law. there was this one psychiatrist who was charles. and we arranged for him to come to lunch. so i went down to see mike. he interviewed me and he said can you show me a writing sample i said unfortunately i can t. i have never written anything. when i was a psychiatrist, and you discharged a patient you write a discharge summary. the first time did i a discharge summary it came out looking like it was written in chinese. i had to rewrite the whole thing. after one or two or three or four. i would dictate, this is 3,000 words in one go. as long as i had it in my head where i was going with this, so i learned to dictate long just from the practice i got at mass general as a psychiatrist. so then when i began to write articles, another stuff i was in that habit. so i wrote something. they liked it. they published it. and i got lucky again. it was republished on the op-ed page of the washington post. it was the first time any article of the new republic had been picked up by the
said can you show me a writing sample i said unfortunately i can t. i have never written anything. when i was a psychiatrist, and you discharged a patient you write a discharge summary. the first time did i a discharge summary it came out looking like it was written in chinese. i had to rewrite the whole thing. after one or two or three or four. i would dictate, this is 3,000 words in one go. as long as i had it in my head where i was going with this, so i learned to dictate long just from the practice i got at mass general as a psychiatrist. so then when i began to write articles, another stuff i was in that habit. so i wrote something. they liked it. they published it. and i got lucky again. it was republished on the op-ed page of the washington post. it was the first time any article of the new republic had been picked up by the post. solve hit a double the first time out. how many people have you heard of who become giants
you show me a writing sample? so i had to go through the same thing, sorry, i don t have any. have you ever written a speech no. i will tell you what, mondale is giving a speech next week. write me a speech. i looked up political speech and began reading them. so i get an idea of what political speeches look like. it struck me when i first came to washington is the fact that all the monuments here, unlike the monuments in europe, are monuments with words on them. i decided i would make that the theme. i wrote that they liked it. they used it. they hired me. 1980 he worked for walter mondale, democratic candidate for vice president. but, this was long before the triballization of american politics and the polarization that have the two parties facing one another across the barricades of mutual incomprehension. a much more gentle kind of partisanship then. and when we got totally crushed in the general election got a call from the
of journalism just by sending a piece to a magazine like the new republic. that s what charles did. then i went through another stage. i became a speech writer for the vice president of the united states, walter mondale. i joined him sometime in the spring of 1980. talk about luck. i had met, again, shear blind luck once at a dinner the chief speech writer. and we met a second time. talking about the job. he said, you know, he mentioned the third speech writer had quit. i thought well, i might be interested. i said well, maybe i could apply. he said okay. so he gave me the to jim johnson. jim johnson was the chief of staff to mondale. interviewed me and of course the first question is can you show me a writing sample? so i had to go through the same thing, sorry, i don t have any. have you ever written a speech no. i will tell you what, mondale is giving a speech next week.
law. there was this one psychiatrist who was charles. and we arranged for him to come to lunch. so i went down to see mike. he interviewed me and he said can you show me a writing sample i said unfortunately i can t. i have never written anything. when i was a psychiatrist, and you discharged a patient you write a discharge summary. the first time did i a discharge summary it came out looking like it was written in chinese. i had to rewrite the whole thing. after one or two or three or four. i would dictate, this is 3,000 words in one go. as long as i had it in my head where i was going with this, so i learned to dictate long just from the practice i got at mass general as a psychiatrist. so then when i began to write articles, another stuff i was in that habit. so i wrote something. they liked it. they published it. and i got lucky again. it was republished on the op-ed page of the washington post. it was the first time any article of the new republic