 Can you introduce yourself to the audience of the Nexus Institute? You wrote this great book the first of a series of four on on Lincoln, but what are you? Are you a journalist? a writer political man Well, I think the best way to describe myself is The experience that I brought to bear in writing this book. Mm-hmm. I Grew up in Chicago, Illinois Illinois is Lincoln State It's in the middle of the United States Mm-hmm, and I have that perspective that I can That vantage point that I can bring to American Society culture and politics. I became a journalist and have been a journalist for many years I worked for such publications as the New Republic the Washington Post and the New Yorker I've written many books about American politics and I served with President Clinton in the White House. I've been active in campaigns and elections as a Democrat And I'm a historian Why is it that you got so much involved with American politics? I At the age of 12 became Entranced with a presidential political campaign and that campaign was in 1960 And the candidate was John F. Kennedy When I grew up in Chicago, there was a political organization. It was a Democratic Party organization and Every part of the city had what was called a precinct captain Who was a member of the Democratic Party and that precinct captain? Recruited me as a boy. I was just a boy to help him After school to get people to vote and I would go around and speak to my neighbors and say on election day and say You would vote and the reward was that my precinct captain took me to the rally to see John F. Kennedy And that made an enormous impression on me Shortly after that I was taken To Springfield, Illinois, which is where Lincoln was from and Springfield has many of the sites that Lincoln was involved in The state Capitol his law office the small little town where he had lived outside of Springfield as a young man And shortly after that Martin Luther King came to my city and I saw a doctor came and so I saw Even in in the north not in the south the civil rights movement and its greatest leader and all of these things combined to Impress upon me and awaken in me an interest in American politics