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Speaker 1: Hi, I'm Molly John Fast and this is Fast Politics,

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Speaker 1: where we discussed the top political headlines with some of

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Speaker 1: today's best minds, and Justice Thomas has hired a law

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Speaker 1: clerk accused of sending racist texts.

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Speaker 2: We have such an interesting show for you today.

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Speaker 1: Former US Attorney Barbara McQuaid stops by to talk to

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Speaker 1: us about her new book, Attack from Within, How disinformation

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Speaker 1: is sabotaging America. Then we'll talk to Carlos Lozada about

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Speaker 1: his new book, The Washington Book How to Read Politics

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Speaker 1: and Politicians. But first we have the host of the

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Speaker 1: Enemy's List, the Lincoln Project's own Rick Wilson.

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Speaker 3: Welcome back, Rick Wilson, Molly Jong fasts.

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Speaker 2: Whatever this show is called, nobody knows.

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Speaker 4: Whatever, whatever it's called, whatever it is, whatever we do,

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Speaker 4: We're back again for you.

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Speaker 2: America, exactly.

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Speaker 1: You and I here to dissect the Week of fuckery.

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Speaker 2: And what week it was.

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Speaker 1: There was a lot of stuff that got written about

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Speaker 1: and talked about, and certainly the smeirnoff Right, the Russian

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Speaker 1: asset who turns out the lead witness in the impeachment

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Speaker 1: against Joe.

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Speaker 4: Biden, the centerpiece of their entire Portshit, bullshit, weapons grade

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Speaker 4: garbage pretend impeachment case against Joe Biden turns out to

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Speaker 4: have not only been a criminal, but a Russian asset

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Speaker 4: who was mean he was senior Russian intelligence officials. Did

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Speaker 4: you read that charging document on the guy?

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Speaker 2: No, but tell us what's in it, Folks.

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Speaker 4: You've heard Jim Comer, Slow Jim and Jim Jordan over

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Speaker 4: and over again talk about this gold plated class a

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Speaker 4: witness who is a direct witness to seeing Joe Biden

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Speaker 4: take sex of cash from the Barisma executives and his

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Speaker 4: having his corrupt son Unter direct this gigantic international criminal scheme.

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Speaker 4: And it turns out, I know you're going to all

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Speaker 4: be shocked to hear this. It turns out the entire thing,

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Speaker 4: every last detail of it, was completely made up. None

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Speaker 4: of it was real. It was hot garbage from the

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Speaker 4: very beginning. And now they're desperately trying to retcon this

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Speaker 4: thing and like put it in reverse, like, well, we

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Speaker 4: didn't really know who this guy was. He was an intern,

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Speaker 4: a coffee boy. We barely knew him.

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Speaker 1: My favorite was Jim Jordan saying that it doesn't change

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Speaker 1: any of the fundamentals, right, which is we're.

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Speaker 4: Gonna impeach Joe Biden because we're a bunch of assholes

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Speaker 4: with nothing better than do es.

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Speaker 5: It's all vibes, but we don't like this guy.

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Speaker 1: We don't know why, but we know that's high vibes

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Speaker 1: and misdemeanors.

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Speaker 4: I that, my friends, is the episode title, high vibes

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Speaker 4: and misdemeanors.

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Speaker 2: That's right, misdemeanors.

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Speaker 4: No. Look, and you and I were talking this earlier

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Speaker 4: in the week. They're not going to stop doing this.

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Speaker 4: They will continue this BS until the sun dies into

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Speaker 4: a burt cinder because they have nothing else to offer.

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Speaker 4: They have no other plan.

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Speaker 1: Their boss told them to, right, I mean, they're all

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Speaker 1: arms of the Trump campaign at this point.

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Speaker 5: Right.

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Speaker 4: And look, the fact that in twenty sixteen the Russians

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Speaker 4: had to kind of sort of maybe disguise their role

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Speaker 4: in helping Trump was one thing. Right now, it's like, well, why, yes,

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Speaker 4: I do enjoy taking Russian intelligence materials because, after all,

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Speaker 4: who's our real ally in the world but Vladimir put

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Speaker 4: Well that.

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Speaker 1: Is thanks to Tucker Carls and also, you know, the

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Speaker 1: far right industrial media complex has decided that authoritarianism is

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Speaker 1: the way to go, and the democracies are for cocks

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Speaker 1: and losers, and I think that's right. But you know,

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Speaker 1: it's interesting because it's like this House impeachment inquiry. It

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Speaker 1: comes from this Republican House who can control only the

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Speaker 1: House right now, and they control it by two seats

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Speaker 1: at this point.

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Speaker 4: And fewer every day.

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Speaker 1: Right, and then they have a few like non voting seats,

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Speaker 1: So the math is they actually have more than two seats.

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Speaker 1: But what I think is really interesting about this is

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Speaker 1: like next week they're probably going to shut down the

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Speaker 1: federal government because the Speaker of the House had this

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Speaker 1: like brilliant idea. Again, Mike Johnson, all he wants is

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Speaker 1: to not be removed from this job, right, That's all

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Speaker 1: he literally, he just wants to keep his job.

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Speaker 4: I think there are other things he wants to but

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Speaker 4: we're not going to discuss those on a family show.

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Speaker 2: Right, yes, oh jesus.

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Speaker 4: But anyway, while he's like, oh god, he's going to

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Speaker 4: work blue, right, he's going dark.

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Speaker 1: This is the problem is that like for Rick to

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Speaker 1: talk about Mike Johnson and not talk about the porn accountability,

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Speaker 1: it's like he just can't do it.

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Speaker 4: I listen, who can blame me?

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Speaker 2: I can blame you.

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Speaker 5: But anyway, well you can't.

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Speaker 1: I certainly I can, and I will. So Mike Johnson

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Speaker 1: has this one. There's still in place, this one person

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Speaker 1: motion to vacate. So it's probably not going to be

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Speaker 1: Matt Gaates this time, but it could be any other

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Speaker 1: member of Congress.

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Speaker 4: A Chip Roy, Marjorie Taylor Green, could be anybody.

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Speaker 1: Marjorie Taylor Green has already said she will do it

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Speaker 1: if he funds the government, so he's.

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Speaker 2: Sort of thrown out a bunch of things.

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Speaker 1: I read in punch Bowl this week that maybe they

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Speaker 1: would shut down the government a little bit. I mean,

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Speaker 1: he cooked up this idea of a tiered CR. I

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Speaker 1: want to just talk about it for a second. A

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Speaker 1: CR is you fund the government temporarily. You did it

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Speaker 1: as a tiar so that half would expire at one

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Speaker 1: point and then half would expire three weeks later.

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Speaker 2: No one's ever done this because it's a stupid waste

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Speaker 2: of time.

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Speaker 1: But I think in his like lizard brain, he was thinking, like,

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Speaker 1: maybe I'll trick them into not thinking I'm funding the government.

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Speaker 1: I mean, I think it's worth just pulling back here

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Speaker 1: for a minute and realizing that this crew is really

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Speaker 1: quite stupid.

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Speaker 4: Well. I mean, look, let's be very very direct about

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Speaker 4: who we're talking about here. These are people who have

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Speaker 4: a very deliberate hatred for any kind of experience or

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Speaker 4: knowledge or expertise. And the purpose of their position in

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Speaker 4: Washington is not about serving their constituents or helping the

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Speaker 4: country or passing legislation. Their entire purpose is chaos. That

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Speaker 4: is the only reason they are there is to cause

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Speaker 4: and stoke more chaos, and the only incentive they have

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Speaker 4: is chaos. What do you get on Fox for? Do

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Speaker 4: you get on Fox for saying why, yes, I was

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Speaker 4: in the sub committee today and we worked on electric

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Speaker 4: vehicle mandate standards or whatever. No, you get coverage on

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Speaker 4: Fox by saying today I fought back against the pedocuck

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Speaker 4: army of sorow Shills, and I burned it all down.

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Speaker 4: And of course burning it all down is all they

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Speaker 4: care about. So you got Mike Johnson clinging to power

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Speaker 4: and political life by a thread. And look, no one

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Speaker 4: in that organization, no one in the House, cares whether

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Speaker 4: they keep the government open or closed. They want it

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Speaker 4: to be chaotic. They want the problems of a shutdown,

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Speaker 4: They want the chaos of a shutdown. And they all

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Speaker 4: do it because they want to please Donald Trump and

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Speaker 4: they want to get on Fox News. These are the

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Speaker 4: only things that matter, and so that's what that's what

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Speaker 4: we'll get more of.

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Speaker 1: So I want to talk to you about something that you,

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Speaker 1: as a campaign guy, are going to.

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Speaker 2: Be obsessed with because it's so stupid.

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Speaker 1: I want to talk to you about Republicans and in

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Speaker 1: vitro fertilization in the great state of Alabama. Third Hospital

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Speaker 1: in Alabama said they're not going to do IVF the

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Speaker 1: court ruling from the Alabama Supreme Court. They are taking

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Speaker 1: this country back to the eighteenth century. They have decided

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Speaker 1: that embryos are people discuss.

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Speaker 4: I will say this, the most consequent and far reaching

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Speaker 4: political moment of the last five years was the Dobs decision,

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Speaker 4: in which the Republican Party, which they'd been telling Democrats

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Speaker 4: for fifty years, this is what we're going to do,

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Speaker 4: and this is how we're going to do it, and

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Speaker 4: they did it. They woke up the next morning and said, wait,

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Speaker 4: what a quarter of our female voter population the Republican

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Speaker 4: Party is either actually like Roe v. Wade, pro choice

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Speaker 4: or libertarian, state of the hell out of my business.

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Speaker 4: Pro choice what's happening here. They were shocked that this

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Speaker 4: suddenly bit them on the ass politically in twenty twenty two,

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Speaker 4: and it bit them hard, and it's still hurting them

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Speaker 4: right now. If you think that Dobbs blew a hole

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Speaker 4: in the Republican Party's coalition, particularly with women who were

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Speaker 4: more educated and affluent IVF, if Dobbs was a bomb,

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Speaker 4: IVF is a nuclear war, you were going to see

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Speaker 4: Republican women, Democratic women, independent women lose their damn minds

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Speaker 4: over this for absolutely good reasons, because you know what

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Speaker 4: if an embryo is a baby, if they're going to

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Speaker 4: play this game. You know, Nicky Haley had a child

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Speaker 4: by IVF, and Mike Pence and his wife and mother

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Speaker 4: had a child by IVF, and I know people and

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Speaker 4: you know people who've had children by IVF and it

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Speaker 4: was a great blessing for them.

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Speaker 1: Bet In Darwin, My twins were made in a lab

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Speaker 1: in New Jersey. And I want to point out that

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Speaker 1: like in New York, people are having IVF, they're having surrogacy,

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Speaker 1: they're having you know, there's not this is this is

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Speaker 1: there's no stigma about this. It's ridiculous. I mean, you know,

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Speaker 1: if you can't have children there are we have science.

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Speaker 1: That's what science is for. People don't die of the

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Speaker 1: measles anymore. That's what science is for. I mean, this is, like,

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Speaker 1: you know, as much as this is about the end

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Speaker 1: of ree Vwaight, it's also about a Republican party that

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Speaker 1: hates science. I mean, you watch these Trump rallies and

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Speaker 1: they're advertising ivermectin next to Trump. I mean, I mean,

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Speaker 1: this is not just the end of women's reproductive freedom.

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Speaker 1: This is the end of like legitimate science based freedom.

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Speaker 1: And the thing that I'm so struck by is when

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Speaker 1: you talk about the architect of overturning Rev. Wade, the

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Speaker 1: guy who created SBA in Texas, which functionally overturned ROW

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Speaker 1: a year before, a guy called Jonathan Mitchell has told

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Speaker 1: The New York Times last week he said, we're.

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Speaker 2: Not going to talk about this. We don't need a

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Speaker 2: federal ban because.

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Speaker 1: We have the Comstock Act and Act from the eighteen

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Speaker 1: hundreds that prevents you from sending pornography in the mail.

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Speaker 1: He's going to use that on abortion pills. And like

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Speaker 1: even now the abortion pill case is about trying to

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Speaker 1: overturn FDA approval. So this is not just about abortion pills.

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Speaker 1: This is about a broad rejection of science more generally.

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Speaker 4: Well, look, you've got Christopher Rufo, who is a famous

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Speaker 4: right wing troll, but who also now is you know,

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Speaker 4: Desanta's split on the board of New College in Florida,

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Speaker 4: and he's a big influencer in the right wing space.

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Speaker 4: Last night he's out basically saying, well, you know what's

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Speaker 4: birth control is done away with for women, and we'll

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Speaker 4: get back to the purpose of sex, which is procreation

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Speaker 4: and creating families. This entire movement, they are so running

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Speaker 4: into a gigantic cultural and social buzzsaw that they have

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Speaker 4: not calculated yet how deeply they're going to break their coalition.

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Speaker 4: You know what, if y'all want to go off and

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Speaker 4: go to Alabama, Stan and have twelve kids, more power

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Speaker 4: to you, God blessed, do your best.

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Speaker 1: I want to pause for a second and talk about this.

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Speaker 1: Alabama is one of the fifteen states that has rejected

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Speaker 1: millions in federal dollars to promote food assistance. Right, they've

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Speaker 1: rejected food assistance, They've rejected Medicaid expansion.

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Speaker 4: Food is for cox Molly, It's week.

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Speaker 1: This is a state where you're forced to have your baby.

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Speaker 1: You can't have a baby you want, and you also

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Speaker 1: are not going to feed for children like it's exactly

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Speaker 1: the opposite of everything Christianity teaches.

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Speaker 4: Sure, you've got a state that is determined to inject

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Speaker 4: not just Christianity into its politics, but a specific, narrow,

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Speaker 4: casted edge of Evangelical Christianity into its politics. And when

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Speaker 4: you read that decision, it is these embryos are made

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Speaker 4: in the image of the Lord, etc. Okay, you are

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Speaker 4: free to believe that that is not law or jurisprudence.

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Speaker 4: That is your faith. And if you believe that, more

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Speaker 4: power to you great, go forth and conquer. But the

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Speaker 4: brutal reality is we now have people who are overt

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Speaker 4: theocrats seeking to impose a specifically narrow type of Evangelical

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Speaker 4: Christianity on every single American. And we've both talked to

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Speaker 4: Tim Alberta about his book about how politicized the MAGA

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Speaker 4: religious movement has become, and how far it is from faith,

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Speaker 4: and how much it is about a social and cultural

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Speaker 4: rejection of modernity, and whether that's science or whether that's

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Speaker 4: birth control, or whether that's medicine. They don't want to

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Speaker 4: live in this century. They don't want to live in

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Speaker 4: the last century. They want to live in the nineteenth

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Speaker 4: century or before. And it's all because they believe at

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Speaker 4: the fundamental underpinning of all this, when you get right

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Speaker 4: down to it, is they're worried that the brown people

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Speaker 4: are having more babies than they are. That's what's really

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Speaker 4: underneath all of this, right, is racism. The white replacement

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Speaker 4: theory informs so much of what's happening here.

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Speaker 1: Biden HQ has been very smart about clipping things, and

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Speaker 1: they clip this. Dasha Burns talking to Senator Tuberville, and

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Speaker 1: she says, do you have a reaction it's the Alabama senator, right,

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Speaker 1: do you have a reaction to the Alabama Supreme Court ruling?

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Speaker 1: Senator Tuberville, I'm all for it. We need to have

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Speaker 1: more kids, Dasha. But IVF is used to have more children,

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Speaker 1: and IVF services are positive some clinics. So there is

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Speaker 1: a slim but real chance here that Tommy Tuberville the

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Speaker 1: dumbest member of the United States Senate. And this is,

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Speaker 1: by the way, the competition is stiff. Do we think

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Speaker 1: he may not know what IBF is.

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Speaker 4: He doesn't know what IVF is, and does he thinks

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Speaker 4: them scientists and their coats are making the babies die.

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Speaker 4: That's what he thinks. I look, there's a moral question

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Speaker 4: underneath this idea that, Okay, we're going to ban IVF

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Speaker 4: in order to promote what What does banning IVF actually do?

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Speaker 4: The idea of fetal personhood is very central to all this.

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Speaker 4: But once again, none of them are going to propose

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Speaker 4: that we go out and provide any kind of family support,

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Speaker 4: family leave, helpcare for any of these tens of millions

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Speaker 4: of children who are yet born. I know people, you know,

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Speaker 4: people who who have struggled to have children, who desperately

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Speaker 4: want to have kids. And now what they're saying is,

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Speaker 4: we're so afraid that there's some overlay with our anti

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Speaker 4: abortion crusade with IVF, that we're going to ban IVF.

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Speaker 4: It's a fascinating and really dark place.

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Speaker 1: Sorry, I really want you to weigh in on what

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Speaker 1: this is like.

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Speaker 2: Electorally for them. You're a campaign guy, bad.

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Speaker 4: And also terrible, stupid and also idiotic, moronic, and yet

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Speaker 4: blistering with stupidity and political consequences they have yet to reckon.

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Speaker 1: Can you just talk about the birth control like that

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Speaker 1: they're making overtures towards birth control devoters like that.

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Speaker 4: If you want to try to find like a ninety

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Speaker 4: five percent issue in American politics, you're going to struggle. Okay,

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Speaker 4: Getting a ninety five percent issue is really, really tough

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Speaker 4: in American politics, And I haven't pulled it yet this week,

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Speaker 4: but I'm going to guess I'm just going to make

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Speaker 4: a make a quick back of the envelope calculation that

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Speaker 4: banning birth control is about a point zero one percent

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Speaker 4: favorable you get right down to it, and the lack

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Speaker 4: of understanding of political consequences in order to keep a

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Speaker 4: narrow slice of the social conservatives happy. It may end

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Speaker 4: up being the thing that legitimately kills the Republican Party

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Speaker 4: in this country.

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Speaker 1: As Lindsey Graham says, they will have deserved it right awful.

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Speaker 2: And you know, it's funny because.

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Speaker 1: It's like I grew up in the time when timber

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Speaker 1: Gore was coming for pornography, and people gave up on

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Speaker 1: that because I'm Americans love pornography.

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Speaker 2: Here as the daughter of.

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Speaker 1: An erotic writer, Yeah, love pornography.

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Speaker 2: They love it.

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Speaker 4: You may have noticed that Americans love pornography. They like sex.

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Speaker 4: The idea you got Christopher Rufo, one of the biggest

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Speaker 4: leaders in the social conservative movement, out saying we're going

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Speaker 4: to get rid of birth control because the purpose of

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Speaker 4: sex is procreation. Good luck, good luck in America, good

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Speaker 4: luck in the anywhere in the world with that.

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Speaker 2: As somebody tell that to Matt Schlaf.

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Speaker 4: Matt's encounters are rarely going to result in children.

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Speaker 2: Oh, did you know?

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Speaker 1: Rick Wilson and I are bringing together some friends for

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Speaker 1: a general election kickoff party at City Winery in New

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Speaker 1: York on March sixth. We're going to be chatting right

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Speaker 1: after Super Tuesday about what's.

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Speaker 2: Going on, and it is going to probably be.

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Speaker 1: The one fun night the next eighty days. If you're

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Speaker 1: in the New York area, please come by and join us.

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Speaker 1: You can go to City Winery's website and grab a ticket.

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Speaker 1: Barbara mccuad is a former US attorney and author of

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Speaker 1: Attack from Within, How Disinformation Is Sabotaging America.

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Speaker 2: Welcome to Fast Politics, Barbara.

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Speaker 3: Mccuay Hi, Molly, great to be with you.

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Speaker 1: I'm so happy to have you. And first I want

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Speaker 1: to talk about the book. So the book is called

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Speaker 1: Attack from Within How Disinformation Is Sabotaging America? Can you

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Speaker 1: talk to us about why disinformation and sort of why

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Speaker 1: that was where you went with us.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, so, you know, my background is as a national

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Speaker 3: security prosecutor. That's what I did for most of my career,

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Speaker 3: and I watched the threat evolve from al Qaeda to ISIS,

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Speaker 3: to cybers, to Russia, and finally to disinformation. And now

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Speaker 3: I teach a law school class on the tensions between

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Speaker 3: national security and civil liberties, and so in twenty sixteen,

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Speaker 3: I started assigning our students to read Robert Muller's report

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Speaker 3: about Russian disinformation. It's a bit of a distraction when

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Speaker 3: people talk about it, as you know, what did he

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Speaker 3: conclude with regard to Donald Trump. There's a fascinating discussion

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Speaker 3: in there about Russian disinformation, about the use of social

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Speaker 3: media to sew division, to influence voters in a really

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Speaker 3: sophisticated propaganda campaign. And since twenty sixteen, I have seen

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Speaker 3: those same tactics now being used by political operatives in

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Speaker 3: the United States. And if you listen to the way

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Speaker 3: Donald Trump speaks and talking about you know, January sixth

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Speaker 3: insurrectionists as hostages, or saying we need to preserve presidential immunity,

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Speaker 3: as if that is a thing. He is using some

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Speaker 3: of those same tactics that we saw in twenty sixteen

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Speaker 3: by Russia, and frankly, once I started digging into it

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Speaker 3: and studying the same tactics, we saw a boy Hitler

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Speaker 3: and Mussolini and other authoritarians throughout history. And so my

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Speaker 3: goal in writing the book is really to just share

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Speaker 3: with the public in a readable and accessible way the

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Speaker 3: things that I've learned in my research, the danger of

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Speaker 3: disinformation and how it is being used against us to

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Speaker 3: manipulate It's.

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Speaker 1: Really interesting that you're talking about this because I've had

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Speaker 1: people on this podcast like Jason Stanley. Jason Stanley is

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Speaker 1: a professor at Yale who focuses on this sort of

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Speaker 1: post reconstruction, anti democracy movement in the Republican Party, and

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Speaker 1: I'm sort of mis explaining what he does, but we

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Speaker 1: talked about how unusual it is Donald Trump is so

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Speaker 1: gifted at misinformation and disinformation. Then right now he's on

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Speaker 1: the stump talking about how.

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Speaker 6: His opponent is a danger at a democracy.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, yes, I mean. One of his most recent posts

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Speaker 3: on the ironically named Truth Social talked about how the

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Speaker 3: death of Navali and Russia makes him fearful of what's

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Speaker 3: happening in our country by his opponents. I talk about

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Speaker 3: a jiu jitsu move. Yet Jason Stanley is actually quoted

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Speaker 3: in my book because he does talk about the use

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Speaker 3: of propaganda really before, during, and since World War Two,

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Speaker 3: about the way Hitler and Mussolini used propaganda to manipulate

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Speaker 3: a population. And we see those same tactics used today.

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Speaker 1: Now.

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Speaker 3: The methods of delivery are a little different with social

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Speaker 3: media and cable news, but the tactics are really the same.

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Speaker 3: So I talk about the history of disinformation, I talk

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Speaker 3: about the cognitive forces that cause it to work, and

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Speaker 3: then I talk about some of the tactics, and I'll

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Speaker 3: mention just a couple of them, because they really are

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Speaker 3: some of the things we are seeing Donald Trump and

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Speaker 3: others used today. You know, he's not the only one

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Speaker 3: referring to insurrectionists as hostages. We see a last Stephanic,

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Speaker 3: the congressman from New York, repeating that phrase, or Marjorie

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Speaker 3: Taylor Grain and Georgia repeating that phrase. And so one

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Speaker 3: of the things that I learned that Adolf Hitler knew

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Speaker 3: and wrote about in Mind comes and that Joseph Gerbels

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Speaker 3: his propagandist talked about is that you must use simple

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Speaker 3: messages understandable to the masses, and then repeat, repeat, repeat

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Speaker 3: them over and over again, so that people hear them

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Speaker 3: from so many different sources they begin to think, well,

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Speaker 3: it must be true because I hear it all the

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Speaker 3: time from so many different people. I see it from

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Speaker 3: my friends, I see it on television, I see it

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Speaker 3: on social media. That's one. Just repeat the simple message.

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Speaker 3: So a stolen election in twenty twenty stop this deal.

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Speaker 3: Everybody hears it and they begin to believe it. The

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Speaker 3: other fundamental aspect of disinformation is that a big lie

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Speaker 3: is ironically more believable than a little lie. Hit We're

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Speaker 3: talked about this in nine Cobs. That's because all of

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Speaker 3: us have experienced little lies. Most of us tell little

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Speaker 3: lies because it's a kid thing to do. My husband

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Speaker 3: might say to me, no, that dressed does a make

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Speaker 3: you look fat, deer? He is being kind all of us.

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Speaker 3: You know your hair looks just fine, I might say

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Speaker 3: to my daughter. We're all accustomed to that. But what

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Speaker 3: Hitler said is no one would have the audacity to

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Speaker 3: tell a big lie. And because we think that, we

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Speaker 3: think it would be so immoral to tell a big

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Speaker 3: lie that most of us just can't even imagine telling

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Speaker 3: a big lie, you know. Of course, for him it

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Speaker 3: was that, you know, Jews were the source of all

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Speaker 3: problems in our world, and we need a solution to them.

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Speaker 3: But what we're hearing today, of course, is this idea

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Speaker 3: of a stolen election. And I think people think, I mean,

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Speaker 3: it must be true because it would be so easy

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Speaker 3: to disprove if it weren't stolen. But in fact it's not,

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Speaker 3: because it's fifty individual state elections. And so if you

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Speaker 3: throw that out there and say it enough, you could

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Speaker 3: undermine people's confidence in the election. And that's a big

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Speaker 3: part of it, you know. I've just occard in recent

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Speaker 3: days Donald Trump telling people that voting by mail is unreliable,

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Speaker 3: because he's already laying the groundwork so that when we

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Speaker 3: see people in his own party choose to vote in

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Speaker 3: person and people in the other party choose to vote

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Speaker 3: by mail, and we see this red mirage, just as

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Speaker 3: we saw in twenty twenty, where in the early returns

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Speaker 3: he's winning, and then later as a mail in ballots

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Speaker 3: are tonad he loses. He can say they flip the votes.

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Speaker 3: It was fraud, you see. And so this idea of

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Speaker 3: simple repeatable eyes about a big audacious fact is right

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Speaker 3: out of being with you know, sometimes referred to as

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Speaker 3: the authoritarian playbook.

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Speaker 1: Now, I wonder if you could just explain a little

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Speaker 1: bit about so this is like an obsession of mine

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Speaker 1: right now. I have this theory that part of how

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Speaker 1: we are here is that Congress refused to regulate social

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Speaker 1: media at all, and had they been just a little

437
00:23:44,240 --> 00:23:48,560
Speaker 1: bit more careful, had so, for example, in two thousand

438
00:23:48,560 --> 00:23:51,560
Speaker 1: and five or two thousand and six, when all this started,

439
00:23:51,800 --> 00:23:53,320
Speaker 1: if they had said, you know, if you're going to

440
00:23:53,440 --> 00:23:56,760
Speaker 1: link to a story, you have to pet you know,

441
00:23:56,920 --> 00:23:59,879
Speaker 1: like made it so that these social media sites have

442
00:24:00,160 --> 00:24:03,720
Speaker 1: to have editors or fact checkers, so that there was

443
00:24:03,880 --> 00:24:06,240
Speaker 1: some sense in which, you know, if you just put

444
00:24:06,320 --> 00:24:08,919
Speaker 1: up something that said, like the election was stolen, that

445
00:24:09,000 --> 00:24:13,320
Speaker 1: there would be some kind of pushback from the platform.

446
00:24:13,560 --> 00:24:18,120
Speaker 1: That doesn't happen, right, So I'm wondering, like, obviously this

447
00:24:18,200 --> 00:24:21,880
Speaker 1: is tangential, but I'm wondering if you think regulation could have.

448
00:24:21,840 --> 00:24:22,680
Speaker 6: Prevented some of this.

449
00:24:23,160 --> 00:24:25,760
Speaker 3: Absolutely, and I also think it's not too late. I

450
00:24:25,800 --> 00:24:29,919
Speaker 3: think we must regulate social media in this polarized world.

451
00:24:30,440 --> 00:24:34,280
Speaker 3: There is this concept called the either or fallacy, and

452
00:24:34,359 --> 00:24:36,960
Speaker 3: people want you to think that there are only two

453
00:24:37,560 --> 00:24:40,400
Speaker 3: sides of every issue. You're either with us or against us.

454
00:24:40,520 --> 00:24:43,280
Speaker 3: You're either a you know, a Republican or a democrat.

455
00:24:43,359 --> 00:24:46,199
Speaker 3: You're red or blue. You favor free speech, or you

456
00:24:46,320 --> 00:24:48,400
Speaker 3: want to be a censor. Is what it comes down

457
00:24:48,440 --> 00:24:51,280
Speaker 3: to you when we start talking about social media. Elon Musk,

458
00:24:51,359 --> 00:24:54,439
Speaker 3: any regulation is censorship, and of course that is not

459
00:24:54,600 --> 00:24:58,960
Speaker 3: the case. There is far less restriction on social media

460
00:24:59,000 --> 00:25:01,879
Speaker 3: than there is on televis and radio, where there are

461
00:25:02,000 --> 00:25:05,960
Speaker 3: regulations that require disclosure of who paid for ads. For example,

462
00:25:06,080 --> 00:25:09,520
Speaker 3: on social media, there is no requirement to disclose who

463
00:25:09,560 --> 00:25:12,399
Speaker 3: pays for ads, So Russians could be paying for ads,

464
00:25:12,480 --> 00:25:15,080
Speaker 3: or large corporations could be paying for ads, or one

465
00:25:15,119 --> 00:25:17,560
Speaker 3: really rich guy could be paying for ads, and instead

466
00:25:17,600 --> 00:25:19,280
Speaker 3: they use a name like the Red, White, and Blue

467
00:25:19,320 --> 00:25:22,800
Speaker 3: Grandmothers of America. No requirement to disclose. You know, when

468
00:25:22,840 --> 00:25:24,399
Speaker 3: you watch an ad on television or hear one on

469
00:25:24,480 --> 00:25:26,600
Speaker 3: the radio, they'll say, I'm candidate so and so, and

470
00:25:26,640 --> 00:25:29,000
Speaker 3: I approve of this ad because they have to disclose.

471
00:25:29,280 --> 00:25:32,080
Speaker 3: That's not true on social media. So I think there's

472
00:25:32,080 --> 00:25:34,840
Speaker 3: a lot we can do to regulate social media that

473
00:25:34,960 --> 00:25:38,320
Speaker 3: would comply with the First Amendment and fall short of censorship.

474
00:25:38,520 --> 00:25:40,760
Speaker 3: So one of the things we've learned about social media

475
00:25:41,000 --> 00:25:44,760
Speaker 3: from the congressional testimony of that whistleblower named Francis Hougans

476
00:25:45,119 --> 00:25:47,359
Speaker 3: was that it wasn't so much about the content but

477
00:25:47,440 --> 00:25:52,359
Speaker 3: about the algorithms that so manipulative. So Facebook, for one,

478
00:25:52,880 --> 00:25:56,760
Speaker 3: was using algorithms that was designed to push content that

479
00:25:56,800 --> 00:26:00,440
Speaker 3: would outrage us. The more outrageous the content, the more

480
00:26:00,520 --> 00:26:04,080
Speaker 3: it would get. They introduce the dislike and hate emoji,

481
00:26:04,480 --> 00:26:07,439
Speaker 3: and the more that was attached to an article, the

482
00:26:07,440 --> 00:26:09,639
Speaker 3: more likely that would show up in a prominent place

483
00:26:09,680 --> 00:26:12,480
Speaker 3: in our feeds. And the reason was that kept you

484
00:26:12,520 --> 00:26:15,240
Speaker 3: on the platform, it kept you looking at advertisements, and

485
00:26:15,320 --> 00:26:18,600
Speaker 3: it made them money. Instead, we could require them to

486
00:26:18,720 --> 00:26:22,800
Speaker 3: disclose their algorithms, maybe we don't prohibit them, or we

487
00:26:22,840 --> 00:26:26,119
Speaker 3: could tell them you can't use certain algorithms that manipulate

488
00:26:26,200 --> 00:26:28,239
Speaker 3: your users in this way. So there are a lot

489
00:26:28,320 --> 00:26:30,919
Speaker 3: of things we can do, from requiring disclosure of the

490
00:26:30,920 --> 00:26:35,800
Speaker 3: payment of ads to requiring some transparency around algorithms that

491
00:26:35,840 --> 00:26:39,560
Speaker 3: would be very helpful. I think that could avoid arguments

492
00:26:39,600 --> 00:26:42,320
Speaker 3: about content. Now, I'd go even further than that and

493
00:26:42,359 --> 00:26:46,320
Speaker 3: say that when there is controversial content, they should push

494
00:26:46,400 --> 00:26:49,400
Speaker 3: us toward other sources that even if they're not saying

495
00:26:49,440 --> 00:26:52,560
Speaker 3: this is false, if it's about an election, maybe it

496
00:26:52,600 --> 00:26:56,080
Speaker 3: gives us the website to our state secretary of state

497
00:26:56,160 --> 00:26:58,919
Speaker 3: so we could read more about elections. I think we

498
00:26:58,960 --> 00:27:01,600
Speaker 3: could do those things. Can we require it under the

499
00:27:01,600 --> 00:27:04,280
Speaker 3: First Amendment? I don't know, but I think we can

500
00:27:04,359 --> 00:27:07,639
Speaker 3: permit it. You currently before the Supreme Court, there are

501
00:27:07,640 --> 00:27:10,639
Speaker 3: a couple of lawsuits pending, one out of Texas, the

502
00:27:10,680 --> 00:27:13,760
Speaker 3: other out of Florida where they have statutes that have

503
00:27:13,760 --> 00:27:17,359
Speaker 3: been passed that would prohibit content moderation as censorship, as

504
00:27:17,440 --> 00:27:20,320
Speaker 3: violating First Amendment right. So those are a coup pair

505
00:27:20,359 --> 00:27:23,840
Speaker 3: of cases I am looking for, and media companies have

506
00:27:23,920 --> 00:27:28,480
Speaker 3: joined against those statutes to say, without content moderation, social

507
00:27:28,520 --> 00:27:31,720
Speaker 3: media would be a toxic healscape. You think it's bad, now,

508
00:27:32,040 --> 00:27:34,440
Speaker 3: just way do we stop moderating all the threats and

509
00:27:34,520 --> 00:27:36,720
Speaker 3: harassment and other things we see there? You know, there

510
00:27:36,760 --> 00:27:39,520
Speaker 3: is an argument on the right that social media platforms

511
00:27:39,720 --> 00:27:42,320
Speaker 3: have a pro left bias in their censoring things. On

512
00:27:42,320 --> 00:27:44,920
Speaker 3: the right, I think what the social media platforms would

513
00:27:44,960 --> 00:27:48,600
Speaker 3: say is, well, we do take down things that threaten people,

514
00:27:48,680 --> 00:27:52,400
Speaker 3: that harass people, that target groups, and so this Supreme

515
00:27:52,440 --> 00:27:55,800
Speaker 3: Court decision will decide whether that is permissible. I shudder

516
00:27:55,880 --> 00:27:58,800
Speaker 3: to think what social media will look like if those

517
00:27:58,800 --> 00:28:00,000
Speaker 3: social media companies lose.

518
00:28:00,400 --> 00:28:03,520
Speaker 1: I always think of this Supreme Court as doing the

519
00:28:03,560 --> 00:28:04,720
Speaker 1: worst possible thing.

520
00:28:05,440 --> 00:28:08,199
Speaker 6: But do you have some feeling that they might not.

521
00:28:08,520 --> 00:28:10,080
Speaker 3: I have some feeling that they might not. I don't

522
00:28:10,080 --> 00:28:11,919
Speaker 3: know that they always do the worst possible thing. I

523
00:28:11,920 --> 00:28:15,760
Speaker 3: think that this Supreme Court is extremely conservative. I think

524
00:28:15,800 --> 00:28:19,040
Speaker 3: they are exercising their power, even if it requires an

525
00:28:19,119 --> 00:28:22,600
Speaker 3: overreach of the normal rules about when to overturn precedent.

526
00:28:22,760 --> 00:28:24,840
Speaker 3: But I don't think they're magas, and I don't think

527
00:28:24,960 --> 00:28:26,880
Speaker 3: they're in the bag for Trump. I think that that

528
00:28:27,200 --> 00:28:29,879
Speaker 3: means that in some decisions we will see not the

529
00:28:29,920 --> 00:28:32,400
Speaker 3: worst possible thing they can do. But you know, they

530
00:28:32,400 --> 00:28:35,879
Speaker 3: also favor big business, and so the media giants are

531
00:28:35,880 --> 00:28:38,160
Speaker 3: also a big business, and so I think they will

532
00:28:38,160 --> 00:28:40,600
Speaker 3: look somewhat favorably there as well.

533
00:28:41,000 --> 00:28:44,800
Speaker 1: So crazy, so we know so much more. Like in

534
00:28:44,840 --> 00:28:50,880
Speaker 1: twenty sixteen, what happened we saw disinformation weaponized against Hillary

535
00:28:50,960 --> 00:28:53,040
Speaker 1: Culton like I think about Hillary's emails.

536
00:28:53,200 --> 00:28:54,240
Speaker 2: I actually it's funny.

537
00:28:54,240 --> 00:28:58,200
Speaker 1: I was listening to on the media today and someone

538
00:28:58,240 --> 00:29:01,200
Speaker 1: who is like a straight down the middle journal was saying, no,

539
00:29:01,400 --> 00:29:04,920
Speaker 1: Hillary's emails was a great story and really important, and

540
00:29:05,240 --> 00:29:08,200
Speaker 1: I think that we did the right thing by just

541
00:29:08,600 --> 00:29:13,479
Speaker 1: endlessly rehashing them. But they really were set out in

542
00:29:13,480 --> 00:29:16,600
Speaker 1: a way that was disinformation. Can you talk a little

543
00:29:16,600 --> 00:29:17,560
Speaker 1: bit about wiki leaks.

544
00:29:17,800 --> 00:29:21,440
Speaker 3: Yes, So this was an influence campaign, which is slightly

545
00:29:21,480 --> 00:29:25,360
Speaker 3: different from a disinformation campaign, but it is still intended

546
00:29:25,640 --> 00:29:28,520
Speaker 3: to influence the outcome of an election. So you may

547
00:29:28,560 --> 00:29:33,040
Speaker 3: recall the timing of all of this. Russia steals emails

548
00:29:33,440 --> 00:29:37,400
Speaker 3: from the Democratic National Committee, and you know that includes

549
00:29:37,720 --> 00:29:41,880
Speaker 3: Hillary's emails that include the party chair, and they hold

550
00:29:41,920 --> 00:29:43,920
Speaker 3: on to him for a little while, and then the

551
00:29:44,040 --> 00:29:47,240
Speaker 3: day the excess Hollywood tape gets released in which Donald

552
00:29:47,280 --> 00:29:50,960
Speaker 3: Trump is saying some disgusting things that is very likely

553
00:29:51,000 --> 00:29:53,720
Speaker 3: to lose him a lot of voters, particularly women. Now

554
00:29:53,800 --> 00:29:56,840
Speaker 3: is when Wikileiks decides is the time to drop these emails,

555
00:29:57,200 --> 00:29:59,320
Speaker 3: and so they drop a lot of emails, including some

556
00:29:59,400 --> 00:30:03,440
Speaker 3: that were actually that were unflattering to people in Democratic

557
00:30:03,440 --> 00:30:08,000
Speaker 3: Party leadership, and so Russia is controlling the narrative. Instead

558
00:30:08,000 --> 00:30:10,920
Speaker 3: of talking about access Hollywood, that gets pushed off the

559
00:30:10,960 --> 00:30:14,480
Speaker 3: front page, and instead we're talking about palace intrigue in

560
00:30:14,520 --> 00:30:18,320
Speaker 3: the Democratic Party, so that gets repeated. Of course, the

561
00:30:18,400 --> 00:30:21,560
Speaker 3: other email scandal is a different one, which was Hillary

562
00:30:21,560 --> 00:30:25,800
Speaker 3: Clinton's use of a private email server. Certainly, Caroless, certainly

563
00:30:26,200 --> 00:30:28,600
Speaker 3: is something that voters should have been thinking about and

564
00:30:28,640 --> 00:30:30,760
Speaker 3: been aware of. But this idea that it was ever

565
00:30:30,880 --> 00:30:34,680
Speaker 3: criminal was far fretch from the start. Ultimately concluded, the

566
00:30:34,760 --> 00:30:37,720
Speaker 3: FBI concluded no crime, and then Jim call me, I

567
00:30:37,760 --> 00:30:39,760
Speaker 3: think makes a real serious mistake.

568
00:30:41,560 --> 00:30:45,760
Speaker 1: I do truly, truly hate Jim Camy. I'm sure you've worked.

569
00:30:45,440 --> 00:30:47,280
Speaker 3: With him, and I think he's a decent person. But

570
00:30:47,360 --> 00:30:50,960
Speaker 3: I think that he overestimated his own personal credibility when

571
00:30:51,120 --> 00:30:54,040
Speaker 3: he thought that he needed to say some things. I

572
00:30:54,080 --> 00:30:56,880
Speaker 3: don't know if it was to appease Republicans or because

573
00:30:56,920 --> 00:31:00,440
Speaker 3: he thought he himself had such great credibility that people

574
00:31:00,440 --> 00:31:03,000
Speaker 3: would accept what he had to say. I think when

575
00:31:03,120 --> 00:31:06,120
Speaker 3: times are tough, it's best to follow DOJ policy and.

576
00:31:06,000 --> 00:31:08,200
Speaker 1: Not just to go out on your own and throw

577
00:31:08,240 --> 00:31:09,480
Speaker 1: the election to Donald Trump.

578
00:31:09,600 --> 00:31:12,240
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm both In July when he said the investigation

579
00:31:12,400 --> 00:31:14,920
Speaker 3: was closed. You know, he made a lot of disparaging

580
00:31:14,960 --> 00:31:19,000
Speaker 3: comments about Hillary Clinton that is in violation of DOJ policy,

581
00:31:19,320 --> 00:31:21,200
Speaker 3: just as we have seen, by the way, with Robert

582
00:31:21,240 --> 00:31:24,240
Speaker 3: Hurr and Joe Biden talking about you know, his memory

583
00:31:24,280 --> 00:31:26,560
Speaker 3: and his elderly and other things. There is a DJ

584
00:31:26,960 --> 00:31:30,480
Speaker 3: principle of federal prosecution that says the prosecutor should refrain

585
00:31:30,520 --> 00:31:34,000
Speaker 3: from disparaging a person when charges will not be filed.

586
00:31:34,160 --> 00:31:36,920
Speaker 3: And so back to twenty sixteen, I digress. And then

587
00:31:36,960 --> 00:31:39,160
Speaker 3: when he reopens the case, you know, they discover a

588
00:31:39,200 --> 00:31:42,080
Speaker 3: few more emails on I think it was Anthony Wiener's computer,

589
00:31:42,200 --> 00:31:44,240
Speaker 3: and they realized that he look at some more and

590
00:31:44,240 --> 00:31:45,480
Speaker 3: he didn't know how long it would take. In fact,

591
00:31:45,520 --> 00:31:46,840
Speaker 3: it took a few days and they were done before

592
00:31:46,840 --> 00:31:48,880
Speaker 3: the election, but he felt the need to report to

593
00:31:48,960 --> 00:31:52,720
Speaker 3: Congress that they had reopened the investigation. I don't understand

594
00:31:52,760 --> 00:31:55,120
Speaker 3: why there is a need to do that. Ordinarily, it

595
00:31:55,240 --> 00:31:57,480
Speaker 3: is the policy of the Department of Justice to neither

596
00:31:57,480 --> 00:32:00,360
Speaker 3: confirm nor deny the existence of an investigation. I think

597
00:32:00,400 --> 00:32:03,640
Speaker 3: at that point, if charges are merited, you file them.

598
00:32:03,760 --> 00:32:05,960
Speaker 3: But to say we're going to be looking at these

599
00:32:06,040 --> 00:32:08,520
Speaker 3: emails over the next few days. It just put the

600
00:32:08,600 --> 00:32:12,280
Speaker 3: matter in the headlines again, stayed there for several days.

601
00:32:12,240 --> 00:32:13,640
Speaker 6: And it lost her the election.

602
00:32:13,960 --> 00:32:16,120
Speaker 3: I don't know if we know with mathematical certainty, but

603
00:32:16,480 --> 00:32:19,080
Speaker 3: in light of how close that election was, it certainly

604
00:32:19,120 --> 00:32:21,560
Speaker 3: had to sway voters to see those headlines. And the

605
00:32:21,640 --> 00:32:24,520
Speaker 3: other data point I'll mention Molly is that there is

606
00:32:24,680 --> 00:32:27,959
Speaker 3: I forget the statistic now, but more than any single

607
00:32:28,040 --> 00:32:32,479
Speaker 3: policy issue, Hillary Clinton's emails dominated the news cycle by

608
00:32:32,520 --> 00:32:34,640
Speaker 3: a factor of you know, I forget the number, but

609
00:32:34,720 --> 00:32:38,440
Speaker 3: it's you know, sixty to one or some outrageous ratio,

610
00:32:38,560 --> 00:32:42,560
Speaker 3: and so that became the narrative on Hillary Clinton instead

611
00:32:42,560 --> 00:32:45,720
Speaker 3: of anything about you know, her experience or positions between

612
00:32:45,760 --> 00:32:49,480
Speaker 3: the two parties, between the two candidates. And so I

613
00:32:49,520 --> 00:32:54,280
Speaker 3: do think that that issue, both the way the Justice

614
00:32:54,280 --> 00:32:58,160
Speaker 3: Department and Jim Comy in particular handled Hillary Clinton's email investigation,

615
00:32:58,760 --> 00:33:03,440
Speaker 3: and the way Rush used WikiLeaks to drop these emails

616
00:33:03,480 --> 00:33:07,200
Speaker 3: on the public in October close to the election, to

617
00:33:07,400 --> 00:33:11,600
Speaker 3: push the EXUS Hollywood tape off of the headlines, I

618
00:33:11,600 --> 00:33:14,280
Speaker 3: think those absolutely had some influence in the outcome of

619
00:33:14,320 --> 00:33:14,720
Speaker 3: the election.

620
00:33:15,120 --> 00:33:17,560
Speaker 6: Jesus such a nightmare.

621
00:33:17,720 --> 00:33:23,320
Speaker 1: So if you were committed to trying desperately to stop

622
00:33:23,720 --> 00:33:28,560
Speaker 1: foreign interference in our elections right now, what would you do?

623
00:33:28,680 --> 00:33:30,480
Speaker 6: Give me one or two suggestions.

624
00:33:30,600 --> 00:33:34,800
Speaker 3: Well, for foreign influence, I would say most importantly is

625
00:33:35,120 --> 00:33:39,160
Speaker 3: to get transparency in advertising on social media. I don't

626
00:33:39,160 --> 00:33:40,800
Speaker 3: know if we're going to see that change happen in

627
00:33:40,800 --> 00:33:45,000
Speaker 3: time for the election. I would also eliminate anonymous users

628
00:33:45,040 --> 00:33:48,200
Speaker 3: on social media. We know Robert Muller's report that there

629
00:33:48,280 --> 00:33:52,160
Speaker 3: were account holders that had millions of followers that were

630
00:33:52,560 --> 00:33:57,200
Speaker 3: Russian operatives. There was one called Blacktivist that spent many

631
00:33:57,240 --> 00:34:02,200
Speaker 3: months gaining followers, saying things that seemed very mainstream if

632
00:34:02,280 --> 00:34:04,720
Speaker 3: you were you know who, This person purported to be

633
00:34:04,800 --> 00:34:07,720
Speaker 3: a black activist, lots of things that people would like

634
00:34:07,800 --> 00:34:10,400
Speaker 3: and share and follow, and they believe this person to

635
00:34:10,400 --> 00:34:13,640
Speaker 3: be a credible black activist. And then as the election approach,

636
00:34:13,680 --> 00:34:16,799
Speaker 3: said things like, don't vote for Hillary, stay home, you

637
00:34:16,840 --> 00:34:19,000
Speaker 3: don't have to vote for Trump, just don't vote for anybody,

638
00:34:19,120 --> 00:34:22,520
Speaker 3: vote for Jill Stunt. Hillary doesn't care about the black vote,

639
00:34:22,560 --> 00:34:25,360
Speaker 3: don't vote for her. And so that was made possible

640
00:34:25,600 --> 00:34:30,000
Speaker 3: by anonymous accounts, by the ability to call themselves blacktivists,

641
00:34:30,040 --> 00:34:33,000
Speaker 3: and so I think we should require social media companies

642
00:34:33,000 --> 00:34:36,040
Speaker 3: to verify all of its users, and not by simply

643
00:34:36,080 --> 00:34:40,799
Speaker 3: paying a fee, but by genuinely sharing identification documents so

644
00:34:40,880 --> 00:34:43,880
Speaker 3: that people are who they say they are, because I

645
00:34:43,880 --> 00:34:48,359
Speaker 3: think that is a really dangerous way that disinformers can succeed. Now,

646
00:34:48,400 --> 00:34:52,120
Speaker 3: I'm more worried about attacks from within our own country

647
00:34:52,120 --> 00:34:55,200
Speaker 3: that I am about foreign interference. I'm worried about political

648
00:34:55,200 --> 00:34:57,640
Speaker 3: operatives now who have learned from the Russians how this

649
00:34:57,800 --> 00:35:01,080
Speaker 3: game is played. And so Trump has truth social where

650
00:35:01,120 --> 00:35:03,720
Speaker 3: he is posting all kinds of things that are trying

651
00:35:03,760 --> 00:35:06,880
Speaker 3: to persuade voters that things that are not true are true.

652
00:35:07,160 --> 00:35:09,440
Speaker 3: You know, he's been talking about we need to preserve

653
00:35:09,520 --> 00:35:13,960
Speaker 3: our great presidential immunity, as if that's a thing. Yeah,

654
00:35:14,160 --> 00:35:16,719
Speaker 3: but people receive you see that and think, oh, it's

655
00:35:16,800 --> 00:35:19,520
Speaker 3: Jack Smith is trying to change the status quo and

656
00:35:19,560 --> 00:35:22,480
Speaker 3: we can our presidency, when that's not the case at all.

657
00:35:22,520 --> 00:35:23,439
Speaker 3: There's no such thing.

658
00:35:23,719 --> 00:35:26,560
Speaker 6: Thank you so much, Barb for joining us. I hope

659
00:35:26,560 --> 00:35:27,239
Speaker 6: you'll come back.

660
00:35:27,440 --> 00:35:29,239
Speaker 3: Well, thanks Molly, it's been a pleasure talking with you.

661
00:35:29,239 --> 00:35:30,080
Speaker 3: I'd love to do anytime.

662
00:35:31,800 --> 00:35:35,279
Speaker 1: Carlos Lozada is an opinion writer at the New York

663
00:35:35,320 --> 00:35:38,600
Speaker 1: Times and author of the Washington book How to Read

664
00:35:38,719 --> 00:35:43,280
Speaker 1: Politics and Politicians. Welcome to Fast Politics, Carlos Losana.

665
00:35:43,360 --> 00:35:44,480
Speaker 5: Thank you so much for having me.

666
00:35:44,760 --> 00:35:45,880
Speaker 2: I'm so excited to have you.

667
00:35:45,960 --> 00:35:51,680
Speaker 1: I'm a longtime listener, first time caller. Let's talk about

668
00:35:51,760 --> 00:35:54,080
Speaker 1: this book. You know, I was reading the excerpt in

669
00:35:54,120 --> 00:35:57,879
Speaker 1: The New York Times yesterday and I'm hoping you could

670
00:35:57,880 --> 00:36:00,840
Speaker 1: explain to us your theory of the case with this book.

671
00:36:01,000 --> 00:36:05,000
Speaker 5: Sure. So, I've been a Washington journalist for about twenty

672
00:36:05,040 --> 00:36:07,520
Speaker 5: five years. I'm like dating myself here, and in that time,

673
00:36:07,560 --> 00:36:10,960
Speaker 5: I've read a ton of Washington books. You know, I

674
00:36:11,000 --> 00:36:13,560
Speaker 5: define that very broadly. It's like, you know, presidential memoirs

675
00:36:13,600 --> 00:36:16,880
Speaker 5: and biography, and you know, journalist books on campaigns and

676
00:36:16,920 --> 00:36:20,880
Speaker 5: the like, but also commission reports and Supreme Court opinions,

677
00:36:21,040 --> 00:36:25,040
Speaker 5: special Council investigations, you know, all the texts of official Washington.

678
00:36:25,160 --> 00:36:27,560
Speaker 5: And I've covered these as as a book critic for

679
00:36:27,640 --> 00:36:30,919
Speaker 5: The Washington Post and now as an opinion columnist at

680
00:36:31,000 --> 00:36:33,440
Speaker 5: the New York Times. And when people hear that, this

681
00:36:33,520 --> 00:36:36,520
Speaker 5: is how I spend my time, like you know, like reading,

682
00:36:36,560 --> 00:36:39,319
Speaker 5: like Mike Pence's memoir, and you know that sort of thing.

683
00:36:39,719 --> 00:36:42,720
Speaker 5: People say to me, like, Wow, I'm glad you're reading

684
00:36:42,760 --> 00:36:44,640
Speaker 5: those books and telling us what's in them, but like,

685
00:36:45,080 --> 00:36:47,239
Speaker 5: I would never read them, like you're reading that so

686
00:36:47,320 --> 00:36:50,759
Speaker 5: that we don't have And the implication of like you

687
00:36:50,840 --> 00:36:52,520
Speaker 5: read them so we don't have to is that these

688
00:36:52,520 --> 00:36:55,759
Speaker 5: books are bad, right, they're self serving, boring, or their propaganda.

689
00:36:55,960 --> 00:37:00,839
Speaker 5: But I am a real believer in the world Washington Book.

690
00:37:00,880 --> 00:37:03,160
Speaker 5: I want to make the case for the Washington Book

691
00:37:03,160 --> 00:37:06,240
Speaker 5: because what I've found, you know, for all these years

692
00:37:06,320 --> 00:37:09,799
Speaker 5: of reading and writing about them, is that no matter

693
00:37:09,840 --> 00:37:13,880
Speaker 5: how carefully these political figures, you know, sanitize their records

694
00:37:13,960 --> 00:37:18,680
Speaker 5: and their experiences, or present themselves in the most you know, favorable, electable,

695
00:37:18,760 --> 00:37:23,080
Speaker 5: confirmable light, they always end up revealing themselves right in

696
00:37:23,560 --> 00:37:26,120
Speaker 5: some way, you know, they they end up telling us

697
00:37:26,160 --> 00:37:28,360
Speaker 5: who they really are. And it could be like a

698
00:37:28,360 --> 00:37:32,800
Speaker 5: little throwaway line here, a recurring phrase, something in the acknowledgments.

699
00:37:32,920 --> 00:37:35,320
Speaker 5: The acknowledgements are by the way, like an amazing source

700
00:37:35,400 --> 00:37:38,799
Speaker 5: of information about about these people. But it's in there somewhere, right,

701
00:37:38,840 --> 00:37:41,680
Speaker 5: And that means that even books that are I grant

702
00:37:41,719 --> 00:37:45,200
Speaker 5: you all of those things, right, propagandistic and self serving,

703
00:37:45,560 --> 00:37:49,600
Speaker 5: are still really illuminating about our politicians, but also about

704
00:37:49,800 --> 00:37:53,360
Speaker 5: our politics. And so my book, The Washington Book is

705
00:37:53,600 --> 00:37:57,720
Speaker 5: a collection of my digging into my deep dives into

706
00:37:57,920 --> 00:38:01,319
Speaker 5: Washington books over the past decade, basically starting from like

707
00:38:01,600 --> 00:38:05,719
Speaker 5: this Town, you know, by Mark Lebovich, through to you know,

708
00:38:06,040 --> 00:38:09,760
Speaker 5: the Trump indictments. That's the Washington Book. And I hope

709
00:38:09,800 --> 00:38:12,520
Speaker 5: that once you get through it you will find that

710
00:38:12,840 --> 00:38:15,440
Speaker 5: the case for the Washington Book is real and that

711
00:38:15,640 --> 00:38:18,520
Speaker 5: these really are, you know, if you read it carefully enough,

712
00:38:19,120 --> 00:38:20,920
Speaker 5: very revelatory texts.

713
00:38:21,440 --> 00:38:24,239
Speaker 1: Yeah, this is a really good point, especially when you

714
00:38:24,320 --> 00:38:28,959
Speaker 1: talk about things like the Trump indictment or the Mahla Report,

715
00:38:29,200 --> 00:38:34,800
Speaker 1: or these large reams of paper filled with information that

716
00:38:35,000 --> 00:38:37,880
Speaker 1: may or may not be carefully combed through. Can you

717
00:38:37,960 --> 00:38:39,880
Speaker 1: talk about other books like that?

718
00:38:40,320 --> 00:38:43,080
Speaker 5: Yeah? Sure, I mean there's just a slew of different

719
00:38:43,160 --> 00:38:45,799
Speaker 5: examples before we get into like the big reports. I

720
00:38:45,800 --> 00:38:48,120
Speaker 5: want to like one example of a book that maybe

721
00:38:48,160 --> 00:38:50,080
Speaker 5: not a lot of people read, but that to me

722
00:38:50,280 --> 00:38:54,400
Speaker 5: was incredibly useful to understanding Barack Obama. For instance. You know,

723
00:38:54,440 --> 00:38:56,640
Speaker 5: he wrote Dreams for My Father and Audacity, The Hoope

724
00:38:56,640 --> 00:38:59,319
Speaker 5: and now his first presidential memoir, you know, and those

725
00:38:59,320 --> 00:39:01,640
Speaker 5: are those are those are good books to read to

726
00:39:01,680 --> 00:39:03,800
Speaker 5: try to understand him. I read those, But I also

727
00:39:03,880 --> 00:39:07,160
Speaker 5: read this book by Reggie Love, who was the guy

728
00:39:07,200 --> 00:39:09,520
Speaker 5: who was his personal aid, like you know, the body

729
00:39:09,560 --> 00:39:12,520
Speaker 5: man that you know, candidates and presidents have. He wrote

730
00:39:12,520 --> 00:39:16,320
Speaker 5: a book called Power Forward, My Presidential Education. He was

731
00:39:16,360 --> 00:39:18,560
Speaker 5: a basketball player, so that's how Power Forward, you know,

732
00:39:18,680 --> 00:39:20,800
Speaker 5: makes it make sense. But there was one little detail

733
00:39:20,840 --> 00:39:24,359
Speaker 5: in that book that for me, just captures Obama so well.

734
00:39:24,400 --> 00:39:26,120
Speaker 5: It's the only thing I remember from this book, or

735
00:39:26,120 --> 00:39:28,000
Speaker 5: the thing I remember best from this book, I should say,

736
00:39:28,040 --> 00:39:30,840
Speaker 5: and that is that there was a moment when Reggie

737
00:39:30,880 --> 00:39:35,120
Speaker 5: Love forgot to bring Obama's briefcase on the plane, and

738
00:39:35,239 --> 00:39:36,560
Speaker 5: you know, he's like, oh my god, I'm going to

739
00:39:36,600 --> 00:39:38,840
Speaker 5: get fired. You know, he's freaking out. Obama, you know,

740
00:39:39,120 --> 00:39:42,680
Speaker 5: was annoyed but gracious, and you know, forgave him for it.

741
00:39:42,920 --> 00:39:46,160
Speaker 5: And then Love explains, you know that Obama mentioned one

742
00:39:46,239 --> 00:39:48,880
Speaker 5: reason he had been so annoyed about the missing bag,

743
00:39:49,120 --> 00:39:51,920
Speaker 5: and he said he wanted to be seen carrying something

744
00:39:52,000 --> 00:39:56,000
Speaker 5: off the plane because he said JFK carried his own

745
00:39:56,080 --> 00:39:59,560
Speaker 5: backs and like that told me so much. That told

746
00:39:59,560 --> 00:40:03,000
Speaker 5: me how so carefully Obama thought about his public image

747
00:40:03,320 --> 00:40:06,520
Speaker 5: and how he was sort of hearkening back to perhaps

748
00:40:06,520 --> 00:40:11,239
Speaker 5: our most mythologized former president to develop the image and

749
00:40:11,320 --> 00:40:16,200
Speaker 5: story behind perhaps our second most mythologized who was Barack Obama.

750
00:40:16,280 --> 00:40:19,279
Speaker 5: And so that's just one little detail in a book

751
00:40:19,320 --> 00:40:22,399
Speaker 5: that did not make major waves. But if you read them,

752
00:40:22,440 --> 00:40:25,640
Speaker 5: you find stuff like that. That's why I you know,

753
00:40:25,680 --> 00:40:27,360
Speaker 5: sort of enjoy digging through these.

754
00:40:27,239 --> 00:40:28,920
Speaker 6: Books really interesting.

755
00:40:29,560 --> 00:40:31,600
Speaker 2: But talk to us about these.

756
00:40:31,480 --> 00:40:35,480
Speaker 1: Huge government reports, because there is so much in there,

757
00:40:35,719 --> 00:40:38,919
Speaker 1: and they're also I mean, certainly there are people who

758
00:40:39,200 --> 00:40:39,960
Speaker 1: dig through them.

759
00:40:40,040 --> 00:40:41,760
Speaker 2: But being someone who.

760
00:40:41,840 --> 00:40:45,640
Speaker 1: Has all this knowledge from reading all these books and

761
00:40:45,680 --> 00:40:50,239
Speaker 1: then is going into these reports, explain to me a

762
00:40:50,280 --> 00:40:52,880
Speaker 1: little bit. I mean, do you ever find stuff in

763
00:40:52,920 --> 00:40:56,000
Speaker 1: there that is like, holy shit, no one's seen this.

764
00:40:56,360 --> 00:40:58,520
Speaker 5: There's two ways to kind of comb through these books, right,

765
00:40:58,680 --> 00:41:03,319
Speaker 5: One is looking for that little detail that is, you know,

766
00:41:03,400 --> 00:41:07,400
Speaker 5: sort of new and revelatory or sometimes ambiguous in a

767
00:41:07,440 --> 00:41:11,560
Speaker 5: really fascinating way. So, for instance, you remember Cassidy Hutchinson's

768
00:41:11,600 --> 00:41:16,000
Speaker 5: testimony in the January six hearings, right, and she was

769
00:41:16,120 --> 00:41:20,279
Speaker 5: there the mourning of Donald Trump's speech at the Ellipse, right,

770
00:41:20,320 --> 00:41:22,880
Speaker 5: and she's describing how he wanted them to take the

771
00:41:22,920 --> 00:41:27,640
Speaker 5: magatometers away so that even if like his supporters were armed,

772
00:41:27,680 --> 00:41:29,520
Speaker 5: he still wanted them to come through and be where

773
00:41:29,520 --> 00:41:31,200
Speaker 5: he was because he wanted the bigger crowd. That was

774
00:41:31,280 --> 00:41:32,880
Speaker 5: kind of a big dramatic.

775
00:41:32,440 --> 00:41:34,080
Speaker 2: Moment, and they were his people.

776
00:41:34,200 --> 00:41:37,000
Speaker 5: They were exactly, you know, let my people in. But

777
00:41:37,040 --> 00:41:40,160
Speaker 5: there was one moment in Hutchinson's testimony that to me

778
00:41:40,440 --> 00:41:43,600
Speaker 5: was so interesting because you know, she quotes him, you know,

779
00:41:43,680 --> 00:41:46,480
Speaker 5: something along these lines. Right, she says that he said,

780
00:41:46,680 --> 00:41:49,759
Speaker 5: you know, let them through. They're not here to hurt me.

781
00:41:50,320 --> 00:41:55,760
Speaker 5: And depending on how you say that sentence out loud,

782
00:41:56,160 --> 00:41:59,120
Speaker 5: it has two radically different meaning. Think about where you

783
00:41:59,160 --> 00:42:02,600
Speaker 5: put the emphasis. Right, they're not here to hurt me, right,

784
00:42:02,640 --> 00:42:05,000
Speaker 5: if it's unhurt and that means what that means. You know,

785
00:42:05,040 --> 00:42:07,200
Speaker 5: he thinks they're here to praise me, they're here to

786
00:42:07,280 --> 00:42:08,960
Speaker 5: support me, they're here to applaud me.

787
00:42:09,120 --> 00:42:09,239
Speaker 4: Right.

788
00:42:09,520 --> 00:42:12,920
Speaker 5: If it's they're not here to hurt me, then it's

789
00:42:12,960 --> 00:42:15,960
Speaker 5: suddenly far more nefarious. Right, it's they're here to hurt

790
00:42:16,000 --> 00:42:18,640
Speaker 5: someone else. Right, I'm safe, but they might go after

791
00:42:18,680 --> 00:42:20,719
Speaker 5: somebody else you know, And so I went back and

792
00:42:20,760 --> 00:42:23,359
Speaker 5: I looked at the video of her testimony. I look

793
00:42:23,440 --> 00:42:25,960
Speaker 5: to see how that quote was rendered in a few

794
00:42:25,960 --> 00:42:28,760
Speaker 5: different moments in the January sixth Committee report.

795
00:42:28,960 --> 00:42:29,440
Speaker 4: The way she.

796
00:42:29,480 --> 00:42:32,400
Speaker 5: Describes it as kind of neutral, you know, in the

797
00:42:32,760 --> 00:42:36,000
Speaker 5: they italicize one word versus the other in different parts

798
00:42:36,040 --> 00:42:39,439
Speaker 5: of the report, and so it's not exactly clear what

799
00:42:39,960 --> 00:42:43,600
Speaker 5: Trump actually said in that moment. But to me, that's

800
00:42:43,640 --> 00:42:46,480
Speaker 5: one of the most fascinating moments in the entire report, right,

801
00:42:46,560 --> 00:42:50,920
Speaker 5: Like it's like the stress that you put on a single,

802
00:42:51,520 --> 00:42:55,680
Speaker 5: one syllable word can radically change the way you read

803
00:42:56,040 --> 00:42:59,440
Speaker 5: what happened that day. So to me, that's like, that's

804
00:42:59,520 --> 00:43:01,520
Speaker 5: one of the joys of reading these.

805
00:43:01,560 --> 00:43:03,760
Speaker 1: The only thing I would say is that the context

806
00:43:03,800 --> 00:43:07,200
Speaker 1: seems really important there, right, I mean, like if you didn't.

807
00:43:06,960 --> 00:43:09,759
Speaker 5: Know, oh definitely, But you know, if this he do

808
00:43:09,800 --> 00:43:12,400
Speaker 5: you think that the January sixth Report provides it is

809
00:43:12,440 --> 00:43:15,040
Speaker 5: that context. The one thing that makes clearest of all

810
00:43:15,120 --> 00:43:18,080
Speaker 5: I think is that Trump knew that all the things

811
00:43:18,080 --> 00:43:21,280
Speaker 5: he was saying about the election were false, right because

812
00:43:21,360 --> 00:43:23,879
Speaker 5: it you know, there's this wonderful, like two or three

813
00:43:23,920 --> 00:43:26,480
Speaker 5: page chart in the middle of the January sixth report,

814
00:43:26,600 --> 00:43:28,879
Speaker 5: where it shows like every time that he had been

815
00:43:28,920 --> 00:43:33,279
Speaker 5: told by you know, the Attorney General, by a top eight,

816
00:43:33,280 --> 00:43:35,719
Speaker 5: a D, a J. By one of his own campaign staffers.

817
00:43:35,719 --> 00:43:37,440
Speaker 5: You know that that you know, X, Y or Z

818
00:43:37,600 --> 00:43:40,359
Speaker 5: thing was wrong, that actually we lost this stage, or

819
00:43:40,400 --> 00:43:42,719
Speaker 5: you know, what you're saying isn't true. And then you

820
00:43:42,760 --> 00:43:45,120
Speaker 5: know it shows how you know the exact you know,

821
00:43:45,360 --> 00:43:48,400
Speaker 5: day later he's out, you know, repeating the same the

822
00:43:48,440 --> 00:43:51,560
Speaker 5: same lie. But what I find I try to look

823
00:43:51,560 --> 00:43:55,200
Speaker 5: at these all these reports as almost like speaking to

824
00:43:55,320 --> 00:43:57,960
Speaker 5: each other, as as as chapters of a of a

825
00:43:58,000 --> 00:44:02,799
Speaker 5: bigger story rather than his and his des greet individual moments. Right,

826
00:44:02,920 --> 00:44:05,480
Speaker 5: if you read, say the Muller Report, and then you

827
00:44:05,520 --> 00:44:10,160
Speaker 5: read the Special Committee report on Trump and Ukraine right

828
00:44:10,200 --> 00:44:13,239
Speaker 5: on the perfect call, you know that thing led to

829
00:44:13,239 --> 00:44:16,160
Speaker 5: the first impeachment, and then you read the January six report,

830
00:44:16,320 --> 00:44:18,319
Speaker 5: you sort of see how they're talking to each other.

831
00:44:18,440 --> 00:44:18,600
Speaker 4: Right.

832
00:44:18,960 --> 00:44:21,920
Speaker 5: The Mallor report very restrained. Right, the Mallor Report was

833
00:44:22,080 --> 00:44:25,160
Speaker 5: recognizant of what it could and could not do. You know,

834
00:44:25,200 --> 00:44:27,200
Speaker 5: we can indet a city president. It sort of bent

835
00:44:27,239 --> 00:44:30,200
Speaker 5: over backward to give Trump the benefit of the doubt.

836
00:44:30,400 --> 00:44:35,120
Speaker 5: But it kept saying, actually, this is for some future investigation.

837
00:44:35,400 --> 00:44:39,080
Speaker 5: This is I don't want to preempt constitutional remedies. And

838
00:44:39,160 --> 00:44:42,040
Speaker 5: so it kind of like glaid the groundwork for what

839
00:44:42,360 --> 00:44:45,560
Speaker 5: future investigators could do. And you see how the Ukraine

840
00:44:45,600 --> 00:44:48,600
Speaker 5: Report and the January six report, you know, completely picked

841
00:44:48,680 --> 00:44:51,239
Speaker 5: up on the things that Mueller almost that the Mother

842
00:44:51,360 --> 00:44:53,839
Speaker 5: Report wished it could have done but wasn't able to do.

843
00:44:54,040 --> 00:44:56,880
Speaker 5: And so it's impossible for me to read these and

844
00:44:57,000 --> 00:45:00,920
Speaker 5: isolation from one another, like that's that's the key, you know.

845
00:45:00,960 --> 00:45:03,640
Speaker 5: When the January six Commity Report came out, I use

846
00:45:03,719 --> 00:45:06,640
Speaker 5: that as an opportunity to write like one big piece

847
00:45:06,680 --> 00:45:10,439
Speaker 5: about all three of these investigations together, because they really

848
00:45:10,480 --> 00:45:11,560
Speaker 5: are talking to each other.

849
00:45:11,840 --> 00:45:12,960
Speaker 6: It's really interesting.

850
00:45:13,640 --> 00:45:16,480
Speaker 1: So I want to go back to your case for

851
00:45:16,840 --> 00:45:22,520
Speaker 1: like Mike Pence's memoir, because I remember seeing that and thinking,

852
00:45:23,120 --> 00:45:25,759
Speaker 1: like I think about many political books like who is

853
00:45:25,800 --> 00:45:29,879
Speaker 1: this for? Which again is not really Mike Pence's problem, right,

854
00:45:29,920 --> 00:45:33,080
Speaker 1: that's the publisher's problem. But explain to us a little

855
00:45:33,080 --> 00:45:37,359
Speaker 1: bit about the merits of Mike Pence's memoir. This is

856
00:45:37,400 --> 00:45:40,160
Speaker 1: a hot take and perhaps contrarian.

857
00:45:40,920 --> 00:45:42,680
Speaker 5: That's why you were having me on to talk about

858
00:45:42,719 --> 00:45:44,439
Speaker 5: why Mike Pence's memoir reading.

859
00:45:44,680 --> 00:45:46,840
Speaker 6: I read this and I thought it was interesting.

860
00:45:47,320 --> 00:45:49,440
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, first of all, there's kind of why

861
00:45:49,480 --> 00:45:52,680
Speaker 5: these books exist at all. Right, I think published play

862
00:45:52,680 --> 00:45:54,960
Speaker 5: a kind of sweepstakes. They think, you know, one of

863
00:45:55,000 --> 00:45:57,360
Speaker 5: these people is going to be presidents of the United States,

864
00:45:57,600 --> 00:45:59,640
Speaker 5: and when that happens, you know people are going to

865
00:45:59,640 --> 00:46:01,319
Speaker 5: look alone this book or or one of them will

866
00:46:01,320 --> 00:46:03,600
Speaker 5: become the nominee. And so that's why you end up

867
00:46:03,640 --> 00:46:07,040
Speaker 5: with like the existence of like a Tim palente book, right,

868
00:46:07,200 --> 00:46:10,480
Speaker 5: exactly like Tim Polenti's book was I Believe Courage to

869
00:46:10,560 --> 00:46:12,200
Speaker 5: Stand an American story.

870
00:46:12,400 --> 00:46:13,280
Speaker 2: I can't even.

871
00:46:13,080 --> 00:46:16,120
Speaker 1: Remember who Tim Polenti is. Can you just remind us

872
00:46:16,200 --> 00:46:17,560
Speaker 1: from my dad who was.

873
00:46:17,480 --> 00:46:18,200
Speaker 2: Listening to this.

874
00:46:18,560 --> 00:46:23,480
Speaker 5: Tim Polenti was running or president. He was governor of Minnesota.

875
00:46:23,560 --> 00:46:24,400
Speaker 6: He was a Republican.

876
00:46:24,480 --> 00:46:28,880
Speaker 5: Yes, Republican governor of Minnesota. Reef hot moment when people

877
00:46:28,960 --> 00:46:32,360
Speaker 5: thought that Tipau was of presidential timber he was.

878
00:46:32,680 --> 00:46:36,799
Speaker 1: He was running for the He had pomentum for the past.

879
00:46:36,800 --> 00:46:38,120
Speaker 6: That's what Jesse just said.

880
00:46:38,480 --> 00:46:41,759
Speaker 5: There was pomentum. Yeah, not to be confused with with with.

881
00:46:41,840 --> 00:46:43,720
Speaker 2: Joeman or clomentum.

882
00:46:43,800 --> 00:46:46,400
Speaker 5: Yeah, but he ran for president in twenty twelve, and

883
00:46:46,440 --> 00:46:50,040
Speaker 5: there was, like reef brief talk that he might be

884
00:46:50,760 --> 00:46:54,040
Speaker 5: a deep candidate for Romney, but that didn't go anywhere either.

885
00:46:54,160 --> 00:46:57,520
Speaker 5: I used sort of Tim Polenti's book as an example of,

886
00:46:57,719 --> 00:47:00,960
Speaker 5: you know, a book that someone published, but that that

887
00:47:01,080 --> 00:47:03,239
Speaker 5: death maybe didn't pan out in the sense that he,

888
00:47:03,480 --> 00:47:06,759
Speaker 5: you know, he did not become you know, either a

889
00:47:07,000 --> 00:47:09,960
Speaker 5: me or a reep or a book that then someone

890
00:47:10,040 --> 00:47:12,560
Speaker 5: is going to want to sort of go go back to.

891
00:47:12,840 --> 00:47:15,759
Speaker 5: You know, these are kind of like a publisher's sweepstakes,

892
00:47:15,840 --> 00:47:18,839
Speaker 5: you know, hoping that one of them pans out. Pence's book,

893
00:47:18,840 --> 00:47:21,160
Speaker 5: he was already clearly a public figure. This was sort

894
00:47:21,200 --> 00:47:24,240
Speaker 5: of looking back on his vice presidency, and it came out,

895
00:47:24,440 --> 00:47:28,359
Speaker 5: you know, after he had distinguished himself by not being

896
00:47:28,440 --> 00:47:32,920
Speaker 5: hung on January six and by not refusing to certify vote.

897
00:47:32,960 --> 00:47:34,719
Speaker 5: In this book, he was kind of it was a

898
00:47:34,719 --> 00:47:36,560
Speaker 5: bit of a victory lap about you know, what he

899
00:47:36,600 --> 00:47:39,000
Speaker 5: had done on January sixth, that that was a lot

900
00:47:39,040 --> 00:47:41,239
Speaker 5: of it. And so in that sense, is it incredibly

901
00:47:41,280 --> 00:47:44,799
Speaker 5: revelatory on some of those basic elements. Maybe not. But

902
00:47:45,080 --> 00:47:47,200
Speaker 5: just like the point I made with you know, JFK

903
00:47:47,280 --> 00:47:49,640
Speaker 5: carried his own bags. You know, Like, there's one moment

904
00:47:49,840 --> 00:47:54,000
Speaker 5: in the Pence book that I find so telling, and

905
00:47:54,040 --> 00:47:57,120
Speaker 5: that is when he's looking back on January sixth, and

906
00:47:57,440 --> 00:48:00,200
Speaker 5: he is talking about how he did the right thing,

907
00:48:00,360 --> 00:48:03,440
Speaker 5: and then he mentions how Trump finally issued that video

908
00:48:03,560 --> 00:48:06,600
Speaker 5: telling people to leave the cap after taking far too

909
00:48:06,640 --> 00:48:09,080
Speaker 5: long to sort of make any effort in that regard.

910
00:48:09,200 --> 00:48:13,240
Speaker 5: He then quotes Pence in his book quotes from Trump's

911
00:48:13,920 --> 00:48:18,080
Speaker 5: video address, except he makes one omission in the quote.

912
00:48:18,120 --> 00:48:20,040
Speaker 5: So here's what he quotes in the book. I know

913
00:48:20,160 --> 00:48:23,520
Speaker 5: your pain, I know you're hurt dot dot dot, but

914
00:48:23,600 --> 00:48:25,880
Speaker 5: you have to go home now. We have to have peace.

915
00:48:26,239 --> 00:48:28,480
Speaker 5: So when I read that, I wondered, like, what was

916
00:48:28,560 --> 00:48:31,080
Speaker 5: the dot dot dot? Like what did he skip with

917
00:48:31,520 --> 00:48:32,120
Speaker 5: the ellipses?

918
00:48:32,200 --> 00:48:32,799
Speaker 2: Right?

919
00:48:32,840 --> 00:48:35,640
Speaker 5: And so I went to the video right and what

920
00:48:35,840 --> 00:48:36,240
Speaker 5: was gone?

921
00:48:36,440 --> 00:48:38,560
Speaker 1: I should not laugh, by the way, because this is

922
00:48:38,640 --> 00:48:40,279
Speaker 1: American democracy.

923
00:48:40,400 --> 00:48:42,760
Speaker 5: Yeah, but here's what was missing. We had an election

924
00:48:42,880 --> 00:48:45,480
Speaker 5: that was stolen from us. It was a landline election.

925
00:48:45,800 --> 00:48:49,839
Speaker 5: Everyone knows it, especially the other side. So what's remarkable

926
00:48:49,880 --> 00:48:52,040
Speaker 5: to me is that even in this book, right written

927
00:48:52,040 --> 00:48:54,840
Speaker 5: for posterity, telling your version of the story on the

928
00:48:54,920 --> 00:48:58,239
Speaker 5: day when Trump supporters were calling for his hanging. Mike

929
00:48:58,320 --> 00:49:01,800
Speaker 5: Pence is still covering for the boss. He is still

930
00:49:02,280 --> 00:49:07,359
Speaker 5: omitting Trump's repetition of the election lie, right, And so

931
00:49:07,640 --> 00:49:10,520
Speaker 5: to me, that captured everything, right, Like I think so

932
00:49:10,640 --> 00:49:13,680
Speaker 5: much of Pence's vice presidency is captured in those three

933
00:49:13,719 --> 00:49:16,759
Speaker 5: little DUTs. He would always say, I'm here to serve, right,

934
00:49:16,800 --> 00:49:20,120
Speaker 5: that's his recraise, I'm here to serve. But who was

935
00:49:20,120 --> 00:49:20,880
Speaker 5: he there to serve?

936
00:49:21,080 --> 00:49:22,520
Speaker 4: Right? Was there to serve the people? Well?

937
00:49:22,560 --> 00:49:25,920
Speaker 5: Like I was there to serve this one man. And

938
00:49:25,960 --> 00:49:30,319
Speaker 5: so for me, that's why Mike Pence's memoir is illuminating.

939
00:49:30,400 --> 00:49:34,200
Speaker 5: Even when he's trying to recreate himself, he still can't

940
00:49:34,320 --> 00:49:37,760
Speaker 5: quite help it. He was still covering for Donald Trump

941
00:49:37,800 --> 00:49:39,879
Speaker 5: on a day that Donald Trump did not cover for him.

942
00:49:40,239 --> 00:49:43,640
Speaker 2: It's such a great and interesting point.

943
00:49:43,800 --> 00:49:46,000
Speaker 6: He's still covering for Donald Trump, even on a day

944
00:49:46,040 --> 00:49:48,759
Speaker 6: Donald Trump was not covering for him. It speaks in

945
00:49:48,840 --> 00:49:52,520
Speaker 6: a larger way to the Republican Party too, weirdly, right, like,

946
00:49:52,840 --> 00:49:58,160
Speaker 6: covering for him as he picks out on electable candidates,

947
00:49:58,280 --> 00:50:02,759
Speaker 6: right like constantly they're an impossible situation which they put

948
00:50:02,760 --> 00:50:05,799
Speaker 6: themselves in anyway explain to us now sort of what

949
00:50:05,920 --> 00:50:08,879
Speaker 6: you're doing. You have a really interesting mandate. You come

950
00:50:08,880 --> 00:50:10,240
Speaker 6: from the world of book reviewing.

951
00:50:10,840 --> 00:50:14,120
Speaker 1: Now you are on the opinion side, but sort of

952
00:50:14,280 --> 00:50:17,239
Speaker 1: with a book caveagte a little bit and talk to

953
00:50:17,360 --> 00:50:18,239
Speaker 1: us about what that means.

954
00:50:18,520 --> 00:50:24,120
Speaker 5: Yeah, I still I still try to understand politics through

955
00:50:24,400 --> 00:50:28,080
Speaker 5: the lens of books. I'm no longer a book critic.

956
00:50:28,160 --> 00:50:28,360
Speaker 4: You know.

957
00:50:28,440 --> 00:50:31,040
Speaker 5: The New York Times has you know, a fantastic book

958
00:50:31,080 --> 00:50:33,640
Speaker 5: review and outstanding book critics who do a great job

959
00:50:33,640 --> 00:50:34,799
Speaker 5: and who cover books.

960
00:50:34,600 --> 00:50:36,880
Speaker 2: In that way, like Dwight Garner.

961
00:50:37,160 --> 00:50:40,440
Speaker 5: Oh yeah, no, and Jens la on nonfiction.

962
00:50:40,320 --> 00:50:42,680
Speaker 6: And Alexandra Jacobs.

963
00:50:42,880 --> 00:50:43,200
Speaker 2: Yes.

964
00:50:43,200 --> 00:50:45,840
Speaker 1: Continue, Sorry, we should not now call out all the

965
00:50:45,880 --> 00:50:47,000
Speaker 1: book critics we love.

966
00:50:48,600 --> 00:50:49,080
Speaker 2: At all.

967
00:50:49,400 --> 00:50:50,200
Speaker 6: Okay, continue.

968
00:50:50,320 --> 00:50:52,959
Speaker 5: But so what I try to do in a sense,

969
00:50:53,040 --> 00:50:57,040
Speaker 5: I'm sort of a political writer, I suppose, but who

970
00:50:57,440 --> 00:51:01,799
Speaker 5: uses political books as my kind of reporting material. That's

971
00:51:01,840 --> 00:51:04,799
Speaker 5: mainly what I do, so, you know, and it doesn't

972
00:51:04,880 --> 00:51:07,520
Speaker 5: you know, it sort of transcends politics as well. Like

973
00:51:07,600 --> 00:51:09,520
Speaker 5: one of the pieces that I wrote last year that

974
00:51:09,560 --> 00:51:12,080
Speaker 5: I'm most you know, interested in or kind of happy

975
00:51:12,120 --> 00:51:15,120
Speaker 5: that I did, was on this question of, you know,

976
00:51:15,160 --> 00:51:19,600
Speaker 5: whether a US Chinese conflict is likely right, And so

977
00:51:19,760 --> 00:51:22,200
Speaker 5: I read a bunch of different books, five or six

978
00:51:22,200 --> 00:51:24,600
Speaker 5: books on that subject, just to try to figure that

979
00:51:24,640 --> 00:51:28,279
Speaker 5: out for myself, and then you know, wrote about it

980
00:51:28,400 --> 00:51:31,280
Speaker 5: for The Times. You know that that took a while.

981
00:51:31,560 --> 00:51:34,680
Speaker 5: I'm really grateful to have editors who kind of let

982
00:51:34,719 --> 00:51:38,040
Speaker 5: me take the time to do that kind of thing.

983
00:51:38,160 --> 00:51:40,720
Speaker 5: But you know, when Liz Chinese book comes out, when

984
00:51:40,920 --> 00:51:43,279
Speaker 5: all these kind of prominent political books come out, now

985
00:51:43,320 --> 00:51:45,400
Speaker 5: I get to pick my spots a little bit more,

986
00:51:45,560 --> 00:51:47,040
Speaker 5: as opposed to when I was a book critic. I

987
00:51:47,080 --> 00:51:49,759
Speaker 5: kind of had to review everything that came out. That

988
00:51:49,800 --> 00:51:52,000
Speaker 5: part is enjoyable, but I you know, I fully recognized

989
00:51:52,000 --> 00:51:54,839
Speaker 5: books as a way to understand politics is just my way.

990
00:51:54,880 --> 00:51:57,080
Speaker 5: But there I mean, there are obviously so many different lenses,

991
00:51:57,440 --> 00:52:00,279
Speaker 5: even if you look at different cultural artifacts. Like James

992
00:52:00,280 --> 00:52:03,480
Speaker 5: pony Wasac, the TV critic at the Times, wrote a

993
00:52:03,480 --> 00:52:05,759
Speaker 5: really good book about the Trump era through the lens

994
00:52:05,800 --> 00:52:09,400
Speaker 5: of television, right, trying to understand Trumps as a product

995
00:52:09,400 --> 00:52:13,080
Speaker 5: of television. And you know, that's an equally legitimate way

996
00:52:13,120 --> 00:52:15,799
Speaker 5: to do it. Books just happened to be to be

997
00:52:15,920 --> 00:52:18,680
Speaker 5: my way the way I'm comfortable doing that. I'm starting

998
00:52:18,719 --> 00:52:20,840
Speaker 5: to look at some of these big kind of government

999
00:52:20,880 --> 00:52:23,719
Speaker 5: in waiting policy books that are coming out on the

1000
00:52:23,760 --> 00:52:26,799
Speaker 5: Trump side, and that's my way of kind of reporting

1001
00:52:26,840 --> 00:52:29,360
Speaker 5: on what a future administration might look like, what a

1002
00:52:29,400 --> 00:52:32,160
Speaker 5: second Trump term might look like. But again like through

1003
00:52:32,360 --> 00:52:33,880
Speaker 5: through the lens of books.

1004
00:52:34,120 --> 00:52:36,239
Speaker 2: Carlos, thank you so much for joining us.

1005
00:52:36,480 --> 00:52:39,080
Speaker 5: I hope you'll come back anytime. Mollie, thank you.

1006
00:52:41,200 --> 00:52:42,760
Speaker 4: A moment.

1007
00:52:44,920 --> 00:52:49,160
Speaker 1: Rick Wilson, Yes, do you have a moment of fuckery?

1008
00:52:49,320 --> 00:52:51,520
Speaker 4: I do have a moment of fuckery, and I'm going

1009
00:52:51,560 --> 00:52:54,399
Speaker 4: to condemn with all the fire and brimstone I can

1010
00:52:54,640 --> 00:52:57,440
Speaker 4: muster at the moment at Seapack, during one of the

1011
00:52:57,480 --> 00:52:58,399
Speaker 4: opening moments of.

1012
00:52:58,360 --> 00:53:01,239
Speaker 2: Seapack this year, you and I are both not.

1013
00:53:02,000 --> 00:53:04,600
Speaker 4: We are not. At Seapack, we had two of the

1014
00:53:04,640 --> 00:53:12,000
Speaker 4: most egregious, low scumbag, reprehensible people who I would gladly

1015
00:53:12,160 --> 00:53:16,160
Speaker 4: watch submerged in a blake of lava or eaten by wolves,

1016
00:53:16,520 --> 00:53:19,879
Speaker 4: Steve Bannon and Jack pisobiac. Jack Pisobiec went out and

1017
00:53:20,160 --> 00:53:22,919
Speaker 4: cheer led for the death of democracy, and he said

1018
00:53:23,040 --> 00:53:26,680
Speaker 4: we didn't finish the job on January sixth, and Bannon

1019
00:53:26,760 --> 00:53:28,600
Speaker 4: cheered him on, and they talked about how they were

1020
00:53:28,600 --> 00:53:31,200
Speaker 4: going to turn America into a nation where you know,

1021
00:53:31,360 --> 00:53:34,839
Speaker 4: Christ is first before anything else. I know that they

1022
00:53:34,880 --> 00:53:38,680
Speaker 4: will try to say, we're just trolling. Watch the Libs

1023
00:53:38,719 --> 00:53:42,160
Speaker 4: lose their minds. But what they're doing is try to

1024
00:53:42,200 --> 00:53:45,560
Speaker 4: shove the Overton window further to the right. What they're

1025
00:53:45,560 --> 00:53:47,960
Speaker 4: doing is trying to give themselves a permission structure and

1026
00:53:48,000 --> 00:53:51,960
Speaker 4: give their people a permission structure to say, yeah, now's

1027
00:53:52,000 --> 00:53:55,600
Speaker 4: the time, we're done with this, with this pesky constitutional republic.

1028
00:53:56,000 --> 00:53:59,920
Speaker 4: We want the autocrasy, we want the authoritarianism, and frankly

1029
00:54:00,000 --> 00:54:02,520
Speaker 4: Trump is reelected, they're going to get it. This is

1030
00:54:02,520 --> 00:54:05,320
Speaker 4: why I tell people that you cannot let these people

1031
00:54:05,680 --> 00:54:09,360
Speaker 4: pretend that they're joking, pretend that they're trolling, because they're not.

1032
00:54:09,680 --> 00:54:13,000
Speaker 4: They're deadly serious about it. This is what they want,

1033
00:54:13,160 --> 00:54:16,319
Speaker 4: this is what they're working for every single day. And

1034
00:54:16,680 --> 00:54:21,560
Speaker 4: the idea that these assholes, that these scumbags, that these

1035
00:54:21,840 --> 00:54:25,960
Speaker 4: vile low travelers in this grotesque movement think they're going

1036
00:54:26,040 --> 00:54:29,359
Speaker 4: to get away with this is astounding to me. And

1037
00:54:29,400 --> 00:54:33,040
Speaker 4: the fact that people still in mainstream journalism call Steve

1038
00:54:33,080 --> 00:54:35,719
Speaker 4: Bannon and Jack Bisobiak and talk to them and say, hey,

1039
00:54:35,800 --> 00:54:38,200
Speaker 4: what's going on in Trump World? Man how are you, buddy?

1040
00:54:38,280 --> 00:54:41,760
Speaker 4: When they are intention and their direction is incredibly clear.

1041
00:54:42,239 --> 00:54:45,440
Speaker 4: They are people that really deserve and need to be

1042
00:54:45,560 --> 00:54:48,719
Speaker 4: thrown as far out of the political process and mainstream

1043
00:54:48,760 --> 00:54:51,719
Speaker 4: in this country as you can imagine. So that's my

1044
00:54:51,800 --> 00:54:52,640
Speaker 4: moment of fuckery.

1045
00:54:52,840 --> 00:54:55,040
Speaker 1: That is a really good moment of fuck Gray. My

1046
00:54:55,239 --> 00:54:57,920
Speaker 1: moment of fuck Gray is I hate to do this

1047
00:54:57,960 --> 00:55:00,000
Speaker 1: because I feel like they get such a tough time,

1048
00:55:00,360 --> 00:55:03,239
Speaker 1: but and this is a terrible time in media, but

1049
00:55:03,760 --> 00:55:07,480
Speaker 1: you guys have to stop. Okay, Trump and Biden are

1050
00:55:07,520 --> 00:55:11,399
Speaker 1: not the same the idea, I mean, my new thing

1051
00:55:11,920 --> 00:55:14,600
Speaker 1: is that sometimes I'll go to a party and someone

1052
00:55:14,640 --> 00:55:17,120
Speaker 1: who's a conservative will say to me, Biden's going to

1053
00:55:17,200 --> 00:55:19,480
Speaker 1: drop out, right, And I'll be like, why would Biden

1054
00:55:19,560 --> 00:55:22,759
Speaker 1: drop out? And I realized that some of it is

1055
00:55:22,760 --> 00:55:27,120
Speaker 1: that there has been so much reporting about Biden's age

1056
00:55:27,360 --> 00:55:33,120
Speaker 1: versus Trump's ninety one criminal indictments that these people actually

1057
00:55:33,200 --> 00:55:36,960
Speaker 1: think that Trump is a more suitable candidate. And I'm

1058
00:55:37,080 --> 00:55:41,040
Speaker 1: saying to you mainstream media people, and you know, I

1059
00:55:41,080 --> 00:55:43,359
Speaker 1: don't even think it's the journalist. I don't think it's

1060
00:55:43,400 --> 00:55:45,560
Speaker 1: fair to blame the journalists, because you know, the truth

1061
00:55:45,640 --> 00:55:47,960
Speaker 1: is a lot of journalists don't write headlines. I know

1062
00:55:48,080 --> 00:55:51,160
Speaker 1: this myself, Like you know, you don't get to sign

1063
00:55:51,200 --> 00:55:54,800
Speaker 1: off on the headlines, especially at big places. So I understand.

1064
00:55:54,800 --> 00:55:58,200
Speaker 1: But if you are an editor right, ask yourself, what

1065
00:55:58,239 --> 00:56:01,680
Speaker 1: am I fucking doing here? For American democracy? You don't

1066
00:56:01,800 --> 00:56:04,080
Speaker 1: have to be for the left or for the right,

1067
00:56:04,120 --> 00:56:06,839
Speaker 1: but you do have to be for democratic norms. Having

1068
00:56:06,840 --> 00:56:11,000
Speaker 1: a pro democracy bias does not make you a partisan.

1069
00:56:11,200 --> 00:56:13,520
Speaker 1: And I think that is really important that these people

1070
00:56:13,560 --> 00:56:17,359
Speaker 1: ask themselves, like, what am I fucking doing? Why am

1071
00:56:17,440 --> 00:56:20,400
Speaker 1: I framing this in a way that both sides are equal?

1072
00:56:20,400 --> 00:56:23,080
Speaker 2: Because they are not. And even the right knows this

1073
00:56:23,320 --> 00:56:23,800
Speaker 2: very well.

1074
00:56:23,960 --> 00:56:27,400
Speaker 4: They are not equal. They are not equal. Molly. I

1075
00:56:27,440 --> 00:56:29,799
Speaker 4: couldn't agree more with you on this. This is a

1076
00:56:29,880 --> 00:56:33,400
Speaker 4: moment where if Donald Trump wins, they will be the

1077
00:56:33,440 --> 00:56:35,800
Speaker 4: first ones to say, oh my god, I can't believe

1078
00:56:35,800 --> 00:56:38,920
Speaker 4: these new assaults on press freedom. I can't believe that

1079
00:56:38,960 --> 00:56:41,719
Speaker 4: they're passing these new laws to undue Sullivan and to

1080
00:56:41,760 --> 00:56:45,319
Speaker 4: make us liable for every word we say. And I

1081
00:56:45,320 --> 00:56:49,600
Speaker 4: can't believe that they're banning reporters from government events and buildings.

1082
00:56:49,840 --> 00:56:51,799
Speaker 4: I can't believe that they are trying to lock up

1083
00:56:51,840 --> 00:56:55,680
Speaker 4: reporters for reporting things from whistleblowers. They'll be the first

1084
00:56:55,680 --> 00:56:59,240
Speaker 4: ones shocked as hell when people like Bannon and Miller

1085
00:56:59,280 --> 00:57:01,600
Speaker 4: and Patel and the rest of these people are in

1086
00:57:01,680 --> 00:57:07,279
Speaker 4: charge and running American media into the ground. They'll be

1087
00:57:07,320 --> 00:57:10,479
Speaker 4: the first ones to be like, I'm appalled by this. Well,

1088
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Speaker 4: don't say you were not warrant.

1089
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Speaker 2: That's right, Thank you, Rick.

1090
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Speaker 1: That's it for this episode of Fast Politics. Tune in

1091
00:57:19,360 --> 00:57:22,560
Speaker 1: every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday to hear the best minds

1092
00:57:22,560 --> 00:57:25,800
Speaker 1: in politics makes sense of all this chaos. If you

1093
00:57:25,920 --> 00:57:28,600
Speaker 1: enjoyed what you've heard, please send it to a friend

1094
00:57:28,640 --> 00:57:32,200
Speaker 1: and keep the conversation going. And again, thanks for listening.