The Press Box - Mary Trump’s Book, That Harper’s Letter, and Listener Mail

Episode Date: July 9, 2020

Bryan Curtis and David Shoemaker discuss the new book by Mary Trump, niece of Donald Trump, in which she writes about how her family "created the most dangerous man" (2:05). They then touch on the letter in Harper’s that was signed by everyone from J.K. Rowling to Matthew Yglesias and discuss what brought these people together and what the point was (20:35). Then, they respond to some listener mail and address the urgent question, “Did The NYT reuse the heavy-weight champion of celebrity-profile headlines?" (34:15) Plus: the Overworked Twitter Joke of the Week and David Guesses the Strained-Pun Headline. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

From the Ringer, I'm Tyler R. Times. When I spoke to NFL star Cam Newton in January, his mindset was clear. I want my whole career to be in Charlotte. Cam won't be getting that wish. He was released by the Carolina Panthers in March. Cam is a complex figure, and my interest in him goes far beyond his exuberant smile and transcendent style of play. Cam broke the glass ceiling in American athletics, ascended to a place in the sport that few black quarterbacks have ever reached, making his fall that much more dramatic.

Over the past year, I've traveled the country speaking to coaches and teammates, friends and family, reporters, and even briefly to the man himself, trying to unravel the enigma that is Cam Newton. I uncovered contradictions at every turn. How can the hardest work on the team be depicted as a bad leader? And how can a franchise icon with the NFL MVP and Super Bowl appearance on his resume? may be so abruptly cast aside.

The Ringer NFL show presents The Cam Chronicles. The series premieres Monday, July 13th. Hello, media consumers. You've got the press box. Brian Curtis and David Shoemaker of the Ringer here.

We got a lot of stuff for you today. We'll talk about that letter in Harper's magazine that was signed by everyone from J.K. Rowling to Matthew Iglesias. What brought these people together? and what was the point? In listener mail, we addressed the urgent question,

did the New York Times just reuse the heavyweight champion of celebrity profile headlines? All that plus David Schumacher guesses the strain pun headline and the overworked Twitter joke of the week. But David, let's start with the new book by Mary Trump. She is the niece of Donald Trump and herself a clinical psychologist. Her book is called Too Much and Never Enough, How My Family Created the World's Most Dangerous Man.

David, I'd have to know what your favorite accusation from the book is so far. Number one, Trump paid a stand in to take the SAT for him. Or number two, Trump gave Mary Trump a food basket, I guess, regifted her a food basket in which the caviar had been removed, right? One of those things where you get like caviar and crackers, not that I've ever gotten that in my life, but the. Caviar was gone. Listen, I, uh, I know that, you know, dogging the president for his like, lack, I mean,

for doing something like having someone else take the SAT for any, any bad grades or whatever conniving he took to get him into college. I know that's all fun. And especially, you know, in a world where he spent years dogging our previous president for with similar accusations. I get the joy of that. But there is a sort of old-fashioned scampiness to like getting someone to take the SAT for you that I can, I don't know if appreciate is the right word. But like, you know, I have a sort of wistful memory of the days when you could do that without the fear of like public recrimination and potentially losing, you know, your career and everything else that would follow. I think the caveat thing is much more to the point of like who this man is as a as in the psychological profile. And, and so I'm going to, I'm going to lean on that one. absolutely if someone ever gave me the pepperage farm basket for Christmas and removed the good cheese and the salami I'd be pissed Harry and David shows up with one pair and a bunch of like empty holes where the other ones were that would be terrible I'm going to the press too we should say that this book is less about the Trump White House as John Bolton's tell all and some of the other ones have been yeah than about the Trump family backstory which feels straight out of succession

Mary Trump's grandfather, Donald Trump's father, was Fred Trump. Mary Trump says her granddad was a sociopath. That's her word. He made fun of her dad, who was Fred Jr. And then Donald joined in. That's where Donald Trump became the insult comic we know today. A Frankenstein's monster, Mary Trump writes. Mary Trump's dad, Fred, dies relatively young.

And when Fred Sr., the grandfather dies in 1999, she finds out that she and her brother have been cut out of the will. Then things got really ugly. At one point, Mary was called a bad granddaughter in some of the testimony and court depositions that followed because she wore a baggy sweater around her grandfather. That is a true detail. Also, David,

remember the blockbuster Trump financial investigation in the New York Times two years ago? Yeah. Well, it turns out Mary Trump was the source for. that. Yeah. Also fascinating. Suzanne Craig, who is one of the Times reporters who broke that amazing story, showed up at Mary Trump's house.

She did not want to talk, but Suzanne Craig left a business card. Some time goes by. Mary Trump changes her mind and she winds up giving 19 boxes of documents to the New York Times reporters in her driveway, which is pretty incredible. Got a couple questions for you about all this stuff. as a veteran of the book publishing industry, what did you make of the rollout of this book where seemingly every big ticket political writer

on the planet woke up in the morning and said, hmm, just found an interesting book outside my door. What could this possibly be and then started tweeting out the revelations? I mean, listen, I don't have any issue with this book being published and regardless of any agreement, legal agreement that they may have reached before. And, you know, the status of the presidency. I mean, this is a clear free speech issue. And I'm glad the book exists.

That said, yeah, they really worked this one. I don't know how they got away. I mean, how they got through the White House trying to challenge the book because the publisher wasn't, you know, wasn't held to whatever agreement that Mary Trump had signed. that seems like a really easy way to get anything you want out there, right? You just got to like, just make sure that they, that you have a publisher and then, then they're not liable for any of the agreements that you're privy to. And then, listen, getting the book out there, that was the real checkmate move, because even if this book had been still in litigation, then suddenly, if all the information is out there, then keeping it away, like, publishing it doesn't do any extra harm, right?

If the book just kind of gets leaked out to the press, the information's there, then the publication in the book is is sort of a fit of complete listen i i i mean we've all seen this we've all in the book publishing world i mean in every in any sort of media world this is just called you know seating the marketplace this is like gets the info out there and as we've discussed before there's really no limit anymore to like the stuff you want to keep exclusive to the book you know i mean it's so many of these books are bought not to be read again as we've discussed many times. And I don't know that anybody picked up a Michael Wolf book and said, well, shit, there wasn't anything in there that wasn't in the New York Times and everywhere else.

No, they never got that far enough in the book to find out that there was nothing new in there. You know, you expect the news organization to have all the info. And it's, you know, it was a really effective move. I mean, they got it out there. This is like, this is, this went from, and I don't know if this falls under like the stric end effect umbrella or whatever. I don't know if the the lawsuit from the White House really raised the profile of it, but it sure does seem like it did only because that's been the entire narrative of the book in the public sphere, right? And that the White House trying to keep it out of, you know, from being published made us really interested to know what's going on. And just like so many things with this White House,

it adds legitimacy to the detractors because you just, you know, why would you, why are you trying to keep John Bolton's book from, how can you call John Bolton's book bullshit, but then also try to keep it from being published on national security grounds? right? I mean, it's the same thing with this. It just raises the profile of this seemingly very compelling psychological interrogation of the president. Well, it used to be the Trump tweet, right, that inflated the sales of every book that was critical about Trump. But now it's a two-step publicity process where you get the Trump tweet, but before that, you get the Trump lawsuit. Yeah, exactly. This dangerous book must not be shared with the public. What better invitation is

there if you're Mary Trump and Simon and Schuster to sell the book. I mean, that is just absolutely incredible. And I want to circle back to what you said about providing certain writers with a copy of the book. This is kind of amazing to me because somebody tweeted out the acknowledgments of the book. And I believe Mary Trump is very online. She thanks Charles P. Pearson, Adam Serwer, in her in her acknowledgments. So this is somebody who is reading the same Twitter accounts that we are. I think, and when you look at it, Pierce got a copy of the book.

Jonathan Chate got a copy of the book. This was not where you just go to the big ticket, you know, reporters, the Maggie Habermans, you know, people at the Washington Post, things like that. Or even the old school kind of like opinion page writers, right? That would have been the maybe the Obama era go to. Yeah, the George Will got a copy of the book on his doorstep.

You were really, it feels like they were really micro-targeting people with a couple hundred, thousand Twitter followers who are big daily names in liberal political Twitter and like here you go the Twitter thing is key for the rollout too

because there's not I mean not saying there's any lack of substance here but there's no fact checking on people's tweets right and you're just tweeting out the thing that you've got in your hands that that's just a matter of fact if this were if they were waiting on the publication

of the big you know right along times piece that might have that some of the It might not have been so seamless. Yes. I did notice one thing, and it was in one of the main New York Times pieces about the revelations in the book, is they kind of waived away everything she wrote about Trump and the White House. She had written some things apparently about, you know, David Kelly and some of the other things that happened in the White House. And they were kind of like, these are events that she was not privy to. Yeah.

So we're kind of not going to touch that. But we are going to happily sort of take her word or at least, you know, happily share it. with everything that happened in the Trump family, which I thought was an interesting sort of line to draw. She writes in the book that she didn't share all this stuff in 2016. She has not had a good relationship with her uncle in quite some time. But she did not share this stuff in 2016 because she didn't think Trump was going to win like everybody else. And she also didn't think that whatever she said would penetrate the media at that point.

Which brings me to my next question, which is all this stuff is interesting. I'm with you. Absolutely, she has the right to write the book and have it published. But what does kind of a familial, psychological profile of Donald Trump do for us at this stage other than sort of inform the history books that are going to be written 10, 20 years from now? Well, maybe nothing, but the entirely damning White House memoirs haven't seemed to have that much of a negative effect either. So, I mean, if it makes the target audience more convicted of their feelings about the president or warms the cackles of some anti-Trump, you know, person's heart, then maybe it does its job. I do think that there is a more significant piece to this, which is even as Trump's politics continue to be popular, and I, you know, use Trump's politics loosely, but his politics, can you, you, continue to be popular amongst his base. I do feel like the real like battlefield

in the election that's on that that's coming up, you know, sooner and sooner is sort of rounding back around to Trump the person. And I don't, I think as much as all that stuff didn't stick, in this case, Mary Trump was right. In 2016, you know,

he could profess to sexual assault on, on tape and just, and everyone just sort of like laugh it off. I think that it's more of this psychological profile stuff that it's going to end up being really damning because we're seeing. Everybody that had a family member get sick or, God forbid, die from the coronavirus

is going to start, I mean, has started looking at the president and trying to identify what aspect of his character it was that led, what failing, personal failing of his it was that led to this. And you see a lot of that reflected in the personality profile in this book, at least in the parts that we've been

we've been shown, right? And I do think that it's not, he is an evil man, he is a rapist, he is a white supremacist, those things may well be true, but I think the parts that are really going to have, that are really going to have potency in the purple parts of the country

are these just sort of more almost pedestrian things that make him just seem like a shitty dude. So she's not the first person to call him a narcissist, and she's not even the hundredth person call him a narcissist. Mm-hmm. But as the Democrats build their case against him, you're saying, especially with

things like his complete disinterest in doing anything about the coronavirus, instead talking about the stock market or whatever he wants to talk about, reinforcing that idea becomes really a potent weapon against him. He's such a narcissist that he couldn't even be bothered to talk about the virus that's killed over 100,000 Americans. That's kind of thing? That's what you're saying? yeah i do i mean i think that there's listen i don't know that it's her specific point of view

although there's certainly a lot of stuff that she's the information that she's privy to that other writers aren't going to be privy to or at least wouldn't even be as compelling if this was if her story was being retold by a new york times writer or whatever doing a book right but i do i do think that there's a there's a potency to the sort of repetition to the to the reiteration and you know narcissism calling somebody a narcissist can be a pretty empty thing without specifics, right? I mean, it does not even necessarily an insult the way that it's used, you know, sometimes. I think these, I think the pettier, the more insignificant some of these stories are,

the more really underscores the point that some people take for granted. There are going to be lots and lots more Trump books over the next decades. But in the particular subcategory of Trump tell-alls, that really began with Michael Wolf, whom you mentioned in 2018, will this be the last significant tell-all of the Trump presidency, do we think? You mean if Trump doesn't win re-election,

this will be the last one under the wire? Is that the question? Yeah, basically, which is kind of an era of literature in and of itself. Bolton being the penultimate one, right? And now we have married Trump. Yeah, it will be interesting to see

just in terms of publishing schedules, we know this book, every time one of these books gets a little bit of attention, they put it out a month early or two months early or three months early, whatever they can get. I wonder if as the election starts bearing down if there's not going to be some Trump books in the pipeline that get pulled up to like, you know,

a September 1st publication date. Every time you turn on CNN or MSNBC, it seems like there's a new author of Kairon under somebody's name that's like, you know, some new Trump book coming out. this will probably be the last significant one to answer your question yeah i mean i don't i think that i think there's probably a lot of writers who were very even writers who were under book contract already who were who were maybe secretly very eager to pivot to a post presidency book or what

the hell just happened book uh rather than to try to do a uh another like inside the white house expos yeah i just you just sort of wonder because they're feel there's all these kind of marginal Trumpy books that could be written if he had a second term. Like, what's going to happen to those, right? And there is a whole Trump post-presidency. There's how Trump changed the Republican Party. There's what the hell just happened over the last four years of American life. There's lots of places to go with this.

But in terms of, and I guess we're, I bet we get more tell-all's post-presidency too, right? I mean, there's zero chance that all these people whom he insults after he fires them are None of them will write books about what happened in a White House. In fact, there are probably a bunch of those. We usually get lots of presidential memoirs, even when the occupants are not as strange from the president. I guess I wanted to end here, David, with the thought that this has been a tough year for Peter Lugar's Steakhouse in Brooklyn. Allow me to explain. First, Peter Lugar, known as the place David and I tried to convince our parents to take us when they visited from out of town.

unsuccessfully got taken down by Pete Wells in New York Times last year. Then Mary Trump, not to be outdone, Mary Trump writes in her book,

Peter Lugar was a deeply strange, very expensive restaurant. It feels like she did the whole Wells review there in like half a sentence. I think so. Now I want to go even more. But yeah,

I think that description probably, probably suits it. We have a food podcast that Mary Trump could be a part of. Does House of Carbs have a slot next week? I want to hear more of Mary Trump's lacerating criticism of New York restaurant. I'm sure Joe the house would love to have her on. Let's make that happen. All right, David, let's do the overworked Twitter joke of the week where we celebrate a gag that was so obvious that all of media Twitter made it at exactly the same time, send your nominees to at the

Press Box Pod where they are always gratefully received. David, did you see or maybe hear the new Joe Biden for president ad? I don't know. Maybe I missed it. If not, see what classic commercial

associations this evokes. This job, this job is about protecting Americans, not tear gassing them for a photo op. It takes strength. courage, compassion, resilience, that's a president. It was an overworked Twitter joke to write,

I feel like buying a Dodge Ram pickup truck right now. That's great. Love that music. David, the Wall Street Journal, our Wall Street Journal editor tweeted this yesterday. Quote, Japan's theme parks of bands screaming on roller coasters because it spreads the coronavirus. Oh, no. Quote, actual quote, please scream inside your heart.

Scream inside your heart. It was an overworked Twitter joke to write 2020's official slogan has been chosen. Thanks to Elijah Wolfson, Matt Simmons, and Tom Gunjami. And about that letter in Harper's Magazine, signed by everyone from J.K. Rowling to Matt Iglesias to Ian Baruma to Winton Marsalis.

It was an overword Twitter joke to write that the letter is Punditri's version of the Gal Godot Imagine video. Thanks to our pal Matthews Eitland. If you reminded us of a shitty crossover event, we'd forgotten because of all the shit that came after, congrats. You made the overworked Twitter joke of the week.

That seems like six years ago. It really does, doesn't it? All right. On that subject and in the notebook dump, first of all, Harper's Magazine has really entered the zone where we talk about Harper's controversies, almost solely and never talk about like, I don't know, Harper's articles that are divorced from controversy?

What was the last time you just brought up a Harper's article to me? And we're like, wow, that was a really, that was a really nice literary treatment of a subject. I do not know. Harper's letter in question came out Tuesday morning. It was just over 500 words long titled a letter on justice and open debate, a letter about cancel culture. It reads in part

the free exchange of information and ideas the lifeblood of a liberal society is daily becoming more constricted. While we have come to expect this on the radical right, censoriousness is also spreading more widely in our culture, an intolerance of opposing views,

a vogue for public shaming and ostracism, and the tendency to dissolve complex policy issues in a blinding moral certainty. Dot, dot, dot. dot you had a take on this david yeah i mean you know i kind of honed down on this quote from nicholas lemon who's obviously a fantastic writer and and teacher and thinker but he says um and signatory to this letter we should and signatory this letter i get yeah that's why i bring

him up he says what concerns me as a sense that a lot of people out there seem to think open argument over everything is an unhealthy thing he says uh i've spent my whole life having vigorous arguments and people I disagree with and don't want to think we're moving out of this world. I really think that's the crux of a lot of the controversy around this thing, because I think that everybody who signed this letter seriously worries about this issue. And at the same time, I don't think any of the detractors of the letter, amongst which I would probably count myself, would agree that this is even happening, or at least not happening enough for it to bear mention right now of all times.

You know? I mean, this is like, this would be like, you know, a shop owner during the American Revolution just like making a public pronouncement that like everybody should be tucking in their shirt. This looseness with shirt tucking is really gotten out of it.

I mean, it's like so beside the point. And to not see that, even if it's happening, even if this thing is really happening, to not see how that pales in comparison to what everybody else, is worrying about right now is in essence like that's the entire problem right i mean i'm not sure like this is like this is this is disconnected from reality is like you know someone saying

white lives matter in a not or all lives matter sorry in a not racist way you know it's like it's still totally wrong it's still the problem i mean it's just it's just such an it's so idiotic i i'm with you, I just, I mean, just for starters, I find the timing of this just to be completely gobsmacking. I really do. That as you say that this, the issue right now is that we're not having an open debate in American society, right? This is the key issue. Even within the realm of journalism, they were not allowed to have an open debate without

being canceled. And I'm just like, what, what have we just spent the last several weeks talking about in American life? What, why, why are we, why are we shoving this in right now? And yeah, when I hear that Nicholas Lemon quote you talk about, I just think it's really important. I'm a fan of his too, a great fan of his writing. I've been reading him for a long time now. But look at the magazines that guy came up writing for, right?

The New Republic, the Atlantic, the New Yorker, right? Guess what the composition of those magazines were, right? And so when you say, well, I came up having a free and open debate about ideas. did you? Did you? When you look at the mastheads of those magazines, you did? Really?

And were those magazines not set up to make a certain, certain people in this world essentially uncancellable? And to essentially make this whole kind of thing. And like that is so the point of this. And somehow that just completely seems to sail over the heads of the people who signed the letter.

Well, I mean, you know, Nick Lemon was not, at all involved with the New Yorker during the time when there was the Steve Bannon New Yorker festival controversy. But your mind immediately goes there, right? Where you have David Rimnick or whoever saying, oh, I just had Bannon on because I wanted to have a free-flowing, you know, a good-spirited debate so we could highlight the ways that he's very wrong and to totally miss the point, and missed the point that that's not what people, people are not, people are not

saying he doesn't deserve, like, it, like, like, no right-leaning person deserves to have the stage to debate, right? I mean, you're just to miss. To miss. To miss. You know, missed the point so dramatically is, well, damnable in its own way. I was the other day, someone's asking say, what are, what are the biggest issues in sports journalism to take our little corner of the world? And I said, two things always come to mind. More jobs and more diversity, right? It's really hard for me than to get to anything else. I was looking at these numbers the other day. This is in 2018, the AP sports editors put out a racial and gender report card. This is just one example.

sports editors in America, 85% white, 90% male, sports reporters, 82% white, 89% male, sports columnists, 80% white, 83% male. These are in Kendall Baker's Axios newsletter, which is very helpful on these matters. But I'm just like, where is the interest in all these people in diversity in journalism, right? You can't get canceled if you never got hired in the first place. Yeah. Right? You don't get to get canceled if you never got the job. And we are looking at decades and decades and decades of which many of these people have

been working in journalism where they were working for places. And you and I are in the same boat here, working places that were not diverse, that we're not offering opportunities to everybody else. Yeah. So again, spare me until we actually try to write that enormous problem, spare me this. stuff. Yeah. I couldn't say that better. I mean, honestly. It's just, and listen, it's a lot of the people on this, on this letter have not been in those newsrooms or comparable places that you mentioned in decades either, right? I mean, it's like, I mean, even some of the

most, the people, I mean, a lot of people have graduated on to jobs outside of the newsroom or outside of, you know, publishing specifically and or their, or their freelance writers or, or, you know, in the case of some people like Ian Baruma have been ousted in the not too distant past as well. And just to be clear, just to go over that quickly, they, they, when he was running the New York review of books, they published a piece about, about Gian Gio Meshi, the Canadian talk show host, who got charged with a bunch of sexual assault things and charges and ended up having to apologize. And it was sort of a relitigation of his case along the, I mean, not specific, not exactly like what this letter says, but it's sort of.

like questioning the cancel culture, even in terms of like the Me Too era and issues of sexual assault. And he defended, Baruma defended the decision to publish. Well, I'll just say this. We talked about at the time, it was a terrible piece to publish for so many reasons. But at the end of the day, I was just like, why, I mean, regardless of the politics of it, regardless of whether or not you think it was right, why the hell did you think it was a good idea to publish it? Like, what did that do for the national debate? What did that do to victims? What did that, like, how did that do anything except make you feel better about yourself for this,

for this same weird, like, resisting cancel culture issue that's bubbling up in the back of your head? If you feel, I mean, you got, listen, we're not, Brian, you and I are not spring chickens. We are of the age of the people that I'm pointing my finger at right now. Maybe not quite Ian Brooma, by the way. No, but if you or I wake up in the morning and we're like, you turn on CNN and you're like, and you have an inkling in your head that's like, what the fuck is wrong with these kids these days out there protesting in the street or whatever, that's the moment where you like, take a breath and go look in the mirror and you say, either I could be really wrong or

I could be really in the wrong line of work, you know? I mean, and maybe just the world doesn't need to hear what I have to say on the podcast this week. Or yeah, or even about this particular subject, right? I mean, it's just, you know, whatever, whatever subject is in front. If you feel so out of touch with what the world is doing, then interrogate that and don't. Don't just like find solace with your peer group, which, I mean, listen, I don't know that this was just a mass text message that Rick MacArthur, you know, sent out and just decided to publish of his own accord. It feels a lot like that, right? And it, and it just, it's just, it's just kind of sad. It's just, it's sad.

This feels like a real offensive version of like, you know, of like George Gervin or somebody talking shit about. the new generation of basketball players. You know, I mean, it's just, it's just sad. I saw somebody saying, well, this is not about defending the jobs and the, and the status of the people to sign the letter. This is about other people. This is about doing it on behalf of other people.

Come on. Come on. Really? Yeah. You know, really? I don't think so. Reader check or out or ask us this, David. Would either of you have signed on to the Harper's letter?

I think the answer is probably no after what we just said. My question was, Would you have signed on to any open letter, David? I mean, if we pick like the most popular, non-controversial press access thing, I think I'm out on open letters, just generally. No, I mean, and that's kind of what I was just getting at. I don't think anybody needs my, needs, like, you know,

my voice, like, joining a chorus right now. I'd happily do it if I felt the cause was right, but I would certainly hesitate to do anything. I mean, like, wouldn't you just write a piece? piece in your own words rather than sign it with like 30 other people? It's, it's wild. It's wild. And just really quickly to touch on what you were saying before about representation and,

and jobs, like, you know, canceling is more than the threat of one losing one's job. But the people signatories of this letter, I feel confident could fairly easily employ every writer that gets canceled over the next two years, right? They could find a place for them in one of their, one of their, one of their, one of their, publications or otherwise their businesses. No one's no one need to lose a platform over saying something that's minorly, minorly offensive to the wild liberal online hordes, right? I mean, like, Harper's can sign that person up for a weekly column or a month, sorry, not weekly, for a, is it monthly, bi-monthly? I don't want to talk at in school here, but like they,

speaking of not knowing what's in Harper's, go ahead. They can put them online, you know? I mean, it's just, It's sort of wild. It's sort of wild. The, I do have a power ranking here of top five Harper's scandals of recent vintage. Do you want to hear these? Oh, please. Number five, publisher Rick MacArthur hates the internet. I don't know if that's really a scandal. But in 2014, he was still using floppy disks, word perfect, and corresponding with authors like William Volman via typed letter.

The internet, MacArthur told the New York Times quote, wasn't much more than a gigantic zero. rocks machine. I love that. Number four. What is Word Perfect? I don't even know the answer to this. Word perfect was Microsoft Word. Was it sort of like the new Coke of Microsoft Word?

Was it a better version of Word? Or was it a different? Was it not Microsoft? I think it was the Pepsi of. Okay. It was another word processing program that had some moment in the sun. Chris,

all made it changing his Twitter bio. what is word perfect? Yeah. By the way, Rick MacArthur is 64 years old. This is not a 90-year-old person we're talking about right now. Yeah, no. Number four on the power rankings,

2010, Rick MacArthur fires Harper's editor, Roger Hodge. The Times reports a quote in a rambling 40-minute monologue that left his employees perplexed. MacArthur declared, quote, the mainstream media is ignoring Harper's to death. Guess he fixed that problem. Number three, there was,

a Chris Hedges charge of plagiarism in an article in a draft article he submitted to Harper's. Harper's did not run the story. Number two, the fact-checking email in 2018 makes it seem like Harper's going to docks the creator of the shitty media men list. We talked about that here on the press box. And number one, David, maybe my all-time favorite, Lewis Lapham, long-time editor, writes a column sharing his reactions to the 2004 Republican National Convention. Alas, the New York Times reports, the magazine arrived on subscribers' door. steps before the convention had ever taken place. It was kind of had a pre-reaction that was sold as an actual, as an actual reaction.

All right. Time for listener mail. First letter, David, is from me. I was clicking around this morning and there's a new New York Times profile of the band formerly known as the Dixie Chicks. Now just the chicks. Here's the headline. The chicks are done caring what people think.

now the Times has stumbled on to the greatest celebrity profile headline of all time because I would submit that we are constantly being told that celebrities don't really care what you think I don't know if you want some examples here Miles Teller is young talented and doesn't give a rat's ass what you think oh that's nice Kevin Durant doesn't care what you think it's also been used in political profiles Nancy Pelosi doesn't care what she think what you think of her. John Huntsman doesn't care what you think. Well,

that's, that's a, that's a shame that John Huntsman doesn't care what I think. It's probably news at this point, if the celebrity being profiled cares what I think. And I'm not sure we really need to, by the way,

the Dixie Chicks have been outspoken for like two decades now. So this is really not, really not news that they don't care what, what you think. I think they have, I think they have not cared blissfully so in a long time. Yeah. Only if they cared what I thought,

I think that's the only news that belongs in the headline. What do you think? What celebrity does care what you think? We need to find the great search for the celebrity who cares what you, I mean, who cares what we think? Who cares what we think? Yeah. Well, it's a good profile, right?

If they actually cared what we thought. Yeah. Desperately cared. If they were desperately worried what just like randos like us thought of them, that would be an interesting profile. Yeah. I mean, I think that that would be, yeah. I mean, that would be a problem.

It's a problematic condition, you know? I mean, I guess some people fall under that trap, but to really like seek everybody's approval, you know, that's, that's not, I mean, I guess there's, I guess Sally Field, right? Wasn't, was it Sally Field back in the day? It was like, they love me, they really love me. Yeah.

But that's more the academy. That's not like, that's not people. It's not you, David. She doesn't care what I think. I have very, very, very high opinion of Sally Field though in case she's listening. This is from our pal Chris Sullenraub wants to see if David can figure out what these people have in common. Oh, no. Fred Savage,

Tom Hanks, O.J. Simpson, Courtney Love, and Donald Rumsfeld. No, they did not sign a letter to Harper's about cancel culture. Let me just give you a hint there. Fred Savage, Tom Hanks, OJ, Courtney Love, and Donald Rumsfeld. Um, man. I feel like I should be able to get, but Fred Savage,

just doesn't have, I know he was a director and stuff, but I feel like just from Fred Savage alone, I should be able to, is it, is, like I should be able to suss something out. Is it like a Princess Bride thing?

What am I? It's stupider than you think. It said, they all had birthdays on July 8th. Oh. The AP planner, uh, Twitter account set that out.

Chris, uh, commented on Twitter. What a dinner party. That would be. Fantastic. What do you think O.J. and Don Rumsfeld would talk about.

This is from DERP. Does Tucker Carl, have a line he cannot pass? What could he say that would get him fired from Fox? It seems like he's asking us the same question, right? Implicitly? It seems like he is in constant, like he's like pushing the boundary performatively every night.

And I say performatively because like we, we've talked about Tiger Carlson a lot of times. I'm not trying to give him a pass the way that like, you know, we used to like absentmindedly give Ann Coulter a pass because we thought she was playing a wrestling character or whatever. I mean, he's,

Tucker Carlson is a evil piece of garbage. But like, it does seem like he's just trying to figure out what button he could push to get called into an office and like cackling every night on the way home that he hasn't gotten reprimanded yet. Yeah. Tammy Duckworth, Senator from Illinois,

who was a target for a couple of nights, saying all kinds of things about her. I mean, it was just reprehensible stuff too. I mean, almost like just laughable. I mean, It could have been a script from an, you know, episode of the O'Reilly factor from 10 years ago about someone else entirely, about, you know, whatever. But it was just like, I mean, just so, so ridiculous.

That really felt to me like he wanted, like, he wanted a win, like, he wanted a very specific win. Like, he wanted, if Tammy Duckworth does not become the vice presidential nominee, he will dine out on that for the rest of his career, right? and say that he got her yanked from the consideration. And if he does, he wants to be on the cutting, on the forefront of whatever charges eventually inevitably get leveled against her because now she's the standard bear or one of the two on that side. Yeah. I just, yeah, I don't, I don't think he is fireable for what he says on the air.

I mean, who, how many people from Fox have been fired over stuff that happened on the air? It's much more stuff that happened off the air. I think if you look at just purely on the numbers, you know, the terms of big stars, you know, why they left Fox, sir, I don't think it's been comments like that. And I think he'll probably just keep going. No, I don't, I don't think so either. I do.

I mean, and certainly, it seems like in the post-Rupert Murdoch era, it's even, there's even less, there's even more of a blind eye turn to the sort of commentariat over there. You know, the primetime host as far as like how offensive they can be. But I, I, you know, in an age where the Washington football team can change their, change their name. I kind of feel like anything's possible with enough money lean. I mean, it's already been established that doesn't matter of every commercial they run on that show is like,

you know, like a random, you know, a my pillow ad or like, you know, some sort of medication ad. But if enough money leans on a company, then maybe,

you know, maybe there is something that he could say that would get him fired. This is from Alex Stewart. Given Biden's lead in the polls, is it too early to worry about what happens when Trump refuses to recognize election results. I feel I get this question a lot from family members. This is a lot of question a lot of people are worried about.

So here's my theory. Donald Trump will almost, if he loses, we'll almost certainly say that the election was stolen. I think that's just 100% chance. He was saying it last time before the election, getting ready to make that case before he somewhat surprisingly won. I think there's the theory that Donald Trump is just too lazy to not leave the White House, right?

I can totally imagine him skipping the inauguration, throwing out the window all the politeness we, you know, associate with presidential transitions, including the politeness that the Obama's afforded to him in 2016 and 2017. But I kind of think he's just going to, he's just going to pack up his toys and go home. What do you think? I do think that that's, I do think that that's, especially if he has a, you know, at some point he'll be setting up as opposed to. presidency plans. Remember four years ago he was going to start his own TV network or like over the top network or whatever it is. There have been a lot of articles about this too and forgive me. I do not remember who wrote this. And I apologize and I'm going to mangle whatever the mangled it just by recounting my memory. But, you know, someone, someone pointed out that the fear is not

that he would just say, forget the votes. I'm your, I'm your, you know, dictator for life now. but it's more like you really if you once you start questioning mail-in ballots once you start introducing these questions into enough different states that there's and if you file suit I mean there's also poll watchers

in all these states that they're doing they're ready to pull out all the stops and all these different directions and at the end of the day if the votes sign up in a certain way or even a likely way kind of all you have to do like we saw in Bush v. Gore was just sort of run out the clock

on the recounts if you can just pause the recounts or pause the counting of mail-in ballots the point that, like, you might actually have some claim to victory by the, you know, by the end of the calendar year or whatever. It's, it's really a bizarre hypothetical. And I hope against hope that the swamp that he, you know, has failed to drain. And, you know, all of the otherwise sort of eyebrow raising semi-questionable parts of Washington establishment will kind of all swing into action at once. And I think he will probably be escorted from the White House by senior military officials, you know, very quietly and as not to hurt his reputation if he tried anything like that at all. Yeah.

I think, I think, I don't, I think there'd be a lot of people who would, who would probably make it. You're saying he would be escorted out. Yeah. Yeah. If he didn't, if he didn't want to leave. I think if there was any, I think if he gave any indication of defying the results of the, of the election, there would be a lot of stuff very quickly happening, uh, off stage. that would change his tune. And I don't, and I don't, that's not something to be necessarily super proud of at your country, but in this, in this situation, I think that the way that the military,

at least, is lining up right now, that, that would, it would be, uh, that wouldn't surprise me. Sacked in the Fool. As a few journalist-centric political movies have come out during the Trump administration, the post, Richard Jewel, shock and awe, but nothing squarely about this era. What do you think will be the story at the heart of this film when it finally, gets made. Interestingly, in speaking of Fox News, bombshell also came out

during the Trump administration. And in a way, that sort of is the story of the Trump administration, right? And the sort of Fox News culture. Do you have anything else? David, do you think would make a good movie about journal? I'm dubious of any movie about journalists. As much as I like to watch them,

I'm dubious that any will work, especially well. Yeah, I can't think of one. I can't. I mean, the best movies are, I mean, I guess there's a lot of good journalism movies from years past, but. Yeah, there's some. Yeah, I just can't. There's some good ones in a lot that journalists watch over and over again. I see journalists sticking up for the paper. You know, it's like, come on, really? The paper. Yeah. We, we going, are we going with that? I can't, I can't think of anything. I have a, someday, I'm kind of against power rankings unless they're about Harper scandals just in general.

But I do have a journalism movie one that I, at some point maybe we should roll out. This is from Quinn Fields. Would be interested in hearing y'all's thoughts on the place of mugshots in journalism and whether it should ever have been there to begin with. He sends along a New York Times article that's about how a number of law enforcement officials have stopped sharing these images unless there's some public safety concern. And then also certain newspaper chains have stopped doing those slide shows, which were just pure, I mean, like the most base hit magnet that you could possibly get. I remember when I was in Albuquerque once I had visiting family there and I was at a gas station, I think. And there was just like a newsprint style magazine that was just filled with mugshots. Like that was a whole magazine.

It was just like, please have fun enjoying yourself with pictures of people who've been arrested. It's just... What? Yeah. I mean, this is a thing that has just been low-key, a just really gross way to... For people to enjoy themselves. Gannad here says mugshot galleries presented without context

may feed into negative stereotypes. And our editorial judgment are of limited news value. Goodbye mugshots forever. And let's get behind that, I think. Well, the mugshots are also released. I mean, listen, I could be... off about this in some jurisdictions or whatever, but mugshots usually come out

sort of at the discretion of the police, right? And depending on how busy they are, or more significantly, what they see as a sort of PR value of putting them out, I mean, makes a big difference in what gets out there too. So it's not, it's never,

I mean, I just don't, I agree with not putting them out, I think. I mean, I'm not quite exactly sure with the public good, unless it's a matter of, you know,

immediate danger. Yeah, but the people we're talking about here mostly are not like public officials, right? This is not like Tom DeLay's mugshot or something like that, right? This is, these are people that are just, you know, normal private citizens who are then their stuff is put out there for everybody's entertainment. This is from real K-dog Kevin.

Love that you guys are self-aware enough to disavow references to the Dakota Ring and Christmas story, but proceed to drop both Seinfeld and Joan Collins references later in the same episode. David was responsible for the former me for the latter. Good stuff as always keep it up. boys. I really do think we need to have a Rubicon line of reference. It's just really not ever, ever pass. Animal House is on the far side of that for me. The Seinfeld and the Simpsons basically at this point are on the other side, even though we grew up with that. You just really

should just never reference those things. We can we just release, we should just release two episodes forever. I mean, two different versions of every episode. One, which it's just the 40 and up episode that is how we normally record it. And then we'll release a separate one. where Chris and Erica can do voiceovers. And every time we make a pop culture reference, Chris just comes in. He's just like, it's like that episode of SpongeBob,

and then just like proceeds to give some very modern, like millennial point of reference. Would that work better for people out there? Yeah, it's the what is word perfect version of the show and then the senior version of the show. I kind of want a whole segment on references journalists should never make that we should just have cut off, right?

The drawbridge went up. You can't no more, no more of this. I mean, I think, I think we could actually come up with a pretty, with a pretty funny list. Finally, this is from Dr. Bobbert. Is Joe Biden's digital divide narrowing? How dare you, sir? How dare you? But that does tell us it's time for David Shoemaker.

Guesses the strained pun. Oh, all right. All right. Monday's headline about Republican pushback to Trump's Russia policy was Trump faces a GOP mutiny on the Russian bounties. today's headline comes from AMCK 125 and Todd Morrissey who created a Twitter account to send this. By the way, the press box is very popular with people who do not have Twitter accounts.

I don't know what that says about us. People that probably really appreciate our Joan Collins references. Right. Sure, Todd Morrissey objected. This is from the New Zealand Herald. New Zealand, as you know, David, has done a very good job of controlling the spread of coronavirus, unlike the United States. A 32-year-old man there who,

had the virus was in managed isolation in an Auckland hotel. I mean, he could not leave, not allowed to leave. Well, that man escaped. He went to a supermarket, and according to the paper, the man spent 14 minutes in the beauty aisle buying toothpaste, body wash, and razor blades. Sounds like us back in our Lower East Side Days. Keyword here is aisle, aisle as in aisle in the supermarket. What was the New Zealand Herald's strained pun headline?

So he broke out of coronavirus isolation, supervised isolation, and went to the supermarket, I mean, went to the drugstore? Yeah, went to the market. Isle, I'll, I'll of, like, Isle of Man, Isle of, Ile of, um, we're easing up, Treasure Island, Ile of, Ile of, I. Why can't I think of any aisles? Isle of, the Emerald Isle, uh, uh, uh, um, um, um, I'll be I'll be back I'll be I'll be

getting there you're so close I'll be damned Oh that's great That's great Great look on Chris's face right now I'll be damned COVID hotel escapers supermarket

Selfies He is David Shoemaker I'm Brian Curtis Researched by that very same Chris Almeida production magic by Erica Servantes We're back Monday I kind of want to do the segment

about reinventing the Sunday political chat shows if I can get myself ready to watch four hours of political chat shows on Monday. It might be time, it might be time to actually have a segment about the horrors of coronavirus again. It's been, it's been several months and it's worse than ever now.

It's like we're like, now we're the hand waivers of this whole situation. Let's do that too then. And of course, Joe Biden's digital divide. Plus more lukewarm takes about the PDC. See you then, David. See you, Brian.