tavis: pleased to welcome robert kennedy junior to our program. he has dealt his life to environmental issues including the fight over coal. he has featured a new documentary about coal which is called "the last mountain" playing in theaters in select theaters. >> we are cutting down the ap lashian mountains literally. >> absolutely gigantic. >> blowing the tops off the mountain to get at the coal. >> coal is sort of a layer of cake, layer of coal, lake of rock, layer of coal, lack of rock and keep this process up until they reduce the mountain to rubble. >> they detonated explosives every day. and explosive power the size of a hiroshima bomb once a week. tavis: this documentary is about coal, but at the center of this documentary, sits an uncomfortable conversation in this country that we have to have about corporations versus democracy or put another way, when corporations take over the space that democracy ought to occupy. talk to me about that battle between corporations and democracy in this country beyond just coal. >> you put your finger on

i was just so, i was very much for robert kennedy.sassinated in eugene mccarthy didn't get the nomination and he and johnson were responsible for this war. and i just could not get behind hubert humphrey. i mean i'm in ninth grade, what do i know. but i thought nixon said he had a secret plan to end the war and he was going to in did in six months and that sounded good to me. i was going to the seminary at the time. i left home at 14 and my parents let me go to the seminary because i wanted to be priest and i remember the dish up one day asked me to come over and do some yard work and i think that he heard i was out campaigning for nixon and he wanted to ask me about why are you doing that and he wanted to educate me about nixon's past and all this, and his name was bishop hecky and he went on to become the archbishop in washington, d.c. and in the 1980's a very outspoken advocate against the war in central america and all that. but it was like -- was one of their early encounters where somebody was trying to set me straight and dixon

only a soviet agent whom robert kennedy had befriended told the americans the truth. he told bobby that there would be a tough meeting, that khrushchev was going to be hard on berlin. kennedy replied, bobby replied, you know, on this one the president is hard set. he's not going to pull out the troops. and so bobby said to jack, we're going to have trouble. but nobody else did. well, as it turned out, he was right. when the summit began, kennedy began with two proposals, two ideas. the first idea was to divide the world and, particularly, to divide europe. he said to kruschev -- and this is in the record -- as far as i'm concerned, you can maintain your position in east berlin, and you can maintain your position in eastern europe. we want to maintain our position in western europe, and we want to maintain our position in west berlin. khrushchev absolutely and totally rejected that. he said, you cannot prevent the people from acting as they want to act. then kennedy, basing on his briefings in washington, said to khrushchev, you know, we all have nuclear weapons now, we

c-span: jay edgar hoover verses robert f. kennedy. [laughter] >> guest: that's a shakespearean wrestling match. there's no way of simplifying the. hoover was a skilled bureaucratic. he was also come to some degree, a bully in that he would try to get his way, but he was a gossip. and he -- people who really stood up to him could back him off. bobby kennedy never did. and i think this is a young girl, not mature, bobby kennedy who feels heavily the burden of having to defend his brother, the president, jack kennedy, who was vulnerable because he was having affairs with people in the mafia and even an east german woman that sort of thing. bobby kennedy had to have hoover's help to protect his brother, and compromised him in this three or four we dance he's going to try to protect the kennedy's political position in the south and -- and the alliance, to luther king. it's like riding razors come and ultimately, i believe hoover, without ever saying you've got to do this for that. they're far too skilled bureaucrats for that. they would sa

i saw your program with robert kennedy jr.. what a story.e talking about the prison industrial complex. i would like to add the private prison industrial complex. that is a prison in florida, the largest corporation in the state, and it is taking away jobs from the small local printers. my other point is with regard to walmart, and i think you need to drop walmart as a sponsor of your show, tavis smiley, first of all they get tax breaks from towns and cities to build their stores. also, walmart and procter and gamble, they take out life insurance policies on their employees, and the beneficiary is not the employee. the beneficiary is walmart, procter and gamble, and there are a number of others, and people that died working for wal-mart are left with hundreds of thousands of dollars in bills. one woman who died had a really bad as the situation. walmart made $81,000 on her. his guest: i hear your critique, and you are entitled to that. i am glad you watch the program. people want to watch the program to be empowered by what i'm trying to do,

three weeks after senator robert kennedy was killed the files show the son of mobster al capone was overhearddy during a phone call. the fbi and secret service were notified. this claim is notable because of all the conspiracy theories connecting the mob to president kennedy's assassination. >> fascinating. >>> a bizarre twist in the investigation of that brutal beating of a san francisco giants fan at l.a.'s dodgers stadium in march. an important witness, matthew lee, has suddenly died. lee went to the game with beating victim bryan stow and lee died sunday apparently from an allergic reaction to eating a peanut. he had already given a statement to investigators and had provided other evidence as well. >> what a mystery. >> a crazy story gets crazier. >> yeah, absolutely. >>> now casey anthony may have to show her face in public for the first time since she was released from jail last month. >> a florida judge wants anthony to serve a year of probation in orlando on a check fraud conviction. abc's diana alvear has the latest on this. good morning, diana. >> reporter: rob and tanya, good morn

i saw your program with robert kennedy jr.. what a story. you're talking about the prison industrial complex. i would like to add the private prison industrial complex. that is a pron in florida, the largest corporation in the state, and it is taking away jobs from the small local printers. my other point is with regard to walmart, and i think you need to drop walmart as a sponsor of your show, tavis smiley, first of all they get tax breaks from towns and cities to build their stores. also, walmart and procter and gamble, they take out life insurance policies on their employees, and the beneficiary is not the employee. the beneficiary is walmart, procter and gamble, and there are a number of others, and people that died working for wal-mart are left with hundreds of thousands of dollars in bills. one woman who died had a really bad as the situation. walmart made $81,000 on her. his guest: i hear your critique, and you are entitled to that. i am glad you watch the program. people want to watch the program to be empowered by what i'm trying to

now, the rule of law is what justice kennedy and justice roberts recently spoke about. in their opinions, one was involving the flag-burning case. texas vs. johnson. the other one was by justice kennedy. the other one was by justice roberts very recently in the demonstrations of military fit -- demonstrations at military funerals. they both said the same thing. they said, we don't like what these people did. as a matter of fact, what they did and their beliefs are abhorrent to most americans, and to us personally, but unless we protect their rights, all our rights are in jeopardy. and that is why the concept of a constitutional democracy is so important and must be preserved, but is not understood today. it is not understood by many americans. why? it is not that hard to understand. we live in a democracy. a democracy is supposed to be governed by a majority opinion. so, why isn't the court just governed by whatever the majority of people think? the answer is that that is what is also called mob rule. a constitutional democracy is one that protect everyone's rights, even

i've got tears in my eyes because i lost my mommy and daddy ended senator robert kennedy. and so, the story is about his effort to find my parents that day in the capitol building. there's another story. i guess i parents effectively at home and i was 14. they said yes because i wanted to be up priest and they didn't want to get in the way of god's calling, so i went to seminary at 14 years old and so there is a story about being there at the seminary. and i of course have a lot of thoughts about the catholic church. as a recovering catholic. so there's a whole bunch of things like this. and i found myself present at a paris incident that took disseminate teen 80s, particular day was only 19 people killed in probably about 120 or so injured from bullet and grenade shrapnel. and i was just coming into the airport to change planes. so i read about what it's like to actually be present at one of these terrorist incidents and live. so the book has a lot of these experiences and stories that are sort of maybe explained how i got to be where i got or why i ended up doing the thi

puts the paper down, and i have tears in my eyes because i lost my mommy and daddy, and senator robert kennedy, and so the story's about his effort to help me find my parents, a day in the capitol building. there's another story about i asked my parents if i could leave home at 14, and they said yes because i said i wanted to be a priest, and they didn't want to get in the way of god's calling, so i went to the seminary at 14 years old, and so there's a story about being there at the seminary, and i, of course, have a lot of thoughts about the catholic church as a recovering catholic, but so there's -- there's a whole bunch of things like this, and then i found myself present at a terrorist incident that took place in the 1980s in this particular day where there were 19 people killed and probably about 120 or so injured from bullets and grenade shrapnel, and i was just coming into the airport to change planes, and so i write about what it's like to actually be present at one of these terrorist incidents and live and so the book is -- the book has a lot of these experiences and stories that sor

i've got tears in my eyes because i lost my mommy and daddy ended senator robert kennedy. and so, the story is about his effort to find my parents that day in the capitol building. there's another story. i guess i parents effectively at home and i was 14. they said yes because i wanted to be up priest and they didn't want to get in the way of god's calling, so i went to seminary at 14 years old and so there is a story about being there at the seminary. and i of course have a lot of thoughts about the catholic church. as a recovering catholic. so there's a whole bunch of things like this. and i found myself present at a paris incident that took disseminate teen 80s, particular day was only 19 people killed in probably about 120 or so injured from bullet and grenade shrapnel. and i was just coming into the airport to change planes. so i read about what it's like to actually be present at one of these terrorist incidents and live. so the book has a lot of these experiences and stories that are sort of maybe explained how i got to be where i got or why i ended up doing the thi

a secret meeting between robert kennedy and marilyn monroe right before her death. could be destroyed long ago on this "american morning." >>> good morning. it's friday, august 6th. it is a good morning. >> that's because it is friday and it's saturday tomorrow. >> we know stocks won't fall on saturday. >> we begin with the unshakeable economic fear in fact,ing the markets across the globe. u.s. stock futures are down as we speaker and europe to asian, investors are pulling their money. >> hong kong's hang seng closed down at the close of london. trading under way. the ftse is also down. >>> we are watching your money across the globe. let's start with nina. what we saw in the united states yesterday continuing overnight, didn't it? >> reporter: it did, indeed. we woke up worried and went to bed worried and the ftse down 2% to 3%. as ali was saying the markets in asia suffering and even heavier percentage declines. all of this on the back of concerns about the states of the recovery or, indeed, the potential of a double dip back towards the recession for the world's

non-fiction history of his family and american liberalism and the 20th century, which won the robert f. kennedy book award. he has written two novels and a new but and has served in the peace corps in west africa and togo and is working on a buck about -- working on a book about institutional decline in america. welcome to george packer. >> thank you. [applause] >> i'm glad to have beaten the traffic. >> george drove out from brooklyn and nobody gave him the back road map. bob carroll, who many of you know because he is one of us and lives out here, as you well know, has written truly adjective-busting biographees. his biographies of robert moses and lyndon johnson he twice won the pulitzer prize for biography. he has gone virtually every other married -- every other major literary honor, including the national book award, a gold medal of biography of the national academy of arts and letters and on and on. i would love to read the mall but i would rather get to our subject in a minute. his first book was "the power broker -- robert moses and the fall of dark." the modern library called one of t

i like robert kennedy. i like harry truman but if you're talking about people that you really try to emulate, musically i like to listen to the beatles and the stones. i'd probably be more excited meeting keith richards than meeting president obama again. >> host: you often quote led zeppelin on the house floor. >> guest: i did once and we were doing one minute and everybody was saying the same thing both sides and the democrats especially. the song remains the same so trying to put it in the parlance of the day. i could quote charlie woods woodsworth. i brought up kashmir and other songs i tried to put up in the speech. >> host: when instruments do you play. >> guest: i play combhov instruments. when you're homely you have to play something. >> host: the new flying squirrels. >> guest: we used to call the flying squirrels. >> guest: who else became part of the band. >> guest: it was always me and my brother and our drummer was john. and he passed away, unfortunately, from a heart -- congenital heart ailmen

one of my heroes, robert kennedy, heied in 1968. he said, our future may be beyond our vision put it is not beyond our control. either fate nor fortune or the tides of will determine our future. there is pride in that statement. there is also arrogance. but there is also great truths. is the only way we can live. abraham lincoln, right after he announced the emancipation proclamation did before he would actually release it, had a statement to the congress. in those days it was called, you did not have the stated the union, they were written messages. it was one of his most famous. it says everything we should be about. he said, "the dogmas of the past are inadequate to t present. the occasion is piled high with difficulty and we must rise to the occasi. we must think and act anew. we shall save our country. fellow citizens, we cannot escape history. we will be remembered in spite of ourselves. the fiery trials for and -- through which we pass will honor or dishonor the latest to generation. we say we are for the union. the world wil

one of my heroes robert kennedy spoke about when he died, 1968.he said, he said before he died, he said you know, he said, our future may not be beyond our vision but it is not beyond our control. it is shaping impulse of america that neither faith nor fortune or determine our future but rather the work of our own hands match and reason in principle that determine our destiny. he said that there is pride in that statement. there is also arrogant, but there is also great truth and in any event is the only way that we as americans can live. abraham lincoln in december 1862 right after he had announced the emancipation proclamation before he would actually write or release it on the first had a statement that he had to the congress. in those days it was called, you didn't have the state of the unions. they were called messages. they were written messages and it is one of his most famous and i want to read the ending to you because it says everything we should be about. he said this. fellow citizens, he said the dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate

robert kennedy spoke, and he died in 1968, and he said before he died, he said, you know, he said our future may be beyond our vision, but it is not beyond our control. it is a shaping impulse of america that neither fate nor fortune or the irresistible tide that determines the future, but rather the work of our own hands matched to reason and principle that determine our destiny. he said there's pride in that statement and arrogance, but there's also great truth. in any event, it's the only way we, as americans can live. abraham lincoln in december 1862 after he announced the emancipation proclamation before he would actually write and release it on the first had a statement that he had on for the congress. in those days it was called the -- you didn't have state of the unions, but they were called messages, written messages. it's one of the most famous. i'll read the ending to you because it says everything we should be about. he said, "the dogmas of the quiet past are an adequate of the stormy present. the occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise to the occasion. we

robert bork -- kennedy set the stage. i was inspired to write "the nine" by a book familiar to a lot of you due to a book called "the brethren" published in 1979. a long time ago, now. if you recall the theme of that book, the theme of that book was how all the justices, without regard to politics, really couldn't stand warren berger. they thought he ways pompous jerk. as i started to work on "the nine" i thought, great, i get to report on how the justices really don't get along. well, to my great disappointment as a journalist but to my satisfaction as a citizen, i learned that was not at all the case under chief justice rehnquist. chief justice rehnquist was a very popular figure around the supreme court without regard to political affiliation. he really learned a lot from, i would submit, the negative example of warren berger. one of the things that he learned, and one of the things chief justice rehnquist did was he engineered a tremendous reduction in the court's workload. the justices liked this very much. in the 19

kennedy. he's a deal maker. but his best friend in the senate, robert bennett, was defeated last year by a tea party candidate, who is now a united states senator in utah. 1286 words could have been summed up in 14. i saw what the tea party did to my friend bob bennett last year. he's not going to vote yes. >> you can't really overestimate the sea change that's going on right now in washington. because you're right, these tea party conservatives have really shifted the debate. remember, barack obama when he started this and said i want a clean debt ceiling -- >> which happened 70 times in the past. >> and mitch mcconnell also made the point, i think he's absolutely right, he said the template for the debt ceiling has now changed because it's always now going to be associated with deficit reduction. we've been in the process of stimulus spending for the last couple of years, to try and get the economy jump-started. now we're going to a new era of real fiscal restraint and economists disagree, actually, about whether that's the right thing to do to the economy but we are clearly shifting right now. >> no question ab

that is when his seat went to anthony kennedy, and i do not think kennedy is a liberal, but he is certainly not robert bork. the court has reflected that over the years. the appointment of bork -- kennedy set the stage for the rehnquist years on the court. that is what my book was about. was inspired to write "the nine " buy a book called "the brethren," the first behind the scenes look at the court, published in 1979. if you recall, the theme of that book, the theme of that book was how all the justices, without regard to politics, could not stand warren burger. they thought he was a pompous jerk. i get to report about all -- about how all the justices did not get along and they do not like the chief justice. to my disappointment as a journalist, i learned that was not all the case. chief justice rehnquist was a very popular figure around the supreme court, that regard to political affiliation. he really learned a lot from i would submit the-example of warren buerger, and one of the things he learned and one of the things rehnquist did was he engineered a tremendous reduction in the court's workload.

the public really came down on roberts in particular because it soon as the swing justice in the same way that a lot of public anger today is concentrated on justice kennedy because you think maybe maybe kennedy might side with the liberals and then he doesn't and if you're left of center you're very upset with that right it's very interesting. you talk about how in fact you just mentioned how roosevelt didn't see packing the court but for that matter he didn't see you know the the end is that this was all a means to in his mind was totally constitution and not just constitutional where you characterize it a book it was the survival of american democracy i mean literally that's because because because other nations you know coming out of the great depression were flipping the fascism or communism or whatever. as a as an historian have ever had a president since roosevelt who so passionately had a clear crystal clear vision of america and fought so hard for well i think we certainly have presidents who had clear vision and fought hard for it i think president johnson had a clear vision and thought i think president reagan had a clear vision and. hard for i

and anthony kennedy, i don't think you can say is any liberal, but he's certainly not robert bork and the court has reflected that over the years. now the appointment of bork really sort of -- kennedy not bork, set the stage really for the rehnquist years on the court. that's what my book "the nine" was about. the rehnquist years. i was inspired to write "the nine" by a book that is familiar, i'm sure, to a lot of you which is called "the brethren" by bob woodward and mr. armstrong. first look at the behind-the. scenes look at supreme court which was published a long time ago now. if you recall the theme, the theme of the book was how all of the justices without regard to politics couldn't stand warren berger, they thought that was a pompous jerk. as i started to work on "the nine" great, i get to report about how all of the justices don't get along and like the chief justice. to my great disappointment as a journalist, but satisfaction as a citizen, i learned that was not at all the case under chief justice rehnquist. chief justice rehnquist was a very popular figure around the supre