WEBVTT - Generated by AI 00:00:00.200 --> 00:00:03.299 Something is changing in our country, and most 00:00:03.299 --> 00:00:08.000 people feel it before they can explain it. Good 00:00:08.000 --> 00:00:13.320 morning. My name is Margaret Hennock. I'm a member 00:00:13.320 --> 00:00:16.019 of the steady state. I retired from the Central 00:00:16.019 --> 00:00:18.719 Intelligence Agency after 25 years as an operations 00:00:18.719 --> 00:00:21.780 officer, and I'm now working with the steady 00:00:21.780 --> 00:00:25.399 state for the protection of democracy and the 00:00:25.399 --> 00:00:28.460 Constitution. And my guest this morning is Bob 00:00:28.460 --> 00:00:31.440 Drogan, who's a reporter, well, I guess a retired 00:00:31.440 --> 00:00:34.439 reporter from the L .A. Times, whom I've known 00:00:34.439 --> 00:00:38.280 for a fair number of years because he wrote a 00:00:38.280 --> 00:00:41.020 book about something that I was part of. Anyway, 00:00:41.240 --> 00:00:46.780 Bob, over to you. Introduce yourself. I'm Bob 00:00:46.780 --> 00:00:49.520 Drogan. I spent 38 years at the Los Angeles Times 00:00:49.520 --> 00:00:53.460 as a national correspondent, a foreign correspondent, 00:00:53.520 --> 00:00:56.909 and ultimately a Washington correspondent. And 00:00:56.909 --> 00:00:59.429 when I covered intelligence and national security, 00:00:59.770 --> 00:01:02.969 my last job there was just a White House editor 00:01:02.969 --> 00:01:05.030 during the first Trump administration. And when 00:01:05.030 --> 00:01:07.709 he lost, I left because I thought my work is 00:01:07.709 --> 00:01:09.489 done. We're never going to see this place again. 00:01:10.189 --> 00:01:15.930 I guess I'd like to start with how you got into 00:01:15.930 --> 00:01:18.189 journalism and how you got into national security 00:01:18.189 --> 00:01:20.329 and just sort of give us a couple of words on 00:01:20.329 --> 00:01:48.019 how that happened. And I was having a conversation 00:01:48.019 --> 00:01:50.900 once with the dean of students and for reasons 00:01:50.900 --> 00:01:53.799 I cannot remember he told me that the CIA were 00:01:53.799 --> 00:01:56.379 coming to recruit on campus. Apparently they 00:01:56.379 --> 00:01:58.700 had decided that hiring all those white guys 00:01:58.700 --> 00:02:00.859 from Yale was cutting it in the third world. 00:02:01.640 --> 00:02:07.239 And they were coming to recruit at what was then 00:02:07.239 --> 00:02:10.960 called Acro House. So I wrote that up for the 00:02:10.960 --> 00:02:13.900 local paper, and it led to protests, and the 00:02:13.900 --> 00:02:17.780 CIA, we were told, pulled out, and the Associated 00:02:17.780 --> 00:02:20.020 Press picked it up, and the next thing I knew 00:02:20.020 --> 00:02:21.680 it appeared in the New York Times, and I thought, 00:02:22.080 --> 00:02:30.300 This isn't very hard. Anybody can do this. What 00:02:30.300 --> 00:02:34.180 kind of national security stuff did you do? I 00:02:34.180 --> 00:02:40.800 then went on and wound up working after graduate 00:02:40.800 --> 00:02:42.599 school, wound up working at the Charlotte Observer 00:02:42.599 --> 00:02:45.240 in North Carolina, then the Philadelphia Inquirer 00:02:45.240 --> 00:02:47.159 in Philadelphia, and then the Los Angeles Times. 00:02:47.639 --> 00:02:49.840 So I worked for the Los Angeles Times for 38 00:02:49.840 --> 00:02:53.259 years as a national correspondent, a foreign 00:02:53.259 --> 00:02:56.139 correspondent, and then a Washington correspondent. 00:02:56.159 --> 00:03:00.860 And when I came to Washington in 1999, I wrote 00:03:00.860 --> 00:03:04.680 a memo for the editors that I called nukes, kooks, 00:03:04.680 --> 00:03:07.300 and spooks, and proposed that that would be my 00:03:07.300 --> 00:03:11.110 beat, being... nuclear proliferation and terrorism 00:03:11.110 --> 00:03:16.069 and intelligence agencies, which had us all sort 00:03:16.069 --> 00:03:18.770 of fallen by the wayside after the end of the 00:03:18.770 --> 00:03:22.729 Cold War. And so I was in position and already 00:03:22.729 --> 00:03:25.069 started doing that beat when 9 -11 happened. 00:03:25.229 --> 00:03:28.289 And then I just spent the next 10 years doing 00:03:28.289 --> 00:03:30.789 that or 12 years or so and then became an editor, 00:03:30.849 --> 00:03:32.810 became the national security editor for the Los 00:03:32.810 --> 00:03:40.330 Angeles Times. enough experience to answer this 00:03:40.330 --> 00:03:44.509 one. How does Trump's assault on the press come 00:03:44.509 --> 00:03:47.030 across to someone who is a member of the press 00:03:47.030 --> 00:03:49.069 as opposed to how it comes across to the rest 00:03:49.069 --> 00:03:53.930 of us? You know, he came into office promising 00:03:53.930 --> 00:03:58.150 to be a dictator on day one, and he has absolutely 00:03:58.150 --> 00:04:05.289 fulfilled that as regards his efforts to against 00:04:05.289 --> 00:04:08.810 any media that he considers not slavish enough 00:04:08.810 --> 00:04:14.050 in parroting his lies on a regular basis. From 00:04:14.050 --> 00:04:17.810 my perspective, he is conducting an unprecedented, 00:04:18.129 --> 00:04:21.769 full -out war against freedom of expression, 00:04:22.029 --> 00:04:24.269 against journalism, and against the First Amendment. 00:04:25.350 --> 00:04:31.610 It is difficult in the churn of daily... uh craziness 00:04:31.610 --> 00:04:33.790 that we all put up with in this administration 00:04:33.790 --> 00:04:36.870 to keep track of it but last night i tried to 00:04:36.870 --> 00:04:40.689 make a list of the things he has done and i will 00:04:40.689 --> 00:04:43.730 go through some of it with you uh because it's 00:04:43.730 --> 00:04:46.230 longer than it's amazing when you think of it 00:04:46.230 --> 00:04:50.069 so his administration has cut funding for npr 00:04:50.069 --> 00:04:53.730 and pbs it's threatened to revoke broadcast licenses 00:04:53.730 --> 00:04:57.560 for every network except fox It's filed punitive 00:04:57.560 --> 00:04:59.600 lawsuits against the New York Times, Washington 00:04:59.600 --> 00:05:02.579 Post, Wall Street Journal, BBC, Des Moines Register, 00:05:02.980 --> 00:05:06.259 CNN, and even the board that issues Pulitzer 00:05:06.259 --> 00:05:10.740 Prizes. They have ended or limited processing 00:05:10.740 --> 00:05:13.180 of FOIA requests. They've demanded the firing 00:05:13.180 --> 00:05:15.740 of Jimmy Kimmel twice now. They've barred the 00:05:15.740 --> 00:05:17.779 AP, the Associated Press, from the White House 00:05:17.779 --> 00:05:21.199 briefing room because it won't use his preferred 00:05:21.199 --> 00:05:23.959 title for the Gulf of Mexico. They've taken over 00:05:23.959 --> 00:05:27.370 the White House pool. reporters from the Pentagon 00:05:27.370 --> 00:05:29.709 unless they agree to print only government handouts. 00:05:29.970 --> 00:05:33.290 Bob, when you say taken over the pool, what does 00:05:33.290 --> 00:05:36.029 that mean? The White House pool, not like the 00:05:36.029 --> 00:05:39.730 outside. So, yeah. Oh, right. So it's not a swimming 00:05:39.730 --> 00:05:43.610 pool. It is. There has been since the days of, 00:05:43.670 --> 00:05:48.620 I believe, FDR, a dedicated. reporters assigned 00:05:48.620 --> 00:05:51.519 full -time to be with the president every time 00:05:51.519 --> 00:05:59.339 he travels or does anything in public. And it's 00:05:59.339 --> 00:06:01.379 a protective pool, as it's called, so that you're 00:06:01.379 --> 00:06:03.509 always there. if anything should happen, and 00:06:03.509 --> 00:06:06.730 whatever he says about it. And it has always 00:06:06.730 --> 00:06:09.310 been run by the reporters themselves. It's an 00:06:09.310 --> 00:06:12.829 independent operation run by, in the last some 00:06:12.829 --> 00:06:14.990 years, the White House Correspondents Association. 00:06:15.329 --> 00:06:17.769 And Trump has basically said, no, I'm going to 00:06:17.769 --> 00:06:19.569 pick who covers me. I mean, it's the classic, 00:06:19.769 --> 00:06:22.230 I don't like the way you're covering it, and 00:06:22.230 --> 00:06:24.050 by the way, you're Miss Piggy, and I'm going 00:06:24.050 --> 00:06:26.870 to insult and demean and be horrific to all of 00:06:26.870 --> 00:06:30.529 you and go after anyone I don't like as fake 00:06:30.529 --> 00:06:33.420 news and enemy. of the people. So that's what 00:06:33.420 --> 00:06:37.540 the pool is. He's taking over the pool. I could 00:06:37.540 --> 00:06:41.620 go on. I will go on. His administration put up 00:06:41.620 --> 00:06:43.579 something they call the Wall of Shame. It's a 00:06:43.579 --> 00:06:47.199 website targeting various media outlets, and 00:06:47.199 --> 00:06:50.980 it's run by the White House, and people can complain 00:06:50.980 --> 00:06:54.639 about specific journalists. His administration 00:06:54.639 --> 00:06:57.550 is targeted. Whereas censored government data, 00:06:57.709 --> 00:07:00.310 they've taken down websites on everything from 00:07:00.310 --> 00:07:02.870 vaccine to climate change. They've dismantled 00:07:02.870 --> 00:07:05.189 the Voice of America and every other foreign, 00:07:05.410 --> 00:07:08.470 you know, every other government -backed broadcast 00:07:08.470 --> 00:07:11.410 outlet that works overseas, U .S. broadcast outlet. 00:07:12.209 --> 00:07:16.300 They've installed cronies to lead the FCC. You 00:07:16.300 --> 00:07:18.000 know, I could go on. They've arrested Don Lemon. 00:07:18.079 --> 00:07:20.339 They've, you know, invaded a reporter's house 00:07:20.339 --> 00:07:23.860 and stolen her notes. They've, you know, they've 00:07:23.860 --> 00:07:27.079 detained journalists at ICE things. They've deported 00:07:27.079 --> 00:07:29.699 journalists. You know, it's just it's one horror 00:07:29.699 --> 00:07:31.959 show after another. And at the same time, you 00:07:31.959 --> 00:07:37.120 have corporate owners at CBS, The Washington 00:07:37.120 --> 00:07:41.259 Post, The Los Angeles Times and elsewhere that 00:07:41.259 --> 00:07:45.399 are either pulling critical. or they're changing 00:07:45.399 --> 00:07:48.120 their management or they are paying millions 00:07:48.120 --> 00:07:50.740 of dollars, tens of millions of dollars to settle 00:07:50.740 --> 00:07:55.420 utterly frivolous lawsuits. At this point, YouTube 00:07:55.420 --> 00:07:58.000 has paid him $25 million because he didn't like 00:07:58.000 --> 00:08:02.379 their coverage. The Washington Post, CBS paid 00:08:02.379 --> 00:08:06.779 him $16 million. ABC News has paid him, ABC Paramount 00:08:06.779 --> 00:08:10.879 has paid him $16 million. All of this has tremendous 00:08:10.879 --> 00:08:13.220 implications for freedom of the press and for 00:08:13.220 --> 00:08:15.500 democracy because he's following the playbook 00:08:15.500 --> 00:08:19.720 of Viktor Orban in Hungary or Vladimir Putin 00:08:19.720 --> 00:08:22.860 or Mussolini, I mean, for that matter. So it 00:08:22.860 --> 00:08:27.040 is just horrific. I'm just going to ask you this. 00:08:27.100 --> 00:08:28.720 I think I probably know the answer, but just 00:08:28.720 --> 00:08:33.080 to make sure that I'm not wrong for once. Tell 00:08:33.080 --> 00:08:36.559 me what that does to when you start suppressing 00:08:36.559 --> 00:08:39.429 the press. Give me the list of, I realize it's 00:08:39.429 --> 00:08:43.110 an ABC, of how that damages democracy, how that 00:08:43.110 --> 00:08:45.370 damages freedom, how that damages the country. 00:08:46.389 --> 00:08:52.950 And do people realize that before it's too late? 00:08:55.350 --> 00:09:00.360 That I realize is a joke. Yeah, I don't know 00:09:00.360 --> 00:09:03.039 how to judge that. But I think part of what we're 00:09:03.039 --> 00:09:07.320 seeing, this comes at a time when trust in media 00:09:07.320 --> 00:09:10.360 is at an all -time low. I mean, we're barely 00:09:10.360 --> 00:09:13.340 ranked, I think, 22 % trust or something. So 00:09:13.340 --> 00:09:17.559 I think trust in Congress and used car salesmen 00:09:17.559 --> 00:09:21.700 may be lower, but not much. And meanwhile, there 00:09:21.700 --> 00:09:24.120 is just the economic pressures of journalism, 00:09:24.139 --> 00:09:27.860 which has been a... has been collapsing since 00:09:27.860 --> 00:09:30.659 the mid -2000s through social media and eBay 00:09:30.659 --> 00:09:36.679 and just changing reader and viewer interests 00:09:36.679 --> 00:09:39.059 and so on. So you have this shrinking of the 00:09:39.059 --> 00:09:41.659 traditional media at a time when he's cutting 00:09:41.659 --> 00:09:44.460 off access to government. And the whole role 00:09:44.460 --> 00:09:48.279 of the whole point of the First Amendment is 00:09:48.279 --> 00:09:50.559 to provide accountability, independent accountability 00:09:50.559 --> 00:09:54.789 of what the government does. you know, we're 00:09:54.789 --> 00:09:57.649 supposed to be watchdogs. I mean, that is our 00:09:57.649 --> 00:09:59.970 role, not lap dogs and not attack dogs, but, 00:09:59.990 --> 00:10:02.029 you know, watchdogs for the government. And we 00:10:02.029 --> 00:10:05.090 have no, there's less and less access to the 00:10:05.090 --> 00:10:07.210 kind of information that I think people need 00:10:07.210 --> 00:10:11.039 to make educated choices. in a day when AI is 00:10:11.039 --> 00:10:13.799 making stuff up, when God knows what's appearing 00:10:13.799 --> 00:10:16.259 on social media, to be able to go to a trusted 00:10:16.259 --> 00:10:18.200 voice and find out. And, you know, the Iran war 00:10:18.200 --> 00:10:20.480 is a perfect example. You tell me what's going 00:10:20.480 --> 00:10:24.080 on over there. I mean, nobody knows between the 00:10:24.080 --> 00:10:27.519 Iranians and Trump. It's a blackout. So, yeah. 00:10:28.840 --> 00:10:31.679 How does it feel to be in that? How does it feel 00:10:31.679 --> 00:10:35.139 to be, to have been a respected voice against 00:10:35.139 --> 00:10:38.659 government and now to just be a pariah? In so 00:10:38.659 --> 00:10:42.980 many ways. And that's just personal. If it's 00:10:42.980 --> 00:10:46.519 too personal, you don't have to answer. No, no, 00:10:46.559 --> 00:10:48.620 no. Well, you know, I'm retired, so I'm a civilian 00:10:48.620 --> 00:10:52.840 these days. But I think, you know, what's happening 00:10:52.840 --> 00:10:58.360 is a part of, I think it's overlooked by an awful 00:10:58.360 --> 00:11:00.779 lot of people. One, because they're not sympathetic 00:11:00.779 --> 00:11:03.259 to the press and because there's so many other 00:11:03.259 --> 00:11:05.080 things happening. It's, you know, Trump is everywhere, 00:11:05.200 --> 00:11:07.539 everything all at once, you know, between the 00:11:07.539 --> 00:11:10.480 ice rays and the war in Iran and, you know, blowing 00:11:10.480 --> 00:11:12.480 boats out of the water in the Caribbean and God 00:11:12.480 --> 00:11:14.840 knows. So it's very hard to keep track of it. 00:11:14.860 --> 00:11:16.720 And the list that I read you is not a full list, 00:11:16.759 --> 00:11:19.500 but it's sort of, you know, it's incremental 00:11:19.500 --> 00:11:21.279 and you add it up and you suddenly think, oh 00:11:21.279 --> 00:11:23.659 my God, he's trying to destroy the, I mean, how 00:11:23.659 --> 00:11:26.100 does it feel? It's outrageous. I mean, it's just, 00:11:26.120 --> 00:11:28.690 I think the country. Thomas Jefferson famously 00:11:28.690 --> 00:11:32.070 said, I'd rather have a media without a government 00:11:32.070 --> 00:11:34.909 than a government without a media. Because look 00:11:34.909 --> 00:11:37.789 at Trump, he's out of control. Is there anything 00:11:37.789 --> 00:11:40.490 that you can do as a former press person that 00:11:40.490 --> 00:11:44.490 you are willing to talk about? That's legal. 00:11:47.529 --> 00:11:56.820 Mostly. You know, I think, yeah, I think. I support 00:11:56.820 --> 00:12:00.879 various causes. I go out. I do protests. I write 00:12:00.879 --> 00:12:04.500 what I can. I'm not leading the opposition by 00:12:04.500 --> 00:12:08.019 any means here. I'm just trying to point out 00:12:08.019 --> 00:12:11.299 to your – this organization and whatever that 00:12:11.299 --> 00:12:16.419 the issues that you focus on should include the 00:12:16.419 --> 00:12:19.059 First Amendment because so much of what we know 00:12:19.059 --> 00:12:23.110 about national security depends on – The access 00:12:23.110 --> 00:12:25.590 to information that the government has total 00:12:25.590 --> 00:12:30.830 control of now. Look who the government is. Tell 00:12:30.830 --> 00:12:32.809 me about the White House Correspondents' Dinner. 00:12:35.990 --> 00:12:39.950 So I have an iconoclastic view of this thing. 00:12:41.450 --> 00:12:43.629 Here's a shot. And I think what happened that 00:12:43.629 --> 00:12:46.429 – yeah, here's a shot. So I think what happened 00:12:46.429 --> 00:12:49.450 that night, not to be too crude about it, a couple 00:12:49.450 --> 00:12:52.950 of good things happened that night. Okay. First 00:12:52.950 --> 00:12:57.669 is obviously no one was hurt. Thank God. And 00:12:57.669 --> 00:13:01.169 if anyone were going to get hurt, it almost certainly 00:13:01.169 --> 00:13:03.169 would have been journalists because this putz 00:13:03.169 --> 00:13:07.110 was smart enough to take a train across country 00:13:07.110 --> 00:13:10.230 so that I assume so he didn't have to check his 00:13:10.230 --> 00:13:13.289 weapons in an airport. And he somehow got a room 00:13:13.289 --> 00:13:16.070 in a hotel that's booked up weeks or months in 00:13:16.070 --> 00:13:18.539 advance for that weekend. But apparently never 00:13:18.539 --> 00:13:20.179 went down and looked at the ballroom because, 00:13:20.279 --> 00:13:22.879 you know, to get in there, you have to go through 00:13:22.879 --> 00:13:25.639 the mags, and then there's another set, and then 00:13:25.639 --> 00:13:27.139 you go down a long flight of stairs, and then 00:13:27.139 --> 00:13:28.659 there's another level, and then you go to something 00:13:28.659 --> 00:13:30.379 else. And then you get into the back of a room, 00:13:30.419 --> 00:13:33.659 and there are 250 tables. There are 2 ,500 people, 00:13:33.779 --> 00:13:36.799 plus waiters and whatever. I mean, it's impossible 00:13:36.799 --> 00:13:39.200 to move when you're in there. You'd need a helicopter 00:13:39.200 --> 00:13:41.240 to pick you up to just, you know, go to the restroom 00:13:41.240 --> 00:13:43.179 or something. There's no way he was going to 00:13:43.179 --> 00:13:44.440 get close to the president, but he could have 00:13:44.440 --> 00:13:47.379 certainly killed somebody. So thank God for that. 00:13:47.659 --> 00:13:50.419 Secondly, thank God Trump didn't get to give 00:13:50.419 --> 00:13:52.220 his speech because, as he said, it was going 00:13:52.220 --> 00:13:54.019 to be the most inappropriate speech of all time. 00:13:54.059 --> 00:13:56.220 You know he was going to get up there and insult 00:13:56.220 --> 00:13:58.860 everyone in that room, every journalist there 00:13:58.860 --> 00:14:02.440 for an hour and just be demeaning and heap abuses 00:14:02.440 --> 00:14:05.340 and be as crude as he possibly could. And I think 00:14:05.340 --> 00:14:08.559 we were all spared that. And thirdly, from my 00:14:08.559 --> 00:14:10.960 point of view, and I'm a total hypocrite on this 00:14:10.960 --> 00:14:15.080 because I've attended this dinner, I think. We 00:14:15.080 --> 00:14:17.039 were trying to count it somewhere between 15 00:14:17.039 --> 00:14:19.740 and 17 times. I'm not sure. But it's an abomination. 00:14:19.840 --> 00:14:22.259 It should be canceled. It should be shrunk back 00:14:22.259 --> 00:14:24.320 down to what its original purpose was, which 00:14:24.320 --> 00:14:26.720 is to raise money for scholarships for journalism 00:14:26.720 --> 00:14:28.899 students, to give some awards to people who cover 00:14:28.899 --> 00:14:31.259 the White House and get rid of all of this, you 00:14:31.259 --> 00:14:34.279 know, celebrity suck up stuff that goes. I should 00:14:34.279 --> 00:14:38.100 tell you that I was at the dinner in 2011, the 00:14:38.100 --> 00:14:41.980 famous dinner where Trump, where Obama insulted 00:14:41.980 --> 00:14:45.690 Trump. And Trump has always denied that that 00:14:45.690 --> 00:14:47.809 is the reason that that's the night he decided 00:14:47.809 --> 00:14:49.769 to run for president. But, you know, who knows? 00:14:49.809 --> 00:14:52.610 Because he lies about everything. So it was actually 00:14:52.610 --> 00:14:55.129 very funny at the night, but it was not at all 00:14:55.129 --> 00:14:58.509 a big deal that night. The bigger news, at least 00:14:58.509 --> 00:15:00.929 at the table I sat on, is that Scarlett Johansson 00:15:00.929 --> 00:15:03.470 sat on Sean Penn's lap at the next table. And 00:15:03.470 --> 00:15:05.110 that was the first time their romance came out. 00:15:05.149 --> 00:15:07.460 My wife was very excited about that. I spent 00:15:07.460 --> 00:15:09.960 the night trying to chase down a rumor. This 00:15:09.960 --> 00:15:12.179 was the year of the Arab Spring, to chase down 00:15:12.179 --> 00:15:14.500 a rumor that the U .S. had just taken out Gaddafi 00:15:14.500 --> 00:15:16.700 in a missile strike, which turned out to be not 00:15:16.700 --> 00:15:19.039 true. And none of us realized that the really 00:15:19.039 --> 00:15:21.240 big news that night was Obama had just signed 00:15:21.240 --> 00:15:24.500 off on the bin Laden raid. That afternoon, it 00:15:24.500 --> 00:15:27.620 was postponed that night because of weather, 00:15:27.720 --> 00:15:30.620 but it actually took place the next day, so that's 00:15:30.620 --> 00:15:32.899 what we did the rest of the weekend. So Trump 00:15:32.899 --> 00:15:35.419 was not the big news that night, but in any case. 00:15:35.840 --> 00:15:42.679 I digress. Interesting. And I would like to know, 00:15:42.740 --> 00:15:44.820 you offered to give a little bit of perspective 00:15:44.820 --> 00:15:47.519 about the golden age of newspapers, how short 00:15:47.519 --> 00:15:54.240 it was and the sort of fallout from that. Yeah. 00:15:54.419 --> 00:16:05.000 So I think there is a misconception about how 00:16:05.000 --> 00:16:12.799 news organizations have always been trustworthy 00:16:12.799 --> 00:16:18.019 and steadfast and true and so on. And the fact 00:16:18.019 --> 00:16:22.919 is that the image that we like to think of or 00:16:22.919 --> 00:16:26.240 that I grew up thinking of as the standard was 00:16:26.240 --> 00:16:29.580 a relatively new and relatively brief thing. 00:16:29.700 --> 00:16:35.039 If you go back 100 years, the landscape, in this 00:16:35.039 --> 00:16:38.539 country was it was a very atomized news or news. 00:16:38.940 --> 00:16:41.340 You know, every town had multiple newspapers. 00:16:41.659 --> 00:16:46.240 Big cities had 10, 20 newspapers. You had big 00:16:46.240 --> 00:16:49.519 press lords like Joseph Pulitzer, who's sainted 00:16:49.519 --> 00:16:52.299 now because of the Pulitzer Prizes, but back 00:16:52.299 --> 00:16:54.360 then was known as the father of yellow journalism. 00:16:54.580 --> 00:16:57.539 And you had William Randolph Hearst, who famously 00:16:57.539 --> 00:17:00.000 pushed the U .S. into the Spanish -American War 00:17:00.000 --> 00:17:03.440 and was also known for this, you know, what they 00:17:03.440 --> 00:17:05.539 called. gutter journalism, but they were the 00:17:05.539 --> 00:17:07.259 press lords and they controlled vast things. 00:17:07.420 --> 00:17:10.579 And sort of, and then you had smaller groups 00:17:10.579 --> 00:17:14.039 like the Chandlers in Los Angeles, absolute right 00:17:14.039 --> 00:17:17.500 -wing family that created Richard Nixon and Helen, 00:17:17.599 --> 00:17:19.940 you know, took the Helen Gahagan, Doug is, and 00:17:19.940 --> 00:17:22.920 the Annenbergs in Philadelphia, you know, another 00:17:22.920 --> 00:17:25.079 right -wing paper at the time. And suddenly that, 00:17:25.119 --> 00:17:28.079 this begins to shift, right? Radio opens it up 00:17:28.079 --> 00:17:30.160 after World War II and then the television networks 00:17:30.160 --> 00:17:33.119 in the 1960s and then Watergate happens and it, 00:17:33.519 --> 00:17:37.180 Watergate, right, suddenly this idea that that's 00:17:37.180 --> 00:17:38.980 the start of the golden age for me of journalism. 00:17:39.099 --> 00:17:42.079 And it goes until, depending on your point of 00:17:42.079 --> 00:17:45.660 view, until either eBay came along, which, you 00:17:45.660 --> 00:17:48.420 know, ate all of our money, or social media came 00:17:48.420 --> 00:17:51.960 along, which ate all of our brains in the 2007s. 00:17:51.960 --> 00:17:54.900 And so where we are now, ironically, is I think 00:17:54.900 --> 00:17:58.539 there's some similarities. Again, we are in this 00:17:58.539 --> 00:18:02.039 very atomized landscape. We're no longer relying 00:18:02.039 --> 00:18:04.579 on three networks and two or three newspapers. 00:18:04.680 --> 00:18:06.920 We're relying on this endless stuff out there. 00:18:07.059 --> 00:18:10.440 And we have press lords out there or billionaire, 00:18:10.759 --> 00:18:13.579 I mean, odious billionaire owners, the Jeff Bezos 00:18:13.579 --> 00:18:16.259 at The Washington Post and Patrick Sung Chung 00:18:16.259 --> 00:18:20.839 at The Los Angeles Times, who have pulled editorials 00:18:20.839 --> 00:18:23.799 they don't like or change management. And it 00:18:23.799 --> 00:18:25.859 is their right. They are the owners. But it is 00:18:25.859 --> 00:18:28.079 suddenly it's not something that we're used to. 00:18:28.099 --> 00:18:31.089 And we're about to see. They've already made 00:18:31.089 --> 00:18:34.549 changes at CBS with Barry Weiss, who's considered 00:18:34.549 --> 00:18:38.670 certainly far more political than the previous 00:18:38.670 --> 00:18:42.569 president of CBS News. And Ellison is about to 00:18:42.569 --> 00:18:45.410 take over CNN. And that's going to, we assume, 00:18:45.569 --> 00:18:49.309 become another Trump mouthpiece because that's 00:18:49.309 --> 00:18:51.970 what the politics are. So in a way, we're going 00:18:51.970 --> 00:18:54.910 back to the future. We're going back to the past 00:18:54.910 --> 00:18:57.779 and what it looked like 100 years ago. But the 00:18:57.779 --> 00:19:00.079 good old days were not as long as we'd like to 00:19:00.079 --> 00:19:02.859 think. It was maybe 30 years. You were trying 00:19:02.859 --> 00:19:06.519 to figure out where to look for an informed source 00:19:06.519 --> 00:19:09.500 of information. What would you do? How would 00:19:09.500 --> 00:19:13.940 you advise people to go find fewer places to 00:19:13.940 --> 00:19:17.400 consume their news from which to get the actual 00:19:17.400 --> 00:19:21.940 news or from which to get information? You know, 00:19:21.960 --> 00:19:26.809 I think it is a... No, you know, it's just a 00:19:26.809 --> 00:19:28.630 supermarket out there now. I mean, everybody, 00:19:28.849 --> 00:19:31.609 for better or worse, we all get to pick our own, 00:19:31.609 --> 00:19:36.490 you know, topics that we like to follow. You 00:19:36.490 --> 00:19:38.950 know, thanks to you, I'm reading Steady State 00:19:38.950 --> 00:19:43.769 every day. And I'm learning a great deal. As 00:19:43.769 --> 00:19:46.450 I should be. And I read Foreign Policy and I 00:19:46.450 --> 00:19:48.349 read The Atlantic and I read The New York Times 00:19:48.349 --> 00:19:49.970 and I read The Wall Street Journal and I read 00:19:49.970 --> 00:19:53.930 The Washington Post and I just wrote a piece 00:19:53.930 --> 00:19:58.309 for Spy Talk, which I think is interesting. I 00:19:58.309 --> 00:20:01.430 have a number of Substack writers who I follow. 00:20:02.309 --> 00:20:05.289 I spend far too much time staring at screens 00:20:05.289 --> 00:20:09.430 these days. I just signed up for a course on 00:20:09.430 --> 00:20:12.180 Hamlet. I'm sorry. You go ahead. They do. I was 00:20:12.180 --> 00:20:14.759 just about to say I just signed up for an online 00:20:14.759 --> 00:20:18.220 course in Hamlet and King Lear Shakespearean 00:20:18.220 --> 00:20:19.480 class because I have to tell you I just need 00:20:19.480 --> 00:20:21.839 to get my head out of Trump land for a little 00:20:21.839 --> 00:20:24.519 bit. Do they still teach journalism? Yes, they 00:20:24.519 --> 00:20:33.160 do. I was at my reunion two weeks ago for the 00:20:33.160 --> 00:20:36.359 Columbia Journalism School at Columbia University. 00:20:38.820 --> 00:20:43.619 I mean, we need talented, qualified, smart journalists, 00:20:43.859 --> 00:20:47.799 honest more than ever. The medium is changing, 00:20:47.960 --> 00:20:51.480 right? So one of the professors I was chatting 00:20:51.480 --> 00:20:54.359 with last week was telling me it's no longer 00:20:54.359 --> 00:20:57.660 teaching students how to just write paragraphs, 00:20:57.940 --> 00:21:00.799 you know, when I was a tape writer, but paragraphs 00:21:00.799 --> 00:21:03.900 on a page because people are reading their news, 00:21:03.960 --> 00:21:07.039 most people on a phone. So now it is write a 00:21:07.039 --> 00:21:10.660 paragraph. Add a photo. Write a paragraph. Add 00:21:10.660 --> 00:21:14.980 a video. Write a paragraph. Add a graph. Write 00:21:14.980 --> 00:21:18.339 a paragraph. Link to something else. That basically 00:21:18.339 --> 00:21:21.559 people are getting their information in this, 00:21:21.640 --> 00:21:25.380 you know, small screen, bite -sized chunks, and 00:21:25.380 --> 00:21:27.519 they're used to having it come in in different, 00:21:27.619 --> 00:21:31.859 you know, through different formats. And I think 00:21:31.859 --> 00:21:35.240 that's exciting. You know, it's a change. You 00:21:35.240 --> 00:21:37.789 know, AI is going to come kill us all. I think 00:21:37.789 --> 00:21:41.930 AI is already having a huge impact in newsrooms 00:21:41.930 --> 00:21:44.910 and in the information industry overall, as it 00:21:44.910 --> 00:21:47.430 is in advertising. And my son is in film. And 00:21:47.430 --> 00:21:49.970 it's changing the world around us faster than 00:21:49.970 --> 00:21:54.470 we can recognize. And I can't possibly predict 00:21:54.470 --> 00:21:55.930 how it's going to be because I don't think anybody 00:21:55.930 --> 00:21:59.150 knows. But it's having an impact. In some ways, 00:21:59.289 --> 00:22:01.890 it's a very useful tool for journalists, right? 00:22:01.970 --> 00:22:07.950 It allows you to analyze, you know. analyze material 00:22:07.950 --> 00:22:10.369 very quickly especially when it comes to spreadsheets 00:22:10.369 --> 00:22:13.789 and vast data sets and so on um you know it's 00:22:13.789 --> 00:22:18.049 other utterly untrustworthy in terms of um you 00:22:18.049 --> 00:22:20.230 know trying to find material but if you give 00:22:20.230 --> 00:22:22.309 it you know sports scores and you need it to 00:22:22.309 --> 00:22:26.150 you know write something up it'll do it i mean 00:22:26.150 --> 00:22:29.069 there there are ways that can be utilized that 00:22:29.069 --> 00:22:33.680 free up hopefully I mean, what we've seen so 00:22:33.680 --> 00:22:35.960 far at a lot of these places, it's led to a lot 00:22:35.960 --> 00:22:38.180 of people being fired. But I'd like to think 00:22:38.180 --> 00:22:41.319 what it does is it frees up people to do other 00:22:41.319 --> 00:22:44.440 more valuable work and lets AI do the scut work. 00:22:45.200 --> 00:22:48.339 That would be my hope. For somebody who's not 00:22:48.339 --> 00:22:52.440 in the business that you were in, how would you... 00:22:52.440 --> 00:22:56.119 I'm sort of trying to ask the same question I 00:22:56.119 --> 00:22:58.900 did a minute ago. How would you tell people to 00:22:58.900 --> 00:23:03.279 find... How would you advise if you were advising 00:23:03.279 --> 00:23:06.039 younger people, which is just about anybody in 00:23:06.039 --> 00:23:08.680 the world but me, how would you advise them to 00:23:08.680 --> 00:23:11.220 select the people they read in whatever media 00:23:11.220 --> 00:23:13.980 they choose? I mean, because when I came through, 00:23:14.039 --> 00:23:18.079 as you know, it was The Post and The Times, New 00:23:18.079 --> 00:23:20.420 York. I think L .A. Times wasn't quite there 00:23:20.420 --> 00:23:23.720 when I was a kid. But you sort of that's how 00:23:23.720 --> 00:23:26.140 you knew a trusted news source. And you also 00:23:26.140 --> 00:23:30.009 had. Walter Cronkite. And there was nobody more 00:23:30.009 --> 00:23:32.710 trusted than Walter Cronkite. And I'm just wondering 00:23:32.710 --> 00:23:36.150 what you say to people who are new to the world 00:23:36.150 --> 00:23:39.950 or new to figuring out, I guess, maybe how you 00:23:39.950 --> 00:23:44.150 figure out what's a trusted source. Is that an 00:23:44.150 --> 00:23:48.769 unfair question? No, I just I'm amused. No, no 00:23:48.769 --> 00:23:50.769 young person has ever asked me for any advice 00:23:50.769 --> 00:23:55.970 ever. That's not the least of all. So at one 00:23:55.970 --> 00:24:03.740 point. At one point I told my kid, he's 34, she's 00:24:03.740 --> 00:24:06.960 31 now. A couple of years ago, I think when they 00:24:06.960 --> 00:24:09.319 were finally college or something, I told them, 00:24:09.339 --> 00:24:11.660 you know, be careful what you put on the internet. 00:24:11.859 --> 00:24:13.559 You know, you don't want anything that appears, 00:24:13.640 --> 00:24:15.700 you know, could work up on the front page. And 00:24:15.700 --> 00:24:18.200 my son very innocently turns to me and says, 00:24:18.339 --> 00:24:21.319 what's a front page? They are not used to getting 00:24:21.319 --> 00:24:32.259 the material. You know, they – frankly, I still 00:24:32.259 --> 00:24:37.599 rely on some of the same sources that you did 00:24:37.599 --> 00:24:40.559 and I did growing up, and that's what I would 00:24:40.559 --> 00:24:44.000 advise. Not that every story in The New York 00:24:44.000 --> 00:24:47.480 Times is the best or correct or 100 percent, 00:24:47.599 --> 00:24:50.720 but overall they are trying and nobody is deliberately 00:24:50.720 --> 00:24:53.200 – you know putting their fingers on the on the 00:24:53.200 --> 00:24:55.519 there's something on the on the scale and nobody 00:24:55.519 --> 00:24:58.240 certainly deliberately putting false information 00:24:58.240 --> 00:25:01.680 in there at least not supposed to so well it's 00:25:01.680 --> 00:25:03.960 interesting that you talk about some words and 00:25:03.960 --> 00:25:05.759 then a graph and some words and then a picture 00:25:05.759 --> 00:25:08.559 and some words and then a clip of something because 00:25:08.559 --> 00:25:10.940 when we're doing writing which i do for steady 00:25:10.940 --> 00:25:13.839 state a fair amount and then i read things and 00:25:13.839 --> 00:25:15.740 they're a paragraph and then some of those things 00:25:15.740 --> 00:25:18.819 it just throws me so off balance i can't concentrate 00:25:18.819 --> 00:25:22.109 through that stuff at all And I have this ongoing 00:25:22.109 --> 00:25:26.630 discussion with a couple of you. Are you reading 00:25:26.630 --> 00:25:28.230 it on your phone or on your computer screen? 00:25:29.250 --> 00:25:32.069 On this thing. I can't read on my phone. My eyes 00:25:32.069 --> 00:25:36.930 aren't good enough. And I'm too old. Yeah. Well, 00:25:37.069 --> 00:25:39.450 they're not writing it for you, I guess. I don't 00:25:39.450 --> 00:25:42.109 know. No, I'm with you. No, it's just interesting 00:25:42.109 --> 00:25:45.549 to see because it's so different and it's so 00:25:45.549 --> 00:25:49.400 jarring. The young people that we work with always 00:25:49.400 --> 00:25:52.079 tell us that makes it better to read. So I guess 00:25:52.079 --> 00:25:56.640 I have officially become a dinosaur. Don't agree 00:25:56.640 --> 00:26:00.599 with that. You know, as we go through this, there 00:26:00.599 --> 00:26:03.279 are a couple of things happening that are encouraging, 00:26:03.460 --> 00:26:08.920 I would say. One is that – no, I'm serious. So 00:26:08.920 --> 00:26:11.519 one is that when I was a foreign correspondent, 00:26:11.759 --> 00:26:16.160 which I did 15 years or so. And I loved it. Went 00:26:16.160 --> 00:26:18.240 to 90 countries. I mean, just loved every bit 00:26:18.240 --> 00:26:21.960 of it. I used to think, I used to wake up and 00:26:21.960 --> 00:26:23.539 think, I can't believe they're paying me to do 00:26:23.539 --> 00:26:24.920 this. Then I came to Washington and I thought, 00:26:24.940 --> 00:26:27.960 they're not paying me enough to do this. But, 00:26:28.039 --> 00:26:33.980 you know, I was the eyewitness. My job was to 00:26:33.980 --> 00:26:37.819 go to places and be the eyes and ears of our 00:26:37.819 --> 00:26:39.960 viewers on the ground, of our readers, right? 00:26:40.039 --> 00:26:43.369 To bear witness to whatever. Good or bad, I was 00:26:43.369 --> 00:26:49.430 seeing wars and revolutions. Now, you know, everybody 00:26:49.430 --> 00:26:51.710 has a cell phone. Everybody's taking pictures. 00:26:51.890 --> 00:26:54.329 Everybody's getting video. There's so much more 00:26:54.329 --> 00:26:57.710 information out there. The problem is now because 00:26:57.710 --> 00:26:59.769 of AI and the rest of it and deep fakes, you 00:26:59.769 --> 00:27:02.109 don't know exactly what's real and what isn't. 00:27:02.109 --> 00:27:05.450 But in theory, there's a much greater flood. 00:27:07.819 --> 00:27:11.500 world of information out there from which you 00:27:11.500 --> 00:27:17.940 can draw your opinions or your beliefs or whatever. 00:27:18.200 --> 00:27:22.480 So I find that very exciting. I also find just 00:27:22.480 --> 00:27:27.299 on a short -term basis here, Trump isn't succeeding. 00:27:27.619 --> 00:27:30.460 I mean, for all that long list I gave him, there's 00:27:30.460 --> 00:27:32.720 been enough pushback now that the courts have 00:27:32.720 --> 00:27:36.279 thrown out. They threw out his $10 billion lawsuit 00:27:36.279 --> 00:27:38.559 against The Wall Street Journal. They threw out 00:27:38.559 --> 00:27:41.039 a lawsuit against The Post and The New York Times 00:27:41.039 --> 00:27:43.759 and various others. There is starting to be pushback. 00:27:43.920 --> 00:27:48.980 And if the midterms go the way polls suggest, 00:27:49.180 --> 00:27:52.579 and I'm not suggesting they will, then there 00:27:52.579 --> 00:27:55.180 might be more pushback. So I covered three presidential 00:27:55.180 --> 00:27:59.420 campaigns. And the one thing I can tell you is, 00:27:59.539 --> 00:28:06.259 or the one thing that I learned is, and by covering 00:28:06.259 --> 00:28:09.119 it, I was a proverbial boy on the bus, which 00:28:09.119 --> 00:28:12.029 meant that you follow the candidate. you know, 00:28:12.029 --> 00:28:14.369 in the bubble with the candidate. You're on the 00:28:14.369 --> 00:28:17.029 bus or in the plane or whatever. And you've got 00:28:17.029 --> 00:28:18.950 to help me. I did that for 15 months with Michael 00:28:18.950 --> 00:28:22.130 Dukakis. I also covered Walter Mondale and John 00:28:22.130 --> 00:28:25.569 McCain. Do you see a pattern there? They all 00:28:25.569 --> 00:28:32.190 lost. I was the kiss of death, right? One thing 00:28:32.190 --> 00:28:35.519 that I learned is you take polls. Especially 00:28:35.519 --> 00:28:37.779 now, we're six months out with a large grain 00:28:37.779 --> 00:28:40.339 of salt. If you don't believe me, ask President 00:28:40.339 --> 00:28:43.460 Hillary Clinton or President Kamala Harris about 00:28:43.460 --> 00:28:47.819 polling. And the problem is, even if you drill 00:28:47.819 --> 00:28:50.180 down into these polls that show Trump's numbers 00:28:50.180 --> 00:28:55.480 really cratering, they don't show Democrats. 00:28:56.039 --> 00:28:58.279 jumping up because these are always binary choices. 00:28:58.319 --> 00:29:00.900 Trump is down, you know, whatever it is, 21 % 00:29:00.900 --> 00:29:03.619 from his high, but Democrats are up 2 % from 00:29:03.619 --> 00:29:06.460 their low. It's really quite something. And the 00:29:06.460 --> 00:29:09.099 best line, the best explanation I got for this 00:29:09.099 --> 00:29:14.980 was I met a guy last year from Atlanta, and I 00:29:14.980 --> 00:29:17.339 asked if the anti -Trump movement was going to 00:29:17.339 --> 00:29:20.140 turn Georgia, you know, into a... a blue state, 00:29:20.220 --> 00:29:23.059 a purple state. And he said, you know, just because 00:29:23.059 --> 00:29:25.220 I don't like my rabbi doesn't mean I'm going 00:29:25.220 --> 00:29:27.779 to become a Catholic. And I think that's sort 00:29:27.779 --> 00:29:32.920 of where they are. Leave it at that. Nice, depressing 00:29:32.920 --> 00:29:36.880 place to leave it. It appears to me that we may 00:29:36.880 --> 00:29:39.799 be out of time. It has been a pleasure to talk 00:29:39.799 --> 00:29:43.700 to you again after a long drought and to see 00:29:43.700 --> 00:29:47.109 you. And I will see you soon, I expect. Thank 00:29:47.109 --> 00:29:49.130 you for agreeing to do this. Keep reading Steady 00:29:49.130 --> 00:29:52.569 State. Try to give us some hope next time I talk 00:29:52.569 --> 00:29:57.849 to you. And we'll go from there. So thank you 00:29:57.849 --> 00:30:02.130 very much, Bob. I was honored to do this, Margaret. 00:30:02.210 --> 00:30:07.190 Thank you for inviting me. Take care. Thank you 00:30:07.190 --> 00:30:09.809 for listening to this week's episode. If you 00:30:09.809 --> 00:30:12.029 like what you heard, please consider subscribing 00:30:12.029 --> 00:30:15.029 and leaving us a review. Your comments are really 00:30:15.029 --> 00:30:18.380 helpful. And we also welcome suggestions. This 00:30:18.380 --> 00:30:20.619 is Margaret Hennock for the SteadyState Sentinel 00:30:20.619 --> 00:30:27.019 Still Standing Watch. Thank you for listening 00:30:27.019 --> 00:30:30.740 to the SteadyState Sentinel podcast. Don't miss 00:30:30.740 --> 00:30:33.799 out on more insights and exposes from America's 00:30:33.799 --> 00:30:37.319 premier global security experts. Also, subscribe 00:30:37.319 --> 00:30:42.400 to our Substack at substack .com slash at SteadyState1 00:30:42.400 --> 00:30:45.500 and follow our social media. 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