>> did anyone ever see him dance? >> no. >> in houston, he was in a houston company. anyone ever see him? >> i never saw him live -- >> the actual person we're talking about. >> if you get on youtube and put in his name, you can find

performances that he has -- and i did that when we -- >> what did you think? >> ', he's wonderful. he's wonderful. >> one thing that i'd like to talk about just for a minute was when he defected, that portion. did anyone have any comments about that, with his marriage to, what was her name, elizabeth? >> elizabeth. >> do you think that was a marriage of true love, or was he just trying to stay in america? >> a little bit of both, i think. because when she asked him did you really love me or just -- he hesitated, in the movie. he hesitated and then said, i love you. >> and he stayed with her after. [inaudible] so he must have loved her. >> that marriage lasted -- >> didn't last very long. >> couple years, was it? we're talking about his first

marriage, yeah, his first one. >> i thought, i thought she showed great bravery in staying with him when they were kidnapped at the chinese consulate and force today stay there until, well, mrs. bush was instrumental, barbara bush was instrumental in helping them get out of the chinese consulate. because they were ready to ship them straight back to china. >> it was because the media got hold of it -- >> yes. >> and made it so bad for china that they had to. >> yes. and i think the fact that the vice president of this country and his wife who is on the board of the houston ballet went to bat for him as well. >> you know, once somebody defects, you really can't expect that country to let him back in. >> no, i know that. >> even the eight years, he was lucky -- >> he was lucky he was able to go back. but i just thought it was, you know, so -- it had to have been so hard on him not to have that

close contact with his family. although he hadn't had a lot of close contact because he only went home once a year. >> you know, on that point -- [inaudible] defecting and being held at the embassy, that was really disturbing. i mean, the whole issue of propaganda and giving people the wrong with idea of what other countries are like, you can really see how wars can start. and his life was in danger. that was a very stressful part of the story. and the only way that, the only thing that helped me was that i knew it was an autobiography, and he knew he survived and was still alive. [laughter] right? so i was like it's going to have a happy ending. >> yes, ma'am? >> i think it's a tribute to the man that here we are with this book and discussing it and his

life. and his determination to achieve all that he did. i think it's wonderful. >> yes. >> wonderful experience. >> why didn't you like it? >> you know, i knew someone would ask me that. [laughter] i think it's because i've read a whole lot of books about asians, because i'm asian and where it's about immigrating or defecting, i just felt this didn't hit the mark quite, although i agree with what everyone says. it's a heartwarming struggle -- [inaudible] as a piece of literature i wasn't blown away. [inaudible conversations] >> journalistic. >> yeah, the other book we

read -- [inaudible] which, you know, i don't cry when i read very much, and that book just tore my heart out. >> the other comments in we wrap up our discussion. great discussion today, folks. thanks for coming, and we'll see you next time. >> now, hear grace robbins talk about her book, "cinderella and the carpet bagger" in palm springs, california. >> it was early one morning, i was on my way to school. ♪ that early monday morning, i was on my way to school. ♪ that early monday morning when i broke my mother's rule. ♪ bye-bye, cherry --

[laughter] >> i don't think grace will be above it tonight. i think it'll be a lot of fun. she's led the life that we've all dreamt about living, and hopefully -- and she'll answer questions. she'll answer questions, so we'll have fun. so enjoy your dinner, and as soon as we're ready, we'll have the lady up to speak to you. so enjoy and thank you for coming. [inaudible conversations] >> i was a working girl. this was in the '60s.

>> working working girl? [laughter] >> actually, i was a very hard working girl because i was a casting director for television commercials for gray advertising in new york. and when i say i had to work, it's because i was married to a very handsome artist who refused to work. [laughter] anyway, needless to say, that was not a very happy marriage, and one day i was asked to be on a yacht at the 79th street brook basin, this was in new york, alone. i wanted to be alone. there was a little library in the boat, and i picked up a book, a big, heavy book, and it was the carpet baggers. i never knew anything about it, and i didn't know anyone had

ever spoken about it or -- i had never read about it. i started to read the carpetbaggers. well, i couldn't put it down. can and i loved it. and when i finished that weekend on sunday, sunday night i finished the book, and i looked for the author, and i said i want to meet this man. i've got to, i've got to meet this man who wrote this book. and so the next morning i'm back in my office, and i get a phone call from one of the agents who said i'm going to take you to lunch. and i said, but you've never asked me for lunch. he said, well, it's not my lunch, it's harold robbins' lunch, okay? >> i'm sorry, i think i -- okay, i'm better now. and do you know, that was the

beginning of my cinderella life. because he wooed me without making a move. hello. and fortunately, he was unhappily married -- [laughter] and so we would meet for lunch, or we would meet for cocktails, and he would go to connecticut on the train, i would walk with him to the station, and then i would go to my little apartment on 72nd street on central park west, and that's what we did for a year. until one day he said why don't you come to hollywood. and i said, well, i'm a new yorker, i've never been to los angeles. he said josephine levine wants me there, and we'll have a great time there. that was his producer of all his books.

he made them into movies. so we go. as i tell you this story, i'm reliving it. [laughter] we go to the beverly hills hotel, and of course, he has a bungalow. hello. [laughter] and he orders champagne and caviar as soon as we get into the bungalow, but we never had any of that. [laughter] and so he says, well, why don't we extend this little time together and go to hawaii. and we did. we went to kauai. it was very rustic then. it was called the plantation, and there were little cottages, and we were in the missionary cottage -- [laughter]

i don't have to tell you why. [laughter] and so this was the beginning of my cinderella story. we returned to new york. i'm supposed to go back to my handsome, nonworking artist husband, and he's supposed to go to connecticut, and we don't. he said, where are you going? i guess i'm going home. he said, no, come on. we're going to, we're going to live the rest of our lives together. and that's what we did. i had the most wonderful experiences because of harold robbins, and i want you to know something. if you think that everything that is wonderful is going to stay like that, it doesn't. [laughter]

unfortunately. but i never thought that. i thought, oh, this is going to be forever. i mean, we have villas everywhere, we have mansions, we have yachts, we have -- you name it, we had it. and i thought, well, this is going to be hike it is now, and it can't possibly change. it's too good. but too good is too good, huh? yeah? too good to last? one day harold after i had this wonderful daughter, i gave birth to adriana in the south of france, in cannes. well, we were three of the happy people in the world until one -- happiest people in the world

until one day harold said i think we should have an open marriage. just like that. and i didn't even know what that moment -- what that meant really. i go off to work -- he couldn't write at home. there were too many distractions. we had homes everywhere, so when you're in l.a., i'll be in the south of france, or if you're in the south of france, i could be in acapulco, or if you're in acapulco, i could be in new york. and i said, well, i know that you want to work away from home, but i don't understand what you're asking. i didn't understand. he said, well, he said, i'm going to be away for six weeks sometimes, maybe even longer, and i'll need a woman. and then i understood. [laughter]

and if anything, if there is anything that i want everyone to know who reads my book, open marriages do not work. [laughter] >> you're right. >> they don't. [laughter] they don't. okay. in the beginning it seemed like it was working. of course, harold had rules. he said, number one, he said it's important that we tell everybody -- no, no, i'm sorry, we tell each other everything. so that -- then we're not cheating on each other. hello. okay? [laughter] and then it's important that we do, we do no --

[inaudible] in other words, no celebrities, no one in our social area. and, well, you know, no long-term affairs. so where does that leave you in i don't know. [inaudible conversations] [laughter] >> were you allowed to do what he was allowed to do? >> exactly. he said you can do the same. but i didn't care to really. and then i realized that he was breaking all the rules. hello. i mean, he was going with this angelique, this french actress, hello. and then he picked up this little waif at the beach in st. tropez, leslie, and she

practically moved in with us. and then -- did you get can up to that part if. [laughter] and so i thought, well, i don't know. i think if something comes my way, i'm not going to refuse it. [laughter] and sure enough, something came my way. >> sean connery. >> hello. [laughter] i was at a dinner party at sa sa gabor's. yes, yes. and she made her hungarian goulash. >> that was a naughty girl too. >> no. well, the day before she was man

handled by a police officer in beverly hills. and she was cuffed, and she showed the markings on her wrist. oh, she said, he was so cruel to me. [laughter] well anyway, at the dinner party i was alone, harold was off writing, and sean connery was -- [inaudible] [laughter] and so we introduced ourselves very formally. he was gorgeous. and he thought i wasn't bad. and he said, you know, this is a very boring dinner. shall we go somewhere and have a drink? and i said, well, i live not far from here, and i can always pour you a drink. [laughter]

well, i can tell you, i was shaken and stirred. [laughter] [applause] so life was going around like that, you know? and all of a sudden destiny had a way of changing things entirely. you never know what's out there for us. we don't know s. and harold had an accident. it was a cocaine accident. yeah. he fell, and -- he passed out, and he fell and broke his hips. and i could see that our lifestyle was coming to a screeching halt. no more. he came -- he stayed at home. he was in a wheelchair. he stopped writing away from

home. he had to write at home. it was all changed. and i realized that he needed a lot of help, a lot. he would -- he needed like 23 pills a day and at certain times of the day. and my assistant, jan, said you know, mrs. robbins, i can help you with that. and so she helped me -- >> uh-oh. [laughter] >> and then she helped herself to him. [laughter] and that's what we did for quite some time. until it was time to sort of i'm afraid the word is end it. i don't like that word, but things can't continue that way. and i hope that when you read my

book, you'll see that it all did end. it was right for all of us -- harold and jan and me and adriana. thank you. i'm so thrilled that i was able to really finally get this book out. it took 20 years, and i thank gilbert holmes who is absolutely the best friend one could have. he said why don't you get that book out of the closet and start reading it and see if you want it published. and that's how it happened. [applause]

i've been talking about this book forever. you know 20 years. but let me tell you something, this is the best time of all, and i thank you all for being here. i appreciate it. thank you, mel. prison. [applause] thank you so much. >> with the help of our local partner, time warner cable, we sat down with dee an tillman in california. ms. dillman details the manhunt of donald cook who killed a deputy sheriff in 2003. >> at high noon on an august day, august 2, 2003, deputy sheriff steven sorenson was following up on a complaint about a squatter in that area of the antelope valley which was near palmdale, one of the two big cities in that part of l.a.

county. and he had evicted this squatter who had been befouling the desert and just leaving a trail of garbage everywhere and annoying various neighbors. and he had -- one of the residents had called deputy sorenson to make sure that this squatterrer was gone. so the squatterrer was living of on the outskirts of donald cook's property. so nobody knows exactly why sorenson turned down donald cook's driveway on august 2nd at high noon, 2003. but it seems as if he was following up on this, the complaint about the squatter. >> donald cook was a dedicated hermit, and in the 2 22st sent -- 21st century it's hard to imagine if. who is a hermit? well, we do have a hermit

kingdom outside of los angeles. many of them are living on the other side of los angeles proper in the antelope valley which is the mojave half of los angeles county. and he dropped out of civilization sometime in the 1970s and left his fam ally and -- family and just wasn't cut out for conventional life. and like a lot of people, found a new home in the desert just about an hour away from the styled owes and the beaches. interestingly enough, steven sorenson also didn't like city life, and he was originally a surfer and lifeguard from the south pay of los angeles -- south bay of los angeles. and he ultimately fellowed the beach -- fellowed the beach and headed -- fled the beach and headed into the desert. he loved our wide open spaces and also was not cut out for conventional life. and he volunteered for the job of resident deputy in the

antelope valley. and that's not a job that most cops want to have. you're on a very remote beat. if you need backup, it might take an hour for somebody to arrive. and look what happened when he went to, when he made a fateful turn down donald cook's driveway. strangely enough, seven years prior to that approach to donald cook's trailer, he had -- he and cook had had another encounter on a remote desert highway in the antelope valley that almost led to violence. sorenson had pulled cook over for reckless driving on a very remote patch of pavement, and a conversation quickly escalated, you know, into an argument. and the two almost came to blows until backup arrived at that time.

and cook, after that he filed a number of complaints against sorenson. he tried to get him fired, and he sent letters from everyone, from then-head of the l.a. county sheriff's department steven block to the fbi. i mean, it was a very serious attempt to try to get steven sorenson fired. and he wasn't able to. but in my book i explore this idea of the conclusion of their dance happened that day on august 2, 2003, where deputy sorenson turns down the driveway, and who does he come up against, but donald cook, the guy who tried to get him fired. so at high noon on this august day in 2003, deputy sorenson makes this fateful turn down donald cook's driveway, and he heads past the no trespassing sign which is rated led with bullets -- riddled with bullets and heading down, down, down

this driveway which is kind of strewn with old oil drums and he passes old cars that cook had been work withing on, and it, you know, it's a hermit's junk yard. and one of the things that he drives right past is cook's own grave which he had dug for himself about a year prior to sorenson making this turn. he had been -- cook had been melting down out there in the desert and had ever since a rapprochement with his son failed and his son ultimately died of a drug overdose in a warehouse in down on the los angeles, cook had really gone into a tailspin. cook was probably, probably heard him approaching. sound travels for very far distances in the desert, and if somebody is driving down your driveway, if a cop is approaching your driveway in an suv, you would totally hear it. and donald cook had, was very paranoid about law enforcement. and here comes the local cop.

and he grabs his automatic rifle, his daewoo rifle, and as sorenson is making an approach to cook's front door, there's a rattlesnake in a bucket at the front door. it might have been -- cook loved wild animals and had a thing for snakes, and this snake was kind of, this snake was kind of like his official greeter. [laughter] you know, in the spirit of don't tread on me, there it was at his front door. and sorenson kept walking. and as soon as he began to make an approach on cook's front door, cook broke out the ak -- the draw wu and raked him with a number of shells. cook began ransacking sorenson's suv, and the neighbor, some neighbors who lived adjacent to cook, these were the people who had called, who had made the call to sorenson about this to

fending squatter living in the neighborhood, they heard the gunshot, and then they climbed up in a tower on their property and saw cook running around sorenson's suv and ransacking it and taking out supplies and his backup gun and so on, and then they saw him drive off. and that was his escape. and they phoned in this report of gunshot to, you know, local police hearse, and within -- headquarters, and within minutes this massive manhunt begins building, and sirens flood across the mojave desert. and that was my first knowledge of this incident and this rapidly-escalating manhunt. choppers are flying in from downtown los angeles, vigilantes are mobilizing, squad cars start

pouring in from points east, west, north and south. i mean, when a cop is killed, it's a very big deal. many agencies get involved by the end of day one. the fbi was involved, the dea was involved, tracking from edwards air force base was involved. this was turning into the biggest manhunt in modern california history. ask by the end of the seven days that cook was on the run, there were literally thousands of cops looking for him. there was one man who knew the desert so well that he was able to outfox this mass massive, modern, high-end, low-tech posse which in the end deployed a tank from the gulf war called the bear. and one of the amazing things which happened during this manhunt was because donald cook knew the desert so well and was able to elude this positive is si for -- posse for such a long time, the s.w.a.t. team needed to encamp on his territory in

the desert, and they were not accustomed to desert tracking. their thing in the past had mainly been like urban situations involving street fights and so on. so here -- now they find themselves trying to hunt down this hermit. one of the things that has happened while cook is on the run is that he has this cell phone that his sisters had bought for him some time prior to this shootout with deputy sorenson, and he took it with him while he was, you know, in flight. and he had been, um, phoning his daughter who lived in riverside, a city a couple of hours east of where this incident happened. and on the first day he was calling and saying, honey, i don't think i'm going to be able to come and visit you on monday. he sounded a little shaken up, but she didn't know why. and be she was, she thought, well, okay, and then he was

calling on day two and three as the manhunt was escalating, and finally she realized that he was not just a suspect in the killing of deputy southernson, but had killed him -- sorenson, but had killed him. the fbi tracking planes were in, had picked up signals in a trap and trace operation from donald cook's phone as he was calling his daughter, and so they had -- they knew he was in a particular area. and by the last day, as he was calling his daughter really in a panic, the manhunt begins to close in. they get a tip that cook is heading to a complex of sheds somewhere in the mojave a few miles from where he lived, and cook is repeatedly calling his daughter by then as he sees this manhunt begin to close in. more and more choppers are on his trail. more and more, you know, there's, there's a squeeze play

underway, and he knows there's nowhere to run and nowhere to hide. and homicide detective mark lillefeld heads out to cook's daughter in riverside to intercept these calls because he knows that the game is over, and he -- cook by then is surrounded in a complex of sheds by a ring of thousands of cops with choppers hovering. and it's nearly sundown, and he's been given an order to come in by sundown, otherwise it's over. and sheriff baca issued a call, we want you dead or alive. and you can hear a loudspeaker outside the sheds where cook is now about to make his last stand. the loud speaker is blaring donald cook, come out with your hands up, come out now. and that's -- the announcements are going off like every five or ten minutes while he's on the

phone with detective lillefeld. and at some point the phone has nearly completely melted down, and lillefeld says, donald, donald, press channel 7. talk on channel 7. press the red button and say this is donald cook, emergency, can anyone hear me. and it's quiet. and when i heard that part of the conversation, i was really amazed. because to me -- because donald cook goes ahead and says it. he says donald cook, emergency, can anyone hear me? to me, that kind of summed up the entire human condition. i mean, isn't that what we're all saying at any given time? after that remark the cell phone cuts out, and it's sundown, and donald cook has not surrendered, and gunshots are exchanged. he gets off some shots, and this tank from the gulf war that has been deployed in the manhunt begins to move in towards this complex of sheds, and cook is

still being ordered to come out, and he doesn't, and he's firing at the tank, and is -- the suspect w.a.t. team inside this tank, and they're taking a lot of hits. at one point they fire a grenade into this complex of sheds, and they see donald cook reach up with a bare hand and grab the grenade and throw it away. i mean, that's how intense this pursuit gets. they start firing tear gas in because cook is not coming out. i mean, really this kind of unfolds -- it's like a tony montana scene. he's not coming out even though he's surrounded, literally, by thousands of cops. there's a ring. you can see it in all the -- there's a ring of law enforcement around this complex sheds with the choppers hovering, and he is not coming out. the tear gas is fired into the sheds, and a fire breaks out. shots continue to be exchanged.

cook is seen dashing in and out of the flames. this goes on for hours. the sun has set. it's -- there's a full moon. it's this verying so marijuana scene. finally around midnight the gunfire has died down and the fire has died down, but there's still no sign of donald cook, and cops are wondering what's happening? have we been chasing a ghost all week? they haven't seen him. they haven't seen him for seven days. they don't -- they're not even sure, you know, if he's even in the area anymore. so there's still no sign, and they begin to search the rubble after the fire dies down with this full moon, you know, illuminating the scene. and they're walking across the ashes -- the embers of this firestorm, and finally at the end they find, they see a leg bone jutting up through the

ashes, and they look down, they brush the ashes, they brush the ashes away, they look down, and they find donald cook's remains, and he's lying in the ashes clutching a rifle. and be that's, that's the end. >> roger ransom explores how domestic and foreign policy would have been different if the civil war was won by the south. his book is "the confederate states of america," and he spoke with booktv while we were in palm springs, california. >> well, the premise of the book is exactly what the title suggests, it's what might have happened if the south won the civil war. and i think that's manager worth worrying about, because the truth of the matter is the reason we worry so much about the civil war is the south did not win, and the north did. and so i'm trying to go back and reconstruct from what we know

about the way the war actually went and the reasons for it and say now if we changed a few things, we'd have to change more than one, but a few things, then what would the world be like if a southern confederacy was on the southern border of the united states of america? >> what are some of the first things you look at? >> well, the first thing i look at is why did we fight this war in the first place? and i won't go into all the details, but to make a long story short, it is we went to war over the issue of slavery. there were a lot of issues between north and south, but as my daddy used to say about money, slavery may not have been the only reason that the civil war happened, but it's way ahead of whatever's in second place. and that's important because the issue of slavery turns out to be something that is extremely difficult to resolve. so as the war progresses, there

isn't very many exit paths, to speak, to say let's stop fighting and see if we can seat settle that. we already tried all those, and they didn't work. so we have to fight it to the finish. what most people concentrate on is one of two battles. gettysburg is one, and that's the most famous battle. that's the one that lee could have won, but didn't. and the other one that a lot of people think may have more pittal yet was antietam. the battle in which the british basically decided since the south didn't win, we won't go in. and, of course, it's also the battle that prompted lincoln to issue the emancipation proclamation. and that sets the tone of the rest of the war as being a war against slavery. and the inability of lee to defeat mcclellan in what is sometimes referred to as the maryland campaign was a turning point in a sense that it meant the south was committed to having to keep on fighting, something they really weren't as

prepared to do as -- simply because they were a smaller country, fewer men, not the capacity to fight war that the north had. the south really would have preferred to end this quickly. and antietam put any end to hopes, any end to people who had hopes for that. the other turning point once you get past gettysburg, the other turning point would have been lincoln would have to lose the election. i think that one of the premises i've always felt about the civil war is that a major thing the north had going for it was a leader who was totally and completely committed to waging that war til the end, to ending slavery and to winning the war. and that meant the election for '64 would have had to go the other way. now, that wouldn't have happened without some things prior going differently. the two things i have differently are that the northern forces are not as successful in the west, particularly in shiloh, and this leads up to a situation where by the time you get to gettysburg

if the south wins that battle, it is likely to turn the populace against lincoln, and maybe they could have lincoln win the election and then end the war. >> so now can we, i guess, tell the story of how history was in your book? lincoln has lost the election in 1864. what's going on now? >> well, i follow what is probably a pretty standard practice for people who speculate. i have lee winning because he does a couple of things right, and luck goes with him rather than against him. and the union army has to retreat. well, you know the way elections go, these things sort of build, and the opponents jump on it, and the next thing you know poor old lincoln's defending himself because lee's ram rampaging through pennsylvania. and the next thing you know, he

loses the election. the person coming in is going to be in a position to try and negotiate with the confederacy. and it's not that they necessarily want to negotiate with the confederacy. the problem is with a victory at gettysburg, the french and the english who have been watching ever since early in the war for a chance not necessarily to send troops to the united states, but to meddle. we're familiar with this today because you always see people -- we will mediate the peace for you. and the british offered to do that. lincoln would have turned them down. but in his place the new president says, no, wait, we will let you mediate a peace. the peace is mediated. the treaty is signed. and the confederate states of america, with jefferson davis as the president, become a nation to the south of the united states of america. and that opens up a whole new

world, a world that we can only imagine because it never existed. but think for a minute of the united states from baltimore all the way down through around florida, down along the gulf coast to the end of texas, that would all be a foreign territory. it would not be part of the united states. in fact, the united states would have no real access to either the atlantic or the caribbean except for a narrow path from baltimore north as far as boston, and beyond that it's sort of not very good harbors anyway. so all of a sudden the great coast, the atlantic coast of the united states is narrowed down to a point where it can easily be blockaded, everything has to be funneled through there. it doesn't mean the united states would collapse of its own weight. it means that the united states would no longer have anywhere near the presence in the western hemisphere in terms of dealing with british intervention or french intervention. and i remind my readers that in

1865 the french had troops -- technically, it was the emperor maximilian -- in mexico. and my theory is that had the south won the civil war, the french would have stayed in mexico, and the british would have expanded their influence around the caribbean. and what became for the last half of the 19th and into the 20th century the caribbean as american-like dominated by the north american state would not be that. there would be a south and the north, and the south would be allied to the british and to the french. and that would change the geopolitics. now, i think it would also change the politics within the united states of america. losing wars does not come easily to any populace. and in the case of the civil war going the wrong way and having the south win, the republicans

would be cursed because they were the ones that started the war in the eyes of the public and then lost it. but the south would be the ones who surrendered to the enemy. and both parties could use that against the other. so my theory is that you probably would get a huge realignment, probably the rise if not what became the populace, but some third party. but mostly you would get a situation of much more instability and much less one has to remember that the actual path after the civil war was a republican-dominated perseverance that led to the united states becoming the great industrial nation of the 20th century. i'm not sure we would have been the great industrial nation of the 20th century had the south won that war. and the south certainly wouldn't have. >> so what happens to the institution of slavery in "the confederate states of america"? >> oh, you took it right out of my mouth.

as far as the slaves are concerned, the irony of all this is that the slaves would have eventually become free. they would have become free not because the confederates wanted to free them, not because of abolitionists in the north. they would have become free because the cotton market was going to collapse in the 1870s. whatever the outcome to have civil war. of the civil war. and that collapse was going to cause the prices of slaves to fall dramatically. now, slavery in the united states was a very economic institution. even before the civil war, half the value of invested money, capital in the south was in the form of slaves. it's huge. now, think of housing market collapsing recently in the 21st century. in the 19th century, a collapse of the cotton market and a collapse of slave prices would have a similar sort of effect. it would be a financial disaster. now, the way to offset that

disaster, if prices are falling and people expect them to keep falling for a while is that the slave holders would turn to the government for help. that is, after all, the american way. they would say buy our slaves, emancipate them, get us out from under this debt, because it would become a debt because they had paid a lot for the slaves, and they couldn't repay it. get us out from under this debt, and we will be forever thankful. now, in the book i probably have to speed things up to suit my tale, but i have that happening in the 880s. if it weren't the 1880s, it would be the 1890s. now, i have to quickly remind people this isn't the same as saying, oh, well, the united states would have emancipated the slaves anyway. the southerners could do that because they controlled the outcome. and what you would have as far as slavery is concerned is something not very much, i would think, different from apartheid

in south africa. blacks wouldn't be free, they just wouldn't be slaves anymore. you wipe out the economic burden of slaves being capital, and you replace it with a racial system of segregation much stronger than what we actually saw. but what we actually saw is enough to give you a clue of what would happen if southerners had their hand free to do anything. and the one huge loser in a southern victory in the civil war would have been the african-americans. because each if they were freed from -- even if they were freed from slaves, they wouldn't be able to go north. remember that, in fact, the way many, many african-americans got out from under the heel of segregation as the legacy of slavery is they went north. i don't think the united states would welcome them if it had been in the context of a war that they lost to the south. >> why not? >> the same reason we don't really welcome mexicans, latin americans. i think there are very strong racial aspects here that i've

always told my students one of the things that made the expansion of slavery so disagreeable to northerners was they really didn't want blacks coming into their territories. i mean, it was simple. you don't want blacks in your neighborhood. and slavery and black were synonymous. i mean, there were a small number, a very small number of free blacks. but for the most part, a black person was a slave, and, therefore, if you moved your slaves in there, you're moving black people in there. and i have always argued that this was, this was definitely a deterrent to favoring any form of expansion of slavery in the new areas. slavery could be tolerated partly because northern americans weren't all that free from racism themselves. they could tolerate slavery if it were in the south, run by

southerners and never touched our shores, so to speak, but they wouldn't tolerate it if they started bringing their slaves into the neighborhood, so to speak. >> so now let's move into the 20th century. what would the united states or the confederate states of america be like? >> well, in my book i point out that one of the problems with counterfactual history where you'll note that i keep referring back to what actually happened, well, you can only do that up to a point, and the further on you go it's kind of like climbing a tree. and pretty soon you're way out at the end of the branches, and you've got too many branches and too many root, and you can't -- you can no longer maintain a coherent story. so i end my book, and i'm perfectly willing to concede that to some extent this is just a convenient way to close out ending a counterfactual back is harder than starting it. i end it by saying, look, the one thing that wouldn't have changed is the world would still

have been caught up in the grips of the first world war. france, germany still would have played out their games and fought the great war. but i say one of the differences about this great war is that the united states would have been drawn in, because the confederacy would be tied closely to england and france, and america would only have one place left. that would be germany. now you say, oh, no, no, no, 20th century america would never join up with the germans n. 1900 the germans were the second largest immigrant group in the united states behind the irish. and there are a lot of germans. and to this day you can see it in the midwest, in milwaukee, in st. louis, large german communities. so -- and this, actually, was a factor in our not getting into world war i to some extent. my theory was the united states would have come into the war on the side of germany and the confederacy would have been on the side of the quote allies,

and the first world war would have been right here at home. counterfactual history changes just a couple of things. in my case it's the battles in the war, and then after that you begin to see what the ramifications of that are. but you try -- i had a recipe i'll try and remember. i believe it's two parking lots reality ask and one -- two parts reality and one part imagination. and you intersperse them, and, you know, enjoy a good meal. but the factual part is very important. >> is what if a question that historians ask often? >> they don't ask it often openly. there's a -- the way i put it, every historian secretly asks what if when he's writing his history, or at least if you're dealing with historians who are writing about great events and so forth. they choose their events partly because they think they're

important. why are they important? because if they didn't have to happen, the world would be different. if you're arguing that the world is changed because of your event, then you must be arguing that it would have been different if it didn't happen. so, yeah, i think what if is have very, very much there. and that's why i came out of the closet, so to speak. i think that's what my book on the confederate states of america was: coming out of the closet and saying, hey, guys, here's the way i think the civil war should be taught. taught in terms of what would have happened if that war turned out differently. >> for more information on booktv's recent visit to palm springs, california, and the many other cities visited by our local content vehicles, go to c c-span.org/localcontent. >> are you interested in being a part of booktv's online book club? in may we featured "salt sugar fat: how the food giants hooked

us" by michael moss. here's what some of you had to say on facebook and twitter during our live moderated discussion: >> the booktv online book club selection for june is sheryl sandberg's book, "lean in." ms. sand beggar, the coo of facebook, discusses why it's still difficult for women to achieve leadership roles in the

united states. she also talks about her own career choices and experiences. you can watch ms. sandberg talk about "lean in" at booktv.org. as you read the book this month, post your thoughts on our twitter account with the hash tag btv book club and write on our facebook page, facebook.com/booktv. then on june 25th at 9 p.m. eastern time, join our live, moderated discussion on both social media sites. have an idea for next month? send your suggestions on which books you think we should include in our online book club via twitter, facebook or e-mail us, booktv@c-span.org. >> here's a look at some books that are being published this week.

>> susan dunn, humanities professor at williams college details the 1940 election and the debate over isolationism in "1940." in "brainwashed" psychiatrist sali satel and scott lilienfeld. jeffrey sachs discusses president john f. kennedy's campaign for sustainable peace with the soviet union in "to move the world: jfk's quest for peace." in "men on strike," psychologist helen smith argues that men are reacting to the anti-male bias in our society by increasingly rejecting the traditional roles they once played. and bloomberg view columnist jonathan alter has a new book

titled "the center holds." mr. alter says that the result of the 2012 election demonstrates that the public wants american politics to be pulled back towards the center. look for these titles in bookstores this coming week. >> what are you reading this summer? booktv wants to know. >> first on my list is a book that i've already read the first chapter of, it's called "eating animals." it's been out for a few years. my daughter read it. she's an environmental studies major and is very interested in the whole food movement and fighting against factory food. and i'm interested, i mean, i eat meat, i eat chicken, i eat seafood. i may come away there this book not wanting to eat any of that or at least being more selective about how i eat it, but i know that ford is a compelling writer, and i'm looking forward to that one.

next on my list is more a tribute to my son. this is the new biography of david foster wallace, and it's called "every love story is a ghost story." i've heard that it's very, very well researched. david foster wallace was a professor at pa moan that college where my son just graduated, and my son is a big fan of wallace. he read "infinite jest," which i cannot claim to have done, but wallace was regarded to be one of the most interesting and creative writers of his era. tragically killed himself a few years ago, and i'm just very interested in sort of what happened with his life. i know he had many struggles, and i love biographies, so that's my biography for the summer. next is a book by a friend of mine named jonathan rowe, it's called "our commonwealth." jonathan sadly passed away a couple years ark, so his friends

pulled together essays all about the commons which is, basically, anything that belongs to humanity. the it's air, it's the water, it's public spaces, it's the internet. and his, one of his drives in life was to protect the commons and make sure that everything doesn't get taken over by private enterprise. so this is, that's very much on my list. it's not a long read, and i've heard that it's really very interesting. ..

the program is about an hour. >> we are here today to talk about "fighting for common ground: how we can fix the stalemate in congress" waves olympia snowe, the senator