>> he had a stroke. he had a stomach operation. he was old. he was at the time the oldest president ever. he smoked four packs a day up until 1949. his health was not great. he was a robust man, but an old man with serious health issues. they got to him. >> dr. snyder. >> he was his personal doctor. he seemed to be at the white house. -- white house 24-7. he kept a diary. they feared if ike got to tents and to worry, he would have another heart attack. he said mr. president, you have to relax. he would say, what you think this job is? of course he was worried. that was a constant theme. >> who was howard snyder? >> he was his personal doctor, older, an army surgeon. it was happenstance he became a doctor. was not properly trained. the misdiagnose -- he misdiagnosed ike's heart attack. ike could have died in 1955. he was a good, old fashioned general practitioner. he knew his patients emotionally. i think that is as important or more important than any kind of medical training he could have bought to the trade -- brought to the table. he met him in the army. he was an army doctor when ike was an officer in the late 40's. he became his doctor when ike was army chief of staff, then he was the first supreme allied commander in europe in 1950, and that is when, about the late 1940's. >> chapter 17 starts off, "when eisenhower was down or stressed, he lashed out at his doctors, the only people he could safely blame." >> ike was an old fashioned thinker in that he kept his emotions. unlike the modern age when everybody is sharing their feelings. that was not ike. like everybody, he needed somebody to blame. he used his personal doctor as someone he could get mad at. people of that other people, as well. ike had a temper, a real temper. it was like staring into a furnace when he blew up. he would periodically blow up at his doctor, even throwing his golf clubs at him one time. >> in the next sentence, "with the hungry crisis, snyder had found his pace and in an evil state -- patient in an evil state." >> the eisenhower presidential library, they have been there for 10 or 15 years. they have been used by a book for an academic press about ike's health. popular historians have not used them. i have gotten a lot of use out of them. they are all there. they are open to the public. >> where did you go to get them? >> the presidential library. you just ask for them. >> you say in the acknowledgments that you're interested in this book. >> john wrote for the new yorker. we talked about the dulles brothers. head of the state and head of the cia. i wrote a book about the cia. he asked if i wanted to the dulles brothers as a biography. i was interested. the conversation drifted off to eisenhower, the boss of dulles brothers. he said the general who had been ik's staff secretary but really his chief national security adviser, had said to him, the thing about eisenhower is he would never tell anybody whether he was going to use nuclear weapons. why is this important? weapons1950's, nuclear- were pretty new and we threaten ted to use them. no one ever knew if eisenhower was serious or not. to be credible as a deterrent, you have to be chronicled -- credible. ike never told anybody. talk about loneliness of command. the use of nuclear weapons. what could be a greater command decision than that. he was a guy who brought the allied invasion in world war ii. now he is president and he has an even greater level of responsibility. at a time when nuclear weapons are new. not just one or two, but a whole arsenal. h-bombs. are we going to use these things or not? ike used these things as a tool to avoid any war. that is what the book is about. it is how i used nuclear weapons to bluff to avoid war. he did not want to get into little wars. he knew that little worse lead to big wars. wars get out of control. >> who was older, john foster dulles or allen dulles? >> john. >> dollars hated him? >> eisenhower hated him? >> he said you needed a kind of genius. at first, dulles was that man for eisenhower. as time went on, and dulles became looser around the edges and distracted and older, and the cia, which had early successes, overthrowing the government in guatemala and iran, when they started to have blunders, eisenhower began to distrust dulles. one of his failings, and eisenhower is not perfect, he should have fired dulles. by the end, the cia was out of control. as i write in the book, it came at the very end in 1960, when the paris summit, very important, the cia did not warn eisenhower that the spy plane was at the risk of getting shot down flying over russia, spying and getting information. the president of united states was not warned. that was a big oversight. the plane got shot down. 1968. a big to do. the cold war ended a very dangerous phase. the cia basically portrayed -- the trade -- betrayed. eisenhower was mad at himself that he did not fire dulles. i took his son, john. he was 90 years old. very much alert. i had lunch with him recently. really interesting guy. he worked in the white house for his father. john eisenhower, as they flew to that summit meeting, john eisenhower went to his father and said, you should have fired him eisenhower blew up defensively and told off his son. he blew up because he was mad at himself for not allowing him -- for not firing allen dulles earlier. it reminded me of george bush. they are similar, george h. w. bush. they would say things like, i am president and you are not. eisenhower said to his son, i am the president and you are not. it is a feeble defense. do not question my judgment. eisenhower is not that way normally. he welcomed criticism and would engage in debates. on something like this, i think he knew he had blown it. he regretted it. >> what book is this for you? >> number8. -- which sold the best? >> i had a world war ii book. >> the lease? >> my last book about teddy roosevelt, that sold less than 20,000 copies. >> when did you decide this'll be a flattering portrait? >> it is hard to say. the authors fall in love with their subjects and fall out in love. i would say i was predisposed to like eisenhower for one big reason. i am fascinated with the idea of confidence. it is so great that you do not have to pretend or bluff. we live in a celebrity age where people are slip -- people are showing off. eisenhower is a throwback figure to someone who is so confident he can be humble. people are so confident they can afford to be humble. they do not have to show off. african people are insecure. -- arrogant people are insecure. that phenomenon interests me. eisenhower had a secure confidence. even though he had anger and fear and insecurity. but he had a basic confidence that allowed him to rise above things, to keep his own counsel, to experience the loneliness of command, to take on responsibility in a way that was unusual. >> ever capture -- every chapter, you have a call from john eisenhower -- a quote from john eisenhower. >> i had lunch with john eisenhower three times and talked to him over the phone. susan will be the first to tell you-can be cranky. he can be. but he is really smart. see says she does not understand her own father. good luck. she was trying to figure out bad. 75% cold blooded. that is unusual for a son to be able to talk that way about his father. it was a loving relationship but a complicated relationship. can you imagine being polite eisenhower's son? john eisenhower starts his ma'am wires with the sentence, i sometimes think i was born standing with attention. very tough to have a father always lecturing you about it for the department, as white house hired did predict the white eisenhower did. >> you did not " david eisenhower except for his book. >> i did interview him. he was one step more guarded with me than susan. he was friendly, he was polite, a nice man, but i sensed some reserve. i sent him the manuscript. i got no response. i did hear back from susan, made some fixes based on what she told me. i sent it to john nt wrote a flattering blurb on the back saying it you got as close to my dad as anybody was going to. david is married to julie. that could make you wear earlier. the book is fantastic. it was a great book written a great source to me. it is a warm, affective, funny them wire. i learned a lot from that. i was interested in mamie, who does not play a great role in advising ike, but whose marriage was important. susan told me the kind of little things that could make a difference. for interned -- for instance, mamie dressed carefully for ike, and showed off our bosom and waste. ike was a handsome guy. there is all this chatter about ike having a mistress and world war ii. he had a real love with his own life. susan help me understand that. susan is also very savvy. the public observer. >> i think that is her. >> the baby. it could be. with granny. susan and david were close. he was a good grandfather. susan was a writer. she was a wonderful story about her horse getting loose and tearing up the putting green at gettysburg where they live. she thought grandpa would let her have it. he did not. he was sweet and controlled. he showed his self control, his graciousness. mamie eisenhower, did she have a drinking problem? the picture you paint in there is they were at each other's throat yet they were very close. there was a quote where he told her to wrap herself all around her husband to keep him warm. >> when he had his heart attack, one thing cider did right was he told mamie to get in bed with her husband. he was in shock. that was plain spoken, old- fashioned medical advice that worked. it gets to a larger thing. they slept in the same bed. the had a close physical and personal relationship even though they start at each other, they thought, mamie was high strong, paranoid about her husband's health. they would clash. this is all and snyder's diary. snyder has one scene where they were grabbing at each other all day long, and yet at 4:00 in the morning, ike had gotten up and he had gone to sulk in his dressing room. he gets into bed with his wife. that is important. those intimate things are important to somebody who has to do with the responsibility of handling an arsenal of nuclear weapons. >> how extensive or harassed. howard snyder's diaries? >> a paragraph or two every day. they would come and go. ike and snyder had a falling out. a jealous spat. the diaries are less full writer on the time of the paris summit. generally, a paragraph a day. >> at what times were you surprised at what you read and did eisenhower note -- insider novis would become public? >> i do not think he did. he would " eisenhower saying, let's get drunk. i do not take a personal doctor to put that in. there are a lot of stories about ike's flatulence. personal stuff i do not think the doctor would want out. it made its way to his family, and now it is public. his stores since are lucky in historians are lucky it is. >> there is discussion all locked in here from a diary of anne woodman. who is she and what was mamie's reaction? >> she end ticket mamie not get along. mamie was jealous of the english driver who allegedly had an affair with ike during world war ii. two weeks after ike hires whitman, mamie tries to get her fired. it is a rival. ike gets her to calm down. mrs. whitman stays on her side, and mamie only visited the oval office four times in eight years. that was mrs. whitman's domain. there was friction with mamie. >> i am pulling out personal stuff because so much is found in this about the white eisenhower, but some of this is not her stuff i have seen before. about two rounds of golf a week. we see complaints about barack obama plane to much golf. does he come close to that kind of golf? >> no. not close. ike played a lot of gall. he took read about this while he was president. he developed a reputation as a golf-playing, out of it caretaker president. there was a political cost. ike's own view was that it was essential to his health. the commander, he needed to be out on the golf course. i right in the book, it was not a good game to relax. any golfers out there know gulf was not a game of perfect. ike was tense. he blew up. he called his doctor wants. he was not easy. the gulf could not relax and. -- him. he was very close to his brother. he found that ike was paying for him to stay at the white house. he stayed at a hotel. typical, scrupulous, cost- conscious person carried there is not much record about what milton said to ike. those notes were not taken. he had a bland ma'am wire. clearly, ike valued milton. he said in various levels he could be president of the united states. in a possible -- obviously impossible. maybe not so impossible. look at the bush family. it didn't happen though. >> if i calculate this right, he was 63 to 70. >> he turned 70 in november of 1960. he was 70. he was the oldest president ever. he was 70 at jfk's inauguration. >> 63 to 70, and he was sick all that time. >> world war ii will take a toll out of you. he ate a lot of states. by modern standards, he did not have the healthiest diet. he quit smoking. four tanks today reach a four packs a day -- four packs a day. it took a toll on him. his stomach was in bad shape. he had something wrong with his intestine. they had to operate. it was mostly a nervous stomach. he would get sick when he gave a very important speech. he gave a famous piece -- speech about the importance of peace. he was sweating and he was skipping pages because he was afraid he would have an unfortunate accident. >> i wrote down a lot of words used to describe him. i will mention them. give us a little touch of what you meant. you said he was manipulative. >> he did not always tell you what you want. he had a way of pushing people in a direction when they did not know they were being pushed. >> he said he was crafty. >> he seemed to be honest, but he could lie. he believed in and it was a big user of the cia. >> bacterial? >> he had an enormous temper. but he was sunny. >> a romantic. >> he was tormented about the united states he loved his country and his wife. >> hero worshiper. >> he liked church hill, washington, he had heroes. >> he was a big fan of lee? >> lee was good because he cared about his troops. that was really important to eisenhower. a general who cared about his troops. a great strategist. importantly, on the third day of gettysburg, lee made a big mistake by allowing ticket to lead the charge that failed. he said to take it, do it if you can bury it eisenhower would never have said to his, a commander, do it if you can. it is either, you know you will win or you do not. you do not take the chance. eisenhower was a all or nothing guy. do not do it unless you would win. ike thought we made a big mistake- - lee made a big mistake. >> back to naida for a while? >> yes. >> where did he get his money to buy the farm in gettysburg? mamie had to sell her stocks in order for them to buy a car when .hey were in new york an >> the wrote a memoir. he got a tax deal. he had at least a half a million dollars in cash. he used it to buy the farm. he also got help from george allen, who had a farm next door. he had rich friends. ike's buddies bought him a house. he got a lot of guests. the rules were loser in those days. >> explain the business about them building a pond and putting fish in it so he could have fish to catch it. >> agusta wanted ike. his millionaire friends bought a house for him and dug a pond and put fish in it so ike could relax by facing -- by fishing when the weather was bad. >> did we know that back then? >> i am not sure. i am not sure they knew the detail about the pond. >> human. >> he could be. he had a great smile. a warmth that flooded over him. if you were around him over it -- a long enough, you also felt the cold side. >> expensive. >> he had a largeness about this. he did not get caught in petty details. he was a big picture guy. conquer europe. save the world. he thought in those terms. >> patient. >> he was not patient when he was losing his temper. he had a long view. he only decided things when he had to. this is important. i wish i was like this. he did not make decisions to quickly. he would wait until the last second to decide. >> wisdom? >> good judgment. he was wise. he made good calls. >> i use all of these words because, is it hard for a journalist like you all your life to use all of these very positive things to describe anybody in politics? >> i have been a starkey journalist for much of my career. i have used a lot of critical terms. i think these are true of ike. he was a complicated figure and he was not perfect. he made mistakes and i point that out. >> cunning. >> he could outfox his opponents. he is good to hide his ball. other scholars have come before me and established this. a wonderful book was written about ike's nuclear policies. they are not discoveries by me. i told the story. >> how did you go about writing a book about a man that lots of books have been written about? >> i do not think -- i made it must more personal -- much more personal. we have been talking about all of these personal things. they are not front and center and other priorities. they are boring. there is too much going on. the president is doing too much. ike took one narrative. he took us out of war. an exciting and narrative. i focus on that. >> you talk about a famous person in the back of your book who is not famous to most people, mike hill. >> my researcher. >> he is not the only one? >> david, matt, others. he has had a long client list over the years and he is a warm, wonderful, great library and. he is good. >> how does he do his work and how does he fit into your work? >> different ways. he goes out into the advanced work, put together a briefing book for me, what i need to know. xerox in. he is the kind of guy who is a good friend of mine any knows what i think and what i am looking for. the two of us went out together. he has a good eye. i trust him. he is careful and thorough. in all the years when he worked with me, he never complained. i know i talked to other historians and they have used him. he is really good. >> how else did you prepare yourself for this book? where did you go? >> i went to gettysburg to his farm. i walked the battlefield by playing golf where he retired. i never got on the course of agusta. i had been in washington. i prepared by being the chief of newsweek for 10 years. i have been in washington since 1986. i have been preparing my whole life in a way. i wrote t"the wise men." i have essentially been preparing for this book for 40 years. >> you say the president eisenhower did not want to statue himself as a memorial. what would he think of what this whole discussion is? >> susan eisenhower feels strongly about this. she thinks he would have hated what is going on. i do not know. i do not think he would have loved frank's design. i do not know. he was a modest guy. like most modest guys, there is that it be in there. he would have wanted some kind of memorial. would it have been frank's ?oubt i doubt it. he might have liked to the theme of modesty, the boy from kansas. he might have thought that was a good idea. maybe not rendered that way. but he might have gone to that theme. it is hard to read his mind. op.singer particul >> eisenhower, when the navy was having its own nuclear posture, and the air force, ike said we need to have one, single operating plan. when he saw it in november, 1960, just as he was leaving office, he was upset by it. it was a kitchen sink operation. it was way out there. other presidents would get op.efed on the side u i think there still is one. it was a plan to end the world. >> why? >> we wanted to have over killed. we did not want the soviets to think about it. curdle -- curtis lemay. he was a very tough, bomber commander from world war ii. he was a great general and leader. he was not on a leash. he was straining at i caught -- ike's lease. -- leash. lemay thought the command could have gone and taken them out. eisenhower consider doing that. there was a moral argument for going first, before the soviets could build up. they rejected that idea. they did not do it because it was all for it -- ultimately immoral and goblets. but they had to think about it. maybe before the russians could hit us, we would hit them. >> the number of nuclear weapons when we had in the country when he started as president and a number when he left. >> 1000 to 20,000. i think there was too much of a buildup. ike wanted to send a message. we are on stoppable, strong, we will crush you if you think about it. in doing that, the nuclear genie got out of the bottle in a big way. we have a lot of weapons, some blame launch weapons, a bomb dropped weapons, missiles, and there is a view that we over did that. the arsenal got too big. >> you refer in your book to the sunny night dinners in georgetown. -- sunday night dinners in georgetown. >> this is the high chattering class. the well-to-do, harvard and yale, the cool crowd, in the cafeteria. >> where did you go? >> i went to harvard. i teach at princeton. it is a world i am familiar with. my father was a book publisher. i work for katharine graham's for many years. i know something about this world. it is a later generation. it was the in-crowd. they could be snooty. richard nixon never quite recovered from going up to one of these parties and being snubbed. his resentment was rooted in part in going to this dinner. >> to talk about you for a moment, back when we did "book notes"in 1995. [video clip] my background growing up in the 60's, going to harvard, i had a liberal sensibility but i came from a conservative background. the combination gave me a sense of capital -- skeptical curiosity and fascination with the workings of the american aristocracy. >> have those terms changed any since 1995? >> no. \ i am still curious. i look younger. i have not really changed. i did come from a liberal background. i got more conservative. i am a moderate now. i am unpredictable. i politics have become more unpredictable. the source of my curiosity, coming from a liberal background but having grown up in a fairly rich, conservative environment, created a kind of yang yang thing for me that helped spur my curiosity. i grew up in a town full of lawyers. they voted republican. my parents voted democrat. i grew up in a conservative, preppy environment. upper-middle-class. i was always skeptical about it. my grandfather was a socialist. i came from both worlds. pretty strongly from both worlds. they were confusing at times. i also hope, it bred in me curiosity. >> when did you get married and how many kids do you have? >> 1975, i was in law school. we have two daughters, ages 31 and 28. one is a professional writer and the other is a construction manager. >> construction manager of what? she is building. >> she is building a building. >> what kind of writing is your other daughter doing? >> a book she wrote was called the "conscience." c is now writing a biography about lisa adams, the wife of john quincy adams. she is also a sports writer for espn for a blog. >> you open your book this way -- what will did he play? -- role did he play? >> the cover all of the electronic equipment and cameras in black so ike would not be distracted by it. he was a good public speaker but had trouble with the teleprompter. >> he began by glancing down and reading from the tax on his desk. -- paused, pla why did you choose to begin the book this way? >> subliminally, let you know this great man was a human being. he was right -- he was like the rest of us. he could make mistakes get this is a real person to read about. [video clip] >> to share a few final thoughts with you, my countrymen. we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or on sought, by the military industrial complex. >> why was that speech so important? >> he warned against the military industrial complex, which has become a cliche. he will not pay attention to the speech much at the moment. they have since then. ike spent much of his presidency making to the military did not get out of hand. he was only partially successful. he kept military spending steady. that was hard to do in the 1950's. there was tremendous pressure. ike gutted his own service. he really cut it to have the money to buy the missiles. military spending in the 1950's was 70% of the 70 budget -- of the federal budget today. ike believe we had to control federal spending, even if that meant holding the line on military spending, even as the cold war was building up and there was all this stress. it was a hit in victory. people did not pay attention at the time. ike took a lot of grief from democrats. they accused him of the missile gap. he stuck to his guns. he did not overspend. he kept the federal budget under control. he kept taxes from going higher. he quietly helped preserve the prosperity of the country by controlling his own military. he warned that in the future, presidents would have to do the same. >> do you remember whether the budget was balanced back in the day? >> it was almost budget. it was with in, close to balance. >> do you remember the tax rate? >> very high parish for millionaires, 70%. high income, maybe even 90%. world war ii, it got up. rich people had a way of getting around those tax rates. they were a lot higher than they are today. >> what is your sense of what happened to us since flight out -- white eisenhower was president? it is down to 25%. >> we much more spend our money on entitlement programs, writing checks to see years, poor people, and the whole budget has changed that way. it is a big obligation. the next president will have to face this extraordinary challenge of writing in -- reigning in our heavy expenditures for the elderly and the sec. that will be hard to do. it is the challenge of leadership. we will need somebody like eisenhower who was willing to take on tremendous responsibility himself and make the hard choices and to the hard thing. >> when he was president, what did people read about the most? >> they were snotty. a liberal press was a little snobby about him as being boring. he took a lot of grief about that. he was still a war hero. he was the man we could trust. his approval rating as president was 65% over eight years. that is a big number. that is more than what obama is now, in the 40's. most modern private -- presidents are around 50 if they are lucky. the press reflected their trust. the liberal, north east press was snooty about him. >> joseph alsop, what was his relationship? >> a figure that is forgotten now. he was very influential talking about the missile gap and the bomber gap. fictional gaps that suggested the soviet union had more bombers and missiles than the united states. it was not true. eisenhower knew it. he knew from secret intelligence. from that spy plane. he could never admit to it. ike could not tell the public about it. he could not say, there is no bomber gap or missile gap. he was a little bit trapped. meanwhile, alsop was sent phony intelligence that there was a big gap. he drove ike crazy. ike would throw the newspaper across the room, have a temper tantrum. he hated alsop. ike tended not to read the newspaper appeared a lot president say that. i do not believe it. ike would get mad. heard him. -- it hurt him. class we talk about the diaries, howard snyder, but you also look at diaries of john hughes. he was a speechwriter. eisenhower did not like him because he wrote a book about the eisenhower administration that was not flattering. he had -- hughes had a big ego. he exaggerated -- exaggerated in his own biography. but i use the diaries more than i use the memoirs. >> how extensive? >> not every day, but pretty extensive. he leaves after a couple of years but is brought in sporadically. he is useful for the first couple of years of eisenhower's administration. >> jackson? >> a cycle lawsuit but i psychological warfare adviser. he had a lot of theories, lots bad, a few good. he was way out there on whining to do crazy covert action on the soviet union. >> of all of these diaries, which was the best? >> some more type. -- typed. >> who was the best writer? >> hughes was the most writerly, but snyder was the most honest. >> who was -- >> he was a hack. he kept copious diaries. he wrote about what it felt to be around ike. charm andatch ike's anger. >> looking at the time period, and looking at the president, compare that with today. jim hagerty vs j kearney. >> the press secretary had a real control. the press was not as adversarial in the 1950's. they would drink with hagerty and they would hang around with him and did what he told them to do. there were exceptions to this group. some colonists recall on this could be critical. -- some columnists could be critical. the press was pretty tame around hagerty. kearney could ntot pull that off. i knew him. he was younger. he was a young star. he was like a summer intern. he was a young star and had a good career and has done well. abc.gerty whaent to >> that could be. a very smart guy. >> what about looking today at the chief of staff to president obama, comparing him to sherman adams? >> washington is so different. you could keep secrets in the 1950's. the president did not have to be out there blabbing and raising money. ike did not have to raise money carried it was raised for him. ehrlich and band. -- he barely campaign. -- campaigned. he got caught in a scandal. this is modern. he made a lot of enemies. he was the abominable no-man. made a lot of enemies. when he was caught taking favors --m a lobbyist >> he was the former governor of new hampshire? >> he did not say goodbye on the phone. he would just hang up. he got caught in a little scandal, taking favors from lobbyists -- from the lobbyists. a minor thing carried he had no friends in washington. he said no to everybody. when he got in trouble, there was no reservoir of loyalty or friendship. ike had to cut him loose. it pained ike. he had to let him go. >> we have you back in 1995, and in 1983. i hate to do this to you. here you are. [video clip] >> young reporters like me are ambitious and want to get ahead and be on page one. that can lead you to take liberties you should not. usually, outweighing it is a terrible fear of being wrong. there is nothing, nothing worse for a journalist than to be wrong and be caught at it. you do get caught. it is just the most sinking feeling that you say something factually wrong, especially something that hurts people. >> 30 years later, did you do what you wanted to do in journalism? >> yes. i have been so lucky. i had a great run. i had great jobs as a bureau chief here in washington. i was editor in large. i got to write lots of -- write lots of great stories with a lot of help. i was really lucky. i was able to write books at the same time. i was able to blend my weekly or day-to-day journalism with my history. one informed the other constantly. i have been blessed. >> what is your life like now? class i teach a writing course. i love it. i have really smart kids. i have been doing this since you're six. i taught at harvard and princeton before that. i teach mostly writing and journalism, and how to avoid reporters. i teach few short -- future public officials how to deal with the press. that is a great reward to me. i write books. i have always got a book cooking. i was thinking about my next book. i have a pretty good balance. >> how long did this book take to write? the whole process and research. >> 3.5, four years from the time i started thinking about it to when it is sitting in your hand. >> when did you finish? >> what is finishing a book? when did i really finished? six months ago. you are fiddling with it up until the very end. i had a great editor. a really good pencil editor. he was fiddling until the end. i had a lot of friends help me carry my life was good. you are fiddling with a book until the last minute. >> you have another book you're thinking about? class i cannot talk about it. i have not decided what it is. until i do, i do not want to talk about it. >> out of all the books you have written, do you have to have, in order to even start thinking about doing a book on something? >> we have to be curious about a subject. the great thing about being a journalist is that i do not have to narrow especially. i can do what interests me. i have done late 19th century imperialism. i have done john paul jones in the late 18th century. i have done more -- if i have a specialty, it is post-war washington, foreign policy, of the whole generation that came out of world war ii and tried to make the world a better and safer place. that was my father's generation. it fascinates me. that is what i have read most about. >> your father died back in 1999? >> yes. >> what was his job? >> he was a book publisher. he published -- he met president kennedy. i got to meet some of these figures. i was exposed to the world i right about now. >> if you have to list the most impressive people you have ever known, in the public life, who would that be? >> by old boss, she was so human. i like per insecurities and her toughness and her bravery. i think she stands out. in public life, it is hard to say. i wrote a biography of bobby kennedy. he always intrigued me. i never met eisenhower. >> you met bobby kennedy? >> he said he -- he signed by pilots to book when i was in high school. i talked to him on the phone once. >> where would general, president dwight eisenhower be in your list of most popular presidents? >> i put him on rushmore. he is not there. he had a judgment and wisdom, a quiet, confident judgment and wisdom that i believe kept us safe and prosperous at a dangerous time. --think of the 1950's boring as boring, but they were because ike made them boring. a lot of gone wrong. there are a lot of books about him. this is the third eisenhower book this year. he deserves that recognition. is f the name of the book "ike's bluff: president eisenhower's secret battle to save the world." thank you very much. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> for a dvd copy of this program call 1-877-662-7726. for free transcripts or to give us your comments about this program, visit us at www.q-and- a.org. "q&a" programs are also available as c-span podcasts. >> c. the second presidential debate online at c-span.org, c- span, and c-span radio. next on c-span, birmingham england. we will hear from mayor michael bloomberg as he introduces the british prime minister, david cameron. earlier today, former senator alren specter died. we shall in interview about him talking about his book and 30- year career in the senate. tomorrow, we will show you two live u.s. senate debates. the first is from ohio. that is live at 12:30 p.m. eastern. later, from indianapolis, the indiana state treasurer faces off against the congressman. that is also live at 7:00 p.m. eastern. the british house of commons -- we will look at the conservative party conference from england. michael bloomberg praised the efforts of british prime minister david cameron and his government. he talked about the success of the london olympics and a coalition government's deficit reduction plan. reduction plan. this is about