and they're so complex, what about the nuclear plant just on the coast where there's fault lines surrounding it with no wall and and no planned, do we accept technology and just accept disasters or do we do something about it? >> thank you. >> joel, i'll say that i think that we in fact, we do accept technology to some extent. every time we switch on a light or drive a car. something like that. we are embedded in the system. but i think you're right about the nuclear powerplants. i would question the has around maps, not because i think that they're necessarily, you know, insincerity put together. i think the amount of knowledge we have about size mick has around is lower than some that experts think. it should get everyone paused to

understand how might the system fail. there's an overwhelming incentive for executives of companies, and for regulators and politicians to think in the short-term. what's the best move for me? in the next three months. how are we going make the stock price go up? how am i going to get re-elected. that's a ready -- that's a real problem when you have long-term problems. >> i want to respond to the question about the festival. some of my best friends work at the "l.a. times". i love the "l.a. times." i'm sorry, it's like a marriage gone sour sometimes. but i really respect the history the paper when it was conservative, when was it was more liberal. i do know it was a paper, as all great papers are put out by people willing to make great sacrifices. they risk their lives. some get killed.

they they are hard working. i don't go down with putting down the paper with con conspiracity. they are understaffed. i think it is hard to put things on like this. things get lost. i think it is great that the festival it was moved. it's not domination position. i love the fact that the "l.a. times" made a commitment to take books to people who love in this part of lax los angeles and not just center it and all other culture things on the west side. applaud that decision. i'm happy. [applause] just have a couple of minutes. those of you who don't get to ask the question. if you come to the signing area at 7. you talk to the authors there. >> amy, what do you -- am i right to feel i'm not nationalistic in 9/11 by not hanging a flag out my window. i don't want to contribute to

the red cross. >> are you asking me if i advise those? >> you were involved in 9/11. i think you were living in new york. >> yeah. the beginning of my other book is about it. >> is it right for me to feel an aversion to donate because of a disaster. no. i think, you know, it's all always the best to follow your heart for other people. that's one thing i believe. sometimes your money is not going to the best charity. sometimes the charity is kind of self-perpetuating, and charities, ease especially disaster -- who has the most rape victims. they can make the most money. that's a cynical way of looking. there's also right thinking and attempt to do right. there's a problem in

understanding. that sometime mys the help situation in haiti. as for hanging out a flag, well, you know, i think what did george washington say about pottism? >> you quoted him before, bob. it was so good. false, bloated patriotism. >> be aware of the intended patriotism. >> it's in the farewell address. >> it should be -- >> i felt very not very thoughtful when everybody in response to 9/11 hung out their flags but on the other hand, it was an emotional ranch. so i'll forgive them. >> well, we have one minute to go. if you have a question quick. very quick for the entire panel. do you think the republican party will go the way of the american wicc party? >> i hope so. [laughter] >> i saw senator allen simpson

speak. he's demoralized. i want to say something about that. one of the bravest things i did in life. i wore an i like iraq. i know,izer headquarter was flawened. we had a panel on it. i love iraq because -- ike. they were reasonable and sane. he did not want to get into another -- he was i argue -- and, you know, he did attack the military. i hunger for the day when we had a republican party that was reasonable and could keep the democratic party in check. it's sad this day in age. i interviewed richard nixon. there's a blerp on my other book. it's a sad day in america when i look back on richard nixon. thank you all very much for

coming. great panel:

>> it was within a few months, and my mother followed him very quickly, and suddenly i went being from being a child with parents to without parents and becoming one of my own, and i took on that position. in 2005, i lost friends, an mortality was weighing on my relatively heavily at the time and i was grappling with what it meant and my place in time in the unit verse, and i wanted to

write something to articulate those feelings common to so many people. i didn't consider it a biography, but it's what a lot of people share. if i've done it right, this book will take people into their own stories and something magical about that in memoir because it all -- we all share, you know -- in fact, we come from childhood, and for many of us, it's still present, and more me, being a child, it was very, very much alive. >> you told me a number of men buying your book thinking it's a war memoir, but it's reflecting on the soldier and how that affected your life, but it's not a war memoir. >> it's not. it has many aspects of war because my life took place in war, but the pieces memoir that reflect the war particularly are given a lot of context for the

human condition, how we arrive at war, how, you know, how we grow from a child playing war to someone who is a participant and a warrior and the aftermath of being there, the idea of innocence to experience the reflection this thereafter now that we have new knowledge of the confrontation of the most extreme activity which i think is fighting one another. the idea that is a strange one, and so people looking for a straight up war memoir, will not get there. 100 pages of the book reflects my training and going to war with the marines. >> i want to invite the national audience to be part of the conversation and talking about living and dying and serving as a soldier that you explore in the book, and i'm sure he'll

take your questions about this art he's doing and own experiences with it. welcome to join us in that as well. c-span phone numbers are on the screen or tweet us at booktv or e-mail us at booktv.org. >> some things in us are set. my parents who were war protesters -- >> you couldn't have a toy gown as a boy -- toy yon as a boy. >> no, i had to make my own. i felt was it was inevitable,

and i was testing the limits of safety, and those of us who play war, who are not serious about taking it to a professional level, but i always was, and being an artist and being a marine are completely impossible to put together into one person, and i fund them intertwined and interdependent and the disciplines of both were engrained in me when i was young. i knew i was an artist, and i knew in some ways i had to serve, had to be in uniform. >> dwight eisenhower was a writer and painter. >> painter, yeah. >> is this not uncommon for artists to become soldiers? not surprised you find yourself in both? what's the first word about the book that comes to mind? >> curious. you know, it's being curious

about my surroundings, landscape, about my place in time, and i think everybody puts off the fact that we're terminal beings. we get time distracted by life as it happens, and we don't think so much how we arrived here, and furthermore where we end, and this crossed my mind with how much i'm the child that i always was, that i can follow the idea of memory back and retrace myself, and i think in writing the book, the thing i got from it is going from my childhood, i was able to restore my parents, bring people back, and i thought i had lost them, and in some ways, i found much of me that i have taken for granted all this time, and, you

know, i -- it if we go into memory deep enough, we find we have stored incredible amounts of our imprints, our ideas and formed our personality, and it's amazing to see how much of us was here and obvious at a very young age. people who know me, you know, they are not surprised that i was an artist and a marine because those traits were always, you know, kind of on display. there was never the idea that these were the things that i would become, but as you watched my life, as you watch everyone's life, they begin to assess themselves over time, and i think it's interesting. you know, we come from a good childhood, which i did, or a bad

childhood, and how we arrive from childhood is who we are. >> it's not particularly a war memoir, but those who served in the audience could find resonance in the book. i've never come all the way back from the places i've been. we'll take your telephone calls, but tell me about this artwork on the cover. >> yeah, what i wanted was a counted on the that was familiar, common, that had been lost and recovered in some ways, much like memory, and at the same time, as much as it's a common object we all seem to have in a relationship too and the world, it's also symbolic of danger. my last chapter is "ash," but i didn't design the cover. that was alison forner, and i think it's wonderful. >> you're on the air, welcome to

the conversation. >> caller: hello, thank you, how are you? >> doing great. >> caller: great. we grew up playing army and soldier, and we love our country, but, you know, a lot of things -- and i never served myself, you know, i was -- my friends are older than me and had the two year program and then three and four year, but a lot of people who serve believe in peace, too, so we can't forget that. we can't stereotype soldiers are about action and explosives, you know, just progressive violence, you know, but i want bruce springsteen is in california this week, and if you have a chance to catch him, do. he's incredible what he's bringing to the world right now. common sense american citizens, reflect on that for a minute. that's my question because, you know, i a lot of us fall into

the progressive right or the progressive left, when really when you talk to common people, we're very fed up with both parties. majority of americans want the middle of the road. we want to work together. we want a good school. we want good crime prevention, heament -- healthy foods, checks and balances, and for somehow, the media -- >> robert, let me jump in at this point. >> caller: sure. >> taking us in a different direction, but asking you whether or not you are political and your politics come through moving in the direction of the country right now. >> no, you know, my book doesn't address the politics too much. the idea that marines are where the politics send them give the marines one option which is wherever they are, there they are. we have to establish, you know, our sense of justice in humanity in the location we find ourselves.

we don't choose them or make wars. we're sent to them. i wouldn't not have gone because my mission, my job always as a marine leader was to ensure that my ma reaps were well-led, and so i think really that's answering it in some ways what you're saying is choose carefully the wars we extend ourselves to, and the objective is always is peace. >> talking about officers and the freedom corp., and here we are, the "l.a. times" this week published photographs of the soldiers, really, with the remains of taliban fighters, and i'm wondering, a lot of analysis whether or not there's break down in the leaders and the men in the field and women in the field. what are your thoughts having been there on the courts course of duty.

>> i department see the photographs -- >> but you know of them? >> i've been driving for the past 27 days issue and i can guess what they are like. there's a history of that. for about every war, there's been photography -- >> all soldiers who fight? >> yeah, there's something about the fact that that's a recordable moment where you, you know, you are present to those you defeated, the same people who hoped to defeat you. i don't really have comment about this at this point. i don't support that photography. i'm a photographer myself, and i took many pictures myself when i was in iraq, one or two a day over two deployments. they were not images of that, but the idea that we need to record experiences some ways is interesting, and it's been a long tradition that a war, but i have not seen the images.

i don't really want to comment on that. >> does it surprise you? >> it doesn't surprise me. it's not done from evil will. there's been reports of, you know, this immature acts in the face of extreme danger precipitated by being under pressure constantly and being angry and being occasionally victorious, and i think part of the celebration of that has sometimes been these infortunate images which are kind of these private moment celebrations in some strange way, but it's not of merit, and they don't reflect the values that the military hopes to instill in its soldiers and service members, so, you know, i find it very unfortunate , but at the same time, i'm not surprised.

>> a caller from vermont. >> caller: yes, i appreciate very much booktv today, great, great programming as usual. i guess my concern, i have a lot of concerns over u.s. military and how expensive it is, how it creates a stockholm syndrome, and no one wants to make a big deal of the military because of the great sacrifice, but we have concerns at great expense. i don't know the statistics exactly, you know, as to how expensive it is to soldier, but it is quite expensive. how do you justify the great expense that all the taxpayers have to shell out for this war

and previous wars. >> are you asking me to justify the taxpayers' expense for iraq and afghanistan? that's kind of above my pay grade in terms of geopolitical allocation of taxpayer money. you know, we have a military for very particular reasons. there's people you can't negotiate with. bin laden and hitler were ones. occasional, you have to take up arms, and that's why we have the military. if it's misused, that's a betrayal of the men and women who go forward. the electorat make the wars, and if they can't support them, they should end them. they don't support the troops, but yet they continue the war. i don't see americans traumatized by anything, but attached to the war, and in that way, i feel the service has been detached from their country.

we're fighting in a war no one believes in. whose fault is that? i don't see that coming back reflecting on the military, but it's a reflection of the nation, and as we soul search, we have to think about that. what does this war mean to us, all of us, and how does this affect us, but that's not the message of my book. my book is very much about the moment that i arrived in iraq, spent time, and also my last tour in iraq, and how i reflected since then and the idea we carry after math with us after being exposed to extreme circumstances. i speak that a little bit, you know, because we all begin with an innocent idea of what war is, although we are presented with the information about the horror of wars, and yet we're still in some ways drawn to it. i was drawn to it as well, so that's the dichotomy we struggle

with as an artist going to war, is that i was aware that war is destructive, but you discover that war is also betrayal. >> the question is in a different direction. the book reflects on your relationship with your parents. one e-mails us and writes, i met your father in iowa some years before he died at a writer's conference. discuss being a writer for our children? do you feel resentment to your father he may have abused your life or your family's life in his work. >> my father was an endless observer of us. my brother and i, my mother, and everyone around him. he could listen to conversations in his cafe, and if he heard a stray round of dialogue that led to interperm tragedy between two people, he would make a story about it. i appear in his work a lot, but

you know, fictionalized. it's not me, although it's drown from me. i have no resentment at all. i am endlessly filled with admiration for his work and for him, and he never meant me any up appropriate invasion. he wrote from what he knew, and as he watched me, he tried to know me, and so i didn't write in any way to distance myself or compete with him in any way. i don't consider us doing the same thing in some ways. >> started writing by the time he died? >> no. i had written letters home from iraq, which were beginning me on my path towards finding my voice, and i'm a visual artist and i make movies and photographs, and i draw, and i make scroll --

scroll -- sculptures, and i thought i could solve everything with visual means, and my father was a writer, and so he solved everything with language. that's what i learned by writing the letters from war was really war that made it impossible for me to express myself in any other way, and i wrote home once a month, and in the letters, i began to find ways to share my experience which, i think, really became prose. that's when i realized the power of language to transfer these ideas and in a sense of place. visually, i was always able to do that, but now i had to do it dlsh the -- the book is very much about place guiding readers home. >> this is bill in alabama. >> caller: hello, i'm appreciate being on. i wanted to ask benjamin, a

comment related to the other caller. within your experiences in the iraq war, can you give us a sense of soldiering with regard to comment among soldiers about what's happening? i mean, maybe this is something that is private, and you prefer not to respond to it, but can you give us sense of soldiers' comments to each other with this war as to something we should be doing or i'm glad i'm here, and i think we're doing the right thing. anything you can say or would like to say about the atmosphere of conversation within the soldiering situation? thank you very much. >> great question. well, what i think you're asking is do i think we're doing the right thing in the right place as the military? is that what you mean? >> i think it's more not just

you, but among with the people you served. is there a general sense that not only you, but your colleagues feel they're in the right place doing the right thing? >> no, we didn't. many times, we did not. when i led a reconnaissance unit, we were not given the evidence, but sent to find weapons of mass destruction and we didn't have a lot of information about who had the weapons or who didn't. we obeyed under the best connections to locate and destroy that. it was discovered since then there were weapons of mass destruction and the mission changed four or five times in my time in iraq to a return in 2005, and they were trying the best to be the second fallujah which was unpopular globally, although i thought it was very

interesting, tech technical solution dividing out the enemy and made one of the only clean battles between committed enemy and u.s. sources that we had in the war. those who stayed in fallujah were committed to fighting, and those who fought into fallujah were also committed to victory there. we'd never had it again, and we'd never had it before. regionally, it's a diverse country. it's divided into three countries. because of the incredible ethnic and religious divisions, but we didn't. we did what was most convenient for us, which was centralized control back in baghdad, which it was familiar, but i think we very vaguely, and we had the idea behind the mission that had

already eroded away, and it was happening in afghanistan sooner. the hunt for bin laden is why we went there, and bin laden was in pakistan. we continued to hunt down the last of his construction, but really our place in afghanistan is a very foreign one, and i don't think we're there -- i don't think we're equipped to nation build in a place that already has a sense of itself, and it's not the one we hope it has, and so we become an imposition, and i think ideologically in both places, we are irrelevant which is upsetting. >> five minutes left, and next is leland in new york. >> caller: yes, hi. thank you for taking my call. a question for you, and i want to thank you for your service. both my parents were marines, my mom and dad, and not unlike yourself, i just lost my mom as well. she passed on