so again, the prosecution just -- i mean, a slam-dunk case with the typical hanging jury. it was the failure of imagination. he did not see that if you had a 2-time convicted like phelan sitting there being accused of his third felony, the jury is probably going to view him one way. if you have of light of standing member of the community sitting there, the jury is point to be inclined to view them very differently. and all this took place days after jonestown. the assassinations were ten days after jonestown, and it was the darkest, gloomiest time in the history of san francisco. i just can't imagine -- maybe the fire, of course. a bright light. , i mean, first johnstown. you know, most of the people died in jonestown as we all know, people around here. almost everybody knew somebody or knew somebody who knew somebody who had been lost in jonestown. ten days later this happened. it seemed impossible. i remember on the night of the assassinations after i filed my stories and was taking that j. church home from the building where time magazine was housed in the financial district out to know we valley, and it was silent in the city. the trolley rolled. a lot of people out, and no noise. people were beyond words. they could not speak. it was just too much, too awful. >> and jim jones was part of the coalition. >> well, yes. in fact, the reason that john jones fled is a couple of very good reporters were preparing an article in which they had gone to members of peoples temple and said, disaffected members who claimed that jones was beating them and stealing their money and sleeping with their wives. so they were preparing this article which was coined to blow the lid off of to jim jones really was. keep in mind that he was an ally of george moscone. he did get the people to the precincts. they had the discipline to group. jim jones was aware of this article was about to be published. somebody broke into the offices of new west magazine and rifled the files trying to destroy the article before it could be published. then when it was clear it was going to be published, that was when chin jones left. it was very much connected. and george moscone and willie brown defended jim jones until the day he died. history is tragedy, not melodrama. >> what about tommy norman and joe frazier is after the trial, was that the end of their careers? >> well, no political future at all. he was through. he left politics. tom norman went on prosecuting cases. doug schmitt and steve, who beat tommy, they liked him. i was not particularly friendly. i did not describe his style, but if you can imagine -- remember stanley tucci, sort of slithering through the double or pravda, that was kind of -- tommy never would say over. he was a very formal pretentious kind of guy with the widow's peak. he went on working. they felt so badly for him that they seriously discussed offering in a partnership in their firm. [laughter] they liked tommy norman and a lot of people around like him. they were sorry to see all that he had messed up big time. it wiped out all the accomplishments of the rest of his life, and he was no longer among us. the rest in peace. >> we would like to remind our listening audience that this is a program with the commonwealth club of california, listening to "double play." reporter and author mike weiss. unfortunately we have reached the point in our program whether is time for just one last question. i guess, how would the city be different today if it were not for these tragedies? >> i don't know that it would be. well, i mean, dianne feinstein probably would not be a u.s. senator, but i don't know if that has much effect on the life of the city. there would not be streets and buildings named after harvey and george, but other than that i don't think it really would be a different city. a lot of time has gone by. history flows forward and things go on. i don't see on a daily basis that it makes much difference. in fact, we have district elections again, right? i can never keep track. i don't live in the city anymore. a pity that i don't get to vote for the board of supervisors. i can never keep track of when they're in and when they're out because it seems to be a constant back-and-forth. i honestly would say that i don't know of any differences that would be felt in our lives today if this had not occurred, except those two names and so on. someone want to give a better answer? that was a pretty weak cancer. [laughter] >> our thanks to mike weiss, author of "double play." his participation in tonight's program. [applause] [applause] >> thank you. thank you very much. [applause] >> we also think our audience here as well as those listen to our recording. now this meeting of the commonwealth club of california celebrating more than a century of enlightened discussion is adjourned. [inaudible conversations] >> you're watching book tv on c-span2, 48 hours of nonfiction authors and books every weekend. >> you're watching book tv on c-span2, 48 hours of nonfiction books and authors every weekend on c-span2. well, fall is one of the biggest bookselling seasons and book release seasons of the mall. this is our 2011 fall book preview show. we are joined by two industry watchers and put followers. bob minzesheimer is with usa today, the book critic for that newspaper in new york city, and jason boog is with galley cap, which is a website that covers books and the publishing industry. gentlemen, thank you for being on book tv today, and i want to start by asking you, which booked you are most excited about or are looking forward to this fall. bob minzesheimer, we will start with you. >> peter, i am going to mention three books. i will try to do them briefly. one is already out. book critic that is a no-no. i should have read it already. it is called what it feels like to go to war. wrote a novel about vietnam last year. it was published. it took in 20 some years to get it published. he shifted to nonfiction to ride both for military and a civilian audience what combat is really like, which he thinks the military really does not prepare soldiers for. they prepare them for this technological and physical demand, but not the emotional and philosophical. he is very good at writing about other writers and novelists. that is one book. they're is a book coming from an opera called elizabeth and hazel two women of little rock. it is about to women who were 15 years old in 1957 who were captured in the famous photograph intering the little rock central high school. a white woman, white students yelling at her, and this is the story of their improbable and years later and how that fell apart. they made a movie of this. and finally, like a lot of people i am looking forward to seeing what jacqueline kennedy had to say to arthur schlesinger charlie after the assassination of president kennedy. >> the caroline kennedy book. >> well, she is the editor. >> conversations on life with john f. kennedy. is that the book? >> right. >> bob minzesheimer, why did the two women from little rock, why did their relationship fall apart? >> i have not gotten that far in the book yet. you will have to stay tuned. >> at 11, what are you looking forward to? >> i am looking forward to susan's new book coming out this fall about rain 1010, the famous dog that started in a number of movies. when i first heard about the book and had to confess i was a little skeptical. you would want to read what the dog on tv. i read the first excerpt in the new yorker, and it just blew me away. the excited to see this story crossing different world wars. a fantastic story. >> well, you both mentioned biographies, so let's look at other biographies. that includes christopher hichens, arguably essays by christopher hichens. jason boog, what can you tell us about this? >> he has not put together a collection of essays like this in a few years. i think 2004 was the last time. he will cover a lot of ground, everything from his controversial stands on the iraqi war to the al qaeda and more current events. he is, right now fairly ill with cancer. the book that is really going to put him out in the public. a very important book in his career. >> please. >> dipping in and out, and the great thing about him is whether you agree with him or not, whether he is writing about a topic in the news are not he is just a lot of fun to read. >> michael more has his biography coming out. here comes trouble. he will be our in-depth guest in october. >> excited about that book, actually. >> go ahead. >> he is a michigan boy. i grew up watching his work on flint. this actually shows his life before he was a filmmaker. i'm looking for a to seeing these stories from his life. >> we did a short interview with him in the paper today which would be by the time you see this last thursday and he describes it as not a memoir. it is sort of an anti mark, just some stories including i think he was 13 years of wandering around the capitol and got lost and ran into bobby kennedy. >> sentiment, a book by michael more. will that automatically be a large print run? >> i would say yes. >> i'm sorry. go ahead. >> he has such a big following online. go to his website and you can see all the people that are talking about this book. i think it will sell a lot of copies. >> well, two other well-known authors who might generate automatic large print runs, and economic books. sylvia nasser and michael lewis. grand pursued, the story of economic genius and boomerang, travels in the third world. what can you tell us about these two books, bob minzesheimer? >> well, probably best known for her last book which was a beautiful mind, which was sort of an oxymoron. a best seller about a mathematician who was helped by the fact that it became a movie with russell crowe. so she has a big following. i think what she is trying to do is take economics which has been called the dismal science and at some humanity and personality to it. i just began. and she comes across. to me it was a new idea that 150 years or so ago the idea at that most people were doomed to live lives filled with poverty and despair was an accepted given. she traces how that has changed over 200 years or 150 years. >> jason boog, what about michael lewis. >> looking for to this book. his last book, the big short, looked at the economic meltdown and other stock-market crash affected our lives in the united states. his next book will go around the world and look at the different ways it affected other countries from europe to the developing countries around us. it is an important thing to do, not forget that we are not the only ones suffering through economic crisis. there are a lot of countries struggling. looking at the way it affected the global commerce, an important thing to do. >> go ahead. >> his subtitle, he talks about the new peril world which is the idea that there is a strict division between the developed world and a developing country. i think he is trying to get beyond that and show what easy credit did tell a lot of economies, including our own. also the life of a writer. >> a third book coming out by nicholas what shock. what is this book about? >> yes. i am actually really -- this is something that interests me personally. i am working on a book of my own right now about the great depression and our riders in new york city survives that. this book would set a very critical moment when economists in the united states were trying to decide how we should respond to the great depression. the two different views that came out, one was we should spend a lot of money and put these programs to put the country back to work or we should be more cautious. we will see these new dynamics play out through 2012 during the election. i think it is a good time to read up on these issues. >> all right. and an austrian economist did not believe the government should intervene. recently on the best-seller list thanks to glenn back who is a big advocate. >> well, jason boog, a book that has done a lot of attention on the east coast and i want to get the west coast perspective. already out, dick cheney's buck. is that getting a lot of buzz or noise? >> believe it or not the last time i checked it is the number to book in the history section in the amazon and about the number ten but in overall. so i think that people all over the country are interested in reading this book. he served during a crucial moment for our country, and it does not look like he is apologizing. he has already caused all sorts of reactions from different officials that worked with him saying he took cheap shots, some people think. it caused a stir all around the country. seeing him on television helps. >> bob minzesheimer, go ahead. >> on usa today listed was number four. our list includes both paperback and hardcover. however, to put a little bit in perspective the novel that is now a movie house selling about four to one, but it will be next week, the week after next number one on the new york times nonfiction hardcover list. >> a book like this by a vice-president even though he was potentially controversial, does it have staying power? >> probably not. they talk about journalism being the first draft of history. this would probably be the second draft. phew will a lot of people be reading it in ten years? i doubt that. >> the second half is coming out, and this is about her years in the white house with the bush ministration. >> in fact, i was going to suggest that you should get ms. rice and mr. cheney to interview each other. >> i would watch that in the second. >> well, we have bob woodward interviewing dick cheney for hour after words program. we will have that for our archives. what about the book from condoleezza rice? have you heard anything about this, jason boog, out at stanford? >> yes. it is quite a heavy tone. 700 pages or more. she served in a very historic time, the first african-american woman to be the secretary to serve. and so i think it is going to be a very historic book. she has a lot of scores i think she wants to settle, 700 pages worth. i think a lot of people will look at that. >> will you read that book, or is that a book that one might do a washington read and go back to the index and look for names? >> in my job we tend to do the index read where i will look at the portions of her book that interest our audience the most. we have already done that with the book from dick cheney. an interesting way to look through it, but i'm interested to find out the books that interest her and what she thought the books that were being published during her time. the books she wants to answer. >> will you read the book from condoleezza rice? >> well i read it? no, i probably will not. i would be curious about it. it has been embargoed, which means there are no advanced copies of it. i did read most of her first book, her memoir about growing up in segregated alabama and thought that was rather interesting. with the publisher put out, that talked about it as a master class in diplomacy and heard humility and humanity, and i was wondering if that was some sort of a at the former vice president. humble is not an adjective often described with him. >> this second volume of the autobiography of condoleezza rice coming out november 1st. book tv interviewed her for the first half. you can watch that interview, if you're interested, at booktv.org. simply use the search function in the upper left-hand corner of our website home page. well, one former governor, one current governor currently have books out. we will begin with mitch daniels, keeping the republic, saving america by trusting americans. was this up three presidential run but? bob minzesheimer. >> probably. i don't know for sure. i'm sure that people at penguin publishing were disappointed that he did not decide to run. i'm not sure if a book by a presidential candidate, they very rarely become best sellers. people read these for a variety of reasons. some, just the idea of getting their idea out there. probably have not heard the last even though he is not running for president. >> former to term michigan governor has a book out, the fight for jobs in america's economic future being put out by public affairs in september. jason boog, former governor of michigan, you going to read it? >> i am. i am from michigan. she just took the state during the roughest time in that state's history. i was living in new york before this. i was not in michigan during her tenure, but talking to my family it was such a rough time. the really interesting time. her focus on jobs in trust me. i like that approach better than mitch daniels who has a a blurb from jeb bush calling in the anti obama. i don't like it when someone takes a bow and pauses it against someone. i like it when they focus on the job market in the struggle. i am looking forward to checking that out. >> bob minzesheimer, herman cain, republican candidate for president. he has his autobiography coming out. my journey to the white house. >> notice the! the latest incarnation of someone who has been very successful in business. his grandfather speeds up. now wants to take those lessons into politics. he calls himself abc, american, black, and conservative. i would not -- i think most people would not bet on his presidential campaigns. he has some interesting ideas. i'll leave it there. >> with a book like this to my candid it may not be that well-known, what kind of a print run the you have? >> one of the dirty secrets of publishing is publishers are always exaggerating. very hard to know exactly. they say they will print 20,000 it probably print 10,000. it is all relative. this is such -- books in our culture are such a sort of -- i mean, they are influential, but by numbers alone there are a drop in the bucket. a book can sell 25,000 copies in a weekend be a best seller, but in a country of 300 million people that is not a lot. i don't put a lot of stock in print runs. >> i do want to add one thing. herman cain is that sure bet for publishers. any time some of the comes in with a strong following on the radio, a built-in audience who are interested, publishes love that. they're making more bets on people like him that have a preformed platform. that is where publishing is putting money. >> being published by threshold. what is a threshold? >> threshold is, i believe, a more conservative and print. we are seeing more of these plan beck has his own imprint. it is a strong movement. more conservative focus. >> along with sentinel and gregory. bob minzesheimer, does a conservative book has a built-in audience? >> i think so. there is this odd thing and there is no way of proving this. the party out of power does better at bookstores. cranston's, during the bush administration, the second bush administration a lot of books critical of the president did well in bookstores. the same thing for bill clinton. a lot of you could take critical anti-clinton books during his administration. now we are seeing conservatives do well during the obama administration. again, numbers are different. again, of lot more people votes than buy books. one other thing about a book by herman cain, i'm sure he did not write that book to make much money. in fact, he may not be making any money at all. that is attraction to a publisher. they don't have to pay very much money. >> this is a book tv on c-span2, and this is our 2011 fall book preview show. bob minzesheimer and jason boog. gentlemen, one other political book that is coming out of politicians but. just recently announced. representative gabrielle giffords and her husband, mark kelly. >> yap. i put that up earlier this week. i was amazed by the response. people circulated it around the internet and are excited to see what happened in her life since that's tragic shooting. also her husband just took a trip to space. it is such a powerful combination