John Dickerson's Blog
I found another artifact in my flies. It’s from 2008 before the seat reclining wars flamed into full roar. It feels like these still hold up: Air Travel tips -Items will not shoot from overhead bin the instant you place them there. Close the door of the bin gently. -Don’t get dressed at the opening […]
Read the Full PostI’ve been working on sorting and cleaning my digital files. I come across all kinds of notes to myself, like this one from 2010 about the presidency. It only took me 10 years go write the book on that subject, but an examination of the BP oil spill and presidential standards made it into the […]
Read the Full PostI joined Norah O’Donnell and Margaret Brennan for CBS’s coverage of the 20th anniversary of the terrorist attacks of 9/11.
Read the Full PostMy conversation with Chris Wallace about his new book Countdown: Bin Laden and presidential decisions.
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From Thomas Merton’s No Man is an Island.
Read the Full PostThis was an extremely hard piece to think through, and very meaningful to have worked on. I had Viktor Frankl’s Man’s Search for Meaning in my head the whole time.
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As we prepare to move apartments– just a few blocks away– we’ve been packing up the books with all of their underlined passages. Some of those passages are being posted here. A post shared by John Dickerson Library (@jfdlibrary) As we prepare to move apartments– just a few blocks away– we’ve been packing […]
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I started writing a note to myself to help me understand what this year 2020 meant. I am posting it here in this low-key way for those I’ve come to know over the years. Please click “Read the full post.” Then click the link to End of Year Thoughts 2020 – Google Docs Thank you […]
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I was recently in a discussion about presidential standards. Someone made the same case Senator John Cornyn does in this Tweet, that we should evaluate presidents by what we can see them do. I argued, as I do in my book, that this is not just wrong, but a big problem. The job […]
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In 1976 government officials thought there was going to be an outbreak of swine flu that would kill as many or more than the 1918 flu. (Some good background). They developed a vaccine and these PSA’s were created to convince people to take it. Whoa…Wait ’till you hear about Dotty!
Read the Full PostIt has become extremely normal for politicians to say something untrue or irretrievably dumb on purpose, in order to create a politically beneficial controversy. A politician does this to spread disinformation. The goal is to disinform the credulous, not educate the curious. It is also a way to set the agenda. If the public debate […]
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“Members joined in the shouting and kept it up for some minutes. Some embraced one another, others wept like Children. I have felt ever since the vote, as if I were in a new country.” — Congressman George W. Julian on passage of 13th Amendment.
Read the Full PostSo here’s a project that I really would like to follow through on: America is in a tough spot and has been for some period of time. This has caused considerable psychological woe. Many of us have had personal bouts. Public life has compounded things. What has helped you get through? Meaningful, joyous, frivolous, momentary. […]
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John Lithgow on his new play, “Stories by Heart,” and playing Churchill This interview for the CBS This Morning podcast is from 2018 and it is still one of my favorites. “My favorite podcast this year was talking to John Lithgow. We were in his green room right before his amazing one man show. […]
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I am continuing to go through old notes and papers. I found a series of sentences I’d written down from Charles Dickens’ Selected Journalism. This one amused me: “What I particularly want to impress upon you is, that it is not enough to see a thing and go home and describe it, but that the […]
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I have been going through stacks of papers finding things I never had time to put in The Hardest Job in the World. Here is an exchange with John Lewis Gaddis on his latest book On Grand Strategy We had a wonderful, wide ranging conversation on the CBS This Morning podcast, but here’s a part […]
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I like this metaphor: This is from Harry Emerson Fosdick’s book The Meaning of Prayer.
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Reading President Obama’s book A Promised Land, I keep coming across passages that I wish I could drop into The Hardest Job in the World. Here is Obama’s passage on the mystery of his own schedule: Here is what I wrote about the presidential schedule when I was trying to help readers understand the job […]
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