Transcripts For KQED Charlie Rose 20170216

There was a conversation that was happening after my first cover, is she fat or not. And i think thats that that was literally what the conversation was. And you know, thats insane to me that anyone, i mean, honestly, anyone can call me fat, its fine. But its insane to me that that is actually something that were debating. It shouldnt be if im fat or not. It should be how i feel. If i feel confident, if im proud of my body, if i am at a good place. Micklethwait we conclude with my conversation with maggie siff from the showtime series billions. I dont think she would be in that job or in that marriage, actually f she didnt have a huge quantities of sort of respect, curiosity and empathy for who these men are and how much theyre ego and their will to dominate really, like, consumes them. I think shes by turn fascinated. I think she feels tenderly towards it, and sometimes horrified. Sometimes titillated, like she is a very complicated character. Micklethwait politics, Sports Illustrated and maggie siff when we continue. Funding for charlie rose is provided by the following and by bloomberg, a provider of multimedia news and Information Services worldwide. Captioning sponsored by Rose Communications from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. Good evening, im John Micklethwait editor in chief for bloomberg nil filling in for chartie rose. Michael flynn resigned on monday night after reports refeeled he had mislead the Vice President about his communication with russias ambassador. Intercepting calls and phone records gathered by u. S. Intelligence agencies then revealed further contact between the Trump Campaign and russian intelligence officials last year. Earlier today france warned russia against interfering in its own upcoming president ial election after the center left frontrunner accused moscow of cyberattacks targeting his campaign. And now theres news that russia is secretly deployed a Cruise Missile in violation of a major arms control treatee. But what exactly is a putin up to . What is russias grand strategy . Joining me now for a discussion is mario calvo platero, set u. S. Editor of the italian newspaper il sole 24 ore. Edward epstein is an veggive journalist author of how america lost its secrets, edward snowden, the man and the theft. And gideon rose, the editor of Foreign Affairs magazine and an old friend of this program. Welcome. Gideon, why dont we begin with you. Set the scene, what exactly does russia want from all this . So there is the crazy stuff going on in america and elsewhere. But the russian part actually isnt that crazy. The russian part is pretty straight forward. Vladimir putin is a smart, ruthless, leader of a strong but not dominant power whose trying to advance his own countrys interests in whatever way he can. Now the main things that he is trying to do are resist what he sees as regional encroachment and therefore he wants to push out on his borders and get nice compliant border states. And the second thing is he wants to undermine the liberal order that the United States and its allies have constructed that essentially runs much of the world. And so what putin is trying to do in a variety of different ways is advance Russian National interests, push the actual edges of his sphere of influence outward and undermine his enemies. So the electoral stuff is largely designed to mess with other countries, ideally if you can, to get prorussia people elected, but even if not, just to simply cast doubt on the notion that liberal democracy is worthwhile, that these people are efficient, that there is any real difference between whats going on in the west and whats happening in russia. Micklethwait this broad policy which you might describe as making russia great again or another wellknown political phrase, how is this advanced by what has happened in the first couple of days. Surely that causes problems, doesnt it. Well, if im a middle power or a minor great power and the superpower goes into complete and utter disfunction, then even if its policies dont ultimately benefit me because i have somebody friendly to me in power, if it looks like the u. S. Is chaotic, if u. S. Democracy is nothing serious, if there are all sorts of violations, and the u. S. Principles and ideals are revealed to be irrelevant, then russia benefits because the alternate world order that has kept countries like russia on the margins and delegitimized them, weakens and allows more space for russia to move forward. Would putin have going on the assumption that maybe, just maybe is he the alleged instigator of this. But would he be pleased about this coming out . No. Putin is obviously not going to be pleased that his schemes which are all done sort of behind the scenes and in the dark, are coming up to the fore. So, and hes certainly not happy that flynn was out because whatever the connections that flynn had with russia, he clearly was sim pathetic to russia. So theyve lost an ally and theyve gotten embarrassed in the process by having their contacts revealed. So this particular element of the situation isnt good for russia. On the other hand the more that the u. S. And the Trump Administration looks disfunctional and show out of touch with reality or completely corrupt or whatever, or in turmoil, that helps russia because anything that hurts the u. S. In russias terms helps russia. Do you agree with that . You followed russian espionage probably as long as anyone. What do you think was the goal here . Completely consistent with what gideon says, putin has stated on a number of occasions that his central policy is opposing a unipolar america, a unipolar world dominated by america. Hes against american hegemony. What were seeing in cyberspace is basically a new phase of the intelligence war. And to understand this new intelligence war, the rise of the russian intrusions, aggressive intrusions, we cannot understand that unless we understand the decline of the cape abilities and the impairment of american intelligence and especially the nsa. I think you were about to mention the word snowden. Would you say that allowed the the changes post snowden allowed russia to do more in america, to watch it less. The moment snowden got on a plane with 1. 5 million files according to the House Intelligence Permanent Select Committee on intelligence, the status quo changed. Whatever he did with those documents, even if he dumped them in the ocean, the nsa had to assume they were compromised. And what you do with intelligence when its compromised is you press the selfdestruct switch, all the sources it took five months to go through the sources in these 1. 5 million files, took a team of 250 people working around the clock, all these sources have to be closed down. This was 2014. In the years that followed, we basically had no dominance in cyberspace, when the cats are away, the russians will play. Micklethwait lets bring in the european angle. If you were living in france, you would be by the fact that the frontrunner is claiming that putin is also involved there. Yes, yes, the frontrunner is mcrone and gideon is right. There is a general underlying plan which is to undermine the liberal system, to undermine the multilateral system that had been created gi the u. S. , and europe on an operational basis becomes the central target. Its near by the border, a weaker europe is very important to Vladimir Putin. And so he starts to hit the various European Countries. The interesting fact about mckroan who is an attractive young man who all of a sudden has the chance of becoming the next president of france, after the crisis crisis we had, and you know. Micklethwait it is interesting, fion is somebody who has gone on about being nice tore russia. Because its very interesting. The European Public opinion likes putin, thinks that putin, after all, is a good leader. Hes doing good things for his country. I found it astonishing to realize when i was back in italy or you know we were debating things, the fact that he got crimea, well, after all, you know, thats russia. What are they complaining about. The sanctions back fired because the idea that started, you know, to become more and more widespread also with russian propaganda, they have been excellent with the propaganda. I mean putin has played a masterful game, has been that the sanctions are hitting much more the European Countries than the u. S. Micklethwait why then, maybe gideon could come in on this as well. One interesting thing seems to be the europeans seem to be telling trump repeatedly, please keep the sanctions on. Yes. Well, that is, you know, particularly merkel and the fact that there are, you know, theyre all part of the same group, lets say. The it he european level. But the Public Opinion thinks differently. So there is that aspect. And to go back to mcrone it is interesting. Because you had Russian Media like russia talk, or sputnik which is another sort of gossip or anyway propaganda media started to divulge news about mcrone, that hes gay, that he has a lover, and hes married with his former professor. So they got into the personal issue here. He denied with some humor. Exactly. There was some humor but theyre saying that more is going to come very soon, and through a sang by the way. You know, i think that i think its a little bit wrong to focus too much on russia and putin as this incredibly nev arious operation. Not because theyre not nev arious, but because its kind of expected, right . This is who Vladimir Putin is, and even if you had a somewhat less personally nasty guy, i mean someone without didnt go out and kill his journalistic or political opponents just to get him off the scene. If you had somebody who was less of a thug, less brutal. More cuddly. A kinder, gentler putin will still be advancing russias interest, will still have largely similar Foreign Policy, lets you change to a nonauthoritarian system in russia, the real problem here is not so much that russia is trying to do these things because frankly the United States of all people, t the uni, whether in eur your mean countries who are actually collaborating. That is the real danger here and the real worry. Its not that the russians are trying, opening doors, pat moynihan used to liken the russians during the cold war to a burglar going down the street, trying to open doors to see if any were unlocked in the night. And he said you had to lock the doors. The difference now is we have somebody saying hey, come on in, and be part of our election and undermine our system. Thats the danger. Its the people in the west who are collaborating with the russians that are the surprising aspect of it. It is not that the russians are not nasty. You kind of expect them to be nasty and were Strong Enough and able enough to oppose that if we want to. It is the element inside that are letting the enemy inside the gates that are the real danger. You see that, a lot of European Business leaders as well. Do you see that in terms of people wanting to do deals with russia . They want to do deals with russia. At every level. The European Businessmen says you know, come on, enough already. Lets lets stop the sanctions. Lets find a solution for the ukraine. Micklethwait has they time gone too far. The fact that you suddenly have people all around the world debating whether russia is interfering in their elections, thats not the way to encourage friends. The interesting thing about the latest sanctions, the ones that obama put on in december is basically we threw out a number of Russian Diplomats from the United States. And since the beginning of the vienna treaty, 150 years, the quid pro quo was you retaliated by throwing out diplomats from your country. But putin did not. Instead he invited the diplomats children to his christmas party. Now whats interesting here and goes to what gideon was saying about collaboration, we now have a telephone call, a number of calls from general flynn, just at the time of these sanctions, did he Say Something which lead putin to think if i wait another 28 days, which is the time that trump would be inaugurated, would trump do something that will reward me for not retaliating. Tweeted once having a Good Relationship with russia is a good thing, not a bad one. It is interesting, there is is an element of truth to this. There are people who are so hostile to russia and so eager to recklessly get into conflict that you could imagine russia policies that were even more agressive than necessary and that provoked conflict and provoked real encirclement. And we should avoid those policies. I have for example not been a fan of arming the ukrainians and i think that what we should do is try at this point contain rather than trying to roll back. And there are areas of cooperation. Whether its iran like the Iran Nuclear Deal or whether it is potentially antiterrorism, you could imagine a workable, practical cooperation with russia on some issues. The problem is that what is being talked about is not that but something much more hey, lets be really nice to russia acrosstheboard. Let all the bad things that we are doing to them and hope that they play nice. Its so naive that it makes you question is there something behind the scenes that were not seeing. Gideon, wasnt this how the Obama Administration started with its restart and Hillary Clinton . No, what happened with yes, in one sense, so i have actually heard europeans say you know what, this is the third consecutive reset. We actually were reminded about hillary because we would have at least had a different policy. Now you are doing the same thing again. Be nice to russia, hope you request have a better relationship with putin and then become disillusioned with it. But these guys are, that is how everybody in the field, every professional is ed raking the papers obsessively, gossipping with each other. Because nobody can understand the its like a force, as could mick force moving things in a direction that we dont see. And so it is that invisible forgs that nobody is quite sure what is going on. Thats why we are all. The general assumption of all of news different ways is russia is opportunistic and has a longterm strategy to make russia great again. Again, surely on this potential possibility, maybe of sanctions being rolled back, hes much less likely to get sanctioned rolled back now in the back of all this stuff about cybersecurity than he was before. I think thats absolutely true. And to the extent that part of this operation on his part on putins part was a very direct and simple quid pro quo, that this might get in the way of that, the revelation of the operation. On the other hand, getting the u. S. If the russians did indeed interfere with the election in such a way as to help affect the outcome and if indeed that throws the u. S. Into turmoil, and if indeed sort of you have giant chaos in the u. S. Alliance system and the world order as a result, you would have to say if you are russia, maybe i dont get the sanctions relief that i wanted but im kind of happy how this is playing out because right now the entire world order is in crisis, and since i dont like that order, i am benefiting from this. And i have to say, that putin, you know, has been working on this for decades. I mean he hated, you know, he was back with, you know, in the years of gorbachev and yellsin in the creme lynn an he saw the country crumbling. So he promised to himself that he had to do something about it. And so it is not an improvisation. Clearly he has very vivid ideas about how to go, how to go to this. But there is also one thing about europe. I disagree with the fact that this is going to be bad for him, because of this intrusion, because it all depends on who is going to win these elections. I mean you know if maureen la pen wins in france, its a disaster. Shes not going to win, but you know, its still provoking and there would be still a large part of Public Opinion that would say lets work with putin. Micklethwait personally seems to fascinate trump and putin more than anyone else, angela merkel. She sits there, there is at least some noises from people around merkel but she is paranoid about what putin might try to do to her. Yeah, absolutely. But she started actually quite ahead of the game to start po put out, you know, measures to stop some kind of cyberattack. But she is in trouble because of the syrian refugees. And you know, all of a sudden we have Martin Schultz who came as the candidate of the socialists. And the moment he announced, he made a jump of ten points. But i dont see a problem in germany. You know, if we have to talk about germany, in a way germany is partially responsible for the situation, because it did not open up to an Economic Policy that was progrowth and i am among those that think that merkel has been narrow minded on this. Can i follow up on that for a second. I think its a good point. If the mainstream Political Parties in the main major western countries that have dropped the ball by not dealing with major problems in their countries and their economies over a long period of time, which allowed a general popular feeling to spring up, that essentially said the elites in our country are not delivering what they should as much as they should, and that kind of dissatisfaction with mainstream parties is what has created the opening for all this other stuff to happen. And while all the while im as opposed to many of the populist parties platforms and opposed to the russian actions, i think that its hypocritical for western elites not to acknowledge that this all could have been prevented and could still be solved if mainstream western Political Parties were to adopt real and serious responses to the major problems in their countries and their economies, and do so in a krukive way rather than simply giving tax cuts to rich people or doing silly tested pc kind of things on the other side. In some ways to make the case for the western elites, briefly. They they would look at the trump white house, surely and say this is what happens when you put a populist in, is that it seems to be chaos, all today, im just tell turning the conversation back on to trump. How much trouble is he in, do you think from your per of trusn experts in the United States, right. If you think back to brexit, michael gov famously said when asked what do you say to all the economists and experts who think brexit is going to be a disaster, he his response was i think the country has had enough of experts, right . That is the motive and mindset and attitude behind the Trump Administration. The problem is you cant actually run a country, you cant even run an ad mrgs and you certainly cant run the world with a bunch of amateurs. And theyre trying to do that and youre seeing it screw up as a result. My feeling is the big picture here is this ends only one of two ways. Either the amateurism continue its and you end up getting a full scale crisis because they literally cannot run the government or create giant blowups with American Allies and american enemies and the public at large or congress, or this finally gets shaken out and the flynn thing becomes one step along the way towards an ultimate course shift in which the administration changes. Gary koan and these. This is accidental. Right. The Trump Administration is falling part. The elites, New York Timeses, the accounts on foreign relations, the elites have never seen them so opposed to a president there is no honeymoon period. They have come down on him harder than nixon at the height of watergate. And we dont know the pressures being brought on them, the leaks from the new york office of the fbi. The leaks from the senate, the leaks from the, Trumps Administration itself are completely unraveling this. It is not like hes unraveling himself although hes doing a good job of that too. The idea that trump seems to have moved away from the two state solution in the middle east. I think thats exaggerated. What trump seems to say with netanyahu, was hey, two state, one state, whatever you guys want, i just want to deal, i want to do that. Rather than interpret that comment as i am changing u. S. Policy cuz i dont believe in the privacy of a twostate solution, i think this is somebody who doesnt actually know anything at all about the issue, has never thought about it, and is simply his way of saying hey, i kind of want to deal and lets have everything on the table and talk about it. And then people will go back and actually negotiate stuff and. Its more a sign of rampant amateurism than a different and new policy. What will happen with tie want at the beginning. Exactly. The interesting question as you put it, okay, what will they walk back. Theyve walked back the were going to change one china policy, some of the stuff on settlements. They walk back the item they will rip up the iran deal. We dont know how far that goes and how trump himself, how comfortable he is backtracking. To me you had mentioned gary couldhen, this is a really interesting. Gary couldhen is the head of the National Economic council and the guy in the white house. Formally at goldman sax. It is not just goldman sax, all the big wall street guy, people in finance that i know think incredibly highly of gary couldhen. They think hes a very serious guy and they think is he able to provide precisely the kind av dult supervision were you talking about. The interesting thing is there is nobody in the white house who can provide adult supervision yet on National Security and Foreign Policy. Mattis at the pentagon, hopefully tillerson may be, we dont really know because he never has done this scrob but is obviously serious in other respects. And there are some people outside in the departments but in the white house, theres nobody who does National Security or Foreign Policy in the white house who can provide anything like adult professional supervision. And whether they get ssh like that, like a gary cohen for Foreign Policy we would all be able to breathe some relief. The thing where people get frightened of america having a very dom nantd Foreign Policy, they did under george w. Bush for awhile and even more frightened when they think they dont know what the american Foreign Policy will be. You know what, this whole last couple of months, the last few months has made me more sense tifer to the sensitive to the frustration American Allies must feel at having their fates so completely tied to something they cant control. My heart went out to shino abe and the entire shinzo abe and the entire japanese people watching him forced to come and make actually a cow tow to suck up to the new president swus because they want to make sure that the entire defense structure of japan remains in play. What i thought was very interesting today, is europe. There was a big meeting in brusesel with nato allies and it basically said you guys have to pay up, otherwise were tbg to reduce our remembers going to reduce our forces in europe. This came as a surprise. It was a sort of an alignment with what trump says, and it was not in the same line of what the Prime Minister of the u. K. , when she was here said. She said oh, hes 100 percent behind nature nato. Hes negotiating. There is a constant negotiation going on. But i would not take on face value whatever he says. Because it may be. We should end with one thing quickly on putin. Do we expect putin to be weaker. Do you expect putin to be weaker or stronger, especially in his ability to influence america in years time . I think putin now is as strong as he has ever been. And he will try to stay at least as strong as he is now. Think what he has done in syria, et cetera, et cetera. So so far i dont see even with this news that are enforcing him in other quarters, in a nonmainstream Political Parties. I see putin being quite strong. America is still a superpower that has no parallel or equal am our army, our nuclear forces. Putin might have gained some tack kal space but i think the rest of the world looks to america for leadership. And who knows what is going to happen tomorrow or the next day but if the administration doesnt implode t will have to get as gideon suggests some adult leadership. And once it has that, we might last four years. I agree with what ed just said in the sense that i think that there is no visibility at this point more than a few weeks, even days ahead, this is all breaking so quickly on so many fronts, theyve theyve been so slow at staffing up the administration. They have no change. Its almost impossible to predict what is going to happen more than a few weeks out. And that will make all the difference in terms of what happens next. If i were frankly an american ally i would be in effect playing a shortterm defensive game to keep my head down and not have things screw up in some major way until the dust settles, the storm blows over and were back to some form of normality because what has been going on the past month cannot be sustained for too much longer and at that point whether it blows up or comes back closer to normal, then well be able to scope out what the future looks like. Micklethwait first survive the mall stop. Thank you very much. The maelstrom. Thank you very much. Good evening, im Andrew Ross Sorkin filling 234 for charlie rose, Sports Illustrated revealed its swimsuit issue, it has show showcased the worlds most beautiful and striking figures, joining me is kate upton, the 2017 cover model it is her third time on the cover in the last six years. And also joining me is mj day, she has been editor of the swimsuit issue since 2012 and has worked on each addition since 1998 and im pleased to have them both with me to date. Thank you. You have an amazing story which is to say that you started at the magazine literally sorting bathing suits in a closet. Yeah. Its truly working your way up from the bottom. So lets talk about how this happened am you had been on the cover before, but you had not been in the magazine for the past two years, so how does this work . Do you have to beg her to be in the magazine . Do you have to beg to be in the magazine . How does this process happen . No, i mean kate and i have been friends since she first was in the issue, back when she was 18. And you know, i mean kates achieved and continues to achieve everything that we hope for the women that are in the magazine which is to exceed, you know, modeling. And to branch out into other areas. And you know, she was dominating, she dominates all of media in the industry. And of course we want everyone to spread their wings and fly. That is what she did. She is an actress, she is an entrepreneur, she is all of these wonderful things. How did it feel to be on the cover the third time, different than the first two . Yes, well, every year its that im on the cover is so special. Like it doesnt matter how many times you have been on the cover, its still such a special event. Everything that goes into making this one photo makes it special even inside the magazine am but to see it on the cover is a whole other experience. Did you think you were going to be on the cover. Is this a surprise to you. It was a complete surprise. I hoped to be on the cover. But as soon as mj told me what the theme of this years magazine was which was about empowering women of all shapes and sizes and ages, i knew i wanted to be in the magazine no matter what. But to be on the cover is a whole other level. Are you on the cover i should say three times. I told the producers, this is very distracting to have this right here this way. Why three different covers this time . Because there were three amazing pictures. And i loved how they were all very, very different. But they all spoke to who kate is in different ways. And you know, its like a fashiony cover, there is like a supertraditional sexy sportsity straighted cover and one where they push the envelope. Which one, define them for us. Which is which. Im in the jacket, the jacket i what say old factored moment. There is the fashion. Almost an homage to antarcticaa. Okay. And what is this. That is our jewelry cover and that was sort of like, lets just try this. The stylist was like lets do this. I said great, lets try it. It looked amazing. And this one. That is our traditional s, cover. Dare i ask, do you have a favorite . I mean i love them all because of how different they are. But whenever we were shooting the white string. Call it it that. The white rope, the macrame one piece, it would be tbeat for europe. Did you know, im curious, as an editor when you are onsite watching the photo, do you know this is working or this isnt working. Yeah, oh my god, yes. She is an amazing editor. That is what it is to be an amazing editor is to help guide everybody on set in the right direction so we can make the best image that we can make as efficiently as possible. Do you know when its working or not working. I mean yeah ive learned over the years when its working and where the lights coming from and what angle theyre shooting at, there is a lot that goes into it and the more you do it. Are there things where too far dare i say how much skin you show . I mean theres a certain level of trust, right. So of course you know, these two there is a lot of skin happening. Even this one, cuz you dont know where you are pulling the jacket, et cetera. But there is a lot of trust that goes into it it with the photographer and with the final pic. You know, and i worked with u. S. A. I so many years. I trust that he was going to find the most elegant image of a sexy situation. Where does this, now the theme of this years magazine has so much to do with different body types. Where is that come from and where does Sports Illustrated the swimsuit issue fit into culture today . Well, i mean, i think that the theme comes from the realization and you know, Sports Illustrated embracing that, the reality of the situation is that no one should be fed one particular ideal of beauty and that its very subjective. And it encompasses a wide range of body types and skin colors and statures and everything, and all of the above. And i think that you know, Sports Illustrated, honestly has been one of the guiding lights in this evolution, and this, you know, cultural conversation thats now happening around the industry. And what is considered accessible, and whats considered worthy of being celebrated. And our answer to that is that all body types are beautiful. An all women are beautiful. And every one has a different ideal of what beauty is. Right. A critic might say kate upton is still on the cover though. Kate upton is the person that launched this conversation five years ago. And something that i was thinking about today was that five years ago when she appeared, she was, people came after her about her size. And how she was not a traditional standard body size. They called you perfect, you heard that before. Yeah, i mean flat out called me fat. There was a conversation, you know, that was happening after my first cover, is she fat or not. And i think that that was literally what the conversation was. And, you know, thats insane to me, that anyone, i mean honestly, anyone can call me fat, its fine. But its insane to me that that is actually something that were debating. It shouldnt be if im fat or not it should be how i feel. If i feel confident, if im proud of my body, if im at a good place. So when critics talk about the objectification of women wa, do you think about that . How do you think about that issue . As a model. Given that are you in these magazines. I think that everybody has the right to their opinion. And everyone should have an opinion. And thats what, its good for a strong reaction, it is good whenever you feel a strong reaction towards a photograph. When you dont have any behind the scenes of what went into the photograph. That means were doing our job well. But i think that the most important thing and what this issue is about is finding your ideal body and having your goal weight be what you want to achieve. Not what a magazine tells you you should achieve. You said recently the celebration of sexuality is in a really weird place right now. Uhhuh. What do you mean by that . I mean that right now its so debatable, you know. Women are being judged by if theyre too outthere with their sexuality or if theyre not, you know, everyone is judging and evaluating everyone, based on their outwardly appearance. And what i hope everyone will recognize and adopt is the thought that its a personal choice. And so you can wear Something Like this on the cover of this magazine, and it doesnt mean that you are not to be respected. It doesnt mean that youre not brilliant. It doesnt mean that you cant speak to matters of world and global importance, you know . Like a woman that wants to be sexy is often judged as something that is not worthy of a higher level of thinking or putting herself, you know, in positions of power. And i dont think it has anything to do with that. Its a form of expression. 70 Million People will likely see this or have seen this historically. What does it do for your career both as a model and all of the other businesses, being an actress, other enterprises that you have gone into . I mean its a huge moment, in a models career. Before social media it was one of the only platforms that puts your name in the magazine, that gave the model credit. And so its iconic inside the modeling industry because all the models want to be inside of it. And having 70 million eyes on anything always helps your career. Are all the models friends with each other or is this very competitive in terms of getting on the cover and this whole process. I would say its competitive. A lot of the girls are friends but i would say its competitive. We function differently than other magazines. Every woman shoots individually. Its not like they are together shooting for long periods of time. But they are definitely friends as well. Its like a workplace, you know. I would say its a friendly environment but are you putting the best of the best in their fields together, if there is not competition, than how are they becoming the best. In the future of this, the print publication, how i im a New York Times guy so i care about print publication but the world has moved digitally. Do you see a day where we wont be holding these things. I hope not. I certainly see a day where both digital and print will be equally as revered and, i mean were there, you know. Our digital plat form sees billions in traffic. And that is extraordinary. And you know, we have over a thousand images that are available to you on all these different platforms. But i dont know, i think theres something very tangible about holding a magazine and being able to keep it if you love it, you know. Or i dont know, if you dont even love it, just to have it go through it, and experience it. Maybe thats me. As you enter how much are you now thinking physically about this publication. How much are you thinking about what it looks like dow jones tally. You guys now film a lot of the shoots. By the way s that, do you like being shot, in addition to the actual photographs, does that make it easier or harder knowing that there is is a video camera . Well, i mean its doubled the work but Sports Illustrated was really one of the first to have behind the scenes cameras always on set. And now you see it everywhere. But it all depends again on the crew, whether you know, you like their feel and you trust them and you know what theyre getting or you dont. But i think behind the scenes is great. I think its great to show people what goes into it. Christie brinkley is in this issue. How did you get her back . Well, it actually stemmed d she brought sailor, hert youngest on to the set with her. Who was 16 at the time, 15 at the time. And i remember thinking wow, shes extraordinary and christie is extraordinary. And i knew alexa. I dont know her personally but of her. And it just a lite bull be went off wow wouldnt this be amazing to highlight these incredibly beautiful, extraordinary women together in the magazine that launched christies career. Easy or hard to convince her to have her daughters in the magazine. I will say, i was very worried about that, you know. Because you never know how a parent is going to receive, obviously we waited until sailor was 18 years old, which meant we waited for a couple of years. And then we approached her about it. And christie has such an incredible relationship with the brand and has such strong feelings towards it and is so loyal to it that she trusted us so much that it it was a resounding yes. I was so pleased with her enthusiasm for the project. Final question from me, and its probably more comfortable for me to ask than for you to oh my god. El to be painted . Body paint is incredible and it is seriously, its art. But being the canvas is, its hard work. Its exhausting. Its a lot of just standing and not moving. Kate upton, thank you. Mj day, thank you. Thank you for joining us. Micklethwait good evening im John Micklethwait filling in for charlies he rose. Maggie siff is here. She stars as wendt owe rhodes in the show time series billions the drawma centers on the titanic battle between Hedge Fund King Bobby Axelrod and chuck rhodes the u. S. Attorney bent on exposing axelrods corruption, wendy is stuck in the middle playing the therapist, but as her character name implies she is also stuck in a complicated marriage with u. S. Attorney Chuck Rhoades, here is a trailer of the upcoming second see on. Almost killed axe capital and that is never going to happen again. I want the world to know he is going down. As long as he is in that job im not safe. Change is coming. An investigation has begun into your offices methods of conduct. Its not serious. Whatever choices you have been making, they sure as hell arent working. We all know its happening. None of us want to get caught in another Chuck Rhoades way. You know what he is, you know he should be out of the job. The way we were brought up, it was always them or us. I say you do what you got to do. When an enemy is down on the 2350e8d, you got to to finish it. Can you hold this for me. Youve been served. With a lawsuit. 127 of them. Boom, body shot. I need you back at axe capital. I work for myself. Wendy and rhoades separated. You have to accept the reality. A man facing a firing squad has only two choices, accept it or push against this restraint and i dont accept anything. Its really in your head. I need him gone. That will be expensive. Good thing im a rich man. A coverup at the highest level. I know you dont want things to get in the way of women. The attorney general is calling me down to washington. Hes going to fire me. You are good. Never give in. Never yield. To the enemy. I am you a a survivor and i will do whatever it takes to avoid my fate. Ask yourselves. Are you . Im pleased to have maggie siff at the table for the first time. Welcome. Thank you. Pleasure to be here. Lets start with the new series. One of your costars nicely described it it as a battle between two silverbacked male gorillas with you in the middle and you are as working the axe, the hedge fund manager, but are you also married to chuck rohades and you have a complicated marriage. Can you take us through how it ended at the end of the first series and how it begins in this new series. Yes. So she is the inhouse psychiatrist performance coach for the hedge fund. And shes also married to Chuck Rhoades who is the attorney for the southern district. And you know, so there is a pretty deep conflict of interest because theyre sort of mortal enemies trying to take each other down. And in the first season you see their sort of tension and their conflict get more and more. Kind of psychopathic in some ways. Yeah, so at the end of the first season there is a huge sort of coming to jesus moment between the two of them. But theres also for my character, she realizes that shes been pretty deeply betrayed by both of these men and she walks out on them. So she leaves the marriage and the hedge fund and strikes out on her own. All through the first season she is a very powerful character and she has a good deal of insight and sometimes control over these men and some of the choices they make. I think she holds out great hope for them, each interpersonally. Do you think she sees them as rivals for her . I dont think she does. Although i think shes smart enough to know that there is thats something about who she is to each of them pours a little gasoline on their fire. And in some ways she helps to control what that flame is for each of them in the hopes of letting it it be something that kind of sharpens them or as opposed to destroying them, like she knows that they can destroy each other. Wheny has a lot of empathy for the male ego structure. She identifies with them in a lot of ways. I think theyre almost split down the middle in terms of the male and female, the yin and yang. I do, yeah, i think that i dont think she would be in that job or in that marriage, actually f she didnt have huge quantities of sort of respect, curiosity and empathy for who these men are and how much theyre ego and their will to dominate really like consumes them. I think shes by turn fascinated. I think she feels tenderly towards it and sometimes horrified, sometimes titillated like shes a very complicated character. Lets begin, lets maybe do the first silver backed male gorilla, the husband, chuck. Welldocumented it begins with this s m scene and this is not a normal marriage, i think. Indeed. Or it may be. Well, you know, i think most people dont reveal what goes on in their marriage if this is what is going on. So it is an element. It begins with the scene as i remember it, him lying on the floor and you have stubs cigarettes and do something worse to him. It is the very first scene in the pilot so it prepares everybody for something exciting. Why does he do this . Hes an attorney. He wants to run everything. Uhhuh. After doing that that tied into the dom National Risk thing. Yeah, i mean i think that character derives tremendous pleasure and excitement from you know surrendering control and coming up against his edge, his threshhold of pain tolerance and you know, i think its hugely cath artic for him and i, you know, like when i first understood that thises with a component of the character, i didnt want it to be sensationalist. I think it it is a component of their marriage. And i think it speaks to something that each of them was willing to make room for. Like i think of it as something that wendy was like, i can do that for him. And that allows them to connect on sort of an even keeper. She relishes it to some extent. And to some extent she relishes it. I dont think its fully worked out for her exactly what st or how i think thats kind of unexplored territory. I think in the ears the creators have been very careful to use it almost as a punk ways. Its not something they go to a lot. In the Second Season you dont see very much of it at all. So its that may disappoint my friend. That may disappoint some people. I mean its there, you know, its there. But because theyre split, its not thats not going on for them right at the top. What about the other silver backed male gr la. Do you find it kind of strange in some weighings you have this guy who is there, who causes all these problems and yet a lot of people keep on reaching for him, on the face of it he is corrupt, hes difficult, very greedy. Criminal. Yes. Axe is such an interesting character because hes brilliant and he fulfills and taps into something about the American Dream that i think people are really moved by which is that he comes from nothing. And he is a warrior. And you know, hes tribal. And so i think theres something that, like a blending of the class system in him that is really interesting and exciting and makes people root for him in a sort of like working man away. You took it back to have pizza in the same place. Yeah. And you know, he has so much like zest and joy deveef and a sense of humor. And also, i think, there is the question that gets posed in the first season of like is this guy a sociopath because i believe i read somewhere that many c. E. O. S and you know, heads of business and finance are, in fact, display some sociopathic tendencies but you sense in him a desire to be a human being and this may northbound the most disstilled dns dns. Your husband says your patients are criminals, does that cause her problems. Yeah, i think i mean i think theres the accumulation of that conscience that happens over the course of the first season. And theres also a dawning revelation of perhaps how criminal or how much along the edge axe is willing to walk that she begins to sort of grapple with and understand. I think she believes fumentdly that like the rules and regulations, theyre sort of like this constant moving line and shes working with people who are constantly assessing risk. I think shes not exactly sharp with herself. Working for the super rich, people go into these businesses do that, most people that go into these professions like being therapists, generally target up. This was a big question i had for the writers because me personally, maggie, am trying to understand the character, shes somebody who is so brilliant, she has so much empathy, she has so much insight into the human psyche. Like why these guys, why is this her passion. Why is this like her thing. And you know, like where i arrived with is she is she is also you know, a muscular, egoistical. Like she started out i think as a sports therapist. Like there is something about the muscularity and the athleticism of, and the pace of that life, the size of that money. She has a better. She has a bift the she does, yes, in fact she does. And i think she is l recognizes that in helping these people to perform, she can leverage philanthropy and other kinds of benevolent behavior that has impact and ripples out into the world in significant ways. Take me forward. How do you see wendy ending up . I really, you know, i really dont know. You said something once, a lot of your previous characters tend to end up dead. You dont want that to happen. I dont want her to die, no. Yes, i have played a lot of characters who have bit the dust in the more and less graphic ways. But i dont see this show really turning that corner. I mean you know, you never know. No, i mean with all characters that i love, i think one of the reasons, theres something actually kind of psychologically difficult about when a character that you love dies. Because you, you know as actors, everything is in our imaginations. And you do like to imagine that they go on to some other sphere without you. But that they are still like going on with some kind of psychic em nation, you know, into the universe. Even if the two men are still fighting. Even if the two men are fighting each other to the death. I would hope for her that she makes peace with her conscience about what she is doing ang where she is doing it and that she finds peace either inside the marriage or outside the marriage and finds a way to be she a warrior. And so i just want her to be able to be as powerful and ferocious as she can and feel good about herself. But you know, that might not be the most interesting, dramatic choice for her. That is just like me and my actor self sort of, the romantic part of how you want to see a character that you love live on. Thank you very much, for coming on the show. My pleasure. For more about this program and earlier episodes visit us online at pbs. Org and charlies charlie rose. Com. Funding for charlie rose is provided by the following and by bloomberg, a provider of multimedia news and Information Services wor announcer this is nightly Business Report with Tyler Mathisen and sue herera. Funded in part by all it takes is a spark. One idea to take flight, the courage to seek the unknown. To innovate, disrupt. To move us all forward. To explore a different perspective. At nasdaq we connect the world, its ideas, its capital, its businesses. The people that drive global economies. The future isnt tomorrow, its right now. All it takes is a spark. Nasdaq. Solid momentum, the job market Consumer Spending even manufacturing are gaining strength, so why does it seem like no ones noticing. New pick President Trump has