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Can Journalism Save a Marriage? · Question Everything

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: From Placement Theory and KCRW, this is Question Everything. I'm
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Brian Reed, and this show is my real-time quest to
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: try and find ways to make journalism better. So far
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: on that quest, I've been talking to a lot of
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: people who aren't so optimistic about journalism. These are reporters
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: I admire, academics, politicians, and just regular consumers of news.
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: And when I ask them about the state of things,
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: I hear a lot of the same points. Trust in
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: news is at an all-time low. People don't believe facts.
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: And then people feel frustrated when they see bias in
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: the media. Or when they feel lied to. And I
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: expected to hear all of that. That's why I'm here.
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: But recently, one of my producers came to me with
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: a different type of story. This is the story of
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: a couple, Dick and Emily.
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  Speaker 2: Dick doesn't trust anything, no matter what it is. It
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: comes from the New York Times, the Washington Post.
• 0:48
  Speaker 3: The Atlantic. The Atlantic.
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: The Atlantic.
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  Speaker 3: MSNBC.
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  Speaker 2: CNN. CNN is another one. It doesn't matter what they're saying.
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  Speaker 2: He just automatically dismisses. Well, they develop their own reputation.
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  Speaker 3: Okay.
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  Speaker 1: Today on Question Everything, a story about a couple of
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: more than 20 years in turmoil and how they tried
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: to get out of it. A story where I got
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  Speaker 1: to see these conflicts about journalism playing out under one
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  Speaker 1: roof and taking a toll on one couple's marriage. A
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  Speaker 1: story with some lessons not only for journalists, but for
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  Speaker 1: all of us, I think. Stick around. So I'm here
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: in the studio with one of our producers on Question Everything,
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: Zach St.
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: Louis.
• 1:39
  Speaker 4: Hey, Zach.
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  Speaker 5: Hey, Brian.
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: So, Zach, you're the one who's gotten to know Dick
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: and Emily, this couple that was fighting over the news, right? Yeah.
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  Speaker 5: So their names are Richard and Emily Newton. He obviously
• 1:49
  Speaker 5: goes by Dick. They're in their 70s. They just celebrated
• 1:52
  Speaker 5: their 24th wedding anniversary. It's a second marriage, both of them.
• 1:56
  Speaker 5: They fell in love singing hymns together in the choir
• 1:58
  Speaker 5: at church. She's an alto. He's a bass.
• 2:00
  Speaker 6: That's sweet.
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: Where do they live?
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  Speaker 5: They live in Orange County, California, Irvine, California.
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  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 2:05
  Speaker 5: And over the last several years, they've found that they've
• 2:08
  Speaker 5: been growing more and more miserable, basically, at home over
• 2:11
  Speaker 5: a tiny thing, which is what news they would each
• 2:14
  Speaker 5: want to read in the morning.
• 2:16
  Speaker 7: We get up and get a cup of coffee, and
• 2:18
  Speaker 7: we sit down, and we start going through our emails.
• 2:21
  Speaker 7: And we sit next to each other when we're doing that.
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  Speaker 7: I'd say, Emily, I have an article here. Would you
• 2:27
  Speaker 7: be interested in me sending it to you? And she
• 2:30
  Speaker 7: would say, who's it from? And if I said, Brebert
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  Speaker 7: News or.
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: Breitbart?
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  Speaker 5: Is that what you mean?
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  Speaker 3: Breitbart.
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  Speaker 8: That's it. Yeah, Breitbart.
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  Speaker 7: Or Epic Times was another one. She knew those were
• 2:43
  Speaker 7: really right-leaning and wasn't really interested. I was the same
• 2:48
  Speaker 7: way with her. She found something on Atlantic or New
• 2:52
  Speaker 7: York Times or Washington Post, and she wanted me to
• 2:56
  Speaker 7: read it, I kind of shied away from it.
• 3:01
  Speaker 8: If I said to him, oh, I just read this
• 3:05
  Speaker 8: article in the New York Times. It's really interesting. Do
• 3:07
  Speaker 8: you want to read it? He would automatically shut down
• 3:11
  Speaker 8: and say, no, I don't trust the New York Times.
• 3:13
  Speaker 8: They're whatever. I realized We are not reading from the
• 3:20
  Speaker 8: same hymnal here.
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: Did they have like a full sense of each other's
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: political leanings when they met? Or is this something they
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: discovered about each other after they were married?
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  Speaker 5: Oh no, they knew.
• 3:31
  Speaker 7: I pretty much knew going in that she was definitely
• 3:36
  Speaker 7: not a Republican. She was.
• 3:44
  Speaker 5: So they told me that they started arguing a lot
• 3:45
  Speaker 5: more when Trump came on the political scene. Dick supported Trump.
• 3:50
  Speaker 5: Emily furiously did not. But then, it was after Election
• 3:54
  Speaker 5: Day in 2020 when they had one of their biggest disagreements.
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  Speaker 5: From the beginning, I.
• 4:00
  Speaker 8: Never believed that the election was fraudulently stolen. I have
• 4:05
  Speaker 8: more faith in people and in our democracy. Dick was
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  Speaker 8: more open to doubt.
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  Speaker 7: They were saying that there was a lot of things
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  Speaker 7: that were going on that shouldn't have been going on.
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  Speaker 7: There was packing drop boxes with ballots. One person would
• 4:26
  Speaker 7: walk up to the ballot box and drop in all
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  Speaker 7: kinds of ballots into it.
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  Speaker 5: So this particular theory Dick's talking about, it's from a movie,
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  Speaker 5: one of the many sources that he was turning to
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  Speaker 5: at the time. It's called 2,000 Mules. Have you heard
• 4:40
  Speaker 5: of it?
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  Speaker 1: I've heard of it, yes. I've had people talk to
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: me about it as I've been reporting, basically.
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  Speaker 5: Yeah, so this movie, 2,000 Mules, it Looks like a documentary,
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  Speaker 5: but it's really a propaganda film. It's about a stolen
• 4:52
  Speaker 5: election theory. It's not true, but it made some waves.
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  Speaker 5: It played in over 400 theaters around the country. You
• 4:58
  Speaker 5: can watch it online. It's made by Dinesh D'Souza. He's
• 5:01
  Speaker 5: a right-wing political commentator.
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  Speaker 2: Let me begin by asking a very simple question.
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  Speaker 5: Do we know the truth about what really happened in
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  Speaker 5: the 2020 election?
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  Speaker 1: All right, what's the gist?
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  Speaker 5: The gist is that it's about this theory that a
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  Speaker 5: bunch of Democratic groups were paying people, who they call mules...
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  Speaker 5: to illegally collect ballots and stuff them into ballot boxes
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  Speaker 5: in key swing states.
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  Speaker 9: Philadelphia alone, we've identified more than 1,100 mules.
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  Speaker 5: So there are these talking head interviews, and they're intercut
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  Speaker 5: with this grainy surveillance footage that shows this person putting
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  Speaker 5: ballots into a box, and they're like, see, there's all
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  Speaker 5: the evidence you need.
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  Speaker 1: But that's not real surveillance footage?
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  Speaker 5: It is real surveillance footage, but it's showing people just
• 5:45
  Speaker 5: dropping off ballots legally.
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  Speaker 1: And there's scary music under it.
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  Speaker 5: There's scary music, scary voiceover. We are not a democracy.
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  Speaker 5: We are a criminal cartel masquerading as a democracy. And
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  Speaker 5: when Dick watched it, like a lot of people, he
• 6:01
  Speaker 5: thought it seemed really plausible.
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  Speaker 7: It just added to the other stories that I was hearing.
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  Speaker 7: Things that were happening in Arizona and Georgia. I'm thinking, yeah,
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  Speaker 7: there's stuff going on here that shouldn't be going on.
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  Speaker 5: So Dick is watching this movie. He's reading his sources.
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: And also he's watching the president, President Trump, and other
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: powerful people around him say over and over again that
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: the election was fraudulent and had been stolen from him.
• 6:31
  Speaker 5: Yes, exactly. And then Emily's consuming all of her own sources,
• 6:34
  Speaker 5: and they say the exact opposite. And it all added
• 6:37
  Speaker 5: to this feeling that it wasn't safe for them to
• 6:39
  Speaker 5: talk about politics. Did that feel different from other arguments
• 6:45
  Speaker 5: or disagreements you'd had about non-political things over your marriage?
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  Speaker 8: It did because there was no give and take. We
• 6:54
  Speaker 8: can argue about, you know, what we're going to spend
• 6:56
  Speaker 8: our money on. We can argue about our kids. You know,
• 6:59
  Speaker 8: we can argue about the neighborhood. But we usually come
• 7:04
  Speaker 8: to some sort of resolution. This whole thing about Trump,
• 7:08
  Speaker 8: there's no resolution.
• 7:11
  Speaker 5: How did that feel?
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  Speaker 6: Frustrating.
• 7:12
  Speaker 8: Frustrating. Because I know my husband. I know what a smart, sensitive,
• 7:21
  Speaker 8: thoughtful person he is. He's very generous. I know all
• 7:25
  Speaker 8: that about him. And to have him suddenly be aligned
• 7:31
  Speaker 8: to this person who I found absolutely despicable was very troubling.
• 7:41
  Speaker 7: She wouldn't talk to me. She basically just... I don't
• 7:44
  Speaker 7: want to talk about it. I would try, but it
• 7:48
  Speaker 7: just wasn't going to happen. And if it did, we'd
• 7:51
  Speaker 7: end up yelling at each other. I got so angry
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  Speaker 7: with her one day that I finally, I just had
• 7:57
  Speaker 7: to walk out of the house and walk down the
• 8:00
  Speaker 7: street to cool off. And then I started thinking, wow,
• 8:05
  Speaker 7: I'm letting politics get involved in our marriage because I
• 8:09
  Speaker 7: was really angry at the time. And I just couldn't
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  Speaker 7: stand that. I never thought that politics was important enough
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  Speaker 7: to jeopardize what she and I had together.
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  Speaker 5: Did you feel like that it could do that, that
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  Speaker 5: politics could jeopardize it?
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  Speaker 1: Yes, I really did.
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  Speaker 7: I think, what did I get myself into here? Maybe
• 8:28
  Speaker 7: I did something I shouldn't have done.
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  Speaker 5: What's the mistake you're talking about?
• 8:33
  Speaker 7: Having someone that was so far left that I couldn't
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  Speaker 7: live with.
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  Speaker 6: Oof.
• 8:39
  Speaker 5: Yeah, this was a pretty low point in their marriage.
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  Speaker 5: And they told me that they really wanted to find
• 8:43
  Speaker 5: a way out of it.
• 8:45
  Speaker 8: We were both looking for some sort of, I don't
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  Speaker 8: want to say neutral, but impartial news source.
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  Speaker 7: I was hungry for something that I could count on
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  Speaker 7: to peel the layers away and really show what's in
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  Speaker 7: the heart of it.
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  Speaker 5: They started reading different online news sources that branded themselves
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  Speaker 5: as being unbiased, plant-free, that kind of thing.
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  Speaker 1: Interesting. Interesting.
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  Speaker 5: And then they finally landed on something. It was a newsletter.
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  Speaker 5: Dick seemed to like it okay. So did Emily.
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  Speaker 8: We both agreed. Oh, yes, let's read Tangle.
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: Tangle.
• 9:21
  Speaker 5: Yes, that's the newsletter. And it not only helped fix
• 9:25
  Speaker 5: this problem in their marriage, but it also did something
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  Speaker 5: for Dick that no other news source up to this
• 9:31
  Speaker 5: point was able to do.
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: All right, so tell me about it.
• 9:35
  Speaker 5: It's this daily newsletter. It comes to your e-mail. It's
• 9:37
  Speaker 5: like a Substack type thing. It's run by a guy
• 9:40
  Speaker 5: named Isaac Saul. He started it. He writes it. They
• 9:43
  Speaker 5: have about 135,000 subscribers. It comes to your inbox every weekday,
• 9:48
  Speaker 5: and each issue is all about one topic from the news.
• 9:52
  Speaker 5: What they try to do is summarize two or three
• 9:54
  Speaker 5: of the best articles and arguments from right-leaning sources about
• 9:58
  Speaker 5: that topic, and then they do the same thing with
• 10:00
  Speaker 5: left-leaning sources. And the whole premise of the newsletter is
• 10:03
  Speaker 5: that there are people out there, like Dick and Emily,
• 10:05
  Speaker 5: that are reading completely separate sources, and why not put
• 10:08
  Speaker 5: all of those in one place?
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: So that's what the newsletter is? Like, it's just like,
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: here's this topic, here are a few stories from the left,
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: here are a few stories from the right? Yeah, so
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: you can actually read what those arguments are.
• 10:19
  Speaker 8: I think probably the first thing that astounded me was
• 10:23
  Speaker 8: the transparency that when they make a mistake, they correct
• 10:28
  Speaker 8: it as soon as they realize it and they put
• 10:30
  Speaker 8: it right up front.
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: How is that different than corrections in a newspaper? A
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: little bit.
• 10:36
  Speaker 5: It's the way that they do it. So corrections in
• 10:38
  Speaker 5: a newspaper, you know, traditionally, they are at the end
• 10:41
  Speaker 5: of the article. They'll be like a little footnote. Actually, no.
• 10:45
  Speaker 5: We got this wrong. It's been changed above. We regret
• 10:47
  Speaker 5: the error, you know, in like little print italics at
• 10:50
  Speaker 5: the bottom. Tangle's approach to corrections, it's a bit different.
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: Can you show me?
• 10:53
  Speaker 6: Yes.
• 10:55
  Speaker 5: This is from August 21st. And at the very, very top,
• 10:59
  Speaker 5: the very first thing that you see is correction, period,
• 11:03
  Speaker 5: in big letters. In our coverage of the Medicare drug
• 11:06
  Speaker 5: pricing negotiations yesterday, we said that four of the Medicare
• 11:09
  Speaker 5: Part D drugs for which the government had negotiated lower
• 11:12
  Speaker 5: prices were overprescribed in the United States. That was false.
• 11:16
  Speaker 5: We misread the abstract of a study and rushed our
• 11:18
  Speaker 5: review process when we included it. A sincere thank you
• 11:22
  Speaker 5: to the 10 or so readers who caught the error.
• 11:24
  Speaker 5: And then in italics right below that, this is our
• 11:27
  Speaker 5: 114th correction in Tangle's 263-week history and our first correction
• 11:32
  Speaker 5: since August 13th. We track corrections and place them at
• 11:35
  Speaker 5: the top of the newsletter in an effort to maximize
• 11:37
  Speaker 5: transparency with readers.
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: So this is different than a newspaper, I see.
• 11:41
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: What else did Dick and Emily notice about Tangle?
• 11:44
  Speaker 5: Yeah, so they noticed that it wasn't so sensational. It
• 11:47
  Speaker 5: was more measured or even handed in their language. So
• 11:50
  Speaker 5: for instance, Tangle noticed that readers on the right would
• 11:53
  Speaker 5: sometimes unsubscribe from the newsletter after reading a phrase like
• 11:56
  Speaker 5: undocumented immigrant. But they also didn't think it was right
• 11:59
  Speaker 5: to call someone illegal or an illegal alien. So they
• 12:02
  Speaker 5: did this big internal review and they settled on the
• 12:05
  Speaker 5: term unauthorized migrant.
• 12:07
  Speaker 6: We really liked that approach, trying to filter out all
• 12:12
  Speaker 6: the trigger words or the words that were very highly
• 12:16
  Speaker 6: volatile emotionally, which helps both of us then consider the
• 12:22
  Speaker 6: issue with less emotion about it.
• 12:24
  Speaker 2: I'm not going to say with no emotion. We would
• 12:27
  Speaker 2: still argue, but with.
• 12:28
  Speaker 6: Less emotion about it. And then we loved Isaac's take.
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: What's Isaac's take?
• 12:34
  Speaker 5: So Isaac's take, Isaac refers to Isaac Saul. He's the
• 12:37
  Speaker 5: founder and writer of the newsletter. And at the end
• 12:40
  Speaker 5: of every issue, he spends a long time writing his opinion.
• 12:45
  Speaker 5: And these can be long. And he says exactly how
• 12:48
  Speaker 5: he feels about the issue after having researched it and
• 12:51
  Speaker 5: just describes his own feeling about it.
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: Wait, do you have an example of this?
• 12:55
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 12:56
  Speaker 5: Here, I'll send one to you. We can look at it.
• 12:57
  Speaker 2: All right.
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: This was earlier this month. Hurricane Helene and the disaster
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: relief efforts.
• 13:03
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 13:04
  Speaker 5: The first part is just the topic. Then they summarize
• 13:06
  Speaker 5: what the right is saying. They summarize what the left
• 13:08
  Speaker 5: is saying. But then at the end, you see my take.
• 13:11
  Speaker 5: And so I'm obviously not going to read this whole thing.
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: Yeah, this is long. Wow.
• 13:16
  Speaker 5: 2,200 words, I looked.
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: It's like a whole essay. But what's his take on
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: Hurricane Helene?
• 13:21
  Speaker 5: Yeah, so before we get to his take, I think
• 13:23
  Speaker 5: you need to understand what he's responding to here. There
• 13:25
  Speaker 5: have been a lot of attacks on the Biden administration
• 13:28
  Speaker 5: from the right saying that they're doing nothing to help
• 13:30
  Speaker 5: people who've been affected by this hurricane.
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: Like actually nothing.
• 13:33
  Speaker 5: Well, that they failed to rise to the occasion, basically.
• 13:36
  Speaker 5: So Isaac, he really puts a stake in the ground
• 13:38
  Speaker 5: and says there's a big problem with this narrative. all nonsense.
• 13:41
  Speaker 5: It's all a lie. And then he writes, I hate
• 13:44
  Speaker 5: writing pieces like this. It's not my job to defend
• 13:47
  Speaker 5: the federal government from lies. And it's hard to write
• 13:49
  Speaker 5: a piece like this without reading it like I'm openly
• 13:51
  Speaker 5: shilling for Harris or Biden. I am not. I'm not
• 13:54
  Speaker 5: here to do their PR or protect their reputations. However,
• 13:57
  Speaker 5: I do care about our information ecosystem. I care about reliable,
• 14:00
  Speaker 5: accurate information being shared widely. I also care about the
• 14:04
  Speaker 5: North Carolinians in danger right now, not just because they're
• 14:06
  Speaker 5: Americans and it's a state I love, but also because
• 14:09
  Speaker 5: my mom, My aunt, my brother, and his family, my sister-in-law,
• 14:13
  Speaker 5: and my niece, they all live in North Carolina. So
• 14:15
  Speaker 5: the horrors we're all witnessing on the news hit close
• 14:17
  Speaker 5: to home. Here's the truth, though. Biden and Harris have
• 14:20
  Speaker 5: actually pulled every lever federal executives can in a situation
• 14:24
  Speaker 5: like this. None of the critics that I posted above
• 14:27
  Speaker 5: can say exactly what they want them to do that
• 14:29
  Speaker 5: they aren't already doing. And if you're planning on writing
• 14:31
  Speaker 5: in to tell me that I am shilling for Harris
• 14:33
  Speaker 5: or being a left-wing hack by calling out lies online,
• 14:36
  Speaker 5: you better be prepared to tell me exactly what I've
• 14:38
  Speaker 5: gotten wrong here. And he goes on for several more paragraphs.
• 14:41
  Speaker 8: Oh, wow.
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: Interesting. I can feel his resentment at having to defend
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: the Democratic administration.
• 14:47
  Speaker 5: Yeah. He's like, I don't want to do this just
• 14:49
  Speaker 5: to defend them. But in this case, they're doing everything
• 14:51
  Speaker 5: they can. And that's what the facts show. And so
• 14:53
  Speaker 5: I'm going to say that.
• 14:54
  Speaker 8: Right.
• 14:54
  Speaker 5: And this part of the newsletter was something that Dick
• 14:56
  Speaker 5: and Emily really came to appreciate.
• 14:59
  Speaker 8: He was very clear about what his biases were. That
• 15:03
  Speaker 8: made him extremely trustworthy. More often than not, When we
• 15:09
  Speaker 8: get to the end and we read my take, we
• 15:12
  Speaker 8: look at each other and say.
• 15:13
  Speaker 5: Yeah, that's how I feel. They started realizing that they
• 15:17
  Speaker 5: actually agreed with each other on a lot of things
• 15:19
  Speaker 5: and they were able to talk about it. And eventually
• 15:21
  Speaker 5: something pretty remarkable happened. So remember how Dick was totally
• 15:25
  Speaker 5: convinced the election had been stolen. He watched 2000 Mules.
• 15:28
  Speaker 5: He read all of those conspiracies about it. So as
• 15:31
  Speaker 5: Dick and Emily were starting to have this shared understanding
• 15:34
  Speaker 5: of the news again, Tangle did the thing for Dick
• 15:37
  Speaker 5: that no other source seemed to be able to do,
• 15:39
  Speaker 5: that Emily wasn't able to do. And that was proof
• 15:42
  Speaker 5: to him that the 2020 election had not been stolen.
• 15:45
  Speaker 7: The only thing that changed my mind completely was the
• 15:49
  Speaker 7: fact that I started reading Tangle. And it's only because
• 15:53
  Speaker 7: I trust Isaac and his team so much.
• 15:59
  Speaker 4: It's incredibly fulfilling, to be honest.
• 16:02
  Speaker 5: This is Isaac Saul.
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: He's the guy who writes Tangle.
• 16:05
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 16:06
  Speaker 4: It's actually so rewarding because the election fraud stuff in
• 16:11
  Speaker 4: particular was one of the most difficult times of my
• 16:14
  Speaker 4: life as a reporter. The month after that election was dark, stressful, really,
• 16:22
  Speaker 4: really hard work. And hearing that somebody had that reaction,
• 16:28
  Speaker 4: that their mind was actually changed, even one person, it's like, yeah,
• 16:33
  Speaker 4: it makes me want to cry.
• 16:34
  Speaker 5: Yeah. So I know we have to take a break now,
• 16:40
  Speaker 5: but when we come back, I'm going to tell you
• 16:42
  Speaker 5: the thing that Isaac did, the thing that he wrote
• 16:45
  Speaker 5: that wasn't necessarily facts or evidence, but it was something
• 16:49
  Speaker 5: else that helped change Dick's mind.
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: Stick around, everybody. All right, so I'm here in the
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: studio with Zach St. Louis, one of our producers here
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: on Question Everything. And Zach, you've been telling me the
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: story of this married couple, retirees, Dick and Emily, Orange County, California.
• 17:07
  Speaker 6: Yes.
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: And then we just got to the point in the
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: story where this newsletter called Tangle had apparently done something
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: that I feel like so many journalists, myself included, have
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: been banging our heads against the wall trying to figure
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: out what to do, which is how do you get
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: people to believe the evidence that the 2020 election was
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: not stolen from Donald Trump? Something like a third of
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: Americans believe it was. It's really threatening, like our ability
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: to function. How do you present those facts and get
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: people to believe them And even just our last episode
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: was all about Barton Gellman, one of the greatest investigative
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: reporters of our time, I'd say, who quit journalism because
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: of this problem.
• 17:46
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: And you're saying Tangle did it.
• 17:49
  Speaker 5: In this case, Tangle did it. Yeah, for Dick, Tangle
• 17:51
  Speaker 5: did it. All right.
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: So how did Tangle do this? How did Isaac, the
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: guy who runs this, do this? Yeah.
• 17:56
  Speaker 5: So Isaac did a ton of work around this whole
• 17:59
  Speaker 5: election denialism issue. It wasn't just one newsletter. Every time
• 18:03
  Speaker 5: a new claim about how the election may have been
• 18:05
  Speaker 5: stolen surfaced, he would spend all this time running it down.
• 18:08
  Speaker 5: explaining in detail why it was false. He did that
• 18:11
  Speaker 5: in the days and weeks immediately following the election. He
• 18:13
  Speaker 5: continued doing it as new claims surfaced in the years since.
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: But a lot of news sources have done this, looked
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: at these different claims about how the election was stolen
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: and showed why they aren't true and looked at the
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: court cases where no evidence surfaced and all this stuff, right?
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: They did.
• 18:26
  Speaker 5: But Isaac was doing a lot of research. Like, for example,
• 18:30
  Speaker 5: in the weeks following the election, right after, he did
• 18:33
  Speaker 5: this 400 tweet long thread that was going in detail
• 18:37
  Speaker 5: into each claim. He was really, really deep on this.
• 18:41
  Speaker 5: But I don't think it was only the research that
• 18:43
  Speaker 5: helped convince Dick. There's something else that Isaac did. And
• 18:46
  Speaker 5: it was in his tone and how he approached this
• 18:49
  Speaker 5: whole issue, especially around the claims that seemed more persuasive.
• 18:52
  Speaker 5: He didn't just write them off. He assessed them seriously.
• 18:55
  Speaker 5: He presented them seriously. And that didn't make Dick feel stupid.
• 19:00
  Speaker 5: Here's Isaac.
• 19:01
  Speaker 4: Some of the stuff was really convincing. And proving that
• 19:04
  Speaker 4: they were wrong was not as simple as saying like, oh,
• 19:09
  Speaker 4: this is just like conspiracy nonsense, like the ballot stuffing thing.
• 19:14
  Speaker 4: That was a plausible way to steal an election.
• 19:18
  Speaker 5: In 2022, he actually dedicated an entire newsletter, a deep
• 19:22
  Speaker 5: dive into 2000 Mules, that movie we were talking about.
• 19:26
  Speaker 4: So when that movie came out and everybody just like
• 19:29
  Speaker 4: laughs at Dinesh D'Souza, I was kind of like, I'm
• 19:31
  Speaker 4: going to watch it and take some of these allegations
• 19:34
  Speaker 4: seriously and see what's up. It turned out they're all bullshit,
• 19:38
  Speaker 4: but you only know that if you actually do some
• 19:42
  Speaker 4: of the work.
• 19:43
  Speaker 5: Can I actually just read you what he wrote at
• 19:45
  Speaker 5: the top of that newsletter?
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah, please.
• 19:47
  Speaker 5: So the title of the newsletter is An Honest Look
• 19:49
  Speaker 5: at 2020. Mules, The New Stolen Election Theory. And this
• 19:53
  Speaker 5: is how he opens it. I consider myself to be
• 19:55
  Speaker 5: both a skeptic and an open-minded person. I am deeply
• 19:59
  Speaker 5: cynical about our government, believe intelligence agencies are covering up
• 20:02
  Speaker 5: the truth about UFOs, and don't feel any particular loyalty
• 20:06
  Speaker 5: to any major political parties. I generally distrust authorities government agencies,
• 20:10
  Speaker 5: and politicians. But I do believe it's wise to consult
• 20:14
  Speaker 5: expert opinions and advice. I love a good conspiracy, a
• 20:17
  Speaker 5: good cover-up, and a great story. A stolen presidential election
• 20:21
  Speaker 5: would be an all-timer in every regard, a story so gigantic,
• 20:24
  Speaker 5: a conspiracy of corruption and power so unthinkable that the
• 20:28
  Speaker 5: idea alone is tantalizing enough I almost want to believe it.
• 20:32
  Speaker 5: And then he goes on to dissect every point made
• 20:34
  Speaker 5: in the film and show why it's inaccurate. But that's
• 20:37
  Speaker 5: how he starts.
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: Interesting. OK, so that's the presentation difference you're talking about?
• 20:42
  Speaker 7: Yeah.
• 20:43
  Speaker 5: And I'll just say that that framing, it's really different
• 20:46
  Speaker 5: from how other outlets covered this film. Like, for example,
• 20:49
  Speaker 5: there's a New York Times headline about the movie. It was, quote,
• 20:53
  Speaker 5: a big lie in a new package. There was a
• 20:55
  Speaker 5: Washington Post headline that was, quote, 2000 mules offers the
• 20:58
  Speaker 5: least convincing election fraud theory yet. And look, I mean,
• 21:02
  Speaker 5: that's all true. It is a lie. But Isaac realized
• 21:05
  Speaker 5: he's probably not going to convince someone who already believes
• 21:08
  Speaker 5: the lie by leading with that. So instead, he levels
• 21:11
  Speaker 5: with people, explains where he's coming from and all the
• 21:14
  Speaker 5: research he did, and then explains what he found about
• 21:17
  Speaker 5: the claims. And so this was what Dick was reading.
• 21:20
  Speaker 7: After reading his article, what I realized was, and he
• 21:23
  Speaker 7: even admitted there were some things that were happening that
• 21:26
  Speaker 7: shouldn't have been happening in some of the polls. But
• 21:30
  Speaker 7: it wouldn't have changed the dynamics of who won and
• 21:32
  Speaker 7: who lost.
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: At all.
• 21:35
  Speaker 7: That was actually the first time I really realized it
• 21:37
  Speaker 7: for sure. And that really opened my eyes to how
• 21:42
  Speaker 7: corrupt that was. That really sold me on the fact
• 21:46
  Speaker 7: that the election wasn't stolen.
• 21:53
  Speaker 4: What I was thinking in my head was like, I
• 21:55
  Speaker 4: want to bring all these people in my life under
• 21:59
  Speaker 4: one roof. And I want them to be able to
• 22:02
  Speaker 4: read a news source that like the, you know, Trump
• 22:05
  Speaker 4: MAGA bro will trust and like the left wing Bernie
• 22:09
  Speaker 4: bro will trust.
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: What was the like origin story for Tangle, for Isaac?
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: Like he was a reporter before this?
• 22:18
  Speaker 5: Yeah, he was a reporter. He worked for Huffington Post,
• 22:20
  Speaker 5: a couple of other places. And he told me that
• 22:23
  Speaker 5: he's always been the type of person that's brought together
• 22:25
  Speaker 5: people from different backgrounds in his personal life. Maybe they
• 22:28
  Speaker 5: don't agree. And he's often mediating between those people. But really,
• 22:32
  Speaker 5: the inspiration for Tangle came out of his own news consumption.
• 22:36
  Speaker 4: The idea for Tangle basically came from the Trump era
• 22:41
  Speaker 4: of like Trump proposes a border wall. And I'm like,
• 22:46
  Speaker 4: he's like proposing a 2000 mile border wall. This sounds
• 22:49
  Speaker 4: totally insane. I can't imagine the best argument for this,
• 22:53
  Speaker 4: but I really want to understand, is this something that
• 22:56
  Speaker 4: would actually work? And in order to grasp what was
• 23:01
  Speaker 4: actually happening, my day would be like, I'm going to
• 23:04
  Speaker 4: go read the New York Times editorial board. I'm going
• 23:06
  Speaker 4: to read their immigration reporting about it. Then I'm going
• 23:09
  Speaker 4: to go to Fox News and, you know, scroll through
• 23:11
  Speaker 4: their opinion page and search for Trump's border wall. And
• 23:13
  Speaker 4: then maybe I'll listen to like a Ben Shapiro podcast
• 23:16
  Speaker 4: and then I'll go listen to Pod Save America and
• 23:19
  Speaker 4: And then I'll watch The Daily Show do a bit
• 23:21
  Speaker 4: about it or watch John Oliver. And then I'll spend
• 23:23
  Speaker 4: like an hour on some Tucker Carlson special about it.
• 23:27
  Speaker 4: And then I'll do like 10 hours of all this
• 23:29
  Speaker 4: consuming the news. And I'll sit down and I'll be like, okay,
• 23:33
  Speaker 4: I think I now have a really good understanding of
• 23:37
  Speaker 4: everybody's perspective, positive and negative, about this policy proposal. Why
• 23:42
  Speaker 4: can't I just find that one place? That should exist somewhere.
• 23:47
  Speaker 5: Do you know who's reading the newsletter? I kind of do,
• 23:50
  Speaker 5: based on a reader survey of Tangle subscribers. So a
• 23:53
  Speaker 5: little bit over half of the subscribers are men, around 57%.
• 23:55
  Speaker 5: Its queue is very wide, just below 90% of readers.
• 23:59
  Speaker 5: It's U.S.-based, but Isaac says it does reach something like
• 24:02
  Speaker 5: 55 other countries. And about a third of the readers
• 24:06
  Speaker 5: say that they're on the left, a third on the right,
• 24:08
  Speaker 5: and the last third are either center or independent. Wow,
• 24:11
  Speaker 5: so pretty evenly politically split. Yeah, pretty even split politically.
• 24:15
  Speaker 5: And I did talk to some other readers of the
• 24:17
  Speaker 5: newsletter who said that it had an impact on them,
• 24:19
  Speaker 5: similar to Dick and Emily.
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: Like who?
• 24:22
  Speaker 5: I met this one guy at like a political event
• 24:24
  Speaker 5: in New York, and he told me it's basically the
• 24:26
  Speaker 5: only news that he reads. I talked to this therapist
• 24:29
  Speaker 5: who said it was similar to the work that she
• 24:31
  Speaker 5: tries to do connecting with clients that she doesn't see
• 24:34
  Speaker 5: eye to eye with, but with whom she wants to
• 24:36
  Speaker 5: increase compassion. And I even spoke to another guy who,
• 24:40
  Speaker 5: like Dick, had his mind changed about the 2020 election.
• 24:43
  Speaker 9: I assume that Donald Trump was telling me the truth,
• 24:47
  Speaker 9: that they had firm evidence that it was definitely manipulation
• 24:52
  Speaker 9: of the ballots.
• 24:54
  Speaker 5: This is a guy named Rick.
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: Wait, Rick and Dick?
• 24:56
  Speaker 5: Rick and Dick.
• 24:57
  Speaker 9: Okay.
• 24:58
  Speaker 5: Both Richard, if you want to be technical about it.
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: Got it. Go on.
• 25:01
  Speaker 5: It's a really similar story to Dick and Emily's. Rick
• 25:03
  Speaker 5: was a big Trump supporter, voted for him twice. Rick's
• 25:06
  Speaker 5: son is on the left politically. They were arguing about
• 25:09
  Speaker 5: the news a lot. And the son started forwarding Rick
• 25:12
  Speaker 5: the newsletter. including issues that were about the stolen election claims.
• 25:16
  Speaker 9: They weren't just laughing it off. I have a trust
• 25:19
  Speaker 9: in their news gathering and presentation abilities head and shoulders
• 25:25
  Speaker 9: above any other news gathering source. I have a trust
• 25:28
  Speaker 9: level there that's unequaled.
• 25:31
  Speaker 5: And again, like Dick and Emily, Rick and his son
• 25:34
  Speaker 5: have mended their relationship. They can talk to each other
• 25:36
  Speaker 5: about the news again. And now he doesn't think the
• 25:39
  Speaker 5: election was stolen. And that feeling of being lied to,
• 25:42
  Speaker 5: it's actually convinced him not to vote for Trump this year.
• 25:45
  Speaker 8: Really?
• 25:45
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 25:46
  Speaker 9: The only reason I wouldn't vote for him because he
• 25:49
  Speaker 9: made me look foolish in front of my son.
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: You know, Zach, you mentioned the importance of striking the
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: right tone when we're presenting evidence, especially evidence that's like
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: contrary to what someone believes. And that does seem important.
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: But also, you know, just hearing the story of Rick
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: and his son. alongside the story of Dick and Emily,
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: his wife, I do just wonder, does a person have
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: to be motivated to get along with someone they love
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: to repair a relationship, essentially, in order to change their mind?
• 26:22
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, it's a good question. Wanting to see
• 26:24
  Speaker 5: something from someone else's perspective, someone you love, seems like
• 26:28
  Speaker 5: it doesn't hurt. And in Dick and Emily's case, at
• 26:30
  Speaker 5: least the last time I spoke to them, they did
• 26:32
  Speaker 5: seem to be in a better place.
• 26:34
  Speaker 8: It's a huge relief, Dick and I, can now agree
• 26:38
  Speaker 8: on more or disagree based on the same information, at least.
• 26:45
  Speaker 7: I don't feel like I'm walking on eggshells if I
• 26:47
  Speaker 7: want to mention something to her. I mean, she's her
• 26:50
  Speaker 7: own person. I'm not going to tell her who to
• 26:52
  Speaker 7: vote for. And she wouldn't listen to me anyway.
• 26:55
  Speaker 8: Now we're on the same hymn book, more or less.
• 26:57
  Speaker 8: Although he might be reading a different page than me
• 27:00
  Speaker 8: at the time, but it's generally the same hymn book.
• 27:04
  Speaker 5: But I mean, agreeing on the same set of facts,
• 27:06
  Speaker 5: being in the same book, That's only going to get
• 27:08
  Speaker 5: you so far.
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: Who's Dick voting for?
• 27:10
  Speaker 3: You know, as far as I'm concerned, I don't like
• 27:14
  Speaker 3: Trump as a person. The way he handles himself, the
• 27:18
  Speaker 3: things he says, it bothers me a lot. But the
• 27:21
  Speaker 3: one thing that I did like about him was his policies.
• 27:25
  Speaker 3: And so I'm definitely leaning towards Trump still.
• 27:29
  Speaker 6: Okay, that's Dick's take.
• 27:32
  Speaker 3: That's my take.
• 27:33
  Speaker 2: That's the first time that he's... verbalized to me that
• 27:37
  Speaker 2: he's thinking about voting for Trump, my heart just stopped.
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: Emily and Dick Newton in Orange County, California. Question Everything
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: is a production of KCRW and Placement Theory. Coming up
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: on the show. Let me finish my message. It's inadequate
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: to do what, Jeff?
• 28:01
  Speaker 8: It's inadequate.
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: I invited both sides of a fiery Twitter debate to
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: come hash out their differences and the way God intended,
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: face to face and on microphones.
• 28:09
  Speaker 7: Our field, a field that I've devoted my entire life to,
• 28:13
  Speaker 7: is failing in the most important story of my lifetime.
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: A battle over the soul of journalism on our next episode.
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: Make sure you follow Question Everything on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube,
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: wherever you get your podcasts. If you're so inclined, leave
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: us a review. Ask a question in the comments. Oh,
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: and also, please subscribe to our newsletter at kcrw.com. slash
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: question everything for a prediction about what's going to happen
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: after the election, which came out of the reporting for
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: this episode. That's kcrw.com slash question everything. Today's episode was
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: produced by Zach St. Louis and edited by Jonathan Goldstein.
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: Our show is made by me, by executive producer Robin Simeon,
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: and production intern Emily Malterre. Neil Drumming is a contributing editor.
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: Sophie Cassis is a contributing producer. Fact-checking by Kaylin Lynch.
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: Sound design by Brendan Baker. Music by Matt McGinley. Special
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: thanks to Lisa Pollack. Our partners at KCRW include Arnie Seipel,
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: Gina Delvac, Hazel Ajmera, and Jennifer Farrow. We'll be back
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: two Thursdays from now. Join us.