AI transcript
0:00:12 I’m Guy Kawasaki and this is Remarkable People.
0:00:15 We’re on a mission to make you remarkable.
0:00:19 Helping me in this episode is Kurt Eichenwald.
0:00:23 He is a distinguished figure in investigative journalism.
0:00:29 He’s currently serving as the senior investigator at The Conversation.
0:00:35 This is one of my favorite publications because of its dependency on academic experts in
0:00:36 current events.
0:00:43 As a senior writer at Newsweek, a contributing editor at Vanity Fair, and a senior writer
0:00:49 at The New York Times, his work has encompassed a broad range of topics from Wall Street and
0:00:57 corporate scandals to terrorism, health care policy, and the dangers of the internet.
0:01:02 Beyond his accomplishments as a journalist, Kurt has crafted a literary legacy with his
0:01:05 compelling non-fiction books.
0:01:13 This includes The Informant, A True Story, 500 Days, Secrets and Lies in the Terror Wars,
0:01:17 and finally, A Mind Unravel.
0:01:23 In particular, this last book chronicles the humongous challenge of living with epilepsy
0:01:25 since a young man.
0:01:29 It makes his accomplishments even more remarkable.
0:01:31 I’m Guy Kawasaki.
0:01:43 This is Remarkable People, and now, here is Kurt Eichenwald.
0:01:49 I was diagnosed with epilepsy when I was 18 in my first semester of college when I had
0:02:00 a grand mal seizure, and it took a great deal of effort to get it under control, and I got
0:02:08 sicker and sicker, and I had a lot of medical misdiagnoses.
0:02:15 I was advised to hide what was going on, and so I pretty much stayed in my dorm room most
0:02:19 of the time, and my roommates helped me out.
0:02:25 When I finally stopped doing that, after eight weeks, I was thrown out of school and had
0:02:34 to fight to get back in and bring in the federal government and an advisory capacity, and from
0:02:40 that time forward, I had to learn how to manage every element of my life.
0:02:48 How do you tell employers or potential employers that you have uncontrolled epilepsy, or poorly
0:02:51 controlled epilepsy, that you could have a seizure at any point?
0:02:58 Are you going to get fired from one job when they found out within 24 hours of having been
0:02:59 hired?
0:03:03 But for the most part, people from that point dealt with it pretty well.
0:03:07 This job you alluded to is that you had less than 24 hours.
0:03:15 I have to say, I was amazed because I had it in my naive brain that Ralph Nader is protecting
0:03:22 the people and he’s a do-gooder and all this kind of stuff, and then his organization terminated
0:03:25 you when they found out you had epilepsy.
0:03:28 What the fuck is that?
0:03:33 Sometimes when you experience people in real life, they aren’t what you imagine them to
0:03:34 be.
0:03:40 At the same time that was happening, literally at the same time, Ralph had a publication
0:03:48 called Multinational Monitor, and he fired the editor because he didn’t like what they
0:03:54 were doing, and so the staff started performing union in order to, one of their demands was
0:04:00 to get the editor back, and Ralph busted the union and changed the locks on the door and
0:04:02 fired everybody.
0:04:05 So this man is not what people think he is.
0:04:11 It’s been difficult for me over many years when people are holding him up to be a saint
0:04:17 to go, “Yeah, this was the guy who fired me when he found out I had seizures.”
0:04:21 It was funny because I got a phone call in all of this from Sid Wolfe.
0:04:26 He’s always called Ralph’s doctor, he was the head of the public health group, I can’t
0:04:32 remember the name of it, and he was asking me all these questions about it, which made
0:04:37 me obviously very uncomfortable, and at the end of it he just said, “Oh, Ralph is just
0:04:38 such a hypochondriac.”
0:04:39 And I’m like, “What’s he thinking?
0:04:41 He’s going to catch it from me?”
0:04:46 Yeah, that was quite surprising.
0:04:57 Well, maybe Ralph will spend eternity in a pinto, and that would be just right?
0:05:02 There were periods I was terrible because I would be on Twitter, that’s what it was
0:05:10 called, and Ralph would pontificate about something on his feed, and I would frequently
0:05:11 reply, “Ralph, remember me?
0:05:17 I’m the guy you fired when you found out he had a disability, and hey, you really should
0:05:21 stop being such a hypochondriac.”
0:05:29 I do enjoy that over time you do get to be able to snap back at people.
0:05:36 Okay, so here’s another prime example of—I hope you snap back at this guy too.
0:05:45 So apparently, I read this, and I was shocked that this professor basically said that your
0:05:47 writing was horrible.
0:05:48 He was right.
0:05:50 That’s the thing.
0:05:58 I wanted to be in a career that would entail writing, and it was my first college essay,
0:06:05 but it came back marked all over the place and red marks, and he wrote across the top,
0:06:10 “Your writing is grotesque,” and yeah, it was a punch in the face, but I could then
0:06:12 read it and go, “Yeah, he’s really right.
0:06:18 I really need to work on my writing,” and he wasn’t just being a jerk, he was being
0:06:19 quite honest.
0:06:21 Wait, Kurt, I’m sorry.
0:06:26 You don’t write somebody’s writing is grotesque and claim that you’re taking the high road
0:06:29 and doing it for his benefit.
0:06:31 Excuse me, that’s bullshit.
0:06:34 It worked out that way for me.
0:06:35 It made me take it right.
0:06:40 I guess I could have taken a step back and gone, “Oh, what was me,” but I just looked
0:06:43 at it and went, “Yeah.”
0:06:47 Did you ever let him know that you work for the New York Times?
0:06:48 No, no.
0:06:54 I got better during college for everything, and actually, I write about this in the book,
0:06:57 which was the strangest thing.
0:07:01 There was a period of time I was having a grandma seizure, you know, full convulsions
0:07:02 every other night.
0:07:03 This is a great story.
0:07:04 Please continue.
0:07:07 I was just going to ask you about this.
0:07:11 There were periods, seizures don’t just end when you move on.
0:07:18 There was something called post-dictal period, and I wrote an essay, and I was fine at the
0:07:19 time I wrote it.
0:07:22 I would turn it in and get it back.
0:07:30 But if I was post-dictal, I would still write whatever I had to write, and I would turn
0:07:37 it in, and I would get back a great essay if this is fantastic, this is the best thing.
0:07:43 I’d read it, and first of all, I didn’t recognize it.
0:07:49 It wasn’t like, “Oh, yeah, I wrote this,” it was like, “I wrote this,” and they were
0:07:50 brilliant.
0:07:55 So I just sat here going, “I guess somewhere inside me is a brilliant person who comes
0:08:04 out,” but yeah, it was the strangest thing because there was a clear change in my capacity
0:08:10 to write and analyze when I was struggling after a seizure.
0:08:13 And is this still true if you have a seizure?
0:08:22 I haven’t had, with one or two exceptions, I haven’t had convulsion since I was 35, and
0:08:30 now, I mean, I have what’s called intractable epilepsy, meaning I’m never going to be 100%.
0:08:37 So now I’ll have small seizures on a bad day, I’ll have small seizures throughout the day,
0:08:44 and I don’t start getting smart, I start getting exhausted, and eventually it’s like, “I have
0:08:48 to go to bed,” and I’m also not in my 20s anymore.
0:08:51 Even that is bizarre in a sense, it’s in you, right?
0:08:53 Yeah, somewhere.
0:08:56 Maybe now, nobody would say my writing is grotesque.
0:09:01 Maybe that person has come out now, I don’t know.
0:09:08 And then tell me that I had the capacity to write better than I wrote, if that makes any
0:09:10 sense.
0:09:12 Whatever it takes, man, whatever it takes.
0:09:19 I have to say, there are more what the hell moments in your memoir than maybe any book
0:09:21 I’ve ever read.
0:09:29 And this includes Dr. Nicholson, Dr. Craddock, Strauss, Whitaker, your father, I hope I got
0:09:30 this right.
0:09:35 Basically, you had so many misdiagnosis and your father was a very accomplished doctor
0:09:42 and he refused to admit this, that you had epilepsy, like, how do you interpret all of
0:09:43 that?
0:09:45 At some level, it’s medical malpractice.
0:09:53 One of the things that’s been disturbing after the book came out, I did a lot of bookstore
0:09:59 appearances and a lot of public speeches, a lot of talks at epilepsy organizations and
0:10:04 a number of times that people came up to me and said, “I felt like I was reading my own
0:10:06 story.”
0:10:12 It’s not as if what you’re reading is, I don’t mean for it to be a horror story, but it’s
0:10:16 not as if it’s exclusive to me.
0:10:22 In fact, when I was thinking, it took me a long time to decide to write this book.
0:10:31 And there was a point where I went to somebody at the Epilepsy Foundation and I said what
0:10:36 I wanted to do, but I said, “I’m going to tell you my story because I don’t want to
0:10:43 write something that is just a horror story, it’s just going to scare people who have this
0:10:44 diagnosis.”
0:10:51 So, I laid it all out and he said, “There is nothing that you’ve described that I haven’t
0:10:55 heard of happening to someone else.”
0:11:01 I’ve never heard of anyone who’s had all of it happen, but that was me.
0:11:11 And then I found people who had a lot of it happen and people thrown out of school.
0:11:16 When I was … I can’t remember if the book had just come out or if it was about to come
0:11:23 out, but Notre Dame drove a kid out and I launched it right when the book was coming
0:11:29 out, right around that time and I launched a bit of a war on Notre Dame, but the kid
0:11:31 ended up going to another school.
0:11:39 Fortunately, it started before he got to the school, so unlike me, when it was junior year
0:11:40 is when they threw me out.
0:11:45 By then I had settled in, “This is my school, these people know me.”
0:11:50 I didn’t want to go somewhere else where I would, in two weeks, become the epileptic
0:11:54 as opposed to curt with epilepsy, which I was at the school I attended.
0:12:02 This kid, he hadn’t started at Notre Dame yet and they notified the school of what was
0:12:08 going on and they said, “Oh, we’re very committed to supporting people with disabilities.”
0:12:13 But then they made all these rules that he had to follow and the rules were basically
0:12:17 his own neurologist was saying, “You can’t do that.”
0:12:18 Well, he asked.
0:12:25 It was a very effective way of throwing somebody out of school without saying why you were
0:12:29 throwing them out, but everybody understood you were throwing them out.
0:12:34 If somebody came in was a quadriplegic and Notre Dame said, “That’s fine, we’re accepting
0:12:37 of that, but first you have to run a quarter mile.”
0:12:42 Well, we’re not saying we won’t admit him if he’s a quadriplegic, we’re just saying
0:12:47 that to have the full Notre Dame experience you have to be able to run a quarter mile
0:12:49 and that was what they were doing.
0:12:51 And when was this?
0:12:53 Oh, 2018.
0:12:56 2018 is yesterday.
0:12:58 Work with me here.
0:13:03 What goes through their minds at Notre Dame or Swarthmore, do you think they’re like smoking
0:13:09 in this smoke filled room and they’re plotting how to get rid of you or how to get rid of
0:13:14 his kid or what goes through their mind that they think this is ethical?
0:13:16 I’ll throw one more on the pile.
0:13:21 There was somebody, I don’t want to give the school because I’m not 100% sure, but it’s
0:13:29 a nursing school in Virginia where somebody was training to be a registered nurse and
0:13:34 when she went into convulsions and they threw her out of school, these nurses, a nursing
0:13:35 school.
0:13:42 Swarthmore, what they did, it was so long ago, it was when I was in college and they
0:13:46 have really advanced.
0:13:51 To give you an idea, this book came out, I sent them an early copy because I knew Swarthmore
0:13:59 looked horrible and I sent them an early copy and I got a phone call from the president
0:14:01 of the school.
0:14:06 Of course, I’m thinking, “Oh man, this is going to be really bad.”
0:14:13 She said, “We’d like you to come up and talk about what is in your book in terms of your
0:14:19 experiences from Swarthmore and just basically let’s sit down with current students and talk
0:14:25 about the horrible things that the school did and I can talk about the lessons that
0:14:29 they learned because it wasn’t the first time they invited me to speak and I’d gotten a
0:14:32 formal apology from them.
0:14:39 But the fact that they really wanted to confront it said a lot.
0:14:41 But that doesn’t mean this is over.
0:14:46 There are a lot of people, kids who’ve been thrown out of private school, now I’m talking
0:14:55 about real people I came across, a girl who, while the mother was waiting to get a signed
0:14:57 copy of the book from me.
0:15:06 She got a phone call from her daughter’s best friend’s mother telling her that she had
0:15:11 found out that the daughter had epilepsy and she no longer wanted her to spend the night
0:15:16 at their house and that night she was supposed to be spending the night at their house so
0:15:21 the mother had to drive home when she started sobbing in front of me and the mother had
0:15:28 to drive home so she could be at the house because her daughter was being thrown out
0:15:30 of her best friend’s house.
0:15:33 Really it comes down to ignorance and fear.
0:15:36 I mean convulsions are frightening if you don’t understand what’s going on.
0:15:45 And so do you think in that case they were worried that they could not take care of her
0:15:51 if she had a seizure or do you think that they thought epilepsy was contagious or something
0:15:52 like that?
0:16:01 I think people are just scared of what they don’t understand and scared of seeing someone
0:16:14 who has lost control of themselves physically and it can be very ugly and people get frightened
0:16:19 and what they get frightened of I’m not sure.
0:16:23 I’ve always said I don’t know because I’m not there.
0:16:31 There was a time where it was actually during an interview with Ralph Nader’s group before
0:16:40 I got the job that someone had a seizure outside and everybody surrounding him was absolutely
0:16:46 horrified and they had to look on their faces but I recognized because it was a look that
0:16:53 I saw when I would wake up sometimes and to me it was like this is it because it was the
0:16:58 first seizure right after years and years God half a decade of having seizures.
0:17:02 It was the first seizure that I actually could see.
0:17:10 I’d seen one before but there were a bunch of football players piled on the guy supposedly
0:17:15 trying to quote unquote help and so I couldn’t see what was going on but this was the first
0:17:23 time I saw somebody have a seizure and it was just like there are no dragons flying around,
0:17:27 nothing’s on fire, you’ve got to understand it.
0:17:33 You know there’s this thing that terrifies people and it’s this thing in you but you
0:17:34 never see it.
0:17:39 You’re never part of it but you only deal with the consequences of what it did and
0:17:48 so seeing this gentleman was really it was stunning and it also made me angry on some
0:17:56 levels because it’s like this is what you’re so scared of, this and truthfully if I didn’t
0:18:02 see everybody surrounding him looking so horrified I would have thought oh this is not that big
0:18:09 a deal nobody’s going to and so it was just it was very eye-opening and disturbing and
0:18:11 angering all at the same time.
0:18:20 Well this is a very good point in the interview for you to explain to people if they see someone
0:18:26 having a seizure what should they do because until I read your book I thought oh yeah you
0:18:31 got to make sure they don’t bite their tongue or something you got to open their jaws so
0:18:37 tell us what you should do if you see somebody having a seizure.
0:18:42 Step one is don’t panic they’ll survive.
0:18:50 Step two is be aware of the time because after four minutes you do need to get an ambulance
0:18:58 get something under their head do not force something into their mouths if somebody’s
0:19:04 going to bite their tongue after the seizure started it’s too late it’s been bitten and
0:19:13 there is someone I know who the people surrounding him thought the most important thing was to
0:19:20 get something into his mouth to stop him from biting his tongue which apparently he wasn’t
0:19:27 doing and so they tried to pry his mouth open with a bottle opener and broke his teeth.
0:19:33 So that’s the horror story that says for God’s sake now if the seizure hasn’t really started
0:19:40 yet but your person’s mouth is open and you want to put a soft wallet in nothing hard
0:19:47 that’s fine but no spoons no pencils nothing that you couldn’t bite down on really hard
0:19:55 without hurting yourself then it is good if you can to be able to turn someone on their
0:20:02 side because saliva can build up and if you can’t wait until the seizure stops and then
0:20:14 turn them on their side and then talk calmly get people to back up get people to be quiet
0:20:22 so that there’s only one person talking and then just as the person wakes up just say
0:20:29 you might have to say it over and over again okay you’re here you’re safe you’re on sidewalk
0:20:37 on the street I found you here and you haven’t injured yourself that I can see it is very
0:20:49 calm descriptions and ultimately just don’t panic don’t think you can stop it don’t hold
0:20:56 anybody down the brain is firing neurons saying move your arm this way and if you push the
0:21:02 arm back the neurons are not changing what they’re doing they’re still giving that command
0:21:08 and you can actually make it worse by holding someone down so just let the seizure proceed
0:21:14 make sure their head is on top of something if they’re face down flip them over and be
0:21:23 calm but after four minutes call me wow if we just help one person because somebody hears
0:21:44 that advice that makes this episode worth it right well that’s that’s icing on the cake
0:21:54 the father was in denial basically right and yet you write that you have come to forgive
0:22:02 him so let’s talk about forgiveness because you are about a 10 on the forgiveness scale
0:22:12 I want to hear about this one of the things that I circle back to in the book frequently
0:22:23 is the blame that I bear where I made mistakes where I had decisions that were terrible decisions
0:22:27 and a lot of people will when I bring this up will say yeah but you were just a kid you
0:22:33 were in your 20s and it’s like well yeah and I don’t think we should expect that I would
0:22:39 handle this perfectly but I can stand back and say there were decisions I made that made
0:22:46 the circumstances worse my father was a pediatrician and a very prominent pediatrician in pediatric
0:22:55 infectious disease this was not his area and it was something they have the old line the
0:23:02 cobblers children go without shoes the children of doctors tend to get the worst care and
0:23:12 he didn’t want to confront it and so he just remained in denial and you go how did I forgive
0:23:17 him let’s start off with one thing did he do it on purpose of course not was he trying
0:23:27 to do his best well yeah his best wasn’t very good but if I can’t forgive him how can
0:23:36 I forgive myself and I have to when I have to look at people’s failures and there were
0:23:41 a lot of people who failed clearly including me and if I look at people’s failures that
0:23:49 late that led to this it comes down to who was malevolent and who was human my father
0:23:57 was human my first doctor was I would say was malevolent he was so caught up in his
0:24:04 own opinions of what was going on and what would stop things that when his treatments
0:24:11 didn’t work he just blew it off he didn’t do a good job of figuring out what the side
0:24:17 effects of medications were he was very reckless the second doctor was worse the third doctor
0:24:26 was better but still bad so it was the fourth doctor I don’t forgive the first doctor and
0:24:35 the psychologist at Swarthmore who was a purely malevolent person and I will never
0:24:43 forget his entire thing I was very glad that the book came out that I was able to talk
0:24:51 to his family he wouldn’t get on the phone before he died and he died after the book
0:24:57 came out because I identified myself when I called up and they said oh yes my father
0:25:03 told me about how he saved you and did all these things for you and I said well your
0:25:10 father is a liar your father almost destroyed my life it was his pushing that got me thrown
0:25:19 out of school and when I was doing the book I found a book he had edited and partially
0:25:29 written that were did it like 25 years after he successfully got me thrown out of school
0:25:37 and it talked about how the college health centers have to be protected and if there’s
0:25:43 one person who has the risk of harming other people in the student body by draining too
0:25:51 much resources or attention they should be thrown out and I was like what yeah I actually
0:25:57 I quoted in the book in the afterward I have this section on what happened to all of these
0:26:04 people and and it quotes that very thing and the fact that he was also fired because of
0:26:11 a group of students who got together because there was a recognition that he just really
0:26:17 got off on getting people thrown out of school and I learned that very early on and so he
0:26:24 is somebody the degree to which I would never forgive him somebody said oh he died and my
0:26:32 response was good I hope stress from him knowing I was going to print this play to roll oh my
0:26:42 god the first doctor same thing he’s not dead as far as I know I will feel nothing and there
0:26:49 are some people who cause so much damage in your life and hurt you so badly and do so
0:26:58 out of the worst of intentions that I’m not a pure enough person to forgive him I will
0:27:05 always forgive people whose actions no matter how painful they were for me whose actions
0:27:14 were the consequence of human failures so again not malevolence I would think if I was
0:27:23 listening to this and you had this streak of lousy doctors and lousy diagnosis and lousy
0:27:29 psychologists like they’re probably wondering with hindsight how do I recognize when I’m
0:27:36 getting bad advice the most important thing and it’s one of the lessons of the book I
0:27:44 think is everybody has to be their own advocate meaning the big problem I had with my first
0:27:50 doctors when things weren’t going the way he said they were I mean he guaranteed we’ll
0:27:57 do this and this will happen well it didn’t and when things weren’t getting fixed easily
0:28:07 he just pretty much stopped returning my phone calls or if he did he’d be so cruel and abusive
0:28:13 that it would be emotionally destructive the reality is I should have let that happen
0:28:23 maybe once not for two years and as an advocate for my own health I never would have allowed
0:28:33 that to keep going the second doctor but what his failure was he kept boosting me on my
0:28:38 and he convulsions these are very very powerful drugs and they have some really horrible side
0:28:46 effects and he kept boosting me on them about after every third seizure and I started to
0:28:57 get worse and I started to lose a lot of weight and eventually and looked like a scarecrow
0:29:05 and I was saying something’s wrong I’m nauseous all the time I’m losing weight constantly
0:29:10 the seizures are getting worse and he would say oh it’s stress it’s not the medication
0:29:18 I even knew that that was ridiculous nobody has so much stress that they lose 70 pounds
0:29:29 and losing the 70 pounds with starting at 170 it was not normal and just saying stress
0:29:37 now it ended up that in fact he was killing me and it was the third doctor who figured
0:29:43 out that actually he brought in a hematologist who figured out that I was being driven into
0:29:53 aplastic anemia by the drugs and they caught it just in time but for another year or so
0:29:58 I had to have my blood taken once a week but then that doctor just goes on and on it was
0:30:04 the fourth doctor who by the time I sat down with him and this is spelled out in the book
0:30:15 I didn’t trust anybody and I was giving up I was planning either to run away and nobody
0:30:22 would ever hear from me or if I could manage to get out but I was just going to kill myself
0:30:29 because I couldn’t keep living that way and he came in and he just I don’t know if the
0:30:37 book conveys what a humorous character he is but not in a funny way in an odd way when
0:30:44 I’m seeing a neurologist and he’s suddenly talking to me about the brothers Karamazov
0:30:52 like that’s what it was and the telling me stories about French carriages in the 18th
0:30:59 century and how those were found because of certain things that happened were found to
0:31:09 be triggering seizures and it was all designed to throw me off guard because I was very much
0:31:16 like on guard like I don’t trust doctors at all you know yeah it’s like none of you know
0:31:22 what you’re doing and he said a few things and probably the most important thing he
0:31:30 said was he talked about bringing in a new medication and I said in the greatest tone
0:31:35 of obnoxiousness because I’ve heard it so many times and then everything will get under
0:31:42 control right and he just looked at me and says I don’t know I can’t make that kind
0:31:52 of promise I can promise you that I won’t stop and I will do what we need to do to
0:31:59 get you to the best life you can live and that might mean living with some side effects
0:32:05 and no seizures or living with some seizures with fewer side effects or everything working
0:32:09 up but we can’t I can’t tell you one way or the other what’s going to happen I’m just
0:32:16 not going to quit on you and I knew that was the truth I knew and he said the line when
0:32:21 we understand seizures will understand the human brain and we’re nowhere close to understanding
0:32:28 the human brain and it was that level of humility that none of the other doctors had demonstrated
0:32:37 they all knew and doctors need to be humble and they need to be careful and so that was
0:32:45 my big lesson and this doctor Alan Arden trained me on how doctors are supposed to be and
0:32:51 so in the future I only encountered one more terrible doctor and I fired him on the very
0:32:59 first meeting but most of my doctors since then have been really good they keep retiring
0:33:09 I have one who’s great I was like okay I retired although it’s interesting we moved to Massachusetts
0:33:16 not long ago and I made an appointment to see a neurologist and I went in and started
0:33:23 talking and she said do you remember me and I was like no I had given a speech at Harvard
0:33:28 and she came up to me afterwards about the book and she came up to me afterwards to ask
0:33:34 me all sorts of questions and so I was like oh really she said yeah it’s like all right
0:33:42 you better be good then because I always have another book and I just wondered okay one
0:33:51 more question about epilepsy okay okay and you stated that if you could go back in time
0:33:59 and not have epilepsy you would not do that and no I said something even stronger if I
0:34:07 could change the experiences I had and why is that because those experiences were the
0:34:15 most formative things of my life they made me the person that I am and I like the person
0:34:23 that I am I like the life I live I would not have gone down the path of journalism it was
0:34:37 too hard but I did because that experience taught me that we only have one life and I
0:34:48 was supposed to be dead and I wasn’t I’d survived and so I was forced when I was at my sickest
0:34:54 I was forced to really think what am I fighting so hard for because it’s really easy to give
0:35:04 up and I envisioned a life that was in Northwestern Hospital that I was having this experience
0:35:12 of like Paul on the road to Damascus level experience and I envisioned everything I wanted
0:35:17 in my life and I went from thinking I was going to be a lawyer to being a journalist
0:35:24 that was the night and the kind of woman I wanted to marry and the kind of life I wanted
0:35:31 to live and what I wanted to value I really charted everything out and that wasn’t the
0:35:41 last time that happened I had one more big one which dealt with my kids that didn’t exist
0:35:47 in fact I didn’t even have a girlfriend at the time but it was looking into a future
0:35:55 involving my children and it was interesting because that was taking place at a Irish bar
0:36:02 right wasn’t drinking I was having a hamburger in Washington on Capitol Hill and I vowed
0:36:10 to myself that if I survived and at that point I was pretty sure I was going to survive
0:36:17 but that I had this mental image of sitting across from my oldest son and yes it was
0:36:25 a son I just happened to be and telling him I was proud of him and I committed to myself
0:36:33 that someday I would come back and this is what this experience would happen and my kids
0:36:40 all knew about this and my oldest son would be like when are we going not for a while
0:36:47 you have to be older we have to be the age you were in my not vision but in what I saw
0:36:58 in my mind’s eye and eventually we all went to Washington and I sent the middle boy and
0:37:05 the youngest boy or son they were adults sent them away I said I’m sorry the mental image
0:37:13 was of one not three so I have to do this the way I promised me I would do it and we sat
0:37:22 down the restaurant arranged the table our table the way it had been on that day because
0:37:29 it needed to be the same it’s a very strange experience and I told my son that I was proud
0:37:37 of him and he told me the same thing and I burst into tears because I had reached that
0:37:44 point it was the ultimate representation that not only had I survived but I had accomplished
0:37:51 everything I wanted to accomplish wow I feel like we should end right now I mean how we’re
0:38:00 going to top that story shit oh my god but like Elizabeth Warren nevertheless I’m going
0:38:10 to persist because now you’ve had some amazing investigative reporting and I just want to
0:38:18 know how you do a story like Enron like how do you take on a story about Enron because
0:38:23 I read in your book about that and that is an amazing thing how do you do a story that
0:38:33 big what goes into it what are the big failings of journalism is that a lot of journalists
0:38:43 don’t know what they don’t know a lot of politicians too but I digress yeah yeah exactly and they’ll
0:38:50 jump into it and start dividing up the world into okay here are the bad guys here are the
0:38:57 good guys who tells me what you told me this you’re my source blah blah blah blah and Enron
0:39:05 collapsed into bankruptcy and everybody was chasing the story and I was doing something
0:39:10 else I don’t remember what I was at the New York Times and we were getting beaten fairly
0:39:20 roundly by the Wall Street Journal and then there was an announcement that a bunch of
0:39:26 document that the the accounting firm Arthur Anderson which existed then it was a big
0:39:34 accounting firm had destroyed documents related to related to Enron and it was at that point
0:39:40 that we had been beaten so many different ways that my specialty was corporate fraud
0:39:46 was see why hasn’t he been doing this and so I was asked by the executive editor no
0:39:54 I was told by the editor to start covering Enron and I sort of freaked everybody out
0:40:01 because my response was okay give me two weeks and they’re like no we need you on it right
0:40:08 now I was like I will write some stories but I’m not going to jump into it full force because
0:40:17 I don’t know what I’m talking about this is about a pipeline company that became a trader
0:40:24 of gas contracts but it’s actually more complicated than that and I don’t quite understand what
0:40:33 they do and then this involved something called structured finance and an accounting rule
0:40:40 that pertain to 3% outside equity and I don’t know what any of this means I had over the
0:40:50 years built up what I call the grayheads who were experts in law securities law criminal
0:41:00 law accounting finance and I always said I had the greatest business education of anybody
0:41:05 I know because it’s been constant and all of my professors are the world or national
0:41:13 experts and so I called up these folks and said teach me I need to understand this I
0:41:26 need to understand that and that is really the key to reporting that people miss is I
0:41:34 don’t care what somebody tells me I care what they tell me makes logical sense and fits
0:41:40 within the reality of what we’re talking about if somebody tells me that oh this fraud was
0:41:47 they did it this way a big one is oh Enron lied and they had all these off the books
0:41:52 partnerships which is the heart of this off the books partnerships they didn’t disclose
0:42:00 you go wait a minute I’ve read the SEC filings they did disclose them and oh there was a partnership
0:42:05 that was financing Enron operations that was being run by one of its executives and they
0:42:12 never disclosed it yes they did just because someone told you that doesn’t mean it’s true
0:42:18 you can look it up it’s a public document there it is disclosed and so the questions
0:42:26 became much more complicated it’s how what did they do that wasn’t disclosed and how
0:42:33 did those things make a difference and why didn’t people know what were within the disclosures
0:42:41 and at the end of the day it was a much more complex story without oh here are the absolute
0:42:45 good guys and here are the absolute bad guys people always wanted to be good guys and bad
0:42:52 guys and it’s always more complicated and at the end of the day that was how I did it
0:42:59 and once I understood this stuff at a fairly strong level and I just kept getting deeper
0:43:06 and deeper and deeper every time every day I worked I was able to really do stories there
0:43:14 was always something I always said my best source is logic and if you understand what
0:43:23 the complexities of the field then logic will take you to where what questions there are
0:43:31 to be have and logic can prove to be wrong but the other thing is that if you know what
0:43:37 you’re talking about you can stand out among the sources if you’re not sitting there going
0:43:43 somebody told me such and such how do you respond I never do that ever it’s always I’m
0:43:49 working I want to hear what you have to say this is what I hear is that lining up with
0:43:56 it and ultimately it doesn’t become like on the one hand on the other hand it becomes
0:44:03 I’m able to figure out who’s right and who’s wrong because I have bothered to wait to wait
0:44:10 and to learn the complexities before jumping into it but with both feet up next on remarkable
0:44:19 people it’s really really hard doing it right takes an enormous amount of time and enormous
0:44:26 amount of self doubt the people who doubt themselves in my career the people who consistently
0:44:38 thought they were getting it wrong were the greatest reporters become a little more remarkable
0:44:44 with each episode of remarkable people it’s found on apple podcast or wherever you listen
0:44:53 to your favorite shows welcome back to remarkable people with guy Kawasaki from the outside looking
0:45:00 in when you read about terranose do you say to yourself this was well done it was well
0:45:07 analyzed or did the wall street drill just jump in on that and said elizabeth lied sonny
0:45:14 lied they’re gonna go to jail I think that they did a very good job I think that was
0:45:25 also a complicated story and they really delved into those complications very well and got
0:45:33 it very clearly the conclusion of responsibility took a little time but eventually it did start
0:45:40 to sneak in on responsibility but they didn’t jump into it full force okay from the beginning
0:45:46 which is what happened with enron it’s like oh it’s all lay and skilling heads of the
0:45:50 company okay and it’s like well how do we know that we don’t know anything we don’t
0:45:58 know what happened and now there have been some horrible stories that have run in the
0:46:05 journal there that have run in the time of over the last couple of years and in terms
0:46:13 of on the business side of things and I stand back scratching my head going that’s not a
0:46:18 good story and wait wait I can look at it and say okay this is going to blow up in their
0:46:25 faces and it does but but okay from the outside looking in just I’m a reader of the Times
0:46:32 or the Post or the or the Journal how do I know that what what’s the tells on this is
0:46:38 a lousy story well you have to pay attention to by lines first of all as an example there
0:46:44 was a journalist a financial journalist at the Times Floyd Norris if he wrote it I know
0:46:50 it was true foreign correspondent Steve airliner if he writes it I know it’s true or it says
0:46:57 true is truth is a complex concept it’s accurate and fair people say I write the truth well
0:47:02 if you write the truth then you can’t possibly be wrong so people write what is accurate
0:47:10 and fair and there are people like that throughout all publications but then there are also people
0:47:21 who you read and go that a great example there was a story I won’t say in which publication
0:47:29 where they had I think four reporters and three editors and it was about this investment
0:47:39 firm and how it was a sweatshop and really difficult and combative environment and interviews
0:47:48 with 12 current and former I’m like 12 how many people work there 3000 Wow and so you
0:47:53 sit there going okay that story strikes me a far fetch we have something these days which
0:48:00 are called employee reviews online let me look it up let’s see what oh four and a half
0:48:08 stars from 2000 employees what do they have to say this place is a hot house but if you’re
0:48:14 able to work hard and work through this it’s enormously rewarding this is not the kind
0:48:21 of place to come to and it was all like how is it phrased yeah some people would go oh
0:48:26 my god it’s so terrible but then when you read the reviews it was people going wow this
0:48:32 is challenging and it’s not for everybody so it’s like okay well this story is going
0:48:43 to blow up in their faces and it did this sounds like goldman there was a story pertaining
0:48:49 to the Nancy or Michael Milken I can’t remember which publication it was in but just in reading
0:48:56 it it was this doesn’t make any sense I remember it was something to do with getting an enterprise
0:49:04 zone designation over certain property and it was a big it was a big property like many
0:49:10 many thousands of acres and there was like one little line in there Milken among a number
0:49:16 of other investors it’s like well wait a minute how many who are they related to him what are
0:49:23 we talking about and then it’s with this billionaire is going to walk around going to the secretary
0:49:30 of the Treasury and saying I want an enterprise zone designation for this piece of land I
0:49:39 was like this doesn’t make any sense and it ended up that Milken threw that an entity that
0:49:44 may or may not have been controlled by Milken nobody ever established that it was but it
0:49:54 was owned I think it was something like 2% of this land and the 98% was owned by the
0:50:02 other investors who had no connection to Milken other than they held adjacent properties and
0:50:09 you look at that I could read the story from the get go and just say does this make logical
0:50:18 sense that a billionaire would go to the secretary of the Treasury and the secretary of the Treasury
0:50:26 would take action to make this particular property have a designate it’s like it the
0:50:32 world doesn’t work that way you don’t just the secretary doesn’t just wave a magic wand
0:50:40 and the government is much more complex and why would milken go to the trouble and why
0:50:47 you know you just it didn’t make any sense and ended up it didn’t make any sense because
0:50:56 it wasn’t correct okay you know there was going way back in time there was a boasis name
0:51:02 the guy from the New York Times who was making stories about a whole clock so it was a big
0:51:10 scandal and how can I not remember his name anyway this was around 2005 and I read a story
0:51:21 he wrote it was about the DC sniper and I read a story he wrote and the second paragraph
0:51:26 I forget what it was that it had it was the lead of the paper and the second paragraph
0:51:34 said according to three federal law enforcement officials and two state officials who spoke
0:51:40 on condition of anonymity because blah blah blah blah blah and I finished it I said that
0:51:50 was made up because the source I’ve used anonymous sourcing and it’s complicated and to have
0:51:57 five anonymous sources three on the federal level two on the state level who are all giving
0:52:04 you the same piece of information and are all explaining precisely why they are speaking
0:52:10 to you on background and all of them have the same reason it’s an editor’s wet dream
0:52:15 this is the kind of thing they tell us to do and it’s not doable it’s not that we don’t
0:52:19 do it because we’re being difficult we don’t do it because it’s not doable but this guy
0:52:27 did it and what I figured was that Jason Blair that was a thing and what I figured was he
0:52:34 made up the sourcing I never imagined he made up the whole story and that’s what ended up
0:52:41 being true is that Jason Blair was making up stories making up stories and getting really
0:52:47 good play in the New York Times because he had blockbuster stories with huge sourcing
0:52:54 that met all of the desired standards that editors demanded but never got and the reason
0:53:02 they never got okay I got to ask you this because you’re one of the few people I can
0:53:09 trust with an answer for this question alright so it seems like in this political environment
0:53:17 the conservatives say quote unquote mainstream media is suppressing our speech and then the
0:53:27 liberals say mainstream media they don’t condemn Trump enough as a threat to democracy so liberals
0:53:32 have their issues conservatives have their issues with mainstream media and by that I
0:53:38 think they were referring to the post and the times so what do we believe what what is
0:53:46 the role of mainstream media anytime anybody says oh the New York Times is a liberal publication
0:53:52 I goes which article led you to think that and they always cite the editorial page and
0:53:58 it’s like that’s an editorial editorial is meant to be opinion and like yes but that
0:54:10 bleeds into the news like never did with me now what is wrong with all areas of news
0:54:19 reporting is hard it’s really really hard doing it right takes an enormous amount of
0:54:25 time an enormous amount of self-doubt the people who doubt themselves in my career the
0:54:30 people who have consistently thought they were getting it wrong were the greatest reporters
0:54:34 because if you’re not consistently thinking you’re getting it wrong you’re probably getting
0:54:39 it wrong you know you’re always playing defense if you think you’re getting it wrong which
0:54:51 means you’re busy making things is there bias in people’s personal beliefs that bleeds into
0:54:57 the news I used to say of course people have biases but good journalists do not allow there
0:55:04 is a thing of objectivity and you are able to objectively know a fact from my belief
0:55:13 and you can have a value system but once you get out of social areas reporters tend to
0:55:23 be people who have more experience with the LGBTQ community they tend to be people who
0:55:33 are widely read they tend to be people who have more of a social experience that gives
0:55:44 them one perspective now the problem is that it blinds them to other perspectives there
0:55:53 was a great book I read called white working class which was really is really about the
0:56:00 white working class and not in a look down your nose way but actually in a let’s examine
0:56:07 the values here the real values where they stem from and why big news organizations don’t
0:56:14 get it and it was a really really fascinating book and it’s true there are things that they
0:56:22 don’t get I’m really circling around your question I would say that what has started
0:56:33 to happen is that more and more opinion and personal values it used to be the problem
0:56:39 was just laziness but now it is more and more opinion and personal values are getting into
0:56:48 the news and that is from every perspective conservative liberal whatever and one of
0:56:55 the greatest air editors of modern times is a fellow named Marty Baron who was the editor
0:57:04 in chief at the Boston Globe and at the Washington Post and he was the senior editor at the
0:57:13 New York Times and just a brilliant guy and he gave a speech or wrote something I read
0:57:21 it I think it was a transcript of the speech where he was talking about how expressing
0:57:29 the value of objectivity and objectivity is important and I was like why are we even discussing
0:57:34 this of course it’s true this is like saying it’s important to wash your hands before performing
0:57:42 surgery I’m like yeah and I had no idea this was a topic of debate and it ends up that
0:57:47 it is I would encourage everyone I don’t know if this will come up with it but search
0:57:54 Martin Baron and objectivity and see if you can find this speech or whatever it is because
0:58:02 it was horrifying to me to realize that this was a discussion and that Marty was saying
0:58:07 in the course of his speech was making it or what he wrote was making it clear that he
0:58:15 was getting progressively in the minority talk about arrogance it takes for a reporter
0:58:26 to think that their non-objective beliefs have any value at all in my books one of the
0:58:35 things I get cited for more than anything else is you know Curt never said his opinion
0:58:41 on what people should conclude and my answer to that is once I finish the book you know
0:58:46 everything I do I mean not every single thing but you know everything it’s important enough
0:58:51 to make your own conclusions and I am at that point no more qualified to make a conclusion
0:58:59 than you are and so I will give you the facts I will not tell you what to think my opinion
0:59:08 has no value should there be a statement that in a recent speech Donald Trump channeled
0:59:16 or emulated or was similar to Adolf Hitler and therefore he is a threat to democracy
0:59:24 that’s an opinion that’s not a fact right does not belong in there but you can state
0:59:35 very clearly that when Trump talks about yeah you can then say this statement set off outrage
0:59:41 and upset because it is the language that critics say is the language of Adolf Hitler
0:59:48 and you can quote what Hitler said where he used these exact words and then quote people
0:59:55 talking about it so yeah but should you stand up and down and say oh my god but he’s a Nazi
1:00:02 no that’s not a reporter’s job now if I was on the op-ed page when I say that that would
1:00:08 be in the headline or he’s a fascist yes that would be in the headline and a lot of people
1:00:15 are now starting to say he is a fascist and all you have to do is go off and read about
1:00:22 fascists and recognize that that’s what we’re dealing with and at Joe Scarborough the other
1:00:27 morning said okay we need to finally start using that word he’s like yeah you do but
1:00:35 in terms of reporting if you are telling that the Republican party doesn’t do any great
1:00:40 shakes here either because you go to them and say Trump said this what do you think
1:00:45 they know exactly what he said they heard it they got an aide coming in going oh my
1:00:51 god Trump just said this and they’ll go oh I haven’t seen it I can’t say it okay this
1:00:56 is the dissentist effect no it’s been going on for years this has been going on since
1:01:01 Trump got into office the oh I have a lunch and it’s I’ve always wanted to see if somebody
1:01:09 had the guts to walk up and say senator are you going to lunch because I have a question
1:01:18 about Donald Trump or to walk over with I mean you know dissentist the other day when
1:01:23 he was asked about something that Elon Musk had done yeah I haven’t seen it is agreeing
1:01:28 with the anti-semitic tweet he said well I haven’t seen it it’s okay here it is this
1:01:33 is what he said this is what was said this is what he said oh I don’t know the context
1:01:38 it’s a tweet there is no context that’s it that’s we’re not talking about Moby Dick
1:01:48 we’re talking about a total of 50 words and that’s the kind of dodgeball that the failure
1:01:56 to do follow-ups is one of the the biggest failures of our profession now if you don’t
1:02:06 start doing follow-ups if you allow someone to say something absolutely ridiculous and
1:02:11 then you move on to the next topic you’re no good you shouldn’t be out there and there’s
1:02:18 one oh how can I not remember his I’m doing so badly on names today and this is someone
1:02:25 I know personally an MSNBC reporter or anchor who had something on the Peacock network and
1:02:32 he’s the best interviewer out there and I cannot for the life of me oh many a son yeah
1:02:38 many a son has been here he’s been on we’ve interviewed him and he’s amazing yeah he is
1:02:46 what every journalist should try to be and not enough of them do because he does not
1:02:53 let people get away with anything he and if you watch Meet the Press these days you go
1:02:59 what do you think of Trump on such a well Trump is 700 feet tall and weighs eight pounds
1:03:06 okay and following up and what about Biden it’s wait a minute follow up God’s sake to
1:03:14 challenge what they’re saying don’t just move on to the next topic because then and this
1:03:24 bothers me a lot is I believe that all TV news on one level of the other have become
1:03:29 propaganda machine they bring on the same people to say the same thing over and over
1:03:37 and over again they rarely challenge what’s being said they rarely follow up it’s all
1:03:45 about getting people worked up one way or the other and many his son does that he gets
1:03:51 people worked up but he gets them worked up because he’s plowing in and getting information
1:03:58 would forcing people to give answers I would pay to watch many his son be the moderator
1:04:04 of a presidential debate yeah me too but it would never work and he would never do it
1:04:09 and nor should he do it presidential debates aren’t debate so the thing about many his
1:04:18 son is he has no qualms about asking the same question a good interviewer if somebody’s
1:04:23 dodging and dodging and dodging you just you just say it certainly seems like you’re not
1:04:28 willing to answer this question but I’m going to ask it again until you finally do this
1:04:35 is the question why won’t you answer the question let’s make it into a yes or no question
1:04:43 and this is the thing is that journalists these days on TV are not asking hard questions
1:04:54 and so when you end up there’s a great old line that I love and applies to so much that
1:05:02 if you have a barrel full of garbage and add a teaspoon full of wine you get garbage and
1:05:08 if you have a barrel full of wine and add a teaspoon full of garbage you get garbage
1:05:13 something that’s supposed to be good you only need to add a little bit of bad and it’s bad
1:05:21 and if something’s bad you can add a little bit of good and it’s still bad and the news
1:05:32 business some of it is a barrel full of garbage some of it is a barrel full of wine but very
1:05:42 little of it is garbage free and as a result we have a lot of oh my god that is a brilliant
1:05:49 metaphor we gotta end this episode my head is exploding I think you have clearly proved
1:05:56 if nothing else in this interview that you do not have to have a grand mal seizure to
1:06:03 be insightful anymore you’ve moved beyond that I figured out how to have some of the
1:06:12 benefits without all of the downside so that’s Kurt Eichenwald for the last 20 or so years
1:06:18 I’ve had Meniere’s disease and one of the symptoms of Meniere’s disease is sporadic
1:06:25 attacks of vertical so at any given moment the world could start spinning and I would
1:06:34 be on the ground sometimes throwing up in my opinion not nearly as traumatic as an epileptic
1:06:42 seizure but I could tell you what an effect the threat of vertical had on me so I can
1:06:51 only imagine the effect of epilepsy on Kurt he has become such an accomplished investigative
1:07:00 reporter it is truly remarkable and the story of how his family coped with it or in one
1:07:07 case didn’t cope with it is pretty amazing I hope if you have members of your family
1:07:12 who have something like this you appreciate what they’re going through and do everything
1:07:21 you can to help them control or overcome or cope with their affliction I’m Guy Kawasaki
1:07:28 and this is remarkable people my thanks to two people at the conversation Beth Daly and
1:07:37 Priyanka Sharma Sintar the two of them made this episode possible and if you want really
1:07:46 first rate journalism check out the conversation I guarantee you that you will find very few
1:07:55 new sources more informative than the conversation let me also thank the remarkable people team
1:08:03 that would be Jeff C and Shannon Hernandez they are remarkable sound engineers then we
1:08:12 have the Nismar sisters that’s Madison who is the producer of this podcast and co-author
1:08:20 of our book think remarkable Tessa Nismar recent graduate provides the background research
1:08:28 that preps me for these interviews and makes the transcripts perfect finally we have Luis
1:08:37 Magana Fallon Yates and Alexis Nishimura this is the remarkable people team and we are dedicated
1:08:45 to helping you become remarkable in 2024 one plug for our book Madison I have a book that
1:08:53 is releasing on March 6 it’s called think remarkable nine paths to transform your life
1:08:59 and make a difference this book reflects the wisdom of the 200 or so remarkable people
1:09:08 we’ve interviewed as well as our experiences in business and life the blurbs are from believe
1:09:18 it or not Carol dweck the mother of the growth mindset Bob Cheldini the godfather of influence
1:09:25 Julia Cameron the mother of creativity and blurb the likes of which has never been seen
1:09:34 Amy Handy she was the copy editor of the book and her email comments to me were so positive
1:09:44 and so flattering I decided to turn them into a blurb oh and by the way last but not least
1:09:53 the Ford is by Jane Goodall yes the Jane Goodall how can you resist that book oh my god end
1:10:01 of promotion think remarkable available March 6 all over the world with that let me say Mahalo
1:10:10 and aloha this is remarkable people
0:00:15 We’re on a mission to make you remarkable.
0:00:19 Helping me in this episode is Kurt Eichenwald.
0:00:23 He is a distinguished figure in investigative journalism.
0:00:29 He’s currently serving as the senior investigator at The Conversation.
0:00:35 This is one of my favorite publications because of its dependency on academic experts in
0:00:36 current events.
0:00:43 As a senior writer at Newsweek, a contributing editor at Vanity Fair, and a senior writer
0:00:49 at The New York Times, his work has encompassed a broad range of topics from Wall Street and
0:00:57 corporate scandals to terrorism, health care policy, and the dangers of the internet.
0:01:02 Beyond his accomplishments as a journalist, Kurt has crafted a literary legacy with his
0:01:05 compelling non-fiction books.
0:01:13 This includes The Informant, A True Story, 500 Days, Secrets and Lies in the Terror Wars,
0:01:17 and finally, A Mind Unravel.
0:01:23 In particular, this last book chronicles the humongous challenge of living with epilepsy
0:01:25 since a young man.
0:01:29 It makes his accomplishments even more remarkable.
0:01:31 I’m Guy Kawasaki.
0:01:43 This is Remarkable People, and now, here is Kurt Eichenwald.
0:01:49 I was diagnosed with epilepsy when I was 18 in my first semester of college when I had
0:02:00 a grand mal seizure, and it took a great deal of effort to get it under control, and I got
0:02:08 sicker and sicker, and I had a lot of medical misdiagnoses.
0:02:15 I was advised to hide what was going on, and so I pretty much stayed in my dorm room most
0:02:19 of the time, and my roommates helped me out.
0:02:25 When I finally stopped doing that, after eight weeks, I was thrown out of school and had
0:02:34 to fight to get back in and bring in the federal government and an advisory capacity, and from
0:02:40 that time forward, I had to learn how to manage every element of my life.
0:02:48 How do you tell employers or potential employers that you have uncontrolled epilepsy, or poorly
0:02:51 controlled epilepsy, that you could have a seizure at any point?
0:02:58 Are you going to get fired from one job when they found out within 24 hours of having been
0:02:59 hired?
0:03:03 But for the most part, people from that point dealt with it pretty well.
0:03:07 This job you alluded to is that you had less than 24 hours.
0:03:15 I have to say, I was amazed because I had it in my naive brain that Ralph Nader is protecting
0:03:22 the people and he’s a do-gooder and all this kind of stuff, and then his organization terminated
0:03:25 you when they found out you had epilepsy.
0:03:28 What the fuck is that?
0:03:33 Sometimes when you experience people in real life, they aren’t what you imagine them to
0:03:34 be.
0:03:40 At the same time that was happening, literally at the same time, Ralph had a publication
0:03:48 called Multinational Monitor, and he fired the editor because he didn’t like what they
0:03:54 were doing, and so the staff started performing union in order to, one of their demands was
0:04:00 to get the editor back, and Ralph busted the union and changed the locks on the door and
0:04:02 fired everybody.
0:04:05 So this man is not what people think he is.
0:04:11 It’s been difficult for me over many years when people are holding him up to be a saint
0:04:17 to go, “Yeah, this was the guy who fired me when he found out I had seizures.”
0:04:21 It was funny because I got a phone call in all of this from Sid Wolfe.
0:04:26 He’s always called Ralph’s doctor, he was the head of the public health group, I can’t
0:04:32 remember the name of it, and he was asking me all these questions about it, which made
0:04:37 me obviously very uncomfortable, and at the end of it he just said, “Oh, Ralph is just
0:04:38 such a hypochondriac.”
0:04:39 And I’m like, “What’s he thinking?
0:04:41 He’s going to catch it from me?”
0:04:46 Yeah, that was quite surprising.
0:04:57 Well, maybe Ralph will spend eternity in a pinto, and that would be just right?
0:05:02 There were periods I was terrible because I would be on Twitter, that’s what it was
0:05:10 called, and Ralph would pontificate about something on his feed, and I would frequently
0:05:11 reply, “Ralph, remember me?
0:05:17 I’m the guy you fired when you found out he had a disability, and hey, you really should
0:05:21 stop being such a hypochondriac.”
0:05:29 I do enjoy that over time you do get to be able to snap back at people.
0:05:36 Okay, so here’s another prime example of—I hope you snap back at this guy too.
0:05:45 So apparently, I read this, and I was shocked that this professor basically said that your
0:05:47 writing was horrible.
0:05:48 He was right.
0:05:50 That’s the thing.
0:05:58 I wanted to be in a career that would entail writing, and it was my first college essay,
0:06:05 but it came back marked all over the place and red marks, and he wrote across the top,
0:06:10 “Your writing is grotesque,” and yeah, it was a punch in the face, but I could then
0:06:12 read it and go, “Yeah, he’s really right.
0:06:18 I really need to work on my writing,” and he wasn’t just being a jerk, he was being
0:06:19 quite honest.
0:06:21 Wait, Kurt, I’m sorry.
0:06:26 You don’t write somebody’s writing is grotesque and claim that you’re taking the high road
0:06:29 and doing it for his benefit.
0:06:31 Excuse me, that’s bullshit.
0:06:34 It worked out that way for me.
0:06:35 It made me take it right.
0:06:40 I guess I could have taken a step back and gone, “Oh, what was me,” but I just looked
0:06:43 at it and went, “Yeah.”
0:06:47 Did you ever let him know that you work for the New York Times?
0:06:48 No, no.
0:06:54 I got better during college for everything, and actually, I write about this in the book,
0:06:57 which was the strangest thing.
0:07:01 There was a period of time I was having a grandma seizure, you know, full convulsions
0:07:02 every other night.
0:07:03 This is a great story.
0:07:04 Please continue.
0:07:07 I was just going to ask you about this.
0:07:11 There were periods, seizures don’t just end when you move on.
0:07:18 There was something called post-dictal period, and I wrote an essay, and I was fine at the
0:07:19 time I wrote it.
0:07:22 I would turn it in and get it back.
0:07:30 But if I was post-dictal, I would still write whatever I had to write, and I would turn
0:07:37 it in, and I would get back a great essay if this is fantastic, this is the best thing.
0:07:43 I’d read it, and first of all, I didn’t recognize it.
0:07:49 It wasn’t like, “Oh, yeah, I wrote this,” it was like, “I wrote this,” and they were
0:07:50 brilliant.
0:07:55 So I just sat here going, “I guess somewhere inside me is a brilliant person who comes
0:08:04 out,” but yeah, it was the strangest thing because there was a clear change in my capacity
0:08:10 to write and analyze when I was struggling after a seizure.
0:08:13 And is this still true if you have a seizure?
0:08:22 I haven’t had, with one or two exceptions, I haven’t had convulsion since I was 35, and
0:08:30 now, I mean, I have what’s called intractable epilepsy, meaning I’m never going to be 100%.
0:08:37 So now I’ll have small seizures on a bad day, I’ll have small seizures throughout the day,
0:08:44 and I don’t start getting smart, I start getting exhausted, and eventually it’s like, “I have
0:08:48 to go to bed,” and I’m also not in my 20s anymore.
0:08:51 Even that is bizarre in a sense, it’s in you, right?
0:08:53 Yeah, somewhere.
0:08:56 Maybe now, nobody would say my writing is grotesque.
0:09:01 Maybe that person has come out now, I don’t know.
0:09:08 And then tell me that I had the capacity to write better than I wrote, if that makes any
0:09:10 sense.
0:09:12 Whatever it takes, man, whatever it takes.
0:09:19 I have to say, there are more what the hell moments in your memoir than maybe any book
0:09:21 I’ve ever read.
0:09:29 And this includes Dr. Nicholson, Dr. Craddock, Strauss, Whitaker, your father, I hope I got
0:09:30 this right.
0:09:35 Basically, you had so many misdiagnosis and your father was a very accomplished doctor
0:09:42 and he refused to admit this, that you had epilepsy, like, how do you interpret all of
0:09:43 that?
0:09:45 At some level, it’s medical malpractice.
0:09:53 One of the things that’s been disturbing after the book came out, I did a lot of bookstore
0:09:59 appearances and a lot of public speeches, a lot of talks at epilepsy organizations and
0:10:04 a number of times that people came up to me and said, “I felt like I was reading my own
0:10:06 story.”
0:10:12 It’s not as if what you’re reading is, I don’t mean for it to be a horror story, but it’s
0:10:16 not as if it’s exclusive to me.
0:10:22 In fact, when I was thinking, it took me a long time to decide to write this book.
0:10:31 And there was a point where I went to somebody at the Epilepsy Foundation and I said what
0:10:36 I wanted to do, but I said, “I’m going to tell you my story because I don’t want to
0:10:43 write something that is just a horror story, it’s just going to scare people who have this
0:10:44 diagnosis.”
0:10:51 So, I laid it all out and he said, “There is nothing that you’ve described that I haven’t
0:10:55 heard of happening to someone else.”
0:11:01 I’ve never heard of anyone who’s had all of it happen, but that was me.
0:11:11 And then I found people who had a lot of it happen and people thrown out of school.
0:11:16 When I was … I can’t remember if the book had just come out or if it was about to come
0:11:23 out, but Notre Dame drove a kid out and I launched it right when the book was coming
0:11:29 out, right around that time and I launched a bit of a war on Notre Dame, but the kid
0:11:31 ended up going to another school.
0:11:39 Fortunately, it started before he got to the school, so unlike me, when it was junior year
0:11:40 is when they threw me out.
0:11:45 By then I had settled in, “This is my school, these people know me.”
0:11:50 I didn’t want to go somewhere else where I would, in two weeks, become the epileptic
0:11:54 as opposed to curt with epilepsy, which I was at the school I attended.
0:12:02 This kid, he hadn’t started at Notre Dame yet and they notified the school of what was
0:12:08 going on and they said, “Oh, we’re very committed to supporting people with disabilities.”
0:12:13 But then they made all these rules that he had to follow and the rules were basically
0:12:17 his own neurologist was saying, “You can’t do that.”
0:12:18 Well, he asked.
0:12:25 It was a very effective way of throwing somebody out of school without saying why you were
0:12:29 throwing them out, but everybody understood you were throwing them out.
0:12:34 If somebody came in was a quadriplegic and Notre Dame said, “That’s fine, we’re accepting
0:12:37 of that, but first you have to run a quarter mile.”
0:12:42 Well, we’re not saying we won’t admit him if he’s a quadriplegic, we’re just saying
0:12:47 that to have the full Notre Dame experience you have to be able to run a quarter mile
0:12:49 and that was what they were doing.
0:12:51 And when was this?
0:12:53 Oh, 2018.
0:12:56 2018 is yesterday.
0:12:58 Work with me here.
0:13:03 What goes through their minds at Notre Dame or Swarthmore, do you think they’re like smoking
0:13:09 in this smoke filled room and they’re plotting how to get rid of you or how to get rid of
0:13:14 his kid or what goes through their mind that they think this is ethical?
0:13:16 I’ll throw one more on the pile.
0:13:21 There was somebody, I don’t want to give the school because I’m not 100% sure, but it’s
0:13:29 a nursing school in Virginia where somebody was training to be a registered nurse and
0:13:34 when she went into convulsions and they threw her out of school, these nurses, a nursing
0:13:35 school.
0:13:42 Swarthmore, what they did, it was so long ago, it was when I was in college and they
0:13:46 have really advanced.
0:13:51 To give you an idea, this book came out, I sent them an early copy because I knew Swarthmore
0:13:59 looked horrible and I sent them an early copy and I got a phone call from the president
0:14:01 of the school.
0:14:06 Of course, I’m thinking, “Oh man, this is going to be really bad.”
0:14:13 She said, “We’d like you to come up and talk about what is in your book in terms of your
0:14:19 experiences from Swarthmore and just basically let’s sit down with current students and talk
0:14:25 about the horrible things that the school did and I can talk about the lessons that
0:14:29 they learned because it wasn’t the first time they invited me to speak and I’d gotten a
0:14:32 formal apology from them.
0:14:39 But the fact that they really wanted to confront it said a lot.
0:14:41 But that doesn’t mean this is over.
0:14:46 There are a lot of people, kids who’ve been thrown out of private school, now I’m talking
0:14:55 about real people I came across, a girl who, while the mother was waiting to get a signed
0:14:57 copy of the book from me.
0:15:06 She got a phone call from her daughter’s best friend’s mother telling her that she had
0:15:11 found out that the daughter had epilepsy and she no longer wanted her to spend the night
0:15:16 at their house and that night she was supposed to be spending the night at their house so
0:15:21 the mother had to drive home when she started sobbing in front of me and the mother had
0:15:28 to drive home so she could be at the house because her daughter was being thrown out
0:15:30 of her best friend’s house.
0:15:33 Really it comes down to ignorance and fear.
0:15:36 I mean convulsions are frightening if you don’t understand what’s going on.
0:15:45 And so do you think in that case they were worried that they could not take care of her
0:15:51 if she had a seizure or do you think that they thought epilepsy was contagious or something
0:15:52 like that?
0:16:01 I think people are just scared of what they don’t understand and scared of seeing someone
0:16:14 who has lost control of themselves physically and it can be very ugly and people get frightened
0:16:19 and what they get frightened of I’m not sure.
0:16:23 I’ve always said I don’t know because I’m not there.
0:16:31 There was a time where it was actually during an interview with Ralph Nader’s group before
0:16:40 I got the job that someone had a seizure outside and everybody surrounding him was absolutely
0:16:46 horrified and they had to look on their faces but I recognized because it was a look that
0:16:53 I saw when I would wake up sometimes and to me it was like this is it because it was the
0:16:58 first seizure right after years and years God half a decade of having seizures.
0:17:02 It was the first seizure that I actually could see.
0:17:10 I’d seen one before but there were a bunch of football players piled on the guy supposedly
0:17:15 trying to quote unquote help and so I couldn’t see what was going on but this was the first
0:17:23 time I saw somebody have a seizure and it was just like there are no dragons flying around,
0:17:27 nothing’s on fire, you’ve got to understand it.
0:17:33 You know there’s this thing that terrifies people and it’s this thing in you but you
0:17:34 never see it.
0:17:39 You’re never part of it but you only deal with the consequences of what it did and
0:17:48 so seeing this gentleman was really it was stunning and it also made me angry on some
0:17:56 levels because it’s like this is what you’re so scared of, this and truthfully if I didn’t
0:18:02 see everybody surrounding him looking so horrified I would have thought oh this is not that big
0:18:09 a deal nobody’s going to and so it was just it was very eye-opening and disturbing and
0:18:11 angering all at the same time.
0:18:20 Well this is a very good point in the interview for you to explain to people if they see someone
0:18:26 having a seizure what should they do because until I read your book I thought oh yeah you
0:18:31 got to make sure they don’t bite their tongue or something you got to open their jaws so
0:18:37 tell us what you should do if you see somebody having a seizure.
0:18:42 Step one is don’t panic they’ll survive.
0:18:50 Step two is be aware of the time because after four minutes you do need to get an ambulance
0:18:58 get something under their head do not force something into their mouths if somebody’s
0:19:04 going to bite their tongue after the seizure started it’s too late it’s been bitten and
0:19:13 there is someone I know who the people surrounding him thought the most important thing was to
0:19:20 get something into his mouth to stop him from biting his tongue which apparently he wasn’t
0:19:27 doing and so they tried to pry his mouth open with a bottle opener and broke his teeth.
0:19:33 So that’s the horror story that says for God’s sake now if the seizure hasn’t really started
0:19:40 yet but your person’s mouth is open and you want to put a soft wallet in nothing hard
0:19:47 that’s fine but no spoons no pencils nothing that you couldn’t bite down on really hard
0:19:55 without hurting yourself then it is good if you can to be able to turn someone on their
0:20:02 side because saliva can build up and if you can’t wait until the seizure stops and then
0:20:14 turn them on their side and then talk calmly get people to back up get people to be quiet
0:20:22 so that there’s only one person talking and then just as the person wakes up just say
0:20:29 you might have to say it over and over again okay you’re here you’re safe you’re on sidewalk
0:20:37 on the street I found you here and you haven’t injured yourself that I can see it is very
0:20:49 calm descriptions and ultimately just don’t panic don’t think you can stop it don’t hold
0:20:56 anybody down the brain is firing neurons saying move your arm this way and if you push the
0:21:02 arm back the neurons are not changing what they’re doing they’re still giving that command
0:21:08 and you can actually make it worse by holding someone down so just let the seizure proceed
0:21:14 make sure their head is on top of something if they’re face down flip them over and be
0:21:23 calm but after four minutes call me wow if we just help one person because somebody hears
0:21:44 that advice that makes this episode worth it right well that’s that’s icing on the cake
0:21:54 the father was in denial basically right and yet you write that you have come to forgive
0:22:02 him so let’s talk about forgiveness because you are about a 10 on the forgiveness scale
0:22:12 I want to hear about this one of the things that I circle back to in the book frequently
0:22:23 is the blame that I bear where I made mistakes where I had decisions that were terrible decisions
0:22:27 and a lot of people will when I bring this up will say yeah but you were just a kid you
0:22:33 were in your 20s and it’s like well yeah and I don’t think we should expect that I would
0:22:39 handle this perfectly but I can stand back and say there were decisions I made that made
0:22:46 the circumstances worse my father was a pediatrician and a very prominent pediatrician in pediatric
0:22:55 infectious disease this was not his area and it was something they have the old line the
0:23:02 cobblers children go without shoes the children of doctors tend to get the worst care and
0:23:12 he didn’t want to confront it and so he just remained in denial and you go how did I forgive
0:23:17 him let’s start off with one thing did he do it on purpose of course not was he trying
0:23:27 to do his best well yeah his best wasn’t very good but if I can’t forgive him how can
0:23:36 I forgive myself and I have to when I have to look at people’s failures and there were
0:23:41 a lot of people who failed clearly including me and if I look at people’s failures that
0:23:49 late that led to this it comes down to who was malevolent and who was human my father
0:23:57 was human my first doctor was I would say was malevolent he was so caught up in his
0:24:04 own opinions of what was going on and what would stop things that when his treatments
0:24:11 didn’t work he just blew it off he didn’t do a good job of figuring out what the side
0:24:17 effects of medications were he was very reckless the second doctor was worse the third doctor
0:24:26 was better but still bad so it was the fourth doctor I don’t forgive the first doctor and
0:24:35 the psychologist at Swarthmore who was a purely malevolent person and I will never
0:24:43 forget his entire thing I was very glad that the book came out that I was able to talk
0:24:51 to his family he wouldn’t get on the phone before he died and he died after the book
0:24:57 came out because I identified myself when I called up and they said oh yes my father
0:25:03 told me about how he saved you and did all these things for you and I said well your
0:25:10 father is a liar your father almost destroyed my life it was his pushing that got me thrown
0:25:19 out of school and when I was doing the book I found a book he had edited and partially
0:25:29 written that were did it like 25 years after he successfully got me thrown out of school
0:25:37 and it talked about how the college health centers have to be protected and if there’s
0:25:43 one person who has the risk of harming other people in the student body by draining too
0:25:51 much resources or attention they should be thrown out and I was like what yeah I actually
0:25:57 I quoted in the book in the afterward I have this section on what happened to all of these
0:26:04 people and and it quotes that very thing and the fact that he was also fired because of
0:26:11 a group of students who got together because there was a recognition that he just really
0:26:17 got off on getting people thrown out of school and I learned that very early on and so he
0:26:24 is somebody the degree to which I would never forgive him somebody said oh he died and my
0:26:32 response was good I hope stress from him knowing I was going to print this play to roll oh my
0:26:42 god the first doctor same thing he’s not dead as far as I know I will feel nothing and there
0:26:49 are some people who cause so much damage in your life and hurt you so badly and do so
0:26:58 out of the worst of intentions that I’m not a pure enough person to forgive him I will
0:27:05 always forgive people whose actions no matter how painful they were for me whose actions
0:27:14 were the consequence of human failures so again not malevolence I would think if I was
0:27:23 listening to this and you had this streak of lousy doctors and lousy diagnosis and lousy
0:27:29 psychologists like they’re probably wondering with hindsight how do I recognize when I’m
0:27:36 getting bad advice the most important thing and it’s one of the lessons of the book I
0:27:44 think is everybody has to be their own advocate meaning the big problem I had with my first
0:27:50 doctors when things weren’t going the way he said they were I mean he guaranteed we’ll
0:27:57 do this and this will happen well it didn’t and when things weren’t getting fixed easily
0:28:07 he just pretty much stopped returning my phone calls or if he did he’d be so cruel and abusive
0:28:13 that it would be emotionally destructive the reality is I should have let that happen
0:28:23 maybe once not for two years and as an advocate for my own health I never would have allowed
0:28:33 that to keep going the second doctor but what his failure was he kept boosting me on my
0:28:38 and he convulsions these are very very powerful drugs and they have some really horrible side
0:28:46 effects and he kept boosting me on them about after every third seizure and I started to
0:28:57 get worse and I started to lose a lot of weight and eventually and looked like a scarecrow
0:29:05 and I was saying something’s wrong I’m nauseous all the time I’m losing weight constantly
0:29:10 the seizures are getting worse and he would say oh it’s stress it’s not the medication
0:29:18 I even knew that that was ridiculous nobody has so much stress that they lose 70 pounds
0:29:29 and losing the 70 pounds with starting at 170 it was not normal and just saying stress
0:29:37 now it ended up that in fact he was killing me and it was the third doctor who figured
0:29:43 out that actually he brought in a hematologist who figured out that I was being driven into
0:29:53 aplastic anemia by the drugs and they caught it just in time but for another year or so
0:29:58 I had to have my blood taken once a week but then that doctor just goes on and on it was
0:30:04 the fourth doctor who by the time I sat down with him and this is spelled out in the book
0:30:15 I didn’t trust anybody and I was giving up I was planning either to run away and nobody
0:30:22 would ever hear from me or if I could manage to get out but I was just going to kill myself
0:30:29 because I couldn’t keep living that way and he came in and he just I don’t know if the
0:30:37 book conveys what a humorous character he is but not in a funny way in an odd way when
0:30:44 I’m seeing a neurologist and he’s suddenly talking to me about the brothers Karamazov
0:30:52 like that’s what it was and the telling me stories about French carriages in the 18th
0:30:59 century and how those were found because of certain things that happened were found to
0:31:09 be triggering seizures and it was all designed to throw me off guard because I was very much
0:31:16 like on guard like I don’t trust doctors at all you know yeah it’s like none of you know
0:31:22 what you’re doing and he said a few things and probably the most important thing he
0:31:30 said was he talked about bringing in a new medication and I said in the greatest tone
0:31:35 of obnoxiousness because I’ve heard it so many times and then everything will get under
0:31:42 control right and he just looked at me and says I don’t know I can’t make that kind
0:31:52 of promise I can promise you that I won’t stop and I will do what we need to do to
0:31:59 get you to the best life you can live and that might mean living with some side effects
0:32:05 and no seizures or living with some seizures with fewer side effects or everything working
0:32:09 up but we can’t I can’t tell you one way or the other what’s going to happen I’m just
0:32:16 not going to quit on you and I knew that was the truth I knew and he said the line when
0:32:21 we understand seizures will understand the human brain and we’re nowhere close to understanding
0:32:28 the human brain and it was that level of humility that none of the other doctors had demonstrated
0:32:37 they all knew and doctors need to be humble and they need to be careful and so that was
0:32:45 my big lesson and this doctor Alan Arden trained me on how doctors are supposed to be and
0:32:51 so in the future I only encountered one more terrible doctor and I fired him on the very
0:32:59 first meeting but most of my doctors since then have been really good they keep retiring
0:33:09 I have one who’s great I was like okay I retired although it’s interesting we moved to Massachusetts
0:33:16 not long ago and I made an appointment to see a neurologist and I went in and started
0:33:23 talking and she said do you remember me and I was like no I had given a speech at Harvard
0:33:28 and she came up to me afterwards about the book and she came up to me afterwards to ask
0:33:34 me all sorts of questions and so I was like oh really she said yeah it’s like all right
0:33:42 you better be good then because I always have another book and I just wondered okay one
0:33:51 more question about epilepsy okay okay and you stated that if you could go back in time
0:33:59 and not have epilepsy you would not do that and no I said something even stronger if I
0:34:07 could change the experiences I had and why is that because those experiences were the
0:34:15 most formative things of my life they made me the person that I am and I like the person
0:34:23 that I am I like the life I live I would not have gone down the path of journalism it was
0:34:37 too hard but I did because that experience taught me that we only have one life and I
0:34:48 was supposed to be dead and I wasn’t I’d survived and so I was forced when I was at my sickest
0:34:54 I was forced to really think what am I fighting so hard for because it’s really easy to give
0:35:04 up and I envisioned a life that was in Northwestern Hospital that I was having this experience
0:35:12 of like Paul on the road to Damascus level experience and I envisioned everything I wanted
0:35:17 in my life and I went from thinking I was going to be a lawyer to being a journalist
0:35:24 that was the night and the kind of woman I wanted to marry and the kind of life I wanted
0:35:31 to live and what I wanted to value I really charted everything out and that wasn’t the
0:35:41 last time that happened I had one more big one which dealt with my kids that didn’t exist
0:35:47 in fact I didn’t even have a girlfriend at the time but it was looking into a future
0:35:55 involving my children and it was interesting because that was taking place at a Irish bar
0:36:02 right wasn’t drinking I was having a hamburger in Washington on Capitol Hill and I vowed
0:36:10 to myself that if I survived and at that point I was pretty sure I was going to survive
0:36:17 but that I had this mental image of sitting across from my oldest son and yes it was
0:36:25 a son I just happened to be and telling him I was proud of him and I committed to myself
0:36:33 that someday I would come back and this is what this experience would happen and my kids
0:36:40 all knew about this and my oldest son would be like when are we going not for a while
0:36:47 you have to be older we have to be the age you were in my not vision but in what I saw
0:36:58 in my mind’s eye and eventually we all went to Washington and I sent the middle boy and
0:37:05 the youngest boy or son they were adults sent them away I said I’m sorry the mental image
0:37:13 was of one not three so I have to do this the way I promised me I would do it and we sat
0:37:22 down the restaurant arranged the table our table the way it had been on that day because
0:37:29 it needed to be the same it’s a very strange experience and I told my son that I was proud
0:37:37 of him and he told me the same thing and I burst into tears because I had reached that
0:37:44 point it was the ultimate representation that not only had I survived but I had accomplished
0:37:51 everything I wanted to accomplish wow I feel like we should end right now I mean how we’re
0:38:00 going to top that story shit oh my god but like Elizabeth Warren nevertheless I’m going
0:38:10 to persist because now you’ve had some amazing investigative reporting and I just want to
0:38:18 know how you do a story like Enron like how do you take on a story about Enron because
0:38:23 I read in your book about that and that is an amazing thing how do you do a story that
0:38:33 big what goes into it what are the big failings of journalism is that a lot of journalists
0:38:43 don’t know what they don’t know a lot of politicians too but I digress yeah yeah exactly and they’ll
0:38:50 jump into it and start dividing up the world into okay here are the bad guys here are the
0:38:57 good guys who tells me what you told me this you’re my source blah blah blah blah and Enron
0:39:05 collapsed into bankruptcy and everybody was chasing the story and I was doing something
0:39:10 else I don’t remember what I was at the New York Times and we were getting beaten fairly
0:39:20 roundly by the Wall Street Journal and then there was an announcement that a bunch of
0:39:26 document that the the accounting firm Arthur Anderson which existed then it was a big
0:39:34 accounting firm had destroyed documents related to related to Enron and it was at that point
0:39:40 that we had been beaten so many different ways that my specialty was corporate fraud
0:39:46 was see why hasn’t he been doing this and so I was asked by the executive editor no
0:39:54 I was told by the editor to start covering Enron and I sort of freaked everybody out
0:40:01 because my response was okay give me two weeks and they’re like no we need you on it right
0:40:08 now I was like I will write some stories but I’m not going to jump into it full force because
0:40:17 I don’t know what I’m talking about this is about a pipeline company that became a trader
0:40:24 of gas contracts but it’s actually more complicated than that and I don’t quite understand what
0:40:33 they do and then this involved something called structured finance and an accounting rule
0:40:40 that pertain to 3% outside equity and I don’t know what any of this means I had over the
0:40:50 years built up what I call the grayheads who were experts in law securities law criminal
0:41:00 law accounting finance and I always said I had the greatest business education of anybody
0:41:05 I know because it’s been constant and all of my professors are the world or national
0:41:13 experts and so I called up these folks and said teach me I need to understand this I
0:41:26 need to understand that and that is really the key to reporting that people miss is I
0:41:34 don’t care what somebody tells me I care what they tell me makes logical sense and fits
0:41:40 within the reality of what we’re talking about if somebody tells me that oh this fraud was
0:41:47 they did it this way a big one is oh Enron lied and they had all these off the books
0:41:52 partnerships which is the heart of this off the books partnerships they didn’t disclose
0:42:00 you go wait a minute I’ve read the SEC filings they did disclose them and oh there was a partnership
0:42:05 that was financing Enron operations that was being run by one of its executives and they
0:42:12 never disclosed it yes they did just because someone told you that doesn’t mean it’s true
0:42:18 you can look it up it’s a public document there it is disclosed and so the questions
0:42:26 became much more complicated it’s how what did they do that wasn’t disclosed and how
0:42:33 did those things make a difference and why didn’t people know what were within the disclosures
0:42:41 and at the end of the day it was a much more complex story without oh here are the absolute
0:42:45 good guys and here are the absolute bad guys people always wanted to be good guys and bad
0:42:52 guys and it’s always more complicated and at the end of the day that was how I did it
0:42:59 and once I understood this stuff at a fairly strong level and I just kept getting deeper
0:43:06 and deeper and deeper every time every day I worked I was able to really do stories there
0:43:14 was always something I always said my best source is logic and if you understand what
0:43:23 the complexities of the field then logic will take you to where what questions there are
0:43:31 to be have and logic can prove to be wrong but the other thing is that if you know what
0:43:37 you’re talking about you can stand out among the sources if you’re not sitting there going
0:43:43 somebody told me such and such how do you respond I never do that ever it’s always I’m
0:43:49 working I want to hear what you have to say this is what I hear is that lining up with
0:43:56 it and ultimately it doesn’t become like on the one hand on the other hand it becomes
0:44:03 I’m able to figure out who’s right and who’s wrong because I have bothered to wait to wait
0:44:10 and to learn the complexities before jumping into it but with both feet up next on remarkable
0:44:19 people it’s really really hard doing it right takes an enormous amount of time and enormous
0:44:26 amount of self doubt the people who doubt themselves in my career the people who consistently
0:44:38 thought they were getting it wrong were the greatest reporters become a little more remarkable
0:44:44 with each episode of remarkable people it’s found on apple podcast or wherever you listen
0:44:53 to your favorite shows welcome back to remarkable people with guy Kawasaki from the outside looking
0:45:00 in when you read about terranose do you say to yourself this was well done it was well
0:45:07 analyzed or did the wall street drill just jump in on that and said elizabeth lied sonny
0:45:14 lied they’re gonna go to jail I think that they did a very good job I think that was
0:45:25 also a complicated story and they really delved into those complications very well and got
0:45:33 it very clearly the conclusion of responsibility took a little time but eventually it did start
0:45:40 to sneak in on responsibility but they didn’t jump into it full force okay from the beginning
0:45:46 which is what happened with enron it’s like oh it’s all lay and skilling heads of the
0:45:50 company okay and it’s like well how do we know that we don’t know anything we don’t
0:45:58 know what happened and now there have been some horrible stories that have run in the
0:46:05 journal there that have run in the time of over the last couple of years and in terms
0:46:13 of on the business side of things and I stand back scratching my head going that’s not a
0:46:18 good story and wait wait I can look at it and say okay this is going to blow up in their
0:46:25 faces and it does but but okay from the outside looking in just I’m a reader of the Times
0:46:32 or the Post or the or the Journal how do I know that what what’s the tells on this is
0:46:38 a lousy story well you have to pay attention to by lines first of all as an example there
0:46:44 was a journalist a financial journalist at the Times Floyd Norris if he wrote it I know
0:46:50 it was true foreign correspondent Steve airliner if he writes it I know it’s true or it says
0:46:57 true is truth is a complex concept it’s accurate and fair people say I write the truth well
0:47:02 if you write the truth then you can’t possibly be wrong so people write what is accurate
0:47:10 and fair and there are people like that throughout all publications but then there are also people
0:47:21 who you read and go that a great example there was a story I won’t say in which publication
0:47:29 where they had I think four reporters and three editors and it was about this investment
0:47:39 firm and how it was a sweatshop and really difficult and combative environment and interviews
0:47:48 with 12 current and former I’m like 12 how many people work there 3000 Wow and so you
0:47:53 sit there going okay that story strikes me a far fetch we have something these days which
0:48:00 are called employee reviews online let me look it up let’s see what oh four and a half
0:48:08 stars from 2000 employees what do they have to say this place is a hot house but if you’re
0:48:14 able to work hard and work through this it’s enormously rewarding this is not the kind
0:48:21 of place to come to and it was all like how is it phrased yeah some people would go oh
0:48:26 my god it’s so terrible but then when you read the reviews it was people going wow this
0:48:32 is challenging and it’s not for everybody so it’s like okay well this story is going
0:48:43 to blow up in their faces and it did this sounds like goldman there was a story pertaining
0:48:49 to the Nancy or Michael Milken I can’t remember which publication it was in but just in reading
0:48:56 it it was this doesn’t make any sense I remember it was something to do with getting an enterprise
0:49:04 zone designation over certain property and it was a big it was a big property like many
0:49:10 many thousands of acres and there was like one little line in there Milken among a number
0:49:16 of other investors it’s like well wait a minute how many who are they related to him what are
0:49:23 we talking about and then it’s with this billionaire is going to walk around going to the secretary
0:49:30 of the Treasury and saying I want an enterprise zone designation for this piece of land I
0:49:39 was like this doesn’t make any sense and it ended up that Milken threw that an entity that
0:49:44 may or may not have been controlled by Milken nobody ever established that it was but it
0:49:54 was owned I think it was something like 2% of this land and the 98% was owned by the
0:50:02 other investors who had no connection to Milken other than they held adjacent properties and
0:50:09 you look at that I could read the story from the get go and just say does this make logical
0:50:18 sense that a billionaire would go to the secretary of the Treasury and the secretary of the Treasury
0:50:26 would take action to make this particular property have a designate it’s like it the
0:50:32 world doesn’t work that way you don’t just the secretary doesn’t just wave a magic wand
0:50:40 and the government is much more complex and why would milken go to the trouble and why
0:50:47 you know you just it didn’t make any sense and ended up it didn’t make any sense because
0:50:56 it wasn’t correct okay you know there was going way back in time there was a boasis name
0:51:02 the guy from the New York Times who was making stories about a whole clock so it was a big
0:51:10 scandal and how can I not remember his name anyway this was around 2005 and I read a story
0:51:21 he wrote it was about the DC sniper and I read a story he wrote and the second paragraph
0:51:26 I forget what it was that it had it was the lead of the paper and the second paragraph
0:51:34 said according to three federal law enforcement officials and two state officials who spoke
0:51:40 on condition of anonymity because blah blah blah blah blah and I finished it I said that
0:51:50 was made up because the source I’ve used anonymous sourcing and it’s complicated and to have
0:51:57 five anonymous sources three on the federal level two on the state level who are all giving
0:52:04 you the same piece of information and are all explaining precisely why they are speaking
0:52:10 to you on background and all of them have the same reason it’s an editor’s wet dream
0:52:15 this is the kind of thing they tell us to do and it’s not doable it’s not that we don’t
0:52:19 do it because we’re being difficult we don’t do it because it’s not doable but this guy
0:52:27 did it and what I figured was that Jason Blair that was a thing and what I figured was he
0:52:34 made up the sourcing I never imagined he made up the whole story and that’s what ended up
0:52:41 being true is that Jason Blair was making up stories making up stories and getting really
0:52:47 good play in the New York Times because he had blockbuster stories with huge sourcing
0:52:54 that met all of the desired standards that editors demanded but never got and the reason
0:53:02 they never got okay I got to ask you this because you’re one of the few people I can
0:53:09 trust with an answer for this question alright so it seems like in this political environment
0:53:17 the conservatives say quote unquote mainstream media is suppressing our speech and then the
0:53:27 liberals say mainstream media they don’t condemn Trump enough as a threat to democracy so liberals
0:53:32 have their issues conservatives have their issues with mainstream media and by that I
0:53:38 think they were referring to the post and the times so what do we believe what what is
0:53:46 the role of mainstream media anytime anybody says oh the New York Times is a liberal publication
0:53:52 I goes which article led you to think that and they always cite the editorial page and
0:53:58 it’s like that’s an editorial editorial is meant to be opinion and like yes but that
0:54:10 bleeds into the news like never did with me now what is wrong with all areas of news
0:54:19 reporting is hard it’s really really hard doing it right takes an enormous amount of
0:54:25 time an enormous amount of self-doubt the people who doubt themselves in my career the
0:54:30 people who have consistently thought they were getting it wrong were the greatest reporters
0:54:34 because if you’re not consistently thinking you’re getting it wrong you’re probably getting
0:54:39 it wrong you know you’re always playing defense if you think you’re getting it wrong which
0:54:51 means you’re busy making things is there bias in people’s personal beliefs that bleeds into
0:54:57 the news I used to say of course people have biases but good journalists do not allow there
0:55:04 is a thing of objectivity and you are able to objectively know a fact from my belief
0:55:13 and you can have a value system but once you get out of social areas reporters tend to
0:55:23 be people who have more experience with the LGBTQ community they tend to be people who
0:55:33 are widely read they tend to be people who have more of a social experience that gives
0:55:44 them one perspective now the problem is that it blinds them to other perspectives there
0:55:53 was a great book I read called white working class which was really is really about the
0:56:00 white working class and not in a look down your nose way but actually in a let’s examine
0:56:07 the values here the real values where they stem from and why big news organizations don’t
0:56:14 get it and it was a really really fascinating book and it’s true there are things that they
0:56:22 don’t get I’m really circling around your question I would say that what has started
0:56:33 to happen is that more and more opinion and personal values it used to be the problem
0:56:39 was just laziness but now it is more and more opinion and personal values are getting into
0:56:48 the news and that is from every perspective conservative liberal whatever and one of
0:56:55 the greatest air editors of modern times is a fellow named Marty Baron who was the editor
0:57:04 in chief at the Boston Globe and at the Washington Post and he was the senior editor at the
0:57:13 New York Times and just a brilliant guy and he gave a speech or wrote something I read
0:57:21 it I think it was a transcript of the speech where he was talking about how expressing
0:57:29 the value of objectivity and objectivity is important and I was like why are we even discussing
0:57:34 this of course it’s true this is like saying it’s important to wash your hands before performing
0:57:42 surgery I’m like yeah and I had no idea this was a topic of debate and it ends up that
0:57:47 it is I would encourage everyone I don’t know if this will come up with it but search
0:57:54 Martin Baron and objectivity and see if you can find this speech or whatever it is because
0:58:02 it was horrifying to me to realize that this was a discussion and that Marty was saying
0:58:07 in the course of his speech was making it or what he wrote was making it clear that he
0:58:15 was getting progressively in the minority talk about arrogance it takes for a reporter
0:58:26 to think that their non-objective beliefs have any value at all in my books one of the
0:58:35 things I get cited for more than anything else is you know Curt never said his opinion
0:58:41 on what people should conclude and my answer to that is once I finish the book you know
0:58:46 everything I do I mean not every single thing but you know everything it’s important enough
0:58:51 to make your own conclusions and I am at that point no more qualified to make a conclusion
0:58:59 than you are and so I will give you the facts I will not tell you what to think my opinion
0:59:08 has no value should there be a statement that in a recent speech Donald Trump channeled
0:59:16 or emulated or was similar to Adolf Hitler and therefore he is a threat to democracy
0:59:24 that’s an opinion that’s not a fact right does not belong in there but you can state
0:59:35 very clearly that when Trump talks about yeah you can then say this statement set off outrage
0:59:41 and upset because it is the language that critics say is the language of Adolf Hitler
0:59:48 and you can quote what Hitler said where he used these exact words and then quote people
0:59:55 talking about it so yeah but should you stand up and down and say oh my god but he’s a Nazi
1:00:02 no that’s not a reporter’s job now if I was on the op-ed page when I say that that would
1:00:08 be in the headline or he’s a fascist yes that would be in the headline and a lot of people
1:00:15 are now starting to say he is a fascist and all you have to do is go off and read about
1:00:22 fascists and recognize that that’s what we’re dealing with and at Joe Scarborough the other
1:00:27 morning said okay we need to finally start using that word he’s like yeah you do but
1:00:35 in terms of reporting if you are telling that the Republican party doesn’t do any great
1:00:40 shakes here either because you go to them and say Trump said this what do you think
1:00:45 they know exactly what he said they heard it they got an aide coming in going oh my
1:00:51 god Trump just said this and they’ll go oh I haven’t seen it I can’t say it okay this
1:00:56 is the dissentist effect no it’s been going on for years this has been going on since
1:01:01 Trump got into office the oh I have a lunch and it’s I’ve always wanted to see if somebody
1:01:09 had the guts to walk up and say senator are you going to lunch because I have a question
1:01:18 about Donald Trump or to walk over with I mean you know dissentist the other day when
1:01:23 he was asked about something that Elon Musk had done yeah I haven’t seen it is agreeing
1:01:28 with the anti-semitic tweet he said well I haven’t seen it it’s okay here it is this
1:01:33 is what he said this is what was said this is what he said oh I don’t know the context
1:01:38 it’s a tweet there is no context that’s it that’s we’re not talking about Moby Dick
1:01:48 we’re talking about a total of 50 words and that’s the kind of dodgeball that the failure
1:01:56 to do follow-ups is one of the the biggest failures of our profession now if you don’t
1:02:06 start doing follow-ups if you allow someone to say something absolutely ridiculous and
1:02:11 then you move on to the next topic you’re no good you shouldn’t be out there and there’s
1:02:18 one oh how can I not remember his I’m doing so badly on names today and this is someone
1:02:25 I know personally an MSNBC reporter or anchor who had something on the Peacock network and
1:02:32 he’s the best interviewer out there and I cannot for the life of me oh many a son yeah
1:02:38 many a son has been here he’s been on we’ve interviewed him and he’s amazing yeah he is
1:02:46 what every journalist should try to be and not enough of them do because he does not
1:02:53 let people get away with anything he and if you watch Meet the Press these days you go
1:02:59 what do you think of Trump on such a well Trump is 700 feet tall and weighs eight pounds
1:03:06 okay and following up and what about Biden it’s wait a minute follow up God’s sake to
1:03:14 challenge what they’re saying don’t just move on to the next topic because then and this
1:03:24 bothers me a lot is I believe that all TV news on one level of the other have become
1:03:29 propaganda machine they bring on the same people to say the same thing over and over
1:03:37 and over again they rarely challenge what’s being said they rarely follow up it’s all
1:03:45 about getting people worked up one way or the other and many his son does that he gets
1:03:51 people worked up but he gets them worked up because he’s plowing in and getting information
1:03:58 would forcing people to give answers I would pay to watch many his son be the moderator
1:04:04 of a presidential debate yeah me too but it would never work and he would never do it
1:04:09 and nor should he do it presidential debates aren’t debate so the thing about many his
1:04:18 son is he has no qualms about asking the same question a good interviewer if somebody’s
1:04:23 dodging and dodging and dodging you just you just say it certainly seems like you’re not
1:04:28 willing to answer this question but I’m going to ask it again until you finally do this
1:04:35 is the question why won’t you answer the question let’s make it into a yes or no question
1:04:43 and this is the thing is that journalists these days on TV are not asking hard questions
1:04:54 and so when you end up there’s a great old line that I love and applies to so much that
1:05:02 if you have a barrel full of garbage and add a teaspoon full of wine you get garbage and
1:05:08 if you have a barrel full of wine and add a teaspoon full of garbage you get garbage
1:05:13 something that’s supposed to be good you only need to add a little bit of bad and it’s bad
1:05:21 and if something’s bad you can add a little bit of good and it’s still bad and the news
1:05:32 business some of it is a barrel full of garbage some of it is a barrel full of wine but very
1:05:42 little of it is garbage free and as a result we have a lot of oh my god that is a brilliant
1:05:49 metaphor we gotta end this episode my head is exploding I think you have clearly proved
1:05:56 if nothing else in this interview that you do not have to have a grand mal seizure to
1:06:03 be insightful anymore you’ve moved beyond that I figured out how to have some of the
1:06:12 benefits without all of the downside so that’s Kurt Eichenwald for the last 20 or so years
1:06:18 I’ve had Meniere’s disease and one of the symptoms of Meniere’s disease is sporadic
1:06:25 attacks of vertical so at any given moment the world could start spinning and I would
1:06:34 be on the ground sometimes throwing up in my opinion not nearly as traumatic as an epileptic
1:06:42 seizure but I could tell you what an effect the threat of vertical had on me so I can
1:06:51 only imagine the effect of epilepsy on Kurt he has become such an accomplished investigative
1:07:00 reporter it is truly remarkable and the story of how his family coped with it or in one
1:07:07 case didn’t cope with it is pretty amazing I hope if you have members of your family
1:07:12 who have something like this you appreciate what they’re going through and do everything
1:07:21 you can to help them control or overcome or cope with their affliction I’m Guy Kawasaki
1:07:28 and this is remarkable people my thanks to two people at the conversation Beth Daly and
1:07:37 Priyanka Sharma Sintar the two of them made this episode possible and if you want really
1:07:46 first rate journalism check out the conversation I guarantee you that you will find very few
1:07:55 new sources more informative than the conversation let me also thank the remarkable people team
1:08:03 that would be Jeff C and Shannon Hernandez they are remarkable sound engineers then we
1:08:12 have the Nismar sisters that’s Madison who is the producer of this podcast and co-author
1:08:20 of our book think remarkable Tessa Nismar recent graduate provides the background research
1:08:28 that preps me for these interviews and makes the transcripts perfect finally we have Luis
1:08:37 Magana Fallon Yates and Alexis Nishimura this is the remarkable people team and we are dedicated
1:08:45 to helping you become remarkable in 2024 one plug for our book Madison I have a book that
1:08:53 is releasing on March 6 it’s called think remarkable nine paths to transform your life
1:08:59 and make a difference this book reflects the wisdom of the 200 or so remarkable people
1:09:08 we’ve interviewed as well as our experiences in business and life the blurbs are from believe
1:09:18 it or not Carol dweck the mother of the growth mindset Bob Cheldini the godfather of influence
1:09:25 Julia Cameron the mother of creativity and blurb the likes of which has never been seen
1:09:34 Amy Handy she was the copy editor of the book and her email comments to me were so positive
1:09:44 and so flattering I decided to turn them into a blurb oh and by the way last but not least
1:09:53 the Ford is by Jane Goodall yes the Jane Goodall how can you resist that book oh my god end
1:10:01 of promotion think remarkable available March 6 all over the world with that let me say Mahalo
1:10:10 and aloha this is remarkable people
In this episode of Remarkable People, join host Guy Kawasaki as he has a captivating conversation with investigative journalist Kurt Eichenwald. Together they discuss Kurt’s unbelievable journey overcoming terrifying seizures to break monumental stories exposing corporate corruption and fraud. Hear how Kurt turned adversity into purpose by firing incompetent doctors, thoroughly preparing himself to uncover the truth, and envisioning his ideal future family during health crises to find the strength to endure. Let his unconventional path inspire you to use hardship to fuel meaningful contribution.
—
Guy Kawasaki is on a mission to make you remarkable. His Remarkable People podcast features interviews with remarkable people such as Jane Goodall, Marc Benioff, Woz, Kristi Yamaguchi, and Bob Cialdini. Every episode will make you more remarkable.
With his decades of experience in Silicon Valley as a Venture Capitalist and advisor to the top entrepreneurs in the world, Guy’s questions come from a place of curiosity and passion for technology, start-ups, entrepreneurship, and marketing. If you love society and culture, documentaries, and business podcasts, take a second to follow Remarkable People.
Listeners of the Remarkable People podcast will learn from some of the most successful people in the world with practical tips and inspiring stories that will help you be more remarkable.
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