20 year low in the presidential election. we have a lot of rebuilding to do. >> president barack obama and japanese prime minister abe visited the naval airbase in pearl harbor. wednesday in a beginning at 8:00, a review of house and senate hearings from 2016 on topics including the flint, michigan water crisis, and the wells fargo unauthorized account scandal. >> seriously? that one of your divisions had created 2 million fake accounts, had fired thousands of employees were improper behavior and had cheated thousands of your own customers and you did not even once consider firing her ahead of her retirement? of theemember some political figures that passed away in 2016 including former first lady nancy reagan and supreme court justice antonin scalia a. and friday night at 8:00, our in memoriam program continues with shimon peres, mohammed l.a., and former senator and astronaut john glenn. this week in prime time on c-span. look at the latest book featured in our weeklong authors series on washington journal. this is an hour. washington journal continues. host: we are joined by tevi troy who spent time in the george bush administration who has released a new book, "shall we take the president?" welcome this morning. let me ask you what was behind the idea of writing about a president and administration's response to disaster? guest: i worked in the bush administration and i'm a presidential historian. i was thinking of writing a book that was a little more policy focused. marrhen i had the idea of ying it with presidential history, how presidents have looked at disaster over time. it was fascinating. the approach has changed since the 19th century did today, when they are expected to roll up their sleeves and get very involved. changehat specifically that? we talked about this in our previous segment. the president has become the comforter in chief aside from all the administrative aide that comes through particularly in a natural disaster. guest: that is the underlying story of the book. i did not know that when i started writing it but it became the story. in the 19th century there was little knowledge of what was going in other parts of the country. he did not have instantaneous communication. in 1811 there was a huge earthquake in missouri and president madison did not know the extent of the damage for six weeks. there was no telegraph, and telephone, and certainly no twitter. i come in 2011 and there was an earthquake in washington and i was on the west coast, i knew within 30 seconds. the instantaneous nest of instantaneous-n ess of communication and the federalism that the government should be involved in local events, and localities should handle it, state government should handle it. i tell the story of the johnstown flood in 1889. , the2000 people died largest loss of life on u.s. soil until 9/11. president harrison was telegraphed by the people from johnstown who said, lease help back,d he telegraphed this is really in the responsibility, the orbit of the governor and the governor should handle it and deploy the resources. the people of johnstown respond back, thank you. can you imagine today if you got a response like that? you would have protests. this is not to suggest he was at all in compassionate. donation of $300 to the town of johnstown. host: in your book, where did the title come from? guest: there is a jeffrey archer book in the early 1970's, "should we tell the president?" it really comes from the 3:00 a.m. phone call with hillary clinton where she was suggesting that president obama was on ready. ready the idea that when there is a bad thing that happens around the world, who do you want to take the call? i did a side article with politico about presidents awakened in the middle of the night. it does not happen as often as you think, and sometimes it comes on the tail of white house administrators. host: our guest is here for the next 45 minutes or our, and we welcome your phone call. (202) 748-8001 four republicans. (202) 748-8000, democrats. .nd all others, (202) 748-8002 you can send us a tweet if you would like. the book covers a range of issues. he talked about the earthquake in 1811 and the colonial era with washington. epidemic --ce influenza epidemic of 1918, and you write about then-president woodrow wilson. you point out that if there were half the people died from the flu. 43,000 died from the flu. attemptt wilson, in his wrote thee war, sedition act of 1918 which forbade abusive language about the form of government the ofted states, was indicative the rise of the coercive power duringfederal government the wilson administration. killedthe flu epidemic 650,000 americans. -- 675,000 americans. it reduced the life expectancy of americans i a decade, that is how devastating it was. there were two things that i point to in the book that were his fault. number one, he was told by his personal physician who was a navy doctor who stop -- to stop the troop transport to europe because they were spreading the disease among the servicemen and the people of europe. it was called the spanish flu but it started in the u.s. he was told to stop these troop transports. by effectively the chief of staff of the army not to do so, and he listened even though it was only one month before the hostilities ended. if he had stopped, there would have been fewer deaths. because of the efforts by george creel, the head of propaganda, he did not want to talk about any problems going on in the country. the newspapers were supposed to be putting out happy talk, and talking about this devastating flu epidemic was not on the agenda to promote the winning of the war. not really talking about the flu , and the problems with the flu i think helped exacerbate it. an example of how better sharing of information could have alleviated the problem, of course we do not know today -- we did not know then what we know today. louis, saying you should not have weddings and celebrations in movie theaters while there is this disease because you could spread it you'd the people of philadelphia did not do it. they were a comfortably support -- sized city. it was five times worse in philadelphia where they did not have the social distancing regulations. book, onm tevi troy's 1980reat flu influenza of to 1920, estimated deaths worldwide 50 million and in the united states, 675,000. most recently the swine flu, worldwide death, 18,500, u.s. 8870 to 18,300. it has drastically changed in almost 100 years. not saying that the swine flu is as eerie lint as the 1918 flu, but there was a went --s fear you virulent as the 1918 flu. bysident bush read the book john berry and said, we have to put together a flu plan. that included how to develop vaccine faster, how to distribute it, how to store it, how the states and local should work together. it was a thoughtful approach of what the u.s. government should do in the case of a flu outbreak. the outbreak we were preparing for was an avian influenza. it did not happen in the bush administration but it did happen at the beginning of the obama administration. not a senior -- a single official had been confirmed. what they did was they went off the shelf and got this flu plan that had been developed in the bush administration, deployed it and deported effectively. the number of deaths -- and i'm not saying the swine flu if untreated would have hit as many people as the 1918 flu -- but in that 2009 incident there were fewer flu deaths than in the average year. the average in the 1990's was 36,000. there were fewer people dying from flu in the 1990's. host: the range of your book goes from covering the flu epidemic to the financial crisis. what made you decide on such a broad range of presidential responses? guest: i was trying to get at disasters that have ripple effects, that went beyond the immediate area where they took place. a pileup in 1995 is a tragedy but does not have ripple effects. the swine flu or the 1918 flu, that obviously has a nationwide effect. i was trying to look at things that had a broad impact and because of that, it raised them to presidential levels of attention. it mandated president had to look at it because it was so serious. host: let's go to tony in pleasantville, new jersey, democrat line. caller: good morning and merry christmas. host: merry christmas. caller: my question for your guest is, out of all of his explain what he -- under what circumstances a president is allowed to have certain things happen? for instance, hurricane katrina, can he speak on that? certain presidents, they want to hold certain presidents accountable for different events that happened under their rule. i just want to know, how many republican presidents let certain things happen as opposed to democrats or whatever? and thank you. guest: that is a really good question. i actually do in the book, at the end i have an attendance -- appendix where i list the best and worst presidents during disaster, and there are democrats and republicans on the list. the woodrow wilson incident with the flu. i also talk about george w. bush who was my boss. i do not think you could fairly put together a list of worst presidential responses to disaster and not include the bush response to katrina. that was a very difficult situation that did not go well, and president bush said in his memoirs a were not as successful as they wanted to be. i do not think it is a partisan thing. i think there are presidents of both parties that have been met with disaster and left wanting, but others who stepped up and did the job. when i find -- and this is very interesting -- these external en ds from the outside, and they often lead to tripping up the president or sometimes provide opportunities for the president to shine, but i would not say allow them to happen. what do you do when this bad thing happens? a famous picture of george w. bush atop the rubble in 2001, three days after 9/11. , why wasis approach his approach to katrina different where he seemed to really take command after 9/11? guest: i mentioned i put him on the worst list when it comes to responding to disaster but i put him on the best list because i thought on the 9/11 response he was very good, very strong, and galvanized the nation at a time we needed it. there were things he did write in the 9/11 aftermath. he did not say things when we did not know what was going on. that very first day when journalists were starting to ask question, ari fleischer writes on a piece of paper in big letters that bush can see that the journalists cannot, he said do not say anything yet because the time was not yet right. we did not know who had committed this atrocity and we needed to find out more before speaking. holding your tongue at the right time is important, but also communicating to the american people at the right time. he gave a strong interest to the american congress, and also the moment i have in the book, the picture you are referring to where he stands on the destroyed fire truck and somebody says, we cannot hear you, and he takes the bullhorn and says i can hear you and the rest of the world can hear you. from we have mark washington on our independent line. caller: happy holidays. guest: happy holidays. caller: i would like to address the major disaster looming over the world right now, population growth. population growth equals climate change. i think diseases are needed. if not for diseases, the earth would be overrun with people as it is now. i think one of the major concerns i have is that the government itself is in charge of many diseases. they ship them around the world to various countries quite by accident, and it concerns me that our government is so irresponsible with these diseases, even though i knowledge it is going to be inevitable that these numbers of humans need to drop. guest: a very interesting question. thank you for raising it. approach not take that where we will be overpopulated and we need people to die from various methods to maintain a manageable population. i do think the federal of timent spends a lot thinking about diseases in a way they had not in previous years. that is something that emerged from those conversations in the bush administration not just about flu, but the potential of biohazard. such as vaccines and antiviral's are stored in case of some kind of epidemic, the government can say we are going to deploy these countermeasures to mitigate the impact. the most likely scenarios and stop howling those type of count -- stockpiling those type of countermeasures. host: not a population story, but a weather story on the weather at the north pole on this christmas morning. they write it is expected to reach rick steve -- 50 degrees warmer than normal. what is the worst weather related response? is it katrina? that the story -- of the country is seen? know thelot of people story. it is the 1927 mississippi flood that killed a lot of people. i do notot of people, know the records were not so great. to 1000 people. it was an interesting incident where you had calvin coolidge who was the president who was famous was not very enamored with the government getting too involved in things. herbert hoover who really wanted to get the federal government involved in things. he was known as the master of emergencies. he was a kind of guy who would go when there was starvation in europe and would bring full. he really wanted to get the federal government involved in it. coolidge was kind of annoyed by hoover and he said that man is getting me nothing but advice, all of it bad. it relates to communications and people knowing about the extent of diseases. we now had radio. it was easier to put pictures in papers. the american people were aware of the depths of the problem. there was pressure on the coolidge administration to do something. they sent herbert hoover and he handled the federal response in the area and by all accounts a did a great job and opera pelto to presidency. host: and a book from tevi troy 's book, "shall we wake the president?" , the book,tevi troy "shall we wake the president?" wisconsin, democrats line. lou, go ahead. caller: good morning. merry christmas. i want to thank you for the program. my thought here was fema. and your guests had mentioned that the politics really do not play in issue -- i am misquoted him. .t should not be an issue in this day and age where we have the deniers or people who are pushing back, a lot of us are seeing down here, you just mentioned the north pole and temperature changes, the mad swings. how it affects cities and, i guess, my point being, fema is us.cted and come and save and we have the republican party who is so federalist as they want to assume that kind of power, you know, we can take care of ourselves in the state until we have one these natural disasters. my question is, when i was growing up, i am 64 years old, those were to say, the spots where you really did not -- you cannot defend on anything because of the weather. you know what? you were not the own. we live in a day and age now where if something is happening to florida, everybody anticipates a multibillion-dollar high-rises or properties are going to be guarded and shorter by the federal government. and this is where it drives me crazy. how long can we sustain that? we have more in more people living in these areas. millions and millions. i do not believe we can just sustain this kind of a bailing out continually without -- thatg -- my thought was my question, as convoluted as it was. guest: you raise a lot of interesting questions that is raised in my book, that i talk about in my book. on politics, i say we should try to get to a nonpartisan and maybe post-partisan the level when it comes to dealing with disasters. i read a piece in "political" called "enter the neutral zone." i was concerned when i heard all person saying i am not going to listen because of the democrat runs and on the other side because a republican runs it. you should not say, i disagree because i do not vote for that party in charge right now. i am weary of an over political approach. i am not naive and i know politics play a part in it. and part about your question about how to deal with people in dangerous in vulnerable areas, one overarching recommendation i have in the book is if there is a major disaster in your area, a flood or hurricane, you cannot count on the federal government, regardless are -- of it is a they canor republican, deploy fema and send people. in the first 24 hours, it is best uf may preparations and have the relations with your family and neighbors and community and have a plan if something goes wrong. that includes having reserve food. that includes having home and protection. there are forms of home protection short of buying a fire or. having a plan with your family. have practical advice for individuals on things everything can and should do. i am not one of these shelter builders in the backyard, there are certain commonsense steps people should take, recognizing the federal government cannot say for the first day. host: the annual flu shot? done. i get it when people ask me, i say you should do it. it is not only a safe thing, one of the most effective life-saving measures we have. it saves thousands of lives. host: the politicization of disasters, you wrote in the book , the issue of politicization of disasters, the presidency as an inherently political job and they are viewed through a presidential lens. i wanted to ask you about a piece you wrote about the presidents'getaway. trump shall remember his never of the clock. what was your point? , itt: there was a paragraph addresses, if you have a democrat in the white house and republicans say how dare he plays golf. and when you have a republican, there's a similar thing. criticism is silly. want to get away from that. need to take vacations. what i was saying is when there are external events and crisis and the president is away, if they are not careful, there are being away can exacerbate. i tell the story of the 1965 watts riots. president johnson was away on his ranch. he was not on top of it. his domestic policy aide was trying to reach him. johnson would not get on the phone. it is not clear why. part of it was he may have been disappointed, that is what jack said, he had done so much and there were racial undertones. host: was a couple of days? days. it was a couple of just was always, always available and this was the only time he had trouble getting johnson on the phone. host: the book is "shall we wake the president?" and the author is tevi troy. for republicans. (202) 748-8000 for democrats. (202) 748-8002 for independents. riches next. caller: does your book go into presidential action or inaction and events such as tulsa21 thing riots -- riots in which a sizable black neighborhood was harmed? for labor disputes such as the pullman strike? thank you, i will take a response off the air. it looks as civil unrest and riots which can get out of control and go beyond the immediate area. the model of the book is i looked on one major incident where you have a presidential response or no response and i use it to talk about what policies we should try and take and alleviate. my major focus is what i talked about with a lyndon johnson and the 1960's. president bush for i have a picture of lyndon b. johnson lying over washington, d.c. in 1968 after the ryan's following martin luther king's assassination. looking down on washington, somewhat and aptly at that -- riotsy somewhat by the that he was unable to stop. me.pitcher jumped at -- the picture jumped at me. it looked like president bush flying over hurricane katrina and was criticized for that. one other piece of advice i have is sometimes it makes sense to go to disaster areas. because logistics, sometimes it does not hurt you should never fly over. host: north carolina. johnson, good morning. north carolina, good morning. hello? we have lost him. indiana.to south bend, donald on democrats line. good morning. go ahead. just two quick points. first off, let's give trump a chance for we will come back in two years and seeing. that's the first thing. i get so tired of people calling in and saying the only reason i voted for barack obama was because i am an american who happens to be black because obama does barack obama was black. i voted for barack obama in 2008 one, he hadn mccain, a chance to pick joe lieberman. the republican said no because joe lieberman was a democrat. he was a conservative democrat. ok. i believe heon, was going to pick with tom ridge. a perfect choice for you republican, pennsylvania governor. i believe he was a vietnam vet. but no, the republican said no because he was, tom ridge, correct me if i'm wrong, tom ridge was pro-choice. they do not want tom ridge. picks sarahccain palin. i was like, oh, my goodness, no. barack obama was the perfect choice in 2008. in 2012, i do not like mitt romney. holtzman a little off-topic. a question of about disasters? -- host: a little off-topic. people,well -- presidents -- when george bush i -- irina thing, i -- was disappointed. i did not believe he was not a bad person. he just did not do what he was supposed to do. respond tosidents the way they do. people have to give them, the presidents some leeway. much has each administration learned from the other that we will not do what george bush or lyndon b. johnson did? guest: you should give the incoming president a chance. i do not think i've said anything otherwise. i am glad the collar like to joe lieberman and -- i'm glad the caller likes joe lieberman and todd ridge. aboutf them talked bioterrorism and not to deal with them. in terms of learning, there's a lot to be said about collecting learns from previous andnistrations incorporating them. the best example is george w. bush and the flu. andooked at the situation of the 1918 flu and said what the federal government did was borderline criminal. there were so inept. we know a lot more. what should the federal government response be? financial collapse, when things were going poorly, he said at one point, if this is the great depression, you are dam sure i will be fdr. theote another book about movies they watch. i talk about the kind of reading they do. read historynd to and biography spring from that, they get lessons from history that they apply. host: i do not a you are this issue. how do you think the governor of the state and reacted to the flint water crisis? city leaders were charged in the past week. this was a real problem. i talked a little bit and i have a chapter on food and water shortages. this is the kind of thing that is mostly a local issue. the responsibility of the state and local government to handle the water systems in their states. in this case, it seems like the epa knew about a lot of the problems and not only do not respond initially. lack of does a communication between the federal government and states exacerbate problems and that's one of the lessons in the book that you need to have better communication about who is supposed to do what. host: more calls for tevi troy. george and i democrats line. caller: good morning. merry christmas. i have two things. one is i am a conservative democrat. i am 87 years old. i have been around the world just about. the korean war and the second world war. has killedtic party themselves. and i think it will take about 50 years for them to come back again. and the second thing is if you go back in history from george washington, you will see every time there was a democratic president in office, there's always been a lot of the crisis happening. they do not know how to handle things the way the republicans do. they do not want to give the credit to where the credit belongs. host: let's get response. you look a lot of presidencies, is it equally split? guest: george, thank you for your service. second of all, i do not necessarily agree that there is more likelihood of a disaster to happen under a democratic administration or republican. i do think there has been more disasters declared by the federal government steadily over the last 60 odd years since with cap presidential declaration. themany have we had in 1950's and how it has been rising. it seems to be as spike and disaster declaration in years to coincide with the summer olympics which is presidential elections. there may be a political aspect to the deployment of presidential disaster declarations. host: next? in iowa. -- next is iowa. caller: i have a question about the earthquake in the 1800s along the fault. many, many people were killed. i believe it rerouted the mississippi river. i was wondering if that was something he looked at? did we have a response? what could we have done? guest: it's the 1911 earthquake he is talking about. president madison did not find out about the extent of the damage for six weeks. he did not know about it, that was not much of a response. that's one of the themes of my book, when presidents do not know about it, they are not going to get into it and is now widely known and it will be less clamoring. the federal government was much smaller and had a smaller role and vision of what the government was. impetus to get involved in. a very different time. in theo with the people past several decades have become more reliant or expected on organizations like fema will be there to assist them regardless of what the disaster may be? guest: absolutely. there seems to the reliance on fema and the federal government is there to bill is out. partly because there was a after, the floods of 1927 though hoover and ministration, you had roosevelt, for it with roosevelt and he expanded the size of government to deal with certain ties a disasters including the economic crisis. there was world war ii. the end of the roosevelt europe, a much bigger federal government that got more involved in more things. , a much biggera. federal government they got involved in more things. host: have you seen evidence that states have increased their responsibility or the money they put towards disaster repair, disaster aid? state's would say the increase the amount of money they spend on disaster preparations but perhaps not as much as they would have otherwise for the believe the federal government comes in. earlier calls were referring to this, you have cross organization of in idaho, there is little likelihood of of a coastal hurricane because they are not on the coast. coastalda, you have hurricane's and situations that people live in those areas are more vulnerable. the extent the federal government is spending money is effectively is subsidization of the states. host: can you see a time where the government in areas, low areas of the coast, for example, where the federal government would say, you are going to be on your own for a certain amount? we are not going to be able to assist you whether rebuilding or immediate emergency aid because of rising seas or other environmental issues? guest: my thoughts in the book when we were talking about presidential involvement, we should kind of skill that presidential involvement in those kinds of local weather disasters and have them focus more on things that you really mean the president of focus on such as if there is a mile -- massive bioterrorism economically fax nationwide. nationwide. it does not mean we cannot be compassionate. in terms of presidential involvement, we need to rejigger presidential focus away from things where they do not really bring that much other than comforter in chief into areas where presidential attention would help get us out of potential sticky situations. host: debbie and mobile, alabama. good morning i democrats line. caller: hello? thank you. as far as a crisis, as far as of the gulf coast, we have had several and certainly i hated how bush reacted to new orleans. i was just devastated. i am devastated every time i go over there and every time i see anything on tv about it. and also with this flint think, think president obama should have reacted immediately to it. i know he has a lot of -- things have to go through congress and our blocked everything he has tried to do. i think flint is a horrible thing. something we will be paying for thousands of years. the same with the oil management that was poorly, poorly done. and -- host: we will let you go. we hear your phone greeting. will not touch on bp. guest: i have a great story. , axelrodbp oil spill was a presidential adviser and he gets a call from a caller who was talking to him. he starts saying these people are handling the bp oil spill are incompetent and i could go and plug this whole. put me in charge and let me. it was president-elect donald trump. it was a great story. he was adamant he could've solved it. he was already looking at ways that he could adjust crisis before even he could potentially be president. host: could you see him taking a more potentially hands on, showing up at disasters as he is done at construction sites on his project? he shows up in his the boss. guest: i think he is the potential to be good on this. i wrote on this. the response he has to the flooding in baton rouge before the election, around august and september, i felt was very savvy and very smart. he showed up there and was giving off supplies to the affected people. a time when president obama had not gone, he eventually did, he was on vacation. we talked about vacations earlier. i doubt the kids often staying on vacation was not good for. hillary clinton did not go at all. i think the optics of him staying on vacation was not good. we will see how he handles a going forward. one of the keys, handling disasters is communication. when i looked at the list of recommendations for presidents on handling disasters, i do not think about it before i wrote it. i had nine recommendations for six of them had to do with communication. your ability to communicate with the american people and give them accurate, real-time information and a sense of compassion is how the america people judging. host: it is both history and a guidebook? guest: absolutely. host: for the next 15 minutes or in --02) 748-8001 for republicans. (202) 748-8000, democrats. (202) 748-8002, independents. independents line. caller: i just wanted to mention that our governor had to step in because we had to disasters. the governor was just sworn in. number two, we get hurricane sandy that just demolished the coast. the newtown,ad connecticut shootings in 2012. both of these tragedies happened in 2012. our governor was so worn out, the president obama did fly in and meet with the parents and gave his condolences. they reached out to our community. but also, a state that really to help these people and also our community, our city, our state there try to help as much as they can. the local leaders like the mayor, the alderman, they got together to help the people on the coast line that lost their homes. we do rely on earth ceo of the country, that's a first-place we look. we also really rely on our governor and when all of the lights went out and we were without power for a while, he had created a program where people would lost all of their food, a. program and gave out cards. -- lost all of their food, a foodstamp program and gave out cards. we do not know all of the policies and procedures. the lines were so long. our state and local government did jump in and took care of us. host: a couple of good points there. thank you. guest: great points. first of all, i agree with you in those particular circumstances, those are areas that handle by the state and the governor. at, you're talking about really important thing that i do talk about in the book and i've written about which is this idea all facing disasters in your first year in office. the first year disasters can often of end of presidency were also make a presidency. however president deals with those responses right in the beginning of the term really helps determine how the american people view them. with the swine flu in his first year and president bush had 9/11. president kennedy had the bay of pigs. herbert hoover, he had to stop working crash in 1929 that not only set the tone for his administration but his historical reputation. how you handle those first year disasters are incredibly important. host: news this past week of an ebola vaccine shown to be highly effective. the washington post saying announcing a milestone in the fight against ebola and a major trial of a vaccine shows it may be highly protective against the virus which is affected nearly 30,000 people and killed 11,000 worldwide since 2013. health officials fear the deadly passage in could that pathogen could return. what was the ebola response from the administration a couple of years ago and how you rate the presidents response? guest: 2014, the ebola outbreak that's was really devastating in africa. it ended up killing a number of under 10.the u.s., the problem with something like ebola, if it should not spread in a modern medical system where we know how to contain the spread and how to track and trace people who have the disease. i thought the initial response to ebola was a little worrisome. another problem was you mentioned this trial for the vaccine. in 2001, there was a promising monkey vaccine for evil -- ebola. 2014 came and there was still no vaccine for humans. we are a little late on the development front even though we have promising scientific news. we had no countermeasures when it struck. some for medical procedures, health care procedures that should be containable in a modern system of medicine did not work initially. we had to gear up and focus better on making sure the disease was not spreading from patients two health care workers which is what happened a little bit. host: next on the phone is green cap, pennsylvania. good morning. caller: merry christmas. i'm curious as the crisis goes on, 63. in baltimore, when they were rioting and try to itng the city to the ground, was fruitless what they did. the state police were there. i know the president obama was watching on tv. you should have sent the national guard or army reserve or delta force or somebody. he did not do that. countrywidea crisis with heroin addiction in the kids. it needs to be dealt with. we just lost a niece a week ago, 6, 12t a rehab december kids in the small town area. in terms of baltimore, a comment from a viewer asking on effective -- the affected disaster state must request that a real help. in the case of baltimore, with the governor have had to ask the president for help? but they can also call their own national guard, correct? guest: correct. in katrina, you need the state to request for help if you want the federal government to intervene. it's a way of protecting states. there was obviously concern, we had broken away from england and we didn't want to do federal or big government troops to interrupt our liberties. that's an issue. i will tell one quick story about the 1960's riots, when urban riots were so frequent and so common that when the incoming 1969,staff took over in they were given a mimeographed task that had to blank spaces. one to fill in the city and one for the signature of the president. they were calling out the national guard so frequently. there is certainly precedent for using the national guard to deal with urban riots, but you need cooperation between the federal government and the county. that's why the inability to track lyndon johnson down was a problem. of the major disasters to strike the city, from washington, d.c., was the burning of washington in 1814, much of the administration fled washington. guest: this was in the madison administration. they saved some of the portraits from the white house. there was incompetent military leadership on multiple points that led to this burning of washington. .t was unfortunate i had the privilege of working in the white house, and there's a part in the white house if you go into the white house kitchen, on the see charred marks wall from the remnants of the original white house that have been burned by the british. host: it was burned for the thoroughly. -- pretty thoroughly. guest: bob on the independent line, good morning. caller: hello. host: you are on the air. caller: i'm no fan of george w. bush, but i think you got some got some bad rap for delaying seven minutes by reading a children's book to kids. tell you, i am korean-american and i'm following closely to the situation over there with the current president being impeached right now for letting a personal acquaintance abuse and interfere with the government through her. ago, when thears ferry boat sank with some 300 ,igh school students drowned that woman was nowhere to be found for seven hours. host: talking about the president of south korea. he started off talking about george bush's response, you see the famous photo of him reading to the first-grade class. like fromhat moment the telling of folks you know who were there? i talk about this incident and the book. it's a tough call. you are reading to students and the chief of staff whispers in the second tower came down and the united states is at war. do you get up and throw down your book and leave the room in a panic and panic those children? he's also on camera. how you react in that situation? -- how do you react in that situation? i don't fault president bush for that relatively minor delay. i agree with bob, that he got a bit of a bad rap for that. the real question is do you jump up when you are told about a crisis. it is what you do in response to the crisis. i think that is the long-term important question from a historical perspective. host: judith in indianapolis, good morning on the democrats line. .aller: hi when i first started to call to talk about the disasters that president obama. has worked with in this country, he has dealt with many, many crisis in this country. spillls bills, -- the oil crisis, the weather crisis on the east coast, the one down in new orleans. the killing of the children in newtown. but then when i heard the caller call in about how he lost someone his family due to heroin , the use of drugs -- he sounded like a caucasian. been a about, there has drug crisis in this country for many, many years. the federal government are have druge people who use, are dying from heroin and mass -- meth. these are drugs that are mostly used in the white community. i'm not trying to talk about race, but the majority of people who are in congress are white men. have all types of medical programs, needle exchanges in all these different things that they have put in place. host: we're going to wrap up here in a moment, thanks for your call. she talked about the crises that president obama has faced, and your criteria of ripples -- these prices that cause ripples throughout community. would you say that president obama has dealt with more than his fair share? guest: i would say that president obama has not dealt with the kind of major, nation shattering crisis that you saw in the version administration or the riots in the 60's. to some degree, he has been lucky and not having a massive crisis. however, he certainly was taken aback by the number of crises that reach presidential attention. there's a story i have in the book that early on in the administration, there are all these things going on. you heard about the somali pirates they were hijacking american ships. without we were going to have to deal with pirates. whoever you are, whichever president you are, you are going to face external events that common surprise you. sometimes they will be nation altering level events, but whoever you are, you have to deal with them and you will be judged by that measure. host: he was never president, but you write about robert kennedy and show a photo of his gravesite in arlington national cemetery. robert kennedy's grave side at arlington national, kennedy was in indianapolis on april 4, 1968, and was advised by the .ayor not to speak kennedy not only spoke, but had the difficult task of announcing king's death to the ground. indianapolis, like new york, remained largely calm. andt: it's a great story, robert f kennedy gave one of his favorite problems, aeschylus, and he really did come to the crowd. i mentioned to new york and john lindsay, the republican mayor went to to harlem when he was advised by his security people not to do so, and he helped calm tensions. i think sometimes when people are facing a difficult situation, people are worried and anxious and upset. i'mng a politician say hearing your concerns, i want to address them. i'm not good to be scared of you, i'm going to reach the people and be honest with you, that can alleviate crisis. about theeet talking heckuva job from george bush. that's the conservative philosophy of congratulating folks on doing a poor job to make the public think they did a good job. to be fair, when disasters happen, they are all different. you may not be able to use the same tactics as all situations. let's hear from anthony and washington, d.c. caller: happy holidays. reference to [indiscernible] the blood in baton rouge. the louisiana government asked the president to delay his arrival, they also asked the candidates not to come. into atrump turned it photo off. all he did was sit there and pass out supplies. it was a photo lot, that's all he did. , that's all he did. fact of the matter is the way it was played in the media was the donald trump went down to deal with the situation and to help give out supplies to people and that president obama was continuing to play golf. you have to, as president, be able to read the situation. forve president-elect trump reading the situation well in that instance. is more backere story to these things, but what the president actually does is what they are judged on. host: the book is "shall we wake the president." we >> c-span's washington journal live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. monday morning, the "washington post" national security writer. he will discuss some of the defense and national security challenges facing a trump administration. a retired colonel who worked extensively with the incoming defense secretary general mattis will share his insights. be sure to watch c-span's "washington journal" live at 7:00 a.m. eastern. join the discussion. ♪ >> tomorrow night at 8:00 eastern, who will hear some of the people hoping to become the next dnc chair, including chairs from south carolina and new hampshire and keith ellison. the fifthrict is congressional district of minnesota. when it first got there, my history was the lowest turnout district in the state. today, it is the highest turnout district because we have invested in turnout 365 days a new, all over, everybody, -- young people, we are doing the deed. if success is a qualification, i felt that criteria. i hope that you will take that into consideration, who has produced a literal success -- who has produced electoral success. -- because we turned out to vote. al franken win by 312 votes in 2008 because we turned out to vote. i want to tell you, i am an organizer at heart. . walked picket lines i am out there with you. postal workers, verizon workers, i have been arrested to stand up for immigration reform. we are fighting for our new americans and i traveled to nearly 30 states in the last two years fighting for candidates at all levels. watch the entire dnc candidates forum, monday night at 8:00 eastern on c-span. >> follow the transition of government on c-span as donald trump selects his cabinet and the republicans and democrats prepare for the next congress, we will take you to key events without interruption. watch live on c-span and on-demand at c-span.org or listen on our free c-span radio app. >> next, the annual christmas message from queen elizabeth. from london, this is just under 10 minutes. ♪ queen elizabeth: there was a time when british olympic medal winners became household names because there were so few of them. the 67 medals at this year's games in rio, and 147 at the paralympics meant that the gb medalists reception at buckingham palace was a crowded and happy event. throughout the commonwealth, there were equally joyful celebrations. the bahamas, jamaica, and new zealand. many of this year's winners spoke of being inspired by previous generations. inspiration fed aspiration, and having discovered abilities they scarcely knew they had, these efforts allowed inspiring others. a few months ago, i saw inspiration of a different kind. it was not hard to be moved by the dedication of the highly skilled doctors, paramedics, and crew who were cowed out on average five times a day. but to be inspirational, you don't have to save lives or win medals. i often draw strength from meeting ordinary people doing extraordinary things. volunteers, carers, community organizers and good neighbors. unsung heroes whose quiet dedication makes them special. they are an inspiration to those who know them. and our lives frequently embody a truth expressed by mother teresa, from this year, saint teresa of calcutta. she said, not all of us can do great things, but we can do small things with great love. this has been the experience of two remarkable organizations, the duke of edinburgh's award, and the president's trust, which are 60 and 40 years old this year. these started as small initiatives that go beyond any expectations, and continue to transform young people's lives. to mark my 90th birthday, volunteers and supporters of the 600 charities of which i have been patron came to -- many of these organizations are modest in size, but inspire me with the work they do. giving friendship and support to our veterans, the elderly, or bereaved, to championing music and dance, providing animal welfare, or protecting our fields and forests. their selfish devotion -- their selfless devotion and generosity of spirit is an example to us all. when people face a challenge, they sometimes talk about taking a deep breath to find courage or strength. in fact, the word inspire literally means to breathe in. but even with the inspiration of others, it's understandable that we sometimes think the world's problems are so big that we can do little to help. on our own, we cannot end wars or wipe out injustice, but the cumulative impact of thousands of small acts of goodness can be bigger than we imagine. at christmas, our intention is -- our attention is

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