washington d.c. 1913 parade and the fight for the boat. >> more interviews from the press club's book fair. you can also watch them in any of our programs in their entirety at booktv.org. the author's name in the search bar at the top of the page. good afternoon and welcome to what will be a fascinating program. welcome to all of you many things for being here. i want to let everyone know that in addition to our audience here, we are live streaming this and the video will be available later if you want to download it from the internet.

we are also being joined by c-span which will telecast this at a later date. let's begin by saying many thanks to vivian for her help in arranging this program with our two guests today. [applause] we are here to talk about a new book from alan. breaking the news, remaking of journalism and why it matters now. he writes about this subject with great authority. he was the editor-in-chief of guardians, news and media from 1995 -- 2015. he oversaw an extraordinary run of world making, world shaking scoops including the exposure of phone hacking, by london, the wikileaks of u.s. diplomatic cables and later, relation of edwards snowden's national

security agency files. alan is going to be interviewed by the executive editor of washington post which is one seven, surprises under his leadership. we are delighted to welcome him to the press club. he served on the board of journalism institute for two years. just last week, marty received the club's highest honor, the fourth award, the executive order of the times. he gave a speech about the untruths. in case you missed it, here is one. his free tells us we can't always rely on leaders to safeguard the expression and the cause of truth. today, we face another threat, arguably more pervasive. this one is against a very concept of truth itself. i wouldn't be surprised if that's the topic that comes in the conversation.

we'll have a little time for questions at the end of the ho hour. if you have questions, write them on the cards of the table and pass them to me. also, allen's book is available for purchase and he will stay after the program in order to sign your book. without any further ado, i'll turn it over to marty. welcome our guests. [applause] >> thank you for being here. it's an honor to be with one of the most distinguished editors of our time. also a great competitor as well. it's not often i have this opportunity. thank you for offering this opportunity. i thought i'd start easy. then get to the tough stuff quickly. you cover a lot of different subjects in this book.

business model and things like wikileaks, some big stories you've been involved in. what is the message you want people to walk away with when people are reading this book, when they finish it, what you want them to think? >> one is that, the ugliest thing you would expect a journalist to write, journalism. we need journalism more than ever. the traditional role of journalists have, it's been weekend and all kinds of ways. i think we really are looking at some kind of press. the second message was, i think it has to be better. just like everything.

nothing survives unless it is the internet, i think journalism and thinking about it sometimes struggle with the trust. some people aren't actually turning to journalism as widely as they should. i think we have to square up to the feelings we have. >> what is the biggest of journalism today? >> it's not big enough. you're making gigantic generalizations. there's journalism that is mechanisms. you're sitting along that. when i was writing this book, it's the most consequential decision people make.

as a citizen, what i wanted was them to recognize this issue and is a look, there are two sides that this is going to reliant. if you make a good decision and all that, that's not what they've done. most journalism screams bullying, multitude. we've now arrived in a position in which there is no democratic program, through the solution with adequate information. it's a perfect example of journalism leading to a terrible terra-cotta crisis. i think climate change is another example where the situation does not match the ability of journalists. i think we need to think, if all

these measures of trust happen, we don't trust it. i think we need to think about why that is. >> let's talk about one particularly controversial story. you have a chapter in the book called gatekeepers. it refers to the role the journalists as being the gatekeeper of information taking out information. deciding what it means, which information should be terminated and what shouldn't be. in that chapter, you specifically point to someone who is not. who runs wikileaks. he happens to be in the news right now. the u.s. attorney's office in the eastern district of the u.s. attorney office is revealing the concept on this.

those charges are not specified but it's been known that prosecutors are considering whether charging wikileaks for the 2010 publication of secret diplomatic and military. you and the guardian were right in the middle of that story. so you say in the book, if they were charged for the specific activities in which we are engaged, i would give evidence on his behalf. i believe then and now in the value of our carefully edited and rejected publication. what does that mean? if you are charged in the united states, you would be willing to testify on behalf of on his behalf? why? >> that's it we did -- and information thing. he doesn't believe in this. 200 years journalist, gatekeepers because we had the press. over slightly above everyone

else. people could talk to each other on there. people are now questioning who are you to be the gatekeeper? what is a reasonable question. >> they don't believe in gatekeepers. we worked with some friction together. it was always looking at that. we would say no, traditional think of journalists. we'll edit and redact and will make this as safe as we can. for my point of you, the information we released with him in the guardian, was as good as we could do that would depend his role on that. it was to dump the entire archive out there and i don't do that. i think the interesting question is whether -- basically, there are three categories.

one is the stuff i just described. the second is to dominate. the third is what he is now accused of doing which is to be on pond the agency to steal information and moderate through there. whether we should depend that material as well. new creatures, we had to deal with and they give that -- >> you would testify on his behalf? >> what we did together, yes. >> do you believe he is fulfilling public service? >> sometimes. >> when? >> suppose these pedestrian easements arrived and we didn't know who they were from. these e-mails. we didn't know how they came, what you would have done is look at them and examined the news

worthiness of the interest of each one. make a decision whether or publish or not. >> public interest or did they say valuable things? if that's true, how do they get into the source? it's very complicated question. >> using conflicted in the book over the role of the gatekeeper. why are you conflicted of that? >> i think it would be an easy book to write saying social media is terrible. maybe i will write that next tonight, i found a lot of good things. i quite like that business of

taking stuff out of a very narrow group of people hands and saying, this is extraordinary that so many people who have in history never had a voice. they make decisions about what they think is public. part of me is attracted to that but at the same time, i spent four years as a journalist and do believe in the role of gatekeepers. i do feel conflicted. i guess a lot of people do. >> you feel for example, releasing the dossier? how do you feel about something like that? >> i felt conflicted again. i thought what i have done as an editor x it would have been, what we do as journalist, we publish stuff we can verify. otherwise, we are the same as them.

we verify and what we know to be true. >> i found myself as an ordinary reader and citizen, getting slightly crossed with these organizations that had this generally across the election. we can't release that. i thought, i think i found myself being grateful for that. i'm glad to have been able to read this. make decisions for myself about this. i don't know which is right but i found myself -- >> we were one of those organizations. we were not able to verify the information in there so we didn't publish it. did we make a mistake?

>> i believe that if i had been in your shoes, i would have making the same decision. >> i would love your shoes. [laughter] >> i found myself wishing i ha had -- >> if it happens again, do you think we should? >> i think you could say, look, guys deal, he's not a complete cowboy. we could have qualified in all kinds of ways. we can't vouch for all of this. we have been able to verify, this is in the hands of the president's desk, the fbi reading it. we can't vouch for the truth of all. but we can prescribe this in the context around it. i'm not saying i would, i just

think there's an argument for doing. as a result, reader, i find myself finding i would have. >> also disseminated e-mails from the democratic national committee, separately from the investor, hillary clinton chipping, any other news, you publish stories based on those evils. yet we know the hacks were undertaken by russia, various entities with the very purpose of undermining and campaign. and promoting donald trump's campaign. ...

. >> we have a great deal of judgments so where do you say thank you edward? we don't need to talk to you now so at the end what about the material itself? . >> evenly with his motives that's almost a separate question if you should publish it but what if they were? . >> i think that's banting. >> so then what if we did become aware?

he was a foreign government and we knew that at the time although there were plenty of reports the russians had hacked through to wikileaks so that wasn't a total mystery the russians were involved by any means so then do we just say that this got to us through improper means and not publish? or do you ignore motivation and look at the documents to see what they have to say? . >> i don't know if you actually had the stuff with a common narrative i shouldn't know that i will put that into a safe and not publish it. there was one occasion early on in my life remember fax machines? [laughter] we had just done a big story

on the british government but there was still a bit of that we didn't understand and miraculously my fax machine went to life with incredible documents of which we had never seen filled in the story. now it turns out there was a nefarious character called benji the big man. [laughter] who discovered the solicitor's office late at night and collects all the material kept in a bin and then kept in his garden shed and then send them out the next day. i thoroughly disapprove of that. [laughter] on the other hand, that was. gold. i'm afraid i did not put them in a safe and fair place but i published it. >> does that just encourage

more people? . >> yes. [laughter] . >> does it encourage more hacking by foreign governments? because they know the press will disseminate what they have discovered? . >>. >> it is obvious you shouldn't be breaking the law to get information but i think i got a letter the other day from "the new york times" from someone at the american papers who has written a very good account and he said no matter how much we hate julian we have a duty to stand behind him because if we don't than

that is bad for us and i tweeted that there was some interesting arguments that i'm not sure yet i believe that completely. >> do you agree with that if he is prosecuted? . >> yes. i think the argument of saying there should be first amendment protection on the material that is published. i am very undecided about that because that involves no editing or any kind of editing when you describe that. does that have protection? with that material undoubtedly is of high importance and some of that is very dangerous that was a terrible betrayal to

people so that second question is what troubles me most. >> in the case of edward snowden and his name is already, he made a choice and basically turned over the documents to the press with the idea they would make decisions about what would be available but he did not turn them over to wikileaks on the other hand, he may have less protection and he was releasing that so do you see some injustice in that with his first amendment then somebody like julian quick. >> i do. they were very different as you said julian wanted to throw it all out and edward snowden set i don't want no part of this at all but i respect the process and if we

take snowden on his face value as an idealistic young man who took the constitution very seriously and believes americans should be informed of the government to break the rule love what is existing between companies in the state and the people needed to have a view on that which i believe, then i think i understand why somebody would want to prosecute him he should have some protection. >> do you regard him as a hero? . >> i do actually. >> would you testify in his behalf quick. >> i would. >> just for the reasons that you argued quick.

>> i did a conversation with him recently i was invited to talk to an audience in oslo the sometimes he speaks against the russians he doesn't want to be there but i haven't seen anyone seriously within the intelligence community suggest he is an agent of russia so i'm inclined to discount that and less the original publisher that has rather high ideals is the one that i tend to believe so. >> so publishing those documents that were

disseminated by snowden it was in the public interest with the surveillance regime put in place in the grounds of national security with no public debate on what it meant for the privacy of individuals but you say in the book but with the intelligence agency should be the arbiter of the public interest so essentially they should decide if the public now and did not know so there are many in the public who would say they are compounded by the journalist argument they should be the arbiter do you see where they are coming from? . >> yes. >> if you believe in the free press and from all other that's all places a huge responsibility on the press and if we do our job badly but

that is different from allowing those intelligence agencies or the government from determining what the country can know the pentagon papers paid for that and next and said that did irreparable damage to the state that they published at the times and now everyone thinks of course, he's a hero and they are right because the government's definition of public interest so yes it is conscionable to say journalist should have that right but if you don't then you don't believe in a free press. >> what is your definition of public interest? [laughter]

. >> i wrestle with that in the book also but it is something to do with enabling individuals to make better choices and have better government and we could figure out that exact wording afterwards. [laughter] over some wine. >> so a lot of the stories we talked about with nsa surveillance but also phone hacking by the british press but i get the impression from your book that even though the nsa and wikileaks the most classified documents the phone hacking were the most difficult for you or the most terrifying for you to undertake that involved

investigating murdoch journalism empire which you described it one point as ruthless and you talked about contemplating the investigation after it was proposed by your staff and said i did look in the mere that night and asked if i was up for it which is never something i thought would happen in only in airport thrillers and i thought this would and horribly. >> out of all of those investigative stories quick. >> it was your writing about colleagues but the story was that the most private media corporation in the world had decided to conceal evidence of criminality in the newsroom with a large payment and now we wouldn't think twice about running that story and the

fact that i even thought twice but even having that moment in the bathroom mirror makes you wonder about the accountability of the press and also a very good tv station and using that power really to make and break people especially the competition so when we did publish that story they announced an investigation at 9:00 in the morning and closed at that afternoon then i said something is going on here. intolerant in the police just disappearing because nobody wants to take part but that's what we argued about and so it

was a very learning story and "the new york times" came in on it and published a version which was then the tipping point. >> you call the operation ruthless do you still consider that quick. >> yes they came out pointblank and lied about it. they used all of the newspapers they had to publish articles that was all fake news and disgraceful and they even had my house swept and he came back two weeks later and those very people so i had to

have it swept again and you just have this feeling that this organization had tentacles everywhere is not paid out hundreds of millions of dollars but thousands of victims they were impacting people's private engagements but it was a very ruthless operation. >> why do you think it survived that scandal? it seems to have survived and thrived in the us and uk and australia? . >> it isn't clear it doesn't act like any other corporation to survive something like that but the first thing they would do if anybody said anything if they got anywhere near that they would never publish them again but i think james is

still in their company and rebecca facing criminal charges that would not happen in a normal business but he's a very rich man. >> one of the things that would strike me in the book how angry you seem to be even today for targeting the guardian after expose the phone hacking scandal publishing the nsa investigation with the snowden documents and its coverage which you have mentioned and with regard to edwards noted suggesting that you committed treason in that instance when it came to that story for year i was schooled we should all circle the wagons when one of us was attacked now i was watching the wagons receding over the horizon one of them giving a single finger salute

so what do you think how the guardian was treated by its fellow journalist in britain and how does that leave you feel about the profession in general in the uk quick. >> the bigger picture is we use one word journalism to describe the thing we want to defend journalism's pop news and "new york times" and the daily mail and they all have a very different view of what journalism is but we expect the public to understand that journalism that we need to protect and also the big tech companies to support journalism and i've had those conversations what is it? what kind of journalism you are protecting? so writing about these words of the public interest some of

my colleagues on fleet street didn't think snowden was in the public interest and said lock him up. they did think it was in the public interest to write about it they were very cross with me when i said that's not my idea of public interest so it comes back to the pitch he doesn't make the pitch for journalism as a public service that that it's that vital to democracy but yet we can agree amongst ourselves what it looks like and what the public interest looks like and what we are trying to serve and that's a conversation we have to have. >> is it your impression the press here in the united states sticks together better than britain? . >> that's my impression. >> i think the debate is under

so much attack there is a much richer and more sophisticated debate about what happens in britain. which is part of the british newspapers. i understand the press feels very beleaguered and paranoid why are you attacking us? and also america doesn't have a very aggressive main street like britain does so there is a cultural division between the papers that really have a significant idea that's different. >> the guardian is seen as a

publication of the left that is something the guardian enthusiastically embraces and the book talking about business opportunities for the guardian that you pursued you say in the middle liberal america was not feeling well served by its media then you go on to cite a widespread mistrust of the views of many american newspapers with regard to business prospects there was a sense the coastal progressives were on the lookout for like minded spirits so is the business strategy of the guardian to pick sides of an ideological position? . >> i think we describe ourselves people say liberals a bad word so we drop that. [laughter]

. >> it is rather limiting because after 9/11 we found a little newspaper would have 400,000 sales in britain and now suddenly we had 116,000 that was huge to break the scale two thirds of which were bought and that was north america so that was curious we have to understand what it was apart from that ideology but now they try to understand that but it is something the guardian is doing that many americans feel i have an appetite for. >> so do you think in today's environment the outlets have to choose a side now fox versus msnbc model is that the

model for all news organizations or journalistic knowledge? . >> you won't get to journalists as that subjectivity is a better word still thinking about those british newspapers they tend to be more on the subjective side and they both have their merits at the bbc we are more objective you have fox news that is less objective and probably as long as we have all of it and not just one model but i can understand why

if you they are there for something that seems to be speaking more to them there is nothing wrong with that. >> i am curious if you have to be an optimist or a pessimist where we are headed with quality journalism and truth prevailing and crackpot conspiracy theories? you say for the first time in modern history facing the prospect of studies that exist without reliable news as it used to be understood and then you wonder at the moment the greatest existential crisis how much has lived up to the crying need and then another point discussing digital disruption of the business model but if not enough citizens or readers did want to be informed? i'm hoping you will answer the questions that you posed to yourself. are we becoming a society is

the journalism profession doing enough to provide reliable news? are there people who want to be truly informed her just those news grazers? . >> there are 533 questions in this book and he does not have them. [laughter] so yes all the people say now we cannot tell what is true and what's not true two thirds of people say we don't know a good source from a bad source and we cannot have that basis and that is really scary. but then your third question really is about but there is a whole suspicion that actually

people have somehow lost and they don't believe actually the business of calling themselves through journalism is necessary any longer. because the scale is now so at some point we have to turn that question back and say what are you doing? will you retweet something that is right? are you challenging these lies? because if it's on that kind of scale then took that scale that yes i am because i think there are so many newsrooms

now that have been cut back to the bone especially at the regional level with this word journalism is just reporters who are recycling puerto rico news it's the most depressing thing to see i call this the remaking of journalism because if we can make it more as a public service then people will embrace that and realize the value and how it could be beyond the crisis that we are facing. >> have you yourself incorporated analytics into the newsroom initially as you say you didn't want that information in the newsroom but then you did. why and what do you see is the proper use of metrics and analytics we had no idea what

people were reading me sat in a room and put copies on the pieces they read we had very little idea about our readers now we know exactly who they are where they are how long they read for what they are reading how long they read before they stop reading and those are fantastically useful as long as those are not your master but if you say we will do exactly what our readers want us to read or what drives the subscription that's supposing that want to read about climate change because that's depressing does that mean they don't like climate change that could be a good business model but catastrophic for society. the use of metrics coupled with journalistic judgment is the obvious way to go.

>> much of your reputation journalistic ely is built under investigative reporting at one point you say there was a financial benefit to a newspaper of such investigations but it's long-term readers on some level expect newspapers to be brave they like corruption exposed power to be challenged and it reminds them what journalism is for but yet a few paragraphs later your remark on how hard investigative journalism is given the time and the money and the effort required the bleaker the financial figures the tougher the argument for investigative journalism came to sustain it was about to become harder so what do you see? . >> the bedrock of what we do and that financial managers they see that is their job but

long-term the benefit that you get from what people admire this story took about seven years others that took six months or two years to do british aerospace scandal and there is no conventional way to account for that except to say at the end of it that model depended on going to the readers and asking them to contribute. and that this is what newspapers should do. so long-term it is financial as well. it is building the brand to see yourself as this kind of

newspaper and not a journalism nice paper one - - newspaper that is just recycling. . . . . of the web not just on the web. it was a small thing to say, but a huge thing to imagine let alone do. then you quote the visionary emily bell who is at columbia university, but now at the guardian, who says i was wondering if the story is going to be the main form of journalism any longer. what does it mean the story is not the main form of journalism and is the practice of journalism being transformed in some way? >> the small -- well emily has this walk-on part she was the person who came in -- she would

say this thing called twitter, and you ought to have a look at it because it's going to be the biggest news organization in the world, and it would be people describing what they had for breakfast, and nine months later would be a time lag for what she told me and what i understood. obviously if you print a newspaper, you print a story it has a finite end, you press it and send it, and that's the artifact you produce. i think we were the first paper to start live blogging which was to -- we started live blogging sport with readers joining in, and we started live blogging politics, so the story went on. if a guy goes home at the end, it's a thread into which you are pulling other multiple sources, and it becomes a way of describing news in a continuum in which the moment you publish a fact, somebody else challenges

it or clarifiize it. that's now news happens. it's not a story however, we found of -- if your experience is the same we've live blogged more than anything, and that appears to be the most trafficked bit of the site on the day. i was explaining this to somebody during a brexit debate. it was lewis lath m who is 83. he was astonished at these people. and i said well it's happening now, and there are 12,000 comments and it's lunchtime, and that is readers desperate to have their say. so the major things like that that the story being the artifact changed. green walled, who did the phone hacking story for us, and had never been -- sorry -- no one has told him how to be a

journalist, and no one has told him to write the story, press send, and go home. he worked from his kitchen table, and he thought the most interesting part was the moment you press send because that's when people would startser start expected to it. so he's make himself a cup of tea, and talk to the readers, and they'd say nice story, but i think there's a mistake in paragraph 2, and you missed a link, and by the way you should write about this next week. by the time we met him he had a personal following of a million. these are people who thought here's a guy who is willing to respond, and doesn't think its the end of the day when you write your story. and this new mentor about our readers know more than we do. well edward snowden knew a lot more than frank greenwalled, and this ability to honor all the things we used to think were a

given about journalism is one of the features of the age we live in. >> marty: you talked about twitter and your first disdainful hue of twitter given what you're seeing on there. and that gets at the issue of all evidence indicates that our field was unprepared for the changes that hit our profession. and the business. how well prepared do you feel we are today? for what comes next, whatever that happens to be? and then you can tell me what you think comes next. >> alan: i do think -- the vertical mindset, which was lovely, there was nothing not to like about it. it was great being a journalist at that time when you were the arbiters of truth, is a very difficult mindset to share. i see a lot of colleagues saying we tried that utopian thing of all those people talking but it

turns out their idiots, we're going to turn off the comments on the articles because our readers are morons and we want to get back to the vertical thing. my experience with twitter especially now i'm not an editor, because it can be quite humbling if you're an editor, so nobody knows who i am now. i follow delightful intelligent informed people, and they behave in a way i find very fetching. they listen to each other, they aim for the truth, iteratively and here's my link, here's my screenshot, my evidence, by the way interrupt me at any point if you think i have it wrong. challenge me, respond, here's a joke or a gif, and i think we'd be foolish to disregard that as a way of people saying -- in the modern age that's how i believe

people. it's how i believe things, i need the evidence. some colleagues are still on that vertical model where we're going to tell you brexit is necessary, europe is crap and you take our word for it. people are not going to -- >> marty: my time is up but we have questions. >> guest: marty you did such a good job with the questions that we didn't get many questions from the audience. we do have a few that we have time to address. this one is hedrich smith, longtime journalist recently told a press club audience that the media is too binary, blue

wave versus trump-based. and this is a very focused on american journalism now. do you agree, and if so how does journalism escape this binary trap? >> alan: i do agree and i think one role for journalism is to find common ground and try and see what people agree on rather than what they disagree on. and try to find constructive answers to things rather than purely being negative and critiquing. i agree with that. >> guest: and what conversations do you think newsrooms should we having about objectivity and bias? >> alan: well -- as i say up to 200 years it's sort of surprising that we can't agree on the best method of -- it's at

the core of what we do is this business of trying to establish facts, and getting people to believe them. not the same thing. then i think we have to think through the best methods by which we should convince people that this is -- some people say well it's better to be subjective, i'll tell you what my politics are, i'll tell you who i am, you know where i'm coming from. you'll trust me more. some people think that's the wrong answer, i have no views about anything, i never vote and i want you to believe i am entirely objective. i think that's a conversation we need to have in which to -- because it is about convincing people of what we say. a deinvestigators here, there's a film that's come out by mike

lee about this terrible massacre that happened in 189 and at that event was a businessman called john edward tailor and he saw the troops ride into the crowd and cut people down, they were unarmed protesters in 1819, and there was only one reporter from the times there, and he was locked up. tailor saw that you needed facts, and to establish facts about the event. and he wrote it up and got it to the times overnight in london. it's fascinating reading the times over the next two or three days. the editor of the times is saying well, i have this account but how am i going to establish these are facts as opposed to one person's view. he does very modern things like crowdsourcing. he fills the paper up with multiple accounts of multiple eyewitnesses in order to

establish a basis of fact. and you feel we haven't -- then they went on to found the guardian in 1821. you feel we haven't got much beyond that. not only have we established facts, but how do we persuade people those facts are genuine. >> guest: a bigger challenge all the time. this question asks how did the guardian's expansion into the u.s. change the guardian? you spoke of how the international audience grew, what did you do differently then? >> alan: it's a -- we all know our lives are international. we may not want them to be, but the inference on our lives, and the security of our lives, the well being of our lives the environment we live in, international stories, and you can't cover them nationally. i think the guardian's been imeably improved by having the

dimension. we did the same in australia so we can report around the clock and have a much more international mindset. i think one point we considered having the default position for the guardian being an international edition. like the bbc world service. but i think that's one of the things that was a great retreat from international reporting. and i think as people realize how much their lives are impacted by things that might be happening on the other side of the world i think there's a first for that kind of reporting. >> guest: the guardian went to a membership model. what did you find motivated people to do that? how -- >> alan: well, we had in 2012, we had something like 4,000 guardian readers come through the office, because i thought we're going to have to have a conversation with our readers about all this stuff.

a new york academic, and a digital guru moderated that. and he said to the readers we are going to have to ask you for money. there are two possible models for that. one is that you pay us in order to have to right to read the guardian over here, and for no one else to be able to read the guardian. that's a private goods model, and no hands went up on that. i thought we're in trouble here. and then clay said the other model is you pay as a member of the guardian to make the guardian available to the whole world so that everybody can have a reliable source of information. everybody's hands went up. that was a public good. and the guardian has a million people who pay now in the u.s. that's half the revenue now. it seems to me it's not a model that will work for everybody,

but it's -- to me if you do the journalism we were talking about just now, and good journalism, the public appreciates that and are prepared to take enormous philanthropic view of supporting it. >> guest: thank you. marty did you have one more question you wanted to ask? >> marty: so in the book you argue that donald trump as you put it in some ways has been good for news. how so? and will this presidency be good for journalism over the long run? >> alan: i think he's brought out -- made people realize the vitality of what the press do. basically down to the judges and the press now, and maybe the judges not so much in future -- so it's the press and i remember meeting you a couple years ago after the election in 2016, and saying you know -- i'm afraid

the weight of the world is on your shoulders marty because it's all down to you. and i do think american journalism has risen to the challenge and proved what journalism -- and reminded people who needed to be reminded about the essential work that we do. so of course he's a disaster, and a crawv in my view, for journalists and for journalism, and one of the most insidious things i was in italy a couple weeks ago, and the italian leaders are saying our leaders are doing what trump is doing. that's terrible. but, if the response is to provoke great journalism than i think he could end up doing us all a great favor. >> guest: so with that a relatively optimistic note i think that's a good point to

end. thank you so much on behalf of the national press club journalism institute for being here, and for these two of the best editors on the planet. sharing their wisdom for the past hour. and in thanks we have a wonderful gift for you. >> marty: i didn't share any wisdom i want you to know. [laughter] >> wise questions i'd like to present you with a national press club mug. >> marty: i have a collection of mugs, yes i do. mugs and tote bags. [laughter] >> you'll have a matching set. thank you so much for being here, and welcome to our new executive director julie moose, and thank you to our friends from the national press club and the institute and thank you again let's give everyone a round of applause.

[applause] >> throughout the year book tv attends author events conferences and book fairs to speak with non-fiction authors. at the national press club's annual book fair in washington we spoke with vanity fair editor david marglic about the relationship between robert f. kennedy and martin luther king, jr. >> he's a former legal affairs reporter from the "new york times," mr. david margolick, you're the author of "the promise and the dream," most people will link those two from those deaths in 1968, but they had a robust relationship, is that correct? >> david: robust is one way to describe