>> From the Library of
Congress in Washington, D.C. >> Margaret Sullivan: I
have the honor this evening of introducing Jeffrey Toobin,
whose new book is American Heiress: the Wild Saga of the Kidnapping,
Crimes, and Trials of Patty Hearst. Jeffrey is the author of six books? >> Jeffrey Toobin: This is seven. >> Margaret Sullivan: This
is seven, six previous books, and is a staff writer at
The New Yorker magazine and the Senior Legal Analyst at CNN. He is a graduate of Harvard Law
School where as a longtime fan of his, I had the pleasure of hearing him address the
law school's 2013 graduates which happened to include
my son, Alex. >> Jeffrey Toobin: So adorable! I love that. >> Margaret Sullivan: And with
that not-very-humble brag, let's turn to your book
which reviewers have called "riveting" and "a page turner." >> Jeffrey Toobin: All true. >> Margaret Sullivan: Yes. And have, and have praised
it for its nuanced portrayal of a truly bizarre
cast of characters. I'll just mention that we're
going to leave some time within this 45-minute period,
about ten or fifteen minutes for audience questions,
so please start thinking of what you might want to ask. And there are standing mics around. Including, you could ask,
about our current politics because we have an expert
witness in our midst. Okay. So Jeffrey, let's start out
by setting things up a bit for those who may need a refresher
in the Patty Hearst story. May not know the details of this
strange story from the 1970s. Would you please take
us through kind of a bare bones version
of what happened? >> Jeffrey Toobin: Okay. Thank you, Margaret. Hello everybody! How's everybody doing
out there today? [ Applause ] Thank you for hanging
in to the bitter end. Wow, am I? I'm like too loud. But that's my problem, I recognize. >> Margaret Sullivan: You
definitely woke them up. >> Jeffrey Toobin: Well, you
know -- it's just, great -- you know, it's just like 100,000
people, not here at this event, but 100,000 people come to
talk about books and Washington and makes you restore
your faith in humanity. So thank you all for coming. Thank you for being here today. Margaret, thank you for being here. Okay. So I would like to
start by asking a question which will help set this up. Is there anyone here who
was alive in the 1970s? There we go! Beautiful! So you know, I -- I started
working on this book and, you know, I was alive in the
'70s, but I was a kid. I didn't have like a sense of
perspective about the '70s. And I sort of assumed that
the '60s were the time that the country was full
of tumult and craziness. But the '70s, everything sort
of calmed down and chilled out. Could not be more wrong. The '70s were sort of an extended
nightmare in the United States. It is astonishing to think
about some of these things. One fact: a thousand
political bombings a year in the United States during
the early and mid-1970s. Think about that. We just had a bombing in New York. I don't mean to minimize
that at all. Try multiplying that times a
thousand, and that's what it was like to live in the United States. Two hijackings a month
in the United States. And the epicenter of the craziness
was the Bay Area of California. And, and one of the, one
of the signal aspects of the craziness was this
alliance between what was left of the counterculture
and the prison movement. There was this idea that
prisoners would be sort of the vanguard of the revolution. And there was this keyword here,
symbiosis between the prisoners and the, the counterculture
figures where they, they started working together. One place in particular,
the Vacaville Prison, which was outside,
outside of Berkeley. Lot of students went there to
visit, as it turns out one prisoner in particular, Donald DeFreeze. Donald DeFreeze was basically a
low to mid-level hood who sort of got caught up in this. He moves, he gets transferred
to Soledad Prison, escapes from Soledad
prison in the mid-1973. Gravitates to Berkeley because
that's where these students were, and that is the birth of the
Symbionese Liberation Army. He calls it "Symbionese" because
it comes from the word symbiosis. They didn't liberate
anything or anyone, and he called it an
army even though it had about a dozen people
in it at its peak. In late October of 1973,
DeFreeze becomes obsessed with a figure named
Marcus Foster who is a -- a, the, the Oakland
School Superintendent. African American, heroic figure, but
DeFreeze becomes obsessed by him. Decides and does assassinate
him in cold blood on the streets of Oakland. At just that moment, right
afterwards, the SLA, such as it is, gets an infusion of,
of reinforcements, three people from the Indiana
University theater program. There are these three
people, Bill and Emily Harris, who decide that they are,
are going to -- you know. They said, like, "Let's, like, dial
it back from the assassination. Let's kidnap someone." And they start making lists of
people, corporate figures and -- . But then, in early January,
just by coincidence, there's an engagement announcement
in the San Francisco Examiner, and the, it's the engagement of
Patricia Hearst to Stephen Weed. Patricia Hearst is 19
years old, she's a -- and it says in the fourth
paragraph of the obituary. Oh, sorry. Sorry, not obituary. An engagement announcement that -- that is like don't even
explore that at all. [Laughter] The -- my wife is here. I'm so happy that she's here. I don't mean that at all. The -- it says that she's an
undergraduate at Berkeley. Emily Harris is a secretary
at Berkeley. She knows that in that more innocent
time there is a directory open to the public of the home
addresses of every student. So Bill Harris, Emily's -- these
are the two Indiana people, goes and looks up the home
address of Patricia Hearst: 2603 Benvenue, apartment
number four. And they start staking her out. And on February 4th,
they kidnap her. >> Margaret Sullivan: And this
is just her little apartment. >> Jeffrey Toobin: Just her little
apartment, and they kidnap her. And before I stop and let
you ask another question, I apologize for going
on for so long. It's important to remember
that she is a Hearst. >> Margaret Sullivan: Yes. >> Jeffrey Toobin: If I may ask
one more question of the audience. Is there anyone in the audience
who remembers what a newspaper is? [Laughter] That's alright. No, I was afraid to make that
joke with you here, Margaret. >> Margaret Sullivan:
That's okay, I've heard it. >> Jeffrey Toobin:
You've heard it before. But the name Hearst meant something
different in 1974 than it does today because newspapers were bigger,
richer, and more powerful. And there was no name more resonant
and more powerful than Hearst in the newspaper business. So to grab Patricia Hearst as
Donald DeFreeze, Bill Harris, and Angela Atwood did on February
4th, 1974, was an earthquake that is hard to parallel today. And that's what started the story. >> Margaret Sullivan: Okay. That was a good primer. So, Jeffrey, the New York Times
review of American Heiress, by Janet Maslin which was
very favorable, by the way, called your account,
"Adversarial by definition." She noted that Patty Hearst, now
in her 60s, I believe, is alive and a frequent participant
in the world of dog shows, but that she did not
cooperate for your book. Was that surprising? Was it a problem? And is the book adversarial
in your view? >> Jeffrey Toobin: Well,
Patricia Hearst did not cooperate. And we did have one
conversation, so I can, I -- which I can quote in its entirety. I -- I, you know, I made many
overtures to her directly: email, letters, through mutual friends. I never got a response. So I figured what the hell? I was getting to the point where
I had to, you know, you know, and so I had a phone number. I called her up. I said, "Hi, Patricia. This is Jeff Toobin." And she said, "Oh, god. Click." [Laughter] So you know,
I was getting these mixed signals from her but I didn't really know -- [ Laughter ] But look, you know, the answer is I
don't consider the book adversarial. And this is an -- I mean,
I thought this was -- I -- all the other books I wrote,
have written, are books, stories I covered in real time
and then wrote a book about it. You know, two books
about the Supreme Court, the recount in Florida,
O.J. Simpson. And this was a story 40 years
earlier that I knew very, very little about when I started. And, and it was really at the
borderline of journalism in history and the word that I kept thinking of as I was writing
this book was tragic. And not in the sense of tragedy-sad,
but the sense of tragedy, in the, in the, in the Greek sense. In that people are prisoners
of forces beyond themselves. So I, I did not at all
view this book as like, "I'm going to nail
Patricia Hearst" in the way that I might have a
motivation about a, you know, book about a contemporary event. You know, to prove that I was right. So you know, yes, it is true. I draw different conclusions
about Patricia's own behavior and the story as a
whole than she did. But I mean, like I have no ax
to grind with Patricia Hearst. I, you know, this is not a person
I have any animosity towards. It's just, you know, I followed
the facts where, where they led me. >> Margaret Sullivan: And it's
not an unsympathetic portrait, I didn't think. >> Jeffrey Toobin: No, no. I mean, and, and you know,
February 4th, she is -- there are many things
you can say about her. But the most important thing you
can say about her unfortunately on February 4th, 1974, is
that she's 19 years old. You know what? I mean, I don't think
I am branding myself so much an old fart
as to say 19 is young. Right? I mean, 19 is very young,
and, and she was very unformed. The SLA did not know that as
it happened, she was miserable in her engagement with Stephen Weed. She later described
herself as mildly suicidal. Having met Stephen Weed,
I can sort of understand. But the, you know,
she was, you know de-- he was treating her like
a sort of proto-housewife. At the same time, she was very
alienated from her mother. Not an uncommon thing for
women in their teenage years. But her mother was very
conservative, Southern belle from Georgia who disapproved
of Patricia living in sin, as the phrase was in those days. So she was kind of whip sawed between the principle
people in her life. So she was uniquely
vulnerable and restless at the moment she was kidnapped. >> Margaret Sullivan: So
there is a famous photograph of Patty Hearst many of you
have seen and can conjure in your minds wearing
a beret and she's in a kind of a combatant stance. And she's brandishing
an automatic weapon. And it became an iconic image, and
your phrase for it, which I love, is "a Mona Lisa for the 1970s." Is that your phrase? >> Jeffrey Toobin: Yes! >> Margaret Sullivan: Mr. Toobin -- >> Jeffrey Toobin:
Take that [inaudible]. >> Margaret Sullivan:
It's a great phrase. >> Jeffrey Toobin: Thank you. >> Margaret Sullivan: And
I wish you could explain to people exactly what
you mean by that. >> Jeffrey Toobin: Okay,
well let me just -- this requires a little set up here. But she's kidnapped on February 4th. The SLA puts her in
a closet at first. But in short order
the closet door opens, and they start talking to her. One person in particular,
Willie Wolfe, who is -- of the eight kidnappers, the eight
people in the SLA at that point, the most similar to her
in background, class, son of a physician from
Connecticut, prep school guy. Went to Berkeley, archeology
student for a while. And they start to hit it off. March 31st, she sends a
communique, a tape that says, "I have decided to stay and fight. And my name is now" -- and
I bet there are people here who remember this: "Tania." Tania is the name, the
nom de guerre of the woman who was Che Guevara's partner
in the jungles of Bolivia. And, and you know, it's a -- it's
a -- and on April 15th, the, they, SLA, the eight of them rob a bank,
the Hibernia Bank in San Francisco. And they pick that bank because
it had a relatively new innovation at that point which
was security camera. And they wanted Patricia
photographed in front of the camera because, and this is
where the Indiana people really, they wanted to show, they had a
real concern for PR and showmanship. And so they put Patricia in the bank
where she would be photographed. That bank robbery is
actually a big success. They get about $15,000,
they go back to the house. And to celebrate, they
take two portraits. The, there's a group portrait, but the more famous portrait
is of Patricia herself. And, and she's standing in
front of the flag of the SLA which is a seven-headed cobra,
and she's there with an expression on her face that I believe is
correctly described as inscrutable. And I think the, the,
the, the photograph serves as a great metaphor for the whole
story and frankly, for the mystery at the heart of the book. Because you can look
in that photograph and say, "She's terrified." You can look in it and
say, "She's thrilled. She's -- she's happy, she's sad." It is a -- it is an mysterious
expression on her face. And, and you know, that's the, the
mystery at the heart of my book which is is she really part
of the SLA or just coerced? And the photograph
displays that mystery in a, in a Mona Lisa-like way in
that it's just hard to tell. >> Margaret Sullivan: Why does
that photo endure so much? Is it the mystery at
the heart of it? >> Jeffrey Toobin: Well,
it's also a bad-ass photo. >> Margaret Sullivan: It is. >> Jeffrey Toobin: I mean, you
know, there is part of, of -- >> Margaret Sullivan: She's a very
good-looking woman, for one thing. >> Jeffrey Toobin: She,
she is good looking. But it is also, you know, a part
of the story that, you know, the counterculture was a real thing. And, and you know, it is true
thank goodness, that most people in the counterculture
were not assassinating school superintendents. But they were very angry. I mean, there, there
was, you know, you know, this was not just you know, the '70s
were also the time of Watergate. And the energy crisis. I mean, the country
was in bad shape. Vietnam was not yet
over at that point. And, and there were people
for whom rebellion was a very appealing thing. And here you have this
rich, rich woman. You know, with a machine gun. I mean, a lot of people
thought that was kind of cool. And, and, and, and you know
that photograph, you know, she's got a swagger about her that
was captivating to a lot of people. So, so it is not, I mean, I -- I -- you know, it's just a quirk that
Mizmoon Soltysik who was one of the kidnappers happened
to snap this. It was Polaroid picture. It was, you know, crappy camera. The group portrait is so bad,
you can barely tell who's who. But it just so happened she caught
Patricia at this mysterious moment that served as a great
metaphor for the whole story. >> Margaret Sullivan: So robbing
a bank was not the worst thing that the SLA did? >> Jeffrey Toobin: No. >> Margaret Sullivan:
Tell us about that. >> Jeffrey Toobin: Well, see this is where I learned the most
in the, in the story. Because, you know, I was aware
that she was, she robbed that bank. And I -- there's, there's an
almost-as-famous photograph from the security camera with her
and the machine gun in the bank. But what, what happened was
the bank robbery is April 15th. The heat starts to get really
bad in, in, in San Francisco. So DeFreeze directs that the nine
of them, the eight kidnappers and Patricia, they all go to Los -- they all decide to
go to Los Angeles. They rent a small house
in South-central L.A. And then they sit there, and
they start to go stir crazy. Because we usual, the
SLA had no real plan. They were just sitting there. So one day, May 16th, Bill,
Patricia, and Emily -- Bill Harris and Emily Harris and
Patricia decide to go shopping. And they take a van, and
they go to a grocery store. Then they go to a newsstand. And then they go to buy some clothes at a place called Mel's
Sporting Goods. And Bill Harris parks the van
on, on a main, on a main street in Los Angeles across the
street, four lanes of traffic, from Mel's Sporting Goods. Bill and Emily go inside. Now just picture the scene. Patricia's alone in the van. Key is in the ignition. She could drive away. She could walk away. She could call the police. She could call home. She does none of those things. She waits for Bill and Emily Harris. Now Bill goes inside the, the store and because he's a genius,
he decides to shoplift. [Laughter] So he shoplifts. Starts stuffing stuff
in his pockets. Now as it just so happens,
one of the, one of the clerks is an aspiring
police officer, Anthony Shepherd. And Anthony Shepherd
knows that the crime of shoplifting does
not actually take place until the person leaves
the room, leaves the store. So he sort of keeps an eye on Bill. Watches Bill leave without paying,
then jumps on him on the sidewalk. Emily jumps on Anthony. Bystanders jump in. It's a melee in front
of Mel's Sporting Goods with Patricia across the street. What does Patricia do? Does she do nothing? Does she drive away? No. Patricia goes into the back
of the van and gets a machine gun, fires it out -- takes
it out the window and sprays Mel's Sporting
Goods with a entire magazine of bullets to free Bill and Emily. Doesn't work. So she gets another machine gun. And fires it out, through
the, the glass. Again, miraculously
not hitting someone. And that succeeds and
gets Bill and Emily free. The three of them get into the van. They realize that this has
drawn a good bit of attention, so they decide not to go back to
the house with the other six in it. Emily has had a summer job a
few years earlier at Disneyland. So the three of them go to
Disneyland where they check into a motel and they
turn on the television. And they see that the LAPD has
surrounded the six comrades in the, in the, in this house. And what follows on live
television is the biggest shootout in American history to this day:
5000 rounds of ammunition go into the house, 3000
rounds come out. The house is enveloped in flames and
all six people inside are killed. Donald DeFreeze, Willie Wolfe,
Mizmoon Soltysik, all of the SLA. Four women and two
men, and Bill and Emily and Patricia are watching
live on television. What follows from May 17th
to September 15th of 1975, almost a year and a half, is what's
known as "Patty's lost year." They rob two more banks, including
one where a woman is killed. They set off bombs in the Bay Area. That's the crime spree
that she's participated in. >> Margaret Sullivan: So Jimmy
Carter commuted her sentence. And Bill Clinton pardoned
Patty Hearst. As a legal analyst, how do you
see these examples of clemency? Were they justifiable? >> Jeffrey Toobin: Okay. So she's arrested on
September 15th, 1975, a year and a half after
she's kidnapped. She's charged with the original bank
robbery, the Hibernia bank robbery, not the two later bank robberies. F. Lee Bailey defends
her, big celebrated trial. She's convicted and sentenced
to six years in prison. The Hearst family mobilizes
a real political campaign to get Patricia sentence commuted. A very important intervening event
is another event, another example of San Francisco madness. The Reverend Jim Jones -- a nod
of recognition, I'm so pleased. And the People's Temple, he takes
his group of followers to Guyana. They commit mass suicide. Nine hundred of them drink poisoned
Kool-Aid and kill themselves. It's funny, you know,
people today talk about "They drank the Kool-Aid." Most people don't even
know what the reference is. But it's to the Jim
Jones mass suicide. That creates this national
conversation about, like, "Why do people do stuff that is so
much against their self-interest?" In this environment, Jimmy
Carter commutes her sentence with the support of Ronald Reagan, his political rival,
after 22 months. But that's not enough
for Patricia Hearst. Twenty years later Bill Clinton is in his final days at
the White House. And he gets this application
from the Hearst family for a full pardon long
after she's committed her, completed her prison sentence. And she, and he grants the pardon. >> Margaret Sullivan: Of course
he was on a pardon-granting spree. >> Jeffrey Toobin: Right, it was the
same day that he pardoned Mark Rich, his brother, Roger,
the -- remember that? Good times! Clintons are back! [Laughter] Going to have
all that stuff come back! It's going to be great. The, she's the only person
in modern American history to receive a commutation from one
president and a pardon from another. And if you want an
example of how wealth and privilege helps you
in America, this is one. Thank you for that
ovation from two people. [Laughter] The, no! But I mean, there are a lot of
people in prison who get mixed up with bad people
and they make mistakes and they like, do stupid things. They're not getting any commutation. They're not getting any pardon. And they sure as hell
aren't getting both! But -- >> Margaret Sullivan: She did. >> Jeffrey Toobin: Yeah. >> Margaret Sullivan: Now
she's going to dog shows. >> Jeffrey Toobin: Now
she's -- uh, excuse me. She's participating in dog shows. >> Margaret Sullivan: Yes, yes. So you have written about
O.J. Simpson in your book, The Run of His Life,
which you may have read, but if you haven't read it,
you've seen the FX series that followed more recently. It's very popular. Another celebrity who got in
serious trouble with the law. And another whose defense
included F. Lee Bailey. >> Jeffrey Toobin:
More successfully. >> Margaret Sullivan: Yes. How would you compare the two
trials, and the legal aspects? >> Jeffrey Toobin: Well, you know,
it's -- one of the, you know, this has been this sort of weird,
you know, the O.J. story has sort of come back in a pop culture
phenomenon thanks to the FX series and the wonderful documentary
that ESPN did. And, and they, they are all -- all
of this is like 20 years apart. You have 1974, the
kidnapping; 1994, the O.J. case. End of 2016 roughly, the this -- so you know, I've had occasion to
think a lot about the news media in connection with all of this. You know, people talk about the
O.J., about the Hearst case. They say, "Oh, my god,
there was so much publicity! It was like -- " And you know, she was on the cover of
Newsweek seven times. And people today are
like, "What's Newsweek?" And what's a cover?" And, and, and, and, and the
O.J. case was at a moment of cable news arriving on the scene. Gavel-to-gavel coverage
on CNN, on [inaudible] TV. But pre-social media, pre-internet,
and, and, and today, you know, you have a completely
different news environment. The, the trials I think
reflect, you know, they, they all reflected what was
going on in the society. First of all, they all reflect
a venerable American truth which is it's better
to be rich than poor. They also reflect sort
of that trials, especially high-profile
trials, reflect, you know, the political environment in
which they're, they're taken. And one reason why there was
a lot of hostility to Patricia at her trial was that this
was a time when, you know, what was then called the
Silent Majority was like, "Why do these kids? Why are we indulging these kids? You know, rich kids who want
to go shoot up streets?" I mean, you know, the -- she
was not the figure of sympathy that in many respects she is today. The O.J. case, as you know, I
certainly explored in my book and the FX series did
brilliantly, you know, reflected the tremendous
history of antagonism between the African American
community in Los Angeles and, and the police department. And I think one reason why O.J. was
such a resonant story in 2016 was because we are now in a
world of Black Lives Matter and Ferguson and Tulsa
and Charlotte. I mean, you know, all of
these stories, you know, made that story seem very fresh. So in that respect, you know, especially these high-profile
trials, they are very much part of the broader national dialogue. >> Margaret Sullivan: So I
have many more questions, but I want to at least, yes! Let us, let's open it up. And while you're getting to
your mics, I will ask you about my favorite one of your
books which is Too Close to Call, an examination of the 2000 election
between George W. Bush and Al Gore, and its drawn-out aftermath. Looking at today's presidential
campaign, is it possible that anything similar could occur. Has anything happened
to prohibit that? >> Jeffrey Toobin: Well, speaking
of my books you know, I am not, not going to re-title my
book The Nine, The Eight. But that's what we're, you know. At the rate we're going,
it's going to be pretty long. It could be quite a while. No, because this is not
going to be a close election. Hillary Clinton's going to win
this election fairly easily. That's just a prediction. That's just a prediction,
that's not an advocacy position. But, I, I, I just, I don't
think this is, you know. >> Margaret Sullivan: It will
not be too close to call. >> Jeffrey Toobin: It will
not be too close to call. What remains true, and, and, and
what is interesting in, in -- about the aftermath of, of the
recount is that it alerted the, the political system
to the political nature of the electoral process itself. That the idea -- you
know, voter registration, at least the mechanics of it. Certainly, you know, voter
registration was a key part of the Voting Rights Act. But the mechanics of voter
registration had sort of become relatively
uncontroversial. Until 2000, and particularly the
Republican Party saw the advantages of using the electoral process
to its, to its advantages. One thing we, we have
seen, you know, particularly since all
the Republican landslides of 2010 were these efforts
to limit the franchise and limit the people
who vote Democratic. You know, limit early voting,
limit absentee voting, you know, establish photo ID
requirements, you know. In the state of Texas, a gun
permit is a legitimate form of identification but
a student ID is not. Now how do you think
that helps, right? I mean, this, this really began
I think with the, the recount. >> Margaret Sullivan:
Thank you very much. By the way, full disclosure. I lived next door to
Nicole Brown Simpson. So you and I could have a
very interesting conversation. >> Jeffrey Toobin: Oh really? On Bundy? >> Margaret Sullivan: Yes. Literally. I had roses -- I had flowers and
cards for them at my front door. Why do you think the lawsuits
against Trump University and the shenanigans with his, the
foundation money and all of that, and all of these other, the plethora
of the abundance of lawsuits? And, and challenges to,
to Trump's integrity that have been legal have not
really generated the media coverage and the depth of media
coverage that other like-crimes and like-charges usually do? [Inaudible] >> Jeffrey Toobin:
Go for it, Sullivan! No, come on, you're
the press critic. Come on! >> Margaret Sullivan:
No, no, you're the star. >> Jeffrey Toobin:
It's a hard question. You know, I mean, you know, it
is not the case that, you know, Trump's various misdeeds have
not gotten a lot of attention. Your question illustrates it. You know, I, I participated
in CNN discussions where John, where he said, you know,
John McCain's not a war hero. He's -- you know, I like
people who weren't captured. The whole notion of gaffes
as defining moments in -- you know, the stuff he has
said, we really can't keep track of all the crazy stuff he has said. He has managed to, to,
to float above this. And you know, it is
true that I think for many months he was
treated more like a curiosity than a full-fledged candidate, and I
think he benefitted from that a lot. Especially in the Republican
primaries. But it is also the case that,
you know, there has been a lot of detailed searching, scrutiny
to his business dealings. And you know, and you know obviously
I think Hillary's going to win, but it's obviously a very
competitive election. And I, I don't know. I -- I, I, I wish, I mean, that
is a big part of this election. And I don't really understand why
he seems to be immune to the laws of political gravity the
way others have been. That's a pretty good
answer, isn't it? >> Margaret Sullivan: Very good. >> I have a craft question that
might interest the audience and journalists like myself. You write really superbly
researched, in-depth reported books continually. You're very high productive
and prolific. How do you manage to
do that in the -- ? Is it? Because even
when you are covering, let's say the Supreme Court, and
then you do a book like The Nine, it has way more depth than what
you were covering in New York. And you are a regular guest on CNN and The New Yorker
correspondent and a book author. Do you like work like
19 hours a day? Or have a word count -- ? >> Jeffrey Toobin: Definitely now. Okay. First of all, thank you. Second of all, I'll
give you two answers, two reasons why I get things done. One is when I write a book, I
am on leave from The New Yorker. And I thank David Remnick,
the editor. I cannot write New Yorker stories
and a book at the same time. So don't think, you know, that's
not in the 19 hours a day. The second reason is
extremely simple-minded. When I have completed -- more
or less, not totally, but more or less completed my research on
a book, I write five pages a day. I write 1250 words a day. Now, I -- you know, that to
me, I don't know about you, but to me the single easiest thing
in the world to do is not to write. Is to say, "Well, you know,
I'm going to do research today. I'm going to do -- ". I am disciplined about writing
1250 words a day which, you know, five double-spaced pages which
is not an unreasonable amount of a day's work. But you know, it's 25 pages a week. It's 100 pages a month. It really does add up,
and you get a book. And I don't write these
doorstop books. You know, these books
are a reasonable -- you know, 300, 400 pages. You've got a book in
six or eight months. So I, I -- that is the way I --
now I often go back and rewrite. It's not like this
stuff is set in stone. I do a lot of editing, but
to me, the hardest thing in the world is to
write a first draft. Anything is preferable
to writing a first draft. That's why I force myself to do it. >> Well, thank you so much for
your discipline and your hard work. We really appreciate it. >> Thank you! >> Margaret Sullivan:
Let's go back over here. >> In the aftermath
of the 2000 election, it's somewhat remarkable how
well the country was able to heal from such a traumatic electoral
experience with potentially, that's because Al Gore
conceded arguably early or however you, your
opinion on that. If a similar situation happened
now in 2016, while I agree with you that it's unlikely the math
would work out in such a way. But are we approaching a point
where there's no longer going to be this general kum ba yah,
"Okay, well that was kind of rough. But let' get back together,
believe in the rules [inaudible] and our system of government." Is that starting to crumble? >> Jeffrey Toobin: Do you
have one candidate in mind who might be like a little -- ? Look, you know, I think Al Gore
really thought, and correctly, that he was committing a
patriotic act by saying, "It's over, let's be done. We only have one president
at a time." It is true that Donald Trump
does not have a history that would suggest a
similar kind of graciousness. I kind of like that
sentence, the way I said that. >> Margaret Sullivan: It is true. >> Jeffrey Toobin:
Wouldn't you say it is true? Graciousness is not necessarily
the first word that comes to mind when you think of him. So -- I don't know. I mean, you know, probably this
will, this will not be, you know, a, a, a contested election. But you know, every
time he lost a primary, he said there was cheating involved. Remember? So, buckle your seatbelts. >> Margaret Sullivan:
Let's go back over here. >> Hi, I'm curious about your
fact-finding process behind the Patty Hearst project, especially
since she wasn't willing to do personal interviews. Did you rely on a lot
of public documents? And if so, were those hard to get? >> Jeffrey Toobin: The -- I, I --
we're running out of time here. The, there were, there's a lot
of public documents starting with the transcript of her trial. Also, you know, she wrote a
book about her experience, so that was a very
good place to start. She also testified at her trial,
and testified in grand juries. Bill Harris, who was one of
the SLA people, later went on, when he wasn't in jail,
became a private investigator. And a, and a rather good one. And he, he's an enormous packrat. And he had collected 150 boxes
of material, other court cases, FBI documents, SLA material. Literally, 150 boxes which he was about to sell to a
university library. It fell through. I bought it from him. And in addition to
interviewing about 100 people who were still around, I was
pleased to see that 40 years later, a lot of the protagonists were still
alive, including F. Lee Bailey, including the prosecutor who sadly,
died after I interviewed him. But -- >> Margaret Sullivan: No connection. >> Jeffrey Toobin: Why
are you laughing at that? Terrible! No, he just died. He was old. It was sad. But the, so you know,
I, I just approached it. I got, inhaled, and
assembled everything I could. >> Margaret Sullivan:
Let's do one more question. Right here. >> Mr. Toobin, do you feel a
responsibility as an analyst on television not to be evenhanded when one candidate
is lying all the time and the other candidate is capable of having some problems
in what she says. So how do you approach your
colleagues and to make sure that you're not evenhanded given
the craziness of this election? And by the way, could you please
write a book about this election? >> Jeffrey Toobin: Yeah, now
there, there are going to be so many books about this election. I'm like, I'm seeding the,
I'm seeding the ground. You know, this is one of the most
difficult journalistic questions that's been asked about
this election. And Margaret has dealt with
this in a more learned way, in a more experienced
way than I have. But the issue of false equivalence. And it's not so much the, any
individual's story in terms of are you being accurate about
this story versus that story? The question is really
what you're covering. In many respects, the
most important question about journalism is
what stories you cover, not so much what you say about them. And if you do daily, daily coverage
about Hillary's emails, and daily, daily coverage about the Clinton
Foundation, even if you're accurate in each sentence you say, you give
the impression that it is equivalent to Trump University and
all, all the rest of it. And that is a very hard
question to address. And I think in our profession,
that is going to be the biggest after the fact question we
all have to wrestle with. And, and, and you know,
first of all, I'm hired help. I'm not an editor,
I'm not a producer. You know, obviously, I have control
over what I say and what I write, but I am not someone who, you
know, decides what's being covered. And I think that's, that's been
an area that we're going to have to do some real soul-searching
about. >> Margaret Sullivan: Okay,
we're going to wrap it up. Thank you so much, Jeffrey Toobin. >> Jeffrey Toobin:
Thank you, Margaret. [ Applause ] >> This has been a presentation
of the Library of Congress. Visit us at LOC.gov.
