point? >> to a general audience it is that judges matter. we tend to talk a lot when we talk -- we invoke something like habeas corpus, we get quickly into abstractions, moral claims about the nature of liberty that we think habeas corpus stands for. i love those abstractions as much as the next person. but this history fundamentally tells us all those abstractions matter very little if there is not all the monthly sum figure of authority that other people possessing power are going to recognize. that authority has historically been the judge. indeed i wonder, thinking about what judges were like three or four centuries ago, whether or not they might rediscover something about what it is they can see and do. ..

"the father of spin" about the life and career of edward bernays. c-span: larry tye, author of c-span2. he was the? >> he was edward bernays, and he was an influential man on what happens starting in the 1920's and going into the died in 1985. c-span: ec f and n some bananas and a woman smoking on the cover. but this did for?

>> i start at the bottom. that is the campaign that he led to get america smoking. we can talk about that. the banana is the campaign that he led in the 1950's to overthrow the leftist government. the fan is general electric. he worked for them, and did lots of things over lots of years, the most notable of which was the 50th anniversary of the invention of the electric light bulb. he helped publicize thomas edison and the whole operation. c-span: you had one meeting with edward bernays in cambridge, massachusetts. tell us everything about that you remember. >> really an incredible meeting in 1994. 102 years old. his health was failing to read his mind was beginning to go. yet he pulled himself together for that afternoon meeting. was really an incredible session. he came down dressed in a suit.

he told story after story about his campaign harkening back to things that happened 80 years before. he told them and wonderful and stunning detail. his eyes lit up, and he really clearly for that afternoon pulled himself together and was a consummate pr man that he had been for 80 years. it was a great day. he died a year later nfl lucky to have met him. that they convinced me that i had to write. c-span: here is of the last picture in the book. who is in this? >> that is 80, and to his immediate life is his wife of 60 years. >> to his right. >> to his right. c-span: our left. >> the rest of his grandchildren two, four, six grandchildren, three from each daughter. that was one of the many celebrations they had, they're wonderful home in cambridge. c-span: when did you first get interested in him? >> 1994 when i was at harvard university taking a great course

and creative writing from his daughter and that the novelist. she convinced me that her father was really an important historic figure draft the 20th-century. her husband who is a pulitzer prize-winning biographer convinced me he would make a great biography. every journalist was looking for a way to find something beyond newspaper work that they had come from that era began by writing books. this guy seemed like a perfect character. i decided at the end of that year would go back and try to write a book. >> is showing a picture of him. what year is that? >> that looks like it was in the and late 1930's, maybe early '40's. that is what he looked like for most of his career buried hand very well-dressed. quite short,. >> self-conscious about being short but who was an overpowering presence. c-span: how policy?

>> he was five ft. four something. it depended on who you're talking to how we decided to be that date. it was something that he was conscious of. c-span: who did you talk to the most to get ready to write this book? >> what i did the most before i get ready to ride it was try to talk to everybody was important in today's pr world, the founder of the largest pr firm in the world, people all around the world to work remembering him and to try to see whether they agree that this was a seminal figure in their field. the more people i talk to the more i realize he was a controversial guy, but everybody agreed he played a role that really was very, very important. of really convinced me was to go and start looking through the 800 boxes of paper.

c-span: let's go back in your situation. what do you do full time? >> a reporter at the boston globe. c-span: how long have you done that? >> a dozen years. c-span: so when you got your name in you decided to go across the river? >> had to go across the river. excited to go back but looking for a way to try something different which was this book. my dad was a doctor. father-in-law was a doctor. madison was something that had always intrigued me. when i started reporting its in like a natural thing to do. nothing more natural or critical to medicine and industry as well as the people who care about health care. c-span: where did you grow up? >> massachusetts in a small town. a city about 45 miles north of boston. c-span: where did you go to college? >> brown university. c-span: when did you first get interested in being a writer?

>> always interested in writing it brown, but i had a cynical view of reporters. people who could not do much of their own and had to live vicariously. after working following college in washington for four years of wedded to see another part of the country before i moved back to new england. it seemed like writing and reporting was a great way to do it. i went to the deep south and work for a wonderful paper called the alabama star. stay there for six months. in the that there for two years. reporting for a lifetime. c-span: in washington? >> i was. c-span: where? >> for mike dukakis during his first term as governor. for two years for an environmental group called the union of concerned scientists. c-span: 800 boxes in a library of congress. >> enrolling and wonderful. c-span: what? >> every piece of paper he wrote during the life of 103 years and everything that he received. he saved it all. interestingly he donated it when he was 75 years old.

the library of congress up the sky is aging, we have to get it ready san. so they rushed to get it ready. he surprised them. he said the documents did not become public until he died, and he died 28 years later. sydney be the best organized collection in the history. c-span: or you the first one there? >> thankfully. c-span: how many of the 800 boxes did you get in? >> 750. i looked through just about everything. c-span: how long did take you? >> it took me five or six months in washington looking through documents. he also chided his own biography in no way that was really quite exceptional. he had a graduate student at harvard school of education 30 years ago put together an annotated bibliography with every book and article he had written every time that he was ever quoted in anything from the new york times to somebody else's book or magazine story. this was a wonderful collection

that went on for about 750 pages i'm sure that i and the first person to have ever spent any time looking at that book. tens of thousands of copies printed in, but it was a wonderful romance to everything that had been written about him. and only did he leave his papers the everything he had ever written or have been said about him. c-span: this picture on the bottom. >> that is his mother who was probably in her 90's. sigmund freud's sister. with them is the young walter cronkite. always acted as the consummate pr man for everyone in his family. i'm sure he had arranged for cronkite to come in and interview her on the occasion of solely birthday. c-span: most people listening know who sigmund freud was, but for purposes of this discussion the who was the? >> for this discussion he was the uncle of edward bernays, the man he told him exactly how to

understand human psychology and use it and while freud was using psychology to try some basically free people from their notional bonds his nephew took a different lesson and use psychology and an understanding of why people behave the way they do to help tide them to his plans be the company's top politicians. a brilliant student of his uncle, but did things with his uncle's psychology that might have made his uncle really turnover in his grave if he saw. c-span: how well did he know his uncle? >> seen him quite well. he spent time with and in europe on family vacations. when he was in his 30's and '40's he had a 20-year correspondence with his uncle. again, these papers were made public for the first time, and they showed a side that i found intriguing. c-span: what did you learn of the sigmund freud? >> i learned during those 20 years while the word was

focusing on have been he was really petrified about how he was a fight to survive financially. de. he had very little money. the person in the world needed most easily turned to was his american nephew, edward bernays. he turned to him for advice on how to survive physically and more importantly on how to have the financial resources to support himself and his family. c-span: where was he born? >> vienna. came over on the boat when he was born and spent the next 60 something years in new york. thankfully he retired in cambridge a few blocks from where i live. c-span: of total, i believe, of edward bernays and his wife. >> yes. bound for europe. this was a memorable photo in part because she was the first american woman to have a passport issued in her maiden name. she went for most of her life by doris fleischman, never taking his name.

that really created wonderful ways in terms of the feminist movement in america. for edward bernays it did wonderful things for him in terms of attracting attention. that is what he tried to do too much of his life. c-span: being jewish was a problem. being a religious person was a problem. explain. >> she did not believe in god. more importantly as part of his world view he saw the world as something that he could mold. he was the p.r. man who could come in and tell us how to look at things, how to behave, how to believe. the idea of religion and that things were already set in some sort of divine order was something that was contrary to everything that he believed. and so he never had any use for religion and disparaged it. when his daughter asked him at about age five what am i. he said you're nothing. your what you want to be. c-span: did he not like being a jew? >> he did not like religion of any kind. in terms of his jewish entity

used it when it helped him in terms of having this cultural identity with important people, but he never saw himself as a jew and never wanted to be defined as that. he never wanted to be defined as anything other than what he told you he was. c-span: showed the picture earlier with he and eleanor roosevelt. what did he do for her? >> the help to promote her memoirs. as he did with every kind of his seed developed a bit of a deeper relationship and tried to give her advice on all kinds of things. in her later years at. he was brilliant in promoting anything. c-span: what did he do for calvin coolidge? >> calvin coolidge had at that time that he had inherited the office of the presidency an image problem. , teddy roosevelt daughter had basically coined the phrase about calvin coolidge that stuck in the american public's mind which was that he was weaned on

a pickle. a personality so sour that it was said that he was weaned on a pickle. the edward bernays went into try to sweeten things up. he arranged for a trainload of this dollars along with a famous entertainer to come from broadway in new york the station in washington to be picked up at the white house by cadillac's, broadband where they spent the morning eating breakfast with the president and actually singing and dancing with them. one of my favorite newspaper headlines ever was the next morning in the new york times where it said president almost smiles. this was edward bernays and managed to lighten up in this seemingly duck president. several months later he was reelected. the lee edward bernays does not deserve all the credit, but help people see this guy as a human being. c-span: to pay for all of that? >> the white house. c-span: what did he do for herbert hoover?

>> the type to do the same thing. seen as a dark personality in a dark time of our history with the depression. edward bernays but he could come in and rally business leaders and the public behind hoover. he had a wonderful campaign is to try to do that but that was one that he could not overcome all of the natural obstacles that hoover faced. as we know, hoover lost badly. edward bernays talked of to experience that even he could not do when needed to be done. c-span: a graduate in error grocer. >> correct. actually, from cornell. he came out with a lesson, that people's behavior could be dramatically influenced. he wanted to deal with the public.

never want to be on another farm or shovel another pile of manure. c-span: how did he take agriculture and cornell? >> it wasn't much of a choice. the natural choice buried his parents pushed into agriculture. these are people who came over as immigrants and decide that being close to the land was really the surest way of insuring your future and your family as they convince there son to do that. he reluctantly bought into it. from the day he got there he knew he would do something difference. c-span: you say that he portrait? >> for the first time he broke down voters by everything from your ideology to religion to race. he decided that if you did this year could fashion various kinds of appeals to appeal to various voters in the days before

scientists polling, but he was essentially structuring a campaign in the same way we do today. all these interest groups. fashion that pits the will appeal to each interest groups. he did. he helped why bother the whole notion of spending today, polling, scientific research. he always believed that behind every campaign critical was understanding the psychology, sociology, and history. this is what he called the science of pr. he wanted to combine that science with an art form of brilliance down south. together the profession of public relations. c-span: who was he? >> a young guy running for mayor. elected mayor. somebody who believed in the sky but also believe in testing of his theories to see whether they

could work for politicians as well. c-span: do you remember the list that was published several months ago, maybe a couple years ago, the words that people were supposed to use in political campaigns? >> that again sounds exactly like the approach. he understood the symbolic power of words. as gingrich did he understood that you could not just pick these words out of the air. you had to test that the impact. he would often go and ask them to help him understand the symbolic value of different approaches that he was trying to use and campaigns including the symbolic value of words. c-span: a sale, tonight, predict, hell, ask, promises, courage, hope, advocate, see, say, talk, declared, deploy, request car market, can deal, exert, praise, forecast and the bank. redefine the list?

>> in one of his campaign brochures for various clients. that was one that he prepared specifically for one of his other political clients. the same kinds of things on his corporate clients. each of those, you will notice not only powerful but it is an action oriented words. he believe that words ought to convey action in no way that every writer understands. you want things to be in an active tense. the one power behind the words. c-span: what did he do? >> he helped when she was a young congresswoman. her husband was very powerful owner and editor of time magazine. he helped her with fashion issues that she thought were important and that he thought could sell to the public and in campaign after campaign he helped her develop programs and understand how to sell them to people. c-span: along the way you found inconsistencies where he would

say one thing and you would find others. >> absolutely. let me give you an example. during the years in 1920's and 30's when he was helping sell american women on smoking cigarettes there were things that came up in the campaign. his most dramatic was in 1929 the tobacco makers realized, american tobacco, the biggest company realized that they had managed in cracking the male market for their products. lucky strikes, the number one seller. they could not reach women. they said we have half of the american market but we aren't reaching an all. what can we do. he said give me a minute. he went to see his uncle's and said, what is it that cigarettes represents symbolically to bremen? why aren't they smoking cigarettes? he said is very simple. cigarettes are a male and post taboo. men have convinced women is on

ladylike. he thought that was brilliant. he went out and are arranged for a dozen debutantes on easter sunday in 1929 to march down fifth avenue holding what he called the torch of freedom. the newspapers could not resist. the next day every paper in america and across the world had a picture of these very elegant debutantes marching on easter sunday with a cigarette dangling from their hands are mouth. they call that the torch is a freedom parade. that helped launch an entire movement of women in the 20's and 30's seeing cigarettes as a sign of liberation. instead of being something that were taboo, they became a positive social value. women in large numbers some fall of man into smoking. the inconsistencies, the inconsistencies were lots of things. pop -- probably the fact that no one ever said it was a or american tobacco who convinced

these skills to do what they did. the inconsistencies were at the same time he was trying to put cigarettes he was telling his endeavors at home any time they found them of their cigarettes to break than half and fussed and down the toilet. the inconsistencies were that he had evidence, the earliest evidence of some of the potential health threats of cigarettes. he helped his tobacco company plants rabat or cover-up. sixty years later he was working with the american cancer society hoping and trying to wean women from the same habits they had formed in telling the world and they ask that he had never understood the health risk of cigarettes when he, in fact, have evidence as early as 1930's. incredible inconsistencies throughout most of his campaign. we see it in cigarettes. c-span: back to the story about the march. i just wonder if there is any similarity to the things you hear today.

he had a secretary that that involved. you're talking about fifth avenue. patrick's church, of these churches along the way. how did he get women to march down fifth avenue smoking a cigarette? >> he had his secretary this send a telegram to these women basically asking them if they wouldn't join in doing something that would strike a blow for women's freedom. he found the women by going to the editor, either vote wreck magazine, got a list of these wonderful debutantes. she simply took her telegram, sent it out of these women and got enough to agree to participate that we knew we had an event. they actually spree managed from stage minutes for these women exactly what they ought to do in terms of just how to come down, just what to do in terms of letting up a cigarette. he warned the press beforehand what was coming to go on. everything was perfect the scripted except for the fact that nobody knew where the script was.

>> 125,000 pr people. >> a handful. at least 125,000. c-span: the issue, the father. >> the first. somewhere between six and 12 people who were out there before he was doing essentially the things that constitute public relations. defined as somebody who was the spiritual and emotional and scientific originator of a lot of the things that we think of today as public relations. edward bernays was the one that was the most inspired of the early people, and he was also the one who was best at crafting his own legacy. continually insisted that he was a father. if you repeat things often enough to take on a certain truth. reporters were so used to calling him the father of pr, and he outlived all of his would-be competitors to the throne. when he died in new york times and every other major newspaper

in america and his abate declared him the father of pr. he would have loved that because that was a title that he tried to win for 103 years. c-span: how many books? >> fifteen books, scores of articles. he left behind an incredible written legacy. c-span: how long was his autobiography? >> more than 500 pages. it recounted in excruciating detail every significant an insignificant event in a 70 or 80 your lifetime. >> what did you think of it? >> wonderful for me since he was not around to help me work my way through his life. a great thing for me. can't imagine anybody else plowing their way through rid of it and his daughters and people who were his proteges. very, very difficult. c-span: he also found oral histories. >> correct. columbia and so many scores of interviews. this guy talked so much.

everything that he had done in his life. the columbia or of histories, by the time i got to those of public record have recited them. he told the same story so often that having read his autobiography and listens to 80 hours of taped and having read scores of newspaper interviews over the years and magazine interviews, by the time it came to columbia i knew the stories as well as he did. c-span: an honest public relations practitioner could use all the while some the profession to measure public opinion and to try to sway it to see how people perceive politicians and repackage them more to the public slacking provided it was all done to lead the people to where they want to go. in a democracy is solving the problems they believe need solving. >> right. edward bernays did not believe in god, but the closest thing to a guy was a pr man. he felt that there were not there to take these unholy messes and give them some order and lead them in a useful, socially useful direction which

was a nice idea. the fact is the direction he was the people in. >> do you think he would have liked to make you get some of the well. >> i don't know who your grandfather was, but we all have the metaphorical grandfather who is part cadaver and character and part level will guide. there are parts of, definitely would have liked. i would not have wanted him for a grandfather father, but i certainly would have enjoyed him. he was somebody that was tough not to at least enjoy even if he didn't respect. c-span: this picture. >> one of his most famous campaigns. he worked for more than 30 years for procter and gamble, and he decided in the 1930's that he had to take a symbolic and psychological approach in trying to sell a product. they were trying to sell the product of ivory soap. what he did was launch a campaign that was based on so. we see here judges looking at

stores of so sculpting down by kids all across the country. he decided the kids are never going to like the idea of cleaning up with soap, but he also understood that you could sell so by convincing kids that they had to talk their mother into buying its particular brand when they were at the market with her. what he did was start this contest, he get millions of young kids across the country competing by sculpting the only bar of soap that was acceptable which was average into everything from likenesses of the statue of liberty, calvin coolidge. when edward bernays get large retainers for procter and gamble. c-span: at one point you talk about and enter a bar of soap and say have that it. what was the edited? >> to attitudes. that particular date she

actually cut herself and had to be taken to the doctor. a very deep cut. that represented symbolically the fact that he was not always appropriate. something that was risky, but more risky over the years was that every time that he was trying to sell something they seemed to get brought into the campaign to the point where we see that even at his daughter's wedding he was putting out press releases and basically telling the world that not only were they his daughters who were getting married, but the grandnieces of sigmund freud in or about to marry these distinguished people. everything became a campaign, including raising his own daughters. c-span: backed his picture. you were taught by his daughter, and. where is she? >> she is, two daughters, your daughter, and endorsed.

doris was wonderful at helping me understand her father in terms of what made him take psychologically. your daughter was wonderful in helping me understand what he was like as a human being. as a writer she understood just to would be useful. they helped me to the whole process. c-span: what do they really think of their father? >> an intriguing character. but and was not so sure that he was ever made to be a father. very frustrated by him. they loved him, but were frustrated by their inability to get him to see them and not as young kids with special needs of their own. they seemed to be extensions of whatever is need was at the time, seemed to always be almost a science to him. c-span: did you talk to them after the book came out? when. >> i have talked to and. c-span: what did she think? >> very kind. if we talk together, and she gave me and a minus for the book which i thought was a note a

great set. c-span: what do you think she missed? >> see things that nobody ever deserves an aide to start with and that i am sure there are things in there that she is certain i missed but to kind tommy. c-span: guatemala. >> 1950's. banana republics across latin america, which it had these countries where it was the biggest employer and landowner, and the countries are always complaints. the whole republic seems devoted to their crop of bananas. 1950's they ran into a problem. a leftist government is elected and they start changing things. it discourages workers to push for higher wages and expropriates of the land. the company is worried it will happen. they bring their van. he understands that we can just deal with guatemala in a vacuum.

we have to work through the press and the public and make a symbolic of something bigger. the biggest thing at the time sitting there staring him in the face was the cold war. suddenly became the science of the press as a little country 100 or so miles from our southernmost point that was a bastion of soviet influence and that's might let the russians really gain a foothold in our continent. scary to the american public, american government. the government is up working with united fruit in orchestrating a campaign to overthrow the guatemalan leftist government. done incredibly efficiently it sets a dangerous precedent but changes things. c-span: the middle and american information bureau. >> of french group that he set up through his career to get out supposedly neutral information. in fact, it was edward bernays

and a staffer he hired putting out the propaganda he wanted. c-span: how often did he do that? >> for every client he could. he had over 400 clients. c-span: how much of that is ten today? >> a good question. the press is much more sophisticated. any time the first question i ask, any time i see a study is to is behind it. c-span: anything else? >> i learned to ask and be cynical basically about every press release that comes across my desk. every week i get 100 e-mail or facts a letter telling me that people have, but the latest cure for cancer or heart disease or diabetes. adam the question the presumption behind it but i want to know who funded it, exactly

how the research was done and all the questions that edward bernays hoped reporters would never ask. c-span: you know, over the years this shows we have done, one of the names that comes up more often, and it did again, and i will read the sentence. it would also have appealed. this tutors and the use of symbols. what is it that others keep bringing up? how did -- what role will he play? >> one of the series starting with some people in france and coming to america that understood and was trying to come up with theories to explain how you control the masses of the public. how do you generate cohesion? at time in the world was worried about communism and the forces taking the masses and steering them.

there were trying to tell the public and leaders, these are ways of uniting people behind the goals that you think are socially useful and important, using symbols whether it be the printed word, the new communication media at the time which was the motion picture. you can make those capture certain symbolic values, partial goals. intrigued by symbolism, intrigued by it at one level and at the sociology leveled. somebody he never credited much, but that really helped him for his whole ideas on just how public-relations could come in and perform this role of social cohesion. c-span: eventually went to cornell. where were the different places to iraq. >> manhattan and cambridge.

all over manhattan. his family moved a number of times. economic circumstances going up and down. lived in probably five or six different places across manhattan. some of them wonderfully elegant. he moved when he was in his 60's to cambridge and ended up spending and give 40 some odd years there. >> that is right on the border of greenwich village across from washington square park. one of the first truly eloquent places he lived. >> you say there were chauffeurs and cuts and all that. >> everything. c-span: also had a lot of big places to live in with nothing inside. somewhat of a misleading of how much money he really had. >> there was. it was never clear. at various points in the 30's

and 40's as much as a million dollars a year. in those terms of a been many million in today's terms. the difficult thing was deciding how much money he was able to hold onto. at one point they had much of a floor. the houses that he rented were exceedingly expensive. money came in and went out. at the end when he died he left much less of a legacy. c-span: paid $600. >> basic to the value of this house. incredible the guy who had earned those kinds of millions, and the most brilliant corporate minds in america. he would have been left for the millions. it was partly that he spend so much of the years. when people plan for retirement they envision it at ten, 20, 30

years. retired for more than 40 years. every year he tapped a little bit more into its capitol. c-span: 1988, john sondra swept into his life. >> hired as a caretaker. she eventually became much more than that. apparently his mistress. >> wife did? >> had been dead for a number of years. he had had various them women who live with him as caretakers. the oldest of the islamic. develop what appeared to be the closest relationship with them. it became a very contentious thing because his daughters were convinced that she was taking too much of his money. they appealed to a court to declare them conservatives.

there were eventually declared in control of his finances. c-span: did you meet her? >> actually, i met her in phone conversations with her. she was very cooperative. c-span: half his age? >> she was early fifties, he was late 90's. c-span: this line popped off the page. the last time they intimate was when he was 101. >> she tells stories about him having an insatiable sexual appetite but also an incredible sexual ability in prevent aggregate's. >> what did you feel the need to put that in the book? >> lots of reasons. the most significant of which was this had been reported extensively and picked up by the national press. this was something about was out there. it was what a lot of people did

not know in his earlier years. i was provided with court documents that went through and gave as definitive a version as there was. it was important. c-span: in the end, what happened to her? you say it is still -- there may be a book there. >> a filing of one lawsuit that appears to be settled. in the end she disappeared from the scene and is living a quiet life in the boston area. >> 1993 when doors fire joan, his daughter. they went away somewhere. popped up of mattel's. >> the story was apparently they have arguments.

they left town with a car packed with seemingly all of his belongings, whether he had a passport with him as well. showed up in a couple of motels, various parts of new england. he said afterward they had just come off on a ride. they were upset with the daughters. dollars stuck there had been kidnapped, bryan and police investigators and of them became a crisis situation. years later the court tried to sort out and decided that they were just left with differing versions. he was not in misstated the point based partly on your extensive interviews with him. c-span: why did he and his wife moved? the story that he loved to tell and told to scores of reporters was that he did scientific study of all the places they can move

looking at everything from the kinds of transportation systems they had, the kinds of natural environments, cultural life, universities. he was left with berkeley and cambridge and a couple other places. for various reasons he merited down to cambridge. it was all done on the same scientific basis that he advised his clients to use. the reality his daughters and grandchildren live in cambridge. that was the only place that made sense from day one, and that is where he was destined to be. the other was just a wonderful story. c-span: you say that at one point he wanted to put out a personal clipping book of himself. first, what kind of anita did he have? >> and eager to the extent that he was often described over the years, 400 something plans, but people said he was on best client, perpetually promoting himself, and he had an ego that was not only unusual for any human being, but especially

unusual for a pr guy. suppose to be in the background. their client should be the only ones we see pictures of it and read stories about. edward bernays could not resist promoting himself throughout the years. >> his wife. >> she wrote a number of books, but she never wrote -- she had people come along and right pieces about her, and the suspect someday their will be a biography. in intriguing character. the spiritual leader. she was probably mother of pr, even if he wasn't the father. c-span: their relationship? >> he described them as a full and equal partnership at home and their work. he is right that she was a partner in business. she was wonderful and advising him, a better writer than he. more outlandish schemes. she would put a stop to them before he embarrassed himself. a wonderful partner.

he was always called. she was never given the kind of credit, in the name on a shingle. she was a full and equal partner in terms of the work but not the credits. well she was his partner at work at home she was doing everything, taking care of the household, managing the staff and raising the kids. expected to be a partner at work when he wasn't one at home. c-span: you have in his campaign. define your objectives. by the way, is there anything special about this? >> nothing other than it was the most repeated a part formula. if he was sitting across from you here today he would tell you that he had devised that formula and that it was entirely original. interesting, but not the original. c-span: define objectives, conduct research, modify objectives based on research.

set a strategy, established themes, symbols, and appeals, create an organization to execute your strategy, decide on tactics and kerrey of your plan. >> a simple idea. be strategic, understand where you're going with that and be creative in coming up with campaigns. as with everything it had to be put in terms of rules. c-span: thomas mccann. >> right. c-span: what did he think of him? >> he thought -- he actually when i used the metaphor earlier i think that mccann might have used that same sort of image in the sense that he was a young pr guy. unisys for company. he looked as a tutor and a lot of these things that united effort was doing. over the years he became really frustrated with some of the things. he wrote his expos say on the

united fruit company and particularly the campaign in guatemala. he said things in terms of him having manipulated the press and stretched the truth. he felt he had been this guy, his mentor and that he had been let down. in fact to me give him credit but also was honest. c-span: let me read what you quote him as saying. my estimate is we are spending in excess of $100,000 per year just for his consulting services which was an enormous amount of money in 1952. and everybody in the country hated him, did not tustin more like his politics or his feet. the company executives were negative because they wanted to do business in the same old way and get the hell out of there. >> i think that in saying that mccain is giving a sense of just how popular who. c-span: popular edward bernays was but also one of the reasons that he was unpopular was because he was changing the way

business has traditionally been done. he really appreciated just have different and creative u.s. but also appreciated how bloated his sense of himself was. c-span: a little bit more. by the way, is he alive? >> he is. he has been wonderfully supportive. i talked to him at length before and after writing the book. c-span: accused edward bernays of organizing the anti-american demonstration that it placed during arthur hays visit to guatemala in 1949 which helped convince the new york times publisher that his papers should explore the troubles. how often -- by the way, did he create an anti-american demonstration for arthur hays? >> i can't say whether he did not. i can say that he clearly showed the publishers of time magazine and newsweek and everybody else that he brought over there that he made sure they saw what he

wanted them to see. that was something that really outraged edward bernays. who they went there as a totally neutral strip. they saw everything, all sides of things which clearly is not the way he operated. he was smart enough to show them enough to make them think they're reading the full picture but not let them talk to people on the other side. c-span: more on politics. the sum politics. in most elections you can count on 40 percent of the voters deciding. >> he and other people. c-span: 40 on your side, 40 against. what counts is that 20 percent in the middle. winning over 20 percent is what public relations is all about. all pr. >> right. if he was brilliant.

coming up with a basic truth is about the profession he was involved with which is one of many midwest and the book. lots of truisms like that. it is unclear how many he originated, but he was quoted often. c-span: the public relations? >> she did. never believed in organized groups. so outlandish it * that he was not especially welcome. he saw himself as different and wanted to be seen as a unique figure. never part of a big pr firm. nine people working under an. he just didn't want to share his expertise or money or glory with anybody. c-span: all of these little sayings that he liked to use. he had a theory on stubbornness. sometimes possible. >> he knew that well.

c-span: the basis of a latin phrase. i will be able to do this. i apologize. that is not right. as much as one deserves, the corporation is much more likely to do what you suggest if you charge a higher fee than if you charge very little. >> he lived that. excessively high fees. no one knew what to expect. his theory was, charge high fees, deal only with the ceo. that way people take you seriously, listen, try to do what you were doing and you become rich. c-span: the best defense against more propaganda? >> more propaganda. throughout his life he was brilliant in understanding where resources were varied. he understood how much was available in open public forum. if he were around in the days of the internet would have been the first one to use it to get more information for his clients. c-span: no more than 16 words in

just one idea. >> just one idea. he was great in his later years which were in his 80's and 90's. scores of young students over to his house, and he would help them try to find a job. c-span: why he will read playboy. >> going somewhere. c-span: the same reason i read national geographic. i like to see places that i will never visit. >> that's great. he was apparently visited this place is into his late 90's. c-span: to things, his connection with sigmund freud and experiences at the field of war propaganda during world war one. what did he do? >> he tried, first of all, to get into the war in active duty. he had various bad eyes. feed that or a problem. he tried and tried but could not get in. a set to join with the u.s. propaganda agency which was called the u.s. committee for public information.

he became one of their star propagandists, and he helped convince the american public in a very unpopular war it was one that we ought to fight. up to convince our allies. c-span: this picture right here. >> they were about to set sail from paris to the peace conference. turned out to be a very controversial episode. he upset the people who were leading the delegation by trying to work with the press. the opposition became outraged and saw this as propaganda. an ongoing battle over his role that continued until he wrote his autobiography and for years afterwards. c-span: you mentioned about the library community, the advantage of going to libraries. how would you grade the library of congress after all that time? >> after i spent time there and looking to research collections

and manuscript collections and other libraries across the country, it gets an a-plus. i think they get an a-plus part because they were so brilliantly organized and partly because they helped when i wanted to cross just -- cross check things. they were wonderful in making that easy. i was possibly the most ignorant office aide they had ever had. c-span: why did he say ignorant? >> because i was a newspaper reporter with no idea how to read a book. at the earliest stages of research, and they were great at helping me out and understanding how to use the collection, the collections. they ended up giving me one of the great resources that nobody knows much about, if you have a book contract and if they have open space they will give you an office. you might have to share it with someone, but you can take books out to your office and keep them until somebody else asks for them. i have this office and it made things so much easier.

c-span: which building? >> in the madison building in the manuscript collection room which is where presidential papers are. very unusual for somebody to get into that room if they are not a public figure and then enlisted the importance. >> what would you recommend someone who has never done this before? they know they have 800 boxes. >> two things. one is being really nice to the librarians and having one or two of them that there to give you the kind of advice you need. the other thing i would recommend is finding somebody like me who started out with this whole thing, getting some tips in terms of what the resources are they used. i had a wonderful guy i sat next to for a couple of months it may have written the best book ever on vietnam. grated helping steer me through the library and understand how to make them work for you. >> he was working on a book in

the cold war. that's probably all i ought to say about it. c-span: the reason i ask, he was our first interview about ten years ago. >> well, he was inspirational. it was great. c-span: you say that edward bernays appeal to people's instincts. that was a philosophy rather than reason. >> correct. he insisted that people respond more quickly when he tapped into something symbolically important. the instinct in terms of cigarettes was to convince women that buying cigarettes, the money they would spend what they put into their body made sense, to tap into something that was symbolically important. the instinct was freeing themselves from this taboo. everyone wants to be liberated, whatever that means. this was an instinctual process that help them change their behavior. >> at the very end it was difficult. he had gone through this whole dramatic thing in the last

couple of years. being taken to court. his daughters involved in the struggle. it was difficult. he had friends who visited him, but he lived relatively lowly the last couple of years in cambridge which was a contrast to what he had done when he had these wonderful parties 30 years before that in his backyard. one of the real social people in that community. >> stays just gave in at the end. 103 he died quite peacefully. c-span: who was with him? >> a very close friend. a number of people claimed to have been with him at the very end which is one of the things we talk about in the and. is unclear. he had family and was very close around him at the end. c-span: first book for you? >> number one. >> what do you think? >> wonderful. as somebody who loves daily journalism the idea in a newspaper if you're given two or

three months to work on a project that is an incredible luxury. the idea of having had an entire year to write a book was terrific. if you can use the best 5% of all the material you have collected you're lucky. here i could use about 50 or so percent. the time to tell a story like this was a true joy. c-span: what is next? >> what is next is enjoying the globe and as some point trying another book. c-span: any idea what you would like to do? >> i do and when i know more of tell you. c-span: a personal subject? >> subject. c-span: our guest has been the author of this book, "the father of spin: edward bernays larry tye of the boston globe. >> the redesigned website now features over 800 of those interviewed about their books. view the programs, see the transcripts, and use the searchable database to find links to blocks, web sites, facebook and twitter fields.

a brand new look and feel the rita hopeful research tool, and a great way to watch and enjoy authors and books. >> matt, here is my question. the breezy, a popular style, and it has a breezy optimism to it. you write at one point, and i'm quoting here, the innovative capitalist culture will allow us to make a houdini style escape from climate changes most devastating impact. but what makes you so sure of that? >> my mother always told me to avoid wishful thinking. i've always tried to be provocative to see if folks are awake. i take climate change very seriously. now that my two minutes is up -- [laughter] i love good jokes. i take time to change very seriously. my optimism is really, the core

of my optimism, and i don't want you to walk away thinking i am a navy optimist. when we anticipated challenge that our minds, and a world of 7 billion people, perhaps nine, if enough of us are scared and aware of the challenge that climate change poses, the beginnings of addressing doom head on is anticipating a problem. our best minds, in a world where we have seven to 9 billion people anticipating major challenges and anticipating that there will be a market just as folks are using their blackberry right now to text may setting points, and a world where there is a need for climate change innovation that demand, create, supply. that is not my you wishful thinking, but if we anticipate that of like the titanic if we can see the iceberg ahead, afraid of the iceberg, this is