A Conversation with Jake Tapper

become a sustaining member of the commonwealth  club for just ten dollars a month join today hello and welcome to today's  commonwealth club program   my name is clara jeffrey i'm the editor-in-chief  of mother jones and today's moderator   as the club continues to hold virtual events  during the pandemic they're also grateful for your   continued support visit thecommonwealthclub.org  to learn more about membership or to support   the club right now with a tax deductible gift by  clicking the blue donate button on your screen the   club would also like to thank the bernard osher  foundation for supporting today's good lit event   it's my pleasure to welcome jake tapper he's  the anchor and chief washington correspondent   at cnn where he hosts both a weekday show and a  sunday show he's also the author of a new novel   the devil may dance it's a sequel to his best  seller the hellfire club which is being adapted   into a tv series by hbo max we're going to talk  about historical fiction but also about politics   and media so if you have a question for jake  please put it in the chat jake um welcome good   to see you again good to see you been a long  time since i saw your face a very long time   you know a lot of the things that we're going  to discuss today are sort of an interesting   venn diagram between truth lies and fiction  so let me start off by asking you about some   news you made a few days ago when you told  kara swisher of the new york times that   republicans who push the election fraud  conspiracies are not welcome on your show and you   estimated that's about a third of the caucus which  to be honest seems low no no it's two-thirds of   the house box two-thirds of the house caucus  all right um in any case how did you arrive   at this decision well to be completely candid  um it's not a decision and it's not a policy   uh it's i i i haven't booked any of the  liars since the election and i just started   recently in the last few weeks talking publicly  about it it's not a policy i mean if if   if one of them wanted to come on the  show i would talk about it with my team   and i would want to talk about the election lies  obviously not just as a throwaway at the end   but as a focus i respect that there are other  people who do it differently who think that   the way to do it is to press them on the lies  etc although i haven't really seen a tremendous   amount of interviews like that but my so just  to be clear it's not a policy and if people uh i just think that we in the media  need to be having the conversation   and since uh i pretty much alone  haven't booked any of these people   i started talking about it publicly because people  started noticing it and i didn't want to be coy   about it i have real misgivings about it um and i  think that they're i think it's important to book   republicans and i think it's important to book  conservatives and um i just had congressman mike   mccall the uh chief um republican on the house  foreign affairs committee on on my show today   to talk about his view of biden and russia  and i think that's important you know what   but the election lies are not a difference  about tax policy it's not a personal personally   different you know disagreement about a social  issue the election lies are lies it's no less true   than saying i mean no no less alive than saying  that the the moon landing was faked or uh   that the holocaust didn't happen or uh i mean  these are just these are or that um are cueing on   or that bush knew about 9 11 and let it happen  you know these are these are offensive ideas   and generally speaking society treats them as such  this one was offensive from the very beginning   and and the re and the reason was you know when  trump's trump started lying about this before the   election he started setting the stage for when  it was obvious what was going to happen that   biden could very well win according to the polls  and that it was going to be a close election   especially in some states and that democrats  were using absentee ballots et cetera et cetera but we all feared i mean the reason  why we all feared about this i don't   care if it you know i don't care if  donald trump hurts joe biden's feelings   that doesn't that's not what's at stake here  what's at stake here is violence um you know   gabe uh uh sterling the the georgia republican  election official very conservative republican   in december early december i think december 6  in fact was warning about this he was saying   someone's going to get killed he was worried  about his election workers who were getting death   threats because of the lies that trump was saying  uh and then a month later was the insurrection so   yeah it turned out we had to worry about  mike pence as well yeah hang mike pence   we we had to worry about mitt romney we've seen  the video now of mitt romney running down the hall   i mean who knows what would have happened look  people lost their lives that day and there are   lots of brave capital and capitol police officers  and metropolitan dc police officers who who have   ptsd who are who are shell-shocked who are who  are some of them are wounded maimed for life   but the truth is we're lucky that more people  didn't die um four people who were part of the   mob died officer sicknick died afterwards were you  know we're still not sure why his family thinks   that it had to do with that day but the medical  examiner couldn't find any evidence of that two   police officers died by suicide in the days after  this body count this is what people were worried   about and so i think that it is uh incredibly  uh derelict for journalists while it is easier   it is derelict for journalists just to pick up  and move on so chris wallace was one of those who   when asked about this um you say it's  not a policy but a a history thus far   he characterized it as moral posturing um and  and said that the way to deal with this kind of   a thing is to have them on and grill them about it  you you say that you're not seeing that much of it   and i wonder why you think that is is it is  it a format issue is it a moral courage issue   what do you diagnose the problem to be   um it is not fun it is not easy it  subjects you to attacks from republicans because donald trump so successfully convinced  so many millions of americans that facts   are a partisan issue   you know there's a whole there's a whole group  of people like the elise stefanix and the josh   hawley's of the world that will attack you for  standing up for the facts about the election   and i can't speak to why other people don't i  can just say i have yet to see kevin mccarthy   or elise stefanik or or steve scalise or josh  hawley or ted cruz who i would consider to be   the five uh the five basically who kind of  led this effort like if it's stefanik is a new   addition to house leadership but she certainly  was a willing participant and that's why she's   in the position she's in now she's more liberal  than liz cheney she voted with trump less often   than liz cheney she just happens to be with  trump on this on the lie so the question is um   have any of them been held to account for  their election lies for kevin mccarthy saying   right after the election that donald  trump won the election in a landslide for   for steve scalise signing out signing on to that  truly deranged texas attorney general lawsuit that   tried to disenfranchise four states just cancel  their electoral votes and it's i mean i don't   know how many of the people who signed on to it  it's about i don't know i think it's about 100   340 members of the house republican caucus i don't  know how many of them read it but it's crazy it's   like it's crazy stuff in there it's not just like  you can be cr like there's a difference between   being critical i don't like how states changed  their election laws and played fast and loose   because we're in the middle of a pandemic like  there's there's a way to do that and then there's   a way to which i i think i could understand  somebody having uh making an argument like   that that's not to me election line i have  concerns about how that was done like you're   not saying that joe biden's illegitimate you  just don't like how states did that because of   the pandora but this is crazy stuff i haven't  seen any of one of these five grilled at all   at all literally at all by this have you i mean  i'm happy to say i'm happy to correct myself but   i haven't seen anyone of those 5b really ask tough  questions over and over in an interview about this   i wonder what you would say to this  theory that i'm going to put out that   historically politicians go on cable  news show sunday shows radio interviews   to spin something to or to put out their positions  whatever that is and so now when confronted with   you know lies and just bizarrely deranged theories  that they're putting forth that it's very hard for   the sort of apparatus around producing these  shows to adjust you're an exception and i wonder   even within your own network how that's being  received i mean i'm given the um you know the the   leeway to do what i want to do um i don't  and look everybody has different ways of   doing it there are many anchors for whom i have  tremendous respect who are doing it differently   and you know maybe maybe they think all you  need to do is have the person on ask a few   questions about whatever the issue of the day is  and god knows there are important issues of the   day that we need to be talking about with not only  democrats but republicans um for what it is that   we do at cnn uh and then they ask a few questions  and you know i and they think that that's   good enough and i don't i'm not saying that i have  the answers on this i don't know i am just saying   as genuinely as i can at that i am i am and it  would be much easier if i did not feel this way   it would much be much easier to book the shows  it would it's much more it's much easier to   get along to go along in washington dc it's there  are there are people who went along with this lie   that i liked that i had had on my that you  know that i have had on my shows before to   talk about important issues um but i can't  get behind it if one of these people said i made a mistake i shouldn't have done that  i shouldn't have signed on to that lawsuit   i shouldn't have voted to disenfranchise the  millions of legal voters who cast their ballots   in arizona and pennsylvania i shouldn't have done  that i shouldn't have told those lies or whatever   i honestly would say okay and then i would be able  to i honestly would then book that person i really   would i i don't want it's not fun this really kind  of sucks um it makes it tougher to book the show   and uh it's not like there's a lot of people like  saying yeah i think that that's a good example   that tapper kids doing i guess i guess no one's  calling me a kid anymore anyway but yeah i'm gonna   follow that guy's lead that's a good they're not  and that's okay but i just this is just how i feel   and again it's it's not a policy i'm not saying  i'm never going to do it i am just saying right   now in june 2021 i feel really uncomfortable  about the idea of just letting these folks   walk away from this as if what happened in january  6 didn't happen as if they as if they played no   role and also listen to liz cheney listen to what  she's saying she is very clearly saying although   i'm going to say it more clearly than she does  because she's she's got i mean she's already   it's tough what she's going through she is saying  they tried to steal the election once they're   going to try to do it again that's what she's  saying very clearly at great professional cost   she lost her leadership position she may never be  elected president she might lose her house seat at   great professional costs she has done this and  i'm sure she's getting death threats like crazy   and i'm sure it's not fun to be in wyoming for  her yeah i would imagine um so we we've touched   on lies we'll come back to more lies but um i  i just wanted to ask you a sort of professional   jealousy question i guess you know you're the lead  acre of cnn you have two shows you had to be on   hand for all the craziness that was you know on  call for whatever 2020 threw at us and and early   21. you have two kids how in hell did you find the  time to write this book well first of all i have   an incredibly supportive spouse so that's you know  really important and my kids are old enough now   that the time they're 11 and 13 that they want to  spend time with me but they don't want to spend   too much time with me you know yeah  familiar yeah you know so but i will say   this i mean you know i wrote this this book  in about it took about two and a half years   so it wasn't like it just happened um  but i will say that first of all uh   the i find the outlining process very helpful  when it comes to writing because then you can just   it's like i'm i'm the kind of person that i get i  just i got signed up for all these committees for   i went to dartmouth for dartmouth i'm on all these  committees and for me honestly like i don't i just   give me a list of five things to do that's what  i want you know what i mean that's what i would   prefer as opposed to the committees and but  an outline is like a list of it's it's like   this is what you need to do and so for example  like oh you know okay i'm on chapter 13 today   here is what it says in the outline to write  and like then i'll do that so that helps   and then the writing program is like a diet  or like an exercise routine or anything like   that you just have to make a rule and stick to  it as much as you can and for me the rule is   try to sit down every day and write even  if it's just for a minimum of 15 minutes   because because anybody can find 15 minutes  in their day over breakfast lunch dinner   right before you go to bed whatever and if  all you do is 15 minutes a day for a week   that's an hour 45 minutes that's three or  four pages and it adds up so that's really   the rule but i'm i will also say that i  wrote a lot of this during the pandemic   and is excruciating and awful a time it was for  all of americans and all everybody worldwide and   as tough as it was for journalists too because  we had like we couldn't turn look away we had to   stay abreast of everything i did the show from  my house from from april to august and i found   myself with a lot more time than i'd ever had in  my life so you're making the case for remote work   well the lack of commute is the key to a novel  i mean i i think that's reasonable the hour and   a half two hours of commute gone the i won't i'm  not going to say that there's a lot of time spent   in the office that's wasted but there's a lot of  time spent in the office that's wasted i think we   i think anybody who's ever worked in an office  knows that there's a degree of hanging out time   and meetings time and there was something about  the pandemic that made meetings at least for me   and i hate meetings uh if i had far fewer meetings  no birthday parties i had to pop by in the in the   kitchen i had more time on my hands i really  did and i had a desire to escape the reality   of what we all went through by spending uh an  hour you know with the rat pack in my brain   it's interesting i i was just about to ask you the  first book was sent set in dc in the mccarthy era   and you know your your protagonists um are the  same both book this couple charlie and margaret   martyr um but what made you choose to set  this book in you know vegas and hollywood in   62. it honestly was just um i heard this amazing  story and i heard it right around the time   that uh i realized that the book that people were  buying the first book the hellfire club and that   i was gonna if i wanted to i was gonna be able to  write a second one and i just heard this amazing   true story which is something so amazing i don't  think i could have ever concocted it which is   so sinatra which i'm sure you're the attendees  tonight know was one of the biggest stars in the   world and the rat pack which were his best friends  who were also the biggest stars in the world and   it's hard to explain to younger people the best  way i can explain it and this falls short too   because this isn't even like a good this is maybe  like a millennial reference definitely not gen z   but the rat pack was so big that they made a  really they made a really crappy movie called   ocean's 11 and everybody saw it and it's not  a good movie it's really awful it was just so   they could go hang out in las vegas and and screw  around um not that they needed a reason anyway but   but the remake of oceans 11 by soderberg is you  know like almost everything soderberg does just   absolutely brilliant and it stars the biggest  stars of its time george clooney and brad pitt   and matt damon and don cheadle and you know  uh julia roberts you know there's just a ton   and what you have to understand about the rat pack  is imagine if all those guys cloney and damon and   all imagine and brad pitt imagine if they could  all sing as well as act and imagine that they're   all best friends like that's what the rat pack was  like this just incredible constellation of stars   so anyway they worked their hearts out to get  senator john f kennedy elected in 1960 and   thought not crazy not not insanely at all that  when sinatra thought that when the president   kennedy would would come stay with him when  he came out to california i mean the rat pack   did a lot for him and it was a very narrow  election and also a member of the rat pack   was married to kennedy's sister uh peter  lawford was married to patricia kennedy   so he started having all this work done to his  estate to the compound in rancho mirage right   near palm springs it's about two hours well you  guys know it's about two hours outside in l.a so   um he like he had rooms put in he had  phone lines installed he had a helipad   constructed this is this is i didn't make this  up this is this all happened and then attorney   general robert kennedy who was going after  organized crime it was pointed out to him   and he hated organized crime i mean he he worked  against it when he was a senate staffer and there   was a famous showdown he had with sam g and khanna  the chicago mob boss where sam giancana was taking   the fifth and giggling and then just senate aide  robert kennedy i guess he was the chief democratic   council said something like are you giggling mr  giancana i thought only little girls giggled mr   g and khan or something like that anyway he hated  samji and kind of anyway it's pointed out to him   when he's attorney general i mean i think he  was like 36 or something um you know sinatra   who's friends with your brother the president is  friends with giancana right so i don't can you   really let your brother stay at sinatra's house so  kennedy had this robert kennedy had this dilemma   do i insult one of the biggest stars in the  world a friend of my brothers who helped   get my brother elected through ways known and  secret or do i let my brother sleep in a bed   where mobsters have slept so when i heard that  story i'm like first of all i said how have i   never heard the story before i mean it just i  don't know how i made it to whatever age i was   uh late 40s early 50s and i had never heard that  story before and then i said well i need to have   charlie and margaret go into that because  that's just amazing as it is and i can keep   playing with the kennedys and  now i can add the rat pack and   it just sounds fun i mean there's a lot of work  too but it just seemed like it would be fun   what was the what was the funnest part to research  i mean you you get into the mob you get into the   rat pack you get into the scientologists um what  was the most uh fascinating or just a good time to   to to read up on some of the best books of that  era there's some magnificent um books about uh   members of the rat pack nick tochis wrote the most  beautiful one called dino uh uh the it's like dino   the the dirty business of dreams or something like  that but it's just so good the late nick tatches   uh james kaplan wrote a couple amazing biographies  of sinatra kenny kelly wrote a pretty dishy   kitty kelly version uh but some of the most  enjoyable ones are the ones by some of like   the smaller characters like judith ecksner uh  who uh had an affair with um giancana and others   in that era um she wrote a book uh that came  out in 1977 and kind of disappeared i'm sure   with people pulling strings but  it was catching kill of its day   i mean it was published but i think it went  straight to paperback and yeah i mean i'm sure   i'm sure there was some pressure on networks  to not touch it i'm sure there had to have been   because it's so insane this book she wrote uh and  then george jacobs who was a valet of sinatra's uh   just reading about the era is incredible um there  was so much that was interesting i'll tell you   what was most surprising to me was just thinking  about race in 19 and there's a lot of this in   the book there's a lot about um how women are  treated in hollywood and there's also a lot about   um race in hollywood because sami davis junior  obviously is a character in the book but first   of all sinatra was unbeknownst to me at the time  really progressive on civil rights issues like in   the 40s and the 50s i mean you and i think are  roughly the same age you look younger than me   but i think we're roughly contemporaries uh and  i the sinatra i knew was kind of bloated with   the toupee and he was singing to ronald and rancy  nancy reagan that's the reagan that's the sinatra   i was a first when i was first aware of sinatra  and then i became aware of like him through   people making fun of him like joe piscopo  or doing impressions of him on certain life   and it wasn't until later that i started  like you know listening to his music and   and the like but he was very progressive on  civil rights issues in the 40s and 50s like   forcing uh vegas hotels to integrate uh demanding  that um african-american members of the band   were paid the same i mean in today's  context it's not that big a deal but in 1950   it it it was pretty revolutionary the kennedys  also one of the other things that was interesting   to me um was sammy davis jr i never really  thought about it but he his wife was white and what a i mean which was very uncommon in  1960 very uncommon i mean loving versus   virginia virginia was 67 or something  the law the supreme court case that   struck down laws against interracial marriage  i think it was like seven years later   the kennedys and i don't know whether john or  robert knew about it certainly ambassador kennedy   leaned on the rat back for sammy davis jr to delay  his wedding until after the election i mean that's   how messed up this world was so i think just a  lot of that stuff like you know it intellectually   that like boy it was really racist back then  but then like seeing like little examples of   even super huge stars like sammy  davis jr were being pressured by the   democratic nominee to delay his interracial uh  marriage and even then he wasn't asked to perform   at the inaugural ball because he had a white  wife so sydney partier was there with his his   black wife but you know so just i mean it makes a  little bit more sense why jackie robinson endorsed   dick nixon in 1960. you know i had this  experience reading the book that i would   stop every few pages to to to google things you  know i i feel like an interactive version of   it should be available at some point but you know  your protagonists move kind of zelig like through   just a world chock full of real celebrities all  the names you just mentioned and many many others   um it's a real who's who of 1962. and i i was  kind of intrigued to think about like your your   job as a journalist is to unearth truth about  powerful people when you put on your novelist hat   you're also inventing some tales about them and  just tell me how you thought about that tension   it is a tension you're right and it's one  that i struggled with in the first book   and the second book because i'm making  stuff up about real people um and i felt   uh in between the first draft and the second draft  of the first of the first book the hellfire club i   became a little bit more comfortable with uh and  i made um joe mccarthy a bigger character in the   book and if i could do a third draft of it i would  make him an even bigger one and in fact in the tv   show that we're working on me and  mark smith who wrote the revenant   i said make like i wish i could do a third draft  and i'd make joe mccarthy an even bigger character   um which is why and so in the second book i'm  even i'm more comfortable with it and that's   why sinatra is arguably the the third biggest  character in the book after charlie and margaret   you i you know i guess the challenge is you're  just trying to be you have to just let yourself   make stuff up because it's a novel and you can't  just go by transcripts of things that people said   uh because then you have no plot you know  you're then it's just um you know you're uh   do you remember uh what was the name of the book  dead of the movie do you remember dead men don't   wear planned you can't do a dead man that's  for people who don't know uh dead men don't   wear plaid is a movie that came out in the 80s and  it's steve martin as a detective in the 30s or 40s   and it's him interacting with real film stars  from that time so he can only he has to use   what they did in real movies so i can't do that  in a novel and i can have more i know i have   more freedom than that than uh than steve martin  did for that but you try to be true to the idea   you try to be true to the to the essence  of the person you know you can't have   frank sinatra like open his shirt he's spider-man  you can't have um you know you just you want it to   ring true that's all i mean like you're creating a  universe and they're real people in this universe   and you want it to ring true you don't want to  um you want the reader to believe it in fact   one of the somebody asked me  the other day you know what   is there any is there anybody from that era that  i wanted to have in the book uh as a big you know   that i didn't and there is and it's marilyn  monroe she appears a few times in the book   this is like towards the end of her life she  dies in 1962. um but not not in the in my book   but um because the book ends in may and i think  she dies later i think maybe august or september   but she kind of is here and there she shows up  and she's kind of like falling apart because   she's really drug-addled and just really destroyed  at that point real a real tragic uh figure and   i never could figure out a way to get her  into the book in a way that didn't feel   even though the book is all kind of gimmicky it  just i never could i never could figure out a   way to do it that rang true so that's it i mean i  just had to rely on my instinct to like make it so   people would feel my ambivalence about sinatra  uh but also see the good and bad in him   and that sort of thing but like never it just had  to ring it had to ring right for the world i was   creating you know sometimes historical fiction  whether it's in printed form or in films can   can kind of end up being the perceived history  of a moment or a person um even even though   it you know is not a strictly historical  work and i'm like i can see alaska from   my house which sarah palin never i can see  russia from my house which she never said   and is probably her best known quote and she never  said it absolutely and um you know in in this book   your the hellfire club was written further  back in in the trump era when we you know had   already gotten into the world of alternative  facts and everything but probably wasn't   quite as obvious just how much of a sort of  post-truth era we are in yeah um and this one   about the demagoguery as well i mean there's  there's resonance in the first book about   trump but it's uh in the in the form of um  joe mccarthy's demagoguery but yeah no i'm   sorry to interrupt but yes i agree um well  i was just wondering because in this book   without giving away too much you know we have we  have the church of scientology up to some some uh   not such good things we we have human trafficking  kind of at the center of the book and um   i'm wondering on kind of both those those topics  you know given how much the sort of moral panic   over human and child trafficking has become  such a part of q anon for example did that   was that more interesting to explore did  it make you uneasy at moments when you   were exploring that wondering oh man is  is jake tapper's version of history gonna   you know blot out the sun uh it's more i think  it's more epstein than q anon in terms of the the   the trafficking angles like in other words  like reality based um and we can't pretend   that it's still not a part of the  life of some you know very wealthy   and powerful men that uh you know i look i don't  know what of the allegations against congressman   matt gates i don't know what's true i don't know  it's not true i don't know it's going to hold   up in court but there are there has certainly  been many allegations about a scene in florida   where women are encouraged to come and party  and have things paid for uh and that's it's 2021   still going on so i did feel like exploring that  was important uh especially because you know the   book was taking place in hollywood um i wanted  margaret to have her you know generally the way   these books work is i give charlie kind of like  a mystery to solve and margaret gets one too or   margaret margaret has her own mystery like they're  both he's kind of the main protagonist but she's   kind of the hero so it's like they have these kind  of like joy you know uh parallel adventures so   i wanted how women are treated in hollywood to be  a subtext of of the book both you know janet lee   and and tippy hedren and and the like uh but  also younger more vulnerable uh women and yes   i definitely thought about epstein um which  is a real see the thing about q anon is if   any of these folks were as far as i can tell  first first of all let me just say there's nothing   unrighteous about caring about child sex  trafficking or sex trafficking in general i mean   that's a horrible major problem in this country  all over the world i don't see any evidence that   these people are actually concerned about it i see  them like like worried about it's not like they've   turned on matt gates right i mean like it's a  partisan a partisan filter for sure yeah no i   mean there are a number of and you can find them  uh former trump and i'm not blaming trump for it   at all but there are people who you know have been  affiliated with the trump campaign or the trump   white house or the republican party who have been  who've gotten in trouble for child pornography or   trafficking or whatever and i mean you just have  to google it it's right there the rest reports and   i've seen none i see nothing about q anon caring  about any of that it's just as a way to traffic in ways to demonize democrats  in the media and hollywood   but but epstein was definitely on my mind  very much let me ask you about in some ways   maybe the highest wire you were on in  this book you invented a sinatra song   um which is yeah the title of the book is the  title of the song and it's not in the book you   the the lyrics are sung and therefore written  on the page intercut with an action scene and   uh you know i don't i don't know how  vicious the sinatra fan base is these   days but i i wondered what you did to sort of  feel like you felt pretty sure that these are   in the style and the manner of  lyrics that sinatra would have sung   well it was more so when i wrote the outpost  which is a non-fiction book about afghanistan   uh there was a scene where one of the guys in  his whole unit where they were driving into   afghanistan they're driving north and afghanistan  and they are cranking up ac dc and there was   another scene at the end of the book after the big  battle where eight of their brothers died this is   all this all true story where they're singing  johnny cash songs because one of them played   the guitar this guy specialist chris jones and  i had to take out everything except for one line   because the attorneys for little brown and i'm  sure it's the same for every publishing house said   you can't quote more than one lie or we'll  get sued for copyright infringement period   and then the same happened when i wrote the  hellfire club and i tried to use songs from the   time to set a tone set a one line and i i hate it  so much music is so such a part of our lives and   you're not quoting the song you're not playing  the song but you just you know you're recording   a lyric i think i think it's really so this is  like frustration over the limits of fair use   i love it entirely it was like and in fact the  lawyers called me there's more than one song in   there that's made up by the way the um first of  all thank you for reading the book not everybody   who does one of these actually reads the book  so i appreciate it um the scene at disneyland   where sammy davis jr and peter lawford sing  a wacky song about the cuban revolution   uh like a cheesy like kind of embarrassed like  that i wrote that i made up and then there's   another time that peter lawford and charlie are  driving to the compound in rancho mirage and uh   and there's like a song a sinatra song comes on  the radio that's just a paragraph or something but   i made that up too yeah and the lawyers called me  up and they're like tapper we've been through this   now this is the third book you can't quote more  than a line from a song you have an entire scene   with an entire song intricately woven into  this action scene at the climax of the book   and i'm like i wrote the song it's not a real song  it's not a real sinatra song but i but they they   were so i was really psyched that i fooled them  and then my editors made me put at the end of the   book um to make sure that nobody went mad googling  uh that i made that i wrote it that i made it up   but it's the theme of the song the theme  of the book the theme of the book is   what happens to you when you ally yourself with  somebody who is who has worse ethics than you   whether it's the kennedys allying themselves  with the rat pack or sinatra allying himself   with the mob or charlie hanging out  with the rat pack what happens to you   when that happens and that's  what the song is about   and it's also something that we're seeing play out  in real time right now with the republican party   they danced with the devil metaphorically donald  trump to get their judges and their tax cuts and   whatever they wanted and now we see how he has  altered them and i mean i know people who knew   elise stefanik when she worked at the bush white  house and they do not recognize this person so   i mean i think that wasn't intentional at the  time but but when i wrote the book about what   happens to you when you ally yourself but  it's i think it's kind of resonant right now   um you and i both got our start more or less  at the same alternative weekly washington city   paper where they're at slightly different times  jack schaefer i would i had i had a i split my   time between jack shaffer and david carr so i was  doubly blessed um that's great i'm i'm wondering   what how that time helped inform the rest of your  career well david carr was an incredible editor   and if i'd known how little time we were going to  get with him i probably would have taken advantage   of it more um he is the one that convinced  me i was writing freelance i was working in   public relations because it paid better and i  was you know this is in my twenties when i was   so i was doing pr and kind of figuring  out what i wanted to do with my life   and i started doing freelance journalism and then  he took me to lunch to that french restaurant in   adams morgan that he loved i forget the name  of it you know what i'm talking about and   yeah it was the first time i ever saw snails not in a garden and he convinced me to   quit my job and take a huge pay cut and become a  journalist join you know hop on his pirate ship   and so that was huge and then i mean i remember so  many things and i wish i could go back in time and   yell at my younger self to take advantage more of  being next to him being near him but he was just a   interesting guy critical thinker i  always thought it was so amazing how he   one of the things he did was he wrote the  press column while being this amazing editor   he wrote the press column and he would take  on the washington post in these just like   in this fearless way because like every writer in  washington wanted to work for the washington post   everyone and carr was like crapping all  over them righteously with repo with in   like the best way possible which is like not  with opinion with inc with reported analysis   but just like the facts were what drove it and  he was just fearless and uh i wish i wish he's   one of the people that i wish i could see i  wish the world is so deprived of his voice   um not covering the era we're in he obviously  went on to become the media writer for the new   york times i would just love to see him making  sense of our media now making sense of trump world   when did he die in 2014 2015 or something yeah so  and uh yeah but i mean it was just it was very um   influential because it's so funny i know that the  perception of me and anyone who works for cnn is   that we're mainstream corporate blah blah blah  but like i feel like a city paper i feel like an   alternative weekly guy you know and like yeah i  realize i'm working within the confines of like   commercial television commercial news but like my  roots are city paper and i'm really proud of it   you know it's um i think we're we're both bereft  that alt weekly's um you know have really kind of   taken it on the chin the last past couple decades  or you know most of them are closed the ones that   are left are um mostly not where they used to  be and and honestly that's true of a lot of   journalism and i'm wondering what  part of it worries you the most   well i mean the stuff that david simon talks  about that who is going to go to the baltimore   city council meetings because it's not going to  be cnn it's not gonna be the new york times it's   not gonna be mother jones like who's gonna  do it like it has to be the baltimore sun or   the baltimore city paper it has to be um that  terrifies me because the truth of the matter is the politicians in washington  are probably less crooked   than as a general rule than the ones in state  capitals and cities and counties all over the   country just because there's so much oversight uh  by the press and by the house no that doesn't mean   that there isn't a lot of corruption and and  generally speaking uh it's cliche at this   point to say but the scandal in washington  is always what's legal not what's illegal   but i worry about like what's going on in  harrisburg you know what's going on in trenton um   is anybody covering it uh are  enough people covering it so that's   but you know it's not just it's not just the the  local newspapers and um the local free weeklies   it's local television stations too um i  mean some of them are still in the fight   i just saw a great report out of seattle of uh  some really messed up treatment of foster kid   foster kids um by the sea the service there the  foster service in washington state but like all   all of these institutions are are holding on you  know by a thread and you know that's by intention   i mean that's what that's what politicians  and corporate america want to have happen   yeah and i think it's also  that you know things like cnn   and the new york times rely either either on the  talent pool that comes up through those places or   the file footage i mean you know or whatever like  the reporting that's done locally uh you may not   live in that location but if it's important enough  it gets to the national news but not if it's never   told yeah and i will say especially if anybody  is listening um when it comes to mother jones   or any other organization if you think that  you have a story that is big that you've broken   for your local outlet hit me up on twitter or  social media i will you know we will go in we   will give you the credit i just did it today for  reveal which is this non-profit uh great uh news   organization that broke this horrifying story they  have this video of a sheriff's deputy in texas   that's a great story tasing a 15 year old migrant  a year ago somehow the video didn't come out till   this week and the investigation by the sheriff's  office didn't start until last month but reveal   did it and you know we gave them the credit their  stamp was all over the video like we'll bring   attention to it if it's a big enough story and and  i mentioned some other local news coverage uh on   my show today from kansas and from washington like  i i am it's probably a manifestation of coming up   from citypaper and salon.com and seeing people  take my scoops and not give credit that i try   to be assiduous with my crediting if somebody  breaks a story and i will continue to do that   but we need that i mean we  need i mean i'm not gonna   yeah i mean we need great investigative  journalists all over you know every profile   that i've i've read about you um has described you  as being very confident from a young age and um   i think you know me well enough to know  that i'm i have plenty of insecurities   well i i would say that what do you  think for you at least in your public   your public persona which came first  the confidence or the accomplishments   like how did you gain confidence and what would  you say to young journalists who are maybe   a different gender or a different race what would  your advice be to to kind of seize that confidence   first of all i'm plenty insecure i mean you  know like any other human being on the planet um   but that said i think one of the things and  this is i say this to young people constantly   because i don't think anybody prepared me  so i want young people to know this and   young people who are any color any race  any gender identification any whatever   any any ethnicity especially in journalism  but in anything there is a lot more rejection   out there than you have been  raised to believe there is in life   like if you're a kid and then you're a high  schooler and then you're a college kid there's   some rejection here and there maybe you didn't get  the part you wanted in the school play or maybe   the boy you liked or the girl you like didn't  like you back or whatever you didn't get into   the fraternity you wanted but generally speaking  you get a lot of what you want and there are like   there's a cocoon around you there are like people  there are people in college whose job it is to   your resident advisors right who their job is  to make sure that you're doing okay right um but   then you go into the into the real world and it  is it can it can't for me at least it was harsh   because it's not like it's and it's tough not to  take it personally but like it's not it's just   it's just a different world and people  just need to be ready to be rejected and   not take it personally and i know it's easy  to say it but you just have to believe me   that every successful person you see in  journalism everyone and i'm friends with a lot of   people in journalism you know from print to radio  to tv whatever every one of us has been rejected   so many times by so many people um like  professionally and maybe personally too   and uh but i mean professionally uh when  i was a freelancer i mean submitting story   and this is like and you know i'm faxing  story ideas to people so much rejection um   and you just have to this is just part  of it it's just part of it and you just   have to think of it like you're gonna make  it it and it's gonna you know and nothing   like there are going to be people who get like  everything they want and whatever just the world   lies prostate at their feet but generally speaking  it's uh it's it's much more of a struggle and   that's just how it is and i just think  people should just be prepared for it   i think there's probably never been a better time  to be a woman journalist or a journalist that's   who's who's black or latino or asian that i'm  not saying that it's easy or i'm it's still much   easier to be a white male journalist don't get me  wrong but people are at least now like aware that   you know it's part of the conversation in a  way that it wasn't when i was coming up so   don't let that discourage you um  there will be there will be um   there's always going to be uh obstacles but if  you want to be a journalist or if you want to   be whatever you want to be you can be it what  um what part of your job do you enjoy the most the truth of the matter is i love doing my show i  love doing the lead and i love doing state of the   union uh which i do know twice a month and dana  bash is my co-anchor she does the other two times   i love it i love like i love having like we  do i feel like we do a really good show like   we do we cover news from all over the world i  love not having to cover whatever you think of   trump and i'm not saying he should have been  elected or reelected or whatever but like   him not being in the white house and not like   doing crazy tweets or having like  everybody just like constantly reacting to   the disrupting he's doing means that like i  now have time in my show to do a piece about   foster care in america or to do a piece with  somebody about the elections in nicaragua or   you know we have these amazing journalists  like clarissa ward and nema al beger and   i love bringing their stories to air i love nema  goes to ethiopia uh in the tigre and i love that   uh and i'm proud of that i feel like a lot of  people talk about like a lot of people talk   about what journalism should be and what  how you know and i feel like i'm not doing   i'm not saying like i'm not i'm you know  i'm our show's perfect or i'm perfect or   anything like that i'm proud of the fact  that we're doing stories from ethiopia   you know is it is it i mean that's an  entire show but of the sort of particular   pieces do you do you love grilling someone do you  love the sort of research process leading up to   a great segment is there a part that particularly  charges you about the making of any any one show i mean when i have a good interview with  somebody like a good tough interview with   somebody it's it's uh it's fun i  like doing stephen miller perhaps   that was a sort of a it was a classic that was a  long time ago i i feel like but that wasn't plus   i would have really honestly preferred him  to have been just like a normal human being   and like answer my questions but he  was performing for his audience of one i'm actually i haven't watched it i did fresh air a few years ago and  they played me a chunk of the interview   and i couldn't believe in retrospect how patient  i was with him like i really let him babble for a   long time like i guess it was 2017 or 2018 like  my tolerance changed a lot i like calling out i   really do like calling out the lies i do like it i  mean i would i would prefer that they didn't do it   but i do like calling it out because i think  that we're in a i worry about our democracy   uh i worry in a way i worry more  than it now than i did before because it's not that it was out of character for trump  what he did but there was always the belief   that he could be reined in and i think that  jared kushner was telling mitch mcconnell just   wait till december just wait till the electors  meet then he'll drop it and he didn't obviously   so i do feel like their democracy is at risk  maybe even in a greater way than it was before   you know i think people don't really fully  understand how close we came to the election   being stolen well and how they're setting up  to enshrine the ability to do it again uh you   know that's what i'm worried about because now  they're changing laws in states like georgia   to make it so it will be easier for a  state legislature to overturn the will   of a secretary of state whose job it is like brad  rappensberger who is a very conservative christian   evangelical republican who abided by the law  and stuck to the facts and now may well not be   re-elected he might not he might be primaried he  might lose his primary um and i think that's going   to happen in a few places i i think people i don't  know if people really fully understand that like   15 20 different people in the job in specific  places philadelphia city council and you know   michigan borderlands yeah maricopa county like  all of them republican by the way all these   people i'm talking about the governor governor  kemp very unlikely heroes right governor ducey   i think people don't fully understand necessarily  that if like 15 20 different people were in those   positions the election would have been stolen and  i don't know what would have happened i mean would   there have been another civil war i mean what  would have happened i mean let me ask you what   what was happening at the network when that was  going on i mean journalists covering it were aware   of of the peril that it was coming down to a very  i mean we were calling it as we were laying it   straight as it was during that time saying i don't  know what they were saying on other networks um but you know but we were just saying what  was happening but i don't know i'm afraid   of what's going to happen next time i mean i was  afraid before but if trump and the mega forces   literally steal an election and i think just  to be clear on what we're talking about we're   talking about the the theory goes um whoever the  democratic nominee is biden or harris or whoever   wins the popular vote by 10 million  wins the electoral vote by a few states   and then those states georgia  arizona pennsylvania wisconsin   michigan the laws have been changed or whatever  i guess that won't happen in michigan as long as   there's a democratic governor but in certain  other places who knows and there's and there   are disputes we have like the election of 1876  where there's two different slates of electors   this happened before right right  it happened in 1876 and uh anyway   i mean i don't know what's gonna happen and and  if kevin and if um mccarthy is the speaker of the   house i mean what liz cheney is saying is he won't  do the right thing i mean she doesn't say it like   that i asked her what would what would mccarthy  have done had he been speaker in january 2021   what would he have done would have upheld the law  in the constitution and she said i think you can   only judge somebody by his actions and i said  well his actions are he supported the big lie   she said i mean yeah i think that that's what's  so interesting i mean you mentioned a while ago   that that uh you know jared was telling mitch  mcconnell like he'll let it go don't worry   i i don't know what would lead jared or anybody  else to believe that at that point i don't put   much credence queens in uh jared's honesty but  um now he wasn't even there right he was running   he around solving middle east peace you know so  he did accomplish something but he but he's but   he's deluded if he thinks that's going to be  in the first paragraph of his obituary i mean   you know hopefully which won't be  written for a long long time but like   that's not the lead but but dean i think what's  interesting about this moment is that yes   trump still holds sway and they're all worried  about being primaried and mean tweets or mean   you know email misses whatever tool he's using at  his disposal now that he's killed his failing blog   but they're doing it nonetheless it's not you  know it's maybe at his behest but in a much more   attenuated way so there's not there's not this  sort of oh i didn't see that tweet oh i don't   know what he's doing i don't really believe him  you know and i think that's a scary new moment   for the country that i i am not sure people fully  understand either that this is this has become   an ideology of maintaining power at kind of all  costs yeah absolutely i mean i think liz cheney um i mean you just have to look at liz cheney who  is somebody i'm sure that you agree with nothing   i agree with her about almost nothing  but you just have to look at what she did   and like this whole idea i mean it's such a joke  when the maga people say like liz cheney did that   to be popular at cocktail parties or whatever  what cocktail parties like who's having cocktail   parties and even then when there were cocktail  parties i never saw this cheney at a cocktail   party i mean i don't go too many too many of them  anyway but like it's all such nonsense there's no   upside for liz cheney other than she can sleep at  night that's it like she might lose her house seat   her state is mad at her it's the most  percentage-wise the most trump supporting state in   the country she wants to be president i can't see  that happening anytime in the least in the next   decade or two i mean forget being i'm not sure  that ever would have happened to be honest but yes   i i mean i can't imagine any of these people  becoming president until all of a sudden   they're president so yeah i mean i guess i get  your point i mean my only point is just like   she threw i mean she didn't throw it away but  like she risked it all because she's saying   they're lying they've been lying it caused the  insurrection they're going to try to do it again   this is a clear and present danger to the nation  she didn't go on david axelrod's podcast because   she and david axelrod are friends  she's trying to get the word out   i mean you know i just i just think it is a i  admire what she's done what she's doing there   are a few members of congress like this mitt  romney uh congressman meyer congressman kinsinger   but it's very few governor hogan you know there  are there are a few people here in there but it's   very few and far between it's not just mean tweets  though right and it's not even just their jobs   because trump will primary them he's going to  go after lisa murkowski you know etc etc it's um   i mean liz janie said a bunch of the people  that voted against impeachment did so because   they were getting death threats and they  were afraid that if they voted to impeach   that they could be killed yeah this um i've  been weaving in questions from the audience   all along but i think this is a good one to  end on from from somebody in the audience um   you know who's basically asking a question  i'm sure you get a lot and i get a lot but   um with everything that's with our country being  so divided politically what gives you hope that we   could come closer together or are you  in a sort of ebb of hope at the moment i'm never without hope for this country um and  other countries have their problems too it's not   like i look at any other country and say they've  got it figured out maybe new zealand but yes i've never been to new zealand it's easier to  control a pandemic when you're an island though um   but they have their problems too remember they  had that horrible massacre at a at a mosque right   in new zealand so they've got they've got  their problems too um i'm never without hope   uh i think that you know it's just a time for  people to it's a time for politicians to really   think about what's more important their own  individual pursuit of power or the country and i'm not seeing enough people pick the country  but i do see some and i think about peter meyer   who's new freshman congressman from  michigan very conservative served in iraq   i think he did some ngo work in afghanistan  and this is his first six months in congress   and he's you know voted for the january 6  commission voted to impeach trump based on the insurrection taking some very bold stance and  you know i do find some comfort that there are   people like him like liz chaney uh taking these  stands but i think that people in media i think   i'm obviously not talking about you but but  i think that the more people in media need to look i i'm not a liberal democrat i'm not like  advocating the joe biden be re-elected i mean i   just think i think it's important that these very  nefarious lies be called out you know um they're   really horrible i mean you see i had the capital  police i'm sorry the metropolitan police officer   fanon on my show he's a republican you know he's  a cop he just can't believe this and i just think   that we need to speak for him people like us  in the media need to speak for him and just   call things as they are uh i saw something in  politico the other day that described to you know mccarthy and uh scalise and stefanik is you know  uh standing by trump's election fraud claims is   that what they're doing right is that i mean but  are they just election fraud claims right election   fraud beliefs is that what they are elected for  our beliefs it's a lie it's a lie we have to call   it out i mean anyway so i have some hope but i but  i also hope that other people get with the program   a little bit more well jake i want to um thank you  very much um again to our audience probably need   no real introduction or exit statement but thanks  to jake tapper cnn anchor and author of the devil   may dance um which we encourage you to pick up at  your local bookstore which you can go back to now   almost everywhere and if you'd like to watch more  virtual programs or support the commonwealth club   please again visit commonwealthclub.org i'm  clara jeffrey thank you everyone take care   um and take care of you jake thank you so  much and you did a wonderful job thanks for   reading the book and thanks for being a great  moderator that ask great questions thank you you

Channel: Commonwealth Club of California

Views: 12,445

Keywords: CommonwealthClub, CommonwealthClubofCalifornia, Sanfrancisco, Nonprofitmedia, nonprofitvideo, politics, Currentevents, CaliforniaCurrentEvents, #newyoutubevideo, #youtubechannel, #youtubechannels, jaketapper, clarajeffries

Id: TyuWB4Km6tg

Length: 69min 12sec (4152 seconds)

Published: Tue Jun 29 2021