is light at 7:00 a.m. eastern on c-span. next, q&a, then david cameron at the british house of commons. after that, a european commission debate on the eurozone crisis. ♪ >> this week on "q&a," john feinstein talks about his new book, "behind the scenes with the greats in the game." >> john feinstein, author of "one on one" how much impact has the government had on the world of sport? >> i go back and forth on how i feel about that. sometimes i think it would be

best for government to stay out of sports. when congress gets involved, a lot of the times the hearings are television shows designed to give the man exposure to a different audience. sport is a multi-billion dollar business in country. it has a huge effect on the lives of people as fans, in terms of raising money for universities, for higher education. there are so many different ways it affect our lives. many stadiums are built with funds. there are times when i think the federal government should be more involved. there would be times when i suggested that the president appoints a tsar of sports. it is a sports stoppage. we're going to fix it here.

we're going to work it out. nowadays it is topped off by the horrors of penn state. more and more as i get older, i think the federal government should be more involved. >> we have a clip of you testifying. how many years is this for you as a sportswriter? >> i started when i was at in college, at age 35. i was a college sophomore at duke when i for started working with the student newspaper. i did not just write sports.

i was a night police reporter. i covered politics. i have been involved as a sportswriter for 35 years. >> what is your connection to them now? >> i am listed as a contributor. i write columns on a regular basis. i am not a full-time employee. my first of this is the books. i work for the post whenever i can. i still enjoy it. i love daily journalism. i believe in it. >> 28 books plus this 1? >> this is the 28. i have written five kids mysteries which are for children age 11-12 and up with a sports genre involved. the two heroes are budding sports writers. >> this testimony you start off by saying i did not write the testimony.

i will just wing it. jack brooks is no longer in congress. he was from texas. let's watch this. you can explain. >> you made the point that government should not intervene. congress should not intervene in baseball. the government did intervene to the supreme court ruling on good 1922 when it granted baseball this exemption. to me, i am not a lawyer, an exemption from the law means there's a special circumstance. if a police officer tells me i can drive my car 80 miles an hour to a hospital because my wife is about to give birth in the back seat of my car, that does that mean he will grant me the same exemption from the speed limit when i drive my wife and child on two days later. i do not need that exemption any more. >> what are you doing then?

>> you mean professionally? i had just written a book on major league baseball. i cannot believe how young i looked. the subtitle of the book was "the life of in troubled times of major league baseball." it came out before this testimony. it was clear that they were heading for a collision. they had hired a union lawyer to take over his negotiations. he said he would break the union. the baseball union has been the strongest a back to the 1960s. the players walked out. there was no world series that year. that is why the congressional hearings were held to try to get the owners and players back to the bargaining table. the commissioner was sitting next to me during that testimony.

at one point, i talk about him in this book, he put his hand on the microphone and lead back and said "you cannot possibly believe that." i said "i believe every word of that." we argued in the hallway. he said i completely disagree with you. next time you will walk there. that is the kind of person he was. the law i am talking about is the antitrust law. baseball was granted an exemption. they had maintained it. >> what is an antitrust law? in layman's terms, how does it apply to this? >> the way it applies to baseball is it gave the owners the right to say to franchisees you cannot move from one city to another without our approval.

in any other sport, like when al davis tried to move the oakland raiders to los angeles, they tried to block him. he sued and won on the basis of antitrust. baseball has an antitrust exemption. it can say "no you cannot move." franchisees do move and to get owner approval. it also came into play at a particular strike because the owners wanted to give you this new contract. this will be the collective bargaining agreement. did the union did go to federal court. sonia sotomayor ruled against the owners. the players said you cannot invoke the new rules.

that is when the strike finally ended. it was not until the following. >> why is baseball get an exemption and not football or basketball and hockey? >> baseball asks and got it. judge landis was the commissioner of baseball in 1920's. they were able to get the exemption then. other sports will lead to have the exemption. congress has set to others that you cannot have the exemption. they allow baseball to continue

to have it. >> do you think that will ever change? >> it would change only if baseball did something to anger congress. i thought in the case of 94 they were abusing the exemption. that is what i was saying. it did not happen then. it took a federal court ruling to end the strike. after 2005 when it the steroid hearings with mark mcgwire, the government chose not to intervene in anyway. it leads me to believe that it will not happen. >> another clip we have from that same hearing. we will watch. >> when he was a commissioner of baseball, he made the statement that if there was a work stoppage that most fans would view it as a bunch of whiny millionaires taking on a group of greedy billionaires. clearly that is the way many baseball fans, maybe majority, if you view this current dispute. that is not good. if they do impose the cap they will win a victory.

it has been said that it would take an act of congress to get the chicago cubs back to the world series. i would suggest that it will take an act of congress to get the chicago cubs and the other teams back on the field next spring. i would ask you on behalf of many of my colleagues in room who were neutral observers and think that you need to take this action, to take it. >> who is neutral? >> i neutral in the sense that we're trying to be fair to both sides. i was not neutral. i was on the side of the players during the course of that work stoppage. i tended to be on the side of the players, because what happens frequently is that there are these disputes and it

is the owners who want to change in contract. it is always the owners who are saying we are not making enough money. it is not that they're losing money. in the nfl dispute, it was not that the nfl owners were claiming that they're losing money. it's just they said that they want to make more money. we want to change the rules. the always have the advantage. the millionaires and to have the leverage on the billionaires. they will end up winning. in case of baseball, they won virtually all the disputes for many years until the drug issue came up between the owners. >> i have said that you have the all-time best-selling sports book called "season on the brink." is that true?

>> another book i read about professional office sold more. that was my first book. it was about an indiana basketball coach. it cannot 25 years ago. it was the reason for "one on one." i wanted to look back of my 25 years of writing books and go back to the many people i had written about. i get asked, what ever happened to this person or that person? many people are famous but many are not. that was the purpose of this new book. >> how many copies? >> i am told worldwide it is somewhere past 2 million. it has been sold in japan and australia and great britain and here in this country, too. it still sells in paperback. the publisher put out a 25th anniversary edition.

>> how have you changed? >> i have gained weight. >> how have you changed the money alone? you have to be a wealthy man? >> i do not know if i was a wealthy. i am divorced. those of us to go through divorce tend to be less wealthy. i have absolutely no complaints financially. the irony was the advance was $17,500. i had to take a leave of absence to go live in indiana during the basketball season. i expected to lose money doing the book. i wanted to do it. i thought this could be a good book. my goal was for it to do well enough that someone would give me a chance to write a second book. i never dreamed anything beyond that.

the initial book tour was two days in the state of indiana. that was supposed to be it. then when the book took off and became the no. 1 best seller, i was sent to a lot more places to do a lot more promotion. >> you say because two n.c.a.a. rules have been changed? >> i did a season inside. i have complete access to indiana. i sat on their bench. i was in their locker room. i have total access. the n.c.a.a. passed a rule that said no member of the media could be in locker room of a team before or during a game at halftime. and that if one member of the media was allowed, the locker

room was then opened to all members. by that role, everybody who is in the dome with the media credentials would have been allowed. that cannot happen. the other role that was changed when i did my second book, i went on recruiting visits with coaches and into the homes of high school kids. i would hear their pitch to the families. after that book came out, the n.c.a.a. created a role that said no member of the media may go on a recruiting visit with a coach because they deemed it to give that coach and unfair advantage because it applied if you come to my school then you will get more media coverage. here is this guy coming on the trip. i asked my friend at the n.c.a.a. and said what if i went on every visit that a kid had? what if i won all five visits? and there would be no advantage. he said there would be a role

for that one. >> how long was bobby knight the coach? >> he was there for 27 years. excuse me. 29 years. he was fired in fall of 2000. >> how did you get inside? why did he let you spend six months with him? >> it was six months. the entire season of 1985. i had covered bob knight. i have said that he is the most black and white person i have ever met. the only gray in his life is his hair. he either really like you are really does not. i had experience both. he liked some other writers. they have spoken on my behalf. coaches that he liked spoke on my behalf. i covered his olympic game in 1984. i was around him quite a bit. interestingly, it is one of the great disappointments. the soviet boycott did those games. all he wanted to do is beat the soviets. the soviets had beaten the u.s.

in 1972 in munich. that famous game where they had three replays at the end of the game. this was a way to get revenge. he never got to play. after i cover that team, i developed relationships with him. i was writing a story on him the week that he threw the chair. it was a game against purdue. i wrote a piece about him in washington post or i said that is clearly wrong. among the crimes being committed today compared to the cheating, on a scale of 1-10 it is probably a three or a four. he called me and thanked me for

not just killing him and invited me to a dinner. i realized as being invited into the inner circle. i had never written a book. i always thought it could get inside a college basketball program with a great coach, there is a great book to be written. i proposed the idea of spending the season with them. it opens with that scene. the great duke coach was in room. as we walked out the door, the door shut. he looked at me. i will clean up what he said. "are you out of your mind? you're volunteering to spend a year with him? you have been around him a day. you do not know what it is like

to spend an entire winter with him. you are crazier than he is." i did it. he was right. you cannot know what it is like to you are there. i am glad i did it. >> in book, it seems like you're all over the place about how you really feel. i would give you an example. things that he would say in presence. he said this "you know, there are times when i am not sure that had always thought right about you people." you also report that he would introduce you as is "liberal jewish friend from the east." what did you say that you do not seem to be bothered. >> i was bothered by the hitler comment and discuss it with him that night. what i have learned about

knight, the sound of his life is uncomfortable laughter. he does not have a good sense of humor. he does not have a good sense of what is funny. he once brought a weapon to a press conference and pretended to be using them on one of his african-american players. to try to make a funny point about the fact that he was not a racist. i do not believe he is. he will make jokes to is african-american and jewish friends about african- americans, about jews. they are not funny. he thinks they are. most of the time, you just let this slide. you know it is then not understand the humor. when he made the hitler comment, it was in front of all of his coaches. i have been there long enough

that i knew if i confronted him in front of his coaches he had to win the confrontation. that is how he is. when we were in a car alone in we were driving to a speech, i said "i have a pretty good sense of humor about jokes about jews." my mom used to tell a joke about a jewish mother on a beach and her baby was washed away to sea. she looked up at the sky and said, "if you spare my child, i will be forever grateful." then there's the baby unharmed. to look at the sky and said, "he had a hat." that is funny. what he said was not funny. i pointed that out. there's nothing funny about hitler. there is a long silence. i thought was going to say get out. he said you know what i hate more than anything? when i say something stupid. that is the closest i ever heard him say "i am sorry." he knew he went over the line. he did grasp that. i was able to get by.

i had to have that conversation with him or would not have been able to sleep. >> he retired. did you ever see anything scandalous in his operation? >> if i had to bet my life on one coached in college athletics that i'm convinced never cheated it would be bob knight. he has many flaws. he was absolutely rigid about the rules. at one point during the year, he heard that there was a gas station owner in town that was giving his players free gas. he got in the car, drove to the gas station, i went with him. he is a big guy. he is intimidating. it was a little guy. he said if you ever give anything free to one of my

players again, i will run you out of town like that. then he went back to the players and he said "if i hear a few taking anything free from him or anyone else, no question your off the team. you will lose your scholarship." he was rigid. >> switch to miami. i want you to analyze how much should a government get involved? >> what happened at miami is there was a former booster who has photos of himself giving money to the president of miami who is involved in the federal government, high up in cabinet. giving money as a contributor to the president of the university. there were pictures of him in a basketball arena. it turned out that he was kicking back money under the table against the rules for years and years to many miami athletes, mostly football players. he is in jail now.

he was involved in ponzi scheme. he felt that as soon as he was not giving money to the school any more, the school went away. we're not your pal. he turned on them. he said this is what i did. he gave details to a reporter. now he is testifying. this is a case where it is funny because n.c.a.a. rules are so different than law, whether they be local or federal. in penn state case, even if jerry sandusky is guilty of sexually abusing his children, clearly it is a huge criminal case, there is no evidence at the moment that there were any n.c.a.a. rule violations. how do you figure that out so that if a crime is being

committed, there is a way to enforce a law as opposed to enforcing n.c.a.a. regulations? they play with important schools. it makes them a lot of money. they just slap them on the rest. >> you right "i really do not like the n.c.a.a. and what it stands for. it is fair to say indiana is not my biggest fan." >> the n.c.a.a. has administered the rules of college athletics. they also put on every championship in college athletics other than football. the championship series that determines the national champion in college football is administrated by the conferences. that is separate even though the schools involved are all n.c.a.a. schools. everything else is organized and paid for by the n.c.a.a. all the money for that comes from television that is paid to the n.c.a.a. by cbs and turner for the right to televise the men's basketball tournament. that is the biggest moneymaker for the n.c.a.a.

television runs the n.c.a.a. as much as a mark emor runs its. >> again, does the government have anything to say about this? >> i believe what should go on is someone, if it is the government it is fine with me, need to step in and say to mark

and the people who run the n.c.a.a. "let's be realistic. what goes on in college football and the roles that need to be implied is entirely different from college basketball." there 85 athletes on scholarship in football as opposed to 13 in basketball. arenas are as small as 2000 or 3000 top levels. every sport except for football and men's basketball. there should be a commissioner who runs the ball. there should be a set of rules for football. instead of a 400 page rulebook, there should be a 10 page rulebook that is enforced. same for men's basketball and the non-revenue sports. at their needs are entirely different. the way you run it is

completely different. that way you can have sensible rules. it often makes no sense. that is where you need to start. you need to break it up and stop pretending. the n.c.a.a. runs these psa's during the basketball season when they talk about their students. it is redundant. they are all students. beyond that, what they're trying to imply is that the football and men's basketball players, the elite among whom

graduate at a rate far below 50%, it frequently includes kids to walk on. they're not on scholarship. coaches are smart. they pay four kids that have high gpa some put them on their team. that increases the gpa. the graduation rate of the here are probably 100%. if you go to college as a swimmer or a wrestler, you know you're going to have to get a job when you graduate. many of those football and basketball players assume they will make a lot of money playing their sports. the rules that are needed are entirely different. if the federal government is stepping in and saying your way is not working and we are telling you to change, i am all

for its spirit of the other thing i am for is the bowl championship series is the most unfair entity there is in and the sport. the reason i say that is the university of houston finished its regular season this year undefeated. they did not lose a game. they have no chance to compete for this national championship because of the way it is structured. only two teams can play for the national championship. there is no tournament. you have to come from one of the six power conferences. even if you are undefeated, you're not getting in the championship game. there is no other sport in the game we cannot lose one and not play for the championship. i have advocated for years there should be tournament as

there is in every other college sports. my solution for it is for president obama to call the 66th presidents of the championship, invite them to the white house, give them a drink, and say "if there's not a playoff in two years, i am taking away your 5013c status." the charity they give their money to is themselves. we would have a tournament in two years. >> talk about the tax exempt corporations and the salaries. i made some statistics from the big 10. the left is the coach's salary. we are not even sure that is the salary. that is what we could find. on the right is the president of the school. look at the difference there and i was. look at the state school. eight of the 12 schools get the big grants. otherlook at some schools.

michigan state. the cut is $1.9 million. this is nebraska. the president of the school is $411,000. i know they put some of the money and foundations for the president. moneyre's also have the for the coaches. >> i think we have one more side to look at. that is $4 million. the president of a high state makes the most of any president, $1.6 million. what do you think of this tax all of these big 10 schools get

federal grant money, at $200 million to $300 million dollars a year. michigan gets the most, some are close to $1 billion. it is a lot of federal money. >> when i see those numbers i am reminded of a baby ruth. he was asked about the fact that he was making twice as much money as the president. he said i had a better year than he did. >> excuse my cough. >> the fact is athletes and entertainers and coaches of athletes have always made more money than its seems they should make. we know about tom cruise making

$2 million a movie or whatever. i am not defending those salaries. i will say this. the successful football coach makes more money for the school by far than the president could ever hope to make. when his team wins games and tournament and championships, they sell tickets. and they also booster money. it goes way up. admissions goes way up. at duke when ever they have a major fund-raiser, who is the speaker? mike sheff. he is the symbol. joe paterno was. these guys bring into the university to be successful. the cannot calculate it. >> let me go back to the newspaper here. this is a big story. this story point out that the person inside the university was responsible for students. what had to go along to the university two football players

that or not living up. paterno said he would discipline and not you. >> that is the way it is that virtually every school. this is that. it is an example of a simple truism, absolute power corrupts absolutely. these coaches are so important. if they do make some much money for the university. they basically do have absolute power. when he had four losing seasons in five years, the now dispose president went to his house. and joe paterno was 75. he said, it might be time for you thinking about retirement. who's the most powerful man? the president or the football coach? it is the football coach. that is a problem.

what i'm trying to do is explain why those numbers exist. there is a reason. there are obviously huge pit falls in having those numbers. when richard took over as president at duke, mike had not gotten along with his predecessor. i have been to agree with him on the dispute. that is another story. at that moment, he was offered the job of coaching the los angeles lakers. he had no intention of taking that job. he let it leaked out that he was considering it. he let it leak out because he wanted the others to know i am in charge here. i am the most important person here. when they held a press conference to announce he was not leaving, if you would have listened to the president speak

about him, you would have thought that mother teresa and gondi had nothing on him. that is what powerful coaches can do. >> what was your personal reaction when you heard about penn state? >> stunned and broken hearted. >> and let me at syracuse. >> that is a different level. there's not a grand jury report. we do not know that he had any knowledge at all. joe paterno did. we know he was told about it in 2002 at the latest. >> we are recording this in early december in case something happens. >> the two most important men at in college athletics in the past 50 years are joe paterno and dean smith. dean smith did far more than

win games. he helped desegregate restaurants in the 1950's. he was a truly great man. i felt pretty much the same way about the turnout. when i heard this comment i was stunned. it is most heartbreaking for the boys involved and their families. the like that penn state will never be the same. there was always a feeling that we have the coaches that can win games the right way. we graduate our players. we do the right thing. not that part has changed. that feeling is gone though. there will never be an old normal at penn state. there will only be a new normal some day. >> how much of this is caused by the money and lack of leadership on the part of the president? should be football players be treated in the same ways? >> yes.

they are acting as students. if they are late for practice, that is up to the coach to discipline. if he feels they are not doing what they're supposed to do. if they do something as students or as citizens as an break the law and get arrested, they should absolutely be treated the same way. >> how should the government involved? >> that is hard. i do not know if government can come in and say to a university "you must do this." i do not know if there is a lot. >> i'm going back to the 5 01k3. if they go too far everyone makes the threat taking away the tax exemption.

>> i do not know what the justification for the 501k3 is. the money to charity that the schools are pumping money into is themselves. much of that money goes to build bigger locker rooms. it is charter airplanes. duke's recruiting budget and basketball is about $900,000 a year to recruit may be three players. on a basketball team you'll have 12 or 13 guys. many schools have huge recruiting budgets. >> i want to go back to 1999. another clip of you. it is interesting how often you appear on c-span. you gave a speech in stamford about "season on the brink." >> when the book came out, it did much better than any of us dreamed. the one person not too happy was bob knight. i was in the unique position of having entered a subject by

reporting what he said to accurately. i left in the words that rhyme with luck and duck. he was not pleased. he called me a pimp. he called me a whore. i was banned from press credentials. i was interviewed and he said he called you a pimp. he is called you a whore. how do you respond? i said i wish he would make up his mind so i know how to dress in the morning. [laughter] >> what is your relationship today? >> civil. it has ebbed and flowed since 1986. for eight years we did not speak at all.

he called me a pimp and a whore. in 1994, i was covering a basketball tournament in hawaii. we encountered bob night and a friend of his. he turned and started talking as nothing had ever happened. he said, why would even speak to him after all the names to call to? i said because he built my house. well, he did. in 2003, i talked to him about it for two hours. he's a great interviewer when he wants to be. when we see each other we say hello. it is almost cordial. in this book i decided at the very beginning that the last thing at the end of the book would be me going back to him 25 years later. it has been 25 years. do you want to talk or not?

that is essentially what i did. i went to madison square garden. he would not speak to me. that did not surprise me. that is who he is. if he feels you want something, he has control. that is how he likes it. i said he would not talk to me. it has been 25 years. i said that is who he is. he did not talk to me. i ended up not finishing the book with bob knight. of all the people i have dealt with is a group of athletes that affected maybe most, the ones from the civil war. it was 15 years ago. there was a horrific incident involving one of the young men that i had written about. his wife committed suicide. i was amazed knowing the kid.

the day of his wife's death, i got a call from one of his friends to tell me. he said there are 10 army football players in his living room right now. when they heard the news that day, they all literally dropped what they were doing and got on a plane and flew to dallas to be there. he was still their teammates 16 years later. i spoke to him on the phone. it was the day after his wife's death. we spoke for a long time about how he was trying to deal with it. it was awful obviously. the next have got an e-mail from him. every football team has a sign over the door of their locker room something that is using meant to be inspirational. the most inspirational is notre dame. above the locker is the sign for inspiration. the one over the army locker room was "i lay me down now to bleed for you awhile and then i will rise to fight with you

again." i always thought that was brilliant for a team of his that will be in the military some day. he sent me any money they to me for calling him and being his friend. at the end of the e-mail, he wrote that. i remember crying. the real courage involved in dealing with this tragedy was his response, "i am going to get up and fight for my children." sostruck me that i've been extraordinarily lucky not only to know bob knight and others but to know derek and people like him who may not be rich and famous but you had stories to tell. >> how much of all this was

because of your heart bypass operation that i do not know that i ever met anyone that has had seven. >> i think i have the record. i think there are four arteries begin have more than one blockage in an artery. that is what the doctor told me. to say it was stunning to hear that i needed bypass surgery, i went in for a routine stress test. both my parents have hard issues. my doctor said you ought to get a stress test once a year. i was a swimmer. i still swim competitively. i went in for the stress tests. i did well on the treadmill. the doctor said you are buying. there is one little black spot. instead of having an angiogram, let's be safe. the doctor walked in and said you have seven blockages. you need bypass surgery. that was on friday. i had surgery on monday morning. i went home on thursday. this was 2009. i do not think what i do have

anything to do with it. i think the fact that i a far too much red meat and the doctors tell me was hereditary because of my parents. my cholesterol level on the day i had surgery was 160. it was as much hereditary as anything. i am still overweight. i still swim. i have done well on my stress tests. i have a one-year old daughter. >> you are divorced you have remarried. >> yes. >> your dad? >> here is the first director of the kennedy center. his my name was mark. he is the director of the washington opera and symphony orchestra. he was a remarkable person.

he grew up in brooklyn. his father ran a cafeteria for the longshoremen that live near the cafeteria. he loved the arts. he loved the music. he would ride the subway. he went to the army. he came out after world war ii.

>> what about your mom? >> she also grew up in new york. she got her ph.d. in music history from columbia while she was raising her three children. she had worked with my father. she stopped working when i was born. i was the oldest. then she went back to college at columbia to get her ph.d.. she taught at columbia until her death. >> your brother named you during you junior? >> no. i was very young at "the washington post." i wrote a long story on john mcenroe. we became very friendly afterwards. i wrote this long story. a lot of people were saying how to get him to talk to you? it is not hard to get in to talk to you. he will talk to someone in the middle of the street if he has something to say, which is almost always. he said of course you will. you're the same person. he was left handed, from new york, he has a temper, and is a tennis player. i was three out of four of those things. because i was the youngest guy on the staff, they nicknamed me.

his friends call me junior. that was 30 years ago. i still have strangers call me that. >> you do not like it? >> i like it. it is an oxymoron at this time. i do not think strangers should be that familiar with you. some people recognize me. i've been on television. i have written 28 books. you get a lot of perks. if you're going to accept the perks, you have to deal with the responsibilities. if that is one of them, that is not the worst thing in the world. >> talk about the difference between sports journalism and regular political journalism? you are in the middle of these families. you give awards out to some of these people. you dropped off bobby knight's kids from school. too close? >> it is a fine line. if you go back to political

reporting, the book on kennedy -- when i cover politics, i went out at night and drink with politicians. that was part of political reporting. it still is to this day. everything has changed in all forms of journalism. there is a line. it is an invisible line. the line moves. i think the time i was most comfortable was that line. i wrote about that in book. jim ho was a great basketball coach. he won the chairmanship in 1983. jim was as bright as anyone i've met. that is what he had aspired to do his entire life. he felt like he had done what he came to do.

he began looking around for the next thing. he stopped paying attention to what was going on. he would say to me, what am i going to do when i grow up? i cannot just do this. i am not like mike. i need something else. when he was forced to resign, i wrote about some of these things. he did stop paying attention. when he made excuses for what had gone wrong, he sounded mixed. jim was furious with me. he said how can i of all people say these things about me? i said if i just finally defended you, then when i defend u.n. you deserve it, it would not have any legitimacy. he looked at me and said but you, it would have meant something to me if you had defended it because we are

friends. i was right to write what i wrote. he was right, too. i was his friend. it hurt when i wrote what i wrote. >> no. there's a story about ben bradlee in the washington redskins. put it into context. this is often full of politicians. it used to be. what about that? >> when i was a young reporter, williams was the president of the redskins.

he was also a lawyer and a close friend of a ben bradlee. one of the things i learned was that there was no beat more important at the post including the redskins. i am including the white house. the most important beat was the washington redskins. he came in. he yelled at george and said who did we get? because i was a wise guy, i said i did not realize the post had a tiffany in the draft. he whirled on me and said "if you do not like the redskins game get out of town right now." he meant it. i knew he meant it. i went back to working on my story.

there was no question that the post never referred to the redskins at "we" but they knew it was better for everyone in town when they won. the news around the newsroom and the city was completely different when they won. it is still true to this today. >> here is more of you. you're talking about washington's phenomenon. i want to connect that with all the money that is spent on football. >> it is a decision that they had no choice. they do not have the money. there are creative ways to get

around something like best. the number is deceiving. if you add up all the dollars it takes, it is about $3.5 million a year. you need to endow them. you need to raise $25 million a year. i think they should go to their rich alumns. dan snyder, give us 10 or $15 million. these are all people with huge dollars. you have to think out of the box.

you have to try to do something. california did that with their baseball program. they made the world series last year. >> that is only a couple of weeks ago. >> the university of maryland like many schools is in a financial crunch. a lot of them had many failures in football. football is a big-ticket item. if the kids want to continue to compete, they will have to transfer to another college. if they stay, they still have their scholarships but they cannot compete in sports. what i was talking about was that in ideal world, those big money people i am talking about, and dan snyder and larry davis, would give money for a new library or give money for the more important cause than sports team. in the real world, and they do not. >> are those bodyguards? >> they were.

>> why does an owner of a football team need bodyguards? >> he does not. it is an ego thing. one of the new things for sports people in the last 15 years is the body guards. it is a status symbol to have bodyguards. michael jordan was the first one. maybe michael jordan needed one. tiger woods everywhere he goes has body guards or police around him. snyder's daughter attends the same school as mine. they get upset when he attends school functions and brings his bodyguards. all these kids are looking at these big guys. >> he's one the most disliked people in washington. >> he may be the most disliked person. the redskins are so important and he has failed so spectacularly. >> fein-steen versus fein-stine. >> the way my parents explained it, my father's family is from the ukraine. if you're from that background, it is said "steen." a germanic background says

"stine." >> it has been a pleasure. thank you for joining us. >> thank you for having me. >> for a dvd, call-877-622-7726. for free transcripts are to give you comments, visit www.q- and-a.org. programs are also available at c-span podcasts. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2011] cable satellite corp. 2011]