Speaker 1: Good morning, peeps, and welcome to Okay f Daily with
Speaker 1: Meet your Girl Danielle Moody, recording from the Brooklyn Bunker. Folks,
Speaker 1: there is so much breaking news that is happening this week,
Speaker 1: it is hard to keep things straight. So I'm going
Speaker 1: to try and do something a little bit different, which
Speaker 1: is run through a countdown of things that literally happened
Speaker 1: in the last twenty four to forty eight hours. So
Speaker 1: here we go. Let's start from the top with the
Speaker 1: fact the biggest of the pieces of breaking news, which
Speaker 1: is that seven hours, over seven hours, four hundred and
Speaker 1: fifty seven minutes of White House phone logs are somehow missing, erased,
Speaker 1: lost on the day of the insurrection. I want you
Speaker 1: to think about this because somebody had tweeted me and
Speaker 1: I said, oh my god, what a wonderful way to
Speaker 1: think about this. Imagine being on the job, whatever job
Speaker 1: that is. Imagine that you are a blue collar as
Speaker 1: the Republicans love to say, regular American worker, and you
Speaker 1: happen to go dark, right, for over seven hours. That's
Speaker 1: an entire workshift, right. Let's assume that we all work
Speaker 1: for roughly eight to ten hours a day and you
Speaker 1: go missing for over seven hours or people are trying
Speaker 1: to call. There's just a gap in communication during this time.
Speaker 1: And oh, by the way, you're also the manager of
Speaker 1: said building that is on fire and no one can
Speaker 1: find you. That is essentially what the National Archives when
Speaker 1: they gave over the records up from the White House
Speaker 1: on the day of the insurrection, what the one six
Speaker 1: Commission has recognized and is being reported by the Washington
Speaker 1: Post and now ever every major news outlet Donald Trump.
Speaker 1: We know from the over five hundred interviews that the
Speaker 1: White House that the one six Commission House Investigation has
Speaker 1: done over five hundred interviews that during that time everyone
Speaker 1: who was in the vicinity of Donald Trump said that
Speaker 1: Donald Trump is on the phone. We know that he
Speaker 1: talked to Kevin McCarthy. We've learned that he tried to
Speaker 1: call Mitch McConnell. We know that he talked to Jim Jordan.
Speaker 1: We know that he talked to Steve Bannon. We know
Speaker 1: that there are a list of people that were in conversation,
Speaker 1: whether for sixty seconds or ten minutes plus with Donald
Speaker 1: Trump on the day of the insurrection. But there is
Speaker 1: a huge fucking gap in the White House phone locks.
Speaker 1: Now a couple of things can also be true at
Speaker 1: the same time. First of all, the only reason that
Speaker 1: a president of the United States wouldn't be using said
Speaker 1: white house phone logs is because you are trying to
Speaker 1: cover something up. The only reason why you would be
Speaker 1: using other people's phones, as I'm probably assured that Donald
Speaker 1: Trump has more than one cell phone, is because you
Speaker 1: are trying not to be traced. That you don't want
Speaker 1: your you know, big moment, right, your big insurrection moment
Speaker 1: to be interrupted, so you just stay off White House lines.
Speaker 1: That is not the action that is taken by somebody
Speaker 1: who is innocent and somebody that doesn't know how to
Speaker 1: operate as a criminal. Here's the things that we already
Speaker 1: know to be true about Donald Trump. Donald Trump does
Speaker 1: not use email, does not have email, doesn't use text messages,
Speaker 1: doesn't write shit down. We even know from Ama Rosa
Speaker 1: herself that one day she walked into the Oval office
Speaker 1: and Donald Trump literally put a piece of paper in
Speaker 1: his mouth. Innocent people don't do dubious shit like what
Speaker 1: has been uncovered in Trump's White House. So here's the
Speaker 1: fucking question, the million dollar question, the billion dollar question
Speaker 1: that I've been asking since the insurrection on January six,
Speaker 1: twenty twenty one, Where the fuck is Merrick Garland. Seriously,
Speaker 1: at this stage of the game, you can no longer
Speaker 1: tell me that things take time. You can no longer
Speaker 1: tell me that the Department of Justice is actually putting
Speaker 1: every bit of muscle necessary behind this investigation. You can't
Speaker 1: because it's been over four hundred fucking days and we
Speaker 1: have no word, not even a murmuring from inside the
Speaker 1: Department of Justice other than people who work there that
Speaker 1: are saying that they are frustrated with the inaction of
Speaker 1: this age. So here's the thing, folks. We have a
Speaker 1: case that was in New York that was supposed to
Speaker 1: be overseen right by the Manhattan District Attorney, the new
Speaker 1: Manhattan District Attorney, Alvin Bragg. In the course of the
Speaker 1: last few months, we have had two of the leading
Speaker 1: prosecutors in that investigation quit, and they quit outright because
Speaker 1: there has been no movement with regard to interviews in
Speaker 1: front of the grand jury that his predecessor Sidance had
Speaker 1: put in place, a special grand jury to sit for
Speaker 1: longer than normal juries, because the mountain of evidence that
Speaker 1: they need to fucking go through is just that deep
Speaker 1: and that high Alvin Bragg, however, says, oh, there's nothing
Speaker 1: to see here, folks, Merritt Garland mountains of evidence that
Speaker 1: has been put together by a House commission that has
Speaker 1: absolutely no teeth. All they can do is investigate, right,
Speaker 1: All they can do is investigate and then make recommendations.
Speaker 1: It is up to the Department of Justice to actually
Speaker 1: offer up indictments, which, by the way, they have enough
Speaker 1: fucking evidence to do, from Steve Bannon to Mark Meadows,
Speaker 1: to fucking John Eastman to Donald Trump and to all
Speaker 1: of the minions in between, and yet we have seen
Speaker 1: absolutely nothing. But do you know what the other story is,
Speaker 1: because there are many. Here's the other story. Thomas. Clarence
Speaker 1: Clarence Thomas, who I always refer to because you know,
Speaker 1: you can never trust a person with two first names, right,
Speaker 1: you can't. So. Clarence Thomas's wife, Jinny Jinny was at
Speaker 1: the insurrection. Genny funded buses for the insurrectionists. Clarence Thomas
Speaker 1: was the soul, the soul dissenter on the decision to
Speaker 1: provide access to Donald Trump's phone records. Clarence Thomas, let
Speaker 1: me say that again, was the soul dissenter, not wanting
Speaker 1: to release Donald Trump's phone records. Then we find out why, Oh,
Speaker 1: because Genny Thomas had been in regular communication with Mark Meadows.
Speaker 1: And so why do I say this? Let me bring
Speaker 1: it full circle. Seven hours of White House phone logs
Speaker 1: are empty. Mark Meadows was in deep communication with everybody
Speaker 1: who was at the insurrection right as a as a participant,
Speaker 1: or we're in the chamber hiding and fearing for their lives.
Speaker 1: Why wouldn't Clarence Thomas want that information release? Oh, because
Speaker 1: it would show that his wife's phone number would come
Speaker 1: up on Mark meadows phone more than a couple of times.
Speaker 1: And then you have yesterday, Senator Chuck Schumer, the majority
Speaker 1: leader for the Senate, say just casually that Clarence Thomas
Speaker 1: should recuse himself or should have recused himself, and maybe
Speaker 1: there should be some type of ethics with the Supreme Court. Folks,
Speaker 1: let me tell you something. My ability to have patience
Speaker 1: anymore for accountability, for responsibility for an attempted coup to
Speaker 1: overthrow our democracy is done. I am going to call
Speaker 1: out every single fucking person until I no longer have
Speaker 1: breath in my body for their ineptitude. Folks will say
Speaker 1: to me, well, Danielle, What do you want Chuck Schumer
Speaker 1: to do. It's not like he can remove Clarence Thomas
Speaker 1: from the bench, No he can't. But do you know
Speaker 1: what Democrats can fucking do? Wage a full on media
Speaker 1: onslought on Clarence Thomas, applying the fucking pressure so that
Speaker 1: Republicans are forced every time that there is a camera
Speaker 1: in their fucking faces to be able right to state
Speaker 1: to the American people why there should be no trouble
Speaker 1: with the fact that literally Clarence Thomas is literally in
Speaker 1: bed with the fucking enemy, the enemy, the trees in
Speaker 1: his enemy. Who was on the phone with Mark Meadows
Speaker 1: saying this is how Donald Trump stays in office. You're
Speaker 1: telling me that a woman who is the wife of
Speaker 1: a sitting Supreme Court justice doesn't know how the fucking
Speaker 1: constitution works, doesn't know electoral politics. Oh you want to
Speaker 1: tell me that they're they're a Switzerland that is in
Speaker 1: their house and she Clarence Thomas is completely neutral to
Speaker 1: the fact that his wife was at the rally. Because
Speaker 1: here's the thing, folks, they don't even give a fuck
Speaker 1: about perception. You know why, because Democrats never lean into
Speaker 1: how things look, and that all you need to do
Speaker 1: is what Donald Trump did with his accusations of fraud
Speaker 1: in the twenty twenty election, which is planned to fucking seed.
Speaker 1: Oh seems like there was fraud. Remember Donald Trump said,
Speaker 1: right on the phone with Secretary of State in Georgia,
Speaker 1: Brad rath Nsberger, find me eleven thousand, seven hundred and
Speaker 1: thirty some odd votes. I'll handle the rest. I got
Speaker 1: my folks in place, I got this covered. What the
Speaker 1: fuck do you think that Donald Trump was doing for
Speaker 1: four hundred and fifty seven minutes, right, Donald Trump was
Speaker 1: sitting in the White House orchestrating the coup that was
Speaker 1: playing out on national television. But Republicans want to turn
Speaker 1: around and even a sitting here's my other story, sitting
Speaker 1: federal judge appointed by Donald Trump, Judge McFadden, said this
Speaker 1: about insurrectionist that, oh, if they were a non violent
Speaker 1: they shouldn't see any fucking jail time. And equating what
Speaker 1: we saw on January six, twenty twenty one, to the
Speaker 1: protest against the killing of George Floyd and consistent and
Speaker 1: unrelenting police brutality, how can you look at these two
Speaker 1: fucking situations and say these two things are the same bitch,
Speaker 1: what are you looking at? But this is who Mitch
Speaker 1: McConnell and Donald Trump put on over three hundred federal
Speaker 1: courts around the country. But again, no media pushed by
Speaker 1: Democrats to bring the world's attention to what the fuck
Speaker 1: is happening in the United States Supreme Court, in the
Speaker 1: United States Congress, and what was happening on the day
Speaker 1: of January sixth. It's oh, nothing to see here, folks.
Speaker 1: And I gotta tell you this. You know, there is
Speaker 1: just so much that is happening. There is just so
Speaker 1: much that is at stake, and I want to say this.
Speaker 1: So in New York magazine, Alexandriocstio Cortez was interviewed, and
Speaker 1: I want to read you what she said in this article, right,
Speaker 1: and the article is entitled AOC's warning for Democrats, We're
Speaker 1: in trouble. My other big story. What she says here,
Speaker 1: I want it on a billboard, I want it on
Speaker 1: every TikTok, I want it on every fucking reel. But
Speaker 1: it won't happen because, you know what, it's not a
Speaker 1: slap that took place at the Oscars that we can
Speaker 1: all talk about for two and three and four days
Speaker 1: but not the fact that we literally have active sitting
Speaker 1: justices and active members of Congress that are bitch slapping
Speaker 1: our democracy up and down, and no one gives a shit.
Speaker 1: This is what Alexandrio Cassio Cortez said about Democrats and
Speaker 1: said about the midterms that are coming up in a
Speaker 1: few months. Quote a younger member of Congress, the first
Speaker 1: vote I ever cast was for Barack Obama, who was
Speaker 1: called a socialist, and all of this stuff, all of
Speaker 1: this rhetoric that we see today, has been the political
Speaker 1: reality my entire life, and so I never felt a
Speaker 1: nostalgia for something that never existed in my lifetime. I
Speaker 1: feel like our politics has fundamentally changed, whether it's for
Speaker 1: the better or for the worst. It's for people's determination.
Speaker 1: But I was never under the illusion that we can
Speaker 1: bring mansion along. And this is what she is referring to,
Speaker 1: because Ocasio Cortez, according to this article and facts, was
Speaker 1: one of only six Democrats that voted against Biden's one
Speaker 1: point two trillion dollar infrastructure bill last November, and the
Speaker 1: reason was because the larger bill, right, the bill back
Speaker 1: better the people's the human infrastructure component was going to
Speaker 1: be split off right and they said, oh, let us
Speaker 1: pass the actual infrastructure that then we can tout as
Speaker 1: bipartisan as if people give a fuck, and then we'll
Speaker 1: come back for the BBB portion later on. And then
Speaker 1: what happened. Joe Mansion and Kursten Cinema right renamed as
Speaker 1: they always do, they smile to your face and stab
Speaker 1: you in your back, and oh, Cassio Cortez is just like,
Speaker 1: do we not understand the same person? And what she
Speaker 1: says in this article so very plainly is that she's like,
Speaker 1: I want to trust that the President of the United
Speaker 1: States knew what he was doing, but this doesn't feel right,
Speaker 1: and it didn't feel right. Here's her quote quote. I
Speaker 1: have the utmost respect and confidence in the president, but
Speaker 1: I just felt like we called two different plays on
Speaker 1: this one. I think that there is a sense among
Speaker 1: more senior members of Congress who have been around in
Speaker 1: different political times that we can get back to this
Speaker 1: time of buddy buddy and backslapping and we'll cut a
Speaker 1: deal and go into a room with some bourbon and
Speaker 1: some smoke, and you'll come out and work something out.
Speaker 1: I think there's a real nostalgia and believe that the
Speaker 1: time this time still exists, or that we can get
Speaker 1: back to it. Folks, how many times have you heard
Speaker 1: me say the very same thing on woke af that
Speaker 1: Joe Biden went into the presidency with this sense of nostalgia.
Speaker 1: He went into the presidency and clearly let go of
Speaker 1: the eight years in which he was vice president and
Speaker 1: watch the hostility right play out against Barack Obama then
Speaker 1: President Barack Obama. And I believe that Joe Biden thought
Speaker 1: to himself, well, you know, it really isn't about race,
Speaker 1: you know, and they're calling him a Muslim, but it
Speaker 1: really isn't about xenophobia or or Islamophobia. It really is
Speaker 1: the fact that you know, he was an outsider, right,
Speaker 1: and I know these guys. I've you know, played games
Speaker 1: with these guys and attended dinners and birthday parties, and
Speaker 1: so I'm one of the good old boys. And so
Speaker 1: when they see my old ass, white face, that they
Speaker 1: will see some comfort and they'll come to the table
Speaker 1: because we're cut from the same cloth. And you see, folks,
Speaker 1: it's that kind of thinking that made Joe Biden my
Speaker 1: fifth choice for president. My fifth choice for president because
Speaker 1: I knew, I knew and felt exactly what Ocasio Cortez
Speaker 1: stated in this article, It was the belief that I'm
Speaker 1: one of the good old white boys, and all we
Speaker 1: need is a couple of bourbons and a cigar, and
Speaker 1: we'll get this country back on track like we always have,
Speaker 1: not at all recognizing that our body politic had been
Speaker 1: forever changed, that it was already changing when he was
Speaker 1: vice president, and that Donald Trump and the Trump administration
Speaker 1: wiped out any ever possibility, any little strand of hope
Speaker 1: that the Republicans of yesteryear were gonna fucking return. So
Speaker 1: when he saw the very same people that he used
Speaker 1: to sit bourbon with decide that they were going to
Speaker 1: vote against the certification of his election win, and then
Speaker 1: he saw the same onslaught of lies right, and then
Speaker 1: he saw the Capitol Building in a plum of smoke,
Speaker 1: you would think that Joe Biden would have shook off
Speaker 1: his desire for yesteryear and had his ass blasted into
Speaker 1: the present fucking moment. But alas, here we are. Here,
Speaker 1: we are with nada, nothing, zilch, zero to offer the
Speaker 1: American people as to why Democrats need to remain in power.
Speaker 1: Because here's the thing, Democrats are not making any type
Speaker 1: of push to hold Donald Trump accountable. They want to
Speaker 1: move on to issues that quote unquote the American people
Speaker 1: care about. Do you know what the fuck the American
Speaker 1: people care about having a government that isn't corrupt Because
Speaker 1: the questions that I keep asking about Marrick Garland, about
Speaker 1: the Alvin Braggs of the world right, is that they
Speaker 1: all take money from the same fucking people, both Republican
Speaker 1: and Democratic donors. And I'm saying to myself, self, why
Speaker 1: isn't their rigorous investigation because I believe that these motherfuckers
Speaker 1: are bought and sold. But instead of anybody doing any
Speaker 1: deep dive investigation into whether or not, oh, I don't
Speaker 1: know that a sitting Supreme Court justice members partner decided
Speaker 1: to fund insurrectionists instead of going into see like who
Speaker 1: exactly was funding Alvin Bragg's campaign and what decisions did
Speaker 1: he make about slow walking the Trump investigation. And after
Speaker 1: literally years of work that has been done to build
Speaker 1: a criminal case, an airtight criminal case against the man
Speaker 1: who has been on a thirty plus year fucking crime
Speaker 1: spree in this state, let alone the four year crime
Speaker 1: spree that he did nationally. So you look at this, folks,
Speaker 1: you look at this and I think to myself, like,
Speaker 1: where is the energy? Why is there such a lack
Speaker 1: of focus? Why is there such a lack of grit
Speaker 1: and pursuit of justice above all else right now? And
Speaker 1: the only thing that I can think of, the only
Speaker 1: thing that makes sense is that money is entangled in
Speaker 1: this because there's no other and you can't you shit like, Oh,
Speaker 1: the country's been through enough, right because this is the
Speaker 1: type of talking points that both sides want to offer up.
Speaker 1: Oh the country has been through enough. The American people
Speaker 1: want to turn the page, turn the page on to
Speaker 1: what authoritarianism? American fascism? What are we turning the page too,
Speaker 1: We're turning the page to the focus on preserving democracy
Speaker 1: overseas while ours is under attack. Why would people decide
Speaker 1: to vote for Democrats when Joe Biden stands up and
Speaker 1: refers to the people that want that believe that he's
Speaker 1: an illegitimate president as his friend. So if you're not
Speaker 1: making it very clear who the fuck the enemy is,
Speaker 1: then how are you getting people to vote for you?
Speaker 1: And why would they show up? Here's what else Okasi
Speaker 1: or Cortez offers in this interview in New York magazine quote.
Speaker 1: If the president does pursue and start to govern decisively
Speaker 1: using executive action and other tools at his disposal, at
Speaker 1: his disposal, I think we're in the game. But she says,
Speaker 1: if we decide to just kind of sit back for
Speaker 1: the rest of the year and not change people's lives, yeah,
Speaker 1: I do think we're in trouble. So I don't think
Speaker 1: that it's set in stone. I think that we can
Speaker 1: determine our destiny. Here. Here's the thing I do disagree
Speaker 1: with Ocasio Cortez here, I do believe that it's set
Speaker 1: in stone. I don't think that Democrats in charge, in
Speaker 1: power in this administration are going to do or offer
Speaker 1: a fucking thing. They're not going to offer a rebuke
Speaker 1: of the Republican Party turned into white nationalist party. They're
Speaker 1: not going to offer right to the use of executive
Speaker 1: action because they have this fifty fifty split that ain't
Speaker 1: shit can get done. So they're not going to cancel
Speaker 1: student loan debt. They're not going to do shit on
Speaker 1: climate change, they're not going to do anything on police
Speaker 1: or form. But get this, even though we know that
Speaker 1: executive orders can be rolled back, Joe Biden has until
Speaker 1: twenty twenty four, so he could be providing clear relief
Speaker 1: and leadership in this moment, even if it is just
Speaker 1: to use as a campaign motivator to get people to
Speaker 1: want to go to the polls in November and then
Speaker 1: again in twenty twenty four. And this is why my
Speaker 1: upcoming conversation with our friend doctor Jonathan Metzel today is
Speaker 1: so important because Jonathan and I get into a conversation
Speaker 1: that really got me, and it is this, the Democratic
Speaker 1: Party does not understand power. They don't understand how to
Speaker 1: get power, they don't understand how to hold power. And
Speaker 1: when Jonathan begins to unpack what he believes are the
Speaker 1: reasons why, and I want to say this, we can't
Speaker 1: just say and rest on our laurels that, oh well,
Speaker 1: it's easier to sell hate, like, oh well, it's easier,
Speaker 1: And Jonathan will say this to be united when you
Speaker 1: were a monolith. Because here's the thing, and my pushback
Speaker 1: is that if saving our democracy is not the unifying message,
Speaker 1: then what the fuck are Democrats running on? That's really
Speaker 1: the question, because you don't have to be focused on
Speaker 1: all of these other issues because the reality is is
Speaker 1: that if we don't preserve our democracy. Then it doesn't
Speaker 1: matter what is happening with climate change, It doesn't matter
Speaker 1: what is going on with police reform. It doesn't matter
Speaker 1: that women and people with uterusis are about to lose
Speaker 1: abortion access when the final decision is made in June
Speaker 1: about Rovie Wade and the Mississippi case. None of that matters.
Speaker 1: If we don't have free and fair elections, None of
Speaker 1: that matters if we have lost faith and the integrity
Speaker 1: within our governmental agencies. So we can talk about all
Speaker 1: of these other issues until we're blue in the face,
Speaker 1: But if the fundamental, the foundation of it all, which
Speaker 1: is our democracy, government formed by the people, is not protected,
Speaker 1: then nothing else matters. And what is sad but so
Speaker 1: very evident, is that Democrats are looking up in the
Speaker 1: sky hoping for a miracle and one ain't coming. Because
Speaker 1: the miracle right now would be them developing a spine,
Speaker 1: would be them developing some type of warrior spirit that
Speaker 1: has been absent, which leaves me wondering why I'm still
Speaker 1: a Democrat. Do you know why you are still a Democrat?
Speaker 1: Tell me in the comments section today, why we continue
Speaker 1: to be a part of an activated in this party
Speaker 1: that clearly has no path forward. We have a handful
Speaker 1: of months, folks, a handful of months. We'll be here
Speaker 1: in the blink of an eye, and so will American fascism.
Speaker 1: And I'm wondering which gets here first. Coming up next
Speaker 1: my conversation with our friend doctor Jonathan Metzel. Folks, I
Speaker 1: am back from vak as you know, and super excited
Speaker 1: to be rejoined by my favorite Wednesday guest, doctor Jonathan metzol.
Speaker 1: You know him and you love him as the author
Speaker 1: of Dying of Whiteness, which apparently we are in fact
Speaker 1: going to all die of in the next several months.
Speaker 1: I mean, I don't know how much more information we
Speaker 1: need to see in front of us, Jonathan about the
Speaker 1: direction that this country is headed in about its love
Speaker 1: affair with white supremacy. So talk to us about what
Speaker 1: you have been seeing and noticing, because I'm telling you again,
Speaker 1: I don't know what your thoughts were when you wrote
Speaker 1: Dying of Whiteness, Where where your mind was in terms
Speaker 1: of how you were going to see the evolution of
Speaker 1: essentially your thesis, the evolution of your book over the
Speaker 1: last couple of years. So hello everybody. I'm in Ithaca,
Speaker 1: New York today. I'm obviously wearing a turtleneck because it's
Speaker 1: a blizzard out. It's literally snowing like crazy out my window,
Speaker 1: and it's nineteen degrees and so it's end of days.
Speaker 1: And if it's if I'm realizing, if it's end of days,
Speaker 1: you want a comfortable turtleneck. So that's that's kind of
Speaker 1: my strategy now. But I'm here actually giving I'm giving
Speaker 1: the Krieger lecture that later this afternoon on the topic
Speaker 1: of dying of whiteness, and they asked me to talk about,
Speaker 1: you know, what's the lesson of my book you know
Speaker 1: now a couple of years on. And it's pretty interesting, right,
Speaker 1: because I wrote that book as a as a warning. Right. Initially,
Speaker 1: I was doing research in I was doing research in
Speaker 1: Kentucky and Tennessee and Missouri and Kansas, and I was
Speaker 1: seeing people make decisions that were terrible for their own health,
Speaker 1: like literally ending their own life, but they were leading
Speaker 1: to a lot of power for the issue that they
Speaker 1: care about, namely, keeping conservative white America on top, playing
Speaker 1: a card of being a victim in order to a
Speaker 1: sure power. And I tell a lot of stories in
Speaker 1: that book about people who basically say, I realize I
Speaker 1: could benefit by, you know, getting my own health insurance
Speaker 1: or sending my kid to a better school. But to
Speaker 1: do that would mean to participate in pluralistic democracy, and
Speaker 1: instead I'm not going to do that, so that my
Speaker 1: party basically people laying their lives down on the line.
Speaker 1: And so obviously those issues now are almost on steroids.
Speaker 1: I mean, I wrote the book. It came out in
Speaker 1: twenty nineteen, twenty twenty as a warning like, let's not
Speaker 1: do what Kansas and Missouri are doing. But instead what
Speaker 1: used to be called the Southern strategy whip up white
Speaker 1: racial resentment, is now a national strategy. And so the
Speaker 1: talk I'm going to be give today is basically, what's
Speaker 1: the lesson? Like how did these crazy politics, who seemingly
Speaker 1: self defeating, fascist politics, how did they get to the
Speaker 1: position they are now, which is that they take over
Speaker 1: the you know, the country. They've taken over the Supreme Court.
Speaker 1: Poor Justice Thomas has his wife sneaking around behind his
Speaker 1: back when he doesn't even know it or he would
Speaker 1: ruse himself. So the politics have taken over the entire country,
Speaker 1: and the question is how did we get here? And
Speaker 1: on one hand, I think it's easy to say and
Speaker 1: I think it's right that right racial resentment is so
Speaker 1: deep in this country that any moment that there's the
Speaker 1: promise of any kind of equality is going to take over.
Speaker 1: But I would also say that the other lesson of
Speaker 1: the book that I'm going to talk about is how Republicans,
Speaker 1: you know, during the Obama presidency, were worried that they
Speaker 1: were literally getting wiped off the map, and so they
Speaker 1: didn't just play to white racial resentment. What they also
Speaker 1: did is they mobilized at local levels. They took over
Speaker 1: school boards, they took over county commissioner's office, election offices.
Speaker 1: They really they became a very formidable voting block as
Speaker 1: a result of people who really cared almost more than
Speaker 1: their own well being. And what they did is they
Speaker 1: basically took over They used local power to take over
Speaker 1: courthouses and judges and work their way up. And so
Speaker 1: the other part of this isn't just about condemning whiteness.
Speaker 1: It's also to recognize that we got here because, to
Speaker 1: be frank, Republicans were better than us at playing the
Speaker 1: political game in terms of seating the power of you know,
Speaker 1: they noticed they basically realized that the power was in judges,
Speaker 1: and they did what it took in a way to
Speaker 1: get there. And so I'm saying that because the other
Speaker 1: part of my talk today is a challenge for Democrats,
Speaker 1: which is we better get mobilized. You know, even though
Speaker 1: everything is it gets us, and we mobilized like crazy,
Speaker 1: but I think for us it's kind of like a
Speaker 1: lot of us feel like we mobilized for the presidential
Speaker 1: election and where did it get us? But the Republicans
Speaker 1: would say, we mobilized for the school board and the
Speaker 1: election and the county commissioner, and we built our way
Speaker 1: from the ground. App we didn't think, oh, because we
Speaker 1: won a presidential election and we didn't get what we wanted,
Speaker 1: we were going to stop mobilizing. You know, Jonathan, so
Speaker 1: many things that you bring up, and I want to
Speaker 1: go to the beginning where you said that the Southern
Speaker 1: strategy has now turned into a national strategy, and I
Speaker 1: want to dig into that a bit because as we
Speaker 1: continue to get news right, and you brought up Jinny Thomas,
Speaker 1: which should be front page news, but instead we continue
Speaker 1: to focus on, you know, the flap that happened at
Speaker 1: the Oscars, and you know, and the entertainment value thereof
Speaker 1: and the debate thereof with regard to, you know, acts
Speaker 1: of violence, but we don't actually continue to talk about
Speaker 1: the act of violence that proceeded the the desire to
Speaker 1: halt an election and then bring down our country, the
Speaker 1: act of violence being the insurrection, right, and the enablers
Speaker 1: of that being a spouse of a sitting Supreme Court
Speaker 1: justice who was the sole person to vote no on
Speaker 1: Trump being able to Trump needing to release his phone records.
Speaker 1: And now we understand why, right, because they were back
Speaker 1: and forth text messages between his wife and Mark Meadows,
Speaker 1: chief of staff to Donald Trump. And so the question
Speaker 1: that I have about white resentment is that for a
Speaker 1: party that value who, for a party whose value right,
Speaker 1: whose value base is logic, how is it that we
Speaker 1: are supposed to battle against something that isn't steeped in logic,
Speaker 1: which is white resentment? Because for me, when I think
Speaker 1: about it, I'm like, what the fuck do white people
Speaker 1: have to be resentful about? Right? Like, that's that's what
Speaker 1: that's where my energy goes. And you know, forgive me,
Speaker 1: because I have lost all ability to like be gracious anymore,
Speaker 1: given like where we are and the fact that there
Speaker 1: is no fire under the ass of Democrats. There is
Speaker 1: no strategy that you continue to bring to light things
Speaker 1: that I'm wondering, is there a war room in the
Speaker 1: White House anymore that isn't just focused on what's happening abroad?
Speaker 1: And so how do you how do you profess that
Speaker 1: we battle this growing cancer of white resentment that has
Speaker 1: moved from a southern strategy to a national one when
Speaker 1: we base as Democrats, our fight it with logic and racism,
Speaker 1: isn't logical? Well, look at look at what's happening now.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think it's a perfect, perfect example. The
Speaker 1: Republicans lost the election, right, they clearly lost election, and
Speaker 1: they knew they lost. Selection Trump knows he lost the election,
Speaker 1: but instead of saying like, oh gosh, we tried really
Speaker 1: hardly lost or something like that, he came up with
Speaker 1: this all encompassing, totally bullshit narrative. And the narrative he knows.
Speaker 1: I mean, he's been told a million times and he
Speaker 1: damn well knows he lost the election. But that wasn't
Speaker 1: the point. The point was how can I mobilize my
Speaker 1: base and keep them engaged and keep them enraged to
Speaker 1: the point where losing an election comes at a cost,
Speaker 1: so at a moment of weakness the Republicans, at least
Speaker 1: in their own party base. And I'm not saying this
Speaker 1: because I agree with it. I completely don't agree with it,
Speaker 1: but I don't just want to note what happened. They
Speaker 1: use that as a way to mobilize, right, They use
Speaker 1: that as a way to say, we were wronged, we
Speaker 1: were ripped off, and they created i mean, Trump for
Speaker 1: all of his you know, horribleness is he's an evil
Speaker 1: genius about like coming up with that narrative that will
Speaker 1: whip everybody up, you know, critical race theory or this
Speaker 1: kind of thing. He's you know, And so the issue is,
Speaker 1: the minute he started saying, oh, we were ripped off,
Speaker 1: it became you know, obviously it played into white greevents,
Speaker 1: It played into victimization, it played into lost wages of whiteness,
Speaker 1: all these you know, historical narratives. But what happened was
Speaker 1: what did they do when that when that happened, Well,
Speaker 1: they turned around and it became a rallying cry to
Speaker 1: run for every position that was a lever of power.
Speaker 1: And so twenty twenty two in the election, it's not
Speaker 1: just an election about the control of the Senate, it's
Speaker 1: it's elect It's an election about every you know, every
Speaker 1: school board across the country, every every um, you know,
Speaker 1: election official, the people who decide all, who counts the ballots,
Speaker 1: all those kinds of things. And so they turned a
Speaker 1: loss into a massive mobilization that is, I think, to
Speaker 1: be honest, acutely aware of how power works in this country. Right.
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm not saying that because I agree with it,
Speaker 1: m but but the Democrats again and are saying, we
Speaker 1: won the federal we won, we won the presidency, and
Speaker 1: what's the president doing for us? The Republicans are turning
Speaker 1: a loss into a recognition of how power works at
Speaker 1: multiple levels in this country. So I just would go
Speaker 1: back to say, and I'm obviously a very liberal Democrat,
Speaker 1: but I do have to say studying Republicans that they
Speaker 1: understand how power works, and they're doing it from They're
Speaker 1: doing it from the top down. And so I would say,
Speaker 1: how come there's not massive mobilization of the Democrats, not
Speaker 1: just by Biden they bide administration, but for every single
Speaker 1: local office across the country, Like, that's where we should
Speaker 1: be mobilizing, because that's that's where the that's where the
Speaker 1: you know, that's where the the afterlife of this insurrection
Speaker 1: is happening in local elections. So let's pretend we're all stupid, right, Um, No,
Speaker 1: I mean I'm stupid. No, no, No, Let's let's pretend
Speaker 1: that we have no idea how power works, because Democrats
Speaker 1: clearly don't know. What is it that Republicans have figured
Speaker 1: out that democrats in power are currently ignoring. So what
Speaker 1: is it? What are what is their understanding of power
Speaker 1: versus the democrats understanding of power? Well, I think the
Speaker 1: Republicans have pretty I mean, let's just be honest. It's
Speaker 1: easier to have a unified theory of power if your
Speaker 1: party is monolithic. And it's easier to have that if
Speaker 1: you're if the common common narrative that joins your party
Speaker 1: is um, you know, almost a libertarian engagement with business,
Speaker 1: hands off my privilege, that kind of stuff, and a
Speaker 1: sense that you're being done wrong by immigrants, minorities. That
Speaker 1: that that's the gift that keeps giving because you can
Speaker 1: tell one one story about your party that just keeps
Speaker 1: getting amplified and enhanced. And the Democrats, of course, are
Speaker 1: a coalition of many different agendas, many different people, many
Speaker 1: different regions, and so the Democrats don't have that luxury.
Speaker 1: So there is something inherent about the Republican Party that
Speaker 1: makes it easier to do what it's doing. But I
Speaker 1: would also say that the Republican Party has very correctly
Speaker 1: diagnosed where the power lies in the American political system.
Speaker 1: It's not I mean, the president of course wields a
Speaker 1: lot of power, but ultimately, if you control the courts,
Speaker 1: as we've talked about nine billion times on here, then
Speaker 1: you control many of the major decisions. And how do
Speaker 1: you gain control of the courts while you gain control
Speaker 1: of the state apparatus? And so for all that talk
Speaker 1: about states rights and all that kind of stuff, the Republicans,
Speaker 1: I mean, I see it in the South very well.
Speaker 1: The Republicans have such a stranglehold on the slates of
Speaker 1: every kind of election. And I would just say the minute,
Speaker 1: the minute the insurrection happened, I mean, I know it's
Speaker 1: important to like get to the bottom of it and
Speaker 1: try it and bring you know, truth and light and
Speaker 1: justice into the open um. But I would also say
Speaker 1: that the Democrats the day the election was over, should
Speaker 1: have mobilized a massive national campaign of people running for
Speaker 1: local elections. The you know, I mean, where's our national
Speaker 1: coalition of you know, zillions of dollars into people running
Speaker 1: for comptroller and attorney general. Yeah, but here's my but here.
Speaker 1: I'm just going to push back just a little bit
Speaker 1: because I think that I agree with the I agree
Speaker 1: with the your framing, but I want to push back
Speaker 1: a bit because it isn't Republicans at the national level
Speaker 1: that are running these school boards and running it's the
Speaker 1: it's the local ones. And so why do you think
Speaker 1: that local democrats right right, are not because we can't
Speaker 1: Because here's the thing, right, everything that you're saying is right,
Speaker 1: Democrats in and of themselves are patent breaking their arms,
Speaker 1: patting themselves on the back because we have the White House,
Speaker 1: we have and we have Congress, which shows us to
Speaker 1: be completely and totally ineffectual. Right like we where where
Speaker 1: is the progress that we that we voted in in
Speaker 1: twenty twenty and supposedly have these levers of power? And
Speaker 1: so I guess what is it that you think that
Speaker 1: the Democrats at the local levels in these you know,
Speaker 1: really battleground states and places are not getting that Republicans are.
Speaker 1: I see it in Tennessee. I mean the stuff that's
Speaker 1: happening in Tennessee is just it's just mind boggling in
Speaker 1: a way. But but they're so I mean, and I
Speaker 1: don't know how representative Tennessee is. I mean, I do
Speaker 1: feel like it's pretty representative. But I mean, the Republicans
Speaker 1: are coming in with sponsors, slates of ideas, you know,
Speaker 1: this kind of thing. I mean, there's so much support
Speaker 1: for just local GOP level elections, and it is I
Speaker 1: think coordinated in a national way through national organizations and
Speaker 1: things like that. But there's so much mobilization to win
Speaker 1: local elections that comes from the top down and from
Speaker 1: the bottom up. And I think that you know, I
Speaker 1: don't know, I mean, it's it's I mean, if you
Speaker 1: look on Twitter, I follow all the Democrats in the
Speaker 1: Tennessee State, for say House for example, they're just crying
Speaker 1: out for help, honestly, and partially it's like there's so
Speaker 1: many tidal waves coming at us at once in a
Speaker 1: certain kind of way. But I do feel like the
Speaker 1: Democratic Party suffers from a lack of central organization in
Speaker 1: a certain kind of way. And the other part is
Speaker 1: kind of what's what's the narrative if the other facide
Speaker 1: is running on a politics of white grievance. How do
Speaker 1: you combat that in a certain kind of way, And
Speaker 1: so I think the Democrats need to think about who's
Speaker 1: in their coalition. Basically, what I'm saying is local democrats
Speaker 1: need much much more help, and there needs to be
Speaker 1: much more coordination, and there needs to be much more
Speaker 1: of a kind of and I just feel like there
Speaker 1: need to be more national organizations that help people in
Speaker 1: red states run for office, because what we're seeing is
Speaker 1: is fracture. And I think the other really important point.
Speaker 1: We have a great congressman, Jim Cooper, his district got
Speaker 1: his district got jerrymandered, and so he's now out of office.
Speaker 1: It became three Republican districts from one Democratic district, and
Speaker 1: so again it all goes back to who controls the judges.
Speaker 1: But there is one point, and I realize I'm rambling
Speaker 1: on a little bit here, but the one point is
Speaker 1: the Democrats were very not unified. It's been the case
Speaker 1: for every election. We've got progressives and Centrists going after
Speaker 1: each other. And in fact, before Jim Cooper got unseated
Speaker 1: by jerrymandering, the National Progressive Organization was trying to unseat
Speaker 1: him because he was an incumbent and things like that,
Speaker 1: and so Democrats also, I think we're just we're very
Speaker 1: far from unified in a way that I think leads
Speaker 1: to some bad hour comes, at least in Tennessee. I
Speaker 1: you know, I guess I'm I'm so confused, right, And
Speaker 1: here's here's what I'm confused by. I thought that as
Speaker 1: a nation collectively watching our capital building in a plume
Speaker 1: of smoke, literally seeing a physical assault on our democracy
Speaker 1: unfold in real time, would have been the only unifying
Speaker 1: message that we needed that everything that we had hold dear,
Speaker 1: everything that we pledge allegiance to, everything that we wave
Speaker 1: a flag about on the fourth of Lie is under attack,
Speaker 1: and that the only unifying message would be we can't
Speaker 1: have that happen. We can't have our democracy fall. Because
Speaker 1: for those people who want to tell me that this
Speaker 1: administration can't walk, skip and chew gum at the same
Speaker 1: fucking time, because we are fighting a nuclear you know,
Speaker 1: a potential nuclear attack in Europe, so we can't put
Speaker 1: eyes on the domestic terrorism that is unfolding in outside
Speaker 1: of our front doors. That we can't handle both those
Speaker 1: things at one time. I'm confused about what they think
Speaker 1: will happen when America falls and there is no unification
Speaker 1: around democracy. Right, and we've already saw over four years
Speaker 1: of Donald Trump. What a political vacuum and leadership? What
Speaker 1: would happen? Right? And so you would think, Jonathan, wouldn't
Speaker 1: that wouldn't what we saw in January six, twenty twenty one.
Speaker 1: Wouldn't that have been our unifying message? And what is
Speaker 1: it you think that Democrats missed in that moment and
Speaker 1: and and the proceeding and the following moments. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean I'm going to turn that question around, which is
Speaker 1: to say, look at what the Republicans have done with
Speaker 1: this horrible moment, right, Look at what the Republicans have
Speaker 1: done with the insurrection. Right. They've used this moment of
Speaker 1: it's a moment of profound shame. Right, but look at
Speaker 1: what they've done. They've turned it on its head and
Speaker 1: they've used it as they would They didn't say, oh
Speaker 1: my god, look how we got here. They're using this,
Speaker 1: They're using the symbol of that insurrection to further enhance
Speaker 1: and solidify their own power in a certain kind of way. So, Um,
Speaker 1: we've said it a lot on this show. The Republicans
Speaker 1: have a theory of power and the Democrats have a
Speaker 1: theory of Maybe justice would would be a way to
Speaker 1: think about it, you know, something like we have a
Speaker 1: theory of something. Um. But I will say, okay, that
Speaker 1: was a viral moment there. I mean, I guess my
Speaker 1: point is we don't have a theory of power. I
Speaker 1: don't know, I'm trying to I'm trying to be nice
Speaker 1: about it. We don't have a Democrat like. So basically
Speaker 1: Republicans have a theory of power which I just wrote down,
Speaker 1: and Democrats have dot dot dot. I don't know what
Speaker 1: it is. We have excellent stationary or something. We have
Speaker 1: to have something. But my point is they turn everything
Speaker 1: into power, right, I mean, think about it. And so
Speaker 1: in addition to condemning the insurrection and all these things,
Speaker 1: look at what they've done. They've taken the insurrection and
Speaker 1: they've noticed how to get more power, and then they've
Speaker 1: done it. And so again it's it's like watching Voldemort
Speaker 1: at work. Um. It's not like I'm saying, you know,
Speaker 1: I want to be that or anything. But I would
Speaker 1: say that when we were fighting an opponent, a political
Speaker 1: opponent who has a very developed fascistic, monolithic theory of power.
Speaker 1: The answer is not going to be to just show
Speaker 1: them the moral implications of what they're what they're dot.
Speaker 1: And so in a way, I feel like, even even
Speaker 1: with the second impeachment trial and all that kind of stuff,
Speaker 1: I think the Democrats should have been saying, how can
Speaker 1: we get more power? Yeah? And so I think the
Speaker 1: part of the helplessness on the Democratic side. Um, I'll
Speaker 1: just tell you this because nobody else knows this, but
Speaker 1: the book I'm writing now is how the Democrats lost
Speaker 1: the gun debate. Like, that's the book I'm writing now.
Speaker 1: It's I just signed a contract for it. But it's
Speaker 1: exactly that we're talking about today, which is we had
Speaker 1: everything on our side, how did we lose? How do
Speaker 1: we lose the gun debate? And it's part of this
Speaker 1: thing that we had a theory of We had a
Speaker 1: moral imperative, we had incredibly important human tragedy, but we
Speaker 1: didn't have a theory of power, and we lost to
Speaker 1: a side that had a theory of power. Brilliant doctor
Speaker 1: Jonathan Metzel coming back at us with a bang, return
Speaker 1: to woke a f put me in a hotel any day,
Speaker 1: and like I'll just show you guys. God one would
Speaker 1: have no idea that it's almost April. Jonathan As always,
Speaker 1: thank you so much. We appreciate you and look forward
Speaker 1: to continuing this conversation in the socials and next week
Speaker 1: on Woke a f See you in the diverse. Everybody,
Speaker 1: take care. That is it for me today, friends on
Speaker 1: this Woke f AS always, Power to the people and
Speaker 1: to all the people. Power, get woke and stay woke
Speaker 1: as fuck.