one speaks to a controversy in our politics a subject of an enormous amount of argument the last few years and the connection to the forces to drive the politics of the west in recent years. we will hear about the book and discuss it and then open to questions. so please let's welcome rich lowry. [applause] >> thank you everyone it's a pleasure to be here. thank you for taking your time i will share with you my favorite moment of the book to were so far it came very early on the second day with an npr intervie interview. they have a practice i like to think of as professor ring so they have you on as a conservative you give your take on the policy than they have a professor on and the role of the professor that you are in it to remus and allows that the npr listener believes anything that is said with some authority with credentials so now you're deemed to the ignoramus so everyone could go home happy this is like the jerry springer when big mama comes on. [laughter] so i have this extensive pre- interview in preparation for this npr program. everything was set to go now they're desperately trying to get in touch with me. is it okay if we have a professor on with you? i said i know what you are doing. but it's fine. so i go with the interview for a while clearly she cannot believe what i am saying. and with the concept of nationalism. so basically really that when you scratch the surface most people are nationalist in some form so are you really saying that is not necessarily synonymous with bigotry and hatred? i am saying it gave us modern democracy. she said will go to break it here from the professor and sure enough the idiosyncratic sophisticated way to talk with a foreign accent and after some preliminaries she says everyone in the modern world is a nationalist and they created modern democracy. she cannot believe it and is taken aback and she says do you agree? it turns out in this case npr did not do sufficient research with a professor and the woman who is an extraordinary scholar on nationalism and it turns out i had read her most recent book on my own. so i had to interrupt to say actually i agree with her. to be on this topic so npr had professor at itself and it was very gratifying. so let me give you five arguments of nationalism and then we can talk. so the first proposition that nationalism is very old and natural and powerful. and they've tried to eliminate it with the ideology unsuccessfully. and to give you an example or at least national feeling you could go to one of history's great monsters and to have a vision and that she will liberate france from the english. at the time they had a fixation the english line originally comes from france and the english had been attempting to put someone there and then to precipitate the 100 year war and then is a debacle for the french as the population declines by half and then when joan is born it 75 years with the aspect of civil war in addition to the english occupation and because of the willpower it is difficult to fathom somehow she condenses the authority to pursue this vision and mission that she has she ends up in camps with french troops and sends messages to the english troops and says i am a warrior. that i will chase you all from france. and then to say i'm serious but this is my last warning. and then to take about the seriousness they scored her and her messages. and more news from the french war and then on average as a teenage girl would and consulted and cries tears of outrage and shame and what no teenage girl have ever done before she leaves the troops into battle carrying a white banner with the image of christ sitting in judgment. and astonishingly enough as the french heir to the throne so the english undertake that is not very fair-minded spaced on finding her guilty but on the fact that she wore men's clothing. the whole trance thing was not going on in military england. they burn her at the stake. she goes through this ordeal and a thrower in the river than she is 19 years old. no more memory of this bizarre incident. and then the opposite was the truth because she was a symbol of her nation and as such would not be let down for all of french history. . . . . via n was to say that nation had its own rights and claims and should govern itself. you wouldn't get the ratification of the constitution without the nationalism of hamilton and washington and the like-minded founders who believe that we could not just be the series vulnerable to the foreign powers around us and to being picked apart falling into disgrace. we need the incapable national government and of course you don't get the victory of the civil war without the nationalism without undermining the legitimacy of the american state. so, this tradition runs through alexander hamilton and he should have a strong military, especially strong nav navy commd our country should become a great nation and a great power on the model of great britain and the tradition that runs through lincoln you can see the sentiments running through fdr and ronald reagan, fdr uses blue legal to sell the nra program. he's a democratic nationalist against hitler and world war ii he had a lot of inaugural addresses. timothy mcveigh his prayer which donald trump read on the anniversary of normandy several months ago that begins the pride in the nation that are now set out by the mighty endeavor and both fdr and reagan had access to the nationalistic sentiment and feeling and symbols just how it is a fairly plastic phenome phenomena. both parties and ideologies have access and it can also obviously be abused by these factors as we see throughout history. third proposition, america is not just an idea. one of many basic axioms in washington, d.c., if there is something that both sides automatically and thoughtlessly say the way joe biden says it's probably wrong or you should at least be skeptical of it. america is not just an idea. no one lives in an abstraction. if you ask anyone where you're from, no one in their right mind since i'm glad you asked. i'm from the second treaties chapter four. that just isn't how it happens. more defensible version of the notion is america is just about the civic nationalism, it's all about the quality and citizenship and that is a big part of the nation bu nation tht represent all that. the problem with i have i think that a slight fact that the nations are thicker. it's of the ideals and they are built on cultures. so the way to illustrate this, we take an example. instantly it doesn't matter whether they have different ideologies or if they are from different parts of the country, the instant you were in common than anyone around them. they share the language so they can instantly communicate and dangerous largely the same and like largely the same food and have the same founders and in enormous stock of assumptions and references to extend the tourism metaphors. tonight in munich around and they say wait a minute, see that guy i think that he believes in the declaration of independence anand then they see you smile ad nbc's loud and boisterous, he might be american. these are cultural markers that set us apart from other people and account for the fact we have more communication and attachment to one another than to other people around the world. third proposition, sorry, for proposition related to the third is underlining the importance of culture and how important it was at the very beginning of the settlement of north america when they came to massachusetts colony, they brought with them the charter they had gotten from the king of england to govern themselves. they exploited a loophole that should have stayed in england, but it allowed them to bring it to the shores which they wanted to do because they wanted the assurance of having a document setting out their self-government in their own possession. they very quickly worship their own way and very quickly establish their own mode of government not to the liking of the king were the people around the king who began to urge him why don't you go back and take the charter. why don't you go get it. the governor and others had to consider what are they going to do. the king is going to come and get the charter and they make that decision collectively we will resist them by force. the hill today is known as beacon of so this is just so incredible 140 years before the revolt against endless royal authority led by independent minded stubborn people in boston massachusetts, there was narrowly the revolt against the royal authorities center in boston massachusetts led by independent stubborn minded people and to me this just goes to how deep the cultural groups in this country are run and we can also talk about the bible. it's beeexpensive import into or history and to our culture. initially it was the geneva bible that dominated when they came over and it was sometimes referred to as the breaches viable because of the modest way that tells the story of adam and eve. they realized they were naked and sewed together leaves and made themselves bridges. very quickly is the king james bible that came to dominate and it resonates throughout history. it's been a great fund of frederick down through the centuries. we often hear martin luther king quoting the proposition of the declaration of independence as a promissory note. a very powerful sentiment, but the main element of martin luther king's rhetoric and what made it so powerful wasn't thomas jefferson, it was amos, matthew and from the bible we get the key aspects of the national identity. one is that we are a chosen people were apeople were as line modestly and perhaps more appropriately, you get the idea that we are living in a promised land and you get the idea o of a covenant that goes back to the old testament. first is the competent than the settlers come pretty much every time they find a new town and every time they start a new church there is a covenant. there is a written document setting out the rules. and the most important in our country is the anchor of the sovereignty which is the u.s. constitution which gives a a limited government and goes back to this notion of the covenant. finally, i will set out very quickly but i think is the lowest common denominator in the conservative agenda based on nationalism which focuses on the culture and preserving our cultural core. it means one, defending zealously the english language as the dominant language in this country. if there's anything that we know about the cultural cohesion and national cohesion, it is that if you get multiple languages, you are going to get a problem. in a nice pleasant canada a couple of decades ago was almost torn apart by the fact that québec is a french-speaking province trapped in the middle of an english speaking country. you see the convention now in spain over the status based around the fact they have their own culture and their own language. we have to defend our founders and our heroes who are under an ongoing assault. if there isn't a memorial 20 years from now and in charlottesville you have a hideous march by the neo-nazi. there was an old church in alexandria virginia where property and george washington, who worshiped said they had a plot. marking robert e. lee and george washington. they took down the plaque because they considered it too divisive. i can say that. i think that is reasonable enough. they also took down the plaque of george washington, which is completely in vain, but sort of represents the drift of the argument. on the founders international heroes. we have the standard civil rituals and symbols and including the flag one reason i am so irritated when people use the flag as a means of protest, disrespecting it or they can come tthe incomethat celebratese men died for that flag not in a symbolic sense that the literal sense because the history of the civil war they carry the flag in the battle as a rallying point for their comments and took this duty seriously. multiple men died defending the flag right around the spot where they gave the gettysburg addre address. one was wounded and handed the flag over to another sergeant who was wounded and who took it to another officer so they could wrap it around as they died when he was grievously wounded. so, these are very, very deep and part of our cultural inheritance. finally, we teach to the truthful about our history and yes we have national sin, but that isn't all that country is about. we shouldn't be teaching our history as a tale of them relieve depression but the glorious story of three people who are living in a blessed land. and i will leave you with one last quote and then i will conclude. this captures how deep these attachments are and how even if we don't realize it we all feel this. it's given by a scholar named john thornton who went on to become the president of harvard anand is 701798 speech we've led to love our country because it is our country, because we are near it and we have an opportunity of being useful to it because we share it down piece and the spread of our fathers brow subdued it. it increases our fathers and mothers and children and brothers and sisters. here are the altars and fireside because patriotism and the combined energy of the social section we appreciate that and this book that steps into a very wide controversy around the question of nationalism and the politics now and tries to organize a little bit. the book is structured in the shape that you lay out for the idea of nationalism and to think through its place in american history in its place in contemporary american life and the challenges it faces now. i guess i wonder first as an opening question, why do you think that nationalism is such a controversial issue now? why is it understood to be so connected to the essence of this political moment and what does that have to do with president of trump, whether that is why it has risen in the way that it has, why is it that we are talking about nationalism so much at this point? >> so, the way that i think about this, the book was -- i haven't really thought much about nationalism. they have shared the lazy assumption, that is a dirty word, until trumps inaugural address which got me thinking about it a little more. so, if it has happened is democrats although they have a nationalist tradition and it's not so distant past probably turn their back on it. they also lost touch with nationalism under the influence of the value of markets and under the influence of the business elite is a little more transnational as the lead scientist for the in the 19th century the business innovations and technological changes that created a national affiliation and edited over and above local attachments and affiliations in the late 20s and 31st century the same kind of technological innovations and business changes and then finally the overtly idealistic emphasis on the foreign-policy i think all that kind of lost touch with nationalism to some extent so you have to kind of baton on the floor and trump picks it up but it goes deeper than trump because it was a major event that happened before the election of donald trump and it just goes to this question they think it's nationalism and the nationstate because the agony of europe in the 20th century to the project is a dream of the united europe goes back to roe. the. do they have to somehow bear the burden of trump. i think with trump if you get trump on the teleprompter. in this speech i think they are deeply true. in the best speech of the presidency they advanced the idea that even pulling a certain kind of the worst place you can in europe and has been overrun in the occupying armies and partitions over the years subjected to this. poland has never gone away because in essence they are so polish and that is the essence. it would be between rousseau and trump. they wrote at a time that was occupied by russia stick to your traditions and they will never be able to absorb you and that has been completely true. the problem obviously is once they get off the teleprompter issues in the wild, it's nothing like this, and they unify and potential nationalism is something about the fact. briefly at war with the city of baltimore, date said no human being would want to live in west baltimore. too often that doesn't seem to make any impression on him and in political terms in a more nationalistic and populist republican party fought through this aspect of the new agenda and integrated a program that would have more chance of jumping the racial lines then a more stereotypical mitt romney republicanism. the african-american latino, overwhelmingly male, middle-class working class in this program at iteration but is more appealing you have to look at it and very often trump doesn't en end just the opposit. and does the opposite. >> these kind of elements or incidental to nationalism or is it a coincidence they emerge with trump in the debate emerge when nationalism is out in the open in a lot of places in a lifetime's? >> i think the or incidental or should be incidental. the issue is that they are caught up with populism, which is a different phenomenon. and number two in the persona is the personality which is a different phenomenon. but the populism and nationalism in our age do tend to be mixed in together because the elite institutions tend to be so hostile to the nationalism and respectable political parties tend to not want to have anything to do with it. so, it leaves it to the populist outsiders but i don't think that this is inherent to the nationalism and alexander hamilton at the american tradition was not a populist committee was opposed to the populist and they were better at the small politics than he was. henry clay, lincoln, exemplars of this tradition also were anti-populist, but with trump, if you are making 19th century and allergies, he is more in line with andrew jackson then the abraham lincoln. >> in talking about the first, you said nationalism or national feelings have deep roots. it's nationalism just natural feeling or what actually is it, but kind of thing is that it, is a sentiment, and ideology, we, e thinkinweare thinking about pol? >> you get into the definitions where it is in the conversation people tend to think patriotism that is where everything is good for the nationathat the nationad everything bad. if you are going to be technical about it, patriotism, it's patriarchy, loyalty, nationalism is the idea that a distinct people founded by a common culture, common language, common history should govern a distinct territory. but the patriotism and nationalism is caught up with one another and in this conversation, they should be interchangeable. if you are zealous about your sovereignty and governing a distinct territory, you also probably have a really strong sense of community with everyone else so the patriotism and nationalism sort of mixed together. >> but you think it is ultimately a feeling of community? it's not a way of organizing politics, or is it, thinking about the world affairs, especially in the kind of debates we have had in these years have circled these purposes. it's been a concept of foreign-policy thinking which is largely the role played in europe and it's been a way of thinking about domestic affairs, nationalism but i take it is not quite what you'r you are sayingd it's also acquainted with patriotism and then how can you not be for the national. >> said, i think that there is a certain lowest common denominator nationalism that means you're focused on putting your people's interest first. focused on preserving your sovereignty and pursuing your national interest in foreign policy. that doesn't give you a policy answer to anything and it's a mistake i think to say i'm a nationalist could therefore i support the iraq war. it doesn't give you the answer on what was the best service any of these, but there are schools of thought, cosmopolitan progressives and libertarians who think there is something small indoo small minded or constructed focused on other peoples we are going to be focused on our sovereignty and our national interest. so, 80% of americans who shaken awake at 3 a.m. should be in favor of our own interest. people would say yes, but there is 20% or whatever it is that have a commitment that is at odds with the nationalism. bernie sanders is an example. i talked about this at the end oof the book. a famous interview that he did with fox in 2016 or the editor says you are in favor of helping poor people, isn't it true the best way to help poor people around the world is to let them all coming to the united states, which actually that is a truthful proposition. there's no doubt that it would be better for all the immigrants coming in, but no, no, that is a coke brother proposal we cannot do that. so that's kind of beaten out of him but that wa there was a basc nationalistic sentiment. >> of the striking things is the way you prove the case for nationalism and history and its various phases and among the most striking claims is that it precedes american independence that we exist as a nation before we were a single and that is rooted in the english nationalist. how is it our nationalism can be rooted in another nationalism and what does it say about the character if that is the case? >> what i argue is that in the english civil war going way back, that was about whether the english nation has existed over and above and outside of the monarchy. so, the stewards had this idea. it's kind of belong to the belom and what they said is it belongs to the people. there is a restoration and then you get the style tha title thaa muddy compromise that works but it does limit the power of the crown and what you have to do, the people that are most vociferously and intensely on the site of parliament in contention come here and bring all of those cultural assumptions and predilections and predicates to the shores and there are truths in this kind of version that i think would give you a version of the revolution even without the enlightenment of the key part of it. but as i say, before anybody had when they need to read john locke and no, we are going to govern ourselves, i can't give you the date, but somewhere between the early 17th century and early 1776, you do have an american nation that has governed itself with its own institutions, its own moray and way of thinking from about 100 years. but the rights of the nation. >> why do you resist the notion that america is an idea in a general sense that it's defined by the way of thinking about itself and the political life more than it is defined by the police or language and ethnicity and other kind of things that hold nations together. you are describing people unified by other ways of thinking. >> i think that is a good point. i would just make the case that number one, it's how you think is caught up in your culture. culture is seeded with ideas. so what i say in the book is where the united states had been settled and you give them all a copy of the second treaty and mandated you still wouldn't have gotten anything close to the american founding so that is one point. the second is that they've been dependent on the success of this distinct political entity which is the american nation depended on it extent and however i mentioned in the opening remarks of hamilton and others if it fell apart in disgrace after 1776, it dies and the ideas i would have because they are discredited. we wouldn't have been able to vindicate our ideas and influence the world with them in the same way we did in the 20th century which involved winning the two world wars if we hadn't been a continental nation. so, the idea is a way of thinking it's just not the entirety of the story, and i think republicans have even served to further emphasizing the ideas. >> .. >>. >> when jones was indicating that the french after the revolution they had these ideas to lead the world in liberty and ancient israel made a very complicated subject that i simplify. but the idea was on to the nation but with the universal and lincoln did that in a particularly inspired way but at the end of the day the most important mission was saving the nationstate. in part we thought there was a is a logic to the liberty but if slavery still existed then in some extent the south would still be overrun by the logic henry clay as the statesman and as lincoln said one because it was free and two because it was the country and modesty to lincoln statements to be largely observed never once is there any suggestion on the part of lincoln that god would actually have a divided united states of america to make he said in his eulogy to henry clay he left mostly because it was a free country to lincoln love america mostly because it was free mostly. what provided the opportunity for people to rise but that would not be defended or preserved if the nationstate was torn apart. so again to come to the argument that they are connected. and to create that opportunity for people to rise in his view to the economic nationalistic and political program with railroads and canals when there is only local markets. >> in 2009 and ten president obama said sure americans are patriots and the greeks have greeks patriotism and that's great that is a failure to understand. but maybe you would defend obama the most. so the nationalist appreciates the nationalism of other nations. >> that the greeks do love their country. but i'm an american. so that doesn't mean they can't have their patriotism and we should not honor it. and to talk much about foreign policy but this is a key element in the 20th with a small d democratic nation states. and a relative. and the success of establishing that norm with the wars of aggrandizement that created a more sinker synced sense of orders and legitimacy. and one last point to say that's where we get militarism from but the human organization is not deeply flawed people. tribes are not peaceful. and with those wars of extermination. into that point empires had wars with the temple to indicate for peace for several years and its history. but with empires someone has to rule with the dominant language, with the dominant culture. 600 years with the coercive apparatus the nations will go their own way with that exact same experience with the soviet empire and with the western colonial empire in the h century. people feel connected to one another and they will want to govern themselves. >> and where does it leave the question of federalism or localism? nationalism that you describe like teddy roosevelt of progressive nationalism not so much to globalism but localism is nationalism opposed to have one american way. >> i don't think rightly understood. teddy roosevelt the presidency is fine. but it's where we get that weaning of nationalism and that's never a good sign. but proper nationalism needs to be rooted in the united states that creates a national government but also a system of dual sovereignty. and having distinct local pressures within limits is part of the american way i would want the entire region to speak another language that would tear at the national cohesion to represent something that has to be avoided at all cost to the nation that is held together how do they deal with the darker side of its own history? it is controversial now with the political idea it strike some people as ignoring or overlooking america's natural sense in the nationalist expansion with the race and slavery question which is not just historical but contemporar contemporary. what does nationalism have to offer us with these challenges quick. >> a truthful history to acknowledge our sins. and the project from the new york times there is an element that is profoundly true so the essay and the new york times series describes the author. a little girl as a teacher who has a well-meaning project of course she wanted the kids to point out. because she and her african-american friend were so american they had no idea. there was nowhere to point. so if you take the average african-american family aside those that immigrated recently going way back much further than the neo-nazi so african-americans were part of the cultural nation from the very beginning making extremely important contributions to it. that has to be acknowledged. they should be fully cognizant in a way that we haven't been in the sweep of american history it was the nationalist who vindicated the rights of african-americans so the bogus sense of states rights was of southern nationalism in a way to continue chattel slavery in the jim crow system in the south. we should not lie about ourselves. that's the other side of the coin that the american revolution was about slavery. gets over the whole fact after 1776. all of them embracing abolition. and backsliding of the 19th century. but it is very unusual to have people who want to lie about themselves. normally you lie about the other guy. the germans lie about the french. it is new and unusual to lie about yourself to tear down the legitimacy. and how we have that d nationalizing an important respects. >> how do you explain that? >> that business and physiological changes the trends nationalism the cosmopolitan with the attitude the outsiders the diogenes the first to say i am a citizen of the world. and in the athens marketplace. and that attitude in the sixties and seventies was to the elite to focus on identity politics with subnational loyalties. if you put them all togethe together, you put our nation and coherence. >> but does it contribute to a different kind of identity politics another way to approach political life through the lens of essentially identity rather than idea? >> i don't think nationalism is identity politics i think it is the opposite of tribalism. for our those perspective of the citizen of the world to look at someone ago it's not. if you look at the places around the world and in part because of the artificial borders by colonial rulers. it hasn't been unifying. it was worse you have no dm os or mutual sense of obligation or duty and you have real tribalism which tears countries apart and makes it impossible that is for democracy and capitalism. >> we will now go to the audience for some questions. >> my name is michael i am an intern here. do you think nationalism helps from one volunteer to go from one place to another? why? between different nations. in a gallup poll 50 percent of the worlds people want to emigrate but cannot. >> i don't think any countr country, this is the experience of the actual world should stop people from emigrating of the only totalitarian country to do this but because i think nationalism is bound up and it is really implicated. and for the citizens for those who are already here. and to have a big policy dispute that it is even truer at a higher level i think it's true or add lower level but if they are overwhelmed and then to assimilate and the national focus and then to put an emphasis on assimilation. and that word successfully absorb you have incredible machinery with the institution of american life helping to assimilate then the pressure and then a pod of immigration beginning in 1824. as people were supportive. but that did create pressure on ethnic enclaves to marry outside of their group. that's what you should want is to have americans all mixed up together and have a mutual feeling as one rather than any type of enclave. >> and those that serve the national interest of people. >> we are in a different place than we were with a great american manufacturing economy. 40 percent of those on the factory line were immigrants we have a different economy now technology and information. so my basic take is that many many people will come here for very good reasons which gives us the opportunity to be a little choosy. there should be a refugee program. humanitarian elements. and with the reunification but that said there should be much more of an emphasis for those who already speak english. that just means you're not having people just come from australia but millions that already speak english in places like nigeria and india. so let's get immigrants who will succeed here in economic terms very quickly perhaps three generations hence. so then so many people want to come we can decide to pick and choose. to me that just seems common sense. >>. >> obviously the president and his rhetoric can hurt this type of discussion. so in that mindset you would advance this idea of nationalism where they are just offended by the word in relation to the president. >> a very good question. but it is a bigger phenomenon than donald trump. but i want trump supporters to say it is okay but those who are skeptical and opposed to tromp to read the book and hopefully come to the conclusion this is an important thing and should be integrated into any post conservative party. this does not begin and end with donald trump. there are many many things he would not say but i am not equipped with such a wand unfortunately. >> thank you for your remarks. do you believe the us government making policy decisions to any other domain place any value in american life and why or why not? >> thinking on the right about trade the arrangement with china is great to bring people out of poverty. but the focus should be here in the united states the cost of that benefit is 2 million americans dumped into poverty and other self-destructive behaviors changes the equation for me. so the focus should be on her own people and her own interest. not every humanitarian initiative. with african and aids initiative. but the focus has to be on those at home. >> i look at a quick look to - - at your index i heard you say southern nationalism having studied southern history in several generations , i do agree it was rooted in slavery with the cultural systems but that's why it became a regional or nationalist culture. we have all of these confederate monuments and i could go on and on. just surprised to hear you say that. >> you heard me correctly. and with all of those geographic boundaries but that instinctive regional culture and the basis it was explicitly of a hideous and unjust institution. in terms of economic power and in terms of population and that would impinge on this institution. but this is what the secession was. this is a revolution in a deeply unjust cause. there should not be spray-painted but those monuments should be in museums other than battlefield especially those that were directed at a certain point of time to send a message about the appeal and legitimacy of the so-called southern nation and to send a message to african-americans that it would get bad for them. so i am not a fan of those monuments. >>. >> thank you so much for talking i'm taking a class right now about emmett burke. reading burke is impossible not to conclude he loved great britain and being british but at the same time he supported letting the american colonies go. do you think his nationalism is more what you are talking about incense it is not militaristic? >> you put me on the spot asking me and edmund burke question on the same stage. i know very little compared to him. so i will just redirect to the question. [laughter] >> @-at-sign must be the most stirring defense and that suggest capacity for the appeals of others nationalism and a sense it isn't connected to militarism. is that fair? >> i think it is. nationalism can stay into imperialism but it's often fuzzy but i had inherited sympathy from british colonialism that was more benign and had a tendency but to beam a tight on - - entirely mistaken. and then to be willing to let people build their own way and be self-governing and fdr and churchill had a big argument and he was on the question of colonialism. >> you answer the questions when you moderate? >> pretty much. [laughter] >> so there are dangers to both ends of nationalism could lead to isolates them that leads to imperialism. this is exactly what happened in japan. so my question is, what are the differences? how do you distinguish? >> i'm not sure i have a satisfying answer. the foreign-policy should be national interest -based and of what that is some would say it's more interventionist. i tend to think those institutions to develop in that environment and and any unreasonable cost-benefit. but this just gets to settle these policy questions. with the tax rate should be. and that attitude towards nato. i've got nothing for you. [laughter] >> so you touch upon the relationship of how both are together in places at the same time and at the same time there is corrosive but then to leave the united kingdom and join the eu. and that to reinforce the relation ship or is there is a reason they coexist? >> in such a relationship and as a symptom of a lack of a true nationalism but i don't see that relationship and the cosmopolitan on - - cosmo paul attendance him and tribalism. >>. >> you spoke a moment to go about trade policy. and that argument about trade so if you accept that as a nationalist trade policy how do you say about the traditional conservative humility about what is best for american people? and then to better american interest and to say maybe we should not plan on that. >> and then to be unclear and we regret it. and then in the interest of our own workers to each have industrial policy on that basis. and to know where we are coming from, skeptical of intervention. based on as you correctly point out with an understanding of what it is best for every single industry. and the history of those policies is not a happy one. and then look at the 1970s and then generally a failure. >> that capitalism is the most inherently? >> but it does depend on rules that are not self generating. and then to have no rules with china. and then to write it down. and number two and you don't get democracy. and then with social trust without nationalism in the sense to create the nationstates. with those critical entities. but now capitalism will tend towards that openness but you need the nation to have the government to write the rules to facilitate the trade. so that there is no such thing as free floating libertarian out in the ether. everybody lives somewhere and everyone has to be governed and there has to be rules even for the market for trade to work. >> is that an acceptable answer? [laughter] >> exactly just a neutral observer. so that is the end of the discussion. lets think rich lowery very much. [applause] he will be outside signing book books. thank you for being here. [inaudible conversations]

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