is when their base breaks. You look at that 35 percent and say hes very unpopular. They look at the 80 percent rating among conservatives and say i cant risk it because im more concerned about losing in a primary and a general election. You will see political consequences and by the way, i didnt ask about this but i thought it was an extraordinary moment when a former president george bush, formerrepublican nominee john mccain, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee bob corker and jeff flake in a period of about a week gave speeches calling out the dangers to our democratic norms. It was an amazing moment. It was also amazing because they were speaking to a lot of other republicans have been reluctant to speak. But youll notice how other republicans blame them publicly. And everyone i mentioned is basically out of electoral politics. So theres that dynamic. In answer to your first question what will it take for the trump base to break, ill let you know when it happens. We have seen him almost impervious to any of it. Do not assume that base will vote with him even after the russia investigation becomes more toxic. I havent even mentioned that. Again, i am so old i remember when conservative republicans thought that the russian attempts to hurt our democracy could be a big deal. And that we should be concerned about that sort of thing. Last years book fair was about two weeks after the election. Enough time for the shop to have worn off a little. I spoke to an author signing table and said i understood now how about the rise of nazi germany. And he told me that was ridiculous, things would never get that bad. What are your feelings . Well, i cant remember what the term is but anytime the first person the nazi loses the argument, however, i will tell you that throughout 2016 i lead to people that i was close to and it was a smaller group, but that i understood the dynamics of the 1930s a lot better including the way that insurgent rational, decent people convinced themselves to support something because the other side was worse. I understand that. I understand now why someone so made at least made the trains run on time. Our version is, is at least it taxes so were willing to put up with everything. Im not going to the nazi thing here but i will say this. Theres nothing preordained about our democracy and our democratic norms. These do not exist because weve been guaranteed. Were not entitled to them. And we have to fight for them. Ronald reagan says were always one generation away from losing our freedom and i think maybe thats a shot. Maybe its because there are things we dont appreciate, some people are threatened with the loss of it. Maybe we now understand these things. I feel that way. I feel more passionately about the country and how important it is now than i did even 10 years ago. We may have been waving the flag but in how we feel that it made a difference. [applause] good morning. This morning i woke up to an article with the headline defending roy moore, alabamas gop with the tradition of defiance. Although theres democratic challenger is edging out in the polls, he still has a very sizable and tendency of supporters. In light of this, i wanted to ask do you think the Republican Base bill sees itself as a part of decency and family values in the age and how does it justify this . [applause] you should invite sean hannity to answer that question because they would have more insight into it. Again, when i use words soul crushing and disillusioning, it is. And if you remember when the party talked aboutdecency and family values, how can you reconcile that . Part of this is if you understand that our politics is us versus them. If you convinced for example evangelical christians that you are under attack, you are under siege, they are coming for you, you have people who retreat within the fortress and they wont listen to the arguments and they will rally around and defend their guy who is being taken down. Its a powerful phenomenon. The politics of paranoia. It helps trigger your reality bubble that as i said before, i could write a whole book on laws and how the evangelical question right lost its mind because thats whats really on display here. I say that with no disrespect to christianity. My concern is that those leaders are rationalizing roy moore are doing more damage to christianity and to religion in general and any atheist author has ever done. That any secularist has ever done and this is a moment of choosing. A moment of choosing for them as well. But you want to just look at the kind of phenomenon were talking about. Everything binary, everything is black and white, everything is us versus them and then theres a point where you go ive given up everything i claimed i cared about because i have adopted morally relativistic win at all costs living which is shocking and stunning to see even though we are there. One sentence in a question. The sentences years ago Warren Beatty was in a movie where he ran for president and he was very different than anyone else because he spoke as he saw fit and didnt use. I think people are so tired of hearing politicians that speak and not answer questions but thats that some of those, they going over to trump. The question i have is are we in a moment that i realized that the Republican Party had gone astray of when i read that, Top Republican leaders met on Inauguration Day and decided to oppose everything that barack obama was for. And i want to know if that has happened before and we just didnt know about it or did it happen because he was an africanamerican or because he was a democrat . I cant comment on whether that is there but obviously we went into complete oppositional politics where rather than try to compromise, when the compromise become a dirty word . I felt that happening over the last decade. And we are really reaping the impact of that right now. And in terms of people supporting trump because they were tired of the same old politics andgobbledygook , i would recommend if you have some time you never want to get back, read the transcript of any interview of donald trump. This is where people would always say, he tells it like it is. What is . When they asked him who here would vote for the republican candidate no matter who it was, hes the only one who said no. And the other didnt vote for him but they would say. It was a novelty candidate aspect to all of this that i think a lot of people play around with and wait around with. That this would never actually, its like playing around with fire and you burned down the whole city. That sort of thing. But i find among the most extraordinary things is number one, he tells it like it is. The bar is set pretty high in terms of politicians who are liars. We have a lot of liars out there. In terms of just how often he says things that are demonstrably untrue, how indifferent to the truth he is, how he weapon arises full information and yet he tells it like it is. Really . Not to mention the utter and complete incoherence of the mans thought pattern. It never ceases to amaze. That is the one thing that really depresses me is you read anything that he says and you go okay, howdoes anyone listen to this and not think , we are really in trouble. As a physician with 45 Years Experience in patient care, i know that we need to have every United States citizen covered with comprehensive and yet economic healthcare. [applause] now, as a conscientious republican who is not beholden, conscientious conservative, im sorry, who is not beholden to any special interest who have gotten rich of exploiting the American People, how would a conscientious republican design a program that would give every American Comprehensive and economical political care . The first thing i would say, the first rule should be, you will recognize this as a physician, first do no harm. Do not break something that you dont have a good idea how youre going to fix. And i think thats one of the things that was apparent is as republicans we been campaigning on revealing obamacare for seven years, then they get into office and theyre like, we dont know how to do this not damaging the system. What i find extraordinary is that right now, the only strategy the republicans team to have is to sabotage the system, create as much pain and dislocation as possible and hope somehow that somebody else is to blame. Im always hasnt to say, use a word like unprecedented because theres always is historian that will bring something up but im not sure the last time a party that was president set out to sabotage a Government Program that tens of millions of people rely upon for political advantage. Its truly an extraordinary moment this is one of those things. I dont know that youre ever going to get any republican to buy into for example singlepayer health care. Im talking about that. Next but there have to be sometime in the distant future when this the c breaks. Some sort of a system that looks at this problem and says okay, rather than imposing some sort of an abstract dogma on the medical system, what is the program thats going to make sure that every sick child is able to get a best kind of medical care . Thats not leftwing, thats not right wing. Jimmy kimmel is soundly marked by conservatives. I dont think that was unreasonable, that no american be denied healthcare how will we structure it . Whats been the standard bar. I think there are people who probably design that but im afraid that its going to get into a sickly binary choice. Government controls everything or destroy everything just because we can read it and thats why i think people ought to be worried about this. Again, i see this as a conservative, im watching guys that ive known for years that you dont know what youre doing here. Have you thought through what actually happens . And this whole way of governing and legislating about public hearings, without deliberation, especially because the stakes are so great. Thank you. [applause] thats all the time we have four questions, please join me in thanking mister fry. Thank you. If you wish to have your book signed, he will be on the green autographed area for the next program. Please have your ticket handy. You are watching the tv on cspan2, live coverage of the Miami Book Fair. Charlie sykes will be joining us later and you will have a chance to talk with him about 15 minutes or so. Cnns van jones will be talking about is new book. Thats coming up but in the meantime we are set up in the center of the festival with the book tv call inset. We which is joined by author and journalist jefferson morley. His most recent book is called the ghost. The secret life of cia spy master james jesus eggleston. Who was mister adelson, mister moore . You would be born in 1917, he beyond her years old. He was a gale educated spy. And one of really the founding personalities of the cia, one of the most powerful man in the cia from its founding in 1947 until his forced retirement in 1974 really a founding father of us counterintelligence. What type of issues and areas that he work in . Singleton use his position as chief of counterintelligence to create a kind of eia within the cia. Go eat out everywhere. It very influential in us policy toward israel. Created programs of surveillance, opening the mail of americans. Involved in the domestic surveillance schemes of the Nixon White House for example. Involved in the early days of mk ultra mind experiment program. A story i tell him, this was a man who made his influence felt everywhere. Very involved in us politics toward cuba. Disposition, a lot of ca officers right through a geographical Directory Division within the cia. Angleton had his fingers in many things. Was he a wellknown personality during the years he was active . It was not. Theres stories, one story that i heard, one man worked for him for four years and never knew who he was. He was very secretive in his ways. Even within the cia. One of the underlying themes of your book is the importance of bureaucratic infighting when it comes up again and again. Singleton is a master of that. As an administrator, hes kind of lousy. He doesnt deal well with his subordinates. Imagine if somebody work for you for four years and doesnt know who you are but in a one to one meeting, angleton was intelligent and hispresentations were very compelling. Cultivated allen dulles , richard helms, cia directors and so forth. He was able to maintain his position even when he came in for a lot of criticism from his other colleagues in the cia. Jefferson morley, if you survive in the cia at that level from 47 to 75, we often think about j edgar huber and the fbi surviving that many president s. If you get close to the president as well or was he, did he have to work on people, what was it . He was right. And he was a close collaborator with hoover for many years. Huber didnt like the cia at all but he did come to trust singleton because angleton supplied him with that kind of secret information and both of them were masters at using secrets to leverage their power. So yes, angleton did collect information. The president and the president was probably closer to president nixon. Nixon was the man who appealed to me most. He thought eisenhower maybe was a bit dodgy, jfk a bit we created lbj crude. Angleton was the best prepared president. He liked nixon a lot and is compelling that they both fell at the same time and for the same reasons, because they were spying on their enemies. They were excessive about secrecy. Nixon resigned in august 1974 and angleton resigned in december. The last chapter of watergate. Is there room at the cia named after Mister Angleton . It in the cia, angleton is not in good standing. They sent people, agents to review what this man done because it was so secretive the cia themselves didnt know. And the internal consensus on angleton is negative. You made a lot of mistakes and his actions on the agency so he is not honored that much within the agency. You say in the book that his legacy is the mass surveillance of americans. Yeah. Today we have this powerful system of mass surveillance that weve learned where the nsa can pick up on your email and telephone calls. Angleton pioneered an early version of that which was the open end of the mail of americans. He picked up this program in 1955, it was very small. It was opening 100, 200 letters a year but within a few years was opening 10,000 letters a year and on the barest of authority. There was no justification, no warrants, no probable cause for opening peoples mail. And he ran his program from the late 50s to the early 70s. Opening 10,000 letters a year, copying them, effecting the names, so this really was americas first Mass Surveillance Program so you can see as the progenitor of the systems that we have to day. Use the same justifications that we hear today from the nsa and cia. Another line from the book is that Mister Angleton was not surprised when Lee Harvey Oswald showed up. He knew, he might have been surprised when he shot him but he knew very well who Lee Harvey Oswald was. One of the most distinctive things, one of the most important pieces of the book is that Angleton Oswald under close monitoring in november 1959 and for the next four years, wherever oswald went, hamilton was informed in detail about what he was doing, who he was in touch with, hispolitics, personal life , his foreign travel so the story that was sent to the American People after the assassination that this guy came out of nowhereand shot the president , that was a cover story to protect angleton. Oswald had been monitored for years before november 22 area. It does eia know he was in dallas . A week before the assassination on november 15 1963, angletons top aide times for an fbi report. We have the routing slips. His liaison officer, he received the report and in that report the new orleans fbi office reported oswald had returned from mexico city and was living in the dallas area so i believe that angleton read that report and he was a voracious consumer of intelligence. I believe angleton new oswald was in dallas. Mister morley, youve been a reporter for 37 years. Do you go out to the cia and go out to their archives . I asked them for an interview and not surprisingly, they turned me down. I got this from interviews with retired cia people, declassified records and archival material at lbj library, the general library. Jfk library as well as different collections at stanford, yale and austin university. Though this was kind of an investigative irv. If the cia documents were available, would it be a different book . Absolutely. Theres a secret study of angletons tenure. Its 12 volumes, each volume is 400 pages in that study encompasses angletons entire career. Its totally classified so the full story of James Angleton is still classified. As i say in the beginning, this is the story as best it can be told so far. If americans are suspicious of a shadow government, running this country. Your book is a little bit of support to that question. When i started this book, nobody talked about that, that was an unknown phrase. Two years later the president believes in it and its in headlines all the time this suspicion is the area i wasnt going to look for the deep state but if you look at angletons career, you see the power that somebody can accumulate operating within these secret agencies and it does lend credence to these fears that people are secretly manipulating our political system from these positions ofsecrecy. Angleton certainly did. What do we not know about him and how much do we know about his personal life . Who were his friends . Angleton was a very attractive man personally and people really believed in him. He was a father of three, lived very modestly in Arlington Virginia off of lee road. His wife came from a very wealthy family but there was nothing ostentatious about him. He was an intellectual. He cared about books , travel , he was at the end of his career andalcoholic. And tended to isolate him. And it also made his thinking rigid and this is what led to his downfall. He lost allies within the cia by the early 1970s. But you know, even when i didnt likehim, he was a very , he was never an uninteresting man. He was a complex character and he was always interesting to try to figure out how he would think and how he made his way. He was in his office until 1975 and you talk with people who knew him well. Yesterday. I talked with a man named efrain levy who is the eventually became the chief of the mossad. And, the new angleton from when angleton would go to israel which he did frequently and how levy was a junior officer who was preparing his briefcase and driving the car. And how levy knew him quite well. I talked with a man named peter seychelles was a cia officer who worked with him in the 1950s. I talked with jane roman who was his aid, bill hood was another man who worked with him that iinterviewed so these retired cia people , some of you arenow dead , provided this type insight into what was a man like . Jefferson morley spent manyyears at the Washington Post. And he writes for them anymore . Occasionally. You have the spelling out . Im going to write about the jfk files from the Washington Post. Was recently released. Were trying to go through and figure out what significant and i have ideas towards that end. Have you found in your going through these pages or files, have you found new materials . There are things that are new. Its a little confusing because some of this stuff has been made public before and people who come to the subject for the first time, they dont look at it. Those of us whove been involved in this know that thats not true. But so far there have been some interesting things but remember the cia knows whats in there. Theyre not going to release the good stuff first. Theyre going to release the good stuff last so we are still waiting or the most important material to be released. The authors author is jefferson morley, secret lives of the cia spymaster James Angleton. Book tv is live in miami for the Miami Book Fair and coming up next is cnns van jones. His new book is called beyond themessy truth. Hes talking about that. Afterwards, we will show you a bit of the book signing that mister jones is doing and we want to hear your reaction to what he has to say in his presentation so its your chance to talk about what you heard and thats whats coming up, several more hours live. Go to our website booktv. Org for the schedule and beginning in just a moment, van jones. [inaudible conversation] good morning miami. Good morning miami please find your seats. Were going to get started. Its an absolute pleasure to be here with you, my name is pascal charlo, dean of the Honors College at Miamidade College and we are excited to offer you the 34th annual book fair. [applause] this book fair would not be possible without the support of premier sponsors such as the Knight Foundation. The Battle Foundation and the grohl foundation. We are also thrilled to have with us our local heroes, many of whom are here today. Please acknowledge their support. Todays program will feature van jones who will speak at the time. Yes please, give him a shout out. We will have time reserved for questions at the microphone. If you see me, thats not a good sign, that means were running out of time to be concise your questions and we will be able to get as many in as possible. If you have not already silenced her cell phone, please note that he will be signing books in the autograph area, the green autograph. To the right of the escalator. At this time i have the distinct honor and pleasure of introducing my codirector of the bureau foundation. Is my great pleasure this morning to introduce and jones. Van jones is the nn political contributor and host of the recurring special but messy truth. He grew up in the conservative south, graduated from Yale Law School and is the author of two New York Times bestsellers. The green colored economy and rebuild the dream. Van jones is also a social entrepreneur. He founded the social justice excelerator the dream core and has led numerous social and Environmental Enterprises including the Ella Baker Center for human rights, color of change and dream for all. Among his many honors, hes been named one of the best companies 12 most Creative Minds on earth area. And times 100 most influential people. Van jones has made his mission to challenge voters and viewers to stand in one anothers shoes and disagree constructively. In his new book, beyond the messy truth, he encourages all of us to set fire to our old ways of thinking about politics and to come together with when the pain is greatest. Join me in welcoming van jones. [applause] hello. Miami book fair. Well, thats an honor to be near. The 849 Miami Book Fair, Something Like that. Im glad i got in before the hundreds. But i am going to talk for a shorter period of time because i want to get to the question. I am very concerned about where we are as a country and if we dont change direction, we are going to end up where we are headed. Where were headed is very bad. Democracy can fail. In fact, democracies usually fail. And the fact that we have had a democratic republic here for 200 years is a miracle. That we should take more seriously than we do. So i wrote a book called beyond the messy truth but the subtitle is more important than the title. The title is how we came apart. And how we come together. And the call i got a chance to work at cnn and ive been able to in conversation with both guys for a while, ive also been to red states and blue states this past year, west virginia. Ive been to south los angeles. Ive been to the arizona mexico border. Ive been to flint michigan. And what i can report back to you is that theres common pain across this country. Every place i go, its the same story. Addiction, a broken criminal justice in court system, bad jobs or no jobs. Common pain. But no common purpose yet. Common pain should lead to common purpose. Common purpose should lead to common projects area common projects should become common sense but thats not whats happening. And i am very concerned that we now have a political dynamic that set in where both sides can score points just attacking the other side without any concern for how we might actually solve the problem. Or get something done. Make the country work, and this does not, by the way from a position of centrism. Im not acentrist. Im a strong liberal, proud progressive. Obviously im on the left side of pluto. You cant find any issue im not on the left side up. Im left on transgender liberation back in 1967. Though this is, im not new to these. I was working on Police Accountability back in the 90s. I found in organizations, the Ella Baker Center for human rights that help to close five abusive prisons, ive been on the frontlines of all these issues. Black lives matter before we even have that phrase. So when somebody whos as strong a progressive as i am says hold on a second guys, i think its Worth Holding onto second. Let me tell you how i think we got to this place. And let me tell you how i think we might be able to move forward. Both Political Parties, this is i think now less controversial than it might have been but i would say over the past 30 years, both Political Parties fought, they just sucked. And its just a technical term. Political science. But what i mean is both Political Parties signed on to ideas that turned out to be just ruinous, bad ideas for working people. It was both Political Parties that we should sign on to trade deals like nafta and it would be great for everybody. And it was great for a lot of people. But the beneficiaries of globalization arent i use and ungrateful. It doesnt mean you both walmart and say were raising taxes but the losers are concentrated in the Industrial Department and they are just because theyre rightfully pissed. They overpromised how we were going to fix the industry and they never showed up. But both parties signed off on that, both parties signed off on the regulating wall street. Both parties. And they said was really wrong with america, you know whats really hurting the country, taggers are oppressed. So bankers. Bankers are struggling under this oppressive weight. Leave kooky in jail but free the bankers. We got to free the bankers, what could possibly go wrong . And within years you had crash of millions of dollars, millions of homes, both parties find on that. Both parties signed off on the idea thatwe should build prisons. Both parties, mass incarceration. Raising each other, to strikes and youre out, you know. Both parties. And they said it would make black communities better and its just destroyed families, destroyed neighborhoods. But both parties were for that. Both parties said we should get involved in these overseas wars. 15 years, we still cant figure out a way out of them. But when you have two parties, you have a bipartisan elite failure at the top of both parties, at some point, youre going to have a bipartisan rebellion. And so what you saw in the Democratic Party, you saw black lives matter. You saw Bernie Sanders movement. And in the Republican Party, you saw the Tea Party Movement being curled into this trump thing. But i think the wrong rebel one. Im antitrust but the rebellion itself is justified. This frustration, the sense that the big people up there dont care about me, thats justified. The fact that both Political Parties seem to have learned so little from this train crash. You have 47 percent of democrats voting for you know, a former. Bernie sanders had the same political stand that Dennis Villeneuve had got two percent of the vote. He got 47 percent of the vote. That shouldve been a huge thing for the Democratic Party. There was a massive level of discontent and yet it was brushed under the rug, brushed under even the present day. So what do i think now, having been around the country . I seem to things iwant to share with you. In the book, i really tried to get into the mistake i think that democrats have made. And its a complicated argument. I think that the democrats have a lot to be proud of in that we drew a circle from 2016 that included people who have been left out, cracked on and mistreated and disrespected for too long and the Democrats Use to include people in the back of the bus but this time we included people and we were proud of that. The lgbt queue community, even in 2012, no less than president barack obama was a little hesitant in 2012 to speak out for marriage equality. Remember . It was joe biden that got out there and said we are for it and obama said joe, right . So then obama came out in 2012 she basically like, well, for me personally im for it. Im not going to put the law forward but my friends have lesbian moms. Thats just five years ago. Now we have transgender liberation, people think if youre not for it its weird. Im proud of that. Im proud of that. One reason i dont like democrats calling ourselves progressives, i think trump is the resistance. I think we are winning and thats why these people are freaking out. So im proud of that. Im proud of the fact that we embrace american muslims without apology. Its really frustrating to me, i talk about in the book why are we so tough on american muslims . This is one of the best countries that we have. We have the lowest crime rates, they have the lowest divorce rates, they have the highest education, one of the highest educational rates for women, american muslims. Every muslim you know, theyve got a job, an advanced degree and or a business. This is the actual muslims that we have, their amazing people. If a muslim family moved in next door to you, you would be thrilled because the chances of your kid getting in trouble just went way down. Way down. So you have this Amazing Group and then we mistreat them. We have to because of terrorism. I dont mean to be rude. But statistically, the majority of terrorists in the United States are not muslims. I dont understand. I just dont understand. So. See what i did there . Anyway, i dont get it. The immigrant community, not just that, weve got 11 Million People the country is literally falling apart. If they say when were leaving, we would know what to do. Construction would fall apart. Articles would fall apart. Theres 11 Million People and democrats embrace those folks. Black lives matter, probably the first one ever to be president , thats all without us. I dont want anybody to back away from that. We raised the bar, we should leave it there and let everybody else catch up. And i also think its fair to say that we may have drawn the circle a little too small. There may have been people who were also hurting and we did a good job with the traditional disenfranchised. But theres some newly disenfranchised here earning folks. Who are white. Who are often male, who are working class and who whose pain didnt register with the democratic coalition. And for those people, its tough to admit this. But if the only time Hillary Clinton has a white guy in the, its donald trump. That may not signal a local party. So i think that for our side, you need to draw the circle as big as can be drawn. You draw as big as early chisholm drew it, just draw the circle the way we used to dry to include everybody and this time be loud and proud about some of the people that have been baffled about before and i think will be all right. On the other side, i think you have a real problem. The left are good, the Republican Party is the party of lincoln. Its the party that was founded on antislavery, proliberty party. And its now in danger of becoming the party of steve bannon. Now, theres nothing inherent in conservatism that requires this sort of hostile thing for people of color, for the rising majority. In fact, im going to be honest. Black people should be voting for republicans. All my god, how can you say that . And if you actually have a conversation with africanamericans, we are the most churchgoing part of the democratic coalition. The two strongest parties of the black community, the black church and hiphop. Right . Pop. Nobodys rapping about being on welfare. There wrapping up getting rich. Thats republican, right . There wrapping about us, thats republican. And then the people, black people go to church multiple times a week. So this is, its weird why an aspiring, we have a strong middle class that we never talk about. Why are half of us voting for republicans . Because the Republican Party, if you listen to the talk radio guys, and watch that new station that they have, im not going to mention them. But i will say this, go home for thanksgiving, youll have a relative that only watches one station. And you can be out that if you are a news source, your primary source of information is specifically named after a furry predatory mammal that cant be trusted, cant guard the hen house or anything else, you might want to diversify. You just might want to diversify, thats all im going to say. Im not going to mention fox. You just might want to diversify. So but when you listen to the furry predator station. Its almost all negative. You would think all black people are lazy criminals and you cant vote for a party that doesnt respect you. I dont care what they put on the website, i dont care what they say. You cant support it. And theres nothing inherent in conservatism that would require this level of hostility towards immigrants, towards muslims, towards africanamericans so i think you have a great party in danger now of being taken over by white supremacists. And i think thats a concern to everybody. Ive been proudto see people , i never thought i would say it kind word about jeb bush. I mean, but to him, he came out and said i dont like this stuff. I wish more of them would do what george w. Bush is doing, i dont like that stuff. Thats important. So then the question is how can we combat this . I want to be very clear. Im not a pollyanna person. Ive been on the frontlines of some of the toughest struggles my entire adult life. Ive been to a lot of funerals, a lot of young people and older, grayhaired people sitting up in the pews. I think a lot of horrifically bad invalid measures passed and hurt a lot of people. Im on the frontline guys. Im not a july i guy and theres some things we have to fight it out. Good thing about democracy is we dont have to agree. On a dictatorship, you have to agree. Democracy, we can disagree so were going to fight about some stuff, going to fight about immigration. Womens rights, quite about a lot of stuff but you cant only fight and still have a country. You cant only fight and still have a country. And if we keep jumping up and down on the floor boards, at some point youre going to have a breakdown. A realbreakdown. You dont want to live in that and neither do i so in addition to the battleground where we should show up i believe , with as much principle and as much dignity as possible, its also massive Common Ground that we never even discussed. You have just this addiction crisis that is tearing this country apart and i have stuff in my book that you can stick a bunch of it tomorrow on a bipartisan basis, you say republican, i say a democrat. You dont change one thing you can think and we can fix a big part of this crisis tomorrow. Unless i forgot, my friends died of the same opioid that are tearing up rural white america. This is across the board. And i think if we start dealing more intelligently with people. Crisis, that should open the door to the narcotic crisis. Thats supporting community and people said not one time is working in the police. So we can completely reset on how we deal with addiction but were not doing it. The criminal justice systemis a complete catastrophe. So much so that republican governors, nobody on the Democratic Party. You have republican governors that have been shy about how dysfunctional and all our prisons are and have been closing prisons. Rick perry in texas, would clear three presence and brought the crime rate down. Governor steele in georgia has brought the crime rate down by 30 percent. John casey in ohio, republican governor, big criminal justice reform, nikki haley the same thing. Black lines matter area and republican governors have more in common on prisons and a ever sat down to talk about. On ground. But well talk about it, we will want to argue about tweets all the time. And then also, nobody thinks that their kids or their grandkids or their niece or nephew is actually being trained for the jobs of tomorrow. Nobody. Public school, private school, vouchers, not counters. Im not talking about education reform, im talking about the curriculum. Nobody teaches the kids in a world of Artificial Intelligence and going to mars and smart screens and robots. Your kids are ready, my kids are ready. So its an emergency. Were not even talking about it. So there is Common Ground beyond the battleground. My proposal in this book is simple. From nine until noon, lets just fight. Every day, just fight. And then from noon until one, can we get something done . One thing, anything. Anything that might help a Single Person in america. Just one hour. And then afterwards, from one until dinner, we will fight some more. And is that a crazy idea . Can we do one thing to help one person together . Because if we dont, we are going to end up where we are headed. Kids are doing better than the grown people now. The kids are doing way better. The grown people are now flunking kindergarten. Remember kindergarten . Listen, sit in your chair. Theres not a Single Person i can identify in public life that would do well in kindergarten because we fight all the time. Nobody listens, nobody shares. Listen to what we can make the kids do. Thats the genius of america. We forcethese kids every morning and most , they go to school, they should. We make them stand up and we make them say the pledge of allegiance. And the and with one nation indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. This is brainwashing. This is brilliant brainwashing. Liberty really is a large conservative concept. Liberty really says look, government, get out of my way. Let me get out here and make my money and be myself and dont you boss with me, government. I want my liberty. Justice really leans left. It says its all good but we all want free market and stuff but can we have a Great Society if you only deal with thecorporations. Mark. You also need government, but what about the big groups . That might run over the little groups . What about the week groups that might get run over by the strong groups . If you only have just the liberals who are able to get out of your conservatives, go to mars, the problem with justice and no concern for individual liberty is youre going to wind up with overregulation, over taxation. Youre going to wind up with totalitarianism. You wind up with government domination which is a nightmare. At the same time, on the other hand, if you only go with liberty, me, myself and die. Im going to do whatever i want. I dont care about justice, just liberty. You wind up with a different type of tyranny. Corporate tyranny. And that survival of the fittest, the fittest wind up with all power and we got corporations that own your media, run your government and thats a nightmare. Is without liberty is a nightmare. Liberty without justice is a nightmare. In other words, we need each other. Ive never seen a bird fly, only a left wing. Ive never seen a bird fly with only a right wing. It takes two wings to fly. We need each other, lets fight constructively but lets not all only fight otherwise were going to lose the country. Thank you very much. [applause] so theres a line conform right there and heres whats going to happen. The first person is going to sit an amazing example. Just an incredible example. Its going to be concise. Its not going to be a speech, not the first guy. The first person is going to have a question which is consistent with a . Thats whats going to happen. And this example is going to be so powerful that every other question will say ive got to match that. And its going to be the most amazing experience youve ever had, i promise. Go ahead, sir. What do you have to say about the sham attacks republicans have come up with . How is it going to affect a lot of the people who voted for trump . Its a question about the tax plan. Before i say anything about the tax plan, let me Say Something about the tax plan process. Which doesnt exist. I mean, you literally have something as one of the great congresspeople pointed out. Calling only about four percent of the economy. Only about 50 percent, or im sorry, 100 percent of the economy is going to be impacted by one bill with no hearing. Thats never happened. Thats totally not. Nobody likes bureaucracy, nobody likes this process but the constitution requires it, its whats served ourparents and great grandparents for years. I dont know why this month we want to throw in the garbage can. All that i think for both parties. When you called the speech to congress in late february and extraordinary moment, and the virus had mutated basically but the reaction that people that in that moment was that hes defending him, youre not realizing the real threat. Yet you are pointing out this ability to take these moments of presentation to the entire country and some people have an excuse or a reason to justify to think that its a reasonable person would get a with, he present a reasonable case. How do we prevent that from occurring when he still speaking to the base . Well look, i thought and still think the president addressed the congress, his first sort of state of the union, sort of addressed was an extraordinary speech. He started that speech off talking about civil rights thinking up for jewish people. That was speaking up. That was a shock to me. What i said at the time was, dont forget by the way, something happened which nobody comments on because it scared people, but when President Trump walked into the chambers, the only shook hands with republicans. Do you know why . Because no democrats would even come to that side of the aisle. The democrats were afraid to be seen in a in the picture with e president of the United States. Ive never seen that before. Im not saying they are wrong. Im just saying just take that as a snapshot moment for the country, that weve arrived at the place with the president has offended so many people that an entire party doesnt have a Single Member willing to be shot in a picture with him. Even when obama came in the review by both sides. I mark that as a real peril for the country. I thought if this guy gives a hitler youth speech were in deep trouble. Instead he gave a decent speech. At one point he got everybody up on the feet applauding a widow. At that moment he became the president thats what the president does. You wouldve thought i would have said im going to work for donald trump. [laughing] you wouldve thought i i now believe we should build a wall. [laughing] and the reaction from liberals that one, you know, certainly nicely dressed black commentator on cnn could ruin the republic by saying, you knew, one kind think about part of the speech, that let me know the Progressive Movement was in a very scary place. Let me Say Something to progressives. We have now, its been two years since trump came down the escalator here two years. And in that two years you now have a ritual which is called wake up in the morning, reach for your smart phone, and freak out, right . [laughing] just freak out, lose your stuff. Repeat. [laughing] freaking out is not a strategy. And the problem that we have is that because were in this politics of accusation, hey guys, please be quiet. Please be quiet back there. Okay, thank you. You are offending the whole front row. [applause] this is an important point for progressives. Freaking out is not a strategy, number one. And number two, part of the reason were upset is that we wont admit the obvious. Theres a real concession thats called for here, and the confession is this. We didnt work that hard in 2016 to stop donald trump in the first dad gum place. We didnt. It was all he cant win, its impossible, hes going to blow himself up. Hes going to tweak himself to death. Demography is going, hes offended too many people. What happened was we didnt actually fight. And you say thats not true. I tweeted many times, you know . You should see my facebook feed. I write so many articles. [laughing] that doesnt count. Thats not what im talking about. Im talking about what we did in 2008 for obama where people work their butts off. People went to swing states your people have a house party. People phone banked. If the relatives were afraid of you in 2008, they didnt want to im voting, please stop, right . We did all that to stop john mccain. [laughing] [applause] 2012 same thing, you know, the tea party was out of your way to stop them. With make sure. People went crazy. 1 million more africanamericans voted in 2012 than voted in 2008 to stop mitt romney. Mitt romney, who i would not vote for, i would give him a lap dance if you would come back and be president. [applause] and so would you. So look, so look, when you do all that to stop mccain and romney and basically tweet and ban yourself in the face of somebody who, according to you, is an authoritarian fascist sexist dictator, you might lose. But that might say more about you than it says about the country. In other words, you have been feeling powerless and bullied and triggered and we traumatized for two years because you feel the country is a terrible country with 69 people who all are now nazis and all this crazy stuff. No. When you stood up, you change the country in a positive direction. When you sat down, the country fell apart. That doesnt mean you are powerless. It means you are powerful. We have to use our power better. Thats why i dont freak out as much as you guys want me to. [applause] i feel like the two parties are at the civil war, both in spirit where missing the middle, a moderate republicans and i think the moderate democrats. And i want a third party and i think thats the only way we can make it work. I think that, i was wondering what you thought, question. [laughing] [applause] what you thought about having primaries with both parties voting so we dont get these crazy candidates . Were doing a a little bit f that in california, called the jungle primary where everybody runs against each other and to everyones at the top. In california, still basically a oneparty state for democrats. I dont know if that solves the problem or doesnt. What i will say is that at this point i would take one functional party. Im still waiting for that. And our system does tend to punish you when you run a thirdparty effort, the party closest to you tens to get hurt politically. We dont have a parliamentary system where you can have multiple parties and everybody can get their fair share. So i do feel like no internal to both parties now, its not just a civil war between the parties. Its the civil war inside the parties. I talk about that in my book. And it has to do with the fact that people feel a level of urgency in their own lives, and despair, and have since a real disconnection from the people who seem to be the winners. And as long as that dynamic is present, there is a danger. The solution as i said before, its not about being a moderate or citrus. Im not a centrist. Im a a leftist and proud of i. You do have to have some concern for the country beyond your own ideology. You want to be looking at the Republican Party, where is that jack kemp figure . Thats very conservative but actually doesnt just talk about kids in chicago but goes to chicago and helps those kids. You start seeing conservatives doing stuff like that, they dont just talk about those people over there who are everything negative. They go and sit down and work, talk with foreign workers. And similarly on the left, in the Democratic Party, again the return of the shirley chisholm, Bobby Kennedy spirit that i dont care who you vote for. I care about you. Republicans, i know bunch of the. Listen, im a democrat. If youre a republican, you dont believe a woman has a right to choose, you are scared of muslims, you dont like multiculturalism. Please stay in your party. Dont come over here. We have enough problems as democrats. Please stay in the Republican Party. Listen, we have enough problems. But vote for better republicans. Be a better republican. The a better conservative. Right now youre voting for people who are so extreme that if i gave them a deal where 99 would help the conservative base, and 1 would would help the muslims, they would turn the whole deal done. You cant get anything done with it. Uncontested democratic uni convinced me to change my mind. I dont like you to change your mind. We need better conservatives, better progresses. If we focus on that then we can get something done. Im still kind of forgot how to get that the so we can have at least one functional party before we try to get to three. [applause] thank you, mr. Jones as a most american i would like to thank you for standing up for common muslims who are living in this country [applause] raising our families, children we have the same problems just like every other american would have. What i want to know is that we cant match what terrorists are doing. We cant match their work as common muslims living in the streets of america. What can we do to have a voice in the Mainstream Media that only, i can only put towards you that youre the only one who ive ever heard on Mainstream Media speaking on behalf of of common muslims. This is my question, but one, i would like to make, i came to this country from pakistan to icing pakistan from being such a prolific country, a leading example for economic, social and all fronts was a leading country. Then one mistake the country made when they involve religion into the politics, and then it took a very bad turn and now we have country of no future. As a muslim, prehistoric dichotomy is the values that islam and carron teaches us were being practiced in the west. And as muslim countries we were away from those values and in the process we ruin the whole islamic world. Theres no one Muslim Country where islam is being practiced the way it was revealed to the prophet of islam mohamed, peace be upon you get what im concerned as raising my three kids in this country is that in the last few years im seeing those same intolerance, mine is right, i am right, you are wrong. The same things happening in the United States and i hope and pray for the Brighter Future for the sake of our children. Thank you. [applause] thank you. You know, you. 2, i will respond everything set but you do point to something they should concern everybody. Democrats and republicans and independents. The authoritarians around the world seem to be winning right now. You look around the world right now and youve got isis, putin, china. I mean, the democracies seem to be struggling a little bit, and the authoritarians, the strongmen, the fundamentalists seem to be gaining some real strength. And thats why i keep telling people, theres really only two Political Parties in the country. Theres the give a damn party and the dont give a damn party. Most people are in the dont give a damn party is just watching the kardashian or whatever theyre doing. Those of us in the give a damn party whether its the left wing, the democrats, or the right wing which is republicans are some of the other kocsis, green party, they give a damn party needs to really start getting a damn. Because we could wind up, look at turkey right now. That was a democratic republic 20 minutes ago. So you know, theres a reason for us to tap down on some of the rhetoric. You know, you just cant respond to the most extreme a great stuff from other psycho matter what side youre on. Even the most extreme interest stuff coming from the white house. Its not, its really not wise. I get beat up by a lot of liberals because they see on tv and im trying to have an intelligent conversation with people they disagree with. Dont forget, im a father. Im a dad. My kids are nine and 13. When i am on tv, on the east coast, its late at night but theyre on the west coast most this time. They get a chance to see on television. I cant be on television screaming at people, cutting people off, treating people badly and then tell them to be nice to each other. It doesnt work. It doesnt work. [applause] you know, lets not eat what we are fighting. Lets not become what we are fighting. You know, i can speak this way because im still a follower of obama, and her husband by the way, and her husband. [laughing] [applause] he had a a role. Dont leave him out. [laughing] but im still a follower of obama. What she said, when they go low, we go high. When they go low, we go high. [applause] they say they went low, we went high and they kicked us in the shins and one. But we didnt fight. Never underestimate again the heroism of our cause. And i dont just now meeting democrats, liberals. The heroism of our cause as america get the idea you can have one country with every color, every class, every state, every gender, every sexuality, every ability level, every kind of human being ever born in one country and that we can mostly get along and we can write it as a democracy. That is an insane idea. It is a miracle in Human History we are able to do this together. And if you ever take it for granted and think its easy what obvious that you drive to work hard or that fool cant win or whatever, you are going to suffer. Thats all, but breakdown and breakthrough. This breakdown in our democracy and our civility is creating a massive desire on the part of people to figure how to get along again. Dont think these extremes are speaking for everybody. They are not. The people in this room and the people we care about can bring this back together. Lets fight where were supposed to. But what we can Work Together but Work Together because the country deserves it and so do our children. Thank you very much. [applause] if you want to have your book signed, van jones would be at the sign every which is on the other side of the elevator. We ask that you please exit quickly. The next program is starting in ten minutes. Thank you [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] you are watching booktv live coverage of the Miami Book Fair. Van jones just talking about his book and getting a standing ovation, beyond the messy truth is of the name of the book. What were going to do is a couple of things next. Were going to follow mr. Jones over to the book signing area so you can see some of the interaction that he gets as he signs his book. Quite a line for about a half hour ago to get the books sign. We are going to watch a little bit of that. All the authors always go over to a room next to the hall where we hold these events, and they go over and they signed a books for a while. We are going to watch a little of that, but we also want to hear from you. We want to get your reaction to what van jones had to say in his presentation. Some of his lines included im a leftist and proud of it. And you have a great party in danger of being taken over by the white supremacists. That was in regard to the Republican Party. So 2027488200 for those of you in the east and central time zones. 2027488201 for those of you in the mountain and pacific time zones. We will begin listening to those calls and in about ten minutesr so. We want to catch some of his book signing c can see it as he walks over there. Coming up after that, call in opportunities with charlie sykes, have right lost its mind and sharyl attkisson, the smear is the name of her book. Thats all coming up this afternoon. The full schedule is booktv. Org and a reminder to follow us on social media. Were going to watch a little bit of van jones now. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] as we continue to watch van jones signs copy of his book with some of the audience wheels want to hear from you. Get your reaction to what he had to say. Beyond the messy truth is the name of the book. 2027488200 for those of you in east and central time zones. 2027488201 mountain and pacific time zones. Lets hear from martin up in potomac, maryland. You are on booktv. What is your reaction . Caller i disagree with everything he has to say. Yes, hes beyond the message and he misconstrues which planet he comes from. I think he is deeply lodged with his head in the planet uranus. Also id like to ask drama to you what, lets leave it there, martin. Lets hear from marylee who is calling in from albuquerque, new mexico. Good afternoon to you. Caller good afternoon to you and thank you very much for this program. I listen to van jones. I also listened last night to norm ornstein. I think i was watching a rerun of norm ornstein last evening, and both of them have comparable messages, which is we have to get past the situation were in right now. I have been suggesting although probably ineffectually for some time that what we need to pay more attention to is independent voters, voters who in some cases have the right to vote in primaries in their state and can perhaps move their state away from the extremes, especially the extremes on the right. And in some cases independent voters who are stubbornly saying, depending on the laws in their own states, who are stubbornly saying i do want to join any party because they are all awful, and yet they disenfranchise themselves. It is those for in that independent middle, and not all in the middle also one must be aware, but it is the voters who may be the key to turning some of these things around. My philosophy is that if you want to change the system you have to start with following the rules of assisting you. Thats my comment and thanks very much for running van jones, and thanks very much a running norm ornstein and all the other great speakers you have had. Host before we let you go, van jones talked about the extremes in the Republican Party. Do you think there is an extreme and the Democrats Party as well . Caller i think under bill clintons Democratic Party move so far to the right that the way it is, some of the democrats are tempted to move back to the left is where i i thought the Democratic Party belonged all along. And so i think the Democratic Party has little bit of a ways to go to actually get it back to being the party that represents the kind of things that van jones talked about. Theres an little too much corporatism in the Democratic Party. I would say that is largely the result of a terrible effect where having of pumping money into politics. Host thank you. Let your from diana in cleveland, ohio. Hi, diana. Caller thank you so much for taking my call. I wanted to make a a comment ai was sitting here thinking about what he said and im somewhat offended and a little trouble. I also want to make a statement. I had been a democrat for about 20 years of my life. I look at scene where donald trump did commend office for some reason and a lot of obama supporters voted for trump for some reason. But im a little concerned when he talked about being on the obama trinket we had to let it go. We have to keep it moving. Theres nothing special think that mr. Vomited and a photo for them, but i know that weve got a lot more liberal than we were before. Sometimes i wonder if liberalism is getting too much, what were doing away with all of morality, what we see good, what want to teach our children this is a little confusing to me. I was raised in the democratic household. Its confusing to me. Now that im getting older i see that i more maturing, i see what i dont like my children. I went back to Republican Party, i did become a republican because i i voted for delta because i just knew that our primaries were rigged. I was all about bernie but i do things before they came out. It deserves me to watch things like cnn, disturbing to watch fox i just watch it anymore. When he says the Republican Party is becoming more of a racist party, i really want to say to these people dont they feel they offend white men because it seems like every time theres a white man in control, unless is a liberal and youre not my dad is a veteran, born and raised in this country and hes white. Hes far from being a racist. I feel theyre getting a little bit too much on this racist stuff and that they think it all meant in the Republican Party tend to be racist. Thats so untrue. Some people believe in being prolife, some people believe and not turning this country procaine. Some people dont want to go that route that everybody has to answer to copy everybody has to answer to god. We just to be able say Merry Christmas and have everybody and the thing i dont understand is all the monuments are coming down. Why didnt they think about 40 years ago . Why now . Why does everything be moving this why . I think because obama is no longer in office so people can get over it. Theyre still upset that hillary lost and again, they wanted to go so liberal. I really feel medico, where to keep it moving after eight years. Host how do you think President Trump is doing so far . Caller you know what . I think that sometimes i dont like, i really dont like what he did in puerto rico. Thats not just me being a latina but i just really felt sometimes he doesnt, he does silly stuff. I think jobs are, people looking at this. I got a bill quickly everybody in my families working at jobs are coming your we have a lot of silent voters have voted for trump. People do want to say anything. Of all presents, even latinas. I think donald trouble come around. We need to be worried about jobs. I dont think he, hes a racist person at all. I dont think this stuff about what happened in, virginia or was it, i figure all that stuff was going on, but it really dont know why people think that the may be the think is a racist when was on your fired when he had his own reality show. People tend to think that and i dont know why there getting that donald trump is all about these racist parties i dont know why because host thank you for your time this afternoon. Our coverage for miami is continuing. We have several more hours. Right now were getting a reaction to what van jones had to say about his new book beyond the messy truth. Mark is in portland, oregon. Hi, mark. Caller how are you guys doing . Host whats your reaction to van jones . Caller its encouraging to see these young leaders, and i can you believe that the way this country was put together for it to properly work you have to both pick you got to have conservatives, the liberals, republicans, democrats, whatever you want to call it. But to reach the high principles and ideals of freedom takes both. And the other thing is host jesse, i apologize i erupted you but well move on to jesse in overland park, kansas. Jesse, go ahead. Caller good afternoon. Thank you. I find it interesting that, in what van johnson is saying. I have written for self published books but the one i like the best, looking at our Great Republic is im navy. I was a pilot, three tours in vietnam, and i knew nothing until 1969 about the history of the african impact which we call the economics, the slavery, the politics. And it wasnt until really 1975 i felt grief as a black person somewhat economically and politically. What i found out recently to an actual book, thanks to cspan, i watch you all the time, i probably by 60 books a year just from watching books from the cspan, was the most blessed of patriarchs. I saw that. What fasted me was the way we study history in this country and how much has really been left out and how many people dont realize what has been left out. Thomas jefferson, i get goosebumps every time i look at his book, the most blessed of patriarchs. My previous book as i said they hated outside as i didnt find out until 1898 that we want to make cuba estate but because of the south host tell you what, jesse. If you could wrap this up and get as caller i will pick one sentence, the economics of slavery has been totally left out of our history text. How this country prospered as i will say the new israel has been left out. Changes the whole dimension. I learned as most host thank you. That was jesse in overland park, kansas. If youve been listening to booktv you heard van jones talking about his book as he signs his book for folks, but we want to get your reaction to what he had to save for a few minutes. Some of the things he did say include we need to have better republicans. Im a leftist and proud of it. And joe in pueblo, colorado, what did you think of what van jones had to say . Caller first of all id like to say that i think he would be our next great president , because hes about right and wrong, not about so much republican or democrat. And another thing i would like to say, the class, because it falls in line with right and wrong, is most people made their money out of Natural Resources such as land, minerals. And so the benefit of that should come to all the people, not just the rich that made the money off of it. And again id like to say we need to start voting right and wrong, not parties. Thats about all ive got to say. Host thank you, sir. Joe in pueblo. Van jones also said you cant only fight and still have country with regard to partisan politics. Next call is diana, Spring Valley new york. Hi, diana. Caller thank you for my call. I was very happy to hear van jones comments because i think that he is being very much objective than the entire picture. The twoparty system it seems to me was set up as a kind of balancing system so that one wouldnt go off the rails too much. And i think thats whats happened to nothing just happens overnight. Everything is a process, anything theres been a process of selfinterest, of agreed, of corruption that is been going on for quite a long time in this country, that weve been warned about with the corporate industrial complex. And also what happened is that politics and power has become more important than whats doing right for the country. So for some time now democrats have stonewalled republicans what do want to do, and vice versa, and its going to such a pitch now that is really dangerous for our country. I personally think we had to scrap all those systems. I think members of congress, many of them wonderful people, but it think its absolutely atrocious and we dont participate. I i dont hear what the problems whether its healthcare or taxes, what is your opinion. If you dont vote and give your opinion or three times, you are out. We are paying their salaries and they are not participating, not helping the people in this country. Im a democrat but i did vote for trump because of the same reasons as the other diana express. I was very concerned about not only does getting things in the Democratic Party, but its like i see it as a whole picture. Theres been talk february, politically. Host thank you for your time this afternoon on booktv. We are in miami for the Miami Book Fair. Several hours of authors and collins ahead full schedule available booktv. Org or were getting a reaction to van jones and his comments about his new book beyond the messy truth. Joe is in annapolis. Hi, joe. Caller thanks for taking my call. I got some of the show yesterday you had katy tur on, chris matthews, with some else that at the same politics as van jones it does today which i think is far too left of the spectrum and wondering if you could address the question that you post yesterday that you ignored. A call yesterday as to why cspan cant have any conservative people on as guests. Notice people on phone but as guests. You just completely ignored that person, insultingly so i would cpaa is wondering you could confirm why cspan doesnt have conservative guess. Is it because companies the punch you wont let you . Is it because cspans management wont let you . Host i understand, joe, and i wasnt a question that was presented yesterday. That was a statement. So i chose to thank that caller and move on, and im sure if you look at our schedules, if you look at what we cover, we maintain strict policy of lots of points of views. Sometimes a book fairs. We dont have control over who is invited. We like to cover fairs. We like to go out and cover a lot of events, sometimes at the fairs you may seek to or three or four authors who you disagree with, and we try to bring in other points of views throughout the evening. Or where we have control over the schedule. So this evening the dilbert cartoonist has written a book called when bigley and its ultimately supported donald trump and youll see that tonight after the festival. We recently went over to regnery publishing, which is a conservative publisher, get a profile that we also covered are 70 anniversary party. Ann coulter was there, Sebastian Gorka and this book. So you see a lot of different authors. Lower ingram was just on. One of the books we tried to cover this week was the bush sisters. Barbara and jenna, the twins and avenue book about life in the white house. Unfortunately we had a crew staff to him unable to cover that but we were going to show you that today as well. So those of the types of things weve done in the last two weeks to bring lots of points of view. Just remember that. We are always looking for lots of points of view. We are here in miami and where please to be down here and bring other points of view down here as well. So brenda is in west monroe louisiana. Brenda, look forward to hearing what you have to say about van jones comments. Caller yes. Time that this country take a hit, take a stand that there has been some fixed in politics, the president running our country now, set this whole country [inaudible] a very dark psychic its time for everybody to open their eyes and see. Its time for impeachment. Its time for impeachment. Et al. Have to say. Caller next call is carol land in bethesda maryland. You are on booktv. Hi. Caller i want to first thank you for a terrific program. I often watch the other, you know, cnn, msnbc but ive learned so much more in recent months listening and watching booktv. And i thank you for the coverage in the Congress Come for the race. Its been so informative. Ive had a terrible year of Health Issues and couldnt get out much. So i got to enjoy life inside, becoming more informed. Thank you for covering this book fair today. Its a fantastic event. I am with van jones. My parents, i come from better parents who met at a union dance between the Teachers Union and the for your union. It was a basketball dance and my dad took my mom home and fell in love. I grew up a liberal and i am still a liberal. I believe that we have to support all the people in this country. My parents are both from immigrant families. They are immigrants. My mother would not like to admit it but the fact is that its because they left a terrible situation in poland and russia that they came to this country. They had opportunities beyond belief. My mother had a fantastic career as an educator, and my father had a business that struggle at times during tough times, but in the long run they were able to support their family beautifully. And i am supporting those immigrants to come here, and i wish this administration host do you consider yourself socalled leftist like van jones said he was . Caller yes, i do. I do. I have more sympathy host what does that mean to you . Caller it means to me that we should spread the wealth in this country, that we should be doing more training. We should be changing the way we deal with wages. We should provide healthcare for everyone. I think, i i look at denmark ad sweden and the other countries that have given families benefits, family care benefits to families in their countries. Action was a Childcare Center director and a software consultant. I know how parents struggle with her childcare. I did myself as a single mom. I think this country needs to do more and spread the wealth throughout all of host thats carol and in bethesda. Thank you. J, los angeles, youre in booktv. Your reaction to van jones comments. Caller van jones is on point. [inaudible] regarding is correct. I like the analogy used, you never see a bird with just one wing flies. It needs both the left and a right wing. Also what i wanted to say is we need people like van jones in the white house, in congress and local politics throughout the United States. Thats all i have to say. Thank you. Host that was j in los angeles. We appreciate everybody colligan to give the reaction to van jones here at the Miami Book Fair we have a couple of call in opportunities coming up this afternoon. Charlie sykes, how the right lost its mind. If even watching our coverage you saw him a little earlier today. After that sharyl attkisson, her book is called the smear. She appeared on our afterwards broken a couple months ago but we will bring her back and have a chance for you to talk with her as well. So those interviews are coming up this afternoon. Several events still at chapman hall with the authors are talking, that includes les standiford, the historian, and novelist but his book is called the man who invented christmas about charles dickens. And also Martin Boutin and Kurt Andersen will be talked about their books as well. All live this afternoon we got a couple of other interviews here on our set including one with the present america of spelman college. Her book is called why are all the black kids sitting together . Thats a coming up this afternoon. The Miami Book Fair is not just this weekend. Its a weeklong event. We are down here for the weekend, but during the week they of authors commit such as the bush twins and donna brazile, former chair of the dnc whose new book