ome 2030, we're going to have real problems and the terrorist are going to get more american money. that's my concern. i appreciate it. >> we'll take one more question and then we'll move into the front lobby for the book signing. >> at the very beginning you talked about border security and my question is, there's so much conversation where everyone is talking over one another with regard to immigration. my question is if we simply took the existing laws and adhere to them how bad would the problem be? >> well, yes. if we could -- we would be a lot better shape, i agree with you. >> one more. this one is a -- >> van, we have had a lot of discussion about prospects for developments scientific,

engineering and otherwise, but there's one thing that we have to get away from and that's fear of the new things. we talk about our fear of nuclear energy and we haven't even tried to continue with what we had years ago at oak ridge. with -- her toum instead of uranium? we stuck with uranium because we had to make bombs. make us independent and use thoruim and it's cheaper and the indians and chinese are doing it. we have to wake up. >> very good point. [applause] >> thank you very much. >> thank you very much. he will be in the front lobby. see you up there. [inaudible conversations] >> every weekend book tv offers

programming focused on nonfiction authors and books. keep watching for more here on c-span 2 and watch our past programs online at booktv.org. during booktv's recent visit to galveston, texas, we toured the galveston book shop with owner sharon washington, dc who rebuilt the story after it was destroyed by hurricane ike in 2008. >> we're in storm alert as powerful hurricane ike closes in on the gulf coast. you can probably count the hours before landfall. we're talking on one hand. >> absolutely. the impact paul take a look at these waves crashing over the sea wall in galveston texas. now, this sea wall is 16 feet tall so imagine how high the waves. >> this is truly amazing what ike is dishing out right now. this is the worst we have seen, obviously, for the past two hours or so since we have been here in houston the past two days.

the problem is -- my goodness. i mean really, this is mind-blowing what we're withing right now and being able to broadcast to you live. i've never witnessed anything like this in my career. >> when we came down here, we tried to be prepared. we brought overalls and shoveled and first aid kits, and the extent of the damage, you just can never imagine how bad it is. there's no way. the adjustor later determined we had seven feet of water here at the height of the storm. when we name there was debris that was taller than this table right here so i guess about four feet, and it was just -- all the bookshelves had fallen over.

we had a large desk like that, that was made out of metal, and it had turned over and twisted. and you couldn't even walk on top of the debris. it was -- i thought that, yeah, the books would have water in them and the wooden shelves might swell and the books might swell, but i didn't realize they would fall so easily and just fall on top of each other. it's hard to describe. but you literally could not walk in the store anywhere. we tried to go through the area where the book -- glass was broken up and start cleaning up. and my husband and paul randall my employee, were able, after

hours of work they had cleaned off one square foot. so at that point they turned to me and said this is too big a job for us. we can't do this ourselves. and later in the day, before we went back to houston we drove around as much as we could, and we saw a lot of different companies that specialized in fire water damage restoration. so we started writing down names of them. and later i called and interviewed four to five of them and had to pick one. they wore hazmat suits because before the storm even hit, water had collected in the sewers had backed up, and so they wore

hazmat suits and had these huge while bare rows and huge shovels and these impossible blue strong black bags. never seen anything like. i they work as a team. they just left baton rouge and they worked together on a regular basis. so they just came in and started shoveling and putting it in bags and breaking up the wooden shelves, which took at least a week to get through the whole store. so there's a park bench on the opposite side of the street with no shade on it and that became my office. and i called about 20 book stores in houston to see if

anybody had excess shelving they could give me or i could purchase from them and the first person i called, because i had been in his store and just loved the way it looked i was a man named neil surtee with bookland and he didn't -- he donated it to us. all we had to do is rent a truck, hire some temporary employees, get it out of these ware houses he had and assemble it. and it was -- and he also sold us books at a very discounted price, and then later gave us a ton of books. he also gave us a cash register and some cabinets that we had back in our storage room. so he was very generous person. i told all my contractors i worked with that we were going to open thanksgiving and if

they weren't onboard with us, then that was my deadline. i at any time want to miss the thanksgiving traffic. so the whole -- all the repairs were done with generators. we didn't -- the event was on september 13th, and we didn't get electricity returned until november 3rd, and the -- then we had to wait while an ac unit had to be ordered and sent here and we were actually open before we had our air conditioning installed. and when we opened, we had maybe one shelf with -- for each shelf, one row of books. but we were open, and people came in and bought. there was very little to too when you got tired of working on your house, and so we were open.

after ike hit, while we were waiting to come down here for a whole week i think i cried in my bed for maybe an hour or two and then i said, okay, that's it's. i just have to get to work. i might as well give it the old college try again. people are always going to want to come to the beach, so there always has to be people to service them and entertain them that are the year-rounders. and i just couldn't see galveston dying. i thought we'd come back stronger than ever, and it's true. everything looks beautiful. it's got fresh paint on it.