In this culture brief time that was pretty admirable and having lived through those days it was a delight really to go back and live through what kennedy did. I was at a lecture of the library of congress of biography is the she give you a copy and i had read this number of years ago but i am so glad i did it was a delight i am also reading the book on dark many that is less but not because of her but relieve the and believable influence of right wing in american political life. Natalie buying Television Time for candidates but universities and movements with special interest of big money. We have very disturbing things for all americans with the purchase of our political life in many aspects by a group of determined ideologues. Host where was the idea for the book . Actually it was sent to me here. I said i will read that some day that came and now im halfway through and that is no less enjoyable read. Host what types of books to gravitate toward the ruth lilly normally . Normally history and biography than Public Policy. For a break i will read mysteries and literature i am an old English Literature major but i dont read that as much as i would like but periodically i am able. Host your Congressional District is right across the river in virginia seat on how the long flights home so what do you to . Mac will whole life ive a compulsive reader if i am waiting between events i pick a book and read environ traveling somewhere or on an airplane i just recently went to china i had a lot of reading time on the flight slyke to get a lot of reading and but it is like breathing air for me. You have to read. We ask your staff prior to coming today some of the of books you have recently read and to learn the Supreme Court justices Justice Brennan and Justice Marshall . I have a fascination of us ate third branch of government and we have allowed this method of some type of priesthood with that building that looks like a greek temple and periodically from olympus they threw down was a man the guidance. They are branch of government like the other two and they need to be held accountable like the others. I very much want to understand the people that make up the core in it nature of their decisions and how does this impact American Life . Host if you see something you disagree with his reaction . It depends. Is somebody gets history wrong it bothers me there is no Fact Checking or a mistake could be that fundamental i remember reading a book in that category and the author it was a book actually about a president in our lifetime there is talking about the gettysburg above the commanded the union army wrong at gettysburg in referred to fokker and i that that is pretty fundamental let fundamental widened the fact check get that . Or why did you if youre writing the story . Any books he disagree with politically . Yes. Craig shirley very conservative author i thank you have to try to understand. You can say youre not an informed at this point. Garner their books the you go back to . I am always you reluctant to read a book because there is so much to read i dont want to have to go back over. With the reading that you do congressman, do you find you can affect Public Policy through the knowledge . Yes. I do. When i was in graduate school i took a class with a historian who wrote a book on the uses of history and the purpose of the course was to help eliminate how policy makers miss use history largely for analogies. For example, Lyndon Johnson who was president kennedy sent him with vietnam to help the situation and johnson was taken with the idea referred to the president of china as the churchill of southeast asia. In his mind that is who he was. Rising against all odds and colonies with this bastion of the democratic ideals but that was the analogy for Lyndon Johnson now what could go wrong . That was in his head and when he became president that war was based on a lot of the role of war to analysis that were inappropriate for the situation for america and policy makers to say to talk about chamberlain but kennedy during the cuban missile crisis when there were talking about a preemptive strike he said i want my brother to be that guy of the 60s as a preemptive a pearl harbor type of strike using this has a history does matter. And with the mockups here in the house it is fun to add to it so having a bit of a command. To share with your colleagues . I do. There somewhere informally causally sharing i love narrative history so ive always trading that and what is good. Host are their authors that you go back to if this author has the new book . Yes. I am waiting robert to come up with a book on Lyndon Johnson so yes. When that comes out we all get it. I remember when the manchesters went to finish his biography of churchill the same thing we waited for that to come out to read that the data is kind of fun to have a group of goods for that book that were all anticipating i think it is a little adult version of the harry potter series. Did you read that . Everyone of them with my daughter. I love them for gore thought they were great i was so excited as a lover of reading that my daughter and all of her friends did not think reading was a chore but something they could not wait to get their hands on. And eventually as she got older when the next 1k mount they would be at the bookstore at midnight to purchase the book and sit all night reading it i thought any offer that has that ability to excite to get kids reading as not a burden but as a joy and a treasure she has a lot working for her. Host were you get your books . Bookstores or sent to you . Library . All of the above. I collect books by wife will tell you i probably possess at this point thousands of them we are amazed the floor has a crash. On occasions for birthday and whatever and to share my love of this to causally go back and forth but what i want to is get a book online because i do not wish to contribute to the demise of a published a book. Want bookstores to be around forever. And i want people to always be able to have the option and the pleasure of reading a physical book. Some on my staff think it is a little oldfashioned but i still mourn the closure of bookstores like borders and some of the others that were fairly ubiquitous and now most of them are gone. Fairfax county public virginia at Library Comes into lobby water their concerns and what is your answer . Largely is funding and obviously all the we have a very robust System People who live in our county including this one although they have the vote evolved there is a lot of technology but it is a safe place for a lot of kids to go to do research for their homework and i can relate to that because frankly when i was the kid afterschool went to the library to read periodicals and i read books so the librarys that we have today are a far cry from those kinds but theyre not that dissimilar in the functions. Day remember the first Nonfiction Book that you read that is still your love of reading . When i was young i would say around fifth grade i have read all of jules verne all of Charles Dickens i remember being blown away of David Copperfield and extraordinary story and to enter into another world. And i have bad habit if i am an author i want to Read Everything and i still do that with mysteries today. If i like an author i will Read Everything hear she has written to have read dick francis and Robert Parker and go through the portfolio of writing up so with some are real classical authors digest to enjoy reading of the food they were because of the pleasure. Host i you a fan of William Shakespeare . I am. Why . Really he was foundational for the englishlanguage with the literature, and in many ways the philosopher of the englishlanguage. Is there a Human Emotion more brilliant than he did not anticipate or express . In that is an incredible role to play and skill to possess the to dash six your in the english language and we just celebrated his birthday allegedly died on the same day he was born obviously decades later but it although some played something similar with the spanish indian war and i was actually thinking about it yet today just how harrowing a figure shakespeare really was and the genius that he possessed it wasnt like he had years to write his opus she had deadlines to meet because people would go to plays a lot so it is doubly impressive what he produced in his lifetime it is genius and inspired. What is the but he would recommend about congress . And he wrote a book on congress and that is as good as any. And there are some figures and those who served and John Quincy Adams he surged 17 years in the house the presidency was considered an affair after he said to the president he found his voice and incredible champion to petition the government which does subcurrents slavery holders nonetheless they respected him. And has an incredible figure actually. He served here in the house. Host there is a new biography out and John Quincy Adams. Host dave you ever think about writing a book . Actually there are two books. Yes i have. And served 14 years in local government and with the appreciation of congress during the civil war our so that congress but to do the Land Grant University act there are extraordinary things theyre doing and that would consume you. And then to continue to invest in this country and is an extraordinary story. In the other one is a broader more philosophical tone and there is a lot of conventional wisdom tickets examined. I have lived here 40 years in washington i think a lot of our fox drive us and tend to do harm. As a result incredible loss of life and treasurer as a wasted part of the decade to tear the country apart. One wonders about what might have benefit had a lot more scrutiny of his challenge to. Host have you read the mcafee on every american president . Ivan l. Van buren or not. But at this point most of them made to look about. It has been a while. To study it not only the history and how happened but the eternal life. What is very striking to meet most members historically spent their whole lives that find themselves pretty unsatisfied and then leave the white house disappointed disillusioned or broken. And then wishing for more that tells you something about human ambition and political ambition. Finally what is on your Summer Reading list . I am hoping friends provide me with reading material. I am looking a reading a book about Michael Collins who was an Irish Revolutionary in the beginning of the 20th century as he celebrates the 100th anniversary having a lot to do with the irish free state. And so with that biography with aaron burr and to leave the historical narrative about the pris civil war. Year read book reviews . Sure. And the Washington Post no longer has a book review. A democrat from virginia this is booktv on cspan2. Fifth step neck the publisher of of public affairs, what do you have coming out . I am not a big Computer Games guide the one that i know or almost Everybody Knows is tetras and it is far more than a game of cute shapes falling out of the black sky lighting about the bottom of the screen is a fascinating story of a young brilliant Computer Programmer working in his dying days of the soviet union to its smuggle this came up to the west so there is industrial espionage the end of one political system and the beginning of the latter perhaps the creation of the most copied imitated stolen gave a full time. How did dan discovered to discover this . He got ahold of this story and interviewed him. And has been scouring around the story for some time and it is a terrific tale. Nation books has a wonderful all eventually moving book from gary young the former guardian who lived in chicago for several years looking at the death of 10 and people in one day in america and well links all these people that died there under age of 19 most of them accidental not the highprofile victims and what we explain away as an act of madness. With the people to guns they barely have a paragraph and the local newspapers. The of the circumstances of which they would play and he asks the kind of questions we should all be asking where the guns are in culture. And with the caribbean born so he knows what it is like to be a black president in american and has done a remarkable job of editing the book will move lines. Host one more . It is fascinating to me professor pardon it Harvard BusinessSchool Writing a book called why they do it his focus is on whitecollar crime those who had a successful professional lives often will revered who nonetheless cannot stop themselves with sometimes one very large step. But he and madoff have changed long written correspondences and how he became the finance your at the end of the eddy to do tremendous damage to a lot of people. It is a great city to work in a certain kind of environment you can shut yourself off from her moral compass that is where this country is going so does a story of the elite and how