This is Sarah Stewart Holland. This is Beth Silver's. You're listening to Pantsu Poohletics, where we take a different bonus episode this week.

Earlier this year, Sarah read and loved James Traub's biography of Hubert Humphrey called True

Believer. And a couple of months ago ago she sat down with him for a wide-ranging

conversation. We wanted to share a bit of that discussion today that we thought

was a perfect accompaniment to our coverage of the Democratic National Convention taking place in Chicago this week.

In a way this conversation is about Hubert Humphrey and the 1960s and Sarah likes to talk

about the smoke-filled rooms.

But in another way, it's about the psychology of leaders

and about the trade-offs and choices they make,

about what motivates them and what inhibits them.

So we hope this quick rich conversation is a way of

looking back in order to look forward. You might say it is an acknowledgement and

example of the fact that we exist in the context of all in which we live and what came before us.

Here's Sarah and James Traub. James, welcome to fancy politics. I'm so thrilled to have you here. I talked

about your biography of Hubert Humphrey so often on our podcast it became a joke and I said yeah your your

bingo card, so often on our podcast it became a joke and I said, your bingo card because I'm gonna talk about the

Hubert Humphrey biography I'm reading right now.

That's how much I've been talking about it.

Well, I'm very flattered to hear that.

Well, as I was reading it, I mean, the first thing about a biography of a man such

as Hubert Humphrey is you forget how much of American history,

his own life spanned.

...