Mediaite Interviews Piers Morgan On Politics, The American Dream, And Why His Show Isn’t The Today Show

What Morgan’s programming continues to boil down to, time and again, is his goal to reflect the best of America– whether it be interviewing some of the most inspiring people he can find or highlighting in a particular election result a trait that none of his peers picked up on. “25% of Americans have passports. 75% never leave the country,” he explains, “I spent 40 years of my life not living in America,” and that experience makes a difference. He appears particularly fond of the last regular segment now on his program, “Only in America.” It gives him an opportunity to apply what he is learning from interviewing American subjects one on one to a greater cultural narrative. Spending hours with the country’s cultural and political elite is an eccentric sort of anthropological study, and that one last segment is Morgan’s time to report on his results so far– what patterns emerge, what idiosyncrasies tie news cycles and music charts and box offices together. If Alexis de Tocqueville could see what Morgan was up to, he would approve.

He has concluded so far that Americans are correct to be worried about the immediate future, but are failing to see that America isn’t the sort of country that takes very well to a “we’re all doomed, isn’t it terrible?” attitude. Morgan makes it clear he doesn’t think the economic recession or low morale in the country are particularly troublesome in the grand scheme of American history, and that he finds that, by contrasting his international experience, he can make a stronger case for Americans to stop thinking things are so bad. “I always knew America was a great country. Coming here and feeling that everyone had slightly lost their mojo and wasn’t sure if the American dream is still the American dream—I think having someone come and say ‘yes it is, because I’m living it.’ I’m the absolute personification of the American dream. I’m the Brit who replaced Larry King on primetime CNN. What could be more emblematic of the American dream than that?”

[Photos courtesy CNN]

This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.