Barbara Frum, more than the average Broad-caster

It is clear from the get-go that Barbara Frum is not conducting an average interview when she gets on the line with Manson follower Sandra Good. But this odd interview takes a turn for the utterly abnormal when Good starts talking about a fanatical devotion to nature, and a murderous malice for those who would destroy it. Through this strange and baffling tirade, Barbara Frum refuses to give up the chance to talk with a mind, which through cultist ideals is probably exactly the same as Lynette Fromme's. This interview, whether Frum realized it or not when she scheduled it, would be an amazing insight into a mind like Lynette Fromme’s. I think that about two minutes into the interview, Frum realizes this and starts to run with it. Her questions shift away from “When did you last see Lynette” and “How was she emotionally” to more personal questions for Good herself, hoping to understand more of the mind of a person capable of killing for the benefit of trees and plants.

Because of this desire to see into a crazed mind, Frum refuses to let go of the interview. She stays in control, but in a subtle way. She doesn’t ask the same question twice, but instead maintains her line of questioning through asking a different question that would lead to the same answer, and unfortunately for someone trying to gather the facts, every question did lead to the same answer: “you’re ignorant... and killing trees.” Despite Ms. Good’s irritation at her “ignorance” this subtle and crafty style of questioning allows her to keep Sandra Good on the line for 7 minutes. Only when she begins to interrupt Ms. Good’s psychotic recital of the Manson-inspired manifesto does Good finally hang up the phone. Had Frum been very aggressive and confrontational, the interview may have lasted 70 seconds instead of 7 minutes.

The most effective thing that Frum said throughout the interview was “Ms. Good, how come you’re talking about trees that you care about, but you don’t care about killing men?” because this question causes Good to state her goals and the intent of her actions outright, as well as the reasoning behind them. Good makes it very clear that her intent is to see trees live, even if men must die. It is this exact state of mind that Barbara Frum was trying to uncover when she asked “what was the condition you last saw [Fromme] in?” One thing that I learned from this as a student journalist is that it is very important to get to the answer that will define the interview, but you cannot force it. You are an important part of the interview, but the interview is non-existent without the person you are interviewing. If that person gets out of control and you lose them altogether without getting that all-important answer, your interview has been virtually meaningless. You need to get that answer without destroying the contact between you and the person you are interviewing.

If I had to choose one person to interview, it would be Rudolph Hess, the Nazi general who was arrested in Scotland after his attempted independent peace treaty with England ended in disaster. He was a man who was very close to Adolf Hitler, and he would be very interesting to interview about his reasons for trying to end the war. It wouldn’t be a tough interview, because the man seemed to have firm convictions about the war, thus he would likely talk freely about them to propagate his ideas of peace.