both of you mentioned in the books the relationship of both kennedys to joseph. so i'm interested in hearing about bobby kennedy working with joseph mccarthy that it was your story not to distance himself from mccarthy but the way that he managed not to distance himself to the degree that other senate democrats did. that surprised me. they both seem to have a sympathy and a fondness for the unwillingness to jettison mccarthy more than i expected. >> kennedy had an excuse to not say anything about joseph mccarthy during the time when mccarthy was causing so much trouble in the united states because john was very sick and had been many times in his life, but this time he was having a back issue again and was in the hospital. so he took the opportunity of sort of hiding around his operation to avoid having to speak out and condemn mccarthy. but what is interesting about this particular moment in his life is that as he did many times in his career and his life, he thought about it again a second time later and realized perhaps he didn't show the courage that he needed

i'm a little bit interested in joe kennedy, joseph kennedy oroe sr.. he's such a patriarchal figure, of course, to the whole kennedy clan. and, of course, both brothers,s, bobby and john, were so enamored of their father, and he was such a big influence in their political careers as they emerged. they became such great champions of civil rights and, of course, joe kennedy was a virulentt anti-semite. i'm not quite sure, perhaps you can enlighten me how he felt about the black experience, but did the kennedys really have to battle their father against this? were they afraid of his influence? please, shed some light on that for us, if you can. >> before getting into, i guess, how joseph kennedy reacted to the civil rights pushes of the kennedy brothers, by the time we reach my book, joseph kennedy had had a stroke, was incapacitated, could no longer communicate.e. though i will say how bobby dealt with disagreements with his father. in 1966 he gives a speech about social programs which is very much far to the left, and he say toss his speech writer if my

opens up the famous back channel to churchill in response to his distrust of joseph kennedy. where was i getting with all of this? >> host: class. >> guest: so they're both attuned to class issues. ore well, of course, sees the world through a bit of a class prism but churchill notes something interest. the pilots of the royal air force are not the aristocracy. he asked how many pie lets win to private schools and the find a very small number. the 5,000 pilots who win the battle of britain and help stave off the german invasion that everybody expected in 1940, they were middle class and lower middle class. they were the sons of government clerks, of rural clergy, grocery store managers. and churchill observed rather stridently, they have saved the country and earned the right to run it. and that sense margaret thatcher is churchill's natural heir. the daughter of a grocer from the country side. she experiences a lot of class sort of snobbery, her own life as she grows up, and one thing she does upon becoming prime minister is restore the war rooms where churchill fought world

so tracks they whole people from joseph kennedy to jack kennedy. >> we want to hear from you send us your summer reading list via tex or individual -- text or video or post it on our facebook page. >> publicity manager at -- what are the big titles. >> our lead tool it is called "sharks of the shallows" coming out after shark week, a huge thing, and it's an unofficial series we're doing there, oversized coffee table book, havery illustrated, reasonably priced. we have done a handful of them and we have the shark book coming out. so we have a book that sort of tongue in cheek, it's like "the revnant" minus the bear, the story of the western frontier and fur trapping and three guy whose lives dissected at a place called radio lake house. and then we have a book called "uncompromising activist." ...

from joseph kennedy down to jack kennedy. >> we want to hear from you, send us your summer reading list by a text or video or post them to facebook page, book tv on twitter at book tv or email us at book tv at c-span.org. >> good afternoon and welcome to the harrisburg book festival, i am a resident of gaithersburg and a member of the democratic central committee representing district 17 which encompasses the beautiful city of gaithersburg so welcome. gaithersburg is a city that supports the arts and humanity, we are pleased to bring you this event acts in

so it tracks that a whole period there from joseph kennedy down to jack kennedy. >> we also want to hear from you. send us your summer reading list via text or video or post it to our facebook page, facebook.com/booktv, on twitter @booktv or e-mail us at booktv@c-span.org. >> you're watching booktv on c-span2 with top nonfiction books and authors every weekend. booktv, television for serious readers. >> host: walt mossberg, in your code of ethics statement you write that i am not an objective news reporter, i am a subject i opinion columnist -- subjective opinion columnist. >> guest: right. >> host: what does that mean? >> guest: just what it says, you know? i'm like a movie reviewer. movie reviewer is not objective. you don't look at the movie reviewer to read an objective, each-handed, i don't know -- even-handed, i don't know, business story. you go to read someone's opinion about whether this particular actor did a good job or a bad job, whether this actor did a good job or a bad job, whether the, you know, aaron sorkin did

churchill was still alive and kennedy was assassinated so tracks that whole period there from -- joseph kennedy down to kennedy. >> we want to hear from you send us your as you recall reading list via text or videos or post to our facebook page facebook.com/booktv on twitter, at booktv or e-mail us at booktv at c-span.org. ♪ [applause] [applause] [inaudible conversations] [laughter] would you mind if i went out again -- i was to be say how special this night is. but all beat me to it which is great welcome my name is steve, i'm executive director of the john pment kenley library foundation. and on behalf of all of the colleagues and foundation, and jam mee roth and colleagues in library we're really thrilled you can be here. all of our forums are great but tonight is really a treat. because of the speakers are here also the beginning of the john f. kennedy centennial weekend and planned this months ago and we really literally thought who would be the best pair of bo speaker and moderator we can get for this historic time and this is what we've gotten so we're thrilled they're both here before -

joseph p kennedy was a really important one and he and missy were good, close friend. you know, he-- kennedy loved being in that inner circle with fdr. they had a sort of tumultuous relationship which in the end broke down, but he leased this palatial mansion when he was working as chair of the sec and missy would arrange for him to have evenings out there and she'd bring all the irish cat athletics with her and they'd sit out there and sing irish songs and play the accordian and drink and have a big time and grace tully had been the secretary for a bishop and the state leaders would come in the white house at anytime and stayed with fdr. it was important, father cochran, the radio piece, he had a bigger audience than rush limbaugh, it was hard to counter act his hate speech. he was influential. [inaudible] >> yes, ma'am. >> i believe i read in goodwin's book, you mention that roosevelt left half of his estate to eleanor and half to missy lehand and he outlived her, but barely and i believe i read in doris kearns goodwin's book that in order to do that, he had to disin

frankly, i think back to before i was around to joseph p. kennedy, a stock speculator in the day.elt created the securities and exchange commission, he put kennedy, the fox in the henhouse. in fact, he did a fabulous job and set the standard here. so my point is, having people who know something about these issues, who are -- >> here's the thing, jeffrey. i hear what you're saying. maybe it's blown out of proportion. but in the case of president trump, he made such a big deal about this sort of thing, about the lobbyists. and made such a big deal of saying, i'm going to do things differently. there will not be lobbyists. he established this rule. what's the point of making that rule to begin with? >> at the end of the day, he's the president, not the lobbyists. >> okay. >> he makes the decisions. >> before we go, i want to get your reaction to some reporting just in. we're learning the president has filed for an extension for his 2016 tax return. the president said no one cares about tax returns. polls show that's not the case. richard, what's your reaction? >> it's fine for him t