Episode 31: Larry Wilmore on Presidential Comedians, and James O’Keefe’s Blunder

Summary

The New Yorker Radio Hour – Episode 31: Larry Wilmore on Presidential Comedians, and James O’Keefe’s Blunder

Date: May 20, 2016
Host: David Remnick
Featured Guests: Larry Wilmore, Jane Mayer, James O’Keefe, Hua Hsu, David Carroll, Jen Spira/Rachel Dratch, Brian Silverman, Elizabeth Samet

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Overview

This episode explores three major stories, blending humor, politics, investigative journalism, and thoughtful profiles:

1. Larry Wilmore on Race, Humor, and Presidential Comedy:
   David Remnick interviews comedian Larry Wilmore about his memorable appearance at President Obama's final White House Correspondents’ Dinner, presidential comedic personas, and the racial undertones of the 2016 election.

2. James O’Keefe’s Blunder:
   Jane Mayer recounts an attempted sting operation by conservative activist James O’Keefe against the Open Society Foundations—an operation that backfired due to an accidental voicemail.

3. Veterans at Vassar: David Carroll’s Story:
   Hua Hsu profiles David Carroll, an Army veteran navigating campus life at the liberal Vassar College, showing the intersections of war, identity, and the challenges of reintegrating.

The episode also touches briefly on the meaning of leadership at West Point, and features a satirical commencement speech by Jen Spira.

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1. Larry Wilmore: Presidential Comedy & Race in America (00:30 – 15:03)

Main Discussion Points

• Wilmore at the 2016 White House Correspondents’ Dinner:
  Wilmore discusses crafting his set, feeling the room's shifting energy, and the intent behind jokes—especially those about Obama and Wolf Blitzer. He reflects on the tension of balancing comedy with cultural and political commentary.

• The Infamous Closing Remark:
  Wilmore recounts the powerful, controversial closing where he addressed President Obama with, "Yo, Barry, you did it. My nigga did it." He explains that it was a deeply personal moment, meant to express pride in Obama’s presidency as a Black American.

  • Quote: “To me, that was having a private moment in public.” (Larry Wilmore, 04:49)

• Obama’s Humor and Delivery:
  The pair analyzes Obama’s comedic timing, comparing him to past presidents—Reagan, Nixon, Bush—concluding that Obama is rarely, if ever, unintentionally funny.

  • Quote: “Obama uses his smile and his charm as his cigar, if you will.” (Wilmore, 07:32)

• Presidential Comedic Styles:
  Wilmore discusses which presidents were naturally funny and how charisma often fuels the perception of humor.

  • “Ronald Reagan was very funny. Reagan was funny on purpose and by accident. Obama’s never unintentionally funny, which is interesting.” (Wilmore, 09:59)

• Trumpism as Backlash:
  Wilmore calls Trump’s campaign “the unblackening,” seeing it as a reaction to Obama’s presidency and a reassertion of white America’s anxieties.

  • Quote: “The Trump presidency is certainly a referendum. I call it the unblackening.” (Wilmore, 11:04)
  • On “Make America Great Again”: “It appeals to this narrative that Obama has ruined the country in some way… I find that part very offensive.” (Wilmore, 11:33)

• Wilmore on Hillary Clinton, Comedy, and the Future:
  He remarks that Hillary provides “comedy in spite of herself,” and looks forward to comic material regardless of the election outcome.

Notable Quotes & Timestamps

• On the emotional weight of Obama’s presidency:
  “In our lifetime, a black man couldn’t be a quarterback. …Then to see this man… a black man’s the leader of the free world... I was crying when I wrote that down, you know, because it meant so much to me.” (Wilmore, 03:29–04:49)

• Obama’s comedic mastery:
  “He learned how to pause like comedians used to have accessories onstage… Obama uses his smile and charm as his cigar, if you will. And he’s very good at it.” (Wilmore, 07:32)

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2. James O’Keefe’s Blunder (16:10 – 24:45)

Story Summary

Jane Mayer recounts the unraveling of James O’Keefe’s attempted “sting” at the Open Society Foundations (funded by George Soros). O’Keefe, under the alias "Victor Keshe," leaves a voicemail but inadvertently records a lengthy conversation plotting entrapment because he forgets to hang up.

Key Discussion Points

• The Accidental Voicemail:
  O’Keefe's failure to hang up exposes his full plan to infiltrate the foundation through low-level staff.

• Inside the Blunder:

  • They discuss setting up “compromising situations” via fake donors, referencing Soros' Hungarian heritage to build credibility.
  • O’Keefe critiques which entities "would be crass enough" to accept shady money, listing: "Hillary would. Chelsea would. Center for American Progress would." (21:25)
  • He comments that Soros’s foundation wouldn’t fall for such schemes, but others might.

• Aftermath:
  When confronted by Mayer, O’Keefe first feigns ignorance, then admits to the failed attempt and apologizes to supporters, claiming more stings are ongoing.

  • “What needs to happen is someone other than me needs to make 100 phone calls like that.” (O’Keefe on the voicemail, 24:37)

Timestamps

• Introduction and accidental recording: 16:10–18:55
• Exposed plotting and Soros targeting: 19:00–22:02
• Jane Mayer’s investigation and O’Keefe’s public reaction: 23:04–24:45

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3. The Veteran at Vassar: David Carroll’s Story (25:07 – 39:33)

Main Discussion Points

• Adjustment to Campus Life:
  David Carroll, a 35-year-old Army veteran and Republican, enrolls at Vassar College. He and professor Hua Hsu reflect on culture shock and Carroll’s process of relating to much younger, liberal students.

  • “Let’s go to a woman’s college full of Democrats. Awesome.” (Carroll on choosing Vassar, 26:38)

• Intellectual and Social Challenges:
  Carroll discusses the differences in communication styles between military and academic life, learning new ways to express opinions.

  • “In the military, the more I cuss, the faster I get promoted. So that was, you know, that’s just how you talked…” (Carroll, 28:11)

• Processing Combat Experiences:
  Carroll shares his struggles with writing about war, feelings about violence, and the burden of memory—detailed in a confidential essay for Hsu.

  • “It's hard to tell my story to civilians because the first thing most of them think is he likes killing. I wonder if he still wants to…” (Carroll, 30:40)

• Music and Memory:
  He recalls listening to heavy metal, particularly “Let the Bodies Hit the Floor,” as a war soundtrack, but can’t listen to it now.

  • “If you had to put a theme song to the war in Iraq, it would be that... Now I can’t listen to them anymore.” (Carroll, 33:27–33:59)

• Post-War Identity & Politics:
  Carroll emphasizes that real differences between right and left are overblown, finding commonalities among students:

  • “The left and right aren't that far off... almost every single person here could be just categorized in the middle.” (Carroll, 37:55)

• Looking Forward:
  Upon graduating, Carroll is unsure of his next steps but intends to enjoy some peace before considering law school or other paths.

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4. Satire: Commencement Speech to the Class of 2050 (39:57 – 42:57)

Highlights

• Satirical Tone:
  Jen Spira (performed by Rachel Dratch) delivers a mock-apocalyptic commencement speech, lampooning both modern career advice and the absurdity of survival in a dystopian future.

• Memorable Lines:

  • “Success doesn’t mean having a big house or a fancy corner office. There’s only one true measure of success, and that’s how close you can get to deciphering the Mayan hieroglyph that will show humanity how to defeat the tall ones.” (Spira, 41:20)

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5. Leadership at West Point: Reflection & Responsibility (44:36 – 54:14)

Main Discussion Points

• Exploring Leadership:
  Josh Rothman visits West Point, speaking with English professor Elizabeth Samet and senior cadet Brian Silverman about the meaning and practice of leadership—not just crisis heroics, but daily responsibility, reflection, and character.

• Cadet Anecdote:
  Silverman shares a story of making a dangerous mistake during training (a negligent weapons discharge), and how leadership meant owning up, learning, and facing consequences.

• Key Insights:

  • “A lot of good leadership happens silently. It happens not in moments of crisis.” (Samet, 53:05)
  • “Leaders are responsible, restrained, attentive, focused, concerned, even a little frightened of the consequences of their actions…” (Rothman, 54:07)

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Conclusion & Episode Takeaway

The episode weaves together comedy, political critique, investigative journalism, and personal storytelling to examine American leadership and identity—from the nation’s highest office to a liberal arts campus and the training grounds of future military leaders. In each story, authenticity, vulnerability, and the ability to critically reflect—whether as a comedian, whistle-blower, veteran, or aspiring leader—emerge as core virtues.

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Visit newyorkerradio.org for extras and future episodes.

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Transcript

[Larry Wilmore]

Floor 38.

[David Remnick]

I'm so excited to be having a.

[David Carroll]

Conversation with someone when they have that revelation.

[David Remnick]

How does this work as a national story?

[Larry Wilmore]

Well, it's a whole lens.

[David Remnick]

San Francisco from one World Trade center in Manhattan, this is the New Yorker Radio Hour, a co production of WNYC studios and the New Yorker.

Welcome to the New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm David Remini. And recently the topic of race has entered into campaign news. For a closer look, please welcome our black correspondent, Larry Wilmore. Larry, thank you so much for joining us. Larry.

[Larry Wilmore]

Okay.

[David Remnick]

Please welcome our senior black correspondent, Larry Warmore.

[Larry Wilmore]

Hey, John. Glad to be here. Thank you, Larry.

[David Remnick]

The senior black correspondent on the Daily show was a role Larry Wilmore was almost born to play. He's got a keen eye finding comedy and white America's difficulty when it talks about race and somehow always seems to make an ass of itself. Last year, he became host of his own show, the Nightly show with Larry Wilmore. So he was a natural choice this year to appear at the White House Correspondents Dinner, the very last of Obama's presidency. But his remarks there somehow caused a lot of concern among people who thought that in speaking too familiarly to the president, Wilmore had crossed the line. You were the speaker, the comedian at the last White House correspondent center for President Obama.

[Larry Wilmore]

Speaker slash comedian. Yes.

[David Remnick]

Tough gig. Tough gig. I think you told me before that you had had 80 jokes all set to go.

[David Carroll]

Yeah.

[David Remnick]

And you had thrown out God knows how many.

[Larry Wilmore]

Yeah, we started with a lot more. And you know, you cut down. You cut down, cut down, cut down. We ended up with about that much. And then I was editing as it was going along too.

[David Remnick]

That's gotta be nerve wracking. And why are you editing what's happening?

[Larry Wilmore]

Well, once you realize temperature of the.

[David Remnick]

Room, what was the moment that you did?

[Larry Wilmore]

And what I did was the Wolf Blitcher joke. I think it was the Wolf Blitzer joke where I said, okay, I don't know if these people are on my train right now.

[David Remnick]

So what was the Wolf Blitzer joke?

[Larry Wilmore]

It was connected to the joke before. So I did a joke about Obama enjoying his last year in office. Saw you hanging out with NBA players like Steph Curry, Golden State Warriors. That was cool. That was cool. Yeah. You know, it kind of makes sense too, because both of you like raining down bombs on people from long distances.

[David Carroll]

Right.

[David Remnick]

And Obama gave it at least a fake laugh, that one, you know, one.

[Larry Wilmore]

Of those things which I didn't see at the time, I saw later, you know, which is fine. You know, I mean, that's. He's supposed to do that. He's such a good sport. Right. So the follow up is. And speaking of drones, how's Wolf Blitzer still on television? You know, it's, you know, he looked mortified. Yes.

[David Remnick]

And pissed.

[Larry Wilmore]

Yes. It came across as a statement of fact that I was taking a pause from the comedy routine and just stating this, like this hard, cold opinion, which it wasn't at all.

[David Remnick]

The most controversial and electrifying moment, without a doubt was at the end. So walk us through what you did at the end of the speech and the thought process that went into it. And then also Obama's reaction.

[Larry Wilmore]

Okay, so that was something that I thought of maybe a month earlier. I just kind of wanted to have a moment where I kind of summed up what his presidency really meant to me. And I, I've made jokes saying I vote for him because he's black and all that stuff. But there is meaning behind that joke. It's a proud moment that can't fully be expressed in words. And one of the manifestations of that feeling is pointing out to people, and it's ironic because I'm the same age as the president, is that in our lifetime, a black man couldn't be a quarterback. People thought, why did a black man lead white people? That's impossible for a whole host of reasons that everyone agreed on not so long ago. Yes, that's my point. It happened in my lifetime. This is not something my parents told me. And then to see this man, you know, as I said, to live in your time, Mr. President, where, you know, black man's the leader of the free world. And actually when I wrote that part down, you know, it was so emotional. I was crying when I wrote it down, you know, because it meant so much to me. And you know, the last part was just something that came out of a burst of inspiration. I just thought it was something that I just had to express. That way, words alone do me no justice. So, Mr. President, if I'm going to keep it 100. Yo, Barry, you did it. My nigga did it. To me, that was having a private moment in public.

[David Remnick]

And how did the room, how did you feel the room reacting?

[Larry Wilmore]

I had no idea. I had like an out of body experience at that point, you know.

[David Remnick]

And then you walked over to your right.

[David Carroll]

Yes.

[David Remnick]

And you get a hug from the President of the United States. And he said.

[Larry Wilmore]

And he kind of beat his chest too. That's right, that I did. Which was an amazing non verbal response because the Non verbal response could have been. Okay, what did you just say?

[David Remnick]

When you look back on this presidency, forget policy for a moment. Sure. Foreign policy, domestic policy, the way he has talked about and marshaled his own blackness and race has been an adventure, a very complicated performance in many ways. How do you. Now that it's coming to an end? How do you look back on it?

[Larry Wilmore]

How do you think about it? Yeah, it's an interesting way to put it because the first incident was before he was elected when he had to answer charges about the Reverend Wright and those sort of things. And he gave that, I thought, a very great speech on race and spoke directly about it. And in his first year, the Skip Gates thing was the first time he kind of addressed something and he had the beer summit.

[David Remnick]

That's when Henry Louis Gates, the Harvard professor, was. And I remember breaking into his own house.

[Larry Wilmore]

Exactly, exactly. But that was kind of an awkward moment. It didn't seem like that was a moment that was truly owned or truly choreographed. Well, it was just weird. Why are we having a beer summit over this? You know, it just seemed odd.

[David Remnick]

You know, it did seem unplanned and unscripted. And there's actually a moment in the press conference where Obama's first asked about Gates arrest. And I wanted to listen to that with you. I think it's a pretty good example of Obama's off the cuff sense of humor. The guy forgot his keys.

[Larry Wilmore]

Jimmied his.

[David Remnick]

Way to get into the house. There was a report called in to the police station that there might be a burglary taking place. So far, so good, right? I mean, if I was trying to jigger into. Well, I guess this is my house now, so it probably wouldn't happen.

[Jane Mayer]

But let's say my old house in Chicago.

[David Remnick]

Here, I'd get shot.

[Larry Wilmore]

That's an amazing hard joke there at a press conference. Yes. And first of all, and the president should know, brothers should never be trying to jimmy or jigger their ways into homes. That right there is a mistake. But what that was an show the key. Show the key. I'm jiggering right now. Sorry, brother. You should not be jiggering your way into a house. But what an amazing joke about him trying to break into the White House. That's a pretty good joke, actually.

[David Remnick]

But you've talked about him as a comedian and you pretty admiringly. What skills does he have and how much of it derives just from the chair he sits in?

[Larry Wilmore]

He has an incredible sense of timing. He's very likable. He learned how to pause like comedians used to have accessories on stage, like a drink or a cigar and that type of thing. And that was to allow the audience to laugh, you know, like you. George Burns would take his puff of cigar so he would laugh, not because he wanted to smoke a cigar on stage. That's why Groucho had the cigar. Right. So Obama uses his smile and his charm as his cigar, if you will. And he's very good at it. He knows how to pause and wait and the audience gets to think along with him and gets to enjoy kind of sharing a moment with him. What's interesting though is that when he's talking about policy, I don't think it works as well. How so? Well, he has a very deliberate approach, especially when he's speaking. Hyper deliberate. Yes. When he's speaking extemporaneously. And I think that works against him. I think he would be better served if he was more succinct and more direct. In some ways it's almost like when.

[David Remnick]

He'S talking, it's like he's talking to be quoted when I've had the opportunity.

[Larry Wilmore]

Very lawyerly language.

[David Remnick]

Well, yeah, when you interview him, when you transcribe an Obama interview, they're full written paragraphs. And it's not just because he's prepped, it's. That's the way he is.

[Larry Wilmore]

Yeah. He's writing his essay as he's talking to you.

[David Remnick]

Yeah. And he's self revising in his head. Nothing undeliberate pops out.

[Larry Wilmore]

Yeah. I remember I did a joke a couple years ago. I was like, Obama just takes too long to talk. I mean if you just asked him what he had for breakfast, he'd be like, well, for breakfast there was some sort of decorative plate and say I'm hungry, come on, let's go. Give me an egg. Yes. If you ask Bush, it's like eggs, you know, it's just that. Some kind of sausage. Great. That's all we wanted to know. Thank you.

[David Remnick]

Mr. Who's the least funny president you can remember?

[Larry Wilmore]

Well, in my time it had to have been Nixon. I mean, arguably the funniest thing he ever did was he was on Laugh and said soccer to me. But he was like, it was unintentionally funny. Gerald Ford. I know I'm going back so far. Gerald Ford was funny, but he didn't know why he was funny. Jimmy Carter wasn't very funny. Ronald Reagan was very funny.

[David Remnick]

Why?

[Larry Wilmore]

He was a performer, he was an actor. He knew how to deliver a joke and he was charming. Reagan had charm and charm goes a long way to. Reagan was funny on purpose and by accident. He was both. Obama's never unintentionally funny, which is interesting because many presidents are usually unintentionally funny. I can't remember him being unintentionally funny. I think the only possible thing I can think of is when he tried to bowl that time when he was running for office.

[David Remnick]

That wasn't good.

[Larry Wilmore]

Yeah, that's the only unintentional funny thing I can think about, Obama. But there's not a lot of that, which is kind of weird. You know, you would think there'd be more.

[David Remnick]

So now you've got a presidential race where you've got Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican, and you've got Hillary Clinton, who's close to that, and Bernie Sanders still hanging in there.

[Larry Wilmore]

Right.

[David Remnick]

And you've got a show to do every night.

[Larry Wilmore]

Yes.

[David Remnick]

And what does that present for you?

[Larry Wilmore]

Gold. In Trump's case, maybe. Fool's gold, I don't know.

[David Remnick]

But in all seriousness, do you think that Trump and Trumpism is the outcome of eight years of Obama? How do you link them together?

[Larry Wilmore]

Yeah, some of that is that. I mean, presidencies are either a continuation of the previous one or a referendum of the previous one. You know, the Trump presidency is certainly a referendum. I call it the unblackening, you know, Obama leaving the White House. I mean, because here's a man who spent a lot of his time and resources and capital trying to question the legitimacy of this black man who is the President of the United States, you know, which I found very insulting. And now he says, make America great again. And a lot of people are following that.

[David Remnick]

And that phrase means what to you?

[Larry Wilmore]

It's just very problematic. First of all, it assumes that America is not great, which I don't agree with. But it appeals to this narrative that Obama has ruined the country in some way, that he's taken away the thing that made America special, his time in office. I find that part very offensive.

[David Remnick]

But you've been around New York long enough. You kind of go back and forth between LA and New York, and you know that Trump in the 80s and 90s was kind of a figure in our ego sphere. He was a kind of comic, business figure. And he was complicit in the comedy almost completely. There was a sense that he knew just how ridiculous he was in order to keep his head above water and his name on buildings. This is the role he played. How did that get from that point to this point?

[Larry Wilmore]

God, it's a great question. Who knows? I mean, I call him the leader of the upper class is what I say. You know, it's this movement that only wishes to speak directly from the ID and handle issues as shallowly as possible.

[David Remnick]

And he uses political correctness as the way in that I'm not going to be politically correct. And then he says something, he uses.

[Larry Wilmore]

It as an excuse to insult people, which is not. That's not how you talk about political correctness. I mean, I would agree that sometimes our language can be too careful, but you don't break that down as an excuse to, to call John McCain a war hero, a loser. Cuz I don't like people that get captured. That's your reason to break down political correctness. It doesn't make sense.

[David Remnick]

But I gotta tell you, when that happened, when the John McCain moment happened, this is now months and months ago, I thought to myself, well, he can't. Yeah, he's cooked. And then there would be another one two weeks later and another one two weeks later, and his percentages only grew and grew and grew.

[Larry Wilmore]

And now he's the number one. Amazing.

[David Remnick]

Which tells you what? It tells you that the country is, you know, the quick answer to this for a lot of people. I was watching Rob Reiner.

[Larry Wilmore]

I think you understand how fungus works. Do you? Yes. I don't. I don't get it. It just keeps growing. I mean, you try to attack it any way you want and that fungus just keeps going. Right. I don't understand why that happens, you.

[David Remnick]

Know, now how do you face the prospect of a Hillary Clinton presidency?

[Larry Wilmore]

Comedically speaking, Hillary is another person who's funny in spite of herself. You know, I've never seen Hillary funny on purpose, but she's very funny. Not on purpose. So she offers a lot of comedic material. Of course, she had the first husband possibility too. I mean, there's so much comedic material on that side. So on both sides, there's. Look, I have a lot to look forward to, no matter what happens as a comedian, but in completely different ways.

[David Remnick]

You talked about how you felt in January 20, 2009, which is the first inauguration of Barack Obama.

[Larry Wilmore]

Right.

[David Remnick]

And for all I know, you were there.

[Larry Wilmore]

I don't know, maybe I was. Yeah, me too. I was there with my family, out.

[David Remnick]

With a lot of coats.

[Larry Wilmore]

A lot of coats.

[David Remnick]

How are you gonna feel January 20th coming up, man, That's a good question, I think.

[Larry Wilmore]

Yeah. Wow. I think I'll probably be a little misty. You know, definitely the end of an era to see the last black president you know, go, well, this is it.

[David Remnick]

Keep it 100. Are you gonna see another black president in your lifetime or mine?

[Larry Wilmore]

I always thought it'd be more like Haley's comment or Alex Haley's comment, if you will. I don't know. You know, I'll be lucky if I see it streaking across the sky again. Who knows? It would be nice. But, you know, we'll see. We'll see.

[David Carroll]

Larry, thank you.

[Larry Wilmore]

Thank you.

[David Remnick]

Larry Wilmore, host of the Nightly Show. This is the New Yorker Radio Hour. Coming up in a minute, a kind of fish out of water story. A veteran from Texas, hardened by years of combat in Iraq, who found himself among kids half his age at a Nazi liberal arts college.

[David Carroll]

I said, is it a good school? He said, yeah. I said, done. Let's apply. And then I said, well, where the hell is Basser at? I was like, I've never heard of that.

[David Remnick]

This is the New Yorker Radio Hour. Stick around. James o' Keefe is a conservative activist known for his undercover videos that have embarrassed npr, acorn, Planned Parenthood. He recently had an operation go awry, and it exposed some of his working methods. It all started with a phone call. New Yorker staff writer Jane Mayer takes it from there.

[Jane Mayer]

The phone call came into the Open Society Foundation. Now that's George Soros Group, which funds a lot of progressive causes. And it came to an employee named Dana Garrity.

[David Remnick]

It was, I believe, March 16th. It was pretty quiet, and I was just kind of hunkering down and getting through my work when I noticed that my phone was ringing and a number I wasn't familiar with popped up. And so I let it go to voicemail.

Hi, you have reached Dana Garrity with.

The Eurasia Program at the Open Society Foundations. I'm not available right now, so please.

[James O'Keefe]

Leave a message and I'll get back to you shortly. Hey, Dana, My name is Victor Kashumah.

[David Remnick]

It was a call from a Victor Keshe, who apparently was a Hungarian American citizen who worked for a foundation.

[James O'Keefe]

I'm representing a foundation that would like to get involved with you guys.

[David Remnick]

So I was a bit kind of suspicious about that because when you call, you identify the actual foundation you work.

[James O'Keefe]

For, fighting for European values and some other issues. I'm an American citizen, but dual citizenship, Hungarian American who wants to aid. And give me a call back when you can. Thank you.

[David Remnick]

And then there was a pause and he kind of stated under his breath to not talk until he hung up the phone.

[James O'Keefe]

Don't say anything right at the phone.

[David Remnick]

And I heard him begin to discuss in a very different tone, actually, with his colleagues about what had just happened, what he wanted them to do, what their plan was going forward.

[James O'Keefe]

What needs to happen is someone other than me needs to make 100 phone calls like that.

[Jane Mayer]

Evidently, Victor Keshe thought that he'd already hung up the phone. And what Dana Garrity could hear was a group of men talking with him as they began to plot something for nearly 10 minutes.

[James O'Keefe]

So this situation, I just got a name.

[Jane Mayer]

Keep in mind the quality is not that good because they're not actually talking into the phone. They don't realize they're being recorded.

[James O'Keefe]

Dana Lee Gehry, Open Society Foundation. There she is. Eurasia Program.

[Jane Mayer]

So Dana Garrity is a 28 year old operations specialist who's overseeing pro democracy programs in Eurasia for the Open Society Foundations. And evidently the man who identified himself as Victor Keshe is trying to explain who she is to the rest of the group.

[James O'Keefe]

Just by making a phone call, I was able to understand who she is, I was able to understand her title, and I know that she deals with pod great polling issues.

[Jane Mayer]

Victor Keshe wants Dana to call him back.

[James O'Keefe]

Probably going to call me back now.

[Jane Mayer]

If she doesn't call back, Keshe says he can create other points of entry to get people in positions like Dana.

[James O'Keefe]

Even if she doesn't, I can create other points of entry to get people like that.

[Jane Mayer]

It's important to note that he's not targeting the president of the foundation. He's looking for points of entry with relatively low level employees from whom he can work his way in and work his way up. So what is going on here and who is Victor Keshe? The voicemail actually contains a number of clues and if you follow them, the person you get to is James o', Keefe, a conservative activist who is infamous for doing secret videos that seek to embarrass liberal groups like npr, Planned Parenthood. And his most successful operation so far was his takedown of acorn, a liberal political organizing group.

[David Remnick]

A young woman pretending to be a prostitute and a man pretending to run for Congress one day walk into acorn's Baltimore headquarters and speak with two of the employees who run the facility.

[Jane Mayer]

As soon as the tape came out, it created a sensation in the media, particularly in the right wing media. And not long after, Congress voted to cut off all federal funding to acorn, and the group soon after collapsed.

[David Remnick]

Four ACORN employees have been fired.

[David Carroll]

There are new calls on Capitol Hill for hearings into acorn, and ACORN has been dropped from participating in the census next year.

[Jane Mayer]

It now appears that James Okeefes latest target is the Open Society Foundations and their creator, George Soros. As the voicemail continues, we hear James o' Keefe speaking with the other people in the room about some kind of questionable money operation.

[James O'Keefe]

Getting a meeting, you know, through a foundation that exists would be a good one. We're not going to do it. An officer, you know, British Virgin island companies in this case, because Soros people don't want how to take money from a group like that.

[Jane Mayer]

He seems to be saying that they want to set up a compromising situation in which they entrap someone at the Soros foundation into taking some money under dubious kinds of circumstances. But he's saying that probably the Soros foundation won't take money from something obvious like a corporation that's registered in the British Virgin Islands. Instead, what he's looking for is something that seems like a plausible way to sort of set the Soros people up. He suggested that other liberal targets that they might go after would be crass enough to take that kind of money.

[James O'Keefe]

Hillary would.

[Jane Mayer]

Hillary would.

[James O'Keefe]

Chelsea would.

[Jane Mayer]

Chelsea would.

[James O'Keefe]

Center for American Progress would.

[Jane Mayer]

I don't think the Open Society would. He says the Open Society Foundations were founded by George Soros. He is a liberal hedge fund billionaire who is one of the largest funders of Democratic and liberal politics in America. And he has become almost a boogeyman to some people on the right. So why did Victor Keshe state twice that he's a Hungarian American? And this kind of small detail seems key too.

[David Remnick]

I think maybe the reason. I mean, this is just pure speculation, but perhaps the reason he chose a Hungarian identity is because George Soros is also of Hungarian descent and is a Hungarian American.

[Jane Mayer]

So it seems almost designed to hook him in at this point. The voicemail continues and it gets a little weirder.

[James O'Keefe]

We spoke with my friend in Atlanta who's the orthopedic surgeon.

[Jane Mayer]

What they're talking about, it seems, is importing an orthopedic surgeon from England who's visiting the country and is going to come up to where this sting is supposed to take place, evidently in New York and, and help them out on it.

[James O'Keefe]

We'll train him and he's more than happy to do anything he can do for us. He's got a real heavy British accent.

[Jane Mayer]

So this fellow from England is very technical and he's not going to have any problem with the cameras.

[James O'Keefe]

He's very technical. I'm sure he's not going to have Any problem with the cameras?

[Jane Mayer]

He's a very talented guy, they say, and so he'll be able to pull it off.

[James O'Keefe]

And he's a very talented guy. So, I mean, he'll be able to pull it off.

[Jane Mayer]

When I first called James o' Keefe asking if he had any idea who Victor Keshe was, he acted like he was mystified. He said, victor Keshe. Victor Keshe. And then he said he had no interest in discussing this or talking about any investigations or operations that were, as he put it, real or imagined. But when I kept reporting and made clear to him that, that I actually had a copy of the tape of his phone call, he then decided to put the best face on it and publicly confess.

[David Remnick]

We had a plan to go undercover into the Soros foundation to expose their questionable activities. We posed as a Hungarian investor named Victor and eventually connected with Dana Garrity, a program specialist at the foundation. We were hoping for a meeting. She called us back and left a message.

Hi, Victor, this is Dana Garrity giving you a call back.

I got your voicemail. But the Soros people were able to thwart our plan.

[Jane Mayer]

So this time, o' Keefe got caught trying to sting George Soros, one of the most important funders and players on the liberal side of American politics. He said he had to fold the operation and he apologized to his supporters for the embarrassment. But in the end, he also noted that that he's got many more operations that are still ongoing. And he's also got, he says, dozens and dozens of other operatives out there in the field looking for the next get.

[James O'Keefe]

What needs to happen is someone other than me needs to make 100 phone calls like that.

[Jane Mayer]

For the New Yorker Radio Hour, I'm Jane Mayer.

[David Remnick]

This weekend, young people all across the country are going to graduate with as much pomp and circumstance as they can muster. One of those graduates is a guy named David Carroll. Carroll is a long serving veteran of the Army, a former tank commander who retired and then applied to Vassar College. Now, Vassar is like the quintessential small, artsy, liberal Northeastern school. And going there was almost a lark. The way David Carroll tells it. When he got there, he befriended one of his professors, Hua Hsu, who's also a contributor to the New Yorker.

[Hua Hsu]

Typical Vassar, that's almost an oxymoron because the campus prides itself in being really diverse, really welcoming, really open minded, pretty liberal, progressive campus vibe. A lot of interest in social justice. It's very, very gay friendly.

[David Carroll]

My name is David Carroll. I'm 35 years old and I'm a senior at Vassar College. Now, before that, before coming to Vassar College, I was in the army for 11 and a half years and spent four years deployed to Iraq as a 19 kilo tank commander.

[Hua Hsu]

Have a great weekend. And we have six more presentations on Tuesday.

[David Carroll]

You know, I am a Republican and I'm a Texas Republican.

[Hua Hsu]

In fall of 2013, Dave Carroll was one of three veterans who enrolled in my freshman riding class as part of the Posse Veterans program at Vassar College. But what did you know about Vassar?

[David Carroll]

I knew nothing about Vassar. Nothing. A buddy of mine said, hey, man. He called me one day. He's like, hey, you know, Vassar College is looking for veterans. You should apply. I said, is it a good school? He said, yeah. I said, done, let's apply. And then I said, well, where the hell is Vassar at? And I was like, I've never heard of that. So I googled it and looked at the library and I was like, looks good. Let's try that. Let's go to a woman's college full of Democrats. Awesome.

[Hua Hsu]

Actually, Vassar went co ed in 1969, but the reputation lingers on. I've always wondered this. So, like I've told you in the past, I didn't really know that we had this program before showing up that first day and, you know, like, you get pictures of all your students, and I remember printing out the pictures for your class, and I'm walking to school and I look down and I see a guy who's like my age, his head shaved. But I remember you were also wearing a T shirt with like, the GOP elephant on it.

[David Carroll]

Yeah.

[Hua Hsu]

Did you do that on purpose?

[David Carroll]

Oh, yeah. You gotta represent, you know, can't just let all the liberals think they're getting over on everybody. You know, if I'm the guy with the Republican shirt on, whenever the teachers print out their little things, you know, at least then they know that they're gonna have to address that issue at some point, you know, and it forces them to be honest a little bit more.

[Hua Hsu]

So it totally worked for me.

[Larry Wilmore]

I mean.

[Hua Hsu]

What was your impression of Vassar kids when you started?

[David Carroll]

I was impressed. I was impressed. It took a good almost a whole first year just to be able to articulate my thoughts the way that they did, you know, so in the military, the more I cuss, the faster I get promoted. So that was, you know, that's just how you talked, you know, so it was just a different language. So you had to, you know, you had to learn a different language when you came here just so that you could be able to get your point across. So my first impression of these students were holy, these kids are smart.

[Hua Hsu]

I remember having to remind Dave and the other veterans that they were smart too, just in a different way. Maybe a little rough around the edges, but I wondered if he was ever bothered with being around so many young.

[David Carroll]

College students, you know, so it wasn't so much dealing with 18 and 19 year olds at college here because I dealt with 18 and 19 year olds all the time. There was a little bit difference where I couldn't just scream at them and make them do push ups, you know, wish I could have done that a few times but there's times where I walk there and I just hear a really ignorant conversation of, you know, just not ignorant, just you know, no experience, no life experience conversation going on somewhere. And you know, and I just think, you know, what it, what it's like to be 19 again and try to figure it out.

[Hua Hsu]

I was doing an independent study with Dave and you know, we, we just sort of. There was no actual final assignment. So I just said, look, you've mentioned in the past wanting to write about your experiences. Just write me, you know, five or six pages and, and, and that'll be it.

[David Carroll]

I mean I have files and files of just stuff that, you know, just because I don't sleep well some nights, you know. So whenever I'm thinking about it I just go try to ride it just to get it down and out.

[Hua Hsu]

He sent me a document. It was one of the most disturbing things I've ever read.

[David Carroll]

You know, I mean I revisit it a lot just in my own mind. You know, it plays all the time in my own mind.

[Hua Hsu]

And part of it was because I think he was aware of how disturbing it was.

[David Carroll]

You know, I have tons and tons of just gibberish written but so far they've just been going into a file on my computer that says veteran.

[Hua Hsu]

This was just an account of combat, of life as a soldier of destruction that was unlike anything I'd ever read or seen.

[David Carroll]

You know, you have highlights that you look back on your life. Some of my highlights are just happen to be really horrible things happening.

[Hua Hsu]

And when he turned the paper in, he included this note. Don't worry man, I'm not a monster anymore.

[Larry Wilmore]

Haha.

[Hua Hsu]

I've come to grips with my past. It's hard to tell my story of.

[David Carroll]

Civilians because the first thing most of them think is he likes killing. I wonder if he still wants to. War is a different place. Those actions are acceptable there. I have boxes full of medals from acting like that. They are all in my attic to be seen again whenever I move. I am not proud of a lot of things I did while I was deployed, but I am damn sure not ashamed of any of them. Most of the people I know now in my life know I was in the army, but few of them know what you know. Now. If this paper has to be seen by anyone other than you, let me know so I can write you something else. This is for your eyes only. See you next semester.

[Hua Hsu]

Typically when I meet with students, I can kind of rely on being older than them to have a tiny bit more wisdom than them. With these guys, there was no age difference and their life experiences were really different from mine. I didn't feel like I had that much to offer other than just as someone who's willing to listen to them and take them seriously. What was the experience actually like of.

[David Carroll]

Being in a tank? Yeah, so it's. I wouldn't say it's miserable, but it's pretty miserable. And it's incredibly hot. So whenever you're in August In Iraq, it's 110 outside, it's 125 in the tank, you know, so it gets to be miserable. And it. After times, there's a lot of times where you did 24 hour ops. So you went out there and set for 24 hours in one spot and just kind of scanned. And after a while it feel like your brain is literally melting because it was just so unbearable.

[Hua Hsu]

So over. Over 11 years you were in Iraq for like four and a half years?

[David Carroll]

Four.

[Hua Hsu]

Four years. How many, how many firefights were you involved in?

[David Carroll]

A lot. A lot. I would say that I pull the triggers around about 300 times. I think the best I can gauge IEDs that went off on my vehicle or near my vehicle is 32.

[Hua Hsu]

Like, what do you do to kind of keep it together? Are you just sort of anticipating the next rush?

[David Carroll]

Yeah, you're just anticipating the next rush because it can happen at any second. Kind of just sit in there and just talk and listen to the radio.

[Hua Hsu]

What were you listening to?

[David Carroll]

Like, puddle of mud. Let the bodies hit the floor. Let the bodies hit the floor. Let the bodies hit the floor. It was on somebody's ipod, but Let the bodies hit the floor. Man, you listen to that and just wait for the kickoff and just be in the tunnel waiting for him to call your name.

[Hua Hsu]

Like you would just listen to that one Song over.

[David Carroll]

That was the theme of it, you know, so if you had to put a theme song to the war in Iraq, it would be that everybody had their own taste, but in my tank, it was nasty heavy metal.

[Larry Wilmore]

Do you still listen to those songs now?

[David Carroll]

No. No, I can't listen to them anymore.

[Hua Hsu]

You know, up until this point, I felt like I had a pretty good understanding of him. And what really shocked me about what he sent me was just how it seemed as though he actually would have wanted to go back.

[David Carroll]

So I missed the adrenaline of it. You know, it's the fear, the excitement, the pain. If you get to engage with the enemy at close range, it's like the. The best challenge that you can have in your life. And then on the other side of that is when it doesn't go right and it's really bad. So then you can go into the rest of your life knowing that it'll never, ever be as worse as war. But there's also a little bit of it that you're never gonna feel again that you're gonna miss.

[Hua Hsu]

I think what troubled me was the honesty was his recognition that this was a part of who he was. I just felt really humbled, and I also just felt in awe that this guy had done all of these things, and now he was. Now I was somehow responsible for him even.

[David Carroll]

I remember going to your office the first semester and just looking around in your office and be like, oh, yeah, this is the exact same. You know, you got the west coast vibe on it, but, you know, this is the exact same stuff that I have. You know, I was like, this is awesome, because it's just random 90s things thrown in there, you know, just like you had a masterpiece doll.

[Hua Hsu]

One thing that I think is really important to note is that these guys weren't the type to sit around and swap war stories. In fact, Dave told us that before coming to Vassar, he'd been part of a veterans group at his previous school, and he had put up a sign on the first day that said, only one war story per day. He just wasn't really the type who wanted to live in the past. When I interviewed Dave, one of the producers I worked with asked if he could read a copy of Dave's essay, if he'd be willing to share it. Dave basically said, no, you haven't earned the right yet. And that got me thinking. You just said that, like, someone you don't know needs to, like, earn the right to access your stories. Why did you think I deserve to read? I mean, I know I assigned you.

[David Carroll]

Something, but like Master P doll in.

[Hua Hsu]

Your room, dude, you know, I mean.

[David Carroll]

It doesn't take a whole lot. You know, it just has to be somebody that you can connect with that, you know, it's not just gonna be. That's. That's open minded enough to see those things and say, well, that's really not who he is. That's just some of the things that has, you know, he's been involved in.

[Hua Hsu]

I think that's all because of the Master P doll.

[David Carroll]

It all rolls around the Master P doll.

[Hua Hsu]

It's crazy that you. I barely remember that I have that doll. I mean, it's because I have so much in my office, but I mean, did you think though, when we started like our class that I would end up earning that right?

[David Carroll]

No, because you were, I think you were the first professor that I had. I think you were the very, very first class that I taken at Vassar, you know, so. And then here comes, you know, the stereotypical northeast professor, you know, and I was like, oh, look at this guy. Then after, you know, the third or fourth class, I think that's when I was like, hey, man, this guy gets it. You know, he understands what, you know, all of this kind of looks like a little bit.

[Hua Hsu]

That first month, all three of you guys had a lot of challenges and you would come talk to me and I would feel really bad. But then after a while I was like, I can't. Just feeling bad doesn't really do anything. I just can't. I can't just like have pity for these guys.

[David Carroll]

And none of us want that. We just don't know what we're doing.

[Hua Hsu]

Like, how do you think being here has changed your sense of, like, politics or just sort of how you see the world or so?

[David Carroll]

I've always had a moderate conservative viewpoint.

[David Remnick]

Always.

[David Carroll]

And you know, I just think that as far as what's really changed me from being here is knowing that the left and the right aren't that far off. But almost every single person that's here could be just categorized in the middle. You know, I don't think it matters if you got an elephant or the donkey on your shirt. I don't think it really matters.

[Hua Hsu]

So at the end of this month, Dave and his Fellow Liberal Northeastern 20 somethings will be walking as part of Vassar's 2016 graduating class. He himself doesn't seem particularly interested in this ritual, but his mom and grandma are coming all the way to Poughkeepsie and they are so proud. They really want to see him cross that stage. We've talked about what he might do in the future. He's mentioned the possibility of getting an mba, maybe law school. You know, I've thought maybe he should write a book.

[David Carroll]

As far as I've gotten now I bought a house near Fort Worth so that I have the possibility to go to A and M Law. So I thought try to go to law school and see where that leads me. So.

[Hua Hsu]

So Dave's got a lot of options, but in a way, I don't think he's that different from a lot of the twenty somethings he'll be walking with. They've acquired a lot of knowledge, they've learned a lot about themselves, but at this point, they don't really know what they want to do next.

[David Carroll]

It's just that I want to go spend some time in my pool and float underneath the shade for a few years and figure out what I want to do with life. So I really don't know yet.

[David Remnick]

David Carroll, a US army veteran and a newly minted graduate of Vassar College, talking with the New Yorker's Hua Hsu. Speaking of graduation, we're going to hear now a commencement speech for the graduates of the future. This is to the Class of 2050 by Jen Spira.

[Jen Spira]

Class of 2050 faculty, alumni, family and friends. I remember when I sat where you sit today. The year was 2020. The fires from the impact still smoldered in their craters. Madonna's dance dance boom boom had just hit the airwaves. Athleisure was bigger than ever, and it seemed like everyone I knew was either dead or enslaved by the tall ones. I had no idea what I wanted to do do with my life. A couple of friends were talking about combing the wreckage for survivors, and a couple of other friends were talking about combing the wreckage for food. Meanwhile, my boyfriend was begging me to come with him to Chicago to do improv. I didn't know where to start. I had no money, no flint, and no plan. Sure, I had a bachelor's degree in English, but what was I going to do with that.

[Jane Mayer]

Plan?

[Jen Spira]

Plus, like many survivors, I no longer had skin on my face or my hands. Luckily, it didn't take me long to learn that there's only one thing you have to worry about, and that's following your passion. If you do what you love, you'll never work a day in your life. Maybe you're passionate about making spears or cudgels or daggers to fend off our oversized invaders. Perhaps you're more Interested in? In nunchucks or spikes or clamps, Whatever it is, simply follow your interest and have at it. If you take away anything from this speech, let it be this. Success doesn't mean having a big house or a fancy corner office. There's only one true measure of success, and that's how close you can get to deciphering the Mayan hieroglyph that will show humanity how to defeat the tall ones. When I was your age, I had big plans. I was going to find the glyph. I was going to decode it and free my fellow humans from our tragic captivity. But then you know what happened? I fell in love with long form journalism. I met the love of my life at usc. We had two beautiful children and eventually being humanity's savior, fell by the wayside. Do I have regrets sometimes. The tall ones tore my husband and my children apart in front of my eyes as I listened to their screams. Did I wish that I put in a little more glyph time? Sure. I made mistakes. That's called being human. Remember, life is 10% what happens to you, 10% how you respond to it, and 80% how good your reflexes are when the tall ones come at your throat with their pincers. Today you guys are going to be awarded diplomas. You've earned it. But remember that a diploma is just a piece of paper. What really matters is what you do with that piece of paper. And I strongly recommend burning it to ward off the tall ones, for they fear an open flame. Thank you and good luck.

[David Remnick]

Words of wisdom for apocalyptic times. That was to the Class of 2050 by Jen Spira, performed for us by Rachel Dratch. I'm David Remnick. You're listening to the New Yorker Radio Hour. More to come. This is the New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm David Remnick. Lena Dunham is the creator of Girls, our preeminent show, about 20 somethings. But she herself just turned 30. Dunham is also a die hard supporter of Hillary Clinton, so there's lots to talk about.

I don't mind the idea of having somebody who's a member of the establishment because guess what? The government is an establishment and there needs to be somebody who understands how to navigate it. But also, if all I wanted was a female in the White House, why wouldn't I have been running around behind, you know, Sarah Palin fixing her skirts?

That's next time on the New Yorker Radio Hour. A presidential election is a moment when we choose not so much a politician, but a leader or Ideally so. And every so often, the choice between candidates looks like a choice between entirely different definitions of leadership. Leadership is even an obsession. It's an entire industry with God knows how many books published on the subject. And a couple of months ago, the New Yorker's Josh Rothman started thinking about this obsession and what it tells us.

[Josh Rothman]

I got really fascinated by the question of what leadership was, and I started out by reading a lot of leadership books. Of all the books I read, the most interesting was an anthology edited by an English professor named Elizabeth Sammet, who teaches at the United States Military Academy at West Point.

[David Remnick]

When I first got here, I used to see a fellow who works in landscaping here, and we'd pass almost every day, and I'd wave to him on his mower and he'd wave to me. And then one day he stopped and he said, what's your function? What do you do here? And I said, this was early on. And I said, well, I teach English. And that's really how I thought of it.

[Josh Rothman]

She teaches English at a place where everyone wears a uniform and calls her Ma'.

[Larry Wilmore]

Am. Ma'.

[David Carroll]

Am. Section formed. Missing one. Cadet Silverman.

[Larry Wilmore]

Thank you.

[David Remnick]

Take seats.

[Josh Rothman]

Each of her students. Each cadet is training to be a military leader.

[David Remnick]

As I was here longer and had a greater connection with lieutenants and captains and now even a few majors who are my former students, I realized the role that those that studying English plays in their lives. They will write and say, I was thinking about my reading of Coriolanus or of Henry V or Richard II before a mission, when I was going to tell my soldiers what we had to do and how I believed in them. Another example would be actually one of my current colleagues who flew Kiowa helicopters in Afghanistan. And we had talked for a long time about Antoine de Saint Exupery's writings. And he said, obviously the aircraft that St. Exupery flew were so different from mine. And yet he would read what Exupery has to say about personal responsibility and responsibility to one's fellow pilots. And that really struck a chord with my former student when he found himself in Afghanistan.

[Josh Rothman]

Zany Zupari isn't included in Zamit's anthology, but she does include a lot of surprising stuff. The book has a lot of poetry, it has diary entries, it has some pieces you'd expect, Machiavelli or Clause Fitz, classic writers on leadership, but it also has writings by Virginia Woolf and even Zadie Smith. It really seems like Samet is determined to look at leadership from every possible.

[David Remnick]

Angle every day, just in the course of my job, I had to keep asking myself, what does good leadership look like? And we're required to write evaluations all the time. And those evaluations ask you to talk about their leadership potential. And at first I thought, how do I know what their leadership. I don't know. I know whether they can scan a line of poetry, or I know whether they understand Shakespeare. But I don't know if they're going to be good leaders or not. What does that mean?

[Brian Silverman]

I'm Cadet Brian Silverman. I'm from outside of Philadelphia.

[Josh Rothman]

Samet introduced me to a student of hers, a senior who's studying international relations. When Brian's done at West Point, in a few months, he'll go to Fort Benning for boot camp.

[Brian Silverman]

So I'll be an infantry officer for four years before transitioning into military intelligence. And I'll be posting to Fort Campbell, Kentucky, with the 101st Airborne Division.

[Larry Wilmore]

Wow.

[Josh Rothman]

Are you excited?

[Brian Silverman]

Yeah, absolutely.

[Josh Rothman]

Brian told me that he'd gone to a Quaker school throughout his childhood, and that part of the reason he decided to go to West Point was because he'd read the Chosen, a novel by Chaim Pottok, which crystallized his belief in simple service and commitment to values. Samet says he's already a leader among his peers.

[David Remnick]

There are certain cadets who, even as freshmen, sort of show this. I don't know this particular facility for. Maybe they're very attuned to the other people around them, what their preoccupations are, a certain attentiveness, that focus, and that kind of tenacity. I think those are important elements as well.

[Josh Rothman]

And Samit sees her literature class as a place where those leaderly qualities in Brian and other cadets can grow.

[David Remnick]

I think that reflection and careful study that the classroom encourages helps. It helps with self awareness. It helps with an awareness of others. But I also think there's sort of an element of luck or chance involved in it all. I mean, if you're placed in a particular circumstance at a particular moment, perhaps all of those faculties, perhaps all of whatever it is you've been thinking about and you didn't realize it was leadership, then suddenly becomes an opportunity to show this.

[Josh Rothman]

I asked Brian about how he was learning to be a leader at West Point, and he told me a kind of story that I wasn't expecting to hear.

[Brian Silverman]

Yeah, I guess I'll say this even though it's sort of a professionally embarrassing moment for me.

[Josh Rothman]

One of the capstone experiences at West Point is something called cldt, which stands for Cadet Leadership Development Training Field.

[Brian Silverman]

Exercises for, you know, period, seven, eight days, something like that, blank rounds, executing whole wide variety of missions.

[Josh Rothman]

When I asked Brian if he was in charge of other cadets during that time, he clarified he wasn't in charge of them. He said he was responsible for them.

[Brian Silverman]

I had done really well. I had been very diligent. The missions that I had been in charge of as the platoon leader were successful. My patrols were good. But there I was on the last night, literally hours from finishing this huge graduation requirement, which a lot of cadets sort of think of as the bane of their existence. And I was cleaning my weapon and still I really don't understand how this happened. But there was a round inside the chamber. I was doing a functions test. The point is, I had a negligent discharge. I had a negligent discharge of my weapon. And this is one of the most catastrophic things that can occur because it shows that you don't have control over your most important tool and more, that your negligence has risked the lives potentially of the people around you. In a patrol base in the middle of the night, you know, you give away your position, everyone around you could die.

[Josh Rothman]

Now, what makes this a leadership story is what Brian did next. He walked over to the person in command and told him what had happened. He faced the consequences.

[Brian Silverman]

And he sat me down and gave me one of the hardest hitting talks that I have ever had. He and the NCOs that were around him explained to me that even though I had done well, a mistake like this, it would destroy my career, but far more importantly, risk the lives of the people around me. And I think the reason that this was so important, the reason that it was so impactful, was that at no other time in my experience as a cadet had the real army deployment. At no point had they felt more real. I looked someone else in the eyes who had been there and had them tell me, you made this error. This is unacceptable. You need to fix this. Still, I think about it all the.

[Josh Rothman]

Time, and I found myself thinking about Brian's story too. When pundits and politicians talk about leadership, a lot of times they seem to be talking about something different, about who's in charge, who's the toughest, or alternatively, who's to blame. There's a disconnect between the real life leadership that Brian's talking about and the spectacle of leadership that we watch on television. I think that's what Samet was trying to puzzle out when she was putting together her anthology.

[David Remnick]

The narrative of crisis is very seductive in this vacuum of leadership. I'M your next leader. So if there's no vacuum, then you don't need me. And so there's this idea that we I think people imagine leadership as something they can see, and you can see it in a crisis because someone has to rush in and do something very dramatic. But I think a lot of good leadership happens silently. It happens not in moments of crisis. That's my concern about this romance of crisis, because you need people to lead when things are going fine or okay or before they collapse. And yet that's not a particularly romantic kind of leadership. It's not a particularly appealing kind of leadership in the military. It's the difference between peacetime leadership and leadership in war. And what I try to emphasize with my students is that peacetime leadership is just as important and you don't win medals for it. I mean, it's hard to measure leaders by all of the actions they didn't take. And yet in the long run, that's often what really matters. But it's such a hard thing conceptually to get excited about.

[Josh Rothman]

I really learned something from Samit and Brian about leadership. If you watch political debates on tv, they seem to focus exclusively on the qualities of wartime leadership. They're so often about being aggressive, tough and intimidating. You never see the other half, the peacetime half of leadership. It's ironic, I think, that if you want to learn about peacetime leadership, you have to turn off the television and go to the United States Military Academy at West Point. And I love Samet's definition of leadership, that leaders are responsible, restrained, attentive, focused, concerned, even a little frightened of the consequences of their actions, that they've been tempered by real world experience that's left them compassionate and self aware and that those qualities make it possible for them to be creative, ambitious and daring when there really is a crisis.

[David Remnick]

Josh Rothman of the New Yorker. He spoke with Elizabeth Sammet, a professor of English at West Point. At newyorkerradio.org you can sign up for our newsletter and we'll let you know what's on the show and all of our podcasts, fiction and poetry and politics. Lots of good stuff. That's it for this week, though. We'll be back next week with Lena Dunham and Baratunda Thurston, who talks about working on and leaving the Daily Show. I'm David Remnick. Thanks for joining me.

The New Yorker Radio Hour is a co production of WNYC Studios and the New Yorker. Our theme music was composed and performed by Meryl Garbus of tune Yards, with additional music by Alexis Cuadrado. This episode was produced by Emily Botin, Ave Carrillo, Rhiannon Corby, Jill Duboff, Karen Frillman, David Krasnow, Sarah Nix and Steven Valentino, with help from Owen Agnew, Alex Barron, Becky Cooper, Matt Fiddler, Trey K, Rick Kwan and Josh Rogan. Special thanks this week to Andy Lancett, the director of archives at New York Public Radio. The New Yorker Radio Hour is supported in part by the Cherina Endowment.