The Press Box - The New Weinstein Book, Democratic Debate Fallout, and Joe Biden vs. Corn Pop | The Press Box

Episode Date: September 17, 2019

Bryan Curtis and David Shoemaker talk about 'She Said,' the new book by reporters Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey on Harvey Weinstein (03:00), the Overworked Twitter Joke of the Week (16:45), fallout from the Democratic debate (19:00), Joe Biden vs. Corn Pop (31:30), the return of Gary Larson's Far Side (36:30), and more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What's up, guys, it's Liz Kelly, and welcome to the Ringer Podcast Network. We hope you enjoyed listening to Breakstuff, The Story of Woodstock 99 on Luminary. Now continuing with our 99 theme, I wanted to let you guys know we've got all new episodes of the rewatchables, 1990 starting back up right now. Since we've returned, we have rewatched eyes wide shut and election, and up next is Never Been Kissed and many more 1999 classics. So make sure to check out the Rewatchables 1999 on Luminary. David, at last week's debate Hulian Castro brought up the issue of Joe Biden's age and then spent the next 48 hours

pretending that he didn't. What I want to know is what have you said in your life that you would now like to preposterously pretend you didn't say? Oh man, there is no answer to this. It's not going to get me into trouble. How about the time when I said

I would absolutely love to host the press box two times a week election season. Does that count? It's funny because it's true. See, I was going to just I was just going to say we shouldn't have made fun of Andrew Yang so much because we're about to get a thousand dollar freedom dividend. Oh, please bring on that dividend. I'll take everything back. No, no, but I'm, I'm, let's not go there. Let's go back to what you were complaining about hosting the show every week. That really, it cuts to the core. I apologize. I didn't actually, I want to take back what I just said in response to your

question. That's my official answer. We are the stab at the back of media podcast. This is the press box. Part of the Ringer podcast network. Hello media consumers. Brian Curtis and David Shoemaker here. Lots to get to today, including fallout from last week's Democratic debate. We're going to talk

about Joe Biden's standoff with a man named Corn Pop. The return of the comic, the far side, and a little conflict of interest to get your week started right. David, let's begin with the brand new Harvey Weinstein book. It's called She Said by Jody Canter and Megan Toey, who published their Weinstein smiting and movement starting pieces. And the New York Times back in October 2017, in the time Susan Faludi calls She Said a feminist, all the president's men, which is exactly the same track I was on this weekend when I read it.

Because one, it's a great book about a huge story, but it's also a great book about journalists. And I think the first three quarters or so is some of the most extraordinary stuff I've ever read about just journalists breaking a story, how you do it, what you do, the brick walls you run into and how you get around them. One revelation I want to start you with, Gwyneth Paltrow, the actress, did not appear in the first Harvey Weinstein story that Canter and Tui wrote. She actually appeared five days later. but according to she said she was talking to Jody Kanner the entire time constantly texting back and forth, even reaching out to actresses on her behalf. Here's Kanner talking about their relationship with Gail King on CBS.

You told us some never before things. Like, I have to say, Bravo Tudu, to Gwyneth Paltrow. She played a much bigger role, I think, than many, I think, than many people realized. When we were starting out, I barely thought we should call her because I thought she was Harvey's biggest star. And also, she's not an activist type. She's not going to talk to us.

And in fact, when almost nobody else in Hollywood would pick up the phone, when only a few other people like Ashley Judd were really helping us, Gwyneth told us her story of predation with Harvey Weinstein, told us how he threatened her, and she was afraid she was going to lose those critical early roles. And also, Weinstein was kind of obsessed with the question of whether or not she was speaking to us. So at one point, I actually got a panicked phone call from her. She was hiding in her bathroom from Harvey Weinstein because he had showed up to her house. He had showed up. She knew he was coming to the party, but he showed up early.

And that was really scary. That's an extraordinary. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, this is, and according to all of these women who had the courage to even pick up the phone and talk, you know, not even agreeing yet to be on the record, not agreeing to be in an article in any kind of way, but just. even to sort of, you know, answer a phone call or a text, we're so worried about Harvey Weinstein finding out that they were doing that,

that you get a lot of stories like that, which is just just wild. The other thing, David, that's just amazing to me is you and I, when we read these pieces, and obviously we don't see them until they're in the newspaper, but when we read them, we marvel at the courage,

you marvel at, you know, the sort of fortitude to come forth, put yourself in the, you know, out there like this. But these women, of course, had other stuff going on. Canter and Tui Wright, I thought that was amazing that when she first calls Gwyneth Paltrow, everybody's making fun of Goop at the time.

And so in addition to everything else, Paltrow thinks, why am I going on the record now about this when I'm being made fun of for these things I'm selling online? another time close to publication the article canter texted her and paltrow was on the set of the Avengers movie and essentially saying I'm here filming an Avengers movie I don't think I'm going to go on the record in what turns out to be a history making Harvey Weinstein article because I've you know in addition to everything else I'm about to go shoot a a photo with the other Avengers. Anyway, I just thought that was amazing.

It just reminds you that real life has had. happening the whole time. Yeah. The journalism has happened. Yeah, that's right. And, and, you know, you know, Paltrow's obviously has a rather unique set of circumstances, you know, just the way her life is constructed and their level of fame and from a lot of different quadrants, I guess. But, but I thought the Goop thing was actually particularly instructive because you do, you know, everybody has to weigh these decisions on their own. And obviously, like, the relative, you know, punchline status of Goop is a really huge. minor thing in the grand scheme of things are compared to what a lot of other people have to go through.

But you do sort of see in a very small way what everybody sort of wrestles with in any kind of journalistic, you know, whenever you're trying to get somebody on the record, right? I mean, it's just like, how will it sound? What will it be, do I want to be talking about this now? Will it be perceived them talking about this for a reason now? Like, how is it going to come off? Small things, you know, can make a big difference. It does.

And it just made me think of her so differently because she has been such a, punchline for the Goop stuff over the last couple of years. This is not a woman who was deciding whether to go on the record with Canter and Toey, which he ultimately did. She was saying, let me, tell me who you want me to contact in the world of, you know, of Hollywood. And I'll reach out to them. And I'll also reach out to some other people.

She was a huge behind the scenes, you know, air traffic controller for the story. and that's important to appreciate two more. Let me give you that surprised me. Lena Dunham and Jenny Connor, who created girls in the Lenny Letter, among other things, were part of this. The reporters were initially worried about Lena Dunham

because are you going to let her in on this secret? Is she going to crowdsource this on Twitter? Like, hey, anybody know anything? But she didn't. And Dunham and Connor became, as they write a two-woman celebrity switchboard, sending Jody some of the direct contact information she needed because that's another thing.

You can't write, you can't get on IMDB pro and write to the actors, you know, publicists and say, hey, I got all these questions about Harvey Weinstein and sexual assault. You need to contact them directly. Yeah. And that was big. The technique stuff, David fascinated me. Tooie, in particular, she was a reporter in Chicago before coming to New York Times, had lots of experience writing about victims of sexual abuse. and assault. So one of the, one of the sort of amazing characterizations here is Canter going to her and

saying, what do I say to these people when I call them up? Because a lot of people are going to say, no matter whether they wind up cooperating or not, they're going to say, I don't need this in my life. You know, why should I help you, even if you're on the right track here? And Tuwey's advice to Canter was to say, I can't change what happened to you in the past, but together we may be able to use your experience to help protect other people. And I thought that was so interesting because Canter writes, it's not sucking up to the source. It's not trying to promise them that something amazing is going to happen or don't worry. You know, everything will be okay because nobody at that point knew that everything was going to be okay.

You know, a lot of people thought Harvey Weinstein was going to survive, but that was a way to just sort of say the next thing because so much of it investigative reporting is not about you know the kind of Woodward and Bernstein moment of voila it's about keeping the subject talking and being able to at least temporarily answer the question that they have so that potentially you'll get farther

I know I thought that was just fascinating yeah I mean certainly I mean this goes to the larger conversation about the book and the Susan Faludi review in the times that you mentioned as it just I mean as a as a behind the scenes look at the way journalism works This is just like some of the most compelling stuff you could ever, you could hope to find.

It's always hard to, I mean, just from the publishing side, it's always, it's always precarious to try to expand a successful article or even a big magazine piece into a book, you know, because how much more, that's a lot of extra words. A lot of extra information, a lot of extra content. And so you get people, you know, there's a million different ways that people sort of fleshed out. And a lot of times there's enough content to make it work. But this is a really interesting, I mean, just the nuts and bolts of the reporting process. end up being a sort of incredibly harrowing story in their own right. And I have my history right here, right, when Woodward and Bernstein were trying to figure out how to write all the president's men, they were going to write it or even did write it one way. And then the big revise was, no, no, no, this book should be about you guys figuring out this story as much as it should be about Nixon and his cronies.

Am I right about that? Yeah, that's the story that I know. Yeah. So that's what they did here. And it's like one of those things where not every, not every translation, as you say, from article and the book would the move would be to do that. But, you know, what they were able to do here. And she said is to go back to all their sources and essentially say, can we share all this information that was on off the record at the time, right? Can we go back and recount the early conversations with Gwyneth Paltrow with Marissa Tomei with all these other people, which was just fascinating. Can I, let me blow your mind for a second.

the initial Harvey Weinstein article that ran in the Times and of course there were many subsequent ones with 3300 words So the next time you write about a wrestler or I write about a sports announcer and we look at the word count and it's like 3,600 words and we haven't done anything yet Just remember the Harvey Weinstein initial Harvey Weinstein story 3,300 words unbelievable Peace also had its deep throat Irvin writer or excuse me Irwin writer an executive who started working for the Weinsteins in 1980s in 1980s in 1980s in 1980s he died. This is just this is this is some of the best and most cinematic

part of the book parts of the book. Cantor calls Irwin Ryder because she's heard that he has something against Harvey Weinstein. He says and listen to this this little walk through investigative reporting. He says, I'm not talking to you but here's my personal email.

Okay. So Canter writes him with this email. Writer writes back to say, your background is impressive. I have a healthy respect for reporters. Now, that's not a no. That's interesting. They go through it. Again, she is kind of keeping him talking, keeping it going. And then a writer eventually says, meet me in a bar in Tribeca. In Tribeca, a few blocks away from the Weinstein company. At this point, and Harvey is very well aware that they are writing something. Canter does,

and after several meetings, writer pulls up on his phone a key document, which is a memo. A woman who worked for Weinstein had written about Weinstein's treatment of women. Writer hands canter his phone. The document is up on the phone, okay? This memo. And he says, you know what? I got to go to the bathroom and leaves her on purpose with this document in her hand, which she then copies and immediately sends to her colleagues at the times.

Now, that is incredible. When I say that sounds like a movie, it really does. Yeah. That really does. I sort of wonder if we're going to get the fictional treatment of this, because this is one of the rare journalism stories that deserves it. How much different would history have been if his phone had locked while she was fumbling with her own? Somebody called through or whatever.

He got one of those calls from the Bahamas that you're not supposed to answer. Just a key moment. Yeah, no, it really is. It's a really, it's a really incredible story. And his and, I mean, writer is just an incredibly compelling, I mean, compelling. character in the context of all this stuff. He is because, you know, again, when you read that, I'm not sure I like, you or I actually made this connection, but it's like there had to be somebody there who was essentially

betraying Weinstein, even righteously betraying Weinstein. You know, you had to get to somebody inside the company to have that kind of detail because they quoted from that memo several times in their first piece. And that really made it, you know, once something like that is on file, right, that becomes a primary source and something really interesting. interesting to the reporters. The only other thing I would leave you with here is Harvey Weinstein's defense during this whole saga. You know, we knew we knew Weinstein by reputation as this monster and threatening people and reporters or anyone who got in his way. We read about the black cube

intel guys, read about David Boyes, Lisa Bloom. Lanny Davis, history's saddest man, came in at one point in this story and wondered aloud to the reporters about Harvey giving it. interview about how he has evolved on his treatment of women. Like, so this is what he was saying. Let's let it maybe, you know, you're, you're, you're trying to write this exposee of Harvey Weinstein. What if, what if he gives you an interview saying, you know, he's really learned from his past and we kind of make this into an Esquire, what I've learned column.

That was, that was not going to happen. The other thing is at the very end of the piece for it's published, Weinstein didn't have anything. I mean, he just had no, he had no defense. he had no he had nothing he threatens at one point to give an interview to the Washington Post to scoop the reporters which by the way is exactly what Roger Ailes did to Gabe Sherman way back when maybe not coincidentally he gives them at the very end right before they hit publish a rambling statement that cites both jZ and the national rifle association

um Ashley Judd at the very last minute decided to go on the record which necessitated them right rewriting the lead of the story which of course course made it even more compelling than it had been. As David, I was reading this whole thing and reading some of the pieces you've been reading about the book, how journalistically useful the word disgraced has become in the Me Too era. Harvey Weinstein has not been convicted of anything, but Harvey Weinstein is a disgraced movie mogul. Mark Halperin has not been convicted of anything, but he is the disgraced political pundit. And all right. Right. It just,

that disgrace lands us just nicely on this side of libel and they don't actually have to have to have to have left court in handcuffs. They can just be disgraced. Is that a useful word or what? Yeah. Yeah, it does a lot of legwork, especially in this day and age.

All right, David, let us transfer to the Overwork 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 over the weekend, kind of a puzzling tweet from the president.

He just wrote plenty of oil, all caps, exclamation point. Plenty of oil. Several overworked Twitter jokes that were gathered by Olivia Nuzzi. One was me leading off my arugula pesto pasta recipe. Another person said,

when someone asked me why my oatmeal cookies are amazing, also enjoyed people just posting pictures showing the hair of Donald Jr. and Eric Trump. Anyway, thanks to Brian Cogsall for that one. David, we're in the midst of a vaping panic. You have no personal reaction to this. I know. No, we have the midst of a vaping panic. The only thing Donald Trump and Andrew Cuomo agree on is that they're trying to ban flavored e-cig.

A lot of E-Sig gun control jokes out there on Twitter this week. Oh, yeah. Pretty common one to write. If the government wants to take my jewel, they're going to have to pry it out of my cold dead hands. But I think I preferred this one. The only way to stop a bad guy with a jewel is a good guy with a jewel. Thanks to Damien Murphy for that one.

Very good stuff. All right, for the world of politics, David. Newsweek reports today, the Secret Service wants jet skis to protect the Trumps. jet skis to protect the Trump's quote, the first family is very active in water sports. Okay. First family is very active in water sports.

It was an overworked Twitter joke to say the pee tape is real as hell. That's fantastic. Gross, I mean. And finally, on Friday, actress Felicity Huffman was sentenced to 14 days in jail for being rich and white and committing a crime. I'm sorry, her complicity in a college. mission scandal aimed at getting her daughter into a good school. I don't know if this was overworked, but this was really good.

Congrats to Huffman on making it into an exclusive institution based purely on merit. Oh, boy. All right, the notebook dump. Let us do some fallout from Thursday's Democratic debate. First of all, late night, not even that late here on the West Coast, I wrongly put some words in the mouth of Andrew Yang. I said he was the one complaining about Democrats taking shots at each other. It wasn't Yang who said that it was Pete Buttigieg. I'm sorry.

Here's my question to you, David. We've had five debates over three rounds. Do you feel like you have any idea who the Democratic nominee is going to be at this point? I can tell you with certainty that we are going to look back in however many months and feel like it was a given. Although I cannot answer your question at all. we're going to write the game the game change narrative is going to be like everything changed right before the third round of debates and then we'll be quoting what we just watched on Thursday night I mean listen if it feels a lot like it's either

going to be Joe Biden and we will be able you know easily look back and say that he was inevitable based on his poll numbers going in or it's going to be Elizabeth Warren and and it'll be and it'll seem like it was inevitable because Biden was such a flawed candidate as competition But who knows? Yeah. I mean, I'm obviously writing off a huge swath. I mean, like Bernie Sanders is still up.

This will incredibly high. And obviously anything could happen. Those are the two most likely scenarios, though I do feel we're uniquely likely that something weird outside of that could happen at this point. Versus where we've been in other primaries. Like, it's imaginable that somebody else would win. I don't have a path for Kamala Harris to become the nominee in front of me. But given where we are. and everything that's happened, that's not totally nuts.

I agree. I mean, I think it's easy to say that she's, you know, that she sort of had a moment and squandered it. And, you know, as recently as four years ago, I think those sorts of like minor metanarratives were really powerful, right? I mean, I don't, I think that, but, but the fact that she kind of had the boomlet that she had, I think, shows that there's going to be a lot of volatility going forward. And I think the media is just general hunger and for these sorts of meta-narratives mean that, I mean, if somebody surprising comes in second place in Iowa, um, you know, all bets are off, I think. Beto? Who's the, who's the, who's the, who's the most interesting second place surprise in Iowa? Well, I mean, someone that's, that's, that's actually,

like, like, showing in Iowa. Uh-huh. Probably Beto. I mean, probably probably, I mean, probably, I mean, but, but Buttigieg probably, I mean, it, bedos, it's really hard to, I mean, despite the sort of reboot, whatever. I mean, it's hard, that, that one's a little hard to wrap your mind, But yeah, for, I mean, for Iowa, it'd be one of those two. It'll be, it'll be interesting for sure. Big story from Thursday was Hulian Castro bringing up the idea of Joe Biden's age, really for the first time, at least in that way. You and I both think that do you have the mental faculties to be president is a perfectly

reasonable line of questioning. Here's the funny part. It turns out it's a totally reasonable line of questioning, but you can't admit to having brought it up if you're a presidential candidate. Because I don't know if you saw this, but after the debate, both that night and the next day, Castro repeatedly and preposterously claim

that he wasn't talking about Biden's age at all. Listen to him here with CNN's John Berman on Friday morning. Are you asking us to believe? Are you asking us to believe this morning that you weren't questioning Joe Biden's memory? Oh, I was questioning why he was saying that he hadn't said the words buy-in, which is significant to health care policy when he had just said that two minutes ago. Are you questioning his memory?

Are you questioning? Do you have questions about Joe Biden's memory? I was questioning. I was, look, this is the game that the media liked to play. This isn't a game. Secretary, Mr. Secretary, just to be clear. You said this three times. And you are a very skillful politician who chooses your words very, very carefully.

Because he had said the words buy in. Because he had said the words buy in two minutes before and then he denied saying it. So of course, I asked him, look, you know, did you forget that you said buy in? This is important because it means the difference between covering 10 million people in this country and not covering 10 million. Now who's playing games here? Is it the guy on CNN or is it? By not admitting what he was doing by saying the word forgetting three times in a row. There's so many things going on here at the same time.

One, it was telling that the guy on CNN was unwilling to actually ask the question that he was asking. So he was playing the exact same game that he was accusing Castro of playing. Right? Right. He would not say the words, are you calling him old? I mean, like he never said that. And then, but I mean, I think Castro, I think there's a degree to which Castro

assuming that he did that deliberately and he did it as a mean to underline Biden's age, there is, I mean, we've talked to this in other context before, but yeah, part of the job, I mean, the gig is that you go and performatively deny it and everybody knows that you're not, that you don't really mean it, and that's fine.

Then we can put it to bed, but that we have to sort of have the kind of public airing of that at some point and then move up forward from it. But then also, like, I don't, I mean, it, it is very strange. I mean, it's, it's just like, I don't, it's, it's a reasonable line of, of, of questioning. And even absent that sort of, you know, that sort of implication, it's a reasonable question, you know, even though, even if he did get it wrong, I was sort of shocked in the aftermath how much, I mean, I flipped on the TV the next day and, uh, I think Fox wasn't

talking about it when I woke up and, and I switched a morning Joe. And they were like, constructing an effigy of Julian Castro that they could set on fire in the middle of the show. I mean, it was their, I mean, Joe Scarborough's anger was so visceral. It was unbelievable. But I was surprised with how much time was spent, I mean, and we talked about it the night of the debate, but I was surprised with how much energy was spent explaining that Castro got it wrong. Like, oh, he blew his gotcha moment because he got it wrong. That's another one where it's sort of missing the force for the trees, right? I mean, if the point was that he was trying to say Joe Biden was old,

then it doesn't matter if he got it wrong, right? I mean, if the point, if the point was making this crack and showing Joe Biden, like, you know, stumbling in response to it, then it was a roaring success. Yeah, though, I guess if you're, if you're Joe Biden and he's like, he attacked me for not remembering what I said two minutes ago, but he actually, but Castro, this, this, you know, vibrant young man over here is the one. who misremembered. I guess that's a pretty good defense. It's a pretty good defense if again, you're going to pretend like it wasn't an age crack, right?

And that's, I think, more than anyone else, it's incumbent on the Biden campaign to downplay the ageism implicit in it because then you're raising the specter of age, right? This was just a good faith disagreement about health care that we just happen to. First of all, we should just say it is preposterous that he was not, he is claiming that he was not talking about. Biden's age. I mean, that is, that is, no, but I, of course he was. Of course, of course he was. But as, but I, but I'm just saying is, I think it's, I think it's, I think it's, I think it's, I think it's reasonable for him to deny it and, and to, and to move on. I mean, that's, that's, that's the way that the politics functions now. I guess. I mean, I just find it, I find it, you're, you're, you're, you're really, you know, trying to turn this, this, this carefully, you know, negotiate this curve here. I'm trying to reach for a race car reference for race car metaphor. negotiate this turn because you're saying I'm going to hit Biden for his age on national TV. I'm going to risk pissing off a huge segment of the Democratic electorate, you know, Biden fans, other people, people that just like, oh, that wasn't very nice. Joe Scarborough, other people like that. Then I'm going to claim, instead of owning it, I'm going to claim afterwards that I wasn't talking about this at all, which will appease none of the people who are. pissed off at me because they know I was talking. I mean, I just at some point, I'm just like,

if you're Castro, this is a weird thing. And can he not come out there and, and go on CNN the next morning and say, you know what? Here's the thing. I total respect for Joe Biden. I have respect for everybody in the age. I think it's important for the guy who is facing down Donald Trump to be able to clearly explain things and clearly be able to remember things and explain things because you're going up against this huge Republican apparatus. If you're going to tell a story about the troops, you should get the details right. Or at least in the ballpark of being right rather than like three things wrong. Can he not say that? Is that totally evil to just say something like that? I mean, you should have been script doctoring for him.

I mean, that would have gone a lot better than whatever he did. I'm surprised. I guess I was my shock was that he went on TV to defend himself at all. And if and you're right, if he, if he was going to go on, If he was obligated or felt necessary to go on, he should have said what you just said, you know, just like make the case without saying explicitly, you know, this guy may be too crotchery to be our president to sort of, to make the affirmative case for why that line of questioning is valid would have been a lot different than doing the whole, oh, this is the game the media likes to. Once you say this is the game the media likes to play, you already lost, you know? Yeah. It's a, it's a, this is the game the media likes to play as I voluntarily. do a hit on cable news at 6.30 in the morning, you know. I don't know. I think you're playing the game too, dude.

One final note from Thursday's debate, Aestead Herndon and the New York Times had a great note, which I regret we didn't say on Thursday night. He writes on Twitter, We shouldn't lose sight of how that Budajudge moment, a major candidate openly talking about coming

out on a presidential debate stage is a historic one that seemed unlikely even a decade ago. he is right and let's hear a little bit of that because this was from that section of the debate at the end where they were talking about your moments of resilience

which is I think we said that night was sort of amazing because you actually remembered why you like these people and why these people made appealing politicians in the first place because now you know before we slice and dice everything they say for public inspection anyway here's Buttigieg from the debate

Thursday night you know it was military officers serving under Don't Ask Don't Tell, and as an elected official in the state of Indiana when Mike Pence was governor. At a certain point, when it came to professional setbacks, I had to wonder whether just acknowledging who I was was going to be the ultimate career-ending professional setback. I came back from the deployment and realized that you only get to live one life and I was not interested in not knowing what it was like to be in love any longer. So I just came out. I had no idea what kind of professional setback it would be, especially because

inconveniently it was an election year in my socially conservative community. What happened was that when I trusted voters to judge me based on the job that I did for them, they decided to trust me and reelected me with 80% of the people. the vote and what I learned was that trust can be reciprocated and that part of how you can win and deserve to win is to know what's worth more to you than winning and I think that's what we need in the presidency right now good time to remember that the last Democratic president we had ran his first Democratic excuse me his first campaign for the Democratic nomination against gay marriage against the legalization of gay marriage just a reminder and he

here we are in a much, much happier place, if not an ideal place in 2019. David, I've been waiting all weekend to talk to you about the saga of Joe Biden versus corn pop. According to the Washington Post Robert Samuels, Biden became a lifeguard at a public swimming pool in Wilmington, Delaware, about 50 years ago. The pool was frequented by African Americans. Biden had seen footage of civil rights demonstrations in the size. South and realized Samuel's rights that he had no real relationships with black people.

So he takes the job. He's 19 years old. He's wearing big sunglasses. And he gets into a confrontation with a street tough named corn pop. Let us let Joe Biden tell the rest of the story. I learned a lot. And I learned that it makes a difference. This was the diving board area.

And I was one of the guards. And there weren't a lot of it. So there was a three-meter board. And you fell off sideways, you landed on the darn cement over there. And Corn Pop was a bad dude. And he ran a bunch of bad boys. And I did. And back in those days, the show how things have changed,

one of the things you had to use, if you used pomade in your hair, you had to wear a bathing cap. And so he was up on the board, wouldn't list him. I said, hey, Esther, you, off the board. I'll come up and drag you off. Well, he came off, and he said, I'll meet you outside. My car, this was mostly, these were all public housing behind it. My car, there was a gate out here.

I parked my car outside the gate. And he said, I'll be waiting for you. He was waiting for three guys in straight racers. Not a joke. There's a guy named Bill Wright, Mouse, the only white guy, and he did all the pools. He was the mechanic. And I said, what am I going to do? He said, come down here in the basement where mechanics, where all the pool.

pool filter is. You know the chain, there used to be a chain that went across the deep end. And he cut off a six foot length of chain. He fold up. He said, you walk out with that chain. And you walked in a car and say, you may cut me, man, but I'm going to wrap this chain around your head. I said, you're kidding me. He said, no, if you don't, don't come back. And he was right. So I walked out with the chain. And I walked up to my car. And those days, you used to remember the straight raise you, bang them on the curb, get him rusty, put them in a rain barrel, get him rusty. And I looked at him, but I was smart then. I said, first of all, I said, when I tell you get off the board, you get off the board, I'll kick you out again, but I shouldn't have called you. Esther Williams,

I apologize for that. I apologize. But I didn't know that apology's going to work. He said, you apologize to me. I said, I apologize for that. Not for throwing you out, but I apologize to what I said. He said, okay, close the straight razor and my heart began to beat again. What the hell? So you thought the record player thing at the debate was wild. Woo.

Oh my gosh. We just need Joe Biden to tell old-timey stories to America. Everybody, this is fantastic. My grandfather never told me any story that involved three guys with straight razors in a six foot length of chain

wrapped around his arm. that sounds pretty bonkers, and we know Biden has exaggerated many things. A writer over the weekend with the route named Michael Harriet came forward and tweeted that this whole thing seemed like a white fantasy about race. He says, I bet my pinky toe that corn pop, who was the antagonist in this story, never existed. Well, it turns out corn pop, aka William L. Morris, did exist. America's favorite Canadian Daniel Dale found his obit. and the former head of the Delaware NACP

says that he was actually at the pool and witnessed the first part of that tale. I think we can probably wonder whether Biden is taking some extreme creative license with the showdown in the parking lot part where he is holding the chain around his arm and three guys have razor blades out waiting for him before a convenient apology stops the whole story cold.

but there you are David I'm not sure that this is again this is the resurface this weekend that original bit he was doing was from 2017 but that's the story of Joe Biden and corn pop that is incredible stuff

Joe Biden at a public pool I mean if if you're one of Joe Biden's opponents and you want to convince people that maybe he's not the right guy to take on Trump maybe just play that at length maybe just play that and say if this is the guy you want to be the public

speaker of the Democratic Party for the next year plus have at it. Wow. Department of Reboots, David. Got some amazing news back from the years where we used to buy softbound comic copulations at places like B. Dalton's.

The news is that Gary Larson's legendary comic The Far Side, which ran from 1980 to 1995, and then ceased because Larson retired is coming back? we think. A message on the Farsize website reads, uncommon, unreal, and soon to be unfrozen, a new online era of the Farside is coming.

Do you want to explain to the youngs out there what the unique? You were always a comic guy. God. The unique appeal. Is that Chris laughing? It's true. What the unique appeal of the Farside was. Sorry, I'm over here so slightly floored that old school tough in Joe Biden's stories turned out to be less fake than than Corey Booker's. But the far side, right.

The far side was, God, how to describe it? The far side was like, if you woke up every day and opened up like the section E, whatever, of your local newspaper, and like Zach Galfinakis was there with a joke. And you were just like,

and you got to push play and listen to like a 15 second bit every day and you were just like, yeah. And by the way, that's Zach Gaffanagas in the absence of every other good comic and that's the only access anyone has to him. Except like you said, you could go

to the store and buy the compilation. It was just like an absolutely irreplaceable, irrepressible sort of irreverent dry humor that barely existed anywhere else in the mainstream, but certainly

didn't exist on the comics page, was I could say a lot of nice things about a lot of legacy comic strips that, you know, matter, mattered to me and whatever else. But like, man, I mean, that was like LeBron James showing up at the why. I mean, there was no competition in that style of humor. And it spoke to kids and grownups, and it sounds so cliche to say. But like, man, when I was growing up, if our family my parents were going to a party and they didn't know exactly

what to get it bring as a gift they would bring a far side compilation and wrap it. Totally right. Like that's how big of a deal it was and yet it was my favorite thing too. Like it was the funniest thing I'd ever,

I don't know, it's so crazy. Yeah, it has, this is not a good metaphor in any other way, but it was a little bit like Pixar movies

where it's the adult's favorite thing. and then it's also the kid's favorite thing. But that even relies on almost you kind of being a parent or in the parent zone. The Farside didn't. Farside was like for jaded people and unjaded people at the same time. And as you say,

this is a world of Garfield. A lot of comic strips that have been around since our grandparents were in high pants. And it seems so much more sophisticated. And as you say, dry than anything else on the page. I think another part of its mystique, and tell me if I'm wrong about this,

was that it ended when Gary Larson was still in his prime. And it wasn't like one of these comic strips that goes on for another 40 years, first written by the cartoonist's son and then written by like, you know, the great grandson that just like the family circus that just never ends.

It stopped and quit while it was ahead. Yeah, it seemed like he was just sort of like, yeah, I'm done. You know, he just, it's like, he just did a, he just, he just walked off. Um, and that I think shows the sort of artistry of it. Now, it's not like, you know, there's, the door is always open. I guess felt like it was always open for, for some sort of return. But I mean, there's no, there was no like, I'm going to take some time off. Certainly, you know, since then, there have been some time, I think Calvin and Hobbs or, I mean,

I'm sure the Farsite continued to run after it was over for some time, right? But, I mean, but this is a daily or weekly endeavor so that when you stop doing new material, like people are immediately aware of it. So there's no like, oh, I'm just going to like take a breath or whatever. When he quit, he was just like, he stood to make millions and millions more dollars and he just decided to take some time off. Calvin and Hobbs was a walk off in Bloom County was a walk off too around the same time. Am I wrong about that? Same era, four or less? Yeah, absolutely. This was a 90s reboot I did not see coming. I see every 90s reboot seems like we could just, okay, okay, of course there's going to be a Murphy Brown, you know, what do people have better to do? Of

course we'll see Frazier at some point. I don't know if I could have seen the far side coming back. That just seems like, but the thing is, it wasn't a, you know, a lot of this stuff that's coming back relies on the 90s, it being the 90s. And I'm, and I'm sure it relied on that age of newspapers. And, you know, like you said, there was no Zach Gallifanakis around to, you know, there was nothing like it where there's probably stuff like it or generally like it now. Yeah. But it did seem timeless, right? Like lots of animal jokes, lots of jokes with like people in medieval dungeons, things like that. It was like the anti-Dunesbury, right? It was just all about it could have run essentially at any time. Yeah, it relied heavily on those sorts of tropes that like weren't even, I mean,

were less tropes and more to sort of commentaries on the way we consume tropes almost. But like it's, you know, yeah, there were cavemen and, and, I mean, you know, angry natives and like you know whatever i mean just like all all kinds are just like probably at this point slightly inappropriate i was i say we might have to might not bring those back but well i but i mean but it's funny when you think about comparing him to you know what the with the points in comparison outside of the comics page are and it's sort of i don't know to me it's like i don't know what gary larsen's been doing for all i know he's been you know producing major motion pictures but it does seem like he took off like he left so much on the table not just

money he would have made from far side collections but like i mean why gary larsen shouldn't be coming back to the far side gary larson should be like signing a hundred million dollar netflix deal you know i mean gary larsson's gary larson should be doing should be like you know parading proudly into the middle of our like pop culture mainstream he is that sense of humor is like i mean i think informed a whole generation it was just so it was just like such a big deal i for one vote for him not to sign a hundred billion Netflix deal. I don't know. I'd find that a little depressing. I don't know. I'd have to

not that he doesn't deserve it. But you know, does everybody have to get a development deal at this point? Just draw a comic. They can stop as soon as we get ours. How do you deliver a comic at this point in history? His is going to be web only, it looks like. It looks like that and by the way. Okay, but tell me

more. Where do I get it? Is it going to be on Twitter? I think you go to the far side. He's very, he's very protective of his, of copyright stuff. And he's actually for a while was like sending out cease and desist to like fan sites. Right.

But this was before the era of social media where copying could mean like retweeting or something like that. Like I don't think he was anticipating that. So the idea is that fans will log on to the far side website

to find his comic at the day. Or maybe they'll subscribe to, I mean, maybe it'll be in a Twitter feed. Who knows? Who knows? But it does seem like it's going to be online only.

And yeah, I mean, it's, it's, you know, he's, my guess is you'll have to go to the farside.com or subscribe directly to one of his feeds to get a hold of it. This is amazing. Welcome back, Gary Larson. So much more exciting than Murphy Brown. Department of Inside Jobs, David. This weekend, the venerable magazine show CBS Sunday morning did a story on New York Magazine. It was exactly what you think your parents would want to consume over their Sunday coffee at a moss, found, photos of the founding editor Clay Felker, art director Milton Glazer, you get the idea. But this little moment caught my attention. Listen to correspondent David Pogue.

In an age when dozens of venerable magazines have gone to the great newsstand in the sky, it's impressive that New York is still in print. One key reason? Adam Moss started publishing the magazine on the internet early. I was leading the charge, I guess. Today, there are five spin-off websites with a total of 50 million readers a month. Intelligencer, The Cut, Vulture, Grub Street, and The Strategist.

I myself write tech reviews for The Strategists. So CBS needed someone to do this, and they got someone who's a contributor to New York Magazine. And whatever remains of the legions of CBS correspondents, we couldn't find someone who did. and review the new Fitbit last month for the strategist. Now, is there anything super corrupting about that? No. But I love how we've reached a point where just nobody gives a shit anymore. They just don't care. David Pogue is going to do a toothless little piece about a website that he is paid to write for.

In other news, CBS is going to have a piece about the ringer next week and the correspondent is Stephen Hayden. So we'll look forward to seeing that on television. That's a joke about it. One wacky headline, David. Before we do the pun headline, what to acknowledge us? We got listeners,

Bonnie Rachel, Jonathan Tierney, Ryan Hand, and Arn, sent us this New York Times tweet. It is yet another animal story. Everyone lets their headline freak flag fly when they write animal story headlines. This is an actual tweet from New York Times.

When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie, it may not be a moray at all, but a ghostly white barn owl about to kill and eat you. If you're a vol that is, that's a real tweet. Wait, what? That whole, oh, if that's a tweet, that's not a headline. I guess that's better. That's a tweet.

All right. Just let me say one more time. When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie, it may not be a moray at all, but a ghostly white barn owl about to kill and eat you. If you're a vol, that is. Kind of a weird tack on there at the end. How are you doing bad? how are you using

when the moon hits your eye like a big thing when you're using that and it's an animal pun you better be talking about a moray eel like there's no other option they weren't

they were not or just like a pizza restaurant or something right all right time for David Chewmaker guess this is a strain pun headline I was going to use that but what would you guess

it's not even a pun I don't know last Tuesday's headline was court of appeal. And this week's David, I found an airmail. The Graydon Carter and Alessandra Stanley edited publication. It is a piece about

Downton Abbey creator Julian Fellows that was written by Victoria Mather. But ignore that last piece of info. It's not important and really ignore everything else. And just do it. What was airmail's strained pun headline for a sit down with Julian Fellows? There's so many ways I can go with this.

Dang, fellow, uh, Julian, I'm gonna guess that Air Mail would lean towards a down, a downtown, downtown, down sort of pun.

I think, um, no, I think you just go, just go a little higher brow than that, or just, you know, stay above the,

stay above the frown. Abby, Abby wrote, um, you got to, you got to help me at. You're having lunch with Julian fellows. You're having an encounter Julian fellows.

Meeting fellow, good fellow, good fellows. Yeah, I have no idea. It is Hale Fellows well met. I was searching for that phrase. You were circling it. Hail fellows well met over there in Ammet. airmail. Good, good job guys and gals. He is David Schumacher. I'm Brian Curtis. Research by Chris Albeda production magic by Jim Cunningham.

We're back Friday. Bright and early with more Luke Wurb takes about the media. See you then, David. See you later, Brian. David? Hell yeah. I'm here. You know, in addition to everything else, I'm about to go shoot a photo with the other Avengers. I'm not talking to you, but here's my personal email. Wait, what?

nobody gives a shit no they just don't care so much more exciting than Murphy Brown for sure now who's playing games here man I mean that was like LeBron James showing up at the Y

I mean there was no competition that sounds pretty bonkers and by the way I don't need this in my life do you want to explain to the youngs out there God how to describe it that's not a no I can tell you with certainty

Have at it. It is very strange. I mean, it's just like, I don't... David, we're in the midst of plenty of oil. All caps, exclamation point. Plenty of oil. That's fantastic. Gross, I mean.

Let me blow your mind for a second. He is David Shoemaker. I'm history's saddest man. Am I right about that? Yeah, that's the story that I know, yeah. My grandfather never told me any story that involved three guys with straight raisers and a six-foot that sounds like a movie?

It really does. Yeah. What do I say to these people when I call them up? This guy may be too crotchary. I think you're playing the game too, dude. There's so many things going on here at the same time. Hey, anybody know anything? Right.

I mean, that is ludicrous. Right. Is that a useful word or what? Right.