there there is a price to pay for speaking the truth. there is a price to pay for speaking the truth, a greater price for not speaking the truth. >> do you think we will ever find out who actually killed doctor king? >> don't hold your breath. i don't know. you will read the epilogue, which i think we will blow you away. this may be the only book about doctor king that does not even include the name james are already.

he is not relevant to the story we are telling. he knows nothing of the monuments that is to come. let me close on this note. my understanding, the journey that martin had to walk, most of it by himself, you we will come to understand, appreciate, and embrace them in a knew way, and i hope that for you as individuals, we understand that we do not come into the fullness of our own humanity until we can revel in the humanity of every other human being. you cannot experience your

own humanity and full until you learn how to revel in the humanity of other people trying to respect people and push back against the contestation of their humanity means being willing to tell the truth. i will close where i began. make a commitment. i am not asking you to put your life on the line, not asking you to take a vow of poverty. that is how we honor his legacy. i no that every one of us has the capacity to seek the truth and to speak the truth and to stand on the truth and to stay with the truth.

america needs truth tellers. america needs truth tellers, and we are the truth tellers that we have been looking for. thank for. thank you for coming out tonight. i appreciate it. [applauding] >> teesixteen, book tv, post a comment on our facebook page. >> next, book tv next, book tv speaks with dana goldstein about her recent book "the teacher wars: a history of america's most embattled profession" at the 31st annual miami book fair. annual miami book fair. >> dana gold steen, this is her book, "the teacher wars: a history of america's most embattled profession," a teacher -- dana goldstein 11, when did the concept of public education coming to being in the state's? >> about 1830 we did not have

public schools in the united states as we know them today. it was up to individuals, neighbors, perhaps churches to come together and start schools with funding if they wanted to. that ended in the eighteenth ins with the common school system that went state to state and made the argument to raise taxes at the state level. we need to tell parents it is not your choice, you have to send your kids to school and from 1830 to years after the civil war each stage embrace the idea of universal public education which was new at the time. >> reporter: was the resistance to the idea? >> yes there was. not surprisingly a lot of the resistance was because it was expensive. one of the early compromises that was made to make some affordable which is one of the stories i tell in the book bringing female teachers into the classroom, in 1800, 90% of school teachers were male. and 76% were female by 1900.

today of the three quarters remain female. one of the big reasons this was done was because public education -- we don't want to pay that much for. discrimination was not against the lie and you could the female teachers at as much as that male teacher. >> host: how many public school the jitters are there today in the united states? >> guest: 3.4 million. >> host: what is the average salary? >> guest: the salary is $54,000 per year. >> host: where do they start? >> guest: in new york city where i live, years of experience can make a 6 digit salary which sounds really great. the secret is how long it takes to get there. teachers don't get to have a big bump in salary like many other white-collar professionals. most of them have to wait a very

long time. north carolina for example paying $30,000 to advance to $30,000 one has to work for 15 years. we are talking about being in your 30s before you make $40,000 and a great payback. a big variation across the country, urban areas, suburban areas, but overall it is not commensurate with other jobs that require a master's degree. >> host: are private schools on a different scale? >> guest: they pay less in many regions. in many cases it might be easier, so not as many social challenges. >> host: when you look at figures how much are we spending on public education? >> guest: i don't have that ball

park figure, more people on average, we often hear a lot about the panels, and about average or below average in math. we have generous pensions and health plans that come to our future is. one of the reasons is we don't have a social safety net for guys coming out of retirement provided by government in the country. teachers have fought for that to offset relatively low pay as we were talking about and teachers' unions have achieved something end extracurricular activities for it, transportation. might not be focused for achievement or student. >> host: how much goes to the

teacher's pension? in the public schools? >> i was going to say eight and 12. the city -- a small amount of that overall goes to a teacher pensions in particular but human-resources, the main cause of the school system and so a lot of times that is one reason. in a time of austerity budgeting in many states, you see a little bit unfairly, teachers as being expensive. that is a rhetorical argument made from the nineteenth century to today, resentment about the teaching profession. overall when you see what teachers bring home at the end of the year is not all that much. >> host: in your view has the nba teachers' federation taken

positive steps? >> guest: historically there >> reporter:s. back to the 1960s before teachers have collective bargaining rights, teachers were making $66 a week, the same as a car wash. we see at teachers unions they come to the table to fight the teachers, we see teachers, the middle-class standards, when it had been in the nineteenth century, as long as they are working class type of jobs, young women for a few years, there wasn't a career, we did not pay that much because they were going to do it before -- it was a bit of a family to support and the teachers' union to move away from that and we see that, collective bargaining for teachers, teachers make 10% more. there were positive changes that needed to do with the country such as teachers' unions and

respectfully. as teachers unions gain more power they became less popular and one of the reasons why was they seemed more powerful, studying with mayors and governors, and often times students at the table, as strong a voice for student names and that critique in the late 1960s with the black power community movement. a group of african-american parents started to raise this issue alongside a radical critique in the 1960s becoming more mainstream to the point where it as the bipartisan consensus over the years the teachers' unions a too powerful, something a lot of democrats and republicans seem to agree about. and we need to hold accountable so we have standards and

accountability. >> host: do you agree with that? >> guest: there is a lot of accountability. before no child left behind the law that president bush pushed, we did not have student achievement number is in every single state by english-language lerner status, by with this students a living in poverty, by disability status and now because of accountability and testing measures we can see how our children are doing in a detailed way and we know so we are not closing that. >> host: it was purported by the democrats. >> kennedy was a big supporter. >> host: common core. we had raced to the top, either subtle differences? wikipedia no a child left behind, george w. bush overall,

the most important in education. and charged with is the school was failing or succeeding. that change president obama in 2009. they looked at a lot of research and decided that was not what was to support but the individual teacher and his or her individual classroom and things like race to the top, to change no child left behind requires states they want federal money to evaluate every single teacher no matter what grade they teach. to a lot of changes, everything from kindergarten or standardized testing in art class or jim class or based on a

kid's test scores. a lot are not tested. >> host: what is your day job and where does your teacher work come from? >> guest: i worked for a magazine for ten years covering the democratic presidential primary in 2007-2008 between barack obama and hillary clinton, and education policy was one of their big dividing lines, president obama went in front of the national teachers' union and supported merit pay, the idea of paying teachers based on how well they're doing with kids and he did not get the teachers union endorsement. hillary clinton got those endorsements so this was fascinating, the democratic party with the teachers' union, came into office and a lot of policies are not happy about. >> host: how much control at the federal level as opposed to

state and federal level? >> guest: only 12% comes from the federal government so these mechanisms are largely at the state level and since the recession hit, 12% comes from the national center, important to begin with. when the federal government says we will give you more money if you evaluate teachers -- a said you want to do that and pass laws to change testing policies. >> host: you talk about "the teacher wars: a history of america's most embattled profession," one eye you talking about? people criticize public education? >> guest: i was interested in 2008, what job or roll in inequality and the safety nets

which children living in poverty, to compare ourselves. and i was curious where that idea comes from that teachers are responsible for closing poverty down and it does go back to the nineteenth century, the gap about immigrants, between black and white and in terms of income inequality, fighting about what it teaches at doing a good enough job closing the gap which has often been disappointed in a teacher, with all that. >> host: different from where we are in miami, if it was the other way, can you measure the

socio-economic standards? >> guest: they correlated closely. they have found 7%, 7% of the achievement gap is driven by teachers. that means 93%, neighborhood poverty, the achievement is closely linked. that doesn't mean the supply in closing the gap. if we get a better job as a nation to our immediate students we could have all of that and we are not doing that as a country. we have not made that a priority. >> host: at the same time you are managing in friday when you are going into a rough neighborhood. >> guest: that is often the idea.

we know now because we had a great group of successful schools teaching children but doesn't have to be that way. and the management that they can do a lot more than manage, they can focus on what we need to be holding. >> host: our charter schools a new concept? >> guest: charter schools concept dates back to the 1980s, the idea of teachers' starting their own school at laboratories and innovation and something the president of the national american innovation of teachers and unions loves the idea, he thought was going to empower teachers but they didn't take long for conservative lawmakers to realize charter schools could be exempting charter schools from being tools and there we have the war we have been

having. and the charter school as a whole on the same quality kerf, and the same number are average but what i will say is among the most successful charter schools, the power program schools, the most successful schools we have. >> host: your teacher wars: a history of america's most embattled profession"? >> guest: a lot of recommendations. i asked to boil it down. we have always -- the concession in american politics, education problems i teacher problems so we need to get rid of the teachers and start with a new group. as i explained in the book, we hire 100,000 new teachers in

this school year, there is no proven method of making sure the new people would be any better so we must improve the skills such of the teachers we have wind in our schools, their air a lot of collaborative tools we can use. >> host: dana goldstein is the author of "the teacher wars: a history of america's most embattled profession". >> you are watching booktv, television for serious readers. you can watch any

having shared them with so many others in the past. he served as secretary of the air force, the youngest ever director of the national covert reconnaissance office and later served as special assistant to the president.

his technical his technical background includes nuclear weapons design and low-temperature physics. he has advised the joint strategic planning staff on policy and intelligence matters, authored three books documenting the history of the cold war and its principal players. i am always pleased to welcome my former colleagues. we do so today. >> thank you very much. [applauding]

the reagan ending is not another i was there book, not another phony biography filled with fictional people that never existed, not hero worship. it is a publication by a distinguished research university and explores the topics of what made reagan take. let's give it a try. let's start at the beginning. fifty years ago reagan's political opponents described him as a dumb actor. in 30 years ago he was called an amiable dunce. they were all wrong. he was not an actor. he. he is a master of the political stage.

his mind was immense. it operated at ten times the speed of us mortals. reagan was a a great communicator, note that way because of his performances on television, but he was the great communicator with everybody. in 1966, i was taking him to northern california. on the way up i briefed him on the problems in sonoma county. the corps of engineers wanted to reverse the flow of eagle river. he is ready to talk about these big issues.

i look in the door. blood all over the floor, two halves of the snake on the floor. he just killed the rattlesnake. he did not skip a a beat. he talks about the best way to deal with the, a rattlesnake that spooked his horse. they talked about them being there all the time. we did not talk. he established a rapport, and when we left they were handshaking and hugging and, friends for life. they took good care of us. that is the kind of man he was. he was amiable, fun to be with, lots of fun to be

with, but strangely enough had few). in my years companionship, never talked about his hopes and dreams, his kids achievements, financial blows, never talked about any of these things. he had no close personal friends. that that is the way i think it was. wrote about that in her memoirs. she. she wrote, sorry, you are not his best friend. his press secretary put it more sink. he would have made a superb hermit. seems strange.

he had no friends but compartmented allies. he helped run the state government, close with ed needs and the counselor. , pastors that he talked about. wonderful in that regard. no second guessing, micromanaging. but i was not a friend.

really friends. confirm that. he does not let anyone get too close. i feel that barrier. the campaign manager during the 70s said, as the second son of an alcoholic heat up being a people pleaser. that is how he coped. an upbeat man, pleasant to be with. in the case of defeat the incident had to be even raised, raised, forgotten. he simply could not mentally deal with defeat. example, from his own memoirs he wrote, wrote, running for president in 1968 was the last thing on my mind. that is absolute baloney. iran that campaign. we were flying around.

in august we were in miami trying to break next is. yet basically yet basically he said it was a campaign. that is because it was the campaign, a campaign, did not work, and needed to be erased. fast forward, after all of the documentation, he documentation, he said to the american people, i did not trade arms for hostages. interestingly enough it was devoid of political ambition he knew what he wanted people to follow, but was not drunk with the thoughts of power. he the lust for power.

he found the office to be funny. a thought the trinkets that went with being governor were funny. he thought that the accoutrements of power were funny. funny. he did not have a driving political ambition. he was competitive, but not ambitious. nancy provided the driving ambition. one early report comes from michael. in 1965 nancy was shouting, if you don't run for governor, i want a divorce. the want a divorce. the.is the evidence that the drive came from our. fast-forward to the inauguration, johnny carson going coined the moniker nancy to to a greater

ambitions with those of april. without nancy reagan would not have been elected to anything. another misunderstood aspect is his conversion to republican. it occurred over a decade. during the early 40s reagan was threatened with an acid in the face attack. in response the burbank police department offered protection and offered a concealed weapon permit. not well understood, he was also packing heat. he came to understand the following, the lofty ideals

of communism could not be enforced without terror. from the political political movement, the korean war, reagan's enthusiasm transferred to harry truman. as truman. as the korean war dragged on a concerned. the invasion of the south,, but two years later there was no end in sight. it was a lot like the war in vietnam. reagan to his war hero. reagan campaign on his behalf.

he worked for the eisenhower designated successor, but always as a concerned democrat. a decade after his original connection with eisenhower he reregistered as a republican because his party had left him. interestingly enough as a result of that relationship he became a reagan mentor. at the end of 64 eisenhower began to pay attention. it stood in stark contrast. at years and reagan was seeking out, seeking to rebuild the republican

party. they stayed in touch, exchanged letters, phone phone calls, and personal visits. they stayed in touch you make last visit. the concept of piece through strength was probably born during those conversations. we know of these because of the records that are at the eisenhower library. reagan had a hero but also of note. the archvillain in reagan's life was robert kennedy, his supreme nemesis. in 1961 upon becoming his

brother's attorney general he pursued corruption with a vengeance. he also targeted political opponents. kennedy hold reagan before a grand jury two weeks later. the justice department subpoenaed. the matter never resulted in an indictment, he lost his job. they got the news over lunch on sunday. i just lost my job. his daughter confirmed that same daughter confirmed that same bobby kennedy had a hand in this cancellation. this may not be accurate.

others pointed out that they were losing ratings. liens leaned on general electric and caused the cancellation. he sought retribution during a debate. television in europe, but he went all out when kennedy entered the presidential campaign sweepstakes with reagan really got actively involved in campaigning for the presidential population. kennedy in and then relented if a religious man. his minister was one of a half-dozen people present at the kickoff meeting in reagan's home. my insight comes from the

conversation with bill clark that i had in late 1981, serving as deputy secretary of state, ready to move to the white house in december of that year. having coffee. we were brainstorming. without messing up the i want to the communist oversight and free eastern europe from communist control. i thought that was an interesting ambition. he pushed himself back and said, we have a secret. he. he reached into his pocket, pulled out a crucifix and slammed it on the table.