Trey Gowdy: The Power Of Persuasion

hello everyone welcome to the commonwealth  club for today's program my name is melissa   kane i'm a journalist and an attorney in the bay  area and i'll be moderating today's discussion   now we'd like to thank our members our donors and  our supporters for making this and other programs   possible we're grateful for your support and  their support and we hope that others will   continue to follow this example and support the  commonwealth club now as you may know our special   guest today is a former member of congress and  i'm sure many of you have political questions   i know i certainly do and i want to assure you  we are absolutely going to get to some of those   in today's program but i just want to flag that  we're going to start with actually talking about   his new book we are going to talk about that and  then we will get to some questions about today's   current political climate and any other questions  that you have related to that so to begin   when it comes to persuasion we always of course  want everyone to agree with us all the time but   how do we actually convince people that we're  right well today's guest is a former congressman   who believes that one of the secrets lies in how  you ask questions his new book it doesn't hurt to   ask using the power of persuasion i'm sorry  using the power of questions to communicate   connect and persuade he draws on his experience  in the courtroom and the halls of congress to   teach us how to persuade no matter the jury and  no matter the cause we're going to be discussing   a lot in the next half hour but i want to get  your questions too if you're watching along with   us please put a question in the text chat button  on youtube or in the comments on facebook and we   are going to get to those later in the program and  so without further ado let us introduce trey gowdy   thank you for having me thanks for joining us  here today let's start with a super softball   question a little early here on the uh in for the  bay area so let's we'll start with an easy one   just tell us how uh how you came up  with the idea to write a book about   about how to ask questions it's not something  we hear much about well tim scott and i wrote   a book together on unity which is also a kind  of crazy idea for two people in politics um and   you know so so we kind of wanted to figure out  what could we write another book together and it   became clear he's so optimistic so hopeful and  i'm such a cynic that became clear we couldn't   write another book together and so we're leaving  the restaurant i'm driving back home and we've   concluded he's going to write a book about his  life and i'm going to go work on my golf game   and he called me before i even got  to my driveway and said you need to   write a book about what you're passionate  about not congress but about the courtroom   and how to persuade and so i you know you're a  lawyer you know this we spend most of our time   trying to get things more concise uh not i mean  we take a paragraph and try to make it a sentence   writing a book is a challenge because it's  the opposite you're trying to make it bigger   the real hard thing for me was as a lawyer you you  i almost say it comes easy because i was terrible   when i started as a prosecutor absolutely terrible  but you do question whether or not you can explain   the power of questions and how to ask them and  once i convinced myself that i thought i could   then um i loved every second of writing that book  well you you sort of begin with a a personal story   about your best friend's mom and how someone's  ability to ask the right questions really changed   your life can you talk a little bit about that  yeah i mean i think to persuade most effectively   you do have to have a relationship you have to  think that the person cares about you or has your   best interests in mind and i had graduated college  with a history degree but knew no history at all   um had taken the lsat but had decided i wasn't  going to law school in fact i got a really really   small scholarship to go and i had returned it  already i just said i'm not cohen and we went on   this beach trip and she just kind of sat me down  grounded in love which you know most effective   persuasion is grounded and something like that  and she just asked me she's she was a stay-at-home   mom she was not a prosecutor she wasn't a lawyer  she was a stay-at-home mom who just kind of said   what are you doing with your life and what do  you expect from yourself and before i had left   for the beach took her about 30 minutes and i  decided i was going to go do the hardest thing   i'd ever done in my life which is ask my father to  borrow money to go to law school that is still the   hardest thing i've ever done he's a doctor he  was not thrilled about me going to law school   so joe evelyn cox is the reason that i decided  to go to law school it took her about 30 minutes   and it was just asking questions what do you  want to do what do you want to accomplish why   aren't your expectations higher you do  have to have a relationship that helps   but she pulled off more in 30 minutes than any  of my academic advisors could do in four years   so then you you go to law school you become a  prosecutor and where as you say you you had to   learn i think girl has to learn the art of asking  questions sort of what order to ask them in and   um i don't know for about you but for me i often  will have a deposition or something and then and   i think one thing happened and i walk out of the  room and i go yeah and then i read it and i go   oh my gosh i did not do what i thought i did uh  and how you really it's really hard to to learn   how to how to listen uh to to get the right  sort of back and forth i i firmly think and   believe that the next good question you or i will  ask will come from something the other one said   so if you were so wed to your notes now i'm a huge  fan of preparation in fact i i spent a lot of time   in the book saying if you don't know what you hope  to accomplish with this conversation then you're   not going to accomplish it and i mean you have no  way of judging success so i'm big on preparation   i'm big on having an objective but that  objective can can change in one answer   when i was in a courtroom and a little bit in  congress too although congress is a terrible   example because you only get five minutes and  five minutes is not enough time to do anything but   in a courtroom you mentioned depositions imagine  being in a criminal courtroom and you've never   talked to the person before and you have no idea  what's going to come out of her or his mouth   so i drew this chart if they say this i'll  go here if they say that i'll go there   the only rule i had was don't act surprised  whatever the answer is do not act like that's   the first time you've heard it even though that  was the first time i'd heard it because the jury   wants to know that you're prepared and that you  didn't say oh well i've never heard that before   let's let's end the trial now that's the one thing  you can't do well i grew up watching perry mason   i always hope for hope for that moment uh but  people can go off the chart and they can surprise   you i think if you're if you're really asking  questions as informed as you can be but also with   an open mind about why this person did a thing  that they did or believe a thing that they do   well speaking of being surprised you can imagine  my surprise and i do tell this story in the book   it was my first a capital case and people have  different opinions on the death penalty and that's   fine i'm not even sure what my opinion is anymore  but nonetheless you're going to be prepared and   the first time i heard that he only had one eye he  was my only eyewitness so i had one eyewitness and   the first time i learned that one of his eyes  was prosthetic was in a courtroom when i asked   him how was your vision um that was a shocking  answer i i was not counting on there being a   one-eyed one eyewitness but you you've lesson  learned i ask all my other witnesses that now   bank tellers used to look at me like i was crazy  when i said you know you got any vision issues but   you have to anticipate everything the audience  or the jury is going to ask themselves i mean the   best lawyers the best persuaders have these  debates and conversations with themselves   weeks or months before it actually goes live well  and you uh i think there was a picture of you in   that moment when you learned that your witness who  was the only eyewitness yes had a prosthetic eye   it's a it's a keepsake now right my staff gave  it to me because there was no visible reaction   it was like i had heard it a hundred times and i  was just making sure the jury knew that i wasn't   keeping anything from them but the reality is  i had never heard that before and um and you're   sitting there thinking number one how you're mad  at yourself for not asking the question doing the   preparation and then number two you're mad at  god for giving you in your first capital trial   a a witness um who has a prosthetic eye and and  you just got to figure out how to the big thing i   used to communicate to the jury was fairness that  i'm not here to get a conviction i'm here to do   the right thing and um and then i'm not keeping  anything from them so you can't act like you're   surprised i mean what i wanted to say is what did  you just say but that's not what i said but the   jury didn't believe the witness though it didn't  it he was still really credible that seems like uh   despite that despite that issue really was  confident in what in what he had seen um and   as far as he could right well i never would  have sought nor gotten the death penalty had   that been the only piece of evidence there was  forensic evidence about who was there so there   was no doubt about the two people involved  the doubt was about what happened was it   self-defense was it a robbery and forensics  can't tell you that but the witness can't   um so had that been the only piece of evidence  i had was a you know one-eyed one eyewitness   i'm not even sure i could have won a regular  murder case with that but but because the   jury believed the forensics all i was asking  them to do with this witness is understand the   chronology of what happened from the time he  walked into the store until the time he left   well uh you do talk in the book you tell some  other personal stories about why it is you   actually left the prosecutor's office to um to  then and then eventually ran for congress again   i know it's not exactly about asking questions  but can you talk a little bit about that   well i mean it's about asking questions from  the from the standpoint that the toughest   questions you should ever get in life should  come from yourself and um and if you are adept   at asking yourself really tough questions  about why you believe what you believe   and have you considered every alternative and i  you know some people call it an inner dialogue   the problem when i do it is that it's audible so  people think i should go to a psychiatric hospital   because i literally am having a conversation  with myself and it's out loud sometimes   uh the the the the courtroom you know when  all you see is inhumanity you think that's   all there is and you can tell yourself that you  know 90 of the people in the world are great   and you're just dealing with the ten percent that  aren't you can tell yourself that but it's all you   see and you get the proportions misaligned and  you think i mean every time you hear something   outside you assume the worst and uh when your  kids are late coming home you assume the worst   and and it it takes its toll on your faith and it  did for me it took a toll when i say i'm a cynic   i am and it came from just the questions about  why why would a child have cigarettes put out on   their face who would do that to a child who would  kill someone that had done nothing wrong to them   and i could never answer the question so it's  either become a miserable person to live with   um or go find another line of work i mean you  know when you're going to congress to improve your   view of mankind that the other job must have been  pretty bad so yeah so tell me how did your uh your   career with dealing with criminals  prepare you for congress um they're um i would have a hard time finding a single person  in congress that i didn't have a good relationship   with um and and that's the great myth that we  don't share with the public and i don't know why   we don't share it with the public the first  thing i did when i woke up this morning   was to see how a friend of mine did in a senate  primary in massachusetts and he did not win so   the next thing i did was send him a text and you  would never guess that i would be following that   race or care about what happened to that person  because we never voted the same and then we get   on a text string and it's about half republicans  and half democrats trying to see what we can do um   and there's nothing you can do the day after  a race but what can we do a month from now   or three months from now to kind of pick  our friend back up we get along much better   than we want anyone that doesn't mean we're not  dysfunctional and it doesn't mean we're effective   but this myth that we're constantly in a state  of war with one another is just not accurate and   well i mean i put on a pretty good show it's like  feeling pro wrestling sometimes everyone it is but   i will say this i teach a class on congress  at a small liberal arts school and i asked the   kids last night all right who can name the most  number of members of congress and somebody felt   like they could name 30. and i said well you  have 405 left to go so are you really going to   draw your opinions from such a small sample size  what you see on television are primarily leaders   on the republican and the democrat side  or people who are most animated about that   issue that night what you don't see is this person  who's on msnbc going to dinner with this person   who's on fox five minutes after they get through  saying uh what a terrible person the other one is   so i mean you're a lawyer you know we can do that  we can be mean to each other and go to dinner   most people don't get that but congress  is what i mean maybe two-thirds lawyers so   i guess we're just better at doing it uh at hiding   i think disingenuous yeah being disingenuous yes  we're better at it well when you got to congress   you know one of the things you talk about in the  book is that in when you're dealing with a jury   at least you have people who have sworn to have  open minds who have said they'll they'll keep an   open mind and really take everything in and try  to make a decision based on the evidence and then   you get to congress and and that's not uh the  ability to persuade is is very different there   um and even if you were successful at persuading  i'm not sure you would see any manifestations of   that and that is because uh one of two things  either we don't try to persuade our base and i   think politics now is almost all about the  base i mean there's very little persuasion   that takes place in politics it is ratifying  or validating what a group already believes   because almost all districts are primary districts  they're very few november districts and if you   don't win in the primary i can promise  you you're not going to win in november   so is there you know tulsi gabbard and  i did an amendment together all right so   he was one of my favorite people in all  of congress there are these episodic   examples of working across the aisle but if you'll  notice tulsi did not do well in the democrat   primary um and i certainly didn't run campaign ad  saying hey look at me i reached across the aisle   and worked with a progressive democrat from hawaii  there's no reward in base politics to doing that   i get it all the time i hear the question all  the time why can't y'all work better together   because the people that do the nominating in  politics that's not a high priority for them   well yeah we have this top two primary system in  california we're one of just a handful of states   uh that have it and it's interesting there's  um the parties hate it uh and the public   loves it if you look at the polls in california  you know every couple of years this there's this   effort to um and it's only state offices right we  obviously can't do that for um federal offices um   necessarily but but people who are regular people  get that the primary does have this ability uh   the primary system really has this ability to to  warp uh public sentiment in the way it comes out   i think if i'm not mistaken that you'll also have  your legislature doesn't draw the political lines   in california y'all may or maybe it's arizona  but i know some states are are experimenting   with having non-political bodies draw the lines  yeah i'll work on the commission and arizona's is   actually based on ours okay i worked for a federal  judge that was on a panel that drew the lines in   south carolina because the legislature did not  draw the lines correctly and that was fascinating   to watch three federal judges who have lifetime  jobs and don't need to worry about politics how   they decided to draw the political lines you  certainly can't do it on the basis of race and   you cannot dilute majority minority districts the  real question is can you do it based on politics   and you know the arguments on both sides  of that i mean do you really want to pit   a bunch of democrat incumbents against one  another in california i mean do you want to pit   adam schiff zoe lofgren and nancy pelosi against  each other all in the same district or or are two   of them then going to move to other districts  which you have from time to time see that   i think redistricting is is probably what  contributes to the partisanship more than   anything else just having been there you know  eight years i would say it's redistricting   well it's interesting to mention joe zolofg  and she's of course a bay area representative   and uh you mentioned her as one of the more  open-minded um and uh sort of approachable   people that you've worked with in congress i loved  her she uh she was smart she was prepared um so uh   you know zoe was actually up to be the chairperson  of judiciary and lost to jerry nadler and that's   kind of an inter inner family battle wow but i  do wonder watching impeachment would it have been   different zoe just has a different way about her  and i wish i had a nickel for every time she came   and found me on the floor of the house and said  look we we don't agree on 99 of life but i found   this one percent and and can we work together on  it and there's such an authenticity about that she   didn't ask me to do anything that was going to get  me in trouble back home and i wouldn't ask her to   do it but she was really intentional about  finding something we could do together   and she was one of my favorite colleagues i  think she's super smart i like to listen to her   ask questions she's always prepared and i don't  know that i've ever heard her raise her voice   well you know she's she's not as someone who lives  in the bay area and sort of covers politics is   interested in politics she's not one that's going  to be at every event she's not a cut the ribbon   kiss the babies always sort of out and about a  different event kind of kind of congress person   she seems somebody like somebody who really  is in there doing the really hard work of   reading everything and doing the research  and um and the the less glamorous parts of um   of being a member of congress that's at  least just the perspective someone who   has a pretty good perspective i i don't  i zo is not a look at me kind of person   right absolutely now when we do have an audience  question here that says um usually um both sides   are trying to persuade especially i'm sure when  you were in congress and do you approach that as   a sort of win-lose outcome or is there a way  to just sort of get to a win-win even when   you're you've got an agenda of of persuading the  other person i i think there are a few instances   where both sides may be trying to persuade i  think what i notice more than anything else   first of all we have to identify what  group is still persuadable in our country   i mean how big is that group of quote undecided  voters what i saw more than anything else was   how do we ratify our base validate our base keep  them energized and maybe possibly appeal to this   group that we're not currently doing well with  that that i saw this attempt to kind of navigate   this really narrow path but no matter what  you're not going to alienate your base   and and that to me is what's wrong with politics  now is i can't remember the last elected official   that i thought was really trying to persuade  people that did not agree with them in other   words not get them to convert but get them to say  you know what i never thought of it that way i'm   not with you yet but you've given me a different  way of looking at it i i don't i don't see an   effort to do that in politic there's an effort  in every other facet of life but in politics   when i watch the conventions or i see press  conferences it is primarily i've got to keep this   believed majority i've got to keep it  and that's a very different dynamic   than trying to actually persuade people that  maybe you're not as bad as they thought you were   and do you think that that's just a function of  fear people just trying to keep the voters that   they have instead of really focusing on expanding  and maybe risking the loss of some of those base   voters to try to get new voters yes the lack of  courage you think i think it is a function of   primary politics i could i would never have lost  to a democrat in my district you could run any   democrat you want i wasn't going to lose i could  only lose to a republican that said i was not   whatever enough and in my district it would be  i was not conservative enough and that's what   i heard a lot even me i heard it a lot mulvaney  heard it a lot so you're so busy looking to your   right or left in her primary i mean look i i mean  some some chair persons lost on the democrat side   uh you know neil who's the chairman of ways  and means was in a tough re-elect to the left elliott engel i think lost right chairman of  farm affairs i mean so these are chairpersons   power used to mean something in congress i mean  for us to have a chairperson is a big deal for   our district not anymore if there's someone more  progressive than you or more conservative than you   we're going to run you out so you're not looking  to the middle you're looking to the to the sides   well one of the things you talk about in the  book is is that persuading people really takes   listening and really takes incremental change  that people don't just wake up one day and say i'm   i'm going to do a 180 on this issue or that and  that may happen from time to time but but by and   large change happens slowly in small increments  and that's why asking the right questions to try   and sort of lead them along even a little bit um  can be really helpful what are what are some of   the mistakes that you see uh people making when  they they think they're persuading or they're   trying to persuade uh other people that they don't  communicate their own persuadability i mean if i   were to tell you that i have the right answers on  gun control and you need to listen to me and i'm   really not interested in what you have to say  my guess is you're not going to find me very   persuasive if i were to say um tell me how you  think what what what law could we pass tomorrow   that would limit our exposure to mass killings um  then you're you're talking to me i'm evaluating   whether or not that really should be number one on  your list i'm evidencing to you that i care about   your position and i really do because one of the  mistakes that some folks on the other side make is   they'll start with something that is not causally  linked or connected to their desired outcome   so but but i have communicated to you that  i am persuadable because i've asked you   to to tell me what you think i began lots of  sentences with i'm open to i say it all the   time i am open to you convincing me i am wrong i  i think the mistake people make is they confuse   persuasion with proselytizing that i really  need this time to tell you how wrong you are   and what i should be saying is all the  facts i have have led me to this conclusion   but i am one fact away from believing that  there's a better way um and now it's your turn   you go and then with the power of questions i mean  let's assume you pick the gun show loophole which   some people do they say well that's what we need  to do first we need to close the gun show loophole   fair enough consider it closed how many  mass shootings would that have prevented   chances are they don't have the number uh and  when they find the number uh they won't like it   because it's not causally linked so the questions  getting people to support same thing you do in a   courtroom it's cross-examination but without the  um but with the air of i need you to educate me   i need you to help me i say it all the time i  need you to help me understand sometimes i mean   it sometimes i don't but i always say it i need  you to help me understand persuasion requires   us both to be persuadable because i can't ask  you to do something that i'm not willing to do   that's that's hypocrisy and i can't think  of anything less persuasive than hypocrisy   right or um yelling at people or  thinking that one fact is going to   change everything i think i see it on on  different sides of different issues or people   are just they go okay well this one thing  happens then everyone will have to believe   x and y that's probably not going to happen  that quickly that easily with that you know one   you know thing you know the number one  thing i used to get asked a grocery store   why don't y'all have a press conference and just  lay out x as if that's the only thing keeping us   from winning the issue of the day is we just need  one more press conference but but it's those folks   that are so wed to what they believe um but  but what you got to do is ask them why do you   believe it give me the evidentiary basis for what  you believe and and what other options have you   considered so maybe pick whatever issue it is  i mean if they can't tell you and it's got to   be more than well i've always believed this  or my parents told me or the preacher said   it but that's not going to hold you in very good  stead i i get in tons of trouble when i say this   so i'ma say it again i am one fact away from  changing my mind on almost any issue the bigger   the issue it has to be a really compelling fact  and you're going to have to establish it by a high   level of an evidentiary burden but for me to say  i am wed and i don't care what else is out there   i don't care what other facts are out there i mean  honestly can you think of anything less persuasive   than for me to say i don't you know do not let the  evidence interfere with my deeply held conviction   there's nothing less persuasive than that you  know when abraham i was reading this book and   when abraham lincoln uh first declared his intent  to run for congress he wrote you know you have   read a candidate statement and in his candidate  statement and i'm paraphrasing because he wrote   it much more eloquently than i'm about to  say it he said i promised um to change my   mind if the facts weren't it that was a selling  point you know at the time uh not something to   to be hidden from a public view and how do we get  the because this is being driven by the voters who   demand certainty and um and demand a consistency  regardless of whatever new facts have come out   what what's the what's the solution there when  um when the voters are responding in this way   you put your finger on it the real persuasion  that needs to take place in our country   right now is not across the island washington it  is us going back home and talking to our bases there was a senator from south carolina who's  no longer in the senate who said you just cannot   survive politically telling your base they're  wrong so i probably would not lead by saying   you're wrong um but there is a way i mean imagine  you're at a town hall and i did some of them until   they just proved such a waste of time that i was  not going to do them anymore it's it's there's   no persuasion that goes on there but imagine  you're in the town hall and somebody throws out   a conspiracy theory or it actually happened to  me two weeks ago i had somebody come i i didn't   i mean i'm not a conspiracy guy so this q anon  thing somebody asked me what i thought about it   and i said well i don't know anything about it  tell me about it and then i just began to question   this person so i never said you're a lunatic which  is what i was thinking what i did was well what's   the evidentiary basis for that and and what what's  the evidence for that and no i'm not interested in   a tweet and i'm not interested in anything  else that would not be admissible in court   what reliable evidence do you have to support the  following notions and they have not so there you   first must persuade the voters you put your finger  on it and is one reason you know i'm glad i don't   ever have to face the voters again because it's  not smart to tell them that they're wrong or that   they should view things differently but you're not  going to fix washington i mean washington reflects   it doesn't lead it reflects and it's not  popular to say we get what we ask for   but the reality is we get what we ask for and if  you don't like the leadership you have in dc the   first person you need to look at is yourself well  you know one of the frustrations with watching   people in congress and maybe you experienced  this you mentioned before you get five minutes   you know when you're you're in a hearing and um  and it can be frustrating i can tell you as you   know as a sort of civilian uh you see the media  reports oh tim cook and mark zuckerberg um are   they're going to capitol hill they're going to get  grilled uh but it never happens it's really just   such a disappointment every time to watch members  of congress make speeches ask questions where   they don't even listen to the answers i mean they  just seem really incapable and i mean this across   across the political spectrum of of actually  listening asking good questions and sort of   engaging in that when they get that moment to  actually ask the questions was it frustrating   for you as a as a prosecutor to to then sort of  be up there watching your your co-workers uh do do   the same thing a structural yes frustrating just  for lack of my ability to use an nc 17 word yes   it was frustrating we'll go with that um but i  also was part of it so you have a choice when i   became the chairman of the oversight committee  we had fewer of those spectacle hearings now   what constituencies do you offend when you have  fewer public hearings the media hates it because   they can say what they want but they love these  hearings they absolutely love them people who   are ambitious on both sides of the aisle love the  hearings because they have their youtube moment   staff love the hearings because it's so ad  hominem so i compare the depositions i did   behind closed doors no time limits no you know  interrupting the witness compare those with   the public hearings and there's no comparison in  which produce more information but the the media   belittles you if you want depositions or witness  transcribed witness interviews they belittle you   so across the board there's an appetite for this  theater there's no other facet of life where we   say this is really important we're talking  about encryption or the social media giants   or we have bill barr with us or eric holder super  important so let's just give everyone five minutes   it's there's just a complete disconnect it's  important so you have less time than it takes   mick mulvaney to line up a  putt there's a huge disconnect when i say it's structural there's an  easy way to fix that easy way to fix it   simple republicans you get an hour democrats you  get an hour you can spend it however you want   and then what you begin to hear are those  individual members who may not be good at   asking questions and they're going to lose their  five minutes of fame so you're going to find   the people who are good at asking questions  like zoe and they're people on the republican   side very good at asking questions but people  who aren't good but want their youtube moment   or want their their base moment they're cut out  it's an easy fix it doesn't require constitutional   amendment you get an hour we get an hour you  can have the same person in an hour you can   get somewhere you can't get everywhere but you can  get somewhere five minutes is a joke well it seems   like the folks who might get cut out of that uh  are are the same folks who are probably not gonna   go for that rule change how do how did you find  the preparation among your fellow members of   congress because one of the things it seems like  when they're just reading a speech or reading   pre-prepared questions that they're  not listening to the answer to   um that they're just reading the question for its  own sake and then no matter what the person says   they're gonna be on to the next question i  always wonder did you did someone else write   these for you are you not even taking the  time to really get ready for this hearing   like it like every other group um there are  really really good ones and then there are ones   um that don't prepare at all i had colleagues that  for every minute they were in the congressional   hearing room would spend an hour outside of  it and you could tell who they were and they   wrote their own questions um and then what you'll  see if you if you notice carefully you will see   staff walking around and that's not their fault  they're not being egoist they know that certain   members are relying on them to give them the  questions well there's nothing less authentic   than reading someone else's question when you  have i mean but it's either that or the person's   you know not going to ask anything or not  asking anything constructive i i had a rule   when i first got there and staff would come  up to me of course you sit and order seniority   so the younger you are all the good questions  have already been asked i mean they've been   asked multiple times when you sat where i sat but  i would have staffers come up and they would say   they were real timid and they would say mr gowdy  um we have some questions that have not been asked   yet and i always had the same reaction i  said remind me again how many trials you had   in federal court and then how many did you have  in state court and these of course they're fresh   out of college they haven't been to law school  they have none i said well when you have the   same number i have had then i'm going to take  your questions in the meantime i'm going to ask   the ones that i wrote out if you stay you can  pick these lanes that have not been taken yet   the easiest questions are the ones the most senior  people ask because they're obvious and and all the   good ones are taken preparation they're peter  welch from vermont always incredibly prepared   hakeem jeffrey said richmond jim jordan um would  prepare weeks before a hearing happen so would   the president's chief of staff mark meadows not a  lawyer so he felt the need to kind of over prepare   you can tell who's for even if you don't like  what comes out of their mouth you can tell who's   prepared who's not well i mean even for the folks  some of the folks who do come off as prepared   they aren't always there for the entirety of  the hearing as well i mean it's so deflating   when they get sort of the pullback camera shot  and no one else is in the room uh they've either   asked their questions and left or because their  time to speak hasn't come up yet they're not   present at the hearing can i defend them for  one second on that one second one second some   members are on a bunch of committees i was on  four and if you don't show up for the committee   hearing they'll use it against you politically  and say you didn't even care enough to show up   so if you have three committee hearings all  at the same time you do feel the need to   participate in all three now that wasn't very  many folk but john ratcliffe who's now the dni   was on four committees and when you're on house  intel you're away from your phone you're down in   a skiff away from your phone and if you don't  show up that's a big deal because these are   intelligence matters some of the members were not  there because they're really busy and some of the   members were not there just because they weren't  there so don't judge them all by being absent   but your point is well taken you can't just show  up read your five minute soliloquy and then leave   well i mean it looks bad and i get your point  that's a fair point um it just it can be a   little heartbreaking when that you get you get  this person who's up there making these fiery   uh statements and questions and then they're not  even staying what it looks like you know and maybe   they go back later and read the transcript and  so of course they don't no they do not either well speaking of good people to uh to to grill  uh to do some grilling and hearings we've got   of course the california senator bay area native  kamala harris now who's the vp she got a lot of   attention for her uh questioning abilities uh  uh in congress and in the senate and what uh   what do you make of of her sort of rise uh based  at least in part on her ability to ask questions   well i mean it's she's a former prosecutor so  you you expect them to be quick on their feet um   i i think what prosecutors like senator harris can  do is separate what are relevant facts what are   important facts i mean when i hear her question  witnesses she doesn't have five minutes but she   doesn't have unlimited time either they  have a little bit more in the senate but   she knows exactly where she is going and the best  questioners start with a purpose and whether it's   jeff sessions or bill barr or brett kavanaugh  she knew before she opened her mouth what her   objective was she's also very bright so she knows  who her jury was um was her jury undecided voters   was her jury the base was her jury the democrat  nominee who might be looking for a vice president   of course i think she ran for president also so  her jury may have been democrat primary voters   look i know people don't like lawyers  but there's a reason we have them   and they are pretty good at sizing up who the jury  is and then how to effectively communicate to them   so she and i probably don't agree on a whole  bunch of things but i admire i like watching good   lawyers and she's good well here's hoping other  folks will see that asking good questions is a   is also a really good way to have a youtube  moment listening and uh and asking those   follow-up questions can also be helpful uh you  don't have to just you know sort of read a script   when you're um when you're up there we do  have a question from the audience here it says   um when we live in a world of sound bites and  one minute videos and 280 character tweets   how can we persuade people to spend a little time  investigating before formulating their opinion   that's a great question i i hate the culture  that we live in i hate how superficial it is   um if if i were on twitter a lot and i'm not but  if i were um i would use the question how do you   know that i do it with people in my own life um  who are on social media a lot some of whom are   related to me i would just say how do you know  that and what are the limits of your knowledge   and and so then you begin to test the i mean if  they respond back well i read it well you know   what tool do you and i use to elucidate the  truth it's examination and cross-examination   so i love to ask people how do you know that's  true when i'm having this conversation about   this q anon conspiracy theory i mean i must have  asked that a hundred times how do you know whether   that's true or not okay i get that you read it i  get that it's you know in print i mean my parents   god bless their soul the worst thing that ever  happened was them getting an email because every   email they're forwarded they think well no  somebody wouldn't lie i mean when they tell   us that you have lifetime salary because you  serve one term in congress they wouldn't lie   about that would they yes mom yes they would you  how do you know that you can't you can't simply   so what would i do if i were on twitter how  do you know that what are the limits of your   knowledge have you asked them have you is there  any evidence on the other side are there any   studies that indicate otherwise when i read  headlines now use the word grill that word is   used more by the headline writers at politico  in the hill than any other place even outdoor   grilling companies don't use the word grill more  than politico and the hill and if you watch it   it's really not a grilling they may be just  good fair questions but they need you to click   so what i'll tell folks if you want a higher level  of discourse require it don't engage with people   if they won't answer how do you know that  they're probably not worth your time well   you know it's interesting we we in california  we've getting we've gotten more and more um   decline to state that's our sort of not republican  not democrat voters are the is the largest uh well   is growing the most um of of any sort of party  with that we have out here the republican party is   is um as shrunk down to a size it hasn't moved  much the democrats are shrinking a little bit but   it always struck me that the fact  that you're a member of a party   why should one your opinion on one thing  automatically lead to your opinion on the   other thing and this is a good example would be  why would your opinion on you know abortion rights   influence your opinion on foreign affairs or you  know there seems to be some group of people who   are willing to sort of just buy the whole party  line instead of stopping to say wait a minute what   does this have to do with what i truly agree with  the party on and why am i just am i just sort of   espousing this view because my friends are  telling me to or because um you know other   members of my party are telling me to are they  really connected there have to be more than just   two blobs of ideology in the world right uh  you know i think you know maybe this you know   the elusive independent as you as you point out  is really the the only moderately persuadable   person left well in terms of getting  you know the big prize which is the vote   yes it's going to be it'd be very  tough for me to convince someone   that was pro-life um to vote a democrat  of most house races it it'd be tough   um in the old days you could be um  fiscally conservative socially moderate   you would hear that from time to time that  that's a dying breed what i've noticed and again   if you don't listen to anything else i'll tell you  and there's a good chance that that's going to be   true but trust me when i tell you this uh politics  reflects it reflects what they think the voters   want and my fear now is that 99 is a failing grade  on both sides of the aisle when i see when i see   my friend in massachusetts portrayed  as not being sufficiently progressive   when he may have been the most progressive  house member i worked with or one eyes for me   is it kennedy yeah joey yeah joey joey to  me was the most authentically progressive   person that i worked with but he  lost a primary because he wasn't   progressive enough and then you see republicans  where 99 is a failing grade and and so   is that the fault of the candidate or is that  the fault of the people who pick the candidate   the easy thing for me to do is to blame members  of congress that's easy i could survive a   long time doing that but politics reflects and  evidently they think that's what the voters want   so it's incumbent upon the voters i mean  i don't know how many people listening   today split their vote i mean how many of them  vote all are you know all are or all day if you   want to send a message and confuse politicians  then start flipping up your ballot a little bit   interesting interesting advice there uh  do you have another audience question   here um and actually i want to just take a  minute to talk a little bit about the benghazi   hearings because you do talk about that in  the book um about how it went for you how   maybe you would have done things differently so  let's just stop for a minute and before we ask   there's a question that's sort of related to  it to to have you discuss the the role of uh   questions in uh in the magazine hearings well you  know that was the seven i'll give you both sides   of the issue to the extent i can it was the  seventh investigation so if you're a democrat   you're very frustrated at the fact  that this has already been looked into   multiple times reports written by other rep  republican chairpersons and um so that would   be the democrat side the response to that would be  all of that's right factually you're 100 correct   how did they miss the following things because  none of the other seven read ambassador   stephen's emails so if you agree that ambassador  stephen's emails would be relevant to what he was   thinking why he went to benghazi from tripoli  his emails may help but if you haven't read them   you won't know what's in them and if you didn't  bother to ask for them so i kind of justified in   my mind that there were questions that despite  the number of investigations still existed   so you're fine to say well the republican chair  person didn't do a good job investigating it   you're fine to say that i would rather you say  that than to say that the questions weren't worth   answering where i made mistakes in my mind  there were there were multiple ones but um   i was slow to send subpoenas i really thought  if you view this as the deaths of four americans   just take her out of it these  are the deaths of four americans   take the secretary out of it finding out what  happened can it be prevented lessons to be learned   then to me it was like a homicide case and  i know how i used to work homicide cases and   it wasn't in public hearings so i was on with  i don't know if it was colbert or bill maher   one of those guys that's crazy about me and  he mentioned all the public hearings we had   in benghazi we had 103 witness interviews  over 100 were done behind closed doors   we had one really high profile hearing which was a  disaster by the way and that was secretary clinton   all the rest were done behind leon panetta was  done behind closed doors ben rhodes was down   behind closed doors susan rice was behind closed  doors i got a lot of flack from republicans they   wanted susan rice done in public they wanted  that spectacle that you and i talked about i   wanted three hours with her so i could understand  what happened so i got the jury wrong um i thought   i thought that if you did things a certain way  that even your critics would grudgingly say all   right well you're not just in it to embarrass  the following people first hearing we had the   washington post was complimentary which is the  seventh sign of the apocalypse but uh dana milbank   wrote an op-ed piece this is the way congressional  hearings should be run that was the first one we   had and then we had another one and then it became  clear to me meanwhile look i'm getting pressure   from the right that you know we're not necessarily  looking for you to run the hearings this way   and i think the democrats were getting pressure  elijah whom i loved god rest his soul i think   elijah was getting pressure we don't need  republicans receiving positive press in the   washington post that is not in our best interests  so we began to fight a little bit publicly never   privately but a little bit publicly when her email  was discovered by the way by the new york times   it not not a bunch of right-wing nut jobs the  new york times wrote the first story about her   email i knew that she had private email but we  didn't leak it new york times wrote the story   i knew that the whole dynamic would change and  it did become about her and not about four people   who died and those that survived but if you ask  me to give the one fact if i if i get one fact   to a jury to try to convince them that the report  is worth reading we mentioned her name less times   than the democrats mentioned donald  trump's name in their benghazi report   and i know what you're thinking you're thinking  well donald trump didn't have anything to do with   benghazi you're right he didn't but his name  was mentioned more on the democrats report on   benghazi then we mentioned clinton's name and  ours so if you read the report i think you will   find it to be what we wanted it to be which  is the definitive accounting on what happened   you cannot investigate anything in the current  political environment bob mueller found that out   and i found that out what do you make of this  you know so to fast forward to today one of the   once the audience one of the audience questions  is that um these coveted hearings are they uh   are they helpful i mean to your point are are we  able to even have objective public airing of facts   about even something as sort of scientific  as medical as critical as as copen 19.   i don't think so i i think you know the brokenness  of our current culture and the political   environment is best evidenced by the fact that  really the the only thing that matters is winning   and we have managed to politicize sporting  events we have managed to politicize um i was   one of the first ones that said the officer in the  george floyd case should be charged with murder   i mean as a prosecutor i looked at it  and i thought that was a proper charge   what happened in kenosha wisconsin um i did  my podcast yesterday on the 20 questions that   need to be answered but but it's too easy  to politicize everything and if we can use   this i mean i really can't think of anything  that should be less political than a virus   i i mean i'd have a hard time thinking of anything  that's less overtly political than a virus   but that's just the world we live in and i'll  let other people figure out whose fault that   is um you know that's probably above my pa i  think it's everyone's fault quite frankly and   winning look you and i are both from the justice  system so if cops get it wrong even though they   have the right person the evidence is excluded  the confession's thrown out we'd rather let 99   guilty people go free than convict a single  innocent person that's the justice system   it's not about winning politics is about  winning and that unfortunately is about   all it's about right now so whatever it takes  to win is what the two sides are willing to do it reminds me of the um there was that  famous clip of john mccain during the um 2008   election cycle he's doing a town  hall and there was a woman who   i think and forgive me i'm paraphrasing here but  said that barack obama was a terrorist or muslim   and john mccain said no no he's not and sort of  fact-checked her right right in that moment and   was held as a as a hero for that and it was uh you  know an important and i think good reaction but   i'll give you another example just to show  you with newsworthy is so amazing i'll give   you a recent example just to show uh i try to be  fair joe biden said mike pence was a decent man   and he got excoriated for it um kudos to him you  know look i wouldn't vote for him i mean i wrote   about it my book i would never vote for joey  kennedy joey kennedy would never vote for me we   should not vote for each other we have different  views of the role of government but i would trust   him with the most important things in my life and  sometimes that's enough for a relationship i got   family members that wouldn't vote for me if i  ran again they shouldn't vote for me i mean i   i don't they don't i don't represent what they  want so why would they vote for me but it doesn't   mean you can't have a relationship i think now if  you're on the other team you just must be all bad   well you you said the b word so i do want  to uh go ahead and get your take on what is   happening right now with the current election  we have a an audience question here that says   if you could give democrats one piece of advice  heading into 2020 what would it be oh well they'd   be crazy to take it um but i think and i think  they figured this out recently i think that um   whether you call it safety whether you call it  security whether you call it law and order you   can call it what you want apparently some of those  phrases are okay now and some of them are not   that there is a um a large swath of voters that  care very much about having an orderly society   and i think you saw that yesterday the fact that  the vice president addressed it so you know my   advice to democrats i know they think the pandemic  is a good issue for them i know they think that   the leadership style of donald trump is a good  issue for them they would not be wise to overlook   um even moderate maybe even progressive folks  view that we cannot have a society where creating   more innocent victims is the answer to an innocent  victim we just we cannot have that society well we   have reached the point in our program where there  is time for one last question and it's a great one   from our audience and it is what is one question  that you think should be asked at the presidential   debates this year oh you're going to think this is  a cop-out and maybe it's just because i've gotten   old and gotten soft but i would make them say  something that they respect about the other one   i would make them do it i wouldn't let  them off by saying you have good kids i would um and if it had to be policy i tell  the most from someone by asking what do you   view the role of government to be as opposed to  the responsibility of the individual that would   be the one question i would ask of any candidate  because if i understand how you view the role of   government as opposed to what my individual  responsibilities are i have a better idea   of whether you're persuadable i had a kid last  night in the class he thinks that government   should provide everything um i'm probably not  going to persuade him um probably not what is your   view on the role of government and its  responsibilities versus the individual   it's just they're both so adept at not answering  the question um i mean they would pivot from   that you know what i would do to change the  debate i would have them question each other   and i know i should not say that because i'm  talking to somebody that's done a brilliant job   asking questions but there's no substitute  for that kind of questioning one another   and more than 60 seconds to i mean health care  is complicated i don't think 60 seconds is going   to get it done i'd love to see candidates question  one another well you know you say that here in san   francisco i've moderated debates among mayoral  candidates and and in other races and that's   always a real audience favorite when we ask  the candidates to ask each other questions you   can really uh you know get some um interesting  answers questions and and certainly fireworks   uh sometimes as a result so i think that would be  a ratings boon and so it would be a ratings boom   it might be the end of our republic  but it would be a ratings boom for sure   why would the bank already on that happy hopeful  note uh are many thanks here to trey gowdy   former congressman author of this new book it  doesn't hurt to ask using the power of questions   to communicate connect and persuade for joining  us today copies are available everywhere books   are sold so make sure you grab one and we want  to thank you to the audience for watching today   and participating live and if you want to watch  more programs or support the commonwealth club's   efforts at making virtual programming  available please visit thecommonwealthclub.org   online i'm melissa kane thank you  everyone for joining us stay safe you

Channel: Commonwealth Club of California

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Length: 62min 52sec (3772 seconds)

Published: Sun Sep 06 2020