Speaker 1: Welcome to today's podcast sponsored by Hillsdale College, All Things
Speaker 1: hillsdalet Hillsdale dot ed or I encourage you to take
Speaker 1: advantage of the many free online courses there, and of
Speaker 1: course I'll listen to the Hillsdale Dialogue all of them
Speaker 1: at Q for Hillsdale dot com or just google, Apple
Speaker 1: iTunes and Hillsdale.
Speaker 2: Morning Glory and even Grace America. And a happy New
Speaker 2: Year to you.
Speaker 1: It is the first Big Weekend Pod of twenty twenty six.
Speaker 1: I'm back behind the microphone after moving west for a
Speaker 1: couple of months and getting the flu and doing so
Speaker 1: so that's why I was off the air thanks to
Speaker 1: Kurt Schlickter, who filled in for me. The Big Weekend
Speaker 1: Pod today is pretty much a couple of monologues by me,
Speaker 1: Matt Continetti, Eli Lake and that's it now the monologue
Speaker 1: You are interesting because CBS Evening News has made a
Speaker 1: promise that I talked about in the opening monologue. Second
Speaker 1: monologue beginning of the month, beginning of a new year,
Speaker 1: station switch around stations are added. I got to do
Speaker 1: the who I am and why am I doing this
Speaker 1: first broadcast of the month business, And so if you're
Speaker 1: new to this, you'll hear that, and if you don't
Speaker 1: like it, just fast forward through it to get the
Speaker 1: continenty and Eli Lake and all I can tell you
Speaker 1: is it was a a great time being having the flu.
Speaker 1: There's no better place to have the flu than in
Speaker 1: California because you realize that it doesn't matter where you are,
Speaker 1: it doesn't matter that it's raining. And it just rained
Speaker 1: for a week, so I didn't miss anything because California
Speaker 1: was miserable, and I got up the implacable hill this morning,
Speaker 1: so that's good too. I want you to make sure
Speaker 1: that you like and subscribe to this podcast so that
Speaker 1: you can get it sent to you Monday through Friday.
Speaker 1: But the Big Weekend Pod purposely intended for you people
Speaker 1: who are doing your gym routine or your exercise on
Speaker 1: the weekend. If you're new to this, usually cover the
Speaker 1: weekend review news. But it's the first weege of theyar
Speaker 1: there isn't much news except in Iran, so expect the
Speaker 1: heavy focus on Iran, maybe a little bit of catch
Speaker 1: up on the Somali land recognition, talk, a little bit
Speaker 1: about the Minnesota fraud's story, but there really hadn't been
Speaker 1: any news for three weeks, except the biggest story of
Speaker 1: twenty twenty six might be unfolding as we speak in Iran,
Speaker 1: where up to seven people have been murdered by the
Speaker 1: regime as protests spread throughout the country.
Speaker 2: This is their fourth revolution.
Speaker 1: Their first one was in nineteen seventy nine of the
Speaker 1: Islamic Revolution toppled the Shop. I watched it on a
Speaker 1: couch basically with former President Richard Nixon and Ray Price.
Speaker 1: The three of us every day would be in the
Speaker 1: former President's office in San Clementy watching then network television
Speaker 1: of the massive demonstration that forced the shot of Flea.
Speaker 1: In early nineteen seventy nine saw the return to Iran
Speaker 1: of the Iatola Homini, who was the first Ayatola. They've
Speaker 1: had for forty seven years, right, they started in nineteen
Speaker 1: seventy nine, so it's been forty seven years.
Speaker 2: They have had two guys.
Speaker 1: Running the country, the Itola Homine followed by the Atola.
Speaker 1: And they're both theocratic, fanatical Shia.
Speaker 2: Dictators.
Speaker 1: And it's a brutal, repressive regime, the leading exporter of
Speaker 1: terror in the world. There are some good resources on it.
Speaker 1: Our friends over at the Foundation for the Defensive Democracy
Speaker 1: did a long podcast series last year on Iran by
Speaker 1: Mark Dubitz. Dubovitz and I would recommend that to you.
Speaker 1: Look up Foundation for the Defensive Democracies and Iran and
Speaker 1: Mark Dubovitz, and you can find I think it's a
Speaker 1: twelve parter. It takes it through the near a half
Speaker 1: century of the Islamic Revolution and the tyranny and the
Speaker 1: oppression and the murder and the export of terrorism associated
Speaker 1: with it, and then the great book Vanguard of the
Speaker 1: mm I put a couple of people over there. But
Speaker 1: the most recent thing, have you read it? Gurn No
Speaker 1: surprise there tracked down a leading Iranian dissident in the
Speaker 1: United States and interviewed her for almost an hour on Friday,
Speaker 1: and you should listen to that. The link is over
Speaker 1: at my ex account. Hugh Hewett and Aviv just basically
Speaker 1: let her fill us in. There's no intervention here that
Speaker 1: the United States should be considering. I know the President
Speaker 1: said he would protect the protesters. I'm not sure what
Speaker 1: that means if they're mowed down in the streets and
Speaker 1: Israel's standing back and saying this is an US, yea,
Speaker 1: this is organic. It's the fourth one nineteen seventy nine,
Speaker 1: followed by a late nineteen nineties attempt to throw off
Speaker 1: the regime that was crushed brutally. Unfortunately Bill Clinton was
Speaker 1: in power. We didn't do anything help them. Then the
Speaker 1: Green movement, some people are onsly call it the Green Revolution.
Speaker 1: One revolution was a movement. It was a very peaceful,
Speaker 1: massive protest that was crushed and Barack Obama was the
Speaker 1: new president, didn't know what he was doing, said nothing
Speaker 1: about it, and instead ended up in the JCPOA which
Speaker 1: was a nightmare. And then there was another attempt at
Speaker 1: uprising with the murder of a young woman in twenty
Speaker 1: twenty two. The infirm Joe Biden, his appeasement oriented foreign
Speaker 1: policy team did nothing to help Iran in twenty twenty two.
Speaker 2: The people of Iran.
Speaker 1: So this is the first time that Iran has had
Speaker 1: one of these convulsions. It's the fifth convulsion that there's
Speaker 1: actually a group of serious people running American foreign policies.
Speaker 1: I'm looking to the President, Secretary Rubio, un Ambassador Waltz
Speaker 1: to do the one thing the United States can do,
Speaker 1: which is focus attention on and condemn violence by the
Speaker 1: regime against innocent protesters. The recipient cause of this is
Speaker 1: that the real their currency is plummeted in value, and
Speaker 1: I learned there are four different exchange rates, and the
Speaker 1: exchange rate for the ordinary person is just it's like
Speaker 1: a million and a half realls.
Speaker 2: For a dollar an American dollar.
Speaker 1: So people have been impoverished, their life savisty have been
Speaker 1: wiped out, and that will radicalize you in a hurry.
Speaker 1: Then on top of that, there's just dysfunction at every
Speaker 1: level because the corruption is endemic and systemic throughout Iran
Speaker 1: and the Iranian Revolutionary guardcore which props up the regime.
Speaker 1: It's different from the Iranian military, but as Aviv said
Speaker 1: on his podcast, highly unlikely to that the Iranian military
Speaker 1: is going to be the step in and stop the
Speaker 1: Iranian Revolutionary Guard, which there's sort of a shadow paramilitary
Speaker 1: police that's the name of the besiege. They're killers and
Speaker 1: they will kill. So it takes extraordinary courage on behalf
Speaker 1: of the people of Iran to step up and step
Speaker 1: into the streets right now.
Speaker 2: But they are desperate.
Speaker 1: Nothing works, there are blackouts everywhere, the water supply is fragile, and.
Speaker 2: People have just had it.
Speaker 1: So it's the fourth time in less than fifty years
Speaker 1: that the country has convulsed. Maybe this time it'll be
Speaker 1: like one of the color revolutions or like the dissolution
Speaker 1: of the Soviet Union. At least the dissident that Aviv
Speaker 1: talked to was optimistic, but she also was very adamant
Speaker 1: Israeli United States people stay out of this. Let the
Speaker 1: Iranian people decide. So I'm all for that. With that,
Speaker 1: let's turn our attention to CBS News and the promise
Speaker 1: that was made by Tony Ducoppole on Thursday, New Year's Day,
Speaker 1: posted his promise about the new CBS Evening News which
Speaker 1: begins on Monday night, and I played it for you
Speaker 1: in the first segment of the New Year on The
Speaker 1: Hugh Hewitt Show, and my commentary is attached.
Speaker 2: Don't go anywhere, enjoy the big weekend pot.
Speaker 1: Good morning, glory and even grace in America. I'm Hugh Hewitt, Welcome,
Speaker 1: Happy New Year. This is my first broadcast of twenty
Speaker 1: twenty six. I want to thank Kurt Schlickter, who sat
Speaker 1: in for me on December twenty sixth and every show thereafter.
Speaker 1: As I moved out to the West Coast for a
Speaker 1: few weeks and also got the flu, which is inevitable
Speaker 1: if you fly cross country this time of the year.
Speaker 1: But thank you, Kurt did a fabulous bang up job.
Speaker 1: As usual, I have new stations and station changes all
Speaker 1: across the Salem Radio Network. Salem News Channel is still
Speaker 1: the same, and I will cover all that who I am,
Speaker 1: what I do in hour two today, and I hope
Speaker 1: you'll subscribe and like the podcast highly concentrated Hugh. If
Speaker 1: you can't catch the program when it's live in your
Speaker 1: car three to six in the East, noon to three
Speaker 1: in the West, and different times in between, different stations
Speaker 1: carried at different time, the podcasts always a good way
Speaker 1: to start the morning and get all the news that
Speaker 1: you need and the analysis that you want, and the
Speaker 1: consistent delivery of clear, concise facts, my take the great
Speaker 1: guests that we've been doing on this program since two thousand.
Speaker 1: I've been in the business since nineteen ninety, both radio
Speaker 1: and television. And whether you're listening on the Sale Radio Network,
Speaker 1: watching on the Sale News Channel, picking up a YouTube clip,
Speaker 1: or listening to the podcast Welcome, you should also know
Speaker 1: I'm about to talk about the news, and you've got
Speaker 1: to adjustment that I am a Fox News contributor I
Speaker 1: think Brett Barr is the best newsman in the business.
Speaker 1: I don't think anyone can ever measure up this Special Report.
Speaker 1: But everything we do here we do with six people.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: It's me and Dwayne Adam, three of us have been
Speaker 1: together for twenty five years, plus Harley, Danielle, Diana and Ben.
Speaker 2: That's it. Six people.
Speaker 1: We do this whole thing, and we are I think
Speaker 1: the very best at news and analysis and great guests
Speaker 1: and commentary of anyone in broadcast in any format. And
Speaker 1: I think you find it right here. If you want
Speaker 1: a nightly news program backed up by bureaus and analysts
Speaker 1: and people reporting from around the world, that would be
Speaker 1: Fox News Special Report with Brett phre But Yesterday, CBS
Speaker 1: Evening News soon to be anchor Tony de Kopple laid
Speaker 1: out a video that I want you to hear, and
Speaker 1: I'm going to talk with you about it. Barry Weiss,
Speaker 1: of course, became the head of CBS News division late
Speaker 1: last year when a sale of the network occurred and
Speaker 1: she was hired by the new bosses. She founded the
Speaker 1: Free Press, New York Times Editorial Board, Wall Street JOURNALI
Speaker 1: Editorial Board. I've only talked to her once. I've never
Speaker 1: met her. Barry Weiss, I think is a center left person,
Speaker 1: sort of a classic liberal left person, but I don't
Speaker 1: know we're well enough to say that with great conviction.
Speaker 1: But she, of course, compared to most of the major
Speaker 1: news outlets in the United States, considered a conservative, she's not.
Speaker 1: She's not a conservative, but she's fair and she's trying
Speaker 1: to rebuild the brand. And to that end, Tony Dekoople,
Speaker 1: he promises, and I want to make sure that I
Speaker 1: give you the money clip I report for you, he
Speaker 1: tells the American public via the video available at CBS
Speaker 1: Evening News on x which means, I tell you what
Speaker 1: I know, when I know it, and how I know it,
Speaker 1: and when I get it wrong, I'll tell you that too.
Speaker 1: That's the heart of it, and I think that's good.
Speaker 1: I'm not going to stop watching Brett Baer and Special
Speaker 1: Report because it's the best news program out there, but
Speaker 1: I'll at least give Tony and the gang at CBS
Speaker 1: Evening News a chance to show me that they've come
Speaker 1: back in from It's not left field. To use a
Speaker 1: baseball analogy for the bettersit of the Steelers fans, center
Speaker 1: field is where Huntley and Brinkley and Walter Cronkite and
Speaker 1: Frank Reynolds and Peter Jennings played forever. They were in
Speaker 1: center field, and I play in right field, and most
Speaker 1: of legacy media is in left field. But unfortunately the
Speaker 1: television networks, including most of CNN, went into the left
Speaker 1: field bleachers over the last thirty to forty years. And
Speaker 1: I've stayed the same. I'm a center right guy. I've
Speaker 1: stayed the same for the whole time. And as a result,
Speaker 1: with a bunch of other factors, including the availability of
Speaker 1: media streaming services, lots of choices, people on their devices
Speaker 1: not glued to the television set for their streaming platform,
Speaker 1: not watching the evening news, it used to be at
Speaker 1: the height of CBS, Walter Cronkite had a seven share,
Speaker 1: all right, So that was it was enormous for that
Speaker 1: period of time, the late sixties, early seventies. Last month,
Speaker 1: ABC World News Tonight six thirty pm with David Muir
Speaker 1: averages about seven point one to nine million viewers, NBC
Speaker 1: Nightly News averaged about five point six three million viewers,
Speaker 1: CBS Evening News about three point five to five million viewers,
Speaker 1: and our friend Brett and Special Report. They're always about
Speaker 1: three million, and some days they beat all three of
Speaker 1: the networks when there's big news, when people are going there,
Speaker 1: when breaking news is happening, like arguably right now what
Speaker 1: happened in those years. By contrast, by the way, got
Speaker 1: a couple of metrics for you, So seven million over
Speaker 1: at ABC, five point six at NBC, three point five
Speaker 1: to five at CBS. They do have to shake things
Speaker 1: up at CBS because they're dying what happened to Compare
Speaker 1: NBC Sunday Night football in December Vikings Cowboys nineteen point
Speaker 1: six one million viewers.
Speaker 2: So it's not just CBS, it's just the news division.
Speaker 1: CBS had a late night National Football League game on
Speaker 1: Sunday at twenty four and a half million viewers. Fox
Speaker 1: News and sanh it's just not even in the game.
Speaker 1: They're so broken. I didn't even bother with that. The weekend,
Speaker 1: the weeknight edition of CBS, ABC and NBC airs at
Speaker 1: six thirty pm. Bread starts at six pms ago a
Speaker 1: little bit of advantaging goes for an hour, and they
Speaker 1: go for a half hour now cronkite CBS Evening News
Speaker 1: at its peak had between twenty seven and twenty nine
Speaker 1: million viewers every night. That was when the population of
Speaker 1: the country was two hundred million. It's three hundred and forty.
Speaker 2: Million now, and what needs to happen is quite obvious.
Speaker 2: You just got to tell the truth. Let's try Tony again.
Speaker 2: Here's his claim.
Speaker 3: A lot has changed since the first person sat in
Speaker 3: this chair. But for me, the biggest difference is people
Speaker 3: do not trust us like they used to. And it's
Speaker 3: not just us, it's all legacy media.
Speaker 4: And I get it.
Speaker 3: I get it because I've been hearing about it from
Speaker 3: just about everybody for more than twenty years, as I've
Speaker 3: traveled to America on this assignment, or that my mom's
Speaker 3: neighbors in West Virginia, my own neighbors in New York City,
Speaker 3: thousands and thousands of conversations in between. Sometimes people want
Speaker 3: to talk to me about our coverage of NAFTA or
Speaker 3: the Iraq War. Other times it's all about Hillary Clinton's
Speaker 3: emails or Russia Gate, or more recently, COVID lockdowns, Hunter
Speaker 3: Biden's laptop, or the President's.
Speaker 4: Fitness for office.
Speaker 3: The point is, on too many stories, the press has
Speaker 3: missed the story because we've taken into account the perspective
Speaker 3: of advocates and not the average American, or we put
Speaker 3: too much weight in the analysis of academics or elites
Speaker 3: and not enough on you. And I know this because
Speaker 3: at certain points.
Speaker 4: I have been you. I have felt this way too.
Speaker 4: I felt like what I.
Speaker 3: Was seeing and hearing on the news didn't reflect what
Speaker 3: I was seeing and hearing in my own life, and
Speaker 3: that the most urgent questions simply weren't being asked. So
Speaker 3: here's my promise to you today and every time you
Speaker 3: see me in this chair, you come first, not advertisers,
Speaker 3: not politicians, not corporate interests, and yes that does include
Speaker 3: the corporate owners of CBS. I report for you, which
Speaker 3: means I tell you what I know, when I know it,
Speaker 3: and how I know it, and when I get.
Speaker 4: It wrong, I'll tell you that too.
Speaker 3: It also means I'm going to talk to everybody and
Speaker 3: hold everyone in public life to the very same standard.
Speaker 4: After all, I became a journalist to talk to people.
Speaker 3: I love talking to people about what works in this country,
Speaker 3: what doesn't, and not only what should change, but the
Speaker 3: good idea is that should never change.
Speaker 4: I think telling the truth is one of them.
Speaker 3: I'm Tony Dakoppel, the anchor of the CBS Evening News.
Speaker 1: That will start on Monday night. It's a good mission statement.
Speaker 1: I hope he makes it. I want to correct him.
Speaker 1: I was not late on COVID, I was not late
Speaker 1: on the laptop. I was not late on Joe Biden's infirmity.
Speaker 1: I was early, if not first, on all those stories.
Speaker 1: But I want to tell you what the difference is
Speaker 1: between that and now. Nineteen seventy seven, between my junior
Speaker 1: and senior year in college, in the summer, five other
Speaker 1: guys and I would watch sixty minutes every Sunday night.
Speaker 1: Back then, it had an audience of about twenty five
Speaker 1: million people. Now it's down to ten million people, and
Speaker 1: not many young men are watching it.
Speaker 2: Why.
Speaker 1: It's more often than not, just bad television and it's
Speaker 1: not reliable.
Speaker 4: And I like Ed Whitaker.
Speaker 1: I met him recently. I think he's pretty smart. But
Speaker 1: all of news depends not just on anchors and faces,
Speaker 1: but on the head of the news division, the producers
Speaker 1: of the segments in the day parts, the journalists, the writers,
Speaker 1: and then the editors and then the anchor. So a
Speaker 1: lot's got to change at CBS News but I'm willing
Speaker 1: to give them a chance. I'm willing to see if
Speaker 1: they can in fact fix having gone into the left
Speaker 1: field bleachers. I'm Hugh Hewett, and I'll continue to tell
Speaker 1: you that station.
Speaker 2: Morny Loren Evening Grace in America.
Speaker 1: I'm Hugh Hewett inside the Relief Factor studio out West,
Speaker 1: where I am for a few weeks. If you marry
Speaker 1: a Californian girl, and I did, I got lucky. I
Speaker 1: met a beautiful Californian girl in nineteen seventy eight and
Speaker 1: she said, yes, we got married in nineteen eighty two.
Speaker 1: You can't spend the winter in the East. They're just
Speaker 1: not cut out for it. And so most years I'm
Speaker 1: teaching at chap In Law School, but I'm taking this
Speaker 1: year off and it's an election year, and I usually
Speaker 1: do because there are demands on my time and from
Speaker 1: Fox News, etc.
Speaker 2: Things like that.
Speaker 1: But I'm out of here for a few weeks, and
Speaker 1: thanks to my former producer Dwayne, I'm able to talk
Speaker 1: to you today, Harley and Adam. Of course some of
Speaker 1: you are hearing me for the very first time because
Speaker 1: at the beginning of a year, or it might be Monday,
Speaker 1: this is the first broadcast day of the month. A
Speaker 1: lot of stations change formats, change owners, pick up new shows,
Speaker 1: drop old shows. Some of you find the podcast Highly
Speaker 1: Concentrated Hugh, which is available wherever podcasts are, Salem Podcast Network, iTunes, Spotify,
Speaker 1: wherever like and subscribe. Tens of thousands of you begin
Speaker 1: your morning with the UWIT Show from the day before,
Speaker 1: which is heard live three to six pm in the East,
Speaker 1: and so it's got all to day's news to the
Speaker 1: extent that there is news, and a lot of you
Speaker 1: just begin your day with it the next morning. That's
Speaker 1: why I would say morning, Glory, evening grace. But it
Speaker 1: is my practice and has been since Dwayne Adam and
Speaker 1: I got started in two thousand, to always give a
Speaker 1: little bit of the backdrop to who I am, so
Speaker 1: you know whether or not you want to listen to
Speaker 1: me or trust me. And it's all very simple. I
Speaker 1: am a son and a grandson of Ohio. All four
Speaker 1: of my grandparents born, raised, lived, died buried in Nashtabille, Ohio.
Speaker 1: My mom and dad we got married after the war.
Speaker 1: Dad was youngest of three boys. He got to the
Speaker 1: war in time to occupy Japan. He said, The most
Speaker 1: dangerous thing he did was transit ships to the Philippines
Speaker 1: and then floating offside of Japan before Truman dropped the
Speaker 1: atomic bombs when they were Japanese submarines left and kamakazis.
Speaker 1: So he really was not in the war, but he
Speaker 1: was part of it. Brother flew over the Hump, another
Speaker 1: brother through in Europe in the b twenty nines. So
Speaker 1: the greatest generation raised us and I grew up in Warren, Ohio,
Speaker 1: steel Town, Cartown at that time seventy five thousand people.
Speaker 1: I'm born in nineteen fifty six. I turned seventeen a
Speaker 1: month and Cartown, steel Town very very prosperous in the
Speaker 1: fifties and the sixties, not so much in the seventies,
Speaker 1: and the plummeting began in the eighties and the nineties,
Speaker 1: and maybe it will rekindle now. The one thing Ohio
Speaker 1: as is water, but it maybe. Who I am, I'm
Speaker 1: Roman Catholic. I'm actually an evangelical Roman Catholic Presbyterian because
Speaker 1: my wonderful wife, the fetching missus Hewett's a Presbyterian. I'm
Speaker 1: a cradle Catholic, so I usually go to Mass on
Speaker 1: Saturday and to the Presbyterian Church on Sunday, double dipper,
Speaker 1: one river, two banks were good, and I spent twelve
Speaker 1: years in Catholic education and then got into Harvard under
Speaker 1: the Ohio lottery and good test scores back in the
Speaker 1: days when they basically let in people who did well
Speaker 1: in the national merit scholarship business. So I went there
Speaker 1: studied government. Wish I was smart enough to be Estrousian.
Speaker 1: Took all their the classes I could from Harvey Mansfield
Speaker 1: and Nathan Tarkov and a bunch of other people.
Speaker 2: But I wasn't smart enough to be a PhD.
Speaker 1: So I applied to and did not get into law
Speaker 1: school har or Michigan, where I wanted to go. So
Speaker 1: I went instead via The most important words in the
Speaker 1: English language is I know a guy? And have you
Speaker 1: ever considered well Ed Mansfield Harvey's son saw me sitting
Speaker 1: on the steps one day, said what are you doing
Speaker 1: next year? When I was a senior in college, said
Speaker 1: I have no idea. I didn't get into Harvard or Michigan.
Speaker 1: I don't want to go to the University of Chicago.
Speaker 1: Nobody wants to go to the University of Chicago. It's
Speaker 1: where fun goes to die. And I didn't know that
Speaker 1: the University of Virginia was as beautiful as it was,
Speaker 1: and so I just I don't know. I didn't have
Speaker 1: a job. Then he said, well, you ought to call
Speaker 1: a guy. I know a guy that here's per Cup
Speaker 1: and it was I got am Ray Price down in
Speaker 1: DC and he had taught at Harvard a year before.
Speaker 1: He was looking for a research assistant on a book
Speaker 1: on the media. So I called him up. He said,
Speaker 1: why don't you fly on down and we'll talk about it.
Speaker 1: So I got on an airplane. Was not much of
Speaker 1: a flyer. I would drive from Ohio to Boston to Cambridge.
Speaker 1: And I put on my only suitent and flew down
Speaker 1: to DC and knocked on Rape House in Georgetown on
Speaker 1: Prospect and he answered the door and said, yes.
Speaker 2: Can I help you?
Speaker 1: He said, well, I'm Hugh you we have an interview
Speaker 1: and he hit his head, you know, oh, dear, and
Speaker 1: that's never a good sign. He had forgotten the interview,
Speaker 1: and he explained he had to go out to San
Speaker 1: Clementy to work with Richard Nixon on a book that
Speaker 1: was passed deadline after the memoir.
Speaker 2: It's called The Real War and then he probably said
Speaker 2: have you.
Speaker 1: Ever considered which are the second foremost important word, have
Speaker 1: you ever considered moving to California. He wasn't offering me
Speaker 1: a job, but David Eisenhower needed a research assistant, so
Speaker 1: I said, I hadn't thought about it, but be glad
Speaker 1: to next thing I know, Julie Nixon. Ieen hours on
Speaker 1: the phone at my dorm and David gets on the phone.
Speaker 1: I agree to go do the TikTok for Eisenhower at War.
Speaker 1: The TikTok's day by day chronology of what Ike was
Speaker 1: doing during World War Two. It's a great book on
Speaker 1: every book a word out there War by David Eisenhower.
Speaker 1: And after three months, which I guess was a sort
Speaker 1: of a tryout, Urn offered me a job on his
Speaker 1: writing staff, which consisted of our and Ray Price, a
Speaker 1: fellow in DC whose name was Todd I can't remember
Speaker 1: his last name. And then me and I became a ghostwriter,
Speaker 1: editorial assistant, researcher to the former president in exile in
Speaker 1: San Clementy. That was great fun until he moved to
Speaker 1: New York in nineteen eighty and I lasted about six
Speaker 1: months there. Said to the boss I'm going to go
Speaker 1: to law school. I had reapplied and gotten into Michigan,
Speaker 1: not Arbor. We got into Michigan in the second time.
Speaker 1: He said, go with God. No one going to be
Speaker 1: in the city unless you've got a lot of money
Speaker 1: or none at all. And I left and went to
Speaker 1: ann Arbor. Got married during the course of law school
Speaker 1: to the vetching Missus Stuett, and then did a clerkship
Speaker 1: on the d C Circuit. Unusual clerkship. Judge Roger rob
Speaker 1: hired me. Then he got sick, so I worked for
Speaker 1: Judge Bork, Judge Galia, Judge Ginsburg, Judge Kelly Wright, Judge
Speaker 1: Spots Robinson, and then George McKinnon came back from Minnesota,
Speaker 1: and I just went full time with George mckinn until
Speaker 1: Roger rob came back. It was a fabulous year. And
Speaker 1: then I was going to go to work at done
Speaker 1: in Kutscher, but then I got a phone call, have
Speaker 1: you ever considered coming to the Department of Justice. My
Speaker 1: friend Terry Eastland was working over there for William French
Speaker 1: Smith as a speech rights that I have ever considered.
Speaker 1: We were in a Bible study together at National Presbyterian
Speaker 1: Church and I said, sure, I'd love to do that.
Speaker 1: And I went over to the Attorney General's office as
Speaker 1: a special assistant for the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court warrants
Speaker 1: and a few other things, And so I reviewed all
Speaker 1: the FIZA applications for warrants from the bureau.
Speaker 2: There was no National Security Division in nineteen eighty four.
Speaker 1: Then I went to the White House Counsel's office with
Speaker 1: ricarda who now runs a hot dog stand in a
Speaker 1: driving range in Miami and actually makes his retirement by hustling.
Speaker 1: He's a hustler on the golf course. Do not give
Speaker 1: him strokes. Ricardo's Cuban hot dogs are fine, the driving
Speaker 1: range is fine. Don't play golf with the man. And
Speaker 1: Fred Vailing. Then I went into the agencies. Then finally,
Speaker 1: after all that time, ended up running OM because if
Speaker 1: you hang around an administration at the end, they would
Speaker 1: promote people who anyone who's around. I got picked a
Speaker 1: run OPM, got through the Senate, got confirmed. OPM's the
Speaker 1: OPPS personal management. Then we finally went to California because
Speaker 1: Richard Nixon called and the dime dropped. They'd been good
Speaker 1: to me, will you build the library? I came out
Speaker 1: to San Clementy again, and this time I didn't move
Speaker 1: to San Clementy, but I moved closer to where the
Speaker 1: library is in ne Orba. Linda and I started a
Speaker 1: law practice, and I got the Nixon Library built and open.
Speaker 1: And then I got a call from KFI Radio.
Speaker 2: Have you ever.
Speaker 1: Considered during weekend raise it? Does it pay anything? I'm poor?
Speaker 1: I said, yeah, five hundred bucks a weekend. So I
Speaker 1: did six hours of radio for KFI on the weekends
Speaker 1: for a few years. Then I got a call, if
Speaker 1: you are considered doing TV. This is nineteen ninety two
Speaker 1: for casey Et and I did ten years anchoring the
Speaker 1: nightly news with Pat Morrison, Rubin Martinez, Kirmin Maddox on
Speaker 1: Life and Times. Then Salem called and this Motley crew
Speaker 1: got together and we launched this show on July ten,
Speaker 1: two thousand.
Speaker 2: I'm still practicing law.
Speaker 1: In between, I started teaching constitutional law at Chapman Law School.
Speaker 1: I'm better than your average con law professor, not as
Speaker 1: good as some, better than most. And I've been teaching
Speaker 1: at Chapman con Law since nineteen ninety six. Began in
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety five teaching torts. Those poor kids what I
Speaker 1: know about torts I learned the night before that year,
Speaker 1: but I know con law and practicing administrative law. And
Speaker 1: then we started the show in two thousand. Then I
Speaker 1: got asked to do the debates in twenty fifteen twenty sixteen,
Speaker 1: which we partnered Salem with CNN. I was the Salem
Speaker 1: guy and did four presidential debates, got offers from the networks.
Speaker 1: Then went to work for NBC for four years and MSNBC.
Speaker 1: So I've been before the mass I did in my years.
Speaker 2: In big media. Then the Washington Post offered me a calm.
Speaker 2: I wrote that.
Speaker 1: Then I left NBC Michel agreement. We just did not
Speaker 1: get along. Then I quit the Washington Post. Most of
Speaker 1: the people there were wonderful, but there.
Speaker 2: Was a problem. And then I went to work for
Speaker 2: Fox News.
Speaker 1: I keep doing the show and we're on the Salem
Speaker 1: News Channel now and I've written a dozen books, and
Speaker 1: I write columns twice a week for Fox News. I
Speaker 1: write for The Washington Examiner, and I'm a talking head.
Speaker 1: I think I'm on handity tonight. I doubt that Shawn's
Speaker 1: back from vacation. I'll bet you it's Kelly Ann normally
Speaker 1: asked for me to be on the panel when she's in,
Speaker 1: I'll be on Fox and Friends in the morning. I'm
Speaker 1: a Fox News contributor, but I'm a Salem guy, and
Speaker 1: what we do is bring you the news, the news
Speaker 1: you need, the analysis you've come to trust, and great guests.
Speaker 2: We are center right and proud of it.
Speaker 1: Fact base, serious fun, and I keep you up to
Speaker 1: date on the Cleveland Browns, the Cleveland Guardians, the Cleveland Cavaliers,
Speaker 1: and the Ohio State University Buckeyes, who may not win
Speaker 1: back to back championships, but are a good bet in
Speaker 1: twenty twenty seven, don't go anywhere, America.
Speaker 2: Welcome back to me here at first broadcast of the
Speaker 2: new year.
Speaker 1: For me as it is first time I've talked to
Speaker 1: Matt Continetti of the Wall Street Journal in the American
Speaker 1: Enterprise Institute in twenty twenty six.
Speaker 2: Happy new Year, Matt. I hope it's off to a
Speaker 2: good start for you.
Speaker 5: Happy new year, Hugh.
Speaker 1: Let's begin with the biggest story in the world, Iran.
Speaker 1: Not a lot of Americans know what's going on there
Speaker 1: because it's not being covered very well by our media.
Speaker 1: How important is this series of developments in protesting your view.
Speaker 5: Well, I think that's important.
Speaker 6: Iron goes through this every few years, it seems widespread
Speaker 6: public protests, regime crackdown. I think this particular outbreak is
Speaker 6: important for a few reasons, Hugh. The first is, after
Speaker 6: Operation Midnight Hammer, our strike on the Iranian nuclear facilities,
Speaker 6: the commentariat all pronounced that this would strengthen the regime,
Speaker 6: that Iranians would rally to the regime. In fact, the
Speaker 6: exact opposite has happened, and the Iranian people are showing
Speaker 6: their frustration with their government, which has been unable to
Speaker 6: provide them basic utilities such as water or energy. Of course,
Speaker 6: inflation is out of control. Economic and political breakdown in
Speaker 6: the months since Operation Midnight Hammer, so that's important. The
Speaker 6: second reason it's important is there seems to be a
Speaker 6: split within the regime, with some political elements saying that
Speaker 6: they understand what the protesters are complaining about, that they
Speaker 6: want to even take action to mollify them. And that
Speaker 6: suggests that we could have a difference here between earlier
Speaker 6: widespread protests like the Green Revolutions, say in two thousand
Speaker 6: and nine, where the government itself begins to fracture that
Speaker 6: could lead to regime collapse and then the third reason
Speaker 6: why this protest is different is we have an American
Speaker 6: president who has situated himself on the side of the protesters,
Speaker 6: and President Trumps from remarkable post on social media this
Speaker 6: morning where he said that America is ready to protect
Speaker 6: the protesters if the Iranian government opens fire on them,
Speaker 6: is a true remarkable stance for an American president to take.
Speaker 6: It's the first time, whether these protests happened under Obama,
Speaker 6: or they happened under Trump, or they happened under Biden,
Speaker 6: that the American president has said that he stands alongside
Speaker 6: the protesters. So for those three reasons, I'd say this
Speaker 6: has the potential to be much more than a typical
Speaker 6: flare up against the regime.
Speaker 1: Typical flare ups, by my calculation, in nineteen seventy nine,
Speaker 1: the Iranian Revolution, Jimmy Carter's president the late nineteen nineties
Speaker 1: is the first attempt to throw up the regime. Bill
Speaker 1: Clinton his president, the Green Movement in two thousand and nine,
Speaker 1: President Obama his president, and then the young woman was
Speaker 1: murdered in twenty twenty two in the protests there that
Speaker 1: were ignored by.
Speaker 2: The Biden administration.
Speaker 1: Those four seminal moments current under democratic presidents who were
Speaker 1: weak on national security and with an administration that was
Speaker 1: averse to any kind of vocal support. Do you think
Speaker 1: we'll see Secretary of Rubio and UN Ambassador Waltz in
Speaker 1: the game talking about Iran this week.
Speaker 6: I think I've already seen Ambassador Waltz make some statements.
Speaker 6: I'm sure we'll see Secretary Rubio follow through. And you know,
Speaker 6: you you bring to mind this idea of maximum pressure
Speaker 6: that was always kind of the motto of the Trump
Speaker 6: administration's approach to Iran. It began in the first term
Speaker 6: where the Trump administration applied economic pressure, really squeezing the regime,
Speaker 6: withdrew from the nuclear agreement that Obama had made, took
Speaker 6: out Solamani, the head of the IRGC. And now we
Speaker 6: have this second term where Trump has took out the
Speaker 6: Ford how nuclear facility, you know, building on on Israel's
Speaker 6: achievements in taking out other nuclear and missile production sites
Speaker 6: during the war.
Speaker 5: Earlier this rather last year.
Speaker 6: Now we have additional maximum pressure, and we have Trump
Speaker 6: on the side of the protesters. So there's a moment
Speaker 6: of opportunity here I think where we could really score
Speaker 6: victory for freedom. If the Iranians do take that next
Speaker 6: step to bring down the Mullas.
Speaker 1: Now Donald Trump has used military power against Venezuela. I'm
Speaker 1: not sure it makes sense to use any military power in.
Speaker 2: Iran right now.
Speaker 1: Unless it is absolute chaos and American interests and people
Speaker 1: are threatened.
Speaker 2: What I read in that.
Speaker 1: Through social post this morning was the kind of vocal
Speaker 1: focus and support that was lacking under President's Biden, Obama, Clinton,
Speaker 1: and of course Jimmy Carter. Do you actually expect any
Speaker 1: more than that? I mean, four and Oh was great.
Speaker 1: Operation of Night Hammer was great, But I don't expect
Speaker 1: anything more than that.
Speaker 6: In the near future. Probably not. I mean, it depends
Speaker 6: on what the regime does. Of course meant let's forget,
Speaker 6: let's not forget. Rather that just last week when Prime
Speaker 6: Minister net and Yah who visited Trump and mar A Lago.
Speaker 6: What we got out of that meeting was President Trump saying, look,
Speaker 6: if the Iranians moved to restore the nuclear program, Israel
Speaker 6: has a green light, and America we'll take action too.
Speaker 5: So I don't think we're done with Iran quite yet.
Speaker 2: I hope not.
Speaker 1: That I'm treating that in a separate category. Don't go
Speaker 1: anywhere in America. I'm with Matt. During the break, we'll
Speaker 1: be back on the other side talk about CBS. But
Speaker 1: during the break, Joseph Epstein state ten, I'm back with
Speaker 1: Matt Continey of The Wall Street Journal and Ai.
Speaker 2: Matt.
Speaker 1: The last book I read in twenty twenty five, and
Speaker 1: I finished it yesterday is Joseph Epstein's twenty twenty four
Speaker 1: memoir Never say You've had a lucky life, especially if
Speaker 1: you've had a lucky life. Actually brilliant?
Speaker 2: Have you read it?
Speaker 6: Not only did I read it, I reviewed it for
Speaker 6: The Wall Street Journal, Hugh.
Speaker 4: Oh where I stumped you? I stumped you.
Speaker 2: And you beat me. Tell people have.
Speaker 1: Heard me talk about Joseph Epstein for years. Bring me
Speaker 1: the Brain of Joseph Epstein. He has repeatedly politely turned
Speaker 1: down the invitation to be on the program. He doesn't
Speaker 1: like this format or whatever. But I think he is
Speaker 1: our most brilliant essay is Is there anyone else in
Speaker 1: his league?
Speaker 5: Oh?
Speaker 6: No, I'm certainly not living any longer. Joe is one
Speaker 6: of the last great literary journalists, a great literary intellectual.
Speaker 6: I've often recommended his books to young people as a
Speaker 6: form of graduate school. I mean certainly they amount to
Speaker 6: earning a master's even a PhD in literary and cultural history.
Speaker 5: I own all of his books. I returned to them
Speaker 5: again and again.
Speaker 6: He's a brilliant, brilliant writer, whether he he's writing on
Speaker 6: sports or culture, or movies or books. Though, I think
Speaker 6: I like his literary biography the best when he kind
Speaker 6: of locates an author and just writes a very long
Speaker 6: essay talking about the author's life and work.
Speaker 5: That those are my favorite Epstein.
Speaker 2: I do love all that. I also have not all
Speaker 2: of his books.
Speaker 1: I don't have his book on divorce, for example, but
Speaker 1: I've got probably ninety percent of them, and they're well thumbed.
Speaker 1: How do you get that smart? Because you know, he's
Speaker 1: very self effacing in this autobiography. He's in Little Rock, Arkansas,
Speaker 1: to was married to his first wife, with two boys
Speaker 1: that were not his own, end up with. There's tragedy
Speaker 1: his life. They're sadness. There's great, they're brilliant writing. But
Speaker 1: how do you learn all this stuff? He didn't do
Speaker 1: any work until he was twenty five. I mean work
Speaker 1: being educational, hard work.
Speaker 6: Well, the University of Chicago helps. There's no doubt about that,
Speaker 6: and the curriculum there, especially when Epstein went there, is
Speaker 6: pretty demanding and wide ranging. It still is to I
Speaker 6: think a large extent. And then, of course, in some
Speaker 6: of his essays, Epstein points out other places where you
Speaker 6: acquire culture libraries, use bookstores, and he's a haunt. He
Speaker 6: haunts the use bookstores, going through them and picking up
Speaker 6: volumes that he reads and learns from. And you know,
Speaker 6: another way you acquire this learning is through time. You know,
Speaker 6: Epstein has been at it for a long time, He's
Speaker 6: in his ninth decade now or approaching it very soon.
Speaker 6: And that work builds up, and that store of cultural
Speaker 6: knowledge builds up over time to the point where, you know,
Speaker 6: in the last ten years or so, Joe has been
Speaker 6: writing mainly about classical authors, the Greeks and Romans, figures,
Speaker 6: figures that you know, he didn't really pay much attention
Speaker 6: to for most of his career, but now he's been
Speaker 6: writing eloquently and learnedly about them as well.
Speaker 1: I just want to warn the audience when you get
Speaker 1: never say you've had a lucky life. Especially if you've
Speaker 1: had a lucky life, you'll just feel so dumb, but persevere.
Speaker 2: He'll help you out of that.
Speaker 1: Even if you don't, even if you have to look
Speaker 1: up things as I had to do repeatedly, don't go anywhere.
Speaker 1: I'm coming right back with Matt Contney. We'll talk about
Speaker 1: CBS Welcome Back America. I'm gonna deal it with Matt
Speaker 1: Khnenny of The Wall Street Journal, Senior Fellow at the
Speaker 1: American Enterprise Institute for Domestic Policy Study. Matt, have you
Speaker 1: followed Did you watch the Tony Decopple video about his
Speaker 1: promise about how he's going to approach anchoring duties at
Speaker 1: CBS Evening News.
Speaker 2: I did.
Speaker 4: I thought it was a breath of fresh air.
Speaker 6: And it's amazing that this counts as novelty in the
Speaker 6: world of corporate media. But I'm happy that Tony gave
Speaker 6: the message, and you know what, I think he and
Speaker 6: CBS News are going to try hard to deliver on it.
Speaker 1: Now the second quest, and I'll come back to Tony,
Speaker 1: Nick Shirley and Minnesota. Do you count that as journalism?
Speaker 5: I do? I do.
Speaker 6: It's reporting, it's investigating, it's talking to people, it's going
Speaker 6: to places, it's recording what you see and hear. It's
Speaker 6: reporting your conclusions. So it is journalism. Yes, it is,
Speaker 6: and I think it's highly influential journalism, considering that Nick
Speaker 6: Shirley has kind of amplified this ongoing welfare fraud scandal
Speaker 6: in Minnesota to the next level where not just conservatives
Speaker 6: are talking about it, but Americans of all persuasions doing so.
Speaker 1: What Nick Sureley has, I'm not sure Tony had Dacoppel
Speaker 1: and CBS has yet. Isn't a unique experience he was.
Speaker 1: I don't know if you read up on him. He
Speaker 1: was a missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of
Speaker 1: Latter day Saints in Chile for two years.
Speaker 2: Were you aware of that?
Speaker 5: No, it wasn't.
Speaker 1: Well, that means you knock on thousands of doors of
Speaker 1: strangers and sometimes they might shoot at you or set
Speaker 1: a dog on you. Sometimes they might invite you in
Speaker 1: to have dinner, but you do it for two years.
Speaker 1: I always call on my LDS law students on the
Speaker 1: first day of class becuse they're asolutely fearless if they've
Speaker 1: been missionaries. I think a lot of that came through
Speaker 1: and I had the echo of it in old journalm
Speaker 1: show up and ask a question or two.
Speaker 2: That's all it really is.
Speaker 1: The late Michael Kelly used to say on this program,
Speaker 1: journalism is a craft, not a profession, and I think
Speaker 1: he was right. Now Tony Dekoppel sits a top, not
Speaker 1: a throne of skulls, but a vast newsroom that the
Speaker 1: pipeline of people with pre existing conditions.
Speaker 2: When it comes to the media that feed him.
Speaker 1: The anchors really don't often write the news, Brett, does it?
Speaker 1: Do you think it matters who the anchor is at
Speaker 1: a place like CBS with its legacy journalists there in
Speaker 1: the newsroom.
Speaker 6: Well, I do think anchors matter because they might not
Speaker 6: do the reporting, they may not even do the writing,
Speaker 6: but an active anchor will put his or her personality
Speaker 6: in how they present the information, which stories they highlight,
Speaker 6: They will change the script. We know that our friend
Speaker 6: Brettbear takes a very active role on the CNN side.
Speaker 5: Jake Tapper will take an active role.
Speaker 6: You can have, of course, you know, as someone who's
Speaker 6: not quite an anchor but a CBS personality.
Speaker 5: Mike Wallace.
Speaker 6: You knew what you were getting from Mike Wallace, he
Speaker 6: had a hand in it, and from his son Chris
Speaker 6: Wallace as well. So I do think the personality of
Speaker 6: the anchor matters quite a bit, and that's why I
Speaker 6: was happy to see this message from Tony Dokoupool over
Speaker 6: the weekend.
Speaker 1: Now, I told my sister in law yesterday at a
Speaker 1: birthday party slash New Year's Day gathering that very wise
Speaker 1: I've only spoken to once and only ever worked on
Speaker 1: one thing together and end up not getting printed because
Speaker 1: we just couldn't.
Speaker 2: Get tough the editorial pressers together.
Speaker 1: When she was with the journal I told her I
Speaker 1: thought Barry Weiss was a center left journalist and.
Speaker 2: That she should trust her. Do you agree with that
Speaker 2: assessment center left?
Speaker 4: I would say she's center.
Speaker 6: She certainly has, you know, liberal instincts, but it's it's
Speaker 6: an older liberalism than what we think of when we
Speaker 6: hear the word today. I mean, she believes in equality,
Speaker 6: she believes in freedom, she believes in merit, she believes
Speaker 6: in America's alliance with the state of Israel.
Speaker 5: All of those values.
Speaker 6: Were part of the liberal side for many decades on
Speaker 6: the American left.
Speaker 5: They are less so today.
Speaker 6: So she, you know, she may distance herself from some
Speaker 6: aspects of conservatism, certainly trump Ism, and that definitely puts
Speaker 6: her on the center.
Speaker 5: I don't know if it quite puts her on the
Speaker 5: center left.
Speaker 1: Well, I've always used the baseball analogy when it comes
Speaker 1: to newspeople. They play center field, they play right field
Speaker 1: like I do, or they play left field in the
Speaker 1: way that for example, New York actually New York Times
Speaker 1: in the left field bleachers, that the Washington.
Speaker 5: Out of the stadium.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Ruth Marcus, all right, Ruth Marcus is a classic
Speaker 1: left center left person. And there are a bunch of
Speaker 1: them out there, and they're fair minded, and they know
Speaker 1: what they're talking about, and they know the other side.
Speaker 1: We may not agree, but you're going to get fairness
Speaker 1: out of them. What worries me is that I looked
Speaker 1: up the numbers. CBS is way behind ABC World News
Speaker 1: seven point one nine million in October, NBC Nightly News
Speaker 1: five point sixty three million in October, CBS three point
Speaker 1: five to five million in October. How long will it
Speaker 1: take to actually regain trust of the sort? I told
Speaker 1: Elia like this in the last segment, when I was
Speaker 1: twenty one, about to begin my last year in college.
Speaker 1: Six guys in the summer, after he played golf, went
Speaker 1: to the Indians game or.
Speaker 2: Screwed around whatever.
Speaker 1: We'd always watch sixty minutes same six guys drinking beers
Speaker 1: and watching that's gone.
Speaker 2: That demo's gone. Now, how in the world do you
Speaker 2: get it back? Map?
Speaker 6: Oh, I think that's the big question, you know. I
Speaker 6: think it attaches to individuals more than more than to networks, say,
Speaker 6: or The way to build a great network is to
Speaker 6: have a stable of individual anchors and reporters that audiences
Speaker 6: trust and want to watch, want a key into. And
Speaker 6: so I think that's why this appointment of the new
Speaker 6: anchor and the messages he's sending is a good sign.
Speaker 6: We want to see what happens next with Barry Weiss
Speaker 6: her hires, you know, can she come up with individuals
Speaker 6: that audiences really respond to, because you know, I think
Speaker 6: the Nick Shirley example is very important in this In
Speaker 6: this context too, is that here you have one person,
Speaker 6: he's got maybe some friends holding the camera, you know,
Speaker 6: driving him around different places. Is a very small light unit,
Speaker 6: and yet he had a major effect on his reporting.
Speaker 6: It's a lesson that we took to when we were
Speaker 6: founding the Washington Free Beacon, and that Eleanna Johnson still
Speaker 6: applies with the journalism of the Washington Free Beacon. Is
Speaker 6: that with just a few people asking the right questions
Speaker 6: and looking in places where others aren't looking. You can
Speaker 6: have a major impact on events in politics and society.
Speaker 6: So it's a question of finding the right people. And
Speaker 6: if there's one thing I know about Barry Weiss, having
Speaker 6: worked for her for a little bit last year, she
Speaker 6: knows people and she's a great talent spotter.
Speaker 2: We all said that's what they need.
Speaker 1: Matt Continetti, follow him on Extra Continenty, read him in
Speaker 1: the Journal, read him at AAI, and here are most
Speaker 1: fridays right here on the Uhwit Show.
Speaker 2: Don't go anywhere, America. I'll be right back. Welcome back
Speaker 2: in America. I'm Hugh Hewett.
Speaker 1: Eli Lake as the host of the Breaking History podcast.
Speaker 1: He's a contributor to the Free Press, frequently heard on
Speaker 1: Commentaries podcast as well. And we caught Eli unaware, so
Speaker 1: we've got a T shirt on is he's still celebrating.
Speaker 2: My holidays are over, Eli, The hollidays are over.
Speaker 7: You know, I filed a very good column on Iran,
Speaker 7: by the way, I just didn't realize that was going
Speaker 7: to be on air.
Speaker 1: Well, I want to talk to you about Iran, but
Speaker 1: before that, I want to talk to you about CBS
Speaker 1: Evening News and Tony de Kopple's thing yesterday.
Speaker 2: Did you watch his video yesterday?
Speaker 7: I saw the message about how the CBS is now
Speaker 7: going to be trying to cover more stories that are
Speaker 7: relevant to all of America, and I applauded one hundred percent.
Speaker 7: I think he's he's going to do great.
Speaker 4: So do I.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: I've been in the news business since nineteen ninety, so
Speaker 1: I'm an old guy, and I've been doing this forever
Speaker 1: on radio and television for network and for PBS and
Speaker 1: for NBC and Fox, and on the radio for forever.
Speaker 1: You've been in the print business for a long time.
Speaker 2: Right, yeah, since the mid nineties.
Speaker 1: All right, so we're roughly we are contemporaries. I'm older
Speaker 1: than you are. What do you think went wrong with
Speaker 1: television news specifically?
Speaker 2: I just gave my opinions. I'm wondering what yours are.
Speaker 7: I think with elite like sort of the mainstream the
Speaker 7: top television news we're talking about, you know, CBS, like
Speaker 7: sixty minutes New York, but also the New York Times
Speaker 7: and things like that, I think it really happened. There
Speaker 7: was always a bit of a liberal bias, but there
Speaker 7: was also a commitment to the editorial process. I think
Speaker 7: after Trump wins in twenty sixteen, the elite sense makers
Speaker 7: in the news business, and I mean television news as well,
Speaker 7: kind of became part of like a big bord like
Speaker 7: structure that we might call like resistance. And once you
Speaker 7: become a kind of political it's very difficult to then
Speaker 7: also be the chronicler of our times, the newsperson. I
Speaker 7: just wrote a review of a new documentary on Seemur Hirsh,
Speaker 7: and I think that's kind of what happened to sy Hirsch.
Speaker 7: Sy Hirsch began breaking really important and big stories about
Speaker 7: the overreach and abuses of our national security state, but
Speaker 7: over time he also became a kind of advocate.
Speaker 2: And I think something like that.
Speaker 7: Happened in places like CBS News and ABC News and
Speaker 7: so forth, which is that once you sort of stop
Speaker 7: doing the process and trying to get fair comment and
Speaker 7: trying to sort of say we're going to do stories
Speaker 7: that are relevant to our readers, then at that point
Speaker 7: on our viewers, and at that point it becomes more
Speaker 7: a part of advocacy and less a.
Speaker 2: Part of journalism.
Speaker 1: I think that's pretty much what I believe agenda driven
Speaker 1: journalism isn't journalism. It is an agenda being driven by
Speaker 1: the vehicles that used to be journalism. Now, when I
Speaker 1: say journalism, you mentioned sixteen minutes. I was a sixteen
Speaker 1: minutes addict. I just think it broke when it came
Speaker 1: to quality and quantity. It just didn't deliver the goods.
Speaker 1: And there are a lot of options now on Sunday night.
Speaker 1: I began the program by saying, when I was twenty one,
Speaker 1: and you know, the summer between my junior and junior
Speaker 1: year in college, a half dozen guys would get together
Speaker 1: on Sunday night to watch sixty minutes and have a
Speaker 1: couple of beers because football is over, and you know,
Speaker 1: we were young men. That demo's gone now from television,
Speaker 1: isn't it.
Speaker 7: I mean, it's a totally different media world right now,
Speaker 7: and everybody can kind of all heart their menu of
Speaker 7: what they want to watch. So the idea that everyone's
Speaker 7: gathering in a dorm room to watch a presidential debate
Speaker 7: or sixty minutes or something like that, I mean those
Speaker 7: days are over. I think that we have that semi
Speaker 7: sort of version of that experience on social media when
Speaker 7: we talk about big news events, but it's not the
Speaker 7: same as it used to be, where we were sort
Speaker 7: of all watching it together at the same time, which which.
Speaker 2: Brings me to the test case.
Speaker 1: The buest news event in the world right now is
Speaker 1: Iran by I have magnitude of ten, maybe one hundred,
Speaker 1: Bigger than Minnesota fraud, bigger than what they're doing at CBS.
Speaker 1: It's their fourth revolution, the original seventy nine revolution, the
Speaker 1: nineteen nineties, late nineteen nineties, then we had the Green Movement,
Speaker 1: and then we had twenty twenty two. Unfortunately for the
Speaker 1: Iranian people, weak democratic presidents and administrations were in power,
Speaker 1: and each of those four moments. This time is different,
Speaker 1: and all I want the American government to do is
Speaker 1: pay attention and publicize what's going. I don't want intervention,
Speaker 1: I don't want military action. I want a lot of
Speaker 1: focus and condemnation on violence. Do you think we'll get
Speaker 1: it right this time?
Speaker 7: Biggest crossed. I think that Trump's truth social post. He
Speaker 7: has a flare for the language, and it evokes potential,
Speaker 7: like Americas will come to their rescue, we are locked
Speaker 7: and loaded. That evokes military, but it doesn't explicitly say military.
Speaker 7: I don't think think there is really a military option
Speaker 7: right now, as much as I want to see the
Speaker 7: Iranian people succeed, but there are lots of things and
Speaker 7: I just did a ton of reporting on this, and
Speaker 7: you're catching me at the right time. There are a
Speaker 7: lot of things that we can do. We can do
Speaker 7: cyber things where we helped blind the security services against
Speaker 7: the demonstrators. We can publicize you're absolutely right, people who
Speaker 7: have been abducted and things like that. We can publicize
Speaker 7: the names of people who shoot others, and we've already
Speaker 7: started to see that among the Iranians themselves. And what
Speaker 7: I would say, and what surprised me is I've been
Speaker 7: reporting the story, Hugh, is that the State Department under
Speaker 7: Marco Rubio has been there already. So you can find
Speaker 7: statements from Marco Rubio from before when these protests started
Speaker 7: December twelfth, saying, yeah, we're really concerned about how the
Speaker 7: regime treats its own people. You can also find if
Speaker 7: you look at the rate at the Far Sea account
Speaker 7: of the State Department, really specific posts for the last
Speaker 7: six months about demonstrations that didn't get in much attention
Speaker 7: individual activists. I spoke to people who are in the
Speaker 7: US government who are kind of anonymous sources saying that
Speaker 7: they have been tracking at a very high level of
Speaker 7: detail the people who are emerging as a kind of
Speaker 7: you know, leaders of a leader list movement that's very
Speaker 7: desperate right now. So I think there's a lot that
Speaker 7: can be done, and American people can show solidarity. You
Speaker 7: can raise money and figure out ways to raise money
Speaker 7: for secure communications, things that Elon Muskin do in terms
Speaker 7: of starlink, and try to make it so that Iranian
Speaker 7: cell phones can connect without a base station, which are
Speaker 7: you going to get you in a lot of trouble
Speaker 7: with the security services right now. And finally, like raising
Speaker 7: money for things like a strike fund. We're not seeing
Speaker 7: a general strike, which is what preceded the nineteen seventy
Speaker 7: nine revolution. But I think the fact that this one
Speaker 7: started with the merchant class, by the way the merchant
Speaker 7: class started the original nineteen oh five Constitutional Revolution, the
Speaker 7: merchant class a huge part of the reason why the
Speaker 7: Homini seventy nine revolution. The fact that it started with
Speaker 7: the merchant class this time around is very significant.
Speaker 2: So I'm you know, I don't want to make.
Speaker 7: Any predictions, but the Iranian people continue to tell us
Speaker 7: loud and clear they do not want to be ruled
Speaker 7: by the mullas.
Speaker 1: So Eli Javi Reddy Gur made all of American media
Speaker 1: to this story. He had an hour long conversation with
Speaker 1: the Iranian diition. It was great Roya Hakami on this
Speaker 1: morning and I listened to it and I.
Speaker 2: Say, where are people? Do you think?
Speaker 1: This is a test for CBS Evening News and a
Speaker 1: test for every network to cover this because there are
Speaker 1: a lot of diaspra Iranians out there who speak very
Speaker 1: well at length about I didn't realize how broken Iran is.
Speaker 1: The reservoirs are dry, the electricity of intermittent. Where do
Speaker 1: we go to get more stuff?
Speaker 7: All right, well, you're gonna get me in trouble with
Speaker 7: my boss and my dear friend Barry wife. So I
Speaker 7: don't want to, but I will say this. I mean,
Speaker 7: I have not had any conversations obviously with her. I'm
Speaker 7: on the free press side, but I would imagine that
Speaker 7: this is going to be a story.
Speaker 2: Hopefully the CBS News.
Speaker 7: Is going to cover, and frankly it's be some of
Speaker 7: the CNN covers. Everybody should be covering. This is the
Speaker 7: biggest story in the world right now. I one hundred
Speaker 7: percent agree the implications. If you think about it, We've
Speaker 7: got two kind of moves that Trump's doing right now.
Speaker 7: He is expressing solidarity one hundred percent with the Iranian
Speaker 7: people in Iran, there are domino effects in the Middle East,
Speaker 7: and then Venezuela. Keep your eye on Venezuela. If that,
Speaker 7: if the Madora regime goes down, I think Cube is
Speaker 7: in a lot of trouble too.
Speaker 1: Eli Lake, follow him on an x at Eli Lake,
Speaker 1: read him in the pre Press, and do not miss
Speaker 1: an episode of Breaking History. I'll be right back in
Speaker 1: America at the podcast at ELI producers.
Speaker 2: Stay tuned. Welcome back to Myica.
Speaker 1: I'm Hugh hewittt Douglne Marie is one of the hosts
Speaker 1: of The Bill and Doug Show, which you can always
Speaker 1: get everything on it at Billandugoisue dot substack dot com
Speaker 1: and the free podcast at the Bill and Doug Show.
Speaker 1: They are experts in Ohio State and Big two in
Speaker 1: college football. I think it's the best college football show
Speaker 1: in America.
Speaker 2: Doug.
Speaker 1: Since New Year's Eve, with about a minute and a
Speaker 1: half left in the game, I have felt awful, and
Speaker 1: it's because I don't know these kids.
Speaker 2: I ain't call them kids. They're young men nineteen to
Speaker 2: twenty two.
Speaker 1: But I like Sunny Styles and tegra and Carnel Tait
Speaker 1: and Jeremiah Smith and Julian San And I think Ryan
Speaker 1: Day is good and I like Brian Hartline.
Speaker 2: I don't know them, though, but I feel awful for them.
Speaker 2: You know them, so you must feel really crappy.
Speaker 8: Well, you know, I've been interacting with a lot of
Speaker 8: fans since then. I kind of feel worse for the
Speaker 8: fans because they take this to heart. I will say
Speaker 8: it is a little mitigated, Hugh. They won the national
Speaker 8: title a year ago. Yes, So those guys that you're
Speaker 8: talking about there, they still have rings, they still have memories,
Speaker 8: they still have felt the confetti fall on their heads.
Speaker 8: They were trying to accomplish something that had never been
Speaker 8: done in Ohio state history, which is go back to
Speaker 8: back as national champions, and they had talked about that,
Speaker 8: Ryan Day said going in to the game against Miami.
Speaker 8: You know that'd been on their minds for ten months.
Speaker 8: So there was an opportunity there. Especially when you go
Speaker 8: through the regular season twelve and oho and you beat
Speaker 8: Michigan and you're number one in the country. There is
Speaker 8: an opportunity to make history, to go down as potentially
Speaker 8: the greatest team ever at one of the greatest programs ever.
Speaker 8: So that is very difficult. It reminds me a little
Speaker 8: bit here to like twenty thirteen. The build up the
Speaker 8: highest State was it was twelve to oh and twenty
Speaker 8: thirteen lost in the Big Ten championship game in Michigan.
Speaker 8: State lost their bowl game to Clemson, and it's that
Speaker 8: they were so good along the way and you started
Speaker 8: thinking historic things that made it worse when they fell
Speaker 8: short at the end.
Speaker 1: So, Doug, how do you cover this in the aftermath?
Speaker 1: Obviously you got to cover the playoffs, and we'll talk
Speaker 1: about that next Friday, But how do you talk to
Speaker 1: say a Sunny Styles who's a graduating senior or Carnell
Speaker 1: taking away hope ends up wearing a Browns uniform next year.
Speaker 1: Do they make themselves available or are they basically grieving
Speaker 1: away from people?
Speaker 2: And this goes for Ryan Day and the coaching staff
Speaker 2: as well.
Speaker 9: Yeah, it's they do make themselves available.
Speaker 8: They bring three people into the postgame news conference that
Speaker 8: was Caleb Downs and Julian say And as players, and
Speaker 8: Ryan Day's a head coach that wasn't super long. They
Speaker 8: had interviews on the side with some other players, Sonny
Speaker 8: Styles who seemed very composed, Carson Hinzman, Kaden Curry, and
Speaker 8: the locker room was open, so my partner Bill Landis
Speaker 8: was in there talking to some people. So, like, you
Speaker 8: do have to face the music to some degree, right,
Speaker 8: That's kind of part of it. And I think that's
Speaker 8: okay in sports when you're celebrated in victory, I think
Speaker 8: it's okay to answer questions in defeat. You know, it
Speaker 8: was interesting. Some people have brought up, some of our
Speaker 8: Ohio State fans who follow us have brought up the
Speaker 8: idea that, like you, like Kirby Smart stuffered a really
Speaker 8: tough loss George against Old Miss last night, and like
Speaker 8: Kirby Smart after the game was kind of like not bubbly,
Speaker 8: but it was just like, you know, hey, that's a
Speaker 8: great game, and like what are you gonna do? And
Speaker 8: like Ohio State, they really took it hard. So I
Speaker 8: do think it's interesting. I think you can set the
Speaker 8: tone for your fan base and sort of how you
Speaker 8: deal with the loss. At Ohio State, they took it hard,
Speaker 8: you know, I mean, everybody loses sometimes, and.
Speaker 9: They're the defending national champs.
Speaker 8: But they did take this thing hard, I think because
Speaker 8: they know there was something there that fell just outside
Speaker 8: their grasp.
Speaker 1: Well put, these seniors do out a national championship, and
Speaker 1: they did beat the team up north in twenty twenty five. Yep,
Speaker 1: and they are all coming back except for well, there's
Speaker 1: some big name you mentioned Caleb Downs and Sunny Style.
Speaker 1: They're not coming back. Colonel Tate's not coming back. But
Speaker 1: Ryan Day strikes me as a pretty emotional guy that
Speaker 1: he keeps it bottled up, and like Urban Meyer and
Speaker 1: maybe not Jim Trussels so much is he more emotional
Speaker 1: than the other head coaches in college football.
Speaker 8: He takes losses heart, and I think he did. Urban
Speaker 8: took law is hard, right, and it's interesting to me.
Speaker 8: I want to write about this. I want to talk
Speaker 8: about this with our audience. Can they set its hon
Speaker 8: because Ohio State fans take a loss hard, because I
Speaker 8: think the standard at Ohio State is higher than anywhere
Speaker 8: else in the country, and there's a lot.
Speaker 9: Of great things that come with that.
Speaker 8: Holding yourself to a high standard everyone around due to
Speaker 8: a high standard, you know, sets up opportunities for success.
Speaker 8: And they have been the most consistently successful college football
Speaker 8: program since what he has got here in nineteen fifty one.
Speaker 8: So that's what they are, and so in some way,
Speaker 8: no loss is ever acceptable. But you know, Miami's good,
Speaker 8: and it was a tough matchup, and you know, there
Speaker 8: was an interception return for a touchdown that flipped the game,
Speaker 8: and Ohio State missed a field goal that might have helped,
Speaker 8: and so you know, they didn't get blown off the field.
Speaker 8: There were some things they couldn't stop from Miami's pass
Speaker 8: rush in the first half.
Speaker 9: But I think it can be difficult, Hugh. It's the
Speaker 9: opposite of being a Browns fan. It is so crazy,
Speaker 9: someone like.
Speaker 8: You who is both an Ohio State and a Browns fan,
Speaker 8: and it's one hundred and eighty degrees. Almost every little
Speaker 8: morsel of success for the Browns is worth a chick
Speaker 8: or tape parade, because you assume losing for Ohio State,
Speaker 8: you assume victory, and then every loss is devastating. So
Speaker 8: High State went twelve and two. The Browns are going
Speaker 8: to win four games this year. But Ohio State fans
Speaker 8: like you and and thousands millions of others are devastated
Speaker 8: right now because Ohio State is so good?
Speaker 1: What is what is your in the substact chat room,
Speaker 1: Bill Anddougowisu dot subject dot com.
Speaker 2: What is the general I haven't listened to a minute.
Speaker 2: I can't bear it yet. I'll wait a while and
Speaker 2: then I'll listen to it. But what's the general? Immediate?
Speaker 2: Are they mad? Are they sad? Are they AnGR? What
Speaker 2: is it? The fans?
Speaker 9: So it's two things.
Speaker 8: One is one is sort of this deficiency about there
Speaker 8: in a ability to block Miami? Does it show something
Speaker 8: with the offensive line, with the offensive line coaching, with
Speaker 8: the offensive game planning. Was there a hole there that
Speaker 8: they didn't recognize during the season And is there a
Speaker 8: deficiency there that should have been figured out covered.
Speaker 4: Up some other way?
Speaker 8: And then the other is this and I've been writing
Speaker 8: about this and talking about this at the Substact Hugh
Speaker 8: that Indiana, Old Miss and Miami are three teams, and
Speaker 8: Oregon to some degree. They all have a lot of
Speaker 8: transfers on their teams, and we've all gotten used to
Speaker 8: the transfer world in college football. Alabama, Georgia and Ohio
Speaker 8: State have far fewer. They are teams that are blue
Speaker 8: bloods that are built on recruiting and right now a
Speaker 8: lot of Ohio State fans are asking does a team
Speaker 8: like Ohio State, which recruits at a very high level,
Speaker 8: need to do more getting transfers.
Speaker 9: Indiana and Old Miss.
Speaker 8: In Miami they had to get transfers because they didn't
Speaker 8: recruit like Ohio State. But here they are. They're still
Speaker 8: alive in Ohio State's not. This shifting sport is very interesting,
Speaker 8: but it's making some Ohio State wonder does their strategy
Speaker 8: of getting players have to change a little bit?
Speaker 2: Very interesting. I will buck up.
Speaker 1: I will listen to every minute of every Bill and
Speaker 1: Doug show that's been done since the loss over the weekend.
Speaker 1: I look forward to doing the Friday Football Forecast a
Speaker 1: week from today.
Speaker 2: Doug lay Marie follow him on Exit Doug lay Marie.
Speaker 2: Subscribe to Bill and Doug OSU.
Speaker 1: Dot substack dot com for the best football college football
Speaker 1: coverage in America.
Speaker 5: To