About the Program
Evan Thomas, assistant managing editor of Newsweek, recounts the lead-up to the Spanish-American War and profiles six men who he asserts were responsible for America's involvement, Teddy Roosevelt, Henry Cabot Lodge, President William McKinley, William Randolph Hearst, Thomas Reed, and William James. The author examines the explosion of the USS Maine in Havana Harbor on February 15, 1898 and argues that there was no evidence implicating the Spanish for the attack. He contends that the incident was trumped up to spur support for war. Evan Thomas discusses his book at Politics & Prose Bookstore in Washington, DC.