YouSaid · the spoken record

Cheri Bustos

lines on the record
82
first
2018-01-08
most recent
2018-01-08
sittings or episodes
1
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  1. “Yeah. I get a call from the president of this health system and says, you know, we have a new CEO. We would like to hire you to be our director of communications. And I immediately said, no, thank you. And he said, Well, you want to just talk about it? And I said, no, I said, I'm really not looking. And I love what I do. And, you know, that back to the 9-11 in the turning 40, I was just going to figure out, you know, what was my path going to be to be the editor of the paper? That was really kind of how I was reassessing things. So I go home that night”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  2. “So, if you can think about all of our emotions with 9-11, right? Everybody was thinking about gosh, life changes in an instant. Yeah. So that was happening, and I literally get a call. I'm in the middle of the newsroom. I get a call from the president of one of the health systems in our region.”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  3. “Well, it was a combination of turning forty, nine eleven happened, and a job offer came to me. And the reason I bring up the, you know, turning 40 and 9-11 is every 10 years in my life I've always kind of done this reassessment. Am I doing what I should be doing? Am I making a difference? Should I be considering doing something else? So I did that when I was 30, 40, 50. And when I turned 50, I ran for Congress. And so that happened. 9-11 happened. And if you remember kind of...”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  4. “You mentioned foreign governors have gone to prison in my lifetime. And it is bipartisan in Illinois, too, when it comes to governors going to prison.”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  5. “Yeah, I mean, it is literally exposure to people in the best of time, their best of times in their lives in the worst of times in their lives. And, you know, meeting everyone, again, from accused or convicted murderers to presidential candidates. And being a newspaper in eastern Iowa, I always lived in Illinois. But being a newspaper there, all of the presidential candidates, you know, we have access to all those guys.”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  6. “It's, you know, not terribly upscale But we met and got married a year after that. And then started raising our family. And I pretty much had every beat you can have at the newspaper and really loved every day of my career. But David, back to your point about what you see when you're a reporter, you are exposed literally to the worst possible scenarios in people's lives, you know, maybe after somebody loses a loved one in a car crash or a murder.”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  7. “Spend a lot of time in them back then. So did I. So did I. But that's how I met my husband to be was at this third shift party at a tavern in downtown East Moline called the Lill Cowbell. Is not little, so I'm not pronouncing that like in case I”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  8. “You're in the copy. Yeah, great bead, isn't it? Because cops are notoriously tough To get, you know, they don't trust you. And so, how do you get them to trust you so that they get the right to do that? Well, the other thing is.”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  9. “Yep. Yep. So I moved to Molene. I didn't know anything about the Quad Cities. It was 1985. The economy was terrible. John Deere was on strike. The quad cities was a very different community than Springfield, what I was used to. And my goal was I'd be there a year, and then I was going to go to Chicago Tribune. Well, six months later, I'm on the cop beat. That was my first beat at the paper. And I meet this guy named Jerry Bustos. It was a third shift party. And so all that means is, you know, the cops get off at 8 o'clock in the morning. They work the midnight to eight shift. And at the time, I worked, let's see, 5 p.m. to 1.38 a.m.”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  10. “And I have, you know, I think I was born to be a reporter, and I think I probably still could be a reporter and be a good one because I have a curiosity about virtually everything and I never run out of questions. So being on the receiving end of questions is not as comfortable for me as asking questions. And so I applied at the public affairs reporting program, which is a master's level program through University of Illinois at Springfield now, and was accepted into that. And that's how I began my journalism career. I started in a news bureau covering the state legislature, writing for four newspapers in the state. One of those newspapers hired me when I was done with that master's program.”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  11. “I hope President Obama, but no, I just, but at that age, that was like it did not at all interest me. So literally somebody says in passing to me, you ask so many questions, you ought to be a reporter.”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  12. “And this is very common. At the University of Yes, and it's beautiful. And this is probably almost twice the size of this little room that we were in. There were four interns. I loved my fellow interns. I keep in touch with two of them to this day. And my job was to analyze bills and write a synopsis of those. And I was, what, 20? I would have been 21, 22 years old. And it was boring to me. And I realized that this is not what I wanted to do. I didn't want to be an office looking at bills all the time and write what they meant. And so.”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  13. “Really, kind of by accident. I realize I loved politics. Absolutely loved it and did from the earliest memories. I loved those conversations. I loved being in the know. Even as a kid, I read the newspaper every day. So what happened is I went to... My junior year and went to University of Maryland, majored in government and politics, came back, I interned with the Illinois State Senate, thinking that I wanted to do something in politics and realized in that internship that I didn't like it at all. Why? Well we sat in a room smaller than this, small room with there were four interns”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  14. “Go and get the Bud and Budweiser, and while the door was open, I'd take a quick little sip. Probably not for Paul Simon. No, he was a Pepsi drinker. You remember that? I sure do. Oh, no, he never drank any beer. But my dad was a beer drinker.”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  15. “Yeah, and he worked with Paul Simon. So it would be people who were leaders in Democratic politics would come over to our house because my dad was a very social guy. And not that my mom was a great cook, but she didn't care if people stopped by at any hour. She'd make him an ice cream Sunday or whip something up. And we had unbelievable conversations. And what I so appreciate about my family is there wasn't one time where I was ever shushed or told to go away because it was an adult conversation. I could always sit there and I just would sit there and listen and really my only role would be my dad would say can you get us a butt out of the fridge and I'd”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  16. “But I would say my growing up years were having people like Paul Simon and Dick Durbin, his first job out of law school was with...”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  17. “And you probably have some of them in your library behind you. And I have, I think every single one of his books. I haven't read them all, but I have them all, and they're all inscribed to my dad”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  18. “Well, he was bad. But Paul, and my dad would wear his, you know, he had this pink tie-dyed shirt that our neighbor girl gave to him. And he'd wear his underwear just walking around in the house. Didn't matter who was there. And Paul would wear pajamas and a robe and it'd be all tied up and everything. And it was just like, oh my gosh, this is just so unusual. We weren't used to something like this. But Paul being around our house for about a half a year was, I mean, if you think about some of the conversations we were able to have, this is a guy who wrote how many books, David? I mean, many, many, many books.”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  19. “At that point, we had moved after that duplex when my dad started making a little more money. We live in a very modest house off of West Jefferson in Springfield. And so Paul lived with us for about a half a year. And I mean, again, very vivid memories of our discussions around the kitchen table and how he would dress compared with my dad for I mean, you were talking about Paul's short pants and stuff, but my dad was like the worst dresser you can imagine. You know, he'd wear short sleeves year-round with suits and, you know, ties, and he'd always have stains on his shirts because he'd be eating.”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  20. “So, probably one other thing to mention about Paul Simon, and I hope your listeners can get a feel for just what a tremendous guy this was. But after he lost... He got a job out at Harvard. To teach, so he took his wife Jean, who he had served in the state legislature with and had married her, and they had two kids at the time, Martin and Sheila, Sheila, who would go on to be our lieutenant governor in our state. But at the time they were little. And they move out to Massachusetts, and Paul teaches, and the kids enroll in school, he decides after one semester he wants to come back to Illinois. Well, but he doesn't want to take his kids out of school. So Paul ends up living with us.”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  21. “So I remember waking up that next morning. We would always stay up really late on election night and thinking, oh my gosh, my dad's out of a job. What are we going to do? I mean, I was like really worried about this. And then he would go on to, he had a short stent in city government working for one of the city commissioners for less than a year and then went to work with Alan Dixon, who at the time was state treasurer, then became Secretary of State and then U.S. Senate. U.S. Senator.”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  22. “But his candor led to his defeat. And my dad would always say too that in this Democratic primary it was against Dan Walker that Dan Walker would criticize Paul and Paul didn't want to hit back. And so he ends up losing. And I still remember.”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  23. “And that was the first person I ever went door to door for. So I would have been about 10 years old at the time. But Paul Simon was this guy who always wore a bow tie, had this real deep baritone voice.”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  24. “And worked with Governor Shapiro and then to Paul Simon. So that's where he ended up with Paul Simon. Paul Simon was lieutenant And Paul made a decision to run for governor, which is, I think, probably at about the time where you and my father started.”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  25. “Yeah. Well, I consider Paul Simon one of the best public servants our state has ever produced. He was at the time lieutenant governor. So my dad went from Kerner. Then if you remember for a short time there was Governor Shapiro.”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  26. “The horse meat scandal. And basically, just I never asked him about how he got it straightened up, but I'm guessing they just took accountability and said, look, we're going to have better oversight, make sure that something like this doesn't happen again. So that's why he left journalism after, you know, a decade or so and went into politics.”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  27. “All right. So there was a meat scandal, and what it was is horse meat was being sold as beef. And so the governor's office, it would have been Governor Kerner at the time, decided that they needed somebody to help get this thing out of the press so they could move on and get the work done. So they offered my dad a job. It was significantly more pay. So really the only reason he left journalism, because he loved it, loved every minute of it, was because he couldn't make any more money there. He had three kids and a wife who was staying at home with us. And he had this job offer and took it. And so he was handling press. He was a deputy press secretary in the Kerner administration.”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  28. “Well, so he had been got out of, he graduated from Illinois College in Jacksonville in 1955, went to the Army, served for two years in the Army most of that time in Germany, came back, married my mom in 1957, started having kids in 58, 59, and 61. And so he had three little kids. And again, I was telling you, we lived in this duplex in garden courts, people in Springfield would know where that is. And we outgrew this little place. He wasn't making very good money. So he goes to the editor at the time and asks for a raise. And the editor said, well, Gene, you're already the best paid reporter we have. We can't give you anymore. So at the same time, do you remember anything about this meat scandal that the state of Illinois had?”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  29. “Yeah. And my grandfather's name was Joseph Callahan. So he had a pretty good Irish name. Irish names do well. A good ballot name. And then, of course, two years later, being in this very, very Republican area, he didn't win. So he was in for one term. But I bring that up because, and these are still memories I have, but my grandma and grandpa would come down to Springfield, which is where I grew up and stay at our house when they were in session. And so I just liked it because my grandma and grandpa stayed with us. And so that would have been like my earliest memories of being around anything political. But at that same time, my father was a political reporter for back in the day, the state journal register in Springfield was they had a morning paper and a PM and my dad worked at the register.”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  30. “Right, right. I know you know this history better than I do. So he had been the party chair in Iroquois County. So Iroquois County lived in a little farm town called Milford, which is where my dad and his brother and two sisters were all born and lived until they, well, until my dad went away to college. But so he ran, was only the second Democrat ever to be elected from Iroquois County for any race.”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  31. “He was a hog farmer. Yeah. He was a hog farmer. I come from a long line of farmers. My grandpa was a hog farmer. My aunt and uncle are still dairy farmers. We have cousins who are Angus farmers. They all grow corn and beans. So a long, long line of farmers. So he was elected the state legislature.”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  32. “So we can go back to gosh, I was a three-year-old girl, a little girl, living in a place called Garden Courts, which is, I think it's public housing now on the east side of Springfield. And my grandfather was elected to the state legislature. It was a farmer.”

    2018-01-08 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 206 - Rep. Cheri Bustos · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source