And the Hi, I'm Bill Crystal. Welcome to Conversations. I'm very pleased to be joined today by

Greg Wiener, Professor of Politics at Assumption College, formerly worked here on Capitol Hill for Senator

Baukeery and others as well, I believe.

No one ever works for only one person.

Author of three books, all very much worth reading a book on Madison and the

Constitution a book on Daniel Patrick Moynihan which will talk focus on today

and a very recent book which everyone should get

old Wiggs Burke Lincoln and the politics of prudence and since you talk about

Burke so much in the morning handbook maybe we'll come at the end we can talk a

little bit about why you find Evan Burke so helpful to understand

Mornahan Lincoln and American politics since he was a British thinker and statesman.

But let's talk about Pat Moynihan, whom you admire, as you say in this book, and I've written, I think really the first maybe only biography that tries to really capture his overall thought and work.

I guess we should say I work for him so I feel I'm very interested in this myself

but I suppose not everyone today remembers him. It's hard to believe what 16 years since he died in 2003.

He left the Senate in 2000. Say a word just about the biography and then we'll talk about

his what you think is most notable for us to understand this major figure

in American politics and an American intellectual life.

Sure, and thank you for having me.

He's, the book tries to capture his political thought so it's it's less

uh... not even quite intellectual biography it's more exegesis of

of his uh... mainly of his public writings, which are vast.

He wrote or edited 19 books, and there are hundreds of essays,

...