this person. that needs to change on the long list of biden harris administration things to change, that should be near the top. >> to watch the full program visit booktv.org and type his name or the title of the book the fbi way in the search box at the top of the page. .. the hero code. wrapping up a look at some of the best-selling books according to publishers weekly is

everything will be okay. former white house press secretary and fox news post recap of her career. some of these authors have. on both tv and you can watch their program anytime apple tv.org. next it is a book tv's monthly in-depth program with best-selling author and historian craig shirley. december 1941 and most recently mary washington the untold story of george washington's mother. >> author craig shirley, you: have written for biographies of ronaldhi reagan. how did you divide them up? >> that's a good question. divided up by chapters in their life. mostly political. the first i did was reagan's revolution. that was 1976.

narrowly narrowly lost. just by a few in 1976. and the next about the 1980 campaign.i another booka called last act which is about reagan's postelection years. nobody had ever done a book about postelection years. the time he left and the time he passed away. he flew hot air balloons and did a lot of things long before he had contracted alzheimer's. finally, another book on right again. this is about reagan rising. 1976 and 1980. it was a very important time for

the conservative movement and american politics. the panama canal treaty fights. raising that as an issue. you had tax cuts raising as an issue. raising up as an issue. all sorts of issues. of course, at the time, jimmy carter from michigan. he was advocating a certain view of government and they were punching back and advocating a different view of government. it was a very interesting time for the american conservative movement led mostly by ronald reagan. definitely panama canal treaty. the 1980 nomination. now i am working on two more books to read again. another one on reagan's skill as

a negotiator. under underappreciated in that regard. he was skillful his whole life. with both chip o'neill and later -- all of life he was underappreciated in many regards as a negotiator. it has been a fun ride. there are a number of good reagan historians. i am proud to be among the ranks. >> what do you mean when you talk about his real ideology. the new book coming up. >> that is a good question. never as conservative as conservatives wanted him to be. he was much more pragmatic, much more temperate in his outlook on the world than a lot of conservatives wanted had to be.

he was a grateful warrior who negotiated treaties. their reduction, the elimination of nuclear warheads in eastern europe. we ran on the missile gap in 1980.t behind the soviets that we needed to catch up. we needed to catch up to get to the negotiating table and to agree to reduce nuclear armies. he was proven right. it only took eight years before we saw the winning of the cold war and its structure of the soviet union. >> certainly in your book last act you talk about the emerging legacy. >> the what legacy #oh, the

emerging legacy. that is interesting. and in webster's dictionary, there is not obama, there is not trump, but there is reagan. he was content and a lot of scholars were content. a separate distinct and individual ideology. a hybrid between libertarianism, conservatism and other elements that go into it. it was his own philosophy. he enacted much of it when he was president. not all of it. he hader a different view of the world thand most other politicians don't have now. it is, there is nobody whose

shadow that is cast more over the republican party than ronald ragan. he is the uber leader. he is equipped, in my opinion, abraham lincoln as the epcot of the republican party. >> somewhat argue that ronald reagan newt gingrich and donald trump are the outside figures of the moderngu republican party. what do you agree with that? >> i would absolutely agree with that. they certainlyev are. 1984. trump and his populace revolution of four years ago, all of them represent different periods of times and philosophies of republicanism which is, actually, the big ten

of ideologies. t going back to abraham lincoln. >> when did you first meet ronald reagan? >> i first met ronald reagan in 1978. i was working on a campaign in new hampshire. one of the u.s. that were considered by a everyone at the time as a long shot. actually ended up winning by 6000 votes. reagan came up to campaign or, obviously, new hampshire shows a very important primary state. reagan winning new hampshire in 1980. he came up to campaign. he came to the hotel and what

film commercials for gordon humphrey. he was accompanied by two aides that quickly disappeared. governor reagan and i just sat there in the lobby. incomplete all of this man. had been for many, many years. completely friendly, we talked about high school and college sports and what we liked and what we played. talked about the weather. he was utterly charming. here i was just a 21-year-old gkid talking to the national leader of american conservatism at the time. a republican nomination. he afforded me nothing but kindness and generosity of spirit. that was a memory that i will carry with me the rest of my

life. >> the hotel lobby and chatted with him. you also recount the last story about his post- presidency office. the phones were not hooked up correctly. >> yes g. that was given to me there was president reagan's chief of staff. post- presidency. he had rented office space. former president reagan in century city. ironically, went to the building where a movie was filmed. this office was chosen where a terrorist attack had happened. it was high in the building. the office was being assembled. there reagan's, reagan was not supposed to be in the office for several weeks or at least months

had his own house in bel air to attend to. as you can imagine, quite busy. showed up at the office one day. here i am. what am i supposed to deal. easily ran around and rearranged the boxes, cardboard boxes and set them up in the office. a pad of paper and they thought that he would be okay for a short time. they were not going to the receptionist desk. she would answer to everyone and be joe blow calling and wanting his picture taken with the president. reagan would write it down and write it down.

these people want to meet you. a little bit taken back. everybody was called back and got their picture taken with xcronald reagan except for this one fella after he was on the list, he wanted to come back and bring more of his neighbors. he said, that is enough. did not come back a second time. what are some of the topline things in your view that ronald reagan accomplish as governor 48 years and president 48 years? >> a neo fight. he thought he would do a lot more than he actually did. and then he got it back. started to address the affairs

of government more diligently. he enacted a huge tax rebate at the time in 1970. $500 million considered to be an astronomical amount of money, at the time. many antiwar protests going on. berkeley and other campuses. reagan was at a college campus and sign said make love not war. reagan looked at the side and says --

[inaudible] [laughter] he had tried too reorganize government sessions. and he did. he was a very successful governor. at the time, california, a country in itself, the sixth largest economy in the world spirit just one state alone. the six largest economy. police protection it is to a greater degree. meeting students in talking to them about their concerns and their complaints and things like hathat. not that he could actually do anything about vietnam but it meant a lot that he would talk to young people. they show that student asked governor reagan, his weekly television show, these high

school students answering all the questions.rd it was just unheard of at the time. he actually became quite able to handle all of their questions straightforward. the l.a. times, when reagan left the presence, they acknowledged that reagan saved the state from bankruptcy. when he became governor, he was running a million dollar a day deficit. increasing by a million dollars a day and he turned it around tr a surplus from bankruptcy. it was exactly what he said he was going to do. when he a ran in 1980, he would defeat them. he would turn around the economy

he would restore american morale. he did exactly all of those things. he defeated communism and won the cold war. inflation, when hen was running, interest rates were something around 18%, inflation was almost as high. the value of the dollar is not worth today what it was yesterday. it is really devastating to people's savings. especially to citizens. he turned around the economy and created 18 million jobs. when he left office, inflation was 4.7% when he left. restoring american morale. the proof is in the pudding. his approval rating among all americans was something like 73%.

when he left office in january january 1989 -- it was higher even then fdr when he passed away in april of 1945. higher than dwight eisenhower. t higher a long, long time. the american people as one from washington, lincoln and franklin roosevelt. >> one of the critiques of the reagan presidency was he spent a lot of time talking about deficits, but they grew under his stewardship. >> that is true. two things in your regard. two things he was disappointed and that he could not do more about. on the other hand, not the deficit is explainable as what we now know as the piece

dividends. this was necessary to build up america's defenses. since richard nixon's time. gerald ford, jimmy carter. 1980 where they were actually on food stamps. they were applying airplanes that were 50 years old. they were protecting their newest technology. actually supersonic and quite deadly. the national defense said be refilled. that was his commitment. a stronger defense. everything else was academic.

it was created by the defense buildup. if freeing millions of people that have been imprisoned in poland and other, you know other third world countries and ultimately soviet russia itself, then it was a price worth paying to free the millions of people. >> you talked about true ideology being more pragmatic than he is given credit for. herding his legacy among conservatives. >> i do not think so. i think his legacy is pretty well cemented among conservatives. his library and see me and california is still the most

visited library. the reagan library which is, by the way, out of the way. simi valley, off the beaten path somewhat. more people go there and go to the kennedy library, the clinton library or the bush library's or anything that you have approached in that. he still remains to this day very popular and very successful >> in march of this year you wrote that reagan was a populace but he had the articulation. reagan like trump ran at a time when many americans also had grievances against thees establishment. unlike trump made every talking point optimistic in every speech uplifting. something trump could never do

with his life depended on it. >> that is the essential difference, i think, between trump and reagan. reagan was reelected and trump was not. second of all, -- third of all, most of trump's philosophy is derived from ronald reagan. the idea of the conservative judges or tax cuts. not just to stimulate the economy. said to expand personal freedom. increase the power of the individual. a time in 1981 just after he was elected p president. just after he was sworn in. meeting with a group of conservatives. about the economy and creating jobs. really about expanding personal freedom.

he knew k of that power finite. you cannot put it here or there. it is either with government or with citizenry. he wanted to go back to the time of the founders and framers and move it away from the national governmente . giving them more of their own money. that was real motivating force and tax cuts. expanding the power of the individual. very, very committed. you look at speeches and how many times using the word individual or individuality or something other. this was the core of this philosophy. it was a small respectful government with a strained police force and an intelligent judiciary.

otherwise leading people alone. that was his philosophy. starting in the 1940s. i would say in 1980 with the accent to his coalition fully formed conservative. >> it was in 2017 that your book reagan rising, the decisive years. i want to play a little bit of video from 1976 in kansas city. >> if i could just take a moment, i had an assignment the other day. one hundred years from now. on our tri- centennial. it sounded like an easy assignment. something about the issues today

riding down the coast in an automobile. the mountains on the other. oti could not help but wonder if it would be that beautiful now as it was on that summer day. let your own minds turn to that task. you will go and write for people 100 years from now. will they look back and say thank god for those people in 1976 who headed off that loss of freedom who kept us 100 years later free who kept our world from nuclear destruction and if we failed, they probably would not get to read the letter at all because it spoke to individual freedom and they would not be able to talk of that or read it. this is our challenge. this is why here in this hall tonight, better than we have ever done before, we have to quit talking to each other and

about each other and go out in communicate in the world that we may be fewer numbers and we have ever been but we carry the message they are waiting for. we must go forward from here united, determined spirit what a great general said a few years ago. there is no substitute for victory. [cheering and applause] >> craig shirley, what did you uehear? >> it is interesting. reagan's political future. first of all, i was not there in 1976. it is now since gone. destroyed in a tornado some years ago. i was actually making my way

through college. my wife was there. she was working for the campaign and she was on the floor that night. she told me many times we had talked about it. the most thrilling appearance or her time. i wrote the book and interviewed many people. standing next to a board supporter from florida. after reagan came to speak she muttered oh my god the wrong man. a conventional list then. at the time you needed $1130 for the nomination. only by 50-60 delegates lost by 80 some.

it was very, very slim. very narrow. just the accusations over the year. the new york delegation. it was pretty clean, as far as i could tell. they administered lie detectors and one police officer said at the time the test came back positive. that was the first time ever we have heard of a politician telling the truth. the speech itself is so important. there were newspaper articles and columns and things like that i remember an article off into the sunset.

reagan's political career. sixty-five years old. he had been around the track twice. both times he lost. most people assume spirit he gave the speech and what is interesting is that fall he was out campaigning for delegates across the nation. a the press conferences and endorsements and things like that. everywhere he went. everywhere he went. a citizen on the street. everybody came up and said you've just got to do it one more time. run it one more time. convincing him to try one more time in 1980. he was not going to try.

that was probably it for him. one time where he was on an airplane. greeting people as they were coming on our meeting people on the plane. this woman came on and embraced him. doing this one more time. sitting next to him. years ago. before he passed away i interviewed him. he told me the story. sitting next to governor reagan. he turned to mike at the time and he said i guess i better go. so, down pouring that speech. it is interesting. it is nominee who is the last speaker. he has the last speaker of thean night. this night in kansas city, it

was ronald reagan who was the last speaker. not gerald ford. reagan was not supposed to speak to the audience. ford knew he was the president or the head of the fractured party. at the last minute they encouraged reagan to come down. reagan did interviews in the sky box. in the city. there is one interview with tom brokaw in the sky box. are you going to address the convention. reagan says no. 17,000 people resort him to come down too the stage. all applied. we want reagan, we want reagan, we want ron, we want ron.

he slowly and reluctantly leaves the sky box. no prepared tax. can you imagine the pressure of a man who is live on three networks giving a speech before 17,000 people? it was a great reveal of reagan's heart. .... .... of minutes. they told you what was really on reagan's mind and mike was accompanying reagan and the governor said tim mike what you think i should say he needs a governor you'll think of something. >> host: ronald reagan went on to win elections in 1980 and 1984.

1014 electoral votes and 62 total for jimmy carte total for jimmy carter andr walter mondale. good afternoon and welcome to booktv on c-span2. this is our monthly program with one author and wewi look at hisr her entire body of work. craig shirley as our guest. he has written seven books and we talk about some of the reagae books. the first one came out in zero five, rendezvousus with destiny. then he switched topics to 1941, 31 days that changed america. that came out in 2011 and we will be talking about that as well. last act of the final years from the emergent legacy of ronald reagan came out in 2015. reagan rising the decisive year 76 to 80 came out in 2017 and then a citizen the making of a reagan conservative also came

out in 2017. finally his most recent book is on mary ball washington the untold story of georgeune washington's mother that came out in 2019 and we will be discussing that as well. this is an interactive program and we want to hear your voices. here's how you can participate with authorhi craig shirley. 748-8200 if you live in the east and central time zones. for those of you in the mountain and pacific 748-8201 and if you can't get through on the phone lines but still want to participate you can do it in a variety of ways number one text andly this is also for text messages please include your first name and city if you would (202)748-8903. we will also be looking at comments on our facebook page and twitter page and instagram

page. we will be scrolling through all of those numbers and ways of contacting us in just a moment so you can participate and we will begin taking your calls in just a minute as well. in the midst of writing biographies on ronald reagan, you switched to december in 1941. what inspired that? >> i remember as a child i was born in the 50s, so i didn't remember world war ii but i had to grandparents that every sunday afternoon after church there was a dinner at one of my grandparents house and there were table cloths and napkins

and there would be relatives on the war. they would talk about the various exports and everybody sacrificed to the effort. everybody had victory cards like one third may be, one fourth for several years during world war ii and my father was a boy scout

and. my grandfather tried to list three times and after pearl harbor you are blind as a bat and have four dependents. the other was a bomb inspector.

they would come down the assembly line. i saw everybody in my family included my uncle paid the ultimate sacrifice. there was a navy operator in the pacific and southeast asia and ironically killed on hiss 21st birthday so it became a memory for all of us to talk about the

rationing it came out 20 or 30 years ago. on the effect and how america changed literally overnight.

it issued proclamations on how many you could use. to start making cars on the orders and bombers. they did that in a matter of three weeks. you couldn't use, the government sent out a memo to the radio operatorsvi. you couldn't broadcast.

they took the loose lip syncing ships ordinarily and made instructions to the stations. everybody went around and followed the orders of the government and believed the nation was at risk and they had to do the same so it is just fascinating how much it was in 1941 versus today. the other thing in comparison it is this center and the pentagon and the unity only lasted for a couple of weeks for a couple of months and soon fell to the

union issues we stayed pretty unified as a nation until 1945 when the japanese finally surrendered to douglas macarthur in world war ii. >> host: the book is divided by day. how prepared was the unitedd states on december 1st for a major war and how much of a surprise to the american government was december 7th? >> we were not prepared at all. if it had come within one month earlier of dissolving our standard army.

something we discovered that the library, my son andrew was the head researcher on this book it is a 17 page memo it laid around

gathering dust. the office gave out in detail between the effort in japan and united states at the time and the officers did an assessment where they might attack with wake island, the philippines and the hawaiian islands no action was taking of sending a warning out to the commanders on december 6th, 1941 but it wasn't an alert to disperse your ships and planes to minimize the

attack and all the other things. interestingly enough, it went unnoticed until andrew founded the library i of new york. >> how was the economy, eight years of fdr at that point, what was the economic situation? >> it is a nuanced answer because the new deal as an economic strategy unemployment in 1943 was almost the same as it was in 1941. the new deal was good because it

boosted people's morale and gave them support and without hope there is no future. it raised the tariffs coming into the united states and fdr didn't cut taxes for as much money and circulation. it focused on may be production to achieve a growing economy, you need consumption. it's not enough to build a car. you have to be able to use it so

gm or whatever can make all the cuts they want and may not have the money to buy them with the japanese and the pacific, they were consuming american products that they were either borrowing or buying.

we were producing things being consumed by the british people and that's when it really took off after pearl harbor and a mass production of shifts and allnd that. everything was devoted to the war effort. >> before we get to calls it should be noted you are not a full-time author. >> no. i also i wear many hats. i was coaching youth and high school lacrosse. there's a college coach and i also own- a small public relations property firm here in

virginia. we have many conservative foundations and think tanks. this has been now for 35 years and never missed a payroll in 35 years. i'm also a farmer. >> let's hear from our callers. we've got a little bit of american political history and world war ii history. michael is in deerfield beach. >> you are always so amazing. reagan was so amazing because of

his popularity and his popular conservatism that inse my opinin is the same as trump but it's different because reagan i think it meets a more precise metaphor it would be a precise temperature control otherwise it's solid and that isn't good. it is a balance between positivism, group interest and abundance versus fear and mindset of interest. right now in the current contest with trump, we are seeing that as a battle in some cases of one versus the other and what he had a sense of is that it needs governance and temperature

control. edthey created this thing that s our social content again in this icbiology. a. >> before we get too deep, very quickly you are a fan of ronald reagan and not so much of donald trump, is that correct? >> correct. >> thank you for your calls and your interest. i've been in that same camp myself although he had a very good story to tell. it's how he arrived at the economy and the vaccinations and all the other issues. those are issues i take to his

personal behavior as far as what he said and the comments he made. it's still to be determined before we rationally address it. but it was a detour or was it something more important. i tend to lean more towards it was something more important but in the short and nuanced context because sometimes we move to the left and sometimes to the right. clinton and barack obama and

others were moving before that and would detest many times this rhythm and the presidency. but i agree the legacy is important and needs to be studied. by the way i'm writing two more books april, 1945 that is a companion book to my book and the reason that i submit this book is so much happens. almost everything happens in april of 1945 with franklin rooseveltfr passing away.

mussolini being kicked down by the mob which was the final staging before the invasion of japan. the allied troops and soviets. there's so many thingsth that happened in these four weeks which comes out early next year. >> he you in virginia. you are on with author craig shirley. >> thank you for this program it is interesting to look back. there are things that we were not aware of and i would like to bring even more things out in a positive way. i have a poem titled caring and

sharing national care and shared a and nonprofits to do as much as they can to help the less fortunate, so that is a positive message that needs to come out even more in these times. i received a letter from a friend of president reagan who headed the u.s. information agency related to information i sent to him concerning the company now roy cohen also was

donald trump's main mentor so i wanted to see if he knew much about those gentlemen. >> charlie was a near and dear friend he came up through the many years to the other broadcasting but they were very close and used to spend christmas together every year. i believe he was godfather. they were close spiritually and politically and geographically

their entire life. a lot of people come away thinking the president is going to take their advice and listen to them and roy cohen was important to joe mccarthy in the senate subcommittee investigating sabotage of the government in the early 40s and 50s but he was a self promoter and made himself more important. he already had his framework for

the country and the worldview was already set. there was very little you could point to he simply met him once or twice and there were several letters on the reagan white house. the political analysis was to give as much as possible. it's pretty outsized considering who he was and what advice he took. >> sylvester georgia, good

afternoon. you are on booktv. >> thank you. it's a wonderful program. a few things. the first one i lived down the street from the pearl harbor survivor and the japanese submarines that morning. the other thing i want to ask you about one of the books you wrote about reagan between 76 and 80 i remember reagan debating his fellow conservative about the panama canal treaties into the status with his own parties. >> i'm sorry, go ahead. >> he's done, craig shirley. >> the panama canal treaties were in this country the treaties have gone back when the panel was dugout under teddy

roosevelt's administration. over the 70s, the 1960s andha 70s we always had control over the jurisdiction. there was this anti-imperialism belief in america that we should return the rights for the sovereignty of the canal but the time was being run by a dictator referred to as a dictator but there was a great debate inside the republican party over the treaty so reagan was supposed to

relinquishing the treaties in 1978 and bill buckley was a neighbor. there were others in favor but reagan was leading a national campaign against the treaties and he participated and there was much debate in national television and then the newspapers and it really gripped nation for a long period of time. they only passed the senate with two treaties and passed the senate by i think one vote so the jurisdiction over the panama canal was returned to the

people. reagan used it for the maximum advantage to keep himself in the public eye and there were millions of americans. it really helped him and the republican party. i i remember when i interviewed former president carter on my book rendezvous destiny on the campaign, he pointed out every democrat and republican voted for the panel canal treaties 1978 or 1980 and filter the result this was just after the vietnam war and became an issue

of national pride. i remember my grandmother was so hot about this at the time because she grew up in the era when it's one of the first wonders of the world, this and other things and it was important psychologically to the american people. we conquered malaria because of it. and we built this tribe. it was important to the american people and became an issue they were itching to have the canal

so they could easily move their fleet to the atlantic and pacific ocean so it was a hot issue at the time. i salute your neighbor who was a panama canal survivor. it's a wonderful thing he did and it was a great sacrifice. we have one hour left in our conversation with author craig shirley. (202)748-8200 for those of you in the east and central time zones 748-8201. if you can't get through on the phone lines ores would prefer to send a text or a written message you can do that in many ways. here is our number for text only. include your first name and city

(202)748-8903. @ @booktv and finally e-mail booktv@c-span.org. we referenced william f buckley a minute ago but i wanted to ask about him and milton friedman and their affect on ronald reagan's thinking. they exchanged many letters and bill buckley, also nancy reagan exchanged letters it cannot be

underestimated in its role for the conservative movement beginning in the 1950s we are rejecting the society and other things like that as part of the american conservative movement. they were extremely close friends also of milton friedman and of course friedman won the nobel prize for economics teaching at the university chicago. i remember in the 70s when pbs was running a series on economics and continued a lot of interviews but it inspired a lot

of reagan's policies including the tax cuts and budget policies that help reach the economy for adding dollars to the workplace what was nancy reagan's role in his success and what do you think of karen's new biography of her? >> i have not read the book yet. i'm anxious to read it. what was the first part of the question? >> nancy reagan's role. >> nancy reagan was valuable. if reagan wanted to be a shoe salesman, she would have made

sure he r was the best shoe salesman in the world. she was not a passive little [inaudible] she was traditionalist, elegant, beautiful and had a lot more for detecting. she famously was involved with the personnel in sacramento. they were a true partnership.

it's one of the great romances of the white house history going back to georgeng and martha washington. some presidential couples are more estranged than others, but they were not only a loving couple. they were a good political team although her influence was much more subtle than say eleanor roosevelt and effective as a first lady. reagan was wonderful to me over the years i remember when i was starting my first book she

caught wind of it from a mutual friend of mine and no book had ever been written on the services of the campaign. these vials had been sealed and were not the priority. on the biography of nancy reagan and o the fact we covered her at an event at the ronald reagan

library. montgomery, alabama. please go ahead. >> i as a baby boomer am celebrating my birthday today. >> happy birthday. >> i want to go ahead and share a story i remember my dad saying in regards to the fdr coined the day of infamy. he had two brothers and four sisters and i remember him saying he and one of his siblings, one ofgs my aunts were driving on their way to see my grandparents, their parentss of course and a bulletin came over the car radio and my dad and my aunt looked at each other and were thinking the same thing. their oldest brother was a chief petty officer stationed on pearl

so a lot of things were going through their mind. my grandparents didn't have a radio, so my dad and my aunt decided not to say anything to them when they arrived. luckily my uncle called and it was an inordinate amount of time they heard from him but you can imagine what they allwh went through. my grandparents got word that the japanese bombed no harbor. but my uncle called. thank god he was safe. >> can you bring this to a rap? >> wrap? >> yes. basically, nationalism was running very good. my other aunts were making

military belts in connecticut and my uncles of course my dad served in the marines, mind uncle in the navy and my other in the army so it was a time of being proud to be an american and i just want to say that thank you for writing about world war ii. indeed it was the greatest generation. >> in montgomery alabama. anything you want to add to that? >> first of all, thank you and your family for your service. i'm sure [inaudible] you're right it was a time of great patriotism and sacrifice. every family sacrificed in world war ii. they sacrificed and everybody

made some type of sacrifice in world war ii. it's a remarkable time we will probably never see in this country. >> aney e-mail from mark. do you think carter would have been reelected if the ear on hostage rescue had succeeded in 1979? >> that is a good question. i think it is possible for the rescued hostages on the other

hand it happened months before the high interest rates, unemployment and other things so i'm not sure. if anything it may have made it closer. boynton beach florida, good afternoon. >> i just wanted to tell you a couple of things and ask a question and that was by the way when i was six weeks old my

father took me out of the bassinet to hear roosevelt declare a war and my father's three brothers subsequently served one getting at least 14 metals. but my question is about breckenridge. you mentioned in 1945 and in april that we found out about auschwitz. my understanding is the state department knew about it all the time going back to the 1930s and almostmo single-handedly gog to any newspapers. are you familiar with the story? >> thank you ma'am.

the new deal was an economic failure and the greatest success was in the defeat of the empire of japan and winston churchill. and they saved europe and america from the acts of powers and so where it was debatable it is the reason we won world war

ii. i heard the story. there is no evidence in 1933 or 1935 or something like that they may have known about these things so i had to rely on what was available at the time which was fdr documents, truman administration documents, the documents of newspapers and things like that and that's when all auschwitz and the other camps were discovered in 1945 so it would be the subject of a very good book.

the united states actually knew about auschwitz and if so why they didn't move to stop't it earlier. that is a worthy topic and discussion. >> in 2017, your book the making of a reagan conservative came out. is newt gingrich a friend of yours? >> it is an authorized biography. i took three or four years to finish it. certainly one of the leading political figures in america today you have to think long and hard about a president that has as much influence over the

national political debate as newt gingrich has had and still has with the regular commentaries and social media contents on fox news columns. he was more cooperative in this book and to talk to him about everything in the campaigns basically we talked about everything. we talked about race and gorbachev and al gore. henry clay who is speaker of the house in the 1820s, 30s.

i think his place in history in the party in the movement is assured. do you think nancy pelosi has that same status today? >> she's not an idea factory the way that gingrich is or was, but she probably understands power better. she's never been ousted as the speaker or challenged as speaker. her authority is supreme.

certainly from a political standpoint and an admirable woman who has done much with her tenure as speaker of the house but didn't do the revolutionary things. gingrich reformed the house post office and went after corruption left r and right more so than anybody else did so they are similar and different. she understands power better than he does. he understands ideology and movement better than she does. >> in 2018, mccabe wrote in the atlantic about newt gingrich figures in modern history have done more than gingrich to lay out the groundwork for trump's rise. during the decades he pioneered a partisan combat replete with

name-calling conspiracy theories and strategic obstructionism that poisoned america's political culture and plunged washington into permanent dysfunction. reject that. there'ss been animosity because of the parties going back to the civil war when they literally went to war with each other. the democrats were the first party and republicans were the party to eliminate. 6,000 men died as a result of the two parties, so it hadn't come to that yet and newt gingrich isn't to blame for that. he is a tough fighter but he was a firefighter. he defended people who needed defending and he saw that.

i talked to many people who vote for newt gingrich and came to the conclusion this is a good man who has had, because he has been through some stuff when somebody like this comes in he would be a critic opposed to the ideas and strategies please go ahead with your question and comment. it's customary for former presidents to have speeches and

memoirs. what do you look at now 30 years the fact was that on presidential? >> do you think it was? >> i really don't know what to think about it seeing how other former presidents like the clintons cashed out. this is the first one that i remembered in my lifetime. >> thank you. >> it's aa good question. i thought about it a lot. they needed the money at the time, i know that and the japanese were willing to pay it so why not. on the other hand, it's somewhat

of this legacy but not completely and still regarded as one of the greatest presidents. usually it is the iran contra and people raise the question about the presidency or his dealings with his hard-line in the war. as opposed to his post-presidency. but i understand your concern and there is one i don't have an answer to quite frankly. whatat is your take on iran cona and ronald reagan?

>> it was unusual, arms for hostages as we all know. it was a turnover in the chief of staff position atff the white house supremely incompetent and earned her hired justifiably

with the chief of staff at the end reagan took responsibility himself. remember he wrote in his diaries that he was mad claiming he wanted to campaign and the law didn't show so the proof was on reagan's side. it is a black eye on his administration nobody prompted

it from iran contra but it was a violation of the amendment it is something that needsds to be considered in all aspects in this approval brought down to 45% approval because of the controversy it's justifiably or not and it was a months long debate. before we run out of time we

have about a half-hour left and want to make sure we get to the most recent book the untold story of george washington's mother. you write mary washington was a woman that used a façade of motherly virtue to cover her desire to control her son. in the same way that he led a country to break away from its overbearing imperial matrix. george had to struggle to find independence in his own life to step away from the power of his demanding mother. how are you able toou discover that? >> through letters, contemporaneous accounts and the obvious truth when washington was 14-years-old he wanted to be on the list in the british navy

so mary wrote a letter to a relative and said under no circumstances it would have been a voice and the british admiralty including one third.

bunkers and bombs and all the sort of nature of those forged and throw them onto chips with a reallyn rough crowd and dangeros crowdwd so to become a british cabin boy changing the course of history may have saved his life as well.

what got you started on mary washington? >> they pursued many different careers in military politics. after i discovered others may be maybeit was to do a book about s father because nobody had done a book about washington before and

i live on the peninsula in virginia and the family of her descendents are down there and there's a lot of people work in history. she died in her 80s of breast cancer and just a couple of years ago a descendent that owned a bookstore also died of breast cancer but she had an enormous influence on her son and i wanted to write this book about him and how he is influenced by her. she was a single mother raising

six children. what we don't know women in that era couldn't even own property and unless they were holding on onto it simply for a deceased husband to pass along to their son as she was doing to the farm to hold for george washington. she was a strong and capable woman but especially so for her as a single mother. she again is somebody that's fascinating.

i couldn't discover and nobody knows where the mother is buried rin and around and where she usd to go to r the states she wouldo with her bible and think and meditate and she may have been buriedn there. nobody knows. not everything is known about her, not everything that should be known.

>> stephen in pennsylvania please go ahead with your question or comment for craig shirley. >> caller: hello. i appreciate you being on today and your insight. i would like to ask a question on a more personal level for president reagan. he appreciated his staff and when a staffer would have a significant event in their life such as a marriage or birth of a child he would personalize something. i appreciate you answering that. >> he had, how do i say, a debatable relationship with the staff. with some he was curious or

personally involved. hegs would write them a letter. there was a zone of privacy people couldn't penetrate. on the other hand he said this is a very tender letter when he was giving donations there was a famous story he would get a bunch of letters every morning. he got hundreds of letters. hate letters, love letters and there was one from this woman out in indiana raising her two

childrener by herself having a difficult time. he wrote her a letter back with a check for $100 and she couldn't believe it. the president of the united stateses would hand her a letter and a check so she took them to the bank and found out yes this is ronald reagan's signature and the next month he was balancing his checkbook and noticed this woman hadn't deposited the check so he got on the phone of course the white house communications office is famous for you can describe someone and we would get her on the phone five minutes later without a name, address, phone number, famous

for tracking down people. but they got her telephone and asked why and she said i'm sorry, mr. president, but i want to keep this souvenir. he said look i'm going to send you a check. but thereat were moments of gret tenderness. hee would donate where he went o school. there are many times he showed affection and warmth and kindness to people. the white house staff is big and complex and things like that one department he probably loved the most was the speechwriting department. he had the best speechwriters in the history of america with thea exception of ted sorensen who is john kennedy's speechwriter but

he had a marvelous set of speechwriters and it wasn't just order takers. it was a think tank inside of the white house with ideas and suggestions and things like tear down this wall. sometimes reagan would accept them.s. he was involved in every one of them. he was very involved with them and they grew to really appreciate and love ronald reagan. >> here is an e-mail from margaret any place i think you've probably been, dixon illinois. thank you for your extensive information on ronald reagan. ii live in dixon illinois.

the church that he attended is still going and the church is now a museum. the public library has a large section on the reagan. i will check to find your book. i once lived in his home before it became a historical site. a.a. >> isn't that a wonderful story. i've been there many times and attended church several times. there are two statues of ronald reagan. one down the river where he was a lifeguard and saved 77 lives as a high school lifeguard and near the boyhood home there on dixon so it's important and also important to remember he moved around many times as a child.

his father was a shoe salesman well-known and took jobs in many locations including chicago and in many other places. this is important but there's a number of homes he lived in including college where he was a member and had been to church as well. once joked he served food and a women's sorority and joked later that it was the best job he ever had. >> george from manassas georgia texts in can you comment on the importance of the radio show that he did between 1976 and 1980 and he goes on to say i

heard president reagan's begin 1975 and it changed me. it felt like he spoke only to me was his comment. >> what a wonderful letter. wi'm glad he brought up the rao show because it was important. this is the era before cable television and the internet. you are limited in your forms of communication. you have a local radio and syndicated radio then newspapers, magazines, things like that and personal lettersl and spoken word. but communication was much more limited in that era and that made his radio announcement very important. he did over a thousand radio commentaries in his lifetime before his presidency. they were five minutes piece, five days a week and so you had

to really keep your wits about yourself to make sure [inaudible] they were at the radio studio in west los angeles literally at the corner of hollywood and vine and he wrote many of them. some were written and others by pat buchanan or peter hannaford but he wrote the vast majority of them and several books have been published. they were syndicated on hundreds theadio stations around country including radio broadcasts in my parents home in syracuse in the 1970s and of course they had a great effect on his ability to mobilize voters and potentially seek the

presidency one more time. there were lots of people who listed reagan and later became reaganites after his comments. >> mark in st. paul minnesota. hello, mark. in the joint address to the congress, president biden indicated the trickle-down economics have never worked. i'm curious what his take would be on that comment and the economic legacy of president reagan in general. >> thank you. >> thank you for that question.n i'm glad you brought it up. i heard that in the speech and of course it was nonsense. it was simply giving people back their own money. it was an unfortunate phrase that was created by david w stockman who was the director

that later resigned and remains with a stain on his record today. so it's a false argument, a false charge. it would be a waste of time to try to engage. in the eight years, he had 19 million new jobs. he beat inflation and high interest rates. he turned around the nation. the proof is in the pudding as they say and the proof is it worked as an economic and cultural, social, political force from 1981 to 1989. >> you wrote recently in newsmagazine we have had great presidents and bad presidents, and at the moment, we are stuck with one, joe biden who will at

most be just mediocre. my hopes are not even that high to be honest. >> mine is rougher than my [inaudible] i think biden's problem today is he has two fundamental a belief on the ability to solve people's problems. reagan, when he accepted the nomination for president of the united states 1980 said to the national audience don't trust me, trust yourself. that is a difference between the two parties. one is the party or should be the party of the individual and the party of believe in themselves, ourselves and the other is people are inherently intellectual solving their own problems and the government it

necessary as a means to solve their problems. that is the summation of what i said historically in the context of what reagan did. i might write into the op-ed about that. >> barbara in virginia please go ahead with your question or comment. >> i have a comment and the comment is i can't believe that you sat there and said that no one made money off the iran contra affair. there's no way for you to make that statement. you have no t knowledge of that. you have the cia, everybody they knew, all the politicians said they were getting paid to look the other way and the military-industrial complex, which is the corporations that

run the world which is why it was done and you had it done. then you say reagan paid the price politically. big deal. he should have gone to prison. >> barbara in virginia, craig shirley. >> i think we should put barbara down as undecided. >> carmine in new york. >> good afternoon. over the years i have heard rumors and a suspicions that when president reagan would run forr the office against jimmy carter he had representatives in iran talking to the leaders as to not release the hostages. i always wondered if it was true and maybe if you could shed some light on that.

>> thank you. that is a good question. there is no evidence. several years ago, one whose last name has lost me that [inaudible] representatives of the ayatollah to keep the hostages in iran during the 1980 campaign to enable. nothing could be further from the truth, but george bush didn't fly to paris france, he was in the united states the whole time.n, representatives of the reagan campaign or anybody from the military, cia heard that and these are conspiracies and just made up. i will tell you i interviewed

bruce langdon of the embassy in tehran for the 1980 campaign and he told me he said the reason we were released on the inauguration of ronald reagan was the iranians were terrified. they felt like they could push jimmy carter around and could push reagan around. they were terrified reagan would take military action, decisive military action if they stayed to release the hostages. there are several reasons, several factors. >> for all of the authors we like to ask him or her what they are reading currently and some

of their favorite books. here are the responses from craig shirley some of his favorite books include mark twain the adventures of tom sawyer, jay winick april 18th 1965, kathryn, miracle of philadelphia, tom wolfe the bonfire vanities and larry mcmurtry lonesome dove. currently, reading james swanson's end of days napoleon hill's john meacham's franklin and michael dobbs one minute to midnight. a lot of history titles there but one stood out to me and that was napoleon hill's thinking while rich. what is that about? >> that book has been around for a hundred years. my grandmother first brought me onto this when i was a young boy. it is kind of a similar to other

books but it's different to the power of positive thinking, similar to norman's books and it just is inspirational about how toon achieve success and differt means, your economic means, social needs and it's a book to read just for pleasure and re-energize my thinking. as a matter of fact for many yearsno i also whenever i had a new person in my pr firm, i gave them a copy of thinking while richnk because it has so much useful information. >> another book you tell us you are reading is c.s. lewis the screwtape letters. why? >> i love c.s. lewis. he proved you can be a spiritual

and libertarian in this case. it teaches about what he's teaching his young ward how to ruin people's lives and things to avoid and know about, but like in the house is burning down you hand somebody a box of matches orbo if somebody is drowning you hand them a fire hose. it's about what is going on in society and culture and what to avoid and what to embrace. it is a good spiritual and practical book. >> wilmer is in south park new york please go ahead. >> good afternoon. how are you doing today. >> i'm doing okay hanging in there.e.

>> thank you for having me. >> no problem. the reason i'm calling is i want to ask what was a documentary from a few months ago did you think that it was [inaudible] >> what were your thoughts about it? >> my thoughts i found it to be a very interesting documentary because as youou know, i've watched past documentaries like american experience, but this one was a little more in depth. i just wanted to know did he believe it was accurate? >> it was not accurate, it was a mess. it was made by a man that used to work for w michael dukakis. i was not approached about being in an interview because i wouldn't cooperate the way he wanted me to collaborate.

one person later told me he said he was duped. selectively edited. a liberal attempt. much better treatment of reagan's life is an epic movie coming out for release in the ornext several months [inaudibl] i happen to know the producer and he is a straight up guy and has several reagan books. it's not a documentary it is a theatrical movie. dennis quaid is playing reagan and several well-known actors are in it as well so this will be i think a much more accurate portrayal of reagan's life and

career that document is lacking. >> when you say the producer is a straight up guy is that a wayy of saying he's coming at it from a conservative point of view? >> i don't know his politics. i know him socially but i don't know him politically. i've known him over many years and many years they've been working on this movie and i've always -- i've been on several political accounts and i've judged him as a straight up guy. there've been many documentaries that have been anti-reagan. there are a few that are pro reagan so i look forward to this

imovie. i will [inaudible] >> we've often heard over the past four years about the media and donald trump. the did ronald reagan face a hostile media? >> youch betcha. downright hostile media. the post was most especially despicable. of course i believe every democrat running since adlai stevenson, 1952 the newspaper coverage was to destroy reagan. networks were very rough on him in all the years. that's why he used the phrase. there were a number of grants to

support the tax cuts, things like that because the white house staff knew they couldn't get a fair shake in the media so he faced a very hostile media and that was probably as hostile as trump because it tempered the media as less prevalent today for issues like individual shows and things like that were much more respectful on the side of the aisle than they are today. now they are just downright hostile "washington post," "new york times" which is why alternative media is growing up around the three networks. fox and warner news and the

washington examiner, c-span and other broadcast outlets where people who are on the right feel like they can get a fair shake to tell the point of view without being filtered. >> the author of four biographies on ronald reagan ans a couple more in the works. he's written about world war ii. another one in the works and he's also written about newt gingrich and mary washington, the mother of george washington. he's been our guest on booktv for the past two hours. thank you. >> thank you very much.

next on booktv afterwards program cindy mccain discusses family, country and her life with her late husband republican senator john mccain of arizona. interviewed by joseph lieberman former u.s. senator and vice presidential nominee. >> well, everybody. it is a pleasure for me to have been asked for this conversation with cindy mccain about her new book. and