Anniversary 55 years to one guy. Its amazing. Im so thrilled to be with you. An interesting time dont you think . Its an interesting time. Jamie before you leave everybody in the writers festival so professional and so helpful stu and i about 12 years ago we brought a house it already had it. This library and now the writers festival that really made my day. What more could we want. Im going to talk about this book it took me four years to write this book. This is an effort of love and memory and i had been published before. This is my fourth published book. This one is the closest to my heart. For a couple of reasons. As we get older we do get wiser we do understand things better. Here we are all products of the times in which we live. So for someone like me and yesterday we have a little bit of a writers lunch that was so fabulous. Theyre so brilliant and they look at things from way. And put it in the context of the universe and i had been at ground zero about so many things that they write about. And i say you think about it i look about a lot of people in my age. Its the issues that we have im not talking about the fact that i was born around world war ii. As i get older the lgbt rights. The war in iraq. Trying to change the Great RecessionVoting Rights that is just a few that i was in the middle of. You all were in the middle of it. But not in the middle middle. You were there giving me your views and having your own thoughts and feelings and taking your own action as you wanted to. When i sat down and decided to write this book four years ago i just did on the airplane. With the long trips back to california every week. I really had two purposes in writing the book. One was to share the inside of the inside of what goes on and how a bill really becomes that way. It sounds so easy. Passing pass it out of the committee. And then you take it to the other house. There is a lot more to it. And its is as easy as it sounds. I wanted to take you into the middle of it. They also know that theres an expression that came from the founders. There is a government of law. They would say people. We are a government of laws and we are a government of people. How people make a difference. At those very moments. In those side rooms. In the debates and i wanted you to see some of those people and learn about some of those people how does it feel to Serve Service someone like that. What he has meant. In serving with him was some of the ups and downs with me. Just really interesting stories. You dont know them the way i know them. And someone who was a mentor. I wanted to tell the stories and i also wanted to share when people were calling me names. Because i believe in life. We face those things regardless of whether were in politics or community situation. In our family. There are people who will try to shut you down. And how do you retain your toughness. How do you summons your toughness. Its an empowerment book as well. How did i get the name. While i was writing this book during that. Of time people keep coming up to me insane how did you get to be so tough. I would say im not tough i was born in brooklyn. Im just who i am. Maybe i really am tough. I called my staff stefan and i said could you google some of the right wing commentators and see what theyve said about me. They come in and after i listened to what these people have said about me i am tough. I said to my agent i want to have tough and the title in the title and i couldnt get it. I kept saying why ive had to be tough. And i thought i will call it why you have to be tough. And i said to kimberly. And shes here. My fabulous agent can you just seen it. Could you stand up and say hi. Shes such a help. And she came up with it. I said thats it. There is an art. And thats what i tried to talk about in the book. The book came out before the election and i thought if ever there was a time for tough its now if you voted for clinton as i did you have to pick yourself up off the floor face what happened and fight back from what you believe in. And if you voted for trump working to hold you accountable you have to explain to us why you did and whats going on. I think we all had to be tough. Now, i did introduce you to kimberly and i did mention that stu was here but i do want to say one my favorite lines in the book because i talk about when i met him i was 18 years old i was a cheerleader in college and when we got married he called me in one day and said want to talk to you. I was 21 i was still in college. They think its time you quit the cheerleaders. I often say and i write in the book one of my favorite lines is that stu married Debbie Reynolds and he woke up i think happened to lotta guys his age. The Womans Movement moved on. But when i say i knew you would like that one. Im going to redo the first page of my book. I want you to really buy this book. When im finished i will be signing books in stu will be taking your camera and taking pictures with us. I will give you some readings from it. Let me read you the first page. I know martial artists are big times highstakes moneymakers. I barely measure 5 feet. Maybe 53 in my high heels or on this box. But nobody has ever accused me of having a menacing presence. No but i have lived with an emotional essence of the a sense of the nation determination sometimes outrage. That has often inspired opposing reactions among my political colleagues voters and rightwing pundits who have said this and other quotable things about me. Get ready. This is doug powers. Barbara boxer is quite possibly the biggest doofus ever to enter the Senate Chambers including janitorial staff. And carpenter ants. Thats one of the best ones. This next one how about this. Barbara boxer is a great candidate for the Democratic Party female and learning disabled. And then this one from arthur schlep. Hes on tv a lot now. Speaking for trump. Keep your eye out for him or dont. This is what he said. She continues to prove that she is unfit for any office. Higher than turn expect her. This is the worst one. I will redo review all of them. One is just more interesting than the next. This one is unbelievable. In the future Barbara Boxer may be remembered as the file document may macula of the u. S. Senate. The nazi war criminal who directed merciless experiments may have decided to come back as a woman. I dont even understand that. Know what you can tell we already knew i was getting heat but you see how tough it was. You have to have a sense of humor and one of the aspects of having a sense of humor is one of the rules of the art of tough. If the let your stuff will off your back. Different people use a sense of humor in different ways. Heres what i do. I write funny lyrics to songs. About politics and issues. It was just the way to have an outlet it was just great. So when i got to the house house of representatives after serving as a county supervisor i said wheres the gym. And they said i am used to the filibuster. I dont want to lose my way here. When i get to the house of representatives i say wheres the gym. They say where there is no gym for women. There is a little room you can get in the gym. Im from california this is 1983. We were already working it out. And jumping around. I said what i will go look at that womens gym maybe its fine. Its like a six by seven room and has five hairdryers im getting really annoyed at this and im saying this can be true. I thought will all he have a do was ask a few people so i go to the man who was in charge and he said sorry you have to go talk to dan and he is i suggested expanding the other gym. There was a very big room. So i go to see dan. Ive a simple request. You cant have that extra room because i use it. I said i dont mean to pry but why do you use it. And they give me this and i give it out as gifts as christmas. Mister chairman we need a room to workout in. Go away. The issue is when i get angry or what i use my sense of humor. I was annoyed. I wrote a song i sang it to one of my colleagues and said thats great he could work. So i put together a team you cant believe this. The red white and blues the one thing we could do is we could barely carry a tune. But we were very convinced that we could turn our sense of humor into a winning strategy. So i sang the song and they said while sing it to tip oneill and leadership. So i called the women together. And i said you got to annunciate. We have a story to tell. So that i got then i got a guitar. Today i have paul who is this fabulous guy and i sing the song. This is a very unusual book event because i menacing a few songs you. I thought we all need to be lifted up a little bit. Im guessing the song and guess what after it was over we got the gym. Into this day we go to the gym. So this is a song that we sang and forgive me if im not perfect singer. I am a perfect politician. Cant everybody use the gym. Equal rights lets avoid those macho fights and everybody use your gym. Now if you run into fight and fuss you bet your life they could be us. Youre not trim and were not slim. Were only asking can everybody use your gym. [applause]. That was part one of my presentation. Can you believe thats what we have to do. By using the sense of humor as part of the art of tough. Its better than anger. I once tried anger when i was a kid. I read about in the book. Most of these lessons i learned as a kid. And most of us do. It was a little kid named albert about 11 years old. He was little. And so of course who did he pick on someone his size. He was in my face and saying things and pulling my hair and he was getting me crazy. I didnt want any part of it. One day were in the hall he just got to me. I did a horrible thing. Really. Im not kidding. I took out my number two pencil and i stabbed him in the arm. Right way you get that vaccination. I can remember it. No one was around. He started to cry. I was crying because i have lost it he was crying because he deserved this and it was a nightmare. So i go home i thought okay. He didnt talk about it i didnt talk about it. We go home. And he says in the next day i come to school hes not there. I didnt think anything of it. Hes absent the day after. On the third day i walked home and have a go through the slot to get home. And his house was on the left. Very small. Italianamerican family. And there is a big black crate over the house. I said i mustve killed them. I am panicked and i go home and of course my mother said barbara sue what is wrong with you. I confessed to the murder i said mom i stabbed albert in the arm hes not in school. She said im in a tie something and this is a rule you never act when youre mad like that. And then you can tell some of the off you can do in such a nice way. They called up the principal. I felt guilty. I felt bad for him and when he came back actually hugged him but we never talked about anything and he is there. You dont act out of anger. Now when i got to the house there were a lot of other things to worry about other than not getting in the gym. We a horrible disease to fight and i was called aids. I represented a district up in northern california. Ronald reagan was president. Some of you may have been at the Ronald Reagan speech. When it took him a very long time to understand that this disease needed attention because he and his staff would even say the word aids for so long. It became real to Ronald Reagan. But before that i was kind of alone with this handful of people. We can get a penny and i remember walking in the door to the chairman of the Appropriations Committee and he was so old he mustve been my age now. I have to tell you about this terrible disease i dont think you really know about it. You are in a rural district. He was so incredibly wonderful and he said i dont care who these people are if you need them and their hurting and suffering we will double the funding of aids. And he did. He took it from 6 million to 12 million. I was there right in the middle. What a great incredible surgeon general. Very conservative person. She he refused to treat this in an ideological way. If people were sick they were going to get treated. But it put me in quite a situation and that. Of time when the Reagan Administration when act and here i am kind of the middle class im now talking about condoms and having to lose my sensibility about what i could say. I go to parts of my district if i didnt do it i would be guilty of quickly allowing people to just die. There was a lot of president s against people. It was considered a choice. And when bill clinton put up. Jesse helms have a nervous breakdown. Remember him and i said i will be his worst nightmare. I went down and said that damn lesbian. Its amazing that we beat him and put them in as a very first openly gay woman. It was quite a victory. And he whacked his finger at me. In the senate when i got there later. The world will never forget this day that this woman got this appointment. I said later in the speech there right we wont forget this. We will stop this discrimination. Into a been in this particular time and place when i have a chance. Its very dear to my heart. Going back to the 80s and then we will leave the 80s and move forward in addition to the aids crisis it was in deep anxiety over the Nuclear Arms Race. The soviet union had that missiles facing each other. Everybody was scared to death about it. Anybody remember her. They have missile envy. Who could have the biggest missiles and they were very destabilizing. I think sometimes we go through hard times and we will always go through hard times. I think we have to remember what times we came to i want to redo part of the book a young woman 16 testified before congress and the height of this Nuclear Arms Race and this is what she said. I think about the bomb every day. She 16. It makes me sad and depressed to think about a bomb ever been dropped. I dont want to die alone. I think about it most un sunny days. When i was a school built on two levels. I think about the building crashing down on me. I think about all of the air being sucked out of me. I burned up under the rubble. I want to live longer but at least i have lived this long. Its not their fault the government cant find a way to solve their problem. I think the arms race is going on too long. I hope you will open your eyes and your mind and stop the race before its too late for us. What a powerful commentary and what a lesson to all of us that was. That timeframe was very difficult for us. For all americans because i think whatever side you are on it should be done. Again i have to deal with this in my way. Everything am singing to im singing to you was never sung publicly it was just sung to colleagues ever treats and things like that. Youre getting a look at that. There is a tune called that. Probably some of you remember that. I wrote the song about this. You will hear it. Its strange to sing about a thing called war. Whats the point. Stop all the testing ask your congressman. And lead our children into the sun. Thats part two. Now we are moving on except the wrong folder. That cant be right. Totally right for you. That wasnt right. So as we move forward we get to 911 and it was an amazing moment. And history. Now how did i get to the senate. Thats something i wanted to share with you. I get to the senate because of one woman. And her name is anita hill. Because of the courage people got to see there were no women in the senate. One republican and one democratic woman. And they wanted to be heard because she said that she was sexually harassed by Supreme Court nominee. Im in the house and im running for the senate. Ive absolutely no chance of getting there. Great congressman. I am so nowhere. But i decided i wanted to lead the house because it was too partisan. I wanted out. I want to more bipartisanship. There is a needing help. And she tells her story. They may remember that. The pictures in the book. Bottom line we knock at the door. Joe biden was the chairman of the committee. In a staffer pops up. We want the hearings open just to have her chance to tell the story. Not happening. Because of the hearings are over. Now you have this information and they said you cant come in because we dont allow strangers in the senate. Weve a hundred years of experience. Heres the deal. Theres like 50 cameras there. We were marching down. Their own colleagues wont even allow us to have a meeting. We will meet with you. We said senator mitchell you have to open that. So they open up the hearings in anita tells her testimony in the whole country whichever side they are on cs that there is not even one woman there. Everybody is pounding on her. And she gets fairly amiss mis treated in my opinion. At the end of the day heres what i think happened. Her testimony was heard. They shut down the hearings. Later i found out there were many other women that were waiting to cooperate her testimony. So i write in my book the following i blame myself for not focusing on what was happening. After we marched up the steps of the senate. I might have learned in real time what i learned later. They have refused to allow the testimony. Thomas have made an solicited sexual advances. Moreover the article in 93 of may stated that joe biden have advocated control. I didnt call for women who traveled all the way to washington to cooperate the claims. They claimed that they have that. I blame myself very much. For not focusing. I thought that was it. Looking back i failed to do the follow through. I feel bigtime. Not that wouldve been easy. We were seen as enemy we really were. And enemies of the status quo. Of the gentleman thing. I believe that even my dear friend joe biden have to succumb to the vast majority of his Committee Members on both sides of the long and sad story and theres even more. This is a message on the machine. I would love you to consider an apology and simple explanation of why you did what you did. So give it some thought pray about it and come to understand why you did what you did. They reported it to the security department. Professor hill said i have no intention of apologizing because i testified truthfully about my experience in and i stand by that testimony. His story touch the hearts touched the hearts of women and caring men. It was a rough wave. I hope you can understand now whether it translated into victory for children it is an icon that went through hell for coming forward. I hope she knows what a difference she made. The long march to get more women elected to congress and kicked into high gear. Her ability to be tough under extraordinary pressure. That is the anita hill story. One that is hugely important for me. Paul, thank you for that. Perhaps the most difficult issue for me was the war in iraq. When it came to us i knew i could never vote for even though 85 percent of the people across the country supported the war at the beginning. I was sent. It was very difficult time. Because california lost more than any other state i carried this in my heart. I go down to the senate floor with the names of those who are killed. I was a kilt of being too emotional i was reading the names. I never realized until later how tormented this war was. Every time i finished a speech i thought about what to say in the next one. I asked what the war was going to cost in blood and treasure and whether the nation would support us militarily, what the rebuilding of iraq would cost the us taxpayer, how long what our troops day there, i was worried our troops would be a target for terrorism and the war was a diversion from the antiterrorismish and that i had voted for to go after osama bin laden. I railed against the Bush Administration for calling those of us against the war week. We werent week. We were tough. We were the minority. We were fighting to end this unjust war. In 2004 i got an amendment through to make sure injured troops wouldnt have to pay for their own meals. Would you believe they were forced to pay for their own meals . I couldnt believe it. We got that through. I encouraged others to speak out by one of my heroes, Martin Luther king, our lives begin to end when we become silent about things that matter. Our lives begin to end when we become silent about things that matter. I talked about going up to that room, this little room in the capital to bear witness to the torture photos from abu ghraib. It was one of the most painful experiences i had ever seen. Trent lot, republican leader from mississippi was in the room, was very kind to me. He must have watched me sink down in my chair with shock on my face as i saw the photos. He asked if i was okay. I wasnt. He walked me out of the room for which i was grateful. The fact american soldiers did these things was beyond my imagination and i realized what a war could do to the best of people. Day after day i did everything i could. I also went after the people on the tv pushing the war whether it was rumsfeld or Condoleezza Rice and that was hard but i did it because i knew when she went on tv and said unequivocally that every Intelligence Agency agreed that saddam was getting weapons to build a nuclear bomb, i knew that wasnt true because i had classified briefings in the Foreign Relations committee and i saw the intelligence agencies arguing with each other in front of me. I tell the story in the book, i called up george tenet, the head of the cia, can i go out and say this is not true . He says you are in a catch22. You had a classified briefing, you cannot talk about it. All i could say was i have reason not to believe. I couldnt do it. One day, in front of the Foreign Relations committee, i have got to try another approach with Condoleezza Rice. This is what i said. I said you know something, the sacrifices that are being made in this war, not being made by us, they are being made by the people who are sending their sons and daughters, many of whom are coming back with horrible physical and Mental Illness and some will never come back. I said i dont have anybody in the war. My children i too old, my grandchildren are too young. As far as i know you dont have any immediate family in the war. I get back to my office, the right wing media has said i attacked Condoleezza Rice because she was a single woman. Attacking someone for being a woman and single, really . And it went on for a month. Resign, resign, you are a disgrace. This whole thing. I said no, no. I tried to do was find common ground. If you want to twisted, be my guest. Of course i resorted to my sense of humor and wrote this song. Okay, lets see if i have it. Forget it. I remember it. Dont cry for me Condoleezza Rice you are the one who told us of weapons there were none your truth was halfbaked with yellow fake tape powell called a foul but not you is nothing that was true [applause]s is in my book i talk about the Lessons Learned from the iraq war. There are tween 9 of them. Enclosing, i have two more songs. One of them is about the Environmental Movement which broke my heart it became partisan, period. It never was partisan. Republicans and democrats love to fight for the environment and then all of a sudden it became not so easy being an environmentalist so i wrote this song. It is not easy being green when people love their suvs and their heat on high and the cooling load and the lights all bright and everything like that it is not easy being green when people laugh at little cars and you look like you are running at windmills but green is all we have really got to bring us out of a tough spot it means jobs it is truly our shot with Global Warming heating up and our children, they wonder if we will fix the place we gave them and save them for all time it is not easy being green when many hate the epa even though no solution makes it stick and everything like that it is not easy being green when people love their mobile phones and their plugins in their ipads and kindles and everything like that but green is all we have really got to bring us out of a tough spot it means jobs weatherproofing it is truly our shot with Global Warming heating up and our grandkids they love us they trust us but they wonder if i will be green and save them for all time [applause] it really closing i will bring you into a room, i want you to think about this, senators who were retiring and we were asked to give a speech and as you know, i would rather think so instead of saying to my colleagues thank you, it has been glorious i saying this song. This is never been heard except by a lot of senators is what i did and what i am saying to you. Say goodbye never can say goodbye when i started all those years ago with harry chuck and dick no one ever thought i would make a mark because i was just a check but anita hill stood though strong and women said it was wrong we proved so much many hearts we touched and now i never can say goodbye now i never can say goodbye never can say goodbye but in song i will try when diane and i made history main New Hampshire washington we thought that it was great but this was not the only thing you would see many strong and wise i never can say goodbye now i never can say goodbye never can say goodbye i am afraid i will cry as i look back on my senate years i had so many friends hard for years have gone but then again we brought so many issues to people we serve even though i tried you know i never can say goodbye now i never can say goodbye note the no i never can say goodbye now oh no i never can say goodbye change 32 seconds left, thank you so much, everybody. I hope you are in the signing room, thank you. [inaudible conversations] the change the president and ceo of the Eisenhower Medical Center to discuss the state of american hospitals xt from