JON SOPEL: WHAT IT’S LIKE TO FLY WITH A PRESIDENT

Summary

Great Company with Jamie Laing: Episode Summary Episode: JON SOPEL: WHAT IT’S LIKE TO FLY WITH A PRESIDENT Release Date: October 30, 2024

Hosted by Jampot Productions, "Great Company with Jamie Laing" brings together engaging conversations with remarkable guests. In this episode, Jamie Laing welcomes John Sopal, a seasoned broadcaster and author, to discuss his extensive career, experiences flying with the U.S. President, insights into gun culture in America, the evolving political landscape in the UK, and the impacts of social media on public discourse.

---

1. Introduction to John Sopal

[03:34]
Jamie Laing introduces John Sopal, highlighting his credentials as the host of the widely acclaimed "News Agents Podcast" and his nearly four-decade tenure with the BBC, including his role as the BBC's correspondent in America.

• Jamie Laing: "John Sopal, who is coming on Today, is a seasoned broadcaster. He is a credible broadcaster on politics."

---

2. Navigating High-Stress Situations

[04:05] – [07:13]
John delves into his experiences reporting from conflict zones, emphasizing the importance of situational awareness. He recounts a tense moment in Northern Afghanistan where unexpected Taliban gunfire necessitated swift action to ensure safety.

• John Sopal: "If you think the only safe part of a car door is the engine block because that is solid metal, forget it. A bullet goes straight through."

He also discusses the rigorous training journalists undergo to prepare for hostile environments, highlighting the impracticality of relying solely on professional protections in unpredictable scenarios.

---

3. Insights into Gun Culture and Political Extremism in America

[08:59] – [14:46]
The conversation shifts to the pervasive gun culture in the United States, tracing its origins to the Second Amendment and the framers' intent to prevent an overpowering central government.

• John Sopal: "The second Amendment... came about that everyone should have a small, well-trained militia to fight off an over mighty Washington."

He contrasts the relatively low number of gun deaths in the UK (25-50 annually) with the staggering figures in the US (35,000+), attributing the disparity to the constitutional protections and widespread gun ownership in America.

• John Sopal: "In the UK... in America it'll be at least 35,000... So it is an insanity."

John critiques the notion that arming "good people" with guns effectively mitigates gun violence, pointing out the lack of impact despite widespread gun ownership.

---

4. The UK's Evolving Political Landscape

[15:50] – [18:44]
John returns to the UK, discussing the country's recent political instability marked by rapid changes in leadership and escalating polarization akin to the US.

• John Sopal: "In 28 years, we had three prime ministers... and I come back in 2022 and we have three prime ministers in one year."

He expresses concern over the rise of extremist factions on both the left and right, fearing that the UK's democracy might mirror the deep divides seen in the US.

---

5. Experiences on Air Force One and American Power Projection

[27:18] – [35:48]
John provides a vivid account of flying with the President on Air Force One, describing the plane's intimidating security measures and the stark contrast between the understated British approach and America's grandiose projection of power.

• John Sopal: "Air Force One is a really shitty old plane... You can only walk backwards."

He shares anecdotes about the complexities and absurdities of navigating such a heavily secured and expansive environment, highlighting the theatrical nature of American politics.

---

6. Social Media, Polarization, and the Younger Generation

[23:14] – [44:33]
The discussion shifts to the detrimental effects of social media on public discourse, where echo chambers and misinformation contribute to increased polarization and intolerance.

• John Sopal: "People listen to news not to be informed but to be affirmed, but to hear their own views echoing back to them."

John emphasizes the importance of fostering a culture of debate and resilience, encouraging the younger generation to seek truth-based information and remain open to differing viewpoints.

---

7. Transition from BBC to Podcasting and Embracing Freedom

[48:40] – [53:19]
John reflects on his transition from the structured environment of the BBC to the more liberated and flexible format of podcasting with "News Agents." He describes the newfound freedom to engage more openly and inclusively with a diverse audience.

• John Sopal: "The ability to talk in a more free way, more open way... we're having a conversation that is more inclusive, that seems a bit more human."

This shift allows for reaching a younger demographic and promoting authentic, fact-based discussions without the constraints of traditional broadcasting.

---

8. Personal Insights and Reflections

[55:27] – [63:43]
In the final segment, Jamie poses a series of personal questions to John, revealing his philosophies and vulnerabilities:

• Favorite Saying: "If you stand by the riverbank long enough, the body of your enemy will eventually float past."

• Crying Moments: Emotional responses to personal losses and witnessing tragedy, highlighting his deep empathy.

• Embarrassing Likes: John refrains from sharing specific embarrassments but acknowledges a desire for acceptance.

• Turns Off: "Arrogance and certainty. I think that people who just are so confident of their own rightness and don't give room for doubt..."

• Turns On: Positive energy and people striving to make the world a better place.

• Self-Likes: Playfully downplays his qualities, later acknowledging genuine generosity and spirit.

• American Election Prediction: Leaning towards Kamala Harris, influenced by youth voter turnout and cultural influencers like Taylor Swift and Billie Eilish.

---

Conclusion and Final Thoughts

[65:05] – [66:28]
Jamie and John wrap up the episode with mutual appreciation for the insightful conversation. Jamie encourages listeners to subscribe and engage with the podcast, while John expresses his commitment to fostering meaningful dialogue through his work.

• Jamie Laing: "I absolutely loved it and learned a huge amount. That was amazing."

The episode concludes with a heartfelt endorsement of John Sopal's contributions to journalism and podcasting, emphasizing the value of open, informed conversations in today's polarized world.

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Notable Quotes:

• John Sopal [06:27]: "Never think it's all over."

• Jamie Laing [58:05]: "Never give up hope. Never keep going. One foot in front of the other."

• John Sopal [14:46]: "The best job in the world being the BBC's North America editor. The worst bit of that job... having to deal with mass shootings."

---

Key Takeaways:

1. Gun Culture and Policy: The entrenched gun culture in America, rooted in historical and constitutional contexts, poses significant challenges to reducing gun violence, contrasting sharply with the UK's more restrictive approach.

2. Political Polarization: Both the US and UK are experiencing heightened political polarization, driven in part by social media echo chambers and extremist factions.

3. Journalistic Integrity: John's commitment to truth and resilience underscores the importance of responsible journalism in combating misinformation and fostering informed citizenry.

4. Personal Growth and Risk-Taking: Embracing risks, whether transitioning careers or confronting intense situations, is vital for personal and professional development.

5. Impact of Social Media: The pervasive influence of social media on shaping public opinion highlights the need for critical thinking and exposure to diverse perspectives among the younger generation.

This episode offers a comprehensive exploration of contemporary political and social issues, enriched by John Sopal's extensive experience and thoughtful analysis. It serves as an enlightening resource for listeners seeking to understand the complexities of modern democracy, media influence, and the enduring quest for truth in journalism.

Transcript

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[Jamie Laing]

Hello, everyone. My name is Jamie Laing and this is Great Company. Well, hello.

[Jemima]

Hello.

[Jamie Laing]

How are you?

[Jemima]

I'm well. Who are you?

[Jamie Laing]

My name is Jamie Lang. I'm the host of Great Company and you are?

[Jemima]

Jemima, the producer.

[Jamie Laing]

So what are you feeling about today's episode?

[Jemima]

I'm very excited. How are you feeling about today's episode?

[Jamie Laing]

I'm really excited because I'm a little bit nervous.

[Jemima]

There we go. There it is. I knew that was in there.

[John Sopal]

Why?

[Jamie Laing]

I'm nervous because John Sopal, who is coming on Today, is a seasoned broadcaster. He is a credible broadcaster on politics.

[Jemima]

Yes.

[Jamie Laing]

He's a seasoned pro in podcasting now because he hosts the News Agents Podcast. And sometimes you feel a little sense of imposter syndrome when you're discussing things with someone who's clearly more experienced and knowledgeable in the area.

[Jemima]

Area, yes. However, I would counter that by saying we have had a lot of experts who are more knowledgeable than us in the area that we're going. So that's a fine. And that's what. That's what's so lovely about this is. It is Great Company. And you're so good at just asking questions that maybe some people a bit like, oh, is that a bit silly to ask? Because we're all thinking it, like, what is the House of Representatives, for instance?

[Jamie Laing]

Yeah.

[Jemima]

I mean, probably won't ask that.

[Jamie Laing]

No, we could ask that, but I.

[Jemima]

Don'T know what that is.

[Jamie Laing]

But I'm with you. And I think. I think something with politics especially is we're quite British about it. We don't really talk about who we support or. Or who we're voting for. And also, maybe we're sort of meant to know a lot more about politics, and perhaps we do, so we don't want to sound stupid or it is.

[Jemima]

From an expert on, say, a few weeks ago when we had Dr. Sarah Berry, like, not knowing loads about menopause, you know, actually came. We realize that there's not much research on it, so it's kind of okay for us to be a bit unknowledgeable, whereas politics, you know, it's a bit like, why haven't you been reading the newspaper? Why haven't you? But podcasts are a great, great way, A great way. A great way for people to, oh my word, to consume that kind of content.

[Jamie Laing]

It so is. I look, I'm really excited. So John is coming on, he bring out a new book which is called Strange Land. It's all about Britain and, and everything surrounding the sort of politics and the sort of culture within the uk, which is really interesting. He's the host of the News Agents podcast, one of the biggest podcasts in the UK. He was a BBC broadcaster for nearly 40 years. Yeah, many, many years, many years. He was the BBC correspondent in America. So he has done a lot of incredible, interesting, amazing things. And he's coming on to have a chat and I cannot wait.

[Jemima]

I know it's going to be fantastic.

[Jamie Laing]

Also, if you're listening to this and you haven't subscribed to our show, please do. And also you can send us an email. It is Great company. Or you can slide into our DMS GreatCompany podcast on Instagram. Let us know all, any notes, any questions, anything at all. Okay, Jemima, you ready for this?

[Jemima]

I am ready to rock and roll.

[Jamie Laing]

Please, please welcome to Great Company, John Sopal.

[John Sopal]

Hello, I'm John Sopal, really average company on Great Company.

[Jamie Laing]

We're seeing this, doing the podcast right now. And you have one ear on, one ear off on our headphones. I have mine fully on because I'm fully, I'm in it. You like to take one off because you like to understand potential risk. Right. So explain that.

[John Sopal]

I just suppose that there have been times when you've been in places where if you had your headphones fully on, there could be extraneous sound happening a little way away that you wouldn't be aware of. You know, it's like when I first kind of covered the troubles in Northern Ireland. You always learned to in when you were parking the car to park, you know, reverse in so you can go straight out if you need to get away quickly. And there were certain risk things, I don't know that I've just always stayed with me. I prefer, I, I, I think I'm sounding like a complete weirdo now.

[Jamie Laing]

You're, you're sounding complet. Have you been in a situation or been in situations when there's been. It's been pretty scary.

[John Sopal]

Yes. Yeah. And, and you've got to have your wits about you. You've got to be aware of everything taking place around 360 degrees also, if you're filming, you've got to be aware of your, you know, your cameraman has got his eye in the camera lens or her eye in the camera lens, and they're, you know, they're focusing on that. They're not aware of what's going on around them because they're just focusing on, have they got the shot? Is it in focus? And so to have your wits about you in those sort of situations, I, you know, I mean, I suppose, you know, kind of being on a front line, moving with a front line in, you know, in northern Afghanistan, which I was. And, you know, suddenly, if you would. So, for example, I was a. There was a situation where we were at this. There was a siege taking place of this town, and the Northern alliance and the Americans and the Brits were trying to dislodge the Taliban. And there hadn't been any firing. The only firing had been from the US and from the Northern Alliance. There was very low cloud cover one day, and suddenly Taliban stand up and start firing. I know you're suddenly aware of sad bits of sand spitting up beside you. You think, oh, my God, that's gunfire. Right, let's get them out of here as fast as we can. And it's just having your wits about you. Right, Come on, let's go. We're going. Because you haven't got time to kind of, you know, you've just got to be pretty. I mean, you know, if hot metal is flying in your direction, you really do want to get the hell out of the way.

[Jamie Laing]

What happens in those situations. Because if you, if you see the sand spitting up, you crap yourself. You do, Right? That is because. But it's, It's a strange situation, something like that, I imagine for someone who isn't typically trained in combat, which I'm assuming you're probably not.

[John Sopal]

No.

[Jamie Laing]

So you're, you're a civilian. You're standing there, you're reporting you're on the front line, and then you see you're being fired at, and suddenly you're realizing, hang on a second, these are bullets flying over our heads. That is a pretty scarce. It must be surreal.

[John Sopal]

I mean, in fairness, we do training. I mean, we. Before you, before you go to somewhere like that, you do what's now in the industry known as a he fat course, which is, if I could remember what it stood for. I mean, it's. It's kind of, you know, it's a safety first aid course. It's what you do, you know, if there's incoming fire Where. What does that sound like? If it's outgoing fire, what does that sound like? What? Where. Where is a safe place to take cover. You watch a COP program.

[Jamie Laing]

Yeah.

[John Sopal]

Okay. And you see them opening the door and hiding behind a car door and then firing from behind the car door. We were never going to talk about any of this. I don't know how we've got here. But this is.

[Jamie Laing]

Do you know why? It's because I'm a great interviewer.

[John Sopal]

This is why. This is what conversation is. This is why. It is. This is why when people say to you, to me, you know, oh, can I have a list of the questions? You say no. Because no conversation has ever worked on the basis of a list of questions.

[Jamie Laing]

Thank you.

[John Sopal]

Exactly.

[Jamie Laing]

Thanks.

[John Sopal]

It's potty. Anyone who says anything like that is a lunatic.

[Jamie Laing]

By the way, he thought that is that he, he fat Hostile environment and emergency first aid training.

[John Sopal]

There we are. Brilliant. You had. You knew that was just at the.

[Jamie Laing]

Top of my head.

[John Sopal]

So clever. So, so, so and so, you know, so we went to this shooting range we went to and someone just gets out.

[Jamie Laing]

Where are you at this point? Where, where.

[John Sopal]

This is in the uk. So we got trained in the uk. I've also been trained in the States when I lived there. And someone gets out a low caliber revolver and just fires it into a car door. The bullet goes whistling straight through it. Don't ever hide behind a car door. If you think the only set part of a car that would be safe to hide behind is the engine block because that is solid metal. Wow. You find low ground, you hide behind a tree, you know, brick wall, forget it. A bullet goes straight through and a high velocity round will go. So you learn all this stuff. Wow. Before you go out there, I mean it's always kind of one of the things that struck me as one of the madnesses about when I was in America of saying what you need to do is you need. You know, there are so many bad people with guns. What you need is more good people with guns. And why don't we have guns in schools? Arm the teachers so that you. You cannot believe what a bullet sounds like being fired. Working out where it is coming from. And the idea that you're going to be able to keep this under control. If you have teachers with guns where you're not even sure. It seems to be a recipe for even more mayhem to have something like that.

[Jamie Laing]

What is your. I mean, if we could start here as well. Because this is super interesting, right? I think just gun crime in America from someone living over here who, and I imagine lots of the audience has sort limited knowledge and just sees things in the news and understands and restories. It's sort of catastrophic. The sort of thing that's happening over there are crazy. And from a naive position you say well why don't you just put a ban on these guns and stop them happening and stop all these things happening in America.

[John Sopal]

So that's a huge question.

[Jamie Laing]

It's a huge question. I know. That's why we have you here.

[John Sopal]

So. Well essentially you, you go to the, the framing of the US Constitution and the founding fathers coming together. They've kicked the British out. George III is history. And they're trying to write a, at the turn of the sort of 18th century about what America will be. And one of the great suspicions was that you, you know, America is this vast geographical landmass. You can't have too much power at the center, you can't have too much power in Washington D.C. you need to make sure that states have rights. And so the great fear for the framers of the Constitution was that the Washington would get an army and then it would rule the whole of America and no one would have any rights. And so the, the second Amendment, which is the right to bear arms came about that everyone should have a small, well trained militia to fight off an over mighty Washington. So guns became part of life in America in a way that they never have been.

[Jamie Laing]

So it just, so they basically everyone had militia. So they would stop a sort of civil war from happening.

[John Sopal]

They would stop an over mighty state trampling over the rights of Alabama or Mississippi or Louisiana or wherever it happens to be, Pennsylvania or Arkansas, you name it. That was the idea. Spin forward kind of until the 1980s, 1990s and it gets, the law gets changed so that everyone has the right to bear arms. It changes from a, instead of it being a small, well regulated militia, I think was what the original amendment said it was that anyone could have the right to bear arms. I remember going to cover one of the crimes, one of the mass shootings that had taken place in Orlando at the Pulse nightclub. And this, the guy who carried out the killing had been, he'd grown up nearby. And I went to the town nearby and we did the classic TV vox pop. And you know, I said are you a gun owner? Yeah, I'm a gun owner. How many guns have you got? To which he replied no one asks how many pairs of shoes my wife has got. And you think, hang on, just take, let's, let's Just pick apart the logic of that. Why do you, you know, okay, you wear different shoes because sometimes you want to wear smart and sometimes you want to be casual and sometimes you want to go somewh somewhere very formal. Sometimes it's very informal. I understand why people have different pairs of shoes. Why do you need so many ways to kill somebody?

[Jamie Laing]

But then you go back to that argument which you said, which I understand is where everyone, you need to stop this idea of Washington, be able to take over the country or whatever it is. But then when it becomes such a problem and such an issue where people, parents are scared of sending their kids to schools because they're worried there's going to be a shooting and still nothing is done about it, I, I tell.

[John Sopal]

You the thing that, I mean, look, there are so many things that brought it home to me, but we, I was brief. I was spent four years as the BBC's Paris correspondent, made great friends there with this American family and, and their son has just had kids of his own. The little tiny tot is going now to kindergarten and they, they got a note from the school, from the kindergarten saying, we want to take a sample of your son's DNA, aged 18 months, 2 years, just in case there's a mass shooting and we need to identify bodies. You cannot quite believe that, that. Just consider that that's what you have to do, that you have to have drills now in schools for, you know, in case of a shooter, in case of active shooter, they regularly practice barricading themselves in a classroom as if that is normal. And they have.

[Jamie Laing]

It was a fire drill we used to do at school.

[John Sopal]

Exactly. It is normalizing the most abnormal. And I find that terrifying. And you know, the number of gun Deaths in the UK each year is probably between 25 and 50. A few will be murders, a few will be a shotgun.

[Jamie Laing]

25 and 50.

[John Sopal]

No, 25 to 50.

[Jamie Laing]

25 to 50, yeah.

[John Sopal]

And in the US it'll be at least 35, 000. So okay, we're five times smaller. So on that statistic, it ought to be 125 deaths in America if they were the same as us. It is in the tens of thousands. The lowest it's been when I was there was about 35, 000. So it's. So it is an insanity.

[Jamie Laing]

It is a complete insanity.

[John Sopal]

And, and they think that the only way they, I mean what, what is it about the logic that they don't get? They keep saying that the only way to stop a bad person with a gun is to have a good person with a gun. Well, okay, fine, but then why has it not worked? Everyone has got guns in America. I mean, you know, they are widespread and we've just heard that Kamala Harris has said that she's a gun owner and Tim Wolves, her running mate, he's a gun owner. You know, so everyone has got guns in America, but the fact of the matter is that it would take a constitutional amendment to take away people's guns. It is never going to happen and there would be a civil war before it did happen. I genuinely believe that the one thing that would result in civil war in America is if the state tried to take away people's guns.

[Jamie Laing]

But try and break that down for me, because what then people believe that they don't have their freedom and they don't have the ability to defend themselves.

[John Sopal]

Yes, the size of America is vast. You could live in some rural homestead that is 50 miles from the nearest town. And you feel to protect my family, I do need to have a gun. I can't rely on the Metropolitan Police or Hampshire Police or whatever it happens to be turning up to protect me. I mean, you know, the best job in the world being the BBC's North America editor. The worst bit of that job, all the endless towns I went to where 40 people had died. 50 people had died. Las Vegas. There was the country music festival. You know, all of these different places that I've been to, which I, which I associate with mass shootings, which I associate with the ready availability of high power, high velocity rifles, as much ammunition as you can pack away. And you just think this is just, it's a disease.

[Jamie Laing]

You speak about America being this sort of strange, bizarre place. But then you have your new book, which is Strangeland, which is all about how you feel that UK has become slightly bizarre in its own way.

[John Sopal]

Yeah. You know, I came back from America in 2022, having been away for how long? Nearly eight years and living in DC, living in DC. And you come back and, you know, the first time I'd voted kind of in the deep, distant mists of time, in 1979. And for the next three decades, three decades, there were three prime ministers. There was, there was Margaret Thatcher, there was John Major and there was Tony Blair. Three prime ministers, 28 years. And I come back in 2022 and we have three prime ministers in one year. And you think, what the hell is happening to this country? And Boris Johnson is, you know, brought down by a whole series of lies that, you know about the, the unlawful proroguing of Parliament, lying to the Queen and lying to about why certain ministers had happened and the impossibility of Brexit. And then you get the madness of Liz Truss and you think, geez, what the hell has happened to. You know, everyone looks to Britain to be this kind of bastion of stability. And it suddenly felt very unstable. And instead of lots of irony and humor, everyone felt really angry. And people are going to the, you know, on social media, it's hyper aggressive, it's you. Unless you think exactly like I do, then you are to be condemned. And I kind of found there was this intolerance on the left and I found there was this intolerance on the right and I thought, oh my God, I don't recognize any of this. And so in some ways you could say the counter argument is, oh my God, look at the boring general election we've just had in the UK where, you know, Rishi Sunak goes down in flames, Keir Starmer wins huge, and there's a peaceful transfer of power. What's the fuss about? And then you look and say, well, hang on, we've now got, you know, a hard right anti immigrant grouping in the House of Commons, which we've never had before in the shape of reform. Arguably, we've got a hard left grouping around Jeremy Corbyn and some of the people that are attracted there. You've got people who have kind of quick to the barricades on some of these social issues and intolerance of, you know, other people's views. And I sort of do worry that, you know, there's a danger that we become as polarized as America. And I just don't think that's a great thing because I think that American democracy, I mean, we'll see what happens over the next few weeks. The one thing I do not predict will happen is that if Kamala Harris wins, Donald Trump will pick up the phone and say, kamala, congratulations, good luck for the next four years. Just don't see that happening in a way that Rishi Sunak did for Keir Starmer in July.

[Jamie Laing]

Wait, just jumping to that, what do you think will happen then if, if Trump loses?

[John Sopal]

I mean, honestly, no ways.

[Jamie Laing]

It can't be that you think it's going to be that dramatic.

[John Sopal]

Well, did anyone think it would be that dramatic last time around this? I mean, what happened four years ago was not that the US Constitution showed how durable it was, I think it showed how brittle it was, but for the actions of a few people who were really brave and said no no, no, I'm sorry, Mr. Trump. My loyalty is to the Constitution, not to you. The President, Donald Trump is going to be better organized this time round. There are all sorts of possibilities. I'm not predicting anything, but I just think that the chances of there being a smooth, easy, trouble free transition of power like we had in Britain in July, I think are negligible. I think that if Donald Trump wins, he wins, and if he loses, he'll say it was a. The election was stolen from me with the consequences that could flow from that. There's one huge difference, and I don't want to be boring and start talking about American constitutional politics, but when Trump lost in November 2020, the House of Representatives, which certifies the election, was controlled by the Democrats and Nancy Pelosi was the speaker. This time round, and nearly all the Republicans voted not to certify Joe Biden's victory for no other reason than they were terrified of Donald Trump. This time round, the House is run by the Republicans. A Republican speaker, Mike Johnson, who was there, who didn't vote to certify Joe Biden's victory four years ago, who might be in a position where he says, okay, well, I know that according to the Electoral College, Kamala Harris won, but we're not going to certify it. And then you're into a full scale constitutional crisis about what happens next in America. I'm not saying that will happen. But, you know, anyone who thinks there are no dangers and there are no pressure points is being willfully blind.

[Jamie Laing]

It's quite a scary world we live in at the moment. It's sort of terrifying. And going back to your book, but why did you decide to write the book?

[John Sopal]

I suppose my purpose for writing the book was saying, you know what, I kind of like where we are and I think Britain's a great country. I, you know, and there were bits of 2022. I thought the death of the Queen was a real kind of. That was a light bulb moment for me where you thought, oh, my God, you know, though many people may have doubts about the monarchy and, and, you know, on an intellectual level, it's hard to rationalize why you have one family which becomes where the son becomes the king. You know, it doesn't make a whole lot of logical sense, but it was a glue. It was a glue that bound us as a nation. And I think, you know, you see the people from all walks of life. I remember going to football on the day of the King's coronation and I watched the coronation in the morning on the telly. And then I go to Tottenham in the afternoon and what a day, what a day. And everyone. And everyone's singing God Save the King. And it was kind of like, oh, my God, the hairs in the back of your neck are standing up at this. And so there are things. So I just want us to remember all the good stuff that we've got in this society, which are considerable. But, you know, there are bad actors out there who would seek to undermine it. And if you're Vladimir Putin and you've, you know, he interferes in elections because he wants to sow discontent. He wants, he doesn't want to see a strong Europe or a strong America or a strong NATO, who genuinely scares.

[Jamie Laing]

You in the world.

[John Sopal]

People who have no tolerance of other people's views, people who just think that they have got absolute moral certainty. Those people frighten me. And I think there is that sort of danger at the moment that, you know, on certain issues you get people. It's all the fault of illegal immigration, or it's all the fault of the fossil fuel companies, or it's all the fault of, you know, whatever it happens to be. And I just think that it's on both edges of politics. And then you, those people unwittingly become the useful idiots for people who've got much more of a plan. Like, you know, in Russia, where Putin, it's clear that he wants to rebuild the sort of Russian empire, as was anyone who just assumes that what we've got because we've grown up with it is permanent. I think he's kidding themselves. I think there are dangers out there and there are threats to democracy. Those sort of need to be taken a bit seriously.

[Jamie Laing]

The hard thing, I think, is we have a lot of young listeners, right, who are probably listening to us and, you know, losing hope because, you know, social media creates this sort of echo chamber of distress and. Yeah, and, and lies, and everyone's an expert on everything it feels like. What would you say to the younger generation?

[John Sopal]

Well, I wouldn't dream to speak to the younger generation in a sort of patronizing. Well, let me tell you, young man, young woman, you know, I, I just. Because that's, that's pompous and it's just stupid. I think that, you know, one I would say, is social media the real world. It's. It is a. It is a world, but is it the real world? So don't start thinking that just because someone has got a lot of likes for something on Insta or Tick Tock or whatever, it Happens to be that that is the real world. I think that society as a whole is more diffuse. I would also say my experience in life has been that things invariably happen because someone has up and has up and it's just made a complete bloody mess of things rather than some dark, evil conspiracy. And you. I mean, you look at what happened when, you know, Kate, as in Kate and Will, the Princess of Wales, gets sick with cancer. You know, we went mad. We went mad with the conspiracy theories of. That it was the marriage that was over. She was dead. She was dead. She's not alive. The palace is not admitting it. You know, a million different things were going on about why we hadn't been told what we'd been told. And you just think, oh, it's a much sadder story than that. She just wanted to tell the kids. That conspiracy theory. Is it really plausible? Or is it probably more complex, more layered, more gray and murky and muddy than all of that? And I think that the more you get to know about things, the more you think there isn't a simple unifying explanation of these dark forces that are at work. I just don't buy it. You know, one of the things that sort of slightly frightens me now about the environment out there is that, you know, people catastrophize things and build conspiracy theories. And actually, I think life's all right. You know, I think life's okay. I think there are challenges, sure there are challenges, sure, life's complicated and it's messy, But I don't think the great conspiracy theories and, you know, and what. What really pisses me off is when I see. Sorry, my language has suddenly deteriorated.

[Jamie Laing]

It's because you're in my company. It happens all the time.

[John Sopal]

I know. What the hell's happened anyway? I'd like to apologize.

[Jamie Laing]

Happens all the time.

[John Sopal]

Yeah. You know that there are not the. When. When I see someone like Liz Truss trying to explain the fact that she was brought down as Prime Minister because of these dark forces of the bank of England, these dark forces in the treasury who plotted against her. The British establishment wanted to see her fail. No, you just screwed up, love. You know. You know, just made a complete. Utter holics of it. And. And you failed. You came up with an unfunded budget that sent the markets berserk. And hey, presto, people said, you've got to change course, and she didn't want to. And the markets forced her to the free markets that she reveres. And you just think what has happened to people being able to take responsibility for their own behavior.

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[Jamie Laing]

You mentioned that you say that that being the US correspondent is the best job in the world. Why is it the best job in the world?

[John Sopal]

Oh, because it's so fabulous and it's so. Look, America is an amazing country. Everything is big. Everything is big. Whether it's. It's Yosemite national park is big. It just doesn't feel like the Lake District National Park. Everything is oversized. The sandwiches are too big, the food is too much. The, the, the, the, the sweet food is too sweet, the salty food is too salty. Everything is over the top in Americ. But it relates to the politics as well, that even the politics is big in America. And, you know, I was kind of privileged to be part of the, you know, the White House press corps. You would travel with the President. I've traveled with the prime minister in a motorcade. It's cool. Traveling with the President on Air Force One and being part of his motorcade is cooler. It's just ridiculous. I mean, the size and the scale of it and the self importance and that kind of, you know, landing at, landing at Stansted Airport on Air Force One, getting into these Osprey helicopters that take you from by the foot of the aircraft to the back garden of the U.S. ambassador in Regents park in about 15 minutes. I mean, hey, it's testosterone. It's kind of cool. It's all happening there. And you're just thinking, well, this is a laugh.

[Jamie Laing]

What is Air Force One like?

[John Sopal]

It's a really shitty old plane.

[Jamie Laing]

Get out of there. It can't be. It is.

[John Sopal]

It's a really.

[Jamie Laing]

I've seen the movie with Harrison Ford. It's not.

[John Sopal]

So the law of Air Force One, right, is you can only walk backwards. You can't move forwards. So no, no, no. So if you're at the back of the plane, which is where the journalists are, there are and there's. I try to imagine this. The bulkhead at the back of the plane goes down the middle of the plane. So you've only got, you can only, you can't see what's at the far side of the aisle.

[Jamie Laing]

Got it. Okay. Yeah.

[John Sopal]

So we're on one side and There are about 13 seats for the journalists. That's all under Wrangler. You get on Air Force. So you, you, you go to Andrew's Air Force Base, right. In Maryland, and you film the President going up the steps. And then Secret Service take right on the plane and you go up through the belly. There's a little short staircase that goes up through the belly of the plane. You're not going into the cabin, you're going hold. And then you're going above that. And there's all sorts of weird in the hold of stuff that you, you know, boats and whatever else, you know, crazy stuff.

[Jamie Laing]

Are you serious?

[John Sopal]

Yeah. And then you go up to the back of the plane, which is where you sit.

[Jamie Laing]

Yeah.

[John Sopal]

And you have not put your cameras down and your microphones down and the plane is moving. It's like being in an Uber for a start. Once the Paris is on board, the plane is moving. There is no waiting. There's no air traffic control clearance. You are in the air while you are still putting away your stuff. Forget seat belts and all that kind of crap. You don't worry with any of that. But it's a really old rust bucket of a plane. At the very front of the plane, you've got the President's quarters and his bedroom. And then on the top. Did you see that? No, because of course that's out of bounds. That's. You can't, as I say, you can only move backwards. And if you're at the back of the plane, all you can go to is the galley and the toilet. In front of us on the plane are the Secret Service. And the Secret Service carry their weapons all the time the plane is in flight. So realistically, if you want to make a move to the front of the plane, you've got to get past about a dozen Secret Service agents who are all armed. I'm going to suggest that's not going to turn out well for you on the plane. If you try to do that. There's an operating theater on the plane. There is a. There are doctors on the plane. There is, it's, you know, and then there are staff quarters and there are the meeting rooms and on the top deck of the jumbo. So at the front is where, where no one goes. And that's where all the comms team are who are, you know, patching you to world leaders or whatever. And that is, you know, strictly, strictly out of bounds. I think for even for all the White House staff, only the President and those that, you know, have got the highest clearance can go up top.

[Jamie Laing]

When you amplify things purposely, you know, whether it's in supermarkets, food is big, or you go on Air Force One, it's big. If you make. If you sort of create theater around things big and strong, then you yourself feel important and big and strong. And there's that kind of. With American politics, it feels. It's a little bit like that. It feels like it's a very big theater show.

[John Sopal]

Here we go. It's absolutely like that. It's also the projection of power that, you know, in Britain, we do understate it, which always. Which is what I love about this country. I mean, I remember Barnst being on the M4 and going up behind a Range Rover and kind of. It was in the fast lane. It was doing 70, and I wanted to go faster, kind of, you know, I was rushing to go somewhere, I can't even remember where, and I. So I flash the. The Range Rover and just this little thing on the back comes up and says, police, keep your distance. And they were had. I don't know whether the royalty or the prime minister in front, but it was like three cars. That was it. We do discreet, understated. America does big projections of power, and it is theater and it is show. And, you know, look, America is, you know, still the most powerful country probably in the world. It's got the biggest army in the world. It's got the most heavily armed armed forces in the world.

[Jamie Laing]

But then there could be an assassination attempt on Trump.

[John Sopal]

Yeah, there has been.

[Jamie Laing]

Is there a real threat that people are so radical now that they will climb on roofs with guns and try and assassinate presidents or, you know, anyone.

[John Sopal]

Yeah, Jamie, I want to just pick that apart slightly.

[Jamie Laing]

Please do.

[John Sopal]

I think that there is. There is undoubtedly polarization in America, and it is my belief that had the assassination attempt succeeded on Donald Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania, you know, back in July, it would have resulted in civil war. I think it would have been. The consequences would have been horrific because a lot of the Trump supporters are heavily armed. And, you know, we. January 6th, we saw that they were prepared to take the law into their own hands. I think that any Democrat politician or media person who'd ever been critical of Donald Trump would find himself in the crosshairs of people saying, we want revenge. I think it would have been a really scary moment for America. You know, thank God he missed on every level, because, one, we should resolve our political differences through argument and debate and listening to each other's viewpoints and letting people vote and decide. That's how you do it in a democracy. But thank God he missed as well, because the consequences would have been so far reaching and so destabilizing for America, which has already had the shock of January 6, you know, 2021. But the other thing about it is, you know, do I think that the two attempted assassination attempts were from people who were deeply politically motivated, who had, you know, it wasn't a commun. This plot. It wasn't a kind of like the JFK assassination. It was a random guy who kind of had disaffected individual. There are a lot of. I mean, you know, there are a lot of nutters out there, to use the politically incorrect phrasing for it. There are a lot of people who are fruitcakes, who've. But who've got guns. We've got fruitcakes in Britain as well. They don't have guns and they're not in a position to do quite as much damage for the most part. So I think there is a difference between political extremism and polarization, which I think is there. I think it's real. The fact of the matter is that you get a lot of people who have got guns, who shouldn't have, who get it into their head that they've got messages that someone is telling them they've got to shoot, they're hearing voices. I've got to kill Donald Trump or I've got to kill Kamala Harris or whatever it happens to be. And so, you know. But that I don't think is necessarily a function of the extremism.

[Jamie Laing]

I went to Miami in January and it was. And I hadn't been to America in a while. And I arrived there and I went through security and I felt this is just a personal opinion compared to London, where I live all the time. There feels this sense, or it feels aggressive when walking through security. You feel like you're being watched. You feel like if you put a foot wrong, something's going to happen. Did you, when you in America, did you feel that there is a sense of unrest?

[John Sopal]

Well, obviously on January 6th, there was unrest.

[Jamie Laing]

Are you there at the time?

[John Sopal]

Yeah, I was in. I was in the capital. I wasn't at the Hill. I wasn't on the Hill when the riots happened. I'd been at the Ellipse when Donald Trump made the speech. We've got to fight. We've got to fight like hell to save our country.

[Jamie Laing]

For anyone who doesn't know, can you explain what happened then?

[John Sopal]

So yeah. So let's go back to January 6th. I'd been to so many Trump rallies, and there was always a slight carnival atmosphere. I mean, you know. Yeah, we were called fake news. Yeah. We were called, you know, enemies of the people, all that sort of stuff. But people dressed up. It was like, if you're going to a fiesta, and they were wearing Trump costumes and Trump hats and Trump T shirts and Trump socks, and, you know, they adore Donald Trump. And it was a kind of. It was a kind of fun that people went for entertainment. You know, don't believe that all these people that go to Trump rallies are deeply political. Trump is funny. He's a very entertaining speaker. You know, you can't, if you wrote it all down, transcribe what he said. You would think he was a nutcase.

[Jamie Laing]

But he's serious.

[John Sopal]

Yeah. No, no, but he's entertaining. He comes on to, you know, explain what he's like. Well, because he comes on to ymca, you know, a macho man. Okay. And he's kind of. He's dancing and he's hamming it up, and he's, you know, and it like, he was. He was in Michigan, I think, at the weekend, and he was telling, you know, get your fat husband off the couch and get him to vote now. You know, in normal political terms, you would not campaign like that. So Trump does this because he wants to make people laugh and he wants to be an entertainer. January 6, the mood was sulfurous. It was sour, it was aggressive. People had come clearly spoiling for a fight. And, you know, and, I mean, Trump would deny this, but he absolutely encouraged it. He said, you know, come to Washington on January 6, it's going to be wild. He did nothing to deter the rioters when the riots were first taking place. And he knew, was aware that there were gallows being built to hang Mike Pence, his vice president. And there was an attempted insurrection. There was an attempt to stop the peaceful transfer of power from Donald Trump to Joe Biden. I was doing the 10 o'clock news that night. I went on air, and Joe Biden's election victory should have been certified by Congress by then, and it hadn't been because the mob was in control of the House of Representatives and the mob was in control of the Senate, and it was an attempt to overthrow democracy. I mean, it's hard to describe it as anything else. That was January 6th. So there was a real danger of violence. I just want to go back to your question about you arriving at Miami Airport and feeling this sense of Aggression, what you get in America is passag. There's a lot of passive aggression. No, sir, you can't do that. Don't ever try and do a joke with a security official in America. Never, ever, ever try humor. Never try irony or sarcasm. Just leave those behind in Britain. Not going to work in America with the security forces that are there. They are not going to laugh, they're not going to smile, and before you know it, you'll hear the snap of latex gloves and could you bend over, Mr. Lang, please? There is a certain we, we are going to conduct a full bodily examination. I really don't. It's. And that, I think, marks it out and that takes some getting used to, where you kind of, I suspect you and me are used to kind of joshing our way through things and, you know, kind of, you, you try and have a laugh with someone, you try and you deploy a bit of charm, whatever it happens to be, because you think you'll get more that way. And I've, that's my, the sort of my life, I've kind of, you know, once I'd written on school report, jonathan must learn that in life, charm is not enough. And I, because that's all I was good at, really.

[Jamie Laing]

It's exactly the same as me. It's all I was good at. My report said, getting across at Jamie is like drowning puppies. Exactly.

[John Sopal]

So you and me are the same there. So I, I, I've always tried to deploy humor. American security. No, forget it. It's not going to work. They just do a very serious matter of fact. Yes, sir. But, you know, there's this sort of, there's this kind of strange politeness, whether it's, yes, sir, no, ma'am, you know, walk this way, it's sort of polite. But don't ever think you can cross the line of engaging in banter. You know, when you're getting your passport stamped and you've queued for bloody hours, you know, just suck it up.

[Jamie Laing]

John, why did you become a journalist?

[John Sopal]

No. God knows. No, no, I couldn't get any other job.

[Jamie Laing]

Because you're clearly so passionate, just from this brief sort of moment that we spent together, you're clearly passionate about it. You're clearly passionate for the truth, which I think is what we're really lacking at the moment is people don't want to particularly find out the truth. They want to find out what fits their narrative. And I think you don't mind what narrative it really fits, as long as it's the truth and has that always been with you ever since you were young. Were you truthful as you when you were younger?

[John Sopal]

Caring about the truth and being truthful? I would say two slightly different things. No, I do care passionately about it. I do care.

[Jamie Laing]

Why?

[John Sopal]

Because. Because I think that there's a real danger. So you know, if, if, if my book is a kind of Living in a democracy is a bloody great thing and we should preserve it it then I think that if you are going to have people being fed utter falsehood and nonsense on social media and you know, AI generated pictures and whatever else it happens to be which we have seen now in successive elections and some of it is put out by people who just want to make a bit of money on the side and create clickbait. Other of it is being created by states who want to undermine our institutions and undermine our democracy. I think there is a real premium on having facts out there and people just can't have their own facts. There are certain stubborn things that are facts. I have got a cup of coffee in my hand that is a fact. Is it? Yes, I think it. I. Well and it's a very nice cup of coffee and I want to thank your producer for getting it. I think that those things are facts and I think that we should be able to stick to those. And I think that. So why I became a journalist was that I was curious. I didn't have any high when I went into journalism, which was 40 years ago, God help me. I didn't have these high minded ideals about upholding democracy. I just thought, God, it's quite interesting to be able to poke a microphone under somebody's nose and say what the hell's going on? You know, it satisfied the nosy in me. I think also I like telling stories, you know. Are you a storyteller? Yeah. And I think that there is an element of that in journalism and the, the correspondence that you kind of want to watch and read other people who weave a beautiful story and say, look, this is complicated but we're going to cross this busy motorway, I'm going to hold your hand and we're going to get to the other side and we'll get there safely. But just hold on because I'm going to tell you something that you know and we've got to go through this busy lines of traffic but we're going to get there and it's worth listening to. So I kind of quite enjoyed all of that about storytelling today as I sit here now with you in 2024. I am a bit fearful about the amount of fake information out there. So I don't care, Jamie, whether you go to a polling station and you vote Tory or Labor or Reform or for Corbyn or pro Europe or anti Europe or Democrat or Republican. All I care about is that you've had good information on which to base your judgment. So that when you pick up that little stubby black pencil in the voting booth, you've got kind of reasonable facts on which to base it. And I worry that exactly as you say, that people listen to news and there are, you know, there's a whole variety of ways that people are getting news, that people are listening to news not to be informed but to be affirmed, but to hear their own views echoing back to them. That, oh yeah, this is what I think. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, you're right. I'm never listening to anyone who says anything contradictory. And I just think that, you know, that sort of level of intolerance about hearing another viewpoint is really bloody dangerous.

[Jamie Laing]

It completely is. And I, and I, I love that sort of idea of just understanding when you are going to vote, to have a little bit of knowledge about what you're doing and understanding things when it comes to voting. Why are we so, as Brit, so private and so scared about saying who we're voting for, where in America, if you're a Trump Fund, you're screaming about it. But in the uk, we, we don't, we hide it, we're embarrassed, we're shy, we're reserved. Why is that?

[John Sopal]

You know, one of the things I, when I was sort of thinking about writing this book, I read an essay that Orwell had written in 1941, during the Blitz, the bombs are falling on London. He's sitting at a, you know, a Remington typewriter. Clack, clack, clack, clack, clack, you know, all the rest of it. And he, he describes the British personality so accurately that I think it's sort of relevant today. And he says we are basically private individuals. We're not showy, demonstrative people. We're not people who beat our chests, that our army do not go in for goose step marches and stuff. Like, not this sort of outwardly projecting showy, you know, we like the privacy we like, you know, we, we kind of like our own front yard. I mean, I remember going to the Netherlands and seeing no one had neck curtains in their houses and thinking, that's not British. We, we want to, we want to lock ourselves away. Totally. And I, I think there is a degree of privacy that we have. And I kind of like that. And I think that people who invade your privacy is, Is one of those things that you. Excuse me, don't stand so close to me, please. Please, can you keep your distance? Like when you're, when you're on the tube or you're a cocktail party and you meet an Italian and the Italian is wanting to be nose to nose with you, and the Brit is backing off another four feet because we don't want that invasion of our personal space. And it's like a dance goes on around the room as the Italian is trying to get closer to you and the Brit is trying to get further away. And I think that there is an element of that in what we. Who we are. I quite like that. I think that's respectful. I think, you know, respect people's space and.

[Jamie Laing]

But that's sort of counterintuitive to what you do as a job because, yeah.

[John Sopal]

I know you're, you're.

[Jamie Laing]

As you describe it, I want to put a microphone on someone's nose.

[John Sopal]

I try and do it in a sort of, you know, nice way that, you know, people want to open up to you and. Because I think people do like telling their stories.

[Jamie Laing]

Can I. How do you open someone up in terms of. In conversation? So if you are trying to. You're trying to deliver a message, but you're also trying to get something out of someone. What is a tactic that you would say to someone in conversation in order to get the answer out of someone?

[John Sopal]

I think it depends on the person. I think you've got to, you know, you. There is no generalized rule of social conduct that some people are shy and it takes a little bit of coaxing. You've got to build confidence.

[Jamie Laing]

But you must have read people.

[John Sopal]

I think you've got to have. People have got to have confidence that you are fundamentally a decent, upright person. I think if they're going to open up to you and you've got to be, you know, I'm interested in people and I think. Think that people think that the great skill of broadcasting is do you have a great sonorous broadcasting voice? The great skill of this. And, you know, I, I say I have, actually.

[Jamie Laing]

Thanks very much.

[John Sopal]

I am actually. No, no, no, because I'm gonna, I'm gonna say what you've done. I, I suspect that, you know, look, your producer sent me a rough plan of what the interview was going to be.

[Jamie Laing]

Yeah.

[John Sopal]

And we've gone way meandered all sorts of ways because that's where conversation takes you totally. And, and it's about you Know, if you imagine that there is this giant switch on top of your head and one switch is. It's got two positions. One is transmit and one is listen. Too often people are on transmit and are not listening to other people. And I think that the art of good interviewing and getting stuff out of people is to be able to listen to what they've had to say.

[Jamie Laing]

I couldn't agree with you more. More people need to listen. How many years do you spend at the BBC again?

[John Sopal]

Oh, oh, don't. So, I mean, you know, people do less from multiple murder.

[Jamie Laing]

Four years.

[John Sopal]

Yeah, exactly. I did. I did. Oh, God, 35 plus years.

[Jamie Laing]

So 35 plus years. The BBC, which, you know, I do Radio 1. I understand how the BBC works. It's very controlled. You have to sort of be quite balanced in your view in lots of ways. And I mean, I don't need to. I'm telling you how to suck eggs here. But you understand, you then go to do a podcast, the News Agents, which is. Is hugely popular. I was listening to it this morning. It's just. It's great. And if anyone who hasn't listened to it, please go and listen to it, which kind of are no rules. You can kind of do what you want. You're paid more money. What was it like going from the BBC to doing your own podcast?

[John Sopal]

There's a sort of. There's an easy, glib answer, which is, you know, I kind of compared it to mass murder. And there was an element in. And there was an element in which the. The sort of. You're sitting in your prison cell, cell, and the water comes and you hear the lock turning and they open the door and they say, Mr. Sopal, you're free to go now. And you think, well, I don't go outside. I don't want to go out there. It's scary out there. I'm much more comfortable in here. And there was an element in which I was institutionalized at the BBC in the sense that I. Okay, I had never bought a mobile phone, I had never bought a laptop, I had never bought an iPad. If I had any problems, I used to ring IT support, because that's what there was there at the BBC. The BBC would give me my phone, they would give me my laptop, they would give me my iPad, they would give me the microphone I needed to broadcast with. And so when you go outside and suddenly think, oh, my God, I've been wearing this heavy, wet woolen overcoat for quite some time now, and I can just take it off and I Can my shoulders can move freely. I think that that's kind of, there's an element of liberation and there are things that probably we've got wrong on the podcast. You know, no one's perfect, but the ability to talk in a more free way, more open way. And you asked me about young people and I've, you know, what's my advice? I haven't got any advice. But I think the reason we're attract. I don't know, we're attracting young people because I think that we're having a conversation that is more inclusive, that seems a bit more human. Goes back to when you were asking me about my passion for journalism. It's still there. It was the case when I left and I was doing the 10 o'clock news, or there's a day program that you were reaching an older demographic, you were reaching people in their 60s. Well, that's crap. We need to reach all sorts of. We need to reach all demographics. News needs to get, you know, facts need to get to all people. Good reporting, interesting takes on what's happening in the world. You want. I want it to reach the widest possible audience. And if we are getting young people listening disproportionately to us compared to what was the case at the BBC, Happy days.

[Jamie Laing]

What does it teach you about taking risks? Because I feel like you've sort of taken risks in your life. You've been to the front line, you leave the BBC, you start this podcast.

[John Sopal]

That's a good question. I, I mean, we started off talking about me on a front line. I want to add for context, I bloody hated it. I was absolutely terrified the moment we got out of Afghanistan, I thought. And likewise, when I've been in Iraq or other places in the Middle East.

[Jamie Laing]

Still doing it.

[John Sopal]

Yeah, I still did it. I mean, I, I suppose part of me wanted to see how much of a coward I was or wasn't and whether I, you know, I could do this. And it was a kind of like, you know, could I do this? I. But I didn't want to become a war correspondent at the end of it. Every time I left somewhere like that, I just thought, oh, thank God for that. Thank. You know, I wasn't hankering to go back to the next place where I'd be shot at. You know, I'd kind of quite like my family and I quite like to get home in one piece. And so I, I. But I mean, yeah, I did, yeah, I took risks and, and there are things I've done where I think I look back and think you are mad. Why on earth did you do what you did? You know, the. The drive to get on air, to hit the bulletin at the top of the hour, driving at ridiculous speeds, cutting corners in your life to get there, to do the story, to be on the story. That is a disease that's in me. I've. I fully acknowledge and, you know, you can probably tell from the way I'm speaking about it that it's probably still there. That if I got a note now saying that, you know, big story are broken, I would be there in a shot. You drop everything, pack a bag. Airport, go. You don't know where you, you know, you're in flight. You don't know where you're gonna. When you land. You don't know where you're gonna stay. You don't speak the language you've got to make. You don't. And you're hoping that while you're flying that someone is taking charge of the logistics of kind of figuring this stuff out so that you can hit the ground running. Running. Because that's what I've done for, you know, for years and years and years. And that's, you know, that adrenaline is still there and it's still in me, that if the story broke, I'd be gone, I would be on it. So, yeah, that's. That's sort of part of it. And then there was a risk of doing. Leaving the BBC. You know, I'd done a long time at the BBC. How much of a risk was it? I mean, I could have fallen flat or not. We could have fallen. Yeah.

[Jamie Laing]

We stay in our lane and you. You seem to not. And I just. I think it's so important to encourage, especially the younger generation. I'm a big believer in taking risks.

[John Sopal]

Totally.

[Jamie Laing]

And I always look back at when I was 14 years old, I really fancied this girl. And we're sitting on the rocks and I didn't kiss her.

[John Sopal]

Now we're going. Now we're getting it done. The podcast is getting interesting.

[Jamie Laing]

And I remember I didn't kiss her. And then two years later, she had a boyfriend. And I said, we got drunk. I said I was gonna kiss you that time. She said, why didn't. I wanted to kiss you. And it never left my head. I realized that you gotta just. You gotta take risks, even if it makes you feel uncomfortable, even if it makes you feel nervous. And I think the younger generation needs to, you know, in. In voting or in politics or have a view, take risks. I think it's really important.

[John Sopal]

I also think that the other side of that is. I completely agree with you is resilience. That sometimes you're going to take a risk and it's. You're going to fail. And that's not the end of the world. It's not. Doesn't mean you forever got a black mark against your forehead. That failure is part of the, you know, is part of what we have to do. And we have to learn to live with the fact that at times we're going to get rejected, we are going to be rebuffed, we are going to find that we've made an idiot of ourselves. And, you know, no one likes to humiliate themselves. I still have nightmares about, you know, the moments where I felt, oh, my God, I screwed that up. How. How could I have got that so wrong? But you've got to do that because I think that otherwise, you know, you can play everything really safe. And I'm not. And this is. I'm not kind of. This is not me advocating, you know, doing stuff recklessly because I think recklessness is equally, you know, what's the point of, you know, when I hear some of the risks that people take that are just preposterous, that you haven't even thought about what the dangers are. But equally, I think the idea that you just stay under your woolly, you know, nice warm duvet and never cross the road for fear of getting run over means that you are never going to explore the world. And it's fabulous. And you've, you know, it's. Honestly, I mean, the. The. I mean, the weird bit about, you know, you talked about being in Afghanistan. Never felt more alive in a weird kind of way because of the threat of death. And, you know, just your senses of the colors, the vibrancy of everything, just feels more kind of alive and potent than just humdrum daily life. And. No, I heard you had, you know, Alan de Botton on the other week, and, you know, he was talking about a lot of life is ordinary. Yeah, it's true. And we do live with that. But you've got to challenge yourself.

[Jamie Laing]

Speaking of Alan de Botten, we always ask these questions, which I'm gonna ask you, which is, yeah, we're not quite yet. We're nearly there. I asked him what his biggest turnoff was, and he probably gave my favorite answer, which he said, when people are certain, when they don't go, or maybe how important is it for people to change their minds and not be so certain on things. Things.

[John Sopal]

The weird thing is, you you asked me. As I've got older, I've become less certain about everything. I think, you know, when I was 25, I was absolutely. I thought I had the answers to everything. We were talking about. I was talking about this podcast last night to my daughter Anna, and she was saying, you know, why the hell.

[Jamie Laing]

Are you doing that?

[John Sopal]

No, she's. No, she was. She said what? You know, kind of, you're going to get our strength and weaknesses. You're going to get asked this. You're gonna, you know, And I, I, I. And she. And I say, oh, God, what are my strengths? She said, well, I. Because, you know, I've always driven her mad because I've always challenged every argument. You know, I've kind of come at it from a contrarian point of view.

[Jamie Laing]

Which is healthy, though.

[John Sopal]

Yeah, which is healthy. Which is to debate, which is to make people think that they're not 100% right on everything.

[Jamie Laing]

And debate is really important, and people go against debate for whatever reason because they think it's arguing and it's not. It's a debate is good.

[John Sopal]

Yeah. I mean, look, you know, I kind of seen some of the stuff in universities where people have been, you know, I hate the phrase deplatformed or whatever it is, whether, you know, we don't want to hear your viewpoint on this. You think, well, you know, you don't have to be convinced. Listen to the argument and counter the argument. You know, that's how we kind of move forward in life, is we. You come up with an idea, but actually, I think your idea is wrong. This is a better idea. Well, actually, your idea is okay, but it would be improved further still if we could. You know, that's how you make progress. And I just think that the ability to listen. Listen is really, really important.

[Jamie Laing]

John. I've loved every minute of this.

[John Sopal]

No, you say. You say that to everyone.

[Jamie Laing]

Well, I. I do, but. But I really mean it on this one, John. I really listen when we're recording this Monday morning, and I don't know, it just. I'm gonna be honest, I was a bit nervous about this one because you're so highly educated in the world of politics, and perhaps sometimes there's a bit of imposter syndrome from my side because you're an amazing broadcaster, so. No, but you are. But. So I was a bit nervous coming in, and I thought it was just fantastic. We like to end with eight questions, and you have to be honest, and you can make them short or long. It's totally up to you. Are you ready?

[John Sopal]

No.

[Jamie Laing]

Good.

[John Sopal]

Can I go now?

[Jamie Laing]

No, you can't.

[John Sopal]

I think I need to go to the toilet.

[Jamie Laing]

You can't.

[John Sopal]

Please, sir.

[Jamie Laing]

Not allowed. What's a saying or phrase that always makes you smile or cheers you up?

[John Sopal]

It's the motto in life, which is, if you stand by the riverbank long enough, the body of your enemy will eventually float past. And it's a great piece of resilience advice, which is that every time you think, oh my God, it's over and my career is ended and nothing, and then you kind of see that the person who's been blocking you has been fired and suddenly the world opens up. Never think it's all over.

[Jamie Laing]

That is so. I was talking about that with my wife last night.

[John Sopal]

It's the old Chinese proverb.

[Jamie Laing]

It's fantastic. We, we, when we think we're down and out, we never are.

[John Sopal]

No, I love that. Never give up hope.

[Jamie Laing]

Never keep going. One foot in front of the other. Best compliment anyone's ever given you.

[John Sopal]

You look like Robert De Niro. And then there was once on a plane where I was flying from Washington to la and the woman mistook me for the. The cool, good looking doctor in Grey's Anatomy to me. And she, she's. And she kind of says, are you? And I said, no, sadly I'm not. I'm just a Brit who happens to be on this plane. And so that. I think that was pretty cool.

[Jamie Laing]

Who is, He's. Was he just voted sexiest man in the world? Patrick Dempsey.

[John Sopal]

Is it conceivable that I could have been mistaken? Oh, you see, I've got. I've got production help here. So anyway, so that. So, so that seemed the most bizarre thing ever to be. And you know, and I told my daughter that she just laughed. Laughed, laughed derisively.

[Jamie Laing]

Dr. McDreamy.

[John Sopal]

Dr. McDreamy. There we are.

[Jamie Laing]

What scares you most about yourself?

[John Sopal]

Bad judgment. Bad judgment. Occasionally, I suppose I kind of want to give people the benefit of the doubt. And occasionally you give people the benefit of the doubt and you think, oh, I shouldn't have done that.

[Jamie Laing]

When was the last time you cried? And why?

[John Sopal]

I mean, there's the sort of. There's the easy answer, which is watching a movie on a plate, which I don't know why. I think there is something about being at 36,000ft and you this sort of existential angst that the plane could crash at any moment, but somehow rom coms just kind of have me blubbing like a baby. Oh, I suppose. I mean, recently, you Know, kind of death and, you know, having to deal with stuff like that and the sadness and saying goodbye made me cry. I. Yeah, that was quite recently in a hospital, seeing that still body. Yeah.

[Jamie Laing]

I'm sorry, John.

[John Sopal]

I know.

[Jamie Laing]

What's something you can't let go of?

[John Sopal]

Youth. It's an interesting one because I don't think your brain ever suddenly starts thinking. I mean, yeah, physically, you know, you kind of. You can't move around a tennis court in the way that you used to. You can't run like you used to. You know, my knees are. And it's kind of crap like that. But. But mentally, I still feel excited by the world. And so, you know, I can't. I can't let go of that.

[Jamie Laing]

Great answer. What would you be embarrassed for people to know you like or want too much?

[John Sopal]

And I'm not gonna say. It's just funny, actually. Embarrassment is one of those things that does. You know, there are some people who just. I don't give a damn. I don't give a flying whatever. And I come of, you know, I cringe at certain things and that. I suppose this sort of. There must be a streak in me of wanting to be accepted. I'm eager to please. And so. Yeah, that's not. I don't think that's a great thing, to be honest. I think that. So I do get. There are things that make me feel embarrassed when I, you know, just sitting here now thinking about it.

[Jamie Laing]

I'm the same. I'm exactly the same. What turns you off?

[John Sopal]

Arrogance and certainty. I think that people who just are so confident of their own rightness and don't give room for doubt, I just find them very unreal as people. And I think it's a sort of unhealthy and unnatural to be like that.

[Jamie Laing]

What turns you on, being called Robert De Niro?

[John Sopal]

Yeah. Being with people who are doing things, who are living life, who are making their way, who are excited by the adventure that we can all have and who want to do, you know, make the world a better place. And I. I mean, that sounds a kind of. I don't know whether that sounds a really sickly answer, but, yeah, it's. People who've, you know, got that sort of positive energy about things that can be done and see the potential ahead.

[Jamie Laing]

What do you like most about yourself?

[John Sopal]

I mean, just really super smart, good looking, suave, debonair. No, not the obvious. Yeah. I mean, I mean, obviously that. That all goes without saying. This is. You see, this is. This is where if you do this in America, America, you could really screw this interview up. I once did a conference where I, I said, you know, and I was, I had to do a thing about communication skills and we played this show reel and I said at the end of it, I have no idea why you've invited me. I mean, I know nothing about this subject whatsoever. You know, did all that kind of faux self deprecating. I came off stage at the end of it and this American woman said, you never ever say that in a conference of mine. You go up there and say, I kick ass. You know, and that's why. And that's why you're there. So what do I like about myself? I suppose there's again, it's double edged, I think, generosity of spirit.

[Jamie Laing]

Last question. Who is going to win the American election?

[John Sopal]

Can I go now? It's gonna be, I mean, you know.

[Jamie Laing]

I want your honest answer.

[John Sopal]

I honestly, I, I wish I could say in my bones, I feel it with absolute certainty, you know, if I had to bet a thousand pounds on it, I'd say I'm not going anywhere near the bookmakers. If I had to bet ten pounds on it, I would say Kamala Harris, marginally, because I think that, you know, we're talking politics now. 2016, Trump won the election. Not a lot of people saw it coming because it was underestimated the support he would get from the male pale, stale brigade, the old white men who lived in trailer parks, who polished their guns, who didn't have much education, but who came back onto the grid to vote Trump. I think in 2024, the hidden superpower is young people who feel that a woman's right to choose has been taken away from them because of the overturning of the abortion laws, who want to go back on that. Taylor Swift has had an impact, you can't deny it. Billie Eilish coming out for Kamala Harris. I think maybe that young people will vote in this election. A lot have registered to vote. There's been a very high early voting. I think that probably not definitely, but probably works in Kamala Harris's favor.

[Jamie Laing]

John, thank you so much for coming on. Great company.

[John Sopal]

Thank you so much.

[Jemima]

That was great.

[Jamie Laing]

That was good, wasn't it?

[Jemima]

That was so good. Did you enjoy it?

[Jamie Laing]

I really loved it.

[Jemima]

It was fantastic. And little note to the listener and peep behind the curtain. We finished right on time because John had to zoom off to record the.

[Jamie Laing]

News agents and just what a lovely, lovely man. There's something very generous about him and he just wants the podcast to be good.

[Jemima]

Yeah, he said it himself. He's very charming.

[Jamie Laing]

I absolutely loved it and learned a huge amount. That was amazing. Hey, listen, if you enjoyed this episode, you can subscrib to our show. It helps us so much, I cannot explain.

[Jemima]

And we're on YouTube.

[Jamie Laing]

And we're on YouTube, so you can go and watch it there. And you can send us an email great company productions.co.uk or you can slide into our DMS Great Company podcast. Let us know anything or everything that you want to tell us because we'd love to hear from you.

[Jemima]

Little owls.

[Jamie Laing]

Little owls. What an amazing episode. And we can't wait to see you next week for another episode of of Great company.

[John Sopal]

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