Host how far was your boyhood home . Guest i was born in South Central, picot union which is a pretty heavily hispanic area. And then my dad moved up to South Central. We were the second black family on the block, and within five years the whole block was all black. Host larry elder, theres a picture on the front of your book, very quickly. And i promise then well go to calls. What is this a picture of . Guest thats a picture of my dads restaurant. And if you can look very closely in there, you can see my dad leaning over there. Its one of the rare only photos we have of my dads cafe. Thats where i was born, in that little house right there. My dad tore it down after the place was zoned for Light Industrial and built the restaurant there. Lousy location. You cant see it, but the food was so good, people found their way. Host and you hated working there. Guest i wouldnt stand working for you. He cursed at me. He would get volatile and start yelling and screaming. You can see how small it was, it was embarrassing. And i told myself the next time he cursed at me im going to walk up to him and say, now see here, buddy. I didnt have enough guts to confront him, but we did have the conversation that lasted a few minutes, and then we didnt talk for ten years. Host im done talking, its your turn. Larry elders our guest. Henry in bay shore, new york, youre the first caller. Guest i cant hear. Host hi, henry. Last chance. Were going to move on to ohio, thered doe, ohio. Anthony . Anthony, youre on booktv on cspan2 with larry elder. Hi, anthony. Caller hi, how are you . Host please go ahead, sir. Caller yes. I was wanting to ask mr. Elder, is he having any plans on having another talk show again . [laughter] guest well, anthony, thank you for the question. From your lips to gods microphone. Id love to have another talk show, id love to have a show along the lines of a hannity or reilly, political show where you call in and give your opinions, and im looking around to try and find that. Hopefully, that can happen. Host is radio the only thing youre doing right now . Guest well, im writing a play. Ive had a meeting with sony pictures, and theyve begin me some optimism maybe this project could be a movie someday. And i want to make it a play first along the lines of what tyler perry did. And then take it to a production house and maybe get it made. Host would you star in it like tyler perry does . Guest no, im not an actor. [laughter] host are you still a lawyer . Practicing lawyer . Guest i am. Im not practicing, but im still a lawyer. I havent been disbarred. Host johns in west lake village, and i have no idea what your state is, because its all run off the screen. Tell us your state and go ahead with your question or comment. Caller california. Host thank you, sir. Caller i guess i have three questions. Number one, do you have any children . Number two, do you treat your children or would you advise treating your children the way your father treated you . And, number three, does the, does the way your father treated you affect your relationship with people and the way that you approach political discussion . In other words, do you consider yourself [inaudible] of the people when they disagree with you . Guest well, thank you for that. Um, i think the first question was how do i feel host do you have children . Guest do i have children, thank you. No, i dont. And people have asked me whether or not my not having children had to do with way my father and my mother raised me, and i think probably so. I remember watching them when i was a kid in the kitchen watching them discuss something financial, and i remember saying to myself, this doesnt seem like a whole lot of fun. And i really thought that fathers were mean task masters, and i never wanted anybody to feel towards me the way i felt towards my father. When i got into college and i had classmates and was invited to their homes, i saw their homes were very different from my home, and they felt very differently towards their father. So i realized it was not necessarily the way it had to be. But the i do think it probably made me feel, maybe understand how hard it is raising children, what hard work it is and how labor intensive it is. And what i wanted to do was to be a writer and do a lot of traveling. I think i felt probably that i didnt want to make those kinds of sacrifices. I have an enormous appreciation for what my mother and father went through and all of the sacrifices that they did financial and otherwise. When people decide to raise children, i think it is the most important decision you can possibly make maybe short of going into combat. My goodness, you cant send them back . They often dont turn out the way you want them to turn out. They often get angry when youre trying to do the best for them. Its a thankless task. But i think the rewards are there, and now that my friends are having kids that are my age, i see why they put in the work. If i had to do it all over again, i probably would have kids. Host has it affected your relationship with people, as that caller asked . Guest um, i think probably so. I think when you dont feel loved by your father, it makes you a little less warm and a little less loose. And as i said, when my dad and i reconciled, my friends noticed a difference in my personality. They thought i was funnier, happier, more accepting of other people. So i think early on some of this imprinting might have made me have decisions about family and that sort of thing. Host patrick, peter borrow, new hampshire. Guest thank you for remembering the questions, peter. [laughter] host please go ahead. Caller thank you very much. I would like to ask mr. Elder well, first, i would like to say i really admire your, and am impressed with your courage you had to confront your father and go through the working things out with him. I couldnt think of a word the use. Guest thats right. Caller and i grew up with a very loving father. However, my mother was an alcoholic, so they had all of these fights when i was really young. And i was never aware of what was going on. And so, um, i never, you know, i always want withed my father wanted my father to tell me why he was so angry and stuff. And, of course, later on i figured it out. But my question is, um, how open do you think, you know, from your experience, how open dune dune do you think a father should be with their children or child as to how, what his feelings really are and, you know, how you know, his most intimate feelings as far as things he might be dealing with within himself, his own issuesesome. Guest right. Host all right, patrick, i think we got the point, thank you. Larry elder . Guest well, i think its the 64,000, and what youre really asking is to what extent should your father be a friend as opposed to being a parent, and the answer is real simple, he should be a parent. Whatever stories the parent has that could perhaps give a lesson, a life lesson to the child, the father should use. But, again, as i said before theres no handbook here. And my book is written from the perspective of my dad. We often talk about how we are raised from the perspective of a child, but we dont think about how our fathers feel about disciplining us. My father told me he didnt like doing it, but he wanted us to turn out okay, and he was willing to go through the necessary years, in my case, of being the bad guy in order to achieve the objective which was to have three wellgrounded boys. Host who are kirk and dennis . Guest they are my two brothers, im in the middle. Dennis was wayward and kirk was much more solid. Both of them are vietnamera vets, dennis in the army, my brother in the navy. Dennis, he and i could not stand each other. We fought night and day, day and night, 24 7 the way a lot of boys do. And my little brother, i think, had a problem with me because i was such a good student, and in those days teachers were so insensitive, they would often say to my little brother, how come youre not like larry . So dennis, i think, early on decided to be the antilarry. I think now a School Psychologist would intervene, and we probably would deal with him a little better, but kids often compared him to me, and i think my little brother wanted to be the antilarry, as i explain in my book. Host where are they today . Guest dennis died about 15 years ago. My older brother is still around, he is a foreman with a major oil company, happily married, has three children by the way, both of my brothers married women who had children and went on to have very long marriages. Host talk about your brothers funeral and your mothers view and your view and what actually happened. Guest youre talking about dennis funeral. And, again, this is the brother that i didnt get along with. And my brother dropped out of high school. He did a lot of drugs. The military straightened him out. But he got out. He was still fairly wayward. And when he died, i said to my mother, well just have a very Small Service because dennis, dennis friends are scattered here and yon, and theyre not the kind of people that you can reach on a phone and will show up. And she says, you dont know him. We need to have a big church. Dennis friends are going to find out that he died, and theyll be here. It was one of the largest funeral id been to. Almost like maag relate Thatcher Margaret thatcher had died. People were coming from everywhere. He lived in arizona, other parts of the country. People came to pay their respects to him. And when i would hear them talk about him, it was almost like my dads and my conversation because i would hear things about my brother that i didnt know and things hed said and done that i didnt know, and he was apparently a far better friend to other people than he was to me in many cases. My brother and i shortly after he died, he was laying in the hospital x we had a very long conversation, and i found out that he did respect me and love me and look up to me, and i told him the same thing. And it was kind of a nice moment. Host larry elder, do you have any reticence about writing a Family History and putting your life out there in print for people . Guest i would not have written that book had my mother still been alive. Theres a story i told about how my mother got my brother in the service. Ill let the readers read it. My mother would not have liked me to have told the story. But it tells you my mother was gutsy. My mother was tough. And the book, the book is a, a book thats also an ode to her as well, but theres some stories in there that my mother probably would have been embarrassed about. Host you know what . I dont often do this, but its worth getting this book just to read that story about his mom. Frank, in montgomery, alabama, youre on with larry elder on booktv. Caller mr. Elder, i appreciate what you said. But i want to guest hi, frank. Caller have you read a wonderful poem by Robert Hayden . A bunch of sundays . It fit well what youre saying about your father. And its a short, wonderful poem. It begins that [inaudible] and put his clothes on in the blue black cold. And from then [inaudible] weekday weather made bank fires blaze. Then he says in the poem that when the rooms are warm, you recall me. I would get up [inaudible] driven out the cold and feeling the [inaudible] but then he says later on [inaudible] what did i know . What did i know of loves austere and lonely offices . Finish so so the point is, you make the point so well in your talk that your father did love you. But you didnt know that, what that love austere and lonely offices. My father and i never got along together. He lived to be 104 years old, but we never got along together. But i love what you said. And im glad you wrote it. Republican or whatever you are. [laughter] guest well, thank you very much, and youre absolutely right about the old man getting up and going to work every day, not liking it, and that was his role modeling. And and you didnt realize it when youre a kid, to watch somebody get up, and theyre complaining, theyre grumping, they dont want to go to work, but they do it anyway because theyve got obligations. Thats what you learn by having a father in the house. One of the things i also talk about is it also affects the girls. You dont have a father in the house, and often what happens is a girl would meet a man and demand thoughts of [inaudible] and show her some sort of affection, she embraces this guy. And if hes a bad guy, its too bad for her. And so not having a father in the house effects not just boys, but girls as well. Host larry elder spent several years living in cleveland working for a law firm, and this next call comes from bobby in ohio. Caller ive got a question for you in regards to the comment you made about rg 3 and the article about him being called an uncle tom. Why would you state that person saying that would be republican . Wouldnt democrats actually sometimes have feelings like that . Im a republican, and i dont feel that way towards rg iii, so im just curious why you would say that. Guest you either misunderstood what i said, or i said it badly. What i said was the espn guy criticized rg iii because he thought he was republican. He said theres a rumor hes republican, i dont know about that. Hes got a white fiancee, i dont know about that. He called him a cornball brother because he suspected that rg iii was a republican, but he had a white fiancee. That is why this caster called him a cornball brother which i think is a racist thing. So im sorry if i misexplained it. Host go ahead, bobby, youre still on the line. Caller i appreciate that. I agree the same way you do then. I think its totally a racist comment also. Guest absolutely. Caller and host thank you, bobby. Caller and im a republican okay, thank you. Guest all right, thanks for calling in. Republicans dont like being called racist, and with good reason. They shouldnt be called racist. Host larry elder, dear father, dear son, is this an africanamerican story . Guest no, its an american story. Its a story about a guy who struggled, who overcame, who endured the Great Depression, who joined to fight in the second world war, who was part of what tom brokaw called the greatest generation. It is an american story of hard work, of triumph, of family, of success. This is a guy who did not know his biological father, became a entrepreneur, started a cafe, being able to buy that piece of property and the little house next door to it, plus the house in South Central. My father is an american success story. Host linda is in winthrop, massachusetts, larry elder is our guest. Caller yes, hi, larry. I have a question for you. Guest hi. Caller hi. Im very impressed by your story, and i know there are a lot of people out there that, um, have a hard time forgiving whether its their parents or their spouse, and in some cases even their children. Did you find that you were able to have the kind of forgiveness after ten years because you turned your life over to jesus and you gave it to him . Id be interested to know. Guest well, ive always been a christian. My mother was, taught sunday school. So going to church was not an option. I spent my 21st birthday in jerusalem as part of my junior year abroad in israel. Ive always been very religious. No, that had nothing to do with it. The reason, i suppose, the tenyear relationship healed so quickly is during the eighthour conversation because of my fathers demeanor. When i unloaded on him and told him all the things he had done harshly, my father was like, is that it . Youre mad at me for whipping you with a belt . Thats it . Do you know to know what my father did to me . And it was horrific. My father was like, is that all you have . [laughter] host larry elder, did your father go to church . Guest he did not. My father was a religious man though. He did not go to church, and i talk about that in the book. My father felt that organized religion was partly a scam. My father thought there was something wrong about the man in the south who was the pastor during the Great Depression having the biggest house, driving the nicest car, wearing the nicest clothing. He thought the person whos a man of god should be poor and should be wearing holy clothes and should not be sporting around in the sunday best. He said there was something inherently wrong about that. He also, when he came home, my dad said his mother and the neighbors would be gossipping about what was going on in church. So my father thought going to church was a big dressup thing, a big thing to gossip, whos doing what, whos sleeping with whom. And my father thought it had very little to do with god, so he worshiped himself. He would often watch televangelists on tv and would read the bible, but my father felt that organized church was a ripoff. Im not saying i agree with him, my mother certainly didnt, but it was one of the differences they had. Host you also say your parents never went anywhere together, they lived separate lives. Guest my father and my mother slept in separate bedrooms after a while. They never took vacation together. I never saw them kiss, i never saw them hold hands until after my dad and i reconciled, and then i began talking to them both, and i think that i improved their relationship a little bit. And much to my surprise be, they met some friends who lived in scottsdale, arizona, and they actually packed in the car and drove this together. I was stunned. And they stayed in motels along the way. I presume they had to sleep in the same bed. But i think my relationship with my dad, once it healed, improved their as well. Host and that couple in scottsdale, that was a white couple, right . And they went to the grand canyon . Guest they went to the grand canyon. The story they tell me is at the ticket praise place the person said i need to know who your family is, and the man said, here they are. All these black people with these white guys, and the ticket guy goes, okay, let em through, and they went through. Host temple city, california. Hi, bob. Caller am i really on or no . Host yes, you are. Caller okay. Mr. Elder, youre the best. Ive been listening to you. 38 year withs army, three wars, blown up in iraq, 32 years hapd. Thats not my question. My question is when are you going to stop playing around d lack of words and run for president . [laughter] guest two things could happen if i run. One of them is i could win, the other one is i could lose, and both of them are bad. [laughter] but thank you for that. Ive given it some thought, seriously, and i came this close to running for senate against barbara boxer, and i flew to d. C. , and i met a bunch of senators. My be arena lost by ten points, i could have. Host larry elder, what do you think about the kerfuffle around dr. Ben carson . Guest i like dr. Carson, and i thought that it was pretty gutsy for him to have said what he said right in front of the president , advocating the use of Health Savings accounts to deal with medical issues. And im not a big proponent of obamacare. I think that obamacare will, ultimately, hurt this country. And i agree with them. But for people who are touting him for running for o