My Dear Rachel: I was frustrated and ultimately angry with the behavior of Jon during your interview with him. He was arrogant, overbearing, condescending, and he continually interrupted you. Jon said that calling Bush a war criminal "stops debate." But pouncing on every point you made and making his points instead stopped the debate too. He wanted the last word, and he seemed to get it, at the expense of your charitable behavior toward him. (After all, he was a "guest," right?) It was nice of him to say at the close of his monologue that he "likes" you, but I'm not so sure he does: I felt like it was some sort of appeasement for the cavalier way in which he treated you. Another way of saying it is, instead, he likes only himself -- at least in interviews. I remember how rude he was with Tucker Carlson when he was a "guest" on that late CNN show "Crossfire" and I liked it then because I thought the show's shouting was worthless and I frankly do not like Tucker Carlson, whom I regard as also arrogant. But I do not equate you with Carlson, or Bill Kristol, or John Bolton, or George W. Bush, or Karl Rove, or Samuel Alito, as deserving a comeuppance. You are the Joan of Arc of journalism to me and I will not have anybody mistreating my heroine. It was nice for you to say that Jon is a mensch, but I'm not so sure. I can think of other Yiddish words to describe him, at least while on your show -- again as a "guest" -- and they mostly begin with "schm--." (In fact, the Anglo-Saxon word that comes to mind also begins with the "sh" sound.) There was at least one unflattering comparison of late of Jon with Stephen Colbert, with Stephen being favored, and it caused me to imagine how Stephen would behave in an interview with you. I think he might take a satirical "Papa Bear O'Reilly" tack for a while, but his true graciousness would come out at some point, and you would know it, and we as viewers would all know it. I know I love you, and I'm quite fond of Stephen, but I'm not so sure I like Jon all that well right now. Voltaire or Mark Twain or Will Rogers or even Mark Russell he's not, just yet.
Always your loyal viewer,
John T. (JT) Evans
Madison, Indiana
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