>> i'm excited to have this opportunity to visit with you about this new book. it's very interesting and provocative. and like i said, it reminded me of when i was working in treatment about the relationship and it's one of the questions i wanted to ask you is why now? why is the subject seen as a

crisis and important for you to get the message out? >> guest: we are seeing a global problem a closing of the gender gap between men and women. we've always known that men drink more than women do but what has been happening now is men have been declining a little bit in their drinking. women are not adderall and this is global. the more developed the country, the smaller and the gap between men and women's consumption. places like britain for instance where we almost seeing it. we see young girls in their 20s who are dying in the river disease which is classically seen as an old man disease. to open up a dialogue because it is our favorite drug. it's legal to consume. >> host: that's correct.

can you tell the driving force for writing "drink"? >> guest: it is a decades old. i grew up with an alcoholic mother on volume of like a lot of women were in the 60's and 70's dependent on mother's little helper and who was a stay at home mom for that era. i've always been interested in why she drank the way she drank and the one thing i said to myself is i never well and in my fifties i fell into really bad behavior with alcohol. i would say poster girl for this era to the well-educated, highly professional other hand i found myself drinking of two or three glasses of wine before, five, six. i caught myself quickly and went to rehab.

>> what was that like for you? that realization. it's probably the worst thing i've ever gone through in the sense that i was full of shame, deeply humiliated by my behavior i didn't do any of the above but i did blackout each night before i went to sleep, and it was something i said get a handle on it. i have learned so much to alcohol in my childhood. i knew that i was addicted. and i found myself going for help but it was compounding. what is confounding is.

>> host: like as a kid mirror mere month on the wall i am my mother after all. do you think that what you have experienced is pretty common with other women? >> guest: the extreme behavior that i was involved in was in the spectrum and i became addicted. i think the larger group of women are not addictive it's only about two and a half percent depending on the country how many are actually alcoholic could but there are involved in risky behavior that came out in january and warned about the fact this was an epidemic proportions and we focus on the alcoholic or the churn driver. we don't look at the common

person's behavior. for a woman is only nine drinks a week in terms of the guideline. that is not a lot never more than one or two on an occasion. taking in light of from drinking and a lot of people would find that something that they couldn't manage. >> host: what about for young girls? do they fall in the same range as that? because i know that we look at the age difference is between, you know, young women and women our age finding the difficulty. are there differences among the age in general? >> guest: the tiffin targeted very heavily by the alcohol industry and by that i mean and about the mid-1990s we saw the invention so sweet dhaka in houston drinks that are basically starter drinks, transitional, interested in

drinking moving away from the year because young women don't usually like the taste of the year and what happens is they mature into vodka drinkers on campus, you have got young men and women playing drinking games but she might be two-thirds of his body size is playing with an dhaka shots. a very risky behavior. we know that now cahal is the number one date rape drug so we are seeing a different behavior on this part of the generation that doesn't drink and drive but ave predrink before they go to the bar because it is expensive. they have alcohol in the dorms, endangering the head of the evin which means when they get there they are already inebriated. very risky behavior. >> host: that also puts the attack risk for what other type of the teacher? >> guest: many other types of

behavior. you see high-profile accidents fall to be it may be sexual behavior that wasn't wanted. absolutely a broad spectrum of accidents and so on and so forth young women use to slow down. after the university college they would slow down. >> host: why do you think that this? >> guest: i think that women are getting a very complex message. we are in the middle of a sociological revolution. young women are told that they have to be great mothers, be thin, they have to be good looking, they have to manage their house well and there is a sense of entitlement. i can do everything a young man does that includes having a glass of wine or two after work, drinking to wind down, and women

tend to medicate depression and anxiety and loneliness. i think there is a lot of anxiety in this generation in terms of how do i manage all. so when we look at who is drinking the most we are seeing the professional educated woman and i don't think this is what gloria steinem had in mind when she talks about being equal. >> host: it sounds as though the expectation that not only society puts on women but what we take on ourselves to match plays a role. >> guest: right. i think the question in the book whether it is the modern woman steroid enabling hurt when i drink to stay awake, to sleep, to relax at a party, i used it, i used alcohol. i think if you are relaxing rewarding yourself you can be fined if you are mumming yourself is not a great idea.

>> host: okay. as i was reading through "drink," one of the things that came to mind for me, were there times when you find yourself kind of hesitating to move forward in writing and putting words on paper about your experience? >> guest: this was a huge decision. it drove from a huge series that i did in canada's largest newspaper with a 14 part series on women and alcohol. at the time my editor said for me how do you feel about telling your own story? and i said i'm beginning to think maybe i should tell it and she said you have to work again? i said yes. she said you can't, the stigma is too great. i paused for about two years before i decided to write this

"drink" -- "drink"? [laughter] book. once i put pen to paper it came out of me very quickly. but i was worried about how it would be seen. there was a saying that we had we have public life and secret life and was a release to tell the secret. >> host: as they say secrets to kasich. >> guest: secrets deutsch keep you sick. i found this book in credibly cut cathartic. >> host: how to use the women's drinking patterns different from men? >> guest: does a lot of research that when a man gets into trouble with alcohol he tends to go to the bar, hangs out with his friends and then makes new friends, maybe not great friends and that is the pattern to a woman tends to drink alone to isolate to member

complicated feelings of anxiety. so when a woman goes to treatment is really important that we now know for her to have a hard look at the things that were traverse for her. it can be really hard when you get sober as i did and find out the things that you were trying to numb are medicated so it's really important when you go to treatment or are dealing with sobriety that you recognize you are going to have the host of emotions that you have to address medicated in a different way, and this is progress because they used to believe that when you went to treatment you have to be sober for two years before you dealt with the underlining. now for women it's very difficult because getting to treatment is the issue. getting to treatment especially

if you have young children, we see some fabulous entities across north america that appreciate what young mothers have to deal with when they are trying to get sober but they are few and far between had to often it stems from the you know, whether you have enough money, where you live, whether you will get the right kind of treatment. >> host: why do you think that is? >> guest: i think it's obvious. i think our values as a society of alcohol are very fuzzy. i don't think we have decided what we want to do. we don't think if i'm sophisticated i know my wine. if ayman adel i should know how to handle my liquor. if i'm drinking a little too much media i'm just trying to act like the french were the spanish or italian. it is and me that has the problem is that rare and drinking driver. we don't look at yourself because you don't want to. this is something we used to

relax. we love dhaka was a culture. it's cheap and our culture, very cheap sometimes in a corner store or gas station it is cheaper than milk and orange juice so we have fauzi values and i think we haven't really done well on her mental health. we have done well in understanding depression. we haven't done well understanding adel addiction. >> host: another question as i was reading your book is that had your thoughts of support groups such as a a versus women of sobriety and whether or not you think that there are some differences between support groups that are geared mainly towards men as opposed to those towards women. >> guest: great question. women for sobriety is a group that developed some time ago.

the reaction in part the word powerlessness which is an aa term and women who were having trouble with some of the language of the big book the problem with women for sobriety is that it is very hard if you live in a small town or even where i live in a big city to find for a sobriety group you can start your own but it's difficult. i think it's interesting that the fis has really changed. it's become much more female and much younger. in the younger generation there is a huge pride in being sober. there's a lot of shame in my generation stigma but the younger generation is pretty proud of rocking sobriety. >> host: it's interesting that you say that. do you think that the overall

public views it foresees that same concept as young individuals and a? >> guest: no i think it's totally hidden. i think the anonymity peace is been kept in and buying a big fan of something called faces and voices of recovery based in washington. a very, very strong organization , and i am part of a movement in canada just a stone washing now and the idea i tell people that i am five years without wine or without a drink. i believe a terrific life. i don't need to break my anonymity but i need to tell you that i'm sober and this is what looks like. >> host: are you familiar with the concept of the systems of care? >> guest: i'm not.

>> host: it is a philosophy that was claimed by william white in taking a look at how to build the community and the community of recovery. and i was just kind of wandering in your book reading about a a and then thinking about the difference is for when and i remember while working in a treatment facility that a lot of times when men may go initially but then they would fallout because of the relationship peace that women generally have to deal with not generally but have to deal with in the recovery and i was wondering if whether or not you are familiar with of recovery systems of care concept as well. >> guest: that's so funny that can across my radar this week's. i don't know if you've seen the film when the anonymous people, but it's fabulous and that was

the trigger for me to understand who he was. >> host: that's good. i wondered if you could maybe talk a little about what you see as it relates to our differences isolation for women? we know there are differences when they are actively drinking and but what about when they get to recovery? are there similarities with the issue of isolation as they move into recovery? >> guest: weddington recovery you have to be careful with isolation and be careful about your care. that is why i am such a fan is that there is a focus on the self care peace and i can't

speak for being a man in recovery but i know that when i am involved with my friends who are also sober this is something we focus on a lot, making sure that you don't get to hundred or angry or donley or tie year, it's a very important. what i found in sobrieties everything was new. it wasn't just the fact i never been to a christmas or new years or birthday sober become absolutely everything in terms of my human relationships. i live much more conscious lee and much more happily now. >> host: i know one of the things that you refer to is drinking by women is a cultural thing. i wonder if you can speak a little bit about what do you mean by that? >> guest: the phenomena of

women drinking is a piece of entitlement. our sense of entitlement, we can't. men can so we can. certainly the young generation has that feeling. but going toe to toe is actually a dangerous thing. 15% of breast cancer cases are related to alcohol. democratically, we are equal but the bulkeley and hormonal, we aren't when it comes to alcohol. what i find is alcohol and tobacco, no that is the alcohol industry beating like the tobacco industry used to? yes to date we have a feminized drinking culture and across my out and a skinny girl dhaka and

happy bitch wind believe it or not and this is focused on the drinking culture. it starts with terry bradshaw when she was drinking the cosmopolitan on sex in the city. did she had to it? yes she did, but we have a female drinking culture now and it's i think incumbent upon us to make sure a good young women are market savvy. they understand they've been targeted and about it's becoming a person, it's tweeting, it's on facebook and it's getting better for the alcohol is and you are the target. that is the tobacco industry. >> host: i read that in your book and after i thought about it there is a strong and allergy between the two.

and along with that, had you attended a tobacco conference and one of the sessions i remember attending is it had to do with a marketing strategy and how they really year marked and focused on sort of groups of people and based on what you are saying i see the same thing with the alcohol industry really targeting in on women. but not only targeting in on the women but do you see them targeting in on more of a specific racial ethnic groups as well, too? >> guest: you do see a huge vulnerability if you look at the data coming out of the colleges that certain ethnic groups are actually drinking at a higher rate than others so when you look at the upswing in the young women, you see that women from different races have more

trouble. it's a complex story. it's the number-one predictor of whether you will get into trouble as a woman with alcohol is sexual abuse. that is your number one. more than anything else. it's very much related to, and therefore the trauma related we haven't treatment is really important and we've seen a wonderful upswing in the understanding that, does relate to alcohol. this is our easiest and most accessible drug could and people do medicate with it. >> host: at one point in time it used to be the mind set for treatment providers is to not even address that. >> guest: right. >> host: but now that has shifted, which i'm glad to see is to address that, but what is the risk of women to become

traumatized if they are in treatment and talking about the trauma that they have experienced? >> guest: that is an important question because you have to be very savvy as a treatment provider to make sure that you do not traumatized a person. i for instance went to reach out and was diagnosed with ptsd, post-traumatic stress syndrome and i had to really take my time with the trauma that i was dealing with and know that this was a multi-year issue that i had to address. but i couldn't do it overnight. you don't want to read traumatizing person. but speaking of, one of the problems is young women will have a trauma in their life, drink too much, find themselves in a compromising position sexually and we traumatized. women have to keep themselves

safe. there is a connection with date rape and abuse and violence, the debate to being a victim of partner violence, it put one in a very vulnerable place to have too much to drink so there's many reasons to be cognitive of what you are putting down. >> host: exactly. moving on, can you speak to -- and you alluded to this a little before when you said starting the faces and voices of recovery in canada about the role of stigma and addressing it and why that's so important and if you think that there are gender differences in how the role of the stigma is addressed. >> guest: i think that you can be a male in our culture and

have too much to drink and be seen as a good old guy. just a terrific guy i. a woman you don't lose your masculinity. a woman drinks too much and she is seen as sloppy and not eminem. we are much harder on the women who drink too much. and so, i'd and faces and voices of recovery canada and in the state's we are very much following the parent organization in the united states. the notion is we've known for more than 20 years that addiction is a disease is, it's a complex disease like diabetes, you have to contribute to it yourself but it is a disease that we have known but as a culture we don't see it as that we see it as a moral failing and definitely as a mother who drinks as way down the totem pole in terms of who you can respect or add my ear and then the complex issue of pregnant

women drinking. so there is an order and stigma is enormous for women. it's something that we have to have an open dialogue about and people in recovery to have as i do clean and sober and others that time, 15, 20 have to stand up and be counted. we pay so much attention as a person that spent 30 years in the media, we pay so much attention to a person like charlie sheen when he gets in trouble and robert downey jr. and whitney houston but when they get clean and sober we don't focus very much on them, we are not as impressed with the antics stop. mincy -- lindsay lohan. it's like the issue with mental health. we need to profoundly understand what's going on live in a society that we need to pay more attention to this fact.

>> host: do you think that society thrives off chaos and in other individuals' lives? >> guest: there is an interest in watching somebody else self-destruct. there is no doubt about it and that's compelling, but it's a classic and we have to have a lot more compassion. we are a compassionate society in terms of appreciating. we can appreciate the person born with depression or suffers from diabetes, but we are not very sympathetic or in the attic when someone has an addiction issue. >> host: from your perspective, what would be a comprehensive public health response to this issue? >> guest: there is no doubt in my mind that pricing is a huge issue.

if you look at the hard data on the cost of dhaka, it is just become cheaper and cheaper and cheaper in recent years and very often in a gas station i would argue why is it even in the gas station, but often in the gas station it's cheaper than the milk or the orange juice and that's just wrong. there is very clear data that shows that if you add it 10% increase to that cost that you would see a 9% drop in terms of hospital out missions or emergencies for instance are not dhaka hall. the cost is too accessible, overly accessible, over the cheap and we are not connecting the dots with a lot of trouble. what we are doing for instance in canada and certain regions is we are starting to produce report cards. so we know that alcohol produces a lot of revenue for the

government but what we are doing is connecting the dots on the emergency room admissions and related to alcohol so that we can understand that it's costly. i think we should take a very hard look at marketing. i don't think that there should be the marketing a load especially in social media targeting the youth. i think it is definitely from and i think what we should seek out pop star targeted to the young teenager anchor. those premixed drinks should definitely not be categorized as they are in the united states as a malt beverage so they can be sold like your and sold cheaply. >> host: what other things do you think need to be included in that public health strategies

looking at what other types of strategies would be? >> guest: we need to take a hard look at treatment and comprehensively investment in treatment so that it's not just for the rich and famous but for instance a will give you an example. i was at betty ford in the last six months and they are lamenting the fact that a lot of the programs that were aimed at children, children of addicted parents have gone the way of the bluebird -- dodo bird. so helping children and getting away from that second generational problem is something that i think should be very high on the totem pole of needs. so we are not really understanding -- if we aren't understanding it and we certainly don't understand that it's not one of those things that you come in and get fixed for in 30 days and then walk away and you are fine. even with breast cancer, you are

told what you're after care is like. you don't go in for a 38 program -- i've been there and i did come to this state your essentially seen as fine. follow-up is key. taking care of yourself is a key. so why don't think we have a full understanding of what needs to be done when this product is sold cheap, accessible, taxed so badly in the united states and privatized we have a real problem. >> host: it sounds like we are getting to a place where there is parity between this particular disease as well as other diseases. >> guest: absolutely. absolutely. >> host: i think you touched on this before, but if there's anything else you want to talk about, the similarities with tobacco policy and what similar

strategies can be related to risky drinking behavior. >> guest: one of the things that has come out is appreciation in the last five years of some of the 50 diseases and cancers that are related to alcohol. we have not had a public dialogue about that. we don't appreciate at all that there are some downsides to drinking. we typically sell the drinking and driving and other than that, you don't appreciate that although throat cancers and colorectal cancer is related we don't appreciate but here is a big one. people die typically 20 years younger than they do with smoking. that is a huge one and women by faster than men from drinking so we are not having a public health conversation the way that we jumpstart one on tobacco years ago. we know the problems with trans

fats and tanning beds and not with this? it doesn't make any sense. we know more about gluten than we know about all cahal. so that is the key issue. just like with tobacco if you keep it simple and keep it to accessibility and price he will be turning around many of the problems that are major issues but washington state for instance in privatizing and putting alcohol in kosko is a huge complexity of what is unfolding in that state. you see what's interesting in the united states is many experiments in terms of what policy changes come about and

how that affects people. but there is no doubt about the united states is right. you have countries like scotland that are looking at a minimum pricing which is fabulous. britain should have and decided not to. you look at africa which is looking at a marketing man because they have such a problem with alcohol. so people -- and that is a whole other subject. there are many policies some of the best research in the world but the gap between what we know and what we don't do is enormous. >> host: would you say it is more so here than in other countries? >> guest: absolutely. alcohol is hugely cheap in this country. in canada we have not police and a fairly firm hand on pricing.

but here all bets are off. all gloves are off and i come regularly to an alcohol policy conference here but in north america we have some of the best brains working on these issues and yet the public appetite for understanding this is small. >> host: there's a great deal of environmental strategy to be utilized but maybe are not necessarily. >> exactly. >> what sort of messages can be incorporated across the life span for females that could reach them about the impact of risky drinking? >> guest: we have the guidelines come out in 2011 and

with it nine drinks per week. there was a lot of pushback. are you kidding me? what if i get four or five on saturday night and four or five on friday night i'm already over my, you know, over my limit, so i think that we are in the middle of an educational uptick where we have to just start having the conversation and start to know what is safe, but you see for instance in the big study of harvard recently a huge problem with how much young women are binge drinking at the college local versus how much young men are drinking for the stereotype is out the window. john lewis of he were alive today would be female. >> host: okay. one of the things -- and we have a few minutes left but one of

the things i wanted to ask you about, the national roundtable on girls, women and alcohol to provide you an opportunity to maybe talk about the effort, the purpose and kind of what is your vision for that? >> guest: our vision is to open the dialogue about the policy leaders you and i were just talking about about what those marketing look like, what is good marketing awareness look like? how do you reach 15-year-old girls who are just facing a lot of social media and educate them that they have been targeted? how do you do that? how do you look at accessibility? so we are trying to build awareness and policy understanding in canada on the issue of girls and women and on the understanding that girls and women are far more former double to words alcohol abuse and than men are.

so that initiative is -- i like to tell a little story, it's a short one and a frog pond and a lot of the frogs are out and a lot of them are growing worse. do you stand to be to send in the fertility experts foresee maybe there is something in the water? the national roundtable basically is saying there is something in the water. our culture has it wrong. let's open up the dialogue and get a right. so in the face of the voices of recovery i am pretty busy. >> host: wonderful. we have maybe just a few minutes left and i wonder if there is anything else he would like to say about this issue, about your book which i love the title, the intimate relationship between women and alcohol because that is what it is. it is a relationship with your we like it or not. >> guest: what i would like to say is i don't mean to be a qalqilya. i certainly enjoyed my fair share of all cahal in my life,

but one of the things that really alarmed me after a van the data about the young women would really alarmed me is the fact that the more professional and the more educated you were, the more likely you were going to get into trouble with alcohol and your wim protected and would be a blue-collar job, that is a really scary fact and it's scary because as women become more educated and as women are occupying the lion's share to the secondary institutions what is happening to us? what is happening to us that we think we have to vacate with alcohol? it's more than just a celebration. something is going really wrong and the market is there to serve us. so that feminized drinking culture is alive and well and i want to put up my hand and say let's have a hard look at what's going on and know your personal vana devotees. i should have known what to

alcoholic parents than i was pretty vulnerable. know whether you are vulnerable to breast cancer. you should really know what you are putting down your throat and take a hard look at just like with everything else. are you say, are you healthy, is it okay for you and if it is, wonderful. >> host: i do like the print. >> guest: harper collins has been terrific. >> host: i think this kind of brings us to a conclusion but i just wanted to say thank you and i did enjoy having this conversation with you the dividing could you bring up a very i guess alarming issue that really doesn't get to the table very much except i know that within the profession that i worked in it's always there but to the general public it's not

there having that conversation and i think being able to have it from one provision to another but also at the community level as well will be very critical. >> guest: thank you very much. >> host: thank you. >> that was "after words," booktv signature program which authors of the latest nonfiction books are interviewed by journalists, public policy makers, legislators and others familiar with their material. "after words" airs every weekend on book tv at 10 p.m. on saturday, 12 p.m. and 9 p.m. on sunday and 12 a.m. on monday. you can also watch online. boe to booktv.org and click on "after words" in the book tv series and topics list on the upper right side of the page. from the 13th annual national book festival on the national mall in washington, d.c., and interview and national

defence and call with steve vogel who discusses his book through the perilous fight, six weeks that saved the nation. this is about 20 minutes. >> on our air conditioned c-span bus is author steve vogel who has written this book. it's called through the perilous fight six weeks that saved the nation. steve, what was the war of 1812 about? >> guest: it was different things to different people would was fundamentally a war about the future of the north american continent. you had great britain which still controls the canadian colonies and this new american republic about had been established a generation earlier. fundamentally, the united states and great britain were fighting for control of the continent, who would be the power that would be allowed to expand into

the western or the northern regions and there were issues that were raised that more or less fostered the war including maritime issues, great britain of course was in the midst of an enormous struggle with napoleon and they were stopping american ships at the sea because they needed to impress the sailors off of our ships in order to man from navy ships. you had a british restrictions on american trade with the u.s. and in america there was just the beginnings of a further look westward and maybe northward and those were some of the fundamental tensions behind the war of 1812. >> host: how did it get started? >> guest: we forget that the united states declared war mechem great britain and not the of the way around. sometimes in the united states

we tend to think they're great britain was interested in recreating the colony's. it was really american exasperation with brereton's refusal to honor american sovereignty. great britain because of the struggle with france was quite often quite willing to ignore american sovereignty with the trade restrictions. president james madison had come to the belief that the united states continued to allow this to happen, then we would be nothing more than a state of great britain not really truly independent nation. >> host: how long did it last? >> guest: the war of 1812 was a poor man because it lasted for three years. the war was declared in june of 1812, but for the defense that i read about really take place

some in 1813 but fundamentally the six weeks in 1814 and the british were attacking washington and baltimore and the work continued on through early 1815. before we get to the six weeks what was the conclusion of the war? >> the treaty was concluded with negotiations christmas eve of 1814 and in a lot of ways the treaty which wasn't ratified until a few months later, the treaty reasserted the status quo so people think the war of 1812 didn't really settle anything but it actually settled quite a bit in terms of establishing that canada would remain at that time part of great britain but lead the pack for its future independence and the united states but is given more or less a green light for the westward expansion. >> steve fogle was our guest talking about the war of 1812.

he is a national reporter with "the washington post" and has also written a book called the pentagon a history. 20,258,538,890 for those in the east and west time soon. to discuss the war fet 125-85-3891 if you live in the mountain and pacific time zone. steve fogle, what are the six weeks that you concentrate on through the perilous fight? >> this is a period in august and september of 1814 when the british army troops arrive from europe. they've been sent as reinforcements to the british royal navy squadron which has been doing quite a bit of damage in the chesapeake bay for the better part of the year but the reinforcements arrived in over the course of the next six weeks

in committee would land to maryland and capture the capitol of the united states and then launch an attack on baltimore which at the time as the third largest city of the nation and as a very precarious moment in american history where the united states future would look like. >> how did they get in the white house coming to washington and were able to burn the white house? >> it was a mixture of unbelievable american incompetence. really through bold leadership on the part of the british commanders, very veteran accomplished troops. part of it was almost just a guess believe that the relatively small british force would be able to capture the capitol of the united states when they were so far from any

major support. they would have to march 60 miles inland in the they were really quite exposed, but the united states had a very small military at the time and as much military we did have it was on the canadian frontier engaged in various futile attacks on canada and the militia the was left behind in virginia and maryland weren't that well trained or equipped to stand up to the veteran british forces that were attacking washington, the poor leadership and a little bit of luck on the part of the british. >> we are we to begin with a call from john and st. clare's sure michigan. you are on booktv. >> caller: thank you. quick comment. one of the enduring controversies for the war of

1812 is the surrender of detroit and the behavior of general william during that time. i've let a summary of the court martial that is in the library and the university of michigan and they describe him at the time of the british as virtually having a mental breakdown shoving one after what of tobacco in his mouth, juices running down his shirt and he's a absolutely oblivious to everything going on behind him. and then he unexpectedly surrenders. i also found a reference in another document that he suffered a stroke lead in the revolutionary war and the war of 1812. he was a hero in the revolutionary war. his brother was in the constitution, he had a sterling work in detroit. i would just like to know what your views are on him and dhaka

court martial results that happen afterwards. thank you very much. >> guest: i think essentially he was having a nervous breakdown. he really wasn't expecting the situation he was facing. he lost his nerve. there's been different accounts as to how much responsibility he deserved for that disaster. i think he deserves credit. there was a big push for him to be executed actually for treason but president madison declined to do that. it didn't hurt that the relative as you mentioned was the captain of the u.s.s. constitution which a major victory at the sea so more or less they just cashiered him but my book is focusing more

on what's going on here in the chesapeake essentially in the last six months of the war. >> host: if the outcome of the war had been different with a history of the country have been different? >> guest: i think it's certainly possible. the peace treaty term that great britain was initially proposing at the time when they seem to be in the position to in the the war on british terms included turning over a large swath of american territory in what was then the northwest today in putting much of indiana, michigan, parts of ohio, this would have become a buffer state fund that would be turned over to the native american tribes and essentially great britain was interested in dominating the

great lakes, not allowing any american military force to remain on lakes and maintaining the navigation right on mississippi. had they been able to get people on those terms, you would have seen a much weakened american states that wouldn't have -- but wouldn't have had the opportunity to expand for the united states at this early point in history. post to your own book tv on c-span2 with steve fogle. >> caller: thanks for taking my call. i would like to ask a question about thomas jefferson's position. he had the embargo that was already trying to keep america from being involved in the napoleonic war that was going on. at the end of his administration the embargo was lifted in america almost immediately gets dragged into this war. do you think that he thought it

was a trend on the embargo or what was his position on the war altogether? thank you. >> it was almost a continuation of his administration policies. james madison served as jefferson's secretary of state for eight years and together they add, wofford the embargo which turned out so disastrously when the united states declares war, jefferson is basically quite supportive and the fact that he declares the capture of quebec would be a matter of marching a couple of american regiments. so he thought that it made strategic sense the united states plan was to take canadian territory and more or less use that as a bargaining chip to force great britain to respect

american sovereignty and jefferson and madison were very much in the same mind on those issues. >> host: dallas texas talking about the war of 1812. >> caller: thanks for taking my call. my question is about andrew jackson. i know that he became a military hero in new orleans, but i have read that the american forces he commanded were really fairly peck and i'm wondering if that's true and if you could comment on that. thank you. >> host: steve? >> guest: like the forces defending washington and baltimore, we were primarily relying on militia troops so a lot of the forces that jackson

had in new orleans were this mixture as you mentioned of everything from water men and pirates. that's not to say they were not necessarily good fighters, and jackson was a good leader. unlike the commanders who were defending washington, he established a very strong defensive line that protected new orleans and whereas in washington you had pretty capable troops particularly in maryland which was probably the best militia troup unit in the area was fighting but they were rushed to the position because the americans hadn't properly anticipated the british revenue of an attack on washington and they didn't have the cover and

the protection that jackson's forces had down in new orleans and it's interesting to remember that jackson was fighting essentially the same force that the united states was fighting in baltimore and washington in other words the same british force that at that captured washington and then a tax baltimore, goes on subsequently to take part on the attack in new orleans. one of the reasons the british failed in new orleans is because of the good leadership of andrew jackson. >> host: david in arlington virginia here in the suburbs you are on with steve. >> caller: good morning or good afternoon. i have two questions here. one, do you regard the american war covered the war of 1812 to

be worth more effort at war war commander in chief? also i'm just curious what role the french canadians played in the war of 1812. were they on the british side or the american side or did they decide to let them in? >> guest: with regards to whether this was the worst performance it is hard to make an overall assessment because it also offers some brawley and moments of american history, some of the naval battles on lake erie the defense of

baltimore is very effective performance by maryland militia together with the u.s. army garrison at fort mchenry augmented by the u.s. navy. overall we had some very poor commanders particularly at -- when i say war john armstrong who did not provide the washington commander and the backing needed he was certainly one of the most disastrous military leaders of our time. one of the things the united states assumed including jefferson and madison was that

because the french he did the british so much the assumed that when they attacked quebec, the french would rally inside and that turns out that when you invade someone's country, they don't like. so our attack into quebec wouldn't welcome the liberators that had been assumed. and turn out to be one of the number of miscalculations. >> host: very quickly we have about 30 seconds left. how does the star spangled banner fit in the war of 1812? >> guest: this book tells that story. it was francis scott key was witnessing a very dangerous moment in american history, but missing the baltimore attack after the fall of washington he realizes that the fate of the country might hang on the outcome of that fight and if it

wasn't there in the morning he would face the future of the country. >> host: steve vogel six weeks that saved the nation joins us. >> this event was part of the 2013 national book festival and washington, d.c.. for more information, visit loc.gov/bookfest. ..