Anthony Weiner on Term Limits and Text Messages

Weener that opens in theaters later this month. The film covers the former congressman's two thousand thirteen bid for New York City mayor, which ultimately ends in his defeat amid a sexting scandal. This was Weener's second time facing this issue. The first resulted in his resignation from Congress. But in spite of his problems, Weener does emerge in the film as an effective campaigner and one who is not without his supporters. It's easy to see why he's a natural.

He's charismatic and quick on his feet. If you had won the election, the last election you ran for, how do you think things would be different right now in the city. I've always had this theory about mayors in New York City that we go from personality like mayors, you know, the coaches, the Giuliani's and then we'd like to kind of take a deep breath afterwards and have

more of a commer or technical maybe. Guy and I had the theory that we were due after Bloomberg for more personality, kind of someone really enjoyed it, someone really like engaging in it, so and mixing it up a little bit more, and the blaza hasn't quite been man. I think there's kind of an appetite a little bit for a different head of personality. I would obviously be a different type of mayor than he. I mean a little more peripatetic, a little bit more like doing stuff.

I had a thousand ideas, a little ideas, big ideas that I would have like been doing every single day, less kind of like this thematic thing that he's got going about being a progressive mayor. All that being said, you know that it's not as hard as a job as it used to be. You know, Money's boy. Well, so much of being a mayor is defined in the past has been to finding these two big things. One is the budget has always been very tough, very dependent

on Washington, very depending on Albany. The second thing is that you get buffeted used to get buffeted by the tabloid wars constantly in New York City, Like, you know, chewing up mayors was what the tabloids used to do, and they're just not what they used to be. Like, you don't have the day to day headwind being a politician New York City that you would have in the past. And then the third thing is just that progressively, over the course of time, government at all levels has gotten

more competent. It's less driven by just you know, guys who knew guys who knew guys and three fifty employees. It's not saying that every one of them is good, but are ways of spotting and weeding out the ones who aren't that good. I mean, you know, a day to day sanitation man works pretty hard, knows his job pretty well. Technology is a good way of keeping up with them. So those types of things have made the

city less breakable than it used to. So you don't think the police is a kind of a closed chop and it's you gotta know somebody to be get a job well, less so than maybe it used to be. What I will say is this is that the size of the police department being bigger it's bigger than the FBI, it's one, it's one of the biggest parlemoud people. I mean, they're not all out on the street at the same time.

But then they're arguably one of the larger paramilitary forces in the world, and they're incredibly efficient to do a good job. But invariably, every so often you're gonna have problems within any agency that large. But you know, very rarely does someone stop a cop on the street and day I didn't get mug today, Thank you for that. Like you basically only see the cops when there's a problem.

You know something's going wrong. But the recent pressure, in my view of the recent pressure on statistical improvement every day since crime has basically been eliminated in so many people's lives. I mean, it's a completely different city than it was in the seventies when I was growing up. I mean, you know, the idea of like you know, I have a four year old son, like you, when you were old enough to have a bike, you're old

enough to have your bike stolen. Basically you're old enough to be the idea of Wilding and Central Park in the exactly. I mean, it's just even little things like if you had nothing to do when you wanted to get mugged, you got on the L train. You know. Now you get on the L train and it's all these hipsters and nothing else, and it's, uh, it's just a much, much safer, better city. And so we're not used to it. We're not a customers culturally to say

things are better, but things are amazing now. One thing I wanted people to understand. I mean, you said that the budget was at the mercy of Albany and of Washington, and the city is still it's safe to say, in receivership from the economic crisis of years ago. They really don't handle their own finances without some rubber stamp from Albany. Correct. Well, Look, the City of New York is a creation, a constitutional creation of the state legislature and of the of the

State Constitution. As such, it's not it's still The Mayor of New York City is a fairly powerful mayorality compared to a lot of other cities, and the city Council has a lot of responsibility. When you say it's a creation, what do you mean meaning the five counties have a special right, meaning literally, the political subdivision of the City of New York was a creation of law, is the creation of of the of the state constitution, and as

such you're at the whim. And all throughout state law you'll see things like cities of excess of a million people must do a B or C. And you do have a state legislature. That's still so, where does the city's money come from? I mean, for people who don't understand the political process and as much detail as you do, they nonetheless recall that basic kind of primmer where federal dollars come largely from income tax, and state from sales tax,

and municipal dollars from property tax. Is that still true in New York City that the problems comes from. Here's here's where the city less so than most cities, like, for example, our education budget is not tied to property taxes as it is in Long Island, a lot of suburbs and a lot of cities around the country, because we have two giant engines of revenue. One is the financial sector, which you know when you hear about people getting needs of scene bonuses, we're getting a piece of

the action on those bonuses. Although the day to day transaction type of things don't create revenue for the city. But all the deals, the big deals, we're getting a little piece of that. And the second thing is real estate, which has I mean, it said, mind bogglingly high levels. I mean, you can literally buy a forty million dollar apartment in New York City and it's um. Those two

revenue streams are very very strong. Now we do have a byzantine property tax assessment system, which has apartments being taxed a certain level, co ops being attached a certain certain level, and that it's it's another very complicated thing. What it it is. It's kind of like one of these things, you know, camel is a horse designed by committee. It's a little bit like over the course of time, different constituencies have put their finger on the scale and

now created this weird system. So you're born in Brooklyn, yeah, and you went to Plattsburgh way up there in the boondocks. It's a province of Canada. Virtually, it is I need to be close enough that a thirty minute car ride can get me six and a half percent alcohol bre That was basically the criteria when my dad and I were talking, like where do you want to go to school? Son? It's you know, he's like, will he do. He's just a neighborhood lawyer guy. And my mom was a school teacher.

But you know, like I basically said I was not good a student. They say, you can go anywhere you want. It's a sunny state over Seniork or a Cunee school, anyway you want. So I just I kind of look, what's the furthest one away that I can go play hockey every day? And who was the tougher one? Your mother or your father? Who are you? Like, I'm probably more like my dad and that I'm sucked up in

the same way he is. But you know it's uh, probably my dad had the greatest kind of influence on the path I took in life, for good reasons and bad reasons. That you know, he was the he inspired you to go into politics, and not in that way, no, but he would be the one like arguing all the time and like, hey, you to defend your positions and that kind of stuff. But you know, it's funny you actually had you you were there a little bit at the birth of my career. In a strange one, Let's

see if you can figure it out. Has to do with Chuck No Glen Gary, Glenn Ross. You guys, you guys were filming while I was running for city council for the first time. You guys were filming. It's externals, I know what you guys call them by the Sheepshead based subway stop and I don't know, I think the outsides of the thing. And so crowd would form, like people in line. I'm like, what's going on? And she say bad? Like where not? You say, get some signs,

get some signs. Totally, I'm like working the lines and I'm like a Jewish version out of that guy who's in this movie. I'm a Jewish version. I'm the Jewish Alpacino. Yeah, because you know, when you're running for city counts, like a gathering of like twenty people is wow, I hit the jackpotty. And then I'm thinking, I, well, I should probably make an issue of all this double parking. These guys are doing, these Hollywood guys. But but yeah, that

was it. Uh, that was like politics, don't you you did? No, No, I totally do. I totally do a movie. And we're gonna get to the movie. In the movie, you're waving that band or your and you look like a kid you're so happy. Yeah, and these people are all jumping up and down and they part of you loved retail politics, No, I love I love that stuff. I don't know who you were talking to, Um, maybe it's only been Jerry Seinfeld. Way, it's like all that. I just love power. It's clearly

deals a power. People don't understand that, you know, to go into polo, going to any profession and to really enjoy to love it. And like a lot of a lot of times you're doing you're enjoying the the constituent parts of a job, like being in Washington and sitting there and being committee hearings and passing laws that gratifies it.

That obviously scratches an itch. You want to make the world better, But there's an element of that that is really not completely on the level because you're not really passing laws all that often. You're usually having hearings of things that you've heard before, etcetera. But when you're at home and you're you know, solving the problem from someone because they came in and they can't figure out you know,

my my my husband has actually happened. My husband dropped his dentures down the sewo we don't know who to call it. They get the back and you're like trying to figure out, well, if it got washed out, I gotta call this guy. You want what switched to your throat so this guy's dns don't get washed away. Whatever it is, you've got to kind of like you are. You're either good at that or you're not, like unpacking how to do it, and you have to like it.

Like I have run against in my day, people who, no doubt would be excellent presentatives in the classic sense, going there and casting the right vote and probably giving a good speech or writing a good book. But they clearly didn't like the other stuff. And the other stuff is not inconsequential. And I don't you know anyone who makes it, say, to congress or to be a mayor of a city, they've got to like that. You cannot

fake that stuff. And I legitimately that's the only part of the job I really miss, is that is that kind of stuff. You were in Congress? How long were you in the countress? I was in I was in a city council for seven years. I was in Congress, I guess thirteen years. In Congress for thirteen years. What

was the shortest thing you did the city council. Now that you know, seven years, I mean like basically that the TikTok for me is I mean I never had you know, I have no marketable skills because I never had a real job out of college. I up at Plattsburgh. I wrote my congressman, who I had a look up in one of these guide books in the library. Who my congressman was, sent Ruck Schumer A letter spelled his name wrong. Can I come in violence and I basically

do an internship there. They're like, you're there for six or seven years? Well what happened was I was an intern's finished six seven years. But I basically you know, liked and quill I failed upwards, you know, like for a while. Yeah, you're pretty good up in to mail

was about six years. Just about everything that I mean, he if you can only have one political kind of mentor kind of guy you know so much exactly Eskimo, someone who you know, when I started working for Chuck, I was six three, had blonde here in a little nose. I kind of morphed into this semitic collectible version of myself. But uh, you know, like because he did the inside game and the outside game about as skillfully as anyone does.

Um So, then I just kind of like I did a few years in Washington in the eighties, and then when I decided I wanted to try it myself, I had this brilliant idea. I was going to move to Florida, where they're just there were like adding districts left and right, just so much population was being and I figured, a Jewish guy from Brooklyn, I'll fit and find down there, and Chuck I would have been I would have named

I would have fit in great. You know, it would obviously you would have to lose the anthony somehow, but um and Chuck said, no, you should come back and work in my district. David okay, David Winer, Yeah, I mean totally the library. Yeah yeah, vote even though even though votes for a Winer, it just worked so perfectly, Dad, Yeah, okay, all right, thanks that that might have been the problem. That was probably it. I wish I was spoken to thank.

Uh So. Yeah. So I basically came back round for the city council, won a six way raised by a couple hundred votes, and it was like your years in the city council. Um it was great. I mean, look, I was a kid. I was electors at the time. I mean, now I think people have gotten life was like twenty seven got elected and um had apprentice for the job, you know, ran against all the county organizations

and county machines and everything else and still one. And so when I got in, I didn't really owe anyone all that much, so I can kind of do really what I wanted. And what was something you did that was memorable to you? Like, what, what's something that defines your period? Well, the thing I mean, I had a

signature issue that kind of was visited on me. That so since I wasn't kind of an insider guy, I didn't have great committee picks, And so I was interested in the idea that people in public housing part of the reason they have such crummy lot in life is that their representation is never very good because who the heck, you know, they're not a lot of they're not heavily voting,

they're overly poor, a lot of headaches. So I asked them to create for me a subcommittee on public housing, and by as fortune or misfortune would have it, in the mid nineties, there started to be this circumstance where there were these terrible fires in the hallways of the public housing developments, and no one knew what was going on.

And I had a mole in the fire department who kept sending me documents that showed that a buddy of Rudy Giuliani had started a paint company because he can make money selling it to the Giuliani administration, and the paint was horrible and flammable, and that people would be in the hallways and smoke in the in the lobbies in the hallways, and it was creating these terrible fires

and people were dying. And because I was getting all of these in these documents, I knew what was going on and was able to stop it, but not not until I basically had this head on war with the

Giuliani administration. Um what was eventually done about though we basically eventually the Julian administration fesst up and they but the guy had a business and they repainted everything like that, which was my original thing is you got to repaint all this stuff, like it's not enough just to like do asst housing city public housing, you know, and um, it's like a cousin of Giuliani or something like that. How did Giuliani react? Not very well? A funny story.

So finally the New York Times does a story about it because another one of these stare hole fires, and I get another document, and the fire commissioner and now the mayor himself both say they have no way of knowing this was a problem. And I had a document that was directed to the fire commissioners to stamp received by his office. So I hold a press conferensations around

the time of Christmas cold Day. I'm at the bottom of the steps of City Hall, which is where city councilmen do their press conferences, and I'm releasing this document. I'm standing in front of the cameras and I'm like, and I'm here to deliver this, this document to the mayor, who says that they had no idea of knowing, showing that they indeed did, and a cameraman and remember my back is to city Hall. My camera says we should give it directly to Mary. So that's why I'm here.

Says no, directly to him. He's right there. So the mayor had walked up the steps with his son Andrew by the hand. It was right before Christmas. It was a cold day, It's like a Sunday or something like that, And the New York Times captured this picture of me at the bottom of the stairs and him at the top, me holding this letter and him like Zeus at the

top of the stairs, like glaring at me down. The footnote of that story is he became convinced that someone in his office had given me his schedule to know exactly when he was going to be walking up with his son, and that one I had violated the whatever code I don't known't involved the families, you know, whatever it is. And he began an inquisition within his shop.

How did we get in my stay when it's just weird fluke of scheduling that I happened to be standing there on a Sunday because I had this this semeon. It was one of the I mean that that was the van going tension with him after that. Oh well, I had been on. Giuliani famously kept a list, you know, one of these Nicksonian kind of ship lists, and I had been on that early on, and and it would probably just made it worse. But yeah, he sends someone out to say that, uh, the mayor wants see you,

which was then still a big deal. I mean, let me go. I'm as this a councilman. I mean I would run into the mayor, but to be quality, and I'm what's gonna happen? I mean, did you want to apologize that you want to take this letter, did you want to say here's what we're doing about it? Or did he just want to yell at me? Whatever it was? And so I'm waiting outside, uh for him to summon me in about thirty minutes good bye, and the same guy, the same staffer that had said, wait, the mayor wants

to see you, came out city changed. He doesn't want to see you. You can go, And apparently he was the game he was playing. I don't think it was that. I think that he was so livid at this that just wanted to tear my head off, and someone talked about and someone basically said yeah, and he changed his focus on instead. I want to find out how the hell he knew my schedule. But that's all. That's all secondary that that what it Well, it was the first time I kind of had a real issue in the city,

how really doing good things. It was not kind of like this weird fabricated thing because it really was a dangerous situation. Um. And then the following year, I think I Chuck announces he's running for Senate against the motto. So then I announced that I'm gonna run, and I

didn't have much of a chance of winning. It was like three men versus one woman, three guys from Brooklyn, one woment from Queen's and again just by you know, didn't have kind of really just a good strategy, just running and had knocked in a lot a lot of doors, won by a couple hunch of votes. Now you go to Washington and you're there for six terms, and again,

what's what's a highlight? Aments It's tough to distill it down twelve years into you know, we give us one or two highlights of what the kind of work you were doing. Well, I mean, you've got us ever you were representing, Chuck was serving the Chuck's district. So I'm representing democratic district in New York City, but not as liberal as you might have met. For example, Obama in

two thousand eight only got in my district. You know, it's it's it was as a matter of fact, when I had my scandal, and I left the Republican took it for for a brief cup of coffee, and then

they redrew it again. So it's a pretty conservative district, and I kind of developed a rhythm after a while of prosecuting it by kind of like the old adage, there's nothing in the middle of the road but dead possums and yellow yellow lines, like, I'm going to really kind of lean into being being who I am and kind of being progressive on some stuff, being hawkish, and you're kind of being true to who I was, and rather than trying to shoot this middle line kind of

leaning into stuff. But the real difference in Washington was when you were in the majority, you're getting stuff done, and when you're in the minority, warrant it's the bottom line. And I was in the minority most of the time. A couple of weeks, while you're yelling at the top of your lungs of that podium on YouTube, I'm not dude, I wasn't. I yelled once, and even in the midst of my most ferocious yelling, I observed regular order. I

called him a gentleman. I'm aout criticizing, No, I'm just I'm just saying that there's a little bit of yelling. You you were very wound up. There was one time I was yelling and the other time it's just being a New Yorker. Brother. That's the way the way we're all.

You brought the New York to But so I I mean it is I mean what happened in Washington since the time I was there in the eighties as a stafford to when I got elected, there used to be a core of let's say, a quarter of the place that you do you would like to hang out with, like you would like to have arguments with Democrat and Republican like that took the time to learn stuff, had a philosophical view on it, kind of wanted outcomes, like they wanted to do stuff like if you sat across

the tables, is what do you want? What? What do you want? And you can kind of then it becomes a little where then it's a problem solving thing that actually is not. It's kind of interesting now and that has given way, and maybe I contributed to it has given way to a different type, which is you guys that are basically like this ain't gonna happen. It's not

on the level. We basically are just going to fight about this, So let to be really skillful at the Christians and Lions element of the show of like where we go out and we fight over stuff, and those types of people are now the center of gravity in Washington.

And so notwithstanding of the fact that you might be one of those people and you're good at it, it kind of is a shitty way to kind of like, you know, go through like what you can sit in the Judiciary Committee and you can see an issue of gun control or of of abortion rights or something like that, and you're basically pressing play. You know, you might be good at it, but you're just pressing play on your speech that you gave and you you understand how to triangulate,

You understand what the other guy is gonna say. So the part of it that's frustrating is that you're not passing laws, So like, now why are you there. You're there to do this show and that's okay for thirty minutes a week maybe, but it's not there to be there all week doing it. And then my other problem was I was in a weird space in that I was kind of young, like you there, it's still an older place and you know, you know, going out, you know, having a bunch of drinks and just hanging out with

fat cigar like they didn't do anything for me. And and I don't think the people are venal and I don't think that they're not decent people. And you don't get Washington unless you're being elected by people and you've got something on the ball. It wasn't the kind of crowd that you wanted to spend days and days and

days on end with. And that's really all you're doing now is sitting around stewing in your juices and you know, waiting for the next you know, vote MP, vote to impeach, your vote to overturn some law that you care so in a career in which someone's got to leave a position for that position to become opened up, and meant you it gets to be two thousand eleven and you decide is mayor something you thought about before? But five

I ran and I had an amazing experience. You know, I had zero expectations of me, nothing, you know, of the polls. I didn't have to get my seat to run. I ran because it's the job, that's the job, that's the job. I was you know, that's the job iways meant to do. Like I like problem solving. I like being the kind of the spokesman of a thing. I like the city, like I just it's like, I love it. I love the city. I love I love the neighborhoods,

I love the idea. I I'm something of a student of it, and like I admire mayors and I liked what they do. And I also um realized that I didn't have a legislative temperament sit there and do three yards in a cloud of dust for five years to work on an immigration bill someday that's sort of study copyright law and like be the expert on that. I just didn't have that temperament. I just want to get ship done, and I wanted to do it quickly. I

wanted to do stuff. And when you're the mayor of the City of the York, the stuff you can do with a phone call is a lot. You can solve a lot of people's problems that way. So in two thousand five, I ran as a I mean, I don't know how it's put. It is about as long as shot as you can get. We're running against Bloomberg was on the Republican side, and I had a borough president Manhattan Borough President of the Bronx who had run before city council speaker and then me. Um. But it was

a great experience. I I made run off, surged at the end, did it just right, was relaxed the whole time, doing my thing of doing issues every single day. No one cared, no one was showing up, but I liked doing it, and I just put myself in a position to take advantage when the other guys either made mistakes or took me too lightly. Um. Two thou We're gonna run again two thousand nine was my moment boarded that when the extended the term limits right, that was the

tough I've never been so outraged. That was so jarring to me because it was really even for someone who's a politician for a long time in New York City, you understands how things goes, the sheer goal of it. A rich guy buying buying it for the third time, actually spent a hundred million or more nineties something million on the previous TIF. You add it all together, it's

a quarter of a billion dollars we know of. And then it's all the walking around money there, but that part having a free spending guy, it's one thing, but he basically bought the newspapers to do this, right, I mean, you don't get away how would you get away with over just for your listeners who are in steep to New York. The voters of the City of New York put term limits in. I donmight have a big, big fan of terments, never have been. The voters then again

were asked to consider it. A few years later, they again reaffirmed it says we still want to do it. How was the city council empowered to set it aside? Well that the way the low was written, No, it's you can Well it's a good question, I believe, and it was challenged in court, and I believe you can make a pretty good argument that there should be a hierarchy of things. And when the voters vote on something, the only way to undo it is when you do it. We don't do a lot of referendums in our city.

We just don't do it. And so this California, right, it's very unusual. And so this was an unusual constructor. This was one of those rare cases that the City of New York had done something by voter referendum. So the city council said, it's a law like any other. We make laws and pass laws all the time. We can get out from under it. I think the courts made a mistake in a collegeing, but the courts generally speaking, really do let legislatures do their thing unless they think

there's a real important reason to step in. And at any rate, the city council and the mayor who had repeatedly said he would never support changing tournaments, and the city council repeatedly said they would never change it, so they ran. They both campaigned saying they would ever do any such thing. It was so feign and you can't imagine it was such an unpopular thing. I was about

s the New Yorkers wanted it to stay. It is so voted to put them in the first place, and that kind of an undoing of the public will, notwithstanding the substance when I can, I don't care about terminists. I mean this case, it impacted me on the poster child. Who would impact it because I was going to run, but it was so offensive to me. I really could

not imagine it would ever happened. Like the very scaffolding of our relation of citizens relationship to their government was now being undone right because it's it's one thing to change the law that happens, and even a popular law that happens. When you start saying we're gonna put something out to vote for you, the people, and we're going to kind of discard it for our own self interest, the psychic over there's also there's been on a republic

sense to it as well. I mean, and this is New York City, this is not like some sleepy town. So my position was, if you want to do this and you believe it's the right thing to do, let people voteing in. And I said I will join you and putting that on the ballot. If that's what people say, then so be it. But um, I had seen what it was like to run against a billionaire and I had to decide whether I wanted to do it again. Remember something else that and actually really complicated the decision

for me. Barack Obama just been elected. There was this notion that finally we in Congress, like all these things I wanted to do that I was telling you earlier, you really don't do you just sit around and do nothing or you're in the opposition party, you could do like you know, healthcare for him, holy cow, you know, the stimulus, like these things that we were on the verge of doing. Um so like when I I think I wrote it up in from New York Times, like

explaining why I made the decision I did. It's not often you get a chance to kind of like a lot of people say, well, I want to spend more time with my family. That's why I'm gonna do, Like, I really do want to go back to Washington he gets some stuff done. I was, no, it was no longer. Like I didn't have a sense that it was now or never. I was now, like leading in all the polls. I thought, I could, you know, maybe wait for for

for some more time. But it was a very painful because I had that I thought I I was was my moment and it uh, it didn't work at But I think it's a scar on Bloomberg's legacy that really can't be removed. After the break. Anthony Weener on the difference between politicians and movie stars when it comes to surviving scandals. Explore the Here's the Thing archives where Ed Rowlins, Republican campaign advisor talks about the Jimmy Carter presidency. You know,

he was a micromanager. He was an engineer, and he wanted he wanted to manage everything. And the reality of the president isn't a management job. The president is an inspirational job, and he sets a direction. He has four or five big decisions to make every day. If you have an inability to make decisions, then they basically stack up on you. Take a listen that. Here's the thing. Org. This is Alec Baldwin, and you're listening to here's the thing.

My guest today is Anthony Weiner. Wiener is a former congressman and has run for New York City mayor twice. He's also the veteran of two major scandals that brought unwanted fame to him and his wife, Huma Abaden, a longtime aid and current vice chair of Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign. Wiener says the unrelenting media coverage and painful public interactions led to some very dark days, and somehow he managed

to pick himself up again. The reason I had the problems that I did was the reason that I was able to survive it, and that some wiring, some emotional wiring that wasn't attached just right made it possible for me to do dumb things and kind of reach out and be connected to strangers and things like that and have conversations over this whatever it did, not never meet

them and be fine with that. It might be the same kind of emotional miss wiring that made it possible for me to be in this storm and not let it completely debilitate me. Your compartmentalize. I don't even know if it's that formal a thing that happens. I just don't think that. It's kind of like, to some degree, the emotional input is not getting in, like it's not firing, you know, not firing correctly, and so you don't kind

of feel it as much. But all that being said, I'm not gonna lie to you that I was not reading my clips during this stuff. I was not watching

John Stewart scure me. I was not, and so it might have been harder for many people who were around me, Like I remember my friend Harry calling me up while as everything's going on, and there's twenty TV stations outside my house, and this is when the scandal first broke, saying, ye, you want me to come over and bring you some food or something like that, whatever it is in it, It dawned on me pretty you wanted to make sure I was gonna do something nuts to myself and commit

suicide or something like that. It was harder actually for people watching it happen. But he represented one of the fifty different views of my scandal, like everyone looked at as a Roy Sach test for their own experience. You know. So some people as many people come up to me in the streets now and say, my god, you were treated terribly to come up to me and said, boy, what an idiot you are? Has come up to me and say, you know, why are you out on the street,

why aren't you home? You know, with with with your with the bill of your Mets hat pulled down over your eyes. Everyone views the thing and sometimes and I would get calls from people who I hadn't spoken to in a while being the most generous friend. And it occurred to me after a while, as grateful as I was for that gesture, that is probably because something happened in their lives that they're like before before, for the grace of God, they're you know, go I kind of thing. Um,

so I don't really. I didn't like view the presses of God. This is like so outrageous what they're doing to me. I'm like, I know their role in my world. I always have The underlying challenge that I have is I'm a guy name winer with pictures out there that that ded of sending it is hard for people to understand, etcetera, and that, and that you can't plow through the tabloid and the talk shows and everything else. So there's just that you did. You're not left with enough oxygen, And

how are skillful? You know? I have this conversation with people. I think if anybody could do what you could. I said to my priests once, I said, who passed away? I said to him, you'd say confession now face to face. They have what's called reconciliation no more in the booth with the screen. They come in and I said, what's that like for you? He says, Well, the women come in and say that they've met a guy at work

and there in love and they have real feelings. And the guy comes in and says he's met a woman at work and he's just fooling around with her. It's just sex. And he goes, but I come from the Thomas Aquinas school, where the sins of the flesh or the least of our concerns. He said, I want someone to walk into this reconciliation says to me, bless me, father, for I have sinned. I have an abundance of pride when someone will say that to me, because now I

know we're getting somewhere. Well. I can tell you that everyone you included apparently think they have the magic words to say. But what complicates all of this is is that I am limited by the idea that I know what I did is is serious and a very narrow sense of the impact that I had on my wife and my family and everything else. And so all that being said, I don't have a lot part of you know, you asked the question how do I do it with the press today. I don't believe in letting the cultural

shame keep me in a place. You know what I'm saying that that they may be right, they may be right, I might be an asshole, and and I definitely it sound like I don't feel great deal of regret. And then I don't every once in a while to say say fun, you know that was close I could have really had this dream thing that I wanted. But now

standing here, it's a fairly binary choice I have. I either go and be there's the best I can me and do the best I can, or I throw in the towel and be and And it wasn't in the in the internet culture that we have the number of people who are so fired up at the idea that I have the audacity to still live my life. And this is why I kind of why I ran in

two thousand and thirteen again after this. If you're an actor, if you're you know, Tom Cruise, and you have some crazy scientology thing, or you're you have a messy divorce or whatever it is, you go, do you know, uh, Mission impossible five and it's done. You Basically you're out on your press store. People are asking you about how you did that stunt, people paying, they go see the movie.

If you're Alex Rodriguez, you go play baseball, get a couple of home runs one after another, you win a pennant. You're thing he's done. In politics, you don't just say I'll be okay, I'll be the Secretary of Defense for a while. Like you don't do that because the path to get there is really difficult. And so this notion of like getting back on the train. Everyone not everyone, but a lot of people have the same thing. Well, you should go back and run for something again. You know,

I had a nice run. I mean I had a you know, I served in the city council. As you said in Congress, I did it for a while. It's not and but it's not easy just to kind of say, all right, let's put it behind you by running for something again. I think I would like to do it. I am sensitive to the idea that the nature of my scandal might jam people up if they're like, oh, he's out, he's in the room with you know, teaching you know, you know, teaching college students or something like that.

So I've kind of not put people in the position of asking them to do that kind of the film you talk about you went to therapy, What did that do for you? A lot of it is about getting in touch with this idea about what what motivates you would animate you. And there's no doubt about a couple of things about me that that we just kind of touched on it became obvious, is that I'm very into the action, And I don't spend a lot of time thinking about what's animating the action because and and political

and that exactly. Politics is the great job for that. You've got a problem to fix, Just go fix the thing. You know, You're not spending a lot of time navel gazing about it. You just go fix the thing. But in emotional life and in a healthy person, you're thinking for a moment, you're taking deep breaths, you're understanding what's motivating you to do something. Like people would say after my scandal, it so what else did you do that? I mean, that was weird, like you're having communications with

people you haven't met and whatever it is. And I would have to say, you all, honestly, I'm not really sure. It wasn't like I was like thinking it through and like, Okay, this is gonna be. It was me acting obviously in something in a kind of impulsive way that was that was wrong. So there was a little bit of that and also a little bit of like figuring out like what went wrong early on in my life that led

me not to have that kind of wiring. All that well done, But none of it turns back the clock, and none of it really changes all that much about it just kind of makes you more aware of help you stuff. I think it did only in as much and maybe I understand a little bit about why I was doing stuff and make me a little bit understand what was animating me about stuff. But you know, Congress

made me crazy too. I mean not to not that obviously, I don't blame the job, but I was saying the idea that of a place that you're getting rewarded for being glib and good at arguing and and clever on format and performing and clever on your feet and like being the guy who can summarize the Obamacare exactly. I'm

like that, like and so that kind of stuff. And also the weird kind of feedback loop you get in Congress in the Internet age is you can find thirty thou people who think that Michelle Bachman is a smart person. Like you can find stuff, so you get reinforced even when it should be moments where you're like, that was not a good day. I should not have said that to that guy. I shouldn't have shut down Megan Kelly that way. I should have thought I had been more

thoughtful and more whatever it is. And then you you know in the internet world, it's like, oh my god, you're like, I love it when you go on Fox because you kicked their ship out of them and everything else. That's so great. When maybe the things that animated me to go into politics and to be good at it, meaning wanting to win fights for people that were the underkind of the underdogs, like being in there, like not backing down, not liking bullies. Not that what made me

a democrat. It made me someone who is progressive, made me someone who liked arguing with people who I thought were wrong and who were in plicit of power when other people were. Probably that type of kind of feistiness and battling. I think it's probably the same wiring that doesn't leave you enough space to kind of think, all right, maybe everything is in a fight, maybe everything isn't a conflict. Maybe you should kind of get in touch with like

some other emotion or some other feeling. Um. But it does like a warrior, like you like it when people say, yeah, we like that you're fighting and that kind of thing. And but then it became more and more of well I need more people to like that I'm fighting, or like, what do you think about me? Fighting or this this type of stuff. I don't think it's particularly healthy, but

it is. You know, it probably is the same things that drive me, that drove me to be good at some elements of my life, led me to be fucked up at other elements. What are you doing now? Not a lot. I mean, you know, I've got a four and a half year old at home that I kind of like the stillness of being the guy who's taken care of him and like that. I mean, it's like,

it's funny, it's funny. I was very self conscious about this idea of being a you know, stayed on dad is a little bit of exaggeration, but being a dad as a primary right, being a dad as kind of that's my job. What's my job is dad? And with whom it being on the road as much as she is, and my sense of obligation of like giving her some space to be able to do her things. Now that she sat, unfortunately and helped me to do my things, I want to let her do hers. And she's got

the deal. She has stuff that they didn't resolve in two thousand and eight. You know, she came so close working on that campaign and wants to get this done and to give her the sense that you can do whatever she needed that Jordan was going to be okay. But there's another element to it. It's kind of like, why does my redemption as a politician, as a public figure have to be as a public person and a politician. Why can't it be just doing this other important element

of my life? Really well, like no one may see me being a dad, and it might not be something you can measure, like I get this number of votes or this number of people that wrote me positive letters or this number of times I was on hardball or something, But I know I'm really good at it, and I'm

doing it every day. And and like you seem to me like someone who was at a place, you're at a level, you're at a stage, and there are multiple stages, and I've been there, you're at there's multiple stages, and even though our circumstances are different, multiple stages of recovery from these dynamics. And let's say it's eight stages and you're at stage five, let me finish, and you've got a couple more stages to go. And when you get to that stage, there's something you're going to do that

you have to do. Who gives a fuck about whether this college kids in the class you should be teaching the class. I don't know. You're right, people, that's a very good way to look at it, in that I'm still getting my footing. I mean, there's a lot of currents here right. One is the wife's got the big thing going. No no, no, one just some fine own personal thing. One is the world looking through my thing through their own lens and deciding this disqualifies me for

some other thing. And besides politics, I don't know about hell. I don't want him to be on the board of Coca Cola less we want to Cocola associated with that guy. Or on the other hand, you know a radio station that wants me to be a shock shock jock on their station because as it's great, okay, weener like whatever it is. So I'm still filtering what other people think. And then totally I would I would. I would love it.

I love a splitting headache every day. The other thing is that, um, it's a synops thing, right, Like my synops has fired in a certain way for so long. Like I know politics and I know governance, and I know the latter, and I know how to do this, and I know how to climb and whatever it is. I might not have been guaranteed success with without my scandal, but I know it really well. And now I've got

to redirect somewhere else midlife. I'm fifty one years old, so I've got to like redirect to a different place, and that takes a little while to do. And then there's this third element of I'm so happy with Jordan's and kind of like being at this peaceful place where I don't feel like I've got to go on and be again measure my life by how many prests I'm

doing that week, And it's figuring out. I think there's a happy medium, a quiet place where you go, hey, listen, you might not become the mayor of New York, but somebody who could become the mayor of could learn something from you that you passed. You could help make a mayor but firmly believe it. But how do you do yours? You can pay it forward, but how do you do your thing? So you like, you've got the stuff that you're known for and the TV stuff that is in

the movies, which you're amazing. And and and then I'm a big fan. You've got this which scratches this it's that you're able to do, and then you have this, you have amazing family in this two tiered sense that you've got the little ones, you get the old ones, and everything else. That's the kind of thing I want to try to find. Like maybe I still do a little bit of teaching people about politics and talk about politics,

but I gotta tall something. If tomorrow I can call it the new owner of the Islanders and like help run their team because they're not doing a great job, I would do it. I would totally do it, totally do it. And if I if you know, I live in fear of whom I saying I want to move back to Washington work for Hillary, Like I live in fear because I love New York City. If there's some way that I can contribute here somehow without actually being like, you know, like hood Hillary is gonna win? Is that

what she wants to see She's going to do? I don't know, you know, it's funny she is. Here's the straight strength of whom is that she's the vice chair of the campaign. She is constantly living in this planning mode that has to be by almost by definition seven eight days ahead, thinking about media buys, think about state by state primaries, and everything else in her own life, having a conversation with her of like what happens? What

what if you win New York? And then like do we have time maybe to go to Disneyland with Jordan? And as I can't, I can't think of I can't think, I can't, So to have a conversation about January seventeen not even conceivable. Um So, all of that being said, I kind of like what you. I kind of see you as kind of that kind of rhythm I want to have, Like I I want to figure out the kind of things that I like doing. I do like kibbitt singer about politics, but I don't want to go

do split screen arguing with people again. And and I I find much more pleasure and having people stop me on the street and I explained to them that what they just heard is bullshit and that it's that's not really And I am fascinated with this thing that everyone is trying to figure out, which is how younger people are consuming information about politics and governance and how to participate in that conversation in a way like find like they're talking and they're doing so you go to Reddit,

for example, and like this notion of apathy or the notion that these young people don't care. We've left them to some degree in electro politics, but that doesn't mean that there's not so some way to find them. And Bernie's tapping into maybe something or so I'm fascinated with that is kind of almost an academic level, like where is the new conversation about governance and politics going on?

And how do you find it and how do you inform it a little bit um And I do think that we're kind of getting close to an almost existential crisis in our democracy that the founding fathers did not think through. They would thought through about something happening too fast, did not think through this scenario where a relatively small number of people can stop anything from happening at all. And how we kind of figure out a way to jerry rigged the system to fix that problem or to

work around it. So these things interesting me, last, but not least, what do you want your son to know that you know? What do you want your son to learn that you've learned? Well? The I'm force fed a tougher version of that question of like, well, what do you want Jordan's to know about about Dad? Like what like I don't care about that? What would you like? What kind of man do you want Jordan to be?

I guess I, you know, one of the things if there's been a salutary and there are several, But I look at the public maelstrom around people's foibles a lot differently than I did. You know, you you develop an appreciation for people who are chewed up and spit out in this build up, tear down kind of thing, and it's given me, you know what I want someone to have. I want someone like Jordan's to have this notion of perspective, like you know, there's bad stuff, there's not so bad stuff.

They're complex people doing good and bad things and like and the well, we lose a little that nuance. And I'm not saying that in defense of me so much as I say that now I view the world a lot more that way. You know who you are, not who you are on your worst day. That's not who I am. Right, no one should be defined by the

shittiest thing they've ever that they've ever done. Um, But I and I think that we're in a world that in a weird way, we have this this cacophony of information going on, but everyone is tugging to this absolute pure place, like we've lost this conversation. Nuance is lost, like it's almost it's almost considered contemptible in political life,

like just have a nuanced, thoughtful position on something. And I guess I want him to be someone to to grow up being someone that sees that sees complexity, that sees that, you know, good stuff happens in badstone humanity and like see the and and see see that that kind of stuff and I and not be so sure

that you've got it right. Um, And that's kind of like those are the conversations I most like having when people are sure they've got something right, and I see, you know what, that's not really right, so and answer your question kind of to see complexity, see new ones. One of the reasons I love the city is that there's ways to do it, and hopefully I'll find some ways. I'm going to just finish with this one more time. I know you're going to ignore me because you're just

a tough You're very thing. I'm ready. I wasn't aware that I that you had you had said something, I had to go ahead, and that's something on Did I leave some opening? No, No, you've been been very gracious. You have been very You've been very open. Get back on the ice. The metaphorical, I get back on the metaphor.

I love your brother. But let me just it's not it's not like it's not like it's like, yeah, go ahad so go out for run for some by the way, something, Get back on, get back on the ice and public a lot. Am I doing here? Right? I think that I'm doing what you said. I mean I'm here. You know, when people ask me questions, I usually answer them right. I mean I'm not. I'm not. What's done is done? Dude, MyD you Is there anything have I have? I said?

I mean, you're doing this half of you know, boy, this is kind of tough and everything else, and half hold your head up. I mean, you too are giving me conflicting message. No, no, Michael, my message is not conflicting my message. I want you to get back out there and get into what you're also asking me to do, like reflection on a dark period of my life and that kind of stuff. And you know, I think that that's only normal because what interested in advance of you

doing the one. I'm curious what your thoughts are on the other. Like when I when I went through what I went through in my life. Oh, I did a lot of I was curled up in a fetal position for months doing a lot of thinking. And it does change you. Yeah. Well, that's the other thing that you realize pretty quickly when you've been through of these things and no one gives a shit right like you think when you're in the middle of it. Now, when it's you know, I mean all, with with all due difference,

your ship was nothing. Come out of mind was like becoming like a ridiculous thing. Um, But it doesn't matter, it doesn't look I can't say stuff like other people could say, Like I can't say I didn't murder anyone, and I didn't go to jail. I didn't I frankly, I think I did my job pretty well even in the height of this thing and everything else, and that even when it's yourself. Well, but I just right, because it's it's I. I can't say those things. Other people

have to judge those things. But all of that being said, it's true, I'm walking streets. I'm not. I don't you know, it's not I'm I'm okay and other people are not okay and I'm and I fully, I fully get that and I and I appreciate the opportunity to have have talks like this and I'm trying to be as transparent or like you can't run for mayor after having a scandal and then suddenly say, oh, I'm not talking about

that anymore. It's like I'm a public person. It didn't work out, um, but I still get to be be it of you. By the Great Alec Bola. Is there anything else you'd like to say before we wrap it up? I want to give you the last word. Uh no, no, you you do. This is your This is a god this is uncomfortable. Is a solid B plus interview. We're done. I do know this much. Anthony Weiner will find his

way back into public service. His brother Jason said, quote no one has been harder on him than he has been on himself, and he believes that the scandals could make his brother a better politician. This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to. Here's the thing