THE ED MYLETT SHOW - The Making Of Real Journalism w/ Megyn Kelly

Episode Date: November 30, 2021

Few people are more qualified to talk about POLITICS and NEWS MEDIA in America than this week’s guest, MEGYN KELLY. For the past several years, most of us have watched the stunning transformation of these parts of our society from the comfort of our living rooms.  But this week, Megyn gives us a NEWS INSIDER’S VIEW on some of the most high-profile political events and personalities in recent history. It’s part of a larger look inside who Megyn Kelly is and how she has dealt with being a CHARISMATIC media figure over the past two decades, including dozen years spent at Fox News and later, on NBC’s The Today Show.  She remains in the public eye through her current daily podcast on SiriusXM. During her broadcasting tenure, politics and the news game became FULL CONTACT SPORTS, and Megyn often climbed in the ring to take on heavyweights in bouts that gained her the reputation of asking tough questions and demanding HONEST answers.  Perhaps the best known of these was her ongoing back and forth tussles with then-presidential candidate Donald Trump.   Megyn’s CANDID take on the CURRENT STATE OF JOURNALISM will confirm what many of you already suspect.  You’ll want to hear what she says about BIAS and how it rapidly accelerated during the Trump era. You’ll also appreciate her insights about President Trump, the nature of identity politics, and how the public reacts to manipulative news media in and out of their own echo chambers. On a personal level, Megyn talks about her SUPERPOWER and what she attributes to much of her success.  She also offers advice about HOW TO RAISE WELL-ADJUSTED KIDS and what’s worked best for her as a mother of three children. We spend a fair amount of time on a couple of essential but often overlooked questions in our lives.   Is Megyn happy? She is. And what does it take to make her happy? It’s a simple answer, but much like the rest of who she is, Megyn’s answer is SMART and STRAIGHT FROM THE HEART. As it should be for all of us. I hope you’ll enjoy listening and learning from Megyn as much as I did. She remains an INTELLIGENT voice in a lot of important discussions going on right now.   

This is The Ed Milach Show. Welcome back to the program, everybody. I'm really honored to have this woman here today. I've been so interested in her from a distance for a long time. You guys probably best know her from Fox News or from a today show, but I have followed almost everything she's done. I think she's one of the most compelling figures on television over the last couple decades and certainly one of the smartest. And I'm really, really looking forward

to getting to know her better and sharing her wisdom with all of you. So Megan Kelly, welcome to the show. What a beautiful intro Ed. Thank you so much. I mean it. And by the way, in that introduction everyone should know that she's on serious XM channel 111 every day, noon to two Eastern. She's got a thriving YouTube channel. So if you want to find Megan, that's where you'd find her now. And I've been listening for a while. So let's get into it. I want to know about you mainly. But there's this like overriding thing as I was preparing for this. I'm like, I just have to ask you your opinion. Do you think journalism is like completely dead? Because there's been this blending,

it seems to me between commentating or editorializing and actual news people that's just sort of gotten away from us. It's so spread out now. Is it gone forever? Or am I crazy to think that? I don't want to say it's completely dead because there's still people out there

who do good investigative journalism and break big stories that we'll use. And I'm always thankful that they're out there who do good, investigative journalism and break big stories that will use, and I'm always thankful that they're out there doing it. But I think as an industry, it's dead. The fact that there are a few here or there doesn't mean the industry isn't anyway still thriving. And it's been, I mean, it's been a long time coming, but you could see the death happen under the Trump era.

You know, they were sort of teetering on the edge before he came along. And I've said before, but I really think it's the apt analogies that he didn't kill them. They killed themselves, but he was like a Kavorkian helping them along. And you think that was it? I look back even to when, you know, you were there. Fox was thriving when President Obama was in. And even at that time, I felt that getting pretty slippery during those times as well. And then they had been

a social media where you're just being fed what you already believe in these algorithms over and over again, it's like this echo chamber. But don't you think it was already happening even back at that time? Definitely. It was, it was happening on its way. And you could look back at sort of the way that the press covered Obama versus Trump. I think that's been true for a long time though Democrats versus Republicans and how the media would approach them. But the difference when Trump came on the scene was they started owning their bias, their bias. They didn't say I'm biased, but they would come out and say, here are all my opinions about President Trump and they were uniformly bad. and that was called for by journalists like Jorge Ramos of

Univision and he won he won that debate because a lot of us when he came out and said we need to call him a racist We need to call him a xenophob all the things that in his opinion Trump is and there were a lot of us saying what are you saying? That's not how journalism works You're supposed to keep your opinion to yourself. You can come at a story and be sort of open about like where you're taking people. I'm going to conclude this segment by leaving you to believe Kyle Rittenhouse should not have been charged.

But that's not the same as saying Trump is a bad man. Barack Obama is a god. Nancy Pelosi is a man. That's different where same as saying Trump is a bad man. Barack Obama is a God. Nancy Pelosi is a man. That's different where you're rooting openly for a politician you're supposed to be covering objectively. And the press completely gave up the gig when it came to Trump. They lifted the dress up, so to speak.

And once you've seen that, you can't unsee it. Yeah, but in your case, I told a lot of people you're coming on the show. And obviously, there's these opinions that my left lady got me, and he's like, oh, she's so right. And then the right lady, if you were like, does she regret she didn't support Trump more?

And I was thinking, what you actually just described is why I was such a, I don't want to call it a fan, but why I listened to you. I'm nice on every night was because I kind of got the feeling your personal opinion of Trump and sort of gone south after a lot of your interaction. Yet it seemed to me as if you were trying your best to cover him in some sort of a fair-minded way. And that even get difficult for you when I get the feeling this was not your favorite guy in the world at some point. Did you have to fight your own tendencies that way?

Yeah, I think you nailed it. I liked Trump going into the election season. I liked him a lot. We were kind of friendly. And then I didn't like the way he treated me for those nine months after that debate. And I know it was a tough question, all that stuff. It's fine. They all got asked very tough questions by me and my co-host.

But I didn't like how he wouldn't let it go and how it got very threatening and dangerous in my own personal life. And a lot of people I knew and was friends with, like, Hannity and at the time Roger Rails would go to him and say, it's really gotten out of control now. You know, she, she's had to have 24 hour security guards, armed guards, all, you know, she's getting threatened in the street with her kids. He didn't care.

And it was like, okay, I get it was a tough debate question, but you got to let it go now. You have real enemies in the press. I'm not one of them, right? Like, look at the Kelly file every night. I cover you very fairly. Most nights, I was out there defending him. You know, I hit him on some things. He went after the judge Curial and he went after the gold star family. So it's fine. I would hit him just like I'd hit anybody on some other controversies. But so yes, it was difficult because it was affecting my personal life, the way I live, the way my kids live. So yeah, I was very irritated with the upset.

But I understood my mission as a journalist and what he deserved from me on the air was for me not to make it about me. Right. And so yeah, if you would ask me back when Trump was running, what do you think of him, you know, privately over a drink? I wouldn't have said nice things about Trump. Sure. But when I go in the air, that's a totally different scenario.

You're not supposed to let it show. And I was very proud of the job my team and I did of covering him. You know, I thought we were very measured. We didn't become his sick of fans, like some people did. And we didn't become his chief antagonists, like some in the press who were supposed to be objective did. And since then, I've had a different feeling.

Personally, those feelings of aggravation have changed. You know, I've got over it. He and I made up. So that was good too. He stopped the nonsense. I went to CM've got over it. He and I made up. So that was good too. He stopped the nonsense. I went to CM and he agreed to stop and I appreciated that. And I then saw what the press continued to do to him the way he was as a leader. I mean, not his petty tweets and all that.

That's just who he is. It's not his best quality. But the way he governed, the policies he put in place. And I just saw a different kind of leader than was reflected in the tweets and the nastiness he unleashed on me. And it became easier and easier to be objective about him. And it wasn't such a struggle to cover him

in a way that was, I knew was fair. That would be instinctively fair as opposed to fighting my own internal feelings about the guy. I think that debate question is a perfect example of doing it correctly, which I believe you did. And I know you're your friend of yours, but Anderson Cooper say who I think did it incorrectly. So that debate question you asked in the creative such controversy, actually the way you couched it, the way you phrased it, people go back and watch, this is real journalism, is to say,

listen, they're going to hit you with this issue. Right. You're running, they're going to hit you with this issue. Right. You're running, they're going to hit you with this woman issue, man. This is, this is your thing, right? This is where you're the most vulnerable. How are you basically going to handle it? That's a fair question. Anderson Cooper in the debates with Biden, he's asking about his son and he says, the president

has falsely accused you of blah, blah, blah. He basically takes the objection away before he answers the question. That's bias leaking into the media in a debate in my opinion. So I just want to make sure I point that out for even my own audience who wonders. I don't think it was an unfair question at all. But I was impressed with by the way with the level of preparation, which we're going to talk about in a minute. But what did I say something on that? So I agree with you. Thank you for noting that. So yeah, if you listen to the end of that question, it was how are you going to respond to the Democrats who are likely to nominate Hillary Clinton the first woman that you are part

of the war on women? I mean, they did it to Mitt Romney because he said binders full of women, short form to I tried to recruit more female candidates in my company. But they would think what they would do to Trump with all the things in his history and indeed they did. So yeah, that's what I was trying to ask him. And the reason it became a thing and the reason viewers had this impression I was against him, I submit, was not the question itself. It certainly wasn't my coverage on the Kelly file in the nine months thereafter. It was that Trump

kept complaining. He was like a dog with a bone, he never let it go. And to be honest with you, when I spoke with him privately, he basically admitted to me, he enjoyed let it go. And to be honest with you, when I spoke with him privately, he basically admitted to me, he enjoyed the storyline. He liked stoking it. You know, that's who he is. It makes more sense now that we've had so many years of him. But, you know, I did not enjoy it. And I think I hope that fair-minded people can see now

why he was doing that, what he got out of it. And, you know, it would be open-minded to the thought that perhaps I was more fair to Trump than even he openly said. I think so too, and there's an element of it, and I don't like to talk about things this way, but there's an element of it that you were a woman asking the question as well. Had a male asked that question,

wouldn't have had the legs, I don't think, up to the story that it had, because a woman asked the question, and that's not a man-woman thing, that's just a fact. There is, I always get so caught up on these issues because I'm definitely for female empowerment. And as anybody who knows me or is watching me knows, I don't call myself a feminist. It can know it's a bunch of things that I don't agree with. But I am for female empowerment.

And Trump, he has given pretty good to guys and gals, right? And I get that. I totally get that. But that's not how the Democrats were gonna style it against him, you know? In the same way, you know, if you say like, whatever, about, you could say about a black candidate like Obama. Oh, he seems lazy.

You don't think you're gonna get blowback for being racist for saying that. Whereas if you said about a white guy, that wouldn't be the problem. You say about a woman, she's got a face like a dog, you're gonna get different blowback than if you say it about a man, right? So this is sort of where I'm going with him in that question.

But I will say, that all of this doesn't mean I'm not for female empowerment, or I didn't find it controversial that Trump had done and said all these things about women. I could see that it was controversial. I didn't particularly like him retweeting people calling me a bimbo and things like that. I didn't like that my five-year-old daughter learned what that word was from him. Things like that were irritating. So I don't, in an effort to sort of, I don't know,

swage my fans on Fox or people who love Trump. I don't want to telegraph. I abandoned my commitment to my fellow women to living in a world where we treat each other well and we shouldn't talk about each other that way. It's not that I want to word police anybody. Trust me. It's just, that's a fair game question for somebody who wants George Washington's job. Absolutely. In fact, is he actually got pretty lucky that the person in a running against was Hillary because of the history of her husband, so that wish you didn't have quite the teeth you would have had, right?

I could think of the field day I could have done it. Bill Clinton, we're running. It would have been so fun. Exactly. I'm curious. The magnitude, I would watch you. And I have a busy life. I'm curious, the magnitude, I would watch you and I have a busy life. I'm an entrepreneur. I do a lot of different things and sometimes just the weight of doing it daily, you know, weighs on me to some extent. And I would watch you, particularly when you're on Fox, and I thought every night having a burger, every night, the preparation.

And I'm wondering if just the weight of the grind of doing that impacted you and how did you energize yourself? Because there's people listening to this that they're in a career, they're in entrepreneur, they're busy all the time. Just the way it feels like they can't escape it ever, right? They're just in it all the time. They're thinking about it all the time. And just the magnitude of your job, any mistake, any error in one of these debates are on

the Kelly file every night, exposed immediately. Did it weigh on you, and were there any strategies you used to energize yourself so that you did bring your A-game so to speak every night? Well, I would say that the job itself, I loved so much, it didn't feel like work. You know, I made that course correction when I left the law and got into journalism. I love the news, and I love storytelling, and I love taking complex stories and condensing them into digestible bits. I feel like it's a public service, and I know I'm really good at it. So it's sort of your zone of genius, as they say. So I looked forward to doing that, and it didn't feel like work to me. It was fun. What I hated, what weighed on me and what ultimately led me to leave the job in addition to the bad schedule that didn't allow me to see my children was the toxicity of it, the nonstop

toxicity of it to be perfectly honest inside the building ever since I sort of didn't support Roger L's and but more more than that outside the building, you know, just constant slings and arrows and under attack from whatever your your brethren in cable news, your the media non-stop writing terrible things about you all over the tabloids, your personal life, you know, a controversy's created over everything you say, you know everything. It's like, I'll give you one example.

I got in trouble back in 2013 for saying that Santa is white. Here's what actually happened. A black woman said he's white and that should change because she found it offensive. I went on the air and said, yeah, we're talking about the commercial image of Santa. He's white, you're right. He's white and everything.

Why does it need to change? Oh, hell broke loose. I was like, I know, I realize Santa's a mythical figure. I'm not maintaining. He has, I'm saying what you're saying. I see what you see. I just don't think it needs to change. Stuff like that. It was just irritating night after night after night after night. And in the midst of all that, you're not seeing your kids. Like it just made doing the news not fun. And after a while I realized, that's bad, that's a bad sign. Something I love doing shouldn't feel not fun. I'm sure I can change it so that it is.

Yeah, a lot of pressure, especially the internal stuff with the stuff with Gretchen and then you sort of supported that. I just have to imagine it was a lot of toxicity. Did you ever feel, I've had a couple of these experiences, not a lot, luckily, because I love what you said that I'm really good at this, right? There's a confidence to the fact that you're,

that is your core genius zone, so to speak. And I asked President Obama this, so I wanted to ask you this. I asked him, I said, you ever have in posture syndrome ever, where you just, you're in a space, you're like, I don't know that I'm prepared for this. I don't know that I'm equipped for this, or just the magnitude of what's happening right now, you won't add an experience one time I was speaking

is like 50,000 people the first time I did it. And I almost floated above my body like, I can't believe I'm doing this right now. And then you kind of come back into your space. President Obama tells me, he says he's in the White House for one of the first meetings he's having and he's leaning back in his seat and he looks over his shoulder

and Abe Lincoln's pictures there. And he just hit him and he just went, what the, whoa, just for a minute, you know, you kind of, it grabs you, right? And you go, okay, I'm back in this. I do belong here. You know, it happens to every human being. Have you ever had one of those moments interviewing somebody or one of the debates where you're like, whoa, am I am I capable of this? Am I equipped with this? And did you do anything about it? So I don't think I've really doubted my ability to do the job. You know, like I've known I could do the job.

I guess I got so well known when I was at Fox and I mean, ironically, in the wake of the whole Trump thing. I almost sort of crossed over into celebrity world, you know? And I hated it. I felt like I didn't choose this. I'm not some celebrity to be sort of admired in this weird way. I can't maintain it.

You know, I'm just a regular girl from Upstate New York. I'd rather just be a gritty newswoman. I don't wanna have to look perfect all the time and be totally pulled together and never say the wrong thing. I'd much rather be my normal self as opposed to this like I don't know Sort of warrior that the left wanted to see me as you know, they painted me as a Trump foil and I wasn't And just sort of crossing over into celebrity size felt totally artificial and false and meaningless And yet it seemed to be taking over my life at the same time. I will say in general, for the course of my adult life, I have never felt like I was

that smart. And I know people use that word to describe me, you know, often, not my critics, but, you know, people who listen to me and my fans. And it's not like I disbelieved them. I guess there's a part of me that felt like I was fooling them. I was only smart enough, and they were misinterpreting it for genuinely smart.

And I never, part of it is my academic pedigree. I went to Syracuse undergrad. I went to Albany Law School, which is to be kind a third-tier law school. And I was up against all these guys from Harvard and Yale, Stanford, all these places, and I just always felt like their brains are bigger than mine. I just have to over-prepare because I just don't have

the natural intellectual gifts that they have. And truly, it wasn't at until I married my husband Doug that he was like, and he went to Duke undergrad and then he went to Georgetown. And he was like, babe, and he went to private school. He's like, you put too much stock into academic pedigree. He's like, you're totally underselling yourself and he kind of walked me back through my own history. He's like, your dad died while you were sophomore in high school.

You didn't have any parent who pushed you to study or prepare for the SAT or anything like that. You were alone in the house with the grieving mother for most of your high school years. It was a very tough time. You know, it's like I started to forgive myself a little bit for my lack of hard work and academic achievement. That's a totally diminished their accusing Albany. You know what I'm saying. I just had such a high opinion of these IVs. And it wasn't until I really started to think about it like that that I was like, you know, like the scene and the fugitive, whist-mot, what about us?

I'm smart, I'm smart too. I'm in a better place with it now. I have to tell you, when I was preparing to do this, I was struck that that's where you went to school. I thought for sure this is a Princeton grad or she went to Yale. I did. I thought that. No, and I say that because I do consider you. I mean, I don't know about IQ test, but I'm pretty sure you're higher than mine.

And I was preparing. I was thinking that that did surprise me a little bit somewhat underwhelming. It's not the right word. It was actually encouraging. I think it makes your story even more compelling. I was surprised when I was researching that. I'm curious, you're super power. See, for me, I think interesting people and successful people have this nuance that it seems to me you have, which is that they tow this line between confidence and humility. So, if I meet people, they're super overly confident of lack humility. They end up having some sort of an event that ends things for them because they just lose that ability to prepare whatever it might be. Also know a lot of people that ton of humility that can't walk into a room and own a space and hold their own because they lack that confidence.

In my case, I kind of know my limitations from an intellectual standpoint. So my super power is preparation. That's where my confidence comes from. And I think that humility to some extent of knowing what I don't have is what also causes me to prepare. What is your superpower in terms of your career? You said, I'm great at this, I know I'm great at this. You got to have some superpower. But it's not academic pedigree. You don't think your IQ, your intellectual capacity is necessarily off the charts, which I think is debatable. What do you think your genius is? I think I'm an excellent linear thinker. I think I'm a very good logical reasoner. You know, I like, I can see an argument or a story

and I can see the thread running right through it and I can separate the wheat from the chaff easily and stay on point in a debate, in a story, in a conflict, you know, I, I, I don't lose the thread, you know, I've got it, I've, and I, I just won't let go of it. My brain can see it all the way to the end. And that's why I love other linear thinkers. It's one of the reasons why I get along so well with Alan Dershowitz. When I hear him talk, I'm like, oh, yes, my brother from another mother. You know, I like people who think like I do and explain things the way I do. And I would say it's probably the thing that's led to most of my success. It's a communication ability, really. And frankly,

it's not something that you would really notice that much in school or get praised for in school because you're not really doing the explaining when you're going through school. You know, I had a talk with my daughter recently. I have three kids, 12, 10 and eight, boy, girl, boy. And my oldest son is very, very smart. He's got a crazy good memory. Grades come easily, but he studies too.

And my daughter, I would say, is more like I was back at her age. She's in fifth grade. And I think she has a self-confidence problem to some extent because she always compares herself to yates, my oldest. And she say, he's so smart. You know, tell him something one time. He remembers it forever. She doesn't have that nor do I nor do I almost people. I started walking her through I'm like yards. There are different types of smarts, you know of intelligence. And I'm like, you know, we sit around and do brain teasers. Who gets them first?

You you're always the for you beat everybody in the room. You know, who can explain us who can watch whatever a series that we watch. It's 10 hours long. We watch it over the course a couple months and recount every single thread that happened without missing a beat. You can walk us through from beginning to end. You can. No one else in the family can do that. And when we were done, she was like, this is very helpful.

I'm feeling a lot better. I love it. And honestly, it helped me with myself too, because there really are different types of intellectual gifts. And I think that ability to sort of see the thread in a story, to be a good logical reasoner, to think linearly, at least in my business, is a major asset. Yeah, I think that's one of the most important things a parent can do, by the way, just for the audience's state, is that when you have children help them identify

what their giftedness is, and then it link it to things they already do well, and they begin to believe that. So many children go through their entire life not knowing what some of their geniuses or gifts are. It could be their kindness, their beauty, their humor, their problem-solving skills, their humility, you know, their nurturing ability. It's so true. And in an addendum, make sure it's real. You know, when you talk about your ability to understand yourself, I can relate to that. I have that confidence and that humility only because I had merciless parents. Yeah. They gave it to me straight, you know, and they definitely praised me, but not for everything.

And not everything was celebrated. And I wasn't like, you suck all the time either, but if I did something wrong or bad, they'd be like, yeah, it was bad. That wasn't so good. And you're not very good at this. And I think I think a good child wants some standards. I think when you hold any human being to a standard, they deduce that you must believe of them enough to hold them to that standard.

And that's sort of embedded in us. And for me, just to share everybody, I don't have that many skills. One of them, as I read people very well, I can be with someone pretty quickly and sort of read what their needs are, what moods they're in. It's so valuable. And that's born out of the fact, my dad was an alcoholic. He's got sober, but he was alcohol, he was a little boy. And from the age of four or five, when my dad would come through that front door,

I had to read him. I had three little sisters. Is this sober dad who's gonna play catch in the backyard? It's gonna be fun. Or is this dad who's a little bit lit up and we gotta avoid him for a while? I could tell by the sound of the key in the front door. Well, that's sometimes everything's happening for us

and not to us in our lives. And for me, that seemed terrible, but it really happened for me. It's one of the main skills I've used to be successful in business and my ability to read people. Now I'm curious, quick, interesting, and I'm sure some of these skills you have are born out of different experiences when we're young as well, good and bad. If you were advising those precious children of yours about their life and their career and what they want to do, because I read this quote, it was fascinating by you, you said, just because you're good at something doesn't mean it makes you happy.

And I was in your book, actually, and I'm curious, if they asked your advice on, you know, like, mommy, which, which, when I grow up, I want to be what, what, what counsel would you give them? Because I think everyone listening to this is still growing up to some extent in their life and trying to find what makes them happy. Well, I think you have to cast a lot of lines. And I think that's probably the number one goal of, of, well, I don't want to say raising children because you want them to be ethical and moral and so on. But in terms of, rather than like making them join the water polo team so they can get into Harvard, right? Or like

you must get up straight days on every single test. I think encourage them to cast a lot of lines because what's the goal for them to get to know themselves? For them to figure out what they enjoy, yes, what they're good at, yes, that also matters. What are they gravitating toward over and over? And you aren't going to succeed in answering that question unless you put yourself out there. You got to try a lot of things.

So that's the goal. I like, right now, my husband once wrote a book, we got renamed, but he was gonna call it specialized because that's what we're doing to our kids. Like, you will be the tennis prodigy. And we're giving up like the multi-sport thing for our kids. And it's true in academics too, like math, math is your thing. You'll be a math leech, you know, as opposed to just like, well,

maybe they also like literature. You could develop that side of the brain too. That's not bad just because she's a girl, right? We've crossed over to that place. We have to abandon the things that women traditionally are attracted to because I don't know the name of equity somehow. Now we all need to be scientists. It's just BS.

So if you cast a lot of lines, you see what you gravitate toward. That's part of getting to know yourself. And ultimately, you'll use that information to make a lot of lines, you see what you gravitate toward. That's part of getting to know yourself and Ultimately, you'll use that information to make a good career choice whether you're 20 or 50 Right. Do you think that I'm curious? It's maybe it's a hard question, but I watched you at Fox and it worked You're just great at it In fact, and I'm not just saying, my favorite person who's played that role on television ever from Aurelie to Hannity to Cooper to Don Lemon, whoever you want to sort of categorize on those sort of category, I thought you were the best at it. Wow. And I watched you do the today thing, and I thought you were good at it on being candid,

but I thought you didn't seem to me, and maybe I'm wrong, as comfortable in that environment, as you did in the previous environment. So I also think, and if I'm wrong seem to me, maybe I'm wrong, as comfortable in that environment as you did in the previous environment. So I also think, and if I'm wrong, correct me, because I couldn't be wrong. But did you know that? And it isn't that part of it as well that when something just maybe doesn't feel right to you, that might not be the right place for you long term either.

Am I wrong about what I saw there when you were doing the Today Show? No. Am I right about the Fox thing? Yes. So I was like, the Fox thing was, it came easy to me. I was right where I needed to be. I knew I was great at that job.

I knew it. I also felt like eventually I needed to stretch some more muscles. Like I needed to do. I've never been somebody who can just sort of stick, you know, I gotta keep going, keep forward motion. And so part of the today's show thing was like, oh, I'll develop new muscles.

You know, it's awkward when you do that on the air. Right. So I think if I had been given the chance to stay there for five years, I think I would have gotten better at that morning show. I don't know. But I think what you were, what you were picking up on overall is that that show didn't wind up being anything close to what I thought it was going to be. And so I was like a fish out of water

because I, I hadn't even chosen to swim in this pond. You know, I thought I was going over there to do something that was a little bit of Oprah, you know, like uplifting good stories, but also still hard news. I didn't think I was abandoning hard news. And to be perfectly frank, what got what happened was we went over there and realized that stuff wasn't really rating. What the people at that hour wanna see is cooking and like fashion shows.

And at some point, you know, the people who pay the bills get to make the calls on what's going to go on the air because they wanna drive viewers and so on. And I wanted to be a team player. So, you know, that's kind of how we got to where we were. And it wasn't really that fun for me. It wasn't a natural fit for me.

I loved, loved, loved my audience there. I have to say they were so encouraging and rooted me on. And we did have a lot of really heartfelt moments that I treasure this day. But overall, it was SquarePag Round Hall. And so, treasure this day, but overall, it was square peg round hall. And so in the end, I was relieved it was over. I thought that there's just a depth to you that was being restrained during that time of day, just because I think programming for whatever reason during that time of day doesn't demand the depth that the time of day in the programming you were doing prior did.

And I think that's a, that's something for everybody in their careers. You know, you get to be able to read the room when you walk in it. And there's different elements of your strengths and personalities that apply in different places. And I watch this, you still have the same poise, the same command, the same. I think you showed a side to yourself on that show. There was more new wants than you got to show on Fox. Yeah. More emotion, those different things. But I remember just thinking this woman's got so much depth that I don't know that it's going to play at this time of day every single day. Can I tell you something?

Maybe when you were talking about how you can read people, I was thinking in my head, oh my god, I don't have this at all. Like I am the opposite of that. And maybe that would factor it in. You know, maybe I would have made a different choice if I had been able to read the room better, as you say. I think back to like, I'll give you one example. I had people on the today show

while I was hosting that nine o'clock hour. I don't know if you remember the story, but it was a guy and his wife who allegedly helped a homeless guy get, the homeless guy gave his last $20 to the woman to fill her tank of gas. And then she was like, oh my God, he's a veteran and he's homeless and I'm a help him.

And she started to go fund me and they made like hundreds of thousands of dollars. I was like, this is the nicest story. And then the homeless guy came forward. He was like, they stole my money. Well, yes. And then it turned out that the whole thing was a fraud. He was in on it. They were, well, I had the couple on my show while it was still unclear that the homeless man was also a fraud. At this point, we just thought they, they might be fraudulent. And that we're stealing his money. And they were like, no, we're trying to help him. Buh, buh, buh, you know, we watched it a little because he was a drug addict.

And I bought it hook, line, and singer. And honestly, I thought Harvey once, he was a good guy. I thought Matt Lauer was nice. I thought Charlie Rose was a beach. I thought, I mean, honestly, I never get it. My husband's always like, Meg, these are not good guys. I'm like, yeah, they're fine. So I wish I had that ability that you have.

The read the room ability, that's super interesting. I read people's ability. That is so interesting to me that you would miss that. I'd fascinating. So I don't have limited time with you, but I want to ask you, you're the best communicator that I see. There's got, this can't just be natural.

Everybody wants to communicate better. I do. Everyone I got this can't just be natural. Everybody wants to communicate better. I do. Everyone I notice. Are there things you consciously do to communicate so clearly, so well, so concisely, television communication, obviously shorter sentences, fewer words? You have to learn those compared to being an attorney. It's a different dynamic.

But have you worked on it, and is there any advice you give to people on just being a better communicator? Well, I love this saying, if I had a longer time, I would have written a short of brief. You know, you say that in the law and that does sum it up. You know, you, it takes a long time to get your story, your message condensed down to the most impactful, least worthy thing. And the only way of getting good at that is to practice it. You know, you can't practice it with the same story every day, but you can take a big book and try to condense it.

You know, we used to say, if you can't tease the story in two lines or less, it's not a good TV story. And frankly, that applies to almost everything in your life. No one has time. No one wants to listen to you for very long. So you should make the effort to condense everything in your life to two lines or less. And then if somebody's interested, you can go deeper. But you have to practice it just like anything. So read the news, read a ton of news, and then practice saying out loud. This is what the news is in one paragraph, right?

Or whatever it is your business is. You have a presentation to do, you need to understand it so clearly, so forward and back that you could just out the top of your head, spout it and it's no problem. In my business, you just have to stay steeped in the news. You have to read every day a lot so that you have a running knowledge of the story and then news tends to be incremental once you have that big base in your head, you can just easily follow the day's incremental addition. But that's probably true in most people's business. You know, so if you stay prepared and say steeped in whatever it is that you need to be understanding, you can do this, but you have to practice the communication, too. If you never have to get on TV and say it

or get in front of your boss and say it, you could literally put your iPhone in front of you and say it, just do it, say it every day, because you can't just be a good communicator unless you actually do the communicating. You mean audibly, literally out loud communicators that people in your own, I totally agree with the other thing too, is I think when you do learn a lot about some of these are salespeople or entrepreneurs or even people in the news, you have to tell people they need to know

not everything you know. And a lot of times when I watch speakers, I watch commentators on television. I just think you could say this in fewer words. There's that get to the important things. And I think that's true in presentations. I think it's true. And every area of our lives is getting better at being concise in your communication, saying a few words. I started with it. And even in this interview, it's been a couple of times I could have asked the questions with fewer words. It's just something I'm conscious of. No, just think about it. Right tight, right tight, right tight, you know, and the same when you speak,

you know, just tight, tighter than that, even tighter than you just did. Keep going. Less words. It's really good advice, by the way. I'm curious about, now I get to finish the few things on you. Do you, are you happy? And do you, this is a life question. Someone asked me this other day, I get interviewed. Do you know what makes you happy? Yes. And I've listed, I listed some things, you know, my children spending time with my family, helping other people, I really enjoy doing that.

But I don't know that I spend enough of my time doing the things that make me happy. And I wonder if I spend too much time doing things and don't bring me joy in this. So in your case, are you happy? And do you know what makes you happy? I do know what makes me happy. I think I come by that honestly,

because my mom who's such a fun character in my life, she's awesome. If you've read my book, you fall in love with Linda. But she, I'll give you the example, this is, oh god, I was in law school. So it was in 1994 or 95 around there. And I lived with her for a couple of years, because I was going to Albany Law School, and she lives there. That's where I grew up. And she's outside with my stepfather. She's gardening.

She pulling all these weeds, she planting flowers. And my mom was this like pretty high powered person within the medical system. She was a nurse at the Albany VA and moved up. She wound up becoming the head of behavioral health. So anyway, there she is in the garden. I said, ma, you really seem to enjoy that. You really like that?

And she goes, no, I really just like to watch TV and play cards. The full list of Linda. So I love that she just owns it. You know, it's not like she doesn't want to go to the museum. She doesn't give a damn about that. She's supposed to do those things. So I will say for sure for me, it's, it's being with my family by, by far. And it's one of the reasons I was so unhappy at Fox because I never saw them.

And as my kids get older, even more so, right? The kids are kind of annoying when they're really little like the toddler face was not for me. I'm more like a dad, I think, in that way. Now they can talk and interact. They're awesome, and I want to spend tons of time with them. But, but not all my time. You know, my time off between the today show and now, that was an over correction. That was too much time. Yeah. I need to work. I need to be intellectually

stimulated. I need to be with other people. I need to be sort of, you know, you know, how to say like those energetic dogs that you have to give them a job. They got to like send them out there. I need I need a job too. And then I love stories in other forms. I love TV like my mom. I love movies. I like books, but I do books on tape more than anything. I just find it's easier. You do makeup or whatever. And that'll be that'll complete the list of things. No, but I like being with friends. I'm a typical woman. I'm like interactive with other humanity is what brings me joy. Well, then I'm a typical woman too, because I very much enjoy that.

So last question, because we're going to run out of time. I enjoy you so much. I just try to like three hours with you. You know, in your life, you've accomplished a lot of things in your life, obviously. I wonder if it ever just dawns on you how much you've accomplished. But if you could go back and change something, is there something that sticks out in your head like, this is the thing I would probably change? I you've you've you've had the ability to reinvent yourself many different types. And the reason I asked the question just so you can finish with the answer is that I think most people arrive listening

to my show or watching it today in the process of reinvention. Maybe they've made a mistake they wish they could go back and change which they can't. If someone is thinking about reinventing themselves, I'm just curious what your council would be to them. And is there a misstep you made that taught you a lesson or a step you've taken that's helped you reinvent yourself that you would share with them? Well, I think you shouldn't do that. Don't reinvent yourself. That's not the way forward.

And I can honestly tell you, I have no regrets about anything I've ever done. None. And it's the way I am built, the way I think about life. It's not that I've never done anything that's, you know, not so great. It's that I embrace all of that as the ingredients that made me the multi-layered cake,

I am very tasty. And I think, why would you reject any of that? How boring you'd be if you had let a perfect life, if you wanted to do over to get past a terrible mistake or decision you'd made, it'd be such a bore. Being like a good person or like enjoying your life or being attractive to other people is not about being perfect, having always nailed it.

You know, or having the perfect pedigree, whether it's academic, relational, or whatever, it's about being interesting, right? Like, you want somebody who's like, well, you did what? Oh my god, that's fast. Like, I had an interview the other week with Jordan Belford. He's the wolf of war at Wall Street, right? He's interviewed me. I like Jordan. Oh my God. So I read his book. I did all his homework on the guy. I'm like, this guy is absolutely filthy and fascinating. He's awesome. I love talking to him. He's so open about the mistakes he made and the terrible choices he made for such a long period. That's much rather have dinner with that guy than somebody who's never

made huge errors or I mean it was going to prison He went to basic convicted felon Right, so you should embrace all of that is the stuff that makes you layered and we're spending time with and That's assuming you take the time to reflect on the mistakes you've made and layer that into right like grow Except that you're going to be imperfect every day of your life. You're gonna make tons of mistakes tomorrow as well as the ones you made already.

That's okay, that's a challenge, but it's also a blessing. You know, I was just recently talking to a woman who I won't say who it is, but she's very much in the news right now. She's going through a big crisis. And she's in tears, and she's having a rough time. And I was saying, I realize you can't see this now, but this is so good for you.

This is going to be, this is going to make you so interesting for the rest of your life. Everybody's going to want to know about this chapter. And as you get older, you'll be able to put it in the right file and take the right things from it. But don't reinvent yourself. Own it all. Own it all. Own it all. You're so much better and more interesting and more compelling and more beautiful if you own it all.

That's one of the most interesting things someone has ever said on the show and no one has ever answered it that way before. You're making me rethink it. To be honest, I wouldn't go back and change anything either. I want to grow, I want to change, but I wouldn't change anything. I would change one thing.

I wish the interview was about 30 minutes longer than that. Really enjoying this. Next time, let's do a part two. I would love to do that. And by the way, I just want to make sure that I've adequately promoted this too. You guys really should listen to Megan's show. It's on serious, which is you guys can find me all over the place now too. She's channel 111 every day, noon to two.

I enjoyed today. I want to thank you for just being such a great example, not for women, just for people. I think the way you've overcome some of the adversity you've had in your life, the way you've handled yourself through stressful situations, the way you continue to grow, and the way I just genuinely think you care about people and want to make a difference. I really appreciate and I'm grateful for the example you set. So thank you. I really do.

That means a lot to me, truly. This is like, this is the opposite of spending time with somebody on CNN. I really am. I'm absolutely enjoyed it. It's further affirmation, right? It's like just this exchange is further affirmation that you can't don't spend time with the haters, right? Like, don't waste time on what the negative people say about you online, whether you're a civilian

or somebody in the public eye. Spend time with people who believe in you, who you feel a natural attraction to, you know, who, for whatever reason, the universe is gravitate you towards, gravitated you towards, like, that's, that's where the reward is, right? Don't just keep banging your head against the wall, waiting for your haters to come around because they won't. And there's such greener pastors out there. So good.

Yeah. Bring, bring people, bring you great energy. And you did that. I feel great. Thank you so much. It has been a pleasure. My honor, Megan. Thank you for being here and everybody else. Hey, share today's show obviously it's a fast growing show on the planet for a reason because I get people like Megan Kelly in front of you guys and you get to learn and you get to inspire it. So please share it with them.

Wish you all continued success. God bless you. Max out. This is the End My Let's Show. you