weingarten care so deeply about the children and education delivered to the children's classroom, that you do gives me the slightest bit of hope that maybe there is an for copper mines in improvement there. host: all right, the cover story for "time" week, thank you very much for your time. that does it for today's "washington journal." a.m., up later at 11:00 we will have the funeral services for longtime washington post editor ben bradlee. the service will be at the washington national cathedral. he led the newspaper for 26 years and died from natural causes at his home in washington, d.c.. the funeral today is open to the public. profileid and american interview with him just after he announced that he was leaving the post. we want to bring you that interview.

>> ben bradlee, how do you feel about leaving your post that you have been in for 20 some years? >> i feel great about it. i feel excited about the new things to do. i feel excited about the quality of the team that is going to take my place. i feel wonderful about the leadership, the owners of this newspaper. they are special people. they have set this newspaper on a path that is the best there is. >> what are you going to do? >> i'm going to do so many different things. when i was contemplating this, i talked to a number of people. i got a lot of jokey suggestions. don't go to the post office and safeway on the same day.

i'm going to be a director of the washington post and the herald tribune. i have a contract to write two books. i'm going to be a vice president of the newspaper. not quite sure what that means. i have just finished a documentary television film that the post has made about how we got into the gulf and the first place. nothing to do about the war but how we got there. i have decided to do -- when you are an editor, you can't do pro bono things. that shows you are a partisan of something.

i have not done any. my wife and i are going to take on the capital funded drive for children's hospital. $40 million, we are going to try to raise in five years. we are indebted to that hospital. our kid was sick. they saved him. i have a couple of other things. some people have asked me to do something that i can't talk about yet, but it is interesting. >> those books, what will they be about? >> i have this theory that the pros and our business bring understanding and skills to reading a newspaper that the average person does not. you can read a story that quotes an anonymous source and you know

who it is. the average person does not. there were a lot of things i think i could explain in a non-stuffy, hopefully well-written way. >> like strunk's elements of style. >> if i could take a reader through a newspaper and say, this is what you ought to look for. >> memoir? >> i have all sorts of material on it. i am having trouble with the first-person singular. newspaper have been told to park that, leave it. i find it hard to say i. >> you read memoirs of others? >> i have always been interested in memoirs. i have been interested in -- i

remember kennedy telling me once that the most interesting part of journalism is describing somebody. what are they like? what is he really like? i find it hard to do, but i am interested in it. >> have you read any memoirs where you said, this is what i want mine to be? or the opposite? >> there are people who talk about themselves in a vain and it seems to me bad way. dean acheson's books were very good. i thought the book was very good.

i read elia kazan's book. it seems that he had trouble with the first-person singular. >> you mentioned your son, who survived -- >> he is nine. he had something called a ventricular defect. it is a hole in his heart. he was born with it. when he was eight pounds, three months, at children's hospital, a doctor went in there and sewed a patch on to the hole. did it blind.

he is terrific. he was left with all sorts of other problems, but he has conquered them one by one. >> you mention in your past job, you could not be a member of a pro bono organization to raise money. why not? >> the theory is if you run the united givers fund, how is the newspaper going to cover them without confusing the readers? if we write a story about children's hospital, the reader is liable to saybradlee is on that board. we are trying to avoid having demonstrators -- reporters covering a demonstration with a

button showing their appearance -- sympathies. >> you mentioned writing a book about how to read a newspaper. what do you say to that? >> we don't like it. there are parts of our profession that are lazy about it. there are parts of the political process, people in it who are lazy. i think editors ought to, i think we have done it more than we have to. there is a lot you can do to narrow it down.

to help the reader. if you say your source is a male or female, that would help. pentagon or state department. by shaving it, you get the source down to a segment of society at least. that helps the reader. it takes longer, another four or five phone calls. there is a book about the networks called "three blind mice." i am stunned how much is on the record. he said, you can get it if you have the time. he says, you guys do not have the time. we have the time -- more than people think.

sometimes it is 7:30 at night, there's not much you can do about it. >> how many people in the newsroom right for a living for the paper? >> i'm sort embarrassed i don't know the answer. probably about 300. there are 600 -- the table of organization has 625 or 630 names. quite a few of those are vacant. we are trying to cut back. the economy is so lousy. you have a tremendous support force. telephone operators. dictationists. artists who are vital to the paper.

editors who are not writers but

i was on destroyers the whole time, in the pacific ocean. i had what was called a good war. i got a lot of action. it was crucially important for my life. i am sometimes embarrassed to admit it. >> why? >> i don't believe disputes between nations should be resolved by war. i was 20 years old and traveling in a destroyer around the pacific ocean. i look at my kids now and wonder how they could possibly get that kind of responsibility that early in their lives.

i was 20 or 21 and a greek major, driving destroyers around. it was a formative thing for me. i loved it. i guess i was pretty good at it. >> you grew up in boston? >> grew up in boston. sort of a bent silver spoon. my mother came from new york but my father was an all-american football player at harvard. he was a vice president of a bank until the depression when he went broke. very typically of him, he thought he wanted to repay the people whose money that had invested. that took about 15 years to do, but he did it.

>> why in the world did you study classics? >> i ran into a greek professor -- i went to a prep school in the middle of massachusetts -- he got me interested. i don't know why. it was funny, it was fun to go around with that skill of classical greek. it seems so ridiculous now.

>> when you read about the change here at the post, everybody loves to talk about the boston brahman versus the ohio milkman. >> will that make a difference? >> if i were him, i would brain me. i would be so sick of all these eulogies i'm getting. which are really quite -- i'm not false modesty. i know what i have done. i know it is an extraordinary team around here. i know the course was determined, and i got here. lyndon johnson made the editor the ambassador to the united nations just before the end of his term.

extraordinary man, still running a newspaper in maine with all the rigorous and injure -- rigor and energy. he must be reading the stuff and want to brain me, getting tired of too. >> -- brain me, too. >> getting sick of talking about yourself? >> my kid said come up a fork in me, he is done. normally you have somebody that has five minutes and hasn't done much homework. they want to talk about watergate and the pentagon papers.

i don't feel that i have been able to convey much. >> back to the ohio milkman. does it matter what your background is? would you recommend somebody today going to communication school? >> no, i wouldn't do that either. i think a standard education with a liberal arts education would be the best. thing you go back to russ wiggins who never went to college. probably the most educated man i ever met. he would give me two or three books a night to read. len downie has been here for 26 years. to say he is a son of an ohio milkmen is ridiculous.

he went to ohio state and i went to harvard. those are accidents that neither one of us had anything to do with. he is going to be different from me. big deal. the paper is not going to be different. >> a constitutional convention on the first amendment were held today, what would happen? >> i don't know. the 10 commandments couldn't pass, either. i suppose the bill of rights would have trouble. that is something that -- i try to worry about things i'm going to face and things i can do something about. i don't have to get the first amendment or bill of rights passed.

it is passed. >> were those men, were they extraordinary or is there something that would lead to the same -- >> they were extraordinary people. you don't see their like now. it is embarrassing to try to compare those people with the people up there now. >> what you think of today's politicians? >> i probably think about them the way they think about me. the process is drowning in the difference between substance and fact. i think television has done a lot about that.

there are days when i have yearned for the smoke-filled room. it seemed to me it produced some pretty, some quite extraordinary people. i don't think that when everything is done in the blinding spotlight, you have people fighting to get in front of a television camera and say something in a louder voice or different way, i don't think that the average politician is a hell of a lot better than the average editor or the average businessman. may be a little better than the average businessman. >> why do people change in front of these things? >> it is the heisenberg principle in physics. the examination of an object

changes the object. if you split a cell, the act of looking at that cell means it is not a cell, it is some thing else. i used to say that politicians love inc., they look to be in the paper that is nothing compared to their love of light and lenses. i see people talking in front of a television camera and not saying anything. they are really not. they have a speech. i have been on television because of my retirement, and i am saying the same thing over and over again. i launch into a story and i say, you are going to try that one more time? i can't believe it. kennedy, who was the first television president, used to

tell these stories. he would change the names of people just to keep himself on his toes. he had a story about the lights going out at the connecticut legislature. he would change the name of the speaker of the legislature, just to see if the reporters were on their toes.

>> he is a warmhearted guy. what is your reaction? >> you got the right guy. i had him waiting in there for you today. you know what people's image, my image, there is a lot of my image tied up in that movie. "all the president's men." i don't know. any answer is self-serving. i care a lot about people. i think an editor is given a certain amount of brains and energy. he is really a coach. he tries to find the best players and give them the best plays. >> what i was getting at is when you read any article about you, people try to characterize you. his walk is jaunty.

have you ever read a piece where you said, that is hogwash? >> i am always impressed at how people who do try to do stories about you feed off each other. the raspy voice, i have a raspy voice. my father used to say, we have a wart on our larynx. i don't take myself seriously. if that makes you jaunty, that makes you jaunty. with the computer, people can pull up any stories about you so you have the sharks feeding in the same pool.

>> you have something about a -- you are referring to -- what is that? >> if someone reads the washington post and their head falls into the bowl of oatmeal, you have done a bad job. you have been known to refer to a story as a four-bowler? >> i don't the guy have. i am not interested in boring people to death. i think a good newspaper ought to be exciting and have good writing. amuse, entertain. as well as inform and be useful. i have a certain irreverence

which people talk about. i am not impressed by the office you hold. i'm impressed by what you are like. i have seen a lot of people in my time here who hold high office. who are treated with a certain attitude because of that office, not because of who they are or what they do. >> who in your years in politics or journalism, or in any field, has impressed you the most with the job they are doing? who are the people you admire? >> i don't know. i look at the people that i think have done a tremendous job under difficult circumstances. dean rusk as secretary of state had one of the most thankless jobs in the world. it seems to me, and what my

greek teacher used to call a sober second thought, did a tremendous job. there are people who ran departments. >> secretary of labor during johnson's administration. >> kennedy and johnson. i am not prepared for that question. without having a long list, i don't think there are a lot of people -- there are some politicians who i think do a good job, who are on the good side. >> you have a favorite president? >> kennedy, he was the president i knew the best and was closest to. i went on a trip that had been

arranged by tom lovejoy, an assistant secretary. a great environmental expert. we went down to the rain forest in brazil with congressman. led by senator tim worth of colorado. al gore. and lots of other people. lying in a hammock in the jungle -- >> can you talk about how presidents have dealt with

people? people that have done it the wrong way and the right way? the fact that george bush has met with the press so often, did that work to his advantage? and wisely presidencies as you saw them from your post -- analyze the presidencies as you saw them from your post? >> i have been interested in which presidents like the press. they are all dependent on the press, including television. my god, they are in office i mean, my god, they are in office because of the press, and because of the abilities of the press. to first cut i would make is who understands the press, and there aren't many of them.

kennedy was successful with the press because he was interested in the press. he knew about it and would ask about it. how come they let with that story echo he was really interested in it. lyndon johnson, he didn't like the press much. but i think he understood the press. he understood his position in society. richard nixon was fighting with the press from day one. and didn't like it and thought that the press was all, all out to get them. it's hard to build a relationship with anybody who feels that way about you. gerry ford love the press and understood the press, and the

result is, he had a terrific press. he will like him. --y didn't suck up to them to him and they flatter -- and didn't flatter all over him, but they try to understand him. , he felt besieged. he thought the press was always eastern and northern, quite like lyndon johnson, as a matter of fact. isolated andlt hostile toward the press. reagan, who was the best manipulator probably of all of , handling the press was a royalty. he was good at it -- was a role to him. he was good at it, but he didn't like the press and he didn't understand the press. and he did not understand the press's role in society. that is the trouble with these .eople

they think that they and the press have a common job. well, they don't. the white house press officer and the white house press system, and the president, their job is to tell the truth to the country in a way that makes it look best and our job is to try to find the truth, period. and mind you, they all lie to the press. and i think as soon as those lies start coming in, it really is difficult to treat them the mean george bush who is really friendly and decent and bright person, he looks you in the eye and says clarence thomas is the best person he can find to be on the supreme court and that the appointment had nothing to do with race and that's not

true. the press recognizes that and as a result a way of that single statement. enemies.g to make him >> is that story throughout george bush asking you to the white house? >> he asked me to lunch at the white house one day. and told me in the course of , that he wasn't making any said -- with mary and i i forgot what i said. i think i said it was a credit to marry. >> the way the story went, he had a dinner and said, try to

talk her out of those things, saying things about me. >> well, good luck. if you tried really to understand mary and mary, well, you can't help but listen. mary is a great listener. >> why do they care about one columnist? >> they want them all. they don't want handful of columnists who agree with them. they want 100 of them. kennedy would get sore as hell at one correspondent for 20 minutes and then get sore as the heraldbanned tribune, but it wasn't very serious because he would send somebody over to dr. linsky's drugstore and buy 20 of them so comehe could read them

even as he had said that the paper was bad. >> again, to the presidency, techniques. do a lot of them call you directly over the years? >> i don't think so. did, and nixon did for a brief time. saturday mornings over here and it was a slow time for president as well as for editors. i thought it was awed, buchwald imitating nixon for the first time that we talked a little bit. i have talked to them, just not over the phone.

>> doesn't matter when they call? sure, it matters. and just aator says, minute, the president calling, if you believe it, sure it matters. you wonder what they are calling about and whether you know anything about it. >> other than the pentagon papers, what was the toughest assisting you made regarding whether to print something? >> it is hard to tell you about the stories we decided not to print.

there is no point in deciding not to print them and then deciding to broadcast them. >> can you tell us the areas? >> national security matters. if you get a story, and somebody tells you it is against the interests of your country to publish that, you have got to listen to that. we got to become trouble making a rule that if anybody who had the credentials said that, we would say, we will not print it tomorrow. we will convene a group and look into it. maybe print it the next day. i can to you i have almost never heard a claim of national security that ended up as a fact of national security. richard nixon said he could not tell the truth about watergate because it involved national security. that was baloney. sometimes it is a tough decision, a tough call.

but i can remember stories we had. one story bob woodward had about the cia giving some money to king hussein of jordan. just walking around money, not economic or military aid. there was no question it was true. we got a call from, i got a call from jody powell. he had gone to the carter white house to find out if it is true or not. powell said, if you would like to talk to the president, you can. carter was disarming. the first thing he said was, it was true. we knew it was true but we didn't have anybody with the president's title telling it was true.

then he said he wasn't going to beg us not to print it. i think the secretary of state was in the area at the time, and he said it would be very embarrassing. they were trying to settle the middle east. the existence of the story would make it harder. i've forgotten exactly what we did. we agreed we would wait a day so the secretary of state could at least inform the king hussein the story was coming out. our decision was based on the fact that any piece settlement settlementce

settlement that took place without that being public knowledge had no chance. it is vital for the american public to know that they had a king on the payroll. >> i wanted to ask you, what do you think of bob woodward's technique of sourcing a lot of material? -- of not sourcing a lot of material? >> i am in awe of his technique of reporting. i think it's quite extraordinary. the energy he puts into going back. and going back and going back. to talk to people 40 times. no reporter has that kind of patience and energy. he obtained information on the

basis that he -- of confidentiality. felt in his judgment, and i don't quibble, that he would not get it without that promise. it doesn't take a brain surgeon to know who is talking to him. george bush knows. you know. but i thought the way he handled that at the beginning of the book, if you pay attention and read it, you understand what is going on. >> you know him well, you trust him. what do you feel about -- that technique? in the whole world of journalism today. >> either people would learn to shut up, but i think that is beyond the capacity of most

politicians to learn. or if every reporter was doing it, reporters would quickly start saying who the hell the other reporter's sources were. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2014] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org]

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