Max Boot, in his 836-page book titled "Reagan: His Life and Legend," says that his is the first definitive biography of the 40th president. Boot suggests that Edmund Morris, the president's official biographer, "appeared to be so flummoxed by the complexities of Reagan's character that he produced 'Dutch: A Memoir of Ronald Reagan,' that was widely criticized in spite of its acute insights." Max Boot also points out in his introduction: "I am fortunate that Ronald Reagan's story can now be told as never before because we possess far more archival sources and far more historical perspective." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brenda Wineapple calls them "two gladiators." The year was 1925. She writes that "the ubiquitous politician William Jennings Bryan and the criminal lawyer Clarence Darrow, each of them national celebrities for decades, were going into battle over God and science and the classroom and, not incidentally, over what it meant to be an American." Brenda Wineapple's latest book is titled "Keeping the Faith" and is about the Scopes Trial, held in the small town of Dayton, Tennessee, which focused on the state law that prohibited the teaching of evolution in the schools. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Harvey Mansfield has been a professor of political philosophy at Harvard for over 6 decades. He retired from the classroom in 2023 at age 91. However, he's not finished thinking and writing about his favorite subject: democracy and how it works. In the Wall Street Journal of September 7, 2024, Professor Mansfield wrote an essay with this opening: "The Supreme Court case of Trump v. U.S. was about more than special counsel Jack Smith’s prosecution of Donald Trump, which continues under a superseding indictment handed up by a federal grand jury in Washington. The decision and the dissents contain a fundamental debate about the presidency that looks beyond the present personalities and campaign." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The book is titled "All the Presidents' Money." It's about how the men who governed America governed their own money. The author, Megan Gorman, is the founding partner of Chequers Financial Management, a San Francisco-based firm specializing in tax and financial planning for high-net-worth individuals. Megan Gorman writes: "The American presidents are a complex group to tackle. While they live in a mud-slinging reality on the way to and through their presidency, the moment their term ends, they become historical figures carved in stone." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lindsay Chervinsky is the brand-new executive director of the George Washington Presidential Library at Mount Vernon. Simultaneously, her new book on John Adams has just been published. The book's title is "Making the Presidency." In her introduction, Chervinsky writes that Adams was "guaranteed to fall short in comparison to George Washington." She says the "challenge of the second president, therefore, called for someone to battle the growing partisan divisions without Washington's presence." John Adams served only one term and was defeated by Thomas Jefferson for a second. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Dr. Marty Makary is a Johns Hopkins School of Medicine professor. He has published more than 300 scientific research articles. His book is called "Blind Spots: When Medicine Gets It Wrong, and What It Means for Our Health." In his preface, Dr. Makary says he realizes that much of what the public is told about health is medical dogma, an idea or practice given incontrovertible authority because someone decreed it to be true based on a gut feeling. He writes: "This book may change your life, it did mine." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The book is called "Behind Closed Doors: In the Room with Reagan & Nixon." It's the title of a memoir by a man who worked closely with both. Ken Khachigian, the author, was a speechwriter and a confidant to former Presidents Nixon and Reagan back in the 1960s, 70s and 80s. Near the end of his book, Khachigian, a lawyer based in California, writes: "I spent a decade and a half in close, confidential contact with these two Presidents." In 1990, when Presidents Reagan and Nixon were together, chatting about history, Khachigian kept notes of their conversation, which he reveals in his memoir. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is the second in a 2-part series with David Roll, a Washington-based attorney, who has written books on Harry Hopkins, George Marshall, and Louis Johnson. Now comes his fourth book, "Ascent to Power," which focuses on Franklin Roosevelt's final days through the sudden transition to the presidency of Harry Truman. Spanning the years 1944-1948, David Roll's newest book looks at the struggles of a relatively unknown Missouri senator, Harry Truman, who had served the U.S. as vice president for only 82 days before FDR's death on April 12, 1945. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

David Roll, a Washington-based attorney, has written books on Harry Hopkins, George Marshall, and Louis Johnson. Now comes his fourth book, "Ascent to Power," which focuses on Franklin Roosevelt's final days through the sudden transition to the presidency of Harry Truman. Spanning the years 1944-1948, David Roll's newest book looks at the struggles of a relatively unknown Missouri senator, Harry Truman, who had served the U.S. as vice president for only 82 days before FDR's death on April 12, 1945. This is the first of a 2-part interview with David Roll. Part two will be posted next week. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Presidential historian Tevi Troy has called his latest book "The Power and the Money: The Epic Clashes Between Commanders in Chief and Titans of Industry." Mr. Troy has spent most of his professional life in and around Washington-based government and politics. He is currently a senior fellow at the Bipartisan Policy Center. In the introduction to the book, he writes: "For current and future CEOs, this book can be a guide for how to engage with an increasingly powerful and involved federal government, especially in our era in which both Democrats and Republicans target corporations in their rhetoric and, often, in their policy prescriptions." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Maureen Callahan's book "Ask Not: The Kennedy's and the Women They Destroyed" has been near the top of the New York Times nonfiction bestseller list since its publication in early July. In a review of the Callahan book by Nina Burleigh in the Washington Post, Burleigh writes: "She identifies the wellspring of misogyny in Irish Catholic patriarch Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. in Boston during the Gilded Age, and traces it anecdote by anecdote down through JFK, RFK and Teddy, and the litter of boomer generation men — boys hatched by three Kennedy wives Callahan depicts as humiliated breeders and political props, driven to madness and alcoholism." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Richard Brookhiser has written and edited for National Review magazine for over 50 years. He has also written books about George Washington, James Madison, John Marshall, Alexander Hamilton, and "gentleman revolutionary" Gouverneur Morris. Now comes his latest, "Glorious Lessons: John Trumbull, Painter of the American Revolution." Trumbull, who lived between 1756 and 1843, was most famous for his 4 very large paintings about the Revolutionary War on the walls of the rotunda in the U.S. Capitol Building in Washington, DC. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Leon Dash spent over 30 years with the Washington Post from 1966 to 1998. In 1995 series on poverty and survival in urban America. Leon Dash spent 4 years following the life of Rosa Lee Cunningham and her 8 children and 5 grandchildren. He appeared on C-SPAN's Booknotes program in November 1996 to discuss his published book, which focused on the underclass in the United States. In the last 26 years, Leon Dash has been a professor of journalism and African American studies at the University of Illinois. We asked him for an update on his original story. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This Booknotes+ podcast is a repeat of a Q&A program from November 4, 2015. The featured guest, Ronald Feinman, is the author of the book "Assassinations, Threats, and the American Presidency," in which he examines attempts on the lives of presidents and presidential candidates throughout history. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Rupert William Simon Allason was a Conservative member of the British House of Commons from 1987 and 1997. However, he's best known around the world as Nigel West, military historian and journalist specializing in security and intelligence matters. During the recent commemoration of the 80th anniversary of the Normandy landings, Nigel West's name surfaced in relation to his 1985 book on Agent Garbo, the personal story of who, some say, was the most successful double agent of World War II. The agent's real name was Juan Pujol. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On Saturday, June 8th, 2024, the headline in the Wall Street Journal Saturday review section read: "The Hidden Life of Google's Secret Weapon." The author was Brody Mullins, a veteran investigative reporter for the Journal. The series ran over 3 days. The focus was on a man named Joshua Wright, a lawyer and former law professor at George Mason University Law School. Under the Journal headline, the paper declares that: "Joshua Wright cleared a path to domination for the world’s biggest tech companies, keeping regulators at bay while juggling inappropriate relationships and skirting conflict-of-interest standards at every turn." Brody Mullins, with his brother Luke, also has a new book out called "The Wolves of K Street." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Robert Schmuhl is the Walter Annenberg-Edmund Joyce Chair Emeritus in American Studies and Journalism at the University of Notre Dame. He has often written about the American presidency. His newest book is "Mr. Churchill in the White House: The Untold Story of a Prime Minister and Two Presidents." Prof. Schmuhl says both Roosevelt and Eisenhower eventually adjusted to the unconventional habits and hours of their White House guest, who not only proposed his visits but almost always, by accident or design, stayed longer than initially intended. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On January 16, 2024, after nearly 30 years, David Tatel retired as a judge on the Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. On the cover of his new memoir is a photo of Judge Tatel in his black robe with his dog Vixen standing on his left side. The book is titled "Vision: A Memoir of Blindness and Justice." He says he wrote the book together with his wife Edie. "Day in and day out we sat at our long desk overlooking an immense oak tree and the hills beyond, Edie on the left with her laptop and me on the right with my brail computer. We wrote, we debated, we laughed, we deleted words, paragraphs, pages. Slowly but surely, a book emerged." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Six-time book author Stacy Schiff made a guest appearance in early April at Purdue University. She was a guest of the C-SPAN Center for Scholarship & Engagement. A large number of questions were asked by the students studying communications and political science. Stacy Schiff's latest book "The Revolutionary: Samuel Adams" was published in 2022. Her 2005 book on Benjamin Franklin has been used as a primary source for an Apple TV series currently available on that streaming service. Students also asked her about her writing and her other books from "Cleopatra" to "The Witches: Salem, 1692." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

"June 6, 1944, is the most famous single day in all human history." Those are the words of Garrett Graff in his author's note in his book "When the Sea Came Alive." This month is the 80th anniversary of the Normandy landing in World War II. As Graff introduces the reader to his oral history of D-Day, he writes: "The official launch of Operation Overlord, the long-anticipated invasion of Western Europe, marks a feat of unprecedented human audacity. A mission more ambitious and complex than anything ever seen, before or since, and a key turning point in the fight for a cause among the most noble humans have ever fought." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In the first week of publication of Erik Larson's latest book, "The Demon of Unrest," sales put it at the very top of the bestseller list. It's about the start of the Civil War, with a focus on the five months between Abraham Lincoln's election and the day of the first shot fired on Fort Sumter, which is off the coast of Charleston, South Carolina. That was April 12, 1861. In his introduction, Erik Larson writes: "I invite you now to step into the past, to that time of fear and dissension…I suspect your sense of dread will be all the more pronounced in light of today's political discord…" Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Glenn C. Loury is a professor of economics. He teaches at Brown University and is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute. He calls his new book "Late Admissions: Confessions of a Black Conservative." His publisher, W.W. Norton, describes Prof. Loury on the flap of the cover: "[He] grew up on the south side of Chicago, earned a PhD in MIT’s economics program, and became the first Black tenured professor of economics at Harvard at the age of 33. He has been, at turns, a young father, a drug addict, an adulterer, a psychiatric patient, a born-again Christian, a lapsed born-again Christian, a Black Reaganite who has swung from the right to the left and back again." In his book, Prof. Loury attempts to explain all of this. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Alan Taylor is the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation professor of history at the University of Virginia. He is only one of 5 history writers who have won the Pulitzer Prize twice. His 11 books focus mostly on the early years of the creation of the United States. His latest book is titled "American Civil Wars: A Continental History, 1850-1873." During these 23 years, North America's 3 largest countries – Canada, Mexico, and the U.S. – all transformed themselves into nations. Professor Taylor includes stories of Black soldiers fighting for the Union, Native Americans struggling to preserve their homelands in the United States and the West, women fortifying the homeland, and newly arrived immigrants thrust into the maelstrom of the Civil War. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

For over 10 years, Washington Post investigative reporter Craig Whitlock has tracked the story of Malaysian shakedown man Leonard Francis, aka "Fat Leonard," and his collusion with hundreds of U.S. Navy officers, several of whom have spent time in prison. Now comes the book titled "Fat Leonard: How One Man Bribed, Bilked, and Seduced the U.S. Navy." Craig Whitlock writes: "On the surface, with his flawless American accent, Fat Leonard seemed like a true friend of the Navy. What the brass didn't realize, until far too late, was that Francis had seduced them by exploiting their entitlement and hubris." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Duke Ellington was the grandson of slaves. Louis Armstrong was born in a News Orleans slum so tough that it was called "The Battlefield." William James "Count" Basie grew up in a world unfamiliar to his white fans, the son of a coachman and a laundress. Author Larry Tye says the Duke, the Count, and Satchmo transformed America. The book is called "The Jazzmen" and Mr. Tye writes: "How better to bring alive the history of African America in the early to mid-1900s than through the singular lens of America's most gifted, engaging, and enduring African American musicians." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The book "Fire and Rain" is a narrative, according to author Carolyn Woods Eisenberg, about the way national security decisions, formed at the highest level of government, affect the lives of individuals at home and abroad. Her primary focus is on the way the Nixon administration fought and ended the Vietnam War. Early in the book, Hofstra University professor Eisenberg quotes President Nixon's predecessor, Lyndon Johnson, during his 1964 election campaign: "We are not about to send American boys nine or ten thousand miles away from home to do what Asian boys ought to be doing for themselves." However, the U.S. left Vietnam permanently in 1975 and, at the end, the number of U.S. military personnel killed in the war was 58,098. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Early in his newest of over 30 books, Joseph Epstein, our guest this week, writes: "I feel extremely lucky in all these realms in which I had no real choice: parents, epoch, country, and throw in religion, city, and social class." The 87-year-old Epstein, a longtime essayist for the Wall Street Journal, has written his autobiography called "Never Say You've Had a Lucky Life: Especially If You've Had a Lucky Life." He has spent 20 years as editor of The American Scholar and 30 years teaching in the English department at Northwestern University. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Matt Drudge started his website called "The Drudge Report" in 1995. In those early days, he had just 1,000 e-mail subscribers. Within a short time, that number jumped to hundreds of thousands. Until the mid-2000s, Mr. Drudge was very visible, appearing on television and hosting his own radio show. After that, without notice, he disappeared from public view. Chris Moody, our guest this week, just finished hosting an 8-part podcast series called "Finding Matt Drudge." We asked him to tell us what he found. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The book is called "The Real Hoosiers". The author is Pennsylvania-based Jack McCallum. He was a senior writer at Sports Illustrated for 30 years. "The Real Hoosiers" is a book about parts of Indiana, race, and basketball. To tell the story, McCallum focuses on the life of "The Big O," well-known basketball success Oscar Robertson, who is now 85 years old. Oscar Robertson started his career at Crispus Attucks High School in Indianapolis. Author McCallum says his is a story of a city, a state, and a country struggling to come to terms with race. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Charles Sumner of Massachusetts was a United States Senator for 23 years. He lived to be 63, from January of 1811 to March of 1874. Stephen Puleo has written the first major, full biography of Sumner since 1960. It's titled "The Great Abolitionist: Charles Sumner and the Fight for a More Perfect Union." Mr. Puleo writes: "His positions cost him dearly. Southerners despised him, sometimes feared him, and celebrated gleefully when Sumner was beaten unconscious in the Senate chamber in May of 1856." Stephen Puleo first published the full story of the caning of Charles Sumner in 2012. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Andrew Pettegree is a British historian at St. Andrews University in Scotland. His specialty is the history of the book and media transformations. He has written a great deal about the written word with an emphasis on libraries. His latest book is titled "The Book at War: How Reading Shaped Conflict and Conflict Shaped Reading." In his introduction, Prof. Pettegree writes: "In all nations, once war broke out, writers and libraries were expected to play a full role in forging victory….after the Second World War the Allies would face the problems of how to sanitize, or exploit, the collections of the defeated." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In Dorothy and Thomas Hoobler's latest book, they open with this introduction: "This is a book of love stories. Every one of them involved a president of the United States, and we will tell their stories through letters they wrote. Through this collection of carefully chosen letters, we reveal the writers at their most vulnerable, providing a surprisingly intimate and deeply personal portrait that is often obscured by the public persona." Dorothy and Thomas Hoobler's book is titled "Are You Prepared for the Storm of Love Making?" Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

James Traub's latest book is titled "True Believer: Hubert Humphrey's Quest for a More Just America." In the introduction, Mr. Traub writes: "I return to Humphrey in order to explain what liberalism was at its ascendant moment, why it mattered so much to so may people, why it abruptly lost its appeal to the majority of Americans – and, perhaps, how it might rejuvenate itself." Hubert Humphrey served as mayor of Minneapolis, United States Senator, Vice President of the United States under Lyndon Johnson, and a candidate for President in several years, including 1968. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The year is 1942, the month is November. The subject of Peter Englund's book is "An Intimate History of the Turning Point of World War II." Mr. Englund, who is based in his native Sweden, features close to 40 people from around the world and what they were doing during that month and year of the war. He writes that: "At the start of that [November] many people still believed that the Axis powers would be victorious. By the end of that month it had become clear that it was only a matter of time before [Germany, Japan, and Italy] would lose." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jim Trusty, our guest this week, is an attorney with 28 years of experience as a prosecutor, first in the state of Maryland and later with the U.S. Justice Department in Washington, DC. He has worked as an attorney for Donald Trump on several pending cases. In June last year, Mr. Trusty withdrew from representing former President Trump, citing irreconcilable differences. However, in his public appearances, Jim Trusty remains a critic of the different prosecutors and their approach to his former client. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Glenn Kirschner, our guest this week, is an attorney with 30 years of trial experience. For 24 of those years, he prosecuted 50 murder trials for the U.S. Attorney's Office in Washington, DC. Three years ago, he created for YouTube viewers a daily video analysis of Donald Trump's legal issues and indictments. He calls his show "Justice Matters" and records his remarks from his home in Virginia. We asked him how he puts it all together. As you'll learn, he is not a fan of Donald Trump. Our next episode of Booknotes+ will feature Jim Trusty, a former attorney for the 45th president. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

"Between 1881 and 1914, over ten million people crossed the Atlantic from Europe to America, the largest mass migration of people from one continent to another in human history." Those are the words of our guest, Steven Ujifusa, from his introduction to his book "The Last Ships from Hamburg". Over 2.5 million of these immigrants to America were Jews. A significant percentage came from Russia. Mr. Ujifusa focuses mostly on three men to tell the story: Jacob Schiff of Kuhn, Loeb & Company; Albert Ballin, managing director of the Hamburg-American Line shipping company; and J.P. Morgan, mastermind of the International Mercantile Marine trust. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Henry Wallace was President Franklin Roosevelt's vice president during his third term, 1941-1945. FDR then chose Harry Truman as vice president in his fourth and last term. In author Benn Steil's book "The World That Wasn't: Henry Wallace and the Fate of the American Century," he writes, "Wallace loved humankind but was mostly vexed or bored by humans…" Steil takes us through Wallace's life, from Iowa farm boy to presidential candidate on the Progressive ticket in 1948. Wallace preached the supremacy of human rights over property rights yet excused the absence of human rights in Russia. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Henry William Brands Jr. has written close to 40 books in the past 36 years. The Portland, Oregon, native is a professor of history at the University of Texas at Austin, the same school where he earned his PhD in 1985. His first American history book, written in 1988, was titled "Cold Warriors: Eisenhower's Generation and American Foreign Policy." The list of other books includes one on Lyndon Johnson, Benjamin Harrison, Woodrow Wilson, Andrew Jackson, U.S. Grant, Abraham Lincoln, FDR, and many others. We talked to Prof. Brands about these and his newest offering, "Founding Partisans," about Hamilton, Madison, Jefferson, and John Adams. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When Nigel Hamilton was a student at Cambridge University in Great Britain, he stayed for a brief time with Winston and Lady Churchill at their home at Chartwell in Kent. He also spent hours talking about World War II with Field Marshall Bernard Montgomery. These experiences led to a life as an author about history. Nigel Hamilton first moved to the United States in 1988 and is now a U.S. citizen. He's based in the Boston area and his books include "JFK: Reckless Youth," two volumes on President Bill Clinton, and a trilogy on FDR as Commander in Chief during World War II from 1941 to 1945. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

It has been 3 years since the January 6th events at the U.S. Capitol occurred. Since that time close to 300 individuals have been charged with a crime by the U.S. Justice Department. Because of the Sixth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, and subsequent Supreme Court decisions, defendants have a right to an attorney, paid for by the taxpayers if necessary. Kira Anne West, our guest this week, has been one of the defense attorneys involved in the January 6th trials in the United States District Court of the District of Columbia. She's a graduate of Drake University Law School in Des Moines, Iowa. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The name of the book is "The Vice President's Black Wife." The author is Amrita Chakrabarti Myers. Prof. Myers teaches history at Indiana University. She explains best what is between the covers of her book in the first paragraph of the introduction: "This is the story of an American family. Set in Great Crossing, Kentucky, in the early nineteenth century, it’s a tale that seems typical at first glance: a plantation owner was sexually involved with an enslaved woman and had children with her. The union of Julia Ann Chinn and Richard Mentor Johnson, a congressman from Kentucky who became vice president of the United States in 1837 under Martin Van Buren is, however, anything but standard." Make your donation at: c-span.org/donate Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

With less than a year to go before the 2024 presidential election, there continues to be a lot of chatter about the possible impact of a candidate on the ballot who is not a Republican or a Democrat. Over the years, third party candidates have made a difference in several elections. The third party candidate to get the largest percentage of votes was Teddy Roosevelt in 1912, at 27 percent. Next was Ross Perot at 19 percent in 1992. His campaign didn't start until the same year of the election. Here he is, from March 1992, talking about his life and politics. Make your donation at: c-span.org/donate Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week a conversation with the new host of Q&A, Peter Slen. We discuss the mission of the program, what to expect, and the best parts of hosting a one-hour conversation with interesting individuals. Make your donation at: c-span.org/donate Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On the cover of R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr.'s memoir is a photo of him holding a 3-olive martini. It was obviously his choice and part of a message he chooses to send his readers about his life after 79 years. Mr. Tyrrell founded the American Spectator magazine in 1967. In the author's bio in the back of the book it says: "He has never had another job, though he came terrifyingly close in the late 1960s when the Vice President asked him to join his staff. After strenuous negotiations, the Vice President settled for Tyrrell as a consultant. After that the Vice President resigned." The Vice President was Spiro Agnew. Make your donation at: c-span.org/donate Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

British-born author Nick Bunker, our guest this week, has written books on the Mayflower Pilgrims, the Revolutionary War, and a biography of Benjamin Franklin. Lately he has turned his attention to America and the world in 1950. His book is titled "In the Shadow of Fear." Nick Bunker, a graduate of King's College, Cambridge, and Columbia University, focuses on names like Joseph McCarthy, Harry Truman, Dean Acheson, Margaret Chase Smith, George Marshall, Robert Taft, Alger Hiss, Winston Churchill, Joseph Stalin, and Mao Zedong. In addition, Bunker pays close attention to the Korean War. Make your donation at: c-span.org/donate Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Michael S. Bryant, our guest this week, is a professor of history and legal studies specializing in the impact of the Holocaust. He's based at Bryant University in Smithfield, Rhode Island. Among his many writings he co-edited and contributed an essay to a book titled "Hitler's 'Mein Kampf' and the Holocaust." In the introduction, the editors point out that: "When the Bavarian government's copyright to Adolf Hitler's 'Mein Kampf' lapsed on January 1, 2016, the opportunity to reissue the book in German arose for the first time since 1945." Make your donation at: c-span.org/donate Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

It's not normal to hear what a politician really thinks about his or her colleagues in the United States House and Senate while they are still in office. McKay Coppins of the Atlantic magazine, our guest this week, tried to change that with his bestselling book about Senator Mitt Romney of Utah. The book, called "Romney: A Reckoning," is, according to the publisher, "a redemptive story about a flawed politician who summoned his moral courage just as fear and divisiveness were overtaking American life." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

At the beginning of November, the George Washington Presidential Library in Mount Vernon celebrated its 10th anniversary with a symposium titled, "The Great Experiment – Democracy from the Founding to the Future." Guests on this panel included: Historians H.W. Brands of the University of Texas, Douglas Brinkley of Rice, Joanne Freeman of Yale, and Edna Medford of Howard University. One point of the discussion was the Mount Vernon poll that found that 2/3rds of Americans are pessimistic about the country's direction and dissatisfied with the political climate.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sarah Ogilvie spent 8 years studying the creation of the Oxford English Dictionary. Her book is called "The Dictionary People." Ogilvie, who has a PhD in linguistics from Oxford University, studied over 3,000 original contributors to the dictionary. In her introduction to the book, she writes: "I was thrilled to discover not one but three murderers, a pornography collector, Karl Marx’s daughter, a president of Yale, the inventor of the tennis-net adjuster, a pair of lesbian writers who wrote under a male pen name, and a cocaine addict found dead in a railway station lavatory."  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Martin Gurri is a former CIA analyst who writes about the relationship between politics and media. Gurri was born in Cuba and came to the United States with his parents in the 1950s. In 2014 he self-published an e-book titled "The Revolt of the Public and the Crisis of Authority in the New Millennium." It was republished in hardback in 2018. Martin Gurri says his thesis is a simple one: "The information technologies of the twenty-first century have enabled the public, composed of amateurs, people from nowhere, to break the power of political hierarchies of the industrial age." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When you read about the political history of Illinois, you often see the word "corruption." For instance, from January 1961 until January 2009 Illinois citizens elected 8 different men to be their governor. Four of those eventually went to prison, all convicted after they were out of office. Our guest this week, Robert Hartley, has written 11 books about the politicians of Illinois, including one titled "Power, Purpose & Prison." Mr. Hartley writes that these men met their downfall under different circumstances. He asks: "Where did they go wrong?" and "Were they able to recover self-respect in spite of their punishment?" Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ben Stein, our guest this week, is close to 80 years old. When he was in his 20s he wrote speeches for Richard Nixon. He wants you to know that he still calls Mr. Nixon his hero. Mr. Stein also tells you in his latest book about what he's done since those early years: "I've worked as a university teacher, a columnist for the Wall Street Journal, a scriptwriter, a novelist, an investigator into financial fraud for Barron's, a columnist for the late greatly lamented Los Angeles Herald Examiner, a writer and a commentator on economics, an actor, a game show host, a talk show host, a father, and a husband." His book is called "The Peacemaker: Nixon – The Man, President, and My Friend."   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

John Hancock is one of the most famous signatures in the history of the United States. Most people don’t know much more than that about him. Brooke Barbier, our guest this week, who is the founder of Ye Olde Tavern Tours of Boston, wants to change your perception of this American signer of the Declaration of Independence. Barbier's newest book is called "King Hancock." He got that moniker back in the middle of the 1700s. The author writes: "His stature eventually rose so high that he became known by both his friends and enemies by that name."  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Diana Henriques is the author of 5 previous books including "The Wizard of Lies: Bernie Madoff and the Death of Trust." Originally from Bryan, Texas, and Roanoke, Virginia, Ms. Henriques spent 22 years as a reporter with the New York Times. In her latest book "Taming the Street," she writes in the preface: "My mission is to describe just one of the New Deal's most significant achievements, clearing out the vicious jungle that was the nation's financial landscape in the 1920s and replacing it with a well-tended terrain where ordinary Americans could save and invest with confidence."  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Historian Andrew Roberts calls this week's guest Kenneth Rendell the "manuscript whisperer." Rendell's new book is about his travelling the world during his career buying and selling significant historical letters and documents, from the Renaissance to the present day. The title of his book is "Safeguarding History: Trailblazing Adventures Inside the Worlds of Collecting and Forging History." One of the stories he tells is about his role in determining whether the Hitler diaries, published in 1983, were real or fake.     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

"America is deeply divided. Our politics is broken, marked by anger, contempt and distrust. We must acknowledge that reality but not lose historical perspective. It’s bad now, but it’s been worse before—and not only during the Civil War." These are the words of Fox News contributor Karl Rove, a longtime political consultant and former senior adviser to President George W. Bush. He wrote them under the headline: "America Is Often a Nation Divided," in a recent Saturday edition of the Wall Street Journal. The piece is historical and starts back when the country began.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Author Charlotte Gray, our guest this week, is a Canadian born in Great Britain who now lives in a suburb of Ottawa. Her book "Passionate Mothers, Powerful Sons" is about Jennie Jerome Churchill and Sara Delano Roosevelt. The former Jennie Jerome was born in the United States and was the mother of Winston Churchill. Sara Delano married James Roosevelt and became the mother of FDR in 1882. Charlotte Gray writes that one of the reasons to write about these two women is that: "Their reputations, so different within their lifetimes, have both suffered since their deaths." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Erec Smith, our guest this week, is an associate professor of rhetoric at York College of Pennsylvania. He is also the co-founder of Free Black Thought, a website that "seeks to represent the rich diversity of black thought beyond the relatively narrow spectrum of views promoted by mainstream outlets..." In a Newsweek article, Prof. Smith wrote: "We hear endlessly about systemic racism, white supremacy, the black/white income gap, and police brutality. So powerful an ideology has this narrative become that those of us who pose a credible counter-narrative—black anti-woke writers, for example—frequently find our words being misconstrued in an effort to stanch their impact."  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lindsay Chervinsky is a presidential historian who has written what she says is the first book on the presidential cabinet. It's called "The Cabinet: George Washington and the Creation of an American Institution." It was on November 26, 1791, that President George Washington convened his cabinet department secretaries: Alexander Hamilton, Thomas Jefferson, Henry Knox, and Edmund Randolph. It was the first cabinet meeting ever held. Among other things, we asked Lindsay Chervinsky why Washington waited a full two and a half years into his presidency to call everyone together. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

It has been 32 months since the attack on the U.S. Capitol that disrupted a joint session of the U.S. Congress in the process of completing the presidential election result. More than 1,100 defendants have been charged in nearly all 50 states and the District of Columbia. More than 110 individuals have been found guilty of felonies. Kyle Cheney of Politico has spent a lot of time during these past months covering the trial in the U.S. District Court of the District of Columbia. We asked him to give us an overview of what these court proceedings have looked like up close. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Chapman University professor Luke Nichter is the author of the book "The Year That Broke Politics: Collusion and Chaos in the Presidential Election of 1968." Professor Nichter is also the creator of nixontapes.org, the "only website dedicated solely to the scholarly production and dissemination of digitized Nixon tape audio and transcripts." Nichter's book focuses on the 1968 presidential race and the contentious battle between Vice President Hubert Humphrey, Richard Nixon, and George Wallace.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Craig Nelson, in his book "V Is For Victory," reports on the number of casualties from World War II. He writes that, according to the U.S. Department of Defense, the military casualties were 1,870,000 (405,000 killed and 673,115 wounded). Then, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, there were over 8.9 million American war industry worker casualties (75,400 dead and over 8.8 million wounded) between 1942 and 1945. Author Craig Nelson, our guest this week, further says: "Across history, the 'arsenal of democracy' has come to mean this miracle of American manufacturing. When Roosevelt used the term, however, he meant the miracle of the American people."      Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Metropol Hotel is located near the Bolshoi Theatre in downtown Moscow. When it opened in 1901 it was the symbol of Russia's growing prosperity. After the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution, it was often used by Lenin to give speeches at so-called party congresses. During World War II, the Metropol became a home and office for almost all foreign journalists allowed to work in the U.S.S.R. British journalist Alan Philps, our guest this week, has written a book about those days titled "The Red Hotel: Moscow 1941, the Metropol Hotel, and the Untold Story of Stalin's Propaganda War."    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Adam Andrzejewski is the founder of OpenTheBooks.com and lives in Hinsdale, Illinois. OpenTheBooks.com says it is "the largest private repository of U.S. public sector spending." The mission is to post "every dime, online, in real time." In their 2022 annual report on government spending, Alexander Fraser, a 19th century Scottish professor of history is quoted saying: "A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. Democracy will continue to exist until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury." Mr. Andrzejewski is our guest this week on the Booknotes+ podcast. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Wall Street Journal reporter Katherine Clarke, in her book "Billionaires' Row," admits that: "Part of my motivation for writing this book was that as a reporter I can't help but observe that the colorful characters who've made the New York real estate world so dynamic are increasingly few and far between…In some ways, this book memorializes that dying breed of New York real estate kingpins who took big swings and risked losing it all." The subtitle of the book describes its focus: "Tycoons, High Rollers, and the Epic Race to Build the World's Most Exclusive Skyscrapers." These supertall buildings that house $100 million apartments are located on 57th Street at the southern end of Central Park in Manhattan.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In the past 18 months, since the start of the Russia-Ukraine War, the threat of a possible nuclear war is mentioned in the media almost every day. There are 9 countries in the world that reportedly have nuclear weapons, over 13,000 in all, 89% of which are controlled by the United States and Russia. Rebeccah Heinrichs of the Hudson Institute spends most of her professional time thinking, speaking, and writing about national security and defense. We asked her to give us her analysis of the nuclear weapons issue.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

As we begin the 2024 presidential campaign, we hear the word "inflation" in almost every candidate's speech. One issue that is always mentioned is the price of food. Benjamin Lorr spent several years travelling the United States and the world to investigate how the food supply chain works. His book is titled "The Secret Life of Groceries: The Dark Miracle of the American Supermarket." He writes that: "Most people shop for groceries with clueless abandon."    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On September 6, 1970, TWA flight 741 from Israel to New York was hijacked and flown to the Jordanian desert. Historian Martha Hodes, at the time 12 years old, was on that plane along with her sister Catherine, who was 13. A group called the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine was behind the hijacking. For years, Martha Hodes, who teaches 19th Century history at New York University, only had fuzzy memories of those 6 days and nights in the desert as a hostage. In the past couple of years, Prof. Hodes decided to try to piece together her experience. The result is her book titled "My Hijacking: A Personal History of Forgetting and Remembering."     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

C.W. Goodyear was born in New Orleans. He's a graduate of Yale University and now lives in the Washington, DC area. He's also a first time biographer, having just published a book about James Garfield titled "President Garfield: From Radical to Unifier." Garfield, America's 20th president, took office on March 4, 1881. His time as president lasted only 200 days. Garfield was assassinated by Charles Guiteau in a Washington, DC train station at the corner of 6th and Pennsylvania Avenue on July 2, 1881. Mr. Goodyear has written a full life biography of James Garfield, from the years he grew up in Ohio through his generalship in the Civil War and his 17 years in the U.S. House of Representatives.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Former president Theodore Roosevelt died on January 6, 1919. He was 60 years old. Author William Hazelgrove, in his new book about Roosevelt, chose to focus mostly on the last two years of TR's life. It's titled "The Last Charge of the Rough Rider," and it's the focus of this week's podcast. Mr. Hazelgrove takes us through TR's feud with President Woodrow Wilson over wanting to create another Rough Rider soldier regiment to fight in Europe. Wilson turned him down in spite of the fact that both the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House of Representatives had approved Roosevelt's request.     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Simon Sebag Montefiore is a British historian. He's 57 and lives in London with his wife Santa and their two children. He's written 12 books - 9 nonfiction and 3 novels. His latest effort is titled "The World: A Family History of Humanity." Including the index, it's 1,304 pages. In his preface, Montefiore writes: "I have always wanted to write an intimate human history like 'The World' – in some ways a new approach, in some ways a traditional one – which is the fruit of a lifetime of study and travels."   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Robert Kaplan's 21st book, "The Tragic Mind," revolves around what he has learned over the years from Greek philosophers and William Shakespeare. Yale University Press says that Kaplan "employs the works of ancient Greek dramatists, Shakespeare, German philosophers, and the modern classics to explore the central subjects of international politics: order, disorder, rebellion, ambition, loyalty to family and state, violence, and the mistakes of power." Mr. Kaplan, 70, was born in New York City and graduated from the University of Connecticut.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

James Risen's latest book is titled "The Last Honest Man." The man he's talking about is Frank Church, former Democratic senator from Idaho. In the prologue he writes: "When the Church Committee began to investigate the CIA, FBI, NSA and other agencies, it marked for the first time there had been any serious congressional inquiry into the national security state." The year was 1975. James Risen is a former New York Times reporter and currently covers national security for The Intercept.     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

"How did the U.S. lose the war in Afghanistan? Who bears responsibility? What has been the human cost?" These are the questions asked on Frontline's website advertising the 3-part documentary series "America and the Taliban." These hour-long documentaries, which are available for streaming online, were produced and directed by Martin Smith and Marcela Gaviria. Because of his on-screen appearances, Mr. Smith is better known by the public. From the other side of the duo, here's a conversation with Marcela Gaviria, who has produced over 40 hours of programming with Frontline.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When a historian writes a book, there are at least two ways to read it, two different parts. One is the narrative, the story, usually told in chronological order. The second part includes epigraphs, footnotes, source notes, photography, and the acknowledgements. Richard Norton Smith spent over 6 years writing and researching his new book, "An Ordinary Man: The Surprising Life and Historic Presidency of Gerald R. Ford." Susan Swain interviewed Mr. Smith on the first part, the narrative, which is available on C-SPAN's video archives. Now comes that second part, the process, the research, and the extras.     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Seattle-based author Timothy Egan has written 10 books. His newest is called "A Fever in the Heartland: The Ku Klux Klan's Plot to Take Over America, and the Woman Who Stopped Them." The description of Mr. Egan's book on the dust jacket reads: "The Roaring Twenties – the Jazz Age – has been characterized as a time of Gatsby frivolity. But it was also the height of the uniquely American hate group, the Ku Klux Klan….They hated Blacks, Jews, Catholics and immigrants in equal measure, and took radical steps to keep these people from the American promise." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

 For the millions of visitors who come to Washington, DC, one of the most popular destinations is Lafayette Park, across from the White House. There's no longer vehicle traffic on Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the President's house, but you can often find a crowd on the street, most having fun or taking pictures. Since 1981 there has also been a peace vigil on the spot, 24-hours a day, 7 days a week. You can't miss it. To find out how it all works, we talked with a veteran of the anti-war, anti-nuclear protests – a man who has been there for close to 40 years – Philipos Melaku-Bello. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Wobblies is a nickname for an early 20th century union called the Industrial Workers of the World, or IWW. Book author Ahmed White writes: "Like the Christian martyrs to whom they have been likened, the Wobblies were left to find confirmation and redemption mainly in their own destruction." Yale Law School graduate Ahmed White has a book titled "Under the Iron Heel," a takeoff from a novel written by author Jack London. Prof. White is currently teaching labor and criminal law at the University of Colorado in Boulder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Dr. Edna Greene Medford is a well-known historian and expert on Andrew Jackson and Abraham Lincoln. She spent 8 years as chair of the history department at Howard University in Washington, DC. She recently appeared before an audience at Purdue University in connection with the C-SPAN Center for Scholarship and Engagement to talk about African American History, U.S. Presidents, the Civil War and Reconstruction. Over the past 20 years, she has also served as a member of C-SPAN's advisory team for the network's periodic surveys ranking U.S. presidents. Those participating in the questioning included students majoring in political science and communications. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Two public corporations, CBS and Viacom, used to be controlled by the same man, Sumner Redstone. This is the subject of a book called "Unscripted." Our guest is reporter James B. Stewart of the New York Times. He along with his co-author Rachel Abrams write in the preface of the book that: "The drama that unfolded may have occurred at Viacom and CBS, but the recent drumbeat of greed, backstabbing, plotting, and betrayal at the upper level of American business and society has hardly been confined to one or two companies, or one wealthy family and its hangers-on." Viacom and CBS merged in late 2019. The new company is called Paramount Global.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Derek Leebaert says, in the introduction to his newest book, that "Only four people served at the top echelon of Franklin Roosevelt's presidency, from the frightening early months of Spring 1933 until he died in April of 1945 and, in their different ways, they were as wounded as he." The book is titled "Unlikely Heroes" and Mr. Leebaert puts the spotlight on people who served FDR for his entire presidency: Harry Hopkins, Harold Ickes, Frances Perkins, and Henry Wallace. They all had a major role in creating and running what is known in history as the New Deal.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Edward Achorn has been a life-long reader of Abraham Lincoln. In 2020 he published his first book on the 16th president called "Every Drop of Blood: The Momentous Second Inauguration of Abraham Lincoln." In his second book on Lincoln, just published, Mr. Achorn dropped back to the beginning of Lincoln's national political career. That year was 1860. The subject matter: inside the Republican convention held in Chicago. This time the book is titled "The Lincoln Miracle." Edward Achorn is the former editorial page editor of the Providence Journal and lives in Rehoboth, Massachusetts.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Since January 6, 2021, more than 1,000 defendants have been arrested in nearly all 50 states and the District of Columbia. Those arrested have been charged with a long list of felonies and misdemeanors, including assaulting, resisting, or impeding officers or employees of the U.S. Capitol. Over 518 individuals have already pled guilty to a number of offenses. Over 60 people have been found guilty at contested trials. A just completed Oath Keepers trial found defendants guilty of both felonies and misdemeanors. To try and understand more about the judicial trial process, we asked a juror on this recent trial to tell us her observations.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

100 years ago, these names were in American newspapers on many days: Harry Daugherty, Jess Smith, Roxie Stinson, Burton Wheeler, and Gaston Means. Today those names can be found in a new book, "Crooked: The Roaring '20s Tale of a Corrupt Attorney General, a Crusading Senator, and the Birth of the American Political Scandal." Nathan Masters is the author and it's his first book. For the past 7 years, Masters has hosted a television series known as "Lost L.A." He works at the University of Southern California Libraries in Los Angeles.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Who killed Jane Stanford? She died in 1905. She was the wife of Leland Stanford, a former railroad magnet, governor of California and U.S. senator. Their son Leland Stanford Jr. died at age 15 in 1884 of typhoid. In his honor, Stanford University was born in 1891. But why all these years later is there a book about who killed the doyenne of Stanford's family? Our guest, Emeritus Stanford University professor Richard White, has been chasing this mystery for several years. His book on the subject is subtitled "A Gilded Age Tale of Murder, Deceit, Spirits, and the Birth of a University."  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kidada Williams is an associate professor of history at Wayne State University in Detroit. In her research work, she has focused on African Americans' accounts of lynching and the impact of terrorist night riders on the lives of enslaved people. Williams, who received her PhD from the University of Michigan in 2005, has just published her latest book, "I Saw Death Coming: A History of Terror and Survival in the War against Reconstruction." Prof. Williams stated her goal is to transport readers "into the daily existence of formerly enslaved people building hope-filled new lives." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The United States of America was originally built on two important documents. The first, the Declaration of Independence, was signed by 56 men in the middle of 1776. The second, the Constitution, was signed by 39 men in September 1787. Six of those men put their John Hancock on both documents. To find out more, we talked with authors Denise Kiernan and Joseph D'Agnese who have written short background stories about the signers in two books: "Signing Their Lives Away," for the Declaration of Independence, and "Signing Their Rights Away," for the Constitution.      Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In its 41 years of existence, the Southeastern Guide Dogs organization in Palmetto, Florida, has created over 3,000 human-guide dog pairs. In 2006 they launched their program to help military veterans. One of the first things you learn if you take a tour of their facilities is: "We rely 100% on private donations. No government money is involved." Titus Herman, CEO of Southeastern Guide Dogs, has led the organization since 2008. We asked him to tell us their story.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Historian Robert Kagan has been writing about foreign affairs for most of his 64 years. The first book in his planned trilogy on American foreign policy was published in 2006 and focused on U.S. history before the founding up to the Spanish-American War. Mr. Kagan, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, has just completed the second book in the trilogy titled "The Ghost at the Feast: America and the Collapse of World Order, 1900-1941." He, in conclusion, writes: "Americans have complex attitudes toward power and morality. They have a sense of distinctiveness and remoteness in a tumultuous and highly contested political system." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In our most recent podcast, Roger Parloff gave us an inside look at the Proud Boys trial which has been underway in the U.S. District Court of the District of Columbia since January 12th. In this follow-up to Mr. Parloff, we asked Dr. Megan Squire, a computer scientist, how she applies data science techniques to track and expose what she calls "networks of hate and extremism" online. She has studied the Proud Boys since 2017. Dr. Squire recently joined the Southern Poverty Law Center to continue her research.      Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In the two years since January 6, 2021, close to 1000 people have been charged with federal crimes relating to the attack on the U.S. Capitol. The legal process used by the federal justice system to deal with these cases is complicated and often out of sight to the American people. Attorney and journalist Roger Parloff, senior editor at Lawfare, has been live tweeting the trials of the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys over the past several weeks. We asked him to explain to us, in some detail, how it all works.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The language of 2023: "threat to democracy," "Antifa," "Stop the Steal," "fascism," "Proud Boys," "Brexit," "artificial intelligence," "BleachBit." Who understands all this? Where does the language come from? We asked British author Dorian Lynskey, our guest this week, to help us. His latest book is titled "The Ministry of Truth: The Biography of George Orwell's 1984." In the introduction, Lynskey writes that "The phrases and concepts that Orwell minted have become essential fixtures of political language, still potent after decades of use and misuse: newspeak, Big Brother, the thought police, Room 101,…doublethink, unperson, memory hole" and much more.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In Yale history professor Beverly Gage's 837-page cradle-to-grave biography of J. Edgar Hoover, she writes, "I do not count myself among Hoover's admirers." However, in the introduction, she says her book "G-Man" is less about judging him than about understanding him. Hoover ran the FBI for 48 years until he died at age 77 in 1972. Prof. Gage, who did her undergraduate work at Yale and received her Ph.D. from Columbia, writes that "Hoover emerged as one of history's great villains. Perhaps the most universally reviled American political figure of the 20th century." She joins us to talk about her new book and the complicated life and career of J. Edgar Hoover.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Back in the period between June to November of 1962, Paul Gregory reportedly knew Lee and Marina Oswald better than anyone else. Two hours after President Kennedy's assassination, Mr. Gregory, then a student at the University of Oklahoma, was watching television and saw members of the Dallas police escorting a suspect into police headquarters. Paul Gregory said out loud, "I know that man," meaning Lee Harvey Oswald. Sixty years later he has written a book about his friendship with the Oswalds and the conspiracy theories surrounding Kennedy's assassination. He joined us to about it.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Steve Kornacki, our guest this week, is the national political correspondent for NBC News. You see him often around campaigns and election nights in front of what the network calls the "Big Board." He recently finished a 7-part podcast series called "The Revolution with Steve Kornacki." It's the story of how the Republicans took over the U.S. House of Representatives for the first time in 40 years. That happened in 1994 and was organized and led by former Georgia congressman and Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Gordon Chang, our guest this week, is a well-known opinion writer, book author, and graduate of Cornell Law School. His father was born in China. His mother is of Scottish ancestry. Gordon Chang was born in Long Branch, New Jersey, and grew up 25 miles outside of New York City. At Columbia High School in Maplewood, New Jersey, he was president of his class. Mr. Chang spent almost two decades in China, where he practiced international law. In the past 20 years, he has appeared regularly in the American media. Gordon Chang was the author of "The Coming Collapse of China" in 2001. We asked him if he's still sticking by that prediction.        Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On the cover of Bloomberg reporter Mark Bergen's most recent book, "Like, Comment, Subscribe," it says it will take the reader "Inside YouTube's Chaotic Rise to World Domination." Mr. Bergen, our guest this week, has reported on Google for the past seven years. YouTube was bought by Google in 2014 for $1.6 billion. In the prologue to the book, Bergen reports that more than 2 billion people visit YouTube every month, making it the second most visited search engine on Earth, second only to Google. He adds that YouTube is still dominated by music, gaming, and videos for children.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The title of Dartmouth history professor Matthew Delmont's latest book is "Half American: The Epic Story of African Americans Fighting World War II at Home and Abroad." Prof. Delmont, our guest this week, writes in his introduction that: "Nearly everything about the war – the start and end dates, geography, vital military roles, home front, and international implications – looks different form the African American perspective." He points out that ultimately, over one million Black men and women served in World War II.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A couple of weeks ago, the conservative Heritage Foundation published its 2023 Index of U.S. Military Strength. At that time, we discussed the Index's findings with the editor, Dakota Wood. The Heritage study concluded that the current U.S. military is at significant risk of not being able to meet the demands of a single major regional conflict.  We wanted another point of view on the current U.S. military posture. So this week, we asked longtime observer and critic of the U.S. military procurement process, Winslow Wheeler, to talk with us. He has spent over 40 years working on national security defense budgets and military reform for both political parties, the Government Accountability Office and the Center for Defense Information.        Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Adam Hochschild, in his new book "American Midnight," writes about what he says is left out of the typical high school American history book, especially when the subject is the United States during and immediately after World War One. "This book is about what's missing," writes Hochschild, "It's a story of mass imprisonments, torture, vigilante violence, censorship, killings of Black Americans, and far more that is not marked by commemorative plaques, museum exhibits, or Ken Burns documentaries." Adam Hochschild joins us to discuss it all.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

To people who know him well, Mark Dimunation is, first and foremost, an accomplished storyteller. Second and not least, he has been for twenty-five years the chief of the Library of Congress' Rare Book and Special Collections Division. The library has over 850,000 items in the collection, including Charles Dickens' walking stick, the Bay Psalm Book, published in 1640, and the contents in Abraham Lincoln's pockets on the night he was assassinated. Mark Dimunation, our guest this week, has a lot more to add to a conversation about his work.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Stacy Schiff has written books about Benjamin Franklin, Cleopatra, and the Witches of Salem. And now it's Samuel Adams, a Massachusetts man Thomas Jefferson called the Father of the American Revolution. Stacy Schiff, appropriately born in Adams, Massachusetts, is our guest this week. Her book is titled "The Revolutionary: Samuel Adams." Mr. Adams was born in Boston and lived for 81 years from 1722 to 1803. He's also been called the most Puritan and the most populist of the American Founders. If you met him before his forty-first birthday, according to author Schiff, you probably wouldn't consider him much of a success. Includes bonus interview material. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In October, the Heritage Foundation in Washington, DC, released its 578-page 2023 Index of U.S. Military Strength. Retired Marine Lt. Col. Dakota Wood edited the Index, which includes essays and analysis from over 16 experts chosen by the Heritage Foundation. The introduction to the Index concludes: "America’s leadership role remains in question, and its security interests are under substantial pressure. Challenges continue to grow, long-standing allies are not what they once were, and the U.S. is increasingly bedeviled by debt and domestic discord that constrain its ability to sustain its forces at a level that is commensurate with its interests." Lt. Col. Wood joins us to talk about the findings.      Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

At age 37, Vivek Ramaswamy has already built and sold several companies. Before he began his career as an entrepreneur, he managed to serve as the valedictorian of his 2003 senior class at St. Xavier High School in Cincinnati, Ohio, and was a nationally ranked junior tennis player. Then there was a Harvard biology degree and graduation from Yale Law School. Ramaswamy has written two books. His latest is "Nation of Victims: Identity Politics, the Death of Merit, and the Path Back to Excellence."     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

"The Great Stewardess Rebellion" is about the women who changed the working conditions for stewardesses in the late 1960s and early 1970s. The author, Nell Wulfhart wrote the New York Times "Carry-On" column from 2016 to 2019. In the introduction to her book, Ms. Wulfhart writes that: "It wouldn't be much of an exaggeration to say that in the 1960s the airplane cabin was the most sexist workplace in America." Since then, she adds, the "flight attendants' achievements are, even from today's perspective, remarkable: they forced the airlines to promote them alongside men, to pay them fairly, to treat them as legitimate workers."   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Snyder offers a full and fascinating portrait of the life and legacy of Felix Frankfurter. This is the biography of an Austrian Jewish immigrant who arrived in the United States at age eleven speaking, not a word of English, who by age twenty-six befriended former president Theodore Roosevelt, and who by age fifty was one of Franklin Roosevelt’s most trusted advisers. It is the story of a man devoted to democratic ideals, a natural orator and often overbearing justice, whose passion allowed him to amass highly influential friends and helped create the liberal establishment. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Charles Kupchan is a professor of international affairs at Georgetown University. He has served on the National Security Council for both the Clinton and Obama White Houses. Prof. Kupchan has a doctorate and a master's degree from Oxford and an undergraduate degree from Harvard. He is the author of 10 books. His latest is titled "Isolationism: A History of America's Efforts to Shield Itself from the World." We asked Prof. Kupchan to appear on the podcast to give his perspective on Vladimir Putin and his use of propaganda during the current war in Ukraine.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jay Gould revolutionized the world of finance in the 19th century. In “American Rascal,” Greg Steinmetz tells his story. Jay Gould was a brilliant strategist in any scrap over money. For a good example of Mr. Gould’s cunning, consider how he outgeneraled his fellow robber baron Cornelius Vanderbilt in what might be called the Bovine War. The former reporter for the Wall Street Journal and current partner at a money management firm in New York City sheds light on the life of Gould and his abilities with finances. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Author Troy Senik says in his new book, "A Man of Iron," that Grover Cleveland was the self-made, scrupulously honest man Americans often say they want as their president. President Cleveland served two nonconsecutive terms as commander and chief, a term as Governor of New York, and even as sheriff in western New York's Erie County.  In this episode, Mr. Senik, a former speechwriter for George W. Bush, discusses Cleveland's political career. According to Mr. Senik President Cleveland became the most successful Democratic politician of his era, though he has become a minor icon for modern-day libertarians.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Judy Shelton has been appearing on C-SPAN since 1989 and in this edition of the Booknotes+ podcast, she talks about the role of the Federal Reserve in our economy. . Her first visit was on Booknotes to discuss her book titled "The Coming Soviet Crash." During the past 33 years since her first appearance on C-SPAN, Judy Shelton has been in and out of politics. She worked for a time with three presidential candidates, including Bob Dole, Ben Carson, and Donald Trump. It was President Trump who nominated her to serve on the board of the Federal Reserve. Her selection to the Fed was controversial, and eventually, President Joe Biden's administration withdrew her nomination in February of 2021.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

John Locke was born on August 29, 1632, in Sommerset, England. He lived for 72 years. University of Montana professor Claire Arcenas, in her new book, calls him "America's Philosopher." She writes in the preface: "Though he never set foot on America soil and died long before the creation of the United States, John Locke stands and has always stood at the center of American intellectual life." Prof. Arcenas focuses on how Locke has captivated our attention for three centuries and has had an unparalleled influence on the development of American thought and culture.      Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On August 16, 1977, 45 years ago, Elvis Presley died at age 42. The autopsy found eight different drugs in his body. Just seven years earlier, Presley was with Richard Nixon in the Oval Office to offer his assistance in fighting the war on drugs. He asked for a special agent badge from the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs. A copy of the photo of President Nixon and Elvis on that occasion is the most requested from the National Archives. Our guest, cultural journalist Alanna Nash, has spent a lot of her professional life telling the story of Elvis and his well-known manager, Colonel Tom Parker. She reveals in her book "The Colonel" that Parker was not an American and wasn’t originally named Tom Parker.         Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey all you teachers and all you parents, and all you professors and all you students: Season #2 of the C-SPAN in the Classroom podcast drops this fall! Whether you're mowing the yard, on a peaceful weekend drive, or just relaxing on the couch with your favorite blanket, make sure to tune in to the first episode of Season #2 of C-SPAN in the Classroom on September 10th, available at c-span.org, on the free C-SPAN Now app, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Make sure to like, subscribe, and share, and visit us at www.c-span.org/classroom. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ron Liebman and Tim Baker are former assistant U.S. attorneys who were part of the prosecution team that brought down Vice President Spiro Agnew on October 10, 1973. On that day, Mr. Agnew appeared before the federal court in Baltimore and pleaded "no contest" to one felony charge for tax evasion in 1967. Messrs. Liebman and Baker talked about their role as the case unfolded. Agnew was fined $10,000 and placed on three years of unsupervised probation. This conversation was originally recorded in 2019.     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Terence Smith's media career went from the Stamford Advocate the New York Times, then to CBS News, and finally the PBS Newshour. In his short memoir of his working life, titled "Four Wars, Five Presidents," Terrence Smith writes: "There is a great deal of hand-wringing these days about the news business. Young people don’t read, don’t know anything beyond what they see on their screen, and don’t see the value of independent knowledge as long as they have Google and can look it up. The sky, we are told, is falling."   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

David Kertzer has studied and written about Italy, the Catholic Church, Nazism, communism, and fascism for over 40 years. His latest of 13 books is about the secret history of Pope Pius XII, Mussolini, and Hitler. It's titled "The Pope at War." In 2020, Pius XII's archives were finally open in the Vatican. Brown University professor Kertzer, according to Random House, his publisher, "paints a new, dramatic portrait of what the pope did and did not do as war enveloped the continent and as the Nazis began their systematic mass murder of Europe’s Jews."  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In the history of Pulitzer Prizes and the Oscars, very few winners have turned down these awards. One of those who did was a famous Armenian-American, a writer from the 1930s, 40s, and 50s. His name was William Saroyan. He turned down the Pulitzer for the drama called "The Time of Your Life" in 1940. Saroyan said he was opposed in principle to awards in the arts and was quoted as saying "such arts awards vitiate and embarrass art at its very source." His son Aram, a well-known poet in his own right, has written a lot about his father and his relationship with him. We asked him to talk about his book "Last Rites: The Death of William Saroyan."   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In the heart of Washington, DC, is a unique place for kids. It's called the Little Blue House. For 31 years, it's been the first love of its director, a man named Carl Foster. On the website of the Little Blue House, it says that there is a single core mission: "to foster the development of vulnerable and at-risk children and youth in the District in a safe, stable, and healthy environment." Carl Foster, a Vietnam War veteran, says that for over 30 years, the Little Blue House "has provided whatever service was needed by our kids to give them a chance to become self-sufficient adults."  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

"Americans react to homeless with a mix of anger, compassion, perplexity, and frustration. Little progress ever seems to be made." Those are the thoughts of Stephen Eide, from his book "Homelessness in America." Mr. Eide is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute with a PhD in political philosophy from Boston College. He focuses a good deal of the 151-page book on the housing issue. In Chapter 11 he suggests: "When housing is all that anyone debates, nothing winds up getting done about public disorder, drug addiction, and untreated mental illness."   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

New York Times reporter David Gelles claims in his latest book that legendary General Electric CEO Jack Welch is the root of all that's wrong with capitalism today. The title of his book is "The Man Who Broke Capitalism: How Jack Welch Gutted the Heartland and Crushed the Soul of Corporate America – And How to Undo His Legacy." Mr. Gelles says while Welch made G.E. the most valuable company on Earth, his strategies ultimately destroyed what he loved so dearly. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lance Morrow is an author, writer, and essayist. He joined Time magazine in 1965. During his time there, Morrow covered the Detroit riots, the Vietnam War, the Nixon administration, and the Watergate scandal. In 1976 he became a regular writer of essays for Time magazine and wrote more "Man of the Year" cover articles than any other reporter. From 1996 to 2006, he was a professor at Boston University. His several books include "Evil: An Investigation," "God and Mammon," and his latest, "The Noise of Typewriters," to be issued in January of 2023.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

According to Beverley Driver Eddy, little has been written about Camp Ritchie, Maryland. Dickinson College retired professor Eddy says in her book "Ritchie Boy Secrets" that on June 19, 1942, the U.S. Army opened a secret military intelligence training center. Over the next four years, it produced some 20,000 graduates, intelligence and language specialists, for service in World War Two. Some of the famous names of men who were Ritchie Boys include J.D. Salinger, former senators John Chafee and Frank Church, David Rockefeller, and Reverend William Sloan Coffin.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

At least 6 U.S. Presidents recorded conversations while in office. Hear those conversations on this C-SPAN podcast. Season 2 focuses on President Richard Nixon's secretly-recorded private telephone conversations. Through eight episodes, hear Richard Nixon talk with key aides about Watergate strategy, potential Supreme Court Nominees, and hear his reaction to the leaked publication of the Pentagon Papers.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Historian Thomas Kidd, a professor at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in St. Louis, opens his newest book, "Thomas Jefferson: A Biography of Spirit and Flesh," this way: "This is a biography of a brilliant but troubled person. Thomas Jefferson would seem to need no introduction, yet among the Founding Fathers he is the greatest enigma – and the greatest source of controversy." Professor Kidd also writes that "Jefferson left a massive collection of carefully curated papers, but he seems virtually unknowable as a man." Mr. Jefferson was our third president and the principal author of the Declaration of Independence.      Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Elizabethtown College professor David S. Brown is the author of a new book on former president Andrew Jackson. Professor Brown writes that Jackson was the first president to be born in a log cabin, to live beyond the Appalachians, and to rule, so he swore, in the name of the people. The title of the book is "The First Populist: The Defiant Life of Andrew Jackson." He was president for two terms, eight years, from 1829-1837. Jackson, in his lifetime, was a jurist, a general, a congressman, a senator, and America's seventh president.      Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Booknotes the television program started in April of 1989. Our third guest was journalist Bruce Oudes. His book was titled "From: The President-Richard Nixon's Secret Files." Because the 50th anniversary of the Watergate break-in is on June 17th, Booknotes+ is revisiting Mr. Oudes' book, which contains over 600 pages of previously unreleased memoranda from Richard Nixon and aides during the six years of his presidency. Bruce Oudes took a deep dive into over 3.5 million pages of material that were housed at a government warehouse in Alexandria, Virginia.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Any follower of C-SPAN knows the name Harold Holzer, a lifelong aficionado and chronicler of Abraham Lincoln. He has either written or edited fifty-four books on America's 16th president. President Lincoln has been Mr. Holzer's avocation over these many years while he maintained full-time work and responsibilities for twenty-three of those years as senior vice president for public affairs at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. He currently serves as director of Hunter College's Roosevelt House Public Policy Institute. Recently, he talked about his favorite pastime, Mr. Lincoln, before an audience at Purdue University. Students were able to ask many questions about Abraham Lincoln and how the media has treated some of the other forty-five presidents in our country's history.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Not a day goes by that Russia is not in the news, especially since the February 24th invasion of Ukraine. In the history of Russia, one of the most familiar figures, especially in the world of writing and writers, is Leo Tolstoy. He's best known for two novels, "War & Peace" (1869) and "Anna Karenina" (1878). He lived for 82 years, had 13 children, was married for 48 years, and left his wife just before he died in 1910. We asked University of Virginia professor Andrew Kaufman, author of two books on Tolstoy, to give us his take on Russia and Tolstoy's attitude toward war.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Professor Olivier Zunz has been a professor of history at the University of Virginia since 1979. He was born and raised in France and received his Ph.D. from Pantheon Sorbonne University in Paris in 1977. Alexis de Tocqueville (TOKE-vihl) was also a Frenchman. At 25, Tocqueville traveled throughout the United States for nine months and recorded his experiences in the well-known 1835 book "Democracy in America." Professor Zunz has just published the newest book on Tocqueville titled "The Man Who Understood Democracy."  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Joe Madison has hosted a radio talk show for over 40 years. He's known to his audience as the "Black Eagle" and can be heard daily on SiriusXM radio. A native of Dayton, Ohio, and a graduate of Washington University in St. Louis, Mr. Madison started his professional life as an activist. One of his first jobs was working for the NAACP as political director under the leadership of Ben Hooks. Joe Madison angered both his allies and adversaries when he organized a boycott against Dearborn, Michigan, when that city prohibited nonresidents, including African-Americans in Detroit, from visiting its public parks. This story and many other are included in his memoir titled, "Radio Active."     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Megan McArdle has been a columnist for the Washington Post since 2018. She has described herself as a right-leaning libertarian. At the same time, she says she's actually a social liberal. Megan McArdle graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with a degree in English literature in 1994 and worked for several start-ups before getting an MBA from the University of Chicago. She started her professional writing career as a blogger in November 2001. Since then, Ms. McArdle has written for the Economist, the Atlantic, Newsweek, and Bloomberg View. In a recent column in the Washington Post, writing about today's journalism, she said: "We are not trusted because we are not entirely trustworthy."     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The book is called "Last Call at the Hotel Imperial: The Reporters Who Took on a World at War." The author is Deborah Cohen, a professor at Northwestern University. Prof. Cohen primarily focuses on four American journalists who traveled the world in the 1920s, 30s, and 40s: H.R. Knickerbocker, Vincent "Jimmy" Sheean, Dorothy Thompson, and John Gunther. These reporters landed exclusive interviews with Hitler, Mussolini, Nehru and Gandhi and helped shape what Americans at the time knew about the world.       Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

For the past twenty years, Dr. Thomas Fisher has worked in the emergency department at the University of Chicago Medical Center, serving the same South Side community in which he was raised. During the past two years of COVID-19, he decided to write about his experience in a large urban hospital emergency room. He says that at the end of a shift he was haunted by the confusion in the eyes of his patients. He asks a couple of questions that they probably are thinking: Who is this man treating them from behind a mask? Why do they have to wait so many hours to be treated? Dr. Fisher attempts to answer these and many other questions in his book "The Emergency: A Year of Healing and Heartbreak in a Chicago ER."       Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In Jeffrey Frank's recent book titled "The Trials of Harry S. Truman," he reports that at his low point in his time as president, Truman's popularity rating was at 16 percent. However, seventy years later, according to the latest C-SPAN survey, he was ranked sixth most effective of 44 U.S. presidents. Jeffrey Frank, whose career includes professional years at the Washington Post and the New Yorker magazine, has written the first full account of the Truman presidency in nearly 30 years. The book's subtitle reflects the theme of the biography: "The Extraordinary Presidency of an Ordinary Man, 1945-1953." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The book is titled "The Lords of Easy Money: How the Federal Reserve Broke the American Economy." The author is Christopher Leonard, the current director of the Watchdog Writers Group at the University of Missouri School of Journalism. On the dust jacket of the book it says: "If you ask most people what forces led to today's income inequality and financial crashes, no one would say the Federal Reserve." Christopher Leonard explains why so few people understand the language or inner workings of how American money is managed by a seven-member board in Washington, DC.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Emma Camp is a 22-year-old senior at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, home of Thomas Jefferson. She calls herself a liberal and has written opinion pieces for the school newspaper, The Cavalier Daily. Back in October of 2020, Ms. Camp had some strong things to say about the First Amendment. She wrote that: "The first amendment does not exist to protect reasonable opinions — it exists to protect the unreasonable, the offensive, and the unpopular." In March of 2022, she moved her opinions to a national platform, the New York Times op-ed page. We asked her to tell us what is behind her statement: "I went to college to learn from my professors and peers. I welcomed an environment that champions intellectual diversity and rigorous disagreement. Instead, my college experience has been defined by strict ideological conformity."  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The list is long and, to a lot of people, confusing. We're talking about the language of money. How would you do if you had to define the following: stocks, bonds, private equity, index funds, leveraged buyouts, venture capital, hedge funds and sovereign wealth funds, just to name a few. We asked Jeffrey Hooke, author of "The Myth of Private Equity," to give us some help in understanding the world of investment and finance. Mr. Hooke is a senior lecturer at Johns Hopkins Business School and has spent all of his adult life in and around money.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

During his 40 years in the political science department at the University of Chicago, John Mearsheimer has not avoided controversy. His article and subsequent book about the Israel lobby, for example, written with Harvard University's Stephen Walt, caused a stir in 2006 and 2007. More recently, at the beginning of March 2022, the New Yorker ran a headline that read: "Why John Mearsheimer Blames the U.S. for the Crisis in Ukraine." We asked Prof. Mearsheimer to explain that and talked to him about being a realist, his military service, and his time in academia. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In the dedication of his book, "The Heart of Caring," Dr. Mark Vonnegut tells his patients, teachers, and parents everywhere, "Thank you for letting me have such a good time when I go to work." Dr. Vonnegut is a pediatrician who graduated from Harvard Medical School in 1979. This was after he had been diagnosed, at age 25, with severe schizophrenia. He's had four psychotic breakdowns in his life, but has managed to successfully practice pediatrics for close to forty years. Mark Vonnegut, in his newest book, writes about patients, parents, insurance companies, and his late father, the novelist Kurt Vonnegut.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What is the financial history of the Founding Fathers? How did their personal finances affect the Constitution and the new United States? Historian and Champlain College professor emeritus Willard Sterne Randall puts the focus on how money shaped the birth of America in his book "The Founders' Fortunes." Prof. Randall has written books about Benjamin Franklin, Benedict Arnold, Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, Alexander Hamilton and Ethan Allen. He has now turned his attention on these and other Founders and how they made and lost their money. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The book "Hitler's American Gamble" recounts the five days in 1941 that upended everything. Starting with Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7th and ending with Hitler's declaration of war on the United States on December 11th, British historians Brendan Simms and Charlie Laderman trace the developments during the five days in real-time and reveal how America's engagement in World War Two was far from inevitable.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

July 23rd of this year will mark the 55th anniversary of the Detroit Race Riot. Forty-three people died and more than 1000 were injured during that chaotic week in 1967. Our guest, Professor Clarence Lusane was there. His mother and sister were shot. We talked to him about that experience and about his academic career and activism, which has taken him around the world. Clarence Lusane is currently a professor of political science at Howard University in Washington, DC.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

"I knew Richard Nixon well." At age 81, Dwight Chapin has decided, for the first time, to write about his years in politics and the Nixon White House. His book is called "The President's Man: The Memoirs of Nixon's Trusted Aide." In the first chapter, he writes: "I started working for him as an organizational field man during his 1962 California gubernatorial campaign….I became an advance man at the beginning of the 1966 off-year election cycle and then his personal aide in 1967. In the White House, as his appointments secretary, I had the office next to his." Unfortunately for Chapin, as he explains later, his time working for Richard Nixon didn't end well.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

British historian Andrew Roberts, in the introduction of his latest book called "The Last King of America," about King George III, says the following: "This portrait of a heartless, absolute sovereign is repeated almost every single day in America's print and online media. Even two centuries after his death, hardly a day passes in the United States without some reference to George III where he is still held up as an…archetypal bogeyman, attacked in the same measure by Democrats and Republicans alike." Andrew Roberts, who says the Revolutionary War-era English king was misunderstood, has also written major histories about Napoleon, Churchill, and World War Two.       Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In early 2001, Bethany McLean, at the time a reporter for Fortune magazine, asked the question in an article: "How does Enron make its money?" McLean's reporting, and the reporting of others, led to inquiries that were put to the Enron management. Within a few months, the company was bankrupt. Bethany McLean's subsequent book, "The Smartest Guys in the Room," became a bestseller and a successful documentary. In January 2022, she wrote about her reaction to the Theranos saga. In an essay about the trial of Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes, she wrote, "For those who believe she was guilty of a great crime, it's a disappointing verdict." She joined us to talk about it.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On the dust jacket of Debby Applegate's book "Madam," it says "Simply put: Everybody came to Polly's." Polly being Polly Adler, the madam of some of the most popular brothels in New York City during the 1920s. It was a hangout for politicians, entertainers, writers, and members of the city's underworld. According to Debby Applegate, Polly's pals included FDR, Frank Sinatra, Desi Arnaz, and Duke Ellington, among many others. She joined us to talk about Polly Adler and the power Adler wielded in New York City during the Jazz Age.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In March of 2017, Lance Geiger, from the basement of his house in O'Fallon, Illinois, created a new business, a YouTube show that is now regularly seen by hundreds of thousands of people. Since that day in 2017, Geiger has been known as "The History Guy." He has produced hundreds of short documentaries on history. In his home studio, "The History Guy" is surrounded by artifacts, including military hats and ship models, and he's always dressed in his trademark dark suit, dark-rimmed glasses, and bow tie. Lance Geiger joined us to talk about the genesis of the "The History Guy" program, the work involved in putting out three episodes a week, and the success the show has attained over the past five years.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The first ever televised congressional hearing was on August 3, 1948. The first witness was a man who said he didn't want to be there. He had been subpoenaed to testify before the House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC). His name was Whittaker Chambers, an American who had been a Communist spy for the Soviet Union in the 1930s. We spoke to DC-based attorney John Berresford, who has spent years studying Chambers and the story and trial of the man Chambers accused of also being a Communist spy, Alger Hiss. Mr. Berresford has presented the story of the Hiss-Chambers espionage case in a series of 38 lectures on YouTube.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

"What's your question or comment for Rush?" That is how James Golden – aka Bo Snerdley – would greet callers to Rush Limbaugh's daily, 3-hour radio program. Mr. Golden has written a book about his time as call screener, official show observer, and producer of the most popular talk radio show in America during the past three decades. Rush Limbaugh died on February 17, 2021. In his book "Rush on the Radio," which Mr. Golden says is a tribute to his former boss and friend, he writes about his love of radio and how the Limbaugh program came together behind the scenes.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Between 1915 and 1970, six million African Americans moved from the rural South to cities in the North in search of a better life. Author Isabel Wilkerson captured the history of that mass movement, known as the Great Migration, in her Pulitzer Prize-winning book "The Warmth of Other Suns." She sat down with us in 2010 to talk about the book and the approach she took to tell the story. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In 1787, between May and September, James Madison gave 167 speeches, made 72 motions, and served on four committees at the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia. Jay Cost writes that "most importantly, Madison authored the Virginia Plan, a bold call for a total redesign of the national government that set the agenda for the convention and established the foundation upon which the Constitution would be built." At that time, James Madison was 36 years old. Jay Cost, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, and author of "James Madison: America's First Politician," joined us to talk about the influential Founding Father.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Roosevelt Montás came to the United States from the Dominican Republic in 1985 at the age of twelve. He couldn't speak a word of English. He eventually went on get a Ph.D. in English and Comparative Literature from Columbia University, where he currently teaches. Prof. Montás joined us to talk about his latest book, "Rescuing Socrates," in which he chronicles his journey and explains how books by St. Augustine, Socrates, Freud and Gandhi changed his life.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

"Many people don't want to believe that the citizens of the Southern states were willing to fight and die to preserve the morally repugnant institution of slavery. There has to be another reason, we are told. Well, there isn't." Those are the words of retired Southern-born Army general Ty Seidule, who taught at West Point for two decades. Gen. Seidule, author of "Robert E. Lee and Me," grew up revering Confederate general Robert E. Lee and believing in the Lost Cause, but eventually grew to view Confederate soldiers, including Lee, as "traitors for slavery." He joined us to talk about his transformation and the reaction he received when he made his views public.      Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

WASPs – White Anglo-Saxon Protestants – such as Henry Adams, Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt, Dean Acheson, and Joe Alsop, held an outsized influence on American culture and history for much of the country's history, waning only after the mid-twentieth century. Author Michael Knox Beran ("BARE"-in) joins us to talk about the power, privilege, and contributions of WASPs in the United States and the eventual backlash against them, their ideas, and their way of life.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Abraham Lincoln and his wife Mary were the parents of four boys. Only one – Robert – lived beyond his eighteenth birthday. Author Jason Emerson spent nearly a decade researching the 82-plus years of Robert Lincoln's life, including his time as a Union soldier, minister to Great Britain, Secretary of War, and president of the Pullman Car Company. Mr. Emerson is the author of "Giant in the Shadows: The Life of Robert T. Lincoln."   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

From 1946 to 1958, the U.S. government conducted 67 nuclear tests in the Marshall Islands, a chain of islands and coral atolls in the Pacific Ocean that had been inhabited for thousands of years. Walter Pincus, longtime national security reporter for the Washington Post and current national security columnist for the Cipher Brief, talks about the tests and the fate of the Marshallese people who had to deal with the fallout. Mr. Pincus tells the story in his latest book "Blown to Hell: America's Deadly Betrayal of the Marshall Islanders."  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Edward Moser has been a speechwriter for President George H.W. Bush and a writer for the "Tonight Show with Jay Leno." He currently works as a tour guide, historian, and author. We spoke to Mr. Moser about his latest book, "The Lost History of the Capitol," an account of the many bizarre, tragic, and violent episodes around the U.S. Capitol Building since 1790.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

"It is a great advantage to a President, and a major source of safety to the country, for him to know that he is not a great man," wrote President Calvin Coolidge in his autobiography, originally published in 1929. An expanded and annotated version of that book, which historian Craig Fehrman calls "the forgotten classic of presidential writing," has recently been published by ISI Books. Amity Shlaes, chair of the Calvin Coolidge Presidential Foundation and co-editor of the new edition of the autobiography, joins us to talk about the book and its importance today.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Frenchman the Marquis de Lafayette came to America two years after the start of the American Revolution and was promptly made a major general in the Continental Army by George Washington. The year was 1777 and Lafayette, an aristocrat with no military experience, was 19. He later returned to France and helped launch the French Revolution. History podcaster Mike Duncan, author of "Hero of Two Worlds," joined us to talk about Lafayette's life and fight for liberty on both sides of the Atlantic.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Keith Richburg, a native of Detroit, has been a print journalist for nearly his entire life. During his 30 years at the Washington Post he reported from countries in Asia, Africa, Europe, and the Middle East. He is currently the director of the Journalism and Media Studies Centre at the University of Hong Kong. We chatted with Mr. Richburg about his career, his life in Hong Kong, China, the United States, and more.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

After he became president in 1789, George Washington visited all thirteen former colonies to talk to citizens about the United States and what it meant to be an American. In 2018, historian Nathaniel Philbrick, along with his wife and dog, set out to retrace Washington's journey to find out how much has changed since then. He chronicled the trip in a new book, "Travels with George." We talked to Mr. Philbrick about Washington's journey and legacy and what he learned from following in Washington's footsteps over two centuries later.     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Erik Larson is the author six nationally bestselling nonfiction books, including "The Devil in the White City," which was on bestseller lists for years and "The Splendid and the Vile," published in 2020. His latest, available only as an audiobook, is a work of fiction, a ghost story based in 1905 called "No One Goes Alone." Mr. Larson joined us to talk about the new audiobook, his previous books, being critiqued by his wife, teaching, and more.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In 2019, through FOIA requests and lawsuits, the Washington Post obtained hundreds of interviews conducted by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) for its Lessons Learned Program. The interviews showed that behind the scenes, U.S. military and government officials in Afghanistan presented a far gloomier picture of the war and reconstruction efforts than was presented to the American public by officials in Washington. Washington Post investigative reporter Craig Whitlock, author of "The Afghanistan Papers," joins us to talk about the Post's efforts to obtain the SIGAR interviews, the war in Afghanistan, his reporting on the U.S. Navy's "Fat Leonard" scandal, and more.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On February 25, 1956, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev delivered a secret speech to the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in which he denounced the crimes, bad decisions, and cult of personality of his predecessor, Joseph Stalin, who had died three years earlier. Georgetown University professor Kathleen Smith, author of "Moscow 1956," joined us to talk about the speech, what Khrushchev hoped to achieve with it, and what it eventually led to.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Joseph P. Kennedy, the patriarch of the Kennedy dynasty, served as U.S. ambassador to the United Kingdom from 1938-1940. By the end of his tenure, he was despised by both governments. Historian Susan Ronald, author of "The Ambassador," describes Joseph Kennedy as a Fascist sympathizer and anti-Semite whose desire for power eclipsed his allegiance to his country. She joined us to talk about all of that and more.      Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Twenty years ago on September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in the U.S. took the lives of nearly 3,000 people, over 2,600 of which were in New York City at the World Trade Center. On September 12th, the day after, eyewitnesses to the attacks in New York City called into C-SPAN to share their stories.     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Theodore Bilbo (1877-1947) served twice as governor of Mississippi and was elected to the U.S. Senate three times. He was a liberal, a strong supporter of FDR's New Deal, and a member of the Ku Klux Klan. We talked with University of Southern Mississippi history professor emeritus Chester "Bo" Morgan, author of "Redneck Liberal," to find out more about Theodore Bilbo and his controversial political career.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

George Washington University professor David Shambaugh has written nearly 30 books on the subject of Asia, a great majority of which focus on China. He talked with us about his latest, "China's Leaders," in which he profiles the five leaders of the People's Republic of China since 1949 and provides an analysis of their policies.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

If you research the origins of critical race theory, one of the names you'll find is Derrick Bell (1930-2011). Prof. Bell, Harvard Law School's first black tenured professor, appeared on Booknotes in 1992 to talk about his book "Faces at the Bottom of the Well: The Permanence of Racism." In this excerpt from that program, he talks about the status of blacks in America and his personal experiences with racism.     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

British author Charles Dickens is credited with creating some of the world's best-known fictional characters. To find out more about Charles Dickens, his work, and his two visits to the United States, we spoke to Jenny Hartley, emeritus professor of English at the University of Roehampton in London. She has written three books about Dickens, including "Charles Dickens: A Very Short Introduction," published in 2019.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Veteran Canadian journalist Ken Cuthbertson talks about the life and work of American writer John Gunther (1901-1970), author of the popular "Inside" book series that provided an in-depth look at countries around the world. The series included the 1947 bestseller "Inside U.S.A.," in which Gunther provided observations, sometimes highly critical, from his visits to every state in the country.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Historian and attorney David Stewart talks about the political career of George Washington and his evolution from an egotistical military hero to Founding Father of the United States.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The late columnist Robert Novak (1931-2009) was nicknamed "the prince of darkness" by friends and enemies alike in Washington, DC. He appeared on C-SPAN's "Q&A" program in 2007 to discuss his memoir, titled "The Prince of Darkness," in which he tells stories about his 50 years as a reporter, television personality, author, and conservative commentator. He also talked about many of the sources he had during that time.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Longtime reporter, editor and publisher Peter Osnos has published books by four American presidents, two Russian presidents, George Soros, Natan Sharansky, and a host of other high profile figures. In his new memoir "An Especially Good View" he discusses his publishing history, Russia, reporting on the Vietnam War for the Washington Post, and more. Mr. Osnos was vice president and senior editor at Random House from 1984-1996 and publisher & CEO at PublicAffairs, which he founded, from 1997-2005.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Washington Post's Carol Leonnig reports on the overall record, including serious failures, of the Secret Service from the assassination of John F. Kennedy to today. Ms. Leonnig first reported on the Secret Service in 2012, when agents working in Colombia engaged in a night of booze and prostitutes, a scandal that became known as "Hooker-gate." Ms. Leonnig talks to Brian Lamb about her new book "Zero Fail".  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Based on the Nixon tapes and the personal memoirs of Nixon administration officials, author and former Washington Post reporter Michael Dobbs tells the story of the Watergate scandal through the eyes of its participants in his new book "King Richard." Mr. Dobbs portrays what happened during the 100 days following President Nixon's second inauguration on January 20, 1973. Here's his conversation with Brian Lamb.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

"I'd rather win a Pulitzer Prize than be President of the United States," said John F. Kennedy in 1953. In 1957 he was awarded the prize for "Profiles in Courage." In "JFK's Ghost," author and retired pastor David Stokes tells the story behind the publishing of "Profiles in Courage" (written mostly by speechwriter Ted Sorensen), Kennedy's all out pursuit of the Pulitzer Prize, and the impact that the book had on his political career. David Stokes talked with Brian Lamb. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A longtime Washington, DC, legislator and official known for his humor and friendliness, Dan Glickman (D-KS), author of "Laughing at Myself," was a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from 1977-1995, served as US Secretary of Agriculture from 1995–2001 and was chairman of the Motion Picture Association of America from 2004–2010. He talked to Brian Lamb about his long political career, political relationships in Washington, the entertainment industry, and the importance of humor in his life.     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Reporter and speechwriter Liz Carpenter (1920-2010), known for her acumen, humor, and Texas drawl, served as executive assistant to Vice President Lyndon Johnson and press secretary for Lady Bird Johnson. During this selection from her appearance on Booknotes in 1994, she talked with Brian Lamb about the importance of storytelling and humor, covering FDR as a young reporter, working in the Johnson White House, her relationship with Bill & Hillary Clinton, and more.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Historian and bestselling author Douglas Brinkley has written dozens of books spanning topics such as American presidents, politics and culture, World War II, Hurricane Katrina and Hunter S. Thompson. Recently, he sat down with Brian Lamb for six hours to talk about a wide-range of topics, everything from U.S. presidents and Neil Armstrong to Evel Knievel (EE-vuhl kuh-NEE-vuhl) and his trip to Cuba with Christopher Hitchens and Sean Penn. That whole conversation can be heard on C-SPAN's "Talking With…" podcast, available now. During this 25min segment from that interview, Prof. Brinkley talks about his relationships with Bob Dylan, Chuck Berry, and other musicians.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

University of Maryland professor Christopher Bonner discusses his book "Remaking the Republic," about free black Americans and the limits of legal change during the 19th Century. He also talks to Brian Lamb about his approach to teaching and his appearance on the six-part CNN series "Lincoln: Divided We Stand."   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Wall Street Journal editorial board member and columnist Holman Jenkins joins Brian Lamb to talk about the media, politics, the COVID pandemic, global warming, and more. Mr. Jenkins' twice-weekly column appears in the Wall Street Journal on Wednesdays and Saturdays.     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Author and historian Doris Kearns Goodwin appeared on Booknotes in 1994 to talk to Brian Lamb about her book, "No Ordinary Time," about the White House scene during FDR's presidency, and the intimate circle of friends surrounding Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt during that period. This is a brief selection from that interview.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brian Lamb talked with Jason Hershey, founder of David's Tent DC, a 24/7, inter-denominational ministry located on the National Mall, where Christians come together to worship through music and prayer. The 1,600 square foot tent has been a fixture on the Mall since 2015.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Randall Robinson, author, human rights activist and founder of the TransAfrica Forum. He talks with Brian Lamb about his work and his decision to leave the United States for St. Kitts in 2001. Randall Robinson is the author of "Defending the Spirit," "Quitting America," and other books. He has appeared on C-SPAN many times, including on our "Q&A" interview program in 2007, from where this selection is taken.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Historian Peter Henriques discusses with Brian Lamb his book, "First and Always," about the strengths and flaws of the George Washington. Mr. Henriques is professor emeritus of history at George Mason University and the author of several other books on George Washington.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Historian Harlow Unger chats with Brian Lamb about the work and legacy of Thomas Paine. Mr. Paine's political writings inspired American revolutionaries, but his later writings on religion made him a pariah. Harlow Unger's book, "Thomas Paine and the Clarion Call for American Independence," is the latest of 27 he has written, including many on the Founding Fathers.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brian Lamb talks with longtime journalist and author Tom Ricks about his book, "First Principles," which examines the influence of the work of Greek and Roman philosophers on our Founding Fathers. Mr. Ricks' other books include "Fiasco," about the Iraq War, and "Churchill & Orwell." www.c-span.org/person/?thomasricks Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Journalist and historian Craig Fehrman talks with Brian Lamb about his selection of the best writing done by U.S. Presidents. His book, "The Best Presidential Writing: From 1789 to the Present," is a follow-up to his first book, "Author-in-Chief," about the books written by our Presidents.  www.c-span.org/person/?124859  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Christina Shutt talks to Brian Lamb about her goals for the Lincoln Presidential Library & Museum after she takes over as executive director this summer. She also talks about her background and her time as executive director of the Mosaic Templars Cultural Center in Little Rock, Arkansas.   www.oracle.com/goto/cspan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Historian Eleanor Herman joins Brian Lamb to talk about her book, "Sex with Presidents," about sex scandals involving U.S. presidents going back to the early years of the Republic. Eleanor Herman is the author of many other books, including "Sex with the Queen" and "Sex with Kings." www.c-span.org/person/?eleanorherman Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Booknotes is back with more compelling interviews in a new podcast Booknotes+. Taking the concept from his long running one-hour Booknotes TV program, Brian Lamb is tailoring the discussion for a new platform and new audience. Booknotes+ offers podcast listeners more books and more interviews in a shorter period of time. Whether you watched Booknotes on TV (1989-2004) or are experiencing it now for the first time on its new platform, the goal is the same – give listeners the opportunity to learn something new. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices