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Speaker 1: This is Annie and this is Bridget and you're listening

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Speaker 1: to Steph. Mom. Never told you today, we're going to

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Speaker 1: be joined with another guest. UM. A couple of months ago,

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Speaker 1: we talked to journalists and author Joe Piazza about her

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Speaker 1: podcast Committed, which is awesome if you haven't checked it out, UM,

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Speaker 1: and that is all about how to stay married. But

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Speaker 1: recently Joe had a book come out called Charlotte Walsh

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Speaker 1: Likes to Win, and she was very kind to send

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Speaker 1: to some copies which I gobbled through at at the Beach.

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Speaker 1: It was nice actually got to read at the Beach

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Speaker 1: for once. And the book is all about a woman

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Speaker 1: named Charlotte Wash surprise there, who wants to run for

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Speaker 1: office in her home district in Pennsylvania after living and

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Speaker 1: working in Silicon Valley. And as the title suggests, Charlotte

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Speaker 1: Walsh likes to win. She is unabashedly ambitious and that's

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Speaker 1: kind of what the book examines. So, as we touched

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Speaker 1: on in our episode called Year of the Woman, a

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Speaker 1: lot of women are running for office this year, and

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Speaker 1: not only that, they are winning. According to The New

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Speaker 1: Yorker in April four hundred and seventy two, women had

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Speaker 1: entered the race for House, which is a lot of women.

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Speaker 1: Fifty seven women filed or are likely to file candidacies

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Speaker 1: for the Senate, and with historic primary wins from folks

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Speaker 1: like Stacy Abrams and Georgia alex Ocasio Cortez. In New York,

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Speaker 1: Dana Carome winning the election for Virginia's House of Delegates

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Speaker 1: as the first openly trans woman to do so. Women

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Speaker 1: are really kicking ass when it comes to running for office.

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Speaker 1: But unfortunately, as y'all might suspect, running for office as

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Speaker 1: a woman comes with its own unwritten set of rules. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: sometimes literally. Earlier this year, after Tammy Duckworth became the

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Speaker 1: first sitting US Senator to give birth, she and Senator

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Speaker 1: Amy klubash Or had to negotiate four months to change

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Speaker 1: Senate rules to allow Senator Duckworth to bring her under

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Speaker 1: two weeks old nursing daughter with her for a confirmation vote.

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Speaker 1: They were obviously engaging in this negotiation before Tammy Duckworthy birth,

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Speaker 1: but and in there were even rumors of a compromise

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Speaker 1: that will allow her to vote from a closet. From

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Speaker 1: a closet, Wow, Yeah, the implication and unfortunately the reality

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Speaker 1: there is that the rules were made for men and

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Speaker 1: that women are outliers, and probably we should have started

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Speaker 1: with this. This is a fiction book Charlotte Walsh likes

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Speaker 1: to win, but it it reflects so much of our reality,

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Speaker 1: and it is extremely timely. A lot of it examines

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Speaker 1: the the media coverage, the differences in media coverage a

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Speaker 1: male versus a female candidate faces. And I remember when

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Speaker 1: Hillary Clinton was running and all the talk of her

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Speaker 1: shrill voy and she's not authentic, and she's cold. And

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Speaker 1: I would hear friends say to me, I just don't

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Speaker 1: like her, and I'd ask why, and they'd say something

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Speaker 1: along the lines of she just seems fake. I don't

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Speaker 1: believe her. And I try to explain, well, she's probably

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Speaker 1: been coached to a friend as little men as possible,

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Speaker 1: and and people would shrug at me and say, well,

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Speaker 1: I don't like her. Um, she wants it too badly. Essentially,

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Speaker 1: she's not a cool girl. Yeah, even even politicians can't

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Speaker 1: get away from this cool girl trap. I want to

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Speaker 1: be clear. I like Hillary Clinton. I campaign for her,

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Speaker 1: I voted for her. Obviously, I'm not saying there are

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Speaker 1: not legitimate reasons to not want to vote for her,

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Speaker 1: but saying that she just doesn't seem cool or she

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Speaker 1: wants it too much. That seems like a like a

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Speaker 1: coded sexist implication that because she's driven, because she's ambitious,

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Speaker 1: that comes off as untrustworthy to you. But if a

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Speaker 1: man had the same behavior, you would you wouldn't necessarily

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Speaker 1: say that, And the data agrees with me. Women like

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Speaker 1: Hillary Clinton are saddled with another unfair hurdle, and that

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Speaker 1: is the need to be likable. The nonpartisan and Barbara

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Speaker 1: Lee Family Foundation had a study called The Keys to

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Speaker 1: Elected Office, The Essential Guide for Women Now. The data

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Speaker 1: in this report was gathered from the campaigns of every

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Speaker 1: woman who has run for governor in the past fifteen years.

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Speaker 1: The report pulled voters along the candidates and campaign staff,

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Speaker 1: and they found that likability and qualifications are more closely

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Speaker 1: linked for female candidates than with male candidates, or, as

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Speaker 1: a study puts it, for women candidates not making a mistake,

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Speaker 1: it's part of being likable. For male candidates not making

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Speaker 1: a mistake, it's part of being organized and getting results.

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Speaker 1: And women are even deemed for really simple things like

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Speaker 1: the choice to wear clothes. One study found that when

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Speaker 1: articles mentioned a woman's shoes or clothing, voters are less

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Speaker 1: likely to want to vote for them if they're women.

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Speaker 1: Name It, Change It. A joint project of the Women's

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Speaker 1: Media Center and She Should Run released a study conducted

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Speaker 1: by the Salinda Lake of Lake Research Partners and how

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Speaker 1: dropped in mentions of a woman's clothing in appearance affect voters.

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Speaker 1: They probable voters read gender neutral descriptions of a hypothetical

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Speaker 1: male and female candidate and then asked them how likely

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Speaker 1: they would be to vote for one over the other.

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Speaker 1: At the beginning, they liked each candidate about equally. Then

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Speaker 1: four separate groups of study participants each heard a slightly

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Speaker 1: different version of a news story about hypothetical candidates. One

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Speaker 1: group's new story didn't mention the female candidates clothing or

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Speaker 1: appearance at all, and of that group have said they

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Speaker 1: would vote for the male candidate half for the female candidate.

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Speaker 1: But the three groups of study participants who heard a

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Speaker 1: new story that mentioned the woman's appearance suddenly changed their

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Speaker 1: minds and started ranking the female candidate. It's less experienced,

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Speaker 1: less confident, less effective, and less qualified than her male opponent.

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Speaker 1: So basically, if an article mentions, oh, she wore x

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Speaker 1: y Z kind of shoes or x y Z kind

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Speaker 1: of haircut, or x y Z kind of jacket or

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Speaker 1: x y Z kind of purse. As articles about women

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Speaker 1: politicians often do automatically, voters experienced them as less qualified,

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Speaker 1: less constant, and all of that, and it's really it's

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Speaker 1: mess up. We have to wear clothes, Yeah, can you

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Speaker 1: imagine if we didn't wear clothes would be a different

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Speaker 1: news story. I know, I know women across all industries

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Speaker 1: are kind of up against that's very very unfair double

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Speaker 1: standard where we can't win. You know, you can't be

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Speaker 1: yourself otherwise you look unhinged or crazy or this or that.

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Speaker 1: You can't be too coached and too you know, sanitize

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Speaker 1: otherwise you want it too bad, you don't seem trustworthy.

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Speaker 1: That there's really no way to win, especially for women

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Speaker 1: who are running for office. And Joe's book, which we're

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Speaker 1: going to be talking about in a little bit, looks

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Speaker 1: all at all aspects of that, at female ambition, at

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Speaker 1: what a woman running for office is up against, that

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Speaker 1: double standard, that tight rope. You're damned if you do,

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Speaker 1: damned if you don't. We're gonna pause for a quick break,

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Speaker 1: but when we come back. We're going to be joined

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Speaker 1: by Joe Piazza. We're gonna talk all about this and

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Speaker 1: we're back. Thank you sponsor, and we're joined by our

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Speaker 1: friend Joe. Hello, Joe. Hey, ladies, thank you so much

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Speaker 1: for joining us again, and congratulations on the book. Thanks

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Speaker 1: for having me again, um, and thank you for that.

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Speaker 1: It's it's been really amazing. I like literally just got

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Speaker 1: home for the first time in a month. We were

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Speaker 1: on a book tour, driving through the middle of the

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Speaker 1: country for the past four weeks. What was that like? Um,

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Speaker 1: it was amazing actually, and I'm so glad that we

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Speaker 1: did it because so the book is about a woman

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Speaker 1: running for office, kind of timely right now, right a

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Speaker 1: little bit. And we went to we we started in Asheville,

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Speaker 1: and we went to Asheville, Nashville, Louisville, the suburbs of Chicago, Milwaukee, Minnesota,

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Speaker 1: and we got the hell out of our bubbles, which

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Speaker 1: was incredible. I mean, I live in San Francisco, I

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Speaker 1: work in New York most of the time in l

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Speaker 1: A And those are some real bubbles. And so we

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Speaker 1: talked to women who were completely different from us, um,

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Speaker 1: and who were hungry for this story, who were hungry

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Speaker 1: for a story about a woman running for office, about

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Speaker 1: an ambitious an ambitious woman. Um, because books, movies, and

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Speaker 1: TV just kind of fail women a lot of the time.

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Speaker 1: You know, we don't we don't show really powerful strong

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Speaker 1: women nearly enough. So no matter what side of the aisle,

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Speaker 1: a lot of the women in the audience were on,

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Speaker 1: they were psyched for such a strong female character and

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Speaker 1: that was just really cool. Why do you think that is?

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Speaker 1: Why do you think the media does such a bad

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Speaker 1: job when it comes to displaying ambitious women in that way,

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Speaker 1: Because it's been run by men ever, I mean since

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Speaker 1: the very beginning, I mean genuinely, the Hollywood studio system

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Speaker 1: has was the brain child of men, except for Mary Pickford,

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Speaker 1: who did started with her who started the original studio

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Speaker 1: with her husband, but she was pretty much cast aside.

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Speaker 1: And we've had men making the decisions about what they

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Speaker 1: think women want to be seeing. And I genuinely think

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Speaker 1: pop culture, so books, TV and movies, they've just they've

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Speaker 1: all failed us by failing to create strong women because

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Speaker 1: they say, one men definitely won't see it, and two

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Speaker 1: women women don't want to watch it because their men

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Speaker 1: won't watch it with them. It's changing now, it's starting

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Speaker 1: to change. Um. But I've been in l A. I

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Speaker 1: was in l A all last week doing negotiations to

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Speaker 1: turn Charlotte Walsh into a TV show, and I'm working

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Speaker 1: with people who get it and who love it. But

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Speaker 1: it's definitely not the norm. Yeah. I remember the last

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Speaker 1: time we spoke with you, you were unhappy with this,

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Speaker 1: this lacker of representation of ambitious women in the media,

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Speaker 1: and you kind of blamed it for the how it

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Speaker 1: turned out the election totally. I mean, I absolutely think

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Speaker 1: that's that that's why the election turned out way that

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Speaker 1: it did. I also blamed the media, and I think

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Speaker 1: I'm allowed to say that, you know, because I am

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Speaker 1: the media, and I was the media for twenty For

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Speaker 1: twenty years, um, I was I covered for presidential races.

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Speaker 1: I covered a slew of local and state races in

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Speaker 1: New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. And I think that

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Speaker 1: we know, we know that the media treats women completely

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Speaker 1: differently than it treats men. It criticizes women for what

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Speaker 1: they wear, how they walk, how who's taking care of

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Speaker 1: their children, or what kind of makeup they have on.

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Speaker 1: And they would never ever do that to a man.

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Speaker 1: So I blame I blame the media, and I blame

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Speaker 1: pop culture. I mean I mostly blame men. I pretty

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Speaker 1: much always mostly blame me. That's usually a safe bet.

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Speaker 1: Just blame then that's generally what I do as well. Um,

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Speaker 1: something that interests me. So you said that, you know,

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Speaker 1: the media is one of the reasons why the Clinton

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Speaker 1: was treated so badly. I completely agree on that same

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Speaker 1: flip side. You know, we we opened the episode talking

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Speaker 1: about all of these women running for office, this sort

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Speaker 1: of untested slew running and winning primaries. Do you think

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Speaker 1: that's a reaction to Donald Trump. I mean, it absolutely is.

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Speaker 1: And I say this all the time that if Donald

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Speaker 1: Trump gave us one good thing, I mean besides a

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Speaker 1: slew of memes, Um, I think that he empowered us

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Speaker 1: to to fight. Right If we had we been given

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Speaker 1: Hillary right after we've been given Barack, I think we

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Speaker 1: would have been like, oh, okay, the world has finally

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Speaker 1: changed and come to its rational senses. But now we've

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Speaker 1: had no choice but to fight. Women have had no

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Speaker 1: choice but to stand up and say, yes, I'm running,

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Speaker 1: Yes I want to fix this, Yes I want to

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Speaker 1: change this. And I mean that is a gift to

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Speaker 1: learn how to fight back. Um All. I interviewed hundreds

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Speaker 1: of women for for this book, women who'd run for office,

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Speaker 1: are running or running campaigns, um and a lot of

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Speaker 1: women running right now, and they all told me they're like, yes,

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Speaker 1: it's a reaction to Donald Trump, but it's also a

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Speaker 1: reaction that Donald Trump shows things are broken and they

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Speaker 1: want to fix it. Because when women run for office,

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Speaker 1: they run because they want to fix it, and when

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Speaker 1: men run a lot of times it's because of ego.

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Speaker 1: What you just said about women running to fix and

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Speaker 1: men running because they want the glitz and glory, I

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Speaker 1: gotta say, you know, I no longer than the New

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Speaker 1: York City, but I did watch the debate last night

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Speaker 1: between Cynthia Nixon and Andrew Cuomo, and what you just

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Speaker 1: said is like ding ding ding ding ding. Yes, you know,

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Speaker 1: the person who seemed like they were just as an

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Speaker 1: as a New Yorker fed up with all of these

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Speaker 1: issues and thinking we can do better, I want to

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Speaker 1: fix it. I have to say. I mean that person

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Speaker 1: was Cynthia Nixon, and the person who seemed like I

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Speaker 1: am fulfilling my political destiny by winning this race that

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Speaker 1: will put me on a trajectory to be president someday

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Speaker 1: and fulfill my family like legacy and dynasty. That person

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Speaker 1: was Clomo. I mean I so I watched scenes from

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Speaker 1: that debate over and over again. I mean, this, this

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Speaker 1: is what I did last night with a tub of

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Speaker 1: ice cream, just me Wahington, Washington Day Nixon. Um, and

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Speaker 1: she was incredible. She was so impressive. Cuomo was up

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Speaker 1: there like stock political character, look at me, and since

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Speaker 1: they was like, Okay, this is how we're going to

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Speaker 1: fix the subway. Okay, this is how we're going to

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Speaker 1: fix education. I mean literally, it was like fix it,

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Speaker 1: fix it, fix it. And what amazes me still is

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Speaker 1: looking at coverage of her, She's still not taken seriously

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Speaker 1: as a candidate. I mean she's there's constantly references to

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Speaker 1: sex in the city, often in the headline of major newspapers. Um,

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Speaker 1: I get it. She was an actress. She hasn't. She

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Speaker 1: hasn't not been an actress on a television show for

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Speaker 1: quite some time. She's been an activist for quite some time. Um,

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Speaker 1: she lives what she preaches. And had it been a

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Speaker 1: man who was running, I mean, and we've seen men run.

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Speaker 1: We saw Al Franken run we saw Arnold Schwarzenegger run,

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Speaker 1: they would not have been treated so lightly in every

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Speaker 1: single story about them as Cynthia has been treated. And

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Speaker 1: I think, especially with her particular case, Dixon had a

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Speaker 1: legacy of risen around public education, predating her work on

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Speaker 1: sex and the city. Like she I like, I didn't

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Speaker 1: know this, and I'm surprised that I that I should

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Speaker 1: didn't know this. But she had been really, really active

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Speaker 1: in New York City's public education site for a long time.

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Speaker 1: And so this idea that she has no political background,

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Speaker 1: no advocacy experience, which is not true. No, it's just

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Speaker 1: I mean, it's absolutely not true. It's a complete myth. Um.

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Speaker 1: Cynthia really killed it last night. I mean, I said

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Speaker 1: to my husband before we went to bed, and like, I,

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Speaker 1: I actually think she might be able to win. Now.

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Speaker 1: I did not know going into this. I mean, because

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Speaker 1: Cuomo is such a legacy, right, um, and even people

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Speaker 1: that know nothing about New York politics, of course, Andrew Cuomo,

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Speaker 1: I mean, he's a politician. He sounds like a politician. Um.

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Speaker 1: But I genuinely believe I feel good about her race now,

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Speaker 1: and I feel good about so many other women's races now.

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Speaker 1: And like you said, we're seeing a record number of

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Speaker 1: women running right now. I Christina Reynolds, the VP of

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Speaker 1: comms for Emily's List, was on two of my event

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Speaker 1: panels with me UM in York and in DC, and

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Speaker 1: she just said, they've never ever seen anything like this.

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Speaker 1: They've never seen they never had this many women one

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Speaker 1: to ask about running and to ask about helping women

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Speaker 1: to run, and it's it's incredible. Yeah, it really is, Um.

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Speaker 1: And I wanted to ask, even though I feel like

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Speaker 1: the answer might be might be easily guessable, motivated you

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Speaker 1: to to write this book? Well? I thought about writing

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Speaker 1: the book before November. I mean mostly because I was

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Speaker 1: watching how the media wasn't just covering the women candidate,

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Speaker 1: but all women candidates, and I was like, you know,

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Speaker 1: we fiction really should reflect the reality we're living in

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Speaker 1: right now. But then absolutely everything changed. Um. The book

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Speaker 1: was originally going to be much more of a satire,

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Speaker 1: and then we started living in a satire, so that

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Speaker 1: wasn't possible anymore. And so and a lot of people

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Speaker 1: ask me, they're like, your journalist, why didn't you make

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Speaker 1: it nonfiction? You interviewed all these people, And I think

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Speaker 1: that fix just has a way of changing people's hearts

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Speaker 1: and minds in a way nonfiction doesn't, because you're just

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Speaker 1: kind of slipping it in. It's a little softer then

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Speaker 1: banging them over the head with facts and figures. And

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Speaker 1: people are reading the book that wouldn't pick up a

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Speaker 1: nonfiction book, that wouldn't pick up like hardcore political book

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Speaker 1: at all. And you know, I kind of a bitch

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Speaker 1: about it all the time. The fact that this book

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Speaker 1: came out in the summer, um like a lot of

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Speaker 1: books by women authors do um. It was categorized as

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Speaker 1: a beach read by a lot of people. Had the

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Speaker 1: book been written by a man, it would have come

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Speaker 1: out in the fall and been an important fall book,

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Speaker 1: um and been categorized as very serious literature about the

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Speaker 1: times we live in. But that's fine, and I'm fine

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Speaker 1: with it because it means that women that wanted to

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Speaker 1: pick up a quote unquote beach read picked it up

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Speaker 1: and read it. And I get comments all the time

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Speaker 1: from people saying, oh my god, I never thought about

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Speaker 1: these things. Oh my god, I just picked the woman

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Speaker 1: running in my district and I'm volunteering now, but I

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Speaker 1: never would have done that before. Um. And so that's

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Speaker 1: the coolest part about this book. And that's why I

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Speaker 1: wrote it. I was like, let's let's start a conversation,

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Speaker 1: a real conversation. And we're seeing it. I mean, we

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Speaker 1: are seeing New York Times articles about the harassment that

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Speaker 1: women face on the campaign trail, the terrible things that

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Speaker 1: people say to women. Um, we're seeing women candidates speak

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Speaker 1: up when people when newspapers use a picture of them

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Speaker 1: that isn't that's not just flattering, but that's insulting. And

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Speaker 1: then put a picture of male candidates in their nice

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Speaker 1: business suits with their next Brianna Wou that was that

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Speaker 1: story was was really something to me. Okay, So for

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Speaker 1: folks who don't know what we're talking about, um, it's

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Speaker 1: Brianna Wou sort of came to prominence throughout gamer Gate,

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Speaker 1: Like she was a big, outspoken critic of gamer Gate

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Speaker 1: and with someone who raised alarm bells about what had

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Speaker 1: been happening to her women like her in the gaming industry,

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Speaker 1: and it made her a huge target, as you might imagine.

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Speaker 1: And so now she's running for she wanting for Congress. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: she's running for the House. And you know she had

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Speaker 1: just done this a photo shoot with the Boston Globe

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Speaker 1: wherein she you know, was looked very you know, it

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Speaker 1: looks like someone running for office, you know, brown hair,

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Speaker 1: wearing a professional dress, all of that. And she's someone

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Speaker 1: who in other times in her life has worn you know,

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Speaker 1: dyed hair like anime colored hair, and funky clothes like

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Speaker 1: many of us. And the Boston Globe chose her two

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Speaker 1: male kid her two male opponents normal pictures of them

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Speaker 1: in suits, head shots, and it seemingly took a picture

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Speaker 1: that was like a screenshot on her doing like a

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Speaker 1: live stream that was probably from years ago, where she

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Speaker 1: had anime colored hair, was wearing a T shirt. And

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Speaker 1: she spoke out, she said, listen, one, you guys just

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Speaker 1: in a photo shoot with me, so I know you

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Speaker 1: have access to photos, right, look really professional too. I

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Speaker 1: have gone out of my way to present myself for

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Speaker 1: the last two years in the most serious way. I

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Speaker 1: dyed my hair brown. I'm wearing the same dress even

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Speaker 1: when it's really hot, Adam wearing the same uncomfortable dres

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Speaker 1: us and this is still how you portrayed me. I mean,

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Speaker 1: I think, no matter where you fall on the political spectrum,

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Speaker 1: that anyone can look at that and say that is

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Speaker 1: unfair treatment. And it's because she's a woman, and it's

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Speaker 1: because she's a woman. And I don't think that she

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Speaker 1: necessarily would have spoken out or had the platform to

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Speaker 1: speak out in any other election cycle, because we're finally

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Speaker 1: at this point where we're saying we've had enough and

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Speaker 1: and we're fed up. Um. You know, I have a

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Speaker 1: scene in Charlotte Walsh Likes to Win where the opposing

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Speaker 1: candidate's wife, the opposing candidate is very conservative, and the

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Speaker 1: press finds out that his wife had had had an abortion,

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Speaker 1: and you're imagining the photo editor pulling pictures of being like,

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Speaker 1: let's find let's find a picture of a woman who

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Speaker 1: looks like she might have had an abortion, and they

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Speaker 1: pull pictures of her from fifteen years ago when she

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Speaker 1: was in her twenties and she dressed differently and you know,

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Speaker 1: maybe a little bit sexily, and those are the pictures

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Speaker 1: they ran, And those are serious decisions, like visuals matter,

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Speaker 1: photographs matter, and you have to think about the people

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Speaker 1: that are choosing choosing those photograph. Like I was, I

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Speaker 1: just kept tweeting Brianna Wou like kind of like a

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Speaker 1: weird stalker yesterday, being like you go girl, yes anything

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Speaker 1: you want. I'm sending you a copy of my book.

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Speaker 1: I'm gonna come out and stump for you, like, yes,

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Speaker 1: you're killing it. And she I think she thinks I'm

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Speaker 1: I'm a little I'm a little bit stalker in creasy.

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Speaker 1: It's probably a good kind of stocking compared to what

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Speaker 1: she's gotten before. I'm I'm certain. So it's funny that

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Speaker 1: it's funny that you say this. One of these scenes

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Speaker 1: in the book finds Walsh kind of getting into like

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Speaker 1: a minor scandal for wearing flats instead of heels heel gate,

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Speaker 1: and you know, it sounds really far fetched, you know,

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Speaker 1: the idea that would happen, but we know that that's

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Speaker 1: actually not true. Like women candidates are often dinged for

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Speaker 1: what they what they wear, how they how they dress.

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Speaker 1: I saw this for the interesting quote from cultural critic

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Speaker 1: Amanda Hess and she says that pointing out a woman's

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Speaker 1: heels in articles, it's kind of a shorthand for what

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Speaker 1: kind of woman that you're trying to kind of depictures.

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Speaker 1: She writes, high heeled name droughts like these are a

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Speaker 1: scourge on realistic profiles of powerful women. For some journalist

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Speaker 1: supporting that a woman wears high heel, high healed shoes,

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Speaker 1: or various colors and origins apparently passes for a weighty

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Speaker 1: detail that gives some inside into the subject's character. Often

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Speaker 1: that perceived inside is negative. Heels are mentioned to pain

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Speaker 1: a woman as spending, superficial, sepia, or a deviation from

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Speaker 1: the male standard. So I'm curious, like, is this something

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Speaker 1: that you found where articles will mention such and such

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Speaker 1: female candidate. Oh, she's wearing heels. You are lubatans and

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Speaker 1: have that sort of act as a kind of shorthand

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Speaker 1: for she's flighty, she's superficial, she's spendy, or something like that. Oh,

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Speaker 1: totally absolutely. I mean, first off, a woman in most

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Speaker 1: articles about a woman candidate, and another reason I want

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Speaker 1: to write this book was just so people would notice it. Right,

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Speaker 1: her outfit is mentioned in the first or second paragraph.

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Speaker 1: And we saw that a lot when London Breed was

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Speaker 1: elected here as Mary of San Francisco. You know, in

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Speaker 1: in no articles about a male politician, are you like, well,

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Speaker 1: he's daring that navy blue suit again and that red tie. No,

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Speaker 1: but the color of a woman's suit is always always

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Speaker 1: noted her, the size of her heel is always noted.

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Speaker 1: And what a lot of the women candidates told me

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Speaker 1: too is that they get this schizophrenic advice all the time.

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Speaker 1: So I did a podcast episode of Committed with Lauren Bear,

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Speaker 1: who just won her primary down in Florida. Um in

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Speaker 1: the House is eighteenth district. And people say, wear more dresses.

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Speaker 1: It makes you look prettier and softer, and people will

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Speaker 1: like you more. Wear more suits because they make you

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Speaker 1: look smarter. Your hair is too severe And by severe,

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Speaker 1: she's like, you mean it's curly, and they're like yes,

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Speaker 1: I mean these are things just would never happen to

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Speaker 1: a man. And their shorthand. I mean there's all kinds

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Speaker 1: of shorthand that we use around women candidates. The outfits

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Speaker 1: are just one piece of them we call and by we,

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Speaker 1: I mean the press women candidates things like hysterical and unhinged,

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Speaker 1: and that shorthand for she's a crazy woman, and what

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Speaker 1: do you think about? It's like the press is writing

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Speaker 1: about a woman the same way that every man ever

428
00:23:04,119 --> 00:23:07,000
Speaker 1: has talked about their ex girlfriend to their new girlfriend.

429
00:23:07,800 --> 00:23:13,680
Speaker 1: Oh that's such a good boy. She's crazy, she's crazy,

430
00:23:13,840 --> 00:23:16,280
Speaker 1: she's nuts and and that and those are the things

431
00:23:16,400 --> 00:23:18,879
Speaker 1: used to describe a woman. I remember when I was

432
00:23:18,920 --> 00:23:21,199
Speaker 1: at the New York Daily News, my editor pushed me

433
00:23:21,280 --> 00:23:26,119
Speaker 1: to write the story about Hillary Clinton wearing a scrunchy

434
00:23:26,400 --> 00:23:28,119
Speaker 1: and I can't find that story and I wish that

435
00:23:28,160 --> 00:23:30,320
Speaker 1: I could, And I remember thinking, why does it matter?

436
00:23:30,359 --> 00:23:32,560
Speaker 1: And I remember thinking I wanted to make my editor happy,

437
00:23:32,600 --> 00:23:34,520
Speaker 1: and I did it anyway, and I hate myself for

438
00:23:34,560 --> 00:23:38,160
Speaker 1: doing it, but why why? I remember? It turned into

439
00:23:38,200 --> 00:23:41,440
Speaker 1: scrunchy Gate. And so when I put this heel Gate

440
00:23:41,640 --> 00:23:43,719
Speaker 1: story into my book, and my editor was like, well,

441
00:23:43,760 --> 00:23:46,640
Speaker 1: isn't that a cliche? And I'm like, yes, and that's

442
00:23:46,640 --> 00:23:49,280
Speaker 1: why we have to write about it. Yes, it's a

443
00:23:49,320 --> 00:23:54,159
Speaker 1: cliche and it's absurd. Yeah. One of the things that

444
00:23:54,240 --> 00:23:56,359
Speaker 1: stuck out to me when I was reading this is

445
00:23:56,400 --> 00:24:01,760
Speaker 1: how our politics are so superficial. And there's one point

446
00:24:01,760 --> 00:24:05,680
Speaker 1: where Charlotte's campaign advisor Josh tells her a woman who

447
00:24:05,720 --> 00:24:08,600
Speaker 1: doesn't smile as an angry woman. You cannot be an

448
00:24:08,600 --> 00:24:12,919
Speaker 1: angry woman even for a second. No, not allowed. And

449
00:24:13,000 --> 00:24:15,080
Speaker 1: one of one of my favorite anecdotes from one of

450
00:24:15,080 --> 00:24:18,400
Speaker 1: the women I talked to, who was who had run

451
00:24:18,440 --> 00:24:20,920
Speaker 1: for governor in the last cycle, told me she got

452
00:24:20,960 --> 00:24:25,520
Speaker 1: t MJ from smiling so much that just forcing herself

453
00:24:25,560 --> 00:24:30,080
Speaker 1: to smile actually messed up her jaw. But male candidates

454
00:24:30,119 --> 00:24:33,479
Speaker 1: don't get that. Um. The other interesting thing I found was,

455
00:24:33,840 --> 00:24:36,359
Speaker 1: you know, you know, like mailer's those glossy things you

456
00:24:36,400 --> 00:24:39,480
Speaker 1: get in the mail. I like never actually check my

457
00:24:39,560 --> 00:24:41,520
Speaker 1: mail or like go through my mail, but it's still

458
00:24:41,560 --> 00:24:44,639
Speaker 1: a big thing on campaigns. Men are always told to

459
00:24:44,640 --> 00:24:47,840
Speaker 1: pose with their family male candidates, um, because they're like,

460
00:24:47,840 --> 00:24:51,160
Speaker 1: you know, everyone wants a family man, it makes you softer. Um.

461
00:24:51,200 --> 00:24:54,000
Speaker 1: But women are always told to pose alone in a

462
00:24:54,040 --> 00:24:58,480
Speaker 1: power pose, so like arms crossed or like knuckle under chin.

463
00:24:58,640 --> 00:25:01,919
Speaker 1: It's like you look smart, you look powerful. They're like,

464
00:25:01,960 --> 00:25:05,480
Speaker 1: don't make don't let your kids be on there. UM. Again,

465
00:25:05,520 --> 00:25:08,840
Speaker 1: I think that's changing. I think that's changing, um because

466
00:25:08,920 --> 00:25:11,800
Speaker 1: more women who are running are being really authentic. They're

467
00:25:11,840 --> 00:25:14,199
Speaker 1: being really open about having kids, which I think is

468
00:25:14,240 --> 00:25:17,600
Speaker 1: awesome because the reason that the government doesn't help out

469
00:25:17,760 --> 00:25:20,040
Speaker 1: mothers is because we haven't had a lot of mothers

470
00:25:20,040 --> 00:25:23,560
Speaker 1: in government for a long time. UM. I talked to

471
00:25:23,600 --> 00:25:28,040
Speaker 1: one candidate, a Virginia delegate, who told me that when

472
00:25:28,520 --> 00:25:30,480
Speaker 1: she found out she was pregnant on the campaign trail,

473
00:25:30,520 --> 00:25:33,800
Speaker 1: people actually said, great, when are you dropping out? I'm not,

474
00:25:34,720 --> 00:25:37,400
Speaker 1: and they're like, okay, great, can you hide it? Can

475
00:25:37,440 --> 00:25:41,040
Speaker 1: you hide this pregnancy while we're campaigning? And she's like, no,

476
00:25:41,160 --> 00:25:45,760
Speaker 1: I'm pregnant with twins. And she didn't hide it, and

477
00:25:45,800 --> 00:25:48,200
Speaker 1: she thinks it was a plus, and that race went

478
00:25:48,240 --> 00:25:51,200
Speaker 1: to a recount. She did the recount in her hospital

479
00:25:51,240 --> 00:25:54,120
Speaker 1: bed postpartum with twins, and then went out and walked

480
00:25:54,160 --> 00:25:56,199
Speaker 1: around with one twin strap to her front and one

481
00:25:56,240 --> 00:25:58,040
Speaker 1: twin strap to her back. And I'm like, yeah, so

482
00:25:58,080 --> 00:26:00,760
Speaker 1: women aren't strong at all. Now. Think what you're saying

483
00:26:00,840 --> 00:26:02,760
Speaker 1: is so true, and that you know, if we're able

484
00:26:02,880 --> 00:26:08,360
Speaker 1: to see competent, strong women kicking ass while being pregnant

485
00:26:08,400 --> 00:26:10,840
Speaker 1: while having a baby, we should we should be able

486
00:26:10,880 --> 00:26:13,040
Speaker 1: to see that like reflection, because it's it's the reality.

487
00:26:13,080 --> 00:26:15,280
Speaker 1: Like I was so happy to see Tammy Duckworth go

488
00:26:15,359 --> 00:26:18,359
Speaker 1: through that process and still hold public office. You know,

489
00:26:18,400 --> 00:26:22,040
Speaker 1: we we pretend that, you know, if you get pregnant

490
00:26:22,119 --> 00:26:24,560
Speaker 1: you have to sort of hide it, and it's just

491
00:26:24,600 --> 00:26:26,919
Speaker 1: it's just sort of we're acting like it's not a

492
00:26:26,960 --> 00:26:28,520
Speaker 1: normal part of life for a lot of us, and

493
00:26:28,560 --> 00:26:30,320
Speaker 1: it is. It's like we're acting like the reality is

494
00:26:30,359 --> 00:26:32,879
Speaker 1: not actually the reality, and it's the cycle that helps

495
00:26:32,960 --> 00:26:36,439
Speaker 1: no one exactly exactly. I mean, I turned in the

496
00:26:36,440 --> 00:26:38,240
Speaker 1: first draft of Charlotte Welsh. I might have told you

497
00:26:38,240 --> 00:26:41,800
Speaker 1: guys this while I was in labor, bouncing up and

498
00:26:41,840 --> 00:26:44,159
Speaker 1: down on a yoga ball um and I'm like, all right,

499
00:26:44,160 --> 00:26:46,160
Speaker 1: I just gotta get this done. My husband was sleeping.

500
00:26:46,840 --> 00:26:50,640
Speaker 1: I'm in labor finishing a draft of a novel, and

501
00:26:50,680 --> 00:26:53,800
Speaker 1: he's snoring. Women get done. But we never see that.

502
00:26:53,840 --> 00:26:56,000
Speaker 1: And this is this goes back to the pop culture thing.

503
00:26:56,440 --> 00:26:59,159
Speaker 1: We rarely see that on the screen. We see pregnant women,

504
00:26:59,200 --> 00:27:02,240
Speaker 1: you know, being treated very delicately, and then once they

505
00:27:02,240 --> 00:27:04,680
Speaker 1: have the baby and have the newborn, then they're typically

506
00:27:04,680 --> 00:27:07,600
Speaker 1: relegated to their houses. You know. We like, we just

507
00:27:07,760 --> 00:27:12,240
Speaker 1: don't see pregnant women and new mothers working and working

508
00:27:12,320 --> 00:27:14,520
Speaker 1: hard in the same way that we we don't see

509
00:27:14,520 --> 00:27:17,840
Speaker 1: female politicians doing that on the screen either. I love Veep.

510
00:27:17,960 --> 00:27:21,560
Speaker 1: She's an idiot on Veep, Like we see women politicians

511
00:27:21,640 --> 00:27:25,280
Speaker 1: as idiots or shrews, or wives that become politicians because

512
00:27:25,280 --> 00:27:30,560
Speaker 1: their husbands up somehow scandal Yeah, I mean, I love

513
00:27:30,640 --> 00:27:32,920
Speaker 1: the two, but I sort of what you just said

514
00:27:32,960 --> 00:27:36,320
Speaker 1: that I didn't realize. Yeah, she's sort of presented as bumbling,

515
00:27:36,400 --> 00:27:38,879
Speaker 1: like she can't get anything right, even when even when

516
00:27:38,960 --> 00:27:40,679
Speaker 1: things go right for her, they still go wrong, Like

517
00:27:40,720 --> 00:27:45,200
Speaker 1: she just is kind of hapless. Yeah, and it's hilarious.

518
00:27:45,240 --> 00:27:47,639
Speaker 1: But the fact is Veep is the really one of

519
00:27:47,680 --> 00:27:50,600
Speaker 1: the only shows that we have that show a woman

520
00:27:50,800 --> 00:27:54,960
Speaker 1: in political power and she's hapless, she's bumbling and that

521
00:27:55,400 --> 00:27:57,919
Speaker 1: and people people take that to heart too. I mean

522
00:27:58,200 --> 00:28:02,280
Speaker 1: the I'm constantly lon away by the majority of Americans

523
00:28:02,320 --> 00:28:06,960
Speaker 1: who take what they see on screens as what is reality. Yeah,

524
00:28:07,119 --> 00:28:08,720
Speaker 1: I guess that's what That's why I love the show

525
00:28:08,760 --> 00:28:12,040
Speaker 1: parts and breath because you know, Leslie No doesn't always

526
00:28:12,040 --> 00:28:15,480
Speaker 1: get it right, but she wants that she wants to

527
00:28:15,520 --> 00:28:17,200
Speaker 1: do the best thing. She wants to do the right thing.

528
00:28:17,240 --> 00:28:18,840
Speaker 1: Like I don't know, I guess I just wish that

529
00:28:18,920 --> 00:28:21,959
Speaker 1: we like men. I wish that we got to have

530
00:28:22,000 --> 00:28:24,919
Speaker 1: a variety of women who are running for office, the

531
00:28:24,920 --> 00:28:27,240
Speaker 1: ones who are hapless and bumbling, the ones who are

532
00:28:27,320 --> 00:28:29,959
Speaker 1: scheming and power hungry and awful, the ones who are

533
00:28:30,000 --> 00:28:33,080
Speaker 1: altruistic and doing a great job. Men. When you look

534
00:28:33,080 --> 00:28:35,919
Speaker 1: at shows that feature men, who hold public power. You

535
00:28:35,960 --> 00:28:38,840
Speaker 1: get the you get the variety, you get all all stripes,

536
00:28:38,880 --> 00:28:42,040
Speaker 1: from your Frank Underwoods to your who was the president

537
00:28:42,040 --> 00:28:45,360
Speaker 1: on West Wing Um, oh gosh, Jeff Bartlett, thank you,

538
00:28:45,800 --> 00:28:47,960
Speaker 1: and we just we just don't have that as women.

539
00:28:48,000 --> 00:28:51,760
Speaker 1: It's a very sympacific bucket that we're able to test

540
00:28:51,760 --> 00:28:56,080
Speaker 1: sort of fall into exactly exactly. It was funny west

541
00:28:56,080 --> 00:28:59,440
Speaker 1: Wing um, like the official west Wing tv H Twitter

542
00:28:59,560 --> 00:29:02,040
Speaker 1: tweeter the other day they're like, I think we should

543
00:29:02,080 --> 00:29:04,800
Speaker 1: come up with a prequel about Jeff Barlett unning for governor.

544
00:29:04,840 --> 00:29:06,280
Speaker 1: And I'm like, oh my god, shut the up, Like

545
00:29:06,320 --> 00:29:08,200
Speaker 1: why don't we come up with a sequel where CJ

546
00:29:08,680 --> 00:29:12,440
Speaker 1: runs for Senate like that, Like, yes, come on, come on,

547
00:29:12,920 --> 00:29:16,960
Speaker 1: men um. Something else we don't see very often in

548
00:29:17,080 --> 00:29:19,920
Speaker 1: media that I really enjoyed seeing in your book is

549
00:29:20,160 --> 00:29:24,719
Speaker 1: um relationships between different generations of women. And in this

550
00:29:24,760 --> 00:29:28,680
Speaker 1: case it was older women who had run for office

551
00:29:28,880 --> 00:29:31,960
Speaker 1: and been elected, And so it was cool because you

552
00:29:31,960 --> 00:29:34,520
Speaker 1: get to see the relationship between the characters, but also

553
00:29:34,600 --> 00:29:38,480
Speaker 1: it was kind of a it's showcased how politics had changed,

554
00:29:38,640 --> 00:29:41,600
Speaker 1: how maybe things what had stayed the same in what

555
00:29:41,760 --> 00:29:44,680
Speaker 1: hadn't In this case, Um, can you talk a little

556
00:29:44,720 --> 00:29:48,760
Speaker 1: bit about about writing that. Oh yeah, women have been

557
00:29:48,760 --> 00:29:52,240
Speaker 1: told forever. And by forever, I mean since the beginning

558
00:29:52,240 --> 00:29:55,120
Speaker 1: of women taking office, and in the beginning of women

559
00:29:55,160 --> 00:30:00,160
Speaker 1: taking office, they were taking office because their husbands died. UM,

560
00:30:00,200 --> 00:30:03,440
Speaker 1: to run like a man, to rule like a man. Um.

561
00:30:03,520 --> 00:30:06,880
Speaker 1: Hillary Clinton was told that as recently as this recent

562
00:30:06,920 --> 00:30:12,160
Speaker 1: election by her male campaign managers. UM. And I wanted

563
00:30:12,200 --> 00:30:14,480
Speaker 1: to be able to show that through these multi generations

564
00:30:14,480 --> 00:30:18,000
Speaker 1: of women. So we have a character Roz who had

565
00:30:18,040 --> 00:30:22,360
Speaker 1: been a senator now she's in her late sixties. She

566
00:30:22,600 --> 00:30:26,520
Speaker 1: ran ran the gauntlet of of of male dominated politics

567
00:30:26,600 --> 00:30:29,840
Speaker 1: for a long time, and she had to completely hide

568
00:30:29,840 --> 00:30:33,200
Speaker 1: who she was. She had to completely hide anything that

569
00:30:33,240 --> 00:30:35,960
Speaker 1: would have been considered feminine. And then we have Charlotte,

570
00:30:35,960 --> 00:30:40,160
Speaker 1: who's and actually really fun side note. When I was

571
00:30:40,200 --> 00:30:43,480
Speaker 1: down in l A having these meetings, in one of

572
00:30:43,520 --> 00:30:47,920
Speaker 1: the meetings, one of the like producing executives actually listed

573
00:30:47,920 --> 00:30:49,800
Speaker 1: off of people that a group of people they wanted

574
00:30:49,800 --> 00:30:51,320
Speaker 1: to play Charotte Walsh, and all of them were in

575
00:30:51,360 --> 00:30:53,560
Speaker 1: their thirties or like, and one of them was in

576
00:30:53,560 --> 00:30:59,680
Speaker 1: their twenties. What I actually, I almost like hung up

577
00:30:59,680 --> 00:31:02,280
Speaker 1: the phone and I got a text from my producing

578
00:31:02,280 --> 00:31:03,640
Speaker 1: partner who was like, don't hang up. And now you

579
00:31:03,680 --> 00:31:05,000
Speaker 1: want to hang up. I know you want to call them,

580
00:31:05,600 --> 00:31:08,000
Speaker 1: don't call it. Call just finished the call. And I

581
00:31:08,040 --> 00:31:10,880
Speaker 1: did finish the call. But on every other call I said,

582
00:31:11,120 --> 00:31:13,280
Speaker 1: it's important to me that Charlotte Walsh is a forty

583
00:31:13,280 --> 00:31:15,400
Speaker 1: seven year old woman. There are lots of forty seven

584
00:31:15,440 --> 00:31:18,160
Speaker 1: year old actresses in Hollywood, lots of fifty year old actresses,

585
00:31:18,200 --> 00:31:20,240
Speaker 1: and lets of sixty year old actresses in Hollywood who

586
00:31:20,240 --> 00:31:23,320
Speaker 1: look forty seven. UM Like, let's let's make her her

587
00:31:23,360 --> 00:31:26,960
Speaker 1: actual age, UM. And so Charlotte's forty seven. She's going

588
00:31:26,960 --> 00:31:29,240
Speaker 1: through her own stuff. She's also the mother of three

589
00:31:29,480 --> 00:31:32,920
Speaker 1: young kids under six years old. But then we have Leela,

590
00:31:33,000 --> 00:31:36,840
Speaker 1: who is her chief of staff, who I don't want

591
00:31:36,840 --> 00:31:39,160
Speaker 1: to give away any spoilers, and she she does something

592
00:31:39,360 --> 00:31:41,840
Speaker 1: at the end of the book to um in politics,

593
00:31:42,200 --> 00:31:44,680
Speaker 1: but she has a completely different view on it. She

594
00:31:44,720 --> 00:31:46,960
Speaker 1: doesn't want to put up with any mail bulls at all.

595
00:31:47,280 --> 00:31:49,640
Speaker 1: When Charlotte gets harassed, she's like, you need to talk out,

596
00:31:49,680 --> 00:31:52,840
Speaker 1: you need to speak up. And me too happened while

597
00:31:52,880 --> 00:31:55,480
Speaker 1: I was writing this book, or actually, me too happened

598
00:31:55,520 --> 00:31:57,000
Speaker 1: after I had already written the book, and then I

599
00:31:57,040 --> 00:31:59,400
Speaker 1: demanded the book back and Simon and shester got pissed,

600
00:31:59,720 --> 00:32:02,320
Speaker 1: and I'm like, no, I'm sorry, I've got to change

601
00:32:02,360 --> 00:32:06,560
Speaker 1: a bunch of stuff. The world changed again, um, and

602
00:32:06,640 --> 00:32:09,240
Speaker 1: so I wanted those three generations of women to reflect

603
00:32:10,400 --> 00:32:14,360
Speaker 1: how politics has changed for women in the past thirty years,

604
00:32:14,440 --> 00:32:18,160
Speaker 1: and how it's changed in the past two years for women.

605
00:32:18,280 --> 00:32:20,800
Speaker 1: So and also it'll it'll be great if it does

606
00:32:20,880 --> 00:32:22,760
Speaker 1: make it to the small screen because then we have

607
00:32:23,200 --> 00:32:27,040
Speaker 1: these really strong roles of women of all different ages

608
00:32:27,120 --> 00:32:30,640
Speaker 1: and we don't see that enough. Totally sort of along

609
00:32:30,640 --> 00:32:33,960
Speaker 1: that same vein, I was really excited to see in

610
00:32:34,080 --> 00:32:37,280
Speaker 1: real life all of these women who are running for

611
00:32:37,320 --> 00:32:39,600
Speaker 1: office who were really supporting each other. And thinking of

612
00:32:39,720 --> 00:32:44,280
Speaker 1: how Cynthia Nixon endorsed Alexandria Ocastio Cortes and then vice versa,

613
00:32:44,360 --> 00:32:47,840
Speaker 1: Cortes you know, endorsed her as well. I think they

614
00:32:47,960 --> 00:32:51,040
Speaker 1: were given these messages that ambitious women are caddy, that

615
00:32:51,120 --> 00:32:53,520
Speaker 1: they're you know, competing with each other, that they hate

616
00:32:53,520 --> 00:32:56,360
Speaker 1: each other, they want to tear each other down and impact.

617
00:32:56,360 --> 00:32:58,520
Speaker 1: In your book, that's not true and in your life

618
00:32:58,520 --> 00:33:01,479
Speaker 1: that's not true. Like, we have this this idea of women,

619
00:33:01,880 --> 00:33:05,440
Speaker 1: ambitious women as these horrible people who will you know,

620
00:33:05,520 --> 00:33:08,200
Speaker 1: step over anybody to get ahead and are treating their

621
00:33:08,240 --> 00:33:10,600
Speaker 1: fellow women awful and stabbing them in the back. But

622
00:33:10,680 --> 00:33:12,480
Speaker 1: that so often isn't true. You know where where do

623
00:33:12,520 --> 00:33:16,360
Speaker 1: you think that comes from? Pop culture? And men? I

624
00:33:16,400 --> 00:33:18,480
Speaker 1: hate saying it all the time. It's just it's so true.

625
00:33:18,640 --> 00:33:21,160
Speaker 1: It's just so true. I'm gonna make us all T shirts. No,

626
00:33:21,480 --> 00:33:23,640
Speaker 1: you don't have to apologize for blaming men. Men on

627
00:33:23,640 --> 00:33:25,840
Speaker 1: this podcast, do what all you want. But it is

628
00:33:25,840 --> 00:33:27,760
Speaker 1: true because I think that men's view of women is

629
00:33:27,800 --> 00:33:31,120
Speaker 1: that ambitious women are scary, because ambitious women are scary

630
00:33:31,160 --> 00:33:33,440
Speaker 1: to men, and so that's how we've seen them portrayed

631
00:33:34,000 --> 00:33:37,080
Speaker 1: for so long. Um, you're still right. I mean we

632
00:33:37,240 --> 00:33:39,400
Speaker 1: when we on the rare occasion we do see an

633
00:33:39,400 --> 00:33:42,880
Speaker 1: ambitious women, she's scheming, she's a shrewd, she's a bit

634
00:33:43,240 --> 00:33:45,520
Speaker 1: she has no friends. And that was that was actually

635
00:33:45,600 --> 00:33:49,520
Speaker 1: a note that my editor, um really wanted in Charlotte Wall.

636
00:33:49,600 --> 00:33:52,640
Speaker 1: She's like, we need to show that Charlotte wash has friends. Um,

637
00:33:52,680 --> 00:33:55,600
Speaker 1: she has supportive friends, She's surrounded by other women. She

638
00:33:55,680 --> 00:33:57,920
Speaker 1: wants to help other women, because it's just something we

639
00:33:57,960 --> 00:34:01,680
Speaker 1: don't see portrayed enough. We never Hillary Clinton had such

640
00:34:01,720 --> 00:34:04,880
Speaker 1: a close group of female friends supporting her, and such

641
00:34:04,880 --> 00:34:08,440
Speaker 1: a close group of female staffers who would have literally

642
00:34:08,480 --> 00:34:10,800
Speaker 1: done anything for her. And I know that because I've

643
00:34:10,800 --> 00:34:15,640
Speaker 1: spent so much time with her female staffers post campaign. Um.

644
00:34:15,760 --> 00:34:19,359
Speaker 1: They speak about her like she is Jesus Christ walk

645
00:34:19,360 --> 00:34:22,600
Speaker 1: in the earth right now. Oh my gosh. They love her.

646
00:34:22,719 --> 00:34:25,200
Speaker 1: They're so disappointed that the public doesn't know all of

647
00:34:25,239 --> 00:34:28,120
Speaker 1: the wonderful stories about her. And yet we never saw

648
00:34:28,160 --> 00:34:29,719
Speaker 1: that side of her. We were never allowed to see

649
00:34:29,719 --> 00:34:31,880
Speaker 1: that side of her. Her campaign tried to do it,

650
00:34:31,920 --> 00:34:34,399
Speaker 1: but the press never let us do it. And that's

651
00:34:34,480 --> 00:34:36,040
Speaker 1: one of the reasons that I wanted to try to

652
00:34:36,040 --> 00:34:38,560
Speaker 1: do it in fiction. I wanted to show Charlotte as

653
00:34:38,920 --> 00:34:43,520
Speaker 1: a vulnerable, flawed Also, she's flawed, She's not perfect. It

654
00:34:43,520 --> 00:34:45,319
Speaker 1: would have been so easy to write fan fiction and

655
00:34:45,360 --> 00:34:48,040
Speaker 1: be like, oh, women candidates are great. They're not, but

656
00:34:48,120 --> 00:34:51,239
Speaker 1: all male candidates aren't great either. But as a real

657
00:34:51,960 --> 00:34:55,880
Speaker 1: person and a real woman, Yeah, I'm so glad that

658
00:34:55,920 --> 00:34:58,799
Speaker 1: you brought up the Clinton friends thing. Um in her

659
00:34:58,880 --> 00:35:03,160
Speaker 1: big you know, messed up email hacking dumb thing. My

660
00:35:03,200 --> 00:35:05,920
Speaker 1: favorite favorite favorite email of all time that I literally

661
00:35:06,040 --> 00:35:08,640
Speaker 1: have have this phrase printed on a T shirt is

662
00:35:08,640 --> 00:35:11,160
Speaker 1: an email that she SAIDs to Huma, where she says,

663
00:35:11,880 --> 00:35:15,000
Speaker 1: should we be bad, you should get a kerm roulet.

664
00:35:15,200 --> 00:35:17,320
Speaker 1: Let's split a firm roulet. Like that isn't an email

665
00:35:17,320 --> 00:35:19,680
Speaker 1: that you could get from a friend, a friend being like, listen,

666
00:35:19,719 --> 00:35:22,040
Speaker 1: I know we have all this important, you know, business

667
00:35:22,040 --> 00:35:23,759
Speaker 1: not to talk about, but do you kind of want

668
00:35:23,760 --> 00:35:26,759
Speaker 1: to split a carm roulet? Yes? Yes, And I have

669
00:35:26,840 --> 00:35:29,520
Speaker 1: an homage to that in the book where they're in

670
00:35:29,600 --> 00:35:31,640
Speaker 1: a diner and I think I think it's a brownie

671
00:35:31,640 --> 00:35:34,000
Speaker 1: Sunday because I was like, you know, she got to

672
00:35:34,080 --> 00:35:36,680
Speaker 1: change it up, but she's like, let's be bad, let's

673
00:35:36,680 --> 00:35:38,400
Speaker 1: get that. I'm like, and I love that moment too

674
00:35:38,480 --> 00:35:40,719
Speaker 1: between those two women because it's just so human and

675
00:35:40,800 --> 00:35:43,680
Speaker 1: so real. It's like, yes, of course. And I actually

676
00:35:43,680 --> 00:35:45,359
Speaker 1: I think they order a salad two in the book

677
00:35:45,360 --> 00:35:47,319
Speaker 1: and they're both picking at this anemic salad and then

678
00:35:47,360 --> 00:35:51,520
Speaker 1: they're both digging into this Sunday because that and that's

679
00:35:52,160 --> 00:35:54,000
Speaker 1: I think about that all the time when I think

680
00:35:54,000 --> 00:35:56,080
Speaker 1: about what happened to Hillary Clinton in this race. I'm like,

681
00:35:56,320 --> 00:36:00,799
Speaker 1: she was just Hillary Clinton, just like us, just like us.

682
00:36:01,080 --> 00:36:03,319
Speaker 1: We have some more conversation with Joe, but we're gonna

683
00:36:03,320 --> 00:36:05,120
Speaker 1: have pause for one more quick break for word from

684
00:36:05,120 --> 00:36:16,520
Speaker 1: our sponsor. One thing I really appreciated that you included

685
00:36:17,080 --> 00:36:21,480
Speaker 1: was that Charlotte have these thoughts like am I ruining

686
00:36:21,560 --> 00:36:24,479
Speaker 1: my my children's lives? She had these doubts, At least

687
00:36:24,480 --> 00:36:26,359
Speaker 1: for me. When I see ambitious people a lot of time,

688
00:36:26,400 --> 00:36:30,120
Speaker 1: I think they must not have any doubts, which is

689
00:36:30,200 --> 00:36:35,080
Speaker 1: completely incorrect. They're human too. It was really important to

690
00:36:35,120 --> 00:36:38,360
Speaker 1: me that Charlotte had kind of the impostor syndrome that

691
00:36:38,400 --> 00:36:41,040
Speaker 1: I think we all have. I was, I was out

692
00:36:41,080 --> 00:36:43,160
Speaker 1: to dinner with a bunch of friends in New York

693
00:36:43,280 --> 00:36:45,719
Speaker 1: when I was up there um for the book, and

694
00:36:47,320 --> 00:36:48,640
Speaker 1: it was it was a table of just like the

695
00:36:48,680 --> 00:36:52,000
Speaker 1: most badass ambitious women you've ever met, um, you know,

696
00:36:52,160 --> 00:36:57,799
Speaker 1: like book additors, lawyers, politicians. And I was like, who

697
00:36:57,800 --> 00:37:01,239
Speaker 1: feels like a failure on a daily basis? And they

698
00:37:01,280 --> 00:37:04,960
Speaker 1: all raised their hand and I was like, me too,

699
00:37:06,000 --> 00:37:08,799
Speaker 1: why do we feel like that? Like every every like

700
00:37:09,160 --> 00:37:12,239
Speaker 1: kind of lame, mediocre man I know thinks that he's

701
00:37:12,239 --> 00:37:15,880
Speaker 1: winning every day. Um, you know, my husband has been

702
00:37:15,880 --> 00:37:17,640
Speaker 1: out of a job for two months, and like, if

703
00:37:17,640 --> 00:37:20,240
Speaker 1: you were like, should you run for office? He's like absolutely,

704
00:37:20,280 --> 00:37:23,680
Speaker 1: I'm like super qualified. Um. But as women, we doubt

705
00:37:23,680 --> 00:37:26,520
Speaker 1: ourselves and we don't talk enough about doubting ourselves or

706
00:37:26,600 --> 00:37:30,160
Speaker 1: feeling this imposter syndrome or feeling like a failure. And

707
00:37:30,520 --> 00:37:33,200
Speaker 1: I think even ambitious women feel that. I know even

708
00:37:33,239 --> 00:37:35,520
Speaker 1: ambitious women feel like and I really wanted to show

709
00:37:35,560 --> 00:37:38,279
Speaker 1: that with Charlotte, to show her doubts and show how

710
00:37:38,320 --> 00:37:40,600
Speaker 1: nervous she was. And one of the other things that

711
00:37:40,640 --> 00:37:42,680
Speaker 1: I learned from talking to the folks at Emily's List

712
00:37:43,160 --> 00:37:46,520
Speaker 1: was that historically, women won't run unless they think that

713
00:37:46,600 --> 00:37:50,520
Speaker 1: they are a hundred percent qualified to be running, whereas

714
00:37:50,520 --> 00:37:53,040
Speaker 1: a man will run if he has zero qualifications. I mean,

715
00:37:53,080 --> 00:37:57,160
Speaker 1: come on, let's be honest, um. And that's been a

716
00:37:57,239 --> 00:37:59,800
Speaker 1: barrier to women running for a long time. If Donald

717
00:38:00,160 --> 00:38:03,239
Speaker 1: did anything, I think it would show women that, you know,

718
00:38:03,280 --> 00:38:06,280
Speaker 1: a complete idiot can run for office. Oh my god,

719
00:38:06,400 --> 00:38:09,200
Speaker 1: of course I can do this. Um again, all right,

720
00:38:09,239 --> 00:38:11,759
Speaker 1: find two good things that Donald Trump did in the

721
00:38:11,760 --> 00:38:15,799
Speaker 1: midst of ruining the world. But yeah, it's again, we're

722
00:38:16,080 --> 00:38:19,439
Speaker 1: we're women were complex, were flawed. We've seen complex men

723
00:38:20,000 --> 00:38:23,600
Speaker 1: for the past hundred years, written about, talked about on

724
00:38:23,640 --> 00:38:27,040
Speaker 1: our screens, and now we're only just starting to get

725
00:38:27,080 --> 00:38:28,759
Speaker 1: the tip of the iceberg of what it's like to

726
00:38:28,800 --> 00:38:32,320
Speaker 1: really be a woman. Absolutely, something that you that you

727
00:38:32,440 --> 00:38:34,200
Speaker 1: tease out in the book a little bit, and that

728
00:38:34,239 --> 00:38:36,680
Speaker 1: you that I know that you've done in terms of research,

729
00:38:37,080 --> 00:38:39,319
Speaker 1: is talking to about the ways that women who aren't

730
00:38:39,360 --> 00:38:41,520
Speaker 1: running for office, the ones who are working on campaigns,

731
00:38:41,520 --> 00:38:44,279
Speaker 1: who are supporting campaigns, who are volunteering on campaigns, the

732
00:38:44,400 --> 00:38:46,480
Speaker 1: sort of climate that that they deal with as well

733
00:38:46,520 --> 00:38:48,120
Speaker 1: in terms of sexism. Can you can you talk a

734
00:38:48,120 --> 00:38:50,520
Speaker 1: bit about that? Oh my god? I mean, campaigns are

735
00:38:50,560 --> 00:38:54,920
Speaker 1: just an old boys club through and through um the majority,

736
00:38:55,440 --> 00:38:59,359
Speaker 1: the vast majority of campaign managers are still men. UM.

737
00:38:59,520 --> 00:39:02,200
Speaker 1: Most camp paign offices are like a frat house. I

738
00:39:02,239 --> 00:39:06,000
Speaker 1: mean we're talking like potato chip bags strewn on the floor,

739
00:39:06,200 --> 00:39:08,560
Speaker 1: people chain smoking, marble reds in a world where no

740
00:39:08,600 --> 00:39:11,320
Speaker 1: one still chained smokes. I no one smokes anymore except

741
00:39:11,320 --> 00:39:13,960
Speaker 1: on the campaign. You know, everyone going out for fast

742
00:39:13,960 --> 00:39:16,520
Speaker 1: food all the time, people playing pranks on each other.

743
00:39:16,840 --> 00:39:22,880
Speaker 1: I mean, just like boys. Campaigns run by boys. Um. Again,

744
00:39:22,960 --> 00:39:24,839
Speaker 1: it's starting to change, it's starting to be different. When

745
00:39:24,840 --> 00:39:27,400
Speaker 1: I was down in l A, I was with UM

746
00:39:27,480 --> 00:39:31,520
Speaker 1: Julia Peacock's campaign manager and they have an all women's

747
00:39:31,520 --> 00:39:35,400
Speaker 1: staff and she was like, we are so efficient. She's like,

748
00:39:35,440 --> 00:39:37,680
Speaker 1: we just we really get things done. We get things

749
00:39:37,760 --> 00:39:40,759
Speaker 1: done on time. Everyone's kind, everyone's pleasant to each other.

750
00:39:41,080 --> 00:39:43,520
Speaker 1: And again, I'm not saying that all women environments are perfect,

751
00:39:43,560 --> 00:39:47,440
Speaker 1: but they're they're definitely a little bit better. Um. You know,

752
00:39:47,920 --> 00:39:50,719
Speaker 1: on a campaign trail, I have a friend who who

753
00:39:50,800 --> 00:39:55,680
Speaker 1: did what was going through IVF in the beginning of

754
00:39:55,920 --> 00:39:59,040
Speaker 1: a campaign, and all of the men on the campaign

755
00:40:00,000 --> 00:40:01,920
Speaker 1: older just to quit. They're like, you can't work on

756
00:40:01,920 --> 00:40:04,880
Speaker 1: this campaign. Um, You're you're not. You're you're just not

757
00:40:04,920 --> 00:40:07,719
Speaker 1: equipped for it right now meaning and by equipped for

758
00:40:07,760 --> 00:40:11,160
Speaker 1: it meaning you're going to be weak. UM. Mothers are

759
00:40:11,160 --> 00:40:14,080
Speaker 1: treated terribly on the campaign trail. There's no flexibility given

760
00:40:14,120 --> 00:40:16,400
Speaker 1: for mothers to take care of their children. There's no

761
00:40:16,440 --> 00:40:19,719
Speaker 1: compensation given for daycare. That's been a huge barrier to

762
00:40:19,800 --> 00:40:22,799
Speaker 1: women candidates running UM, the fact that they can't use

763
00:40:22,800 --> 00:40:26,359
Speaker 1: campaign funds for daycare. UM, when even though they have

764
00:40:27,280 --> 00:40:30,680
Speaker 1: a full time job while running for office. Um, and

765
00:40:31,200 --> 00:40:33,880
Speaker 1: you can't run when you have two kids running and

766
00:40:34,000 --> 00:40:37,600
Speaker 1: running around and you don't have any support. Uh yeah,

767
00:40:37,760 --> 00:40:41,960
Speaker 1: I think again, it's changing. We're seeing campaigns run by

768
00:40:41,960 --> 00:40:46,200
Speaker 1: women for the first time pretty much ever, and we're

769
00:40:46,200 --> 00:40:50,239
Speaker 1: seeing a big difference in how campaigns are run in

770
00:40:50,320 --> 00:40:54,560
Speaker 1: that I think that they're becoming just a lot more

771
00:40:54,640 --> 00:40:57,359
Speaker 1: palatable to a lot of different kinds of people. Yeah,

772
00:40:57,480 --> 00:41:00,040
Speaker 1: I'm I cannot agree more with what you said. And

773
00:41:00,120 --> 00:41:02,600
Speaker 1: I've done a handful of campaigns in my day, and

774
00:41:02,760 --> 00:41:04,719
Speaker 1: I always say like, oh never, every time I do one,

775
00:41:04,760 --> 00:41:07,279
Speaker 1: I like never again, never again, never again, And I

776
00:41:07,280 --> 00:41:09,439
Speaker 1: always somehow wind up back on on them. I don't

777
00:41:09,440 --> 00:41:12,080
Speaker 1: know what happens, but I do think there is something

778
00:41:12,080 --> 00:41:14,200
Speaker 1: in my in my psyche or personality, and that gets

779
00:41:14,200 --> 00:41:16,800
Speaker 1: sort of addicted to it. You know. You get these

780
00:41:17,080 --> 00:41:20,680
Speaker 1: crushing loads and these like dizzy highs, and at a

781
00:41:20,680 --> 00:41:22,640
Speaker 1: certain point, when you've done them for a while, you

782
00:41:22,719 --> 00:41:25,439
Speaker 1: kind of can't see going back to a nine five

783
00:41:25,440 --> 00:41:27,880
Speaker 1: desk job. Like you can't see working a job where

784
00:41:28,160 --> 00:41:31,560
Speaker 1: you're not working these intense hours and having all these

785
00:41:31,640 --> 00:41:35,440
Speaker 1: ups and downs. And it's just a really unless you've

786
00:41:35,480 --> 00:41:37,520
Speaker 1: done it or been around it are reported on it.

787
00:41:37,520 --> 00:41:41,279
Speaker 1: It's a really weird environment that's difficult to describe, and

788
00:41:41,320 --> 00:41:44,200
Speaker 1: it sounds so awful. So that's why it sounds so

789
00:41:44,320 --> 00:41:46,360
Speaker 1: weird that then you would sort of become addicted to it.

790
00:41:46,400 --> 00:41:50,880
Speaker 1: But you do, um, you do. It's it's it's toxic

791
00:41:50,920 --> 00:41:52,920
Speaker 1: and weird and I can't even really like verbalize it,

792
00:41:52,960 --> 00:41:56,680
Speaker 1: but it's weird. But in in those campaign settings, I've

793
00:41:57,160 --> 00:42:00,840
Speaker 1: I've had campaign managers and state there's say things to

794
00:42:00,840 --> 00:42:03,759
Speaker 1: me like what did you expect from a campaign? Because

795
00:42:03,800 --> 00:42:06,520
Speaker 1: I if I went to someone and said, hey, this

796
00:42:06,640 --> 00:42:09,040
Speaker 1: sexist thing happened, or this racist thing happened, or this

797
00:42:09,160 --> 00:42:12,800
Speaker 1: gross thing happened, or this toxic thing happened, the answer

798
00:42:12,880 --> 00:42:15,319
Speaker 1: is always what did you expect on a campaign? Like

799
00:42:15,680 --> 00:42:18,800
Speaker 1: I'm happy that that that you know that is changing

800
00:42:18,800 --> 00:42:22,200
Speaker 1: and that there are more decision makers that are women

801
00:42:22,200 --> 00:42:25,160
Speaker 1: in folks of color and queer folks in these spaces

802
00:42:25,200 --> 00:42:27,480
Speaker 1: because for so long it was a boys club, not

803
00:42:27,520 --> 00:42:29,200
Speaker 1: even a men's called a boys club. It was a

804
00:42:29,239 --> 00:42:33,840
Speaker 1: gross place. And you know, I always when I did campaigns,

805
00:42:33,880 --> 00:42:36,720
Speaker 1: I always came back as the worst version of myself,

806
00:42:36,760 --> 00:42:39,799
Speaker 1: the version of myself that ate terribly didn't sleep sort

807
00:42:39,800 --> 00:42:44,600
Speaker 1: of weirdly, you know, bragged about living a really healthy lifestyle,

808
00:42:44,840 --> 00:42:48,759
Speaker 1: you know, was hitting substances hard, you know, drinking a lot.

809
00:42:48,840 --> 00:42:51,360
Speaker 1: Like the worst version of who I am as a person.

810
00:42:51,560 --> 00:42:53,440
Speaker 1: That is a version of myself that I have to

811
00:42:53,480 --> 00:42:56,359
Speaker 1: be to make a campaign work, and it's it's it's bad.

812
00:42:56,440 --> 00:42:59,080
Speaker 1: The version of myself who puts up with it's really

813
00:42:59,200 --> 00:43:01,279
Speaker 1: sexist bull crap and it doesn't speak up of that.

814
00:43:01,520 --> 00:43:04,120
Speaker 1: Like that is the version of who I became when

815
00:43:04,120 --> 00:43:07,920
Speaker 1: I did campaigns. Yeah, no, totally. It was. I was

816
00:43:07,960 --> 00:43:11,560
Speaker 1: blown away the other day talking to Sarah Holland Julia

817
00:43:11,560 --> 00:43:15,040
Speaker 1: Peacocks campaign manager, because she was like, oh, we make

818
00:43:15,080 --> 00:43:17,080
Speaker 1: sure that everyone has self care days. You know, we're

819
00:43:17,120 --> 00:43:20,440
Speaker 1: making sure that everyone everyone gets time off. If you

820
00:43:20,560 --> 00:43:22,120
Speaker 1: just come and you're like, I need a self care

821
00:43:22,239 --> 00:43:25,200
Speaker 1: day to self care day to day. Um, including the candidate,

822
00:43:25,280 --> 00:43:27,799
Speaker 1: including Julia. Julia's like, you know what, no, I'm out

823
00:43:27,880 --> 00:43:30,400
Speaker 1: tapping out today. They're like, we're totally accommodating of that.

824
00:43:30,480 --> 00:43:32,000
Speaker 1: We work around it, we figured it out. And I'm like,

825
00:43:32,040 --> 00:43:35,000
Speaker 1: oh my god, that's crazy, Like you were what do

826
00:43:35,040 --> 00:43:37,719
Speaker 1: you say self care day? My jaws trap. It was

827
00:43:37,760 --> 00:43:40,200
Speaker 1: like what you have a what what day? You know,

828
00:43:40,280 --> 00:43:42,200
Speaker 1: because I mean, yeah, I can tell you hard stories,

829
00:43:42,239 --> 00:43:44,040
Speaker 1: but the idea that you would be able to even

830
00:43:44,120 --> 00:43:47,920
Speaker 1: take a day just to sort of, you know, set

831
00:43:48,000 --> 00:43:50,920
Speaker 1: back and collect yourself. On the campaigns I've been on,

832
00:43:50,960 --> 00:43:52,760
Speaker 1: I'm sure that I'm sure some of them are different

833
00:43:52,760 --> 00:43:55,920
Speaker 1: than my experience, but that was just laughable at the

834
00:43:55,960 --> 00:43:57,879
Speaker 1: idea that would happen would be laughable. So I'm really

835
00:43:57,920 --> 00:44:01,319
Speaker 1: happy that that seems to be changing laughable, you know.

836
00:44:01,360 --> 00:44:03,879
Speaker 1: And Hillary Clinton fought really hard. She's like, I want

837
00:44:03,920 --> 00:44:06,920
Speaker 1: to make sure that my campaign staffers have health insurance.

838
00:44:07,080 --> 00:44:09,160
Speaker 1: Um I told I heard a story the other day

839
00:44:09,200 --> 00:44:11,560
Speaker 1: that they that she wanted to make sure that if

840
00:44:11,680 --> 00:44:15,080
Speaker 1: her campaign staffers needed things like IVF or reproductive help,

841
00:44:15,160 --> 00:44:18,040
Speaker 1: she was going to give that too. I mean that

842
00:44:18,280 --> 00:44:21,080
Speaker 1: that was a complete anathema to what happens on every

843
00:44:21,120 --> 00:44:24,160
Speaker 1: other campaign, where not only are you your grossest, worst

844
00:44:24,280 --> 00:44:27,399
Speaker 1: version of yourself, but you're also paid nothing. I mean,

845
00:44:27,400 --> 00:44:30,200
Speaker 1: the pay is terrible on campaign, so I mean, you're

846
00:44:30,200 --> 00:44:33,480
Speaker 1: pretty much living your worst life. It's so true. Fun fact,

847
00:44:33,560 --> 00:44:37,600
Speaker 1: a friend of mine ran the North Carolina Clinton headquarters.

848
00:44:37,880 --> 00:44:39,520
Speaker 1: I'll let her forget her saying Oh, we have a

849
00:44:39,560 --> 00:44:42,560
Speaker 1: lactation room. And it sounds like such a small thing,

850
00:44:43,120 --> 00:44:45,800
Speaker 1: but the fact that they included a place for nursing moms,

851
00:44:46,120 --> 00:44:49,239
Speaker 1: I mean, it shouldn't it shouldn't be revolutionary that that

852
00:44:49,320 --> 00:44:53,279
Speaker 1: your campaign headquarters has a lactation room. But it was.

853
00:44:53,320 --> 00:44:55,080
Speaker 1: To me. I thought, Wow, they were really saying, if

854
00:44:55,120 --> 00:44:58,320
Speaker 1: you are a new mom, you can still work here. Yeah,

855
00:44:58,480 --> 00:45:02,680
Speaker 1: exactly exactly, whereas when don't have a lactation room, you're saying,

856
00:45:02,760 --> 00:45:04,880
Speaker 1: as a new mom, you can't work here, that that

857
00:45:05,200 --> 00:45:08,240
Speaker 1: this is a hostile work environment for you, Like actually

858
00:45:08,280 --> 00:45:10,520
Speaker 1: a hostile work environment for you, because if you've ever

859
00:45:10,560 --> 00:45:12,799
Speaker 1: been a new mom, you know that if you don't

860
00:45:12,840 --> 00:45:15,200
Speaker 1: have a lactation room, you're gonna be squeezing milk out

861
00:45:15,239 --> 00:45:18,520
Speaker 1: of your boob into the toilet. Yeah, it's it's it's

862
00:45:18,560 --> 00:45:21,799
Speaker 1: weird how those little things can mean so much in

863
00:45:21,880 --> 00:45:24,160
Speaker 1: terms of the environment that you're cultivating on a campaign.

864
00:45:24,560 --> 00:45:29,719
Speaker 1: I wanted to ask about. The book takes place in Pennsylvania,

865
00:45:29,880 --> 00:45:31,960
Speaker 1: and that's where Charlotte grew up, and she moved to

866
00:45:31,960 --> 00:45:35,920
Speaker 1: Silicon Valley and ascended the corporate ladder and became one

867
00:45:35,960 --> 00:45:38,759
Speaker 1: of the quote elite um one thing we heard a

868
00:45:38,760 --> 00:45:42,160
Speaker 1: lot about post seen election, but after pretty much every

869
00:45:42,239 --> 00:45:48,600
Speaker 1: American election, really is this divide between rural and urban America.

870
00:45:48,719 --> 00:45:51,719
Speaker 1: And from what I understand, Pennsylvania has never had a

871
00:45:51,760 --> 00:45:54,719
Speaker 1: female governor or senator. Right, pretty much one of the

872
00:45:54,840 --> 00:45:58,640
Speaker 1: most hostile states to women in the country. Uh. And

873
00:45:58,680 --> 00:46:01,799
Speaker 1: people don't think about pennsylvani you like that. But I

874
00:46:01,920 --> 00:46:05,480
Speaker 1: chose Pennsylvania. I'm from p A, my dad's from northeastern

875
00:46:05,800 --> 00:46:08,799
Speaker 1: rural coal country PA. It's a state I can write

876
00:46:08,840 --> 00:46:12,360
Speaker 1: really well. But it's also a microcosm of the country

877
00:46:12,440 --> 00:46:16,760
Speaker 1: as a whole. Uh. Pennsylvania has never elected a woman's senator,

878
00:46:17,040 --> 00:46:19,520
Speaker 1: they've never elected a woman governor, and they currently have

879
00:46:19,560 --> 00:46:22,759
Speaker 1: an all male delegation to Congress. There's some incredible women

880
00:46:22,800 --> 00:46:24,920
Speaker 1: running for the House in PA right now, and I

881
00:46:25,000 --> 00:46:27,640
Speaker 1: encourage everyone to go, like, look them up, throw your

882
00:46:27,640 --> 00:46:31,120
Speaker 1: support behind them, because Pennsylvania is the epitome of a

883
00:46:31,200 --> 00:46:34,920
Speaker 1: boys club and it's it's a terrible thing. And it's

884
00:46:34,960 --> 00:46:36,920
Speaker 1: not a terrible thing because I'm like, oh man, terrible.

885
00:46:36,920 --> 00:46:41,440
Speaker 1: It's a terrible thing because there's no diversity in that state. Um.

886
00:46:41,480 --> 00:46:45,040
Speaker 1: You know, I wanted to write Pennsylvania so that I

887
00:46:45,080 --> 00:46:48,640
Speaker 1: could write about that divide. Pennsylvania has Philadelphia and Pittsburgh

888
00:46:48,920 --> 00:46:53,000
Speaker 1: vibrant urban metropolis. Is Philadelphia has you pen which is

889
00:46:53,000 --> 00:46:57,000
Speaker 1: an Ivy League university. I mean, it's like eight. It's

890
00:46:57,040 --> 00:47:00,359
Speaker 1: like the liberal the liberal elite personify in a lot

891
00:47:00,360 --> 00:47:04,480
Speaker 1: of ways. But then you go forty five minutes outside

892
00:47:04,480 --> 00:47:08,840
Speaker 1: of Philly and you have Amish country, you have serious

893
00:47:08,920 --> 00:47:12,280
Speaker 1: working farms. You go up north, you have the areas

894
00:47:12,520 --> 00:47:14,920
Speaker 1: of the state where the factories were shut down in

895
00:47:14,920 --> 00:47:17,600
Speaker 1: this generation, where the coal mines were shut down in

896
00:47:17,600 --> 00:47:20,959
Speaker 1: this generation, and you have a lot of working poor

897
00:47:20,960 --> 00:47:24,120
Speaker 1: in that state. And my favorite character in Charlotte Walsh

898
00:47:24,200 --> 00:47:28,320
Speaker 1: Likes to Win is actually Kara, and she's Charlotte's sister

899
00:47:28,360 --> 00:47:30,800
Speaker 1: in law who still lives up in northeastern p a

900
00:47:31,000 --> 00:47:34,560
Speaker 1: r Right outside of Scranton. She's like, whatever, I don't

901
00:47:34,560 --> 00:47:37,400
Speaker 1: get politics. What the hell have politicians ever done for me?

902
00:47:37,600 --> 00:47:39,839
Speaker 1: What the hell has anyone ever done for me? But

903
00:47:39,960 --> 00:47:45,800
Speaker 1: she's smart, she's smart, she's sassy, um she and she's

904
00:47:45,880 --> 00:47:48,760
Speaker 1: working class. And I wanted to create a working class

905
00:47:48,760 --> 00:47:51,600
Speaker 1: hero in this book just as much as I wanted

906
00:47:51,640 --> 00:47:55,439
Speaker 1: to create an ambitious woman from Silicon Valley coming and

907
00:47:55,640 --> 00:47:57,759
Speaker 1: we have we can see Charlotte too, coming from her

908
00:47:57,760 --> 00:48:02,160
Speaker 1: Silicon Valley bubble and coming back two areas in Pennsylvania,

909
00:48:02,640 --> 00:48:04,799
Speaker 1: in the area where she grew up, which has a

910
00:48:04,800 --> 00:48:06,840
Speaker 1: lot of the working poor, and she grew up working

911
00:48:06,880 --> 00:48:09,879
Speaker 1: poor um, and we can see her chafe at that.

912
00:48:10,200 --> 00:48:12,160
Speaker 1: And I think that's a very real thing for a

913
00:48:12,200 --> 00:48:14,960
Speaker 1: lot of politicians just out of curiosity. Do you identify

914
00:48:15,000 --> 00:48:17,279
Speaker 1: with that aspect of Charlotte as someone who grew up

915
00:48:17,320 --> 00:48:19,560
Speaker 1: in those kinds of communities and then moved to California

916
00:48:19,600 --> 00:48:23,640
Speaker 1: to be like a flashy, successful writer and journalist. I mean,

917
00:48:23,680 --> 00:48:26,000
Speaker 1: I actually and I moved you to New York to

918
00:48:26,040 --> 00:48:28,279
Speaker 1: be a gossip columnist in my twenties, so like I

919
00:48:28,320 --> 00:48:30,520
Speaker 1: was going to like movie premieres in Bungalow eight through

920
00:48:30,520 --> 00:48:34,240
Speaker 1: my twenties, like there, you couldn't have been more different,

921
00:48:34,600 --> 00:48:37,600
Speaker 1: um than the way that I grew up. Uh. And

922
00:48:37,640 --> 00:48:39,719
Speaker 1: so I completely related to that with Charlotte, and I

923
00:48:39,719 --> 00:48:42,000
Speaker 1: wanted to just puncture the bubble is the thing I

924
00:48:42,000 --> 00:48:44,840
Speaker 1: wanted to puncture Charlotte's bubble um. And her husband is

925
00:48:44,880 --> 00:48:47,080
Speaker 1: really her husband is the one who represents the bubble,

926
00:48:47,080 --> 00:48:49,960
Speaker 1: because her husband is really bought into Silicon Valley and

927
00:48:50,080 --> 00:48:52,799
Speaker 1: the fact that Silicon Valley is quote unquote normal when

928
00:48:52,800 --> 00:48:56,759
Speaker 1: there's nothing normal about Silicon Valley. There's nothing normal about

929
00:48:56,800 --> 00:48:58,680
Speaker 1: what life looks like out here. Yeah, I think that

930
00:48:58,760 --> 00:49:01,000
Speaker 1: the way that you do that is masterful, and I

931
00:49:01,000 --> 00:49:03,319
Speaker 1: think it does sort of go along the lines of

932
00:49:03,360 --> 00:49:06,960
Speaker 1: how we actually live that people who like I'm probably

933
00:49:07,000 --> 00:49:09,800
Speaker 1: someone who is in a you know, East Coast liberal bubble,

934
00:49:10,080 --> 00:49:13,920
Speaker 1: but my background, my roots are certainly not East Coast city.

935
00:49:14,000 --> 00:49:17,520
Speaker 1: It's it's it's rural small towns, and that even like,

936
00:49:17,600 --> 00:49:20,200
Speaker 1: you can get in your bubble but still maintain these

937
00:49:20,239 --> 00:49:22,520
Speaker 1: kind of tenuous connections to your to your pass and

938
00:49:22,600 --> 00:49:25,920
Speaker 1: to your roots, and navigating that can be really really complicated,

939
00:49:25,960 --> 00:49:28,719
Speaker 1: like navigating what it looks like to be someone living

940
00:49:28,719 --> 00:49:31,000
Speaker 1: in New York City and living a glamorous, glossy life

941
00:49:31,040 --> 00:49:33,800
Speaker 1: and going to Bungalow eight who has these roots inside

942
00:49:33,800 --> 00:49:37,040
Speaker 1: of her. Navigating that is actually really interesting, And I

943
00:49:37,040 --> 00:49:38,880
Speaker 1: don't think that's the story that we're told often. I

944
00:49:38,920 --> 00:49:42,160
Speaker 1: think the author who we're told people are city folk

945
00:49:42,320 --> 00:49:45,080
Speaker 1: who don't care about rural people or their rural folk,

946
00:49:45,280 --> 00:49:47,680
Speaker 1: and you don't actually tease out the intersections there in

947
00:49:47,760 --> 00:49:50,080
Speaker 1: and I think, I think you personally do that so well,

948
00:49:50,120 --> 00:49:52,520
Speaker 1: and the book does it very well as well. Thank you,

949
00:49:52,640 --> 00:49:54,880
Speaker 1: I mean, and that was really it was just important

950
00:49:54,880 --> 00:49:59,120
Speaker 1: to me because again, I think that we operate in

951
00:49:59,120 --> 00:50:03,680
Speaker 1: in books, um, and on TV and in movies in stereotypes,

952
00:50:03,960 --> 00:50:06,799
Speaker 1: and we operate in stereopy. We operate in the rural

953
00:50:06,880 --> 00:50:10,879
Speaker 1: stereotype and the urban stereotype. And people are not People

954
00:50:10,880 --> 00:50:12,920
Speaker 1: are not a stereotype. Real people are not a stereotype.

955
00:50:12,960 --> 00:50:14,719
Speaker 1: And that's one of the reasons that I wanted to

956
00:50:14,760 --> 00:50:17,960
Speaker 1: have this book tour. Driving through the middle of the country.

957
00:50:18,040 --> 00:50:21,360
Speaker 1: I we had a lot of farmers at our events,

958
00:50:21,360 --> 00:50:25,719
Speaker 1: women farmers UM when we were driving through Kentucky and

959
00:50:25,760 --> 00:50:30,200
Speaker 1: southern Indiana, who related to Charlotte, who were some of

960
00:50:30,239 --> 00:50:33,479
Speaker 1: the most I wouldn't call they're not liberal, but they're progressive. Um,

961
00:50:34,120 --> 00:50:36,560
Speaker 1: some of the most progressive women that I've ever met,

962
00:50:36,640 --> 00:50:39,560
Speaker 1: and who defied every stereotype that you have of a farmer.

963
00:50:39,640 --> 00:50:42,040
Speaker 1: I mean, they were put together as like, I mean,

964
00:50:42,120 --> 00:50:44,280
Speaker 1: I looked like crap I was eating gas station food

965
00:50:44,280 --> 00:50:47,840
Speaker 1: on my book tour, like they looked shic as hell, um,

966
00:50:48,000 --> 00:50:50,279
Speaker 1: And I want to just I want to break those stereotypes.

967
00:50:50,280 --> 00:50:51,960
Speaker 1: We have to break those stereotypes or else we're never

968
00:50:51,960 --> 00:50:54,000
Speaker 1: gonna be able to relate to people who aren't quote

969
00:50:54,080 --> 00:50:58,200
Speaker 1: unquote like us. Absolutely, And I think, I think, yeah,

970
00:50:58,320 --> 00:51:00,560
Speaker 1: that is an important work, Like I I got a

971
00:51:00,560 --> 00:51:04,640
Speaker 1: little bit id with you know, and blah blah blah.

972
00:51:04,719 --> 00:51:07,520
Speaker 1: But it's not even about that. It's about understanding the

973
00:51:07,640 --> 00:51:09,640
Speaker 1: lives of people who are different than us. And I

974
00:51:09,640 --> 00:51:12,200
Speaker 1: think I think your work really drives at home and

975
00:51:12,239 --> 00:51:14,760
Speaker 1: where people are coming from. I mean, you know, Charlotte's

976
00:51:14,800 --> 00:51:17,919
Speaker 1: sister in law lives in a part of the state

977
00:51:17,960 --> 00:51:20,640
Speaker 1: where she hasn't been taken care of, and she's piste off,

978
00:51:20,840 --> 00:51:23,479
Speaker 1: and she's piste off. She's like, you know, we don't

979
00:51:23,600 --> 00:51:26,279
Speaker 1: name like real life politicians in the book because I

980
00:51:26,320 --> 00:51:29,080
Speaker 1: was like, it's just too easy. It's just too easy. Um,

981
00:51:29,239 --> 00:51:31,480
Speaker 1: So we wanted we we really wanted to root it

982
00:51:31,520 --> 00:51:34,879
Speaker 1: in fiction. But she's piste off that the last administration

983
00:51:34,960 --> 00:51:36,840
Speaker 1: didn't do anything to make her life any better, and

984
00:51:36,840 --> 00:51:39,960
Speaker 1: in fact, her life is worse right now, and Charlotte

985
00:51:40,000 --> 00:51:41,600
Speaker 1: has to reckon with that. She's because she's like, the

986
00:51:41,640 --> 00:51:44,960
Speaker 1: last administration was wonderful, but we have to think about

987
00:51:45,520 --> 00:51:48,280
Speaker 1: the issues that are important to people, the kitchen table issues,

988
00:51:48,400 --> 00:51:52,680
Speaker 1: and they're the things that actually affect their lives. UM.

989
00:51:52,800 --> 00:51:55,680
Speaker 1: And it's I think it's hard to reckon with when

990
00:51:55,800 --> 00:51:58,279
Speaker 1: you have been in an urban bubble and you don't

991
00:51:58,360 --> 00:52:01,319
Speaker 1: know anyone outside of that bubble. Um, and we put

992
00:52:01,320 --> 00:52:05,840
Speaker 1: ourselves in an echo chamber we do, rather than actually

993
00:52:05,880 --> 00:52:09,160
Speaker 1: getting out and actually having conversations with people or seeing

994
00:52:09,160 --> 00:52:12,200
Speaker 1: people that are different from us. One thing that became

995
00:52:12,239 --> 00:52:15,040
Speaker 1: pretty clear to me reading this that I suppose it

996
00:52:15,080 --> 00:52:17,359
Speaker 1: is pretty obvious, but um, when you decided to run

997
00:52:17,360 --> 00:52:21,680
Speaker 1: for office, to varying degrees, kind of everyone in your

998
00:52:21,680 --> 00:52:24,560
Speaker 1: family and in your circle is running for office, they're

999
00:52:24,560 --> 00:52:28,440
Speaker 1: going to be examined, um talked about. And the relationship

1000
00:52:28,920 --> 00:52:34,160
Speaker 1: between Charlotte and her husband undergoes I mean, probably an understatement,

1001
00:52:34,200 --> 00:52:37,719
Speaker 1: tremendous train um. And we do get to see both

1002
00:52:37,719 --> 00:52:40,480
Speaker 1: sides of it because, like you mentioned earlier, Um, Charlotte

1003
00:52:40,480 --> 00:52:46,600
Speaker 1: Walsh's opponent, his wife gets pulled into it as well. Uh.

1004
00:52:46,640 --> 00:52:51,520
Speaker 1: And just it's a lot I'd never appreciated that if

1005
00:52:51,640 --> 00:52:54,040
Speaker 1: later in life you decide to do this, if you

1006
00:52:54,080 --> 00:52:57,319
Speaker 1: decide to run for office, then it's a decision that

1007
00:52:57,400 --> 00:53:02,759
Speaker 1: impacts almost everyone you know. Oh yeah, Um, marriages fall

1008
00:53:02,800 --> 00:53:06,560
Speaker 1: apart on the campaign trail. Um. And in addition to

1009
00:53:06,960 --> 00:53:10,200
Speaker 1: campaigns being gross boys clubs, I mean, they're also just

1010
00:53:10,280 --> 00:53:19,200
Speaker 1: a hotbed of incestuous inner campaign there can confirm. It's

1011
00:53:19,239 --> 00:53:23,279
Speaker 1: just it's it's so true. But a marriage, you you

1012
00:53:23,360 --> 00:53:26,520
Speaker 1: don't run just as you. And this is particularly true

1013
00:53:26,680 --> 00:53:29,440
Speaker 1: for women. Your whole family is running for office. Your

1014
00:53:29,440 --> 00:53:33,200
Speaker 1: whole family is open to scrutiny. Your whole family has

1015
00:53:33,239 --> 00:53:35,719
Speaker 1: to work that campaign, which means they're showing up at

1016
00:53:35,760 --> 00:53:38,759
Speaker 1: campaign events. There they have to smile. They can't look

1017
00:53:38,760 --> 00:53:40,680
Speaker 1: piste off, they can't look annoyed to be there, even

1018
00:53:40,680 --> 00:53:42,719
Speaker 1: though of course they are. No one wants to go

1019
00:53:42,800 --> 00:53:44,480
Speaker 1: to one more state fair. No one wants to go

1020
00:53:44,520 --> 00:53:47,719
Speaker 1: to one more car dealership, ribbon cutting, No like, these

1021
00:53:47,760 --> 00:53:53,239
Speaker 1: events are exhausting and frankly boring. Um. And then throw

1022
00:53:53,360 --> 00:53:56,719
Speaker 1: into the mix with a woman running for office. Um,

1023
00:53:57,000 --> 00:54:02,320
Speaker 1: you have that kind of ambitioning that makes even strong

1024
00:54:02,640 --> 00:54:07,799
Speaker 1: feminist men uncomfortable. And I've seen it in my own marriage. Um.

1025
00:54:07,840 --> 00:54:10,560
Speaker 1: You know, with when now that my husband's looking for

1026
00:54:10,600 --> 00:54:12,799
Speaker 1: a job, and you know, I've got this book coming

1027
00:54:12,800 --> 00:54:14,520
Speaker 1: out and I'm working on all these projects. He's the

1028
00:54:14,520 --> 00:54:16,680
Speaker 1: most feminist man you'll you'll ever meet. I mean, he

1029
00:54:16,800 --> 00:54:19,040
Speaker 1: really is. He read all the Judy Blue Books as

1030
00:54:19,040 --> 00:54:21,160
Speaker 1: a little boy. He cried a blood and it is

1031
00:54:21,160 --> 00:54:23,480
Speaker 1: still he still chafes. I think that he still chafes

1032
00:54:23,520 --> 00:54:26,320
Speaker 1: because it's not something that's the norm, and he feels

1033
00:54:26,320 --> 00:54:28,720
Speaker 1: like he should be out there supporting, supporting the family

1034
00:54:28,760 --> 00:54:31,440
Speaker 1: and doesn't know what to do with all of my ambition.

1035
00:54:31,560 --> 00:54:34,960
Speaker 1: And we see that in Charlotte's marriage that her husband

1036
00:54:35,040 --> 00:54:40,239
Speaker 1: really he's told to. He takes a hiatus from from

1037
00:54:40,280 --> 00:54:42,440
Speaker 1: work because I'm silicon value allowed to take a hiatus.

1038
00:54:42,440 --> 00:54:46,320
Speaker 1: It's ridiculous. Um. But he becomes the primary caregiver for

1039
00:54:46,360 --> 00:54:49,000
Speaker 1: their three children, because when a woman is running for office,

1040
00:54:49,360 --> 00:54:51,400
Speaker 1: she gets asked all the time, who's watching your children?

1041
00:54:51,400 --> 00:54:53,680
Speaker 1: Who's watching your children? And it's bad optics to have

1042
00:54:53,760 --> 00:54:56,000
Speaker 1: a nanny. Not bad optics for a man to have

1043
00:54:56,000 --> 00:54:57,920
Speaker 1: a nanny, bad optics for a woman to have a nanny.

1044
00:54:57,960 --> 00:55:00,480
Speaker 1: So he starts to he becomes the primary ever and

1045
00:55:00,520 --> 00:55:03,759
Speaker 1: he hates it. He can't. He just he's not programmed

1046
00:55:03,800 --> 00:55:07,080
Speaker 1: for it. And their marriage goes into crisis on this

1047
00:55:07,120 --> 00:55:09,439
Speaker 1: campaign trail and it's just it's one of the most

1048
00:55:09,520 --> 00:55:11,560
Speaker 1: real parts of the book because I have seen so

1049
00:55:11,600 --> 00:55:16,440
Speaker 1: many marriages actually end after a campaign. Yeah, oh my gosh.

1050
00:55:16,560 --> 00:55:21,000
Speaker 1: I again, in my own experience, I can confirm that

1051
00:55:21,080 --> 00:55:25,960
Speaker 1: campaigns can really re havoc on your personal and romantic life.

1052
00:55:27,239 --> 00:55:29,480
Speaker 1: I think anyone who's done a campaign will probably agree.

1053
00:55:30,120 --> 00:55:33,120
Speaker 1: And I think, yeah, it's it's I think it's good

1054
00:55:33,120 --> 00:55:37,440
Speaker 1: to give people this lens into the inner workings of

1055
00:55:37,440 --> 00:55:39,279
Speaker 1: the people who are running for office and the people

1056
00:55:39,320 --> 00:55:43,480
Speaker 1: around them, because what you see our TV is I

1057
00:55:43,480 --> 00:55:47,080
Speaker 1: think kind of manufactured. Him has to be, because no

1058
00:55:47,120 --> 00:55:49,480
Speaker 1: one wants to think like, oh, they're having marital trouble.

1059
00:55:49,520 --> 00:55:53,080
Speaker 1: Oh they're arguing, Oh, like their domestic life isn't is

1060
00:55:53,080 --> 00:55:56,040
Speaker 1: in turmoil because that's all like you said, it's bad optics,

1061
00:55:56,080 --> 00:55:58,719
Speaker 1: And so you're kind of you kind of know you're

1062
00:55:58,760 --> 00:56:05,000
Speaker 1: seeing this manufact extured version of perfection, but we're kind

1063
00:56:05,000 --> 00:56:08,200
Speaker 1: of not acknowledging the reality, which is that, Yeah, campaigns

1064
00:56:08,200 --> 00:56:10,200
Speaker 1: are stressful. Yeah they take a toll on of marriage.

1065
00:56:10,239 --> 00:56:13,719
Speaker 1: It makes sense, Yeah, exactly exactly. And I another reason

1066
00:56:13,760 --> 00:56:17,520
Speaker 1: I wanted to write this book really was that everything

1067
00:56:17,560 --> 00:56:20,760
Speaker 1: that a politician does is speak is in sound Bites.

1068
00:56:20,920 --> 00:56:24,080
Speaker 1: Is in sound bites is about optics. We so rarely

1069
00:56:24,120 --> 00:56:27,239
Speaker 1: see the realities of what it's like on a campaign trail,

1070
00:56:27,360 --> 00:56:29,319
Speaker 1: or the human side of a campaign trail, and I

1071
00:56:29,400 --> 00:56:32,560
Speaker 1: just wanted to expose that in a way um to

1072
00:56:32,680 --> 00:56:35,040
Speaker 1: make it. And also, I think that politics to the

1073
00:56:35,080 --> 00:56:39,239
Speaker 1: average person seems like something that isn't important to their

1074
00:56:39,280 --> 00:56:42,960
Speaker 1: lives anymore. It seems something like something that's so far away.

1075
00:56:43,080 --> 00:56:46,560
Speaker 1: And I thought that by humanizing the campaign and humanizing

1076
00:56:46,560 --> 00:56:49,319
Speaker 1: the politicians, we could bring it back to the way

1077
00:56:49,320 --> 00:56:51,800
Speaker 1: that it's supposed to be. That we live in a democracy.

1078
00:56:51,880 --> 00:56:54,319
Speaker 1: These people are representing us, and we need to care

1079
00:56:54,320 --> 00:56:57,960
Speaker 1: about politics. But I understand I think people are just

1080
00:56:58,000 --> 00:57:02,200
Speaker 1: so exhausted from the whore race tabloid style that we

1081
00:57:02,280 --> 00:57:05,080
Speaker 1: cover politicians these days, and people want to check out,

1082
00:57:05,239 --> 00:57:06,839
Speaker 1: And I'm hoping the book makes them want to check

1083
00:57:06,920 --> 00:57:10,160
Speaker 1: back in. I love that. I love that so much,

1084
00:57:10,239 --> 00:57:13,680
Speaker 1: just so true. You know. I've heard people say things like, oh,

1085
00:57:13,680 --> 00:57:16,320
Speaker 1: I don't really do politics, I'm not really interested in politics,

1086
00:57:16,640 --> 00:57:18,600
Speaker 1: as if they're talking about a TV show they don't

1087
00:57:18,600 --> 00:57:20,720
Speaker 1: happen to watch, like oh I don't watch sharp Objects,

1088
00:57:21,080 --> 00:57:23,560
Speaker 1: you know, But this is people's lives, and a lot

1089
00:57:23,600 --> 00:57:26,360
Speaker 1: of us really don't have the privilege of saying I

1090
00:57:26,400 --> 00:57:29,280
Speaker 1: don't care about x y Z policy. I don't. I

1091
00:57:29,320 --> 00:57:32,480
Speaker 1: cannot pay attention to what's happening on x y Z

1092
00:57:32,560 --> 00:57:36,400
Speaker 1: legislation because it's our lives. And when people say I

1093
00:57:36,400 --> 00:57:38,480
Speaker 1: don't really do politics, I'm not really into politics and

1094
00:57:38,560 --> 00:57:40,720
Speaker 1: check out of politics, part of me get it, but

1095
00:57:40,760 --> 00:57:43,800
Speaker 1: part of me gets so angry because, yeah, I don't

1096
00:57:43,800 --> 00:57:46,440
Speaker 1: really As as women, as people of color, a lot

1097
00:57:46,520 --> 00:57:50,560
Speaker 1: of us just don't have that that luxury. No. Absolutely,

1098
00:57:50,600 --> 00:57:53,720
Speaker 1: politics has to be a part of your life, and

1099
00:57:53,760 --> 00:57:54,920
Speaker 1: it should be a part of your life, and it

1100
00:57:54,960 --> 00:57:57,400
Speaker 1: shouldn't be a part of your life that's also considered

1101
00:57:57,400 --> 00:57:59,560
Speaker 1: so negative. I just think that we've turned politics into

1102
00:57:59,560 --> 00:58:01,840
Speaker 1: a dirty word too. I mean, one of the things

1103
00:58:01,880 --> 00:58:04,560
Speaker 1: you're not supposed to talk about in polite conversation, along

1104
00:58:04,600 --> 00:58:07,840
Speaker 1: with religion insects, is politics. Like why is that? Shouldn't

1105
00:58:07,880 --> 00:58:10,840
Speaker 1: we all be talking about politics with each other? And

1106
00:58:11,240 --> 00:58:15,040
Speaker 1: you know, as a woman, it's it's hard to think

1107
00:58:15,080 --> 00:58:16,720
Speaker 1: about the things in my life that could be better

1108
00:58:16,760 --> 00:58:19,200
Speaker 1: if politicians were just better. I think that there are

1109
00:58:19,240 --> 00:58:20,680
Speaker 1: a lot there are a lot of people who can

1110
00:58:20,760 --> 00:58:22,520
Speaker 1: check out who have the privilege of checking out, but

1111
00:58:22,560 --> 00:58:24,920
Speaker 1: a lot of us cannot do that. Um, and a

1112
00:58:24,960 --> 00:58:26,800
Speaker 1: lot of us who cannot do that or should not

1113
00:58:26,880 --> 00:58:29,520
Speaker 1: do that, are checking out anyway because they're just like,

1114
00:58:29,560 --> 00:58:31,600
Speaker 1: how does that? How does this even affect my life?

1115
00:58:31,920 --> 00:58:34,400
Speaker 1: And it's see, it all just seems so far away,

1116
00:58:34,440 --> 00:58:38,200
Speaker 1: like it's all done in some ivory tower in Washington,

1117
00:58:38,360 --> 00:58:42,000
Speaker 1: as opposed to something that's happening and should be happening

1118
00:58:42,000 --> 00:58:45,760
Speaker 1: in their backyard. One of my favorite stories that Lauren Bear,

1119
00:58:45,880 --> 00:58:49,040
Speaker 1: who's running for Congress in Florida, told me was that

1120
00:58:49,160 --> 00:58:51,480
Speaker 1: when she announced that she was running, she didn't have

1121
00:58:51,520 --> 00:58:55,040
Speaker 1: any of her platforms on her website and people got pissed.

1122
00:58:55,120 --> 00:58:58,080
Speaker 1: They didn't understand like it really it freaked them out

1123
00:58:58,200 --> 00:59:01,480
Speaker 1: because that's the status quo. And she said, I'm running

1124
00:59:02,120 --> 00:59:05,000
Speaker 1: for Congress to represent you, and so I need to

1125
00:59:05,040 --> 00:59:07,560
Speaker 1: talk to you. I need to figure out what you

1126
00:59:07,600 --> 00:59:11,040
Speaker 1: want me to do before I come up with these platforms,

1127
00:59:11,360 --> 00:59:13,400
Speaker 1: before I come up with the things that I'm going

1128
00:59:13,440 --> 00:59:15,880
Speaker 1: to do to represent you in office. So give me

1129
00:59:16,400 --> 00:59:19,200
Speaker 1: a month to listen to you and then I'll come

1130
00:59:19,280 --> 00:59:22,400
Speaker 1: up with my ideas. And that it sounded so revolutionary

1131
00:59:22,440 --> 00:59:24,960
Speaker 1: at the time, because you know, so many male politicians

1132
00:59:25,000 --> 00:59:27,600
Speaker 1: come in just like their balls swinging all over the place,

1133
00:59:28,120 --> 00:59:31,240
Speaker 1: being like, this is what I think needs to get done.

1134
00:59:31,640 --> 00:59:34,440
Speaker 1: But the fact of the matter is a politician is

1135
00:59:34,520 --> 00:59:37,560
Speaker 1: just a representative of you, and that's what they should be.

1136
00:59:37,600 --> 00:59:39,600
Speaker 1: And we need to remember that and go back to

1137
00:59:39,640 --> 00:59:43,720
Speaker 1: our roots remembering that, because if we check out, then

1138
00:59:43,760 --> 00:59:45,960
Speaker 1: we don't let them represent us, if we don't have

1139
00:59:46,000 --> 00:59:48,200
Speaker 1: that voice. And I'm not saying it's a perfect system,

1140
00:59:48,240 --> 00:59:51,720
Speaker 1: God knows it's not. But but if we if we

1141
00:59:51,840 --> 00:59:54,680
Speaker 1: stay home, if we check out, then we don't even

1142
00:59:54,680 --> 00:59:57,080
Speaker 1: get the chance, we don't even get the option for

1143
00:59:57,120 --> 00:59:59,400
Speaker 1: them to represent us. And they should be representing us

1144
01:00:00,200 --> 01:00:03,160
Speaker 1: the ship that's that's actually there one job. Actually they're

1145
01:00:03,200 --> 01:00:06,280
Speaker 1: one and only job. And I think that And again

1146
01:00:06,320 --> 01:00:09,280
Speaker 1: I'm not saying, raw raw, all women are perfect. We're not.

1147
01:00:09,520 --> 01:00:12,600
Speaker 1: We're better, but we're not perfect. But one of the

1148
01:00:12,600 --> 01:00:14,880
Speaker 1: things that they do is they really do listen. And

1149
01:00:15,160 --> 01:00:18,120
Speaker 1: Hillary Clinton, there's this great part in her biography where

1150
01:00:18,160 --> 01:00:20,840
Speaker 1: she talks about just filling notebooks and notebooks of with

1151
01:00:20,960 --> 01:00:23,880
Speaker 1: notes from listening to people and then having her staff

1152
01:00:24,160 --> 01:00:26,800
Speaker 1: archived them for her because the listening was the most

1153
01:00:26,800 --> 01:00:29,560
Speaker 1: important part, I actually think, and this is just me

1154
01:00:29,760 --> 01:00:32,400
Speaker 1: with my big Hillary Clinton opinions, I think that was

1155
01:00:32,440 --> 01:00:35,360
Speaker 1: probably her favorite part of the campaign trail, was the

1156
01:00:35,440 --> 01:00:38,120
Speaker 1: listening as opposed to the performing. And I and that's

1157
01:00:38,200 --> 01:00:42,080
Speaker 1: Charlotte Walsh's favorite part too. She enjoys listening. She enjoys

1158
01:00:42,440 --> 01:00:45,160
Speaker 1: the complexities of thinking about how she can fix the

1159
01:00:45,160 --> 01:00:48,000
Speaker 1: things that she's listening to, as opposed to the performance

1160
01:00:48,040 --> 01:00:51,520
Speaker 1: that a campaign trail has become because of, you know,

1161
01:00:51,840 --> 01:00:55,280
Speaker 1: the fifteen second news cycle that exists. Now, Oh man,

1162
01:00:55,360 --> 01:00:57,680
Speaker 1: I have not this is gonna make me all listful.

1163
01:00:57,720 --> 01:01:00,160
Speaker 1: But one of my favorite Clinton emails, I think her

1164
01:01:00,160 --> 01:01:02,960
Speaker 1: email scandal was like my favorite thing about it was

1165
01:01:03,000 --> 01:01:05,120
Speaker 1: the emails that did not get reported. There was a

1166
01:01:05,160 --> 01:01:07,320
Speaker 1: story of her trying to help a little girl I

1167
01:01:07,360 --> 01:01:10,000
Speaker 1: think from Afghanistan, and they had a photo op where

1168
01:01:10,000 --> 01:01:12,160
Speaker 1: they brought her to America and this and that, and

1169
01:01:12,480 --> 01:01:15,000
Speaker 1: you know, the story ended. And then after what it

1170
01:01:15,040 --> 01:01:17,880
Speaker 1: turned out that this little girl actually didn't like things

1171
01:01:17,880 --> 01:01:20,760
Speaker 1: did not improve for her, like her life after whatever

1172
01:01:20,800 --> 01:01:23,320
Speaker 1: like photo up they did and intervention they did, her

1173
01:01:23,360 --> 01:01:27,280
Speaker 1: life actually wasn't that great. And so months later Hillary

1174
01:01:27,280 --> 01:01:29,480
Speaker 1: Clinton in an email, was like, is there something that

1175
01:01:29,560 --> 01:01:32,240
Speaker 1: could be done to improve her life? That's kind of thing.

1176
01:01:32,280 --> 01:01:34,520
Speaker 1: And that was the thing I loved so much about

1177
01:01:34,520 --> 01:01:38,080
Speaker 1: Clinton was that she seemed like someone who, even when

1178
01:01:38,120 --> 01:01:41,680
Speaker 1: the cameras were off, gave it like the photo off

1179
01:01:41,720 --> 01:01:43,600
Speaker 1: with this little girl that she was trying to you know,

1180
01:01:43,840 --> 01:01:46,919
Speaker 1: help was over, had been over for months, but upon

1181
01:01:47,080 --> 01:01:49,920
Speaker 1: finding out that her life had actually not improved, in

1182
01:01:49,960 --> 01:01:52,120
Speaker 1: an email that she thought would be seen by nobody,

1183
01:01:52,160 --> 01:01:54,320
Speaker 1: was trying to ask questions about what they could do

1184
01:01:54,640 --> 01:01:57,160
Speaker 1: to still help her even after the fact. Like those

1185
01:01:57,200 --> 01:01:59,920
Speaker 1: are the stories that I that I that resonate with

1186
01:02:00,040 --> 01:02:02,360
Speaker 1: me when it comes to politicians and politicians that elected

1187
01:02:02,400 --> 01:02:05,400
Speaker 1: officials when the cameras aren't there, when do you think

1188
01:02:05,440 --> 01:02:08,480
Speaker 1: it's just you in an email? How are you? How

1189
01:02:08,520 --> 01:02:11,680
Speaker 1: are you representing the people who put their faith in you?

1190
01:02:11,880 --> 01:02:15,400
Speaker 1: And I really again not to get to rob rock Clinton,

1191
01:02:15,520 --> 01:02:17,760
Speaker 1: but that was something that I that I really connected with.

1192
01:02:18,320 --> 01:02:20,760
Speaker 1: Oh no, me too, And I loved that email. In fact,

1193
01:02:20,960 --> 01:02:23,400
Speaker 1: I think a best selling book would actually be Hillary

1194
01:02:23,400 --> 01:02:25,880
Speaker 1: Clinton's Emails that you never read. Hillary Clinton's emails that

1195
01:02:25,880 --> 01:02:28,040
Speaker 1: you never paid attention to. I mean, like, let's split

1196
01:02:28,120 --> 01:02:30,640
Speaker 1: a cramber lay like, let's fix this little girl's life.

1197
01:02:30,720 --> 01:02:33,040
Speaker 1: And that's what I want to show. In Charlotte, Wash

1198
01:02:33,080 --> 01:02:35,600
Speaker 1: likes to win, like I want to show those human aspects.

1199
01:02:35,640 --> 01:02:37,720
Speaker 1: And we kind of have a moment like that in

1200
01:02:37,880 --> 01:02:41,520
Speaker 1: Charlotte where she's doing a photo op with um babies

1201
01:02:41,600 --> 01:02:45,160
Speaker 1: who are born with opioid addiction, and she's told, just

1202
01:02:45,200 --> 01:02:48,400
Speaker 1: do the photo op, hold the crying, whimpering baby, and

1203
01:02:48,440 --> 01:02:51,760
Speaker 1: she's like, how can I fix this? Like, how how

1204
01:02:51,800 --> 01:02:53,960
Speaker 1: can I talk about actually fixing this as opposed to

1205
01:02:54,000 --> 01:02:57,600
Speaker 1: putting something that will tug at people's heart screens on

1206
01:02:57,600 --> 01:03:01,040
Speaker 1: on in these new stories and then forget about it

1207
01:03:01,080 --> 01:03:04,040
Speaker 1: the next day. UM. So you know, I'm not all wrong.

1208
01:03:04,080 --> 01:03:05,960
Speaker 1: I'm not all rob rob Hillary Clinton. I think that

1209
01:03:06,440 --> 01:03:08,560
Speaker 1: her campaign was flawed. I think that she was a

1210
01:03:08,560 --> 01:03:13,080
Speaker 1: flawed candidate um in so many ways. But at the

1211
01:03:13,160 --> 01:03:15,800
Speaker 1: same time, a lot of the things that I know

1212
01:03:15,920 --> 01:03:18,760
Speaker 1: about her personally and that people closer have told me

1213
01:03:19,000 --> 01:03:22,720
Speaker 1: really did inspire a lot of Charlotte I am. I

1214
01:03:22,760 --> 01:03:25,320
Speaker 1: want to talk about the ending, but I I feel

1215
01:03:25,360 --> 01:03:28,400
Speaker 1: like we can't without spoiling it for listeners. I'm so

1216
01:03:28,520 --> 01:03:32,240
Speaker 1: intrigued by it, But I guess that means some people

1217
01:03:32,280 --> 01:03:35,959
Speaker 1: hate the ending. My editor and my agent both told

1218
01:03:36,000 --> 01:03:40,760
Speaker 1: me not to end the book that way, and I

1219
01:03:40,800 --> 01:03:43,480
Speaker 1: disagreed with them, and I went against their advice. One

1220
01:03:43,520 --> 01:03:46,880
Speaker 1: woman gave me a one star review on Amazon the

1221
01:03:46,880 --> 01:03:49,680
Speaker 1: other day and demanded her money back from Simon and

1222
01:03:49,720 --> 01:03:53,680
Speaker 1: Schuster because of the ending. What I can say without

1223
01:03:53,760 --> 01:03:57,040
Speaker 1: spoiling anything, really is that the ending does not It's

1224
01:03:57,080 --> 01:03:59,160
Speaker 1: not all tied up with a big red, fancy bow.

1225
01:04:00,280 --> 01:04:04,200
Speaker 1: And I that's because real life isn't all tied up

1226
01:04:04,200 --> 01:04:06,520
Speaker 1: with a fancy bow. I think we're living in a

1227
01:04:06,560 --> 01:04:10,360
Speaker 1: world of anxiety and uncertainty right now. And I wanted reality.

1228
01:04:10,400 --> 01:04:13,520
Speaker 1: I wanted the book to reflect reality um in a

1229
01:04:13,560 --> 01:04:15,800
Speaker 1: lot of ways. And I wanted to end the book

1230
01:04:15,840 --> 01:04:19,160
Speaker 1: in a way that we would start a conversation. The

1231
01:04:19,160 --> 01:04:21,120
Speaker 1: whole goal of writing this book. And I wrote this

1232
01:04:21,160 --> 01:04:23,800
Speaker 1: book when I was not planning to write anything. Last year,

1233
01:04:23,880 --> 01:04:27,480
Speaker 1: I was launching the podcast, I had a newborn, I

1234
01:04:27,520 --> 01:04:29,360
Speaker 1: was pregnant, and I had a newborn, I was tired,

1235
01:04:30,040 --> 01:04:33,000
Speaker 1: and I just think it's so important to start a conversation,

1236
01:04:33,080 --> 01:04:35,600
Speaker 1: and I think the ending does that, but it pisces

1237
01:04:35,640 --> 01:04:37,680
Speaker 1: some people off. And so every time I talk about it.

1238
01:04:37,720 --> 01:04:40,240
Speaker 1: I tell them you can email me, we can talk

1239
01:04:40,280 --> 01:04:42,360
Speaker 1: about it. We could have a skype talk about it,

1240
01:04:42,400 --> 01:04:43,800
Speaker 1: we can have an email, we can have a text

1241
01:04:43,880 --> 01:04:47,280
Speaker 1: chat about it. UM. And so yeah, if it's the

1242
01:04:47,360 --> 01:04:49,880
Speaker 1: kind of thing that really resonates with you or makes

1243
01:04:49,880 --> 01:04:53,800
Speaker 1: you real, real angry, then just text me to hear

1244
01:04:53,840 --> 01:04:58,000
Speaker 1: that listeners, or you can leave me a one star review,

1245
01:04:58,240 --> 01:05:01,040
Speaker 1: of which I will respond to. On Amazon, I responded

1246
01:05:01,080 --> 01:05:03,480
Speaker 1: to I never respond to reviews, I never even read them.

1247
01:05:03,480 --> 01:05:04,840
Speaker 1: And I responded to it. I was like, let's have

1248
01:05:04,840 --> 01:05:10,040
Speaker 1: a conversation. Here's my email. I love it, UM, and

1249
01:05:10,080 --> 01:05:12,920
Speaker 1: I feel like you have started a conversation. I think

1250
01:05:12,960 --> 01:05:14,800
Speaker 1: I think I have. I think we're we're we really

1251
01:05:14,800 --> 01:05:18,040
Speaker 1: are finally talking about it. And and that's that's the

1252
01:05:18,080 --> 01:05:20,360
Speaker 1: most important thing that we talk about these women candidates.

1253
01:05:20,880 --> 01:05:24,640
Speaker 1: At my events, I get asked all the time. They're like, well,

1254
01:05:24,680 --> 01:05:27,480
Speaker 1: where are all these women candidates? And I like lower

1255
01:05:27,560 --> 01:05:31,440
Speaker 1: my voice to this conspiratorial whisper, and I'm like, they're everywhere.

1256
01:05:31,880 --> 01:05:34,400
Speaker 1: And that's all I wanted. I wanted people to be like, Okay, great,

1257
01:05:34,440 --> 01:05:36,320
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go find them. And we have like a

1258
01:05:36,400 --> 01:05:38,520
Speaker 1: resource guide in the back of the book, like it's

1259
01:05:38,520 --> 01:05:41,520
Speaker 1: a weekly reader or something like. Go to Emily's list,

1260
01:05:41,560 --> 01:05:44,360
Speaker 1: go to she runs like here, go to emerge. These

1261
01:05:44,400 --> 01:05:47,040
Speaker 1: are places you can go to find women running on

1262
01:05:47,120 --> 01:05:50,840
Speaker 1: both sides of the aisle. We we list organizations that

1263
01:05:50,920 --> 01:05:56,440
Speaker 1: are partisan and some that are nonpartisan. Go just support women.

1264
01:05:57,040 --> 01:06:00,640
Speaker 1: That's all, that's all I want. I think it's happening. Well,

1265
01:06:00,680 --> 01:06:04,080
Speaker 1: thank you so much for speaking with us, Joe. Where

1266
01:06:04,120 --> 01:06:09,400
Speaker 1: can listeners find you? Um So, I'm my website, Joe

1267
01:06:09,400 --> 01:06:13,760
Speaker 1: Piazza dot com, um or Joe Piazza author on Instagram,

1268
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Speaker 1: and Charlotte Walsh likes to win It's She's on Amazon,

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01:06:17,680 --> 01:06:23,160
Speaker 1: she's in all the indie bookstores and hopefully fingers crossed

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Speaker 1: knock on all the things. She will be on the

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Speaker 1: television screen in the next year or so. So let's

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Speaker 1: hope that all works out for her. Yes, absolutely, that

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Speaker 1: brings us to the end of this episode. And since

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Speaker 1: we kind of got to talk in for a while

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Speaker 1: with Joe, we're gonna skip listener mail for this one,

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Speaker 1: but it will be back. But if folks want to

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Speaker 1: send us email, how can they do that? Annie, Well,

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Speaker 1: we would love to hear from them, and they can

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Speaker 1: do it by emailing us at mom Stuff at how

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Speaker 1: stuff works dot com. That's right, and we're also on

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Speaker 1: social media. You can find us on Instagram at stuff

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Speaker 1: mom Ever told You, and us always on Twitter at

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Speaker 1: mom Stuff Podcast. And thanks. It's always to a producer

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Speaker 1: feeling Faith's