Former Fox News anchor and founder of American Tinkerpreneurs, Michelle Malkin, joins me on the show to talk about her new book, Who Built That? and why she s never going back to work in traditional media.
00:01:18.000You know what it's like to be able to maintain that every single day and not feel like you're just about to have a heart attack or need a permanent hot shower.
00:01:32.000The reason why we can do things like that is in large part because of the alternatives we have as social media entrepreneurs.
00:01:44.000And it afforded me and it afforded my family a kind of freedom that I would have never envisioned when I embarked on my media career almost a quarter century ago when you had to be a company man or a company woman.
00:02:00.000I know you've been kind of, I guess, dipping your toes back in the water.
00:02:05.000Are you mainly going to be doing media to promote pieces of content like your book, or do you think we're going to be seeing the Michelle Malkin show on traditional media anytime soon?
00:02:15.000I was very grateful for the friends that I do have at Fox News who welcomed me back with great grace to talk about the book.
00:02:28.000I think it's really important to reach those platforms, especially with the message of this book.
00:02:39.000There are other things that are, you know, way more important to me and always have been, the reason why we bailed on the East Coast and the whole D.C., New York scene in the first place.
00:02:49.000And, you know, because we can be on Twitter and on the blog and on Facebook and Facebook, I don't have to be on the daily TV treadmill.
00:03:03.000But for a book launch and a book campaign, I make no bone spatter.
00:03:09.000I'm trying to reach as many people as possible.
00:03:23.000I really think it's the most liberating feeling of all.
00:03:27.000And I think, you know, back when I wore the corporate media hat, and it really was the only choice around, I worked for two major newspapers, you know, syndication and early bloghood gave me a taste of that freedom.
00:03:43.000And obviously, I'll never regret a moment of all of the work that I put in, you Ten years, when you saw my face pretty regularly on TV, I just think when you're trying to balance different needs and wants, it's so much easier to do that when you have the world of the Internet in bits and bytes to fill a vacuum.
00:05:29.000And so the picture that's presented is not necessarily one that represents completely who you are.
00:05:36.000And this is why I started off the book joking about how a lot of people perceive me as being that angry brown lady on TV. For most of the people who have met me on the speaking trail or who have had any chance to interact with me personally, they know that's just one small aspect of my personality.
00:05:55.000Just like you said, Stephen, because I always say it too, I'm very proud that I've never said anything on TV or radio or anywhere else that I don't absolutely believe.
00:06:05.000Because I feel as if, and I know you do too, Stephen, that if...
00:06:39.000I feel like I could not have sustained 25 years of going out there and Putting yourself on the line, and you know what it takes, Stephen, because it's putting yourself at risk, putting your family at risk in dire ways that you would have never thought possible when you embarked on.
00:08:39.000It was a typical story of left-wing blogs lying And, you know, falsely accusing me of using some doctored photo on an article that was syndicated and then run by National Review.
00:10:06.000It doesn't look like there are a lot of people that are phoning it in.
00:10:08.000And I've talked about this with Andrew W.K. and I think Milo Yiannopoulos last week.
00:10:14.000This is abnormal, I know, for people like you and I who've done media for so long, but this is kind of the way media is going for younger people.
00:10:22.000They want things that feel a little organic, and my theory has been when our parents were growing up, it was, let's sit around at the dinner table and talk.
00:10:30.000And then we'll sit and we'll watch, you know, The Tonight Show, or we'll watch Steve Allen, and it's, oh boy, gee, betcha!
00:10:36.000Whereas now, people aren't talking with each other, they're so married to their device, they're looking to their entertainment, and that's sort of the podcast phenomenon, for that sort of human touch and interaction.
00:10:44.000They want it to feel more conversational.
00:10:47.000I don't know if you've picked up on that, because you sort of always have your finger to the pulse of how media evolves.
00:10:51.000Have you noticed that with younger people?
00:10:56.000I don't know if this is the best example of it, it's just something that's been on my mind lately, but My oldest, my daughter, had wanted a Twitter account.
00:11:46.000And I went to Instagram, and it was basically nothing but pornography, so I didn't go back.
00:11:53.000Well, you know, I opened up an Instagram account, oh, I don't know, several months ago, mostly as a tool to do something that we've just been talking about, which is sort of to provide a fuller, richer, rounder picture of who we are.
00:12:07.000I think that one of the troubles that the right faces is this problem that I've talked about, about framing who we are.
00:12:16.000It serves useful purposes to be perceived all the time as an angry person who is fully immersed and obsessed with partisan politics, and that's not true.
00:12:29.000And the more you are able to make yourself look like a human being, the more dangerous it is for the progressives.
00:12:37.000And the problem is, Michelle, that you and I both know this, that a lot of people who sort of control the more conservative mediums don't want that.
00:13:50.000And what they hate most about the GOP establishment is the fact that these people never fight back.
00:13:57.000And you see them on TV and it's clear that their main agenda is to get invited back on the show, to chum it up in the green room.
00:14:05.000And so whether it's, you know, appearances that I did on The View for the last book or with Matt Lauer, You know, or even just last week where, you know, I had been on hiatus from Fox for a long time.
00:14:19.000I did the whole, you know, book promotion.
00:14:21.000And then they had me on for a segment on one of these shows where they put me up against some dumb open borders liberal.
00:14:28.000And yeah, my head is going to explode because I can't stand what I'm hearing.
00:14:32.000And for the most part, these people get away with it.
00:14:42.000You know, if you've got three minutes to, you know, completely expose some open borders traitor, yeah, you're going to do it.
00:14:51.000But like I said, you know, the framing is really important because you don't want to, I don't want to just be seen as somebody who, you know, hates immigrants.
00:14:59.000And that's why I went off on the guy in the first place.
00:15:01.000This idea that we all just want to all throw every last foreign person into a cattle car.
00:16:03.000All of a sudden, the dynamic changes and people find that interesting.
00:16:07.000And I think that's what's interesting about you.
00:16:09.000If you're on a panel and there's three other people or if you're on debating to other people and their goal is, okay, make sure I get back on the show again.
00:16:29.000And I would say that the most enjoyable TV appearances I've had since I've gotten back into it the last couple of weeks...
00:16:39.000We're the longer-form programs and segments.
00:16:44.000I did 45 minutes on C-SPAN, and God bless C-SPAN. You know, it's always no holds barred there, and they've always been great about just, you know, giving me a fair shot.
00:16:56.000And when it's more conversational, and really when somebody's yelling at you and, you know, calling you the most evil person on earth, and you're able to do more than 30 seconds and really reveal...
00:17:08.000You know, the truth about who the real haters are.
00:17:15.000And then the other thing I did recently was I got to speak at the Reagan Ranch last week, and they're going to be showing that on C-SPAN again.
00:17:23.000And I think it's really important to reach that kind of audience because people will give you a shot because they know it's not just going to be 30 seconds and out.
00:17:33.000And you have time to develop your ideas, and that's what I got to do with this book.
00:17:39.000The other reason why I was really mad the other day, Stephen, was a Washington Post book reviewer who was mocking the chapter that I did on toilet paper, thinking that this was so funny in and of itself, QED, because he couldn't wrap his head around possibly reading the whole thing, digesting it, and understanding the thrust of what I was trying to do, which is what you tried to do with so many...
00:18:04.000And done successfully in your past videos of, in particular, reaching younger people.
00:18:10.000Remember the segment you did with the kids and the Halloween candy, which is still one of my kids' favorite segments, of really driving these lessons about a free market economy home?
00:18:22.000Yeah, well, you know, first off, I'm actually more flattered when your kids compliment me, Michelle.
00:18:28.000No offense to you, but it's like for people who don't realize their children are these absolute, just total talent, these massive talent pools where you look at it and you go, oh my gosh, I wish I were as good at anything as this kid is at music.
00:18:41.000I'm a loser, and it makes me want to go swallow a sword.
00:18:49.000Well, I had a mountain lion mom, and I look like the marshmallow woman compared to her.
00:18:56.000But, you know, I think that inculcating that sense of drive and work ethic, and there's a Latin phrase that I included at the end of the book, which is really our family motto, nihil boni sin labore.
00:19:11.000There's nothing great achieved without work.
00:19:34.000I know you've talked about that everywhere else, but my audience may not necessarily be familiar with it because there are a couple things that I think are important for everyone to know, and you should drive that point home.
00:20:24.000Well, I appreciate that, and I really appreciate just your public recognition of that.
00:20:28.000Because, you know, again, I think it's served the left's purposes to not acknowledge, you know, the full breadth of who you are.
00:20:36.000So it's much easier to just, you know, consider me these phrases that have been bandied about for the last, you know, decade and a half on all.
00:20:45.000online that I'm just some white man's puppet.
00:21:11.000I was saying that news sites, you know, they might mention offhandedly like Ashton Kutcher said something stupid and there might be a hyperlink to Twitter.
00:21:18.000But you were the first one to put in a timeline in a way that was entirely graphically accessible.
00:21:32.000And I was amazed that people were mad at me giving credit.
00:21:36.000Well, yeah, and I think partly it was deliberate misunderstanding, deliberate misunderstanding, and also, again, because if people acknowledge that, yeah, I had something to do with that, yeah, I had an innovative thought, again, I think it's something that does not compute in their worldview, and that's why you'll never see me at South by Southwest, or up there with Ariana Huffington.
00:22:01.000I have to tell you, Stephen, when we first rolled out Twitchy, I mean, you can go back and look, unless, of course, they deleted them.
00:22:09.000I didn't bother to save any of these stupid tweets of people who had no idea what I was doing.
00:22:32.000So, look, you know, this is something that, of course, every disruptive innovator from the industrial age to the internet age has had to face, whatever the degree.
00:22:42.000Obviously, it was so much smaller than mine.
00:22:44.000You know, it's not a huge breakthrough.
00:22:46.000I think it was inevitable that you were going to see Twitter aggregation.
00:22:51.000I think it was really important to gain a foothold in that, because I think the right has been caught flat-footed so much, and I wanted to be ahead, and we were, and I'm really proud of that.
00:23:02.000I think that this idea of disruptive innovation really captivated me, and that's why I was so really keen on doing this book.
00:23:10.000It was really like taking a graduate course in the history of American innovation.
00:23:15.000Now, would you say – well, I guess I'm – let me scrap that question.
00:23:20.000I was going to say if you feel the need to focus more so on inventions or sort of improvements because it seems that the United States now doesn't maybe invent as much but they improve upon things really, really well.
00:23:33.000They innovate things or they're creating better mousetraps.
00:23:36.000Do you think we're in a stage right now in American history as you research this book where – Not everything under the sun has been done, but a lot of it has.
00:23:44.000And so you see more entrepreneurs, you know, like the Zuckerbergs, people who didn't invent the Internet, but they're creating the Facebook, they're creating the Instagram.
00:23:51.000Does that seem to be where the puck is going?
00:24:09.000In the book that talks about how, you know, what makes America look great is not the endeavors of a few huge products and projects, but the confluence of an amazing amount of small ones.
00:24:23.000And that's the history of, whether it's the bottle cap or the razor blade or even the development of glass bottles in this country, that it was One insight that was labored upon and tinkered upon for years and years and years and continually improved, and of course the ability to profit from those large amounts of improvements over time.
00:24:45.000I mean, the people that I highlight didn't just have one or two patents.
00:25:06.000But there really is – if you look at their investment patterns, they're not rolling the dice in the stock market.
00:25:11.000But they actually are investing long-term in diversified portfolios.
00:25:14.000They do believe in higher taxation and Bernie Sanders.
00:25:18.000But then you look at them and a lot of them are really trying to swing for the fences and become entrepreneurs.
00:25:23.000Do you think the American entrepreneur is, like a lot of people on the right say, kind of dead with my generation?
00:25:29.000Or do you think that it'll be even bigger than ever?
00:25:33.000Well, yeah, it is thriving in a way and it is that indie spirit, which has sort of been the theme of our entire show.
00:25:40.000Show here, of people who want to work for themselves.
00:25:44.000Now, it's paradoxical, because on the one hand, shows like Shark Tank are wildly popular, and yet these same millennials who are striving to hit it big vote for people whose entire careers are based on demonizing the financially successful.
00:27:02.000Socialism is no longer a dirty word because of the institution of higher learning and, of course, the media.
00:27:09.000I mean, if you look at Bernie Sanders, it's amazing, but he's gaining so much traction with people my age, dare I say it, even more than Hillary with the leftists.
00:27:17.000And these same people are often the people who are innovating and creating these amazing services online.
00:27:21.000So there is a real sort of dichotomy there.
00:27:25.000And I don't know that I have – I try and provide – I don't know that I have any kind of an answer for it other than hopefully they'll grow out of it.
00:27:31.000I mean, I don't know how when, you know, the common clarification of the teaching of AP U.S. history, the teaching of economics in this country is now, you know, thoroughly saturating.
00:29:46.000Do you ever have anyone compliment you on your smile?
00:29:48.000I said, no, because I've got a snaggle tooth, but I would like to.
00:29:51.000We have an entire generation of people who are just offended.
00:29:55.000And anyways, this doesn't go back to the entrepreneur thing, but I think that still is reflected in this disconnect even with the entrepreneurial spirit.
00:30:01.000People who are out there who want to strike it big, yet they vote for people who punish them for that.
00:30:06.000People who want free speech, who want this form of ideas, yet they're social justice warriors and they don't see it.
00:30:22.000I mean, what you were describing with microaggression and these feminists, I mean, I experienced it all at Oberlin, and I always talk about the Oberlinization of America, and I think that kind of ties everything together here, because they're not actually imparting knowledge of history into kids' brains from preschool through college and beyond.
00:30:46.000And then a lot of these people who, of course, are majoring in gender studies or multiculturalism are the people who are then going back into the elementary school classroom.
00:30:57.000So what does that bode for innovation?
00:31:00.000What does that bode for the next generation of makers and builders?
00:31:04.000Well, it means that these young people are not getting their educations inside the classroom.
00:31:08.000They're getting them outside the classroom.
00:31:10.000And the last chapter, I talk about the history of prosthetics in America from the Civil War to the present.
00:31:16.000And I do have some sense of hope because I quote these Girl Scouts who made this Lego-powered prosthetic hand for a little girl, a toddler, who had been born with a congenital defect.
00:31:28.000And somehow these girls, maybe through their Girl Scout troop, I don't know what, but parents or grandparents who still have some sense of appreciation for innovation and intellectual property rights, one of the little girls said, I'm so glad that we're getting a patent because it means that we've made it.
00:32:10.000And I'm sorry, Michelle, I think I've gotten to maybe, no, I've asked exactly zero questions that were suggested by your publicist talking about the book.
00:32:47.000I mean, it wouldn't be safe for the Avengers if you go nuclear on these people on Twitter.
00:32:53.000You know, I'd say I have your back, but matter of fact, I would rather...
00:32:57.000I need you to have my back more so, but not only that, if you could just swaddle me like a baby through Twitter and carry me, I think that'd be a more...