FPR.057 10 Sum WL Mag-F:FPR.029 06 Fall WL 4/15/10 10:25 AM Page 19
Steve Goldstein and his wife, Deanne Poulos, enjoy one of Goldstein’s abiding passions: baseball. Here, they’re at a Diamondbacks game, though Goldstein’s team is the Cincinnati Reds, not the D-backs. old I was listening to talk radio. I used to love that stuff. I didn’t listen to music,” the now grownup and public-radio employed Steve Goldstein says. “I felt like I wanted to learn as much as I could. I always wanted to be the first to tell people this guy got elected or that guy got traded.” He was reading local papers “as a tiny kid—pre-10 years old,” as well as Time magazine and Sports Illustrated, studying form as well as content. “They had these long features and I thought, wow, you can really tell stories like this! I always knew I wanted to grow up to be in some sort of media thing.” So, yes, Goldstein is positioned in that enviable spot where occupation and defining passion meet. But he appreciates that his job isn't about his own interests and has found it a joy and a responsibility to bring news and analysis to a metropolitan area of educated, aware and sometimes tough listeners. “Once you get past the point of, Hey, I’m on the radio and I get to talk to people, then you really want to make an impact,” he says. That’s where Here and Now comes in. Currently airing on Wednesdays and Fridays, Goldstein says the goal is to go to five days a week starting later this year. “The talk show is how you can attract that community connection,” he says. “A fourminute report on John McCain is great, but as a listener I can’t call in, I can’t text. So I love the interactivity of Here and Now. Plus, it’s always cool to see what a wide variety of people call in. They’re so well educated, and they want to learn. That’s the
coolest thing.” Goldstein and his listeners have that much in common: “Learning is a big word for me,” Goldstein says. He’s deep into three books at the moment: a galley copy of Play by Play, about the Herberger Theater; a biography of the 1975 Cincinnati Reds; and a Sherlock Holmes mystery. He sees a learning opportunity in just about every conversation—more than anything, he wants to get at the intricacies of how other people think. “He always wants to know more,” is how Here and Now’s producer, Paul Atkinson, sums up Goldstein’s appetite for knowledge. “He does his own research and comes prepared for every interview. He also has passion for the topics we cover on Here and Now. He loves Arizona history, particularly the political characters our state has produced. He knows things about local, state and federal politics that few reporters would take the time to learn.” In fact, Goldstein is such a politics hound that he worries the show can skew too political. “I just love talking with politicians. I kind of get giddy,” he says. “We had J.D. Hayworth on, who I’m sure 90 percent of our listeners
“Once you get past the point of, Hey, I’m on the radio and I get to talk to people, then you really want to make an impact.” hate, but he’s a great guest. He’s a really good communicator. What we do—this is so radio—is find people, whether listeners agree with them or not, who can get their message across. You hope it’s not too calculated a message. You have to find the best advocate for a particular point of view, but it has to be someone who can articulate it.” Goldstein names Jon Kyl and Janet Napolitano as favorite guests because, “whatever you ask them, they’re not afraid to answer the question. They’re both smart, confident people who are always ready to defend what they did. They say, ‘I appreciate the fact that you disagree with me, but here’s why I did what I did.’” That’s his aim for the show: interesting, always meaty, conversation without too much emphasis on “horse race” coverage or excess punditry. Goldstein has tried to train his eye on big-picture professionalism, not personalSummer 2010 19