measures which they had to unwind when the country ran into an economic crisis two years later. hollande i think knows very well that he can't do that kind of thing. what he is pro posing -- proposing when you dig deep and not that-- some of his proposals like a 75% marginal tax on anybody earning more than a million euros is certainly raises the eyebrows. but in france, i have to say, it's not that radical. it's not that unpopular. in fact, it's proved quite a popular proposal during the election campaign. so i think some of the things that hollande has proposed which are being portrayed as very left wing are not as leftist as they might seem when you get up close. take, for example, his proposal to reverse some of the pension reforms of mr. sarkozy. what he is basically saying is he is going to allow some people to retire at 60 who had already worked from the age of 18 and built up all their contributions. i think he's going to inevitably be in the center.

jim is right that he has to take care of his left support before, running you up to the legislative elections in june am but i think he's already been sending signals, perhaps not strong enough to really get the message across but he has been sending signals that he's going to look after the public finances. we don't yet know the details of how he's going to do it in terms of spending cuts. and that is going to be an october stack el for him when he tells people how he is going to do that because that go toing to hurtment but i think this man knows perfectly well, what the constraints are and that's why he needs to get from the other european leaders a package of growth measures so can come home and say look, i've got these measures that sarkozy never got from angela merkel in germany. now the other side of that coin is we still have to bite the bullet. >> francois hollande is basically someone with little government experience and actually no government experience apart from being an advisor to francois mitterrand, a very young advisor after the 1981

victoriment and then he became a member of the french parliament and then he held the socialist party, he was chairman of the socialist party for ten years, about ten years. so he has been depicted as an and its true the on claim to fame, he doesn't have much international experience either, except for his links with the german socialists or other parties in the socialist international. >> yeah, hollande is an interesting guy, though. because he's often typed as a kind of weak, kind of the french marshmallow type, and the french satirical puppet shows him as a giggley vague guy. they had him passing out from dieting on a program last year because he was on this diet. and yet everyone i talk to in paris who knows him say he is an extremely intelligent and able guy with a hard-core within him. that there is a role discrepancy between the image that he projects of mildness, and the reality of

the man. and let's remember too, charlie, that though this is the first socialist president in a long time there have been socialist governments right along. things like the 35 hours for instance, were produced by socialist governments under right wing presidents. so i tend to think that the changes will be much less radical than people desire or fear, depending. >> nicolas sarkozy announced that he will not take part in politics any more. he will certainly not take part in this campaign. i think you have to take him at his word. he's clearly more interested now in returning to his career as a lawyer. and perhaps making a lot of money. something he suggested in the past. so it leaves french politics like politics in many countries today, very fluid, very much at the mercy of growing resentments, growing frustrations, perhaps vulnerable as the la pen vote suggests to some more populism than we've seen for a while in france. but at the same time,

francois hollande does have a background that could be very helpful in the sense that he has run the party machinery. the socialist party machinery for nearly 20 years now. he knows where the levers of party politics are. and perhaps he can bring a discipline to the socialists that will translate into better news for france. >> rose: an a conversation rohred before the french elections with allison smale, executive editor of the international herald tribune. >> we are already in places where even five years ago we couldn't have imagined ourselves. so it changes the whole relationship of the human being to the human being surroundings. and then yet i will do something quite often, marvelous high speed train speeding somewhere in france or across the continent in europe and i was traveling the other day to basil, early morning, beautiful sunrise over a landscape in you are rural france. and there was smoke coming

out of every chimney in this village. and houses were old stone. and i just thought to myself, i wonder how many people there are going to get on the internet today. >> rose: we conclude this evening with cost rick kennedy on a if you book of joe dimaggio called 56. joe dipgaio and the last magic number in sports. >> one thing was almost again quus about imhad. he knew about his image. and he knew how to take care of joe dimaggio as an idea as much as joe dimaggio in person. >> as a brand. >> as a brand, that's right. sow only did a couple of advertising, famously mr. coffee and bow ree saving banks, one or two others. and a big thing that happened, charlie, was in 1969 maker-- major league baseball had an event where they would name the greatest living player in each position. and the night want on, almost at the end of the night and he said the greatest living right fielder and they brought up willie mayes. and he got up and said i only played right field twice in my life. and everybody realized the

greatest living centerfielder is going to be joe dimaggio and he was named greatest living centerfielder and greatest living ballplayer at that event. and incidentally, it was said then, argly-- largely in addition to everything else he did. he was an mvp and played in ten world series but the hitting stroke was sort of what put him over the edge. and so that was 1969. he lived another 30 years and he wore that crown, greatest living ballplayer. he loved to be introduced as the greatest living ballplayer and fit eagerly into that role. >> he was only 26 years old. we think of him as this fully formed icon as he came into our consciousness having had songs about him on the radio, and of course married marilyn monroe and all of this. he was a living icon. and at this time, he is a 26-year-old kid. he was a baseball star but people didn't know him before this. i mean people in new york and san francisco southern did but throughout the course of his hitting streak it became partly because of the time we were in, just before world war ii, and

sort of fragile summer. it became a really captivating thing throughout the country. and suddenly your grandmother was saying hey, did joe get a hit tote. >> rose: the french election, european challenges, and a magical record in sports. when we continue. >> funding for charlie rose was provided by the following:

captioning sponsored by rose communications from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. >> rose: france elected francois hollande the first socialist president in 17 years on sunday. his supporters celebrated outside the bastille in a scene marking the resurgence of the left it was a vote against incumbent nicolas sarkozy and against austerity. the new president of the republic has vowed to demand growth, jobs and prosperity from europe. he promises a tax on the rich and spending increases at home.

but as eurozone descends deeper into crisis, hollande will face steep challenges in his effort to revive france's faltering economy. joining me from washington jim hoaglund of "the washington post," justin vaisse from the brookings institution, and from paris, hugh carnegie of "the financial times" with me here in new york, adam gopnik of the new yorker. let me go first to paris. tell me, hugh, why did this result happen? >>. >> the first reason was that mr. sar-- sarkozy was an unupon lar president, and he played on that he knew that it was his biggest asset. and he presented himself as a change of style, somebody as he put it would be a normal president, the french seem to crave that after five volatile years, mr. sar cos did-- sarkozy, that was reason number one. the second reason i think you referred to was the general climate about the economic situation in france and in europe as a whole. mr. hollande had made a play,

you if you like about the need for growth to match the austerity which has been the focus, the german lead austerity that has been the focus in europe for the last couple of years as europe has grappled with the sovereign debt crisis. and theres with a strong feeling, i think, amongst many people in france by was showing partly on the extreme left by the performance of the extreme left parties, and especially on the extreme right by the performance of the national front party, a great disquiet and a great discomfort with the economic situation and this policy of austerity. so he played on that. but that's going to leave him with some issues because mr. hollande himself is committed to fiscal consolidation in france just like the other countries. he's not actually questioning the need to reduce france's debt and take control of the public finances here. and he's going to have to reconcile that with the expectations he's now raised that he can persuade the rest of europe to produce some measures which will generate growth.

>> rose: jim hoaglund, is it a pan date? >> not really, charlie. it's a vote against sarkozy on the firsthand. it's also a vote against the threat of austerity. because there is no way you can describe the policies that nicolas sarkozy followed for the last few years as austerity. there's a feeling of fat agency. fat egg-- fat agency with sarkozy personally, but also of this economic situation which has produced rising unemployment, ten straight months, unemployment has increased in france. and i think that was the final blow for sarkozy's presidency. >> rose: why did they dislike him so much? was it personality or policy. >> very much so-- not policy. it's hard to actually describe the coherent policy that sarkozy followed. i think they resented his not following through on promises. he made a number of strong o initiatives that then he allowed to go nowhere.

and i think people became tired of that. but they also became tired of him being constantly in their face. with his marriage, collapsing, with a second marriage very glitzy affair. at the long end of the day, the french said enough. >> rose: at the beginning, adam, when sarkozy began and he appointed members of the socialist party, a foreign minister and others, bernard kushner was his foreign minister and others, he seemed to want to do something big. >> he seemed to have a reformist project for france. it was very ambitious. and even if you weren't politically on his side in some way, it was hard not to root for him a little bit. it was very weird what happened. he got typed very quickly. you know, the first night he was elected president he wasn't to a bad expensive restaurant on the champ delease a, and that teamed to be remember in duck soup when groucho heared upstart and he goes crazy that

seemed to have that affect on the french population. i can't tell you how many people were talking about that dinner, the time he spent on a rich man's yacht, that whole president bling bling thing which he tried very hard to turn around for the next four and a half years and simp loly couldn't do. the marriage as jim was saying affected it, as i wrote last week in the new yorker. people will forgive a short man with a beautiful wife if he seems sufficiently surprised. but not if he seems to be showing her off all the time. and people just did not like that. you know, the presidency of the fifth republic is the role for a monarch. that is what it was designed tore, made for de gaulle, inhabited by mitterrand and sarkozy was just too hypoactive a guy to be taken seriously as the king of france. >> rose: where would you be chirac in that. >> he was a very effective king of the sleepy kind. he mastered the monarchical role of being above the battle but never very much participated in the battle. >> so justin tell white house francois holland is. >> francois hollande, he's

basically someone who has little government experience, and actually no government experience apart from being an advisor to francois mitterrand, a very young advisor after the 1981 victory. and then he became a member of the french parliament. and then he held the socialist party, he was chairman of the socialist party for ten years, about ten years. so he's been depicted as a an-- and it's true that it's only claim to fame is precisely this role for the socialist party. he doesn't have much international experience either, except for his links with the german socialists or other parties in the socialist international. >> rose: many people i have met today have said to me bet me. he will be like mitterrand and move to the center. jim? >> he will not be able to move to the center in the first month of his administration because they still have the legislative elections in june.

at which the socialists clearly want to establish a majority so they can form the government. so he is condemned to stick with his leftist program at least until then. but i do think the mitterrand example is very much on people's minds. because mitterrand, francois mitterrand eventually proved after about 18 months of very cay os-- chaotic conditions to be a good president and a very faithful ally to the united states. now hollande is an unknown quantity for the united states. obama actually weighed into the french campaign on the side of sarkozy, as did angela merkel of germany, as did david cameron of britain. now the timing now suggests that the nato summit may 20th, 21st in chicago will be a key moment for these two presidents to try to come together and find some common ground. president obama gave what i thought was a very effective speech from cab you will,

afghanistan, last week in which he laid out this country's concern, fatigue with that war, and the fact that we will remain engaged but at much less cost. this gives francois-- sorry, francois hollande the chance to come here and to begin to find some common ground with the american president. which doesn't exist for the moment. >> rose: if he, hugh, makes war on the rich, makes war on the financial sector, can he pull it off. and will it work? >> well, i think we have to be careful not to exaggerate how left wing hollande is. in fact, i don't think we're going to see a repeat of what happened in 1981 when mitterrand, after all, launched a whole program of nationalization and really did take some radical measures which then they it had to unwind when the country ran into an economic crisis two years later. hollande, i think, knows very well that he can't do that kind of thing. what he is proposing, when you really dig deep and not

that, that some his proposals like a 75% marginal tax on anybody earning more than a million euros certainly raises the eyebrows. but in france, i have to say, it's not that radical. it's not that uno popular. in fact, it's proved quite a popular proposal during the election campaign. so i think some of the things that hollande has proposed which are being portrayed as very left wing and not as leftist as they might seem when you get up close, take, for example, his proposal to reverse some of the pension reforms of mr. sarkozy. what he's basically saying is he is going to allow some people to retire at 60 who had already worked from the age of 18 and built up all their contributions. i think he's going to inevitably be in the center, jim is right that he has to take care of his left support before they are running up to the legislative elections in june. but i think he's already been sending signals perhaps not strong enough to really

get the message across but he has been sending signals that he's going to look after the public finances. we don't yet know the details of how he ising to do it in terms of spending cuts and that's going to be an obstacle for him when he tells people how he is going to do that because that's going to hurtment but i think this man knows what the constraints are. and that's why he needs to get from the other european leaders a package of growth measures so he can come home and say look, i've got these measures that sarkozy never got from angela merkel in germany. now the other side of that coin is we still have to bite the bullet. >> rose: someone on his staff said the first 45 days will be crucial. that they really do have to prove themselves in the first 45 days. >> yeah, i think that's true. i think that's what sar kozeau didn't do, in fact, successfully. hollande is an interesting guy, though. because he's often typed as a kind of weak, you know, kind of the french marshmallow type. and the french satirical puppet show always shows him as a giggley vague guy.

they had him passing out from dieting last year, yet everyone i talked to in paris who knows him say he is an extromly intelligent, and able guy with a hard-core within him. that there is a real discrepancy between the image that he projects of mildness, and the reality of the man. and let's remember too, charlie, that though this is the first socialist president in a long time, there have been socialist governments right along. things like the 35 hours, for instance, were produced by socialist governments under right wing presidents. so i tend to think that the changes will be much less radical than people desire or fear, depending. >> rose: who do we expect to serve with him? who might be his prime minister? who might be his foreign minister. >> various names are put forward. i suspect that people in france know better than i. >> rose: okay, justin who might be his foreign minister not that you are in france, i mean who are the people that are closest to him that will expect to see, who, will it be a team of rivals. will it be something else? >> no o, you know, the interesting thing about the election is that he doesn't

owe very much of his victory to the extreme left. the extreme left candidate only reached this appointing 11.5 whereas he was expected to be higher. so he is pretty much his own man and he has said clearly that he would pick socialists and that he would pick people close to him. so that he could keep it sort of tight team. and jean, the president of the french socialist group is rumored to be the front-runner for the prime minister job which will be announced only when hollande is invested with power. the former prime minister of francois mitterrand is front-runner for the-- the-- who has been director of campaign is also slate ford a major job. and then remember that one of his promises is to get parity in the cabinet. so we'll probably see people like elizabeth gigou and many other women have very important jobs.

>> rose: how about segolene royal? >> she probably won't have a prominent job. >> rose: but she did endorse him. she did endorse him. >> she did. and one thing that she might get is to be the leader of the socialist group at the national assembly which means that she would get to on the president of the national assembly which is quite an important function. apparently that is a dole that is in the works. >> we should explain, charmie, that the reason there are smiles is that segolene royal was their partner, they have four children together. one of their sons was interviewed last night, very movingly on french television. >> rose: and said. >> and you know, said well done, dad. but it's odd to have been the child of two candidates. >> rose: and he has another lady in his life now. >> yes, he has another. >> rose: former journalist. >> very distinguished journalist who will take over. but what i think, the point is that all of the people were talking about, have been in politics. have been at the centre of french government for a very long time. >> rose: jim, so how does this change the picture of

french politics? either looking at what la pene achieved what happened on the left what this victory, where does this leave sarkozy's party? >> well, in disarray at this point. the so-called elephants, the real big figures in the party will now have to come together to figure out where this party goes now. i think they're very much in the same condition as the republican party has been for a while. in trying to find a new identify for the party. nicholas sarkozy announced that he will not take part in politics any more. will certainly not take part in this campaign. i think you have to take him at his word. he's clearly more interested now in returning to his career as a lawyer. and perhaps making a lot of money, something he suggested in the past. so it leaves french politics like politics in many countries today, very fluid, very much at the mertsee of

growing resentments, growing frustrations, perhaps vulnerable as the la pene vote suggests to some more populism than we have seen for a while in france. but at the same time, francois hollande does have a background that could be very help envelope the sense that he has run its socialist machinery for nearly 20 years now he knows are the party moll particulars are now and perhaps he can bring a difference that will translate into better news for flanges. >> who does he know in the united states, hollande. >> not many people as far as i can tell. he spent a little time here studying at one point but he's to the been here. he wanted to come to washington. the white house was very slow, in fact.e, and therefore mr. hollande decided not to am come he sent a few emissaries.

the question you asked before is a key one. without does he appoint now. will he appoint people like fabous, elizabeth gigou who are known in washington, and who are considered to be safe hands. that's going to be one of the first important statements that it takes by the appointment of the people. and the second thing to watch is whether or not he becomes as most presidents do, seduced by the appeal of foreign affairs. so far he has given every indication that he will concentrate a lot on the nitty-gritty of governance in france. and not become a monarch and not become wrapped up in wars and foreign policy. he wants to work on the economy. we'll see if he can stick to that resolve. sometimes you don't have a choice. you get drawn into it because you have, because the nature of the office. not because you just find it more interesting and you

have more power than you do sometimes over domestic affairs. >> but you know, charlie, that's right. it's been interesting to watch francois hollande during the campaign talk about one foreign policy problem that seems to loom large in his mind, which is miley. there's been a koups deda deday-- coup dethat, really a territorial disintgation there, he is actually ahead of other people in realizing this is a serious problem in the region of africa and need to be paid attention to. but it also reflects a fairly narrow french perspective on world politics. both hugh and justin, why don't you bring in on this. this idea of what is france's place today in the world. >> well, nicolas sarkozy definitely had a view that frances place in the world was in the front rank. he of course lead the nato intervention in i will libya last year. and he saw himself very much as somebody who was projecting france as a member of the security

council as one of the world's lead pog we ares. and that's a seductive self-view of france which i think resonates. so i think hollande will be a little bit more measured. you mentioned the nato summit. he is, of course, pledged to pull france's combat troops out of afghanistan by the end of this year which is at least a year ahead of the previous schedule. and so that suggests that he is perhaps a little bit less ambitious than mr. sarkozy and that's going to be something in chicago which will have to be sorted out with his partners. i think his concentration is going to have to be so heavily on the french economy and on the european situation that he may be less expansive, if you like, in foreign policy terms than mr. sarkozy. >> can you say, justin, that hollande believes looking at the campaign and looking at whatever we foe about him, because he had wanted to be president last time out, and

his wife segolene, not wife but partner at that time got the nomination of the socialist party. he's a strong central state guy. he's a guy who believes in the state. >> yes, i think that's a fair statement. i, when i think of francois hold ande i think of two models perhaps, one is francois mitterrand, you remember that in '81, francois mitterrand who had communist ministers in his cabinet to the great furror of washington who sent george h.w. bush and the vice president to make sure that things will continue, he basically affirmed the continuity of french foreign policy and that's when the phrase, the mitterrand de gaulle consensus was forged. that is to say the idea of a very strong continuity in french foreign policy and indeed, i think, that's exactly the kind of continuity that hollande has pledged. to mitterrand is one important figure model. the other one, i think, is

jack daleure and that brings us back to the question of the euro crisis. he was a minister for mitterrand in the '80s. and he was the one advocating staying, sticking with the european monitor system in '83 when mitterrand did a sort of u-turn in his policies, in his economic policies which were not working. and in order to stick with germany and stick with the european community at the time, he advocated austerity and rigor. and then it's the same dulore who became president of the your mean commission between '85 and '95 and who sort of presided over a jump in integration, especially the common market, and was one of the founding fathers of modern europe. and i think this figure is important because hollande was a protege of jack dulore so that i think can give you a hine of things to come in terms of continuity but also if terms of his european

engagement. >> rose: last word to you. >> jack was a passioned european. i think the key question here, charlie, is about franco german questions. since 1870 french-german relations have been the driving force in europe towards catastrophe, through two wars, and through prosperity, since the end of the second world war. that relationship, what some people used to call a french jockie on a german horse, the idea of the alliance between france and germany is central to the whole idea of european identity. >> rose: so that means that the meeting between merkel and hold and-- hollande assumes even greater importance. >> i think so i think that that more than anything else is the most telling relationship that he has to consider forge. and that's where the story will be told. >> when does he take office? >> may 15th, i believe is the date. >> the transition is reasonably quick, isn't it. >> yeah, not like ours, yes. >> thank you, adam, thank you, jim, thank you very much, justin, thank you from paris, hugh, carnegie, thank you all. it will be fun to watch.

we'll be back in a moment. stay with us. >> allison mail is here, the executive editor of the international herald tribune, the global edition of "the new york times". the first woman to lead the daily operations of the newspaper since it was founded in 1887. a former foreign correspondent she covered the fall of communism across eastern europe in 1989, and the wars in the balkans in the 1990s. she joined the times in 1998 and was named to her current post in 2008. i am pleased to have her here at this table. well swom-- welcome. >> thank you. >> rose: let me turn to the economic crisis. >> yes. >> rose: what is the sense in europe about this crisis and whether there is the political will and the institutional will. >> well. >> rose: to deal with the hard reality. >> i think that there definitely is a great deal of thought going into how can we deal with the hard reality. but we can't, what the u.s.

government can do is go to the market and has an almost infinite ability to sort of borrow more money from the market and issue u.s. treasury bond os. that option is not available to european leaders. so they can't stimulate their way to growth. it's interesting, mario draggy, the head of the european central bank gave a very interesting position on how we do need to do both at the same time, austerity and growth. i think angela merkel would agree with thatment maybe she wouldn't call it quite these things. i mean she objects to the idea that there is a backlash against use ferrit ferrity-- austerity or to the idea that this is how, you know, all ordered from berlin. i think call it what you will. everybody is trying to think very hard. what is the place of europe in the 21st century. how does it manage to project its soft power, does it need to project hard

power. there was a lot of you know, we did a marvelous job in libya but now when you really look at the nato operation in lib ya, we couldn't possibly have done it without the americans. and i think nato for a long, long time will be dependent on the u.s. so it's important to keep the united states within the european sphere, if we have such a crisis that it affects the u.s. presidential election and indeed the u.s. economy, that will not make america very well disposed towards maintaining a strong alliance with europe. but as you know very well, charlie, because he spend time in europe, and you study its politics, this is not a yes-no, black-white sort of proposition. in order to make the european union work which i do think is an admirable institution in the sense of bringing together 27 nations that have fought goodness knows how many wars with each other, into this peaceful, huge trading block, of 450 million people,

and inevitably it is governed in shades of gray. because you have to make compromise all along the way. the markets don't like the language of primes. and anglo sacksons as we're called by continental europeans lumping the brits and the americans together, you know, prefer yes and no as well. but i do think that there is, it's difficult to translate the sense of the good it brings by working, other than actually live on the ground or watching, i covered a lot of eastern europe as you noted. and just the idea that now those countries which when i was growing were up shut off behind the iron curtain and caught in this terrible system where you couldn't really prosper and you couldn't tell the truth. and all sorts of things that we forget now. they have really prospered since joining the european union. and yes, there are difficulties. there were 90,000 people on the streets in prague.

something seen very rarely since the velvet revolution. you know, but it's not really europe or austerity that they are so worried about. a government which is corrupt. and or which they believe to be corrupt. and just sort of general wheeler dealering. plus this uncertainty in the european's face and the fact that, you know, their economy is to the growing as fast as it had. but compared to what the situation was 25 years ago, this is tremendous progress. and i think it's difficult to remember that sometimes, that it's important to remember it. >> what is the challenge for you as editor? >> well, i think what i like to say in setting out what we present to our readers on a daily basis, i like to call it the conversational menu for the global dinner party. and what i like to think we do and what we have done for

125 years is, and it started life as the new york herald. >> right. >> rose: as we have just been recalling because we pulled up the coverage 100 years ago of the titanic disaster. and of course james gordon bennett who founded the paper and was the scion of the herald publishing family here in new york, he knew his passenger shipping list very, very well because those were basically his leaders. and he scoured the list of the carpathia, the ship that was sent to pick up people who had survived the disaster. and he saw the name of a young woman there who they had written a profile about in 9 paris edition of the new york herald previously. so he telegraphed her. and she had never written a word. and she interviewed all these survivors and then when they were brought back to new york, she raced to the herald offices here and wrote tons more wonderful stories. and became the participate's first society editor. and she was great friends

with general pershing and had lots of scoops during world war one. >> black jack pershing. >> yes. but what's interesting about that is just it shows you how woven into the fabric of sort of transatlantic conversation the herald was. i mean that was its origin. james gordon bennett looked and saw how many americans were coming to paris to buy the clothes, to buy the art, to live the life. and realized they need news from their home country. and they need news about their new place, europe, in a language they can understand which is english. now i mean, those americans then were the global class now. and i think we like to think that we're having, we're hosting this conversation. i like to think of it as taking place around a dinner party table just because the global dinner party can be happening anywhere. >> rose: it must be a great job to be a be an editor of a newspaper that has such an

elite readership around the world i'm very lucky. >> rose: i'm always looking at whether the big ideas that are happening right in front of our eyes, what is sort of the reshaping of the world, what is the new world order, which is a terrible word but define was is going on. the rise of the east and what it means and where, and so you see a thousand books about the decline of america. but it seems to me the seasons people believe that the united states, and especially even more so has a real opportunity to, in a sense, play a different role but an equally important role, that's number one. number two, it is to me you know looking at global economics and the players who would functioning in that world were just similar to the new world order. and three, it is the idea of how digital media is having an influence not just on our business but also on our culture and also on our politics. >> uh-huh. >> rose: four t is science, and the continuing impact science is having on us. >> yeah. i think it's very difficult for nonscientists to grasp how many advances have been

made by science. >> rose: unbelievable. >> the things that they can now know are just so beyond any imagination. >> rose: and they're telling us things about what it means to be human, you know. why we are the way we are. >> uh-huh. >> rose: in part. >> yeah, and then you wonder, sort of so does that ever unlock the final mystery. >> rose: yes. >> of how did we get here. i mean with such a complex brain as one little part of our body, i mean very important part, obviously, but if we can know all these things, how did that happen? how did that evolve. and you really do get down to you know, the bake question, where do we come from. but i do think that this very fast reordering of the world or so it seems to us, is fascinating because we talk about digital media but it's really, it's science and technology. >> rose: yes. that's driving the. >> that's driving it. and we are already in places

where even five years ago we couldn't have imagined ourselves. so it changes the whole relationship of the human being to the human being surroundings. and then yet i will do something quite often, marvelous high speed trains speeding somewhere in france or across the continent in europe. and i was traveling the other day to basil. it was early morning, beautiful sunrise over a landscape in rural france. and there was smoke coming out of every chimney in this village. and the houses were old stone. and i just thought to myself, i wonder how many people there are going to get on the internet today. and you know, they probably willment. >> rose: how many are going to simply sit by their hearth and talk. >> maybe. it is a very big contrast. and i think it's easy for us to be living in the world world world of-- whirl whirl whirl of new york, for instance to sort of imagine that the wol world is moving at this speed. and it isn't, in fact.

although the world itself is changing. and you're dead right that the politics are changing really fast. and that i think is the sort of, the disconnect between the structures of government and the speed at which to say diplomacy moves. and the speed at which events are going. that seems to be a disconnect that we are going to have to somehow reorder in the next year. >> rose: and at the same time we're having wars that we didn't imagine and all kinds of things are happening and those kinds of conflicts wochlt would pga even though it is part of two of these ideas. one and the reestablishment of world order and the political dysfunction. without would have imagined two years ago an arab spring happening? >>. >> well, indeed. but who would have imagined also, okay, tsunami, you knew that that existed. but to watch live in paris having your breakfast, coffee, how a japanese car is being swept away and the occupants almost certainly dying is just bizarre. >> rose: it's an exciting world we live in. >> absolutely.

and we wouldn't have it any other way, jurnlsists. >> rose: the best place to be from a journalistic approach. thank you. >> thank you very much. >> rose: pleasure to have you here. come back any time. >> thank you. >> rose: back in a moment. stay with us. joe dimaggio's 56 game hitting streak is one of baseball's most indelible records, more than 70 years later, the streak remains an athletic gold standard. it is written about the sights and sound that surround dimaggio during the summer of 1941 and beyond. his book is called 56, joe dimaggio and the last minutic number in sports. i'm pleased to have him here at this table for the first time, welcome. >> good to be here, charlie. >> rose: a lot of people i respect say wonderful things about this book including bob costas, 56 alone has meaning but there is compelling next and story behind it. a story that pre and post dates the summer of 41ee. >> may be the last word on a record that may last forever, roger kuan, the 5-- 56 is a

fine book, takes us back to the sun bright terrifying years of 1941, and rich ben cramer author of joe dimaggio the hero's life, kennedy rescues the streak from the numberish precinct of the record book and brings it back to the realm of drama which had dominated in 194 -- having said all of that, why did you want to do this. >> i think charlie it started, it started back in 1995, i think, when i was at the game where cal ripken, jr. tied lou gehrig's restaurant playing in 130 consecutive games. and it was a number that seemed impossible to break. and the night that he tied it, that day, throughout the year they had in back of the park at oriole park camden yards the big ban their would if you recall out and say he was at 2102, 2110, whatever. when it became an official game and went to 2130, it was just chilling for everybody, in the whole stadium, that this event that harkened back to this

sort of magical time, and this great figure and lou gehrig and all that, was not upon us again. and ballplayers tacked about that too, afterwards and seeing it. then we had the whole steroid era came in baseball. and a lot of the great numbers that we think about like babe ruth home run, 714, and all that, they're gone. and what was left standing was 56. >> rose: and will it remain standing. >> i think it will. i say it is the most unbreakable of the theoretically breakable records because it is really just as easy by all evidence to hit in 56 straight today as it was then which means not bloody likely. it's not easy at all. yet, nobody has-- nobody has even come close. >> rose: what is close. >> well, only one person since dimaggio has even gone over 40 and that is pete rose got to 44. no one else even has come to 40ment before dimaggio you go back to 1897 for somebody to even get to 40. and that was wee wily kiefer had 47.

>> rose: what do hitters tell you when you talk to them. >> they say and i spoke to all the guy os who really got a lot of hits, tony gwynn and wade boggs, guys there today's game, is that the pressure is what really makes it so difficult. because it changes. it might change the way you hit and you have to resist that, that you need to perform every day. it's not like you know pete rose said to me with the hardest thing he ever did in his life. because when he broke the career record for hits, ty cobbs, he said well, i did it one day in september. if i hadn't i would have done it the next day w the hitting streak, it never ends. you have to do it every single day. you can't, and if you walk that's bad because you have lost an opportunity to get a hit. so for numerous reasons it's just a very difficult and statistically highly improbable. >> rose: so 99% of the people you talk to say it almost -- >> there is an untouchable number hit --00 and pretty

much everybody, ted williams was the last to do it. pretty much everybody said that it would be more likely that somebody would hit 400 than hit -- 6 straight. not that it's so easy to hit 400 certainly. >> rose: so what was it like for dimaggio. >> it was an incredibly intense time. he was only 26 years old. we think of him as this fully formed icon. he came into our consciousness having had songs about him on the radio and of course married marilyn monroe and all of this. he was a living icon. and at this time he is a 26-year-old kid, a baseball star but people didn't know him before this. people in new york and san francisco or his sons certainly did. but throughout the course of the hitting streak it became partly because of the time we were in, just before world war ii and sort of fragile summer. became a really captivating thing throughout the country. and suddenly your grandmother was saying hey, did joe get a hit today. and joe was aware waf was happening. he was clearly aware of it and it weighed heavy on him.

>> how did it weigh heavily on him. >> well, it was very difficult for him and his relationships among others withdom dimaggio who i was very fortunate to speak to before he passed away, very kind to talk to me for the book. and was his wife dorothy arnold who was also a movie starlet and who was parried and pregnant with joe's child at that time. it was a sort of distance. joe could be very distant and could be maybe elusive the word, or just sort of private. and he became even more sort of isolated from those people around him. and he became unwilling to sort of open up about things. and again, he internalized everything. so he never showed he mention on the field but he simply smoked more. which he smoked already. he drank more coffee. began to develop ulcers. all of these things that weighed on, and he knew what time it was for him in his life. he knew that he was making a

legacy. >> rose: did he talk about it much? >> while it was happening. >> rose: both. >> well, while it was happening there was no way to avoid it in some ways because there were writers. there wasn't twitter, of course, they all wanted to talk about it and the other team knew about it. and pitchers might pitch him differently or behave dichbly sow talked about it almost every day if not every single day. then after sure, he talked about it. he wasn't, he was not a superstitious person at all. i mean particularly in a world of ballplayers where-- who was on the team with him, a rookie he didn't want to change the cap. he had a piece of gum that he had stuck under his cap. he didn't want to take it off for the duration of the hitting streak but joe wasn't superstitious. he went about his business. >> rose: how close did he come no-to-not getting a hit but did. >> there were about six times where in his last chance he got a hit. one of them famously in game 36 where he came up in a situation where cohave been walked intentionally.

and the pitcher was a young pitcher named bob moneycrease said i don't want to do that i want to give him a chance, try get him out. 8th inning, last crat bat and got a single on the first pitch so there were several times. a couple of other times where he got little infield hits to extend it. he fever bunted it. he never, which would have been very easy for him to have dorntion the infield played him very deep and he was a big power hitter. he never did anything really to change his approach. maybe swung at a few pitches he might not have swung at but that was it. >> rose: and what game did he finally gail to get a hit. >> game 57, of course. and it was the most widely attended night game in history at that time. there were 60,000 people in chief and municipal stadium. and it was a fight game which was kind of rare then. and bob feller, another person i was able to speak to was in the dugout. and he was the great pitcher of the time. and he was scheduled to pitch the next day, 58. he wanted to be the one to stop him. and sow told me i was kind of rooting both ways.

i wanted to us stop dimaggio but also i wanted to be the one, if he kept it going one pore day. but joe got it up that night it was a little wet it had rained. and he hit two balls both of which had a real chance to be hits and a third baseman named kenkel ner dove to his right and stopped him both times and threw them out just by a little bit. and that was it he hit into a-- . >> rose: he got the wood on the ball. >> he did, three times, including two near hits. de walk once. and then that was it when it ended he just kind of ran out to centerfield. he knew it was go stock his last at-bat. and afterwards it was interesting. it was sort of an interesting guide for me to look into, sort of internal struggle. he said in one minute, oh, you know, i'm glad it's over. what a relief. and then he said, i felt like i lost my best friend. and he, he had that conflicting emotion, which one can identify with. >> rose: what did you find out about dimaggio as you looked at these 56 games. >> i found, you know, i

think the biggest sort of macro revelation for me in a way was we talked earlier about his privateness. so here he was a kid who grew up in the depression, one of eight kids and his father was a bait fisherman. he didn't even get far enough to get the net, he was a bait fisherman and his parents were illiterate in italian and english. his father later learned to read. but and joe had never really gotten to high school, at all. dom, his brother was quite intelligent, got educated and i think joe came to new york. and was now seen to be somebody who prepare panted to get a quote from he was a wol banter. and he was insecure about that. he didn't want to be seen as unintelligent in any way. i think a lot of his distance and almost suspicion that he had from people stemmed from that feeling. i mean here was a man who would go so far as to open a dictionary and try to learn two words a day and he liked

longer words because they sounded better in an effort to compensate for that. so i think that was the biggest sort of realization that a big element of why joe was the way he was, was through that insecurity. and the whole thing was heightened. people sort of wanting a piece of him and wanting to put him on a stage, particularly during this time, during this. >> he never got over marilyn monroe. >> he never did. i think he really loved her. you know, for all that had been chronicled, the difficulty, maybe he didn't always treat her as well as he should have, certainly, but he certainly really loved her and never got over it. >> and what was his life like after baseball? >> you know, he wore the he had a kind of rygalness about it one thing weigh almost genius about him. he knew about his image. and he knew how to take care of joe dimaggio as an idea. >> as a brand. >> that's right so he only did a couple of advertising.

famously mr. coffee, and bowry savings bank, one or two others. and a big thing what happened charlie was in 1969 major league baseball had an event where they were going to name the greatest living player at each position. and the night want on. almost at the end of the night and they said the greatest living right fielder and they brought up willie mays and willie got up there and said i have only played right field about twice in high life. and everybody realized that the greatest living centerfielder going to be joe dimaggio and he was named greatest living centerfielder and greatest living ballplayer at that event. and incidentally, and it was said then it was largely in addition to everything else de, he was an mvp and played if in ten world series but that this hitting streak was sort waf put him over the edge. and so that was 1969. he lived another 30 years and he wore that crown, greatest living ballplayer, he loved to be introduced that way. and he fit eagerly into that role. so he-- . >> rose: and wrefer he went, other celebrities wanted to say hello to him, heads of state and people like that.

there is a famous story i think about at "time" magazine, the time some big event at "time" magazine in which people wanted to come to his table. >> right. >> rose: an talk to him rather than go see some of the people more famous because of politics. >> rightment and it was partly because, the way an athlete can have a grip on people especially when they are young and they have seen him. and also because he was pars mondayuous in what he gave out. he didn't come over and shake a lot of hands. he was pressure. >> rose: if he is going to be broken who would be most likely to break it playing today. >> well, i guess the player i would say is ichiro of the mariners, he is getting older and he had an off year last year but he still gets a ton of hits and he's got a lot of speed. robinson kanno of the yankees, you can see some holes there but he's got a chance. honestly it is hard to pick somebody out. >> rose: did joe think it would stand forever. >> well, his manager joe mccarthy said right then we're never going see anything like that he didn't come right out and say that

you about i think he did. and when they asked him when rose was getting close in the 40s, you know, without you like to see it broken. and he was like no. does a fish like to be out of water, no, you know. so he was very happy with what it was. and he continued to push, the record then was in the 40s and when he pushed past it, and knew that he was achieving something that could last. >> 56, joe dimaggio and the last magic number in sports, thank you. >> pleasure to have you here. >> great to be here. >> rose: thank you for joining us. see you next time. captioning sponsored by rose communications captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org

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