there. john boehner discussed trying to get a construct so perhaps you have a plan above the cut, cap and balance act that would help us. if the gentleman wants me to yield i will yield. i yield back the balance of my time. >> both gentlemen yield back. ..

discusses his politically injected novel, "only the super-rich can save us!" with two of the billionaires in his book, businessman and philanthropist ted turner and peter lewis, nonexecutive chairman of progressive corporation. in his book he imagines placing 17 billionaires in one room to solve the country's problems. this conversation at the newark public library is about an hour and a half. >> tonight, we have the honor of welcoming ralph nader who will speak into conversation with ted turner and peter lewis. this program is entitled

billionaires against books. the title was going to be slightly longer, but i decided to leave it at that so as to be able to keep my job. the subtitle of the event is from charity to justice. nader will speak about the difference between charity, philanthropy, and justice. libraries as you know, depend greatly on philanthropy, but i think the greatest mission is to offer, to the engines of social change. they are incredibly important organizations in our life, and in some way the heartbeat of the city. they bring people together, such as tonight for conversations. in only the superrich can save us, ralph nader imagines all coalition of billionaires who join forces to answer the

question, what if america's wealthiest individuals decided it was time to work for the collective good. we are very happy to bring ted turner and peter lewis, two of the billionaires against, described in nader's book to the new public library for discussion with also about wealth, philanthropy and social justice. saint augustine reminds us that charity is no substitute justice without. has rarely been true event in america with the wealthiest 5% own 65% of the nations wealth. >> ralph nader's radical idea which peter lewis and ted turner have taken to heart through the social activism is that the superrich can harness a power that comes with wealth to create a more just and democratic society. it is fitting that they should

be here in this conversation and debate on this stage at the newark public library, an institution that unlike our universities and our hospitals, is open to all curious visitors, regardless of their financial situation but as i often say, if you walk through these doors, 15 minutes after walking through them you can actually be touching the leaves of grass. we have the manuscript of walt whitman. when asked to submit a bio and seven would go something we do now with all the people we invite, peter lewis wrote, chairman, progressive insurance, philanthropist, father and grandfather. ralph nader wrote justice advocate, founder of many citizen groups. maybe also provocative. ted turner wrote chairman, united nations foundation, philanthropist, environmentalist,

conversationalist -- conservationist. is with great pleasure that i welcome the three of them to this stage. [applause] >> thank you very much. thank you all for coming this evening. this is a unique format in the sense that these two are my billionaire heroes. they are in the book and it jumped out of this fictional narrative to be here today. i want to thank you for performing so brilliantly in my fictional narrative. [laughter] they were bowled. they were bracing. they were pioneers. and actually extending a lot of the things they have written and

talked to me about, so i didn't start the new. ted turner was always a renewable solar energy advocate, and he said something in this book, some of those spectacularly flamboyant son got festivals that one could conceive, a little controversial, too. and peter who was my classmate at princeton, what a shy lad you within. took on insurance companies to push them toward more loss prevention, which should be their mission, as well as a lot of other activities. so i want to thank you for your fictional role. and now we go to the nonfiction. at dinner, you said, peter, you spent 35 years trying to find ways to intelligently apply your philanthropic impulses.

and at the time we were talking about what does it mean to move from charity to justice, and i gave this example. i said charity are starting soup kitchen. we have a lot of poverty in the country. 13 million children go to bed hungry at night. that's charity. that's needed. that's very commendable. but justice would say why do we have hungry people? in such a rich country. maybe we should have full employment, a living wage, universal health care, and other things that people in western europe has had four years. so i said this to peter, i said why is the emphasis on soup kitchens and not dealing with hunger? and he said, because you can build soup kitchens. which i took as a way of you're saying, what ideas are going to work to deal with poverty, to

deal with hunger? and the thrust of this book is ideas tend to work when there's a real resource behind them. when there's real infrastructure. and the abolition of slavery received a lot of money from proper bostonians. the early civil rights movement and environmental movement receive money from rich families. so there is a precedent there. but having said that, and there's only problems that we all recognize. i mean, ted thinks the world is collapsing. the oceans are collapsing. and what's happening in terms of the american empire is pretty startling from illegal constitutional viewpoint, political boomerang and everything else. so there so many problems, so many potential solutions. let me post what could have happened. in 2002 when george w. bush and

dick cheney were beating the drums to invade iraq, there was about a nine-month window from the summer of 2002 to late march when the invasion occurred. george soros wrote against it. he spoke against it. he actually wrote a book against it. he gave interviews against it. on the other side, all that criticism were 300, and we were counting, former retired generals, admirals, leading diplomats, the head of the nsa, admirals, general zinni, the tg security advisers to the first bush, they wrote editorials. they wrote op-ed's. they gave interviews and they went back to their work. there was no infrastructure. i called george soros several

times. i never get a return. and i wanted to say to him, if he put $200 million in those nine months with a massive infrastructure of media, lobbying, to take those 300 very imminent people, unheard of in american history, to oppose the present and the prewar stages, which would have tripled immediately with more generals, colonels, et cetera, security, analysts, former diplomats, had he put 200 million, and i was opposing that war and i was very close to the dynamics, i was convinced that he, unleashing all these people on capitol hill, indie media, would overcome the media complicity, like "the new york times," and the democratic party, and torn

apart the lives and deceptions that bush-cheney used to invade weapons of mass destruction, collaboration with al qaeda and saddam, a threat to the united states with drone like technology, et cetera, et cetera. all now we have shown to be false. is this pie in the sky? why didn't george soros think about? he makes three-$4 billion on his good year, and to, two-and-a-half on apache but he's extremely smart. he knows what civic action does. he's got an open society institute. am i missing something? isn't a lack of imagination? is it a lack that if some of you called him he would never turn the calls because it wasn't his idea? is it too much of a hypothetical?

what do you think we could have avoided, a disaster that is still in the making for the people of iraq and our soldiers and our standing in the world and our environment. >> i think it's a lovely idea, executing would have been impossible. >> tell me why. >> you can't put $200 million to work in nine months and be effective. someone came to me with that proposition, i would say show me your plan, showing the details of your plan. how are you going to spend your money, how are you going to know if you're doing any good? no one comes with that because no one has that. most people, activists and others, don't think that way. they think you plug into hundred million dollars, you get something done. not true. >> what you say, ted? >> i say i think peter is right about that. but i think the basic reason is,

i know the way that i think, i was opposed to the war, too. and spoke out against it when i got an opportunity, like those people you spoke of. but it's very hard for an individual to write an op-ed -- i write some op-ed's so i know, that tells the whole country our political leaders are wrong and we got to do something totally different than they want to do. so something as basic as whether we go to war or whether we don't. and i just think it's too big a job for an individual to tackle. pretty much. coming, there are some very, very courageous people like yourself that we speak out against it like you did against the problems with the corvette, that you didn't have a 200 my dollars to buy advertising campaign. peter is right, to do that

properly takes years. you need an advertising agency and a lot of people, most businessmen, regular businessmen who look at the bottom line and investment bankers and so forth, are not really qualified to do it. and to put that together in a very short period of time and carry it off really well, would be externally difficult. i think the main problem is, you know, you say to yourself , gee, i'd like to do that, but i'm really afraid to do it because i will look like a fool stepping as saying the president and congress don't know what they're doing. i know more. and i'm telling american people what to do. most people are too humble for the. >> okay. let me be clear. first of all soros atari, out against. >> he didn't spend $200 million. i like george soros tremendously. we do have a similar situation where boone pickens has done that with natural gas, and he is

about to get a bill through congress on his own, working with congress, but he was very critical of the government of not having an energy policy and he did spend close to $100 billion, not quite, but on television advertising, just paid for by himself. and he's not near as rich as george soros. but george is spending a lot of money. and he gave, back when the cold war, the cold war and come to an end and eastern european countries were struggling with democracy and capitalism, george went over there and spent hundreds of millions of dollars, gave it away to help build up czechoslovakia and yugoslavia and hungary and the other eastern european countries that were struggling to try and find their way towards democracy and capitalism. and i give him tremendous credit for that. that took a lot of courage. in fact, he was the inspiration

are my starting to get, giving dollars to the u.n. because i say he was giving billions of dollars away and i said if george can do it, why can't i do it? though i did have the kind of billions he had but i had a billion and i gave it away. [laughter] [applause] >> this gets down to peterson challenge, what do you do with the 200. >> pursuant to a point, breed his most recent book, he said of his contribution in eastern europe, they didn't do much good. he was totally well-intentioned. he didn't do much good. that's my point. given that problem, my solution, because we shouldn't have been in the war, and i spent a lot -- george and i together spent a lot of money to try to keep --

to be george w. bush in 2004, to no avail but we tried. ted is right. you've got to have a lot of people together to do this, and money doesn't do that. now, my solution for the time being, given out daily in 2004, okay, it looks like the conservatives are taking over, christian right are taking over, and things i care about are being not promoted. is to try to do what the conservatives started doing 25 years ago, is to build a progressive infrastructure so that we have people and organizations and the ability to do things that the progress is do not have today. and the conservatives have. >> let me just get back to this because i disagree that there is no way to spend those

200 million. if we remember this, we had the best tribunes against bush and cheney you could ever have. war battled soldiers, generals, diplomats, nsa, cia types, and they didn't have an infrastructure. they couldn't get on the me. they didn't have the infrastructure to mobilize where they were, to multiply their numbers. and it was basically a battle for the troops. and bush and cheney were peddling untruths or lies or deceptions. and the money would go, not going to support all of these people going up on capitol hill, going to the local media, people who attracted auditoriums full of citizens, but it would also be immediate blast. and the case was overwhelming that they could not support the lies that they were peddling. and on top of that, who could

you have better than four-star generals, general odom, head of the nsa who had 10 reasons, why not invade iraq? you had people symbolically invincible, compared to those draftdodgers, pro-vietnam war george w. bush and dick cheney -- >> let us know how you think. [laughter] >> you see, and then okay, let's take a skepticism and 200 million is a lot of money without a real detailed plan, which we could have given them. and we could have tripled all of these people. they were ready to come out. wants school croft and and bakker and jimmy, there were more ready to come out. quite extraordinary. but intimidation from the white house is extraordinary, too. how would you test something like that? how we hypothesize a way to keep this country from plunging

himself into wars that are unconstitutional, violate international law, violate federal statute, boomerang against us and that decision is made by two guys in the white house. how do you do it? >> i support media matters, which was organize just before the 2004 election, to find all the lies and expose them. they're doing a very good job. >> drew. >> and if you're in the business of buying and exposing the lies early, i think you can deal with this. we had no mechanism for doing it and you couldn't have put a plan together that was viable to mobilize these people for $200 million in nine months. you could not have done it. >> 100 million? 50 million? >> twenty maybe you would have spent. maybe. >> take this -- >> i've got to say something. when you said these two guys,

those two guys were the president of the united states and the secretary of defense. and those are the guys that we elected under a democratic system to be our leaders and we were paying them that check everyday. the rest of the guys work. those 400 generals. you can get 400 generals to sign up for anything just about. if you pay them a little bit. >> here's the point. never before in american history has there been -- >> ralph, ralph. we are paying the president -- the president, he may be wrong, but then it's our fault and the next election we should corrected the environment are correctly we reelected him again, didn't we? >> yes, but you ran. >> tell me you want to change things. you tried and failed. >> but this was an emergency. let me back up. >> we will survive.

>> you can't wait for election. >> i think we ought to go to war with yemen while we are already over there. maybe a couple others. saudi arabia. we can take the oil. [laughter] >> you have funded think tanks. do you think that the retired military diplomatic and security people in this country who have a different perspective, you know, -- >> doing commentary for cnn like you did. >> in my judgment, in my judgment our tremendous resource because they have been there, that credibility. nobody is going to attack -- >> so is the president and the secretary of defense. >> i'm getting to that. should there be a permanent secretary that serves these people in moments of insipidus plunges into crazy wars or other military adventures? so they're always there to be activated.

they're always there to get on the media. they're always there to get up to testify. because as you know, to organize people in the white house can flatten 300 million americans who are not organized. so you have this human treasure out there, and you know some of them, you know some of them, this human treasure in their retirement, and there's nobody giving them a public infrastructure. no one giving them media. no one giving them the ability to do more than what they do, which is right an op-ed year, given interview there, and go back frustrated. you don't see that as an object for justice? >> you spent your whole life doing this. i spent my whole career taking the networks around, you know at the end of the third years what i had to show for it? roque and those. you tried to kick establishment around. all your life. you are still kicking but you don't have a whole lot of influence. the government is still here and

still screwing up. >> we are talking about buying media. >> but you do vote. >> aren't they willing to sell time? is a propaganda on the media? >> i mean this business have become try to do exactly what you're saying. not stopping wars. i'm not up for that. my objective is to reduce the penalties on people use, grow and sell marijuana. [applause] >> and i'm particularly focused on having been a people's ability to use marijuana for medicine, which is very valuable. in colorado there would be an initiative on the ballot in november, i think, in 2012. the current polling doesn't justify -- the current polling would say that initiative won't pass. i am trying to concoct and

finance a public education campaign, simply for colorado. we have our target, we know what we are doing. to communicate the good things about marijuana, medical marijuana -- marijuana in general. and blunt the bad things come in hopes of taking that polling from where it is up seven or eight points to where it is viable. now, this is trying to do in a very small way exactly what you are doing. don't bet on me. we are doing this smart and as luxuriously as it can be done. don't bet it's going to work. we are trying. we're trying to establish a tenement for doing these things but this stuff is tough to accomplish. >> you funded for several states medical marijuana so that works. works. you and george soros. >> they were well organized that

it didn't work in california. these will organize groups came to us and said we have a plan, we think we can do it, give us money. that's different. we didn't generate it. we are not in the business of making plans, but this is one thing i am trying. if someone comes with a decent proposition, somebody probably will listen to it. but you were saying give me $209 we will stop the war. it's a hell of a -- had i thought it was possible i would've given you $200 million. >> that's the challenge, to make those kinds of proposals credible to businessmen and businesswomen who want results. they are tired of writing checks that in effect go nowhere. but take and daschle have which had an interest income if we would ever legalize industrial hemp, it's legal to import industrial hemp, 5000 uses, energy, food, paper, very hardy plant, tuttle aren't much

fertilizer or pesticides and we can import from canada, romania, france, china, for clothes, food. but it's illegal here. now, what would you think it would take, because you know a lot about this, what would you think it would take to get the government to take industrial hemp off of the dea prescribed list, which is absurd. i mean, the last thing a marijuana farmer wants is an industrial hemp plant next to him to diluted, right? so this is medieval thinking. the farmers wanted. international paper wanted to take a poll, everybody wants this. how much would it take in terms of justice advocacy, lobbying, mobilizing media, the whole works, you think to get that off the dea list? since the most conservative farmers in america can't wait to start growing it. >> hemp is interesting -- is an

interesting to me because i know nothing of it. >> give me an estimate. >> i tried to spend a couple of my dollars in colorado to move the needle a little bit. i haven't the foggiest -- we have a lot of research to i haven't the foggiest notion about hemp. i don't know. i just happen to know a lot about one thing. and that's the same problem that ted has got and warren buffett scott. they know a lot about some things, and not much about doing this. >> what that tells me is the groups have been in civic action and have changed things, look, i don't like to toot my horn but almost everything we've done has been done, all the environment, the auto safety, the freedom of information, things that others in his eyes have worked on, all of it since 1970 has been less than $200 million. all the changes, the legislation, the standards,

judicial systems, the victory, the creation of tristan project 55 and harvard law school appleseed, diffuse throughout the country, the public interest research groups, building institutions, it's not just issues. the aclu and when that started, what a great contribution to our country. naacp, what a great contribution to our country. there isn't a single nonprofit group monitoring nanotechnology. there's only two or three little ones on biotechnology and you can give one example of where there are no citizen vigilant groups monitoring researching, pushing, nudging congress, state legislatures, filing lawsuits. that's a huge, huge gap. so what i'm saying when you say you don't have the foggiest idea, it's our job, let's say on the full-time citizen advocate, to get really detailed so we cannot only persuade you, but we

can say look, peter, let's try a test case here, the way you are in colorado, although i don't know why you picked colorado for this speed is i will tell you what. >> okay, but just a minute. [laughter] let's get a test case. i think we're in agreement that those two or three presidential debates that are hoped up for the republican democratic nominees are dull, predictable, insipid, why don't we break the lock? why do we have all the people in the country anticipate in inviting the candidates to st. louis, to atlanta, to cleveland, to san francisco where you get whole coalition of groups, business, religious groups, environment groups, women groups, neighborhood groups, et cetera, all on a letterhead led by the mayor perhaps, inviting the two democratic and republican nominees in august, september, early october to come to their

city. or come to the region, appellation. so that the people can change the dynamic and raise all these issues that the candidates don't want to touch. they won't like four or five issues, deficit, taxes, et cetera. they don't want to touch that. this will completely change the dynamic of the presidential campaign. it will put millions of people in view when now they are redlined. what republican goes to massachusetts or new york? what democrat goes to texas to campaign? they never see them. i have talked to you about this, peter, and i said for a million and a half dollars we can get enough organizers come into researchers and so media people to contact these coalitions to put together in all the cities and areas, and should a very good response. you said show me to cities or three cities where this coalition is getting together to invite before you decide it. that's exactly the kind of test

i'm trying to meet. in other words, we can look and say something and say fine, it won't work, et cetera. or we can be inherently cynical are skeptical. what i want to try to do is push it to a level of rigor, where you push for rigor, which is what you are known for, we pushed to respond, that we at least can start with a test case. so we can't have to prove the whole thing. we can start with a test case. now, tomorrow you're going to phoenix, and you're going to be sitting in the biggest conglomerate of multibillionaires ever assembled. probably over 50, led by bill gates. bill gates senior is in the book, it is hard to fit. bill gates junior is too young. these are old, iconic classic philanthropists. and warren buffett is going to

be there. and he's probably relieved after -- now, you are known to be one of the world's greatest mavericks. somebody wrote about on that. and you really are a matter. what are you going to say speed is i don't feel like a matter. i feel like i'm in average joe. [laughter] >> just a country entrepreneur? >> i like to watch the news, that's all. >> okay. now, they're going to try to teach each other, they're going to try to give each other ideas. that's a good thing. but as one of them told me a few months ago, a very rich man, he said ralph, we know how to make a lot of money, we don't have a clue how to spend it. >> i do. >> including me. [laughter] spent exactly. i do. >> i have more ideas than they do money. >> what is your role tomorrow? >> i'm a banana, one of the

bunch. i'm just going to listen and learn and maybe say a few words. >> too much awe shucks. let's have the real ted turner. you cannot believe how he hides. he hides his -- [applause] >> ted is an actor and he's also offended. >> entertainer. >> karl rove or to become he is siding from memory whole sections of shakespeare, on and on and on. and poster i said where did you learn all this? he said when i was little point and i decided to remember it. [laughter] >> look, you know, -- >> you don't understand the depth of this man and the versatility of what he has been involved in and his personal courage. he's going to the congo in a few months because he wants to help save the great apes because he said if you save the great apes, -- >> if we can learn to stop

killing the great its, made we can learn to stop killing each other. >> this isn't going to end table. is going to the congo. i'm really intrigued to see what you're going to do to take these billionaires beyond simple charity. >> if i get a chance, my issue is, i'm interested in marijuana, too, and i think it should be legalized. because i think about a lot of other problems that are a lot worse progress been too much time and money and effort on it. it's like prohibition. people are going to drink. i don't think marijuana is any worse than alcohol. but my main issue is nuclear weapons and global climate change, over population and family planning, and just generally preserving the environment, learned to live sustainably with that, with our little fragile planet down there. so that we can live for

thousands of years. i'd like to see pashtun i like it. i like people. i m1. and i'm proud of. i would rather be a person than a mouse. [laughter] >> if we were a bunch of mice we will have trouble. we wouldn't even talk. we wouldn't be having this intelligent discussion. >> all right. let's take something near to home here. after fukushima following chernobyl, filing -- following three mile island, et cetera. we have a couple of aging reactors that are been in a lot of trouble. hillary clinton said should be shut down. andrew cuomo said it should be shut down. they're having public hearings debt. within 30, 40 miles you have 30 million people. and there's no way they can evacuate. there's no way. so they shut down before it acts open in long island for one reason only.

no evacuation feasibility and that was in long island. now, what about some billionaires getting together and saying, we don't want to lose new york. there's an earthquake so here. >> the question threat to new york and moscow is an accident or man launching nuclear weapons. but let's get rid of them first. i think nuclear power, we don't have to worry too much about it. it's going to have a real hard time not getting off the ground. very few people want a nuclear plant in their backyard and it's too expensive. it's not competitive. i think we should be focusing on wind, geothermal and solar power, and replacing fossil fuel as quickly as we can. [applause] because that's what the scientists, the preponderance of scientific information tells us, because if we let global climate change get out of control, we are going to have a trouble.

>> you dodged the issue. >> i did? >> the issue is indian -- >> how do you get to define the issues? that's what i was worried about when we had dinner. he took over as we're supposed of a a moderator, and nader takes over. why did you just take over the united states instead of an for president? [laughter] no, look -- [applause] >> i thought about that. >> peter, listen, you're in the insurance business. nuclear power, serious critiques, unnecessary, unsafe, uninsurable, you know. investable. you've got to have tax guarantees. from an insurance point of view, right at the beginning insurance companies said we are not ensuring nuclear power. we can't actuarially come to a positive conclusion, so the

government passed the act instead you get a little bit of insurance but if something really blows and with his state of pennsylvania, which is atomic energy commission estimate in worst case scenario, area the size of pennsylvania, from an insurance point of view why can't some insurance magnets, or insurance companies say look, we want to sell policies, we want to get premiums we want to make money, sure, but we have a responsibility because we know about risk. we have a responsibility to tell the american people these are uninsurable for very risky reasons, and we are going to fund a movement to do what harry clinton and andrew cuomo, not exactly off the wall politicians, shut down indian point? because it cannot risk this disaster that they're expensing now a far less populated area in northeastern japan. why can't the insurance

billionaires do something like that? it won't take that much might? >> personal contested question before about liking to 3 billion us get together and do something. a bunch. one of the main reasons that can happen is they won't. they won't. these guys that are billionaires take they know everything. both of them. and they have made it mostly doing on their own, and they are not inclined to work with teams. they are inclined to have teams working for them. and that's a reality that almost destroyed your idea of them getting together to do something -- >> how about one of them? let's grant would you say there's a lot of truth to that. but how about just one of them? have a funny the citizen groups are trying to close these potential disasters down, this technological insanity. these are aging plants.

how about one, just funding a major short-term, six-month move, to get the nrc, which is already worried sick about indian point i'm a we know that from the inside. they're holding public hearings. and to get it done. >> we have an example of billionaires working and getting stuff done. the koch brothers. i been doing a pretty good job. >> exactly, on the other side. >> but they are driven by self interest. the economic self interest. most of the do-gooders better meeting in arizona are theoretically driven, by now i've got a, i want to help out. economic self interest is a very important driver, and that's what is facilitate the koch brothers. wouldn't be economic self interest to say property guys in your city metropolitan area from and credible claims on insurance companies? >> insurance companies --

insurance companies are not, cannot ensure that. insurance is the business of multiple risks and averages. when you have a fukushima, that's not a multiple risk. that's not an average. that's a disaster that no one can ensure. that's the problem. economically it's not possible. >> that's what in the fine print they exempted, and homeowners policies? the fine print, that's another whole project of all the fine print contracts we have designed. [applause] >> we are in the midst of trying to convince want a 50 department, state departments of insurance to let us have a policy on the internet. so we don't have to send one out every time and waste all those trees. we won't get it done because we have bureaucrats standing there stopping because they like the current system because they can make money on it somehow.

[inaudible] >> fight them, we do. in our economic self interest we fight them. [inaudible] [laughter] 's. we the realists here. let's see if let's say full medicare for all. is that worthy of billionaires lobbying power? single-payer, most doctors, nurses, majority want it. instead of his present system of how to describe it? denial, exclusion, this bit, fat, 45,000 americans dying every year because they can't afford health insurance for diagnosis or treatment. harvard medical school study, peer review department. so where are you on that? would you want canadian type system, free choice of doctor, hospital, private delivery, public insurance? >> deal with alternate energy

and nuclear weapons just wore me out. i'm for universal health care like the rest of the rich world has. i think america being the only country that didn't have it all these years was incorrect. the details on how to do it, i've got to lead to others because i'm not a medical insurance expert. that's not my thing. >> you are property-casualty. >> it was hard to figure who is going to play second base next year for the braves. >> by the way -- >> really, that's challenging as hell? how many people in the room have won the world series? it ain't easy. >> by the way, you know the old store you go to an ivy league school because you want to develop the old bowtie later on, it never worked for me. [laughter] until i met peter 15 years ago we had lunch in washington. and i said, it's one thing that

can be done with their -- their backs and we're trying to get company fleets to convert to airbags, not just the government to purchase cars, airbags. this is under reagan administration. and he converted his company fleets to airbags. that to me is what insurance should really be all about. that was a business decision, not just a charitable decision to do that. in fact, there is an insurance company, hartford that they're just about a week after. >> if you had lunch with and tried to me, i would give airbags to my car. i didn't know about it how come your time to see peter but not me? [laughter] >> you didn't go to princeton. [laughter] he went to brown. listen. all right listen but let me just throw it open to taboos. this country is full of taboos. all societies have taboos.

we are full of sense suffers you. we're not just talk about pornography. self-censorship is enormous today. we don't often say what is on our mind. we don't say what should be changed in this country, is controversial but like a lot of corporate executives don't want to go after the military budget which is eating up half of our federal budget, apart from the injured, medicare and medicaid. and there's no more soviet union. and we're fighting these wars, three, $4 billion a week now in iraq, afghanistan. >> i speak out against the size of u.s. military budget. we're spending like 17 times as much as the next two biggest countries, russia and china, and i think it's crazy we have troops in 65 countries and bases all over the world. what do we think we are, the british empire to images ago? we don't make any money off that. and they do better without us there. the last war we won was against japan.

[applause] >> okay, peter? i mean, it is true. you do speak out on it, but a lot of corporate executives, even when they are retired, not just corporate executives, congressman and centers, not wondering the last election that i cannot remember one except maybe the one from ohio. >> kucinich. thatcher hosted. they're both from ohio spent his name is hard to pronounce. but i think he was the only one that spoke out against the size of the military budget. nobody spoke out against it. it's true, the military-industrial complex like eisenhower warned us years ago has taken over the country basically spent not just the military budget. you've got retired very wealthy businesspeople. know what is going to be able to do anything to them. >> mostly they kept their mouth shut and they learn during their lives that they got their butt kicked a whole lot when they did

open their mouth to learn to keep their mouth shut. >> you mean retirement lockjaw? >> not just retirement. i don't say everything i would like to say. it would be too outrageous spent why don't you say one outrageous thing, a significant? [laughter] >> don't do it. >> i'm afraid. >> i'm getting q. next, peter. >> i'm afraid. i can't think of anything right now. [laughter] >> peter? >> i don't think any of my thoughts are outrageous. so i don't have anything to say. >> you don't think you censor yourself at all? >> i know what i'm going to say, particularly when the television cameras on. >> and we are on c-span, also. >> i heard. >> let's take the tax system. would you agree that we should have basic principles where the taxes first should be assessed on things society likes the

least or dislikes the most, before you assist taxes on labor and furniture and clothing and things that are -- >> are you asking the? >> i haven't finished. and let's start with -- >> i always have the answer. >> let's start with a carbon tax. >> i don't need the question. >> let's start with pollution, speculation tax, wall street, trained entrance of dollars, a half of one percent would raise three or 4 billion. what do you say? >> i surrender. i work on nuclear weapons. i'm going to let you take care of the taxes. it's too damn copy. i. i in for a carbon tax to i think we should have a carbon tax and refund on peoples income tax. i think the polluters should pay because if the players hate him he's got more of instead to cut back on the publish and. that makes good sense. and i in for phasing out fossil

fuels. they served us well for the last 3 million years, but it's time to move on. we've got more modern, better ways of doing things and less expensive and sustainable, fossil fuels are not sustainable anyway. we are going to run out of them, when hundred, 50 years. we will run out of atmosphere first and that ain't good. >> if you write, where fossil fuels and nuclear winning? why i -- >> because they're holding the hill and have all the money and they've got all the subsidies, huge subsidies because the society is bearing the cost of coal burning electrical generating, the health, our children have twice as much as they did 20 years ago. we are being poisoned by merger from the coal emissions, and solar power is absolutely clean. and so is wind. other problems specific to that, but they're all manageable, and if we started switching over right now, it would be great for

the economy, create jobs. we would be cutting back on -- >> why are we doing it? >> because the coal and oil industry like the tobacco industry were able -- if obama, god bless his soul, had put energy ahead of health care, we would've had the energy bill, would have gone through the senate. it get passed the house. but he decided, there were good reasons are taking health care first, but by the time the health care bill was so contentious, and also it gave the coal and oil industry a chance to buy ads, they outspent the solar and wind industry were started industries that don't have too many subscribers and don't have any income, they don't have any money to spend. they spend what money they had. but they ran out of money and then the coal -- i've seen so many clean coal commercials that i wake up in middle of night saying my god, maybe coal is clean.

[laughter] >> i just watch cnn for our and dolby five commercials, one every 10 minutes. and you see none for solar or wind. we don't have the money. >> here's the point. >> the bad guys have the money and they're spending it and they have, they have 100 years of advertising agency experience, all the stuff you're telling about. they know how to do this because that's what they do. they are winning even though they are wrong and they are been. >> and the people are on your site. why don't you have some billionaires mobilize in 405 congressional districts to counterattacked? >> i'm going to fix do more to see if that's so we can do. >> exactly. [applause] >> peter? spring under. >> and we're going to give them free pot. [laughter] spent outrageous thing number two. >> if we did that we might win.

[laughter] >> free pot for congressman. all you can smoke. [laughter] >> most are paying it themselves. >> look what you would have done for cnn ratings if you a program. >> go ahead specular implicit in your which, in your fantasy. is that a lack of understanding of the power of economics self-interest. short-term economics self-interest if we were all brought up in this country to concentrate on short-term economic interest, except you. [laughter] >> and that is a very difficult thing to overcome. >> i talked to ed markey, the energy bill, he says it's like on capital hill, he is swarmed with these lobbies, exxon and peabody coal and the nuclear industry, and is almost nothing

out there that is organized except the people that are on their site. people on the side of renewables and efficiency, commonsense but what they don't have a laser beam organizing capability. and that's where full-time organizers and local media and marches and demonstrations and focusing on every member of congress, and you will overcome these lobbyists who don't have a single vote. they represent, you know, in an object called corporations. so why don't you -- i don't understand. you are among the most optimistic, positive people. you understand the difference. change technology, arousing people. the history of america is when people get organized things get done against the special interest them against commercial interests.

against ruinous ideology and technology. and when they don't get organized, so isn't it logical to say that every time to establish with convincing evidence something is wrong, it's destructive, it's damaging to our posterity, that the corollary to that is there's got to be enough resources to activate that latent leadership in neighborhoods and communities all over the country and focus on congress and focus on the decision-makers. why are you so jaded? >> wade -- >> i'm over -- >> i can tell you, i think i'm older. we spent $20 million on the most simple thing. get people out to vote. >> that's not a simple thing. that's what the most difficult species that's pretty straightforward, very focused. and we couldn't do it. that was 20 million. if we spent 200 i don't we might get six or seven more people to vote. [laughter]

>> that happens to be one of the most difficult things to give people don't intend to do it. right. >> why don't you advocate not like people have a drivers license if they don't vote? >> i have a better proposal that is operating in australia, belgium, austria. voting is a duty, just like jury duty. we've got a lot of civil duties and civil rights but the only duty in the constitution inferred is jury duty. if we got to update thousands of laws, we should have a legal duty to vote. if you don't like who is on the ballot, we should be able to write in a bowl, vote for yourself or vote for i did not the above which takes care of my judgment of civil liberties issue. [applause] >> that way all the obstructions to votingcome at a still a lot of obstructions, you know, fooling around changing precincts and voted this blockage and registration, all of that becomes criminal behavior because you will be

opposing someone who is trying to fill the legal duty. >> where is -- good idea, good idea. your idea is terrific spent a few million bucks will make you more than a good idea. [laughter] [applause] >> go ahead. >> i would say, and i don't want to infer that i'm going to pay for it. show me a viable plan that will make that come to pass. one of the things is we spent a lifetime trying to make a living, get very realistic. >> you're right, peter. >> so i'm giving you -- >> this is the core of the issue. we have to persuade with some rigor and experience and data and then send that, for this money to start flowing. and once it starts flowing and wants the results come, there's a whole transformation other resources, so the community in this country.

and that's what we have. i hope this meeting is just the beginning of a rigorous exchange with your billionaires in phoenix as well as others. because -- >> and they are not month. >> okay, with the billionaires you're going to see. just before proposal to reform the financial industry started in congress, after the wall street crooks and speculators crashed the economy, i called up carl icon. he is the epitome of trying to invoke investor power for crummy our crony corporate executives, board of directors. and i said to him, karl, he also went to princeton. i said karl, -- >> much younger though. >> yes. $14 billion. he also lives in florida.

and i said karl, you know, if you put in three, $4 million has some really good experienced advocates so they get in on attracting stage of this you should legislation and they make investor rights and interest of was a statutory part of it, you know, this is what you live for. this is what you are known for. and he said, well, i've got a guy there, i fired him, he sort of part-time lobbies, why don't you call him? i called them. he wasn't there. it fizzle. the point is i was willing to meet with him, and basically take this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, because wall street was on its knees. at that point had very little credibility. to give voice to 60 million individual investors, not to mention, on the corporation have so little control that they told

you don't like the way we are operating? beat it. and you know, when you have that, when ownership has no responsibility and no authority, then if the guys at the top go off half cocked, then the economy shudders. and shareholders chatter. your company, for example, took a hit just as a collateral damage to win wall street went down. so here is this man, no one could epitomize investor rights more than he could, and yet he didn't, he didn't cross that line. ..

a society with more justice needs less charity. [applause] i interrupted you. you were saying? >> a want to point out one of carl icahn's reluctance to spend a lot is he is fine with current shareholder rights. economics rears its ugly head again. >> he is not hurt because he has the power. >> he knows how to make a living. >> he has the power to buy 5% of the company and to scare the executives. he has made statements of a broader level of concern. in a capitalist society the owners have more control. >> when we set out in 2004 to

form these politically progressive organizations we got the best and brightest people we could find to run some of them and organize themselves. what i realized after watching them for a year or two is these people were brilliant, will educated, hard working illegal well motivated, nice people with the body is notion of how to get anything done. they don't know how to manage, don't know how to evaluate people's performance, they do not know how to get things done. that is most people and almost all -- they don't know how to do it. so i formed an organization whose only function is to help them do the fundamental things like to write a mission statement to tell people what

your organization is about. very ingenious name. they are doing a lot of good and they are necessary but they're also fighting against -- people who don't want to know about this. >> einstein once said physics is simple compared to politics. if you go to a national convention on political science and you say i am trying to change things for the people against the corrupt power structure, give me some strategies, give me some ideas, give me something that works, give me something that has worked they don't come up with it. >> they are teachers. they don't know about this. >> some are former government officials. >> there are a few people in business who learn how to

manage. a few people in the military now how to manage. people in government and politics could care less about managing. >> i didn't go into this. your business. this is about how to motivate people. i try to deal with that question. how do you get people out from mass rallies. how do you get people to show up in town meetings and all that stuff? when you were running your business you dealt with what every manager deals with. people who are not creative or dynamic or don't meet deadlines, people who get discouraged or don't have high enough significance of their own ability. how do you deal with that? >> either they left or they changed. most of them changed and we just

saw with the marines you join the marines and after you have been there you are a different person with different people. they got it done. i made it clear what i expected of them. >> what did you have on your desk? >> lead, follow or get out of the way. >> peter was a very shy person when he was in college. he became one of the most motivating stated driven flamboyant executive before these agents had to sell insurance policies. how did you do it? how did you get them to do more than they ever thought? >> both my shyness and my flamboyance. i figured out pretty early that people do better working for you, working for me if i tell

them -- you think there are many bosses who tell their support of what to do to please them? no. that is the key issue. what that requires is for the boss to figure out in advance what this person will do in the next six months and then you feel good but that requires discipline on the part of the boss that they don't put in. it is hard to do. that is what we did. everyone in our company knows what they are supposed to do. we discussed it with the manager and negotiated and when they don't do it they pay a penalty and when they do they get rewarded. it is very pavlov the and. >> is that what you did? >> i could hear very well. i am hard of hearing. [talking over each other] >> he said -- >> living in the dark. >> he let his employees know

what pleases him. >> i let my employees know i want done too. when you work for cnn you are supposed to come and give commentary so many times at a certain time and you did it. >> it works for everybody. >> what time to be there and what to do when you got there and how to address. wear a tie. >> as an overview, where do you see this country going? >> to hell in a handbasket. dido know where the country is going. my main thing is is going to be okay. i am doing everything i can and going back ten minutes ago or so but never got around to the question and answer about what we are going to do. in furring i am not doing my share, i feel like i am doing my

share. i gave away half of what are had before they asked for it. i didn't think about whether it would happen or not or what was supposed to happen. >> i never said that. [talking over each other] >> you are my hero in this book. >> i am like the woman in the tv commercial, the cleanup lady. i am doing the best icahn. >> recent polls give partake 80% of people think america is going in the wrong direction. [talking over each other] >> going in the wrong direction--in some ways we are -- >> overall -- [talking over each other] >> i agree with t. boone pickens that we need an energy plan. we don't have one. >> 75% of people think big corporations have too much

control over their lives. >> i try to get a big corporation -- i never had one but i would like to have more control over people's live. to bar my stuff. go to my restaurant. >> the third one was 62% of people think both major parties are failing. i have to step aside on that. >> failing? both of them? who are you going to vote for? >> i am conflicted. >> i will vote for a party heading in the right direction. >> they can't get anything done in congress. we are a paralyzed society. we have had a rough couple weeks. >> there's stuff in the middle east shaking everybody. all the upheaval we don't know what is going on or what is

going to happen and we have had these tornadoes and all we've ever problems, have the news viewers like me are kind of shaking. i would like a little peace and quiet. give me some more lindsay lohan and i will be happy. it will mean the worst is over. >> there is some of view that some of the privileged well-to-do elders in our society -- >> what? >> elders. and people in their 90s and 80s that they have a lot more to give than just money to the younger generation. to different kinds of education to this and that. you think there is potential in raising that to a higher level? >> i went to my old school last week at my own expense and spoke

to the student body about getting ahead and doing the right thing, giving back. older people who are semi retired, all kinds of social work, you could be a big brother or big sister, a million things that you don't have to have any money. all you need is your time and your love. >> what to do about the iphone? the iphone in between? all the technology the young are so dependent on. they have been split off from the older generations more than ever before. >> it will take a generation to adjust. a bit more information will lead to better information and will be better off more than worse off. i hope that is the case with cnn. we are going for one technological revolution after another particularly for the last 50 years.

when you go back when we were born 70 years ago they didn't have television. they didn't have nuclear power. they didn't have computers. we had typewriters and carbon paper and telephone booths. we were lucky to have a phone or electricity. some people didn't have electricity. we have made tremendous progress technologically. our real challenge has been to keep up. to keep our social structure up to and able to cope with the technological advances and we have not done so well. we are still fighting wars and blowing things up and dropping bombs on people when we should move on from that and we should have moved on from the process of moving on from coal and oil as quickly as we can and we are not doing that either. hopefully we will. >> let's look at --

>> it will happen real quickly. those who want to wait long watch cnn and you will be there. >> 80% of people falling behind economically since 1973. >> i sure as hell have. a lot of it was given away. i. myself up. >> you gave a million dollars to the u n. >> like people do in egypt. they blow themselves up. >> what about -- >> have you ever thought of that? have you ever thought of blowing yourself up. when you ran against al gore a lot of people thought it might have been good since you stole the election. you are really responsible for bush in my opinion. >> at least -- i love you like a brother. you used to work for me.

[talking over each other] >> took those votes away from our -- >> you are filibustering me. >> pretty good. >> point of privilege. everyone has an equal right to run. >> didn't say he didn't have right. [talking over each other] >> i wish you had -- [talking over each other] >> bush took and stole more votes from bork than i ever did. byway never mind tennessee or arkansas, he got more votes -- more popular votes than bush. >> that doesn't count. >> they threw it to florida. get rid of the electoral college. maybe $50 million. >> i will go along with that.

>> al gore was asked whether he blames me. >> he is a politician. >> he was in outer space then. [talking over each other] >> he was in climate change. he won the popular vote. it was stolen from him from tallahassee to the supreme court 5-4. [talking over each other] >> to stop the recount. >> why do you say that? like saying third-party candidates are second-class citizens. this is the two party nation, get out of the way. that is not -- that doesn't reflect the world's greatest -- >> you had every right to do it. your world's greatest maverick, not be. >> that was all digression. >> i am your friend. >> democrats could have stopped

anything bush did from tax cuts to the war to the filibuster power. what would you do -- about corporate crime or corporate irresponsibility or corporate speculation with other people's money? >> shoot them. >> and abandoning our country? >> shoot them. >> would you care to elaborate on that? [talking over each other] >> the pharmaceutical industry has outsourced all the ingredients. penicillin is not produced in this country. there was an indian scientist who said if china shot down its pharmaceutical industry world -- [talking over each other] >> what about making shoes? >> isn't there a limit -- [talking over each other] >> is very limit --

>> what about chinese food? >> contaminated fish. how far is this globalization going to go before we make it too dependent? >> i don't think -- [inaudible] >> our job is to be the best. that is why we are losing out. we haven't mentioned our failures in education. the most significant failure in 20 years. so we are losing out. if we can't be the best we will be second class warfare in class or fourth class even though we have all the resources. that is what is going to happen. >> i had manufacturers think they are the best when they can't pay their workers $0.60 an hour. labor unions and worker rights can't compete. can't compete. can't compete with modern

technology, repressing their rights by dictatorships abroad like in china should be back in this country. the auto supply industry, the electronic industry, furniture industry is gone. i told some corporate executives they have to keep up with the global competition. i said why don't you fulfilled that? i know some bilingual chinese superexecutives and managers who will work for one tenth of what you guys work. is so unfair to the working people in this country. the level of discouragement and depression is imploding in this country. this huge underemployment. of the head of walmart with the rubber-stamp board of directors is not the biggest aid guy is making $11,000 an hour and has 1

million workers who make less than $11 an hour, before noon on january 2nd he has made 80 one million workers and it here in that or just have a board of directors? do people have a sense of unfairness? >> are of these disasters and we haven't even talked about nuclear-weapons, civilization ending in the next 15 years. >> tell us what you are doing about that. >> trying to get in on the agenda by coming to meetings like this and talking. are you getting paid for this? >> of course not. >> i know you are not. >> i actually get $0.78. >> probably making you a fortune. >> not exactly. it would have made me a fortune

if the superwill be talked about a little more. yoko ono was invited and didn't come. phil donahue was invited. you came because you've got guts. peter came because he has got guts. [applause] >> we are still not talking about climate change. >> tell us about nuclear-weapons even now, 20 years later. >> i worked with a group of smart people on nuclear disarmament and nuclear safety in the meantime. there are over 2,000 nuclear weapons on hair trigger alert in the united states with russia pointed at each other. if there's a mistake or an earthquake under central command

and the wires get crossed or there is a mistake of some sort and somebody pushes the wrong button, when i went into the russian nuclear launch facility 30 miles outside of moscow it took me down six floors and this is the room where the attack will be launched against the united states and the whole wall was covered with maps of the u.s. and the rest of the world. down at the corner on the side of wall was a picture of jesus christ. i said what in the name of god are you doing with that in here? this was when it was still the soviet union. they said we wanted to be sure we cover all the bases. they told me you can sit in a chair just like this except it is an easy chair and a box on the table with a red button on it. don't push the red button.

why not? that is the button. it launches everything. >> this is -- [talking over each other] >> you have really touched a lot of issues. >> what i decided was to have a plan. if i am going to worry -- spent my whole life worrying. i tell my friends if they don't need to worry so much i would like to say that to you because i will worry for you. i have become the great global worrier and i am worried about -- they are eating the chimpanzees because they doubt have enough food. that is wrong. that is almost like eating a person. they can even talk once you learn to talk to them with sign language.

>> give me an example. >> where was i? >> a can talk. [talking over each other] >> if i'm going to worry why not worry about the biggest problems? global warming could kill us within 20 or 30 years. nuclear-weapons could kill us this afternoon. but nuclear-weapons our number one. let's get rid of nuclear weapons first and get global warming under control. overpopulation moves more slowly but in our lifetime -- i was born in 1938. when i was born the population was just over two billion. it is seven billion now. in 70 years, the number of human beings on this planet will increase by 3-1/2 times. the number of elephants went down 90% during that 70 years. the number of great apes went down by 90%. most of the environment figures

close to that. what we are doing is more people are putting more pressure on a finite resource. farmland is eroding. the oceans are poisoned. look what happened with the gulf oil spill. we have to change the way we are doing things. a billion people went hungry. i put the secretary general of the united nations on a committee to abolish poverty. i agreed to do it. that is another nonpaying job but i am going to do it but i don't know how to eliminate poverty. we have to do it in ten years. not just poverty in the united states that all these other places. >> the u n development unit for out the most detailed plan year after year on what it takes to

abolish world poverty. >> they were doing it mainly because of the increase in the economy in china. a lot of poverty has been eliminated. the latest recession we had pushed the lot of people. food prices going up. >> basic nutrition, basic health. >> we were making progress in a lot of areas. >> you know how much they've saying? $40 billion to $50 billion a year. >> global military budget is $1 trillion a year. the united states spends half of that not including the wars. >> you said something quite interesting in an interview.

marijuana. i never heard -- it stimulated your creativity, your focus, made you a better manager, better human being. you want to elaborate on that? not that i am taking a position. any addiction that is made illegal goes underground and can't deal with it. provision was an example. prohibition was an example. you gave a variety of functions for going into that level. i don't want to put you on the spot. >> i think you did a good job explaining. my experience with marijuana has been 1% all the time. you may have missed some of this. >> it was good for your company. >> i think so. i am biased but i think so.

>> do you see a downside? is very hazard like cigarette smoking? >> it is not legal so there has not been adequate research. there's a lot of evidence that it is not addictive but when you can't do research because it is illegal you are greatly inhibited. >> you may be point it is beneficial for glaucoma and multiple sclerosis. >> those things have been proven. there's a medicine being sold in canada which is a spray, a marijuana sprayed for multiple sclerosis. >> how about driving cars? when you are stoned? >> better than when you are high on whiskey. >> certainly a much more serious problem. >> i'm not advocating anything.

i think we have half a million people in jail in this country because -- we have 50,000 new yorkers get arrested every year for possession of marijuana. it is crazy. it is expensive. it is unfair. it is racist. it is everything wrong -- [applause] >> you are on record saying the prison industry is involved on this. >> i didn't say that. >> they have motivation because there are a lot of people in jail. economic self-interest. >> when you go with these people can you convey a message for me? >> ralph nader? in person? >> tell them -- [talking over each other] >> i would like to get a small number of accomplished americans

in the civic world -- >> got a copy of your book. >> we would like to meet with them either one by one or at some of the dinner they have. >> need to set you up with -- >> i spoke to warren buffett. he invited me to come to omaha. he was quite taken with the book and invited me to the shareholders meeting. the leader in this book is the one who got 16 other very rich people together to plan this. it is a very detailed plan. 730 pages of detailed plans. i said this may be a movie some day. he said to is playing me? i would say warren beatty's. turns out war in haiti is in the book running against arnold

schwarzenegger for governor of california. warren buffett will -- he has concrete ideas. it is not going to happen unless a few people in that circle try to make it happen. i haven't begun -- people in this audience haven't begun to convey the turnaround project and movements that are very feasible and very well documented. they need research and infrastructure. for that we need some time to talk. we need time to exchange. you can say this is a good idea and give me more detail. we want to give you an inventory and a lot will be in your area of major concern and peter's area of major concern. we haven't talked about other things peter supported but we have to have entry. very hard to get your call

returned. >> hate to be a stuck record but you have got to have a proposition. a realistic proposition speaking for myself. i don't want to get into a meeting where a lot of smart guys are running ideas up the flagpole and debating this budget. it is a waste of time. >> you have been through that? [talking over each other] >> let's say we prepare a detailed compendium of projects that meet your standards. let's say there are 50 project. [talking over each other] >> the point is some people want diversity. it might hit one billionaire one way because billionaires' experience -- might hit another billionaire. suppose we did that and we are ready. how do we connect? how do we connect? you return calls. most people of your wealth do not return calls.

you return calls. you return calls. >> not to everybody. i don't invite everybody to call me. i get a lot of junk mail. >> we all do. what is the next step here? >> keep doing what you are doing. get on the talk shows as much as you can and promote your book. i did all this stuff. say all you can and give away the rest. >> that doesn't quite do it. [talking over each other] >> we don't have all the answers. >> we have to connect with the passion of the superwealthy. you can stereotype the superwell the. >> there are not that many. >> there have never been more billionaires'. >> a few --

[talking over each other] >> were you in the forbes 400? >> he was. >> the point is this. >> at the bottom. >> people who want to get things done stereotyped the superrich as in their own world leaders will want to make more money and art narcissists with no interest, they are indifferent and love their grandchildren etc.. we are saying there are 1%. let's say this is 1% of the multibillion airs and multi millionaires who really care. how do we connect with their distinctive passion? they all have different passions. once we meet the responsibility of leaders properly established, let's say someone comes up with something that can accelerate the transformation of energy to renewable.

>> i will certainly listen. i am going there to learn. >> how do we connect with a passion -- >> go to the meeting if you get invited and keep writing letters to people. i write letters to people all the time. i use to send a letter -- state of the world, 4.2, i thought -- when i wrote a book about the environment or anything superimportant, list of all members of congress and all fortune 500 corporations, all the college presidents, i send out hundreds of copies, $40,000 with a personal letter suggesting that they read that book to give them a free book.

that is one way of doing it. maybe out of sending thousands of books i get 100 letters thanking me for the book. do what you can do. if you do what you can do, when i walk down the street in new york and atlanta if i see a piece of trash i pick up and carried to the nearest waste point. i can't carry it all but i carry what i can because if we have enough people picking up trash, more people picking up and throwing it down we will live in a clean world. that is what i am looking for. >> as you know better than most there's trash you can pick up. >> you can do it with a big enough piece of equipment. >> pretty good place to stop. thank you very much for this evening.

ralph nader. [applause] >> peter b. lewis and ted turner. [applause] >> for more information about this book visit the publisher's web site, sevenstories.com and search for ralph nader. >> here's a look at some upcoming book fares and festivals from across the country. on july 23rd booktv will be live at the thirteenth annual harlem book fair in new york with panels on african-american history. about the in current affairs. there will be a three day festival celebrating writing and publishing at the end of july. and in september the decatur book festival, the largest independent book festival in the country. do you want your local book fairs and festivals featured on

booktv? e-mail us at booktv@c-span.org. >> professor bernard harcourt. what is illusory about free-market? >> we have a fantasy that there are such things as free markets. what i argue in the book is that is a fantasy which has negative consequences and detrimental effect on our political discourse and our political practices. what is illusory is the fact that there could be such a thing as a free market. essentially we focus in this country on small spaces where we see free exchange. voluntary compensated exchange. weakness at the chicago board of trade or the pit at the new york

stock exchange. we turned those small spaces into stand-alone images of a free market and ignore all of the regulatory framework that is necessary to create a little space like that. so the illusion is to think that there can be such a thing as voluntary compensated exchange that can occur without all the mechanisms required to put it in place. the chicago board of trade is a perfect example. an institution we think of as the space of a free market but an institution constructed through the enormous regulatory and state intervention. it is a privately chartered organization that couldn't even exist without having criminalize all of the other bucket shops in

chicago. if you hadn't had all the criminalization and elimination of the other spaces you wouldn't have been able to create that illusion that this is the place of freedom. what i try to get at in the book is what work it does for us to create this magical space and ignore the regulatory framework around it. what i suggested has negative consequences. >> and what are they? >> the two major negative consequences, the first is in some sense it naturalizes the distributions that occur as a result of this, regulations that are hidden. we think distribution in terms

of wealth and resources that come out of these exchanges are natural and appropriate because we don't really see that there are regulations, rules and practices that have certain tilt in them that distribute resources so when you don't see those, we think the result is unquestionable, just the way it should be. in the sense that good or bad we think that is just the way it is. >> give an example. >> you could have any kind of regulation. regulation of an investment bank or any bank as to whether or not you can have debt equity ratio or 30-1 debt equity ratio. those have consequences. who is going to be picking up

the slack if there are bankruptcies for instance. that will have consequences. all of the regulatory pieces. in a situation like the chicago board of trade there are requirements of inventory being in the city of chicago. that will have consequences on long distance for versus closer to the city producers. when you standardized contracts you are creating a standard that is good for some people and not others. once the regulatory framework is hidden from view we don't see it anymore. very simple thing. a standardized grain contract traded on the chicago board of trade gives you different kinds of wheat you can trade in. there would have been a time before a standardized contract

like that that some people game reputation for better wheat than others and that would require a lot of work. the fact the we have standardized grain contract doesn't allow for reputation will relations or investment in those kinds of relations that would give you a reputation for being someone whose grain is usually the best. all of these my new regulations that we don't see have distributional effects. it is when we don't see those that the distributions become natural and unquestionable. the second effect is also very troubling and has to do with the fact that we then tend to allow the state to do certain things that they seem to be more

competent at. that tends to be punishing. we develop this kind of -- this kind of differential treatment of the confidence of the state. we think the state is incompetent when it comes to regulating the economy. legitimate when it comes to policing and putting people in prison and to a certain extent the more we believe in the incompetence of the state in regulatory matters but the legitimacy of the state in law-and-order matters easier it is to allow what we have seen in the last four decades which has been an exponential increase in the number of persons in prison in this country so basically we passed from a situation in the 1970s when we would incarcerate approximately 150 per 100,000

persons to a rate where we are at 1% of the population behind bars. it is an increase of seven times. it is exponentially few look at it on a curve. what made that possible is this background, often unconscious but expressed so you hear it, idea that the state is not good at regulating the economy. when they do things like run the railroads, when they run amtrak you know the train will be late. it will be incompetent etc.. on the other hand for some reason we allow them -- we allow the state to fully regulate the penal sphere and create huge prison apparatus. it is that contrast between

those two which have to do with basic assumptions we have about what the state is good at and what the state isn't good at and this illusion in part that there is some order leanness in the economic realm. there is this invisible hand in the economic realm. there is this freedom in the economic realm we shouldn't be touching. >> what is the image on the front of your book? >> this hand which is mysteriously holding up this leaf. it is the idea of the magical ideas that we could kind of create this orderliness, we could create this space without touching it and that is the image of an orderly market, and orderly space and we don't have to touch it. it happens on its own. we don't put our fingers in it. we don't have to hold onto it.

it is just there. >> you teach at the law school and political science department at the university of chicago. where do you teach? >> i have these very interests. in part theoretical, political, economic. in political science i teach political theory and i teach courses on contemporary political thought. some fringe theorists', i have a background in continental theory so i teach that at the political science department. i am chairing it now. there are administrative tasks. hiring new faculty. i also teach at the law school

in criminal law and criminal procedure area so i teach courses on punishment and social theory and sentencing and criminal procedure as well. >> you have blurbs from cornell west on the back of your book. is it written for students or layman? >> i tried to write it for the reader of the new york times. or the new york review of books. someone who has some theoretical interest and therefore wants to put their hands into some of the archival materials and historical materials. so i tried to not addressed only

my colleagues. i tried not to address only my colleagues. i tried to make it more in conversation with an educated public. >> if somebody said to you define capitalism how would you define it? >> the definition of capitalism would be a system, and economic system that depends primarily on private property ownership and put in place structures of economic organization that respect private property ownership as a mode of production. that is how i would be fine it. in contrast to other economic systems such as socialism where an industry may be fully

nationalized. of course those are easy definitions and things get much more complicated in reality. as you know as a result of the 2008 great recession or depression, however you want to term and we actually nationalized in part the biggest banks. pretty soon after 2008 the people of the united states became the greatest shareholders in citibank and bank of america. in most countries that would be considered nationalization. in the united states we don't call it nationalization. in part because of some of the figment of imagination that are associated with this illusion of

the free-market. that is a very interesting episode in american history which under president bush, under republican president with a treasury department headed by hank paulson who was one of the leading investment bankers of this country, under the leading private investment banker of this country we nationalized our biggest banks but we didn't call it that. paul krugman have the term which was the most interesting term which was pre privatization. we were pre privatizing the banks in the sense the government was coming in and bailing them out, buying equity basically with the expectation of than allowing them to return

to private ownership once the financial collapse -- we recovered from the financial collapse. i like your question because to a certain extent it puts one finger on this problem of how to define these systems. could you say in 2009 when we nationalized the biggest banks in this country or it was clear the only way this country could survive was through government bailouts, affect the government was prepared to and did nationalize gm and partially nationalized the biggest banks that the federal government was there to catch this economy as it was collapsing, would you

call that socialism? >> that was a little bit from bernard harcourt. "the illusion of free markets: punishment and the myth of natural order" published by harvard. thank you very much. >> you are very welcome. >> "the idea of america" is a fabulous book and you will be doing a book signing afterward if i am not mistaken and it is one of those books that if you love history not just the revolutionary period but history in general this is something you should have on your bookshelf. having said that i am hoping 10% after words. i felt we could start out -- some general questions about history and talk about you a little bit and then ease our way into the book as well. since we are at the national archives the first thing i want

to get your thoughts on is the following. many of those within the historical field have lamented the lack of historical knowledge among young people. can you take a second to tell us why it is important we study history. >> guest: history to a society is what memory is to an individual. without knowing where you came from and what your background is you are lost. there is a movie about a man with no memory. can you imagine how terrifying it would be not knowing your past? for society that is a comparable situation. if you don't know where you come from it will be difficult to know where to go. to get our bearings we need to know where we have been. that is a classic answer to why

we should study history. without knowing history one is living in at two dimensional world, not experiencing reality as it ought to be experience. is a mode of understanding. as important as the other senses and once you acquire a historical sense i don't think it is just information about the past but once you study history and reading enough you develop what i would call a historical sense so you see the world differently. suddenly the whole world is different. the perception of your present is different because you have an understanding of that. >> this set of remarkable events are sweeping the world today in the middle east would release

so-called arab spring where people are rising up trying to grab a piece of a greater say in their destiny, greater sense of self determination. what do you think the founders could teach them and in the same breath what can they learn by looking at the experience of america as young americans wrestle with setting up their -- >> guest: presumably these people are seeking democracy. that is what we are told. they want to vote and all the other things that come in their minds with democracy. they see how the rest of the world is living and they want a share of that. the issue is democracy is hard work. it does not come easy. authoritarian governments are easy to put together. the world has always had

authoritarian governments. marty --monarchy is the wrong word to use. we have a lot of the ninth -- that is not quite the word but it was the enemy and what they meant was authoritarian government. those governments have existed from time immemorial because it is difficult to govern a democracy. it has to be governed from the bottom up. people have to be willing to sacrifice their selfish interests for the good of the hole. that is what the founders meant by virtue. classical term. surrendering some of your private interests for the sake of a public good. it has required a lot of self sacrifice and it is not easy to do. a leading french philosopher of the 18th-century very much read by the founders said democracy can exist in small states because you can't build a consensus in a large diverse

population. that was an important principle with which the founders had to confront when they were drying up the constitution. would not be surprised by what happened when tito was removed. the other ethnic -- ethnic groups were at each other's throats in the yugoslav area. when the soviet union was removed all of the various parts fighting with one another -- when you remove the authority from the top down you have a difference that will come to the 4 and they make democracy difficult because people have to willingly surrender their selfish interests and that is not easy. the founders became very

pessimistic about the ability of other people to become democratic. they thought the french were following them and many french leaders fought so too. lafayette at the outset was a leader of the french revolution in 1789. he sent the key to the bastille. best deal they is still celebrated. he sent that key to george washington and it hangs today in mount vernon. that was his way of saying you americans are responsible for our revolution. americans assumed they were responsible for all the leadership that took place in the nineteenth century. somehow or other they were in the vanguard of spreading democracy around world but when the french revolution spiraling

-- the great upheaval -- they became pessimistic about the ability of other people to be like that which gave us that notion that they were exceptional. that theme is very controversial in comparison with europe. the dream that other people would follow us, that is one of the essays in the book, why america wants to spread democracy around world. we wanted to do that from the beginning. by example. by showing the world we could do that. that is what lincoln was all about. mobilizing the north in the civil war.