Pushkin.

This is.

This is talk easy. I'm San Frigoso. Welcome to the show.

Welcome to the show. Today I am joined by author Michael Lewis. Lewis began in 1989 with a book called

Liar's Poker which used his experiences as a bond salesman to examine life on Wall Street in the late 80s.

Despite his father's apprehension, Michael would eventually leave that job at Solomon Brothers and go on to write many

best-selling books. You've likely read or seen some of them turned into movies

The Big Short Moneyball, the Blindside, Flash Boys. His

latest book is called The Premonition. It follows three characters, a biochemist, a public health worker, and a federal government

employee who worked in the White House as they confront the pandemic head on.

As is customary in a Michael Lewis book, these are subjects working against the grain.

People trying to improve infrastructures they know fundamentally can be improved.

In this case, it's the wall of ignorance that was the official response of the Trump administration

to COVID-19. Of his new book Lewis said,

it's a superhero story where the superhero seemed to lose the war,

but all they've lost is a battle. There's a war they're going to win. If that sounds shockingly optimistic for a book

about the pandemic, you're right. In fact this whole conversation with Lewis is a lot lighter than you may imagine given the subject matter.

So in the first 15, 20 minutes we outline the premise of his new book and most pointedly his indictment of the CDC and

their structural shortcomings. Then as someone who's liked Lewis's work for a long

time as I have, including his podcast,

against the rules, I wanted to better understand just how he makes what he makes.

And to do that, we have to walk through a few key inflection points

...