Karol Markowicz sits down with Commentary Magazine senior editor Seth Mandel for a wide-ranging conversation about journalism, family, faith, homeschooling, and the future of media.
Seth shares how a local newspaper job launched his career, his journey from community journalism to Commentary Magazine, and what it's like being married to author and commentator Bethany Mandel. He also opens up about raising six children, homeschooling, balancing work and family life, and why he believes strong families remain one of society's greatest blessings.
Plus, Seth offers a surprising five-year prediction about the future of streaming, sports broadcasting, and entertainment consumption that could fundamentally reshape how Americans watch TV and listen to music.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
Hi, and welcome back to the Carol Markowitz Show on iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
My guest today is Seth Mandel.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
Seth is the senior editor of Commentary magazine.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
Hi, Seth, so nice to have you on.
Speaker 3 (00:17):
Hi, Carol, thanks for having me so.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
Seth, you've been my editor.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
You are married to the co author of the only
book I'm ever going to write, Stolen Youth, and yet
it was harder to get you on my show than like,
I don't know, I was gonna say I'm Madonna, but
that seems like a dated reference Taylor Swift. You are
harder to get than Taylor Swift.
Speaker 2 (00:36):
What is up with that?
Speaker 3 (00:39):
I you know, I don't. I wanted to give you space.
I don't want to crowd you.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
So is that it?
Speaker 3 (00:43):
As I said, I was your editor and yeah, you know,
married to your co author and all that stuff.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
So you just feel like I have enough of you?
Speaker 3 (00:50):
Yeah, you know, I don't wanna. I don't wanna. There's
there's a certain amount of Seth that like, it's a
bell curve right right, and I wanted to make sure
to keep our friendship. I don't know, screen can see
it at this part of the curve.
Speaker 2 (01:03):
It's an audio show mostly, but I get it.
Speaker 3 (01:05):
Okay, Well, we'll.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
Just the audience understands you want to curve with my hands.
Speaker 3 (01:11):
For those who can't see, it's a very it's it's
it's very accurate because I've been doing geometry with my
daughter homeschool and yeah, shapes.
Speaker 1 (01:22):
I think you just wanted to stay mysterious. You didn't
want to expose. You know a lot about your life,
and your wife enjoys the talking to camera on Instagram,
but you have abandoned all social media projects. You started
a Instagram that lasted like two weeks. I think you
(01:43):
guys had a show, The Sephany Show that was very fun.
Speaker 2 (01:47):
Also no longer do that. So tell us about yourself.
Speaker 3 (01:51):
How did you have an abandoned Twitter x?
Speaker 1 (01:55):
Yeah, so you don't talk about yourself on there. You're
not like, here's what I did today. So all right,
we're going to find out some stuff about Seth Mende.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
I brought some pictures of my lunches over the past
week and we could show them. Oh, it's an audio
only show, that's right.
Speaker 1 (02:10):
Mostly I do clip from it, so maybe i'll clip
the pictures of your lunches. How did you get into
this thing of ours. How did you become a journalist?
Speaker 3 (02:19):
I actually majored in journalism in college.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
Wow, what a mistake.
Speaker 3 (02:23):
It was the last I know. For years, my mom
would just remind me that law school was still an
option even after I had become a professional journalist. But yeah,
this was like the one thing that I actually planned
and you know, was ready for. I wanted to write.
I knew I wanted to write when I was in college.
I think, you know, there, I definitely went through a
(02:45):
period where I thought I was going to be a
sports writer, which I think every guy in college does,
whether they're majoring in journalism or not. But it just
writing was my thing. It was my thing in school,
and so it just made sense to me, uh to
major in it, and so I did. And then you know,
from there, it was like my my childhood friend's uh
(03:10):
mother they lived across the street, saw an ad in
a newspaper for a reporter job.
Speaker 2 (03:16):
Wow, how old are you brought it over? I know,
I'm saying ad in a newspaper.
Speaker 1 (03:22):
I don't even think I try to ads, And I mean,
I'm older than you, but I don't think that I
even ever saw employment ads in a newspaper.
Speaker 3 (03:30):
Get this. Then I went to work for a newspaper,
so they.
Speaker 2 (03:38):
You should apply.
Speaker 3 (03:39):
Yeah. But actually it's kind of funny because my my
newspaper experience was also very like ancient Egyptian papyrus style too,
because we had an internet station, have internet at your
computer at you went and used it the net as
the as the young kids say today, you had and
(04:02):
if you wanted to print something out you had to
go to the print the internet station and which was
connected to a print d and printed. The only thing
you could get at your desk through the Ethernet connection
was you or your work email.
Speaker 2 (04:15):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (04:15):
So I actually, yeah, no, I did. I did. I
was a journalist in the old days. Wow.
Speaker 1 (04:21):
That's amazing. I mean, I can't even say that. I
don't even I mean I had early internet, like in college,
you know, we had very very little internet. But I
never worked anywhere where I didn't have internet that was already.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
That's pretty wild. So where was your first journalism job?
Speaker 3 (04:39):
I was. It was a newspaper called the East Brunswick Sentinel.
It was a weekly. There was a Greater Media newspaper.
Greater Media is at an organization in a media group
in New Jersey that owns like radio stations, local newspapers,
stuff like that. They had their own printing press. The
highlight of which every week, by the way, was they
printed the Onion. I don't know if your listeners are
old enough to remember the Onion when it was funny,
(05:02):
but I don't think printed. And it was funny, very
printed and very funny years ago. And so they had
these weekly newspapers as part of it. So that's that's
where I started the local local, super hyper hyper local
level without without internet. So I just I just made
up my stories.
Speaker 2 (05:22):
So where did you go from there?
Speaker 1 (05:26):
He didn't make up his stories, invented the stories. Yeah,
everybody goes back and like find the archives.
Speaker 3 (05:36):
Yet, and so I from there, I went on this
while I was working as a reporter at the Sentinel.
I went on this trip family trip to Israel and
it was I guess it was six And it just
happened to be that R. L. Sharon, who was Prime
Minister at the time, had a stroke and went into
(05:59):
a cone while we were there. So my editors back
home got word to me. Again, this was a long
time ago, so you know, they sent a pigeon.
Speaker 2 (06:11):
Like all six everybody had internet.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
I don't know what is going on at your weekly
in New Jersey, but literally two thousand and six internets everywhere,
there's lots of internet.
Speaker 3 (06:22):
Yeah, so they actually so they just texted and said,
you should, you should write about this, but not a
since we were a weekly. Don't write a news story
because like we could pick it up from the wires
by the time we got home and we run it.
Since weekly, it's not gonna make sense I have a
news or like, actually write an opinion piece, a sort
of observation piece. What I saw, what it looked like,
(06:47):
you know what what what my my front row view
was of this monumental thing happening around me.
Speaker 2 (06:55):
And that was your first opinion column.
Speaker 3 (06:57):
Yeah, that was a opinion piece that I wrote. And
it was really it was really like a reporter's notebook
sort of thing. It wasn't it wasn't even like op
ed style, but I was really into it because, you know,
the whole thing meant a lot to me. And I
came home and I wrote it, and somebody who published
(07:18):
the Jewish newspaper saw it and they needed an editor
and they said, I'll take this guy who wrote this,
this looks good, and so it ended up that got
me into Jewish media. And then I was editing local
Jewish media, and then that closed, like much local media,
Jewish or otherwise. And it came to Washington, and I
(07:42):
did a stint at the Foundation for Defensive Democracies and freelanced,
and from there was hired by Commentary the first time
we moved back to New York. From Commentary, I went
to the New York Post, where I was your editor
on the editorial page, and from there I went to
the Washington Examiner, where I edited the Washington Examiner magazine,
(08:06):
a weekly magazine, and then back to commentary.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
That's such an interesting journey. But actually I think that
the biggest leap there is columnist to editor. I like,
how did that happen? I mean, I couldn't go be
an editor right now?
Speaker 2 (08:22):
Well, you never know, no, no, I know, I need
an editor.
Speaker 1 (08:27):
I have a substack that I never write on because
there are no deadlines and I can't do it.
Speaker 3 (08:33):
I need everyone needs an editor. That's the truth. Editors
need editors too. I'm not comfortable writing things that don't
get looked at by someone interesting. I write every day,
you know, sometimes multiple pieces a day at my current job,
and they all get looked at by somebody. I have
an editor, and so shout out to Abe Greenwald who
(08:57):
does that.
Speaker 1 (08:58):
Abe, who also refuses to do my show, doesn't like
to talk about himself. He says, yeah, he's a mysterious
We're gonna make him come on.
Speaker 2 (09:06):
Though.
Speaker 3 (09:06):
You don't know if Abe exists. They just know it's
like you know, Kaiser shows or whatever. Yeah, no, no, no,
he's he. I mean, Abe is is like the most phenomenal.
He's just a phenomenal person and phenomenal editor and just
everything just.
Speaker 2 (09:21):
Like until he comes on here, he's.
Speaker 3 (09:22):
Just an okay.
Speaker 1 (09:24):
Person, you know, Like I'm sure he's a good editor,
but as a human, you know.
Speaker 3 (09:31):
Well, we'll tell him, we'll tell you. We'll Yeah, you've
laid down, you know, the gauntlet. So I need an
editor too, I really do. We all need it. It's
very hard to see. It's very hard to see from
an editorial perspective and a writer's perspective on the same piece. So,
but making the leap was also when I made that
leap from writing from reporting for a secular newspaper to
(09:56):
editing a Jewish newspaper. Part of it was also that
it was organization. This was a Jewish newspaper or a
group of Jewish newspapers that had closed and were then
purchased by somebody in the area and sort of restarted.
And I was brought into restarted. So it was not
just editing, but it was really, yes, trying to I mean,
(10:20):
there was there was a obviously there there was a
skeleton there of what it was. It wasn't like I
totally reinvented the wheel, but but yeah, it was. It
was it was like a whole sort of project. And
since it was local, it was covering Jewish stuff in
New Jersey, and so to me it was a different
(10:41):
sort of project than just editing. It was like I
came from the Jewish community in Jersey, I you know,
was raised among the Jewish federations and all those organizations.
You know, I went to both n cs Y and
u s Y.
Speaker 2 (10:54):
You know, growing covered, covered your bases, covered.
Speaker 3 (10:57):
All the bases, you know, and so like I can't,
I really came out of this this world entirely, and
so you know, it was it was it was about
project about that even more than any specific editorial type
of thing. But you know you you just you have to.
I had other editors on staff. Uh, and you know,
(11:18):
you learn.
Speaker 1 (11:19):
Yeah, do you think you have a book in you
and you want to preview anything?
Speaker 3 (11:22):
Here?
Speaker 2 (11:24):
Tell us about it.
Speaker 3 (11:26):
Uh, we'll see, we'll see.
Speaker 1 (11:28):
Even though Bethany and I both are like never writing.
I mean, we say this to each other, we're never
writing another book.
Speaker 3 (11:34):
I I watched Bethany you know, on her write the book,
and it just it looked like so much fun. That's
all I want to do with the rest of my
life is write books.
Speaker 2 (11:49):
It's funny because the writing part, the writing part, is
the least of it. It's the writing part what was
the most fun? That was the best part.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
And our book you know, I say this all the time,
but our book was a success, and it's still was
like the worst thing I've ever done, Like imagine.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
And then imagine it's not a success. That's like I
don't even know.
Speaker 3 (12:10):
Yeah, well, you've just convinced me so no, I'm not
going to write as I do and I should And
you know, I have some ideas kicking around, Yeah for sure,
and I think, you know, it's kind of the thing
that I really should do, and it's time and and
so yeah, I mean hopefully soon i'll have you know,
something to to talk about in that.
Speaker 2 (12:30):
All right, I'll have you back to talk about your book.
Speaker 1 (12:32):
You know, you don't have to ask twice, that's okay.
Speaker 3 (12:36):
So I always remember, I always remember Bernard Goldberg, the
legendary newsman who said that he loved having written Yes,
and so that sort of stuck with me.
Speaker 2 (12:52):
Yeah, that's enjoyable.
Speaker 3 (12:53):
He really loved he was talking about it, and he
said he really loved having written these books. He loved
being the author of the books talking about them. But
the process getting to that point is that seems to
be a common thing.
Speaker 2 (13:05):
Total nightmare.
Speaker 1 (13:06):
We're going to take a quick break and be right
back on the Carol Markowitz Show. So the question you
get asked a lot on social media is why can't
you control your wife?
Speaker 3 (13:20):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (13:21):
Or control your wife?
Speaker 3 (13:23):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (13:23):
It's less a question, less a statement statement, More.
Speaker 3 (13:27):
Like people just assume that I don't know that she's
making trouble somewhere, and so they're alerting me. It's it's
it's very rarely, could you please control your wife? Right?
It's more like sending out the bat signal.
Speaker 2 (13:43):
Do you like that?
Speaker 1 (13:48):
Or you don't like that, Like it's sort of funny
and cool to be like the guy who like gets
told to control this.
Speaker 3 (13:55):
Why Yeah, And there's you know, there's a couple others
that come along every so often and we're like, oh,
we're in, We're in the club, you know. But Justice Thomas,
for example, the only the only one I can think
of that gets told to control as WF more than
more often than I do. But but you know, I
turned it into a joke because you know, otherwise it
(14:17):
would really get annoying because it's, you know, it's like
everybody knows my wife as her own person and not
as like some kind of appendage and you know, or
some sort of hanger on. And you know, she had
her career in politics, you know, moving before I did,
while I was still doing local journalism and stuff like that.
So it was kind of annoying because you know, it's
(14:40):
because of the suggestion that it's like, well, you know,
without Seth, you know, she would just you know, I
don't know, she's just you know, a nuclear bomb waiting
to explode and and bring down everybody in the blast owner.
Speaker 4 (14:52):
You know, maybe maybe yes, but she's you know, she's
the toughest, strongest, most independent person I know, and that's
you know, so it's it's so it's just so far
from who she is that it's you know, yeah.
Speaker 3 (15:04):
I don't. I don't know who that person is. But
so we turned it into a joke and it got
less and less. But at one point in my in
my social media life, I opened my DMS. Uh, and
that opening my DMS was the sort of opening the
floodgates for that. That was when I that was when
everybody realized they could join in and yeah, to control.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
My wife, Yeah, I don't.
Speaker 1 (15:28):
I don't know that you could control your wife. I
think she's largely uncontrollable in the very best ways.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
And I love your relationship.
Speaker 1 (15:34):
I think you guys are so cool and have such
a nice public relationship where I think you it's very
real and I enjoy watching.
Speaker 2 (15:44):
You two together very much.
Speaker 3 (15:46):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
What are you most proud of in your life? Seth Mandel.
Speaker 3 (15:53):
Well, Carol Markowitz. I am. I I don't really have
a clever answer to this. I'm most proud of my family.
Speaker 2 (16:01):
It's a good one.
Speaker 3 (16:02):
I have. I have a you know, I I love
my wife, I love my kids. We have six kids,
we homeschool and the dog. I won't forget.
Speaker 2 (16:11):
The dog is the craziest part to me.
Speaker 1 (16:13):
If I told you this before, like like having six
kids at you homeschool, people are like whoa, But that
to me is okay, Yes, you have six kids at
you homeschool. Adding a dog to it is bananas.
Speaker 3 (16:26):
Yeah, no, absolutely, I mean I don't disagree with that
at all. Okay, And it turned out to it turned
out to be harder than the kids for the most part.
Speaker 2 (16:33):
Anyway, it seems harder.
Speaker 3 (16:35):
Yeah, I had four when we got the dog, so
you can't.
Speaker 2 (16:38):
Reason for the dog. You can't be like, look, I've
told you this before, right, and.
Speaker 3 (16:44):
We had we had, you know, our our daughter we
don't use their names on public, but had a a
daughter who was not a new born but a baby
when we got the dog, and then two children came
after him. So really he's been around through like babies,
so to speak. And I think it probably was tougher
than the three babies that he's been I can't really
(17:05):
compare to the others, but he was co terminous with
three of them as and yeah he was, he was.
He was very hard, but but we love him. You know,
his dog's become part of the family.
Speaker 2 (17:17):
And no, I'm sure. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (17:19):
The truth is that we we understood going in how
crazy it was, but we had always said, we're not
going to get a dog until we can, you know,
until we have a yard, offensive yard, and you know, yeah,
just so it was this was and then COVID came
and I was working from home full time and Bethane
was home full time, and so it just we were like,
(17:40):
this is the moment. If we're going to be there's
not going to be a better moment. So if we're
going to take this crazy plunge, we do it.
Speaker 2 (17:50):
So yeah, I mean I love it. I love watching it.
Speaker 1 (17:54):
I just it's great. It's my favorite reality shows.
Speaker 3 (17:59):
Very Tanny. The dog is the dog is something. But yeah, no,
I am. I I love the activity and the energy
of the home life. I didn't know that I would
because I was I'm one of three. I have two sisters,
one older, one younger, and so you know, not necessarily
a big family, a normal size I guess normal sized family,
(18:21):
I don't know whatever, But I didn't come from like
a crowded, chaotic place. And now we have four boys, yeah, lots.
So now like the chaos is but you know, and
we homeschool and so the chaos is something that it
takes getting used to, but it's really really you you
(18:44):
wonder how you lived without it, you know, after any
quiet moments, like when the kids are off at camp
or something, you're like, what is this? Yes, I mean
there's two reactions. One is like, this is really boring
and you know, lonely and you know, semi post apocalyptic.
And then the other one is like, I have so
(19:05):
much time. I could cure cancer now, like I could
now the book that everybody first that so you know,
I went on when I went on by my most
recent TV appearance in the makeup room, I noticed that
they were mostly focusing on the area underneath that we
(19:26):
were chatting about that, you know, so, but I I
I love it. It's it's just it's constant. First of all,
I really like my kids, like they're turning out to
be and you know, and I take full credit for that. Yeah,
but it's also like, you know, we it's not even
(19:49):
you know, when you ask, like the thing you're most
proud of. In one sense, obviously, I work very hard
with you know, on the family to build the family
is very time consuming. We have you know, big family,
all that other stuff. At the same time, there are
various elements of my of our life that were far
easier than they often are for people, or sometimes are
(20:12):
for people. And so in a way it's like I'm
sleep deprived, but I also kind of feel like I
was handed something, you know, like I don't it's not easy,
but I do feel like certain parts of it were,
uh were easy and and and so I came out
of it feeling like really blessed. And so it's weird
(20:33):
to say pride because I you know, on the one hand,
I do, I am very proud of it. On the
other hand, I'm also very I'm just very appreciative because it,
you know, it feels like a gift we got Bethany,
and I bet you know, we set we set out
to make a certain life, and you know, we feel
like we got basically what we you know, set out
(20:53):
to do and set out to be. And so no
matter how hard you work, once you realize that, it's
very hard to not feel like, you know, yeah, maybe
you didn't deserve Not not that you don't deserve it,
but it's just it's very hard to feel like it's
not a gift, like it wasn't given in some way,
no matter hard, hard to work for. When you get
what you want, you know, it's just it's it's not
(21:14):
it's not automatic in this world.
Speaker 2 (21:16):
And you know we're just you know, your joy is
very palpable.
Speaker 3 (21:20):
You get that gets you through the you know, the
hard times, the times you're tired. Yeah, the times. I
spend hours doing geometry yesterday with my daughter. That was parallel,
not my favorite one.
Speaker 2 (21:29):
But yeah, there be no math.
Speaker 3 (21:33):
Yes, yeah, there's lots of math in homeschooling.
Speaker 2 (21:37):
That's literally why I can't do it.
Speaker 1 (21:39):
Actually, the idea of teaching math to somebody is just
I could not possibly. It's you know, it's something salute
you really the geometry give us.
Speaker 2 (21:53):
A five year out prediction can be about anything at all.
Speaker 3 (21:57):
Anything at all, anything at all. Here's here's my five
year of prediction. In five years, the way we consume
entertainment through our streaming channels is going to be totally different.
That's my five year prediction. A shake up.
Speaker 2 (22:14):
Do you know how it's going to be different?
Speaker 3 (22:16):
So I'm not sure, but what I know what will change?
So right now, everything is consumed through streaming, music, TV,
movies all that. Right, Once a year I take my
kids to the movies because there's a kid's movie, all
six of them, you know. So I take out a
second mortgage and take my kids to the movies. But
(22:37):
and if we get a good rate on the mortgage,
you know, the pop pin tea. But we consume it
all through like the streaming. And you know, I'm watching.
I'm basketball. I'm a sports fan, and every single day
I love the NBA Playoffs because there's games going on simultaneously.
It feels like March madness. There's three games a night
(22:58):
at the begin you know, the first round of the
NBA Playoffs. There's like three games every single night. And
because there's an East.
Speaker 2 (23:04):
Coast tool aware, yes, yes, thank you.
Speaker 3 (23:06):
So there you go, so of the long suffering wife.
So but you don't suffer as much because you know,
it's only been recently that the Knicks have been involved
in this.
Speaker 1 (23:17):
If you think he wasn't watching all of this every
like my family joke, is anyone anywhere in the world,
you know, throwing a ball, hitting a ball, my husband
is watching.
Speaker 3 (23:27):
Yeah, yeah, So I love it. And growing up I
loved it, And for most of my life it was like,
you just have to know that TNT is channel thirty eight,
and TBS is channel thirty six, and ESPN is channel
thirty whatever, and those are your three options. And now
I like, I look at the every day I pull
up there's like a USA Today chart graph of like,
(23:48):
and I just have to line it up where to
watch it pot eight on the X axis. Mine is
two on the y axis, and I can watch, you know,
the Knicks game or whatever. It's just like it's maddening.
And yesterday or the other day, there were four games
and the last game was only when I was able
(24:10):
to watch. It must have been Saturday.
Speaker 2 (24:11):
Night, I guess because you didn't have the service.
Speaker 3 (24:14):
No, because I was it was shop it was it
must have been Saturday night. So by the time jobs
was over and everything I was able to, you know,
when the kids were in bed and all that stuff,
there's a one game left. And they were like, and
you know, I looked at the chart graph and it
was all four games and the fourth game was the
only one. They didn't have the corresponding streaming network too,
(24:35):
So it's like this is on this channel, but if
you're streaming. It's on Roku, right right, right, Yeah, And
I just had to figure out that the game was
on ABC and ABC is owned by Disney, and that
must mean that if I open up the ESPN app
on my iPad. Yeah, So I think this is all
(24:55):
going to change.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
You think it's gonna change.
Speaker 3 (24:58):
I do. I really think. I watched I watch things consolidating.
I mean, Disney, what.
Speaker 2 (25:02):
Do you think we're going back to cable?
Speaker 3 (25:04):
Yeah, I think we're going to end up with a
streaming version of I think we're going to go through
this huge earthquake moment and come out almost exactly as
we were before, and probably not as good. Like I
think you'll end up paying for TV the way you
paid for cable, except it's not going to be included.
(25:25):
You're streaming is not included in your Internet. So you know,
I think in the end of this, we're not even
going to come out ahead. But I really think and
I think the same thing with music, Like you know,
there's radio, there's Spotify. Fewer people listen to the radio,
but you can also choose what you listen to in
the radio with satellite and stuff now, and so they're
just it's it's kind of like social media became where
initially it was like the whole world is at your
(25:46):
fingertips whatever you want, but then it would be just
became this you know, massive self selection, just like everything else,
and the algorithm just dominates, and so you know, I
feel like it's ah, I feel like the music thing also,
it's just something's got to give. The artists are unhappy
with it. Yeah, And first of all, anything Taylor Swift
is unhappy with is not going it's going to change.
(26:09):
She just okay, she just took down Ticketmaster or Live Nation, right,
and yeah, she's there's no force that can that can
stop her on you and I'm and I'm rooting her
on to you know, break up all the monopolies or whatever.
But but I do think that I do think that
stream and it's not a I don't This complaint is
not about Spotify. I use Spotify. I just feel like
(26:29):
it became like the radio in the way that the
Internet streaming and the democratization of the web through music
was supposed to go in a different directions, and I
feel like people still want that other direction, and I
feel and so I think they're gonna keep gunning for it.
And shooting for it. So I think, like the way
(26:50):
we get music and movies and TV all our entertainment,
I think it's just a few years away from another
big shock.
Speaker 1 (26:58):
This is such an interesting prediction. I will tell you
a lot of the predictions I get right now.
Speaker 2 (27:02):
Are all like about AI, like will it be good?
Will it be bad? This is an unusual one, and
we're going to see what happens.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
We're going to come back to this and be like,
Seth Mendel was right, or if we're going to continue
to go down this path, Seth Mendel was wrong, but
we can't continue on this path.
Speaker 2 (27:17):
So I think you're going to end up being right.
Speaker 1 (27:19):
We're going to take a quick break and be right
back on the Carol Markowitz Show. Seth, you are like
in my top two Mandel's, and I find you super interesting.
Speaker 2 (27:33):
I you know, I think you're awesome. I always love.
Speaker 3 (27:36):
Your work a lot of Mandels, so that actually means
something to me.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
I mean in your household, but yes, not all Mandel's everywhere.
Speaker 2 (27:43):
That's crazy. There's just too many.
Speaker 3 (27:45):
Household If I'm to groups, I'll take it.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
Leave us here with your best tip for my listeners
on how they can improve their lives.
Speaker 3 (27:59):
I would say to I have found that it's very
grounding to focus on the things that you are physically
surrounded by at any one moment. I have noticed that,
for example, I like to write long hand by hand,
(28:19):
I like to pick up a notebook. I mean, it's
it's much slower. I'm obviously I'm very than I was
one of those kids who learned to type in school.
They you know, they made so I've I've typed, well,
you know, since i was a kid. It's secondhand, but
I've I've come to kind of resent all the screens,
and not not just because of what's on them. Necessarily
(28:42):
the stuff that's on the screens is the same thing
that was on the other screen. Whatever. Yeah, it's it's
that it feels like I'm looking at a hologram of
some sort. You don't feel the depth. But I noticed
that when you pick up a notebook and you find
a pen that you like, you know, and a type
(29:03):
of paper that you like, it's the whole thing is
just a different experience. And I'm not surprised because I've
always felt that way about books too. I have a
kindle I read on the Kindle. I'm not anti ebook.
In fact, I'm very appreciative to you, because I think
the kindle revolutionize things and maybe saves reading for a time. So,
(29:23):
you know, but it's just it's you remember things better
the more of your senses are involved. So if you're
reading a book, believe it or not, the fact that
you can smell that book, the pages and you know,
whatever actually contributes to the experience. And I find that
(29:44):
if you if you branch that out to the rest
of your life, the things that you can feel, touch, smell,
the things that all your senses are involved with you,
you know, it can really calm. It's calming, it's grounding
rather than being overwhelming. It it's like, you know, instead
of instead of just your eyeballs, like on a.
Speaker 2 (30:05):
You're touching the paper, you're holding the pen. I still
don't want to do.
Speaker 3 (30:09):
It, but I hear you physical. Yeah, So that's that's
why I would say, I I don't know, I don't
I don't have any like real life wisdom.
Speaker 2 (30:18):
No, I like that a lot, you know.
Speaker 3 (30:22):
Something. Incorporate this, you know, incorporate all your senses into
your daily life. I guess that is what I would say.
Speaker 1 (30:29):
All right, we'll we'll consider it again. I'm not a
big into actual handwriting, but fine, I'll think it over.
He is Seth Mandel. He is at Commentary and the
Commentary Podcast. Thank you so much, Seth for coming on.
Speaker 3 (30:43):
Thank you, Carol,
Hi, and welcome back to the Carol Markowitz Show on iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
My guest today is Seth Mandel.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
Seth is the senior editor of Commentary magazine.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
Hi, Seth, so nice to have you on.
Speaker 3 (00:17):
Hi, Carol, thanks for having me so.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
Seth, you've been my editor.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
You are married to the co author of the only
book I'm ever going to write, Stolen Youth, and yet
it was harder to get you on my show than like,
I don't know, I was gonna say I'm Madonna, but
that seems like a dated reference Taylor Swift. You are
harder to get than Taylor Swift.
Speaker 2 (00:36):
What is up with that?
Speaker 3 (00:39):
I you know, I don't. I wanted to give you space.
I don't want to crowd you.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
So is that it?
Speaker 3 (00:43):
As I said, I was your editor and yeah, you know,
married to your co author and all that stuff.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
So you just feel like I have enough of you?
Speaker 3 (00:50):
Yeah, you know, I don't wanna. I don't wanna. There's
there's a certain amount of Seth that like, it's a
bell curve right right, and I wanted to make sure
to keep our friendship. I don't know, screen can see
it at this part of the curve.
Speaker 2 (01:03):
It's an audio show mostly, but I get it.
Speaker 3 (01:05):
Okay, Well, we'll.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
Just the audience understands you want to curve with my hands.
Speaker 3 (01:11):
For those who can't see, it's a very it's it's
it's very accurate because I've been doing geometry with my
daughter homeschool and yeah, shapes.
Speaker 1 (01:22):
I think you just wanted to stay mysterious. You didn't
want to expose. You know a lot about your life,
and your wife enjoys the talking to camera on Instagram,
but you have abandoned all social media projects. You started
a Instagram that lasted like two weeks. I think you
(01:43):
guys had a show, The Sephany Show that was very fun.
Speaker 2 (01:47):
Also no longer do that. So tell us about yourself.
Speaker 3 (01:51):
How did you have an abandoned Twitter x?
Speaker 1 (01:55):
Yeah, so you don't talk about yourself on there. You're
not like, here's what I did today. So all right,
we're going to find out some stuff about Seth Mende.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
I brought some pictures of my lunches over the past
week and we could show them. Oh, it's an audio
only show, that's right.
Speaker 1 (02:10):
Mostly I do clip from it, so maybe i'll clip
the pictures of your lunches. How did you get into
this thing of ours. How did you become a journalist?
Speaker 3 (02:19):
I actually majored in journalism in college.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
Wow, what a mistake.
Speaker 3 (02:23):
It was the last I know. For years, my mom
would just remind me that law school was still an
option even after I had become a professional journalist. But yeah,
this was like the one thing that I actually planned
and you know, was ready for. I wanted to write.
I knew I wanted to write when I was in college.
I think, you know, there, I definitely went through a
(02:45):
period where I thought I was going to be a
sports writer, which I think every guy in college does,
whether they're majoring in journalism or not. But it just
writing was my thing. It was my thing in school,
and so it just made sense to me, uh to
major in it, and so I did. And then you know,
from there, it was like my my childhood friend's uh
(03:10):
mother they lived across the street, saw an ad in
a newspaper for a reporter job.
Speaker 2 (03:16):
Wow, how old are you brought it over? I know,
I'm saying ad in a newspaper.
Speaker 1 (03:22):
I don't even think I try to ads, And I mean,
I'm older than you, but I don't think that I
even ever saw employment ads in a newspaper.
Speaker 3 (03:30):
Get this. Then I went to work for a newspaper,
so they.
Speaker 2 (03:38):
You should apply.
Speaker 3 (03:39):
Yeah. But actually it's kind of funny because my my
newspaper experience was also very like ancient Egyptian papyrus style too,
because we had an internet station, have internet at your
computer at you went and used it the net as
the as the young kids say today, you had and
(04:02):
if you wanted to print something out you had to
go to the print the internet station and which was
connected to a print d and printed. The only thing
you could get at your desk through the Ethernet connection
was you or your work email.
Speaker 2 (04:15):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (04:15):
So I actually, yeah, no, I did. I did. I
was a journalist in the old days. Wow.
Speaker 1 (04:21):
That's amazing. I mean, I can't even say that. I
don't even I mean I had early internet, like in college,
you know, we had very very little internet. But I
never worked anywhere where I didn't have internet that was already.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
That's pretty wild. So where was your first journalism job?
Speaker 3 (04:39):
I was. It was a newspaper called the East Brunswick Sentinel.
It was a weekly. There was a Greater Media newspaper.
Greater Media is at an organization in a media group
in New Jersey that owns like radio stations, local newspapers,
stuff like that. They had their own printing press. The
highlight of which every week, by the way, was they
printed the Onion. I don't know if your listeners are
old enough to remember the Onion when it was funny,
(05:02):
but I don't think printed. And it was funny, very
printed and very funny years ago. And so they had
these weekly newspapers as part of it. So that's that's
where I started the local local, super hyper hyper local
level without without internet. So I just I just made
up my stories.
Speaker 2 (05:22):
So where did you go from there?
Speaker 1 (05:26):
He didn't make up his stories, invented the stories. Yeah,
everybody goes back and like find the archives.
Speaker 3 (05:36):
Yet, and so I from there, I went on this
while I was working as a reporter at the Sentinel.
I went on this trip family trip to Israel and
it was I guess it was six And it just
happened to be that R. L. Sharon, who was Prime
Minister at the time, had a stroke and went into
(05:59):
a cone while we were there. So my editors back
home got word to me. Again, this was a long
time ago, so you know, they sent a pigeon.
Speaker 2 (06:11):
Like all six everybody had internet.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
I don't know what is going on at your weekly
in New Jersey, but literally two thousand and six internets everywhere,
there's lots of internet.
Speaker 3 (06:22):
Yeah, so they actually so they just texted and said,
you should, you should write about this, but not a
since we were a weekly. Don't write a news story
because like we could pick it up from the wires
by the time we got home and we run it.
Since weekly, it's not gonna make sense I have a
news or like, actually write an opinion piece, a sort
of observation piece. What I saw, what it looked like,
(06:47):
you know what what what my my front row view
was of this monumental thing happening around me.
Speaker 2 (06:55):
And that was your first opinion column.
Speaker 3 (06:57):
Yeah, that was a opinion piece that I wrote. And
it was really it was really like a reporter's notebook
sort of thing. It wasn't it wasn't even like op
ed style, but I was really into it because, you know,
the whole thing meant a lot to me. And I
came home and I wrote it, and somebody who published
(07:18):
the Jewish newspaper saw it and they needed an editor
and they said, I'll take this guy who wrote this,
this looks good, and so it ended up that got
me into Jewish media. And then I was editing local
Jewish media, and then that closed, like much local media,
Jewish or otherwise. And it came to Washington, and I
(07:42):
did a stint at the Foundation for Defensive Democracies and freelanced,
and from there was hired by Commentary the first time
we moved back to New York. From Commentary, I went
to the New York Post, where I was your editor
on the editorial page, and from there I went to
the Washington Examiner, where I edited the Washington Examiner magazine,
(08:06):
a weekly magazine, and then back to commentary.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
That's such an interesting journey. But actually I think that
the biggest leap there is columnist to editor. I like,
how did that happen? I mean, I couldn't go be
an editor right now?
Speaker 2 (08:22):
Well, you never know, no, no, I know, I need
an editor.
Speaker 1 (08:27):
I have a substack that I never write on because
there are no deadlines and I can't do it.
Speaker 3 (08:33):
I need everyone needs an editor. That's the truth. Editors
need editors too. I'm not comfortable writing things that don't
get looked at by someone interesting. I write every day,
you know, sometimes multiple pieces a day at my current job,
and they all get looked at by somebody. I have
an editor, and so shout out to Abe Greenwald who
(08:57):
does that.
Speaker 1 (08:58):
Abe, who also refuses to do my show, doesn't like
to talk about himself. He says, yeah, he's a mysterious
We're gonna make him come on.
Speaker 2 (09:06):
Though.
Speaker 3 (09:06):
You don't know if Abe exists. They just know it's
like you know, Kaiser shows or whatever. Yeah, no, no, no,
he's he. I mean, Abe is is like the most phenomenal.
He's just a phenomenal person and phenomenal editor and just
everything just.
Speaker 2 (09:21):
Like until he comes on here, he's.
Speaker 3 (09:22):
Just an okay.
Speaker 1 (09:24):
Person, you know, Like I'm sure he's a good editor,
but as a human, you know.
Speaker 3 (09:31):
Well, we'll tell him, we'll tell you. We'll Yeah, you've
laid down, you know, the gauntlet. So I need an
editor too, I really do. We all need it. It's
very hard to see. It's very hard to see from
an editorial perspective and a writer's perspective on the same piece. So,
but making the leap was also when I made that
leap from writing from reporting for a secular newspaper to
(09:56):
editing a Jewish newspaper. Part of it was also that
it was organization. This was a Jewish newspaper or a
group of Jewish newspapers that had closed and were then
purchased by somebody in the area and sort of restarted.
And I was brought into restarted. So it was not
just editing, but it was really, yes, trying to I mean,
(10:20):
there was there was a obviously there there was a
skeleton there of what it was. It wasn't like I
totally reinvented the wheel, but but yeah, it was. It
was it was like a whole sort of project. And
since it was local, it was covering Jewish stuff in
New Jersey, and so to me it was a different
(10:41):
sort of project than just editing. It was like I
came from the Jewish community in Jersey, I you know,
was raised among the Jewish federations and all those organizations.
You know, I went to both n cs Y and
u s Y.
Speaker 2 (10:54):
You know, growing covered, covered your bases, covered.
Speaker 3 (10:57):
All the bases, you know, and so like I can't,
I really came out of this this world entirely, and
so you know, it was it was it was about
project about that even more than any specific editorial type
of thing. But you know you you just you have to.
I had other editors on staff. Uh, and you know,
(11:18):
you learn.
Speaker 1 (11:19):
Yeah, do you think you have a book in you
and you want to preview anything?
Speaker 3 (11:22):
Here?
Speaker 2 (11:24):
Tell us about it.
Speaker 3 (11:26):
Uh, we'll see, we'll see.
Speaker 1 (11:28):
Even though Bethany and I both are like never writing.
I mean, we say this to each other, we're never
writing another book.
Speaker 3 (11:34):
I I watched Bethany you know, on her write the book,
and it just it looked like so much fun. That's
all I want to do with the rest of my
life is write books.
Speaker 2 (11:49):
It's funny because the writing part, the writing part, is
the least of it. It's the writing part what was
the most fun? That was the best part.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
And our book you know, I say this all the time,
but our book was a success, and it's still was
like the worst thing I've ever done, Like imagine.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
And then imagine it's not a success. That's like I
don't even know.
Speaker 3 (12:10):
Yeah, well, you've just convinced me so no, I'm not
going to write as I do and I should And
you know, I have some ideas kicking around, Yeah for sure,
and I think, you know, it's kind of the thing
that I really should do, and it's time and and
so yeah, I mean hopefully soon i'll have you know,
something to to talk about in that.
Speaker 2 (12:30):
All right, I'll have you back to talk about your book.
Speaker 1 (12:32):
You know, you don't have to ask twice, that's okay.
Speaker 3 (12:36):
So I always remember, I always remember Bernard Goldberg, the
legendary newsman who said that he loved having written Yes,
and so that sort of stuck with me.
Speaker 2 (12:52):
Yeah, that's enjoyable.
Speaker 3 (12:53):
He really loved he was talking about it, and he
said he really loved having written these books. He loved
being the author of the books talking about them. But
the process getting to that point is that seems to
be a common thing.
Speaker 2 (13:05):
Total nightmare.
Speaker 1 (13:06):
We're going to take a quick break and be right
back on the Carol Markowitz Show. So the question you
get asked a lot on social media is why can't
you control your wife?
Speaker 3 (13:20):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (13:21):
Or control your wife?
Speaker 3 (13:23):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (13:23):
It's less a question, less a statement statement, More.
Speaker 3 (13:27):
Like people just assume that I don't know that she's
making trouble somewhere, and so they're alerting me. It's it's
it's very rarely, could you please control your wife? Right?
It's more like sending out the bat signal.
Speaker 2 (13:43):
Do you like that?
Speaker 1 (13:48):
Or you don't like that, Like it's sort of funny
and cool to be like the guy who like gets
told to control this.
Speaker 3 (13:55):
Why Yeah, And there's you know, there's a couple others
that come along every so often and we're like, oh,
we're in, We're in the club, you know. But Justice Thomas,
for example, the only the only one I can think
of that gets told to control as WF more than
more often than I do. But but you know, I
turned it into a joke because you know, otherwise it
(14:17):
would really get annoying because it's, you know, it's like
everybody knows my wife as her own person and not
as like some kind of appendage and you know, or
some sort of hanger on. And you know, she had
her career in politics, you know, moving before I did,
while I was still doing local journalism and stuff like that.
So it was kind of annoying because you know, it's
(14:40):
because of the suggestion that it's like, well, you know,
without Seth, you know, she would just you know, I
don't know, she's just you know, a nuclear bomb waiting
to explode and and bring down everybody in the blast owner.
Speaker 4 (14:52):
You know, maybe maybe yes, but she's you know, she's
the toughest, strongest, most independent person I know, and that's
you know, so it's it's so it's just so far
from who she is that it's you know, yeah.
Speaker 3 (15:04):
I don't. I don't know who that person is. But
so we turned it into a joke and it got
less and less. But at one point in my in
my social media life, I opened my DMS. Uh, and
that opening my DMS was the sort of opening the
floodgates for that. That was when I that was when
everybody realized they could join in and yeah, to control.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
My wife, Yeah, I don't.
Speaker 1 (15:28):
I don't know that you could control your wife. I
think she's largely uncontrollable in the very best ways.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
And I love your relationship.
Speaker 1 (15:34):
I think you guys are so cool and have such
a nice public relationship where I think you it's very
real and I enjoy watching.
Speaker 2 (15:44):
You two together very much.
Speaker 3 (15:46):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
What are you most proud of in your life? Seth Mandel.
Speaker 3 (15:53):
Well, Carol Markowitz. I am. I I don't really have
a clever answer to this. I'm most proud of my family.
Speaker 2 (16:01):
It's a good one.
Speaker 3 (16:02):
I have. I have a you know, I I love
my wife, I love my kids. We have six kids,
we homeschool and the dog. I won't forget.
Speaker 2 (16:11):
The dog is the craziest part to me.
Speaker 1 (16:13):
If I told you this before, like like having six
kids at you homeschool, people are like whoa, But that
to me is okay, Yes, you have six kids at
you homeschool. Adding a dog to it is bananas.
Speaker 3 (16:26):
Yeah, no, absolutely, I mean I don't disagree with that
at all. Okay, And it turned out to it turned
out to be harder than the kids for the most part.
Speaker 2 (16:33):
Anyway, it seems harder.
Speaker 3 (16:35):
Yeah, I had four when we got the dog, so
you can't.
Speaker 2 (16:38):
Reason for the dog. You can't be like, look, I've
told you this before, right, and.
Speaker 3 (16:44):
We had we had, you know, our our daughter we
don't use their names on public, but had a a
daughter who was not a new born but a baby
when we got the dog, and then two children came
after him. So really he's been around through like babies,
so to speak. And I think it probably was tougher
than the three babies that he's been I can't really
(17:05):
compare to the others, but he was co terminous with
three of them as and yeah he was, he was.
He was very hard, but but we love him. You know,
his dog's become part of the family.
Speaker 2 (17:17):
And no, I'm sure. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (17:19):
The truth is that we we understood going in how
crazy it was, but we had always said, we're not
going to get a dog until we can, you know,
until we have a yard, offensive yard, and you know, yeah,
just so it was this was and then COVID came
and I was working from home full time and Bethane
was home full time, and so it just we were like,
(17:40):
this is the moment. If we're going to be there's
not going to be a better moment. So if we're
going to take this crazy plunge, we do it.
Speaker 2 (17:50):
So yeah, I mean I love it. I love watching it.
Speaker 1 (17:54):
I just it's great. It's my favorite reality shows.
Speaker 3 (17:59):
Very Tanny. The dog is the dog is something. But yeah, no,
I am. I I love the activity and the energy
of the home life. I didn't know that I would
because I was I'm one of three. I have two sisters,
one older, one younger, and so you know, not necessarily
a big family, a normal size I guess normal sized family,
(18:21):
I don't know whatever, But I didn't come from like
a crowded, chaotic place. And now we have four boys, yeah, lots.
So now like the chaos is but you know, and
we homeschool and so the chaos is something that it
takes getting used to, but it's really really you you
(18:44):
wonder how you lived without it, you know, after any
quiet moments, like when the kids are off at camp
or something, you're like, what is this? Yes, I mean
there's two reactions. One is like, this is really boring
and you know, lonely and you know, semi post apocalyptic.
And then the other one is like, I have so
(19:05):
much time. I could cure cancer now, like I could
now the book that everybody first that so you know,
I went on when I went on by my most
recent TV appearance in the makeup room, I noticed that
they were mostly focusing on the area underneath that we
(19:26):
were chatting about that, you know, so, but I I
I love it. It's it's just it's constant. First of all,
I really like my kids, like they're turning out to
be and you know, and I take full credit for that. Yeah,
but it's also like, you know, we it's not even
(19:49):
you know, when you ask, like the thing you're most
proud of. In one sense, obviously, I work very hard
with you know, on the family to build the family
is very time consuming. We have you know, big family,
all that other stuff. At the same time, there are
various elements of my of our life that were far
easier than they often are for people, or sometimes are
(20:12):
for people. And so in a way it's like I'm
sleep deprived, but I also kind of feel like I
was handed something, you know, like I don't it's not easy,
but I do feel like certain parts of it were,
uh were easy and and and so I came out
of it feeling like really blessed. And so it's weird
(20:33):
to say pride because I you know, on the one hand,
I do, I am very proud of it. On the
other hand, I'm also very I'm just very appreciative because it,
you know, it feels like a gift we got Bethany,
and I bet you know, we set we set out
to make a certain life, and you know, we feel
like we got basically what we you know, set out
(20:53):
to do and set out to be. And so no
matter how hard you work, once you realize that, it's
very hard to not feel like, you know, yeah, maybe
you didn't deserve Not not that you don't deserve it,
but it's just it's very hard to feel like it's
not a gift, like it wasn't given in some way,
no matter hard, hard to work for. When you get
what you want, you know, it's just it's it's not
(21:14):
it's not automatic in this world.
Speaker 2 (21:16):
And you know we're just you know, your joy is
very palpable.
Speaker 3 (21:20):
You get that gets you through the you know, the
hard times, the times you're tired. Yeah, the times. I
spend hours doing geometry yesterday with my daughter. That was parallel,
not my favorite one.
Speaker 2 (21:29):
But yeah, there be no math.
Speaker 3 (21:33):
Yes, yeah, there's lots of math in homeschooling.
Speaker 2 (21:37):
That's literally why I can't do it.
Speaker 1 (21:39):
Actually, the idea of teaching math to somebody is just
I could not possibly. It's you know, it's something salute
you really the geometry give us.
Speaker 2 (21:53):
A five year out prediction can be about anything at all.
Speaker 3 (21:57):
Anything at all, anything at all. Here's here's my five
year of prediction. In five years, the way we consume
entertainment through our streaming channels is going to be totally different.
That's my five year prediction. A shake up.
Speaker 2 (22:14):
Do you know how it's going to be different?
Speaker 3 (22:16):
So I'm not sure, but what I know what will change?
So right now, everything is consumed through streaming, music, TV,
movies all that. Right, Once a year I take my
kids to the movies because there's a kid's movie, all
six of them, you know. So I take out a
second mortgage and take my kids to the movies. But
(22:37):
and if we get a good rate on the mortgage,
you know, the pop pin tea. But we consume it
all through like the streaming. And you know, I'm watching.
I'm basketball. I'm a sports fan, and every single day
I love the NBA Playoffs because there's games going on simultaneously.
It feels like March madness. There's three games a night
(22:58):
at the begin you know, the first round of the
NBA Playoffs. There's like three games every single night. And
because there's an East.
Speaker 2 (23:04):
Coast tool aware, yes, yes, thank you.
Speaker 3 (23:06):
So there you go, so of the long suffering wife.
So but you don't suffer as much because you know,
it's only been recently that the Knicks have been involved
in this.
Speaker 1 (23:17):
If you think he wasn't watching all of this every
like my family joke, is anyone anywhere in the world,
you know, throwing a ball, hitting a ball, my husband
is watching.
Speaker 3 (23:27):
Yeah, yeah, So I love it. And growing up I
loved it, And for most of my life it was like,
you just have to know that TNT is channel thirty eight,
and TBS is channel thirty six, and ESPN is channel
thirty whatever, and those are your three options. And now
I like, I look at the every day I pull
up there's like a USA Today chart graph of like,
(23:48):
and I just have to line it up where to
watch it pot eight on the X axis. Mine is
two on the y axis, and I can watch, you know,
the Knicks game or whatever. It's just like it's maddening.
And yesterday or the other day, there were four games
and the last game was only when I was able
(24:10):
to watch. It must have been Saturday.
Speaker 2 (24:11):
Night, I guess because you didn't have the service.
Speaker 3 (24:14):
No, because I was it was shop it was it
must have been Saturday night. So by the time jobs
was over and everything I was able to, you know,
when the kids were in bed and all that stuff,
there's a one game left. And they were like, and
you know, I looked at the chart graph and it
was all four games and the fourth game was the
only one. They didn't have the corresponding streaming network too,
(24:35):
So it's like this is on this channel, but if
you're streaming. It's on Roku, right right, right, Yeah, And
I just had to figure out that the game was
on ABC and ABC is owned by Disney, and that
must mean that if I open up the ESPN app
on my iPad. Yeah, So I think this is all
(24:55):
going to change.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
You think it's gonna change.
Speaker 3 (24:58):
I do. I really think. I watched I watch things consolidating.
I mean, Disney, what.
Speaker 2 (25:02):
Do you think we're going back to cable?
Speaker 3 (25:04):
Yeah, I think we're going to end up with a
streaming version of I think we're going to go through
this huge earthquake moment and come out almost exactly as
we were before, and probably not as good. Like I
think you'll end up paying for TV the way you
paid for cable, except it's not going to be included.
(25:25):
You're streaming is not included in your Internet. So you know,
I think in the end of this, we're not even
going to come out ahead. But I really think and
I think the same thing with music, Like you know,
there's radio, there's Spotify. Fewer people listen to the radio,
but you can also choose what you listen to in
the radio with satellite and stuff now, and so they're
just it's it's kind of like social media became where
initially it was like the whole world is at your
(25:46):
fingertips whatever you want, but then it would be just
became this you know, massive self selection, just like everything else,
and the algorithm just dominates, and so you know, I
feel like it's ah, I feel like the music thing also,
it's just something's got to give. The artists are unhappy
with it. Yeah, And first of all, anything Taylor Swift
is unhappy with is not going it's going to change.
(26:09):
She just okay, she just took down Ticketmaster or Live Nation, right,
and yeah, she's there's no force that can that can
stop her on you and I'm and I'm rooting her
on to you know, break up all the monopolies or whatever.
But but I do think that I do think that
stream and it's not a I don't This complaint is
not about Spotify. I use Spotify. I just feel like
(26:29):
it became like the radio in the way that the
Internet streaming and the democratization of the web through music
was supposed to go in a different directions, and I
feel like people still want that other direction, and I
feel and so I think they're gonna keep gunning for it.
And shooting for it. So I think, like the way
(26:50):
we get music and movies and TV all our entertainment,
I think it's just a few years away from another
big shock.
Speaker 1 (26:58):
This is such an interesting prediction. I will tell you
a lot of the predictions I get right now.
Speaker 2 (27:02):
Are all like about AI, like will it be good?
Will it be bad? This is an unusual one, and
we're going to see what happens.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
We're going to come back to this and be like,
Seth Mendel was right, or if we're going to continue
to go down this path, Seth Mendel was wrong, but
we can't continue on this path.
Speaker 2 (27:17):
So I think you're going to end up being right.
Speaker 1 (27:19):
We're going to take a quick break and be right
back on the Carol Markowitz Show. Seth, you are like
in my top two Mandel's, and I find you super interesting.
Speaker 2 (27:33):
I you know, I think you're awesome. I always love.
Speaker 3 (27:36):
Your work a lot of Mandels, so that actually means
something to me.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
I mean in your household, but yes, not all Mandel's everywhere.
Speaker 2 (27:43):
That's crazy. There's just too many.
Speaker 3 (27:45):
Household If I'm to groups, I'll take it.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
Leave us here with your best tip for my listeners
on how they can improve their lives.
Speaker 3 (27:59):
I would say to I have found that it's very
grounding to focus on the things that you are physically
surrounded by at any one moment. I have noticed that,
for example, I like to write long hand by hand,
(28:19):
I like to pick up a notebook. I mean, it's
it's much slower. I'm obviously I'm very than I was
one of those kids who learned to type in school.
They you know, they made so I've I've typed, well,
you know, since i was a kid. It's secondhand, but
I've I've come to kind of resent all the screens,
and not not just because of what's on them. Necessarily
(28:42):
the stuff that's on the screens is the same thing
that was on the other screen. Whatever. Yeah, it's it's
that it feels like I'm looking at a hologram of
some sort. You don't feel the depth. But I noticed
that when you pick up a notebook and you find
a pen that you like, you know, and a type
(29:03):
of paper that you like, it's the whole thing is
just a different experience. And I'm not surprised because I've
always felt that way about books too. I have a
kindle I read on the Kindle. I'm not anti ebook.
In fact, I'm very appreciative to you, because I think
the kindle revolutionize things and maybe saves reading for a time. So,
(29:23):
you know, but it's just it's you remember things better
the more of your senses are involved. So if you're
reading a book, believe it or not, the fact that
you can smell that book, the pages and you know,
whatever actually contributes to the experience. And I find that
(29:44):
if you if you branch that out to the rest
of your life, the things that you can feel, touch, smell,
the things that all your senses are involved with you,
you know, it can really calm. It's calming, it's grounding
rather than being overwhelming. It it's like, you know, instead
of instead of just your eyeballs, like on a.
Speaker 2 (30:05):
You're touching the paper, you're holding the pen. I still
don't want to do.
Speaker 3 (30:09):
It, but I hear you physical. Yeah, So that's that's
why I would say, I I don't know, I don't
I don't have any like real life wisdom.
Speaker 2 (30:18):
No, I like that a lot, you know.
Speaker 3 (30:22):
Something. Incorporate this, you know, incorporate all your senses into
your daily life. I guess that is what I would say.
Speaker 1 (30:29):
All right, we'll we'll consider it again. I'm not a
big into actual handwriting, but fine, I'll think it over.
He is Seth Mandel. He is at Commentary and the
Commentary Podcast. Thank you so much, Seth for coming on.
Speaker 3 (30:43):
Thank you, Carol,
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