Black National Anthem followed by novelist jody pico including her novel a spark of light. In journalist 6 novelist corey doctorow discussing his books and activism. After social distancing get close to a good book tonight, booktv on cspan2. [inaudible conversations] thanks for coming out. My name is travis cohen, i will do some quick housekeeping and jump right in. Quick second to remind everyone to silence your cell phones. We are recording video and audio. When it comes time for the q and a portion, we ask you speak to it and keep your question to a question and following everything we have all the books on sale behind the Cash Register at the front of the store so if you want to get those, keep your chairs in place, we would greatly appreciate that. Many of you know we host a lot of events and if you need any help keeping track of those we have the calendars at our info desk and check your website, it is the best we get the information we can. We have the pleasure of hosting matthew algeo, an awardwinning journalist whose stories appeared on all things considered, marketplace, many books on Harry Trumans excellent adventure, the president is a sick man among them. He is here to discuss his new book all this marvelous potential Robert Kennedys 1968 tour of appalachia. The story tells of kennedys tour starting in mid february four months before his assassination. Books like a victim hillbilly elegy recast the story of appalachian life, what decisions were in place to generate the world. Having lived near cumberland for years, has seen how the story resonates with the population but even deeper into the books pages, readers familiar with the story of economic withdrawal and Party Infighting will find much to discover. Please join me in welcoming matthew algeo. [applause] thanks, travis. How is everybody feeling . Everybody feeling okay . It is great to be at politics and prose again. It is like Madison Square garden, it smells better. Travis was mentioning my earlier books. I kind of like where this fits into the previous books i have done but a little background about myself is in order. Always good to let people know the person who wrote the book, the people you will be giving your money to hopefully. I grew up in a town about 30 miles north of philadelphia, i went to college at the university of pennsylvania and major in folklore. I have that going for me. After i graduated, i couldnt find any work in folklore. I started working in public radio, the place folklore went at the time. I met my wife in st. Louis, we were married in 98, hired by the state department. I have been able to write these books, my wife has a real job. The string of nonselling books is given me something to do when we are overseas. Quick plugs for my earlier books, last Team Standing, big fan, the 1943 merger of the steelers and eagles. The nfl was so short of players during world war ii they had two teams. It is on them for they are not the last Team Standing but the publisher insisted on calling it last Team Standing but dont worry about that, it is a good book. Harry trumans excellent adventure retraced the road trip harry and this truman took in summer of 53 after they left the white house, pensions and secret service protection. Harry and best got in the chrysler and drove from independence missouri to the east coast to visit their daughter margaret who lived in new york and the second time. It is a sweet book, eating at diners, speaks to a bygone era. When truman left office, he was the last president to return to something resembling a normal we life. A sick man, the secret operation in Grover Cleveland to remove a cancerous tumor from his mouth. How are these not bestsellers . Pedestrian is him, the history of competitive walking in the 1880s, the 6day walking race and, okay. Abe and fido, the greatest biography ever written of lincolns dog. Lincoln plus dog, what do i have to do. We will see about this marvelous potential and how well that fits into the scheme of things. This came in 2016 after the president ial election. You are aware donald trump is president and a lot of people were surprised when he was elected and they looked at the numbers and were especially surprised at the overwhelming majority he picked up and a lot of counties in appalachia and people started writing about this, that is interesting, i wonder how that happened. I knew about the kennedy trip. These famous poverty tours to Eastern Kentucky. He was considering against Lyndon Johnson in the democratic primary. It was in effect a campaign stop, had all the trappings of a Campaign Trip, Photo Opportunities and speeches. It was interesting that Robert Kennedy as a liberal could go to Eastern Kentucky and credibly campaign and 50 years later you see donald trump winning these counties with 60 , 70 of the vote. I thought i should write a book about that and everyone else thought the same thing so this book ended up being a little different, it focuses more on the trip itself, i dont get much into the analysis of why things changed. I look at how things have changed and leave it up to the reader to decide whether the changes are for better or for worse. I went to kentucky and began researching the book in 2017. I grew up in philadelphia, outside philadelphia. I have a lot of biases attached to it, to the story of appalachia in the 1960s, my idea of the 1960s was woodstock and the chicago convention, san francisco. You dont think of kentucky when you think of the 60s. At least i didnt where i came from. But the 60s happened in kentucky, a lot. In appalachia and Eastern Kentucky, things to do with environmentalism and poverty and that is a way to approach the story, what the 60s were like, by way of background, before the rfk trip, in 1960 his brother jack ran for president as West Virginia was an important primary for john kennedy to win. Body was his campaign manager. This was the first time jack and bobby were exposed to american poverty up close and it stuck with both of them. There is a funny story from the 1960 campaign in West Virginia where a coalminer came to jack kennedy and that is a true you never work today in your life . Jack kennedy said there is some truth to that. The coalminer said dont worry, you havent missed a damn thing. Kennedy really was enamored by the people in West Virginia and appalachia and they stayed with him. And 63, july of 63, harry caudle, a writer from kentucky wrote mike comes to the cumberlands. It was an expose on the exploitation of the people in Eastern Kentucky about the Coal Companies and the major corporations in the us that depended on coal and in october of 63, a reporter for the New York Times wrote an expose about poverty in Eastern Kentucky. Jack kennedy had seen both of these and they make quite an impression on him. He plans to go to Eastern Kentucky to see what the conditions were like for himself and the trip is scheduled for december of 1963 so of course that never took place. After his assassination, lbj took up the mantle for antipoverty campaigns. In his january 64 state of the Union Address declare war on poverty and in august of 64 just we 7 months later, the Economic Opportunity act was passed creating the office of Economic Opportunity or oe oh which was the agency that oversaw the war on Poverty Programs. There were so many programs. It takes a page in the book just to list all the programs but somewhere head start, medicare was something that came out of the School Lunch Program and things like this. Rfk when he went to Eastern Kentucky in january of 68 had a few reasons to go. One, it was in the back of his mind that his brother had wanted to visit Eastern Kentucky in december of 63 and never made it. He wanted to gauge the success of the war on poverty too, the bill to reappropriate the office of Economic Opportunity was coming up and he wanted to see what progress had been made on the war on poverty. Robert kennedy also wanted to show the poverty wasnt just an effort an american problem or native american problem or Mexican American problem but an american problem. Disaffected every community and every group in the country including white people, white people in Eastern Kentucky particularly. I think he thought it was important to show that to the country. The trip itself was two days, hills hearings in a 1room schoolhouse and at a gymnasium in a town called neon. A high school gymnasium. As i was writing the book i thought it was more interesting, Robert Kennedy, a lot of books have been written about Robert Kennedy. Larry tie wrote an excellent biography and gave me a good blurb which is the most important thing. I didnt want to write a book about Robert Kennedy, a biography help him, as much as exciting what he did on this trip, the people he met in the issues he faced and try to put them in context of what was happening in the 60s and what is happening today. Also to show what changes have happened since the 60s and what changes havent. A few of the issues he discussed or confronted in Eastern Kentucky, one was strip mining. At the time there was a system called the broad form deed. I dont know why was called that. Maybe was big. These were deeds people sign over the mineral rights to their property, often 50, 200 years earlier. These deeds gave companies the right to strip mine, to strip the land that the coal was on and companies werent required to repair the land or do anything to fix the damage that was created by stripmining so people Coal Companies would take out the call and leave. Environmentally it was disastrous. It stripped hillsides, the hollows would flood every spring not to mention very exploitative since it destroyed the land people had and they got no benefit from the coal that was taken out. Something like 1 trillion worth of coal has been extracted from Eastern Kentucky and not much of that money made it back. Another issue that was pressing at the time was the concept of maximum feasible participation. The Economic Opportunity act provided the people most affected by these programs, i. E. Poor people, would be given maximum feasible participation in deciding how the money would be spent and what the money would be spent on, where the money would be spent. As an example there was a grassroots Citizens Committee of wolf and brevet counties that was organized, got a 40, 000 grant from the federal government to build new roads and this was a Committee Formed by unemployed minors. It seemed like a fantastic thing that they were able to get this money but who do you think didnt like the fact that the federal government, the state and the county politicians were used to having the money go to them first. E to that despite this to the world poverty in the economic act paternity act and the Economic Opportunity act with maximum feasible participation it was a fantastic idea but in a way, playing it a little seed of its own demise right there in the act. That it trigg that it triggered such a backlash among the entrenched lyrical interest. This was an old in kentucky but everywhere that any of this money went here of course 1968, the president ial campaign was heating up. Lyndon johnson had not withdrawn yet from the campaign. Bobby would not announce his candidacy until march so were in february when the trip took some attempt takeses place, six weeks before Robert Kennedy officially announces his candidacy. But like i said it really had the trappings of a Campaign Trip and its funny, i have pictures in the book, kennedys aides did not expect quite a crowd of present to accompany the senator on this trip. You would see this long caravans of cars following him and he would stop sober and go inside a house and talk to somebody and done in light, onto the next house before the care of it even finished pulling up to the house. It was kind of funny how much attention it got. I was surprised to learn the networks did not archive nightly newscasts until august of 1968 win the Democratic Convention came. It would be occasional news cast would find it some thought it was important to save for one reason or another but the network newscasts from kennedys trip, i was not able to find anything they just were, they didnt archive the newscast at that time. There were a host of issues, edges were briefly, food stamps was one of the fascinating issues to me that i learned about in this book. Mainly because people had to pay fornl food stamps which i hadnt really appreciated but when the Food Stamp Program began you paid foror a certain denominatin of stamps and then an addition to that you were given free stamps. You would pay like a 10 and get 15 15 with the food stamps, and that he was determined by a number of factors, the size of your family, your income, that can think but it could be a fairly big price. Kennedy, one of the people he talked to on the trip at one of the hearings was an unemployed minor name swank of phuket. I lovees these names, who spent 72 a month for 94 in 94 in food stamps. He had to pay 72 72 to get n food stamps. Guy name johnson who was a father 15 whose monthly income was 60. He paid 206 a month for 112 in food stamps just leaving 34 for all other expenses. Johnson said at to kennedy he said have you seen 15 kids in three beds . Robert kennedy said im headed in that direction. [laughter] he had ten kids at the time i think. And after the trip, one of the things that did come out of this was that eventually, the purchase requirement was lifted. Although it did not take effect until the food stamp act of 1977 and that did not ta that didnt take effect until january 1979 when the purchase requirement was finally ended their participation in the food step program went up 1. 5 million in one month so it made a big difference in a lot of peoples lives just by lifting that purchase requirement. Food stame program for people for the hungry. Also Welfare Program for walmarts, because about 4 of walmart sales come from food stamps. So its always interesting to see walmart, how they come down on legislation that makes it harder for people to get food stamps because it cuts into their revenue. Of course, after rfks assassination in june of 68, Richard Nixon was elected president. He had to appoint someone to oversee the office of Economic Opportunity to oversee the world poverty. Of course republicans for the most part did not like the war and poverty inhaled the programs. It kinda put nixon a tough spot who is he going to find to this thankless job that nobody wants. He found a congressman from illinois a guy named donald rumsfeld, who took over the office of Economic Opportunity and one of his first tires was a young ambitious congressional intern from wyoming, a guy named dick cheney. So in 1981, the office of Economic Opportunity oh eo, was finally abolished altogether. We couldnt give rumsfeld and cheney credit for ending at least one war, and that was the war on poverty. [laughter] what to soon . Finally, we took a couple statistics one is poverty was reduced, 1959 poverty was 22 , thats pretty crazy. Let me do the math thats one and four, one and five . And in 1973, it was 11 so is cut in half. In the space of 14 years. When you look at a graph a chart of where poverty was headed, from 1959 to 1973, its just straight down. But since 1973, when the effects of putting the brakes on the world poverty took effect, it is held steady. Its been about 11 to 15 since then. In some ways i think the warm poverty was a success in other ways it was not. Id be happy to take any questions if anybodys got them, you can step up to the microphone and let it rip. Somebody has to have a question. Thanks for being here, thank you for the talk. I look for to reading your book. My question is, i wondered if you could speak more about the decline in poverty . I work in Montgomery County with Patient Population of uninsured adults. The criteria to get into the program listed the below to below 250 of the poverty level. The federal poverty levels of same across the night safety and the cost of living is not the same across united states. When you went from 22 to 11 could you give us the context of where those numbers came from . One of the things, and a talk about it in the book, and excruciating but fascinating detail is how you determine poverty. This was a huge thing when kennedy came in and 61 and said what we do about poverty, the first thing you want to know is whats the number . People said we dont know what the numbers. I think rita or sharansky was her name at the department of agriculture was a woman who came up with a formula for determining what the poverty line was. And basically, she took the usda, im giving a lo