booktv was on hand at politics and prose bookstore in washington dc where cbs news legal analyst kim whaleycussed her book "how to read the constitution and why". here's a portion of her talk. >> a monarchy traditionally the power comes from god. if you slay the monarch on the battlefield and the jolly shares of england the idea is god decided you would be king. or clean. the power comes from god, the people are separate. in our government the power ultimately always comes from the people and that document is designed to hand out, i call it job descriptions, there's a job description for congress, there is a job description for the executive branch, there's a job description for judges. all of us who have had jobs there are consequences for violating your job description if you so up late seven times in a row or steal something from the tail, there's a consequence. the institution can't function with that kind of bad actions, you will get fired. i use this analogy, you signed a contract to renovate your bathroom put a $5000 deposit on it they come and do demo and then walk off and leave you

attorney kim whaley, who was associate independent counsel during the whitewater investigation.'s the author of "how to read the constitution and why." also with me is ben wittis, editor in chief of the law fair blog, senior fellow at the brookings institution, msnbc analyst and, i should note, friend of james comey. welcome to both of you. ben, let's start with that. donald trump's beef was with james comey. he then got him out of the way, saying it was about russia, and then it became, as soon as robert mueller was appointed, it all became about the illegitimacy of the investigation, and that has been his cause from the beginning. what does this mean to you, that this has become a criminal probe? >> well, it could mean one of two things, and i honestly don't know which it is. so, one is, you know, john durham, barr's kind of hand-picked u.s. attorney from connecticut who's been doing this review, has been looking at the kind of origins of this investigation and the possibility that is not nefarious is that in the course of looking at that, they have stumbled upon something tha

. >> joining me now, kim whaley. she was involved in the white water investigation, a constitutional law expert, i cannot imagine a better voice. legal experts, including fox's judge napolitano saying the call with ukraine's president and president trump alone manifests general and impeachable behavior, do you agree. >> impeachment is a political consideration and we heard from the fec chair, the chair of the federal election commission, she tweeted or retweeted that it subpoena against federal law to accept campaign support from a foreign national. so we're talking about a potential crime here. and it is triggered for high crimes and misdemeanors. and i would think this squarely falls in the ambit of an impeachment prerogative. all of this comes down to enforcement. this president has consistently said make me. i'm going to mow down norms and laws and see if you can catch me, see if you can ping me for running the speed limit. that's what they're up against in this moment. i think the american people are up against

. >> to watch the rest of the program visit our website booktv.org and search the authors name kim whaley using the box at the top of the page. [inaudible background conversations] [applause] welcome to the new york public library. please silence your cell phone. tonight we present the first conversation from the common center of our 20th anniversary year cory robin will discuss his new book the enigma of "the enigma of clarence thomas". as some of you know the kallman center selects 15 fellows a year for a nine month term. fellows receive an office in the center access to our collections and a stipend so they can focus exclusively on their work during their fellowships. the fellows are some of the very best and most promising academics independent scholars poets playwrights journalists dramatists artists and fiction writers at work today. they come here from around the country in the world to use the unparalleled collections housed at this library to write the books of tomorrow. the program was founded in 1899 and to date it has supported the work of gordon 300 fellows. the deadline for

joining me is cnn's evan perez and sara murray who broke this story and former federal prosecutor kim whaley whose knew book "how to read the constitution and why" is out now. the fact there is a counterintelligence component, how stig is that. >> it is a big deal. because this means that this goes beyond just run-of-the-mill financial crimes, possible corruption. it means that there is a national security component that there is -- that national security threat component to the investigation and that is why fbi agents and prosecutors are looking into whether or not rudy giuliani witness wittingly or unwittingly was part of an influence operation targeting the trump white house. people overseas figuring out a way to use rudy giuliani and his close tied to the president to influence the way u.s. policy is carried out and that is a big deal. >> and sar a, last week the two figures connected to giuliani, the two that were arrested but the indictment didn't arrest giuliani and what does that say about the scope of the investigation. >> when they put the dieindictm out it was narrow and had to do