The Week Politics Went Tabloid: A Conversation with Matt Bai about Gary Hart and THE FRONT RUNNER

For those that study and write about politics, the holy grail is to find those seminal moments in the nation's public and political life that change everything. And while the antecedents of those events may be years in the making, they usually create a perfect storm that results in an event that is a kind of tipping point; one that marks a permanent tectonic shift in the political landscape. Sometimes we have to let time pass, before we appreciate or even understand those moments.

The televised Nixon-Kennedy Debate, Watergate, the Nixon’s resignation and the Vietnam war piped into our living rooms, are such event. And, according to longtime political journalist Matt Bai, the implosion of Gary Heart's presidential campaign in 1987, was also such a moment. One that Bai captures in all its complexity,  in All the Truth Is Out: The Week Politics Went Tabloid.  The book has been turned into the recently released movie THE FRONT RUNNER, also co-written by Bai.

It's about a time when politics became a plot-line, when the personal became both political and public, and when Who, What, Where and When, became Gotcha. This conversation, while it originally took place in 2014, shows the blueprint of how Trump got elected and how we got to where we are today.

My conversation with Matt Bai:

Chris Christie

We know from watching Wisconsin and the events in neighboring states, that public sector unions have become political whipping posts for Republican politicians, especially Governors. But where Wisconsin’s Gov. Walker may have overreached and seems politically tone deaf and Arnold Schwarzenegger was to timid here in California; New Jersey’s Governor Chris Christie may have found the sweat spot, as the pitch perfect spokesmen to an electorate fed up with the rising salaries and perks for public employees and their unions.

In so doing, he may actually have a chance to move his state forward, reduce deficits, and engage in endless bloody battles, while becoming more popular in the process. Is he a model for other politicians, or just a big bully who knows how to craft a message?  All of this is part of the Cover Story in this past Sunday's N.Y Times Magazine, by one of the best political reporters in America, Matt Bai. Matt is the new Chief Political Correspondent for The New York Times Magazine.

My conversation with Matt Bai about Gov. Chris Christie:

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The hell with governing....

The 2012 presidential election is still 30 months away. But Republican challengers to the President already think that holding public office may be a liability. Are we heading into a campaign that's not at all about policy, or ideas or governing, but about anger at a changing society, played out in a multilayered media landscape. Matt Bai, contributing editor to the The New York Times Magazine, and one of our most astute political observers, thinks this might be happening.

My conversation with Matt Bai about his article in The Magazine this Sunday:

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The times they are a changing...and most politicians missed it.

Matt Bai, one of the country's most astute political observers and reporters talks, in his recent N.Y. Time magazine story, about how politicians missed the generational shift on the gay marriage issue.  It's an interesting look at how American values and culture are indeed changing.

My conversation with Matt Bai:

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