virginia, the homestead in hot springs where emily would take the waters and henry would play golf, yet they would still send cables to their book sellers. thank you. [applause] >> before the final line up to the left. plenty of copies by the register. [inaudible conversations] are you blogging responses?

[inaudible conversations] >> on this labor day weekend booktv brings three days of nonfiction authors and books on c-span2. we are live from the fourteenth annual national book festival. check online for complete television schedule. >> here's a look at books being published this week. gail sheehy recounts her life in my passages legion eisenhower:a life paul johnson examines the child in kansas with military career and eight years in the oval office. former marine corps sergeant recounts his unit's offensive against the taliban in 2009 in level zero heroes, the story of u.s. marine special operations in afghanistan. in liar, a temptress, soldier, spy, karen middleton recounts the exploits of four will and on the front lines of the civil war. british iranian foreign affairs journalists look at the capitol city of iran in city of

lies:love, sex, death and the search for truth in tehran. kristin o'keefe remembers the life of nineteenth century innovator and reconstructive plastic surgeon thomas motor in dr. motor's marvels. look for these titles in bookstores and watch for authors in the near future on booktv and on booktv.org. >> i have enormous respect for bowls and simpson. they are great guys and the thinking at the time is here are the numerical benchmarks you have to pass any budget plan to stabilize your fiscal situation. i didn't like some parts of what they did and thought it was missing a lot so we put our own together and exceeded those benchmarks. we assumed the president would do the same, if he didn't like simpson-bowles he would put his own plan out meeting these benchmarks to stabilize their fiscal situation and he chose not to do that either. was set up by his executive order and so we really did

expect him once we decided not to support it, the house republicans, and go do our thing, we thought he would triangulate like bill clinton did for the sake of 2012 and supporting it. so he jettisoned it, demagogued what we were doing and did not offer a credible fiscal alternative that met anywhere close to the bench marks of bowles-simpson and meanwhile we have the same fiscal problem looming over us. you have to ask him but my theory is ideology. i write about this in the book at the particular moment it was clear the decision was being made and i think it was more of an ideological interest in front and center of his mind forces something that was more moderate or moderate seeming to and i just believe at that moment he decided not to do bowles-simpson to demagogue republicans and not to offer a credible alternative,

that that was what this administration was about. i concluded we need a new president to fix this mess. >> you might describe -- i agree. you might describe how it was unveiled to you, your experience. a personal story which is interesting and make a decision about whether or not to remain. >> three house republicans, the chairman of ways and means, myself, a budget guy, who were on bowles-simpson and the white house invited us to a budget speech the president was going to give and all the media was coming up to as a day or two before hand saying i hear there will be social security reform or the olive branch or something to reach out to you guys so we were conditioned to thinking he went pretty far left on all these other reaches but may be on the fiscal issues he will move to the middle and trying

delayed and we thought for sure we saw bulls and since and everyone else from the commission that would he would embrace bowles-simpson and we figured that was going to happen. he was sitting closer to is that column, 20 feet away, giving a speech basically calling for another round of $400 billion in defense cuts on top of what they had already done which was a budget driven strategy, not a strategy driven budget for defense which was rather odd but he pursued and absolutely demagogued of the work we have been doing. nothing about bowles-simpson. it became very clear to me the demagoguery that was coming out of his speech was aimed at doubling down and going hard left, hit the fence, raise taxes, go after republicans and that is what i realized this is not a compromiser. this is not someone who will move to the middle. you should get up and leave

right now. we looked at it and discuss it and out of respect for the office of the presidency that we would not do that. >> even though it was really over its the pale. so we got up and left after words. >> uconn watch this and other programs online at booktv.org. ..