A Conversation with Mark Salter, Author of "The Luckiest Man: Life with John McCain"

  Join Michael Zeldin in his conversation with Mark Salter, Author of The Luckiest Man: Life with John McCain.Salter collaborated with John McCain on all seven of their books, including The Restless Wave, Faith of My Fathers, Worth the Fighting For, Why Courage Matters, Character Is Destiny, Hard Call, and Thirteen Soldiers.  He served on Senator McCain’s staff for eighteen years.

Guest

Mark Salter

Author of "The Luckiest Man: Life with John McCain"

Mark Salter is an American speechwriter from Davenport, Iowa, known for his collaborations with United States Senator John McCain on several nonfiction books as well as on political speeches. Salter also served as McCain's chief of staff for a while, although he had left that position by 2008. 

About the Book

More so than almost anyone outside of McCain’s immediate family, Mark Salter had unparalleled access to and served to influence the Senator’s thoughts and actions, cowriting seven books with him and acting as a valued confidant. Now, in The Luckiest Man, Salter draws on the storied facets of McCain’s early biography as well as the later-in-life political philosophy for which the nation knew and loved him, delivering an intimate and comprehensive account of McCain’s life and philosophy.Salter covers all the major events of McCain’s life—his peripatetic childhood, his naval service—but introduces, too, aspects of the man that the public rarely saw and hardly knew. Woven throughout this narrative is also the story of Salter and McCain’s close relationship, including how they met, and why their friendship stood the test of time in a political world known for its fickle personalities and frail bonds. The capstone to Salter’s intimate and decades-spanning time with the Senator, The Luckiest Man is the authoritative last word on the stories McCain was too modest to tell himself and an influential life not soon to be forgotten.

Host

Michael Zeldin

Michael Zeldin is a well-known and highly-regarded TV and radio analyst/commentator.He has covered many high-profile matters, including the Clinton impeachment proceedings, the Gore v. Bush court challenges, Special Counsel Robert Muller’s investigation of interference in the 2016 presidential election, and the Trump impeachment proceedings. In 2019, Michael was a Resident Fellow at the Institute of Politics at the Harvard Kennedy School, where he taught a study group on Independent Investigations of Presidents.Previously, Michael was a federal prosecutor with the U.S. Department of Justice. He also served as Deputy Independent/ Independent Counsel, investigating allegations of tampering with presidential candidate Bill Clinton’s passport files, and as Deputy Chief Counsel to the U.S. House of Representatives, Foreign Affairs Committee, October Surprise Task Force, investigating the handling of the American hostage situation in Iran.Michael is a prolific writer and has published Op-ed pieces for CNN.com, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Hill, The Washington Times, and The Washington Post.