Behind the Scenes & Thoughts on the Kevin Johnson Interview

in response to the emails and calls that the interview generated, here are my personal observations of Kevin and his campaign. Keep in mind that im not that invested in doing a post mortem on every video interview that i conduct ( i just don’t have the time, for one reason. and it might bore you for another)

I encouraged them to choose the location in which he would be the most comfortable. They picked the headquarters. He and His Team were very accommodating to us when we showed up for the meeting. They welcomed us warmly (i believe i made a few friends). they didn’t know what to expect so i had to hand it to them because I was pretty much ripping KJ and his team for pretty much every day for pretty much the whole primary. (They deserved it. They were running a bad campaign. Then Johnny Business came along. and the running from door to door in sneakers. And then The 30 vans on Election day. And then the rest became history.)

I digress.

With all of the Talk as of Late that KJ is not honest or Accessible, They proved to me that the campaign is making a concerted effort to be the total opposite.

They were taking a risk of having me there with a running digital camera. So I commend them for their willingness to take that chance. Team KJ did not hinder any question at all. I had the freedom to ask what (ever reasonable question that) I wanted. They even allowed the interview to go longer than we had agreed which was a real bonus and an aspect that i highly appreciated.

I asked most of the questions that i intended on asking. (except for one, no big deal)

I had made the decision to not get into the scandal questions for a number of reasons;

#1 - The Primary Results proved to me that the voters have decided that KJ - with all of the past skeletons - is still alright with them. General elections are never won on moral issues, they are won on dominate issues. I wanted this interview to be about the issues, and that is the current flow.

#2 - If i had intended to get into all that, it would have been a total waste of time because - well - what would you expect him to say?

#3 On the ch3 debate- he was asked about all of the allegations straight up & I thought he answered them straight up. It didn’t settled it for me, but i had to at least give KJ some credit for dealing with it on live TV. So, at that point - i had to say to myself - what else do we expect to hear at this point?

#4 with only 20 min to spare, you will only have about 4-5 topic questions to get into depending on how much your subject talks.

#5 gotcha questions are not really what im about. It takes much more skill to ask questions that encourge the subject to open up.

#6 you have to allow the respect factor to kick in. How would you feel if you invited me over to your place for a conversation and then i started to ask you all sorts of personal questions about something that was an embarrassment to you when you expected something else? You probably wouldn’t think i was too funny, would you? Well, im sure KJ would probably be feeling you on that one too. and - There is a decorum when Interviewing accomplished individuals of KJ’s calibre on top of all that.

#7 - its not that hot of a topic anymore. Crime is - for example. so we talked alot on that because its relevant now.

So - if you think i was too easy, im sorry to disappoint you.

but - I was going to ask about the St Hope stuff. And so i did tip them to that intention so that they wouldn’t feel that i was sneaking it in on them. I did follow through on that question. I thought his answer was humble. And, in my opinion, It sounded like he was laying the ground work for a not so positive outcome with his answer on it.

KJ didn’t show until we were ready to go at and sitting at the table. After he came out of a side room, He was all business and then was polite after we were done and then went right back into the side room. But - that’ s the way they play it and he’s famous and all that to a certain extent - so no big. I was impressed with KJ’s focus. He struck me as a man of mental preparation. (should i be surprised? anyone who had to guard Michael Jordan in a triple overtime finals game 6 would have had to be...)

I think that if a person had a high unfavorable feeling towards him before the video, they would probably not be moved by this interview. But I though that he opened up a bit and showed a bit of himself. So it made for good video. I was happy with it and im pretty critical of what I put online. I want it to be high quality. By the Way, my oldest son Marco did the Camera work and i thought he did a pretty sound Job. He handled the pressure of pulling this off without a hitch. not many young people could go into a tense situation where they needed to catch high quailty film with an NBA legend sitting at the table while his campaign is giving you camera angle suggestions - in a one shot deal. not easy to do.

All and all Team KJ is a first rate operation (so is the Heather Fargo Team) but they are very controlled. I expected that. I understand. And i do believe that they want to win. Can’t say i blame them. 

Update: An e-mail responce prompted me to Clarify the last paragraph in this post. When i wrote that they are very controlled - i am refering to a controlled or high quailty environment, rather than ‘controlling’ as in possessive.

Update 8/6/08: The Johnson Campaign has this post featured on their home page today. Thanks so much.

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