. >> rose: welcome to the program, we begin tonight with politics, we talk with robert costa of "the washington post" an washington week on pbs. >> the voter, the swing voter saying generic democrat may be better for me and a better fit than president trump, dun many republicans can't push and pull and win the voters back but the voters seem rattled onier into the trump presidency. >> rose: we continue with the film three billboards outside ebbing, missouri. we talk to writer and director martin mcdonagh and its stars frances mcdormand and sam rockwell. >> it is almost too dark to tell a story about. but when i imagine the person who put the signage up there to be a mother and a vong woman, everything fell into place. i didn't even have to plot the film after that. mildred popped up and it was

just about following her through her adventures almost. >> we conclude with michael lewis, his book the undoing project is now out in paperback. we talk about thatnd a new series for "vanity fair." >> it's a very odd system of government. we have two million federal employees yefer seen by 4,000 political people. sometimes they know what they are doing. sometimes they have to learn very quickly. >> so the trump people didn't show. it was like an exquisite course on how the federal government works, was prepared and the student didn't show up. >> robert costa martin mcdonagh, frances dk more dand, sam rockwell and michael lewis. all of that when we continue. funding for charlie rose is provided by the following: bank of america, life better connected.

>> 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: we begin this evening again with politics, republicans are reeling after election losses on tuesday. gop lawmakers are growing increasingly divided over president trump's leadership of the party. many are concerned the white house is alienating moderate voters and swrep ardizing republican prospects for the 2018 mid term elections. party unrests comes as the gop works to overhaul the u.s. tax code, senate republicans unveiled their own tax plan on thursday breaking with the house gop's earlier proposal. joining me from washington, robert costa a national political reporter for "the washington post" and the moderator of washington week on pbs. i'm pleased to have him back on this program, welcome. >> good to be with you, charlie.

>> rose: let may begin with tax reform and what the senate is proposing and what difference there are about the house bill. and how significant are they? >> they're pretty significant at this poant. the key challenge for republicans right now is whether they want this tax cut legislation to be populist in nature or not. they know they want to have a corporate tax rate bringing down the rate from 35% to around 20%. at the same time, the debate now between the senate version which is moving forward and the house version for republicans is about the top rate. should top earners see a tax cut or not. and that's going to be something that is really going to perhaps hold up the bill in the coming we can. >> so what about other issues in terms of the corporate rate that was reported in the washington most, i think that they made delay their corporate reduction until 2019. is that still under consideration? >> that's exactly right. and that comes back to the same point about populism. all these republicans on capitol

hill are republicans elected during the george w. bush era, during the obama era. they know president trump has disrupted their entire party. and as they adjust to that, and as they try to pursue the signature item, tax legislation, they're grappling with this idea that the base isn't really begging for it. at least that's what they tell me privately. so because of that, feeling that the base doesn't really want this but the corporate donors want it, they're trying to see maybe they delay the corporate tax cut for a year. the white house is more open to these changes about not giving a tax cut to the top earners, or delaying the corporate tax cut a little bit, maybe one year, two years even, because they think heading into 2018 they don't want to be seen as a typical mainstream wall street republican party, maybe these tweaks could be helpful in that sense. >> rose: is everything in the congress today, every consideration, especially after tuesday, about what does this mean for 2018? >> everything, charl yea. and tuesday with the defeat in

particular in the virginia gubernatorial race has alarmed republicans pub lookly and privately. they're saying that now every step they take politically, legislatively has to be calculated about what does it mean if you are a moderate or even a conservative running in the su beshes, democrats did well, not just in the gubernatorial races in injuriesy and virginia, but in county races and local races in new york and the new york suburbs, the philadelphia suburbs, northern virginia, and that is why, they're moving slowly on tax cuts. it's in part because they don't have consensus in the congress but also because they're wary of the wipeout potential should they have a tax cut bill that is seen as not really connecting with the grass roots in either part. >> rose: but the president needs a victory badly, does he not? >> there's debate about that inside of the white house. of course they want something more than the confirmation of judge gorsuch on to the supreme court. at the same time, they don't want to be panted with the brush that they're hurting the middle class or they're helping the wealthy.

so this is something they will have to navigate. >> rose: if you looking forward to 2018, i mean how much of this suburban vote that went to democrats was about trump the personality and how much of it was about trump's policies? >> that is something that's also under intense debate right now in gop circles because they look at 2016, charlie, and they say the reason they won the presidency, he kept control of congress is because they wanted the milwaukee suburbs, the phillie suburbs in columbus, ohio, all these areas where you had college educated, republicans and independents who voted for a change candidate in donald trump. >> rose: and women as well. >> and women am but now they look at this can aree in the coal mine of women on tuesday in virginia, women on tuesday in new jersey, to an exent it. they're moving away. and why is that? republican pollsters tell me in part it's because of the president's unorthodox, incendiary behavior but also because of the policies, and in particular, pay attention to health care. the republican moves didn't

passion. but their efforts against medicaid expansion, i think based on my reporting have had an impact. >> impact manying that people who were receiving med case-- medicaid don't want to give it up, and they believe that the trump policies or the legislation that came out of a republican control of congress would eliminate some of the medicaid expansion that they had come to need and appreciate. >> in the view of obamacare is more newanced than some republicans like to admit in the sense that criticism of the market place is in both parties. but you see a lot of people, independents i have met and you see this in polling, democrats and some republican voters, trump voters like the aspects of the law that have provided expanded coverage and that includes the medicaid provisions. republicans are seen as the party going for a corporate tack cut, trying to go after medicaid expansion. the voters who were tempted by trump's change and may have even voted for trump in 2016, now they're wondering, they may even

still like trump because he's such a disrupter but they don't rep particularly like the republican-- if tax reforms km, if they pass t will only be with republican votes. >> well, almost certainly majority republican votes, of course. but i think could you see senator manchin of west virginia, you look at a joe donelly of indiana, moderate democrat, low key presence, respected in the u.s. senate, president trump won a state of indiana by 16 points last year. he's traveled with president trump on air force one. there's a lot of courting from the white house. but senator donelly, i have pok inwith senator casing in the last few days from-- casee, a democrat from pennsylvania, they still believe the republican party is separate from truck, in that if they can vote against the tax cut but still articulate trump style positions on trade, a little more populist when it comes to taxes and they don't feel the pressure to go with the republican tax bill. >> rose: what is the reaction to tuesday from people like

steve bannon? >> he is disappointed in gillespie. bannon offered to do i a rally for gills-- gillespie, his campaign said no thanks. bannon was working with the grass roots in virginia to try to get it behind gillespie. but it hurts bannon in the sense that he had hoped that trump, the trump message would be resonant even though gillespie didn't fully embrace trump. he certainly played to the kind of cultural issues, confederate history, illegal immigration, crime, and gangs. gillespie towmped on those issues, a mainstream republican taking some of those bannon breitbart issues and trying to use them to win. it didn't work because the suburban voters said that's not the kind of politics i like. >> roy moore was somebody that steve bannon enthusiastically supported, now he's being confronted by some sexual charges. is elicly to step down? >> it is hard to say at this point, charlie.

my colleagues here at the post broke that story, spoke to women on the record. one of them who was 14 when they had an encount we are judge moore, the republican nominee in alabama. almost every republican who the post and other newspapers spoke to at the senate said if these charges are true, the allegations are true, he should step down immediately. there's a lot of pressure from leader mcconnell, the majority leader for roy moore to perhaps get out of there. at the same time in alabama there is a lot of defense going on right now for judge moore, this is seen as a media attack even though it's solid reporting from "the washington post." and i think it's hard to say if judge moore who is such an outsider, outside of the mainstream of the gop will be pressured to step out. >> rose: is there any sense that the democrats in the election that took just took place in new swrersee, i mean in new jersey, in virginia, in parts of new york, that it was a pro-democrat vote, it was a vote that was responsive to dem kratdic ideas or was it more a negative vote against president trump and his personality and or

ideas. >> it was a little bit of both, in the sense that northam, lt. governor of virginia, phil murphy a businessman who ran, both democrats in those states in the gubernatorial election, they ran as typical democrats. they tried to touch on some trade issues. they focused on things like the minimum wage and raising the minimum wage, these were bread and better democratic issues, in a sense they were generic dem contractic candidates so you saw the suburban voter not really embracing the democratic party in a full way yet but saying generic democrat at this point in those states, those states it should be noted, did go for democrats in 2016 so it wasn't entirely unexpected. but the swing voter is saying generic democrat at this point may be better for me and a better fit than president trump, that doesn't mean republicans can't push and pull in the next 12 months and win those voters back. but those voters just seem rattled right now one year into the trump presidency. >> rose: robert costa from

"washington post" and from washington week, thank you for joining us. >> thank you. we'll be right back. stay with us. >> rose: three billboards outside ebbing, missouri, is the new film from writer/director martin mcdonagh. it tells the story of a woman whose daughter was raped and murdered after months with no development in the case, she rents three billboards outside of town to accuse the local police of neglect. david edelstein calls the film instantly gripping, a finely calibrated mixture of foggy mel an koly and quirk, here is the trailer. >> you ain't trying to make me believe in reincarnation, are you? because you're pretty but you ain't her she got killed. >> how come, i wonder, there ain't no god in the whole world, it doesn't matter what we do to each other?

>> i hope not. >> i don't know what the police are doing. >> i hadn't heard a word from them-- il a he tell you this. i have heard a lot from them since i put them billboards up. >> will you keep the case in the public eye. there is a chance they're getting it solved. >> they got nothing to arrest you for. >> if i had some food i would give it to you. all i got is some doritos, but they might kill you, they're kind of pointy. then where would we be. >> rose: this is so good. joining me is the writer and director martin mcdonagh and two of its stars frances mcdormand and sam rockwell. i'm pleetioned to have all of them here at this table. welcome. this is a script that had been around. >> i wrote it eight years ago. but it wasn't like i was trying to flog it around or anything like that. i kind of wrote it. >> rose: let it rest and

marinate. >> yeah, just kind of, it was pretty much identical to the one we started started from a year a half ago but i was doing a different project, seven psychopaths and this one could have happened first. but because we set the ball rolling with that one, and that was five years ago, this was always going to be the next one. and then after we finished that, i am kind of lazy so i just kind of traveled around and did nothing for a few years. >> rose: mildred looks like just, in that trailer, fascinating woman. >> i think she is a fascinating woman. >> rose: tell me more. >> well, you know, you put martin's writing in the cocktail shaker. and you put me in that cocktail shaker and a bunch of other good folk from the theater world and you mix it up and you're just happy. you're happy. also. >> rose: so you saw it in the script. >> oh yeah, well, martin actually wrote it for me. and he had seen not only my film work but a lot of my theater work. so he knew what he was dealing with. and i'm 60, charlie, come on,

you know, i got a breathed of work and i got some stuff on my face to work with. >> rose: yeah. but you got some talent too. >> yeah, you know, i've worked hard. i was told in drama school i was not naturally talented. and so i went at it. >> rose: did you? >> systemically, oh really? okay, i'm going to change some minds. >> rose: you went out just to multiply that talent. >> i didn't know how to do anything else. i'm a pretty good housewife but besides that, i hadn't really any other-- i wanted to to do it. >> rose: if you hadn't been acting you don't know what would you have done. >> housewife. >> i think that is the same with all of them. >> i don't have any planes either, i would have been pumping gas. >> it's really good not to have a plan b sometimes. >> rose: i just walked into what i do. why did you think her, what was it with her, having defined the character with her in mind. >> integrity, tbreat actress but integrity-- but integrity on and

off screen too. just reading about her, and just bumping, we bumped into each other a few times in theater work. but just the knowledge that like off camera, off screen a she doesn't take any crap, you know, that was a part of what mildred was too. so i knew we could harness that as well as the brilliant actress that she is. >> rose: who is mildred, i will ask you. >> she is a mother. she's someone who has lost her daughter to a horrible murder, seven months before the story started. and that, she's gotten through, i think the grieve the grief and the sadness and depression and she's come out, correct me if i'm wrong, but has come out of the end of that weird pure rage almost, at the beginning of the film, she is raging that the police haven't really done enough to solve the crime. and it is certainly a character i had never written before, a

woman who is that strong and outrage us, almost. but you know, how to had a heart but didn't have to wear that on her sleeve. >> i think that, i don't think the grief will ever be over. i think that that is part of mildred's tragedy and any parent that loses a child because st a biological imperative that you keep them alive. but i think what happens is after that seven months she takes action, radical action and that breaks the paralysis of the grief. and knowing full well there will be collateral damage. robbie, her son, people in town. >> rose: yeah, but he said an interesting thing, correct me if i'm wrong. he created the character but you have also created the character. >> yeah, it became a collaboration. >> yeah. >> i mean we had a lot, we had one major debate after i read the script, knowing, being so honored and so excited. you do not get a gift like this.

even from your family members, i'm waiting for my family members to give me another gift like this. but especially, well, you gave it to me like three years ago, so you know when i was, do the math, do the math, 57. and but i, i was concerned about the character's age. because i am from a working class background and i feel like a lot of women from that sowsio economic world as mildred's wouldn't wait till they were 38 to have children. so i was concerned about playing the moth of-- mother of younger children, 16 and 18. and so i asked martin to make mildred their grandmother knowing that a lot of grandmothers knowing that a lot of grandmothers raise their grand children. and but he was realy, and i think rightfully so, was connected to the idea of her being a mother in kind of the greek tradition of how mothers fight for their-- . >> rose: revenge. >> well, yes, justice, it's justice. >> rose: not revenge. >> we never talked about revenge. because it almost makes it

too-- justice is larger. a large-- larger goal. >> rose: and who is dixon. >> dikes on is a complicated guy. yeah, he's a lot of things. he is a racist cop. but he is a momma's boy. he is a lot of stuff, yeah. but he takes a journey and he transforms into something different, yeah. >> rose: you prepare hard, don't you? >> i try, you know, it comes out of, you know, fear of sucking, i guess. but country, i mean i had the luxury, i had time for this one. so i was able to do a couple of things i normally wouldn't do. >> rose: hang out. >> hang out with some cops, stuff like that. but it's just really, i mean martin write this great script and it's a road map of what to do. >> rose: that's where you start. >> that's where you start, yeah. >> rose: what do you want your actors to do? >> bring the truth, i guess, just bring the truth to the characters, as they see it. or as we see it between us, i

think. we, in all of the stuff, in this particularly, we talked about, i wouldn't call it rehearsal really, just talking it through, before hand, trying to get on the same page with each other about who we think these characters are. and going forward together, me trying to get out of the way as much as possible. >> rose: get out of the way. >> yeah. get get out of the way of the choices in their performances. >> rose: so what, stimulate-- the script. >> stimulating, give them a text, stimulate the sense of what this adventure is about and then get out of the way, let them find it. >> pretty much. >> there's kind of a point in the collaboration where we become the experts because we're living the interior lives of the characters as well as the, the you know, honoring the words on the page. that's not always the case. i would say that we're represented three quarters of the time with blue prints. there's huge holes in the story,

plot lines, character development, we have to fill a lot more of that in. but with martin's work it's like a play, you start inhabiting it from the minute you decide to do itk don't you think. so you can inform, then you go into meetings with costume designers and hair and makeup and you, we can actual leigh help martin because we start living the interior life. >> i immediately wanted to do it, but so the minute i quoo say, took me about a year and a half to really-- . >> rose: because of time factors or you just wanted to be what? >> took about a year and a half just for us to actually develop, be able to produce it. that's the time line. >> scheduling stuff with plays too, you had a play, i had a play, then money fell through, and it came back, stuff like that, right. >> but in terms of the age question, my husband said just shut up and do it, he's right. >> rose: your husband would say that. >> and i don't always listen him when he says shut up, but in this case i did.

>> rose: roll clip, a of when they are together at the police station. >> [bleep]. >> what? >> what? dixon when she comes in calling you a-- don't you come in here. >> shut up. >> you get over here. >> no. >> you get over here. >> all right. >> you do not gsh-- i'm taking care of it in my own way, actually. get out of my-- office. >> what is it i can do. >> where is denies watson. >> in the clanger. >> on what charge. >> possession. >> of what. >> two marijuana cigarettes, big ones. >> when is the bail hearing. >> i asked the judge not to give her bail on kft her previous marijuana violations and the judge said sure. >> you do not call an officer of the law in his own station

house, mrs. a, or anywhere, actually. >> what's with the new attitude, dixon, your momma been coaching you? >> no. my momma-- doesn't do that. take them down, you hear me? >> rose: i want mildred on my side. >> me too. >> both of them, actually. you want either of them on the other side. now do we see redemption for dixon? >> absolutely. i think so, yeah. i think there is definitely some redemption for-- yeah, he really takes quite a journey, yeah, yeah. in that scene he's got an achilles heel which is his mother. so any time that i try to stand up to mildred, that's his crip ton identity, she uses that. and then maybe he could alpha but then he can't, when she brings up mama, it's over.

>> rose: and she knows it. >> she know it, yeah, right? >> yeah, it's a small town and i think that, momma dixon is played by an extraordinary actress, and what is wonderful about the way that the chemistry between sam and sandy and the film is like they really are like spores from the same tunnel, right? and. >> the word spores from the same tunnel. >> but mildred and mama dixon are cut from the same cloth. they're women, missouri women that are cut from the same cloth. so there is-- . >> rose: what is that cloth? >> oh, bark cloth, i would say a nice bark cloth, well-- yeah. floral pattern, perhaps. but, right? >> yeah, yeah. >> so i think there's some, that there is kind of a-- yeah, it's a working class. we got it. but i think also that there is d-- there's something about

mildred is allowing her matchismo to come forward. >> rose: everybody says she is allowing her macihsimo to come forward. >> i think that is part of the radical action she takes. >> rose: you thought of swron wayne as a kind of mod e8 here? >> i did. have i to say in retrospect, i worked really hard to for just such an occasion to come up with a female iconic, cinematic character that i could-- and the only one, who who would you think of. >> rose: barbara standwick. >> i should have talked to you, well yes, sure. though it's interesting because i could-- i didn't cast that far back, would have the same balls, it really felt like a cowboy to me. and i've always wanted to play a cowboy. so i, yeah, and it's interesting. i had just read a biography

about john wayne, cover to cover and i usually don't read biographies cover to cover but it was a really well written one, cannot remember the author's name. >> rose: what do you do, stop halfway. >> i'm not that interested in actors lives after a certain point. but there was something about the breathed of his life that was really fascinating. >> stunt man, yeah. >> came out and had to work in b movies for so long before he got, you know, that he did stage coach. so it was just, it was fascinating is. >> rose: casting was a homerun. >> dreamland. >> i would say not one person said no. >> rose: is that right? >> no. >> rose: how many people did you have in mind for when you wrote the piece. >> these two and woody. >> rose: three of them. >> yeah. >> rose: in mind. >> yeah. woody and i go back, because woody is a theatre guy too. and woody and me met over my plays. he read all my stuff and we met in dub lib in a bar. and chatted for a few days. and but we would always wanted

to work together for ages. first on a play and it didn't quite work out. but then got to work with seven psychopaths with him and now it is, he is almost the moral center to a degree of the whole film. and woody is that in life, you know, there is something so lovable and decent about woody as a man that like as soon as he is on screen, or on set, you just-- . >> rose: you are feel relaxed around him. >> he just has a relaxation about him that makes you feel-- . >> rose: feeling comfort because you know-- like frances you know he knows what he is doing. >> yeah, but i feel like i'm related to woody, there is something about him. >> he's trust worthy. so if you know you will be in a situation where you are really laying it bear bare, he will take care of it, right? i think that is also, also comes from, you know, the top, same with martin.

we were all going out on various limbs. and dangling over the edge. and we all felt like we were, you know, not safe because it's never fun to be safe. but we had a good harness. >> rose: mildred's relationship with her son changed after the death. >> yeah, i think the months of paralysis, i mean i'm not one, a big one for back story but lucas and i talked a bit about it, we had a lot of time in that car where we shot our scenes, we talked a lot about actor because he's a young actor, i'm an older one, so we had fun with that. but i think what i-- offered him was the idea that for seven months she was probably laying around on the couch, i mean, you know, commatows and not really eating or drinking or speaking. and so though her aks are not great for him or his life and not completely understandable, at least she's seems like herself again. >> rose: do you prefer actors who have had some experience on

the stage, in theater. >> i wouldn't say i go out and seek it, but i think it just naturally happens. >> rose: what is that then? >> i guess it's a lack of love of movie stardom and a love of acting. that these are all actors. probably more-- ways of saying it, it is that, they're all proper actors. and i think proper actors know they will have to do theater for good parts as well as movies. i think you have always said that, if you want the good parts, you have to go back and forth. >> yes, it's going back to training ground am but i also think, you know, none of us yet, and if i catch you doing it, we don't sell perfume, or watches or cars. you know, you don't-- our faces aren't. >> lucas done that yet? >> we'll have to ask him. >> christopher walken, has he done any? >> it is kind of hard for an

audience. >> it started in japan, yeah, the ad thing started and i think people thought when we weren't so global that that was there and it wasn't. but it's really difficult, i think, so you know, if he with wanted to play a heroin addict living on the street, it wab really hard if somebody had just seen us in a magazine, you know, with diamonds dripping off our ears. it's really hard to go past, for me, even people who whiten their teeth too much. do you know, when you go well, i don't know, but so i think it really, it behooves an actor who wants to play a wide variety of characters. >> rose: stay real. >> closer, it's still a movie, after all. we've got people fixing our hair all day so it's not like we are really living-- it's not a documentary, right. but on the other hand, i think, it's for the story telling, it's just so much easier.

>> yeah, yeah, completely. like for mildred, especially when it's a working class character, it's very hard to find the actors who can play that convincingly without sentimentalizing or patronizing that. >> rose: you guys practice this dynamic, we just saw in that scene. >> what about it? >> did you rehearse that a lot? >> no, no. >> rose: were you off on the side say also let's just get this dynamic. >> i think we came in knowing what we had to do, loaded for bear. >> rose: you are shaking your head. >> yeah, yeah. >> rose: in other words, that is what a real actor does, comes ready. >> i think there are a lot of real actors that love rehearsal. but in this case, we were all, we were just cast properly. and so you put, you put those dynamics in the same space. we knew who we were playing. >> yeah. >> and i think it's also, we are theater actors but it is also, there is a consistency to being a theatre actor. but now we don't have the time, the luxury to do a million takes.

and we got to come in ready to go, right am you got to know your stuff, you know. >> rose: you are a man from london, an irishman. ebbing, missouri. >> makey upy name. >> rose: makey upy name. >> ebbing isn't real but-- . >> rose: you had in mind, you had a sense of the town. >> i had, yeah, probably from almost as much from movies as from traveling. i do like traveling around small down america quite a lot. >> rose: do you do that? >> yeah, like ever since the beauty quen was on i kind of fortunately had money enough to get a train or to get a bus and just have time to explore america. >> rose: do you write while you are doing this. >> this was written mostly on trains and in little towns across the country. >> rose: do you check into a hotel in little small town mot el or hotel. >> yeah, and in the daytime go to a field, go to a river, riverbank and, yeah, i think when i was up a mountain and a

deer came along. and that just made it into the scene. >> rose: everything is. >> funny, when you do that, everything becomes part of the script, you know, as you are walking down a street, you wouldn't notice it but everything, even a song becomes, you know, integral. >> rose: what was it that caused you to write this though? >> i saw something similar to what we see on the billboards at the start of the movie, on a bus trip across the state, about 17 years ago. and it was something-- . >> rose: you made a note. >> it was like just a mental note, the rage of it, and the pain that was obviously behind it. and the bravery, i realized because it was calling the cops out for inactivity, even in that signage. stayed with me and kind of bugged me for ten years. and it felt almost too dark to tell a story about. but then when i imagined that person, the person who put that

signage up there, could be a mother and a strong woman, everything just kind of set into place. i didn't even have to plot the film after that. mildred popped up and it was just about following her through her adventures, almost. >> rose: some people see parallels with flankery. >> i love-- him and we have a kind of nod of the head to one of her books during the film. i mean she's-- we've got a catholic back grounds. we like to explore the darker side of life. >> rose: congratulations. >> thank you. >> rose: fantastic. >> thank you very much. >> rose. >> thank you. >> >> rose: it opens in a limited release, i think, november 10th, select cities. the movie once more three billboards outside ebbing, mississippi ouree, back in a moment, stay with us. michael lewis is here, best

selling books include liar's poker, money ball, the big short and flash boys, his latest book the undoing project was just released in paperback. he also has a new investigative story about the department of agriculture that appears in this month's "vanity fair." i'm pleased to have michael lewis back at this table. welcome. >> thank you. >> rose: so how do you end up at the department of agriculture? >> very good question. how do i persuade gradeen carter to publish 13,000 words on the department of agriculture. >> rose: yes. >> so this is the idea. it's part of a series i'm doing. >> rose: let me interrupt you, as you have said, it should be called the department of 2350d. >> yeah, it-- maybe even the department of helping little people, helping the little guy. because it's such an important part of social safety net. people think it has to do with warming an less than 10% of the budget has to do with warming. what is really doing is the food stamp program, the snap program there is a $200 billion bank inside that does nothing but essentially subsidize rural

america. and so an and so forth. let me just say, i got there. the, i couldn't help but notice after trump was dlectd elect there were reports about how the franceician wasn't going well, that trump, the administration was either thin on the ground or not there at various agencies. and the obama administration had, partly because there was a law passed during the obama administration requiring the president to prepare for the transitionment but also because the bush administration had prepared so well for ot bama administration, that obama was personally grateful to bush. obama had essentially-- several hundred people threud the administration for a better part of the year to prepare briefings, briefing books so for the day after the election, whoever won, it was assumed that people would roll in from the new administration, take over the department of energy, agriculture, treasury department. and they would be there with a

nonideaological briefing about what goes on be side this place. if is a very odd system of government we have, we have 2 million federal employees yefer seen by 4,000 political people. sometimes they know what they are doing, sometimes they have to learn very quickly. so the trump people just didn't show for much of this, it was like anix questionskk exquisite course for how the federal government works and the student didn't shoip. that's just interesting. it is interesting on a number of levels but it's interesting because there were these briefing thras didn't happen that i can go get. and that's what i have been doing. i've been going out getting the briefings that the trump administration either didn't get at all. >> rose: when you walk into the department of agriculture and say i'm michael lewis and here to get the briefing. >> i find out who was supposed to deliver these briefings or prepared them and i call them and they are usually home in their maine or wherever they are. >> rose: waiting for somebody. >> they are not. but you call them and say can i

give you the briefing. he said i spent six months on this thing, i would love to give it to somebody. and the-- but it's getting, it's trying to understand how these enterprises work but with a particular angle. and that is what is vulnerable inside them to an administration that hasn't done its homework, that is either ignorant, misinformed or are hostile. >> rose: didn't take the transition seriously. >> certainly didn't take the transition seriously. and thinks that-- and to this day hasn't really staffed up the place. so the department of agriculture has i think 13 senate confirmed positions that you are supposed to fill. >> rose: and how many. >> when i finished the piece, only one had been filled. and there was one other guy who had been nominated, but, and it was, this is an example of the problem. so one of the jobs, the senate confirmed job is to be in charge of all the science in the department of agriculture. so like $3 billion a year that et goes doled out to tech schools and ag schools to essentially prepare for climate

change, to figure out how to grow crops and raise livestock in different climates. a lot related to climate change. but it is very long-- it's research that has consequences far into the future that private industry is not going to do. and the woman who occupy od that job, a woman kathy woteki spent years preparing for it, an agriculture scientist, she had done original work in connecting like the american diet to american health. she had run all kinds of interesting parts of the government. she was exquisitely prepared to oversee this thing. and the person that trump, this is one nominee he made other than the secretary was a guy named sam cloffist who was a right wing radio talk show host from iowa who was the cochairman of his campaign who had no background in science, much less agriculture science at all. so there is a sense that either trump himself or the people am his orbit actually think that

the government runs it self or if we neglect it maybe it will all fall apart like we want it to or shrink like we want it to. it is unclear what. it feels like ineptitude or like no plan rather than plan. >> rose: never got int governance. >> right. and i thought, this is to scare people away from the thing i have written, but this is an interesting way to deliver a ea, if you ask me i would say that is the place that pays farmers not to grow things. hi no idea that it was in charge of policing all conflicts between people and animals in the country or that it ran the forest stfer. -- service. it's vast, it is 100,000 people. >> rose: does it run the wildlife. >> just the forest service. and so-- qurchg that is 200 million acres of lands, when you see the federal government fighting wildfires, that is the department of agriculture. so i went in with a-- the angle

is, like where are we vulnerable. what should we be worried about. the truth is, not all of it. farm program, the farm subsidy programs are watched by the senate like a hawk. i mean if there are senators in farm states that aren't going to let the white house screw with the farm subsidies. whether you like them or not. but there are parts of the government where people pay no attention at all. >> rose: you have done agriculture. >> and energy. >> rose: you are going to do how many departments within five, maybe. i i think i will do another few of these. >> rose: like what. >> i am trying to decide, if you have ideas, i'm open. >> rose: i would suggest justice. >> well, maybe, i think that-- there is a broader question ask like where is the light not shined. i mean energy and agriculture seem like two obscure places. energy happens to be the department of nuclear weapons so it is a shame it is an obscure place, so where is it most useful for me to wander in and

start asking question. and it may be the justice department is so shall did -- it's so reported on, so watched, in the news every day, that may be the point of vulnerability. >> rose: did you have no idea, knowing the relationship you had with barack obama, knowing those really interesting seminal magazine pieces you wrote about him for "vanity fair," did you have no idea in trump himself? >> well, i may get to that. >> that may be down the road. >> rose: are you building to that? >> maybe i'm kind of making it up as i go along. >> but so if you ask me, so with obama, when i went to go get to know obama and write about obama there were a whole bunch of things that i wanted to do to get to know him that seemed obvious like play basketball with him. take me to the place in the white house where he writes at night when he is alone because that was very important to him. there were just things, with trump, if i exierl that list of

like if trump, he won't, but if he were to let me into his life, what would i want to say. the only thing can i think is i want to be there late at night when you tweet. >> what is your mood. >> what turns. >> rose: what t turns you on. >> exactly what were you watching when are you pounding the thing in your phone or wherever are you doing it, what i don't know.thout does it.s >> rose. >> who ever is doing it, i mean, it's just because of gram at kal errors and spelling errors you have to assume he's doing it himself. i would love to know what is going through his mind and what he thinks in that moment he is achieving it is his mode of communication with the american people, really. so-- . >> rose: he usually jumps to the idea that roosevelt's medium was radio, kennedy was television. reagan's medium-- he basically says social media is my medium and so. >> i'm not-- i'm not going to be

arguing with that, i just want to understand what he thinks. >> rose: he think 50s million foarls. >> what he thinks he achieves when he does whatever is doing at the moment, it would be fun to take one tweet and take it apart. >> rose: or does he accept that all the arguments, that it takes him so far off message that what he hopes to plaish legislatively is delayed or impacted. >> or does he think that what i am doing is engaged in an act of constandly distracting everybody from the fact i'm not running the federal government. but it would also be fun to know, i mean he composes them, these are literary events. he has to write a sentence or something like a sentence. why put it-- i would ask why did you put it that way instead of this way. >> rose: how interesting is he to you? >> well, obama was really interesting to me. trump, trump has never been that interested to me. interesting because of the position he's in. if you would have said to me,

you know, when he was a real estate developer in new york, you can go write a profile of donald trump. >> he mim self is not, doesn't strike me as that interesting a person. >> rose: what if i said here is a real estate doaferler who never ran for public office who will become president of the united states. are you you more interested now? >> i would have been terrified then and i'm interested, yeah, well, so because of his situation, sure, i'm interested now. >> rose: obama said at the beginning, after the election obama said it's no mean trick to win the presidency. >> no. >> rose: so whatever he did, ladies and gentlemen, you know, we need to know. >> yeah. so i am not neglecting him intentionally. it's just that i'm-- that i may get to him later. and i'm going to continue with the series. and it's been, it's funny. the department of energy, i didn't know what it did. i thought what the hell, start with that, and i found out what

it did. a lot of people were tre vd then i thought i wonder how robust this is, if i pick just almost because it seems like the most boring, neglected department, if i just picked that department and went in, would it be interesting. and i was rivetted by the department of agriculture. in particular the caliber of the person i was dealing with, you know, ktee woteki, kevin kincanon who basically dispensed a trillion dollars worth of hunger-- . >> rose: annually. >> no, over the course of eight years but nobody knows his name, nobody knows his name, exactly why he was good at that job. why he cared so much about it. and but he did. and an he, the bigger point for me was you know t sounds simple, but the motives of a person in a job really matter. why you were doing what you are doing. why you are president of the united staights, or why you want

to be the deputy secretary for the science program in the department of agriculture. it dictates in a lot of ways how you do your job. and if your motive is i was just a trump supporter and this is where they sphuffed me, you get a completely different outcome. >> rose: absolutely. i have an impression that most people who have been really successful outside of government, who because of whatever reason go into government, they come away with more admiration of-- i'm asking, so this is my impression. more admiration for many of the people they work with than they imagined before hand. >> yes. so this is what i am finding. it's incredible. some of-- the person at the center of the piece i wrote on the department of energy, a fellow named john mcwilliams who made his fortune as an investor in the energy sector. and he thought he knew both what pbei mainly all fern tiff energies.

but he thought, he thought not that he would be con depend-- condescend to government employees but he didn't expect to think highly of the department w40 would be working there when he came to work at the department of energy. and he was blown away. absolutely whroan away, first rate scientist wandering the halls. people who work really, really hard, of course in every place, there are people who are-- . >> rose: of course. and private sector too, by the way. >> but it is, in a way, shocking to the people who come from the outside of the caliber of people inside the federal government. but on the other hand, if you think about it, it is almost at this point an act of bravery to go-- i mean we've been dumping on it for 30, you know, for 40 years in this country. we don't pay them that well. if are you there for a real purpose, i mean, it takes some courage to be there.

>> rose: but also if you talk to people like bill gates, who has a healthy respect for at some of the money he believes creates is to be able to show government a direction, because only government scale, the amount of resources government has, can do things like conquer disease and lots of other things. >> correct. >> there are things that only government can do. >> right. >> and if in fact you can and in some way be part of the direction in the smart as possible application, of those, that power, those resources, then that's a very good thing. >> it is a very good thing. i totally agree. and we have this disfunctional relationship with our own government, it is regarded as this hostile other force, this deep state and all that. and i find it bizarre because i think that if our government fails, our society fails. >> rose: absolutely. let me talk about this for a few minutes. the undoing project. i love this story and the friendship or the promans that expected between the two of them, one now dead. you came to this attention

because after writing money ball, you had mentioned the work that they had done, correct? >> correct. so this is the honest book i have ever written-- oddest book i have written in this way, because it has a 13 year history, norm 58ly i'm in and out very quickly. money ball was a story about the way that baseball teams figured out that the market for baseball players is screwed up. baseball players are misvalued by the ex-baseball player experts. when the book came out, richard sailor who won the nobel prize in economics and cast unseen his writing partner wrote a nice review but it was a very damning review. it said michael lewis doesn't seem to understand the point of his own book, basically. that yes, this is all this is very interesting t is a very interesting case study of the work of-- . >> rose: you doesn't mention them. >> the point is that i never got to the place in money ball where i was asking why are the baseball scouts making these

mistakes. the systemic errors that someone coming in with statistical analysis can exploit. why do they make, why are the best looking baseball players overvalued and the worst ones undervalue the. why are the young guy who reminded some scout of some player they saw 20 years ago overvalued and guy who looks like no one ever seen under. >> so they did all these study showing the way the mind makes mistakes. >> rose: what did they do? >> to broadly what they did is set out to study the way the mind works scientifically, and they did it by giving people paper and pencil tests, essentially statistics tests to see where they got things wrong. having a hunch in advance of where they might get things wrong. they, so over the course of 10, 12 years of working very closely together, they're exploring human nature. they're exploring the things the mind does.

and they turn up, lots of startling insight. they turn up the fact that i mean generally that when people are deciding between things, they're deciding between things, between descriptions of things and if you change a description a little bit you can get them to completely reverse their choice. they discover that when people are making judgement, it is just like gut decisions. they're way too influential-- influenced by whatever just happened or whatever they just heard or something viv ent that is in their head. so when you are driving down the road, and you are deciding how fast you're going to go, you're making essentially a probability judgement about how likely you are to be in an accident. you may not be thinking that way but you are. and the needle on the spedometre is measuring that. you are going 75 miles an hour because you think are you immortal and then you see an accident and all of a sudden you slow down to 55 along with everybody else. well, it is a weird thing to do because at that moment, or you see a red light.

>> whatever it is, your sense of the probability of an disebt went up at the moment you are probably less likely to have an accident. so they showed the way how when we move through the world, we as people are always making these implicitly this probbistic calculations and how we are wrong. now instead of actually doing statistics, even when we can do statistics, like in the test they gave people, we're answering by telling ourselves a story. we think in stereotypes, instead of when you can think in statistics instead. so we think that you know the big player is better than the small player because we think big players are better than small players. they showed, i mean it's kind of-- they're on a journey. after the fact we can say what they got, got the nobel prize for something called prospects. and prospect theory is an unbelievably complicated theory that has inbedded interesting, started elling insights. >> quickly before we go, tell me

the personality of the two. because they were dramically different but had. >> they were oscar and felix, they were so different that nobody who knew them imagined why they would ever work together. konaman was this dark, brooding, constantly doubting, and in fact his doubt ends up being kind of the engine of the collaboration. he doubts everything around him. he doubts the existing theories of everything. but a basically kind of an artistic temperment. turn the dial a little bit on his personality and you got a novel. and started ellin him, constantly. -- is this totally self-assured, smartest man in the room wherever he goes. wearing it lightly almost all the time, that everybody who meets him says that is the most brilliant mind i have ever met. but it is the kind of a-- it is not really a fertile, creative mind exactly. it's a mind of someone who, if you give him a very startling fertile, interesting idea, he can figure out how to carve it

up and present it to an audience and where you can't argue with it any more. and he was the life of the party, tom was the afterparty. >> rose: great to you have here, michael lewis of the undoing project, a fascinating story about science and friendship and understanding humanity. thank you for joining us. see you next time. >> for more about this program and earlier episodes visit us online at pbs.org and charlie rose.com. captioning sponsored by rose communications captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org

>> rose: funding for "charlie rose" has been provided by: >> and by bloomberg, a provider of multimedia news and information services worldwide. >> you're watching pbs.

a kqed television production. >> it's sort of like old fisherman's wharf. it reminds me of old san francisco. >> and you'd be a little bit like jean valjean, with the teeth, whatever. >> and worth the calories, the cholesterol, and the heart attack you might have. >> it's like an adventure, you know? you gotta put on your miner's helmet. >> it reminds me of oatmeal with a touch of wet dog. >> i did. inhaled it. >> p