CARVILLE:   Welcome back to CROSSFIRE. We're looking at some notable books by some of our favorite authors. My colleague on the left, Paul Begala, joins me to talk to Tucker Carlson about his latest book, "Politicians, Partisans and Parasites: My Adventures in Cable News." 
BEGALA:   Tucker, welcome to CROSSFIRE. 
CARLSON:   Thanks for having me, Paul. I like your set. 
BEGALA:   Isn't this wonderful?  
CARLSON:   It's fantastic. 
BEGALA:   Look, this will probably tank sales. Not a turkey; it's a damn good book. 
CARLSON:   Thank you. 
BEGALA:   I read it; I loved it. It's terrific. It's very funny, but it's also very true. You talk -- You go through a lot of it. One of my favorite passages, you go through an interview in a seminal story you did in the 2000 election, I think the year 1999, with my governor in Texas, George W. Bush, who went on to obscurity after the interview. But in the interview -- Well, here's how you describe it in the book. Let me read it to you. "Bush hadn't liked the piece at all. In fact, I later heard from someone who was with him at the time, he was wounded by it. He was surprised by a couple of faintly critical lines. I'd pointed out that he dresses like someone who just got back from an afternoon shoplifting at Sears. He found the tone annoying. Most of all, he didn't like being quoted using profanity." Now, there's not much I like about George W. Bush, but I like that he cusses. He's cussed me out before. Why is he so -- I mean, he's supposed to be this Texas cowboy. Why was he so wigged out about being quoted accurately using bad language? 
CARLSON:   Well, I don't know the full answer. I think part of it is that people are always surprised when they hear the way they speak. It's almost like when you listen to yourself on tape for the first time, you think, "Who is that guy with squeaky voice?" You don't recognize your own voice. And I think people almost never like what you write about them, even if you mean it to be positive. The day before I filed the piece I showed my wife the story, and she said people are going to think you're sucking up, aren't they? Because I thought, and she thought, that it was that positive a piece. I liked the guy; I found him charming. I like people who, you know, use the "F" word from time to time. Didn't bother me at all. 
BEGALA:   Yes. Use that one with me with an "m" in front of me, as well. And that's fine with me. I don't mind a president with a temper. I wish he had a little higher intellect, perhaps, a little better plan to get us out of the war in Iraq. But what did that presage for his presidency, that temper? 
CARLSON:   Well, I don't know. I mean, all politicians -- you know, no politician I've ever covered likes to be contradicted. I mean, if you had sort of a, you know, kind of weak ego, you probably wouldn't be running for president in the first place. They're all the same.  I just -- And I've certainly been yelled at by politicians before. I don't think I've had many politicians like stories I've written about them. The striking thing about this one, though, was again that I thought it was positive. It just wasn't taken that way at all. They really overreacted. I think the Bush administration, like the Bush campaign, if it can be said to seen in its relationship with the press, tends to be a little bit too controlling, way too controlling, and I think it hurts itself by doing that. 
CARVILLE:   Tucker... 
CARLSON:   James. 
CARVILLE:   You pathetic worm of a human being that spends all their time sucking up to power and spitting down on average hardworking Americans, who's a lackey for every right wing thing that comes along, do you think that the tone in Washington has gotten out of hand? Or do you think... 
CARLSON:   Let me just first point out to be called a lackey by one of our age's great throne sniffers is really a compliment. No, I don't think the tone is out of hand. I don't mind a little barking. Obviously, I work on CROSSFIRE. It's a well-known political debate show on CNN at 4:30 Eastern. I guess what bothers me, though, is barking in the service of partisanship. I don't mind ideology. If somebody comes on the show and says, "Look, I believe the Earth is flat, and I will die espousing that view." If you believe that, even if it's demented, I'll respect you for it. It's people who come on and lie in the service of a team: "I'll say anything because I want my team to win." There's nothing noble about that at all. Partisanship, in my opinion, is completely different from radical ideology and just much less admiral. I just am not a fan. 
CARVILLE:   So anytime that you see something that you disagree with, you just bring it up, whether or not it's on your team or not. You're never sensitive to kind of pressure from Republicans... 
CARLSON:   I don't have a team at all. 
CARVILLE:   You don't? 
CARLSON:   No. I mean, I have my beliefs, which I'm really up front about. I mean, there are certain things I believe are true. But when I see evidence that contradicts what I believe, I hope that I'll be man enough to admit it. I mean, for instance, the war in Iraq. I'm open to the idea that it was a mistake. I haven't reached that conclusion, but if the evidence becomes overwhelming, I will change my view. And I will.  
BEGALA:   Let me suggest -- You say you don't have a team. 
CARLSON:   Yes. 
BEGALA:   I think you do. First off, you're conservative. 
CARLSON:   I'm very conservative. 
BEGALA:   Secondly... 
CARLSON:   I'm much more conservative than this administration. 
BEGALA:   I believe that. And yet, you've pretty much endorsed Al Sharpton to president. He's not the conservative candidate, actually, of my party. So much so that Sharpton himself has a quote praising the book on the back. He says, "It's an exciting book by an exciting author." Now, he's a minister of the gospel. 
CARLSON:   Well, you've got to actually spend... 
BEGALA:   You spent a lot of time with Sharpton. You traveled to Africa with him, wrote an amazing piece for "Esquire" about it. Why -- You're a deeply principled conservative. We debate this every night? Why are you such a fan of the most liberal guy running for president? 
CARLSON:   Actually, the rest of the quote you didn't read answers that. 
BEGALA:   There's not enough time. There's not enough time. 
CARLSON:   He says, "If I win, if I become president I will make him head of Amtrak." Me. So I do have a financial interest in this. I took my daughter, actually, to see Sharpton preach in Anacostia (ph) in Washington, D.C., last week. Really one of the great preachers, one of the best preachers I've ever seen. He has a lot of talent. I think he's amusing as hell. I think he tells the truth a lot of the time. He is kind of an ideologue. And he drives Democrats crazy, and I love that. Nobody dislikes liberals as much as Al Sharpton does. He just absolutely hates them. They bug him. 
CARVILLE:   Tucker, let me ask you something. When the public buys your book, and they're going to buy it, because it is a hell of a book, what insight -- what is it that you -- that they're going to find out about Washington, about all of this, that they didn't know before they bought the book? 
CARLSON:   My adventures in cable news, that's the subtitle. It's an adventure, working in cable news. And nobody, you know -- Every book you read about, you know, my life in television -- I'm only been doing it three years so I couldn't write much of a book of that -- but they're all platitudinous (ph), children are our future, did you know that? They're all boring and antedyne (ph). And I figured I would tell the truth. I mean, whenever I go places, I'm on airplanes, people say, "What is James Carville really like? What is Paul Begala really like?" 
CARVILLE:   I'm a sniveling snake. 
CARLSON:   Exactly. My answer is always they're exactly the way they appear on television, except more so, which in your case is, you know, disturbing. 
CARVILLE:   Tucker, you really do think I should be one of the sexiest men alive? 
CARLSON:   Actually, we were talking about this on the show last week. It's upsetting to me, as the father of three daughters, husband to a marvelous wife, I think you know, you think you understand women. But when you become, you know, one of the sexiest men in America, it just shows I know nothing about women and what they like. Sorry. 
CARVILLE:   What can I say, Mr. Carlson? I'll tell you what. You wrote a hell of a book, and it deserves to be widely read. And it's very good, and I congratulate you on the accomplishment. 
BEGALA:   Let me read another excerpt out of it, though. It's a sort of poignant part you wrote about Alan Keyes. 
CARLSON:   Yes. 
BEGALA:   An amazing speaker, a conservative Republican, maybe the most conservative guy who ran against President Bush. But here's how you assessed covering his race. "There's something humiliating about hopeless candidacies. No matter how obvious it is that you're going to lose, you still have to pretend in public that you're going to win. It's enough to erode anyone's self-respect after awhile." Do you see that happening to Keyes or to this current crop, to the Kucinich's, Sharpton, your man, the guys who obviously have no chance? 
CARLSON:   Yes. I mean, to some extent. When I was a full-time magazine writer, I spent a number of years on the freak beat, sort of not covering the main candidates, but covering people like Alan Keyes or Steve Forbes. And a lot of the time I respected them, because they were running because they believed in something and they wanted, you know, a billboard for their beliefs. And there's something admirable about that.  But there is something sad about watching a guy schlep from little town in little town in Iowa, flying in these little prop planes -- a hard life running for president, as you know better than I -- with no hope, no expectation he'll get even any delegates. Alan Keyes, I loved simply because he's one of the greatest speakers in American history, I think. Alan Keyes would begin sentences that were so complex, with so many independent clauses, that you would sort of sit on the edge of your chair waiting to see if he could bring it all back home. 
BEGALA:   He's stunning. 
CARLSON:   And he could. 
BEGALA:   And he's spell binding, but the problem is there are no electoral votes on Mars, which is where he's strongest. 
CARLSON:   There's the dementia problem. No. I must say, though, Alan Keyes, I agreed with everything he said. 
BEGALA:   Well, OK. Hang on just a second, Tucker. Keep your seat. Tucker's adventures in cable television would not be complete until he has been on the receiving end of our "Rapidfire" treatment. We know little Tucker can dish it out. But can he take it? We'll find out right after a quick break.
