kepler's books in california hosted the event. it is 35 minutes. >> i'm thrilled to be here at kepler's, i love this bookstore. it is a wonderful institution. so the king of vodka. i get asked more than anything else what i wrote this book. and is actually every good question for people who know me well. and the research that was required for this book was absolutely immense and it was mostly in 19 in early 20th-century archives in russia, i live here and i don't speak a word of russian so that was my first problem. secondly, the book really follows the story of russia itself in 1910 and early 20th-century russia from the crimean war to emancipation to industrialization to all of the labor strikes, the fall of the czars and, of course, the russian revolution and i had never studied russian history, another problem for me. as you probably figure out by now if you have taken some of the moscow coming in, this book is about a man who may vodka and i'm not much of a drinker. [laughter] so the question, why would i write this book, is

i want to rhyme you that peop-- remind you that keplers books worked and the three books they would have the core books is europe from the back door is how the travel book. that's the one book if you like traveling the way you see me on tv or whatever. the last are skills and the last chapters. postcards from europe is my autobiographical books. all my favorite stories laced in a fantasy trip. it's a fun read. as i mentioned earlier it's my worst-selling guidebook but i just think -- for some people it's their favorite because it lets them get to know behind the scenes of my work doing tv and tour guiding and guidebook writing and you meet a lot of people in a guidebook in disguise and the best of europe is the most important chapters all over europe. if you're going to do a once over lightly trip you have the big -- the big sites covered here not just big cities but the

kepler's books hosted the event. for more information visit keplers.com. >> what is a demagogue? >> there are the book offers, 4 part definition which is one of the few times anyone has defined demagogue for a while. i barrault elements from an 1838 essay by james fennel or cooper. there are 4 characteristics, a man of the people, person of the people is how they identify. the second, they trigger great emotional reactions from people. they use those irrational -- emotional reactions for political benefits and the most important one, they bend or break established rules of governance or law. >> who would you define as an american demagogued? >> q long was the quintessential american demagogue. there have been many other examples from daniel shea, a revolutionary during the time of the constitutional convention. joseph mccarthy, george wallace, david duke has a burst, in louisiana, was a demagogue. and in history, when i talk about -- is beneficial, paradoxically you can have a demagogue, they test establish rules. if the rules are on just a, there's a chapter of british history w

if we will have a collaborative kepler's system, what if we had hmo's along with the government funding individual hospitals or health care systems at least on a trial basis for each organization worked in tandem with the public government system and at best a hospitals are subsidized by both public and private interests in a forthright fashion. host: howard on our republican line from germantown, maryland. caller: i think the industry has run amok with capitalistic entities. it has become a business of making money, not securing the patient. if we took away the pressure that the keep applying to physicians and health-care providers by allowing them to have an insurance plan they can afford but as affordable, and rewards doctors that are curing patients and punish those who are spending excess of money to do services unnecessary solely to pad the profit of the firm -- if we can do that, it would minimize costs and make it available to more people. being fiscally conservative and makes sense to limit the expenditures of the federal government in terms of health care costs, but more ameri

kepler's books in menlo park, california hosted the event. for more information visit kepler's.com. the brecht forum held a benefit and celebration of the 40th anniversary publication of noam chomsky first political book, "american power and the new mandarins". event took place at the riverside church in new york city, and lasts an hour and half. >> it is such a great honor to be here tonight to make this interjection. as we're standing here i was thinking that 14 years ago it was 1995, it was november. there was a forum on globalization that was taking place here at riverside and it was there that i've heard the announcement that nine activists had been executed in nigeria. in the writer is environmentalist to had dared to take on the nexus of a corporate and military power, the military dictatorship of nigeria and shell corporation, which had crisscrossed his land in the niger delta with gas pipelines above the ground, burning off gas and flares the size of apartment buildings. the children of the niger delta and never knowing a dark night. and yet not profiting from the trailing

if we will have a collaborative kepler's system, what if we had hmo's along with the government funding individual hospitals or health care systems at least on a trial basis for each organization worked in tandem with the public government system and at best a hospitals are subsidized by both public and private interests in a forthright fashion. host what's your proposing for saving health care. caller: it's become the business of making money, not the business of securing the patient. so when we took away the insurance companies' pressures that they keep applying to physicians and health care providers by allowing them to have an insurance plan that they can afford that's affordable and reward doctors who are curing patients and punish those doctors who are causing patients to spend excessive amounts of money to continue to do services that are unnecessary solely to pad the profit of the firm, if we can do that then we minimize the cost and bin minimizing costs make it available to more people. being fiscally conservative, it makes sense to limit the expenditures of the federal governm

kepler's books in menlo park, california, host the event. >> i'm just thrilled to be here. i love this bookstore. it is such a wonderful institution. so, the king of vodka, i get asked more than anything else why i wrote this book. and it's actually a really good question particularly for people who know me will. the research that was required for this book was absolutely immense. and it was mostly in banking, early century russian archives in russia. i live here and i don't speak a word of russian. so that was my first problem. secondly, the book really follows the story of russia itself in 19th and early 20th century russia. from the crimean war to emancipation, to industrialization to all of the labor strikes, the fall of the czars and of course the russian revolution. i had never studied russian history. another problem for me and as you probably figured out, by now if you have tasted some of the vodka as you are walking in, this book was about a man who made vodka. and i am not much of a drinker. so the question, why would i write this book is a very good one. and the

i'm sure kepler's does it and barnes & noble does it. i was blown away the friendliness. later on in the day there was a traffic jam. i'm just hanging out in the backseat of my car. the car next to us motioned to rolled down the window and he passed over a bouquet of flowers. give this to your foreign guest and apologized for our traffic. that just doesn't happen here in the bay area. [laughter] >> so, you know, it's an odd -- it's a very odd perplexing thing. you got hateful murals and you have bouquets who don't know you. it's wild. later on i was in traffic and out of the blue my driver just blurted out, death to traffic. [laughter] >> i almost had whiplash. what? [laughter] >> i thought it was death to america. well, no in iran anytime is really frustrating us it's out of our control, we say death to that. and i go, whoa. not to belittle the terribleness of saying death to america, death to israel but this gives it a little different dimension to the average american who would condemn iran and its people based on that slogan they keep hearing. i thought about it for a

i did want to remind you the people at kepler's books did a lot of work. i wanted to be sure -- you know, they got a smartering of single titles, paris or istanbul or whatever. the three books that they have are the core books would be the most interesting are the europe through the back door. that's the how to travel book that i've written and that really is the one book you'd want to read the way to travel. my passion is to make this book helpful the first is skills and individual chapters on my favorite discoveries. postcard from europe it tells all my favorite stories laced into one fantasy three-week trip. a real fun read. as i mentioned earlier it's my worst selling guidebook but i just think -- and for some people it's their favorite because it lets them get to know behind the scenes of my work doing tv and tour guiding and guidebook writing. and you meet a lot of people and the best of europe is the sacollection of the most important chapters all over europe. the notion here if you're going to do a once over lightly trip you have the big sites cove