Huffington Thinks Trump Needs More Sleep
QUEST: Donald Trump's campaign sent a furious statement on Tuesday night calling Ted Cruz a Trojan horse of the establishment after Trump's defeat in Wisconsin. Arianna Huffington said the Donald Trump may just need more sleep. She is the founder of the Huffington Post and the author of "The Sleep Revolution." Delighted. We'll come to Donald Trump in just a moment, because you obviously have some views about the amount of sleep, why did you decide to write this book?</s>ARIANNA HUFFINGTON, FOUNDER, THE HUFFINGTON POST, AUTHOR, "THE SLEEP REVOLUTION": Well, it started with a personal story, when I collapsed from sleep deprivation, hit my head on my desk on the way down and broke my cheek bone. And when I went from doctor to doctor the diagnosis was basically sleep deprivation and burn out. And so I had to change my life and go from four to six hours to eight hours, which is what I now get 95 percent of the time. And in the process I started the new sleep science, which, Richard, makes it absolutely convincing that sleep is not incidental.</s>QUEST: We know it's not incidental but the changes required to get that sleep often seem to be mountains to climb.</s>HUFFINGTON: Well, absolutely, the changes are so mountainous because our culture does not appreciate sleep. Because our culture fails to equate sleep with performance, that's the change we need to make. When you get adequate sleep you are better at your job, you are a better parent, you are a better leader. And we now have scientific evidence that proves that.</s>QUEST: You say in your book that the best temperature for sleep is about 65 degrees.</s>HUFFINGTON: Yes.</s>QUEST: Fahrenheit, give or take. And in your wish list you say that you want the day to arrive when nap maps are as plentiful as yoga maps where people are listing healthy sleep habits as an item on their resumes. That goes against -- I almost leap out the chair at this. Because that goes against everything that we are taught. He's workaholic. He's a good worker. He's in morning, he's in the office early till late.</s>HUFFINGTON: And congratulating the people for working 24/7. But when you read the science chapter, what that means if you congratulating people for coming to work drunk literally. So we've got change that because we now have a golden age of sleep science, I have 50 pages of scientific and notes to convince the most stubborn skeptic that we need to change our habits.</s>QUEST: Do you think that Donald Trump is sleep deprived? And Hillary Clinton, she must also be sleep deprived.</s>HUFFINGTON: They both are. But Donald Trump displays every symptom of what the American Academy of Sleep Medicine describes as chronic sleep deprivation symptoms. He cannot process simple information. He has paranoid tendencies. He repeats endless nonsensical pabulum. He has mood swings. He's incredibly irritable. These are all classic symptoms of sleep deprivation, we've all experienced them.</s>QUEST: Margaret Thatcher then, she used to boast that she only needed four hours sleep a night.</s>HUFFINGTON: Right, and then she would get in one hour nap without fail every afternoon, and look towards the end of her life, how incredibly irritable and difficult to deal with she became. And ultimately leadership is about the executive functions in the prefrontal cortex and this is what is first degraded when you don't get enough sleep.</s>QUEST: So OK, I'm tired, I freely admit that most of working life I'm tired, I have a nap in my office at 3 o'clock in the afternoon or 2 o'clock I need freshen up before I do the program, I feel guilty, Arianna.</s>HUFFINGTON: Oh, Richard, come on, you've got to be a leader in this movement to change how we look at sleep.</s>QUEST: How do we change it?</s>HUFFINGTON: Richard, you have so many millions of people who admire you. So if you just start speaking about it, we are going to end the stigma. We are going to make nap rooms in offices as universal as conference rooms. And so if you are tired in the middle of the afternoon, instead of going to have another doughnut or a fifth cup of coffee, or worse a Red Bull, you go and have a nap. Because we are human beings we are not machines. That change started happening during the industrial revolution when we thought human beings had to have the same operational style as machines.</s>QUEST: Would you say I mean the Huffington Post has been one of your greatest achievements, but would you say your work for sleep and sleep revolution sort of is that thing that you are not most proud of, but that you consider to be you cause.</s>HUFFINGTON: Well, I'm not proud yet because we have a long way to go, but the crusade that we launched this week to change cultural norms around sleep is something that will transform our lives, will transform our decision making, our health, 75 percent of healthcare costs are now because of stress.</s>QUEST: I am obsessed by this subject, I need to ask you though, about election because I mean a contested Republican convention, do you wish no on the Democrats side Bernie Sanders would just get out of the way.</s>HUFFINGTON: No, this process has to unfold, and I think what is now clear though after the results in Wisconsin is that we are going to have a contested Republican convention. Because the way things are looking now, Donald Trump will not have number of delegates he needs at the first ballot.</s>QUEST: And if that and suddenly this election becomes even more extraordinary that it's already been so far.</s>HUFFINGTON: I know but also I think to return to our topic, I think the greatest contribution that Donald Trump is going to make to American political life is to show how dreadful it is for your campaign to be sleep deprived. And it gets cumulative. You know, last week he made his worst mistakes, because what happens is that he is so exhausted now that he doesn't know what he is saying. On abortion he first wants to punish women, he then doesn't want to change the laws, and that really cost him.</s>QUEST: Now I know why you always sparkle when I meet you, it's because you are getting a good night's sleep.</s>HUFFINGTON: I got my eight hours last night. And now I am enjoying being with you.</s>QUEST: Excellent. We will have a Profitable Moment after the break. It's QUEST MEANS BUSINESS.