Is a big fan of richard nixon, he was young student, we are arranged this is for our cspan viewers. The power of the atlantic as opposed to the Washington Post, we got ed snowden to declare he was trained in all sorts of spy craft and helped the white house make revealed the station chief to make tonight extra special. We have a real treat tonight, spies and spy class with a practitioner and someone who has been deeply involved in watching the story of a National Security in all of its forms and tool kids. David ignatius has been longterm nationalsecurity columnist for the Washington Post. He is the interviewer of my Favorite Book called u. S. And the world the making of conversations of the future of foreign policy. I was a producer, he was brilliant. En Valerie Plame was the counterIntelligence Officer, counter proliferation cia operative despite what a desk officer, we want to get into that. And became one of the most known how did see i agents in the history of the institution. Both of them have written novels. Valerie plame has written blowback, the last time i sought blowback which was the cias term which refers to i havent read this book yet but it is reaction to actions that are taken. Johnson wrote blow back the costs and consequences of the american empire which after 9 11 was omaha artist to get book off the shelf because it anticipated 9 11 to some degree. This is blowback, a fictional novel. We have the director the director by David Ignatius, bestselling author of blood money, body of lies, Russell Crowe and others, all of davids of his being made into movies and i hope yours will be as well. When i read this i was on a cruise in the caribbean. I am hoping to get into Valerie Plames in the same way and i fantasized about being the director. Have your agent call someone in hollywood. To begin with, when you wrote this where you envisioning yourself as the director . Is this the frustrated journalists who had become so entranced with this bureaucracies that was so responsible for managing the worlds great secret, americas great secrets and pursuing National Interest of the United States. I felt when i was reading grahams voice, i was hearing your voice. It goes without saying that any character in any novel is some way a projection of the author. That is what is fun about be a novelist. Your voice in the woman character, in making scenes, places, experiences you never had. I told steve who i had in mind for this character and it was so preposterous, he couldnt possibly be. But speak about the character, i hope the has existence of anybody he is montalban become cia director after running the Communications Company so i and in managing a business person who defied the National Security bureaucracy in that job by refusing nationalsecurity letter which is the way in which the fbi tried to compel people so he comes to the cia as the most unlikely figure as a director, the idea of reforming the place, turning it upside down. In his first week, a young, swift hacker in a dirty tshirt and the tattoo on his neck that says cut here in russian walks into the cia u. S. Consulate in hamburg and claims that the agency is communications and codes have been hacked and hands the base chief a list of names of all the people who are in germany and switzerland. That is the first thing that our new director, a champion of civil liberties, has to deal with. The possibility that these weapons that we see have been turned on the cia itself. That is the character stevens nominated himself. David bradley who runs the Communications Company cant do it, we have to turn the seat. The struggle in the book as i read it was a struggle in part between your fathers cia and the next generation cia. One of zeros and 1s digits, very different security running against the bureaucracy of managing in tent in the world of spying. I am wondering, i read your acknowledgements and in it you talk about being in germany and set up with young hackers. You are totally cool guy and i know you hang out in georgetown and stuff like that you are also known as someone who understands the cold war, state crafted it used to be. How did David Ignatius become cool enough to understand what was going on with packers and the new terrain, the new surf of National Security. Hetrick question. There is an answer to this question. This book is about an institution in transition. I began with the idea that every scene of the traditional spy novel, penetration, deception, manipulation, was going to go into additional space. Today you didnt want to recruit the chief of a service, you wanted to recruit the systems administrator. We open up every secret, all kinds of opportunities for covert action. That was the idea at the beginning. It is a picture of an agency that i think having a sense believe it or not since the mid 1970s is haunted. The cia is haunted by ghosts. I met James Angleton when i was a young journalist. One of the ghosts who haunts the place. Valerie plame has lived this and i should let her speak to what she experienced and what she thinks the modern Creative Intelligence agency can emerge but that is very much Valerie Plame, your heroine, youre covered cia official is Vanessa Pearson. Any connection . I want to get into this. Both of you have said that when you cant write about the truth because what you know is classified and secret, telling the story through fiction enables you to go further. Is the Vanessa Pearson store your story that has gone further yen you have been able to tell before . I am delighted to be here with you. Thank you so much. Of course you take these stories, incredible characters and along the way, operations and i would never want to reveal sources and methods and of course the cia publication review board that i am responsible to as well. I think even if i read cookbooks it needs to go to them. A line out of blowback is editor and right now and i feel confident. It was a very different experience than i went through with fair game but that is another story. Feel free to go into it. The whole genesis of this was i became distressed with how female characters, cia officers are portrayed in popular culture, they are always cardboard characters. I wanted to write one that was much more rich and complex and had something to do with reality rather than just a declaration. What inspired me, i had worked in the cia, working on a network that was brought down in december of 2003, we caught mop libyans red handed to add more widgets to their program and that was part of the network. I was working with the people who after years of patient operations, really creative operational work, brought that down but that characters fascinating. He is a moral, he doesnt care who he sells Nuclear Knowledge and widgets as well. So this character has morphed into someone we call in the book. Which is hindi for ghosts. It will open the dirty bomb, but dont worry, National Treasures you shouldnt give away everything. Talk about gender and spice for a moment. We know in the Osama Bin Laden story that there was a young woman, obsessive compulsive, driven, dont know her name, happy to know she was extremely frustrated, felt discriminated against, underappreciate it and undervalued and at war with the culture of almost misogynist men inside the cia. Is any of that truth . The director was that last submitted to you . Still running the halls for sure. Kathryn bigelow, the director of zero dark faherty said publicly as she was preparing this film in doing the research she found herself surprised at the of a woman was at the forefront. Women are persevering and the woman, a composite figure, did she win for it . She was nominated. In any case, showing women place a more Important Role in operation that gives us credit for. In 2011, in afghanistan in 2009. One of the Operations Officer that i happen to know, killed by a suicide bomber and pushed for the narrative, girls can do operations too. And Vanessa Pearson is engaged, challenged by the job inside and outside between the agency, how do you have a normal life . How do you have a romantic life . How diu channel that drive, and how do you allow you to be successful and accepted. If one of your panels can ask the question, i was researching my second novel years ago which has a woman as a principal character, i interviewed a number of cia women in operations including she told me something i want to ask you if it was ever true and she said women in operations have to be careful, and attractive woman who wants to have a conversation with a target, someone who is developmental at a Cocktail Party or wherever you encounters this person, often have a natural reaction, this attractive woman is coming on to me and he will read this through a lens of traditional gender politics. She said it was a tricky challenge to be engaging and personable but not too much. It is very accurate. My way around it for how i worked, i founder leon if i was developing someone that a lunge was much safer than a dinner. Determined end time, nothing happens after lunch. To turn someone gender issues, sometimes you are the only person who was listening to that target. For whatever, bowl spectrum of human emotions, they are feeling somehow not paid attention to, no one listens to them. Their underappreciated, you are the first one hanging on their every word and that is intoxicating, Pamela Harriman if you look at pictures of her, she is not this stunning bombshell but she had the most important men of the 20th century at her back and call. And some are going really . [laughter] what is so important about your books, novels and a lot of nonfiction policy commentary is that you are humanizing and creating stories about an incredible morass of the intelligence world. Data priest has written extensively about our intelligence Industrial Complex being so sprawling, so large that it is not conceivable or realistic that we have no idea how large this is. David, without giving away the end of this book or other books which i wont do, part of the sub theme of your book is the enemy is us and in your book blood money, a young scholar who became an expert in mathematics and associative intelligence, got in that network that our own inability comes in and bite us back and that is telling that i wonder if i am getting that right. When you talk to a cia director and you talked previously was general David Petraeus do they have a sense that the enemy is us . Great question. The great answer is no. If theres one common theme for my nine novels is that bureaucracy and secrecy can produce a real mess. The organizational desire we produce and grow, in this secret world, look at the nsa and all the crazy things it got into. I fought for years the cia, operations would be better if smaller. The desire to be all things to all customers to know as much about compromise in peru and fiberoptic developments, so you get this huge organization stealing secrets that matter that saved our lives, that the cia secrets that dont make a difference. Do you really need to listen to Angela Merkels phone calls . That is just the beginning of the list. And so the simple answer to your question is yes, that is something that bothered me as a journalist and i have written about and often. Theres a way as a novelist you can play it out, this idea is that hidden in these 3 arcus these bureaucracies are fortunes that will bring down the people, my first novel, wonderful reallife hero robert ames ends and ends with his death, aspects of the operation that he wasnt aware of that just came back. A lot of people die in your novel. How do people do in yours . I just want to add to that. The book topsecret america which laid out chapter and verse the unbelievable growth and reaction to 9 11 that traumatized the country and the immediate aftermath of 9 11 had, how it has grown and grown. I agree completely that it is one of the after the 9 11 commission, one of the recommendations was the director of national intelligence, this overarching entity, but 16 or 17 different age gathering agencies and the old point, the cias Central Intelligence agent, with its inception and you are absolutely right. The growth of it, when you see top intelligence officials on tv defending nsa i have no doubt theyre good and genuine and loyal americans that think theyre doing what they need to do to keep us safe. They never quite to my way of thinking never quite in keeping is sitting conflict with our Constitutional Values . Is that the country we want to be . We never quite get there, just keeping you save, dont ask any more questions. Your book reads a little like 24, a gripping page turner of bringing down the Nuclear Proliferation network that matters your own life, a lot of the tension is the controls back home, bureaucrats who dont understand, may be white house operatives and others can you talk a little bit about that tension between doing saving lives, stopping horrible things from happening that you can never acknowledge versus those people that have different calculations of risk and reward. The predecessor picking up the pieces and yet there it is always the dynamic that i am sure you saw, you tease that out in your book between headquarters, we know what we are doing and those in the field that are on the ground need to make judgment calls, why they paid a salary to make this judgment calls on the spot. Sometimes they are right and sometimes they are wrong. That tension is always fair, how do you proceed . A few quick questions. I will go to the audience soon but theres tension between the books. There is a human side, and theyre working in the field and david may not notice this but my interpretation of them seems to be in the way he is telling the story, the automation of spying, the atlantic, to laugh about the jobs we all have are going to be taken over by robots and automated had taken over by computers, i am interested in the technological advances dimension of intelligence and the sort of tension, and when we talk about the chief of operations we are still putting it in very human terms that somehow this man or woman from the cia really matters as opposed to the big computer. I recently had dmitri mad that have tweeted out one of the big missiles on the may day parade in moscow and i said facetiously that barack obama should tweet out a big nsa computer picture and i am wondering. Are you really writing about a post human cia, the human stories dont matter as much in the future . No questioning, allows a collection of information that has never been possible before which means it is especially important for congress and the courts to figure out how to oversee that properly. That said, watch through my career reinforces the importance of the human dimension, not its unimportance. There isnt any substitute for good judgment my first novel has been described in a wonderful Nonfiction Book went to plug called a good spy. Robert amos recruited the chief of intelligence, top Intelligence Officer of hours and adversary and operated way over the line, shared more with his agents then headquarters could possibly have allowed. Headquarters said we dont control this agent of yours and that makes it dangerous. We are giving information so lets bust him and they tried to bribe him. Theres a wonderful scene where they take him to a hotel in rome and offer 300 a month. She says no, storms out, he is furious. How do you think you can bribe me . Iman depending . Ames was smart enough to say to let this be what is, what did diplomat would have with his sources. Headquarters was initially furious and thought this was totally inappropriate and finally that is an example of his human judgment, the fabric of the human relationship between him and his force, the thing that is most precious in intelligence is knowing about intentions, but getting inside the world and foreign leaders and what they do or dont do, theres no way you can get that is in having human sources who listen to the conversation . I completely agree. I am biased, i was in human intelligence but all those billion dollars satellites might tell you as the most recent example the tanks are on the border of ukraine but hopefully maybe within the inner circle of Vladimir Putin to tell you is this just a bluff . Are they really going to go over . Will lead humans will tell you that. That is the justification why you dont need somebody in Angela Merkels circle. I am just joking. Ed snowden we need to make some news here, ed snowden is going to say on nbc nightly news, this is ed snowden, i was trained as a spy in the traditional sense and lived and worked under cover overseas pretending to work in a job that i am not even a signed a name that was not mine, sounds like Valerie Plame. He doesnt have a novel out yet but i was interested if you have any quick reactions to ed snowden describing himself as someone who was more than essentially a clerk in a computer and technical experts that came across a lot of disturbing information but our Intelligence Services were training him and what thoughts you have about ed snowden, we were speaking in the greenroom that ed snowden caused you a bit of a problem with this book because it looked like you were following the news being in front of it. Let me start off. I would love to know Valerie Plames thought. I saw the excerpts from brian williamss interview that is on tonight and i was fascinated that he wanted to establish his credentials as an Intelligence Officer. It was the real thing. I dont know quite what to make of that, what that is up 3. To. May be a personal statement of pride about work that he did. The second thing i would say is even now as we are making reforms that i think are generally good ones it is hard for me to see ed snowden as a hero after i have to be honest about that. He signed an oath to keep those secrets. There were lots of things he could have done if he felt as strongly as he did, even given the things he says he did to try to share them. The conversation wouldnt have happened in the country. I understand that. I understand, that is certainly a benefit. There are benefits for us as citizens apart from the professional benefits for the Washington Post from having this debate. We dont know what the damage is. The organization that exists, the most voluble thing, is the prize that you dream of. The fact that the interceptor, students of intelligence history, shape the cold war. The biggest secrets the United States had, the the enigma, they arguably helped britain around world war ii to defeat the nazis. These were valuable things. What damage has been caused by revealing in affect the things the conversation we listened in to or the techniques we had, nobody knows. It is unlikely the answer is zero. We have to live with that. This is part of living in a democracy. This is one issue where the intent of our founders, there are things in the constitution ijssel scratch my head about but the question whether we should be suspicious of government and government control over our lives the constitution couldnt be clearer. You should be careful about that. The result of this year we lived through is we are much more suspicious of government and we will limit its activities. I am sure Thomas Jefferson is saying good, glad that happened. Let me start with ed snowdens interview later on tonight, he was trained as a spy. I have no idea what is training was. Anyone who is sent overseas in any sort of cia cover capacity you have some superficial training, you cannot trip over too many banana peels on the way. I doubt it is equivalent to the intensive training that i had, developing a recruit , assets to hopefully provide critical intelligence to senior u. S. Policymakers. He clearly to great umbrage at being called a hacker. He was trying to set himself up from Little Things like what i saw. I am really torn. We dont know all the information. You made a comment, there are other ways to put that information forward. I am playing devils advocate because we dont know all the information but what we do know is those that have come, there is not adequate whistleblower protection. According to him, ed snowden, he did go to supervisors with his concerns and was given the back of the hand, i saw john kerry this morning on tv saying he was asked if it were for ed snowden would we be having this conversation . He said of course we would. I respectfully disagree deeply. We would not be having this conversation. I dont want to go down a rabbit hole of freighter patriot because that is ultimately useless. Ed snowden is nothing. We dont have enough information to make that determination, what matters are the issues he brought to the core front. What we do have if not that debate is a trend where the growth in unofficial secrecy in the United States has been determinedly, doggedly growing despite whoever was in the oval office. I remember working at the rand corp. Ben casey was head of the cia, the top soviet Intelligence Officer at the time was worried academics studying the soviet union were increasingly cut off as the growing area of what was classified and sensitive was growing and to come back to both of your novels and the reason we are intrigued with the world of shadows and what was closed off from us, this isnt likely to be solved. We are intrigued with it because this is a secret world envies our people operating with secret rules and secret norms and when you think about the legacy of writing since you have been writing about the chief of intelligence to today imagine the novel David Ignatius will write ten years from now, with all their intelligence problems that we have checks and balances in the system. That i doubt. I dont know where this story is going. As i said earlier, this secret bureaucracy has grown and grown. 9 11 and the panic induced not just among National Security bureaucracy, the Bush Administration that many felt that is how vulnerable we were and people were prepared to allow the government to do things that in retrospect clearly were wrong whether it is interrogation or surveillance, we have to remember what it felt like in 20012002 when no one knew what was coming next. One of the things i hope the most is al qaeda isnt going away as a threat. I have been doing a lot of reporting recently on how how high is putting down very deep roots in syria and iraq. It is the equivalent of jalalabad and a lot will come at the u. S. And europe. I just hope in the next ten years of dealing with this problem we dont make the same mistakes we made in the last ten years, that we have learned something from this period and this really was i think the subject of president obamas speech at west point today, worth looking at beyond the News Highlights and he is trying to make an argument about what is the right way to do this to protect our country, if we had a smaller, more clandestine Operation Service that stole the secrets we really need to stay alive. Before i go to the audience. To allegedly release the name of the station chief with the president s secret trip to afghanistan. Brit hume said that was the worst crime than happened with you in response. And maintaining that sort of secrecy of station chiefs, is there a hierarchy of protection we should be providing our station chiefs . Is it a wink and nod secret, what happened with you even though brit hume has it the other way around, what do you feel about what the white house did . It was not the white house. Was a military age who compiled this list, those greeting the president when he came. Colossally stupid. It was inadvertant. It was an error. I imagine everyone is rather breathless, the president is coming, visit with secret and it was really stupid. The white house apparently said they will do any investigation and they will find there was someone who was really embarrassed at the end of it but it is not analogous i would argue that what happened to me, the crucial distinction being intense. I believe my view of it is there was retaliation for my husband, joe wilson, who was a fierce critic of the iraq war and the george Bush Administration, a warning shot. This was just foolish and i read a little bit and couldnt take any more about what is on line and the right is making a false equivalency that is misplaced. Valerie is the right person to answer this, what she says sounds right. One thing you will see in the media, we put a lot of secrets and the paper, we expect the rule that says naming individuals whose lives would be at risk is something of the Washington Post and most other major newspapers wont do. Looking back at the deliberate outing i am still shocked by it. The new upstart in media wont follow those rules . As media evolve, mainstream media, arguing something very different, as a journalist, finding rules that work for everybody is going to be different. We had rules that our late boss said if you have information about National Security issues, we have a right, the country thinks should know. But you have a responsibility as an employee of the post to talk to the Effective Agency and ask what the consequences are. Is a similar rule going to take effect with bloggers to write about National Security . I dont know. Is this up from 3 it . Certainly a world in which there are no secrets it will . Certainly a world in which there are no secrets it will be a dangerous world. Reporter we have microphones around a room. This is sidney simon, we thank her for all the running she is about to do. We have brief questions and brief answers to get as many as you can before you all go by the books. Do you see a compatibility or conflict between your roles as a columnist who writes frequently and usually respectfully of the cia. As a novelist i am of the third of the way through the novel and need one of your taking guys to tell me how to autograph a kindle book. I have never seen the phrase clowns in action in your column. You are very harsh in this book more so than you are in the column. Does the golf will just give you a way of saying things you would not necessarily say in the column . You are usually more respectful of foreign intelligence agencies and the u. S. When you write a novel you feel leaning in to the story, 750 words, each one of which you have to parse, you have 120,000, lets say, and a canvas on which you can paint a story that is richer and has more complex details, positives and negatives, characters say things. The narrator of my column is David Ignatius whose name is at the top. The narrator of my novel is unstated. He can have all kinds of reflections, a character in the book says clowns inaction is what cia stands for. We know it is Culinary Institute of america. Do you have a question . No, okay. At the very back. Just toss it. Question 4 Valerie Plame. You mentioned going out for lunch, trying to recruit assets. What happens if those assets tell you i read in the newspaper recently fat you had a number of Double Agents to reveal the names of people who cooperated with the u. S. Government and are now dead. What is your response . What do you tell that person . My personal case, what happened to me was the week of my name. The initial reaction was my career is over but theres a broader warning sign to those thinking about they have something for whatever reason they want to share with you is intelligence, back to your last question, sometimes it is a good thing that everyone in country knows who the chief of station is because you know with whom you are dealing. In any case say they decide they are working themselves up to making that approach. Week of mining happened and they say wait a minute. They need a key point of their own safe. Why would i put myself and my family in harms way . I will talk to the russians. They can keep a secret. That is the unintended consequences for sure. We will go over here. Teaching at georgetowns school of Foreign Service what do you tell students who are thinking of a career in this area of clandestine intelligence, Foreign Service that has a specific talents or in cling to going to what you have done to either . Of course to Valerie Plame but david, that would be great. We were meeting earlier. Whenever i speak to University Students always heard them, take the opportunity. I would be remiss if i did not and urge them to consider public service. Doesnt happen to be the cia. I have to preface it to say despite what happened to me i love my career. I love what i did, i was proud to serve my country. So i always do in fact encourage them to think about it. Our big not going away soon and we do need the best and brightest constantly coming in. When i taught at harvard, i would occasionally have the the experience where a student would come up pondering Career Options and ask me what i thought. And beyond the sensible things, i just would add this i think for young people in their late 20s and 30s the really important thing is to have a job where you can take risks and make mistakes. And thats how you you. It certainly was the case for me. I used to say when hiring people at the Washington Post or the International Herald transcribe wound we want to give tribune be, we want to give you the freedom to fail. Its very hard for the United States government in this secret work to give people the freedom to fail and let them make the kind of mistakes through which they can grow. So a very creative young person who asked me, you know, student, i would make that point that, you know, if youre going to need to stretch and test yourself, that may be the wrong place for you to do it, because they just cant take that risk. David, some of the most vivid passages in your book are the next generation of intel officers who are tattooed and pierced [laughter] and wearing goth and, you know, mohawks. One gets the sense these german hackers and polish hackers that you met when writing the book really made an impression. [laughter] you would with correct. Im interested in when, you know, we just someone in the government has begun to say we may begin curtailing some visas to these chinese going to hacker conferences. The americans sort of young digital people, if you will, does patriotism and nationalism beat through that crowd in the way that when you ask that question, its very interesting to me because im not sure when i look at those people that thats whats driving its certainly not in your characters. No. They think of a higher order than u. S well National Interests. One of the first things i did when i was researching this book in 2012 was to go to the big hacker convention. Yes, hackers have conventions. In las vegas, of all places. Its called def con, and this was def con 20. And i met some really strange people. Super smart, but, you know with, they have something a scroll when you walk in, they call it the wall of sheep, which is scrolling in realtime all of the user names and passwords that have been cracked in that, you know, in that moment by their software from peoples computers. Its like, pow. And you realize how vulnerable you are. For our intelligence agencies, its did you see your name go across . Yeah. I had been told before i went by somebody who was very helpful to me in this book who i thank in the acknowledgments, matthew, dont bring any computers, dont bring your cell phones, dont bring anything. As soon as you come in, you know, a false Wifi Networks going to come up and try to capture you. So, you know, these have been recruiting grounds famously for our intelligence agencies for a long time. And if you were to go out to fort meade, go out to nsa tomorrow or six months ago or a year ago as i did researching the book, youd see something very interesting. Youd see a lot of military officers, men and women, but youd see a lot of people with super long hair in black tshirts, you know in people like you see at def con, and thats because theyve been recruited. And i think, you know, the hacker ethos, basically, you asked is it patriotism, am i serving my country . No, not really. Its like if you can hack it, hack it. Its like why, you know, why climb everest, you know . Hillarys famous answer, because its there. Thats sort of the spirit of hackerdom. And thats part of what got out of control at nsa. In every direction these kids, super smart kids said, oh, wow, we can take that down, i think. So i think thats why, you know, very, very good, thatture managers are needed mature managers are needed in that world more than anything else. [laughter] quickly. Def con is going on this summer if you want to go. Valerie, did you hang out with hackers in the a. Q. Khan world . A couple. I dont remember seeing any body art, but maybe it was covered up. Im going to take theyve told me last question, so were going to merge your three questions, so make them real simple, and were going to call it one question. Right here, here and here, okay . Yes, right in the front. Pass it back to valerie, i think you both kind of mentioned this idea we dont need all the hay in this shift to just sucking up all this surveillance, and we certainly hear from across agencies people in power say we do need all the hay, but we dont really hear from the people that come in. Do you have the sense from former colleagues and people youre still in touch with that this shift in surveillance is useful, or is it just shifting to this kind of hacker mentality, like david said, thats gotten out of control . Okay. Great. Lets jump to this question here. This kind of get toss a smaller cia. Cias had this mission of collect intelligence and covert action. Theres been a sense that the covert action side has gotten way out of balance, and i wonder if you thought we maybe need to get back to what dci was supposed to mostly be about in its origin. Great. And right here. This is a great single question. [laughter] yeah. Its kind of precise. I work for james risen, and as you, im sure, are aware the governments been trying to out him in jail for those of you who dont know, hes a New York Times correspondent. Hes been doing legal battles, he wrote a great book called state of war, won him the pulitzer on warrantless wiretaps but then a fascinating story, our cias attempt to recruit a befuddled and frustrated russian defector who then we were trying to, you know, this the iran offices in vienna trying to get them to talk a flawed blueprint of a Nuclear Warhead trigger device. I just wanted to give a quick brief. Right, right. [laughter] there are a lot of cameras going. Its a really great chapter. Theres another chapter which is equally unbelievable. It is a great chapter, and the Supreme Court is tomorrow conferencing to decide whether or not he deserves the medias privileged protected sources, and hes not going to break if they try to compel him, hes going to jail for quite a long time. So a large part of the governments case is that his kind of reporting, in particular this case about the operation exposing the damage of cia operations and endangers cia assets and endangers and harms our National Security, so i was wondering if you could offer any insight or perspective on that. Great. So folks doing the work, getting balance back in the cia and merlin and jim risen. I start with collecting hay . Sure. Former, now [inaudible] general Keith Alexander famously said his motto was collect it all. And that has led us to where we are today, and it, i think it does mature managers and judgment calls are needed to take a close look at that. Im very interested to see where this new, i think its called the patriot, right . Its passed the house of representatives. I want to see my senators from new mexico, heinrich and udall, as well as ron wyden of oregon have been very outspoken. Theyve been, basically, all but jumping up and down for the last two years going attention to what is going on. So this is just my i dont mean to be glib, but, you know, with all this collect it all mentality, i just want to know where those nigerian schoolgirls are, right . Come on. And i wallet, id really like a definitive answer on that terrible chemical weapons attack in august, last august in syria. Was it rebel, was it government . You know, id like it if were going to do that, then id like some real answers. And ill let those other two questions are made for david. Um, no, just briefly on the collect all the hay question, we do now awe peer to have appear to have Senate Reform proposals that theyre going to pass, both houses, and that the president will sign into law which will prevent the government from holding the metadata itself. The Communications Companies will hold it for a limited period of time. The number of jumps, if you query that data, will be limited. So well have a lot of limitations. Not as much as some people would like, but certainly a lot more than we had. And i think the right thing as a country is to live with that and see how does it work, you know . Do we end up suffering as general alexander has predicted we would . Or do we do just fine . You know, well live with that a couple years and see if we do fine. People will argue, well, lets go further. Lets have additional limitations. But i think thats the right way to go. I mean, i think, absolutely, it would be good for cia to be able to focus more on traditional foreign intelligence collection and analysis, you know . Its initial mission. John brennan, the cia director, has said likely that hed like to see less focus on covert actions, special activities. Theres a way in which counterterrorism just ate the agency, you know, and for good reason. Thats what the country, what successive president s in the country behind them wanted the agency to do. If you look carefully again at president obamas speech today, youll see that hes basically arguing that more of the covert action responsibilities should be shifted to the military under title x, the authorization of which our military, essentially openly, takes action rather than being title l covert action by the cia, for example. You know, those dont need to be cia paramilitary officers. I mean, calling this can covert is ridiculous. Its more talked about than almost anything i can think of. So i think thats the desire. Thes made a proposal today the president s made a proposal today or falked about a way of doing that talked about a way of doing that. It makes our foreign partners nervous. If you want more detail, read my column tomorrow. [laughter] finally, on the question of jim risen, jim is hes a friend of mine. I tried desperately to hire him at the Washington Post years ago, and, you know, im sorry to say he said no. But hes a fine reporter and a very brave person. And, you know, i just, i hope that the Supreme Court will respect, you know, this question of whether journalists have a special privilege to resist subpoenas is a very complicated one. In a world where, you know, essentially everybodys a journalist, you know . Everybody with a computer, how am i different from you really . Do we all have a privilege to say, to pick and choose which grand jury subpoenas were going to respect . Because were all, i mean, we all have the right to publish now. So its really, its really a tough one. And its almost a box i dont want the court to open, because when you get inside that box be, i fear there will be a real statement there is no privilege. Youre no different from anybody else. But, you know, on the specific question of jim risen, absolutely he should not be compelled to reveal his sources. This is, this is one of the times, one of the few times i think we could actually go on for hours, and no one would leave their seats. We dont have that much time, but when i look around the room i see friends like eleanor cliff, david bradley, judge webster. Were meeting at the watergate. We have the makings of a really great novel, spy novel right here. [laughter] right here. And we could have a lot of fun. But i do think weve been going back and forth between contemporary political issues that are happening in realtime, we see the president and the legislature trying to dial up or down various powers and how checks and balances work in this world of intelligence, and both of you have written beautifully about how things go wrong, how, i mean, thats really what this is all about. We think about intelligence and, you know, the power in that sector, but its really how things can get screwed up. I think youre helping us to have a debate through these novels that makes the discussion much healthier than it would otherwise be. So i want to thank David Ignatius and valerie lame for joining us plame for joining us today. [applause] we have the books and the director both out there in the lobby, and are you guys going to be able to have a glass of wine and sign a few books . But of course. [laughter] i want to thank you both for joining us today. Thank you both. Thank you. [inaudible conversations] youre watching booktv on cspan2. Heres our prime time lineup for tonight. At 6 p. M. Eastern, booktvs coverage of freedom fest, an annual libertarian conference in las vegas. At 9 p. M. Eastern, former california congressman james rogan talks about meeting and getting advice from famous people throughout his life. Then at 10 after words with veteran space correspondent jay barbary talking about the life and career of Neil Armstrong with michael knew fed of the national air and space museum. And our prime time programming continues with a history of silicon valley. That all happens tonight on cspan2s booktv. Booktv continues now with apg locoed villa who Angelo Codevilla who says u. S. Leaders have forgotten the Founding Fathers put the pursuit of peace state craft and this goal must be regained for the u. S. To thrive again in the future. This is about an hour. [applause]j well, thank you, john, and welce