WEBVTT - Ali Vitali & Ari Aster 0:00:00.640 --> 0:00:04.160 Hi, I'm Molly John Fast and this is Fast Politics, 0:00:04.360 --> 0:00:07.160 where we discussed the top political headlines with some of 0:00:07.160 --> 0:00:11.400 today's best minds, and a new Gallup poll shows that 0:00:11.560 --> 0:00:16.119 Donald Trump's approval ratings have fallen ten points since his 0:00:16.200 --> 0:00:19.800 second term began six months ago. We have such a 0:00:19.840 --> 0:00:23.840 great show for you today. MSNBC's own Ali Batali stops 0:00:23.840 --> 0:00:27.080 by to talk about how Trump is trying to maneuver 0:00:27.280 --> 0:00:31.880 his way out of the Epstein mess. Spoiler, it's not working. 0:00:32.360 --> 0:00:36.080 Then we'll talk to director Ari Astor about his new 0:00:36.120 --> 0:00:40.960 movie Eddington and the politics surrounding it. But first the news. 0:00:41.120 --> 0:00:46.519 Bally yesterday we got one of those demonstrations of just 0:00:46.680 --> 0:00:49.600 how pathetic most of the GOP is as we watched 0:00:49.680 --> 0:00:53.320 Jerome Powell not have any of Donald Trump's bullshit. What 0:00:53.360 --> 0:00:54.080 did you see there? 0:00:54.360 --> 0:01:01.040 This is such an incredibly stupid moment because it shows 0:01:01.240 --> 0:01:03.880 why it's stupid? Is this? It's because it shows how 0:01:04.160 --> 0:01:07.640 everyone else in the Republican party and leadership has just 0:01:07.760 --> 0:01:14.000 given up trying to be real people around our hand autocrat. 0:01:14.200 --> 0:01:18.959 So here's what happened. Trump is trying to blame Powell 0:01:19.080 --> 0:01:23.440 for the renovation of the FED, which Trump was the 0:01:23.480 --> 0:01:27.679 person who initiated his first administration. And the reason he's 0:01:27.720 --> 0:01:31.360 doing this is because he wants to fire Powell this way, 0:01:31.720 --> 0:01:37.840 and in this stupid, stupid, stupid plan, he's trying to 0:01:37.959 --> 0:01:40.839 make it sound worse, to make it so that Powell 0:01:41.160 --> 0:01:44.479 will resign in disgrace or whatever he can do. So 0:01:45.080 --> 0:01:47.720 he is up there with Powell and he says, we're 0:01:47.760 --> 0:01:50.600 taking a look. It looks like about three point one billion. 0:01:50.720 --> 0:01:53.960 Trump says, and then Powell and like, by the way, 0:01:54.000 --> 0:01:57.160 this is how you should do it when you're interviewing Trump. 0:01:57.240 --> 0:02:00.200 This is like a masterclass on how not to get 0:02:00.320 --> 0:02:04.320 run over by the guy. Instead of saying, oh okay, 0:02:04.400 --> 0:02:07.280 he says, Pal shakes his head. He goes, it went 0:02:07.360 --> 0:02:09.480 up a little bit or a lot, so the two 0:02:09.520 --> 0:02:12.280 point seven is now three point one. Trump continues, and 0:02:12.400 --> 0:02:15.640 Pale shakes his head, and then he says this is 0:02:15.680 --> 0:02:20.040 not true. And he says, you just added a third building, 0:02:20.120 --> 0:02:23.920 Pal says, and Trump says, it's a building that's being 0:02:23.960 --> 0:02:27.079 built and Pali says, no, that was built five years ago, 0:02:27.200 --> 0:02:30.760 and it's just like this is. And then Trump said 0:02:31.080 --> 0:02:33.240 it's part of the overall work, right, So it's like 0:02:33.680 --> 0:02:35.519 you can be on Earth one, or you can be 0:02:35.600 --> 0:02:38.000 on Earth too. But if you stay on Earth one, 0:02:38.360 --> 0:02:41.560 when Trump says Earth too stuff, you just say, that's 0:02:41.639 --> 0:02:45.400 not true. This is what actually happened. And I know 0:02:45.520 --> 0:02:49.040 it's not polite, but he's the only way that American 0:02:49.080 --> 0:02:53.440 democracy is going to survive. So when Trump says we 0:02:53.520 --> 0:02:56.519 didn't cut food stamps, you say, well, why are all 0:02:56.560 --> 0:02:59.760 these kids in May not able to get you know, 0:03:00.080 --> 0:03:04.400 snap benefits anymore. That's how this has to go, is 0:03:04.440 --> 0:03:07.440 you have to just say what really happened. And a 0:03:07.440 --> 0:03:09.400 good example is that the other day I was on 0:03:09.480 --> 0:03:12.919 a panel and somebody said that it made a false equivalency. 0:03:13.240 --> 0:03:16.880 They put two people together who were definitely not the same, 0:03:17.080 --> 0:03:20.200 and it was a little bit the equivalency really made 0:03:20.200 --> 0:03:25.359 the woman in the combination seem much less accomplished than 0:03:25.400 --> 0:03:28.840 she was. It was ultimately a bit sexist, and I said, 0:03:28.919 --> 0:03:32.079 you know, these two people are not the same. And we, 0:03:32.440 --> 0:03:34.800 unfortunately were in a moment in American life where we 0:03:34.920 --> 0:03:37.040 just constantly have to say that, and even though it's 0:03:37.080 --> 0:03:40.440 not polite, and even though we were raised to not 0:03:40.600 --> 0:03:44.720 be like that, because you know, especially women of my generation, 0:03:44.840 --> 0:03:46.920 we really weren't supposed to push back like that, but 0:03:47.480 --> 0:03:52.200 unfortunately it's the only choice because we are just down 0:03:52.240 --> 0:03:55.440 a fucking rabbit hole that there's no way out of here. 0:03:56.000 --> 0:03:59.440 Agreed. I don't know about your family, but my family 0:03:59.520 --> 0:04:01.840 took a lot of pictures were young, and yet somehow 0:04:01.840 --> 0:04:04.560 there seems to be more pictures of Donald Trump with 0:04:04.640 --> 0:04:06.920 Jeffrey Epstein that I have of most people in my 0:04:07.040 --> 0:04:09.800 family and I together. And then we also find out 0:04:09.840 --> 0:04:13.240 there's lots of pictures of RFK with Jeffrey Epstein, there's 0:04:13.320 --> 0:04:16.320 signed birthday books. It really just feels like, at breakneck speed. 0:04:16.400 --> 0:04:19.440 Now we are finding out that when Jeffrey Epstein described 0:04:19.480 --> 0:04:21.719 Donald Trump as his best friend for a decade, there's 0:04:21.760 --> 0:04:23.480 a lot of photographic and other proof. 0:04:23.760 --> 0:04:25.640 I mean, this is why this was so stupid for 0:04:25.760 --> 0:04:28.839 Trump to play into at the beginning, right because he 0:04:28.960 --> 0:04:31.839 knew he had been friends with him for a long time. 0:04:32.040 --> 0:04:34.520 He knew, I mean, we just we knew this to 0:04:34.560 --> 0:04:37.119 be true. So the fact that they're just keep coming 0:04:37.200 --> 0:04:39.919 up more and more photos of Trump and jeff app 0:04:40.080 --> 0:04:42.560 I mean, he clearly was worried about that. That's why 0:04:42.600 --> 0:04:45.600 he keeps bringing her off art. 0:04:45.600 --> 0:04:47.719 So Donald's been doing a really great thing where he 0:04:47.720 --> 0:04:51.800 compares his different behaviors on subjects, and the behavior on 0:04:51.839 --> 0:04:55.400 this subject is so clearly different than other subjects. 0:04:55.800 --> 0:04:58.599 Right, It's a really good example. I just don't get 0:04:58.800 --> 0:05:01.599 why he would. I mean, I guess, you know, the 0:05:01.640 --> 0:05:05.000 guy's very visceral and just does stuff just as the 0:05:05.040 --> 0:05:06.920 next thing in front of him. But it is a 0:05:07.000 --> 0:05:09.839 little bit chocking to me that this is the way 0:05:10.480 --> 0:05:13.800 he is doing it and that this is just going 0:05:13.839 --> 0:05:16.520 to keep going like this. But clearly something's going on. 0:05:17.240 --> 0:05:19.520 You know. The TURNI phrase I said yet the other 0:05:19.600 --> 0:05:22.400 day was you know, you don't usually suspect that the 0:05:22.440 --> 0:05:25.360 Achilles heel is going to be whichever thing it is 0:05:25.400 --> 0:05:28.080 on the body when it gets to somebody. But we've 0:05:28.120 --> 0:05:31.160 clearly found it. So this is an interesting turning of 0:05:31.200 --> 0:05:34.159 events from Talking Points to Momo that La Grand jury's 0:05:34.160 --> 0:05:37.240 are refusing to indict Ice protesters. 0:05:36.920 --> 0:05:40.400 Because the mainstream media is so small now and because 0:05:40.440 --> 0:05:43.200 there's so little reporting out there. I don't think people 0:05:43.320 --> 0:05:48.040 understand how mad just normal people are. This is not 0:05:48.080 --> 0:05:50.360 an endorsement in any way, shape or form, because I 0:05:50.360 --> 0:05:53.720 actually think it's really we're heading down really slippery slope. 0:05:53.720 --> 0:05:59.039 But clearly Ice is behaving in an illegal way. And 0:05:59.080 --> 0:06:03.560 then the eye idea is that somehow you're supposed to 0:06:03.640 --> 0:06:08.000 prosecute people who are behaving illegally towards ICE. And I 0:06:08.200 --> 0:06:10.880 just think you can see where this is going, right. 0:06:10.920 --> 0:06:15.080 People don't want to work in a legal framework if 0:06:15.120 --> 0:06:17.719 the other party isn't. That sort of part of the 0:06:17.720 --> 0:06:20.400 problem with trump Ism, too, right, is that these ICE 0:06:20.480 --> 0:06:26.080 people being illegally in this country was a civil violation 0:06:26.600 --> 0:06:30.200 until like six months ago. So the idea that now 0:06:30.279 --> 0:06:34.120 these people are being shipped to like death camps, I 0:06:34.120 --> 0:06:39.120 mean Sea cott is, you know, or Alligator Alcatraz disappearing 0:06:39.160 --> 0:06:41.080 in the middle of the night. This is not legal. 0:06:41.520 --> 0:06:44.880 So then the idea is that you have to somehow 0:06:45.000 --> 0:06:49.760 punish the people who have cooked this all up. You 0:06:50.000 --> 0:06:53.760 have to punish the people who are protesting them. It 0:06:53.760 --> 0:06:55.880 doesn't seem in my mind that this is going to 0:06:55.920 --> 0:06:58.680 work for them. Agreed, You're not going to be able 0:06:58.720 --> 0:07:00.360 to get this to keep going like this. 0:07:00.720 --> 0:07:04.960 So the White House put out this really ridiculous order 0:07:05.120 --> 0:07:09.320 the other day called ending Crime and Disorder on America's Streets, 0:07:09.840 --> 0:07:12.880 and it basically says that the cities and states need 0:07:12.920 --> 0:07:14.760 to remove homeless people from the streets. 0:07:15.160 --> 0:07:19.160 Yeah, I mean this is this push and there's actually 0:07:19.280 --> 0:07:21.920 I mean, this is all of this stuff where Trump 0:07:21.960 --> 0:07:25.760 isn't pushes everyone to the right. So they say, we 0:07:25.840 --> 0:07:28.760 see it with Newsome also signed something. You know, you 0:07:28.920 --> 0:07:31.760 have a Supreme Court that clearly is so in the 0:07:31.840 --> 0:07:34.840 tank for Trump and Republicans. They don't care about civil 0:07:34.880 --> 0:07:39.360 liberties for people who are poor right homeless, as clearly 0:07:39.720 --> 0:07:42.960 that's where this is going. I do think it's interesting 0:07:43.520 --> 0:07:47.720 that Trump is clearly trying to distract and trying to 0:07:47.880 --> 0:07:51.480 ratchet things up. He wants to now send these people, 0:07:51.880 --> 0:07:57.680 to send them to substance abuse programs. Sure. I mean, 0:07:57.760 --> 0:08:01.240 as someone who's sober and who really does very much 0:08:01.400 --> 0:08:04.960 believe that you have to get people sober, and I 0:08:05.040 --> 0:08:08.440 don't believe in harm reduction. I actually think harm reduction 0:08:08.720 --> 0:08:12.160 can be really bad. It just seems to me that 0:08:12.280 --> 0:08:15.360 this is like not really what he wants to do, 0:08:15.560 --> 0:08:17.960 like that he doesn't really want to get people in 0:08:18.040 --> 0:08:20.760 rehab that he doesn't want to. You know, it's hard 0:08:20.840 --> 0:08:22.920 enough to do these things when you actually want to 0:08:22.960 --> 0:08:25.920 do them. It's harder when you don't really want to 0:08:25.960 --> 0:08:34.120 do them. Ali Vittally is the host of MSNBC is 0:08:34.240 --> 0:08:39.040 way too early. Welcome back to Fast Politics, Ali Vitale. 0:08:39.200 --> 0:08:40.959 World to be back here in Alijelfast. 0:08:42.080 --> 0:08:44.920 It's so fun to have you on my podcast because 0:08:44.960 --> 0:08:47.960 I feel like world's collide, you know. 0:08:49.240 --> 0:08:51.920 Yeah, when MJ becomes the podcast, it's great. 0:08:52.520 --> 0:08:57.000 It's all it's all one mushy banana Republic. Can you 0:08:57.120 --> 0:09:00.959 explain to us what where we are? The House has 0:09:01.000 --> 0:09:05.440 gone home like about a week early, because why wouldn't they? 0:09:06.320 --> 0:09:09.480 And I mean really, it's because Mike Johnson has no 0:09:09.559 --> 0:09:11.480 idea how his members are going to vote. 0:09:11.559 --> 0:09:17.800 Right, It's because the Epstein bus that they drove and 0:09:17.880 --> 0:09:21.400 created is about to now run them over. And it 0:09:21.840 --> 0:09:25.160 manifested in Congress I think in a really fascinating way 0:09:25.480 --> 0:09:28.560 because it ground the entire house to a halt. Now, 0:09:28.679 --> 0:09:30.720 the dirty little secret here is that as much as 0:09:30.760 --> 0:09:32.679 they got out of town early, it's not like they 0:09:32.679 --> 0:09:34.960 had this massive list of two dues that they didn't 0:09:35.000 --> 0:09:37.920 get done. But really what happened is more of a 0:09:37.920 --> 0:09:41.600 commentary on the balancing act that the Speaker has to 0:09:41.640 --> 0:09:44.560 do here between his members who know that they've talked 0:09:44.559 --> 0:09:48.000 to their constituents for years about Epstein and the White House, 0:09:48.040 --> 0:09:51.480 who also talked to their constituents about Epstein for years 0:09:51.880 --> 0:09:54.800 now do not want to get held to release these documents, 0:09:55.280 --> 0:09:57.480 and that was the balancing act on display for the 0:09:57.520 --> 0:10:00.360 speaker and ultimately why he had to send his versus 0:10:00.360 --> 0:10:00.839 home early. 0:10:01.240 --> 0:10:04.600 That's right, and I would love to get into something 0:10:04.600 --> 0:10:07.080 a little bit nerdy as opposed to what we do, 0:10:07.200 --> 0:10:09.800 which is get into stuff which is very nerdy. So 0:10:09.840 --> 0:10:13.000 there's we are sort of barreling towards a government shutdown, 0:10:13.360 --> 0:10:16.960 which is the kind of backdrop of all of this. 0:10:17.280 --> 0:10:21.120 Republicans have passed this BBB, then they passed a recision 0:10:21.240 --> 0:10:24.640 package where they took they did funding for pep far 0:10:24.800 --> 0:10:29.320 but also took money away from PBS because it's important 0:10:29.400 --> 0:10:31.240 if you're going to do one good thing to do 0:10:31.320 --> 0:10:33.800 lots of other bad stuff while you're in there. And 0:10:33.840 --> 0:10:35.720 a lot of the PBS that's being punished, which I 0:10:35.720 --> 0:10:38.120 feel like is such a Trump thing, is like the 0:10:38.160 --> 0:10:40.640 PBS that's being punished is not the big PBS, right, 0:10:40.679 --> 0:10:43.360 I mean, they're going to lose little funding, but they'll survive. 0:10:43.559 --> 0:10:49.040 It's more going to be the tribal radio stations in Oklahoma. 0:10:49.520 --> 0:10:52.480 So talk to us about how I just want because 0:10:52.720 --> 0:10:55.000 I'm setting it up for what I want to talk 0:10:55.000 --> 0:10:58.400 about next. Can you explain to us why this recision 0:10:58.480 --> 0:11:02.160 package was asked and a little bit about how unusual 0:11:02.200 --> 0:11:03.160 it is. Yeah. 0:11:03.200 --> 0:11:05.440 So I actually did an explainer video of this on 0:11:05.520 --> 0:11:08.840 Instagram of like what it means to do recisions because 0:11:08.920 --> 0:11:11.280 it's one of those Washington words that's a buzzword that 0:11:11.320 --> 0:11:13.480 I think people's eyes glaze over, and it's like meant 0:11:13.480 --> 0:11:16.520 to exclude people from understanding the process. And so basically 0:11:16.600 --> 0:11:19.280 what they did here through a recisions package is, yes, 0:11:19.320 --> 0:11:21.760 they have done these before. It usually happens at the 0:11:21.800 --> 0:11:24.360 end of a fiscal year when you're about to redo 0:11:24.400 --> 0:11:26.760 the budget or do a continuing resolution that just kind 0:11:26.760 --> 0:11:29.520 of keeps funding levels the same. Typically people look and 0:11:29.559 --> 0:11:31.840 they say, oh, well, there's eighty million dollars left over 0:11:31.960 --> 0:11:34.800 that this one agency didn't use, so we'll claw that back. 0:11:35.040 --> 0:11:37.640 That'll go back into the pot. What was weird about 0:11:37.640 --> 0:11:40.840 this recisions package and why it matters so much going 0:11:40.880 --> 0:11:44.880 forward is because recisions is a partisan mechanism. You can 0:11:44.920 --> 0:11:47.640 do it with just one party, as Republicans did to 0:11:48.200 --> 0:11:52.600 take back funds that both parties agreed to fund and 0:11:52.640 --> 0:11:55.400 appropriate in the first place. And so the reason that 0:11:55.520 --> 0:11:59.320 Recisions at this juncture is so important is because they 0:11:59.360 --> 0:12:02.160 did it in parts and fashion. Republicans for the first 0:12:02.160 --> 0:12:05.960 time ever midstream of a fiscal year clawed back funds 0:12:05.960 --> 0:12:09.600 that Congress had already appropriated. But they did it during 0:12:09.640 --> 0:12:13.199 budget season, mere weeks before both parties are supposed to 0:12:13.240 --> 0:12:18.760 come back together and bipartisanly negotiate another fiscal year package. 0:12:18.880 --> 0:12:21.120 So Democrats are now left in the position of saying, 0:12:21.160 --> 0:12:24.600 all right, we negotiated in bipartisan fashion, as we always do, 0:12:24.800 --> 0:12:27.440 in good faith, to keep the government open, to fund 0:12:27.520 --> 0:12:30.559 various government programs, and then y'all did an end run 0:12:31.040 --> 0:12:34.040 that took out everything that we wanted and negotiated for 0:12:34.240 --> 0:12:36.680 in that process to begin with. So what is the 0:12:36.720 --> 0:12:39.920 incentive then for Democrats to come back to the table 0:12:40.040 --> 0:12:42.520 in September and say, okay, we're going to negotiate in 0:12:42.559 --> 0:12:45.920 good faith, like everything's fine. And oh, by the way, 0:12:46.400 --> 0:12:48.760 the omb chief for US Vote, who was one of 0:12:48.800 --> 0:12:52.280 the key people pushing that first recisions package in the 0:12:52.320 --> 0:12:57.120 interim period, has said, I actually think that Congress's bipartisan 0:12:57.200 --> 0:13:01.400 funding processes should be way less by partisan and so 0:13:01.520 --> 0:13:05.000 that just gives Democrats even more of a reason to, 0:13:05.400 --> 0:13:09.199 if not question, then outright completely doubt that they should 0:13:09.200 --> 0:13:11.880 be at the negotiating table for this, which just meant 0:13:11.880 --> 0:13:15.160 that the odds of a government shutdown went way up. 0:13:16.360 --> 0:13:21.280 And Russvought, architect of Project twenty twenty five, wrote a 0:13:21.320 --> 0:13:24.760 bunch of it, and also is this sort of in 0:13:24.960 --> 0:13:29.080 Trump one point zero experimented with impoundment. Impoundment is the 0:13:29.160 --> 0:13:32.920 thing that the Nixon White House did. It's very sketchy. 0:13:33.040 --> 0:13:38.520 It's basically Congress puts money towards something and the president says, no, 0:13:38.800 --> 0:13:40.120 we're not going to do it. 0:13:40.360 --> 0:13:43.200 So the way that I explained this too, again like 0:13:43.280 --> 0:13:46.840 in my little Instagram explainer, is like, imagine you, me, 0:13:47.200 --> 0:13:49.840 and ten of our friends go on vacation. We all 0:13:49.840 --> 0:13:51.959 put money, We decide to put money in the pot 0:13:51.960 --> 0:13:55.000 to go to dinner every night, and then one person 0:13:55.040 --> 0:13:57.720 of us convinces all of us that that money that 0:13:57.800 --> 0:14:00.560 we said should go to dinner every night actually is 0:14:00.640 --> 0:14:02.480 just going to get clawed right on back. And some 0:14:02.520 --> 0:14:04.040 of us are mad and some of us are happy, 0:14:04.040 --> 0:14:06.440 but it's getting clawed back regardless. And so you're in 0:14:06.440 --> 0:14:08.680 this position then where everyone is still on the vacation, 0:14:09.080 --> 0:14:11.880 but that money back in the pot is now living 0:14:11.960 --> 0:14:14.079 somewhere else that doesn't go to dinner, but all of 0:14:14.160 --> 0:14:16.679 us still have to eat. So where does that then 0:14:16.800 --> 0:14:20.360 leave you? And the mechanism is based in law. This 0:14:20.480 --> 0:14:22.880 is not something that the administration is just doing, but 0:14:23.080 --> 0:14:25.400 it's a law that is not often used and not 0:14:25.640 --> 0:14:28.800 in this way. And that's what turns this on its head. 0:14:29.000 --> 0:14:31.360 And I think we see a lot of times in 0:14:31.400 --> 0:14:36.040 the Trump administration them using zombie laws to do crazy stuff. 0:14:36.480 --> 0:14:39.320 Like I've written about this a lot, like the commstock 0:14:39.440 --> 0:14:43.560 at had wasn't meant for methapristone, or it was in 0:14:43.600 --> 0:14:50.640 the eighteen hundreds, right, the Passikoma taitus was that alien 0:14:50.800 --> 0:14:53.480 enemies wasn't meant for that. Like just a lot of 0:14:53.520 --> 0:14:56.440 times these laws that were never repealed because no one 0:14:56.520 --> 0:14:59.560 ever thought they'd use them. Now you had this sort 0:14:59.600 --> 0:15:03.960 of the better Society crew put together a new way 0:15:04.040 --> 0:15:05.120 of using these laws. 0:15:05.360 --> 0:15:08.520 But this also strikes me. I remember when states like 0:15:08.600 --> 0:15:13.120 Arizona or Michigan in the aftermath of Dobbs repealed laws 0:15:13.160 --> 0:15:15.880 from their books that are from the eighteen hundreds that 0:15:16.040 --> 0:15:21.280 limited abortion. And I remember some casual political viewers saying 0:15:21.280 --> 0:15:23.680 to me, well, what's the point. We're not there anymore. 0:15:23.720 --> 0:15:27.600 It's not like they're going to use them. Here we 0:15:27.680 --> 0:15:32.640 are now, and you realize why Democratic groups did the 0:15:32.720 --> 0:15:36.040 work of making sure that they were closing loopholes that 0:15:36.080 --> 0:15:39.440 could otherwise be exploited, because I think you're right. And 0:15:40.000 --> 0:15:43.160 you know, when you start talking about procedures for doing 0:15:43.160 --> 0:15:46.080 things that are literally Latin, you know they're old, but 0:15:46.120 --> 0:15:48.800 then that must become a tatis act about like how 0:15:49.320 --> 0:15:52.800 federal troops can be moved into states. I mean, lawmakers 0:15:52.840 --> 0:15:55.800 were then immediately coming on my show and saying, but 0:15:55.920 --> 0:15:57.880 this is even more reason for us to have to 0:15:57.960 --> 0:16:00.480 reform the process. And so what we've seen with Trump 0:16:00.520 --> 0:16:03.800 time and again, and I think about the Electoral count Act, 0:16:04.160 --> 0:16:06.400 the reform Act that they did about three years ago 0:16:06.840 --> 0:16:09.560 between the Senate and the House in bipartisan fashions they. 0:16:09.560 --> 0:16:14.560 Had to do because yeah, because it was a loophole. 0:16:14.320 --> 0:16:16.880 Yes, exploit the process of what a vice president can 0:16:16.920 --> 0:16:19.040 and can't do, as well as some other things at 0:16:19.080 --> 0:16:23.040 the state level, like we've seen Trump continuously try to 0:16:23.160 --> 0:16:27.160 press through these loopholes and force the other institutions of 0:16:27.200 --> 0:16:31.400 government to legislate around them to patch them up. And 0:16:31.440 --> 0:16:33.800 this is the problem with a Congress that has been 0:16:33.880 --> 0:16:37.040 completely remade in Trump's image and is held as a 0:16:37.080 --> 0:16:40.400 majority just by one party, is that there is no 0:16:40.440 --> 0:16:44.240 impetus then or motivation to close the loopholes. 0:16:44.040 --> 0:16:47.640 Right, if anything, they want to open loopholes. I want 0:16:47.640 --> 0:16:52.280 to pull this to something else, which is that after 0:16:52.480 --> 0:16:54.520 nine to eleven, we put in place all of these 0:16:54.560 --> 0:16:59.200 emergency powers the Bush administration, and look, everyone was very 0:16:59.240 --> 0:17:01.400 freaked out, and there was a feeling it was very 0:17:01.680 --> 0:17:05.919 These emergency powers were actually quite popular. That's how he 0:17:06.080 --> 0:17:08.600 was able to put them in place. And they and 0:17:08.680 --> 0:17:10.840 as someone who lived in New York during nine to eleven, 0:17:11.359 --> 0:17:13.679 I know why because people are really scared and they 0:17:13.680 --> 0:17:16.159 were willing to give up their civil liberties because they 0:17:16.160 --> 0:17:17.959 were scared and they wanted to be safe, and they 0:17:17.960 --> 0:17:20.160 felt that was the only way to make the government safe. 0:17:20.320 --> 0:17:22.720 But what happened is a lot of those emergency powers 0:17:22.760 --> 0:17:25.640 are still in the box. So it's twenty years later 0:17:26.160 --> 0:17:28.560 and the government has way more power than it did 0:17:28.960 --> 0:17:33.760 in two thousand and one August of two thousand and one, 0:17:33.920 --> 0:17:37.879 So it does strike me that there really is if 0:17:38.320 --> 0:17:41.800 American democracy continues, on which we hope it will, and 0:17:41.840 --> 0:17:45.719 we have midterms that there will really be a kind 0:17:46.119 --> 0:17:49.000 of there's going to have to eventually be some kind 0:17:49.040 --> 0:17:51.600 of reckoning here or were completely screwed. 0:17:52.040 --> 0:17:57.080 Yeah, but those are the stakes, right right. I think 0:17:57.119 --> 0:18:01.240 about Congress and the ways that this building was I think, 0:18:01.280 --> 0:18:05.480 in many ways just built on the etiquette of governing 0:18:05.800 --> 0:18:11.720 in small d democratic fashion, which meant bipartisan compromise and 0:18:12.040 --> 0:18:14.760 the common idea that if everyone was walking away from 0:18:14.800 --> 0:18:18.520 the table unhappy, but with something that was normal. And 0:18:18.840 --> 0:18:22.560 Trump's Washington and other Washington's have exploited this too. That's 0:18:22.600 --> 0:18:24.879 not to say that Republicans are the first people to 0:18:24.920 --> 0:18:27.560 take advantage of having both houses of power in Congress 0:18:27.600 --> 0:18:29.320 and the White House. Certainly that's how we got the 0:18:29.359 --> 0:18:33.000 Affordable Care Act and other mass pieces of legislation. It's 0:18:33.080 --> 0:18:37.040 just the motivation points are different, and Trump's is the 0:18:37.040 --> 0:18:40.840 first administration willing to not just exploit the loopholes, go 0:18:41.040 --> 0:18:43.760 full force on having majorities in the places that you 0:18:43.840 --> 0:18:47.280 need them, but then also bowl over all of the 0:18:47.280 --> 0:18:51.320 cultural and etiquette norms that typically govern Washington. And that's 0:18:51.359 --> 0:18:53.959 why it feels like it's so out of control. And 0:18:54.000 --> 0:18:58.480 without checks because that's no longer part of the permission 0:18:58.520 --> 0:19:03.359 structure here. If anything, no, it's knocked down. And if 0:19:03.400 --> 0:19:05.879 you were to embrace by partisanship, you know someone like 0:19:05.920 --> 0:19:08.720 Tom Tillis, for example, who's like, hey, I just got 0:19:08.720 --> 0:19:12.000 some questions, whether it's about the accept nomination or about 0:19:12.000 --> 0:19:16.040 the recisions package or whatever. Like you're ostracized from the 0:19:16.080 --> 0:19:17.840 party and ultimately have to make the choice not to 0:19:17.920 --> 0:19:21.000 run for reelection. Right, So like, yeah, it's a full 0:19:21.040 --> 0:19:25.400 party apparatus that now just supports administration. That is a feature, 0:19:25.480 --> 0:19:27.800 not a bug of it is to test all of 0:19:27.800 --> 0:19:33.880 the limits in culture, in media in Washington, and policymaking 0:19:33.960 --> 0:19:36.320 and funding in all of these different arenas. 0:19:36.680 --> 0:19:41.280 It does feel like all the guardrails that we had 0:19:41.960 --> 0:19:46.720 in the first Trump administration have been systematically just focused 0:19:46.760 --> 0:19:53.760 on and attacked and decimated. So, for example, while we 0:19:53.920 --> 0:19:56.880 have the CBS stuff, which I think is really important, 0:19:57.480 --> 0:20:00.520 So people listen to this podcasts on Saturday morning, thank 0:20:00.560 --> 0:20:05.240 you for listening, Love, And on Thursday we saw that 0:20:05.680 --> 0:20:11.639 the Trump FCC approved this guy dance murder that is 0:20:12.840 --> 0:20:20.040 conveniently right after the cancelation of Colbert. 0:20:20.640 --> 0:20:24.440 It was an interesting week of timing. I mean, that's 0:20:24.520 --> 0:20:27.840 fnal approval on that big merger. Right that has long 0:20:27.920 --> 0:20:31.840 been talked about as the motivation for CBS settling a 0:20:31.920 --> 0:20:35.920 lawsuit with Trump that hadn't gone to trial. I mean, 0:20:36.800 --> 0:20:39.720 the First Amendment right to edit an interview where the 0:20:39.760 --> 0:20:45.280 meaning wasn't fundamentally changed anyway, is so central, and every 0:20:45.320 --> 0:20:49.439 news organization does this in print or on television, and 0:20:49.520 --> 0:20:52.159 so again, like the dubious nature of that lawsuit to 0:20:52.200 --> 0:20:55.520 begin with is central here. But the fact that this 0:20:55.560 --> 0:20:58.920 merger went through a week after Colbert, I do think 0:20:58.960 --> 0:21:01.600 the part of this sort of runs counter is the 0:21:01.640 --> 0:21:04.920 way that we've seen Colbert, but also The Daily Show 0:21:04.960 --> 0:21:09.280 and now south Park be unflinching in their criticism not 0:21:09.400 --> 0:21:13.000 just of the President but of this deal that their 0:21:13.080 --> 0:21:17.120 parent company has done. Is a bright spot, I think. 0:21:17.760 --> 0:21:20.680 And as someone who sort of came into a love 0:21:20.680 --> 0:21:24.240 of news through a love of satirical news, I so 0:21:24.400 --> 0:21:29.359 appreciate what this little bastion of our industry is doing 0:21:29.440 --> 0:21:34.119 here because it's reminding people that there is a moral code. 0:21:34.680 --> 0:21:37.200 And for someone like South Park, for Matt Start and 0:21:37.240 --> 0:21:39.320 Trey Parker, who just got a one point five billion 0:21:39.359 --> 0:21:42.280 dollar deal for more episodes and to come in with 0:21:42.320 --> 0:21:44.440 the season premiere that they came in with, My jaw 0:21:44.560 --> 0:21:48.920 was on the floor the entire time. The way that 0:21:49.000 --> 0:21:51.600 as a longtime tilth Park watcher, they are now depicting 0:21:51.640 --> 0:21:53.600 the president of the United States in the way that 0:21:53.640 --> 0:21:56.880 they depicted the former president of the Rok Saddam Hussein 0:21:57.000 --> 0:22:01.360 laying in bed with is the jarring and so flooring 0:22:01.440 --> 0:22:03.280 and such a commentary on the times. But they are 0:22:03.320 --> 0:22:05.400 equal opportunity critics. 0:22:05.560 --> 0:22:06.600 Oh yeah, there are. 0:22:07.720 --> 0:22:10.080 He's special because they're going after him, is not. They're 0:22:10.080 --> 0:22:10.800 missing the point. 0:22:11.000 --> 0:22:16.639 No, yeah, no, they hated Bush too. I mean what's 0:22:16.720 --> 0:22:22.080 so interesting, though, is you have so much of trump Ism. 0:22:22.359 --> 0:22:26.399 Is this very kind of one dimensional protect the leader. 0:22:26.440 --> 0:22:28.560 He doesn't like to be made fun of. He really 0:22:28.600 --> 0:22:31.280 doesn't like it, right he remember there was I think 0:22:31.280 --> 0:22:34.919 when they start off with the with the portrait in 0:22:35.000 --> 0:22:38.639 the Capitol of Colorado. He hated a portrait and he 0:22:38.680 --> 0:22:41.320 made them change it because he didn't like it, because 0:22:41.320 --> 0:22:43.520 he didn't like the way he was depicted. So there's 0:22:43.560 --> 0:22:48.040 so many of these like very kind of kitchy, almost 0:22:48.119 --> 0:22:53.879 Mussolini esque kind of tropes that are from other times. 0:22:54.720 --> 0:22:58.720 And to watch this be exploited. I mean, I was 0:22:58.760 --> 0:23:00.720