Is the most Democratic Media is when a person writes a letter to an elected official like a mayor, governor cant be censored or destroyed command not to try to answer it or technology so that people know that its not going to some dark hole is a major issue i think and most people dont realize realize in a written letter to a politician has far more impact than an email. You certainly dont expect him to answer every letter. And we speak about that in the book. Guest a lot of people dont know the teams of volunteers go to the white house every morning and separate all these letters. No one expects the president to answer these letters. But he has a staff and departments and agencies throughout the executive branch and they should all be acknowledged and thats my complaint. We have letters for highprofile issues like the bailout people are writing a book of letters, yes. Now they will send a call like this which doesnt even answer the letter or they will write letters to supporters or co
Going to go to ferguson. Why not to race issues have come to every president in the book. Lbj, john f. Kennedy, eisenhower all of these president s have dealt with issues and acted on it. So people need to understand and so it comes to the president and he is the one who can effectuate change. Bill clinton, did he come close to African Americans considered an apology for slavery . There was a speech that he gave when in africa. He did not apologize for slavery. It was a backandforth fight between the white house and i will never forget it. And i said that i am not looking for an apology for slavery. And not only be issue of reparations, but people said yes, this needs to happen, but bill clinton was the only one that could have done it. He was the first who could. [inaudible] he wasnt even going to take ownership for what america did. But president barack obama at the time, it was not the right time for him. But this president has had to strategically navigated through these waters so
Its incumbent upon us to build a safer community, not through prisons that dont build Safer Communities and in my belief in the belief of many people love looked at this issue, and likewise, you deserve to be served well by a justice by a Justice System as a victim in terms of restitution and reparation and healing and all of the things that victims are deserving of. I think many of us do and i think also believe in our capacity for empathy being tremendous that we can empathize with victims and build a criminal Justice System that serves their needs well. Host lets hear from jim in temple, texas. Go ahead, jim c3 hello. Caller one of the things the public should know is that it is so expensive that many people go ahead and take prison and then of course, we need to consider people coming out of prison should get a little bit of credit for having paid their so that they dont have too lo lose. You are bringing up an important issue which are the issues of probation and parole. Im glad y
Its night to be here at politics and prose after all these years. Thank c sparks opinion cspan for coming which illustrates, by the way, how one person can make a difference. That was the idea of brian lamb many years ago. He persuaded the cable industry to allow that kind of immediate, unedited coverage of events. There are many good people here who ive worked with and who are active citizens in their own right. Mark pla, thekin is here, Joanne Anderson is here. [applause] she wrote the book for the people, whichs a cookbook, in effect, for civic action. Its very clear. Russells here, he never runs out of material. [laughter] robins here, she runs our d. C. Library renaissance project and started out ten years ago it was rated the Worst Library system of any major city, and now a lot of new branch libraries, and there is definitely a renaissance. Alan is here, the great, courageous human rights advocate. And john richard, the citizen networker [applause] is here as well. And many othe
CityWatch is published 24/7 with special e-news blasts on Monday and Thursday evening, with Extras as appropriate around special events such as elections or imp