February 10, 2026 • 47 mins
One need not look very far to see that the television landscape has rapidly changed in the last few years, with an influx of new streaming platforms and shifting audience viewing patterns. Another notable upheaval: In 2023, Don Lemon, the Edward R. Murrow and Emmy Award-winning journalist and longtime host of “CNN Tonight with Don Lemon,” was let go from CNN after seventeen years with the network. Following his exit, Lemon took time for introspection, resulting in his new book, “I Once Was Lost: My Search for God in America.” The work is a deeply personal exploration of his spiritual journey and the role of religion in the country. It is Lemon’s third book, following “Transparent” and the #1 New York Times bestseller “This Is The Fire: What I Say to My Friends About Racism.” Earlier this year, the anchor launched his new endeavor, “The Don Lemon Show,” on YouTube and podcast platforms. Host Alec Baldwin speaks with Don Lemon about the shakeup at CNN, the role of his faith in trying times, and the importance of the press and the First Amendment in a free society.
Originally aired October 21st, 2024.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the
Thing from iHeart Radio. The last few years have seen
drastic changes in the rapidly evolving landscape of cable and
streaming television. You know the times have changed when even
the news is making news. At CNN, there were reports
(00:22):
of chaos and uncertainty, the sudden resignation of President Jeff Zucker,
followed by the installation of his successor, Qus Licked, and
drastic changes to their lineup. One of the biggest changes
moving my guest Today. CNN Tonight anchored Don Lemon to
Mornings after a decade in prime time. Shortly after, Lemon
(00:45):
made some controversial comments on air and was unceremoniously fired
from the network seventeen years into his tenure. Now, he
has released a book, I Once Was Lost My Search
for God in America, a day deeply personal journey of
his faith through difficult times that also takes a hard
look at politics.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
And religion in America Today. The Emmy winning journalist launched
a new series earlier this year, The Don Lemon Show,
on streaming podcast platforms and on YouTube. I wanted to
know how he made the decision of where to launch
his new show.
Speaker 3 (01:23):
YouTube is the number one network in the world. It
has surpassed Netflix. It's because everyone has that computer in
their pocket, and that is the new television. It's the
same thing you watch it, but it's just a different
form of distribution. So if I can go there, create
content and pretty much do exactly what I want to do,
why not. That's why I chose YouTube. Also, Alec, I
(01:45):
have some contractual obligations. As you know, you're in the business,
you have non competes and all of that. So I
had to find a place where I could go and
do what I do and create model cable non network
that doesn't compete with my contract at the old.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
Now I want to touch on that, I'm going to
We've got two things here overacy, career and faith. The
book is called I Once Was Lost, and I went
to your book signing event where you were interviewed by
Zucker who was very funny.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
By the way, I was surprised. He's very good.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
So you go to YouTube oversely, there's a noncompete aspect
in there. But to describe your career in television and
when that ended? What ended you started at CNN, what
year two thousand and six, and you started doing what
I started as.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
Let's see, Oh wow, it's been so long ago.
Speaker 3 (02:35):
Two thousand and six, I was the afternoon anchor on
CNN Newsroom from one to four in the afternoon, and
you did that for how long? I did that for
about eight years or so?
Speaker 2 (02:45):
Eight years? Yeah, yeah, thirteen to fourteen. I moved on.
I moved to New York.
Speaker 3 (02:49):
I was in Atlanta, and you move on to do
what show I moved on to do. I did weekend
evenings for a while to sort of create, you know,
get my own voice, develop my own voice. And then
Jeff Souker took over and said, hey, you're pretty talented.
Who was in charge before Zucker Jim Walton was ahead
of the network here, and Zuker took over and he
wanted you want in the evening? He put you on
in the evening.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
Yes, I went to Zucker because I did.
Speaker 3 (03:10):
I hated Atlanta and I'm a New Yorker even though
I grew up in Louisiana, I'm a New Yorker by heart.
And I said, hey, listen, it's been great working here.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
I'm out of here.
Speaker 3 (03:20):
I said, I can't live in Atlanta anymore. So thanks,
you know, I'm glad you just took over the network.
Blah blah blah blah, he said. He said, yeah, he said,
you don't have to You're moving to New York. And
that was it, and you did the evening on the weekends,
and then you did your evening show starting when how
long was it?
Speaker 2 (03:34):
So weekends?
Speaker 3 (03:35):
I did the evenings on the weekends for a while.
I think I did the evenings for you know, five years.
Look the afternoon. I'm sort of, you know, sort of
mixing that in the evening because I started the evening
in Atlanta and then I continue the evening in New York.
And Jeff would sort of mentor me, you know, because
he's he watched twenty four hours a day son breaking news.
Speaker 2 (03:53):
Tell you.
Speaker 3 (03:54):
He would say, breaking news, I need you to stay
on for another hour. We're going to blow out the
medical show and need you to stay on and do this,
repeat the breaking news.
Speaker 2 (04:03):
You know. Or he didn't coach at style. No, no,
not at all, because he liked my style. He liked
me being me.
Speaker 3 (04:08):
He's he would if anything, he would say, lean into it,
so he would say, you know, recap, tell the audience.
You know it's breaking news, what it is. He wouldn't
tell me what to say. He would say a good
question might be something like this, and I wouldn't ask it,
you know, exactly as he would say if I wanted
to do it. But he wouldn't get upset if I
didn't do it. So you could do audibles like quarterbacks,
(04:29):
Yes I could. And then he started. I had me
filling in on every single show. I'd fill in the afternoon,
I'd fill in the morning, I would do my evening show,
and he would send me on big stories.
Speaker 2 (04:38):
And he was He really developed me.
Speaker 1 (04:40):
And you started doing your show, the big show, the
evening show.
Speaker 3 (04:43):
Win I started doing my show. Aaron Burnett went out
on maternity leave and Jeff said, I want you to
take over for her from maternity leave. So her entire
couple months she was off, I filled in at seven
o'clock show. It was me and I did my weekend
shoe So I was working seven days a week and
I didn't mind it.
Speaker 2 (05:00):
I loved it.
Speaker 1 (05:01):
Actually, you're doing the mornings, and you're doing and morning shows,
which have become so bizarre to me, I know, I
said to people, And I love all these people meant
I love Katie Cork. But the last time I watched
the Today Show was when Katie Cork was on with
lour and they did a I guess maybe it was
for Halloween. They all dressed up and clothing and they
sang diamonds are a Girl's best friend as she's walking
(05:22):
down a staircase, a glittering staircase or whatever, and I thought,
I'm done. I don't know, I want the news, maybe
tell some jokes or whatever. But they turned it into
an entertainment show. But mornings it's obviously a different ball game.
Even weekends, maybe you're a different ballgame. So what adjustments
do you have to make in your style to be
on in the evening?
Speaker 2 (05:39):
Oh? Well, I'm an evening guy.
Speaker 3 (05:41):
The only reason I did the mornings is because and
you told me, you know, when I did the like,
she said, no one wants to see you in the morning,
And you were right. I'm not a morning person. I'm
not very good in the morning. I'm not good on coffee.
Caffeine makes me jittery. I don't know what I'm saying
or doing. So I did it because my company asked
me to do it, and I was being a team player,
but it was not a good fit for me. The
adjustment is is that you're constantly sleeping, you have.
Speaker 2 (06:03):
To get up. I'm a night oul.
Speaker 3 (06:04):
I don't go to go to bed until two or
three in the morning, and I'm up at you know,
maybe ten right before I would you know, i'd have
to wake up when I mean, when I was doing
the mornings, I had to wake up at four in
the morning, right, I know what it'll be. It was really,
really tough. So that's really the adjustment. I'm a cool
cat at night. I like it, and I like that
that late time slot. Working at night, I do too,
and I get my best Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (06:26):
I do movies.
Speaker 1 (06:27):
And the guy said to me, we're in a black
box theater shooting this movie for all these scenes inside
this theater for a month in Florida. And he says, so,
no windows, know nothing, no light dependent at all. He goes,
we can shoot whenever we want. He goes, what time
you want to go to work?
Speaker 2 (06:41):
Love it? And I said none, I'm going to shoot
noon to midnight. Yeah, and we did. We shot noon
to midnight for four weeks. I was in heaven. I
was like man, I'm just getting going.
Speaker 3 (06:49):
Yeah, I like about seven or eight at night, like
my best work. I don't wake up that late, but
my best work is at night. So having that ten
o'clock slot was perfect for me. And then you know,
I was on until midnight every night, but that was
when I would get that energy.
Speaker 2 (07:03):
And you're like being solo. Oh, I love the co
anchors for a while. It's tough. You didn't like that format.
Speaker 3 (07:08):
No, I'm a team player, but not in that way.
I have my own flow and everybody can't keep up
with me, you know.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
And and doubles tennis, they're not the best partner. Yeah,
at your game, and you got to you gotta have
a good part of that. You have to have someone
who can keep up with you.
Speaker 3 (07:22):
And you know, I don't mean that in a you know,
I'm not diminishing anyone, but someone like a Kara Swisher personal. Yeah,
like someone like a Kara Swisher or a Joy Behar
or someone they could keep up with me. They get
my sense of humor and they don't take anything personally
and they can give it or take it as good
as they give it, right, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (07:39):
I love that kind of it. They didn't want to
demonize or criminalize your moderances. No, because they they under
they they their pals and they get me. It's not personal.
Speaker 3 (07:49):
It's just we're just we're just sitting having a conversation
and people say all kinds of things and conversations and
it's not personal. It's just your talking. And when you talk,
you say things. You go, ah, I don't.
Speaker 4 (07:58):
Mean that, Okay, all right, right, so I said some shit,
that was great, whatever, and you just move on. But
you can't do that with everybody, because you know, especially
like younger folks, everything is like a personal affront.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
Well, you walk in on the set of a project,
and when you're around young people, I find that there's
a potential for certain difficulties. So I've never had any
problems with this myself. I never had any I've had
other problems obviously, but not that one. And you walk
onto the set, especially of a film, and you're there
and people they're tents, and you don't realize how tense there.
(08:29):
They're scared younger people. You come on and there. I mean,
I've made whatever number of movies, I've made one hundred movies,
ninety movies, whatever, I take pictures with people now, but
I got taught by somebody famous. You put your arm
out and they hook their elbow around your elbow, and
they go, why do you want to do that? A
few of them would say, and I say, I can't
put my hand behind your body, and you got it.
My hand can't be hidden behind your back in the photogo.
(08:50):
All the games you've got to play?
Speaker 2 (08:51):
Now? Which are which?
Speaker 5 (08:53):
Was?
Speaker 2 (08:53):
I'm concerned? No, but you're right about that. You said
you've done so many movies. I had been.
Speaker 3 (08:56):
I think I was doing the afternoons from six about nine,
and then I started doing the weekend evenings, and so
I've been doing the weekend evenings. I'd been solo, I
should say, from about two thousand and nine to twenty
twenty three or twenty twenty two, and so I was
just used to my own flow and people, you know,
were used to me just being me, and so I
(09:17):
had been there for quite some time solo anchor.
Speaker 2 (09:20):
And you know, people come in and they're like they
you know, they don't get it.
Speaker 1 (09:23):
You know, now when you do a show like that
for people who don't know, because I find this behind
the scenes very interesting. You come in there, you come in.
The show was on the air at ten. The big
show was on a ten. You did the past two
with Chris and then everybody thought that was very entertaining
the two of you.
Speaker 3 (09:38):
It's the biggest compliment that people say about that and
about my show. They say that was the last appointment
television for the network. Was that handoff and then going
on the show.
Speaker 2 (09:49):
Yeah. But the thing that people don't understand is you
get there what time?
Speaker 3 (09:53):
It would depend if I if I had a pre tape,
I would go in earlier. But at the end I
moved across the street from the office, so it would
take me literally a minute, minute and a half to
be on the set because I lived and it was
in huts and yards.
Speaker 2 (10:07):
So I would go to work probably about eight eight thirty.
So you're not there at three o'clock writing.
Speaker 3 (10:12):
No, I'm doing that from home, got it because basically
my office is not much further from the set than
my home was. But before that, I would probably get
to work about six, right And the reason I did
that part of it was because of Jeff.
Speaker 2 (10:26):
Jeff said, why are you working on the show so early?
Your show?
Speaker 3 (10:29):
Why are you guys in the morning meeting the morning
meetings at nine in the morning. Your show is twelve
hours away, a half a day away. Everything's going to
change exactly, So what are you doing? And I found
that when I would study for all of this stuff
and just study, study, study, and over prepare, and then
by the time the show came about at ten o'clock,
it would be a whole different show.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
And I'd say, why the hell did I would I
do this? You've got to be more plodet to learn
to be nimble.
Speaker 1 (10:50):
Now you're there doing a show like that. How much
do director about technical directors with cameras in a studio?
Are there directors, segment producers, writers, who's got your ear
in terms of content while you're doing the show?
Speaker 2 (11:03):
So it's my executive producer? And how many of those
did you have when you were on the big show?
Speaker 3 (11:07):
I had one executive producer who is and then Maria Spanella,
and then I had my own personal producer, and then
there were segment producers. And so if there was a
segment that someone had prepared and they needed to be
in the control room, usually they stood there anyways, and
so the segment producer would get in my ear. But
usually it was the executive producer, but sometimes they would say,
you know, I would say it was nineteen times and they'd.
Speaker 2 (11:28):
Go ninety ninety and I'm going because sometimes you don't
realize what you say right.
Speaker 3 (11:32):
You'll just read something wrong or you just say something wrong,
and so they would correct me. But it was mostly
the director and the executive producer and mostly the director
who would say, Okay, thirty seconds out, ten seconds out
camera two, so start on camera two and I'm going
to turn you to three. Stand by, you know, the
whole thing, three two and go camera one, turn and
(11:52):
then you do that that sort of thing, right, And
then you know, they would say it yeah, and you'd
say you know, and it's fourteen people and they'd say
graphic and I'd go, take to look at your screen,
that it's up on the screen right now, blah blah
blah blah blah, and then you talk about blah and
then they'd say on cam and then I'd look back
up and go, okay.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
Then just someone's directing your performance. Yeah, directing. They just
just to know where I'm going technically, right, but they're
directing your your tone or no.
Speaker 3 (12:17):
If I was off on something, someone would say something
she'd say like, all right, was it up wash your tone?
Speaker 2 (12:21):
Yeah? Or yeah, you're you're dragging a little bit. Are
you tired? Whatever you want us to bring?
Speaker 3 (12:26):
You want us to bring your coffee, diet coke or something, yeah,
or I'm gonna send makeup in.
Speaker 2 (12:30):
You're shiny, but that sort of thing. That's it small small.
Speaker 1 (12:33):
Now I'm assuming that when lickt comes in, this is
just zas Love wants things his way. This is his
magiemem it. Now it's going to be my CNN. So
Zuker's gone and he brings Licked in. And when Zuker's
gonna gone? How much advanced notice did you have the
Zuker was leaving? Oh that I mean that was in
the news, right, so not much. Did you know when
he was going to be gone and someone else was
(12:53):
coming in? Who was going to run the company? You
didn't know.
Speaker 2 (12:56):
No, no one, no one. No one gave you any dance.
Speaker 3 (12:58):
No, it was in the it was in the morning meeting.
When it happened. I was in LA and I forget
what I was doing. It may have been award season
or something.
Speaker 2 (13:05):
I forget.
Speaker 3 (13:06):
I was in La doing a project for the network,
and I took the Red Eye, and I got home
and went to sleep, and I woke up to a
lot of text messages.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
And I was like, wait, what is this. It always
happens that way. That happened that way.
Speaker 3 (13:20):
When when Chris was let go, Chris linked and my
executive purser is at don Jeff just resigned in the
morning meeting, and I was like, wait what And then
he called me and he said I didn't have a
chance to tell you whatever, blah blah blah. And you
know he called everybody afterwards, but I don't think he
really had any notice himself, right, Yeah.
Speaker 2 (13:39):
Well, I kind of equate him.
Speaker 1 (13:40):
This is just my opinion, by the way, which is meaningless,
but I kind of equate him with Ronnie Meyer when
they let Ronnie Meyer go for similar reasons his personal life,
and you want to sit there and you want to go, well,
I'm running a company now and I'd like this guy
to go. And that's my excuse to let him go.
And I really was going to bring it another guy
because I want my I want to run my CNN,
but he's gone, like universal. I think Ronnie Meyer hit
(14:01):
the point where he was making like forty million dollars
a year, and they were like, no, yeah, we need
you to go.
Speaker 2 (14:06):
Look, I'll let you say that. But you're a smart guy.
Speaker 3 (14:09):
So but here, you know, Jeff is the last of
a TV executive, the celebrity TV executive Mavericks. Right, everyone
is so risk averse now they're afraid, you know, they're
with the stockholders wanting all that. He really protected us
from the overlords, right from the corporate you know overlords.
He really did his guts, his guts and he's like,
(14:30):
you know, this is journalism. I understand what you do
because he did what they did, right. He ran NBC
and he understood it. But he's really a journalist at
heart because he started at the Today Show and he
started in the news president there. He had a good
run there, and then he went to run the news
division at NBC, and then he entertainment. Then he ran
the entire network. So he really and we didn't realize it,
(14:53):
you know, until he was gone.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
When Licked comes, like most executives I have assumed when
you're the top tier talent, the show that they come
is it like dinners and whining and dining and getting
to know each other and everything's war and you don't
really know where it's going to go, and then it
goes the wrong way.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
Yeah, there's a little of that. Yeah, there's a little
of that. It's polite, it's polite, yeah in the beginning. Yeah,
and then things changed, right.
Speaker 1 (15:18):
Well, I mean, I just find that odd because I
just feel like I won't name names, but I've known
a couple of people who are execs at film studios,
especially TV, where the that conveyor belt is moving and
they can't press pause. They have a plan which seems
to be everybody's plan now. Years ago it was a plan.
Now it's everybody's plan, which is, if I can't raise revenue,
I got to cut costs. So it's just a lot
(15:38):
of firing, a lot of budget cutting.
Speaker 3 (15:40):
But don't you think to a certain extent that when
your job is protected and mentioned in the First Amendment,
that there should be some exemption from that whole thing.
Like I don't think the news division should be solely
or wholly in large part driven by revenue and numbers,
numbers and ratings. It shouldn't because you're supposed to give information,
(16:01):
you're supposed to hold people who are in power, hold
themto account.
Speaker 1 (16:05):
But you told me that when we were at the
book party. I raised my hand, I asked the question.
I said, the networks and traditional media, mainstream media, have
they lost young people? And you said, they haven't lost,
but they're losing. And then you went on to talk
about the people who are considered through some research who
quoted to being about being the most informed. People get
their news from where.
Speaker 2 (16:25):
They get their news digitally? Right, Yeah, and listen.
Speaker 3 (16:28):
The older people get their news from, you know, they watch,
they sit and they watch cable news all day. They
watch six thirty or they you know, they they're watching
the morning shows or they're doing that. Younger people are
getting their news on TikTok or whatever. But the most
informed people are they'll go on digitally. They'll watch something
on YouTube, They'll watch whatever, even if they go to
you know, Twitter or TikTok or whatever. But then they'll
(16:49):
do their research and they are media literate and more
media savvy. I find the people who sit in front
of the television all day have an unconscious or built
in bias because you can tell from whatever network they're watching.
But by the time they get to the arguments around
the table the panels, they don't know what they actually
came there for, what the point of the whole segment was.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
That's what they conveyed to me.
Speaker 1 (17:11):
Well, the shows which are moderated shows, which are these
s mash pits, and everybody's going at it. I think
more and more people have realized now that it's not
worth their time. I always say to people, what do
I watch? I said, I watch Wolf Blitzer straight. I
call them straight, no chaser, right, right, right, it's just
like happening now. Just tell me what the stop stories
are and then I want to go have dinner with
my wife. You know, give me ten fifteen minutes on
(17:32):
my couch. I watch The Inn every night. Every night. Yeah,
watch Blitzer. I watch MSNBC only when I come home,
I watch Blitzer. I go to dinner, I come back
and I watch Lawrence o'donald ever.
Speaker 2 (17:41):
Yeah, every night.
Speaker 3 (17:42):
I like Lawrence, I like Rachel, I like But I
think it's different when you're in primetime, as you know,
it's just like when you do you know, in primetime
you do sitcoms or whatever. It's different than something that's
on during the day, right, And I think that's the
same thing with cable news now. I don't believe that.
For networks, that's a different thing. You got six thirty
and it's straight, no chaser, good evening and we're gonna
start in Afghanistan and whatever it is. And then but
(18:03):
at night, if you're watching cable, it's more of a
personal experience and it's a longer sort of flow. And
people they wanted to be appointment television, and they wanted
to be someone familiar with, someone they trust, someone who
can actually maybe tell them a little bit how they feel.
Speaker 2 (18:16):
People would say, I.
Speaker 3 (18:17):
Wasn't sure about it, don and I watched you and
I said, you know what, that guy's right, and I.
Speaker 2 (18:21):
Think that's okay.
Speaker 3 (18:22):
I don't agree with everything, hardly anything that Sean Hannity says,
but he's perfect for a primetime cable show, right, he's
and he's a star.
Speaker 2 (18:31):
I don't little O'Reilly.
Speaker 1 (18:33):
We had a great delivery, and he was a real broadcaster.
I didn't agree with the word he said either.
Speaker 3 (18:37):
I've always said that about Bill O'Reilly. He's a great performer.
And I would watch him and I would take notes
and go that guy is good and the same thing,
and people are gonna, you know, gonna go, oh, my gosh,
I can't believe he said that. Same thing with Megan Kelly.
I don't agree with anything she says. She's turned out
to me the biggest troll.
Speaker 2 (18:50):
And and is she she flipped up. Oh my gosh,
it's embarrassing. I went to a book party of first
with my wife, but when.
Speaker 3 (18:57):
She was same, we were at that same party. Yeah,
on the rooftop of a hotel somewhere. Yeah, But she
at that time, I think she was on at eight
or nine o'clock or whatever at night.
Speaker 2 (19:06):
She was perfect for that hour. She's a great performer.
Speaker 3 (19:08):
She comes on and she's energy whatever, and you know,
the morning Speaking of people being out of position, the
morning show is not her position, I believe, just like
it wasn't. I was in position as well. And that's
the thing about a good media or news executive.
Speaker 2 (19:20):
They know what.
Speaker 3 (19:22):
Positions people should be playing, So you need that sort
of a personality.
Speaker 2 (19:26):
Same thing with Chris. Chris is a star. He's great
for cable news at night. Chris Cuomo, he's great for
cable news at night. I thought I was.
Speaker 3 (19:32):
Great for cable news that night, you know, and people
wanted to tune in, they wanted to tune into us.
Rachel Maddow perfect cable news host.
Speaker 1 (19:40):
But I think that people when I watched news, having
grown up and having had news having a very sacred
place in my life, it was sacred. The news was
very important to me. And now when I see the news,
it's just weird. There's a chemistry. You have to have
a chemistry with that person, you know, like I used
to listen to He's a good friend of mine. I
love Kurt Anderson. And when Kurt had that show Studio
(20:02):
three sixty on NPO, I.
Speaker 2 (20:03):
Loved that show.
Speaker 1 (20:04):
That was my favorite podcast, along with This American Life
for Kurt Anderson.
Speaker 3 (20:09):
And you don't feel you have that connection to any
of the news folks with you.
Speaker 1 (20:12):
I love watching you on TV. I'm not just saying
that I thought you were great. I mean were you
had the right chemistry. I mean beyond you being a
handsome guy and being stylish and being this and that.
Speaker 2 (20:21):
Thank you, but you had a great delivery.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
It was really it was easy to watch you where
there's people that I watch and I go, well, maybe
a little less of you.
Speaker 3 (20:28):
But it's the same thing with knowing who's a good
reporter and who's a good anchor. Very few people can
do both, and people don't realize it. They don't understand
that like anchoring a show, it's another world. It's not
easy and you have to hold someone's attention. But I
think now in this day and age, people think that, Okay,
they're a good reporter, so therefore they're a good anchor,
and I disagree with that. You can have someone who
can anchor a show who is not necessarily the best
(20:50):
journalists in the world, but they're interesting. But when there
are big breaking news stories, then you throw to the
person who's the good report.
Speaker 2 (20:58):
The YouTube thing is on what time? Now, you're on
the air? Went I'm on the air?
Speaker 3 (21:00):
Well, it lives forever on YouTube. But I do a
five o'clock show every day, which was not how I
envisioned doing it. I do a five o'clock live show
every day where I just talk to the subscribers and
talk to them about things that's happening and what they
should know before they, you know, go home or have dinner.
But then I just started one at ten am, which
is sort of a hot topic show where I'm trying
to get away from the politics, you know, and the
(21:23):
hard news and do things that are a little lighter.
Speaker 2 (21:24):
But everything in.
Speaker 3 (21:25):
The zeitgeist now is politics. You know, they're eating the
dogs or eating the cats. That goes over, you know,
it all spills over.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
Author and anchor Don Lemon.
Speaker 1 (21:38):
If you enjoy conversations with famous broadcasters, check out my
episode with the legendary Dan Rather.
Speaker 5 (21:45):
When the first faint edge is what we came to
know is Watergate. You can do merge. I was skeptical
that it would reach the Oval Office itself. You never
met anybody who had more respect for the office of
the Presidency in the United States than I do. It
was very difficult for me to accept that the president
himself would be involved in a way. However, as time
(22:07):
went along, facts begin to first whisper, then they begin
to speak in full voice, and then the facts begin
to shout. It isn't just lower level campaign oppertunities, It
isn't just lower level members of the administration. That this
probably goes into the Oval Office itself.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
To hear more of my conversation with Dan Rather, go
to Here's the Thing dot Org. After the break, Don
Lemon tells us how a tragic event led to him
rethinking his relationship with God and with his faith. I'm
(22:51):
Alec Baldwin and you're listening to here's the thing. Don
Lemon's new book, I Once Was Lost My Search for
God in America details his very personal examination of his faith.
But this is not Lemma's first foray in the publishing world.
Speaker 2 (23:09):
I've written three books.
Speaker 3 (23:10):
This is a fire debut at number one New York
Times during the George Floyd thing when that all happened
in twenty twenty one.
Speaker 1 (23:16):
And the first thing I said to you when I
came backstage to just give you a quick carget the
book party was you should write another book.
Speaker 3 (23:21):
And I'm like, I don't know, man, it's tough, Alec,
It's so tough, and you don't know.
Speaker 2 (23:26):
You know it was. It was easier in the sense.
Speaker 3 (23:30):
What was easier was the selling of the book, when
I had that big engine behind me of CNN, where
I could mention at any moment, you know, it's in
my book, and by the way, you can go buy
it and blah blah blah blah blah. Or in the
commercial break, I would say throw my book up, and
as we go to commercial and say, by the way,
my book is on sale and you can get it
at Barnes and Noble or any book store. They were fine,
that would help them. And so I was able to
do that with that book. I can't do it with
(23:51):
this book. I have to sell this book, which is good.
Speaker 5 (23:52):
For you know.
Speaker 2 (23:53):
I don't mind.
Speaker 3 (23:53):
I can't do it on YouTube, can Yeah, of course
I do it on YouTube. I think some people are
getting sick of it. But writing it is hard. It's
like you're putting your heart out there. It's like you're
wearing your heart outside of your body, not in the
way that you have kids. But you don't know how
people are going to receive it, if they're going to
trample on, if they're going to trash you, if it's
going to sell.
Speaker 2 (24:09):
It's just the whole thing. And you know, it's.
Speaker 1 (24:11):
More personal than anything you might do because it's you
and I make a movie. Somebody else is directing the movie,
you know what I mean. Now, you come from a
I don't want to say religious so that you use
the word. You want to describe the family you came
from in terms of faith.
Speaker 3 (24:23):
Well, I came from a family who was faithful. Let's
put it that way. They had faith. My mother was
not as churchy as they say, as my aunt was,
she's got Alzheimer's now a holy roller. You know, she'd
never missed a sermon. She was on the usher board
and all of that stuff. My mom was in the choir,
but she wasn't quite as religious as her the rest
(24:48):
of her family. But my grandmother was as well. You know,
there are members and you pay their dues. I'm sure
my mom still pays dues for the church. She just
doesn't go as often as you know one would think.
But I went to I grew up Baptist. I would
go to church, and then I'd go to Sunday Bible
School in the Baptist Church, and then I'd go to
vacation Bible School in the summer in the Baptist Church.
(25:09):
And during the week during the school year, I went
to the Catholic school and we would do Catechism, and
then we'd have Mass on Friday every Friday, and then
if it was a special holiday, we'd have Mass then.
And then in the morning we would line up like
a military school, hand out front of the hands on
the shoulder, and we'd line up by height, and then
we'd have the announcement and we'd do the Star spangled
(25:31):
banner and the pledge allegiance, and then we would pray,
and then we'd go to class in lines like a
military school. And then you would before you go to
a recess or whatever. You talked about it in the
book how much you liked pray. I liked it because
it was because it gave you discipline, and you had
a regimen, and we're part of something. You were part
of something, and there was a stability there that you had.
You know, Okay, we got to go to the recess.
(25:51):
We stand up, we pray that we're going to be
safe at recess, and then we all line up and
we go down to the yard and we have the recess,
and then we come back. And then before we went
to lunch, we pray, you know, over our meal, and
then we come back and we pray whatever. So and
then if an adult enter the class, you'd say good afternoon,
mister ball Win, and you'd stand up, and we did
(26:12):
not sit down until mister Baldwin.
Speaker 2 (26:14):
Would say you were told to good afternoon class. You
may be seated, you may be seated. It was a
different world, amazing, right, you know my faith.
Speaker 1 (26:21):
I'm a Catholic and I'm still Catholic, and I go
to church periodically. I go into waves and I go
to hear that man speak. Yeah, I'm in Los Angeles
and Father Torchison, who was the head guy there at
Saint Monica's, I go hear him speak. I go went
to the city and go to Blessed Sacrament on seventy
first Street off of Broadway, and watch this a couple
of guys speak. But my guys in East Tampton who
(26:43):
came out for the swing mass in the summertime. So
I go down in the summer and I get my
community and I wait for him as he came out
of the recessional before everybody else mobbed him, and I
said to me, he's alone.
Speaker 2 (26:54):
I get him a lot.
Speaker 1 (26:54):
I pulled him aside from the other people with a
recession and I go, I want to do the confession
the reconcilly face to face. And he literally he's like
this kid from Rosedale Queens. She goes, ah, you want
to do that? He goes, oh please, I go no,
I want to do that. I want to please. I
can't stand that, because are you sorry for what you did?
In the name of the father room the son the
only spit you're absolved. Oh please, don't make me do that.
(27:15):
Like we were pals. That's why we're not in that
racket anymore. We're friends.
Speaker 2 (27:19):
And I thought, oh God, I can't believe that much
of this church has changed. Change. You want to do that?
You know, if you want to do that? Please? He said,
get away. I don't want to talk about that nonsense.
Speaker 1 (27:29):
And I was like, Oh God, who's going to hear
my confession on him?
Speaker 2 (27:33):
See, my friend.
Speaker 3 (27:34):
I still can remember my the priest's voices in my
We have Father Hines, I can remember his big deep
and then we had Father Elwood, and I can just remember.
Their voices are stuck in my head because I was
in Catholic Church so much.
Speaker 1 (27:46):
But but what I want to switch to this idea
that obviously with what I've been through in recent couple
of years, this very difficult situation I was dealing with.
It was painful on a level I can't even give
words do. I literally can't even describe to people how
much I suffered from that. And you were is the
summoning of your faith in your adult life and in
recent years when there was tough times for you, did
(28:07):
you get into digging for help in that direction.
Speaker 2 (28:09):
Yes, I did.
Speaker 3 (28:10):
But first of all, I want to say I'm happy
that you that's over, and you know everyone was praying
for you and we all got what was happening.
Speaker 2 (28:16):
So thank you for standing tough. I really appreciate that.
Speaker 3 (28:20):
So, yes, I've always been a faithful person, but as
my mother is, I'm not a churchy person, but I'm
a believer and I've always prayed and hoped and had faith,
and I've had to summon it more often than not.
I don't wear it on my sleeve because I don't
believe in that. I don't believe in pushing my faith
my religion on anyone else, and it's a personal thing
(28:42):
for me. I had a crisis of faith in twenty
eighteen when my sister died suddenly in an accidental drowning,
and that was I started thinking about this.
Speaker 2 (28:49):
How old was she?
Speaker 3 (28:50):
She was I think fifty nine and at the time,
and I started to question God, like why would God
do that? You know, it's supposed to be a benevolent God,
and I know there are bad things that happened all
the time, and you realize that intellectually until something happens
to you right, and you go, why did this happen
to me?
Speaker 2 (29:07):
And so I asked why? Why? Why?
Speaker 3 (29:08):
And I dug deep and then I said why not?
And I tried to figure out, you know, why this
was why you.
Speaker 2 (29:14):
Read that somewhere It wasn't aver quote in the book
about someone said well why there was a quote in
the book. But also I'd heard that before.
Speaker 3 (29:21):
But also Anderson Cooper's mom, Gloria Benderbilt, said the same thing.
She said, you know, people would go why me, why me?
Speaker 2 (29:27):
Why me? Why not me?
Speaker 3 (29:28):
And then there was in my family there was a
similar sort of saying why not you so figure out
why it happened to you? Why this is happening to you,
And there's a reason, and maybe it's just to make
you stronger.
Speaker 2 (29:39):
I don't know.
Speaker 3 (29:40):
I would much prefer not to go through such things.
And so I started questioning, why would God take my sister.
She has beautiful kids, she has beautiful grandkids. She was
so proud of her grandson, who was a great basketball player,
a great football player.
Speaker 2 (29:52):
She went to every game like what why? Why? Why son?
That happened?
Speaker 3 (29:56):
And then after I started thinking about this book, and
then the George Floyd thing, happened, and I had pitched
this George Floyd book and no one wanted to buy it,
not George Floyd, but about racism, and no one wanted
to buy it. And then you know, the thing happened
and everyone's.
Speaker 2 (30:08):
Like, can you write that book? And I'm like, okay,
So I wrote it. It was number one.
Speaker 3 (30:12):
But I started having this sort of crisis of faith,
and then I started writing the book, and it was
going to be sort of this, you know, a coda
to the last book, and where I was just going
to you know, move from racism and a little bit
more into religion. And I was going to interview religious
figures and people folks like you, and talk about their faith.
And then when I left CNN, it became something else.
(30:33):
I think it became a much better and more personal book.
So yes, it's a long story short, a long story long.
I have had, you know, points in my life where
I had to lean on my religion and the Lord,
and I don't really talk to people about it.
Speaker 1 (30:46):
Yeah, it's interesting when you work in this business. It
could be anywhere a film and television or news of
whatever medium, cable or a streaming network. You're around and
you said, this word a lot in the book cynical.
You're around a lot of cynical people.
Speaker 2 (31:00):
Yeah, and that's our journalists are generally right. Generally you're
right there, of course they are.
Speaker 1 (31:05):
And you sit there and you think, what's it like
to go minute to minute through an experience with a
bunch of cynical people, Like, was there anybody at work
who was faith based even to some degree you could
talk about it with? Was it all just family and
close friends and tim?
Speaker 3 (31:19):
It was all just family and family and close friends,
But mostly it was just me Alan, right, I didn't
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (31:27):
It's an inside job.
Speaker 3 (31:28):
And I remember, you know, things would get so tough
because doing what I did was a very stressful. There's
a high pressure job, high wire job, every night live
and you're like, oh, something comes out of your mouth
and there's always something Why did you say this?
Speaker 2 (31:41):
Why do you do this?
Speaker 3 (31:42):
Other people hate you here, other than mad at you here?
You got to give this response here, and I'm like,
oh my god, Like why most people just go to
nine to five job, they go home. It's like you
screwed up up, you know, you round it up, you know, yeah,
so and then you get over it. And then when
that would happen to my sister and all the other
things that would happen, I would count. I would say,
you know, God got my steps, one, two, three, and
(32:04):
I would just count my step.
Speaker 2 (32:05):
I would take step by step, by step by step, and.
Speaker 3 (32:07):
I would count my steps to the studio sometimes, especially
when my sister died, because you never knew when it
was going to hit you, and so I would have
to like think about things that go, you know, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, steps. Okay, tonight,
I'm going to talk about you know, Trump and you know,
very fine people on both sides, both sides, and I
would just have to keep and I would say, Lord,
when I get there, help me see both sides, or
(32:28):
help me whatever. And then I would just I would
just pay it and say, okay, you know, get the
IFB on it. And then I'd say, okay, God, here
we go. Just don't let it happen. Don't let me
get sad during the middle of a segment of start
crying or whatever, and so let me be focused or whatever.
And then you know, the music would come up and
I would just I would say, and when they would
say go, that's when I would snap out of it.
Speaker 1 (32:49):
Right with this New Mexico event, I sat there saying
to myself, what do you want me to do? There
must be something you want me to do, you want
me to change, you want me to do.
Speaker 2 (32:58):
This or that.
Speaker 1 (32:59):
I prayed harder for them to dismiss the case prior
on the gun charge, and they denied us. So when
I go to trial and I didn't get my way before,
and I begged God, I begged, I'll never forget. I
watched the crown and the Queen of England is on
her knees praying next to her bed, and I go,
if the Queen of England can get on her knees
(33:19):
and pray, why can't I? And I got on my knees.
And sometimes I'm crying, and I go, Please, what do
you want me to learn from this and do from this?
I said, please make this case be dismissed on this charge.
And later on it played out the way it played.
I go, if you take your hands off the steering
wheel and stop white knuckling the steering wheel and trying
to control and manage everything, maybe something wonderful with results.
Speaker 2 (33:40):
Yes, that was the hand of God.
Speaker 3 (33:42):
Yeah, sometimes you just have to say, you know, as
you said, take your hands off the wheel and just
pray that you're going to be okay.
Speaker 2 (33:49):
What do you want me to do? I'm okay with
whatever it will is show me. So did you let me?
I'm going to be a journalist. Did it change it?
Speaker 1 (33:57):
That situation changed me a lot in terms of my
feelings about having my children and getting remarried and having
so many kids, which is something that I you know,
I kind of knew what I was doing, and people
don't think you do. Then they go, you wake up
one morning and somebody goes, oh, hypede on a stick,
and oh guess what?
Speaker 2 (34:14):
You know?
Speaker 1 (34:14):
It's like, it's not all silly, and COVID happened, the
strike happened, and overlapping with the strike was also my
problem in New Mexico. What it made me do is
people would say, my god, now you can get back
to your old life, and I go, I don't want
to get back to my own lives.
Speaker 2 (34:28):
That's what I'm asking you. This is my life. Now,
are you kids? Are you more compassionate? Yes?
Speaker 1 (34:33):
If compassion means everybody I meet, I have to say
to myself, they're going through somebody. Now I want to
switch the topic or to you and fame and bet carpets.
Speaker 3 (34:41):
But I understand how you feel, especially about because people
when they meet me, they say you're different than what
I read about, because people often let their enemies and
their detractors define them, and you know, similarly to you,
the right wing media hates me, so they write the
worst shit about me, And then people meet me who
are conservative and even Trump supporters, and they're like, wa,
you're not at all like what I read about in
(35:01):
the New York Post And you're like, no, I'm not
that person at all.
Speaker 1 (35:04):
Is it funny how you can be somewhere in a
kind of benign setting. You're walking through a park and
with my kids at some store, and you see people
and you see the way within under a second, with
in a fraction of a second, you see them regard
you in a way with their eyes where you who
know they're maga.
Speaker 2 (35:18):
Republicans and they're like, oh god, it's him. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (35:22):
And I go walking to them and their kids playing,
and I go, what's this little one's name? And you
try to charm them and they're totally freaked out and
they're like, my god, I can't normalize you like I
can't handle it right now. You're an asshole when you
have to remain an asshole.
Speaker 2 (35:33):
I know that. I know that very well.
Speaker 1 (35:37):
Journalists and anchor Don Lemon, if you're enjoying this conversation,
tell a friend and be sure to follow Here's the
Thing on the iHeartRadio app, Spotify or wherever you get
your podcasts. When we come back. Don Lemon shares his
thoughts on the cancel deal with Elon Musk and the
X platform. Following just one broadcast, I'm Alec Baldwin and
(36:08):
you're listening to Here's the Thing. Don Lemon's recent wedding
to his partner of eight years, Tim Malone, was heavily
covered in the press. The pair are often photographed on
the red carpet and at stylish events like New York
Fashion Week. I wanted to know how a serious newsman
navigates his relationship with fame.
Speaker 3 (36:30):
That is not why I got into the business, It says,
you know, right, And I didn't get into this business thing.
I was going to make a lot of money, but
you became. But I became famous, And you know what,
I'm enjoying my life. I'm happy. And if that fame
if that comes with it. If I get a better
table at a restaurant, then so be it. But does
that enjoy it? Yeah, I'm enjoying it. And there are
(36:50):
so many people who came before me who didn't get
to do that. And just because I'm a journalist, it
doesn't mean that I'm not a person. It doesn't mean
that I don't enjoy getting out and meeting people. Doesn't
mean that I don't enjoy going on red carpets. Are
going to you know, beautiful events. Why wouldn't I. I'm
a human being. I think it's okay. Just because you're journalist,
it doesn't mean that you're not, you know, a full person,
(37:12):
a multi dimensional person, and I am. And so you
know what, I'm just enjoying my life. I'm grateful that
i'm here. I don't know how many days are ahead
of me, and while i'm here, I'm going to get
the best out of it.
Speaker 2 (37:22):
The only reason you're on those red carpets is you're
good looking. That's the I think it's about you. Maybe
it's I don't know. I think it's both.
Speaker 3 (37:29):
Yes, But I also think I'm there because I am
enjoying it. If I wasn't enjoying it, I wouldn't be there,
wouldn't I enjoyed my job. I enjoyed what I you know,
my profession and what I did, and I think that
that shines through and so I think that that's what
made me, you know, a star, so to speak, right
in this business.
Speaker 2 (37:44):
Even those your warmth, No, why would I? That's important.
Speaker 1 (37:47):
There's a magic mist that has to exude from you.
It has to be admitted by you on camera, whether
it comes through your eyes or anywhere you have to
convey to your audience.
Speaker 2 (37:56):
There's no place out I'd rather be than here with
you right right?
Speaker 1 (38:00):
Would when you do see that, you go, Hi, I'm
don Lemon, and tonight I want to tell you Abeppa.
Speaker 2 (38:04):
They're with you, yes, and you know I couldn't wait.
Speaker 3 (38:06):
I would tell them like I couldn't wait to get
here to tell you this story today.
Speaker 2 (38:10):
So let's go.
Speaker 1 (38:11):
It's like the journalists equivalent of someone walking up to
and going, would you like to dance?
Speaker 2 (38:15):
Charlie? Dance? There's an engagement between you when you're running. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (38:19):
Now, two quick things. One is the election. And I
believe that everybody who talks and kind of piles on
online or anywhere about Trump is completely wasting their time.
Speaker 2 (38:26):
What else are there to say about him? Do you
believe in poles?
Speaker 3 (38:30):
I believe poles are a snapshot in time. I believe
in polls less so now than I did before. We
all learned our lesson from twenty sixteen and then twenty
twenty as well. But I think this time is going
to be surprising. I think it's going to be surprising.
I think she has a real chance. We had no
chance with Biden. I admired, I my operation for him,
but he was old. But I think there's a hidden
(38:51):
vote for Trump with black men. I think even with
some women that you know, they still love him. And
I think with college students, I don't I know, and
I don't get it either.
Speaker 2 (39:01):
I don't get it, but I.
Speaker 1 (39:02):
Don't get Also, is it there's a person who came
in who knew nothing about government. He held no office, not
even a mayoralty, not a governor, or as an executive,
not a legislator in Congress or a state house. He
knew nothing about government, and he served in the White
House for four years and he still doesn't know anything.
So it doesn't know.
Speaker 2 (39:16):
You know that people are what they do, we're shocking.
To me, it shouldn't be shocking. But the folks on
his side.
Speaker 3 (39:22):
Say she's not qualified and she has no experience, and
I'm like, wait, do you know who you're supporting?
Speaker 2 (39:27):
Am I? Are you insane? She's a senator, vice president,
she's the attorney general. She's a bright woman. Yeah, she's
everything he isn't ye?
Speaker 1 (39:36):
All right, Musk, I just want to say with Musk,
you know, Musk is like we were joking before you
got in here. The Musk to me is like Howard
Hughes meets Mickey Rooney. He's like this loopy, nutty guy
that's constantly slamming the door in his hand and screwing
himself up public relations wise. But he's also an engineering
genius or whatever, and he's made all this money and
(39:57):
sold cars, which is one of the most difficult things
on earth to do, is to create a car and
sell it to this country. When you went in to
talk to him, I mean, obviously you were poised to
work with him or for him at that company and
do your show on X and that blew up. But
when you were there, did you say to yourself, he's
not much different? From a lot of other network executives.
I know you didn't have any trepidation.
Speaker 2 (40:17):
Well, let me say this.
Speaker 3 (40:19):
I am in ongoing and pending litigation out of him,
so I can't really say a lot. But what I
can say is that I went into this with the
best of intentions, and at first I did not want
to do it. It took some cajoling and some convincing,
and finally I did. I did not work for him.
He was not my boss. He was not hiring me.
What I had was a content deal with him, a
(40:40):
distribution deal where they would have a certain exclusive material
for an amount of time and then it would go everywhere.
So you know, why not do it? Because I wanted to.
What I wanted to do was what he and they said,
to get on the platform and to be a counter
to all of the sort of right wing conspiracy theorists
(41:01):
that are out there. And you know that, you know,
lasted all of half a day. So it didn't work out.
So I feel, you know, it's awful that it didn't
work out. It wasn't great for me.
Speaker 2 (41:11):
It wasn't what you hoped.
Speaker 3 (41:12):
It wasn't what I hoped, But you know, I'd worked
with difficult people, but usually that's in within the confines
of a business that it does not play out publicly
like it did. He's a very consequential person to the world,
and he has a very big and powerful platform that
can affect lives, livelihood and even people's safety, and one
(41:34):
I believe must be and should be careful and more
responsible with that.
Speaker 2 (41:39):
What do you hope people will take from this book?
Speaker 3 (41:42):
The biggest thing is that I want people to understand
that we don't and shouldn't live in a theocracy, but
it's going that way. And if you go through difficult periods,
as you well know, if you trust the process, which
is really called faith. People always say trust the process, right,
which is really faith for me is that it's going
to be okay. And if it's not okay, then usually
(42:03):
we don't know about it, but usually things work out
for the best. And I think it's you have to
have the right mentality, and you have to have the
right faith, and you have to have people around you
who love you as you well know, as you are, yeah,
and love you for who you are, love you for
who you are, and so but I want people to
get to know my story. I tell my story alec
(42:24):
and America story through the lens of religion and faith
in this country. And I wrote this book because of
my love for the country and my love for God,
and I wanted people to have an insight on how
it shaped my life and my world. And I fought
against the evangelical teachings that sought to marginalize me.
Speaker 1 (42:47):
I want you to read something. You always ask authors
to read a piece of their book.
Speaker 3 (42:51):
Okay, this is an excerpt for my book, I Once
was lost my search for God in America. These days,
a lot of people here and abroad associate the American
flag the most bellicose, narrow minded ideology. Because the ones
waving that flag loudest and hardest are bellicose, narrow minded ideologues.
They wave the flag as a symbol of the America.
(43:12):
They envision a country that belongs to them by divine right,
not the United States we all share. And to drive
that point home, they carried the stars and stripes alongside
the stars and bars of the Confederacy, a treasonous junta
that literally tore the United States apart in a bloody
effort to preserve slavery as an economic engine. The term
(43:35):
Christian nationalism rings out with faux nobility, but it's a
wolf in sheep's clothing, white supremacy, cloaked and evangelical religiosity.
Speaker 1 (43:45):
This section is some of the best writing in the book.
I must say now, the other thing I want to
say is for me, I want people to take that idea,
how we can reframe all that discussion about what it
means to be a patriot and be an American Menon,
You're one of many people who pursued that in this book.
But what I got from this book was your It's
a call. It's a call to say to people, we
all need to take a break from this world, this loud, cacaphanous,
(44:10):
commercialized world, and take a moment to connect with something spiritual.
It doesn't have to be a religion, to just connect
to something where we can settle ourselves. How can you
calm yourself and make yourself the better you on a
day to day basis? I mean, I get this from
this book book.
Speaker 3 (44:26):
Do you realize that you answered that question earlier when
you said that, no matter how someone treats you or
who they are, when you meet someone, you try to
approach them as if they're going through something, going through
what are they going through? And so as I write
and here, I believe that what's important to convey is
that we keep trying to Most people keep trying to
(44:47):
find look at, you know, create God in their own image,
when we should be looking for God's image and other people.
And as long as you do that, I think that's
the answer. That's how you settle yourself. You're talking about
this about patriotism. I say in this book that as
a black man, I have a complicated relationship with a flag,
(45:10):
and as a gay man, I have a complicated relationship
with a Bible. But I was able to overcome that
by using critical thinking and trying to find love in
my fellow man rather than judging people and trying to
create God in my own image.
Speaker 1 (45:25):
You think you have your doubts about everybody comes out
of It's like having a baby. You write a book
and when it's done, you're like, oh, I'm never doing that.
But the thing is that you write these books because
I have a theory which is that these are bricks.
These are bricks, and this is one of your bricks
that you're building a library, a world library. These are bricks.
I have a theory where when the aliens come and
take over and destroy this world, they're going to erase
(45:47):
every tape in every CD and every DVD that's just scarbage,
and they're gonna pick up a book and they go, now,
what's this and they're going to want to go there's
more thoughtful, This is more you, more of your heart
is in this. I mean, your work in television is exemplary.
I mean I don't want you to give up writing books.
Speaker 2 (46:02):
Thank you, Alec. I think you're right.
Speaker 3 (46:04):
It's like we have all of these photographs in our
cell phones, and then where do they go when we're
not here? When I go to your house, right, your
family's there, you're there, but I'm looking at the pictures
on the wall and I go around and look and
where's this from? Where's this moment from? But no one
goes into your phone and does that. And that's the
same thing that you're saying about the books and erasing
things that are digital, because.
Speaker 1 (46:23):
Throughout the moment, yeah, thank you, thank you, My thanks
to Don Lemon. Here's the Thing is recorded at CDM
Studios in New York City. This episode was produced by
Kathleen russo Zach MacNeice and Maureen Hobin. Our engineer is
Frank Imperial. Our social media manager is Danielle Gingrich. I'm
(46:45):
Alec Baldwin. Here's the thing that is brought to you
by iHeart Radio
This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the
Thing from iHeart Radio. The last few years have seen
drastic changes in the rapidly evolving landscape of cable and
streaming television. You know the times have changed when even
the news is making news. At CNN, there were reports
(00:22):
of chaos and uncertainty, the sudden resignation of President Jeff Zucker,
followed by the installation of his successor, Qus Licked, and
drastic changes to their lineup. One of the biggest changes
moving my guest Today. CNN Tonight anchored Don Lemon to
Mornings after a decade in prime time. Shortly after, Lemon
(00:45):
made some controversial comments on air and was unceremoniously fired
from the network seventeen years into his tenure. Now, he
has released a book, I Once Was Lost My Search
for God in America, a day deeply personal journey of
his faith through difficult times that also takes a hard
look at politics.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
And religion in America Today. The Emmy winning journalist launched
a new series earlier this year, The Don Lemon Show,
on streaming podcast platforms and on YouTube. I wanted to
know how he made the decision of where to launch
his new show.
Speaker 3 (01:23):
YouTube is the number one network in the world. It
has surpassed Netflix. It's because everyone has that computer in
their pocket, and that is the new television. It's the
same thing you watch it, but it's just a different
form of distribution. So if I can go there, create
content and pretty much do exactly what I want to do,
why not. That's why I chose YouTube. Also, Alec, I
(01:45):
have some contractual obligations. As you know, you're in the business,
you have non competes and all of that. So I
had to find a place where I could go and
do what I do and create model cable non network
that doesn't compete with my contract at the old.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
Now I want to touch on that, I'm going to
We've got two things here overacy, career and faith. The
book is called I Once Was Lost, and I went
to your book signing event where you were interviewed by
Zucker who was very funny.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
By the way, I was surprised. He's very good.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
So you go to YouTube oversely, there's a noncompete aspect
in there. But to describe your career in television and
when that ended? What ended you started at CNN, what
year two thousand and six, and you started doing what
I started as.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
Let's see, Oh wow, it's been so long ago.
Speaker 3 (02:35):
Two thousand and six, I was the afternoon anchor on
CNN Newsroom from one to four in the afternoon, and
you did that for how long? I did that for
about eight years or so?
Speaker 2 (02:45):
Eight years? Yeah, yeah, thirteen to fourteen. I moved on.
I moved to New York.
Speaker 3 (02:49):
I was in Atlanta, and you move on to do
what show I moved on to do. I did weekend
evenings for a while to sort of create, you know,
get my own voice, develop my own voice. And then
Jeff Souker took over and said, hey, you're pretty talented.
Who was in charge before Zucker Jim Walton was ahead
of the network here, and Zuker took over and he
wanted you want in the evening? He put you on
in the evening.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
Yes, I went to Zucker because I did.
Speaker 3 (03:10):
I hated Atlanta and I'm a New Yorker even though
I grew up in Louisiana, I'm a New Yorker by heart.
And I said, hey, listen, it's been great working here.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
I'm out of here.
Speaker 3 (03:20):
I said, I can't live in Atlanta anymore. So thanks,
you know, I'm glad you just took over the network.
Blah blah blah blah, he said. He said, yeah, he said,
you don't have to You're moving to New York. And
that was it, and you did the evening on the weekends,
and then you did your evening show starting when how
long was it?
Speaker 2 (03:34):
So weekends?
Speaker 3 (03:35):
I did the evenings on the weekends for a while.
I think I did the evenings for you know, five years.
Look the afternoon. I'm sort of, you know, sort of
mixing that in the evening because I started the evening
in Atlanta and then I continue the evening in New York.
And Jeff would sort of mentor me, you know, because
he's he watched twenty four hours a day son breaking news.
Speaker 2 (03:53):
Tell you.
Speaker 3 (03:54):
He would say, breaking news, I need you to stay
on for another hour. We're going to blow out the
medical show and need you to stay on and do this,
repeat the breaking news.
Speaker 2 (04:03):
You know. Or he didn't coach at style. No, no,
not at all, because he liked my style. He liked
me being me.
Speaker 3 (04:08):
He's he would if anything, he would say, lean into it,
so he would say, you know, recap, tell the audience.
You know it's breaking news, what it is. He wouldn't
tell me what to say. He would say a good
question might be something like this, and I wouldn't ask it,
you know, exactly as he would say if I wanted
to do it. But he wouldn't get upset if I
didn't do it. So you could do audibles like quarterbacks,
(04:29):
Yes I could. And then he started. I had me
filling in on every single show. I'd fill in the afternoon,
I'd fill in the morning, I would do my evening show,
and he would send me on big stories.
Speaker 2 (04:38):
And he was He really developed me.
Speaker 1 (04:40):
And you started doing your show, the big show, the
evening show.
Speaker 3 (04:43):
Win I started doing my show. Aaron Burnett went out
on maternity leave and Jeff said, I want you to
take over for her from maternity leave. So her entire
couple months she was off, I filled in at seven
o'clock show. It was me and I did my weekend
shoe So I was working seven days a week and
I didn't mind it.
Speaker 2 (05:00):
I loved it.
Speaker 1 (05:01):
Actually, you're doing the mornings, and you're doing and morning shows,
which have become so bizarre to me, I know, I
said to people, And I love all these people meant
I love Katie Cork. But the last time I watched
the Today Show was when Katie Cork was on with
lour and they did a I guess maybe it was
for Halloween. They all dressed up and clothing and they
sang diamonds are a Girl's best friend as she's walking
(05:22):
down a staircase, a glittering staircase or whatever, and I thought,
I'm done. I don't know, I want the news, maybe
tell some jokes or whatever. But they turned it into
an entertainment show. But mornings it's obviously a different ball game.
Even weekends, maybe you're a different ballgame. So what adjustments
do you have to make in your style to be
on in the evening?
Speaker 2 (05:39):
Oh? Well, I'm an evening guy.
Speaker 3 (05:41):
The only reason I did the mornings is because and
you told me, you know, when I did the like,
she said, no one wants to see you in the morning,
And you were right. I'm not a morning person. I'm
not very good in the morning. I'm not good on coffee.
Caffeine makes me jittery. I don't know what I'm saying
or doing. So I did it because my company asked
me to do it, and I was being a team player,
but it was not a good fit for me. The
adjustment is is that you're constantly sleeping, you have.
Speaker 2 (06:03):
To get up. I'm a night oul.
Speaker 3 (06:04):
I don't go to go to bed until two or
three in the morning, and I'm up at you know,
maybe ten right before I would you know, i'd have
to wake up when I mean, when I was doing
the mornings, I had to wake up at four in
the morning, right, I know what it'll be. It was really,
really tough. So that's really the adjustment. I'm a cool
cat at night. I like it, and I like that
that late time slot. Working at night, I do too,
and I get my best Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (06:26):
I do movies.
Speaker 1 (06:27):
And the guy said to me, we're in a black
box theater shooting this movie for all these scenes inside
this theater for a month in Florida. And he says, so,
no windows, know nothing, no light dependent at all. He goes,
we can shoot whenever we want. He goes, what time
you want to go to work?
Speaker 2 (06:41):
Love it? And I said none, I'm going to shoot
noon to midnight. Yeah, and we did. We shot noon
to midnight for four weeks. I was in heaven. I
was like man, I'm just getting going.
Speaker 3 (06:49):
Yeah, I like about seven or eight at night, like
my best work. I don't wake up that late, but
my best work is at night. So having that ten
o'clock slot was perfect for me. And then you know,
I was on until midnight every night, but that was
when I would get that energy.
Speaker 2 (07:03):
And you're like being solo. Oh, I love the co
anchors for a while. It's tough. You didn't like that format.
Speaker 3 (07:08):
No, I'm a team player, but not in that way.
I have my own flow and everybody can't keep up
with me, you know.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
And and doubles tennis, they're not the best partner. Yeah,
at your game, and you got to you gotta have
a good part of that. You have to have someone
who can keep up with you.
Speaker 3 (07:22):
And you know, I don't mean that in a you know,
I'm not diminishing anyone, but someone like a Kara Swisher personal. Yeah,
like someone like a Kara Swisher or a Joy Behar
or someone they could keep up with me. They get
my sense of humor and they don't take anything personally
and they can give it or take it as good
as they give it, right, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (07:39):
I love that kind of it. They didn't want to
demonize or criminalize your moderances. No, because they they under
they they their pals and they get me. It's not personal.
Speaker 3 (07:49):
It's just we're just we're just sitting having a conversation
and people say all kinds of things and conversations and
it's not personal. It's just your talking. And when you talk,
you say things. You go, ah, I don't.
Speaker 4 (07:58):
Mean that, Okay, all right, right, so I said some shit,
that was great, whatever, and you just move on. But
you can't do that with everybody, because you know, especially
like younger folks, everything is like a personal affront.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
Well, you walk in on the set of a project,
and when you're around young people, I find that there's
a potential for certain difficulties. So I've never had any
problems with this myself. I never had any I've had
other problems obviously, but not that one. And you walk
onto the set, especially of a film, and you're there
and people they're tents, and you don't realize how tense there.
(08:29):
They're scared younger people. You come on and there. I mean,
I've made whatever number of movies, I've made one hundred movies,
ninety movies, whatever, I take pictures with people now, but
I got taught by somebody famous. You put your arm
out and they hook their elbow around your elbow, and
they go, why do you want to do that? A
few of them would say, and I say, I can't
put my hand behind your body, and you got it.
My hand can't be hidden behind your back in the photogo.
(08:50):
All the games you've got to play?
Speaker 2 (08:51):
Now? Which are which?
Speaker 5 (08:53):
Was?
Speaker 2 (08:53):
I'm concerned? No, but you're right about that. You said
you've done so many movies. I had been.
Speaker 3 (08:56):
I think I was doing the afternoons from six about nine,
and then I started doing the weekend evenings, and so
I've been doing the weekend evenings. I'd been solo, I
should say, from about two thousand and nine to twenty
twenty three or twenty twenty two, and so I was
just used to my own flow and people, you know,
were used to me just being me, and so I
(09:17):
had been there for quite some time solo anchor.
Speaker 2 (09:20):
And you know, people come in and they're like they
you know, they don't get it.
Speaker 1 (09:23):
You know, now when you do a show like that
for people who don't know, because I find this behind
the scenes very interesting. You come in there, you come in.
The show was on the air at ten. The big
show was on a ten. You did the past two
with Chris and then everybody thought that was very entertaining
the two of you.
Speaker 3 (09:38):
It's the biggest compliment that people say about that and
about my show. They say that was the last appointment
television for the network. Was that handoff and then going
on the show.
Speaker 2 (09:49):
Yeah. But the thing that people don't understand is you
get there what time?
Speaker 3 (09:53):
It would depend if I if I had a pre tape,
I would go in earlier. But at the end I
moved across the street from the office, so it would
take me literally a minute, minute and a half to
be on the set because I lived and it was
in huts and yards.
Speaker 2 (10:07):
So I would go to work probably about eight eight thirty.
So you're not there at three o'clock writing.
Speaker 3 (10:12):
No, I'm doing that from home, got it because basically
my office is not much further from the set than
my home was. But before that, I would probably get
to work about six, right And the reason I did
that part of it was because of Jeff.
Speaker 2 (10:26):
Jeff said, why are you working on the show so early?
Your show?
Speaker 3 (10:29):
Why are you guys in the morning meeting the morning
meetings at nine in the morning. Your show is twelve
hours away, a half a day away. Everything's going to
change exactly, So what are you doing? And I found
that when I would study for all of this stuff
and just study, study, study, and over prepare, and then
by the time the show came about at ten o'clock,
it would be a whole different show.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
And I'd say, why the hell did I would I
do this? You've got to be more plodet to learn
to be nimble.
Speaker 1 (10:50):
Now you're there doing a show like that. How much
do director about technical directors with cameras in a studio?
Are there directors, segment producers, writers, who's got your ear
in terms of content while you're doing the show?
Speaker 2 (11:03):
So it's my executive producer? And how many of those
did you have when you were on the big show?
Speaker 3 (11:07):
I had one executive producer who is and then Maria Spanella,
and then I had my own personal producer, and then
there were segment producers. And so if there was a
segment that someone had prepared and they needed to be
in the control room, usually they stood there anyways, and
so the segment producer would get in my ear. But
usually it was the executive producer, but sometimes they would say,
you know, I would say it was nineteen times and they'd.
Speaker 2 (11:28):
Go ninety ninety and I'm going because sometimes you don't
realize what you say right.
Speaker 3 (11:32):
You'll just read something wrong or you just say something wrong,
and so they would correct me. But it was mostly
the director and the executive producer and mostly the director
who would say, Okay, thirty seconds out, ten seconds out
camera two, so start on camera two and I'm going
to turn you to three. Stand by, you know, the
whole thing, three two and go camera one, turn and
(11:52):
then you do that that sort of thing, right, And
then you know, they would say it yeah, and you'd
say you know, and it's fourteen people and they'd say
graphic and I'd go, take to look at your screen,
that it's up on the screen right now, blah blah
blah blah blah, and then you talk about blah and
then they'd say on cam and then I'd look back
up and go, okay.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
Then just someone's directing your performance. Yeah, directing. They just
just to know where I'm going technically, right, but they're
directing your your tone or no.
Speaker 3 (12:17):
If I was off on something, someone would say something
she'd say like, all right, was it up wash your tone?
Speaker 2 (12:21):
Yeah? Or yeah, you're you're dragging a little bit. Are
you tired? Whatever you want us to bring?
Speaker 3 (12:26):
You want us to bring your coffee, diet coke or something, yeah,
or I'm gonna send makeup in.
Speaker 2 (12:30):
You're shiny, but that sort of thing. That's it small small.
Speaker 1 (12:33):
Now I'm assuming that when lickt comes in, this is
just zas Love wants things his way. This is his
magiemem it. Now it's going to be my CNN. So
Zuker's gone and he brings Licked in. And when Zuker's
gonna gone? How much advanced notice did you have the
Zuker was leaving? Oh that I mean that was in
the news, right, so not much. Did you know when
he was going to be gone and someone else was
(12:53):
coming in? Who was going to run the company? You
didn't know.
Speaker 2 (12:56):
No, no one, no one. No one gave you any dance.
Speaker 3 (12:58):
No, it was in the it was in the morning meeting.
When it happened. I was in LA and I forget
what I was doing. It may have been award season
or something.
Speaker 2 (13:05):
I forget.
Speaker 3 (13:06):
I was in La doing a project for the network,
and I took the Red Eye, and I got home
and went to sleep, and I woke up to a
lot of text messages.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
And I was like, wait, what is this. It always
happens that way. That happened that way.
Speaker 3 (13:20):
When when Chris was let go, Chris linked and my
executive purser is at don Jeff just resigned in the
morning meeting, and I was like, wait what And then
he called me and he said I didn't have a
chance to tell you whatever, blah blah blah. And you
know he called everybody afterwards, but I don't think he
really had any notice himself, right, Yeah.
Speaker 2 (13:39):
Well, I kind of equate him.
Speaker 1 (13:40):
This is just my opinion, by the way, which is meaningless,
but I kind of equate him with Ronnie Meyer when
they let Ronnie Meyer go for similar reasons his personal life,
and you want to sit there and you want to go, well,
I'm running a company now and I'd like this guy
to go. And that's my excuse to let him go.
And I really was going to bring it another guy
because I want my I want to run my CNN,
but he's gone, like universal. I think Ronnie Meyer hit
(14:01):
the point where he was making like forty million dollars
a year, and they were like, no, yeah, we need
you to go.
Speaker 2 (14:06):
Look, I'll let you say that. But you're a smart guy.
Speaker 3 (14:09):
So but here, you know, Jeff is the last of
a TV executive, the celebrity TV executive Mavericks. Right, everyone
is so risk averse now they're afraid, you know, they're
with the stockholders wanting all that. He really protected us
from the overlords, right from the corporate you know overlords.
He really did his guts, his guts and he's like,
(14:30):
you know, this is journalism. I understand what you do
because he did what they did, right. He ran NBC
and he understood it. But he's really a journalist at
heart because he started at the Today Show and he
started in the news president there. He had a good
run there, and then he went to run the news
division at NBC, and then he entertainment. Then he ran
the entire network. So he really and we didn't realize it,
(14:53):
you know, until he was gone.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
When Licked comes, like most executives I have assumed when
you're the top tier talent, the show that they come
is it like dinners and whining and dining and getting
to know each other and everything's war and you don't
really know where it's going to go, and then it
goes the wrong way.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
Yeah, there's a little of that. Yeah, there's a little
of that. It's polite, it's polite, yeah in the beginning. Yeah,
and then things changed, right.
Speaker 1 (15:18):
Well, I mean, I just find that odd because I
just feel like I won't name names, but I've known
a couple of people who are execs at film studios,
especially TV, where the that conveyor belt is moving and
they can't press pause. They have a plan which seems
to be everybody's plan now. Years ago it was a plan.
Now it's everybody's plan, which is, if I can't raise revenue,
I got to cut costs. So it's just a lot
(15:38):
of firing, a lot of budget cutting.
Speaker 3 (15:40):
But don't you think to a certain extent that when
your job is protected and mentioned in the First Amendment,
that there should be some exemption from that whole thing.
Like I don't think the news division should be solely
or wholly in large part driven by revenue and numbers,
numbers and ratings. It shouldn't because you're supposed to give information,
(16:01):
you're supposed to hold people who are in power, hold
themto account.
Speaker 1 (16:05):
But you told me that when we were at the
book party. I raised my hand, I asked the question.
I said, the networks and traditional media, mainstream media, have
they lost young people? And you said, they haven't lost,
but they're losing. And then you went on to talk
about the people who are considered through some research who
quoted to being about being the most informed. People get
their news from where.
Speaker 2 (16:25):
They get their news digitally? Right, Yeah, and listen.
Speaker 3 (16:28):
The older people get their news from, you know, they watch,
they sit and they watch cable news all day. They
watch six thirty or they you know, they they're watching
the morning shows or they're doing that. Younger people are
getting their news on TikTok or whatever. But the most
informed people are they'll go on digitally. They'll watch something
on YouTube, They'll watch whatever, even if they go to
you know, Twitter or TikTok or whatever. But then they'll
(16:49):
do their research and they are media literate and more
media savvy. I find the people who sit in front
of the television all day have an unconscious or built
in bias because you can tell from whatever network they're watching.
But by the time they get to the arguments around
the table the panels, they don't know what they actually
came there for, what the point of the whole segment was.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
That's what they conveyed to me.
Speaker 1 (17:11):
Well, the shows which are moderated shows, which are these
s mash pits, and everybody's going at it. I think
more and more people have realized now that it's not
worth their time. I always say to people, what do
I watch? I said, I watch Wolf Blitzer straight. I
call them straight, no chaser, right, right, right, it's just
like happening now. Just tell me what the stop stories
are and then I want to go have dinner with
my wife. You know, give me ten fifteen minutes on
(17:32):
my couch. I watch The Inn every night. Every night. Yeah,
watch Blitzer. I watch MSNBC only when I come home,
I watch Blitzer. I go to dinner, I come back
and I watch Lawrence o'donald ever.
Speaker 2 (17:41):
Yeah, every night.
Speaker 3 (17:42):
I like Lawrence, I like Rachel, I like But I
think it's different when you're in primetime, as you know,
it's just like when you do you know, in primetime
you do sitcoms or whatever. It's different than something that's
on during the day, right, And I think that's the
same thing with cable news now. I don't believe that.
For networks, that's a different thing. You got six thirty
and it's straight, no chaser, good evening and we're gonna
start in Afghanistan and whatever it is. And then but
(18:03):
at night, if you're watching cable, it's more of a
personal experience and it's a longer sort of flow. And
people they wanted to be appointment television, and they wanted
to be someone familiar with, someone they trust, someone who
can actually maybe tell them a little bit how they feel.
Speaker 2 (18:16):
People would say, I.
Speaker 3 (18:17):
Wasn't sure about it, don and I watched you and
I said, you know what, that guy's right, and I.
Speaker 2 (18:21):
Think that's okay.
Speaker 3 (18:22):
I don't agree with everything, hardly anything that Sean Hannity says,
but he's perfect for a primetime cable show, right, he's
and he's a star.
Speaker 2 (18:31):
I don't little O'Reilly.
Speaker 1 (18:33):
We had a great delivery, and he was a real broadcaster.
I didn't agree with the word he said either.
Speaker 3 (18:37):
I've always said that about Bill O'Reilly. He's a great performer.
And I would watch him and I would take notes
and go that guy is good and the same thing,
and people are gonna, you know, gonna go, oh, my gosh,
I can't believe he said that. Same thing with Megan Kelly.
I don't agree with anything she says. She's turned out
to me the biggest troll.
Speaker 2 (18:50):
And and is she she flipped up. Oh my gosh,
it's embarrassing. I went to a book party of first
with my wife, but when.
Speaker 3 (18:57):
She was same, we were at that same party. Yeah,
on the rooftop of a hotel somewhere. Yeah, But she
at that time, I think she was on at eight
or nine o'clock or whatever at night.
Speaker 2 (19:06):
She was perfect for that hour. She's a great performer.
Speaker 3 (19:08):
She comes on and she's energy whatever, and you know,
the morning Speaking of people being out of position, the
morning show is not her position, I believe, just like
it wasn't. I was in position as well. And that's
the thing about a good media or news executive.
Speaker 2 (19:20):
They know what.
Speaker 3 (19:22):
Positions people should be playing, So you need that sort
of a personality.
Speaker 2 (19:26):
Same thing with Chris. Chris is a star. He's great
for cable news at night. Chris Cuomo, he's great for
cable news at night. I thought I was.
Speaker 3 (19:32):
Great for cable news that night, you know, and people
wanted to tune in, they wanted to tune into us.
Rachel Maddow perfect cable news host.
Speaker 1 (19:40):
But I think that people when I watched news, having
grown up and having had news having a very sacred
place in my life, it was sacred. The news was
very important to me. And now when I see the news,
it's just weird. There's a chemistry. You have to have
a chemistry with that person, you know, like I used
to listen to He's a good friend of mine. I
love Kurt Anderson. And when Kurt had that show Studio
(20:02):
three sixty on NPO, I.
Speaker 2 (20:03):
Loved that show.
Speaker 1 (20:04):
That was my favorite podcast, along with This American Life
for Kurt Anderson.
Speaker 3 (20:09):
And you don't feel you have that connection to any
of the news folks with you.
Speaker 1 (20:12):
I love watching you on TV. I'm not just saying
that I thought you were great. I mean were you
had the right chemistry. I mean beyond you being a
handsome guy and being stylish and being this and that.
Speaker 2 (20:21):
Thank you, but you had a great delivery.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
It was really it was easy to watch you where
there's people that I watch and I go, well, maybe
a little less of you.
Speaker 3 (20:28):
But it's the same thing with knowing who's a good
reporter and who's a good anchor. Very few people can
do both, and people don't realize it. They don't understand
that like anchoring a show, it's another world. It's not
easy and you have to hold someone's attention. But I
think now in this day and age, people think that, Okay,
they're a good reporter, so therefore they're a good anchor,
and I disagree with that. You can have someone who
can anchor a show who is not necessarily the best
(20:50):
journalists in the world, but they're interesting. But when there
are big breaking news stories, then you throw to the
person who's the good report.
Speaker 2 (20:58):
The YouTube thing is on what time? Now, you're on
the air? Went I'm on the air?
Speaker 3 (21:00):
Well, it lives forever on YouTube. But I do a
five o'clock show every day, which was not how I
envisioned doing it. I do a five o'clock live show
every day where I just talk to the subscribers and
talk to them about things that's happening and what they
should know before they, you know, go home or have dinner.
But then I just started one at ten am, which
is sort of a hot topic show where I'm trying
to get away from the politics, you know, and the
(21:23):
hard news and do things that are a little lighter.
Speaker 2 (21:24):
But everything in.
Speaker 3 (21:25):
The zeitgeist now is politics. You know, they're eating the
dogs or eating the cats. That goes over, you know,
it all spills over.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
Author and anchor Don Lemon.
Speaker 1 (21:38):
If you enjoy conversations with famous broadcasters, check out my
episode with the legendary Dan Rather.
Speaker 5 (21:45):
When the first faint edge is what we came to
know is Watergate. You can do merge. I was skeptical
that it would reach the Oval Office itself. You never
met anybody who had more respect for the office of
the Presidency in the United States than I do. It
was very difficult for me to accept that the president
himself would be involved in a way. However, as time
(22:07):
went along, facts begin to first whisper, then they begin
to speak in full voice, and then the facts begin
to shout. It isn't just lower level campaign oppertunities, It
isn't just lower level members of the administration. That this
probably goes into the Oval Office itself.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
To hear more of my conversation with Dan Rather, go
to Here's the Thing dot Org. After the break, Don
Lemon tells us how a tragic event led to him
rethinking his relationship with God and with his faith. I'm
(22:51):
Alec Baldwin and you're listening to here's the thing. Don
Lemon's new book, I Once Was Lost My Search for
God in America details his very personal examination of his faith.
But this is not Lemma's first foray in the publishing world.
Speaker 2 (23:09):
I've written three books.
Speaker 3 (23:10):
This is a fire debut at number one New York
Times during the George Floyd thing when that all happened
in twenty twenty one.
Speaker 1 (23:16):
And the first thing I said to you when I
came backstage to just give you a quick carget the
book party was you should write another book.
Speaker 3 (23:21):
And I'm like, I don't know, man, it's tough, Alec,
It's so tough, and you don't know.
Speaker 2 (23:26):
You know it was. It was easier in the sense.
Speaker 3 (23:30):
What was easier was the selling of the book, when
I had that big engine behind me of CNN, where
I could mention at any moment, you know, it's in
my book, and by the way, you can go buy
it and blah blah blah blah blah. Or in the
commercial break, I would say throw my book up, and
as we go to commercial and say, by the way,
my book is on sale and you can get it
at Barnes and Noble or any book store. They were fine,
that would help them. And so I was able to
do that with that book. I can't do it with
(23:51):
this book. I have to sell this book, which is good.
Speaker 5 (23:52):
For you know.
Speaker 2 (23:53):
I don't mind.
Speaker 3 (23:53):
I can't do it on YouTube, can Yeah, of course
I do it on YouTube. I think some people are
getting sick of it. But writing it is hard. It's
like you're putting your heart out there. It's like you're
wearing your heart outside of your body, not in the
way that you have kids. But you don't know how
people are going to receive it, if they're going to
trample on, if they're going to trash you, if it's
going to sell.
Speaker 2 (24:09):
It's just the whole thing. And you know, it's.
Speaker 1 (24:11):
More personal than anything you might do because it's you
and I make a movie. Somebody else is directing the movie,
you know what I mean. Now, you come from a
I don't want to say religious so that you use
the word. You want to describe the family you came
from in terms of faith.
Speaker 3 (24:23):
Well, I came from a family who was faithful. Let's
put it that way. They had faith. My mother was
not as churchy as they say, as my aunt was,
she's got Alzheimer's now a holy roller. You know, she'd
never missed a sermon. She was on the usher board
and all of that stuff. My mom was in the choir,
but she wasn't quite as religious as her the rest
(24:48):
of her family. But my grandmother was as well. You know,
there are members and you pay their dues. I'm sure
my mom still pays dues for the church. She just
doesn't go as often as you know one would think.
But I went to I grew up Baptist. I would
go to church, and then I'd go to Sunday Bible
School in the Baptist Church, and then I'd go to
vacation Bible School in the summer in the Baptist Church.
(25:09):
And during the week during the school year, I went
to the Catholic school and we would do Catechism, and
then we'd have Mass on Friday every Friday, and then
if it was a special holiday, we'd have Mass then.
And then in the morning we would line up like
a military school, hand out front of the hands on
the shoulder, and we'd line up by height, and then
we'd have the announcement and we'd do the Star spangled
(25:31):
banner and the pledge allegiance, and then we would pray,
and then we'd go to class in lines like a
military school. And then you would before you go to
a recess or whatever. You talked about it in the
book how much you liked pray. I liked it because
it was because it gave you discipline, and you had
a regimen, and we're part of something. You were part
of something, and there was a stability there that you had.
You know, Okay, we got to go to the recess.
(25:51):
We stand up, we pray that we're going to be
safe at recess, and then we all line up and
we go down to the yard and we have the recess,
and then we come back. And then before we went
to lunch, we pray, you know, over our meal, and
then we come back and we pray whatever. So and
then if an adult enter the class, you'd say good afternoon,
mister ball Win, and you'd stand up, and we did
(26:12):
not sit down until mister Baldwin.
Speaker 2 (26:14):
Would say you were told to good afternoon class. You
may be seated, you may be seated. It was a
different world, amazing, right, you know my faith.
Speaker 1 (26:21):
I'm a Catholic and I'm still Catholic, and I go
to church periodically. I go into waves and I go
to hear that man speak. Yeah, I'm in Los Angeles
and Father Torchison, who was the head guy there at
Saint Monica's, I go hear him speak. I go went
to the city and go to Blessed Sacrament on seventy
first Street off of Broadway, and watch this a couple
of guys speak. But my guys in East Tampton who
(26:43):
came out for the swing mass in the summertime. So
I go down in the summer and I get my
community and I wait for him as he came out
of the recessional before everybody else mobbed him, and I
said to me, he's alone.
Speaker 2 (26:54):
I get him a lot.
Speaker 1 (26:54):
I pulled him aside from the other people with a
recession and I go, I want to do the confession
the reconcilly face to face. And he literally he's like
this kid from Rosedale Queens. She goes, ah, you want
to do that? He goes, oh please, I go no,
I want to do that. I want to please. I
can't stand that, because are you sorry for what you did?
In the name of the father room the son the
only spit you're absolved. Oh please, don't make me do that.
(27:15):
Like we were pals. That's why we're not in that
racket anymore. We're friends.
Speaker 2 (27:19):
And I thought, oh God, I can't believe that much
of this church has changed. Change. You want to do that?
You know, if you want to do that? Please? He said,
get away. I don't want to talk about that nonsense.
Speaker 1 (27:29):
And I was like, Oh God, who's going to hear
my confession on him?
Speaker 2 (27:33):
See, my friend.
Speaker 3 (27:34):
I still can remember my the priest's voices in my
We have Father Hines, I can remember his big deep
and then we had Father Elwood, and I can just remember.
Their voices are stuck in my head because I was
in Catholic Church so much.
Speaker 1 (27:46):
But but what I want to switch to this idea
that obviously with what I've been through in recent couple
of years, this very difficult situation I was dealing with.
It was painful on a level I can't even give
words do. I literally can't even describe to people how
much I suffered from that. And you were is the
summoning of your faith in your adult life and in
recent years when there was tough times for you, did
(28:07):
you get into digging for help in that direction.
Speaker 2 (28:09):
Yes, I did.
Speaker 3 (28:10):
But first of all, I want to say I'm happy
that you that's over, and you know everyone was praying
for you and we all got what was happening.
Speaker 2 (28:16):
So thank you for standing tough. I really appreciate that.
Speaker 3 (28:20):
So, yes, I've always been a faithful person, but as
my mother is, I'm not a churchy person, but I'm
a believer and I've always prayed and hoped and had faith,
and I've had to summon it more often than not.
I don't wear it on my sleeve because I don't
believe in that. I don't believe in pushing my faith
my religion on anyone else, and it's a personal thing
(28:42):
for me. I had a crisis of faith in twenty
eighteen when my sister died suddenly in an accidental drowning,
and that was I started thinking about this.
Speaker 2 (28:49):
How old was she?
Speaker 3 (28:50):
She was I think fifty nine and at the time,
and I started to question God, like why would God
do that? You know, it's supposed to be a benevolent God,
and I know there are bad things that happened all
the time, and you realize that intellectually until something happens
to you right, and you go, why did this happen
to me?
Speaker 2 (29:07):
And so I asked why? Why? Why?
Speaker 3 (29:08):
And I dug deep and then I said why not?
And I tried to figure out, you know, why this
was why you.
Speaker 2 (29:14):
Read that somewhere It wasn't aver quote in the book
about someone said well why there was a quote in
the book. But also I'd heard that before.
Speaker 3 (29:21):
But also Anderson Cooper's mom, Gloria Benderbilt, said the same thing.
She said, you know, people would go why me, why me?
Speaker 2 (29:27):
Why me? Why not me?
Speaker 3 (29:28):
And then there was in my family there was a
similar sort of saying why not you so figure out
why it happened to you? Why this is happening to you,
And there's a reason, and maybe it's just to make
you stronger.
Speaker 2 (29:39):
I don't know.
Speaker 3 (29:40):
I would much prefer not to go through such things.
And so I started questioning, why would God take my sister.
She has beautiful kids, she has beautiful grandkids. She was
so proud of her grandson, who was a great basketball player,
a great football player.
Speaker 2 (29:52):
She went to every game like what why? Why? Why son?
That happened?
Speaker 3 (29:56):
And then after I started thinking about this book, and
then the George Floyd thing, happened, and I had pitched
this George Floyd book and no one wanted to buy it,
not George Floyd, but about racism, and no one wanted
to buy it. And then you know, the thing happened
and everyone's.
Speaker 2 (30:08):
Like, can you write that book? And I'm like, okay,
So I wrote it. It was number one.
Speaker 3 (30:12):
But I started having this sort of crisis of faith,
and then I started writing the book, and it was
going to be sort of this, you know, a coda
to the last book, and where I was just going
to you know, move from racism and a little bit
more into religion. And I was going to interview religious
figures and people folks like you, and talk about their faith.
And then when I left CNN, it became something else.
(30:33):
I think it became a much better and more personal book.
So yes, it's a long story short, a long story long.
I have had, you know, points in my life where
I had to lean on my religion and the Lord,
and I don't really talk to people about it.
Speaker 1 (30:46):
Yeah, it's interesting when you work in this business. It
could be anywhere a film and television or news of
whatever medium, cable or a streaming network. You're around and
you said, this word a lot in the book cynical.
You're around a lot of cynical people.
Speaker 2 (31:00):
Yeah, and that's our journalists are generally right. Generally you're
right there, of course they are.
Speaker 1 (31:05):
And you sit there and you think, what's it like
to go minute to minute through an experience with a
bunch of cynical people, Like, was there anybody at work
who was faith based even to some degree you could
talk about it with? Was it all just family and
close friends and tim?
Speaker 3 (31:19):
It was all just family and family and close friends,
But mostly it was just me Alan, right, I didn't
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (31:27):
It's an inside job.
Speaker 3 (31:28):
And I remember, you know, things would get so tough
because doing what I did was a very stressful. There's
a high pressure job, high wire job, every night live
and you're like, oh, something comes out of your mouth
and there's always something Why did you say this?
Speaker 2 (31:41):
Why do you do this?
Speaker 3 (31:42):
Other people hate you here, other than mad at you here?
You got to give this response here, and I'm like,
oh my god, Like why most people just go to
nine to five job, they go home. It's like you
screwed up up, you know, you round it up, you know, yeah,
so and then you get over it. And then when
that would happen to my sister and all the other
things that would happen, I would count. I would say,
you know, God got my steps, one, two, three, and
(32:04):
I would just count my step.
Speaker 2 (32:05):
I would take step by step, by step by step, and.
Speaker 3 (32:07):
I would count my steps to the studio sometimes, especially
when my sister died, because you never knew when it
was going to hit you, and so I would have
to like think about things that go, you know, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, steps. Okay, tonight,
I'm going to talk about you know, Trump and you know,
very fine people on both sides, both sides, and I
would just have to keep and I would say, Lord,
when I get there, help me see both sides, or
(32:28):
help me whatever. And then I would just I would
just pay it and say, okay, you know, get the
IFB on it. And then I'd say, okay, God, here
we go. Just don't let it happen. Don't let me
get sad during the middle of a segment of start
crying or whatever, and so let me be focused or whatever.
And then you know, the music would come up and
I would just I would say, and when they would
say go, that's when I would snap out of it.
Speaker 1 (32:49):
Right with this New Mexico event, I sat there saying
to myself, what do you want me to do? There
must be something you want me to do, you want
me to change, you want me to do.
Speaker 2 (32:58):
This or that.
Speaker 1 (32:59):
I prayed harder for them to dismiss the case prior
on the gun charge, and they denied us. So when
I go to trial and I didn't get my way before,
and I begged God, I begged, I'll never forget. I
watched the crown and the Queen of England is on
her knees praying next to her bed, and I go,
if the Queen of England can get on her knees
(33:19):
and pray, why can't I? And I got on my knees.
And sometimes I'm crying, and I go, Please, what do
you want me to learn from this and do from this?
I said, please make this case be dismissed on this charge.
And later on it played out the way it played.
I go, if you take your hands off the steering
wheel and stop white knuckling the steering wheel and trying
to control and manage everything, maybe something wonderful with results.
Speaker 2 (33:40):
Yes, that was the hand of God.
Speaker 3 (33:42):
Yeah, sometimes you just have to say, you know, as
you said, take your hands off the wheel and just
pray that you're going to be okay.
Speaker 2 (33:49):
What do you want me to do? I'm okay with
whatever it will is show me. So did you let me?
I'm going to be a journalist. Did it change it?
Speaker 1 (33:57):
That situation changed me a lot in terms of my
feelings about having my children and getting remarried and having
so many kids, which is something that I you know,
I kind of knew what I was doing, and people
don't think you do. Then they go, you wake up
one morning and somebody goes, oh, hypede on a stick,
and oh guess what?
Speaker 2 (34:14):
You know?
Speaker 1 (34:14):
It's like, it's not all silly, and COVID happened, the
strike happened, and overlapping with the strike was also my
problem in New Mexico. What it made me do is
people would say, my god, now you can get back
to your old life, and I go, I don't want
to get back to my own lives.
Speaker 2 (34:28):
That's what I'm asking you. This is my life. Now,
are you kids? Are you more compassionate? Yes?
Speaker 1 (34:33):
If compassion means everybody I meet, I have to say
to myself, they're going through somebody. Now I want to
switch the topic or to you and fame and bet carpets.
Speaker 3 (34:41):
But I understand how you feel, especially about because people
when they meet me, they say you're different than what
I read about, because people often let their enemies and
their detractors define them, and you know, similarly to you,
the right wing media hates me, so they write the
worst shit about me, And then people meet me who
are conservative and even Trump supporters, and they're like, wa,
you're not at all like what I read about in
(35:01):
the New York Post And you're like, no, I'm not
that person at all.
Speaker 1 (35:04):
Is it funny how you can be somewhere in a
kind of benign setting. You're walking through a park and
with my kids at some store, and you see people
and you see the way within under a second, with
in a fraction of a second, you see them regard
you in a way with their eyes where you who
know they're maga.
Speaker 2 (35:18):
Republicans and they're like, oh god, it's him. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (35:22):
And I go walking to them and their kids playing,
and I go, what's this little one's name? And you
try to charm them and they're totally freaked out and
they're like, my god, I can't normalize you like I
can't handle it right now. You're an asshole when you
have to remain an asshole.
Speaker 2 (35:33):
I know that. I know that very well.
Speaker 1 (35:37):
Journalists and anchor Don Lemon, if you're enjoying this conversation,
tell a friend and be sure to follow Here's the
Thing on the iHeartRadio app, Spotify or wherever you get
your podcasts. When we come back. Don Lemon shares his
thoughts on the cancel deal with Elon Musk and the
X platform. Following just one broadcast, I'm Alec Baldwin and
(36:08):
you're listening to Here's the Thing. Don Lemon's recent wedding
to his partner of eight years, Tim Malone, was heavily
covered in the press. The pair are often photographed on
the red carpet and at stylish events like New York
Fashion Week. I wanted to know how a serious newsman
navigates his relationship with fame.
Speaker 3 (36:30):
That is not why I got into the business, It says,
you know, right, And I didn't get into this business thing.
I was going to make a lot of money, but
you became. But I became famous, And you know what,
I'm enjoying my life. I'm happy. And if that fame
if that comes with it. If I get a better
table at a restaurant, then so be it. But does
that enjoy it? Yeah, I'm enjoying it. And there are
(36:50):
so many people who came before me who didn't get
to do that. And just because I'm a journalist, it
doesn't mean that I'm not a person. It doesn't mean
that I don't enjoy getting out and meeting people. Doesn't
mean that I don't enjoy going on red carpets. Are
going to you know, beautiful events. Why wouldn't I. I'm
a human being. I think it's okay. Just because you're journalist,
it doesn't mean that you're not, you know, a full person,
(37:12):
a multi dimensional person, and I am. And so you
know what, I'm just enjoying my life. I'm grateful that
i'm here. I don't know how many days are ahead
of me, and while i'm here, I'm going to get
the best out of it.
Speaker 2 (37:22):
The only reason you're on those red carpets is you're
good looking. That's the I think it's about you. Maybe
it's I don't know. I think it's both.
Speaker 3 (37:29):
Yes, But I also think I'm there because I am
enjoying it. If I wasn't enjoying it, I wouldn't be there,
wouldn't I enjoyed my job. I enjoyed what I you know,
my profession and what I did, and I think that
that shines through and so I think that that's what
made me, you know, a star, so to speak, right
in this business.
Speaker 2 (37:44):
Even those your warmth, No, why would I? That's important.
Speaker 1 (37:47):
There's a magic mist that has to exude from you.
It has to be admitted by you on camera, whether
it comes through your eyes or anywhere you have to
convey to your audience.
Speaker 2 (37:56):
There's no place out I'd rather be than here with
you right right?
Speaker 1 (38:00):
Would when you do see that, you go, Hi, I'm
don Lemon, and tonight I want to tell you Abeppa.
Speaker 2 (38:04):
They're with you, yes, and you know I couldn't wait.
Speaker 3 (38:06):
I would tell them like I couldn't wait to get
here to tell you this story today.
Speaker 2 (38:10):
So let's go.
Speaker 1 (38:11):
It's like the journalists equivalent of someone walking up to
and going, would you like to dance?
Speaker 2 (38:15):
Charlie? Dance? There's an engagement between you when you're running. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (38:19):
Now, two quick things. One is the election. And I
believe that everybody who talks and kind of piles on
online or anywhere about Trump is completely wasting their time.
Speaker 2 (38:26):
What else are there to say about him? Do you
believe in poles?
Speaker 3 (38:30):
I believe poles are a snapshot in time. I believe
in polls less so now than I did before. We
all learned our lesson from twenty sixteen and then twenty
twenty as well. But I think this time is going
to be surprising. I think it's going to be surprising.
I think she has a real chance. We had no
chance with Biden. I admired, I my operation for him,
but he was old. But I think there's a hidden
(38:51):
vote for Trump with black men. I think even with
some women that you know, they still love him. And
I think with college students, I don't I know, and
I don't get it either.
Speaker 2 (39:01):
I don't get it, but I.
Speaker 1 (39:02):
Don't get Also, is it there's a person who came
in who knew nothing about government. He held no office, not
even a mayoralty, not a governor, or as an executive,
not a legislator in Congress or a state house. He
knew nothing about government, and he served in the White
House for four years and he still doesn't know anything.
So it doesn't know.
Speaker 2 (39:16):
You know that people are what they do, we're shocking.
To me, it shouldn't be shocking. But the folks on
his side.
Speaker 3 (39:22):
Say she's not qualified and she has no experience, and
I'm like, wait, do you know who you're supporting?
Speaker 2 (39:27):
Am I? Are you insane? She's a senator, vice president,
she's the attorney general. She's a bright woman. Yeah, she's
everything he isn't ye?
Speaker 1 (39:36):
All right, Musk, I just want to say with Musk,
you know, Musk is like we were joking before you
got in here. The Musk to me is like Howard
Hughes meets Mickey Rooney. He's like this loopy, nutty guy
that's constantly slamming the door in his hand and screwing
himself up public relations wise. But he's also an engineering
genius or whatever, and he's made all this money and
(39:57):
sold cars, which is one of the most difficult things
on earth to do, is to create a car and
sell it to this country. When you went in to
talk to him, I mean, obviously you were poised to
work with him or for him at that company and
do your show on X and that blew up. But
when you were there, did you say to yourself, he's
not much different? From a lot of other network executives.
I know you didn't have any trepidation.
Speaker 2 (40:17):
Well, let me say this.
Speaker 3 (40:19):
I am in ongoing and pending litigation out of him,
so I can't really say a lot. But what I
can say is that I went into this with the
best of intentions, and at first I did not want
to do it. It took some cajoling and some convincing,
and finally I did. I did not work for him.
He was not my boss. He was not hiring me.
What I had was a content deal with him, a
(40:40):
distribution deal where they would have a certain exclusive material
for an amount of time and then it would go everywhere.
So you know, why not do it? Because I wanted to.
What I wanted to do was what he and they said,
to get on the platform and to be a counter
to all of the sort of right wing conspiracy theorists
(41:01):
that are out there. And you know that, you know,
lasted all of half a day. So it didn't work out.
So I feel, you know, it's awful that it didn't
work out. It wasn't great for me.
Speaker 2 (41:11):
It wasn't what you hoped.
Speaker 3 (41:12):
It wasn't what I hoped, But you know, I'd worked
with difficult people, but usually that's in within the confines
of a business that it does not play out publicly
like it did. He's a very consequential person to the world,
and he has a very big and powerful platform that
can affect lives, livelihood and even people's safety, and one
(41:34):
I believe must be and should be careful and more
responsible with that.
Speaker 2 (41:39):
What do you hope people will take from this book?
Speaker 3 (41:42):
The biggest thing is that I want people to understand
that we don't and shouldn't live in a theocracy, but
it's going that way. And if you go through difficult periods,
as you well know, if you trust the process, which
is really called faith. People always say trust the process, right,
which is really faith for me is that it's going
to be okay. And if it's not okay, then usually
(42:03):
we don't know about it, but usually things work out
for the best. And I think it's you have to
have the right mentality, and you have to have the
right faith, and you have to have people around you
who love you as you well know, as you are, yeah,
and love you for who you are, love you for
who you are, and so but I want people to
get to know my story. I tell my story alec
(42:24):
and America story through the lens of religion and faith
in this country. And I wrote this book because of
my love for the country and my love for God,
and I wanted people to have an insight on how
it shaped my life and my world. And I fought
against the evangelical teachings that sought to marginalize me.
Speaker 1 (42:47):
I want you to read something. You always ask authors
to read a piece of their book.
Speaker 3 (42:51):
Okay, this is an excerpt for my book, I Once
was lost my search for God in America. These days,
a lot of people here and abroad associate the American
flag the most bellicose, narrow minded ideology. Because the ones
waving that flag loudest and hardest are bellicose, narrow minded ideologues.
They wave the flag as a symbol of the America.
(43:12):
They envision a country that belongs to them by divine right,
not the United States we all share. And to drive
that point home, they carried the stars and stripes alongside
the stars and bars of the Confederacy, a treasonous junta
that literally tore the United States apart in a bloody
effort to preserve slavery as an economic engine. The term
(43:35):
Christian nationalism rings out with faux nobility, but it's a
wolf in sheep's clothing, white supremacy, cloaked and evangelical religiosity.
Speaker 1 (43:45):
This section is some of the best writing in the book.
I must say now, the other thing I want to
say is for me, I want people to take that idea,
how we can reframe all that discussion about what it
means to be a patriot and be an American Menon,
You're one of many people who pursued that in this book.
But what I got from this book was your It's
a call. It's a call to say to people, we
all need to take a break from this world, this loud, cacaphanous,
(44:10):
commercialized world, and take a moment to connect with something spiritual.
It doesn't have to be a religion, to just connect
to something where we can settle ourselves. How can you
calm yourself and make yourself the better you on a
day to day basis? I mean, I get this from
this book book.
Speaker 3 (44:26):
Do you realize that you answered that question earlier when
you said that, no matter how someone treats you or
who they are, when you meet someone, you try to
approach them as if they're going through something, going through
what are they going through? And so as I write
and here, I believe that what's important to convey is
that we keep trying to Most people keep trying to
(44:47):
find look at, you know, create God in their own image,
when we should be looking for God's image and other people.
And as long as you do that, I think that's
the answer. That's how you settle yourself. You're talking about
this about patriotism. I say in this book that as
a black man, I have a complicated relationship with a flag,
(45:10):
and as a gay man, I have a complicated relationship
with a Bible. But I was able to overcome that
by using critical thinking and trying to find love in
my fellow man rather than judging people and trying to
create God in my own image.
Speaker 1 (45:25):
You think you have your doubts about everybody comes out
of It's like having a baby. You write a book
and when it's done, you're like, oh, I'm never doing that.
But the thing is that you write these books because
I have a theory which is that these are bricks.
These are bricks, and this is one of your bricks
that you're building a library, a world library. These are bricks.
I have a theory where when the aliens come and
take over and destroy this world, they're going to erase
(45:47):
every tape in every CD and every DVD that's just scarbage,
and they're gonna pick up a book and they go, now,
what's this and they're going to want to go there's
more thoughtful, This is more you, more of your heart
is in this. I mean, your work in television is exemplary.
I mean I don't want you to give up writing books.
Speaker 2 (46:02):
Thank you, Alec. I think you're right.
Speaker 3 (46:04):
It's like we have all of these photographs in our
cell phones, and then where do they go when we're
not here? When I go to your house, right, your
family's there, you're there, but I'm looking at the pictures
on the wall and I go around and look and
where's this from? Where's this moment from? But no one
goes into your phone and does that. And that's the
same thing that you're saying about the books and erasing
things that are digital, because.
Speaker 1 (46:23):
Throughout the moment, yeah, thank you, thank you, My thanks
to Don Lemon. Here's the Thing is recorded at CDM
Studios in New York City. This episode was produced by
Kathleen russo Zach MacNeice and Maureen Hobin. Our engineer is
Frank Imperial. Our social media manager is Danielle Gingrich. I'm
(46:45):
Alec Baldwin. Here's the thing that is brought to you
by iHeart Radio
Host
Alec Baldwin
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Betrayal Season 5
Saskia Inwood woke up one morning, knowing her life would never be the same. The night before, she learned the unimaginable – that the husband she knew in the light of day was a different person after dark. This season unpacks Saskia’s discovery of her husband’s secret life and her fight to bring him to justice. Along the way, we expose a crime that is just coming to light. This is also a story about the myth of the “perfect victim:” who gets believed, who gets doubted, and why. We follow Saskia as she works to reclaim her body, her voice, and her life. If you would like to reach out to the Betrayal Team, email us at betrayalpod@gmail.com. Follow us on Instagram @betrayalpod and @glasspodcasts. Please join our Substack for additional exclusive content, curated book recommendations, and community discussions. Sign up FREE by clicking this link Beyond Betrayal Substack. Join our community dedicated to truth, resilience, and healing. Your voice matters! Be a part of our Betrayal journey on Substack.