west. that's how the war ends for him. i think the viewers would get a kick knowing that edward ludlow hines who was john porter's cousin and one the three brothers, he had a son who's name was duncan hines. and that is the duncan hines you see on -- at your grocery store. duncan hines was born in bowling green. edward ludlow hines had another son, a brother who he named john m. porter hines. john m. porter hines was the grandfather of the wonderful lady cora jane spiller who provided me that you see on the dusk jacket and so many of the manuscript that is i used to

describe john porter and his family. it's a very interesting crowd of people. they are still in evidence in kentucky. they don't move away from here much. >> how long did it take you to put this together? >> i suppose the manuscript was given to me and 1995. in the -- between 1995 though and when this book was finally released in february of this year, i published a number of other books. and so it's not as though i took all of that time. i published a book called a retreat from gettysburg in 2005. from 2005 on i began working in earnest on this. i corrected the manuscript so it's readable. i still have the flavor. then what i did, i annotated it.

so that when john porter is mentioning any of these people, and there are hundreds of people he names in here, mostly in the original manuscript, either last names. he thought they knew all of these people. and she probably did. but to us, we would have no idea who mr. covington was at any given sight in warren county, for instance. so what i had to do was found out re owl of the home already and why he was mentioning them. i went to the census of 1860, 1870 to find them. i found all of those people. i could identify who were related to him and who were not. and so you could tell why he chose them to stay in their houses, their route cellars, attics, whatever, or why he just mentioned them. and that also gave me another interesting asset of this. that is in the annotations, you not only find out who the people

were, but where they were living what's amazing about john porter's memoir is that even though it's written in 1872, this is some years after the war was over, he could remember in sequence what house he was staying in along given roads. you could follow the road and the end notes will let you follow those roads under modern highway numbers. you can follow john porter everywhere. he had those people in his head where he staid, when he staid, one road after another. so you can literally map where he's going. and you can take that, the book and open up the end notes and follow the route numbers and you'll be on john porter's routes. there are many, many routes that he rides. you can follow all of them. i annotated with it names, finding who the people were, the

roads he was on, and then also describing to the extent was necessary the importance of places, why they were at a given location when they were all of those kinds of things that the manuscript wouldn't give you. his a stream of consciousness to me. so it's heavily annotated in the back. but you can use the whole manuscript to get a good glimpse of what life was like in morgan's command. >> booktv was in the frankfort, kentucky as part of the city tours. we virginia several southeastern cities to bring you a taste of their literary history and culture. it was local affiliate. for more information on this and events from other cities, visit c-span.org/localcontent.

>> now on booktv, bill moyers talks about his latest book of interviews drawn from "bill moyer's journal." this is about an hour and a half. [applause] >> thank you very much. welcome to the fitzgerald theater. thank you for coming out on the gorgeous evening when you should have been outdoors. we will try to make this evening worth your while. welcome to the fitzgerald theater, named for st. paul author who was a boy that used to sit up in the second balcony

and watched plays and went back to tell his family the whole story and thus developed his narrative skills. our guest, mr. bill moyers, is in town for an important event for his grandson's graduation last night. so that's how he happens to be here. he's not just out flogging a book. he's here on important business and we managed to hold him over for a day. bill moyers was born in hugo, oklahoma. hugo is a tiny town up above the texas border. his father henry was a day laborer, odd jobsman,handy man. his mother, ruby, was a woman that was familiar with poverty and with pain. she lost three babies in

childbirth, two before bill was born and one after. all of them girls. this was a devote southern baptist family. henry moyers was a deacon of the baptist church and in marshall, texas when the family moved down just on the other side of the texas border, the oklahoma/texas border. he was unusual, southern baptist, at least we would look at him as unusual, as well as being a fundamentalist and a born again true believer, he was also in the world of democratic and a supporter of franklin delanore roosevelt. very interesting combination to us today. if there were a henry moyers around, we'd have to put him in a museum. [laughter] >> so that we could study him.

bill moyers was an ambitious, hard-working young man. he was too light to play football, he had to become a cheerleader. he wrote for the school paper, he was attentive to his church, he was there on sunday morning and sunday evening and there for wednesday evening prayer meeting as well. young people bible reading and all. he was very much involved. he wrote for the school newspaper. he worked at the grocery store. he got the attention of a man named miller cope who was the editor of the news messenger, "marshall news messenger" they took an interest in him, hired him to write for the paper, and it was cope the conservative democrat who wrote a letter to his good friend, senator lyndon b. johnson, recommending the 20-year-old bill moyers for an

internship in washington. he went to washington, and something happened between him and lyndon b. johnson, who was a powerful man, senator majority leader. he took the boy under his wing, took him in as perhaps the son that he did not have. and mr. moyers became mr. johnson's protege. he came back to texas, he went to work for the johnson's radio station in austin, and enrolled in the university of texas in austin, he married judith susan davisson, a lucky move on his part, and he became a lay preacher, preaching in country churches around. he got a scholarship off to the university of edenboro, and that confirmed him in the desire to become a minister.

his preaching in country churches was not about ethics, my friends. it was about sin. they were good hard edged sermon. they demanded no less than that. he went off to southwestern baptist seminary, got his masters in divinity. he got a call at a small church, and he was good at it. he earned $35 a week, and put his heart and soul into it. he was popular in the town right up to the sunday where he got up in the pulpit with tears in his eyes and told them that he was leaving the ministry and felt a call to go into politics to a life of action. that call was to come to washington to go back to work

for lyndon b. johnson in 1959. lyndon johnson wanted to run for president. he did with bill moyers' help and lost the nomination to john f. kennedy. and when lyndon johnson was elected vice president this was bill moyers chance to leave his employee and go to work for the peace corps, which didn't even exist yet. he went to work lobbying congress for it. he was only what 26 years old, 26-27 years old. he worked for the peace corps until in the fall of 1963. he was sent off to texas on a political mission. he was sitting at the luncheon in dallas on the day in november when president kennedy was assassinated. mr. moyers made his way to the airfield and got on board air force one and flew back to washington with president

johnson and went to work with his very close personal assistance on domestic affairs and a speechwriter. and then press secretary. he left the white house for a couple of reasons, maybe more. he left because -- because mr. johnson who had powerful trepidations about the war in vietnam had become obsessed with it and paranoid. a sign of disloyalty and he felt that mr. moyers had become closer to hubert humphrey and the kennedys than he was to president johnson. he also left because he needed to earn more money and accepted a job as publisher of newsday out of long island. he was there for a few years. he needed more money because he had taken responsibility for old brother's widow and children. so he had to support them.

he stayed with the paper until it was sold out from under him, and he made his second big career decision. he chose to go into television and to become a preacher, sort of secular preacher on television, and he's been all of these years a preacher of good decent american values. he produced distinguishing documentaries, he won more emmy awards than any human being ought to, and every other award possible and became famous for his conversations, his conversations, quiet, civil conversations on television, particularly the series, the power of myth with joseph campbell, which became a big best seller. [applause]

[applause] >> joseph campbell fans, i see. all right. all right. we'll deal with that. [laughter] >> we'll deal with that in due course. and he became the man whom we meet here this evening. he became this american father figure who sits up at the end of the national dining table and leads the conversation in a more high minded direction than you and i might wish. but there is, there isn't any meanness in bill moyers. there's no gossipiness, and so people feel better for watching home on tv. you might enjoy watching other things more, but you feel better about yourself. while you've seen bill moyers. and in that sense, he's a lot like going to church himself. [laughter] >> so here he is.

he is a giant in our time, he recently announced his retirement, whatever that may mean, he has a lot of work to do as we will point out to him here. he is underneath the easy going southern interior, very ambitious, working man that drives the people that work for him, and as a fellow fundamentalist, no matter what you might think, this is a man with deep sense of personal unworthiness, we were brought up for this. and they made their mark on it, and it never goes away. and a deep need for redemption and i hope he'll redeem himself here tonight. mr. bill moyers.

[applause] [applause] [applause] [applause] [applause] >> i didn't know there were this many lutherans left in st. paul. you must have bust him in from late. >> i'll endowed about these people and their lutheranness. [laughter] >> we'll see. we'll see. afterwards when we get to the pot luck and -- [laughter] [laughter] >> we'll see how much they partake. no this theater is crowded with your admirers and your

disciples. i'm an admirer, but i'm not a disciple. just to get that clear. >> 12 is all i can manage. [laughter] [laughter] >> i never cared for joseph campbell, i never did. i've tried to read him a dozen time even before he was on tv with you. and it just didn't make any sense to me whatsoever. if we're going to get into the power of myth, you are going to be all by yourself over there. you can do that, you can do that later. and there have been guests that you've had in your conversations. i'm not going to mention names that i just thought they should have talked a lot less. you were the kindest, the

gentlest interviewer. you interview jon stewart in the book. he's a funny, funny man. i watched him on tv. i think, jon this is the wrong place for you. he's better with bill riley than bill moyers. he took it heavy. i just want to get it out there. >> i'm having a major confession. you are now forgiven. >> all right. >> i mean be honest now, be honest with me, if you were -- if you were on a book tour and promoting a book and you were sitting down for an interview with somebody you'd rather have a little hostility. you would. you'd rather have some opposition here than to have

somebody, somebody pouring karro syrup on your shoes. >> your hostility is bringing out thoughts i never had indulged before. [laughter] >> i think there's something to that. i do. >> wouldn't you? but you know, yes, of course. for an interview, absolutely. i was not very good at interviews when i was at cbs, when i was a senior correspondent to the "cbs evening news" on political analyst for the cbs news company. i wasn't good in the short quick time period that is going by and trying to get somebody to say something he came to same. i opted for the conversation forum because i think it comes from growing up in the south. but in a conversation, you are reaching beyond the words to try to find the words. an interview becomes a conversation when it begins to

reveal character. i happen to know jon stewart outside of the studio. like you, he is a serious man despite being funny. when i was on the show last week, he came into the green room and we had a spirited discussion about political issues. he would not touch those issues on the show. i knew him to be serious. but he had a side to him that all of the people couldn't see. i wanted to try to bring that out. i think sometimes serious people can be dull. nonetheless, it doesn't make their ideas less interesting to examine. >> i like him funny. i like him funny. >> well, in the country, people ask why did you have your first interview jon stewart, why is he the first interview in the book? i said because mark twain was available. mark twain, jon stewart, they

understand in the society that the truth goes down better if it's marinated in humor. i don't have a sense of humor. i'm a baptist. we don't make jokes. and i do and jon stewart and mark twain if he were here, far more effective than an journalist in trying to get people as close as possible to the verifiable truth. that's the work of journalism. i'm jealous that you guys do better at it than i do. >> you've already made the people laugh hard three times. >> i've told you, the baptists have things in common. >> we had a lutheran in marshall once, he was a traveling salesman. >> we actually spent three days at the marshall hotel. everybody would go by and look in. that's a real lutheran. i became very good friends of martin marty and his son is a

wonderful legislator here. he was the second lutheran i'd known. i realized i was wrong. >> we need opposition, we need something. this is a basic american idea that opposition and competition bring out the best in us. that admiration and they are very hard to -- very hard to deal with. but a little honest debate really snaps us too. we want to -- we want to face a worthy opponent, we want to face a team that is up to our level. we don't want to walk over an opponent. this is an essential aspect of our culture is this beautiful adversary culture. >> that's true, garrison. it's not always beautiful. in our day and time, it's become

quite ugly. and, yes, if you like debate and are good at it, you should be a debater. you should join the fray. it's not my manner. if you read my speeches, they are much tougher than my persona on television. that's because there's the filter in television that can turn anger and turn you off if you feel angry and see the person on the stage or on the screen is angry. i'm not much of a debater. as i said, i wasn't good in live television. there's something else. most the people that i put on are people from whom i've learned journalism for me has been a continuing course in adult education, my own. and i have had a great classroom for sharing it with other people. and so when i discovered the portrait of robert bly who's here tonight sitting up in the balcony. when i discover a side of jon stewart that i wouldn't know and they wouldn't know unless they

had the conversation with him that i once had when somebody has had something that's surprised me and enlarged me and caused me to exclaim i didn't know that. i want to share that. i want to draw the person out. i'm trying to reveal the blessing if i may that that person has bestowed on society through poetry and through a book. luis erdrich here in the twin cities wrote a book that i opened. i couldn't get off of the book. i gave up two nights of sleep to read that book. it's called shadow tag. it's a story of a marriage, of a relationship in which the protagonist discovered that her husband was reading her diary. he begins to write a false diary. and he starts reading that. and then it becomes a dynamic novel that you can't put down. when i finished that, i said

i've got to share this with other people. i've got to bring her on the broadcast so all of these people will know about shadow tag and read it. that's my purpose, that's my aim. not the only one. i'm not much for a debate on television. i've done them, i'm not much for them. >> well, i'm not sure about that. i'm not sure about that. you've said some sharp hard things in your career. and i admire you for it. i mean i wrote a column, a newspaper column for a while. and i felt honor bound to read all of the angry mail that i got. anonymous, you know, comes in the internet. it's all anonymous, it's anonymity leaves people the

freedom to be abusive they wouldn't if they signed their names to it. it was just exhausting. all of this hostility. but there are battles that need to be fought. we all want to be well liked, popular, but there are battles that need to be fought and if people are not shooting at you, then you are in the wrong place. don't you think? >> well, i've been shot at many times. >> yes. >> mostly they missed. sometimes they did not. i mean i have done some of the -- if i may say no, some of the most forthcoming and forthright documents on television in my 40 years. [applause] >> for example, buying the war was an 90 minute documentary after 9/11 showing how the press corps and the bush administration spread the misinformation. i did a documentary four or five years ago called "trade secrets"

about how the chemical industry for 40 years covered up the toxic products they were -- the toxic chemicals that were in the products they were selling to consumers, to citizen, and their workers were producing. 40 years they engaged in the costly tradeoffs as conspiracies against the public. and the chemical industry hired malicious pr guys, malicious april stalk -- malicious political stalkers, they came after. they didn't succeed. the documentary aired. it was a great documentary thanks to my producers. then a documentary called pesticide in children's food. i'm not unaccustom, i'm accustom to being attacked. i read every mail, angry and non, why didn't they get the

message because it overwhelms the message. when i get in 1973 before richard nixon was impeached, i did a document on essay on watergate. because having been in washington, you could see what you couldn't see outside. that's one thing, that's one genere and one form of journalism. fortunately, it can be a symphony of other minutes. i feel when i'm invited into people's homes, i know it sounds, but when i'm invited win don't want to be shouting at them. and i don't want to be shouting at the person sitting across from them. i want to see if we can reach some insight, not agreement, but insight that will cause the light to go off in a viewers hit. >> uh-huh.

uh-huh. but one the most telling indictments of liberals today is that we back away from a fight. we are under heavy assault and have been for years, an assault of misinformation and an all out assault that we can describe this, but we are under attack and we tend to back off. we back off from battles. that's the most telling criticism of this president that he back aways from a fight before he ought to. he's out this week trying to raise money from wall street. the very segment of the society that he ought to be seen in battle with. and he's trying to raise money.

[applause] : a liberal president, franklin

roosevelt, fought for put social security. fought the nazis and warlords of japan. a liberal president, harry truman fought for medicare, and during the alarm forces. a liberal president fought for the civil-rights act of '64 and '65. liberals fought for the suffrage, voting rights for women. liberals have fought for the environmental protection agency. somewhere along the way liberals stopped fighting, and they don't fight today, and that is a great loss and the public realm. liberals ought to be proud of what they have done for this country and they ought to trade the opposition on and beat them. [applause] [applause] >> you said something a couple years back that i imagine that your father would have liked. i'm quoting you here.

and think i'm quoting you. the corporate right and the political right declared a class warfare on working people a quarter of a century ago, and they have one. the rich are getting richer, which arguably would not matter if the rising tide lifted all boats. instead in the quality gap is the widest it has been since 1929. the middle-class is deceased, and the working poor are barely keeping their heads above water. as the corporate and governing elite are helping themselves to the spoils of victory, access to political power has become a matter of who gets what and who pays for it. those are fighting words. >> yes, i wish that more liberals would use words like that. we are in a class war. every time liberals stand up for the poor, working-class, working men and women, even the

middle-class, in particular the wall street journal fires back saying they're trying to start a class war. bull. it was declared in the 1970's, and it is documented, on the record. you can go home and search tonight. lewis f. powell. richard nixon put him on the supreme court, but before that he wrote a famous document in which he called on the business community, corporations, and others to get involved in repealing the new deal, crushingly reunions, fighting government programs that divided the poorest of our citizens. wrote that memorandum for the chamber of commerce. go home and kugel richard simon. he wrote a book called time for truth in which she called upon the business community, corporations just like lewis powell, to rally and the feet ralph nader's consumer programs.

but firing the air traffic controllers in next 81. the most that they had -- several. unions, if they raise the wages of workers, furthermore, unions were the only national organization that could organize middle and working people across the country to take on the powers that be, to take home the large economic interest. [applause] and that demonized liberals. that was the second. demonize liberals. richard nixon believed not in defeating his enemy. he believed in demolishing and destroying his enemy. but gingrich carry that on. of this is political rhetoric. he urged conservatives to talk in demonic wastes. and neutralized the mainstream media, which they did. so many people in the mainstream media are afraid to get as close to the verifiable truth because

we will be accused of being unfair, on the side of the margin nuys, disenfranchised, pork, disqualify people. what is the mainstream media do now? the arguments, the punditry. and they have succeeded. we are at the end of a 30 year war in which democracy is dysfunctional. it is symbolic only, and the aal power is exercised in our n increasingly smaller number of very wealthy people. if you don't mind. [applause] [applause] most of what i learned -- most of what i know i learned from other people. here is an interview i did with simon johnson, one of the most fascinating and economists on the scene. was that the imf and now teaches at the wharton school of business. he has the best economic website in the country called baseline

scenario data work. he wrote an article that i saw on that website called high noon, geithner versus the american oligarchs, and i wanted to know more. i said to him, why i you -- what are you signalling with that have light? i'm signaling something a bit shocking to americans. situation we find ourselves in at this moment is very strongly reminiscent of the situations we have seen many times in other places. the places we don't like to think are similar to us, rusher, indonesia, thailand. this is no marxists. not comfortable comparisons. we somehow find ourselves in the grip of the same sort of crisis and the same sort of oligarchs as in those countries. i say oligarchy is an unamerican term. it means a government by all group of people. we don't like to think of ourselves that way. i know people react negatively when we use the term oligarchy.

it is a way of governing that comes from the system tried in greece and athens. political power based on economic power, and it was actually an antithesis to democracy in that context. a small group with a lot of wealth and power. exactly that. they pulled the strings, had the influence, called the shots. disproportionate, and plenty of unfair and undermines business in this society because in an oligarchic corporation want monopolies, not competition. then he says it is the rise of the banks and economic terms that translates into political power. they then exercise that political power back into more deregulation, more opportunities to go out and take rest was -- reckless risk and capture large amounts of money. would applaud that because he would know today that democracy has become a plutocracy, which is economic power derived --

political power derived from economic power devoted to protecting the wealth of the privileged. that is what we have today. [applause] [applause] >> the bond is for you and i is not that we are democrats, i think. you mentioned your father and made me think of this. not that we are democrats. not the rear of the same generation, but it is that we had a similar upper in. we're both brought up fundamentalists. we both have born-again experiences. to me religion and religious upbringing is more important than race, more important than

politics. i was on a vacation. i was at this very lovely expensive resort. i went for a walk late one evening. i heard. i was walking through a very poor neighborhood. a ragtag falling down shaggy houses. i heard singing. it took me a moment to recognize that because it was in a different style, different proof and i would have heard growing up among the poor with pride of -- brother in south minneapolis. but the worsening, oh, happy day. be my savior and my god. my following hard rejoices in spreads rapture of abroad. they were seeing with percussion, which we didn't.

[laughter] and they were coming down on a different beat then we would have. but those were my people. i knew when i heard that song that i was supposed to go find that music, and i did. i walked over there, and i knew that they would welcome me. those were my people. those are your people. it did not matter that i was white, white, white and they were blackened and black. i walked in, and they will come to me. i did not want to make a big show of myself. i stood off to the side. but they reached out, put their hands on me. i was welcome. those were my people. those are your people. >> when people said that bill clinton was the first black president i understood what they meant because bill clinton grew out in the same way that i did in the south. i grew up in this is really --

segregated town of 20,000 people, 10,000 blacks and 10,000 whites. very seldom did the meat and certainly never mixed in that southern culture. but on wednesday nights i often would slip away and go down to us off alamo street and sit outside of rundown black baptist church where they sang far into the night. i wish to i could belong to that church. i couldn't. something very eerie about that experience. it shows how you can grow up well loved, will church, well taught, and still be on aware of the reality of other people. but we could have a long conversation, you and i, about religion because in 1984i wrote when i was the senior news analyst at cbs news, wrote minnesota public radio. did not know anybody. i said for copies of opinion, fascinating. where can i buy the other's.

i was talking to an executive. a what interested you about that? and i said well, it has almost become a cliche like going to church. a certain set of values, certain sense of justice and reverence that emerges from particularly religion that is why -- that rises from the oppressed. the jews were oppressed by the babylonians, the assyrians, the egyptians, oppressed, oppressed, priced. out of it came what came out of the oppressed black people, songs of hope, songs of redemption, prayers of promise, the promised land, the river jordan. the language runs through america. so there is something there. there are people because we grew up not rich, not well educated. ami, we did not go to the elite schools. religion becomes the force of a firming yourself against tough

world that is a pressing you what that is denying you. i wondered where religion came from. the first woman awoke in the cave and said -- felt the cold body of harassment and said where did he go. where is the? the interview in the book with rhodonite is one of the most outstanding thinkers of our time and rid of book that caused me to bring him on the show called the evolution of god. he talks about this need people long ago to find answers to questions that the universe did not tell them. you talked about joseph campbell. i am a little surprised that you did not find him because i think -- i think that campbell, his great contribution having setting the literature and relations of the world was to translate religion into poetry, to help the see that the literal truth of the scripture is not

nearly as important and can be very misleading to the poetry of the experience. and he said to me, if you want to change the world contains a metaphor. tains the poetry. to me that the essentially is how i see religion today. the troops study reveals poetic rather than literal. >> we were not brought up with metaphor, brother. [laughter] you and i both had scorching experiences when we were young, and you know it. we looked into a yawning chasm at our feet of hellfire, and we withdrew from it. we felt -- and we felt the love of the lord surrounding us. if joseph campbell had told the story of abraham and isaac, i would have understood that. if he told the story of joan and

the whale would have been up there with that. the prodigal son was my favorite, but anyway. because we both grew up with that i know you deeply, maybe more than you want me to know you. >> when did you first go to church? >> palace carried into church. the bosom of large women. [laughter] >> i walked into church at the age of 12. >> you see, i was six dead indoctrination. when i finally went to church, when we joined the church a 12 this is hard to believe in the southern fundamentalist conservative culture, but i was introduced to a series of ministers, preachers who really did believe that the life of the spirit had to increase the life of the mind.

intelligent, compassionate. only one of them delivered fire and brimstone. the others, all the way on, and i had some of the great divides as breaches of the course of my whole life. it was an emphasis upon the opening of the mind. it was not above closing welcome mike campbell used those words religiose, religion is a means of connecting not only us, but us to various other laboratories and experiences in life. i did not have the fundamentalists indoctrination that i might have had if like you i had been carried in. both of those mayors from that, and i'm wondering what you think that says about religion. >> are you saying that in marshall, texas, you did not sit under preaching that made you quiver and shade? >> only once. he is the 1210 suzanne davis

that i asked to perform my wedding. i went to the university of texas. later asked to become a chaplain at harvard. one of the great the logical minds of our time. he was in that culture. j.p. allen, james robinson and james forbes, great african american minister for nine years at riverside historic church in new york. i mean, we all are the products of the influences that we were exposed to. i was fortunate. i don't know how it happened. i was fortunate to have a series of ministers who call this out and said the fight to close a soft. >> nonetheless, brother. [laughter] >> hostility is showing again. >> we just try to get the truth

here. unless i believe that you come from the same background, a similar background, and i believe that you are probably uncomfortable about lavish praise. >> true. >> i believe that when you get an honorary degree you cringe a little bit when they read that proclamation. i believe that you see the powerful and the wealthy as occupying a precarious position in god's world. that god will turn this world upside-down. these people have a temporary prominence and will fall all the harder for their pride and their power, and you, i believe,

sorrow for our brethren who have taken the part of the powerful, and powering the powerful and to have ignored all the scripture says about the poor and who have promulgated cruel policies toward the poor. >> you don't have to feel guilty to love justice. my complaint about the very rich in the very -- not all of them because we all the some of them who have been most generous and democratic in a small sense. they suffer today. the characteristics of sociopaths. that is, radically deprived of and that the. that is with a sociopath is. a medically deprived of empathy. that is the hangman he came to jesus and said to master, what

should i do to be saved. jesus says, so all your riches and come, follow me, and serve the least among us. it was a lack of empathy that was his hell, that was his separation from the rest of us. it is this division between him and the rest of us in society. the gap in inequality in this country is greater than it has been since the great depression. between the top and the bottom. not a matter of money. you will never have -- none of us will have equal money. it is the fact that when you are ready to deprive them of the and you want to pay the lowest possible taxes instead of supporting the great consortium that is embodied in the preamble of the constitution, we, the people, when you want to not carry your fair share you begin to deprive everybody else of the things that made my life.

i grew up poor. my father had a fourth grade education and never made over $100 a month until the last few years when he joined the union. add the paste above his last check, $96 some odd sense after taxes. but i went to a good public school in texas. by the way, an antidote to any fundamental is preaching that reading in town. i drove on a public highway to a public university, the university of texas. i stopped in public parks. the use public facilities, and most important of all i had access to public libraries, and i never walked into a library at the university of texas without thinking, all of these were written for me by people who did not know me. this will university was built by people it did not know me and my will never know because they believe in us. the preamble of the constitution. and they invested their money in public institutions.

this debt between the rich and poor today is to -- starting the public sector. it is retreating from the public life of the nation so that the rich will be behind their gated communities. and the rest of america and the next 20 or 30 years, if we don't reverse this trend, will be like areas of india where they just left, you know, the doctrine of the right is the survival of the fittest. every man for a self. and if that happens that means society becomes a jungle. and civilization, you know this. your show is reap with it. civilization is but a thin veneer of civility stretched across the pashas of the human heart, and we have to work to keep that civilization at when

people would draw whether consent and to withdraw their support from a then you are right close to a reversion to a pre civilization society. that is what troubles me about the elites today who suffer from, i think, the worst of all religious sense, which is malignant narcissism. [applause] [applause] >> i believe we have certain things in common, brother. i'm just pushing. to which i can say as easily as he did so that it goes down better. [laughter] i believe that you and i are a little bit uncomfortable in a

very secular society. i believe that you and i are uncomfortable around profanity. i believe that you and i -- i don't know if i can speak for you, but ims sunday's the ways and is used to be. and this quiet sundays before the shopping malls or open, when we had the sabbath. i miss the sabbath. and i don't care whether they say. i just miss it. i am not fighting for its return, but i am missing it. i miss my people, and i don't understand why our people, your people and mine, the ones who have the benefit of scripture growing up, why they took the turn they did, which is so changing our politics. the fervor of the bid and jellicoe right has given the

other side an advantage over the way she washy middle. it shouldn't be there. how did they take that wrong turn so that a man like jimmy carter who has devoted his post white house years to the cause of peace and negotiation and mediation, who teaches sunday school, for heaven's sake, every sunday. can you imagine george w. bush teaching sunday school? [laughter] i can't. there would be way too many passages of scripture that he would blanch at. [laughter] how did we come to be living in these -- in these twisted * where our people, the people who grew up with scripture, as you and i did, have taken this

strange turn if george w. bush had sent pictures of himself and his underwear he would have been in serious trouble, but instead he started an unprovoked war with a nation that did not attack us. a half a million or more iraqis died in that war, some five or 6,000 of our own people died in this war. and the man skates on word. how did we come to be living in this backwoods time? >> i wish i knew the answer. i agree with you. i do admire john stuart very much, but i keep wishing that he did not feel compelled, and i don't know why he feels compelled, to use all the obscenities in his presentation.

and it is not that i can't move around them, but, you know, he feels like he has to use the f word constantly. it is worse than when you watch it home. you know it. and i don't know why he feels that he's to do that because it means he will limit his influence through the survivors, remnants of america pastille believe that even if we are all centers to five centers and have fallen from grace, the maintenance of a public virtue is a very important standard for people, even if privately we fall off the wagon. i don't know what has happened to that. it is always back-and-forth between culture and religion. progressive christians in this country. william jennings bryan who fought for a progressive vision

of america to walter rauschenberg's who taught us about the social gospel and that it is not enough to be pious. you also have to be committed to a society that is just. but those may never confuse the way the fundamentalist do today, god and government. government was an instrument for justice, but it was not the voice of god. today there is so much confusion between god and governments that their one and the same. they don't want us to use government to advance the interest of the poor, but that one must use government to deny women the power to control their own reproductive process. [applause] i don't know the answer to that question. >> other than your conversation with jeremiah right in this vote, i thought that was a good deed in a dark worlds.

here is a black minister in chicago, the minister of trinity. uc on the south side, the church that bronco, had attended for many years. he and his wife are married and raise children were baptized. and i he became a campaign issue briefly in 2008 for a sermon that he had given, tiny bits of which were paraded out. he is making the very same point and criticizing the use of the phrase of bless america. a tendency wrapped the government of the yetta states up with god in a neat way, despite our history and profound

examples of our national wickedness. and hugh dave jeremiah a chance to explain himself. and you indicated, this man who had been -- who had been used in this campaign. he was -- he was cared richard as an angry black man as a way of trying to portray barack obama. the opposite of an angry black man. and forest barack obama as a practical politician to repudiate jeremiah. you gave him a chance to speak, and that was a good thing. >> jeremiah, whom i did not know, got a bum deal from the corporate mainstream media and from the right-wing media, fox news, talk radio. i mean, anyone could, and probably it our crop producers for rush limbaugh and fox is at

this very moment a looking for seven seconds of our exchange which they can put up and put into a loop. came back up and made us look like fools. no context and nothing comes of four after their own text, context put on top of it. you can do this. this is why there is an obligation that comes with journalism. but they can do that. that is with they did. i did not know jeremiah right. great african american divide. riverside church in new york. he said, bill, that is not jeremiah right. what we are seeing an abc news in talk radio. we have been through many fires together.

he could have his pick of any black church. he chose one with 85 members. he did it with frontline, documentary. a great, loving church set fees the poor and provides advice to alcoholics and addicts. does hiv work and serve the community. fights gangs and drugs. the church when he went to chicago as a community organizer. this is a very short. i want to read to you from obama's book, his memoir. in his book countries for my father coming described his first service. listen. people began to shout, to rise from their seats and clap and cry out. a forceful wind carrying their reverence voice up into the rafters and in that single note,

i heard something else. at the foot of that cross inside the thousands of churches across the city i imagine the stories of ordinary black people merging with the stories of david and goliath. moses and ferro, the christians in the lions' den. these stories, survival and freedom and hope became our story. this is barack obama. my story. our tears until this by church on this bright day seen once more a vessel carrying the story of a people. obama was baptized at that church is a crips could -- christian. to say that this man was damning america with that sermon were he said that, he was invoking the jewess profits who loved israel.

he would call than judgment on the people they love when they fell from grace. he was -- to say that is a travesty of the truth and a great injustice, and that is why i invited him on. >> you just gave them the sound bite right there. [applause] [applause] i'm afraid you have done it now. [laughter] of want to ask you to more questions and then it will open up this year is the 100th anniversary of the birth. we are reserving this. came out of the great depression

who people under the age of 40 don't remember, maybe 50. but people my age do. and we remember hubert humphrey in several ways. first of all, we remember his love to be in a crowd of people and how much he loved to shake hands. the dry fullness of the man out in public was genuine. and so my republican and loss had a sort of a grudging fondness for hubert humphrey. really crossed party lines. this they remember his he was a teacher, died in the world teacher. he left to explain things and would.

he really did. he left to explain and issue to you and the certainty that if he could just explain it to you and you understood it you would agree. >> he once did a press conference that was for an hour during which the answer three questions. >> bless his heart. he was on like most minnesota man in that aspect. [laughter] but then he came from south dakota. [laughter] he had that chance to deal with. [laughter] most historians now looking back on hubert humphrey's career, i think would agree that the great tragedy of his life was accepting the vice-presidential nomination offered to him by and lyndon b. johnson and that this was his downfall.

of course you can say. you can say. who can read history backwards. do you agree with that? >> yes. he got caught in a war that he had no influence over, which she had to defend. he rick humphrey was a greater mentor to me, believe it or not, than john f. kennedy, whom i served, and lyndon johnson with him was very close. because he took the time to teach. he was the biggest man ever elected mayor of minneapolis, and one of the great things he did was to commission the first door-to-door canvass to explore discrimination in the city. he did that in no small part because he went to tulane university to do his master's and discovered a great persecution of the blacks. but he proposed a youth corps in the late 50's, and i was writing a speech for senator johnson proposing a court.

joined by our joy over the fact that the incoming presidents was committed to the peace corps. i was opposed by several republican senators to set those too young. i think by then by the age of 27 and a half. he came running to the floor. he delivered a passionate speech about a young man who had served the public, starting with thomas jefferson and coming right on through. [laughter] it turned the tide. only two people voted against me. i was joined irised president johnson, one of the many that person to support hubert

humphrey's as his running mate. seen as more conservative. such a man of passion. he was the most prolific was a letter of the 20th-century. more acts, more bills than any other single man in the course of the history. he was a great, great man. and because he went along, as everyone in the white house administration did with the present escalation of the war, he got trapped. he did not believe in it, even though he had been a cold warrior a decade earlier. he was way behind. and we talked about this. called me after i came back from the peace talks. he said he had to come out against the war. he did five days before the election. the gap between nixon and

humphrey closed just like that. another day. no doubt. another day and his switching opinion on the war would have carried him into the white house. the whole history of our times of have been different. you're right. a tragedy. >> i just have one more question. tell me a little bit about the 20-year-old, what he looks like and what he wore as he was heading off to washington. imagine, if you can, what he would have thought had he run into the 76-year-old veteran broadcaster, news analyst, documentarian. >> well, i would like to think he would say, how do i get that

job. [laughter] i do. it i was conflicted. i wanted to be everything. i wanted to be a minister, a journalist, broadcaster. i had grown up listening to edward r. murrow on the rooftops of the buildings in london. this is london. and often the power of his words to take me to london and bring london to me changed my sense of perception. i wanted to be a teacher. i was excepted to do my ph.d. at the university winds out some called me and ask me to come. i wanted to be a politician. like most 20 year olds. infinite possibilities. and the human experience of infinite possibility. i got that. it's no mystery. read a book i did some years ago called fooling with words about the english teachers' i have

from the ninth grade and has cool through the second year of college, all of them were wonderfully gifted in the teaching of english and poetry. poetry is all about the possibilities of life, both of charities and triumphs of life. i mean, i came at age 41 to be everything. i was a freudian figure in my head. i committed to one way, and it led to another and it led to another. i think i would say if i were 20 years old, 20 year olds, to me today and say, i want to be a journalist. ... i do. my answer is, don't. i don't say that really. i say if you have a fire in your belly, do it. you will signify if you're lucky, but it is harder and harder to be a journalist is of the shrinking of which is in newspapers. corporate broadcasting has gone hollywood. still world-class journalism being done, and very good

journalists on the internet and other places, but it is not a promising field, a large field that it was when i was growing up. but that is i was at 20. i looked like a hayseed. i had warned glasses. i was awkward,. really, i was. and mostly i was unsure of what was the most -- the right path to take. >> you and i have a lot in common. neither of us could dance. [laughter] >> a great loss. somebody asked me the other day, what is your greatest regret. i said that i never learned to dance. i would love to have been arthur murray or fred astaire. nobody knows who they were in war, but there were -- [laughter] do you know why?

because you are brought of fundamentalist. >> that's exactly right. it is to essentially in sexually attractive. >> it would awaken caramel impulses. all right. let's ask this question, as the audience for the questions. i turn this over to our friends. the stick the first one from -- well, since we are all democrats, must take it from the people in the back. let's find a question. just stand up if you have something that you would like to ask down here. all right. i'm sorry? >> elizabeth warren. >> elizabeth warren. elizabeth warren when she was at harvard on my series with bill moyers son, seven, eight years ago. i had never heard anyone since the i'm ralph nader who spoke so powerfully and truthfully for the consumer in america, for transparency in corporate and

government life. i just was so impressed. not surprised, risen as the progressives have fought back to some extent. he was one of the voices that gave progresses a new sense of responsibility to consumers and the public. should be the head of the new consumer agency, the republicans this said that they will not let that happen. i don't know why he does not do it. i wish that barack obama would give her a recess appointment. it would -- she would be our joan of arc. >> do i have a question? >> does mr. moyers -- thank you very much, i worked for public government for 30 years. you have been the voice of truth

and honesty for all those years. thank you so much for giving the public television everything they have. >> you are very generous. thank you. [applause] >> first off, i want to reinforce what she said. you are an important person and thank god for you. thank you for being here. the other thing is, in your book and when i heard you speak at media matters before obama was elected, you were echoing then and a few other people in saying that there will be no movement unless the people ask for it. you said that fdr, for example, did not move on some social issues until he was pushed by the public. so i went to a couple of rallies

this winter in support of wisconsin. [applause] [applause] and i remember people for the american way or whenever it was. the people need an organizer. the people need a person with passion who will stand up and say the things that they believe. someone that will help them to move in a direction because otherwise it is like going to a meeting where everybody feels good about having been there, but nothing happens. you are a man saying all the things that we agree. i remember, i ask you why you don't run president. you said you're too old. i said what about mccain. you said, well, he is too old

to. but we need somebody to lead us with the spirit. we just need to unite around somebody who can organize us. i guess what i am saying is, what do we do? i know that the movement has to come from the people, but the spirit is here. what do we do? >> yes, rosa parks, who sat down and said that her feet were too tired to get to the back of the bus needed martin luther king. but first there had to be rosa parks. i wish that i had a romantic response to that, but i have learned over a long life and a lot of reading and a lot of talking to people like this that he was right when he said in this book in the interview that governments never do anything that they are not forced to buy

people by movements. movements don't come in our country from the top down. they come from the netting of spirits and hearts of people like those in wisconsin who did not have a leader. sure, they needed one later that could carry, and we can come back to that at another time, but nobody pushed a button or lit a fire court took a bull horn. it just happened from people who found each other. that is the story of real reform and the abolition movement, women's suffrage, look at the people who were arrested, opposing the opposition or persecuted or women who went to jail. before there was a monolithic thing. in black men and women who work putting themselves on the line in the south. burned for it. hounded out of their cities for it. i don't know wind the combustion

happens, but it never happens until the kindling has been lit by people who say i can't, 5:00. sometimes i reflect back on that time when i was helping organize the peace corps, a moral alternative abroad and knocked down on the freedom rides in the south. i don't know what skewed perception made me think that was more important. >> so, there is nothing eloquent to say. the only and some of -- anti note to organize money is organized people. your people. in the whole history of this country the fight between the spirit of the declaration, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for everyone, and the constitution that says, yes, but not for slaves, not for women,

not for workers, not preference, not for the native americans in the declaration called savages. our whole history has been this seesaw. the change has come for ordinary people for whatever reason or whenever altruism or wherever motivation get together and kept at it and get that it. i wish i had a better answer. >> if you had a fight on the website or an organization that you think is possibly an organization that will start moving people collectively in a positive direction to change this horrible mess that we are and. do you know the name of one? >> there are so many. there are so many.

-- sorry to take some lost time, and you can edit this out. i've stopped for a benefit. the runoff movement in this town. the rank voting. it is one way -- and i said to them. i applauded the volunteers there first getting the consent runoff appeared here in st. paul and now going to try to move it to the legislature. as i said, my understanding is it has been two decades since minnesota had a government that was elected by majority vote. well, what and serov will do is to move its past, but not partisan perris were only a small turnout appears and move it. all of you participate fully in a representative alexian in november. very important. only one piece of the couple --

puzzle. we have to put together reform. many public campaign. a wonderful organization fighting on the premise that if anybody is going to on the politicians, we should. for public funding of elections after a certain threshold has been passed. citizens united passed by five conservative members of the court that gave us george w. bush as president, five conservative members invested for-profit corporations with the right to lavish as much money on a campaign in the last few days of an election without public disclosure. there is a wonderful organization called the free speech for people the court. it is trying to reverse that decision. free press story is an organization fighting as effective as any organization can against concentration of media in this country.

there is an organization called u.s. uncut started by 23-year-old mississippian, graduate of morehouse college. had to work four jobs. trust -- started this organization sitting in the lobbies of banks that pay no taxes. he is not against banks. he is simply saying, if you have the right of a person under the first amendment to raise money, you have the obligation of a citizen to pay your fair share of texas. go online. there are a lot of organizations. maybe i will work on trying to compile list. as -- as a journalist to have been out reporting. one of the distinct features of his journal was not -- was, of course, these conversations, but we were the only broadcast on air reporting on people organizing at the local level, fighting for closures in boston, discrimination in los angeles, fighting for public funding in

oregon. all over the country, the mainstream media provides them no attention, and this is a travesty. we have got to find an alternative form of media that lets us know, we are not alone. we are not alone. the great last word. you know, i missed my audience on friday nights. it was time for me to retire. i could not see you, but under you were there. you were felt present as if i could imagine people coming out of the darkness around the camp. this comes from more than happened to me. but of this sense of people coming and gathering around the campfire so that they would not feel so alone anymore. our separation, whether by technology or geography or class or race or religion or whenever is the greatest reality.

at the other side, the forces of corporate power, right-wing ideologies exploit. somehow you have got to answer the question that you asked me. [applause] [applause] [inaudible] >> i wanted to ask you if you could please comment about judith jamison and your collaboration and the influence she has had in your career. >> i met her before school opened at college in 1952. i came last. my friend and die from marshall, texas, came last to the english placement test. i took the last to -- we took the last two seats in a big auditorium. sitting in front of me was a woman i could not see except for

her hair, beautiful hair, absolutely an aura around her. i turned to my friend and said, i'm going to marry that girl. she finished the test obviously faster than i did and left in a never saw her face. we both placed high in the english placement test. went to english and lo and behold eliciting the entering class. when class is over fee -- she finished the essay faster than i did and left. she left the book under her desk, and i took it up to our teacher and said, ms. davidson has left this book. bush should i do? why don't you take it to her dorm. i did. she came down from the third floor. when she turned the stairs, the troubadours of the medieval age talked about -- no, i'm serious. they talked about the eyes are scouts to the hearts. well, i fell in love. i have never fallen out of love.

we have been married 57 years. [applause] not that the mississippi does not arrive and become a tumultuous. it has not been smooth sailing all the time, but she was a journalist and her own right. we sat by each other in economics class. she passed. i didn't. but i was her brother since we had the same name. smart, a good journalist. great intuition, it great management skills. runs our production company. she was an educator, on the board of the state university of new york for 17 years. twelve years as vice chair. on the corporate boards. she is just, you know, this is true of my team. if you pull the camera back you would see me standing on the shoulders of some marvelously talented and professional people.

i am the one who gets the visibility, but led by my wife. we have produced good journalism together because, you know, i quoted some poet who said it was not our -- it was not our intention to be coupled in an ordinary way. that is the story of our marriage and our professional relationship. i would not be here, seriously, i would not be here if she had not been a steady, resilient, and generous as she is. it's a team. [applause] [applause] >> up on the second to -- [inaudible question]

>> well, one of the architects of the libertarian conservative movement is grover norquist. and grover norquist graduated harvard a libertarian who believes no government is good government. he said many years ago, and i've had him on my show, by the way. said many years ago that he would like to start if the government until it shrinks to a size that can be drowned in the bathtub. that is on the record. you have heard versions of it. that is what they're trying to do. on principle the don't believe in government unless it serves their economic interest. they are all gung-ho for it. religious interest, abortion, gay marriage and interests like that which come out of what garrison was talking about earlier. this has been the story of the last 150 years, beginning with a great -- of first gilded age. they just don't believe. they think that people will take

care of themselves. it is a divorce from life, reality, but it is there ideologies. the elegy embraces truths that don't need to be proven. ideologies embraces of view of the world that is contrary to all the existing evidence. and they are ideologue's because they hold to this vision even though constantly refuting by experience. ..

>> with his compassion opinion it just proves again that as garrison knows so well from having been carried into that church as such an early age that all men and some women are fallen. and it's always a disappointment, it's always a disappointment when you discover that someone you admire proves to be what you might have been in weaker moments. >> who do i have? >> right here. go ahead. >> hi there. it's a privilege, thank you. hopefully it's not entirely self-serving question, i'd appreciate either of your responses. but it seems to me one the roles of a president is to set out

ideals almost dream like potential. you know, we can go to the moon so to speak. my question is really about what the difference and where is -- where rests the ideas of idealism and idealistic thinking and realistic or realism. and maybe you can just offer any thoughts. it's an issue that, well, having awoken from a coma a cupful years ago, i'm learning about the world in a different sense. i think ideals can be extremely important. especially in public policy. setting up the highest sights possible instead of what's realistic seems lower. maybe it's only realistic to achieve so much, but maybe we can achieve more. thank you. >> garrison, why don't you deal with that one? >> no, that is your question, sir. [laughter] >> well, i said to a friend of

mine on wall street, i told this story earlier, i asked him are you optimistic about the market? he said, yes. why then do you look so worried? he said i'm not sure that optimism is justified. i'm not either. that comes from a long life in politics and journalism. i have for some time, i was greatly influenced by the writings of an italian political scientist named gromsky, some of you know him. he's a marxist, prestall -- prestalin. but sometimes he was more like a capitalism like ayn rand. he said i practice the pessimism of the mind, that is i see the world as it is without rose-come loved -- rose-colored glasses.

that's the journalist is supposed to be. i practice the pessimism of the mind, but the optimism of the will. what did he mean by that? i can't imagine being in this world without imagining a more confident future. and then getting up tomorrow and doing something within my reach to help bring that future about. that's the conflict between the idealism i had as a young man and the perceptions that i have embraced since i became a journalist. you can't see what i've seen or what you've seen in your lifetime, without knowing we are as our origin taught us, fallen. but at the same time, you can't be reminded, you know, of culture that produced the klu

klux klan also produced martin luther king and the university of minnesota. i'm serious about that. you can't give up on the culture, you can't give up on the various sides of human experience that reach -- well, it was a terrific interview in here with barry lopez. he was one of my favorite. i don't know if you've had him on your show. he's truly one the finest writers of our time. he talks about going -- talks just about this question. talks about going to auschwitz and being brought up short and feeling the dark cloud suspend and dark spirits rise in his soul. he said he couldn't live in a world that knew that was a book involved, without also knows in the world is a bay bay bay bay n

and a bach. he said storytelling, there's no better than garrison. [applause] >> barry lopez said storytelling is our only protection against forgetting the spiritual interior of our lives. and that's why stories are far more powerful than any other form of articulation. and so when i am feeling myself slipping, i listen to prairie home companion, or i pick up my book -- [laughter] >> i do something and i'll close with, garrison, robert bly is here today. one of my favorite minnesotaens. one the beat voices of our time. i've done many conversations over the years with robert, not because i wanted to be hostile

to him or challenge him, but because i wanted him to read poems to me. here's one he read some years ago. he wrote it soon after 9/11 when all of the talk was bubbling up about invading iraq. he wrote this call which was judith's favorite, by the way. she insisted that she be in the book. she didn't have to work at it. it's called call and answer. i'll end my part of the program with this. where are you robert? right there. right in the front row of the balcony. tell me why it is we don't lift our voices these days and cry over what is happening? have you noticed the plans are made for iraq and the icecap is melting? i say to myself go on, cry. what's the sense in being an adult and having no voice.

cry out. see who will answer. this is call and answer. you know what that is. we will have to call especially loud to reach our angels who are hard of hearing, they are hiding in the jugs of silence filled during our wars. he was think of grenada. everybody had forgetten in 1983. why did we do that? no body remembers. have we agreed to so many wars we can't escape from silence. if we can't lift, we allowed others who are ourselves to rob the house. we'd listen to the great criers, poe and douglass, and now we are silent as spar rows in the little bushing. then robert pauses to say it's a bad pun, but i left it in.

we're sold as the sparrows. some masters say our life only lasts seven days. where are we in the week? is it thursday yesterday? hurry. cry now. soon sunday night will come. thank you, robert. [applause] [applause] >> thank you bill moyers. >> thank you. >> you are watching booktv on c-span2. 48 hours of nonfiction books and authors every weekend. >> from frankfort, kentucky,

cook tv talks with connie crowe, manager of the kentucky book fair. >> kentucky book fair was started 30 years ago by carl west and ellen heller, two of the founding members still involved today. we're nonprofit and our purposes are to provide grants to public schools and libraries, to bring readers together in a literary, if you will, atmosphere, and promote love and reading throughout the commonwealth. on the last count we had about 4,000 people. our focus is primarily on kentucky authors, we do accept original authors and nationally known authors. over the past 30 years, we've had a wonderful array of authors, mickey mantle, roger mudd, you know, just a lot of people to draw in the crowds. but we do focus on the kentucky authors as well. >> what role does book festival play in the community? >> oh, i tend to think it's an

institution. after 30 years, we're one the oldest in the country. with provide grands to public schools and libraries. that's the sole purpose. i'm the only paid staffer. we have a 30-member boards that governs throughout the year and guides me. >> how has you noticed? as the readership changed? what have you noticed? >> our demographic tends to skew older and younger. since we offer such a wonderful array of children's authors and activities, people bring their grand kids, we are building on the new readership. >> what dates did you say the fair was going to be held? >> november 12th, 2011, at the convention center in downtown frankfort. >> booktv was in frankfort, kentucky as part of the city tours where we visit several southeast cities overt next few months to bring you a taste of the literary history and

culture. our partner was local affiliate frankfort plant board. visit c-span.org/localcontent for more information on this and other events. >> what are you reading this summer? booktv wants to know. >> there's a book about machiavelli that sitting on my desk that came out, i guess, several weeks i guess. i want to read about it. i want to read that book about machiavelli, and then there's a book called "reckless" which is about what went on in terms of the financial crisis in the country and what led us to it and involves two local businesses freddie mac and fannie mae. i know lots of the players. i'm curious to read and find out what happened there. and then there's some thing that is i want to go back and read. you know there was recently a

controversy about huck finn and the use of the n word. and there was a professor who took it out of the text. this sparked a controversy about sanitizing american history or in the context of my own book, politically correct speech codes and how inappropriate it was given the fact that mark twain and samuel clemons wrote it with the power of that word intended. so i want to look at what is sanitized, if you will, text looks like. i've picked up that book. again, that's sitting on my desk. and then there are two books i'm trying to remember their names and i -- this is an opportunity to help out the authors that i'm reading. one is a book by lawrence block who's a