I had the honor of moderating a great discussion on freedom of the press under the Trump administration with The New York Times‘ Maureen Dowd, the National Memo’s Joe Conason and longtime political reporter Evan Thomas at the Tucson Festival of Books. If you weren’t able to get the festival to see it, you can watch it here on C-SPAN’s website. 

You can find some of the other great discussions from the Festival of Books here.

I ran into Brenda Viner, one of the major forces behind the festival, over the weekend and she asked if I had any suggestions to improve Tucson’s awesome weekend of celebrating books.  

My only suggestion, which is basically impossible because of the limitations of using the UA campus: Make it longer than two days! There’s so much good stuff happening that it’s nearly impossible to take it all in on Saturday and Sunday.

Thanks to all the volunteers that make the Tucson Festival of Books possible. In less than a decade, it’s become one of Tucson’s finest events.

This article appears in Mar 9-15, 2017.

Getting hassled by The Man Mild-mannered reporter

5 replies on “Talking Freedom of the Press with Journalists Maureen Dowd, Joe Conason and Evan Thomas”

  2. I would say the average age 62 those pasty white gov employee retiree. Don’t seem like a market force of literary power there. Better luck next year more area so the toddlers and arm banded masked protester can get in.

  3. Agree – make the festival at least one day longer, and consider using Centennial Hall once each day for big headliners – like Maureen Dowd on Saturday. 600 got in, at least 400 standing in line without tickets didn’t. The Hall holds 2400 – easily that number might have attended if they’d known they’d get a seat.

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