toronto professor jean edward smith. then prime minister theresa may takes questions from journalists for the first time. then young journalists share their stories from the 2016 presidential campaign. >> this week on "q&a," jean edward smith. he discusses his book "bush," a critical biography of george w. bush. brian: jean edward smith, author of "bush." when did you first think it was worth doing a biography so close to his presidency. jean edward: i had just finished the eisenhower biography. i was in new york having lunch with my editor at random house

and he asked me what i wanted to do next. this was in 2012. i said, how about george bush? he said fine and we started on george bush. brian: why? jean edward: he needed to be treated. none of the books out at the time had adequately treated him. brian: i want to jump in to chapter 12. "george w. bush was regarded by many of his classmates at harvard business school as dynamically ignorant. he was energetic but ill informed, untutored, and unread. and he flaunted it. little had changed in his 2002 state of the union and the phrase -- axis of evil reeked of arrogance. bush has spoken without bearing the consequences.

jean edward: i think that is right. that is why someone had to say that. brian: when did you start to feel this way about him? jean edward: when he was president. brian: why? jean edward: there was no reason to go into iraq and his domestic policies -- or his -- his response to 9/11, let us put it that way, seem to be overdrawn. brian: where were you? jean edward: hmm. in huntington, west virginia. brian: do you remember the day? jean edward: i remember my wife seeing it on television. it was a sunny day. i was on the faculty at marshall at the time. i was down at the university. brian: when did you react negatively to the way he handled 9/11?

jean edward: i would say beginning with the treatment of prisoners at guantanamo which seemed totally out of the ordinary. and of course the domestic slang that took place. those were not very well-known until the articles came out in the new york times and the washington post about two years later. brian: here is george w. bush when he was not in office in 1991. an interview done in texas. [video clip] >> there are minor leaguers who view themselves as major leaders who attacked george bush in a personal way. >> do those things hurt? >> not anymore. i don't even read the guy anymore.

when you read your father being called a lapdog by a person of his stature, large or small, it bothers you. brian: what is your reaction when you see that? jean edward: that is george bush in 1991. he ran for governor in 1994. he was head of the texas rangers at that time. it is george bush. brian: what do you see there? jean edward: spontaneity and a lack of sustained judgment or intellectual insight. brian: have you ever met him? jean edward: no, dick cheney, who i interviewed a number of times, set up an interview for me with george bush out in dallas. just before i was to go out, i got a telephone call from one of his aides saying that the

president did not want to see you and he decided not to see you because you wrote a book that was critical of his father. it was true. in 1992, i published a book that was critical of george herbert walker bush's decision to attack iraq. the university of toronto decided to give george herbert walker bush an honorary degree. and the university president said -- jean, you will introduce him because you wrote a book about him. i introduced him and we had about 1500 demonstrators outside protesting. this was a difficult award -- the university of toronto was giving an award for ending the cold war. the demonstrators, 1500-2000,

were protesting him being the head of the cia which in canada was not a popular thing to be. brian: are you a canadian citizen? jean edward: both. i am an american citizen but i went to toronto in the 1960's. in the 1970's, the supreme court had a decision making it possible to have dual citizenship. at that point i became a canadian citizen as well. brian: where do you vote? jean edward: in mississippi. brian: why? jean edward: that is where my parents are from. we own property in mississippi. i have always voted there. brian: back to your book on george herbert walker bush. why were you critical of his activities in the first iraq war? jean edward: bear in mind that when congress asked for permission to attack in iraq, this was a very close war.

bush only won by about 10 votes in the house of representatives. and maybe even less in the senate. this was not a popular thing at the time. brian: that comment by george w. bush about george will -- george will has called you one of the finest biographers in the country. jean edward: i don't think george will like this book. george is a republican. brian: how would you describe your own politics? jean edward: democrat. i am from mississippi. at a time when mississippi voters voted democratic. brian: how would you define your ideology? jean edward: on the left.

i have always been there i think. i went to princeton as an undergraduate. in 1950-1954. paul is a classmate of mine. don rumsfeld was as well. i think most of us there were democratic. adlai stevenson ran for president in 1952 and in 1956. he was a princeton graduate. brian: the best i could find -- i read in the back where you say where you got your material. you had 3-5 interviews. two of them that seemed to be the most important were donald rumsfeld and dick cheney were --

jean edward: it was set up for me. donald rumsfeld and i are classmates. we have known each other since 1950. we lived in the same dormitory freshman year. we have known each other since 1950. brian: at what school? jean: at princeton. we lived in the same dormitory and don was a very popular member of the class of 1954. brian: how often did you talk to him for the book? jean edward: maybe 20 times. brian: what did you learn from him? i have seen a lot of sources in your book. jean edward: i felt he was always very frank and very honest. we have known each other for a very long time. there was no problem interviewing don. i know his wife. he knows my wife. we are friendly.

brian: what do you think his role was in the iraq war? jean edward: i believed that he -- the military thought also that they were going in as liberators. they were going to get rid of saddam hussein. find any weapons of mass destruction and leave within 90 days. that is what they planned for. they did not plan to occupy iraq. general frank's plan for that on donald rumsfeld's instructions -- the military and the state department believed they were going in to remove saddam hussein, find weapons of mass destruction, and get out very quickly. jay garner, the general in charge of dealing with the iraqis, had a council, ready to take charge. and then on may 1 when bush

spoke on the flight deck of the abraham lincoln with a banner that said "mission accomplished," bush changed the ground rules. he said we were going to occupy iraq and bring in democracy. they had not planned for that. they were taken by surprise on may 1 on the flight deck on the abraham lincoln when bush said we were going to bring democracy to iraq. the difference between being liberators and occupiers is profound. liberators make a country free. occupiers impose their will. the military had not planned for that. they had planned to go in and get out. brian: george bush at west point. june 1, 2002, before the war started in march.

[video clip] george bush: the cold war doctrines of deterrence and containment. in some cases, those strategies still apply. but new threats also require new thinking. the war on terror will not be won on the defensive. we must take the battle to the enemy. disrupt his plans and confront the worst threats before they emerge. jean edward: prevention. bush did announce that at west point. the military was not prepared for that. he was absolutely wrong. i don't know what else you can say. brian: at one point in your book, you bring up gog and magog. why?

and who were they? and what is it? jean edward: maybe bush's worse fault is that he is a born again christian who brings that ideology into the presidency. he believes that he was god's agent here on earth to fight evil. and mentioning gog and magog, just before the iraqi invasion, bush called president chirac of france to get them to join the attack. during the course of that conversation, he told the president that we were fighting gog and magog. they were creatures in the book of revelation in the new testament. that is the center of the universe for many evangelicals and fundamentalist christians.

and bush genuinely believed that. he genuinely believed that he was god's agent here on earth to fight evil. if you believe that, whether it is domestic excesses or the war against iraq, if you believe you are god's agent fighting evil -- all holds are removed. you are on a blank slate and you can do whatever is necessary to fight evil. i might say that the french president did not know what he was talking about. and his staff did not know either. they got a professor in basel to clue them in. convincing the french president all the more that he did not want to be part of that. brian: you got that from another book. secrets and lies and

wars". how do you decide as a historian what to quote, what to trust, and what book to trust? jean edward: oh, i don't know. i mean -- it seems to me that as i read it, if it seems reasonable and logical, i use it. but there is a litmus test. test.litmus brian: in preparation for writing this biography, how much reading did you do before you started writing? jean edward: an interesting question. writers write in different ways. i research each chapter as i go. i do not research the entire book before i began. some writers do.

but i research it chapter by chapter. and go from there. when i am writing a book, i do it seven days a week and get up at 5:30 a.m. each morning and work until about noon. i do it seven days a week. i do it chapter by chapter. other writers research for two or three years before starting to write. we are extremes. brian: you have written a lot of biographies. going down the list. i want you to compare what you found out about these people and compare it with george w. bush. let us start with the presidents. in 2001, you wrote ulysses grant. one review said he was a greatly

underrated president. is that the way you felt about it? jean edward: that was very true. grant was not underrated at the time. when he died, there was a parade up broadway in new york.he was very popular. as president, grant genuinely believed in racial equality. he kept the army in the south throughout his presidency to maintain equal rights for african-americans. for the next three generations, that was not popular in the south. historians for the next three generations trashed grant because of his determination to enforce racial equality. his reputation suffered enormously. improperly, it seemed to me. i spent the time trying to rehabilitate him.

brian: is there any comparison you can make between grant and george w. bush? jean edward: i don't think there is any similarity. grant was very reflective. grant spent his time at west point, most of it, in the library reading books. as you know, his own autobiography sets the standard pretty much for presidential autobiographies. i think you could say that the distinction is probably light years apart. polar opposites. grant did not act on impulse. never. brian: your book was 784 pages long. this is a big book. all of your books have been pretty big. what is your approach to this?

why in this day and age when people are not reading as much would a publisher want such a big book? jean edward: you'll have to ask the publisher. if you are writing a biography, you have to write a big book. i do not research the entire book before i begin. i do it chapter by chapter. if you are writing a book that is 700-800 pages, you cannot remember all of that. brian: and then your book in 2007 on fdr. over 800 pages. one reviewer said he changed the relationship between the american people and their government. jean edward: he did in the sense that beginning with the new deal, roosevelt caused people to look to washington for support. which they had not done previously.

the government became a big supporter of the economy and of people. i think in that sense roosevelt did change the approach. brian: in your book, you say george bush was the decider. just like he used to say. what do you think of that? was fdr a decider? is there a comparison between those two? jean edward: fdr occasionally -- when he did that, he usually made a mistake. the supreme court planned in 1937 to expand the size of the supreme court. he consulted no one on that. and his attempt to increase the size of the court from nine to 15 justices caught everyone by surprise and it was a terrible mistake. when roosevelt acted that way it was a terrible mistake.

i will say that the only other example i can think of that roosevelt acted on his own was when he overrules general marshall and secretary stimson in 1942 to order the invasion of africa. he ordered the invasion of north africa. those are the two principal examples i can think of. brian: with grant and fdr and then eisenhower, what did the role of religion play compared to bush? jean edward: dwight eisenhower is the only president elected who did not belong to a church. eisenhower graduated in the class of 1950. west point cadets at that time were required to go to chapel every sunday. and so when eisenhower graduated, he decided he was not going back. mcarthur asked him in the 1930's why he did not go to church. eisenhower said it was because i had to go every sunday at west

point and i am not going back. and he did not. he finally joined the presbyterian church but not until after he was elected president. i think that is a fundamental distinction. grant was not a believer -- not a true believer either. roosevelt was an elder in his church at hyde park but i think he was quite skeptical. brian: in your book on george herbert walker bush -- what role did religion play with him? jean edward: the book about george herbert walker bush is about the iraq war. i don't think it did. george w bush, bush 43, was a born again christian.

he got to that position in the 1980's. brian: you talk about billy graham and his relationship but you also give credit to another minister. jean edward: the other minister -- he really brought bush back or made him a born again christian. bush, george w. bush, credits billy graham but that is because billy graham is known and the other fellow is not. brian: in 2011, george bush talked about sustaining -- being sustained by his faith. [video clip] >> i was sustained by my faith during my presidency. i did pray a lot. i saw god's wonders on many occasions when i was president.

i talk about the rainbow in bucharest, romania. i gave a speech. right before i got on stage, someone pointed out a balcony. a rainbow appears behind the balcony. people can ascribe anything they want to it but i say it is a message that said freedom is beautiful and universal. everyone desires to live a free life. brian: what are you thinking as you listen to that? jean edward: that is exactly right. bush received his marching instructions,he thought, from god. brian: what if he is right? jean edward: i don't think he is. do you? the domestic excesses and the attack on iraq -- it cannot be

argued that that was correct. brian: i want to complete the comparison with eisenhower. that was a 976 page book in 2012. you said he was a canny politician and a skillful, decisive leader. how do you compare what eisenhower was compared to george w. bush? jean edward: i can only think of eisenhower as president making two mistakes. one of them was when he gave the cia permission to topple the leader of iran. the other was when he authorized the u-2 flight just before the paris summit in 1960. otherwise, eisenhower -- one of his great strengths was his ability to conceal his hand.

eisenhower is behind the move that ultimately defeated joe mccarthy. eisenhower -- it was eisenhower that chose joseph welsh to be the council in the senate hearings. eisenhower liked to conceal what he was doing. but i think he was incredibly efficient. the interstate highway system, the st. lawrence subway system, ending the war in korea. eisenhower was elected on a platform of ending the war in korea. he went over and looked at it and saw that it could not be won so he made peace. i think -- two mistakes he made.

but i think he had an incredibly effective track record. brian: you also did a book on john marshall. of all of the books you have done so far, which individual did you like the most? jean edward: grant. brian: why? jean edward: grant had been underrated. and had been systematically abused by southern historians for three generations who resented grant's position on racial equality. i might say that when i was a little boy, of 8-9 years old, my father from mississippi took us to the battlefield in shiloh. my cousins who were there with us said the south could have won this had they done this or that but my father said we should hush up. it was a good thing that grant

was in command that day because grant had saved the indians. from the time i was eight years old, i was on grant's side. brian: the reviews are pretty positive. peter baker. he says in his july 4 review, as a biographer, mr. smith makes no comparisons with today's republican leader but he sides unmistakably with those who see mr. bush's presidency in the darkest shades if often for radically different reasons. mr. smith abhors waterboarding terror suspects. for example. mr. trump wants it resumed. what did you think of his analysis of your book? jean edward: i was very flattered that peter baker wrote such a favorable review.

his book is a major work on the bush administration. it is not a biography. a book on the administration. but it is extremely good. brian: the headline on the review -- presidential biography as scathing indictment. fair? jean edward: yes. that is fair. i think bush deserves a scathing indictment. brian: do you feel as strong about george w. bush as you have other presidents that you have known or written about? jean edward: it is difficult for a biographer to write about someone whom you do not like. all these other people, eisenhower, grant, roosevelt, marshall, were successful people

who deserved praise. it is much more difficult to write about someone you think is wrong. brian: another review in the washington post -- david greenberg, written in snark-free pose with an air of detached inghority, the book is damn of george w. bush's years in office. it reminds us of his arrogance, recklessness, strong-arm heitics, and the apoplexy provoked from liberals and democrats who felt powerless to rein him in. why do you think he was elected twice? gore, who ranl against him in 2000, from the beginning, screwed it up.

science association meeting in 2000, all the political scientists who analyzed elections unanimously picked gore to win. he began by picking joseph lieberman as his running mate, the most conservative democrat in congress, in the senate. bill clinton throughout the campaign. he did not invite clinton to be on the platform with him at the convention when he was nominated. andtreatment of clinton factorsth of those two paved the way for ralph nader to come in and pick up almost 3 million votes. carry 10 states

that clinton carried, including his home state of tennessee, arkansas, and west virginia. carried west has virginia since herbert hoover. brian: why was george w. bush reelected in 2004 after the war? jean edward: kerry did not run a good campaign either. y saluting at the democratic convention. democrats ran a traditional campaign in 2004. i think they were appealing to the voter in the middle, of which there were fewer. kerry did very well in the debates against bush.

but i think that he just did not run an effective campaign. he was not as critical of bush as he could have been. brian: let's go back to your research on this book. you interviewed richard armitage, david frome. interesting meal with a general petraeus. that has already made news. politico came up with a footnote. let me ask you about that. was it lunch or dinner? jean edward: dinner. brian: how did that come about? jean edward: i was in washington at the time. i got an e-mail from general petraeus, inviting me for dinner. before.ver met petraeus as i was leaving that evening,

my wife said, do not talk about somersby. when the first course was over, that was what he wanted to talk about. brian: that was why he asked you to dinner? jean edward: i would think some. he did not know me. brian: when did this dinner come about? jean edward: well, it came about just after he was forced out as head of the cia, just after he affair. because of the i guess he was interested in som ersby, which is fair enough. i was not surprised by it. i think one of the reasons for classmatesprinceton

brought pressure on the president of princeton to resign to create a vacancy. traeus to become principal of princeton and seek nomination as president of princeton as eisenhower had done as president of columbia. if you look at the republican nominee, maybe that was not bad to begin with. cted,e that could be effe the whistle was blown because of dwellpollo -- paula broa affair. brian: what did you tell general petraeus about kay somersby? jean edward: we did not discuss it. kayalked about ike and

somersby. eisenhower told general marshall just after 1945 that he plans to marry kay summers be -- somersby. general marshall said, if you do, i will relieve you of command. eisenhower decided he would never do that. you never told -- he never told kay. he continued to live with kay until 1945, when he was reassigned. kay thought she was going with him. she got orders ordering her to berlin, she did not know she was going with him. once eisenhower got back, he wrote her a very crisp dear john

letter, and that was it. kay continued to pursue him. her tour in europe was over, she visited ike in the pentagon. the next day, she received orders to go to california. eus wasso general petra not happy when he saw the footnote. jean edward: i do not think so. brian: where their ground rules when you went in? jean edward: absolutely not. we were having a friendly dinner. brian: did you learn anything from him about the war and his relationship to the war? jean edward: i did not ask. brian: you did not talk about it? jean edward: i did not ask, no. the militaryhat

passed him over for promotion from major to general. he was promoted by president bush. his career took off after that. petraeus and bush worked well together. brian: here is another gentleman you talked to, dick cheney, in 2000. this.watch 40 seconds of i will ask you what you learned. [video clip] >> when you put together an administration, you look for people with experience. we had a number of republican administrations over 30-some years i have been involved in national politics. many of us have not had prior experience in the bush administration. somehow thatat makes us over reliant, you might as well say we are over reliant on the ford administration.

we are looking for experienced people that can bring a lot to the team they want to assemble. regardless ofks what administration they might have been affiliated with. jean edward: bush was governor of texas and had not been in washington. did not know the washington scene. he really i'd -- relied on cheney. he picked donald rumsfeld as secretary of defense. he picked his friend from midland to be secretary of commerce. otherwise, cheney ran the search both for the cabinet and subcabinet officers. this is unusual. it is inconceivable that franklin roosevelt would have asked garner to pick the cabinet and subcabinet, that eisenhower

would have asked nixon to do that, particularly after the scandal in the speech. think, a first in american history, where the president turned over the selection of most people to the vice president. brian: was that a comment on john garner or the ability of dick cheney, who knew a lot of people? jean edward: it is a comment on roosevelt and bush. roosevelt knew what he wanted. he knew the washington scene. he was the assistant secretary of war for eight years. he knew the politicians and the democratic party. john nance garner was on the ticket to balance it, not for what he was going to do. said, vice presidency is not worth a bucket of warm piss, which is right at

that time. bush, on the other hand, does not know washington. cheney did. cheney that he was not dealing with a possible political opponent. health,eney's age and he was not going to be a candidate for president. brian: you interviewed him on may 13, 2013. where? jean edward: i interviewed , atey both out in wyoming his house in jacksonville, and a number of times at his house here. by date.know it brian: the date is not as important as how often and what you learned from him. jean edward: i began by going to

wyoming. see.t out to wyoming to at his house out in jackson hole. we stayed there for several hours. it was interesting, interviewing cheney. the only ground rule we had was cheney said, do not quote me unless you ask me. do not put anything in quote marks. you can use the information, but do not put it in quote marks. i think there was one quote i used that came from that meeting. he said bush was feeling his way in foreign policy. this was before 9/11. and i am not sure of that.

at his house in georgetown, i might say that cheney's wife, who was also a writer, who got think cheneyll, i was quite receptive. don set it up for me. brian: what impacted -- when did you finish writing this? i am not sure i want to answer that. i finished about a year ago. simon and schuster, in their wisdom, held it. they did not want it to come out. they wanted it to come out just before the republican convention, i think. that is why they have held it until this point. i have been finished for about a year. brian: should we suspect that

simon and schuster did it for political reasons or economic reasons? say theyrd: i would did it for economic reasons. simon and schuster is a democratic publishing house. but i think they held it for economic reasons. brian: owned by cbs. jean edward: whatever. i do not know. brian: go back to when george w. bush's office said to you, he is not going to sit and be interviewed by you. what was your reaction? what impact did that have on the way you felt about the rest of the book? jean edward: i was very close to being finished at that point. i do not think it affected the book in any way. that was ok. i could understand he would take that position. it had no effect on the manuscript.

brian: you quote from a fellow named russ baker, who has been a journalist for a number of years. wrote a book called family secrets. george bush's record at harvard was uninspiring. he had 53 job interviews with fortune 500 companies, said bill white. no job offer. i assume that is the former mayor of houston? jean edward: i do not know. brian: he is the only harvard business school -- jean edward: i know that. brian: let me read it. harvard business go graduate that i know of that job.without a d. -- g.d. not the same guy? jean edward: i do not know. brian: i am interested in how that quote defined bush, in your opinion. jean edward: that is when he

went back to harvard business school. let me quote one of his classmates. they considered him dynamically ignorant. he was very active, very energetic, but did not know anything. brian: anything good about him? jean edward: he was very energetic. brian: besides that. in your book, i know you say positive things about the way he handled the financial crisis. jean edward: about the financial crisis, his leadership on combating aids. no president has done that. aids inhe fight on africa. look, i am 83. he added to medicare prescription drugs for seniors.

behind is a left valuable addition. he got along well with putin initially. they agreed to reduce the number of nuclear weapons each country maintains. a remarkable achievement. he improved relations with china. other people did not want him to go to the olympics. he did. i think that helped improve relations with china. and free trade. president, thee united states had free-trade agreements with israel, canada, and mexico. when he left, we had trade agreements with 16 countries. there is no administration without some success. i think that is why i explicitly state in the book that he is not america's worst president. it is hard for anyone to beat herbert hoover. that does not detract from the

fact that his decision to attack iraq may be the worst foreign-policy decision ever made. brian: the first sentence in your book and the last sentence frankly, ifto know, you decided to do this on purpose, and at what point. where, in the history of the united states, have the nation been so ill served as during the presidency of george w. bush? how long did it take you to get to that sentence to start that book? jean edward: that was probably the first sentence i wrote. backa book from front to chronologically. first, beforece i start writing the book. i put that sentence in the preface and wrote the conclusion without checking it. know they wereot

so similar until i read the reviews. brian: let me read the last sentence. whether george w. bush was the worst president in american history will be long debated, but his decision to invade iraq is easily the worst foreign-policy decision by an american president. jean edward: if you are a historian, you know what presidents have done. i cannot think of a decision that was any worse. maybe you could say harry truman's decision to drop the atomic bomb on hiroshima- nagasaki. but that is about the only contender. brian: what about woodrow wilson's decision to go into world war i? jean edward: well, the germans helped that a great deal when they sunk american ships at sea. it was a response to the germans' military aggression.

brian: what about jfk and lbj's decision to go into vietnam? some think it had a dramatic impact on the last 50 years. jean edward: 58,000 lives are 58,000 lives. there was no terrorist activity after the vietnam war. it was a local war. brian: so how much responsibility do you put on george w. bush for the terrorist activity in the world today? jean edward: 100%. i would say that, if he left saddam hussein in control of iraq, which was a secular state at the time -- it was not a democracy, but it was a secular state. on isisthe l9id -- lid extremism. there was no isis.

al qaeda was not in iraq. it is behind the terrorist threat we have today. brian: let me go to the acknowledgments in the back. i will ask you about a fellow named sanford lakoff. a classmate of mine at princeton read the manuscript for every chapter of every book i have written, beginning in 1963. he has died since then? jean edward: the died in 2013, i think. brian: that is what you say in the book. why did he read every chapter of every book? jean edward: we were roommates at princeton. and we were good friends. he just agreed to do it. brian: gang of 13. who are they? not by name.

jean edward: whenever i finished, i do it chapter by chapter. i send it out to 13 people. they read it. they send me their comments. i do not go back to them. they send the chapter to me. i read what their comments were. if i like them, i use them. brian: who are these people? what kind of friends are they? jean edward: people i have met over the years. i met after she wrote a book about franklin. she is a novelist. she reads them. john, i mentioned. my roommate at princeton, i mentioned. ofan: did you send a copy your book before you published it to don rumsfeld?

think don knew what i was writing. brian: did he try to change your mind? jean edward: sure. if he thought i was off on something, he would tell me i was off on something. what personal opinion did you gather from rumsfeld and dick cheney about george bush? jean edward: i never pressed them for their personal views about george bush. i thought that would be pushing the envelope a bit. i never pressed them about personal views on bush. politician, i think they had skepticism. brian: i want to show you some video of a fellow you talk about. this is only 20 seconds. this was october 18, 2002.

his name is paul wolfowitz. [video clip] consorts withein our enemies. saddam hussein and the war on terror are not related. they are part of the same struggle. if we can defeat a terrorist regime in iraq, it will be a defeat globally. brian: what impact did he have on the iraq war? jean edward: he encouraged it. i do not think it was crucial. he was on the same side as bush. i do not think he spawned it . i think he was perfectly happy to go along with it. brian: did you know his father? --n edward: i did not know 1960's, when there

was a great deal of campus unrest riots at berkeley and cornell, the editor of the magazine asked me if i would go to cornell and interview this particular professor of mathematics who had interesting insight into the nature of student protests. it was professor wolfowitz. professor wolfowitz told me he was convinced that this was a communist plot, the prelude to a revolution. too farhought it was out. brian: are you going to write another book? jean edward: i am 83 years old. it is difficult to write. brian: how have things changed as you have gotten older? jean edward: i think more slowly. i write more slowly. it takes longer.

at 83, i am not sure i have or five years in which i could write a biography. but i think simon and schuster wants me to do something else. i feel i would write about the decision to say paris in world war ii. generalthat the german and eisenhower deserve great credit for saving paris from destruction in world war ii. are not think many people aware, but eisenhower lived for a year and a half in paris in the 1920's. 1920's,n paris in the as he did, he knew paris.

so i think there is a book there. i am not sure. brian: have you started it? outlined it? jean edward: i have read the background material. i have read the background material. brian: 32 years at the university of toronto. jean edward: i got to 33, but yes. brian: how many years at marshall? jean edward: 12. brian: do you consider yourself retired? jean edward: i am not in a classroom anymore. after marshall, i went to columbia for two years and georgetown for two years. i guess. i was at dartmouth for two years before toronto. brian: our guest has been jean edward smith. we thank you very much. jean edward: thank you. [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] for free transcripts or to give us your comments about this program, visit us at qanda.org. programs are also available as c-span podcasts. >> if you enjoyed this week's interview with jean edward smith, here are some other programs you might like. george w. bush on his book, decision point. donald rumsfeld talks about his book, known and unknown. book,illins discusses his the rise of american democracy. watch these anytime or search our video library at c-span.org. journal,'s washington

live from the democratic convention in philadelphia. monday morning, the national political reporter for the tribune review gives us a preview of the convention, including speakers and scenes for the day. then the bernie sanders delegate sharesshington state reference to cover her expenses to be at the convention, including turning to social media. also, the 2016 hillary clinton delegate and ohio state representative on the clinton campaign and what the democrats hope to accomplish at this week's convention. journal fromton the democratic convention beginning at 7:00 eastern monday morning. join the discussion. c-span makes it easy for you to keep up with the latest convention developments with the c-span radio app, available as a

free download from the apple app store or google play. get coverage of every minute of the conventions and information about important speeches and events. get c-span on the go with the c-span radio app. >> british prime minister theresa may answered questions from members of parliament in her first question time since becoming prime minister and leader of her conservative party. she talked about the u.k.'s future relationship with europe following the brexit decision and security concerns after the attacks in nice, france. this is almost 40 minutes. >> order. questions to the prime minister.