Speaker 1: Hi, I'm Mollie John Fast and this is Fast Politics,
Speaker 1: where we discussed the top political headlines with some of
Speaker 1: today's best minds.
Speaker 2: And a new poll says Republicans want someone younger than
Speaker 2: Donald Trump, you know, the oldest presidential nominee in the
Speaker 2: US history. We have such a great show for you today,
Speaker 2: Historian Kevin Kruz pops by to give an accurate historical
Speaker 2: rundown of the more chaotic moments in presidential conventions. Then
Speaker 2: we'll talk to Heated's Emily Atkin about the latest inquiment news.
Speaker 2: But first we have MSNBC columnist and contributor Charlie Sykes.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to Fast Politics. Charlie Sykes.
Speaker 3: Hey, from one crappy Jew to another, I guess.
Speaker 4: That's right, right, I didn't realize you were Jewish.
Speaker 3: Well, you know what, I feel like, I'm an honorary
Speaker 3: horrible crappy Jew given what the President has been saying
Speaker 3: my father was Jewish, I'm actually not.
Speaker 4: But you're Jewish enough for Hitler. I mean that's you know.
Speaker 3: And apparently Donald Trump is obsessed with people who change
Speaker 3: their their racial identity, so I figured more than merrier.
Speaker 1: He doesn't like identity politics, except when he does like
Speaker 1: identity politics, which is all the time.
Speaker 3: He's a little obsessed with all of this, isn't he?
Speaker 1: You know?
Speaker 3: I mean, the whole idea that Kamala Harris is a
Speaker 3: recent convert to blackness, which was really kind of an
Speaker 3: amazing moment, an amazing day. Wasn't actually in an amazing
Speaker 3: week that kept off an amazing month.
Speaker 4: Somebody tweeted like, July you were a lot.
Speaker 3: It was. I think I tweeted this out. It's hard
Speaker 3: to remember because so many things happen in July. But
Speaker 3: a talented historian could write an entire book July twenty
Speaker 3: twenty four, I mean, just just the month. Problem is
Speaker 3: that book probably won't get written because lord knows what
Speaker 3: August Hastember not a berger to be like.
Speaker 1: Yes July twenty twenty four is a book, but it's
Speaker 1: a harm book.
Speaker 4: I mean, actually, though it has a happy ending, right.
Speaker 3: It certainly had the twists in it. I mean, you
Speaker 3: think where we were a couple of weeks ago, in
Speaker 3: terms of the enthusiasm, the energy, the engagement, the optimism.
Speaker 3: It is as if we live in a completely new world.
Speaker 3: And by the way, you could really see yesterday I
Speaker 3: thought that Donald Trump has not figured out how to
Speaker 3: navigate this new world. I was listening to some of
Speaker 3: the pundits talking about why he went to the Black
Speaker 3: Journalist event, you know, because this is exactly what he
Speaker 3: wanted to do in you know, X, Y and Z.
Speaker 3: And I'm looking at that going, you know, let's just
Speaker 3: set aside the strategy and they try to get inside
Speaker 3: the prefrontal cortex of Donald Trump. And what you saw
Speaker 3: was this this aging man with no impulse control, who's
Speaker 3: playing his greatest hits from twenty fifteen. It's basically fat
Speaker 3: Elvis pushed out on the stage and he wants to
Speaker 3: go back to birthrism two point oh.
Speaker 4: Yeah, the birth certificate stuff.
Speaker 1: The fact that they brought that out there was just unbelievable.
Speaker 3: Well, unbelievable except that, okay, this is who Donald Trump is.
Speaker 3: He came down the Golden Nesk. He actually put out
Speaker 3: a statement where he talked about, you know, the controversy
Speaker 3: around his announcement back in twenty fifteen. He talked about
Speaker 3: the Mexican rapists. And what I thought was interesting was
Speaker 3: that he, in his mind wants to go back to
Speaker 3: twenty fifteen and twenty sixteen and play the same damn cards.
Speaker 3: He looks at Kamala Harris and he thinks, I'm going
Speaker 3: to make an issue of whether or not she's of
Speaker 3: mixed race, and then all of MAGA tries to play that,
Speaker 3: and it's like, guys, the world has kind of moved
Speaker 3: on from all of this.
Speaker 1: This is a theory that I want to explore with you.
Speaker 1: I think one of Trump's big problems, and there are many,
Speaker 1: is that he's sort of obsessed with what's worked for
Speaker 1: him in the past. This may be a broader problem
Speaker 1: that other politicians have, but what worked for him in
Speaker 1: twenty sixteen was this ability to use this sort of
Speaker 1: bat his bad qualities to drive a news cycle that
Speaker 1: somehow gave him free media and made him win. So,
Speaker 1: for example, he would say something appalling like the Mexicans
Speaker 1: are rapist, and it would dominate the news cycle in
Speaker 1: such a way that it got his base all excited
Speaker 1: and somehow catapulted him to victory.
Speaker 4: And so I just have to wonder if some of
Speaker 4: this is muscle.
Speaker 3: Memory, oh, very very much so, and and maybe a
Speaker 3: lack of imagination and kind of a reminder that at
Speaker 3: Donald Trump's core, the man is obsessed with racial identity.
Speaker 3: I mean, he is a racist. He launched his presidential
Speaker 3: bid basically on questioning Barack Obama's burke, and so he
Speaker 3: is going back to that muscle memory. But the problem
Speaker 3: is is that, you know, and I gave this is
Speaker 3: you know, you're a seventy eight year old man in
Speaker 3: clear cognitive decline and you're relying on your muscle memory.
Speaker 3: It's like, this may not work in twenty twenty four.
Speaker 3: And I think the reaction was different. In twenty sixteen.
Speaker 3: People were kind of shocked and we have to react
Speaker 3: and we always have to comment. And this year it's
Speaker 3: sort of like that was pretty pathetic, wasn't it. I mean,
Speaker 3: that was that was just lame. That was embarrassing. I
Speaker 3: mean even Scott Jennings on CNN, who's kind of a
Speaker 3: reliable turd polisher, says that that Donald Trump shit the bed.
Speaker 4: I love you for that. Go on, this is more
Speaker 4: of the content I want.
Speaker 3: And Republicans are like, you know, that was kind of embarrassing. Boy,
Speaker 3: that was it was a lost opportunity. They're not spinning it.
Speaker 3: I mean, you know, Trump is I crushed it, But
Speaker 3: he's not the only person who's thinking that he didn't
Speaker 3: shit the bed yesterday, and so he reminded us of
Speaker 3: so many things about him himself in a way that
Speaker 3: was not flattering. And by the way, we can just
Speaker 3: get to how he threw jd Vance under the bus
Speaker 3: and doubled down on pardoning the January sixth, the rioters
Speaker 3: who attacked the cops.
Speaker 1: If they're guilty, and she was like, they were convicted.
Speaker 1: By the way that moment where he said if they're
Speaker 1: guilty and she goes they were convicted. We talked about
Speaker 1: the journalists who did that interview, but like I would
Speaker 1: like to point out, those interviews are actually really hard
Speaker 1: because you're in front of a gazillion people.
Speaker 4: And you know, it's just hard.
Speaker 1: You are confronting someone who really is she's pretty good
Speaker 1: at confronting people. And I thought the woman from ABC,
Speaker 1: Rachel Scott, really I mean, she's young, and she just
Speaker 1: had so much gravitas and you know, she shot back
Speaker 1: right away they were convicted, which you know, in the
Speaker 1: moment I could have been like, you know, she.
Speaker 3: Was legend yesterday. I mean that was really really effective,
Speaker 3: and you're pointing something out that is important. This is hard.
Speaker 3: Those live interviews are hard, and you've seen this with
Speaker 3: a lot of professionals on the broadcast media who just
Speaker 3: cannot keep up with his fire hose of insults and lies.
Speaker 3: And she just kept at it, she kept, you know,
Speaker 3: asking the question again, pushing back on him. She pulled
Speaker 3: no punches whatsoever, and so almost from the beginning she
Speaker 3: laid out the indictment, and Trump's reaction was just to
Speaker 3: insult her over and over and over again, and she
Speaker 3: was absolutely unfazed. And I guess this goes to the
Speaker 3: I don't know how you feel about this, but there's
Speaker 3: a debate about should they have platformed Trump, should have
Speaker 3: invited him, should they not have invited him, and a
Speaker 3: lot of back and forth. At the end of this day,
Speaker 3: I'm thinking, I'm glad they invited him. I'm glad they
Speaker 3: invited him because they exposed him and this was a
Speaker 3: good thing.
Speaker 1: I really try to not make broad statements like it's
Speaker 1: good it's bad, because sometimes it's good. What happened there
Speaker 1: was amazing. And what we saw with him in the
Speaker 1: debate was that if you can't hold him accountable and
Speaker 1: you can't at least try to solicit information. I mean,
Speaker 1: obviously there were other things going on in the debate, clearly,
Speaker 1: and that was not the headline. But you did see
Speaker 1: he was able to just sort of say his stuff
Speaker 1: and go unchallenged, which in it's that is doing him
Speaker 1: a favor. So I think that it can work really
Speaker 1: well and it can also not.
Speaker 3: Right right, going back to this muscle memory that as
Speaker 3: soon as he started raising questions about whether Kamala Harris
Speaker 3: was really black, you notice that his minions began pushing
Speaker 3: the same line on the Fox News. I mean, you
Speaker 3: want to talk about, you know, firing blanks of all
Speaker 3: the things that he should be doing in this campaign
Speaker 3: to run against Kamala Harris. And look, there are issues,
Speaker 3: there are things in substance, and yet he cannot help
Speaker 3: himself but go after her identity. This is the og
Speaker 3: Donald Trump. I'm going way way back, And it did
Speaker 3: occur to me as I was watching this. Again, this
Speaker 3: is not new, because nothing that we say about Donald
Speaker 3: Trump is remotely new. There is really something about black
Speaker 3: women that triggers him, isn't there? I mean there really is.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And again remember he went after the DA in
Speaker 1: New York.
Speaker 3: Well, there was Fannie Willis and obviously Letitia James. But
Speaker 3: I mean, all through his term, he went out of
Speaker 3: his way to pick fights with black women who were
Speaker 3: not necessarily prominent, because that was the fight he wants.
Speaker 3: In his mind. He's thinking that his base wants the
Speaker 3: image of the other, of the enemy, of the person
Speaker 3: that Donald Trump is protecting you from. He would go
Speaker 3: out of his way to pick these fights. And now
Speaker 3: it feels like he's compassed round with all these black
Speaker 3: women saying you know, we're coming for you, Donald, and
Speaker 3: it's rattling him.
Speaker 1: He has doubled down on this strategy, which is that
Speaker 1: he's just going to go for his people and he's
Speaker 1: going to try to juice the turnout so that, you know,
Speaker 1: he'll have the kind of numbers that can propel him
Speaker 1: to victory.
Speaker 4: I'm not convinced that he.
Speaker 1: Has enough people to do that in a high turnout election.
Speaker 4: If she has managed to.
Speaker 1: Galvanize her base, which is a much bigger tent.
Speaker 5: Yeah, you're right.
Speaker 3: He clearly is either not interested or has lost interest
Speaker 3: in going after those swing voters. I mean, you could
Speaker 3: tell that when he chose jd. Vance And by the way,
Speaker 3: isn't that working out well for him? This is not
Speaker 3: going to appeal to, you know, white swing voters in
Speaker 3: the suburbs of Philadelphia. It's not going to get back
Speaker 3: women who voted for Democrats during the midterm elections. And
Speaker 3: he basically doesn't care. He's not talking to the Haley
Speaker 3: voters anymore.
Speaker 4: No, But the question is is enough of America like that?
Speaker 3: Okay, let me annoying answer, because I think that's a
Speaker 3: very interesting question because I think that as Donald Trump
Speaker 3: has decided that he's going to go after Kamala Harris
Speaker 3: based on her racial identity, he is thinking that that
Speaker 3: is what America is. Donald Trump, to his core, believes
Speaker 3: that American voters are racist, that they are racist, and
Speaker 3: they will not elect a Asian black woman as president
Speaker 3: of the United States. So he is assuming that this works. Okay,
Speaker 3: so that's his view. I certainly hope that he's wrong.
Speaker 3: But I want to just kind of step back from
Speaker 3: the horse race aspect of this, because we don't know
Speaker 3: the answer to all of this and just say that
Speaker 3: what you saw yesterday was and I know we've done
Speaker 3: this so many times, but this man is so deplorable,
Speaker 3: so pathetic, so deeply dishonest, and so deeply bigoted, and
Speaker 3: he cannot conceal it at the moment in his life
Speaker 3: when you would think that prudence would dictate that you
Speaker 3: put back from this. And I think what frustrates Republicans
Speaker 3: is they're thinking, Okay, she is vulnerable, run against her
Speaker 3: as being too liberal, run against her as you know,
Speaker 3: having this record, we can do that. Instead, Donald Trump
Speaker 3: just cannot help himself. And it is like fat Elvis
Speaker 3: coming out and somebody handing him some new material and
Speaker 3: he goes, now, I'm just gonna do things. I'm gonna
Speaker 3: do a houndog thing again. I'm just because that's what
Speaker 3: I do. And that's what and that's what you see
Speaker 3: with Donald Trump. He's going back and it worked with Obama,
Speaker 3: It's going to work with Kamala.
Speaker 4: So here's the question.
Speaker 1: Then there's a theory out there, and I'm not sure
Speaker 1: this is right, that he is trying to steal back
Speaker 1: the news cycle to get a kind of hysteria going
Speaker 1: about his racism. Now, she has been much more like
Speaker 1: Obama with the response to racism than Hillary. And again
Speaker 1: I'm not trying to criticize Hillary. I'm merely making a
Speaker 1: point here, which is that when he went after Hillary,
Speaker 1: and you know, when he went after women in general.
Speaker 4: In twenty sixteen, there was a lot of like this
Speaker 4: is beyond the pales, so disgusting.
Speaker 1: What Harris has done has more been like this is
Speaker 1: him like goodbye, shut it down.
Speaker 4: Do you think that's more effective? And also does.
Speaker 1: That take the air of the tires or do you
Speaker 1: think it should be more And why.
Speaker 3: I think she's handling this very very effectively. I will
Speaker 3: confess that I am both surprised and amazed how how
Speaker 3: well she's doing and the way that she's handling this
Speaker 3: with incredible deftness. Now heard the commentary saying, well, this
Speaker 3: is part of you know, Trump's plan to you know,
Speaker 3: sees back the news cycle and generate this this sort
Speaker 3: of outrage. And I think it's only half true. Part
Speaker 3: of it is that Trump just simply can't help himself.
Speaker 3: I do think that Donald Trump wanted to seize the
Speaker 3: news cycle to show himself as strong. I can go
Speaker 3: into the lions, then I can take the insults. I
Speaker 3: will give as good as I get because I am strong,
Speaker 3: because this whole theme of strong versus weak and everything.
Speaker 3: And I don't think that he thought that I'm going
Speaker 3: to go in there and I'm going to seize back
Speaker 3: the news cycle to show what an inveterate racist I am,
Speaker 3: how out of touch with American demographics, I am, how
Speaker 3: deeply insensitive I am. I think he thought that it
Speaker 3: would come off as strong and maybe trigger something. But
Speaker 3: I don't think that what you saw yesterday wasn't anybody's
Speaker 3: game plan, certainly not his. If there was any aid
Speaker 3: that thought that this is the strategy. Let's go up
Speaker 3: there and do all those things. Let's let's repeat the
Speaker 3: black jobs line, let's do you know the you know,
Speaker 3: let's that's that's let's mock the you know, the black
Speaker 3: woman questions, all of that, that person should be fired.
Speaker 4: The black jobs line.
Speaker 1: By the way, when Rachel Scott, I think it was
Speaker 1: her who immediately said what's a black job? That was
Speaker 1: an amazing moment too, because she said what's a black job?
Speaker 4: And he said any job?
Speaker 6: But you knew it was.
Speaker 3: That wasn't what he meant, right right. And also you
Speaker 3: know when they were going back and forth about de
Speaker 3: I and he and he and he thought, you know,
Speaker 3: well you define it, which, by the way, as Trump
Speaker 3: speak for, I have no idea what it means. No,
Speaker 3: and she does, and he could have thrown her off,
Speaker 3: but she kept coming back at it. And this is
Speaker 3: also interesting because a lot of Republicans have been saying, Okay, obviously,
Speaker 3: you know, calling Kamala a dei hire is not working.
Speaker 3: That's a terrible thing. Let's stick to the issues, of
Speaker 3: which there are many. So what does Donald Trump do?
Speaker 3: You know, It's like just goes right there. It did
Speaker 3: feel as if jd. Vance has been out there being
Speaker 3: as weird as possible, talking about you know, the lonely
Speaker 3: crazy cat ladies and everything, and you know it's generated
Speaker 3: this this massive meme about weirdness, and that Donald Trump
Speaker 3: essentially said yesterday, hold my beer. You think you think
Speaker 3: jd Vance is weird, I'm going to show you the
Speaker 3: original weird and he walked into it. And you can
Speaker 3: see from the reaction just across the board. I mean,
Speaker 3: not even Fox News can polish this turd.
Speaker 1: And we did see them really get completely fried by that.
Speaker 1: The part of what's so tragic about Trump is, and
Speaker 1: I also think it's what's tragic about the Murdoch Empire
Speaker 1: is there are a lot of people who work at
Speaker 1: Fox who do not believe those stuff. It's a job
Speaker 1: Harris Faulkner to some extent, she did this to herself,
Speaker 1: but you know, there were people who went and worked
Speaker 1: there when it was normal.
Speaker 3: She made a choice and she decided to play that role.
Speaker 3: And she makes a lot more money than either you
Speaker 3: or I.
Speaker 4: Right, well, that's true or a good point. I can't
Speaker 4: speak to you, no, Now, I'm sure that's true.
Speaker 3: I just generally have reserved my sympathy for people who
Speaker 3: make less than a million dollars. A Yeve, just that's
Speaker 3: just me. I just had a thing about.
Speaker 4: That, Charlie.
Speaker 1: Somebody told me when Harris announced that the first three
Speaker 1: days would be the most critical. She's so blown past
Speaker 1: expectations in every which way thoughts.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's absolutely true. And it's not just the first
Speaker 3: three days. I mean I think the first, you know,
Speaker 3: three weeks will be a race to define her. The
Speaker 3: Republicans are going to spend millions of dollars defining her
Speaker 3: as dangerous and corrupt. In all of those things, she
Speaker 3: has a chance to introduce herself. And what is remarkable
Speaker 3: is there were so many low expectations. One of the
Speaker 3: reasons why people stuck with Biden for so long was
Speaker 3: they thought that she would be an ineffective candidate. No
Speaker 3: one saw this calming. Nobody even among people going Okay,
Speaker 3: the hype is getting too much. But the hype is
Speaker 3: real that you could see with the enthusiasm and the
Speaker 3: energy and the engagement, the amount of money that's coming in.
Speaker 5: This is real.
Speaker 3: And Molly she hasn't even had her bump yet because
Speaker 3: the convention is coming up. She's going to choose a
Speaker 3: vice president, She's going to have this big convention, she's
Speaker 3: going to give her acceptance speech. And the reality is
Speaker 3: is that she is doing as well as she is
Speaker 3: when most Americas still only have the vaguest idea of
Speaker 3: who she is. So she's introducing herself in a very
Speaker 3: very short period of time in really I'm trying to
Speaker 3: think how it could have gone any better. And you
Speaker 3: know that I can be a pessimist and a skeptic
Speaker 3: and a contrarian, and I really can't come up with
Speaker 3: a scenario which she would be stronger. It won't last.
Speaker 3: My biggest concern is when she sits down for a
Speaker 3: network broadcast interview and they play for her some of
Speaker 3: the tapes of her comments that she made when she
Speaker 3: was running for president back in twenty twenty, they say,
Speaker 3: do you still think this? Do you still believe this?
Speaker 3: Do you still believe this? And she's going to have
Speaker 3: to handle that. In the past she has not always
Speaker 3: handled that well, but she's been exceeding my expectations regularly,
Speaker 3: So we will see. But if there's a stumble, it
Speaker 3: will come on that that she will either not handle
Speaker 3: that well or or I don't even think being a
Speaker 3: flip flopper is a negative anymore. I don't think people
Speaker 3: care that much anymore. But that's going to be the test.
Speaker 3: But I think that her bump is going to continue
Speaker 3: through the Democratic Convention, and it's going to be very
Speaker 3: interesting to see what those polls look like the week
Speaker 3: after that convention.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's so interesting. And I also agree.
Speaker 1: I feel like I would say this and people would
Speaker 1: be like, you're stupid or a partisan. But I always
Speaker 1: thought she had become two years into her vice president's tenures,
Speaker 1: something happened and she became an Obama level RA tour.
Speaker 1: Maybe not Obama level because Obama, you know, but I
Speaker 1: mean really good and Democrats haven't had a really gifted
Speaker 1: ORA tour since Obama, and I think it just all
Speaker 1: of a sudden came into place, and because her speeches
Speaker 1: are really good and her energy, you know, she goes
Speaker 1: around to all these different places and she's you know,
Speaker 1: she can really campaign, which is a huge advantage.
Speaker 3: Well, and her campaign just feels like it's fully formed.
Speaker 3: I mean, the themes just came together, bang bang bang,
Speaker 3: in a way that was very impressive. I mean, the
Speaker 3: two themes right out of the box. I'm the prosecutor,
Speaker 3: he's the phone. That's number one. And also then this
Speaker 3: focus on the future that we're not going back.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Smart, you have campaigns that struggle and flail and flounder
Speaker 3: trying to come up with themes like that. Speaking of
Speaker 3: which the Republicans, you would think that they would be
Speaker 3: ready for this, but I think I thought it was
Speaker 3: a tell when they when they rolled out that name.
Speaker 3: She was cackling Kamala or laughing Kamala. Yeah, that's brilliant
Speaker 3: that she laughs and smiles. That's going to kill her.
Speaker 5: Really so good.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Charlie, Thank you. It's always fun.
Speaker 1: Are you concerned about Project twenty twenty five and how awful.
Speaker 4: Trump's second term could be?
Speaker 1: Well, so are we, which is why we teamed with
Speaker 1: iHeart to make a limited series with the experts on
Speaker 1: what a disaster Project twenty twenty five would be for
Speaker 1: America's future Right now. The first four episodes, with the
Speaker 1: final episode coming next week, are available by looking up
Speaker 1: Molly John Fast Project twenty twenty five on YouTube.
Speaker 4: If you are thinking you.
Speaker 1: Are more of a podcast person and not a YouTuber,
Speaker 1: you can hit play when you get to the video,
Speaker 1: put the phone on lock screen and it will play back.
Speaker 1: New episodes are dropping in the next week as well.
Speaker 1: We need to educate America on what Trump's second term
Speaker 1: would do to this country.
Speaker 4: Please watch and help us spread the word.
Speaker 2: Kevin Cruise is the publisher of the Campaign Trails newsletter
Speaker 2: as well as the author of One Nation Under Got
Speaker 2: How Corporated America invented Christian America.
Speaker 4: Welcome to Fast Politics, Kevin Cruz.
Speaker 5: Great to be here, Gate.
Speaker 4: I wanted you to.
Speaker 1: Come on not just because you're a very smart academic
Speaker 1: and very fancy and teach a Princeton, but because you
Speaker 1: study pre recent history, and I think that this is
Speaker 1: a moment when I feel like history informs in interesting
Speaker 1: ways and we just are not in the American political
Speaker 1: industrial complex looking at history to take.
Speaker 4: Lessons from it.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I think that's spare not.
Speaker 1: To be too didactic, but that said, we're in sort
Speaker 1: of a historical times. I'm thinking about, like the precedent
Speaker 1: to the moment, the having a president who decides not
Speaker 1: to run for re election, and if you could sort
Speaker 1: of talk about a little bit more of the sort
Speaker 1: of story of that, and also because it's not so
Speaker 1: long ago, but also what the lessons that we could
Speaker 1: clean from that.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, you know, it's never the history is
Speaker 5: predictive about the future, but often, you know, we see
Speaker 5: some of the same phenomenon play out in the past,
Speaker 5: and it's instructive to see how it worked then and
Speaker 5: what we might take from it and what we can
Speaker 5: leave behind. So the real precedent here is Lendon Johnson's decision, Yeah,
Speaker 5: and early nineteen sixty eight where he announced it even
Speaker 5: though he was eligible for another term in office. The
Speaker 5: twenty second Amendment had been passed but didn't limit him
Speaker 5: because he inherited its first term from JFK. Everybody thought
Speaker 5: he was going to run again. Lynnon Johnson's one of
Speaker 5: the most political or of our presidents in every sense
Speaker 5: of that term, really thrived on holding the office exercise
Speaker 5: and power doing good where he thought again and everybody thought,
Speaker 5: for sure, this thoroughly political animal is gonna day on
Speaker 5: for another four years, And he stunned the nation in
Speaker 5: early nineteen sixty eight by announcing But he wasn't going
Speaker 5: to do it, And it was rationale for that was
Speaker 5: that he wanted to be free from the campaign in
Speaker 5: order to end the war in Vietnam. He wanted to
Speaker 5: bring it to a successful end. So he bowed out
Speaker 5: and he could focus on the dunities of the job
Speaker 5: he already had. But what LBJ did was rather different
Speaker 5: than what Biden did.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's what I was hoping you would talk about.
Speaker 5: Yeah, because I mean LBJ stepped aside, not because of
Speaker 5: any concerns about his capacity to handle the job. He
Speaker 5: would die. He actually died the day Roe V. Wade
Speaker 5: was handed down in January nineteen seventy three, so he
Speaker 5: wouldn't live much longer. But that wasn't a concern of
Speaker 5: the time. Everybody assumed he could carry on the job.
Speaker 5: It was that he wanted to focus on handling Vietnam.
Speaker 5: With Biden, it's rather different. It's all about his own
Speaker 5: personal issues, and that's why he announced the woman to
Speaker 5: step aside, and with LBJ. When he stepped aside, he
Speaker 5: did so without handing the reins of power to his
Speaker 5: byspread it right. Hubert Humphrey become the Democratic nominee nineteen
Speaker 5: sixty eight, but only after a deeply divisive primary season.
Speaker 5: Right Jean McCarthy is challenging on the war. Robert Kennedy
Speaker 5: makes a strong run as well as that assassinated in
Speaker 5: June nineteen sixty eight after winning the California primary. The
Speaker 5: August nineteen sixty eight convention is utter chaos for Democrats.
Speaker 5: It's not a coronation by any means, and the party
Speaker 5: is really badly hurt by the way LBJ leaves it behind.
Speaker 5: And there is kind of a classic Democrats in disarray
Speaker 5: military nineteen sixty eight and lets Richard Nixon swoop in
Speaker 5: and take the White House, whereas Biden has as seamless
Speaker 5: to handle this aw I mean, what's kind of studying
Speaker 5: in retrospect is for those weeks when everyone seemed to
Speaker 5: be kind of rendering their garments in public, it's clearing,
Speaker 5: at least at the very end, the Biden and Harris
Speaker 5: teams got together and kind of flawlessly rolled this out
Speaker 5: so that Biden made his announcement and then boom, boom boom,
Speaker 5: a series of endorsements came out, and Harris basically, we
Speaker 5: had this thing wrapped up in a couple of days.
Speaker 5: There are going to be no challengers in seams of meeting,
Speaker 5: barely knock on one clear sailing to the convention, and
Speaker 5: it's not going to be the chaos that we saw
Speaker 5: at sixty eight.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 1: You know, it's funny because whenever you hear people talk
Speaker 1: about how, you know, a dividing convention would be fun
Speaker 1: and we'll have a mini primary, we'll bring in Oprah,
Speaker 1: you know, and then we'll have you know, Lady Gaga,
Speaker 1: and we'll have every person in the world, you know,
Speaker 1: make this into a complete circus. There is no good
Speaker 1: historical precedent for circus none.
Speaker 5: The contested convention that Blitz primary are all these weird
Speaker 5: West wing ideas that people have thrown out. They come
Speaker 5: out of fiction. The real experience in American history of
Speaker 5: a condestic convention, it's not good.
Speaker 4: Can you talk about the other ones?
Speaker 5: Yeah? Yeah, So I mean think back to you know,
Speaker 5: a century ago when the Democrats in nineteen twenty four
Speaker 5: had a convention that went on for so long. I
Speaker 5: mean went on like hundreds of ballots, hundreds of ballots
Speaker 5: to determine who the nomine would be. And finally Will
Speaker 5: Rogers said it, look, folks, yeah, TAKANDU invited you here
Speaker 5: for a convention, not to live because it was just
Speaker 5: they were going nowhere. And this is the same era
Speaker 5: in which Will Rogers said I don't belong to an
Speaker 5: organized political party. I'm a Democrat. Right, So that kind
Speaker 5: of chaos, right, yeah, oh good, that's democracy. Everybody's finding
Speaker 5: it out. There's a lot of news interests in this,
Speaker 5: but it was not good. People weren't excited about the
Speaker 5: cluster that was going on there, and the results of
Speaker 5: it were good either. Democrats got hammered in by nineteen
Speaker 5: twenty four election. Right, So it's not that this generates excitement,
Speaker 5: it's not that it generates a strong candidate. It generates chaos.
Speaker 5: And I think it's notable. But the only people who've
Speaker 5: really been rooting for a catestant convention for a Blitz
Speaker 5: primary are Republicans or pundits in the media who are
Speaker 5: simply want to be entertained. Right, Democrats having one of them.
Speaker 6: So back.
Speaker 5: What's remarkable is as soon as Biden hass the baton
Speaker 5: to Harris, the general attitude throughout the left, liberals and
Speaker 5: the m the let was great, let's go, that's what candaday, great,
Speaker 5: let's go. The overwhelming amount of donations, the new registrations,
Speaker 5: the volunteers, the party which is looking for some sense
Speaker 5: of direction of finality, and they got it.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 1: No, I think that's really important. And you know the
Speaker 1: Republicans who are like this is rigged.
Speaker 4: Let's have a.
Speaker 1: Spill off contingent so we can get a convicted fallon
Speaker 1: back in the White House. Can you talk about those
Speaker 1: conventions though, because Republicans have had divided conventions and.
Speaker 4: They have also been fucking disasters for them.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, I mean to think about I mean, the
Speaker 5: most famous one is that I think sixty four convention
Speaker 5: where Barry Goldwater took control of the party right and
Speaker 5: it was bitterly fought. The old moderate and liberal Republicans
Speaker 5: were living about it, and there is i mean opening
Speaker 5: of violence on the campaign floor. This is back when
Speaker 5: we still had large numbers of moderate black Republicans. They
Speaker 5: find the experience frightening. There they're getting assaulted by the
Speaker 5: kind of the Goldwater supporters who especially coming from the South,
Speaker 5: these old segregationists who are now taken in control of
Speaker 5: the Republican Party. You know, one of them has this
Speaker 5: soup set on fire. Jack Robinson, who'd been a loyal
Speaker 5: Republican for a long time, comes out of convention says,
Speaker 5: I know what it's like now to be a Jew
Speaker 5: in Nazi Germany. That's what that felt like, right. So
Speaker 5: there's a real sense of chaos and confusion, and of
Speaker 5: course what happens to the Republicans that year have now
Speaker 5: a huge defeat. It's a landslide win for were the
Speaker 5: Democrats who have rallied around when the Johnson with no contest, right,
Speaker 5: So it's these contested conventions. There's a lot of drama,
Speaker 5: but it's not good drama. You know, you think it's
Speaker 5: sixty eight Chicago, you think of either Democrats in seventy two.
Speaker 5: It's chaos, right, And that's it might be fun to
Speaker 5: watch on the outside, it's not fun to live with.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And I think that's a really important point. I
Speaker 1: actually read this weird little book by Norman Mayler about
Speaker 1: that nineteen.
Speaker 4: Sixty four convention.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, they just absolutely could not get a handle
Speaker 1: on things, and there was such division in the party.
Speaker 5: I mean, there's a way in which you think about
Speaker 5: if the conventions are the way in which a party
Speaker 5: formally introducing itself and its program and it's candidates to
Speaker 5: the American people, right, And it's in a way it's
Speaker 5: an audition. And so how well can you run a
Speaker 5: convention in which things are under your control, You're just
Speaker 5: dealing with your own allies, you're able to determine the theme,
Speaker 5: get buffoned around by outside events. Usually that's your audition.
Speaker 5: And if you can't get your shit together in four
Speaker 5: days for convention in terms of being on message, of
Speaker 5: having a good theme, of making an appeal to the people,
Speaker 5: well then why should people want to hire you for
Speaker 5: four years around the country? Right? And so I think
Speaker 5: that's why these conventions matter. There really are a lot
Speaker 5: of times people are just tuning in and they get
Speaker 5: their first impressions of the party and the party's nominees
Speaker 5: from that convention.
Speaker 4: Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1: And I think that one of the things that I've
Speaker 1: been struck by with this Democratic Party. The left has
Speaker 1: been unbelievably amazing this entire time.
Speaker 4: Yeah, And I think part of.
Speaker 1: It is because Biden delivered wins that Hillary Clinton. And
Speaker 1: I say this really not in my opinion, but as
Speaker 1: truth is that he delivered wins on certain things that
Speaker 1: were so broadly progressive. I don't think progressives thought they
Speaker 1: could have ever gone from Clinton or from even from Obama.
Speaker 5: Well, I mean this is if you look at Biden's
Speaker 5: long career, and as he's drawing his career to an end,
Speaker 5: I think we can really say this now with some certainty.
Speaker 5: Look back across his entire Senate career, and Joe Biden
Speaker 5: is a bellweather for where the center of the Democratic
Speaker 5: Party is in any one moment. He consistently votes him
Speaker 5: the center of his caucaus right. And that shows, I think,
Speaker 5: not that the have certain principles, but that he's willing
Speaker 5: to be persuaded right. And that's something that we saw
Speaker 5: in both the vice presidency but especially during his time
Speaker 5: as president. Right the left was there standing in the party,
Speaker 5: not from the outside right. The folks of the Bernie
Speaker 5: of AOC the squad were freshuring him from the left right,
Speaker 5: and he moved left and on climate change, on infrastructure,
Speaker 5: on labor, judicial appointments, on and on. There's a whole
Speaker 5: lot of things in which the Leaf got I think
Speaker 5: a tremendous amount of wins under the Biden administration, and
Speaker 5: they returned that loyalty when all the centrists and all
Speaker 5: the money men were doubting that Biden should stay in
Speaker 5: the race, it was aoc and burning and folks like
Speaker 5: that who had his back right and again Biden responded
Speaker 5: to that, I think by finally embracing judicial reform, a
Speaker 5: long thing that's been a wish list on the left,
Speaker 5: and now I think is we're considering this campaign because
Speaker 5: of their loyalty. So the leftists had remarkable discipline in
Speaker 5: this in which you know, the kind of the the
Speaker 5: Joe Manchion Caucaus of the world has been pandicking and
Speaker 5: flailing around in public. The left really showed they could
Speaker 5: get the most out of Biden and is stuck with them.
Speaker 5: And so their support now even apparently for Kamala Harris,
Speaker 5: who is much more liberal than Biden never was, how
Speaker 5: much more leftist than Biden never was. I think it
Speaker 5: really shows that the strategy is paid off, right that
Speaker 5: working through the party and being loyal members there, they're
Speaker 5: being listened to they're making an impact because the president
Speaker 5: sees them on their left, whether it be Biden or Harris,
Speaker 5: on their left, as a reliable consistency and is looking
Speaker 5: to reward that and keep them in the party.
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly, And I think that's a really important point.
Speaker 1: One of the things that I think is interesting about
Speaker 1: this moment is we really do have no historical president.
Speaker 4: Right.
Speaker 1: We've never had a president who was indicted and convicted
Speaker 1: and still has cases hanging over him, also federal cases.
Speaker 1: We've never had a candidate like that impeached twice and
Speaker 1: then a candidate who is the vice president coming in
Speaker 1: after a one term president who was the oldest person
Speaker 1: ever to hold the office. I mean, there is no precedent,
Speaker 1: but maybe there is something that this reminds you of.
Speaker 5: Pump's criminality is off the charts. I mean we've got
Speaker 5: to think about like, as educ candidates, you can't stress
Speaker 5: us out through our history, and their ambitions are ruined
Speaker 5: by things that would seem trivial today. Ed Musky seemed
Speaker 5: to be crying in the when his wife was attacked
Speaker 5: by a newspaper in New Hampshire that killed his chances. No,
Speaker 5: So Rockafeller got divorced, remarried. That killed his chances. Howard
Speaker 5: d even on our own time, yelled a little too loud,
Speaker 5: and that seemed to derail. Right. Think of Ducaccus in
Speaker 5: the helmet, like there are all these little things. Trump
Speaker 5: is well facing ballanans here, right, Actually he might see
Speaker 5: jail time. That's amazing. That not a campaign killer, right,
Speaker 5: and that actually the party leaned into it. And so
Speaker 5: that is totally imprecedent. But what I think the race
Speaker 5: is shicken down to and in this moment, it's currently
Speaker 5: late July, and this may age badly in three days.
Speaker 5: You know. In this moment, the campaign is totally flipped, right,
Speaker 5: And it used to be this battle between two old men,
Speaker 5: both had a tournament's president. And you're kind of comparing
Speaker 5: apples to apples with Harrison. She's fifty nine. She's not youngish,
Speaker 5: but she's younger. It really does seem more like a
Speaker 5: generational change, right. I mean, this is a campaign that
Speaker 5: feels from the Democratic side like nineteen ninety two or
Speaker 5: from their public eighty right, where there's a really a
Speaker 5: one side is kind of representing an old guard and
Speaker 5: looking back, and the other side is one of optimism.
Speaker 5: And at least in this case, you right, I mean,
Speaker 5: it really does seem like what Clinton as a candidate
Speaker 5: felt like in nineteen ninety two. Mil Clinton felt like
Speaker 5: in nineteen eighty two against in George W. Bush, but
Speaker 5: then dol too, right, So they were in a couple
Speaker 5: of old World War two guys against this baby boomer.
Speaker 5: And it feels the same way. The new level of
Speaker 5: energy in the Democratic Party that I haven't seen since
Speaker 5: Obama in two thousand and eight, it's kind of amazing.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, I think that's a really good point.
Speaker 1: One of the things that I've been struck by too,
Speaker 1: is that I actually think her speech when she declared
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty was really really good. But she has
Speaker 1: really become an Obama level orator. And I wonder how
Speaker 1: much because Biden was never an Obama level orator. All
Speaker 1: of the things he ultimately did when he got in
Speaker 1: there have been incredible. You know, he was sort of
Speaker 1: picked in a way because the Democrats felt an old
Speaker 1: white guy could be this old white guy. I almost
Speaker 1: feel like it was sort of giving up on the
Speaker 1: idea that women or people of color would ever get
Speaker 1: that office.
Speaker 4: That the only way to do this was to beat
Speaker 4: them at their own game.
Speaker 1: Now we have again a gifted orator, someone who can
Speaker 1: really make the emotional case to voters.
Speaker 4: I mean that does seem like a huge advantage.
Speaker 5: Yeah, absolutely. I mean the level of energy I think
Speaker 5: you're seeing from Democrats now is kind of shocking, given
Speaker 5: the attitude in the last four years and which I
Speaker 5: think Biden did have an incredible amount of accomplishments, and
Speaker 5: maybe his decision out to run again will lead to
Speaker 5: some actual retrospectives and reckoning with his accomplishments of the
Speaker 5: way in which running for president or second term didn't
Speaker 5: have people looking at its first term details in that level,
Speaker 5: I think that would only help the Democrats. But he
Speaker 5: was never a great order. I mean, you know, for
Speaker 5: someone who suffering from a stutter his entire life, right,
Speaker 5: the level of ority he was able to do is amazing,
Speaker 5: But it was not his game, And actually I think
Speaker 5: that's good. What Democrats are looking for that moment wasn't
Speaker 5: sobody who could shine them a stump, but somebody who
Speaker 5: could just you know, actually let them forget about the
Speaker 5: President for a while. It wasn't Trump's constant, in your
Speaker 5: face presence, but the other he was getting things done
Speaker 5: behind the scenes, and there was I think a fear
Speaker 5: in twenty twenty that the Democrats had taken a risk
Speaker 5: with a woman candidate in twenty sixteen and they needed
Speaker 5: to play it safe with an old, experienced white guy
Speaker 5: in twenty twenty. But there's a way which I think
Speaker 5: people overread the twenty sixteen results. Right. First of all,
Speaker 5: Clinton won the popular vote, right, Let's not discount that
Speaker 5: she only narrowly lost in the electoral college. But also,
Speaker 5: Hillary Clinton is a very particular person. She is somebody
Speaker 5: who the Republicans had been waging a negative campaign against
Speaker 5: for twenty years. I think people's reactions to Hillary Clinton
Speaker 5: as a nominee can't be read as a reaction against
Speaker 5: a female nominee in general. Right. So it is good
Speaker 5: to see that the Democrats have, whether they planned on
Speaker 5: us or not, backed into having a female candidate so
Speaker 5: soon after Hillary Clinton Austin, because the demographics are there.
Speaker 5: If you look at who who supports the party, if
Speaker 5: you know who does the hard work of organizing the party,
Speaker 5: there are a lot of women there, especially African American women,
Speaker 5: And given the issues at stake in this election, I
Speaker 5: think having someone like Kamala Harris, a racial minority, a
Speaker 5: woman is really useful because those are people who were
Speaker 5: the demographics who are in the crosshairs of the Trump plan, right,
Speaker 5: and so you only have to look at the issue
Speaker 5: of abortion rights to really see how this comes out. Right,
Speaker 5: This is an issue that really should be driving the
Speaker 5: Democratic campaign, should be because it animates younger voters, especially women.
Speaker 5: Were going to make all younger voters so who care
Speaker 5: about reproductive rights and see that contraception and other things
Speaker 5: are on the chopping blocks soon, really an addictim. Joe
Speaker 5: Biden was for abortion rights, but he's an old Irish Catholic.
Speaker 5: He wasn't really enthusiastic about it, right, even talk about,
Speaker 5: you know, restoring Row and getting back to the kind
Speaker 5: of compromise before Harris is all in and restoring Row
Speaker 5: isn't going to be enough, and so that's about, you know,
Speaker 5: we're not going back. A chance that broke out kind
Speaker 5: of spontaneously at her Milwaukee rally is around the point,
Speaker 5: not just on Rode but on a variety of issues, right,
Speaker 5: And so you see a real energy there and come
Speaker 5: through with a different kind of spokesperson.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Thank you, thank you. I'm sorry we went
Speaker 1: so long. I really appreciate you.
Speaker 5: Always be talking to you.
Speaker 2: Emily i Can is the publisher of a substuck.
Speaker 1: Heated Welcome Back, Too Fast Politics Emily for.
Speaker 6: Me heated Yay, Thanks Pally.
Speaker 1: I'm excited to have you because climate is such a
Speaker 1: big fucking deal. And it's funny because it's like I
Speaker 1: was watching this Republican convention where they did not talk
Speaker 1: about climate change because they don't believe in it. Not
Speaker 1: believing in climate change is literally like, it's amazing to
Speaker 1: me because I was one of those people who was
Speaker 1: completely convinced that at some point, and this is why
Speaker 1: I'm an idiot, at some point, like in COVID Republicans
Speaker 1: would be like, wow, this is real. We should all
Speaker 1: get vaccinated, and you know, we should really take this
Speaker 1: seriously so we don't die.
Speaker 4: And in fact, the absolute opposite happened.
Speaker 1: And I think a little bit that's what's happening with
Speaker 1: the Republicans and climate.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 6: I remember this very clearly, a strong feeling, even before
Speaker 6: the pandemic, that Republicans were shifting towards accepting climate change
Speaker 6: and maybe starting to push for market based solutions. And
Speaker 6: I remember on feeling very skeptical about that. Not people,
Speaker 6: they didn't think they were going to do it, but
Speaker 6: just because I thought that if they were gonna accept
Speaker 6: climate science and push for market based solutions, it was
Speaker 6: all going to be a smoke screen for actually doing nothing.
Speaker 6: And so I was wrong. But in the work, we.
Speaker 1: Shouldn't, I want to specify, we laugh to keep from crying.
Speaker 1: Oh but yes, so they did not, in fact, try
Speaker 1: to pretend to give a shit about climate change. In fact,
Speaker 1: they just kept going.
Speaker 6: No, there's no other routes than climate denial and dismantling
Speaker 6: clean energy progress in the Republican Party. If you're a
Speaker 6: Republican who wants to tackle climate age that thinks it's
Speaker 6: real in a real way, there is no place for
Speaker 6: you in the modern Republican crate. And I feel like
Speaker 6: the RNC made that very clear. There were at least
Speaker 6: three chants as I counted, of drill, baby drill.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so let's talk about drill, baby drill, because we
Speaker 1: actually believe it or not drill too much baby drill
Speaker 1: under a Democratic president. So just explain to us what
Speaker 1: the drilling landscape looks like right now, and why drill
Speaker 1: baby drill is actually bullshit, baby bullshit.
Speaker 6: But well, we're drilling more on US land than we
Speaker 6: ever have before. I think that's the one. It's just
Speaker 6: something that everyone should know, is that a lot of
Speaker 6: the Republican fear mongering about how the Biden administration has
Speaker 6: really dismantled the oil and gas in just straight.
Speaker 4: He is brought if only yes, go on.
Speaker 6: I don't say that with glee or anything. As a
Speaker 6: person who care climb change, as a climate change reporter,
Speaker 6: I would say it's probably in the best interest of
Speaker 6: the global climate for the US to not be drilling
Speaker 6: so much, but we are. In fact, our domestic drilling
Speaker 6: is through the roof. That's not entirely because of Biden himself.
Speaker 6: A lot of these permits were granted before Biden took office.
Speaker 6: It just kind of so happens that this is a
Speaker 6: big booing time for drilling in general. But also Biden
Speaker 6: hasn't really done anything to prove then. And during his
Speaker 6: presidency he's approved major major oil and gas projects like
Speaker 6: the Willow Project, like the Mountain Valley Pipeline, and as
Speaker 6: you brought up LNG, you know, he liquefied natural gas,
Speaker 6: which is just I feel like for an average listener,
Speaker 6: we don't have to go too much into like the
Speaker 6: process that creates liquefied natural gas turns it into a gas,
Speaker 6: it turns into liquid, and you've turned it into a
Speaker 6: liquid so that you can put it on a ship
Speaker 6: and export it to other countries. It's easier to transport
Speaker 6: in its liquified form. So Biden put on these new
Speaker 6: regulations for LNG that cause new permits for export plants.
Speaker 6: But new permits for export plants means like it pauses
Speaker 6: the process, the like six to seven year process of
Speaker 6: making a plant. So all the plants that are already
Speaker 6: being built are still being built. So and we have
Speaker 6: this massive in progress leerngy infrastructure on the Gulf coast
Speaker 6: that is still happening. So when you hear republic ads
Speaker 6: talk about like Biden's destroying the lergy or he's destroying
Speaker 6: the fossipel industry. Climate at this could only hope that
Speaker 6: that was I really wish that that's what you sort, Nolan,
Speaker 6: he's doing. It's based in lies.
Speaker 1: It's so interesting to me because you know, when we
Speaker 1: look at the climate stuff, and you and I've talked
Speaker 1: about this before, there's a lot of like lying on
Speaker 1: the part of oil and gas industries because the climate
Speaker 1: friendly solutions are actually cheaper. Right, So you have wind
Speaker 1: is free and solar is free, and you know, it's
Speaker 1: a question of getting batteries that can hold it. But
Speaker 1: it's you know, coal is like digging into the center
Speaker 1: of the earth. To get something like liquified natural gas,
Speaker 1: same thing, you know, you have to drill. I mean,
Speaker 1: these are things that are very labor intensive, and so
Speaker 1: the con here is just to keep saying that it's
Speaker 1: not ready yet, this.
Speaker 6: Idea that renewables like wind and solar are cheaper than gas.
Speaker 6: It's true over a period of let's say ten to
Speaker 6: twenty years, the upfront cost is a lot to build
Speaker 6: the infrastructure, but as you continue to use the energy,
Speaker 6: because it's from the freaking wind and the sun which
Speaker 6: us anything, there's not a big continued cost. So yeah,
Speaker 6: there's like a bunch of studies. I remember one that
Speaker 6: said if we decarbonize our energy, it could save like
Speaker 6: trillions of dollars over twenty years. What Republicans really focus
Speaker 6: on is that the upfront costs of the transition that
Speaker 6: they're not willing to pay or don't want to pay,
Speaker 6: or it's sort of like a thing. It's a capitalism thing.
Speaker 6: There's always an element of like, I don't want to
Speaker 6: make the long term good decision. I want to make
Speaker 6: the decision that makes the most economic sense right now.
Speaker 6: If there were no consequence to burning fossil fuels, no
Speaker 6: environmental consequence, no climate consequence, it would cost less to
Speaker 6: keep burning fossil fuels this year. It wouldn't cost less
Speaker 6: over ten years, twenty years, thirty years, And that's just
Speaker 6: the cost of the energy itself. Because they there is
Speaker 6: such a high cost of inaction on climate change, I
Speaker 6: mean in lives and healthcare costs, and infrastructure costs, in
Speaker 6: natural disaster costs as climate change gets worse that it
Speaker 6: just it makes zero sense not to invest in energy transition. Then,
Speaker 6: knowing all that, it's so crazy, you feel like you're
Speaker 6: on psychopills listening to the RNCA, because they're like, we're
Speaker 6: going to dismantle all clean energy investments. They implicitly promised
Speaker 6: to hault the clean energy transition, which if your conservative conservation,
Speaker 6: it just makes so little sense. And I think it
Speaker 6: just illustrates how deeply in the pocket of big oil
Speaker 6: and polluting industries, this party has become.
Speaker 4: It's true.
Speaker 1: And I also think more importantly, it does strike me
Speaker 1: that when you think back to that moment where Donald
Speaker 1: Trump was in mar Lago with those oil and gas
Speaker 1: executives and he told them that if they raised him
Speaker 1: one hundred million dollars, he would let them do whatever
Speaker 1: they wanted. That's really what's on offer here.
Speaker 6: Yeah. Number one, it was a billion dollars.
Speaker 4: I'm pretty sure was a billion dollars. Yeah.
Speaker 6: And number two, I'm glad that story came out because
Speaker 6: it makes everything, it gives everything like a bit more
Speaker 6: of an evil plot villain twist. But I will say
Speaker 6: that I think that, based on covering the first Trump administration,
Speaker 6: Trump is gonna do all those things, whether he gets
Speaker 6: a billion dollars from the oil industry or not. He's
Speaker 6: gonna dissle all of Bidy's EPA regulations. He's gonna try
Speaker 6: to pause all of the investments being made under the
Speaker 6: Inflation Reduction Act, regardless, that is the clear priority of
Speaker 6: the people that he has historically chosen to lead these agencies.
Speaker 6: You know, he picks these Heritage Foundation people, people behind
Speaker 6: Project twenty twenty five to carry out what's happening in
Speaker 6: the bureaucracy, because he doesn't know shit about what's happening
Speaker 6: in the bureocracy, and their priority has always been to
Speaker 6: dismantle environmental regulation, dismantle research into clean energy, dismantle research
Speaker 6: into climate science.
Speaker 1: That's happening no matter what, right, right, right, No, now,
Speaker 1: for sure it should not be surprising anyone. So can
Speaker 1: you explain to me right now we're in this moment.
Speaker 1: The next five years will pretty much the damage will
Speaker 1: do us if it is allowed. Can you explain to
Speaker 1: us what these five years mean when it comes.
Speaker 4: To climate change.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So, not to be too depressing here, but if
Speaker 1: Trump gets re elected, we're not as a planet.
Speaker 6: The simplest way that I can put it is that
Speaker 6: there's a point at which climate change becomes the effects
Speaker 6: of climate change are to become irreversible. We're at this point,
Speaker 6: and you can't get us back to a totally safe,
Speaker 6: free climate change world. That's probably happening no matter whether
Speaker 6: we get a democratic or Republican administration.
Speaker 4: Really, you don't think there's a chance here.
Speaker 6: I think there's a very low chance that we don't
Speaker 6: pass the one point five degrees celsius threshold. Not global warmant, Right,
Speaker 6: at what point are we stabilizing the climate? I think
Speaker 6: that under a democratic administration, or under any type of
Speaker 6: administration that is actually pushing for a cleaning energy transition,
Speaker 6: we could stabilize at around two degrees celsius or at
Speaker 6: the very worst, but two and a half degree celsius,
Speaker 6: which is bad, right.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, can you explain to us what two
Speaker 1: and a half degrees celsius looks like? For those of
Speaker 1: us like myself who can't totally conceptualize.
Speaker 6: That all this horrible heat wave you're seeing during the summer,
Speaker 6: those get worse, the hurricane become more intense when they hit, wildfire,
Speaker 6: drought becomes worse. You're gonna see. I think the biggest,
Speaker 6: most dramatic difference between like one point five degrees celsius
Speaker 6: and two degrees celsius is that it's the difference between
Speaker 6: like fifty percent of the coral reefs around the world
Speaker 6: dying and like ninety nine percent of the coral reefs
Speaker 6: around the world dying. There are some solutions in place
Speaker 6: that scientists are working on to be able to combat that,
Speaker 6: but that's like a huge difference, And so it's just
Speaker 6: the degree at which all of those weather events, ocean acidification,
Speaker 6: coral reefs, the degree of which at which that gets bad.
Speaker 6: So like two degrees two and a half degrees, you're
Speaker 6: looking at us at a truly climate change the world.
Speaker 6: That is pretty bad, and that would cost trillions of
Speaker 6: dollars to adapt to. It's already a catastrophe. But I
Speaker 6: do think that you wins can manage it now because
Speaker 6: we're already managing it.
Speaker 4: Doesn't it mean like sea levels rise.
Speaker 6: Yeah, sea levels rise, you're going to be looking at
Speaker 6: that coastal area of Louisiana is not going to be there.
Speaker 6: Scientists are pretty darn sure about that if we re celsius,
Speaker 6: and that won't happen right when we reach two degrees celsius.
Speaker 6: That happens over larger time scales, but yeah, probably by
Speaker 6: within the next fifty per seven years. Now, the thread
Speaker 6: of a Republican administration and of not doing anything about
Speaker 6: the business digital scenario is that we start to get
Speaker 6: into like a three degrees celsius, three and a half
Speaker 6: degrees celsius, four degrees celsius amount of warming. That amount
Speaker 6: of warming is almost inconceivable on how that would affect
Speaker 6: the global population refugee populations, war torn country populations. It's
Speaker 6: a really scary situation. Both situations are scary, and I
Speaker 6: think where we get into a problem is when people
Speaker 6: think that like a two degree celsius world and a
Speaker 6: four degrees celsius world are the same, Like, oh, well,
Speaker 6: we got to throw up our hands because we're going
Speaker 6: to surpass one point five degrees and then the fight
Speaker 6: is over. No, Like, every single point one degree of
Speaker 6: warming that you can prevent on average in the atmosphere
Speaker 6: is like millions of lives saved, hundreds of millions of
Speaker 6: dollars saved. Our inaction has already kind of cemented some
Speaker 6: pretty bad consequences unless something really really big happens, like
Speaker 6: a massive global energy transition. So now getting back to
Speaker 6: your actual question, which was like what does the timeline
Speaker 6: look like? What does the next five years look like?
Speaker 6: Or like until twenty thirty. So, in order to stay
Speaker 6: below one point five degrees celsius, the world has to
Speaker 6: reach net zero emissions. So like as much carbon and
Speaker 6: greenhouse got as as we're putting in the abpisos, we
Speaker 6: have to also be taking a lot of that out
Speaker 6: via trees. Lots of trees and carbon capture, which needs
Speaker 6: to become much much better technology for that to happen.
Speaker 6: So net zero emissions by twenty fifty. Right, wow, we'll
Speaker 6: reach that. To get us on track to net zero
Speaker 6: by twenty fifty, the broad can sentense us among experts,
Speaker 6: we need to have had our emissions by twenty thirty.
Speaker 6: If we're going to have our emissions by twenty thirty,
Speaker 6: those policies have to be in place of now or
Speaker 6: within the next four years. Right, it's twenty twenty four,
Speaker 6: So that's the importance of the next administration. The next
Speaker 6: administration is really the last administration that we have before
Speaker 6: that twenty thirty goal of having our missions to get
Speaker 6: those policies in place. So there's a massive difference between
Speaker 6: a Trump administration and an administration for climate. We recently
Speaker 6: did an article about this, unheated where we really tried
Speaker 6: to wantify the emission's difference between a Trump presidency and
Speaker 6: a Biding presidency. We found this great analysis that was
Speaker 6: done by the climate news site carbon Brief, and what
Speaker 6: they found and which we verified, which was that it's
Speaker 6: a difference of about four billion tons of greenhouse gas emissions.
Speaker 6: So a Trump administration would emit four billion tons of
Speaker 6: greenhouse gas emissions more than a Biden administration would be
Speaker 6: the equivalent of like nine hundred and thirty three coal
Speaker 6: plants and like nine hundred million gas cars driven for
Speaker 6: a year. And that is the equivalent to like nine
Speaker 6: hundred billion dollars in global climate damages. And what's crazy
Speaker 6: about those numbers actually is that it's like nine hundred
Speaker 6: billion dollars in global climate damage is more under a
Speaker 6: Trump administration than Biden, right, But Biden is still not
Speaker 6: near the twenty thirty tar right, He's closer to the
Speaker 6: two thirtyth are yout, but it's still off. So like
Speaker 6: there's still debt and damages under a Biden administration, which
Speaker 6: I think is really important to emphasize. It's like, we're
Speaker 6: not solving the problem under a Biden administration, but we
Speaker 6: are preventing way more monetary and human life costs under
Speaker 6: that administration. It's like we're on a better brack. If
Speaker 6: you could pick to be on a third track, that
Speaker 6: was better that you should pick that.
Speaker 4: But yeah, Emily, thank you.
Speaker 6: You're welcome. I hope that that wasn't too much.
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