The Most Dramatic Podcast Ever with Chris HarrisonLiam Payne's recent death was shocking and heartbreaking, but TMZ posting photos of his deceased body as they announced his passing to their readers-- Is this journalism?
Chris and Lauren talk candidly about this topic and other journalistic decisions that received backlash this week.
This is the most traumatic podcast ever and iHeartRadio podcast. Chris Harrison and laurenz Eva coming to you from the home office in Austin, Texas. We are back together. Both of us were gone this weekend. I was in Vegas helping MC and host the Jeremy Renner his Renter Foundation for foster kids that he helps in Nevada and Hawkeuy and the mayor a little bit more for the mayor of Kingstown. I was geeking out a little bit, hanging out with the mayor and he was packing heat all weekend. I'm telling you, it was wild. He's he rolls around like the mayor now and just putting people down. No he wasn't You said he was so nice. No, he's the nicest guy. He's good looking, he's smart.
Do you have a crush on Jeremy Runner.
No, it made me mad. It's like you, you know, when you meet celebrities like that, Because so I had never met Jeremy. I was brought into MC this event and it was fantastic, and I had heard wonderful things about him, which is why I agreed to do it, and then I I spent time with him. But what really struck me is before I met Jeremy. His I think future brother in law picked me up at the airport. His niece was in the car with me. I met his sister who's the president of the foundation. His mom was there, and he adores his family. They're all very tight and everybody's involved in this. It was all hands on deck and it was just like okay, like this is a family event. And he really relished that. So and he's not one of those guys that just didn't show to stuff like he was with the kids. He really gets involved and so that.
Speaks volumes, right.
I think the people who look fame can change you, but if you stay grounded in your family and your friends, then you can hold on to Yeah.
And it was a great event that he you know, by the way, the concert and this is the for the inaugural event. We had a poker tournament, we played some golf and all that, and then there was a big concert that like mister mister Cool in the Gang Cheap Trick, Rob Bass. It was like Robin Thick. But it was like my greatest if you if I had gone to the Perfect Bar spring break in college music. Oh, I was crushing it. Anyway, it was great and it was wonderful to meet Jeremy, a couple friends. Makai Pfeiffer was there, who I've known for years, such a sweet guy. He and his wife. Rob Wriggle are good friend. And comedian Richard Kind was there, who he's another one who I've just known for years at through events and just so there was I'll just tell you one quick story. We get done. The event was at the Brooklyn Bowl, which is by the link the big carousel whatever there in Vegas, and we were staying at the Plazzo. It was really only a ten minute walk, so it's not worth getting in a car, and so Rob Wriggle, Richard Kind and I decide we're just going to walk back and you kind of cut through a hotel. We're on the strip. You're walking down the strip for about half a mile to get to our hotel. We stopped. I stopped to get a slice of pizza. So but to watch people walk by and to watch the faces is I'm staying there with Richard Kine and Rob Wriggle and myself, it was just so it was like, are these are these lookalikes trying to take it was.
Really okay, why are how how far have they fallen?
Why are they walking down the side of the street.
Right, Yeah, it was really really funny. But yeah, so that's that's how the whole event ended, was us just walking down the strip back to our hotel and Richard Kine. As much as I love Rob Wriggil, Richard Kine might be one of the funniest human beings. That guy can deliver a line. Oh wow, he is phenomenal.
I'm trying to think.
And I've heard he's, by the way, like a really smart, end upth person. I've heard him tell just really incredible stories about his upbringing. I think I knew him best from He's one of those faces I know. I guess I probably knew him from like maybe mad about you.
I don't know.
He's been in a ton I know his voice.
He did voices for a Bugs Life and Toy the Toy Story, movies and cars.
That's why I.
Think he was just in an inside out too as well. I think, well, a.
Big shout out to the Renovation Foundation, Jeremy Renners Foundation, and wanted.
To go in there in Nevada and shout out to Jeremy. It was a wonderful new friend to make in my life. Now I got.
Hawkeye on my side, so I'm sorry I wasn't with you, but I had to ditch you for a very good reason. I want to give a shout out to my little sister who has given birth to her first child. She had a baby and they live in Florida, so I couldn't. I wasn't able to go meet him yet because of the hurricane two hurricanes, two hurricanes, So I had intended to go to this event with you, but I just had to the first moment I was able to congratulations. Well, I'm blessed in so lucky to have your nephews from your brother obviously Hank and Sam, who are wonderful kids, but my first baby, and I'm so I'm just so happy for my sister and her husband. He is the cutest and he's perfect, and my mom.
Is so happy.
Shout out to Donna because.
For taking the pressure off thing.
Thank you Christina for yeah finally giving her this gift. We were hearing a lot of I'm this age and I still don't have a grandchild. So she's just in bliss and I got to have a beautiful weekend with my mom and sister, and I stayed up with an infant for the first time in my life. I experienced that because I wanted to help my sister get some sleep, so my mom and I took shifts of staying up with the baby.
Wow.
Wow, wow, I get it on the smallest scale. Now, I don't know how parents do it. I was thinking, how does a single parent do this? If you've got to stay up all night with an infant, then you have to go to work the next day.
God bless him, how does a single.
Parent do this?
Deep deprivation is used as a torture device, and yet it's also how we have to bring the biggest joy into our lives, which is having a baby.
I mean, wow, it should remind us all you never know what someone's going through. Just because they show up to work and they are dressed and they showered and they look normal. You don't know what someone's going through, So be kind, be gentle. Do you persure time or is it a blur? It is a blur. I remember because I was also you know, hosting the show. I got the job. I got the Bachelor. When Joshua or my son, the oldest was six weeks old. Oh wow. So when I started shooting the first season, he wasn't even a year old yet. And I remember, honestly, when I went into my first meeting, I didn't know this, but one of the folks I interviewed with for The Bachelor told me later I had spit up on my jacket. I had no idea.
It was kind of amazing that Josh was there with you in some way.
Yeah. I walked in and they were like, I was like, oh my god, sorry, I just my son, and I think you spit up on me.
And I didn't know what if that, like got you the job did.
They mentioned it because they what the Bachelor wanted was that guy next door, a family man, and they wanted an unknown, which is really rare. Usually they want a big name, and they wanted a no name that didn't seem like a creeper hitting on the girls. And so the fact that I was married and had a kid was one of the main reasons they brought me in, and then the fact probably I had spit up and I hadn't slept it was wait.
I love that because so often it feels like the argument is that marriage and children are a hindrance to a jib.
Yeah, I think it was. It was eighty percent of the reason why even was being talked to because they had seen my tape. They'd seen my performance from another friend and they said, well, who is he? They said, oh, he's good guys from Texas. He's married and has a kid. And they're like, oh, great, that's what we're looking for. But yeah, so thanks to Joshua spit Up, I probably became host of The Bachelor. Those days were a blur because I would stay up all night for the show. I would do a rose ceremony. I would come home often at seven or eight in the morning because the rose ceremonies would go all night, and then I would get up, I would walk again and you know, feed the baby. You know, you're just walking right into it. And then it was, yeah, quite a mess.
So did you come home and like help as much as you could?
As much as I could, And then I would just just pass out for you just grab as you know, as parents know, you grab these two and three hour rests. They're not even naps because you don't really fully go asleep, you just because you're waiting for the baby to cry.
Or hey, I see that now again on the smallest scale, I see that now, I thought, because you.
Always hear we'll sleep when the baby sleeps, so I thought.
And then you kind of realize, well, no, but you're nervous because you're like, is.
Are there making noise? Are they okay?
So you're kind of waking up and then I one thing I learned was the feeding takes longer than I thought. I thought it was, oh, well, they wake up and they eat and then you can go back to sleep. No, the whole feeding thing, because you got feedom a change, it takes like forty five minutes.
I'm like, wow, it was very educational.
I'm glad I did it, and shout out to you and to the kid's mom for everything that you guys went through when Josh and Taylor were babies, and all the love to.
All the parents out there that are blurry eyed going through their life just.
Trying to you know, I do want to really shut that out, and I mean that, and I guess I want to circle back to what you just said and emphasize, like, I'm glad that you being a dad and a husband was considered a good thing when you were getting the job of the show because you know the fact the birth rate is way down in our country. The birth rate is down the world over, and I understand that a huge part of that. I remember when we had doctor Christine Sterling on our podcast and we asked her, like, why is the birth rate down? She was an obgyn, and the number one thing she said was finances. You know, it's really hard to raise a baby now and most houses have to be dual income, and so I know it's tougher than ever, but I just want to shout out the people who are doing it and thank you for having babies. And babies are blessings and I'm just so happy for my sister and I can't wait to hang out with them again.
Congrats the family. I'm so excited to be an uncle again. I know.
And I think my sister trusts you with the baby more than she trusts me. I'm like, aren't you.
I know, I'm after this weekend, I got I do think i'd deproved myself a little bit of your second.
But you you were in the trenchney.
And I wanted to say to her, Hey, I'm your older sister. I hope to raise you. Okay, I mean, all right, maybe not her.
I'm only two and a half years older, but honestly, my brother's eight years younger than me. I one hundred percent. Like I think when I was ten or eleven years old, my parents were like, Okay, you got this. We're gonna we can go out to dinner for the first time. Yeah, I mean, I uh, but I do think. Look, obviously a baby sat on. My friends have baby so I've been around them. But I wanted to take this ant thing seriously. I took an infant safety class. I wanted to learn baby CPR. I wanted to learn all the things you know you maybe don't know unless you read a parenting book. It's kind of crazy, right, anybody can become a parent, but we don't have to study it at all. It's the one thing you don't have to go to school for when you're in charge of human life.
I told your sister when they were when they were going home, I said, it is the weirdest feeling of all the feelings, And I wonder if other parents are like this. When I got in the car and the I forget which which way kids face these days, But like at the time.
You safest way is to face them backwards.
Yeah, so back when I had a kid, you just put them in forwards so you could see their face in the rear view mirror. Now they have like the double mirror where you look in the rear view and then you see the mirror and then you can see the child. But anyway, when I had a child, you just put them in there and I was looking. I just remember driving away from the hospital with a child, and it's like, like, gave me this. Shouldn't you at least give me like a pamphlet, like some sort of a shouldn't.
I have had to get some kind of certificate, right.
Like if I buy a desk from my Kia, you get an instruction I get an instruction manual and some and an Alan wrench and a bunch of tools and things. I got a child. Yeah, I had to bring my own car seat. And they're just like good luck. It's and you just go and you just get home and you're like, okay, so I have a human now, And it's really wild how you just figured out and you do as all parents do, you just figure it out.
To be a part time employee at Target, I had to go through a training. Right, it's not mandated that you go through a training to become a parent. Hopefully you do, Hopefully you read a book or take a class, but it's not required.
It's a scary, scary feeling. So to all the parents that are going through it, are about to congratulations, God bless and good luck.
Yeah, but I do.
I think I proved. I kind of had to prove myself to her this weekend. But she still feels I mean when I've said no, but what about when like we take and you could come visit us in Austin And she's like, yeah, because Chris will be there. So we wanted to dive into a few journalistic things that have our spidy senses up. And I hope that you guys like when we talk about these things, because we certainly enjoy it.
It's when things cross over. It's kind of like when we want to talk about the Menindez Brothers or p Ditty. It's when social media, journalism, celebrity kind of all comes together and we find ourselves debating this at home, and so we thought, let's bring it on the most dramatic podcast ever.
So a few things in the news we want to talk about journalistically.
First, should we dive in with the TMZ Liam?
Yeah, yeah, yeah, let's talk about Liam.
Big controversy in the past week. Former One Direction member singer Liam Payne horrifically tragically dies from a fall from a balcony at a hotel in Argentina. It has come out that he had multiple drugs in his system. It's horrible. He was a father and obviously a beloved member of that band and loved by many. And I do think prosecutors are looking into the case as to where he got the drugs and what really happened. But the big controversy is that TMZ, when they first reported the news, ran a photo I can't see it now because they took these photos down, but a zoomed in photo of his part of his body showing his tattoos. And I believe they said in the copy you can see here his tattoos.
His torso in his arms. You could see essentially.
They were coming from the I think in the copy they were trying to make it sound like they were showing that photo to prove that it was Liam.
Let me start with that, because I do take issue with that.
I don't think anyone would have questioned, was it really Liam, Like these weren't mysterious circumstances a body's pulled from a river or something. He was a guest at a hotel that he used that Well, I mean he was a guest at a hotel who fell from a balcony, and authorities, I think we're already involved at that point. I don't think there was a need to prove it was him. It wasn't someone died in a car wreck and their body is mangled, and who is it?
I don't know.
I just don't think. To me, I think from what it seems, the copy of the article was the text of what they were saying. They were almost trying to justify, well, here's why we showed this photo. But really, they know they're going to get more clicks if they have that photo. People have an an innate desire. It's like why we can't turn away from a car wreck. So, but there's a big backlash they take the photos down, and the question is coming up of, you know, journalistically, was that right or wrong? A lot of people accusing them of just being disgusting but for doing that, So what was your first reaction when you heard about that?
Yeah, and then just to further yeah, kind of, the outlet also ran a photo of the police tent that they later erected over the body.
So took that down as well.
Yeah, and so they you know, I think TMZ is a victim of their own success. Harvey Levin, who's a lawyer, and I'll say this disclaimer, TMZ is very good at what they do. Harvey Levin's a very good lawyer. They're very astute, They're they're accurate. A lot of times. They are accurate because they don't want to get sued. If they weren't, they would have been sued a thousand times over and they're they're sued all the time. But with that said, the reason I say they're a victim of their own success is TMZ became very successful for gotcha journalism on a grand scale before social media. They were Instagram, they were Twitter, they were first on the scene when they were the ones that blew mel Gibson up when he went on his big at tirade. I don't know if you remember the anti Semitic plant he went on. That's kind of where they made their necks. Gotcha journalism, Well, they just weren't afraid to stick a camera in anybody's face. That's what I would say, blow your life up.
They were doing it on a level that no one had done before, where they were first of all, well, a huge part of it is that they're first to things, their first to report things. They're first to things. I mean, they broke the story that Liam Payne had died. They've broken many big, big stories over the years. But yeah, first to things and unafraid to kind of take that next step. They definitely, I think have crossed boundaries over the years that other outlets hadn't and took things to a new level, and then other outlets maybe felt like they had.
To keep up.
But yes, my first visceral reaction was just that it was I it's disgusting. They went beyond too far. It was callous, it's inappropriate. I think it's bad journalism. As you said, what when you you have to ask yourself some questions as a journalist. The news director, Harvey Levin, this falls on him one hundred percent. This is your final decision. Why are you doing it if it is just one hundred percent salacious, one hundred percent just clicks that you're going to get because you know nobody else is going to do it. That's not enough. It was not furthering the story. We didn't learn anything. We knew Liam had died. A yeah, there.
Is it necessary.
Yeah, it didn't add color to the story. It didn't educate us. Well, it didn't educate us in any way as far as the news of this story.
It was definitely just to be sillacious. And this is not a case where you can say, oh, it was like the weekend person was on and they made the wrong choice. No, on a story this big, they ran it up the flagpole. Everybody was involved. They're consulting their deepest sources on this to confirm before publishing that a major celebrity is died.
Everybody who had a decision to make made that decision that went to the top.
My first reaction was, this is reflective of the time we're in, because I think what happened here was TMZ made a choice and there hadn't really been I was trying to think of the most recent surprise, horrific celebrity death Kobe Bryant.
Yeah, which, by the way, TMZ also broke that story, and they caught some flat for that because they that one now I'll let me before you continue that one. I didn't mind because that was breaking news and they broke you didn't mind what they broke the story, and they caught some heat because it's like, oh, nobody else knew. They didn't have the Cherff's department, didn't have time to contact the family, and they debunked that story.
But well, I think it went a little bit both ways. From what I remember, they said Kobe's people knew. I don't know that every.
If Vanessa knew or well, no, I'm not saying that. I think Vanessa.
I would hope Vanessa new there were other people's kids and other family members from I think the basketball team and the helicopter. And I think the argument there was I'm not sure that all those families had been identified yet. I mean, yeah, yeah, notified yet. And I do take issue with that, but.
I okay, I'll fight you on that later. But yeah, no, no, I just it is that was the biggest breaking news story in the world.
I agree. I think that was a tough call.
I think they had to do it at that point if they wanted to break the story.
I think if they named those kids, and I think if they showed pictures. Then that would have been a way a bridge too far. But this is that gray area of you're a news organization and you broke a story.
And I would also say that to the authorities. You know what world we're living in. You know, we're living in the world of social media where everybody has a phone by the way on their end. Remember they got in trouble because some of their officers were taking pictures of the scene and showing it to people.
You have to be on top of notice that.
Events.
I believe the sheriff'sportment, So.
That to me, that's a back and forth between the sheriffs and TMZ. If some of the people's.
Families already know some family members already.
Know, well they could call the other people's family. Like, if the story's out to family members at that point, that's on the sheriff's department. That's on authorities. You need to be identifying or I mean notifying people. I keep mixing those up.
Sorry, but.
I think that going back to reflective of the time, I thought about it, and I'm like, I don't know, like back in do you think back in the nineties, if they'd shown those photos, like say the National inquirer had I think people might have looked at it in the supermarket and been like, oh, that's gross that they showed it, or I think they might have, but but they would bought the copy in secret to read it themselves. I think today, because people can respond so much on social media.
It's like, that's why the photos came down. You know what I'm saying.
Well, in nineteen ninety four, the Seattle Times ran a photo of Kurt Cobain's body after the Nevana frontman died by suicide. The answer your question is right there. No, the Seattle Times did.
It a much more sort of lauded outlet.
Yeah.
I mean you have to remember there were such thing as newspapers and they were huge at the time, and that's a big city and that was huge. It was not a big deal and that kind of kind of that it was a big.
Deal, but it was just seen more as part of the story.
The Nationally wire ran pictures all the time. When I said they're a victim of their own success, I think exactly what you're saying. They got famous by doing this, and I think they just forgot times have changed a little bit.
That was my thought was they were kind of moving through their normal method and trying to get the story up quickly. And I will say journalistically, when you are moving fast, you're trying to make all the right choices. But I'm not saying things don't slip through the cracks because you're moving fast. So I thought they're on their regular systemic things what they do, and maybe they didn't register that even from the Kobe Bryant thing a few years ago, social media has changed a lot and they got a major backlash for it and they took the photos down, so they're responding to how times have changed. But I think they wouldn't do that again from here.
Maybe I don't think they ever issued an apology or said they were wrong. They just took them down editorially made that and then they said we have photos.
I don't think it's going to hurt them as a brand. I think people still feel the same way about TMZ. I think people knew TMZ kind of again went that extra step sometimes, and I think ultimately people will still go to them if they break the big stories. You know, if they're the ones who are well, you're going to want that news. And they are sort of known for having like deep connections in law enforcement and in the court system to kind of get.
Notified like, oh, hey, FYI, this paper work got filed.
They hear about divorces, they hear about houses being sold, they hear about people being pulled over for d uys, and and you know TMZ works, and that they know it's like the DMZ is. That's the play on words. It's the thirty mile zone around Hollywood.
I mean, I'll be honest.
Part of the reason when we got married legally, we got married in Texas because in part we wanted to be married in Texas, but also I knew if we filed that paperwork at California, like our marriage certificate stuff, yeah, then if we up.
Yeah, so, and we wanted to stay in private as long as we could. And you have to think those things to try. And you know, when you file for divorce. I remember when I filed for divorce, we put everything in my ex wife's name. It wouldn't be so she filed, even though it was amicable and we were doing everything together. We put everything in her name and I think maybe even her maiden name, so everything would stay off the grid and so nobody would find out and.
They did because no matter how famous you are, you still have to do things through the courts, and that becomes.
Yeah, and sadly you can't trust the courts. It will get out like it'll it'll ping and someone's making you know, there's a court.
Right When people wonder how to TMZ get these how does TMZ get these stories, it's through those pathways. So where do I think we agree on this that they probably just as a sign of the times, should not have run those photos. And I'm not ethically justifying running those photos. I'm just saying I think years ago it would have sort of been seen as you just wouldn't get the backlash from it.
They they You're right. They clicked into the mode of here we go, we know how to do this, this is how we've been successful. And look, we ran into this on the Bachelor. For many times, you would be doing something and you're like, oh, we've run into this situation before. This is how we treated it, and this is how we took advantage of it made it successful. And then you do it and this new generation had there's a backlash to it. You know, all of a sudden, you know, TMZ's catching a lot of backlash. This is triggering, this activated me, and well, I.
Think it's more so just like what is it the right thing to do or not, because just because it happened years ago, I don't think it's the right thing to do on a human level.
Again, I would ask do you need to do it? And I don't think you do.
You don't need to show the photo of him when we know what happened, we know it was him. No one needs to see it with their eyes to like believe it.
You know, and that and that was the difference to me. He's a human with a family, and that was the difference in the Kobe Bryant case. You know, I didn't you know you And I remember that day vividly because I was out just a mile or so from where it happened, because that's where we were living. You were at work, and I remember you calling me and the rumors were swirling, the buzz, and then TMZ broke the story very quickly that it had happened. It was confirmed. They didn't host a picture, and there were pictures, and that's what Vanessa Bryant won a very huge settlement because they had taken pictures. The Sheriff's Department. Click took pictures of the of the of the scene of the accident. Those did not get out, and the press and TMZ they just broke the news story that Kobe had passed and so that I was okay with because that was pure breaking news. They got it first, They broke the story. If that had been CNN, CNN would have run the story, you know, Fox News would have run the story. TMZ just got it because they did a better job of investigative reporting. So I don't blame them for that. This was just a bridge too far, and there's a there's a difference in it.
Next story, Yes, we wanted to talk about a very different journalistic outlet, sixty Minutes. Yeah, so sixty Minutes did an interview a few weeks ago now I think YEP with Vice President Kamala Harris presidential candidate Kamala Harris.
And what has.
Come out is that there are two different video clips available to see of an answer she gave to a question. One answer is much longer and one answer is much shorter. And the reason they're different is because one clip of this question and answer was edited, I believe for the Internet, or maybe no for the show.
That's why it was shure.
They released, well, they released before the interview took place on sixty minutes, before they aired it on sixty minutes. They released it to X. They always do this, They'll put out teasers, this is what you're going to see, and it's unedited.
And so it was much longer online, much longer, and then it was edited on the television show.
We all watched sixty minutes. The answer was, and I'll just say this, when they put it out on X and I watched the whole thing. It was kind of what Kamala has been derided for, which was a long winded kind of word salad, jumbled up, didn't really make sense answer, and it didn't make her look good at all. Fast forward to sixty minutes and she gives a very solid SoundBite, short, succinct, and the interviewer kind of picked up where she left off, finished her thought and then moved on and everybody was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, that's not what we just saw. They completely edited this to make her look better, and it did. It made her look a lot better. It made her look intelligent, succinct, thoughtful.
I want to read this statement from sixty minutes, because they got a lot of backlash online, people arguing, yeah, that this editing made her look better, that hey, this is a presidential election, and you have a responsibility to the American people to show them who they're voting for. As a journalistic outlet, people wondering if this was a violation of any kind of sort of the codes that we have surrounding Yeah, surrounding campaigns. And here's CBS News's statement, former President Donald Trump is accusing sixty minutes of deceitful editing of our October seventh interview with Vice President Kamala Harris.
That is false.
Sixty minutes gave an expert of our interview to face the nation that used a longer section of her answer than that on sixty minutes, same question, same answer, but a different portion of the response. When we edit any interview, whether politician, athlete, or movie star, we strive to be clear, accurate, and on point. The portion of her answer on sixty minutes was more succinct, which allows time for other subjects in a wide ranging, twenty one minute long segment. Remember, mister Trump pulled out of his interview with sixty minutes and the Vice President participated. Our long standing invitation to former President Trump remains open. If he would like to discuss the issues facing the nation and the Harris interview, we would be happy to have him on. So here's my first issue with that statement. Why are they making it all about Trump?
I am on Twitter.
I know Trump said something about the interview, but to me, this wasn't a Trump versus them thing. Way more people were on x Twitter taking issue and questioning what had happened here and questioning why her answer was so succinct on the show, but they had seen a much longer, more rambling interview answer on the internet. So the fact that they made it them versus Trump, to me, comes across so immature. It's not what a journalistic outlooks should do. It makes the American people have less trust in them. And this has been my issue so much in the past few months. I don't want the American people to lose trust in the media, and I feel like our industry is killing itself literally, the losing viewers, losing audiences with how they're operating the past few months. If they made it about them versus Trump, and the American people feel lost in the conversation, like, hey, wait, we had questions about this, right, talk to us.
Why are you making this you versus showing.
A problem with it? Right, you're journalists, by the way, the other journalists and other shows have picked this up. This is not a Trump versus and I think that's what they're trying to do. But that the funny thing about that statement is it was as big of a word salad as Kamala Harris's answer. You're lying because what you're saying in that statement is we did exactly what you are accusing us of. We edited it to make her more succinct. That full stop. You said that in your answer. You're telling us what you did, and then you're saying you didn't do it.
When they say in the statement, when we edit any interview, whether a politician, athlete, or movie star, we try to be clear. We strive to be clear, accurate and on point. Well, of course you do. The part of you striving to be clear and accurate is showing people how their president is actually going to address things. So to me, there's a big difference between editing for time and editing where you make somebody look like they are more succinct and competition.
You didn't meant to make it accurate or succinct.
You've you actually made it inaccurate by editing it for time.
And by the way, you just happened to fix something that would have made her look bad. So in sixty Minutes. The reason we brought this up is they actually came out in this latest episode of Sixty Minutes the other night on Sunday to defend themselves and we're Vietment vehemently denying everything, and it's like, okay, now thou dost protest way too much. So they had the Leslie Stall mistake and the gaff with Trump. Now they've had this, so CBS News is having a really bad run. And then of course they had the disaster of the debate, So they're having a really bad run in sixty Minutes, who was always held in such high esteem.
So high the show, yeah it.
Was the show is really really having a disastrous run.
And I will hear it.
I was gonna say one thing, yeah about the media. They're so obsessed and captivated by Trump, and I don't think they know what to do because they were blamed the first time for getting him elected because they they were blame for treating him with kid gloves and having fun with him and getting helping get him in the White House. They're so I think, going the polar opposite direction if if Kamala Harris doesn't win, the media will be a huge part to blame because, like you just said, they're so obsessed with Donald Trump. Just do your job. If you guys would just do your job, everything will turn out the way it should be. Show Kamala for who she is, show Trump for who he is. And they do that, by the way, they do let Trump go off and talk about Arnold Palmer's junk, which he just did in a bizarre way. So they are so obsessed and they're making so many mistakes lately.
That I just think what's happening is is they're really looking like they're protecting Kamala Harris, which actually ultimately does kind of a disservice to her as a candidate to the American people, because the American people are smart and have eyes and ears, and they can see that that protection is happening, and so it makes them trust her less. They're generally pulling the best bits from her and the worst bits from Trump, and both things are making the American people trust them less and they have to, as you just said, go back to doing their job. And here's where sixty minutes could have really easily gained some trust back release the transcript of the interview. A lot of people, a lot of journalists who are more independent now, like Megan Kelly, were saying, just release the transcript.
And I think that's a fair ask.
Like, for example, when Time interviewed Donald Trump and in sixty minutes of sitting here being like, well Trump won't come on, Okay, well commel it wouldn't do Time. I mean, each candidate is gonna make their choices about what they're doing and what they're not and that's up to the people to look at.
Which outlets if they can to help the campaign. Yeah, I mean this is a campaign.
But Time just released the full, full Q and A with Trump, and that's what they published sixty minutes.
Just release the transcript. Because here's the difference.
If you are editing for Time, it should still be accurate, it should still reflect the person's answer. So why do you have an issue with releasing the transcript versus this statement that you just gave. And they say in the statement here as well. You know, when we edit any interview, whether a politician, athlete, or movie star, Well, there's a big difference between if a movie star rambles about their movie versus a politician ram about or speaking I won't even say rambling speaking at length about an issue that affects the way everyone in this country lives. Yeah, you can edit a movie star down for time when they're talking about their latest project. But here the American people, it's different. They need to see and hear and understand exactly what this candidate intends to do, and they need to make a judgment on this candidate in a way that really affects their lives in a real way, not just what movie they're going to see this weekend.
Stop treating people like they're stupid. They're not. Stop gaslighting us and telling us that we aren't seeing with their own eyes what we just saw sixty minutes. Massive fail. Conversely, Brett bher Over at Fox News did the sit down with Kamala Harris interrupted her. They counted thirty eight times, and there was a clip that he called for, and I think they thought it was either the wrong clip ran or something happened one of the things. I I appreciate it about Brett Bears is he's come out and kind of faced it. He's like, no, I understand how you could have that criticism of me interrupting her thirty eight times. I was trying. She was going, you know, like she had to your point. She had an agenda when she went on Fox News. Of course she did her it'd be crazy not to. She was prepared to go into the hostile territory and kind of say what she needed to say to that side of the aisle. And I think she got her point across, and she she handled herself. And then Brett bhar his job was to try to get her back on point and answer some of the questions. So he said, look, I understand why people think I interrupted too much, and then he admitted the wrong clip ran good way to own it. That's what a journalist did. By the way, neither one of us are perfect, and you don't expect your journalists to be perfect. If sixty minutes made a mistake, say hey, guys, you're right. You know what, Let's run this whole clip. Let's put it up. This is what she said in its entirety. You be the judge but it's just the telling us, not giving us the facts, not giving us the truth, and then telling us we didn't just see you.
Well, I think what they're caught up in a little bit here is this isn't as their statement alludes to, this isn't a crazy practice. You have a TV show that has to run for a certain amount of time. When I used to interview you, we edited down your answer. You had to you go on a red carpet and talk to someone, You get X amount of minutes with them. You can only share a short clip of that as part of entertainment tonight the program.
Yeah, editing's not know of course.
And it has to be done.
You literally have x amount of minutes sixty but commercial breaks where you can show your segment on television on the internet, you have more time. We would often at ET release longer versions of interviews online because you have more time and because people would want that content. Like if I interviewed you, I might have literally a one minute segment as part of ET where I could air our interview and then online we would release a longer version. Editing happens. But when you have been called into question as to whether you edited someone to make them look better a presidential candidate. Why not just alleviate the concerns and release the full transcript and publish the full transcript, which people have a right to read because they're voting for the person who's going to.
Run now, and you're an unbiased news organization, so you don't care.
Why not do that?
That's the problem, and that's again why they're losing this credibility. And like what Brett Bear's talking about, it's tough like to give people some context when someone comes in for an interview. I mean I only interviewed film and TV. People say that I was doing a junk kit. They come in, they sit down. Things are always running late. Interviews have always run late. People have had to take bathroom breaks, equipment issues have happened. Everything's always running late, so things are tense. They come in. Maybe you thought you had five minutes. They walk in and they say, no, sorry, things are running late. You only have three and a half minutes, and you, as a journalist, have list of all these things you want to get to in three and a half minutes. As part of that three and a half minutes, you also kind of need to establish or a poor so that it's not really awkward. You want to try to have some normal human conversation. It's not easy. And I know Brett Behar said that he came in, he said that they were running late. He thought he'd have twenty five minutes. They told him only twenty. They were hard wrapping him and waving at him for the interview to end. So it can be very stressful. And like you said, it's not perfect. But in this case, then what you do is you explain it. You tell people here's what happened. You give them a fuller picture of the story. You don't shut people down with a statement and just make it about you versus Trump and cut the American people out of the conversation.
Well, it's funny. The hypocrisy is sixty minutes has always been about making things clear and transparent. That's their job, investigative journalists, And what they're doing is exactly what a sixty minutes interviewer would try to debunk. They would try to make this story clear and succinct and transparent. And what they're doing is muddying the waters and they're lying. And a good journalist would go in and just blow this story up because and by the way, a third grade journalist, this is not good, this is not hard. You release the transcript, I would take a look at it and you would debunk this entire lie that sixty minutes is perpetrating. But the biggest problem that I think a lot of people have is the hill that they always run to is blaming it on Trump. And to your point, and I say the same thing, journalists, we need you to be better. You need to be the beacon on the hill, the shining light that we can always go to for the truth, for transparency, for a little honesty. We need a break. And instead this spokesperson for sixty minutes somehow blamed Donald Trump and made it all about Donald Trump and then said, well, he was invited to come on, but he won't come on. That has nothing to do with the facts of this story. It is one hundred and eighty degrees polar opposite of what we're talking about. We're talking about one interview with one human being. It has nothing to do with Donald Trump zero. But that's exactly where they went. And that's what a lot of media does is they blame him as if two wrongs make a right.
Sixty minutes rise above.
Yeah, I think that people generally are tired of the toxicity and the and I'm not absolving anyone here, like both candidates do it too, but at least leave it to the candidates to blame each other back and forth, and as the journalists don't do that.
I don't really care that.
Donald Trump weighed in on this interview. I think the point is you're supposed to be the voice of the people. As the media, you're supposed to be looking out for the people. And I saw a lot of people on Twitter questioning this, So explain it. Talk to the people.
That's who you're doing the show for, right the people at home. So talk to the people.
And address them, and don't make it about you versus Trump. I don't there's enough of the media versus the candidate. I need you, the media, to be there for me, the viewer. And that's how I feel about it. So we continue, and the election is a couple weeks away, and we'll see what happens, and maybe we can all take a breather after and I hope for the best.
Will journalism return. We have hope in twenty twenty five.
There's look that what gives me hope I think is shifting. There are a lot of great podcasts out there that I listen to. Would be happy to recommend a few if anybody's interested, Shoot me a DM and you know we will see you guys again next time, and we'll hopefully try to be the voice for you because we have a lot more to talk about.
Thanks for listening. Follow us on Instagram at the most Dramatic pod Ever and make sure to write us a review and leave us five stars. I'll talk to you next time.
