Those of you in Florida, or trying to get out of Florida, please stay safe. And please check in when you can. I’ve just read that highways are jammed and gas stations are running out of fuel.

I watched a bit of the 60 Minutes interviews with Kamala Harris and Tim Walz. Today the legacy media types are all writing columns saying some of her answers could have been better, but there are no major screaming controversies about anything that was said. There is possibly about as much commentary on Trump’s non-appearance. CBS provided details on the communications between CBS and the Trump campaign about the interview. Trump had agreed to do the interview weeks ago, and CBS and the campaign had worked out a schedule for when and where the interviewing would take place. And then last week Trump cancelled for bogus reasons and denied he had ever agreed to the interview.

I agree with Lawrence O’Donnell (beginning at 4 minutes) that Trump’s mental decline would have been way too obvious in such an interview. Especially if he is in early stage Alzheimer’s, as I suspect, he would be unable to follow a series of questions or remember what he just already said. I’m betting the family and senior advisors talked him out of it.

Regarding interviews, do read Josh Marshall, Insider Newsletters Still Struggling to Make Interview Fetch Happen. Mainstream media continues to grumble that Harris is avoiding “serious” and “substantive” interviews, meaning from legacy/mainstream media. Never mind that Trump avoids such interviews more. She’s appearing on television talk shows and on popular podcasts and other places that are watched by people who are not necessarily news junkies. Sounds like a plan to me. But this part of the article speaks to what I’ve been thinking about a lot of “serious” interviewing.

Harris has now taken questions from the inside-the-Beltway press, in impromptu sessions, in a sit-down interview with CNN’s Dana Bash, with reporters at the National Association of Black Journalists convention, where Daniels was actually one of the questioners. But again and again these interviews have focused on process questions and restating opponents’ attacks and asking Harris to respond. In Dana Bash’s interview with Harris and Walz, the most focused questions were over whether or not Harris had “flip-flopped” on fracking and why Walz had said he and his wife used IVF rather than a related but distinct fertility treatment. In other words, they actually haven’t been very substantive at all. They are more confrontational, but absent a basis in policy particulars it’s not clear why that’s better than an at-length interview in which potential voters get a feel for who the candidate is and that discusses issues like abortion rights or jobs or foreign wars or immigration policy in ways that actually connect with people’s lives. The whole proposition becomes more a matter of candidate feats of strength for campaign gatekeepers than questions that are particularly substantive or ones that campaign reporters have an especial ability to address.

I should note here: I’m not picking on Dana Bash. Her interview is what we now expect from a major media interview. The problem isn’t the interviewer but the format, the genre of interview. Not only are these interviews not terribly valuable for the candidate; they’re not terribly valuable as journalism. You can tell your favored candidate to blow off the prestige MSM interviews guilt free.

Amen.

Bob Woodward is about to release a new book. I don’t intend to read it. Bob may be a genius at sniffing the inner lives of U.S. leaders, but he’s a dull, stiff, boring writer. Possibly the juiciest bit to come out is that in 2020, as the Covid pandemic was getting serious, Trump sent test kits to Putin for his personal use. He has also remained in touch with Putin these past four years. They’ve been on the phone with each other several times. No surprise there.