don't have time. [laughter] and, hetty was bad. she wasn't bad about men. she was bad about money. she was consumed by money. which was not sew dissimilar from the rest of her family. she was born in new bedford, massachusetts, in 1834 to a prosperous family of whaling merchants and in those days whale oil fueled the houses and factories not only here but around the world and whale parts were used for perfume, for paint, for corsets, for buggy whips and just about everything in between. so her family was extremely prosperous and they lived in what new bedford then was the most prosperous town in america. and they seemed like they embod i did -- her family embodied american values. they were rich. they were up standing citizens. her father supported abraham lincoln later on and they were spiritual. they were quakers. and they had the new england values, the quaker values of thrift to the point of stinginess, particularly her father, and they believed in some policety and plain living. and to them, to the quakers, wealth was a sign of virtue, a sign of god's blessing, and so they were very blessed except that her father really wanted a son. when his first child was born it was a girl. it was hetty and he became enraged, furious, so much so that her mother took to her bed and hetty, was dismissed from the house, before she was two years old, she was sent to live with her grandfather and her spin sister aunt. what she really wanted was her father's love. she knew the only way to gain it was to earn it. because her father was obsessed with money and he said so himself. her grandfather taught her to read the newspapers and the business news and the stock and bond prices in the newspapers when she was a little girl. as soon as she could read. at the age of eight she opened her own account at the savings bank in town. and then she was sent off to a quaker boarding school where again, she was taught about thrift. she was taught to eat whatever is put before her as much mush as might be, and if she didn't eat it she would be served it until it was all gone and she taught to respect poorer girls in her class. it was her tuition and tuition of other rich girls that was paying for those poorer girls. in the strange way of her family, she was sent to a fancy finishing school in boston. where she was taught to dance well, to become a witty conversationalist, and she became a striking young woman. in 1854 she had her debut in new york and she came back here a few years later. nothing could outdo the flurry of excitement that hetty encountered when she returned to new york in the fall of 1860. the city shimmered with news that the prince of wales was coming to visit. in his honor, a group of leading citizens was organizing a ball. the society maintained their moustaches and clipped side hisers and women spent hours twisting their curls. at 9:00 p.m., the evening of friday, october 12th, excited couples who paid $10 apiece and arrived at at can mad did i of -- academy of music. women with hoop skirts, covered with sat continues and blaze of jewels can't, aren't we special nods to acquaintances and friends. precisely at 10:00 p.m. the orchestra played, god save the queen, and the slight, small prince, stepped into the room. for two hours nearly 3,000 of new york's finest citizens rushed like schoolgirls to meet him and in a mad crush the wooden floor collapsed. never mind. the band played furiously. the prince and court were led upstairs. the guests rushed to follow and livery waiters piled their plates with a lobster salad, pate, truffles and grouse and filled their glasses with champagne. at 2:00 a.m. the dance floor finally fixed, strains of a straus quadrille could be heard. eager females young or old waited their turn for a walls or polka. finally the young woman from new bedford was tapped. in her gown sashed with pink, her arms covered with long white gloves and ostrich feathers fluttering in her hands, hetty was introduced to his highnews, the prince of wales. and i am the princess of wales she replied. all of neptune's daughters are beautiful, you are proof of that, said the prince and he sailed her away on the dance floor. well it wasn't the prince who courted her. it was a fellow named edward green, who was over six feet tall and over 200 pound in weight and a self-made millionaire. he asked hetty to marry him and her father agreed to it on one condition. that edward sign a prenup that they would live on edward's money, and hetty's money would be hers to protect and to increase and to pass onto the next generation. shortly after that, her father died. he left her a million dollars. the rest of his estate, five million, remember, this was 1865. $5 million he put in a trust for her, which hurt her deeply. she expected to be able to control her own money. two weeks later her aunt died. hetty was the only heir to the family wealth and the aunt agreed to a which she would leave all the money, $2 million to hetty. but instead she left half to the town of new bedford and to her friends and the other half to hetty and again, she put it in trust. hetty was furious. so she sued. the lawsuit went on for years. it became a landmark case and hetty became litigious for life. shortly after that she and edward maierry and went off to england to live where he sold american railroad bonds. these were the days of the booming, boom in the railroads and he sold bonds to european investors. hetty had gave birth to two children, a son and a daughter, and she invested her money in railroad bond and in greenbacks. she boasted that in one day she made $200,000. europe was booming. banks were loaning easy money at low interest rates. real estate prices were rising and, investors were buying the american bonds because they were paying high interest rates. but the prices an houses in europe became so high they had, they had reached a level where no one could afford them anymore. no one could pay those prices. so the market started falling. then they couldn't buy the bonds and they started selling them. 80% of american railroad bonds at the time were owned by europeans. one of the great american railroads then went into bankruptcy and the bank that was funding it had to close. there were no more customer for the railroad bonds. hetty and edward had to come back to america and they came back to new york. the city had burr johned in the boom years. 10 story buildings stood tall on the horizon. central park was as far as as 80th street. expensive brownstone houses replaced shanties along 5th avenue. apartment houses appeared for the first time. scrivener's opened the largest bookstore in the world. the spires of st. patrick's ma jess i canly touched the sky. the metropolitan museum of art and opened so and do the museum of natural history. the exuberant spending once more infected new york was no different expansion by industrial entrepreneurs, promoters, real estate speculators in the midwest and the west. by the autumn of 1873 the financial panic had pricked the bubble of hope and flattened the country into despair. does that sound familiar. new york teetered as stocks bounced up and down. on wall street, men in coats andpy ties and silk hats stunned by losses moved in a daze. only a few months before they walked briskly. the now they held on to their tall hats and worried over their jobs. even lawyers suddenly found themselves unemployed. shortly after hetty arrived she on donned dark dress and cloak, crammed her bag with stocks and bonds and rode downtown to see her banker. head down, hetty made her away along the route of america's riches, past the custom house, past the granite building of the rothschilds, past the shuttered doors of the banker jay cook. at 59 wall street she enter ited the office of john cisco, the banker for herself, her father before and her husband. cisco made his services available for her wall street business. at this time, when stocks were being abandoned, hetty wanted to trade. i believe in getting in at the bottom and out at the top she often said. when i hear a good thing going cheap because nobody wants it, i buy a lot of it, and tuck it away. for hetty the decline in the market offered an opportunity for the future hetty invested. her husband gambled. and at one point he crossed the red line when he used her money as collateral for bad risks. when she had to pay for his mistakes, she sent him packing. hetty was now a single working mother, with two children. at the time there were constant articles about how inferior women were, about how inept women were with money. how about innately impossible for them it was for them to invest. there were also constant articles about hetty, how she was mean. how she was micerly, about how she was a terrible mother. well in true quaker and true new england style she watched her pennies, to an extreme. she lived in boarding houses, and plain apartments. she dressed in old clothes. she ate simply. but she taught her son and daughter as much as she could about business. she believed that girls should know about business and finance, at the very least, they would be better wives. but she thought she should also though about having careers, even if they didn't need one. she believed that women were the equal of any man. well, for the next 25 years, america had its ups and downs. there were booms, and then in 1893 there was a bust. and after a long recession, there was a great boom. and then in 1907 there was a great bust. and every time it happened, it was caused by greed and buy ego, by overlending, and overspending. as warren buffett said recently, a climate of fear is an investor's best friend. well, hetty was brave. she was courageous. she always kept a cool head. she worked hard. she did her homework and she knew her companies. when everyone in the boat jumped over board, she climbed in and grabbed the oars. when everyone was rushing to row, she clam pered off the bode boat. it took courage. she bought when everyone was selling and sold when everyone was buying. by the time she died in 1916, she owned mortgages on 28 churches in chicago and she owned houses and office buildings, big blocks and mines in, from vermont to new york, from illinois to missouri, to texas, to california. she helped out banks when times were bad, and they were in trouble. she was the largest individual lender to new york city government. she lived in the guilded age when society lived lavishly, she rebelled against their opulence. she lived a simple life. she loved her children and her friends. she was wary of those who befriended her for her money and showed her dog great affection. when she was asked why, she said because he doesn't know how rich i am [laughing] she lived her life as she deemed best. she forge ad path for women to have business careers and be mothers. and to her clever investing, she showed that women were the equal of any man. at her death newspapers around the world, around the world, proclaimed her the queen of wall street, and it was known you throughout that she was the richest woman in america. so, i. there are a lots of sayings in the back of the book. her words of wisdom i think are great fun. she did have a good sense of humor and she was one smart lady. so, if you have questions, i'd love to try and answer. yes. >> do you find any evidence of her support for the women's right to vote? >> none. none. she said women should not have the right to vote. and it is interesting because i found that with a lot, many, she hugely successful women. gertrude bell which i wrote about in desert queen, did not believe in women's sufferage. margaret thatcher didn't believe in it. indira gandy, didn't believe in it. they want to make their way in a man's world almost. they feel women should be doing it on their own. >> i hate to generalize but i think women are their own worst ennis for other women, because there is glass ceiling as we all know. >> right. >> when you get into a situation, where you need mentoring or help to get through a certain barrier are there. >> right. >> women like to keep it to themselves. >> yeah. yeah. >> sadly -- >> and i think they love being successful in a man's world. makes them really special. >> [inaudible]. >> yes. >> she was obviously extraordinary woman. how come we haven't heard of her? >> she was so famous in her day, there were popular songs about her. there were plays written abouter had. she was in the newspapers at least once a week. and often more. she had two children as i mentioned but no grandchildren. there were no more heirs. so her name kind of disappeared. there were no buildings named after her. no great institutions that carried her name. and i think that's why it happened. but i have company across many people who had heard of her, whose parents may have said, don't be like hetty green or be like hetty green. [laughter] yes? >> what happened to her wealth? >> well, it went to her son and daughter. and then when they died it was distributed amongst hundreds of heirs because that was the original plan. if there were no more heirs it would go, be spread around the family. distant, distant cousins who didn't even know they were related to her. her name, when she was born was hetty robinson. so the hollands were a big family up in new england and as were the robinsons. that is where it went. >> so her children weren't famous in any way? >> her son was quite well-known. he was, she asked him to buy a small broon much a bankrupt railroad in texas in the 1890's. and he turned it into the most successful small railroad, the texas midland railroad, in the state. then he did a number about things. he went back to new bedford to build a brand new house on the family property and turned it into a center for radio technology and meteorology. gave it to the united states government during world war ii. and, so he was, he had the, is one of the greatest collection of coins and stamps. so he really made a mark to himself. yeah? >> [inaudible]. one of the things that strikes me about the guilded age and the wealth were a lot of wealthy people who believed in give back to society, particularly someone like andrew carnegie. did she donate any of her money to public service >> she never did it publicly and dismissed that she had. her son shade there were plenty of people she gave to. she never wanted it known. she was hounded for her money. she was constantly getting letters beseeching her for money. yeah, so she tried to keep it as quiet as possible. there is no proof, there is no proof. because other people said it at the time, she had a very close friend whose name is ann leery who lived in the neighborhood her who was a great catholic philanthropist. she became a papal countess, i never knew about the title but that is how generous she was and i think she got hetty to give some money to the church. >> how hard was it to research? >> well it was difficult because there were no diaries, there were no journals. there was no correspondence. she didn't want any trace of her signature. she was afraid, she was accused in that lawsuit against her aunt, aunt's estate, she was accused forging her aunt's signature, and she was, so she was always afraid somebody would forge her signature. so there was very little to go on but what i did read was a gazillion newspapers. there were incidently stories about her in the papers and interviews with her and interestingly enough most of the headlines were really negative but reporters who spent time with her really appreciated her, admired her, enjoyed her company. so that was rewarding to see that. stories were syndicated all over the united states and all over the world so, yes. >> how long did it take you? >> it was about five years. thank you. [applause] >> for more information visit the author's website, janetwallach.com. >> mr. mallon we're we're a nonfiction network how do you write a novel about water gait? how do you approach that? >> reader will find what the gore vidal the agreed upon facts most of big ones are still intact. president nixon resigned in 1974. it is the basic timeline. not what is called alternate history the novels which the south wins the civil war, things like that happen. i think what historical fiction can do with existing history insert things in between those existing facts. things that might have happened in addition to what happened. and, try to get inside the heads of some of the peripheral players as well as some of the main players. >> who is fred larue in your novel? >> fred, unless you're a real watergate buff you're unlikely to know. fred larue was a man from mississippi, a republican operative. worked in the nixon white house. not a business card. no salary. did a let of work for attorney general john mitchell t fell to him during the watergate scandal to be the man to coordinate payments to the burglars, hush-money. >> this is historical fact? >> this is historical fact. larue was a soft-spoken, intriguing man. he had a tragedy in his life when he was young. when he was in his late '20s he accidentally killed his father when they were out hunting and he was an increasing figure. and i remember thinking, he had the kind of personality i wanted to think about and explore. so he becomes a main player in the novel even though he was a relatively minor one in the scandal himself. >> is' protagonist in your novel? >> i'm not sure there is a protagonist. the book comes from seven different points of view. some big people. some of them lesser figures. president nixon, mrs. nixon is a main character. alice roosevelt longworth, who was approaching 90 at the time of the watergate scandal, teddy roosevelt's daughter, still very sharp and still very humorous and witty. she is my one witch's chorus in the book with long historical memory. howard hunt, one of the burglars, whos with only person i knew actually. i knew him when i was in the magazine business. he once wrote an article for me when i was at gentleman's quarterly. i had him review norman mail letter's spy novel. harlan's ghost. he used to write spy novels and had been a spy. elliot richardson from investigative side of things and a few more, relatively minor figures. the president's secretary, rosemary woods, who like fred larue lived in watergate. a great players haed their homes are. mitch shells lived there. it wasn't just the headquarters there to be burgled. >> thomas mallon, we interviewed and spent time with david and julie nixon ice hen hour at the national book festival. do they feature in the watergate novel? >> they do come and go. julie nixon was valiant defender of her father and david eisenhower of his father-in-law during the scandal. julie nixon eisenhower wrote a very good book about her mother. her mower one of the least known i think of the first lady's we've had in modern times. mrs. nixon, very private person, never heard from again after the nixons left the white house for call top. she never did interviews. she never wrote her own memoirs. mrs. nixon was somebody i tried to bring to life in the book. >> you written several historical fiction books. you've written nonfiction. you've written novels. how do you approach historical fiction. >> i always tell people who are contemplating writing it if they haven't written before, don't read too much about the period that about the writing about. read more from the period. if you really want to know how people thought, how they spoke, the way their minds worked, read what actually came out of the period. in other words, eliminate the middleman. i think this is why some historians are not very fond of historical fiction because it tries to do something different. you know, historians always have to hedge their bets a little. they will have to say, well, at this point it is not unreasonable to suppose that richard nixon might have thought, et cetera, et cetera. if you're a novelist you go inside his head and have him think it. it is not history. it is more entertaining than it is educational but it's one thing i think that the genre can add to actual history. >> what is your day job? >> i teach at george washington university. i direct the creative writing problem there. >> we've been talking here with thomas mallon and here is his novel, "weight gate".
great day to be in texas and today i have the honor and pleasure to be at the texas book festival serving as a moderator, and i'm pleased to be here with rachel l. swams. i will tell you a few things about rachel because you came here to hear her and not me and our time is limited. she has worked for the new york times since 1995. reporting on domestic policy, national politics, immigration, the presidential campaign of 2004, and 2008, and first lady michele obama and her role in the obama white house. i met rachel at an event this year where i bought a book, the book she wrote, "american tapestry: the story of the black, white, and multiracial ancestors of michelle obama". after hearing her talk, i'd bought six more copies. i bought them for all my family members and to give out as christmas gifts. now after having read her book i can tell you it was a good investment. it helps me better understand my own family and many mysteries surrounding my own family. rachel l. swams's book is a compelling story that stirs deep emotions. it is also a story that would break them here and with that, let's welcome rachel l. swams. [applause] >> thank you. thank you. >> thank you for coming. in the years leading up to the presidential election, the focus seems to be on barack obama's roots and his family and the fact that he wrote his own biography. now in your book "american tapestry," you put the focus on michele obama. tell us about how you got started doing that and what inspired you. >> i was writing about the first lady and the first family for the new york times which was something of an unusual assignment. typically the first family is covered by the white house reporters who chased the president around on air force one and in the briefing room and write about the first lady or first family when they have time that there was a sense in 2008 at the new york times and other newspapers too that we might want to do things differently and this first african-american family living in this house, this white house bill in part by slave labor, with slave labor would be written about regeneration to come and we wanted it to be part of documenting and chronicling that story. in january, before the inauguration, one of my colleagues was writing an article about the president and his rainbow family and we realize that the last minute we didn't know much about michele obama's ancestry. my colleague reach out to genealogist and asked her to do some digging. we didn't give her enough time. she didn't find it very much as we read a lovely story about the president and his rainbow family and we thought that was that. but unbeknownst to us the genealogists kept digging and in september of 2009, the first year the obamas were in the white house she called us back and said i found something really interesting. would you be interested in covering it? i found myself on a plane to birmingham, alabama, where i visited churches, spent time in the archives, tried to find out as much as i could about the first lady's great-grandfather who happened to be by racial and the story ran a month later on the front page of the new york times about the office's parents, millennia, the first lady's great great great grandmother who was the slave girl valued at $475 in 1852 and the first lady's great, great grandfather who was a white man whose identity was a mystery. the day after the article ran, an editor sent me an e-mail and said that was fascinating. a little snippet of the first lady's family tree. would you think of doing a book on the old thing and that is how i got started. >> we are glad you got started on the book because it opens up a lot of information about families across america and the interconnectedness of many families. what i like about your book is it reads like a good suspense mystery or thriller. i suppose you had to be part detective and part researcher in unraveling the story. even michele obama herself was unaware of some of the people in her family tree, both black and white. there are many families in america who are experiencing that same thing or who are unaware of their family tree and what that has hidden inside of it. i found the following passage insightful and -- which is also great prose and by wanted to read it. she never discussed who he was or what happened between them. whether she was a victim of his brutality or a mistress, he treated affectionately, war whether she was loved in return. she went her way and he went his. and just like that, their families split down the middle. children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, some black, some white and some in between scattered across the country as decades past, separated by the color line and a family's fierce determination to step beyond its painful truths in slavery. obviously your research surprise and probably stunned both sides of the family. tell us about at and how michele obama's family and the white side of the family reacted to the news. >> the first lady has long suspected she had white ancestors in her family tree, like many african-americans do. but she had no idea who they were or where they lived for when they -- where and when they fit in her family's story. so i was able through dna testing to solve that mystery in her family. what i did was trace the descendants of mill the knee at's owners who lived in south carolina and georgia, irish-american families. the first lady's family. i tested them and in fact it is the most ordinary of american stories. the white shields and black shields are related. this is on the first lady's mother's side. her mother is marion shields. many americans are making these discoveries with dna testing, just finding these connections through ancestry.com, doing their own genealogy. it is a kind of discovery that many americans are making but it is not an easy one for people. on both sides of the family, this was a hard realization, even though people know these things happen. many members of the first lady's white extended family had no idea their ancestors had known slaves and while many people might like a connection to the white house, this was a most unsettling connection to the white house as you can imagine. it is not something most people expect, to have a reporter not on your door and say one of your ancestors may have owned the first lady's ancestors. and some people simply didn't want to talk about it. but some people were willing to grapple with the history and said it would not be what i would have chosen for myself but it is my history even if it is hard history. so some of the white descendants, distant cousins of the first lady went on this journey sharing their memories and records and dna as they explored what happened more than 100 years ago. it was also difficult too for the black side of the family because michele obama's uncle talked about the silence among african-americans, about him trying over and over again to get his elders to talk about what they knew about slavery and what they knew about the different colors in the family and where the white ancestry came from and over and over again people refused to talk about it and it is one of these things that is hard for people to talk about even though it resonates still, this experience -- we think it is consigned to history books but it is part of our history. so getting people to talk and wrestle with this is not an easy thing. >> i can imagine. as you say, some people were ok with it and cooperated, and some weren't okay with it. and didn't cooperate. i found that to be very interesting, reading the book, how both sides incorporated that into their histories and both sides response to that were similar and different. i enjoyed writing the new york times article that you wrote because some of the photographs were in that article and you could actually see how people on both sides of the family, black-and-white, resembled one another. >> that was one of the things before the dna test results came out. some of the first lady's distant cousin didn't know they were distant cousin then but they were appearing at the photos of the office shields and ancestors, holding them side by side saying -- they were kind of -- i didn't reveal to them the dna results until the very end but by then they were not surprised. >> do we have some photographs to show today? >> we do have some photographs. we will flip through them. >> this is the first lady as a baby with her nuclear family. term mother and her father and her brother. this is joan triples, one of the first lady's distant cousins who were willing to go on this journey and shared with me what she knew about the family and her dna as well. this is the great granddaughter of dolphins shields. [inaudible] >> this is a question that just came from the audience. when we are talking about millbeena and her biracial son, what time period we are talking about. this is pearl. nilbeena was remarkably well in life and i was able to interview two people who knew her which is astonishing but she lived until 1938 and i found two people who knew her in the last years of her life. golf, her son, born in 1959-1861, he also live the remarkably long life. he died in 1950 and i was able to find three people who knew him as well. this is his daughter who move from birmingham to cleveland, ohio. this is dolphus shields, the first lady's great great grandfather with his son willie. he was biracial as i mentioned and quite a remarkable man in his own right. he was born into slavery in george and moved to birmingham, alabama as a young man where he became quite a notable person. he became a property owner in 1900. he was a carpenter and had his own business. he was a founding member of two churches that stand today and still open and running today. when he died the news of his passing was on the front page of the black newspaper. another photo of dolphus shields, dolphus with his extended family. the tombstone of the man who owned millvinia, the tombstone of his son charles, marion shields to the testing suggest was most likely dolphus's father. this move to michelle ng obama's father's side of the family, michelle obama's and and this is steve johnson, the first lady's great-grandmother who traveled to four cities, she was a sharecropper's daughter born in 1879 and somewhere along the way she decided she did not want anything to do with the farming life and she was one of the first of michele obama's and sisters to set site on chicago in 1908. this is her husband who was a minister who also lived in chicago. this is the first lady's great great grandmother, and she arrived in illinois some time in the 1860s. the first lady describes herself as a south side girl but the family had no idea their roots in illinois go that far back. if you look at mary, you will understand why the family story says she was part cherokee. she obviously has a mixed lineage but i was never able to establish for sure whether that was true. this is the first lady's grandfather, a mislabeled slide, who left south carolina and arrive in chicago around 1931. this is millvinia, the owner of millvinia's brother. this is a photo, this is an amazing coat, there is a nice story behind this one. after the book was published and after an article about the book came out, i got an e-mail from a woman who said i think that might meet my family, my husband's family and i think we have a photograph of them and in fact they did and it was the first photograph that i was able to find of millvinia's owner and his family, the shields family. millvinia's owner, henry shields is the older man with the beard and dolphus's father is the well-dressed man with the spectacle standing looking into the distance. it is a remarkable finding. i felt privileged to see it. i will skip to the last one. this is another remarkable moment which was after the book came out clayton county, ga. where millvinia was enslaved your active a monument to commemorate her life and they invited some of her descendants and that the most -- the last moment i thought some of the shields descendants might come and they did and the descendants of a slave and slave owner exchanging numbers, sharing a meal together. i don't know if they will be facebook friends for years to come but it was something to see. >> a great slide show. all of the people you mentioned are covered in the book. they all are characters in the book and one thing i found helpful was you do have a chart of michele obama's family tree, you can always look back and say this is how that person relates back to michele obama. but another thing i find interesting about your book is when we talk about slavery in this country we often talk about it as something only of the wealthy class. in other words if you were wealthy afford slaves and if you were a working-class american you didn't really have slaves. you referenced thomas jefferson and sally hammons as kind of an example of a wealthy family that owned slaves. butting your book, you bust that miffed because millvinia was a slave of a working-class american, can you talk to was a little bit about that? >> many of us when we think about slavery think about the jeffersons, we think about gone with the wind, the grand manner, the vast plantation. michele obama's family, there were ancestors of hers who had that kind of history, the plantations of south carolina. the family story does expose the enormous variation of life during slavery when -- which is not something we often think about. the shields family that owned millvinia they were not wealthy people at all land in some ways that was astonishing to the descendants who said to me we heard those shieldses never had two nickels to rub together. they were not wealthy family. the irish-americans who came some time in the 1700s, worked the land with their own hands, all we ended up owning slaves, shields married the daughter of a wealthy man. when that man with his father-in-law died inherited three slaves. the first lady's great great grandmother and she ended up in a rough rural community in georgia, the vast majority of people were not slave voters, white men worked the fields along the slaves they own if they owned annie and it was quite a different experience than the one we often think about. >> it was quite a different experience and i really enjoyed reading about the people of that day, how she worked the fields and the men who owned her worked the fields. i know that you were not able to determine the relationship between millvinia and the men who owned her. and i also know, code of silence. she never talked about it and her descendants never talked about it. i noticed the same thing in her own family and other families as well. it is about wilkerson who wrote about the great migration, the same code of silence in her family. what is up with that code of silence? >> this is a painful chapter of american history for many families. so i think at the time, people knew. it would have been very clear to people. the people i met and interviewed who knew millvinia and knew her son knew that she was a dark skin african-american woman who was born into slavery, had these very fair skin sons and no father, no husband around. they suspected but no one talked about it. people who knew dolphus shields suspected his great granddaughter said people whispered in the family that he had a white father but it was again something people just didn't talk about and there was a sense among african americans really of trying to move forward, trying to move beyond and not burdening future generations with a painful history, of wanting to have children and grandchildren who had hopes and would find their way with that hope in this country and it is a remarkable story, generations from slavery to the white house. you can sort of understand why people wanted to keep quiet in some ways, but it is a lost art in a lot of ways. >> talking with my own family, i tried and kind of a shame too because children were born out of wedlock and as you say african-american families, trying to move forward and parts of trying to move forward is being legitimate and getting an education and making sure that your relationships, people were legitimately married. anything that pointed back words or made you illegitimate was not really something they wanted to talk about and have out there. it is too bad because it closed a lot of doors in our family and that is what you found in michele obama's family. very fortunate, you were able to help and truly open those doors for her family. >> at least with been -- within her family, there are those conversations happening. as i said americans, ordinary americans across the country are making these discoveries with dna testing so these conversations are happening around the country. when you talk about marriage and the importance of legitimacy, one of the other stories which talks about the variations of the american experience during slavery was the first lady's family had ancestors who were freed for decades before the civil war and one of the most interesting records i came across was a record which showed those members of her family who after the civil war went to the courthouse and lined up to get their marriages, their relationships legitimized and recognize under the law and the lot of people did that. >> i think that is right too. i wonder, i am curious, how did first lady michelle ng obama respond to the news when you talk to her or this was brought to her? >> one of the challenges for those of us writing about the first lady is she is not doing any book interviews at all. i didn't get to talk to her about this but when the article came out, her husband's press secretary was asked about it and said she sounded fascinating. i know her family finds it fascinating and i think it was something they simply -- simply didn't know about. i briefed her staff along the way as i was doing my research and gave her and members of the family, i hope she find it fascinating. >> one thing i did read in the new york times when your article was published, she did have a positive reaction to if, and at some point she even traveled to africa with the children to see the places where the slaves were housed or africans when they were imprisoned warehouse before they were taken in the middle passage and across the sea to the americas. it was very interesting that she was curious to follow her roots all the way to africa as well. your book has been received positively by a lot of people. harvard professor henry louis gates said that the book gives us an idea, a real true idea of our interconnectedness of all americans, the interconnectedness of all americans and we would have to agree with that. talk to us a little bit about that interconnectedness that you found as you were writing the story? >> the book is called "american tapestry" because really, her family reflects the enormous tapestry we live as americans in all of our families. she is our first african-american first lady who has white ancestry, african ancestry, hints of native american ancestry. we often think of this modern contemporary time we live in as an unprecedented period of immigration, interracial marriage, checking as many boxes as you like on the census. when you go back into history, if you look at the census of the late 1800'ss, there are whole groups of people classified as a mixed race and all kinds of labels, quadroons, a cruise, this is not new. we think of the president and his heritage, he is the son of a white woman from kansas, african man from kenya, we all have these connections in our families. >> people are interested in researching their own families and their own family trees, what advice can you give them? we may not have the same access to expert researchers but what advice can you give them? >> i like to say i am a preacher of the gospel of genealogy because it matters a lot. we often write books about our president and first lady's but what i loved about the first lady's story is her story is about ordinary people, we all have these stories and our families and we shall try and dig them up. so first thing is to try to talk to the older people in our families because we often way too long. don't wait. don't wait. collect those photos and talk to people. collect those records in boxes and old folders somewhere. there are great pools where you can find records and documents from your desktop. ancestry.com is a subscriber service which has a fee. familysearch is free. if you know where your family is from you can go to your local courthouse and search for a property records, vital records, birth certificates, marriage certificates. 4 african-americans, many people have fought it is hard and difficult to do and it is because african-americans do not appear in the census until 1870 and people say what about letters and journals and i say slaves were barred by law from being able to read and write and newspapers at the time didn't chronicle marriages and birth and things like that but even so it is difficult. from 1870 on, the census is a great fool and you can find these records. >> that is good advice. there was a question earlier about the time frame the book covers. it covers a lot of territory and a lot of events. maybe you can talk about the time frame as well as many different events that happen in the book. >> i looked at her grandparents' and tried to take them back as far as i could. it is mostly the 1800s into the 1700s to world war ii 1950. really the first lady's family had front row seats to the biggest moment in our history. there's talk among deshields family that one of the white shield ancestors fought in the revolutionary war for instance. they were there during the civil war, during reconstruction, the migration, segregation, world war ii, big moments in our history. >> there were several characters that really stood out to me. beebe was one of them. if i haven't -- if i have it right, she was born in a very small town and would have been a sharecropper but had her sights on the big city. as you say there were quarters and the lives they lead, led, some of that has been glamorized but reading your book, they worked day and night sometimes for three hours, so i got a real view of that. the other thing i liked as you pull in the different characters and put them in different places you also talked about the black newspapers of the day. tell us how important they were. >> the first lady's family ended up in chicago quite early. great migration you often think about after world war i. her great-grandmother was there by 1908. folks came in the 20s and 30s and as a resource they did live in chicago, lucky to have the chicago defender which was -- which advocated -- calls people to move north. the newspaper from that time gives you a portrait of what life was like and it was invaluable. >> i think we are going to move to our q&a at this point in time. let's give rachel a big hand first. >> thank you. [applause] >> you are welcome to move to the mike. >> hello. i don't know if this is gone. there we are. i am from a presidential family of slaveholders. i have been doing a lot of research into the families of people my family held in bondage and i become in a group called coming to the table. are you aware of this group? is an online group that seeks to connect the families of enslaved people and families of an slavers. i find it to be a powerful experience. i am wondering if you think this type of research into our own families can promote racial hearing -- healing. >> i hope it promotes conversation. a lot of what i found on both sides of the first lady's family, black-and-white, was a lot of silence. we should talk more about it. i am not naive to think one book even about a historic first lady is going to solve everything. if it sparks some conversation, that would be a good thing. in talking to some of the first lady's distant cousins, some people, even our conversations were i think meaningful and fascinating. some of them looked at me. i am a journalist with a new york times. what they saw was an african-american woman and they worry would i be fair to their people? 1-woman said to me michele obama has said that she is the descendant of slaves and slave owners and she embraces the history, that is her story and they said to me she is on the right side of history and we are on the wrong side of history. but even when these descendants and i were having these conversations and they were looking at me as someone on the other side, being able to talk about it was a good thing. so the website you are talking about sounds fascinating. is a great thing. >> i would like to talk to you -- thank you. >> i was wondering. does the dna testing since you were able to take it back to irish-americans, you able to use that in africa to see what region she is descended, from one area in africa? >> it is not as precise as one would like. in fact the family, the white descendants actually know the history, they know they are irish-americans and deshields were all shields at one point and the dna certainly suggest west africa but that is a very common thing. beyond that i couldn't be precise unfortunately. >> anyone else? this is your big chance. [inaudible] >> the question was how did i do this dna testing. you don't knock on the door of the white house and ask the first lady for her dna. i knew dolphus shields was her great great-grandfather. the research suggested the other's son was likely the father, she was living next to him in 1870. she continued to have biracial children after the war and so i tracked down dolphus's descendants and descendants of the shield family and there was a match. >> i'm curious in reference to you reference the civil war as one of the important events word their ancestors who possibly fought on both sides of the battle and what legacy has been left within a family? >> the shields, irish-american shields did fight for the confederacy. there -- there are a number of voters sons who fought with the confederate army. on the union's side, not a blood relative but a man who had a formative influence on her life joined the union army and was involved with some notable battles. on the first lady's father's side, there is an ancestor. sometimes making these connections is difficult. someone who i think is an ancestor who joined the union army around the time slavery was ended. kind of making that link was unclear but not an easy thing. the records are there in terms of the civil war service of those ancestors and the descendants didn't know about that. >> you talk a lot about dna testing. with a book like this and your research have been possible before dna testing? >> good question. it certainly helped. we would have had circumstantial evidence that would have suggested the first lady's white ancestors came from the shield's family that owned millvinia but there would be no way to know for sure. 20 first century technology is what helped unravel -- ten years ago i wouldn't have been able to write this book in the way that it is now. >> any more questions? we have a little time left. i just wanted to say something about the book that made me think, but here in texas, looking at its history, particularly the history of slavery and how texas developed, i didn't know but someone shared with me that there was an incentive to have slaves here in texas among regular people because as the land was given away the mexican government giving of land away was based on how many people were in your group. if you could bring slaves, then you would get more land, regular people brought slaves, especially in texas, lots of working-class people came with slaves in order to enhance, are an interesting test about texas itself. regular people and slavery. we have a little more time. if anyone would like to ask a question. okay. would you please move to the mike. >> when i looked at the first lady's great granddad in the new york times and his half-brother and almost looked like the same person, you took the same person and bit him in caramel. that was astounding to me. i don't know if the similarities were that profound throughout but that seemed to me -- anyone who saw the picture and that is why you selected those photographs, i would like to hear about that in terms of the true similarities and i would love to hear any comments you would care to share when families got together for the unveiling and two sides of the family together to describe in appropriate ways the interaction between them. >> the families do find a resemblance. i was actually in nashville recently where another member of the shields family and others descended from the white shield family pass along a photo that shifts the brother of her owner was remarking on the resemblance. dolphus who lived in birmingham, the first lady's great great grandfather lived there at the same time his wife's half brother lived there and they lived not far. his brother lived kind of clothes to wear dolphus had a carpentry shop. people who knew him said he had a white visitor who would come and talk, of which was spun usual at that time and a very segregated city for the end of his life. this woman said that was his brother. the question of whether or not these connections even if they didn't talk about them, whether they did extend beyond millvinia and dolphus's father. as for this reunion, it was really fascinating. it was millvinia's descendant and descendants of millvinia's the owners lose some came from georgia and drove from alabama. we had a ceremony at clayton county with this monument in honor of millvinia and her life. a kind of exchange stories about what they had known. they looked at each other's photographs, they had a meal together, there is an effort underway in the town where millvinia lived in kingston, georgia, to do some commemorative work. she was in a cemetery, church cemetery, an effort to try to get one and i hear from the shield's family often about when that will happen because they would like to come. i don't know how long this kind of connection and interest will last that they are still interested. >> any more questions? we have just a little bit of time? no time. thank you, rachel. thank you so much. she will meet you at the book signing. [applause] [inaudible conversations] >> that was rachel l. swams on the ancestry of michelle obama. in a few minutes we will be back with more live coverage of the texas book festival. our next authors former abc president david westin. >> booktv is on facebook. like us to interact with booktv guests and viewers. watch videos and get up-to-date information on events. facebook.com/booktv. >> this book in particular deals at its heart with several desserts but the subtitle is boom and bust, the new old west. i am looking at the way the economy affects our lives, the economy gets into our bodies. it is a book that i wrote because my body arrived in the desert under particular circumstances in the winter of 1997 when i was broke, broken, and on drugs. i was in mexico city where i had been lucky enough to go under a book contract from new york. i got an advance from a new york publishers to write a book. a dream come true. in mexico city i had crossed the deadline and didn't have a word written and i was broke and i called the only friend i could count on at that point because my life style led me to destroy a lot of personal relationships. i call the performance artist lives in the united states for many years and the solidarity network, art and politics in the 1980s and i said [speaking spanish] >> in the village of joshua tree, calif.. there is a set of circumstances that led her, she is from the tropics in central america. how did she wind up in the desert? everybody has a story in the desert how they got there. she said [speaking spanish] we will take care of you and give you a place to live. i arrive in the desert and one of the first things that i saw when i rented my little shack in the sand next to a sign that said next services, hundred miles, town of 29 palms, felt myself driven to go further and further out. they were in the village of joshua tree and a beautiful national park. you are in joshua tree? if you haven't been there, you 2's album, you know what joshua tree looks like, the arms going this way and that. i wanted to go further out. there was something existential driving me further and further, the big empty as they say about the desert and also because the further out you rent their rent gets cheaper and cheaper. always the $275 a month for two bedroom house with five acres of land on the edge of 29 palms, right where the sign said. that is where the book begins. begins with a personal crisis and arriving, no accident fire arrived in this particular landscape. ultimately the desert has been the site of restorative pilgrimage for millennia. at that particular moment i don't think i was aware what i was doing. i didn't say i am in trouble with my life and must go il in the desert but ultimately that is the state i was entering and later i realized all the symbolism was there to receive me. i began the process of healing and getting to know this place which included almost immediately dealing with the fact that i was arriving in a landscape that had as many problems as mexico city with drugs. i was coming from a place of addiction and all of the pain and struggle that goes with that and arriving in a place where meth lab work devastating the landscape and young marines were training and doing lots of drugs to escape the terrible reality of their bodies. if i was going to carry ancient symbolism of restorative healing pilgrimage by was also entering a place that was the opposite of that. a phantasmagorical place. many years after i moved to joshua tree and 29 palms, a few years later i met my partner angela garcia in stanford and also written a wonderful book about the desert called the past durrell clinic about addiction. imac angela far away from the desert but she is from the desert and that is one of the things i fell for immediately about her, the fact that she was a desert girl, western girl from new mexico, south valley. we ended up living in new mexico to get there when she was doing research for her dissertation on addiction, she is a medical entomologist, to stanford, people representing her tonight. i followed angela to another landscape, northern new mexico which i had already seen. i had been very couple times as a tourist. you have all seen northern new mexico represented artistically. whether it is in the carrousel or truck stop or angela adams or georgia o'keeffe for santa fe artist painters, john nichols, films, how many western have we seen that have the landscape in range? northern mexico in particular has a very powerful draw in terms of its enchanted landscapes, the official state that came -- nickname is land of enchantment which carries a with of new age mysticism with it. warm and fuzzy and tends to obscure complicated reality and that is what desert america is about. how we imagine the desert or the desert has been imagined for us by representations that created this imagery or created this vision of the desert for us, that is consumed and bought and sold and the stage upon real estate is sold and hotels and tourist packages and how complicated the act will human geography of the place is imagined. i am going to take you to northern new mexico briefly here. angela chosen northern new mexico. she is from central new mexico, albuquerque. both of our families have issues with addiction. that was another point of encounter between us but she chose northern new mexico, not to be right next door to her family, but close enough that we could visit and also because northern new mexico, runs along highway 68, which ultimately comes out of santa fe. you are going to the espagnole of valley. that place in northern new mexico has the highest rate of apps addiction and death from overdose of heroin of anywhere in the country and has for a long time. probably not getting better. it is getting worse. >> you can watch this and other programs online at booktv.org. here is a buck at some upcoming book fairs and festivals happening around the country. booktv is live from the texas book festival. coverage includes presentations by douglas brinkley, rachel for and many more. visit booktv.org for a complete schedule of events. national press club book fair and author night is november 14th. many riders and proceeds of for the press club and journalism institute. watch booktv for interviews and this event. national book awards will be new york city nov. fourteenth. the ceremony celebrated author's work of fiction, non-fiction, poetry and young adult literature. booktv will air the ceremony the following weekend. miami book fair international held from november 11th to the 18 featuring 350 authors and booktv will be live from miami nov. seventeenth and eighteenth. for complete schedule of presentations visit booktv.org. please let us know about book fairs and festivals in your area and we will be happy to add them to our list. e-mail us at booktv@c-span.org. here is a look at some books being published this week. historian alex kerr shot tells a story of felix parks, the commander of the 157th infantry regiment in the liberator. one world war ii soldier's odyssey from the beaches of sicily to the gates of dow. jenna lee stand media critic eric begins argues the media capitalizes on viewers fears and prejudices to garner an audience in race here, how the media wields dangerous words to divided nation. in underdog, the making of a modern marine corps, aron o'connell of the cold war in the united states marine corps at the u.s. naval academy chronicles the transformation of the marine corps from world war ii to vietnam. you can see a recent interview with mr. o'connell on booktv.org. the editor at large for time magazine describes president abraham lincoln's political and military decisions in the second year of the civil war in rise to greatness, abraham lincoln and america's most perilous year. in tombstone:the great chinese famine, 1958-1952 journalist explains what led to the famine of the 1950s and 60s which included the death of his father. the creator of fractal geometry recounts his life in the fractali fractalist, more of a scientific maverick. .. [inaudible conversations] >> ready? >> good morning. you can all grab a seat. we're going to get started here. i hope all of you are staying warm or have a jacket or coffee to endure this, but as some of you live in austin, it's nice to have this weather. i'm welcoming it. i was too hot all summer long. very excited to get to interview david west, somebody i have admired from afar, and he is -- he has written exit interview, but i hope you all did, whether you are watching this at your home more here in the audience. it is an extraordinary book about his time running abc news from 1997-2010. he was there for all of the big moments of recent history, and knows all the personalities in the broadcasting journalism business. it is a delight and a real welcome to austin to you. >> thank you very much. it's great to be with you. [applause] >> before i get into your book, i just wanted to ask you about your own trajectory because the you ever plan on -- where were you brought up? where did you grow up? did you ever think about being in journalism as a teenager or a college student? >> i am a proud michigander from north of here. exactly, from plant, believe it or not. i was born in flint, michigan. i went to the university of michigan and then law school and become a lawyer in court for just a spell at the supreme court which was a wonderful experience and was a lawyer and was planning to do that for my career in washington and was plucked really ought to be general counsel of the parent company for abc back in '91. i did that for a few years and then i moved over to the business side. through a roundabout way i ended up becoming president abc news and successor to a legend in sports and later news. that became his successor. so it is not something that i ever sought to do, and even when i went to do it, did it because we needed a succession plan, and i thought i would do it for a couple of years. the biggest surprise was i can't absolutely love it and have had some wonderful jobs, been very blessed, but being in a news organization like abc news, much less running it is a rare privilege which is part of the reason i wrote the book, to try to give people who have not had that experience some sense of what it is like. >> tell us about -- you are young guy in michigan. how you get to get to the supreme court? what was that process? what did you learn that the supreme court that has helped to run abc? >> well, as i say, i went to michigan undergraduate and sort of blundered into law. the first time i met a lawyer was when i went to law school actually. i was fortunate because it was a great law school. the you have it here in austin, the university of texas austin. i did pretty well in law school, and one of the things you do is you hope to be able to clark. i got chosen by justice powell. the supreme court is an amazing institution, for those of -- it is the only part of government where the senior most people do all the work. if you think about it. the supreme court justices read the briefs and listen to the arguments and the side. it does not work that way with senators are congressman our presidents. they have people that given summaries. so it is a great institution, but the most important thing for me was justice powell, lewis powell, who came out of virginia, was a truly extraordinary man, someone i worshipped and became very close with. learning from him and his judgment about people and how to trust people, how to make decisions, hausa have the courage of his convictions and that the same time to keep his mind open. tommy much of what i learned. >> tell us, you know, when i recently will -- wrote a book on walter cronkite. >> a wonderful book on walter cronkite, by the way. >> yes. >> it deserves the applause. >> and it was -- i was looking a lot at the history of cbs and nbc, the big two, but abc has started coming on strong and it became the third of the big three. how did abc news did on parity with nbc and cbs? what is the timeframe that that happened? >> abc news to everyone always says it was the fourth that of three. [laughter] for the 60's and 70's. it was a very weak news organization by all accounts. let's be clear. abc does the weakest of the networks as well. if you recall, there were to nbc network and nbc had a spinoff because they had trust concerns. so letter golden sun started building up the entertainment part of abc and to some degree successfully in the 60's and 70's. he concluded the only way to really get to parity with cbs and nbc was to build a great news organization, not so much because he loved news, but because the local stations made most of their money, as they do today, off of their newscast. he needed to improve. so he turned to abc sports, monday night football, while the world's ports and it said, you go over to news, spend as much money as you want which he did, and he really belted out starting in 19951977 through the 80's, and he did it in part by bringing what he did in sports, brought in big stars. he already had barbara walters. but -- brought in david brinkley and diane sawyer. he brought peter back from overseas and had an amazing graphics on air, amazing look, and he was very, very aggressive and built it up into a real powerhouse petallides. >> what was his personality like? if you have to describe them. >> well, he was a genius. he was larger than life in his thinking, not in his demeanor. if he were here, he was a bit on the size i actually. and often totally absent. i mean, one of the running joke says he never returned phone calls, including the head of the company. in fact, throughout his life when you would call him at home at night because a news you have crises, there was an answering service. it wasn't even a voice mail. he never returned the phone calls. and after he died one of his close friends at the white said to me, you know why he never returned phone calls. why is that? because if you were calling him it was your problem, and he didn't care about your problem. he wanted to do with this problem. but he had this, i think, unique ability, besides just having a very large vision of what was possible, a unique ability to when he watched a television program it was as if he had never watched television before. one of the problems, the people fall prey, they know the people on there, they know what went into it, west and a lot or a little bit of money, and the colors their view about it. with him it was all -- he acted as if he did not know anybody. he did you it the way anybody at home you did, and it gave him a great sense of what worked and did not work on television, but sports and news. >> great. how did you become the president of abc? >> it's a great question. people at abc ask that the time. believe me. [laughter] but i was in general counsel and had gone out to the west coast and overseeing production of entertainment programs, and then i was president of the abc television network which was over news. on paper, he was my subordinate, although he did not think he had any boss is basically. he was largely right. one of the challenges was toward the end of his career. while he was a wonderful news organization that had really been built up, as i said, it was in tough shape. people within abc news were coming to us and saying, you know, we love him and become one anything bad to happen to him. he treated our careers, but he has to move on because things are not getting decided. a different world. cnn was on the table at that point. they have become successful. nbc was on the rise. and they said, you have to have a replacement. as the year-and-a-half or so looking for a suitable replacement for this legend. i tried various things. i could not find it. and i pulled the dick cheney. i said to my boss who now runs the walt disney company, i think i know we can do, but i don't think i want to do it. i know these people and work with them as their lawyer and boss. he said to my think you can do it, but i'm not sure you -- i want you to. we talked about it, and ended up going in. i went in as a good corporate citizen because i value abc news, it needed the help, that i would do it for a 2-year transition or so. i say a great shock to me was i really came to love it as sort of a convert into journalism. it was a remarkable experience and a really inspirational experience for me. >> tell me about the trials and tribulations of president bill clinton. i mean, you are coming in at abc in the 90's. bill clinton, president, he had the impeachment lows. did you have to deal with any of the second term clinton problems? >> a good part of my first year at abc news was dealing with the clinton issues. i mean, the monitor lewinsky story broke ten months into my tenure i was done in cuba. the pope was visiting cuba. we had everyone down there. well over 100 people down there to cover this event. d'agata call one at when i was out to dinner from the desk in new york saying we have this investigation we have had going on that looks like it's going to break. there is this young intern who has told her close friend that she had a relationship, and a proper relationship with the president and i said, that's just ridiculous. that can't be right. we have no reason to believe she's telling the truth, so forget it. i went back in to dinner and about an hour they call back and said we have just confirmed that janet reno, the attorney general has formally and officially expanded the investigation into the whitewater, the whitewater issues and building plants in the financial questions. officially extended the investigation to include obstruction of justice charges against the president of the united states relating to this young woman. at that point, of course, we were off and running. when that happens you can't ignore that. we scurried around to make sure we had the story right and later that i broke the story. so the white house was obviously very upset. supporters of the president were very upset. we were being buffeted by both sides, but the conservatives and liberals, and abc news and we and i were put front and center in it because very early on, two or three days into the story we had the story of the infamous blue dress, and we headed exclusively that i personally that it and made sure about the source a minute. and one of the import lessons i learned in journalism, an exclusive is a really great thing as long as it doesn't stay sesotho long because at the beginning it's great that no one else has it, but when it goes on people start to question what you got it rider not command we had cbs news and geraldo rivera and people billion and sank this is totally bogus the mentally wrong, and we were exclusive for about six and a half months before it finally got confirmed. it was a very uncomfortable time. we have a lot of pressure. >> i went to the clinton library recently, and i did not see the blue dress under glass. it just wasn't there. [laughter] >> it's funny. time goes on and we forget, but in writing this book a went back and reread some of what was happening at the time. today, it was always an awful story because on the one hand it seemed potentially very important and it was incredibly tawdry. none of us -- your not covering yourself and glory. the thing that you have to remember is that the time the blue dress reported the basic claim of the white house was it never happened. she's lying. if you recall, president clinton met with a series of cabinet officers and went out to camera and said never happened. and the reports, like in the "washington post" and other places, anonymous reports of france said she makes things up, she fantasizes, particularly when it comes to romance. so the blue dress ended up being seminal. it had never -- had never been any progress and not sure where the store would have ended up. >> when bill clinton left office when you were president of abc, remember al gore running, did not even want to be in a follow-up with bill clinton in 2000. to his detriment, i think. probably could have won if he had gotten on his side, but there was still a stigma to being assisted with clinton. now in this 200012 cycle he is the rock star. he's trying a bigger crowd than anybody. getting praise from all americans. how do you think bill clinton has rehabilitated himself so fully? >> myrna the things i talk about is that the 2000 convention, the democratic convention, i don't know if you remember, he came down that long white corridors with the black suit on, look like tiny in. at the time i was sitting with george stephanopoulos what -- watching this. i think he should just come out and say, me too. george at the time said no. too much discord of president clinton still at this point, but i tended to agree with you. two things. this was a shortcoming in the media, including us. i think that the american people were ahead of us among the ability store from the beginning. i think that they figured out right quick that, in fact, he did it. they did not approve of it. it is approved of it, but he was a really good president and wanted to be a presence. thank you, let's go on. even when he left office his job approval ratings were quite high. so on the other hand, the clinton global initiative and some of the things he has done since then have been truly extraordinary for an ex-president. he is making a difference around the world, and i think that is now lost on people. >> you mentioned it george stephanopoulos. abc had inherited temperament the demonstration. what made you have confidence that stephanopoulos would be able to make it in the world of broadcast news? >> george is one of the the things i most protestant at abc news. george was a contributor of the round table when i came in. and one of the things i did was sit down with him because i had done to know in a little bit. i saw how intelligent he was, but also, what a wonderful student diaz. i mean, he is, like many broadcasters, willing to go back and relenting and to learn from his mistakes. so i sat down with them early on and said to my don't know what you want to do. at the time he was teaching at columbia, on the lecture circuit -- circuit, had just written his book. i said, i don't know what you want to do, but if you want to give all this up and go into journalism, i think you could be traded. he said, you know, it's funny, i've been thinking that's what would like to do. i told him, you have to go back to the beginning because you have to learn the craft to this whether it's really a teleprompter or voicing over pieces our standards or ever. he did it. and when we moved him into the anchor on sunday morning there was a lot of controversy about it. the left did not like him because they thought he had betrayed president clinton. the right to not like him because you work for president clinton. all of the television affiliates even inside abc were saying we just don't think he's an anchor. he just doesn't feel like an anchor. i believe in him, and we worked hard, and that think he is just superb. very, very proud and delighted because he deserves all the good that is coming his way. a very hard worker and decent man. >> here here agree completely. one of the best in the business of what he does. now, tell us about george w. bush. i mean, you had to up -- tell me about what he is like and did you ever have any squabbles with the bush administration over coverage of things? >> we have certainly squabbles with the bush administration. now with george w. bush. i first met him down here in austin when he was governor and running for president. one of the traditions in a place like abc news is when you get into a presidential election year you invite all the candidates to come in and meet in an informal editorial meeting in new york, and then al gore who was vice president of the united states, but george w. bush's people said thank you very much. you contend austin. we flew down here. peter and i and some others flew down to interview george w. bush. my personal feelings always were he was very pleasant. he was very enjoyable to spend time with. very quick. i always felt the media underestimated his intelligence, certainly underestimated his political savvy. i was always very impressed. that said, particularly as we get into september 11th and wars in afghanistan and iraq, the bush white house, the administration was very aggressive and particularly karl rove who is not a shy person. karl did not hesitate to let us know when he was very upset. by the way, did not blame him. he was doing his job. he was an advocate. but he was a very effective advocate, and he took issue with a number of things we did, and we responded as best we could. >> you mentioned a couple of abc correspondents, and an anchor. let me start with sam donaldson. what is sam like? [laughter] sam is exactly what you see on there, just exactly. he is wonderful. irrepressible. he cannot help being sam donaldson. [laughter] he does it at home. he does it -- you run into him. so energetic. so passionate. he loves the news. he loves washington in particular, loves politics, knows it backwards and forwards. he is wonderful, but you know, sometimes he gets in his own way, but by the way, sam donaldson, one of the things i did was put him back into the white house. he had been white house correspondent under reagan for many years. and when i went in i was not comfortable with the way we were covering the clinton white house, and i put him in to the white house, i think, about three months before the model with the scandal broke. there were a number of reports that i knew were coming. i had no idea. they thought that's why. a massive stroke. the put sam donaldson just-in-time to moscow wednesday scandal. what about peter jennings? in the book jennings seems to be a touchdown person. what was your relationship with him like? >> anyone who knew, my relationship was complicated because everyones relationship was complicated with peter. he was a complicated man. somebody i do mess, even to the state. and missed sorely when we lost him for abc news because he was such an important intellectual and editorial influence at abc news. peter was a great journalist, and i suppose that sounds obvious, but that meant that he was skeptical and chief for abc news, both outside and inside, and so when i came in he was my chief skeptic. he took me out to lunch at the beginning and said to david, you should understand that a lot of us really doubt that you are taking this seriously. we think that you are just punching a ticket on the way through to some other job and don't really understand what we do or care about it, but he was that way. very direct and straight up. and so we start out, you know, looking at each other, eyeing each other. i am really pleased to say we formed a very close bond. it is the sort of bottom of this is important for people to understand, that i did not under appreciate the four went to news. these people overtime have remarkable bonds with each other because they cover news stories, sometimes in dangerous situations under a lot of pressure with all lot of risk involved, and they form bonds that are very, very deep. and peter, i'm delighted to say, and i formed that kind of bond. we did the monica lewinsky, covering the impeachment together and worked closely, but then we -- then we did the millennium program, on air for 24 hours as we showed the dawning of the new year around the world in every time zone. and then we had september 11th together. we have the wars together. and those sorts of things really built up a mutual sense of trust and respect and even affection which i treasure to the state. peter was a wonderful journalist because he was always looking for the contrarian position. he would never go with the perceived wisdom. sometimes it's right. you can go too far with it, but peter was always saying, i'm not sure that's right. that was true with weapons of mass destruction when he and i would talk about it. well, whatever happens all the reporting we have says that there will be weapons of mass destruction. peter always said, not so sure. you can't be that certain command which we have listened to him more. >> did you ever weighed in on -- at abc that the news was not covering the big story enough? i had been annoyed personally this season, three debates, for with the vp, climate change is not even gotten talked about. having all this freakish weather and all the science is so overwhelming about climate, yet you don't see it on the nightly news. is there a story that you wanted to grab of stuff during your tenure at abc in say, we have to cover this war? >> there were several we have had discussions about. actually, one of them was the environment and how we cover the environment. every time we tried to do a prime-time special we would not get a rating, and that led -- one of the chapters are right about this, where i don't come across well, we had leonardo dicaprio at one point, president clinton, and i get killed for it. i did not intend, but we did a prime-time environmental special , and dicaprio was the chairman of earth day that year, and we talk to my that he would make an appearance at the end -- ended up interviewing the president. that was an attempt to try to cover the environment and a serious way and drive an audience. i was concerned, frankly, about our terrorism coverage. we did more than other people did. john miller, our correspondent went in an interview bin laden, the last western journalist the trekked into the mountains in afghanistan, and we did a prime-time special or two, but i had some dealings with the military in washington he said their biggest concern was an act of domestic terrorism. we had active discussions about doing more. in retrospect wish we had done more. education is one that does not covered nearly in the debt that it should be. so there are always travels to try to cover some of those stories. some of which, frankly, are a little difficult to put on television, better and print. >> how much pressure is there today to at entertainment as news? you know, lindsay lohan leading into the evening news or the superficiality of news, lot of people's opinion of journalism has gone down in recent decades. is there up pressure for a president to kind of, the news versus entertainment? >> sure. the first area still in the book was a disagreement with peter in the beginning about princess stannic coverage or wanted to do a prime-time special after she died and pier thought it was a terrible mistake. he quickly came around and decided it was the right thing to do, but that was a constant battle that i had within myself and we had with in the newsroom and the company. and it is a line between news and entertainment and it has moved. it was interesting reading your cronkite book. those issues have been around for the beginning of television and even radio. even walter cronkite did some things that today you would say are on the entertainment center that ledger. so it's not a new issue but it is an ongoing issue and it is important that it remain in detention. the real danger is when you dropped your hands and say let's just to entertainment. you need someone arguing the other side of that equation all the time. in some ways the broader issue is not so much entertainment as getting an audience. and this is an ongoing tension that i had with some of the really purists with an abc news. one major anchor, not peter jennings in a large group of abc news early in my tenure say, i don't care about ratings, and you shouldn't either. and i said to him, you know, i don't believe that an adult think you do either because if you're really a journalist and you believe what you are reporting is important and won as many people to hear what you have to say as possible and if you don't care if anyone is listening then you're really keeping a diary. your not a journalist. so i think that is one of the challenging but also rewarding parts of doing something like television news, doing really good journalism and getting a bigger audience. and it's easy to do one of those or the other committed a really big audience and not care about the journalism or do really noble things that no one pays attention to, and you can see in a given broadcast to this day word goes home where the other, but the real goal is to try to get right at that intersection where you are drawing a big audience but also covering something important. >> one of my heroes a broadcast journalism you have worked with, ted koppel. just tell influential nightline was. what makes him such a journalist journalist? >> well, he is a remarkable man and a remarkable journalist. first of all, and maybe this says something about journalism in general and what it takes to be a good journalist, he is very smart. and in the end there is no substitute for being smart. peter was very smart. diane sawyer very smart. george. complicated issues, and it requires some intellectual firepower. ted has that. ted has an immense curiosity about the world and understands all sorts of wide range of things and really reports out a story in talks to different people and understands very well he's also fearless. he is not afraid of anybody or anything. when we were building up to the war in 2000 he and the receivers sadly departed no, is executive producer cameron said, we want to be indicted. and i said, i'm going to take one of my main anchors and put them with the first imprinted division going into baghdad? does that make sense? we talked about it, and they persuaded me that this was something we needed to do. we spent three weeks with the troops going in. willing to take on anything. and he sees it as his goal to hold everyone accountable. as they say, speak truth to power. ted is the personification of that. >> tell us about diane sawyer, legendary career, but i really want to hone in on, the news industry, truly an old boys' club, people like soy year or kirk, have they had to break the glass ceiling in order to up serve as an anchorperson? >> well, they certainly did. some of that happened before i came in 97. in fact -- frankly. barbara walters was really the path breaker. you read her memoir. she had to put up an awful lot, including a quota. it's just unbelievable now. day and came along. they and ticket to her -- to a different level. italian has of wider range than just about any tv journalist test. she can do without. she has an insatiable desire to do something different and do something deeper at the same time. from the time i got there, it pretty much established is that women could be anchors. certainly katie couric did something in the morning that had not been done before. this is a substantive woman who could do things of proper terribly well. she transformed morning television. now you have, i think, a wealth of wonderful women, and i will just mention one because i am so proud of her, martha raddatz. [applause] yet. martha, who we hired out of npr because she was a really great reporter. and really back here in support of her because she was so wonderful. she is a fabulous, fabulous national security military reporter. i was so proud of the job person. unbiased on this. so proud of the jobs she did in that special debate in part because she clearly knew the material so well, and that is the starting point, to actually do the reporting in understand material, it's not just reading a proper or looking pretty or sounding good but knowing the material, which mark the dust. i believe she held both of those people accountable. she was in the center sort of going at both sides, which is not ideal, so i think it is a wonderful roster of women, and not just on abc, other networks as well, but we have to thank barbara and i and people like that. >> two last questions and then we will open up to you. the audience. in october 2008 the stock market just tumbled, and we were -- the beginnings of what some historians are calling the great recession. what was it like doing the news that october in the middle of an election season when you had the economy tanking? >> it was interesting because if you have asked us in 2007, and we talked about this. we that the presidential election would ultimately be determined by foreign affairs because of the wars. by the time it happened, it was clear that it was only about the economy and it was going south very fast. we were struggling, frankly, to keep up with how bad it was in talks to people on the inside. we had a series of people from the government and private economy. the thing that was most disturbing was the shocking in their eyes. they were scared. senior people were scared, which scared us. one of the things, it's like covering a flood will your own baseball was flooding. on top of all that our advertising one-way. they cut discretionary spending. advertising is at the top of the list. and so we were facing enormous financial pressures. at the same time we had to really gear up to cover this really historic and unprecedented deterioration in the economy which by the way we have not recovered from to this day. >> barack obama. how big a story was it in your mind that an african american became president of the united states? >> well, let me say personally, first, it did not really sink in with me until i was in the control room and one of the early primaries and he won. i remember standing there thinking, he could be president of the united states, and the significance of an african-american in my lifetime being president just struck me personally. and not sure that the reaction, but it was mine. clearly it changed so much in this country and the way we perceive one another and perceive race, and it has been an absolute milestone. no, let's -- that said, and i don't want to take anything away from president obama. he is a remarkable man with a remarkable intellect. anyone would have beaten the republican in 2008 given the economy. i mean, we had eight years of republican. hard to have 12 years of the same party in office no matter what unless you want four more years of the same. given what was going on with the economy at that point there was almost no chance. i mean, my personal view, if hillary clinton had been nominated she would have got elected. so the forces, there were larger forces at work there, but it was, i think, a woman is occasion that we elected an african-american in this country >> any insights right now, just days before this election? all this time you spent in the newsroom, where you see this headed in the next few days? >> i guess the good news is i don't know anything more than any of you do. what i will tell you is what i have been saying. my wife will tell you this is true. i think it is a 50-50 country. it has been a mistake for anybody to predicts to quickly will the law where the other. i think it is a 5050 country. always apart from the candid it's dark there really is an even division certainly when you come to the electoral college at this point. and also because my origins in michigan, has said from the beginning, it may well come down to ohio. a critical state. i believe this is true. i think they're more of workers living in ohio and michigan at this point. and it will be very interesting to see how that plays out. that would be my guess. i have no more information that all of you do. i will say this. however, comes out i think these debates have been wonderful for the country, certainly for television news. you know, a week or two before that first debate it was it -- it's all over, what we pay attention. the level of energy and interest has gone up enormously, and i think that before all this matter how what comes out. it's much more interesting and exciting and compelling raised all which is good for democracy. >> we are talking about david weston's exit interview. somebody has a question, if you could line up at the microphone it would be helpful. yes, sir. we will start with you. >> understanding your bias toward eurocrat abc, which is great, can you speak to your competition as brian williams and his bunch, scott kelly and his paunch and so for in the cables, of course. >> i am happy to. brian is terrific. he is number one in the evening. he has ended. he has paid his dues. he is a terrific anchor, very strong. they have a great news operation and nbc news. their faltering a little bit in the morning now, but they deserve all the success that they have had. i have enormous admiration for what cbs news is doing. people probably don't know the inside of this, but a longtime executive producer of 60 minutes has taken over as chairman. he as a man named david roads to is the president there, and they have decided to go a different direction with their network newscast. in the evening in the morning, to do more international and to do more of what we call hard news. i'd like the hard news of this distinction, but more substantive news. it is a true difference. there are number three, but they have made some inroads, particularly in the evening, and i admire that fact that they're taking a different tack in going for it. cable, it came up, and it came up during my tenure. when i came in in march of '97 both fox news and ms in b.c. were only three or four months old. and the thing that i missed, as most of us at the time, fox news moved to mixing news with polemics, moving away from just 24 hours, which has been a very potent combination, and it has made them a lot of money because they have a fairly defined audience that is deeply engaged a much smaller than the broadcast people, but those people are really passionate about fox news. and that is fine. this is nothing wrong with opinion journalism. i am worried is starting to skew the way we look at the world to more extreme versions. i think most people are more in the center. in between fox news and ms nbc you would think that everyone is way off between the 10-yard in the golan, and i don't think that accurately reflects where we are, and not sure it's of the long run. >> yes, sir. >> one of the criticisms of broadcast journalism has been prevalent is that as cable has moved to polemics the broadcast people with more limited time have just taken on this role of saying there is this year and there is that you. without really confronting the idea that a lot of people in this world on every side live in their own facts and i'm worried about the harbor terrace or what could be the arbiter simply saying, well, they say a and they say be without getting further into it. >> yes. >> a good question. >> it does deserve applause because i could not agree more. [applause] could not agree more. i think it is exactly right. in fact, have a chapter in the book. that john kerry incident. and i think like you do, that part of it is a treatable the cable news, and you can fall into a pattern of he said she said. and we put up both sides of the argument and you decide what is. and there are some instances where that is appropriate, whether our normative questions, we ought to do and there is not our right or wrong, but there are a host of important issues that have answers. and the reason i use this example was that was not a matter of opinion. if you had been there in vietnam in 1969 and senior you would know either john kerry was a liar worry was a hero. there was no middle course. too much of the coverage quickly devolve into putting people on both sides of it, expressing their opinion. i chose it because nightline to my friends at nightline, ted koppel said the team back to vietnam that you're in 2004 and found aged villagers recounted what had happened at three much confirmed what the silver star accommodation had done for him, so i concluded there was a writer wrong and carey was right, what he said was basically right, but there are a host of questions like that. doesn't have to be even large controversies. the polls. some are reliable and some are not worth the paper they're written on. sometimes the news media just put them up there as if you're supposed to sort it out. medical studies. how many medical studies where people know about these things say some of those are reliable and some aren't. i think that is something that people in the news media of you. when there is an answer, do their best to figure it out until you. >> i'm sticking to the medical studies that say caffeine and alcohol are good for you. [laughter] >> i am an avid abc news watcher. i feel like that there has been a decline in the quantity of hard news in favor of love news. the news media spends more time on what michael jackson had, you know, then what happens with mitt romney. comment. >> that's good. first of all, i'm delighted that you are an avid abc news watcher. that's a good start. listen, people have asked me about where the news is heading and what is happening. it is changing. going back to your cronkite book, to see how much it changed well what it -- walter cronkite was there. it will continue to change and evolve. i continue to watch abc news. not as much as i used to, but i continue to watch it, and there is always material that i think is just great. also things that are different. but one of the points that i really want people to take away from this book, something that i learned at abc news, if you want more substantive news, international news, more play, whatever it is you want more of, you hold it within your power to influence that because no matter who the journalist is, no matter what the news organization is, they all reacts to the audience. they do care. whenever they say, they care whether you're paying attention, and there are great news reporting being done in various outlets electronically, whether online or tv or radio. great news reporting. if you want more of that you need to find it and spend your time and energy following a. because the reverse is also true. if you spend all of your time watching the really extreme opinion and watching these salacious rumor mongering you will get more of that tube. one of the things, my pet peeve, people come up and say outrageous it is that is covering some much of some scandal involving the kardashian something. then they recounted the graphic detail, everything that was said [applause] and it's clear to me they have invested a fair amount of time and effort. and i want to say, turn it off. you can turn it off. you don't have to listen to it. we all share in the shaping of where our news is setting, and it lies within our power to headed in the right direction. >> yes, ma'am. >> i too am as daily watcher of abc. two things. i really like this series that you are doing on made in the usa . i like that a lot. and the other is a question. if you came out with this show newsroom with jeff daniels and jane fonda, has that program be instructive to the regular networks? >> sale last question again? >> has that been instructive. i guess i want to know your opinion. >> the made in america was after my time. thank you very much. i think that was diane sawyer in large part, so the credit should go to her, i'm sure with the producers. i'm delighted that you like that. newsroom, i have watched it. i find it very entertaining. a lot of fun. i think it's very successful for hbo. there is a danger, and i think this is true for lawyers watching law shows and doctors watching. you sort of note to much. it is a little simplified and the little black-and-white. maybe a little preachy a times. but having said that and let me pick up on the last thing you said about instructive, we cannot be reminded too often, those of us in the news media about what we really came here, what we're really trying to do because the nature of the news is you're going to cover all the stories you're not that excited about, but there are some that are important. september 11th was an awful, terrible experience for everyone in the country and certainly in the news, but there was no doubt in our mind what those towers came down while you were doing what we were doing in that it was important. you can never remind us often enough of the noble part and the public service part of what we do. i think it is useful for that. >> we are down to our last minute and our last question. >> you mentioned those in the newsroom and they have that show on hbo, the news from. there are so many people. you see the faces on television, but there are a lot of people they go into that report field producers and writers and people that feed a lot of information. and they for that lady, and they never get the representation. to the feel the same amount of self-worth? >> that is a great question. that is as important as anything i'm going to say. i can tell you at abc news, and the sister for the other news organizations i know. there are literally hundreds of men and women whose names you will never know who will never make that much money who come in every single day and give everything they have just because they believe in what they're doing. it is not because of the glory, not because of the famed. but sometimes we got it wrong and sometimes we got it right. certainly it can be subject to criticism, but i do want people who have not had my opportunity to understand that these people either working on their behalf and they should be honored and respected for that. >> thank you all. buy and read david weston's exit interview and thank you so much. it is a great arbitrator, and he gets -- thank you. [applause] >> good questions. >> very good questions. [inaudible conversations] >> i enjoyed it. >> thank you. >> that is my daughter. >> we will be back with more from the texas book festival in a few minutes. [applause] >> here are some of the top-selling nonfiction titles according to the wall street journal. the list reflects sales as of october 14th. >> you can find more on these bestsellers by going to "wall street journal" dot com. >> the year was 1981 or 1982, and i was living where i was working for the asian wall street journal and hancock. i was the op-ed editor, and one day a submission crossed my desk. it was written by an italian journalist to was living in what we then called peking. he had secured a very rare visa to go to p'yongyang and had written an article for his publication about it and set a translation to be hoping that the asian "wall street journal" published it. of course we did, and i was -- i was really blown away by it. it was completely eye opening to me, especially his description of the mass public worship of the general who was then the leader of north korea. it was like reading a chapter from 1984. george orwell's vision had come to life of your years earlier in the democratic people's republic of korea. i also, as the years went by, could not get the closing line of the italian journalists article out of my head. it read, when i got off the plane in peking i kissed the ground happy to be back in a free country. a free country, china? 1981? i had been there. and new china was not free. was it really possible that there could be a place that was -- that north korea could be worse? thirty years later we know the answer to that question. north korea is the world's most repressive state. its people are the slaves of the family regime which controls every aspect of their lives, even whether they get to eat. religion is banned. there is no rule of law, and perceived political infractions are met with harsh punishment, punishment, i should add, that is often needed out to the three generations of a person's family , and political offenders knows that when he goes to present his parents and his children will probably go with him. there are probably about 200,000 north koreans today in the gulag, and more than a million, perhaps as high as 2 million have already died there. the reason we know all of this and much, much more is thanks to the testimonies of north koreans to have escaped. these are the people i write about in my book. this knowledge comes to us despite the best efforts of the family regime to keep it secret. for more than 50 years, ever since the end of the korean war, north korea has been sealed off from the world's eyes. the family regime has pursued an isolationist policy and it maintains an iron grip on information, access to which is very strictly controlled. to give just one example, every radio must be registered with the government, and its style must be fixed to the government-run radio station. to enforce this rule security police equipped with scanners cruise neighborhoods trying to identify households where residents have tinkered with the radios and cartooning end to a band of foreign radio broadcasts . surveys of rotarians hiding in china show that a high percentage of them listen to foreign radio broadcasts in north korea in defiance of the rule. and their motivation to leave was in part influenced by what they heard on those foreign radiobroadcast. people are hungry for information about the outside world. north koreans who escape must first go to china. they cannot go south to south korea, strange as it may seem, because the demilitarized zone that runs along the 38 parallel is, despite its name, the most militarized border in the world and is impossible to get across unless you are a soldier who has been shown the safe route. and only if you make it touter number three by going across the dmz. instead, they go to china. and in china the north koreans usually finds that they have exchanged one circle of hell for another. china's policy is to track down the north koreans in that country, arrest them, and send them back to north korea where they face imprisonment or worse for the so-called crime of leaving their country. this policy, chinese policy is both immoral and in contravention of china's obligations under international treaties it has signed. nevertheless, some of the north koreans who are hiding in china decided to risk a second state out of china to south korea. no one can accomplish this feat of his own. some people can get out of north korea on their own and the hand of the rest your's rarely reaches into north korea itself, but if somebody wants to get out of china any help. the distances are too great, and the challenges are too high for north korea to do it on his own. this is where the new underground railroad comes in. like the original underground railroad in the pre civil war american south, the new underground railroad is a network of safe houses and secure routes across china. the operators are both human traffickers who are in it for the money and christians whose religious beliefs compel them to help the north korean brothers and sisters. thanks to the underground railroad, which has been operating for about 12 years, an increasing number of north koreans are reaching safety in the south and a few other countries. it -- an explosion in the number of north koreans have gotten out is very striking. south korea keeps track of the north koreans your reach south. , and let me share with you just a couple of the numbers. in 1990 only nine north koreans were able to reach south korea. last year 200737 north koreans reached safety in the south. so the people who get out no have formed a large enough of them that they are educated guess about the truth of life in north korea. and there have been several books published about life in north korea, and we now have a much better picture of what the truth of the existence is there. but as the north korean refugees are performing a second equally important function. i do believe more important. they are helping to open up their own information start, and just as the world now knows more about north korea, north koreans now know far more about the world. this, too, is thanks to the efforts of north koreans to have escaped. how did they do that? well, think a minute. in the immigrant to goes to a new country, what is the first thing he wants to do. he wants to let his family back home know that he is okay and tell them about his new life. but for north korean who wants to do that, it is next to impossible. you cannot make a phone call to north area. you cannot send an e-mail or text message for facebook. you cannot even mail a letter. so the exiles have created a black market in information. they hired chinese couriers to cross the border and deliver messages or sometimes they delivered chinese cell phones to a north korean relatives, tell the relative to go to an area near the border on a certain day at a certain hour, turn on the phone, and receive a phone call from their relatives who have escaped to a different country. in south korea and north korean exiles have formed organizations whose purpose is to get information in to north korea, to give just one example, there are four radio stations run by north korean exiles that broadcast daily to north korea. the mantra of the family regime that north korea is the greatest and most prosperous nation on earth and that the north korean people are the world's happiest is being exposed for the line that is. >> you can watch this and other programs online at booktv.org. book tv is on the facebook. like us to interact with book tv guess that your's. watch videos, and get up-to-date information on events. facebook dot com / book tv. >> growing up and a nuclear shadow, a book about my childhood in colorado. i grew up about 7 miles from the rocky plats nuclear weapons plant, and actually, our first house was about 7 miles away, and then in 1969 we moved to a subdivision called bridal veil which was closer to the plant, about three, three and a half miles away. my sisters and brother and i had an idyllic childhood in the sense that we had horses and dogs and fleece been a lot of time outdoors writing your horses in the fields around the plan and swimming in the late. we never knew what went on at rocky flats. we had no idea what it really was. and we had no idea of the environmental contamination that was happening in the area. plutonium and tritium, carbon tetrachloride and a number of things. we had no idea. later, like many kids in my neighborhood, i worked at the plant myself and got a sense of what it was like to be on the inside of the plant. there was one evening when i came home from working at rocky flats and turned on the television and there was a show on nightline, a was an expose a of what was really happening at the planned. it was the first time i really had an awareness in the numbers -- understanding of what was happening and how high extraordinary the contamination was. it was on that tape that i decided to quit my job at rocky flats and the day that i quit was the day that decided i would write a book about it. it took me about ten years of research and writing to pull the story together. but i wanted to write a book that reads like a novel but is very heavily foot noted and everything in the book is factual, so you can check in the back and see where the information comes from. i wanted to write the story from the perspective of all of the different kinds of people whose lives had been affected. not just residents like my family in night, but workers at rocky flats, some of the activists, all the different people, thousands and thousands of people in colorado and beyond who were affected by rocky flats. another reason why i felt very passionate about the story is that there is -- we are -- we continue to deal with the legacy of our nuclear weapons production in this country in so many different ways. the environmental legacy and also the cultural legacy of how important this plan was and the way it affected people, people who were not aware of how they were being affected. when i worked at the plant, it is common for workers -- we call ourselves cold war warriors, the people who, like, but for the people who grew up new -- near rocky flats, we also were cold war warriors. no one told us. we did not know what was happening. in the neighborhood, the plant was operated by dow chemical and in the neighborhood without ever making household cleaning supplies. my mother thought there were making scrubbing bubbles, and it was not really apparent for quite a long time was going on. and what happened now, there has been the cleanup, a very controversial cleanup, the controversy levels of contamination remaining in the soil, and 1300 acres of that site are so profoundly contaminated that they can never, ever be opened for human habitation. and the rest of the site is slated to open as a national wildlife refuge for hiking and biking and possibly even hunting . so even though there is still a great deal of contamination and they're is a lot of home building and shopping malls and highways and all sorts of things going on out there. so even though in colorado and the country as a whole i think we would like to forget that rocky flats ever happened. the story would like to put in the past and pretend that we don't have to do with it anymore , but the truth of the matter is it is a very important story that we will have to continue to deal with now into the future. plutonium has a half life of 24,000 years. it's not going away anytime soon. >> you can watch this and other programs online at booktv.org. >> and now more from the texas book festival. thomas frank takes a look at the effects of the financial crisis ahead on politics. .. does this work? where did she qo. she has her back to us. hey, guy, hello. they don't work! they don't work. [laughter] there we go. great. >> thank you so much for coming to the texas book festival. and thomas frank this afternoon as we know the texas book festival has done fabulous work in benefittingly brierses and -- i recommend you buy every book you can. all proceeds go to benefit the great cause here in the state of texas. at want end of the presentation today we will end at 12:45 there will be time to go back to meet the author and have him sign the book. i'm going leave about twenty minutes at the end for questions. it will be obvious one side to the other where you can line up. okay. thomas frank, the author a former opinion column nist. a monthly column nist but most importantly he wrote a book that almost all authors would love to have. it became viral. everybody that either read or talks about. most people this talk about politics or write about politics would be able to write something like this and become part of the april dialogue trying to figure out what was going on in the american politics at the period of time. he's back here with the new book "pity the billionaire: the hard-times swindle and the unlikely comeback of the right i want to start with that. maybe a few of you were here in the spring of 2008 when then senator barack obama had a political rally out here in front of the capitol. and i believe fifteen or 20,000 people were here. if you were here in no matter when you were for hillary clinton, republican, curious. it felt like an historic moment. when the election came in november and barack obama was elected the first african-american president of the united states. the pundits wrote about the historic victory that was usher in a new era of liberalism. built on the bones two of disasters wars, the incompetent of the reaction to katrina and a ruin in the economy. four years later, what the hell happened? that's my first question. [laughter] >> that's hey, that's what "pity the billionaire: the hard-times swindle and the unlikely comeback of the right is about. and if you all want to you're going have to read the whole thing. that is in very brief form what the book is about. we came to it four years ago we came to a turning point in the country, we didn't turn. you know, -- [laughter] and before i start blabbing about that. let me say how nice it is to be here in austin, texas thank you for inviting me. it i love a book festival where you can buy a corn dog. [laughter] [applause] that's awesome. okay. but back to the sort of story of our times. to pick up on what president obama was say -- paul was saying in 2008 i live in washington, d.c., now. every pundit in the city was saying conservativism is done. it's days over. we followed the economic recipe. look what happened. not to mention all the substantials, tom delay, the katrina, the wars, all of these disasters, it was over. and, you know, there's two different stories here, first of all, what president obama did, you know, how did he let the feeling of 2008 slip through his fingers? the other is how do the conservatives themselves play it? they did an interesting thing. instead of doing bhat pundits said, your day is time and time to move back to the center and give up, they did the opposite. they went hard to the right. you know, they did exactly the opposite what every pundit was telling them to do. when i saw them doing it i was astonished. it was early on in 2009, and, you know, i couldn't believe it. because even if they did succeed, what was their country? don't they care. well, anyhow, the important part of the story they did it and succeeded. and i'll tell you a funny about dote. all my of my life one of my hobby has been reading literature of the 1930s. of the great depression. and all of a sudden, this knowledge which has been basically irrelevant all of my life. all the sudden in 2008 and 2009 becomes very, very meaningful. suddenly i get it like ed monday wilson's book, i understand what he's talking about the floor has dropped out from under the economy. suddenly i understand it. and what i wanted to do, i was a column nist for the "the wall street journal" at the time, i was i was the house liberal, okay. it was, you know, it was a lot of fun. but one of the things i wanted to do was write a bunch of essays in the ed monday wilson manner about the political protest. we knew they were going happen. and somebody called me up and said, tom, this is in february of 2009, barack obama ha h been president for less than a month and somebody said there's a protest schedule forked the park across the street from the white house. go down there it's and the first tea party rally. i recognize a lot of the people at it. this is a populist protest i know who you republican it's the same people from the last go around. now you have the waiving signs and have bull horns and tough like that. anybody can see through this. i wrote, i made fun of them, you know. i'll be dambisaed if it didn't catch on. that's the mystery of the last four years. how you come to the moment when everybody is saying all of these sort of pattern of the 1930s should have kicked in. and everything went in the opposite direction. all of the populace language and symbolism of the 1930s was captured and used by the right. and i can talk about this in great, great, length. i don't know if you want me to do that just yet. i certainly will before we leave this the tent. >> want do we go through the narrative. the obvious narrative is you have hard times, when the government steps in to to be able to remedy that. we pass legislation, we give aid to the poor, we provide jobs, and economics. okay and this narrative was completely as you say in your book turned on the head. >> all the sudden the populace rhetoric worpships the market and small business no matter how large it might be. it worships the job creator i don't know -- that's right. >> what's fascinating about all that have it's in some ways a deliberate inversion of the sort of populace narrative of the last time around. there was a book we we used to read in college called "who built america" a book about the labor movement. ed why the being workers built america. it was a book about labor. and the this was the sort of great story of the 1930s the idea of producers rising up against parasite meaning wall street people who didn't build anything. what fascinates me about the period we're in is the way that whole story has been turned on the head. and the producers are, you know, the job creators. in some ways you remember rick san tellly the famous ranted that go got it going in february of twiep. in the mind of the tea party movement, those are the producers. quites in the chicago board of trade. cheering for rick and booing, you know, people whose mortgage is underwater. the losers need to lose. right. according to the new narrative it's the job creators. the billionaires are the producers and the rest of us are the parasites this time around. and, i mean, the politics of are very fascinating. the whole sort of worship of free market orthodox in period of economic collapse in the 1930s, you know, this is it was not only a period when the politics in the country changed the but the intellectual life of the country changed. orthodox sei was pitched. it a couple of years that's when they revolution happened. and all sorts of different economic theories starting pushing out neoclassic call economic. today there's plenty of new yo neoclassic call economist that willing to admit they are wrong. a sort of mass convention to comij school economic as a result of hard times. it's precisely the opposite. of of what happened last time around. it's something you would never predict to happen. here's how, i don't want to giveaway the whole story "pity the billionaire: the hard-times swindle and the unlikely comeback of the right how it happened the right conservative economic provides us with a kind of utopia for hard times. this free market you type pa, if you get government out of the way, and if you keep deregulating all the way, if you just clear away the red tape, you won't have disasters like the financial crisis and like the bank bailout. you know, all of these things will end once we get government out of the picture. you can debate this in a million different ways you can refute this in a million different ways. the fact is it is an attractive picture, it's an attractive vision and it is even more attractive given the complete absence of any other hard times narrative out there. >> so essentially what you're saying we have forgotten the actual history of the great depression. >> my job as moderator let me try to feed you softball after softball. [laughter] there are a a number of different hinge its throughout the book a number of interesting statement. you can go as long as short. we want you to buy the book. there's a fabulous sentence somewhere in the middle talking about the grassroots movement and the exact quote, -- [inaudible] it's going to come straight out what's matter with kansas. why don't we start with that a creation of the grassroots miewfmght is this do able because it's ready made for millions and millions of suckers. >> okay. that's -- [laughter] >> i'm quoting you. >> i know. what i'm meaning by that. the thing i'm, you know, when i wrote what's matter with kansas it was ten years ago and i was young i thought there was a chance that things might be reversed. just so you know, i'm much less optimistic today. i bring despair with the smile. that's what i'm here to do. and i'm writing about the tea party movement and there's incredible undercurrent of profiteering that goes on within the tea party movement. had you go to tea party rallies they are connected with trade shows. they have a trade show at the same time. where you and k go buy and the tea party trinkets. there's hundreds of different schemes for making money that flowered alongside the tea party movement. you know, there is even one of my favorite ones up with of the political they call themselves political entrepreneur one of the guys was selling a dvd that you could buy that would instruct you how to become a right-wing fund-raiser in your own right for your own education. fundraising by selling the secret of fundraising. i love that. you never see that kind of entrepreneurial creativity on the left. it just doesn't happen. occupy wall street did not sell little gold coin commemorating their march on washington, you know, [laughter] and i make fun of it in the book, but truth be told, this is part of the strength of the conservative movement. this is not a weakness of the conservative movement. it's a strength. this is one of the things that makes it work is all of these people getting together and selling things to unanother. they have a tent down there where you buy all this stuff. that's a joke. [laughter] that's a joke. let me give you one more thing out of the book. it happen because of the self-segregation of americans in terms where they get their news they associate with. many of you have probably read the book four years was on this. it's obviously, you know, relevant to what's going on because even the politics of kansas has gone even further to the right since the time you wrote about. >> yeah, that's right. well, we don't want to get side track tracked on that. when i did the to topeka book festival tomorrow. no. actually actually true. kansas has gone considerably further to the right. and one of the explanation, you search around for reason why it's happening and how it's possible for tens of millions of americans to believe a are in tiff and believe an explanation of what's happening in the economy that falls on the face. that is very easy to refruit. why do they believe something like that? and one of the answers there's lot of different answers i provide in the book, one of them is of course the narrative is attractive. it's fun to believe it. and it's flattering to you, you know, people believe it because it makes them feel good about themselves. makes you feel good to imagine you are a job creator and atlas carrying the weight of the world on your shoulder and everybody disrespects you. you are incredibly creative productive guy and a victim at the same time. that's very attractive. it's also this with cognitive withdrawal from the shared reality okay from consensus reality. and, you know, look, all of stuff is made possible by the demise of the daily newspaper and the replacement of newspapers and books and things like that by the internet. this is ideal in paradox and ironies especially of the darker more bitter story. one of the great paradox of our time, which is the internet which was sold in the fantastic device of universal enlightment has actually become in some ways exactly the opposite. it is a way that you can come completely wall yours yourself off from the world of consensus reality. you see it all over the place. but of course, i have a 1930s parallel with this e. everything in "pity the billionaire: the hard-times swindle and the unlikely comeback of the right has a weird upside down 1930s parallel. the parallel in this case, you saw the same phenomenon at work in the 1930s lots of memoirists who wrote about the period specifically murray wrote one of the best books about the 1930s experience, you know, that he had been a radical in those days. you know, lots and lots of people were radicals. lots of people were communists in those days. and they signed up for a world view where they were able to dismiss the evidence of the census, what, i mean, by that you have things going on in the 1930s like stay stay stay lynn's show trials. plenty were able to listen and say that's real justice and blow it off. they look back, guys like murray would look back from twentd years later and say how were we able to do that. what kind of mental you know what kind of mental withdrawal from reality was allowed for that to happen? and i'll tell you, it was the almost precisely the same kind of you you utopianism. when everything has been blown to hell reaching out for an economic narrative that makes sense and that is going save the world and dismissing the world of fact along with it. it is a previce analogy. it's kind of creepy when i realize. it was a shocking moment. communist party in the 1930s tea party movement today. >> talking about the communist party back then and the reality of the tea party today. there are two names that appear over and over and over again. perhaps they are the cause. glen beck and ann rand. >> i want to -- were able to get through the entire book. >> that's a good question. i wonder about that as well. i never read it in high school. most people read i am rand in high school, they go there u the period. i never did. i remember friend of mine trying to get me read it. it's the most awesome thing. it'll change your life. it's like die nettics or something. i was already lost to, you know, hemming way and fitzgerald and stuff like that. by that point, i couldn't do it. in 2009 rolled around they had huge spike in sales when obama was nag rated and we all know paul ryan reads it, rick is a fan. there's lots and lots of -- a whole ought to be anyway a whole atlas slugged caucus in the house of representatives. i'm forever seeing young people on the subway in washington, d.c., sitting down and reading. i had to read it, okay. so in 2009 i went out and got a copy and read it. i read the whole thing. the first thing i want to to say is never read it before going to bed. [laughter] yeah. "i am rand" contempt for humanity is so toxic and poi poison it's difficult to take. but let's see, the most fascinating thing about the book a lot of my idea for "pity the billionaire: the hard-times swindle and the unlikely comeback of the right come from. it's a deliberate inversion of the standard story in the 1930s. an america is that falling apart and in to a great depression. instead being caused by wall street or whatever you want to point to as the cause of the cross-appeal great depression, the gold standard. it's all caused by government. right. government metaling in the economy. getting in to the grill of the billionaire class. and in the course of the book, the book my serious is an -- fiction a 1930s genere. that nobody reads anymore. i happen to have read a great amount of it. we're not. going to talk about why it is. i'll be doing a readerring over there and i'll explain it then. the idea of fiction about workers achieving class coach p, realize thraig producers and capitalist are the par. they are society's true producers. understand they are society's great victims and i'm directly quoting from book society's great victim. billionaire class and going on strike. a huge strike, strike so devastating it brings the world to the knees. and that's what it is. this is a -- it is a a classic 1930s book with in fact, one of the characters says in the course of the novel one of their aim is actually to invert the way to correct the way people understand who is the righteous producer class in america and who isn't. it's actually billionaires not workers. workers are the parasites. and this is the origin or the source of so many of the bad ideas that you find around america today. by the way, about dote, i got back on a book tour in germany, it happened, i did this. and the audience i would try to describe atlas slug to the audience there. and they would sit there with their mouth open. they could not believe it. it should be familiar to you. it's new york -- a superman figure and it's american businessmen. and, you know, they shake their head. they can't understand. how could you read something like this? anyhow. i talk too much. >> there's other books in germany. that's right. we're not going go there. >> you think they would be familiar. >> there's one more possible cause of this, real assistant to the election today. in the context of situation in 2007 and 2008, that was designed to destroy every belief in our public constitution we have the election of the obama administration and in your book you talk about the complicity of the obama administration in causing what happened. you can do it better than me. >> i think that the great sort of disaster that we have never overcome in the country is the wall street bailout. the financial crisis and the wall street bailout and we still the banks today are bigger than they were before. we haven't put any kind of serious regulation on them. we haven't broken them up. and, you know, we're dealing with, you know, regulation that are totally inadequate for the guys still. and i think this is allowing this to happen, and remember, it was one of the first it was hanging over the country's head when barack obama was sworn in as president, and his first move in office were to signal continuity with the bush administration, with hank paulson, by the way, and, you know, i don't know if president bush is here, but -- [laughter] but the bank bailout are one of the , i mean, this is the great outrage of our time inspect is what launched the tea party movement. this is what launched occupy wall street, this is poisoning the obama presidency. it's like an at tom bomb went off and we haven't figured out how it deal with it. we aren't talking about it in the presidential election this time around. i think it's barack obama's great mistake. if you look at the 1930s there were bank bailout in the 1930s enormous bank bailout if you adjust for inflation equally as large. herbert hoover started them roosevelt continued them. when hoover did them the public was furious. it was obvious insider dealer. a fun you story. hoover said it was the reconstruction finance corporation was the name of the body of the bureaucracy that was handing out the bailout. at one point the head of the rfc quit and went back to the bank in comij in about two months later said gave me a bailout, friends. my old pals. they did. it was an incredible act of crohn yifm. just like agi and cold man sacs the public was furious. roosevelt was fours are when he was running against hoover he did not in a great spirit of bipartisan or come in to a grand bargain or something like that. he did not say yeah we'll continue the policy hep he denounced it. it's one of the reason he won in 1932. he kept the bailout agency but he completely changed their mission. and as we know, they enacted the class stegall act. they broke up the bank. and did the security exchange commission and restructured the federal reserve. he took wall street on and took it apart and rebuild the economy from the grassroots up when barack obama came in to office, i mean, almost identical situation what he did was he brought tim geithner who engineered agi and made him the treasury secretary and did all the other things deliberately to signal continuity with the bush administration. he thought it was a wise political move. it was bipartisanship it showed it was above it all. i'm telling you, this was the disastrous moment inspect is what allowed everything -- look, i'm going go off on a digression here. the election that we're having right now in the country, should not be close. okay. barack obama should by all rights by wiping the floor with romney. the fact we are near to electing an investment banker president four years after the financial crisis is astonishing to me. how is it even possible? you know, what made it possible was that the reason barack obama hasn't built up a roosevelt lead and hasn't, you know, won democratic majority and commerce last for forty years in the way roosevelt did, he never took the steps roosevelt did. he never tackled the situation directly. it's not just the bank bailout. that's the biggest failure. it's across the board. there was no direct federal hiring to deal with unemployment. we got a form of national health insurance. but come on, we got bob dole's plan. [laughter] you know. so, you know, okay. i don't know if i answered your question or not. [laughter] >> i can feel myself wandering off in to place i don't really want to be. hopefully we'll get to that in the question time. >> i'm depressed i forget what the question was. [laughter] let me ask you one more depressing question and i think it's time for questions and i'm not sure i guess lineup in this something here that can line people up. there's a microphone in the middle. >> okay my last question. it's moderators prerogative. george mcgovern died last week. years ago when i was living in new orleans i met the former senator and spent a night walking around the french quarter i organized for the nonexistent party in the state of utah. i was curious how he organized democratic party resurgence in south dakota. okay. today there are no more george mcgovern of frank churches of idaho. bob kerry is probably not going do very well getting reelected in nebraska after years being away from new york. you are from kansas what happened to perry pop lymph? >> man. look, the thing that i didn't say in the last question that i should have said is that we are living in a deeply populace moment. it's a book by the title, largely about texas, by the way. "pop lis moment." that's when we are inspect had obama. -- i don't rhetorically. from the beginning of the term in office. this was the moment for that sort of thing. and we got pop lymph but what we got what i call market populism. people look to instead of, you know, or political constitutions look to the market to deliver, you know, some sort of democratic economic results. and we have been living through decades after decade after decades of right-wing populism. taking different flavors and, you know, always advancing the ball a little bit more. when i wrote "what's matter with kansas." the kind of populism you saw then and little today is the sculpture war. it's about the liberal elite and the effort to, you know, brainwash your kid in to believing tbar darwin or something like that. [laughter] and today of course the populism is slightly different. it's paul ryan yelling about crony capitalism. every time i hear him do that, i remember yells about crony capitalism. occupy wall street. paul talks about crony capitalism. i talk about it. it's across the board. only one two of the political parties has tried to stake its future to that idea. to populism. okay. the problem here this is part of what's matter of kansas people don't remember and "pity the billionaire: the hard-times swindle and the unlikely comeback of the right they don't like to read. it's not conservatives have played the game well, and have built the false populism that is never the less very resonate to people as it should be in the climate that we're in. but it's also the democrats have failed. the other side has completely failed. the actual barriers of the tradition of andrew jackson and harry harry truman and franklin roosevelt cannot ride to the occasion. they can't turn it on. their hearts aren't in it. you know, yes they are good democrats here and there. but by and ladies and gentlemen large of the leadership of the party. i live in washington, d.c., i know what they're like. they don't believe in it. they were ten years ago they believed in wall street. they thought it was awesome. they were making money out of nothing. it was fantastic. this was the post industrial future. we need to get everybody a college degree and a job at goldman sachs. it was democrat that thought that now they don't say things like that. it's the same people. and i think that, i mean, just to, you know, not put, you know, too fine a point on it. i don't think we will ever see liberal democrats at the national level in that party ever again. as long as citizens united in place. they will not go there. you know, they haven't gone there for thirty years. they have seated the field to, you know, conservative pop police of every shape and description. and [laughter] what am i -- okay. i can see everybody about to cry people are heading for for the exit here. i'm a neck person and i know you me to say something sunny and happy. >> nice day. >> it is beautiful day. >> you can't figure out the truth if you . >> that's right. but i can't stress this enough we have been living in a very pop lis age for a long time now. populace movement after populace movement after populace movement and my side can never seem, you know, to pull it off. can never seem to get in the game. and the field automatically surrendered to the other side. >> ten minutes to go. i have a feeling somebody must have a positive question out there. do we have microphone over there. we have hands. and the mirk microphone. >> can you hear me? you're at the microphone. i would leet to get involved with you on atop the hypocrisy. conservative in texas have got anyone to doctors officers and required a vaginal probe or a sonogram or abortion. can you top that? >> what? [laughter] >> is that a question or a challenge. [laughter] >> yeah, i was watching a tv show talking about that. it's unbelievable. the steel sallies of the state. it's like this -- [laughter] [applause] okay. next question. [laughter] i don't know how to follow that up. but you lay a lot of blame on obama for not being more pop police and man manifest what a lot of us wanted to be him to be. i wonder if you can speak about the con con complicity with the media and also race. i mean, i wonder if obama's race may be with a barrier to him being 21st century equivalent of roosevelt. there's a lot of races and opposition to him comes out of that. >>man. you asked four really questions. all of them excellent. i guess what do i want to say? the mainstream media, i used to be in the mainstream media. [laughter] i was another the "the wall street journal" as i mentioned earlier, i was, you know, an opinion columnist there. and tried my best. i felt like it was, you know, you're fighting against a hurricane there. , i mean, i don't know what to say that hasn't already been said a million times before. you've look at what's happening to newspapers. i don't know how it is in texas but everywhere you go around the country they're guying like flies and often see is taken over by rich people and run in a model from a preworld war ii days people want to be there. william raldolf hurst type and the newspaper gives them a platform even in the dying days. -- what can i say? the racial question. that's obviously a huge part of the story here. barack obama is, you know, he's the obviously the first and only black president he's policy an outsider in other really significant ways. he has a unusual name. he was largely grew up in foreign country. he, you know, he worked adds a community organizer with very poor people in a housing project until the south side of chicago. these are things that are extremely suspicious to lots of people in our country. and instead of talking about it doctor directly they use the other terms to code him to describe him as outer calling him a socialist. calling him a communist. these things that manifestly have nothing do with who he is. interest thing about barack obama, if you read his awe disty of hope, his memoir, if you look at the great speech the greatest moment it's about conciliation. this is what how he sees himself. this is an he did want to be a great president. he wanted to bid for greatness and by getting a grand bar iman. doing something bipartisan. he is born conciliators. that's who he is. the sad thing at the end of the day, the tragedy of barack obama is that he was a man who was cut out to do great things. he saw his mission as overcoming partnership in washington, d.c., and ironically, in 2008 and 2009, that was want the main problem in our country. i live in washington i know about partisanship. it's stupid and ridiculous. as problems go, it's about number six or seven on my scale. okay. problem number one, wall street. problem number two unemployment. problem number three health care partisanship is way down there. but strangely number, when you live in d.c. for very long and you talk to standard d.c. democrats they characteristically say partnership is the number one problem. it ails our country. it only we can get together. and i've never understand this. it seems natural to me. of course you're going have different opinions. there's 300 million people in america. people from all different walks of life. people are going disagree. people fight with each other especially when you have a two-party system. i'd rather have a four-party system. we have a two-party system. there are differences of opinion. i think partnership there's natural about it. it's a great missed opportunity of the obama years he completely misunderstood what the moment was in 2008 and 2009. but, by the way, i think he gets it now. in his favor. little late. but i think he get it is now. >> let's try to complete if out of the realm of -- there's a possibility he may win. >> that's right. i think it's a good chance. he has good odds. the conciliator if you go back thirty years and have the same as it was thirty years ago barack obama would not have gone a elected in 2008 he would have gotten killed. okay we're talking about an african-american vote which is 95 to 5 for barack obama probably a large turnout. a latino vote that will end up 75 to 25. we have different country. that's part of the racial mix. i think we have time for one more. >> i have something to say about that. i have something to say about everything. [laughter] i'm sorry i know i blab teach. how much time left? five minutes. [inaudible] they can ask you questions when they buy your book. that's right. you can do that. i brought a pen and i'm from kansas, i'm allowed to say that. i brought a pen and i will be signing bocks later. interesting thing. we can see the demographic change in the country are going toward the democrat when you talk to them in d.c. they are so what if we lose or that. we lost the election, you know, and there's, you know, conservative are doing the things. who cares, frank, they say. who cares. the future is ours. democrat will win the election in of the future. the republicans will no doubt twinned things won't stay the same. republicans aren't stupid. and they, you know, they can see what's happening as well as. did you second of all, the power of money. it's the one thing we haven't had a good chance to talk about. citizens united i think has completely changed the, i mean, partially changed the way politics is done in the country and my argument is that in the future it will be impossible to elect a liberal democrat for president. you won't get the option. if you want to run for president, the price tag is going to get big and buyinger and bigger as we go the future. i adopt care what the demographic say. that's what money says. and the price tag running for the u.s. senate is going to get bigger. and house of representatives is going to get bigger. you can't try to run for the offices unless you're the kind of guy that can raise that money. and how do you raise the money? by being a friend of the anemia have that kind of money. it doesn't really matter to me about the partisan break down in the future. i think we wrap it up. we have one more. quick question. >>reporter: all right. i wanted some your hope. your last answer is powerful. is there any hope you see any democrat any liberal democrat who might court what so you just talked about and lead us to a new liberal. 16 seconds. >> there's great democrats out there. there's lot of them. the problem is that the funding. i work on it. there's lots of great voices. the problem is the political system itself. getting inside the system. the only way we can win, friends, is with a mass movement. i mean, a real movement like the labor movement or the anti-war movement on the civil right movement. a bunch of college kids waiving signs. we have to woo have a real movement that connects with people in their every day lives. that's the only way our side wins. thank you very much. >> wait. wait! we have time for one more question. >> you mentioned the power of money it is in churches very suspicious of the fundamentalist schurnlgs they say god wants you to be rich. that is for a part of the problem is. -- i have a needle. come on. >> guys? as a political junkie, i love reading the book. go out there and go to the book signing. buy it. thank you very much. [applause] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] in a couple of minutes we'll be back with more live coverage of the texas book festival. a panel on education reform is next. here's a look at upcoming book fairs and festivals. this weekend booktv is live from a texas book festival. it includes present tastes by many people. visit booktv.org for complete schedule of the events. national press club book fair and author night on november 13 it includes more than 90 writers and proseeds -- watch booktv in the future for interviews from the event. will be in new york city on november 1th. the ceremony celebrating authors works and fiction nonknicks, poetry and young adult literature. they will air the ceremony the following weekend. miami book fair is held november 11th to the 18th. it features more than 350 authors and booktv will be live from miami november 17 and 18. for a complete schedule of author presentations call and interviews and more visit booktv.org. let us know about book fair and festival in your area. we'll be happy to add them to the list. e-mail us at booktvbooktv@c-spa. i want to begin by telling you a story my thur monday story. when you do research in south carolina, and you go to in archive and people ask you what you're interested in writing about, he and you tell them strom they say let me tell you my story about strom. you can't throw a stone in south carolina without hitting somebody who has a great story, you know, about strom. time he did something for him or did something crazy. my story about strom begins in late july 1992. and i'm on a flight from washington, d.c., to charlotte, north carolina. i had been an intern that summer up on capitol hill. and one of my regrets of the summer was that i had never seen strom. all my fellow interns said you have to see strom. he's an unusual appearance about him. i didn't know what they meant really about that. [laughter] i had my suspicious. i look ahead on the flight ahead of me and i see a man who has the orange-colored hair. it was brightly colored and first generation hair plugs. it shows you how slow i am. i think to myself that must be what what strom's head looks like. and of course, it was. i knew that when people were reaching over and trying to shake the hand and that kind of thing. i wanted to shake his hand too. i had been in d.c. that summer for the first time and i met all of these politicians that seen on tv. it had been a great thrill. i was about to go home and speak to my dad's rotary club. i wanted to tell them about the famous people i met in washington, d.c. and so i was going to try to shake his hand when i got off the plane. as i got off the plane, there were people already lined up to shake his hand. and i didn't get in line. and i didn't, you know, i was thinking i wont constituent. i don't have anything to say to him really. and also to be honest was self-conscious. it was a busy airport. there were a lot of different kind of people. i was self-conscious about standing in line waiting to greet a man best known for the segregation ha range. i thought it was good now have see him. i'm conflicted. i'm conflicted and i'll walk down the concourse about 100 yards and look back and everybody here and a package under one yard shuffling down the busy crowded airport. without thinking, go back and introi deuce myself and i sate senator, i'm on capitol hill this summer. i'll be happy to get to your next flight. are you sure you have enough time. i don't want to delay you. i said i have plepty of time. i picked up the bag and walked together for about ten minute. i was trying to make conversation with strom. and so i told him about the people i met that summer and he said nice things eat the various colleagues i had met. the difficulty i had in writing about the change i faced in writing about this very controversial figure. i wondered if some of the stuff in the book is not another effort in my part to carry his bags. carry his back age and goodness know he has baggage that needs carrying. the other challenge i had, the real challenge i had in the book was to fight the urge to not walk away and not meet the man face to face and present him as three i dimensional character a living and breathing human being. so that's the challenge i face. what i wanted to do really is to write a book about history of strom's america. in the way that would critical but dissipation nate way that would shed light on the issue that shaped each of our own america's today. i hope in doing so you can add a sense of measure of reason and dissipation to these issues that embroil our politics today and divide us. that was the goal. that's the mission as it were. but what are those big issues? what are the issues by history of strom america's speaks to? we remember a lot of us remember who he was. he was the 1948 presidential candidate. he was one of the lead authors of the 1956 southern manifest tow which is the protest of the supreme court decision in the brown v. board of education in 1954. strom is the record holder to the day of the longest one man filibuster. in the book of record records. 2 hours and 18 minutes. he spoke against the 1957 civil rights bill. we remember him today as one of the last of the jim crow demagogue. he was. he was that. he was one of the last. but when we forget about strofm he was also one of the first of the sun belt conservative. what do i mean by that? what is that? the sun belt it's one of the big stories that is the flow of jobs and resource and population from the states of the northeast and the midwest to the south and the southwest. in the older post world war ii people. they recruiting industries. they were passing right to work laws. receiving lots of fundings from the federal government to build military at the time when the united states was involved in the cold war against the soviet union. so states like mississippi but states like georgia and texas and florida and southern california and arizona and north carolina are being transformed in the postworld war two period by the historic shift as the period of the sun belt dominance. if you think about every president elected from 1963 comes from state of the sun belt. lyndon johnson from texas and richard nixon from california. gerald ford was never elected. he doesn't count. jimmy carter from georgia reagan from california. texas and bill clinton from arkansas and the second bush from texas. so twaict is the water shed election. it ends the forty year period of sun belt dominance. there were issues of critical in the politics that developed that came out of the sun belt. that we see the rise by the 1970 be coming to talk about the religious right. so strom was at fore front at all of the issue in the own politics. national defense he was a staunch anticommunist. and played an important role in right-wing anticommunist politics. it's one of the things that lead in to switch parties in 1964. he was a key figure in opposing labor unions. he did so alongside people like barry gold water. even though early in the career a staunch advocate of union in south carolina. back in the '30s and '40s. he switches in the '50s and '60s and becoming a die hard supporter of business against labor in '70s. its an important role in conservative even evangelical politics. he joins the board of bob jones university in 1950. he does to win votes in the country of south carolina. bob jones had moved to south carolina moved university and he needed votes in the south carolina. he lost the 1950 raise for the senate. and that began a long process a long relationship with strom with conservative moneyment lal and even evangelicallists who were looking to get involved in political process. we need understand the racial politics in the midst of these other conservative causes. these conservative issues that he was very involved with. we see how to they intersect with one another. i think doing so gives a history of what his america looks like. it helps us to rethink not only what was going on in the south what was going on in the national conservative political realm as well. rethinking strom helps us rethink the history of modern conservative. a history i think two too often he is left out of because we only remember him as cartoonish racist figure from the deep south. you can watch this and other programs online at booktv.org. booktv is on facebook, like us to interact with booktv guests and interviewers, watch video facebook.com/booktv. war but within the confines of the boob you can only do so much. so we want toddy versety. we wanted democrats, republicans, we wanted different part of the country to some extent we wanted different agents. we knew on the basis of -- you can't make generallyization about our 100% -- and we say as much as what we i think or con conclusions are other people that might run with. but in order to make even those kinds of high hypotheses we needed a fairly diverse group. >> we also included win there's a black -- white house project and they had aid in yaict '08 several years before the 2008 election. olympia snowe, and kathleen essential yous. csh we wanted to consider the notion. we wanted to look at some of the women goshes who had been through some of the training as the pipeline. >> we also made the observation when a male is elected to senatorship immediately he's captive a future presidential hopeful. for example scott browne hadn't been sworn in in massachusetts and the url scott browne 2012.com was already purchased. but so many women had been in washington for so many years as legislators and working on important work and yet they're names never bubbled to the top and we were curious why not. >> how did you decide that you wanted to write the book? all three of you studied similar topics but how did the book actually come about? >> your idea, ted. >> ted? >> well, i guess it was my idea. i have been a political nerd since i was, you know, i don't know my parents still remember my sister and i in 1960, staging a nixon kennedy debate with our stuffed animals. my elephant beat her rabbit. during all of those years years of nerd come, what fascinated me is the magazine issues that would come out way in advance for the presidential election that would preview the eight or ten or twelve people who ought to be considered, and simply struck me after seeing so many of the issues and magazines that women were not making it on to that list. they were not being thought to be presidential. they were thought for some reason not to be a presidential timber. and so, you know, as an academic you tend to ask, why? and that for me is the origin was book. .. we are glad to have yell with us and we're glad had our authors with us. our all others are paul tough, author of how children succeed, meira levinson, author of no citizen left behind and michael brick, author of saving the school. there are some distinct austin and texas connections here. my name is mark, i am state representative from austin and member of the public education committee in the texas house and i want to start this discussion briefly with a little bit of edge occasional contacts. i got a press release from the texas indication agency a couple months ago that said that on the fourth grade science national assessment education abroad rests, texas, african-american students performed fourth best of all african-american students in the country, comparing hours to every other african american. hispanic students were the best on the fourth grade science naep. a anglo students were the eighth best of all the anglo students in the country. and i thought that is a pretty impressive record. it is a little different from what i expected actually. i went to the naep web site and found that in the aggregate, the texas student scores on the fourth grade science naep ranked 29th in this country. that is not so great. how is it possible that when you disaggregate those three student cohorts and evaluate them against the rest of the country, each of the three cote boards is in the top-10%. top-10 in the country. we all know that those three cohorts comprise 95% of the student population. how is it possible that collectively they are 29th? the answer, it turns out, wasn't easy to figure this out, the answer is african-american and hispanic students in texas and in the country significantly underperform anglo students. in texas, african-american and anglo students make up a significant larger share of the entire student population. so when your lower performing categories of students are a larger percentage of the total student population you can have all three student groups in the top ten in the country and still be 29th in the country when you combine them. it begs the question are schools doing a good job or are they mediocre? i think if the question is how are they doing with a student population relative to where they started, we are doing a better job moving them up a steep mountain, but because of the demographics of our student population our mountain is steeper than all the other states and the few measure as not based on how are black students doing compared to other black students but rather what is the output of the education system, there we are 29th and the purpose of the education system is to produce a citizenry capable of sustaining democracy and a workforce capable of sustaining prosperity we are not getting the job done. with that as context, this state has a lot to learn from these three books. what i will do is ask paul tough to start with his book how children succeed. >> thank you very much, thanks to all of you for being here. i will talk for a couple minutes about how my book how children succeed and give you some background on it. help children succeed is an argument against the conventional wisdom that the one quality in a child makes the most difference in terms of how well they do with their iq. i am writing about a group of educators and scientists who are taking on that idea and arguing for a different set of skills, things like grits and curiosity, perseverance, optimism that they say are better predictors of how well children do in the long term. part of the book is about neuroscience, all the underpinnings of these skills are formed in the environments in which children, babies grow up. i spent a lot of time with a pediatrician in san francisco who is watching how to improve environments for kids but a lot of folks also take place in schools dealing with adolescence when those qualities become character. in different ways, different educator's from a chess teacher in brooklyn to a private school principal in new york city to mentors working in the highest poverty neighborhood in chicago, trying to give students the sort of support and help they need to do better in this realm. mostly we don't quite know how to teach these francs, how to help kids improve. what i write about in this book is an experiment, new innovative ideas that might be able to help kids do better in this dimension and in the process help them do better in high school and college and life. >> i am going to follow up beach author's introduction with one quick question and get to the next topic. you wrote a book a few years ago while you were reporting for the new york times on the harlem children -- you wrote a book called however it takes, and we very aggressively pursued a promised neighborhood grant from the federal government to try to replicate the model. yesterday one of the students read you a paragraph you had written three your four years ago and your response was a lot of this book is my repudiation of what i wrote then. tell me, i read this book as sort of a validation of the science behind why the wraparound cradle to college model makes sense in the harlem children zone, but what about this book, is this book a confirmation of the strategy or is a deviation from what you thought then? >> i think what i was trying to say, this particular line i had in 2006 where i talk about middle-class values being an important part and a lot of this is trying to look more deeply at the question of values to look at the skills that are more important part of what successful schools are teaching in terms of what is related to the reporting whatever it takes. a little of both. i think that it is an affirmation of those ideas. the best way that i know of to deliver services to hide poverty neighborhoods is to do them comprehensively, simply working in a school in a i poverty neighborhood is not enough, that school used to be surrounded by early childhood programs, parenting support, after-school programs to help with college admission that we try to provide in the 97 block neighborhood where they work. that model could work in austin or anywhere else. and while it is still little too small for my liking is a good start to try to spur a lot of communities in to replicating that. this does cast doubt on harlan children's own model, and in my first book focused on the charter schools, very focused on standardized tests. as a journalist that was a handy device because each year is focused entirely on how kids do at the standard i sense -- it is very exciting, there's an end to the chapter when test scores come out and lots of principals and teachers and legislators who feel that way as well. a lot of the research that i read to go into this book really challenge this idea that standardized tests are measuring skills that matter most for child's long-term success so i have come to be more of a daughter of the kind of educational focus jeff is using or was using in his charter school. i now believe more in the infrastructure he has built around his school to support them. >> meira levinson is not just faculty member at harvard graduate school, she is a graduate of boston high school in austin, texas. [applause] i will let her speak about no citizen left behind. >> thank you. i want to pick up on the dilemma you posed at the beginning with how to interpret texas's naep scores. the question of looking at the aggregate where texas is mediocre, dad middle or should we look at the subgroups where texas is outperforming 80% of the other states in the country for every subgroup and what i want to argue is what i talk about in the book is we are obsessed in the nation with a question academically, this picks up a lot of part-time as it takes up a lot of your work when working on public education, thinking is this a good or bad? how do we improve hispanic and african-american students and we put in that versus others and like paul we need to be thinking about much more than academic achievement especially but not only as measured by things like standardized tests and even pretty good ones. that is because not only our kids doing much more than merely succeeding in school or failing to succeed but the idea behind school is somehow it should not only be a nice place to spend time, 13 years of your life with all too often it is and, schools, especially that serve low-income kids of color are lousy places to spend time and are demoralizing and demeaning and disrespectful but also the time they spend in that school should prepare them to lead happy, productive, fulfill lives as people, as workers and as citizens. one thing we spend almost 9 -- almost no time on these days is thinking about what citizenship means. and a citizen and why they shouldn't be there and things like that. what we don't take seriously what it means to be a citizen and why it is, and what i write about in no citizen left behind is we have the civic empowerment gap that is as large and well documented as the academic achievement gap. so we all know that if you are well educated, a fair amount of money, if you are a native english speaker. you are much more likely to have voted to be a member of a political party to have contacted by a candidate and had some kind of conversation with a government official whether elected or appointed, and protested or done other things we think of as more outside, all of these things you are more likely to do if you occupy a more privileged space in society. that means right now demographic characteristics, democracy determining democracy, determining who actually has power as a citizen and that is fundamentally anti-democratic. we should not be able to predict who has civic and political power based on the color of somebody's skin, the language they speak at home or how much money they earn or how much wealth they have in the bank. as a proud graduate of the austin independent school district, i really came to understand my student's opportunities and my own fellow student's opportunities as being structured not only by what academic achievement they have but the ways in which they are able to seize civil and political power in order to fight for democracy and justice on their own behalf and on others's behalf because ultimately it is something to be one child rising about of poverty and escaping the neighborhood which means leaving behind the ones they love and who love them, it means kids together working together to improve the communities where they are so they can all lead better lives collectively and lead us to have a better democracy. >> let me follow that up with this concern. i have a background in yachting--getting young people engaged in policies. i run a program called campaign academy, getting people to get involved in my campaign. i love young people's engage and when they are on my side. when we engage the public school system in that, i have got a friend, a government teacher in small-town texas whose views are the exact opposite of mine on just about every question. she teaches a majority/minority class a man she would take them to tea party gatherings, how do you address the issue of boundaries and the appropriateness of politics in public education? >> it is really important that we engage students as citizens. one of the arguments i make throughout the book is we right now fully recognize to teach kids to be writers they should be writing everyday. to teach kids to master mathematics they should be doing math every day. we also think it is perfectly reasonable that a kid who wants to a baseball is going to join the league at age 748, play every single year and if they joined the high school team they will be post seasonal and spend a lot of time focusing on capturing the ball. we spend no time asking students to do citizenship, to practice citizenship. if we reform education the way i am arguing to close the empowerment gap, you mentioned small-town texas, may be taking her students to tea party rallies but also the support and expectations and taking them to city council hearings and taking them to testify in front of the school board about why they should have an advisory or whatever and have a right letters and she will be teaching a politically engage class but it won't be an ideologically particular class. there are lots of ways to keep the class from being ideologically driven and partisan but still have it be politically engaged and have its citizenship be citizens in the way that they are writers and mathematicians. >> michael brick is a former new york times reporter who also now lives in austin, has texas roots and his book saving the school is about reagan high school. that particular year everyone remembers when if they didn't make the scores they were going to be shut down by the state of texas. why don't you walk us through the story? >> thank you for leading the conversation, representative strama. "saving the school" tells the story of reagan high school in east austin. it opened in the 60s as pride of the city, a place that won consecutive championships war europe, big blue banners all over town and 40 years later not much more than a generation, a place that rated academically unacceptable by the state four years in a row. a lot of families fled for the escape hatches of charter schools and other public schools across the highway and the year representative strama is referring to is the 2009-2010 school year and what the book traces is one year deadline teachers and administrators reagan had to for lack of a better term saves the schools. it follows the principle, a dynamo, chemistry teacher, basketball coach, and has they tried to raise scores which involve a lot of gaining of a broken system and data analysis and number crunching and realize they are not going to be able to save the school in a sustainable fashion with bringing numbers up. a new group of kids will come through needing a bunch of tutoring. and put into place the thing that a lot of us remember about high school. after-school clubs and sports teams we could be proud of. maybe a third of the book is about basketball, a dirty little secret. >> michael is a sports reporter for some of that. the chapters about the basketball, very vivid. >> so -- >> i asked the other two policy questions of this. what would you have written after spending a year inside reagan high school and these people's lives, if jay q. hadn't scored the winning basket against lbj and if they hadn't crossed the threshold of flexibility through the texas projection measure that year on standardized tests? >> it would have been a different book. as a journalist, the serious and to to that in terms of journalistic engagement, watching what is playing out over the course of the year, i saw things going in that direction. recognized i am not going to cheer for anybody that at the same time i am not going to have as interesting a book if this doesn't have a decent ending. i don't know if anybody was here that night for that history goes pretty deep. the moment the lay up when 10, i rarely experience moment in other people's lives who are bolstering as winning both of your children. it was a good basketball game. >> okay. we are on live national television. my theory of book festivals is too many jerry springer moments. we are going to try to provoke an argument. i will probably be unsuccessful. i am going to try to get them to argue and we have time at the end for questions from the audience so if fireman's successful maybe you will be. obviously one of the very hottest topics in the politics of education is the question of standardized assessments. i will state the case, we have an enormous system and without objective measures of how kids are doing you run the risk of the soft bigotry of low expectations, providing diplomas to kids who can't read them and so it seems reasonable there should be some things and to your point about democracy there has to be a common foundation of knowledge. even if we trusted e -- every school that the full rigor, you produce that in a society and as you say in the book, one generation grows up not knowing who kurt cobain and another doesn't know -- literally speaking that changes government. each of you has critiques of the standardization of education. talk about it going from michael first. >> tests are good. standards are good, you can follow any rule out the window. what we have done by doubling down on standardized testing, ratcheting up the competition every ten years since the nation of risk doesn't seem to have brought much more than the same dismal rates of the literacy will we have achieved resegregation and i don't know what else could come out of it. >> it would be fine to have a cacophonous democracy if we truly had a democritus -- cacophonous democracy without oligarchy and if we had a cacophony where we really had multiple voices and nobody had dominant voice so i open my book with this anecdotal of kurt cobain and when teaching in atlanta, none of the 35 students i had ever heard of kurt cobain and the mostly white team we were playing with thought it was hilarious my eighth graders never heard of kurt cobain. when i explained to my students that for these white kids the reason they thought that was hilarious was the same reason my kids thought would be hilarious for someone not to know master the, everybody knows master p and i would say they don't, decrepit but everybody knows master the of the problem with that disparity is not that it matters that you know who kurt cobain or master key is but we know they will have more power and therefore my kids at the school i was teaching at were going to need to know kurt cobain or the equivalent in order to have the conversations where they would be respected and taken seriously but if we had a truly inclusive democratic conversations and it would be ok and exchange to kurt cobain was the equivalent and kids would have to explain who master he was or the equivalence but when you start saying -- you get teachers to start teaching the list because any list is going to be long. at the current time we have such an enormous education system that it may be that standardized testing is the lever we have to keep people honest and it is an important tool for parents and students to have as a way of forcing accountability of teachers and districts but it is a tool that i think is also leading us further into a system of international educational mediocracy and it is not clear how to climb our way out of that to obtrusively -- truly professional education system if all we do is keep on pursuing the possibility. >> i have to tell you if you haven't read the book, the scene of her explaining to the kids on the bus that not everybody knows who master the is is so funny. they say everybody knows master key and she says look, all those kids from the other school think everybody knows who kurt cobain is and that is different. everybody knows master key. >> standardized tests, there is a lot that is good about accountability. the idea of high expectations and having ways to measure how schools are doing at educating their disadvantaged subgroups is all very important and to that extent there's a lot of good that has come out of the last 10 or 20 years of accountability. the problem is the tests we emphasize, and the work in the current regime are all about measuring cognitive skills. they measure tests from the s.a.t. to standardize state wide test and measuring very narrow range of skills. the evidence is there in the economic literature and a lot of the reporting night did, what makes a bigger difference for students heading ford public universities is there now on cognitive skills, character strengths, the things that don't get measured but are reflected in a student's gpa. if we had a way of measuring those long-term economic and educational results, things like college graduation rates, we would have an accountability system that would work better. if you are trying to give a kindergarten teacher a bonus based on how many of her students graduate from a four year college, he or she has to wait 20 something years to get the bonus so practically this might not work but as a thought experiment there's something valuable, accountability could work better if we were really holding teachers and principals and school systems accountable for the educational outcomes we care about. >> i asked you about the boundaries in teaching physics in school. your book has a teacher who is heroic in her relationships with her kids and commitment to her kids but i would think some readers would also find she crosses some boundaries of appropriateness in having kids over to her house every night of the week for bible study and really making her engagement with the kids center around her christian faith. many many people would not have a problem with that but some people might. your policy prescription in the book could be reduced to be the nanny state isn't in any at all. and kids are not. how do we address this issue of where the public sector gets into the lives of kids in their homes outside of school which seems to be the gates foundation and education reform movement is so obsessed with teacher quality and what drives positive student outcomes but long before the teachers have an effect the family does and that is why you quote barack obama saying in 2007, that is what i say every time i am engaged in teacher effectiveness, but that is the hardest lever to control through public policy. where are the boundaries? >> i will take that on. a lot of my reporting took place in high poverty neighborhoods. obama on the south side of chicago. my sense is what is going on in a lot of those neighborhoods is kids are surrounded by a disadvantage that goes so far beyond their school. involves neighborhoods, families, environment in which they live in every way and schools are a useful tool for trying to counter that environmental difficulty, to give them the skills they need to do well in life. it becomes clear to anyone who spent time in those neighborhoods that schools alone are not enough and there are some pretty experimental and innovative interventions that work directly with families, and especially in the first few years of the child's like to try to change that environment in a positive way and support families, support parents who are very eager to get that support. it is a kind of intervention that outside of those neighborhoods in the abstract we can get anxious about because americans for good reason think there should be a strong separation between family and the government but in the practical sense, when you are actually there with a home visitor visiting the teenage mom and giving her the support she needed to help her give her baby the right sort of start in life it quickly becomes clear that this is a kind of practice that the public should be involved in in some way so a lot of what we need to do is figure out a way to get beyond the boundary we have created. in those neighborhoods seems a lot easier to get through that boundaries and it does in the abstract when looking at it from here. >> in your first question you asked me about ideological boundaries. another boundary we want to cross the right about in "no citizen left behind" is boundaries between the school and the community in terms of students are crossing back and forth all the time between that boundary because they are going home, coming school, going back home and right now schools are too bounded so they can find learning to their walls and often literally put boundaries against any internet content including the most anodyne so kids are prevented from learning and also it means we are not asking kids to do stuff that will actually help the communities in which they live. we basically treat kids, especially low-income kids of about color in high poverty neighborhoods as these sinkholes of need. they have all these deficits and all of these problems and we're just going to send resources after resources into the sinkhole in order to try to make them productive citizens and workers and family members ideally by the time they're 18 or 19 and that is highly disrespectful to very confident, capable, self-reliant kids but also it means we are taking their most productive years when they are early adolescents, crossing this boundary, who knows so much about what their communities need and what they are lacking and they are not shy about telling you the park is dangerous and they are more likely to get murdered their than play a basketball game, there are no jobs, the health care services are lousy. they can tell you what needs to be done and if we would have the confidence in schools to say we will help you make these differences and changes now when you are 14 or 15, you have a lot of energy and the law time on your hands, we have a school in the community, we will teach you how to make a difference and how to make this park safer, not just to clean up the park but you need to have a partnership with the police and maybe you will need to change some what about assembly and how late you are going to be there and get support from neighbors, the house of midnight basketball games or whatever it is and improving the community and making schools seem like a more relevant place. >> there are a couple seems in your book where the principle that reagan high school literally kind of does that, calls in the student, student leadership, people she thinks have invested themselves personally in the school and says what do we need to do? she has the right this will turn around grant. and i thought your treatment of that science teacher was well done because you never talked about the boundaries, you just illustrated them. where did you come away from that experience? >> it was an interesting reporting challenge. i didn't expect it to be such a big part of the book. or such a big part of her story. if you are doing long form journalism and not price, you're doing it wrong. >> a central character of the corm -- before it became so central to her life. >> like any serious minded person has a keen sense of boundary. she never gets in the car alone with a male student and she doesn't talk about jesus in the classroom and i go through the history of religious organizations that have a long history in schools, more here than in the north. i know that can this new that if she wanted to cross that line and talk about jesus in the classroom she could have because nobody gave a damn about kids at reagan. >> on that subject, i was struck by the number of times she and annabel told the students that they loved their students. he said i love you to them. and a belt made the rounds before the standardized tests to each classroom to tell them that she loved them. your book cites a study about things you say before a kid takes the test, affect how they do on the test. it didn't test telling them you love them but telling the girl, reminding a girl she is the girl before a math test lowers her score on the tests. what is your reaction to that, and contractually the whole argument about some school reformers, a matter of high expectation. that seems to me not a very actionable recommendations but what is the role of expectation in all of this? >> this idea called stereotypes correct, when there are sub groups, whether it is young women, minorities who feel a special identity, anxiety around a particular skill or ability, when they have that anxiety triggered right before a test they will often do less well. girls in middle school math is a perfect example, when girls are asked to write an essay about being girls right before taking a math test date will do less well and there are interventions that can counter stereotypes threats. when kids are reminded for instance that they can improve, intelligence is valuable they are able to overcome stereotypes that it is an indication of how important the psychological realm can be in what we think of as a purely cognitive activity of going to school. this idea of how adults in the lives of school children interact with them is really important, you can't teach a lot of these skills by lecturing or reading in the book, lot of these other character strength that make a few different in kids's long-term outcomes tend to be developed through relationships with adults whether it is family members, coaches, teachers, there is that chess coach i read about at length in the book and there's something about that. >> she is an interesting character in terms of boundaries too because i thought her be raiding the kid who lost his test that was totally over the top but you seemed very charitably disposed toward her. >> i write about this tough chess coach in intermediate school 318 and there's something about watching her tell a chess player his loss in a chess game was completely pathetic that certainly was jarring to me but there is a way and lots of people in the coaching role can be harsh with their students, whether it is a chess coach or an athletic coach or music teacher, but what she was able to do was delivered these critiques even if they were harsh in a way that made it clear to the student that she cared about them very much and cared how they did, believed they could accomplish great things and was trying to give them chess knowledge and the abilities that go beyond chess to overcome and do better. >> i got to think somebody should do a study was affected has an kids test scores of you tell them before they take the test that you love them. if that improves their score. >> she was not a touchy-feely person but was committed to those kids. >> 20 years something crazy? i met this guy who runs the x why zone and that is his old gay because the teachers are so busy doing test drills that they have this guy who is there to do all the stuff you just described and be a mentor. >> in addition to the scientifically proven results establish these relationships it also says something sad about the fact the we have schools where we don't expect kids to go into institution and feel loved and respected and cared for. that is really sad the we are sending 7-year-olds and 12-year-olds and 14-year-olds into places for six or seven hours a day where it is often an anomaly for them to see this overexpression of respect and love. we want more of that. >> i agree but nobody ever said that to me when i was in school. i came from a home where i knew i was loved. and a bell said to those kids no one ever told you that at home but i love you. >> what she is trying to counteract is kids are pretty savvy. we have a really competitive system where the schools competing against each other and the losers identified as the weakest link and we get tough on them and even if it is not meant to transferred to them that is what teachers like annabel are trying to to work against. >> one of my students said to me -- two of my students were talking and i told one of them i thought he was smart and he said dr. levinson always says that and the second student says but she means it. and that was something, they had this conversation about what it meant that i actually believe each of them was smart and wanting them to do better. you may not have had a teacher tell you they love you but you also in new york teachers valued un respected you. >> i know you all think you are pretty smart but there's no better judge of the authenticity of a human being than the kids in those schools. they smell a rat. i will tell you all of you have questions, time to start lining up. i will throw one more topic out in advance and i remind those of you with questions that we're seven days from an election if nobody's going to ask about the political vacations' of this what you're going to leave it to me to do that. i want to say something about these nonacademic programs. you mentioned nation at risk study in 1983. that is what i was in high school. they pronounced my generation the dumbest group of people the american public education system ever produced and predicted we would lead the american economy into the third world. what actually happened when we get the workforce that work force was the biggest productivity boom in american economic history. i know the liabilities of claiming credit for inventing the internet but we pretty much did. the standardized tests that were the basis of the nation at risk report were wrong about my generation. it turns out we had learned some things in school that didn't show up in the tests and the best theory i heard of why that doesn't get measured is we have this rich extracurricular environment in our schools, not just debate and student journalism but basketball and football where kids learn competition, team work, problem solving, and in civics education there is no better way to learn government and threw things like junior statesmen and united nation. other than actually going to city hall in changing the law yourself. and extracurriculars that reagan were a magnet to address the problem of truancy and dropping out. so we quickly cover, is that a measurable thing we should be investing in through policy? any specific ideas? is this something we undervalued? >> and on measurable thing we should be investing in. >> it is a measurable thing we should be investing in. not measurable in terms of output but in terms of input. massachusetts has a lot that says every high school as to have a student government that is not just about the dances. they need to have a budget and have to have a policymaking power. we could measure that and whether schools actually have real student newspapers, whether they had organizations where kids were in control. all of those things are important. >> part of the problem with that accountability regime that is narrowly focused on short-term results is when it is time to make cuts as always seems to be in education politics we cut those things that don't necessarily show up in next week, next year's test scores. you can make that case for extracurricular, maybe they aren't going to help with your standardized test scores but there's evidence and we all know from our own lives that a lot of the transforming experiences that kids have in school happen outside the classroom and so i think it is another downside to looking at accountability in this narrow way. if we were looking at accountability for how kids do through life we would continue to fund these extracurriculars the change lives all the time. >> 14 minutes to cover a lot of questions lining up. let's try to ask some quickly and direct it to one speaker unless it is oral. >> maybe a bit off topic but it is a hot topic in texas, school vouchers depreciate, opinions and thoughts, solutions. is that a problem? >> who wants to go first? >> this is one of the reason standardized tests are so important in this conversation. if we are going to give vouchers or have charter schools or other forms of publicly funded schools that don't have public oversight then we need some means of insuring they are providing kids and education that we the public feel comfortable funding and right now the only mechanism for doing that is these cognitively oriented, narrow standardized tests. having a flowering of educational opportunities for kids that are publicly funded is good but we need to give the public a pre strong voice in terms of insuring these are things we are willing to put our public money toward and they are doing good things for kids and ideally we would have a much wider array of measures on which we would look at schools and look at educational programs in order to make sure kids are really getting what they deserve. >> either we want to pursue the ideal of equality public education for all kids or not. if the answer is yes let's do that if the answer is no than vouchers, charters, take your pick. >> you asked all of us to throw out -- we had an experiment last ten years in public policy with something called supplemental education will services and the and the child left behind act. you mentioned for profit tutors that descended upon reagan seeking the vouchers for private tutoring. dione tutoring company with my wife and we know this market. is a terrible public policy. doesn't work. because frankly the choices being exercised in that marketplace are not best for the kids and the educators who run those schools would spend the money better than is being spent through vouchers. choice works well for a lot of kids using charter schools because they come from a family or have within themselves the character, qualities, social capital they make great educational fleeces and aggregate themselves among other kids who made a great choice for themselves but the vast majority of kids in the school system haven't made that choice. what happens as a result is the schools that left to educate the ones that have not taken that initiative and don't bring that social capital with them to school are left with an even more challenging student population to educate and there is no evidence and there is an empirical record to look for the evidence and there's no evidence that those families that haven't exercised choice for charter schools, that didn't exercise a choice with the vouchers they were given the the supplemental education service bill that they're going to make great decisions for their kids under vouchers instead the whole idea gets really politically hot when there's funding from vouchers. that will change the debate a lot. next question. >> i agree there needs to be some accountability in standardized tests, one way to get that accountability. how do you make that accountability or that tests for performance into a carrot instead of a stick? >> how the make the accountability system a carrot instead of a stick? let me add is that. you said we need to broaden what we are measuring. is there a proposal to do that? is there a concrete, actionable public policy agenda that i haven't seen that has a standard way of measuring the bigger things we want for our kids than their ability to bubble answers on a standardized test? >> measurement has to be a tool. i don't know that you want accountability to be a carrots anymore than you wanted to be a stick. the only reason to have tests is because that is a fool when you don't have another tool to figure out how kids are doing but that won't improve the system. testing a kid is not in itself going to tell the teacher how to teach better or a district how to run itself better or a state how to allocate funds any better. when you are asking about is there something out there is not another accountability tool we want to find. the question is is there something we understand about how to improve practice? how to teach kids better? we know a fair amount about that. it is research intended and would take treating teachers as professionals and attracting really top-notch people into the profession and mentoring them over time and making all sorts of changes we have not been willing to make as the country. >> how we do it as a carrot rather than a stick michael's folks chose the arm of the stick creating a pressurized environment that made it hard for them to do education in the joyful way education should be done. but there is a carrot to try to incentivize, get kids to come to school. they get more funding every day the kitchen is of. the stake was if they don't show up we are setting the school down and that caused the school to go door-to-door dragging kids to school. was that stick, the net effect was more kids got educated than would have without the stick. did it do more harm than good? >> interesting way of looking at it. there were some much bigger branches that have been swung at reagan before that stick came around and parents are getting letters sent home that the school is academically unacceptable. go to another one if you configure out how to get over there. at that point, what you are left with is disproportionate group of english language learners and poor people and the stick worked. i don't see that as a policy model. >> next question. >> i am a progressive living in austin and someone sent me the republican party platform and in the air they do not want creative thinking taught in public schools. you can check me on this. they do not want creative thinking and that is certainly what we need. >> the language was higher order thinking skills. >> i'm in favor of creative thinking in schools. >> anybody want to be against it? >> next question. >> i am currently a graduate student at texas state university in music education. i was a public school band director in a small rural school in east texas for two years and you have mentioned the role of extracurricular activities in keeping kids involved in schools in their own education. i wonder if you could comment of a little bit on a roll of the arts. the comments you have made so far, you mentioned chefs, student government, athletics. if you could comment on what you think the role of the arts should be. [applause] >> i will take a swing at it and turned over to my fellow panelists. the arts are important in all sorts of ways. they're important just because they engage kids, gives get excited about taking part in them, they make for more well-rounded students. in terms of the way that i saw the skills and action in my reporting one of the things that is so effective about music teachers and art teachers is they are in the same kind of training role with students the same way the chesty dry run about was that sports coaches are and one thing that is becoming clear about the skills i am talking about is they do get developed most effectively through those close relationships and through what the chess teacher does, and goes over the mistakes kids make over and over again and there's this feedback loop kids get that can be incredibly positive and music teachers and our teachers are doing the same thing all the time. you see the mistakes you make and you are getting help in correcting them. is much harder for math teachers, geography teachers and science teachers to do that. is not impossible but in lots of ways the relationship and our teacher has with his or her student is a good model for other teachers to follow. >> we're down to four minutes and i have been unsuccessful in two goals. we haven't talked about marshmallows which means you all have to read paul's book because it is essentially about marshmallows and we haven't had jerry springer moment. in the last three minutes i'm going to provoke the jerry springer moment by asking each of you. we have an erection in a week. what are the lessons of your book for the two guys running for president, what the implications of various possible outcomes in this election for the things you care about in your book? >> i will go first. if you look at the two presidential candidates this is an area in which they don't seem to disagree. the way they talk about education is relatively similar which is potentially disturbing to democrats and republicans who tend to think the other person is wrong about everything. i actually think there are many more creative and productive ways we could be running education in washington. the way the race to the top is focused on accountability, good in theory. in practice i am worried it is putting the wrong incentives and to place and a broader federal mandate for education that would include things that go beyond schools would help the matter who is president. >> if president obama stays presidents, and collected another four years and wants to ensure the privacy of the democratic party nationally over the next 40 years he should expand civic education in schools enormously because public schools in the united states are becoming ever more poverty stricken and never more students of color and those are the students at the bottom of the civic empowerment gap and it would be in the democratic party's self-interest to take a generation of young people land have them practice being citizens day after day. they would support the democratic party but on the other hand if romney wins i think actually he might have an interest also in supporting civic education because right now what we know is low-income kids of color are likely to grow up in devoe the democratic so he could have some impact in actual the teachings and civics that might get them thinking beyond what their context is likely to teach them. they should promote civic education. [applause] >> the reason is hard to get jerry springer out of this is this is our only bipartisan issue. everybody cares about it. everybody has been on the same side dating back to ted kennedy and george bush. there are a lot of reasons the election is important. they ton either candidate will take in office will affect what happens with education. >> paul, you wrote in the new york times magazine the obama before he was elected and the obama in the white house having different towns about posture. using the changes if he gets a second term? goes back to the tone he had before? >> i wrote about his policies around poverty and he stopped talking about poverty the last couple years. i would like to think he would go back to poverty in 2007. .. >> in half an hour, otb will be back with more from the texas book festival. >> booktv is on facebook. interact with viewers and up-to-date information. visit us at facebook apple tv .com. >> i ran up to him and i started asking smart questions like, what is this for? how did you get that? oh, yeah, i can shoot back. so he took it for a moment and said, what are you going to do when you get out of high school? and i looked back at him and i tucked my chest out and i said, i'm going to go play football somewhere. and he said, yeah, that is exactly what i would do, too, because there's weight you would make it in the marines. [laughter] i realized that i had set myself up. so i went back to my classroom and i came back. for those of you don't know me, i don't to challenge lightly. i went back to my room and i started thinking about it. i thought about what the recruiter had done, and i came back and here it is that if you look at aqueduct today, i'll do it. i did not expect them to do it. he said okay, let's go. we signed the papers, we came back, and we are talking to my father, waiting for his signature. we are sitting in my living room, on the kitchen table and my dad walks in and he says, what have you done now? and i said dad, i want to go to the marine corps. he said you are going to play football yesterday. and he asked if i had really thought about it. and i said yes, he our drive up there, the hour drive back, and i'm ready to go. so i enlisted in the marine corps on june 18, 2006. it is a date that i will never forget. this is where i would spend my 18th birthday. happy birthday, right? it is not as bad as the next three birthdays that i have had. my 19th birthday, i was in sniper school how we print my 20th birthday i was in hell week mountain training in camp pendleton in california. i was shipped off to camp dodge in north carolina. after that, i ran off to hawaii for the next four years. this is where i attended sniper school. after attending sniper school, i shipped off to iraq. in iraq, i did not get to complete my to her -- actually suffered severe nerve damage. it was from a spider bite. i came home for two years of additional training. trying to get my hand working again. so there was a cyberleader sniper leader that was in charge of five marines. we were training to go back to iraq. and my sergeant came in and said we need five volunteers of afghanistan are it and i said what is the mission? they said they didn't know yet, but 85 volunteers right now. and i raise my raised my hand and said i'm ready to go. so i ended up being assigned to a small team of advisors. and we were going to have to get advisors for the afghan national army. there were two marines, one lady or man, you want to talk about a complete culture shock -- i can tell you right now that i got one. we did everything from eating to drinking to volleyball courts, to mission planning. to hearing about the stories of their lives. it really helped us become a proud unit. we learned to depend on one another and rely on one another. and i want to talk about the afghans later on in the current events. but i have to tell you one of the best lessons it taught me was not to look at the world and not to judge people by their religion or their skin color or their financial status or anything like that. i have to tell you that i am guilty of coming from a small town and having a small town complex. we humans are so fast to judge one another. so it is something we can take and listen to. so i was stationed in northeastern afghanistan. right on the pakistan border. [inaudible] they might as well be marines. i'm going to call the marines from here on out. [applause] so part of my opportunity was getting to meet these guys and develop a team. because this was a group of guys i've eventually learned to call my brothers. they are a team that goes on to advice for the don't ask about personality or anything like that. they put you in there and expect to get along. when i met johnson and latham, they were totally different than me. so i didn't really care about this, but i was just so excited of the thought of going to afghanistan -- it didn't matter to me. but what i learned more and more every single day, these guys are the most important people in my life. each of us share the responsibility to take care of one another, to support and protect one another. it did not take long for the personality differences to just melt away. there was never any doubt in my mind that they were willing to sacrifice their life at a moments notice. in the end, they proved it. on september 8, 2009, we were on a mission in a valley. this is the only mission that they put me out and they replaced me with a sergeant named johnson. he was a big guy. he was a fitness guru. my assignment was to sit back and have my team do well. being in the marine corps, you don't have much option but to follow orders. they said that they were going to pronounce themselves from the taliban. this is how i believe that we won the war. i believe that by that, stopping the taliban movement, we won the war to stop terrorism. so that is what we are trying to do. it didn't take me long to realize that i have been in quite a few fights. you try to figure out that the training to start kicking in and you start doing your job after about 10 or 15 minutes. one thing after another, and everything starts to fall like a house of cards. everything that we relied on was not happening. everything was quickly falling like a house of cards. we needed to get our stuff together and take advantage of it. chavez was sitting in a vehicle and we figured out that we had to do something. we cannot just sit back and watch anymore. each time we were told no. we looked at each other and said, you know what? we have to go in. that is what brothers do for one another. as soon as we were going our own program, we were going to have to answer for it. i would rather be here answering the consequences for my team being alive today and it not being as bad as it was to be standing here -- it is perfect. and the response he got back was, this location is too close to the village. the response back was try your best. two minutes later they called in a medical evacuation. there is a lot of confusion going over the radio track. he said get off the radio, i'm trying to get a grip and get medevac. so he did. so i'm starting to ride on the humvee. he got his first three grades out and he stopped her and that was last time i ever heard for my teammates. we were searching for the wounded marines and missing guys. some guys were in the trench. i immediately knew they were all gone, but i didn't want to face it. surely, it can't be all of them. those men and women paid the ultimate sacrifice. the details that they are difficult for me to communicate. but i'm sure that you get the scene now. my actions had been recognized as outstanding, but for me, to be honest, i was just being honest. the words you never leave a fallen marine behind. you get them out, or you die trying. i was just doing what my brothers and any other marine would've done for me. now i have been honored by the country and the president of the united states. and i stand before you as a medal of honor recipient. >> you can watch this and other programs online at booktv.org. here is a look at some books being published this week. alex kershaw, the commander of the infantry regiment of the liberator. his five-day odyssey from the beaches of sicily to the gates of dachau. journalist and media critic eric wigand argues that the media capitalizes on creditors to garner an audience. and how the media wields dangerous words divided nation. in the making of the modern marine corps, erin o'connell, assistant professor of the cold war in the united states marine corps at the u.s. naval academy, chronicles the transformation of the marine corps from work to vietnam. you can see recent interview with mr. o'connell at booktv.org. and the description of rise to greatness, abraham lincoln in america's most perilous year. in tombstone, the great chinese famine of 1958 to 1962, the journalist explains what led to the famine of the 1950s and 60s, which included the death of her father. and this gentleman recounts his story in his new book. and africa's culture, religion, history and identity. look for these titles and book stores this coming week, and watch for the authors and the near future on booktv.org. >> we are the founders of the canada party and we wrote a book. we are here tonight to talk about this book and tell you how it's going to go. it will be very long. i will do a quick introduction about why we are here. we are always from vancouver. then brian is going to face the candidate here and he will tell you what we are all about. i will read a quick little chapter and then we will do a q&a. after that, you can make a bunch of noise and buy some beers. >> we are from vancouver. about a year ago, we started realizing that we wanted to get into politics. we did years of short films and comedy and in canada we were catching the breeze. watching the conventions for the past two years. everyone announcing their candidacy for president of the united states. so frankly the candidates scare us. so we thought, canada would make a good candidate for president, so we are running canada to be the president of the united states. not the canadian government, but the canadian people. because we love america. we love our big brother and we want to help. all right. so we did a campaign video in january and it went viral. about a half million views. we got a lot of media and radio tv, cnn, the canadian cnn, a lot of acronyms. so it took off and we built a steady team of followers. three weeks later we had a book deal, and this is what we wrote. the canada party manifesto. an intervention from your continental get that. i'm going to turn it over to ryan, and he will tell us what it is about. representing our friends to the north don't want to see you return to the great country that used to be and will be in the future. all right, thank you. [applause] >> thank you so much. canada, canada -- [laughter] >> i can't even get that going in canada, so that is amazing. it was exactly 200 years ago when we have been continental partners ever since. strong and popular and extremely good-looking. you are the country that everyone aspires to be. lately, we put on a few pounds. canada, a few years your junior, we got right down to it. 200 years later, this paperthin border of ours says little about local anguish. we are doing the only thing we can. we want you, america. we want to be elected as your next president. [laughter] now, it's not like we don't have our own fault. we are not perfect. the national oil program is still apocalyptic. once we become the president, we will turn around and invade ourselves. you are probably asking yourself why would these guys be qualified? what qualifies him to be the president of america? not only is it colder in canada, but because we are the little brother who has idolized america. we have conquered ancient conquered the frontier, laughed, cried, together we created some of the weakest beers in the known universe. [laughter] what we really want is a chance to kick back for a while. let us love your pillows and give you some time to do some healing and reevaluate your case in the universe. you have to understand, america, we still love you. we are your family. this is not an invasion. it is an intervention. now, we are aware that all your candidates have to be us-born. but in canada, we consider ourselves u.s. citizens by proxy. so here we are. we publish this manifesto. [laughter] we basically present americans with our ideas for america. which is a great america. it's a good america, but just better. we immediately tackle the big issues in this country. for example, sex education in schools will require to be required of knowledge there that there is such a thing as sex. and america's ever-expanding waistlines, fast food mascots must be tied to the food they are selling. with traditional marriage, we believe that one gay couple should be allowed to marry for each straight couple that gets divorced. and to finally bring much-needed transparency back to your political process, like drugs and cigarettes. it will be titled to reflect the contest untracked contents. we don't stop there. the metric system, 10 times more awesome than imperial measurements. we peel back the layers of america and american exceptionalism on how to make other country so that other bodies. we present practical solutions and how to relieve sexual tension and crime and punishment and crime again. we even have created a simple multiple-choice questionnaire helping american children to determine their value as future americans. and to reinvigorate the polls, we have invented a drinking game for rocking the vote. i know most of you are thinking to yourself how dare you, coffee lover. [laughter] i should tell you that we are running this open transparency. it is not nearly as fancy as you think. but i assure you that we only want to raise america up. we believe you deserve an honest president. so yes, america, we look fat in the stands. now, jobs is a big issue in this election and we will change the phrase job creators to job sensationalists. we will move the prisoners from guantánamo bay to the arctic where they can legally snowboard. [laughter] corporations will still be people. but they will be legally obligated to care for your mom. and for smoking the green, we want to legalize a it, tax it, use that money to invest in stocks and she doesn't use that money to buy back america from china. [laughter] [applause] america, it is probably very clear to you right now that your democracy is due north. so when you go into that polling station next year, consider a country you truly deserve, canada. thank you. [applause] >> is such a handsome man. sometimes they won't tell the canadians together. this is the guy we got. i'm going to read a short section. section 3.2 from the irony of being ironic in a post- ironic age. this is about the citizens united decision. stop putting your politicians on layaway and start buying them outright at the bed bath and beyond. before i introduce this chapter, before i get going, let me thank you guys for coming. you guys are awesome. i'm going to read citizens divided, people are now corporations. before i get started, a quick facts. everyone has affected a promise. exxon and wal-mart, they are now the largest people in the united states. the average american is catching up. [laughter] citizens divided, people are now corporations. much to do about the u.s. supreme court. it is a chilling line that you might expect to find in a dystopian charlton heston film. corporations are people. it is a confiscated decision, but it allows businesses to stop putting politicians on layaway and start purchasing outright of bed bath and integrity around the corner. the side effect of turning more than 30 million businesses and people overnight is the 17% increase in the u.s. population. already reeling from high unemployment and increasingly scarce resources. who will care for these new humans? small businesses now have the legal protection enjoyed by dwarves and abercrombie and fitch -- who will defend target from the nra? come on. challenges cannot be met by the current infrastructure and we have no choice but to reduce the actual numbers by officially declaring a portion of them to be a corporation. in cooperation with henderson family of albany, new york, we have already begun a test program to help mrs. henderson transition her loving household into a streamlined model of genetic deficiency. so this is a memo to the members of the henderson family from mom,. you can watch this and other programs online by booktv.org. here's a look at some upcoming book fairs and festivals happening around the country. this weekend, booktv is live from the texas book festival. includes presentations by douglas brinkley, and many more. visit booktv.org for a complete schedule of events. the national press club's book fair and author nights on november 13, and includes more than 90 writers and proceeds support the national press club's journal institute. watch booktv in the future for interviews. this year's national book awards will be in new york city on november 14. the ceremony celebrates author's works and fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and young adult literature. booktv will air the ceremony the following weekend. and miami book fair international is held the 11th through the 15th of november. it features many authors and booktv will be live november 17 and 18. for a complete schedule of opera opera presentations, interviews and more, visit booktv.org. please let us know about book fairs and festivals in your area, and we will be happy to add them to our list. e-mail us at booktv at c-span.org. >> here are some of the top-selling nonfiction titles according to "the wall street journal." they reflect sales as of october 14. first, bill o'reilly and martin daugaard account the assassination of john f. kennedy in killing kennedy come the end of camelot. second is no easy day. the firsthand account of the mission or killed osama bin laden, written under the pen name mark owen. and third, the songwriter for the british rock band the flu, pete townshend recalls his life and who i am, a memoir. and current and social issues in america. bill o'reilly recounts the assassination of president lincoln and the manhunt for john wilkes booth and killing went in at number six. seven is god loves you, he always has, he always will by david jeremiah. followed by guinness world records 2013 at number eight. nine is i declare, 31 promises to speak over your life. rounding out the list at number 10 is the newest version of strength assessment. 2.0. you can find more on these bestsellers by going "the wall street journal".com. >> douglas brickley is next. live from the 17th annual texas book festival. [inaudible conversations] >> good afternoon. thank you for being here. good afternoon, thank you for being here. what a wonderful crowd. my name is evan smith, i am the ceo and editor-in-chief of the texas tribune. i am pleased to be here today with my friend, douglas brinkley, the popular and acclaimed writer who is a professor of history at rice university, where he is a fellow at the baker institute for public policy. many know that he is the author of books about teddy roosevelt, john kerry, and rosa parks, and is the editor of ronald reagan and injector wax diaries. this week, in particular, you know him as a regular contributor to rolling stone magazine where his long cover story on barack obama gave the word bs new street credibility. [cheers] [applause] let's see if c-span will believe that. he is walter cronkite's biographer. cronkite, his work on the most trusted man in america. he was keen and fair-minded but seven cisco chronicle. do i like? doug is a graduate of the ohio state university and georgetown university and to the eternal glee of those of us who live there, a resident of austin, texas. [applause] even if he didn't have to travel far from home to be with us, please join me in welcoming the great douglas brinkley. [applause] the question is, given everything that's going on in the world, the evolution and revolution in the media, which we consider to be our business, why cronkite now? well, the part of the reason that i decided to write on him was because of the collection here at the briscoe center at the university of texas at austin. i believe he did a book on conversations of cronkite. but this is the grand central station of cronkite studies at ug. as a resident here in austin, texas with three kids. i thought what a great place to do research because i can just drive down the road. that was one reason. a more substantive reason is i am the historian for cbs news right now. so i'm constantly -- i was just in new york today to working with charlie rose on the morning news story. so i understand the culture of cbs, and i go up and a little bit about me is that i grew up watching walter cronkite. i learned about apollo 11, neil armstrong going to the moon, the vietnam war, watergate. camp david, on and on. he was my filter and i would get all of contemporary events through him. of course, when he quit the job at cbs as an acre in 1981, it was a different media culture being born. cnn had just been created. it was the beginning of 24 hour cable news, and of course, now we are in the age of the internet. in some ways, cronkite was right for a historical inquiry. i argue that in broadcast history of television, there are two titans. edward merle, radio and tv, probably the most important. but walter cronkite, either first or second, depending how you look at it, and i decided to tackle a definitive biography. the paper collection one today. i interviewed anybody that i could. anybody that knew walter cronkite, including his daughter kathy who lives in austin, texas. some people i have interviewed have died. some people have passed is generate generations. andy rooney, for example, who worked with cronkite during world war ii, they were indebted with the air force bombing shared bandwidth cronkite ready for the united press and andy rooney from stars and stripes. probably about 10 people that i wrote about have subsequently passed. but i thought is that, i always think of him as mr. cronkite. that is how i always thought of him growing up. his approach to doing his job is, in some ways, vastly different from the people who succeeded him. there is no question that the role of the evening news anchor is not what was common even in 1981, only three decades ago. that is right. i should say that cronkite grew up in texas and he grew up in houston, texas. and i went to a middle school in houston and central high school and he got the bug for being a reporter. and he came to ut and it was here for a couple of years. he considered it his alma mater. he got into being a wire service reporter, most famously, as i mentioned, with united press. out of boston, he was working for what is now the ins international news service wires service. like hemingway who came out of the wire service, you have to drop a lot of adverbs and adjectives. when you 24 hour news, you could throw in burbage. cronkite had to learn to boil things down and he ended up becoming one of these great print reporters. he got his biggest break here in texas. he was in dallas in 1937 when the texas school disaster happened and somebody at the festival is going to be talking about this. 290 children and teachers in new london, texas.will not. they got blown up in a natural gas leak. we have seen cronkite arrived, the bodies of children and the like, and they ended up going to a pay phone. he called in to cbs in new york, and they were able to catch his voice around the country on cbs radio. that is the first time that cronkite was ever heard. the point of this is that cronkite was a serious print reporter. a serious journalist. somebody who covered everything in the united states, and then during world war ii, he was able to cover normandy and the battle of the bulge, and he was at the nuremberg trials and the liberation of europe and all of these things, which gave them gravitas before he went on tv. not just a newsreader, but someone who had the journalistic chops. the thought of 1981 and the fact that cnn had just launched, we were still a country with three nightly newscasts. that's where people got their news. we did not have a great marketplace of choices on cable. we didn't have the internet or twitter, displacing everyone and everything is the as the main source of news. i can't imagine what mr. cronkite would think of the world today he encountered it. i would imagine it would seem very unfamiliar beginning with the fact that many fewer people watch the evening news or are even aware that still exists. mr. cronkite died 2009. so he got to see the internet revolution, and we know what he thought about it. he liked having his laptop. he liked having information. but what he was panicked about, and parents should maybe worry about this -- it is misinformation on the internet. he thought all of this communications technology we are curing or blackberries with everything, but we didn't have internet literacy. we weren't teaching a 12-year-old her 14-year-old or 6-year-old how to troll the worldwide west. so people would get news so kids could turn to a bogus site or a corner graphic site for a sight of just anything like that. he knew that you couldn't put the genie in the bottle because he had heard the arguments before. people have said the wire services, but it was going to kill print reporting. because they would be buying one story and printing it and then there was the argument of radio news was going to forever kill newspapers. and mtv was going to kill radio. what i write about in my book is the history of mass communications. cronkite knew he was a pioneer in the early years of news. an acre from 1962 when john glenn did his triple words. his triple orbits. he was like duke ellington with orchestra players like dan rather and daniel schorr and leslie stahl and ed bradley and all of these other great reporters that come out of that cbs tradition. and she orchestrated that whole effort as managing editor. i reference mr. cronkite as having been the most trusted man in america. that was his great grand at the time. today, the media is, let's just say, it's not trusted as much. in some corners, not trusted at all. one thing that is? what has happened from the hated that has caused that to be the case? could you imagine a journalist today being referred to as the most trusted man in america, other than you, of course. [laughter] >> we have lost a lot of integrity. we are right to be a little sour about the way the modern media works. when this change came in is really when we started getting paid. barbara walters was hired by nbc $4 million. you start getting to the point where an anchor can get paid 14 million a year. well, you might say that's the marketplace. let them are not salaried. the what the big corporations do is downsize. what cbs might have had from saigon and tokyo and rio and reporters all over, they get downsized so much not to pay for salaries and graphics and most troubling, we have now become a society which cronkite deeply worried about. where entertainment is news. what do the kardashian ends do. what does lindsay lohan do. what is happening and it is eating up the oxygen of foreign news. now, i think we do gavel to gavel things well today. watching conventions on cable or gearing up for an election like this. but what we don't do well with his explaining the vast external rom as it was used to be called from the rest of the world very well. in many ways, journalists promoting and ignorance because we are not just being parochial in the united states, we are being entertainment zone. and tablets have now taken over. the british popularized and we have adopted it now. so many times, somebody gets on the air and cronkite's long career, anytime he would break on the airwaves, the wire service reports -- it was important to be first. who cares if you announce something five minutes before competition. get it right. the reason that cronkite had this marathon career is that he kept it together to get it right. people have been arguing about whether he was conservative or liberal, what he was was a professional. he was a trades person. into the power of the camera and that he could not ever -- the pressure on him was never to disappoint anyone with disappointing news being more acceptable. you talk about how we do gavel to gavel. well, then you say, it's on cable. the broadcast networks can sometimes barely be bothered to cover the signature event of an election cycle or when a crisis breaks. i want you to assign blame for this. and i know that you are on the table with cbs, but in the time -- to say bad things about nbc. [laughter] in the time, we have really seen a shift in priorities of the news apparatus of the broadcast network, and by the way, the president is more apt to say before whoopi goldberg and to a baycol on the view that is before brian williams and diane sawyer in the and the newest. >> that's a good point. the truth is a matter. the entertainment shows -- a public service, something they have to do. it's not a money maker, it is full-blown organ in a larger corporate structure, and that in the primetime real estate, it is hard to break into. they put money into, let's say, a paper money into things so well, the chump change was left over from a dick van dyke show. i love lucy, shows that were making real money and in my particular historical narrative, the pt barnum of a lot of this stuff, what he really did understand was that you have to make news as a drama. it was released based that started that. a little bit of a political convention coverage in 1952 and 1956. it was alan shepard and john kwon and everybody in america would watch and glenn became like a hero. what did charles lindbergh of the kennedy years. and that they would follow it not just up there in space, but for days, training the cameras at cape canaveral, building up this drama. in fact, television got john glenn's mother famously saying that her son almost died up in space. there are moments when we could not hear whether he was alive and when they talk to john glenn's mother and they say, are you very excited to reunite with your son recklessly? and she said, i can't make it happened, but i can't wait to meet walter cronkite. >> whether you were there or not, we remember the kennedy assassination when cronkite narrated the most consequential series of events of our lifetime. what do we know about that sequence of days and hours of reporting -- what is surprising about what we think that we know? >> walter cronkite loved late-night cocktails. but he was a stickler for not drinking during the day. while other people like to have a newark lunch, he liked to have a bad lunch every day and did not like to leave the newsroom. using the newsroom and heard the ticker coming over the wires from dallas. he was eating cottage cheese and pineapple. he got over there and said oh, my gosh, that's the first thing, obviously, in the news business. you never know what's going to happen. one gentleman told me that cronkite was like a jaguar leaping out. whenever he would hear the bells go off from the wire machines come he would race to them to be the first to rip off what is coming over the wires. he was an addict of that. well, here was the news from dallas, and now cronkite did marathon coverage. we remember him taking the glasses off and looking at the clock, kind of timing at all and was able to show some emotion, but not professionalism. now, that is a frozen moment. what sometimes gets us is that he stayed on for hour after hour, days after days. he explained to us why is jackie kennedy wearing her pink chanel suit with blood on it still. where is john f. kennedy's body. who were was lee harvey oswald? who is jack ruby? will kennedy be buried in hyannisport or in arlington cemetery? there were rumors of vote. where are the kennedy kids? and we were all glued to it. many places in the world, when a president, a leader, gets brutally murdered, there are riots in the street. in america, we turned on walter cronkite and we all watched. it became at that time something that is hard to define. he was it handled her, rabbi, pastor, you know, a grief counselor. but he was important because he was who we trusted would tell us the up-to-date information that we needed to know. that bond of trust he forged during the kennedy assassination never left him his whole life, even in the years before his death. everyone would want to shake walter cronkite's hand. his nickname was uncle walter. people felt like he was family. that is the skill, not just luck, but somebody who is able to make eye contact. and he loved working the crowds. he would be talking to all of you if you are were up on stage because he really liked people. he kept a watch on the midwest on central time. he never became a manhattan swell, even though he lived in new york and he never, even though he had a home in martha's vineyard, he never forgot his origins in kansas city. as he described them, i'm wondering who is the walter cronkite today. is there a walter cronkite of today? is it too much to ask of there be somebody who plays that role in our lives or who approaches his or her responsibilities in the same way that he did. >> that's an excellent question. i have thought about it long and hard. i came up with only one person, it's going to surprise everybody here. brian lamb of c-span, who has created a c-span network that is so objective -- >> that's just pandering. [applause] >> i would call it pandering, except i dedicated the book to him. but everybody turns into c-span and can trust the network for what they are doing, because they are giving such people played everything. i'm afraid the other network people, if you are conservative, you believe fox come if you're liberal, you believe msnbc. and c-span, we managed to contain and integrity and managed to stay on politicized. in this highly politicized era. >> this is a highly substantial book. i don't suspect there is much that he didn't cover in this book that you wish you had. we left with any things about mr. cronkite that you wish you would have been able to get to the bottom up, but the nature of this kind of work, you can only go so far in trying to figure out the answer was? >> well, lot of controversy swirls around the vietnam war, the importance of the so-called cronkite moment come on piggery 27, 1968, after being very pro-war, meaning that he, personally, was in 1965, 1966, 1967, the fact that the feeling was that the american people were getting the wrong information from the pentagon and we were not winning the war in vietnam. he did a primetime special. an editorial in the broadcast and he basically said maybe it is time to call it a stalemate and sent home the troops and call it a draw. it has become a moment that puts cronkite into the narrative of history. how big of a moment, it is hard to say. president johnson was well aware of problems in vietnam. he also had health problems and cronkite was johnny-come-lately, really. being skeptical about vietnam and cronkite had heard it from years ago from "the new york times" reporters and everyone else. i don't think it mattered a whole lot, except that, you know, it gave him an audience with college campuses and i did notice that he won every journalism award known to man in 1969. it wasn't because of his coverage of the chicago convention. it was because of the sense of cronkite and he started winning all of these journalism awards. there was a very astute comment made to me. they said that cronkite was great and after the vietnam war he got all of this acclaim. i would've stayed anti-vietnam, too. he was saying, you know, he became the edward armor of the critique of murrow. would have significant, as a cultural moment that that is, it really reflects a turning point. i'm struggling to figure out who today he would say that about if you lost ed shultz. i just really think that we seem to lose ed schultz twice or three times a week. i actually don't know -- maybe it's too much wish there was another moment like that. and it may not come again. >> well, what controversialist said about walter cronkite losing the war, losing middle america, or, you know, a phrase, it was backed by the press secretary. subsequently, there is evidence that maybe johnson did, if he said it, it didn't warrant quite the scrutiny it has gotten over the years. it can't really be solved. it is like 15 people saying different things. it carried some significant, particularly because people trust him so much. but we are not going to return anymore than we could hope that the dodo bird comes back. that brand of journalism is extinct. >> it has come and gone to it had ended. cronkite started in 1950, operating in a booth or a broom closet with a camera on him. with 4000 viewers. nobody here knew whether it was going to work. by the time that he leaves, it is the new medium. he represents television news in its infancy, in the 50s, 60s, and 70s. by the 80s, it is a whole new chapter in communication history. but we need to honor him about the professionalism that he exhibited in the way that he helped a society process move. you know, we don't do our calendars around nightly news. we turn on the tv and watched cronkite like i did. there are people doing night classes and play dates and all sorts of different modern era things where we are not quite as regimented. so we are a different society. cronkite is an exemplary person of what is best in that era of broadcast journalism. >> okay, we are going to go to questions from the audience. i think we have talked enough and we would like to bring into the conversation. there is a microphone in the middle. we will ask for the benefit of the broadcast that you walk up to the microphone, use your outside voice so that we can hear you. we will be happy to take as many questions as time permits. >> why did mr. cronkite retired? >> why did he retire? well, he retired when he was 64 years of age. because he was at the very top of his game and did not want to be one of those people that was a hating on person. he decided to quit before he turned 65. there was also some of the more senior people here, they used to be a much greater group of people for retiring in being pressured into retirement. he stepped down, turn the reins over to dan rather, and he was not happy. he was not happy with dan rather or cbs. he simply missed being what he had become. he thought of retirement sounded good. hanging out with old friends, but he missed doing the news. he helped create the discovery channel and all sorts of great things. when he was in california on the great northridge earthquake, that occurred, he had nobody to broadcast here. he ran out and didn't know what to do. he eventually called her nard shaw at cnn. shot put him on the air, but at that moment, cronkite said i don't have a gig anymore. i don't even have -- i have made a turbo estate. i don't have a rule for myself. so he works to rehabilitate her role. you know, he was so against george w. bush's iraq war that after we entered the war in iraq, after the second war with george w. bush, he became a columnist against the war. even today, an aggressive university student or someone wanting to do this should do the collected works. he wrote a column. .. of course you have the airport. barbara jordan did an event in 1988. right after michael dukakis boss to the george herbert walker bush. and cronkite was great friends with george herbert walker bush, personal friends, but he was for dukakis as a liberal. he was livid that dukakis avoided the word liberal as if it was a dirty word fifth. he thought that democrats were cowards, not defending liberalism of harry truman or the kennedys or whatever, fdr. and so at a barbara jordan speech, which you can pull up one youtube, it's unbelievable to watch, i think he had a little bit of scutcheon him. [laughter] he threw his script away and said, i'm going to like in the movie network open the windows and shot it out. i am a liberal. i am for roe versus wade. i am a liberal. it was like -- and he felt good after that. [laughter] he had bottled up his own views on whether he was a liberal. he was just bobbling it up. he was living with the pressure of having to be mr. judicial and mr. center, and i equate a lot of his views on politics much like with the northern european countries, particularly the netherlands that he loved so much. cronkite is a dutch name, and he liked the libertarian spirit of the netherlands, but also that social liberalism that that country is famous for. >> ma'am. >> in your opinion did cronkite experience in the second world war provide a filter for him when he went to vietnam and came to his conclusion about vietnam? >> question. >> in world war ii we all know, we were all in it together. we were attacked by the japanese at pearl harbor. hitler declared war on us 98 percent of the american people were for world war two. and the reporters, he was more of foreign correspondents. he would write what you would call now patriotic gore were patriotic jingoism or whenever. you know, he would interview a bomber boy, a pilot flying over germany dropping bombs. cronkite's lead would be we gave hitler held today. our pilots, it was all of that town and cantor, that ernie pyle let's build up the soldiers bit. and so he was a big part of the war effort. propaganda if you would like, but very good at it. and wrote some very, very distinguished pieces, and that was that generations idea of journalism. so imagine how bizarre and how different things were when cronkite's broadcast ran the story of 1965, are marines using simple letters to burn villages in vietnam with civilian screaming. that aired on cbs. lyndon johnson was not happy about it. he called dr. frank stanton, president that night and said, you know, do you know that you guys are -- of what use the language, but you know what you're doing to the american flag, to our soldiers? linden wasn't being unusual. all of america had seen something on tv, our soldiers and of war as the bad guys. that was not what you did in the world war ii generation. and it may cronkite queasy in the 60's. so even though we talk about the famous dissent pieces on cbs, the network was pretty much doing a lot of g.i. joe stuff, how great our troops are in vietnam and tell that tet offensive, but the key figure in all of it is harrison salisbury who worked for the new york times. but he was an editor for you p. working with cronkite in world war two. sows perry had turned sour on both vietnam and thought that this every generation of journalists at the right. we had to call a truce to power because power was being misused by the johnson administration and then the nixon administration. >> yes. >> in terms of a modern-day cronkite, i'm just wondering what you think of jim lehrer and now retired. and also, the newshour in general, which i think kind of sets the standard now. >> what about pbs, the center strike that we are always talking about. >> excellent question. cronkite's favor show when it was the newshour. he would watch it religiously. he thought that is what it should be and all the networks, a smart our night, not a half-hour. he always wanted an hour and never got it when he was on. and particularly like robert macneil and mr. lear. he taught that they were the example of broadcast television at its very, very finest. he was friends with both the mob was just a fan really of all things pbs. he would start killing every new year's. he would cover the vienna philharmonic for pbs, and he would host the kennedy center gala that pbs would carry. he has a great affinity for public broadcasting. yes. >> to what extent was mr. cronkite's -- were mr. cronkite's political beliefs shaped by his experiences growing up with a family of the midwestern or transported to the harsh jim-crow conditions of houston texas during the 1920's and 30's. >> again, an excellent question. cronkite's family was in kansas city, and they just did not experience jim-crow institutionalize prejudice and misery, although it existed. they were very urban. and that was where jazz was taking place and all that. vine street and casey. they moved down to houston in 1927, and they were shocked by the caste system, the jim-crow laws. in fact, his father who was a dental surgeon working at texas dental college was aghast that the head of the texas dental school had these deeply bigoted prejudiced use. cronkite had zero tolerance for bigotry his whole life, and it was one of the things that attracted him and allowed cbs, i believe, to cover civil rights in the 60's. they used to call cbs the right wing, the john birch people, the color broadcasting system or the communist broadcasting system because once it went from 50 minute news to a half-hour cbs recovering martin luther king every night, turning him into a new superstar and putting their cameras on bull connor's mad dogs in birmingham and water hoses on peaceful protesters and the like. and so one of cronkite's great legacies is that cbs dot in the mode for promoting the civil rights movement, serious news, and gave king such a huge platform. and he loved lyndon johnson. he has an unusual relationship with lbj because he thought what johnson's great society was doing was tremendous, particularly to civil rights acts of '64 and '65. people like roger mudd started cutting their teeth and covering filibusters on civil rights on capitol hill of alike. gant -- dan rather did great work in the south. the openness of the bureau covering civil rights. many might have forgotten named nelson benton. they would do incredible broadcasts. but i would say beyond jim-crow he was a child of the great depression. his father left, so he was raised by a mother. a single mom raising the only child. they were poor. he would have an argument with his mother. mom wants me to eat dog food reverse so broke. his mother said trouble. that did not happen. the point is, it was poverty that he dealt with. he thought what fdr was doing was the way out of it, and he first met fdr, as early as 1928 when the democratic convention was held in houston. and he was such a political junkie, cronkite went to both the democrat and republican conventions in 1928, and he was just a boy, 12 years old. he was already at to political conventions. wearing the pins and getting into that thing. it became a passion of his all his life, the conventions. >> i have a hard time, even though i have seen the photos of him wearing world war ii garb, i just have a hard time visualizing uncle walter parachuting into your. can you give -- you know, ernie pyle was killed certainly other reporters were under fire as war correspondents, can you give a little bit of a detailed picture i mean, after he landed did he rushed to a telephone booth there a thing? and me, what was the -- and you mentioned already interviewing soldiers. but what was the actual sort of under fire experience? >> question. he was upbeat, journalistic beat was military aviation. he embedded with the aid their force. if any of you go to savannah georgia, go visit m.i.t. eight airforce. an extraordinary story of our air war against germany. as i mentioned, his first job was to interview those soldiers when they came back. the pilots. but more than that, he wrote stories of military aviation, and he got to go up in flight. one of his missions, he went on a bombing mission and had to take over the gun. the liftoff was in the air. bob post of the new york times perished in that same day, the bombing raid. so they were in what you call an embedded reporter. he was indicted with the bomber boys. now, he did crash. he went into a dutch potato field on the glider because he was with our troops. the glider crashed, and he had to live off of the land for a while. but cronkite never wanted to be considered a war hero. he had no gun. he were just a uniform by geneva conventions he was a noncombatant. and he self-deprecating reset the worst war injury i got was being to lift for liberation of holland when -- people would take, they took bundles of tulips with thorns and throw them at the troops. he was with canadians die and he had cut in the face by that. he would tell that to love story to say, i am not a war hero. and he would often say on the outskirts of battle. i mean, it's one thing. we don't have to over romanticize him. retreat to brussels wednesday at a hotel where general mark clark was. you know, so he wasn't facing the deprivation of our soldiers, and he never wanted -- he did not like it when people introduced him as a hero of journalism of world war ii. where he was a relic was in his coverage of the nuremberg trials after the war when the nazis are on the docket. he wrote great precede -- great pieces in the open net after world war to the united press is offices in lovesome -- luxembourg city, rotterdam, and other cities where he was quite good and then went to the soviet union in the early cold war and was the united press bureau chief there in the early years after when the iron curtain went down. >> time for just a couple more. >> central to the narrative of walter cronkite's is the issue of trust in america, and i found it interesting the way this audience tittered as we compared the trust in cronkite with the nature of journalism today, and i recognize that much of that has to do with the -- with the different technological nature of journalism today, but still i would ask both of you, where did you find trust? today both for information and for wisdom, which i define as the ability to distill that information into a meaningful and accurate distilled. >> the daily show. [laughter] [applause] >> you know, you could actually probably make an argument that he is the modern-day walter cronkite. he is the most trusted man on, essential. [laughter] but in all seriousness, the technology that has revolutionized the media has also been the enemy of the media and that they have undermined, disagree or agree, the trust that we enjoy. >> is obviously a trust deficit going on here to put it mildly. and it is sad. but look at -- be used to be that even when cronkite was dubbed the most trusted man in america by equitable in 1972, journalists were ranked very high over of politicians. there were like doctors and rocket scientists. people like reporters. and today they have numbers lower than congress. i mean, you know, which is really saying something. so there is no doubt about it. there has been -- and part of it is the proliferation of so much media. just so much false news and wrong news that gets put out there. we grow. people grow weary of it. >> okay. i think we are about out of time. it will let you go on to your next great program at the but the festival. so lucky to get time with the brinkley. thank you all so much. [applause] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] >> book tv will be back in about a half-hour with more live coverage of the texas book festival in austin. >> this book is about liberals, not democrats, who are often not that much different from republicans in many respects. no, this book is dedicated to that peculiar brand of american who self identifies as a liberal, lives life as a liberal and wishes more of us in america were liberal. think michael more. you know, think nancy pelosi. think your local college professor. you know, think the driver of that crazy car with all of the bush is hitler bumper stickers on the back of the car. you know, think that check out help with the masters degree in gender studies wearing their shade of red headband at your local whole food store. you get the picture. and they dominate professions that leaves a very large gender studies wearing the che cultural imprint @booktv imprint. professions like journalism, the arts, academia, the music industry and, of course, america's fastest-growing brand of entertainers, circus' delay acrobats. who are these people who call themselves liberals? and how does such a small tiny group leave such a big impact on our culture and lives? what motivates them? well, i am an excellent position to answer these deep questions because i have been watching liberals closely for over 30 years. i have studied liberals like jane goodall studies a chance. [laughter] in their natural habitats. and with that judgment. in silence mostly because we barely speak the same language. i have been tireless in my research. i lived with them, broke bread with them, he read them committees then, prodded them, imitated them, and, yes, even love some of them because some of my best friends are liberals and some of even members of my own family. my commitment to understanding liberals sometimes worried my good dear conservative friends, some even questioned my mental health. but i read the new yorker magazine. i went to see the vagina monologues. i listened to npr whenever i get the chance. i'll lend everything about the fly one could by turning into all things considered. [laughter] and i even watched my carbon footprint as much as a guy who loves big suvs and has owned a local home in that vote -- dallas can. what did i learn from my three decades a tireless research? have learned that liberals simply don't love many things about this world. there endlessly trying to correct, fix command, and adjust every aspect of other people's daily lives. island they spend a lot of time thinking about america's faults and how to correct them, but america's ills and how to cure them. liberals love to hate things that most americans love, and they spend the rest of their lives endlessly trying to take those things away from us, and they are convinced they do it all because they love us. thus was born this book, 50 things liberals love to hate. i hope you enjoy. >> you can watch this and other programs online at booktv.org. book tv is on facebook. like us to interact with book tv guests and viewers, watch videos , and get up-to-date information on events. facebook dot com / book tv. >> tonight i am going to us discuss abraham lincoln's role in the crisis in 1860 in 1861. more specifically we will talk about why abraham lincoln rejected any meaningful compromise. following his election as president, november of 1860 the country was gripped by a crisis because many southerners feared lincoln and his republican party the republican party was in northern party and proudly so. it did not have a significant seven connection. lincoln was elected without a single electoral vote for many of the 15 south states and only for of the border states, missouri, kentucky, maryland, and delaware did he get any popular votes and then nearly a handful. for the first time in the nation's history a party without any notable southern components would be taking over the executive branch in the national government, but there was more. the republican party was, as i said, proudly in northern party. its brief existence, founded in the mid 1850's, it's rhetoric had insulted the south, and the south major social institution, racial slavery. and the determination that is the republicans determinations that toward the north into a unit that could win a national election without any seven support, republicans repeatedly condemned the south as an progressive, and democratic, even unamerican. with this party on the threshold , southern section of radicals, those people who preach the gospel of this union. they took to the public platform and to the newspaper columns to proclaim that the crisis of the south was at hand. the south had to act immediately to protect itself from the hatred of evil republicans, cries of succession filled the southern air. this was not the first time sectional crisis had gripped the country, however. there had been several sharp sectional disputes, 1860. each of these, each of the major ones have been settled by compromise. here i will point specifically to the four critical ones. first, the constitutional convention of 787 in philadelphia. the missouri crisis of 1820 which had to do with the admission of missouri as a slave state in the future of slavery in the louisiana purchase which, of course, as you know, was much more than a set of louisiana and covered almost all the territory from mississippi river to the rocky mountains, save for texas. it was settled by the missouri compromise. 1832 and 33 developing asian controversy between the state of south carolina and the federal government was also a subtle but compromise. finally, the late 1840's, the battle over the future of slavery and the territory one from mexico known as the mexican concessions following the mexican war was settled by the compromise of 1850. thus you look at these four examples, precedent and tradition for another such settlement to take place in 1860-61. the chief issue between the republicans and the south involved slavery, but not slavery in the 15 states where it existed. almost all americans in 1860, republicans included, believe that the constitution protected slavery in the states where it existed. rather, the critical question was slavery in the national territories and the territories owned by the nation that had not yet become states. geographically these territories comprised what we think of today as the great plains, the rocky mountains and then west of the rocky mountains the california. did not include california because california, as you know, was already state. the question was so critical because it had to do with the future of slavery and the future of southern power in the nation. now, seveners demanded what they saw as their constitutional right as american citizens, to take their property, including slave property into territories owned by the entire nation. in 1857 and the famous or infamous treads that decision the united states supreme court affirmed the southern constitutional deal. republicans in contrast said never, no matter the supreme court. republicans would allow no more slaves in any territory. abraham lincoln was elected in november of 1860. one month later the united states congress came into session. members of congress put forth various compromise proposals. a critical portion of all in some way to go with the division of the territories. most often there was a proposal to extend some kind of dividing line westward beyond the louisiana purchase all the way to the border of california. now, after this rather lengthy purchase i am going to get to my main topic, why lincoln rejected all meaningful compromise, which meant the territories, but they're must be one thing more. i am going to talk about three different men tonight. one of you, one of them, all of you know his name, abraham lincoln, and you was and what he did. the other two are not so well-known. probably a number of you are familiar with henry clay, the great kentucky statement. probably few of you are familiar with henry seward from 1860, the senior senator from new york state and prior to lincoln's nomination for the presidency was, by far, the most notable and well-known republican in the country. now, finally i rate to start. >> you can watch this and other programs online at booktv.org. we would like to hear from you. tweet us your feedback. twitter.com/booktv. >> there are about a little less than two months left before the election, and in many ways this is the time this book was designed for because as we enter these last few months this is when the election really gets going. and, to me, one of the great untold stories is not just obama versus romney, it is obama versus call ralph. he is in behind the scenes the whole time. he has put together over $1 billion that will be spent in these last two months, and we in new york, here you will see much of it. it will be spent in the battleground states. and he has become king of the super pak. he has -- when you put together his money with the money that romney has raised and the republican national committee as a total of about $2 billion. to put that in perspective, in 2008 mccain had 375 million to spend. so this is a factor of five, and you're going to start seeing it coming out now. and the other thing i want to discuss about him is that who is he really? what does he do jackie is a political operatives. how does he operate? what does you really do? botox to a couple of sources about that. one who is one of the victim said, you know, there is a dark and terrible beauty about what he does. and i had another source, a former cia agent named larry johnson who told me that you know, the cia can learn an awful lot from call ralph. and the way he has deniability in all these operation suggests. he is both a very visible. he is something like a 70 percent name recognition in the united states. that is up there with justin bieber, but we don't really know what he does. most people don't. and when you go back over history and look at the things that are starting to unfold in the election, he has deniability at one level after another. to meet the story became interesting in a way because i think most people thought he was finished in 2008 when the bush presidency started to come to an end. he had been forced out of the white house in 2007. he was the prime target in that to biggest scandals of the bush era, the salary plan as fair and the united states attorney's scandal. bush left the white house with a 22 percent approval rating, the lowest in the history of the estate's, and even top republican strategists like ed rollins said that his brand was tainted forever, no one would ever want to the work with call ralph. and the fact of the matter is he was back working again within a matter of weeks. and it became evident to me in two dozen -- early 2010, about a year after obama took office. three things happened. the first was from the united states supreme court. and i think no person in the united states that i can think of has benefited more from the supreme court then call rove. two decisions, one in 2000, obviously, with a bush veto which put his candid in the white house and to in 2010, citizens united decision, and that opened the floodgates for contribution, unlimited contributions, in many cases from secret sources with no transparency whatsoever that is just unprecedented in history. the second thing that happened was michael field in the republican party. sort of running into a ditch. he could not raise a dime, and it came to the early 2010. you may recall, there was a revelation in los angeles the republican national committee had been entertaining its donors had a lesbian bondage the themed strip club. and for the party of family values it did not work too well, so they could not raise a dime. and this gave him his opening. so in april he had a luncheon at his house. in washington d.c. it was co-hosted by ed gillespie , a former chair of the rnc, and they had about two dozen people over and came away with tens and tens of millions of dollars. and that luncheon alone gave them about four times as much money as the entire republican party. so he was effectively establishing an apparatus that gave him an enormous amount of power and authority with almost no responsibility. he reported to no one, but he had his hands on the purse strings. and this led to the 2010 legislative election. they raised a total of $300 million swept congress. they took 63 seats in the house, and suddenly obama bigger advantage was gone. he had no real authority. this money -- so, the question is, what did he do with the money? what is he going to do with the money? it's going to go into the battle ground states. i started to like what he's going to do now. i decided to look at what he had done in the past. i found again and again that a lot of it really had not been reported in depth. we -- one thing i found that he had was a huge technology apparatus. and i went to chattanooga, tennessee, and i found a company called smart tech. i saw it grows about a year ago in ohio, and asked about this company. he told me he had never heard of it. well, i find that hard to believe. this is a company that is a rather byzantine corporate history, but if you go through all the funds -- france within france and corporate changes and find that to put up the original money, the original money came from two very wealthy republican donors into mercer reynolds and bill dewitt. and i researched them, and in the 80's they had bailed out george w. bush several times. he had three oil companies in the 80's that went belly up, and each time they came to is rescue. they were also baseball royalty. bill to which owns the st. louis cardinals and his father had owned the old st. louis browns. and they gave bush entree into is ownership in the texas rangers which is the one, the only lucrative investment he ever made. i mean, he put in $600,000 came away with about 15 million. and this company, smart tech, which started out as quite a legitimate technology company, soon became a republican operation. and it's all good well the republicans or conservative roots should have their websites and so forth, but this was very unusual, and i saw george w. bush was there. the republican national committee hostess web sites. later the veterans for truth. hundreds and hundreds of conservative groups were there. again, that's all fine and well. but this company which is highly, highly partisan also, over time, acquired some contracts that i think probably should not have gone to such a partisan company. and let me just say two of those. one was, if you're in the white house your e-mails according to the presidential records act are public documents. they are supposed to be hosted on white house stopped of. but he made sure that his e-mails were arrested on smart tech and that 80 of his staffers, other people who worked with him in the white house also had their e-mails there. so when growth was investigated for the valerie plane affair and again in the u.s. attorney scandal suddenly 22 million e-mails were deleted and these are all government documents. they have never been found. so that was one thing he seems to have gotten away with. another thing was in 2004 smart tech played a central role in the president's election, and the secretary of state, each state, part of their job is to oversee a fair and impartial election. and you may recall in the 2000 election kathleen harris in florida was secretary of state of florida, and she also happens to play a central role in the bush election and there was considerable controversy over that. well, a very similar thing happened in ohio in 2004 where ken blackwell was secretary of state. again, he was supposed to oversee a fair and impartial alexian, but he happened also to be co-chair of the bush cheney reelection committee. and he decided that to tabulate their returns for the 2004 election his secretary of state's computers were not enough and they needed to get another set of computer service. he did he go to? smart tech. and smart tex role in this is raising a lot -- an enormous amount of interesting questions. i went through the returns that people have studied, civil lawsuits, you can see when the returns came in at night. and what happened as that night wore on, i believe november 2nd 2004, a very, very close election. it was clear the election would come down to who won florida, who won ohio. these were the last two key battleground states. around 11:00 the networks finally called it for florida, and that meant there was one crucial state outstanding, ohio. whoever won ohio would win the electoral college. the exit polls were in, and they showed carry winning ohio by 4%. suddenly millions of people started logging on to the secretary of state's computer in ohio. traffic went through the roof. it went up 700%. that meant the computers in chattanooga, tennessee, had kicked in at 11:14 p.m. and suddenly in county after county that reported there were just these striking anomalies. in the next ten counties in a row. and this raises a lot of serious questions about who actually won the election. i went about as far as i could in tracing this down, and in terms of pinning it down conclusively unfortunately there were still some unanswered questions, and the reason for that is that again and again all of the evidence vanished mysteriously. there was a court order as a result of one of the lawsuits to impound all the ballots, but suddenly over a million ballots were damaged or disappeared. in 2006 and the secretary of state to make democratic secretary of state was elected in ohio, and she was about to take office and went by her new offices just before she formally took office. when she went in she saw everyone they're under the direction of the old secretary of state, the republican, shredding thousands and thousands documents. and finally in this civil suit a man named mike, was scheduled to testify. he had been subpoenaed once, deposed once and given one deposition. he was scheduled to give another, and he was the cyber group. he supposedly had all the answers. and on december 19th 2008 his plane crashed. so there were a lot of unanswered questions about that. >> you can watch this and other programs online at booktv.org. you're watching book tv on c-span2. forty-eight hours of nonfiction authors and books every weekend. >> by the time the civil war ended sheridan was sometimes referred to as the left hand of grant, the left-hand. he was ten years of everett and grant and sherman. he was a dynamo, inspired his men with his intensity and by his personal lead. he led from the front, but he was also a careful planner. he was willing to promptly act on a plan, and once it was made was willing to change if the conditions changed on the battlefield. but during the war sheridan became a household name because of his great victories in the shenandoah valley, especially at cedar creek. and for waging what was called a total war there. he was one of grant's most dependable generals, so much so that during the closing days of the war sheridan became the de facto commander of the army of the potomac. few would dispute that sheridan was the most aggressive commanding general the union had . like grant and sherman sheridan first fought in the war's western theater. stow's river tennessee. sheridan's aldus and tenacity saved general william rose grand army from annihilation on the last day of 1862. his division stormed missionary ridge in november 1863 and in march 1864 grant brought sheridan east with him to command the army of the potomac cavalry corps. sheridan spent the last year of the war in virginia. after the war sheridan carried out the government's reconstruction policies in louisiana and texas. he waged a cold war on the mexican border during the plains indian wars sheridan was the army's top indian fighter. eventually he became commander in chief of the army and surprisingly sheridan save yellowstone national park from exploitation. sharing grew up in ohio and graduated from west point in 1853. when the civil war began in 1861 sheridan was an obscure 30 year-old infantry captain serving in the oregon territory. grant first recognized sheridan's abilities in 1862 when sheridan was commanding a cavalry brigade that defeated a larger rebel force in mississippi three months after shiloh. in chattanooga in november 1863 grant watched sheridan and his division store missionary ridge and then pursue the confederates for hours when no one else did. grant's new then that sheridan was much like him, someone who would act promptly, who would fight always, and you would never quit. >> you can watch this and other programs online at booktv.org. >> in the final panel of the day >> it was time to write a fact based primer on gay-rights, specifically targeted to right-of-center voters, has the subtitle of the book. to do two things, number one, challenge the religious right on its own turf and to show that much of what is derisively or what they derisively called the gay agenda is actually consistent with fundamental republican and libertarian principles. and number two, to show center-right voters who believe in social tolerance that not only are they not of voice in the wilderness, they actually represent a majority of rank-and-file republican voters. so the book has three major things. the first one i just alluded to, that many on the right simply don't understand that properly understood gave rights are, in fact, perfectly compatible with fundamental republican principles of limited government and individual rights and equal protection of loss. the essence of the classical liberal or libertarian philosophy is simply one of live and let live, all people are created with certain inalienable rights. the government does not allow rights depending on what religion you are, what economic class you're in, what your gender is were theoretically at least what your sexual orientation is. at least that is the way it is supposed to be. certainly most libertarians already get that, and i think that's why they have a special obligation to teach fellow conservatives and right of center voters why gay and lesbian americans deserve the same rights as everybody else. the second main theme of my book is that because of this constant over the top rhetoric that we often hear from the religious right, most people have little understanding of what rank-and-file republicans actually believe about gay issues. and i think that the conventional wisdom is that all republicans hate gays, that they are opposed to gay rights and nothing could be further from the truth. >> you can watch this and other programs online at booktv.org. >> in the final panel of the day marked up to growth and michael gillett discussed lbj and lady bird johnson. our live texas book festival coverage continues now. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] >> okay. >> okay. testing, testing. okay. >> testing, one, too. >> do you want to give your mike -- >> testing. >> i see don carlo. >> good. >> okay. >> hi. welcome to the texas book festival panel on ladybird and london. my name is carol dawson. i love being a moderator. every year at the texas book festival, and particularly love this task this year because i have had the privilege of reading two books that interlock so beautifully that it provided one hold 360-degree experience in reading them. before we begin, and i introduce our authors, i want to remind you all that all proceeds of book sales at the texas book festival goats the libraries of this great state. so, please avail yourself of the book tent and after a recession is over the book signing tents where you can get both of the signatures of these two wonderful gentleman on the front pieces of your books. now, our panel today, as you know, is about ladybird johnson, an oral history, and it involves a total of 18 years' worth of interviews with ladybird johnson . and indomitable will come lbj in the presidency, the interesting thing about these books is that ladybird memories and history leading up to the presidency, and where it leaves off mark up digress book about lbj begins, and it is a tapestry of voices commenting about lyndon b. johnson. michael gillett who assembled ladybird sorrell history directed the lbj library oral history program from 1976-1991. he later served as director of the center for legislative archives at the national archives and is currently the executive director of humanities texas in austin. he is the author of launching the war on poverty, an oral history. to my right mark of the growth is the current director of the lyndon baines johnson presidential library and museum in austin, texas. a post he assumed in october of 2009. an award winning author and presidential historian, he has written three books relating to the american presidency, indomitable will lbj in the presidency was published by crown in march of 2012. baptism by fire, a presidency took office in times of crisis in 2009 and second act, presidential lives and legacies after the white house. he spent much of his career at time magazine, first as president of time canada and toronto and then as los angeles manager. he has also been a publisher of newsweek magazine and the vice-president of sales, marketing, and operations for yahoo canada, so he is obviously covering the digital ground as well as the historical and archival ground. welcome to you both. thank you both for these marvelous books. i have had such a good time reading them. and reading the overlaps and the discrepancies. the first thing i want to bring up actually is a very interesting discrepancy between the two. these two people who came together in marriage ladybird johnson and lyndon johnson incredibly different personalities. i'm sure most, if not all of you are familiar with the idiosyncrasies and a famous legends about lbj, shall we say, iran stability, crudeness, larger-than-life personality, contradictory nature, and absolute will to get things done and the things he got done were very important things. he could not have done these things, it is my belief, especially after reading these books, without ladybird. ladybird johnson, born claudia taylor was an incredibly gracious southern woman who grew up in a semi tomboyish practices and the surroundings very near catholic in far east texas in karnak. the fact that she grew up in a town named after a famous egyptian temple, i have always found very interesting. not far from milesian fields, by the way. but she grew up isolated. lbj grew up very much a part of a community, but in a very different part of texas. when they came together they formed a balance that i think is one of the most interesting marital histories in the history of political america. the one thing that i want to employ of really quickly is how ladybird got her neck and. how many of you have heard the story that she was named by her african american nurse when she was about two years old because she was as pretty as a ladybird. please raise your hands. this is what mr. up the growth tells us in his book, but mike gillette has something else to tell us entirely, and i'm going to let him tell us. his particular story of how that came to be. >> well, she told me that the name was actually given to her by her to african american playmates, stuff and doodlebug. and, of course, ladybird is another word for lady bug. apparently it was decided later at some point that it needed the name -- the name needed to be attributed to her adult nurse because to do otherwise might give the indication of social interaction between the races, but -- and i have never read that anywhere else, but that is what she told me anyway. taken for what it's worth. >> isn't that fascinating? it's like the precursor to the civil rights act. >> this conversation is taking a nasty turn since i found out i got my tac -- facts wrong. [laughter] >> you know, you got so many other facts right in your book, i don't think you need to worry. i would like you each to talk a little bit, starting with you, marc, about the different facets and aspects of the personalities to which you were privy, in particular in your case lbj and some of the dynamics and contradictions in lbj is personality as reflected by the many voices that you have included in this book. >> well, i'm looking at in the audience. many technology to people, one of whom is harry middleton. terry was the first director of the lbj library, my predecessor, my dear friend, and so much of the scholarship about ladybird johnson comes from the work that harry did in the lbj library. the other one sitting next to him is surely a chance to work for mrs. johnson for many years into recently prevailed with the united states post office in getting a postage stamp in honors of ladybird johnson. [applause] a friend of mine and harry's ensure lease was a speechwriter like kerrey for lyndon johnson, and i think he put it very aptly when he said, allowing for shades of subtlety there were many lbj is as there were people who knew him, and as often as not people they saw or contradictory. and i think that says so much about lbj. he treated everybody differently because i think as hubert humphrey called him, the world's best psychologist, he understood how to get people who mattered to say yes, and that meant treating people in very different place. so that is why i think that one of the reasons that people saw him so differently from person to person. >> thank you. mike, would you please talk a little bit about what you discovered about ladybird personality through your many interviews with her and the interviews that you read that she had given? >> well, i remember at one. when i was directing the oral history program under harry middleton's lead, might add, for 20 years, we had a contract transcription service come in and transcribe maybe 500 interviews that had never been transcribed under the project that you tea had done that we inherited. and i asked the test crabbers when they finished that project what that take away for them once, and it was hell much they came to admire mrs. johnson, just from hearing what other said about her. and so that is one level. the other level is that when you meet her you discover that she is just as warm and gracious to a government employee as she would be to laurence rockefeller in her home. she was really a wonderful hostess, and she treated everyone with such warmth and kindness, and that was particularly valuable when her husband was as volatile and demanding as he was. she could soften the lbj treatment and nullify the people that he had irritated pipit. >> i think they were utterly symbiotic. a perfect partnership, and i think per refines charms, her smooth to his rough edges. calling his frequent storms, and i think they both gave each other something. i think she gave him solace in so many ways. very tempestuous personality. i think she sues stamp in so many ways. and i think he, by her own account, sort of allowed her to reach beyond her own dissidents, natural any dissidents and to become in her words more than she would have been. >> that certainly is the impression that i have gathered from both books. as she herself put it, we were better together than we would have been, and the implication is as individuals apart. one of the things that impressed me mike in your book was when she said to lbj about his temper and his moodiness and when he became angry, she said you can go in that room and be quiet by yourself and raise cain to yourself. you can raise cain with me and i won't let myself be hurt by it. you know, that is a remarkable offering for a woman to make in order to not only assist her husband, but a sister country because she was up buffer between him and his extremes and the other people that he worked with and the rest of the world. another aspect, though, that you commented to me about that comes through so strongly in this oral history is her sense of humor. would you talk a little bit about that and give us a good example? >> well, she did have a good sense of humor, and she was often the butt of her stories. she had a wonderful sense of humor in telling stories on herself, less so lbj, but, you know, in that wonderful southern accent, i have a couple of excerpts that i can play in a moment that would give you a sense of her sense of humor, her mimicry, if you will. lbj was a famous mimic, as we all know, but you will hear an example of mrs. johnson altering her voice to mimic an old lady. so -- >> can you please give us a really good cleaned up version of lbj sense of humor? and i don't mean what he said ted john kenneth dale about economic speeches. [laughter] hilarious. >> you know, he was a great storyteller, and he was a great joke teller. one of my favorite jokes that he has told was about the school teacher in desperate need of a job during the great depression. his little town of johnson, texas. there is an opening, and the school board meets with the school teacher. they asked him, well, do you teach that the world is round or flat? the poor fellow needed a job so bad he said, i can teach it either way. [laughter] i always thought that was interesting because if you look at lbj as an historian you can teach him either way. he is so vast, the personality that you can look at him in so many different ways. i think that joe, for me, has a certain resonance. >> mrs. johnson describes the trip there she took to china to me, and on that trip she had a rare delicacy of a thousand year old egg. and her comment was, i like them not more than two weeks of myself. [laughter] >> well, another good example, i think, of lbj humor was when he was talking about how back in johnson city the old timer setting aside and played dominoes and one of them says to another, yes, he sure comes up in the world. .. >> he wants of the most important political principles, in order of importance our loyalty, loyalty, loyalty, loyalty, loyalty, loyalty loyalty. courage and compassion are the other two qualities that i think cemented the bond between these people. because they knew that they could trust each other absolutely in these areas. mike, would you talk a little bit about transcends courage and give us a good example of that? >> welcome i suppose the best example is in october of 1968. she and lyndon johnson were leaving the baker hotel in dallas, walking across the street to an event at the adolphus hotel. focusing on well-to-do women who were therefore a event. they carried what mrs. johnson described in her oral history is a sea of angry slogans. she says that they did not like lbj and they hated kennedy. and this mom essentially blocked the passage. it made a very different and difficult for them to get through. and you have to realize the potential for some sort of mob action. she described it as just an animal like tense atmosphere where the slightest thing could trigger a riot. at one point, one of the signs not mrs. johnson's hat off. lbj recognized that she wasn't going as fast as she should have. but they were making the most of this event for television. it would display the behavior of his opponents. so that is certainly an example of courage. >> also on the lady bird special. when she toured the south after she signed the civil rights act, which i'm going ask mark to talk about. can you please tell all of us what his response to russell was when he was pushing the acts through? >> you mentioned loyalty and compassion and courage. this story merges all three of those qualities and exemplifies we're lyndon johnson stood off. it was 1964. john f. kennedy had been assassinated, the civil rights act of 1963, which essentially would rid the south of all jim crow laws that were oppressing people of color. that became the civil rights act of 1964. lyndon johnson was very much in support of that act. he had been opposed to some civil rights legislation early in his life when he was the representative here in texas. but as he said very pointedly, when he became president in the well-known speech, now that i have the power, i need to use it. never expected to be the president of the united states. he has to realize he's going to run over a lot of the senators and a lot of the representatives with whom he worked when he was in the house and senate. one of them was richard russell. his friend and mentor. a giant senator from the state of georgia who vehemently opposed the civil rights act of 1964. he knows he's going to have run over him to get this passed. and they have a very somber conversation. russell says lbj, you know, you can pass the sack. you have the legislative ability to do it. jack kennedy in, but you do. but i'm warning you, if you do, you will lose the democratic party to the south. you may well lose the presidency in the election of 1964. johnson listens to this, and he says very somberly, dick, if that is the price for the spell, i will gladly pay it. a remarkable story of hers. if i may just help one more quick story about his loyalty. as harry knows, he was fiercely loyal to those who worked with him. when the staff was leaving the white house in 1959 and they were going back and finding jobs, lbj wanted to make sure that everybody landed in a good job. transitioning with good prospects. there was one guy who worked as a legal counsel for lbj. he signed out of the white house in order to go to los angeles to talk about starting a washington office for this prosperous firm. the new that he had signed out in order to take this interview. going to los angeles, he meets with the partners of this law firm in a conference room and they are all hundred together. they are very frustrated and one partner says, okay, you take a call from the president. they all leave and pearson gets on the phone. and he says, i don't know if you noticed, but i signed out of the white house and i'm in los angeles. lbj said, yeah, i know that. and he says, mr. president, what can i do for your? and he said oh, nothing for my supper call it help. [applause] [laughter] >> i love that story. i really love that story. there was another example of loyalty in the books, in both books that have to do with the necessary resignation of walter jenkins during the scandal that burst upon the administration. that occurred with a long-term loyal message. he may as well have been a member of the family of ale bj's and administration. one time i was just electrified because it is such a beautiful handling of the situation that ladybird did with lyndon johnson but acknowledged his prerogatives and power. out of their deep compassion about walter jenkins that led to her actually, quietly informing him in a subtle way he was going to be defying him. defying the instructions in terms of a vocal public support for walter jenkins. would you like to talk about a little bit? >> yes, i would. this is, perhaps, the best telephone conversation between the president and mrs. johnson in the recordings. walter jenkins has been arrested on homosexual accusation during the 1964 campaign. i think it is october. president johnson is concerned that if he or mrs. johnson will make a statement support of jenkins, a double dragon presidency, and that will inflate the problem even more. mrs. johnson is thinking first about the loyalty to walter jenkins and his family. reaching out to him with a statement of support. and she essentially says, is carol has indicated, i know you can't do it, lyndon, but i am going to make a statement. she just goes ahead and does it. it is a very well worded and thoughtful statement. she backed it up with years of friendship with walter jenkins. >> is a very moving story. that story alone is who was reading both of these books for. i think. this was one of the most productive presidential terms in the history of this country. it is amazing how many bills got passed under lbj. that, again, was the product of this symbiosis between the two. i have a long list here of the accomplishment of that administration, and i would rather ask mark to please designate as many of the acts that he signed them what they meant meant as a great society and civil rights act, voters rights act and we haven't even begun to get close to vietnam. i would like to ask mike to talk about ladybird's contributions to the country, not as separate, but certainly, her own project. >> the most fruitful year of lbj's presidency was 1965. i have in my office at the lbj library, a shadow box of lpg used to sign the bills into law during that year. the elementary and secondary education and higher education act, which is a profusion of federal money that is going into education. you see high school graduations. enrollment of college rise, dramatically as a result of this. 60% of all student loans today are derived not higher education. the same year, medicare, the arts and humanities act, which creates the national endowment for the arts. the clean air act. the most important civil rights act in our history. it gives people of color power of the ballot and the immigration act, which opens the gates and our borders people all over the world and fundamentally changes the face and heart of america. this is in one single year. i will tell you is a presidential historian. there are those that would stake their entire domestic reputations on this one of those laws. lbj did all those things in one single year. in 1965. [applause] >> reading these books, reading both of these books, i was struck with such awe and admiration of these people. even with all of those lbj's foibles, which many of us are familiar with. i am a true believer for evermore afterwards. mike, would you talk a little bit about what ladybird accomplished? >> after her first accomplishment was to keep lyndon johnson thing while he was doing all of those great things. giving him a safe haven, if you will, an island of peace, as she described it, every day when he was exerting a tremendous effort. in addition to that, she finished jacqueline kennedy's effort to acquire arts for the white house. she lost the committee for the more beautiful capital. beautify washington dc and make it a showplace so that the tourists there and see what could be done in their own hometown. she gave a the head start program the benefit of the white house lawn so that it was elevated to insignificance and became a very important program almost overnight or sponsorship. she launched the environmental movement, if you will, from the white house. the air quality act. the water quality act. in her travels, demonstrated the need for control of air pollution and water pollution. she had an initiative to promote cultural heritage tourism and travel all over the country, showing her the benefit of television, the beauty of this country. she also promoted health legislation with florence mahoney, the cancer stroke movement. she is very supportive of the creation of the endowments for the arts and humanities and the acquisition of the first-run museum. the addition of 35 new national parks, many of which she visited herself. the interesting thing is that this legacy continues in retirement, as we all know here in austin, texas, with what she has done the beautification of this city and her efforts there. and also, what she has done for history by recording 47 oral history interviews, and she was one of the major forces in the organization and development of the lbj library. that is quite a legacy. >> i will tell you what, these people were nothing if not thorough. [cheers] [applause] >> speaking of the symbiosis of their relationship, i love the fact that the various people in your book talk about many of the informal places where lbj would actually hold some of his conferences. i am not going to focus on some of the ones to do with plumbing systems, but i'm going to talk a little bit, for instance, about richard nixon's experience of a meeting between the two of them. can you please describe that? >> only time that lbj was not doing business is when he was unconscious. he was probably dreaming about business at that time. [laughter] actually, the historian described him as always on the move. he was always doing things. even when he took a nap in the white house, which he did daily, it just turned into a horizontal working section. he worked when he was in his bedroom. he worked when he was in his pool. he worked when he was on the ranch. he was always working and doing things. seventy-two phone lines were installed at the ranch. so wherever he was, he could get on the phone and do business. carol mentioned plumbing systems. there is a rumor that lbj did business when he was on the toilet. well, that is actually true, he did it. [laughter] there is one person who was in the white house who was part of the white house council in lbj's later years, and he talked of going into the bedroom from which he did every day to greet the president. he heard a voice in the background and he said larry, come on in here. [laughter] larry came in king and then there was the president on the toilet. [laughter] and larry said, you know, i just thought that was a little demeaning. then he goes up the next day. and again, the president was in the bathroom. but he goes in there and he sees mcnamara and dean on the ground, looking at a map of vietnam talk about the war. larry said, well, if they can do it, i can do it, too. [laughter] and there is in that image a certain crudity. but lbj just did not have any downtime. it was not meant to be demeaning, but he just never shut it off. [laughter] >> the story to which i was referring, talk about crossing the aisle. richard nixon had been called into a conference in lbj's bedroom. lbj was in bed in his pajamas. halfway through the conference, ladybird comes walking and in her dressing gown, greets nixon and they continue the conference from there. >> it had been particularly uncomfortable for tricky dick. >> and then there are the many late-night phone calls from lbj to various people of his staffers my favorite being the one where he calls in and says, are you asleep? >> yes, there is a congressman who said, you know, he would call people at all hours. >> 3330 in the morning. these lawmakers went out and there was one lawmaker called at 230 in the morning and he said, i'm sorry, did i wake you? and he said no, i was hoping you would call. i was sitting here hoping you would call. [laughter] remap all right. it is a great story. these books are so full of great stories. truly, it makes for some of the liveliest reading and some of the most intimate reading that i have had the chance to perceive in a long time. i was just delighted to get to moderate the panel. >> i have a story, carol, that really highlights the differences between president and mrs. johnson. this is a story from 1942 areas the johnsons are still living in their apartment. they have not bought a home yet. and john calmly is working there with lbj and he notices an ad in the newspaper to elderly women are breaking up housekeeping in moving into a retirement home, and they are selling off everything. mrs. johnson goes and looks at all of the beautiful things that they have. the antiques and everything. and she buys a small tainted dish -- a divided dish. one or two other items as well, and she goes home beaming. the next day she goes back again, and i'm going to let her tell it in her voice. because after all, this is what will oral history really is. >> track number for. >> okay. >> [inaudible] >> [inaudible] [inaudible] >> [inaudible] >> [inaudible] >> [inaudible] >> what was your reaction? >> i was mad because i hadn't had to say so. >> [inaudible] >> okay, so you have a sense? >> one of the great quotes that i heard from ladybird johnson was about she would often go to the office. when you think about johnson come he was incredibly a hard task master and he could be incredibly difficult work for. one of the things the ladybird johnson said his that i've learned to behind him and say thank you. [applause] >> the people who work for them knew that you were just working for one of them. you were really working for both of them. for the most part, although he was difficult work for, he could be just impossible, most people really came out loving not only mrs. johnson, but president johnson as well. with one exception. kerry tells a great story. he tells a wonderful story about going back to all the people who work for lbj and collecting the great stories that they have of this titanic personality. and it was called the recollections project. they went to one of the aids for lbj and they are about to turn the microphone on. and he said to no one in particular, i just never liked the sop. he was the exception. the preponderance of folks ultimately love him. >> the ones that he insulted and put through the grill, he also then turned around and compensated with things like a brand-new lincoln, after insulting them publicly. so i would like to talk a little bit now about the more difficult years. first to reach back in the early years with mike and some of ladybird earlier recollections after their whirlwind courtship, which involve a great deal of persuasiveness on lbj's part two when he was running his very first federal program, which involved not only giving the youth of america future is in jobs, but involve the creation of a roadside park. >> yes, this was really an important step for lyndon johnson and mrs. johnson. because the people that work with lbj in the national youth administration. he was the director for texas that medial agency became the nucleus of his political organization for the rest of his life. those people were with him for the duration of his life, and they became mrs. johnson's dearest friends as well. but this was a job that gave him a statewide presence. it introduced him to important people all over this state. and it gave him an opportunity to show him what he could do. but it was also an incredibly demanding job to find and get employed a all of these young people who were unemployed. i have a one minute excerpt from this that i want to hear. this is track number two. >> you didn't have enough time? [inaudible] [laughter] >> we did not have enough time back then. [inaudible] i always felt it was significant. he did a significant job. >> [inaudible] >> [inaudible] >> i think i would've warned him about it and saw the other side of it. >> so she was in search of this significant idea if he was. she was very patient with a schedule that he kept. when she managed the congressional office while he was on active duty, that experience gave her an appreciation of how hard he had to work, and all the things he had to balance for the constituents that he served. >> thank you, yes, that was active dirty unkempt duty during world war ii. when he was in the navy, mark, speaking of war, could you please give us just a couple of minutes talk about the vietnam years and its effects on lbj and those around him? >> i think lbj was very reluctant about vietnam. he was ambivalent about it from the very beginning. i think that there are a couple of phone conversations. the crown jewel of the lbj library. 643 hours of recordings of his phone conversation. there are two in particular. to that really illuminate how he felt. the first was with richard russell, who i mentioned earlier, who had said, you know, if this burden were thrust on me, mr. president, i would decline to fight the war in vietnam. and it just seems like another thing and lbj said i have been thinking the same way ever since i came to office. and george bundy, his national security adviser, lbj talked about laying awake all night and thinking about the war. and he said that it is halting. he says what is beyond me? what is vietnam to this country? and he realizes. it is of no great consequence to the united states. it doesn't mean much. except for the fact that if you do not stave off communist insurgencies, there is a good possibility that the communists would take more grounded or embolden the chinese in other parts of the world. in effect, in keeping the insurgents at bay in vietnam, you are ultimately preventing world war iii and playing out. he was a student of the domino theory. not the theory that came out as the cold war emerged in the wake of world war ii, the domino theory that played out during world war ii and led to world war ii. the conscience of neville chamberlain, the prime minister of united the united kingdom, going to munich and striking an agreement with adolf hitler that he felt would bring peace in our time. well, that's not what happened at all. what happened is he got world war ii. one of the things that lbj says is, there will be no men with umbrellas, by which he is referring. he is not going to give into the communists. ultimately, vietnam does mean something and means something to lyndon johnson. >> thank you very much. we have run out of time for everything but your questions. i hope that all of you have been thinking about the questions that you want to ask. mr. michael gillette and mr. mark updegrove red can you please line up at the microphone. thank you. yes, sir? >> i was wondering, mark, if you could talk about what led to lbj's decision not to run a second time? >> yes, there is a misconception about that. it is because most people think he was embattled over the war. and that was more or less saying that i have had enough, i am calling it a day. in fact, he had made the decision not to run more or less in the summer of 1967. it wasn't because of the war at all, but because of him being conscious of the fact that the man and men in his family died early from heart disease. he himself had had a heart attack in 1955 at the age of 47, which sidelined him for almost six months. what he did not want to do with the nation through a health crisis. he had seen what happened when fdr died early into his fourth term in office. leaving harry truman all that unprepared to take on the burdens of the presidency. he knew what happened when woodrow wilson had fallen ill in the white house. he didn't want to do that to the country. and he could feel his heart every single day of the presidency like lead in his chest. so that was it, first and foremost. but after he came in 1968, he saw his not running again as a means by which to get the very reluctant ho chi minh to the peace table in order to bargain for honorable peace in vietnam. that is exactly what happened. several days after lbj said that he won't run for office by saying that famous statement that we all know, i will not accept the nomination for another term as the president. ho chi minh realizes that this is an overture from the president of the united states. and he agrees to meet with parties in paris to start peace negotiations. it was successful in that matter to yes? >> this is a question about the relationships between the two successive first ladies, jacqueline bouvier kennedy and labor johnson. i seem to remember, jackie kennedy referred to mrs. johnson is lyndon johnson's trained hunting dog at one point, to which i feel, i would rather have a trained hunting dog rather than a french poodle if you want to get something done. but there are many pictures of lyndon johnson and bill signing ceremonies. i'm wondering about that. >> mrs. johnson hosted a reception for the new senate wives in 1953 after the kennedys were married. mrs. kennedy certainly stood out as a glamorous and intelligent young cenobite. they knew each other a decade for the assassination. during the vice presidential period, mrs. johnson was asked to substitute for mrs. kennedy at events, dinners, receptions, teas, events, and she did so. i don't think they were close, personally, or socially, but they had inimical relationship. mrs. johnson visited the kennedy compound at hyannisport. we visited the kennedys in florida. i do think after the assassination, mrs. johnson made it a priority to ensure that the kennedy children had a chance to finish their schooling in the white house, to leave on their schedule from the white house. and to certainly finish mrs. kennedy's effort to furnish and equip the white house with art and antiques as she had done such a magnificent job of doing. this was a great recording for jacqueline kennedy. mrs. johnson think we carry that out. but they were too very different types of women, and this is johnson was much more actively involved in her husband's political career and jacqueline kennedy was. from the very beginning, really. >> this is also a wonderful story. someone was commiserating with the story, they were commiserating with ladybird after the assassination, saying, oh, you poor thing, and follow jackie kennedy as first lady. ladybird was just aghast at this. she said, oh, how can you possibly pity me? please, pity her, she doesn't have her husband. i still have mine. >> there is another way to look at that statement. it is attributed to mrs. kennedy. the fact that ladybird johnson was there and part of the campaign operation, was with him as much as she was, it made lyndon johnson even more dependent on her than he would have been otherwise. >> thank you. >> next question? >> okay. have you heard the phrase about there was no downtime for lyndon johnson? lyndon johnson became president when i was in the fourth grade. my fourth grade teacher went to college in southwest texas. and she might be the only person i have ever heard -- she said she would catch him sleeping in the halls of the old main building and then stop and start loafing around. maybe, you think he did this once in a while anyway? the map you know, the only accounts of him in the white house as when he had his eyes closed and was asleep. but he didn't do much loafing around in the white house. that's for sure. >> i don't think he did much loafing around after college. >> how about another question? the new one? >> please. please come to the microphone. well, you have been a wonderful audience. thank you so much for coming. [applause] >> please remember that mr. michael gillette and mr. mark updegrove will be able to sign books shortly. you can buy the books and get them signed. as a matched set, juas a matche. as a matched set, just like lyndon johnson and ladybird. all proceeds go to texas public library. >> you guys are fabulous. >> thank you. >> thank you. [inaudible conversations] >> that concludes today's coverage of the 17th annual texas book festival. we will be live again from austin, texas, at 12:00 p.m. eastern on sunday. visit booktv.org for a complete schedule. >> booktv is on facebook. like us and interact with viewers. watch videos and get up-to-date information on events. facebook.com last booktv. >> when arthur bohan goes on trial, he is very eager to win a conviction. by this time, mrs. gordon has come forward and come to the defense of her alleged assailant. she says in the trial that arthur never believe that he never intended to hurt her, and she felt safe in his presence and that he was just drunk and that she wonderful thing to go away. well, he was implacable. and he didn't listen to this. he managed to get other people to override her testimony. so arthur was convicted. there is only one punishment for that, which is the death penalty, capital punishment. and so arthur bowman goes on death row. in january 1836. he is sentenced to die in about a month. with the clock ticking, mrs. thornton does something even more unbelievable. it is amazing enough that she had testified on arthur's behalf in the criminal trial. now she goes out and starts recruiting her friends in the high society of washington and she was a very prominent woman with very many prominent friends. easy access to the leadership of the country. she went to van buren and said your good graces with the president, president jackson, tell him that she he should part in arthur. his mother is very good. you know, the execution would be worse than the crime. she could not contemplate that arthur would be executed. he and jackson are unmoved. so the clock keeps ticking. >> you can watch this and other programs online at booktv.org. >> on your screen as the cover of a new book that is coming out in august of 2012. "seven principals of good government: liberty, people, and politics." it is written by governor gary johnson. he is also the libertarian party nominee for president in 2012. governor johnson, when and why did you leave the republican party into becoming part of this? >> i have been a libertarian my entire life. >> there are a lot more that declare themselves as libertarian as to voting libertarian. the picture and trying to make right now is both libertarian party definitions would be give me this one chance, give me a shot at changing things. if it doesn't work out, you can return to tyranny or it and i will argue that that is what we have right now. >> where the seven principles of good government that you write about? >> one is being reality-based. find out what is what and base your decisions and actions on that. make sure everyone who knows what you should doing knows what you're doing. don't hesitate to deliver bad news. there is always time to fix things. if you don't have a job you love enough to do what it takes to get the job done, quit it and get the job that you do love. acknowledge mistakes neatly. there is always time to fix things. very common sense and i continue to live my life by these principles. >> actually delivered one of my state addresses using these principles. here is how we need to conduct ourselves. anyway, very common sense. >> so if you would, your philosophy and the libertarian party's philosophy on the right size of government. >> well, so libertarian philosophy, if you were to with a broad brush stroke, the notion most of us in this country are socially accepting, and that we are fiscally responsible. that is a broad brush stroke. a broadbrush joke is wearing a pin -- a lapel pin that says i am pro-choice. regarding everything. well, pro-choice regarding everything means that actually, if your choices involve putting other people in harms way or your choices and of defrauding or harming another human being, then that is where the government does have a role. to protect us against individuals, groups, corporations that would do us harm. >> as governor, did you shrink the size of the state government? >> you use your veto way that. were you able to shrink the size? >> wanting to dollars, i was able to cut the rate of growth in half. that was the historical rate of growth. i always pointed out state government employees, over an eight-year period, there were 1200 fewer state employees starting with 12,000 and ending with 10,800. it was a 10% reduction in state government employees, which i always pointed out unquestionably. they said that hey, we were doing things more efficiently because we were doing things with fewer state employees and we were doing more things. i would like to point out that the real driver of state budgets, it is medicaid and entitlements. really, it is open ended. that is what has us in the predicament that we already have. medicaid, medicare, social security to a lesser degree. but we have to address the entitlements. we have to address the entitlements. >> what is the libertarian position on that? >> i am promising to submit a balanced budget to congress in 2013. that is not promising a balanced budget, but to submit a balanced budget in the year 2013. believing that if we don't reduce government expenditures by $1.4 trillion, we are going to find ourselves in the midst of a monetary collapse and a monetary collapse, very simply, is when the dollars we have are not worth anything. that is going to be a consequence of us continuing to borrow and print 42 cents out of every dollar. >> governor gary johnson is the author of "seven principals of good government: liberty, people, and politics." he is also the libertarian candidate for president. what other issues do you write about in this? >> this seemed kind of a background on my history. i have been an entrepreneur my entire life. i started a one-man handyman business in albuquerque in 1974. i agree that business to employ over 1000 people. using the same principles. showing up on time. just doing what you say you're going to do for people. it is amazing how far they'll go. it talks about my running. i have been outside of politics my entire life. the only two other political offices that i have run four, governor of new mexico and reelection as governor of new mexico. and i may have made a name for myself. i did make a name for myself. arguably, be doing more legislation than the other 49 governors in the country combined. i vetoed 750 bills. i took line-item veto to a new art form. i said no to billions of dollars worth of government spending. and i said no legislation that i think would of added time and money for us to have to comply with those laws. it was a way to make us any safer, it wasn't going to improve our lives in any way. and it was going to add money we were going to have to spend on it in time to be able to comply with it. >> you also funded your own campaigns, essentially. >> well, my first campaign, i funded it out of a 550,000-dollar primary. 510 of that was mine. thirty of the remainder actually came with a few days ago in the primary because it appeared as though i might actually win it i would like to point out that new mexico is a state that is one democrat. getting elected, vowing to get any picture, spending my time proving that i was a penny pinch or beyond reproach, and then getting reelected by a bigger margin the second time than the third time, i think that speaks for the fact that people really appreciate good stewardship of tax dollars. >> the libertarian party is often associated with with changing the laws. you have abdicated to that as well. >> changing the drug laws? >> yes. >> since 1999, i have advocated legalizing marijuana, controlled and regulated part of it, tax it, we are at a tipping point with marijuana and legalizing it. i think that colorado's going to do that. it's on the ballot in colorado this november. i think it is going to pass. when it passes, and if it doesn't pass in colorado, it's going to pass. 50% of americans are saying they support the notion. it is a growing number. a growing number because people were talking about the issues more than they ever have before. recognizing 90% of the drug problem is probation related. that is not to discount the problems of use and abuse. but that should be the protest. >> i think when we legalize marijuana, i think we will take giant steps forward regarding all of the drugs, and that is going to be starting with looking at the drug issue first as a health issue, rather than a criminal justice issue. >> let's get the police on the streets enforcing real-time. let's forget the court. let's empty the prisons of the 2.3 million people that we have in him are in the majority category of those been drug related. of course, we are not going to release anybody from jail that has committed other crimes in lieu of drug crimes. but those that are in jail, victimless, nonviolent, drug crimes, there needs to be commutation of those sentences. and there needs to be pardon for 32 million americans who have served out their sentences and that would be taxpaying law abiding citizens. >> were these the intersection between republican policies and libertarian policies? >> on the right when you talk about a balanced budget, when you talk about a balanced budget and we need to balance the budget immediately -- we need to cut federal spending. monetary policy. that is the intersection. if i can jump ahead, when it comes to democrats, it is civil liberties. let's repeal the patriot act. i never would've signed the national defense authorization act alone for us to be arrested and detained without being charged by the u.s. government. let's get out of afghanistan tomorrow. and the troops home. and the drug wars. historically democratic issues aren't going anywhere today. just like republicans, their issues have been about dollars and cents. neither one of the parties do well in the areas that they are supposed to do well. there are areas that they don't do well. meaning that romney is ronnie is horrible on civil liberties and obama is horrible when it comes to dollars and cents. >> as a libertarian now, is a little tougher to get media attention away from the tea party system? >> especially if the campaign goes on this fall. for me, personally, there has been about 30% pick up inattention given, making the switch. i think just the opposite. that it has picked up. i am believing that when people come to recognize that there are going to be three candidates on the ballot in all 50 states, myself being one of those three, that that will go a long way towards garnering just a little bit of who is that person, along with ron paul's campaign coming to an end. by his own admission, he says it is coming to an end. and i think that ron paul supporters would not be compromising their vote with a vote for the libertarian ticket. myself and others, who talked to on booktv. >> gary johnson, 2012 is the website here is the cover of his new book. "seven principals of good government: liberty, people, and politics" out in august of 2012. >> now on c-span2, we bring you booktv. forty-eight hours of nonfiction authors and books. this weekend, booktv is live from austin at the texas book festival founded by laura bush. in its 17th year. william cooper presents his book, we have the war upon us on the months leading up to the civil war. at 7:00 a.m. tomorrow, a discussion about affirmative action and its impact on students. watch this all weekend long on booktv.ou >> sir, we are a nonfiction wa network. now, how do you write a novel about watergate? how you approach that? >> well, we talk about thens agreed-upon facts. what alesident nixon resigning in 1974. the alternate history, i [inaudible] i think what fictionce can do is insert things in between. things that might happen in a eldition to what happened. trying to get inside the heads of some of the peripheral players as well as some of the main players.ard >> this was a gentleman who waso a republican operative, worked in the nixon white house, did a lot of work for the attorney general, johno mitchell, and it felt to him to be the man who coordinated the payments to the burglars.intrigui >> and this is part of had historical facts? >> this is part of historical facts. he wisas very soft-spoken and at intriguing man, yet a tragedy when he was young, when he was in his late 20s, he hadas accidentally killed his father when they were hunting. and he was an intriguing figure. i remember thinking that he hada the kind of personality that i wanted to think about andnovel explore. so he becomes a main player evei though he was rather minor in the scandal.ot sure >> is he a protagonist at all? abt se >> i'm not sure there is a protagonist. the book talks about seven different points offi views.is n some of them are lesser figures. president nixon, mrs. nixon is a main character. teddy roosevelt's daughter is o very sharp. very humorous and witty.. and my one women chorus, howard hunt, one of the burglars. one of those that was the onlyma person that i knew when i was in the magazine business, when ivia was at gentleman's quarterly, sied to write.investative elliot richardson on theat investigative side of things,nts and the president's secretary, rose mary woods, who liked. untranslated watergate. a great many ofch the players hs their homes here. it wasn't just the headquarters that was there.ome >> yesterday we interviewed and. time with julie nixon eisenhower here at the booky cod festival.julie nixon was do they feature in your book, watergate, the novel? >> the kind of come and go. julie nixon was a very valiant a defender of her father. julie wrote a very good book about her mother. ewr mother was one of the ladiei who is a very private person. never heard from again after thm next and what the ebwhite house for california. she never did interviews, never wrote her own. memoirs. ficti mrs. nixon was somebody i try to tried to bring to life in the book. >> you have written several historical fiction books. you have written nonfiction. you have writtenro novels. have you approach your right? >> i always tell people who aret contemplating writing, if they haven't done before, do not reay too much about. not that you are writingou abou. read more from the period. if you want to know how people thought and spoke, with theire o minds work. are read what came out of the fict period.se i in other words, eliminate thent middleman. this is why some historians are not fond of historical fiction.o because it tries to do something different. you know, historians -- theyasoe have to say, with welcome at this point, it is not unreasonable to suppose that etchard nixon might have thoughh
granddaughter in law and of course daughter president next 10. we are pleased to have everyone here. we are going to put the numbers up on the screen. (202)585-3885 in eastern and central time zone. 585-3886 in the mountain and pacific time zones. and now, the eisenhower said mr. smith were talking. you hear a lot about presentation. we've got people lined up here and i'm going to give everyone a chance. i get my questions out of the way really fast. jean edward smith, did president eisenhower like campaigning? >> certainly not in 1952. in 1952, this was a new job that he had to learn. but he learned it effectively ended in 1956, he campaigned quite a bit. .. is somebody that recreated for me -- and i tried -- we tried to capture that in going home to glory. the ambience around the eisenhower office, people enjoying a quiet morning over coffee, and in that period rusty brown and dr. mccann pick up a lot of things that dwight eisenhower did conversationally, and one comment they made that stayed with me, and i reproduced it, is that his highest praise for anybody was to call them able, and what he was trying to do was to deflate the language. he felt that everything was being inflated in the 1960s. hour notions of drama on the national level. in fact, very telling book, very searching and interesting book on the year 19 by a trio of british writers, "american mellow drama." everything is so dramatic. i was trying to restore a sense of proportion, and so being very able was something. want to add something, too, to what temperatures smith -- dr. smith said about campaigning. i have spoken to a lot of my grandfather's colleagues of the years in putting eisenhower books together, and one in particular was lynn hall, a former national chairman of the republican party. i interviewed him in oyster bay, new york, close to the teddy roosevelt homestead some years ago, and i asked him that very question, and i think he would have agreed with your response entire lyric that dwight eisenhower did not enjoy campaigning, but said the two greatest natural politicians he had seen were al smith and dwight eisenhower. he said these were two people who had a natural cal lent for it. that is the able to say the right thing at the right time, to make the gesture, and so forth, and he had a talent for campaigning, and i think that is -- he was older, well into this 60s when he was running, so did not have the energy of richard nixon in 1960, or obama running in 2008 and so on. >> and mrs. eisenhower, a lot has been written about your parents' relationship with the eisenhowers. how do you describe it? >> i think that one of the things i enjoyed doing when i was working on the project of eisenhower's retirement years, was to look at that relationship and to think about it more, and i'm amazed that eisenhower and nixon got along as well as they did. you have two presidents, rumbling around together. a president is going to be someone who is very driven, as an agenda, device eighten hour, and richard nixon as 39 becomes his vice president, who already is showing signs he is on his way. so the fact they got along as well as they did is a testament to self things, but i think eisenhower should be praised because eisenhower made the vice-presidency significant. the sent my parents to 53 nations around the world as goodwill ambassadors. they were the vietnam in 1953, 53 nations, because he believed in person to person diplomacy, and my father liked that. eisenhower led the way on that relationship, with making the vice-presidency more than what it was -- a warm bowl of spit, who said that. >> to add to what julie was saying, this idea they got along well in spite of their respective circumstances and their abilities, a case in point, the alternative, would be eisenhower and macarthur. when you see pictures of them together in this cozy situation in manila, you have the general and then the staff aide and the staff aide is leaping over respectfully -- leaning over respectfully and providing the general with a draft of the message he is to approve and so forth, and is all very humble and all that kind of thing. what i think they're going to blow up -- this is a relationship shat is going blow up, and you look at it retropecktively and say, of course it was going to blow up. this person accepts the japanese surrender in tokyo bay, september 1945. this is macarthur, the far eastern theater, dwight eisenhower commanded the european theater. these people who are naturally in a superior-subordinate relationship. no wonder they blew up, and the dade, eisenhower and nextan -- herndon said about lincoln, amibition was an engine that never rested, and you have to have that to be a president, to even be eligible to become a president. to even be within the zone of people who are considered for the presidency so they both have this tremendous dynamism, and they were bound to clash, and the answer is they were of separate generations. i think if they had been contemporary it would have been very difficult. >> the first call for our guests comes from carl in elizabeth, new jersey. carl, you're on booktv, please go ahead. >> caller: this is a great privilege. just a week ago i got mr. smith's book on eisenhower out of the local library, and i'm absorbed in it, and i'm in the middle of drafting a letter to david and to his father and now that i see the two eisenhowers on stage together, it's going to have a third addressee, mrs. eisenhower as well. i have a specific -- i also want to say my earliest political memory is my mother weeping when general eisenhower was nominated at the '52 republican convention so that gives away what my age might be. i have a serious question concerning how history is recorded regarding the u2 incident of may 1, 1960. and i have reference to a memo of general goodpastor, an aide to president eisenhower, writing that after checking with the president i informed mr. bissel of the cia that one additional operation, a u2 operation, may be undertaken, provided it is carried out prior to may 1st. that memo, unless its written to cover mr. -- general goodpastors rear end, suggests the u2 might not have been authorized by president eisenhower but in fact was a rogue operation directed by the director of central intelligence. can any light be thrown on that, please? thank you very, very much. i appreciate it. >> general goodpastor did not go out on his own on anything. the president approved the last u2 flight. there's no question the president approved it. there's no question the president regretted approving it. but he approved it because the cia insisted on it, and he alod -- allowed them to have that one last flight, and of course francis gary powers was shot down, and i us regretted it, and eisenhower to his great credit did not blame this on mr. dulles or mr. bissell and took responsibility for it, even though khrushchev gave him ample opportunity to place the blame on someone else. eisenhower took personal responsibility did approve it. >> our next question is from the audience. >> i had a question about eisenhower's ability to recognize talent. i've read that he was quite good at identifying maybe what other people would consider hidden talents, and i wonder if you can comment about that, if you also found that in your study of him and whether or not there's a particular trait he looks for in people to identify people that might otherwise have been overlooked. >> when you come up through a military career as president eisenhower did, one of the things you learn very early on is how to identify talent, eisenhower was a superb identifier of talent, and i -- simply to give you one example. herbert brownell and lucious clay, who were very close to president eisenhower. after eisenhower was elected president in november of 1952, he immediately took off to play golf in augusta, and let clay and brownell turn -- turned the selection of his cabinet to clay and brownell, because he knew these people and recognized their talent and their ability and he understood they no. knew more about who should be in the cabinet perhaps than he did because he had been in nato for the previous here to years. so eisenhower was a superb judge of talent and learned that through his military career. >> i would say amplifying that, that is probably his most important political contribution as president. dwight eisenhower was a republican and proud of being a republican, and he believed in limited government but he was governing in a democratic era. he was governing in the fdr era, so what the eisenhower administration does politically, it applies the brakes to overreaching and ratifies and in fact makes bipartisan many policies of the new deal, but applies the brakes on others, but it's not an aggressive administration presenting a republican blueprint and driving for a mandate on policy questions. what the eisenhower administration did in the '50s, however, methodically, was it recruited talent. it's hard to find a republican presidency that doesn't trace its origins to the eisenhower administration. george w. bush being the latest actual incumbent in the white house to have acknowledged that debt. mitt romney, who was running -- a republican nominee this year's father was identified by eisenhower in the early '60s as a copper in michigan, and promoted romney's fortunes. the idea is with the power of the presidency and control of the executive branch, the republican party in the 1950s had an opportunity to train a whole cadre, thousands of future leaders, who would go out and make a difference in the future, and i think that's one of the great accomplishments of that administration. it was early republican administration, governing against the new deal tide, g.ing sensibly, governing in a bipartisan way and getting a lot done and governing well, but above all, promoting from within and creating opportunities for people down the road here, and i think they succeeded really well in that. >> our next question comes from steven, right here in silver spring, maryland in the suburbs. high, city steven. >> caller: hi. i'd like to ask the speakers, specifically david and julie, as somebody who is writing his own book on president nixon's vietnam policy, i'd be very interested to find out what, if any, advice president eisenhower might have given to president nixon on an informal basis how to conduct the war in vietnam? >> write about this extensively in hi going home to glory." >> we coveredded in a certain way, and it was -- what happens in late 1967 -- in fact there's a wonderful account that richard nixon wrote that was basically his last business meeting with dwight eisenhower, and what i see here is that a torch is passed. dwight eisenhower was somebody who knew two things. and first of all in his era, he knew the nature of soviet communism and knew america's importance in sort of holding up defending the free world. but he also knew that his perspective and his wisdom was generation-bound, and that the next generation -- and nixon represented the next generation -- would have to make its own evaluation of the situation. i think that what nix won was presenting eisenhower in 1967 was for eisenhower probably confusing. what you said about the eisenhower doctrine, you fight a war, you mean and it go on to win. that was not applied in vietnam, and richard nixon was running for atlanta 1967 on a platform -- not promising to obliterate north vietnam or total victory. he promised to end the war and win the peace. a complicated re-arrangement. so what happens, device i eighten hour and richard nixon's final meeting, eisenhower has read the articles and approves and things the understands and realizes he is now older, and he will not have the energy to see this project through, and this is why turn to able people, turn to energetic leadership, regenerate the presidency, because nixon was in a position to maca call in 1968 that would have endless positive international ramifications, ending the war, winning the peace. >> mrs. eisenhower, did you want to add anything? >> the only thing i would add is that last farewell meeting where my father travels to gettysburg and has a copy of foreign anorth carolina which he says we need to end this isolation and recognize that the united states and china have to move forward together, and of course eisenhower based his presidency and post presidency in saying no recognition of red china, as it was then called. but at the end eisenhower came to agree it was time for a new shift. >> you're watching booktv on c-span 2, live coverage of the national book festival, jean edward smith, buying agrapher of president eisenhower, and david and julie knickson eisenhower, going home to glory about president eisenhower's post presidency. next question from the audience. >> this is to dived eisenhower and julie nixon eisenhower particularly. the '60s was a few multiuse time and feminism was in the air, and i'm wondering, at home on the farm, if president eisenhower had anything to say about these changes, and also maime, what was her role and was she consulted by your grandfather-en-law on these issues and women in the military >> i don't -- i just was sort of changing -- exchanging glances with jean. i don't think eisenhower made comments about women in the military. >> the women's army corps was created but that was during world war ii when eisenhower had -- you're right. >> one of my favorite clips is in pbs, the presidential -- the american experience, there's a wonderful two-part documentary on dwight eisenhower. one of my favorite equips is eisenhower returned to uniform in 1951 and taking up his nato command, and they show him exchanging a salute with a female officer, and it is all business. in other words, dwight eisenhower does not see male-female. he is an officer and she is a superior officer. it as an interesting picture selection. the closest i can come to that is he gave a commencement address -- very proud hoff my three sisters and there were four of us grandchildren, and he addressed the shipley school in the spring of 1967 and was addressing these hemlines that were going up, the mini-skirts, and he says remember that ankles were always neat but knees are always knobby. something like this. in other words he was not very modern, but he loved people. male, female. he loved humanity, and that really came through in everything that i experienced around him. i'm talking about these evening on the sun porch in gettysburg, and dinner and guests and so forth. i don't know how he would have formulated a position about feminism, but i think he -- the key to human relations and his view was mutual respect, and he had tons of relationships like that, mail -- male and female. >> next question, john in woodland hills, california. good afternoon, you're on booktv. >> caller: thank you. good afternoon. let me first say that president eisenhower is one of just a handleful of presidents for whom the office of presidency was not the greatest accomplishment in his career. he would have been an historical figure even if he never ran for president. but my question concerns the nomination of senator nixon for vice president. reports have been stated on tv that eisenhower was approached after he was nominated, and the asked who should be vice president, and he said, isn't that up to the convention? and then his staff said, well, the convention will go for whomever you suggest. and then they recommended senator nixon. but that story always seemed to me to be a little insincere. it seems to me there was more to that than met the eye. i think general eisenhower and president eisenhower was very good at appearing less involved than he actually was, and it always seemed to me this is an occasion where he had made the choice but he wanted the responsibility to fall on the staff, and so since we have people here who are intimately involved with the eisenhower and nixon families, i wonder what they can say about this appointment or this nomination of senator nixon for vice president. >> host: thank you, john. professor smith. >> many years ago i had an interview with herbert brownell, ran eisenhower's presidential campaign. in that interview he said, that evening after ike won the nomination in chicago, he and lucious clay and the general were having dinner at the blackstone hotel, and mr. brownell said, so i asked the general, general, whom do you want to be your vice presidential candidate? and he said the general looked at me and said, well, think that mr. smith, who is the head of american airlines, enormously effective executive, charles wilson, who is head of general electric, is an enormousry effective executive. he would be a good vice president. and brownell said, lucious and i were sort of rolling our eyes at each other at that point, and i rallied and said, general, they're all very fine men but i'm sure the convention is going to want to a candidate whom they can recognize, and i'm sure they're going to look to you exclusively for guidance. and so the general nodded his head, and mr. brownell then said, general, if you haven't thought about it very much, lucious and i believe we should go with richard nixon. nixon's young. he was in the navy. he is from california. he has a good record in the house and senate, and the president said, well, -- general eisenhower said, according to brownell, i think i've met him. i think i've met him. clear it with the staff people and if the staff people say okay, that's fine. i can't say that's exactly how it happened but certainly that's what herbert brownell said was the way it happened and mr. brownell was a key player at that time. >> i have something to add. the first two vice presidents that he selected with the idea that it would be future presidents -- the first two-do were hari truman in 1944 and there is an argument right now between roosevelt scholars and truman scholars over whether that was the case, but buysed on stories i heard growing up, that's pretty true in my mind. that truman was selected in 1944 with the idea that roosevelt would not survive his term. the second was richmond nixonin' 1952. there is a -- i have some personal insight into this. rich nixon in his memoir recounts how in 1951 he gave an address in the waldorf astore ya in the presence of governor thomas dewey, and dewey said to me maersk me a promise, senator, don't get overweight, stay in shape, some day you will be president. i believe that governor dewey was the one who was behind brownell and clay, and the idea was that nixon would be the political arm of the eisenhower years, and he was. he was -- nixon took on enormous responsibility for keeping the republican party in business in that period. the reason i think there's a lot to this is that when richard nixon was elected in 1968 -- and julie and i spent so many evening with him -- '9 and '70, one name that kept coming up over and over again, and i think this would be an interesting article some day. documenting the personal relationship based on complete confidence and fondness between richard nixon and thomas dewey. knickson wanted to name dewey warren's successor. he wanted to elevate him to the supreme court. dewey said, basically, i'm too old. he wanted to be secretary of defense. wanted to be anything in his government, and this was gratitude but a relationship that was forged without question back in a time when thomas dewey identified nixon as a young political comer. >> i know that after my father was nominated and eisenhower and my father met, eisenhower admitted he didn't realize just quite how young my father was when he made the decision for him to be the running mate. i don't think he realized he was 39. maybe he thought he was 41 or something. thought he was 42? >> that's right. 39 years old. >> let me go back to what david said about governor dewey. that's exactly right. eisenhower's campaign for president was run by due yes, brownell, and clay. but dewey always stayed in the background because he had run in '48 and '44 and lost both times so remained in the background, but dewey indeed invited nixon to give the keynote address, the rein lincoln day address to the republican party in new york in 1952, and at that time nixon went up to the suite afterwards with brunell and dewey and that's when they formed that point that he should be the candidate, no question about it. >> host: next question from right here in the audience at the national backfest. >> this is to david primarily. you talked about being -- having a mild manner and having a farm in pennsylvania and having just toning down rhetoric, and things should be in scale, and i was wondering if you or any of your sisters, if they're listening, have any comments on the proposed memorial for the washington, dc. >> i think -- my sister was on c-span as we were coming in. i was listening to her comments, and all i'll say about the memorial commissioner, two things. first is the gratitude or the satisfaction that our family feels that as many senators and congressmen, as many distinguished people served on the eisenhower commission, would devote the time and the resources and so forth to memorializing quite eisenhower, this means a lot to us. second, we drove right through the -- through that area that -- where the eisenhower memorial is supposed to happen this afternoon, and it was a reminder, very close to the capitol, and in fact presidential inaugurals, look over the president, one will see the site where the eisenhower memorial is supposed to happen. seeing that site was a reminder that this is pressures real estate in the district. this is a really important spot. and we have to get it right. in other words, the memorial has got to satisfy everybody, the congress who is going to -- that is going to look out on it. the citizens to come who will attend inaugural ceremonies. it doesn't surprise me that given dwight eisenhower's career, which mr. smith covers in such a -- this is such an incredible life, literally a war career which stands on its own, and the presidency, how to do all of that in a single site, probably 500 ways to do it. maybe a thousand ways to do it. it doesn't surprise me that a controversy has arisen over the design and that will be sorted out. it has to be because this is a beautiful site in washington, and the commission and the people responsible have to get it right. >> host: we are talking with authors david and julie nixon eisenhower. "going home to glory" and jean edward smith. pie eisenhower in war and peace." the next call is from mike in los angeles. >> my question is for david. your father was an amazing president. one of the greatest republican presidents ever to actually serve in our country. but it seems that the republican party has fell short in recent years. look at the last republican president and his eight year administration. look at where the republican convention is, a prime example of the problems that the republican party is having in current events happening today. you had different sects inside the republican party. the tea party movement, which is -- pardon me me for saying -- seems like a joke in itself. what do you think your grandfather would have viewed the republican party and his advice be to republican leaders in today's society? >> host: get an answer from both eisenhowers on the evolution of the g.o.p. >> and also mr. smith who has very interesting views on this. my view of it is that to pose that question -- it is a very interesting what-if. to pose that question is like asking how franklin roosevelt would have viewed the democratic party in the jimmy carter era. in other words, this is -- it's the same idea, but it's being carried forward under different circumstances. in fact a very interesting speech that we studied at the university of pennsylvania is a speech that jimmy carter gave, famous speech, douglas brinkley is here. written the best book on jimmy carter, the unfinished presidency, but he gave a speech called the national malaise speech. and lines that up to next to the franklin roosevelt first gnawing -- inaugural in 1943 the american people were ratifying the new deal in 1979 the more than people had more or less abandoned the new deal. what you see is a change in circumstance. i think the g.o.p. right now -- the vicissitudes have a lot to do with circumstance, but i would say -- this is going back to the '50s and the depth that the bushes acknowledge and others in the republican party. what dwight eisenhower did in selection of vice presidents, at the blackstone in 1952, picking charlie wilson and other business people -- he is member who greatly admired the private seconder of america, and looked for ways to delegate authority to the private seconder in -- sector in his era. that's my response. what would you say? >> i would seek this rule at -- some may be old enough to remember zeke who played for the washington senators in the 1930. he was a big rolly-polly fellow, couldn't move around very much but always led the american league in fielding, and one time a newspaper reporter said, how can you possibly lead the american league in fielding? you're immobile at first base. and he said, it's perfectly simple. if you don't touch the ball you can't make an arrow, so -- an arrow. so i -- error. so i think i'll pass. >> so will i. >> also a heck of a hitter. >> next question . >> i just finished reading a book talking about the role of the former presidents helping the current residents with the party, and you talk about how president eisenhower helped kennedy, nixon, and johnson, but i'm curious how truman helped eisenhower. >> very quickly, a little something on that. >> the question is, could you -- i worked with his successors. how did truman work with him. >> thank you. >> i don't know if you saw the -- >> how did president truman work with eisenhower? when eisenhower was president of columbia and then after leaving the office of -- well, let's go back before that. in berlin in 1945, president truman offered to step down as the nominee if eisenhower would accept the nomination. when it came time to get things off the ground in 1950 and 1951, eisenhower -- president truman asked eisenhower if he would leave the presidency of columbia and go back to europe to organize nato, which generalizen hour did, and eisenhower was there when he came back in 1952 to run for the republican nomination. so there was great respect between the two, and one of the reasons truman did not seek a third -- seek re-election in 1952, was because ike got the republican nomination. if cass had gotten the nomination, truman would have stayed the democratic candidate that year. so there was a great deal of respect between the two. they fell out during the campaign, during the 19352 campaign. ike wasn't quite prepared for the bitterness of the campaign, and he blamed president truman for that, and there was some other things. and ike resented truman's role in the campaign, and you may recall that -- you may not -- that on inaugural day when the president elect calls on the president at the white house and they drive up in the limousine to the capitol, eisenhower did not get out of the limousine to go into the white house to have coffee with the president as is customary. he was smarting over his -- some issues during the campaign, and the ride up to the capitol was very chilling. he had invited your father back from korea at the time, without telling anyone, and general eisenhower took a little offense at that. but -- there was some other things. but three days later, after eisenhower was in the white house, he wrote an effusesive letter to president truman, far more generous and appreciative about how truman had facilitated the changeover and the transition, and an effusesive letter. they didn't really see much of each other for the next, oh, dozen years. they met, i think, for the first time at the assassination funeral of president john kennedy. >> i think they met briefly at the rayburn funerallin' 1961. but that's. there wasn't estrangement and that happens. and again, this is going back to this question of how a richard nixon would have gotten along with a dwight eisenhower or whatever. one of the things you can rely on, i think, is that relations between a successor and a predecessor tend to be frosty, and because of the very nature of executive leadership you come into office and the idea is i'm going to change the world. i see everything that has been done wrong and now we're going to do it my way. so generally your predecessor tends to be your target. so eisenhower and truman fall into that pattern. eisenhower/kennedy to a lesser extent. kennedy/johnson falls into that pattern. johnson/nixon, much less, and carter/reagan. >> the democratic to republican exacerbated the changeover as well. it was at ken's funeral they got back together. they rode in the same car, had a drink before. and i think they got along marv obviously with each other, from everything i understand, and i guess it's not talking out of school -- maybe it is talking out of school -- but they both thought that president kennedy's funeral was overdone, that it was too grand, and i think eisenhower and truman said that. so when eisenhower was buried, this was a very simple funeral. it was -- eisenhower was buried in the g.i. spot. $98. there was no big parade, no mourning. the body lay in state in the capitol and then placed on the train and went back to abilene. i'm sure you were there. >> one more thing about eisenhower and truman. and that is i don't think any two presidents had more in common with each other than those two. they were different personalities but one can easily imagine harry truman in the abilene high school yearbook, might have been wearing thick glasses and holing a violin or a piano player but he was a midwestern type and ike was a midwestern type. there is enseed in the -- episode in the 1952 campaign, and truman more or less asked him to run for president. about september or so, truman goes on the -- -- erupts that eisenhower is a -- a fighting word in the midwest. no one else would have any idea what it is but eisenhower and truman would have an idea, and apparently this is a fighting word, and it means something like kind of a turncoat. the idea that ike had worked with democrats and now is out running as a republican and so forth. this was -- truman knew how to get under eisenhower's skin, and so he did in 1952, and i think that contributed to the very frosty relationship. >> right to point out that truman is from missouri, and very similar. when truman began his career working at a bank, working in kansas city, his roommate for the first year was arthur eisenhower. eisenhower's oldest brother. they lived together in the same room. the same rooming house. in fact there's a document -- is deep in the papers. i don't know how many historians have seen this one but it was a message in effect being relayed to eisenhower through arthur, his older brother, from harry, truman, who was then a senator in missouri and had not been elevated to the vice-presidency yet and it was 1943, early '44 before the political year began, and this is from the u.s. senator in missouri to the commander of european forces, supreme -- the allied forces. says your publicity is perfect. don't change a thing. you're the inevitable successor to franklin roosevelt. and as it turns out, harry truman finds him in a role like andrew johnson after the american civil war. somebody who is dropped into this natural succession, and -- >> unfortunately we could probably go for another hour. we all have 150 questions. we have one minute left. you get 15 seconds and we'll give our panelists 45. >> okay. this is for david. do you recall personally speaking with your grandfather about the norman -- normandy invasion, particularly about its potential for failure. >> jean edward smith's help on this. from a grandchild's perspective, world war ii was a subject that he left alone. as my father put it once, he would accept criticism on anything regarding his presidency, but he could not really bring himself to revisit the controversies of world war ii, i think because so much was at stake. if you think of all the lives that depended on the decisions that were made then, and this reflected in the character of the eisenhower library and the roosevelt library. this is a very somber topic, and my grandfather just simply would not -- he didn't want to teach it. and he didn't want to go back and relive it in any superficial way. by the same token we're encouraged to learn it. so this is the veteran experience -- you covered so many clay, grant. what's your reaction there? >> i think david is the authority on this. 25 years ago david was the definitive book on eisenhower's generalship, and i think that he has had the last word on this. >> i want to finish with that. it's been an honor to be here with jean edward smith, who has written a terrific book. julie and i are fighting over it. this is a great account of the entire life, which is to me the greatest challenge i can imagine in writing, and my personal congratulations to you, mr. smith. >> finally, mrs. eisenhower, what's the most interesting conversation you ever had with president eisenhower or one that comes to mine. >> i'll get very personal, and this will be very quick. we would good visit him during the '68 campaign after we were engaged, and everytime we went into his room he would be lying flat there, he had the heart monitors on, and -- but his spirit was so great and he would always say, when are you going to become an eisenhower? and that made me feel good. it was very nice. >> david and julie nixon eisenhower, jean edward smith. this is book tv on c-span 2. this is the national book festival. and our live coverage from the national book festival continues tomorrow. go to book of.org to get the fuel schedule. see you then. thank you, everyone. >> visit book publish book of.org. you can share anything you see on booktv.org by clicking share on the upper left side of the page and selecting the format. booktv streams live online for 48 hours every weekend. booktv.org.
diplomatic entrance downstairs. >> there is the man who will be president in another couple of hours, gerald ford, and his wife, betty ford. phil jones is on the south lawn. phil? >> as you can see, mr. and mrs. ford have joined the nixons as they make the last walk out to the helicopter. just before the nixons appeared at the south portico, his personal secretary came out with tears in her eyes. ron ziegler, the press secretary, fighting back tears. the president's personal physician moved out ahead to get pictures of mr. nixon as he leaves the white house to board the helicopter for the flight to california. vice president ford, this morning as he left his home to come here for this occasion, said it was indeed one of the saddest incidents he has ever seen. there is the president waving goodbye to applause. [applause] >> followed in by richard nixon, her husband, edward cox. >> we will be seeing the president again at andrews air force base. we are set up there. there will be another short farewell as he transfers to an air force jet. he is not taking the presidential plane. at least that is the word as of this morning. that seems to have changed every hour. >> i think the case is very much as it was last evening. that vice president ford, soon to be the new president, made it clear he would be happy to have president nixon make the ride back to san clemente aboard air force one or the spirit of 76. that is a picture of some of the crowd at the white house, staff members, cabinet members lining the white house walls to say goodbye to the president. vice president ford made it clear he would be happy to have the president fly on the number one air force plane. president nixon knows the value of communications aboard air force one or the spirit of 76. there has been some confusion as to which aircraft he would use. they are both side-by-side at andrews air force base. we will simply have to wait and see. president nixon peering out from behind the bullet resistant glass of the helicopter which so many times has taken him back and forth on this trip as well as other trips. vice president and mrs. ford also on the ground. julie nixon eisenhower and her husband, david. you perhaps saw david. as the president started up the steps to the helicopter, david stuck out his hand and the president shook it warmly. it is a muggy, still day here. leaves in the trees are not moving back and forth. the air, very heavy. vice president and mrs. ford standing just to the left of mr. and mrs. cox and just in front of that old magnolia tree planted by andrew jackson before he left the white house. members of vice president ford's staff have already started making their moves over to the white house. there are some of the waves goodbye to president nixon. helicopterixon's going over the fountains of the white house south lawn, over the lips fence, high over the elipse, toward the base of the washington monument. >> the president is getting his last look as he peers back from that seat in the helicopter as president of the united states. this will be the last look. by the time he comes back to this point, if history decrees he does at any point, you will no longer be the president. >> resident richard nixon resigned from office 40 years 1974.day on august 9, author john farrell responded to questions about president nixon and watergate. mr. farrell is currently working on a biography of the 37th president titled "richard nixon: an american tragedy." this program is about one hour. >> 40 years ago, the white house was the scene. we will continue with your calls and comments on american history tv. our guest is john farrell who is coming out with a new book, "richard nixon: an american tragedy." thanks for being with us on american history tv. you wrote a piece for politico and said this dwarfed any other political scandal in american history. he tried to put the entire nixon presidency in context. how so? talking was sort of a point over the years that watergate was this third rate
intelligence he suggestions. that's the big argument. this has been such a contentious issue we saw the whole drama play out with the house intelligence committee and their top republican leader devin nunes came, saw the material. out of the protocol of that committee and them adam schiff, came and looked at the same material. there's answers about this coming from the white house first from the deputy press secretary who says there was no attempt to keep adam schiff responsible. >>. >> not that i'm aware of at all. i think the bigger point is there's something there. we'd love to come see it which is exactly what we said. it turns out if there's something of substance for him to know about, we want him to
see it. frarjly i think if there wasn't something of sub stns, he would have walked out that moment from the white house and come out and declared that this was a big waste of time and a big dog and pony show. he didn't do that. he doesn't do that. it's very telling in what he probably saw on friday. >> it certainly is an attempt to disstrakts it to hide the origin of the materials, to hide the white house hand. the question is, okay, why. and i think the answer to the question is this effort to point the congress in other directions, basically saying don't look at me, don't look at russia, there's nothing to see here. i would tell people whenever the pretty used the word fake, it ought to set off alarm bells. >> so that tension is still there, alex, between democrats and republicans on h issue. there won't be any quick answers. we know that what's happening takes time and will largely be done out of public view and the
senate committee, it will also take months. tomorrow they're going to begin the first of their interviews behind closed doors, investigative-type interviews, not a hearing, to help them plot their strategy about all of these different buckets of russia questions, the interference during the campaign, which include some of the cyber attacks as well as any contacts that might have existed between trump associates and russian operatives. today is the president not only tweeting about russia and the surveillance issue, he talked about health care. 's notable because we had thought the president was ready to move away from the health care considerations after such a big disaster with not being able to pass the repeal bill. today the president is on the golf course with rand paul of kentucky and the budget director mick mulvaney. rand paul was very much against that bill that went nowhere, so
to those democrats facing re-election in 2018 and whether they make the calculus that joining filibuster will ultimately hurt their prospects, especially in a state carried by donald trump, which is why you have joe manchin of west virginia and heidi heitkamp of north carolina being the two who sads they will continue to vote for kneel gore such. others will be michael bennett of colorado, john tester of montana and joe donnelly of indiana who could also decide there's no upside to blocking this particular supreme court nominee. i think they're under a lot of pressure at the same time from liberals who certainly want them to hold that seat vacant, who believe at the end of the day, anyone appointed by donald trump will not fit on the iej local cat trip of the party and that could force mitch mcconnell. >> potential long-term
implications, what are they if the republicans trigger the nuclear option and what about the poijtd should we be putting all our eggs in one basket. is this something we should be looking to given that antonin scalia was a moderate conservative? >> clearly neil gorsuch, the way of the conservative, is not really outside the mainstream. the problem for democrats he carries the taint of trump. to sabrina's point she's right right. there is no percentage for a democratic senator. no advantage in saying i voted to confirm a trump nominee to supreme court. now, if the nuclear option is triggered, obviously that means its is in future easier for whatever party has it and that's the whole debate. whether that was a good or bad thing. >> okay.
sabrina, also making headlines, trump turning on his own party and trump's meade kra director now urging a primary tee feet for one free thom congressman, that being justin amash. why do this? why is the president motivated to take on members of his own party? >> i think it's not own only nonproductive to take on your own party and why the health care plan failed is because donald trump is unable to secure support from members of the freedom caucus in part because e was using intimidation tactics in privacy meetings and he wasn't taken seriously the concerns offered by the republican leaders in the house. so you also have to keep in mind, the replacement plan only pulled at 18%. when it comes to the president using the bully pulpit, whether you're a moderate republican or
with a simple act of a phone call by chairman nunes. all he has to to is pick up the phone, call the committee back together, share that what he knows from this by be czar handed back-and-forth with the white house thing. also begin to s&p some documents which will help us get at the truth and i have used as an example, we need to see paul manafort's tax records, his bank statements, his e-mail records and his phone records in order to find out some of what may be the money laundering charges that were in the new york media outlet. so one phone call, we could get this back on track. >> barring that happening you're among the chairman recusing himself to try to ensure a fair investigation. are you reassured at all to even some degree now that ranking member adam schiff has got an chance to see the same documents he has? >> you know, alex, i feel like i'm watching this all play out
in 3-d. the truth of the matter is with his early morning tweets and bizarre behavior, it's though they want us to look everywhere but that where we should look. let's just remind everybody. h is about the russian interference in the 2016 presidential election and thor is for the truth about whether or not there were trump operatives or people within the trump orbit who coordinated or colluded with the russians and furthered that objective. most importantly, let's remember, the russians haven't stopped this. they will to it in france, in germany, and russian again. russia wants western democracies weaker so they can be stronger and so their billionaire oligarchs can be richer. >> how did you react when you heard chairman nunes got his
sources from within the white house? what do you make of that? >> ham-handed. i said that earlier. he should have shared that earlier with the ranking manyship and all the members of the ranking committee. it takes us off focus. i'm remembering by a dog from "up" who keeps getting disstraktsed by a squirrel. we're not goej ing to do it. >> how do you commit to the public that your commity's investigation is fair and that this is not just all about politics. >> we can only do this in time and only if chairman nunes will live up to his responsibility and get us back on track. but, alex, remember, it's not just about the house committee. the senate committee begins in earnest and it looks very impressive. the fbi is investigating this. you know what we haven't talked about?
i wouldn't be surprised if the prosecutors are going to look into this, the whole sorted affair. >> thank you so much for your time and insights. enjoy the game monday night. >> go,izatiizatio zags. coming up, the nur surprise with the president trump's sweep next. i don't get it. i use whitening toothpaste. what do you use? crest whitestrips you should try them! whitening toothpaste only works on the surface. but crest whitestrips safely work below the enamel surface ... to whiten 25x better than a leading whitening toothpaste you used the whitestrips i passed the tissue test. oh yeah. would you pass the tissue test? see for yourself with crest whitestrips. they are the way to whiten.
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ambassador. her comments come just days before chinese president joins. so, mark, with a welcome to you, let's get right to it. how exactly is china getting there? what is the role here? how is it happening? >> well, jared kushner has established a very busy channel of communication with china's ambassador to washington. they've exchanged a lot of e-mails. he has actually sent jared kushner suggestions for what a joint statement could look like that the two countries could issue after the meetings with president trump and president xi. they were also the two that
cooked up the meeting. so i think the chinese have concluded that jared kushner is the most efficient way to get to the president. the chinese president is always expert at trying to find the most efficient ways to establish influence with the white house. it's kind of note worthy that this is the one that makes the most sense. >> we saw the president. he said the upcoming meeting is going to be very difficult. he pointed to the massive trade deficits and job losses. so what do they each want from each other? >> president xi above all wants to establish a relationship with the new american president that got off on tough footing if you recall a couple of months ago and then publicly questions whether he was going to adhere to the principle of one china. so i think the chinese want to take the measure of president trump, and for them being
welcomed by his club at florida confers kind of a prestige to the president of china. if you recall the prime minister of japan was also hotted by the president in mar a la fwoe. so that's, you know, in the chinese sense, it's important. it gives the chinese president face. on the american side as nikki haley said earlier, the push will be to exextract a pledge from china, that they'll use north korea to try to get them to curb their nuclear and ballistic missile programs. we'll seethat works or not. >> i want to turn to an article. who are they and why are that so important to the trump administration? >> these are diplomats, career diplomats, who have served in multiple administrations. i focused on these three because
each of them were appointed to highly visible important jobs, in some cases doing very sensitive work. the nature of the work and the roles they've played have made them valuable even in the trump administration. they came in determining to clean house. and yet for different reasons, each has proven to be valuable and playing important roles. >> but with no attempted to remove them by anybody? >> it's not quite that clear. in the case of lempert, it has been hard for her in part because there are people in the right wing and israel and the american jewish community who identify her with the policies o the previous administration that
were viewed as being tough on isra israel. but he has concluded, h gentleman, jason greenblat that she is valuable. knows players and those on the palestinian side and he's asked her to stay on and help investigation. >> okay. from "the new york times." come see us again. >> thank you very much. greeting the president, house supporters and opponents, how they think mr. trump is handling the job so far. what powers the digital world? communication.
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new york. breaking news. an avalanche of water has swept through a small city killing at least 200 people. rescue workers are searching through debris and pulling apart rocks to try to find people missing or injured. it's happened in moccoa near the border of ecuador. coming up in the next hour we're going to talk with a red cross official and get the latest. msnbc has been on the road gauging reaction across towns in trump country. we went to somerville, north carolina, this weekend. talk to us about what the residents are saying. >> good morning, alex. we're in south carolina this morning. we've been to several town halls. this is the flower festival to try to gauge some thoughts on where the trump administration
is right now politically in the minds of the people. we've been from colorado to kansas, across the country and back on the east coast and particularly wanted to ask about russia and whether that's changed our opinion about the trump administration at all. here's what a few of them said this morning. >> that's bucket malarkey. i don't believe none f that grab. they fweefb to blame somebody. >> i feel like they've photo bring our country together as a whole and focus on more reality and work on name calling and ridiculing each other and fighting. >> i worked all my life since i was 15 and you've got to do what's right for us. it's not the people who have. it's the people who are in the middle. you know, i'm a middle of the road person and income. >> she says still focus on the broader agenda. for a lo lot of these people they're correctional officers,
waitresses, power washers, people who voted on trump. they say this is malarkey the democrats put forward in order to take away from the efforts of jobs and veterans affairs. they said, yes, the trump 5d ministration may be something but when it comes town to something, a lot of them are saying, we still want tup. if you look at his approval rating, they want him week after week. nine out of ten republicans stand by donald trump. what we're hearing from people is tup is not a legitimate president. their issues are still very much legitimate, which is something we have not heard democrats come forward and put their own policy path forward which a lot of these people note. they say, republicans and democrats should be teaming up to work with donald trump to push his agenda forward. alex? >> okay. so, vaughn, here folks are talking about russia. that may not be something that affects them in their daily
lives. to you get the sense that they're appreciating donald trump as president because of things he has accomplished or intends to that will change the way they go about their days? >> i think you said intends to is the exact word. if you look a the approval ratings of donald trump, even speaker ryan up in wisconsin, donald trump is far and above away from where the approval ratings are at. they said, republicans and democratsty not put their own two feet forward in order to pass deal that donald trump put forward as part of his agenda that okay. vaughn hillier in south carolina. thank you so much. well, the trump administration is turning up the heat on sanctuary cities, those who refuse to hold them in custody until federal officers arrive now stand to lose federal funding in keeping with president trump's executive order. with us now is texas attorney general ken paxton who supports
the order. good morning, nice to see you. only one mayor is changing in court. here's one of his arguments. >> the tenth amount of the constitution says that the federal government cannot specify how local governments must go about enforcing federal law, yet that is exactly what the president's order does. >> that was not in your state, my mistake. it was in the city of seattle there. what do you say to that? >> it's federal law. they're obligated to follow the law. we have a bill based on the same problems. we have a sheriff who will not enforce federal and state law and we're concerned about the safety of our citizens. >> i want to question you about
the safety in your cities. are you worried that the immigration laws will erode trust, people within immigrant communities and thereby thwart theable for police fighting crime and trying to get thing done in those communities? >> my greater concern is the fact that the sheriff is releasing illegals who have been convicted of crimes in the community when she's supposed to be releasing the federal agents. so as somebody who spends a lot of time, i don't see any upside to that particular policy. i don't see how it benefits citizens who have committed illegal crimes staying in our county. >> again, back to those within our community who tried to work on the trust and not have suspicious behavior from those there to help them get rid of crime in that community, you don't worry that this law will erode that. >> i'm more concerned about the safety of my citizens in released convicted felons and
other criminals in our community who otherwise should not be in our community. there are other ways to solve the crime problem than having people stay there. >> is this all in reference to the lawsuit in dallas where the immigrants in ta state, they've sued the city, claiming a violation of the fourth amendment? >> so what i'm referencing is what's going on in travis county where our sheriff is an elected official. her obligation is to follow the federal and state law and she's refusing to to that. it's what's motivated our legislature to react. i think it's our legislature who will handle that and potentially some of that legislation actually imposed some kind of penalties on elected officials who don't know the law. >> certainly you do know the law and violation of the fourth amend is what it's all about in the city of dallas, that people are being held without warrants. there's not enough probable cause there. to you have any concerns about
that? >> i have not seen any situation where that's occurred. if that's occurring, we'll address that. what we're addressing in texas and what i think the administration is addressing is this commonplace problem we're starting to experience where we have cities and municipalities. that's what we're trying to address. >> do you think this goes all the way up to the supreme court? >> you know, who knows. it certainly could. it could be an issue we see ultimately by a full court. yeah, i think it's very possible you see that. >> all right. texas attorney general ken paxton. thank you for your time, sir. >> you too. thank you. >> thank you. coming up, ivanka trump's new role in the white house and how unusual it is to have family working the west wing and how he weighs in on the free speech and how some of his rallies got rough last summer.
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officially serving as an unpaid family employee in the white house which means she eastbound by government ethic standards including a law prohibiting conflicts of interest. a move comes after they cried foul. her official title is now assistant to the president. but how unprecedent is this? msnbc's savannah sellers is going to join us and give us answers the all of this. have we seen this before? >> actually we have seen this. we've been reporting all week on the new official white house. west wing office. she will not be taking a salary although she is eligible for it. i went and talked and asked real people what they thought about this. is this crossing the line, is this nepotism, or would they want their own daughter advising them. here's what i heard. >> i don't really have an issue. there's been many times in the past it's been done in other administrations. >> i think it's nepotism at the
highest level. if i took one of my two daughters and said, hey, we're going to give them a job about it would be considered as whole will appropriate. >> daddy, i have a problem, you can help me? >> it seems like it could be a little problematic. wh what are her qualifications other than she's the president's daughter. >> it's right down the middle. sort of three categories. either not being okay with it, being okay with it or because it's ivanka and they want her influence. first son or daughter influence is not something new. going back a little bit, julie nixon eisenhower, she was instrumental in nixon's campaign. she was sort of tasked with speaking. also an ma roosevelt, another first daughter who played a
pivotal role in her father's presidency. she was very important in the last years of president roosevelt's presidency. she started traveling when her father could not or her father would choose her instead, for examp example, many the conference to yalta. john eisenhower also and he did accept a salary. there's an even more recent and relevant example. let's take a listen. >> the most relevant parallel here between ivanka trump having an official office in west wing and having an official title is actually to the example in early 1993 of first lady hillary rodham clinton being given a west wing office and being tasked with heading president clinton's health care reform
effort. >> so you heard very similar to ivanka, the west wing office, given a real task. she also did not accept a salary. but some think of hillary clinton as a government servant where ivanka was not. but they work very closely. they have their whole life where her business has been under the trump umbrella. what's really interesting is we get at nepotism. if you look at this, the higher you get up to 7, the better. that means no influence of nepoti nepotism. enormous at 1. the u.s., we fall in about the middle. we' we're closer to influence than no influchbls we fall in the middle amongst countries all over the world. and finally one thing i was hearing from people is they were frustrated by it because they feel that in the real world this would not be okay. they would not be able to give
their son or daughter a job. now what is actually very interesting, i looked at some census data, and actually 22% of americans by the age of 30 will actually be worker for same employer at the same time as their father. 6% will work at the employer their father left. >> this is so interesting. i mean i love it. you've ton such exhaustive research and put a perspective on it. 22 today, i think that's anecdotally for sure. thanks for that. >> president trump commented a short time ago. does he have a point or is he just trying to deflect attention. tastes. honey, what do you want for dinner tonight? oh, whatever you're making. cheesy chipotle pork quesadillas? mmmm... ravioli lasagna bake? yeah, i don't know... grilled white chicken...
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were involved. an investigation is being conducted by the fbi into possible coordination with the trump campaign. that is really, i think, among the most serious business the country has serious business the country has to do right now. and the white house seems to be toing everything it can to point in other directions and say do not look here. there is nothing to see here. >> that was adam schiff, ranking member on the house sbel where she knows committee, accusing the trump administration of trying to deflect attention away from the probe into its ties to russia. let's bring in howard dean and susan. hi, guys. good to see you on a sunday. >> hello. >> susan, how do you respond to that? is the white house really try ing to interfere? >> they're tryi ining deflect a making -- on their own agenda. the it is taking away from the issue of these leaked documents,
which should never have been done and the unmasking of american citizens. they actually have a good argument and one that they could go forward if they would just stop getting in their own way and if donald trump would just stop tweeting about it. >> let's go to what happened a short time ago, the real story turns out to be surveillance and leaking. find the leakers. does he have a point, howard? kind of seems like trump associate, maybe the president himself, were surveilled. so isn't it important to know why how? >> yes, it is important to know and no, he doesn't have a point. this is the classic, the classic diversionary tactic. the issue here is not if there are washington leaks. there were a lot during the obama administration. people always complain about them. the real issue is what susan said it was. have the russians done something to undermine the electoral
process in the united states and does as it looks, mean that trump was helped deliberately by this. i was astonish eed this week wh we found the russians hacked into jeb bush and marco rubio's campaign. i agree with susan. he's not going to get away from this if if fbi does their job. zpl appears that americans really care about it. susan, is there legitimate reason to believe that nunes cannot run a fair investigation? >> well, i think he basically has one more shot leading this investigation. that means he has to basically come clean with all of the members of his committee, let them see everything he shared with congressman schiff. have another open hearing, go back to the agenda, because before all of this started with
him going to the white house, there seem ed to be b some good bipartisan support. so, i think that that would be his best bet. otherwise, people are just going to look at the senate right now, which is going forward in a good bipartisan fashion. >> do you think that is proba e possible? you can't undue what is done. there seems to be a a lot of tension and fair amount of bad blood between the side there is on the house intel committee. >> it's with committee members and including republicans. there are a lot of republicans who are very frustrated with with the press conference that nunes had prior going white house and after going to the white house. they didn't want him to do that. now, he has to actually mend fences with everybody. build up some trust and i do think he could be given just one more chance to do it right. but if he doesn't get these public hearings done quickly, if he doesn't share the intel with the rest of the committee on monday or tuesday, he's then going to be ineffective.
>> look, howard, the russia questions. they've been hanging over the president even before he took office and only seem to be growing. can he make them go away. >> well, depends what the truth is is. my problem b is that i actually think there's a lot more there there. because putin is doing this all over the west. this is his attempt to undue what we would call liberal democracy. he's not in the american sense liberal, but a democracy based on maximum input from citizens and he doesn't like those, so his major aim is to disrupt the west and the best way is to make america weak. so, if that's the case, this isn't going to go away until we find out what the truth is. i have to disagree with soouns. i think nunes is done. i think the hois how's may be done partly because the way they're made u. most of the stuff that gets done is going to get done in the senate.
because of the 60-vote rule and i do think warner and burr are running so far what i peer peers to be b pretty good nonpartisan process. nunes is not going get a second chance. he looked like a clown. >> can we take a look at all the controversies, you've got michael flynn. obama surveillance claims. all this, isn't it going to hurt his ability to govern if it hasn't already? >> i'll argue the problem is his ability not to hire enough people at the lower ranks. he has not goat goth his deputy secretaries in place. his white house lizes. government running. that's what we needed to do. these investigations could be a prop for the rest of his term. i don't know the answer to that, but i know that one the things he can do to help himself is to start running this government and run ining it effectively an working on the things he can control krol and not hurting himself with out of control tweets. >> got to wonder why he hasn't
hired more people. loyally the front and center in any of the hiring he will have. but there are hundreds of positions still open. >> thousands in fact. i think you mean the hundreds that require senate confirmation. what's so staggering, when you have to think of the work the senate has to do. >> so, michael flynn's immunity request. do you think he gets it and if he does, how significant is it? >> not yet. this isn't about michael flynn. this is routine fbi process. they're not going to give him immunity unless they know basically why they want the immunity. flynn and his lawyer, who's very cler clever, is wave iing this around. flynn has done stuff that's om semirelated. for him not to register as a foreign agent then after the fact, reveal he got a huge amount of money from the turkish government, which doesn't have much to do with what's going with russia, that's a major violation. so far, the fbi is going to have
to find a whole lot more that they want. in order to give him immunity. >> susan, does he get snit. >> i agree with the governor. not at this point. he hasn't shown he has worth getting immunity for. yes, the it's what the lawyers should do and he should ask for immunity to go forward, but his own words have come back to haunt him all week. it is in fact embarrassing. >> all right, guys, we'll end on a note of agreement there. thank you so much. always good to see you. >> thank you. >> some help for flint after the city's devastating water crisis, but will it be enough? don't let dust and allergens get between you and life's beautiful moments. flonase allergy relief delivers more complete relief. flonase helps block 6 key inflammatory substances that cause all your symptoms, including nasal congestion and itchy, watery eyes. flonase is an allergy nasal spray that works even beyond the nose. so you can enjoy every beautiful moment to the fullest. flonase. 6>1 changes everything.
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the beginning, from 2006 when the national archives hired me to do this, i was very straightforward about what i was going to do. so there is no debate in switching. the archives came to me. but it was a very interesting conflict of different events because the head of the nixon foundation at that point was john taylor, rev. john taylor. and john taylor is an intellectual. he is very complicated. he is a bit torn about nixon. and he admired nixon's mind. and he wanted nixon's library to be credible. now, i don't believe that every member of the nixon foundation shared john's intellectual goal. he really wanted the cold war historian. he knew who i was because i had worked on the project with pda. i just let the materials speak for themselves. i write books, but on different subjects. john taylor wanted me, too. he was hired by then-president george w. bush. my first book is about the cuban missile crisis. both of them wanted me. they came to me. i did not apply for the job. from the beginning, i said, look, i am a historian. we have to have a place where history is so comfortable. i am not a member of the republican party. i am not partisan crowd i am now going to become a member of the republican party. and that is aside from the fact that i was gay. i told them come if you want this, this is what you will get. i was very straightforward. i spoke with julie nixon eisenhower and tricia nixon carps. i told them, i'm going to create space where there will be a debate about your father, but i promise to be respectful and it will be intellectual and your father was an intellectual. and that is what i promised. the fact that the foundation later would make a big deal out of this was politics. because they knew what they're getting from the beginning. and it becomes politics -- i will tell you what happened. the foundation paid lip service. john was a complicated figure, but most of the members paid lip service. they thought that washington would bring me in. the work -- would reign me in. they assumed, regardless of my big talking or whatever i believe, that ultimately they would reign me in. albert weinstein was very nervous about having a nixon library that would be viewed like a cover-up. and john taylor says he wanted me just as much as alan one stop. -- alan weinstock. they both came to me in 2006 and said, would you do this? >> where were you then? >> i was in the university of virginia. i was doing some teaching. i had worked on the nixon tapes a little bit appeared mostly on the kennedy and johnson takes. i knew what nixon sat on the tapes. i recognize the problem with the federal government. how does the federal government paper over some one who makes racist and anti-semitic comments on tape that can be played over and over again? the answers you don't paper it over. that means that the library cannot be a legacy factor. >> we can at least read the transcripts. >> this is the achievement of part of the nixon project. before there was a library, there was a group of very dedicated archivist's working for the national archives. there was a legal professor who pushed hard for this period of the first opening was at the end of the 1990's. so there's a lot of very bad material that was available. >> have all of that been transcribed? >> know, that takes forever. very little is transcribed. even that is only about 15% of the abuse of power takes. long story short, here's the problem for the federal government. we have a habit in this country coming if i may say this now, of glossing over presidents. we have decided that they all have to be treated as if they are symbols of the country. what that means is that you have a smoothing over of the rough edges. and there is a feeling among modern presidents the they have a right to a certain veneration and it will be located in that presidential library. and even if they're gone, their children in some cases and former allies, other lieutenants who live longer than presidents because they're younger, they continue this. in fact, in many ways, they are even more ferocious to preserve this legacy, because the old man is gone and want to show their loyalty. this is difficult when you have a flawed president. >> you had some controversy over watergate. >> yes. >> have you been to the clinton library? >> i was going to ask you how they dealt with all the problems he had with impeachment and if they had been fair. >> i was told that he was really impressed with the watergate exhibit. i was told that would inspire him to do some -- to make some changes to the museum. one of the things that allen weinstein was hoping was that the nixon library to be a new start. some of the libraries are much too much like shrines. this is public money. you don't get to take off on your tax return with your money goes to a public entity or a public library. it goes to every library. >> george w. bush's library opened in the early part of 2013. how much of the building was paid for by the federal government? >> the building is pay full -- is before by his private foundation. the deal is that they build the building and they have to meet national archives specifications, federal government specification. >> only certain amount of feet? >> i would like to be a debate. i think americans up to decide what they want occurred but i don't think they know they have a choice. right now, congress is reducing the amount of money that is going to these libraries. the result is that the libraries will be more and more like shrines did you ask the private ally of a president to cough up a lot of money, what do they want in return? of course, they expect a certain slant. not only will you build a building, but they will create an endowment to pay for them build in -- the building in perpetuity. so these buildings are more and more pay for with private funds. she billed the building. the federal government gets the keys, the handover the day they open the building. the the government is there, but the federal government is the pauper. it is an amazing thing. you have directors took no money. the money they have is to pay for salaries and it is delightful. >> but the nixon library started the family. >> the nixon library is the only one started this way. it started as a private facility. that was because of watergate. gerald ford signed a law in 1974 called the presidential recording of materials preservation act. i was the only director whose work was governed by a single law. there are differing laws that govern the libraries that print only the nixon materials. by law, richard nixon's materials could not leave 20 miles outside of the district of columbia because it was felt that richard nixon was not a trustworthy conservator of his material. so they couldn't have a library. by law, he couldn't have a live repaired and that is because richard nixon had cut a deal and congress found out about it. he cut a deal with one of his appointees who was the head of the gao. i'm sorry, the gsa. it is the government services administration appeared at those -- in those days, they ran the national archives. the deal was that richard nixon would have the tapes in five years and could destroy whatever he wanted. whatever was not presented for truck, he could destroy and he could have his papers and destroy them appeared richard nixon cut this deal before he left the white house. congress found out about it, went crazy and seized his materials. that meant that the nixon materials were like a crime scene. i am telling you, running the nixon library is one of the most phenomenal experiences one could have. because what happened was nixon overplayed his hand and the government responded in a very tough way. so everything was scooped up, absolutely everything, including separate -- super 8s. those were films back then. it was on government time. people used to take their super eight cameras, and videotaped their birthday parties, their kids' birthday parties. and then they would use the white house labs to develop them. so they had these birthday party reels in their offices and they were all seized. everything was seized, unless somebody destroyed something. the federal government, if they were not that heavy handed, they would give them back. my point simply is that nixes materials were handled differently. now his family and his friends felt he deserved a place of reflection and ultimately a place where he and pat nixon were buried. so they opened a library with no papers. i described it to folks at the roger nixon library. >> were his vice-presidential papers there? >> there were not because he deeded them to the federal government. all he had were his pre- presidential papers, not including the vice presidential papers, and his post- presidential papers i was not around at that time, but the family decided this isn't right. our father wanted a library like every other president. and they lobby congress in the first bush term to change that law so that the materials could be sent to california. but the tradition was that they would have to be sent to a national archive facility i was the director. i oversaw the move. >> and now john taylor, an episcopal priest, was running the nixon library before the federal government took over. >> yes. and he desperately wanted an expert to have impaired my sense is that not everybody in the foundation wanted it to happen -- to have it. my sense is that not everyone in the foundation wanted it to happen. we didn't do it in person. we did it by letter. but bruce herschensohn who ran for senate in california was a nixon speechwriter. i think he was also a speechwriter for ronald reagan. he was also in the u.s. ia, the united states information agency, and he wrote the screenplay for the memorial film about jfk, the man who fought a lot about american history. he disagreed with my approach from the get go. well before the controversies of bringing in john d.. he said every president has a right to a watering hole. there are all those who admires him who can go and speak and not have to worry about the judgment of history. i believe that's true if it is a private facility. but the minute you make it public, i think it can't be published--- cannot be governed by those rules. again, i don't think the public recognizes that it has a choice. if you go to the different presidential libraries, you'll find this among them are shrines and others are places of serious discussion. the harry truman, for example, is a place of serious discussion. the johnson library is redoing its museum. i haven't seen it yet, but i suspect it will be a place for serious discussion. and there are others that are not. i think the public needs to figure out what they want. " your office is and what -- >> your office is in what relationship to the foundation? >> i chemical war historian. i had this discussion. when john taylor was encouraging me to take the job, i said, john, one of the conditions i have was that i would like to run all public programming in the building because i don't want to run berlin. i had steadied divided berlin. i don't want to do that. it would be terrible. but in the end, that is what we got, berlin. my office is one area. the foundation is looking very far from us. relations get very tense and cool. as i said, the shutdown of funding for the library. >> are they required to fund anything? >> i am not a lawyer, but let me put it this way. in the transfer agreement, one of their objectives is supposed to be assisting the library, but there's no set amount that they're supposed to provide a will tell you, when i started, they promised a two hundred $50,000 a year for public programming. that never happened. it a very tense. >> one is -- when was it the most tense and why? >> it didn't take that long. a lot of the fights were actually over little things. they were supposed to setup assistance. when you are a federal museum, you're supposed to maintain certain levels of humidity and temperature control. with the had purchased for the museum was not good enough. they knew they were supposed to fix that. they wouldn't. they were using the deadline and they were trying to use that against us so that we would pay for it. and i did not want the american people to pay for something that they were supposed to pay for. so that was tense. i remember an argument because they turned to me and said, you are supposed to be on our side. why are you on washington's side? because the taxpayer should not be paying for this. so we had fights over logistical issues. but the intellectual fight started when i invited elizabeth drew in 2007. she is a longtime journalist, observer of the nixon scene, wrote a small biography of richard nixon, a study of his presidency for the american presence series. >> she would not have been a supporter of his. >> but she is a serious person. i made it clear -- look, i have already overseen events with al haig, a number of events. the nixon foundation let me come even though i was not yet fully director, i moderated a lot of events. i worked with them on who we would invite good all i said is i want balance. just give me balance. i would be happy to have people who revere richard nixon, but also have people raise questions. otherwise, this is not a national facility. it is an extension of the white house. i invited elizabeth drew. at that point, they said, that's it. and they shut down funding. we had already set up a whole bunch of events for six months. we plan six months ahead. they stopped funding that. in terms of the role history project, there were a number people on the list and said, okay, we promised we would fund the interview with senator dole. afterwards, no more. so the funding for the world history is stopped. it stopped when i invited elizabeth drew. they assumed that washington would still -- that washington would stop me. they felt that they could put pressure on washington. what they did not understand is that, by saving money so i can run this on my own if they tried to interfere. >> but before they became part of the padilla government, they could decide all of those things. -- part of the federal government, they could decide all of those things. >> of course. we give them six months -- elizabeth drew with june 2007. i was at the facility starting in october 2006. i was meeting with them all the time. i said over and over again, we have to have balance here. please -- not pleased because it was my decision but i was preparing them for that. >> what would you want to put yourself through this? >> -- why would you want to put yourself through this? >> i had just become a u.s. citizen. i cared deeply about history. my dad died pretty young. when i became a u.s. citizen, alan escorted my mom to the funeral. >> are you from quebec? >> from west field. and i knew a lot about the fights over the knicks and materials. -- over the nixon materials. there was supposed to be a watergate conference where the nixon foundation was supposed to be receiving things. maybe it is just too much self- confidence, but since both sides wanted me, i thought i had a unique opportunity and i care deeply about this. >> the oral [indiscernible] >> part of my job was overseeing the release of the white house tapes. so i thought i had a remarkable opportunity to do some good as an american citizen. so it was a great challenge. >> let me say what they would say -- my guess -- i can put -- i cannot put words in their mouths. i have talked with some of them before. the would say we didn't want that nixon-hating liberals canadian gays in here that they hired to run the show. >> this is the problem appeared they were convinced -- this is the problem. they were convinced that washington would either restrain your fire me. and washington would do it. >> meeting allen weinstein. >> and his replacement, the acting director. we were supposed to do -- can you believe this? i managed to recapture -- even after elizabeth drew, a year later, we tried to do some -- we try to find some public programs, some exhibits -- we have a temporary exhibits gallery. you don't just have a permanent gallery. i thought what can i do with them? i believe that you find mutual interest. so i can look with some ideas. for example, let's do something on the moon landing. president nixon was president for all of the apollo moon landings. isn't that a non-partisan wonderful thing to do? 1969, 2009 -- let's do that together. i wanted to do -- and the council funding because they were so angry about john been. >> explain that. -- john dean. >> expo in that. >> i invited john dean to speak of the library about his books. i told the nixon foundation in advance. i said, i'm going to have john been here -- john dean here. i think it would be a good thing for us to work on this together. but they split on it. the acting executive director for the foundation, kathy o'connor, who worked recklessly with me and i got along very well with her in 2009, she said, i am understand why you're doing this. john taylor had already left on his blog and publicly supported when i was doing. he recognized that i meant what i said and i said what i meant and lead this -- that my agenda was what i said it was. and he supported me. but the foundation at that point was shifting and christening and they were very unhappy. lemme -- let me read this to you. >> ron walker called john dean a rat. what do you say to that? do you have the sense that there were just throwing this in their face further calling john dean? >> i had said from the beginning that this would not be a credible institution -- which was one of their objectives -- until john dean and other spheres critics of the president in that era came. i made it clear. they could have so easily turned this into a success for themselves. what if they had done nothing rather than go public about it? they sent a letter to every former president -- i mean, i think it may surprise some of the viewers. i have never met president clinton. well, i shook his hand, but i did not meet him really. president clinton said who is this tim naftali. they sent a letter to all of the former presidents complain about my decision to invite john dean, saying that i had somehow violated the basic spirit of the provincial library by doing this. they are the ones who made it to grow case out of it and i think it was a big mistake on their -- made a federal case out of it, and i think it was a big mistake on their part. what would it have hurt them to make this non-partisan ground? he was our guest, not theirs. have him come in. let it happen. not make something out of it. and then just test whether i was a man of my word. how was i going to use -- they were always concerned about how will this be used to hurt richard nixon. but they didn't. they made a big fuss about it. they made more out of it than they had to. >> did you fill the auditorium? >> yes. we had an overflow. and they learn from that. because when i invited george mcgovern -- by the way, we had celebrated visitor. when george mcgovern came, they recognize the mistake they had made. then we had a joint event. the nixon foundation and the national archives, the nixon library, we had 506 hundred people. the nixon foundation let us use the facility for that. >> i don't want to put words in your mouth, but isn't this a dysfunctional system where you have these libraries and these museums and then you have the foundation and the federal government? the foundation has to raise money for people loved the president. >> you are not putting words in my mouth. it is a dysfunctional system. and that is why i want the public to know what they're getting. there are a lot of great people working in the system. i ed maier most of my colleagues, fellow directors. most of them are -- i admire most of my colleagues, fellow directors. most of them are trying to do what i am trying to do. but most of them did not have the unique circumstances that gave me the independence that i have. i told my mother. i told my friends. i told the people i had in the beginning that i would not stay very long. i had a kennedy book to finish. i have a career as a writer to continue. i have other things i want to do with my life. i want to do some public service. i expected to be in and out of there in three years. i promised that i would move the materials. i promised that i would hire the staff. i promised that i would have the first legitimate academic conference there. it took five years to do it when i finish what was on my list, i left. i think that my job was to be a catalyst. i believe, from this experience that, if you want to change things in government, you have to be prepared to stay for short periods. you cannot stay for long because then you begin to compromise. but if you want to be a catalyst, go win, do the job and leave. i looked at with james polk did. he decided one term would do what he wanted to do. i am not saying i and james polk, but i had this mindset and i did what i needed to do and i would leave. that give me a lot of support. i knew in my soul i was not staying long. i just felt i had an obligation to finish what i started. the oral history program is a not unexpected joy. i had that in mind when i started. -- is an unexpected joy. i had that in mind when i started. >> i want to go back to the oral history program in a moment. but i heard somewhere that the replica of the eastern in the white house is built on the campus of the nixon library -- the east room in the white house is built on the campus of the nixon library and run by the foundation. they built it. >> this is true of all the modern libraries. there is a map. i believe it is public information or it should be anyway. there is the foundation space and the national archives space. it is so complicated because -- i can give you an illustration. the reagan library has political speeches in the area around your force one. the audience may have seen presidential campaigns and you might ask yourself how can you have a republican debate in a federal building? you cannot. the air force one pavilion is run by the reagan foundation. it is not federal space. and the clinton library, i believe that the clinton foundation controls part of it. there are some libraries that are totally federal. they are owned completely by the federal government. but the new ones, and the nixon library because it joined the system as one of the new ones, there is a tree between the foundation and the federal government. there is a demarcation mark. in the nixon more--- in the nixon library, you can see the mark. the foundation did not like the map that i selected. they did not like the logo i had selected. so when you go into the library, you have the national archives logo. and they have mats in front of the doors for the foundation and different colored ones for the national archives. that's why i say that i was running west berlin. it is working this way because congress and i guess the executive branch decided that there is only so much the federal government should spend money on. look, i am not a big government person. i am progressive, but mainly on social issues. let me tell you what i want people to think about. do you want your children, because i care most about the high schools and the elementary school kids to come through these libraries -- how much do you want them to learn history as opposed to cant, to spin that white house as produce. if you don't congress appropriates funds for public programming in these libraries, then they will tend to be shrines. there will be people who will fight that. i did and some of my colleagues do. we fight and we don't have a lot of tools and our disposal and we do not have money to do it, but why make it so hard? >> how much federal money would go into the nixon library every year? >> the budget was roughly -- the library has some staff here to this day in washington. the tapes are done here. at college park. so there are two different budgets. that is to run the building and salary and equipment. there is not a cent for public programming. so if i were to go to an organization and ask money from them and then say but leave intellectual content to me, i recognize that this is a problem. in the end, it proved impossible because they wanted to place such limits on freedom of speech in our programs that i couldn't except it. >> robert curls books were not welcome in the johnson library for years -- robert carroll's books were not welcome in the johnson library for years. >> and then they turned around. i can tell you the that was a great achievement for the system. i participated in the jfk library on a discussion of the bay of pigs. they didn't do that until a few years ago. the oral history, 149 interviews, when you think back on those interviews, 300 hours, what are the highlights for you? where did you sit there and go, i did not know this? >> the delight achievement and everywhere he talks about president -- the dwight shafeman interview. robert bork's recollection of tension in the white house and in the justice department. he is a good storyteller. listen to lyn harmen. he was a partner in nixon's law firm. he is still with us. i interviewed him twice for the library. he knew nixon through the wilderness period. he knew john mitchell. john mitchell would become attorney general of the united states, would lead the -- would leave that post to run nixon's campaign and would end up in jail. to listen to him talk about richard nixon, the late-night calls -- nixon was an insomniac, i guess -- so he would call people like garmin just to talk, just to wind down. nixon would fall asleep and he would drop the phone. so the person on the other end of the phone would hear it thud against the ground. but to hear that on tapes -- his description of nixon talking to loretta scott king after the assassination of martin luther king. he decided he should speak with king's widow, but he does not call her when her husband was in jail in birmingham. to listen to fred malek talk about why he made the order to make a list of jews. >> who didn't give you good answers? that's not fair. who didn't give you what you thought was not honest answers? >> first of all, i want to make it clear, even though i am free to say whatever i want and i am free to say what ever want, it is very hard for me to know for sure who is telling the truth or not. so it is a feeling. i have done enough of these interviews. my feeling is that chuck colson was not being straightforward with me. the evidence was overwhelming evidence that linked him to certain things that even the washington -- that even the watergate special prosecutors could not make sense of. >> what was his job? >> he was special counsel to the president. he was basically the president's boyd for political activities and special things -- president boy for political activities and special things. >> he wanted me to fire all the people in the labor statistics. i called george. i said, he wants to fire the head of the bureau of labor statistics. he says they're all against him. he says, don't do anything until i come back. he flew back and dealt directly with the president. there were many times that i didn't do what he said. there were on awful lot of things that he would ask you that you knew that you couldn't do and shouldn't do. >> the interview with george shultz was very powerful. it is only an hour. he only had time for an interview of an hour. he is still reasonably fit. in a few days, he will be 92. that was a moving interview. the interview with robert stockists, the student at the time who met nixon. the student. talking with the special prosecutors, jill [indiscernible] her story is remarkable. i was just about to leave, the summer 2011, and by closest friends knew that i was about to announce -- the watergate exhibit opened in 2011. it was time for me to go. so i was wrapping things up in my mind. and some veterans of the watergate at the house judiciary committee called me and said we would like to interview us. john door had given permission, when he was still alive, but would not be interviewed for the project. he does not do interviews, apparently. he had already started to show these on c-span. they saw them. they wanted this done and they felt that their story should be preserved, too. i had the fbi, the head of the fbi investigation. i did 18 of those interviews before i left. in the last few weeks working for the federal government. i realized this was a once-in- a-lifetime opportunity. and there was a cumulative effect. i was a much better interviewer at the end of this process than in the beginning because i could make connections in my own mind because i had sat through so many of these. for people interested in how this country dealt with impeachment for the first time in the modern era, these interviews are rather interesting. of course, these people would later be involved in the clinton impeachment issue, although on the different side, and they talk about that. so you have an opportunity in listening to people like evan davis and bernie nussbaum. you can hear them talk about two impeachment's in different stages of their lives. i felt so grateful that they had called and that i was around to do that. i did shivers because you can sit there and be transported not simply to 1974, but to 1998 and 1999. and you learn something about our country because people who do public service do it for a long time and they cover many administrations. and they carry both institutional memory and baggage from one era to another. as these folks talk about impeachment, you can see both institutional memory and baggage played out before your eyes. i felt privileged to be an eye witness to those. >> here is another robert bork tape. what is the smoking gun? >> this is important. ok, president nixon i believe understood that the tapes would be his undoing -- i would say unraveling, but that is a bad pun. so he fought tooth and nail to prevent the tapes from being released. this goes to the supreme court. the case is u.s. v nixon. it is decided in august of 1974. he must turn over the tapes. the executive powers and privilege to not cover a criminal trial. as a result, the president gives the special prosecutor a set of tapes that leon dorsey who had been the special prosecutor. before giving them, president nixon ordered transcripts be made before they are turned over and he knows which ones are problematic. so he gets that transcript and he shows them to people. there is an interview that we did with trent lott, then member of congress from mississippi, famous senator, majority leader, i think. he gets a bootleg copy, if you will. but the tape is not released, only the transcript. in the transcript, you can read the president ordering the cia to disrupt an fbi investigation and to lie to the fbi, that the fbi should not look into the sources of funding that was later used by the watergate burglars for national security reasons. don't look into it because it would open a cia operation. it is not true, but the president wanted to use the cia to protect a political shenanigan, a political crime, and use the national security exemption as a cover-up. >> your interview was done in 2008. robert bork was still alive. here he is talking about the smoking gun tape. >> what was your reaction when you heard of the smoking gun tape? >> dismay, but not surprised. >> could you develop that a little? >> i was sorry to see the last nail hammered into the coffin. but i was not so terribly surprised there was a smoking gun. george called me and said, look, we're going into court in about five minutes. i want to tell you that there is an 18 and 1/2 minute gap in the tape. that surprised me and dismayed me. you cannot show up with an 18 1/2 minute gap. that would suspect something. >> how would that affect being on the supreme court? >> i don't remember. i am quite sure -- i haven't looked at that whole interview -- i guess it has been four years since i did it. we talked about the consequences of it. i suspect it is there, but i don't swear to it because i'm not sure. what i did in these interviews -- there is sort of a standard approach. i started well before the nixon period because i wanted to situate them in time and space. a number of them were world war ii veterans. i felt that it would be wonderful to have some vets recollections. i brought them through the nixon period and always would afterwards. i wouldn't be surprised if we talked about afterwards. i know he felt that he was -- he suffered for what he did. the treatment of him later on was the product of the decisions he made in 1970. >> when your time at the library was up and when your time and doing all of these interviews were up, how did you change your mind? >> welle -- >> about richard nixon. >> my mind changed in a strong wave. -- in a strong way. i didn't like richard nixon when i started. but i don't think you have to like the president to respect them. i am among those who feel -- i am not among those who feel that the president has to be a nice person. i am interested in a president who leads and whose administration does good things for the country, including defending american liberties. but i didn't like compared i couldn't possibly like him because i had heard him on the tapes at the miller center. and by the way, the people who were hiring me knew my background. anybody who's job it was to familiarize themselves with presidential tapes would know very well richard nixon's comments. because a lot of those things that come out. over the time i was there, we've been least another 630 hours of the tapes because there were still takes to be released and there are still more to be released. i'm sorry, i couldn't like a man who said things like that about other people. and it's not just once. it is repeated and it is clear that it was a mindset. but that is irrelevant, whether you like somebody. it is whether you respect them. i have to tell you that my respect for our richard nixon plummeted -- for richard nixon plummeted as i got to know more about him, as i oversaw the archives, and come in the 1990's, the national archives, under a lot of pressure from the nixon foundation, withheld some materials which i had a need to know about because i was working on the watergate exhibit. i went into the vaults. these are not classified materials. there were closed for other reasons. i went through the materials. i said why these closed? we put them on the web site, the key ones, about watergate. they shouldn't have been withheld. and it was not the fault of the archives working the nixon project. they were under enormous political pressure. it is a very sad story. there are some very be heroes in the late 1980's and 1990's. anyway, that material, coupled with what i learned from the oral histories and the tapes that we released left me for the dismayed. a lot of what the good that the nixon administration did on domestic policy is the achievement of a lot of good government republicans who worked for him. there are some real heroes that i did not know about who my greatly admire and even went on to work in the george herbert walker bush administration. those are the people who deserve credit. on the tape, richard nixon often wants to dismantle these things. he is embarrassed that he is involved. if he had had a second term, some of the things that he is now credited with, some of the environmental policies, he would dismantle them. in terms of his approach to government, i believe that you should never use government to hurt people. and he sought to use government to actually hurt people. the fact that he did not do more of it is because a real heroes within the administration stopped him. and these are self-serving people who said this on tape for their own legacy. but this is what the documents and the white house tapes show. i must say that my opinion of richard nixon dropped dramatically. i think the country was very fortunate that things didn't turn out worse because they could have turned out much worse. >> are there people who think richard nixon got a raw deal? >> allot. -- a lot. most of the volunteers feel that way. i wasn't planning to change their minds. i wanted to open their minds to the possibility that the critics of richard nixon might not just be partisan attacks. and i hope -- partisan hacks. and i hope that the oral history explains that there is a line you have to draw and the president shouldn't cross it. and on occasion, richard nixon crossed it. i know i am naive, but you cannot be a teacher if you're not an idealist in some way. it didn't work. and there are people in and around the library who believe that he got a raw deal. i remember summit coming up to me when we had one of our tapes openings who was a volunteer at the library say to me, we understand that you can create the states and washington and the you are actually able to manipulate them to make richard nixon sound worse. is that true? they thought i could somehow create richard nixon's anti- semitic comments. they did not want to believe that that was the historical record. oh, no, it is remarkable. i would say i learned so much about the -- about how hard it is to persuade people to have an open mind. and how partisan some people can be. nixon's story is a great story. if you're looking for a great republican story, this is a great story. it is not richard nixon. it is schultz and paul o'neill. you don't have to be partisan about this. but if your goal is to defend richard nixon, then misinformation is troubling. and i found people whose solitary objective was to disprove any critic of richard nixon because they needed him to be the saint who was wronged. >> tim naftali, former director of the nixon library. thank you so much. >> for a dvd copy of this program call 1-877-662-776. for free transcript or to give us your comments, visit us at qanda.org. >> the communism of china that is basically communism enabled me these days. it does preserve the power of the members of the communist power -- city but they threw it aside when he opened the country of and now has become -- now has become a capitalist haven. they talk a great we about to this, but it is all about preserving the party's power economically as the country continues to grow, because they threw aside most aspects of communism to a great time ago. north korea is all about preserving the power of the military and the kim dynasty. again, it really has nothing to do with what karl marx it visited as communism way back. someone could do a fascinating book about how and a move to agent it diverged. it is an absolutely fascinating split that occurred. >> harvard fellow keith richard burke of 34 years of reporting and insights from around the world. next sunday at 8:00 on c-span q&a. >> next, your calls and comments. live at 2:00, c-span begins its new series. first ladies, influence and image with a discussion about the influence of women who served as the first lady. >> what worries me is i do not want to be sitting in the same place i was a couple of years ago going to the government to say can we have more spectrum, please. i would like to see spectrum management that is much more market-driven so that things like incentive options will continue to work. the commission gives more flexibility. the secondary market works it a little bit of a smoother way that it does now. >> you look at the growth rate in data usage from cable data services. anywhere from 30-40% rate on an annual basis. there is an insatiable hunger for capacity. there is a long future to be able to be the provider of choice for the services. >> or from the consumer electronics show with the future of cable, specter views, and research and development tonight at 8:00 eastern on c-span to. take of the sporting -- >> this take of the sporting -- >> this morning, dougl
a group of alumni of the nixon administration who worked on the domestic side rallied and raised a lot of money for this program. i received contributions from donald rumsfeld. i believe dick cheney. i think paul o'neill provided some funding. member people. the fault of the domestic side of the head ministration hasn't received the b.j. of the administration hasn't received the domestic side of the administration has not received that much attention. for the watergate interviews, i used the trust fund. i was very conservative about the way i used the money. the library received one half of the ticket money that came into the library. that money was our trust fund. i used the money for public programming because the nixon foundation shut down all funding. normally, these libraries, people don't know, but the utilities are paid by the federal government. the staff is fedele and their salaries are paid by the federal government. but public programming, there is no funding for that. congress does not appropriate any money for that. we are mandated to do non- partisan work, yet we don't have any non-partisan money. i participated in the negotiations with the nixon foundation. one of the things that the national archives wanted to do was to give $5 in perpetuity from every ticket. i realize that, years from now, $5 might be a quarter. so we negotiated 50%. i was able to fund our public programming, the world history program, and i contributed from that trust fund 50% of the money that went into the watergate exhibit. there was no way to have the watergate exhibit otherwise. by the 34th year, we had $5 million-we had half a million dollars in that trust fund. >> where is it located? >> it is in yorba linda, calif., about half an hour south of l.a. it is a good distance from l.a. to san diego. it is a little closer to l.a. it is in orange county. it is a changing environment, but it is a wealthy, somewhat conservative community. one of the challenges i had was to make the library in a national institution while still respectful of local customs and that was not easy. >> so the foundation, the chairman is still ron walker. how would you describe -- you were very controversial you were about as controversial as any director. >> this is what -- i promised -- if you look at what i said from the beginning, from 2006 when the national archives hired me to do this, i was very straightforward about what i was going to do. so there is no debate in switching. the archives came to me. but it was a very interesting conflict of different events because the head of the nixon foundation at that point was john taylor, rev. john taylor. and john taylor is an intellectual. he is very complicated. he is a bit torn about nixon. and he admired nixon's mind. and he wanted nixon's library to be credible. now, i don't believe that every member of the nixon foundation shared john's intellectual goal. he really wanted the cold war historian. he knew who i was because i had worked on the project with pda. i just let the materials speak for themselves. i write books, but on different subjects. john taylor wanted me, too. he was hired by then-president george w. bush. my first book is about the cuban missile crisis. both of them wanted me. they came to me. i did not apply for the job. from the beginning, i said, look, i am a historian. we have to have a place where history is so comfortable. i am not a member of the republican party. i am not partisan crowd i am now going to become a member of the republican party. and that is aside from the fact that i was gay. i told them come if you want this, this is what you will get. i was very straightforward. i spoke with julie nixon eisenhower and tricia nixon carps. i told them, i'm going to create space where there will be a debate about your father, but i promise to be respectful and it will be intellectual and your father was an intellectual. and that is what i promised. the fact that the foundation later would make a big deal out of this was politics. because they knew what they're getting from the beginning. and it becomes politics -- i will tell you what happened. the foundation paid lip service. john was a complicated figure, but most of the members paid lip service. they thought that washington would bring me in. the work -- would reign me in. they assumed, regardless of my big talking or whatever i believe, that ultimately they would reign me in. albert weinstein was very nervous about having a nixon library that would be viewed like a cover-up. and john taylor says he wanted me just as much as alan one stop. -- alan weinstock. they both came to me in 2006 and said, would you do this? >> where were you then? >> i was in the university of virginia. i was doing some teaching. i had worked on the nixon tapes a little bit appeared mostly on the kennedy and johnson takes. i knew what nixon sat on the tapes. i recognize the problem with the federal government. how does the federal government paper over some one who makes racist and anti-semitic comments on tape that can be played over and over again? the answers you don't paper it over. that means that the library cannot be a legacy factor. >> we can at least read the transcripts. >> this is the achievement of part of the nixon project. before there was a library, there was a group of very dedicated archivist's working for the national archives. there was a legal professor who pushed hard for this period of the first opening was at the end of the 1990's. so there's a lot of very bad material that was available. >> have all of that been transcribed? >> no, that takes forever. very little is transcribed. even that is only about 15% of the abuse of power takes. long story short, here's the problem for the federal government. we have a habit in this country coming if i may say this now, of glossing over presidents. we have decided that they all have to be treated as if they are symbols of the country. what that means is that you have a smoothing over of the rough edges. and there is a feeling among modern presidents the they have a right to a certain veneration and it will be located in that presidential library. and even if they're gone, their children in some cases and former allies, other lieutenants who live longer than presidents because they're younger, they continue this. in fact, in many ways, they are even more ferocious to preserve this legacy, because the old man is gone and want to show their loyalty. this is difficult when you have a flawed president. >> you had some controversy over watergate. >> yes. >> have you been to the clinton library? >> i was going to ask you how they dealt with all the problems he had with impeachment and if they had been fair. >> i was told that he was really impressed with the watergate exhibit. i was told that would inspire him to do some -- to make some changes to the museum. one of the things that allen weinstein was hoping was that the nixon library to be a new start. some of the libraries are much too much like shrines. this is public money. you don't get to take off on your tax return with your money goes to a public entity or a public library. it goes to every library. >> george w. bush's library opened in the early part of 2013. how much of the building was paid for by the federal government? >> the building is pay full -- is before by his private foundation. the deal is that they build the building and they have to meet national archives specifications, federal government specification. >> only certain amount of feet? >> i would like to be a debate. i think americans up to decide what they want occurred but i don't think they know they have a choice. right now, congress is reducing the amount of money that is going to these libraries. the result is that the libraries will be more and more like shrines did you ask the private ally of a president to cough up a lot of money, what do they want in return? of course, they expect a certain slant. not only will you build a building, but they will create an endowment to pay for them build in -- the building in perpetuity. so these buildings are more and more pay for with private funds. the federal government gets the keys, the handover the day they open the building. the the government is there, but the federal government is the pauper. it is an amazing thing. you have directors took no money. the money they have is to pay for salaries and it is delightful. >> but the nixon library started the family. >> the nixon library is the only one started this way. it started as a private facility. that was because of watergate. gerald ford signed a law in 1974 called the presidential recording of materials preservation act. i was the only director whose work was governed by a single law. there are differing laws that govern the libraries that print only the nixon materials. by law, richard nixon's materials could not leave 20 miles outside of the district of columbia because it was felt that richard nixon was not a trustworthy conservator of his material. so they couldn't have a library. by law, he couldn't have a live library and that is because richard nixon had cut a deal and congress found out about it. he cut a deal with one of his appointees who was the head of the gao. i'm sorry, the gsa. it is the government services administration appeared at those in those days, they ran the national archives. the deal was that richard nixon would have the tapes in five years and could destroy whatever he wanted. he could destroy and he could have his papers and destroy them appeared richard nixon cut this deal before he left the white house. congress found out about it, went crazy and seized his materials. that meant that the nixon materials were like a crime scene. i am telling you, running the nixon library is one of the most phenomenal experiences one could have. because what happened was nixon overplayed his hand and the government responded in a very tough way. so everything was scooped up, absolutely everything, including separate -- super 8s. those were films back then. it was on government time. people used to take their super eight cameras, and videotaped their birthday parties, their kids' birthday parties. and then they would use the white house labs to develop them. so they had these birthday party reels in their offices and they were all seized. everything was seized, unless somebody destroyed something. the federal government, if they were not that heavy handed, they would give them back. my point simply is that nixon's materials were handled differently. now his family and his friends felt he deserved a place of reflection and ultimately a place where he and pat nixon were buried. so they opened a library with no papers. i described it to folks at the roger nixon library. >> were his vice-presidential papers there? >> there were not because he deeded them to the federal government. all he had were his pre- presidential papers, not including the vice presidential papers, and his post- presidential papers i was not around at that time, but the family decided this isn't right. our father wanted a library like every other president. and they lobby congress in the first bush term to change that law so that the materials could be sent to california. but the tradition was that they would have to be sent to a national archive facility i was the director. i oversaw the move. >> and now john taylor, an episcopal priest, was running the nixon library before the federal government took over. >> yes. and he desperately wanted an expert to have impaired my sense is that not everybody in the foundation wanted it to happen to have it. my sense is that not everyone in the foundation wanted it to happen. we didn't do it in person. we did it by letter. but bruce herschensohn who ran for senate in california was a nixon speechwriter. i think he was also a speechwriter for ronald reagan. he was also in the u.s. ia, the united states information agency, and he wrote the screenplay for the memorial film about jfk, the man who fought a lot about american history. he disagreed with my approach from the get go. well before the controversies of bringing in john d.. he said every president has a right to a watering hole. there are all those who admires him who can go and speak and not have to worry about the judgment of history. i believe that's true if it is a private facility. but the minute you make it public, i think it can't be published--- cannot be governed by those rules. again, i don't think the public recognizes that it has a choice. if you go to the different presidential libraries, you'll find this among them are shrines and others are places of serious discussion. the harry truman, for example, is a place of serious discussion. the johnson library is redoing its museum. i haven't seen it yet, but i suspect it will be a place for serious discussion. and there are others that are not. i think the public needs to figure out what they want. >> your office is in what relationship to the foundation? >> i am a cold war historian. i had this discussion. when john taylor was encouraging me to take the job, i said, john, one of the conditions i have was that i would like to run all public programming in the building because i don't want to run berlin. i had steadied divided berlin. i don't want to do that. it would be terrible. but in the end, that is what we got, berlin. my office is one area. the foundation is looking very far from us. relations get very tense and cool. as i said, the shutdown of funding for the library. >> are they required to fund anything? >> i am not a lawyer, but let me put it this way. in the transfer agreement, one of their objectives is supposed to be assisting the library, but there's no set amount that they're supposed to provide a will tell you, when i started, they promised a two hundred $50,000 a year for public programming. that never happened. it a very tense. >> one is -- when was it the most tense and why? >> it didn't take that long. a lot of the fights were actually over little things. they were supposed to setup assistance. when you are a federal museum, you're supposed to maintain certain levels of humidity and temperature control. with the had purchased for the museum was not good enough. they knew they were supposed to fix that. they wouldn't. they were using the deadline and they were trying to use that against us so that we would pay for it. and i did not want the american people to pay for something that they were supposed to pay for. so that was tense. i remember an argument because they turned to me and said, you are supposed to be on our side. why are you on washington's side? because the taxpayer should not be paying for this. so we had fights over logistical issues. but the intellectual fight started when i invited elizabeth drew in 2007. she is a longtime journalist, observer of the nixon scene, wrote a small biography of richard nixon, a study of his presidency for the american presence series. >> she would not have been a supporter of his. >> but she is a serious person. i made it clear -- look, i have already overseen events with al haig, a number of events. the nixon foundation let me come even though i was not yet fully director, i moderated a lot of events. i worked with them on who we would invite good all i said is i want balance. just give me balance. i would be happy to have people who revere richard nixon, but also have people raise questions. otherwise, this is not a national facility. it is an extension of the white house. i invited elizabeth drew. at that point, they said, that's it. and they shut down funding. we had already set up a whole bunch of events for six months. we plan six months ahead. they stopped funding that. in terms of the role history project, there were a number people on the list and said, okay, we promised we would fund the interview with senator dole. afterwards, no more. so the funding for the world history is stopped. it stopped when i invited elizabeth drew. they assumed that washington would still -- that washington would stop me. they felt that they could put pressure on washington. what they did not understand is that, by saving money so i can run this on my own if they tried to interfere. >> but before they became part the federal government, they could decide all of those things. >> of course. we give them six months -- elizabeth drew with june 2007. i was at the facility starting in october 2006. i was meeting with them all the time. i said over and over again, we have to have balance here. please -- not pleased because it was my decision but i was preparing them for that. >> -- why would you want to put yourself through this? >> i had just become a u.s. citizen. i cared deeply about history. my dad died pretty young. when i became a u.s. citizen, alan escorted my mom to the funeral. >> are you from quebec? and i knew a lot about the fights over the knicks and materials. -- over the nixon materials. there was supposed to be a watergate conference where the nixon foundation was supposed to be receiving things. maybe it is just too much self- confidence, but since both sides wanted me, i thought i had a unique opportunity and i care deeply about this. >> the oral [indiscernible] >> part of my job was overseeing the release of the white house tapes. so i thought i had a remarkable opportunity to do some good as an american citizen. so it was a great challenge. >> let me say what they would say -- my guess -- i can put -- i cannot put words in their mouths. i have talked with some of them before. the would say we didn't want that nixon-hating liberals canadian gays in here that they hired to run the show. this is the problem. they were convinced that washington would either restrain or fire me. and washington would do it. >> meeting allen weinstein. >> and his replacement, the acting director. we were supposed to do -- can you believe this? i managed to recapture -- even after elizabeth drew, a year later, we tried to do some -- we try to find some public programs, some exhibits -- we have a temporary exhibits gallery. you don't just have a permanent gallery. i thought what can i do with them? i believe that you find mutual interest. so i can look with some ideas. for example, let's do something on the moon landing. president nixon was president for all of the apollo moon landings. isn't that a non-partisan wonderful thing to do? 1969, 2009 -- let's do that together. i wanted to do -- and the council funding because they were so angry about john been. >> explain that. -- john dean. >> i invited john dean to speak of the library about his books. i told the nixon foundation in advance. i said, i'm going to have john been here -- john dean here. i think it would be a good thing for us to work on this together. but they split on it. the acting executive director for the foundation, kathy o'connor, who worked recklessly with me and i got along very well with her in 2009, she said, i am understand why you're doing this. john taylor had already left on his blog and publicly supported when i was doing. he recognized that i meant what i said and i said what i meant that my agenda was what i said it was. and he supported me. but the foundation at that point was shifting and christening and they were very unhappy. lemme -- let me read this to you. >> ron walker called john dean a rat. what do you say to that? do you have the sense that there were just throwing this in their face further calling john dean? >> i had said from the beginning that this would not be a credible institution -- which was one of their objectives -- until john dean and other serious critics of the president in that era came. i made it clear. they could have so easily turned this into a success for themselves. what if they had done nothing rather than go public about it? they sent a letter to every former president -- i mean, i think it may surprise some of the viewers. i have never met president clinton. well, i shook his hand, but i did not meet him really. president clinton said who is this tim naftali. they sent a letter to all of the former presidents complain about my decision to invite john dean, saying that i had somehow violated the basic spirit of the provincial library by doing this. they are the ones who made it to grow case out of it and i think it was a big mistake on their -- made a federal case out of it, and i think it was a big mistake on their part. what would it have hurt them to make this non-partisan ground? he was our guest, not theirs. have him come in. let it happen. not make something out of it. and then just test whether i was a man of my word. how was i going to use -- they were always concerned about how will this be used to hurt richard nixon. but they didn't. they made a big fuss about it. they made more out of it than they had to. >> did you fill the auditorium? >> yes. we had an overflow. and they learn from that. because when i invited george mcgovern -- by the way, we had celebrated visitor. when george mcgovern came, they recognize the mistake they had made. then we had a joint event. the nixon foundation and the national archives, the nixon library, we had 506 hundred people. the nixon foundation let us use the facility for that. >> i don't want to put words in your mouth, but isn't this a dysfunctional system where you have these libraries and these museums and then you have the foundation and the federal government? the foundation has to raise money for people loved the president. >> you are not putting words in my mouth. it is a dysfunctional system. and that is why i want the public to know what they're getting. there are a lot of great people working in the system. i admire most of my colleagues, fellow directors. most of them are trying to do what i am trying to do. but most of them did not have the unique circumstances that gave me the independence that i have. i told my mother. i told my friends. i told the people i had in the beginning that i would not stay very long. i had a kennedy book to finish. i have a career as a writer to continue. i have other things i want to do with my life. i want to do some public service. i expected to be in and out of there in three years. i promised that i would move the materials. i promised that i would hire the staff. i promised that i would have the first legitimate academic conference there. it took five years to do it when i finish what was on my list, i left. i think that my job was to be a catalyst. i believe, from this experience that, if you want to change things in government, you have to be prepared to stay for short periods. you cannot stay for long because then you begin to compromise. but if you want to be a catalyst, go win, do the job and leave. i looked at with james polk did. he decided one term would do what he wanted to do. i am not saying i and james polk, but i had this mindset and i did what i needed to do and i would leave. that give me a lot of support. i knew in my soul i was not staying long. i just felt i had an obligation to finish what i started. the oral history program is a not unexpected joy. -- is an unexpected joy. i had that in mind when i started. >> i want to go back to the oral history program in a moment. but i heard somewhere that the replica of the eastern in the white house is built on the campus of the nixon library -- the east room in the white house is built on the campus of the nixon library and run by the foundation. they built it. >> this is true of all the modern libraries. there is a map. i believe it is public information or it should be anyway. there is the foundation space and the national archives space. it is so complicated because -- i can give you an illustration. the reagan library has political speeches in the area around your force one. the audience may have seen presidential campaigns and you might ask yourself how can you have a republican debate in a federal building? you cannot. the air force one pavilion is run by the reagan foundation. it is not federal space. and the clinton library, i believe that the clinton foundation controls part of it. there are some libraries that are totally federal. they are owned completely by the federal government. but the new ones, and the nixon library because it joined the system as one of the new ones, there is a tree between the foundation and the federal government. there is a demarcation mark. in the nixon more--- in the nixon library, you can see the mark. the foundation did not like the mats that i selected. they did not like the logo i had selected. so when you go into the library, you have the national archives logo. and they have mats in front of the doors for the foundation and different colored ones for the national archives. that's why i say that i was running west berlin. it is working this way because congress and i guess the executive branch decided that there is only so much the federal government should spend money on. look, i am not a big government person. i am progressive, but mainly on social issues. let me tell you what i want people to think about. do you want your children, because i care most about the high schools and the elementary school kids to come through these libraries -- how much do you want them to learn history as opposed to cant, to spin that white house as produce. if you don't congress appropriates funds for public programming in these libraries, then they will tend to be shrines. there will be people who will fight that. i did and some of my colleagues do. we fight and we don't have a lot of tools and our disposal and we do not have money to do it, but why make it so hard? >> how much federal money would go into the nixon library every year? >> the budget was roughly -- the library has some staff here to this day in washington. the tapes are done here. at college park. so there are two different budgets. that is to run the building and salary and equipment. there is not a cent for public programming. so if i were to go to an organization and ask money from them and then say but leave intellectual content to me, i recognize that this is a problem. in the end, it proved impossible because they wanted to place such limits on freedom of speech in our programs that i couldn't except it. >> robert curls books were not welcome in the johnson library for years -- robert carroll's books were not welcome in the johnson library for years. >> and then they turned around. i can tell you the that was a great achievement for the system. i participated in the jfk library on a discussion of the bay of pigs. they didn't do that until a few years ago. the oral history, 149 interviews, when you think back on those interviews, 300 hours, what are the highlights for you? where did you sit there and go, i did not know this? >> the delight achievement and everywhere he talks about president -- the dwight shafeman interview. robert bork's recollection of tension in the white house and in the justice department. he is a good storyteller. listen to lyn harmen. he was a partner in nixon's law firm. he is still with us. i interviewed him twice for the library. he knew nixon through the wilderness period. he knew john mitchell. john mitchell would become attorney general of the united states, would lead the -- would leave that post to run nixon's campaign and would end up in jail. to listen to him talk about richard nixon, the late-night calls -- nixon was an insomniac, i guess -- so he would call people like garmin just to talk, just to wind down. nixon would fall asleep and he would drop the phone. so the person on the other end of the phone would hear it thud against the ground. but to hear that on tapes -- his description of nixon talking to coretta scott king after the assassination of martin luther king. he decided he should speak with king's widow, but he does not call her when her husband was in jail in birmingham. to listen to fred malek talk about why he made the order to make a list of jews. >> who didn't give you good answers? that's not fair. who didn't give you what you thought was not honest answers? >> first of all, i want to make it clear, even though i am free to say whatever i want and i am free to say what ever want, it is very hard for me to know for sure who is telling the truth or not. so it is a feeling. i have done enough of these interviews. my feeling is that chuck colson was not being straightforward with me. the evidence was overwhelming evidence that linked him to certain things that even the washington -- that even the watergate special prosecutors could not make sense of. >> what was his job? >> he was special counsel to the president. he was basically the president's boyd for political activities and special things -- president boy for political activities and special things. >> he wanted me to fire all the people in the labor statistics. i called george. i said, he wants to fire the head of the bureau of labor statistics. he says they're all against him. he says, don't do anything until i come back. he flew back and dealt directly with the president. there were many times that i didn't do what he said. there were on awful lot of things that he would ask you that you knew that you couldn't do and shouldn't do. >> the interview with george shultz was very powerful. it is only an hour. he only had time for an interview of an hour. he is still reasonably fit. in a few days, he will be 92. that was a moving interview. the interview with robert stockists, the student at the time who met nixon. talking with the special prosecutors, jill [indiscernible] her story is remarkable. i was just about to leave, the summer 2011, and by closest friends knew that i was about to announce -- the watergate exhibit opened in 2011. it was time for me to go. so i was wrapping things up in my mind. and some veterans of the watergate at the house judiciary committee called me and said we would like to interview us. john door had given permission, when he was still alive, but would not be interviewed for the project. he does not do interviews, apparently. he had already started to show these on c-span. they saw them. they wanted this done and they felt that their story should be preserved, too. i had the fbi, the head of the fbi investigation. i did 18 of those interviews before i left. in the last few weeks working for the federal government. i realized this was a once-in-a- lifetime opportunity. and there was a cumulative effect. i was a much better interviewer at the end of this process than in the beginning because i could make connections in my own mind because i had sat through so many of these. for people interested in how this country dealt with impeachment for the first time in the modern era, these interviews are rather interesting. of course, these people would later be involved in the clinton impeachment issue, although on the different side, and they talk about that. so you have an opportunity in listening to people like evan davis and bernie nussbaum. you can hear them talk about two impeachment's in different stages of their lives. i felt so grateful that they had called and that i was around to do that. i did shivers because you can sit there and be transported not simply to 1974, but to 1998 and 1999. and you learn something about our country because people who do public service do it for a long time and they cover many administrations. and they carry both institutional memory and baggage from one era to another. as these folks talk about impeachment, you can see both institutional memory and baggage played out before your eyes. i felt privileged to be an eye witness to those. >> here is another robert bork tape. what is the smoking gun? >> this is important. ok, president nixon i believe understood that the tapes would be his undoing -- i would say unraveling, but that is a bad pun. so he fought tooth and nail to prevent the tapes from being released. this goes to the supreme court. the case is u.s. v nixon. it is decided in august of 1974. he must turn over the tapes. the executive powers and privilege to not cover a criminal trial. as a result, the president gives the special prosecutor a set of tapes that leon dorsey who had been the special prosecutor. before giving them, president nixon ordered transcripts be made before they are turned over and he knows which ones are problematic. so he gets that transcript and he shows them to people. there is an interview that we did with trent lott, then member of congress from mississippi, famous senator, majority leader, i think. he gets a bootleg copy, if you will. but the tape is not released, only the transcript. in the transcript, you can read the president ordering the cia to disrupt an fbi investigation and to lie to the fbi, that the fbi should not look into the sources of funding that was later used by the watergate burglars for national security reasons. don't look into it because it would open a cia operation. it is not true, but the president wanted to use the cia to protect a political shenanigan, a political crime, and use the national security exemption as a cover-up. >> your interview was done in 2008. robert bork was still alive. here he is talking about the smoking gun tape. >> what was your reaction when you heard of the smoking gun tape? >> dismay, but not surprised. >> could you develop that a little? >> i was sorry to see the last nail hammered into the coffin. but i was not so terribly surprised there was a smoking gun. george called me and said, look, we're going into court in about five minutes. i want to tell you that there is an 18 and 1/2 minute gap in the tape. that surprised me and dismayed me. you cannot show up with an 18 1/2 minute gap. that would suspect something. >> how would that affect being on the supreme court? >> i don't remember. i am quite sure -- i haven't looked at that whole interview i guess it has been four years since i did it. we talked about the consequences of it. i suspect it is there, but i don't swear to it because i'm not sure. what i did in these interviews there is sort of a standard approach. i started well before the nixon period because i wanted to situate them in time and space. a number of them were world war ii veterans. i felt that it would be wonderful to have some vets recollections. i brought them through the nixon period and always would afterwards. i wouldn't be surprised if we talked about afterwards. i know he felt that he was -- he suffered for what he did. the treatment of him later on was the product of the decisions he made in 1970. >> when your time at the library was up and when your time and doing all of these interviews were up, how did you change your mind? >> welle -- >> about richard nixon. >> my mind changed in a strong wave. -- in a strong way. i didn't like richard nixon when i started. but i don't think you have to like the president to respect them. i am among those who feel -- i am not among those who feel that the president has to be a nice person. i am interested in a president who leads and whose administration does good things for the country, including defending american liberties. but i didn't like compared i couldn't possibly like him because i had heard him on the tapes at the miller center. and by the way, the people who were hiring me knew my background. anybody who's job it was to familiarize themselves with presidential tapes would know very well richard nixon's comments. because a lot of those things that come out. over the time i was there, we've been least another 630 hours of the tapes because there were still takes to be released and there are still more to be released. i'm sorry, i couldn't like a man who said things like that about other people. and it's not just once. it is repeated and it is clear that it was a mindset. but that is irrelevant, whether you like somebody. it is whether you respect them. i have to tell you that my respect for our richard nixon plummeted -- for richard nixon plummeted as i got to know more about him, as i oversaw the archives, and come in the 1990's, the national archives, under a lot of pressure from the nixon foundation, withheld some materials which i had a need to know about because i was working on the watergate exhibit. i went into the vaults. these are not classified materials. there were closed for other reasons. i went through the materials. i said why these closed? we put them on the web site, the key ones, about watergate. they shouldn't have been withheld. and it was not the fault of the archives working the nixon project. they were under enormous political pressure. it is a very sad story. there are some very be heroes in the late 1980's and 1990's. anyway, that material, coupled with what i learned from the oral histories and the tapes that we released left me for the dismayed. a lot of what the good that the nixon administration did on domestic policy is the achievement of a lot of good government republicans who worked for him. there are some real heroes that i did not know about who my greatly admire and even went on to work in the george herbert walker bush administration. those are the people who deserve credit. on the tape, richard nixon often wants to dismantle these things. he is embarrassed that he is involved. if he had had a second term, some of the things that he is now credited with, some of the environmental policies, he would dismantle them. in terms of his approach to government, i believe that you should never use government to hurt people. and he sought to use government to actually hurt people. the fact that he did not do more of it is because a real heroes within the administration stopped him. and these are self-serving people who said this on tape for their own legacy. but this is what the documents and the white house tapes show. i must say that my opinion of richard nixon dropped dramatically. i think the country was very fortunate that things didn't turn out worse because they could have turned out much worse. >> are there people who think richard nixon got a raw deal? >> allot. -- a lot. most of the volunteers feel that way. i wasn't planning to change their minds. i wanted to open their minds to the possibility that the critics of richard nixon might not just be partisan attacks. and i hope -- partisan hacks. and i hope that the oral history explains that there is a line you have to draw and the president shouldn't cross it. and on occasion, richard nixon crossed it. i know i am naive, but you cannot be a teacher if you're not an idealist in some way. it didn't work. and there are people in and around the library who believe that he got a raw deal. i remember summit coming up to me when we had one of our tapes openings who was a volunteer at the library say to me, we understand that you can create the states and washington and the you are actually able to manipulate them to make richard nixon sound worse. is that true? they thought i could somehow create richard nixon's anti- semitic comments. they did not want to believe that that was the historical record. oh, no, it is remarkable. i would say i learned so much about the -- about how hard it is to persuade people to have an open mind. and how partisan some people can be. nixon's story is a great story. if you're looking for a great republican story, this is a great story. it is not richard nixon. it is schultz and paul o'neill. you don't have to be partisan about this. but if your goal is to defend richard nixon, then misinformation is troubling. and i found people whose solitary objective was to solitary objective was to disprove any critic of richard
a group of alumni of the nixon administration who worked on the domestic side rallied and raise a lot of money for this program. i received contributions from donald rumsfeld. i believe dick cheney. i think paul o'neill provided some funding. member people. the fault of the domestic side of the head ministration hasn't received the b.j. of the administration hasn't received -- the domestic side of the administration has not received that much attention. for the watergate interviews, i used the trust fund. i was very conservative about the way i used the money. the library received one head- one half of all of the ticket money that came into the library card -- one half of the ticket money that came into the library. that money was our trust fund. i used the money for public programming because the nixon foundation shut down all funding. normally, these libraries, people don't know, but the utilities are paid by the federal government. the staff is fedele and their salaries are paid by the federal government. but public programming, there is no funding for that. congress does not appropriate any money for that. we are mandated to do non- partisan work, yet we don't have any non-partisan money. i enlisted this problem when they heard me. i participated in the negotiations with the nixon foundation. one of the things that the national archives wanted to do was to give $5 in perpetuity from every ticket. i realize that, years from now, $5 might be a quarter. so we negotiated 50%. i was able to fund our public programming, the world history program, and i contributed from that trust fund 50% of the money that went into the watergate exhibit. there was no way to have the watergate exhibit otherwise. by the 34th year, we havhad $5 million-we had half a million dollars in that trust fund. >> where is it located? >> it is in yorba linda, calif., about half an hour south of l.a. it is a good distance from l.a. to san diego. it is a little closer to l.a. it is in orange county. it is a changing environment, but it is a wealthy, somewhat conservative community. one of the challenges i had was to make the library in a national institution while still respectful of local customs and that was not easy. >> so the foundation, the chairman is still ron walker. how would you describe -- you were very controversial you were about as controversial as any director. >> this is what -- i promised -- if you look at what i said from the beginning, from 2006 when the national archives hired me to do this, i was very straightforward about what i was going to do. so there is no debate in switching. the archives came to me. but it was a very interesting conflict of different events because the head of the nixon foundation at that point was john taylor, rev. john taylor. and john taylor is an intellectual. he is very complicated. he is a bit torn about nixon. and he admired nixon's mind. and he wanted nixon's library to be credible. now, i don't believe that every member of the nixon foundation shared john's intellectual goal. he really wanted the cold war historian. he knew who i was because i had worked on the project with pda. i just let the materials speak for themselves. i write books, but on different subjects. john taylor wanted me, too. he was hired by then-president george w. bush. my first book is about the cuban missile crisis. both of them wanted me. they came to me. i did not apply for the job. from the beginning, i said, look, i am a historian. we have to have a place where history is so comfortable. i am not a member of the republican party. i am not partisan crowd i am now going to become a member of the republican party. and that is aside from the fact that i was gay. i told them come if you want this, this is what you will get. i was very straightforward. i spoke with julie nixon eisenhower and tricia nixon carps. i told them, i'm going to create space where there will be a debate about your father, but i promise to be respectful and it will be intellectual and your father was an intellectual. and that is what i promised. the fact that the foundation later would make a big deal out of this was politics. because they knew what they're getting from the beginning. and it becomes politics -- i will tell you what happened. the foundation paid lip service. john was a complicated figure, but most of the members paid lip service. they thought that washington would bring me in. the work -- would reign me in. they assumed, regardless of my big talking or whatever i believe, that ultimately they would reign me in. albert weinstein was very nervous about having a nixon library that would be viewed like a cover-up. and john taylor says he wanted me just as much as alan one stop. -- alan weinstock. they both came to me in 2006 and said, would you do this? >> where were you then? >> i was in the university of virginia. i was doing some teaching. i had worked on the nixon tapes a little bit appeared mostly on the kennedy and johnson takes. i knew what nixon sat on the tapes. i recognize the problem with the federal government. how does the federal government paper over some one who makes racist and anti-semitic comments on tape that can be played over and over again? the answers you don't paper it over. that means that the library cannot be a legacy factor. >> we can at least read the transcripts. >> this is the achievement of part of the nixon project. before there was a library, there was a group of very dedicated archivist's working for the national archives. there was a legal professor who pushed hard for this period of the first opening was at the end of the 1990's. so there's a lot of very bad material that was available. >> have all of that been transcribed? >> know, that takes forever. very little is transcribed. even that is only about 15% of the abuse of power takes. long story short, here's the problem for the federal government. we have a habit in this country coming if i may say this now, of glossing over presidents. we have decided that they all have to be treated as if they are symbols of the country. what that means is that you have a smoothing over of the rough edges. and there is a feeling among modern presidents the they have a right to a certain veneration and it will be located in that presidential library. and even if they're gone, their children in some cases and former allies, other lieutenants who live longer than presidents because they're younger, they continue this. in fact, in many ways, they are even more ferocious to preserve this legacy, because the old man is gone and want to show their loyalty. this is difficult when you have a flawed president. >> you had some controversy over watergate. >> yes. >> have you been to the clinton library? >> i was going to ask you how they dealt with all the problems he had with impeachment and if they had been fair. >> i was told that he was really impressed with the watergate exhibit. i was told that would inspire him to do some -- to make some changes to the museum. one of the things that allen weinstein was hoping was that the nixon library to be a new start. some of the libraries are much too much like shrines. this is public money. you don't get to take off on your tax return with your money goes to a public entity or a public library. it goes to every library. >> george w. bush's library opened in the early part of 2013. how much of the building was paid for by the federal government? >> the building is pay full -- is before by his private foundation. the deal is that they build the building and they have to meet national archives specifications, federal government specification. >> only certain amount of feet? >> i would like to be a debate. i think americans up to decide what they want occurred but i don't think they know they have a choice. right now, congress is reducing the amount of money that is going to these libraries. the result is that the libraries will be more and more like shrines did you ask the private ally of a president to cough up a lot of money, what do they want in return? of course, they expect a certain slant. not only will you build a building, but they will create an endowment to pay for them build in -- the building in perpetuity. so these buildings are more and more pay for with private funds. she billed the building. the federal government gets the keys, the handover the day they open the building. the the government is there, but the federal government is the pauper. it is an amazing thing. you have directors took no money. the money they have is to pay for salaries and it is delightful. >> but the nixon library started the family. >> the nixon library is the only one started this way. it started as a private facility. that was because of watergate. gerald ford signed a law in 1974 called the presidential recording of materials preservation act. i was the only director whose work was governed by a single law. there are differing laws that govern the libraries that print only the nixon materials. by law, richard nixon's materials could not leave 20 miles outside of the district of columbia because it was felt that richard nixon was not a trustworthy conservator of his material. so they couldn't have a library. by law, he couldn't have a live repaired and that is because richard nixon had cut a deal and congress found out about it. he cut a deal with one of his appointees who was the head of the gao. i'm sorry, the gsa. it is the government services administration appeared at those -- in those days, they ran the national archives. the deal was that richard nixon would have the tapes in five years and could destroy whatever he wanted. whatever was not presented for truck, he could destroy and he could have his papers and destroy them appeared richard nixon cut this deal before he left the white house. congress found out about it, went crazy and seized his materials. that meant that the nixon materials were like a crime scene. i am telling you, running the nixon library is one of the most phenomenal experience is one could have. because what happened was nixon overplayed his hand and the government responded in a very tough way. so everything was scooped up, absolutely everything, including separate -- super 8s. those were films back then could it was on government time. people used to take their super eight cameras, and videotaped their birthday parties, their kids' birthday parties. and then they would use the white house labs to develop them. so they had these birthday party reels in their offices and they were all seized. everything was seized, unless somebody destroyed something. the federal government, if they were not that heavy handed, they would give them back. my point simply is that nixes materials were handled differently. now his family and his friends felt he deserved a place of reflection and ultimately a place where he and pat nixon were buried. so they opened a library with no papers. i described it to folks at the roger nixon library. >> were his vice-presidential papers there? >> there were not because he deeded them to the federal government. all he had were his pre- presidential papers, not including the vice presidential papers, and his post- presidential papers i was not around at that time, but the family decided this isn't right. our father wanted a library like every other president. and they lobby congress in the first bush term to change that law so that the materials could be sent to california. but the tradition was that they would have to be sent to a national archive facility i was the director. i oversaw the move. >> and now john taylor, an episcopal priest, was running the nixon library before the federal government took over. >> yes. and he desperately wanted an expert to have impaired my sense is that not everybody in the foundation wanted it to happen -- to have it. my sense is that not everyone in the foundation wanted it to happen. we didn't do it in person. we did it by letter. but bruce herschensohn who ran for senate in california was a nixon speechwriter. i think he was also a speechwriter for ronald reagan. he was also in the u.s. ia, the united states information agency, and he wrote the screenplay for the memorial film about jfk, the man who fought a lot about american history. he disagreed with my approach from the get go. well before the controversies of bringing in john d.. he said every president has a right to a watering hole. there are all those who admires him who can go and speak and not have to worry about the judgment of history. if it is ahat's true private facility. but the minute you make it belic, i think it can't published--- cannot be governed by those rules. again, i don't think the public recognizes that it has a choice. if you go to the different presidential libraries, you'll find this among them are shrines and others are places of serious discussion. the harry truman, for example, is a place of serious discussion. the johnson library is redoing its museum. i haven't seen it yet, but i suspect it will be a place for serious discussion. and there are others that are not. i think the public needs to figure out what they want. " your office is and what -- >> your office is in what relationship to the foundation? >> i chemical war historian. i had this discussion. when john taylor was encouraging me to take the job, i said, john, one of the conditions i have was that i would like to run all public programming in the building because i don't want to run berlin. i had steadied divided berlin. i don't want to do that. it would be terrible. but in the end, that is what we got, berlin. my office is one area. the foundation is looking very far from us. relations get very tense and cool. as i said, the shutdown of funding for the library. >> are they required to fund anything? >> i am not a lawyer, but let me put it this way. in the transfer agreement, one of their objectives is supposed to be assisting the library, but there's no set amount that they're supposed to provide a will tell you, when i started, they promised a two hundred $50,000 a year for public programming. that never happened. it a very tense. >> one is -- when was it the most tense and why? >> it didn't take that long. a lot of the fights were actually over little things. they were supposed to setup assistance. when you are a federal museum, you're supposed to maintain certain levels of humidity and temperature control. with the had purchased for the museum was not good enough. they knew they were supposed to fix that. they wouldn't. they were using the deadline and they were trying to use that against us so that we would pay for it. and i did not want the american people to pay for something that they were supposed to pay for. so that was tense. i remember an argument because they turned to me and said, you are supposed to be on our side. why are you on washington's side? because the taxpayer should not be paying for this. so we had fights over logistical issues. but the intellectual fight started when i invited elizabeth drew in 2007. she is a longtime journalist, observer of the nixon scene, wrote a small biography of richard nixon, a study of his presidency for the american presence series. >> she would not have been a supporter of his. >> but she is a serious person. i made it clear -- look, i have already overseen events with al haig, a number of events. the nixon foundation let me come even though i was not yet fully director, i moderated a lot of events. i worked with them on who we would invite good all i said is i want balance. just give me balance. i would be happy to have people who revere richard nixon, but also have people raise questions. otherwise, this is not a national facility. it is an extension of the white house. i invited elizabeth drew. at that point, they said, that's it. and they shut down funding. we had already set up a whole bunch of events for six months. we plan six months ahead. they stopped funding that. in terms of the role history project, there were a number people on the list and said, okay, we promised we would fund the interview with senator dole. afterwards, no more. so the funding for the world history is stopped. it stopped when i invited elizabeth drew. they assumed that washington would still -- that washington would stop me. they felt that they could put pressure on washington. what they did not understand is that, by saving money so i can run this on my own if they tried to interfere. >> but before they became part of the padilla government, they could decide all of those things. -- part of the federal government, they could decide all of those things. >> of course. we give them six months -- elizabeth drew with june 2007. i was at the facility starting in october 2006. i was meeting with them all the time. i said over and over again, we have to have balance here. please -- not pleased because it was my decision but i was preparing them for that. >> what would you want to put yourself through this? >> -- why would you want to put yourself through this? >> i had just become a u.s. citizen. i cared deeply about history. my dad died pretty young. when i became a u.s. citizen, alan escorted my mom to the funeral. >> are you from quebec? >> from west field. and i knew a lot about the fights over the knicks and materials. -- over the nixon materials. there was supposed to be a watergate conference where the nixon foundation was supposed to be receiving things. maybe it is just too much self- confidence, but since both sides wanted me, i thought i had a unique opportunity and i care deeply about this. >> the oral [indiscernible] >> part of my job was overseeing the release of the white house tapes. so i thought i had a remarkable opportunity to do some good as an american citizen. so it was a great challenge. >> let me say what they would say -- my guess -- i can put -- i cannot put words in their mouths. i have talked with some of them before. the would say we didn't want that nixon-hating liberals canadian gays in here that they hired to run the show. >> this is the problem appeared they were convinced -- this is the problem. they were convinced that washington would either restrain your fire me. and washington would do it. >> meeting allen weinstein. >> and his replacement, the acting director. we were supposed to do -- can you believe this? i managed to recapture -- even after elizabeth drew, a year later, we tried to do some -- we try to find some public programs, some exhibits -- we have a temporary exhibits gallery. you don't just have a permanent gallery. i thought what can i do with them? i believe that you find mutual interest. so i can look with some ideas. for example, let's do something on the moon landing. president nixon was president for all of the apollo moon landings. isn't that a non-partisan wonderful thing to do? 1969, 2009 -- let's do that together. i wanted to do -- and the council funding because they were so angry about john been. >> explain that. -- john dean. >> expo in that. >> i invited john dean to speak of the library about his books. i told the nixon foundation in advance. i said, i'm going to have john been here -- john dean here. i think it would be a good thing for us to work on this together. but they split on it. the acting executive director for the foundation, kathy o'connor, who worked recklessly with me and i got along very well with her in 2009, she said, i am understand why you're doing this. john taylor had already left on his blog and publicly supported when i was doing. he recognized that i meant what i said and i said what i meant and lead this -- that my agenda was what i said it was. and he supported me. but the foundation at that point was shifting and christening and they were very unhappy. lemme -- let me read this to you. >> ron walker called john dean a rat. what do you say to that? do you have the sense that there were just throwing this in their face further calling john dean? >> i had said from the beginning that this would not be a credible institution -- which was one of their objectives -- until john dean and other spheres critics of the president in that era came. i made it clear. they could have so easily turned this into a success for themselves. what if they had done nothing rather than go public about it? they sent a letter to every former president -- i mean, i think it may surprise some of the viewers. i have never met president clinton. well, i shook his hand, but i did not meet him really. president clinton said who is this tim naftali. they sent a letter to all of the former presidents complain about my decision to invite john dean, saying that i had somehow violated the basic spirit of the provincial library by doing this. they are the ones who made it to grow case out of it and i think it was a big mistake on their -- made a federal case out of it, and i think it was a big mistake on their part. what would it have hurt them to make this non-partisan ground? he was our guest, not theirs. have him come in. let it happen. not make something out of it. and then just test whether i was a man of my word. how was i going to use -- they were always concerned about how will this be used to hurt richard nixon. but they didn't. they made a big fuss about it. they made more out of it than they had to. >> did you fill the auditorium? >> yes. we had an overflow. and they learn from that. because when i invited george mcgovern -- by the way, we had celebrated visitor. when george mcgovern came, they recognize the mistake they had made. then we had a joint event. the nixon foundation and the national archives, the nixon library, we had 506 hundred people. the nixon foundation let us use the facility for that. >> i don't want to put words in your mouth, but isn't this a dysfunctional system where you have these libraries and these museums and then you have the foundation and the federal government? the foundation has to raise money for people loved the president. >> you are not putting words in my mouth. it is a dysfunctional system. and that is why i want the public to know what they're getting. there are a lot of great people working in the system. i ed maier most of my colleagues, fellow directors. most of them are -- i admire most of my colleagues, fellow directors. most of them are trying to do what i am trying to do. but most of them did not have the unique circumstances that gave me the independence that i have. i told my mother. i told my friends. i told the people i had in the beginning that i would not stay very long. i had a kennedy book to finish. i have a career as a writer to continue. i have other things i want to do with my life. i want to do some public service could i expected to be in and out of there in three years. i promised that i would move the materials. i promised that i would hire the staff. i promised that i would have the first legitimate academic conference there. it took five years to do it when i finish what was on my list, i left. i think that my job was to be a catalyst. i believe, from this experience that, if you want to change things in government, you have to be prepared to stay for short periods. you cannot stay for long because then you begin to compromise. but if you want to be a catalyst, go win, do the job and leave. i looked at with james polk did. he decided one term would do what he wanted to do. i am not saying i and james polk, but i had this mindset and i did what i needed to do and i would leave. that give me a lot of support. i knew in my soul i was not staying long. i just felt i had an obligation to finish what i started. the oral history program is a not unexpected joy. i had that in mind when i started. -- is an unexpected joy. i had that in mind when i started. >> i want to go back to the oral history program in a moment. but i heard somewhere that the replica of the eastern in the white house is built on the campus of the nixon library -- the east room in the white house is built on the campus of the nixon library and run by the foundation. they built it. >> this is true of all the modern libraries could there is a map. i believe it is public information or it should be anyway. there is the foundation space and the national archives space. it is so complicated because -- i can give you an illustration. the reagan library has political speeches in the area around your force one. the audience may have seen presidential campaigns and you might ask yourself how can you have a republican debate in a federal building? you cannot. the air force one pavilion is run by the reagan foundation. it is not federal space. and the clinton library, i believe that the clinton foundation controls part of it. there are some libraries that are totally federal. they are owned completely by the federal government. but the new ones, and the nixon library because it joined the system as one of the new ones, there is a tree between the foundation and the federal government. there is a demarcation mark. in the nixon more--- in the nixon library, you can see the mark. the foundation did not like the map that i selected. they did not like the logo i had selected. so when you go into the library, you have the national archives logo. of they have matts in front the doors for the foundation and different colored ones for the national archives. that i wasi say running west berlin. it is working this way because congress and i guess the executive branch decided that there is only so much the federal government should spend money on. look, i am not a big government person. i am progressive, but mainly on social issues. let me tell you what i want people to think about. do you want your children, because i care most about the high schools and the elementary school kids to come through these libraries -- how much do you want them to learn history as opposed to cant, to spin that white house as produce. congressn't appropriates funds for public programming in these libraries, then they will tend to be shrines. there will be people who will fight that. i did and some of my colleagues do. we fight and we don't have a lot of tools and our disposal and we do not have money to do it, but why make it so hard? >> how much federal money would go into the nixon library every year? >> the budget was roughly -- the library has some staff here to this day in washington. the tapes are done here. at college park. so there are two different budgets. that is to run the building and salary and equipment. there is not a cent for public programming. so if i were to go to an organization and ask money from them and then say but leave intellectual content to me, i recognize that this is a problem. in the end, it proved impossible because they wanted to place such limits on freedom of speech in our programs that i couldn't except it. >> robert curls books were not welcome in the johnson library for years -- robert carroll's books were not welcome in the johnson library for years. >> and then they turned around. i can tell you the that was a great achievement for the system. i participated in the jfk library on a discussion of the bay of pigs. they didn't do that until a few years ago. the oral history, 149 interviews, when you think back on those interviews, 300 hours, what are the highlights for you? where did you sit there and go, i did not know this? >> the delight achievement and everywhere he talks about president -- the dwight shafeman interview. robert bork's recollection of tension in the white house and in the justice department. he is a good storyteller. listen to lyn harmen. he was a partner in nixon's law firm. he is still with us. i interviewed him twice for the library. he knew nixon through the wilderness period. he knew john mitchell. john mitchell would become attorney general of the united states, would lead the -- would leave that post to run nixon's campaign and would end up in jail. to listen to him talk about richard nixon, the late-night calls -- nixon was an insomniac, i guess -- so he would call people like garmin just to talk, just to wind down. nixon would fall asleep and he would drop the phone. so the person on the other end of the phone would hear it thud against the ground. but to hear that on tapes -- his description of nixon talking to loretta scott king after the assassination of martin luther king. he decided he should speak with not's widow, but he does call her when her husband was in jail in birmingham. to listen to fred malek talk about why he made the order to make a list of jews. >> who didn't give you good answers? that's not fair. who didn't give you what you thought was not honest answers? >> first of all, i want to make it clear, even though i am free to say whatever i want and i am free to say what ever want, it is very hard for me to know for sure who is telling the truth or not. so it is a feeling. i have done enough of these interviews. my feeling is that chuck colson was not being straightforward with me. the evidence was overwhelming evidence that linked him to certain things that even the washington -- that even the watergate special prosecutors could not make sense of. >> what was his job? >> he was special counsel to the president. he was basically the president's boyd for political activities and special things -- president for political activities and special things. >> he wanted me to fire all the people in the labor statistics. i called george. i said, he wants to fire the head of the bureau of labor statistics. he says they're all against him. he says, don't do anything until i come back. he flew back and dealt directly with the president. there were many times that i didn't do what he said. there were on awful lot of things that he would ask you that you knew that you couldn't do and shouldn't do. >> the interview with george shultz was very powerful. it is only an hour. he only had time for an interview of an hour. he is still reasonably fit. in a few days, he will be 92. that was a moving interview. the interview with robert stockists, the student at the time who met nixon. the student. talking with the special prosecutors, jill [indiscernible] her story is remarkable. i was just about to leave, the summer 2011, and by closest friends knew that i was about to announce -- the watergate exhibit opened in 2011. it was time for me to go. so i was wrapping things up in my mind. and some veterans of the watergate at the house judiciary committee called me and said we would like to interview loss could -- to interview us. john door had given permission, when he was still alive, but would not be interviewed for the project. he does not do interviews, apparently. he had already started to show these on c-span. they saw them. they wanted this done and they felt that their story should be preserved, too. i had the fbi, the head of the fbi investigation. i did 18 of those interviews before i left. in the last few weeks working for the federal government. i realized this was a once-in-a- lifetime opportunity. and there was a cumulative effect. i was a much better interviewer at the end of this process than in the beginning because i could make connections in my own mind because i had sat through so many of these. for people interested in how this country dealt with impeachment for the first time in the modern era, these interviews are rather interesting. of course, these people would later be involved in the clinton impeachment issue, although on the different side, and they talk about that. so you have an opportunity in listening to people like evan davis and bernie nussbaum. you can hear them talk about two impeachment's in different stages of their lives. i felt so grateful that they had called and that i was around to do that. i did shivers because you can sit there and be transported not simply to 1974, but to 1998 and 1999. and you learn something about our country because people who do public service do it for a long time and they cover many administrations. and they carry both institutional memory and baggage from one era to another. as these folks talk about impeachment, you can see both institutional memory and baggage played out before your eyes. i felt privileged to be an eye witness to those. >> here is another robert bork tape. what is the smoking gun? >> this is important. ok, president nixon i believe understood that the tapes would be his undoing -- i would say unraveling, but that is a bad pun. so he fought tooth and nail to prevent the tapes from being released. this goes to the supreme court. the case is u.s. the nixon could is decided in august of 1974 -- the case is u.s. v nixon. it is decided in august of 1974. he must turn over the tapes. the executive powers and privilege to not cover a criminal trial. as a result, the president gives the special prosecutor a set of tapes that leon dorsey who had been the special prosecutor. before giving them, president nixon ordered transcripts be made before they are turned over and he knows which ones are problematic. so he gets that transcript and he shows them to people. there is an interview that we did with trent lott, then member of congress from mississippi, famous senator, majority leader, i think. he gets a bootleg copy, if you will. but the tape is not released, only the transcript. in the transcript, you can read the president ordering the cia to disrupt an fbi investigation and to lie to the fbi, that the fbi should not look into the sources of funding that was later used by the watergate burglars for national security reasons. don't look into it because it would open a cia operation. it is not true, but the president wanted to use the cia to protect a political shenanigan, a political crime, and use the national security exemption as a cover-up. >> your interview was done in 2008. robert bork was still alive. here he is talking about the smoking gun tape. >> what was your reaction when you heard of the smoking gun tape? >> dismay, but not surprised. >> could you develop that a little? >> i was sorry to see the last nail hammered into the coffin. but i was not so terribly surprised there was a smoking gun. george called me and said, look, we're going into court in about five minutes. i want to tell you that there is an 18 and 1/2 minute gap in the tape. that surprised me and dismayed me. you cannot show up with an 18 1/2 minute gap. that would suspect something. >> how would that affect being on the supreme court? >> i don't remember. i am quite sure -- i haven't looked at that whole interview -- i guess it has been four years since i did it. we talked about the consequences of it. i suspect it is there, but i don't swear to it because i'm not sure. what i did in these interviews -- there is sort of a standard approach. i started well before the nixon period because i wanted to situate them in time and space. a number of them were world war ii veterans could buy it felt that it would be wonderful to have some vets recollections. i brought them through the nixon period and always would afterwards. i wouldn't be surprised if we talked about afterwards. i know he felt that he was -- he suffered for what he did. the treatment of him later on was the product of the decisions he made in 1970. >> when your time at the library was up and when your time and doing all of these interviews were up, how did you change your mind? >> welle -- >> about richard nixon. >> my mind changed in a strong wave. -- in a strong way. i didn't like richard nixon when i started. but i don't think you have to like the president to respect them. i am among those who feel -- i am not among those who feel that the president has to be a nice person. i am interested in a president who leads and whose administration does good things for the country, including defending american liberties. but i didn't like compared i couldn't possibly like him because i had heard him on the tapes at the miller center. and by the way, the people who were hiring me knew my background. tobody who's job it was familiarize themselves with presidential tapes would know very well richard nixon's comments. because a lot of those things that come out. over the time i was there, we've been least another 630 hours of the tapes because there were still takes to be released and there are still more to be released. i'm sorry, i couldn't like a man who said things like that about other people. once.'s not just it is repeated and it is clear that it was a mindset. but that is irrelevant, whether you like somebody. it is whether you respect them. i have to tell you that my respect for our richard nixon plummeted -- for richard nixon plummeted as i got to know more about him, as i oversaw the archives, and come in the 1990's, the national archives, under a lot of pressure from the nixon foundation, withheld some materials which i had a need to know about because i was working on the watergate exhibit. i went into the vaults. these are not classified materials. there were closed for other reasons. i went through the materials. i said why these closed? we put them on the web site, the key ones, about watergate. they shouldn't have been withheld. and it was not the fault of the archives working the nixon project. they were under enormous political pressure could it is a very sad story. there are some very be heroes in the late 1980's and 1990's. anyway, that material, coupled with what i learned from the oral histories and the tapes that we released left me for the dismayed. a lot of what the good that the nixon administration did on domestic policy is the achievement of a lot of good government republicans who worked for him. there are some real heroes that i did not know about who my greatly admire and even went on to work in the george herbert walker bush administration. those are the people who deserve credit. on the tape, richard nixon often wants to dismantle these things. he is embarrassed that he is involved. if he had had a second term, some of the things that he is now credited with, some of the environmental policies, he would dismantle them. in terms of his approach to government, i believe that you should never use government to hurt people. and he sought to use government to actually hurt people. the fact that he did not do more of it is because a real heroes within the administration stopped him. and these are self-serving people who said this on tape for their own legacy. but this is what the documents and the white house tapes show. i must say that my opinion of richard nixon dropped dramatically. i think the country was very fortunate that things didn't turn out worse because they could have turned out much worse. >> are there people who think richard nixon got a raw deal? >> allot. -- a lot. most of the volunteers feel that way. i wasn't planning to change their minds could i wanted to open their minds to the possibility that the critics of richard nixon might not just be partisan attacks. and i hope -- partisan hacks. and i hope that the oral history explains that there is a line you have to draw and the president shouldn't cross it. and on occasion, richard nixon crossed it. i know i am naive, but you cannot be a teacher if you're not an idealist in some way. it didn't work. and there are people in and around the library who believe that he got a raw deal. i remember summit coming up to me when we had one of our tapes openings who was a volunteer at the library say to me, we understand that you can create the states and washington and the you are actually able to manipulate them to make richard nixon sound worse. is that true? they thought i could somehow create richard nixon's anti- semitic comments. they did not want to believe that that was the historical record. oh, no, it is remarkable. i would say i learned so much about the -- about how hard it is to persuade people to have an open mind. and how partisan some people can be. nixon's story is a great story. if you're looking for a great republican story, this is a great story. it is not richard nixon. .t is schultz and paul o'neill you don't have to be partisan about this. but if your goal is to defend richard nixon, then misinformation is troubling. and i found people whose solitary objective was
he wants immunity before he opens his mouth. speaking of the white house, this question is having the first daughter in the official role the best thing for america? ivanka trump's new job at the white house raises ethical question. and mike pence said he won't do it, but would you? he won't spend time alone with the opposite sex. not for dinner. voice your opinions on the pulse questions. grab your phone or any digital device you have got. go to pulse.msnbc/com. you can vote as anymore times as you'd like. we'll share that data right here on the screen as question go. okay, let's start this hour though with three pressing questions faces the white house on a sunday. number one, did trump officials dig up intelligence reports related to incidental surveillance of trump associates? two, did those trump officials show them to the house intelligence committee chairman? then finally the big question, if so, why? the top ranking democrat on that same committee, adam schiff, offered his first on camera comments since viewing the said documents in question this past week. the white house officials tells schiff those documents were the statement ones viewed by house intelligence chairman nunes. a statement that for him doesn't quite add up. take a listen. >> how does the white house know that these are the same materials that were shown to the chairman if the white house wasn't aware what the chairman was being shown? it was told to me by the deputy assistant that these materials were produced in the ordinary course of business. well, the question for the white house and for mr. spicer is, the ordinary course of who's business? >> according to reports, three white house officials helped chairman nunes view the documents that we're talking about on the white house grounds. nunes calls those reports though mostly wrong. >> the challenge was was finding a place to be able to view this information, to be able to get my hands on this information so there were people that probably knew about this. knew about me being there. but the fact of the matter is, that doesn't make them the source of my information. >> all right. that brings us to the first pulse question of the day. do you agree or disagree -- the house skel intelligence committee's russia investigation should be halted over questions about chairman cnunes? let us know what you think. all right, let's go to kelly -- kelly o'donnell at the white house for us. as we were running through what has happened so far today, the question is what is next in the investigation? we're starting a new week. >> reporter: there will be some developments but they come from the senate side, richard. we expect that the senate intelligence committee which has a team of investigators, professional sfaf professional staff as they're known, will begin doing behind the scenes interviews. they have identified 20 witnesses and so the initial interviews will be within that group of individuals where they think they can get some information that will help shape their information about russian interference in the 2016 election. again, behind the scenes so it's a very early starting point. i'm also told by sources that house speaker paul ryan remains confident in the leadership of devin nunes to lead the house intelligence commit can tee. despite all of the controversy. and all of the attention he's brought on himself. so at this point, no expectation that the speaker who would have the power to decide committee chairmanships has any plans to make a change at house intel. when devin nunes talks about seeing the materials you were explaining in your opening piece on white house grounds that means the executive office building which is a tall building next to the white house, not in the white house itself. the 18 acres here actually comprises a couple of different buildings so he was in a different building there. same place that congressman adam schiff got to see the same materials where the national security council is located and where they have some secure facilities to look at intelligence types of data, materials, that sort of thing. that falls under different levels of classification. so he was nearby, but not necessarily inside the white house for that. and so this week expect the pressure to remain high. there's something talked about on the various russian aspects of this investigation, day by day. and the president keeps some of it alive by tweeting his objections to this, saying the real question should be in his mind about surveillance and a leaks and not about alleged ties to anyone associated with donald trump. richard? >> revisiting the wiretapping tweets he had made earlier. also "the new york times" is reporting that fired national security adviser michael flynn failed to report income from russian linked entities on one of two financial disclosure forms that were just released yesterday. now, the senate intelligence committee rejected flynn's request for immunity in exchange for testimony in their russian investigation and that happened last week. the president tweeted his support for flynn seeking immunity calling the investigation a quote witch-hunt. and then this morning, he tweeted again saying that quote the real story as kelly o'connell is telling us is about surveillance. ted lieu said -- agents do surveillance on one, suspected agents of foreign power or two suspected criminal activity, which is it? thanks for being here with us. why did you tweet that, what did you want from that? >> thank you, richard, for your question. i want a full investigation into this issue because u.s. officials only do surveillance for one of two reasons. either there is a suspected agent of a foreign power or there's suspected criminal activity so let's find out what is there and by the way, the president himself can declassify these documents. if trump has nothing to hide he can show the american people what's going on. >> are you alluding to the documents that again adam schiff the lead democrat on the house intel committee is alluding to, also what we understand that chairman nunes had seen? is what what you're alluding to? >> yes. let me tell you how ridiculous chairman nunes' political stunt was. he goes to the white house and gets these documents from white house officials. the next day he's -- he calls this press conference saying i've got these secret documents showing surveillance and a i have to run back to the white house and brief them on the very documents the white house handed them the day before. chairman nunes needs to resign. this political stunt was designed to mislead the american people. >> so nunes is saying that is not the case. we're on the question if the house investigation is even worthwhile moving forward with at this moment, that we should be looking at the senate at this moment. >> right, if the white house wants to clear its name, it would ask chairman nuns es to resign because no one beliefs him any more. but he's entirely partisan, trying to mislead the american people. we cannot believe him anymore. >> what might turn this around? the senate said no, but if the house intel committee says yes to michael flynn which we're talk about a second ago and give him immunity, might that turn this around? >> the -- >> are you confident in the house effort right now? >> a great question, richard. as a former prosecutor myself, i know people who believe they're innocent typically don't ask for immunity. so this is a very huge news break that michael flynn is asking for immunity. it shows that he has information that he believes american public wants to see. this highlights why we need a special prosecutor because only the department of justice itself can decline prosecution over immunity issues. a congressional committee cannot offer that on behalf of the department and that's why we need to appoint a special prosecutor in addition to an independent commission to look at the issues. >> you know your constituents as well as constituents of republican members of congress, they want some progress here. they want to see something coming out of congress. just because the approval rating as was well know is not necessarily high on the hill. as question move forward to -- as we move forward to issues around the russia connection which is the tax and the budget, which we expect in the next couple of weeks to be hitting the house, what do you expect, what do you want from that piece of legislation? >> thank you, richard, for that question. let's take a step back and consider how shocking it is that the president's associates and maybe the president himself is under investigation by the fbi for possible collusion with russia. at stake is the legitimatesy of the trump administration. there needs to be a pause of what's going on. congress should not be voting on supreme court and lifetime appointments or on major tax reform. we need a pause and see where this fbi -- >> you're saying stop everything until we answer the questions about the russia connection question -- >> that's not routine, absolutely. we should make no major decisions because we don't know if we have a legitimate president. >> the country could be shut down because we don't have money. >> well, hearings on supreme court nominations and tax reform should not occur. >> when it comes to this yes. but -- >> obviously we need to continue to move forward on the budget. we don't know if our president is legitimate. >> all right. representative ted lieu from california, thank you so much, sir. >> thank you. >> all right. joining me to discuss this, betty woodruff, political reporter, and kevin cirilli. you heard ted lieu, one who is known for using expletives in his tweets. he's unsavory i should say with the president at the moment. maybe outtweeting the president in terms of the use of language. this is really what we're seeing on the hill, isn't it? a bitter separation of left and right. is this -- are we going to see any progress as i was just alluding to? we have a tax plan, we have a budget that's upcoming as well. >> i think it's extremely unlikely. nancy pelosi knows that her caucus is about as unified as it's ever been. as house republicans are at each other's throats over the affordable care act, the democrats have worked in lock step, working together, agreeing on basic policy issues, voting as a bloc. that's important. that makes democrats and -- it benefits them politically, of course. they can go home to their constituents and say they're fighting against trump to say their constituents like that, that's helpful. but it makes pelosi very powerful when the white house comes to her because she has that caucus so disciplined. i think it's unlikely we'll see democrats becoming more warm or more amenable to republicans going forward because there's not much in it for them right now. >> i'll get over to you, kevin, the relationship that speaker ryan has with leader pelosi. how do they get along? it's been talked about that perhaps you know speaker ryan may go to the other side of the aisle and say, i need help here. >> look, there's some evidence they have a cordial relationship but ask john baoehner when they go to the other side of the house. boehner broke the so called hastert rule that had the democratic support but didn't get the support of the republicans. so paul ryan is courting disaster potentially if he decides he has more luck reaching out to democrats than working with conservatives in his own conference. >> kevin, your thoughts? >> well, i think what's interesting are two things. first and foremost, look, the house freedom caucus led by mark meadows whatted a victory of sorts -- had a victory of sorts as any derailing any advancement of the obamacare and now comes the hard work. who in the white house is going to be negotiating with these tea party members, with people like senator ted cruz and rand paul whom the president spoke with recently? that remains to be seen because house speaker ryan is in charge of whipping in the house and he was unable to do that. let's look behind the scenes, the second point i'd make, who exactly are house republicans negotiating with in the white house? is it the former chairman of the republican party, reince priebus or do they have another alley in the vice president's office in mike pence? to the broader point of whether or not democrats are going to get on board with this, certainly not in the house. but look at senators who are up for re-election in red states, people like senator heidi heitkamp and joe manchin, those are the type of democrats who might work with republicans on energy in particular. >> betsy, you heard the comment by adam schiff. he said i did see the documents, the documents that were allegedly in question here. but he also cast some doubt are those the actual documents that chairman nunes had seen? what is the next move for the lead democrat in the house intel committee investigation? >> we can expect him to put significant pressure on nunes to be as prtransparent about this investigation as possible. the way that the republicans has handled it has undermined a lot of confidence in the house intel committee. one thing of course that's important for context on this, is that michael flynn's request for immunity which was major news story could be a bit of a head fake. alex whiting a harvard professor wrote about explaining that often when folks like flynn ask for immunity publicly it's more of a pr campaign than an act chu -- actual indicator he has information. if he could take down prominent members of the white house, he would be negotiating privately with folks in the justice department to hammer out a deal. the fact that him and his lawyer have gone public with this immunity request means that it's more likely that itrethey're tr to stir up pressure to give him immunity from whatever prosecution could end up happening. i think it's important not to overstate the significance of his request there. >> kevin, to you here. the things we're looking forward to this week, we have obviously have gorsuch. one of the topics we have been talking about. china, a meeting with president trump there in florida. and of course we have the senate investigation as a -- as they do some 20 different interviews this week. what are you watching? >> take your pick, right? look, i think from the economic standpoint, president trump's meeting with china's president xi jinping is going to be fascinating. last week he started to tweet out, it will be a tough conversation given how can critical he has been on china and of course on the trade agreements. let's all -- it will be interesting to see whether or not this meeting yields any significant results on trade when they head down to the club at mar-a-lago to have their big two day summit. >> i think they're both wondering what the other is like. what are they like and how they communicate. >> who knows? >> what's the bedside manner. we'll talk about that in the next hour in fact. thank you. >> sure thing. >> for the first pulse question, agree or disagree, the house intelligence committee's russia investigation should be halted over questions about chairman nunes? first overall, look at the numbers it is 83% saying yes we should halt that process. and then when we look at political breakdown, it's pretty much the same over democrats, independents and republicans. agreeing that it should be halted. then when you take a look though overall, strongly agree when we look at male versus female, and some slight variation seeing those are female strongly agreei agreeing. 81% agrees. 19% disagreeing. he could be the man that could make the break the russian investigation wide open. why were senate investigators so quick to turn down general flynn's offer to testify in exchange for immunity? 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ask your hep c specialist about harvoni. remember here at ally, nothing stops us from doing right by our customers. who's with me? we're like a basketball team here at ally. if a basketball team had over 7... i'm in. 7,000 players. our plays are a little unorthodox. but to beat the big boys, you need smarter ways to save people money. we know what you want from a financial company and we'll stop at... nothing to make sure you get it. one, two... and we mean nothing. ♪ ♪ the dinosaurs' extinction... got you outnumbered. and we mean nothing. don't listen to them. not appropriate. now i'm mashing these potatoes with my stick of butter... why don't you sit over here. something for everyone is awesome. find your awesome with the xfinity stream app. more to stream to every screen. so there's a lot we need to learn before entertaining anything like this. is there's a lot we need to -- there's a lot we need to learn from other witnesses but i start off with a healthy skepticism. >> that is how the top democrat on the house intel committee said he's approaching mike flynn's immunity request. he is saying here it's too early in the investigation to consider that. the lawyer for president trump's former national security adviser said his client has a story to tell. no one has taken him up on that story yet. this was the reaction from the kremlin's spokesperson. >> you yon certained about anything he might say about his contacts with russia? >> no, we're not. any blamings that russia could have been interfering in domestic after fafairs of the u states is slander and it has no evidence at all. >> that brings us to our second question of the day for you. agree or disagree -- mike flynn should be given immunity to tell everything that he knows in the russian investigation. you can go again to pulse.msnbc.com/america. now let's bring in msnbc chief legal correspond end ari melber and the author of "how to catch a russian spy." you've been digging deep on this and what's the downside from the senate or the house granting immunity here long term? >> immunity can mean more than one thing. one is the congressional committees using their authority to grant immunity for the testimony that's provided basically saying whatever you say won't be held against you. remember that's the opposite of what you see on the crime shows. whatever you say can be and will be held against you. the other one is the other one that prosecutors provide. that is where you actually say, you're going to immunize someone for potential prosecution for cooperation. participants under the law are granted immunity for testifying for the federal government and that refers to the idea that the fbi or doj might say you're turning someone in. we're nowhere near that, because nobody is taking flynn up on any of this right now. >> which do you think is more likely? >> i think -- >>if it were to happen. >> based on what we know at this early juncture it is unlikely to anyone will hand out immunity because he's a senior figure. when you talk about collaboration immunity, people think about it, again from the big movies. a low level drug dealers turns on the high level mafioso. the national security adviser is a senior position so to the extent he needs immunity from something he may have done in the eyes of the law, i don't think that's going to be cleared away any time soon. >> naveed, one intdz mated that the -- intimated that the conversation went like this, what kind of fish can you bring me? who is bigger than the national security adviser? was she alluding to the president? >> i think that is the big quesonnd look, the other thing we don't know, richard, what does the fbi have? i mean, it may be possible that what the fbi has, they don't need general flynn to corroborate. they may have enough evidence to pursue charges without flynn's offer of testimony here. so we don't know yet. it seems like a very early, early offer in an investigation which is probably still in its -- you know, fairly early stages here. i'm not sure exactly what the intention of flynn was to come out so early off and say this. you know as previously you reported i think it may be a head fake a bit here. >> a head fake. ari, what are the processes like? how does this happen? because we're hearing from the lawyer openly, at least that there was a story to be told. how does this request for immunity happen and then how does the reaction happen? >> the short answer is not like this. >> right. >> because -- >> i would like immunity, please. >> and a big dramatic letter. hey, i have a story to tell. i have been impugned. there's a showmanship that jumped out to everybody. very specifically and privately a discussion with again either granting entity, the congress or a prosecutor saying we know what you'll provide. we know where it's going. the lawyers don't typically ask questions they don't know answers to in the open court or hearing. and here we'll immune use on the fact that you have something to provide. either because you're turning somebody over bigger or a larger example we need it. let me give you a positive example. you could imagine after the 9/11 event that the country might care more about getting all the facts than whether anybody broke some misdemeanor. so you could imagine a scenario where an nsa or a cia agent who saw something go wrong is granted immunity saying oh, you know what, if they put the classified information in the wrong pile and they didn't translate this material in time and that was a contributing factor to why we were caught off guard we care about getting the full story than we do about prosecuting one individual. there are certainly times that the national interest is greater than the individual prosecution. but is this one of the times? we don't know yet. >> naveed, you heard what the kremlin spokesperson said. they're not worried about this at all, if an immunity is granted or not. what's your thought on this spokesperson speaking out on national tv here in the united states, a very uncommon situation. >> if they're saying they're not worried they're worried. you know, look, this is -- we're talking about flynn, talking about a connection to trump but we're not talking about what the russians did. i think there was a very clear and deliberate and planned out operation and i think that operation really consistented of two parts. the second part was a very concerted effort to recruit u.s. persons. i think, you know, we talk about the house, we talk about the senate, we talk about the fbi investigation. i think that question of what exactly the russians did, how they were able to, you know, potentially pitch which is the beginning stages of recruiting u.s. persons i think this is something that both republicans and democrats should rally behind. this is a big, big problem. i think that it emboldens pure adversaries like china to look at this as a mode that's successful. i'm concerned that we have senior members in the trump cabinet that were approached with an intent -- a clear intent to target them for recruitment. that concerns me greatly and i think that when it comes to investigations that part of what russia did is something that needs to be focused on. >> naveed and ari thank you. don't miss ari by the way, growing up trump. a special segment of ari's show "the point" tonight. 5:00 p.m. ari will talk to young people across the political divide about what the trump era means for their generation. all in the studio right here. that's tonight. 5:00 p.m. eastern. thank you. we have been asking you by the way, agree or disagree, mike flynn should be given immunity to tell everything he shows in the russian investigation. this is what you're saying so far in terms of the overall tug of war. 94% of you disagree with that. then we look at age, people 18 to 34 are neutral. people older than that disagree with that. that he should be given immunity. and looking at the graph of the political breakdown we can see here that republicans in most cases are neutral. independents, democrats disagreeing. 88% disagree that mike flynn should be given immunity to tell everything he knows about the russian investigation. thanks for doing that. we'll have another question for you. devastation in colombia. surging rivers there trigger mud slides. the death toll now above 200 and climbing. the latest on rescue efforts next. imagine if the things you bought every day earned you miles to get to the places you really want to go. with the united mileageplus explorer card, you'll get a free checked bag, 2 united club passes... priority boarding... and 50,000 bonus mes. everything you n for an unforgettable vacation. the united mileageplus explorer card. imagine where it will take you. i'm raph. my name is anne. i'm one of the real live attorneys you can talk to through legalzoom. don't let unanswered legal questions hold you up, because we're here, we're here, and we've got your back. legalzoom. legal help is here. more "doing chores for dad" per roll more "earning something you love" per roll bounty is more absorbent, so the roll can last 50% longer than the leading ordinary brand. so you get more "life" per roll. bounty, the quicker picker upper more than 200 people were killed in a mudslide friday. the search continues in colombia, near the border with ecuador. an avalanche of water from three overflowing rivers tore through a small border town and toppled homes, high water swept cars away. torrential rainfall suddenly struck that area and the rainy season has just begun. ivanka trump's new job at the white house. controversial but not uncommon in light of other surrounding her father. agree or disagree, ivanka trump having an official job at the white house is good for the country. go to pulse.msnbc.com/america and let us know what you think. will your business be ready when growth presents itself? 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nothing. only glad has febreze to neutralize odors for 5 days. guaranteed. even the most perceptive noses won't notice the trash. be happy. it's glad. well, as reports have it ivanka trump officially now works as an unpaid federal employee this week. she'll serve as assistant to the president, ergo her dad. she's now bound by government ethics standards. this prohibits conflicts of interest and unpaid employee was her designation. we have more and savannah, tell us about the new role that ivanka has. >> as you mentioned she's become official. she is not taking the salary that she is actually eligible for. but i wanted to know what real americans thought. it sparked national debate, is this okay? or is this crossing the line? is this nepotism. let's take a listen. >> i don't really have an issue. many times in the past that's been done in other administrations. >> i think it's nepotism at the highest level. if i took one of my two daughters over there and i said, hey, we're going to give her a job it would be wholly unappropriate. >> at the end of the day, i think he can have -- he can do what he wants. he's the president. >> daddy, can you help me? >> it seems problematic, what are her qualifications to be adviser to the president? >> it was extremely divided and they were from all over the country. what's interesting is that first daughter and first son influence is not new. it's not always official as icaiva ivan ivanka's role is, but not unusual. i spoke with national first ladies library historian karl anthony and he pointed out many first children with big roles. going back in history a little bit, julie nixon eisenhower. she was instrumental in the re-election campaign in 1972. she spoke at rallies and she was tasked with interpreting her father's message. there's recordings of her and her father speaking on the phone after that. and anna roosevelt. she was even chosen even when first lady eleanor roosevelt could travel. sometimes her father would choose anna to go with her, for example, to the conference in yalta. john eisenhower, he was a first son. this in an official kastcapacit. he did accept the salary. but historian anthony said there's a recent and more relevant example of this. >> the most relevant parallel here between ivanka trump having an official office in the west wing and having an official title is actually to the example in early 1993 of first lady hillary rodham clinton being given a west wing office and being tasked with heading president clinton's health care reform effort. >> so as karl anthony just said they're very similar. west wing office not accepting the salary. a lot of people are upset because ivanka does not have government experience. she's just a business woman whereas hillary was a government servant. something that is actually unprecedented here is that both ivanka and her husband both have official roles within the government. that's the first time that's ever happened. there have been three first daughters married to government servants but did not actually have official roles. so the real issue, hillary, was the first lady. and ivanka is the first daughter. but this gets at nepotism. looking at where the u.s. lands in nepotism, we are in the middle. i want to point out that enormous influences is down here at 1. and no influence is over here at 7. so in finland, not prevalent at all. in zambia, very prevalent. we fell into the middle of the scale. one of the things that's very interesting to me when i was speaking with the people a lot of people said what upset them is that this wouldn't fly in the real world. for them they couldn't give their son or daughter a job in the way that president trump has with ivanka. but i went through some census data. i found out that 22% of americans by the age of 30 will be working for the same employer at the same time as their father. and in addition to that, 6% will work at a company that their parent recently left. richard? >> i guess that means i'm going to become a pastor. i don't know. >> very interesting. >> it's a sunday, why not? very interesting stuff. savannah sellers, thank you. all right. let's bring in political analyst robert trainen and a democratic strategist. thank you. ivanka reacted to the criticisms and she put out a statement. she said this heard, i have heard the concerns some have with my advising the president in my personal capacity and volunteering complying with the ethics rules and i will instead serve as an unpaid employee. robert she was saying i'm no longer the unpaid adviser, i'm the unpaid official employee of this great country. does that relieve some of the concerns that you might have here? >> yes, it does. because the reason why she just said it. she now is is an official government employee. so what does that mean, richard? it means she has to fill out ethics forms and she has to be transparent. it means she needs to use a government e-mail. it means that in fact she could be subpoenaed before congress if need be. it means just that. she's a government employee whether she's making 1 4u00 $10 year or $1, she has to abide by every single ethics law that every single government employee has to abide by. thing is a good thing and kudos for her for proactively doing this. >> you heard savannah describe the precedence here, right, that we have seen before in the history of our great country. does that make this okay, another chapter if you will? robert says things are on the up and up. >> no not for me. america kicked aristocracy to the curb over a hundred years ago for a reason. i think there are thousands more capable conservative women who could have taken this role and denied that role simply because she's her father's daughter. that's the very definition of nepotism. you know, she has always been an informal adviser to her father and any of his work, whether it be in business. and when he was running the presidential campaign. that's not a surprise. but she can continue to have that influence doing her work, her women at work policy stuff she's been doing through her business. and not necessarily in the white house. where there's more experienced individuals who have a lot of great credibility who could be doing that work for donald trump. >> speaking about business, the financial disclosures on friday, the white house releasing over a hundred of them. big numbers here, righ jared kushner and ivanka trump worth over $740 million. i think it's not the quantity, but the potential congliktflict interest of the countries they're doing business in and what the deals might be going now and forward. >> that's good question. i don't think anybody is surprised by the number, at least i was un't. i looked at some of the comments, people weren't surprised. i think the question is whether or not there's some congliktd of interest and whether or not you can recuse yourself given the broad portfolio you may have in the white house, ie, jared kushner. when you look at his business in terms of the real estate dealings it's impossible for him to recuse himself because there are so many things there. i think that's a deeper question that quite frankly the american people need to ask the president is whether or not that is appropriate because i think that's a legitimate question to be raised. >> the question we're asking here is ivanka in the white house good for the president, good for the country we? we are seeing a white house in turmoil right now. your thought as a progressive here. >> yeah. here's the thing for me. i don't think we should be in the business of putting children in the white house specifically to run policy. either he's doing this because a lot of the gop, talented conservatives out there who have worked on presidential administrations for years don't want to work for him. certainly having several appointments open indicates that might be the case or he's grooming the family to take over a throne. amanda carpenter, a conservative commentator wrote for k cosmopolitan, this unpaid job gives off the air of a royal princess. not that she thinks she is one, but it looks like this. and if hillary clinton did this for chelsea there would have been a lot of screaming and appropriate for that. what is not the country we have been. republicans always talk about meritocracy. we have prided ourselves on being the country that people work for what they get. this is not an example of that in any way, shape or form. >> i know you have no reaction, but we'll get you next time. thank you both and have a good sunday. >> thank you. >> now we have been asking this question, agree or disagree, ivanka trump having an official job at the white house is it good for the country? this is what you're saying so far. 98% say no. not good for the country. then when we look at the educational level, pretty much everybody is saying no. not good for the country. except high school is slightly different. statistically again, very, very close. then finally here, you get the picture here. a lot of folks strongly disagreeing on this should ivanka trump have an official job at the white house, 97% disagreeing. thank you all for participating. we have another question for you coming up. every marriage has its rules. like do not put an empty carton back in the fridge or don't touch the thermostat after we agree on the correct temperature. one rule followed by the vice president and his wife has social media on fire. is a rule of not being alone with about many of the opposi opposite -- with a member of the opposite sex, is that a good idea? various: (shouting) heigh! ho! 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-i would. -i would indeed. well, let's be clear, here. i'm actually a deejay. ♪ [ laughing ] no way! i have no financial experience at all. that really is you? if they're not a cfp pro, you just don't know. find a certified financial planner professional who's thoroughly vetted at letsmakeaplan.org. cfp. work with the highest standard. i will tell you one thing he is one hell of -- he has one hell of a good marriage going. >> my wife karen she's sorry she couldn't be with us today. she already had dinner plans. >> well, it all started with a "washington post" profile on vice president pence's wife karen pence which he was alluding to the vice president. it said this in part, in 2000, mike pence told the hill he never eats alone with a woman other than his wife and he will not attend events featuring alcohol without her by his side either. critics called this sexist. one woman who worked for him in congress, said his personal decision no tot dine alone with -- to not dine alone with female staffers was never a hindrance and never kept me from reaping the rewards of my job, end quote. do you agree or disagree, vice president pence's rule of never eating alone with a woman other than his wife a good idea? here to talk with us is liz from vox.com. is it sexist? >> yes, but a different kind of sexism than we're used to seeing. we have two men in the white house, one of them has bragged about sexually assaulting women and the other one says he does want don't eat alone with a woman. it's benevolent sexism. it comes off as a compliment, but it's sexism with a wink and a smile. it's still basically saying that women and men are different and that women should be or can be excluded from very important parts of society because they are women. >> would it be different if he was -- he's not in the sales position specifically let's just say, but let's say he worked in sales for a larging the company he had to -- for a large tech company and this was part of what he did day to day, is that a different policy? you can't do it? >> imagine if he was a woman. could a woman -- could i do that if i was in that position? exclude men -- >> from any gender. >> exactly. so it's wrong. and it's not something that women can do. obviously it's also a reflection i think of the antiquated why and the antiquated view that a lot of members of the gop have of women. if you look at the way that mike pence and donald trump have conducted themselves in the white house, you know, signing executive orders restriction -- restricting women's reproductive rights and restricting access to -- >> a good point. by itself, yeah, you can have that role and you can be a feminist and you can do your job well, but amongst everything around that's been happening with this administration, it fits in with a bad thematic. a badnary gi narrative. >> where are the women in this administration, there are some, but not a lot. it's one of the most white and male administrations that we have seen in a very, very long time. so are we going forward? are we going backwards? >> i can see where across the generational lines those who are younger would go, i don't quite get this. it's very different when it comes to those who are having the younger perspective on the way equality might or might not exist. >> republicans need the young voters. >> so do the democrats. liz thank you some, his plank with vox.com. thank you. still time to weigh in, agree or disagree, vice president pence's rule of never eating alone with a woman who is not his wife a good idea? the results, next. an... except for every ladies' night. only glad has forceflex to prevent rips, leaks, and punctures. so whatever you throw in the bag... stays in the bag. be happy, it's glad. before fibromyalgia, i was a doer. i was active. then the chronic, widespread pain drained my energy. my doctor said moving more helps ease fibromyalgia pain. she also prescribed lyrica. fibromyalgia is thought to be the result of overactive nerves. lyrica is believed to calm these nerves. woman: for some, lyrica can significantly relieve fibromyalgia pain and improve function, so i feel better. lyrica may cause serious allergic reactions or suicidal thoughts or actions. tell your doctor right away if you have these, new or worsening depression, or unusual changes in mood or behavior. or swelling, trouble breathing, rash, hives, blisters, muscle pain with fever, tired feeling, or blurry vision. common side effects are dizziness, sleepiness, weight gain and swelling of hands, legs and feet. don't drink alcohol while taking lyrica. don't drive or use machinery until you know how lyrica affects you. those who have had a drug or alcohol problem may be more likely to misuse lyrica. with less pain, i can be more active. ask your doctor about lyrica. okay. now to our final pulse question of the day. we have been asking you, agree or disagree, vice president pence's never agreeing to eat dinner with a woman other than his wife -- 81% said that's no a good idea. break it down by gender. pretty much the same. there was no difference here and then look at the age breakdown. it's actually 55 and older we have been seeing trend as a hey, this is not a good idea which is not necessarily what the stereotype for you. the final scoreboard, 81% disagreeing that gets the big red square. yes, you can eat with a woman or individual of the opposite sex. thank you all for taking part in our "pulse of america" and we have the latest fallout in the russia's medali delling in the . election. ces you really want to go. with the united mileageplus explorer card, you'll get a free checked bag, 2 united club passes... priority boarding... and 50,000 bonus miles. everything you need for an unforgettable vacation. the united mileageplus explorer card. imagine where it will take you. liz assumed all dressingsrust were made equal. assume nothing. just like the leading brands, these kraft dressings are made with high quality ingredients, at a price you can feel good about. no wonder kraft is so good. (i wanted him to eat healthy., so i feed jake purina cat chow naturals indoor, a nutritious formula with no artificial flavors. made specifically for indoor cats. purina cat chow. nutrition to build better lives. good an sunday afternoon to you can. i'm richard lui in new york city. the ranking democrat is skeptical of mike flynn's request for immunity saying it's unclear if flynn can add anything to the investigation of russia cease interference in the 2016 selection. committee chairman nunes blasted today by john mccain who says that nunes has killed any heart of a bipartisan investigation. >> this is why we need a select committee, martha. every time we turn around, another shoe drops from this. >> plus the senate judiciary committee they're set to vote on the nomination of neil gorsuch to the supreme court. that's going to set the stage for a showdown between republicans and democrats on the senate floor. >> neil gorsuch will be confirmed this week. how that happens depends on the democrats friends. >> it's lightly unlikely -- highly unlikely he'll get 60