Democracy. That is a shame. It is a disgrace. It is really an open scandal. And we need to do something about that. I would totally embrace the comment that we need you as much as we can, first of all to change our policies we dont incarcerate so many people. And secondly for those people have been incarcerated i think we do over stigmatize them. We do hurt their ability to come out of prison and get on with the gainful, productive life. I wholeheartedly embrace the sentiment of that collect. Host gelled in florida. Caller good morning. I have a question for professor kennedy. Some of us look towards affirmative action us to blacks entering university circuit. I happened to be one who graduated from a Major University, white Major University in the state of ohio. This was before affirmative action. Far too many times there is nothing said about those of us who were participants in the collegiate atmosphere, collegiate i guess academia, that existed before affirmative action. What is hi
Desegregation. And now ceo rosen, in turn, is enforcing the time limit. [laughter] ladies and gentlemen, like the sixth amendment right to speedy trials, the National Constitution center book fairs have to end on time. But i just have to thank, first of all, our two superb participants, harlow unger and judge wecth, for a spectacular conversation. [applause]. A tribute to the cspan audience and a vindication of my faith that when the citizens of the United States are presented with the best arguments on all sides of complicated constitutional questions, they can Pay Attention and grasp them and make up their own minds. Its a privilege to share bill of rights day with you. Thank you so much. [applause] [inaudible conversations] every weekend, booktv offers programming focused on nonfiction authors and books. Keep watching for more here on cspan2 and watch any of our past proms online at booktv. Org. Jonathan yardley, how did you get into the become review business . Guest i stumbled int
America and three the. I would like to thank everyone especially my friend and my poet and everyone else that is here for giving me the pleasure and privilege of sharing what it means to me. And i thought of that before beginning to share with those thoughts and ideas i want to honor two groups. Yesterday i was in such a hurry to actually listen to others. This is the kind of place everybody asks me what is the public of imagination. And i tell them this is the republic of imagination. You have people come communities, publishers. The publishers, leaders, booksellers all of us gathered together and the most important thing is with acts of that acts of imagination and ideas you transcend, you transcend the boundaries that reality is in front of you and you transcend the boundaries of the nationality, religion, language, race and gender. And one of the things about books, book sales and libraries is how central they are. I sometimes feel like a naughty child going to a bookstore and feel
I think that you will agree with that because the lieutenant that i saw failed as young officers, the ones who came in and thought that i thought im going to be a general tomorrow. And they were not successful. As a matter of fact when they kept hosing over their troops, the troops always found a way to set you up. So okay. What you want to do is come in and say that i am here to serve. As i told my unit in my battalion in iraq, the most expendable person in our entire battalion is me. Because my believe is a you can go out and get another battalion commander. But i cant go out and get another soldier. When that is your mentality and when they see that as your mentality and when you understand that that is the model that jesus gave us. He came to serve and not to be served. That is why i say the bible is greatest leadership manual that the world has ever known. If you stick close to that word, meditate on it day and night, in turn not from the left or the right and youll be billed grea
That america that i turned to. And i want to end by saying that it was very hard to choose these books, because i had, you know, we are all promiscuous when it comes to art. We have so many lovers, you know . And we are allowed to. And so what happened was that i had 24 books. I couldnt do it, i had to condense it to books that would express my feelings. And the books that i chose were i realized how the american novel, the American Fiction goes exactly against that class materialism of american dream. There are two sides to this dream, two contradictory sides to this dream. And the fact that most of the influential american heroes are outcasts and strangers, not just in huck finn, but even in the mystery tales in that magnificent writer named raymond chandler. They are, quoteunquote, little people, ordinary people who do not want material success. They are, in henry james words, perfectly equipped failures. And i wanted to talk about them beginning with huck finn because i think huck