Weekend on cspan2. Joining us on booktv is ambassador Samantha Power, her new book, education of an idealist, comes out in september. We want to do a short preview of that book. How did you get to the states . My mother, rambunctious irish doctor, athlete, humanist, decided to get on a plane and run away with a man she loved who wasnt my father and they moved to pennsylvania in 1979, there was no divorce in ireland so the terms under which she came here, raised a good irish catholic, continue to learn irish and go back for all our holidays and stayed but i would not have known, she would not have known we were immigrating to this country but that is what it turned out to be. Host it wasnt all that simple. Guest nothing is as simple as you wish it were but it wasnt simple. The big rupture in my life, her life, my fathers life. When i was a kid and moved to pittsburgh the year the Pittsburgh Pirates win the world series, everything was big and loud and there was an abundance of sugared c
A few people have read and if you havent. The character in the book swears he will never come back to little rock ever again. Thats one of the mysteries in the book that you hopefully will learn why he never came back, swore he would never come back and thats why he never came back. But he is forced to come back to little rock to defend his best friend from high school who has just murdered by u. S. Senator in the capitol rotunda, that you probably can see from here. So thats what when men betray is about. Its i think a fun book, and its a fun but because id so much fun writing it. I want to give you a little bit of background of why i wrote it, how i got into this. It really is another story of what i say in the book is that you cant plan life. You just run into it. And in my case, about four years ago i had a liver transplant. It was very traumatic, didnt think i was going to make it. And when i did i told my kids and my wife agreed with me, that we would do something i really wanted
Clustering of states in the world where there wasnt a single democracy. And now according to Freedom House i think correctly judged there is a democracy in tunisia tunisia. Its transitional. It has elements of fertility. Things we should be concerned about. We shouldnt take it for granted and thats precisely my point. If i were an american policymaker i would be saying okay whats the economic agenda for embracing and lifting up this economy, for strengthening the state, for partnering with the Civil Society and political institutions. Youve got to start somewhere. This country is crucially important in an outsized way i think to the future of democracy and freedom throughout the world. The final thing is you know i really do believe and i think my colleagues agree we are really still in a very early days here in terms of the process of the struggle for, to use one of the arabic words, corona dignity throughout the region and this isnt going away. There are many historical events that a
Leave it there i appreciate your good questions and we will go sign copies now. Thank you. [applause] stick we would get this lightning going in just a minute. James pretty brady critically wounded in the assassination attempt of reagan has died the the impartially paralyzed in the accident. He would want to campaign for stricter gun laws the brady bill signed into law in 1983 required a mandatory five day waiting period for handgun purchases and background checks for potential gunfire. James brady was 73. [applause] in recent days israel has been attacked in compelled to take action to defend itself from attacks from gaza this is the third time in six years once again voices have been raised you criticize the military operations to demonize israel . Of selfdefense that would be a nobrainer for any other country in the world this is a sad and tragic time the special for the more than 1. 7 million palestinians who have been taken hostage by her boss with the efforts to abeyance the radi
I tell the story in this journey over the past decade and a half or so but coming almost right up to the present. I think i didnt want to do a quickie book in 2011. I went to being a historian and having perspective and thought well of in my profession. And so even to write something after three years is oaudacious. The first generation was elected into office in 20112012 and a raft of books said this is the islamic winter. Not the arab springs. Lets talk about the people who made the changes. Lets talk about this generation. What are they like and who are they and what have they done. Let me read a little from the book about an internet activist of the early 00s. He setup an internet Discussion Group and magazine which was very lively and was very much disliked by the dictatorship. And he ran this for some years and then his Internet Police finally tracked him down at 5 p. M. On june 4th, 2002 six plane closed police man raided the cafe he worked and took him to his apartment and took