Transcripts For WHYY Charlie Rose 20141219

Do you know what twerking is or Justice Bieber got a haircut or taylor intift moved back to new york. Rose fundee for charlie rose is provided by the following rose funding for charlie rose has been provided by rose additional funding provided by 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. Rose tom friedman is here, a Pulitzer Prize winning author and Foreign Policy kohls upist nor the New York Times, 2014 presented a convergence av conflicts for president obama at home and abroad. The crisis have not deterred him from faking eck difficult action to enact fundamental change in his second term. In beijing last month he announced a historic climate agreement between the United States and china followed by decisions unilaterally grant protection to nearly 5 million undocumented immigrants. And on wednesday he made history again with his announcement to do away with the half century long u. S. Estrangement from cuba. Im pleased to have tom friedman here to talk about these issues and more as we look back at 2014 and look forward to 2015. Welcome. Great to be here, charlie, thanks. Rose good to see you. So first, this specifically. Its very interesting time. Here is barack obama who suffered a huge defeat in the midterm elections. And is now almost liberated and doing things that hes probably wanted to do from day one. But somehow, some reason, bad advice, toughen me, tough adversary wasnt able to do. And hes taken advantage, carlie. The u. S. China climate agreement, big deal. It is a very, very big deal. Very easy to i think underestimate these kind of things. We undertake to try to achieve x, y or z. But when china puts into excuse me, next five year plan, all the ingredients, i believe its 2015, that they are undertaking to build up their Renewable Energy by 2030, by 20 . By roughly a thousand gigawatts. A thousand gigawatts. A thousand gigawatts. Wait a minute, that is exactly how much Energy Electrical Energy Capacity we have as a country. They are going to build a United States of Renewable Energy. Now charlie f they just do half that, okay, the implications of that in terms of own vacation, in terms of scaling, in terms of bringing solar panels down that cost volume curve, that is a huge deal, if they do nothing else. So its a big deal. Rose did you once say you would like to be china for a day. And theyre going to be china for a day. I think what i. Rose i like to make decision and make sure that they will take place. Be implemented. Exactly. In a sense, what the president is doing, in your lead in, with his executive authority is just that. Hes ordering and getting stuff done. Now the congress can roll it back, obviously, and some they might. But you cant just knock out his immigration bill unless you come up with a real alternative. These are important things hes doing in terms of, you know, legalizing people who are here, but also opening the way to some of the really hightech immigration that we need. Do you want to really reverse this cuba decision when the polls today tell you that two out of three cuban americans liked this idea. So i think hes really laid down the gauntlet to the other side. That you cant get away any more with driveby Foreign Policy. Drive by the white house and you say syria. Everybody laughs, you know, you drive by the white house, you say cuba, everybody immigration everyd laughs. You better have an alternative because hes not just talking about an alternative, hes laying one down. Rose do you think he goting to with his own mind and said look, i realize this has been a very, very tough election for me, and perhaps i made some mistakes, you know, whatever reason, it didnt go my way. But i have got two years left. Yeah. And this is a very big pulpit. Well, you know, i said we talked about it a little back in the last president ial election. It was really about we had two guys running. Barack obama ran as im not mitt romney. And mitt romney ran as peoples not that centrist guy who governed the state of massachusetts. So we had a election about nothing. Now we are say midterm basically about nothing. It was about whether isis people. Rose it was about we dont like the fact that nobody is about nothing. Right, exactly. Rose and everybody is about nothing. Exactly. I think thats a good way to put telephone. We had an election about whether isis people are coming over with ebola on the mexican border. It was truly kind of in outer space. But we can have elections about nothing, but the world is to the about nothing. There are big issues out there. There are big interests we have at stake. And in rising to those interests and challenges, you cant just have elections about nothing. And im glad the president has this executive authority. Im glad hes using it in exactly the way hes using it. Rose do you think the politics may change . You look at some of the early reaction on the republican side to kouba. Marco rubio, even jeb bush. Well, you know. Rose both from florida. How long is that party going to be dragged around by the base . Really, charlie, in my next life i want to be part of the base. The base has all the fun, okay. Clearly, you know. And at some point, theyre going to have to say, again, lets look at just the cuban american issue. Twothirds of cuban americans, i read in the poll this morning, support this. Because its a new generation. They dont carry the feelings, very legitimate feelings of their parents, having, you know, been exiled forcibly in some cases. So i think ultimately you have to Pay Attention to that. You cant just be responding to what Rush Limbaugh is stoking up in the base, you know. Youve got to actually look at the world. And thats what i think has been missing so much from our foreign and domestic policy. That we arent starting the day off by saying what world are we living in, okay, were living in that world. How do we align ourselves with the big trends in that world in order to get the most out of our country and our the opportunities and our talents, and cushon the worst. Too many times we start the day by saying, where is the base . Where is the base . Okay. I think a lot of what the last election was about about disgust about it. Rose i like about it boldness. I like to see boldness in leadership. I totally agree. Rose but looking at climate, how close are we to some Tipping Point in terms of years unless we have drastic action, and a dramatic reduction of emissions . Well, you know, there is a concept, that climate Scientists Use which is our challenge is that we need to avoid the unmanageable, and manage the unavoidable. And thats really at the thats the sort of nice edge that were on. Because pick up the New York Times this morning. Big story about how the arctic just keeps getting warmer and warmer. And when the more ice melts, the less you have the rays of the sun being reflected off the earth. And the more those rays go right into the water, warm the ocean, the more ice meltsment and you get into that cycle, basically. Where everyone, theres certainly a strong consensus among scientists that by the end of the century, there will be no ice. You will be able to transit the arctic. You will be able to sale from, new york to seattle. Or just will. I think there is a lot of people feel its going to up and down like this, but directionally, that is clearly where things are going. Unless obviously you get some kind of climate event that reverses that. But you have to, you know, you have to presume that theyre right. And heres the real point, charlie. Lets say you are a climate denier and im not, okay. And what is my reaction. My reaction is well, lets say im wrong. And we do everything we can to get ready for climate change. What are we left with, lets see, were left with cleaner air, more innovative technologies. Less support for petro dictators. A stronger dollar, a stronger country an a more respected country. Thats if im wrong am if you ares wrong, were a bad biological experiment. So this is a nobrainer for me, you know. Rose you said the other day in a column that what we really ought to do is a gas tax. Thats the way to go. If we take that money and designate it to be used for infrastructure, think what we could be and do. I mean, first of all, we have a real problem. Last time we raised the gas tax was under that percent where we Ronald Reagan, okay. So if Ronald Reagan could raise the gasoline tax, we can raise the gasoline tax, especially when youre talking about, you know, 5, 10 currents a gallon, do you know between gas stations theres a dince between five and ten cents a gallon am but most importantly, just talk to our secretary of transportation. The Highway Trust Fund is basically broke. We cant fix our roads. This is not about building crazy high speed rail from chicago to los angeles, okay. This about the roads you ride on. The trust fund that is funned by our gasoline tax to support those roads is going bust. Because people are driving less. More hybrids, i mean its all actually a good news reason. So now is the perfect time, take the money, invest in infrastructure, create jobsment wouldnt you rather create jobs that way than by building a Keystone Pipeline that brings the worst dirty oil from canada to our sands, to the United States. And you have exactly the image you want, are you stronger and strengthen our productive capacity as a country. Rose one of the things you have railed about is us going dependent on middle eastern oil. An along comes shale oil and means that we will no longer be dependent on it. But are there risks at shale oil that concern you so that we cannot look at it as a panacea. There is no question. We see the governor of new york abandoning fracking in new york state. You know, my guide on there is my friend hall harphy who i think is one of the great environmentalists, an advisor, not a hank paulson. And you know, halls view is that there is a way to do fracking right so you dont get the met ann leakage which is so much more potent as a Greenhouse Gas than co2. That you dont des poile the water and environment. There is a way to do this right that actually doesnt cost much more the a all, charlie. The problem is we have no National Standard for fracking. The Oil Companies oppose that. Okay. So the epa, there is no epa standard for fracking. Its done at the state and local level. Thats why the governor of new york can do what he is doing. If anyone should be militatting for a National Standard, it should be the Oil Companies because there are a lot of moms an pops in the fracking business, they are the ones that dont have the resources or scien particular knowledge to do it right. The Big Companies do it right for pennies and nickels, it is not that expensive to do it rights. That is where we should be going. They should be leading it so you dont get local reaction, look what you did to my water. I turned on the tap and a flame came out. Its just, stop stop being dumb as we want to be. Rose there is also this factor, though. Because of decisions by a whole range of factors. We see the price of oil declining by the barrel. And some say it will become, if it continues to get lower and lower, it will stymie the development of alternative sources. Right. Rose one reason to go on the gas tax. Absolutely. There a real danger in that. My friend and teacher on the subject is phil verleger. Really a smart energy economist. And phil said in that column i wrote, there may be a moores law going on with fracking. That as moores law says the speed of microchips will double every 24 months. What if franking is a kind of moores law, that the Technology Keeps Getting Better and making it better, easier, cheaper, hopefully cleaner at the same time. What happens is you dont just knock out coal, god bless you for that you knock out solar and wind as well. And thats why we want fracking to be a bridge to a clean energy future, not a ditch. And it could become a ditch if the Technology Takes us there and we dont compensate for that. And that could be our undoing. Rose were talking about 2014. But looking at the front page today we talk about cuba and we have talked about climate. Theres also a russia and later north korea. Look at putin, his press conference today. I mean, what is your sense of what he has accomplished, the challenge he faces, because Falling Oil Prices have put his economy in recession and in danger. I consider him and by the way, this is not monday monday quarter backing, si have been writing this since march. I think putin is a towering fool. Rose towering physical. Towering fool, and i will tell you why. Rose who got away with crimea. Our friend Warren Buffett licks to say in the 2008 economic crisis, when the tide goes out, you see who isnt wearing a bathing suit. And when the oil tide goes out, you also see who is buck naked. And i would tell you putin is a guy who was born on third base and thought he hit a triple. I am standing here on third base, here he was, 110 barrel oil. He thought he was a genius, okay. And suddenly its 50, he doesnt look like such a genius any more. In my view, putin is a guy, a leader who at one and the same time is taking on the market, mother nature, moores law and human nature all at the same time rses but therefore this irraise man who will necessarily dot rational. The famous first rule is hold, when are you in one, stop dig, right now he is in one. The idea that he would dig it deeper, i think at a certain point, he has already, you know, probably cut net worth of all his cronies. But i think people forget one thing about russia. I have seen some of this in the analysis, you know where i stand, are the russian people, even putin says this, were used to sacrifice, hitler, winters, were used to sacrifice. This is not your babuska russia. Remember putin built a huge middle class. These are people with cars, jobs, homes, the ability to travel. Now you have come hell has no wrath like a middle class that loses its ability to travel, okay. You have gotten all these people, all these opportunities and suddenly say okay, no travel. By the way, your ruble, that air particular you are trying to buy, now takes ten times as many rubles to buy. And we will see how in to suffering they are, you know, for crimea. I walls find that people who tell me the other guy is ready to suffer, he is the guy who has the secure government job. Rose and can leave. Can leave, exactly. But people telling you about other people are ready to suffer, im a little dubious. Rose as we end the year also in the headlines is north korea because of hacking. Someone said this morning on my cbs program, you know, that they had won the first cyberwar, north korea wchblts look, its you know. They intimidated a company to withdraw its moviest. Hard case its a hard case because in my view, incredibly stupid movie. Stupid not in the bad humor but do you think we should be making movies about assassinating city leaders even, you know, the awful tyrannical leader of north korea. There are enough people killing people in the world. Its not funny to me. That said, i cannot dispute what you said. They have intimidated soniment and our theatre operators from showing this film. And i find that very disturbing. Rose what is disturbing to me, is a they intimidated them and everybody is alarmed at that. But if they could do it to sony, who else can they do it to. Why not the charlie rose, New York Times, the washington post, the wall street journal. We dont like that editorial. Were shutting you down for a day. Rose how about con ed. And i think right, we are if he beginning of something i find very unnerving. Charlie. Rose they an a country you thought had any technological talent and all of a sudden a huge hit. Well, they did build a nuclear bomb on their own as a her hit kingdom. Rose with the help of pakistan and a lot of money. But there obviously was enough talent for that and who knows, maybe they are other help too. Rose china. Anybody, any of the people you mentioned. I did a come awhile back where i said there are four words disappear fringt english language. Our kids can forget about these words. They are first of all, priv see. Forebet about it. Proif see is over. Number one, number two, average, average is over. In a world where robots, Automation Software to you can do above average so much more easily. Later, for climate reasons, whatever you are going to save, please save it now because later will be too late, and lastly local. Local is over. If i go out in the lobby here, you know, and punch you in the nose, people will be look at friedman punching charlie rose in poland in 30 minutes, okay, someone will have a camera ot there and tweet. So you know, privacy, average, local, and late remember all over. And what will be. Rose to what consequence. And that is what i really ask. I really am talking to my Dear Colleague maureen dowd the over day really saying, i have to say, glad i had my journalism when hi it, you know. Rose because . Because it was just a lot simpler. And it wasnt that we were under scrutiny. People were always writing letters, attack, writing about you. But just physically as a journalist, you know, when i was a foreign correspondent, i just had to write my story at night, file it in. I didnt have to tweet, facebook, instagram, update for the web, you know. You could actually sit back and reflect. Hey, what happened today. And then type it out on something called, i dont know if your viewers know what this is, its called a type require, put pressure on a key and if leaves an impression of a letter on a piece of paper and file it by tellex, but i will take that over what we have today any day. Rose lets talk about isis. Where do you see that struggle and is it going to demand in the end more than we see now . So heres what i think about the isis problem. One is that so they are now embedded in mosul and all of these ro vince towns in the sunni areas of iraq. So the mehta question is who is going to take them out. We can bomb them from the air, do so quite effectively. I think really hurting them but who is going to go doortodoor, so i ask myself that question. Are the kurds going to go doortodoor in mosul to give it back to sunni government, shiite government in baghdad . I dont think so. No, no, the sunnies are going to go doortodoor to give it back to pro iranian government shiite, i dont think so no, shiites are going to doortodoor to rescue the sunnies in order to give them their i dont think so the so the question is who is going to go doortodoor, that is the sfrajic question. So to me, the answer is the only one that will go doortodoor are the People Living under isis. The people in effect either passively or actively invited them in because they thought the shiite rule of president maliki and the militias associated with him was even worse. So then so for me the an lit call question is what will get the sunni tribes and sunni mainstream residents of a mosul, of a fallujah, in order to rise up excuse me, against isis. An here is whether where i come down. I think that we have to create a de facto sunni stan in iraq just like kurdi stanl. So what do i mean . So if you look at the surge, and the anbar uprising, the original one during the iraq war, what was our strategy there. It was clear. Build, hold. We basically did the clearing, with the help of the sunni tribes. We helped them hold it. And then we turned it over to maliki to build it. And of course he completely squandered it. Now that legacy, thats an important part of the story. Because the sunni tribes now under isis are saying oh, youre going to sell me that, you know, carpet again. No, no, we bought that carpet once. It didnt end well, okay. So i think our philosophy is strategy is going to have to be build, clear, hold, that is you got to be able to say to the sunnies of that region, you are going to have the same deal the kurds have. Will you have your own local militia. You will have your own share of the oil wells. You will have your own federal rights an powers in a federallized iraq am i think thats the only way to get them. To in effect create a sunni kurdi stan. Rose what happened with the awakening was, in fact, those sunni tribes turned against al qaeda who they had been supporting because they said you guys are going way too far. Right. Rose were not comfortable. Youre worse than this. Rose well, thats what they said at the time. And the iraq war now, isil is much worse than al qaeda was at the time. Well, you would think so. But let me just say this. Google, in fact. Rose it was from shall did go ahead. Google shiite militias and power drills in iraq, and youll discover that isis didnt invent barberism. Rose but they have done it on a larger and much more public scale. Im in the in any way defending them am but we werent paying attention for the last two years of maliki. He was bombing, shelling, sunni towns. He was letting shiite militias there really terrorize people. Was it isislike that scale . No, but if you were a sunni living in those towns, it was really awful. And thats what made you want to say, when isis showed up, you know, i think well take isis, at least theyll protect us from those guys am i think it was a bad decision am i think these guys are psychopaths. But it wasnt without logic. Rose well, they came from al qaeda in iraq. Right. Rose thats where they came from. But also the iraqi army. There are a lot of exiraqi army guys there. Rose got out in time for the invasion. Yeah. It was a coalition in that sense. Iraqi army guys. Rose are there enough tribesman to build the kind of sunni stan that you talk abouting and can we quip them and other saudis and other sunni nations equip them fast enough nor for them to stop . In theory, we can. I think they can. Its going to take, though. Rose a few years. Its always about the politics for me. Never about the fight. Get the politics right. The fighting will take care of itself. If you give people an incentive to build a political structure where they know they will be secure and represented, i think the fighting will follow. The mehta point im trying to make is the british and french divide up the middle east, created lebanon, syria, iraq. Were now seeing the do it yourselvesers. So back, you know n 1914, 1915, they did it from the top down. Churchill, and his pals had a map, they carved it up into all these funny shapes. What were seeing now almost a century later basically is the people people redrawing the borders. But iraq is not going to be put back together in my view from the top down. It can only be put together by the bottom up. Bit constituent communities first living apart, and learning then for how to live together. What is the relative population spread between kurds, sunnies and shia . Shia are the majority. The majority. We dont know exactly because they havent done a sense of some people think as many as 70 . Kurds are what, about 10 . Roughly. And then you have christians, yazidis, making up small percentage, the sunni are the majority, and the pro shia aloe whites are the majority. The turks dont surprise you at all, do they. For me erdojan is going down the putin track am it is really sad to see, what they have in common, charlie, is something we should all remember, dont stay too long. You know, erdojan retired after bringing the turkish economy really to worldclass. Rose 6, 7 . He would have been remembered as the deng za peng of turkey. People would remember him so well. Now he didding going to be remembered as a guy that really turned the country in a way that empowered so many and rich enriched so many more people, not just at the top, but at the bottom instead. Rose instead. Instead hes going to go out as i think a hateful, tyrannical crony capitalist who before he is done, im not sure what he will do, you know. But i think hes really soiled his image. Imagine if putin had not come back. He would be remembered as the guy who took russia from the chaos of the end of the yellsin era to a stability, handed it over to medvedev, and the country had a positive slope. We would remember him so differently. I think hes going to go down as an utterly failed tyrant, unless he completely surprises us and reverses course. And i dont think his ego will let him do that. Rose how do you think assad will go down . I think as one of the worst people who inhabited the 21st and late 20th century. Rose because of 250,000 dead syrians. Barrel bombs. Looking we know what he did. He took what was a truly Popular Democratic revolt, and he turned it into a sectarian revolt, by opening fire on the militias, on the protestors. Rose they came in from everywhere. Exactly. Basically saying this is just sunni was want to oust shiites. Rose the most interesting thing, and this is a team you have talked about, that moderate islam has to speak out. Right. Rose you have been writing about that for a long time. Yeah. Rose in every country. And you cant let what happens and what is said nonpublicly. Right. Rose what they say publicly not be compared to what they say privately. Exactly. Rose and what they say in the mosque is what you have said. Yeah. Rose King Abdullah did an interview with me several weeks ago and talked about the fact that, not a new song but he basically said that what islam has to do is come together and speak out loudly about isis and isil. That they are extremists, theyre not muslims. Theyre not theyre murders and extremists. Yeah. Look at the taliban. What happened there. 146 kids shot in the head. Dont we still dont live in a world where killing kids in cold blood is off the table. Its just not something human beings of any ilk, religion, background do. Rose which everybody has to come together. Yeah. And but that can only come from those restraints have got to come from within. Theyve got to come from within the community. Its got to come from within their narrative. We as outsiders cant do that. Rose dow come to the conclusion we shouldnt do anything in syria because its not our fight and the people who have to get rid of assad are the people in syria . My philosophy about syria and iraq is the following im for containment and amplification, what do i mean by that. First of all, i dont want isis to spread. We have an fundamental interest in it not spreading to islands of decency, kurdi stan, lebanon, jordan, lets start there. That is a fundamental american interest. I want to contain that. Beyond that, i will amplify whatever they do. I have said this before in your show. The middle east only puts a smile on your face when it starts with them. When it starts with them, the two most important words in Foreign Policy kick in, self and sustaining. When they own it, when they start it, anbar uprising is a good example am then we can amplify it. But what i am done doing, because we have already proven enough times in afghanistan and iraq that it fails, is were to the going to do it for them. And the very act of them doing themselves is what requires them to come together, okay. Because they cant defeat isis, sunni, shiites and kurds come together, all right. Around a philosophy and power sharing agreement. Rose isis in iraq. But in theory, you cant bring down assad, carlically, who is the leader of the syrian opposition. Rose nobody knows. Exactly. What is their platform. Rose nobody knows. So if you are a sunni muslim or a crist yen living in damascus, and you dont really know what the who the Opposition Leader is, what politics they. Rose if you come to a point where we have to take on isis, even though it might benefit assad because it is a growing emergency and urgency . First of all, its let me just start by saying it is a hellish problem. Its a problem, when a society breaks down like this, you have no good choices. But i personally think you know, one war at a time. We cant the idea that were going to fight assad on one side, and isis on the other and get the balance just perfectly right, i just dont believe it. Rose so if you dont believe that, what is our option . Our option, unfortunately s to live with the situation in syria. Its ugly but we lived with it now for several years. Rose in other words, not do anything. Let assad stabilize the situation. And with the militia. Get a balance of power there. Enormously ugly. I wish we. Rose can he get power without support from the United States. Can you come to amplify if they are not likely to get to that place where there ask something to amplify . Then my question to you would be they wont be sustaining if we dont. If they cant come together and build something, that will be selfsustaining, then all our support in the world, we will be back where we are in a year. Theyve got to own it. And if they dont want to own it, look at turkey. I mean lets look at turkey, okay. This is right on their border, okay. Even if the turks arent willing to join this fight, that should be a warning. Warning, warning. Big sunni country. Next to isis, doesnt want to join this fight. Because more worried about the kurds, you know, having a little strip on the border, and maybe erdojan thinks he should be i dont know what zaniness is acting out there. But im tired of the difference between a good day and a bad day for being what bashar assad or, you know, they want to do. They have got to own it. We will amplify telephone. But they have got to own it. If they dont own it, it is not selfsustaining and if its not selfsustaining, well be right back there. Rose so the short term you think will simply be the impasse that we see as now with the possibility of assad remaining in power. Yeah, and ultimately, what you have to hope for is that if we can defeat isis, then you do have the foundation to support different forces there, to create some kind of power sharing agreement. Charlie, i lived through years, lets see, what were they, four through ten, nine and ten of the lebanese civil war. Ending in 1989 with the Peace Agreement in saudi arabia. How did it end, it ended on one principles, no vickar, no vanquished. Anyone who thinks that syria is going to end with the sunni muslims vanquishing the allouites, anyone who thinks iraq will end with the shiites vanquishing the kurds and sunnies, i tell you, i got a lot of history that will tell you it aint going to happen. Its only going to happen when they exhaust themselves as they did in lebanon and decide no victor, no vanquish, were going to share this body. Rose what happens to the iranians in all of this . Well, theyve got a little bit of the putin problem. Rose right. You know, they certainly have budgeted their government budget on. Rose something problems too. Over a hundred dollar barrel of oil, over sanction and half the oil income. Look, what happened last time oil prices collapsed in the late 80s and early 90s. The soviet union coulds lad. Yassir arafat agreed to negotiate with israel because he lost his backing am look what has happened so far. Kuba, by the way, this cuba deal . This, i know they were negotiating in secret, it didnt just come together for nothing. Its because cuba lost their Venezuela Oil backer. So i think were just at the beginning of some really interesting and funky geo politics. If this oil price stays down where it is, you are going to see stuff that you never dreamed of again, there are a lot of leaders like, you know, the supreme leader, khameni in syria or putin, at 110 a barrel, they are sitting so pretty that, you know, they are the cat that ate the canary, theyre geniuses. Rose but at 55. At 40 and 50 a barrel, boy, theyre going to be somewhere else. Rose so you want to see Oil Prices Continue to decline even though it may thwart the development of. I want oil prices to decline and our energy taxes rise. Rose to me is a happy medium. Rose tell me about the big issues that youee that are important in terms, we talk about climate. What are the transnational borders issues. One is health, clearly ebola has shown us that. That is an issue that is not about nation states, its about global pandemics. I believe, charlie, that over the last ten years something huge has happened in terms of technology. And weve talked a little about it before, as the world went from connected it to hyperconnected, were interconnected to interdependent so what is another way of saying that . Another way of saying that is that we have actually built with our hands, now a global system, that is as interdependent as the Natural World. Not quite, but it mirrors the Natural World more than ever before. You know, the conservation board irtheir motto is lost be there, felt here. That was about naturement now were feeling that loss in the greek stock exchange, felt on wall street, more than over ever. But in many other ways. Here is the problem we face. Nature evolved what all these interdependences, when my frenls and teachers calls healthy interdepenged ease, over millennia. We have become totally interdependent over a decade. Decade and a half. So we do not have the habits, the values, the norms for how to live in such an interdependent world. Lets go back to your north korea story. I dont like your movie, i will hack your studio. Oh, look at all these emails that are on the street. Heres a good one about soandso. So in other words, were totally interdependent, almost like a natural system, but we have not developed the norms, habits, regulations, behaviors to actually live in the world weve created. An every day you see more examples of this. Whether its in the banking world, or . The art world, or in the world of ethics and philosophy. Rose finally i want to talk about the senate report. And because people raise the question about americas values and americas reputation, and americas relevance. You know, i came down, when obama in 2009 i supported that. I thought it was the right thing to do. I thought, i was very influenced by reading john mccains speech in the senate am i think nobody knows more about this issue and no one has more right to speak about it than john mccain. And he said its wrong. It is going to make us more enemies that is why it is a question you have to ask about any you know, David Petraeus used to say this, whatever policy you are going to undertake, always ask, is it going to create more bad guys or less bad guys, fewer bad guise. I think mccain made a strong case where its wrong and it will create more enemies. And by the way, what i thought if convinced me, it didnt work. Those are two powerful reasons, im glad the senate published, i sport that. But at the same time s lets recognize that we are in a different time. That was a really scary time. And. Rose a lot of people out there that want one more 9 11. Rose use every device they have. And one more 9 11 and we wont be having this discussion at all. Because there will be a lot of americans who will say to the cia, just do whatever you need to do. So i think this was a really healthy exercise to go through. So maybe when and if there is another 9 11, were going say wait a minute, we tried that. That didnt work. Obviously you have a ticking time bomb you do whatever you need to do and can do in order to diffuse that time bomb. I thought it was a healthy exercise. I thought it was parker at its best. Rose what is this new book about, something you can talk about . Yeah, i havent really i mean i am tentatively in my head calling the world is fast. Rose fast. Yeah, because basically what happened is the world started to get. Rose flat and fast. Bail what happened is the world first had to get flat, everyone had to have a smart phone. Everyone had to have wireless broadband, pay pal, facebook. And when that happened, once that happened, charlie, things started to change really fast. Suddenly i could stack all those up and create overnight and take over the global taxi business out of nowhere. Rose great to see you. Always. Rose merry christmas, happy new year, happy hannah cass. Thanks so much. Great to be here. Rose back there a moment. Stay with sus. Gone pittman is here, chairman ceo of iheartmedia Global Digital entertain am company, had i a greater reach than any other radio an television outlet in the United States. Over 245 million listeners tune in each month. Pittman rose to prominence at the age of 28 when he could founded mtv in 1981. Since then hes also been c. E. O. Of aol networks, six flags theme parks, quantum media, century 21 real estate and time warner enterprises. Former mtv c. E. O. Tom preston said bob has been reincart natured so many times hes like buddha am im pleased to have buddha back at this table am welcome. Thank you, sir. Rose dow agree with that quote from him. He always has a good quotement i dont know any are true. Rose exactly. Tell me exactly what you you got invested in Clear Channel with your own Venture Investment firm called pilot, i guess was. Right. Rose with what idea . Well, i actually looked at the company because my friend rich bresler who had been with me at time warner said we take a look at the company, we need a c. E. O. He said i know you wouldnt be interested. I said absolutely not am i will never do a job like that again. He said look at the company for me. And i looked at it i called him, i go rich, you cant believe the assets youve got here. And he goes yeah, yeah, that is what i was telling you. So i made an investment. And a agreed to be parttime chairman. Then i agreed i would take over the digital, develop what became i does heard does ready and along the way they said you know, you said you didnt want to work too hard any more but i cant imagine working any harder than you do now. Why dont you just be the c. E. O. So that was the way i became the c. E. O. , the reluctant c. E. O. So Clear Channel became iheartmedia. What is that. Right, it is the combination of this huge broadcast radio platform, very big digital platform now, about 90 million monthly uniques and all of our digital properties. It includes all the events business, we just did swing el ball here in new york. Iheartradio Music Festival and big Music Festivals. Weve got a huge social Network Although we dont have a platform, over 70 million users on twitter and facebook alone. And then weve got the outdoor, which has been, which kept the clearchannel name which is the United States and around the world. Which you know d the billboards is have changed. They are i pateds on a stick and dow neat tricks with it. Rose so what, occasionally i will read this over the last five years, radio is no longer what it was because of the internet. And the same thing applies to satellite radio, that the internet is where radio will be received from now on. Right. Well, the interesting thing is, since 2010 weve grown the number of radio listeners on broadcast radio about 17 million. The good news is weve added digital as well. And what you find is, i saw you just took your phone out of your pocket, is what we found is we found another radio. We have clock radio, we got a car radio, we got an office rye radio. I got one in the play room and now i have one you carry around with you. So i dont think the consumer thinks of digital and broadcast. They think im looking for z 100, im looking for kiss fm or kfi, its right here. They dont know thats digital and the other is an fm chip, nor do they care. So for us it expands more listening opportunities. When i was a kid and you were a kid, we will little portable radios about this size am we got portable radios back. Thats a good thing. Rose but what about spotify and all those places like itunes where you can downstream. Those have really replaced cds and lps, et cetera. They really have replaced radio. In the old days we had radio, 45s, then lps, then cds, from am to fm. Radio tends to be more and more choices where you discover your new music, where you find out what is going on in the world am we have people we pay enormous sums of money to kur right, everything good and bad. And the music collection like spotify and itunes is where you store your music. And the two are symbiotic with. Is i escape the world with my music. Find out what is going on. So radio has a future. Better. Im working too hard for it not to have a future. What is your vision to take it to the next stage. Well, look, i think with i heart media were really trying to build into the future. And were trying to think of this business as all encompassing. Its not just radio. I will take our station here in new york, the real popular z 100. There is z 100. Com and all sorts of information you get there which is a companion to your listening experience. And so for us what were trying to do is blur these lines and trying to do consumer first. What is the consumer want and how can we serve them with all these assets, not how have we served them in the past and how can i hope theyll hang in the past with mement and i think moving to the future has been the right game plan and will be going forward. How much of it is driven by personality . A lot. And you know, you may not know the personality because they may only be a star in jackson mississippi or. But theyre known there. Theyre known there and theyre popular. Its interesting, Ryan Seacrest talks about it, he says if i go out with a movie star, people rush up to the movie star and worship them and they look to me and say that thing you were talking about the other day, they treat me like their friend. We talk about at our company that the Radio Station is sitting in the seat next to your car. We are your companion, not a hobby, not an object. And what we better do is exactly what a great friend does which tell you a lot of good information. By the way, traffic, here turn left, weather good tomorrow, did do you know what twerking is or Justin Bieber got a haircut or taylor swift moved back to new york. Important pieces of news that people need to know. And our measure is, when you get to the office, you are going to sleep for eight hours. When you get to the office, we should catch up on every bit of the conversation that is going to happen that day, so you are not the person who doesnt know what theyre talking about when they say the red wedding episode. We are will tell you what happened. Has become important in the new media. I think they have always been important and now they are using new media to make it more efficient to get to the curators and find the curators that changed your life. We have always had a best friend for every category we were interested in. If something is wrong with our computer we call soandso and say what the hell is wrong. Wasnt that what you were at first, a curator but then called program directors. We call them by many names. Sometimes we all call them an algorithm but at the enof the day its the same function. Is human beings dont want to go through everything to find what theyre looking for. They are willing to substitute somebodys judgement for theirs. And let them there are so many opportunities that they want someone else to save them time by doing it. Completely. Completely. Rose and the role of live today, i mean how does that play in terms of what most Consumers Want in terms of entertainment . You know, its funny. I think consumers smell live. I was always amazed in the early days of mtv, we would pretape some concerts as if they were live and run them. They looked live. And then we did some live. The rains were always higher for the live concerts. Rose people knew. How did they know, it is like the dog, how does the dog know we are almost home when we are driving on a trip. They know. Yes. Rose and to big stars paul mccartney, people like that, taylor swift, can fill up the arenas, tour as long as they want to. As long as they want to. And i think what you are finding is that you and i got in this business in an era in which we were working toward the connected home. And a funny thing happened it turned into connected individual. So americans now spend 30 more time in their cars today than they did ten years ago. It reversed. A and now things like concerts and sporting events, movies are all place these want to go. Restaurants. Rose but take the time people spend in their cars, how is that going to change in how they program it . Well,. And how absurd information. With, i think the car is turning out to be like the phone turned out to be a vessel to carry all these things with you. I think the car is turning into a vessel to carry all these other things with you. Its becoming sort of your mobile home, if you will. And. Rose mobile home and office. Yeah, and i think youre looking at, and by the way there are people who sell now, salesmen who just sort of do everything in your car. And it becomes the device. And i think if you look at what the automakers are doing, they are doing pretty interesting stuff. When is the last time you ask a friend, give me the directions to your house. Just put in the gps now. When you were at mtv, what was was the spirit there. Looking back, it was sort of like these guys at silicon valley. It was facebook, it was twitter t was google. It was, you were in the center of the action. You were doing something no one had done before. And there were no rules. We were writing the rules. And our group of people, all in our 20s, ex didnt worship that experience. People say experience that will mess you up. You dont want to have experience. And i think its again a fresh perspective, everything is possible. And by the way, if i knew now what i now know, i would have never been involved in startinging is like mtvt would be too risky. If you were starting out today, what would you do. If i were starting out today i would get an advanced math degree and learn to write code. Would you really . Of course. And secondly you would learn chinese. Secretary learn chinese, more people speak english in china than in the u. S. , isnt that the stat now. I think is. I think. Leadership, you worked with some giants in terms of management and leadership. What have they taught you . What go you learn from whom. Steve ross probably had the biggest impact on me in terms of magazine. And steve used to say, founder of time warner, warner and time warner. Steve would say, you know, with this company you will never be fired for making a mistake. With this company you will be fired for not making a mistake because are you not making a mistake tells me you are not trying. Not taking a risk. And you always have to try new things. And when we started mtv it was thought that basic Cable Networks could never make money. A fools errand. The board of directors why would you think that when they had two income revenue sources. No one knew. No one knew the advertisers would come there because cocacola didnt advertise for the first five years because we didnt have a 65 reach in the u. S. An three household rating. An when we finally made money, we were the first basic Cable Network, first Cable Network to make money on advertising, i went to see steve because he had saved us from being shut down by the board a couple of times. I said we made money. And instead of saying thats great, congratulations, he saided it goo, now heres what we can do. Everything is a steppingstone to something else. Now you made money, there are things we can do that we never thought about before. We now have the clout, we done have to worry about the losses. It was always about what is next. Not about congratulating yourself. And never do you arrive. There is no such thing as i have arrived. Rose there is always a future. Always. Rose who else had an influence on you. Well, you know, i think steve case did who i worked with, and steve had a completely different view of the world than i did. But i think it was a really good team. Because it was almost black and white difference, 180 degree. But it cost us i think to look at every decision, completely as opposed to all going down the same path together. I think Henry Silverman who really taught me about cost. And why are you spending money on that, and taught me about urgency. We were going to do some major restructuring of the company. He said when are you going to do t i said plan over six weeks. He said why dont you do it this weekend. I still remember, i was taken aback, and gi i can do it. And now i tell people when they tell me, i say can we do it in 24 hours. I start my negotiation 24 hours and move out from there. I think incredible sense of urgency is so critical in a world like this where things move very quickly. Get there first, and youve got an advantage. Rose is there a common denominator among its entrepreneurs that you have worked with other than urgency. I think urgency is one. I think its also about decisionmakingment i think you sort of, i spent a lot of time on both sides of it. How can a startup be so nimble and a big company not be nimble at all . Always wondered that. And i think its because by the time a decision gets to be in a big company it has to go through about ten people. That means ten people all have to agree it is an idea to si yesment one person can say no and kill the idea so mathematically if you have got ten layers you have stocked your odds a hundred to one nos to yeses, in a Small Company the same person is saying yes and no and they are bald. What i try and do in ours as opposed to sequential decisionmaking, i say send the request to everyone in the decision tree, lets talk about it together so that no one can kill the idea. And i will often say in a meeting, theyll give me the idea, everybody agrees, i know that is the safest idea. And i will say, what is the other point of view. What is the dissenters say. The first time they say no, everybody agrees, well youre not listening well because somebody uls always disagreesment you want to hear the outliar opinion because the great ideas are never safe ideas. Its always the outlier idea. Rose what is the biggest risk you have ever taken . Probably this one . That say question shall did im not sure. Its funny, things look risky in advance, and after the fact they dont. When i went from century 121 real estate to aol, i had people say oh my gosh, why would you leave century 21 to aol. Rose you knew nothing about real estate. Nothing. Rose nothing about computers at aol. Nothing, i knew nothing about theme parks. D y knew a little bit about. But not a lot in terms of building a radio empire. I knew nothing about tv when i went into it. Rose so therefore, what is it you had to contribute . I always thought i was a sociologist. And i always said even when i was a young guy, that its all about the consumer. That there are plenty of people know about theme parks and tv. But what i want to be is the expert on how the consumer is behaving. And that behavior is very consistent. And if we can study the consumer, well figure out, come upstream about what kind of tv we should do for them. How we should position it, how we should advertise it. And i still do that. Rose what did radio learn from the coming of ipods and things like that, what was it from the digital revolution wa, did radio have to learn and has video media learned it . Well, its interesting. With radio, people confuse it with the music businessment so i think radio has been good for the radio business. Because more people get interested in mix. I think its also been interesting as they have been able to move their music to a handheld device or their computer, and then they also find radio there helps radio go along on the journey which physical distribution of lps didnt do. But it really wasnt easy h a digital transfer. But it was really the music business that went through a transformation. Radio has been growing. And it has been is the same thing going to happen to the movie business. Is it happening . I think what is happening to the movie business and tv business is that we found the love affair the consumer has is with the program, not the network. People love your show and maybe not the network its on. They look for the show. So if they can fine your show. If they can find the show somewhere else. They dont need the network any more. And they cut the cord. The good news about radio, it it hasnt cannibalized them. It hasnt cannibalized the shows, just the networks. I mean when i started in the tv business. But theyre doing all right, arent they. Somewhere. Somewhere are age some arent. In the old days, you had five or six networks and you looked at radio and said wow, its so fragmented. Today with 3,000 networks you look back at 50 Radio Stations and say i wish hi that world in which there wasnt a lot of fragmentation. Rose local television stations doing well. I think theyre doing pretty well. Its a pretty Good Business model. No matter how much they fragment they have the biggest audience. There is an advantage to advertise. Rose Warren Buffett put together a chain of newspapers, mostly those newspapers in which one newspaper town and its principal thing that people rely on for business. And its made it very successful because he understands the connection between those kinds of newspapers and the audience. Look, i think at the end of the day newspapers are not going out of business. Theyre transforming the electronic delivery. And those who understand its just a transformation and delivery mechanism, were doing fine, the ones that go oh my gosh, its out of print. People arent going to hold print. Rose thank you. Good fun. Rose thank you for joining us. See you next time. For more about this program and earlier episodes, visit us yen line at pbs. Org and charlie rose. Com. Captioning sponsored by Rose Communications captioned by Media Access Group at wgbh access. Wgbh. Org hi, im ed slott. Its 2014, and theyre at it again. The u. S. Government is trillions and trillions of dollars in debt, and congress is just licking their lips trying to get their greedy hands on your hardearned retirement savings. Dont let them. Im here to show you how to rescue your retirement. Stay tuned for an updated package of gifts for 2014 that will help you and your family and help support this great Public Television station. Thanks. Announcer your retirement is in danger. 20, 30, 40 years of your hard work is at risk. Wall street banks and congress are waiting to grab whatever is