Heather Pharis, Viking Fusion Reporter

Personal Questions with James Carville

Dressed in brown corduroy pants with a light blue button down shirt, navy blue and red tie slightly askew, James Carville sat with his right leg crossed over his left, raising his pant’s leg just enough to catch a glimpse of brown and orange plaid socks.  He sat in the science classroom filled with local Rome reporters and a few student reporters from Berry’s campus. A thermos sat underneath his chair filled with coffee that he had occasionally sipped on in between interview questions.

Carville spent most of the day answering questions. At 4:00 Carville attended a Q&A session hosted by Berry communication professor Dr. Bob Frank. James Carville showed up 20 minutes late to this event due to a phone interview prior. “I’m sorry I’m late,” he said with his Louisiana drawl, “I just got off the phone with Bill O’Reilly,” Carville chuckled to himself and then sat down in a chair in front of the room.

The auditorium held about 30 students and each student had written questions on slips of paper prior to Carville’s arrival. Dr. Bob Frank searched through the stack of questions, which held a range of topics from Ukraine to Fox News. Carville took his time and answered all the student’s questions thoroughly. When the topic of ObamaCare came up, Carville simply answered, “You have to ask yourself do you want to live in an economy or a society?” When the topic of Ukraine came up, Carville discussed both sides of the dispute, “Very few things you get are all good or all bad. It’s all about the trade off.” Then the clock hit 4:00 p.m. and Carville had to head to a press conference on the floor above.

At the press conference, the very first question concerned how James Carville, a democrat, could stay married to republican Mary Matalin. James Carville joked about how that was always the first question. Then after his chuckling quieted down he stated:

“We wrote a book about it, there are so many other things we do in life that’s not politics. We have learned to deal with it or go around it. How many times have you heard someone complain about your mother in law? You have to ask yourself, Can you work around politics as easily as a mother in law? I just got off of Bill O’Reilly and all we talked about was politics, all we ever do is talk about politics, and once me and Mary get on the plane tonight and we won’t talk about politics.” 

Then reporters proceeded to ask more questions about politics. He was asked to describe his feelings about President Obama’s work and answered, “If I had one word: historic. For whatever troubles we’ve had and whatever flaws we can detect, it’s going to change the way people live and get health care. I think it’s a big deal but in the end, I don’t think it will ever go back to the way it was.”

Then Carville was asked if he would help Hillary Clinton’s campaign in 2016. Carville smiled, “No. I’ll be 72 and living in New Orleans. This business is for people with more energy and time than I have.”

The questions then shifted away from politics. Carville stated that his favorite film cameo was the Will Ferrell film “Old School” and that his favorite President was Abraham Lincoln. The final question was whether he would be interested in appearing on the popular Netflix series, “House of Cards”, Carville smirked,” Why not? I have never turned one down yet that I didn’t enjoy.”  Then Carville picked up his thermos underneath the chair and asked if there were any remaining questions before leaving the press conference to prepare for his and his wife’s appearance at the Shatto Lecture later that evening.