The FedEx Box From a Source Who Said ‘Not Yet’

I’m Darren Samuelsohn and this is The love, journalism Show. First time visiting? Please sign up for my love letter from the beat.

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I got my introduction to Andy Revkin when he was at The New York Times: Olympus, as my old college advisor called it.

His coverage of Phil Cooney, a Bush White House aide who edited climate science, dominated the early days of my time in Washington on the energy and environmental beat. I learned back then what it meant to chase the Times, and that my work could be cited in the paper of record, too.

Andy walks me through how that scoop happened. A government functionary named Rick Piltz came up to him at a White House meetup on how dangerous climate change was. Piltz said he had things to give him eventually, but not yet. A couple years later, a FedEx box arrived with Cooney’s handwritten scribbles inside. Andy calls it a lesson in patience, and a case for staying dug in on a beat.

COP13 in Bali, Indonesia, ran from Dec. 3-15, 2007. Photo by Darren Samuelsohn

I met Andy in 2005 in Montreal, at the first climate conference I ever attended, a UN COP. I was starstruck. He wrote for a massive audience. I was in the weeds.

Twenty-one years later, the world heads to Turkey for COP31, Nov. 9-20. Andy’s last day as a Times reporter came at the end of Copenhagen in 2009. His read on these summits: the treaty process reflects what countries have already decided they will do. It does not determine it. His advice to reporters is to do the reporting at home before these things.

Along the way: Senator Inhofe, the chunks debate, and Pete Seeger’s red pen on a song about Arlington National Cemetery, and why Andy ignored most of it. He closes with a line from Jay Rosen: journalism is a practice, not a product. He opened with six words that make a fair thesis for this show: “I love journalism, still, despite all.”

And for the first time in the history of this show, a musical performance. I asked Andy where the exit is, in a world where we’re all trying to pull back and yet speeding up so fast. He answered with “Good News from 2044,” a short song from his new album.

Enjoy.