i am interest in the question of how does the marketplace work for coaches? it turns out there is no marketplace for these coaches per se. it is really the coaches and their agents setting their own salaries. the idea is there are only so many guys who can run a major football program which basically means fill up the stands, bring the money in and win a few games. ...f the students who go

to the university of alabama come from out of state. it is a good thing? economically it is good because they are probably playing full great but i am not so sure about that. >> you write about the intersection of media in these big programs. you have a striking quote in the book and i will read it. to set it up he is doing what he is probably doing every day

when i was 19-years-old, yes. there are so many games on now. there's so many schools. you've got to close this deal by being one of the games. they were restless and increasingly board unable to enjoy any game because of the spectacle. he tuned out and watched a movie. as i read that i thought the question to ask is are we ruining this thing? >> i think over saturation is having an impact. there are a number of threats. i look at college football as a bubble we are not at that point it's going to break that it's probably going to break out some level. the tv companies have old overpaid dramatically for this.

there are technological threats. the younger generation is more interested in looking at their cell phone in his declining students in the stadiums georgia had to buy back the 2,000 tickets from the students as they just were not interested in going to the games. in the short run that is a good thing because they can turn around and sell them and make a boatload of money but in the long run may be not so good. my issue was in terms of saturation i had this odd since station when i was watching these games. and they were good games in terms of watching the spectacle of the sport but my problem is i would watch one and wonder what's going on at that other game. after a while i have no interest

or investment in the games and i would get bored and watch watching movie because i just sort of -- >> i'm willing to admit that. >> tell me about the intersection of capitalism and sports. >> that's part of it we are all a little bit numb. in the college is what is interesting is just how at the major schools including a place like this it has grown so big the department thanks to the presidents of the schools are basically stand-alone entertainment divisions. that's how they operate. they get very little money. it turns out they are really good at business and they are making tons of money.

the defense of having huge impacts on the schools. you are all familiar because you are probably reading the papers or see on tv. a week doesn't go by there is a major scandal almost all of them involve the men's basketball teams or football teams with the academics and despite spending millions of dollars a year to keep those athletes eligible a lot of them still fall by the wayside. >> the intersection of capitalism and science where does the benefits come into start to fall apart.

one of the disciples was running the national lab that lawrence found in the manhattan project he wrote an article in the science magazine in which he coined the term and raised a number of questions about it about the inflow of money and what it was going to do to science and he was really skeptical of the future of science and said what we are ending up with is the construction of monuments these are our pure meds, our huge cyclotron, adam smashers, the idea of going to the moon and it's going to inevitably raise questions if this is the best way to send society's resources to be one to be known for having

put a man on mars more than solving the history of cancer which doesn't lend itself to big science. we are turning the university administrators and science department heads into bureaucrats, promoters, impresarios. they have to go out and raise more money to make science bigger and that isn't going to be a big thing. we haven't seen that because we have seen a lot of programs that need more nurturing being overwhelmed by the idea that we can throw three or $4 billion at a narrow program with the request for an achievement that may not actually have been. so this is a debate that started long ago in the 1960s. we are still having it played into the end with the

superconducting texas in the 1990s when congress decided this is just too expensive and the physics community couldn't get its act together to say this is why we need it. so the products are becoming harder to justify and they are becoming more expensive and the dog thing is i think that they can still make the case this work still needs to be done as a value but the scale of expenditure is overshadowing the whole enterprise. >> if you haven't read the book yet, the thing from 50 or 60 years ago it is a contemporary but because all of these that began 60 years ago come to this moment and you see them very

well realized. good capitalism fail detroit or how do we look at that now? >> it is those of the rise both of the rise of capitalism and of its flaws. certainly they were both capitalist successes in many ways but the forces of capitalism or market decisions by corporate executives helped kill detroit. the auto industry bailed out of the city both physically and emotionally a long time ago. you can see my book takes place the heart is 1963 this is before the riots of 67, before the difficulties with the pensions

and the municipal corruption and the structural problems were already there and they had to do with capitalism with the industry moving away and the people that built the city there was a slow decline in the labor movement which was the pushback against office. you've read the papers walter wrote in 1963 and you will see here again another person predicting what was going to happen in technology and the effects over the next 50 years. now you have michigan which was the heart of the labor movement in the states so i think that detroit in many ways was an exaggeration in almost every respect in that push and pull between the government and capitalism regulation and a free

trade and restrictive trade that comes into play in the rise and fall. >> one is the incredible ease with which the people of detroit gets blamed for at least kind of seeing it as somehow >> the situation they are victims as part of the political reality today which is inexcusable certainly there are problems in urban centers that have to do with individual responsibility.

it integrates the city. it is the great forces that realize detroit helps make america help bring it back. you have to go to the microphones because your questions will be picked up by c-span. millions of people across america fascinated by your insight. you have been out traveling all across the country looking at this time and that is a simple

question so you will be able to do it in ten seconds. but look at this moment and take what you learned from the book learn from the book and gained in your insight and how are they interacting in the moment we are in politically. >> in some ways it reminds me of 1968 but it's completely different in a larger sense it is just a culmination of several forces at once. the evolution of the political debate down to the level of reality television, the changes of technology leaving people behind, the forces of race again that are very key to what's going on in different ways. all of that has come together at this point and when you look at detroit and flint and the problems and neglect of the cities just north of detroit

where many of the democrats were born in 1980 and now a lot of the mark trump democrats or whatever so you see all of that being played out this year. >> you said you were writing more stuff now, you are writing like crazy and and evil started writing about politics. where do you find the intersections. there is faith and trust in institutions. in science, american science and british science from world war ii with incredible scientists, physicists were treated as superman mostly men not very many women who had won the war so they became heroes but that

couldn't last and didn't last because expectations were laid on them that they simply couldn't shoulder. science couldn't solve the problems to solve scientists who came out of the manhattan project and went into the nuclear power technologies. some of them may be as a way to expedience the guilt but of course nuclear power. it clearly has lived up to and today we see a great deal of skepticism and science and it's basically fermented by politicians who want to use politics to undermine science in the area of climate change.

it's in the loss of trust to treat as authoritarian institutions that i think has infected american politics and lead us to the point that we are at today. give me a download on the intersections. the athletic director at one of the largest universities in the country is all i'm going to say. very simply because the congressman also offer over the

football coaches. there's a chapter in the book that is about the tax status of college football. it falls under the uncle of the universities were treated as 501 c. three charities under the law so in effect college football is a charitable enterprise despite the fact it's now a two or 3 billion-dollar enterprise. >> several times they've attempted to deal with this issue and do what it should do. you don't just pay.

they began to go after it and this is where the politics goes in so the lobby turned to their friends in congress and got them to beat back the irs. the gain $10,000 a year as a seed donation even though it is a mandatory payment coming off a gift. so that's how politics plays out in college football. it's a very reassuring thought. we turned our notion of charity upside down because a lot of it is just simply there is no

regulation anymore and congress won't allow people in the tax organization section to regulate. >> and on that happy note let's go to the first question we have the gentleman over here and you even have your sports. should college football and basketball players be paid, should they be required to the students, and if they do get paid how do you keep a successful programs from literally putting the smaller programs out there? >> it's a great question and there's a number of slices i will try to do quickly. in the short term we are beginning to pay the other athletes and at a surprising number of what i call the have-nots the other 65 schools that really lose great sums of

money trying to play beer going to get this close which is three or $4,000 in addition to their athletic scholarship and that is to -- a lot of the kids are poor and need pocket money. that's great. i have no problem with that. where this gets tricky is a couple of years down the line the football and basketball players aren't going to be happy very long getting three or $4,000. they are going to want to give $20,000 or $25,000. i had an interesting conversation with the one who is arguing we are going to go to a competitive bidding model for athletes and football players to review or a quarterback from california maybe five schools will offer varying amounts from 50,000 to 100,000. the argument believed that it is being written largely is they are all victims and this big

system is taking advantage of them and they are the ones putting their lives at risk. they ought to be getting that money. i don't care whether they pay or don't you are going to have consequences once you go to the model you start paying the athletes large amounts of money you immediately are conceding that this is a commercial business in which case then it raises the tax issue again and if you raise the tax issue and say we are going to start taxing this as income, the model begins to waver and if you go into the donations again and say we are going to tax and begin to tax this than the model collapses into there isn't enough money to keep it going the way that it's going now. not to be overly critical that they are not but they are not including that were thinking about those issues.

>> let's take this gentleman. this is a question for gilbert and sean that is when you think about the coaches the question of paying players even if they are not paid today for the kind of scholarships and the benefits that are given, the legislatures have taken an eye towards this and they certainly don't support much in the line of athletics of most state schools. are those being paid to the coaches and what's going on carried over to the legislators in many states backing off in terms of the support their support of the state school? >> they have surprisingly very little to do with it for good reason. the president back in the 70s

and 80s were so embarrassed by the scandals in college sports they took the athletic departments push them off into the far corner of the university and said go find the money if you want to keep doing what you're doing. great but we are not going to give you the money and as mentioned earlier the athletic actors turn out to be smart people. really good and they raise a heck of a lot of money and that includes the money for the coaches said the state legislatures i would say have little to do with this. >> with respect to those that are being paid and the stadiums are being built into the athletic departments go find your own money into the tickets can be sold there is a lot of cutbacks in state legislators over the dollars that flow back to the universities.

>> we could do a good five hours on this. >> a lot of the legislators get free tickets sitting up in the luxury boxes at the games they aren't going to take this on in the way that we broke a lot of the corruption in the state is when robert got elected governor in wisconsin he took away the passes of the legislatures and then you start to get the debate but where you are doing is something bigger in academia which is we are adding to the entities to come to exist separate from the state becomes a secondary player. it's a spectator rather than where you end up with the situations where you have so many students coming from outside who say the connections starts to get broken.

>> we have seen this in science and we've seen basic science basically get an impoverished because you need basic money to confronting the government withdraw because they don't want to spend the money. the businesses are funding programs and institutes and universities and of course inevitably when the businesses find something that is the interest and as a result we have seen really a provision in many universities from basic science to applied industrial science and some of the institutes really are pursuing what their patrons want. the whole patent system, we have professors who basically are being funded in large part by the public who are patenting their discoveries and closing

off what they discovered to their own colleagues and they are in it for the main chance and i think that we see a lot of ease in academia about this but a little desire to do anything concrete about it. >> we are in the state where the whole wisconsin idea is the university was a laboratory for the entire state and now it's a laboratory for corporate america to the point they were debating how to structure tenure the other day. >> it goes back to the question of the university partnership is there any partnership between the success of an athletic program and the kind of money that comes in from an alumni to the academic institution? >> there have been studies on this question. the universities will claim

there is there's money from athletics donations, that they are giving big dollars to the university for academics. the studies are split down the middle. half of them say no and half of them say sure there's definitely some impact their. my sense from what i can tell with directors is in some cases there is some impact but it tends to be temporary and it's not nearly as large as you might think or they claim. let me bring this woman in here and then this gentleman. bring the microphone down just a little bit. >> i just want to make sure that i understand the point more clearly about corporate america.

it can have a marketable skill and get a job to make it out. where is the perfect conversation? >> the businesses and corporations funding a lot of the research and universities that are exploiting the patented discoveries and inventions that's a pretty short-term interest that you are seeing there and i think any serious scholars of science and history will say that it's basic research that is being minimized in universities because there's not enough money for it but if

google comes in and says we want to create an institute in biotechnology the university will say sure, and we will allow the corporation to dictate a lot more than that responsible administration would allow so we don't really get the range. we are not training them to follow their nose as much. we are training them to find university grants and foundation grants, corporate and foundation grants things that are narrowly focused and will hurt us and we have seen that already. >> you read so much about american politics you've done incredible books on the presidential campaigns many of them over the years is that this

question is to go to the heart of some of the stuff if your book we are a question that has industrial policy where the government comes in and plans in the way that you made in germany were some things like that so we believe in amount to what the corporations decide is the right way to organize an economy and how we do jobs and those sort of things and if that is how detroit gets left behind in a game like that. >> it does and i think that is a very valid question you've raised but there's another answer as well which is jobs come to a place that has a good public education system that's one of the drawing points where people would come to madison wisconsin or detroit in the 1940s and so it's both the public education and the college

somethings that diminish or narrow the scope of the public education both in terms of funding and in terms of its interest have a longer term deleterious effect on jobs than does the simple notion of you're just going to train people for these jobs. it's the foundation that brings the jobs and that's what i think happened in detroit and is happening to a lot of places around the country. this trend for men right here. >> a question about big science. i'm i am in the position of starting out in high-energy physics myself and ended up writing the economic history of silicon valley where i lived for 20 years and i started with a computation of geneticists and that didn't exist when i was in college but your big science which is high-energy physics that had a wonderful heyday we

were right in moving public money out of that area. we got dramatically how your game and we moved the money into a little bit of material science which helped the whole business take off and went beyond the government very quickly and this whole thing is a million times better than the computer undergraduate at harvard. >> and in biotech we have invested in and we are making major progress in that area and it is a combination of public and private money. >> i think you are right and very briefly you'd be amazed you would be amazed at how briefly. [laughter] it's an evolutionary process and basic research and science that needs government patronage because no corporation can see how it can profit from something at that basic level.

a basic level. we saw that in the creation of the internet. the question is at what point do you free the technology that was created to be commercialized and i would suggest the tendency has been to bring much earlier in the process than we used to. >> we are on the very cusp of this so we turn to you for the final question. >> i don't have a question i have a comment. i'm from the city of windsor from detroit. detroit has made some great progress in the last three, four, five years. i've heard only bad things and thought somebody should say something good about them.

detroit is on its way back both in the downtown area that is starting to thrive amid the midtown area that is becoming a new brooklyn and until that gets all the neighborhoods involved in that recovery you can't call it a true renaissance but the whole essence of my book is that it's a great city and it is coming back. >> these three gentlemen have written incredibly beautiful and poetic books that are actually very human. they talk about big things committed big money, big politics it's often very personal and reflects the heart and soul. you have a chance to talk to them more.

they will be over at the signing tent in a few. he will go on c-span and they answer questions for a half-hour that he will wander over there when he is done for the great masses of americans. but let me close by saying that what you have seen here is what journalism can do. it's still the most vital core of our democracy. it's what tells us how things work and how we can make things work so i hope you'll join me in you will join me in thanking the three great journalists. dave marinus, and gilbert. [applause] ladies and gentlemen, thank you for joining us here and on c-span. [applause]

>> have you looked at the finances of the wildcats? >> i've looked at them enough i'm a little bit familiar but i couldn't focus on the reasons. there were a handful for specific reasons. >> so we are here on the campus with a nice basketball stadium. good teams and what do those programs provide for this whole university? >> i'm sure that it provides some exposure because they are one of the better in the country

they've done a little bit better so you are definitely getting some exposure from that and you are getting alumni feedback. you have some student involvement so you're getting fat and a back in a little bit of branding for the university as i argue in my book that is really more of a temporary phenomena then anything and in many cases it's not even that good of a thing. >> are the students getting a lower tuition? >> no, no, no. one of the things you hear a lot is if the big football program but it's contributing about of money to the university's so very little money goes to the athletics. some of the larger schools have some money that goes to academics but it's not a huge amount of money were the kind that's going to make a critical

difference on the academics and in fact in terms of tuition is helping to drive up tuition at a number of schools. the smaller schools in the major programs that are trying to compete at a larger level because they have to fund those programs somehow. they don't have the revenue streams up a larger football programs have. the stadiums are half empty boast of the time. they don't have television revenue so they take the money out of the tuition and fees the universities charged to the students for example in akron or in the eastern michigan part of the budget is coming out of the students. >> gilbert is our guest talking about sports and money. you referenced this in the talk and the state legislature

support. we are nothing to do anything that will hurt the college football team because you don't win any votes by taking the college football team if you were in nebraska or texas or louisiana that isn't going to happen so they basically keep their hands off and they may provide some capital money for the new stadiums. they may approve the bond that you are selling to fund the $150 million stadium. >> i've been asking this question the last week or so. my mom is a big basketball field fan. indiana won the big ten. why is there a tournament after that which indiana already lost? >> the answer is simple because you can get television exposure and then you get more revenue flowing into the athletic

department. it's the same reason with march matt us. all the excitement is great but you have to step back and think about the hundreds and millions of dollars that are generated by the tournaments that flows back to the conferences which acts like atm machines for the schools and help them back to the athletic department. >> so the whole system is all about money? >> it's completely about money and the playoff system they just revamped is kicking out extraordinary sums of money to the conferences and the so-called live super conferences i think that the payout was in the magnitude of $72 million just for those playoffs. >> this is what people want? >> but that doesn't mean that there aren't issues.

people like to be entertained. we are talking about the economy over the last three decades that we now focus far more on the entertainment economy than we do on manufacturing and sports is a big part of that. >> and gilbert is our guest. cc is calling in from portland oregon. go ahead please. >> i just wanted to get your comment about paying athletes. i think it is unconscionable that the degree to which athletes don't need a lot of money as the reaching and millions idiot in the society we have the degree that you probably won't view in the scholarship that could be cut or if i get hurt i don't get paid i have millions and i can tell you you don't need any money.

we allow that are just really speaks to the degree of the program and the way they are making money off the backs of the labor of these young men and i just think it's horrible but everyone seems to think that's okay. i don't think that is accurate. i think that a lot of people think that it's not okay and the argument is that they ought to be paid and that is where the momentum is going so in the short term they are doing this thing called full cost of attendance and they will be paying the athletes certainly in the superconference from a couple thousand dollars to up to $5,000. that's pocket change in the grand scheme of things and you're right, there is no argument about that but you have to think through what you are suggesting if you are going to start paying $20,000, $30,000 or more if you go to a competitive system when you are recruiting a star quarterback in the schools

offer between 50,000 to 100,000 how does that then impact on the business model for the athletic department, how does it affect the tax status of athletics in the university's? i would argue if you are going to pay huge sums of money you will immediately have tax issues for the business model because you no longer of people to hide behind the notion that this somehow is purely an educational exercise. you are acknowledging it as a business and if it's a business it is good to be taxed and then the model begins to unravel so there are some complications and i'm not arguing whether you shouldn't because i agree with you they are the ones who are getting the compression's and generating the huge sums of money. all i'm saying is you have to think it through but there are complications at the end of this. >> host: steve is in stafford

virginia. >> caller: i have a question for the author and that is i'm a graduate from the university of oregon and i know several years ago a fellow graduate had multimillion dollars to the universities to build a very fine state of the art perhaps one of the finest in the nation training and athletic facilities and my question is did he receive any tax breaks as a result of that contribution? >> he wouldn't talk with me but you have to assume he took the same deduction from taxes in the charitable gift anyone would take given that huge sum of money to the university. i've been to both somewhere in the neighborhood of $300 million including the 70 million-dollar

football performance center in a 42 million-dollar academic support center that looks like the modern museum of art when you go in and both of these are extraordinarily lavish so i assume he took the tax deductions. >> speaking of large sports companies like nike, do they have a vested interest in big-time college sports? >> this has been going on for decades. it started back in the early '90s or maybe even in the late '80s shortly after the company was formed. part of that is marketing and he realized if he gets his brand on the backs every time you turn on the game that has marketing advertising value and he also has played an integral role in

helping the marketing department everything from designing the uniforms that they where on saturdays to mixing and matching which uniforms they are going to wear on saturday so it's a huge impact. >> host: the next call author of billion-dollar ball culture of college football comes from dave in louisville. they had a self-imposed ban on the tournament played. can you help me understand how that money wouldn't flow into the university? >> i will correct you and say not flowing to the athletic department university because that's where the money would have gone.

it's a really rough ballpark estimate that's going to be in the several million dollars that they would lose out. it's a little bit tricky because it flows through the conference and then it gets divided up. each has a different formula to determine how much money it is going to get depending how far it gets in the tournament but they always have a great basketball team and so i ensure that they would have gotten at least a couple of rounds in the tournament which means more money for the conference and which would have meant a bigger payout. for the sake of argument let's just leave it at one or $2 million. one and done what is this doing to athletics at the college level? spin it again i'm not a basketball guy but it's obvious it makes a much more commercial enterprise for bringing in a cave cave that is and there is a student athlete he is looking at it as the minor leagues with the

development to play basketball. so, you know, it is the pretense that it goes out the window. and it's hard to be a fan of your great player is only fair and kentucky in particular with. from the standpoint of competing against you have to do it to compete at the highest level. i would say it's having a very deleterious effect on the sport. >> what kind of support are the football and basketball etc. given? >> they get a lot of support which is why i always hesitate when people are equipped to say they are victims to be i don't think they are victims. i think they get a lot of support. you can argue they are to get

more money. that is a different issue if you come in and you are a major football player and they bring you an early at least during the summer if not six months before the school season they put you through a summer course that introduces you to the library and the sort of issues about what you can and cannot do before you get in trouble. the academic support is extraordinary. one of the biggest change is in the college sports of the last two decades is the creation of these things called academic support centers. they are totally exclusive. at the same services are unavailable to the students. they spend millions of dollars in some cases tens of millions of dollars on buildings. they extend hundreds of thousands of dollars. oregon told me that they did at 1700 hours a week during the

school season, during the football season. think about that, 1700 hours. in some cases they knock on doors of athletes to wake them up the morning and in some cases they walked into class and have people positioned outside of the doors of the classrooms and basically have a sign in sheet you have to sign in to show the coach you into class and they a calling in to say he didn't show up this morning so the level of support is dramatic and i will tell you one of the things i did as i compared it to the services that the schools gave or gave to the colleges of the public universities and food do you think gets a lot more, the football players get dramatically more than the kids in the most ambitious aspirational. >> so if i were here studying veterinary science, should i be

resentful of these programs? >> i don't know if resentful is the right word. i think it all goes to this issue of what is the purpose of the university and is it really all about education and i think what we are seeing in the big-time sports and college football is that it's really not. let's give up the pretense that it is and then figure out how we are going to deal with it. but there is no question that the athletes get far more than the regular student does. >> ashland virginia in the washington, d.c. -- not the washington, d.c. area, sorry about that. please go ahead with your questions or comments. yes i wanted to bring forth something very important in these times and it about spirituality because that is going to come into play with today's technologies and back in the days of the olympics can you name them about 10,000 years from now will anybody know who

they are? probably not. so where is the spirituality in the sports is that going to come into play now in the use times? >> i'm not sure that i understand the question. when you say spirituality what do you mean? >> i mean being transparent with the money that will do things for the betterment of mankind overall if you are a celebrity or in the communities that plus those that can't help themselves -- >> the short answer is this has nothing to do with that and other than somebody saying i'm getting a good feeling because my college team is nine and zero this season i'm not sure there's much spiritual impact on the communities because the football team is very good.

in terms of transparency, one of the things i discovered in writing billion-dollar ball is there is very little transparency and college athletic finances. surprisingly so schools make it harder to get the information and they collect the data and do not make them better you have to go or having to around and do the freedom of information act request to the universities themselves in order to get them. there are a few exceptions. i was talking about oregon a little bit. what's give them credit. they are transparent about their finances. they are good. kansas and kansas state at most schools, no. >> last year we had tom interview you for the program. who is tom mcmillan? >> a basketball player at the university of maryland. i think that he's about 65 or 66.

he went on to become a scholar and also played in the nba. and he was a congressman. >> host: so he's back involved in sports? isn't he the ceo of the athletic directors association? >> i think he might be. what did he think about your book? >> you have to ask him. we had a good conversation. there may have been a few things he may have taken exception to the during the interview -- >> with respect to the football injuries are the consequences of these injuries that are long-term illness, mental deficiencies, the concept seems to me is you should even

continue with football at all regardless what these young men get paid. that is a huge issue not to mention all of the other broken bones that is starting to play out at the college level and also at the high school level there there's a number of schools that actually dropped at the high school level including in all places, texas. so i think that you are beginning to see parents say i'm not so sure that i want my son playing this sport in the future. there's an interesting side question of okay who will play it then and you could end up with a situation where only the poor kids end up playing football because they see it as a vehicle way to get ahead which would create a very strange and

possibly damaging situation. >> gilbert, what happens to a young athlete out of college if he's injured early on and his team put out in the pasture in a sense or does he have someone to wake him up and guide him through the class is? >> it is a mixed answer. that is beginning to change because that's on the table. some schools have taken away the scholarship. when i was an athlete in the early 70s i tore up my back and i came to school in september and my athletic scholarship morphed into and academic scholarship that i think there's a growing consensus including in the ac biko -- ncaa the way that they are obligated and they need to continue to give hope to those

athletes and continue to give them tutoring and whatnot. >> next: valley forge pennsylvania. you are on booktv. i didn't know there was a tax evasion going on but that was my take. i recently heard the professor speaking about the industrial sports complex and it was the phrase i had been looking for for years when i saw this industrial financial taking over the huge sections of society and once i heard that i realized it's part of the entertainment industrial complex that is replacing the manufacturing space of the country and it's a rather expensive and exclusive club where most of the members are really taking off very large

incomes and everyone is wondering why the country hasn't seen the raise is where the jobs were. that's where it is. it's in this entertainment nation that we've become. i can't imagine. .. i mean, if you look at the last couple of decades where the growth in our country has been in the economy has been in entertainment. it's not in manufacturing, it's not in other real job-producing kinds of businesses. and the problem is, you know, sports is a huge piece of -- and college sports is a huge piece of it. and in terms of, you know, again, there are jobs that get created. obviously, you have coaches, back office operations, things like that. but it's not, it's not the kind of industry like manufacturing was where you basically were taking millions and millions of people and putting them in good-paying jobs. so i think you're absolutely right. >> host: could the president of

the university of alabama fire nick saban? >> guest: i doubt it. [laughter] not at this point. no. [laughter] >> host: what would happen? >> guest: he or she -- it's a he now, right? he would lose his job. absolutely. i have no doubts about that. yeah. >>rnor >> ohio go-ahead. >> caller:, jr. i seventh and eighth grade football may sound like is off topic but a couple years ago with that trickle-down poison from theof c college system which is trickle-down poison but we will my get into that. >> i know we were going.

we have a freshman quarterback who was a pretty large boy in high-school that was pretty typical these days 6-foot 4 inches as a freshman.un skinny and as of rail but a letter of intent from ohio statee university had rigo about to get bigger andth stronger? >> host: what is the gau connection and? for >> so people that are involved in sports there is a big history and high-school football but

they are pretty well known inell football.-- >> that is the high-school program. >> this trickle-down is absolutely true watch whatevel happens at college level and that the professional level. i don't coach football at that level but i am confident if you interview it becomes difficult especially with a letter oftent intent as a freshman to listen to the high schoolut a coach or to said have a intent in my backpo pocket i must be pretty good.ck but looking to scale back

after those high school athletes.hat' >> at a live coaches will go along with that at the college level but i forget which this involves. and there's a line from the coaches but it didn't quite work out. but for those high schooley'r athletes to say lithology special tournaments' to goall through all that attention. >> host: go back to theth

reference. >> i forgot how was never have to read. and to give them an edge. >> here is the book. >> when i to attend on the weekend. it is for the new release. >> it is the best television. en to delve into their works >> they bring author after all other after author. >> i am a c-span fan.

>> it is nice to meet you.

i am the resident history enthusiast. a couple of my colleagues are riskier -- are here. this is a great show especially when i monica. the station is working in doing these events and we are doing them because we know that our listeners our readers as well. readers of newspapers newspapers, readers of books and review prior salsa have been educated audience so we are excited to be out here. let's get to our guest of honor, the author of washington's monuments even eight interesting subtitle.

your also interesting in engineering. >> guest: the books always end up being different and what you set out because they take on a life of the round. they were just enormously expensive and difficult to create to get them across the and the training and. and i always wondered why because they're not good for anything. [laughter] issing basically that is the case that they were so extensive that i am so rich and powerful it could be this much money. and then i was very interested why the of of washington monument had the obelisk shape a real one has

to be monolithic and one stone 555 tall would be super engineering even today. but the ceremonial buildings were neoclassical like the capital in the white house and the supreme court. some are from the style of the day with the eisenhower executive office building. venture with thought was the deadliest building in the united states. but the washington monument doesn't fit into any of those. victorians really believe more is more. and it has no more and also headed the end up to them by

far is the largest in the world. very not washington like. >> you refer to what has the odd man out. and when i was assigned to read the book at dawn on me i did know anything about the monument and that is something i should probably know something about. so you learned about the many problems that it took a so witter the origins? and any kind and then to the obelisk? >> 1783 win the war was over with the reading of peace congress authorized a bill to authorize a monument to a sheer joy equestrian monument with the base and

that was the easy part to pass the bill. transeventeen the 83 that country was as brokers they could be in didn't have money to pay interest on the debt will build a monument so nothing happened and every few years somebody would suggest we should have a monument to him even then was thought of as the father of his country just like in his eulogy it was said he was first in the hearts of his countrymen. a huge washington fan wrote a five volume biography and history and john quincy adams sent his annual message to congress which we now call state of the in suggesting we do something and finally a group of

people formed the washington monument society and they started raising money in the past and architect and he would build a lot of buildings at the old patent office letter robert mills building so he came up with the obelisk in his bid with a flat top but surrounded by this enormous pantheon of neoclassical style of washington in driving a chariot and 30 statues of the other founding fathers

and washington's grave would be there. so they started raising money to do this. money was very slow coming in. very, very slow. they will try all different things period dollar there would give you my certificate you could frame. finally 184817 years after they formally started, they decided they had enough money to start then the figure more money will come. so it was dedicated they had to build the obelisk first before they had the panty on around it. >> and as the results unforeseen problems and also mismanagement.

the tall structure in the world when finished one of the original design ideas was to build a mausoleum almost a pyramid on the national mall but but they wouldn't send as washington's body? >> at first martha washington she died 18 '04 washington guide 79 john steele gordon she agreed to have his final resting place to be under his monument whatever it turned out to be the monument is angled as the great pyramids it would have been 61 feet high. but congress would not put up any money. but the time things were getting busy one of his

great nephew said no. in general washington is staying right here so that was the end of the idea of a mausoleum. >> host: if you conceptualize your book between modern history in aged history. so go up to the civil war in the process of building of monument. you alluded to the society that was formed it at that point they estimated it would cost $1 million for construction lender early in the process they could get a decent amount of money to start. it was very difficult but they tried so many different ways. post office is, enticements and talk about that with mixed results.

>> one idea that i thought was good but they didn't get cooperation of the post office was to put a box and every post office in the united states and people could drop in pennies or whenever the the postmaster would sort -- forward june the society. the guided 1,000 post offices but not much money people thought the government ought to pay for this. so they didn't raise much money but they got up 150 feet to the very strange thing happened. at that time they were accepting stones from cities or states or societies in four countries.

one of the people that sent one of the stones was pope pius the ninth and they remember the unknown nothing's been all the members were told that say i know nothing. [laughter] so they broke into the construction lot and broken up into pieces the nobody has ever found anything now there is a new stone from the vatican it doesn't like it is represented and then having gone this far they called a meeting which they had no right to do. and voted themselves into office and took over the monument.

the money stopped right then and there. after a couple of years they gave it back there is very badly done and because they were the know nothing. when it came to the architect. [laughter] and that was it with the civil war although it is interesting as it continues the construction finally finished in the 1860's it was manufactured in the bronx and most people don't know that. it was brought down piece by piece from the railroad and assembled and then it was finally finished the that was a popular symbol but

they couldn't care less of the washington monument and like have a monument to open different chapters with it is amazing but even early in the part of the 19th century after jefferson was elected president his party was not thrilled with washington in the federalist >> that is true thomas jefferson was the great man but by far my least favorite founding father. to be a classic ideologue in

washington was basically a federalist. but he wanted a strong union so jefferson was his vice president. so the press started to savage president washington to say if you think it is bad today you should read early 18th-century. >> back to the know nothings the reason why they wanted to put a stone is it is good timing with those leanings and donald trump was not available to moderate this discussion. >> but they pretty much went

bonkers and tried to keep catholics out of the country. they were anti-immigrant and anti-catholic. especially from the german and the irish. and of course, they were all catholics. they did not like that and all. so they wanted to keep out immigration. so the last one in wants to be the last one in. so that is why day through without. by great great grandfather ran for congress has the know nothing. >> one last anecdote bit but

in 1850 there is a fund-raiser that is held who is rough and ready? >> the whigs had very bad luck with the president. >> as he said some of very hot summer day. >> zachary taylor was very old and considerably overweight. on a hot july washington day with humidity at 100 percent. it went on and on and on. but then got back to the white house he a double of cherries and iced milk in the next day grew sick then the doctors were summoned

which which usually not a good idea and then he died a few days later. >> and to build these structures ocean was ted had a field day how did they do that? there are almost always ordered impairs -- and they

would catch the first rays of the sun so of course, the gold has long since disappeared as a dynasty fell. but how they did that is the good question. because they have a lot of stone in egypt and one thing to remember how incredibly ancient is. in she died but that was 200046 years ago.

the pyramids of egypt for 2500 she was closer to less than half a millennium than the pyramids. the obelisk were known in the old kingdom but they were constructed with the era of ramses the great aunt king tied and those guys -- and king taught. but there were 28 obelisk in the world only six are in egypt "washington's monument" in rome the romans really like the egyptian obelisk. [laughter] so how do they carve them? they didn't have iron tools

so they were at the granite quarry and fortunately it broke in the midst so we have a much better idea thanks to that and since we didn't have tools even more of a hard stone they and granite. so they are about the size of grapefruits to the beats of the senior that would speak in raleigh they would

pound and pound and setup the rhymes and talk to various people and to make fun of them solo it was also the entertainment to keep the beat the amazing talent you have it or you don't and some people don't have that. sullivan surely if you get to enough of the groove and it would swell and crack. some of them would get back obelisk down the nile. but now they would get it down then the flood would come along and we do have the picture that shows a

huge ship with a priest throwing rose petals then they would have to drag it up somehow. i direct something that weighs two were 3 tons? nt only get wind shot to get a ride. so we think they put the base down than they put the mud wall around it to fill with exeunt and with the slope they would drag that up to lose at the center of a mouse then open the mud

down below and it would go into place. if you would like to see this watch the 10 commandments in the early scene because you'll brenner was about to blow it. the you can see it there. >> hundreds have died in the process. >> there was no ocean in egypt. and then to be pulled by hundred san and hundreds of people to help it slide along. one of these expeditions

took 8,000 people and the course 800 died. >> to wrap up the finishing of the monument the you mentioned before the europeans had a vacancy for these obelisk to talk about read a all are today and how they were shifting around the world on special votes that they had to carry these objects talk about how the death of places you would never think. >> first was the romans that fell in love with them to put him up at the end of the circus maximalists if you

want to see the roman chariot race goes the ben her. [laughter] in the 19th century it took them to go from luxor to paris up the sand then somebody had a homer simpson moment and said it we need a base so the obelisk sat there three years while they moved and carved a base now it is there today so then of course, of british wanted one but it took them for years to get their act together the magazine said iraq did like little old ladies who wanted an elephant in the raffle.

but they had to pay for it that was a lot of money but they told the engineer here is 10,000 pounds you get it erected and you keep what is left. so he designed a cylinder manufactured in britain taken apart move to egypt that was on its side because it had fallen down. they built a circular ship around it with the idea to roll let into the ocean and it probably sank because it hit a rock that had a very deliberate -- calabria's system so if one has all whole will still flow but they forgot to shut the doors.

then they are in the bay of biscay it is the target -- the notoriously stormy six sailors lost their lives to get to the sailors have ron the obelisk ship finally they get them off and then the next day they could not find it so they took off to england to say saree it is at the bottom of the day. does somebody yelled saudia and claimed it it cost him 2500 pounds to get back. after that it was pretty routine and had a fight where to put it. they didn't want it on top

because and it would break through it is an odd place for something that important >> now with the ancient history in 1848 that cornerstone the ticket may more years to finish the washington monument what is the average person thinking about how long the project is taking? >> will still had to worry about putting food on the table and this was a big project and the government wasn't going to pay for it for the centennial of american independence and they said okay we will pay for that.

but at that point they hired a new engineer he decided that foundation will hold 90,000 tons of stone but they finally had to a large that foundation that is a lousy time to a large the foundation when it is up here was a little dangerous but they got it done and they began to build. but this point they took down with the notion that things put up but it didn't quite match allen ended 50 feet with a change of color and marks the high

point of the potomac river flood. [laughter] >> you can see that sari stomp of a monument. but 1884 but even at the very end to negotiate a deal thought it was only isolated it was exceedingly expensive to get. it was as expensive as a goal the 1.and napoleon the third had had dinner party

one night they had dealt the aluminum silverware the rest had to do with the gold but they thought that would be classy to do. very erotically that process the next year was invented that is why aluminum would really smell of the place as they had hydroelectric power today this metal that was more viable bin golden was always a terrific conductor so the engineer was frugal. not cheap yes, sir. treasury department if it was okay to

pay coffee when they were 500 feet up and the treasury said okay go ahead. only guy in the country that could make a pinnacle it and it cost more than expected, $260 and before they put it up the guy who made it had in philadelphia since it up to tiffany's then for $0.25 you to step over it to say you were over the top of the washington monument. [laughter] >> it is also a man not inspiring. and to capture that spirit is there is any monument or

memorial endicott sign that the views. >> partway and said something and then said it was a stock of this very best. because congress would not pay for it. with a plateau and a retaining wall. has an angle as 73 degrees

and some dozen military, but the best solutions since is the statue of the one being memorialized. was jefferson 15 feet high with all the generals charging around on horses to even have a statue there 1994. >> we will take some questions.

>> it's. >> in to be one of the burial places. and then to be buried at beloved mount vernon? thought if that is true that in rare is a the mausoleum idea of? >> can you clarify those states where george washington's body may have wound up? >> marcel was willing to have him buried in a crypt

in the capital that is still there. then they moved it to the mall in she was dead and now diverted was owned by somebody else. and he said no. that is right he will be buried and with the two mile for harding by the way that hope was paid for by that parting family -- hardings family. >> where did you go for research? >> every historian that i know every morning and they get down on their haydn's sienese and think the

almighty god. i cannot tell you how much time it saves especially with google books that are out of print millions of books you can find it and read it it is just wonderful. i am hoping the publisher would send me their research >> i am one of those readers in the footnotes if we're using secondary sources and who wrote about this monument society? if there is the book published 1902. >> that was a very useful book.

so as far as i know it is a good book and straight forward with good information and very helpful indeed. >>. >> so what was that role? >> she did issue would show up baddie vince along with dolly madison. >> i would like to propose a

different scenario i believe there was a full masonic ceremony, there is another monument that was a confederate general and one of the most important nations. >> but in the middle of the book it says they choose the wrong god but the right god is lucifer but he is the god of light from the amazon extempore they believe in the god of light it goes back to ancient egypt and that is a monument to the god of light it is probably anti-crested monument.

>> is there any truth to what he suggests? >> we certainly did not worship lucifer they had elaborate ceremonies. but in the masonic order you are brought to life and that is when you were becoming a mason. said washington was a mason benjamin franklin, and their early founding fathers to have these secret ceremonies tuesday the only secret of the masons the you can get all that they want.

>> philadelphia is elaborate to george washington but does that help keep this simple? trying to raise money. >> did other ordinate statutes influence them? >> no. that third was in the 1820s else looks like old-fashioned milk bottle made out of stone. you can see it. almost every city the have a huge equestrian square.

there are 31 states in the union and he is the only american to have a state named after him. in their name after european royalty. so he is the most memorialize man. >> obviously it was filled with that question of where was built? >> yes. what they originally were thinking is where today it is in line with the capital

and lincoln memorial it is 300 yards east of the line between the white house and in jefferson memorial. and every time i see a picture i want to do this. [laughter] but i didn't so now what you

>> >> any other questions? >> how did they stay intact?

if they are just pieces of stone and? >> a dimension it is supposed to be one piece. >> sometimes they fell down and broken to more than one of the payroll carved from one piece but it is the weight that kept them where they were if there was an earthquake down they go so there were 11 with one exception that is now wednesday peter's square that fell down in the middle ages and the pope at the end of the 16th century put them back together again. >> so we can think egypt.

yes because they invented paper said they were good scribblers. so given the antiquity of egypt. >> you talk about the hieroglyphics. >> he said is the largest loan structure? >> made entirely of stone. but the one that is 110 feet high. >> we are wrapping up. thanks for coming. he will find that to be signed and in beijing and i

learned that ton of things. you'll cover a lot of ground is a nice overview of our great monument and flashbacks. i am sure the audience will find it very interesting. i am reading of the script so i apologize. so you can find us 88.5 on the dial. and my colleagues are here.

and then also had a book signed by john steele gordon [applause] [inaudible conversations]

but. >> not all the air the new book for everyday of the year. why this book? >> we have a lot less bellyaching going on. this is three his 65 really bad days it could be january 1st or january january 2nd and people having bad-- rulers and celebrities.

>> i thought it would be inappropriate talking about mary lincoln? >> that is the day her son robert it said she was spending too much money and without any warning showed up at her house and had her hauled off to a hearing before the judge in a court room with no lawyer or representation to be declared insane. and so for the widowed first lady qdoba. >> when your only living son turns on new to have no ideas this is happening it does go to the concern that

she was spending too much. >> you have international and national figures. >> making it interesting that they have by in large herd of. that is the obvious choice we were trying to avoid that. so in the context so when the manager had landed back on shore and was called a coward and then pushing a few people lot of his way. >> you talk about the university of michigan basketball team? >> yes. the only all freshmen teams

they were as cocky as could be. and did all concluded with one of the fab five calling a timeout but it was an example of hubris and arrogance. one of the of their great sports stories one of the most intense super bowls ever and nbc had scheduled the movie and then day cutaway to show heidi so all these people that are riveted in the last couple

minutes of the game it is when the cozened tries to climb out of her wheelchair after having fallen out some said short of that they could not make the worst choice cassava heidi watchers and all the sports watchers were devastated. >> the author of bad days in history. they give so much. . .