Below is the transcript of an interview with Mill Dione, who recently released “Falling Semis”. We recommend you listen to it in its original form for the full effect.

The transcript has been lightly edited for length and clarity.

Siegel: I’m Robert Siegel, now a contributor to The Times. Today, my guest is Mill Dione, former Secretary of Transportation and author of sixteen bestselling books, including Flight of the Valkyries and Higher Tides. How are you?

Dione: I’m doing well, if you can believe it.

Siegel: [Laughs.] Well Mill, your latest release was a short story you posted onto X. A bit of a departure from your regular style, don’t you think?

Dione: Well, if you had told me back in 2016, when I was publishing LaGuardia Unleashed, that I would soon be releasing my work onto a website owned by Elon Musk, for free no less, I would have laughed at you. But really, I think that my goal has always been to reach as wide an audience as possible, so I wanted to see how far this story could make it. I really couldn’t have imagined the impact it would have online.

Sigel: The story focuses heavily on a character named Luther, who is stuck in a traffic jam on I-43. For those who haven’t read it, could you give a summary of how he’s impacted by the traffic?

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Sigel: You spoke earlier about LaGuardia Unleashed, your bestselling memoir about the efforts to stop the Y2K bug from grounding American air travel. Now, as the longest full government shutdown in US history continues, many flights have been grounded or heavily delayed without the failure of any technological systems. Why do you think our airports have been less proactive in efforts to stay on schedule this time around?

Dionne: It really has to do with the way modern politics are framed. Back in 1999, I couldn’t imagine a time where the DOT would be so heavily politisized. Obviously people notice when planes are running slow, so it was always in the best efforts of both parties to keep them going. People across the aisle worked to make sure the white-collar workers of America could fly to meetings and do business. It really wasn’t negotiable.

But in the modern era, we’ve been seeing far fewer international flights for business. It’s become much easier for companies to conduct video calls rather than to pay for flights. Even the idea of the business class on planes has slowly faded out of public consciousness, with more budget airlines doing away with it entirely. Now, when the planes are running slow, it doesn’t affect the economy as much as it does your average voter. So, now we’re seeing Marjorie Taylor Greene put her video blaming the Democrats onto screens in airports, because she knows it will reach people who are mad they have to wait in lines instead of flying to their vacation spot. It’s a departure from tradition, but we didn’t have TVs in airports in the 90s.

Siegel: So would you say that 

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Siegel: Thank you.

Dionne: Thank you.