WEBVTT - We're Losing Everywhere 0:00:11.800 --> 0:00:15.080 Good morning, peepson, Welcome to woke f Daily. Would meet 0:00:15.120 --> 0:00:19.239 your girl Danielle Moody recording from the Home Bunker, Folks, 0:00:19.760 --> 0:00:23.320 I'm really excited to welcome back to wok Appa Daily 0:00:23.520 --> 0:00:26.840 our friend and our in house doctor, doctor Jonathan Metzel, 0:00:26.920 --> 0:00:32.080 the author of Dying of Whiteness. And today Jonathan and 0:00:32.120 --> 0:00:36.559 I get into yet another conversation about the lack of 0:00:36.600 --> 0:00:40.639 gun reform in this country. But it's predicated on an 0:00:40.680 --> 0:00:44.839 awful fucking video that is going around on TikTok that 0:00:45.000 --> 0:00:50.960 I've seen reposted on Joey Read from MSNBC's Instagram page. 0:00:51.159 --> 0:00:55.600 Viola Davis, actress, reposted on her page, and it is 0:00:55.720 --> 0:00:58.800 if you haven't seen this video, because I by the 0:00:58.840 --> 0:01:01.200 time that this recording come out, I will have done 0:01:01.400 --> 0:01:05.680 a TikTok of my own. It is a video of 0:01:05.720 --> 0:01:11.240 an Alabama school district that has rolled out a new product, 0:01:12.200 --> 0:01:18.600 which is a whiteboard that pulls out into a bulletproof 0:01:20.160 --> 0:01:26.399 shelter safe room for your kids in the classroom. It 0:01:26.520 --> 0:01:31.920 is the most obscene fucking thing that I have seen ever. 0:01:32.319 --> 0:01:36.080 And the reason why it's going viral is because people 0:01:36.120 --> 0:01:40.960 in this country and other countries are like, Wow, classrooms 0:01:40.959 --> 0:01:45.840 are supposed to be safe spaces. Schools are supposed to 0:01:45.920 --> 0:01:54.520 be safe fucking spaces. The fact that Americans would rather 0:01:55.520 --> 0:02:02.360 build safe rooms and monetize bullet proof backpacks so monetize 0:02:03.120 --> 0:02:11.800 childhood trauma instead of voting for politicians that care more 0:02:12.200 --> 0:02:16.600 about our fucking children and our nation's safety than they 0:02:16.680 --> 0:02:24.320 do their fucking donor base is absurd. But you know, 0:02:24.520 --> 0:02:27.480 let's hand it to Americans to be able to fucking 0:02:27.639 --> 0:02:35.080 monetize every goddamn thing, including your children's trauma. You know, 0:02:35.320 --> 0:02:39.800 we are now living with the first generation of active 0:02:39.840 --> 0:02:47.800 shooter drill children who are now Gen z's, graduating from college, 0:02:48.000 --> 0:02:52.960 entering into the workforce. They've been doing active shooter drill 0:02:53.080 --> 0:02:58.280 since they were three fucking years old. We have created 0:02:58.320 --> 0:03:05.520 an entire generation of traumatized, depressed, and anxiety riddled children 0:03:05.600 --> 0:03:12.040 that how are now adults who have never known safety ever. 0:03:13.639 --> 0:03:19.960 Think about that. Think about your own childhood. Think about 0:03:20.000 --> 0:03:24.320 the fears that you might have had, the normal fears, 0:03:25.440 --> 0:03:30.640 right the boogeyman, you know, maybe the bully at school, 0:03:30.960 --> 0:03:36.680 maybe standing up and giving your presentation. But nobody from 0:03:36.720 --> 0:03:40.360 the boomers to the gen xers to most of the 0:03:40.440 --> 0:03:49.960 millennials ever had to fear getting shot dead in their classroom, 0:03:50.000 --> 0:03:53.320 getting shot dead at their place of worship, getting shot 0:03:53.400 --> 0:03:58.520 dead at the mall. But this is what we are 0:03:58.560 --> 0:04:04.360 doing now. We're creating bulletproof whiteboard safe rooms inside of 0:04:04.440 --> 0:04:12.720 classrooms instead of passing gun reform. What in the entire fuck? 0:04:13.960 --> 0:04:17.839 So coming up next, friends, my conversation with our in 0:04:17.960 --> 0:04:21.960 house doctor, doctor Jonathan Metzel, who has a new book 0:04:22.040 --> 0:04:25.960 that will be coming out next year, folks, on this 0:04:26.160 --> 0:04:32.359 very issue, folks. I can't tell you how excited I 0:04:32.400 --> 0:04:36.760 am to welcome back to woke F Daily doctor Jonathan Metzel, 0:04:36.880 --> 0:04:39.560 our friend and the author of Dying of Whiteness, who 0:04:39.600 --> 0:04:42.920 is working on a new book that I can't wait 0:04:43.320 --> 0:04:46.120 to read and discuss here on Woke f when it 0:04:46.160 --> 0:04:50.719 comes out. Jonathan, it's been a while, and sadly, in 0:04:50.760 --> 0:04:53.359 the time that we have not been together, there have 0:04:53.520 --> 0:04:57.599 been so many mass shootings, more mass shootings that have 0:04:57.680 --> 0:05:02.000 happened than days in the year thus far. This week, 0:05:02.279 --> 0:05:06.920 President Biden went to Moderate, California, the site of the 0:05:07.000 --> 0:05:10.920 shooting that was targeted at the Asian American community during 0:05:11.240 --> 0:05:16.000 the Lunar New Year celebration. There, he spoke about you 0:05:16.040 --> 0:05:19.040 know how many times he has done this, the fact 0:05:19.080 --> 0:05:23.760 that we need sensible gun reform. It's the same conversation 0:05:23.960 --> 0:05:27.719 that unfortunately he has had as Vice president and now 0:05:27.800 --> 0:05:30.960 as president of the United States. And so I just 0:05:31.000 --> 0:05:36.040 want to get initially your reactions to his speech and 0:05:36.080 --> 0:05:42.440 where we find ourselves right now in twenty twenty three. Well, 0:05:43.920 --> 0:05:47.279 I appreciate that President Biden did something. I think it's 0:05:47.360 --> 0:05:50.200 symbolically important. I think where he did it is important, 0:05:51.200 --> 0:05:53.880 and I think that it's also important that he signals 0:05:53.920 --> 0:05:57.400 that he's not going to let this issue diet, that 0:05:57.720 --> 0:06:00.120 he's going to keep at it. But I would also, 0:06:00.160 --> 0:06:04.680 of course admit a frustration because but democratic presidents can 0:06:04.760 --> 0:06:09.520 do are largely symbolic executive orders that can easily be 0:06:09.560 --> 0:06:13.920 overturned if a Republican takes over. That's what we saw 0:06:14.040 --> 0:06:17.960 with President Obama after his frustration that nothing really got 0:06:18.000 --> 0:06:23.279 passed after Sandy Hook and all the all the uproar 0:06:23.320 --> 0:06:26.080 after that, tried to work with people, tried to work 0:06:26.120 --> 0:06:29.040 with people, and then ultimately passed a bunch of really 0:06:29.080 --> 0:06:31.800 I think, really good executive orders keeping guns away from 0:06:31.839 --> 0:06:35.120 people with serious amounts of illness or convictions. Another thing 0:06:35.120 --> 0:06:39.880 President Obama did was invest in smart gun technology to 0:06:40.160 --> 0:06:43.240 guns that could only be fired by recognizing the palm 0:06:43.360 --> 0:06:46.039 print of somebody who owned them, which I think would 0:06:46.080 --> 0:06:49.039 be great. But the minute Trump took over, he just 0:06:49.120 --> 0:06:51.840 overturned all that stuff, and so really there's a kind 0:06:51.839 --> 0:06:54.520 of back and forth nature of it. And of course 0:06:54.560 --> 0:06:56.360 the other part is that a lot of things that 0:06:56.360 --> 0:06:59.920 are signed by executive order really aren't implemented that much 0:07:00.480 --> 0:07:05.400 in states that have really strong gun lobbies. So California, 0:07:05.640 --> 0:07:08.279 we're you know, California's already doing a lot of the 0:07:08.320 --> 0:07:13.880 things that President Biden had suggested, enhanced background checks, other 0:07:13.960 --> 0:07:17.240 kinds of factors, but it's limited because it's surrounded by 0:07:17.240 --> 0:07:20.480 states like Arizona where there are hardly any gun laws, 0:07:21.000 --> 0:07:23.679 and so it really can't stop the flow of guns 0:07:24.120 --> 0:07:27.560 into its borders. And so again, I think this is 0:07:27.560 --> 0:07:32.200 an ongoing struggle, obviously a polarizing struggle struggle, but I 0:07:32.720 --> 0:07:34.320 just to be honest, as somebody who's studied this for 0:07:34.560 --> 0:07:37.440 a long time, I think it's important to keep going. 0:07:37.480 --> 0:07:40.840 But of course there's always frustration that we just keep 0:07:40.880 --> 0:07:43.920 going back and forth about the same issues of background 0:07:43.960 --> 0:07:47.240 checks and red flag laws, when really what we're talking 0:07:47.280 --> 0:07:50.800 about is a much bigger issue about polarization and public 0:07:50.800 --> 0:07:56.080 safety and race and guns in America. You know, Jonathan, 0:07:56.840 --> 0:08:01.640 what I find so troubling about where we are right now, 0:08:01.760 --> 0:08:03.480 and I feel like, you know, for the past I 0:08:03.520 --> 0:08:05.880 don't even know, it's been three years now since you 0:08:05.920 --> 0:08:09.120 and I have been in deep conversation about so many 0:08:09.120 --> 0:08:14.640 issues that are affecting Americans every single day. But when 0:08:14.720 --> 0:08:19.400 I see President Biden, you know, once again, do exactly 0:08:19.400 --> 0:08:23.880 what she said. You know, he provides a moral barometer, right, 0:08:24.040 --> 0:08:27.800 he gives a speech, he is empathetic, and he does 0:08:27.880 --> 0:08:33.320 what any responsible president of this country would do. But 0:08:33.400 --> 0:08:36.040 at the end of the day, we know that that 0:08:36.120 --> 0:08:40.280 community and Moniti. Since that shooting actually happened, there have 0:08:40.400 --> 0:08:44.600 been I think roughly sixty plus shootings that have happened, 0:08:44.679 --> 0:08:48.160 right because we know that mass shootings are identified as 0:08:48.720 --> 0:08:53.079 four people shot or more at a time. So since then, 0:08:53.559 --> 0:08:57.560 you know, there have been countless and not everybody gets 0:08:57.559 --> 0:09:00.720 a headline, and not everybody gets the met the attention 0:09:01.000 --> 0:09:04.200 unless it's gruesome, unless the ages of the victims are young, 0:09:04.320 --> 0:09:09.280 unless it's a marginalized community that was targeted. You know, 0:09:10.360 --> 0:09:14.400 this is Republicans problem. This is the problem of Republicans 0:09:14.559 --> 0:09:19.080 solely right. That if we had the will of the 0:09:19.120 --> 0:09:23.080 Republican Party to recognize that young children shouldn't have to 0:09:23.160 --> 0:09:26.560 learn how to army crawl and begin active shooter drills 0:09:26.679 --> 0:09:29.600 at three years old in this country, that that shouldn't 0:09:29.600 --> 0:09:32.079 be a norm of what it means to grow up 0:09:32.200 --> 0:09:36.960 in America, we wouldn't be here. So explain to me 0:09:37.600 --> 0:09:43.800 and just your thoughts on where parents and caregivers are 0:09:43.920 --> 0:09:47.800 in this country, because this to me, Jonathan, Yes, I 0:09:47.880 --> 0:09:51.000 understand the gun manufacturers make money. I understand the gun 0:09:51.000 --> 0:09:55.359 lobby is a billion dollar industry, and I understand that Republicans, 0:09:55.520 --> 0:09:58.440 you know, have written their souls off in blood in 0:09:58.640 --> 0:10:03.440 order for donors right from the NRA. But this has 0:10:03.559 --> 0:10:07.920 got to be beyond four parents and caregivers, beyond a 0:10:08.000 --> 0:10:15.160 partisan issue. Unfortunately, it is a superpartisan issue. It's an 0:10:15.160 --> 0:10:17.080 identity issue for a lot of people, and so of 0:10:17.120 --> 0:10:20.760 course I definitely, definitely, definitely agree with you. I wish 0:10:20.880 --> 0:10:23.720 that we could come together to make school safe, and 0:10:23.840 --> 0:10:27.680 workplace is safe, and shopping mall safe and every place 0:10:27.679 --> 0:10:31.080 else that has been targeted by this horrible violence. But 0:10:31.160 --> 0:10:33.920 I think that the split really is how people respond 0:10:33.960 --> 0:10:36.200 to it. I mean, I've been doing this kind of 0:10:36.200 --> 0:10:39.400 work for a long time, and I think that the 0:10:39.840 --> 0:10:43.560 false dichotomy that we get into is like Democrats want 0:10:43.559 --> 0:10:47.080 gun safety and Republicans wants shootings, Like nobody really, when 0:10:47.080 --> 0:10:51.200 it comes down to it, really wants shootings. Are we sure? 0:10:51.400 --> 0:10:54.720 Because when you have I mean, honestly, I think about 0:10:54.760 --> 0:10:58.079 this because when you have, right, I saw another headline 0:10:58.160 --> 0:11:00.800 this week which was that a four year old got 0:11:00.800 --> 0:11:03.240 a hand of a gun in Texas that was not 0:11:03.440 --> 0:11:07.440 locked up and shot and killed their three year old sibling. Right, 0:11:07.679 --> 0:11:11.920 That's a normal headline in places that have loosened or 0:11:12.040 --> 0:11:15.679 completely erased any type of gun safety. Right. But I 0:11:15.720 --> 0:11:17.360 guess the let me let me just what I mean. 0:11:17.400 --> 0:11:21.000 I mean that Republicans are so programmed to think that 0:11:21.160 --> 0:11:24.240 more guns is the answer to every one of these provocations. 0:11:24.240 --> 0:11:26.720 So it's not like they're pro shooting. I think that's 0:11:26.720 --> 0:11:29.559 a I think that's a misnomber that the Democrats get into. 0:11:29.960 --> 0:11:33.120 But I will say that there's no provocation to which 0:11:33.160 --> 0:11:37.000 the answer for many GOP voters and RA supporters isn't 0:11:37.280 --> 0:11:40.120 isn't more guns? And so when they hear that there's 0:11:40.360 --> 0:11:44.160 a mass shooting, the automatic responses, man, I wish I 0:11:44.200 --> 0:11:45.920 would have had a weapon at that time. I would 0:11:45.920 --> 0:11:48.800 have stopped this. And when they hear that there's any 0:11:48.880 --> 0:11:51.439 kind of robbery or crime or anything like that, all 0:11:51.480 --> 0:11:55.240 the stuff that the GOP amplifies, the answer isn't let's 0:11:55.280 --> 0:11:59.320 make communities safer for everyone. It's I wish I wish 0:11:59.360 --> 0:12:01.360 I had my gun that moment. So that's kind of 0:12:01.360 --> 0:12:05.200 the ingrained logic, which of course is tied into logic 0:12:05.679 --> 0:12:08.559 that is as old as this country that is very racialized, 0:12:08.640 --> 0:12:12.160 that white Americans get to carry guns, that white that 0:12:12.280 --> 0:12:15.880 guns are, you know, symbols of white protection. So there's 0:12:16.040 --> 0:12:19.560 a whole history here going into it, and the question 0:12:19.640 --> 0:12:21.400 is what do you what do you do about that? 0:12:21.480 --> 0:12:24.480 Are you trying to reason with centrist gun owners? Are 0:12:24.480 --> 0:12:27.840 you trying to just create laws that force them to 0:12:27.960 --> 0:12:30.880 go along? Are you trying to fortify blue states? I 0:12:30.920 --> 0:12:32.600 just think that the minute you start thinking like, what 0:12:32.840 --> 0:12:35.320 really is the answer to what we're facing right now, 0:12:36.400 --> 0:12:40.040 it's it's a bigger issue than it seems, even with 0:12:40.120 --> 0:12:42.480 all these mess shootings. And I'm not trying to sound 0:12:42.480 --> 0:12:44.720 like I'm talking around in circles. But as you can 0:12:44.760 --> 0:12:46.200 hear from the way I'm talking about this, I've been 0:12:46.240 --> 0:12:49.160 writing a book about this exact issue for the last 0:12:49.200 --> 0:12:53.480 ten years now, and the diagnosis for me is very easy. 0:12:53.520 --> 0:12:56.160 But the question of where we go in this country 0:12:56.480 --> 0:13:00.360 is really complicated. Let me give you an example. One 0:13:00.360 --> 0:13:03.040 of the main things we suggest as Democrats, right is 0:13:03.080 --> 0:13:06.520 background checks. Right initially, we say background checks on all 0:13:06.559 --> 0:13:10.640 gun purchases. That's one of the things that Biden just did. Well. 0:13:10.679 --> 0:13:12.960 I agree we need background checks on all gun purchases. 0:13:12.960 --> 0:13:16.560 They're way too many loopholes, but we already have four 0:13:16.679 --> 0:13:20.520 hundred and fifty million guns in this country roughly, and 0:13:20.559 --> 0:13:23.960 that's almost one hundred million more guns that we have people. 0:13:24.320 --> 0:13:27.520 And so even if you implemented background checks right now 0:13:27.640 --> 0:13:31.559 on every single gun purchase, which isn't going to happen, 0:13:31.920 --> 0:13:33.920 you still have more guns than people. And so it 0:13:33.920 --> 0:13:37.680 would take you three hundred years probably to get to 0:13:37.720 --> 0:13:40.920 even that out in a way. And so the suggestions 0:13:40.960 --> 0:13:43.480 that were I just feel like the suggestions that we're 0:13:43.520 --> 0:13:49.160 positing honestly as Democrats, are way they under estimate the problem, 0:13:49.280 --> 0:13:52.199 or do they under they're not answers to the problem 0:13:52.200 --> 0:13:59.840 we're facing so right now we have watched it's mark 0:14:00.240 --> 0:14:03.280 and there are over three hundred pieces of legislation that 0:14:03.320 --> 0:14:08.600 have been rolled out to restrict drag performances or ban them, 0:14:09.240 --> 0:14:15.920 to deny trans kids gender affirming care, to ban books, 0:14:16.040 --> 0:14:24.240 to do all of these radical fascist ideas and bring 0:14:24.280 --> 0:14:28.640 them into fruition in red states across this country, you know. 0:14:28.680 --> 0:14:30.920 And their hope is that in twenty twenty four they'll 0:14:30.960 --> 0:14:36.720 be able to nationalize their chrystal fascist beliefs. When I 0:14:36.880 --> 0:14:42.440 look at how rapidly they're moving to target the LGBTQ community, 0:14:42.480 --> 0:14:48.200 to target the Black community, to target the Jewish community, 0:14:48.240 --> 0:14:52.320 there seems to be no guardrails on how quickly legislation 0:14:52.400 --> 0:14:56.880 can get passed and be operationalized. The same thing has 0:14:56.880 --> 0:15:01.880 happened with abortion. So we look to the president to 0:15:02.000 --> 0:15:05.280 guide us right, and for so long we were taught 0:15:05.320 --> 0:15:08.000 that the president is the most powerful person in all 0:15:08.080 --> 0:15:11.840 the land. But it turns out that Ron De Santis 0:15:11.880 --> 0:15:15.480 actually is. It turns out that Greg Abbott actually is. 0:15:16.080 --> 0:15:19.080 It turns out that Sarah Huckaby Sanders actually is. These 0:15:19.080 --> 0:15:23.120 are governors in right states. So again, when I think 0:15:23.120 --> 0:15:26.800 about the core of the problem, it isn't just an 0:15:26.840 --> 0:15:31.600 ideological one, Jonathan, or or values based one or lack thereof. 0:15:32.440 --> 0:15:35.040 It's also the fact that Democrats have put all of 0:15:35.080 --> 0:15:40.840 their eggs in the executive branch and none at the 0:15:40.960 --> 0:15:43.960 state level. Can you speak to that, no, I mean, 0:15:44.000 --> 0:15:46.480 that's my frustration. That's kind of the core argument of 0:15:46.480 --> 0:15:49.880 my book is that. And let me just be clear, 0:15:50.080 --> 0:15:52.840 part of what I'm showing is that guns are a 0:15:52.960 --> 0:15:56.280 core aspect of the ideology and the movement that you've 0:15:56.320 --> 0:15:59.760 just talked about. So it's no mistake that, for examples, 0:16:00.000 --> 0:16:03.520 to Santist right now is overturning Florida's gun laws, right 0:16:03.880 --> 0:16:08.120 Texas gun laws. Loose gun laws have propelled people like 0:16:08.200 --> 0:16:11.520 Abbot to power. In Tennessee right now, they are overturning 0:16:11.720 --> 0:16:15.920 every single gun law in Tennessee. We they just passed 0:16:15.920 --> 0:16:19.240 a bill or are about too that anyone eighteen year 0:16:19.240 --> 0:16:23.680 old and over can open kerry in public, an AK 0:16:23.880 --> 0:16:26.640 forty seven or an AAR fifteen with no training, no 0:16:26.760 --> 0:16:30.160 permit whatsoever. And so, in a way, guns are a 0:16:30.240 --> 0:16:35.760 massive aspect of this issue. And I feel like it's 0:16:35.800 --> 0:16:38.200 not just about executive I feel like for too long 0:16:38.320 --> 0:16:41.640 Democrats have kind of told themselves, well, bad gun policies 0:16:41.640 --> 0:16:46.560 are just a red state problem. They're just something happening 0:16:46.600 --> 0:16:49.160 down there. But here in New York we have, you know, 0:16:49.280 --> 0:16:51.720 tight gun laws, so we have much more public health. 0:16:52.080 --> 0:16:53.720 And I think that was part of the lie that 0:16:53.800 --> 0:16:56.720 Democrats told themselves, is that the country wasn't connected, that 0:16:56.800 --> 0:17:00.720 the aims of this movement, which is symbolized by loose 0:17:00.720 --> 0:17:03.360 gun laws and more public carried guns, was just going 0:17:03.400 --> 0:17:05.879 to stay in the South, when when we're seeing with 0:17:06.000 --> 0:17:08.240 the Supreme Court, for example, right now, or with the 0:17:08.359 --> 0:17:13.120 judge in Texas right now overturning MIFFI pristone is that 0:17:13.160 --> 0:17:17.080 this movement really has national implications and national designs. And 0:17:17.160 --> 0:17:19.679 so I think we've woken up too late to the 0:17:19.720 --> 0:17:24.760 fact that red state politicians, pro gun politicians were building 0:17:25.400 --> 0:17:27.800 really an orc army in a certain kind of way, 0:17:27.880 --> 0:17:30.840 like a kind of red state movement that really the 0:17:30.920 --> 0:17:33.920 aim wasn't just to have bad gun policy in Tennessee, 0:17:33.920 --> 0:17:36.560 it was to take over the country in the Supreme Court, 0:17:36.560 --> 0:17:39.720 and so I certainly think that a much more ambitious 0:17:39.880 --> 0:17:45.720 national response that starts with taking grassroots movements the way 0:17:46.480 --> 0:17:49.840 I mean the Republicans de Santa started by taking over 0:17:49.880 --> 0:17:53.600 the school boards and public health boards. Look what's happening 0:17:53.640 --> 0:17:56.560 in Tennessee right now with city commissions and so playing 0:17:56.600 --> 0:17:58.919 the game of investing in local politics is where the 0:17:58.960 --> 0:18:03.880 Democrats have to start completely agree. You know, here's the thing, Jonathan, 0:18:04.560 --> 0:18:07.920 and you know, I hate to be Debbie Downer, right, 0:18:08.040 --> 0:18:13.840 this is a Downer conversation, right, which is that we're losing, yeah, right, 0:18:13.960 --> 0:18:16.879 like I mean. And not only are we losing in 0:18:17.000 --> 0:18:20.720 terms of policy, we're losing in the courts, We're losing 0:18:21.240 --> 0:18:25.760 in the states. We're losing everywhere. And I posted this, 0:18:26.359 --> 0:18:28.560 I joked on Mary Trump Show the other day. I 0:18:28.680 --> 0:18:32.440 posted this very scientific poll on Twitter, and I asked 0:18:32.520 --> 0:18:36.080 folks if they thought that they were going to see 0:18:36.640 --> 0:18:39.960 the end of democracy in their lifetimes. And I'm assuming 0:18:40.000 --> 0:18:44.879 that people are my age or older. And when the 0:18:44.920 --> 0:18:48.640 poll came back after you know, twenty four hours, the 0:18:48.640 --> 0:18:52.720 majority of people said yes, that they believed that democracy 0:18:53.000 --> 0:18:58.320 will be done in their lifetime. And I'm not talking 0:18:58.359 --> 0:19:02.119 about twenty thirty years from now. I'm actually talking about 0:19:02.160 --> 0:19:10.120 you know, two, five, maybe ten at most. Tell me something, 0:19:10.640 --> 0:19:14.920 is there a going backwards here to sense, to logic, 0:19:15.080 --> 0:19:18.840 to shared values in morals and if there's not, then 0:19:18.880 --> 0:19:20.879 what the fuck are we all doing? Do you know 0:19:20.880 --> 0:19:24.399 what I'm saying, Like in all honesty, because I people 0:19:24.440 --> 0:19:28.520 ask me all the time, like we're losing. I need 0:19:28.520 --> 0:19:31.639 to move right, You're telling me it doesn't really matter 0:19:31.760 --> 0:19:35.520 if you move from Florida to New York, or Texas 0:19:35.600 --> 0:19:40.119 to Washington, or you know, or Alabama to Oregon. It 0:19:40.160 --> 0:19:44.920 doesn't fucking matter. You're not safe anywhere. So at this stage, 0:19:44.960 --> 0:19:46.960 I'm just like, so, what the fuck are we all doing? 0:19:48.119 --> 0:19:50.879 This is not sour grapes. Okay, it's a little sour grapes. 0:19:50.960 --> 0:19:53.520 But the initial title of my book, which was rejected 0:19:53.520 --> 0:19:56.960 by my publisher was how We Lost a Requiem for 0:19:57.000 --> 0:20:00.600 Liberal America. That was my working title, and they said, 0:20:00.640 --> 0:20:03.680 nobody's going to buy a book about losing, and we're 0:20:03.720 --> 0:20:06.280 not losing anyway. All the publishers, of course, are in 0:20:06.320 --> 0:20:08.280 New York. They don't see what I see in Tennessee. 0:20:09.160 --> 0:20:11.800 And I'm like, no, we're actually losing. So I actually 0:20:11.840 --> 0:20:13.760 showed them one of your tweets and I'm like, look, 0:20:13.760 --> 0:20:16.479 we're losing. People agree we're losing, but they don't. But 0:20:16.520 --> 0:20:18.360 I think that we need to figure out like why 0:20:18.400 --> 0:20:21.760 we lost, Like as I completely agree with you, And 0:20:22.160 --> 0:20:26.240 the answer that I give about why we lost is 0:20:26.480 --> 0:20:30.400 that this stuff that's happening in the country right now 0:20:30.440 --> 0:20:33.800 that people in New York and Los Angeles and Honolulu 0:20:33.880 --> 0:20:40.240 and other Democratic strongholds that are urban cities largely seats 0:20:40.240 --> 0:20:43.679 of power, it's been happening in the South for a 0:20:43.720 --> 0:20:46.960 long time. And I think that really what we needed 0:20:47.080 --> 0:20:49.480 was a Southern strategy to say, hey, look, the whole 0:20:49.480 --> 0:20:54.479 country's connected, and we're going to aggressively intervene into the 0:20:54.520 --> 0:20:57.320 South and really try to change the issue in the South. 0:20:57.359 --> 0:21:00.520 What we did was we let a Republican power base 0:21:00.680 --> 0:21:04.320 grow in the South in a way that then is 0:21:04.359 --> 0:21:07.480 taking over the country. And so my answer for that 0:21:07.640 --> 0:21:09.919 is we need to learn from first of all, from 0:21:09.960 --> 0:21:11.679 the lessons of the past, Like what would it have 0:21:11.760 --> 0:21:15.160 taken to win in my home state of Missouri when 0:21:15.160 --> 0:21:20.600 the NRA took over the state, really or in Tennessee 0:21:20.640 --> 0:21:24.359 when they rejected the affordable character to fight back against 0:21:24.359 --> 0:21:28.600 that would be to fight on the ground of racial politics, 0:21:28.680 --> 0:21:32.400 to fight on the ground of learning for local elections, 0:21:32.480 --> 0:21:35.960 to instill science and common sense and other factors. But 0:21:36.040 --> 0:21:37.879 we didn't do that. We kind of let the South go. 0:21:38.320 --> 0:21:41.719 We didn't have a kind of reverse Southern strategy. And 0:21:41.800 --> 0:21:43.800 so I think that's what we're that's what we're seeing 0:21:43.880 --> 0:21:45.840 right now where that's that's my read on it. And 0:21:45.840 --> 0:21:47.840 so the question of our people going to wake up 0:21:47.960 --> 0:21:52.040 right now, I guess I would just ask you, like, 0:21:52.080 --> 0:21:54.280 which people are going to wake up right because people 0:21:54.320 --> 0:21:56.800 in half the country have already been living under the 0:21:56.840 --> 0:22:00.239 regime that you're talking about for quite some time, and 0:22:00.359 --> 0:22:03.360 it's led to more power for this agenda, not less 0:22:03.359 --> 0:22:07.600 power for it. I mean, I guess my feeling is that, 0:22:08.080 --> 0:22:09.840 by the way, would you would you buy a book 0:22:09.880 --> 0:22:13.440 called How We Lost or Recoring for Liberal America because 0:22:13.440 --> 0:22:19.560 you're my friends? Yeah, Okay, fine, Okay, I like the 0:22:19.640 --> 0:22:21.960 new working title that you have that you don't want 0:22:21.960 --> 0:22:26.320 to use. Okay, Okay, that's what I like. Okay, But 0:22:26.480 --> 0:22:31.840 I think that we're at a time where we got 0:22:31.880 --> 0:22:36.000 an actual war that is being waged through mass shootings 0:22:36.040 --> 0:22:38.600 and lack of gun reform, and not even lack of 0:22:38.600 --> 0:22:42.080 gun reform. Republicans aren't even in the lack of gun 0:22:42.119 --> 0:22:45.280 reform type of place they're in the everyone gets a 0:22:45.359 --> 0:22:47.439 gun as soon as you come out of the womb 0:22:47.760 --> 0:22:51.919 type of place, right like, this is a hellscape. And 0:22:52.640 --> 0:22:57.760 I see this getting drastically worse over the next two, five, ten, 0:22:57.920 --> 0:23:01.159 twenty thirty years. I think that the first half of 0:23:01.200 --> 0:23:04.280 my life, where things seem like they were going in 0:23:04.280 --> 0:23:07.600 the right direction, every generation was afforded something better than 0:23:07.800 --> 0:23:12.120 previous generations. That that's dead and gone. And I think 0:23:12.160 --> 0:23:15.200 that a lot of Americans, more so than not, are 0:23:15.240 --> 0:23:17.960 conscious right to that, which is why there's a war 0:23:18.000 --> 0:23:21.480 on wokeness. They don't even know how to fucking define it, frankly, 0:23:21.840 --> 0:23:24.920 but there's a war on wokeness because they prefer people 0:23:24.960 --> 0:23:28.520 to be asleep and scared. So I guess the last 0:23:28.560 --> 0:23:33.720 question for you is you know you've spent your entire 0:23:34.240 --> 0:23:41.920 career trying to diagnose this problem. To me, your book 0:23:42.000 --> 0:23:45.280 Dying of Whiteness did diagnose the problem. It's whiteness, it's 0:23:45.280 --> 0:23:49.959 white supremacy, it's Christo fascism, it's you know, the belief 0:23:50.040 --> 0:23:52.680 that so long if I'm doing bad is fine, so 0:23:52.720 --> 0:23:54.760 long as the person down the street that's of color 0:23:54.920 --> 0:23:58.080 is doing worse, then that's great, right, And the fact 0:23:58.160 --> 0:24:01.199 that you can monetize that you can sell that you 0:24:01.200 --> 0:24:05.440 can keep, you know, recreating these characters, these minions to 0:24:05.560 --> 0:24:10.280 sell this bullshit. And I'm just wondering, like, do you 0:24:10.400 --> 0:24:13.800 see hope in our future? Or do you just see 0:24:13.840 --> 0:24:19.199 an increase in violence? How much time do I have 0:24:19.200 --> 0:24:22.640 to answer that question, I mean, take all the time 0:24:22.640 --> 0:24:25.800 you'd like, do I see hope? Well, let me ask 0:24:25.840 --> 0:24:27.480 you really quickly, rights that, do you see hope in 0:24:27.520 --> 0:24:36.600 our future? I am you know, some days, some days 0:24:36.600 --> 0:24:38.760 I see hope in the future. I see that there 0:24:38.800 --> 0:24:42.680 are more people that are conscious to inequity, to injustice, 0:24:42.760 --> 0:24:48.040 to the lies of capitalism, to the indoctrination of patriotism. 0:24:48.080 --> 0:24:51.600 I see hope in that. But do I think that 0:24:51.680 --> 0:24:57.120 I'm going to see change in my lifetime? No? Do 0:24:57.160 --> 0:25:00.320 I think I'll see things get worse in my lifetime. Yeah, 0:25:01.720 --> 0:25:04.720 we have a pretty big election coming up in a 0:25:04.720 --> 0:25:06.880 little over a year here, year and a half here. 0:25:08.480 --> 0:25:14.520 Um so, so I think despair is not helpful right now. 0:25:14.560 --> 0:25:17.960 I certainly think that getting getting involved because I do 0:25:18.040 --> 0:25:22.040 think I mean, we felt like this in the twenty election, 0:25:22.119 --> 0:25:24.000 but oh my god, the stakes of the twenty twenty 0:25:24.040 --> 0:25:27.679 four election are in many ways even greater because of 0:25:27.720 --> 0:25:30.280 all this stuff that's happened since the Biden's election, and 0:25:30.320 --> 0:25:34.119 so I think mobilizing, I mean, we basically have an 0:25:34.160 --> 0:25:36.800 electoral fight for the future of our country coming up, 0:25:38.840 --> 0:25:41.720 and maybe maybe we can talk about this next time, 0:25:42.000 --> 0:25:45.600 like how do we how do we how do we 0:25:45.680 --> 0:25:49.400 flip the things we're talking about into democratic strategy, which 0:25:49.400 --> 0:25:51.159 I think is going to be the hard part. And 0:25:51.200 --> 0:25:54.359 I do think the Democrats are really facing a really 0:25:54.359 --> 0:26:03.879 hard question about really rerunning Biden, who's really old, or 0:26:05.720 --> 0:26:08.159 or opening up. I mean that should have happened a 0:26:08.200 --> 0:26:10.200 while ago. It looks like Biden's going to run again. 0:26:10.200 --> 0:26:15.239 But I do think that mobilizing, mobilizing Democratic voters right 0:26:15.280 --> 0:26:17.439 now for these issues. In other words, there's there's a 0:26:17.440 --> 0:26:20.400 place we can go with this frustration right now which 0:26:20.480 --> 0:26:24.359 is actually tied to electoral politics, which may not be 0:26:24.400 --> 0:26:26.400 the case in twenty twenty five, but it's the case 0:26:26.520 --> 0:26:29.720