Transcripts For KQED Charlie Rose 20170504

Rose welcome to the program. We begin this evening with fbi director jaimsz comeys testimony on capitol hill. We talk to karoun demirnlgian of the Washington Post and mike schmidt of the New York Times. Comey is usually the cool cat, very sort of even keeled but today he was much more animated. His voice was louder, he used his hands a lot more in expression. And he seemed very frustrated. And he said at one point that hes almost gnaw shus to think that he has some impact on the election. Rose we continue with journalist jonathan at enand amie parnes, their new book called shatter, inside the Hillry Clinton doomed campaign. We both believed on Election Night that she would win as much as she did and much of the country did. In the reporting and the writing of this, we had been reporting it for back since the end of 2014, even before she got in, the key for us was that we tried to report it and write it as though we didnt have any prediction of what was going to go on. And so as a result of that, we didnt have to go back and tear anything up. We conclude this evening with the architect renzo piano and author victoria newhouse, her book is called chai os and. It occurred to me that when institutions make the decision to build, they often did it without really knowing what theyre getting into. And so i wrote this book primarily to raise awareness of what is involved when you take on this kind of project. Rose the comey testimony, the Clinton Campaign and a new Cultural Center innateens when we continue. Funding for charlie rose is provided by the following. And by bloomberg, a provider of multimedia news and Information Services worldwide. Captioning sponsored by Rose Communications from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. We begin this evening with fbi director james comeys testimony today before the Senate Judiciary committee. Comey defended his decision to inform congress that he was revisiting the Hillry Clinton email two weeks before the election. To conceal that information, he said would have been the death of the fbi. While he stood by his actions, comey said it made him mildly gnaw shus to think that we might have had some impact on the election. He also answered questions about russia, wikileaks and president trumps claim that the Obama Administration had wiretapped trump tower. Joining me from washington, Karoun Demirjian and mike schmidt, a federal law correspondent for the New York Times. Let me begin with you, mike. Tell me what is the headline coming out of the fbi directors testimony today . Well, what comey said was that if he could do it again, he would do it the same way that he had. That he thinks that he had no choice but to tell congress, and that if he didnt do that, he would have been concealing something from them. And that that would have been disastrous for him, and for the fbis reputation. Now what his critics would say is that well, it really wasnt a question of concealment or disclosure. Why didnt you just take the time to look at the emails, figure out what they were, and then inform congress. You saw a bit of a different jim comey today. Comey is usually the cool cat, very sort of even keeled. But today he was much more animated. His voice was louder. D he seemed very frustrated. In and he said at one point that hes almost gnaw shus to think that he has some impact on the election. Was he defensive . He was the most defensive that weve ever seen him, jim comey really came to the sort of forefront of washington, almost 13 years ago when he testified about an incident where he stood up in the Bush Administration to not authorizing a wiretapping program. And in that he told a very interesting story about how there was a hospital room scene with John Ashcroft in the white house. Chief of staff. And he said hey, were not going to authorize this. He really became sort of a hero, that would stand up and blow the whistle. You know, one, someone once told me whenever youre explaining you are losing and he was doing a lot of explaining. You are smiling. What would you add to this idea that he thought that to have concealed would have been catastrophic for the fbi. Well, not everybody on the panel bought it. He phrased it, basically, as he had two choices which was in concealing would have been the worst option or saying something would have been the less bad option even though it was still a bad option. And most of the democrats on the panel really did think there was a Door Number Three which was as mike just said, take some time, look at the emails and dont talk about there if there is nothing there so shortly before an election. And even comey was acknowledging that he knew by speaking up he was going to have some sort of likely affect on the election but was trying to parcel that off in his brain and not Pay Attention to. By paying attention he had a pretty significant affect at least on the political discourse surrounding the election that was a few weeks later. So you dont necessarily have democrats on that panel saying that they didnt believe comey. They were saying they certainly believed that he believes he did the right thingment but that that doesnt really matter given that this didnt happen in a vacuum. He may try to make decisions in a vacuum based on procedures, based on the rules that he conducts himself by in his own head but he still existed in the world of late october. And that was a very different world in which clearly this, at least rocked a lot of the emotions surrounding the election although we will never really know because you cant trace what he said to individual votes that happened in november. She thought that she had the momentum going in and this all of a sudden upset her momentum. In the final weeks of the campaign. The interesting thing to me is the idea that Anthony Weiner was receiving classified information or emails that contained classified information. How was that true . How did that work . Well, we got some more information about that today which was that apparently huma abedin who is clintons close kf dante staffer aide was forwarding these emails to her husband, Anthony Weiner who was printing them out. And so what comey was basically saying is that even though that is wrong t didnt seem like through their probe of that activity, that huma abedin or Anthony Weiner really realized what they were doing was actually wrong and potentially criminal. So they decided since they didnt have, the fbi decided since they didnt seem to have a cog any glans that that was not cog any glans that they wouldnt prosecute them for it. That brought blowback from the republicans. Does that matter if they were dealing with classified information without the clearance why was weiner getting his hands on this at all. We are not buying that his prox imity to a printer was a valid excuse. So more details about why that happened. And kind of adding the color to the story, though we knew that there was certainly a connection between Anthony Weiner and clinton and it seemed logical that it was through his wife, the reasons that comey gave which was to facilitate the emails turning up on paper that could then be shown to clinton, did make a lot of people kind of throw up their hands as he though, this is what this is and is this a valid excuse for dealing with classified information which is supposed to be regulated and classified and thus only visible to people who have the clearance to be viewing it. Rose Diane Feinstein has suggested that secretary clinton was treated very differently than donald trump. Mike, did that have a resonance there . Yeah, the issue on trump is that basically in july as, right after the fbi closes the email investigation, comey opens up another investigation into the Trump Associates and their links to the russians. So the question from democrats is that why did comey not disclose that investigation before the election. He ultimately did disclose it in march but they said well, voters went to the booth thinking that Hillary Clinton was under investigation when Donald Trumps folks were actually under investigation. Now what the fbi would say is that at that point, early on in the investigation, they really didnt know a lot and it was t never the less it reallyn. Raises the question of the double standard here. And why is that. And even late today senator richard bloomen thal of connecticut was saying well, why is it that comey can continue to oversee the trump investigation. If he doesnt find charges are we going to believe him because of the decisions he made on the clinton case . So there seems to be some political blowback by the end of today on comey and questions Going Forward. I dont think there will be a special prosecutor. I find it hard to believe that comey would be taken away from the trump investigation. But it sort of showed by the end of the day comey hadnt really assuaged the concerns of democrats but comey may never do that. Could democrats may hold comey accountable for this for the rest of his life and say hes the reason that Hillary Clinton didnt get collect haded. Clarily she believes he was part of the wherein she didnt get elected. She said that, she said that yesterday when she said that if the election had been held on october 27th which was the day before mr. Comey sented the letter, that she would have been elected. She did say that she had some responsibility for losing but that that and the russian wikileaks really played a factor in that. The question Going Forward for comey is like, comey unlike hillary has more political life left. And he has more time to play. And can comey deliver for the democrats on trump and sort of rewrite his own history. You know, would that change the way the democrats feel him, i dont know. But certainly there is more to the comey story. But probably only in the fifth inning. What about the leaks. What did we discover about leaks that people believe may have come from the fbi . Well, there was some discussion about that. He was asked specifically about statements that geulianee had made during the campaign that he had some advance notice from former members of the fbi, at least, that said that there was going to be, about the clinton investigation. And he was grilled about that specifically by Patrick Leahy and said that he didnt know specifically that they were looking into it. And that if they found any leaks that were made from the fbi, either to journalists or individuals like geul oni giuliani that there would be consequences for that. So he didnt specify specifically, he accident sub stand yait any of those allegations to a specific person that we have heard about. But he did pretty much corroborate that they are looking into those leaks that were bragged about to an extent. By trump surrogates like giuliani. How long can he stay . A ten year term . Yes, i believe that hes been in for about a little over five of those ten years if im not mistaken. But right now theres not people really calling for his head. So it would be an extraordinary move to actually remove him. And like mike said, the journey is still out on what the ultimate verdicts on comey will be, at least among the democrats and because we havent seen yet what the trump investigation is going to yield. Because lately theyve been rather pleased with the moves comey is making to say on the record that hes an investigating trump. Although clearly they would have preferred it if he spoke up about that eight months before he did. Let me come back to that one point in terms of why he spoke out at all. Not speak out, knowing whatgh he had and intended to do. His rational again was that he thought it would be cat strofng for the fbi if he didnt do it, correct . Right. And the question is, really, the reality in which everybody was operating. Comeys assessment was that in terms of maintaining his own integrity, in terms of maintaining the integrity of his agency, he could not take the particulars about what was happening in that electoral space into consideration. He brought it, boiled it down to what he considers his rule which is that you talk about an investigation thats closed. He had told kok the clinton investigation was closed. He then gets this information that maybe theres something in these weiner this weiner information that would implicate clintonment maybe it was the smoking gun they were looking for in that investigation. So he felt he had to talk about the investigation he had said was closed. And if the trump investigation was ongoing, he doesnt talk about yn going investigations so it is very cut and dry in his head. But again, he maybe thinks he has to make those decisions or had to make those decisions in whatever vacuum he could construct around that decision. But he wasnt operating in a vacuum. It was shortly before the election. There was no way the decision he was going to make was going to just kind of go over and everybody would say oh, well, we understand that. Especially because there is this practice, if you dont throw a live grenade into the mix right before an election. And he knew that that was a consideration that he said today over and over again. He tried to discount the fact that that might be the issue because he wanted to maintain the clarity of well, i do comment on the closed investigation and i put my name around the fact that this was closed when maybe its not and dont comment on the open ones it is much more in their heads than anybody else, all involved observing politics at that point in time which is why the bad feelings about this have not gone away. Rose finally there is this hind shoo that Lindsay Graham raised what can we expect from russia in future elections and what can we expect from russia in other countries where the elections are coming up . What comey said is that russia, he actually, he wouldnt disclose anything about the russia investigation but what he did say was that russia was still trying to influence american politics. He didnt explain what he meant by that. And it was sort of curious, does that mean that russia, you know, is trying to influence the Trump Administration in some way. Are they trying to influence the media. Is there still a Hacking Campaign going on. We know that the Hacking Campaign that the dnc was caught up in had been going on for two years. Comey did say that russia was the biggest threat to the United States, because they had the willingness and the capability to try and come back and that what he said in response to graham was that if the United States didnt do anything, that the russians would be back by the next election. Now this sort of raises the question, that the fbi is doing an criminal investigation. Theyre trying to get to the bottom of whether any laws were broken. But theres not really a larger look going on inside the government about, you know, how to prevent Something Like this in the feult. How to deal with this information and Hacking Campaign. The Senate Intel Committees investigating, both of those are seen as sort of partisan. But what some folks on capitol hill would say is that there needs to be an independent Commission Like there was after 9 11. So to look into these accusations, to look into what the russians were doing before the election and come up with best practices about what the government could do Going Forward, that is not something the fbi does. They just tell you whether you broke the law or not. With that i have to close. Thank you both very much. Thank you. Well be right back. Stay with us. Rose Hillary Clintons lost it donald trump in the 2016 president ial election stned the nation. In the more than five months since, there has been much speculation about the fact that is responsible for her defeat. A new book shattered, inside Hillary Clintons doomed campaign, a search that clinton herself was the core problem. The authors join may now, Jonathan Allen is a columnist for roll call and the head of community and content at sideware. Amie parnes is the senior White House Correspondent for the hill. Im pleased to have them both at this table. Welcome. Thank you. Rose fifers of all, tell me when the first of all tell me when the idea of doing this came about and how the two of you got together to do it. So we wrote our previous book hrc on secretary clintons time at the state department 6789 and we didded questions, we wanted to know if she had learned her lessons. We saw her kiepped of kind of talk to a lot of aides post campaign and try to figure out what happened. We wanted to kind of answer those questions in this book. And they are very different books. One is very focused on policy and what she was doing in governance. And this one is a political book. Rose so you already had a history of writing together so that was already done. Right. And there is so much to cover about it. So did you assume as you were writing this book and as were you doing all those inside interviews during the campaign that she was going to be president . I think we both believed on Election Night that she was going to win, much as her team did, much as she did, much as most of the country did. But i think one of the keys for us is in the reporting and writing for this, we had been reporting it back since the end of 2014, even before she got in, the key for us was that we tried to report it and write it as though we didnt have any prediction of what was going to go on. And so as a result of that, we didnt have to go back and tear anything up. We didnt have to go back and rework chapters that were built for her to win. We just had done the reporting and we stayed true to that throughout the time. In fact, in october, right before the election, our editor called us and said i dont understand what is going on here. You guys have this book that he details all these problems, all of the, you know, all of the clashes on substance and on style within her campaign. The inability to come up with a message that really resonated with the voters. And she is about to win. He said this is a problem for your book. And we said look, this is the reporting weve done, this is what we have got. Rose you had people working with her who say she struggles to understand or articulate her motivation for running. Right, this chapter one. And right from the start, her Roosevelt Island speech in new york, she brought in a lot of advisors to help craft the speech. And there wasnt a core mess ang, a lot of people were struggling she brought in john favreau, president obamas chief speech writer and even he end threw up his hands and said he was used to working with one advisor. He said he with would go in, the president would say this is what i want to talk about and say, we do the first draft and the president , and the two of them would edit it after that. There were too many cooks in the kitchen and he was frustrated by that. And that wasnt, he wasnt the only one. I think a lot of people were kind of frustrated. They still, they werent sure why she was running. And that was problematic at the time. Rose James Carville says you have to have a big economy, like its the economy stupid. Absolutely. I think that is one of the great lessons of this book. For anybody in either party that is interested in politics, certainly the people that are practitioners of politics, this book has a ton of lessons, that is a big one. Clinton was for a lot of different things. But it was difficult for a lot of voters to figure out what were the priorities that she was going to take into the presidency. What was she going to do with that awesome power. I think donald trump despite saying things that were untrue. It was clear what he wanted to do with that power. Sort of a nationalist move alot of things fit into that basket. And create jobs. Bernie sanders on the other side, he similarly wanted to redistribute the wealth and the power in this country. Nd everything that he did fit into that basket. For clinton she sort of built from the ground up with all of these different policy ideas. And it was hard to fit them under an umbrella of an easy to understand vision for voters. Rose there was also this conflict between data. And the argument that someone said yes, data is important but you have to have something else. You have to have the feel, which president clinton had on the ground, that there was something amiss, he thought. And he was sounding the alarm to brooklyn and saying. Rose brooklyn is where the headquarters were. Exactly. And hes basically saying there are problems on the ground am im getting a different feel than what you are reporting back to me. And at the same time. Rose saying that to robin mook, the chairman. Right, hes basically telegraphing this to mook and to podesta and other people. And i think you know, there were other problems on the ground when you talk to state directors. They were saying they are sending us into battle without armour. Were not prepared. Theres a lack of even lawn signs there on the ground. People, you know, there was something missing. Rose so bill, she had to choose between her husband, one of the most successful politicians of his time, of his generation, you know, and a campaign that was run by people she hardly knew before. And she chose them rather than her husband. She did. We think that this is a lot. We think this because we talked to people who said it. This largely results from her experience in 2008 when she ran against barack obama. And he ran circles around her on some things, on technology, on sort of the modern campaigning am people told her she was running an oldstyle political machine. And you know, bill clinton had gone out there and said some things that he had gotten in trouble for. He took a lot of blame for the loss. She is looking at 2016 and thinking how do i do more like obama did. And the data guys were part of that. They got a ton of credit for helping obama win. Maybe too much. Barack obama being a different product than Hillary Clinton. Rose there is all this too you deumed, you have so many conversations but if, in fact, she had won, somebody would be writing a book about what a genius people she had behind her. Im not sure. Somebody would be writing that book. We wouldnt have written that book. And this is why we wouldnt have written that book. Cuz we had this discussion before the election as we were talking to our editor about the fact that we had identified a lot of problems even though it looked like she was going to win. There were some serious fundamental management problems that you know, that we would have looked at as Going Forward into what are the struggles of this administration going to be am how do the things that shes having trouble with on the campaign trail extrapolate to what the administration would look like. Is she going to be able to go to the people and get them behind their policies. Were watching done all trump struggle with that right now. Hes not able to move the legislature because hes not moving the people beyond the base that he had. If you look at some of the infighting and some of the back stabbing that went on, and the lack of a central clear leadership, these are problems that would have followed her into the white house. Rose now to make sure i understand. What was the difference in 2016 and 2008 . A big problem was the leaks in the press. This time i think they kind of overlearned their lesson there. And tried to gloss over everything at this time and tried to make the campaign seem as if it were more joyful, a better run campaign. I mean in some ways it was. And i think we talk about that in the book. But i think there were flaws along the way. You know, there were promotions and demotions and people, we talk about this in the book. There was a creation of kind of a board of directors, a supersix that never was reported during the campaign. Rose who prepr they . It was Jake Sullivan, jen palmeri, huma abedin within john podesta and robbie mook. Rose those were the kind of strategic board that ran the campaign. Exactly. And you know, Jake Sullivan was kind of her chief strategist. He was her policy guy and kind of became elevated. Mook was sort of kept to his analytics and his strengths and that turned out to be a weakness i think in the end. When they decided they were having trouble internally because mook and podesta ran things differently and people couldnt get people below them couldnt figure out who they were supposed to respond to, the answer to it wasnt to stream line and put one person in charge, it it was to put six in charge. Even then some people said it operatedded a little better after that. But it is an unusual structure to be sure on a campaign. Rose did she ask for the emails of her staff to try to determine who was what . One of the revelations in this book is that after 2008 she was doing an autopsy on the campaign. She wanted to find out what had gone wrong. I think she believed that some of the leaking and backstabbing which are probably symptomatic of other problems rather than the cause of the defeat of a she asked one of her aides to download the messages of her senior staff. So she could lack through them and see what had gone on at Campaign Headquarters when she had been asked. The communication between them so she could figure out, if she could, what went wrong. Thats what our sources told us. And she had a pretty good road map. That is what was so fascinating. She had done her homework and figured everything out. And people, actually talked about it, they said she had it all laid out and figured out. She kind of knew what went wrong. After speaking to a lot of people as well. Rose why was she, i mean, i think she asked herself this question and others who liked her very much asked this question. She was very popular as the secretary of state, correct . But not popular as a candidate. Its something with herr where i think shes shown herself to be competent tent at governance, first of all. But second of all, when shes in government, shes a less political figure naturally particularly as secretary of state, the nations top diplomat. She was warned in about 2011 by a good friend of hers, who was an undersecretary of state, and a former congresswoman, when Hillary Clintons numbers rose to about two thirds approval with the public, she was very happy about that. He said to her look, but the second you if get back into the political realm, the second you are a candidate your numbers will go from 64 to 54, to 44, to 34. And you know, it was something that i think was understood by people around her, that she became, that she was a polarizing figure. We have watched her in Public Office and as a first lady, and as the candidates wife and all these different venues. And she has been polarizing over that time. And thats not a value judgement, just an analysis of why her numbers go down when shes on the Political Campaign trail. Has she taken defeat . I think in the beginning she didnt take it very well, obviously. And thats when we saw her taking a lot of walks in the woods. She was talking to friends. She was trying to figure out what went wrong. Rose the woods behind her house. Exactly. She was taking a lot of walks, with her husband as well. But i think she was trying to come to terms with it. I think she really, she never expected to have that happen that night. She never thought she would be saying congratulations donald as we report in the book. She thought it would be a much different outcome. So it took her a few months to kind of wrap her mind. Rose she called the president and said im sorry. She did. The president called her, yeah, its a very dramatic moment that we report in the book where her aide huma abedin comes in holding a cell phone and says its the president. And she gets up out of her chair and she winces, she doesnt want to take the callment and you can tell what a weighty moment that is for her. Rose how many people in the room . I would say maybe a dozen. Yeah. And they are all, and she steps into a private room, shes in a hotel suite at the peninsula hotel. She steps into a private room and her aides can hear her say, you know, im sorry, mr. President. And then they carried on a conversation. But it was it was a tough moment for all of them in that room. Rose does she believe now that she got all the support she needed from him . One thing that she was unhappy about was after the election more and more came out about these questions of potential russian couldlution with people on kollution with people on the trump campaign. She was upset that president obama didnt do more to make that public. Rose it was an outrage of fore ingo trying to effect an american election. And she made that case, herself from the podium at the debate. One of the debates against trump, we can all remember her calling him a russian puppet and talking about the 17 u. S. Intelligence agencies that had found that the russians were trying to interfere with the election. But i think she believed that there was more information that the president and administration had that should have been out there for the public before the election. I think she was upset about that. Rose is she upset about james comey. Oh, absolutely. Rose does she believe that he either caused her loss of the election or was a significant contributor to it. An significant contributor at the very least. And she expressed this to one friend. She basically said she felt like she lost because of the kgb, the fbi and the kkk. Thest being a reference to the people who are supporters of trump that she referred to as deplorables, and that now infamous moment in september of 2016. Rose she could never really apologize in a way that sort of got through on the server issue, could she. No, and that haunted her from even before she actually announced she was running. She had this press conference at the u. N. She had to talk about it even back then. And then fast forward to the summer, she is frustrated because her message has been getting isnt getting through. And shes basically making that known. Shes asking her aides. And one moment her husband is just as frustrated. And hes kind of hes making that known, why isnt our message getting through. And they kind of want them to get out in front of it. And theyre reluctant to do so, initially. Rose both of them. Both of them because they feel like theyve done nothing wrong. They felt it was totally above level. They didnt think it would be as big a story. They were telling their surrogates as much at the time. You know, this will blow over. Rose you suggest that in fact, if she had apologized in a way that served, made it clear. Right. Rose that would have gone a long way to sort of eliminate or reduce the impact of the trust issue. I think, yeah, i think the trust issue really took hold of her campaign for months and months. And think about it, it is not just that it took her a long time to apologize and you know, it is every day, there is no apology. And people think she did something wrong. Some people think she did something illegal. James comey decided she didnt do anything that was criminally prosecutable. Least did somethingought shee politically had fool hardy in setting up this system. And there was nothing forth coming for months and months and months. Rose well, do you guys believe that if comey had never said anything that she would have won . I think its hard to replay that. I think, it was such a close election, 70, 80,000 votes in three states, that you could point to any factor as the cause. Rose there was momentum, and so he then said what he said, its near the end of the campaign because he said something early in the campaign. Correct. There was no accounting for i think its difficult to account for what james comey did. Rose try to explain it in a New York Times piece. A very good New York Times piece. That san early favorite for a pulitzer. But she left her fated in the hands of the Justice Department and the fbi. That is not the kind of behavior that you would expect from a Public Servant to sort of leave those things to fate. Rose much has been made including by donald trump of not going into michigan. Right. Rose why didnt they go into michigan . That is a big mystery. You had people like debbie dingle, the congresswoman. Rose saying come in. Come in, for months. Sounding the alarm. Rose you better. And for whatever reason they disn take it seriously. And then this great moment of frustration where she is getting ready for a debate and its the night after the michigan primary and she, it is one of the big blowups of the campaign where she is letting her aides have it. And shes basically saying why isnt our message getting through. You know, this is it is a moment of frustration i think. And it came back to haunt her again, they never quite fixed that problem in the general election. And that was one of the states that ultimately lead to her defeat. Rose bill clinton thought the campaign and especially some of the Campaign Managers especially robbie mook did a terrible job. I think he believed that they were misguided. Rose misguided would be a better way. Well, you know, i dont want to put words in president clintons mouth. But i think he believed that they were so focused on data and science to the exclusion of what bill clinton was so good at. Which is the art of per situation. And he couldnt understand why he they wouldnt let him go out and talk to people that were not already on board with Hillary Clinton. What they wanted him to do was talk to people and get them to turn them out. What is the relationship between former president obama and former president clinton . I think its got be a lot better over the years. I think they pretty much detested each other in 2008. Bill clinton stood up and gave the convention to validate her on the economy, tore apart the mitt Romney Paul Ryan view of the economy. And it brought them together. I dont think they will ever be close pals. But you know, barack obama has done enough for bill clinton and his family now and bill clinton has done enough for barack obama and his family that i think they get along. Even though they have vastly different personal and political styles. Rose so what happened to Hillary Clinton . I think it was a combination message, a combination mismanagement, there were so many factors here. And you know, we dont want to downgrade russia and comey because those were obviously factors. But you know as john and i were reporting this book we noticing these flaws in the campaign. And i think all of them kind of contributed to it. The lack of, you know, she became the inevitable candidate again. And i think that was a fob for her. There was a great sense of frution traition among bern yea sanders reporters, some of them voted for her and held their breathe and voted for her. Annie now are kind of, they dont quite understand why they did it. They did it because she wasnt trump. But they didnt really have that, she didnt have that Energy Behind her. So i think all of these factors kind of played into that. Rose what about the young vote did she get the young vote . Not all of it. I mean certainly. Not as much as Bernie Sanders got in the primary. Exactly. And when you compare it to president obama and what he was able to do in 2008. Rose the question i really asked was, what is 457ing to her now. What is her future . She from what i understand is not going to be a part of her foundation, her familys foundation. She is stepping away from it. And she wants to do something different. And she is still trying to figure that out from what i am hearing. Rose could she become a University President or Something Like that . She could do anything. Shes one of the smartest people, she will always be the smartest woman in the room, i think. Rose what access did you have to her . We dont talk about our sources charlie, im sorry. Rose shes the candidate. Well, still,. Rose did you publicly sper vaw her. We did not. Rose there was no public sper view, it if had an interview with her that you could have published, you didnt. Correct. Rose the book is getting a lot of attention, called shatters, inside Hillary Clintons doomed campaign. The first book that really talks about it thank you so much, jon, thank you, amies. Honored to be here. Rose back in a moment, stay with us. On october 2920006 the a foundation announced its instation to design a new cultural in in athens greece t would include an operahouse and 40 acre park, renzo piano was elected, after five years of construction and cost of 842 million, the center opened last june. It was officially handed over to the greek state earlier this year. Architecture historian victoria newhouses new book chaos and culture tells the story of the Centers Design and construction. She joins me now with the architect renzo piano. Im pleased to have both of them back on this program. Welcome. Thank you. Goods to see you so come to you in a minute am but what drew you to this and what story did you want to tell . What drew me to it was my last book before this which was about new concert halls and operahouses. And doing the research for that. And writing that book, i realized how incredibly come plex it is to build a cultural venue of the acoustics in auditoriums, i think the whole problem of building for music and especially Classical Music is much more complex than museums which hi written. Rose. And so i wanted, it occurred to me that when institutions make the decision to build, they often do it without really knowing what theyre getting into. And so i wrote this book primarily to raise awareness of what is involved when you take on this kind of project. Rose you came to the project in 2008. How did that happen . It was a conversation with and we found immediately very close, an affinity. And then it was a competition. It was a selection as normally, and they went through a selection and then i new the place, actually. I am a that is pie be jo. And that place, is the new arbor, in athens, so i knew the place. So i sketch quite immediately an idea because you know, the beautiful view, that part of athens but the view was stalling by motorway crossing. So the idea to go up, just 30 meters, 100 feet up, then you rediscover the sea. Well show you alot of photographs and slides but there it is, where my hand is. That is where it is looking out. And it has magnificent views, you had far is it from the acropolis. It is quite far, about five kilometers, about three miles. But athens is very low city. So with 100 feet up in the air, you see everything. Rose was that the idea . The idea was to make a big parkment and to make a big park, if you have to build an operahouse and a library, you take the entire piece of land, so the idea wask tallly to lift up the land, and to put the operahouse and the library underneath that. And by doing this, gesture, you go up. You walk up. And without really understanding are you going up because its very slow slope. You go up. And then when you find yourselves up there, you realize that you have been going up. So you rediscover the city on one side. And you see the sea on the other side. Rose you said a process of constructing the center was to be a model for the government to emulate a micros could am of the country if and when the country changes. Yes, thats correct. Well andreas who renzo mentioned is an idealist as renzo is himself. And dracopolou circumstances was conventioned if he could build this culture center, mf informs the public every way, honestly w no graph no corruption, and on and on and on with all good intentions, that to be able to do Something Like that, in a country like greece where corruption is so rampant, and where its so terriblably difficult, because of the heavy bureaucracy there, to a accomplish anything, in a practical manner, he was convinced if he could pull this off, it would be, in fact, as you say, a model for the country. And i think renzo had his complete confidence and believed also that this could happen. Rose you talked about the redemp shif power of beauty. Yes. I talk, you know, beauty is a beautiful idea. It st a great idea, that people believe is romantic. But its not romantic. Beauty is very profound. This has been stalled by the good publicity. So when you talk about beauty, you immediately think about, cosmetic, this sort of thing. But its not true. Beut beauty is probably one of the most important emotion in life. The only one that can compete about the he motional like power, money, and, you know, beauty is also especially talking about greece, beauty is never just beautiful. Its always beautiful and good together. Beautiful and good together. Rose you had also said people need beauty and hope. You know, beauty when you apply beauty to a place like this, that is actually this kind of beauty, not just aesthetic t is more profound than that t is about knowledge, its about understanding, about the beauty of staying together, then you start to believe one thing, that beauty can really save the world. It is one of those things that can save the world. Rose you believe that. I believe that. It will do one person at a time. But it will do it. Im sure of that. So its a kind of idea that one, that must be considered with more attention. Rose the foundation said it would pay for the building and for all of that, and also at some point, though, the government would take over the responsibility of maintaining it. Thats right. Rose between the time that contract or whatever arrangement was, was written, and the time that the building is finished, you went through about seven greek governments. Seven governments, right. Well, the government approached the new yorker foundation to start with, because they desperately needed a new library building. And they also felt that athens should have a proper operahouse it had never had an operahouse. The opera was performing in an old movie theater. Rose the greek government said we will take over but then later the new government. Its been given over to the government, actually. That happened in february of this year. And the deal, the contract, the signed contract stip lated that ltural center and for runningp it. But obviously thats not possible. I mean the government has no money whatsoever. They are deeply in debt and constantly borrowing more. And so the foundation stepped in to bail them out for the next five years. And it remains to be seen. There is something very ironic about the situation, actually. Because so many cultural venues in the United States, for example, and europe also, have enormous trouble raising the money to build a building. Then when its built, usually they manage, certainly in europe to maintain it. But this is just the opposite. This building was built with absolutely no problem in funding because this very, very wealthy foundation was behind it. But now that it is finished, its in more or less the same situation as to many other cultural venues that dont have the money to maintain it. Rose it would never have happened without andreas capokoplis. No, he was the mover and shaker. His vision was that greek needed this. It needed a operahouse, a National Library. The government informed him that they needed it. And they wanted to do something quite revolutionary. The National Library which had been only for scholars, they wanted to make into a public library. And which is something 4r78 almost unknown in greece. There is no tradition of public library. And so he really felt that in many ways, not only as a model to be followed in terms of honesty and transparency, but also to open the greek public to the use of a public library. And this library is incredible, what renzo has designed. Take a look, this is slide number one. Image number one, original sketch by you. The foundation, Cultural Center. Can you tell me anything about that . This is very simple. Its almost a childish drawing, this one, showing that when you go up on that slope, it is only four percent so you dont even notice that you are going up. You take a walk in the park, that is the biggest park there by the way, then when you go up, up to there, what we call the where the library, the reading room, the library and theater, then from there you turn your eyes back and you see athens. You see it, because, again, 100 feet up is largely enough to see. And of course when you look down, then you see the city that has been lost a long time ago. Rose number two, public protest during the construction of the center, take a look. Explain this to me. Well, there were constant protests like this during the construction of the center because the government had agreed to the most draconian austerity measures in order to be eligible for the enormous loans. They have had enormous three enormous loans from a group of bankers in europe. And i think one thing that should be considered in addition to the beauty of the Cultural Center is the extraordinary opportunity to work there, over 2,000 people worked on this project in the course of the construction. And now that its completed, there will be many thousands working there to run it. So i mean this has been looked upon as something a god send to athens. Okay, the next thing is an aerial view of it, take a look at this. The great thing about the picture is that you can see both on the one side, the harbor, and the acropolis in the background at the far right of the background. And those are the views you have when you are at the Cultural Center. I also have to prik a note on that. You see that kind of flank up there, this is one that is 10,000 square meter of solar panel. Rose 10,000 square meters of solar panel. And they make 2. 5 mega watt of energy. That is athen, because athens is actually more sunny that the rest of europe. So this building is actually, not zero emission because we need a special moment when the opera goes on but it is very close to tment and this building was made in the system measuring the sustain ability of a building. Being platinum for a public building is is actually quite unusual. Rose take a look at the next slide. This is an aerial view, of the building from the 40 acre park created by landscape designer nevins. There it is. Look at that. You see the can opie again in this view. And i think one of the fascinating things about that can opie is as advanced it is, and as experimental and adventurous, it is it was made by men on their hands and knees, knitting together the wire mesh that holds it together. Which i think is just such a fascinating paradox. The day you came, you were surprised. We got 200 people working there, doing that job. The other thing you see, you know, if you know athens, if you know greece, the first thing you know is that you need the shade in the summer. You need a shade. And that this is the reason why we put that there. Rose because you need shade in the summer. Shade in the summer, and also of course we made an opportunity to catch the energy from the sun. It made sense. Rose for all those solar panels. The next thing is the closeup of the view of the park as well, the other view. You see from below, below from underneath, that is made of cement, we talking about spermal things, yes, i love that idea. I love the idea that building experimenting, exploring. And this material will be there forever. It is not plastic, of course. Its not metal. It is something that will be there forever. And the finish underneath is the brilliance, so that when people move around, they reflect themselves there. So it is a kind of funny. And you see that antenna, that is actually showing where the fresh breeze comes from. St actually made of fiber. St made of carbon fiber. Made of fiber, not really carbon but anyway, it is a fiber. And it is flexible. So when the wind blows from one direction, they show where the breeze comes from. It looks like. When you are up on that terrace the breeze is so di vine. Rose the next thing is a view of renzo at work. Lets see this. Renzo at work was like a pop star going through a city. Is that right . He was followed by everybody who was allowed on the site with flashing cell phone cameras, and in that case i was showing something wrong in the joint. Because you know, im still the son of a pie father was a small business, i grew up on the site. So this is my place. I go around and i make a paint of everybody because you know. Not a i think you are greatly respected for your attention to detail. Rose obsessive exulsive. Yeah. Rose next is the view from the terrace he of the operahouse. You are looking he at acropolis, the idea to make a place in the shade where you are not you dont have a glare, so you can see, easily everything. Rose take a look at the next slide which is an aerial view. Put it in context right there. You see how far, how close we are to the water, to the sea but we are divided from the sea by a motorway there. And so the only way that find again the sea was to bring up. Those hundred feet and thats what we did. Rose the next is a night view of the operahouse and the library. And the next one is an interior of the operahouse. So now greece has a national operahouse. Next is a rendering of the National Library as it will appear this fall when the books in its collection are moved in. And finally, there is a library interior. It good to know that the bib leo tech comes from greece, bbliotech, the box of the book. Rose came from greece. From greece, everything comes from greece. So what do want readers to take away from this book and this project . Well, i with like them to be aware of the political and Economic Conditions in greece over this period between the time that they deal with the deal was made for the Cultural Center to be built. Which was as early at 2006. And ten years later, its completion. And an awful lot happened in that time. I mean you mentioned seven governments. They had this crazy finance minute ster, you remember him. And the current Prime Minister who promised one thing one day that he would do away with the austerity conditions, and then a couple of months later, maybe weeks later, he absolutely reversed himself and said sorry, folks, but you know were not going to do it away with it. It was a very dramatic time. And it was heartbreaking in terms of what the greek people are going through. And i really would like, i tried to write the book and position the Cultural Center as a symbol of hope. As a beacon of light in this add verse adversity. And i think it is. Anybody i ever talked to when i have been visiting athens has been positive and just thinks its the most wonderful thing that it shows how important people can still have faith in the greek nation. Thank you for coming. Thank you. Rose the book is called chaos and culture, renzo piano, building workshop and the foundations Cultural Center in athens, great to have you. Thank you. Rose thank you for joining us. See you next time. For more about this program and earlier episodes visit us online at pbs. Org and charlie rose. Com. Finning for charlie rose is provided by the following and by bloomberg, a provider of multimedia news and Information Services