July 4, 2025 • 35 mins
In this episode, Karol sits down with veteran journalist and author Salena Zito for a candid conversation about her path into journalism and what she’s learned from years of listening to everyday Americans. Salena reflects on her deep ties to Pennsylvania, the pulse of voter sentiment in heartland communities, and how local voices shape national narratives. She also shares her perspective on covering the attempted assassination of President Trump and what it reveals about the current political climate. The Karol Markowicz Show is part of the Clay Travis & Buck Sexton Podcast Network - new episodes debut every Wednesday & Friday.
Pre-Order Salena's new book HERE
Follow Clay & Buck on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/clayandbuck
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 (00:04):
Him. Welcome back, Carol Markowitz show on iHeartRadio. Clay Travis,
he of the Clay Travis and Buck Sexton podcast network
that this show is on, highlighted a new study about happiness,
and he pointed out that the happiness index has hit
an all time low and that that number is largely
driven by young people.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
The United States overall happiness index, to the extent that
they track this hit a all time low, and it's
being driven by people under the age of thirty. And
I would bet that it's women under the age of
thirty overwhelmingly who are unhappy. And I think it's hard
not to believe at this point that all of this
(00:46):
isn't directly connected to social media. I mean, if you
go look at the charts overall mental health rates. Now
certainly COVID didn't help, but overall mental health rates just
collapsed about twenty fourteen when social media became prevalent in
everybody's lives. Yeah, and I think we're going to find
out that this is like the nicotine or cigarettes of
(01:08):
our generation, where we allowed these phones and these social
media apps, particularly for young people, to really kind of
lead us astray in terms of our life's pursuit.
Speaker 1 (01:17):
Now, he's right that it's the phones. But people who
have been listening to the show for a while know
what I'm going to challenge here. It's not the social media.
There is no social media anymore.
Speaker 3 (01:30):
It used to be.
Speaker 1 (01:31):
That teenagers would get depressed because their friends would share
pictures on Facebook or Instagram of the amazing weekend they
had and maybe didn't include them. Or they'd see their
friends living amazing lives, filtered pictures, great vacations, perfect babies,
all of that. That's just not what's happening on the
internet anymore. That's not what the kids are watching. We're
(01:53):
just all watching TV all the time. It might not
be half hour or hour episodes, but these young people
are just scrolling through hours of videos. And I said
this last time, in the last episode about the girl,
the mom wrote in to me about her daughter who
doesn't seem to have a social life, and I said,
you know, we'd recognize depression if I told you someone
(02:17):
watches ten hours of TV a day. But because they
do it in bite size, you know, pieces, and they
carry it around with them on their phone, we don't
see how bad it is. Social media has nothing social
about it. And I think we need to see exactly
what the problem is in order to fix it. We
have to think of it like a little TV we
(02:38):
carry around. We have to understand how damaging it is
to be that distracted all the time. Just imagine when
there were no phones. If every time you were in
an awkward interaction, you just turned your television on. When
you're out, you don't see people taking selfies with their
friends anymore. Instead, you still might see like a full
(02:59):
on photo shit hapless man shooting his girlfriend from all
different angles. She's a content creator, fine, but there's nothing
social about that. And look at least her content is
a break from the videos. Instagram, by the way, now
offers bonuses for creator accounts that post photos because so
(03:20):
few of them do that. It would be something else
entirely if young people were still posting pictures of their
lunches or their parties or whatever. But they're not. They're
just zombified watching TV all the time. There's no way
happiness levels will increase until we solve that. Thanks for listening.
Speaker 4 (03:40):
Coming up next my interview with Selena Zito. But first,
I ran a nation that has vowed to.
Speaker 5 (03:45):
Wipe Israel and the United States off the map made
calculated strikes at Israel. The onslaught of missiles targeting hospitals, schools,
and nursing homes caused widespread devastation. Day after day, night
after night, Israeli's faced relentless.
Speaker 4 (04:02):
And unprecedented attacks that killed dozens of innocent civilians. Thousands
fled bombed out homes. Many required immediate medical care. These
attacks were only the start of something that could be much,
much worse. Your urgently needed gift to the International Fellowship
of Christians and Jews will help provide wide scale food
(04:22):
distribution along with critical first aid and emergency supplies, especially
to Israel's most vulnerable, the sick, the elderly, children and families.
Your gift today will help place new bomb shelters across Israel,
along with first responder flak jackets and armored emergency vehicles.
Now is your time to save and heal Israel's innocent,
(04:44):
most vulnerable.
Speaker 6 (04:45):
To rush your gift, call eight eight eight for eight
eight IFCJ.
Speaker 4 (04:51):
That's eight eight eight for eight eight.
Speaker 6 (04:53):
IFCJ, or go online at IFCJ dot org, if CJ
dot org.
Speaker 1 (05:04):
Welcome back to the Carol Marcowitch Show on iHeartRadio. My
guest today is Selena Zito. Selena is a Washington Examiner
reporter and author of the upcoming book Butler. Hi, Selena
is so nice to talk to you.
Speaker 7 (05:18):
Hi there, how are you?
Speaker 1 (05:20):
We were just talking offline about how insane it is
that we've never met in real life. But I've been
a Selena Zito fan like much of the country for
a long long time now, and I just think you're
fantastic and everything you do is like full of joy
and happiness and you're wonderful. Thank you for coming on.
Speaker 7 (05:39):
Oh, thank you.
Speaker 8 (05:41):
I'm everybody's grandma. No people really, actually everybody's bestie. It's
basically the food. Then they maybe read me, but basically
the food.
Speaker 3 (05:51):
I have to tell your listeners though, that I thought
you gave me a homework assignment and I obeyed because
you told me.
Speaker 7 (06:00):
I don't know how you phrased Ita.
Speaker 1 (06:02):
Like I said, here are the questions I ask all
my guests, and my listeners will know that a lot
of the time, the guests won't read the emails, and
you'll be able to tell because they'll just be deer
in headlights when I ask them, kind of you know,
a big question like what do you worry about? And
they're like what where did this come from? But Selena
(06:24):
sent me back the answers, which was the cutest thing ever.
I said, no, no, we're going to talk about it
on the show and she said, oh, I thought you
gave me a homework assignment, which she then did. She
finished the homework assignment, she was like, all right, I
have homework. What am I going to do?
Speaker 7 (06:42):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (06:42):
It was late though, Like if it was true homework,
I would have answered it that night, but in my
zeal to be a perfect.
Speaker 7 (06:55):
Progression, I sent it to you the night before.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
It was great. I did not read your answers because
I want to be surprised.
Speaker 7 (07:04):
I only even remember them.
Speaker 1 (07:06):
So the questions will be brand new either way, right,
brand new? So how did you get into this world?
I know a little bit about your story, but you
really hit the national scene in twenty sixteen writing pieces
that I think nobody else was doing anything close to.
You were doing this crazy thing where you went out
(07:28):
and you talked to regular people and ask them what
they thought, and that was really groundbreaking. So tell me,
tell us about your path.
Speaker 8 (07:38):
So I got into this accidentally and sort of the
old fashioned way, the way journalists used to be years ago,
at local newspapers where they were members of the community,
and most of them didn't have college degrees, but they
had good writing skills, they had good people instincts, and
they were able to turn a phrase pretty well, basically.
Speaker 3 (08:00):
All I had. And I also had experiences as a hairdresser,
as a waitress, and most importantly as a soccer and
football mom and hockey mom. So you know, I came
into the game late. I was in my mid forties
when I went back to work. I was mostly a
(08:22):
stay at a home mom at that point, and they
worked for the local newspaper, the Pittsburgh Tribune Review. But
the owner of the paper's name was Richard Mellon'scaife. He
had a very nationally well known name, one of the
richest men in the country, from a very old family,
(08:43):
the Mellon family, who owned all the melon banking, and
he had a really keen interest in national news. And
I don't know what he saw in me, but he
saw my ability to listen to people and to be
able to tell a decent story, and so he said,
(09:03):
do you want to cover national politics? And I'm like,
all right, and I did, and I learned pretty darn quickly.
I was there for twenty years. I did this for
twenty years, covering local and national politics and culture, and
I learned pretty quickly. I think it was the John
Kerrey campaign or the maybe it was the Obama campaign.
(09:27):
I can't remember. I knew very quickly that I did
not belong on the campaign bus, like I just.
Speaker 7 (09:34):
Didn't not belong there. I remember calling it. It happened.
Speaker 3 (09:39):
Maybe it was Carrie.
Speaker 7 (09:40):
I don't know, I can't remember. I'm old.
Speaker 8 (09:43):
I just remember calling my boss from a pay phone
in Scranton, Pennsylvania, saying I can't go on this bus
any longer.
Speaker 3 (09:56):
All I am doing is spending time with other reporters,
and they're all like I.
Speaker 7 (10:03):
Have the same mindset. They're not from Pennsylvania.
Speaker 3 (10:07):
They don't kind of understand our quirkiness. And I'm not
having any interaction with voters because they when you're in
the press bus.
Speaker 7 (10:16):
You don't get to talk to people. So I'm like,
I'm writing crap.
Speaker 9 (10:20):
So he said, okay, just come home, and and in
typical Selda fashion, I told the bus to just keep
going without me. And then I was like, oh wait
a minute I'm i gonna get no, SAT randomly rent
a car.
Speaker 3 (10:35):
And from that moment on, I only drove to whatever
I was covering. And I've driven driven to every state.
I've even been to Alaska.
Speaker 8 (10:46):
And I used to fly to events, but flying then
became ridiculous because I live in a city where there's
no hub, so therefore you had to make like thirteen
different connecting flights, and you.
Speaker 7 (10:57):
Would miss one of them because one was late.
Speaker 3 (11:01):
And so I just started driving. So when I interviewed
Governor Desants, I drove to Florida. But in that stretch
I got seventeen other really good stories, right. And I
always take back roads. I don't take turnpikes or interstates,
(11:22):
because that's where you can see how places have changed
for the better or for the worse, and you can
understand why people vote the way they do.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
That is so amazing. I no, I did not know
the driving thing. I always felt like your writing was
you were trying to get to the bottom of what
people really thought and where they really lived, and you
always treat every place with such respect, and I think
that that's so beautiful. But I didn't know you were
driving the back roads to get these stories. That's incredible.
Speaker 3 (11:55):
My first jeep had four hundred thousand miles. It was
fourteen years old. I'm on my second one and I
just passed two hundred and seventy thousand. So yeah, but
you know that's where the best stories are. I can't
if I take the interstate, that's no different than flying right.
When you pull over to get gas, it's like the
(12:18):
same gas station and the same McDonald And there's nothing
wrong with that. There's no depths of perception of understanding
why people vote the way they do. And that's why
I understood in twenty sixteen and Trump was going to win.
But I actually called this this conservative populist coalition that
(12:40):
was forming in two thousand and six during those mid terms,
And interestingly enough, it was when Republicans were losing to Democrats,
and I was like, what's going on here? And it
was this really interesting intersection where the Rob Emanuel, who
(13:01):
was then in charge of the D Triple C and
recruiting candidates, he picked candidates that were pro life, pro gun,
were fiscally responsible, So they picked candidates the Republicans could
be comfortable voting for. In because he understood that Republicans
(13:22):
were pissed off at Republican candidates because they were spreending
like drunken sailors, right, and they had lost their way.
So it was showing me that these coalitions were starting
to shift and that the working class was becoming part
of the Republican Party. That was very early inception, but
it was definitely happened.
Speaker 1 (13:44):
What has been the best part of all this, this
whole crazy journey that you've been taking, Oh, all the.
Speaker 3 (13:50):
People I get to me, all the privilege that I
have to interview people where they are, and really getting
a profound sense of what place means to people, having
a sense of place, being rooted. You know, people don't realize,
but eight out of ten people in this eight out
(14:10):
of ten people in this country live within one hundred
miles of where they grew up, and seven other ten
people live within ten miles of where they were. So
roots matter. So when people don't understand, take my state
for instance, and.
Speaker 1 (14:31):
Her state is Pennsylvania.
Speaker 3 (14:33):
For anyone who doesn't know, yeah, oh Pennsylvania. So if
anybody remembers, one of the last best speeches Joe Biden
gave was at the State of the Union dress in
twenty twenty four. It was arguably his best spee and
it was coherent and it was to the point, and
it was something that had been lacking with him and
(14:54):
leading me to that date. And so people were like, okay.
But then he said some in that speech. He said
something about snackflation, and he was talking about how greedy, uh,
these these these uh snack company owners were, and he
pointed to Bob Casey, who was then the US Senator
(15:16):
from Pennsylvania, Democrat, and said, I'm putting you in charge
of these evil, bad people.
Speaker 1 (15:20):
I'm honestly paraphrasing a little bit only yeah, but.
Speaker 3 (15:25):
Not really in tone. He was like, you're in charge
of snackflation. Get you know, all this greed, and he
was sort of putting the blame of inflation on that.
And I'm watching it and my mouth is wide open.
I'm like, wait, what do they not realize that eighty
percent of the snacks consumed in this country are made
(15:48):
in six counties in Pennsylvania. Now affect someone's vote? Yeah,
the farmers, the manufacturers, the people's in the people in
the c suites that live in the night neighborhoods to
drive a truck drivers, all of these people are a
coalition of people and you just call them the bad guy.
Speaker 1 (16:09):
Right, I had no idea, that's really sure. It's like
such an interesting.
Speaker 3 (16:14):
As not meaning me. But I know you expect this
Montgomery County or your county c suite, like living in
a half million dollar home, vote for Kamala Harris or
Joe Biden because that's what sort of the stereotype dictates.
But if you're going after my industry, right, I don't
(16:35):
think so. I know you think my family's going to
vote for you, I don't think so. So it's those
sort of intimate, granular things that that makes me understand
like why my state is it mattered? But also if
you didn't know this, if you weren't on a back
(16:56):
road in York Pennsylvania and you didn't see snyders potato
chips or have you've never been to Hershey Park and
understand sort of all that happens in our state, you
know that that contributes to snacks, then you know there
was just such a huge disconnect.
Speaker 1 (17:18):
Right, he had no idea. He was just criticizing you
know some ceo, Yeah, some ceo somewhere, right.
Speaker 3 (17:24):
You literally look it up on Wikipedia snack belt Pennsylvania.
It's fascinated not that hard.
Speaker 6 (17:31):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (17:32):
So you're such a champion for Pennsylvania. You clearly love
your state so much. And you know, one of my
best friends considers Pittsburgh like, you know, the undiscovered or
not undiscovered but undervalued American city, which he just thinks
is like the greatest city in the country. I've never
been to Pittsburgh. What makes it so amazing.
Speaker 3 (17:51):
If you asked me five years ago, I would say everything,
but the people. Undeniably, it's the people that made the
city amazing. Unfortunately, the politics in the city has gotten
very weird. Uh. And there's been a lot of anti Semitism,
there has been, uh, you know, a defiance to the
(18:16):
Ice orders, there has been it's just been very ugly,
ugly politics. A lot of that has to do with
the Democrats Socialist of America sort of being backing these
far left candidates, right, because we are a closed state
and a closed primary state, and because people generally that
(18:41):
vote in primaries tend to be either the furthest left
or the furthest right of their party, they have become
the leaders in the in the city. So think summerly
is our congresswoman, and so the politics have sort of
hurt the city a little bit. We have a homeless problem,
we have a crime problem. But outside of that, my
(19:05):
city is you know, it's it's a beautiful city. It's
a very old American city. It was literally considered the
West in the beginning of foundings.
Speaker 1 (19:18):
Of our of our Country's funny, you know, my.
Speaker 3 (19:21):
Family has been in Pennsylvania since sixteen thirty two. The
Scottish shide, not the Italians. There wasn't even in Italy
in sixteen thirty two. But the and and have been
in Pennsylvan in Lake Pittsburgh and Butler. That's what made
That's what made what happened to me? And Butler are
all that more. You know, personal have been there since
(19:43):
the seventeen fifties. I love my city. I just wish
that it would clean up as ap.
Speaker 1 (19:49):
We're going to take a quick break and be right
back on the Carol Marcowitch Show. So what happened to
you in Butler? For anybody who doesn't know.
Speaker 3 (19:58):
So, yeah, wait, y'all, I need to buy my book.
Speaker 1 (20:01):
Yeah, a book is called Butler, and when it's coming
out you can pre order it. We order it now.
Speaker 3 (20:06):
So I was four feet away from the President when
he was shot at in Butler. It was an interesting day,
as any journalist knows when you go. When you when
you have certain things planned for a day, including an interview,
there's a seventy percent chance it's not going to happen.
(20:27):
Sure right, like your day is just not going to
go the way it planned, and you have to be
ready at coord of it. I was supposed to interview
President Trump that day, July thirteenth, in Butler, and it
was supposed to be five minute interview right before the rally,
And about three hours before he got there, I got
(20:49):
a text saying, hey, change of plans, and so I
immediately think it's not going to happen, but they said,
now can you interview them for five minutes after the rally?
I said bought. And then about an hour before President
Trump gets there, I get a text saying, so, hey,
President Trump really doesn't want you to be like five
(21:09):
minute interview. Want to fly with him to Bedminster do
the interview on the plane. I'm like, well, I didn't
have that on my Bengo card, right, you know?
Speaker 7 (21:19):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (21:20):
I had my daughter with me. She's a photo journalist.
So she was gonna do the photos. So she you know,
four kids, her husband was with her. There's a reason
why her husband was with her. It was one hundred
and three degrees that day. We made him carry everything.
So we're like, okay, that's what we're gonna do. And
(21:44):
about two minutes before, no, about five minutes before President
Trump's about to go on stage, this campaign advance man
Gradman said, it's go time. I'm like, oh my god,
everything's changed again. Like follow hims. This like narrow little causeway.
We go in the back of the stage, there's President Trump.
(22:05):
It's called a clickroom. A clickroom is where generally the
president will meet with like local people, a couple people
grab from the crowd, and law enforcement and then they'll
get their photo taken with the president. They put me
at the end of the line, the three of us
at the end of the line, and I said, well,
where are we doing this interview? And the poor guys
(22:29):
his name was Michelle. He goes, I actually don't know,
because let me go ask the president. He goes around.
There's a big curt and he goes around and he
comes back. It's like very sheepishly says you just wanted
to say, Hi, We're still going to Bedminster. I'm like, okay, right,
(22:49):
so again things are changed. I go around and and
we have this thing between us. He always is like, say,
you know, best hair in America. Yeah, And I get
so embarrassed because then everybody is staring at me, like,
and I'm thinking, is my hair good? I've been in
the affinity for like five hours. I don't I hear you?
Speaker 1 (23:10):
Girl?
Speaker 3 (23:11):
Yeah, my currently Italian hair, Like we can't keep it straight.
Speaker 1 (23:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (23:16):
So he asked about my grandchildren and then set me
on my way. So at this point he can't get
us back to the press riser where the rest of
the press are, because that little causeway that we were
sent through was now closed off. So he goes, okay,
since you're going right after the rally with the president,
(23:36):
let's put you in the buffer. And the buffer is
is sort of a well mostly used by security that
separates the president from the crowd and also by photo
journalists because just going to well follow him around as
he goes out on the stage and then get over
on the far side. Okay, we're all taking photos. My
daughter and my son in law. We come, We're what
(23:59):
he comes out, well, he waves to the crowd.
Speaker 1 (24:02):
He then.
Speaker 3 (24:04):
Goes up to the podium. And you know, if you've
never been to a Trump rally, you don't understand. But
the relationship between him and the people that are attending
it is very transactional. He feeds off of them, they
feed off of him. And this isn't a positive way.
This is a very sort of aspirational way. People believe
(24:28):
they are part of something bigger than themselves, and Chump
intuitively understands that he is as well. He's part of it.
He's part of them. It's not just about him, it's
about everybody there. So because of that, he never looks
away from the crowd. He'll move his he'll move his
body and look at different size, like, turn around and
(24:50):
look at the crowds around.
Speaker 1 (24:51):
Right, It's not like he has notes or anything.
Speaker 3 (24:53):
Yeah, so two things happen simultaneously. That never happened. He
brings a chart down, what is he ross perrot like,
he never has a chart?
Speaker 1 (25:05):
Amazing, huh.
Speaker 3 (25:07):
And then he turned away from the crop and he
never does that. And at that moment, I hear pop
pop pop pop, Well, let's fly right over. I watch
him go down but he takes himself down. I note that, like,
it's really weird. You know how they always say things
happen in slow motion, They absolutely do. Really, I can
(25:30):
see him go down. I can see him hold his ear.
I see the Secret Service go around him. You remember,
I'm like four feet away from him at this point.
Speaker 1 (25:40):
And is your daughter snapping pictures my dog?
Speaker 3 (25:43):
Yeah, we're We don't stop working until the second four
bullets go by and Michelle takes us down. The campaign
press guy, He's amazing. He's my hero. He Michelle Licard.
I will love him him forever. He was so protective
of all of us. And I can I can hear
(26:05):
the whole conversation he is having with the Secret Service. Uh,
and you know, like about when to go up, you
know that the shooter is dead, Like you can hear
them talking, you can hear their ray I can hear
the radio's just because of how close I am and
(26:25):
I can. It was a little bit funny. It's funnier now.
It was a little bit funny in the moment. And
hear him like they want him to get up and
want me to go, but he's like basically saying, I
need to put my damn shoes on right like his
someone had knocked his shoes off. And and I hear
(26:47):
one agent CI like okay, all right, like okay, put
your shoes.
Speaker 1 (26:54):
On right, and they get his shoes off. That's so weird.
Speaker 3 (26:56):
And then he comes off the stage. He goes right
past me. There is an agent that holds a gun
right in our heads as he's going past. Because they
still don't know what they don't know. And so I
did not go to Bedminster that day, no, obviously. But
he calls me the next morning, bright and early, and
(27:17):
before I could say hello, like I didn't even get
my hello out, He's like, are you okay? Is Shannon
and Mike okay?
Speaker 7 (27:25):
I'm like and I felt like.
Speaker 3 (27:26):
Saying, are you freaking kidding me? You do you've just
been shot?
Speaker 1 (27:32):
Yeah, maybe focus on yourself.
Speaker 3 (27:33):
Yeah. We would ended up talking, I believe seven different
times that day. You called me back a lot of
times because he kept getting interrupted, obviously obviously, but also
just talking about faith, about him making that decision. Like
all of that's detailed. All the details of those conversations
(27:55):
are in the book.
Speaker 1 (27:57):
I cannot wait to read this because he seems a
changed person after.
Speaker 3 (28:01):
She's probably changed her Yeah, as someone that has interviewed
him nineteen times, he has definitely a changed hersent. And
there's really some poignant moments with him and I after
that at different places. They're really powerful. But the book
(28:21):
also really gets into like everybody was reading things in
other newspapers and thinking one thing might happen, and I
kept writing notes, not you'll need to come to Pennsylvania.
It was clear to me that that she stood no chance.
Biden definitely didn't stand a chance. Probably, I mean, I
(28:46):
will say this unequivocally, would have lost worse than she did. Really,
it was clear to me that she was not gonna win.
She had no cultural connection to the voters here and.
Speaker 1 (28:58):
That way where any kind of connection, and I think
to any voters she was impossible to really get through to. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (29:05):
So, and and you'll find out in the book the
first the forward in the book, not the foreword, the
first chapter, you'll find out that there was another president
that was shot in Butler and it is really intense
and that's really really.
Speaker 1 (29:25):
Interesting, shocking. I can't wait to read it. Butler, And
when does it come out again? That comes out of
July eighth, but pre order pre order pre orders are important,
is like this, It's the main thing everybody pre orders
Selena's book. It's going to be amazing. You could tell
by the story she just told how incredible a storyteller
she is. And I just can't wait to read it.
(29:46):
So a question that I ask all of my guests
is which what do you worry about?
Speaker 3 (29:54):
So, as I said in my homework sign, yeah, I
tend not to work.
Speaker 1 (30:00):
Really yeah, I mean it doesn't mean Italian doesn't worry.
Speaker 3 (30:06):
Well, here's why you don't worry because it has no power.
Worry has absolutely no power. It drains you. It can't
do Worry can do nothing to change circumstances. It is
just a waste of energy. If you want to, if
you have something that's really sort of concerning you, or
(30:29):
a life struggle that you're trying to work your way through,
or even if it's just an issue with your child
or your parents or your family or your career, the
best thing to do is go outside and take a walk.
And if faith is important to you, prayer is something
that has often gotten me through. And by the way,
(30:51):
ever get everything I ask for when I pray, I
probably only get a tense, But prayer is really really
a great way way or being reflective is a great
way to uplift that stress, and it helps you understand
that there are some things you just don't have control over,
and it helps you think about better ways to manage it.
Speaker 1 (31:15):
What advice would you give your sixteen year old self?
What does sixteen year old Selena need to know?
Speaker 3 (31:21):
All the things you're going to fail at, don't worry
about it. They end up being the things that make
you successful.
Speaker 1 (31:28):
What have you failed at?
Speaker 5 (31:30):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (31:31):
I've admired so many times.
Speaker 1 (31:33):
Really, just I see you as like this beloved writer.
Like I was thinking about this before our interview, Like
the right is very fractured, and there's a lot of
like groups or clicks or whatever, and you just kind
of transcend all of that. And so it's surprising to
me that you failed at anything.
Speaker 3 (31:56):
Oh, that's because I didn't belong there.
Speaker 6 (31:58):
You have.
Speaker 3 (31:59):
We have to recogniz eyes. Failures aren't about not trying
hard enough. Failures about it not being a good fit.
It's sort of like going on a date with the
eurosay your woman and you meet the perfect guy, right,
and you like, you know, you get along and on
(32:19):
paper he's great on paper, You're great, but it doesn't
work out like And it's not because either were bad.
It's because it wasn't a good fit. He's in corporate
America for two jobs, and I was terrible at it.
And it was not nothing to do with not working
really hard, right, I was just really, really bad. But
(32:41):
where I learned so much, and I think what makes
me a good writer is observation skills. I have always
been a people watcher and it has taught me so much.
But also being a waitress, being a hairdresser, being a
hockey moms, soccer mom, football mom, my kids played every
(33:02):
cross mom, my kids played every sport imaginable.
Speaker 1 (33:05):
Yeah, I have one of those. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (33:09):
And also understanding place in the world where you are
and where you're from. A respect for a place, no
matter where you no matter where you find yourself, helps
you become a better writer.
Speaker 1 (33:27):
I love that. I love everything you do. She's so fantastic.
Selena Zito, leave us here with your best tip for
my listeners on how they can improve their lives. Well,
I'm going to go one of the three questions. Selena,
you wrote out an answer.
Speaker 3 (33:42):
I can go find you right out an answer, and
I go back to my second answer. Okay, how do
you improve your lives? Take a little care of yourself.
I'm telling you nothing is better than either a good
cup of coffee or glass of water or whatever your
drink of choices shouldn't be alcohol in the morning, and
make a walk. Yeah, a fifteen minute walk you walk
(34:04):
in your house like it gets your endorphins going, right.
And as What's your Name famously said in What's the
Movie where she becomes a lawyer.
Speaker 1 (34:17):
I think legally blind. I felt like I knew where
you were going with this reason. With this food, you're endorphins.
Speaker 3 (34:23):
If you're if you're working, you're endorpy.
Speaker 1 (34:25):
People don't kill people. Yeah, And so.
Speaker 3 (34:30):
Taking that walk, you know, in the first thing in
the morning, even if your kids are around the how
do circuits around your house, whatever you need to do,
get them, get those juices flowing. It helps your mind
be clear and had its Exercise is never bad, that's.
Speaker 1 (34:48):
Right, hear. I wouldn't take the chance myself, but.
Speaker 3 (34:51):
Yeah, that would be my best advice.
Speaker 1 (34:56):
I love it. She is Selena Z. You know, she's amazing.
Pre Order her new book Butler. It's going to be
out in July, but pre order right now so you
have it the day it comes out. Thank you so much,
Selna Zita, Thank you so.
Speaker 3 (35:08):
Much for having me. This is fun.
Speaker 1 (35:10):
Thanks so much for joining us on the Carol Marco
which show subscribe
Him. Welcome back, Carol Markowitz show on iHeartRadio. Clay Travis,
he of the Clay Travis and Buck Sexton podcast network
that this show is on, highlighted a new study about happiness,
and he pointed out that the happiness index has hit
an all time low and that that number is largely
driven by young people.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
The United States overall happiness index, to the extent that
they track this hit a all time low, and it's
being driven by people under the age of thirty. And
I would bet that it's women under the age of
thirty overwhelmingly who are unhappy. And I think it's hard
not to believe at this point that all of this
(00:46):
isn't directly connected to social media. I mean, if you
go look at the charts overall mental health rates. Now
certainly COVID didn't help, but overall mental health rates just
collapsed about twenty fourteen when social media became prevalent in
everybody's lives. Yeah, and I think we're going to find
out that this is like the nicotine or cigarettes of
(01:08):
our generation, where we allowed these phones and these social
media apps, particularly for young people, to really kind of
lead us astray in terms of our life's pursuit.
Speaker 1 (01:17):
Now, he's right that it's the phones. But people who
have been listening to the show for a while know
what I'm going to challenge here. It's not the social media.
There is no social media anymore.
Speaker 3 (01:30):
It used to be.
Speaker 1 (01:31):
That teenagers would get depressed because their friends would share
pictures on Facebook or Instagram of the amazing weekend they
had and maybe didn't include them. Or they'd see their
friends living amazing lives, filtered pictures, great vacations, perfect babies,
all of that. That's just not what's happening on the
internet anymore. That's not what the kids are watching. We're
(01:53):
just all watching TV all the time. It might not
be half hour or hour episodes, but these young people
are just scrolling through hours of videos. And I said
this last time, in the last episode about the girl,
the mom wrote in to me about her daughter who
doesn't seem to have a social life, and I said,
you know, we'd recognize depression if I told you someone
(02:17):
watches ten hours of TV a day. But because they
do it in bite size, you know, pieces, and they
carry it around with them on their phone, we don't
see how bad it is. Social media has nothing social
about it. And I think we need to see exactly
what the problem is in order to fix it. We
have to think of it like a little TV we
(02:38):
carry around. We have to understand how damaging it is
to be that distracted all the time. Just imagine when
there were no phones. If every time you were in
an awkward interaction, you just turned your television on. When
you're out, you don't see people taking selfies with their
friends anymore. Instead, you still might see like a full
(02:59):
on photo shit hapless man shooting his girlfriend from all
different angles. She's a content creator, fine, but there's nothing
social about that. And look at least her content is
a break from the videos. Instagram, by the way, now
offers bonuses for creator accounts that post photos because so
(03:20):
few of them do that. It would be something else
entirely if young people were still posting pictures of their
lunches or their parties or whatever. But they're not. They're
just zombified watching TV all the time. There's no way
happiness levels will increase until we solve that. Thanks for listening.
Speaker 4 (03:40):
Coming up next my interview with Selena Zito. But first,
I ran a nation that has vowed to.
Speaker 5 (03:45):
Wipe Israel and the United States off the map made
calculated strikes at Israel. The onslaught of missiles targeting hospitals, schools,
and nursing homes caused widespread devastation. Day after day, night
after night, Israeli's faced relentless.
Speaker 4 (04:02):
And unprecedented attacks that killed dozens of innocent civilians. Thousands
fled bombed out homes. Many required immediate medical care. These
attacks were only the start of something that could be much,
much worse. Your urgently needed gift to the International Fellowship
of Christians and Jews will help provide wide scale food
(04:22):
distribution along with critical first aid and emergency supplies, especially
to Israel's most vulnerable, the sick, the elderly, children and families.
Your gift today will help place new bomb shelters across Israel,
along with first responder flak jackets and armored emergency vehicles.
Now is your time to save and heal Israel's innocent,
(04:44):
most vulnerable.
Speaker 6 (04:45):
To rush your gift, call eight eight eight for eight
eight IFCJ.
Speaker 4 (04:51):
That's eight eight eight for eight eight.
Speaker 6 (04:53):
IFCJ, or go online at IFCJ dot org, if CJ
dot org.
Speaker 1 (05:04):
Welcome back to the Carol Marcowitch Show on iHeartRadio. My
guest today is Selena Zito. Selena is a Washington Examiner
reporter and author of the upcoming book Butler. Hi, Selena
is so nice to talk to you.
Speaker 7 (05:18):
Hi there, how are you?
Speaker 1 (05:20):
We were just talking offline about how insane it is
that we've never met in real life. But I've been
a Selena Zito fan like much of the country for
a long long time now, and I just think you're
fantastic and everything you do is like full of joy
and happiness and you're wonderful. Thank you for coming on.
Speaker 7 (05:39):
Oh, thank you.
Speaker 8 (05:41):
I'm everybody's grandma. No people really, actually everybody's bestie. It's
basically the food. Then they maybe read me, but basically
the food.
Speaker 3 (05:51):
I have to tell your listeners though, that I thought
you gave me a homework assignment and I obeyed because
you told me.
Speaker 7 (06:00):
I don't know how you phrased Ita.
Speaker 1 (06:02):
Like I said, here are the questions I ask all
my guests, and my listeners will know that a lot
of the time, the guests won't read the emails, and
you'll be able to tell because they'll just be deer
in headlights when I ask them, kind of you know,
a big question like what do you worry about? And
they're like what where did this come from? But Selena
(06:24):
sent me back the answers, which was the cutest thing ever.
I said, no, no, we're going to talk about it
on the show and she said, oh, I thought you
gave me a homework assignment, which she then did. She
finished the homework assignment, she was like, all right, I
have homework. What am I going to do?
Speaker 7 (06:42):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (06:42):
It was late though, Like if it was true homework,
I would have answered it that night, but in my
zeal to be a perfect.
Speaker 7 (06:55):
Progression, I sent it to you the night before.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
It was great. I did not read your answers because
I want to be surprised.
Speaker 7 (07:04):
I only even remember them.
Speaker 1 (07:06):
So the questions will be brand new either way, right,
brand new? So how did you get into this world?
I know a little bit about your story, but you
really hit the national scene in twenty sixteen writing pieces
that I think nobody else was doing anything close to.
You were doing this crazy thing where you went out
(07:28):
and you talked to regular people and ask them what
they thought, and that was really groundbreaking. So tell me,
tell us about your path.
Speaker 8 (07:38):
So I got into this accidentally and sort of the
old fashioned way, the way journalists used to be years ago,
at local newspapers where they were members of the community,
and most of them didn't have college degrees, but they
had good writing skills, they had good people instincts, and
they were able to turn a phrase pretty well, basically.
Speaker 3 (08:00):
All I had. And I also had experiences as a hairdresser,
as a waitress, and most importantly as a soccer and
football mom and hockey mom. So you know, I came
into the game late. I was in my mid forties
when I went back to work. I was mostly a
(08:22):
stay at a home mom at that point, and they
worked for the local newspaper, the Pittsburgh Tribune Review. But
the owner of the paper's name was Richard Mellon'scaife. He
had a very nationally well known name, one of the
richest men in the country, from a very old family,
(08:43):
the Mellon family, who owned all the melon banking, and
he had a really keen interest in national news. And
I don't know what he saw in me, but he
saw my ability to listen to people and to be
able to tell a decent story, and so he said,
(09:03):
do you want to cover national politics? And I'm like,
all right, and I did, and I learned pretty darn quickly.
I was there for twenty years. I did this for
twenty years, covering local and national politics and culture, and
I learned pretty quickly. I think it was the John
Kerrey campaign or the maybe it was the Obama campaign.
(09:27):
I can't remember. I knew very quickly that I did
not belong on the campaign bus, like I just.
Speaker 7 (09:34):
Didn't not belong there. I remember calling it. It happened.
Speaker 3 (09:39):
Maybe it was Carrie.
Speaker 7 (09:40):
I don't know, I can't remember. I'm old.
Speaker 8 (09:43):
I just remember calling my boss from a pay phone
in Scranton, Pennsylvania, saying I can't go on this bus
any longer.
Speaker 3 (09:56):
All I am doing is spending time with other reporters,
and they're all like I.
Speaker 7 (10:03):
Have the same mindset. They're not from Pennsylvania.
Speaker 3 (10:07):
They don't kind of understand our quirkiness. And I'm not
having any interaction with voters because they when you're in
the press bus.
Speaker 7 (10:16):
You don't get to talk to people. So I'm like,
I'm writing crap.
Speaker 9 (10:20):
So he said, okay, just come home, and and in
typical Selda fashion, I told the bus to just keep
going without me. And then I was like, oh wait
a minute I'm i gonna get no, SAT randomly rent
a car.
Speaker 3 (10:35):
And from that moment on, I only drove to whatever
I was covering. And I've driven driven to every state.
I've even been to Alaska.
Speaker 8 (10:46):
And I used to fly to events, but flying then
became ridiculous because I live in a city where there's
no hub, so therefore you had to make like thirteen
different connecting flights, and you.
Speaker 7 (10:57):
Would miss one of them because one was late.
Speaker 3 (11:01):
And so I just started driving. So when I interviewed
Governor Desants, I drove to Florida. But in that stretch
I got seventeen other really good stories, right. And I
always take back roads. I don't take turnpikes or interstates,
(11:22):
because that's where you can see how places have changed
for the better or for the worse, and you can
understand why people vote the way they do.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
That is so amazing. I no, I did not know
the driving thing. I always felt like your writing was
you were trying to get to the bottom of what
people really thought and where they really lived, and you
always treat every place with such respect, and I think
that that's so beautiful. But I didn't know you were
driving the back roads to get these stories. That's incredible.
Speaker 3 (11:55):
My first jeep had four hundred thousand miles. It was
fourteen years old. I'm on my second one and I
just passed two hundred and seventy thousand. So yeah, but
you know that's where the best stories are. I can't
if I take the interstate, that's no different than flying right.
When you pull over to get gas, it's like the
(12:18):
same gas station and the same McDonald And there's nothing
wrong with that. There's no depths of perception of understanding
why people vote the way they do. And that's why
I understood in twenty sixteen and Trump was going to win.
But I actually called this this conservative populist coalition that
(12:40):
was forming in two thousand and six during those mid terms,
And interestingly enough, it was when Republicans were losing to Democrats,
and I was like, what's going on here? And it
was this really interesting intersection where the Rob Emanuel, who
(13:01):
was then in charge of the D Triple C and
recruiting candidates, he picked candidates that were pro life, pro gun,
were fiscally responsible, So they picked candidates the Republicans could
be comfortable voting for. In because he understood that Republicans
(13:22):
were pissed off at Republican candidates because they were spreending
like drunken sailors, right, and they had lost their way.
So it was showing me that these coalitions were starting
to shift and that the working class was becoming part
of the Republican Party. That was very early inception, but
it was definitely happened.
Speaker 1 (13:44):
What has been the best part of all this, this
whole crazy journey that you've been taking, Oh, all the.
Speaker 3 (13:50):
People I get to me, all the privilege that I
have to interview people where they are, and really getting
a profound sense of what place means to people, having
a sense of place, being rooted. You know, people don't realize,
but eight out of ten people in this eight out
(14:10):
of ten people in this country live within one hundred
miles of where they grew up, and seven other ten
people live within ten miles of where they were. So
roots matter. So when people don't understand, take my state
for instance, and.
Speaker 1 (14:31):
Her state is Pennsylvania.
Speaker 3 (14:33):
For anyone who doesn't know, yeah, oh Pennsylvania. So if
anybody remembers, one of the last best speeches Joe Biden
gave was at the State of the Union dress in
twenty twenty four. It was arguably his best spee and
it was coherent and it was to the point, and
it was something that had been lacking with him and
(14:54):
leading me to that date. And so people were like, okay.
But then he said some in that speech. He said
something about snackflation, and he was talking about how greedy, uh,
these these these uh snack company owners were, and he
pointed to Bob Casey, who was then the US Senator
(15:16):
from Pennsylvania, Democrat, and said, I'm putting you in charge
of these evil, bad people.
Speaker 1 (15:20):
I'm honestly paraphrasing a little bit only yeah, but.
Speaker 3 (15:25):
Not really in tone. He was like, you're in charge
of snackflation. Get you know, all this greed, and he
was sort of putting the blame of inflation on that.
And I'm watching it and my mouth is wide open.
I'm like, wait, what do they not realize that eighty
percent of the snacks consumed in this country are made
(15:48):
in six counties in Pennsylvania. Now affect someone's vote? Yeah,
the farmers, the manufacturers, the people's in the people in
the c suites that live in the night neighborhoods to
drive a truck drivers, all of these people are a
coalition of people and you just call them the bad guy.
Speaker 1 (16:09):
Right, I had no idea, that's really sure. It's like
such an interesting.
Speaker 3 (16:14):
As not meaning me. But I know you expect this
Montgomery County or your county c suite, like living in
a half million dollar home, vote for Kamala Harris or
Joe Biden because that's what sort of the stereotype dictates.
But if you're going after my industry, right, I don't
(16:35):
think so. I know you think my family's going to
vote for you, I don't think so. So it's those
sort of intimate, granular things that that makes me understand
like why my state is it mattered? But also if
you didn't know this, if you weren't on a back
(16:56):
road in York Pennsylvania and you didn't see snyders potato
chips or have you've never been to Hershey Park and
understand sort of all that happens in our state, you
know that that contributes to snacks, then you know there
was just such a huge disconnect.
Speaker 1 (17:18):
Right, he had no idea. He was just criticizing you
know some ceo, Yeah, some ceo somewhere, right.
Speaker 3 (17:24):
You literally look it up on Wikipedia snack belt Pennsylvania.
It's fascinated not that hard.
Speaker 6 (17:31):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (17:32):
So you're such a champion for Pennsylvania. You clearly love
your state so much. And you know, one of my
best friends considers Pittsburgh like, you know, the undiscovered or
not undiscovered but undervalued American city, which he just thinks
is like the greatest city in the country. I've never
been to Pittsburgh. What makes it so amazing.
Speaker 3 (17:51):
If you asked me five years ago, I would say everything,
but the people. Undeniably, it's the people that made the
city amazing. Unfortunately, the politics in the city has gotten
very weird. Uh. And there's been a lot of anti Semitism,
there has been, uh, you know, a defiance to the
(18:16):
Ice orders, there has been it's just been very ugly,
ugly politics. A lot of that has to do with
the Democrats Socialist of America sort of being backing these
far left candidates, right, because we are a closed state
and a closed primary state, and because people generally that
(18:41):
vote in primaries tend to be either the furthest left
or the furthest right of their party, they have become
the leaders in the in the city. So think summerly
is our congresswoman, and so the politics have sort of
hurt the city a little bit. We have a homeless problem,
we have a crime problem. But outside of that, my
(19:05):
city is you know, it's it's a beautiful city. It's
a very old American city. It was literally considered the
West in the beginning of foundings.
Speaker 1 (19:18):
Of our of our Country's funny, you know, my.
Speaker 3 (19:21):
Family has been in Pennsylvania since sixteen thirty two. The
Scottish shide, not the Italians. There wasn't even in Italy
in sixteen thirty two. But the and and have been
in Pennsylvan in Lake Pittsburgh and Butler. That's what made
That's what made what happened to me? And Butler are
all that more. You know, personal have been there since
(19:43):
the seventeen fifties. I love my city. I just wish
that it would clean up as ap.
Speaker 1 (19:49):
We're going to take a quick break and be right
back on the Carol Marcowitch Show. So what happened to
you in Butler? For anybody who doesn't know.
Speaker 3 (19:58):
So, yeah, wait, y'all, I need to buy my book.
Speaker 1 (20:01):
Yeah, a book is called Butler, and when it's coming
out you can pre order it. We order it now.
Speaker 3 (20:06):
So I was four feet away from the President when
he was shot at in Butler. It was an interesting day,
as any journalist knows when you go. When you when
you have certain things planned for a day, including an interview,
there's a seventy percent chance it's not going to happen.
(20:27):
Sure right, like your day is just not going to
go the way it planned, and you have to be
ready at coord of it. I was supposed to interview
President Trump that day, July thirteenth, in Butler, and it
was supposed to be five minute interview right before the rally,
And about three hours before he got there, I got
(20:49):
a text saying, hey, change of plans, and so I
immediately think it's not going to happen, but they said,
now can you interview them for five minutes after the rally?
I said bought. And then about an hour before President
Trump gets there, I get a text saying, so, hey,
President Trump really doesn't want you to be like five
(21:09):
minute interview. Want to fly with him to Bedminster do
the interview on the plane. I'm like, well, I didn't
have that on my Bengo card, right, you know?
Speaker 7 (21:19):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (21:20):
I had my daughter with me. She's a photo journalist.
So she was gonna do the photos. So she you know,
four kids, her husband was with her. There's a reason
why her husband was with her. It was one hundred
and three degrees that day. We made him carry everything.
So we're like, okay, that's what we're gonna do. And
(21:44):
about two minutes before, no, about five minutes before President
Trump's about to go on stage, this campaign advance man
Gradman said, it's go time. I'm like, oh my god,
everything's changed again. Like follow hims. This like narrow little causeway.
We go in the back of the stage, there's President Trump.
(22:05):
It's called a clickroom. A clickroom is where generally the
president will meet with like local people, a couple people
grab from the crowd, and law enforcement and then they'll
get their photo taken with the president. They put me
at the end of the line, the three of us
at the end of the line, and I said, well,
where are we doing this interview? And the poor guys
(22:29):
his name was Michelle. He goes, I actually don't know,
because let me go ask the president. He goes around.
There's a big curt and he goes around and he
comes back. It's like very sheepishly says you just wanted
to say, Hi, We're still going to Bedminster. I'm like, okay, right,
(22:49):
so again things are changed. I go around and and
we have this thing between us. He always is like, say,
you know, best hair in America. Yeah, And I get
so embarrassed because then everybody is staring at me, like,
and I'm thinking, is my hair good? I've been in
the affinity for like five hours. I don't I hear you?
Speaker 1 (23:10):
Girl?
Speaker 3 (23:11):
Yeah, my currently Italian hair, Like we can't keep it straight.
Speaker 1 (23:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (23:16):
So he asked about my grandchildren and then set me
on my way. So at this point he can't get
us back to the press riser where the rest of
the press are, because that little causeway that we were
sent through was now closed off. So he goes, okay,
since you're going right after the rally with the president,
(23:36):
let's put you in the buffer. And the buffer is
is sort of a well mostly used by security that
separates the president from the crowd and also by photo
journalists because just going to well follow him around as
he goes out on the stage and then get over
on the far side. Okay, we're all taking photos. My
daughter and my son in law. We come, We're what
(23:59):
he comes out, well, he waves to the crowd.
Speaker 1 (24:02):
He then.
Speaker 3 (24:04):
Goes up to the podium. And you know, if you've
never been to a Trump rally, you don't understand. But
the relationship between him and the people that are attending
it is very transactional. He feeds off of them, they
feed off of him. And this isn't a positive way.
This is a very sort of aspirational way. People believe
(24:28):
they are part of something bigger than themselves, and Chump
intuitively understands that he is as well. He's part of it.
He's part of them. It's not just about him, it's
about everybody there. So because of that, he never looks
away from the crowd. He'll move his he'll move his
body and look at different size, like, turn around and
(24:50):
look at the crowds around.
Speaker 1 (24:51):
Right, It's not like he has notes or anything.
Speaker 3 (24:53):
Yeah, so two things happen simultaneously. That never happened. He
brings a chart down, what is he ross perrot like,
he never has a chart?
Speaker 1 (25:05):
Amazing, huh.
Speaker 3 (25:07):
And then he turned away from the crop and he
never does that. And at that moment, I hear pop
pop pop pop, Well, let's fly right over. I watch
him go down but he takes himself down. I note that, like,
it's really weird. You know how they always say things
happen in slow motion, They absolutely do. Really, I can
(25:30):
see him go down. I can see him hold his ear.
I see the Secret Service go around him. You remember,
I'm like four feet away from him at this point.
Speaker 1 (25:40):
And is your daughter snapping pictures my dog?
Speaker 3 (25:43):
Yeah, we're We don't stop working until the second four
bullets go by and Michelle takes us down. The campaign
press guy, He's amazing. He's my hero. He Michelle Licard.
I will love him him forever. He was so protective
of all of us. And I can I can hear
(26:05):
the whole conversation he is having with the Secret Service. Uh,
and you know, like about when to go up, you
know that the shooter is dead, Like you can hear
them talking, you can hear their ray I can hear
the radio's just because of how close I am and
(26:25):
I can. It was a little bit funny. It's funnier now.
It was a little bit funny in the moment. And
hear him like they want him to get up and
want me to go, but he's like basically saying, I
need to put my damn shoes on right like his
someone had knocked his shoes off. And and I hear
(26:47):
one agent CI like okay, all right, like okay, put
your shoes.
Speaker 1 (26:54):
On right, and they get his shoes off. That's so weird.
Speaker 3 (26:56):
And then he comes off the stage. He goes right
past me. There is an agent that holds a gun
right in our heads as he's going past. Because they
still don't know what they don't know. And so I
did not go to Bedminster that day, no, obviously. But
he calls me the next morning, bright and early, and
(27:17):
before I could say hello, like I didn't even get
my hello out, He's like, are you okay? Is Shannon
and Mike okay?
Speaker 7 (27:25):
I'm like and I felt like.
Speaker 3 (27:26):
Saying, are you freaking kidding me? You do you've just
been shot?
Speaker 1 (27:32):
Yeah, maybe focus on yourself.
Speaker 3 (27:33):
Yeah. We would ended up talking, I believe seven different
times that day. You called me back a lot of
times because he kept getting interrupted, obviously obviously, but also
just talking about faith, about him making that decision. Like
all of that's detailed. All the details of those conversations
(27:55):
are in the book.
Speaker 1 (27:57):
I cannot wait to read this because he seems a
changed person after.
Speaker 3 (28:01):
She's probably changed her Yeah, as someone that has interviewed
him nineteen times, he has definitely a changed hersent. And
there's really some poignant moments with him and I after
that at different places. They're really powerful. But the book
(28:21):
also really gets into like everybody was reading things in
other newspapers and thinking one thing might happen, and I
kept writing notes, not you'll need to come to Pennsylvania.
It was clear to me that that she stood no chance.
Biden definitely didn't stand a chance. Probably, I mean, I
(28:46):
will say this unequivocally, would have lost worse than she did. Really,
it was clear to me that she was not gonna win.
She had no cultural connection to the voters here and.
Speaker 1 (28:58):
That way where any kind of connection, and I think
to any voters she was impossible to really get through to. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (29:05):
So, and and you'll find out in the book the
first the forward in the book, not the foreword, the
first chapter, you'll find out that there was another president
that was shot in Butler and it is really intense
and that's really really.
Speaker 1 (29:25):
Interesting, shocking. I can't wait to read it. Butler, And
when does it come out again? That comes out of
July eighth, but pre order pre order pre orders are important,
is like this, It's the main thing everybody pre orders
Selena's book. It's going to be amazing. You could tell
by the story she just told how incredible a storyteller
she is. And I just can't wait to read it.
(29:46):
So a question that I ask all of my guests
is which what do you worry about?
Speaker 3 (29:54):
So, as I said in my homework sign, yeah, I
tend not to work.
Speaker 1 (30:00):
Really yeah, I mean it doesn't mean Italian doesn't worry.
Speaker 3 (30:06):
Well, here's why you don't worry because it has no power.
Worry has absolutely no power. It drains you. It can't
do Worry can do nothing to change circumstances. It is
just a waste of energy. If you want to, if
you have something that's really sort of concerning you, or
(30:29):
a life struggle that you're trying to work your way through,
or even if it's just an issue with your child
or your parents or your family or your career, the
best thing to do is go outside and take a walk.
And if faith is important to you, prayer is something
that has often gotten me through. And by the way,
(30:51):
ever get everything I ask for when I pray, I
probably only get a tense, But prayer is really really
a great way way or being reflective is a great
way to uplift that stress, and it helps you understand
that there are some things you just don't have control over,
and it helps you think about better ways to manage it.
Speaker 1 (31:15):
What advice would you give your sixteen year old self?
What does sixteen year old Selena need to know?
Speaker 3 (31:21):
All the things you're going to fail at, don't worry
about it. They end up being the things that make
you successful.
Speaker 1 (31:28):
What have you failed at?
Speaker 5 (31:30):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (31:31):
I've admired so many times.
Speaker 1 (31:33):
Really, just I see you as like this beloved writer.
Like I was thinking about this before our interview, Like
the right is very fractured, and there's a lot of
like groups or clicks or whatever, and you just kind
of transcend all of that. And so it's surprising to
me that you failed at anything.
Speaker 3 (31:56):
Oh, that's because I didn't belong there.
Speaker 6 (31:58):
You have.
Speaker 3 (31:59):
We have to recogniz eyes. Failures aren't about not trying
hard enough. Failures about it not being a good fit.
It's sort of like going on a date with the
eurosay your woman and you meet the perfect guy, right,
and you like, you know, you get along and on
(32:19):
paper he's great on paper, You're great, but it doesn't
work out like And it's not because either were bad.
It's because it wasn't a good fit. He's in corporate
America for two jobs, and I was terrible at it.
And it was not nothing to do with not working
really hard, right, I was just really, really bad. But
(32:41):
where I learned so much, and I think what makes
me a good writer is observation skills. I have always
been a people watcher and it has taught me so much.
But also being a waitress, being a hairdresser, being a
hockey moms, soccer mom, football mom, my kids played every
(33:02):
cross mom, my kids played every sport imaginable.
Speaker 1 (33:05):
Yeah, I have one of those. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (33:09):
And also understanding place in the world where you are
and where you're from. A respect for a place, no
matter where you no matter where you find yourself, helps
you become a better writer.
Speaker 1 (33:27):
I love that. I love everything you do. She's so fantastic.
Selena Zito, leave us here with your best tip for
my listeners on how they can improve their lives. Well,
I'm going to go one of the three questions. Selena,
you wrote out an answer.
Speaker 3 (33:42):
I can go find you right out an answer, and
I go back to my second answer. Okay, how do
you improve your lives? Take a little care of yourself.
I'm telling you nothing is better than either a good
cup of coffee or glass of water or whatever your
drink of choices shouldn't be alcohol in the morning, and
make a walk. Yeah, a fifteen minute walk you walk
(34:04):
in your house like it gets your endorphins going, right.
And as What's your Name famously said in What's the
Movie where she becomes a lawyer.
Speaker 1 (34:17):
I think legally blind. I felt like I knew where
you were going with this reason. With this food, you're endorphins.
Speaker 3 (34:23):
If you're if you're working, you're endorpy.
Speaker 1 (34:25):
People don't kill people. Yeah, And so.
Speaker 3 (34:30):
Taking that walk, you know, in the first thing in
the morning, even if your kids are around the how
do circuits around your house, whatever you need to do,
get them, get those juices flowing. It helps your mind
be clear and had its Exercise is never bad, that's.
Speaker 1 (34:48):
Right, hear. I wouldn't take the chance myself, but.
Speaker 3 (34:51):
Yeah, that would be my best advice.
Speaker 1 (34:56):
I love it. She is Selena Z. You know, she's amazing.
Pre Order her new book Butler. It's going to be
out in July, but pre order right now so you
have it the day it comes out. Thank you so much,
Selna Zita, Thank you so.
Speaker 3 (35:08):
Much for having me. This is fun.
Speaker 1 (35:10):
Thanks so much for joining us on the Carol Marco
which show subscribe
The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show News
Hosts And Creators
Clay Travis
Buck Sexton
Show Links
WebsiteNewsletterPopular Podcasts
United States of Kennedy
United States of Kennedy is a podcast about our cultural fascination with the Kennedy dynasty. Every week, hosts Lyra Smith and George Civeris go into one aspect of the Kennedy story.
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