(bright music) (camera beeping) (upbeat music) - Thanks for joining us.

I'm Fred Martino.

InFocus today, Scott Simon of NPR News.

He anchors NPR's "Weekend Edition Saturday" and has been with NPR for more than four decades, beginning in 1977 as Chicago Bureau Chief.

Simon has reported from all 50 states and five continents, and has written nearly a dozen books.

Scott Simon, what an honor and a delight to have you with us today.

- Thank you.

Good to be here.

- It is so good to have you with us.

You know, before we start, full disclosure, WSIU operates several NPR-affiliated radio stations.

We let folks know that.

You are talking here in Carbondale with the Paul Simon Public Policy Institute, invited by them to join us, about the media and how it's undergone extraordinary change.

I mean, that's an understatement, right?

- Yeah.

- With the significant loss of print journalists, many communities being called news deserts, how do you assess this challenge, and maybe even more importantly, what it means to the country?

- Well, no doubt about it, for a lot of Americans, journalism has become DIY, do it yourself, and they figure they can acquire whatever knowledge they need to navigate the world from various online platforms, and they don't have to worry about journalism, about reporting.

I would say that's not right, but of course, everybody is entitled to their opinion.

And I worry about the entire, about the state and the health of the entire system at this particular point, because of course, I've been with NPR a long time.

I've also contributed to other news organizations and obviously publications, but you need places for young journalists to learn the business.

You need places for, I think, people to learn about the world and about the most direct surroundings in their communities.

And a lot of these places are just disappearing, unfortunately.

I mean, I think the national news and international news, that kind of coverage, I don't think it's enough, but on the other hand, I think that seems to be a little bit healthier nowadays than local coverage.

And I really worry about that because it's a continuing relationship.

I mean, the people, I mean, I speak for myself and I have reported from 10 wars around the world, but every place in the world where I have reported benefited from the fact that I learned the business, well, here in the state of Illinois, and what I consider to be the best possible place to learn, to be a reporter, by covering courts, by covering city council sessions, by covering zoning laws, zoning ordinance hearings, which, you know, can sometimes be even more dramatic than you might think that they might be, by going to crime scenes.

I worry that a lot of people who are working in journalism these days have never seen a crime scene, have never been to a place where a family who has lost a loved one, is there at the immediate point of loss, where sometimes law enforcement officers themselves are overcome by what they're seeing.

I worry that they've never covered hospital emergency rooms.

So all of this stuff that can be both exciting and mundane contribute to the fact, you know, I absorbed all of that material so that by the time I reported the Civil War in El Salvador, by the time I reported religious rivalry in India, by the time I reported the war in Bosnia, I mean, the first time that I knew a little bit about some of the rivalries that were driving that area of the world was on the northwest side of Chicago when somebody who was a Serbian nationalist had been killed, and I remember walking into the storefront and seeing pictures of bearded men.

They were all men who had participated in past kind of revolutionary and sectarian wars and thinking, boy, this is ancient, with no idea that 15 years later I would be covering the war in Bosnia.

Turned out to be not so ancient at all.

- Hmm.

- And so all of this, I think, is part of a system that has traditionally enriched journalism, and that's what we're losing now.

- Yeah.

It is scary.

As, you know, in addition to the loss of journalists, who've lost their jobs, newspapers, many that have gone out of business, what is left sometimes in some communities is often just repeating information.

- Yeah, exactly.

- You know, it's devoid- - Repeating press releases of physical statements, that sort of thing, as opposed to digging into subjects.

And I think that's a real loss too.

- It is.

And- - It's a little bit like, you can report the results of a baseball game, and that's a perfectly respectable thing to do, but you're not telling the story of the baseball game.

- Right.

- And I don't think we would accept that when the Salukis are playing football.

In fact, I think I know here in Carbondale that wouldn't be accepted.

(Fred laughs) But it's something that we're beginning to accept, or large parts of the audience are beginning to accept when it's applied to other stories.

- Yeah, so in your view, and this is a really hard question, but in your view, how do we encourage more thorough journalism?

There is some amazing journalism out there, as you pointed out in your first answer, on the national and international level.

I mean, I'm always thinking on the national level about ProPublica and how they revealed the compromised Supreme Court, and what an incredible service that was, and that's just one example.

- Yeah.

- How do we encourage more of that?

- I don't have the magic answer.

- Yeah.

- If I did God bless, I probably- - (laughs) You wouldn't be here with me, right?

- Wouldn't be, yeah, here with you, Fred.

- (laughs) Right.

- I don't have the answer, but I think some of the nonprofit alternative forms that are being built of journalism in some communities are a good way to begin to push forward.

(sighs) I think it's also talking to the audience.

I hope that it will, that we are beginning to create an audience for this kind of journalism.

Because in the end, that's what it's going to be.

If people see an interest in acquiring this kind of knowledge and in supporting it, and that's very important.

And look, as I say, I don't have the answer, but I do know that it's a time for the people who are consumers of news, and I hate that term, but there you go, we're saddled with it, to be able to say they want something more than just press releases and handouts.

- Absolutely.

Well, in your presentation in Carbondale, I know you're talking as well about opportunities, not just the challenges.

- I'm gonna suggest journalism students begin by getting their real estate licenses.

(Fred laughs) I just think that's a very smart and wise thing to do.

- I would- - Although, you know, with the recent Supreme Court ruling, maybe not even a real estate license is a guarantee for a future anymore, yeah.

- Yeah, (laughs) I'd give advice, too.

- Yeah, so.

- Working in this for three decades myself.

So, but seriously, I never like doing interviews or stories where it's just the challenge or the problem.

I like to talk about the solution as well, and possible solutions.

What are some of the opportunities?

- Well... - You talked about nonprofits.

- Yeah, and I also think creating your own opportunities, I think that's something that's very important.

Begin to cover things, begin to write, begin to put together news conduits that will reach people.

I think there are gonna be all kinds of websites covering news and different kinds of news that are gonna be created, and I don't know, I'll make up a figure, 75% of them might fail, but the 25% or 5% that succeed and begin to go on can contribute something.

I think that's going to be important.

You know, I think you learn by doing, and the whole point is not just to sit down and accept it, but to try and do something different and better.

- Yeah, you mentioned online and of course, a lot of online resources at our disposal, and I mean, I love the opportunities that that presents.

- Yeah.

I use them all the time.

Every day, all day, yeah.

- I do too.

I think all of us do, folks watching this certainly maybe at a higher level than the average person, using those for certain things.

So a lot of the press about this gets negative and skeptical.

I want to just start this question by saying, Hey, there's a lot positive, there's a lot great about this, but, you know, one of the things I worry about with it is that, and I'm sure you've worried about this too, is that with the online world, particularly in journalism, some people may only seek out information about things that are of interest or happy things, or- - Yeah, and this is one of the things too, and again, I don't have the answer.

This is one of the things I actually regret (sighs) about the newspaper disappearing, and I mean, even the physical newspaper.

- Right, right.

- Because I used to open let's say, the front page.

I know I'm in southern Illinois.

Can I say the St. Louis Post Dispatch?

- Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

- Or, you know, when I was learning journalism, the Chicago Daily News, or the Chicago Sun Times, and you would thumb through the paper and you would see stories that you wanted to see.

On the other hand, every now and then, your eye would be caught by something that you didn't think you had any interest in, but it was there and you began to read, and you thought, well, you know, this is interesting, or I didn't know that, or this is interesting.

And of course, that's often missing online, because you're just immediately directed to those stories that algorithmically have dictated what you're interested in.

And I regret that, because unless you make a concerted effort to begin to search and broaden their interests, it's not gonna tell you what's going on.

Now, look, we all make use of it.

We don't know the ways in which it is making use of us.

- Right.

- And, you know, certainly when I get my... Well, I get so many morning news feeds, as you can imagine.

- (laughs) I bet.

- Between Politico and Axios.

- Me too.

- And I go on and on.

When I get something like the Apple newsfeed, they know I'm a Cubs fan.

- Mm-hmm.

- They know I'm a Bears fan.

They will get me the news about what are the bears gonna do in the draft?

So that's why I have no idea what the Cardinals are gonna do in the draft, because I'm a Bears fan, and I have to search for that.

And unless it's mentioned about the stories about the Bears, I won't see it, and I think we just have to be a little bit more thoughtful in broadening our taste and broadening our scope of interest.

But that being said, I know we have a limited amount of time in our lives.

And I think that's going to be one of the challenges.

I will say, I'm going to return tirelessly to what National Public Radio Puts out, or what NPR puts out.

When you listen to even half an hour of our shows, you will get a good idea of the state of the world, and when the local news cuts in, you will get a good idea about your community, and I think that's a half hour of time well-invested.

- Absolutely.

- And an hour of time might be even better.

- Absolutely.

Along those lines, as you know, there has been a lot of discussion lately about criticism from within news organizations, including an internal critic at NPR, who say that news organizations have to be more careful about balance and about applying scrutiny to stories in a balanced way.

What do you make of this in a general sense?

- I think news organizations have to be careful about balance.

- Always, right.

- Of course.

And I mean, I don't want to, we're being mysterious.

You're obviously talking about the article that Uri Berliner wrote for the Free Press, which I think has caused a lot of reaction and consternation.

And I think I can say I'm proud of the way... My mic.

I'm proud of the way NPR has reacted.

It hasn't been defensive.

It said everybody is entitled to their opinion.

We have to be able to listen to criticism.

We have to be able to weigh and evalue criticism.

I think that's a very measured, wise, and statesmanlike response.

As I speak, Uri has been suspended, I think, for five working days, if I'm not mistaken, and not because he expressed anything resembling a contrary opinion, but because he leaked information that was not considered, you know, publicly available.

I find that a very measured reaction.

We always have to worry about balance.

And look, I cannot speak in behalf of NPR.

I am perfectly willing to talk about anything that's on our show or anything that I've done, because I think we have to be available to the public.

I mean, we come into people's homes, we come into their bedrooms, God forbid we come into their bathrooms.

It's a very intimate form of communication, audio, and I'm willing to answer for anything that I've had a part of.

- Sure.

- I think we have to make ourselves available for that.

- And for folks who are not familiar with what you were just talking about, if they go to npr.org, NPR does something that some news organizations do, not too many.

They, when there's an issue like this, they will often have an independent news story about the issue.

- Yep, right.

And David Folkenflik, I think, did an amazing job covering this.

- Yeah.

- So you could read that online at npr.org.

There's another major issue that you probably expected I would ask you about today.

Recently at NBC News, there was an on-air revolt by a number of journalists after NBC hired former Republican National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel as a paid analyst.

McDaniel, was promptly removed from her post after this on-air outcry.

What do you make of that extraordinary, and I don't think it's an overstatement to call it extraordinary, an extraordinary story and the end result?

- Yeah.

I don't think there is anything wrong with hiring a paid commentator who used to be head of the Republican National Committee, the Democratic National Committee, or for that matter, the Bernie Sanders campaign, or the Socialist Peoples Party, or the Prohibition Party.

I do think where the questions about Ronna McDaniel entered is if you're hiring, for example, somebody to comment on science news or the space program, would you hire somebody who says man never landed on the moon?

(Fred laughs) And it was her continued insistence when she was head of the RNC that the results of the 2020 election were counterfeit.

And I think that is such a misrepresentation of the facts.

That's not even a difference of opinion.

- [Fred] Yeah.

- It's a conscious misrepresentation of the facts.

I would've told you that removes her from consideration of being any kind of commentator.

- Right.

Right.

And of course, that wouldn't remove her from being in a news story and being interviewed to express that, but being a paid analyst is a different thing.

- Paid analyst is a different thing.

- So.

- And you know, and so there were on-air talents who drew the line in that, and then NBC changed direction.

- And that was extraordinary as well.

I haven't seen that.

- I've never seen that on the national level in that way.

- I've never seen that, yeah.

- When you saw it and heard about it, what did you think?

- I was surprised.

I was heartened though.

I was heartened by the fact that there were journalists that were taking their responsibility seriously.

And look, I do think it's fair to raise other questions.

And I say this with respect to all of the names I'm about to utter.

George Stephanopoulos was press secretary for President Clinton.

He moved into a news anchor role without anybody blinking an eye.

Diane Sawyer worked in the press office for impeached president Richard M. Nixon.

(Fred laughs) He was impeached, but, you know, resigned before he was convicted.

I think she moved into the news industry without anybody thinking that there was anything necessarily wrong with it.

I mean, we could go on.

Jen Psaki at the moment, obviously.

- Yeah.

- And I understand people on the right who say, well, how come this is okay with Democrats and the only time you raise a question is with a Republican?"

I think that is not quite true.

I think the questions in this circumstance with Ronna McDaniel were different, because as I said, she was what we would now call an election denier.

Michael Steele, former head of the Republican National Committee is, I'm not sure which network he's on as a commentator now, I think at CNN.

- Sure.

- I could be corrected on that, but I mean, you know, I mean, I think the fact that he was head of the RNC didn't remove him from consideration of that.

So it wasn't a matter of just presenting a conservative viewpoint.

- It is such an interesting story.

And as you point out, there are other things to consider in other news organizations that often aren't talked about, but are interesting.

I understand, speaking of connections and other journalists, I understand you have a connection to an iconic Illinois journalist, Virginia Marmaduke.

Tell me about her.

- Ha!

My godmother.

- Yeah, your relationship, your godmother, and what she meant to you.

- Oh, I mean, the Duchess was what she was called.

Well, she held...

I'm gonna get a little...

I'm sorry.

- That's okay.

- She held me in her hand when I, you know, I was a premature baby.

A lot of people would say I am now.

(laughs) In any event, when I got out of the incubator, she was one of the first people to hold me, to hold me in her hand.

- Hmm.

- And my mother always felt that some spark had passed between us.

I mean, she was a legendary figure in journalism.

One of the first really, it was certainly one of the most colorful and well-known women in American journalism.

She would show up at crime scenes and like, you know, the police, then they knew it was a big story if the Duchess was there.

And she just had a genius for maintaining relationships with the police department, with, god forbid, organized crime, which, you know, I think was just part of the beat in Chicago.

- Yeah.

- But incorruptible, colorful, funny, vivid.

She was just absolutely amazing.

She really was.

- What do you think she would make of some of the things we've already talked about about how much journalism has changed?

What do you think would stand out?

- Oh, I mean, I would think, you know, she would talk about it as, you know, just the terrible loss that it is.

- Yeah.

- It's not, you know, it's not people getting to know their communities.

- Yeah.

- And what distresses me about that is that people wanna know their own communities, or think what they are, their own communities, their own silos of information, I think those are more solidly connected than ever before, but they're not reaching outside of that, the silo, the bubble, whatever you want to call it, to find out about people who are very different from themselves.

Situations that at first they might not think that affects their lives, but do.

And I think that's where journalism can really shine.

Not telling us stories about people that we think we recognize and think we know, but people who are very different than us.

And yet, by getting to know their story and getting to know a story, we make a basic human connection.

And that, to me, is what journalism should be doing.

- [Fred] Yeah.

- And when journalism is at its best, that is what journalism does.

- And when it does this, you know, it's a good way for us to wrap up in the last few minutes, it is an essential, not optional, an essential part of our form of government.

- Well that kind of, yeah.

- That there is, only an informed democracy is the only real democracy, right?

- Yeah.

- If you don't know what's going on, how do you vote?

I mean, I think any discussion on this is just, it's gotta happen, right?

- You're absolutely right.

And that's why the founders made a point of obviously mentioning Freedom of the Press, and what we would now call Freedom of Information in the founding documents, because a well-informed public was considered to be absolutely intrinsic to a system of democracy in which people (sighs) find out about the world and then cast votes depending on whatever their points of view are.

And to do that, there's been so much emphasis in all ways.

Political parties have been talking about churning out their vote, maximizing their vote.

They talk much less now about reaching across the aisle, trying to even convert people who may not have voted for them the last time.

And for that matter, there are journalistic organizations that talk about maximizing their audience, maximizing their demographic, not reaching outside of it.

- And elections are only the horse race, not issues.

- Yeah, and that, you know, and that does make me despair.

It's interesting.

I have a newsletter also, a weekly newsletter that started recently and seems like- - Is this is your own, or is this an NPR?

- It's an NPR newsletter.

- NPR newsletter, okay.

- It's NPR newsletter.

- I've gotta subscribe.

Thank you.

(laughs) - And as I... Oh, I wish I could tell you... Ah, you can look it up.

- But it wasn't a promotion, right?

(laughs) - Well, no, it's not a promotion.

- (laughs) Not at all.

- And as I like to joke, everybody's got a newsletter now.

- Yeah.

(laughs) - Right?

Everybody.

And last week, in fact, I even included recipes from Rick Bayless.

- (laughs) Okay.

- Our friend, the famous chef in Chicago, but the one that's coming out, as you and I are sitting here, there are actually a lot of candidates that are on the ballot for president, and will be depending on the state of November, and I talked to the Prohibition Party candidate, and this to me was very interesting.

Because we usually cover third parties and independent parties in terms of whether they're going to, what kind of effect are they gonna have on the two major party candidates.

- Mm-hmm.

- He is willing to say, Mr. Wood, that he's not gonna have any effect on that, but he's making some important arguments.

And they have a full platform.

And by the way, they're called the Prohibition Party.

They're not in favor, they said, "Well, I don't want to take your beer."

That kind of prohibition didn't work, but at the heart of their political statement is they think there are too many deaths caused by alcohol and tobacco consumption, and they have ideas for which ways in which the government can become active in discouraging what they think of as being absolutely these avoidable deaths.

And you know what?

I liked talking to him.

I liked hearing the ideas.

I think that's part of what we do.

I don't think we say, "Look, this is a party that's only gonna get 3000 votes nationally," and by the way, I made that number up.

It'd probably be a little bit more than that, but I think we ought to be capable of saying, "These are some interesting ideas.

Why don't we give them the opportunity to be heard?"

- And your point is an offshoot of another issue that we don't talk about enough, and we don't have time to talk about today, 'cause it could be a whole half hour, but all of the news stories about even bills for instance, introduced in Congress that are never covered, or almost never covered, in the news.

- Oh, yeah.

- Because they don't have a chance of passing.

- Yeah, yeah.

- Not a reason, Right?

- Yeah.

- Scott Simon, what a delight, what an honor to have you here and to talk with you today- - Well, very good to be with you, too, thank you.

- About these important issues.

And it was great to meet you.

- Very good to meet you.

Thanks very much.

- Thank you, and thank you at home.

Have a great week.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music continues)