tavis: good evening. from los angeles, i am tavis smiley. tonight, a conversation with benjamin barter about his new book, "if mayors ruled the world." then we will turn to a conversation with oscar and emmy nominated actress mary mcdonnell whose hit series major crimes wraps up its second season on tnt next week. we're glad you have joined us. those conversations coming up, right now.

>> and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. tavis: the argument that cities function better than their local governments is laid out in a well reasoned tone called "if mayors ruled the world." benjaminitten by barber. good to have you back on this program. >> so nice to be here.

story >> there was a big in the papers the other day, president obama had a meeting with newly elected mayors, the mayor of new york, a big meeting with mayors. mayors sometimes get the short tripped on what happens, and these mandates a often hand out to states. have you heard anything about what happened in that meeting the president had with these mayors? >> here's the interesting thing. 30 years ago, season were chasing washington to help them headline, was that dropdead, new york. it was not just about cities going to president obama and asking for help. i think it was about president obama looking to american cities to help them solve some of the national problems of

unemployment, inequality. cities are now helping washington solve problems, where 30 years ago cities were looking to washington. tavis: let's address the big if. if mayors ruled the world, and what? was if mayorsle ruled the world, why they should, and how they already do. interestingzens of associations around the world where mayors are already cooperating with one another in things like the climates change cities that are working on climate change. the most important institution nobody has ever heard of, but there is an organization of 3000 cities that work together globally. so mayors are already cooperating across borders and across nations to work together.

what also, they are proving themselves capable of solving locally problems that are also global problems. , we cleanedangeles up the port that provided about 40% of the toxic emissions. in new york, mayor bloomberg got a lot -- got rid of a lot of the old insulation in buildings. globalre mayors solving climate change problems with local solutions. so mayors are really not just governing their own cities but governing in a way that promises solutions for global problems as well. >> new gingrich made some news the other day when he essentially said that poverty is greatest in america's cities, and that most of the cities are run by democratic mayors. the politics notwithstanding, what do you make of it that if

mayors are doing such a good job that poverty is so concentrated in cities? gingrich,ys with mr. newt gingrich knows how to tell untruths with great eloquence. [laughter] that was great eloquence. >> this is another good example. one of the great myths is that a lot of lazy people of color are spending all the money of cities. it is exactly the op is it. cities produce 80% of the gross national product in the united states. a lot of the tax revenues go out for corncounties subsidies and roar a welfare. 65% of the counties with the tea party that have the biggest vote are the biggest welfare counties of america. it is simply a lie to say that cities are somehow dealing money from the countryside. cities are centers of creativity

and productivity. america are increasingly more independent, because it is not about partisan politics. they don't stand on principle and frees the government. a couple of months ago, the u.s. government closed down. schools,t close the the police, the fire, the hospitals. cities cannot be closed. it.rs know mayors have to get things done and solve problems. they are not democrats, they are not republicans, they are problem solvers. that is where newt gingrich really has got it wrong. tavis: give me some sense of how it is that cities are going to survive if what i am reading is correct, which is that the federal government is spending less money -- sending less money to the states.

exhibit a, detroit michigan. how do city survive if they are getting less support for the programs of everyday people? >> a really important question. very straightforward answer. americans live in cities. there are small cities in kansas, but they live in cities. city dwellers have to start voting their urban interest. never mind republican or democrat. the interest of cities is the interest of nations. if urban citizens both their interest the national government will be giving them back the resources. it is only because the american government is in the hands of a minority right now that the urban minority is not being well served. worldwide, the majority are in cities, and if we follow democratic practices, in time that means national governments will be controlled by urban majorities, and the national

government will work with, not against, cities to get the job done. tavis: detroit, now that we know the bankruptcy is official, but there are other cities that are teetering on being detroit. armed big their cities and small cities that maybe the next detroit. chicago comes to mind immediately. give me some sense of what happened in detroit and how we keep other cities from going the same route. very important example. the bankruptcy of cities locally -- it is a spreading problem for every big city. a great productive city like l.a. nonetheless follows the track of other cities that have been bankrupt. let's take detroit. that is a supreme example. detroit's boundaries were drawn

in the 19th century. downtown detroit was really drawn with boundaries from 150 years ago. since 1960, detroit has gone from 2 million to 700 thousand people. two thirds of the population gone. a lot of the schools gone. a lot of abandoned things. detroit looks like a disaster area. what people don't know is, downtown detroit, the greater detroit metropolitan region includes 10 counties around detroit. those 10 counties during the same time when detroit went from 2,700,000 has gone from 3 million to 5 million population. leftof the industry that downtown detroit resettled in the counties around detroit. if you look at the five top economic new economy sectors in 10 counties around

detroit are among the top five. greater troit is flourishing. the detroit from the 19th century, bound by these ancient, antiquarian and observe boundaries -- we have to readjust. we have to talk about cities in terms of metropolitan regions. we have to redefine our cities in terms of the demographics and economics of the 21st century. that is also a political battle. tavis: michael bloomberg is going out as a three term mayor of new york city. expectation in new york city that de blasio would do something about not just quality-of-life issues that bloomberg did a pretty good job on by and large, but on the issues of poverty and disenfranchisement and class. give me some sense of what you think he might be able to do , and is what he can accomplish their replicable around the country?

>> you have been focusing for years now on issues of harvard he. the fact is -- on issues of poverty. it remains dangerous and insidious in our cities. the inequalities of wealth reappear in cities in drastic form. there is a new inequalities that is really dangerous. affordable housing -- under bloomberg, the mayor did a good job of doing all kinds of real estate development, but not enough affordable housing. or 50,000 damage living in homeless shelters that are supposed to be temporary because there is no affordable housing. how do we tell the real estate agent, you can build your high-rises but

you also have to build affordable housing. called>> his new book is "if mayors ruled the world." they say all politics is local. this is a new one from benjamin barber. good to see you, and congratulations. coming up, actress mary mcdonnell. oscar and emmy nominated actress mary mcdonnell has an impressive array of movie credits to her career, including dances with wolves. as she will be linked ydor.in rade let's look at a clip from the series now wrapping up its second season. ago, homeless,

abandoned, disappeared off the streets of los angeles. the detective investigating the disappearance managed to alarm the suspect, who in turn contacted a lawyer specializing in sex crimes. >> if the suspect you are referring to is the material thatss in your withholding name, you had better give it to us right now. >> did i imply that i knew this person's identity? no. tavis: this has to be the smoothest spinoff in the history of television. guys made this so smooth. >> it is an unusual situation in

the sense that most of the characters came along and we are still in the same location and basically the same story. a lot of spinoffs go into a new setting, they take one character and put them into a different we took one character and put her into a different professional position inside of it. we were able to move it forward in a more organic manner than other spinoffs. and it was highly successful, so we are really thrilled. also because iul think it doesn't feel to me and other fans like it is in the closer." "the >> he wrote it into a new form and he wrote it gracefully and organically. one of the things we were all very committed to was not acting to the audience are trying to push the audience into feeling one way or another about it, but

hopefully allow them to get used format, and all those beloved characters were still there. there was real attachment, and the fans stuck and it is growing. on youret me pick up word beloved, because you were anything but beloved in "the closer." speaking of a smooth spinoff, you have done a 180 here. you were not beloved in "the closer," and now you play a character that is more likable. >> she is much more able to be herself, the way i look at it. literally, i was hired to come in and do three episodes to be the antagonist and really drive her crazy. tavis: and you did it very well. >> i had a blast once i got used to it.

where is the power in not being liked? where is the power in wanting to be separate from people? once i understood where that power was, i loved it. when they presented me with this new idea, how do you take a person everyone loves to hate and put them at the center as the protagonist? i didn't understand quite how it would happen. and thetalked about it idea was that we would unfold a woman to an audience that saw , and we do make all kinds of judgments about people. we make pre-judgments, we see them in one capacity and we think we know them. so this has been a kind of unfolding of a woman. moment agosaid a that you had to discover what the power wasn't playing a character that is so unlikable. tell me more about what you

discovered in that regard. >> what i discovered is that for me, as an actress, one of the most essential things that i wantto know is what do i for and from the people around me in the story? what is my offering, and what is my need? quite often the need within a human being is to be loved, liked, to be connected to. , whenever i try to discover what she wanted, that would not work. so i would feel nervous or insecure. what i discovered pretty early on, this was even in working by myself with the script, is that her need was to have them not get comfortable with her. she was the internal affairs person. she did not want him to like her. she did not want them to try to

seduce her into liking them. she wanted distance. she didn't care. the less they, liked her, the better her job went. and once i got the power of the distance, the power i felt in being distant, and that i understood that that made her do her job more correctly. then i was fine. something that made me think about a quick personal story. l career started here in eight working for tom bradley, the late, great mayor of the city. when you work for the mayor, your job is to be like -- the mayor has to be liked to be reelected. him likableto make to people. then after working for him in number of years i went off on my own and started doing political commentary. overnight, i went from being liked to being disliked. not everyone agreed with what i

had to say in my political commentary. that leads me to ask how difficult it was for you, not being a person who wants to be disliked. do you recall making that transition to play a character that was really not likable? >> it was really not until i understood the power in it. it was odd for me to be on a set where people didn't want to speak to me. [laughter] familyfrom a big irish where we have fun and we sing and have a lot of gestures. men are usually nice to me. suddenly someone said cut, and everybody would leave. where is everybody going? maybe they are going out to dinner. well, where, what time? tavis: how did the fans treat you in the street? >> the fans were great. i was on the new york state

thruway and just had a meeting about a project. i was driving back through the ton and i thought, i've got get off, it's raining too hard. i went to this little store and stop there and got something to eat. when i was coming back, i had my ticket and she opened the window and said, oh, my god, i hate you, i hate you. so we had this wonderful everction and she said since you came on the show, i love you so much. it was absolutely delightful. i thought, this is really wonderful for me. it is wonderful for me to understand that there are times in life when your job and the excellence of your job requires her to not be -- have the comfort zone of being popular. do you know what i mean? tavis: i know full well what

that feels like. it's a process. i take your point, though, when you areimes doing your job, which is to get at the truth, the truth is often times unsettling. it is uncomfortable. it doesn't always make you the most likable. but at the end of the day, even when people don't want to hear it, they need to hear it, and that got to come to terms with it. value thathere has a ought to be unassailable. >> i think in a general sense, the idea of getting comfortable with the truth is uncomfortable. even if it doesn't affect alienate you from

what you're used to. to be growing into more authenticity instead of less can sometimes be unsettling with the self, because the authentic self is not separate, but the other self. tavis: it makes sense to me. .t must feel good >> it feels great. sometimes in a career, and i'm sure you have had this, you don't really have your eye on a particular prize. what you have is your heart in a particular place and your

creativity is interested in certain values, and your mind is interested in certain stories. i have found throughout my career, and it has been a long one now, if i proceeded that way with my mind and heart, looking for stories, and the career path took care of itself. but every try -- every time i try to aim for something, like ,he big part or the next award whatever it is, when i try to aim into those values, it doesn't necessarily work. tavis: i read several years ago god laughs, ord the universe laughs. i could talk to you for hours, but my time is up. let me close by saying this. this is a long way from selling vacuum cleaners, isn't it? [laughter]

>> oh, my gosh, yes. one of my many jobs back in new york when i was in awe-off broadway, i answered an ad in the paper for a fuller brush saleswoman. i had hair that was down to my waist at the time, so they figured i would be a good hairbrush girl. my territory was rockefeller center. i would knock door to door. i would come in with my fuller brush catalog and invariably have coffee. i got a date or two out of it. [laughter] i sold so many hairbrushes it was ridiculous. sale ontmas, they had a these little hand vacuum cleaners, and i've taught a whole bunch for my family. have always been terrible at math, so i miscalculated. when i got a job in a lay and i

gave my notice that fuller rush, they handed me an inflow -- and in below with all the money that i owed him. and he took mercy on me said you don't have to pay us, good luck in your career. tavis: and it worked out. >> but that was my career as a fuller brush salesman. you are wearing that dress and those manolo blahnik shoes look great. can i say that? [laughter] mary mcdonnell, come back any time. that's our show for tonight. thanks for watching. until next time, keep the faith. >> for more information on today's show, visit tavis smiley at pbs.org. tavis: hi, i'm tavis smiley. join me next time for a conversation with graham nash about his memoir.

that is next time. we will see you then. >> and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> be more.

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