Transcripts For CSPAN2 Book Discussion 20141225

Reason. The real reason in my opinion is nixon was trying to get whatever evidence the government had of his own wrongdoing. One of the aids told him there was a report on the bombing that was in the hands of prominent democrats who were working at the Brooking Institute and the washington think tank. Nixon is furious and orders a break in the Brooking Institution in order to get the report. That is on tape. It is the only breakin we know that he ordered for sure because he ordered it on tape several times. In order to get this accomplished, he put together the special Investigation Unit and a former fbi agent and cia agent and people wondered about the coverup because as far as we know he didnt order that. If he had not ordered a coverup, a full investigation on the crimes would lead back to the breakin that nixon did order and that would lead back to the shell defense and sabotage the 1968 campaign. So people say about watergate it isnt the crime but the cover up but it is the cover up of the crime of the cover up. What was your source material . I work for the university of virginia and spent years studying nixons private recordings. There is a lot to study. I worked on johnson as well who secretly recorded his phone calls so there was a lot there. So putting together years of research on the tapes and decla declassified documents. And people that go to chasing. Shadows. Org can read transcripts before deciding to read the whole book you where watching booktv. Next, jonathan last, editor of the the seven deadly virtues brought together seven writers to update the the seven deadly virtues book. He is joined by p. J. Orourke, Jonah Goldberg, and Christine Rosen and more. This is a little under an hour. Hello, everybody. What a good crowd. I will keep this short. I am Jonah Goldberg, a fellow at the American Enterprise institute and if that offended you you might as well leave now. I am happier than helen thomas at a hamas rally to be here. I have been using that jobs for a long time. I am delighted all of you can make it. I want to say thank you for coming and thanks the thesis of this book, the the seven deadly virtues, is that the classic virtues have good grown out of fashion. Perhaps no greater proof of this thesis comes in the form of the fact that a book called the seven deadly virtues actually contains 18 virtues under discussion. It reminds me of thorough book about how to live the life of virtue and he said simplicity, simplicity, and simplicity. And one wonders why he needed three. 58 of the American People believe that america is going to quote hell in a hand basket. And even more believe that we are on the wrong track. To this rump of americans who think things are going badly but not we are head to haiti itself all i can say is cheer up as the worst is yet to come. I will close with a favorite story about irving crystal who is one of my favorites and he was watching the Clarence Thomas conformation hearing in his office and at one point when specter did his thing, the judge turned off the tv and said the end of western civilization and irving took a long drag and said of course it is the end of American Civilization but that doesnt mean one cant live well. So i will turn it over to jonathan last who is the editor of this wonderful book and will mc the event and if he with lucky he will explain why owen wilson is on the cover of this book. Thank you all very much. Thank you. Thank you first to the publisher of templeton press. Writing is hard and not a lot of fun as one of our con tributoco will tell you. I am never write a normal book then. This is the way to do it. You get others to write and then at the end you sit back and say look at the book i wrote. And thanks for jonah for making this happen and your contribution to the book which is one of my favorite books. As long puts it virtues are written about the same way he does with star trek with elgence, wit and creepy saunter. I want to tell you about another book and that is bill bennetts book of virtues. It spent weeks on the bestseller week and every set of parents leaving the hospital were said they should be given a copy of this. Virtue was something you could talk about then. There was a shock and scandal when someone asked bill clinton boxers or briefs and today we get naked pictures of famous people and politicians even and dumped on the internet every weekend and people just look over it. People are tempted to say we lost the virtues in society but i dont think that is true. We are focused on virtues but they are just different kinds. I would point to donald sterling, the formal owner of the Los Angeles Clippers basketball team, back in april he was the most vile man in america after being taped whispering racist thoughts in private to his mistress, who like all good mistresses when things went south, released the tape to the media there is a lesson in there somewhere. This sparked national uproar of him being condemed on tv and newspapers and the president of the United States takes timeout from a foreign trip to hold a president conference and condemn sterling and then the nba owners force him to sell his team. Unremarked is he was having an affair in public and cheating on his wife of 50 years. There is no scarlet bar for virtue but there is for racism and the punishments are much worse than they were before and maybe that is good or bad. I dont know. Racism is a terrible thing. But it as the interesting because it as a shift in change in virtues. It isnt just that. Mary is here and pointed out in a book that we live in a time where it is gauche to express judgment about sexual matters. You cannot say someone shouldnt put that part with that part on person xy or z. But we have a complicated moral framework of talking about food. Moderation used to be a high point and it isnt attractive but sustainability is a virtue we strive for. I comprised the modern virtues like freedom, progress, health, and nonjudgmentalism. These are not bad things. They are good but to the extent they supports the classical virtu virtues. The classical virtues deal with the best classes of life. It is good to be healthy and authentic . Yes. But much more prudent to be chari charitable and that brings us to the question of which is the best virtue . That is like picking a favorite child and something we dont do. But secretly we do it. You know my friends already but i will introduce them. First we have jane from National Review and minneapolis starr tribraun to came to talk about tempererance. And Christine Rosen is championing fellowship. And rob long i chose temperance. Rob is going to defend justice after that and jonah defends confidence and p. J. Orourke i feel like Richard Dawson here saying lets play the feud. Lets play the feud. And james since you are soft, tell us what is so great about temperance . I dont know. You tell me. To tell you the truth that is not what i wrote about in the book. I wrote about simplicity but there is no point to see that is a virtue and i will give you 36 reasons why in the next few minutes. I chose temperance not because i believe in the antialcohol carry nation with ax wielding people who want to take the fun away from life but in the sense of moderation i believe in it is lot. For a couple reasons. One, i am a repressed passive aggressive lutheran southerner. And two isnt a license for everything . Everything in moderation. I will have cheese cakes, brandy and dancing girls just a little, though. It doesnt always work. But you cannot say when you are accuse of cannibalism i just a had finger. Moderation in speech is first. There have been times writing on the internet that i hate to say it i have been intolerant and said things i wish i didnt say. Once writing about Michael Moore i said i dont wish him harm but if i was in a room when he packed into a pin and popped and flew around like a big balloon i would like to see it. And people said this was cruel and commenting on his appearance and they were correct in that and i felt bad about that even though he did resemble such. c1 what if we Department Agreement because it you dont have a common values, there is no point in coming to a common agreement. I found myself using a number of friends because we would have discussions. I would not be willing to concede anything to the other side because there is no Common Ground. I cant say i want western civilization to survive and thrive. The other side says i wanted to be destroyed. You cant come to the Common Ground to say we will destroy it, but slowly. So moderation of opinion is something that works amongst your peers and you have something you can share together. There was a point, otherwise i might come out in favor of emond expressions of opinions. That leads us to number three. That his moderation of action. I saw how people prayed against each other all the time. It was an unpleasant place to be on my hot august. I come from a place where people are kind and there was so much social moment around the happy place to live. That brings us to the reclining seat. This guy gets on the play and he is right in front of me and he is about the size of use to be. The first thing he does is he pushes and put in the position at a remote in the other in your set for of football. I about the dimension of the kind of guy who would read dorothy after she killed the witch. Not a big man. I am typing like this. And i cant move. Dow moderation behavior means two things i could do. One, i could get those neat things to keep the seats are rebelling back, but that is wrong. I cant find them on the internet. Or two, i could say to them sir, if you just saw how much little room, i understand you are a big fellow. How about we work this out and arrive at a moderate solution. I give you some of my space and we are happy for the duration of the flight. That is moderate action. They didnt do that. [laughter] what is do that at all. So i waited for his head to allover and i kicked the back of the sea. I dont think he slept a wink i was happy about that in a moderate sort of way. [applause] all right. I got the Bumper Sticker virtue fellowship in the covered campbells an wait until you see what he has prepared for the swimsuit competition. I thought a preview earlier. Its very nice. I have this virtua fellowship which is what people talk about our poor percy during trust building exercises. Imagine retirees playing a vigorous round of shuffleboard. I think its more interesting because i like chastity, which you are either practicing or youre not, fellowship can be taken to extreme. In whole bunch of people in a situation of extreme danger, what is going to happen . They might display a rock acts of courage on the battlefield, a. K. A. Bandit others or they might have enthusiastic acts of cannibalism in the sierra nevada, a. K. A. The donner party. Both are kind of fellowship. [laughter] one of the things i think that we think about when we talk about fellowship today is we use it to ally ourselves with groups who are in fact quite intolerant. Theres great fellowships of people who are intolerant of a lot of modern things, people intolerant of say airport charity, gluten, its working. The list goes on and on. These are all things we can form a group together, shell really bonded to this group and basically hes something else. What this shows is once you are part of these groups, theres a lot of ideological rigor required. I am going to date myself in saying this, but if anyone has been following the kenny g situation. Anyone . Lets bring them into the fold. Its like a colt. So kenny g, [laughter] he somehow manages to pull up the mail well into the 21st century. Anyway, hes very big in china. Kenny g is huge in china. In fact, if you go to a chinese ball, which ive been in, they say going home to get people to leave the mall. Its like someone turned on and on switch. Theyll start to leave. Its like the pied piper of chinese commerce. [laughter] theres a very important role. So kenny g went to hong kong recently and he and his words, was taken in an assembler, but he happened to take a self he confronted a group of protesters who are prodemocracy protesters. This angered the Chinese Government who declared him an infidel in one sort or another. He cultivated the fellowship of people who admire him in china. What is he going to do . Hes broken some unspoken rules. In classic celebrity fashion he deleted the salty. It was on no china, i dont like democracy. I was taking my innocent law to fellowship has this dark side where we start yourself believe if anyone goes outside the realm. For Scholarly Research to the article, jonathan crudely cut it from the essay. I spent a lot of time on Justin Bieber fan sites on the internet. Dont do it. Really, dont do it. Again, it is pretty rigorous. So what should fellowship look like . My argument in the essay and my argument here today which will completely fall flat because top of your tweaking to your friends right now is we should reclaim fellowship because weve totally decrease friendship. We all have a million ransom of followers. We spent our lives online with their friends. But those arent real friendships. Those are pals on the Justin Bieber fan site and we have anonymous handles that we use and reposted them. [inaudible] [laughter] now, my handle is more subtle than not. I think theres theres some existential questions here that we should consider. When we think about fellowship and friendship in the real world versus the way replay of relationships online. What is friendship . Bushido look like . I personally think we should show up moderately consume alcohol and talk to each other facetoface. Its an important part of being a human being. How to connect in meaningful ways and not just on the beaver fan site. I will leave you with this question because it will speak to the issue of fellowship, which is a social media age. If it cardassian falls in the woods and doesnt take a filthy, did it ever really happen . [applause] are you guys buying this . The problem is people are terrible. Do we really want to be in fellowship with actual real people . Just me then. Me and sunny. Im so tired of coming to these aei events in hearing about kardashian and kenny g. Is an unofficial mascot of the American Enterprise. We wonder why we are losing. Me . If thats okay. From russell flory. I am going to begin, which i do whenever i speak obloquy by telling a hollywood in doubt because people who are from hollywood have no idea if its true or not. But this one actually in the words of Henry Kissinger has the additional benefit of being true. A few years ago a tv network was number four spot, which was at that point the lowest spot. Now its number 97 as the lowest spot. They owned all the intellectual property for the 6 million man, which if you are over 90 you remember the show. A friend of mine had a great idea to revitalize the idea of the 6 billion man so they had to find the 6 million man titled the majors, the surprise, surprise is available at the time. Its kind of a funny twist that of course the federal funding gets cut in they kind of had a hard time focusing. I guess he was on the va plan or something. And so, he gave his pitch to us to try out. It was great. He went to the number president who had been a former actor. This is a Crucial Detail any page to the president and the executives great story. The number of president said thats great. Theyll be great, fantastic. And heres why. Because when i was an actor, i did not do so at the 6 million man and lee majors was a total to me. He didnt use the word either way. That is justice, just so you know. This is why justice is the best of the virtues because it is also still mean. I mean, these are virtues here. Fellowship, who cares. Justice is something you do to somebody else. And you can do a hard, anytime you want and say im sorry, its justice. Everybody else goes it is kind of justice. It is like justice is its own evil twin, which makes it the best. Justice is the eyes of the former hollywood assistant who is an abuse nl treated and insulted, then by putting up with it rises through the ranks it becomes an executive and is now sitting in the big chair across from his or her former boss, kind of in a money tieback as everyone is at age 50. Just its an easy terms as an intern who was never properly thanked from that lease of grass. [laughter] so that is why justice is a virtue. Fancy ideals we want. It is sturdy back alley payback when vermont. It is the least virtue is virtue, which is why it is the best. But it also has a positive. Justice is what reminds us to be nice to insurance. Justice also reminds the interns that if we stick with it, it will all be worth it. [applause] every go. Okay. In my chapter, which is i dont know if you know it, but what is the cover article for the next issue of National Review. There you go. To clarify, do you get paid twice . [laughter] theres a room full same him. As you know from National Review, that is not going to happen. My book chapter was on integrity. My colleagues were prudent. Anything dude wheres your virtue. In fact, i get that in an email everyday, sometimes in all caps. If it is in all caps, it has got to be true. And he said all we have left is chastity. Which you know, was sort of like showing not at the end of the day firesale and all that is left in the remainder bin are likely mismatched hot pink socks in the fake velvet tracksuit. I didnt want chastity. Select the scholar in good standing, i heed to the interwebs the interweb somewhat to the list of virtues on wikipedia. And i found continents as in incontinence. Americas foremost on virtues and having this book. He is like dude, is that even really a virtue . I stopped him and so i was sort of i picked continents for a couple reasons. First of all because other than scotch cigars, perhaps the biggest source of joy in my life is star trek references. So i figured theres no situation i would pull off a kobayashi maru. Or we are lucky . Are lucky quite Congress Actually plays a big part in book seven of aristotles eggs, which like most people in this room i spent the afternoon reading very closely. And continents is actually defined as the ability to deny yourself pleasurable body functions. Olmec three points about this and i think they are vital. First, in this age of ebola, the ability to control in the nations and discharges is perhaps never been more important. [applause] he is so tiny i could barely hear that. Two, unlike chastity or honesty, continents is the multibillion dollars industry. One need only look at the commercials for nbc commercials for nbc thinking is broadcasting of that is the truth. In japan, within the next 10 years, Adult Diapers will outsell baby diapers. Yes. Well, that depends. [laughter] always count to recycle adult diaper joke that was already made. And the last and most important and actually the only serious point i will make is my favorite definition of conservatism is this idea that human nature has no history, that we are all built in the crooked timber of humanity and the only thing that separates us from living in the trees is this thing we call civilization. One of my favorite lines is every generation western civilization is invaded ive barbarians. We call them children. So the essence of conservatism, the essence of civilization is to take these barbarians and turn them into civilized human being. The first virtue we teach these are variants is consonant. Anybody who denies this is not a pair for there are really bad parent. The ability to deny bodily pleasures her nose picking and on demand in our years to inappropriate gratification such as an event broadcast on espn are the minimum requirements of civilization. Aristotle says that encourages the greatest virtue because without it we can have no others. This is nonsense. As so often is the case, Jonah Goldberg is right and aristotle is wrong. [laughter] without continents, the ability to keep our animal desires and impulses in check, men are not men, women not women, we are all peace or perhaps charlie sheen. Thank you very much. [applause] suzanne was worried about me having jonah. Everything was fine. Last month [laughter] it is on now. Hope and change. That pretty much tells us where the virtue this particular virtue has gone on nanny rabbit hole of wishful thinking. You know, it was not always so faint a word in the english language. The root meaning of hope is expectation of a thing desired in the book of common prayer in the order for the burial of the dead when the presiding minister says the sure a certain hope of resurrection he doesnt mean wouldnt it be nice. But it is kind of defending hope. Hope has been out of artistic fashion for a certainly more than a century. It is hard to think of a great modern novel play or poem that ends on a hopeful note or even begins on one. The first line of the wasteland, for instance, april is the cruelest month. Excuse me, thomas stearns, mr. Soontobe anglican convert. Did the easter bunny escape the eliot household or was . April is the cruelest month. The great gatsby concludes with a scott fitzgerald, declaring so we beat on boats against the current borne ceaselessly into the past and into the dock no doubt. Even when he was a lad teaching sailing lessons are no hope for society. Now true, the last words of dialogue in henry millers death of a salesman are from willie wollmans wife who says, we are free. We are free. But millard isnt stating and not the logical truth refuting determinism. Speak fashionably ironic. But linda loman is talking about is how the final mortgage payment on the loman house was made the day of willies funeral. I mean, judging by the number of apocalyptic movies released lately, there is no hope in Popular Culture either. I mean, somebody is probably you may know him in hollywood, working on apocalyptic remake on the sound of music. Darwin endangered species, meet the old layperson last, five zombies i better run. What am i going to do. Whatever thomas comes from. T. , that the future, which brings us back to see movies and over and over again like this. [applause] here we go. You are right and youre wrong. I grew up in the 70s and all this is about how bad my future was going to be. 100 Million People and everybody would eat incitements of edward g robinson. I knit at the expense of the nuclear destruction. Charlton heston and all these movies. It was pretty good. [laughter] cannibalism again. But then again in the late 70s comes along as they optimistic cando spirit which is called for, jonah . And pave the way that you are right and wrong because we are right back to the dystopian future. My daughter who was 14, every single piece of Popular Culture she is being is the societal collapse of everything. The hunger games, diversions, all predicated on the future which is all concrete and has two colors. Brown for the bad and blue for the upper class. Hollywood must defeat the most privileged lucky well fed peaceable technological, the greatest generation we been able to produce and we feed nothing but despair. One thing about hunger games. Hunger games was easily the least exciting movie about children fighting to the death i have ever seen. [laughter] its never the children you want. [laughter] let me just say the apocalyptic stuff for a moment because im a huge fan of the walking dead although recalled the three military deceased in my house because we dont want my daughter to find out what we are watching. Our vocabularies getting much better she gets older because we have to come up with phrases that she cant understand. You can make the case that the walking dead is actually, you know, in a lot of these things are movies that are problem solvers. Its all communication. Stanley and problems. Its like Michael Keaton with a hatchet. The problem is. Again and again. I want to say sometimes why exactly am i watching this . Do i care whether this happens . Best practices wouldve been able to do with the guy sitting in front of you on the plane. I dont want to spoil it for anybody. It seems to me the group has found itself a sanctuary, which may not be as it seems. Which was the previous plot . Spoiler alert. [laughter] any shows you want to run while we are here . Beatnik joe has a good point. Its also about fellowship, how people will band together against whatever disparate elements because they have a common object is. Until they become hungry, how do these fellowships hold quick the zombies seem to bond together. They make comments to each other. The satellite passive aggressive. They dont say that. You seem like youre tired. They dont say that. Theres no zombie twitter. You know, i thought this was going to be much more hunger games. I thought you would tear each others heads off over the virtues. The competition comes later. Your is why we are not. The virtue of justice, which is we fear that there might come a time when we appear again. We have to ask each other for a job. For a blurb in one of us will pay that. They are a blurb with this. Look at this. That is the argument the nra makes. They just pay them go. Armed society is a polite society. They need to come out immediately. It may not be justice in the jay sense. Whats the difference between revenge and justice just out of curiosity . It is i am not being paid for my appearance here, so i dont have to answer that. There isnt one. In the eye of the beholder there is someone, which is why justice is so attractive. There is Small Justice and injustice. Big justice may have been achieved with mac i think the project. Larger justice as the world was denied 6 million man repo, which actually mightve been the battle stark alack of the 80s. I cant see the 6 billion man. Both of you will live. Youll have other nerd stuff to geek out on. This is my argument for a concealed carry actually. In the bible, it says god says payback is mine. Revenge is mine. Meaning that you shouldnt way. [laughter] because if you wait, that is revenge. If youve just fallen off the face of the earth, that is justice. Timing. Timing is everything. I will buy that. We should say that one of the virtues, which is courage, is not on display because not lagash is over there and refuses to speak in public. What a beautiful woman, you have to wait for him to come see you. He is not on the panel today. Buddies over in the corner practicing moderation. Its the difference between encouraging foolhardiness. The difference between courage and a 10yearold boy. Thats a very important question. Courage is when they know they are doing something dangerous and foolhardiness is in nato. Hold my, watch this. [laughter] that is foolhardiness. And its interesting watching him grow up not a foolhardy kid because hes grown up in the modern safety conscious world. He really he was the out of balance. That would be wrong somehow. Watching him develop. The bravest people that ive ever met were those who are absolutely had no imagination whatsoever. He could not figure out what was going to go wrong with them we been this or driving through that. But that is not courage. The difference between courage and fearlessness is courage requires knowing the danger. So being afraid is smart. He fearless is. I have a rational fear of sharks. Height is the most rational of all fears. Because they gave Felix Tom Gardner plenty of money that jumps from space. That is i think where people talk about how courageous he was. No, he was and rich. [laughter] in a world and a bicycle helmet world in which everything has been litigated to fare the well. I went recently and brought a pocket, and orange bucket that is covered on all sides. The bucket is covered with white print. A warning and disclaimer warning me. Basically not to use the bucket. You could drown in it. I am not nearly that flexible. I had to say it is inside. I got a little lightheaded. In that world, i have just stuck with the image of you coming around the corner and youre in the garage with your head in the bucket. Downward facing dog. Cant figure out. Hes used to it. The question in that world is is there such a thing as courage in a completely sanitized world, in a puerile helmet bucket disclaimer world. I send my children to school with nonorganic snacks. Peanuts . Peanut butter, yeah. You can say no. You can say no to the whole free range thing. You can send them out, get a few knocks. That is what the emergency room is for. Protests, right . Couldnt agree more. We have better little private school that had little or kids go to, there is the table for people who are allergic to groundnut. Theres a table for people who are allergic to tree nuts. As a intolerant stable and a gluten intolerance table. If you happen to have the rare normal child you have to eat outdoors. [laughter] i mean, when you are filling up the papers, they dont ask you they ask you what your child is allergic to. They dont ask you is. When my data was younger, she is 11 now, but in first and second grade, and made a point of rightists will drop off every morning to come up with another piece of really shocking advice that i would shout to her as she walked into the school. I remember the head of the school. Dont smoke crack. [laughter] the one that really freaked out the headmaster of the School Website yelled really about, no knife fight. [laughter] this little girl, dora the explorer backpack. At least that way it reminds her that im raising my kid in the 1980s and 90s gray. I grew up in death wish new york in the 1970s. I remember making mazes out of piles of garbage on 84th street because we arranged them and then we would have contests to see how elaborate the kabelik at and and found the first dead rat. And that is completely gone. Their kids are growing up unbelievably confident. Im sorely tempted to just give my daughter a falling knife, some antibiotics and some bandages but they trackers say you dont actually get in trouble but so you can learn some lessons. Antibiotics . You are going to spoil that kid. [laughter] i thought it was great when i let my daughter. She moved from the front seat to the back. She was cinched up like Hannibal Lecter for seven or eight years. Finally let her sit in the front. And i thought if we get hit the airbag will take care of it. Then i go to stage a demonstration by the minnesota Highway Department and they said if a kid sits in the front with their legs up like this by the dashboard, if the airbag goes off, it will drive their kneecaps into their nose into will send a bone fragments into their brain and that is now i can think of. So when she does her casual feed up there relaxing. I say dont do that come in kneecaps in the brain. Not realize when i grew up before the age of cinching in six ways, i sat in the front seat of a car that had a dashboard with a painted metal edge. It had a thin veneer of plastic over it. So i was looking at a scalping device that if my mother slammed on the brakes, i went in and it would be serrated and not they would appeal. But i never worried that i actually would hit it because whenever we would stop such glee, my mother would do this because there were no seat belts. She burdened you with her cigarette. [laughter] get back. [laughter] all right. Are we missing a virtue . It is realizing theres all these manufactured. Year behind you advice it was. I hear every set of virtue to which i agree it what to do. Maybe not an organizing principle to society. It is not a virtue in the sense of what we are talking. It is so compelling you have to. Get the entire voice. Sensitivity actually. We were talking about the bucket thing. This is the point automaking. He heard the summertime from politicians. If it saves one life is working. If we did Public Policy that way, it would mean the speed limit would be five miles an hour. We have to walk around with not only so we dont fall and hurt ourselves. The reasons have the bucket has that learning and is tragic and horrible, but Something Like a half dozen kids a year drowned in buckets. So the logical upshot of that is what so buckets with holes in them. If you live in a fast idea for any law is justified, we all have to be strapped in the gurneys like the Power Sources in the nature extent might not move other because that is the only way you can guarantee you will not cause somebody their life. When you look at a warning like that, in the somebody did that. So when a power saw said not for flossing. Somewhere, someplace. Old. Well, gravity is a virtue, too. I promise you that i was going to let you guys vote under the winner is. Where art visors and mentors . Where is s. Counsel . With better voyeur up here. We will be vindicated. We add virtues that are present. I think we discovered another one for me, which is the sense of humor, the abilio