Democratic National Committee Vice Chair David Hogg is quite the polarizing figure. Both sides of the political aisle have found fault with the young, up-and-coming liberal advocate. He made an appearance with WGN Radio afternoon host Lisa Dent last week, and I wondered how she tackled her discussion with the figure.
The very first question of the conversation was, perhaps, the most authentic question I’ve heard asked in to begin an interview since I’ve started dissecting them for this piece.
Dent told Hogg that the show preceding here in the WGN Radio lineup is hosted by John Williams. She shared an anecdote that Williams said he’s never seen Hogg smiles. She followed that up by stating, “There’s literally always someone on your ass, David. So, do you experience happiness and joy?”
That’s not an open-ended question. But it is certainly one that I can’t imagine Hogg was prepared to answer. I’d venture to guess that Hogg had a pre-determined idea of what he’d like to opine in during his discussion on the state of the Democratic Party, and having to answer a question about whether or not he ever feels happiness or joy wasn’t something he was prepared for.
Now, this is something that I generally will champion during the middle of the interview, rather than at the start but I love when interviewers use this card in their deck. The “Throw them off their game question.” The overwhelming majority of interviews — especially bad interviews — include boring, non-answers where the subject talks about what they want to talk about rather than answer the question.
So, what do you do? You throw them off their game and toss in a question they couldn’t possibly be prepared for.
For instance, when I was hosting an afternoon sports talk show, we would have a weekly segment with local high school football coaches. It wasn’t groundbreaking radio by any stretch of the imagination, but it was sponsored and people tuned in because there are few people as influential to their community in Western Ohio as the town’s high school football coach.
Anyway, every week, we’d have a local coach on the air, and he would — and this is not an exaggeration — say the exact same thing, week after week. We could have replayed his answers from the previous week and no one would be able to tell the difference. It became a running joke behind the scenes. So one week, I said “Screw it. We’re gonna throw him off his game.” And after he made his weekly spiel about how he respects the program the other coach has built, the opposing quarterback has the ability to beat you with his arm and his legs, and that winning the field position battle will be of utmost importance in the most monotone, uninterested-sounding voice imaginable, I simply asked him: “Coach, what’s your favorite ice cream?”
I’ve never heard someone physically light up through the phone quite like this guy to talk about how much he loves butter pecan ice cream and that he actually has a superstition that he has to eat it for breakfast on gameday.
That question that he couldn’t possibly have been prepared for disarmed him. It made him drop his guard. He was forced to re-evaluate his approach to the discussion and really, truly, think about his answers.
And that’s what Lisa Dent did here. She threw David Hogg a curveball right off the bat that he wasn’t prepared for, and knocked him off his feet a little bit. It isn’t a strategy I’d recommend to us frequently, but if you have it in the “Break Glass In Case of Emergency” case, it’s a wonderful tool.
She then followed up by asking about Hogg’s relationship with famed Democratic strategist James Carville. If you hadn’t seen the news, Carville — an 80-year-old — called Hogg — a 25-year-old — a “contemptabile little twerp” as Hogg has sought to upset the proverbial Democratic apple cart in recent weeks. However, Carville had since changed his tune, praising the liberal activist for his work after his comments went viral.
The WGN Radio host asked Hogg what it was that turned Carville around. There was one thing I liked and one thing that I didn’t in the lead-up and asking of this question.
First, I’ve mentioned before that I dislike using outside audio and other media in the approach of a question just because I feel as if you haven’t set up the question in such a way to ask it without that clip, is your audience intensely aware of the topic? Probably not. And if they’re not aware of the topic, should you be asking it? I also generally think the point can be made without that external sound, but that’s just a personal preference.
On the flip side, asking a question like this leans into conflict. You know what people love? Conflict. Younger generations like millennials will shy away from conflict in their personal lives, but will consume virtually any media that includes conflict and confrontation. Boomers — who undeniably make up a large portion of the news/talk radio audience — virtually thrive on conflict and confrontation in their personal lives. So by leaning into that aspect of the inner workings of the Democratic Party, you’re checking a lot of boxes.
Conservatives will want to hear about the infighting from the opposition. Others will want to hear about the conflict behind the scenes. Another portion will want to hear about how it was resolved. On the surface, it doesn’t feel like a deep question. But when analyzed further, it is a query that will keep virtually everyone tuned into the conversation. And isn’t that the goal?
Other questions during the conversation included asking about the historically low approval ratings for the Democratic Party, its aging leadership, how the party can win back voters in the future, and what the message from the political left will be going forward.
Overall, I thought Lisa Dent did a masterful job managing the conversation. She didn’t let Hogg go off on tangents, didn’t really let him ramble about whatever he wanted to talk about, and she asked pertinent questions that a broad, diverse audience could be interested in.
This isn’t an easy conversation to navigate as someone might expect her to “take the fight” to Hogg, while critics might argue that the convo was too friendly to the DNC Vice Chair. But, isn’t the old saying that if both sides of the political aisle are upset, you probably did something right? I think that applies here.
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Garrett Searight is Barrett Media’s News Editor, which includes writing daily news stories, features, and opinion columns. He joined Barrett Media in 2022 after a decade leading several radio brands in several formats, as well as a 5-year stint working in local television. In addition to his work with Barrett Media, he is a radio and TV play-by-play broadcaster. Reach out to him at Garrett@BarrettMedia.com.
