Step up to the microphone appear so that the audience can here the question. Keep the spirit going all year long with a subscription to the tribunes premium book section. Also, feel free to download the trip books out for more information as well as access to our digital bookstore. Finally the lit fest love social media. Feel free to take pictures, post messages and upload them to twitter histogram or facebook using the hashtag puerto rico lf 15. Please silence your phones caught in the flashes off your cameras. I will introduce our moderator. [applause] i like a short but sweet introduction. I will give a short one for brian. For the indefatigable research a joke that we should call him brian burrows. Thank you. I am here all week. I asked him how he wanted to be introduced. He said he writes for vanity fair and write books. The book for which it is best known as barbarians at the gate which came out in 1990. The merger of rjr reynolds and the biscoe, food services. But his latest book i think is a profound the of research, storytelling moral inquiry. In the subject is something that i think we thought we do something about because of the events of the last 14 years or so. Thats domestic terrorism. He shows us how to see the subject in a very new line particular story back to 1969 or so. All the way up through the middle of the 1980s. And one of the striking facts of the book and the most fatal endangers your the trade center bombing. Maybe its good to havefund it makes you scratch your head and think maybe you should read this book. Which you should. The 1st thingthe 1st thing i would like brian to talk about is the sheer scale of Political Violence in the United States. My favorite example to get that across was a story you told about the evacuation of a movie theater. Maybe you can address that. Just a small little item in the new york times. I picked up may 1970. The small puerto rican Independence Group set off a bomb in a theater in the bronx s and bombs were so prevalent by the time that the seven hr declared the theater after the kind of the bomb no what1 would leave there was no sense of continuing dangera it was like, we are new yorkers. Its a bomb already. In the box in the San Francisco chronicle. San francisco had so many bombs that the chronicle ran an intermittent box score of how many theyre were and who was in the lead. But the scope of domestic violence, what we would call domestic terrorism today. I dont, terrorism because these bombs were not intended to kill indiscriminately. Most work what i call protest bombs. Set off an empty buildings. Exploding press releases by and large complex of those who did were intended to draw the media and police focus to communicate tapes to the bottom of a pay phone or send to a Radio Station this type of thing. The thething. The sheer scale of it was what stunned me. The Senate Inquiry in the early 70s counted 2,500 bombings to 18 months. Which is just amazing. I remember trying to explain the 1st bombing in berkeley why was so little noticed. Just by going to the major newspapers a 34 other significant bombings most of which injured far more people than a halfdozen policeman. I think the amazing thing is not how widespread it was but have completely forgotten it is. There is so little cultural or institutional memory. I lived through the 70s. I remember patty hearst. So much of it was centered in the bay area and thirdly in chicago, media capitals. If you grew up like i did in a small town in texas arkansas this was easy to miss. You no one day in new york in 1975 following puerto rican independence bombing were so many bomb threats from them than 100,000 Office Workers that they were evacuated going around the streets of manhattan. The 1st time they evacuated the world trade center. And one of the things that i think speaks more highly of American Metal in those days was talk about new yorkers saying this is new york. You dont talk about this particular event in the book. I researched this and came across a lot of strange stories. In 1975 and then climbed over the white house fence with a lead pipe. The secretthe secret service doing what they do with his physical threat to the grounds of the shutting the death. There was like a three paragraph story in the new york times. And that. And there was one sentence wikipedia entry. I compare that to what happened with his poor mentally ill a few years ago read her car no one knows why because she was turned into swiss cheese into the Capitol Grounds and had her infant in the car. Not only was it National News with a week about 100 military and Police Personnel descended on her home with Hazardous Material suits to make sure that she wasnt part of some terror cell. This type of violence was so deeply woven into the 70s no one expresses any outrage. It was so much a part of life it was just kind of no big deal. That people will talk to after a bombing that killed someone. Her quote was another bomb. Coming after the 60s watergate with the multitude of things going on radical violence would not have been the top ten things that would anyone were worried about. Do you think it has anything. We are now is what we collectively forgot to reintroduced to violence and different way. Suddenly out of nowhere to thatcher that did not remember the stuff had 93 and september 11. Suddenly now when i say bombing the shutter. Interesting. It totally for me to write this book had to give my head back before september 11. The puerto rican detonated a bomb in a wall Street Restaurant that killed. Several of these groups a halfdozen a dozen. And there was truly awful ask. Their cause was independence for puerto rico. Liberating puerto rico. But the bombing that they undertook this kind of the very much for your tourist attraction that were George Washington said farewell to his troops. They did it with a lot. Propane tanks. And killed six people. For. Happy are chicago. Seventyfour to 81. The story which im fairly sure it is the 1st time i read it in this detail they came out of a high school in chicago. Most of them were counselors and teachers. The Community Activist who got the interesting thing about that means also in concert distinction to violent political terrorists today. These folks within the mainstream the left or even the liberal mainstream supporters apologist. The most striking thing in the book and why the story is important is because they had the sort of 80s and betters. What was striking was the response of the episcopalian church. The fbi. Operating. They had a puerto rican mainstream social Services Group that was a front for a terrorist group. They proved that the committee was written on a typewriter been atthat the woman who was his group had bought the plane tickets. The episcopal guys hes split into two halves of those regarding concerned than progressives. The quote about going after politically active hispanics. But it was difficult for anyone to imagine that a revolutionary terrorist bombing was using the National Headquarters of the episcopal church. Just stories like this a bit forgotten. There are so many great and footnote stories. Lets talk about what these folks believed themselves to be accomplishing in such a discussion maybe service in 1968 or 69. The halfdozen most prominent underground groups of the 70s. The one thing that all of these groups have in common was they were born of the 60s. The60s. The underground in the 70s is a forgotten last chapter. Obviously what happened is i say that most of these people were unable to shape the dream of 1868. The dream of 1868 was that a worldwide revolution sweeping the globe. It was a. The government would fall and literally a new world was upon us. Itit did not happen. Nixon came in and started cracking heads. But wait 69 the hardest hardest core of the militants, including the leadership of fds the dominant protest the year began to talk seriously about going underground taking it to the next level which was literally watching a kind of war. Undeclared war. Undeclared war. As crazy as that sounds they had a long track record the event that they could. To to show that it was not that crazy. Thirtyfive people on the outside. Governmental. Youve all seen the godfather part two. Ho chi minh start of the ten guys. Fidel and chased out of the ten guys. They all ended up taking control of the country. The 1st of the group at theand the most imitated the largest, most influential of the groups have sought to make that happen. There is a great untold story about how they utterly failed to do so. Right. And to connect that to chicago one of the guys who was the leader of this whose name surfaced during the 2008 Campaign Goes around giving speeches at high schools and stuff talking about this great antiwar movement. I. Out that he was not in and were activist. He was a war activist. He declared war the United States. I toldi told the story of my review of the great socialist friend of mine who was a publisher of americas 1st socialist newspaper in decades in these times. Now a great leftwing magazine. His cousin was in the weatherman. I said, what would you do if your cousins name is jj it was a vociferous advocate of murderous revolutionary violence will help youyou do if he knocked on your door today . I would turn them into the fbi because he destroyed the left. They did not developed any favors. Right. So one of the interventions that you make to the story is that you demonstrate that, yes,that yes after the terrible accident that happened in a townhouse in Lower Manhattan in march of 1970 several members of the Weather Underground themselves up accidentally. You. Out that that moved the whether underground to a policy of only undertaking bombings that would only damage property and that people. Prior to that they had a very different idea in mind. That has been the central message, they never intended to hurt us all these after the townhouse that is the path they embarked upon. They did fairly conventional protest bombings, issuing and bathrooms. Why in bathrooms . The fbi began to take them was seriously and told the terrible toilet bombers. In a public building they were the one place where you are given privacy close the close the door and do the wiring and things that you need to do. The important thing is that what is forgotten by apologists like bill ayres that many whether alumni for what they want to cover is the fact that there were two phases. The longest one was protest bombings. They actively tried to detonate bombs to kill policeman and military officers. They did so in there 1st action in berkeley seriously injuring one officer and lightly injuring a bunch of others. Was an action in detroit in which bill ayres group attempted to that led to bombs in the police functional. The 3rd was the one of the townhouse where the new york collective was building a series of very large bombs that they intended to that date that officers dance at fort dix, new jersey. And however you want to look at this as luck would have it then a lot about politics and poetry but not enough about building bombs. It went off in his hands. It killed him and to others and brought the entire townhouse down upon and convince the rest of the leadership that they had to disavow murderous violence. Other groups later went on and did it. From theyre on out Bernadine Dorn and jeff jones along with bill ayres charted what they called one letter writer to about the paper called it responsible terrorism. Thatthat was what i call protest bombings. The bombs not intended to kill. They never tried to kill any cops. How do you get the story and how confident are you . My source is the end men who built the bomb in place to another zoo were theyre that night. There is everytheyre is every reason in the world it is what the world and of this. Presenting a variety of fame theyre is a large segment of the radical left to whom he is not popular. A lot of them came forward because they frankly felt likewise see the only underground figure that most of america has ever heard of . The young man who built 98 percent of the whether underground bombs blog with a woman who went on to long career teaching a Public Schools in new york and comes out for the 1st time in our book and is identified and tells a story i feel certain that part of it is ron realizing he had a part in this history. And many of them feel like bill is just not telling the true story. The true story is uglier than what people to remember how did they getdo they get away with it . What about the fbi . I love the fbi today. I love the loyalty and professionalism. I have come to no a lot of people who work there. The 1970s was not there finest hour. They had very little history in infiltrating i should sayi should say successfully infiltrating radical is groups. There are hilarious memos you can get about how these people live like reprobates. No wonder we cant recruit informants. No one would talk to the fbi very quickly even though hoover and something many people just dont want to believe or, hoover eliminated blackberry jobs, illegal burglaries. By and large that was moved away from. The whether squad, especially squad 47 in new york brought back blackberry jobs and illegal mail opening in every conceivable thing that you can do in spades to going after weather. Long story short one of the great ironies of the area is in the end exactly one weatherman of the primary group one of the two young women who called out of the rubble of the townhouse that morning was ever convicted of anything. The top three officials of the fbi were convicted and indicted for these breakins. One had charges dropped. Two others were convicted and Ronald Reagan pardoned the. The fascinating thing about the fbi is our did they cheat but they lost. Not only that one of the most frustrating things about this was i thought i would go in this can be able to tell us with documentary evidence, fbi files. It turns out on whether at least what you get is just junk. I talked to a half dozen fbi agents that said after the investigations and scandal started they were taking all the new york files home and bring them in the fireplace. There is just nothing there. As a result i have to take off my historian at and put on my old malaise newspaper reporter at. You know, i. You dont no me. I dont happen to be radical public anyway. Tell me about the building you bargain legend 72. So when i reviewed the book i said, its a cinematic. That stuff was ripped from the headlines. Wewe are talking about a member of a black revolutionary cell goes into an afterhours joint or bad things that are bad for the people are going on but can make everyone strip down naked, steel all the money. The cops come. What are all these people doing naked. Some guys like some direct assault but they are gone now. No, its right over theyre. A lot of the stories call one of the things i learned if your going to be a member of a violent revolutionary army and you get pulled over by the cops the 1st thing you want to do is rather the windows. Thats what the black liberation the members. When a cop came some of the hotheads would just a shooting at the cops. And the glass would be fine and you dont want anyone to get hurt. These guys all have medium to large afros. One story about a particularly murderous sky. Our women were picking glass i was theyre all night. How many rounds of ammunition were involved in that final showdown . I dont know but he was cut to pieces the unofficial end of the black Liberation Army which was not prone to peaceful protest bombings. They assassinated police. They were a spinoff of the black panthers exactly as weatherman was a spinoff of stf. At least nominally run from the black panthers algerian headquarters their world emissary who believed himself to be running sort of the government in exile the black american from a room and algeria where he had a doctor evil a map with lights having all the revolutionary cells, including the one based in china as chairman was a guy named mouth. You cant make this up. I no. And he thought were going to be a guerrilla army. They believed that people going to rise up. Typically black oppressed we will rise up. Always so stunned when it does not happen. Its funny when the head of the Liberation Army on the fbi may be onto us. Lets find another by person knocked on there door. For the fbi was closing and they decided that they needed to move to a knew place. They did not no any place. They started going doortodoor saying i. Im commander sink a of the Liberation Army. Can we move in. Amazingly no one said yes but no one turned the men. No one went to the men. It was a strange time. And the man was cutting down black leaders in cold blood. You no it made sense. A time when government because of the 60s and the corruption of the administration and the war and watergate the reputation of the fbi at an alltime low. I dont know how was lower. If you are in the south bronx and basically the heroin trade is run by the police joining a group like the black Liberation Army seems like a better strategy for change that voting for hubert humphrey. And the bla was the purest outlet for black rage black rage. Which have been rising from the 50s to welcome through stokely, through a trap brown. Finally after five intense years of blacks calling for black power and black revolutionary and black revolution of the big someone tried to do it. By allies the effort to pieces. They assassinated and attacked a number of places will. The delicious moment where one of the bla soldiers says dont you understand where the war. Anyway, let me ask you one more question. Getting the story. The reason i said this is so cinematic if i were writing the screenplay it will be about some guy who lives in taxes in new jersey giving the story. You know, tracking down. But i get a sense that it was not. It was pretty difficult and you are almost at the end of your book. A couple times. This is the most difficult thing ever done command am not sure i would do it again almost six years. For most of those getting a lot of door slammed in my face metaphorically. It was only when i realized and found the bar doesnt matter. A started making the argument have a track record telling us accurately. Look behind m