Factually! with Adam Conover - The G Word and the Truth About Our Government with Michael Lewis

Episode Date: May 18, 2022

Adam’s new series The G Word is out this Thursday on Netflix! To commemorate the premiere, this week The Fifth Risk author Michael Lewis turns the tables on Adam, interviewing him about how made the show. In the second half, they explore Michael's own reporting on how the CDC bungled COVID-19, and how Michael goes about writing his best-selling works of journalism.  You can purchase The Fifth Risk at http://factuallypod.com/books, and watch The G Word on Netflix starting May 19th! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

You know, I got to confess, I have always been a sucker for Japanese treats. I love going down a little Tokyo, heading to a convenience store, and grabbing all those brightly colored, fun-packaged boxes off of the shelf. But you know what? I don't get the chance to go down there as often as I would like to. And that is why I am so thrilled that Bokksu, a Japanese snack subscription box, chose to sponsor this episode. What's gotten me so excited about Bokksu is that these aren't just your run-of-the-mill grocery store finds. Each box comes packed with 20 unique snacks that you can only find in Japan itself.

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So if all of that sounds good, if you want a big box of delicious snacks like this for yourself, use the code factually for $15 off your first order at Bokksu.com. That's code factually for $15 off your first order on Bokksu.com. I don't know the way. I don't know what to think. I don't know what to say. Yeah, but that's alright. Yeah, that's okay. I don't know anything. Hello, and welcome to Factually. I'm Adam Conover. Thank you for joining me on the show once again. I am so excited this week because this episode is dropping on May 18th, and that means that if you're listening to it on the day of release, tomorrow, May 19th, is when my new show, The G Word, will finally drop on Netflix. That's right, my brand new show, six episodes of comedy documentary all about the workings of the United States government. We cover some incredible things on this season, from meat processing to money to how we make change in our political system.

I fly through a hurricane with the Air Force's Hurricane Hunters. It is a crazy show. We packed a ton of jokes in, and I think you're going to love it, and I really hope you check it out. And I want to start this show by talking a little bit about how this show came to be. A couple of years ago, in 2018, I read a book called The Fifth Risk by the journalist Michael Lewis. Now, I'm a huge fan of Michael Lewis. He's an incredible writer, and this is a wonderfully detailed and engaging ride through the Trump administration's half-assed transition after the 2016 election.

But the book is not just about Trump. In reporting the book, Lewis discovered all these incredible, unremarked upon, and absolutely essential duties that the government does that most of us are not even aware of. He found himself boggled by the size and scale of the government and the difficulty of managing it. And he turned up some incredible stories about the people, institutions and agencies that shape our lives for good and for bad in ways that most of us aren't even aware of. It was a fascinating book and I loved it. I read the book. Good book. The end. Except that a couple of months later, in June of the following year, good book, the end. Except that a couple months later,

in June of the following year, I got a phone call. It was from my manager and he told me that the Obama's production company, Higher Ground, had optioned Michael Lewis's book and did I wanna pitch what a comedy show based on that book could look like. And I said, yes, I do in fact wanna do that. I pitched them a show in which I would use my signature combination of well-researched factual investigation and comedy to explain how the government works, warts and all. And I guess they must have liked that pitch because they and Netflix said, yes, they greenlit it and they gave me free reign to make the show that I wanted to make.

And I want to make this very clear because a lot of you might be wondering, hey, if this show was produced by the Obama's production company, do they meddle? Is this propaganda? Is this the Obama party line? And let me tell you something. When we set it up, I said, hey, just so you know, this has to be my investigation. This is going to be my perspective, not the former president's. I'm only doing this if this is my show. And they said, yes, of course it will be. And to their credit, they stayed off of my back and allowed me to make the show that I wanted to make. And we tell some stories on this show that, you know, I don't think Barack Obama would have written himself to say the least.

So you know what? You can watch it and be the judge. But I ended up very thrilled with what we were able to do on this show and the stories that we were able to tell that have never been seen on television or streaming before. And, you know, one of the real thrills of doing this show was that I actually got to know Michael Lewis, who, again, is one of my very favorite writers in the world of journalism. He's one of the greatest journalists of his generation, quite frankly. And his books, Liar's Poker, Moneyball, you know, the motherfucking Big Short, have explained the complexity of our

world with an ease and detail that like no one else is really able to rival. This dude has an intuitive and deep sense of story, which he follows like a truffle pig following his nose in the French countryside. The dude just has an instinct for it. He's a master of finding hidden perspectives, hidden truths, and revealing them to you through the lens of these incredibly compelling characters. So we thought that to commemorate the show coming out, nothing could be better than having Michael Lewis on Factually with us today. And that's what we're doing. We were able to have a wonderful talk about the work that each of us does, the points of similarity, the points of difference,

what it was like to see his little baby book turned into this gawky, lumbering teenager of a series, and how he approaches the incredible work that he does. So look, let's get to it without any further ado. I could not be more excited for you to hear this conversation with Michael Lewis. And before I forget, just one more time, if you're listening to this after May 19th, go watch The G Word on Netflix. It is out, and I can't wait for you to see it. And now, without further ado, here is my conversation

with Michael Lewis. Michael, thank you so much for coming on the show. It's a delight to be here, and it's been, what, two and a half years since I last laid eyes on you? Yeah, it's been about that long. I mean, when we were first working on The G Word, yeah, over two years ago, you joined us in our writer's room for like a week and just hung out and helped us put note cards on the corkboard. And I think that was the last time we saw each other. So I have this very vivid and guilty memory of walking into your writer's room.

This would have been February, maybe, of 2020. 20. Right. So COVID is in the air. And I was as sick as I'd ever been. And I remember having cough drops and Theraflu and blowing my nose and running at you. And you were handing me tissues. And I thought, it wasn't later that I thought that maybe I was the beginning of a super spreader event in your room as you were working on a show about disease.

I felt so bad. And I felt so not myself because I felt so sick and I never, I don't know whether I had COVID or not, but I just come from, I think, I think I'd come from the NBA all-star game where I'd been shaking hands with 6,000 people from, you know, China. And, and, and it's entirely possible that I was sitting in your writer's room with COVID. I don't, I have no memory of this and you never told, I didn't tell you you were sick and you never told any of us this that's hilarious i mean we shut down our entire writer's room like about two weeks after you were in there with us because you know that was around the time the nba season shut down right and you

know so we were in the writers when we closed it down we did everything over zoom and we never had an outbreak on our on our writing staff so i. So you can set your guilty conscience aside, but that is really funny to me that you were sitting there going, maybe I have COVID. And it was totally fun watching you all reconceive my original interest in this subject and doing it in a completely different way. I thought it was really cool what you were doing.

And I wondered, and I do wonder, you had to shut it down and it was done by fits and starts, so you can't tell by watching it. I just watched it last night. I watched it all. Thank you so much. I really liked it. That was great. And thought you actually followed through on what you were conceiving right then. I mean, there were some changes, but you really had the original conception

pretty clear by the time I turned up. And I was shocked when I was watching it. I was absolutely shocked when it says executive producer Michael Lewis. I thought, I didn't do crap here. And is that what executive producers do? Now I know when it comes up. Yeah, that what executive producers do? Is that now I know that when it comes up, yeah, that's, that's what a producer is. Yeah. It's true. About half the executive producers you

will see on any piece of media did almost nothing or did a job other than produce the show, but they have an executive producer title. Right. And then the other half of the producers actually produced it day in, day out. Like, yeah, I won't list everybody, but, you know, we had, we had about four or five people who actually produced the show every day. And then a couple of people who like did other things in the show, such as yourself. That's, that's one of the dirty little secrets about the entertainment industry. That's just, just how it works. And everyone's, everyone's cool with that. Yeah. Well, I almost dropped my Mountain Dew and the card came up. But so, yeah, so that's my memory.

And it was totally fun. And you all just threw yourselves into it in a way that made me proud. And it was such an, you know, as you know, it's such an amorphous subject. Yeah, the federal government. The United States federal government is so vast that if you say, I'm going to go write about that or I'm going to go make a TV show about that. And that's the big the starting point. You have to have some other thoughts before you do anything, because, you know, it's it's it's it's. Yeah. It's like trying to write about the ocean. It's like, what do you want to write about it? Yeah. Yes. And what do you want to write about? But also and and what do you want to write about but also like where do you what where you start and where do you stop i mean how do you how

are you going to define this in a way that you haven't you can get away from it because it just goes on and on and on and you and you did it one way and i did it another way but it was you're basically always in a position you're basically got to acknowledge the audience you're getting a glimpse that there's there's so much else here and

I'm going to give you enough of a glimpse that you understand that it's that it's a glimpse of something you know you're going to see

the dorsal fin of the beast and that's the best you're going to do yeah but it was but I was

I was really pleased that you went in it very differently from how I went at it with very, there's a little, some overlap, but not a lot of overlap and, and that the material continued to be really good. Uh, and I would ask you a question. I know you're, please. I'm so happy to hear you say all this, by the way, cause you spend so long, you know, when you were with us in the writer's room, we're going, oh, is this any of this going to work? How are we going to walk our way through it? You spent so long being uncertain. So to hear you say you started at the beginning and you felt it carried through to now means a great deal to me, especially because I love your

work so much. That's why I'm working on the show. But please ask me a question. Well, no, the question was, once you got into it, did you find yourself surprised by the, by your level of interest? Did you find yourself, did you find yourself finding things that you went, God, I mean, I can't believe this is actually the way it works. Cause I sensed you did because I did when I was working on what I was working on. And I'm wondering where, where like those moments were for you. I mean, I wasn't surprised to have those moments because my whole way I work is to try to find the moments where I'm surprised. So when we started doing this show, you know, I had read your book.

I had loved the book. And my favorite parts were the part about, oh, my gosh, the government does so many things that I'm not aware of. You, you know, the episode of our show that's closest to yours is the weather episode where we talked about the incredible power of the National Weather Service and how weather companies are trying to undermine it. And when I read that passage in the book, it stuck with me, you know, for a year until we finally pitched on it. So I knew that I wanted to do that, but I also knew like, I have the capacity to get interested in almost anything. You know, I'm, I'm sort of aware that in any subject, when you look deeper into it, you'll find things that amaze yourself. And so I knew from reading your book, the government is going to be a topic like that for me. And my job is to go find those things. And so then what I do is with my writing and research staff, it's like, hey, let's all pitch on what this could be.

And when we amaze ourselves in the room, that's when we sort of know we found something good. So the GPS constellation, for instance. That's exactly what I thought you were going to say. Yeah. Tell me. That was amazing. Yeah. Yeah.

That was the one that blew my mind when our researcher, I believe Sam Roudman was the one who brought it in, who was also our research producer on this show, on this podcast. When he brought in, he is also our research producer on this show, on this podcast, when he brought in, he was like, the entire GPS constellation is run by the United States government as a free public service for the entire world. Literally every GPS device in the world uses a government run utility that the government runs and charges nobody for it. Zero cost for anybody to use it. And all of our amazing technology, Google Maps, Uber, you know, Garmin,

all of those things are built on the back of a government utility. And I was like, how did I, how do I use GPS every single day and not know this? I was, my mind was blown by that. The Russian military may be asking the same question. Well, and now I understand that they and the Chinese are trying to build their own GPS systems because they're like, we don't want to be stuck on, you know, the United States government public service and the United States government is like, you can keep using it. We can't even stop you from using it. I believe I don't even,

cause I don't think based on my understanding of the way the technology works, the United States can't like cut off China from it. Anybody with a GPS receiver can use it at any time, but they want to, you know, create their own alternative. But I thought that was, so you were also amazed.

I was amazed. I was amazed that I'm sure their backup systems, but it's all in one, it's these 10 guys in one room running these 24 satellites that are in, I guess, geosynchronous orbit over the- A bunch of 20-year-olds in military fatigue. Yes.

And that they let you type in the codes to whatever you do. I don't know what you were doing with the satellite, but it was, but I thought, I didn't know. But then when you said it, I said, yeah, of course, someone has to do this. You know, who is it? But there's this story over and over. And you do this really well. One of the crimes of the private marketplace in this country is to do what happens inside of every dysfunctional corporation. There's all this credit grabbing.

do what happens inside of every dysfunctional corporation. There's all this credit grabbing, that people seeking to seem responsible for stuff they're not totally responsible for, and not crediting the government where it needs to be credited. I think Elon Musk should stand up once a week and say, you know, I've done a lot of stuff here at Tesla, and I've worked hard to make it work, but without the initial loans from the Department of Energy, we wouldn't exist. Yeah. Or look at, look at SpaceX. I mean, SpaceX has some incredible technology, right? But the only re and that's his most successful business. But the only reason SpaceX exists is because the United States government decided we're going to get out of the business of sending people to space. We're not going to,

this is not going to be taxpayer funded anymore. We're not going to do it directly. We are as a matter of policy, going to shift to paying private companies to do it. And SpaceX like raised their hand was like, okay, we'll be that giant contractor. And that's their revenue stream is money from the federal government who pays them to put our taxpayer funded satellites in the sky, et cetera. They have other revenue sources as well. But if that, if the U.S. government hadn't made that policy change, SpaceX simply wouldn't exist.

Yeah. Yeah, so I thought, I love that episode. And I thought, and that was the most jaw-dropping, or among the most jaw-dropping moments for me in the whole thing. Another jaw-dropping moment was, I could not believe you were able to get cameras into a slaughterhouse.

Oh, my God. Yeah. How on earth did you do that? Because I know whatever they were thinking, like we're showing how carefully the meat is processed. For every nanosecond of footage, 10,000 fewer hamburgers will be eaten. 10,000 fewer hamburgers will be eaten. I got, I got, I was ordering room service as I was, as I was watching this thing and I was going to have a burger. And I just thought I started, you know, like wretch. I just thought I can't, I can't do this.

Well, the show, hopefully the show doesn't make people throw up. Yeah. It's no, I, I was affected by it too. I mean, so, so for folks who have not seen the show yet, and you know, this is, this episode is going to come out right as the show premieres. But in the first episode, I go to a Cargill meat processing plant, one of the, in Schuyler, Nebraska, one of the largest in the country. And it's the first time they let cameras inside one of those facilities in about 30 years. And it's testament

to our incredible field producer, Susie Beck, who got us in there, but also the folks at the USDA. That's the answer to the question was we went to the USDA first and we said, we want to do a profile of the incredible food inspectors at the USDA. These folks who are every single day on the line at every meat processing plant in America, inspecting every single piece of meat by hand. We want to profile that. And the USDA, you know, wanted us to be able to tell that story. And they helped us, you know,

grease the wheels with Cargill. But it was so intense in there. Oh my God. I had an emotional reaction when I was in there. You can see it on the show. You can see it because I had a sense that you went in thinking, this might be wrong. But it felt the way you were telling the story, like you went in thinking this might be wrong,

but it felt the way you were telling the story, like you went in to talk about these USDA inspectors, and you do. Yeah. I mean, but when they're reaching in and pulling out a lung with pneumonia in it or whatever it is, and it's just disgusting. Yeah. I had the feeling that you went in a carnivore and came out a vegan kind of thing. That you went in, but you realized kind of in the middle of it, that, well,

the story who's got these cameras on these cows that are all, all about to be slaughtered. You didn't actually show that. That was it. No, no, absolutely not. And for folks watching the show, we, we do, we do not show you the very grossest parts and with it's, it's very careful. And if you're, we made a segment that if you are an animal lover, as I am, you can watch without being too upset. But it does show the sort of reality of what it's like in those places. Well, and look, we ought to all have to see it, just like we ought to all have to see Elon Musk stand up and say, I want to thank the federal

government for making Tesla possible. It's just like you're rubbing our nose in a reality. And it made me think as I was watching the whole thing, that maybe the problem that the federal government has, it's got this problem. You and I have both kind of been playing a role in addressing this problem. Another way of looking at it is we've seen an arbitrage opportunity. There's a level of importance here that is not being recognized by the people who pay attention to things and if you shine a camera or a writer's eye into this thing it yields gold

but the question on my mind has been since I did The Fifth Risk it's like why I mean my book sold a gazillion copies and it didn't take me very long to do. It was time, even in the most mercenary way, time very well spent. And I love doing it. So I asked myself, like, why was this available to do? Like, why could someone just walk into the Department of Agriculture or the Department of Commerce and come away with really great stories that weren't that hard to come away with? Why hasn't this been done by everybody? And I think there's,

I think, I think partly one, of course, there's this, there's this false notion that it's just this gray, boring, bureaucratic, bureaucratic mass. And it's just, some of it's boring and some of it's gray, but that's not, it's not just that. But I think it's partly that there isn't this demand from the American public because people don't want to see reality. They don't want to see the truth. They like the myth better than the truth. And they like the myth of Elon Musk rather than the truth of Elon Musk. So they like the burger on their plate, but they really don't want to think about how it got there. Well, I hope that that is not true because my entire career is based on showing people the reality. Like that's just simply what I do. What I like to think is that people, people want a good story and the, the

traditional Elon Musk story, the story that Elon Musk tells about him on stage. I did it all by myself, just a guy in a garage or the dream. That's the tech story. That's a really good story. And you need to give people a story that is that good or better. And in my view, the story of, hey, we all did it together. We all pooled our resources to create this massive public GPS utility or, you know, that we, you know, we sent in, you know, meat was killing people. Poisoned meat was killing people. So we sent inspectors into every single meat plant and we solved that problem. That's a that's a better story. And we need to get a little bit better at telling it. And that's what the, that's what the show aims to do now. Yes. People love fantasy. But it's like one of my deep beliefs that like

reality is more interesting than fantasy, because if you can tell the story just as well, then you've got just as good a story that also has the advantage of being true. I obviously built a career on this too. And believe it too. Maybe I didn't put it quite how I meant it. What I meant was more as people go through their daily lives, they don't want to think too hard about how all this works. And an easy story is better than a hard story. And you and I have the advantage of being able to take a hard story and make it fun to read or fun to watch or whatever it is.

It takes a lot of effort. People don't want to make that effort in their daily lives yeah that it's just like and um but anyway it just i was that so one of the things i found when i was watching the show i found myself surprised over and over again about was where you were able to get cameras i worried about that when you had it when you when you had your cards on the board on the yeah on the board laid out in February of 2020, I thought, are you really going to be able to get in there with cameras? And then you were able to get into the GPS room with cameras or in the slaughterhouse with cameras. Yeah, onto the hurricane plane.

Into the FDIC. I mean, I was really surprised the FDIC was willing to let you pretend to put a bank out of business. Yeah. You know, I thought, all right. But it was really cool that they were. Yeah. And I think I was surprised because I'd seen over and over

when I was working on the fifth risk. I did a dance in the fifth risk. I made the reader think they were inside these federal agencies when actually I had to sneak inside. To the extent I got in, I snuck inside. I was not really ever formally, with exception a little bit at the Department of Energy, I wasn't really welcomed inside. Now, it was the Trump administration, but I think even if it had been the Obama administration, there's this defensiveness and wariness about, which is a real mistake i think pr mistake on

their parts yeah but like they just think all they've gotten so used to all publicity being bad publicity that their first and their first step whenever you propose anything is no yeah and and so i and if it's that way for a writer it's that it's 10 times worse for someone with a camp with cameras yeah i was amazed you were able to find your way into these places. Again, that was our incredible producer, Susie Beck, also our producer, John Cohen, who really just were indefatigable

of trying to talk to these agencies. And here's the thing. There are people at all these agencies who wanna tell these stories, but they don't have the budget to do it. What we kept talking about on the show is there's one agency in the entire federal government that knows how to tell its story. And that's NASA. NASA for since the 60s has had the budget to go to NASA dot gov. It's the coolest website you'll ever go to. There's new articles every day.

They like hire writers. They've got video. They've got photos. Go to the USDA. Go to FDIC. And it looks like a website from 1998. Right. They don't know how to tell that story, but they they know that that's a problem. And so when we called them and said, hey, we want to tell the story of your agency, we want to show the work that you did. We were usually able to find someone who said, yes, that's a good idea. yes, that's a good idea. But it often took me getting on the foot with the FDIC. I eventually had to get on a Zoom call with about 15 people from the FDIC, including the folks who reported to the chairman and say, here's what we want to do. We want to show how cool this is. And I could finally see them go, oh, OK, we understand it. And then things sort of fell into place.

But it was a lot of work. Do you think if you hadn't had the Obamas behind you as, as a production team, that it would have been harder? I think everything would have been harder if we hadn't had that. Honestly, it would have been harder to sell the show in the first place, you know, because, you know, that's that's the reality of Hollywood is, you know, having that having that big name behind you helps make everybody more confident. In the case of the actual agencies. Yeah. When we were able to say, hey, we're doing this in connection with the Obama's organization that did help open the doors, because I think all the folks in the government knew. help open the doors because I think all the folks in the government knew, all right, this is a, no one's going to fuck us over here. You know, like they're not going to come in with bad intentions trying to, you know, catch us out. And, you know, this is not, remember like what the Daily Show used to do in the mid 2000s where they would go and, you know, sort of, sort of prank everybody, go under false, you know, false pretenses

and sort of make people look bad. And I had to tell everyone on the phone, I'm not going to do that. I'm not that kind of comedian. I'm going to go and have the experience, you know, in a straightforward way. And they sort of knew that's, the Obamas are probably not going to screw me

over here either. Now, this is a show that is still highly critical to federal government and is not, you know, the Obama sort of institutional voice we're doing. You know, these are our own ideas from the writers rooms. And there's a lot of them that, you know, conflict with, you know, the sort of message that the Obamas might spread and, you know, are, again, highly critical of the government. But we really made an effort when we were with those agencies to be very clear about what we were doing and to not, you know, not mislead them at all and do it in a really responsible way. Even though there might have been segments elsewhere in the show that, you know, those PR people might not have liked as much. You know, we were very honest and straightforward with them, which is how we like to do things when we're producing a TV show. So there were two moments of glaring honesty that I quite liked. One was when you were actually criticizing the Obama administration. And you looked a little queasy while you were doing it, but you did it anyway. You look like you look like someone's going to come and shoot you in

the back of the head at any moment while you're doing your stand up. But you were actually criticizing the Obama administration. You're doing it, you know, but it was, and I thought that was great. And the other was your admission that you were not always as buff as you are now. That was a brave admission. I mean, that you could just let everybody think that you were this ripped guy. You'd always been as ripped as you are now, but instead you actually came clean and said that you used to be like a pudgy little comedian. I sense that I'm being roasted here. I'm certainly not ripped now.

No. No. And I, you know, and I do wonder how good I'd look and how handsome people would think I was if I had people dressing me the way you have people dressing you. Boy, you look good. I mean, and you had like 27 different looks. Yeah. It was not, that wasn't, I'm assuming you didn't do that yourself.

No, we had two different stylists on different parts of the show who did wonderful work. Right. Really, really, I'm okay by myself, but, you know, I really benefit from having the assistance of trained professionals shopping and tailoring and making everything look really nice. And, yeah, it's a it's a magic trick what they do. You know, I worry I give I give other men, you know, hair and wardrobe dysmorphia by appearing the way I do on camera. People say people always ask me, they're like, Adam, what product do you put in your hair? And I'm like, it's not a product. It's a person spends an hour on it.

Like a trained professional with a union job. Like you can't, the average person does not have access to this, you know? No, a family of four could eat a picnic off the top of your head. When you do it the way you're, it is just so perfect. Everything is just so, it's just like, it is just so perfect. Everything is just so, it's just like,

it's just, it's sculpted. It's just. Oh my gosh. Yeah, it was. But anyway, it was totally fun. And I thought, you know, Obama's performance,

you know, he was really useful. I didn't know he was, I didn't realize he was actually going to be in the thing. Yeah. It's a great way to open it and how you opened it. You don't want to spoil it for people, but that was a great way. It was a great way to open it. And I love that at the end of it,

you come back and you actually kind of grill him some. Yeah. You say, oh, the long arc of history and all that bullshit. Right. He actually laughed. Yeah. I really appreciate you saying that that was one of the most important parts of the show to me where I go off and I investigate the government for five episodes. I come back disillusioned and I want to talk to him about how do we actually change the government when it does so many things that hurts us, when it doesn't help us the way we need it to.

And that was like a real crisis for me when working on the show. I actually was wrestling with those questions. And I actually wanted to ask him those questions, you know, because as I say to him on the show, his election was like a really powerful moment in my own political awakening in my 20s. You know, it was hope and change. And then here we are, you know, a decade and a half later. And, well, some of my expectations have, you know, were not fulfilled.

And yeah, it was honestly things that I have always wanted to ask him. And I did have to steal myself. I did feel a little bit queasy because, you know, it was, I put myself in a vulnerable spot doing it, but I really wanted to ask him that. And I also wanted to get him off of the,

look, he's such a masterful speaker, but we have heard him speak about these things so many times. He's got his groove that he runs in and he's great at it, but point a camera at him and he'll do it for six hours without stopping. And it'll be hope and change the long arc of history. And I wanted to just give him a little shove, shove him off of that a little bit and say,

no, come on, man, be real with me. Like, aren't you frustrated? Like, why have these things not actually come to pass? Like what the fuck is going on? And he was, I, he went with me there. And I could tell he was pissed at me, but you know. Yeah. You know, it's funny when he gets, when he gets a little irritated, the way it looks on his face, he looks a little queasy. He's almost like seasick because he's not used to feeling those feelings. He's able to go through his day, and it's mostly pleasant all the time. And he's really good at making it so.

And you briefly made it unpleasant for him. Yep. and you briefly made it unpleasant for him. Yeah. And I could see him thinking, all right, he's thinking like six things at once. He's thinking, I'm actually a producer of this show. I shut this down. He's throwing this bastard out of my kitchen. But of course, that's not what he's going to do. And then he's thinking, this guy's probably right,

even though this is unpleasant for me. It's like a visit to the doctor. guy's probably right even though this is unpleasant for me it's like a visit to the doctor that's probably good for the show to have to grapple with this stuff in an honor you know you know in a raw way that i don't really want to do on camera uh but let's get it over with uh like i don't really want to do this for that long um yeah on the other hand when he's actually performing like it's just a comic bit he clearly is good at it oh my god he he makes me so angry as a comedian because he is too funny for being good at so many other things right obviously he's a great politician like he's at at the work of doing politics he is you know a talent like bill clinton or judge w bush or any

of these guys you you watch someone like that work and you're like, wow, they're so good at that, but he shouldn't be that fucking funny. I'm a, I'm a comedian. I used to get mad watching him do the white house correspondence dinner because like Seth, I remember he followed Seth Meyers and he blew Seth Meyers out of the water. And I was like, if I was Seth Meyers, I would be so mad because I've spent nothing but Mike. I was spent 30 years doing nothing but trying to get good at this one thing. And this guy's the president and he's better at it than me. Like what a pain in the ass that is. Yeah. He, no, he's, he's, he's very good at it. And you think of it as it's funny because it's, it's not obviously something to be these, these little, I mean, it's like

shooting TV commercials. You see this with athletes, like some of them can actually really do it. And it's the, that's kind of in the moment and it's a shooting TV commercials. You see this with athletes. Like, some of them can actually really do it. Yeah. And it's kind of in the moment. And it's a facial expression. It's a kind of acting ability. And some of them just can't. Yeah. And it's true with presidents, too.

And he really can do it. And that really, you put it to good use. Yeah. In the very beginning, his ability to do this. Last question about your show. Please. We can talk about whatever you want, but yeah. Has, have they seen it? Have the Obama seen it? I, my understanding is they have seen it.

You know, we, we, apart from the interview that we did with him, we had one or two phone calls during the writing process where he, you know, had read the scripts and he wanted to give some thoughts, which were very gracious. He was like, take or leave the thoughts that I have. And, you know, ask me whatever questions you want. And we took some of the thoughts and we left a bunch of them. And that was the end of it, which again, it was to his credit that he let us do it the way we wanted to. They didn't ask you to take anything out. What did you say? They didn't ask you to take anything out. No. I mean, there were a few points where, you know, when we talk about, for instance, drone strikes on the show, where he said, here, I think about this differently than you do. Here's my point of view. And I had to say to him in, you know,

no uncertain terms, like, sir, we disagree about this. And he was like, all right. And that was the end of it. If you'd asked me, having watched the whole thing, where he would have winced and said, God, I wish I could get them to do something different there. It wouldn't have been any of the stuff about him. It would have been you briefly lied into Donald Trump without using his name. Yeah. With the beginning of the COVID response. And were you become Donald Trump as conductor of the New York Philharmonic?

Yes. as conductor of the New York Philharmonic. Yes. And I thought that that would be his point of sensitivity, is that I don't want to use this platform to do anything that is perceived as political against a political rival or enemy. But you can't get away from it. I mean, you can't get away from it. It's just like what happened in the beginning of COVID.

Yeah, I mean, it was what we it was what we had to do because we were trying to tell the story of of how did the federal government fuck up COVID? And, you know, there had been plenty done about like, you know, the Trump with the bleach and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. That's all like sideshow stuff. the bleach and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. That's all like sideshow stuff. Our argument was that the federal government's ability to respond was largely eviscerated because of the overall project on both parties, on the side of both parties to like disembowel the federal government. It goes back to the eighties anyway.

But Trump specifically, like, you know, like didn't fill a lot of positions, fired people. And there's no way to tell the story without saying that that happened. And, you know, so what we try to do is my as a storyteller, my interest is always in telling the structural story, telling the not the individual did X, Y, Z, but that here is how the structure of our society got fucked up in a way that caused this problem. And he had a piece in the story of that structure. But yeah, we did it in a way where we're not trying to inflame anybody, but we are, you know, just trying to tell the story honestly. And you're right. I think that probably was a little bit of a, a little bit of a wince, but again, you know, when, when I started doing this show Obama's folks told me, this is your show, not his. And I held them to that the entire time.

And there were a couple of times I had to say, Hey, remember that conversation we had a year and a half ago? Remember that? Okay. So I'm holding you to that. And, you know, and, and everyone said, okay, yes, you're, you're correct. We are going to, we're going to let you do this the way that you want. Okay, so on that note, we have to take a quick break. But when we get back, I want to ask you about your work. Thank you so much for interviewing me about mine. But we'll be right back with more Michael Lewis. so michael um i'm first of all thank you so much for talking to me that was like the best interview i have done about the show so far and it's on my own podcast so i thank you for it um but i've been

a fan of your work for so long and so i want to take the opportunity to ask you about how you do what you do. Like, first of all, you know, when you were doing The Fifth Risk and there's a whole bunch of parts of the book that are about the Trump transition, et cetera. When did the book for you become an investigation into what the government is and the massive things that it does? Well, how did you where did that seed start to form and how did you follow up on it? it does. Well, how did you, where did that seed start to form and how did you follow up on it? So, um, I don't trust my memory entirely because you know what happens with books. It's funny. They, you, you grope your way into them. And then after the fact, once the book is done, you go out to promote the book and everybody wants to know how the book came about. And you end up developing this really smooth story about how it came about. But put, so keep, so this is all with an asterisk, but this is all true too.

It is true that when Donald Trump and Melania were walking up the steps of the White House to meet, to walk into the White House for the first time and the Obamas were at the top, I was in bed, just jacked up on opioids because I just had a hip surgery. So I was in a really weird state of mind. Wow. And I had the thought, how's he going to kill me? And I just thought, I thought,

why am I having that thought? Well, I'm having that thought because I'm thinking of the nuclear arsenal. I'm thinking of like, he's now in charge of this thing. And I knew in the back of my mind that there hadn't, I mean, I've been read somewhere that there hadn't really been a transition. And, um, and I started calling around, uh, and like, I just started like looking at how would I, how would I, how would I get into this? Uh, as I, it was, it was that, it was that amorphous that it was, I was just interested like that. At that point I was writing for Vanity Fair. And so I had a magazine outlet to do something small. And before I even got into it, I met this guy who you've now met named Max Steyer, who runs the Partnership for Public Service, who is devoting his life to trying to save our society from itself. And it's by trying to make the government work better.

It's nonpartisan, just like, how do we fix this freaking thing? And I got him on the phone. And I remember where I was sitting. I was in my car in the parking lot of the Claremont Hotel when I got him on the phone. And I pulled over because the first three things he said were so interesting. And we talked for like 45 minutes. At the end of it, he said, I promise you, Michael, if you just turn your attention to this, there are like six books in it. It's just that good. And everything he'd said had been so persuasive and interesting that I thought, you know, that's right. So then it became your problem. How do you go into this

place? How do you frame it? And for me, it was like the frame was the most important thing. And the frame was, for me, was it went back to how is he going to kill me? This is, among other things, our government manages this portfolio of existential risks. And it is not just the nuclear arsenal. It's like food safety and the electric grid and a weather risk. And there are hundreds of these things that can kill us. And it just hums along quietly in the background, and we assume it's just going to work. And no matter how many devastating blows it's dealt by our own idiocy. So I thought, so I thought that's how I'm going to frame it. And then I thought, well, how do you make it interesting? Well, you don't go into the defense department or you don't go into even the state

department because everybody kind of knows that like, oh, they're managing things that are really like, yeah, they could kill us. But you – so I said, I'm going to pick – I made two piles on my floor. I made manila folders for all the federal agencies, Department of Agriculture, Commerce, so on and so on. And I divided them into two piles, obvious and non-obvious. Like Treasury, kind of obvious, managing like financial, especially on the back end of the financial crisis and so on. And then I had a pile of non-obvious things. And I almost picked at random from that pile, like Department of Agriculture, things that I had no idea what they did. And I had no idea if they were managing existential risk,

I'm going to go in and figure out what happens if we get rid of this place kind of thing. Yeah. And so that was the broad conceit. And then it just led me where it led me, and it was so easy to do. It was so easy to do because there were probably 10 different ways to do it well. Yeah. And I just grabbed the first in each case. Now, this is the thing that really – and this is the, I'm sorry to drone on and on.

No, please. I'm making your life either really hard or really easy. Easy. But the thing that shocked me and shocked me. So the first, so the fifth risk is, it's a couple of things I wrote for Vanity Fair plus another 40,000 words. But the first thing was the Department of Energy. I wrote a piece about the Department of Energy for Vanity Fair. Not an obvious subject for the audience, right?

Yeah. And it was like the most read thing in Vanity Fair in 10 years. Wow. Anything. I'm trying to think if there was some sex scandal piece that was even close, but they kept the metrics. Right. And it was just like, oh, my God, you go fishing for like trout, you catch a shark. And it was just like, well, it's on the line. And what was the thesis of that piece? Well, the thesis was, well, Donald Trump walked into the government, said it was all

stupid and he could learn everything he needed to know in an hour. And he fired his transition team. So I didn't even bother to know what the government did. Didn't install people in the jobs you need to do install. You need to fill so on and so forth. Let's look in this place, we think, and put in charge of the Department of Energy, Rick Perry, who would call for its elimination when he was president. Yeah, that's the dude who's running the, who quickly, quickly backpedals in front of the Senate and says, I didn't know what I was talking about. Because among other things, the Department of Energy does is manage the nuclear arsenal. So it's sort of like, OK, so don't you think, I mean, he should have been disqualified,

but he was, anyway, he got put in charge of the thing. And I think that when people had that same sense of existential dread that I was having, and they themselves had no idea, like me, what went on inside the Department of Energy, and it was this, oh, shit moment, we better start paying attention. And it was a romp. It was fun to write. It wasn't dull to read. It was, I could, and as I said, there were 10 different ways to do it. So I think that was, you know, that was the thing that shocked me. It was like, oh, it isn't just me who feels this way. And I, why should I, there's no reason I, Michael Lewis should be the one writing about the federal government. I mean, it's like

not in my wheelhouse exactly. It was a weird choice of subject matter. And I just thought, wow, I've got this whale by the tail. And then the question was, it's probably the same question you faced in your show. You have actually more budgetary constraints than I did. But where to end? I mean, I could have written eight books like this. Max was right that I could have. I picked three departments, the three that I knew that I eight books like this. Max was right that I could have.

I picked three departments, the three that I knew that I thought nobody would know. But there were three more right behind it. Like, do you know what the Department of Labor does? Not really. Do you know what the Department of Transportation? I started to get interested in these things, actually interested. Like if Pete Buttigieg called and said, Michael, come spend a month with me in the Department of Transportation, I'd have a hard time not doing it because it seems like one of the most exciting things.

Yeah. I mean, we didn't we didn't cover the Department of Transportation on our show. You didn't cover it in your book. But now if you look at the infrastructure bill, people describe Pete Buttigieg as now one of the most powerful people in the country because he's in charge of distributing what trillions of dollars of infrastructure. Yes. And and he's he's got a trillion dollars to spend. And you just know that there are things that are going on there that have huge effects on our lives. Yeah. And you never read anything about it. But to the extent you read about it, it's, oh, someone screwed up inside the Department of Transportation in some way or other.

It's usually oh, someone screwed up inside the Department of Transportation in some way or other. It's usually some kind of trivial thing. But you don't know. I mean, there are a lot of really smart people who are there on a mission and are paying no attention to media or anything else. They're just on their mission. Yeah. And when you go on a mission with someone, it ends up being great material. Oh, my gosh. So I was really surprised by

how the audience responded to the work. I don't know about you, but I often have this where I'm a little off in either in judging what the enthusiasm of the audience is going to be, both directions. Sometimes I think they'll be more interested than they actually are, and sometimes I think they'll be less, and how they interpret it. I'm not a perfect judge of the market generally. But this might have been the time I was most off.

Like, oh, my God. have been the time I was most off. Like, oh my God, people, there's a, and this gets back to like, why more of this kind of journalism documentary stuff isn't done. Why does the government have such a PR problem? Because the stories are actually quite good. Yeah. The thing that is strange to me about this show is that, like I said, this show would not have been made if the Obamas had not optioned your book and had a deal with Netflix, right? Where we could then go, I pitched them, then we went into Netflix and said, here's our idea for the show about the government. If it had been me all by myself saying, hey, I've got an idea for a show about the government,

here's what I'd like to do. I don't have Michael Lewis. I don't have the Obamas, right? The show would never be made. Netflix would have laughed me out of the room. They would have said a show about the government. Why would anybody want to watch a show about the, and I'm, I'd sit there and go, I think people are generally interested in, you know, understanding the world around them. This is full of incredible stories. I'm going to introduce you to incredible characters. I'm very skilled. I'm going to make it exciting. And they would say, fuck you. Like do something about, you know, if it's not a nature documentary or a true crime documentary, nobody will watch it. That's their belief. And I think they're wrong. Right. Um, now I partially think they're wrong. Cause I've read, you know, I had, I had read your book and

I was, I was fascinated by this and other people will be too, but it is weird that we have, you know, we have sort of wrong beliefs about what people will find interesting. Yes. If you tell the story right, people will find anything interesting like you and I do. That's right. I think that's right. And and so it gets back to my mystification about why this problem exists. Yeah. Because you've got, and the government, as you point out, it's partly to blame. It's in, but it's,

it's partly, it's in this defensive crouch, not the politics, not the politicians, the government. It's in this defensive crouch and it's in this defensive crouch because it's been the subject of rhetorical attacks for 50 years.

I think that's part of it. It's in this defensive crouch because it's been the subject of rhetorical attacks for 50 years. I think that's part of it. And in the defensive crouch, it just assumes you or I walking in the door means it harm. And so they just never get to the – everything I've ever written, everything that's any good, requires some degree of trust between me and the people I'm writing about. Otherwise, you know, I can write from a distance essays that take people apart, but they're usually kind of false because I just, you know, get them on the page, requires a great degree of trust that they just generally aren't used to granting and have maybe had bad experiences with granting. But isn't this odd? In most other societies, the government could guarantee that you weren't going to screw

them because if you screwed them, they'd put a bullet in the back of your head right right it's right it's a it's a kind of a it's sort of like a tribute to the weakness of our government that they they're terrified of you or me that they won't let us close um and that this and and in almost i can't think of another society that english maybe just a bit but but not really aware. It's a democracy where the people have gotten in the habit of viewing their own government as in some way the enemy. The government that actually they put in place, and it works at their discretion, and so on and so forth, that the American people come to have persuaded themselves some of the government is there is somehow their enemy as opposed to their servant and um and the

government has internalized this like yeah these people who are coming in from the outside they think we're the end they don't like us yeah and it makes it hard it just makes it hard to get to the point in the relationship where you can actually tell the story. And I like that you did something I didn't do or I didn't do much of. I'm trying to think. I must have done some of it because how can you wander around the government for as long as I did without being – I was really focused on people. I was really focused on some particular characters. Yeah.

on some particular characters. Yeah. And I wasn't... In every one of your shows, at about minute 16, you step back and say, okay, what we saw was just great. It's really cool they're doing this and that. It's unbelievable these people you just met.

But look how screwed up this is, too. Yeah. Look how dysfunctional it is in places. And I didn't do that in the, in the first, in the fifth risk. I did it in the premonition. Yeah. I did it. I did it in the follow-up.

Yeah, I did. And I kind of, I hinted to you, I was about to do that. And then I didn't explain to you what I was about to do. You remember, I don't know if you remember this, but we were talking about it. Yeah, we had a conversation as you began writing that book. Yeah. I began writing that book and I said, you know, this is going to be different. This is going to sound like it's almost contradicting the fifth risk.

It wasn't. It's sort of like this is the response you get when you treat the government the way you treated it for the last 50 years. But there are deep structural reasons in the government why this thing is screwed up. And it's not just Trump. And it's not just Trump. But that was my my it turned out to be my minute 16 where I turned the audience and said, you know, this is not all rosy picture. It should be it should be a rosier picture than it is. Yeah. Well, my belief is you have to give. I felt, you know, as a television host, I have to give people that moment, first of all, because it wouldn't be doing justice to the truth if I said, hey, the USDA is all sunshine and roses, right? The USDA does some incredible work, including incredible work we didn't even talk about on the show, like how much money they put into developing rural areas, schools and roads and things like that. But also the USDA

is in charge of managing our food system. And I don't think you can look around America and say we have a great food system based on our health outcomes as a result of the food that we eat. And so, like, well, we have to talk about that. But also to do justice to people's emotional truth that, as you say, people know that there are some things that don't work well about the government and they have cynicism. And this is a show that's intended to be anti-cynical. And this is a show that's intended to be anti-cynical, but we can't, you know, be, if we just tried to do pro-government propaganda, people would cotton onto it instantly. And they would say, I'm not, I'm not swallowing this shit. And so we had to, you know, meet people in an honest way. But the thing that we really tried to do, and this is sort of one of my missions as a communicator, is the characters are wonderful. And we focus on a lot of wonderful characters as you did in your book, you know, your writing is so you get,

you get such clear characters from it. I can really tell that that's sort of a North star for you, but problems are usually not caused by characters. They're usually caused by structures, by systems. Yeah. By systems. And so a big part of my work is I try to expose the system for what it is and make it visible to people, because that means that once it's visible to people, you can say, hey, if we just adjust the system, it'll be hard. But if we adjust the system instead of incentivizing X bad thing, we incentivize Y good thing or we give more democratic control of this infrastructure, whatever it is, then we can actually solve the problem. I don't know. Or conversely, if you make it much easier to assassinate people from the air without putting American lives at risk. Exactly. What are you going to do? You're going to assassinate a whole lot more people. Yep. And that's the problem with drones. A lot of people

talk about drone strikes and they say, well, it's the individual person ordering the strike. And those people do bear responsibility. But it is a systemic outgrowth of our development and embracing of this technology that caused that to happen. And that was that's the bigger issue. So one thing I'm really interested in, though, is that we talked to you at the beginning of you writing your follow up book to the fifth risk about COVID-19 and the government's response. We also did an episode about the government's response and where it went wrong. But you and I told completely different stories on what that actually was. disemboweled and specifically the slow death of our local public health agencies around the country that in every single city and state, there's a local public health agency that has likely had its budget cut over and over again for the past 20 years. And that's a big part of the story.

You told a completely different story about the CDC and the failures of the CDC. And I thought I found that was so fascinating. Well, the main character of my book was a local public health officer. So in that sense, I was doing this. I was telling the same story. Yes. And you hinted that to us on the phone. Yeah. And and and I knew that the trick to the premonition was going to be taking this character in the public health system who is the lowest of the low, the local public health officer and making her the highest of the high in the book, like flipping the status structure and showing that the people who actually knew that we shoved the problem

of dealing with communicable disease down so far in our health status structure because it wasn't, you know, because we thought we'd solve the problem, you know, measles and polio and malaria and all that, they're gone. They're in the back. They're not completely gone, but they aren't front of mind for anybody. We can afford not to fund the people who are doing this. We can afford not to make them important people. And, um, but they were the people who knew how to do, how to deal with the problem. And we were still kind of incapable of listening to them because, because they, they don't, they weren't important people. But so I did tackle that head on.

I did also, but they led me. So it was the local public health officers. It wasn't my kind of like grand idea, led me to the conclusion that the CDC long before Trump had abandoned its role in actual battlefield command when there was a disease outbreak, when there were little local disease outbreaks that you and I never see. It's multi-drug resistance tuberculosis in the poor Mexican neighborhood in Santa Barbara kind of thing.

It's terrifying. I mean, people die. I mean, people die. That when that gets controversial at all, the CDC would find ways to shove all the political and social risk onto the local health officer in the most shocking ways. And so the health officers were cynical about the CDC well before Trump was elected. In fact, Charity Dean, the health officer who was my main character, said we really should stop calling it the Centers for Disease Control. We should start calling it the Centers for Disease Observation and Reporting because that's what they do. It's essentially an academic – it's turned itself into an academic institution. And its glory days are really quite a long time ago.

And when you dug into it, it wasn't hard to find so the question was like well why had it ever had glory days like what was what had changed in that place yeah and when you talk to the really old timers like the people who are in their 80s now who bit who'd been there forever they were all very clear about when the culture of the place started to change. And it was Carter to Reagan administration. And it was a combination of a mistake that had been made during the Carter administration in addressing what looked to be a coming flu pandemic and the Reagan administration politicization of the institution around research having to do with HIV, a desire for more political control. And so what they had done is in the early 80s, had made the CDC director a political

presidential appointee rather than a career civil servant. And that has huge effects, just in the tone of the way the person does the job, because a career civil servant, a permanent government person, the president can't just fire them for no reason. They have their own kind of ability to defend themselves. Like Anthony Fauci, for instance. There you go. You want to see a career civil servant, and what the effect of being one is, Anthony Fauci versus Robert Redfield, who you probably, you know, most people don't even remember who should have been running this thing, the pandemic. The guy with the Amish beard. The guy with the Amish beard who just screwed it up

every which way, but had the Trump White House on his shoulder and could be fired, you know, with a phone call. And what this does, Max Steyer makes this point, and it's a very powerful point. We've done this across the government. We've turned lots of jobs, the management jobs that used to be career jobs into presidential appointee jobs. And it has a whole bunch of negative knock-on effects. One is, it takes now so long for the Senate to confirm these presidential appointees that the average person who's running, I don't know, the Department of Commerce or the CDC or whatever the job is, is there for 18 months. And in some cases, these places have 100,000 employees. I mean, there's no way in 18 months you're going to do any.

You don't even understand what goes on there. It takes me almost 18 months to write a piece about it. Took me three years to make this show. There you go. So the idea that you're going to come in and be effective in managing this place, when everybody in the place knows you're going to be gone in 18 months, that's one bad thing. The second bad thing is you're being picked partly because of your political loyalties or your political feelings rather than your actual aptitude. And so once that happens, you are, at the very least, you're limiting the pool that you pick from to run these places

to people who happen to agree with you on some political issues. And that's a dumb way to fill these jobs because most of the mostly there are they're not really that political a lot of it is just like do you know your shit and can you run things competently yeah um so that happens um and and the the the third is that the white house gets itself in the position of like micromanaging or trying to or being able to screw up a response, which they did. And the Trump White House did screw up the CDC. The CDC helped.

And so that finds its way. The story I tell is that. It's like the deeper roots of this problem and how you could see what was going on, the rot in the roots being expressed in what was happening at the local level, even before the pandemic. And, and anybody who was sort of trying to manage disease at the local level would have told you we have a problem if't have a system. We have 3,000-something local public health officers with various degrees of authority. The CDC has a kind of moral authority over them, but doesn't actually control them. And people have lost trust in the CDC. Yeah. So, so many of these problems are structural, and they seem hard to fix.

Like, okay, so if the problem is the political appointees, which everything that you've described is a big problem, it's stuff that we talked very briefly about on the show. But, you know, it's like just bureaucratic issues. Right. That like the person who you install takes too long to appoint and then they're not there for long enough. And then all the people working under them are like, I don't have to listen to this motherfucker. They're going to be gone in a year and a half. Like, I'm going to keep doing my job. Right. motherfucker, they're going to be gone in a year and a half. Like I'm going to keep doing my job. Right. So, okay. You say instead, what if every agency was run by an Anthony Fauci was run by a career civil servant who is not that easy to remove? Well then hold on a second. What if, what happens when one of the agencies starts getting fucked up?

You get J. Edgar Hoover, the FBI. Right. So there's an example, J. Edgar Hoover becomes more powerful than the president and the president can't remove J. Edgar Hoover even if he wants to. So there is a balance. There's no question that there is a balance. And what you probably want is at the very top of these institutions, like it's understood that there are renters rather than owners, that that the people the very top you probably do have presidential appointees but right underneath them is our layers of permanent people who who are actual public figures themselves who have an a bit who who you know are going to be there for

for the long haul which is it's just tipped too much in one direction it's true that you you wouldn't want the president having no ability to run the government. That would be dumb. But you don't want 4,000 presidential appointees either. And so it's just a matter of, this is a matter of, it's not a clean, perfectly clean solution. It's just clearly we've tipped too far in one direction. So, and this is, but this is just like one of the, when you start going, if you made me God and let me go try to fix the federal government, that's just one of the four or five things that, I don't know if you noticed this when you were wandering around. But, and in some ways you saw, you filmed some exceptions to this rule. It's amazing how old our federal government has gotten.

Max points to that. He says, like, they're now six times in information technology, the people who fix your computer, they're now six times more people in the federal government over the age of 60 than there are under the age of 30. That's a recipe for disaster. I mean, those people, I don't even know, people over the age of 60 don't even use their phones. That should be a young person's job. And we haven't replenished this workforce. And that speaks to a much deeper problem. It's ceased to become an attractive place for ambitious young people to go work. And you need to fix that problem. You need to make, like, this is, you're helping. Like, show how interesting this is. You're 20 years old and you get to run the world's satellite system. You know, the world's GPS system depends on what you're typing into your keyboard. But it's, they're like, there are these systemic issues that really need to be talked about.

And I'm surprised in our politics, especially in the wake of COVID, that we aren't talking about them, that we still haven't. Nobody's really talking about them. Yeah, it's such a big problem. And one of the things that made me feel really positive, and one of the reasons I hope the show is anti-cynical, and I think you probably found this too, is when we started going to these places, we met at every single agency these incredibly committed public servants who really give a shit and they're doing it just because they care about it. The FDIC blew me away. Right. That like everyone there. First of all, in the episode, they all look incredible. They're all dressed to the nines that, you know, they're very conservative bank people, but they're just like, you know, they're like, so there's there's such awesome professionals. They look straight at us. And now I'm sure they dressed up a little bit for the camera, but you got the sense they dress that way every day, too, you know.

And then, you know, this guy, Tyler, who who was the FDIC worker who helped me showed me how they shut down a bank. who helped me, showed me how they shut down a bank. This guy, so professional, so compassionate to the people that he's working with, even though he's, you know, he's saying it's a bad day for them because I'm shutting down the bank, but I try to soften the blow, you know, and he really gives a shit about the public purpose. He really is doing it for the American people. And this is a guy who could make 10 times as much working for a bank. And maybe, maybe 10 years from now, he will go work for a bank because he'll,

and he'll go cash in. But right now, I don't know how much he makes, but he's, he's not making bank money. He's making government money. And that is the competition that people working for the government have. But,

you know, at the same time that so many of them had a smile on their face, the guy who flew me through the hurricane, you know, the veterinarian at the USDA. Now, the people of the USDA, that's a really rough job and there's not a lot of glory there. But, you know, Dr. Angela Brokman, who I talked to, she was like, yeah, I love cow diseases. I love cow diseases and I get to see so many of them. And so my hope is that some people watch this show and they say, you know what, maybe, maybe I could do some cool work for the government. You know what I mean? And the health insurance is great when you work for the government. That's a,

that's a bonus too. Yes. You know, this is, this is true. And it is, you make a point with that woman who loves, who loves dead animals. And it's a really true, it's an interesting point that there are, you never know what people are going to be passionate about. And there are ways to express all kinds of interesting passions inside the federal government. There are lots of weird, what it is, it's it's like and there's only one place where we really need it but the effect of it is massive in that institution um and it's it's fun to stumble across it and i you see you your point that you keep meeting people who are kind of like basically happy in their jobs yeah it's because their job has a real purpose you know they they it's not a bullshit job it's a real job and really important and it's not a bullshit job. It's a real job and really important. And it really matters whether they're at work the next day or not,

not just for their bank account. And that's that's very that's that's gold in life to find that kind of job. And there are a lot of those jobs there. Well, one of the reasons I love talking to you is because you are clearly a man who loves his job. You clearly get great fulfillment in it. And you are in a wonderful position as far as storytellers go, where you can basically write about whatever you want and have it be published. And it'll do better or worse than your previous book, but people are going to get it and read it. You're in a fortunate position. I find myself to be in a fortunate position in many ways as well. But I'd love to know, just to wrap us up here, like, since you

have that sort of really broad freedom to go wherever you want, how do you choose your next project? And what are you sniffing around about now? I'm really curious, insofar as you feel like saying. Sure. So it really is pretty accidental how i stumble into the books it really is i met someone who said something that interests me that led to this that led to that and yeah and it just it never see and i find something that never ceases to be interesting i mean that's what happened with the fifth risk that's what happened with the premonition yeah money ball that's what happened with The Premonition. Moneyball, that's what happened with The Big Short. The deeper you look, the more interesting it is. Yeah, just that my curiosity

doesn't die at some point. And I've just found another subject. And it's... It's... I don't want to really talk too much about it, because it's much better. But what led me to it in the first place,

it was totally accidentally. I collided with a character. And he was young. The main character is 29 years old. And the first thing that got me going was the genuine hopefulness and idealism of the character. It was not ill-founded. He was really very, but I thought, this is something I want to explore. How a young person in today's world preserves the kind of hopefulness that I had when I was 25 or 26 years old. And I've got, it's a fascinating, I'm going to make it boring if I say any more about it. It's just like, but I, when I know it's, here's what I, the feeling I always have before something I write that ends up being any good. It's always the same. It's, I am just like, without doubt about the thing. Like, I'm just, I'm really consumed by it. Like, I'm really interested.

by it like i'm really interested but also i get to a point in every case where i can see that if i don't write it no one will because i have some privileged access or i i'm seeing it in some way yeah and so i start to feel kind of obligation towards the thing um so like it's very unlikely that i would write a book about a celebrity just because everybody's paying attention to the celebrity already uh it i i'm i tend to get really excited when i find a character or a situation where i think nobody's really paying attention to this but this is really important yeah and and i have access to it so i'm gonna go do it because no one else is gonna do it and i um and that really that gets me out of bed in the morning it's just great it's It's so much fun. And with time, because I've now done it often enough, the people I'm writing about

have a much better sense of what I'm trying to do than they did 20 years ago because they've read the books. And so they kind of chip in in ways that make it a lot easier. They sort of like, okay, we understand that you need to go through our underwear drawers. We can just like agree that it's weird, but we're just

letting you in. We know that eventually we're going to let you in. We can skip stages one, two, three, four, and five. Just come on in because you're going to get in anyway. And it's kind of fun when you get to that point. Your, your subjects ever get together and compare notes. They ever have a reunion about everyone who Michael Lewis has written about like, oh yeah, when Michael, when Michael came to me, what is weird having that guy following you around for half a year, isn't it? But all the book came out pretty good. Like, I just think it's, I wonder what it is like from their perspectives to, to's funny you say this

because with premonition charity dean she was in the first place um though very willing to let me in after we'd spent uh a couple of sessions together was so weirded out by the idea that she was going to be the main character in a book by me. And she's going to be even more weirded out when there's going to be a movie. And so everybody's going to know her. I mean, she's just going to be, and she's going to be Erin Brockovich, you know, it's that kind of thing. And she, that she said, I said to her, would it help you to talk to people I've done this with before?

her, would it help you to talk to people I've done this with before? And so she got in touch with Billy Bean and with Brad Katsuyama, who's the main character of a book I wrote called Flash Boys. And they became kind of, they kind of held her hand through it. Like whenever she was feeling weird, she wouldn't call me. She'd call them and say, is this normal? He's like, he's in my underwear drawer. Is this normal normal. And, uh, and so, and so that was that, that it's, I use the characters that I've written about to make the characters I'm about to write about comfortable. Uh, you can talk to them, talk to them. Yes. They'll tell you how weird it is and how uncomfortable it is just, but they all, but they, you know, they also just leave him alone. Like the big thing is, which this comes up some is like, they also just leave him alone.

Like the big thing is, this comes up some, is like they all think, they don't know how this is supposed to go down. Like, are they supposed to like read what I write before it's published? I never let anybody do that. Not until it comes out.

And then they check their quotes or will they let me into this part of their life? All those questions. And it's really helpful to have a pool of people who can say look i just gave him a hall pass in my life and and i didn't know what was going to happen and he didn't tell me what he was writing and uh and he's not doing anything that he's not saying he's doing he yeah i i try to explain like why i'm interested in this and how I'm seeing this. And if I'm wrong, go ahead and tell me.

And so they said the characters get together. They get together that way. When I say, call this person, they'll help you. They'll help you understand what it is you're feeling. That is so funny to me that they're holding each other's hands, that there's this very small fraternity slash sorority of people who have been written about by Michael Lewis who have had this singular experience

and need to consult with each other. I love that image. And they remain in my life, all of them. You know, so I don't ever really, do you ever see the movie Big Fish? I know I have never seen it, actually. It's a wonderful movie. Peter, Albert Finney, Albert Finney.

I can buy John August. Yeah. Yeah. And and it's about a traveling salesman from the South. And he goes off into the world. And it's from told from the point of view of his son at this guy's funeral. And the joke of the story, what's moving about the story, is the father would always come back with these wonderful stories about these exotic characters he'd met. This eight-foot-tall man, or these Siamese twins or these, and he would just, these exotic characters.

And as the boy got the kids, the dad would tell these stories to when he came home, believe them when they were little, but as they grew up, the dad was just telling us stories, but dad has just now died. And all these characters come from all over the world and show up at the dad's funeral. And they were all, they're all real. And there wasn't not long ago where i thought you know my life is kind of like that that i come back i tell my kids in my way i tell people about these people i've met and uh and it's yeah yeah yeah michael's dad's exaggerating but at my funeral these people

will show up and they'll say wow they're just like that well i'll show up at my funeral, these people will show up and they'll say, wow, they just like that. Well, I'll show up at your funeral, too, if I'm invited. You're invited. I could talk to you for a thousand years, but you're a busy guy and I should let you go. So I just, man, I love talking to you because I love the way that you, I feel like as I am, you're so driven by your curiosity and by, you know, your, your own indefatigable quest to like, understand these things, um, that it, and I really relate to the idea that you want to bring people something new as well. You want to bring them a new thought and a new way of looking at the world. Um, it's just, uh, I love your work so much and I, it's been,

uh, the, one of the pleasures of my career to be able to work with you in even a small way on this project. And it means so much to me that you that you watched it and you enjoyed it. So thank you so much. I hope it happens again. Thanks, Adam. All right. Thank you so much, Michael. Well, thank you again to Michael Lewis for coming on the show.

I was blown away by that conversation. I hope you were as well. If you want to read The Fifth Risk, the book The G Word was based on, we are going to put it on our special bookshop at factuallypod.com slash books. That's factuallypod.com slash books. As always, I want to thank everyone who supports our show at the $15 a month level on Patreon. That's Tyler Darach, Susan E. Fisher, Spencer Campbell, Robin Madison, Rachel Nieto, Paul Mauck, Nuyagik Ippaluk, Nicholas Morris, Mrs. King Coke, Mom Named Gwen, Miles Gillingsrood,

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How fun is that? I want to thank our producer, Sam Rodman, our engineer, Ryan Connor, Andrew WK, for our theme song, the fine folks at Falcon Northwest for building me the incredible custom gaming Thank you. big announcement about that very soon. Until next week, please watch the G word and we'll see you next time on factually. That was a hate gun podcast.