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Speaker 1: Very pleased today to be joined by Washington Post columnist

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Speaker 1: author of The Plumb Line, Greg Sergeant, by my estimation,

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Speaker 1: one of the best most astute columnist observers of this

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Speaker 1: moment in American life over the last seven years. As

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Speaker 1: you know, if you tune into this, something that I

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Speaker 1: regard as an ongoing event that has taken another mighty

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Speaker 1: turn over this weekend. Greg Sergeant, welcome, Thanks for having

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Speaker 1: me on, Steve before going on, what's your initial reaction

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Speaker 1: to the change in the world that's occurred since you

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Speaker 1: left work on Friday and returned on Monday.

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Speaker 2: It's different, Yeah, I mean obviously absolutely horrifying. The attacks

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Speaker 2: on Israelis are just, you know, contemptible and disgusting, and

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Speaker 2: there really aren't enough words to condemn them. I do

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Speaker 2: hope that the two parties can come together at this

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Speaker 2: time in order to address this crisis in a balanced way,

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Speaker 2: without you know, too much politicization creeping into it.

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Speaker 1: I want to step back out from the American domestic

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Speaker 1: label and talk about what we're seeing globally play out.

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Speaker 1: And I can't imagine another instance where there would be

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Speaker 1: an attack like this and there would be marches of

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Speaker 1: support all over the world celebrating the Hamas attack, including

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Speaker 1: in New York City sponsored by the Democratic Socialists of America.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, it's it's versily horrible. I would point

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Speaker 2: out that, you know, the vast majority of progressives who

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Speaker 2: have been critical of Israel have been very forceful in

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Speaker 2: condemning the attack as well. So that was I think

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Speaker 2: heartening to see and shows that this really has made

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Speaker 2: it very hard for anyone who considers him or herself

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Speaker 2: mainstream in the United States to adopt anything like the

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Speaker 2: positions you're talking about.

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Speaker 1: And so when you think about those positions and you

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Speaker 1: think about those protests, what is it that we're seeing

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Speaker 1: Is that anti Semitism of our forefathers stripe that we're

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Speaker 1: seeing manifest itself assert itself in city squares all over

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Speaker 1: the world. The idea that the murder Jews would be

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Speaker 1: blamed for their murders is an extraordinary sentiment, but one

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Speaker 1: that can't be detached from the whole sweep of history

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Speaker 1: and the specter of Jew hatred that has existed since

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Speaker 1: the beginnings of time.

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Speaker 2: Oh absolutely, I don't. I think it's indistinguishable from that

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Speaker 2: sort of anti semitism, And I do want to continue

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Speaker 2: to emphasize that many of the people who have criticized

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Speaker 2: Israel over the years have found their way to the

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Speaker 2: right position on this fairly rapidly and really unequivocally. And

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Speaker 2: I think that that's a real sign, that's a heartening

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Speaker 2: sign in many ways of of where the real center

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Speaker 2: of opinion lies on these things.

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Speaker 1: Globally too, What do you think happens next when you

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Speaker 1: see a military operation that will see house to house

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Speaker 1: combat in the most densely populated peace of land with

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Speaker 1: humans living on it anywhere on Earth. We're at a

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Speaker 1: moment right now where Hamas terrorists are still gunning down

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Speaker 1: Israelies or will or were as of eight nine hours ago,

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Speaker 1: as the IDF secures the secures the country. When you

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Speaker 1: see globally the type of bloodshed, the type of civilian

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Speaker 1: casualties that are an inescapable part of war. When you

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Speaker 1: look in March of nineteen forty five the fire bombing

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Speaker 1: of Tokyo, United States, and one night killed one hundred

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Speaker 1: and twenty thousand Japanese in a military action, most of

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Speaker 1: them most of them civilians, This will not be surgical.

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Speaker 1: This can't be surgical. Hamas has intermingled its military command

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Speaker 1: structure in civilian neighborhoods. What do you see playing out

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Speaker 1: over the next couple of weeks and how does that

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Speaker 1: impact here at home domestically, and how does it intersect

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Speaker 1: with Ukraine.

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Speaker 2: Well, I'd love to ask you about a pretty key

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Speaker 2: element here, which is that the Republican Party has adopted

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Speaker 2: very rapidly as the party wide position that President Biden's

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Speaker 2: weakness is somehow to blame for what's happening there, including

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Speaker 2: a really trumped up and wildly false set of allegations

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Speaker 2: involving funding, which you've probably seen widely debunked, and yet

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Speaker 2: pushed by lots and lots of supposedly senior people, supposedly

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Speaker 2: responsible people in the Republican Party. I think that's going

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Speaker 2: to only escalate. The more chaos we see, the more

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Speaker 2: blood should we see, the more we're going to hear

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Speaker 2: from Republicans along those lines. And we've seen this before.

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Speaker 2: In the aftermath of September eleventh, something very similar happened

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Speaker 2: when Karl Rove essentially said pretty clearly to Republicans, you

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Speaker 2: know you can take this to the country and win

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Speaker 2: the argument. We're now seeing the chairperson of the Republican

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Speaker 2: National Committee saying almost exactly the same thing. Well, you've

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Speaker 2: been around the Republican Party for a while, what do

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Speaker 2: you think of that?

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Speaker 1: I've been away from it for a while. Also, what

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Speaker 1: I would say about this moment in time is that

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Speaker 1: you have reawakened in the United States a version of

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Speaker 1: the American boot. The American First Movement is in fact

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Speaker 1: the American First Movement. I think that one of the

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Speaker 1: singular failures right of the media in the country by

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Speaker 1: way of explanation to the American people regarding what's happening

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Speaker 1: around them, is the inability to make these connections in

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Speaker 1: to explain right. So, in nineteen forty, in an extraordinary

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Speaker 1: congressional vote, Franklin Roosevelt was able to maintain the draft

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Speaker 1: by one vote one vote in nineteen forty. Had the

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Speaker 1: American Army seized its draft in nineteen forty by December seventh,

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Speaker 1: nineteen forty one, or earlier, the results would have been catastrophic.

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Speaker 1: It means that the American Army wouldn't have been ready

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Speaker 1: for a cross channel invasion before at least nineteen forty six,

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Speaker 1: if it was possible at all. So this is one

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Speaker 1: of the most decisive votes that's ever taken place as

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Speaker 1: a matter of voting in human history. And there is

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Speaker 1: a broad amnesia in American history. If you say to

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Speaker 1: your average American Charles Lindberg, and you find someone in

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Speaker 1: the small, small percentage, as any recollection of who he

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Speaker 1: is or knowledge of who he is, he'll be remembered

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Speaker 1: as an aviator, not as a fascist, not as a Nazi,

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Speaker 1: not as someone who was decorated by the Nazi government,

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Speaker 1: who gave a speech on the eve of World War

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Speaker 1: two attacking, attacking the Jews. And so we have seen

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Speaker 1: that movement come back to life. It has an intellectual

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Speaker 1: spine out of the Claremont Institute. It has a strategy,

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Speaker 1: it has a plan, it has it has an agenda,

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Speaker 1: It has a philosophy, it has a point of view.

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Speaker 1: The second part about what you said is a fundamental

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Speaker 1: one chaos. Chaos as a means to an end and

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Speaker 1: in the moment, an end itself. Who benefits in the

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Speaker 1: American election cycle from chaos? Is it Joe Biden? Is

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Speaker 1: it the responsible governing party or is it the agent

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Speaker 1: of chaos? The strong man candidate running on a platform

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Speaker 1: of demagogue like Adolph Hitler, who in nineteen thirty two

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Speaker 1: came to power on a promise to stop the chaos

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Speaker 1: that he had incited and ignited, and he did stop

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Speaker 1: the chaos. There was no more chaos in German society

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Speaker 1: six months after he took political power. And so that's

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Speaker 1: what we're seeing, that's what we're looking at right in

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Speaker 1: this moment, is a chaos movement with the intent to

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Speaker 1: offer as a choice to the American people a chance

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Speaker 1: to end the chaos by picking the people who have

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Speaker 1: started it to lead the country. And that has not

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Speaker 1: typically turned out well. Wherever you see that scenario play

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Speaker 1: out in history.

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Speaker 2: I think it's you raised the really important point. Also

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Speaker 2: another important point with that parallel, which is the notion

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Speaker 2: that there's somehow a genuine streak of quote unquote isolationism

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Speaker 2: behind the movement among Republicans against funding the Ukraine self

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Speaker 2: defense against Russian invasion. The idea that that's isolationist really

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Speaker 2: misses the point. It's I wouldn't say this about all

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Speaker 2: Republicans who oppose funding for Ukraine, but there's certainly a

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Speaker 2: cock within that group of Republicans who seems okay with

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Speaker 2: a Putin victory in the Ukraine Russia conflict, and to

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Speaker 2: call it isolationism, that's a mistake that many in the

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Speaker 2: media may constantly. They've also made that same mistake about Trump.

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Speaker 2: This is not isolationism. This is a situation where one

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Speaker 2: country tried to devour another and is trying to literally

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Speaker 2: erase the other country's nationhood. It's genocidal conquest. And so

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Speaker 2: to oppose aiding Ukraine in some ways, there's no way

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Speaker 2: to call that really an anti war position that I

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Speaker 2: can see war is happening right. Russia's waging violent conquest

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Speaker 2: against a sovereign state and trying to essentially obliterate it.

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Speaker 2: And so I really wish that we could get beyond

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Speaker 2: calling this kind of By the way, the same mistake

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Speaker 2: was still applied back to the America First Movement during

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Speaker 2: World War I to as you.

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Speaker 1: Know, well, this is a this is a movement of

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Speaker 1: fellow travelers. They look at Vladimir Putin, they look at

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Speaker 1: the Revengism, they look at the Christian orthodoxy from the Church,

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Speaker 1: they look at the hostility to the concepts of modern

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Speaker 1: small L liberalism, small P pluralism, and they fetishize Vladimir Putin.

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Speaker 1: And there is a fundamental misunderstanding that endangers all of us,

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Speaker 1: that endangers the peace of the world. And it's and

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Speaker 1: it's very simply this. This war in Ukraine cannot expand

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Speaker 1: for Russia beyond Ukraine's borders so long as Ukraine is

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Speaker 1: winning that war. As soon as Ukraine is in a

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Speaker 1: position where they stand on the edge of defeat, that

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Speaker 1: war will spread beyond beyond those borders. And so in

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Speaker 1: this moment, now in Israel, you see a conflict zone

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Speaker 1: that stretches from Iran across the Levant now from southern

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Speaker 1: Israel to the northern border with Lebanon, could be soon

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Speaker 1: through Lebanon across all of Syria to the southern border

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Speaker 1: of Turkey. You have armed conflict in the Black Sea,

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Speaker 1: you have troops on the border between Kosovo and Serbia,

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Speaker 1: and you have a massive humanitarian crisis playing out in

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Speaker 1: the armed conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia, with the Russian

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Speaker 1: sphere of influence being pushed being rolled back in all

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Speaker 1: of those places. But it's in the Middle East where

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Speaker 1: the Russian Iran access with regard to Israel can be

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Speaker 1: forward leaning in this moment has the ability to incite

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Speaker 1: the type of chaos that lights the world world on fire,

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Speaker 1: and I think we're seeing that play out.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I think you brought up you asked

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Speaker 2: a little bit earlier about what's the connection between what

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Speaker 2: we're seeing unfold in Israel and what's going to happen

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Speaker 2: with the Ukraine War. You may have seen this, but

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Speaker 2: some Ukrainian some Ukrainian officials were out there pretty quickly

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Speaker 2: saying that they fear that if attention gets diverted to

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Speaker 2: the Israeli, to the Israeli situation, that it could actually

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Speaker 2: remove the world's attention from what's happening in Ukraine. Now,

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Speaker 2: obviously the Israeli situation does command attention, but we do

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Speaker 2: have to hope that it doesn't pull us away from

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Speaker 2: what's happening in Ukraine. As you say, these things are connected,

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Speaker 2: and I can see why these Ukrainian officials are so frightened.

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Speaker 1: The other issue that's connected to this, of course, is Taiwan.

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Speaker 1: As the world is watching and distracting in the capacity

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Speaker 1: of the United States in the Middle East, arming Ukraine

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Speaker 1: need to maintain vigilance in the Pacific as well. But

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Speaker 1: the world has taken a mighty step towards the type

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Speaker 1: of chaos that people our age tended to once believe

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Speaker 1: was a function of their parents' lifetime. That in the

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Speaker 1: world where the Berlin Wall came down, where Francis Fukuyama

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Speaker 1: posited that history had come to its functional end, we've

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Speaker 1: been reminded that that's not the case at all. Over

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Speaker 1: this weekend, and you know, the world grows ever more dangerous.

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Speaker 2: I think, yeah, I think there's no question this is

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Speaker 2: going to really call on President Biden to maybe summon

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Speaker 2: up some communications skills that are not always in evidence

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Speaker 2: to put it. To put it gently, he's going to

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Speaker 2: really have to explain to people that they can't fall

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Speaker 2: into a type of despair about the chaos as you're

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Speaker 2: talking about that leads them to think that the sirens

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Speaker 2: song of authoritarian strong men is the way forward. He's

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Speaker 2: got to reiterate the case for a rules based order

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Speaker 2: and say that what we're seeing in both these places

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Speaker 2: is connected in that sense. And I really hope that

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Speaker 2: he does that. I think we haven't seen much of

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Speaker 2: him in the past twenty four to forty eight hours,

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Speaker 2: and I really I don't see how that can continue,

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Speaker 2: do you?

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Speaker 1: I do not at all? And it brings up two aspects,

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Speaker 1: but I want to talk about the domestic politics aspect

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Speaker 1: of this with you really quickly. And I want to

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Speaker 1: say to our audience on the warning who often asks

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Speaker 1: me what should I read? Where can I go? What

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Speaker 1: opinions can I seek that will help explain and clarify,

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Speaker 1: And let me be clear that this guy is one

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Speaker 1: of one of those people I think one of the

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Speaker 1: most astute observers, somebody that I read and when I

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Speaker 1: get done reading, is one of the few people I'm like,

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Speaker 1: right on, spot on, right all the time, which means

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Speaker 1: you know, we're either right together or wrong together on

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Speaker 1: a on a bunch of this stuff.

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Speaker 2: Probably wrong.

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Speaker 1: Hear your cake on something that I saw this weekend

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Speaker 1: and I really watched it with my mouth hanging open

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Speaker 1: on CNN, and it's an interview with a Republican congressman

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Speaker 1: who represents one of the most Jewish districts in the country,

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Speaker 1: who by the voting record, has a has a moderate

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Speaker 1: Ish or as moderate as you can find in the

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Speaker 1: Republican Party, Congressman Lawler from from New York and and

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Speaker 1: so he's on television and he is emotional in a

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Speaker 1: in this moment right of the terror attack, not as

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Speaker 1: a congressman representing one of the most Jewish districts in

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Speaker 1: the country, not as a Jew so far as I

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Speaker 1: could tell, but because Kevin McCarthy was deposed, and he

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Speaker 1: really loves Kevin McCarthy, and so really quickly the conversation

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Speaker 1: spirals into, well, if we don't get Mike Kevin back

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Speaker 1: into the speaker's role, somehow the right existence of the

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Speaker 1: Jewish people, the state of Israel, right American democracy is threatned.

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Speaker 1: And I'm watching this, it's extraordinary. And then he says

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Speaker 1: it was a Republicans and all the Democrats who were

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Speaker 1: responsible for deposing Kevin, And I say, well, okay, And

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Speaker 1: my question is this, how is it possible politically for

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Speaker 1: the Democratic Party to be unable to articulate and explain

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Speaker 1: why they have no interest whatsoever in saving the political

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Speaker 1: career of the most dishonest centical man who has ever

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Speaker 1: held out office, who single handedly, single handedly resuscitate and

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Speaker 1: resuscitated the career of the sedition as president, and who

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Speaker 1: is impeaching the current president in a kangaroo core process,

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Speaker 1: and who has been involved in line to the country

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Speaker 1: thousands of times. It's a matter of politics explain how

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Speaker 1: it is possible, in your estimation that you cannot communicate

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Speaker 1: as an institution and an effective response to Lawler's victimization

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Speaker 1: on CNN. I've never seen anything like it.

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Speaker 2: Okay, Yeah, it's a good question. I would say that

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Speaker 2: some Democrats actually have managed to push back effectively against

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Speaker 2: the arguments that you're talking about. AOC did some some

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Speaker 2: pretty strong stuff, and sort did Jamie Raskin. You know,

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Speaker 2: a lot of the House members who have really dealt

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Speaker 2: looked into the belly, into the eyes of the beast

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Speaker 2: of the Republican Party and under Trump in a way

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Speaker 2: that maybe not all Democrats have, right Reskin having, you know,

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Speaker 2: presided over impeachment in the January sixth Committee and so forth,

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Speaker 2: these these guys, I do think there are a fair

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Speaker 2: amount of Democrats out there who are arearticulating the case

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Speaker 2: you're talking about, but not all of them. And I'll

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Speaker 2: answer your question this way. I think far too many

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Speaker 2: Democrats are susceptible to the argument that they're not in

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Speaker 2: some sense institutionalists, right, that they're not standing up for

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Speaker 2: the institutions that they are part of and value and

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Speaker 2: so forth. And so when a news commentator whether it's

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Speaker 2: CNN type or a New York Times columnist or whoever

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Speaker 2: suggests that Democrats should step in and save McCarthy for

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Speaker 2: the good of the country, their immediate instinct is to think, well,

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Speaker 2: maybe there might be something to that. We can't be

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Speaker 2: like them, right, But in this case, as you say,

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Speaker 2: it's incredibly clear cut, the right thing to do on

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Speaker 2: behalf of the country was to not save Kevin McCarthy.

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Speaker 2: Kevin McCarthy has played a form of double dealing with

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Speaker 2: Trump around the insurrection for years. He was literally threatened.

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Speaker 2: His own life was threatened at one point during the

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Speaker 2: attack on the Capitol, and Donald Trump reportedly was pretty

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Speaker 2: happy about it, telling Kevin McCarthy, you know, well, maybe

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Speaker 2: you should have stolen the election for me, Kevin, and

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Speaker 2: you wouldn't be facing these guys, these angry the angry mob.

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Speaker 2: Kevin McCarthy lied relentlessly about the January sixth Committee, trying

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Speaker 2: to delegitimize what was a perfectly good faith effort to

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Speaker 2: have a bipartisan response to the greatest outbreak of political

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Speaker 2: violence in modern times. Right, Kevin McCarthy decided that the

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Speaker 2: health of the Republican Party required mending fences with Trump

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Speaker 2: and pretending January sixth never happened. And he did that,

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Speaker 2: And as you say, Kevin McCarthy is now pursuing a

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Speaker 2: bullshit impeachment process that's clearly designed to draw attention away

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Speaker 2: from Trump's alleged crimes and corruption. The list is endless,

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Speaker 2: and breaking his own word too, is part of the

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Speaker 2: fiscal talks. Democrats can't save that guy. If they were

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Speaker 2: to save Kevin McCarthy, what it would do is essentially

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Speaker 2: whitewash away the Republican parties flirtations with Donald Trump, and

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Speaker 2: they're enabled, active enabling of him all throughout nearly one

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Speaker 2: of the worst assaults on our institutions we've seen. It's unthinkable.

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Speaker 2: It's shocking that normally intelligent people would even suggest that.

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Speaker 1: Let's talk about Israel for a second. Some Americans may

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Speaker 1: not be aware that Israeli's society has been convulsed over

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Speaker 1: the last eight months by domestic proposal by bb net

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Speaker 1: and Yahoo that would it will sound familiar to Americans,

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Speaker 1: that would the judiciary of its independence. That would have

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Speaker 1: the effect of essentially ending bb netanyah who's vulnerability to

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Speaker 1: a massive series of interlocking corruption allegations trials, so on

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Speaker 1: and so forth, and so the cabinet that bb Netanyah

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Speaker 1: who put together is generously speaking, is the kookiest and

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Speaker 1: most extreme in Israeli history. The United States is now

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Speaker 1: a important stakeholder, particularly with Americans killed and captured. So

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Speaker 1: the continuation of netanya Who's extremist Nutti cabinet as opposed

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Speaker 1: to a unity government that is prepared to make a

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Speaker 1: moral argument of about a very difficult war ahead on

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Speaker 1: the global stage is something that's well within the purview

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Speaker 1: of the United States, well within the purview of the

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Speaker 1: United States to care a lot about. But you've had

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Speaker 1: eight months of chaos in Israel. You had a senior

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Speaker 1: security official say, our national security in Israel has never

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Speaker 1: been weaker. The government has never been more distracted. The

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Speaker 1: cause of the distraction was the subordination of the national

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Speaker 1: interest below, the ego below the personal ambition of a

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Speaker 1: politician who has dominated the culture, the society through the

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Speaker 1: scale of his ambition, His dishonesties, his ego all the

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Speaker 1: way across the board. And so it comes to be

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Speaker 1: on a Saturday morning on Shabbat, paragliders carrying hamas terrorists

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Speaker 1: by sea, by land, they crashed through billions of dollars

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Speaker 1: their defenses. They catch the world's most sophisticated intelligence agency,

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Speaker 1: according to most intelligence agencies, completely flat footed, like gun

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Speaker 1: violence in America, in the middle of a shocking event,

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Speaker 1: A lot of politicians have a go to device, which is, well,

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Speaker 1: now is not the time to talk about this. I'm

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Speaker 1: a guy who's very much in the camp. Now is

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Speaker 1: exactly the time to talk about this, and we have

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Speaker 1: to talk about more than one thing at a time.

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Speaker 1: Do you think there's a lesson for Americans here? This

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Speaker 1: is an attack that, if it had happened in the

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Speaker 1: United States would have killed thirty thousand of US, brought

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Speaker 1: on at the tail end of a period of unbelievable

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Speaker 1: domestic instability caused by politics, caused by a man of faction,

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Speaker 1: caused by extremism, and then the allusion to shattered. The

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Speaker 1: enemy waits, the enemy watches. They made a calculation, and

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Speaker 1: they made an assessment, and these things are linked. You

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Speaker 1: think there's a lesson for Americans here?

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Speaker 2: I think, if I understand you right, what you're suggesting

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Speaker 2: is that if of an extreme right wing minority faction

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Speaker 2: in a country is trying to break the government and

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Speaker 2: break our institutions in pretty much every which way it

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Speaker 2: possibly can. That the people of the country need to

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Speaker 2: really understand that that's going to blow up in their

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Speaker 2: faces before long. That's what you're saying, right, exactly what

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Speaker 2: I'm saying.

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Speaker 1: This guy was distracted, this guy through his country and

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Speaker 1: chaos because chaos was in his political interest, and it's

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Speaker 1: just the result of the chaos clearly.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean we've we've seen it happen here in

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Speaker 2: a different type of way. I'm not drawing a parallel here,

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Speaker 2: but just trying to address the underlying point you're making.

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Speaker 2: When when Trump was hit with one of the biggest

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Speaker 2: crises this country ever has ever seen with the COVID,

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Speaker 2: with the with the COVID pandemic, we really saw the

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Speaker 2: price of broken institutions and a movement that lives to

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Speaker 2: essentially destroy the possibility of serious, sustained collective action by

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Speaker 2: government and in the face of challenges. And I would

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Speaker 2: hope that people don't take the lesson from this to

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Speaker 2: go back to what you said earlier, that the answer

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Speaker 2: is the person who is telling you your institutions are

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Speaker 2: corrupt and only I can fix it. But the opposite

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Speaker 2: is when autocrats like that try to destroy our institutions

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Speaker 2: that were left less prepared to deal with the most

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Speaker 2: serious challenges we face.

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Speaker 1: I want to ask you a direct question that you raised,

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Speaker 1: and I have noticed it. I suspect the American people

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Speaker 1: have noticed it in all of the coverage through last

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Speaker 1: night at midnight, and I watched a lot of it.

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Speaker 1: I haven't seen anybody from the American government, as we

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Speaker 1: have a carrier strike group steaming towards the Israeli coast

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Speaker 1: and the Eastern Mediterranean, talk about Hamas killed Americans, and

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Speaker 1: apparently they have some live Americans, and I want to

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Speaker 1: enunciate a position on this. I don't care if they

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Speaker 1: were kidnapped and taken into the Gaza Strip wearing a

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Speaker 1: MAGA hat, and I don't care if they were kidnapped

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Speaker 1: and taken into the Gaza Strip wearing a aoc T shirt.

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Speaker 1: What I care about is their American citizens. And I've

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Speaker 1: not yet heard the President of the United States speak

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Speaker 1: to this fact, communicate to the American people about what

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Speaker 1: happened in long form, and effectively explain what's going to

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Speaker 1: happen next.

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Speaker 2: I agree, as I said earlier, President Biden needs to

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Speaker 2: find communication skills that are not always in evidence with him.

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Speaker 2: He's really got to speak to the American people about

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Speaker 2: what's happening. And by the way, to return to something

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Speaker 2: we discussed earlier, he should also say in one way

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Speaker 2: or another. I'm not sure how directly that could be

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Speaker 2: left to, you know, his brain trust or whatever, but

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Speaker 2: he should also say that the Republican attacks on the

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Speaker 2: administration that are seeking to profit off of all this

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Speaker 2: at this time are unacceptable, and by the way, that's

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Speaker 2: going to continue. If and when we find out more

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Speaker 2: horrible things about what the terrorists are doing to Americans,

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Speaker 2: it's going to get louder from the Republican Party. You

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Speaker 2: know this as a former Republican, and I don't see

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Speaker 2: any signs, at least as of yet, that the president

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Speaker 2: and his brain trust are prepared for that. And that's

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Speaker 2: a secondary concern to what you're talking about, which is

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Speaker 2: communicating with the country, but it certainly has to be,

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Speaker 2: it should be on their minds. I don't I don't

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Speaker 2: hear anything, neither do you.

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Speaker 1: Last question I have for you is this, I have

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Speaker 1: a I remember distinctly, you know, kind of my my

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Speaker 1: first philosophical question that I would ponder as a kid, right,

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Speaker 1: you know that, you know I've been a class was

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Speaker 1: that if a tree falls in the woods and no one

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Speaker 1: is there to hear it, right, does it? Does it

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Speaker 1: make a sound? Type of stuff? Mm hmm. Do you

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Speaker 1: think the Biden administration has any grasp around the dimensions

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Speaker 1: of the propaganda campaign against it that has been executed

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Speaker 1: and carried out from Fox News across all of the

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Speaker 1: derivative extreme as conservative broadcasting channel, streamers, podcasts. Do they

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Speaker 1: have in your estimation through conversations, experience, proximity talking to people,

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Speaker 1: do they have any idea what it is that they

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Speaker 1: have been facing and are facing. I remember the George

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Speaker 1: Clooney movie and I'm completely blanking on the name of it,

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Speaker 1: the about the northeaster off of you know, Massachusetts in

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Speaker 1: the late nineties in the fishing boat, and you know,

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Speaker 1: the last scene is the one hundred foot wave coming

436
00:33:52,720 --> 00:33:55,840
Speaker 1: at the boat which they which they won't survive. Do

437
00:33:56,520 --> 00:34:01,560
Speaker 1: you think they have any appreciation for what they have

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00:34:01,720 --> 00:34:08,560
Speaker 1: sustained over this presidency with regard to that.

439
00:34:10,120 --> 00:34:15,040
Speaker 2: I think the answer to that is complicated, And my

440
00:34:15,160 --> 00:34:17,840
Speaker 2: senses that having talked to a lot of these people

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00:34:17,840 --> 00:34:20,680
Speaker 2: about these types of topics from time to time over

442
00:34:20,680 --> 00:34:24,440
Speaker 2: the years that there's a bit of a split approach

443
00:34:24,600 --> 00:34:26,960
Speaker 2: or a bit of a split in the understanding of

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00:34:27,000 --> 00:34:32,000
Speaker 2: the moment. When you look at how Biden steps forward

445
00:34:32,080 --> 00:34:37,200
Speaker 2: to condemn attacks on democracy and condemn white supremacy in

446
00:34:37,320 --> 00:34:41,720
Speaker 2: January sixth, you get a glimpse of somebody who clearly

447
00:34:41,800 --> 00:34:46,840
Speaker 2: understands the nature of the threat, right, But then you

448
00:34:46,920 --> 00:34:49,880
Speaker 2: turn around and you're here, Suddenly President Biden is saying

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00:34:49,920 --> 00:34:52,840
Speaker 2: something like, my friends on the other side of the aisle,

450
00:34:52,880 --> 00:34:56,480
Speaker 2: I don't understand why they're doing this, as if that's

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00:34:56,520 --> 00:35:00,640
Speaker 2: going to communicate to anyone anything about what they're a doing.

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00:35:01,200 --> 00:35:03,479
Speaker 2: And it sounds when he talks like that that he's

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00:35:03,800 --> 00:35:09,680
Speaker 2: essentially alluding to some sort of idealized former time when

454
00:35:10,320 --> 00:35:14,880
Speaker 2: comedy supposedly reigned and you know, you could talk shame

455
00:35:15,000 --> 00:35:19,799
Speaker 2: Republicans into operating on behalf of the country and the

456
00:35:19,800 --> 00:35:23,840
Speaker 2: public good and the bipartisan way and to stop essentially

457
00:35:24,280 --> 00:35:27,520
Speaker 2: lying all the time and propagandizing all the time. Right,

458
00:35:29,080 --> 00:35:33,399
Speaker 2: And so there's not enough in the Democratic Party as

459
00:35:33,440 --> 00:35:37,279
Speaker 2: a whole of a real understanding that they are in

460
00:35:37,360 --> 00:35:43,680
Speaker 2: an information war with the right. And I am a

461
00:35:43,719 --> 00:35:47,720
Speaker 2: few of us. You know, Brian Buler, formerly of Crooked Media,

462
00:35:47,760 --> 00:35:51,680
Speaker 2: has his own sub stack now comes to mind. Have

463
00:35:51,800 --> 00:35:55,600
Speaker 2: been pushing them to engage these information wars with an

464
00:35:55,680 --> 00:36:00,959
Speaker 2: understanding that they're up against a massive propaganda and disinformation

465
00:36:01,080 --> 00:36:06,319
Speaker 2: network that really is immensely powerful and reaching millions and

466
00:36:06,320 --> 00:36:10,440
Speaker 2: millions and millions of people, and is really sustained and

467
00:36:10,520 --> 00:36:15,040
Speaker 2: nourished by the Republican Party on a mass scale. And

468
00:36:15,239 --> 00:36:19,279
Speaker 2: I don't see that much of an indication, or really

469
00:36:19,360 --> 00:36:22,600
Speaker 2: much at all of an indication that they see it

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00:36:22,600 --> 00:36:23,000
Speaker 2: that way.

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00:36:24,520 --> 00:36:27,520
Speaker 1: We'll leave it there. One of the most astute political

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00:36:27,800 --> 00:36:32,680
Speaker 1: and global columnists observing, explaining writing about the events of

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00:36:32,760 --> 00:36:38,000
Speaker 1: our time, Greg Sergeant, The plumb Line, Washington Post, Real pleasure.

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Speaker 2: Thank you, Thank you, Steve