issuesrday, c-span's spotlight looks at trade deals, >> and we will defend american jobs, and american workers, by saying noted that trade deals like the transpacific partnership, and unfair trade practices. >> in the state of pennsylvania, they have lost one third of their manufacturing jobs since the clintons put china into the wto. >> the program includes a look at nafta, in 1994 free trade agreement between the united states, mexico, and canada. >> this whole world is together in the cause of more jobs for our people, more exports for our markets, and more democracy for our allies. >> a discussion on how the founding fathers viewed free-trade. >> historically, the united states simply was not a free-trade nation, for most of

american history. the u.s. is, in fact, a tariff protected economy. this goes back to our very constitution. >> and an in-depth examination of the wto, which enforces global trade rules. >> at the time the wto was being negotiated, or nafta, 800 more pages of rules and regulations. my book would be very different. when these two were being negotiated, the u.s. had as official advisers 500 corporate advisors. >> watch our issue spotlight on trade deals, saturday at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span and c-span.org. >> former national security advisers thomas donilon and stephen hadley discussed key national security concerns at an event hosted by politico. they addressed the recent democratic national committee

e-mail hack, as well as the foreign-policy positions of donald trump and hillary clinton. politico's anna palmer and jake sherman moderated the 15 minute -- 50 minute discussion. >> we would like to thank all of you here, watching on the livestream, and c-span this morning. we're thrilled to have two former national security advisers, tom donilon and stephen hadley, joining us for all the news of the day, the crazy wild things happening in this world. before we kick off the program. i want to thank bank of america for their tremendous support of

the series. bank of america has been our partner for many years on this event, and we look forward to many more years of partnership. they were just with us at the conventions, and all across the country at our growing playbook series. >> before we get started, we want to remind everyone to tweak your questions. jake has the ipad here. #playbooklive. we will track them here on stage, and if we get good questions we will post them to our guest. please join us in welcoming thomas donilon and stephen hadley. [applause] thanks so much for doing this. >> thank you, sir. welcome. >> all right. let's get started with really what drove the conversation and i think that you guys in these chairs today. the hacking of 20,000 e-mails from the democratic national committee. experts say, the campaigns say

it is russia. did you see any evidence this would happen, when you are in the white house? i thinknk -- stephen: tom probably some more of it, but clearly state parties have hack inng cyber to increasingly record numbers. the concerns have been with countries like iran, north korea, but russia and china being the a-team. china has done it, not just for traditional intelligence collection, but also to steal corporate secrets, intellectual property, and all the rest at a massive scale. so it's not a surprise that at some point it would migrate into the political arena, as it has done. the intelligence, i think, is still mixed, tom. everybody seems to think it was russia that did it. there's a separate question of who released it to whom, when,

and how. and we need to sort that out. but it is a wake-up call. we have talked about the need for hardening the critical infrastructure of the country. ourhave to recognize, political system is part of our critical infrastructure, and the electoral system and all that surrounds it is part of our critical infrastructure. and we now have to get busy and protect it, in the same way we have been increasingly protecting our banking systems, electric power grid, and all of that. shame on us for not having hardened it. shame on them for having done it. tom: i agree. i do want to lose that last point which is, which is the vulnerability of our systems generally as we become more digitized, as we put our commercial lives and government functions online. we do need to take a hard look at the election system, particularly as election results and voting become more digital,

more online, and more centralized. there's a real vulnerability that needs to be addressed. with respect to russia and your question, there's no doubt russia is engaged in a, is a cyber threat, both from the russian federation itself and from sponsored entities that they support in their operations. steve said there's a private sector companies that have said the dnc systems were penetrated by at least two groups associated with russian intelligence. the fbi's now looking into that. russian statements, by the way, to the effect that they don't engage in these activities, don't engage in interfering in the political process, don't engage in cyber attacks, those are wrong. we have seen a long history of interference in eastern europe and europe generally in the electoral process, and we have seen russian cyber attacks, beginning in estonia in 2007, three ukraine.

i think information warfare, if you will, which is part of the cyber approach they have, is an integral part now of russian actions. the hybrid war that they carried out in europe to annex crimea and invade eastern ukraine had as an essential element of the information warfare. anna: everyone's talking about russia as the people behind this. what they have been doing. the white house has not really call them out in a strong way. do you think they should be more aggressive, in calling out russia on what they have done here? stephen: i think the white house is doing what you need to do. they have said that the fbi is investigating, and they are the entity that investigate cyber attacks. tom: that investigation will focus on a number of things, including attribution. attribution in the cyber world is a difficult problem. jake: when you say that, what do you mean by that? tom: it means coming to an informed conclusion based on

everything that you know, that x entity was behind the attack. in cyber, that's one of the great challenges, the challenge of attribution. the fbi i'm sure will have to look at how strong the evidence is that could attribute that attack to a particular entity. and the whole question comes, what do you do with that information? do you release it to the public? do you go privately to the government, if you come to the conclusion they did it? you do an assessment of intentions, and then you have an assessment of consequences and actions by the federal government. my view on this would be, if in fact you could definitively, or strongly develop a case retribution against russia, russia could be confronted with it, and we should confront them publicly with it. we did this with china. steve mentioned china has engaged for a long time, in a vast program of cyber-enabled economic theft. we called china out publicly on

it. i give a speech in the spring of 2013,: china at on this, saying this was not acceptable. we have engaged china on this and made some progress. jake: so, the next up is the fbi investigating, clearly, and making, it seems quite obvious, according to experts who have tracked this stuff, many of whom are former fbi agents, that this was russia. so the next up is confrontation. is this a dialogue? should the united states be retaliating against the russians a theft most people are comparing to watergate? stephen: that's a good question. tom was at the forefront of trying to publicize these things and make it an issue within the federal government, within the executive branch, and i himtinent him -- compliment for that. think countries are

paying a price for these activities. so you admonish them. you make it public. a lot of their own populations think this is just what countries do, that the united states does it as much as china. anna: don't wait? [laughter] stephen: there are distinctions here. there's stealing commercial secrets and there's traditional espionage. boys will be boys, as they say. but commercial theft is something else. the distinctions here matter. i think the point is, there's been, no one has paid a political price for an operational -- or an operational price for this kind of intrusion. the question is, can you make them pay a price? some people say, you ought to respond asymmetrically. i think the question is, do we have the capacity of the tools, and can we do it in a limited way, to make them pay a penalty in cyberspace? so if you intrude on our systems, we will take away your capacity to do it in the future. quietly, out of the public eye.

you do that enough, and people start doing the cost benefit analysis. anna: so more of actual retribution? stephen: exactly right. tom: how do you retaliate, in a way that actually causes problems for the russians? tom: is a difficult question. i guess one, i think if you establish attribution, you need to engage directly with the government in discussion, number one, which we have done with the chinese in terms of what is on and what is not. it is much more difficult with the russians. with the chinese, there are interests they have. they are the second largest economy in the world, becoming a large e-commerce economy, and they have an interest in having a discussion about what our the appropriate norms with respect to cyber conduct. that's not the case with russia. russia made a different decision under vladimir putin, to pull back from relationships in the world and cut a distinct path on

foreign policy very much rooted in spheres of influence, balance of power, zero-sum outcomes. and they are a much smaller economy, and they have much less at stake. engagement directly, i think. public statements. and then we do have in the federal government now authorities to engage in proportionate sanctions against a country that engages in a cyber attack. jake: it sounds like what you are saying is we don't really have the tools to hit back at russia, because they don't have the incentive to cooperate? i did not say that. i'm not really going to have a conversation about the tools the united states has in cyber. jake: i tried. [laughter] tom: that wouldn't be appropriate. but the general approach, that's what you do.

anna: let's take a step back here, beyond the hacking situation. donald trump has called into question whether the united states would live up to its article five commitments under nato. what are the consequences of statements like that? is: well, the risk of that, that the whole purpose of article five guarantee is to deter. so you don't have to actually enforce and execute it. stephen: and the problem is, if article five guarantees are not credible, people will be tempted to challenge them. when we are already worried about that imprudent -- about vladimir putin, it is problematic. when russia went into georgia in 2008, we said, you know, if we don't handle this properly, if we don't make russia pay a price strategically and tactically for what they have done,, today it will be georgia tomorrow the crimea, and the day after the baltic states. and that is really what we were

saying in 2008. of course, we are two thirds of the way there. warfare, of hybrid which is basically a soviet tactic of undermining states, could be very effective against the baltic states. so we need, and administration, i think, belatedly but nonetheless is taking steps to enhance our presence in europe, to strengthen nato, so as to from, try to deter russia doing in the baltic states what they did in ukraine and georgia. the concern is, if there's any question about whether we are committed to our partners in the atlantic alliance, putin will include that in his calculus. the problem with the statement is, like a lot of his statements, there is a core element to it. administrations republican and democratic, for the last one he five years, have been saying to the -- 25 years, have been

saying to europe, you're going to sleep on defense capabilities, relying on soft power and letting hard power decline, and in the world we are in you need both soft power and hard power. that is a message that administrations have been sending for a long time. the core of that, saying, the european allies need to do more for their defense, is right. the problem is, going the next up and saying, if they don't we might not respect our article five guarantee, that's the problem people have with his statement. principle deterrent, in europe right now, remains nato membership. that an attack on any member of nato is an attack on all of the united states is included in that. that has been the principal push back against russian incursions in europe, and these rain so -- remain so. the problem with mr. trump's statements, to go deeper, is

it's a dangerous embrace of russian strategic goals, right? a russian strategic goal is to fragment unity in europe. this undermines the institution of nato, at a time when it needs to be more unified. so saying that we won't honor our article five obligations, being uncertain, and in fact, about where you stand on the russian annexation of crimea and the invasion of eastern ukraine. these things undercut the institutions, at the very time they are under pressure. europe has had a cascade of crises over the last few years, running from the recession to the eurozone crisis, to migration, to terrorism, to russian pressure, to the attempted coup in turkey. so at the very time we need unity, protecting these institutions, core institutions in the last, statements like

this undermine those institutions. and put forward by a presidential candidate, it is quite damaging. said by a president, it would be exceedingly damaging to the security interest of the united states. stephen: i don't disagree with that, but i think we need to put it in a broader context. there is an underlying issue which isa grand scale, not being addressed. which is the issue of america's role in the world. are we, are we committed to defending the liberal international order we helped establish after world war ii? what price are willing to pay? you know, that broader question gets framed up in the particular about this kind of statement about our commitment to nato. but we need to address the broader issue, because we are at a hinge election in this country. things that republicans and democrats kind of accepted as propositions are now under attack. are we still a nation of immigrants, welcoming those

overseas? are we still committed to free trade, as an engine of global growth and job creation? to beingill committed a leader in the international order, to try to maintain order, and to try to stand for the principles of freedom and democracy, which we have stood for for 250 years? these are questions, and in some sense the broader question is getting lost in the particular. and what we have not yet had, and which i hope you folks will help, you in the media will help, as have in september and october, in a debate on these broader issues. because we need to come to an understanding of these issues. if we go through this election and do not, and someone is elected president, as they will be elected president. jake: we hope so. stephen: they will have a heck of a problem leading this country, if we have not sorted ourselves that on some of these basic principles. that's what elections in the

best sense can do, and that's what we need this election to do. jake: i will put a finer point on that. the republican nominee, let's talk about those points you discussed, has said he is not for the transpacific partnership, something you are very familiar with. he has said, we need to shut down borders to countries that have had instances of terrorism. he has said we should shrink from our responsibilities internationally and globally, if people don't pay fiscal prices for it. it seems like the questions you are positing, the existential questions for america's role in the world, have been answered by the party. stephen: i think that's, i think they have certainly been answered by donald trump. there's obviously a split within the republican party, and we have seen it playing out daily. it's not just the republican party. bernie sanders, and now mrs. clinton, are anti-free-trade,

anti-tpp. bernie sanders has been very articulate about wanting a pullback in terms of america's role in the world. my point is, it's not just about the candidates, not just about the parties,, but there's something fundamentally going on here in the country, as you know. people are very suspicious, rejecting of the establishment, whoever that is. they think that globalization is a bad deal, that they were sold a bill of goods, that free trade has not worked. there are people who feel they have job insecurity, working two jobs. they don't have the benefits they need. they are not getting wage increases, and they feel the country has turned their back on them. i think this is a huge problem. it's not just donald trump. it's not just bernie sanders. it's not just republicans. it's not just democrats. it is something in the country. if i to say one thing, we need a debate to figure out how to

that large section of disaffection in our population, because whoever elected -- is elected president will have to come up with policies to address those concerns. this time, the anger and disaffection is being acted out within our political system. if we don't address it, next time it will be exercised outside of our political system, in terms of violence. i lived through the 1960's. it's not a pleasant experience. doubtne point, there's no in the united states and western democracies generally, there's a real sense that the political leadership has left large portions of the population stand with respect to economics. and the combination of a slow recovery from the great recession, and wage stagnation, globalization, technology, nonresponsiveness to these problems in some places around the world, has led to this populist moment, if you will.

i don't think it's fair to say there's not a debate going on between mr. trump and secretary clinton. there are big differences. you are right, it has been an anti-trade political year. no doubt about that. it is rooted in what steve has talked about, in terms of really serious economic and zaidi among large segments -- economic anxiety among large segments of the population. but that's not to say there is not a difference. i think there is a difference playing out with respect to the role of the united states in the world. secretary clinton and donald trump really could not be more different with respect to the role of the united states in the world. secretary clinton is a strong advocate of u.s. leadership in the world. if you go issue by issue around the world, with respect to nato, her support for nato could not be stronger. she laid out detailed plans for addressing the middle east. she led the effort to become more deeply engaged in asia. and she is a strong proponent of

american leadership. that debate will take place during the course of the campaign between these two candidates. and you have mr. trump, a candidate who has called for the united states to withdraw from the world. the result economically and politically would be less u.s. engagement in the world, it will be, i think, it will do deep harm to our economy, frankly, in terms of pulling back. in addition to the economic plan he has. i think it is a stark choice we have here, and the debate is ongoing. stephen: we will see where mr. trump's position ends up. and i'm not defending him in any particular way, but there is this notion in the republican party, that somehow the ronald reagan approach was right, and we have lost it. that if you really have a strong military, and mr. trump has talk a lot about building of our military, and if you really use it in an aggressive way, as he has talked about, defeating

isis, not sure how you do that, it's very tough, but somehow your friends will be assured. your enemies will be respective. you will not have to use that military. and the problem, mr. trump would say, is that administrations have gotten bogged down on the ground in places like iraq and afghanistan, and that was a mistake. so i think the debate is going to be a little more nuanced than just withdraw from the world or engage with the world. there's going to be a discussion about what is the proper role. but i do think, i think tom is right, and i hope there is this conversation. i hope somehow we can have a conversation about free-trade, which is difficult since both candidates are on the same sid e. we will also have a conversation about immigration. tom: the comparison to ronald reagan is incorrect. i lost my first job in january of 1981 as a result of governor

reagan's campaign against jimmy carter. [laughter] stephen: sorry about that. [laughter] jake: i thought that was heading in a different direction. tom: i was out on the streets on january 21, 1981, having served in the carter white house and the carter campaign. ronald reagan was an entirely different phenomenon, and entirely from person. he had been governor of california twice. he had run for president three times. he was the leader of an ideological policy movement in the united states, coming out of the 1970's into the new conservative movement. this is really important, steve. he also had around him a well-established, well known, highly competent set of advisors. who advised him and help him run the government for the following eight years. and that is interesting contrast. mr. trump doesn't really have a set of advisors. he's not rooted in any sort of

coherent policy, i don't think. , when president carter was beat in november 1980 and the reagan team came in in 1981, there wasn't this high level of uncertainty about what he was going to do. indeed, i have done a lot of work on transitions over the years, and the reagan transition, i said this many times, the people who worked on the reagan transition didn't need a really detailed briefing after the campaign. they do exactly what they were going to do, and it went about doing it. so i think these comparisons between president reagan and donald trump are, i think, ahistoric. we are in a uncouple situation. i am not a trump surrogate. [laughter] maybe we will get back to the issues. that's an interesting historical point. but the point is, mr. trump has

tapped into something deep in the american psyche, in a way nobody has, and he has done it in this extremely unconventional way, exactly as you described, and he has had a bad week or two . [laughter] anna: to say the least. stephen: but don't underestimate what he has told us about the state of the electorate, and the disaffection among our people. it's a challenge for whoever is elected president, because they will have to find a way to address that, and i see precious little discussion about how to address those anxieties, other than build walls and impose tariffs, and that's not going to cut it. anna: we are going to go to her colleague ryan here in a second. but tom, you are obviously a clinton supporter, advisor. this is your opportunity, stephen. a lot of people want to know what you think about trump. you said you were not going to endorse him.

can you talk about why? stephen: i said a lot of what i have to say. he has tapped into something that none of the other, we had on the republican side, this drug is republican field i thought we have had in decades. and he of the serrated all of them.- eviscerated all of he tapped into something in this country, the same way bernie sanders did. i think it surprised a lot of people like me, and we have to figure out how to address that. tom: i agree with you on that, and i think you are seeing around the world, in western democracies, in the united states, there does need to be a policy response. you are seeing a recognition, i think, on the limits of monetary response, and having to move to a more fundamental fiscal and government policy response to the very problems being raised. stephen: a policy response. but i think the person who's going to win this election is the person who convinces the american people and this disaffected group that they understand their problems.

jake: before we go to ryan. president hillary clinton, if she comes to be, issue for the -- is she for the transpacific partnership? tom: she's against the transpacific partnership. jake: she was for it before. does she stick to that? tom: yes. i'm not a spokesperson. but i think secretary clinton has been clear about this. she opposes the transits of the partnership and would -- transpacific partnership and would seek a different approach. >> mr. hadley, you mentioned isis in one of your comments. i thought i could get both of you to weigh in on that. the president this afternoon will be at the pentagon, for another update from his military advisers on how the conflict is going. everybody expects, as soon as this fall, there could be a major military operation led by the iraqis but significantly supported by us to take mosul and possibly raqqa in syria,

their centers of gravity. hat extentll us to wah you think some of the policies of the bush administration created the vacuum in iraq that allowed isis to thrive. to what extent do you think the obama administration may have taken the eye off the ball in this threat in the ensuing years? for both of you, what should the next president to, one or two key things to try to defeat this group? stephen: i will answer that question and then go over to you. my answer will not surprise you. we went into iraq in 2003. we did a bad job managing the consequences. it descended into horrific violence in 2005 and 2006. when all the country wanted us to get out, the president decided, president bush decided to change strategy and 80

troops. it worked. and the violence at the end of 2008 was down to a manageable level and al qaeda in iraq was largely defeated. an indian suing period, two things happen. i pursued a much more sectarian approach that undermined the unity government reestablished, and syria started to descend into a living hell, opening the door for the resurgence of al qaeda and what we have today. fred hiatt in the washington post on monday had a column which you ought to read. what he put his finger on, one thing president obama can do and i think once to do is that the pute for his successor to these many crises any situation so the new administration is not faced with a crisis in their opening month, and to give them

as good of a cloud form as they can to manage these very difficult situations in the world today. he has the opportunity to do that in iraq and syria, and fred hiatt was making this point, that what he is doing, in terms of wrapping up the air campaign, wrapping up assistance to those forces willing to fight isis, putting special forces on the ground, embedding them with those forces willing to fight isis, those are all good things. go toe has not done is the american people and explain to them why he's doing it, why the effortant, why to try to pivot away from the middle east has not worked, and why it is in our interest in terms of our security interest to be doing what he's doing. that's what i would hope that he would do. it's very difficult for a president to say, i was on the wrong track. president bush found it very difficult to do in january 2006, 2007 when he did the new policy

in iraq, but it's what the president needs to do, because he has got to begin the heavy left of getting the american people to understand, this disengagement from the middle east has not worked. we have interests here. it's not like we're going to do iraq in 2003 all over again. it will be much more incremental, depending on our friends and allies in the region, but it can be done, and it's in our interests to do it. i think that's one thing he can do that would really help set the table for whoever follows him into the oval office. tom: you know, a couple of points. one, steve is exactly right. obviously, any president wants to have the sound of the situation as he can possibly put in place for his successor, number one. thatrespect to isis, involves bringing them as close to defeat as possible in iraq and syria, and a key part of that, a number of things, involves taking down the capital, one of the most important things that's going on

here that has to continue, to break isis's narrative of success. that's the basis on which it has become the chief global terror threat against the united states and the west, and the world. the narrative of success, that it was able to take on these regimes in the middle east and defeat them, take on the superpowers, 60 coalition governments, and push back against them. now we have turned that around, in my judgment, and we are on a path, a difficult path, and it will take a while, to break that narrative of success on the ground, in iraq and syria. this conflict with isis is not going to be solved with a peace treaty, right. solvedll have to be militarily with respect to isis on the ground, and the core center of isis, number one. number two, it will also take a lot of political work. the roots of isis are, as steve pointed out, are an

authoritarian, sectarian whichment run by maliki, did spectacular damage to his country and the region and the world. and on the same side, assad. there's going to have to be, after you work through the military problem, you have to have a political solution, otherwise you'll just have son of isis after you do the military work. so the political piece of it is important. the problem is broader than that now. you see that in terms of these affiliates. isis is very different from al qaeda. al qaeda was careful about who it franchised to, who would associated with, who empowered. there has been more indiscriminate franchising by isis, and we have a number of places where this is a serious problem, including libya, and that will have to be addressed. you are seeing now and uptake in efforts there. and you have seen, steve, as you said, a much more intensive

effort in iraq and syria by the united states military. that will have to continue to succeed. you have these affiliates that have to be addressed, and then you have the problem we will have, as you squeeze these entities down, organizations that were really supported by large numbers of foreign fighters. in addition to, as you squeeze them down, some of them will come home. affirmativeeen decisions by isis to engage in operations external to the theater in iraq and syria, and this is a very big problem in europe going forward. i don't think frankly that europe has in place what it needs to address was going to be a long-term problem. now, with respect to the historical points, i do think the major roots of this were maliki's conduct and the civil war in syria, and the opportunity that that gave isis to kind of rear its head.

lots of questions about the united states' conduct and policy in syria that we could spend a long time about. jake: we will go to audience questions in a few minutes. but could you help us prepare the next national security advisor for his or her job? what are two or three situations, regions, incidents, that we are not looking at, that are not on our radar right now, that the next national security advisor will have to deal with and should be paying attention to? stephen: well, i think one of the things, and i expect tom and i will have roughly the same list, one of the things that will confront a new administration, we need to rethink our policy about north korea. you know, we have had this six party talks, which was a for um for pressuring north korea to come to the table and coordinate negotiations, and it has not worked. north korea's nuclear program

and ballistic missiles go forward apace, and it threatens our friends and allies in the region, and ultimately threatens the united states. the world's most dangerous weapons, in the hands of the world's most unstable regime. this is not a good situation. we need a new policy, and we are going to have to engage much more directly with china, because we will not get the right policy until china decides that a nuclear armed north korea is more dangerous than the kinds of concerns they have about a north korea that descends into chaos and they have refugees. they have been putting the stability of the north korea regime over dealing with the nuclear question, and china needs to understand that we're past that point, and that priority needs to be reversed. then we need to have a much more serious policy. i think there's some signs of hope. work have been some recent

done showing china for the first time is really beginning to squeeze north korea economically, so there's something to deal with, but we need a new policy with respect to north korea. second, i have not been a sensitive to the climate change, particularly. but tom friedman wrote some terrific pieces from sub-saharan africa, basically saying, if you want to see where the next refugees flows that will threaten the unity of europe are coming from? come to niger. these are, climate change, other economic dislocations have put people out of work. they are on the move and have no place to go. it means they are recruiting grounds for terrorists and potential refugee flows that will tax the european union

more. those kindsook at of, not just climate change, but other kinds of dislocations, because we have seen the problem refugee flows -- who would have thought refugee flows out of syria and other places would actually put at risk our 60-year experiment of trying to come up with a whole europe? but that's exactly what has happened. thirdly, we are going to have to deal with, and i think this in a way is the most difficult, we finished the end of the cold war and thought that democracy and free markets had been anointed as the only game in town. and we now see a rise of authoritarianism, unapologetic authoritarianism, that is antidemocratic, anti-western values, and you see it in putin, jinping, in erdogan, and

it is a competing model out , and our model doesn't look so good. our economy is in doing particularly well. our politics look fractious. our model, which we thought was the beacon for the world, is not looking so good, and these competitive model seem to be doing particularly well. what are we going to do about that as a country? these are leaders in a lot of cases that donald trump is praising. saying, north korea, at least he has a grip on his people. erdogan put down a revolution quickly. stephen: but the way he does it, he says, these are strong leaders, and america needs strong leadership, and that is resonating. that is resonating. he: what trump has said, does have these odd embraces of dictators around the world, but

he also has said in interviews that he doesn't think the united states has the basis on which to lead, because we are not as good as we used to be, which is basically an embrace of the talking points of these countries, which is damaging to the united states. crises, i agree with most of what steve said. the most important thing for national security in the next term, both here and in europe, is economic growth. of, theng to the kinds voices steve was talking about here that are deeply concerned about stagnant wages and where families stand in future globalization. that is, it is a cliche, but it is true. there aren't a lot of iron loss in history, but this is one. ability to operate internationally depends on economic strength at home, and that needs to be the laser focus of the next administration. we have very modest growth prospects. we have a demand issue. we have a sense that we are not responding to the problems in the world.

that's the most important national security thing to me. the second, i fully agree with thee, the next big crisis, crisis for the next president will be north korea, in my judgment. it is moving headlong with respect to development, not only of nuclear weapons but also the means of development. we saw a test the other day off japan. and this is moving towards a situation which is unacceptable to any president, to have north korea have nuclear weapons on top of a means to deliver them to the continental united states, and that needs to be a total rethink of the policies. steve is exactly right. engagement, serious engagement with the chinese about what we are going to do about this. because we react to it. we will continue to react to it. deployments inle south korea, which the chinese objected to vociferously. more exercises, deeper alliances, cooperation, although

things -- all those things will happen. and the chinese see that is not strategically in their interest. the conversation with the chinese is, this is not about you, this is about this state here and the potential real threat it presents to the united states, which will be unacceptable to any president. third i think is to finish the tok in iraq and syria, and intensify that. fourth, we will have to have a real focus on europe. europe has seen, as i described earlier, this cascade of crises. unity undermined. we have seen borders, we thought orderorders in a postwar were inviolate, and we have seen russia obviously break that rentable. principle.reak that and we have seen democracy under pressure in a nato member, turkey. i would focus on

re-engagement with europe and working with europe to reunify it, if you will, to take on these challenges. i have one more that some will not agree with. [laughter] i don't envy whoever comes into this job. but i think over the next year or two, there's a better than even chance that we will lose the iran nuclear agreement, because of our politics and because of iranian politics. jake: do you agree with that? tom: i hope not. of course it concerns me, but a couple things in that. the agreement is overwhelmingly in the interests of the united states. i was never one of those people who thought it would transform the u.s.-iran relationship. it was a transaction, not a transformation. a transaction that was really important from a nonproliferation perspective, so

it's critical in my judgment that it succeeds. but the pressure on it will come from outside the four corners of the deal. the pressure on it will come largely through iranian behavior, and our appropriate need to confront that behavior, the destabilizing behavior. that's with pressure will come, and i do worry about that. jake: let's kick it up to the audience. anna: we have time for one or two questions. say your name and where you are from. university.shington thank you both for speaking today. the question is for mr. hadley. you served in the white house for eight years. you saw up close the responsibilities and pressure of the presidency. do you believe donald has the temperament to be president of the united states? yes or no? stephen: he stole one of our questions. [laughter] yes or no. [laughter] >> brent stocoroff endorsed

hillary clinton. does donald trump have those unique experiences? stephen: it is a very difficult position that a lot of republicans are in, and it sounds easy. a lot of my recovery can friends have -- my republican friends have said, he does not have the temperament and therefore i endorse hillary clinton, and that is a legitimate approach. the problem is, people than say, republicans will say, you really were not a republican anyway and shelve them. and then you deal yourself out of the debate within the republican party about what should the republican party stand for. because there's a real debate in the republican party, with trump on one side and paul ryan and others on the other side. so a number of people are saying, look, i don't want to do myself out of the future of the republican party, because it's very important to have a

two-party system. a lot of people say, i'm not comfortable with trump, i'm not comfortable with hillary clinton, but they stop short of flipping, because they want to have a voice in where the party goes. so this is not an easy position, and there are a lot of republicans i know who are really struggling with this. we have never seen an election like this. this is unprecedented in my lifetime. and, you know, we have got to figure out what it says about the country, and we have got to figure out what it says, if you are a republican, for the future of our party. tom: can i make an analytical point, in response to a political question, on presidents? steve worked for a number of presidents. i worked with three presidents. you get a response that we have checks and balances, you know, so it's hard for a president to pursue anything that radical. there are checks and balances in the u.s. system, and they are important, the branches. by steve and i have both seen, a

president has a tremendous amount of power in the u.s. system, and makes dozens of decisions a month which are critical, right, which are in his or her pretty -- pe urview. and those dozens of decisions make a huge difference. for example, on military operations, or what's the cost of undertaking a operation, what's the tak cost to our country, what's the likelihood of success, what's the likelihood noncombatants will get killed? is it consistent with the law? you sure about that? these searching questions, which presidents stephen i worked for ask all the time, are absolutely critical. so this temperament question is important. the experience question is important. you can't really dismissive by relying on some sort of structural protections, because of the way the u.s. presidential system worked. stephen: i would say to people, when i would meet a presidential candidate and talk to them

before, in the announcement stage, i would always think not, do they know the name of the president of pakistan, which is something the trip to president bush on, but what are their instincts about foreign policy? what are their instincts? is this somebody who has the right instincts, or not? because those are the things you build on when you make those decisions. so i would hope americans can watch the debates and ask themselves, which one has the best instincts in terms of foreign policy? that's a good test. anna: has trump reached out to you? stephen: no. tom: no. [laughter] jake: not you, either. tom: i'm sorry. jake: one more question. squirm.one of you we have to make both of you squirm. is hillary clinton more of a hawk than barack obama? [laughter] tom: i think it's a fair question. you know, secretary clinton

served on the armed services committee. i was a national security advisor, and the group i was working with everyday, with vice president biden, leon panetta,. petraeus, bob gates. she worked very closely with the defense department. she and bob gates side to i a lot on issues, and she was very supportive of the military. that's the first point. second i think secretary clinton is a u.s. leadership politician, a political leader. that is the perspective that she takes. so i think, i don't want to do comparisons. i worked for three presidents pretty closely, and one of the secrets to that is, don't answer questions like this. [laughter] but i think it's a fair point to

say, secretary clinton is focused on u.s. leadership, does not see an alternative to u.s. leadership around the world with respect to prosperity and security, and is deeply immersed in the history of that engagement around the world, where it has brought, if you do a thought experiment and think about what the world looks like after world war ii today absent u.s. engagement and leadership, very aware of that history, immersed in it, and deeply supportive of the u.s. materiel understands capabilities deeply. anna: unfortunately, it's time for us to wrap up the conversation, torrent stephen -- tom and stephen. thank you for sharing your insights. thank you for joining us in the room and livestream, and thank you again to bank of america, for their continued partnership of the playbook series. stay tuned for other playbook events later this year, and have a great day. [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]

[indistinct conversation]

>> third-party candidates are expected to have a bigger impact than normal in this fall presidential election, and tonight libertarian candidate gary johnson is our guest on newsmakers. he will discuss his candidacy and policy proposals, as well as his views on donald trump and

hillary clinton. newsmakers, tonight at 8:00 eastern, followed by your reaction live through calls and tweets. democratic presidential candidate hillary clinton will be campaigning monday with vice president joe biden. we will have live coverage from scranton, pennsylvania at 12:45 eastern here on c-span and c-span radio. at c-span.org, you can watch our public affairs and political programming any time at your convenience, on your desktop, laptop, or mobile device. go to our home page, c-span.org, and click on the video library search bar, where you can type in the picture of a speaker, a bill, or even the event topic, review the search results, and click on the program you would like to watch, or refine your search with our many tools. if you're looking for our most current programs, our homepage has many current programs ready for your immediate viewing, such

as today's "washington journal," or the events we covered that day. c-span.org is a public service of your cable or satellite provider, so if you are a c-span watcher, check it out at c-span.org. next hour, a book tv exclusive. our cities tour visits port huron, michigan, to learn more about its unique history and literary life. for five years now, we have traveled to u.s. cities, bringing the book seem to our -- scene to our viewers. you can watch more at c-span.org/citiestour. >> welcome to port huron, michigan, on book tv. located 60 miles north of detroit in the eastern most part of the state, the city sits at the juncture of the st. clair river and lake huron, and the blue water bridge serves as one of the busiest crossing points between the u.s. and canada. with the help of our comcast

partners, over the next 60 minutes we will travel around the city of around 30,000 to talk with local authors about the history of the area, including the role that steamships played in the great lakes region during the 19th century. >> a steamboat was constructed in blackrock, new york, near niagara falls, traveling between blackrock and buffalo for three years before it was wrecked. that was the beginning of the steamboat age. people understood, they didn't travel very fast, but they traveled reliably. >> later, we visit the thomas edison depot museum to learn about the importance of the railroads in the development of michigan's region. >> when the railroads first came into the county, into the region as a whole, most of the life was centered upon the lake. so the interior itself, if there were farms or early settlers there, they were few and far between.

>> but first, we talk with the former executive editor of the port huron times herald about the city's history, its challenges today, and the state of the newspaper business. this is enough of the black river, which is a smaller river that comes into the st. clair river. the sinclair river is actually a strait connecting lake huron and lake erie, or part of that strait. water,, as far as the water identifies this community. water is a significant issue. i am kind of a nomadic journalist. you move from paper to paper. i am from west virginia, but we worked in florida, georgia, for a while in kentucky, and now michigan, so we moved around a lot for many years, and one of

the things i learned to do was intoke a dip inot local -- local history to try to understand a community. how do you know where you are going? how do you know where you are or where you are going if you don't know where you have been? frankly i was surprised how rich the history is in this community and this part of michigan. maybe i shouldn't have been, the mid deck of the great lakes, great shipping industry, for 20 years after the civil war we were the leading second point of entry for immigration, you wouldn't think hundreds of thousands of americans came across the border here. they get cheap fares in canada to take the railroad. across the river points westgood evening. there was a reason for it. in the 19th and early 20th century. that is fascinating. the most important story of this

generation has been, in the 1990's this was a very prosperous town, 1990's really thriving economy, not just in statewide but locally we go pretty well. in 2000 if you go by household income michigan is one of the 15 wealthiest states. by 2008, one of the 15 poorest states. a profound change. why that should be the question for economists and scholars and politicians but the effect it had on the people has been devastating.

the poverty rate was 25%, the unemployment rate was in the 30's. really devastating, population, things were turning around and resilient community, and a difficult period of time for the state of michigan. there are 4 5 pages of foreclosures, didn't go on for a week or month but month after month after month or four or five years, property plummeted, you are lucky if it is worth $25,000. they provide services to cut the workforce, and it is affected by the county, on a manufacturing basis, literally disappeared in a few years.

it didn't disappear, but greatly diminished. the most interesting thing about this community, it is 170,000 people, the 12th largest county in michigan. while in office and harry truman came here on the honeymoon, we had several presidents, no sitting president has ever come to this town. they were coming to detroit, marine one, a 5 minute drive from the county line but for whatever reason they always go to in some other direction. we are out of the mainstream. not considerably important

enough to either party that they were not presidential to come and campaign. why should it be that way? used to joke the presidential election counting on going to the democrat in any year that ended in 64. and barack obama carried it on the first go, george bush barely beat out gore, it is a 50/50 basis. the county itself is the -- i don't know that we have become we doemocratic but

consider democrats. still a very republican area. michigan is a democratic state, a blue state, and in the presidential politics, hillary expect to win.ly president obama won it. once you get into the countryside, it -- suburban areas tend to get more republican. the departments have complete control of the state. in the legislature have a supermajority, democrats can't block them. the supreme court is nonpartisan but the state supreme court, and the republicans control the levers of power. detroit get outside the and flint, you get more

republican so the geographical areas for republicans, they make stronger districts. this is where flint, detroit got their water. when detroit was growing, they needed a dependable source of water. there was a time in the cold war where they were getting their water from lake sinclair. it seems kind of funny now but it wasn't at all in the 60's that the soviet union would drop an atomic bomb onto the lake and vaporize that lake and detroit would be left without waters of detroit.

they would put water intake out in the lake in a 7 mile tunnel, i forget how deep, 200 feet deep to this water intake. it is just north of the city. the tunnel exploded, killed 20 some minors. the worst industrial accident in history of lower michigan. detroit built a water main. you can think of a basketball rim. it is that high, that is where the water goes, it goes to west out of lake huron towards flint but the next county west of here, it is a split and half of the pipe or part of the pipe pumping station is in south to the northern suburbs and the other is flint. in 2009 flint goes with another water line that is exactly 6 miles north of this water line, and duplicating water line, i thought it was crazy and i wrote in 2009 that this is insane.

they are going to spend $1 billion, which is what they were estimating back then, to duplicate something that already exists. why are we doing it? the reason we are doing it is -- detroit didn't grow the way we thought. it has never been used to have of capacity. but the water is treated on the lakeshore, going to flint, detroit, claimed good water out of lake huron, it is good water and they are duplicating it and the reason they are gouging them on the price. you would think somebody in michigan is the adult in the room, that some governor -- water is not regulated by the public service commission, they regulate electricity, the fairy , but don't regulate water so

detroit probably was gouging flint. somebody should have said stop it but they didn't and flint says we are going to spend hundreds of millions to duplicate an existing water line so we don't have to be held hostage by you any longer. that is the original sin. if that doesn't happen none of the rest of this happens. the flint people aren't drinking the water out of the river, children are not being poisoned by led. the governor of michigan is made to go down in history as a buffoon is what it looks like. all that happens because of this decision. there was nobody in a position of power in michigan, no adult in the room to say it is crazy. we have so many things we need to be doing in this state, why would we spend $1 billion to duplicate what exists? i never heard a good answer for

that. they will tell you things, they have their rationalizations, the fact of the matter is a perfectly good water line could be serving flint for another 50 years if they just maintain it. everybody knows newspapers are in trouble. what goes around comes around. if you go to the 19th century in this county, most of america, every town had a newspaper. publishers who go into why they have a handcranked printing press on their wagon they , settled in a little town, start a newspaper, making some money, stay put, if they were not making money they would move on. a lot of smaller towns had two papers, republican paper and the democratic paper but there were lots of community papers. we are talking about until after the civil war. we had two german populations,

two german language newspapers in this town and a dozen newspapers at one time or another so what happens is the press comes in. the average guy can't afford to be in the news business anymore, you have to be a multimillionaire. and you can no longer start a newspaper and start any chance of success. a full circle back with the internet's. the disadvantage, not totally a good thing, and one of the things you do sacrifice is if you have a smaller paper with 3, four, two reporters you can't do much in-depth reporting, you can't dig deep into a topic and here is what everybody says, i will talk to 20 people and here

is what is happening, take a week or two, complete package, at least you will know what is going on. you can't do that when struggling to put out a paper with a skeleton staff. it is is got to figure out a business model, if we lose that. if our society loses that community newspapers do in-depth reporting we lost what is important whether you are republican, democrat, liberal conservative, we lost something vitally important if we lost that. >> c-span is visiting the city of port huron located next to the heart of the st. clair river

where we meet up with arthur joel stone as he talks about the role the area played in a 19th century. >> at the turn of the last century the river behind us was , one of the busiest waterways in the world. the saint clair river and detroit river in 1907 constituted more tonnage than the port of london put together. this waterway was moving ships at an incredible place. the freight were carriers, the bulk carriers we got and some were passenger ship carriers that were here. every one of them from detroit to cleveland or buffalo, the history of steamboats started 100 years ago, in 1817, one by the canadians and one by the americans, that got the process rolling. that kind of got the process rolling. the following year a steamboat , was constructed in black rock, new york near niagara falls,

that vessel ran from black rock or buffalo and detroit for 3 years before it was wrecked. that was the beginning of the steamboat age. people understood they didn't travel very fast but traveled reliably. if you were on a sailboat you had to wait for the wind. if you were on a sailboat working against the current like the one behind us was almost impossible unless the wind was behind you. with the steamboat, you would get on the boat and the boat would reliably travel 6, 8, 10 knots and you were going if you could get there at a regular schedule. people could finally rely on travel to get them where they want to be. with the opening of the erie canal in 1825, there was an influx, greater influx of immigrants coming in. soon after that, there was a railroad running next to the erie canal. all of a sudden, you have two

reliable forms of transportation coming in. the railroad stopped in buffalo so once you got that far you had to find another way to get to detroit to catch the next train. trains ran across the bottom of michigan to chicago. the first trade reached their in 1852 and from there, you could get to the westward countries to where the farmland was. before the american civil war if you want to get to the second train, you had to get on a ship. the entrepreneurs who were running the vessels partnered with the railroad companies and the ship became an extension of the railroad. frankly, a much more beautiful extension of the railroad. if you were on a train, they were not as ornate as we think of trains now. they were not very comfortable, if you wanted to walk around you walked up and down the aisles but if you got on a steamer, one of these beautiful paddlewheel steamers, you were not only in beautiful ornate salons, you can

walk around the decks, lots to view. the view up and down the rivers is gorgeous, it was a nicer, more comfortable way to travel. assuming you weren't in a storm or the boat didn't catch fire. while tourism has been an effective business in the great lakes basin since right after the war of 1812, tourism really picked up in the 1880's and 1890's. industries that established themselves, people had resources to take a sunday off and go for a short cruise or actually take a vacation. that didn't start until the 1880's or 1890's and business shifted to take them to destinations. in chicago to see the great

exposition in 1893, all of a sudden the tourism business became an important part of this. much like the cruise ship industry is today so ships were designed for groups of people that would want to travel and that kind of started the palace second era. the first had taken place in the 1840's and 1850's, the second palace era started in 1880 and went through 1910. the second palace era was grander than the the boats were first. bigger, more elegant, some of the interiors of the salons, you thought you were walking into a versailles palace. they were spectacular. the furniture, everything lent itself to an elegant lifestyle. even middle-class people who traveled brought their best clothes. they went there to be seen and to see all the gorgeous people wandering these boats and enjoy being on the water. this is before air-conditioning.

on a good, hot summer day, the best way to cool off was to get on a boat. sometimes you would travel on a fairly long excursion, a couple days, but in the detroit area we had island parks you would travel to. you get in a small steamer, travel for a couple hours from detroit to port huron and while you are doing that the boat is traveling 15 minutes an hour. beautiful, cool breeze coming over. the men were probably more comfortable than the ladies. the ladies were in layers and layers of petticoats and that kind of thing. but certainly much better than hanging out in a hot city. steamboats were an affordable way to relax and enjoy the day. today, we still have passenger boats that mostly come from the ocean during the summer. they are also passenger ferries. if you go to beaver island and

lake michigan, you get a four hour ride on a boat. there is across lake michigan the badger, the last coal-fired passenger carrying steamboat in the united states. if you want a great ride and experience steamboat, you can still do it today. i think people forget how important the great lakes was to developing the middle of america, the heartland of america. when railroads finally reached in there, prior to the 1920's when automobiles could get people into small towns, if you wanted to travel and travel comfortably, the best way to go was on a steamship. because of that, the business men who ran those firms innovated in order to draw people. the innovated in the luxury in their boats, they innovated making comfort something people

could buy, innovated their engines, their advertising, they were many things tied up in the steamboat business and it was very important to the development of america as a whole and we forget that. the steamboat industry is lost to history. if we think about steamboats, very often, americans think about the beautiful steamboats on the mississippi river, which were essentially waning by the american civil war. they could think of the steamboats in his musical. they don't think about the beautiful coastal steamers on the east coast or the west coast but most particularly on the great lakes. it's here on the great lakes where much innovation happened. the largest paddle wheelers in the world were built on the great lakes. several of our vessels designed by people in the great lakes

ended up working on the east coast. it was an important part of the development of steamships, particularly passenger vessels, and i think that is something that has been lost and i hope my book will bring it back to people. >> we are steps from the thomas edison depot museum. one of the places c-span will be visiting in port huron for the literary scene. inside, we will see local author and historian cj gas need. >> the real impetus for writing the book came out of my interest in the rail history of the region. up to that point there hadn't been a great deal written on it , especially when it comes to

the interaction of the different railroads and growth in different communities in the region. region comprises five counties in this state. there is a little debate about that, but when the railroad first came into the county and into the region as a whole, most of the life was centered on the lake so the interior it self, if there were farms or early settlers there they were few and , far between. the first railroads into the region, particularly the one we are at now, the grand trunk when , it came up from detroit or made its connection here, economically it was tied to

with thenterests even not-too-distant lee fought war of 1812 breaking away, it was actually british business interest that financed that railroad to the point where the depots that survived were built to a british design. you go to ontario and other areas where basic depot design was used in the region, was an extremely important one.

the community with the grand trunk railway and later construction. clair river tunnel in the 1890's, not only continued immigration but it meant we were one of the first stops when it also fed many of the industries along the line that wouldn't have been here otherwise. places like that still exist, port huron, anchor, later on, auto light. all of those basically came to this region because of the connection with the railroad and the connection with the water. that double combo was unique for us. the fact you could pick one or two different things was a huge thing even to this day. for large industries, you need a

railroad presence and their freights in an expedited manner. there were several indices in the region that worked with the railroad and also that the railroad employed a large facility, the original shops were located to the north of us after they burned, they were relocated into porter township and were completely reconstructed and rebuilt because of world war i. we are a very large employer in the community. at one point in time, close to 3000 people worked there. agencies inother the railroad, the railroad car carriers of unique to our area that operated back and forth over different parts of time

were heavy employers and at one had probably awe good third of the community that could have tied their employment and their well-being to employment with the railroad. the location we are shooting in, it's actually a historic car. it was restored at the car shops of the railway, just to the north of us here. and that car shop burned in 1913. so there's very few surviving examples of cars that were actually built there. it is primarily built of wood and it is of the type that would have been around the at the time that thomas edison had as a boy. he spent much of his formative

years here and depot to the west of us was the depot that he worked out of as a boy. he spent the ages of roughly seven to 16 here. his early formative years were primarily spend here. edison's basic job description was he would walk around with a basket and had every in from fruit to small sandwiches and later on, his paper that he would sell. there was a separate village at a time tied to the military installation and he would then go ride the train down to detroit and hit all the stations along the way. downtime in between and would very often go to the

city library. if he had down time he was always constantly trying to learn some new and he definitely liked his routines. hisink that started even in youth. that downtime was something he cherished. he mentions it several times and the fact he was always kind of keeping and i and an ear out for what was going on around him i think really helped him move ahead. rail known as the poly and was a nickname that was used for the pontiac, oxford, and port

austin. it was north south of here that ran from -- to michigan. youas somewhat bucolic could say. it ran through very small communities but that is what made it in gearing. a lot of the crews that worked the train were known by the station agents and known by the individuals. to get quite a while there, what would now probably take you less than four hours to drive would take almost 16 back then. they served every little industry and every little green elevator. it was an important route at one point in time and really. the interior of the region. the connection to everyday life,

people just grew to understand it was going to be there and everyday things happened on the train. a woman was coming across from chicago, she had been pregnant begin to give birth of the train was going through the tunnel. life was conceived somewhere underneath the river. aboutare stories passengers bringing a collection together to get the mother and the child to the next location. there are several stories related to those types of things. the site we are at in the museum, you can't get away from looking above you. steelare two very large and concrete structures. one built in 1938 and the other

-85.t 1984 pretty important . their connection with the railroad, they were the next extension, if you will, of the role that the railroad initially played. when the railroad built the , traffic between increase greatly in the natural traffic flow lines that were created by the railroad were then eventually followed by the interstate and the need to be able to transport things easily, quickly and economically led to them, the construction of the two bridges. public when they look at the railroads today

often see them in a negative. things blocking them on the way to the busy life and its schedule and what have you. , there are as place just as important a role today as they did back 100 years ago. large commodities are still shipped most easily by rail. there's been a lot of discussion recently about the impact of coal and his decline here recently. obviously that is have a great effect but the container movement, particularly the connection of shipping containers moving from places like china and indonesia and elsewhere, railroads are very much a part of that. when you go to long beach, california for there are large shop shipping -- shipping

facilities, the railroads are large -- beside the container ships. with semirn work trucks and trucking companies. they are still a very important and vital part of the transportation network. both here locally and throughout the country. there are several things when i was writing this book that came to light that made things interesting. the connection with the titanic. i would say just the overall personal connection between a ots of these smaller communities and the role the railroad played. i think it was the thing that even several years after i would , thehat impact has waned

feeling of the individuals in those committees for those that work for the railroad and the role that the railroad played in the community is still very deep. part of the recent that so many of the pictures i have came to light was because they save those. i'm forever grateful and i thought it was part of my duty to make sure those survived as long as they could. it really helped in making the book a much larger and hopefully more interesting read. >> we are filming on the fourth floor of the minas of office center, or city hall. it is right on the st. clair river. probably the most eastern point of michigan. the city of port here on is a population of around 3000 people. which is a decrease. ago,e time many years

probably 50-60, it would've been closer to 40,000. as economic changes and industry changes, it has decreased over the years. probably havey we an assortment of all types of people. a little bit on the distressed side. we do have, because we are the county seat, we have a lot of the rentals and social services and things like that. we don't have a bit most stable population. it comes and goes. economically, probably not the highest income. it is a broad spectrum of lower tupper incomes. it is in that community live in. we have a whole lot of different things going on.

the unemployment rate in michigan is higher than the country and higher in this area. it has gone down. but it is not come down at the same, we are always a little higher than the rest of the county and rest of the state. and of course the country because michigan is traditionally higher. we have had a lot of improvements over the last couple of years. everybody suffered in 2008 when the economy tanked and we are all crawling out of that. i think it takes a little longer for us to crawl out of it. we have some wonderful things happening right here. i am proud of that. downtowner in the area, and love the downtowns failed, the malls are not doing so well. our downtown is really revitalize. we have a lot of new businesses downtown. a lot of new restaurants and bars and quaint stores.

no big department stores or anything like that. we are getting more loft apartments, something i would not have said years ago would happen but it has been a surge. we have so many that they have waiting lists and two separate contractors building more downtown. good because in those lost it is mostly younger professionals and that is what you are looking for to get the younger people to come back here and the child to come back here. that is what we have been working on. it does seem to be successful. right honey, a-- wonderful piece of property which is the ymca. it was sold to the city a few years ago and demolished and the property was made development ready. we have sold that piece of property to a developer. they will put high-rise condos there.

they not decided on the exact plan yet, we are still the plan. they should be started by the first of the year at the latest. probably at least 4-5 stories high. as bring a lot of people into town also. looking for redeveloping ourselves and reinventing ourselves as marketplace to come if you are younger and if you're looking for retirement and getting people to live in the downtown area has been very much a part of that. i think one of the key parts of our history, we're celebrating and have celebrated in 2007 our centennial. i don't think there's anyone particular story, but i'm proud of the lighthouse and the fact that people can visit and walk up to the top and look out. it was certainly back in the

day, you had shipping around this area and logging and things like that. but it is at today strong part of our heritage. connects us with ontario. 1938.as built in before that you had to take a ferry if you're going across. that is a cumbersome way to travel back and forth. commerce to get from canada to the united states is astronomical. a lot of it goes through port huron and a lot of people come from canada to port huron to shop. it is a big part of the success of the businesses in the area. it is very important for commerce that they have this bridge. that lasted until the 90's and in 1997, they opened the second part of the bridge.

you can still, they are packed both sides going back and forth. truck traffic is sometimes all the way across the bridge. you can tell that it is very much doing his job for the commerce. in the future port huron is only going to get better. i really do feel and see a lot of interest. a lot of interest from investors from the other side of the state. that is one of the reasons we ended with the refurbishment of what used to be the thomas edison and is now a doubletree. and restaurant combined. that was an investor from the west side of the state. hotel going downtown, investor from the west side of the state. i think we're getting more notice from other places. a lot of times people didn't know where it was and just post a small little town by the bridge. when you drive there. -- you drive through. we are getting a better

reputation that it is worth coming here. worth seeing our parks and beaches and what history we have and the people are friendly and we have nice places to go. i think we're going to have a resurgence even more than we have now of our downtown and other businesses coming in and investing in the community. i'm looking forward to good things happening. welcome to the city of port huron, michigan. book tv is visiting the city to learn a little bit more about it nonfiction literary culture. i'll next, we will visit st. clair county library where we will hear from the director about how the public library system works in michigan. standing inrrently the main floor of the main branch of the sinclair county library system. the main branch of the library system is located in port huron which is the county seat of sinclair county. we have a nice group of

libraries that are countywide. we have 11 branches. branch,nch, the main functions as the community help -- hub and the support service of the other branches in the county. we are close to the st. clair river and lake huron and the bluewater bridges. we have a wonderful opportunity by being in the downtown area and the county government campus and we see quite a few patrons who came to the library. we see 600 to 800 people a day. as you can see behind me, we are fairly busy on a regular basis. this building was built in the early 1860's after the sinclair county library system merged with the port huron library. we took on the function of

public library service for the county as well as for the city of port huron. originalfrom the building and this building was a little bit larger and more modern. we are public library so we try to meet as many interests as we can. understanding you can't meet everyone's interest. one of the nice things about the public library system is that we share resources with our branches. we also share resources across the state. if there is an item that a patron is looking for and we do not have it, we can request that from another library within the state. we can also requested from a library outside of the state. libraryhold here in the is general interest topics, entertainment, reading, we also have fiction of all kinds of genres.

nonfiction on many different topics. we also have a historical collection that we house in the michigan room where we had a lot of folks come in and to the genealogical research. the material is very interesting and one of the things that we are working on doing now is taking the material and digitizing it so we can make it available to a broader audience. our library system offers easily over 2000 programs a year. systemwide. we have everything from the clubs which are pretty traditional to clubs that might jong and wey mah have teams that come in and learn how to knit and other games. those are the untraditional gantry we also have computer classes for patrons.

we're the only community center that offers free basic computer classes and we have been doing this for over 15 years. we thought we would work ourselves out of a job but the community really loves their computer classes. programs on literacy. over programs have an element of literacy. a team program or eight children's program, they are doing things that reinforce things they are learning in school or things that the kids need to learn in order to be ready for school. in our thought program, we offer an opportunity to discuss topics of import whether that is both topics, whether that is ormunity event topics situations that are happening,

those folks can get together and that is what i've really seen this liber becoming is more of an opportunity to create and contribute to the community. we're no longer look at ourselves as a warehouse for books and hope that people come and want to continue to read print material. we do on a tradition and we do honor that tradition and we do still collect print materials and we want people to see is as a place where they can come and enjoy spending time with one another, meeting new people, having someone to share kind of likeand our third place in the community, you have your home, your work and where do you go for your entertainment? where do you go to learn something new to add to your knowledge? you come to the library.

the library system plays a role in the library world of the state of michigan. we have 11 branches that are across our county. we're the only county department that has the ability to reach the vast majority of our residents. but we have are, they are not individual autonomous branches here at main library. we do have wonderful teams of staff at each branch who know ther communities, they know reading and entertainment values , not values, likes and dislikes in the community. and we administer the basic business of doing library maince from the line -- library. we are one big team. we come together once a year to have a big staff event where we

learning andnd just being together. what that means for the community is that there is consistent library service across the county so if you are a book and you are from the downriver area and that branch does not particularly have that book, we can get that book for you very quickly within 24 hours from another branch. another thing that that does for us is we are able to have consistent policy inconsistent procedure so your excellent customer service that you receive in one branch you will see mirrored in another branch. one of the most surprising things that i find about the sinclair public library is that it is vibrant. there are people here who use the library and enjoy the library and are excited about

what we do in the community. on a personal net, i grew up at this time. i grew up in port huron. i went to school here, i went away to college but i brought my family back to port huron and one of the things i thought was so important was to get back to my community and doing so at the director of the library system, it is a joy and a pleasure to be here and to work with these wonderful people making those connections, building those relationships with other community agencies, working down some ofreak those barriers. that is a huge joy for me. think the viper system is doing, we are looking servicesbrary delivered to the community

today. we are looking towards the future and what library users will want and need for the future as well as helping to educate those folks who are, maybe don't have access to all the benefits that others may. we still do honor the traditions of library service of yesterday. buildwe are continuing to and renew our print collection and audiobook collections, we are also embracing the electronic collections. we have e-books, you magazines and we also have streaming media. we are introducing these things to the community and making them available for our residents and hoping that we continue to stay relevant for those folks. visiting the city

of port huron. next we speak with an author who shares the city's history through his book port huron, 1880-1950. standing inrrently front of the last known surviving structure of a military installation that was originally constructed in 1814 during the war of 1812. at the time, canada was the enemy, it is controlled. controlled. this structure was built in 1829 with other structures of similar design to replace the original stockade style or log cabin style building originally built. prior to the telephone and communications we know today, the postcard was one of the quickest ways to send small

pieces of information back and forth. the idea there was to keep a concise format, a greeting to let people know that you have arrived at a location and also as a remembrance of where you were. the name of my book is port from, postcards 1880's-1960. of ad it as a continuation project my father had wanted to do. my dad collected postcards of and its region for about 40 years. unfortunately he passed away before he was able to get the project finished here i guess you could say i help them all -- him. book, it ise of the

the largest occupation of torture on really fits within that time praying -- port huron really fits within that timeframe. period of largest growth. it is a fairly well documented period of time. one of the photographers, he was prolific and worked in a small window of time prior to 1912 in roughly from about 1905 to that period. it is known that he took close to 18,000 images, which if you understand what that took in that era, that is astounding. the postcards are marketed in a variety of forms. they're often the photographers themselves would have studios. south of hereo

and in ontario. you could purchase postcards directly from him. he also had several locations ,ithin hotels, train stations like today when you go to a church -- tourist attraction there a kiosk where you can pick up souvenirs. it was similar to that. lewis'images because of their clarity and the forethought that poseok to post people -- and understand the timeframe he was in, several of the images were ahead of the time in terms of how he took them. in many instances, there are the only known images of the subject matter that he took on those photos of. i can think of several great

lakes freighters, passenger boats that he took images of. one instance there is a freighter known as the cyprus. it was in water for three weeks. it was constructed and passed through and he took an image of it and there's only one other known image because it sank in lake superior and month later. out. things stand withistorical connections several of our local businesses as well were important. >> one of the more important wascts to the postcard era the development and change in transportation over time and you can actually see that through some of the images that i chose. the ship for instance, a means to travel that most of us don't even recognize today which would

which is what a very vital connection in our area. it is highlighted there. of time short period and took place mostly in this era. you see several images related mentaletcars within the -- middle of a generic town image. or out in the hinterlands. it is interesting when you look at some of these images, one of the things that really stands out is how people spend their leisure time, not unlike today, he will see people doing a lot of outdoor activities. , several images of people commuting -- canoeing. bicycles were popular. one the most important aspects of the images you will see is documenting how the area has changed.

throughon has gone several changes since that era. of 1960,e the ending even in the 50 years hence, the ,mages often depict buildings parts of the city that are no longer there. also, sort of a time and place that is very indicative of when the photo was taken or says now. it is fun and i had several people who have purchased the book tell me that they like to take the book and find out where the photo was taken and see how that has changed. these types of books are often, so much is driven by the image that some of the commentary gets or is not as emphasized as

much. diligently when i was giving background to the images to try and get folks a real chance to make that connection with today. reference whaten was there, what is there today. and then what made this image is significant to the history of the community. one of the things that tends to get lost when you're looking at several of these images is, what is conveyed on the backs of one of the front? because you're forced up a time or people were forced to write things in a very short and succinct format, it gives you an indication of what they thought was important.

many cases it is very different than what we feel is important to the. in some cases it is very similar. they tended to stick to, just the facts. they really believed that contain the most important but hewere important could see a real idea of what events what people, what were important in the daily windownd that kind of a is very often a tough thing for historians in particular to get an idea of. that is one thing in particular that i think the postcard era really hasn't able to document and ways that you may not have been able to document prior. our visit to port huron is a book tv exclusive and we showed

it today to introduce you to c-span cities tour. for five years we have traveled to u.s. cities bringing the book seem to our viewers. visits watch more of our at c-span.org/citiestour. >> as they want on the week, here's a quick look at what some members of congress are talking about on twitter today. as the congressional summer break continues. minnesota congressman rick nolan had this posting. everyone else took the stairs that virginia fire hall after meeting with iron range fire chief, i found a faster way. sliding down the fire pole. john mccain, a vietnam veteran and former pow was tweaking this, this weekend we celebrate national code talker day. we know not the whole code talkers a debt that can never be fully repaid.