What Christopher Nolan’s Odyssey Reveals About Modern Commentary

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Aldi. Good is for all. Hello and welcome to another edition of Behind the Story. I'm Daily Wire, DC Bruno Chief Tim Rice.

Here is always to introduce you to our very talented reporters and give you the inside scoop

on how what we put on the website gets on the website. So today we're going to do something a little bit different. So far, every episode of this show, I've talked to one of my colleagues about a specific story they've written. We read the headline. We hear what goes into the story and how they got the tip.

Uh, you know how they ran it down. Things that maybe didn't make it into the final draft. But today, I am so excited to welcome my friend and a steamed colleague, Chloe Trapanato, who is one of the Daily Wires opinion writers. Chloe, thank you so much for joining me.

Tim, I am honored to be here. So before we get going guys, I should just say that Chloe has plenty of bylines and headlines on the website. So I could have done things the way that I usually do. I could have picked her most recent piece about how an elevator pitch for socialism. Kind of gives away the lie about socialism.

We could have talked about it. So Ron Mundani. We could have talked about Lindsey Graham. But instead, I kind of want to just zoom out a little bit and talk to Chloe about what her job is like. And what it's like having to have an opinion and write it every single day.

“I mean, I think a lot of us like to think that it would be awesome to have opinions for a living.”

But I think a lot of us myself included who do write for a living. When you actually think about it seriously, find it very daunting. So Chloe, why don't we just start there? What is it like having to have and write and share multiple opinions every single day?

Well, I basically soon just accepted the fact that I'm never going to get to go on the bachelor.

I'm never going to get to go on the voice. I'm never going to get to do any of the fun, cool Hollywood influencer things that typical girls in this industry get to do. Because I have opinions that offend a lot of people. So you're right. And that it's daunting.

But I've gotten over it. And now I'm at the point where I put my opinion out there so much. Everything's been thrown to the wind. And this is just, I've accepted this. I've accepted the fact that I'm basically canceled anywhere outside of conservative politics.

And I'm fine with that. I'm so blessed and grateful to be doing what I do. I do just give my opinion every single day. It's not all of my opinions, though. I throw a lot of facts in there.

I'm learning a lot. A good bulk of my job is just to read, watch and listen to certain things to give myself a better understanding of what's going on. In the world. So I feel really blessed to be doing what I'm doing. That's very good to know.

And I'm sorry that you would ever be able to go on on the natural air or the natural air. But I'm glad that you've accepted your pre-cancel issue.

“But I think there's another daunting part of it.”

And you're just sort of touched on it, which is again, you're not just it's easy to have an opinion on everything. It's easy to say that's dumb. That's good. That's bad. But I'm just going to read off the headlines of the past few pieces that you've written.

The 30 second pitch for socialism left out the part where it kills people.

The Coco Chanel commies making radical chic look quaint. Freddie L.A. seven and immigration plan we can believe in set your AC to 78 for the collective. Comrade hot girl summer turned into the summer of socialist scaries. I mean, these are great. But these are all.

And I encourage everyone to agree with them. These are substantive, well written, fact-based pieces. Is that not the dot? That's what I would find more. I've also accepted being canceled.

But is it not daunting to have to, like, this seems a really hard work. It is really hard because a lot of the ideas that Democrats are throwing around and socialists are throwing out there seem. So lovely on the surface. I mean, the idea of free everything.

The guy that I wrote about yesterday, his pitch for socialism is that it gave you more friends. So yeah, I mean, on the surface, these things sound really lofty and idealistic and nice. So I go in there and I debunk with their saying. So yes, it's hard and yes, it takes a lot of research and a thorough understanding of history. And like, why we've seen some of these things before and how it's going to come back to bite us on the butt again.

But it's good. It's all good because we're all learning together. Today, my piece is called overeducated undercapitalized and inseparable.

So knowing that just kind of helps explain the rise in democratic socialism that we're seeing in the rise in communism because we know historically.

Revolutionaries tend to start with overly educated, very aggrieved and very poor young people. And we're seeing that play out again.

“So yes, it's daunting and it's difficult, but I think it's so so important that we do have the substance and the facts surrounding the stuff because it just helps to debunk the the lips all the more.”

Amen to that. Now, one thing that I think people might be surprised to find given how prolifically and how well you write is that you haven't been a writer strictly speaking. For that long, so can tell us a little bit about, you know, how you got here, what you were doing before and sort of how the jobs are different or how they're being the same. Well, you were right earlier when you said that I have a lot of bylines. I feel like I'm just made up solely of bylines.

My journey here has been so interesting. And I think the reason that I'm so passionate about explaining my stance is because of how I got here. I'm a very argumentative person. I've had to defend my beliefs time and time again growing up. So it's really important to me to have facts and data behind my very very charged opinions. And this all started because I like us.

Oh, I'll start with the beginning. I got pretty interested in politics about 10 years ago when Donald jacquant Trump was elected the the nominee for the Republican Party in 2016. I couldn't understand why people were so upset, crying on the streets.

“And so that's what I kind of got into politics. I was a roof. Was I a freshman in?”

Well, when I went to college, it was 2020. It was COVID time and Joe Biden was elected to office. It was really hard to be a conservative at Ohio State, even though we're in a red state, it was still a liberal school. So I really wanted to get into journalism. But when I tried to write for our newspaper the lantern, I was quickly shot down. They took out a lot of my sentences and paragraphs about Joe Biden being a vegetable and whatnot.

So I felt like maybe I could hone my craft in another way. So I went into sports broadcast journalism and I spent the next 34 years at Ohio State covering sports. I did football soccer with crafts swimming all of the things. I had so much fun thought that I wanted to be a sideline reporter.

But I just could not scratch that political itch that I always had doing sports obviously.

So instead of becoming a beatwriter for the back guys, which is a job that I almost took right before or right after I graduated. I pivoted in last minute and moved to DC. I just wanted to get my foot in the door in media. So I accepted a job with Flex Point Media that was a political PR firm. And because it Ohio State, I was so interested in politics. I was often explaining to my sorority sisters what was going on in the world.

So I would just give them bite-sized bits of news in the kitchen where I was lighting things on fire. One time I actually did light myself on fire. But I just told my friend right before we left our senior year. I said, you know what, I'm going to move to DC. I'm going to take this job in political advertising.

I'm going to start posting on social media about politics. And then I'm going to go on Fox and blow up and work at the daily wire. And literally all of those things ended up happening a year and a half to two years later got it so good.

So I've always had to defend my positions whether that was the sorority sisters or guys that would make me cry in pizza shops.

And I was explaining why I voted for Trump in college. But yeah, I went into journalism via sports. That was my chosen horse into broadcast journalism. And here I am today writing for the daily wire company that I've been a fan of since I was 16 years old. I mean, what what a journey and that is hopefully it's just hopefully an inspiration to some of our listeners that you really it's really if I had to distill your career journey down into one one slogan.

“It you can just do things which is my favorite my favorite bit of gen Z slang because I think it's right you could you could just do things you could just do things.”

You could just start posting videos on explaining politics and the whole career out of it. And so let's I want to talk about those videos because this is something you still do. This is right that's the other big chunk of what's been your day doing yes. It's all politics on Instagram, TikTok and X is at the same or you. It's all the same now.

It took me a while but here we go.

“So what what is what how are like talks to me a little bit about what what it's like going we're going between those two things.”

Do you find one of them easier harder is one more challenging rewarding are they more similar than we would think more different than they would think like what's what's that it like doing both the. This is the the on paper opinion writing and then the kind of quick digestible news briefs on social media. Yes, it's been so interesting to navigate because I do feel like I have three separate jobs and they all have me working a different muscle.

Obviously my job is an opinion writer for the daily wire.

But then I also imposing on social media for myself and for the daily wire.

“And like you said that's different that's bite size news for the daily wire those are more lengthy or opinion pieces and then also we go on you know Fox and different TV hits and podcasts a lot so we also have to know how to do the on air stuff.”

So it's been really really challenging because you almost have to turn on a different part of your brain. Different sections of the day I start my days prepping for my articles I'll read a lot of opinion articles and just pieces. I will scroll X I'll kind of get a feel for what I want to talk about for the day I'll go into writing mode. I'm and then right after that I have to pivot to Gen Z talking on my phone like I'm talking to my best friend. Mode of journalism where I have to give it give the news to people like my sister my younger sister who maybe aren't paying attention to politics as much their in college they're having fun.

They don't really want to pay attention to the news, but they don't want to sound stupid while they go on their dates. So they want the news in a quick digestible manner and about 60 seconds and they want to sound smart. So then I just kind of switch like a transformer into a new gear. I go back to my sorority days and I give the news to the girls and the guys who listen. I find both to be very very fun. It's nice doing the opinion articles first because I can explain things to myself and readers at a higher level more nuanced level and then that helps me distill it down a lot easier when I go to write just like my 60 to 90 seconds script for social media.

But it's hard. I do take inspiration from Ben Shapiro because I think about him a lot when doing this because he is a genius just like you are Tim and he did so smart, but he's able to break down topics in such a it's such a beautiful way for listeners and about an hour. So I guess it's longer than my social media videos, but I just feel like he does a really good job of articulating things. So I try to channel that energy. Whenever I'm making my little political videos, but then, you know, after I make the political video that sometimes we post on just my answer and sometimes we post on the daily wire, then you have to get ready for a 90 second hit on TV and it's pretty hard, but like yesterday, the piece about the pitch for socialism, that worked well on both because I can write an article about it and then I can do my little walk and talk videos.

Where I play the clip and then break it down. So it flows seamlessly, but it is it is hard to work those different muscles, but we're getting better at it hopefully every day and try and. I mean, I think you're doing great on all the levels, but yes, I can imagine how it's it's a little bit tricky and I think it was really interesting and I hadn't even really considered this until you just said it, but the. You know, I would think if I if I hadn't thought about it, if you would ask me, I would have said that doing TV hits and doing your videos were probably kind of the same mode, but of course now that you describe it, but it's not because.

Sitting on a fox panel or on a you know a political talk show for, you know, broadly speaking, that's audiences are you're assuming that they're informed and they're looking for. Right and debate and discussion over an issue, whereas the videos are and yeah, I mean, that's you really you really do do do do a lot that's I should I should tell you that more.

“Oh, thanks the audience are so vastly different that's what's so interesting and and even my social media audiences are different across platforms like X sometimes I don't even bother posting my videos to X because those people.”

Everything so it's a nice it's not even worth posting there when I'm just doing like a let me break down this topic. For people maybe who don't follow the news as much so that that's kind of been kind of interesting navigating that because I think I've cultivated my social media audiences to be different tick talk they really don't know a ton about politics or the news they're much younger.

That blew up during the first 12 day were with the run, they were all so stressed out that we were all going to die and I had to convince them that we were fine.

And then Instagram that happened more gradually those people are a little more new savvy and then X they're the new savvyist so even on there it's like you know you're only.

You have different like do you interact with your audiences and do you have like do you get questions from them do you or the different feedback to you do you find like the interactions are different based on the different caliber of of the audiences.

“Yes, a tick talk it's a lot of like I'm I'm a young college graduate or I'm graduating soon and I've been so afraid to speak out and you give me confidence to like.”

Talk about politics among my high school friends and on my team.

Much younger people but sometimes you get parents who are who say similar things and and then Instagram it's a mix it's a lot of young women well I guess my demographics are split 50 50 male and female. But for a while it was mostly young women just finding confidence in what they were saying in their ideologies because I was so. And then I was like I'm a little bit late and lately and aggressively talking about it so it kind of opened the door for them to talk about conservative politics and their own spaces.

But that ex peat ex it's a lot of old men you know they know what they're talking about sort of or they'll just say something anti somatic even though I'm Catholic is confusing. You know, I there are it's sort of the conventional wisdom in Washington or in journalism more generally is that no one under you here in different forms no one under the 30 should have an opinion no one wants to read 25 year olds opinion.

“You know you should if you want to if you want to be an opinion writer you should spend 15 years as a journalist and then graduate.”

And I'm a woman so I am not allowed to speak on any of that I've always thought that the the those sort of grand pronouncements are a little too broad brush a little ridiculous especially.

Now when there's such a plethora of of outlets but you know there is there is I think. It's the nicest version of that is a little bit. It's kind of fair right like oh you know I don't want someone who doesn't have.

“Experience in the world I'm not I don't I don't think this again obviously I think you're good at this but how do you I'm sure this is or is this something you're aware of right and how do you.”

I love talking to you and.

Yeah, I love talking and thinking about this I talk about this with our reporter Brekosol we call it marinating we do feel young and we feel that we're inexperienced and. Holy uneducated compared to the lights of you and Ben Dominage and Brent share and you know people at the daily wire they know what they're talking about so sometimes we feel an adequate but that. Is an easy thing to work on in this day and age I don't think I could do what I'm doing. Just 10 years ago because now I'm able to learn stuff so much faster so we marinate so me and Brekos were working on reading as much as we can watching as many movies as possible to almost catch up because we are just normal girls who have lives and didn't spend all of our youth.

Reading and rereading the Federalist papers so we're catching up and it's easy to catch up by that one but that's sorry I know I wish I did but I unfortunately did not. Now I can ask rock to read to me the Federalist papers I can ask rock about the history of. Soviet rushing communism the difference between the Bolsheviks and the Meshaviks and get an in depth understanding of these very complex historical topics in. On our which is excellent so it helps me do my job because you know if I'm tasked with something that I don't fully understand I'm able to do research so much quicker.

And I think that's been so so helpful so yes I totally agree with you that you know a lot of us young teams are not totally qualified to speak on all of these topics but don't worry audience I educate myself to the highest degree possible before I go on spouting off my opinion. And thanks to Elon Musk and you know just different and like you guys are giving me book recommendations Ben's giving me movie recommendations I'm learning as much as I can so I'm not just talking out my. But I also want to be very I want to be very clear that I do not act I do not think that young people cannot or should not be opinion writers I'm just I was saying to those in our audience but no I'm curious that this is like the one thing you won't even say it like and it happened to me I was like 23 and I wasn't even a full-time op-end writer I would just occasionally write op-eds and I'd get emails from grumpy old guy saying get a sit down until you're 35 and it's like.

I have a full-time job I just like I just had I take yeah I just have to review if you don't want to be by my one off on bed like thank you right.

Claims and you know I get worried like am I qualified to be talking about this I mean I've had this almost like imposter syndrome thing for a very long time like I was 23 when I started going on national television and talking about politics and it's so terrifying because we're children but you know I'm I'm trying to learn and.

Catch up which is a good and excellent and benevolent thing and I love it so much I love learning so it's the perfect job for me.

I love that so one last question for you.

“And I think I'm certainly interested and I assume everyone watching at home would be interested to is where does an opinion writer or who which which opinion columnists.”

Does an opinion writer read and I'm giving you a restriction making it harder you can't say anyone we work with with whom we work that's that's it goes without saying totally fair. The entire daily wire opinion team is fantastic and everyone should go read them but other than our colleagues yes. Who do you go to for for sound opinions on the news of the day? And before I answer that I wanted I had this thought that I wanted to also mention the reason why I do think it sometimes important for young people to share their thoughts and opinions is because.

We are experiencing and maybe the impetus for a lot of what we're seeing in culture and news like I just wrote a piece about Brianna chicken fry lambasting Erica Kirk Brianna chicken fry no old person would really know but she is kind of. But exemplary of like what's wrong with. Women like young women right now in culture they are very promiscuous they just want to have what they call hookers summers and that and you know cultures downstream from politics or whatever however it is politics is down.

You know what sometimes both apply um so you know I feel like being a young person that. Used to watch Brianna chicken fry that made me qualified to talk about Brianna chicken fry making fun of Erica Kirk but anyway I listen and read.

“And I want to hear see I leave the free press I love Douglas Murray I like the free press in general I think my writing style is kind of similar to very white is wife.”

Nellie bowls she's really really funny sometimes I try to channel Nellie bowls. Wall Street Journal off head page I read a good amount. Gerald Baker I like James Freeman I like Alyssa Finley. They they have a little less personality but their their pages they really get to the point which is something that I have trouble doing sometimes it's a nice I have too much personality and I don't really. You know wrap it up quick enough I like the free press I like the Wall Street Journal I read random people on X and a lot of the daily wire.

But else I I'm frugal so I don't buy a lot of of subscriptions so sometimes even when my editor Ben will send me stuff for different outlet I have to you know go on archive dot pH the website that allows you to hijack the system and get the article for free and sometimes that doesn't work. So it's hard as an opinion writer to read a lot of other people's opinions when you're not willing to get behind their paywall but I feel like.

“And I think that's the first time I've ever had a confession of intellectual property theft on on behind me.”

So we had we linden linden our colleague linden Blake was first person to sing on behind the story you're the first person to confess to a digital digital piracy.

We're just you know we're constantly innovating here which is also bad about doing because a songpiker does this too and I don't want to I don't want to be. Like him in any way shape or form. So I feel bad of doing it but do we know that. I was going to end there but I actually just thought of one more question that I want to ask you because you're in and what is linden sing on here should I sing.

If you if you want you can say you think what how do you because this is something that I always wonder when I'm writing like a book review or something I have a pretty hard and fast rule.

If I'm in a writer review of something I don't read any other reviews until I have written my review because I don't want to. You know have kind of pre I don't want to like take other person's ideas. I think that's that's very easy to do when it's a one off like just you don't have right I can if you're reviewing a book you don't need to read other people's takes just like have an opinion on the book.

So how do you balance that do you have a process is it depend on the issue like at what point do you start bringing in other folks other people's opinions into your writing.

Good question.

“I feel like this is changed a bit since I started I don't know I'm still navigating that because I've only been writing opinions for like three months but I.”

I mean let's take the Odyssey as an example I haven't had to write about that yet thank God because I didn't know much about it so for something like that if I.

were to have had a comment on that whether that be newsmax like our associate yesterday or the daily wire editorial pages I would have had to draw on other people's opinions just because I did not read the original poem by Homer. So I mean I guess I did a little bit in high school and I didn't watch Troy with Brad Pitt which is terrible of me I meant to do this we should do at least one of those things.

“I need to absolutely yes I did start the TV show on Amazon prime I don't already watch that in school but I was going to rewatch it.”

I only got a few episodes and I need to watch try and I did watch the Odyssey last night so. The what how I felt about the Odyssey was a regurgitation of what other people I look up to how they felt about the Odyssey. I don't really have any original tapes on that but for something that. I would like to read about it first that I do as much as just pure primary source research as I can first I'll form like a general idea of what I want to say outline my piece and then I guess it's kind of hard to avoid other people's opinions as well.

You're scrolling on X every other tweet is somebody's opinion typically about the thing I'm writing about because I write about the topic of the day so it's hard not to be influenced by what other people are saying especially when you have to do research on X ahead of writing the piece. I guess just trying to find my own angle on certain things and be creative as this creative as I can be when it comes to stuff like that I do that for TV as well a media trainer told me to bring something fresh to the table that no one's thought of yet which sometimes you can't do but if you can try to do that so I'll bring a new fact in or.

“Just like a different gen Z take that I may have because again not many people are 24 and writing about democratic socialism so.”

That's always helpful just bringing in a personal experience a personal anecdote or a new fun fact that nobody else is really brought to the table yet.

I love it. Chloe Trapinano is one of the daily wires opinion writers Chloe thank you so much this was a wonderful conversation I very much appreciate you joining me. Of course Tim thank you so much for having me it was a pleasure. All right guys we'll see you next time.