[laughter] equally friendly biographer david maraniss agreed. he said the character creations and rearrangements of the book are not merely a matter of style, devices or compression, but are actually substantive. another friendly biographer. now, when lesser memoirists do the same and james frey comes to mind, he of "a million little pieces," they get ripped to pieces on oprah. but for obama, you make stuff up, you get away with it. he's always been allowed to get away with it. and one of hillary clinton's aides told david can rem nick -- david rem nick, he said we didn't understand why his political calculating chameleon nature was never discussed. he changed his life depending on who he was talking to, and he was correct. now, his early influences like his communist mentor in hawaii, frank marshall davis, and his marxist professors and friends at of course city dealtal college -- occidental college did not encourage truth telling. although leftists are not uniquely guilty of lying, they are uniquely guilty of lying as a conscious strategy. thi

. ♪ ♪ ♪ >> while in madison we sat down with "washington post" editor and author david maraniss.es and writes in his hometown for half a year and to talk to us about his latest book, "once in a great city." it will be published in 2015. >> david maraniss, thank you for being with us today. >> thank you. >> can you tell us about what you are working on? >> i just finished literally writing the last lines of the last chapter of a book on detroit spent what's the name of the book? >> that name is going to be "once in a great city." >> why did you write the book? can you give us a background as to what the book is about? >> i'll tell you this story about how the idea came to be because it's a little unusual. it was in february of 2011 and is watching the super bowl which the green bay packers were in and as my football team and had written a book about vince lombardi, their coach. i was in new york city at a bar watching the packers win, and at half-time a commercial came on television the i wasn't paying attention. i was more anxious about other things and then i saw a sign that sai

. >> david mayor necessary, thank you for being maraniss.l us what you're working on. >> i just finished last lines of a last chapter on a book about detroit? >> what is the name of the book? >> the name of the book is called, "once in a great city." >> why did you write the book? can you give us a background what the book is about? >> i will give you the story of how the idea came to me. it was a little unusual. it was in february of 2011. i was watching the super bowl, which the green bay packers were in. that is my football team. i had written a book about vince lombardi, their coach. i was in new york city at a bar, watching the packers win. and at halftime a commercial came on television. i wasn't really paying attention. i was more anxious about other things. then i saw a sign that said detroit on the commercial. and then, i saw the jo lewis fist and rivera mural, all these icons of detroit, abandoned warehouses, gates of warehouses that were abandoned, both the beauty and promise of detroit. this incredible beat came on, who is eminem