Transcript
Corey
0:01
This is The Strategist, episode 1095. My name is Corey Hogan. I'm with you as always, Annalise Klingbeil, Zain Velji.
Corey
0:09
Folks, how are you doing? It's the end of August. Do you want to talk about basketball, Zain? Did you say folks? I thought that was like an address to the audience. This
Annalise
0:16
This isn't a live radio show.
Corey
0:20
That was weird. I'm not used to intros, okay? This is not my forte. They're hard, right? I think so. Three out
Corey
0:26
of the four of you are not used to intros, okay?
Zain
0:28
okay? that's that's certainly what i've heard on the show um cory uh as one of the folk you addressed uh i am i'm doing i'm doing absolutely fine yes i'm doing well thank you i've got no substance to my answer other than to ridicule your salutation
Corey
0:43
salutation you guys have been doing this for hundreds of episodes uh even you annalise at this point has done it hundreds hundreds of
Corey
0:52
you guys record while it was gone was
Zain
0:54
was it like every hour every
Annalise
0:55
hour How are you taking care of that baby, Zane? Okay, it's good. Yeah. We found a few gaps in the
Corey
1:05
you guys write during the Patreon? There
Annalise
1:06
There was a lot going on.
Corey
1:08
Yeah, it was a very busy time.
Corey
1:10
So, yeah, anybody want to talk about any bike rides they've had with Stephen Carter lately? Me.
Annalise
1:15
Me. Yeah, that's why Carter's not here right now. He got injured yesterday, guys. Oh,
Annalise
1:21
i have like a mental picture of stephen carter on the ground on his back with a bike on top of him leg
Corey
1:28
dangling yelling carter on his back carter's monthly nut we've been going down some dark alleys lately i've said one comment yeah
Annalise
1:36
yeah he's hurt i'm
Zain
1:39
i'm into it i'm into parts of it is
Annalise
1:43
there a web is there a website is this true i heard yesterday there's a website website i
Zain
1:48
don't know there's many websites we own several websites yeah i feel like we own most of the internet's websites i feel like cory and and strategist media inc probably keep the internet website domain industry going single-handedly i would say how
Zain
2:02
how many websites do you think we own
Zain
2:05
oh it's it's a lot like
Annalise
2:07
when i was how many it's
Corey
2:10
over 20 what i want to do i want to do one to
Zain
2:12
the dot ca the dot com i want to i want to do an inventory i want you in the back end one day okay i want you to go on the back end and i want you to read off all of it we'll try to get some of them what
Zain
2:20
what the reference you
Zain
2:21
even remember no that's exactly i wouldn't guess
Corey
2:24
reference point was i i paid for an auto renewal of disgraced uh former leader brown dot ca and obviously that's about patrick brown okay i don't know why we bought that you wait did you auto renew it too yeah we still it is evergreen
Zain
2:36
evergreen it is evergreen that is that's
Corey
2:39
maybe more relevant today
Zain
2:41
today than when we purchased it we'll fuck up brampton again so don't worry worry about it um what do you have access to anything else on the back end cory anything else we've done
Zain
2:49
any other good material all
Corey
2:51
of stuff yeah i mean it's
Corey
2:52
it's kind of a rich tapestry here look
Corey
2:55
look we got a lot of questions to get through though um and so i uh i think i'll kick us off here uh start with you zane yeah
Corey
3:02
zane velgey usually at the end of this segment you are looking for a way that you can move on to the substance of the episode i'm wondering and i'll I'll get to you in a minute there, Annalise. But I'm wondering how you like to get out of the small talk at the beginning. Yeah,
Zain
3:15
Yeah, it's a mixture between heart and head, right? So, you know, you clearly want to give the audience a sense of your heart. You want to try to get into a sense of emotional connection. And the best way to do that is to get into their head. And the best way to get into their head, of course, is through their ears, Corey. So what I like to do is I like to use the auditory nature of my vocal cords, also known as my voice, uh to get people to really understand uh through words verbiage uh generally uh the next segment that i'm that i'm about to to to lean
Corey
3:49
yeah yeah no no for sure you have like a really well-known bridge to the next segment it's let's move it on to the next segment the next segment yeah you repeat that and then you go on for
Corey
3:58
sure but it's a little different at the top you have like kind of like a less of a formal thing you often say first segment you don't always say first segment so how do you decide like what do you do do you just kind of go by flow and when you feel it's dying you move on or like what's your what's your plan here um
Zain
4:13
um if there isn't a sustained level of either entertainment or laughs i i move it on because
Zain
4:19
me um i am the both the not the technical producer i would never put myself in that box but i'm both the producer of the show uh and also the host of the show cory see that's what people don't understand When you host a strategist podcast as host, and Annalise will obviously attest to this as well, you have to be both producer and host. It's like doing two things at once, Corey, which is, I know for you, very difficult.
Annalise
4:42
Corey, I'll just jump in here. You got to keep it moving, right? Like that's a big thing. You got to know what's happening and you keep it moving. But
Corey
4:51
But like when do you know it's dead? I've noted, I was listening to some past episodes both of you have done, and sometimes it's three minutes, sometimes it's 11 minutes. And it's pretty consistently, it's right after Stephen talks, you move on to the next segment.
Annalise
5:02
It's a feeling, Corey. I don't know if I can put it in words. I don't know if Zane can. I can. Yeah.
Zain
5:07
Yeah. For me, it's all about the words that I can put in. For me, it's all words, actually. No heart. So disregard whatever I said earlier about the heart and the head. Here's the thing. Usually, it ends on one of two notes. You'll notice a pattern. Either I say something hilarious and then I move it on because I want people to know I'm the funniest of the three of us, regardless of who the three are. And or it's on something weird that Carter says that could probably get him sued, canceled or disqualified. So if you go back, that pattern also remains consistent that I either make a killer joke, which has the audience asking, why does he do this? He's so much better. And or has Carter make a comment which has a very similar outcome, which says, you know, why does he do this? He's not good enough for this podcast. It's
Zain
5:54
a sword or a shield approach,
Corey
5:56
OK, well, that was very helpful for me. I'd like to move it on to kind of our first real segment of the day here. There's been an awful lot in the news lately. The Ethics Commissioner vacancy was recently filled. Of course, we have the government giving their interim. We'll get to our homework later on the Emergencies Act. So, Annalise, as host, how would you approach these issues? How would you tee them up to a podcast panel?
Annalise
6:19
You know, that's a really good question, Corey. I would do loads of research beforehand, just tons of research, read a lot of articles. condense it in some clever words. You know, you don't want to explain for too long. And then start asking some questions.
Corey
6:38
I feel like that's not your approach, Zane. I heard clever words and research and don't want to explain too long. And you seem to take a bit of a different approach. Puns, Corey.
Zain
6:47
Puns is what really makes it happen, Corey. You see, for example, the new ethics uh commissioner right this guy uh last name finkenstein okay so he's only there for six months so what do you do right like let me get you into my head right he's there for not a long time but a short time short term fink short fink right it's kind of phallic it's kind of funny short fink would be the segment that's what we'd kind of kind of start off with right okay
Corey
7:13
yeah i mean i feel like there was also a barton fink joke there somewhere but maybe that's not a topical reference are you interviewing
Corey
7:19
interviewing us or is this the other way around do you want i don't know i'm not i'm not really that good at uh at kind of uh this positionless basketball that we're playing on this podcast yeah great great reference by great keep trying
Annalise
7:29
trying cory keep trying all
Corey
7:33
right so zane i know that often you will go and you'll look and you'll scan the issues of the day on say like um well national news watch if it went down tomorrow you wouldn't be able to say like
Zain
7:43
like exclusively uh just That's the only site I'll use.
Corey
7:46
Yeah, okay. Very minimal
Zain
7:47
minimal latitude in my research,
Corey
7:50
research, Corey, yes. So you get the information. Correct. What's the follow-up look like from there? What's the Zane Velgey creative process? You're now thinking, I'm going to talk. I've got this short Fink segment. How does it go? Walk us through your creative process here. There
Zain
8:05
There is no creative process, Corey. Here's actually how it is. In all seriousness, which
Zain
8:11
which I can give you a serious answer if you want to know. Do
Corey
8:13
Do you actually want to know? I do. I will
Zain
8:15
read, I will literally think of the segment if it's going to be straight questions to you guys and or some sort of gamey thing just based on how the vibe of the conversation is thus far. Oh,
Corey
8:27
so you don't necessarily know the start? No, I have no idea.
Zain
8:30
No, why do you think I ask such long questions? I'm trying to find the episode.
Zain
8:38
100%. It's always been the case. This
Corey
8:39
This is news to you, Corey? It
Corey
8:41
It is kind of news
Zain
8:42
news to me. Oh, this is so interesting. I hosted a radio show for like four months. This is exactly what I would do, is that we'd have like rough outlines, six minutes, nine minutes at a time. Ten and nine minutes, ten minutes, ten minutes, nine minutes would be kind of the back and forth because of commercial breaks. And you'd have like a rough idea of what was up, but the production sort of almost like slogan was like, you have to let it breathe. And whatever that means, that means. So if I'm doing a ten-minute rant, you're not writing any of it. If you're doing a call and text thing, you're throwing out the question, but you always have to have something to go and say, but everything you say has to be a reaction to what someone else has said. So you're keeping a conversation alive. So for me, I don't have questions as much as I have, like, I'm very curious about what something is and what the, uh, and, and why something's happening. And I know that like between the 20, 25 minutes, an hour that we spend on it, we'll get to something that interests me. That's the only metric that I use.
Corey
9:42
so like you you maybe are going to do a fine fabulous or fucked maybe not this is for our new listeners this is a segment that zane velgey occasionally does here you don't necessarily know until you're kind of part way in and the energy or or are ones like that kind of tent poles for the episode so i'll
Zain
9:59
i'll have like six or seven things i want to talk about and i know that they can either go into like one segment or they can be their own 20 minute segment i'll do two or three of them but if it is like if the energy is like you guys are having a good time or i feel like there's like enough just like strategy material that i want to pull out of it just in the moment i'll be like this is what the segment is and we're going to go one by one across them wow
Zain
10:22
really about like where your curiosity is i've never written down like a question around like this is one thing i want to know okay
Corey
10:27
okay well you know i have thoughts now about every time you've gone to a potpourri section meaning that we were having some sort off day. But Annalise, sounds very different from your process. React to what you just heard from Zane. React
Annalise
10:38
React to what I heard. React to that genius.
Corey
10:39
genius. It's a good
Annalise
10:41
good strategy, Zane. It works for you. The audience loves it. It's a good strategy. That seems like a dig. It works for Zane. That sounds like a dig. It
Corey
10:47
It does sound like a dig. There
Corey
10:49
There was no dig there. There
Annalise
10:51
There was no dig there. People love Zane. I
Zain
10:53
I mean, I never listened to the pod prior to coming on to it. And it seemed like it worked for you for that long stretch of time before I got here. So yeah, keep doing it and see if it still works now that you got something to contrast it against. No, thank you, Annalise. I appreciate that.
Corey
11:08
Okay. Well, that's really
Zain
11:09
really fascinating. Are you actually genuinely intrigued by that answer?
Annalise
11:12
I'm curious about that, Corey. You had no idea that that's how he does it? No.
Corey
11:17
No. Let me tell you. Let's look
Annalise
11:18
look over behind the curtain a little bit. For real. Yeah.
Corey
11:20
Yeah. So when we start an episode, and it was much more noticeable when we were kind of in person, and we used to record this podcast in person back in the day, usually we would get there. and zane would then take five to ten minutes to write out his notes and so i had assumed at that point after you arrived my process after he arrived yeah he he didn't want to put in a lot of advancement he didn't take the annalise let's do some research approach to this right but
Corey
11:47
but i had always assumed that was like fleshing out you know i'm gonna hit these treetops i'm gonna talk about these this is the way i'm gonna structure it these are the bits i'm going to do part way through not like these are the jokes i'm not saying he's writing 10 minute monologues but i'd kind of I've assumed that, you know, the beats were all there. And it sounds like that is maybe less the case, more like a napkin with a bit of jazz thoughts on it.
Annalise
12:10
Jazz on a napkin. That's your process, Zane.
Zain
12:15
Just as long as you said jazz and not another word, Corey. Yeah, thank you.
Corey
12:19
Okay. Well, okay. Are you uncomfortable? I
Zain
12:26
I thought you were just saying.
Corey
12:27
I mean, again, like some of these jokes, little blubber. lately I don't know all right they've always they
Zain
12:32
they always have been Corey yeah
Corey
12:34
yeah that's I mean that's really fascinating to me and and this kind of roll with the punches approach uh applied by you Zane and the one less applied by you Annalise I think is uh is interesting because I would wonder if you're finding now that there's two hosts if your styles are converging in any way shape or form well
Annalise
12:51
well that would involve us listening to each other's episodes Corey to give
Annalise
12:55
an honest answer. That's a Stephen Carter question. How about you tell us? Yeah,
Annalise
13:03
Carter has nothing else to do. Let's turn the tables. Give us your thoughts, Corey Hogan.
Corey
13:07
Actually, since Stephen's come up, I do have another question that that one sort of jumps right off of. So lately,
Corey
13:14
lately, it seems that in the news there's been, especially here in Alberta, there's been a couple of like minor controversies and debates about interviewing controversial podcast guests. So of course, Ryan Jesperson had David Parker on, you guys routinely talk to Stephen Carter, despite all wisdom.
Corey
13:29
How do you think podcast hosts for politics should approach controversial guests, perhaps with opinions that are outside the mainstream? Do you see that as platforming people like Stephen Carter? Or do you see it as you're exposing Stephen Carter's views to the world? Yeah, Annalise, how do you see it?
Annalise
13:45
Well, it's an interesting question, Corey, because one of our avid listeners sent me this question and said he wanted to talk about it. So it it sounds like you're listening to the audience right now i
Corey
13:57
i mean sheer coincidence but uh wait did someone
Corey
14:00
actually ask this question someone
Annalise
14:02
someone dm'd this question to me yeah for real so
Zain
14:04
interesting someone actually wrote
Zain
14:06
a question i've never heard of that before that's so weird
Annalise
14:09
here's the thing i mean i made it clear at the very beginning that i cared about the audience and then as a result people in the audience will like message me and be like you should talk about this you should talk about this sometimes i listen sometimes i don't it's
Corey
14:22
it's the thing i see there's that convergence i was talking about that oh yeah no tell
Annalise
14:25
tell us more if
Corey
14:27
credit card is still active what do you think your obligation is as a podcast host when sort of out there ideas come or when when stephen carter starts talking about the structure of communications at the city of calgary that
Annalise
14:38
that well when he starts talking about the structure of communications at the city of calgary is to keep asking questions because that man likes to talk right and people that's that's what people tune in for they like to hear that behind the scenes what's happening what am i not getting from other news sources so i just keep asking questions has
Corey
14:57
has he ever kind of talked clearly this wouldn't be the case with me um i've never listened to the episodes with zane so i don't know but like clearly with steven sometimes he says inflammatory things sometimes he says uh you know borderline actionable things what do you do in those moments do you push further do you just say let's expose them to the world you
Zain
15:18
you may have heard the phrase uh jesus christ carter uh invoked uh and of course as a man of the cloth uh i don't know what that means but it felt it felt right to say um no
Zain
15:31
no we we okay listen here's the thing this is an actually a very fucking interesting question i
Zain
15:36
i have never been a journalist i admire journalists like deeply But it is back to like the Jon Stewart question in some ways, like what we do, right? We're not comedians, right? But we're also not journalists. We're like occupy this really weird, interesting space where we are talking about like many cases lived experience, learned experience. experience. And Carter has opinions, but I think a lot of them stem from things that he feels like he has learned or honestly feels that are part of an extension of his craft. In many ways, a lot of his opinions come from not just like an inflammatory perspective, some of them I would say would do, but some of them are like a byproduct of him like living this craft. And I think one thing about Carter, if you want to talk about this is like, fucking think the guy's like, so resilient in in terms of how many campaigns he has done over and over, right? How many campaigns he's successfully won across multiple decades, if you think about it, quite literally. I try not to, but yeah. Most people in Carter's position would do a couple of wins, take the legacy win, ride on that forever. Frankly, most other quote-unquote strategists, and I'm not throwing shade at anyone that's how they that's their meal ticket they've won one thing once and like that's it then they just become a talking head i think what's interesting about carter is like you're platforming if you want to use that term cory like someone who does this shit more often than any of us maybe you know uh yeah there's a
Zain
17:09
race for it but like more often than like any of us like all the time like including he's like very fucking active at this stuff which i think is like
Zain
17:15
he's a really interesting tension around like what you get with steven and which is why i i love the guy well
Corey
17:21
active practitioner and yeah to zoom this out and make it less about steven there
Zain
17:25
there are times where i
Corey
17:26
i think there must be multi-thousand
Zain
17:29
let's start with the beginning how
Corey
17:33
yeah zoom out cory well
Corey
17:35
there are times when people start saying you
Corey
17:37
you know this is an opinion that was on the podcast you were the host and i want to talk about jesperson for a minute and his uh his conversation with david parker obviously obviously newsworthy yeah
Corey
17:47
people have been talking for you know a couple of weeks since that did that happen like two weeks ago okay yeah okay so he had david parker on and david parker said among other things that take back alberta was going and david parker for those who don't know is the head of take back alberta i don't know what his formal title is with the organization but he's the driving force he um he said that they were going to start turning their attention towards school boards local school boards and this has generated an awful lot of conversation there's There's been conversation about, does anybody want to stop this? There's been conversations about, why
Corey
18:18
why would Ryan Jesperson put somebody like this on the air? Why would they platform this individual here? So as hosts yourself, like, what are your thoughts on these? Like, where's the line with newsworthiness versus, you know, platforming a voice that doesn't need to be platformed? Well,
Annalise
18:34
Well, I haven't I full disclosure have not heard or watched the the interview he did with Jesperson. So that might change it. But how how is him being on Jesperson any different than like when Carrie Tate at the Globe did a big feature on Take Back Alberta and like went to a bunch of meetings with David and stuff? Like, how is it different?
Corey
18:51
Well, that's a great question. I guess you're saying that it's not right. Like, it's just verbatim quotes. It's just a stream of verbatim quotes. Yeah,
Annalise
18:58
Yeah, I mean, I think, and I guess I come at this from the perspective of having been a journalist who did, in a former life, who did interviews with people and then wrote that into stories versus here where we just talk for an hour and there's no editing. But I don't see how it's that different. friend you
Corey
19:15
know i think it's something that zane said i want to i want to ask you to maybe contemplate here zane said i have never been a journalist it's an interesting question what you perceive this as is it kind of entertainment is it analysis is it commentary maybe in between a lot of sometimes i think i think it's all of the above
Corey
19:33
carrie tate is a journalist ryan jesperson is commentary i i think that would be how most people would perceive them so is the difference I think Jeff goes more in
Corey
19:42
in our lane in that
Corey
19:43
sure. Yeah. So like, maybe that's the difference, I guess. And so is there a different kind of expectation when you do have this editorial control, and you do get to tell the stories that you want to tell, rather than kind of the bar of newsworthiness determining where you go next? Was
Annalise
19:58
Was it like progressives that were saying he was platforming? Yeah. So I mean, I guess you could like in the same way Carrie Tate's article that I didn't memorize, but I'm assuming she did her feature she talked to multiple people there was like different sides jess person could have had parker on and then you know his next interview could have been with whoever
Annalise
20:17
whoever right like insert equivalent from the left there i don't know if that would have made um made the difference again i haven't i haven't listened to the interview but i don't see a big difference and i i think if anything i think it's good to have different perspectives out there and be hearing from different voices, I think.
Zain
20:35
I totally agree. Good get by Jespo. Glad that he interviewed David Parker. This is a person who clearly has whatever degree you want to apply some sort of hold on this party, ideologically, policy-wise. He's clearly relevant. Yeah, sorry, in the UCP, clearly relevant. This is a newsmaker. And the fact is, Ryan got him to make some news, right? When you you interview these people, whether it's you do an accountability interview, which Annalise is more so in your lane, what journalists kind of do around keeping folks accountable, or in casual conversation, you can unearth their perspectives. In fact, I would argue that in the lead up to this last election, and even after this last election here in Alberta, it was largely podcasts and other third party sort of like non-journalistic interview sources where we got some perspective about what daniel smith even believes cory you were saying on this pod like her moratorium on on on on electricity on renewable energy projects was derived from like some commentary that rob anderson her when you come put that together you stitch it together you kind of get where they were coming from if you were looking for those breadcrumbs well thanks to those people even if they were ideologically aligned with her i'm glad they did those pods i'm glad they did those interviews i'm glad they platformed that uh her because there was even commentary about jespo platforming danielle smith after she was after she won the leadership race right i think so like before we need this because even if you are against this person ideologically politically on an advocacy level on a human moral level you want to know how they think what they think uh and where they're you know uh placing their priorities their money their talents good for jess but i have no issues with this whatsoever i'm happy to debate that well
Corey
22:22
well i want to push a little bit on both of you on this one here and ask where you see the line, if you see there's a line here. The counter argument is it's moving the Overton window. You're making it part of mainstream discourse. And again, when you're a columnist, when you're a commentary provider, maybe you don't necessarily need to do that. That's the counter argument. I'm not saying I agree with it, but I'm saying that's the counter argument out there.
Corey
22:45
How do you feel about when organizations talk to Donald Trump? We're going to escalate through a bit of a chain here. I want want to see when one of you cries uncle you
Corey
22:54
you okay with donald trump being platformed having a conversation his interview yeah
Annalise
22:59
yeah what's your definition of platforms interviews well
Corey
23:03
well i'm talking about the town hall in this particular case that he did you'll recall uh zane with uh donald trump where there there was a crowd that was almost like a wrestling crowd that was on his side booing the host yeah
Corey
23:16
yeah too far i
Annalise
23:18
i i think the fact of the matter you got to see donald
Annalise
23:22
But the fact of the matter is in an evolving and changing media landscape, which we've seen like on hyperdrive in the past five, 10 years, if, you know, if David Parker wasn't on Jesper's and David Parker would be on someone else. Right. And so as Zane says, it's, it's a get and it's a newsy get. And I think as we see, you know, our post medias and other kind of mainstream media just shrink and shrink and shrink and have like literally no reporters, You see all of these other kind of outlets with their own agendas and their own opinions and stuff. And I think, I mean, it's a good question. I think that this will keep evolving and we'll keep having these discussions. But how is it different than, you know, 20 years ago when the Herald had 40 or 50 reporters? borders.
Zain
24:08
That's a really good point. And can I also add something to this, Corey? I'm going to challenge your premise. And I know it's not your premise. It's a premise put out there right around the Overton window. But I would tell us to be cautious because whether or not interviewing people that you might think are unsavory moves the Overton window is actually complex and has no easy answer, right? So your argument is one of them, which is like you are platforming marginal thoughts. You're giving them mainstream credibility. This can be challenging if the interviewer, for example, doesn't challenge those points. They let them ride by. They can legitimize these perspectives. The other way of thinking about it is that interviewing these unsavory people can actually show a vast audience how unsavory those perspectives are. If done the the right way with journalistic integrity,
Zain
25:04
the interviewer, you know, challenging points, interviewing these unsavory people can help educate the public in terms of the views that they hold, which should not be accepted. And so the real question to me is like, at the end of the day, what is the job of journalists, right? And then this is a question I shouldn't just put at your feet, Annalise, because I know it's complex. But there are models, like there are models of what talking to people that you disagree with, that you think are on the margins, that you you think are unsavory and challenging their perspectives. Two people that I have unbelievable admiration for, Jonathan Swain, who used to be, I believe, was it Vice? He's now at the New York Times. Mehdi Hassan, formerly Al Jazeera, now at MSNBC. Both, interestingly, both journalists who talk about the US are all about the American political system. Neither of them come from the American journalistic tradition of political interviews. Mehdi comes from the British one, Jonathan Swain comes from the Australian one. I think there's something to be said about that around the political traditions that other countries hold around holding accountability. But I feel like there are ways to do these things. So I just wanted to mainly kind of talk about the premise of your question there and challenge it because I think it really does depend on the quality of interview and debate and courage that journalists bring to the table as well.
Annalise
26:25
So I think too that, and Zane kind of brought it up, that what is the job of journalist? I don't think you would get journalists to agree on that and I think I think of a local example um my first uh boss in journalism Darren Krause who was at Metro built up Metro Calgary when um Toronto Star took Metro in a different direction he he was adamant that like journalism is not activism I want no part in that that's not and I think it's probably still in his Twitter bio and that he left Metro four if not five years ago or Toronto Star whatever it was at the time But I think, and now he runs Livewire in Calgary, but I think journalists themselves would, you couldn't come to one conclusion of what is the job of a journalist.
Corey
27:10
Well, let's just go a little bit further
Corey
27:13
further up the ladder. Let's jump all the way to the top or something pretty close to the ladder here. I want to try to pull us back and I'll stop being a pain about this in a minute. White
Corey
27:22
White supremacist. You interview a white supremacist? Ooh, lots of
Annalise
27:27
Well, I think it depends, like, what type of interview, right? I'll
Corey
27:32
I'll give you a very concrete example. The organizer of the Charlottesville white supremacy march in 2018, 2017. Would
Annalise
27:41
Would you interview them?
Annalise
27:43
Who's doing the interview and what are you asking and what are the parameters and all that? Like, I
Annalise
27:50
I don't think it's black and white. Why are you trying to make it so black and white? Well,
Corey
27:53
I'm asking, what are the parameters you would put in place for an interview like that? And you're saying that with the right parameters, an interview like that would be okay for you? Well,
Annalise
28:02
Well, what, no, but is the question, would you have them on the, are you Jesper Sinem, would you have them on the podcast? Is that the question? Or is it, would you write an article about them?
Corey
28:11
question? I mean, either. You'd give different answers then. yeah
Annalise
28:14
yeah if i was doing like a feature story on white supremacy and i was talking to a bunch of people and there was like a photojournalist doing photo essays and stuff like yeah i could see how there would be an interview there yeah
Corey
28:26
what about you zane say it was a radio program say it was your radio show yeah or
Corey
28:31
or something maybe not like your white
Zain
28:32
supremacist maybe not yeah
Zain
28:34
futon ads yeah okay that's good yeah
Zain
28:37
yeah finish your question
Zain
28:39
not between what between what or
Corey
28:41
it's not like live maybe it's pre-recorded but would you would you do it on a radio show 10 minutes it's
Zain
28:48
it's an interesting no
Corey
28:49
no i would not i
Zain
28:51
i i think any journalist would and this is this is me getting into a lane that i have no expertise in right but let me let me just say let me just remove let me remove the journalist hat and let me say interviewer okay i
Zain
29:03
think any interviewer would be disadvantaged if um they are boxed in in in a couple of ways. Either
Zain
29:09
boxed in in the types of questions they can ask, the duration of the interview, the outright sort of editorial on like what stays in, what doesn't if you're producing. So for me, like to do 10 minutes on that, it would have to be the best 10 minutes of a longer conversation, right? And honestly, like I think there's like a lot of guardrails that are required, right? Like you just even think about like safe, secure environment, environment, right? Someone who's willing to challenge, um, the, the interviewer's views and perspective. Um, you know, you may almost need a rule around like what talking points can look like, you know, the time horizon or the timeline of that interview, how long the duration, I should say, should probably have range so that the person can't just talk and have and be there for their own content purposes, right? One of the things we've seen in our, and let me just, you know, leave that bracket open for a second and open another bracket if you don't mind. One of the things we have seen with folks who are perhaps unsavory characters, and let me use one that's maybe not unsavory because he's mainstreaming himself a lot, is my friend from Kumon, Vivek Ramaswamy. This guy running for president shows up on anyone's fucking podcast. This pharma bro, tech bro, clearly someone who speaks with immense confidence and clarity. He railroads everyone he speaks on even if it doesn't look like. And the reason is, is because he's there to create his own content, right? Like he's there to get the 45, 50, 60 second sound bit after someone asks a question. And it could be a really solid, accountable interview. But someone asks a question. And if he's like, this is the one, volley spike, that's the thing that he's extracting and creating his own content from. And it looks like that interview was a slam dunk and neutralizes the interview if it actually finds legs beyond those 40, 50 seconds that he's pumping out there. So you'd also want to have, as an interviewer, an understanding of what content is being produced on the back end, other cameras, etc. You know, I think really, at the end of the day, it's just like, what are you able to do to challenge these perspectives and challenge these perspectives in a meaningful way? And often, Corey, to get back to the heart of your question, that takes a lot of time. That takes a lot of back and forth. That takes a lot of asking the same question over and over. That says, okay, I get what you're saying there. Like, you know, you got your runoff talking points in. Level with me on this now. Same question, different way. Okay, okay, I got it. But like, how about this, right? Different scenarios where you're finally getting them to answer the question in multiple ways or multiple attempts. 10-minute interview? Definitely not.
Annalise
31:35
Well, to Zane's point, too, and to my point about how much media has changed and evolved. Like, so I left journalism five years ago.
Annalise
31:42
Five years ago, I left Daily.
Corey
31:44
Daily. Years ago, in 2018, NPR interviewed Jason Kessler, who was a white supremacist who organized Charlottesville. And it was a big firestorm, just as a bit of a lead in here.
Corey
31:55
Just so I'm not leaving you all exposed too, too far.
Zain
31:59
No, but sorry, Annalise, I don't mean to interrupt. No, no, go ahead. Give us more details on that interview, Corey. Like, how long was it? Where? What medium? I assume, so clearly radio, right? Radio. Was it like a Terry Gross 10-minute segment? What was it? Yeah,
Corey
32:13
I don't know the exact length of time. It was minutes. It was a bit of back and forth. It wasn't just one soundbite that was clipped out. And there was some prodding and pushing on the particular matters, but people got quite upset. And it became a thing that then NPR almost investigated themselves on. You know, and a week later, they were doing an interview with, you know, their media critics about whether it was appropriate to do this particular thing here.
Zain
32:39
But I say that mostly so I
Corey
32:42
I don't leave that hanging out there too, too long before the big reveal.
Zain
32:46
I know I did it
Annalise
32:48
yours. where you're leading
Annalise
32:51
but what I was gonna say is like so I I left journalism five years ago TikTok wasn't on the scene then and to Zane's point which was a great one is like you have these players nowadays who were and and I think there could probably be comparisons to Daniel Smith right during the leadership like just doing a sheer number the more podcasts the more things the more URLs the better because then I can clip it not that Daniel Smith was going viral on TikTok talk but like you can clip it and you can control the narrative so
Zain
33:19
so i mean i'll tell you a story let me go back to yeah right so i ran into him okay actually legitimately ran into him while i was buying theater tickets in new york okay so i run into him as he's going this is a weird story i like this keep going
Annalise
33:31
going this is great no
Zain
33:32
no no no what was this show i'm not i want to know what show it was so
Zain
33:35
so this is um hold on it was um okay
Zain
33:38
okay i'm lost interested what show it was
Zain
33:42
mean girls uh this was in june it
Zain
33:45
was in june we're gonna start rachel brosnahan and oscar isaac were in this show about um
Zain
33:50
um like 1970s new york it was beautiful it's like it's everything your progressive heart would want and right next to the theater is the fox news studio and
Zain
33:59
and i see vivek walking in to the gutfeld studio which is their lame-ass excuse of a late night show um it's terrible by the way it's like atrocious it's very and yeah so the con i say I like run into him. We make eye contact. He's like walking with security people. He's like waiting for the buzzer to let him in. I'm like, Vivek, what's up, man? And he's like, hey. He's like so excited that someone knew who he was, okay? Like this is June. I'm talking like this guy is like Republican rock star right now. This is June. He's like so excited someone knew who he was.
Corey
34:29
And I was like, yeah, I'm from Canada, man.
Zain
34:31
Interesting race you're running in, right? That's all I left. And he's like, yeah, man. Just like just try and do whatever I can. Go wherever I i can just trying to like make any appearances you know i'm gonna go do gutfeld now then we're gonna do whatever and then he like turns the person who's like carrying his dry cleaning literally seemed like his dry cleaning uh and he's like what are we doing after they're like yeah we're doing this pot it's like we're doing everything and
Zain
34:48
and it was such an interesting uh perspective to see someone try to get him on the strategists i see no no no no no no but this is where i was going this is where i'm going cory if my next phrase to him would have been dude i've got a pod i've got a political pod i bet the motherfucker would have said yes i i 100 guarantee guarantee i don't even think he would have given a shit if it was canadian like i'm not even joking the guy would have been like fucking let's do it and there's something to be said like we found ourselves in this really interesting media environment especially for conservatives annalise's point about danielle is such a great parallel that they are like flooding the zone like crazy especially underdog conservatives we saw this in some way and maybe this undercuts my point around conservatives but budaj kind of did the same right like would go on every single podcast that he could every single thing
Corey
35:36
thing that he could he was
Corey
35:37
the democrat who always went on fox right he he went on the other side vivek went
Zain
35:40
went on msnbc right like he would do it constantly um and so there is something interesting here that's that's going on and all that really produces is clippable moments for them right like they're they're not they don't really care about the media downside they really don't care if it's a fucking disaster of an interview because like no one will know
Annalise
35:59
can clip it and they can control the narrative because they have Change the game!
Annalise
36:04
I don't know if you remember, Corey,
Corey
36:07
wants to say something. I gotta
Annalise
36:09
say. Corey, you're the host. Take control.
Corey
36:11
If you both know that in this scenario, doesn't
Corey
36:15
doesn't that sort of reinforce the notion that you don't necessarily want to platform these people? Like, you are not getting the accountability you
Annalise
36:20
you talked about. But if you're not platforming them, someone else will. Well, that's a bit of a wild race to the bottom, isn't it?
Annalise
36:29
but if just if if parker doesn't go on jesper's then parker's gonna come on the strategist or like whatever right i've
Corey
36:34
i've been waiting for a bit no
Zain
36:37
no no cory oh beautiful my ego is so big that i feel like i can get vivek to admit that a wealth tax is what's necessary in this country uh even though it's not his country that has no there is something to be said about like journalists or an interviewer's being like if this is going to be confrontational someone i don't agree with i can get them to say something that they don't want to say and
Corey
36:56
and i took dress post credit well Well, like whether this guy wanted to say it or not. Yeah. Right.
Zain
36:59
Right. Like he wanted to say. So like, you know, he revealed something. It's not about it. It's like it's revelatory. The more they do, the more revelatory it is. I think there is. But here's
Annalise
37:11
here's the thing with today's media environment. So when I when I was a reporter at the Calgary Herald and I was covering City Hall and I was spending like 14 hours a day at that building. it
Annalise
37:25
didn't matter how many clicks I got or how many people retweeted me or whatever I still got paid the same very small amount every two weeks right like that's that's how it worked whereas Jesperson is his own brand and he's his own entity and the more and this is where I think it does get dangerous and in this media environment like the more clicks Jesperson gets the more people who go and watch that YouTube video the better it is for Jesperson right and so I say I think that how I I don't think the general public understands how much media has evolved, especially in the past five years.
Zain
38:00
We have a lot of journalists who listen to this pod, Corey. How many of them do you think are pulling their hair out right now?
Corey
38:05
Well, I hope all of them. And I hope that they, you know, reach out to Annalise and give her questions and thoughts because I'm not going to listen to them. But I found this super fascinating conversation. And there's a thing that you said earlier, Annalise, it's ringing through my head, ringing through my head. It's clashing with something that Zane said earlier, you know, and there's just
Annalise
38:26
just this car crash in my head.
Corey
38:28
Well, I'm not necessarily trying to, but I'm hoping you two can help me reconcile two things, right? One is this notion that you do the work and you do the research. And if you've got somebody who is going to be potentially, you
Corey
38:42
you know, dangerous to the public, let's just, not your words, my words here. You've got to make sure that you face this interview in a way that it's revelatory. It provides some sort of insights into who they are and sunlight's the best disinfectant, blah, blah, blah, all of this, right?
Corey
38:58
And I think about the amount of work that is and the guardrails there. And then I think about your comment, Annalise, Darren Krause's really, journalism is not activism. Journalism is not activism. Well,
Corey
39:10
right there, you are taking a different degree of effort, it would seem to me, for somebody like that. I mean, are there different guardrails for a white supremacist than a PTA president? And as soon as there are, is
Corey
39:21
is journalism activism? That's
Annalise
39:23
That's your question at the end?
Annalise
39:27
to pull a Cory and Carter, not answer it. Um,
Annalise
39:29
no, but I think, okay. I think this is the other thing about the media environment that people need to understand is there's lots of these questions are not easy questions. Like they're the type of thing that you want to discuss with smart people and you want to come to a conclusion. And in today's media environment, you have these people like Jesperson or like Darren Krause who don't have those people around them that they're having those conversations with because they're out on their own and they maybe have one or two staff members like if if if this was 10 years ago and i was at the herald and we were trying to make this decision it wouldn't just be me making the decision it would be like a conversation amongst many smart people weighing pros and cons and i think again back to how much things have changed that's lacking in today's environment so
Corey
40:12
so but like and zane i want to get your thoughts here if
Corey
40:17
if you if there are different guardrails and there is a different amount of legwork that gets done when there's a candidate or a speaker who's a little bit more dangerous. If you do different work, do
Corey
40:29
do you not sort of feed that victim mentality of some of these groups that the media is out to get them that there's this hostility? I know we're taking a bit of a zag here. But like, it seems to me that it's, you've presented very complex views that the media has to tackle with. And it feels like they're destined to antagonize both sides, don't they i
Zain
40:50
feel like the trap and this is this is zane velgey's perspective this is zane velgey not like a
Zain
41:00
feel like never officially the strategist it's just it's just only hours before i i break off from my own podcast cory at this point these fucking questions jesus christ i
Annalise
41:11
once it's over yeah
Zain
41:12
yeah fuck 29 minutes oh no it's not even 29 minutes after After my computer froze, fuck me, Corey. Fuck me. Just call it during my answer, please. Fucking for everybody. Lightning raps. So let me turn it back to my favorite subject, me. A couple of years ago, I think just before the pandemic, we
Zain
41:32
we hosted a conference in Calgary where we wanted to talk about the... And this has a point, I'll get to it. Where we wanted to talk about the media's involvement in advocacy. Kind of like at the heart of your question, right? And I have a friend who came down from Washington, Emma Lacey Bordeaux, who was Director of Standards and Practices at CNN. And
Zain
41:54
And she's been for a long time championing something called solutions-based journalism, Which is ultimately saying the media's job is not to be simply focused on diagnosis, not simply focused on understanding what's going on constantly, and leaving it there with no real pathways or prospects of solutions, but complement the strengths of problems, right? provide valuable insights to help, whether it's communities tackling problems like climate change. In her case, it was incarceration that she was deeply, deeply focused on, on what should be done. She herself would 1,000% consider herself a journalist. She herself would 1,000% consider herself to be nonpartisan. She herself would 1,000% consider herself adhering to the written and unwritten code for a journalist, but is starting to, and I'm not saying she's the one pushing this on her own, but is starting to present as a class of journalists who are saying enough of just talking about the problem. We need to be part of the solution because smartly diagnosing the problem is currently what's being taught and all that's being taught and all that's being valued. We need people like myself who consider themselves journalists, journalists, nonpartisan, above the fold, high integrity to be part of the solution. And I think that's the start of the answer in some ways, is to examine what solutions-based journalism looks like. I'm very curious if Annalise has any thoughts on that. But to me, when she presented in my conversations with her over the years, I found that to be an incredibly compelling way that journalists get involved with, I shouldn't say advocacy because it isn't, But get involved with the dotted line that is from problem to end result as also being citizens living in a community, in a place, in time.
Corey
43:46
as a journalist, a former journalist, how
Corey
43:48
how does that hit
Corey
43:50
hit you? It's certainly in contrast with Darren Krause's view.
Annalise
43:56
I mean, again, I left journalism five years ago. But I think what Zane's saying, like, these are the things we need to grapple with. And I'll put this on the table.
Annalise
44:06
Really long hours, really shitty pay, a lot, a lot of abuse, threats, things that police have to get involved with, especially as a journalist of color, especially as a female journalist, like the amount of abuse and grief that journalists take nowadays for what, right? For 50, $60,000 a year? Like, even today,
Zain
44:28
today, like a tongue lashing by the premier against journalists in Ontario. You know, one of them a racialized minority and like, glad for the other one, Fatma Syed, just to come right back and asking for a moment of honesty to the minister. Like, it's amazing, to your point, like, we're just seeing this live wire right now. out like
Annalise
44:46
like it's it's it's the it's a nutty nutty job i think the past five years covid trump etc has exaggerated that and i think these are questions we need to grapple with as we're like who is going to be journalists into the future and you're already seeing it you look at newsroom vacancies right now across canada higher than they have ever been there's there's um outlets outlets where before it was super competitive to get jobs there that they are just have open vacancies like unreal because you're like who wants these jobs and I've had these conversations with young journalists I'm talking in their early 20s recent grads who've said like I think I'm going to be the last generation of people who viewed this as a sexy job who viewed this as a cool job who like grew up in pop culture where this was like a respected job again I think COVID And Trump has changed that. But I think these are questions we like grapple with as we're like, well, who is going to be providing news, you know, 5, 10, 15 years down the road? Like it's a huge issue, I think.
Zain
45:50
it's a really interesting point. You know, I, we, we never, we never credit him, but, um, David Hurley had a really interesting podcast a couple of months ago, um, where he interviewed some legacy media folks and the, the conversation was, uh, on the heels of what Annalise is talking about here, which is like, we all iterate on what's put out by the media, right? Like we, you talked about this like 35 minutes ago, Corey, like I look at national news, watch, see what these people wrote. I know if I can't find the ad free version of it, I probably am not talking about it at the end of the show. Sorry, folks. So we're getting no fucking Hill Time stories because I'm not paying $7 a week. Are you fucking kidding me? Which I probably should, right, to the point of this conversation. But if these people who put out the facts, put out the stories start disappearing, the people like us that iterate, right, the people like us that comment, that speculate, that extend the news cycle, that talk about the strategy of certain things, that talk about the The analysis will have really very little to do. So what kind of replaces that? And I don't want to get into the CBC conversation because they certainly did. And I recommend people do listen to that episode. If the CBC goes away in a couple of years, at least in its current form, with perhaps a new prime minister.
Corey
47:01
Well, I mean, I could actually drag you guys further down into this alley a lot. I think it's a super fascinating topic. For what it's worth, I think Jesperson was right to talk to David Parker. I don't think David Parker is the same as a white supremacist in Charlottesville, just for clarity for anybody who might have thought otherwise. We're talking about going up the ladder and where the line is. But it's tough. These are tricky challenges. And I find it super intriguing to think about the media almost as the bystander in an accident now, right? They go on these things just to get the clips that they can send out to your crowd. And, you know, as we turn to the lightning round, I do want to say, Zane, as the CFO of the Strategist Media Corporation, I would be willing to authorize $7 a week for The Hill Times if you and Annalise shared the subscription. Let's do
Annalise
47:51
do it. You'd have to share it. Let's share that subscription. There
Zain
47:55
your receipts. Yeah, okay. Okay,
Corey
47:59
well, let's move it on to our final segment, the over-under, the lightning round. Zane Velgey, we do this for you. We've always done this for you. I've got... That's what the words I've been waiting to hear
Corey
48:14
Okay, lightning round. West of Center is starting their podcast season. Who are you hoping will be among their first guests and why? The answer is me, Zane. Moving on. Annalise.
Corey
48:27
Who are you hoping will be one of the first guests on West of Center? Okay,
Annalise
48:30
Okay, well, here's David Parker. Parker, do you think this is the honest question? Do you think West of Center is going to put David Parker on?
Annalise
48:37
Right? The West of Center folks listen to this podcast. They saw what happened with Jesperson. I want
Zain
48:42
want Tony Parker and David Parker on the same podcast with Corey Hogan. All
Corey
48:47
Make it happen. It's
Corey
48:49
let's do it. All right.
Corey
48:51
Okay, I got one more here. Let me see. Hogan or Carter?
Zain
48:57
On what? Everything. In
Zain
49:00
Yeah, just in general. it's definitely carter although i mean the fact is we make so much fun of him but the answer is always steven it always has yeah that's true yeah
Annalise
49:11
feel hurt but i understand what happened yesterday carter came to my house i said do you need my address he said i know where you live which was quite creepy came to my house in his tesla with
Annalise
49:22
with his bike rack then went and rented me and my sister a mountain bike and then drove us in his tesla i was quite worried about the range actually um out to the mountains and then we mountain biked all day and he drove us home yeah it was great i would
Corey
49:35
would never do any of that so
Corey
49:36
i guess yeah i sort of have
Annalise
49:39
plus i've only met you in person like once cory okay
Corey
49:43
okay super i maybe i should have not asked that question at the end it really kind of crushed me uh all right you
Corey
49:50
you are npr it is 2018 18 this final question knowing what you know the conversation we've had do
Corey
49:56
do you have jason kessler on the radio i
Annalise
49:59
i don't know anything you gave us like no details no answer i'm gonna go do some research on this do
Zain
50:07
do you mean jason kessler the
Zain
50:09
the white supremacist corey yes
Corey
50:11
yes i do yeah not
Corey
50:14
music style yeah okay
Corey
50:16
okay well uh we're gonna leave it there You could really dive in
Zain
50:20
That's where you're going to leave it?
Zain
50:21
it? You asked me what I know when a segment is over. I was over two questions ago. Okay, I've got another
Corey
50:28
you. I would have moved on. How do you find the energy? How
Corey
50:33
How do you find, like, what's the way that you generate the energy for your intros and outros? Like, what do you imagine here?
Corey
50:39
Nothing. All right. I'm just naturally gifted.
Corey
50:43
And at least that appears to be your problem then. All right. We're done.