>> thank you. they do for the bookstore. appreciate everyone coming here tonight. it is just so -- this is such a great institution and such a great thing for the city and country. i wanted to be here. i just really appreciate it. and i want to ask you first to be patient with me. this is only the second time i have talked about this book. is this cannot last week. this might be a little rough tonight, but hopefully will get to this all together. so many of my good friends here. that makes the extra hours. can you hear me? get. and how about this? no? yeah. i can, you know -- there we go. all right. okay. i will repeat anything asset because it really wasn't any point to it anyway. i do feel -- i mean, it is awkward, but the terrible events that happened in boston. my heart goes out to all the

victims of there. it was sort of a shocking thing. are the people as it tonight is my brother. we grew up poor spent part of our youth outside of boston. where is my brother? did he leave? the areas. eric, i went to junior high there. eric went through his school and later on become a police officer. he had friends that were sent down and to boston to help out with the security down there. he now lives in northern virginia. helps manage a helicopter ambulance service, still a full public service, but i think. all the people in law enforcement did an incredible job in boston this past weekend i appreciate them for everything that the dew. there are a couple of other friends and i want to recognize tonight for a different type of service, the journalistic service. one is missing ryan, right here in front, a colleague from

warriors the last decade she covered deck complex in iraq. incredible bravery. an incredible, you know, journalism. warrants trouble who is an editor, one of the team that were the only people that of the weapons of mass destruction story right before the u.s. invasion in 2003. then working with jonathan. at morning -- warning everyone. unfortunately larger outlets to not pick it out. lastly, a friend of mine, kathleen, who has been working since she and i met in bosnia 20 years ago training local journalists around the world and an incredible job of creating local media that whole leaders accountable and hopefully counter some of the corruption and other issues that haunts these countries that i'm going to talk about in just a bit. in terms of the book, i first

want to scale back your expectations. i am not going to offer any magic solution tonight for ending terrorism in our country. i don't have any silver bullet that will suddenly stabilize the middle east. michael tonight and in writing it -- right in this book was to try to think about these challenges that we face in this region in a different way. i hope to provoke discussion. try to keep this short. i am eager to take your questions. there should be a conversation command want to your you think. criticize i have to say. want you to drive this thing. you know, the general view of the middle east is it is the center of chaos, meticulous as the arabs bring producing news reports of analysts by street battles in egypt, syria is just a bloodbath. i agree. it is an area of to mold and the sabahs happened there. none of us know what to make of it.

positive and negative. i guess if there is one simple message or vision i want to give the tonight is the way i'll let the region. again, you can question me when i get to that part of the conversation. it is chaos, but i think there is a large and dynamic going on, and i think there is a historic struggle going on right now across the middle east between hard-line islamists, some of them violent. as we know. more moderate muslims and, i think, are more secular. they, you know -- and i am not, you know, an expert by any stretch, but in conversations with these moderate forces in moderate individuals, they talk about how they're very proud of being muslims and they want to be both muslim but they also want to be modern. they don't see those two as in conflict at all. and i want to talk about that kryptonite. the focus of my book is, what was our track record on helping more moderate muslims and looking forward, is the more that we can do to back those

groups and back those people who -- their really don't want to be dictated to by american soldiers as gunpoint and forced to carry out some american idea of democracy, but they don't want to be ruled by gian this or forcing them at gunpoint to live in this strange sort of 12th century caliphate. and again, this might be somewhat simplistic, but i am just going to read a couple of passes from the book or cite a couple of examples that i think represent these two groups. you know, i have a bias because of my experiences, the kidnapping that was mentioned and one group, you know, the native group that i see on the side of a senator but i am biased against what had been my garden and i was kidnapped. during the seven months i was in captivity i get to know these guys fairly well. they rotated during the seven months, but they all had several things in common. again, and this would be the more conservative, more radical side in the middle east.

by no means does this represent the majority, but is the one they see and hear about on the news the most. so when i was in captivity most of my guards were afghani man in their late 20's, early 30's. all had very limited education from government or religious schools, many had gone to madrasahs. some did not make it past high-school and none of them had seen the world beyond afghanistan pakistan. there was one gun in particular who are live with for six weeks, and he was preparing to be a suicide bomber. i had many conversations with him about why he was preparing for this mission. he was a young man in his 20's , sort of slim with brown hair and brown eyes. he said he had studied engineering in a school. years later he was in the trouble areas of pakistan, to guard me and preparing for a suicide bombing. he was, frankly, better educated than many of the other guards. there were other guards the

could barely read, but he had gone ties cool and planned to go to college and will point. and i finally asked him after a few days with him what he wanted to die and be a suicide bomber. the answer to me that living in this world was a burden for a true muslim and that his real goal in life was to die and go ahead and. he said of their relationships with his parents and siblings did not matter to him. we will was interesting, he was so well educated that we were able to speak in english. he was puzzled by me. he was puzzled by the west. he, like many of my other guards , was absolutely convinced that the september 11th attacks were staged and that there was a worldwide conspiracy by christians and hindus in juice to obliterate islam from the face of the earth. they absolutely believed it. they absolutely watched these videos. get showing evidence of this. and i think -- and we can talk about it. this is potentially -- we don't know what happened in boston,

but potentially this world that the seven were lured into. but there really felt helpless, there was this worldwide conspiracy. they had no way stop it and there were defending their faith and their culture and their way of life from this for an assault you know, and he asked me questions during the thomas mantilla. one of his questions was, you wanted to know of it was true that a necktie like the one i'm wearing tonight was a sacred symbol of christianity. he believed that, you know, as he saw afghanis on local tv stations, government officials dressed in western clothes, they were being forced to dress the way in this was some sign that they were part of this christian conspiracy. he had also believed that we were very weak and only care about the pleasures of this world. that i missed my family. he seemed amused by it. again, he had been brainwashed systematically to not miss his family. his relationship with his family did not matter. that is a clear process.

takes a long time to bring what these kids and becoming suicide bombers. the key thing was severing his ties to his family. i was treated well throughout my captivity. one of the most horrible things about him was that i was brought newspapers to read by my guards. they treat me fairly well. they brought me english-language pakistan in newspapers. this is to my income of the more moderate side pakistan. these newspapers would have hands on them for mobile phone companies in pakistan, shampoo command would actually show pickers -- pictures of women with no stars on their heads. we will show their hair. and after i would read the papers and get rid of them, the suicide bomber in training would go burnham because he felt that having these images in the living area where we were was a san and that if he did not act quickly enough to burn them and get them out of our house he himself was going to go to hell. that is the sort of level of, frankly, despair and fear that

these in guys feel. if they don't, you know, pray properly. if there not humble enough toward gun there going to go through hell. this is the thing that they read all the time. it was really dark and depressing. another sign of all of this command is is the second half -- well, it is not the second half of my book, but it is another way of looking and all of this. want to talk about some of the characters in the book the represented different sight of a very diverse region. i apologize because this is all somewhat simplistic. i want to talk about the pakistani american. a graduate of the university of wisconsin. he would not have work in silicon valley for a few years but decided he really wanted to distance of. he went, got some seed capital from the owners of difference silicon valley companies and went back to pakistan and started what became that country's version of a monster.

and he also started pakistan's first dating website. it is now the most popular website in pakistan. and one of the most successful businessmen in pakistan. similar thing happened with another character in the book. another turkish engineer who worked in silicon valley for a few years. he went home in the notice something, that the wi-fi systems in the united states made by cisco, that did not work for well because the walls are thick in turkish homes. he initially tried to attract american firms to change the equipment, make a stronger so that it would work through the walls and turkey. it would not listen to him. in 2004 he started a company called air time. today it is one of the largest companies in turkey. he has expanded this system across the middle east, beating cisco at its own game, and he is, again, an example of this new, more forward looking

business class that has emerged in the region. last person is 80's in. i was shocked. i was their last year. a safe country. want to state that did not go to a war zone. and there was this brand new sparkling tower there. and -- i'm sorry, the manager of a company called sun guard. on know if you have heard of them. american software company with a 17,000 employees worldwide. they specialize in giving back office things. they have offices in india, and that's our i went into was a joint tower built by sun guard and hewlett-packard. and in the sun guard side of that building are 500 to reasons. when you call for help, i guess you get operators in india and frustrates you. what adelle is doing is they speak french particularly well-educated ones. and what they're doing is

back-office work for french consumers. and they're doing very well. if you are calling the help line in france you're very lucky to get an operator in tunisia who will then help you with whether your concerns are forever company. they also write software. and his dream is that to these you will be like india, and outsourcing hub in the middle east. they're closer to france in terms of time zones and he feels like they can -- they can compete with india and terms of that there wages are much lower. this is sort of the other side. this sort of growing modern side of the middle east that i -- you know, i hope that i think is representative of a different side of the region. to me what is happening in the middle east today, the biggest issue is that it is about jobs. that is the economy, stupid. the world bank estimates that if 50 million new jobs, 50 million new jobs are not created in the middle east by 2020, already

high unemployment levels across the region are going to explode. and i was surprised, but in doing my research for the buck and even for this book tour, former obama administrations were honest about what a poor job the u.s. is doing and economic front. a former undersecretary of state for hillary clinton has now left the ministration. he told me flat out, the united states government has done a terrible job of focusing on economic issues in the middle east. need to be thinking bigger all we're going to wake up here and ask what happened. you have huge youth unemployment and no hope. the frustration he expressed was very similar to what i heard from hundreds of americans, republicans and democrats, civilians and soldiers in afghanistan and pakistan and iraq over the years. people that go into these countries all agree that security is vital, the most important thing. you cannot have economic growth the security. they realize that in the long run the best way to counter militancy was creating economic

growth. that consensus never seemed to arrive in washington. we spent over $1 trillion. and of that 95 percent was spent on military efforts. and when we did make civilian efforts there were two dynamics that i thought doom to the u.s. effort. one was the anemic state of our own civilian institutions and the other one frankly was cloaked socratic local governments. i can talk more about that later on. it is clear that in some places we did not have been partners. no matter what we did and how well we carry out our program to simply was not going to work. people volunteer to go over and find themselves trapped in this very dysfunctional american aid

system. they felt it was dominated by creating what was called metrics , numbers, schools built, students enrolled, the number of politicians trained to that would impress members of congress. and as was mentioned earlier, for-profit contractors dominated the effort. and the rise of contractors is a reflection of the lack of desire and a for increasing the size of the state department or u.s. aid. much easier politically to vote for a larger military but not for a larger state department. the same dynamics that i saw continue, one person i met in researching the book was a tunisian american. a 48 year-old ebay executive, and he was asked in 2011 to be part of the state department delegation to north africa. this was an outgrowth of president obama's 2009 speech in cairo which was very popular in

the region and raise a lot of upset. and so what he did was he went to denny's yeah, morocco, and algeria with a group of high-tech executives an angel investors. and in each of these countries they stopped. the u.s. embassy sponsored a competition where young people would come up with business ideas for high-tech start-ups. and there were dozens of people will apply. the top 50 would get to come in and meet these americans. i was not there, but i was told it was a very exciting day when the delegations came in. all these people were pitching their ideas. the winner, it was actually a young woman who proposed creating a biotech start-ups. and the only problem was that the other members of the delegation realized as they were preparing, you know, and making this trip and then eventually choosing a winner, this program was so poorly funded that there was no prize for the winning entrepreneur. so the other members of this

delegation couple together some kind of reward for this young woman who had won the competition and for the winners in algeria and morocco. that report was a three month at the tech town incubator in detroit, michigan. and, frankly put, we have to do better than that. i think better track records exist in the region. you know, many people site turkey. it has its flaws in terms of democracy. the prime minister has done some outrageous things, but economically i see the european union exception process which germany years because turkish leaders to reform their economy as a positive model in terms of creating economic growth. turkey is not a member today, but they don't really care about it. turkey has a faster growing economy than any european nation they are growing in influence across the region and proud of it. terms of other positive

examples, and-read what it is. discussion tonight is a sad statement, but the ongoing palestinian prime minister was known and credited by many people in the region for focusing on creating viable palestinian destitution straw particularly the police and security forces. i said in as an example of the kind of leader that exists out there that you could potentially work with is not a great example , but to talk more. president obama mentioned there are now 100 high-tech firms on the west bank. i interviewed this israeli venture capitalist. cisco has invested in them. it is an area of the economy that can and should grow. what is the answer in terms of u.s. policy? first of all i think we have to scale back we're trying to do. i mentioned corruption and no a specifically name the karzai government that has been a huge

impedimenta things we try to achieve. hopefully it will be one of his brothers. we don't -- you know, if we don't feel that we have a local partner i think we should hold back in our aid efforts. one thing that we can do is create more incentives like its european union system that was used in turkey. two years ago the secretary clinton used the term economic statecraft. any of you heard that all? this is journalists fall. we don't write about these things. she declared in 2011 in a speech in new york that economic tradecraft was now at the heart of american foreign policy. she defined economic statecraft as creating jobs as home and abroad. in terms of the middle east to sort of call for the sophisticated new effort to integrate the region's economies she proposed the creation of an incentive fund -- excuse me, and incentive fund for post errors from countries.

$500 million. just for comparison sake, we give 3 billion per year in aid to israel, so 500 million for all the posters prairie region presuppose to to congress last year and it was essentially dead on arrival. last week john kerrey proposed basically the exact same thing, roughly a $500 million fund to try to up create incentives for these countries to enact reforms. if you enact the reforms you then get basic brakes in terms of aid itself and then eventually tariffs are reduced and other things that will hopefully help economic incentives to get people to actually do this. , suggesting we hurl tens of billions of dollars at the middle east. specific examples. the former state department official. he says that we should use the money from the persian gulf to

find a regional bank would focus on small and medium-size businesses. a former u.s. ambassador to this is a need to listen more. you come in with the american agenda and we have to get these projects finished. we have to get good numbers. and then last week another state department official gave a speech which i think the title is great. diplomacy in an age of austerity i think that is a reality we have to face. he talked about trying to get american companies to sell in the middle east. in 2011 chinese companies sold $150 billion worth of goods across the middle east. that is twice the amount american companies sold in the region. one bright spot was actually the united arab emirates, obviously were dubai is located. believe it or not according to

the state to artificial the united states currently exports more to the united arab emirates that it does to all of india. that is because they're is a huge market for restructure and energy and those areas we do very well in command we could be, you know, more aggressive in those areas competing with chinese firms and other firms. you know, i mentioned this entrepreneurship delegation earlier. that could be expanded. in the educational programs would help. nephew of overall engagement with the region strengthens american security. does not threaten us. and i ask the people what was the worst thing that the u.s. could do in the region and they said it was to launch another ground invasion. what undermine them as moderates and claim these conspiracy theories and said, what should we do? and they said private investment it did not want big debt programs. they said educational opportunity. people can come study here.

given what has happened in boston. another is difficult. they also said tourism and interaction. there would love it if americans would come to these countries. not as keen to get cheated today that would be an example of a country that think has handled this transition poorly. think they have done a poor job, but there are other places and ways that we can interact economically that can produce positive results. and in the wake of boston i think if we sort of engaged in this fortress mentality, that is in a sense with the extremists want us to do. there want to make this a war between religions. there was to discriminate against muslims in this country. you know, is very difficult to do. tragedy that has happened there. we have to be vigilant. we have to find our law enforcement and intelligence efforts absolutely, but i think it is a mistake to overreact and play into their hands by becoming a fortress and allowing bigotry to dominate the way we respond to these things.

i do believe that over time i think prosperity and working with the muslim moderates, not american soldiers and draws tracks, the best ways to eradicate militancy. and thank you for listening to me and i am eager to hear questions. and now this is all very complicated topic. [applause] >> hello. >> side. >> i in no way disagree with your economic pressed, but i was just reading earlier today on the internet, an article by a woman never before, an egyptian woman fleeing from islam. she wrote a very, taught, logical and critical attack on the idea of relying on

moderates. some my question is, if you -- and i hope this is not seen in polite, but if you know that in most muslim majority countries in the middle east it is a death penalty offense to commit blasphemy or very broadly defined, what they are moderates have to say about that? two we just ignore that for an endless amount of time or is a problem? >> i would say that the country that is most famous for that is saudi arabia. i think that we have made a mistake over the years by aligning ourselves. they have spread throughout the region. this very conservative interpretation of islam. i don't -- and i am not -- and if i'm wrong, i apologize. i know of anyone in turkey who has been prosecuted or executed for blasphemy. jordan, i don't know of that happening. tony's death.

>> in pakistan. >> yes. the minister. >> who was executed? >> i agree. but so what do we do? there are people like him, the governor who was assassinated because it criticized the blasphemy law. his son was actually subsequently kidnapped and remains in captivity. do we sort of abandoned this effort? do we reward his assassins to make because i'm trying to argue that there are two groups year. he was a brave man who is a modern muslim trying to camino, lost his life in the struggle is going on for the control of the state. some question is, how can we help people like him? and there are many, you know, mr. rushdie was killed, but i would say she was the kind of person with the vision and the interpretation of islam the week, you know, should be working with. so i don't -- i think if we give up on their religion, that is

what they want us to do. one is to see all of them as this sort of extreme right wing, if you will. i don't think that is representative of the faith that covers a billion people all across the world. and so i just, you know, you can disagree with me, but that is my interpretation. thank you. >> the ongoing shale gas revolution, you know when talking about. to you think -- what kind of impact is there? basically could it decrease the importance? disappear from the headlines and stop worrying about afghan or a guitar or something like this. >> i think that the shell gas revolution, the fracking increase.

energy supplies in the u.s., it won't change american foreign policy. we will be less dependent on oil from the middle east. concern is that china today gets 70% of its energy supplies from the middle east. india is about the same. europe as well. in the global economy is so interlinked that even if the u.s. is not dependent on middle eastern oil, i feel like the instability in the region where the chinese economy and the european economy. so, you know, i think we should step back and do less, but i don't think we can ignore the middle east because it is going to -- turbulence there will impact the worldwide oil prices. and we have seen it with the european debt crisis. if our economic problems in europe, we have economic problems here.

>> going back to the question, if you think about today it is not the middle east, but you have this same moderate and we hope, some moderate muslims. then you have the ruling elite who are very radical muslims. how can we support the moderates without changing the many as of their own people? it is a problem. it could be a problem in egypt. it certainly is a problem in pakistan that association with americans is toxic. they lose all their credibility with their own people. and that was the reason that obama was sort of caught. he did not know how to support the moderates during the green uprising. did not work.

how could we support then without damaging them in their own country? >> i think that we -- you're right, and we don't want to be -- we do undermine and if yeltsin overly. there was an effort -- there was this thing. internet in a suitcase, u.s. department of the doe is trying to get technology in a country that will allow information to again. they have had a hard time blocking internet. not a great answer, but i go back. we should ask these moderates what they want us to do. they might not want us to publicly say we back them because it hurts. i would cite the green revolution as an example of this epic struggle is going across the region. those are real proud, hundreds of thousands of iranians wanted change. you know, they exist. as i said in the beginning, no answers to these complex questions, but i guess i would credit the administration with

backing off. because it is a problem. if you are seen as too pro-american it is an issue. just quickly on pakistan, i believe that there are times when from strikes should be used as a last resort to get militants, senior militants and their remote areas, but we need to minimize them, make them public. they should be handed over to the american military. very clear process kind you can laugh about american military processes. and that we killed civilians cannot pay compensation is only kill civilians, explain how we're starting in line and make all this public. we are absolutely shooting ourselves in the foot with this secret from strike approach. >> i think that will work at a little bit.

i guess i would take a little issue with the weapon of mass destruction, the bomber is actually the weapon of mass destruction. it was not a bird flew the brought down the pentagon or the world trade center or anthrax. the real issue was stability. all it takes is to creatures to create havoc among hundreds of thousands of people. so one part of that stability involves proper security. and that involves all sorts of places in the world, especially the middle east. since what takes down a lot of people is anarchy. the other part is corruption. you have really not said how to deal effectively with corruption on all levels. he talked about the top, but not the bottom. and then the other little impetus that goes on, drugs. that becomes another added a

factor with polygamy, lots of families. >> to you have a question? >> that's right. the question is, how do you bring order to disorder when you have a tremendous number of illiterate people and high-tech companies that come into an area that really are out of their lead in dealing with the literacy. i think you allow the local people to sort out these issues. i think there are people in these countries that are trying to improve education, improve the economies, and i think that you trained journalists, as my friend kathleen has, to expose corruption locally. believe there or not, they're independent tv stations and news stations that attack corruption. afghans are as outraged by the corruption as americans are. and these societies, and i

apologize, but this stereotype. there are problems with the literacy, but there much more complicated than some simply massive illiteracy in polygamy. there are forces in societies that are just like your when they want better government. they want less corruption. i think we kind of have to trust them to, you know, train them, given the opportunity to try to solve these problems themselves. and i just don't see how walking away from the region improves any of the problems we have talked about. >> how would you deal with these creatures in guantanamo who are on the food strike? >> first i think it's wrong to call the creatures. they're human beings. [applause] >> whenever they have done i think it is important that we should try these people. i think that there is a general sentiment people talk about cultural differences. i want to say everything is the same, but one of the strongest things you saw in the air of spring and one of the greatest traditions is the idea of

justice. i think not trying them, holding them for 12 years without trial actually hurts our calls. makes average people in the region think that we are in progress, that we say we support the rule of law and democracy, yet we take these people and hold them for 12 years without trial. it does not intimidate these would-be bombers. they have no expectation of fair treatment from american officials. there are delusional. live with them for a while. being tough on these guys is not like to have any impact whatsoever. we just heard ourselves mild and the mayor for so long without trial. >> i will finish off quickly by saying what to these people expect from the virgins in paris? >> to be honest, they have been lied to. i feel sorry for them. they have been used by their own religious leaders and polluted in the doing these things.

>> they say independent bookstores are a dead species. well done. i have a question. i actually, discuss the radio column on the day before, radicalism is what is to be bland. i come from india. india has stayed independent for 50 years. and for millions of years before , starting with the ninth century, i tell you one thing. if the state of islam. a problem. a lot of muslim friends in india. muslims are more than in pakistan. the point is the becomes a political issue. does not become an allegis to shoot. as the difference. the differences political and

not religious. so my question would be, let's say, less taken example and say -- there is a country. start a large army. the army, some of the army is bad and it attacks the neighboring country. the neighboring country, they come to that country and saying, you're armies attacking us. the king replied oh well, we are good. that army, a few of them are bad. you deal with them, not us. >> you are talking about the pakistani army. >> well, if you will. i am not saying anything. >> i will say it. think you're talking about the pakistani army. the u.s. is saying india, they do bad things now and then, but you have to live with the pakistani army.

>> go ahead. >> i agree with you. >> when you say okay, your country is good but your army is bad. it's all right. we will die. take care of them all we will get them. >> i don't make any assumptions about where you're talking about i think that the u.s. has said a failed policy of giving too much aid and support to the pakistan military. the military -- the pakistani military, many of them have fought and died fighting the pakistan taliban. there are senior generals and members of the intelligence service who continue to believe they can use militants as tools to confront india. they use and support the taliban to a maintain control of afghanistan. they see this whole american presence and efforts by india and the u.s. to create a pro indian regime in afghanistan. and you have essentially got a proxy war in the idea of pakistan generals between the

taliban, pro pakistan and the karzai government which they see as pro india. they are wrong. we should be working to back civilians. >> right. >> in pakistan. you know, i think that would -- a loss of power by the pakistani army would help stabilize the region. >> in the wake of the recent bombings in boston, the next day cannot does not really appreciate these talks. happened the next day. sixteen people were killed. it's a big indian city, if you don't know. so the thing is, your book says, okay. give them technology. the moderate muslims. i don't have any opinion about it. because for me religion is as good as his followers. anyone, it is true for --

>> i would agree to you that the danger is the use of religion to gain political power. >> that is what is happening. >> that is what they're doing. >> to have a point by saying okay, radicalism is what we need to blame and not islam or any other religion for that matter? >> again, not a scholar on islam. there are different interpretations of it and i would say that i oppose, you know, the extreme interpretation of islam that gives women no rights and things that they should create a 12th century caliphate. think there are many pakistan is an indian muslims who also disagree with that interpretation. >> anybody who does know, india has done it in 98 perry supported the northern alliance backed by karzai with technology , everything, but nothing happened. the thing that happened was in 99 we get hijacked. if you don't know. >> thank you. >> that taliban carried out that

hijacking. and along with pakistan in militants, karzai had nothing to do with this. >> right. that is what we get. >> well short. sorry. it's a lively evening at least you're really can look at it that way. >> the questions here, most of them seem to ignore our history in the region. for decades we supported dictatorships. their resources. you go back. supporting. selling them weapons of mass destruction which were used against. now we're saying, by the way, they used gas against their own people. against the wrong. we sold them that gas in the past. so our history with the region is pretty bad. our decisions regarding the region are very bad. we've supported the wrong people of the longest time, and i am

assuming that is one of the reasons there are conspiracies where people think, oh, for the last 30, 40 years they have been doing harm to us. why should we expect something good? european countries like france have their own history in the region also. so my question is, with that type of behavior it is almost like a parent coming back and saying, please forget about the past. let's do something good. i don't think that is going to work. my argument would be, do you really think that we, after the use of abuse and neglect, can go back and tell them how to live their lives? it just doesn't make sense to my head. >> i don't think we should go and tell them how to live their lives. i think we should admit that you are absolutely right. this policy of backing the saudi family because they give us

well, this policy of backing the pakistan family. this is all backfired on us. and i think we should step back and not be so public. in egypt in particular we are using mistrusted because we forget as americans that we have supported dictators for 40 years . there is an opinion poll last year that showed more people -- was it to more people opposed the egyptian government accepting aid from the united states than the egyptians who opposed the peace treaty with israel. more egyptians are against accepting american aid and egyptians you don't want to have a peace treaty with israel. i agree with you. there is sort of a catch-22 where the u.s. is still seen as this sort of all-powerful force in the region. we are behind everything that is going on. you know, i agree with you.

i just think my concern is that we will completely step away from a region and think it is not our problem. we will be fine on its own. maybe carious and draw a stretcher and there. i don't think that is an answer either. and it is not a great dancer. but ryan crocker and listening to these groups, there is, and polls show, admiration for the american ideal of democracy and accountability. we don't implemented well. also admiration for american ways of doing business command and sorry to be take utopian. when i meet people there really are excited about that. not every person can go work for good will, but many of them say they want to. and i apologize if it is a cliche, but this muslim and modern thing. they want to be part of the world community. globalization is happening to be the most popular soap opera across the middle east is a turkish upper right now. that is about the assault on

sarin in the 12th century. it is -- i just want to say. is very racy. clerics have criticized it, but there is this, again, a desire to be a part of the world, but be proud of their own cultures and not to be so backward. again, something between american puppets and ruled by janice. >> the u.s. army reserves, national guard, they are overstretched, tired, and the united states navy and air force are playing the role of the united states army of there. and the europeans. i want to see the european armies over there. i mean, i see the french stepping up to the plate. but to create employment the europeans, the greeks, the germans, there are so many other countries. where are their armies? everything is going on in their front yard.

a soldier, national guard from wyoming it is not the diddly-squat about islam of event. i am just tired of all this intervention. on the conservative. we are done. let the europeans step up. >> i agree. i agree that we should not have any more military interventions. we have tried that. yes into trillion dollars. sending in 100,000 american troops is not going to stabilize the country. that is why i am calling for more civilian efforts. i'm and spent time with all of these military guys. i remember being in northern iraq and after the invasion in 2003 in towns with fall and these soldiers will show up. the colonel would say, corporal zones, you know, you're going to get the schools running again. okay. the tennant smith, you do garbage collection. okay, captain johnson, you fix the electricity. and all the soldiers were like an awareness of billions.

you know, and we have this overly lopsided focus on military efforts. is the only thing that we adequately resource and our government. and let me say, the military is spectacular. they train their soldiers. they have great planning for what they're trying to do to get in and out of the country and they execute well. you know, i am not saying other government agencies can be as good as the military, but when we criticize government and say it is a mess and cannot do anything we don't criticize our military which in the end is a government institution. and anyway i agree with you about less intervention spirit of france to go into molly but generally speaking we are better off working and training and funding of local forces in these countries now want to fight militants. most supported the french intervention. the key now is training, and it won't be easy. it will take a long time to push back against these.

it is much more effective when local forces to it than if americans come in and do it. >> we have time for one more question. you are all here on a historic night. we are selling wine and beer. and you can purchase it. help yourself afterwards. it will take one more question. thank you. >> what is your opinion of how the western countries should deal with the problem in syria right now? >> i think, you know, simply put i think that the u.s. should allow -- there has been a process where the u.s. is blocking or asking turkey to not allow certain weapons to go in to syria for the rebels, particularly anti-tank weapons and anti-aircraft weapons. i don't think anti-aircraft up

and should go in, but i think we should allow the rebels to be harmed by saudi arabia and qatar. my analogy is it is like bosnia. it is a stalemate. now the civil war. a u.n. arms embargo which essentially froze in place the military advantage of the bosnian serbs. we armed the croatians and the bosnian secretly. there were gains on the ground, not magical american airstrikes. i know it will lead to more bloodshed in the short term, but i think that arming the rebels will end the stalemate there. >> qatar and saudi arabia are our men. >> the rebels have claimed -- and it has been lifted now, but the americans were limiting the types of weapons that could go in. they did not want sophisticated weapons going in. new american effort. that is getting these more sophisticated weapons. we really were limiting what

kind of weapon was going in. they have had lots of small arms and our peas that any more sophisticated step to deal with syrian armor and those kinds of things. to me it is your arm and arm fully or you don't arm. not sort of half and half. think you very much. again -- [applause] i appreciate all the questions and it's good to have this conversation. thank you. >> while we were in arizona, book tv with the help of our local cable partner time warner cable took a tour of the corner bookshop. we talked with the owner.

she describes the difficulty yuma arizona has the nation's highest unemployment rate. sitting in about 26%. >> i have always liked to read ever since i was a child. i like to talk to people about it. well, they all ask my opinion on all of them. a lot of them that meet our new authors. i read a lot. tony hillerman is like the off. you know, like that. i have to read a lot so that i can -- okay. who writes like this. well, no. >> some of the challenges tony bookstore? >> well, trying to keep the stock moving, trying to of make

a buck. mostly just trying to keep everything easy to find and trying to keep up with what is new and what is, you know, what everybody is reading right now. and mostly trying to get my story out there to the public so they here. and i have been up in 18 years to my people that come in all the time and say, we didn't know you're there. this year has been our worst year. we have done probably half what we did last year in sales. so it is really a struggle. yes. and i know one of the other used bookstores here in town, they are closing because they could not make it. the one downtown closed because they could not make it. and i am really not making it, but, you know, i might move to a smaller place, but i want clothes. but that is the struggle right

now. >> do you have a plan in place? >> not really. i have lots of well customers. i don't want to just close and leave them out there. but if i move to a smaller place i might be able to maintain. i have had a lot of visitors come in and say, oh, our local and wherefrom, local blog shop at the close. and i have had two or three that live in san diego. they come all the way here from san diego because they don't have anything in san diego anymore. i am sure there are, but they don't know where they are at probably. the e-readers are so new. the new gadgets. always popular. but i have had a couple of people say that, you know, i can come here and get them cheaper than i can buy one online on the

e-reader. and they cannot always find a series of their reading. you know. so hopefully some of the e-readers will become disenchanted and come back. >> coming up next, look at one book yuma, local literacy program sponsored by the public library and paper creating days the committee in dialogue and what issues important to the region and the world. book tv learned about this program and our recent visit with the help of our local partner, time warner cable. >> as you may know, nancy perle, who was a librarian at the seattle public library started the concept of what if one city read one book and discussed it in the late 90's. and in the early 2000's the state of arizona actually started a program, the library, state library started one book arizona. we just sort of piggybacked on

that idea and started one but you must be restarted in 2003 was bless me ultima. that was an initiative of the humus on. next year we went dark. we were just sort of talking about what is it really want to do with this program. what kind of community partners do we bring in and how could we really make this successful so the newspaper in library partnered up. we got on board the arizona western college library, northern arizona university library and the arizona western college office of diversity. we had a lot of input from the community college. some of the high schools were brought in to ask what kind of programs there were looking for and what they thought their teachers and students to be interested in. took us another year to bring all that together. what to do that we kicked off again formally in 2004 with the highway. fabulous to work with. a very understanding that it was our first year really doing a

big program with an author. just wonderful to work with. it just has been going on ever since. i have been here about five years, and every year we get a very positive response. the main point of contact for people here the program. and i never get complaints. it's always what you doing this, how are you doing this. this is a great book. i appreciate you doing this. a lot of grass -- it comes from the people who read the book and turned off because a good chance to meet the authors. you never really get that chance. this program brings that to people and they seem to be very excited about it every year of. come from filling a room to are we going to have enough room. and that is just the last few years. garth stein wrote the art of racing in the rain, and he came here for today's ended three events, one at the college, what the main library, and then we had a special event friday morning, the first since the

book is narrated by a dog, we really wanted to bring in an animal aspect. so we had the humane society in the guy come to the heritage library, and everyone was on the lawn. people not to line up and meet card to have him sign a book and then we got to learn a little bit about what the humane society in the puppy raises to. it was a little detour from the normal community q&a and then sign the book. i think people really enjoyed it. we try to choose books that are topical to our community, usually either hot political topic charges something that people in our community can relate to. immigration, economy, real immigration. and right down to our last book, a lot of response that way. the said bill website. everyone we have this book we up to it.

we updated that continuously. at the small but they have the website. "we put up the website on our home page. >> the ultimate goal is to really get as many people as possible. then they come together and discuss it. how often have you read a really great book or article and then you don't have anybody to talk to about it. find out what other people thought about it. that part of the event was interesting when people ask their questions. ..