Kristin Gore: Sammy's White House

That's the most fun part of the whole thing. I am Carlos Watson I am really pleased to be here, former anchor of CNN I am the host to the new syndicated show, Conversations with Carlos Watson and welcome every one to Inforum which as many of you know is a division of Commonwealth Club and its for and by young people who are intrigued and engaged in a variety of civic issues. I am really exited I just met my partner in crime over the phone a couple of days ago. But I know that every one who comes in to contact with Kristin Gore will enjoy the conversation as much as I did, she is a former comedy writer on TV shows like Futurama and Saturday Night Live and author now of a second book and will talk a little bit about that today and some of you may know her parents Al and Tipper Gore. For those of you who didn't read her first book you now have an opportunity with Sammy's House to get a real inside peak at politics through the eyes of Samantha Joyce a twenty something protagonist who - well I leave that for a conversation. So please join me in giving a very warm welcome to Kristin Gore. Thank you, thank you very much. It's so nice to be here Kristin, do you have any roots in San-Francisco? I don't, but I love San Francisco, I mean my only, I did spend a summer here with my college roommate Kitty James, who is here, and I worked for Sheena back summer after my one year of college and loved it. I had a real fascination with San Francisco always growing up and so I just spend that summer out here and just fell in love with the city and really enjoyed that job, but now I live a little south and just come up as much as I can. So now how did you go from comedy writer and a former member of the famous Harvard Lampoon to writing about politics which I understood you always want to stay away from. I did always, I found just here a very clear of that and on purpose I mean I loved when I wrote a few Futurama, because its great to write about aliens and robots and the year 3000 and though some people insert political jokes there about how that relates to DC, for me it was really really different and it was only after I got some distance and perspective after 2000 and I undertook a novel, that I realize that the advice of right work you know was good advice and for better or for worse the world I know really well was what do you see in politics and for me I wanted to try to reconnect with that world and those experiences and happy fun way and try to show readers what it was like there behind the scenes, well also implant my fiction writing experience to just invent but I hope is a funny entertaining tale that gives a perspective on that whole world. That's interesting, me you saw that write about a world you know and that you know politics, because its not obvious to me may be it should be that just because your father has been, his career in politics and it will be close to what I feel like I have seen lots of children of prominent politicians gone back away from it, never really involved but you are saying as a kid you came to know it well, you discussed it at the dinner table, it was part of part of your world Yeah, we didn't discuss it in the dinner table that much, thank God, but we definitely, he- my dad, he was elected to his first term in congress, a couple of years before I was born. So I really grew up running in and out of his offices on the hill and then I was 15 in 1992, when they you know took over with in the administration and it is true that I actually wanted nothing to do with it and stayed very clear of it for a while, especially at 15, you don't need any help feeling awkward or embarrassed at that age and I got a lot of help with that. But it was, but when I did hang out in that world I didn't really hang with the high command that much, I was always sort of naturally with the people doing the xeroxing you know and then even I never worked for a congressman or senator I but I had a job on Capitol Hill and a lot of my friends worked for those in the name actually married a man who worked in the White House so I had some first hand experience there, but that was I couldn't help it soaked up and form natural relationships with lots of people who were working in that day to day and I tried to you know apply all of that to this fictional world for Sammy. So as you were writing, I mean the president in this book, President Wye why is the southern governor and the vice president by the way is a very good looking former former senator how much did you kind of steal from real reality from you know Clinton/ Gore? I didn't conciously steal very much I really love making things up you know so I with - I didn't plan on writing two books actually so when Sammy's hill that I thought I was so cleaver in making her you know work for a senator and really further from the world that I had come directly from and then I fell in love with her so much as a character that I kept going in my head and hadn't planed on two books at all but then when I realized I had a lot more to say about her, I thought it would be fun, but I, my experience so far with this book is so many people bring their own interpretations to it you know, I was in some one I was in Atlanta and some one said, oh this is all about Nixon and Johnson and then there was a guy from Russia and who said you have written about Yeltsin, this is Yeltsin. You know, and so I get lots of different interpretations and I mean I under stand obviously the temptation that think I have done pretty well things but it's really more complicated than that in terms of the geneses and actually I think if you read it its its pretty clear that they are fictitious and that I made that. Are you, are you an idealist - she clearly, Samantha Joyce 20 something health care policy advisor cares very deeply, believes things can change, has a few phobias, which are interesting. Are you an idealist, are you - are you a political idealist? Yes I am I Sammy is not me in that regard, I wanted to actually celebrate a lot of people, who I knew in DC over the years, who were that passionate and idealistic and determined to change the world and flocked there with this energy and enthusiasm and then proceeded to get knocked around a bit. You know, and people reacted to that in different ways and some people tune out and drop of that whole beat and just, you know, get very cynical about it all and some people stay in their and stay engaged and try to integrate what they learn that it's all, it's all not all easy and its not always but you can still may be try to have a impact and and I wanted Sammy to reflect that, from me you know I have been very dissolutioned by politics in my life and and I could have written much darker more cynical book absolutely I have said you know I said you know I certainly could have. Supreme Court might have been involved? Yeah, it would have been you know Sylvia Plat does DC in terms of tone but -. I'm told she is very funny. But I, I didn't think that would ultimately be that enjoyable to be, you know and and I also, and I also wasn't reflective of the majority of my experience, you know and I and I think that though after 2000 I was really profoundly disillusioned but I think that through Sammy I wanted to sort of embrace the sprit of you keep going, and you and there is always more to work on and more to do and I thank god for people like that because if you completely disengage then all right who is in charge then? Bitter cynical people? That's bad, you know, we want people who care in a good way and so and I didn't want to be with the tone of this book I didn't want to be you know preach here anything like that, I wanted it to be warm and light hearted, ideally, and and to laugh at the ridiculousness of DC too, I mean I want to reflect that there are important meaningful things that go on there and there is also lots of obscenities and may have in silliness, you know I kind of want to wrap that all up and show it Talk about that dissolution because we, when you and I - spoke the other day I was surprised to hear you say that you are disillusioned or some how dramatically surprise by what happened in 2000, talk about your surprise and why that was. Well I was very young, I was 23 I guess and and I was very idealistic and I did actually, I remember during the recount I just it was such an emotional roller coaster but I assumed that they would count the votes I just thought they would. And so that I guess was very shocking to me I mean how ever was it gone all shake out, I just I really -. Are you guys laughing with her or at her? I know because, when actually when I said this on the phone something similar was like you did you thought they were going to count them really and I didn't I didn't realize how nice that was I think it was a time and I had also I mean I had been raised to really - it sounds corny but I had been raised to believe truth and justice prevails if you work hard and you know and that's what you uphold and then I also had thought that I had also been raised to respect the court. And so to the supreme court I know that I mean that there had been a lot of time talking about supreme court but is general sense of respect towards it so I did not know what to do with that you know because it wasn't just against me and you know because one thing I learnt very clearly in 2000 and very before that even very early it wasn't about me, it wasn't about my family, it's about something so much bigger and so many people and so many hopes and dreams and so that was good it wasn't about you know oh my dad didn't get this job he wanted that was as important and powerful at all it was wow so many people want this so badly, want this direction, want this you know this this whole cause and that was the hardest part to There was none of that and again as an answer but there was none of that he is my dad I love him as much as I love anyone in the world and I think he would be the greatest President and Yeah of course as personal you know I I I had known him about 30 years now and and I know how he thinks and how he makes decisions and what he really believes and at his core and how genuine he is and I know and so as his daughter, I know that I love him of course just as a father but I also believe in him and think he is an amazing leader. So I thought he was well qualified for the job and I know he had great plans and you know and he want to deliver on this. So yes there was that element and then just someone who care about hurting that this is happening because he he you know again for him, it was about much more than him obviously. So yeah it was really really difficult but during this 36 days I wasn't depressed because I thought oh great they are count they are going to count them, you know, so you know the depression came later. Were you as a as a future comedy writing effort people like Chris Rock and other people who were involved in comedy talk but what they really like is kids and some of those kids to watch "Everybody Hates Chris." So what were you like as a kid, were you a loud wise cracking center-of-attention kid? No no I was nerdy, quiet, always reading a book, living in my head, writing of what - you know I am very introverted and my siblings are much more out going actually but I was a sort of I was really dorky, did all my home work all the time, you know before I did anything else. And was always had my head buried in a book and I think I made my family laugh I mean at me obviously but also I would make comments and you know which I was very shy so I had to know someone to be comfortable and I think within my family they thought of me as funny and you know I was always sort of going for the comedy of the situation but that was not on display for other people at all. So how did you get in to comedy writing if you weren't getting that kind of affirmation? Well that was at college at Harvard that I got into the Lampoon and that really shaped my comedy writing and made me - Famous Harvard magazine and Right, comedy magazine that has I actually didn't know about it's reputation before Harvard, it wasn't something I read but then being trying out for getting on, it was very formative experience because it made me for the first time inspired to make comedy writing accessible to someone beyond you know my sister and my mom and my dad you know to think okay may be I can make other people laugh. Can I? I don't know. And then the fact that there was this group of people who that's what they did and that's how they helped you shape that it was really interesting to me and so that really got me on that track and then allowed the graduates come would come back and they were writing for the Simpson's or Seinfeld, all these are the shows that I thought were hilarious and they have never occured to me to try to be a TV writer and so that - the Lampoon led directly to that pursuit. And how did you land the first job was it was it a certain dad who was helpful or what happened, how did you get to manage? No no. He what ever I may that my last name means in the world in the comedy writing world it doesn't have a whole lot of cache. I probably think you have good punch line right? Yeah its at the end of jokes right but I I was actually I didn't announce to my parents until - I think it was on spring break with Cattie, my senior year I was I thought it was on the way to grad school and I was always- I really loved academic writing and I was going to do that then I was reflecting on my time in college and I said that most fun I had had was the Lampoon writing. And so I called my parents and said you know instead of grad school I am moving out to LA without a job to try to be a comedy writer you know which is every parents dream, but they were luckily supportive and just said okay go for it and so I moved out, I wrote you know to get to try to get hired on a half hour story write a spec script and so a script of the show in the you probably know this already a script of a show that it was already on the air, like Seinfeld, like the Simpson's, like Everybody Love Raymond. You write like an actual episode? Yeah you do and so you and there are certain ones that I mean you pick a good one and a popular one but you don't want to pick a too popular one that the people are sick of reading you know so they were always trying to find like the next funny fresh one that people and then write a really a good version of it. What did you choose? I wrote a King of the Hill, which back then - I really actually I knew the Simpson's creators were coming - had just come out my senior year college and I wanted that show and so that I targeted that and so that's why I wrote an animated one I also wrote "Everybody loves Raymond" and so I spent a lot of months writing scripts and then submitting them and then I got an offer on 'Spin City' and 'Futurama' after lots of months of no offers and you know being alone in my studio apartments and sort of terrified by LA and typing away and so then everyone told me to take Spin City they said its much more popular its live action and I took Futurama and I just I for me, I thought it was, it just fit my sensibility more I thought it was a smart funny show and I like the fact that they have to draw what you wrote you know seem creatively fun and so that's how I got my first job and I was there until it got cancelled. You told me it was kind of interesting you were the only woman. And that late night writing sessions could be kind of distinctive. Yeah that's true. That's was actually where the lampoon training came in really well because there been women writers before on staff of Lampoon of course and after for whatever reason when I got on writing staff I was the only woman there and that was the exact same situation on Futurama, over 16 guys and me and luckily they were really great guys there was you know locker room nightmare stories or anything they were all total science geeks really I loved them but their idea of you know on a break a good time was figuring out, the circumference of Mars or something you know it was like I will go get sodas, I will meet you guys back here you know so so they were really they were terrific but it was the part of the nature of comedy writing on the shows as super long hours and you are around a table and you can be 3 AM and the show run on the scene or it come up with the funnier line for Bender the robot in you can't go home till you do and at 3 AM that's so sort of miserable. And so they there was a lot of long hours like that its great but its not everyone always thinks like you are laughing all the time because you are with all these funny people and you are just coming up with jokes but you have to develop as things get really fast because you pitch a joke and its either people sort of laugh and it gets on the script and or its just brutal silence you know and crickets chirping and you know pitch again because you just heard everything you know, when you are sitting there it's a job it's a job but it was a wonderful job I mean I learnt a lot and I loved those guys and I loved the show and so it was some hard hours and sleep deprivation but it was worth it. That when you finally got a shot doing some work on Saturday Night Live. Why do you walk away from it because if I understand right that's kind of the Holy Grail, that's where - if you are comedy writer TV comedy writer, that's where you want to be? Yeah its interesting it is for late night and for a lot of people it is but a lot of those guys when they done a SNL, then are going out then moving out to LA and trying to get on shows and so but of course in terms of high profile and prestige everything SNL is fantastic and I initially didn't apply any late night shows because I didn't want to write jokes for my dad that, you know, unless I felt like it, so I didn't go for that. Did anyone ever ask you to do it or any body ever say, we need one on Al Gore? Yeah, sure right but you know they they did just, I could have given great material but they did it, they did the all boring stand-bys, you know its just nothing fresh original there. But no I didn't, so I didn't feel like doing that and then not that they were throwing jobs at me, but I still didn't apply for the late night TV shows for that reason. And then, but SNL - what was great on my dad, hosted I got to guest right there and so I got to - at that point it was after 2000 so I wrote - part of this monologue was a spoof on The Bachelor and he was handing out roses to potential vice presidential candidates and then he ended it up in the hot tub with a actor playing Jelly Berman and then they had a very romantic scenes sipping champagne. So it's very fun to write that and then get him to do it and he was luckily game for it and and he did, he he was up for a that whole show, it's great. So I wrote for him for that and then a couple of other times I was a guest writer because I was living in LA, and I would go and write for a week and - and I had some friends in the Lampoon who were so it was always a fun reunion and they were very welcoming and nice and got to work with Tina Fey who was amazing and I love and she is a brilliant writer. And so but I had at that point established life in a LA and so I didn't I didn't take them up on a longer term job there, I had one one of the head writers was talking to me about that and I its an amazing experience. They really don't sleep you know, and they really its such a frantic pace for the show and I am allergic to caffeine, which is a handicap, but also I just realized that I had a life in Allay and the thing about New York is that if you are in there, then, if it doesn't work out and your time ends and also you know there are not there that many other shows to go to where as in LA, there is a huge gamut of them. Which is why every one ends up being there in then I quit TV any way but. And you started writing books were you confident that your book was going to - for those who don't know, your first book is be turned in to - we think into a movie, its been an option. So were you confident going in to it that you know there was going to be a lot of good news you could finish and be that people would like it. No, I wasn't not confident at all. I was really scared and I actually- Just scared, generically scared or most scared like in till I speak to a lot of writers who say beginning my first book it seems so many people who started and never finished and you know you are on your seven and done it, were you that kind of scared, like that I don't even know that I will get through it or were you just... I wasn't scared about getting through the book, I was scared because I knew, because I actually in last few years I work for TV I felt like I had so much pent up that I want to get out in terms of own characters and my own story lines and explain world beyond one liners and the strict structure of you know half-hour comedy TV. And so I - when I thought about writing the book I just knew I had this, these stories that we were just waiting to come tumbling out. So I dint worry about completing that because I felt like I have a lot to say I worried that it would be terrible and It wouldn't resonate with anyone else you know and so and so and I also worried, I have never done it I scared about how to structure it, I just fear was it was it big motivator, but luckily I was used to long hours in the writer's room and so I just it us translated those hours to sitting up my laptop and then it came, the story really did come naturally tumbling out as I said so that was fun, that experience was a real rush it was almost like I couldn't keep up with it, you know because I I was felt very liberated to be in this new form where I was in I was in I was finally my own show runner you know and I could go so much more in depth. But I didn't have the immediate feed back of the writer's room where you say some thing and people would laugh or they don't. it was obviously much more solitary and so there is months lag time where - and so I just didn't know if if what I thought was funny or good would resonate with other people. So that's where the fear came in. Did you get much help over the where the guest editors in the form of Tipper Al Gore and all or. They were, my parents and my husband, are sort of my first readers and my mom read Sammy's Hill in installments and so and she actually became very annoying because she call me up and say, when is the next batch, you know what's Sammy doing that you know kept working as hard as I can. You know it was very it was great, super encouraging and supportive, increadibly unhelpful because she never thought anything was wrong. You know she never thought anything had to be changed at all. So that's perfect which was not true so that it is a very sweet. And it was you know it was nice, so it's really nice encouragement support and then my dad was great too. He didn't read it installments right after the draft was done and had a lot of good helpful feedback and he doesn't mince words but he really liked it luckily but its also he is very constructive, as was my husband say that was nice and then of course my professional editor. So as we - now we have seen two books will we see three and will we see four, is there in you now this desire to make it you know the next Harry Porter series and I know its very different topic but a very successful franchise. Oh no I would ever want to be as successful as JK Rowling and that was too much. You know I like I said I haven't haven't envisioned to you and that took me of guard I am happy with where I leave her at the end and I also wrote this Sammy's House to be a stand alone so people don't have to have read Sammy's Hill I wanted to be a complete experience in and on it itself ideally and so but I am happy with where she is at the end of this book and so - I am working on the third book but has it's not Sammy and it's not politics or DC but I have my my six year old niece which was last week she said Sammy's Hill, Sammy's House, you are obsessed with Sammy what is it going to be Sammy's Elbow, Sammy's finger? You know, and I thought, all right all right okay although I am giving it a rest now. But anyway but I am - I have loved her as a character and have loved and I feel like she had two very distinct experiences because coming she is you know fresh in DC from a Ohio and Sammy's Hill and she is working for a senator and really learning the ropes and then and thus she is obviously part of a new administration and is in the White house and so though obviously you know there is the the same back drop of DC and politics and all that goes on there. But she is in this other universe and stakes are so much higher in terms of her professional career and then also in both its very fun to try to tell the story of a woman going through with her relationships and her friendships and she is very she is smart and good at her job but she you know does not have the rest of her life together and and that takes some work and then also in her job she is - you know she works in health care and she is a hypochondriac and so she is constantly researching diseases as she had anything just coming down with you know she has her challenges but she she is really fun character to write. And how much of you is reflected in her. I know there is at least one kind of - we wouldn't call it you are not a hypochondriac but there is one interesting twitch I think. Yeah I am not likely a hypochondriac, I have plenty of neurosis but they are different from her as for the most part I cant I cant look at people's wrists actually which is something, the underside of people's wrists, which is a weird thing which I should never tell people my siblings just torture me and you know just put them in my face all the time. Yeah I know that's why I don't know what is just said that it's like my kryptonite. I also cant keep fish alive to save my life, I can't. She struggles with her Japanese fighting fish, her pet fish and and she is always tormented by the fact that she has sort of a death touch, they just die all the time. I take very good care of them - I don't have them any more because I wanted to spare them and I had love for them to else where away from - what I could do to them it's a very distressing for me I have really tried to do everything. And I have cut my self off from owning them because but anyway that worked till end also she has a big crush on Steve Martin and though I don't have a crush on him I have a healthy appreciation for all his talents. So there are really minor things like that but she is she is so alive for me and so different from me you know I mean I really loved inventing her voice and living. I used to think it was so creepy when all authors talked about characters like they were real people, you know, I thought very distinct to get out of the house more and I completely do that now. I think that she is sort of this fictional sister in an alternate universe kind of thing. Now it's interesting you brought up the crush and a crush on Steve Martin you surprised me a little bit but I think it says a lot about who you were and may be still are who you had crushes on as a girl. We didn't get in to that yeah I had well. Friday afternoon conversation? Yeah, we did. I wanted. Well I always wanted to be a writer except for a brief period I want to be a wide receiver for the red skins and a lot of that I had to do with Art Monk and Gary Clark. Who I thought were amazing football players and I had a mild romantic interest in them also. And then I had a recurring dream about The Beatles where I was their manager and I have Paul McCartney fall in love with me so that was all. So that was - so yeah and then I was obsessed with the Bulls the basket ball team and Michael Jordan and I used to rent the "Come Fly With Me" videos and watch them over and over again and I have big posters of them all over my room and Steve Martin, so those were a few of my crushes. You admitted you were dorky early on so. Oh yeah, very dorky. And so but how did how did girls how did other girls treat you growing up and given this you know interest in sports, at Friday nights you would watch you know Michael Jordan videos. I wasn't like 17 doing that, yeah, when I was younger. Yeah, now but go ahead. Real clarification okay? With so I was interested here my assumption was your dad becomes vice president, part of a new administration you move from one public school to a well regarded private school and you would be treated as royalty, you said no that wasn't the case. Yeah, you know it wasn't well even I made the move before he became vice president and I loved my I went to public school I suppose US you just said and I loved it and I really did not want to leave it and if they changed the grades and so they moved after six grade. They moved they were changing around the district and see so you have to go some where else and then the they were making the six grade anyway. I am not going for these details sorry but - I ended up going to NCS at that point and I really didn't want to and it was a very different Universe because it's a private all girl school and I was used to - I played on all guys soccer team and all lot of my friends were guys and all of a sudden it was in this other Universe where they were so bizarre about that about the members of the opposite sex because there was- they just hadn't been around boys, and the boys hadn't been around, girls and no one knew how to relate each other and I just didn't get it and they didn't like me very much and so they had - I actually some one when Mean Girls came out one of the girls called me to apologize because she had been so cruel to me when I first got that and they just you know I don't know make fun of my shoes, make fun of that I like to play soccer and they - I didn't ingratiate myself because they it was just weird social structure - the school I ended up liking eventually, academically it was great great teachers and I have some best friends from there. But I just had a lot of trouble adjusting and I felt like there was a I had gotten into a time machine to the 1950's or some thing because in seventh grade Friday night, their big social out live was dancing school and they would go and dress up and dance but you know the waltz you know and so and I but it was a private thing and I you had to apply to it and be part of it and I just didn't understand that and then my two best friends that who I clicked with immediately had applied and been rejected and then they explained to me it was an all white dancing school. Even though it was not advertised like that obviously and this is you know the 90's and so and my two friends were Asian American, African American and they had they had to fix their photo and with your application and so they told me that and they were they had been upset they want and by seven grade there was sort of over it but I then proceeded to become incredibly unpopular because with them tried to sue the dancing school. Which was not socially that you know that it didn't make me very popular but also it went no where because it is like a country club they can do whatever they want you know I remember calling up and asking the dancing instructor what jurisdiction she was in and being put on hold for a long time and then Monday at school was ugly. How old were you? I was 13, yeah. 12 or13, seventh grade so that was my introduction to private schools and go well but then you know when when they were elected, in DC the weird thing is that there are lots of kids of people in government there and so, you are you know Corinne Quayle, Dan Quayle's daughter was there and it was in my school and a year below me and very sweet girl you know and so we knew each other and its just it is an odd situation sometimes. Was it tough to figure out, did you feel like there were people who sought to be your friend because of who you folks were? And when it was it easy to pick that out? There certainly was and that certainly became a factor of just in meeting new people. There was a sometimes interest for other reasons you know and but I know in my whole life it's been like that. There are there are great things and bad things that come from being a part my family in terms of how the rest of the world relates to me because of that and so I think I was already naturally pretty shy and it probably made me shier and a little more weary of everything. But - but you learn pretty quickly you know, who is genuine and who is not, and if a guy wants to date me or actually is more interested in dating my dad, it is some - it is some weird way. Did your did your dad did your intimidate the guys who had I know that he had three girls and one boy. Right? Yeah! Yeah! Yeah! My dad definitely, I mean Does he go out of his way to do it? I hope not. He definitely was an involved dad in that regard and you know I mean he is very friendly but would make his opinion known and - and so I think he liked some of my boy friends but he really don't like anyone until my husband so that was which was lucky. I would have married him anyways, but it was much more convenient. Made it work a little bit, a little bit better. Yeah! Yes definitely Let me go back to your writing. Where do you write well? I have got a few people say that they - have you know got to be writing themselves, it got be a Starbucks, it got to be with other writers. Where would you do your best work? I have to do that by myself and I have to have quiet, and I work in a room with orange walls actually and so I get this visual jolts when ever I look up at the bright orange walls and just keeps me awake and it's a color I like it, it just keeps me in the moment. Yeah! It's a good time. Come on over, orange walls, it's a party. So that's how and then I do pages so I don't have time limit but I have to get through a certain number of pages a day and on good days, I goes very quickly, on bad day its long and miserable but its it is really miserable actually. I really am happy when I am writing and so I like it into that zone and I just have to hit my page limit everyday and discipline for me is the crucial thing. Now in you - I saw that someone made the comparison between your character Samantha Joyce and Bridget Jones and you said you hadn't watch the movie but you finally did it and then you rejected it. But you feel like there is some kind of not such political commentary but if you will almost kind of a social commentary in your writing about Samantha and kind of who she is? Yeah! I mean its - its funny I mean it's I didn't intend a Bridget Jones-esque character and then when it was I guess marketed that way and that was a response. Then - then that's when I read the book and saw the movie, but they that was surprising to me and you never wanted to be - you know you don't want to be in a situation like, how dare you compare me to international best selling sensation, that everyone loves. You know, I mean that was a flattering - Yeah! Yeah! I mean I know there are a lot of people who love Bridget Jones find an endearing character and so I was you know happy of that's - how they felt about Sammy in anyway. For me politics and DC are characters in and of themselves in my books and her job is so important to her. And I, it's a comedy and so I tried to tell funny stories about her job but that is crucial and it's something that I really enjoyed too is giving a window into that world and commenting on it through her eyes and a sort of popping the reader behind the scenes there and then showing because on my experience and in these and I put it into these books. There are great thoughtful people and they are decent people and they are totally shameless people on those sides at every level and to that is fascinating to me how? Why are they there after all they would disturb themselves, disturb others, some interesting combination of the two. How that all happens in that town is interesting and and so I enjoyed the satirical element of it as much as I do the lighter parts about her life and it's not LA too I mean its very real and I wanted her to be a complete woman with her you know relationships for job, everything but job is very important sorts of a whole meaning though always she is in DC, so that plays a big role. Who do you - given Samantha's interest on politics and your experience in politics both writing about it and seeing it, foreseeing it who do you admire in addition to your dad, who would you admire on the political scene today whether it's here in the US or abroad? Jon Stewart. I think I do actually but I think you stumped me there are a lot of people I admire, I just don't know who to say because there is I think you know that there I could go back in my, through growing up, you know, people from the past you know I mean their my grandfather was - he was senator from Tennessee and so I also heard all these stories about Kennedy and and his fellow senate and my grand father's fellow senators and I think its been in the Nixon and I didn't admire him as much. But he I think in terms of present day and around the world there are really good people trying to do good things and they get and then there are not so great people and so involved and so I don't - I guess I just don't - its not that I don't want to name names I just its just so complicated you know but I think sorry actually go ahead. No no, give us give us a couple name a couple names understanding that this is in your limited list and if we had all the time in the world it would be a longer list, but give us a couple of people and actually before she was given a minute to think about it and about five minutes we are going to come to the audience for questions, so if you have got questions for Kristin, get five minutes you think about it and then I will be going out with two mics but but are there a couple of people who who you feel comfortable saying who you know in addition to John - you know move you? In addition to John F Kennedy yeah. Well there are people who - there is a Lincoln thing in the book on purpose I mean I mean that's obviously not someone I knew personally but there is a Lincoln thing there is there are references that I put through out the book to different people from Johnson, Nixon, Humphrey, Era on purpose and its like if people get that great, if they don't, no mater you know there are but for me I actually spent less time with the - I said earlier like the high command folks you know I mean the person whatever candidate or senator of congress person or President or Vice President is out there the people that really I guess I respond to are the ones in the trenches you know who are part of that operation and that's why people make big deal of the President, the Vice President obviously. But and in the book there are important characters but they are not the main ones at all you know I mean I really focused on the people like Samantha who will throw their life into a cause or a mission something greater than themselves because they believe so strongly in trying to change things and so for me there are just hundreds of people whose names you wouldn't know who inspired my work much more than you know an elected official. Would you ever think about - I mean I know a part of reason lot of people go to office because they are inspired by young people and want to inspire. Would you ever think about running for office and giving that kind of inspiration and and harnessing that kind of talent, energy, and interest? No, I wouldn't myself, but I absolutely believe in people who go into it for the right reasons. I mean I really do think politics done right is truly public service and it's hard to maintain that in the system that we have gone on right now. But I think particular young people who of - you know our generation who want to get involved I am so supportive of that because I feel like we are inheriting whatever is going right or wrong right now and we need to take the reins and just be a part of it not completely take over, just be integrated into I get I completely get people feeling cynical and disillusioned by by the system and by politics and I had been there my self. But I think its just crucial that people stay engaged and stay involved because that's the only way to make things better. And so I will never run for office myself. But I will always be engaged and involved and care and I will just dip into the world fictionally otherwise.