We will stay. Now. None of this at all. Host what was it . It keeps on falling. This magnificent microphone. The horror of their deportation was as horrible as concentration camps. They were taken and brought in the middle of nothing and conditions were atrocious as the constitution there is the concentration camp to the division with the polls, catholic polls and the polish jews and that is the theme i thought was very interesting in your book as well that the tensions between poland and polish nationalism and the jews, patriotic polls, some fodder the polish army and how this was affected by who they belong to in these camps. That is right. The story, shale said the story is unknown. It is even unknown in washington so the big event of this book, they havent collected the material is there but they havent collected it. There was no story in the sense that there is a story of auschwitz, we have art spiegelman. We know what happened, if you go to a concentration camp you know what they
Board chairman, fred ryan. [applause] good evening everyone. I name is don hi bush and i had the honor of being the executive director of the Ronald Reagan president ial foundation and institute. Thank you all for coming this evening. If you would in honor of our men and women in uniform who protect our freedoms around the world please stand and join me for the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of america and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice for all. Thank you, please be seated. Before we get started i would like to take a moment to recognize some special guests we have with us this evening and i will begin with our board of trustees. We have with us governor pete wilson and his terrific wife, gail. [applause] from North Carolina mr. Bennett sutton. [applause] former congressman retired but just as busy as ever alton [inaudible] and his wife janet. [applause] so now on to tonights pro
Story and how to tell the story of the country in a way that neither sells a short the National Greatness or whitewashes our National Sins in our politics and what may be an unusual way and this book is clearly intended to speak the gist of the moment to hear about how to approach the questions. Wilfred mcclay is a national treasure. Hes first and foremost the chair of the university of oklahoma he is admired and loved by scores of students past and present and one of the great writers of American History. His book the self and society of modern america was just the best book in American Intellectual history. Its a students guide to u. S. History and why place matters, geography, identity and civic life in modern america acted in the service of the country he served for 11 years on the National Council of humanity is which is the Advisory Board of the National Endowment for the humanities. Hes a member of the u. S. Commission which i told you in order to challenge myself to pronounce t
And the arrival of the key figures in florida in the years leading up to the boom in the giddiness of the frenzy it self which could be described as one gigantic party, followed by the pain and tragedy of the bust. I think these are very american stories. Every generation lives through one or 2 such booms and busts and virtually everyone learns a few painful lessons from them. Part and parcel of living in a Free Enterprise system with freemarket capitalism. I like to think there is a more serious aspect to what i am doing. I have come to believe we need to look under the proverbial hood of these frenzies to understand why they arose, what went wrong and who or what might be to blame because the economy john kenneth gob race once wrote, quote, regulation that outlaws financial incredulity is not a practical possibility. In other words you cant legislate away human gullibility. How these events happened, and not to be seduced by such speculative frenzies because they do keep on occurring
Weschler. We will give her the word. But Lawrence Weschler as often his books have always had Something Interesting going on. I say this, he sort of in the singular way writes about, has written about unique people or sometimes theres some extra situations is welcome often at the heart of his books are these unique and unusual and distinct people. And this is a time with often it feels like a lot of the force of our work to try to make assaulting exactly alike and something conformed and conventional. Hes done this, the last time he was here in seattle was just a couple of years ago with a man most of what well known in the world of film, walter murch who but they kept in touch and for all this work is done as a film editor, one of the foremost, i mean, oscars and everything, is also an astrophysicist by heart. With sort of rogue theories in the book calls ways passing in the night was a dialogue about what he was doing. Hes done this in various ways and various times. Tonight he is he