by any standard it's inexcusable that despite the excuses and equivocations that some have manufactured it is undeniable. the meaning of this attack goes beyond the conflict in syria itself. that conflict has already brought so much terrible suffering. this is about the large-scale indiscriminate use of weapons that the civilized world long ago decided must never be used at all. conviction shared even by countries that agree on little else. there is a clear reason that the world has banned entirely the use of chemical weapons. there is a reason the international community has set a clear standard and why many countries have taken me just apps to eradicate these weapons. there was a reason why president obama has made it such a priority to stop the proliferation of these weapons

and lock them down where they do exist. there is a reason why president obama has made clear to the outside regime that this international norm cannot be violated without consequences. and there is a reason why no matter what you believe about syria all peoples, though all nations who believe in the cause of our common humanity must stand up to assure that there is accountability in the use of chemical weapons so that it never happens again.

>> the building of human rights would be one of the foundations on which we would does in the world an active spirit in which peace could grow. >> i don't think the white house has completely blown to one person. it belongs to the people of america and i think whoever lives in it should preserve its tradition and enhance it and leave something of themselves there.

next on booktv author susan crawford talks about her book "captive audience" the telecom industry and monopoly power in the new gilded age. she argues that america's economic future could be threatened by other countries that have internet capabilities that are faster and cheaper. author andrew blum hosts this hour-long discussion. >> host: thank you for being here and thank you for doing this. >> guest: i've been looking forward to talking to you. >> host: what is the status of rock band in america today? >> guest: well we have a picture that is quite different than the other developed nations. we have got very high download speeds in america cable and

local monopolies in each region of the country that dominate that market and sell for 85% of americans their only choice where they live is going to be their local cable monopoly. we don't have any of the fastest 25 cities in the world when it comes to internet access in america so we are not the world leaders. we also have a very deep digital divide so having an internet access to home is tightly correlated to your socio- neck on status of maybe half of people with incomes between 30 and $50,000 a year have an internet connection at home. the numbers are even glover with the boys and comes between $50,000 a year. only 9% of americans can buy internet because it's just not available and hasn't been built up to their neighborhood trade. >> host: how did we get here? it seems the u.s. was the inventor of the year internet and still dominates google and

facebook can dominates globally. >> guest: the great thing about the internet is that you can reach anybody. that's the whole point. there is a universal addressability system and the whole idea was that the content provider like google would not be subject to the whims of the telecom provider but we have got this huge split the train the ideal openness of the internet which depend on openness and connectivity and just the dirt and wires and money expense of building infrastructure in america. so calm cut we started off in america with the phone system that was the leader of the world and then in about the 70s seven days and i'm skipping the industry here, the cable industry was launched in america. cable usually was just for one way entertainment. but as telephone and cable started competing particularly

in the late 70's cable had a tremendous advantage which was local exclusive franchises and then a law in 1984 that completely deregulated cable. so fast-forward since 1984 and now, cable with its model of not being particularly open you know , cannot being available for addressability everywhere has taken the lead. it's much cheaper to upgrade a cable system than it is to dig up the phone wires and replace them with fiber. so we have gotten to this place of local monopolies as a result of just fact humans in the united states. we got rid of a very long history of common carriage under which telephone operators had operated. they had to take everything you know and make sure you got to the place they wanted to go and they weren't allowed to pick and choose among content. this was a trade-off and the enormous expense it took to

build those telephone system. here's the problem. it's either the structure elements that are specific to build on huge economies of scale and cable have taken the lead dominated the market and the telephone companies are backing off. as a result of all of that we have no plan to upgrade to those high speeds around the world that people are getting into cable operators have no particular obligation to serve all of america and close this internal digital divide. that is how we got here. plus just the frank economics of how expensive it is to build. it's very difficult to see in a competitive cable showing up right now. >> host: it seems to be a moment where cable companies would have had to act like tell a cop's to recognize the fcc or would have had to recognize cable had to serve everybody in

there had to be the same philosophy that applied to -- >> guest: it hasn't been the case for 20 years. we tried to club a little bit of that in 1992. there was nothing in the act that would make them act differently so for the last 30 years cable has been building under the assumption that they wouldn't be essentially regulated very much. >> host: was it as as that? >> guest: basically it's deep in their dna. they see themselves as just like any private store on the corner. no different. they have never viewed themselves as a mute -- utility. an obligation to serve everybody and serve them at a reasonable cost and to connect with other networks. none of that is part of their ethos as an industry. that was part of the telephone industry but they have lost this battle to serve americans. they have almost completely backed off and gone into their

corner which is wireless. ricin and at&t are mostly wireless companies today not providing wired infrastructure to america. so we have high prices and a huge digital divide internally and the country as a whole is sagging in the national competition for connectivity. >> host: let's go back in time a little bit and talk about common carriage. common carriage does seem to weigh the thinking of it that would to satisfy some of our needs for broadband. how would it be executed by the telecom companies? >> guest: this is an ancient regime and goes back to people operating in the midi folk there an year. the ideas when you hold yourself out to the public in providing an essential transporter communications facility you are subject to public publication even though you are a private company. so the whole idea which came but then travel through railroads

and reaches the telephone industry in 1910 is in exchange for officially a private monopoly you don't just provide people with services. you take on public words to charge a reasonable rate to serve everyone and to not discriminate when it comes to content. so yes this regime would still exist in law but it has not been applied to the cable company. it would have the plates for high-speed internet access in america and fix her problem. >> host: what are the threats? the threats are the digital the five great i want to focus more to begin with on the notion of free and open internet that threatens democracy not just of the divide but of the possibilities that the isps and telecoms are filtering or whatever their plans are. do you put that ahead of the divide? >> guest: these two things fit together. with no competition essentially for high-speed internet access

in america the provider has every incentive and no legal limitations to price discriminate and to make sure that it's reaching rich markets it, and not serving the poor systematically which helps digital divide issues and ensuring that they can provide specialized services, their own video-on-demand that they charge a lot for. so the risks really can't be overstated. if you think of the cable pipe is just one big flow of water and that pipe is controlled absolutely by the cable company. just about four channels right now are applied to internet access of that giant pipe. they are moving technology that would make the pipe essentially undifferentiated. all the same stuff but the gatekeeper the cable company can

pick and choose among communications and look at whatever it wants to, send some communications. in topeka when you thought you were going to chicago all twisting dials that would remove the threat to them of competition from services that they would like to sell to americans. think of anything home security video whatever it is, cable guys can choose what will feel more alive to the consumer and can pick and choose among what goes on line and deliver that to households. it's like living in a gated community. taking the idea of the internet which is all about not having to ask permission and being able to ask anybody in the world and sticky mats on top of the infrastructure which absolutely is controlled by four or five gatekeepers. there is a big conflict there and the threats are very real.

>> host: you you have been restrained so far in your book is very much a story about. you mentioned 45 cable companies. the threat you are talking about is that present or future and are there signs of that threat now or concerned for that kind of monopoly power? >> guest: let me explain. the cable guys fought each other for franchises and they call them franchise wars. there's tremendous consolidation in this industry so comcast is by far the giant. they have 50 million american householdhousehold s in their footprint in 39 states and about 45% of the american population is when within comcast. they never compete with a big company brethren. they never enter each other's markets. they long ago divided up the country among themselves so time warner had a separate market. it is second with not a distant

second but not quite up with comcast and then there are a couple of other charter cablevision and cox. in their regions when it comes to high-speehigh-speed internet access they dominate with the exception of cableviscablevis ion which has to fight off a little bit of fiber competition that everyone else pretty much stands alone. netflix is responsible for about half the internet traffic in american and really eating up a lot of the traffic but their future is entirely dependent on what the cable companies decide to do with them. whether they make it less convenient for netflix to stream close to people so they can be seen easily and quickly, whether the cable companies start charging so people will start assuming that accessing netflix is going to drive their internet access and bundled their bill

even higher so they will drop netflix. their economic futures completely dependent and that is just one story of hundreds of thousands that have to do with the power of a single gatekeeper over all the information reaching american homes. >> host: in my own exploration of the center of the internet the backbone and international networks it's a bit of a wild west. there's a lot of competition. but that companies are not particularly profitable but bandwidth is constantly going up. but then again there's this big stack of fishing nets were where the moment there is '. that becomes very contested. >> guest: write, and bandwidth should be cheap and it is getting very cheap to carry it to and yet does of this

bottleneck control by a few at years over access to the home they can charge whatever they want. so where you might see a very contested market between cities and i'm not sure that is still the case because -- but putting that aside even though bandwidth is getting cheaper and storage is getting cheaper and computation is getting cheaper of the whole price of the system is going down except for consumers that have to buy these connections because they're there is absolutely no control over price. and so prized, quality and reliability, all of that is up or grabs in the cable industry by the way is the lowest rating of consumer satisfaction of any industry in america. >> host: do you think americans will stand for it separate from policy

possibilities. i envision sort of almost like a boutique internet access organic internet access or whatever you want to call it to if there are possibilities for different options we can choose a service that if it's not public then perhaps it's fast something that has the spirit not separate from these giant cannot please. do you think people would choose that if the option where there? >> guest: hang on a second. the assumption behind the question is you have the ability to choose. i'm not sure that makes sense. we don't for the moment but that's because these services as an economic matter are really a natural monopoly. you need a of revenue flowing into pay yourself back for that and it doesn't make sense to have more than one to a home.

and so it's very difficult for competitors to enter this field. it's just like water or electricity. you wouldn't want to have those connections to your home for which you could choose so --. >> host: what is the way out? >> guest: the way out is what other countries are doing which is to ensure that there is a fiber to the home connection everywhere and every single citizen has it just like clean water and electricity. >> host: fiber to home connection meaning a strand of class filtered light that allows potentially infinite amounts of information? >> guest: yeah and so what is odd about where we are stuck as the country with a series of cable monopolies is that the physical connection itself is second best to fiber. so cable is called hybrid coaxial it was built for passive consumption of information for

being entertained. and it can be upgraded to very high download speeds but as an upload matter it's very cramped in its architecture and when we think of ourselves as all publishing and all those kinds of things we should be doing that is going to require a fiber to the home connection and as you said a single thin strand of glass with light can carry 90,000 tv channels and can be upgraded infinitely as far as we can tell. >> host: a new trademark capacity. >> guest: capacity. >> host: who owns the fiber and how do you begin to build that? >> guest: the united states has it deep tradition of private operators building our communication networks. that is where our phone company came from and it works very well and that is where this

fiber-optic national network eventually is going to come from. i see a progression. mayors all over the united states are irritated about the high prices and networks they are stuck with so they are agitated for fiber to be built to their businesses and their consumers homes. that progression is a patchwork across the country that will eventually reach a tipping point of jealousy and awareness in america which will change federal policy and drive towards having an integrated national network but not naturalized. not nationalized. that is not how we do things but private actors are a reasonable rate of return in exchange for what is essentially a monopoly on services where they operate. this works pretty well. we can also, something that happens in many developed

countries is say the operator has to be at the wholesale level only and this is going on in singapore and many european countries and australia. the operator then is obliged to allow lots of retail competitors to reach home. imagine you to a new development somewhere in america and you sign up for utilities. you get water and you get electricity and took up the sewage systems and you get a choice of internet service providers retail and service providers. they will be traveling to to you over his dander diced wholesale fiber cable that has been built to your house. this happens in seoul today. if you move into an apartment in seoul you have a choice of three or four fiber to the home providers and internet service providers selling you services 30 or 40 bucks a month and they're about to download to 10

times faster so lots of choice and very low prices and a standard wholesale infrastructure across the entire country. it really makes sense. >> host: it's happening in some places in the u.s. and czech is one of the great examples. can you describe what's happening there? >> guest: in chattanooga the utility there decided a great side as this would be to use their connections to every home the electrical utility to provide fiber to every home. they are doing that. they are selling services to residents. they don't have this retail competition that i have just explained that the utility is in the business of making reasonably priced fiber available to everybody so as a result business are moving from knoxville to chat megaand they are very excited. they are getting reasonably priced internet access.

>> host: how do the cable companies feel about that? >> guest: they have fought tooth and nail and there's a lot of litigation about that and actually more than 19 states in america it's either legal or very difficult for cities to do this because the existing operators the cable companies and the telephone companies go to statehouses and say they shouldn't be allowed to compete with this is how they put it may try to make it difficult for cities. we see that pattern over and over and i'm hopeful that in the next few years some of those laws will be rolled back because it doesn't make sense. to remove that power self-determination. >> host: it's clearly bad for american consumers to not have the choices of cable or fiber. is it purely the power of -- or is there a business argument that they have to invest in the network? is that what it is? >> guest: there's a lot of traction for saying we are

serving this community perfect way well. the city is just going to waste money by going into this business and its social is somehow. there is this air of not letting cities get into it. we went through exactly the same battle with electricity in the beginning of the 20th century were cities wanted to run their own enisa pull electricity systems and the private monopoly said don't do that it has a terrible risk to the fabric of american society. so there details about those claims in the statehouses but the traction they get is this feeling that government shouldn't be in the business of even commissioning internet access services much less building them are owning them. that is enormously attracted to people at a time when government has less and less money. so, it's actually very cost-effective for his city to be patient with capital, to guarantee loans to private

operators to build these systems and pay it back over several years and then they are free and clear. they are not trapped by a gate keeper who's going to go to business. >> host: how does the highway analogy play with that? is that a correct analogy to say the federal government built the internet highway systems. in your book you said we are driving on a gravel road behind the feed truck. does that resonate to an alternate way of thinking about it rather than a moving ticket from your -- as you might imagine, or entertainment tv? >> guest: we made sure there were railways crossing the united states. eisenhower built the federal highway system to correct -- connect all of america and not leave people behind. this is in fact a business of government. for some people that has attraction but there is enough fear of government to even be involved in communications and an instinctive reaction. this is a very new reaction.

today is the anniversary of the first telegraph sent between boston and new york and a team 27 and that point city fathers would actually be involved in where wires would be strong and who would get the right to have that franchise. today we seem to have some nervousness about it. but in fact this is the only way, the only way to ensure that everybody gets a connection at a reasonable price. we can still have private actors building and operating the systems but they have to be subject to public oversight otherwise the incentives just don't align. if companies aren't evil, it's in their interest to maximize their projects by picking perfect neighborhoods that can pay more and more for service and by not taking the risk of running wires out of neighborhoods that aren't thinly populated hours and. >> host: there's an irony in that that our interests are

constrained. we have seen over the last 15 years we have suddenly gone from paying 5 cents for a cup of coffee and paying $5 for cup of coffee. separate from the digital divide there isn't even an option for superior service and any foreign. >> guest: that's right there really is no choice rate is interesting concept it's as if all water became abdul. there should just be a flow of communication available to everyone in the country so just like electricity we turn on the lights and we don't even think about it. it's just an input into everything we do in the country. communication should do the same thing but because we have been a little confused there is a lot of fog around this issue. people have the sense that internet access is a luxury. what is interesting is electricity was treated as a luxury too. in the early 20th century people said water everyone needs but electricity is really for the rich and it took decades to

change electricity from one thing to the other. we are at a point right now where internet access is still viewed as something slightly magical or expensive but talk to someone who is trying to run a business from his home. for him the internet access is like -- you can't even get going without having that reasonably priced connection and there is no option for it. >> host: and we get our phone and tv over the internet. >> guest: again the internet is the agreement of the computer to speak to another computer using protocol. i am talking about this very basic infrastructure which used to be for entertainment. that is now the single line to most american homes being used for absolutely everything. so it's the infrastructure that

swallowed everythineverythin g. swallowed internet access and swallow these of phone and the mail system and journalism is having trouble. it's the idea of a high-capacity digital wire. it just becomes a platform for absolutely everything. if we need one actor in charge of it that a it that is subject to no oversight in competition that is pretty fascist for everything we speak about freedom of information and economic growth. i think it's his terrible situation dragging down the entire united states connie. if every business could depend on this basic equally priced connectivity we would be doing better as a nation. >> host: you made the analogy in some ways the stakes are even higher than that because it's not just the light goes on and the light goes off at its at the core of our democracy the idea of a free information and free flow of information. >> guest: it should be scary to people that everything they

learn to think or influenced by his under the control of a single company. >> host: it isn't, though. >> guest: for some reason americans are convinced by this one. a lot of it has to do with awareness. we are not aware of what is happening in other countries. they don't really care what's happening in south korea or sweden or the northern european countries or japan or china. maybe china. ..

and then there will figure out what to do in their communities to make sure that the connectivity exists and then gradually will get to the point where federal policy will also change. >> host: these networks are inherently local. we think of the internet as a global network, but in fact, the connectivity is always local. in fact, the neighborhood is technically speaking a good way of going about with these changes. >> guest: it could be. it's just that because the economy is a scale, once you build it it's so cheap to add an additional customer that the neighborhood level may not be the right unit of interest to dig up the streets and install fiber and then tried to depend on someone else to pick up your communications at a reasonable cost. there are lots of bottle necks around. a citywide, we're doing this.

will make sure everyone has fiber and then the city is strong enough with all that negotiation, demanding reasonable carriage rates from the next provider up the chain, the so-called middle mild provider carrying those bits from the city outskirts to the internet backbone. and not sure the neighborhood is the right unit of interest. >> host: i see a lot of opportunity in competition at the middle mile. technical knowledge of knowing how to connect as a way of opening and up as well. certainly in new york where we have the city of abundant and with images tully in a few buildings. this building is one of them, it turns out. but to get across the street is a whole other story. so to me if there is a way of leveraging the places where there is abundant metal mile band with. >> guest: that would require government intervention because you would have to force the middle mild providers to let the

neighborhood connect to them and a reasonable rate. and that is tricky. one of them would have to break from the pack in order to do this, and more and more, even in new york, the providers around by private equity companies don't have an interest in just offering nondiscriminatory connections for the neighborhood that's not their business. they won high capacity dedicated connections to businesses where they can make a lot of money. so breaking this whole system open is just on the order of a we had to do with standard oil, we had to do with the railroads, electricity -- it takes ultimately national leaders to say this is a problem. dramatically and is serving a population and rare falling nine is assigned to file as a country . >> host: who have been the actors speaking out against that?

the competitive forces? is it organizations like the personal democracy forum, community broadband organizations? what is the collective work? you been a very strong voice. what is the backing? why haven't organizations thought about this? >> there actually is a movement. is just not aware of itself. lots and lots of municipal efforts around the country, hundreds of them were individual sales, this is just awful is part of being a decent, respected human being. and they're very, very active in their localities. and there is no particular reason for them to be speaking out on a national scale because they are solving a local problem . and no particular reason for them to be aggregating, although i really think they should because again, when you're sitting in your living room, you are choosing among very physical

attributes. you're looking for somebody. and so they have not been resources, bound together to form a collective to go march on capitol hill. they do often, these municipalities to march on local or state house of representatives. so just in march in charge of one of these terrible bills was proposed that would have removed the power of cities to elect to commission municipal networks. if there was in that city the very crafty wireless signal available to those people, the state bill would have said you can't compete with that. and in georgia city managers, individuals representing rose up and defeated the bill. so on hoping that's a turning point for the state level effort to make this so difficult. >> host: in the is that contradiction for the need for local infrastructure and a nationwide movement.

it surprised me again begins that a supposedly with the internet does, it blinds people across distance. but the infrastructure is always local. >> guest: on so glad you raised this point. there's something about these very perry during wire issues that does not crossover to the people who love the internet. they -- i think they still believe you can get around the stuff. just build a better mousetrap, some type of act that will fix this. and at can't fix the economics of infrastructure and america. we really have a natural monopoly that has been operated on by cable companies, and the only way to get around it is to force them to act differently. so the uprising begins copyright laws that might have constrained operations on the internet was enormous.

that is not yet crossed over to concern about the dirt and wires problem. >> host: i'd like to draw a distinction between communication companies and the information companies in a particularly as they are increasingly in the business where literally threw building infrastructure. most specifically accompany the most of the website is now a global network. is that communication verses information? is this something you thought of all? is that of the right way to phrase it? is that a legal way of phrasing it? >> guest: the dichotomy, telephone companies, communications companies. then we deregulated the entire sector when cable arrived. telephone want to be treated like cable. cable suffragist and information company, the kind of company that sells accountant.

release us from any possibility of future roles. instead of leveling of the common carriage obligations, we level down. now both telephone companies and cable companies and treated like information providers. >> host: as an even more complicated, used to buy the information from the company. now the company buys information from you. >> guest: right. you're right to draw attention to the fact that companies that we think of as basically a youth of the internet to provide functionality. very quickly. they're experimenting with building fiber networks. they have done this in kansas city, they announced they would do it in austin. there will cover ultimately a very small portion of the united

states populace. >> host: as indicated, that might go better. there has been some indication of that. >> guest: though we would not want them to do that and should not wait for them to. will we really need is intentional policy that does not just walk out time warner cable, exchange one for another. actually provide for oversight and make sure that everybody is fair. so what they're doing is very interesting and destructive. i don't actually disagree. i don't think it will go that far with it. they just want to show that as possible to make money building fiber under certain conditions. people love it. every part of society is talking about this. it's a big deal. >> host: again, i have been less restrained about this than you have. but for me the notion of a single company is essentially

the creation of alternative internet, and not an internet to disconnect. >> guest: compared to what? fermium the experiment is like the world's fair. we could not imagine electricity and sell domestic use, until a giant welfare. people went to visit and saw a lecture kitchens and the idea of an electric appliance. so for me is the world's fair of very high capacity stand in as connectivity. people going to live in an and experience it and touch and feel it. that will drive policy. i'm more interested in the experiment as rare visualization of what is possible. i share your concern that if you have one actor it doing

everything, there are risks to the free flow of information. they swear they're not using data from people in kansas city tow tunnel over without permission from the people buying the connectivity. the war could break down anytime as i said, the kansas city network, the change that it makes to our perception. we don't make progress until we see something. we just can't believe it until we see it. >> host: to pick up on your firewall, want to touch on the nsa. the news over the last month saw now have a systematic, the tapping or collection of information. again, there was a moment where phone tapping, the information

was passing by. tapping phones. now it's a different model. the flow of information has pulled. we don't know the details. it is essentially taking it from the data center. where does this -- i mean, could this be -- could this be a tipping point? an alarming moment? >> guest: this is a continuation of a long history of surveillance by the united states government. it's different in degree, but not actually in kind. in the 20th-century every single telegraphs and from the united states to another country with systematically copy.

now we tried to a constrain using law, domestic intelligence but we have also built networks that carry our air most thousand dreams in ways that telephone calls may not have. so we know that the nsa in the past to systematically copied wholesale all internet transmissions going through large exchange points. to save a copy for themselves. they're building gigantic $2 billion data centers in utah to achieve through all this stuff. >> host: the data center interestingly. >> guest: that is interesting. but there are only two actors in the world who understand all the stuff. the head of the nsa and the head of global.

as a lawyer that's my background. i would like to see much more process associated with this wholesale surveillance. up the kid makes sense to be capturing absolutely everything. if we are slowing, running a query against the rest of should only be done with judicial oversight. we should have real visibility into what is happening with the potential of all the information and now is being scraped through. intelligence actors are using these pools of data a broad to just vacuum of, in nail all possible information about people's lives and it's connected to these networks. that has always happened. there's just more of it now than they used to be.

we always ride on judicial frameworks to constrained this insatiable appetite for data. right now all those remarks are being routed around. >> host: an amazing century. we talked about this sort of culture of cable, the culture of telecom. we talked a lot about the culture of washington. what is the culture of silicon valley? how does that play into this? >> guest: what is silicon valley? demint, for me to just like espn , gigantic very successful content companies without which the infrastructure guys cannot survive. you have to think of this as a powerful negotiation. they need each other. for those companies, they're not going to rock the boat with this

particular policy problem. they looked like a monopoly, so that no one to be in that sentence. if you're saying silicon valley is to go and facebook, they're like giant bullies in the schoolyard who are all in their particular corners. they have the markets. they don't really be each other out. the status quo is locked in place. i'm hopeful there is another silicon valley, upstarts, smaller companies, companies is future will be depended on a lot of information flowing to an addressable market in america that is not subject to the gatekeepers control. they should really be exercised and say, how can this be that my destiny depends on some cable guy? that can't be. they should be getting together and taking on this issue. here's the problem and my third

point. i love techies. my favorite people seem to think you can keep around everything. what a drag. let's just build some new shiny thing. that leaves us, that culture has been pretty ingrained. george packer had a beautiful piece about this in the new yorker recently. they assume that the world will work the way they want to and don't have a sense of social conscience of national obligations, trying to make sure that everybody gets reliable, decent standard of living. that is not something they think about. >> host: the promise of the internet is often talked about, the democratization of everything. youtube or crowd funding of the ability the access information from anywhere by anyone. >> guest: true. that could still be true for a few companies that make it

through the cable. if you are a very high capacity application that will be using a lot of band with you will begin to look like netflix, competing with products of the cable company wants to sell. so this mismatch between what people think of as the internet and the reality of the pipes and wires is fascinating. your work explaining of the internet actually does its job, how it is transported over the pipes and wires is extremely important. >> host: we share something of a pessimistic view. i think at the moment. it mostly works. difficult. i catch myself. watching three movies at home. occasionally it does work. seeing the future? a repair and died?

i mean, for you this comes out of a legal background, a study of the history. >> host: we are suffering from poverty of the imagination. we have no demonstration of cases that would show us what life would be like. it should be the connectivity, something we think about. it's just there. it should be that we can be presence, he merely present so that anybody in the world at any time. it should be that every wall in the studio can be a screen. why is it just the two of us? why did we bring in people from silicon valley? exactly. some very high capacity, zero lanes in networks will make that possible. imagine if you are an aging parent to stay at home, never have to go hospital unless it was a real emergency and be

visited once in awhile. of fiber access connection to the doctor who would see him or her. >> host: full hd tell a presence. special networks. it's remarkable. the cost is enormous. >> guest: that's because it's being sold by dedicated companies building lines. if there's a network in place that allows for those kinds of connections, anybody can sell that. it really should not cost anything. it should be like text and. >> host: the low five version of it. it should be able to scale to that. >> guest: the jeter, all the problems with that, we're not satisfied with that. the most human need is there actually communicating. a very high-capacity networks, we should be able to do that. we can't even imagine one now.

so things seem all right. the fumble with our phones and stared down at the circle. we don't realize what we're missing. >> host: a fundamental democratic need as well. the thing in your book. what is good for america. i mean, your vision of was good for america. [laughter] >> guest: just as we make sure that everybody gets a first-class public education because we take that very serious, we make sure the house bills are certified. a major fruiters unadulterated. it's a function of having a decent life and being able to communicate, being part of society. everybody gets for reasonable price carry vacation connection. this was easy as a nation for the telephone. in the passage of time since then we have forgotten that these are essential democratic values to be able to communicate, travel without

being impeded. so we are suffering from amnesia for some reason. it's in the interest of giant companies to keep us a little bit in the dark. >> host: a question about that, more personal question. you have been talking about these things as a law professor, as an author. what is your mode of address with this? there was a petition. how do you envision continuing mess fight jack. >> guest: and privilege to have led to the middle of the washington players. they're all wonderful people. i'm privileged to of served in the white house now feel it is my duty to keep explaining this issue until everybody gets it.

to do it in at dispassionate, fact based, a clear way so that ultimately we stop being bullied this is actually about just being bullied by comcast and time warner. we haven't even really talk about wireless. but they have less. it's just not fair or good for the country feet to care luftwaffe. i'm not alone. i'm lucky that rowboat. >> host: the refrain. it can see the future first. not yet evenly distributed. in not doing a municipal start up. that's not your approach to it. >> guest: my approach is just to explain.

i think that something important to try to empower as many twentysomething says i can't. they really understand this. to make sure that they can act together to make sure that this is a question raised at every debate with every political candidate. they have entire elections might not in america? and the president recently said that in five years 99% of schools and libraries in america will have five connections. putting new money into that endeavor. that's huge. and that is another tipping point. we can see that we care about this when it comes to kids. now all we have to do is care about it when it comes to the rest of the populace. this upgrade to fiber is inevitable, but if we wait for the incumbents to do it, the existing companies, there will take 90 years. it is not in their interest to

speed this up. they're doing very well with the status quo. i want to speed things up, make sure that this catches fire across the country. >> host: as the sec have the apparatus to do that? is that word will come from? >> guest: they have a lot of power that is choosing not to exercise. the sec could label every provider of high-speed internet access as a common carrier. it is within its power to do that. it doing this transport function as a result you have an obligation to serve everybody has a reasonable cost, to connect everybody, every other network. is just a matter of a master of labeling. the sec right now is facing a case in front of the d.c. circuit word is gone through some gymnastics to try to pretend not to label everybody has communications providers but yeah retain some power over

them. likely to say that's months. either label them as a communications provider or don't, but don't try to make up your authority from other parts of your stature. after that case is decided, fed your march, the sec will be confronted with the really hard stores, to relabel everybody has a communications provider and an exercise the authority will broker some kind of deal, obtain better treatment for americans. at much rather see the former than the latter. >> host: and they're is new chair of the sec. >> guest: a terrific guy, deeply experienced. the real backbone. he can activate thing since the right thing to do. i'm hopeful that the reason this issue will get a lot of attention. >> host: that brings us into 2014. it's coming soon. >> guest: these next 68 months

will be extremely interesting and communication policy. what i am open for is actually a sharper edge, a moment that galvanize public attention caucus people activated on this issue. give the sec the political coverage it needs it's all about politics and power. because the language exists. just ask to be used. >> host: a few more minutes. want to pick up on that. slightly more personal. they go what it is. i and stood it. what they did and how the war. what would cns? >> guest: i? this from the internet side of things. the first computer law firms. represented young who back

whenever cool. i really cared. this whole idea, it's the most important idea of my time, you can introduce a new service, new business without asking anybody for permission because there is the standard protocol. that's amazing. and so that -- on so fascinated. the telephone and cable gas. they rose up to a reassessment in years learning the vocabulary's. learning the acronyms, tried to figure out what they're up to. now one man. i understand what they do in the sea that is just about power and money. these natural monopolies of size and scale that make it difficult for any competitor to enter. all of this for me is and the service of that internet ipo. world shaking, the idea that a farmer can sell things online

and speak to anybody. can reach any size audience without some gatekeeper getting in a way. i want to keep that he doesn't place. they should be a global and drop verbal intimate. whatever i can do to help further that vision is one of going to do. >> guest: it is striking to me. there are a groundswell. silicon valley. it has become so much about making a million dollars. that intent is always clear. but i am hopeful. does seem as if there are more and more people. >> guest: and you can make money. the united states is always going to do better. push the idea of an upper network, and affirmative foreign-policy. and that made a lot of markets and other countries possible. because we are impatient we cannot put the best of. now we're at this next american push for a very high-capacity network in the united states and elsewhere that are opened that

allow for anybody to build a new business. we will do better by lowering barriers because we're so ingenious. >> host: nothing that's a great place to stop. thank you for your time. >> guest: thank you so much having me. >> what are you reading this summer? book tv want to know. >> the first book, a novel. it can do that, another book on my list, and it's a book about how it works.

reading about a difference type of experience. and the last one on my list, life, love, meaning. looking at every day. looking forward. >> let us know what you're reading this summer. this week as opposed to summer facebook page to mars in this in the mail. >> on the next washington journal, former chairman michael steele discusses his party's stance on issues including syria , health care, immigration, and calls to impeach president obama. security issues. the man-to-man loss, state and federal governments use.

our guest is stephen sigell, professor george mason university law school. washington journal is live every morning a 7:00 eastern on c-span. >> our special book tv program and continues. he talks about his book high price, and our scientists journey of self discovery that challenges every thing you know about drugs in society. over the next hour he is interviewed by fox news contributor juan williams. >> host: welcome to "after words." our guest, carl hart. his book "high price: a neuroscientist's journey of self-discovery that challenges everything you know about drugs and society". a member of the national advisory council on drug abuse. also an associate professor of psychology and psychiatry at columbia diversity. he's a board member of the college on problems of drug

dependency and has conducted 22 years of research and narrow psychopharmacology. the science of drug addiction. welcome to the "after words." >> guest: thank you for having me. >> host: a fascinating book. it is your personal story as well as the workout for the results of your work in science. but the heart and soul of it i would cite is that you are saying, you know what, i think 20 plus million americans who do illegal drugs. >> guest: the national government conducts a survey every year. this has been known for some time. twenty plus million americans to use drugs on a regular basis. >> host: then you also say that over the generations overtime people of always used drugs. >> guest: people have always and people will always. >> host: birds fly commanded

high. speech of going to have to use the one. >> host: a cake. your point in writing this book as a scientist is that given these realities the impact that charge have on social policy, race, on our culture is often times distorted by lack of evidence based thinking. instead people rely on anecdotes or on fears rather than on the facts. so if that is the art and soul of this book. >> guest: one of the things that has been troubling me, drexel been used as scapegoats. social problems and so forth. we used drugs as scapegoats. the problem for me is that people who looked like me and are often scapegoating more so than other folks. as a scientist to knows the facts about trucks, that's very disturbing. >> host: okay.

i was think as a black person that would be very disturbing. so let's stop for a second in and try to understand something that is race related in this regard. you say it's just an average and the like something like the 1980's, people identify this as a black community problem. in fact, more whites used crack them black. similarly, more blacks went to jail arrested for crack use than whites even though more whites were using the drugs. how do you explain that? >> guest: it's kind of simple. the short answer is racism. this is a new -- class of racism, i mean we put in our police resources in communities of color, primarily black communities.

he can get people doing something illegal. i drove my car. i sometimes has the speed limit. that's an illegal activity. if they want, they can give me a ticket. so that does not happen. because the resources are now where i'm at most of the time. dying out of the upper west side but if you want to catch people doing crime, he put your police resources in those communities. that is what this happened. this isn't new. crack cocaine, it's important to know that in the early 1900's cocaine was used by a wide number of americans. it was and coca-cola. it was the number of products. now there was concern when black people started to use cocaine. for example the new york times ran an article about black folks being the new southern menace.

and the way that cocaine was talked about or by people being under the influence of cocaine was talked about, it caused him to be more murders. it caused them to rape white women. cause them to be unaffected by bullets. all of this nonsense. this was going on then and now. although the language has been tempered, but drugs are such easy scapegoats because most of the population doesn't use drugs you cannot say these things about alcohol, even though algol is pharmacologically active and just like any other drug like cocaine and the rest of these things. you can say these crazy things about how crawl because many people drink alcohol. fewer people use cocaine. you can tell these incredible stories. >> host: you think it's still

the case today you could credibly, on c-span or anywhere else and say people who use cocaine gain superhuman strength or as the new york times article said, if you shoot me in my letter will feel if i use cocaine. i think everyone's a your crazy. >> guest: let's go back a couple years ago. the incident in miami where -- i think they called it does on the incident. he chewed off the face of another guy. originally the report was that the person was on bath salts, new drug. whenever there's a new drug or a new form of drug you can say these incredible stories about the drug can be believed. certainly there was believe that basalts cost the sky is used as dyes -- to discuss face-off. the toxicology but we check to see what was in this person's system, there was no battle. the only thing that was in his system was marijuana, and not

that it was even in the system when -- not that he had risen this month, but we know that it was an assistant. no, with crack cocaine the things that we said about crack cocaine in the 1980's, we said that it costs this incredible amount of violence. we could not of said that about powder cocaine, and we cannot of said that about powder cocaine because a number of americans are using powdered cocaine, particularly americans or middle-class. we had to have a new route, smoking it, not powder, but crack cost these incredible a facts, and we believed it as a country in part because we thought it was something new. in fact it's the same drug. >> host: something new oftentimes leads to this kind of despair reaction. >> guest: that's right. there aren't any real new drugs. that's just a mess.

many of these trucks had been with us forever. >> host: i hear about new drugs, the club drugs, you know, i don't know all the names. the drugs that people take a more chemical compounds, i believe, than marijuana. >> guest: that's right. us think about it. methamphetamine. people act like that as a new drug. that's been around since the early 1900's. ecstasy, and the early 2000's people discovered that. it out of something new. it wasn't. it has been with the since 1912. many of these compounds have been with us. is just that they get a new group of users and then when that new group of users is a group that we despise, that's a recipe for the hysteria that we see. >> host: let's come back to the central point of the book. lots of americans use illegal drugs. your argument is not for drug

legalization. by the way, among the americans have used illegal drugs, president obama, president bush, george h. w. and also bill clinton. these are people who have a acknowledged drug use but go on to do great things. you point out that there were not caught up in the network of police arrest that can often times to real success in america >> guest: that's right. >> host: know when you look at the use of illegal drugs, your point not for legalization personally, but for education. and you talk about the idea that people should know what is in a cycle active drug one of your arguments that i found fascinating is most people who use illegal drugs are not taxed by your definition, does not interfere with parenting, work, all relationships. i think most americans if they

heard this there was a, but doctor, you are taking away all of the hype and fear that we want our children to here. might be better to say to children, don't do drugs. even if your argument is true, there are people into illegal drugs and don't suffer consequences. why isn't it better given what you said about the police and now works of crime that then attach, why when you say you know it's better to say don't do drugs. >> i'm a professor. one of the things that i think is more important is to teach people i think. so when you say don't do drugs and just say no, there is no sort of thinking going on. now, if you have a curious kid, which you would hope he would have, your kid will be curious to find out for themselves. some minor issue is that why not give the kids the proper

education. so if they choose to indulge, many were not. they do choose to and bills that will be safe. that's number one. so i have children myself. until zero than an 18 year-old. of course there in that age group where you worry. my kids, i will refer more about the environment. that environment allows police officers to look of my kids like they fit the description of the drug user. a helluva lot more than i feared the interaction of my kids. i can teach them about drugs. drug effects are predictable. the interaction with black boys and police is not. >> host: both could be avoided by avoiding drug use. >> guest: certainly.

my kids might avoid it, but the point is that there are kids who won't. and so if they do not avoid it at least your keeping unsafe by having them have the education, giving them the correct information. not only that committee not only teaching them about drugs that have to think critically, teaching them how to evaluate information. that's what we value. the talk about legalization. one of the things i want to make clear is that i'm not encouraging legalization. for decriminalization, what you do is the interest of the legal. when people are caught, instead of having the criminal record they receive a civil fine, just like it would if they have a driving violation. and that way you get rid of this notion god is impact on the

futures. if they did, they don't have a criminal record. they can go on and get a job. they become president. but as long as we have these things legal, that is less likely. >> host: you talk about your own experiences. you talk about smoking marijuana and doing cocaine. and you become extraordinarily successful by any measure. and you say again that most drug users and not try to be involved in crime, although you say addiction and crime related. you say the most drug users are not going to get involved of criminal activity. most have full-time jobs. so what is the difference them if you're talking to your son, not to me and say was the difference between the smart way to use illegal drugs and the dumb way?

>> guest: one of the things you have to do, they should know what the effects are. for example, if they take an amphetamine, one of the things that amphetamines are good at doing is keeping you awake. sleep is a central function for human behavior and physiology. the wide range of disorders of been associated with lack of sleep for sleep disruption. you want to make sure that if you take amphetamine urine taken in your bedtime. if you take you want to make sure you're getting the proper amount of sleep. if it thinking about something like heroin, one of things that we have to have as a country is to properly educate people about heroin overdose. the country thinks the it's relatively easy to overdosed on heroin. thus just not true.

it's not supported by evidence. the problem becomes when heroin is mixed with another set of like all. so 75 percent of the heroin overdose deaths occur in combination with something like alcohol. given that that is the case, the public health message is clear. don't use heroin in combination with another set of. if you're just simply blasting that message to the public we can save a number of lives. we haven't. cocaine, one of the things and we know is the cocaine is cut, often with his adulterants. and animal de warmer. one of the side effects is that it decreases wet blood cells. that means the it decreases the body's ability to fight off infection. people can get sick. in extreme cases died produce a

given that that is the case, you want to make sure people understand. using cocaine, a large percentage of it nowadays is cut you might want to stay away from that. -to be one of those. what is being cut with. you might want to know what you drug is being go with. in many cases the more problematic than the actual drug themselves. the public health message is not connected with the real problems. too busy trying to vilify how a typical drug. cocaine, heroin, marijuana, as opposed to making sure that we educate people. >> host: again, we come back to this idea, nancy reagan, justin of the drugs. the war on drugs. you point out of the book, more than 3,000 percent increase in the amount of spending on the war on drugs between 1970 and

2011 with very little consequence in terms of depressing the amount of use of marijuana, ireland, or cocaine. so by that measure not much difference. again, from a parent's point of view, do i really want my children to take the risk and say, well, don't use this chart with that chart or know that destroyed his car with this. charlie want to educate them in this way but there's the risk that it might say, you know what , it's okay to use drugs. >> host: click your parenting is focusing on drug education, your insurer was apparent. he should be educating kids about responsibility, the future, a wide range of things. they're already in trouble. my parents in really focuses on drug use. making sure that my kids get into the proper college, the school that i want them. make sure that the s.a.t. scores

are where they need to be. make sure they understand responsibility. so you're in trouble. all of these things are just described, that is the best drug prevention. not this just say no. and the kids are curious and want to know about drugs, a teacher. if they do indulge their will these be safe. in my research time given of the 2,000 doses of these drugs. none of these drugs can be given safely. and now they can be administered safely. you don't have to look in my research. you can ask americans. as the guy in the white house.

even president kennedy committee used amphetamines. so this notion of drugs being sold, it's misguided. >> host: is a possible, we can use of heroin or cocaine, you said this is not necessarily interfere with their ambition it seems almost counterintuitive the someone is using such strong cycle active drugs that they are a fully functional member of the community. >> guest: when you say strong cycle actor gerard, one of the strong this cycle active drugs is nicotine. so it just requires a small amount of nicotine to have this effect to be in every cigarette there is 1 milligram. 1 million of cocaine would not do anything for you.

so the notion that these drugs are strong is a myth. so you think that when i talk about alcohol and tobacco among them may be more deleterious to my well-being and cocaine or heroin. >> guest: certainly. the thing we have to understand is that with education we can enhance the positive affects of all of these drugs, including a call, including cocaine, including heroin. and with education we can decrease the negative effects. so the first thing we have to understand is that there are people who can use cocaine on the weekend, heroin on the weekend and go to work and pay in taxes. the question that you asked about heroin and cocaine, just think about asking the same question for our call. other people who can drink out on the weekend and in go work on monday and irresponsible? not yes, but hell yes. the same is true.

the same is true even know in the american public's mind those two drugs are far more powerful. >> guest: the things in the american public's mind sometimes are not right to be nice. the public, as i said commences been miseducated about drugs. >> host: here we are in here is your book. high-priced commoner scientist journey of self discovery the challenges everything in know about drugs in society. what would you say? you have this platform. what is it that we should know? >> guest: we're talking about what we should know. the notion that drugs -- most of the people who use drugs, for example, are addictive. just not true. if you're going to use in the judge he should understand that

you should respect the fact that they are potentially powerful cycle active substances. if you don't use drugs with the respect you run the risk of getting in trouble. so if you know about the effects of the drug to your taking, you increase the likelihood that you will be safe. there is one of the things that we think about, the internet contains a lot of information. there is no quality control. that's a major concern. there are other books that have been written on the subject. in which we talked mainly about the biological effects of drugs on people's behavior, on people. but those kind of books and very dry. the public its board. so i think this book, "high

price," is a start. >> host: to explain again for the viewer, this book is not a textbook in any way. it's largely your personal story and then talking about drug use in your life and then about your research in combination. so what we are talking about drug use, for example, you mention that you have and then it over a time. think you said you're doing it twice a month with a girlfriend. but is not the case that when you ran out you felt in the compunction to go give more or were somehow unable to function because you were using cocaine. instead of you talk about larger motivational forces in your life , your desire to succeed educationally, and money, have a lover. these were other forces. so let's transfer that now. you're working with france. he said in this book you have to take rats out of this case to

isolated environment and put them in a more social environment. then you see that they make choices that does not lead them to kill themselves by constantly pushing a lever. so what you're saying to americans is you have to see drugs as part of a normal life? >> guest: seven we think about the lab, many of us have heard about the stories were if you allow an animal to sell to administer a drug like cocaine there will do so until the kill themselves. many of those of her that. but we don't hear is that those rats or those animals were so isolated, the only thing that they could do was take cocaine. certainly if your life consisted of this case in the only thing available was cocaine, that's what you would do. if you put another animal in the cage, cocaine is no longer as attractive.

if you put sweet water in that cage, cocaine is no long rejected. if you put of running well in that cage, cocaine is no longer attractive. so when we have these alternatives and airlines as many of us do, it decreases the impact or the attractiveness cocaine. we know this as parents, as citizens we all know this. if we have jobs, we know that we have to gut our job in order to get the respect, regard, and all the rest of it. sometimes drug use interviews with your ability to do a job, to get this positive regard. so the cocaine may have to go, but certainly that was the case in my life. >> host: tell us and i your life. >> guest: well, as you pointed out, it was just something i was experimenting with a girlfriend.

that was fine. it did not an affair with my work. i had a job that something like ups. if it had al-anon of done it. i knew i was going somewhere. i knew that if cocaine would have disrupted my ability to make money in that situation i would no longer had a girlfriend. >> host: hold on. this is an interesting point. let's say ups said the drug-testing policy, and that would have cost you your job and all you felt you were doing was experimenting with a girlfriend but in fact it had this dire consequence for your future, much as we were talking about young man, especially young black man, marijuana, crack, whenever, higher rates of unrest but it has this terrible consequence for the future.

so in terms of public policy, are you against drug testing? >> guest: of course. i think that drug-testing -- first of all, it tells you nothing about the level of intoxication of the person at the moment. so the thing that we are concerned about, particularly in some sense of the job, we don't want people to be intoxicated on the job. the best way to is see if someone is intoxicated is to look at their behavior, not a year and. the year in toes you absolutely nothing. for example, if you had a beer or alcohol in the past couple of days of so, i can test your sweat and see whether or not you have out call metabolites. but it tells me nothing about your ability to conduct the interview, absolutely nothing. that's essentially what we're doing with shrek testing. someone could have smoked marijuana week ago. test the year in and their positive. it tells us nothing about their

behavior currently. >> host: how would you then determine if i was the pilot or a driver of a vehicle. even a school teacher. have you determine if this person is in fact abusing drugs or is interfering with a capacity to perform the function you're paying them to perform. .. > host: shouldn't we tell

kids don't do drugs. when you say that to a child child being curious and tries drugs and then says, my dad lied to me. because i did drugs and it didn't make me go crazy and it doesn't ruin any performance in school. so the question becomes one of honesty. you want the child to be believe you. at the same time the child may think i'm okay. maybe as you are concerned about when you are a young person it decreases the level of your performance whether it's on the basketball court or in a classroom. how do you deal with that problem? >> guest: so if a child is using drugs, -- >> host: right. and i feel fine the next day i'm doing okay. you see the child give up later. that's not as interested in school. not performing as well in school. how do you respond? >> guest: you respond as a parent. obviously, i mean, the schield

not handing his or her ability. there should be consequences to that. that's what we do as parent. whether the child is not handling the responsibility as a result of drugs or as a result of some other behavior or activity there are consequences. drugs are not special in that way. it leads you to jail. >> certainly. of course and worry about legality, that's something different. of course so i tell my kids in term of this is black people are more likely to be arrested for drugs. if you ever use drugs you don't use them out there. you do so here. because i'm worried about the police more so than anything else. and so, yeah, that's a different level of concern there. white parents don't have the same concern as the legality as

black parents do. >> host: we have to understand that. i think white parents of course are worried about their children getting arrested. you're saying in term of ratio and statistics it's more likely for children of color to be impacted by the arrest in the records and the damage to the future. >> guest: absolutely. go to rickers island where the young kids are kept in new york city. there aren't any white kids there. we know that. in the book, again so much of the book and book called "high price." you talk about an episode in your youth in miami, you saw a man -- a white man get shot in retaliation for a shooting and your sister gets shot. it's drug-related. you understand the negative consequences that comes from people think, well, sure i can handle drugs no big deal. i'm just a weekend user. so isn't that contradictory

about what you're saying well, it's people get out -- it doesn't really damage anything. >> guest: well, like my sisters being shot, that was not drug-related that was some adolescence beef. >> host: i thought there was a drug element to that. >> guest: no. the white guy being shot, he was there simply to buy some marijuana. there was an incident that happened earlier in the day between some other white guys, and the black guys in my neighborhood. that was more race. then the guy happened to be buying marijuana in the neighborhood. >> host: okay. >> guest: the major problem here would be race. that was the issue there. >> host: that was the racial tension of miami in 1980. >> host: correct. what i'm saying to you -- of course it leads to the shooting of your sister. what i'm saying is this drug element -- but i'm saying drugs seem to be a part of -- and this actually emphasizes a point you make in the book. the larger social structure, the

larger social tension, poverty, abandonment, all these issues then when drugs come in to it they can act as a scientific term a catalyst. it can speed up negative reaction. >> guest: or exacerbate problems. absolutely. >> host: so that was why i was thinking isn't that best to say no to drugs, nancy reagan's phrase. >> guest: if you are white and middle class because we don't have to worry -- they don't have to worry so much about the consequence of the environment we have set up by just saying no. when you just say no, you act as if the drug itself is causing these problems. you set up the environment police forces have to get rid of these drugs because i have said they are -- when in fact they're not. and the people will pay the consequences are people who look like you and me, primarily. i can't accept that, as black

person. as an educator it's not consistent with teaching people how to think. >> host: people are curious and people are going to try things. >> guest: people are going to try things, and we would like to decrease the harm if they try things. >> host: i didn't understand one point. if you're a white parent. >> guest: yeah. >> host: it might make sense to say no to drugs. why would that not make sense if you're a black parent. >> guest: no. my point is that single approach if you take that single approach and can be done with it. when you take that single approach, there are is also -- there are also other actions that occur. we say just say no like we have done with nancy reagan. that means we set up an entire environment where drugs are bad and we have to go at them of any cost. and the cost being primarily beared by the black community. that's all i was suggesting there.

>> host: i'm not saying a parent should say -- shouldn't tell their kids they should use drug or anything like that. no, i'm not suggesting that. >> host: in this conversation, you referred to nicotine, cigarettes. >> guest: yes. >> host: alcohol as drugs. >> guest: yes. >> host: so we don't have much discussion about that in this book, but the question occurs. what would you tell somebody given there are so many americans who smoke cigarettes, drink alcohol more than marijuana, cocaine, heroin put together. what would you say to them about the intelligent use of those drugs. >> guest: we think about alcohol, for example. alcohol moderate alcohol drinking has been associated with improvement of health, decrease heart rate, decrease stroke, moderate drinking. so there are clear benefits of alcohol. when people overindulge that's when they get in trouble.

besides every society needs an intox cant. if you try to ban alcohol, good luck. every society needs. >> host: we did try it. >> guest: we did try it, and we no longer have it. in term of tobacco, tobacco also has some positive effects. it enhances your memory, alertness, and all the rest of these things that some people understands that keep the weight off for some folks. that product -- that is a little more problematic for me, because of the potential for cancers and those sorts of thing. we still have to be mindful that the vast majority of the people who spoke tobacco cigarettes get cancer. they don't get the awful disease. i don't want to get crazy about that. i want people to understand there are potential consequence and benefits. people make the calculations

where they weigh the risk benefit ratio of all the things they do. whether it's living in new york city or weather it's -- whether it's smoking tobacco. there are risk-benefit ratios we weigh all the time. >> host: in these cases alcohol and cigarette you seem to be counting as moderation and knowing what you're doing. >> guest: yes. >> host: is that similar than to the way you view what we consider or what we have deemed to be illegal drugs the marijuana, heroin, cocaine. >> guest: that's a difficult question. i'll answer it. because on the one hand, they're illegal activities. and so the short answer is absolutely. if you're going to be using these drugs, know what you're doing. now, that's -- this is a whole different conversation that we have -- we have been having in the country about drugs. when we talk about drugs we're cognitivelied adolescence when we talk about drugs. what i'm trying to do is make

sure we have the conversation, which we treat people like they are intellectual adults, and so, yes. if people are going to use those drugs, know what they're doing. they should also know about doze, the amount of drug you're using, the amount of drug you use, moderation, all of these things. they should know the negative side effect because all the drugs have side effect. they should know everything about the drug. they should -- that f they do that and go their research, not only are they be improving their skills in this area, they'll be improving their critical thinking stills. >> host: which is, as you say, ab absolute requirement for success. you say that -- >> guest: that's in the book. >> host: now, when do you look at the psychoactive effect mind altering fact of drugs. which would you say is the most dangerous? >> guest: wow.

it depends on the user. for example, if you're an older person and you have the cardiovascular blood pressure issues, you probably want to stay away from an fed means and those type of drugs. it depends on who we're talking about and what conditions on what we're talking about. there are a number of young people in the country. you will not encourage older people to take the same drug. so what is might be safe for one group may not be safe for another group. >> host: okay. and when it comes to -- >> guest: it's the definition

from the american -- this is from the dsm. do what i describe in the book. >> host: when we are talking about addiction and people who become addicted give me a discrepancies of who is at risk and why they are at risk. >> guest: that's a difficult one. when we think about addiction, one of the things that americans have done that is. we act as if the drug is special. it has to do with the pharmacologies of the drug. it has a lot to do whether or not they are plugged in to society, responsible, a wide range of social factors play in control. what we have done in the country we have paid less attention to those things because it is less sexy to really talk about the fact that this person was irresponsible before they started using drugs. this person was overindulging in

a wide range of behaviors before drugs. infed -- instead we have chosen to focus on the biology of individual. what does their brain look like. can we tell if somebody is addicted by their brain. no, and hell no. there's no evidence that would suggest that sort of thing. yeah, that's where we're looking. we should be looking. tbhaw has gotten a disproportionate amount of attention rather than the things we know that are valuable. let's look at the person's environment. let's look at the person's -- as a person. >> host: that's where you would go with the addict. it you're dealing with an addict, let's not simply imprison the person or punish the person. let look how we can restructure the environment. i think in the book you talk about a drug user and the setting in which the drugs are used. here we're talking about in terms of trying to conduct

remedial remediation for an addict you're saying look at the larger society and environment. look at the study for the individual. >> guest: that's right. >> host: what if you can't control the environment. you can't give them two good parents or a good school. they are highly frustrated because they are not succeeding in the work world. >> guest: yeah. >> host: what do you do with the person that finds they indulge in drugs to the point of addiction. >> guest: yeah, i mean, rick -- like you said we can't control everybody's environment. i don't know the answer to the people we can't control the environment. we have to decide as a society, i think we have decided as a society. we prefer to lock them up. that's a choice we have made. i think that's inappropriate. how about if we see if we can give them some job skills or get the person some sort of responsibility so they feel better about themselves. how about we do these kinds of things at least we will be trying to make sure they are paying taxes, and they are

contributing to the society. >> host: now when we talk about drug policy right now in the united states, there is a number of states that are legalizing marijuana, and large debate whether it should be nationally legalized. what position do you, as a neuroscientist have on marijuana legalization. >> guest: there are only two states that legalized marijuana. washington and colorado. it's important to understand something about the states. they are like some of the whitest state in the union. and when we think about marijuana legalization in other places that is more diverse, it ain't going to happen. how do i feel about marijuana legalization or legalization in general? i think we should decriminalize all drugs first. we need to have a correspondenting amount of education that goes along with that before we make them more widely available without correspondenting education, then

i would predict we are setting ourself up for more problems. and so if we are going to legalize. the society might decide that. i'm not saying that the society should not. but what i'm saying is that we need really increase our education around drugs. that means that we need to stop having police officers provide drug instay gracious. we need stop having politicians provide drug education. we need to make sure when people talk about drugs, that we can ask the questions do those facts or that information -- does information have foundation and evidence? >> host: you're saying you don't want the politicians and the police talking about drugs, you and saying they are drug educators. you want the scientists and the physicians talking about drug use as drug educators. >> guest: i don't know if i want all the scientist. they have a narrow focus on what

they do. i want the public and i want people to be able to say to the folks the information that you are relaying to me do they have foundations and evidence. not about dote and evidence. >> host: can i understand. i didn't understand what you said at the start. you said colorado and washington are mostly white state. what does that have to do with drug education. >> guest: right on. that's something different. for drug legalization. i'm saying one of the reasons -- all right. so we legalize marijuana in part because we're worried about all the drug arrests. all right. >> host: okay. i think people who want to use marijuana without fear of arrest. >> guest: right. and so one of the sort of -- racial disparity, >> host: okay. >> guest: there's a new report that came out today by the aclu, and they show nationwide black

people are four times more likely to be arrested for marijuana even though they use the drug at the same rate of white folks; right. so much of the few is being for this is racial disparity. even though that's the case. the state in which there are large populations of black people there are no movement to legalize marijuana. >> host: that's because? >> guest: that won't happen in state with large -- who i think are less like lie to be open to the idea of drug legalization. i don't -- are you suggesting it's black politicians who are resistant?

>> guest: no. no, no. >> host: what is your point? >> >> guest: this is my prediction in states that have large number of black folks because white people are afraid that blacks get intoxicated and ability out. >> host: what are you saying? >> guest: actually, i don't know that point. i don't know that point as well. i'll just -- >> host: okay. we'll move on. do you support or oppose marijuana legalization as we're seeing it in washington state and colorado. >> guest: i support marijuana legalization. i support whatever the voters vote for. i think it's a good move by the state of colorado and washington. and i'm happy to see that. they are pushing the envelope and forcing the conversation. >> host: you said earlier in our conversation you're not in favor generally of drug legalization. what you're in favor of is

decriminalization. >> guest: that's right. >> host: in this case you're saying it's okay to legalize marijuana. >> guest: no you asked if i was in favor. i'm saying i support the voters of washington and colorado. i'm happy they pushed the envelope and pushing this topic and the discussion. so now if you ask me what i think we should do as a country. i think we should decriminalize drugs. that's different. but i support washington and colorado. >> host: what if it was a movement to legalize the use of cocaine. would you feel the same way? >> guest: yeah. i would feel the same way, but i would encourage the american people, please, get some proper education on these drugs. >> host: okay. now when you hear about public instances like, for example, the celebrated case of trayvon martin down in florida, your home state. there's an argument there about young man, i think he's 16 or 17

when he died, who had sold some marijuana, had used some marijuana. should be allowed in to the court proceedings when it comes to evaluating who he was? >> guest: well, this goes back to the early articles written by the negro cocaine fee. one of the reasons that the definitely is so adamant about bringing in trayvon martin's drug use history is because they're playing on the perceptions of drug users. the perceptions, by the way, that i try to point out in the book are wrong. they're counting on those perceptions such that people will see trayvon as less than the drug users. they conjure up all the images about drug users that are incorrect. and so it infuriates me that

this becomes an issue. >> host: especially for a young man of color. >> guest: a young black man. it's important to be specific. >> host: go you think if it was latino it would less damage? >> guest: it's not that. but the con speck use characteristic is raised whether they are black or latino is an ethnicity. there are black latinos who the conspicuous character -- characteristic is raised and not so much what they speak. downside? >> host: okay. you think it's color. but again, it's black. >> guest: absolutely. i think that's important. i think the darker the skin, the neighborhood, the rest of those things play a role. not to say, now, that obviously in new york city we arrest a lot of hispanic and black folks. >> host: yeah. >> guest: but i think in this case, i'm asking you just to be specific we're talking about trayvon martin who was black. we can talk about in the box the

-- bronx the kid who was killed bay police officer who killed him in the bathroom who was black because he thought he had marijuana on him. so i'm just asking you to be specific. the term like person of color. it's okay but we talk about trayvon martin you and i both know he's a black guy. >> host: in the history of the united you think about the chinese being caricature of opium users and crazed on drugs. again, you think about the latino community and all a bunch of cocaine. >> guest: i'm sorry, i'm not familiar of that. >> host: cow think of "scar the --

"scarface." we didn't pass the law result of "scarface" in the '80s in miami in 1980 where i grew up. we passed law about crack cocaine when we saw the images of black people using cocaine. "scarface" was a cuban immigrant who came here. there were no new laws. in the 1980 we had murder rates peeking in the country. there was no new law. >> host: your argument is so many of the laws are directed against black people? >> guest: yeah. it's not only -- the seven-day forecast there. >> host: the most i think prominent argument in support of your case would be the argument about the disparity in sentencing for powered cocaine versus crack cocaine. again, the point being crack cocaine -- i want to try to hold to your

line use mostly by black people. not just poor people but black people versus powered cocaine used by white people. >> guest: the data is white people use more powered cocaine than black people. that's a fact. there a perception that black people use crack cocaine at greater rate. the perception drove where law enforcement efforts were placed. >> host: so but going back to your argument, if you are introducing cocaine as a among people who have prominence status, family, income, versus introdisusing it to a community where there's large-scale dysfunction in term of poverty, racism, oppression. i can go on. >> guest: yes. >> host: it seems to me there's going to be a different result. >> guest: yeah. absolutely. we talked about this earlier where drugs or any other illegal activity can campusser bat --

exacerbate. >> host: right. why do you say as a society you are wrong to crack down on the community that has a dispaifting impact. >> guest: i would say you're wrong to crack down in term of drug policy. >> host: yes. >> guest: singling out drugs is the reason for the problems you describe. drugs are probably less of a problem than employment, education, all of these other things. far greater problem. >> host: let me argue with you. >> guest: absolutely. >> host: what i know living here in washington, d.c., in the black community is if you have suddenly, you know, people pop up in crack houses in your community, it depresses the value of real estate, it drives away retail sales, you know, small stores, it makes a community less attractive. suddenly you see the middle class and think maybe i should move out of here. so those are very negative effects. >> guest: yeah, that's the

point. >> host: so in other words if i -- you know, i would rather not see drugs come in to my community whole scale. that's why -- >> guest: wait, wait, wait. who would? that's not the point here. nobody wants to see drugs come to the community whole scale. that would not happen. that's not what we want. i mean. that's not what i'm arguing. >> host: you said in term of social policy. >> guest: that's right. >> host: in term of social policy it shouldn't be directed as the poor black neighborhood i think they're more vulnerable and more easily destabilized when you get drug dealers to plant their flag in the community. >> guest: wait a second. first of all, if you make sure that people have jobs and people have lawful employment. drug drearls are not the most prominent people in the community. >> host: if that's the case.

i'm saying for you go to poor, black neighborhoods. yes, there's a birth of jobs absence of educational and economic opportunities. that's a fact. then you introduce drugs and it seems like -- >> guest: i think that's your sided the way you characteristic it. overly simplistic. en the one hand, first of all, when you say the crack houses and drug houses. we have to do our job as police officers. we still have do all that sort of stuff. you make sure that people are not breaking the law. you still do that. but the consequences of catching people shouldn't be so dire that their lives of ruined as a result of being caught. you want to make sure, for example, all the undercover activity we do with the police, we don't need that. if someone is speeding in the car and you see a police officer you slow down. as a opposed to some police officer hiding where you never knew that the person was hiding. so you can continue to speed.

so you have police officers do their job. that's number one. and you make sure that people have an opportunity for meaningful employment. >> host: right. what i'm saying to you, if you're a drug dealer and looking far vulnerable population to exploit to sell drugs to; right. and you're looking for places where you can in fact establish dominance, i would think you could go to a vulnerable community, a poor community to do it. >> guest: see, this is a myth. >> host: that's what i want to hear. >> guest: i'm a drug dealer and i want to make loot. i'm going to go to the poorest place i can go to. that's not how it works. ic we thought, for example, these kids in the street of d.c., miami, my friend, me included thought they were making all this money. they weren't. there was a notion that the kids are making money. they weren't making money. and the notion that somehow

they're the most appealing folkses in the community. they're only appealing if there's no other alternative that are more attractive. >> host: true. i didn't get your point because as i said to you, that comes book then why they choose those communities. they can be the suddenly the super hero, the one who has the most money, the one providing sneakers or doing -- >> guest: i'm you didn't get my point. the point is they have no money. so drug dealers cannot survive if the community doesn't have any money. so -- >> host: the drug dealers in fact can develop market among those who are vulnerable, needy, feeling they are left out by the larger society been marginalized and looking for something. >> guest: no, i assure you there are white folks coming to the communities to buy drugs if the drug dealers are going to survive. because they can't -- >> host: sure. the whites can come there and buy the drugs. >> guest: yeah. but that's where they are. you don't see the drive by

shootings, the kind of drug dealer rivalry playing out in affluently white community even though there's tremendous drug use in the affluent drug community. >> guest: in the early 1980 you certainly ask in miami. in>> host: in the white community? >> guest: certainly extendedon black community in the 1980. i think you raise the "scarface" example. >> host: what i'm saying in general i think most of the incidents and the shootings, the rivalry among drug dealers take place in poor black communities. >> guest: they certainly do. they certainly do. particularly when the markets are new. that happened with crack cocaine. >> host: right. that settled down and you don't see it anymore. you don't see the thing anymore. but i think that is a minor sort of issue. i don't want to -- i certainly don't want to down

play the fact people are killed. that's not obviously that's awful. but i think that has been the sole sort of point one of the major points driving what we do with drug policy. and i think it's shortsighted and limited. that's all i'm saying. >> host: okay. the book is called "high price." that challenge everything you know about drugs in society our guest has been dr. karl hart. i want to remind you that dr. hart is not only an author at 46. a a board member of the college on the problems of drug dependency, and has done 22 years of research in neuropsych copharmacologies, and dr. hart, it's been a pleasure to learn about you inspect is large part of biography as well as drug

society and race. congratulations on your book, dr. hart. >> guest: thank you. one of the things i looked as i was exploring this. i looked at the lot of county records in which these -- the counties where the colleges are. and when you look at the colonial county records often you'll have the name of the president or the name of the professor, then listed with their taxable -- will be an enslaved person or two or three. >> host: did students bring -- >> guest: yes. >> host: they brought their slaves to school with them? >> guest: when you think about that. if you look at the name of the president and three lines over part of the textbook property is an an enslaved person. what you'll also is in the case of princeton or harvard you'll actually have the president's name ditto the college.

will belong to the person. in the common knowledge of the town, of the local area. the president and the college are inseparateble anyway. booktv's book club returns in september. secretary of state john kerry said chemical attacks in syria are quote, undenial. you can watch the entire statement online at c-span.org. here is some behalf he said. >> for the last several days president obama and his entire national security team have been

reviewing the situation in syria. today i want to provide an update on our efforts as we consider our response to the use of chemical weapons. what we saw in syria last week should shock the conscious of the world. and defies any code of mortality. let me be clear. the indiscriminate slaughter of civilians, the killing of women and children, and innocent bystanders by chemical weapons is a moral obscenity. by any standard it's inexcusable and despite the excuses and equivocation that some have manufactured, it is undeniable. the meaning of the attack goes beyond the conflict in syria itself. that conflict has already brought so much terrible suffering. this is about the large-scale indiscriminate use of weapons that the civilized world long

ago decided must never be used at all. the conviction shared even by countries that agree on little else. there is a clear reason that the world has banned entirely the use of chemical -- weapons. there's a reason that the international community set a clear standard and why many countries have taken major step to eradicate these weapons. there is a reason why president obama has made it such a priority to stop the proliferation of these weapons and lock them down where they do exist. there is a reason why president obama has made clear to the assad regime that this international norm cannot be violated without consequences. and there is a reason why no matter what you believe about syria, all peoples and all nations who believe in the cause of our common humanity must

stand up to assure there's accountability for the use of chemical weapons so that it never happens again. several live event tomorrow morning including the center for -- that's here on c-span2 at 8:30 eastern. also on c-span two at 10:00 a.m. a national press club news makers discussion on the future of democracy in egypt. and also at 10:00 on the companion networking c-span jot going homeland security janet napolitano give a farewell speech at the national press club. she served as the head of her department since 2009. she's leaving to be president of the university of california. next on booktv after words.

hem low. we are here to talk about your terrific new book "strange rebel" and the birth of the 21st century. i'm going let you explain in a second why it is that 1979 was really the crucial hinge point to history. let me first start out with a little bit of explanation for what i think is a really unusual book that you have done. i know, it's a labor of love, but christian, for those of you joining us today is a long time "newsweek" correspondent. as well as my colleague who contributes to foreign policy magazine when i'm the editor of chief. and i think very unusual with the book. you managed to do in a way the impossible linking together in one place margaret thatcher and

the ayatollah as characters in a unified narrative a about the great counter revolutionary year of 1979. it is your very provocative thesis that this was a year in which basically the backlash or the return of markets and religion to global politic in a big way signaled a counter revolution toward these reaction of the earlier post war era. how did you come up with that? who can possibly write a book that said margaret thatcher deng xiaoping, the eye tole will -- ayatollah, the afghan communists and the iranian revolutionary have a common -- never mind pope john paul ii and who which is a fascinating part

of the book. how did you come up with putting these things together? >> well, it had a lot to do with my reporting in afghanistan after 9/11. you were there too. we actually -- memory serves me we stayed in the same house for awhile. you were with "washington post," i was with "newsweek." that house kind of struck me at the time and had a shag carpeting and the tubular light fixture. it was a ranch-style house. it was like the kind of houses we were growing up in the '70s when i was kid. and i was kind of struck by that. when you went nods kabul you were driving around in 1970 american cars sometimes with eight-track tape placers. if you can remember what they were. the ministry buildings, the government buildings were built in the 1970. when you went to the bookstore in kabul you found all the great postcards and books about afghanistan in the 1970.

it showed they were going somewhere. and at the end of the '70s wham they hit a wall. and the more time i spent in afghanistan the more i found myself wondering about that. we shouldn't take that as a self-evident thing when a entire country goes in to reverse. and during my reporting over the past couple of years, i began to notice similar things in other places. we topped focus the united states on '60s, western european tend to focus on the '60s. if you look from a global perspective. i don't think it looks quite that way. my book was an exploration, an attempt figure out why it is so. >> host: let's take the -- quickly here.

you have afghanistan as i mentioned. i thought that house, to me, looked like the brady bunch. it's a copy of the house with the open staircase and the family would come down in the opening scene of the brady bunch. it was most recently occupied before news week took it over by al qaeda leaders or that's what we were told. i guess it seemed more glamorous. but it's a great point you make. afghanistan and the communists take over of afghanistan which happened in 1979. china. the solidarity movement. great britain, the election of margaret thatcher and the

british economy i think has been lost as part of the historical narrative of britain affiliate thatcher. i'm looking forward of coming back to that. and number five, of course, the one that probably most people think of first when it i come of 1979, the iranian revolution. the toppling of the hostage crisis. there's a huge outpouring. tribute to thatcher. the magazine covers and revisiting. your book takes a part some of the myths of margaret thatcher. >> guest: well, i try to do to that. but it's always a challenge because you want to show why somebody is worth knowing about the first place. there were a lot of revisionist history of thatcher. at love people correcting some misperception about her. but of course first so you to establish why she was important

in the first place. i think few people would dispute she was hugely immensely important. but like any hugely important figure.

>> host: it's really on the economy in many ways. >> guest: yes. for example, we live now in a world where it's taking for granite the capital can flow accost boundaries without any barrier at all. one of the first thing she did when she became prime minister is she dismantled capital controls in great britain. there was a period when you want to leave the country you had to fill out a form and give you 50 franks or something if you were going france. you had a bureaucratic procedure. she did away with all that.

that was important what came later. the big bang. question take the stuff for granted today. we just assume it's a given. we assume that, you know, big companies should not multinational corporation shouldn't be owned by governments. right. and this is another legacy of hers. i think indoors to this day. other part haven't endured because we face different conditions austerity is a good example. she was very, very austere in her financial policy, and that those sort of policies are coming under attack a lot now acays. i think economically she was hugely important in by no means of the aspect of the legacy remain in place. it's striking how many she invoke the modern patron of

austerity politic. it may be a reason that her successor david cameron the current leader of great britain embarked upon that path the painful path as a response to the financial crisis of 2008. she's been much invoked even if actually the conditions of today bear almost no resimilar -- massive nationalized economy she was dealing with in 1979. >> guest: exactly. the punitively high rate of personal income tax in britain. 83%. comprehensible; right? no country has a personal income tax rate like that today. at the same time she race taxes on consumption intleefed in balance budget. she was willing to raise taxes to make it balance. and in this, she was quite different from ronald reagan who, you know, allowed the

enormous deficit to build up. it was actually a source of friction between the two of them. when american conservatives now seek to position themselves in, you know, as part of her legacy, i really wonder if they're paying attention to that part of it. she was such a budget hog she was not avers to raising taxes to make books balance. >> host: that's one of the things that comes through very strikingly in your history of her early part of heifer -- of her teen you to use the tools she saw in the toolbox of government. that's not the direction that american conservatives on capitol hill have gone out in dealing with the latest budget crisis here. sometimes history gives us lessons. sometis learn them? right. >> guest: exactly. >> host: i think it brings me right to the lightening rod subject of your book iran and afghanistan. those are both countries that are very much front page news in the united states today.

in term of policily frankly that feel stuck and many ways dealing with the legacy of the 1979 in both of those countries. but frankly, you know, i'm not sure that we have come up with a better way to negotiate with the iranians than we did at the disastrous time of the hostage taking in afghanistan. have we learned the lessons of the last super power to find itself enmeshed in a war there. it's hard say that when our war in afghanistan is now the longest war in history bay long shot. so -- let start with iran, for example, what is surprised you as you delved to the history of this. something we feel like you know. and you turned up a lot of things you didn't know or forgotten. >> guest: i i think the most fascinating i delved to the history of the iranian revolution. precisely the blend of the old and new. one call it is revolutionary

traditionalism; right? it was a revolution. and overthrew the shaw. it was a conservative. some cases nationalist democracy and the force to the left. they were smart in the way that he talks like a leftist. he loved talking about imperialism and the fight against american -- and he was very, very good at incorporating that sort of rhetoric which play a huge role in bringing the leftist and the other revolutionary to his colation. he didn't need them anymore. he discashedded them. but even today i would say that the rating system still has some

very interesting characteristic you can trace directly back to the revolution. so you a combination of an elected parliament and elected president which is the legacy of the democratic revolution, shall we say. and you have the supreme leader who was appointed by the other and exercises ultimate authority. and even today more than thirty years left of the revolution we still see a power struggle between the president and people who support him and the supreme leader. there have been power struggles like this almost since the day the islamic republican was founded. never quite seems to come to rest. just fuss -- fascinated the legacy he established in 19continues to shape the country today very clearly. and particularly relevant with another presidential election coming up in a few weeks in june. and i think you'll see that tension as well as americans don't struggle with the question

who makes decisions in today's slafmic republican. who can we negotiate with? that's another striking thing the internal american division at the highest level of the u.s. government over how we should approach a new more threatening iran. from the beginning you chronicle how secretary of statevance had one point of view. it was more in favor of negotiating of a conciliatory stance. the national security adviser took a harder line. it you changed the name you could be writing a story on today's front page about the internal division within the united states government over how to approach iran. >> guest: yeah. of course, i think -- there were

people comparing them to began i ghandi. he's a religious leader who lead an independent struggle. it was pretty much that simple. then you look at this policy feud that is putting too much on it between secretary of state and national security adviser at the time what you see is competing views about what the whole thing mean balance is going on here? it was hard to understand at the time. we have to remember nobody the word islamist didn't really even probably exist at the time. the idea of revolutionary was pretty new. >> host: two point i want to follow up. one as a historical point it's striking to recall in historical terms what role the hostage taking of the american dip --

diplomats played in resolving that internal power structure. it was a key moment the tension and balance between the elective democratic form of government and a harder line clerical form of government. because of the internal political success of taking the american hostage. they use that in a way that i think many americans wouldn't be familiar with. > guest: exactly. that's another thing i want to exam in my book. naturally and understandably and rightly we americans tend to look at the hostage crisis from an american viewpoint. how could they possibly violate all of these diplomatic laws and tradition by holding them hostage. people understandably and rightly exercised over this. people tended to pay less attention how it factored to the swernl conflict within the iranian revolutionary regime. as you say very, very skillfully use the hostage crisis to

undermine his secular liberal opponent. branding them as agent of america and trying the principle of clerical rule and from then on he had no serious challengers. >> host: yeah. i think that's striking. in term of the present-day relevance you make the point about being almost a key moment in the creation of modern political islamism as we know. it sounds like what is going on in egypt these days or early what is going to happen in egypt and what did the toppling of hosni new bar -- mubarak's regime mean? you can see paralegal between the rise of the muslim brotherhood and what happened there was a sort of early vacuum and jostling for power between a whole bunch of political faction in egypt and the cairo

revolution was driven by, you know, a lot of western-oriented democracy kid. they're not the ones who were in control now. i wondered if you thought echoes and resonance in the story of the revolution in iran. >> guest: absolutely, susan. absolutely. i think what we're seeing right now is a process where the muslim brotherhood, for example now, the muslim brotherhood which controls the presidency and the parliament in egypt is actually showing sign of cracking down on the judicial branch and putting in judges who are amenable to the muslim brotherhood. this looks very much like iran at the certain stage of the revolution there as they were spinning their control over everything. i think the difference with egypt is that egypt is thirty years later, and we have the iranian and the islamic republican of iran as an example of what the fundamentalist state can look like.

and apt necessarily so pretty. an economic basket case. very, very chaotic. very unstable. and even though the islamists right now are cementing their power over politics in egypt, i wonder if they are going to go quite so far if the iranians have. i wonder if there's at least some extent the example deter them from obsolete power. we'll see. right now it doesn't look very good. but of course a big difference is also that the people in charge of egypt now are not collarric. they are not member of the though karattic regime. they are member of the muslim brotherhood who appointed themselves to be the defenders of the religious politic in egypt. i think it colors the situation somewhat differently. but for the moment, of course, it doesn't look very good. >> host: certainly doesn't look very good in a way that everything is relative. we go from iran to afghanistan,

which has an even more tragic narrative over the last thirty years. it really begins in many ways with those soviet tanks rolling in to defend a regime. they wanted to defiend. i think that's an interesting take away from your recounting of sort of the sad history of cue and communists >> guest: it's an important story. when the british intervened they intervened several times in afghanistan. you never really quite want to go in afghanistan. you get drawn in geep your will by the internal politics and the place. and that's what happened to the british. that's what happened to the soviet and in many respects it happened to us in 2001. i don't think anybody was that keen on getting involved in afghanistan in 2001. we felt it was something we had to do once we were there we couldn't leave.

>> right. that's the key part. everybody there was a sort of consensus across the political spectrum that the u.s. was going do something in retaliation for the attack of 9/11, but they had in mind something that was not going to involve a big footprint on the ground that would last, you know, a dozen years later, and that is the part about getting sucked any be the disfunctional politics and situation on the ground. >> guest: what fascinated me, i think, about the situation in afghanistan in '78 and '79 was just how different it was from what we face today. many things are radically different. there are no radical leftist parties or secular parties in afghanistan today. it's been pretty much wiped out. in the 1970s those were the powerful forces in afghanistan. the president, from some of the -- much of the 1970 was a

secularist modernizer he was replaced by the afghan communist who began trying to remodel society according to their own design. they very quickly ran aground with that. the country rose up against him. that's why the soviets have to come in. what is amazing in a way that innovation and the war that followed come paneledded by the u.s. intervention in 2001 and after has completely wiped out that old afghanistan that we saw in the '60s and '70s that was different. ..