WEBVTT - Tragedy and Trauma 0:00:11.880 --> 0:00:14.720 Good morning, peeps, and welcome to okay F Daily with 0:00:14.840 --> 0:00:21.000 Meet your Girl Danielle Moody, recording live from my Brooklyn Cilarium. Folks, 0:00:21.200 --> 0:00:24.640 I want to start off today with saying that, you know, 0:00:25.440 --> 0:00:29.160 I've taken a week off, right, and when I take 0:00:29.200 --> 0:00:34.159 time off, I usually you know, spend more time with friends, 0:00:34.240 --> 0:00:38.199 spend time out of the toxic Twitter verse um, and 0:00:38.320 --> 0:00:43.080 kind of you know, disconnect from the news. The more 0:00:43.280 --> 0:00:46.360 that I begin to get back up to speed on 0:00:46.440 --> 0:00:48.680 all of the things that I've missed, all of the tragedy, 0:00:48.720 --> 0:00:54.279 all of the trauma, it's sitting with me my continued 0:00:54.640 --> 0:00:59.960 contempt and disappointment with this country. You know, there are 0:01:00.040 --> 0:01:03.920 multiple trials that are happening right now, but the biggest 0:01:03.960 --> 0:01:05.840 trial that I think is the one that we all 0:01:05.840 --> 0:01:08.920 need to be paying attention to is America at large. 0:01:10.000 --> 0:01:14.520 Through the Written House case, through the you know, McCullough 0:01:14.600 --> 0:01:20.679 brothers case, right the family that murdered Ahmad Aubrey. All 0:01:20.720 --> 0:01:24.520 I can keep thinking about is this is who America is. 0:01:25.680 --> 0:01:28.880 We often continue to say to ourselves every time that 0:01:29.040 --> 0:01:33.640 something bad happens, every time that something just so absurdly 0:01:33.800 --> 0:01:36.440 cruel happens in this country. We love to say, this 0:01:36.560 --> 0:01:39.440 is not who we are. Donald Trump rips children away 0:01:39.480 --> 0:01:42.240 from their families. This is not who we are, except 0:01:42.560 --> 0:01:47.160 we've been doing this for centuries. It started with Native 0:01:47.200 --> 0:01:50.160 American children that we were ripping away from their families, 0:01:50.560 --> 0:01:56.400 moved into hundreds of years of slavery where we ripped family, 0:01:56.440 --> 0:02:02.560 Black families apart in this country, sold off right. And 0:02:02.600 --> 0:02:05.480 then we come to present day and we love to say, oh, 0:02:05.560 --> 0:02:08.000 this isn't who we are, and yet it is a 0:02:08.040 --> 0:02:11.000 part of our history. And it is this very part 0:02:11.080 --> 0:02:15.080 of our history that the radical right, the Insurrectionist Party, 0:02:15.320 --> 0:02:18.480 doesn't want you to know anything about. It's why they 0:02:18.520 --> 0:02:22.760 have created the boogeyman of critical race theory, something that 0:02:22.880 --> 0:02:27.200 isn't even taught, isn't even taught at the K three 0:02:27.280 --> 0:02:30.280 twelveth level. It's something that is actually only taught at 0:02:30.320 --> 0:02:35.240 the graduate level right and in law school. But they 0:02:35.240 --> 0:02:39.120 don't want you to understand your history. They don't want 0:02:39.280 --> 0:02:42.880 us to be able to unpack and ask critical questions 0:02:43.200 --> 0:02:47.079 about this nation's founding and how we have developed policies 0:02:47.680 --> 0:02:51.160 right and laws that have moved forward that are actually 0:02:51.760 --> 0:02:55.600 a part of our white supremacist founding. Because you see 0:02:55.639 --> 0:02:58.760 that when you prepare people, when you educate them in 0:02:58.760 --> 0:03:02.840 a way to begin to the world around them, then 0:03:02.960 --> 0:03:05.919 you have to answer for the things you don't want 0:03:05.919 --> 0:03:08.600 to answer for. And so what is the radical rights 0:03:09.000 --> 0:03:12.800 response to that? Just don't teach it. Ban those books, 0:03:13.200 --> 0:03:17.800 ban those conversations, Ban the mentioning of race inequity, of 0:03:17.960 --> 0:03:23.280 gender inequity. Let's pretend it doesn't exist. That's their idea 0:03:23.440 --> 0:03:27.080 of how they preserve America, how they don't make white 0:03:27.160 --> 0:03:31.840 kids feel bad about themselves. Let's all just pretend that 0:03:32.320 --> 0:03:36.280 racism doesn't happen, that there is gender equity, and women, 0:03:36.320 --> 0:03:39.040 as a matter of fact, make equal pay, knowing good 0:03:39.040 --> 0:03:41.920 God damn well, that that is not the truth. But 0:03:42.040 --> 0:03:46.840 you see where I find myself struggling these days is 0:03:46.880 --> 0:03:50.520 that I feel like I have been having these conversations 0:03:50.560 --> 0:03:55.160 at nauseam about the democrats inability to message, about their 0:03:55.200 --> 0:03:57.920 inability to actually talk about the things that they are 0:03:57.960 --> 0:04:01.840 providing Americans with as opposed to the things that the 0:04:01.920 --> 0:04:05.600 radical right tells us they are stripping away. You know, 0:04:05.800 --> 0:04:10.160 they're the ones that want to have a whole campaign 0:04:10.640 --> 0:04:15.160 around cancel culture, and yet they're throwing book burning parties 0:04:15.760 --> 0:04:19.440 and yet they're throwing mask burning parties. They are the 0:04:19.440 --> 0:04:23.080 ones that are trying to cancel fucking common sense. And 0:04:23.200 --> 0:04:27.480 instead of having a conversation about that, instead of us 0:04:27.760 --> 0:04:32.120 being very real about how they are trying to roll 0:04:32.200 --> 0:04:35.760 back the clock, how they are trying to continue to 0:04:35.880 --> 0:04:40.760 perpetuate a culture of violence, a climate of written houses 0:04:41.120 --> 0:04:43.960 that all feel like they have the power and the 0:04:44.000 --> 0:04:47.719 ability to sling on in AAR fifteen and go play 0:04:47.760 --> 0:04:52.440 target practice with other American citizens. This is the climate 0:04:52.480 --> 0:04:55.600 that we are setting up, and it is being signaled 0:04:55.760 --> 0:04:59.479 from the top. We have a Supreme Court case, for instance, 0:05:00.080 --> 0:05:02.560 right that we have talked about with our friend doctor Jonathan. 0:05:02.600 --> 0:05:06.560 That's all a Supreme Court case that is about getting 0:05:06.560 --> 0:05:12.040 ready to essentially ban individual states abilities to be able 0:05:12.080 --> 0:05:19.479 to create sensible gun control laws. So they just think 0:05:19.520 --> 0:05:25.040 for a minute that the party that initially was about 0:05:25.120 --> 0:05:33.440 quote unquote states rights has now brought up laws and 0:05:33.720 --> 0:05:38.159 ideology that is about ripping away those very rights that 0:05:38.240 --> 0:05:41.880 they say that states should have away from them. If 0:05:41.880 --> 0:05:45.040 it's a red state, no no, you can continue on. 0:05:45.320 --> 0:05:47.680 But if it's a blue state, oh no, no, no, 0:05:48.040 --> 0:05:50.600 you don't have the ability to say that. In New 0:05:50.680 --> 0:05:54.159 York City, a city of eight million fucking people, that 0:05:54.279 --> 0:05:58.120 we all shouldn't have assault weapons right because oh, that 0:05:58.160 --> 0:06:01.960 will infringe upon their Second Amendment right, not my right 0:06:02.000 --> 0:06:06.080 to exist free of fear. That's not the conversation that 0:06:06.120 --> 0:06:10.360 we are having. No, Instead, we are having the conversation 0:06:10.440 --> 0:06:14.240 about everyone's right to be able to bear arms, everyone's 0:06:14.320 --> 0:06:17.279 right to be able to be Kyle Rittenhouse and shoot 0:06:17.360 --> 0:06:20.920 up who they will when they want. We are the 0:06:20.960 --> 0:06:25.760 times that we are living in, folks is so incredibly dangerous. 0:06:26.120 --> 0:06:28.320 But the conversation that I will have in a bit 0:06:29.360 --> 0:06:34.680 with our friend Kurt Bardella is this, if every single 0:06:34.720 --> 0:06:39.400 election is urgent, then why is it that Democrats continue 0:06:39.440 --> 0:06:44.400 to fall behind? If we looked and knew that Virginia 0:06:44.560 --> 0:06:49.440 was going to be an alarm right for what could 0:06:49.480 --> 0:06:53.000 happen in the midterm elections, then why was Terry mccaullough 0:06:53.440 --> 0:06:58.159 falling behind from the beginning with a no name fucking 0:06:58.560 --> 0:07:04.440 Donald Trump light in a vest? How are we not 0:07:04.680 --> 0:07:07.800 prepared for the tactics that they are using. There's a 0:07:07.880 --> 0:07:14.000 new study that just came out right media hawks who 0:07:14.040 --> 0:07:16.480 pay attention to you know, the Fox News is of 0:07:16.520 --> 0:07:22.240 the world before the Virginia election, the number of times 0:07:22.680 --> 0:07:25.400 that critical race theory was mentioned on Fox was like 0:07:25.560 --> 0:07:31.600 in the hundreds on a daily Right now post the election, oh, 0:07:31.640 --> 0:07:34.440 critical race theory is no longer a conversation. It's no 0:07:34.560 --> 0:07:37.560 longer you know, hide the books from your children or 0:07:37.640 --> 0:07:43.800 decide to homeschool. It's barely barely registering. And so if 0:07:43.840 --> 0:07:48.400 you know that they are using these bullshit tactics, right, 0:07:48.440 --> 0:07:51.080 and you know that they are creating a boogeyman out 0:07:51.080 --> 0:07:55.280 of nothing, then why are we constantly operating from the defense. 0:07:56.400 --> 0:07:59.760 Why aren't we able to see what they are doing? 0:08:00.080 --> 0:08:04.800 Because it's not that fucking deep, do you know what 0:08:04.840 --> 0:08:08.560 I'm saying. It's not as if this is a highly 0:08:08.600 --> 0:08:12.640 strategic maneuvering and conversation and nuance that they are having. 0:08:13.280 --> 0:08:17.400 It's the same race baiting shit that they've been doing 0:08:17.480 --> 0:08:21.680 for decades. Just each and every election they pick a 0:08:21.760 --> 0:08:26.080 new boogeyman. And you would think that Democrats would be 0:08:26.120 --> 0:08:29.520 prepared for that. But the moment that you find yourself 0:08:30.160 --> 0:08:34.760 right explaining what you're not doing, you are fucking losing. 0:08:35.720 --> 0:08:38.640 And that is where Democrats are. So the question that 0:08:38.760 --> 0:08:42.840 I am posing with less than a year until midterm elections. 0:08:42.920 --> 0:08:49.720 Is have we already lost? Right? Because here's the thing. 0:08:50.040 --> 0:08:56.520 When you have anchor anchors and host asking members of 0:08:56.559 --> 0:09:01.400 Congress whether or not Democrats are two woke, you have 0:09:01.520 --> 0:09:06.800 lost Democrats saying fucking woke. If they were, we would 0:09:06.840 --> 0:09:09.480 have passed voting rights out of the fucking gate. We 0:09:09.559 --> 0:09:12.400 would have blown up the filibuster. We would have been 0:09:12.440 --> 0:09:15.240 active on climate change. Why because we would have been 0:09:15.280 --> 0:09:21.480 woke and conscious too, the fucking racist ass filibuster right 0:09:21.600 --> 0:09:27.880 that allows these small as states to have outsize power. Right, 0:09:28.000 --> 0:09:30.520 we would have done what was necessary, what the voters 0:09:30.600 --> 0:09:32.920 called us to do, because we would have been in 0:09:32.960 --> 0:09:37.920 alignment with them. But are we doing that? No, we're not. 0:09:38.880 --> 0:09:41.280 But when you are having to go on the defensive 0:09:41.760 --> 0:09:47.240 about being woke, which means being conscious too, injustice, you 0:09:47.320 --> 0:09:54.640 are fucking losing. So here we are with a handful 0:09:54.679 --> 0:09:56.280 of months, and I'm telling you it's going to go 0:09:56.360 --> 0:09:57.840 buy in a blink of an eye, because the other 0:09:57.960 --> 0:10:02.079 day it occurred to me, said, shit, there are like 0:10:02.200 --> 0:10:06.160 six weeks until the end of this year. Right when 0:10:06.200 --> 0:10:09.960 we get to January, it'll almost be two years. It'll 0:10:10.000 --> 0:10:13.600 be two years that we've been living with COVID nineteen 0:10:14.480 --> 0:10:17.720 and we still have people fucking dying. That's how quickly 0:10:17.800 --> 0:10:20.320 time has gone, because we lost an entire year in 0:10:20.360 --> 0:10:26.360 twenty twenty. Right, twenty twenty one went by like boom, 0:10:27.600 --> 0:10:29.719 And so what is in store for twenty twenty two? 0:10:29.880 --> 0:10:37.400 Dare I ask? Because I'm terrified? But back to these cases, 0:10:39.520 --> 0:10:44.560 You know, when you already know what the outcome is 0:10:44.600 --> 0:10:53.480 going to be, when you can comfortably say to yourself, like, oh, yeah, 0:10:53.559 --> 0:10:56.480 Kyle's not going to go to jail. He wasn't even 0:10:56.559 --> 0:11:01.400 remanded to prison, right while he awaited did trial, and 0:11:01.480 --> 0:11:07.800 yet low level drug offenders. Right Caliph Browder, the young 0:11:07.880 --> 0:11:11.240 black man who was picked up and held in Rikers 0:11:11.520 --> 0:11:14.600 for three years under suspicion of stealing a backpack, who 0:11:14.679 --> 0:11:19.400 would then later be released no charges and kill himself 0:11:19.640 --> 0:11:24.760 after the trauma that was inflicted upon him when he's 0:11:24.840 --> 0:11:28.200 remanded for stealing of a backpack. But Kyle Rittenhouse was 0:11:28.240 --> 0:11:31.440 able to go out drink beers and fucking live his 0:11:31.600 --> 0:11:38.000 life after killing two people, You know that this justice 0:11:38.040 --> 0:11:43.520 system ain't fucking right. When a judge can decide that 0:11:43.600 --> 0:11:46.160 we're not going to use the word victim because he 0:11:46.280 --> 0:11:50.040 believes it's too politically loaded. You know this justice system 0:11:50.040 --> 0:11:57.160 ain't right when cops can get off after we witnessed 0:11:57.200 --> 0:12:05.120 them on video shooting people in the back. You know 0:12:05.240 --> 0:12:10.800 that this justice system ain't right. But what are we 0:12:10.920 --> 0:12:14.480 doing to fix it? What conversations are we doing, what 0:12:14.600 --> 0:12:19.640 conversations are we having? We're not So how is it 0:12:19.679 --> 0:12:22.040 that the radical right is able to say that the 0:12:22.080 --> 0:12:25.320 Democratic Party is too woke when they ignore all the 0:12:25.400 --> 0:12:32.640 same fucking shit. You know, and this is what I'm saying. 0:12:35.120 --> 0:12:39.000 It is all a distraction. It is all a distraction 0:12:39.320 --> 0:12:44.920 in order to keep white supremacy alive. If you are 0:12:44.960 --> 0:12:48.520 paying attention to this shit over here, then you are 0:12:48.600 --> 0:12:54.200 not focused on the bigger picture, which is who is 0:12:54.240 --> 0:12:58.320 making money off of all of this? Right? Who benefits 0:12:59.120 --> 0:13:03.120 from this, whether it be through power for power's sake 0:13:04.640 --> 0:13:11.640 or money right at the sake of greed. But somebody 0:13:11.760 --> 0:13:15.240 is benefiting. And this country only works right at the 0:13:15.360 --> 0:13:20.400 expense of the least among us. So when we decide 0:13:20.440 --> 0:13:25.360 to have honest conversations about that, right, when we decide 0:13:25.400 --> 0:13:30.600 to tell the truth, right, that will be us being 0:13:30.640 --> 0:13:34.080 whoa But right now, both parties, if you ask me, 0:13:34.360 --> 0:13:37.600 are just a bunch of political ostriches. They're just burying 0:13:37.640 --> 0:13:41.559 their heads in the sand. The radical right knows exactly 0:13:41.559 --> 0:13:43.679 how to talk to their base. They know exactly what 0:13:43.720 --> 0:13:45.560 they want to hear. It doesn't matter that they don't 0:13:45.600 --> 0:13:49.480 deliver shit. They deliver the rhetoric that they love. Right. 0:13:49.600 --> 0:13:54.440 They make these people feel proud with their millions of guns, right, 0:13:55.040 --> 0:13:58.960 and the desire for members of Congress to post videos 0:13:59.000 --> 0:14:02.000 of them killing another member of Congress. That's the shit 0:14:02.400 --> 0:14:05.040 that their base wants to see. But the stuff that 0:14:05.360 --> 0:14:08.320 we want to see as a base of the Democratic Party, 0:14:08.720 --> 0:14:11.160 we're told, oh no, no, no, no no, that's too much, 0:14:11.240 --> 0:14:15.280 because I'm too busy fucking chasing the Karens right, trying 0:14:15.280 --> 0:14:19.120 to get them to switch parties, when since nineteen fifties 0:14:19.360 --> 0:14:22.520 they have shown exist us exactly who the fuck they 0:14:22.520 --> 0:14:26.040 are and where their allegiance lies. But we're still trying 0:14:26.040 --> 0:14:31.960 to bring them back. You know, all I can say 0:14:33.240 --> 0:14:40.320 with regard to this current political climate is take good 0:14:40.360 --> 0:14:45.560 care of yourself, right, take good care of yourself. You 0:14:45.640 --> 0:14:50.080 have got to be balancing out what it is that 0:14:50.120 --> 0:14:53.760 we are ingesting with what we are putting back out 0:14:53.800 --> 0:14:58.840 into the universe. We cannot sustain on rage alone. Trust me, 0:15:00.000 --> 0:15:03.840 this is what I am learning after years of doing Woke, 0:15:03.920 --> 0:15:07.120 after years of raging against the machine, that if I 0:15:07.160 --> 0:15:11.600 am not working to fill my own cup, if I 0:15:11.640 --> 0:15:15.960 am not working right as a way to speak and 0:15:16.080 --> 0:15:18.080 say what it is that I have to say, but 0:15:18.120 --> 0:15:22.000 then let it go, relieve myself of the expectations that 0:15:22.120 --> 0:15:25.120 anything is truly going to shift in this country other 0:15:25.200 --> 0:15:29.200 than waking more people up. But knowing right this is 0:15:29.280 --> 0:15:32.240 my turn with the baton, but that I am not 0:15:32.320 --> 0:15:36.080 going to see justice in my lifetime, right, But I 0:15:36.080 --> 0:15:38.880 can only do what I can to pass the baton 0:15:39.120 --> 0:15:42.080 to the next generation, to the next group of people 0:15:42.360 --> 0:15:45.280 who care and hope that they carry the work further. 0:15:45.800 --> 0:15:49.560 But I cannot in the process burn myself out and 0:15:49.640 --> 0:15:54.600 make myself sick, because that would be feeding into the 0:15:54.760 --> 0:15:58.200 system of white supremacy that has a death grip on 0:15:58.200 --> 0:16:03.120 this country. Coming up next, friends, is my conversation with 0:16:03.280 --> 0:16:07.320 our dear friend who has returned to Woke, f Kurt Bardella, 0:16:07.360 --> 0:16:10.480 about what he believes the Democratic Party needs to do 0:16:10.600 --> 0:16:13.960 in order to win in this next election and whether 0:16:14.120 --> 0:16:16.360 or not we're going to have the stomach for the 0:16:16.480 --> 0:16:25.480 kind of fight that we are up against, folks. I 0:16:25.520 --> 0:16:28.560 am so excited to welcome back to Woke f Daily 0:16:28.600 --> 0:16:31.360 our friend Kurt Bardela. You know him as a DNC 0:16:31.600 --> 0:16:35.720 and d Triple C spokesperson as well as a columnist 0:16:35.760 --> 0:16:41.840 and regular guesting contributor on MSNBC. Kurt, let's just you know, 0:16:42.360 --> 0:16:46.560 cut the bs from the jump. Democrats are not in 0:16:46.600 --> 0:16:51.800 good shape. Even though you know, finally, finally, after months 0:16:51.800 --> 0:16:56.880 of deliberation, after back and forth with Senator Kirsten Cinema 0:16:57.040 --> 0:17:00.520 and Joe Manchion and you know, the Progressive Caucus in 0:17:00.560 --> 0:17:04.359 the House, we have a bipartisan infrastructure deal that was 0:17:04.400 --> 0:17:08.960 signed this week. However, there are many people, including myself, 0:17:09.000 --> 0:17:12.639 that are wondering whether or not Democrats have already lost 0:17:12.680 --> 0:17:16.640 the midterm elections before we even get started. With less 0:17:16.680 --> 0:17:19.600 than a year and now to go until those midterm 0:17:19.680 --> 0:17:23.439 elections happen. What kind of shape do you think that 0:17:23.560 --> 0:17:27.080 Democrats are in right now? Well, Daniel, I think it's 0:17:27.080 --> 0:17:30.359 an uphill climb, candidly, and part of the reason why, 0:17:30.560 --> 0:17:34.280 and this doesn't get talked about nearly enough, the redistricting 0:17:34.320 --> 0:17:39.040 process that is happening right now, the partisan Jerry Mandarin 0:17:39.480 --> 0:17:43.000 of congressional districts. Before we even get on the playing 0:17:43.040 --> 0:17:46.520 field in twenty twenty two, we could have already lost 0:17:46.520 --> 0:17:49.919 our majority just based on how Republicans in the state 0:17:49.920 --> 0:17:55.880 houses are drawing these lines and grouping communities of color 0:17:56.040 --> 0:17:59.160 and very concentrated areas so that they don't have widespread 0:17:59.160 --> 0:18:04.919 representations blatant racism, and it's happening in broad daylight, and 0:18:05.000 --> 0:18:08.200 it underscores I think one of the real blind spots 0:18:08.200 --> 0:18:12.040 of the Democratic Party from an organization standpoint, which is, 0:18:12.640 --> 0:18:15.800 for too long we've kind of ignored what goes on 0:18:16.160 --> 0:18:19.920 in the local and state level, while Republicans have very 0:18:20.000 --> 0:18:25.600 systemically and deliberately launched multi million dollar campaigns to build 0:18:25.720 --> 0:18:28.960 up their bench in these places. I've always said that 0:18:29.240 --> 0:18:32.760 today's city council member, today's state assemblyment is tomorrow's congressman 0:18:32.840 --> 0:18:35.680 or tomorrow senator. And we're seeing that happen. I mean, 0:18:35.960 --> 0:18:39.480 right now, local school boards are under siege by the 0:18:39.600 --> 0:18:45.000 radical extreme right, and that is a deliberate plan by 0:18:45.040 --> 0:18:48.879 the Republican Party to try to hijack all of the 0:18:48.960 --> 0:18:53.160 institutions and put them in their column. And that's going 0:18:53.480 --> 0:18:55.840 and as we see every ten years, that has a 0:18:55.960 --> 0:18:59.160 very significant impact. When we look at the playing field 0:18:59.160 --> 0:19:03.040 for mid term elections, I think that after what happened 0:19:03.119 --> 0:19:05.800 a couple of weeks ago in Virginia and New Jersey, 0:19:06.359 --> 0:19:10.520 even though we won New Jersey was alarmingly close, democratsy 0:19:10.560 --> 0:19:14.600 to wake up and realize something. On climate change, we 0:19:14.640 --> 0:19:17.439 saw Republicans hijack the issue and turned the Green New 0:19:17.520 --> 0:19:21.960 Deal into a bad word. On voting rights and police reform, 0:19:22.040 --> 0:19:24.600 we saw Republicans hijack those issues and turn it into 0:19:24.720 --> 0:19:29.160 defund the police. On the issue of infrastructure and congressional spending, 0:19:29.200 --> 0:19:31.640 we saw them hijacket and just make it into a 0:19:31.680 --> 0:19:35.920 price tag designed to scare away of voters. On education, 0:19:36.040 --> 0:19:39.399 we saw them hijacket and turned it into critical race theory. 0:19:39.960 --> 0:19:41.680 And we saw how that played out in the most 0:19:41.720 --> 0:19:46.720 recent elections. Time and again, Republicans take our issues and 0:19:47.680 --> 0:19:51.040 scare us away from talking about them. And I'll tell you, 0:19:51.000 --> 0:19:53.359 if you would to set a year ago, Danielle that 0:19:53.400 --> 0:19:55.679 the Virginia elections can come down to the issue of education, 0:19:55.720 --> 0:19:57.960 who do you think is gonna win? Everybody would have said, oh, 0:19:58.119 --> 0:20:01.160 that faris of Democrats, and education debate is a Democrat 0:20:01.240 --> 0:20:04.960 wheelhouse issue. And yet somehow we lost that, and we 0:20:05.000 --> 0:20:08.439 have got to stop letting Republicans hijack our issues and 0:20:08.560 --> 0:20:12.280 just run unopposed and unabashed on them, thinking that no 0:20:12.359 --> 0:20:14.159 one's going to notice, no one's going to actually buy 0:20:14.200 --> 0:20:17.879 into their fear mongering. Listen, folks, the myth that people 0:20:17.920 --> 0:20:21.040 don't buy into this bullshit should have been completely destroyed 0:20:21.080 --> 0:20:24.399 after the twenty sixteen election. We've got to start matching 0:20:24.400 --> 0:20:26.400 fire with fire here or we're just gonna get wiped out. 0:20:26.840 --> 0:20:30.680 So let's look at the Virginia race from a couple 0:20:30.720 --> 0:20:34.679 of weeks ago, Kurt, you know, and I want to 0:20:34.720 --> 0:20:38.080 be honest where I feel that Terry mcculloff ran a 0:20:38.080 --> 0:20:41.439 bullshit campaign. I think that Terry mcculloff did not offer 0:20:41.680 --> 0:20:45.320 the voters anything right other than I am not Donald Trump, 0:20:45.359 --> 0:20:52.440 and sadly because of the I don't know, hesitation, ignorance, 0:20:52.680 --> 0:20:57.119 blatant obstructionism of two of our own Democratic senators, he 0:20:57.240 --> 0:20:59.879 also had nothing to run on right in terms of 0:21:00.080 --> 0:21:02.920 Democrats get things done, so put me back in office. 0:21:03.920 --> 0:21:09.640 That being said, if you were running that campaign right, 0:21:09.760 --> 0:21:14.760 and in hindsight, we saw that junkin use critical race theory, 0:21:14.880 --> 0:21:18.720 parents should have quote unquote a choice. Right. We saw 0:21:19.200 --> 0:21:24.320 book banning and book burning come back into come back 0:21:24.359 --> 0:21:27.159 into focus in the twenty first century in such a 0:21:27.200 --> 0:21:30.800 way that should have been alarming, but we kind of 0:21:30.840 --> 0:21:34.679 just shrugged at it. What would you have said to 0:21:35.000 --> 0:21:38.000 Terry mccauliff's campaign, What would you have said to him 0:21:38.600 --> 0:21:43.440 in terms of how you combat this wayward messaging about 0:21:43.480 --> 0:21:45.720 critical race theory, which, by the way, is not even 0:21:45.880 --> 0:21:49.520 taught in our K through twelve school systems. It is 0:21:49.560 --> 0:21:55.280 a higher education curriculum, right, What would you what would 0:21:55.320 --> 0:21:58.280 you have said to him to do so as not 0:21:58.320 --> 0:22:01.679 to fall into the rabbit hole of defending something that 0:22:01.840 --> 0:22:06.199 is actually nonsense. I think I would. I would have 0:22:06.240 --> 0:22:09.080 owned the issue of education and never let Glenn young 0:22:09.160 --> 0:22:11.199 can take it from you, and to begin, I remember 0:22:11.359 --> 0:22:13.760 very early on in the campaign one of the first 0:22:13.840 --> 0:22:17.199 public speeches that Terry gave on the sign on the 0:22:17.200 --> 0:22:20.920 podium were the word's education. And yet I never felt 0:22:20.920 --> 0:22:23.359 like I heard Terry talk about that very much. And 0:22:23.359 --> 0:22:26.320 it gave this opening to the Republicans to just kind 0:22:26.320 --> 0:22:29.920 of seize this issue, put millions of dollars of advertising 0:22:29.960 --> 0:22:32.800 behind it, so that by the time Terry woke up 0:22:32.840 --> 0:22:34.760 to the issue that hey, this is becoming a problem. 0:22:34.760 --> 0:22:37.119 It was kind of too late, the person already baked in. 0:22:38.280 --> 0:22:42.480 You know, I really feel like this again. This happens 0:22:42.520 --> 0:22:45.639 all the time and it drives me nuts. Democrats just 0:22:45.920 --> 0:22:50.800 surrendered these issues to the Republicans and they get trapped 0:22:50.800 --> 0:22:52.359 in that, oh, we're not going to go there now 0:22:52.400 --> 0:22:54.160 that the Republicans have touched it, because we don't want 0:22:54.160 --> 0:22:57.720 to play into their into their hands, Ignoring the issue 0:22:57.760 --> 0:22:59.720 is playing into their hands. Terry should have owned the 0:22:59.720 --> 0:23:01.640 issue of education. The guy was governed for four years. 0:23:01.800 --> 0:23:03.320 He has a track record in an education that he 0:23:03.359 --> 0:23:05.800 could have promoted and talked about every single day, so 0:23:05.840 --> 0:23:08.359 that by a time Young Can and the Republicans went there, 0:23:09.040 --> 0:23:11.480 it would have been seen for what for what it 0:23:11.520 --> 0:23:14.480 really was a political stunt, a desperate effort to grab 0:23:14.520 --> 0:23:16.760 onto an issue radicalize it in the same way that 0:23:16.800 --> 0:23:20.000 Republicans like to talk about. Remember the twenty eighteen in terms, 0:23:20.040 --> 0:23:23.680 all you heard on foxes of caravans are coming, are coming, 0:23:23.880 --> 0:23:26.800 Yet they have never arrived, and they never arrived in 0:23:26.880 --> 0:23:28.960 never hear anything about a since. But that's what they did. 0:23:29.520 --> 0:23:32.800 It didn't work because we took that head on. We 0:23:32.800 --> 0:23:35.200 didn't let them get away with that in this case 0:23:35.240 --> 0:23:37.320 in Virginia, I felt like we kind of did. And 0:23:37.359 --> 0:23:42.080 I would have told Terry, listen, do not underestimate this campaign. 0:23:42.119 --> 0:23:45.480 Do not underestimate the money that young can is able 0:23:45.520 --> 0:23:48.880 to have at his disposal to run TV ad after. 0:23:49.040 --> 0:23:50.800 I mean, I live in Virginia, I can tell you 0:23:50.920 --> 0:23:54.000 for months, all I saw were these Glenn Young can 0:23:54.080 --> 0:23:58.119 ads every single day on daytime television, specifically targeting women. 0:23:58.440 --> 0:24:00.640 You don't run ads during general hass Bill unless you're 0:24:00.640 --> 0:24:04.120 targeting a certain constituency. And I never saw mccalliff out 0:24:04.160 --> 0:24:06.840 there early enough, and I think that they started too 0:24:07.000 --> 0:24:10.160 late getting into the game. I think that they gave 0:24:10.200 --> 0:24:14.080 Glenn a huge runaway. Listen, Glenn Yonkin wasn't unknown. He's 0:24:14.119 --> 0:24:15.879 never run for office before, so he kind of had 0:24:15.880 --> 0:24:18.640 a clean slate. So he got to create his own 0:24:18.760 --> 0:24:22.119 first impression with the voters, and he had that playing 0:24:22.160 --> 0:24:26.080 field all to himself for months. And by the time 0:24:26.920 --> 0:24:28.920 the Democrats got along to trying to say, hey, listen, 0:24:28.920 --> 0:24:33.360 this guy is Donald Trump and a vest don't be fooled, 0:24:33.840 --> 0:24:35.920 it was too late. Voters had already made a first 0:24:35.920 --> 0:24:38.479 impression about Young Kin. Because he was able to do 0:24:38.520 --> 0:24:42.399 that without any pushback for months. But I mean, here's 0:24:42.400 --> 0:24:45.800 the thing. If every election we are being told right 0:24:45.920 --> 0:24:49.119 since twenty sixteen, no, actually, let's go back to Obama, 0:24:49.320 --> 0:24:52.280 since two thousand and eight, has been the most consequential 0:24:52.320 --> 0:24:56.840 election of our lifetime. Every single election we hear that 0:24:56.960 --> 0:25:01.919 mantra from the Democrats, except this actually was one of 0:25:01.920 --> 0:25:06.440 the most consequential elections, right, and not saying that all 0:25:06.600 --> 0:25:10.879 is lost because mcculoff lost the race. But let's be clear, 0:25:11.720 --> 0:25:17.240 we had been owning Virginia for the last decade, right 0:25:17.440 --> 0:25:22.119 after hard fought like ground games done in Virginia to 0:25:22.240 --> 0:25:26.480 turn it blue, and so here we are, right. How 0:25:26.600 --> 0:25:29.959 is it that they started late, Kurt? How is it 0:25:30.000 --> 0:25:32.480 that we want to tell people that they need to 0:25:32.480 --> 0:25:35.919 get out and vote it's so consequential, and yet mcculloff's 0:25:36.000 --> 0:25:41.880 campaign could allow such runaway for Yuncan's team and yet 0:25:42.000 --> 0:25:50.800 have no recourse. Yeah, I think that Democrats at times 0:25:51.160 --> 0:25:55.760 are it's hard for them. I think to reconcile that 0:25:55.920 --> 0:26:00.639 after the four years that was Donald Trump, that somehow 0:26:00.680 --> 0:26:03.760 the republic Party has actually gotten stronger and been able 0:26:03.760 --> 0:26:07.240 to gain ground. You know, I go back to the 0:26:07.280 --> 0:26:09.920 twenty twenty election, and while yeah, it was great that 0:26:10.000 --> 0:26:13.359 Joe Biden won, obviously, but I think about the congressional 0:26:13.400 --> 0:26:16.520 losses we absorbed, how our majority got narrowed down to 0:26:16.800 --> 0:26:20.560 just a handful, how we barely have the United States 0:26:20.560 --> 0:26:23.879 Senate if not for the miracle that really was you know, 0:26:23.960 --> 0:26:28.719 Warnock and ass Off in Georgia happening. This was not 0:26:28.840 --> 0:26:31.320 a good election cycle in twenty twenty for the Democrats. 0:26:32.359 --> 0:26:34.800 We won by the skin of our teeth. And Donald 0:26:34.840 --> 0:26:36.640 Trump still managed to get something like seventy two million 0:26:36.720 --> 0:26:39.600 votes or whatever, right, or sixty three million or whatever 0:26:39.600 --> 0:26:43.359 it was. But it's like, man, that that should have 0:26:43.359 --> 0:26:47.440 been the wake up call that it was that close, 0:26:48.480 --> 0:26:52.760 and that the reality is Donald Trump got the second 0:26:52.840 --> 0:26:55.760 most votes for president in the history of our country. 0:26:56.440 --> 0:26:58.840 The only person only Joe Biden got more. But like, 0:26:59.400 --> 0:27:01.400