A Word on Words; 0887; Selwa Roosevelt

delving into the world of books and their authors tonight so we're like the roosevelt your host for a word and words your publisher of the tennessean and editorial director of usa today welcome to word on words we are lucky tonight as i get lucky welcome thank you sacha lucky roosevelt though welcome to world war ii my step here to talk about this new book a book that i think the people who are interested in the glitz and celebrity and politics particularly that focal point for the white house i post people will absolutely adore this book and now also i also think that there are a number of beep oh lou reed people yea been really have to look overall rating is in the white house as unique and different

exciting so they a president with presidential election you were unhappy with the reaction so far i'm delighted and of course as you know i'm a raid marathon reagan nsa so very clearly in the book as well as george schulz lives and loved working for my three bosses were shorts bush and reagan and what or could a woman was well i think you've had a i think putin and considering other people who tell that position of people are gay been in charge of all it seems to me that you had thirty million unique relationship with them i don't know about all the bubble back and forth and you can do all when he had that job and i can remember that there was seemed to be more of a formality in

relationship and plans then obviously that was in your day there's a little story in there when you talk about convincing george to be more critical reception well it was a little bit touchy i mean even george shaw says his dignity and he said to me well we were doing on malcolm forbes yeah and naturally that's a lovely sitting in the diplomat's rhapsody throw or george shultz wasn't quite surreal because there were no lucky how are going to address the entire assembled group i got to spread out our fuels rooms in areas of the year and the artist it's very hard on a public address system seems informal sons alec guinness and said japanese for you these guys and have a

wonderful time because the sector's state is not going to give them a world i thought that was that i was going to my job that he does laughter there was a wonderful i think that if you look at if you look at your relationship with the reagans to me it was huge you're able to say things that might have been mined robin ince deliver a noun and if it was someone else well i don't know the president was someone that was very respectful and i wouldn't have dreamed of of you know there are many issues that i'm not many but there are a couple i disagree with him and it i would've gotten into an argument with an eye to much respect him and so all the officers that even when you're a very good relationship and he was off the street today you just you never lose that sense that you are talking to the president of the united states i could be much more informal with ms shields people may not know

the chief protocol really is the liaison polling the twain visitors from a fall exactly end of the white house and the president so and also the geneva protocol his response when not just forgetting that visitor from the airport bring a man welcoming him and making him feel good but she's got to be sure he that everything goes smoothly throughout the trip regardless of where he's going who he's saying anyone in the government a private person and my office was still charged with being he is a regular mandating really want to give as well and there you talk about helmut cole county an end and in that instance it was your job not just to make sure that his is when the white house was there were also there is a link with the senate the house as your visit they escorted us out to it

that he'd left downtown got their own time all that kind of thank you get a failing black time keeper because you're watching the clock all the time when you're with this it's inevitable when you know make those rounds that he is gonna wanna know about the people who made now obviously his own staff to do on that but the temptation to be baited into conversations that might be on diplomatic just always been there particularly when you're leading a lot of the property the white house now and occasionally going into the camp of a political ad well you mean the case and of course that was wonderful and perhaps that was the most interesting visit my head the entire time i'm steve brokaw incidentally i was there seven years which is our name when asked so of course that's really the reason i wrote the book because i felt i had a little bit more perspective and gorbachev just got to ma'am and the fact that i was able to witness there a few people could spend that the deep

freeze of the groom ego iranian and an hour and that gradual thawing time trying to wean we like to see kiss and i suspect that by the time we finished with with gorbachev nancy and was re warm and friendly an end the whole picture change so rather radically in this man's to talk a little about the rise of where raisins ha ha ha ha i'll speed racer the people really engaged on a slightly distorted picture i think she was very insecure i think what really happened was she came here in tremblay en so as a result became very attached to that too much and latin marxist theory the first time and so what that the public in america sour even here in their outlets in the tavern you know she got a little more relaxed and

now i think she's quite used to us just as we're getting more use to her and i think a lot of that marxist theology has been dropped and for good reason and and we're getting to be a much more friendly basis and i believe that this happened was also she didn't know america or americans on how american women reacted as if she was just very healthy and that caused her to appear roots and towns and not friendly and not as sympathetic issue about you know people think of a jeep recall as a person who has also the race is the might not necessarily have much political activity you really have to have it all you have to have very good antenna and i really think that it's a terrible <unk> the job if you think it's a sort of a glorified miss

manners that it is not it's so tiny that part of the job that of seeing and all that but what's most important is to be so well informed community dick read a lot and be well informed that and so attuned to what's going on in the world that you can sense when things are going wrong in a visit and you can inform repressed it you've suggested that's what you're there for it's clear that one comes back and that book is very unhappy about is that the other and because they were they will talk to you might loosen up more we knew i remembered we had the mexican president and you know that's a terribly important initiative that for us and he was very upset and rightly so by article it back on the zte attacking his integrity and says the recent one who has been leave office with a very good they're kind of delivery that yes and he was offended down billy nungesser in the visit that and he couldn't understand why the prisoners days couldn't disavow that covers public and with you know with that would give the gun and that's

really all day all my system it's better just to let those things go and because the truth will out and the truth that out for dinner and i did the eye witness that and i sensed and i was i was some risk for him because i realized his art is syria have been sour different of course are presently and knows that that he's upset about the assembly's <unk> nowadays it's a very basic engines after that except for one column and one because i mentioned the political ackman because it also seems to me that that as we look at the world right now that tense danger is pressuring right randolph is one that that involved you i mean she could kuwait zach and a nearby

on these people cowering goes to them i mean elia amman yeah that's right all three of the more on saudi arabia and the king the king with most deaths of all of them in the most diplomatic visits to reset our most people have their own as you say things they say the store bad things they thought were important in their culture that we have to be very alert to one example is the issue the sake of kuwait ah wanted to meet with two senators very much but he didn't want to be in the position he going to the hilt of them the same time they couldn't for reasons that were a complicated come gm so i had to think up a solution solution

was to ask george bush if we could use his office and let that be the chef the mayors office for the day in a really turns it over to him then that does the office only on it and soon as so then exactly so then the show and could use that as his out i could receive the two senators who very much wanted to say well just a little check of of of a protocol and then diplomacy but that was important and it wouldn't happen immediately that kenneth anderson sure you are free candid about iran contra you point out of course that you are not by any means a loop but you describe ron mcfarland john poindexter handling as ham handed well it was i mean that i like both men and i'm i was very fond of it but i thought it was her and had enough thought as i think i said look they're caught with him

i mean you really can in many many years to now also said that there's a difference i have tried not to be as we say in the south i'm also does it have tried not to be angry at that i thought that downgrade in a band that was right it was absolute right the downgrade injuries and didn't matter with who's responsible or not he wasn't for the iran contra but as in a situation like that the country demands and therefore they're a scapegoat in that case had to be done we do it was on his watch who just the same ways mark harrington who was no way responsible for whatever was in the falklands he was and over he was foreign secretary and if we found in yonkers well i asked if you look back on that on that period and it's pretty clear that it was in

the most difficult time he iran contra forward very difficult for the president which are now that that on balance it had very little effect on our foreign policy will use quote dirty joke you're right the french foreign minister and it's not just that we had in europe nobody can hear me in the moment there was a second that flag but the final effect on file passe was no examples plus we head the following coming right on the heels of that was the following a rover or an iron curtain began to crumble and sound and hand well who was it who among all those systems do you remember them of division i think you'd be surprised if it wasn't that i was surprised because she's not a woman that most people think inspires affection that you know

when you see a privately she's very nice she's wonderful manners she's enormously appreciative anything do i like the fact that as a woman she could travel with no entourage it all and she seemed to manage that in these men who seemed to come with a hundred two hundred three hundred six hundred and margaret thatcher with a round with two or three people and no hairdresser and know that i made and no no i mean i thought that was fantastic but she always was on time she was incredibly polite but she would say to me one hour ah let's go in and say no amnesty no finance rest know no better i should like in the present that i thought that was such a wonderful mass where's as you can imagine there are other people it kept they had known as the city keep people waiting until you had to sew house along with margaret thatcher i never had to worry in addition she was refreshingly candid herself she never been store it's not a

novel like the good girl mr michael do you like he was a big bear of a man and that was something you know i'm not very tall he was in a suit and he would stride in such a way when i was with him that that could mean catch up with and then he'd stop look very impatient terms was a clock a lot of issues i think underneath that unity and speak english is very hard to know if you like someone when you have a language barrier but just body language and himself i think underneath there was a teddy bear i think i would've liked in five known him better but i never got to know him well enough to know a certain having a dislike about know i rather liked in the end making preparations obviously the political concerns that surrounds every leader must be something that you are able to tune in all what i'm interested to be in neon in the cultural

and the need to get to to tune in on long cultural interests cultural concerns ethnic differences that might relate to food also year or our religion color or religion know yes this was something we had to really be on top of and we were the source for all that information to the entire government let's say you had a near a muslim history and we will we will response pursuing to it not only that affluent was appropriate but that where everywhere we would send were to hit you know you can serve in a bacon and can serve in hammond and not only you can serve and roast pork which will sit in our and then i get confused when you know it's it's the bacon on top of a spinach salad and isis which came to be and then there were other things like i had to learn how to do a kosher meal i don't know and

i had i had to be sure that that was properly done to andy that don't know your the story of the ugly visit we also when someone said that they were orthodox and we also served in the state department a kosher merit to that person if they wish to and one day sent as if the writer asked percussion the un and she was seated i had seen done the cd in their next roger modern life that would be arrested for a top tier and so the just a few hours before the meal as she canceled that added and add adopting he nodded my staff to inform the waiters and so roger mudd was given the kosher meal and he looked at me knows dividing us in a different light and the waiter said do this i am perfectly nate do you think

that do you think that that this a period you've spent the last was demonstrably different just in terms of foreign relations the previous administration and jimmy carter went out of office really with it the shadow of the variety is over his head haunts his innovation even today was very witty play transfixed by dramatizing andromeda end and the i don't but i don't know how foreign a foreign visitors to the white house were affected by my guess is that it was a period a minute presence of color than i'm alive so yes life and i'm stunned

show that so that affects all of us is gone and there's been great delight in fact that that the writing is re saints of recapture sarah's parents on a horse that feel that being a first generation here as i am going up the hills of tennessee and seeing the incredible opportunity i was afforded because of that wonderful signing city on the hill and i mean yeah and all that joyce's and feeling of excitement about this country that reagan was able to transmit not only to make it to the hole world and it inspired me that way and therefore he also had a profound effect on our visitors i never took a visitor in to ronald reagan or even come out smiling except for one who's and mugabe only as a trigger is really grim and he came out with a longer face on a win and i wondered what happened afterwards up and either been rather strongly lunch with bill clark is a bit upset with

that i think reagan you would think would be too keen on say a communist like some more of my show and was a major that bad later plane crash but if he walked into rials riders offices it's all on me i'm going the back enough surprises me as leader rondo may have made that was a wonderful i did what i really wonder about is whether there was a perceptible change in attitude on the part of visitors who are coming as i think it's a common about no and the ones who had been under the carter administration came back under the reagan did indeed come at night me naked ladies compares well as if the fact that we are alive after those hostages table agree on the very day that finally lifted that iran very good there was a sense of happiness and joy and actually we had a promise that it is often but at the same time there was a very good thing that i found that was the opening of eastern europe the russian relationship

so ron reagan left office on a very high end there i think the depth is to judge serving on the domestic side of a lot of things that have come out since that have made up made everyone all of us are sad to see the president marked least but ah i think their visitors found this period very rich warm and cordial and i don't mean did do there was because of me but it was because of reagan and shelves and bush all three were man who had a great sense of how to receive people how to make them feel good and also on the substance side to try to make things so much better and i think things almost every part of the world believe that did get better except in the middle east except lilies and of course very very and the large crowds at and they live in but it's just always been this kind of been the waterloo of every administration is facing it hasn't

certainly of color you know the thing about your book strikes me is that it's not pleasant elbow i'm so glad you said that i hope not had not it's not an i n and my guess is my strong hunch is knowing publishers is that you were pressured to tell more well it was hoped i think that i would be able to but i was very honest and there's a difference pincus until an honest i did what i could honestly do and still feel a sense of integrity and in fact the distrust had been put in me and that i have countered at the same time i want people to be amused entertain i'm a journalist and i hope that our i was able to do that if we see your right now the ten stories you tell me no it's

absolutely the cable is that of the iraqi army although the ones that are going there will travel and to so that will years later whenever again they do on the bases a rhythmic pioneers an ad it really is on how and why did enjoy a semi on every trip with you and you tell me many things our one hour some things even i need to know and the i mean they've needed it but it is but it is truly fun to read but having said that it could have banned it could be you know that it could've been like isn't double oh easily easily that town after i think it's a lot more kiss them tale that is exactly right and i did write that and you did the clothes

tattered novels separately to say that the couple not recently that one that's doing pretty well now one of the solace and it had sort of the first vivid among them negative his comparison to either blow it's almost you know michel i think they'll wait it not not for me to comment that that i tried to keep this book to something that would tell you a lot about what went on and give you really and sat in the band the scenes in the white house and in the state department and all the places where active by visitors my way with that and so in dc at that they're coming at this out that can look at people want that they're not going on the book but it's the portrait of george jones so surprising qualities anyway that that style of germanic fellow that you saw on television that never

practiced law and i talk to her all the monotonous voice and really address immediate return the book tell me that just shows you must be rather boring we're not going the neighbors of the dollar really is is dialing rifle your door is a grandmotherly lasted only is that true and sure as lit up cities like ha ha ha ha ha ha ha's princeton tiger was the most fun you could imagine he was a modest asked me that means days and he still was you play tennis you often saw he was a terrific dancer so

all girls white affect your state as to death in your evening was made it was a dancing party have a good sense of humor and something i remember during the gorbachev is it and i was really uptight and naturally and he blessed me and that's something that was to do with the security arrangements and i was trying to convince him of one bank and he wanted to do something else found that convinced and then afterwards he said you can live their lives and i don't like it isn't like you george shells but i was angry at that and i say you have to weigh what about two hours later i should say he suggested i worked with all the time so you know we could've forced a costly to know about that is that the two hours later he said damn i got to you didn't have to be so tall act it was coming and

so we're lucky roosevelt author of keeper of the gate as an artist or downwards featuring john sigg involved this program was produced in the studios of wbez and television nashville tennessee matter it's been