CHRISTIANE: Yes.

LESLEY: – do your reporting and, as I said before, you have accomplished a body of work that’s one of the finest ever, certainly in broadcast journalism. But I’m wondering what the effects have been on you. You have spent the better part of 20 years watching such horrors. Do you have nightmares? Do you –

CHRISTIANE: You know, it’s several effects. One the one hand I know and I’m sure that I have a comfort level in being able to operate in those situations. When I say comfort level, I don’t mean it as comfortable, but I’ve managed to be in those situations and as they get progressively worse and more dangerous, and I get older and more experienced, I’m able to, I think, report and be able to make judgments that are based on experience and am able, I hope, to be able to give real credible reporting and information. And, again, that’s why I think this job is so important, to be able to spend time and get that experience, and then be able to report through a prism of 20 years of experience. So that’s the one thing. In terms of how it hurts and harms, yeah, you know, it does. Yes, I find it very difficult to witness the incredibly heartbreaking things that we do, and it gives me not so much nightmares when I’m asleep, but when I’m awake it gives me, you know, flashbacks and moments of poignancy, which I sometimes stop and think about, and I get emotional. But usually when I’m actually doing it, a different imperative kicks in, and this is, I know I have to keep my wits about me, I have to use my experience, I have to use my calm that somehow I have managed to keep about me, to be able to report, and increasingly, now, to hold the line against a deluge of anchors and so forth, experts and analysts who have their own theories. And they come at you with questions on the air, and I just have to stand very still, very calm, and report what’s actually happening, not what they wish was happening, or that they think was happening.

LESLEY: Have you ever said on the air, to one of these people, "Are you out of your mind?"

CHRISTIANE: Not in so many words, but I’ve implied it.

LESLEY: You implied it. OK, very diplomatic. Now you have a child. You have Darius. How old is he now?

CHRISTIANE: Darius is nine now.

LESLEY: Nine!

CHRISTIANE: Yes.

LESLEY: And you have said that that’s changed you a little.

CHRISTIANE: Oh, a lot. It made me more sensitive, perhaps, to the plight of children out there, and to the depths of the humanitarian woes that are out there. But it’s also made it more difficult. I don’t want to be away from my son and I think every mother understands that. And so it has made it more difficult. But I strongly believe that – I really do, and I don’t think it’s just professional nonsense or self-serving, you know, claptrap – I strongly believe that the strong democracy and a strong society needs a strong, independent, fair and rigorous class of journalists, a professional class. And without it your country wouldn’t be the same, my country wouldn’t be the same, Iran, many of the emerging democracies wouldn’t be the same. I think strong journalism is what carries us through these crises and these problems in the world, because we are out there trying to bring the truth, and holding those who need to be held accountable, accountable. And I think that’s just … you can’t do without.