Charles Piller
speaker
984 appearances
4 recordings
4 series
first heard Mar 2025
last heard 17 Apr
Charles Piller’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 2 in all, peaking in Apr 2026 with 1.
Appearances
have to challenge myself and sometimes not take myself too seriously.
And my method of doing that is to spend time with my three-year-old granddaughter who does not put up with any kind of pretension or she is someone who I love so much and value so much and spending time with her keeps me honest.
I can't wait to see it, John.
Thank you for mentioning that.
It was my pleasure.
Thanks for having me, John.
Thanks so much for having me, Charles.
Appreciate it.
Sure. At the risk of dating myself, I am old enough to remember the Watergate scandal with Richard Nixon, and it really inspired a lot of young people. Of course, I was too young to be a reporter back then, but I remember being riveted by the revelations associated with that scandal and really inspired by the
kind of intrepid legwork that has to go into uncovering the critical information that goes into helping people understand something from a factual and also a most credible perspective. perspective on important issues facing our society.
And so, like so many young people, I was inspired by that, but it took some years to learn and to study and to understand where I might fit in in journalism and to try things. But yes, I was from a pretty young age interested in trying to become an investigative reporter. It's not that easy to do because It's a competitive field. There aren't that many jobs in investigative reporting.
Unfortunately, there should be a lot more. But if you're deeply determined and want to put in the work, it can be done.
Yeah, I mean, I think if you're doing this kind of work, you have to be prepared for threats and for the consequences of pissing off important people, to put it frankly.
I'm working in an occupation where the articles that I write question and sometimes threaten the careers of people, in this particular case associated with my book, Doctored, scientists who have apparently engaged in misconduct and misrepresentation of important studies. And when exposed, that's a very, very difficult thing for them. But it should be, honestly. If people are engaging in
in misconduct or engaging in activities that appear to be misconduct that needs to be explored. The public needs to know because it can be very harmful to the pursuit of scientific knowledge and also eventually drug development. So we've all got a stake in it. And for me, The threats and the pushback and the kind of public claims about disputes about my work, that comes with the territory.
You've got to be prepared to take it. You've got to have a thick skin, and you've got to be prepared to have good lawyers behind you sometimes because anybody can sue for anything, even frivolously, and you just have to be ready for whatever comes.
Yeah. Well, I'm fortunate that I'm not suffering from a lack of income, but I'm not getting rich either. You know, very few reporters really do get that rich. But yes, for me. Look, I mean, it may sound a little bit corny, but I'm really deeply committed to doing something beneficial with my work.
That's always been my motivation back from, as I mentioned, inspiration as a very young person associated with the Watergate scandal. What I want to do is expose things that can illuminate issues in a way that are helpful to the public, that can advance these causes in a way that might put things a little bit better on track than they were before. Look, you have to be realistic.
Being one person, no matter how influential some of my work might be, and fortunately, at times, it is influential. I think the book, for example, Doctored, has turned a lot of heads, and that's great. But you have to understand that the world's complicated. My goal really is to be one of the many people who's trying to do something beneficial in the world.
And because I feel deeply about it, it also means that I really enjoy what I'm doing. I really enjoy digging. I really enjoy getting to the bottom of puzzles. And that's an integral part of being an investigative journalist, is figuring out how mysteries end, what the steps are to learn what the root causes of problems are, and how someone might try to correct them.
Showing 561–580 of 984 · page 29 of 50
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