Subject: Re: Howard Stern makes his pitch: Why Hillary Clinton should do my show - The Washington Post
From: "Alexander S. Mackler" <[email-masked]>
To: "Eric Schwerin" <[email-masked]>
Cc: "Hunter Biden" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 3 Aug 2016 13:40:07 -0400

Interesting PR turn Stern is on. I read this on Sunday--

Confessor. Feminist. Adult. What the Hell Happened to Howard Stern?

Scattered among the gleefully vulgar mainstays are now intimate exchanges
that have made Mr. Stern one of the most deft interviewers in the business.

By DAVID SEGAL
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/s/david_segal/index.html>

JULY 27, 2016

Near the end of his interview with Bill Murray
<http://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2014/10/08/listen-to-bill-murray-open-up-about-his-loneliness-to-howard-stern/>,
Howard Stern turned an already somber discussion about missed career
opportunities into an existential grilling.

“Is there something that you question in your own life,” Mr. Stern asked,
“like why haven’t I found that great love of my life?”

Mr. Murray audibly exhaled and let a pensive moment of silence pass. “Well,
I think about that, I do think about that, that um, you know. I’m not sure
what my — what I’m getting done here,” he said, sounding like a man
questioning his ultimate purpose. Dating seemed like a bad idea, he went
on, given that he was such a mystery to himself, and a mystery that he was
not very eager to solve.

“What has stopped you from getting in touch with you?” asked Robin Quivers,
Mr. Stern’s longtime co-host.

“What stops us from looking at ourselves and seeing ourselves is that we’re
kind of ugly, if we really, if we look really hard,” Mr. Murray replied.
“We’re not who we think we are. We’re not, uh we’re not as wonderful as we
think we are.”

As an irregular listener of “The Howard Stern Show,” I found this
conversation, which took place in 2014, a bit startling. For years, Mr.
Stern was known principally for pushing the limits of taste as the
ringmaster of a raunchy circus of pranksters, oddballs and strippers.
During his decades on terrestrial radio, his main passions seemed to be, in
no particular order, boob jobs, prostitutes, lesbians and flatulence.
Introspection and empathy were not fortes.
Photo
Mr. Stern being carried to his book party in 1993. Credit Richard
Corkery/NY Daily News Archive, via Getty Images

What I didn’t appreciate, until hearing Mr. Murray lay bare his deepest
anxieties, is that since settling in to his new home on satellite radio,
which he did in 2006, Mr. Stern and his show have gradually taken on an
improbable new dimension. Scattered among the gleefully vulgar mainstays
are now long, starkly intimate live exchanges — character excavations that
have made Mr. Stern one of the most deft and engrossing celebrity
interviewers in the business and a sought-after stop for stars selling a
movie or setting the record straight.

“He’s truth serum,” said the comedian Amy Schumer
<http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/12/movies/the-sneaky-power-of-amy-schumer-in-trainwreck-and-elsewhere.html>,
who has been on the show four times in the last five years. “It’s like
you’re under contract to be totally honest in there, and even though it’s
being broadcast, it feels super intimate and protected, even though you
definitely aren’t.”

By all accounts, the metamorphosis has been slow — the result of a
combination of therapy, his second marriage, mainstream acceptance and a
sixth sense Mr. Stern has about how to evolve with the times.

“I couldn’t have done the show I’m doing now 20 years ago,” Mr. Stern said
over the phone. “I’ve changed a lot. I’d be sort of pathetic if I’d reached
this point in my life and I hadn’t. How else do you have longevity? There
are so many guys who started out with me in radio, who have disappeared,
because they can’t broaden their view of what entertainment should be, or
get in touch with what they find to be exciting and fun and funny.”

Mr. Stern, 62, has not dropped the adults-only material, and the freedom of
satellite radio allows him and his crew to indulge an unconditional love
for profanity. But he seems warmer now and his interest in people has never
had greater depth or range. The interviews give the show a heft that it
didn’t formerly have, turning his New York studio at SiriusXM into a
destination of choice for those who a decade ago might have steered clear.
Continue reading the main story
<http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/31/arts/howard-stern-sirius.html?_r=0#story-continues-2>
Photo
Mr. Stern in his New York studio, where he conducts interviews Monday
through Wednesday. Credit Chad Batka for The New York Times

“Today, if you go on a TV talk show and give a great six or seven minutes,
people will link to it, if it’s incredible,” said Lewis Kay, who oversees
media for Tracy Morgan, Amy Poehler and others. “But if you kill on Stern,
it moves the needle.”

Sometimes the results are concrete. Ms. Schumer’s interview on “Howard
Stern” prompted Judd Apatow to seek her out, resulting in a collaboration
that produced “Trainwreck.”
<http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/17/movies/review-trainwreck-delivers-the-full-amy-schumer-experience.html>
But it’s far more common for celebrities to get the amorphous, though
palpable, sense that by appearing on the show they have climbed a few rungs
on the fame ladder. This has something to do with the fervor of Mr. Stern’s
fans, and their ubiquity.

“Aside from the fact that millions of people hear you, the cross section of
who hears you is what blew me away,” said Ike Barinholtz, an actor and
comedian who has appeared on the show three times since 2014. “When you
have a head of a movie studio in Los Angeles and a New York City police
officer both tell you that it was good when you made fun of Ronnie the Limo
Driver,” — Mr. Stern’s chauffeur and an on-air regular — “you know you’re
dealing with a special entity.”

Revelations on the show sometimes make news, as happened last year when the
“Modern Family” star Sofia Vergara discussed the feud with her ex-husband
over frozen embryos. (All four of the major morning TV shows turned that
into a story.) But more often, Mr. Stern just elicits the most interesting
version of his visitors, through curiosity, patience and the benefits of
huge and commercial-free blocks of time. The interviews are too long for
anyone to fall back on jukebox answers they’ve been playing for years.
Photo
Mr. Stern with Lady Gaga.

Conan O’Brien described himself on the show as “somewhat medicated” in a
discussion about his low-level depression. Lady Gaga talked about the days
she used to snort cocaine all by herself, while she wrote music. John
Goodman admitted that he turned up drunk
<https://soundcloud.com/howardstern/goodman_drinking> a few times on the
set of “The Big Lebowski.”

In the era of the self-packaged celebrity, where public image is carefully
tailored on social media and authentic candor is rare, the interviews are
an almost radical rebuttal to the patty-cake games and singalongs
popularized by Jimmy Fallon on “The Tonight Show”

Mr. Stern believes his approach isn’t just better radio, but also better
for whatever product his guest is promoting.
Continue reading the main story
<http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/31/arts/howard-stern-sirius.html?_r=0#story-continues-5>

“If someone comes in and the audience feels like ‘Oh my god, I love this
person,’ they will want to see their movie,” he said. “It’s a strange thing
to say to someone trained in P.R., but it’s the God’s honest truth. If
someone has an hour to sit and talk about their life and at the end they
say, ‘By the way, that’s what brought me to this movie, or to write this
book,’ it’s such a powerful vehicle for promotion.”

It wasn’t easy convincing Mr. Stern to do an interview about his skills as
an interviewer. Initially he said no, and a week later, when he changed his
mind, he would talk only on the phone. The irony did not elude him.

“But I feel like it’s a bit self-serving for me to participate in this,” he
said. “It’s one thing for you to say I’m doing a good job as an
interviewer. It almost takes away from it for me to say, ‘Yeah, I am.’”

Mr. Stern started in radio in the mid-70s and by 1986 he had a nationally
syndicated show, one that would eventually reach 20 million listeners. To
his most ardent fans, he loomed so large that he seemed like a lifestyle
choice as much as an entertainer. They followed him as he ventured into
books, pay-per-view events, television and film. The government was less
enamored and fined him often enough to make him a First Amendment hero.
Tired of free speech battles, he signed a five year, $500 million deal with
Sirius and started swearing with élan in 2006.

Some worried that Mr. Stern would disappear once he went off free-to-air
radio, and for many he did. But Sirius — now SiriusXM, after merging with
its biggest rival — currently has 30 million subscribers. Exactly how many
are listening to Mr. Stern the company won’t say, but his chops as an
interviewer are a significant part of his appeal.

This is especially true in Los Angeles, where meetings have been known to
be delayed because people are sitting in the parking lot, waiting for the
last question. “One of the most common conversations I have about Howard is
something like, ‘I was stuck in my car because Sia was on,’ or ‘He was
finishing up an interview with Jeff Bridges,’” said Jeff Probst, the host
of “Survivor” and self-described Stern superfan. “You start calculating how
late you’ll be to the meeting based on where Howard is in his interview.”

It makes sense that the celebrity capital of the world would be so
interested in celebrity chatter.

“Among showbiz types, being a Stern fan is something like belonging to a
secret society,” said Andy Richter, the longtime sidekick of Conan O’Brien.
“So when I bump into someone like, say, Jonah Hill, one of us will
invariably say ‘Did you hear Stern interview?’ — and then you fill in the
blank of the last big interview he did.”
Continue reading the main story
<http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/31/arts/howard-stern-sirius.html?_r=0#story-continues-8>
Photo
Credit Matt Collins

Stars have been invited on the air by Mr. Stern for nearly as long as he’s
been in radio, but most kept their distance. “The show had a reputation for
being nutty and off the wall and people didn’t want to be associated with
it,” said Jackie Martling, known as the Jokeman, who left the show in 2001,
after nearly 20 years. “Once they got there, they found out that the bark
was much worse than the bite.”

There were exceptions. Back in 1983, when Mr. Stern worked at WNBC, his
interview with Gilda Radner ended with her in tears
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V-6SkSO0IUA>. At the time, Mr. Stern
lacked the emotional I.Q. to pick up signals that his guest was unnerved,
until it was too late. Most interviews ended amicably, but you often had
the sense that Mr. Stern was more interested in entertaining himself and
his crew than making guests look good. Then there were the A-listers that
he probably assumed would never appear on his show and whom he didn’t mind
ridiculing, in absentia.

“I didn’t think you guys liked me,” Madonna said on the air last year,
explaining why she had avoided the show for so long. “You said bad things
about me.”

Mr. Stern explained to her: “I used to say bad things about everyone. I was
angry, quite frankly. I was an angry young man.”

Mr. Stern still claims on the show to be an anxious mess, but he sounds
calmer and more content. He plainly roots for all his guests and his
questions reflect sensitivities unimaginable even a few years ago.
Recently, he asked Tina Fey if “Who are you wearing?” is a sexist question
to ask women red-carpeting at the Oscars. (Nah, she said.) Lena Dunham
called him “an outspoken feminist” on “The Tonight Show.”

This is the same guy who, for years, traded misogynistic quips with anyone
who was game, including, Donald J. Trump. In a 2005 phone interview, the
two rated the looks of the cast of “Desperate Housewives.”

“Would you go out with Marcia Cross,” Mr. Trump asked, “or would you turn
gay, Howard?”

“She’s got a good body,” he answered. “Just put a bag over her head.”

Pinpointing when Mr. Stern started his deep interview phase isn’t easy. It
certainly was after he joined Sirius and it has intensified in the last two
and a half years, according to his longtime producer, Gary Dell’Abate.

“We never sat down and said, ‘This is what we’re going to do,’” he said.
“It was organic. The caliber of guests got a little better, Howard’s
research got a little better, publicists out there started saying, ‘Wow,
that was a great interview.’”

Friends and fans attribute Mr. Stern’s evolution in large part to his
marriage, in 2008, to Beth Ostrosky Stern, a former model who not only has
left him lovestruck, but turned him into an animal rescue advocate. Serving
as a judge on NBC’s “America’s Got Talent,” which he did for four years,
also proved that his days as an outsider scrabbling for mainstream
credibility were behind him.
Photo
Mr. Stern with Steven Tyler.

“For a long time, he was an underdog, he was always fighting the
establishment,” Mr. Probst said. “Being a judge on ‘America’s Got Talent’
said to him, ‘You are deserving, you are legitimate.’ I think it is one
reason Howard said to himself, ‘O.K., people really do like me. People
really respect me.’ And maybe that chip on his shoulder is gone.”

Therapy has also been key. For years, Mr. Stern was in four-times-a-week
psychoanalysis, as he frequently reminds listeners. (He’s since cut back.)
Not only has this given him a modicum of inner peace, it has provided him
with a set of tools that he uses on guests the way a well-equipped
safecracker opens a vault.

To the extent that Mr. Stern has competitors it is the short list of shows
that interview celebrities at length. That includes public radio’s “Fresh
Air,” though its host, Terry Gross, has only a fraction of the appetite for
the intensely personal questions that are Mr. Stern’s bailiwick. (When was
the last time she asked a pop star about groupies?) His nearest rival is
perhaps WTF, the podcast of comedian Marc Maron, who fearlessly plumbs the
psyches of his guests and has a special fascination with the way parents
warp their children.

The difference between the two hosts is stylistic. When Mr. Stern sounds
like a shrink, he has the physician’s discipline to keep the conversation
about the patient. Mr. Maron is more like a fellow neurotic who wants to
compare notes in the waiting room. Much of his show is the host elaborating
on his own struggles, which by now are pretty familiar.

If Mr. Stern has a weakness as an interviewer it’s his tendency to
interrupt guests, who sometimes seem one second of quiet away from a
breakthrough. This occasionally gives the show an almost prosecutorial
pace, and suggests he doesn’t fully trust his audience’s attention span.
And in rare instances when a guest isn’t willing to bare all — Stevie
Wonder comes to mind <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sJHEW9B6nBg> — Mr.
Stern can take a little too long to grasp that sex and personal income
questions aren’t working.

Most of the time, though, Mr. Stern probes exactly where you would if you
had the nerve. He asked Bryan Cranston if he wished there had been
“nitty-gritty sex scenes” in “Breaking Bad.” (Answer: yes.)
Photo
Mr. Stern with Katherine Heigl.

He gave Katherine Heigl time to describe getting snubbed at a restaurant by
her “Knocked Up” co-star Seth Rogen because she had poor-mouthed the movie in
a Vanity Fair interview <http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2008/01/heigl200801>
.

These in-depth interviews are also strategic, as Mr. Stern has intuited
that outrageousness won’t suffice on satellite radio, a realm without
limits, and therefore a place where nothing is outrageous. Keep in mind
that Mr. Stern could once cause a stir by referring to masturbation on the
radio.

No set schedule is kept for interviews, which Mr. Stern conducts Monday
through Wednesday, the only days he now works, after a contract
renegotiation in 2011. To prepare, he and a couple staffers will read and
compile notes over the course of days. Mr. Stern might strategize for as
long as a week, figuring out what he would want to hear if he were
listening. Right before the interview begins, a point man will read aloud
the team’s collective jottings.

“And then it just sticks in my head and I memorize it,” Mr. Stern said. “I
don’t love the process. I get very anxious and uncomfortable because I want
it to be so good. I want the audience to enjoy it, I want the performer to
feel comfortable. It’s a whole psycho deal.”

While chunks of the show are more grown up than ever, sex and strippers
remain a preoccupation. The Wack Pack, an unpaid and rotating cast of
eccentrics, still have plenty of time to heckle one another and the staff,
though some have been rechristened with less offensive names. (Wendy the
Retard is now Wendy the Slow Adult, for instance.) Prank phone calls remain
a staple. Not long ago, a Hillary Clinton sound-alike called a skywriting
company and asked if it would spell out a derogatory slogan about Bernie
Sanders’s bathroom habits.

Still, the show now includes enough lengthy interviews, delving into enough
serious topics, to annoy some longtime fans. They fume on Reddit. They also
call the show. Mr. Stern will occasionally put them on the air and let them
vent. Enough with the talk about regrets and depression, they will say. We
want naked women.

A version of this article appears in print on July 31, 2016, on page AR1 of
the New York edition with the headline: Confessor. Feminist. Adult. Order
Reprints <http://www.nytreprints.com/>| Today's Paper
<http://www.nytimes.com/pages/todayspaper/index.html>|Subscribe
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On Wed, Aug 3, 2016 at 7:48 AM, Eric Schwerin <[email-masked]>
wrote:

> Jan 23rd.  JRB's first post-VP interview should be on Stern. I'm serious.
>
>
>
> https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/arts-and-entertainment/wp/2016/08/01/howard-stern-makes-his-pitch-why-hillary-clinton-should-do-my-show/?postshare=8351470180073895&tid=ss_fb-bottom
>
> Howard Stern makes his pitch: Why Hillary Clinton should do my show
>
> Howard Stern, left, and Hillary Clinton. (Evan Agostini/AP; Michael
> Robinson Chavez/The Washington Post)
>
> Hillary Clinton said it herself. The “public” part of public service has
> never been easy. Now, with the Democratic nomination in hand, it’s time to
> meet America. And please, advisors, that doesn’t mean popping up on
> “Carpool Karaoke.” It’s time to go on Stern.
>
> Don’t do “The Howard Stern Show” because he’s been a Hillary supporter. Do
> Stern because of what he does: Simply the best broadcast entertainment
> interview show around. Because, as he said in a rare, more than hour-long
> interview with The Washington Post, “the ultimate Hillary interview hasn’t
> been done yet.” Stern talked about how he would proceed if Clinton agreed
> to go on his SiriusXM show. This interview has been edited for clarity and
> length.
>
> *The Clinton campaign has said no so far. What if you got a call tomorrow
> that she would love to do the show? What’s your strategy?*
>
> I don’t think I’d handle Hillary Clinton any differently than I would a
> musician. I had a three hour conversation with Billy Joel and we really
> talked about his music writing process, how this happened, how it evolved,
> and his relationship with his parents, his marriages, the love of the piano
> and the songwriting process and also the torture of it.
>
> You think about politics. Who really would want to go through this
> scrutiny and the torture and the criticism? Now we see it on Twitter.
> Everyone’s getting bullied. But politicians have been getting bullied
> forever and I’m not so cynical. I certainly don’t believe that a young
> person goes into politics with the idea, I’m going to get rich. I think
> there is a desire to serve. Is it any different from Steven Tyler saying I
> want to write songs since I was 9 years old?
>
> *I wonder what you thought of Bill Clinton’s speech at the convention.
> Rachel Maddow called it “shocking and weird” because he was talking about
> Hillary as the object of his desire and, of course, he had his famous
> affair.*
>
> When I watched his speech I, too, had that reaction. But look, there are
> so many hypocrites out there. You know how many guys and women are having
> affairs? I was able to evaluate Bill Clinton as a president without sitting
> there. How many great CEOs of companies have had affairs? It’s an epidemic.
> So for everyone to be so holier than thou and say they can’t buy into the
> fact that he had a love affair with Hillary. Of course they had a love
> affair.
>
> *Trump. He’s been a regular guest on the Stern show over the years. Is it
> fair to say you like him as a guy but not as a candidate?*
>
> No. I won’t say that. Before Trump even got in the race, way before he got
> in the race, I had announced I was supporting Hillary. I believe she would
> be an extremely powerful president. I don’t dislike Trump as a candidate
> but I am absolutely enamored by Hillary. And I’ve told Donald that. Hillary
> as a president was sort of dream of mine for a long time. I thought she was
> an excellent senator.
>
> *You voted for Obama but did you support her over him in the 2008 primary?*
>
> I did.
>
> *If Hillary agrees to come on, do you do that interview in your studio or
> do you go somewhere?*
>
> To me, I’m on satellite radio and that’s the best place to do it. Having
> said that, if there was some kind of concept of doing it somewhere else,
> I’d do it.
>
> *Did you hear Marc Maron’s podcast with Obama
> <https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/on-comedian-marons-podcast-obama-delves-into-race-talk-after-charleston/2015/06/22/551d3e1c-1915-11e5-bd7f-4611a60dd8e5_story.html>?*
>
> I didn’t. No. I had [Maron] on once but honestly, I haven’t heard his show.
>
> *The big thing is Maron does it in his garage, which is his studio, and
> Obama showed up to his garage. For Hillary, I think it would be better if
> she came to your turf and experienced in that way.*
>
> It’s be nice. But it’s almost irrelevant. [Pause] Yeah, I hear what you’re
> saying. Now on second thought, maybe you’re right. That’s the setting I’m
> comfortable in. and the more comfortable I am, it’s like when you have
> someone over. If you’re in familiar surroundings, you can make someone feel
> welcomed in your place.
>
>
> *[Is Howard Stern going soft or just getting sharper?]
> <https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/is-howard-stern-going-soft-or-just-getting-sharper/2015/12/13/691d8cfe-9ddc-11e5-a3c5-c77f2cc5a43c_story.html>
> *
> *So your producers reached out to the Clinton campaign. Do you ever get
> involved to make a stronger push?*
>
> I wouldn’t feel comfortable having someone in who is pressured somehow and
> kind of overhype the experience. They’ve got to come to that conclusion on
> their own. Having said that, we’ve reached out and said, we’d love to have
> Hillary on. And it would expose her to an audience that might not be
> thinking of voting for her. She could also have a direct pipeline to a lot
> of people who wouldn’t normally get to hear her speak the way we have the
> ability to do it. There’s a lot of time to develop an answer. Not do a
> sound bite. And oddly enough, because of that format, I notice a lot of the
> media takes the interviews we do and makes sound bites out of them.
>
> *Well, Howard, one of the biggest sound bites is Trump. He has said he
> never supported the Iraq war, but there’s a clip of him voicing his support
> in an interview on your show in 2002.*
>
> Somebody comes on and everyone suddenly goes, ‘oh, Howard Stern got a lot
> of out of this person or that person.’ It’s because we’re having a real
> conversation. Alec Baldwin said to me, I don’t really want to do any other
> show but yours. Why is that? He said, ‘Anywhere else I go, it’s like hurry
> up and answer. And when I come on your show, I really get to explain
> myself.’ Lady Gaga said to me, ‘I feel most safe when I’m doing your show.’
> And that floored me.
>
> *The first time I remember you really talking politically was with
> Christie Todd Whitman
> <http://blog.nj.com/njv_paul_mulshine/2008/01/howard_stern_rest_area_is_anot.html>.
> And at that time, more than 20 years ago, it wasn’t about your political
> views. It was basically, ‘hey, the first politician who calls me, I
> endorse.’*
>
> On terrestrial radio it was a whole different approach. It was about me.
> In my mind it had to be about me. It had to be outrageous. I didn’t have
> the opportunity or the desire or the medium where I could ask Christie Todd
> Whitman real questions. I had to be, okay, I’m going to get on the air. I
> had 5 or 10 minutes. If you tuned in at 6:10 in the morning, I had to drag
> you to 6:20. How could I get you to stay with me for those 5 minutes? Wham,
> bam thank you ma’am.
>
> *And [Whitman opponent James] Florio would have gotten your support if he
> had called first.*
>
> That’s right. And so it was about me. Look how powerful I am. Me me me me.
> The show I’m doing isn’t about that… What my approach is now, because I am
> on satellite, it’s a different show. … A broadcaster who doesn’t change
> becomes irrelevant very quickly.
>
> *Christie Todd Whitman really did herself a service in coming on your
> show.*
>
> She came on and she was absolutely human. You don’t get to see that in
> everyday politics. Our media world is changing so rapidly. And from what I
> can see, the approach of getting up on the stump and making a speech is an
> antiquated as going back to the days of George Washington and Abraham
> Lincoln. I don’t even think going on some show and being self-effacing and
> doing a game show format or a sketch, I don’t think that’s the way to run
> for president. The position is just too goddamned important.
>
> *It’s as if they think we go to the polls and say, ‘oh, that candidate can
> poke fun at himself. I’ll vote for him.’*
>
> It’s not the way it works. The only way it works is the same way you
> promote a record album on my show or a movie. Don’t promote the movie.
> Promote you and being a human being and relating to people on a very human
> level and then they’ll vote for you or they’ll go see your movie.
>
> *So with Hillary, do you ask her about the e-mail scandal?*
>
> I would leave that to the interview on “Meet the Press” or the Fox News
> channel, CNN, George Stephanopoulos, even Matt Lauer. They can do that
> interview.
>
> *How about her marriage? You have to ask, right?*
>
> But I don’t think it’s necessarily the central thing. When you’re talking
> about the scope of someone’s life and that becomes something in their life,
> it becomes more comfortable to talk about. You’ve heard my interviews. I
> don’t avoid topics. When Gwen Stefani walked in
> <https://www.howardstern.com/show/2016/7/20/gwen-stefani-speaks-her-family-her-love-life-and-her-slew-hit-songs/>
> I didn’t know if she was talking about her marriage or not. I know her
> [former] husband very well. Gavin. I like him very much. But I wasn’t going
> to avoid the topic either. But it wasn’t the focus. I didn’t have her walk
> into the studio and go, ‘Gwen, I can’t believe what happened with Gavin.’
> That’s just poor form and that’s not the way I approach a conversation in
> my home.
>
> *“Welcome to dinner and tell me about that affair from 10 years ago.”*
>
> Exactly. You’d have to be a complete idiot to do that. Or if you were just
> looking to do a confrontational show and have the person walk out. I know
> guys in radio who do that. They ask the worst question up front and then
> the person walks out.
>
> *Back to Trump. You’re obviously a big believer in free speech. He’s been
> blocking the press and trying to control the press and trying to shut the
> press out. I can’t imagine you support that.*
>
> Trump is not a traditional candidate. Quite frankly, I’ve spoken to Donald
> Trump off the air and I’ve said, why the hell you would want to be
> president? You’ve got such a great life. You’ve got a spectacular wife. If
> you’ve ever checked out this place, Mar-a-Largo, it is fantastic. He’s got
> lots of money. He’s got all the toys that a person would want. Why on god’s
> name would you want that? And I will tell you the reason he’s such a good
> guest on your show is because he’s unfiltered and he’s ready to say
> anything.
>
> *What did he tell you when asked him why he’s running?*
>
> I don’t know that that’s fair for me to say what he said to me off the air.
>
> *[From playboy to president? Trump’s past crude sex talk collides with his
> White House bid]
> <https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/from-playboy-to-president-trumps-past-behavior-collides-with-his-white-house-bid/2016/05/09/46bed6f8-12fe-11e6-93ae-50921721165d_story.html>*
>
> *You’ve had Steve Martin on, Bill Murray, McCartney, almost everyone. Is
> Hillary the Holy Grail at this point?*
>
> I wouldn’t say that. I would be fascinated by Hillary Clinton. I think
> she’s a fascinating person and I also think no one has sat down with her
> and really provided a forum for her to not be the politician but to be the
> human being. So would that be a fabulous moment for me to try to
> communicate with Hillary Clinton in front of my audience? Yes. It would be
> fabulous for me. The dinner conversation I would have privately with
> Hillary Clinton is the conversation I’d like to put on the radio.
>
> *And I love the idea it could go on for three hours.*
>
> It could go on all night. And so yeah, would it be the Holy Grail? Sure,
> it would be great. In the same way that Mick Jagger would be the Holy Grail
> and the same way that when I talk with Paul McCartney
> <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=903eh_hEAa0>, it’s the Holy Grail. And
> you can ask him, ‘gee, when you wrote ‘Maybe I’m Amazed,’ what was on your
> mind? The same thing. What was that moment, Hillary, when you decided you
> wanted to be president?
>
> *I’d want to hear what it was like being so accomplished and so skilled
> and then basically deciding, hey, Bill, I’ll become a mother and let you do
> it.*
>
> I talk to actors about what it’s like when they audition for a movie or
> they get offered a movie, they turn it down and then someone else takes it,
> and it becomes the biggest hit. Isn’t that the same thing in Hillary
> Clinton’s life?
>
> *Yes, you go to law school, you’re an intellectual and suddenly you’re on
> TV getting grilled about some offhand comment about baking cookies.
> <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8EGranwN_uk>*
>
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>
> And oh my god, you have to sit there, all this time as a senator,
> building, building, building and this guy comes out of nowhere like Obama.
> And then in relation to her entire history as a little girl. And everybody
> always saying, yeah, ‘you can be the first lady but you can’t be the
> president.’ This is fascinating stuff.
>
> *And there is the idea that after she lost eight years ago, she didn’t
> take her marbles and go home. Clinton participated and stayed in the game.*
>
> How many people do that? And I’ve got news for you. I relate to that on
> such a human level. I remember being in Detroit radio and being at my
> lowest and it never once occurred to me to quit radio. That’s when I dug in
> my heels in and said, I’ve got to get better. I’m not working hard enough.
> And I was working day and night on this thing.
>
> *We have heard Hillary joke around on “Saturday Night Live” and reference
> how she’s sometimes perceived, but I have never heard her emotionally open
> up and engage on what it’s like to feel that rejection and to bounce back.*
>
> That’s exactly right. And now you know my agenda. I don’t give a f— about
> e-mails and scandals. She’s already talked to the FBI about that. She’s
> testified. That’s not my thing. My thing is, ‘wow, as a human being how do
> you succeed?’ Don’t we all need to know how to succeed. This is a
> phenomenal story.
>
>
> Eric D. Schwerin
> [email-masked]
>
> Sent from my iPhone
>

-- 

Alexander Snyder Mackler
(302) 598-867