. >> abigail thernstrom. >> thank you for coming and i apologize for being late. i have become tired so i am swimming underwater a little bit. but i do have one remark and one question. they're both questions. fall notion of cultural competency bothers me. let me make move to another area where there are analogous arguments made in the area of education, k-12 education, there is a lot of chatter in the world of educational literature on the question of whether the racial gap in academic achievement is to to inadequate cultural competence on the part of a lot of teachers. and the record here is very clear. what the term ended the occasional outcomes is the quality of teachers by all of the standard measures. what ritter as a team scores? where did they go to college? what do they know? teachers can't teach what they don't know, too many teachers don't know very much. it has nothing to to do with anything one would call cultural competency or skin color. this squares with a message that one of you delivered, i can't remember which, parents don't care. there has been

[applause] [inaudible conversations] >> abigail thernstrom has co-authored several books with her husband, steven, including "america in black and white: one nation, invisible". her 1987 work "whose votes count? affirmative action and minority voting rights" 14 awards including the benchmark book award from the center for judicial studies. she is a vice chair of the u.s. commission on civil rights, member of the massachusetts state board of education and senior fellow at the manhattan institute in new york. to find out more visit manhattan -- institute.org. >> linda himelsein discusses her book, "the king of vodka" and the light of it pyotr smirnov, the creator of smirnov vodka. she talks about his rise from a lower class family to being one of the wealthy businessmen in russia. kepler's books in california hosted the event. it is 35 minutes. >> i'm thrilled to be here at kepler's, i love this bookstore. it is a wonderful institution. so the king of vodka. i get asked more than anything else what i wrote this book. and is actually every good question for people who know me well. and the r