Annie Jacobsen

I think people are much more open to having an opinion about all of this than they were in, say, the 1950s.

But there's a balance because now opinion somehow seems to be taking over the Department of Facts in many regards.

Well, it's also that, I mean, Joe, I do not write about politics.

I just don't talk about, I talk about POTUS, the president of the United States.

And I talk about moves that certain presidents made.

But I'm amazed at how much time is spent talking about these two individuals.

And their families and what they ate for breakfast that I find, you know, at least the Taylor Swift of it is like slightly, you know, entertaining or uplifting.

But the the way in which America seems to me have almost become like, you know, the way that the UK used to be obsessed with the royal family.

But I'm amazed by the phenomena of podcasts, I must say, because I'm old enough to remember when they weren't around.

And I do have – I have one foot in publishing obviously, author of seven books, but I also write television.

And so I exist in these two different worlds of media that are, you could say, traditional media forms.

And when you consider how radically these different forms of communication are changing, that we did, I sell as many e-books and audio books as I do hardcovers.

And I have a feeling that if those markets didn't exist, I would sell half as many books, if that makes sense.

And so then when you throw the podcast into the mix, I cannot tell you how many people know about my work as a journalist, as a national security reporter, because of podcasts.

That is remarkable to me.

It makes things so much more accessible to so many more people.

Everybody's listening to a podcast driving around, listening, you know, when they're at the gym, when they're on a hike.

And if someone who cares about an alert and knowledgeable citizenry as a fundamental, first of all, because I think if people, people that are curious tend to be less furious, right?

If you can get your curiosity satiated, you don't become so angry.

And so I – and again, I have to be an eternal optimist, particularly writing the kind of books that I do or it would just be – it would be – my thinking would take a negative turn.