checks this relationship, if there's any work that is capitalizing on thats question, that would be it. i can't articulate what heot sas but highly recommending reading it. >> he's in the other panel. [laughter] >> it's a really great piece. >> i think we need to finish our session. the next session starts at 10:30 p.m. there's a break now. thank you to our panelists. [applause] >> starting now, booktv on c-span2. in his new book, contempt, former special prosecutor in the

star about his 1990s investigation of bill and hillary clinton. he talked about the book in this year's annapolis book festival. >> good afternoon, everyone. welcome back if you're with us earlier. if you're just joining us, welcome to the book festival and the key school. my name is john, i'm foreign service officer with yes agency development. much more important, i'm a proud father of three including a son who is a junior here at the key school. i am very delighted to be able to join this conversation with our next offer. kenneth star, with graciously come back to the festival this year to talkal about his latest book, a memoir of his time

reading the 1990s investigations into water and monica linsky matter during the tenure president bill clinton. we've been in the white house in the public eyent as he has, he needs no introduction but i'll give you a quick snapshot of some ofs the distinguished carer in law and public service. his credit rating from george washington university, brown university, duke law school, he was the u.s. solicitor general. he was a dean at the pepperdine law school, chancellor and president of baylor university. he's in a very distinguished private attorney with firms in california, texas and washington d.c. he also has something called independent counsel.

even though we have a very bright crowd here, this is the key school and the annapolis area, i bet if i asked you or said the three names, new gold and john henderson and you are not allowed to answer, can. i bet no one knows who they are. but if i said the names cox, ken star and bob mueller, you know i'm talking about a very select group of special prosecutors, independent councils, special counsel's who were appointed, have been appointed to look into high level, high visibility involving the executive branch. there are distinguishing between each of those titles and we'll get into that a bit later with ken. first, i want to take and start off by going back to 1994.

... who is calling to ask if you would be willing to sound you out about replacing [inaudible], with that i was heading up the white water investigation. can, why did you leave this great job and time in the dc area and go back into the political arena and did you have any idea what you are about to get into? >> i had no idea what so ever but when i arrived in little rock on the day of my appointment and thought if they feel land deal in arkansas it will take maybe six months to investigate and wrap up there was not that much money involved

but when i arrived in little rock on that fateful afternoon i took the oath of office quietly we do not have family present but it was an assignment will get it done. i arrived and bob this office and this will foreshadow mueller and all that was appointed by the attorney general as special counsel. he had a different title in the titles have switched but he was in appointee of then attorney general janet reno and so sitting in his office and i knew bob is a very distinguished lawyer in new york and i had worked with him we had had just about practicing together and had the highest regard and still do for robert fisk. bob said i describe this in the book that we will talk about ken, move your family to little rock you will be here for a long time.

[laughter] he had found more than he failed land deal in arkansas. >> could you take us into your operation and how big is your team and who is working there for lawyers, fbi agents and who were some of the key actors on your team? >> the team expanded or contracted depending on the circumstance and we assigned lawyers to specific matters,st foster junior, for example. the fraudulent billing of webster hubbell, a name for the past but who was the associated attorney general of the united states in hillary's all partner at the rose law firm. he entered a guilty plea for the clients in the law firm in the clients avoided fraud is bad for one of the victims of one's fraud is the united states government and woe be unto that

person. there were different matters under investigation for one of the most innovative thing that happened early on, john, was i went overnight from being a law person with the judge on the dc gecircuit and as you were kind enough to mention and in the justice department had touredtio his of duty in the justice department and "the new york times" is very sweet and while no one was a bob biscuit needs to go and we need a replacement the special division that it be appointment of the special counsel, independent counsel as i was called determine we needed someone who truly independent of the justice department and bob has been appointed by the attorney general so there was a real logic there but in any event "the new york times" praised my appointment and two weeks later your times economy to resign. now, in those two weeks i had not done much bad. [laughter]

in fact, i had done nothing at all but the political milieu changed and the effect of what howard kurtz called the spin cycle inside the clinton propaganda machine and not being political but this is reality in history and i then was visited to this comes backo to who was routine by someone and i see people here who might be as old as i am and remember being called watergate and one of the heroes, a real truth seeker of watergate was sam -- and sam had been a very successful assistant da in philadelphia and was also an academic at georgetown and i knew sam well. sam comes to my office and says ken, you are being pilloried because of your republican credentials and i said yeah, i've noticed that, sam. dhe said, i'm not a republican

and is very well known, prominent democrat and he said, you should consider retaining me a short ethics counsel as a check and balance so that was something i hadas not started to do to have to do but as we geared up, final thing i will say for the trial because it turns out there was serious fraud there in little rock and as we geared up for the trial against the sitting governor jim tucker and james and susan mcdougall and names for the past but some of you may recall that james and susan mcdougall for the sole owners of the madison guaranty savings and loan which had collapsed, fraud, and madison guaranty was hillary's client at the rose law firm which raised a series of questions but also was, and that, an institution whose

funding was in fact used inappropriately for the financing of the whitewater land deal and it gets complex area. when you unravel it all there was fraud of the entire transaction of the financing of the whitewater land deal and so as we look ahead to that trial knowing we were going to trial and not going to have some guilty pleas people along the way, robert palmer, an appraiser who had fraudulent inflated but to his credit some people you see what is unfolding now and the scandal involving the college admissionss right? ugly situation but people entering guilty pleas and i did it and that's what we were experiencing in the upshot was we expanded the trial team in addressing, by the way, included rod rosenstein that is now deputy attorney general of the nonstateob. >> can, you mentioned is a very

complex web of transactions that you are looking at and there were also very offshoots of the investigation and one of which was at the time of very controversial death of a confidant and former all partnen of hillary clinton, vince foster was white house counsel and there were questions regarding the circumstances of his death but you ultimately were able to conclude that it was, in fact, suicide could you talk about that case and how youou came a about? >> bob had undertakenn, bob biscuit undertaken an examination of the circumstances and the death and vincent foster was a very successful lawyer, law partner of the rose law firm of hillary and webb hubbell and the three of them were very close and i'm pleased to say

that there was no suggestion that vince foster was somehow involved in the fraudulent transactions involving madison guaranty but within seven months coming to washington dc this very successful, prominent lawyer loose from all appearances happily married with a family took his own life and so bob concluded that it was a suicide and there were so many conspiracy theories so i decided we need to take a second look to make sure that we've done absolutely everything to examine the questions that were being raised because their work questions that were founded but were suggestions that vince foster, in fact, was the victim of a homicide and that his body had been moved to the park so let's call it conspiratorial theories so yes, we took a very

clever look at that and did higher experts of some of the leading experts in the country in terms of project examination and i think we proved beyond a shadow of a doubt, not just beyond a reasonable doubt, that he in fact, did commit suicide but what i reason the book is why did he commit suicide and why was he depressed? the why something i do speculate about in the book because i think he was a person of conscience and there were some aspects of the former partners relationship with the rose law firm including the so-called missing rose law form billing records that show hillary had, in fact, perform services now that she committed fraud but that she had committed participation in legal advice

aspects to madison guaranty savings and loan including transactions that were clearly fraudulent. it did not prove that she was where and that is the key distinction but now back why would the rose law firm records in those pre- electronic days go missing this is not proper and you don't take billing records out of the law firm and they were of course eventually found and the residents of the white house. >> you know, contrary to some opinions the investigations you ran and that bob mueller referred to sometimes as fishing expeditions hoaxes and witchhunts and by character or definition and by the fact of

the professionals from the justice departmentom caring bees investing in and out if they are anything but and to be able to take anything under your purview you got to get going and in your case when the monica lewinsky came under your purview you initially first i like to know how that came to your attention and then you ultimately had to get permission from the attorney general, janet reno, to move forward and could you talk about that? >> that last fact, thank you for mentioning it, at the time was underappreciated at best but by the market people that the investigation of the president for possible crimes such as perjury and obstruction of justice was expressly authorized by the attorney general of the united states, janet reno. but this came to be because the connection with vince foster

junior. he was the last person, john, we know sauce vince foster junior alive in the white house was when the trip. the trip calls our office in january 1998 when i thought i was on my way to pepperdine law school, not so fast -- linda says a young woman and that was monica lewinsky working alongside me here at the pentagon and the public affairs and public information office has made me aware that there is a relationship with the president but most relevantly she has asking me to commit perjury because she has committed perjury herself. at the end of that phone call that sunday night i was away at american bar association and meeting in colorado and i think

you should know me and i am linda tripp i, a witness in the vince foster a junior death investigation. that is how i came to be and we took steps some of which have been criticized and criticisms go with the territory but we verified what linda had told us on that for the evening but the surreptitious tape recordings that she had recorded a number of conversations with monica and so we were reviewing those in the fbi was looking at those as well but we then had the famous episode at the ritz-carlton which again has been severely criticized but our conduct was vindicated in litigation and we confirmed real-time that this was exactly what was underway namely monica was asking linda

to file a perjurious -- we take it precisely so a lot of talk about that but society concern and ready so but this was essentially a civil rights case brought by jones and employees the arkansas government and she alleged that had been very horrible kind of events have been settling unsettling to her the brought a federal court action against the clinton for this chronic and alleged conduct and a hotel in little rock. it was in connection with that that all this perjury was underway in terms of false perjurious affidavits for statements encouraging others to live in support.

>> obviously intense public scrutiny and a lot of babbling back and forth politically at this time and one thing your book brings out quite poignantly is you got to have thick skin to go into these jobs and i don't want to say they are thankless but they are difficult and difficult for it to end well and you make at least half of the people of that before you come out. i wonder about the toll this takes on you personally or by e mueller, personally and your families. your wife alice, was coded at one point during whitewater thingd this is a nightmare which will not end and then the one example that hit me and probably a lot of people who send their kids to college your daughter is accepted in stamford in the year later after chelsea clinton,

coincidentally, went to stanford andhe she get there and is receiving what the marshall service considered to be credible death threats and has 24 hour protection. how do you deal with something like that spirit what a great freshman year. [laughter] happily, the deputy -- i can't say enough in praise of the united states marshals service completely professional just absolutely superb but they had to do the job because there was appointed by the court and they said why are you protected by the fbi and secret service or what have you but because was appointed by the court under the statute that exists that i was tweeted as if i were a judge and i was not paid as well as judges were paid but the protection then came to the us marshals and a wonderful job it was a toll. adwe had around-the-clock secury at the house so a command post outside our houseid will be cald

r brady bunch house in mclean which the press already knew and so we had the press outside our house those days. they would go away once i left for the office and the press was fine in terms off -- in fact, oe whimsical story at the funeral event went antonin scalia a couple years ago coming out of the church in the cathedral i commenting on the record about justice scalia with whom i have served on the dc circuit and before whom i had argued when i served as solicitor general and i say a quick piece and leaving viin one of the people followede and said by the way, i camped outside her house and you may not recommend me for eight months and i said i'm so sorry and he said no, i think lots of

money. we made a down payment on a l house thanks to you. [laughter] some good comes out of it. i recount some of the pressures on the family but the family was strong we were so surrounded by i call it fate and friends just the support of the secour of our home church and neighborhood and we have a great episode involving michael moore, you will like it but i don't know if you like it but it's a very entertaining episode of michael moore the film maker who is a colorful story and i don't have time to tell her but across the street neighbor and don hogan, wonderful woman had ag young kd and had several children but the youngest was a future stanford quarterback and nfl québecrd called kevin hogan, small world, right? she comes out and demonstrate

demonstrates -- this is all captured by cnn. we to go, donna.. get out of this neighborhood. we have children here. you are scaring everybody and michael had pretty colorful things to say to donna hogan. those are whimsical or not so whimsical moments of the time but looking back it would have suggested the controversy in the national turmoil but here's the very good news. we came through it as a country and we just come through these things as we did during the administration of the you will assist us as grant as was described. how do we, in a free society, the police and will a lot in accountability keep the president and those around him or her honest? right? if there are serious allegations of wrongdoing or be suddenly going to say -- which is the

case inn some countries, excuse me, our chief executive whoever he or she may be is above the law, not in the united states and that's part of, i think, the glory it's unprecedented as all get out and those wrapped up for present clinton and hillary and chelsea this is a horrible episode to go through so at a personal level, yes, lots of calls but in terms of who we are as a free people in the constitutional democracy isn't reassuring to know that truly no one is above the law given that is the goal. that is the goal. no one is above the law. >> that's a statement you made publicly and in the book very frequently and it is clear is a bedrock principle for you and i think the other thing that is interesting in the book something that come out that maybe people aren't familiar with that did you know kenneth started as a democrat?

did you know he was a big admirer of john kennedy -- >> and still am. still an admirer of john kennedy. >> not still a democrat. [laughter] connect we have a song. i saw the light. any event -- this is a polite audience. no booing and hissing. thank you for restraining yourself. i tell that story very briefly and that y is a great admirer of john kennedy and i was a young democrat and then my epiphany for me was sitting at the feet of a republican and i'm from texas sixth generation texan and just hearing his philosophy in learning about the vision of freedom the baseline in the united states of america is freedom so this is not the time to get into that but you are absolutely right. guilty as charged.ch there's also the old saying

attributed to birchall gender-neutral he who is not liberal when young has no heart and he who is not conservative when old has no head. [laughter] >> you also make the point which i think is also personally revealing that even thoughna you agreed with some of the other political leanings that he had at the time, several fulbright, his anti- civil rights record and voting actions and all that were anathema to you. i want to try to bring some of these things together. your clear reference for the l law, the fact that you rightfully believe no person is above the law and i think some of your principles of social justice and i want to really get your thoughts because you had a

you purge of the judge, prosecutor, defense attorney and law professor on our legal system which, you know, is the envy of the world in many respects but when you look at things like african-americans incarcerated double the rate their share of the us population and we still have no connection for prosecution unfamiliarr with senior officials involved in 2007, 2008 financial crisis you continue to see headlines about wealthy individuals who if they don't escape prosecution they're not a getting punishment necessarily commensurate with the scale of the crimes. given your perspective, i think, see the things how can we fix the system and make it warfare? >> being quite sensitive to and skeptical of of the proposed reforms i would remember all too vividly to move toward the

federal level in the states have seen this as well mandatory minimum sentences and i think the number of grave injustices have been done and that has fallen disproportionately heavily on the africanan americn community because of the nature of some of these offenses. i have long been and i sat at the feet of a wonderful man, warren burger, chief justice of the seats for who might work towardan two years and one of hs limitations was we throw people in prison and then forget about them. he loved to quote churchill about one of the signs of the supply society that cares about those who are incarcerated ando wants to give them opportunities for what we call rehabilitation. finally, we need it such a rich subject but another thing i would say is we have to to anywhere hearing it from this person, beware of prosecutorial power. we need to be skeptical about prosecutorial power.

we been involved in the -- not heavily way but an supportive way of the innocence project and the innocence project, if you go on the website, you will see case after case of serious convictions for the most heinous kinds of crimes and guess what? to defend that was actually innocent. something happens to youou what happened to me at pepperdine. i attended a program at ucla of, and justice issues at the ucla law school and i am chatting with a woman who was on death row, death row in california, for the homicide of a family member. she was actually innocent, exonerated by dna and one thing i am deeply concerned about is what i hear about informally is

the self-assurance of prosecutors. we know we got right person et cetera we use every tool to bring a person down and g, kid, you should know that criticism because not directed at you. almost prosecutor who's been in the business for a while so we have to be skeptical about the exercise of power but in particular that which, to me, is the functional equivalent of the unforgivable sin which is what we call a brady violation, when a prosecutor knowingly sits on exculpatory evidence and that prosecutor is duty-bound and asa a matter of constitutional right on the part of the defendant to turn over potentially exculpatory evidence and i am fearful that there is a growing sense that i don't have an empirical study to back this up

but it's conversational anecdotal that we need to be really firm when we find a brady prosecution and we need to drum the amount of the prosecutorial courts. be skeptical and exercise power and power crops. >> thank you but we do have a long way to go but is agreed to hear about the innocence project in things you mentioned. there are clear similarities between your work and that of our molars which recently concluded but there are stark differences in terms of mandate and reporting response abilities and you wrote a piece in the atlantic last month about this what are some of the key differences between your work and bob fuller? >> one is the method of appointment after the 21 year experiment in the independent counsel in renoep congress sougt

not to reauthorize independent counsel law and i applauded that. we in the reagan administration when it started as chief of staff to attorney general ejected to the special prosecutor provisions as raising serious policy questions but in our view it was also an unconstitutional invasion of the powers of the president. you say wait a second. it was okay to fire archibald cox was appointed by the attorney general? know it was not but it was an obstruction of justice but look at what happened. acting attorney general bob work amply within 11 days pointed a good baylor man i might save and carried on the investigation and the rest is all history. while the untidy the old system worked and more study of history and history is a great teacher and it's not an earring that a great teacher would tell us that

.-ellipsis as grant fired special counsel of his time but the medication went on and that harry truman fired the attorney general who fired the special prosecutor and early 1950s but the investigation went on in th. investigation proverbial will go on. it's one of the reasons beware of reforms in the unintended consequence is but now to restore the authority within the constitutional structure of article two of the regulations under which bob fuller was appointed the attorney general makes that -- but rosenstein made this appointment as the acting attorney general and jeff sessions recused himself.al the other thing i would say is so huge right now and at this

very moment is the reporting requirement. i was obligated under the statute to send my findings to the congress of the united states and in fact, i was an arm or tool of the congress of the united states no longer but the regulations which have been in effect for 20 years under which bob mueller was reported in which was appointed under which he's been operating completely scaled back the reporting obligations. i have been saying in public arenas look at the law and the attorney general of the united states was under criticism, i think much of it decided, is to follow the regulations and the regulations call for bob mueller to exactly do what he has done. bob mueller is an honorable person was now provided to the attorney general with a keyword confidentialor report.

under the same regulations and this has the effect of law the attorney general's obligation is to notify congress o that he did on march 22. he set forth the principal conclusions that that is what regulations call for. not to release the report r. t that is the law. now, that having been said both in his confirmation hearings and then in his letters on march 22, march 24 he has reiterated thatl in more recent letter this past friday, one week ago, attorney general said i want to err on the side of transparency so there will be by mid whenever a release of the report but will have, we think, with actions. why would you leave anything out? leave out those things which i will use two examples that i need to use the because the nature ofee the starr report but

injury information as a matter of law must come out and buying a court order we can get into that but what would that look like you secondly national security information all people you got to protect national security and the third category is of privacy and the report may very well have information that is not going to serve the public information function that could be embarrassing to more individuals. that was the concern with the starr report. that's why were seen this episodes from now on we go with no terminator calling for the careful treatment of the starr report and needs to be sensitive information in there and we should not just send it out so he voted along members of the house not to release the starr

report and we encourage this kind of careful look because especially the nature of that report with very intimate details of which show the president in our view is computed perjury and instruction of justice but the nature and conduct was such that it was very -- what should i say? five it in nature. i think what bill barr is doing now is that which the relations call on him to do in the relations essentially that's their face against the openness and transparency of the regime and independent counsel statute. >> you were quoted saying recently that you think bob b mueller probably be made the hard call on the obstruction of justice claim. why do you think he did not

connect. >> i don't have a good theory and i've heard various theories but i think it was his response abilities to do so. from what i have seen and i'm not one of the president's lawyers but that is frequently and publicly and use the example of the firing of james comey it may have been wise or unwise but i do not see how as a matter of law that can constitute obstruction of justice. there are other things in the public domain but i just don't see it as a law and i think i managed to convince on this particular point some prominent members of the media and is nott my persuasive powers but if any it is the rulings of the support of the united states which is very nearly construed construction of justice. we can go into that maybe we will into the questionte and answer the why did he not do it? alan dershowitz had a very interesting theory and i'm happy to pass that along and hold alan in high regard in a great civil

libertarian and his very intimate is simply a very is that bob did not want to overrule his staff. that bob had a less capacious view because of it structure of justice. one person's theory we shall s see. >> we have about ten minutes left and i knowef there are a lt of people itching to ask your opinions and thoughts on things. i want to leave time for audience questions so if you have a question that you would like to ask, please come to the mic set up on the side of the room. >> i have a question about>> the privacy criteriaut for reaction.

so, what are the parameters for that and what kind of checks and balances exist on regulating that? those are fundamentally judgment calls for a bill barr to say i think it would simply not serve the public interest for the following three sentences to be included because of embarrassment factors, unjustified notoriety and in terms of checks and balances i think we will see that play out because all we have is the beginning of a pretty lively conversation between the house of representatives and the justice department. i envision the time will come and there will be as we call a in camera review. let's have the chairman and senior staff people look at the

full set of information, no matter how embarrassing it might be, that is notot done infrequently and we shall see what the protocol is but protocol will emerge from that and there would not be judicial review. >> and was that consideration in your report in terms of relevant whether a private matter was essential to include or not? >> we had a very and i describe this in the book lively and continuing conversation about the details which we set forth the nature of the relationship deeply private relationship. what we determined and these were professional prosecutors guiding me when i made the decision and we have to prove the president committed perjury and obstruction of justice beyond any shadow of a doubt in

the facts are really not disputed. i so wish we look back that this could've been avoided and as [inaudible] famously said when i make a mistake, it's a cute. recognition, admission, apology, settling civil action in januarn before the supreme court of the united states ruled unanimously nine-nothing not one of those five-four or ideological divides that president clinton did not enjoy immunity from basing the paula jones sexual harassment civil rights action that would have been very good for the nation and for the first family and for the lawsuit to have been settled. well over 95% of civil cases in the united states settle in this turn out to be -- well it was eventually settled but only after the country had been through this unfortunate proce process. c

>> i came here today to get a reevaluation of the things i remember that went on during our investigation into the president and i have to say the president's behavior has -- i have a that with new eyes in light of the #metoo movement and some of the assumptions we were making and prejudices for lack of knowledge or whatever were not present so in coming here today you are speaking and you turn out not quite to be the monster we were pretraining has. >> i'm sorry about that and i used to be a sunday school teacher and little league coach. >> i was wondering -- mac but thank you, i think. [laughter] >> i was wondering if you tell smus which of the criticisms abt you that were going on at the

time did you think might have been justified or things that you would do differently? >> so many criticisms that were justified. >> which things -- >> multipart questions. >> , a question. one ofg the things that now i lost my train of thought. >> i'm sorry. >> i apologize. i intervened and i should not have. i think that their criticism that i would level and myself is that i took on the monica lewinsky investigation to begin with. i think not that it did not have to be investigated but that is the key. sometimes i say that and then it misinterpreted old you don't thank you need to be a basket. of course any but the president of the united states is committing perjury in a section of justice i'm sorry but it's not russia. you will need to investigate it in the context of such that you should have -- please, it's

essential harassment, the price action and everyone has his or her right to a day in court and to everyone's honest evidence is a simple as that and it really is. some things in life are comp gated but any rule of law system that is not. i think i would except for the for taking onci the add-on which is the travel office firings that hillary engineered and i think i can be fairly faulted for taking on the fbi files scandal and the fbi files of republicans miraculously mysteriously, i should say, finding their wayf into the whie house and utterly inappropriate but the good news isat we determined that there was sufficient evidence in either of those matters to bring criminal charges. call it an exoneration and wefi

were able to do it efficiently but i think what happened is the investigation went on and took longer and we did not get cooperation and this was huge and i don't know anything i could've done to stop this but once we had that convictions in little rock this was a breakthrough in the sitting governor had been committed a serious fraud and so is jim and susan mcdougall. this is now aea breakthrough moment. joe mcdougall began to cooperate and sad and i describe this in the book that the president of the united states committed perjury during the trial. you can accept that or reject that but this is serious stuff. we cannot get at times the information we needed from jim or jim would say you have to asu susan mcdougall. susan mcdougall declined to cooperate and famously went into civil contempt and we tried her

to criminal contempt and was acquitted on charges and a hung rgjury on other charges but i wish, to this day, that this is a regret not so much criticism but a regret that once we had a white water convictions let's get this done thing over with and everyone cooperate let's let the chips fall where they may. this includes bindings that might be very unflattering about the united states and the first lady of the united states. during the lewinsky phase of the investigation we were met with executive privilege that were completely on meritorious and we were met with other efforts to obstruct us -- sound familiar? to obstruct our investigation such as the creation of a fanciful privilege with no warning whatsoever in the law protective function privilege which is essentially

created a praetorian guard that would not be able to provide evidence so imagine the president of the united states is only with a foreign power? imagine. [laughter] it might very well be secret service agents might have been around from a meeting or conversation was had anythingsa that might be relevant and yes, it would be to get we lost week after week, month after month and so those are regrets and some self-criticism is always in order but everything we did we try to do consistent with the rule of law ash efficiently as e could and the rest one of the reasons i wrote this book is because i felt so much of the r story and never really been told and never seen the light of day, do you mind if i hold that up there?

thank you. this is a very distinguished foreign service officer holding up this book. both criticisms and regrets. great question. >> my question as a man who devoted his life to the law and the rule of law what is your opinion of the vast amounts of money that is involved in politics now and also citizens united? >> yes, i applaud citizens united so i will happily be in the minority in assisting this group because fervent believer in freedom of speech and just as "the new york times" requires money to produce "the new york times" and cnn and so forth so to make our voices heard. i was very impressed with the fact that so many candidates are

depending on small contributions and i think it is simply not the case as a matter of imperial goals reality of the most heavily financed candidates always win. it just does not happen fornt te corporate contributions will control but it is simply i don't think demonstrable empirically. i know it seems to be the case but i think the facts rebut that. that having been said it's an enormous amount of money in politics is wasted such as on high paid consultants losing about half my audience here. [laughter] this is the washington dc area. i know a lot of the consultants are extremely bright people but it's extremely pricey part and the guide to candidate frequently and to their calls and so forth wasted money. i rather like i think it's one of the credits president obama as candidate obama definitely not the establishment candidate and look what he did.

small contributions carry the day. such a healthy system and worry about regulations could so much relation and up backfiring or not working and that coupled with a fervent belief in the first amendment. also, i would just say another example if you have the burn you been given money to senator sanders for these now many years and he is not getting corporate support, is he? at least that i know of. example after example where we havee a very healing process but i know that goes against the grain of thinking of a lot of m thoughtful people who do worry about money and politics. i say go after corruption and there it is. corruption. quid pro quos. look at the nextro administratin and the sale of ambassadorship

and that was quid pro quo for russia. >> i'm afraid that is all we have time for today. i want to thank everyone in the audience think especially kenneth starr for coming back to the annapolis book festival in the book is contempt: thank you all very much. that afternoon. [applause] [inaudible conversations] , what.

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saturday at 2:30 p.m. eastern on c-span2 from the museum. >> before we move on to the supreme court can i just say topics are what you really need to know and here we go. write them down. foundation, federalism, public opinion, participation, political parties, interest groups, campaign and elections, congress, president and those are the big ten. the entire test covers those ten topics. >> are you a student preparing for the next placement of the united states government and politics exam? don't miss your chance to be part of washington journal's annual grant for the exam program on saturday may 4 at 9:00 a.m. eastern for a live discussion with high school government teachers. >> our question is about [inaudible] and why it is significant