And now, from the University of Chicago Institute of Politics and CNN, the Axviles, with your

host, David Axelrod.

I met Dan Shapiro and Barack Obama decided to run for President back in 2007, and he came

on as a foreign policy adviser on Middle East issues.

I served with him in the White House when he was on the National Security Council.

I slipped off late in the day sometimes to play basketball with him on the White House basketball

court where he showed me all his old JCC basketball moves.

But more than anything, I came to respect him as the U.S. ambassador to Israel for six

years of the Obama administration during very, very eventful and challenging times.

And we sat down to talk about it the other day when he visited the Institute of Politics.

Dan Shapiro, my old friend, it's good to see you.

Yes, he is.

Someone gave me a quote of yours that said, the job of U.S. ambassador to Israel was a job

I had been preparing for my entire life, even though I didn't know it.

You were like a kid from Champaign, Urbana, Illinois.

So tell me about how you unknowingly were preparing for this all your life.

Well, when I was four years old, my parents were academics at the University of Illinois,

took a sabbatical.

What were they?

What were they?

My father is an English professor.

Shakespeare is really his area of expertise.

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