the candidates at standing at urinals before they are doing their business before the debate mocking from behind his back as the regular leaded on telhami walked into the room and overheard them and an embarrassed hush falls over the group. >> host: we are waiting for a briefing on haiti to get underway at a pentagon and we will watch that quickly could you also tell the difference between what people saw in r. dee giuliani on the campaign trail? >> guest: want to reinforce this book is about politics and since we write about presidential candidates and spouses but a were goal is to write about a personality as john said before the human trauma of the campaign. we joked of time we knew we had an interesting set of characters when you were writing about a presidential campaign rudy giuliani is the seventh most interested candidate there is all going on. rudy giuliani's image for the country and republican voters was a tough guy who cleaned up new york city restricted terse after 9/11 and on the campaign

trail he was a tiger but a pussycat. his campaign aides could never get him to run ads against components when he was shown the negative ads and mailings going out against him he would laugh and say those aarsele and in the debates when he was challenged by opponents for the questioners he would laugh. he never showed toughness and hunger to win. that is essential in presidential politics and ran counter to his image i think someone earlier in the program talked about cognitive dissidence. it was caught of dissidents. his inability to define himself and reinforce the greatest strength of being tough was a rudy giuliani was mayor. when mccain was starting to fall, he was never worried about rudy giuliani.

" continues. host:

from the ancient greeks to the early 20th century, what do it after the 2010 census will be confronted given destination of race and identity. professor painter has written an entirely accessible readable myth busting and compelling history of race. she is a leading historian in the united states you are tired at western university. she's prolific and award-winning scholar reason for on history and race relations include creating black americans and a second attention a inning armageddon. and we are pleased to welcome here this evening for the history -- "the history of white people" professor nell irvin painter. hot mark

[applause] >> hello. you are a nice-looking group. as for coming. did i hear someone accrete? you all agree? well, what i'd like to do is read to you for about 17 minutes or so from the first part of the book and then from the back of the boat. and then we'll talk, okay? i might have entitled this book, constructions of white americans from antiquity to the president because it explores the concept that lies within the history of event. i've chosen this strategy because race is an idea, not a fact and its questions demand answers from the conceptual, rather than the factual realm. a american history offers up a

large bounty of commentary on what it means to be nonwhite, moving easily between alternate shins and the meaning of racist color. from colored to to african-american to black to african-american always associated the idea of blackness with slavery. but little attention has been paid to histories equally confused inflexible discourses on the white race and the old slave trade from eastern europe. i use white races in the plural because most of the past centuries when race really came down to matters of law, educated americans firmly believed in the existence of more than one european race. it is possible and important to investigate the other side of

history without trivializing the history we are to know so well. let me state categorically that while this is not a history and white versus black, i do not by any means underestimate orono the overwhelming importance of black race in america. i am familiar with a truly gigantic literature that explains the meaning and portends an honest to god reality of the existence of race. it's imperative and a statutory biological definitions of white race, we may notoriously vague. believing that what is not black. the disc thickness does not indicate lack of interest. quite to the contrary for another, past historical literature, much less known today explains the meaning and

portends an honest to god reality of the existence of white races. they may seem not to be given a book on americans in antiquity, a pure fun before europeans discovered the western hemisphere and thousands of years he for the invention of the constant of race. they given the prevalence of the notion that racist permanent, many believe it possible to trace something recognizable as the white race, back more than 2000 years. in addition, not few westerners have racialized antiquity making ancient history into white race history and classics into a living whitefield, complete with pictures of blonde ancient greeks. transforming the agents into anglo-saxon ancestors may classics unwelcoming to african-american classes. the blonde ancient great narrative may no longer be

taught in schools, but it lives on as a net to be confronted in these pages. before launching the trip back to ancient times, however, it may be useful to make a few remarks about the role of science or science of race. i resist the temptation to place the word lion, even serious and assertions of the most furious pernicious or ridiculous kind in quotation marks for the task of deciding what is sound science and what is cultural fantasy would quickly become all-consuming. better to know the qualifications of yesterday scientists and to brand as mere science, they are thought that is not stood the test of time. i give scholars to refute in their day quite a place in my pages, no matter that some of their thinking of fallen by the wayside. today we think of race as a

matter of biology. but a second reminds us that the manufactories quickly spill out as merely physical categories, even in circuit city places one could come in the meanings of white race reach into concepts of labor, gender and classic images of personal beauty that seldom appear in analyses of race. work is a simple part and restart because the people who do the work are likely to be featured as inherently deserving of the toil and poverty of labor and status. it is still a sound, and slavery anywhere in the world must rest on a foundation of racial difference. time and again, the better classes have concluded that most people deserve their lot here at it must be something within them that puts them at the bottom. in modern times, we recognize this kind of reasoning as it relates to black race.

but another times, the same logic was applied to people who were right, especially when they were impoverished immigrant seeking work. let me hold for a moment. i am go -- [inaudible] thank you. those at the very bottoms were slaves. slavery has helped construct concepts of race in two contradictory ways. first, the american tradition equally whiteness with freedom while consigning black nasty slavery. the history of unfree white people flavors and like like slavery move people around and makes it human genes on a massive gale. the important demographic role of the various slave trades is

all too often overlooked as a historical force. in the second place the term caucasian as a designation for white people originates in concepts of beauty related to the white slave trade from eastern europe and whiteness remains embedded in patients with ud found at art history and popular culture. today most americans envision whiteness as racially indivisible, though ethnically divided. this is the scheme anthropologist laid out in the mid-20th century. by this reckoning, there were only three real races: mongoloid, negroid and caucasoid. caol ethnicities. today however biologists and geneticists, not to mention literate critics no longer beliin the physical existence of racist. thank you. now you tell me if any of this remains on my forehead in those little bits of white stuff that

stick to you. it's not funny. [laughter] that's true. where was i.? though they continue to recognize the continuing power of racism, the belief that racism exists and some are better than others. it took some two centuries to reach this conclusion after countless racial schemes had spun out countless different numbers of races, even of white races and attempts at classification produced frustration. although science today denies race any standing as objective truth in the u.s. census faces taxonomic note meltdown aired we shall see. many americans cling to race as the unschooled claim to supersession.

so long as racial discrimination remains a fact of life and statistics can be arranged to support racial difference, the american belief in racism will endure. but confronted with the actually existing american population, its distribution of wealth, power and beauty, the notion of american whiteness will continue to evolve as it has since the creation of the american republic. now i think i'll redo the whole book. [laughter] chapter one. greeks and scythians. were there white people and antiquity? certainly some assume so as the categories we use today could be read backwards over the millennia. people with light-skinned surgeon makes this dead well before our roman times. but did anyone think they were white or that their character but they did to their color?

no, for neither the idea of race for the idea of white people had been invented. and people skin color did not carry useful meaning. what mattered was where they@@@ nonliterate peoples for whom --

who left no documents describing themselves. though scott a shifter intellectual history which american squamous westerners, keeping in mind that one before science stick to the terms of human differences race, long before racial scientists began to measure heads and concoct racial theory, ancient greeks and romans had their own means of describing the peoples of their world as they knew at more than two millennia ago. and inevitably come at the earliest accounts of our story are told from on high by rulers dominant at a particular time period for power and fixes the of history. furthermore, any attempt to trace biological ancestry quickly turns into legends. for human beings have multiplied so rapidly by a thousand or more times in some 200 years and by more than 32,000 times in 300 years. evolutionary biologists now

reckon that the six to 7 billion people now living share the same small number of ancestors living two or 3000 years ago. these circumstances make nonsense of anybody's pretensions to find a pure racial ancestry. nor our notions of western cultural. he any less. if. without a doubt, the sophisticated than no one and persian society is deeply influenced the classical culture of ancient greece, where some still imagine as the west pier and unix source. that story is still to come. for the obsession with purity, racial and cultural, i rose many centuries after the demise of the ancients. now i'm going to read very fast. and here we are at chapter 28.

the fourth enlargement of american whiteness. agitating and media dominating as america's civil rights and black power movements were and those movements help joe the idea of one white race as opposed to several. most of the country's white people might have doubted that the people had much to do with them. they might've thought that they were individuals who have succeeded by themselves and that race had always meant black people who had not. in fact, by the 1960's, the whole races of europe discourse had fallen completely out of fashion in the races of europe disclosed the part of richie really fast.

books such as william c. ripley's races of europe published in eight team -- 1899 and important for a quarter of a century. books such as william c. ripley's races of europe once essential reading on brace for now remaindered as useless. and if you are jewish, calling a race within due straight into the anti-semitic column. reminders at jews and italians have been labeled as racist a generation earlier, might as prompted a retort that race was used more loosely in the past. this is true. but every use of race has always been lives, whether applied to black him a white, yellow, brown, red or other. no consensus is ever formed on the number of human race is or even on the number of white races. criteria constantly shift according to individual taste and political need.

it was clear however that in the olden days, the 20th century, [laughter] in the olden days, jim crow had kept the colored races apart from whites and african-americans largely hidden behind segregation's bail. shortly after the end of the second world war, the end of legalized segregation began to propel black people into national visibility as never before. concurrently, other changes were soon to deeply alter american sense of the very meaning of race. little noticed at the time the openness of the mid-1960's went beyond the black white color line. the immigration and nationality for hard seller at the 1965 was a specially crafted to counter earlier nordic minded statutes, especially in terms of asians. it also allowed for wider

immigration from the western hemisphere and africa. therein lay the seeds of democratic revolution. new new immigrants of the post- 1965 era overwhelmingly from outside europe were upending american racial conventions. asians greatly rising in number were rapidly being judged to be smarter and eventually to be richer than native born wife. latinos from 13% of the population by 2000, edging out to african-americans is the most numerous minority. the u.s. census, without peer in scoring the nation's racial makeup had begun to notice latin americans in the 1940's by counting up heterogeneous peoples with spanish surnames and hastily lumping them together as hispanics. though an impossibly crude measurements, is survived until

1977. by that point, the federal government needed more precise racial statistics to enforce civil rights legislation. to this end, the office of management and budget issued statistical policy to write dave number 15. to this -- sorry. she was a change worth noting. in the racially charged decades of the early 20th century, governments at all levels have passed laws to separate americans by race. the jim crow's segregation was supposed to be separate but equal, and cracked this new word to discriminate by discriminating non-whites from public institutions, whether from libraries, schools, swimming pools for the ballot box. the civil rights act of 1964 and the voting rights act of 1965 began to change all that so that by the late 20th century, the

rationale for counting people by race had morphed into a means of keeping track of civil rights enforcement. statistical policy directive number 15 set the terms for racial and ethnic classification throughout american society by directing federal agencies, including the u.s. census, to collect data according to four races: black, white, american indian, alaskan native and asian pacific islander. hawaiian was added later as a concession to protest. and one ethnic category, hispanic latino, which is not racial. collaboration was not good for civil rights, but it opened the way to chaos. under these guidelines, the hispanic latino classification pretended enormous turmoil. now that there was a non-hispanic white category

commented there not also exist hispanic white people? yes, no and other. faced with a given racial choices on the census of 2000, fully 42.2% of latinos checked some other race rather than black or white. throwing nearly 6% of americans into a kind of racial limbo. in addition, the u.s. census of 2000 how to increase a deeper and more personal recognition of multiracial identities. for the first time, respondents were about to describe themselves as belonging to one or more of 15 racial identities. as so often in the past, adding confusion, the list of races included nationalities.

this expansion now allowed for 126 f. no racial groups were for purist 63 races. it did not take much analytical ability to see that any notion of race lay so deluded as to lose much of its punch. and taxonomy was rapidly populate much further under the weight of interracial sex. nothing new here. americans disorderly habits have always overflowed meet racial lines and proven brace thinkers crazy. asians and native americans indians have the highest rates of interracial marriage, but others including african-americans now often married and had children with people from outside the racial ethnic group. by 1990, american families were so heterogeneous that one seventh of white, one third of

blacks, four fifths of asian and 19 twentieths of native american indian were closely related to someone of a different racial group. now that was back in 1990. with some 12% of young people calling themselves multiracial, it is expected that by 2050, 10% of whites and blacks and more than 50% of latinos, asians and native american indians will be married to someone outside their racial group. though by 2050, the whole thing may have collapsed. with so many nonwhite and white americans married to linda lee, barriers between the progeny of european immigrants have largely disappeared. among white people, three out of four marriages had already crossed ethnic andres by 1980. a generation later, few white americans had four grandparents from the same country.

william z. ripley had good this outcome in 1908, fearing above all the inharmonious, that's his word, the inharmonious nick fan of italian men and irish women. [laughter] by the now would have been forced to reconsider his prediction that such a racial mix would make americans likely. we have artists in the lowering of racial boundaries starting in the 1940's when ethnic began replacing race as applied to this descendents of european immigrants. the use of racial groups for white people has become a more advanced category partly because white people urso maxed out. finally the perquisites of mere whiteness count for less in the present situation of the stigma of blackness was just one job

suffice to curse the white looking individual also seems less mortal. back in the 20th century white people were soon to be rich or at least middle-class as well as more beautiful, powerful and smart. george bush did away with that. [laughter] sorry. that is not in the book. too late to stuff it back in. as citizens and scholars they said what needed to be known to monopolize the study of other people with himself hardly been marked and scrutinized in return. think of francis a. walker and william z. ripley for him for all education, new england ancestry and useful connections for offered authority. half a century later the people of those areas turn the glass around, bringing white people

under scrutiny. think of malcolm x and james baldwin. today the attractive qualities that saxons, anglo-saxons, nordics or white were soon to monopolize or also to be found elsewhere. after a string of nonwhite mrs. america, jennifer lopez and beyoncé knowles are celebrated hollywood duties. vijay singh and tiger woods in the williams sisters, venus and serena dominates the league sports. robert johnson, the founder of et, bill cosby and the financier on flickr junior have made millions. oprah winfrey as rich and famous, colin powell and condoleezza rice have been secretaries of state and alberto gonzales, attorney general. even more to the point of anointing power and beauty, barack obama is president of the united states. first lady, michelle obama,

whose skin color alone would have condemned her to ugliness in the 20th century figures as an iconic duty and intelligent on the global stage. none of these individuals is white, but being white these days is not what he used to be. [laughter] that's a defensible to conclude that the american going under fourth-grader enlargement. although race may seem overwhelming without legal recognition it is less important than in the past. the dark of skin, who also happened to be rich, say people from south asia or african-american or have hispanic background and the light of skin from anywhere who are beautiful are now well on the way to inclusion. is this the end of race in america? is this the end of race in america?

i think we need democracy here. okay, let's take a vote. if you think yes, put your hand up. two? three, three. if you think no, put your hand up. the noes have it. ideal mac -- [inaudible] last night a recount, yes. let's not discuss it. we've had our vote and will sign it tomorrow. [laughter] is this the end of race in america? we know it is not. at the turn of the 21st century, we're starting to look that way back in 2000. remember that? back in the 90's.

in 1997 the american association of physical anthropologists are and the american government to phase out use of race as a data category and to substitute ethnic categories instead. geneticists studying dna, the constituent material of genes that issues instructions to our bodies in response to her surroundings were also concluding that race is a biological category made no sense. the habit of relating human heredity to the environment may be traced back to antiquity, but early 19th century racial thinkers during the notion around, deeming race a permanent marker for any superiority or inferiority. not until the 1850's did the influence of environment on a ready t. get rescued with charles darwin's on the origin of species. darwin described a world much older than the typical 5000 years, reasoning that a ready t. fixed, that generation after

generation, living things change in response to their surroundings. arguments over race in the human genome have subsided a late polythene with that sounds intriguing data about personal appearance. prevailing racial schemes that rest again once again on concept of skin color, as black and white people. the widely recognized as the fact that nobody part black people actually various shades of brown and yellow, but so too are white people, nearly somewhat lighter and often with a lot more pink. or if they've been in the son, a lot more red. hence the red scare. as human block noticed in the 18th century one goes lightly into another. there is no clearly demarcated

lines. some people identify as black may have lighter skin that others to identify its ways. siblings with the same mother and father can display a range of skin colors. race may be all about pigment, but what makes people's skin light or dark? skin color is a byproduct of two kinds of melanin, red to yellow tailed melanin and dark brown to black you melanin in reaction to sunlight. and several genes interact to make people like george art, reddish, brownish or yellowish. ancient scholars were wiser than they do with the related skin color to climate. today's biologists concur. sunny climates do make people dark skinned and dark on the cold climates than people light-skinned. how much of what sort of melanin people have in their skin and to what degree it is expressed depends entirely over time on

exposure to the sun's ultraviolet or uv radiation. melanin both protects against excessive ultraviolet radiation and allow sufficient uv radiation to enter the body. too much uv radiation causes skin cancer and lead to death, but uv radiation is crucial to developing fetuses and strong bones. so where are we now? mapping the human genome publicity at initial proclamations of human kindred miss across the globe. then, racetrack inscribed racial differences on our genes. that talk has not disappeared. but ideally we would realize that human beings short history of the late assault to one another. to speak in racial terms, incessant human migration has made us all multiracial. does this mean the human genome or civil rights desegregation have ended the tyranny of race in america?

almost certainly not. the fundamental black-white binary endures, even though the category of whiteness or we might say more precisely a category of non-black as effectively expands. as before, the black poor remain outside the concept of the american president alien race a degenerate families. and i should explain that i have discussion of the concept of alien races, which was applied to immigrants and their children from eastern and southern europe and degenerate families were the poor white families slated for involuntary sterilization. a multicultural middle class may diversify the suburbs and college campuses, but the face of poor and segregated into remains black. for some time now, many

observers have held that money and interracial back would solve the race problem and indeed in some cases they have. nonetheless, poverty and a dark skin endures as the opposite of whiteness, driven by an age-old social your name to characterize the poor as permanently other and inherently inferior. thank you. [applause] [inaudible] >> way about 20 bits for questions. again, if you can get to the microphone. >> okay, made the race go to the swiftest. here we have a race. yes, sir. >> i was echoing professor? i have sort of a polemical question. >> no, no, no please.

please just ask a question. >> sorry. i'm sorry in to gather at the goal or purpose of your book, like what you would like to have been if also called while people read and agreed with your premise here because when i read works like the encyclopedia of western colonialism, it talks about and i quote, the colonial cause of the west are in possession to nearly all of america and australia. 99% of polynesia, 90% of africa, nearly 50% of a show. or when you read the book we have a unrestored wants the world, that one talks about the largest landowner in the world presently is queen elizabeth. who just happens to be white. both of these books still stand that people who classify themselves as white still a land that wasn't originally bears, still own and control resources that weren't originally bears. so with your boat, either just

to apologize and give the land and resources back to the rightful owners because now they understand they were tricked into whiteness? or is this work were just a pla on semantics, but the overall world power dynamics will not change. >> these are the choices? >> yes. [laughter] now what is the intended goal or hopeful goal of your boat? >> i don't think i can win here. if those are the only choices, i'm going to have to check the other box. my book is the book of a historian, not someone who's making policy, not what? [inaudible] not an advocate. well, i don't know. that's a hard one, too. let me just say that my goal was not to change the world. so, what i would like people to know from reading my book is

that whiteness is a concept. it is not something biological impermanent and inherent, intrinsic and that it does the ats about it have changed over time, that whiteness has a history. sorry. thank you. >> i would like to know if in your research that you found any evidence that this crossing of the racial barriers that were experiencing is leading to better families, that if the people have -- >> another hard question. >> you know, if people have more choice that they can choose better perhaps, leaving out tiger woods. he's just one person. but you know, i was wondering

if, you know, having more leeway to choose is producing better parent and, you know, better families as a result. >> that's another hard question. maybe even another trick question. no tricks. okay and once again i'm going to appeal to this intelligent beautiful audience. we're going to take another vote. i think you all are the question as to whether or not more choices produce utter families, right? is that a fair paraphrase of your questions? everybody understand? does more choice -- you can reach out and married or have sex was more different kinds of people these days. does that make it better? wait, wait, wait. i didn't ask you for an essay. i just like yes or no.

so yes it's more choice makes it better. now it's more choice doesn't necessarily make it better. you ready? no. this is still yes or no. yes more choice makes better families. okay. now, it doesn't necessarily. well, this time it's closer. i think the nose still have it. and i'll bet they're going to say, as i heard other people say, it makes it difficult -- it makes it different. okay. >> my question is not difficult. it's simple. >> that's the hardest kind. >> as we were filling up the census forms and so looking on that, it aims to name that the groups are done generally by

geographic location, except for one, which implies that there's only one skin color that's really important and that's why. so why isn't there an effort to not use that at least some offenses? >> you can be black, african-american, said to come you have a lot of choices in that line, but it does include lack. >> the other one that i think confuses the use of caucasian, whh i don't know -- >> i don't think caucasian is some offenses now? >> at society in general using that, how many people with those various shades of light were from the caucus mountains over? >> zero. >> okay, all right. >> there's the easy answer and the other part i cannot answer. but i can't say that every 10 years from this category suggests to take account of what the federal government things it needs to come to.

so in the middle of -- it started off in 1790. there's a picture in my book of the first census categories and there was only one graceless state, which was white. and it was i think in five different permutations. and then they were unfree people, who at that point were of various races. and then in the middle of the 19th century, the census added the lotto i think for that one census. and then in the early 20th century, for white people they broke white people down into native born and foreign-born and you had to say where your appearance -- maybe even your grandparents were born. so it's changed over time. and if you make a movement, and maybe you can get, you know, pink, gray, brownish, you know, you can get some more variety.

okay. >> a quick statement and then a quick question. really quick, really quick. which is just a other great good fortune of a long friendship with winter jourdan and alter with winter jourdan and alter your talk i thought how exciãi,5

this question over and over again and sometimes people are upset. but i only hear that from people who are upset over the white talks because they know that's the one that the census or somebody, the black helicopters or something, wants them to check and they're not comfortable with it. and i think, i guess with happening is that in the 21st century, white people are more and more becoming aware of themselves as having raised in addition to just being individuals. and now, seeing how awkward a fit a category that to include millions and millions and millions of people really can be. so we are facing a kind of white dilemma, i think, that's going to be really interesting.

yes? >> hello and thank you so much for coming. and i say here here to this the. was the last year when they have the television show twice, black in america. i was like, will they ever ask -- made at the same white in america? pic got apart. get to understand tha and if they do, i hope you're one a console. in the next question was, would you agree or maybe not the question would you agree, that i felt as i watched turmoil kind of take place in this country over the past year, it almost looked like an addict, like racism was almost like an addiction, the need for this country to hold on to that separation is like an addict needing to hold onto something. and then the denial of this addiction and the destruction it does on themselves. how do you feel about that?

>> i hadn't thought of it that way, but that's a really interesting and insightful way of talking about it. and apologists have spoken of people addicted to raise those people who believe in witchcraft and that you can never disprove it. if you point to somebody, you disprove their analysis of something that's based on the, then they have a way of getting around it and holding onto their belief. they think this has been going on for longer than just the last year. in my last book, creating black americans, has a chapter on rap music and hip-hop culture, you know, which is 35 years old now, speaking of things that have history. and a good bit of the anxiety that comes out they are is trying to get black people back in the box. this is what black people are. and a lot of black comedy is

what are, this is what black people do and, you know, it's a kind of a fabricated unitary image, which i think is the kind of, showing the kind of anxiety that you pick up in the culture at large. so opposed to segregation type inc. americans generally are trying to figure out who we are according to our traditional bases. in the new bases are so much more about class because we are living in a country with the most profound inequalities of income and wealth. i think just about in our history. certainly in our post-slavery. in the slavery south, the disparities were infinite. but since that time, you know, we've really reached very few

people who are very rich and an increasing number of people who are increasingly black and brown, who are just scraping by. yes? >> were going to take the last workers who might come in the last four or five. >> hike in the thank you so much for coming and my question i guess is to give context to grew up in d.c. and went to a multiracial public school and went away to a college that was very progressive and much wider and there seem to be almost a preoccupation among the student body about i guess the concept of white privilege and trying to be sensitive about white privilege, but almost to the point where it became full circle and were taught, you know, sperber sensitivity training when we were teaching inner-city schools that science came from white man and, you know, it and that was like one student trying to work through that and trying to train the

students. but this kind of preoccupation of self-consciousness about whiteness as john really interesting because i wasn't used to it. and i guess i'm wondering, historically what was -- is the appeal and the attraction of this category that kind of has no actual categorical basis? >> well, it has a teeny-weeny basis and i assume that's your question. >> what the appeal is. >> what the appeal is yeah. the appeal is that your people, whatever they are, assuming that you -- let's just make you william c. ripley for the moment. you are well educated, new englander, wealthy background, harvard yell columbia, mit and so forth have a way of explaining why you are beautiful and nice and they are ugly and

poor. sorts out the world. thank you. >> hi, i heard you mentioning the effect of white slavery back in europe a long time ago. >> not just a long time ago. slavery exists in our world. >> and on this white slavery, the words slav and the slaves are slim and are. >> they're not surprisingly similar, they are related. >> enemy and they there were sharp differences between different groups of people in europe, but now you go to the census forms in d.c. just one box for why. >> well it depends. every country does the timberlake and in france they do not collect by race, but are thinking about it. >> i'm talking about america right now.

in the census back you up one box and if you go back to the beginning of the 20th century, people coming to ellis island would say europe is germany and europe of these these undesirable, unruly folks coming. my question as, given now you see just one box for white, maybe 100 years were not going to see box above for race and the census form. what do you think? >> i think that very possible because people are so mixed up in were having our little mini revolt about check in the white box certainly. and then the largest immigrant group now is latinos and their supposedly more latinos and african-americans and latinos can be of any race. there are also large numbers of african descendent of immigrants who don't necessarily associate themselves with african-americans, native

american americans whom they see as lazy and inferior. so the whole thing is getting mixed up. something like only 46% of current immigrants. i think this is like 2008 identified themselves as white, whereas something like 70% -- 78 -- 76% to 70% of native americans identify themselves as white. so why is getting to be less popular. we'll see. thank you. >> last three questions. >> okay, couple things. he began by talking about greeks. they were slave owners. romans were slave owners. generally their slaves -- >> not all of them. just to be taught. >> they had slaves. they were conquered and made into slaves likes okay. now we come to this country and

you had capitalism at work in terms of southern plantations meaning labor to sell cotton to england, so they bought and sold to >> and want to correct to your little bit because the whole plantation system started with sugar. that's a big difference and it started he for capitalism really got going. >> will collect commerce. >> you can call a commerce, which is different. >> but that brought blacks over to be bought and sold. >> also a lot of white people. >> the majority were black. >> finally, yes. >> and was a big trade, a circular trade. >> a triangular trade tiered >> in the ships came from north, west africa. >> what is your question, sir? >> my question is if you look at the basis of race or wait and set aside the american

experiment -- >> set aside the american experiment? >> set aside the american experiment, which was set aside by peculiar need of commerce, it was not endemic. >> i can't go with you on your s. because the question is, what is the question? i disagree with you. what is the question? >> when you deal in ways, you have to look at where proliferate and the reason why. and in every part of the world is different. so you can just generalize by using the american experience. >> i certainly can. i'm talking about the united states. >> well, i'm not. you've got to look elsewhere. >> okay, we'll leave that up to you. >> hi, monique mitchell and i think it's very interesting that

you more or less mention what i wanted to say. but however, i'm going to start with a history of white people. i was expecting more universal type of situation and i do realize with here the people and you are the author that we are back to the same subject black and white in the united states. it just happens that i do come and he mentioned false. few actually, six or seven months ago i was asked was sera raised because i was dealing a question by phone from the washington hospital. and the man was the questioner and he said collocation of course. and i said yes, caucasian. and he said no, no, black.

auntie said black? and i said yes because i'm a descendent of lucy most likely. so i am black. [laughter] a >> that most, definitely. >> so what i want toay t you is please give us a book next time, which gives us an episode of the universal black and white world. thank you. >> merci beaucoup. >> hello. just another angle. i used to live in the u.k. and if you want to discuss how characterization really gets taken to the extreme. and for a certain number teeple

and that is people of color. so if you are black, you have basically a whole laundry list. are you black african country black caribbean, are you black mix? if a black mix, and where you mixed with? and then there's black other, which i am because i'm american, black americans living there. but when you look at the english wife, it's basically just one-way category. and the question is, what will it take and where will it come desirable for white people to ask would describe themselves to the same degree that other races, quote races are asked to describe themselves. or is there a fear that every loss of power because one statement i heard you comment on is that there were not any way people until they came to america and that's while the italians, english, themselves united.

in this very fear, a loss of power if -- >> okay, anderson the question. i think the fear of loss of power is already underfoot or in the air or whatever. without tampering any further with the categories. i think categories tend to lag the hind the powerful, the power arrangements. so for instance, as nations become richer, they will also become more beautiful. and as we get all mixed up, the taxonomy will have to somehow catch up to us. one thing that american historians have found a frustrating over the years is that we have a lot of trouble classifying people according to wealth and income. which i think would be a much more useful way of dealing with the inequities words." @@@@

>> "washington journal" continues. host: we are joined by the authors of "game change," and john heilemann and mark halperin. it you have a list things that you thought would make use in this book what on that list has not made news, or what are you surprised at? guest: a lot of things. when john and i set out to write the book, we hope it would be interesting book to read an interesting story.

but we were also going for breaking news because we thought there were things that were uncovered during the campaign. i will give you one. john will have others. sarah palin was picked by john mccain and people were shocked when it happened to that time, the campaign said that she had been on consideration for a long time and receive as much of a background check, so-called vetting, as any of the other people john mccain considered. there is skepticism about that at the time did not of the political journalism parade moved on and there were other things to cover. -- there was skepticism about that at the time it. but the political journals a great move on and there were other things to cover. the truth is that she was brought into the game a very late after their main focus, joe lieberman, fell apart as an option. they needed a game changing pick and joe lieberman was again

changing the of one sort and sarah palin was another. in book, we quote the vetting a report by washington lawyer who was told on a friday afternoon to get ready and in the space of less than two days look into sarah palin's background, not by making a phone call or interviewing anybody, but simply by doing on-line searches, because they needed to keep it secret. looking at the process by which john mccain picked a virtual stranger as his running mate was something that we thought that a lot of attention. guest: there is a ton of stuff out in the book that we thought would have gotten a lot of attention. i will give you three examples. one of them is a macro story. in the wake of the campaign, one of the pieces of conventional wisdom that was compounded by the obama operation, the question of race was something that they did not really think

about. it was not factored into the decision to run, it was a non- issue. that was one of the things they said over and over again after his election. throughout the book, we talk about how much they woere in fact and obsessed with race as a political factor. it produced advertisement after advertisement, fake ads that they thought the mccain campaign would run against them that would be racially frame and how they would respond to that. it was topic a -- host: let me show your view is that what about what you talk about that. "while cash from the mccain campaign was coming up with negative ads on the fly, scribbling scripps, in fact, on the backs of napkins, the obama campaign was determining which

ones were most dangerous and to develop responses." guest: the produced dozens upon dozens of spots, and also to look at those ads to be prepared to respond than and other spots that would deal with the problem. the question of what would obama's alleged connections to muslimism -- the obama campaign was constantly trying to respond. we have a great anecdote worked at one point the obama campaign was trying to produce an ad that would take care of all the questions about his race, his alleged muslimism, and alleged lack of patriotism all in one ad the script of this ridiculous --ad -- this ridiculous advertisement -- he read the script and said, "this

is too much." on the financial crisis, incredible reporting, i believe, about what happened in the white house meeting george bush held with john mccain and barack obama, hardly been mentioned in the coverage of it is very interesting but it showed how unprepared john mccain was, how well prepared obama was. as you listen to obama take over the meeting, it seems that if you close your eyes, you would believe that this is the president of the united states, not george bush or john mccain. we have a very interesting story about david geffen and maureen dowd and a devastating column that maureen dowd wrote in the early part of the nomination, how that came to be, how this hollywood mogul and this "new york times" columnist bill is one of the first blows to -- dealt one of the first blows to

hillary clinton's inevitability. host: she was trying to write that column before she got him to agree to do it. guest: an interesting case of two not only prominent people, but iconic people, it the most prominent "new york times" column is about time -- it columnist of our time, and david geffen, this incredibly influential hollywood figure. he was the head out atf dreamworks and he had turned against the clintons but he was unhappy with the clintons' choice of pardons, not granting a pardon that david geffen had lobbied for us. david geffen had turned on the clintons and felt that they were, if not actual crop, kind

of morally bankrupt. -- if not actually corrupt, kind of marleigh backups. he loved obama. when maureen dowd hurt even given to speak in new york -- heard david geffen speak in new york, he was very tough on bill and hillary clinton. maureen in the audience was struck not only by how tough he was talking about clinton's morality, but here they were in new york, the state hillary clinton represented, and the audience seemed very enthusiastic about the notion of that criticism of hillary clinton. over a long period of time, maureen was lobbying david geffen to take what he said at that event and amplify it in an interview with. she was in california at the night before david geffen was to host a fund-raiser for barack

obama and she convinces him to do the interview. host: what year is this? guest: 2007. barack obama has gotten into the race and has created a lot of excitement, and in communities that are vitally important if you are trying to become the democratic nominee for president, hollywood, new york, liberal circles, hillary was trying to not let obama rise up as a major competitor to her. for david given to agree to host this fund-raiser was a big blow to the clintons but they were desperate to try to overshadow that. it showed that a hollywood support and the democratic party would not be monolithic. again, maureen convinces david geffen had to do the interview her column goes on the web, and rock obama and -- and obama an then hillary were at this -- and

obama was at this fund-raiser. it did not cause any problems for obama. as we report in the book, it was worse for the clinton than they thought. it was the first time that a lot to the issues of bill clinton's personal life, whether the clintons were old politics, whether they were too loose with the truth, was laid out. the one-two punch of it being laid out by david geffen, a pillar of a hollywood establishment, via the maureen dowd column, was devastating. host: i am sure that many people are eager to ask your questions and make comments. sylvia, democrats like, you are first. caller: i saw you all on another show and you are talking about that bill and hillary were upset during the iowa caucuses that the obama campaign had cheated. from what i read and what i heard, the reason they were so

upset was because the obama campaign bussed in lots of young people from illinois with the help of a corn -- of acorn, and they showed up at the caucuses early and they locked out the hillary voters. host: john heilemann? guest: a caller is exactly right about what the clintons believe. that, to the letter, what we report in the book -- hillary had been concerned about the caucuses for awhile, that they were to lose, and that he was the state senator from illinois and that this could happen to it the night of the iowa caucuses, when hillary had come in third, she and former president clinton are in a hotel suite and they are as angry as their aides have ever seen about what has happened. she finished far off third and they are incredibly upset.

former president clinton starts going on about the fact that all of these people, to order 39,000 people had shown up. -- 239,000 people had shown up. it was incomprehensible to him that many people had shown up to the caucuses, and he seized on the notion that the shooting had occurred and that the buses had come in from -- that cheating had occurred and that losses had come in from illinois to five days later, he suggested that hillary raise this question in a debate, at the outcome of the caucuses should be invalidated because obama had done this thing. president clinton was suggesting to staff that they hired lawyers and challenge the results of the iowa caucuses. we cannot know with any certainty that the charges true, but we spoke to many of the clinton white staff, people long experienced in iowa politics and are very loyal to the clintons

and none of them believe that the charges are true but as upset as the clintons were, at what they were looking for some excuse for her performance in there. these are people who would have every reason to believe it was true, and the people who know the iowa caucuses best believe that it is a false charge. host: 80 on the independents' line. amy, could mo -- amy, good morning. i will remind you to turn the television down but i will move on and put you on hold, amy, and move on to palin on the republican line. caller -- ellen on the republican line. caller: i say that i have not read the book, but these folks being so close the connected to the campaign and everybody was involved and all the candidates, i want to know why it is that the most important pieces of all of these people, clinton, obama, mccain -- how everything was

shielded, and the most important aspects never came out, and the democrats were protected down to every minuscule little whatever -- the important things to not cam out to it when it came to mccain and sarah palin, how they attacked her come up for clothes and her eating habits, but yet when it comes to not even reporting on any of the policies or believfs or agenda stuff that obama was going to go for, which he is doing now, not having his pieces, or any of his background, everybody saying he is so smart and intelligent and sarah palin is so on qualified when she had been elected, starting the school system, whatever, a municipal mayor to governor, and she is so stupid and irresponsible -- she had held all these offices. host: i think we got your point. mark halperin?

guest: we knew that one of the challenges about writing a book about politics these days is that a lot of the discourse through the media and directly has become a very partisan. we tried to write a book that is not partisan. i am confident we did. there is stuff that was not ever reported not just twhat the calleri] suggested by democrats, but about republicans. we are heartened that the book has received praise from people on the left and right. sean hannity said some very nice things about the book, as did ed schultz. we reported everything that we could find that we thought was germane to telling this story about both parties, candidates in both parties, without fear or favor and with an eye towards history and eliminating what happened, not covering things up. there has been a concern -- why wasn't this stuff reported in real time? people are not going to be forthcoming the way they were with us in the heat of the campaign.

there are too busy and there is too much at stake. we went to people right after the nomination fights and the general election when their memories were fresh but they were willing to cooperate, they understood the project and its importance, we hope, for history. second, it is hard to piece this stuff together if you don't have the time, as we did come over a long period of time, long interviews, able to sit down and sift through the stuff and pieced together to the realities of daily journalism, particularly these days with the internet and cable -- there is no way to do that. you have to do it as more of the historical work. host: have you heard from your sources and gotten a reaction from your sources, without specifically saying they are? guest: we have. we talked to a lot of people for the book did most of these people are people who have had very long relationships with politics. we have been covering politics for 20 years each. the relationship we have with

those sources of the basis on which the book was built. if we had not had such a strong relationships with the sources, we cannot have done what we did. we have been heartened by their response, which has been uniformly positive. people ought said many notes of congratulation about the book. -- people have sent many notes of congratulation about the book. we have heard from an awful lot of people and they feel that we have gotten the story right and got it in a way that they think is fair, accurate, and good for history in the sense that we captured things about the campaign and how these people live to the campaign and how it changed them and how their strengths and weaknesses affected the way in which they waged a campaign that are important for people who are going to be looking back at his campaign for many years to come to understand what actually happened. host: we go back to georgia and amy on the independents' line. caller: high. sorry about that. you know, i am an independent.

i used to be a democrat, and with this past election with barack obama came around, i ended up dropping apart completely -- dropping of the party completely. but i was looking for at the time was a candidate that would really represent the country well. i know for a fact that the fact that the media was there boosting obama of it like the way they did bush, which they actually did do, seems to be the game plan for me is whoever the media choose is to be the next president is going to be the next president. it is very unfortunate, because i did listen to barack obama a few times, some of the speeches that he set about changing things and washington, but yet he was a supporter of mayor richard daley, witches, as far as i'm concerned, being from illinois come -- which is, as

far as i'm concerned, being from illinois, one of the biggest perks in politics but -- it was the biggest crooks in politics. what makes you think you change anything in washington? he has not. guest: the role of the media in presidential elections is obviously a huge. one of the things most interesting in reporting on the campaign is the fact that all the campaigns feel that the media was biased against them. they all feel, as the caller says, that they look at the power of media and that they feel it pleasant outsized role and is somehow unfair to them. host: even president obama's campaign felt that way? guest: i think mark and i would agree that obama got a very favorable coverage and the campaign did not disputable. but they felt that on things like reverend wright that there were subjected to as tough and media scrutiny as any candidate

in history, and things for which they were hit, like the tony rezko relationship, that those were not germane. they felt that the media was focused on trivialities and things that were non-stories, rather them what the candidate wanted to say about health care policy and economic policy. it is a perennial complaint, and as far as i can see, the media is an equal opportunity in the kinds of readers that puts the candidates through. it is not surprising, as mark said, that in a partisan environment, people feel that the media picks sides. it will not go away, because as our media and to become more partisan, these problems will escalate. caller: good morning, marc, good morning, john, good morning, greta. i have seen you guys on other shows.

one of the things that is fascinating to me is that the country seems to be in a state of cognitive dissonance. and barack obama is incompetent, unprepared, on qualified to be president, john mccain is this. based on what you guys have said this morning, the exact opposite -- the reverse is true to barack obama seems to be hope and change and all that, but he seems to be a very savvy politician, a brilliant strategic thinker, a very well- prepared, understands the issues, and yet all the buzz right now is about sarah palin, who mostly speaks -- her vocabulary is mostly monosyllabic, and i have not heard her say anything of substance in terms of public policy from the time she started running up until now. i am just amazed -- are you

amazed that the country is so enamored with sarah palin, who lacks intellectual curiosity, lacks the depth. she is mostly a vacuous -- guest: i'm a big fan of monosyllabics, so i have to differ from the caller there at that that is a problem. with all due respect to the color and many who called c- span2 and he sees the world in any -- who calls c-span, he sees the world in a particular way but there are many others who see it differently. there are those who think barack obama is a horrible precedent and that sarah palin is the salvation. we'll try to rise above it dominant feature of political discourse, and to say i have a point of view about the world and i hit the democrats or eight republicans and anything i -- i hate to the democrats or hate

republicans and anything i say or write will reinforce that. we wanted to write about this incredibly exciting campaign with bigger-than-life characters and not make a partisan book. as i've said before, we have had a very positive feedback from the left and right, people saying to us, "i may disagree with barack obama's policies, but i was glad to read how he really experienced the campaign and get inside what is real life was really like." same with sarah palin. that is the kind of book we set out to write will n -- set out to right. i hope it has the potential benefit -- the country has become too partisan and it is not good for politics or the future of the country. we hope that people think about politics and a different way, or about the drama and -- more about the trauma and trying to drain it from the pure partisan

ship. host: on the mccain approached the campaign -- "who ever was listening, that was the campaign. the rest was noise. guest: it is a very early part of the book, talking about how mccain in the early planning stages of the campaign -- you had an operation where all the people around him looked back at his 2000 campaign, where he ran as many gay, outsider campaign, and -- he ran this renegade, outsider campaign, and they lost. they said, "we should build on the bush model, raise a ton of money, have a huge operation across the country, the

formidable and scare everybody else away." a problem with that is that mccain is psychologically well- suited to that kind of campaign, and as the organization built itself that way, his attitude was, why do i need all this? he did not want to make fund- raising calls and get into the race as soon as they wanted him to get into the race. we have seen from the book with a say, "we are the front runner and we have to act like the front runner and cannot act like the kind person you are naturally," which is a maverick, to use his favorite term. at the kind of thing they aspired to build for him and the kind of thing that mccain was comfortable doing it turned out to be the immolation of his campaign bu. for the first six months, the campaign was broke, he was lagging in the polls, he was miserable, he was firing his top staff, and the meltdown, which nearly killed him politically if not personally, is about that

mismatch. he is strongest in the book once he gets rid of all these people. you see him emerge when everybody in politics but he was dead -- everybody in politics thought he was dead, and mccann was actually past year. he was running, metaphorically speaking, -- mccai noten -- çmccain was actually happier. he was running, metaphorically speaking, in a beat-up car. the mismatch between him and a bomb in terms of organization, financed, muscular strength -- and no bomb in terms of organization, finance, was to list a --, him and obama in terms of organization, finance, strength -- this is why in some sense the personal, the stuff about the high human drama of the campaign, it actually

matters enormously, because it tells you enormously about john mccain's political fortunes. you cannotç understand that without understanding is psychology and how he looked at the heart and, of politics. -- art and combat of politics. guest: greta, can i say one thing? we are honored and pleased by the amount of attention the book has received. this is literally the first time we've had a chance to discuss this topic, an extraordinarily important part of the 2008 campaign. for people who have seen some of the book and say, i know everything about the book already, it would love to " the thing about the use of airplane tickets, because it defines a huge part of the mentality of the republican nominee i think some people have the impression that they have learned everything that is in the book. we think there is more in the book that people would be interested in. host: nancy on the republican line.

caller: when president obama ran, he was more to the center of the democratic party. that is what i voted for. i voted for obama because i thought he was more to the center of the democratic party, not to the left. he has since become more of left then center. that has made me very disheartened. i have turned from democrat to republican and i will start voting republican and i am going to vote more for the people who are my values and my type of ideas about this country and how it should be run. i think our country is out of whack. we are spending too much, the deficit is too high, there is too many people unemployed. i think obama is not concentrating on what the real

problems are in this country. he is concentrating on his ideas. guest: will was the name of that color -- what was the name of that caller? host: nancy. guest: i would call her nancy, a.k.a. david axelrod's worst nightmare. this the type of voters thought they have to worry about. he has done the thing that is the most dangerous for any politician, lost control of a large segment of the population with his public image, how he is being perceived t. during the campaign, he was very successful at what george bush did, being all things to all people. healthcare is a great example. what has moved through congress -- there are policy differences

that are not insignificant, but the best of it, the scope of it, it is very similar to what he ran on. people should not be surprised that on a range of issues, he is more liberal. at the same time, one of the gifts barack obama has had since he entered public life is to speak as a unifying figure, to give people the sense that he works across the aisle and solves problems in a bipartisan way. that, as it has turned out, partly by choice and partly by circumstances, with the economic crisis in particular, has led to governing in a moreç partisan y that i thought he would do and i think that he intended the result is to alienate colors and voters and citizens like that. part of the challenge he faces now is to finish this health care bill, defined as a very liberal think, rightly or not, and move on to an agenda that addresses jobs and deficit reduction. the state of the union and the budget are opportunities, the white house hopes, to win over

callers like that. host: the state of the union will be wednesday, january 27. steve on the independent-mi line. caller: 1 said the post, he took a called earlier -- you took a call earlier challenging your bias and saying you should be fired.

people. one of the things that mark and i were surprised to learn is how much of a fan hillary clinton was to barack obama before the campaign did she hosted a fund-raiser for his senate campaign, and she talked very admiring look about him, saying that there is a superstar

in chicago, the kind of candidate that she and her husband always wanted to support in the the grand part, very intelligent african- american who had a future and the party. when he came to washington, he seeks her out, six her counsel, already sort of a superstar because of the speech at the convention, and that sort of a bond. she sees him as a potential mentee and he sees her as a potential mentor obviously, a huge amount of conflict and bitterness and then unfolded when they ended at head-to-head in the democratic nomination fight. but in the end, after all for bitterness over how the race turned out and all of her anger, which is documented in the book in a lot of a vivid detail, the extraordinary series of events that lead her to eventually accept the job of secretary of state -- we have at

the end of the book, and that is rather incredible coming together -- there is a rather incredible coming together with the late-night phone call and everybody in her life is trying to get her to take the top. her husband thinks it would be great for, rahm emanuel, joe biden, all lobbies for to take the job. she finally called him to decide that they will not -- that she will not take the top, and had this incredible late-night phone call where she tells him why she does not want the job and he accept ththat those are all good reasons -- she is burdened with debt, she is tired and wants to go home -- he understands all that, but he says, "i need you to take this job. with the economic crisis will be a huge part of my first term might need someone who understands foreign policy whose hand i do not have to hold, and i need you and the country needs

you." after everything with this at the arc of their relationship, it is an extraordinary moment. the moment she admits her husband might be a problem, something she never did in the campaign -- anything bill clinton did something considered politically detrimental, and she defends him. she never takes any other side, totally loyal to her husband. now she is not saying not disloyal, but admitting to barack obama that there is a political vulnerability with her husband . barack obama does not express that he needs anyone did, he is the maximally self-sufficient politician. he turns to her and in its in some ways that he needs her. it is the first bond, the relationship of trust where they can work together. he tells her to sleep on it and not to say no. she decides to take the job i think the caller is right her

first year as secretary of state has demonstrated all the things that is best about hillary clinton. she has worked incredibly, incredibly hard representing america around the world, and from all indications, their relationship is as solid as any relationship of any cabinet secretary to the president. they are on extremely good terms an excuse c-span.or -- and it sl for patriotism and devotion to the country and her ability to put past pain aside for the calling of the country. host: frankie on the line for democrats. caller: have a very simple question for the gentleman but what kind of an impact do think this will have on people running and people who want to work for them when it seems like if you write a book like this -- i don't understand why people talk to you and say some of the things about the candidates.

i think it would be hard to get anybody to work for you again, it would be so hard for the candidates. they have to be so careful of what they say and do in private. what kind of an impact to do you think the book will have? thank you. host: before you answer that, howard kurtz wrote in his column in "the washington post," "the portrait may reflect the fact that aids on a winning campaign have little deeper to dish and even less incentive, since many of them are now running the country." guest: there is a lot of their third let me try to address part of it. -- a lot in there. let me try to address part of it. we were dealing with people with whom we had strong working relationships with over decades. in that process, we explained to them in great detail what we were doing to be explained what kind of book it was.

the terms on which we were speaking. history is important. one of the things we learned, at times to our panic, is that as time passes, people's memories don't work. there is oral history here that if we had not stepped in and done at these interviews when we did them, in what it would have been lost. people have said -- howard kurtz,'s piece and others -- that we rely on people with axes to grind. i have to tell you -- john mayfield of a -- i could john -- upjohn may feel differently -- i can think of five that most or people were trying to spin the story but they cooperated with us to realize that this was an important moment in american history. that process revealed a lot of

stories that we were able, over time, to merge together. there is not a single " controversial" story line in the book that we based on people exclusively who had an ax to grind to we always went to supporters, people more supportive to a candidate or a spouse, and asked what you think there were almost no instances where the merging of those accounts from two sides required judgments. the stories line up. guest: it i want to add something to the quotation you read. the relationship between the public image and a private reality. i think that is actually true. in many cases, there is a wide divergence between public image and private reality. the story of john and elizabeth edwards is the most dramatic and the book, where the gap between what the public saw and wanted

to see and how they were in private was cats make -- was chasmic. the gap between barack obama's public image and private reality was of all the candidates than ever was. the spent very little time in the above -- a campaign was a -- all the candidates the narrowest. they spent very little time in the campaign trying to manage him. the obama campaign was able to focus to a large extent on getting done what needed to get done. there was not as large a gap between the two. it as i talked before about race example, there were times where the public image was not going on behind the scenes, but an important part of why he was successful and the can and was the fact that the gap was

narrower. guest: we don't have a very much about barack obama that is less flattering. i would urge people to read the book, and there are a number of scenes worked there was crisis, questions about whether the strategy was working. in one prominent instance, you see barack obama saying that we will stay the course, that we chose this strategy and is the right thing. there is another instance later in the book where he decides that he is not getting enough advice on a broader circle of people. one of the things that we report about in the book is this group of the three men, david axelrod, robert gibbs, and david plouffe , who almost a stranglehold on the advice -- who have almost a stranglehold on the advice that is to barack obama. other people, including michelle obama, would occasionally say

when things were going badly that there needs to be a broader circle of advisers. there is a stage late in the process when it is clear that barack obama will probably be hillary clinton but will lead into the general election, where he decides to change course and he has a conference call that is not run by one of the three suits but i needed done, who goes on to be department -- but anita dunn, who goes on to be the communications director. some said that the portrait is written by the winners so it is not as full as others. host: when he decides to bring anita dunn into the fold, the strategy she takes up running his fund -- the exchange there, the strategy she comes up with

it for e-mail addresses. guest: in the early 2006, the 2005 period, there was a pac called hope fund, and obama interviewed and eventually hired anita dun to run that pac. even when he was still a candidate for the senate in 2004, he was able to raise money for democratic senators. it was clear that he was going to when in a landslide, and he was doing fund-raising events for tom national and other senators. he was an incredible fundraising -- fund-raising events for tom daschle and other senators. he was an incredible fundraising source. he would turn out huge crowds. we knew that obama was traveling

around and raising money, but i don't think until we wrote the book that we had a clear sense. we talked to people like claire mccaskill who would tell stories about obama campaign for her in 2006 and when they came to st. louis, not only did they have to have the fundraiser for the 2000 were 3000 people, but it would need to get a separate room for 15,000 people, because everybody wanted to see this guy. his fund-raising ability was at the core of why, as we talk about the democratic establishment being behind him, that was part of the political appeal, part of the wheat they demonstrated that he could be a serious candidate. anita dunn, in some sense, along with david plouffe, initiating a similar strategy for deval patrick in massachusetts, started to think about how this could be capitalized on to build the grass-roots army. when people came to obama events, it would ask for e-mail addresses, and it was the

beginning of building the database for hope fund, and it became the core of what became the mass of a fund-raising machine. as they used the internet in i totally novel way to build this fundraising machine unprecedented in the history of american politics. anita dunn and the hope fund with the seeds of that development that made obama credible and give them a huge advantage going against hillary clinton and john mccain. host: marie on the republican line. caller: i get a kick out of the left attacking their opponents. they call them a dime if they see a thread. -- call them dumb if they see a threat and with that sarah palin -- left comedians like joy behar

and bill maher attacker all the time did she had more experience than barack obama. iit is how they try to be little their opponents. they say that europe is this or that. europe is made up of different countries with their own culture. switzerland is not part of the eu -- host: okay, we will leave it there. let me pick up one thing she said about sarah palin and the coverage. sarah palin

they did not know her bridge was a stranger to them. one of things they discussed with her late in the meeting was the importance of her understanding that even though she would remain the sitting governor of alaska, she needed to understand her focus needed to be on the the national campaign. she was basically an appendage of the campaign and would not get back to alaska until there -- unless there was some sort of natural disaster, and she did

not to be focused on her home state needs but on the national ticket. on the point of view of the kaine staff, she did not of a -- up to that from the point -- from the point of view of the mccain is that, she did not live up to that. there were concerned that there was an absence of mccain-palin and yard signs in alaska. it is spent the time complaining to a -- the campaign they spent -- they spent atime complaining that there was not enough of an effort in alaska. she was not being allowed to talk to local reporters, and like a lot of governors, she would give out hurt mobile or two local reporters -- her mobile phone number to local reporters.

that ended when she was put on the national ticket. from the mccain campaign's point of view, there was no time for that, and she said she understood that before she was put on the ticket. that was one of many causes of tension between the palins and the mccain staff. host: david, next caller. caller: on my part i am identified as no party affiliation. i always -- when the politician preaches the corrupt year, -- when the politicians it reaches the crop year, i will not vote for them. with clinton into york -- if i was a resident of new york, i would not have voted for her, because she moved in.

and many voters in southwest florida thought they were voting for his father and they were very upset that they had voted for his son. i was extremely upset, being a disabled veteran, 1 george w. bush -- host: let me jump in here, because we're running out of time. what is your question or comment? guest: this is a question i have recently started asking my friends about voter fraud. which of the three largest cities in the u.s. have a reputation, whether it is deserved or not, for having corrupt elections? host: i am not sureç of this cn answer that we want to take a stab at it? guest: never be wrong picking cities in louisiana and new jersey. host: let me get to some criticism of the book from

howard kurtz's column. he is referring to the quotation that came out about what harry reid said in private about barack obama toç john holliman, why don't you take that? -- john heilemann, why don't you take that? guest: in our author's note,ç we mentioned that we conducted the interview on deep background, basically what howie writes in the peace. it is not complete, the description of all the conversations we had with our sources to talk any great detail about how the interview we did conduct would be used in -- we

talked in great detail about how the interview that he would conduct would be used in the book. i can say that there is no case in which the way that we explained we are going to that in the and we did not live up to that agreement with any source we talked to in the book. it is important that people understand that a deep background, as many people have written, is not a concept that is etched in stone. every journalist has rules of the road. host: you don't think that concrete come on-the-record -- guest: with new ones, you can describe different things. we did not violate the agreement with anybody that we made for the book. unlike a lot of exchanges and washington and journalism

generally, between reporters and sources, with the terms are not defined but there is assumed to be commonality, or they are defined on the fly, we have meticulously and carefully in every exchange we had a free interview we did went through the project, the terms we are discussing, and we did not violate those terms for any person to talk to a to the book. host: melvin on the democrats' line. caller: i have more of a comment and i wanted to address a couple of issues. there are people saying that barack obama is not living up to his campaign promises. but my main point -- you heard a lot of people talk about concern about deficit spending. i don't think they realize that when ronald reagan took office in 1980, the deficit was $980 billion. one him and george bush sr. left office, it was ordered $5 trillion. clinton left a surplus -- it was $405 trillion.

clinton left a surplus, and the deficit was $10.90 trillion when obama took over. where democrats get all the blame for the spending when it is actually republicans who created all this deficit? the democrats never seem to address that issue, and they continue to be demonized for the spending, and republicans used fiscal conservatives -- host: at some of this is playing out, what he is getting at, in the special elections in messages, about democrats' big spenders -- special election in massachusetts, about democrats being spenders and raising taxes. i am wondering if you could compare your debts from hillary clinton's campaign, the staffers -- your notes from hillary clinton's campaign, the staffers that she had, and reports this

morning that hillary clinton's staff for new england is helping to run martha coakley's campaign. guest: mark would know more about this. we have been so busy with this book that i don't know the details of this spirit is the case that republicans have historically and traditionally and successfully in many cases portrayed the democrats as a big spending party. they have been are successful in doing that and in massachusetts it has been playing out where you have martha coakley is not getting the kind of support from the democratic base that she would expect. much more importantly, she is having a very hard time getting a number of independent voters that she would need, who are accessed with these questions of tax and spending and deficit. -- obsessed with these questions of tax and spending and deficit. guest: one of the most serious moments in the book is clinton's

attempt to get teddy kennedy to endorse hillary over barack obama, and the frustration and anger that both clintons felt. they had gone sailing with him. president clinton would tell people how angry and frustrated he was that he had done so much for the kennedy family as president and they were drifting towards obama. hillary and bill clinton have incredible political support in massachusetts, and one of the satisfying moments for them on super tuesday was despitehe fact that senator kennedy had endorsed barack obama, hillary was able to win massachusetts. some of her field operatives in massachusetts and new hampshire are now, as i understand, working for the democratic nominee there. they probably should have been there a little sooner. most people watching the race closely believe that their involvement is being done at the last minute, very quickly, and may be too little, too late, if i may use a cliche on c-span. host: steve on the republican

line. caller: i'm wondering if you could talk about mitt romney, the conflict between his public image and private conduct. and also mike huckabee. thanks. guest: for a variety of reasons, we did not spend as much time on the republican race, because it lacked the drama. but there are some things on it romney could to the specific question, there is one of very striking example of the striking public image and private reality and the kiss of romney. mitt romney's public image, if anything, was defined as a competent ceo character. he was an arch catalyst and had run -- arch-capitalist and had run bain capital. he could run government like running a board room. throughout our coverage in the

book of romney was the fact that the staff was totally frustrated that he was totally indecisive. he could not decide on something as elemental as picking a campaign slogan. they never came up with a campaign slogan. the consultant side of him actually dominated in some ways. he would ask for more and more input and constantly take more and more time and wanted more and more data, and the deluge of data that he sought actually cut paralyzed and 34 people around him, -- actually kind of paralyzed him. for people around him, the worse died. -- they were stunned. we have details of how much john mccain, how much mike huckabee and others disliked commit money to he was sort of a preening -- this like to make romney. he was sort of eigha preening

prima donna. they would malkin behind his back, and that he would rocked -- would mock him behind his back, and he would walk into the room and it would be kind of a hushed. host: could you tell us about the difference between rudy giuliani on the campaign trail and in private? guest: the book is about politics and the sense that we write about presidential candidates and their spouses, but our goal was to write about the personalities and the high human drama. we knew all the time that we had an interesting set of characters. pretty giuliani is the seventh--- we knew we had an interesting set of characters went rudy giuliani was the seventh-the most interesting candidate. a clean up new york city and stood up to terrorists after

9/11. but on the campaign trail, he was not a tiger, but a pussycat. when he was shown at negative ads point out against him, he would laugh at them and said that all of those were silly. in debates, when he was challenged by opponents, he laughed. he never showed the toughness and hunger to win. rinceau counter to his image. -- it ran so counter to his image. his inability to define himself and reinforce his greatest strengths, the image of being tough, was a big part of his downfall. the person who knew him best in the old, was john mccain. they had been friends since back when rudy giuliani was mayor. when mccain was starting to fall, he was never worried about rudy giuliani.

" continues. host:

from the ancient greeks to the early 20th century, what do it after the 2010 census will be confronted given destination of race and identity. professor painter has written an entirely accessible readable myth busting and compelling history of race. she is a leading historian in the united states you are tired at western university. she's prolific and award-winning scholar reason for on history and race relations include creating black americans and a

second attention a inning armageddon. and we are pleased to welcome here this evening for the history -- "the history of white people" professor nell irvin painter. hot mark [applause] >> hello. you are a nice-looking group. as for coming. did i hear someone accrete? you all agree? well, what i'd like to do is read to you for about 17 minutes or so from the first part of the book and then from the back of the boat. and then we'll talk, okay? i might have entitled this book, constructions of white americans from antiquity to the president

because it explores the concept that lies within the history of event. i've chosen this strategy because race is an idea, not a fact and its questions demand answers from the conceptual, rather than the factual realm. a american history offers up a large bounty of commentary on what it means to be nonwhite, moving easily between alternate shins and the meaning of racist color. from colored to to african-american to black to african-american always associated the idea of blackness with slavery. but little attention has been paid to histories equally confused inflexible discourses on the white race and the old slave trade from eastern europe.

i use white races in the plural because most of the past centuries when race really came down to matters of law, educated americans firmly believed in the existence of more than one european race. it is possible and important to investigate the other side of history without trivializing the history we are to know so well. let me state categorically that while this is not a history and white versus black, i do not by any means underestimate orono the overwhelming importance of black race in america. i am familiar with a truly gigantic literature that explains the meaning and portends an honest to god reality of the existence of race. it's imperative and a statutory biological definitions of white race, we may notoriously vague.

believing that what is not black. the disc thickness does not indicate lack of interest. quite to the contrary for another, past historical literature, much less known today explains the meaning and portends an honest to god reality of the existence of white races. they may seem not to be given a book on americans in antiquity, a pure fun before europeans discovered the western hemisphere and thousands of years he for the invention of the constant of race. they given the prevalence of the notion that racist permanent, many believe it possible to trace something recognizable as the white race, back more than 2000 years. in addition, not few westerners have racialized antiquity making

ancient history into white race history and classics into a living whitefield, complete with pictures of blonde ancient greeks. transforming the agents into anglo-saxon ancestors may classics unwelcoming to african-american classes. the blonde ancient great narrative may no longer be taught in schools, but it lives on as a net to be confronted in these pages. before launching the trip back to ancient times, however, it may be useful to make a few remarks about the role of science or science of race. i resist the temptation to place the word lion, even serious and assertions of the most furious pernicious or ridiculous kind in quotation marks for the task of deciding what is sound science and what is cultural fantasy would quickly become all-consuming. better to know the qualifications of yesterday

scientists and@ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @b

in modern times, we recognize this kind of reasoning as it relates to black race. but another times, the same logic was applied to people who were right, especially when they were impoverished immigrant seeking work. let me hold for a moment. i am go -- [inaudible] thank you. those at the very bottoms were slaves. slavery has helped construct concepts of race in two contradictory ways. first, the american tradition equally whiteness with freedom while consigning black nasty

slavery. the history of unfree white people flavors and like like slavery move people around and makes it human genes on a massive gale. the important demographic role of the various slave trades is all too often overlooked as a historical force. in the second place the term caucasian as a designation for white people originates in concepts of beauty related to the white slave trade from eastern europe and whiteness remains embedded in patients with ud found at art history and popular culture. today most americans envision whiteness as racially indivisible, though ethnically divided. this is the scheme anthropologist laid out in the mid-20th century. by this reckoning, there were only three real races:

mongoloid, negroid and caucasoid. ththolic ethnicities. today however biologists and geneticists, not to mention literate critics no longer believe in the physical existence of racist. thank you. now you tell me if any of this remains on my forehead in those little bits of white stuff that stick to you. it's not funny. [laughter] that's true. where was i.? though they continue to recognize the continuing power of racism, the belief that racism exists and some are better than others. it took some two centuries to reach this conclusion after countless racial schemes had spun out countless different numbers of races, even of white races and attempts at classification produced frustration.

although science today denies race any standing as objective truth in the u.s. census faces taxonomic note meltdown aired we shall see. many americans cling to race as the unschooled claim to supersession. so long as racial discrimination remains a fact of life and statistics can be arranged to support racial difference, the american belief in racism will endure. but confronted with the actually existing american population, its distribution of wealth, power and beauty, the notion of american whiteness will continue to evolve as it has since the creation of the american republic. now i think i'll redo the whole book. [laughter] chapter one. greeks and scythians. were there white people and

antiquity? certainly some assume so as the categories we use today could be read backwards over the millennia. people with light-skinned surgeon makes this dead well before our roman times. but did anyone think they were white or tha their character but they did to their color? no, for neither the idea of race for the idea of white people had been invented. and people skin color did not carry useful meaning. what mattered was where they lived, were their lands damp or dry, were they fear i'll were prone to, hard or soft, could they be seduced by the luxuries of civilized society or were they worriers through and through? over their habits of life? rather than as white people, northern europeans were known by their tribal names, scythians and celts, the call center menai.

but if one has to say, were the scythians? the questions at the thought down a slippery slope, for overtime and especially in earliest times, and a search for the ancestors of white americans perforce leads by two nonliterate peoples for whom -- who left no documents describing themselves. though scott a shifter intellectual history which american squamous westerners, keeping in mind that one before science stick to the terms of human differences race, long before racial scientists began to measure heads and concoct racial theory, ancient greeks and romans had their own means of describing the peoples of their world as they knew at more than two millennia ago. and inevitably come at the earliest accounts of our story are told from on high by rulers dominant at a particular time period for power and fixes the of history.

furthermore, any attempt to trace biological ancestry quickly turns into legends. for human beings have multiplied so rapidly by a thousand or more times in some 200 years and by more than 32,000 times in 300 years. evolutionary biologists now reckon that the six to 7 billion people now living share the same small number of ancestors living two or 3000 years ago. these circumstances make nonsense of anybody's pretensions to find a pure racial ancestry. nor our notions of western cultural. he any less. if. without a doubt, the sophisticated than no one and persian society is deeply influenced the classical culture of ancient greece, where some still imagine as the west pier and unix source.

that story is still to come. for the obsession with purity, racial and cultural, i rose many centuries after the demise of the ancients. now i'm going to read very fast. and here we are at chapter 28. the fourth enlargement of american whiteness. agitating and media dominating as america's civil rights and black power movements were and those movements help joe the idea of one white race as opposed to several. most of the country's white people might have doubted that the people had much to do with them. they might've thought that they were individuals who have succeeded by themselves and that

race had always meant black people who had not. in fact, by the 1960's, the whole races of europe discourse had fallen completely out of fashion in the races of europe disclosed the part of richie really fast. books such as william c. ripley's races of europe published in eight team -- 1899 and important for a quarter of a century. books such as william c. ripley's races of europe once essential reading on brace for now remaindered as useless. and if you are jewish, calling a race within due straight into the anti-semitic column. reminders at jews and italians have been labeled as racist a generation earlier, might as prompted a retort that race was used more loosely in the past. this is true.

but every use of race has always been lives, whether applied to black him a white, yellow, brown, red or other. no consensus is ever formed on the number of human race is or even on the number of white races. criteria constantly shift according to individual taste and political need. it was clear however that in the olden days, the 20th century, [laughter] in the olden days, jim crow had kept the colored races apart from whites and african-americans largely hidden behind segregation's bail. shortly after the end of the second world war, the end of legalized segregation began to propel black people into national visibility as never before. concurrently, other changes were soon to deeply alter american sense of the very meaning of race. little noticed at the time the

openness of the mid-1960's went beyond the black white color line. the immigration and nationality for hard seller at the 1965 was a specially crafted to counter earlier nordic minded statutes, especially in terms of asians. it also allowed for wider immigration from the western hemisphere and africa. therein lay the seeds of democratic revolution. new new immigrants of the post- 1965 era overwhelmingly from outside europe were upending american racial conventions. asians greatly rising in number were rapidly being judged to be smarter and eventually to be richer than native born wife. latinos from 13% of the population by 2000, edging out to african-americans is the most numerous minority. the u.s. census, without peer in

scoring the nation's racial makeup had begun to notice latin americans in the 1940's by counting up heterogeneous peoples with spanish surnames and hastily lumping them together as hispanics. though an impossibly crude measurements, is survived until 1977. by that point, the federal government needed more precise racial statistics to enforce civil rights legislation. to this end, the office of management and budget issued statistical policy to write dave number 15. to this -- sorry. she was a change worth noting. in the racially charged decades of the early 20th century, governments at all levels have passed laws to separate americans by race. the jim crow's segregation was supposed to be separate but

equal, and cracked this new word to discriminate by discriminating non-whites from public institutions, whether from libraries, schools, swimming pools for the ballot box. the civil rights act of 1964 and the voting rights act of 1965 began to change all that so that by the late 20th century, the rationale for counting people by race had morphed into a means of keeping track of civil rights enforcement. statistical policy directive number 15 set the terms for racial and ethnic classification throughout american society by directing federal agencies, including the u.s. census, to collect data according to four races: black, white, american indian, alaskan native and asian pacific islander. hawaiian was added later as a concession to protest. and one ethnic category,

hispanic latino, which is not racial. collaboration was not good for civil rights, but it opened the way to chaos. under these)%@ @ rbrb) multiracial identities. for the first time, respondents

were about to describe themselves as belonging to one or more of 15 racial identities. as so often in the past, adding confusion, the list of races included nationalities. this expansion now allowed for 126 f. no racial groups were for purist 63 races. it did not take much analytical ability to see that any notion of race lay so deluded as to lose much of its punch. and taxonomy was rapidly populate much further under the weight of interracial sex. nothing new here. americans disorderly habits have always overflowed meet racial lines and proven brace thinkers

crazy. asians and native americans indians have the highest rates of interracial marriage, but others including african-americans now often married and had children with people from outside the racial ethnic group. by 1990, american families were so heterogeneous that one seventh of white, one third of blacks, four fifths of asian and 19 twentieths of native american indian were closely related to someone of a different racial group. now that was back in 1990. with some 12% of young people calling themselves multiracial, it is expected that by 2050, 10% of whites and blacks and more than 50% of latinos, asians and native american indians will be married to someone outside their racial group. though by 2050, the whole thing may have collapsed. with so many nonwhite and white americans married to linda lee,

barriers between the progeny of european immigrants have largely disappeared. among white people, three out of four marriages had already crossed ethnic andres by 1980. a generation later, few white americans had four grandparents from the same country. william z. ripley had good this outcome in 1908, fearing above all the inharmonious, that's his word, the inharmonious nick fan of italian men and irish women. [laughter] by the now would have been forced to reconsider his prediction that such a racial mix would make americans likely. we have artists in the lowering of racial boundaries starting in the 1940's when ethnic began replacing race as applied to

this descendents of european immigrants. the use of racial groups for white people has become a more advanced category partly because white people urso maxed out. finally the perquisites of mere whiteness count for less in the present situation of the stigma of blackness was just one job suffice to curse the white looking individual also seems less mortal. back in the 20th century white people were soon to be rich or at least middle-class as well as more beautiful, powerful and smart. george bush did away with that. [laughter] sorry. that is not in the book. too late to stuff it back in. as citizens and scholars they said what needed to be known to monopolize the study of other people with himself hardly been

marked and scrutinized in return. think of francis a. walker and william z. ripley for him for all education, new england ancestry and useful connections for offered authority. half a century later the people of those areas turn the glass around, bringing white people under scrutiny. think of malcolm x and james baldwin. today the attractive qualities that saxons, anglo-saxons, nordics or white were soon to monopolize or also to be found elsewhere. after a string of nonwhite mrs. america, jennifer lopez and beyoncé knowles are celebrated hollywood duties. vijay singh and tiger woods in the williams sisters, venus and serena dominates the league sports. robert johnson, the founder of et, bill cosby and the financier

on flickr junior have made millions. oprah winfrey as rich and famous, colin powell and condoleezza rice have been secretaries of state and alberto gonzales, attorney general. even more to the point of anointing power and beauty, barack obama is president of the united states. first lady, michelle obama, whose skin color alone would have condemned her to ugliness in the 20th century figures as an iconic duty and intelligent on the global stage. none of these individuals is white, but being white these days is not what he used to be. [laughter] that's a defensible to conclude that the american going under fourth-grader enlargement. although race may seem overwhelming without legal recognition it is less important than in the past. the dark of skin, who also happened to be rich, say people from south asia or

african-american or have hispanic background and the light of skin from anywhere who are beautiful are now well on the way to inclusion. is this the end of race in america? is this the end of race in america? i think we need democracy here. okay, let's take a vote. if you think yes, put your hand up. two? three, three. if you think no, put your hand up. the noes have it. ideal mac -- [inaudible] last night a recount, yes. let's not discuss it. we've had our vote and will sign

it tomorrow. [laughter] is this the end of race in america? we know it is not. at the turn of the 21st century, we're starting to look that way back in 2000. remember that? back in the 90's. in 1997 the american association of physical anthropologists are and the american government to phase out use of race as a data category and to substitute ethnic categories instead. geneticists studying dna, the constituent material of genes that issues instructions to our bodies in response to her surroundings were also concluding that race is a biological category made no sense. the habit of relating human heredity to the environment may be traced back to antiquity, but early 19th century racial thinkers during the notion around, deeming race a permanent marker for any superiority or

inferiority. not until the 1850's did the influence of environment on a ready t. get rescued with charles darwin's on the origin of species. darwin described a world much older than the typical 5000 years, reasoning that a ready t. fixed, that generation after generation, living things change in response to their surroundings. arguments over race in the human genome have subsided a late polythene with that sounds intriguing data about personal appearance. prevailing racial schemes that rest again once again on concept of skin color, as black and white people. the widely recognized as the fact that nobody part black people actually various shades of brown and yellow, but so too are white people, nearly somewhat lighter and often with a lot more pink. or if they've been in the son, a

lot more red. hence the red scare. as human block noticed in the 18th century one goes lightly into another. there is no clearly demarcated lines. some people identify as black may have lighter skin that others to identify its ways. siblings with the same mother and father can display a range of skin colors. race may be all about pigment, but what makes people's skin light or dark? skin color is a byproduct of two kinds of melanin, red to yellow tailed melanin and dark brown to black you melanin in reaction to sunlight. and several genes interact to make people like george art, reddish, brownish or yellowish. ancient scholars were wiser than they do with the related skin color to climate.

today's biologists concur. sunny climates do make people dark skinned and dark on the cold climates than people light-skinned. how much of what sort of melanin people have in their skin and to what degree it is expressed depends entirely over time on exposure to the sun's ultraviolet or uv radiation. melanin both protects against excessive ultraviolet radiation and allow sufficient uv radiation to enter the body. too much uv radiation causes skin cancer and lead to death, but uv radiation is crucial to developing fetuses and strong bones. so where are we now? mapping the human genome publicity at initial proclamations of human kindred miss across the globe. then, racetrack inscribed racial differences on our genes. that talk has not disappeared.

but ideally we would realize that human beings short history of the late assault to one another. to speak in racial terms, incessant human migration has made us all multiracial. does this mean the human genome or civil rights or desegregation have ended the tyranny of race in america? almost certainly not. the fundamental black-white binary endures, even though the category of whiteness or we might say more precisely a category of non-black as effectively expands. as before, the black poor remain outside the concept of the american president alien race a degenerate families. and i should explain that i have discussion of the concept of alien races, which was applied to immigrants and their children from eastern and southern europe and degenerate families were the poor white families slated for

involuntary sterilization. a multicultural middle class may diversify the suburbs and college campuses, but the face of poor and segregated into remains black. for some time now, many observers have held that money and interracial back would solve the race problem and indeed in some cases they have. nonetheless, poverty and a dark skin endures as the opposite of whiteness, driven by an ald social your name to characterize the poor as permanently other and inherently inferior. thank you. [applause] [inaudible] >> way about 20 bits for questions. again, if you can get to the microphone.

>> okay, made the race go to the swiftest. here we have a race. yes, sir. >> i was echoing professor? i have sort of a polemical question. >> no, no, no please. please just ask a question. >> sorry. i'm sorry in to gather at the goal or purpose of your book, like what you would like to have been if also called while people read and agreed with your premise here because when i read works like the encyclopedia of western colonialism, it talks about and i quote, the colonial cause of the west are in possession to nearly all of america and australia. 99% of polynesia, 90% of africa, nearly 50% of a show. or when you read the book we have a unrestored wants the world, that one talks about the

largest landowner in the world presently is queen elizabeth. who just happens to be white. both of these books still stand that people who classify themselves as white still a land that wasn't originally bears, still own and control resources that weren't originally bears. so with your boat, either just so with your boat, either just a@ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @

[inaudible] not an advocate. well, i don't know. that's a hard one, too. let me just say that my goal was not to change the world. so, what i would like people to know from reading my book is that whiteness is a concept. it is not something biological impermanent and inherent, intrinsic and that it does the ats about it have changed over time, that whiteness has a history. sorry. thank you. >> i would like to know if in your research that you found any evidence that this crossing of the racial barriers that were experiencing is leading to

better families, that if the people have -- >> another hard question. >> you know, if people have more choice that they can choose better perhaps, leaving out tiger woods. he's just one person. but you know, i was wondering if, you know, having more leeway to choose is producing better parent and, you know, better families as a result. >> that's another hard question. maybe even another trick question. no tricks. okay and once again i'm going to appeal to this intelligent beautiful audience. we're going to take another vote. i think you all are the question as to whether or not more choices produce utter families, right? is that a fair paraphrase of your questions? everybody understand?

does more choice -- you can reach out and married or have sex was more different kinds of people these days. does that make it better? wait, wait, wait. i didn't ask you for an essay. i just like yes or no. so yes it's more choice makes it better. now it's more choice doesn't necessarily make it better. you ready? no. this is still yes or no. yes more choice makes better families. okay. now, it doesn't necessarily. well, this time it's closer. i think the nose still have it. and i'll bet they're going to say, as i heard other people say, it makes it difficult -- it makes it different.

okay. >> my question is not difficult. it's simple. >> that's the hardest kind. >> as we were filling up the census forms and so looking on that, it aims to name that the groups are done generally by geographic location, except for one, which implies that there's only one skin color that's really important and that's why. so why isn't there an effort to not use that at least some offenses? >> you can be black, african-american, said to come you have a lot of choices in that line, but it does include lack. >> the other one that i think confuses the use of causian, which i don't know -- >> i don't think caucasian is some offenses now? >> at society in general using that, how many people with those various shades of light were from the caucus mountainsver?

>> zero. >> okay, all right. >> there's the easy answer and the other part i cannot answer. but i can't say that every 10 years from this category suggests to take account of what the federal government things it needs to come to. so in the middle of -- it started off in 1790. there's a picture in my book of the first census categories and there was only one graceless state, which was white. and it was i think in five different permutations. and then they were unfree people, who at that point were of various races. and then in the middle of the 19th century, the census added the lotto i think for that one census. and then in the early 20th

century, for white people they broke white people down into native born and foreign-born and you had to say where your appearance -- maybe even your grandparents were born. so it's changed over time. and if you make a movement, and maybe you can get, you know, pink, gray, brownish, you know, you can get some more variety. okay. >> a quick statement and then a quick question. really quick, really quick. which is just a other great good fortune of a long friendship with winter jourdan and alter your talk i thought how excited he would've been to hear this talk. so just to say this as a historian to historian. >> indeed he >> my question is, you know, i take my census form last week and wrote across it, guys, you know what is a racial constructs. but then i kicked way because i know they've got to count these things in the tragic figure this out. so my question is, how did you take yours and why?

>> well, mine is pretty straightforward. i kicked black. my husband picked white because as far as we know he is. but something interesting is happening. my book came out on the 15th of this month and since then i've been talking to people in i.e. are sort of permutations of this question over and over again and sometimes people are upset. but i only hear that from people who are upset over the white talks because they know that's the one that the census or somebody, the black helicopters or something, wants them to check and they're not comfortable with it. and i think, i guess with happening is that in the 21st century, white people are more and more becoming aware of themselves as having raised in addition to just being

individuals. and now, seeing how awkward a fit a category that to include millions and millions and millions of people really can be. so we are facing a kind of white dilemma, i think, that's going to be really interesting. yes? >> hello and thank you so much for coming. and i say here here to this the. was the last year when they have the television show twice, black in america. i was like, will they ever ask -- made at the same white in america? pic got apart. get to understand that. and if they do, i hope you're one a console. in the next question was, would you agree or maybe not the question would you agree, that i felt as i watched turmoil kind of take place in this country over the past year, it almost looked like an addict, like

racism was almost like an addiction, the need for this country to hold on to that separation is like an addict needing to hold onto something. and then the denial of this addiction and the destruction it does on themselves. how do you feel about that? >> i hadn't thought of it that way, but that's a really interesting and insightful way of talking about it. and apologists have spoken of people addicted to raise those people who believe in witchcraft and that you can never disprove it. if you point to somebody, you disprove their analysis of something that's based on the, then they have a way of getting around it and holding onto their belief. they think this has been going on for longer than just the last year. in my last book, creating black americans, has a chapter on rap

music and hip-hop culture, you know, which is 35 years old now, speaking of things that have history. and a good bit of the anxiety that comes out they are is trying to get black people back in the box. this is what black people are. and a lot of black comedy is what are, this is what black people do and, you know, it's a kind of a fabricated unitary image, which i think is the kind of, showing the kind of anxiety that you pick up in the culture at large. so opposed to segregation type inc. americans generally are trying to figure out who we are according to our traditional bases. in the new bases are so much more about class because we are living in a country with the most profound inequalities of

income and wealth. i think just about in our history. certainly in our post-slavery. in the slavery south, the disparities were infinite. but since that time, you know, we've really reached very few people who are very rich and an increasing number of people who are increasingly black and brown, who are just scraping by. yes? >> were going to take the last workers who might come in the last four or five. >> hike in the thank you so much for coming and my question i guess is to give context to grew up in d.c. and went to a multiracial public school and went away to a college that was very progressive and much wider and there seem to be almost a preoccupation among the student body about i guess the concept

of white privilege and trying to be sensitive about white privilege, but almost to the point where it became full circle and were taught, you know, sperber sensitivity training when we were teaching inner-city schools that science came from white man and, you know, it and that was like one student trying to work through that and trying to train the students. but this kind of preoccupation of self-consciousness about whiteness as john really interesting because i wasn't used to it. and i guess i'm wondering, historically what was -- is the appeal and the attraction of this category that kind of has no actual categorical basis? >> well, it has a teeny-weeny basis and i assume that's your question. >> what the appeal is. >> what the appeal is yeah. the appeal is that your people, whatever they are, assuming that you -- let's just make you william c. ripley for the

moment. you are well educated, new englander, wealthy background, harvard yell columbia, mit and so forth have a way of explaining why you are beautiful and nice and they are ugly and poor. sorts out the world. thank you. >> hi, i heard you mentioning the effect of white slavery back in europe a long time ago. >> not just a long time ago. slavery exists in our world. >> and on this white slavery, the words slav and the slaves are slim and are. >> they're not surprisingly similar, they are related. >> enemy and they there were sharp differences between

different groups of people in europe, but now you go to the census forms in d.c. just one box for why. >> well it depends. every country does the timberlake and in france they do not collect by race, but are thinking about it. >> i'm talking about america right now. in the census bacou up one box and if you go back to the beginning of the 20th century, people coming to ellis island would say europe is germany and europe of these these undesirable, unruly folks coming. my question as, given now you see just one box for white, maybe 100 years were not going to see box above for race and the census form. what do you think? >> i think that very possible because people are so mixed up in were having our little mini revolt about check in the white box certainly. and then the largest immigrant group now is latinos