Hi, and welcome back to the Carol Markowitz Show on iHeartRadio. Our first child, our daughter, was three, when my middle son was born. I admit we were largely cruising along. She was just an insanely good baby, slept through the night at seven weeks old, but really came home from the hospital doing these amazing four hour sleep stretches that had us believing that we were like baby experts and not realizing that we had just gotten lucky. Then our
eldest son was born. He came home from the hospital sleeping forty five minute stretches. He was crankier, he cried more, all of it. I remember being such a walking zombie. It was the first time in my life that I understood how it was possible for a parent to leave a child in a car. I never did, thank god, but I truly remember this one time getting my daughter out of her car seat and being like, oh, yeah, there's a second one, and he's like sleeping quietly.
I have to remember to take him.
I was so out of it, and then my mom just started showing up at my house. She had come over a lot after I had my daughter too, But something unspoken happened after I had my son, she realized I needed her and she started coming every single morning. We made her a key and she'd let herself in.
She'd get my daughter ready.
For school or take my son for a walk so I could sleep. At the same time, my in laws were super involved as well.
My mother in law would have.
A standing weekly date to take my daughter to a Hebrew music class. She'd take her to the park. They would do stuff together. Also, my brother was single and my husband's sister was single, and they would babysit all the time.
All of this to say that I had.
A large amount of family help with my kids, and I kind of don't understand any other way. When my brother had his kids, I babysat for them. If we hadn't moved from New York to Florida, that would probably be a regular thing. My mom now helps my brother every day and she wouldn't trade it for anything.
My kids know that I.
Consider it a top priority for them to get married and have kids, and I'm committed to helping with those kids the same way that my mother and my in laws did for me. I say all of this because the fabulous Jane Ridley, who I got to know when she was at The New York Post has a piece up at Business Insider about how millennials want their parents to help with their kids, but the parents don't want to, and this piece is making a splash online.
People are arguing, you know, who's right and who's wrong.
Here, Jane shares the story of one grandmother, Marjorie Hirschberg, who told her daughter and then told the media that she didn't want to help anymore. In the piece, Jane quotes Hirshburg as being concerned because the grandchildren quote thought she had two separate homes mine and her parents, said Hirschburg, who had set up a room for two of the
grandchildren in her house. Her verdict to stop watching the kids, she said, was prompted by one of the grandchildren saying, let's go to mommy's house, as opposed to let's go.
To my house.
It's just insane. My kids have a room at their grandparents' house. It has a bed for each of them, toys, books, it's a place of safety and comfort. It's wild to me that a grandparent somehow wouldn't want that.
Look.
As a generation exer, I'm very quick to think millennials or gen z are spoiled and wrong about almost everything. But I get the argument that grandparents should be involved in the lives of their grandchildren. No one is saying stop living. I assure anyone listening that my in laws have a much more.
Active social life than you do.
They go out with their friends all the time, they travel a lot. My father in law still works full time.
But they love.
Being with their grandkids, and their grandkids love being with them.
We've created the.
Kind of world where I don't have to say to my kids, now, go give grandma a hug, because they run straight into their arms. I read a lot of stories like this, and I wish people would ask themselves, what's the point. What's the point of my life if not to spend it with my family. Again, that doesn't mean you can't do other things, But if your grandchild being extremely comfortable in your home makes you uncomfortable, that's
just bizarre. Family is everything, and if you're lucky enough to have a good one, it's just crazy to me that you wouldn't do everything possible to maintain that closeness. Coming up next and interview with Kennedy. Join us after the break, Hi, and welcome back to the Carol Markowitz Show on iHeartRadio. My guest today is the amazing Kennedy, one of the hosts of Fox News Saturday Night and the podcast Kennedy.
Saves the World.
Thanks so much for being on Kennedy, Carol. I will go anywhere and talk anytime with you.
Well, so, first of all, I was watching Fox News Saturday Night and I don't understand how you play fake News or Florida without me.
That game is my life.
If you were in New York, you could have been one of our panelists.
Absolutely you would have, and you might have been a ringer like you might have done so well that it would have shamed everyone else. I was surprised how well Charlie Gasperino did.
He was really ran the table.
Yeah. I think I only got one of them wrong. So yeah, I think I would have won. And that's why you didn't want to have me on.
I get it. You know, maybe you and Charlie could have a head to head next time.
So I would say that you're probably the most famous libertarian around.
Is that accurate?
Say?
In the world?
No?
World?
Yeah?
Wait, there are those like lists of libertarians we love comes out. I'm I'm like what numbered seven hundred and eighty No, I never.
Paul. Okay, yeah, okay, second to Ron Paul. Fine, the Pauls don't count really, I mean, okay, non politician libertarians.
There are a lot of very famous libertarians out there, are there a lot of libertarian because you know that libertarians have to like if you are if you claim to be a libertarian, there are one hundred libertarians pop up Troy, Troy, you're non or you say this one thing one time, so you're estranged warmonger.
You are right, I get that.
So what do you think people misunderstand about being a libertarian?
Well, it now means so many different things. So I've got a good friend who no longer calls herself a libertarian. She calls herself a classical liberal because she feels like the term has been bastard. And you know, people who claim to be libertarians have been marginalized in this playpen of absurdity. And you know, the people assume that libertarians just want everything to be like Pioneer Courthouse Square and Portland, Oregon.
Right, they just want you know.
It's like drugs and sexual assaults, and you know, people doing that.
I can't get enough.
And just like you know, feces everywhere sea and like that is somehow the libertarian ideal, and for me, that is not the ideal.
It's actually a civil society where people have agreed upon rules and there are also agreed upon punishment. So if you violate the rules, you know what you're up against, which you know it is an imbalance of punishment in places like Portland, which you know, they've taken these great cities Francisco, La, Seattle, Minneapolis, Portland and they've just flushed him down the toilet. And you know, I was talking
to one economist who said that Portland committed suicide. And many of these choices have been overt and leaders have gone, you know what, Yeah, let's encourage people to sleep literally anywhere. Let's stop arresting people for just about anything, and let's have this free for all, so you can no longer have free association and what used to be one of the most livable cities in the country.
Right, So I noticed he don't say New York though in that list, I.
Was sticking out West. But New York. New York has its own set of problems.
New York is such a big place and it's not impossible to govern, but it just has not been governed well. And to Mayor Adam's credit, I think half the time he really does try. I think that he really is plagued by frustration. I think that he's you know, phenomenally better than build the Blasio. Yeah, but he's where So No, Deblagio really did more to harm the city than any
mayor I have seen since I have lived here. I haven't lived here as long as you have, but I first moved here in the fall of nineteen ninety two and have seen you know, various iterations and evolutions of the city. And build a Blasio put the city in such a downward spiral that it's impossible to recover from in one mayor old term.
I feel like a lot of people ask me, like, why didn't I leave New York sooner? And my answer to that is always like things were so good for so long that we almost expected to coast with.
Deblasio, and we did for a little while.
His first term was a lot of coasting on previous you know, accomplishments of you know, the Bloomberg and the Giuliani eras. But eventually we ran out of steam and his actual governance started to take cold and I had to go, Oh, but you know, I root for New York to come back. I think Mayor Adams is infinitely better than Deblasio.
I think he's he can't.
Really do what he wants to do in a lot of ways or say what he wants to say, which is a problem.
But you know, better than the last guy, for sure.
Yeah.
And there's a natural power struggle between Albany and New York City because the governor of New York wants to be the boss of New York City. But New York State wouldn't be New York State without new York City, right, It's tax base.
And so there you've.
Got these two powerful figures who are always at odds with each other. But I think Kathy Hochel is one of the most incompetent governors in the country. I think she's absolutely awful on just about everything.
Oh, I agree.
I'm really bombed that she won outright.
Yeah, it's sad that New Yorkers don't demand more from their leaders and with their votes.
Yeah, I absolutely agree.
So a question that I ask all of my guests is what do you think is our largest cultural or societal problem in America, and do you think it's solvable.
The biggest problem is it's kind of broad, but it is the encroachment of government into all aspects of our lives. Because when government becomes so big and so powerful, when they have so much money, when we are beholden to them with our tax dollars, they do have much more say over what we do, how we can start businesses, regulating businesses, how our kids can be educated, withholding choices
from parents on how their kids can be educated. And then what that turns into is when you have kids who are educated by propagandists who are beholden to the status. The status need an entire generation of people to be dependent on government to make governments flourish, and so there it fosters this climate of victimhood where you know, kids are told that they are either victims or they are oppressors, but either way they are at odds with each other.
And the only thing that can break that cultural stalemate is government intervention. And you know, it is created this vicious cycle that it's going to be very very difficult to break free from.
I do have hope.
I you know, I have two teenage girls I talk to them, I talk to their friends. We talk about politics, and I'm finding, especially with some of the teenage boys that I talk to, that they are much more skeptical of government. It's really funny because the only way to rebel nowadays it's it's not to be it's not to be trans you know, it's not to be non binary.
It's to be a Republican and so and a lot of teenage boys like all they want to do is pissed people off, and so they found the easiest way to do that is to be Republican.
Yeah.
I can't imagine any child of Kennedy's is going to be status.
So you know, no, I told them.
I told my girls, Like then, it's really funny that you say that because.
You are from Russia. My mom is from Romania.
And the only rule that I have, like, I don't care if you're a Democrat. I don't care if you're a democratic socially not be a communist in my house. Like, if you can back up whatever you say and whatever you believe with facts, with data, with statistics, that's fine. We can have a discussion. We can have a rational discussion. I'll be skeptical of you. You can be skeptical of me. We'll find areas of agreement. You may not be a communist if you are. If you're a communistic, you may
not live in my house. You may not take my stuff I am. You are not entitled to anything I have.
I love it. Yeah.
So you got your start very famously as a VJ and MTV, and you know, I feel like so many people just remember you being such a unique voice on there. Did you get a lot of like pushback from people? Were you, you know, a libertarian then? You know, was everybody around you a communist?
I was a libertarian. There weren't a lot of communists.
There were a lot of moderate Clinton Democrats, and they were really excited and they had a lot of momentum going into the nineties because I was hired at MTV in September of nineteen ninety two. The election obviously was in November, and the Clinton era began when my time at MTV began.
So you had a lot of people who were, you know.
Very pleased with being in the majority after twelve years of Reagan Bush and it was it was interesting because it was a little bit more politically charitable. I did get pushed back, but being you know, because I considered myself to be a Republican at the time, because I didn't have words for what it meant to be a libertarian. I didn't know what it meant to be a libertarian
at that time. But there was more charity because I was seen as kind of this nutty unicorn and then there was a character based on me on Murphy Brown McGovern and I was always somebody I know that super yeah, I was always super embarrassed by that. But now I look back and I'm like, you know, I wish I had embraced that more. I wish I had pushed back a little bit more. But I did talk about politics.
I did go on CNBC because Fox News wasn't around yet when I was there, and I would go on shows and I would argue with people and it was.
A fun time.
But there was definitely more curiosity for the other side. And that doesn't happen now, Like if there were any kind of ATV reunion, they would never have me back because I represent you know, conservative media, and I'm like, guess what. The people that I was partying with and talking to and playing videos for my needs a lot of them are libertarians now.
A lot of them are conservatives now.
And they've got families, and they've got businesses, and they live through the pandemic and they are some of the most skeptical people on the planet. And that's who I get to talk to every single day. I didn't change. I didn't have to change.
Yes, you know I can.
I can speak the truth and I can and even if you don't believe what I believe, I can at least back it up with some evidence that's right.
And I mean, I think you're one of the better known people, you know from all of MTV. Really, I don't know that they wouldn't have you on would be crazy because I think that, you know, you'd be definitely you know, you have most famous libertarian plus top three MTV VJs. I think of all time that people would you know, be able to name. We're going to take a quick break and be right back on the Carol marco It Show. Is it weird living a public life being recognized.
It's funny because I have been on TV for a majority of my life. So I'm fifty one now, I've been on TV since I was twenty and then when I was on MTV. It was such a different time because my old boss Andy has explained this so well. It was like opening up your laptop and there was no Facebook, there.
Was no Safari. It just went right right to MTV. That's all there was.
And you know, we had a cultural monopoly and didn't really appreciate it. And you know, every once in a while the music labels would talk about starting a channel and things like that would pop up, but it MTV still had the monopoly on everything until they stopped playing music and really went into reality TV, which everyone else was doing at that time, and so the audience share sort of dissipated pretty quickly. But at that time it
was just us. We didn't have social media, thank god, because I don't know what I would have posted in some of my more impulsive moments. But it was there was such hyper focus, and I just learned how to not look people in the eye and I always wore hats.
And so now media is.
So diffuse, like there's so many media outlets and there's so many people. Everyone has a podcast, like everyone's got a show, so there are so many outlets that no few people are that famous anymore. And you know, of course, I didn't realize at the time the people who were making news and music would turn out to be icons.
Like I didn't know, you know, obviously when cro Cobaine was alive, that the conversations that we had would mean so much to me later in life, and that that would be the object of curiosity when I talk to people about my time at MTV later, and it's it's bittersweet because I look back and it was such an incredible moment and we all had so much fun and
we're really appreciating and living in every moment. But I look back and I know so many people who have died since then, and you know, some of them, you know, like Kurk Cobain, like Chris Cornell, Uh, they're really tragic, Scott Weiland, right, you know. And there are people that they're just no longer here, like their story, their personal story ended, and so what gets created after that is myth. But yeah, it's weird, But also like I've been through
so much. I've been through so many up and downs personally and professionally that I was really able to when I left MTV kind of find myself and exists outside of a realm where I needed to be famous and needed the outside not attention but AGUALI yeah, and and the outside force of anything else. And I learned to create an identity that was mine and have never really
left that. So it's like, if I weren't famous tomorrow, I would be fine with that, you know, if my broadcast career goes on for another thirty years, like, I'm good with that too.
Do you feel like you've made it?
I feel like.
Every job I had since MTV I've felt like was a bonus round. And I say that because I knew so many people and they called it the curse of MTV, so many people who were VJs who really never heard from again, right, And you know, because there wasn't a natural media outlet for so many people to go who had cycled through as VJs that you know, other than
music radio people didn't really do much. And so that was that was a huge source of anxiety for me the whole time I was there, and I was always looming over me, like what am I going to do after this? And it wasn't until I left and started living my own life that I was like, oh, there's so much you can do anything else.
On top of that has been a giant bonus.
And it's funny because I have been at Fox twice as long as I was at MTV.
Wow, that's really amazing. I didn't realize that.
I recently saw pictures of you and Cat Timp on a safari trip in Africa.
One of the things that we'd get into.
I mean, first of all, jealous obviously, but that's a side note. But something that I cover a lot on this show is making friends in adulthood, maintaining friendships when you have kids.
How do you do it? How is the trip? Tell us everything?
So the trip was great.
Cat and I bonded when her mom died a year before my father passed away, and she was one of the first people who reached out to me, and she reached out to me with humor, which I really appreciated because you know, grief is it's such a dynamic thing that sometimes it's really heavy and it just feels like you're wearing a lead vest and you're walking through cement.
It's very difficult to concentrate. It's hard to do day to day tasks, and you know, other days you have this energy and you don't know where it comes from, and it kind of worries you. But you don't do very much is laugh, like you don't give your self professional laugh, and people don't.
Know how to laugh with you.
They don't want to trivialize your grieving process. But someone who was fresh to the process, who was able to laugh with me, we bonded very deeply over that and have been friends ever since. And you know we have, we've traveled together. She came to Greece with me with her husband last year for my fiftieth birthday. And so my swim coach is from South Africa and is putting together a safari business and so he needed like two clients as a maiden voyage to go through the entire process.
And he asked if I had a friend I would like to go with, and so I called Kat and she was like, absolutely, Lion King.
Is my favorite movie. I had been to Africa, so I know, like you have to jump in with both feet, and she did. And it was a magical trip from beginning to end.
Where when you allow things to happen and you don't try to control them and you just take in your surroundings, that's when magical things really happen in your life, and from the moment we got there, we saw things that are so rare to see on safari. So the wild dogs, they're called painted wolves. There are so few of them left in Africa. It is the most endangered carnivorous species in Sub Saharan Africa, and their numbers are dwindling. They're
phenomenal predators. They're absolutely beautiful. They look they do look like paintings. They look otherworldly, and they don't bark, they squeak. And so we saw this big pack with lots of pups and they're very efficient hunters.
And then the next day there are only five white lions that live in the wild world, and we saw three events.
And so then then the next day we saw a day old elephant with its umbilical cord still attached, and we saw a leopard, Like it's really difficult to see leopards in the wild. We saw a leopard that was three feet from us that had just killed an adult kudoo, which is like a giant antelope, and had eaten half the carcass, and its belly was the size of a medicine ball. And so this leopard was exhausted and it was protecting its kill, their vultures swirling overhead signaling to
other hunters that there's fresh prey here. Yeah, a hyena had already stolen the stomach, and so the leopard is fighting off the hyenas, the vultures and the worry of a lion pride coming through and trying to steal the kill because a leopard can't fight a pride of lions.
That is crazy. Was it like?
It was it one thing after another.
We laughed so hard, We had so much fun, and the places that we want, we're just they were magical beyond belief. Part of the magic is it's not Disneyland. There are no walls, there are no cast members.
Yeah.
There were two male lions that walk through the lawn at dinner.
Yeah, and there's no fence between you and the lions. There is nothing.
And then we walk outside the same night and there were two male cape buffalo and a third coming up behind them. And male cape buffalo who have left the herd are some of the most dangerous animals in Africa because they give you absolutely no warning. They gore you with their giant horns and then they crush you with the top of their head and then they stomp on you until you're intro Yeah, it's but it's really interesting, Like you don't react with your fear the way you
think you would. You react by being very calm and very still and hyper observant. And it's amazing how quickly you get back in touch with senses.
That you don't use on a daily basis in active city life.
Going.
That's it I have.
It's awesome. It's absolutely right.
So and here with.
Your best tip for my listeners on how they can improve their lives.
Oh, I'm so glad you asked that.
So I just did a podcast that Kennedy Saves the World podcast about cold showers.
Cold showers lots.
Of scientific benefits.
Yep. And every shower like hot bath with it.
Do a hot bath and then finish with the cold shower and just steal everything in. Get as much sleep as you possibly can. I'm a huge fan of meditation. There's no such thing as being good at meditation. Your mind will wander. You just have to come back to it. You have to constantly come back to a meditator process. But it is one of the most helpful things that I have found.
Right, I'm going to meditate and take a cold shower tonight, and I will think of you, Kennedy.
Thank you the best weep.
I hope so well. Thank you so much for coming on. Loved having you. Please come back another time.
You are just the You are amazing, Carol, and I love reading what you write. I love that you have a podcast now. I think iHeartRadio is a perfect home for you. Thank you, Thank you so much for having me.
Thank you, Kennedy, Thanks so much for joining us on The Carol Markowitz Show. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.