be sure we have moved away from that. we generated kind of an entitlement society that everybody wants everything now and nothing should ever be taken away. but that is to ask the narrow question would you like another flat screen high-definition tv answer is yes. we all grew up with one if we had one instance four or five every house has a tv it seems. so people will win that maximize their own situation she but if you ask people direct questions broadly people are prepared and willing to make the tough choices to be patient with them and to see us through what i think will be a better future for us and more important for a were kids and grandchildren. thanks very much. ladies and gentlemen, john koshkin. thank you very much. [applause] [inaudible conversations] author louisa thomas talks about her book conscience a family history of her great-grandfather and his three brothers during world war i. she talked with random house executive john mechem at the tenement museum.
drugs and alcohol at younger and younger ages 10 and 11 tallgrass tagamet temptations and pressures they are facing. and the two sides that some people don t live in neighborhoods where you have both obesity and real hunger and often on the same block in the same community. the challenges they re facing with all these horrendous areas to students fulfilling their potential are huge. at a time those challenges, students cannot education, that path, that mission unimpaired it has been more important. we know the international competition. we know it s a nation from first in the world tonight call is graduate. other countries passing us by. we know where 25% drop off for in our country. that the million point to young people with no chance for that to get a job in the legal economy. as i look across the globe and competition were facing, places like spout korea, president obama asked what is the biggest educational challenge for the very high achieving nation. even my poorest pa
february for about an hour 10 minute. i want to start up my talk with two quotes. they are both from the prologue of our book cannot have a little explanation for them, but they introduce why i decided to write the book. so the first quote is in my prose from the prologue. we still hold certain truths about african-americans to be self-evident, that the freeze 19th century black americans refers to enslaved people, that new york state before the civil word denotes a place of freedom, that? in new york city designates heartland, that the black community positive a classic and unify society that a black elite did not exist until well into the 20th century. lives in a new york forbears polite such assumptions. they were born free at a time when slavery was still legal in new york city. they lived in racially mixed neighborhood, first in lower manhattan after the civil war in brooklyn at a time when harlem is a mere village. they were