Date/Time
Date(s) - 04/01/2017
10:00 am-11:30 am

Location
Point Loma Nazarene University - Fermanian Business Center

Address
3900 Lomaland Drive
San Diego
CA
92106

The City Club & San Diego County Bar Association Proudly Present:

Bret Peace – Author of and Speaking on: “Actual Malice”

10 AM Coffee & Croissant Reception & Program

Fermanian Business Center – Point Loam Nazarene University

3900 Lomaland Drive – Catalina Blvd. to Lomaland

Members, $25 (includes autographed copy of “Actual Malice”. If you have the book, the cost is $10)

RSVP: 619-235-4041, or cityclubsd@gmail.com

EVENT SPONSOR: DEPARTMENT OF JOURNALISM – POINT LOMA NAZARENE UNIVERSITY 

Bret Peace – Biographical Brief

BRET PEACE is a graduate of Stanford University and the University of Michigan Law School, where he was a Clarence Darrow Scholar. He has substantial experience representing sponsors, host governments and lenders in project development and finance transactions involving a variety of infrastructure and real estate development projects, both domestically in the United States and internationally.

He has successfully structured, negotiated and documented a wide range of complex and
first-of-a-kind commercial transactions in highly regulated industries including nuclear energy, federal land management, gaming, and telecommunications.

Bret’s prior experience includes practicing at an international law firm and in-house for a
new-build nuclear power plant project in the Middle East.

He lives in El Cajon, California with his wife Noel, his daughter Elena, and his two sons, August and Ezra.

He travels regularly to the United Arab Emirates and the Republic of Korea.

Bret’s writings include: Co-Author, The Handbook, Nuclear Power Moratorium in California: Perspectives in Technology and Financing, Los Alamos National Laboratory; co-Author, Financing the Nuclear Renaissance: the Benefits and Potential Pitfalls of Federal and State Governmental Subsidies and the Future of Nuclear Power in California,” and 30 Energy Law Journal; Project Finance 101.

In addition, he has lectured for China Guangdong Nuclear Power Group, University of California San Diego, and at the Global Leadership Institute School of International Relations & Pacific Studies.

Gary Condit – Biographical Brief

Gary Adrian Condit is a former politician and member of the Democratic Party who served in the House of Representatives from 1989 to 2003. Condit holds a B.B.A from the USC Marshall School of Business. Condit originally represented California’s 15th congressional district, and then later California’s 18th congressional district after redistricting following the 1990 census.

Condit became the object of frenzied and scandalous media attention for an extramarital affair with one of his interns, Chandra Levy, which came to light after Levy’s disappearance in May 2001.

Prosecutors investigating the case, thought Condit was not candid about his relationship with Levy, resulting in media overkill, speculation that run amuck he was somehow involved in her murder.

Condit lost the 2002 Democratic primary based in huge measure to negative publicity from the scandal. Prosecutors later convicted an illegal immigrant, Ingmar Guandique, who had committed other assaults with similar characteristics. However, lacking physical evidence, the verdict was overturned and charges subsequently dropped by Washington D.C. prosecutors after the testimony of a jailhouse informant was determined to be unreliable.

A View of “Actual Malice”

MORE THAN ONE OBSERVER OF AMERICAN LIFE has lamented the dark and depressing tone of the 2016 presidential election, believing we have sunk to a previously unknown low.

Regardless of political inclinations, no one felt good about the tone of either recent presidential campaign of the two major party candidates or the absence of substance in online and mainstream media coverage.

This did not happen overnight. And, it did not happen because of any single institutional failure. On the contrary, it is a manifestation of a cultural and social unraveling that plays out every day in insidious ways and undermines our quality of life and threatens our economic and political security.

At the core of this unraveling is an institutionally incestuous media, as well as political and justice systems that long ago abandoned core principles necessary for the pursuit of truth, including relevance, context, and decency.

Actual Malice is a stunning new book; a book unlike any other, one that demonstrates in stunning fashion how we got here – to a place we have never been.

This is Gary Condit’s story about the death of Chandra Levy, the end of his political career, and the inexplicable behind-the-scenes machinations that drove an unprecedented media frenzy and ultimately derailed the prosecution of her killer.

If you know nothing about this story, Actual Malice is a must read as a factual introduction to incompetence and corruption that frames the interplay between Washington political, law enforcement, and media elite.

If you think you know the story, it will likely challenge most of what you think you know, and does it with superb documentation.

Author and attorney Breton Peace has produced a book that captures one’s attention by competing with the best political thrillers and spy novels on the basis of entertainment alone, but has the huge advantage of being true – which makes it all the more alarming.

In fact, the entertainment value is so high that many readers will get lost in the intrigue of “horse whisperers, motorcycle gangs, and Middle East sex rings.” As a result, many people have lost track of the sobering fact that our justice system and political system have been driven by dark forces manipulating a willing media that treat the bizarre as fact.

The message behind Actual Malice is far more sobering. We have become an unserious people who have conceded our most precious institutions to the purveyors of celebrity and gossip. Doing this has consequences, including losing our most precious societal possession – self-governance.

Actual Malice is a must read for anyone concerned about the state of our democracy.

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