How specific it is, president eisenhower calls his assassination capacity the health alteration committee. So i have located documents in the National Archive that refer to innovation for the health alteration committee. President kennedy called the executive action. Jumping forward to reagan he called it preemptive neutralization. Bush called it lethal direct action and obama called it targeted killing. Going back to after the vietnam war and president reagan developing a capacity for preemptive neutralization and this is because we sell the first rise in terrorism. What i also found very interesting, i interview a gentleman named lewis for this book and he was the 19th director of the secret service, he went on the record to expla explain, how the capacity to protect the president of the United States is the flipside of the coin of the executive action capacity or preempt neutralization capacity if you will. That comes from the fact that richard home so famously said if you have a capacity to take out someone elses leaders, why would they not take out yours. Im paraphrasing but thats what he said. You begin to understand how serious this all gets behind the scenes. President reagan developed preemptive neutralization with the cia director who is a fascinating man named bill casey and where to bill caseys experience come from, the oss. One of the reasons i love writing history, we begin to see how all of these threads pulled together toward the present tense because you have individuals running the show, not the cia in particular is an organization run by individuals. As opposed to the pentagon which is an organization should that forms a bureaucracy. He explained for this book about a very interesting unreported Organization Called the Counter Assault team. Cat team. And what i found fascinating about this largely unknown is starting after president reagan was almost killed by an assassin in 1981, the team began to shadow the president 24 7. And they still do. And all of those Team Operators are trained. Some of them that would go over to the cia paramilitary and go over to the cat team. Blumer luddy being one of them, he was a green beret and vietnam. Emory luddy went on to protect the president in moving forward working offensive operation for cia. The period of time and what i find interesting, we as citizens tend to think that republican president s act one way and democratics act another way. And i found in reporting this book that was not true. The cia pillow military works as the president s operation. They are directed, the order comes from the president through the cia director on down. And there was one exception, that was resident clinton who really opposed executive action preemptive neutralization, call it what you will. As a report in the book the attorney writing up some of these mended memos working on the emissions for the present, whenever they would request that individual be preemptively neutralized, it will go up the chain of the command of the president and president clinton would reject that. And why i found this interesting is one to rumor all day. Going back to the initial spark that maybe want to write this book. One of the people that billy wall was my main character was targeting for the cia in sudan was osama bin laden, this is a 1992. And there are a couple of different versions of the story that i report in the book but they took the very first surveillance photograph of bin laden in cartoon and requested to kill bin laden. And this went up the chain of command to president clinton he was against preemptive neutralization and he said please dont ever ask me anything like that again. It really makes you think about the different consequences that come out of the shadow world of operations. You can watch the entire program anytime online. At booktv. Org. Heres a look at books being published this week. And the best christmas ever, second lady karen pence and her daughter charlotte offered a look at the holidays in washington, d. C. Through the eyes of their pet rabbit and the truth will set you free but first it will piss you off, author and feminist activist provides a collection of memorable quotes from throughout her life and career. Historian Andrew Roberts examines the military tactics of nine leaders from napoleon to Dwight Eisenhower in his latest book leadership and war. And in the market story philanthropist in washington d. C. David rubenstein profiles american historians, also being published this week, the hymns of the republic recounts the final year of the civil war. And how to beat they provide advice from political strategist on how the democrats can win the next president ial election. As his time working instructor communication in chief speechwriter to former defense secretary davsecretary james mag the line. Look for the titles of bookstores this coming week and watch for many of the authors in the near future a book to be on cspan2. Brick tv visited capitol hill and asked republican congressman tom cole of oklahoma, what are you reading. Im reading a book by a guy named tom bullying who is an english author, a new historian called appeasement, chamberlain, hitler, churchill and the road to war and just finished up rick atkinsons great book of projected trilogy on the british are coming. It covers the first couple years in revolutionary war. How do you select the books that you read. Is a variety of things tend to read book reviews so that matters in the local newspapers. Sometimes ill hear about a book in a number of years ago picking up the book devotion to animate goes about two carrier pilots one who shot down and died in the korean war in 1950s and i heard him talking about the book and i thought that sounded like a great read. In listening to other people if theyre reading Something Interesting they will usually talk about it. In a more systematic way but i usually end up with a pretty good book. Where you end up reading . Everywhere probably more on airplanes than anyplace else, you can read policy papers you have a couple hours there or more so i do a lot of that but then i try to read something everyday or read a little bit if i have a book all knock off ten or 20 pages when i get home. But i dont travel ever without a book. Find out what other members of congress are reading by visiting booktv. Org and search what are you reading. Starting now live coverage of the texas book festival from austin with former cia operative fox, on her time on the agency