Speaker 1: Good morning, peeps, and welcome to wok F Daily with
Speaker 1: me your Girl, Daniel Moody, recording from the home Bunker. Folks,
Speaker 1: the countdown clocks have hit zero, and today is the
Speaker 1: final day to vote. It is election Day. It is
Speaker 1: a day that we here at WOKA ASKS have been
Speaker 1: talking about for what feels like a millennia. I am filled,
Speaker 1: and I'm going to try and make it through this
Speaker 1: episode without bursting into tears. I, like many of you,
Speaker 1: are filled with a lot of anxiety and stress and
Speaker 1: fear about what comes next. And I just want us
Speaker 1: to know that the work that people have put in
Speaker 1: the door knockers, the texters, the folks that have donated,
Speaker 1: the folks that have been on air, the folks that
Speaker 1: have been sharing on their pages trying to wake people
Speaker 1: up to the existential threat that is Donald Trump and Maga,
Speaker 1: your work has been seen, it has been felt. The
Speaker 1: energy that you all have been providing me over the
Speaker 1: course of this election cycle, I truly cannot thank you enough.
Speaker 1: We've been living in extraordinary times and the last several
Speaker 1: years have been so much. You know, there's been like
Speaker 1: this joke going around that the human was not built
Speaker 1: to deal with and handle three Trump elections in nine years,
Speaker 1: and I can't agree with that statement enough. I don't know, friends,
Speaker 1: It's been a lot. It's been a lot, and we
Speaker 1: have to hold on to the fact that regardless of
Speaker 1: the outcome, there is going to be so much work
Speaker 1: to do, because what I hope that people take away
Speaker 1: from the last several years is that democracy is not
Speaker 1: a passive sport. Democracy requires our vigilance, our consistency, our attention,
Speaker 1: our engagement on a regular basis, not just every four
Speaker 1: years and not just every two years, but every year,
Speaker 1: every day. And I hope you know that America makes
Speaker 1: the right choice and chooses freedom chooses equity chooses, justice
Speaker 1: chooses bodily autonomy. I don't know when we will know,
Speaker 1: but I know that I will be here with all
Speaker 1: of you finding our way through the end of dismayze.
Speaker 1: I encourage all of you to subscribe over on YouTube
Speaker 1: to the Danielle Moody channel. I will be going live
Speaker 1: tonight for my normal five pm Eastern Danielle Moody Show.
Speaker 1: I will also be live on Mary Trump Media off
Speaker 1: and on throughout the night. I will also be live
Speaker 1: with Mehdi Hassan at some point. So I encourage you
Speaker 1: go over to YouTube follow subscribe because that is where
Speaker 1: I'll be and if you want to be kept in
Speaker 1: the loop on up to time the minute news, please
Speaker 1: do find me there. Coming up next a conversation that
Speaker 1: I had with our friend, doctor Jonathan Metzel about the
Speaker 1: stakes of this election, about the importance of this moment
Speaker 1: and where we go next. That conversation is coming to
Speaker 1: you next. Friends, you know that whenever we have the
Speaker 1: opportunity to sit down with our in house doctor, doctor
Speaker 1: Jonathan Metzel, we are always thrilled and honored. Jonathan, we
Speaker 1: are speaking to you with one week, one week until
Speaker 1: the last day to vote. I feel like you and
Speaker 1: I have been doing a countdown for a millennia at
Speaker 1: this point.
Speaker 2: We've been doing this for a long time.
Speaker 1: We've been doing this for a long time. So before
Speaker 1: we dive in to our topics today, how are you
Speaker 1: feeling with one week until the final day to vote?
Speaker 2: I'm of three minds, I will put oh.
Speaker 1: Three, you're not of two? Damn three? Okay?
Speaker 2: I am try minded.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 2: You know. On one hand, I think Harris is running
Speaker 2: an excellent campaign. There are just so many divergent coalitions
Speaker 2: and interests under the framework of the Democratic Party. The
Speaker 2: Democratic Party, I think, in other hands, would feel almost
Speaker 2: unmanageable or ungovernable and like diametrically opposed agendas in some ways.
Speaker 2: And the fact that she, I think, has created a
Speaker 2: narrative that kind of lets everybody sit under that tent
Speaker 2: and remind everybody of the bigger stakes, I think has
Speaker 2: been a pretty incredible achievement. And so in that regard,
Speaker 2: I feel guardedly optimistic. That's my number one And I'll
Speaker 2: say that I say that in part because of kind
Speaker 2: of the energy right now, but also because I'm seeing
Speaker 2: on the ground that that kind of frame is letting
Speaker 2: different conversations happen. I mean, I'm in on campus today.
Speaker 2: We're doing a big event on guns and politics, and
Speaker 2: it's myself, a Jewish American in conversation with two pastors
Speaker 2: of local churches and a journalist, and it's hosted by
Speaker 2: the Divinity School here at Vanderbilt. So I feel like
Speaker 2: this big tent approach reminds us of why we're under
Speaker 2: the big tent, and so on one hand, I feel
Speaker 2: good like I'm actually you can see wearing a suit
Speaker 2: today because I'm doing this big event with divinity, and
Speaker 2: so I really appreciate that. That's part number one. Part
Speaker 2: number two is that my heart and soul have been
Speaker 2: broken numerous times living here in the South, where I
Speaker 2: thought the momentum was on our side, but it turned
Speaker 2: out the system was fixed. So in every local Senate
Speaker 2: election we've been running great candidates. We're doing it again
Speaker 2: right now, Democrats here. But because the Germander system, it
Speaker 2: just the system is not allow for the kind of
Speaker 2: change that I think a lot of people here want.
Speaker 2: And that's because there's a structural frame around it that
Speaker 2: makes it harder. So number two is I'm guardedly optimistic
Speaker 2: because I've seen here what it feels like to be
Speaker 2: voting in Ostensibly I don't want to just say rigged
Speaker 2: like some Banana Republic way, but jerrymandering here.
Speaker 1: That's the original rigging. That's the original stealing of elections
Speaker 1: is gerrymandering.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And so in that regard here there's so much
Speaker 2: democratic energy and I've also felt it after horrible mass
Speaker 2: shootings and so everybody's like, oh, change is coming, but
Speaker 2: it turned out that the outcome is just determined before
Speaker 2: the way that they've done. The jerymandering here is implicated
Speaker 2: in so many ways. So that's number two. And then
Speaker 2: number three is where are we going to go on
Speaker 2: vacation when this is all over?
Speaker 1: Honestly, I keep thinking about belize I'm gonna I'm actually
Speaker 1: going to be I'm actually going to tell the truth.
Speaker 1: Like yeah, thinking about I'm like, where's it kind of
Speaker 1: tree I haven't gone to, but like I just want
Speaker 1: to lay in the sun, I know.
Speaker 2: Man, Like, so I don't know you and need like
Speaker 2: you've been going NonStop. I've been doing at least three
Speaker 2: events in different cities every week.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, thank you the road Yeah showed up.
Speaker 2: I was in Allentown, Pennsylvania last week. I was in
Speaker 2: I've been in Kansas, Missouri, Boston, you name it, doing
Speaker 2: just everything I possibly can to get out there. And
Speaker 2: so in that regard, you know, I just I love
Speaker 2: the energy that I felt out there, and I also
Speaker 2: just want to go to like a warm, sunny place
Speaker 2: with the Dave and Busters that I could just go
Speaker 2: lie in for a week or something like that. So
Speaker 2: we'll see. So I feel like, you know, this is
Speaker 2: what happens in elections, Like we're headed toward the finish line.
Speaker 2: But even this past Saturday, we did the Southern Book
Speaker 2: Festival here and I'll send you the thing like Justin
Speaker 2: Jones came and other people came. It was, it was.
Speaker 2: There's a lot of a lot of collaborative energy out.
Speaker 1: There that sounds amazing. And I think that what I
Speaker 1: always appreciate about you is that you are on the road.
Speaker 1: You are going out and speaking to Americans and seeing America.
Speaker 1: And I think that that's what I appreciate that you
Speaker 1: bring back to WOKF is that you know, I'm not
Speaker 1: out on the road. I talk to people all over
Speaker 1: the country, but I'm not seeing it unless i'm you know,
Speaker 1: in the moments that I am traveling to really connect
Speaker 1: with other people in real life. And I think that
Speaker 1: that is something that's really important to do, to have conversation.
Speaker 1: And I want to segue, speaking of conversation into what
Speaker 1: has now gone viral, which was a segment on Abby
Speaker 1: Phillips's show on CNN. She does these roundtable discussions with
Speaker 1: Trump's supporters with normal people and Mehdi Hassan and Trump
Speaker 1: supporter Ryan Gerdusky, I think is his name, Ryan Gridusky said,
Speaker 1: just I mean, I don't know why anybody is shocked
Speaker 1: that you bring a racist on and then they say
Speaker 1: racist things, and then everybody's like, I can't believe the
Speaker 1: racists opened up their mouth, Like it's like, what do
Speaker 1: you expect to happen when you engage people like these
Speaker 1: rabbit Trump supporters. But essentially, in an exchange, he insinuated
Speaker 1: that Mehdi was a terrorist for having announced his support
Speaker 1: for Palestinian people. The comment was crass, it was disgusting,
Speaker 1: it was racist. He was then removed from the show.
Speaker 1: Abby Phillips issued a statement. CNN issued a statement he
Speaker 1: will not be back on their airwaves. I want to
Speaker 1: get your reaction to, because you're a person who also
Speaker 1: believes in engaging in difficult conversations and having hard conversations.
Speaker 1: What did you make of what you saw in the
Speaker 1: clips that have now been seen by tens of millions
Speaker 1: of people.
Speaker 2: Well, let me first say that I think it's goes
Speaker 2: without saying that what was said was beyond inappropriate. It
Speaker 2: was unaerrable in a way, and so I think the
Speaker 2: idea that it wasn't just calling somebody terrists, it was
Speaker 2: actually a threat. And so in that regard, it was inexcusable,
Speaker 2: and I think CNN did the right thing by addressing it.
Speaker 2: You know, I'm not surprised in this moment that people
Speaker 2: are saying horrible stuff that shouldn't be news to anybody,
Speaker 2: but I thought that there was you know, a lesson
Speaker 2: in there, right. If you're posting a rally and somebody
Speaker 2: gets up and makes a joke about Puerto Rico, for example,
Speaker 2: that is horrifically offensive, you address it head on. You
Speaker 2: don't ignore it and go on with the rally. You say, hey, wait,
Speaker 2: I just want to say, this is not who we are.
Speaker 2: And so I thought, actually, CNN did a reasonably good
Speaker 2: job in a horrible situation of addressing it. And I
Speaker 2: would never I would. I just think it's inexcusable, and
Speaker 2: I think it's amazing the condemnation that's happened across the
Speaker 2: political spectrum. I mean, the ADL came out right away
Speaker 2: and said this was inexcusable, you know, So I think
Speaker 2: in that regard, you know, highlighted the stakes. So that's
Speaker 2: part of it. I mean, it's just there's no there's
Speaker 2: no excuse for it, except to say, think of all
Speaker 2: the racist crap that's on our airways right now, Like
Speaker 2: it's just how can you so I can say about that,
Speaker 2: because I mean we obviously were going to talk about
Speaker 2: the Trump rally also and things like that. And I
Speaker 2: think the bigger issue is, you know, this is kind
Speaker 2: of weird, right. I know a lot of Trump supporters,
Speaker 2: and in my life, I live in Tennessee. I know
Speaker 2: plenty of Trump supporters. I'm from Missouri, plenty of people
Speaker 2: I know or I mean, there's a lot of people
Speaker 2: voting for Trump. And I wouldn't say that every single
Speaker 2: person who's voting for Trump is a Nazi or you
Speaker 2: know whatever, even a horrible person. I mean, I have
Speaker 2: plenty of people I engage with and we just disagree
Speaker 2: about politics. But I think that these things, when they happen,
Speaker 2: it kind of reinforces the worst stereotype. I mean, in
Speaker 2: a way, if I was running the Trump campaign, I
Speaker 2: would be trying to run away from this thing. And
Speaker 2: so I think, in a way, the idea that this
Speaker 2: guy's going to come over and do fasht things and
Speaker 2: be a racist and then he gets up and says
Speaker 2: fascist things and is a racist and is supporter or
Speaker 2: saying things like this, So.
Speaker 1: You don't run away from who you are. And I
Speaker 1: think like that to me is like people love to
Speaker 1: think like, oh, well, if I were Donald Trump or
Speaker 1: if I were them, like I would denounce X. Well,
Speaker 1: you don't run away from who you are. And I
Speaker 1: think that that is something that is like actually one
Speaker 1: hundred percent Donald Trump where he actually stands for the
Speaker 1: only time in his truth is when he was directed
Speaker 1: to denounce white supremacy, spoon fed it here, here's a
Speaker 1: way to do it. And he's like, nah, I'm good.
Speaker 2: But let me just say that there's a conflation in that,
Speaker 2: which is I don't think every person who supports Donald
Speaker 2: Trump is a Nazi or a racist.
Speaker 1: That's where you and I disagree. Please go ahead.
Speaker 2: And you know, like I know plenty of people who
Speaker 2: they support Trump because of his views on the Second Amendment.
Speaker 2: And they're not convinced that Kamala Harris all of a
Speaker 2: sudden said I'm a gun under two weeks ago. They
Speaker 2: support Trump because of the role of government in their lives.
Speaker 2: That whatever. It's not like it's not like the odious
Speaker 2: stuff is invisible to them, But they have other they
Speaker 2: have other reasons. I just I don't find it personally
Speaker 2: helpful for my life or my work to cast ninety whatever.
Speaker 2: How many million people support Trump, like hundreds of millions
Speaker 2: of people. I don't think every single one is a Nazi.
Speaker 2: I think that there are different reasons and so, but
Speaker 2: the thing is, you're right, Trump can't help himself, and
Speaker 2: so in a way, if this election is something that's
Speaker 2: for you know, they're centrist voters, undecided voters, people in
Speaker 2: these purple states, and I think if the appeal is
Speaker 2: to reach those voters, going on and amplifying the worst
Speaker 2: parts of your campaign is probably the worst possible way
Speaker 2: to do it. It speaks to arrogance and hubris and
Speaker 2: just a lack of political strategy. And so just for me,
Speaker 2: it's kind of like, why are they doing it? You know,
Speaker 2: it's the week before the election. Not many things are
Speaker 2: going to move the needle. Making a horrible joke about
Speaker 2: Puerto Ricans, or calling Muslim Americans who might be on
Speaker 2: the fence of Foo to vote for terrorists and saying
Speaker 2: you're going to explode them with a beeper is something
Speaker 2: that will move the needle at this last moment. And
Speaker 2: so for me it's just morally horrible, but also strategically indepensible.
Speaker 1: I mean, here's the thing. I'm going to say a
Speaker 1: couple of things to the points that you made. There
Speaker 1: is no way, nine years later, that someone can express
Speaker 1: to me that I'm not a racist, but I support
Speaker 1: Donald Trump. That I'm not a misogynist, but I support
Speaker 1: Donald Trump. That I am not an islamophobe or a transphobe,
Speaker 1: or a homophobe or an able list, but I support
Speaker 1: Donald Trump. There is no way that you can point
Speaker 1: to me after nine years of listening to this man,
Speaker 1: after nine years of rallies, of rhetoric, of conferences, of
Speaker 1: interviews where Donald Trump and all of his supporters have
Speaker 1: unabashedly said that they are racist, that they support racism,
Speaker 1: that they support white supremacists, that instead of playing our
Speaker 1: national anthem, that you play the anthem of insurrectionists, that
Speaker 1: you praise people like Robert E. Lee, that you talk
Speaker 1: about the fact that Hitler has done some good things,
Speaker 1: and that people all of a sudden can say like, oh,
Speaker 1: you know, I'll put on my gas mask because I
Speaker 1: don't want the odor to get to me. But there
Speaker 1: are some good things in this steaming pile of hot
Speaker 1: shit that I can find, Like it just is not,
Speaker 1: and I think that for far too long we've done
Speaker 1: too much part in parceling to try and find what
Speaker 1: is left that is good inside of this party that
Speaker 1: has told us time and time again that there is
Speaker 1: nothing left that is good here. When you can go
Speaker 1: and host a Nazi rally in the middle of New
Speaker 1: York City, to do so as a show of strength
Speaker 1: and force and terrorism, to show that you can be
Speaker 1: anywhere and do anything, because that's what that was. It
Speaker 1: goes back to when they would lynch black people and
Speaker 1: leave the bodies hanging from trees as a warning to
Speaker 1: other black people that were around not to cross a line.
Speaker 1: That is what they are doing. So this form of
Speaker 1: hubris and ego and intimidation is to say, we don't
Speaker 1: give a fuck. There are no lines anymore, right, there
Speaker 1: are no lines that shoot or should not be crossed
Speaker 1: to me, CNN cross that line when you decided to
Speaker 1: open up your airwaves to people to lie to the
Speaker 1: American people, and you think that that was like offering
Speaker 1: both sides. So I feel like at this point it
Speaker 1: is disingenuous for us to even comment on and think
Speaker 1: that there are people that are left that are Trump's
Speaker 1: supporters that do not harbor the same sentiments. They may
Speaker 1: not speak on them with the same vitriol that Donald
Speaker 1: Trump and his most advanced supporters do, but they are
Speaker 1: there holding the flags and standing at the rallies and
Speaker 1: going to punch a ballot that says I want more
Speaker 1: of this.
Speaker 2: So that is not accept No, I'm not in any
Speaker 2: way saying that it's acceptable, and I'm also not saying
Speaker 2: that people are. I guess what I am saying is this,
Speaker 2: if I distill a doubt having done a lot of
Speaker 2: research and spent a lot of time in a lot
Speaker 2: of communities across America where racism and ableism and homophobia
Speaker 2: are not the main registers. I mean, if you're in
Speaker 2: like an all white part of southern Missouri, or you're
Speaker 2: living in an all white part of Tessee or Kentucky,
Speaker 2: racism just isn't your framework, right, It's not your framework.
Speaker 2: And so the moral umbrage of somebody saying racist stuff,
Speaker 2: You're going to reach some people who say this is
Speaker 2: morally unacceptable. But for other people, their daily lives, the
Speaker 2: register of their daily lives is government interference in their lives.
Speaker 2: And the plant closing and competition from China and all
Speaker 2: these kind of things, And so I just don't agree
Speaker 2: that every person who's drawn to Trump is drawn because
Speaker 2: of the racism. I also think that there are plenty
Speaker 2: of people for whom racism just is not really a category,
Speaker 2: and so part of the story is And again I
Speaker 2: started by saying, I think that Harris and Wolves are
Speaker 2: doing a great job of reaching out to people about economics,
Speaker 2: even in a slight way, about guns, about other things
Speaker 2: that people vote for, because I think those are the
Speaker 2: people who are potentially willing to listen. But I don't
Speaker 2: agree that every single person who supports the GOP does
Speaker 2: so because they resonate with the racism, and and I'm
Speaker 2: hoping there are plenty of people who are repulsed by
Speaker 2: all of this. But again, I also think at a
Speaker 2: strategy level, we're a week before the election, there are
Speaker 2: very few things that will move the needle, and that
Speaker 2: if Trump loses, that Madison Square Garden rally is going
Speaker 2: to go down in the annals of political history as
Speaker 2: one of the biggest screw ups. Ever, I hope that's
Speaker 2: the case.
Speaker 1: I hope that it is the case as well, because
Speaker 1: I think that the things that were said from that
Speaker 1: stage were not jokes. They were statements. They were feelings
Speaker 1: that were given an enormous platform, from Rudy Giuliani to
Speaker 1: the podcaster to the guy who said, oh, I never
Speaker 1: thought I'd be at a Nazi rally, but like here
Speaker 1: I am. You know, these people know what they're doing,
Speaker 1: they know what they're saying. Stephen Miller America. For Americans,
Speaker 1: the hoods are off, the nuances and the euphemisms are gone.
Speaker 1: They're saying what they're saying because they believe that they
Speaker 1: have the power and that they will win. Right Like,
Speaker 1: you don't pull moves like what they've done over the
Speaker 1: last couple of days unless you think that you're going
Speaker 1: to win, Because normal people would be trying to grow
Speaker 1: the electorate and bring people in, and instead they've said
Speaker 1: fuck it. Our closing argument is racism, misogyny, and we're
Speaker 1: doubling and tripling down.
Speaker 2: And as we said last week in either people were
Speaker 2: laughing about cognitive decline, which I don't buy for a
Speaker 2: second about Trump. I mean, it's irrelevant, but there was
Speaker 2: something terrifying for me.
Speaker 1: Really, you don't think there's any deterioration that's there.
Speaker 2: I mean, it doesn't matter. I think we denature the
Speaker 2: content when we call it some kind of a mental illness,
Speaker 2: you know, or something like that. So whether or not
Speaker 2: that's true, I really don't care, But I would say
Speaker 2: that for me, there was something terrifying about a guy
Speaker 2: who spent a whole press conference just rocking out to
Speaker 2: like Haul and Oates.
Speaker 1: Or whatever for thirty nine minutes, yeah.
Speaker 2: And all the other crazy stuff, and it made me
Speaker 2: feel like, there's something about this that is not there's
Speaker 2: something structurally amiss. I've seen that kind of behavior here
Speaker 2: in Tennessee when people don't. I mean, we've got a
Speaker 2: guy running for Congress here who just openly left his
Speaker 2: wife and ran off with somebody else, and he's like
Speaker 2: the morality candidate he's running against, like this really good
Speaker 2: candidate here. But there was another candidate here who was
Speaker 2: a physician who got caught having relations with his patients.
Speaker 2: It didn't matter because the fix was already in in
Speaker 2: terms of jeremandering. And so when I see Trump acting
Speaker 2: like that, I'm just like, what what does he know?
Speaker 2: So partially it's maybe the fix is in, but the
Speaker 2: other part is, as we know from Trump, a loss
Speaker 2: can also be incredibly generative. Also, and so maybe they're
Speaker 2: setting the stage for stuff that happens either So it's
Speaker 2: to me scary either way.
Speaker 1: It's scary either way. And I think AOC Alexandrio Cassio
Speaker 1: Cortez said it really well yesterday where she said that
Speaker 1: the display at Madison Square Garden was really to prime
Speaker 1: his audience for violence. Yeah, to prime and pump them
Speaker 1: for violence in the way that his tweets and messages
Speaker 1: did in twenty twenty, and to do so in a
Speaker 1: bigger way.
Speaker 2: And let's not also forget that he also tried to
Speaker 2: JFK Junior out there, RFK Junior out there. Sorry, who's
Speaker 2: going to destroy the public health system and medications, vaccines
Speaker 2: and public health? So every person was like a wrecking
Speaker 2: ball to something, you know.
Speaker 1: All right, my friend, Well we will leave it there,
Speaker 1: and the next time help we speak, it will actually
Speaker 1: be election day.
Speaker 2: Well let's invoke Casey casem one last time here, you know,
Speaker 2: tell everybody to keep your feet on the ground and
Speaker 2: keep reaching for the stars. You know, So that's this
Speaker 2: is our week to do it. I have to say
Speaker 2: I voted in Tennessee. There were all this social media
Speaker 2: stuff about how there were tar pits on fire and
Speaker 2: seventy five hour waits. I went there. It was the
Speaker 2: smoothest thing ever. It took five minutes, very well run.
Speaker 2: I was like, wait what and they're like, yeah, it's
Speaker 2: actually it actually works pretty well here. So you know,
Speaker 2: don't believe the hype. Get out there, vote and you know,
Speaker 2: save America amazing.
Speaker 1: Thank you, my friends, and we will talk again soon.
Speaker 1: Stay safe, and dear friends, remember that if you are
Speaker 1: voting today and it is nine PM, or it is
Speaker 1: when the polls close wherever you are, if you are
Speaker 1: standing in line, you are still able to cast your ballot.
Speaker 1: Do not let anyone tell you otherwise. Spread that word
Speaker 1: that if you are in line and the voting has
Speaker 1: stopped or the polls have closed, if you are standing
Speaker 1: in line when the polls close, you can still cast
Speaker 1: your ballot, and do not let anyone tell you otherwise.
Speaker 1: Stay safe, stay vigilant, protect yourselves, protect each other, be
Speaker 1: in community with people. If you see something that is
Speaker 1: going awry, then say something. We need each other now
Speaker 1: more than ever. I will see you, dear friends on
Speaker 1: the other side. That is it for me today on
Speaker 1: wokef as always Power to the people and to all
Speaker 1: the people power, get woke, and stay woke as fuck.