that is followed by prime minister's questions. , the debate on barring donald trump. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2016] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] announcer: this week, carlos lozada talks about the books written by the 2016 presidential candidates. brian: carlos lozada of "the washington post. a while back, you went through a whole bunch of books written by presidential candidates. why? carlos: it started with donald trump. when he launched his campaign this summer, he kept talking

about his 1987 book "the art of the deal. he kept saying we needed a president who could write a book like this. it sort of embodied who he was. so i figured i would read it. i never read "art of the deal. i thought i might write something about it for "the post." i learned he had written many books. three memoirs, business advice books, even a golf book. so i decided to pick a few of them. brian: why did he interest you, other than the obvious? carlos: a lot of politicians memoirs tend to be sort of formulaic. they are prescreened and scrubbed. they project sort of this bland wholesomeness and all americanness. trump wrote his before he intended to run for president ever. the first was when he was 41 years old. i thought they might tell me something about him.

i thought he would be more interesting than reading all the other sort of long-term politicians, which is the same reason i ended up reading ben carson's books too. brian: what is the number one reason candidates write these books in your opinion? carlos: there is probably a lot of reasons. i think they are part of their campaign propaganda in some ways. i just read a book by a buzzfeed clinical reporter about the gop race for 2016. he says up front that he consulted the candidates' memoirs but he treats them as the campaign propaganda that they are. so i think they write them because they want to put out a statement of their general beliefs. they want to appeal to particular audiences. i don't think they sell very well for the most part. publishers go with them because it is a sweepstakes. maybe this guy will end up being

president, in which case the book will sell big. brian: i have here hillary clinton's book "hard choices" in 2014. it was actually published a year after she left the state department. you write a lot about the acknowledgments and the introduction and things. what have you learned from that? she wasn't a candidate here. do you think she was thinking about being a candidate when this book came out? carlos: i suspect hillary clinton has been thinking about being a candidate for a long, long time. what i find interesting about hillary clinton's memoirs is that she wrote one after the white house, right after her years as first lady. then she wrote this one after her period as secretary of state. what we don't have of hers, that i would love to read, is a memoir that really includes her 2008 campaign, the failed campaign.

i think that would be the most -- the story that we haven't heard from her yet. brian: she starts out- i want to get your reaction. this is how she starts acknowledgements, the motto of the clinton foundation is "we are all in this together"." carlos: i haven't read this book yet. reacting to it right now, it sounds fairly typical politician speak, the sense of the american family, "we are all in this together," connecting to readers. but it strikes me as a bit bland. brian: she was paid $14 million for this book. she has done several with simon & schuster. her previous book, she was paid $8 million. and her husband's last book was $10 million. i think it adds up to $32 million.

when did this happen? when did this come to the authors over the years? carlos: president obama, the memoir that he will be writing, the estimate is $15 million to $20 million as an advance for the book. so it better sell. i think that it's a fairly recent phenomenon. presidential memoirs, probably the ones that are considered the best memoir, is that of president grant. and he wrote it because he was broke. he needed the money. it ended up being a terrific book. i think it is only in the last few decades, couple of decades, that the advances for public -- for politicians books, political memoirs, have gotten out of control. brian: and she didn't come close to earning the money back on this, she ended up selling selling 250,000 copies.

carlos: this book, from what i understand, has not sold enormously well. brian: i want to show you a video about a guy named bob barnett. here is what he looks like. [video clip] bob barnett: a lot of people from political life come to me. i just don't think there is a book there. i don't think i can get the book published. and if i do, it will be for a very small amount. it won't sell anything and they will be angry at me. you know, i didn't have anything to do with it. people come to me after their career is over, people who would have in a fun book, but they wait 10 years too long. and by that time they come for me, they are out of the public eye and it is a bit of a hard sell and i don't like to disappoint.

brian: he acts as an agent and has has 375 journalists and political people that he has represented. he doesn't take commission. he gets paid by the hour. what does he do? carlos: i've never met bob barnett. i have only read about him. he appears in virtually every acknowledgment section of every book by any notable politician. it is comforting to hear that he turns some of them down. because it doesn't seem that way. it's not a surprise at all that hillary clinton thanks him. in marco rubio's acknowledgements in section in "american dreams," the first person he thanks is my lord and savior, jesus christ. the second person he mentions is, my lawyer bob barnett. i think that we are seeing some

books coming out way too early before people have a chance to really be reflective about their experience. and when it feels like there is a little bit of maybe too much score settling going on. that sort of thing sells books to what it doesn't make for terrific reading. sometimes i think a little bit more time would help, even if it doesn't help sales. brian: what stood out in the marco rubio book? carlos: he wrote a more personal memoir called "american son," i believe. and then his latest book is called "american dreams." it is a straightforward book about policy and personal experience in which he uses a lot of case studies in florida where he is from. he is a senator from florida. he talks about his various policy issues.

he talks about education or tax policy -- in the acknowledgments of the book, he thanks barnett. he thanks one of his major donors but doesn't identify him as such. he just thanks him for his help and advice throughout the years. brian: you say he is an 83-year-old man now. i think his name is bremen. how much of that goes on in the books that you have read? carlos: in the substance of the book themselves, not at all. people aren't thrilled to mention their funders and their donors. but they thank them sort of in subtle ways, in acknowledgments and forwards and that sort of thing. brian: one of the people that hillary clinton thanks is a woman named named linda muscatine and her husband. she interviewed her in a forum.

[video clip] linda muscatine: you seem like you're having a good time? hillary clinton: yes. i think i am having a good time. i think that is in part due to the enthusiasm that i have experienced as i traveled around in these last couple of days. it is a great feeling to have written a book about four years that were consequential in my view -- and we can talk about that more but which for me were both a personal journey with heavy responsibility. and what i try to do in the book was write it so that i could

give you, the readers, a bit of a peak, and the curtain. because the headlines surely tell some of the story, but not all of the story. brian: who writes these books and how often is it somebody like linda muscatine who is involved in it? she didn't say she wrote it. but she has written speeches for her. carlos: i think on many occasions, the politicians write them themselves. i think often they state this clearly in their forwards or acknowledgments. they have a lot of help. they have ghostwriters or people who serve as readers of various chapters. on occasion, they will put the name of the co-author or ghostwriter right on the cover. i find that sort of honest and refreshing. but usually, you don't care so much about that other individual. and i find it a little unusual to have the person interviewing you. i'm a huge fan of politics and prose, but that was sort of a

softball question. "are you having fun?" brian: the interesting thing i've found is there is one name that is missing, both from the index and from the book and from the acknowledgements -- sidney blumenthal. what are the chances that sidney blumenthal would not be mentioned in this book? carlos: he played a more significant role during her white house years. i seem to recall there was a conversation about him maybe having a role in the state department. but i don't recall that. brian: he has been deeply involved with the e-mails back and forth when she was secretary of state. carlos: on consequential matters, sometimes deeply inane matters. i would subscribe to the rule of thumb on political memoirs.

these should not be interpreted as a true record of what took place. brian: you have written several articles on donald trump. you talk about -- he doesn't seem to be a huge fan of the giffer. you say after he lost the election to ronald reagan, talking about jimmy carter, this is donald trump. carlos: yes. the donald turned him down. but he said that it impressed him that carter had guts to ask them for something big.

he hadn't been impressed with carter as a president. but asking in and asking the donald for five million made him seem like a gutsy guy. brian: later he said ronald reagan as another example -- carlos: i believe this is in one of his earliest books where he -- brian: "the art of the deal." carlos: his first book then, when he is critical of president reagan. which leads me to believe he probably wasn't planning a huge career in the republican politics of the time. later on in subsequent books, he speaks glowingly of ronald reagan. brian: and you say he spoke glowingly of hillary rodham clinton. and there is a picture of the two of them in the book. carlos: as we all know from one of the republican debates, hillary clinton attended donald

trump's wedding. he holds deep grudges. they can be famous people, journalists who have wronged him, bankers he felt gave him a raw deal, and he will call the out to viciously in these books. but he is also a man who cultivates relationships long-term care and including, it seems, with the clintons. one of the best moments in the republican debate is when they asked him, you know, why do you give money to democrats?

why do you give money to some of these politicians? what did you get from hillary clinton? and what he said was, " she came to my wedding." it's these personal touch things that matter to people. and i think that's why he kept up the relationship with the clintons. brian: you write something called "book party." carlos: it's the name of the blog the washington post has given me on the site to write reviews and to write things about books i find interesting. brian: how often do you write? carlos: there is a review that runs every week in the print "washington post" on sunday in the outlook section. i read a book and write a review on it at least every weekend a few times during the close -- the course of the wek, i am writing online. i don't think i wrote anything while i was working on trial.

brian: i saw a tweet on twitter from you saying that it is a strange year to become an american citizen. [laughter] carlos: yes. brian: is 2015 -- carlos: i became an american citizen in 2014. it was my first year as an american citizen. i'm sort of thinking about that a little bit because i have just been reading -- for the first time, it is embarrassing, a book i should have read a long time ago -- "democracy in america" those quote as sort of an introduction to advanced physics, i hope, for the united states. when i look back on 2015, which is my first year as a u.s. citizen -- i lived here for decades. my kids are american. my wife is from ohio. you can't get more american than that, maybe indiana. and so i didn't think a lot would change about the way i felt. but you know, once you take the oath, you feel like you are all

in. and everything that is going on sort of you feel invested in any field is possible for. seeing everything that has happened in american politics this year, the rise of donald trump, hillary clinton and the e-mail obsessions, that sort of extraordinary republican race, has made it interesting. i haven't decided who i am going to vote for. i paid attention more than i have, even after all these working at. a book with the washington post" to be an american is a glorious burden. brian: when did you come to the united states? what has been your career path? carlos: i first came when i was three years old.

my family -- we moved to northern california where we had some relatives. brian: from where? carlos: from peru, from lima. my family is from peru. i lived in california for seven years. then we went back to peru when i was 10 years old. i stayed there until i finished high school. then i returned to the u.s. and went to the university of notre dame for college. and i pretty much stayed here since. i did a graduate program at the woodrow wilson school at princeton university. the maybe soon to be name changed school at princeton. i worked at the federal reserve for a couple of years because i thought i wanted to be an economist. but i found it sort of dull. i'm sure my colleagues from there are going to see this now and complain to me.

they were terrific. but it was the late 1990's. at the time, without the economy was great. without the fed was doing anything perfectly. only later did we learn everything would go wrong. i moved to washington and started working. at a magazine here, "foreign policy magazine" i was there for five years. i learned a lot from smart journalists. i took a fellowship year at columbia university at the journalism school there. business journalism fellowship. and then i went to "the post." and i've been there for 10 years. at the post, i have had a chance to do a lot of different things. i was reaganomics editor first. i was a national security editor. and for five years, i was the editor for our sunday outlook section, which is the greatest job in journalism. you get to sort of dial-up any when you want and debate about anything. i did that for five years. and then i figured i should try something new.

and i saw that our old, long time book critic was going to retire. i thought maybe that was something to try and try to do it in little differently. and really, the experience i had at "the post", getting a chance to edit some a different lines of coverage is sort of the perfect training to then be a nonfiction book critic because we cover politics and history and economics and culture where large. so this is my first year doing that. brian: going back to some of your reviews, here is a video clip of ben carson talking about his book. [video clip] ben carson: when i give a speech, you know, i don't have a written text. i just go up there and i survey the situation. i ascertain what kind of audience we have. and, you know, i will have a few points that i will make sure i make, which i have written on a card.

and then i just start speaking. i write the same way. i have a chapter title and i will write down some bullet points about what i want to say and i order them. i just start dictating. so it's very much what's on my heart. i always pray and i ask god to guide me in my writing, to give me wisdom in terms of what points need to be brought out. and i think he does a pretty good job of that. brian: are you siding with marco rubio in the reference to god. what did you find in his book? carlos: it fits perfectly with the way his books read. he talked about when he goes to speak for an audience, he doesn't really prepare a lot. he just kind of goes. it's confidence. politicians are usually so scripted.

ben carson is not. he has enormous self-confidence in his intellectual abilities. and what comes across in the book as well is he has enormous faith that god will help him whenever he needs it. it could be helping him during surgery. he attributes a lot of his success as a neurosurgeon to his faith and to god very specific interventions in those moments of carrying out cup located -- complicated operations. even in one case, he mentions in gifted hands, his first book, when he was a student at yale, he hadn't really studied hard in his chemistry exam. he was afraid he was going to fail the final.

the night before the final, in a dream, god sent him the questions and answers. so he has this deep abiding faith instilled in him by his mother that god will step in and help him, not just in a general sense in his life, but in very specific moments. : you write "he repeatedly plagiarizes in college -- does anybody ever follow up with the candidate and asked them questions about these books and what they say? carlos: that happened in a very intense way recently with ben carson. he is sort of fading a little bit in the polls now.

but when it looked like he was getting close up there with donald trump, there was a lot of attention paid to very specific incidents in his books. and he couldn't really substantiate. for example, he talks about how, when he was young, he had this very intense temper. at one point, he even tried to stab a friend of his. people have gone back and tried to find who that was, when that happened. no one has any memory of it. he said, well, it was a relative. i don't want to embarrass this person now. or he says that he had the opportunity to go to west point on a scholarship that he turned down. we learned later that he never really applied and west point doesn't hand out specific scholarships. everyone goes tuition free. the thing is getting accepted into west point. what i came away with from ben carson's books is i am most

-- almost think we should treat them -- i mean, you can't do this with normal politicians books because you sort of expect those to be carefully vetted and fact-based and at least checkable in some way. ben carson's books feel more like parables. they feel like these nice, inspirational stories about a guy who came from very difficult circumstances to achieve extraordinary success in his profession. and they were a big hit. they were published, the early ones, by christian publishing houses. it was that kind of intent. it wasn't like this was carefully vetted material. the way he talked about in the clip he showed, he writes what is on the heart. the heart is not always fact-based. brian: have you ever listened to his audiobook? carlos: no. the only time i do is when we

are road tripping and we are going to see family in ohio. i pop a cd in the car and listen. but often with the children -- i have three young kids -- that might be the polar express or some thing like that. brian: i asked that for a reason. i'm going to show you some video of 2006 of senator dick durbin on the floor the senate talking about grammy awards primarily for audiobooks. [video clip] dick durbin: in the history of the united states of america, only two united states senators have won a grammy award. the first was united states senator everett mckinley dirksen from lincoln, illinois, for his album "gallon myth." and now again, another senator from illinois has become the second senator in history for a

grammy award for his written -- spoken word. senator obama won his grammy for his recording of his book "games -- dreams for my father." i understand hillary clinton won a grammy award when she was first lady. now she is a distinguished senator from new york. and she won for "it takes a village." brian: recently, jimmy carter was nominated for a grammy. one of the things that came to mind, they are all democrats. none of the republicans come of the ronald reagan books, the george w. bush, and of those got nominated. do you see this as being conscious on part of the grammy nominees? carlos: i have no idea.

the thing about the reagan memoir authored by him, there was a question about how much he actually wrote. i think even joked at one point, "i hear it is a great book." i haven't had occasion to listen to audiobooks. it seems like a small sample size though if only three of them have won. sometimes you get outsiders to read books. but obviously, with such a notable figure, it is impossible to imagine anyone else. i think president obama has a certain sort of rhythm and cadence to his speeches that personally i think could be more appealing for an audiobook than perhaps senator clinton. brian: he read it himself. carlos: yes. i haven't listened to them. brian: the presidential campaign

right now, from your perspective, take all the candidates into account, in the case of president obama, they always go back to the books. that is what started it all. will they do that in this campaign? carlos: i don't think so. they were politicians before right?re authors president obama, i mean, his first book, i think, terrific. his second book -- maybe he had political aspirations. in fact, he certainly did, but he wrote that before he was, you know, barack obama. the audacity of hope" is not a great book. it is a formal, conventional political book. i think that is typical of what it politician writes. i don't think that any of the

current crop -- at least from what i have read -- really have books that they have written so far that will stand out in some sort of lasting historical manner. brian: ted cruz published a book. did you write about that one? carlos: i think that was part of -- when i looked at the acknowledgment sections of all the candidate's books. >> the book, what i try to do is shine a light on what is happening in washington, the washington cartel, what is happening behind closed doors. if you ever wonder what happens in the republican senate lunches, what they're doing, this book tries to shine a light on it on how the washington cartel, career politicians, republicans and democrats, get in bed with washington

lobbyists, giant corporations, and conspired to grow government to favor cronyism and corporate welfare at the expense of hard-working taxpayers. brian: ben carson was on the bestseller list for a long time. i don't think ted cruz was for rare long. but conservatives are much more successful today. what is it -- what is selling these conservative books now? carlos: with ted cruz, "the new york times" did not put him on the bestseller list initially. there was a huge spat about this were people felt, including the ted cruz supporters, that they were blackballing him from the list. they didn't want to have him there, even though they put a lot -- bill o'reilly's books are constantly on those lists. [no audio] [no audio] [no audio]

no, i don't -- right now, what is going on in the conservative movement, the republican party, is just more interesting. there is a real fight about with the party is going to be, about who the standardbearer is. watching the campaign this year, it is far more interesting to look at the republicans than the democratic side. that may have something to do with why there is more interest in these candidates and their books. brian: what's your reaction to the reaction of the republicans to basically reagan republicans -- to killing the reagan book. it was recently written in the new york times a retort for that book. --there?ing on their?

it is selling books for bill o'reilly. this is only helping the bill o'reilly publishing industrial complex. killing reagan is a part of a series of killing historical fiction books. and a lot of people who were in the reagan administration or reagan biographers have said, have contested the central contention of the book that reagan -- that o'reilly said, after the assassination attempt, reagan was never the same and started deteriorating rapidly. that has been questioned by people who were there. o'reilly doesn't back down. o'reilly says he didn't consult those people for the buck -- book because they have too much skin in the game. they have vested interests in preserving the mythologies of ronald reagan. i think this doesn't stop a book from selling. i think it only helps it. brian: god, guns, grits, and gravy.

carlos: mike huckabee. brian: here is mike huckabee talking about his book. mike huckabee: there are three major cultural bubbles in america. new york, washington, and the other is hollywood. and from those three cultural bubbles emanate fashion, finance, government, politics, music, entertainment, movies, television -- pretty much all the things that set the american cultural table. but the point of my book is that there is a big disconnect between the people, the values, the attitudes, the lifestyles of people living in those three bubbles and the people who live out and what we often call the flyover country. brian: how did he do? carlos: the book? it's sort of, you know -- what does he say? it drips over you like sawmill gravy on biscuits. huckabee as cultural warrior is the theme of a lot of his books. god, guts, grits and gravy, as

critical as he is of new york, washington, l.a. cultural bubbles, as he calls them, he has been very skilled at, you know, making his presence felt in all of them. on cable television, through his books, and in some ways his campaigns feel in part like efforts to solidify that brand. he is the folksy cultural warrior. from the title of his book two comments such as these. brian: lindsey graham ran for president, runs for president -- carlos: still. brian: he did something unusual. he wrote an e-book only and gave it away. did you read it? carlos: i did not. i did not read lindsey graham's e-book. i feel bad. i probably should have. part of what made it hard was he didn't really even seem to want

to write it. he says right up front this is something you kind of have to do when you are applying for this job. not everyone needs to write a book, but i guess i have to. if he's not selling it himself, it's hard to pick it up. brian: he actually said everyone has a story. not everyone has to tell it of course. carlos: i'm not his publicist, but that is not the most engaging way to begin your book. brian: based on your experience of reviewing all of these books, and i know this isn't the business you are in, but what would you advise somebody that is a politician that is going to write a book?

to do to get people's interest a lot of these books didn't sell at all. carlos: i mean, you know, i poke a little bit of fun at senator graham, but he does have a very good point. not everyone needs to write a book. and what may be politically expedient may not make for the most interesting read. so if you're hell-bent on writing a book, what i would really encourage is to be honest, to tell real stories about your life. so many of them, everyone i think does have interesting stories in their lives. and politicians, you know, who are single-minded in this pursuit of power and ideology, could have particularly interesting ones. but when they put out these memoirs, you know, they are sanitized. they are vetted, you know.

they are there for sort of minimum controversy. you know, when ted cruz described what is in his book, it is in every speech he gives. the washington cartel and the politicians in bed with the lobbyists -- people have heard that it thousand times. a real story about ted cruz? that could be interesting, like what his life is really like. that would be good. but they rarely produce those kinds of books. brian: youre the end of 2015, you wrote funniest, scariest, and whiniest books. how do you sift through all the stuff? do you like to read? carlos: i love to read. i have always enjoyed reading, since i was a little kid.

i was just very kind of book wormy boy. we get deluged with books at "the washington post." everyone is trying to get us to review their books. authors reach out with publicists. it is this investment -- i get to read anything i want. sometimes, i may take a book because i already know something about the subject and he could -- i could bring some insight for readers. more often than not, it is something i am curious about, something that sounds like a good story. brian: let me ask you a couple of these.

"most instant classic book i read this year." carlos: barton swaim was speechwriter -- first of all, there are so many speechwriter memoirs. life is too short to read a bunch of memoirs about speechwriters. the reason why i picked his was because he was speechwriter to governor mark sander in south carolina who most of the world came to know when he gave this extraordinary rambling speech confessing that he had not been hiking the appalachian trail but was in argentina with his girlfriend. and of course, he was a married man. so i thought, oh, that is interesting. it would be interesting to know what it was like to write speeches for mark sanford. and barton swaim writes what i think is a terrific book telling you what it is like to be in charge of communication for a politician who is not really a gifted writer or speaker.

he has to learn to write poorly, train himself to use the cliches the governor heard -- the governor loved. the governor was always wanting to mention rosa parks in his speeches. he just liked the idea of mentioning rosa parks. so you see barton swaim trying to work in rosa parks in these completely contrived ways into speeches. also, he really opens up about what the governor was like communicating internally to his staff. and he can be really brutal. it was a book that i think is -- people romanticize the role of the speechwriter. you know, you are whispering into the ears of the powerful, giving them words, like hannity or reagan. this is such -- like kennedy or reagan. this is such a painful experience for this guy and his successes that he rolls and are

exciting but also just -- that he revels in our exciting but also just bad. everyone will remember his confession. he was just in the crowd watching. he didn't get to write it. brian: the marco rubio book, you're right that people often mention connections they have to people that they admire. but here is a man that you say -- marco rubio admires a man who is an intellectual conservative. [video clip] >> the american context has always been a different context. in speaking about the americans around the time of the revolution, one of his great speeches in parliament opposing the policy of the government offers a kind of character description. it is a wonderful thing to read. it used to be read in american schools.

what he said first is that americans are obsessed with personal liberty. they constantly see them coming. in this way, they are different from the british cousins. his argument against the british government, this is something you had to understand about them. you have to understand their character. and their character is an obsession with personal liberty and the translate that into tax policy. brian: how often do you see that where they connect to some you like this in their books? carlos: it doesn't happen a lot. one of the things i really appreciated about marco rubio's book is that he is really transparent about his sort of intellectual and lyrical -- political influences. he has a list of, like, 40 plus people in the back of his book that inspired him on matters of -- and advised him on matters of policy.

this is one of the leaders of what they are calling the reformed conservative movement or the reformicon, which is a great term. should rubio win the nomination and potentially win the white house, i suspect he will be a significant player in whether directly in the administration or as an advisor to him. he was referring to a book that he published a year or two ago, i believe, looking at edinburg and thomas paine as these two competing strands in american political thought. i find that -- whether you subscribe to his politics and policy, i find it -- i find that really refreshing, that a politician will try to engage on

an intellectual level, but also be transparent about what those influences are. brian: you pointed out, when he talks about the 45 individuals, 44 of them are men and one is a woman. carlos: i did mention that. it is very much a boy's club. a policy specialist was the one woman. brian: president of the national alliance for public schools. carlos: congratulations, nina, you made the cut. brian: there is one woman who wrote a book decides hillary clinton. here is carly fiorina on her book. [video clip] >> carly, in your new book, "rising to the challenge," an excellent book, you make it his -- a distinction between people with political experience and expertise and people who have

business experience and expertise. carly fiorina: i think to do the job requires an understanding of how the economy actually works. i started out as a secretary. so i do understand the economy from multiple angles. i think it requires an understanding of how the world works. the truth is i have more experience with more world leaders on the stage today than anyone else running. with maybe the possible exception of hillary clinton. i did not do photo ops. brian: did you read her book? carlos: i read portions of her latest book, yeah. brian: any reaction? small book, right? carlos: both books are sort of thin volumes. you know, she does emphasize the outsider experience which is this recurring mantra in american politics. once in a while, you want to the outsider, you want someone who can run america like a corporation. her tenure at hewlett-packard

was controversial. so it is not the easiest for her probably. in the race she had kind of this moment after the first debate when it seemed like she was going to be a bigger player and elevated. so i don't think -- that has a really materialized. i don't know that her play for the outsider role, at a time when you have trump and carson, has really been effective. her first book was really more about her time as an executive. her next book is more personal, with a searing description of what she lost her daughter. brian: do all of the candidates put their picture on their cover? carlos: i'm trying to think if there was anyone who does not -- yeah, i think they do. i think they all do. brian: when the hillary clinton

paperback came out, they switched the picture, but it's very subtle -- from a straight on shot on the hardback to a side glance on the other of hillary clinton. carlos: maybe they got a better side. brian: if you had to name a book about politics, i mean by one of the candidates, that you would find the most refreshing or the most interesting, which one would that have been? carlos: of the current group? brian: yes. carlos: i guess there is refreshing for different reasons. is something refreshing to read or refreshing because of the departure? jeb bush wrote a book about immigration policy. it is a slod. but he actually tried to lay out a vision on the contentious policy issue, which is something

that they don't do a lot. so it was refreshing and that -- in that particular sense. donald trump, he wrote three memoirs, "art of the deal," "surviving at the top," the art of the comeback. his second book is where he was more reflective. things are going wonderfully in -- things were not going wonderfully in his business at the time or his personal life here it is the only book we see trump sort of struggling a little bit and admitting it. so for trump, i would call that refreshing. he realized that maybe he showed more than he intended to in the second book.

brian: here is donald trump on "the stop." here he is talking about his first one back in 1998. donald trump: our country needs a truly great leader. and we need a truly great leader now. we need a leader that wrote "the art of the deal." carlos: that is what inspired me to start this exercise, reading the candidates' books, that he would so overly stake his credentials to the presidency on this book. when people see that i read eight donald trump books in a row, they make jokes. oh, condolences, better you than me. whatever you think of donald trump, they are far more

entertaining than the vast majority of political memoirs. there is self-indulgence, they are bombastic. but they are not boring to read. brian: back in june 2015, you took from one of the books. i want to read it and see what you think about the technique he has used all year. one thing i have learned about the press is they are always hungry for a good story.

carlos: trump has been famous longer than any business leader we can think of alive now. longer than bill clinton. he was publishing a best-selling memoir in 1987. and part of that is his ability to regenerate media interest. you know, he is always dallying with this idea of maybe i will run for president multiple times. now that he has finally done it, now that he completely jumped into the race, you know, the coverage has been extraordinary. i think he understands that. something else he writes is that even bad press is good press for him. it means they are talking about you. brian: you see the final -- he

says the final key that i bravado. what i do want to ask you though is why has the television medium allowed -- this is the first time i can remember in history -- allowed him to call it in. he doesn't go to the studios. he just calls it in and all the networks taken. carlos: i would imagine because, having donald trump on your show, is irresistible right now. brian: it's not good journalism though, if you don't have to look at him in the eye. carlos: i think you have better interviews when you can look someone in the eye. trump right now, he keeps doubling down on the outrageous things that he says.

the books seem pretty muted by comparison. i think there has been may be an excess of coverage and an excess of sort of lenience and letting him do this. he doesn't like to leave trump tower. he doesn't like to leave where he lives. he talks in this context about his hair and the way it stays perfectly the way it is because he limits the extent to which he can subject it to the elements. he lives there. he takes the elevator up to his office from his bedroom. "the apprentice" was shot their

re. he didn't have to leave. he said, i'm either in a limo, in a helicopter or my private jet. people talk about the presidential bubble. the trump bubble is far more encompassing. and he doesn't even like to travel, you know, like candidates have to sort of go everywhere i go to the swing states. he is basically running his campaign from manhattan. sometimes, that is the only way to get him. brian: if you had to write a book today, what would you write about? carlos: you know, this is a book that only i would care to read, right? but it is something i have had on my mind for a long time. one of my favorite books of all time is called "the worldly

"the worldly philosophers." he writes these incredible stories about economists over time as people. the book i would write is about the thinkers who have to find the big ideas for america's role in the world after the cold war. .ohn williamson, robert kagan and look at each of them and their lives and how their ideas influenced america's sensitive side. brian: if anybody wants to read "book party" on the web, how do they get their -- get there. carlos: you can go to the washington post.com.

brian: carlos lozada, thank you for being here. carlos: thank you for having me. ♪ announcer: for free transcripts or to give us your comments about this program, visit us at q&a.org. programs are also available as c-span podcasts. announcer: on the next "washington journal," mike liles of the hill newspaper talks about the congressional agenda

after the house councils all legislative work this week due to the recent snowstorm. and dan friedman with hearst newspapers talks about the president's executive actions on guns and what it means for the bureau of alcohol, tobacco and firearms. we will also take your calls in the for your comments on facebook and twitter. "washington journal" live everyday, 7:00 a.m. on c-span. announcer: monday night, craig timber joins us from stanford university in california and discusses a number of articles for the post. he examines the creation of the internet, the founders' objective, why security plate a -- played such a small role for them, and what faces internet users today. as consumers, we are forever choosing things other than security. we are choosing the speed, the performance, the features. so security, i don't know, it is maybe somewhere between five and

10 of the list of priorities for software developers. security experts will tell you security really doesn't pay. announcer: watch "the communicators" monday night on on c-span2. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2016] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] members of the british parliament debate whether to ban donald trump. later we hear from the republican presidential candidate in iowa. this week at the british house david cameron answers questions about tuition fees and trade relations with china. questions to t p