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Speaker 1: breakingpoints dot com. Hello everybody. I hope you're enjoying our
Speaker 1: State of the Union content that we brought everyone yesterday. However,
Speaker 1: there is another major event that bears addressing on behalf
Speaker 1: of the Breaking Points community. You might have noticed we
Speaker 1: were on the Joe Rogan experience and Joe actually brought
Speaker 1: up what happened with ilhan Omer eilhat Omar her removal
Speaker 1: from the House Foreign Affairs Committee over alleged anti Semitism.
Speaker 1: In the course of that discussion, he made a joke,
Speaker 1: a joke which is, let's just say, not being well received.
Speaker 1: We are going to play the full context for all
Speaker 1: of you and then break down the ensuing controversy that
Speaker 1: has embroiled all of us here at breaking points. Let's
Speaker 1: take a listen to the clip. First, I just saw
Speaker 1: like Nancy Pelosi is endorsing Adam Schiff for California. When
Speaker 1: you read through the way that man lied to the
Speaker 1: American public through all of Russia Gate, your leg Yeah,
Speaker 1: he should be should be like in prison for perjury,
Speaker 1: not being bolstered by one of the most powerful women
Speaker 1: in the country sitting next to Ilian Omar where she's
Speaker 1: she's apologizing for talking about it's all about the Benjamins, Yeah,
Speaker 1: which is just about money she's talking about apologized, that's
Speaker 1: an anti Semitic statement. I don't think that is. It's
Speaker 1: about Benjamin's or money. You know, the idea that Jewish
Speaker 1: people are not into money is ridiculous. Listen, It's like
Speaker 1: saying Italians aren't into pizza. I understand that the way
Speaker 1: she phrased it, like she could have phrased it a
Speaker 1: different way so that people would have less of a
Speaker 1: freak out. But can you not talk about the influence
Speaker 1: of money in d C. I mean, this is very obvious.
Speaker 1: There's a very obvious reason why for my entire life,
Speaker 1: there's been a uniparty consensus around our policy visa VI
Speaker 1: the Israeli government and a total inability or unwillingness to
Speaker 1: criticize the Israeli government and has everything to do with
Speaker 1: organization and yes, money, just like every other fucking interest
Speaker 1: in DC. And so yeah, the fact that she said
Speaker 1: that she got kicked off the Foreign Affairs Committey, Look,
Speaker 1: I have issues and disagreements with ilhan Omer, but she
Speaker 1: actually is one of the more courageous voices on foreign policy,
Speaker 1: is willing to call out some of the hypocrisy and
Speaker 1: bullshit in US foreign policy, extremely rare in terms of
Speaker 1: the United States congressman. So it's actually kind of a
Speaker 1: real loss that she got kicked off that guy. Get
Speaker 1: she Whether you agree with her or not, she has
Speaker 1: a bold opinion, and that opinion is not her own.
Speaker 1: There's many people that have that opinion, and they should
Speaker 1: be represented. My point is she's sitting right next to
Speaker 1: Adam Shift and no one says shit. She doesn't say yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I probably shays that, hey, motherfucker, what did you say? Yes,
Speaker 1: very correct, she said some crazy shit that wasn't true
Speaker 1: at all. No, Okay, So that's the clip. Now you
Speaker 1: have it in its full glory. You can decide for
Speaker 1: yourself whether he was being anti Semitic or not. However,
Speaker 1: many people have decided to use a bad faith view
Speaker 1: of what happened there and accused not only Joe Rogan, however,
Speaker 1: Crystal and I as well as somehow being anti Semitic.
Speaker 1: So let me go ahead and read this tweet from
Speaker 1: Representative Josh Gottheimer, Democratic congressman best known for trying to
Speaker 1: save the millionaire salt deduction. He says, quote, it is
Speaker 1: despicable language like this that leads to attacks and threats
Speaker 1: against Jewish people. Joe Rogan has a massive platform. It's
Speaker 1: infuriating to watch him and Crystal Ball promote blatant, dangerous
Speaker 1: anti Semitic tropes, including those masquerading as anti Israel sentiments.
Speaker 1: So Crystal, I just want to throw it to you
Speaker 1: for your reaction, because not only Gotttheimer, but the ADL,
Speaker 1: the Anti Defamation League, is now condemning Joe Rogan. Their
Speaker 1: condemn I'm honest, we have multiple pro Israel groups calling
Speaker 1: us somehow anti Semitic for talking about the role of
Speaker 1: money and politics in the way that lobbying works. So
Speaker 1: what was your reaction to all of this nonsense? I mean,
Speaker 1: first of all, I went back and thought through you know,
Speaker 1: our time with Joe and like that particular moment, and
Speaker 1: to the to the extent that I really thought about
Speaker 1: what he said that deeply at all. It was sort
Speaker 1: of like, oh, it's an off color like women be
Speaker 1: shopping level of joke. And so then I went on
Speaker 1: to make the points that I think are really important
Speaker 1: that I one hundred percent stand by, which is that
Speaker 1: it's not anti semitic to talk about the influence of
Speaker 1: money and politics with regards to any topic, and even
Speaker 1: when it comes to the topic of our government's relationship
Speaker 1: with Israel and Israeli government policy. I think it is
Speaker 1: nonsense that Ilhan Omar got taken off of a committee
Speaker 1: because of her comments. I don't think anything she said
Speaker 1: was anti Semitic. I don't think there was anything wrong
Speaker 1: with what she said. And I think we have to
Speaker 1: be able to be honest about the way money works
Speaker 1: in DC without just casually throwing around these very harmful
Speaker 1: and damaging and ugly labels. So, you know, Gottheimer's tweet,
Speaker 1: I don't even really one hundred percent understand what he's
Speaker 1: saying there about you know, masquerading as anti Israel or
Speaker 1: something like that. I'm not even clear on what he
Speaker 1: means by that, but I can tell you personally, I
Speaker 1: one thousand percent stand by the comments that I made
Speaker 1: in my view of the situation with Ilhan Omar, and
Speaker 1: I would say it again any day of the week.
Speaker 1: You have nothing to apologize for for all of the
Speaker 1: people who are out there saying, how dare you? Why
Speaker 1: didn't you confront him? First of all, he's a comedian
Speaker 1: and he was making a joke. Now I'm not going
Speaker 1: to say it was the most artfully phrased joke or
Speaker 1: whatever in the world. And you know, if he wants
Speaker 1: to clean it up, that's on him. Number Two, you
Speaker 1: were having a substantive discussion around the removal of a
Speaker 1: United States Congressman, around allegations that she made that influence
Speaker 1: of money in politics, something that we all seem to
Speaker 1: agree affects every platform on earth, but we're not allowed
Speaker 1: to discuss it here. As people can probably tell, I'm
Speaker 1: really upset because people, I'm not going to just sit
Speaker 1: here and let people smear you and Joe Rogan as
Speaker 1: anti Semitic. We've got every pro Israel group and all
Speaker 1: these congressmen on the planet denouncing us as somehow like
Speaker 1: what is it anti semitic by ally ship or some
Speaker 1: bullshit like that, because we sat by and didn't immediately
Speaker 1: call him out. Once again, I don't think that it
Speaker 1: was the best phrase joke at the same time, like
Speaker 1: who are you? What? You're the editor now? And you
Speaker 1: know even that, take a step back. Do you believe
Speaker 1: Joe Rogan is an anti semi I don't believe that.
Speaker 1: I don't believe that for a second. Do I believe
Speaker 1: Crystal that you were being anti Semitic whenever you were
Speaker 1: talking about, you know, the influence of money and politics
Speaker 1: and how that relates Israel. No, it's complete and utter nonsense.
Speaker 1: And this is how they smear people who want to
Speaker 1: talk about this at all. So I'm really honestly outraged
Speaker 1: by this entire thing and the way that people have
Speaker 1: reacted to it in the broader establishment. And here's the
Speaker 1: worst part, as you and I know, Crystal, how many
Speaker 1: people will watch the full episode in a full context,
Speaker 1: in the full clip. How many people will even will
Speaker 1: dismiss what you said about that substantive point because of
Speaker 1: the joke that preceded it, and just so much of
Speaker 1: this is just completely ridiculous. But they got the headlines
Speaker 1: that they wanted, you know, that got the headlines that
Speaker 1: they wanted. Breaking Points is anti semitic, Joe Rogan is
Speaker 1: anti Semitic, and a lot of people aren't gonna, aren't
Speaker 1: gonna look past this. That's actually what's the most disgusting
Speaker 1: part of it all. There's a whole outrage industrial complex.
Speaker 1: And so the fact that you know, he makes this
Speaker 1: like offhanded, off color joke, and that we don't immediately
Speaker 1: jump how dare you, Joe Rogan and jump on our
Speaker 1: high horse, but instead use it as a moment to
Speaker 1: talk about the legitimate criticism of DC and the way
Speaker 1: that money and politics works. I mean, I just listen. Honestly,
Speaker 1: I don't let it bother me that much because I
Speaker 1: think these people are bad faith. I think they're just
Speaker 1: looking for a way to take shots. I don't think
Speaker 1: they really are like deeply offended or morally outraged or
Speaker 1: like you know, people were saying, oh, this is so dangerous.
Speaker 1: Come on, I mean, it was the State of the
Speaker 1: Union last night. There are so much, so many larger
Speaker 1: issues at stake than one off color joke made by
Speaker 1: Joe Rogan and how we responded to it in the
Speaker 1: moment in you know, our one hour and thirty minutes
Speaker 1: into a three hour plus podcast. So listen. That's it
Speaker 1: is what it is, like I said, for me personally,
Speaker 1: the direction I steered the conversation in the commons I
Speaker 1: made about il haan Omar, about the way DC works,
Speaker 1: about what you're allowed to say, what you're not allowed
Speaker 1: to say. I stand by it. I'd say it again.
Speaker 1: I just said it today. And I don't think there
Speaker 1: is anything remotely anti semitic about talking about the influence
Speaker 1: of money and politics. And it is absolute bullshit that
Speaker 1: Ilhan Omar was pulled off of a committee because she
Speaker 1: was honest about such influence. I agree. You know, actually
Speaker 1: we didn't even get a talk to comment about that substantively.
Speaker 1: I think what happened is totally ridiculous. I mean, especially
Speaker 1: you know, you're actually playing into the trope that you're
Speaker 1: not allowed to talk about it by removing them from
Speaker 1: the committee. And actually that's what this entire thing has
Speaker 1: revealed to me, which is that you are like, what
Speaker 1: are we not allowed to have that discussion? Now? I
Speaker 1: deplore anti semitism. I think it's terrible, but conflating criticism
Speaker 1: of Israel with anti Semitism is freaking ridiculous. And you know,
Speaker 1: even to just to come back to what Rogan was
Speaker 1: talking about, as you said, he was making, as I
Speaker 1: understand it, and as I understood in the moment, it
Speaker 1: was one of those things where like everybody likes money. Now, look,
Speaker 1: I wouldn't have phrased it the way that he said.
Speaker 1: But also like, who are you You're gonna, you know,
Speaker 1: sit in the room with us while we're all laughing
Speaker 1: or whatever, having a good time and being the editor
Speaker 1: of all this and then having your faux outrage. I've
Speaker 1: seen a lot of so called free speech warriors, crystal
Speaker 1: people who believe in free speech. Oh this is so terrible,
Speaker 1: pushing this, you know, cancelation campaign. They're like, we got
Speaker 1: to get right wingers to stand up or whatever against
Speaker 1: Joe Rogan. These people are all complete frauds. In my estimation,
Speaker 1: they're jealous of him. They're jealous of the fact that
Speaker 1: they don't have as big of a platform, and they
Speaker 1: are they are the ones proving the trope that we're
Speaker 1: not allowed to have this discussion by without being called
Speaker 1: anti Semitic and that is where that is why I
Speaker 1: remain outraged by watching people supposedly Chrystal on the side
Speaker 1: or whatever of the free speech come out and you know,
Speaker 1: denounce us and denounced Joe. They're full of it. Like,
Speaker 1: let's be honest, this is always the issue where it
Speaker 1: really comes down to it. I mean, I've said this
Speaker 1: for a long time. The issue you're most likely to
Speaker 1: get canceled on is supporting Palestine criticizing Israel, and that's
Speaker 1: one of I mean, listen, I care about free speech
Speaker 1: for the principle of it, not because of which side
Speaker 1: it happens to help or hurt in the moment. But yeah,
Speaker 1: there's a lot of hypocrisy that's kind of exposed by
Speaker 1: this moment. Listen again, off color, offhand joke made by
Speaker 1: a comedian in the middle of a three hour podcast.
Speaker 1: Is this really what we're like going to the mat over.
Speaker 1: I just feel like there are so many more important
Speaker 1: things for people to actually care about and get outraged about.
Speaker 1: And back to mister Gotttheimer, by the way, one of
Speaker 1: those things perhaps people should be outraged about is this
Speaker 1: is one of the most corrupt members of Congress. As
Speaker 1: you said, Sager. He's like the the guy pushing for
Speaker 1: the millionaire assault tax cap tax break and one of
Speaker 1: the top funded congressman from the private equity industry that
Speaker 1: he has gone and like carried water for and us what,
Speaker 1: I think we should be able to talk about that,
Speaker 1: and I don't think that it's anti semitic to do so, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: he's the one who calls himself mister Salt. His entire
Speaker 1: thing is bringing back a tax deduction which disproportionately helps
Speaker 1: millionaires and multi millionaires, specifically in California and New York.
Speaker 1: And he has the gall to come after you, to
Speaker 1: come after Rogan for talking about it. Also, you know,
Speaker 1: somehow making this into an anti semitic thing. So anyways,
Speaker 1: I thought we owed people our reaction to it, as
Speaker 1: people can say, I'm pretty hopped up about this entire thing,
Speaker 1: And yeah, I don't know. I just I'm often reminded
Speaker 1: of like just how disgusting and how discussing an inconsistent
Speaker 1: so many people claim to be whenever it comes to
Speaker 1: free speech and secondary on the mainstream media. I mean,
Speaker 1: you got to go look every headline, Variety, Mediaite, all
Speaker 1: these other people. They're like, you know, rubbing their hands
Speaker 1: together relishing this complete BS controversy because they have it
Speaker 1: out for Joe. Joe is going to be fine, all right,
Speaker 1: you know, it'll be fine. We will be fine here
Speaker 1: over at breaking points. But that's not the point. You know,
Speaker 1: you can't just call people anti semitic. You can't just
Speaker 1: throw these things out there and try and spin it
Speaker 1: into a whole thing in the service of your agenda.
Speaker 1: And we are not going to apologize. I can tell
Speaker 1: you that right now. For all the people who've reached
Speaker 1: out and said, oh, you guys got to put your
Speaker 1: distance between yourselves and Joe, Yeah, you know, I'll save
Speaker 1: my most vulgar language for my response to that. The
Speaker 1: last thing that I'll say about all of this is
Speaker 1: you can go back and look at our record of
Speaker 1: you know, how we've talked about these issues many many
Speaker 1: times on breaking points, about our you know, full throated
Speaker 1: condemnation of real anti semitism, like what was on display
Speaker 1: with Kanye West. I mean, the record is clear. So
Speaker 1: if you're super outraged about how we you know, navigated
Speaker 1: this one moment in the middle of a three hour podcast,
Speaker 1: I would encourage you to look at the larger body
Speaker 1: of work, and again listening back to it, listening back
Speaker 1: to the comments that I made immediately in the wake
Speaker 1: of it, where you know, clearly directed the conversation right
Speaker 1: to what really matters, the influence of money and politics.
Speaker 1: One hundred percent stand by it, no regrets. I'd say
Speaker 1: it and do it all over again. Good. All right,
Speaker 1: So you guys have no where we stand. For all
Speaker 1: of those who have asked us about the controversy, this
Speaker 1: is the last thing that we will say about it.
Speaker 1: Unless they want to keep this thing going. We can
Speaker 1: go all day, but everybody enjoy all the content out
Speaker 1: on the channel today. We've got our breaking points State
Speaker 1: of the Union for the podcast, we have the full
Speaker 1: audio of all of our pre and post coverage of
Speaker 1: the State of the Union. And also shout out to
Speaker 1: many of the people taking advantage of the premium discount
Speaker 1: we have going on right now ten percent off for
Speaker 1: all of the jri listeners who joined us since that podcast.
Speaker 1: I don't regret going on that podcast. I don't regret
Speaker 1: anything that we said on that podcast. And for the critics,
Speaker 1: you know, I'll save it for later for my more
Speaker 1: off color comments. All right, you have of course been
Speaker 1: listening to the President of the United States delivering his
Speaker 1: State of the Union, leaning heavily into an economic message
Speaker 1: front and center at the top. But I think probably
Speaker 1: the thing a lot of people will pay the most
Speaker 1: attention to is how raucous the Republicans were. You had
Speaker 1: Marjorie Taylor Green yelling You're a liar. Lots of especially
Speaker 1: over his comments about Social Security and Medicare. There's a
Speaker 1: big uproar. They were yelling at him about the border
Speaker 1: and other things. Kyle, let me go to you first
Speaker 1: of all, what were your sort of big takeaways big? Yes, Well,
Speaker 1: I like the fact that most of the speech was economic,
Speaker 1: and the early part was economic. I feel like that,
Speaker 1: you know, if you lean into that, that's positive and
Speaker 1: that'll get a good reaction, I think. But obviously, yeah,
Speaker 1: the bigger story is how I'll go with the word annoying.
Speaker 1: How annoying the room was, and I'm very curious to
Speaker 1: throw it to you guys. I don't know if it's
Speaker 1: just because I'm getting old. I don't know if it's
Speaker 1: because I'm tired and as my bedtime, but every single
Speaker 1: time somebody chirped up, I was like, shut up, just
Speaker 1: wrap it up. I don't want to hear it. It's annoying.
Speaker 1: He's speaking. He's the president, even if he wasn't the president,
Speaker 1: if he was Bob from the PTA meeting. It's like,
Speaker 1: let Bob finish his thought. Because they're all just trying
Speaker 1: to get a viral moment. They're all just trying to
Speaker 1: fundraise off FI because of the Joe Wilson moment back
Speaker 1: when Obama was president and he screamed, you lie, and
Speaker 1: the a massive fundraising numbers. It's like, I get it,
Speaker 1: I get it, I get it. You're all virtue signaling.
Speaker 1: You're all trying to get you know, the spotlight on you.
Speaker 1: But it's it's dumb and it's annoying. Do you guys
Speaker 1: agree with me? I'm not so sure. Here's the thing.
Speaker 1: In terms of my objective feelings about or in terms
Speaker 1: of my personal feelings about it, I'm indifferent. If anything,
Speaker 1: I actually do kind of enjoy it, just because I
Speaker 1: like the idea of a raucous house of representatives that said, look,
Speaker 1: if it's all fake and it's all a stage, then
Speaker 1: these people are gonna have to play their part. Right.
Speaker 1: You pointed to that Marjorie knows exactly what she's doing.
Speaker 1: She's absolutely going to raise a lot of money. But
Speaker 1: I would even step back. I don't think that was
Speaker 1: the biggest story that's going to come out of that.
Speaker 1: It might be a twenty four hour thing and some
Speaker 1: people will be like, oh my god, my norms. Guys.
Speaker 1: The biggest story the takeaway is whenever he would confronting
Speaker 1: them directly on Medicare and Social Security. I mean in
Speaker 1: terms of the take like, in terms of what we
Speaker 1: will be talking about probably for weeks now. That moment
Speaker 1: is going to get replayed over and over again when
Speaker 1: he's like, Okay, are we all agreed here? Oh, so
Speaker 1: you agree with me, So it's not going to be
Speaker 1: a problem. Stand up if you agree with me. That
Speaker 1: was actually Look, I'll give the man credit. That was
Speaker 1: the best absolute part of the speech. It was the
Speaker 1: only part where he went off script and it did
Speaker 1: actually work for him. There were a couple what did
Speaker 1: he say, name a man who would trade places with Jijinping.
Speaker 1: I still do not know exactly what that means. All right, So,
Speaker 1: like my meta takeaway, I was telling you guys this
Speaker 1: during the speech. Vast majority of people stop watching the
Speaker 1: State of the Union after about thirty to forty five minutes. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the first thirty four forty five minutes was all an
Speaker 1: economic message. Most of it was made in America. I mean, look,
Speaker 1: not even President Obama ever gave a made in America
Speaker 1: speech like that. And to me, that just shows me
Speaker 1: the way that Donald Trump really changed politics forever on
Speaker 1: maide in America and on China. So those two issues,
Speaker 1: it's solidly in this state of the Union. No president
Speaker 1: even almost disagrees now at that point, so for the
Speaker 1: Medicare and the Social Security and then I thought overall
Speaker 1: it was an effective speech as far as Biden ones goes.
Speaker 1: If I were him, you know, I'd be pretty happy
Speaker 1: with my performance. Marshall, I want to get your thoughts.
Speaker 1: I sort of feel like with the Republican interruptions, etc.
Speaker 1: Biden really led with this message of like bipartisanship and unity.
Speaker 1: He made a long show at the beginning of congratulations
Speaker 1: to Kevin McCarthy, congratulations to Mitch McConnell. We're going to
Speaker 1: work together. We did work together in the past, so
Speaker 1: he wanted this message of like, I'm the guy who's
Speaker 1: here to work with anybody. We've gotten some things done together.
Speaker 1: Et cetera. And so it certainly serves Marjorie Taylor Greens
Speaker 1: and whoever else's interest to get their little viral moments
Speaker 1: for their Republican based fundraising. But I also do feel
Speaker 1: like that sort of plays into Biden's hands as well,
Speaker 1: when he's trying to portray himself as the grown up
Speaker 1: in the room and the one that's serious about actually
Speaker 1: reaching out and getting things done. Yeah, that's It's what
Speaker 1: we're talking about, the start of the real, you know,
Speaker 1: live show here, which is that voters like hearing that
Speaker 1: you know, you could, you could. Obviously, I think I
Speaker 1: think it's important to separate the like annoying DC version
Speaker 1: of like, oh, back in the eighties, everything was super
Speaker 1: jail and everyone was best friends, the Gipper and Tip
Speaker 1: O'Neill like that, you know, you know, the Joe Scarborough thing.
Speaker 1: But at a baseline level, the centerpiece of American politics
Speaker 1: right now is what like suburban moderate voters think, and
Speaker 1: they want to hear that Marjorie Hiller Green's district may
Speaker 1: be interested in her doing that performance, but no one
Speaker 1: else is. And that's a real misjudgment that could be
Speaker 1: effective in twenty twenty four. Yeah, exactly, I mean, look,
Speaker 1: let's step back. What did we say at the top,
Speaker 1: or at least for what I said, I said, the
Speaker 1: balance is at co of me, lead yourself, try to
Speaker 1: gaslight a little bit about oh, everything's great, you know
Speaker 1: all of that. At the same time, you're like, I'm
Speaker 1: a bulwark again, So what did he lead with? He goes,
Speaker 1: here's all the things I've done, goes straight into the
Speaker 1: bulwark against Medicare, social security, I will veto And what
Speaker 1: does he end on? He ends exactly on stop the steal. Now, look,
Speaker 1: saying the Popolosi attack at any to do anything to
Speaker 1: do with quote the big lie and not schizophrenia is ridiculous. However,
Speaker 1: politically savvy move I think, say, right, yeah, so it's
Speaker 1: like one of those where it wasn't you know, you
Speaker 1: tie those two things together and you know it's savvy.
Speaker 1: I think in that regard, you end on the democracy
Speaker 1: thing that really kept people there. So look, I think
Speaker 1: he hit all the notes. It clocked in and around
Speaker 1: an hour fifteen minutes, as State of the Unions go,
Speaker 1: that's pretty average. I mean overall, again, I just come
Speaker 1: back to him like effective job, I really think so.
Speaker 1: So one of the things I had. I jotted down
Speaker 1: a bunch of stuff that I thought was most interesting.
Speaker 1: One of my favorite lines was he was talking about
Speaker 1: the fifteen percent minimum tax rate for corporations worth over
Speaker 1: a billion dollars and he says they have to pay
Speaker 1: a minimum fifteen percent and then he said like kind
Speaker 1: of casually and flippantly, God love them. Yeah, and that
Speaker 1: got a decent laugh, and you know, I was chuckling here.
Speaker 1: I thought that was a good line. I noticed early on.
Speaker 1: One of the very first lines was like, we've created
Speaker 1: twelve million jobs. And then ah, everybody starts clapping, and
Speaker 1: Kevin McCarthy sitting there like, yeah, I will not clap
Speaker 1: at twelve million new jobs. It's like, dude, this is
Speaker 1: one of the ones that it's like you have to
Speaker 1: do it just to look like you're saying and then
Speaker 1: like you were pointing out the Social Security and Medicare
Speaker 1: moment there, what I was getting really annoyed by is like,
Speaker 1: just own it. It is a lot of the Republican's
Speaker 1: position too, that they want to cut it. They might
Speaker 1: soften the language to try to blunt the effect by
Speaker 1: saying no, we're just trying to reform it or save it,
Speaker 1: but functionally they want to cut it. And when he
Speaker 1: says that's what they want to do, and they're like
Speaker 1: boo boo boom, it strikes me as so ingenuous, like
Speaker 1: just say, yes, this is our position, and we would
Speaker 1: like to debate that on the merits and we would
Speaker 1: like to defend the position of cutting solid security. They
Speaker 1: get so weasily about it, and that's what was driving
Speaker 1: me crazy. I was screaming about it here in the
Speaker 1: studio when we were watching that. So the thing that
Speaker 1: he's referring to specifically when he talks about like sunsetting
Speaker 1: these provisions was what Senator Rick Scott, who was in
Speaker 1: charge of the Republican Senatorial Right campaigns this time around,
Speaker 1: so not like an instant significant player, it was part
Speaker 1: of the plan that he put out. And this was
Speaker 1: Mitch McConnell was basically like, shut the f up, we
Speaker 1: don't want to talk about that. We're trying to run
Speaker 1: on nothing here and just like bash the mon inflation.
Speaker 1: So this is not without basis. And you've had other
Speaker 1: Republicans also talking about the dead ceiling, talking about cuts
Speaker 1: to entitlements. You have had some others who say no, no,
Speaker 1: we don't want to do that. Donald Trump obviously said like,
Speaker 1: this is off the table. But what's sort of more
Speaker 1: interesting to me is I feel like in previous eras
Speaker 1: in the Mitt Romney Paul Ryan era, they were much
Speaker 1: more comfortable owning the fact that they really wanted to
Speaker 1: cut social Security in medicare. Like if Obama had said
Speaker 1: that at a State of the Union, they would have
Speaker 1: been like, yes, we do, and here's our plan, and
Speaker 1: here's Paul Ryan with the PowerPoint of how he's going
Speaker 1: to do it. And so I mean, this is another
Speaker 1: way that even though you still have a lot of
Speaker 1: the same ideology, even though many of them still are
Speaker 1: committed to it, would like to cut social Security and Medicare,
Speaker 1: et cetera, et cetera, the fact that they're offended that
Speaker 1: this is suggested about them, that they want to cut
Speaker 1: these programs represents a pretty remarkable shift in terms of
Speaker 1: the Republican Party and what they want to publicly put forward.
Speaker 1: What do you think of that, Marshall, Yeah, I think
Speaker 1: that's a great way to put it. In Crystal, I mean,
Speaker 1: the core thing, as you guys are particularly, this really
Speaker 1: reminds me of the defund the police debate in terms
Speaker 1: of like how you could identify our vulnerable area. So
Speaker 1: think of defund. Back in twenty twenty, there were some
Speaker 1: Democrats who were very defund. There are plenty of modern
Speaker 1: Democrats who weren't vulnerable. You can take the more extreme
Speaker 1: position as the party's trying to figure it out, and
Speaker 1: that's as a as an attack point. That's basically what's
Speaker 1: happening with social Security. Back in the two thousands. I
Speaker 1: think of when George W. Bush tried to reform slash cut,
Speaker 1: slash privatize social Security after one re election in two
Speaker 1: thousand and five. Like back then, the party consensus was
Speaker 1: that this is what we do. We fight against the
Speaker 1: new deal. We're fighting against the great society that's our party.
Speaker 1: After the social Security privatization failed, after Paul Ryan flopped
Speaker 1: as a VP, and then after Trump then ran in
Speaker 1: favor of social Security and in favor of Medicare Medicare. Also,
Speaker 1: when you need to add the failure of the repeal
Speaker 1: oh Obamacare, Republicans genuinely don't know what to think. And
Speaker 1: I think, as you see. And the thing that's funny, Kyle,
Speaker 1: I get your pointbout need to have a fair debate.
Speaker 1: And I agree with you most of the time, but
Speaker 1: like Jdvans, for example, Jadvans like, actually wouldn't be in
Speaker 1: favor of cutting social Security. He came out, I don't
Speaker 1: think he's I don't think he's the I don't think
Speaker 1: he's the best. I don't think he's the majority of
Speaker 1: the party. But especially with younger Republicans who were basically
Speaker 1: grown up in an America that's accepted the New Deal,
Speaker 1: but it's accepted social Security, it's actually not quite clear
Speaker 1: what the actual position is, which is why it's perfect
Speaker 1: for Joe Biden to attack in that direction. I completely
Speaker 1: agree with that. Characters. The defund is exactly right right,
Speaker 1: which is one of those they're like, no, no no, no,
Speaker 1: what we want to do is raise the retirement age,
Speaker 1: and it's like, well, okay, well you know you're still
Speaker 1: when you're already within that heuristic, it's like, it's not
Speaker 1: going to be good for you. Just so people know,
Speaker 1: cutting social Security and Medicare is probably up there with
Speaker 1: defund the police and affirmative action as the least popular
Speaker 1: things that you could actually try and do in politics.
Speaker 1: Hence why he beats him over the head with the
Speaker 1: club with it, which is exactly what I would do.
Speaker 1: I was surprised that he didn't have been mention abortion
Speaker 1: more in the speech. My count was a single line.
Speaker 1: It came let's say, like two thirds or so into that.
Speaker 1: I was pretty shocked by that. Actually, that's something I
Speaker 1: would have led with if I was president. So I
Speaker 1: just want to say, look, I hope I'm wrong, but
Speaker 1: we just saw with this whole fight with getting Kevin
Speaker 1: MacArthur to be speaker, there was a whole fight, and
Speaker 1: there were was a right flank that was pushing back
Speaker 1: against him. And one of the things they settled on
Speaker 1: is we're going to have a debt ceiling showdown. And
Speaker 1: our whole position in the debt ceiling showdown is we
Speaker 1: want to force cuts to Social Security and Medicare. So
Speaker 1: I think the overwhelming majority of the party is going
Speaker 1: to be on board with that. Now, whether or not,
Speaker 1: you know, I hope Biden is telling the truth when
Speaker 1: he's like, I'm not going to do some sort of
Speaker 1: grand bargain. I'm not going to cut it at all.
Speaker 1: But I think the predominant position in the Republican Party
Speaker 1: is let's cut it. Well, I'm not so sure, because
Speaker 1: remember that's only seventeen people right who tried to extract
Speaker 1: that those are like the Tea Party of Freedom Caucus
Speaker 1: die hards. What the look the majority? I genuinely have
Speaker 1: no idea. I do not know if you were to
Speaker 1: ask me my gut feeling, I think most of them
Speaker 1: would say what I said, something around like they want
Speaker 1: to raise the retirement age, but of course we don't.
Speaker 1: But that's cutting. That's the cutting. Yeah, I agree with you.
Speaker 1: What I'm saying is like, that is what I think
Speaker 1: most of them. They don't. They don't want their position
Speaker 1: to be characterized as cutting, disingenuous and different. That's the line, right,
Speaker 1: But that is even just them not wanting their position
Speaker 1: to be characterized that way is very different. Oh and
Speaker 1: of course the fact that I mean Joe Biden was
Speaker 1: part of the Obama administration that actually put a deal
Speaker 1: on the table that would have cut social Security and
Speaker 1: now clear and he you know, over the course of
Speaker 1: his career a number of times talked about cutting social Security.
Speaker 1: So it does show you the way that the politics
Speaker 1: around this issue have clearly shifted. Now, one thing I
Speaker 1: think that's really important to say is that in terms
Speaker 1: of the big money institutions, within the Republican Party, like
Speaker 1: the think tanks and you know, the coke industry, the
Speaker 1: coke network. They still are very much looking for every
Speaker 1: opportunity they can possibly find to cut these programs, and
Speaker 1: that matters a lot. I think they want to have
Speaker 1: their cake and eat it too. They want to like
Speaker 1: piss on people and say it's raining. So they want
Speaker 1: to do the debt ceiling thing, force the cuts, and
Speaker 1: then go, oh, we're not cut, we're just performing it,
Speaker 1: we're saving it. So that's that's what they've that's their game.
Speaker 1: That's what their game has been for a long time.
Speaker 1: So I think that's the goal. It's not like they're
Speaker 1: actually becoming more moderate on it because they're afraid toledge
Speaker 1: with their actual positions. They recognize how toxic and terrible
Speaker 1: the politics are for them. They recognize that they cannot
Speaker 1: be out and out being like, yes, we want to
Speaker 1: cut social Security because they have realized that that is
Speaker 1: devastating for them. I want to pick up saga on
Speaker 1: what you were saying, because that was something I noted too.
Speaker 1: You know, in advance, you were saying like, okay, here's
Speaker 1: the formula, yes, economics, but clearly the stop the steal
Speaker 1: stuff in January sixth and abortion, like that's what won
Speaker 1: the midterm, so he's going to lean into that. He
Speaker 1: really didn't both he closed with democracy. He closed with
Speaker 1: January sixth. Paul Pelosi with abortion was also in the
Speaker 1: latter part of the speech, but the part that really
Speaker 1: counts in terms of what they're you know, focused on
Speaker 1: and what the message they want to take away. It
Speaker 1: really was loaded up with economics, and I was also
Speaker 1: surprised that you had very little mention of abortion ultimately
Speaker 1: in this speech. I mean, the two themes that he
Speaker 1: leaned into very heavily to start with was the side
Speaker 1: idea of like, I'm the guy who can work with anyone, bipartisanship,
Speaker 1: let's get things done for the American people, and then
Speaker 1: laying out the case of what he thinks he's delivered
Speaker 1: and what he still wants to do now. One challenge
Speaker 1: for him is the fact that we were looking at
Speaker 1: a poll before the speech, very few people say they
Speaker 1: feel like they've been impacted by the Biden agenda. So
Speaker 1: you know, whereas I think, if you're over selling the
Speaker 1: economy and the rosy picture of the economy, you're going
Speaker 1: to have a hard time. There probably is some benefit
Speaker 1: you can get just from selling here's the things we did,
Speaker 1: and going down the list and trying to persuade people
Speaker 1: that know, actually we have been doing some stuff. What
Speaker 1: do you think, Marshall, Yeah, I think it's I just
Speaker 1: want to go back to a quick thing you said
Speaker 1: about the lack of focus on the abortion and the
Speaker 1: democracy thing, Like maybe I think this kind of goes
Speaker 1: to my early comment about how I'd be curious about
Speaker 1: Joe Biden's like political analysis here, and it seems to
Speaker 1: be the political analysis is that you need to move
Speaker 1: on from twenty twenty two, like you're going to reach
Speaker 1: those heights, you're going to be successful that midterm. But
Speaker 1: maybe that's just not going to be successful running on
Speaker 1: that retread when it comes to twenty twenty three, Like
Speaker 1: there could be an instinct of like, man, we're going
Speaker 1: to still like you're still talking about that. It's not
Speaker 1: for grabs as much. So Yeah, I'm really I'm really
Speaker 1: curious how the right responds to the economic stuff, especially soccer,
Speaker 1: to your point about how Biden and Team Biden are
Speaker 1: clearly taking the like Made in America compete with China
Speaker 1: bit that Trump added so that, especially given the I
Speaker 1: think attempt to bring these back to the culture wars
Speaker 1: is going to be interesting ship there. Yeah, I already
Speaker 1: know what they're gonna do. They're gonna go culture war.
Speaker 1: They're going to criticize them on the border, and they're
Speaker 1: just not going to talk about econ because that's how
Speaker 1: it goes anyway. Kyle, let's get our last thoughts from
Speaker 1: you before we bring in Ryan and Ryan and Emily. Sure. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So I wanted to point out the fentanyl line from Biden.
Speaker 1: So he's over there talking about fentanyl and you have
Speaker 1: Marjorie Taylor Green and other start screaming at him. And
Speaker 1: I heard somebody say China, yes, and then somebody say
Speaker 1: like it's your fault or something like that. To be fair,
Speaker 1: the vast majority of the fentanyl comes from China. So okay,
Speaker 1: I know I understand it, but I always get super
Speaker 1: triggered over this because I feel like the approach from
Speaker 1: many people is just brain dead. Because Chris and I
Speaker 1: have talked about this, about thirty thousand people a year
Speaker 1: die from overdoses. When it was the pain pills. Then
Speaker 1: we cracked down on the pain pills with all the
Speaker 1: good intentions in the world, and then people went to
Speaker 1: the black market and they got heroin. Some of that
Speaker 1: heroin was least with fentanyl, and now we have about
Speaker 1: one hundred thousand people dying every year. So it's this
Speaker 1: like the tyranny of good intentions in a sense, because
Speaker 1: if I were to tell somebody like Marjorie Taylor Green, like,
Speaker 1: hey man, we need to legalize, tax and regulate drugs
Speaker 1: in order to get past this whole fentinyl crisis, you'd
Speaker 1: be like, you're insane. That would add to the problem. Well,
Speaker 1: I mean, I think that's a fair point. I think
Speaker 1: it's also a fair point to say, like, there is
Speaker 1: a lot of fentanyl coming across the border, and from
Speaker 1: what I've seen, they've said that actually, if you did
Speaker 1: at least have some more enforcement that was happening there,
Speaker 1: it would make it much harder and raise the price,
Speaker 1: which would increase actually the amount of pure heroin. Now
Speaker 1: I'm not saying that's necessarily a good thing. What I'm
Speaker 1: saying is it's complicated. I also would remind you we
Speaker 1: have to talk about what's in the realm of the possible,
Speaker 1: and in that, what was it in the polling data
Speaker 1: that we had there, which which one is that if
Speaker 1: we have that element, is that a three? Can we
Speaker 1: go ahead and put that up there on the screen.
Speaker 1: Pre research, I think cracking down on illegal drugs was
Speaker 1: at like fifty seven percent, So I mean, the public
Speaker 1: is just not there whenever it comes to now I
Speaker 1: understand that like legalizing there it is, reducing the availability
Speaker 1: of illegal drugs is right there at fifty three percent.
Speaker 1: Biden also doesn't get credit though, when he'd a lot
Speaker 1: of Biden gets a lot of shots from his left
Speaker 1: on the border because he's continued a lot of the
Speaker 1: Trump policies on the border. So he does a lot
Speaker 1: of the things Trump has done. And it's not like
Speaker 1: anybody on the right goes, hey, we agree with you
Speaker 1: on this one. Fella, Well you're talking about like he's
Speaker 1: not doing it. They act like he's in favor of
Speaker 1: open borders or something. Well, you're talking about migrants. So
Speaker 1: to be Fair's administration has tried to end majority of
Speaker 1: those policies in court. And it's only after they weren't
Speaker 1: able to end those administration policies in court that they
Speaker 1: ended up keeping. They not only kept him, they expanded them.
Speaker 1: Well then they also there has been a fentanyl seizures
Speaker 1: at the border, There's been a number of there's been some.
Speaker 1: I mean, he's not trying to see. My point is, Look,
Speaker 1: we can keep going round and round in circles trying
Speaker 1: to do the same policy that's not working, or you
Speaker 1: can do the actual solution. But she's not interested in
Speaker 1: a real solution. She's interested in yelling at Biden in
Speaker 1: the middle of a speech when he's talking about a
Speaker 1: very serious issue like fentomyl I don't think to get
Speaker 1: serious on it. Two, I don't think anyone on this
Speaker 1: stream has claimed Marjorie is interested in and neither is there.
Speaker 1: We perhaps can can close this out with a something
Speaker 1: that will unify us in the spirit of what Joe
Speaker 1: Biden wanted to bring, which is both Kirsten Cinema and
Speaker 1: Marjorie Taylor Green apparently dressed like it was the Hunger Kid. Yes,
Speaker 1: what is going on? Since the wearing some yellow, big
Speaker 1: bird ass looking thing, people will have all kinds of
Speaker 1: memes and Marjorie Taylor Green and some white fur she
Speaker 1: looks like from lying lying the witch in the relevant wardrobe.
Speaker 1: I mean, look, I'm gonna break my cursing thing This
Speaker 1: is driving me insane. What the fuck is going on?
Speaker 1: Like kirston Cinema literally is dressing like she's going to
Speaker 1: the goddamn met Gala after presiding over the Senate in
Speaker 1: a T shirt with a heart on it. She is
Speaker 1: solely responsible for breaking a lot of female dress code
Speaker 1: that is there. And I blame her for Marjorie looking
Speaker 1: like she's literally in the Hunger Games or lying the Witch.
Speaker 1: And there I am losing my goddamn mind over here,
Speaker 1: Marjorie over the collapse of dress code. Go ahead, Marshall,
Speaker 1: is that if we're gonna, if we're gonna, if we're
Speaker 1: gonna rank, I think we have to say, George Santos
Speaker 1: orange tie isn't great. I think Marjorie, I think margin. Well,
Speaker 1: let me put it this way. I think Marjorie' is
Speaker 1: more compelling than Kirsten Cinema. Is it this way? Like?
Speaker 1: If Marjorie showed up in yoga pants and a T
Speaker 1: shirt and you met at a coffee shop, she would
Speaker 1: still like have like a lot of like main character
Speaker 1: energy to her. I really think kirstin Cinema is someone
Speaker 1: who accessorizes to make up for the fact that she's
Speaker 1: just like boring. Very I think that's insightful, insightful comments. Okay,
Speaker 1: everybody stick with us. Just give us five minutes. We're
Speaker 1: gonna switch the chairs out. We're gonna have Ryan and
Speaker 1: Emily in here. Thank you all so much for support
Speaker 1: control room. Let's throw the graphic up there and we'll
Speaker 1: start mishall tyles a fantastic job. Thanks for listening. Okay,
Speaker 1: we're back. Thank you everybody for sticking with us. Look
Speaker 1: at that wide shot we got Ryan and Emily here,
Speaker 1: We got counterpoints, which is in the house. If this
Speaker 1: were any other time, we would be doing a little
Speaker 1: bit of camera adjustment. But this is what looks like
Speaker 1: when it's live. When we have a brand new, beautiful
Speaker 1: studio that you premium subs are helping us with, it
Speaker 1: will be different, we promise. Okay, so people have heard
Speaker 1: us talk a little bit. Now, Ryan, Emily, you guys
Speaker 1: watch the speech with us. What do you guys think? Ryan,
Speaker 1: you go first? All right. I mean, the thing that's
Speaker 1: most important to me about this is that it is
Speaker 1: the launch of his presidential campaign. So you're really not
Speaker 1: going to make a whole lot of policy, and you're
Speaker 1: not going to make a lot of you're not going
Speaker 1: to move the needle on public opinion and really on
Speaker 1: the ground or in the room. Except for that Medicare
Speaker 1: thing and Medicare and security thing, which was absolutely remarkable.
Speaker 1: We want to talk more about that in a minute.
Speaker 1: But if this is what he's going to run on,
Speaker 1: this is kind of exciting, Like this is this is
Speaker 1: a party that like working people could get behind. I mean,
Speaker 1: what did he talk about. He talked about, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: supporting organized labor, past the pro Act, go after big pharma.
Speaker 1: We're going to address climate change. So we're gonna you know,
Speaker 1: cap insulin prices, you know, Medicare, billionaire attacks, We're going
Speaker 1: to bust up monopolies and all the different fees. I'm
Speaker 1: going to a resort and it's not even a resort
Speaker 1: and I'm playing a resort fee, but and his friends
Speaker 1: charged him a resort fee. But so so you can. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and he's going for the identity theft and some funny
Speaker 1: stuff like that, like so many people are getting to him. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but in general, it's that's a platform that people could
Speaker 1: get behind. It's strange, it was a lot of Matt
Speaker 1: Stoller was very excited in this because he's talking about antitrust,
Speaker 1: what was at first present the first presence, it's nineteen
Speaker 1: seventy nine, to mention ante to mention anti trust, you're
Speaker 1: talking about industrial policy, you're talking about making baking thanks
Speaker 1: in America. And then you know, I mean, I'm not
Speaker 1: big on this whole squishy like bipartisan comedy whatever, but
Speaker 1: there are a lot of people who are really into that.
Speaker 1: That's a very normy sentiment of like, why can't we
Speaker 1: all just come together and get some things done? What
Speaker 1: I said earlier, Emily, and I want to get your
Speaker 1: thoughts on the whole thing, though, is I think the
Speaker 1: fact that you had this sort of ugly raucousness from
Speaker 1: the Republicans in there really did kind of play into
Speaker 1: Biden's hands of looking like the grown up in the room.
Speaker 1: He looked in control too. He was almost like engaging
Speaker 1: with the cloud. He let them finish. He wasn't and
Speaker 1: he wasn't heckling them back. He let them finish. So
Speaker 1: I think optically that's one hundred percent correct. That did
Speaker 1: not work the way that let's say, Marjorie Taylor Green
Speaker 1: or whomever else was involved, and it wanted it to work.
Speaker 1: That said to Ryan's point, and actually Kyle made this
Speaker 1: point too. He gave a speech that was so front
Speaker 1: loaded on economics, and that's really smart. If you're Biden's
Speaker 1: speech writers, you should be really happy with how this
Speaker 1: turned out. He's sort of checking down, going through the
Speaker 1: laundry list and flashing out actually not just listening off,
Speaker 1: but fleshing out things like infrastructure, things like the Chips Act.
Speaker 1: Now to the bipartisanship point, I think that's a fascinating
Speaker 1: point because it works with people until the country stops working.
Speaker 1: Because he had a line earlier where he talked about
Speaker 1: basically decades of hollowing out the middle class. Who was
Speaker 1: in the Senate, who was the senator from MasterCard with
Speaker 1: identity theft? Yes, middle class. I mean it's just like,
Speaker 1: so that's a real problem for Biden, and I think
Speaker 1: he has never had a real answer to confronting it.
Speaker 1: Had on politically, but tacking in that direction, it's not
Speaker 1: just good news for Democrats, it's good news for the
Speaker 1: country that Republicans, at least optically were so vehemently offended
Speaker 1: by what Joe Biden said with Social Security, medicareacters. They said,
Speaker 1: Kevin McCarthy gave his whole speech last night. It's off
Speaker 1: the table. It's off the table. That's good news for
Speaker 1: the country because it tells you where the Overton window is.
Speaker 1: You know what's funny, I'm monitoring the professional press corps.
Speaker 1: What are they all talking about decorum in the House.
Speaker 1: I'm like, who cares about the decorum? Like, look, I'm
Speaker 1: not saying it isn't a thing, but social security, people,
Speaker 1: medicare that is that is going to define the next
Speaker 1: couple of months of our politics. It's driving me nuts.
Speaker 1: And like that was the first thing I zeroed in on.
Speaker 1: I was like, man, that's a big moment. That is
Speaker 1: going to be every ad, the Biden ad, the launch.
Speaker 1: I'm the one who protected it. I will veto the
Speaker 1: Bill Crystal, picking up on the fact that Republicans are
Speaker 1: not willing to go there yet. This also puts Trump
Speaker 1: on the back foot where he's like, no, they're lying
Speaker 1: that we don't want to cut those security but he
Speaker 1: doesn't have a unified coalition. I'm like, this is it.
Speaker 1: This is the whole ballgame, Ryan, So what else do
Speaker 1: you want to dig into on? Yeah, And for decades
Speaker 1: on the left, there's been this internal argument do you
Speaker 1: work within the Democratic Party to try to make the
Speaker 1: Democratic Party a better thing? Or do you work outside
Speaker 1: at you start a third party and try to pressure
Speaker 1: them from there. As as the working class is kind
Speaker 1: of being divided by between the two parties, here a
Speaker 1: kind of new answer is emerging, which is that you
Speaker 1: actually work within both parties. And Joe Biden did that tonight,
Speaker 1: Like I've never seen a speech like that kind of
Speaker 1: change the negotiating table, change the game in the way
Speaker 1: it did before this speech. Republicans had their game plan
Speaker 1: for when it came to the debt ceiling crisis. You know,
Speaker 1: they're gonna hold it hostage. They're going to force Biden
Speaker 1: the table or get some cuts, and then they're gonna
Speaker 1: agree to it the same way that they jammed Biden
Speaker 1: up ten years ago. They come out of this speech
Speaker 1: with nothing left, right, like, so what do they gk Okay, well,
Speaker 1: now what are you gonna do? You're not cutting military
Speaker 1: spending because you're Republicans. Now you can't sold security and
Speaker 1: Medicare because you just told the whole country that he's
Speaker 1: a liar and that you would never do such a thing.
Speaker 1: So you're left with the E. P. A and like
Speaker 1: Noah and the BLM, they can cut BLM and tell
Speaker 1: their base that it's Black Lives matter, and actually they
Speaker 1: can trim the Bureau of Land Management. Yeah, I was
Speaker 1: gonna say Bundy alone, right, understand he's gonna fly back
Speaker 1: for that meeting and defend his budget. Well, I do
Speaker 1: to your point, because they obviously took great umbrage at
Speaker 1: the suggestion that they want to security Medicaid. They want
Speaker 1: to save it was strength it right, but I mean
Speaker 1: the numbers just don't work out, Like the math just
Speaker 1: doesn't work out if you're like, I want to slash
Speaker 1: the budget by this huge amount, right, which they do
Speaker 1: in which they've said publicly, But I don't want to
Speaker 1: touch those Security Medica like it just literally the Pentagon
Speaker 1: or the Pentagon, if we put those together, it's not
Speaker 1: going to work out for you. And so that's why
Speaker 1: it is a fair hit to say to that, like, no,
Speaker 1: you want to hold the debt sealing hostage. You want
Speaker 1: to cut these programs. You have a track record of
Speaker 1: wanting to cut these programs. Center Rex Scott said, you
Speaker 1: want to cut these programs, And it was pretty remarkable
Speaker 1: to see how much they freaked out about that and
Speaker 1: a good sign though, again because this is post Paul
Speaker 1: Ryan politics and Republicans have realized, I mean, you can
Speaker 1: cut the entire Pentagon. This is per Brian Riedle at
Speaker 1: the Manhattan Institute. You could literally get rid of the
Speaker 1: Department of Defense, and you can't balance the entitlement balance
Speaker 1: sheet in the way that Republicans say that they want to.
Speaker 1: And there's a reckoning with that on the right right now.
Speaker 1: That doesn't mean that Mitch McConnell wouldn't love to get
Speaker 1: his hands on and strengthen Social Security in money of it,
Speaker 1: but I think it's at least sort of becoming. And
Speaker 1: again I think this is good for the American people.
Speaker 1: You have jd. Vance, Donald Trump coming out and saying
Speaker 1: the same thing and setting the tone. You have Russ Vote,
Speaker 1: who's hugely influential in the new right and Republican politics.
Speaker 1: His entire plan to balance the budget he was omb
Speaker 1: under Trump is don't touch those Security and Medicaid. You
Speaker 1: can get rid of to the point that you guys
Speaker 1: are making all of the woke policies and you don't
Speaker 1: have to. You can bounce the budget in ten years
Speaker 1: without touching anything else, and just the fact that the
Speaker 1: wheels are in motion on that tells you that Republicans
Speaker 1: are like, no, we literally cannot even whisper a word
Speaker 1: about it, and if it comes out of your mouth,
Speaker 1: we are putting you in the corner. That's a really
Speaker 1: interesting point. We got Marshall and Kyle's reaction. I was
Speaker 1: curious for your guys reaction. So right now Sarah Huckaby
Speaker 1: Sanders is giving rebuttal. I don't know who's watching it,
Speaker 1: but we have an excerpt, and I think the excerpt
Speaker 1: is important more so, and what's not in it and
Speaker 1: what is in it, and what the case of what
Speaker 1: the potential Republican pushback against this is going to be.
Speaker 1: I'll just read this again. In the radical lefts of America,
Speaker 1: Washington taxes you and relights your hard earned money on fire.
Speaker 1: You get crushed with high gas prices, empty grocery shells.
Speaker 1: Our children are taught to hate one another on account
Speaker 1: of their race, but not to love one another or
Speaker 1: a great country. And while you reap the consequences of
Speaker 1: your failure. The Biden administration seems more interested in Wolke
Speaker 1: fantasies than the hard reality that Americans face every day,
Speaker 1: most Americans simply want to live their lives in freedom
Speaker 1: of peace, are under attack and left wing culture war
Speaker 1: that we didn't start and we never wanted to fight. Emily,
Speaker 1: what did you think of the strategy there to really
Speaker 1: go hard at the culture war? To be fair, she
Speaker 1: didn't actually watch the speech before she really said excerpt
Speaker 1: so clearly. But I mean that's kind of how all
Speaker 1: these things work. You get a predetermined little fact sheet
Speaker 1: and all that. What do you think of that strategy?
Speaker 1: That's a really good study in contrasts, I think because
Speaker 1: she expects Biden to come out, which is wrong. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's a good example of how Republicans are disconnected from
Speaker 1: the Biden that they're actually fighting as opposed to the
Speaker 1: straw man. And then that's not to say that Biden
Speaker 1: isn't doing stuff in the culture war. Of course, he
Speaker 1: is sort of bureaucratically in the executive that's in its
Speaker 1: year jay right, it's not a national name, right, and
Speaker 1: the Education Department and all these things that people aren't
Speaker 1: necessarily able to follow on a single day to day basis.
Speaker 1: But that Sara Huckabee Sanders comes out anticipating a Biden
Speaker 1: culture war Speeds speech, and what she gets is something
Speaker 1: like what Stolar points out, the first president to champion
Speaker 1: an anti trust performists State of the Union since nineteen
Speaker 1: seventy nine. I haven't seen the full Sarah Hockeby Sanders
Speaker 1: speech yet, but man, is that going to miss the
Speaker 1: mark if Biden is out there talking about increasing manufacturing,
Speaker 1: increasing jobs, increasing decreasing unemployment and all of these economic metrics.
Speaker 1: She said the choices between normal and or crazy. This
Speaker 1: is a quote I just saw from Twitter. Republicans punching
Speaker 1: at a culture warst straw Man is not giving people
Speaker 1: that choice very clearly. She's saying, yeah, right, that's but
Speaker 1: that's their problem because Biden is the one that comes
Speaker 1: off as normal. This is yeah, that's right, and that
Speaker 1: that's why that's Biden's strength is in some ways his weakness.
Speaker 1: He's this like centrist old white man and it's just
Speaker 1: not gonna land. You're just not gonna call him a
Speaker 1: radical wokester, and it's that have its stick. Yeah. Then
Speaker 1: Jesse was like Jesse Waters or somebody said, people just
Speaker 1: don't hate Joe Biden. So on the other hand, let's
Speaker 1: go ahead and put what is this be three guys
Speaker 1: that we could put up on the screen here from
Speaker 1: the Washington Post, where you have the latest Post ABC poll,
Speaker 1: which had a lot of bad numbers for Joe Biden,
Speaker 1: says more than six and ten say the president has
Speaker 1: not accomplished much, despite they say the passage of numerous bills,
Speaker 1: which is true. Sixty two percent of Americans say Biden
Speaker 1: has accomplished not very much or little or nothing during
Speaker 1: his presidency. Only thirty six percent say is accomplish a
Speaker 1: great deal or a good amount. His approval rating is low.
Speaker 1: We shared a poll earlier that has him losing to
Speaker 1: Donald Trump. Of course, a lot of polls out there too,
Speaker 1: having losen to Ron DeSantis. If DeSantis ends up being
Speaker 1: the nominee, you have a majority of Democrats, Ryan, who
Speaker 1: say we don't want this guy to run again. We
Speaker 1: want someone else. So, even as you know, I listen
Speaker 1: to that speech, and there's a lot in there that
Speaker 1: you know, I respond to, I think it's a good
Speaker 1: case he makes about what he's done, about what he
Speaker 1: might do going forward, laying out industrial policy, anti trust,
Speaker 1: pro labor, et cetera. But there's a lot of signs
Speaker 1: American people aren't really feeling that right now. The flip
Speaker 1: side of nobody hating Joe Biden is that nobody really
Speaker 1: likes him either. He's just he's just kind of exists.
Speaker 1: Percent of people they were exciting the cast of Nicole
Speaker 1: Wallace a low rating, not even if there is such
Speaker 1: a thing. Yeah, so yeah, I don't know nobody. So, yeah,
Speaker 1: nobody's excited about him. But that's not that's not that's
Speaker 1: not how you govern anymore in America, and it's not
Speaker 1: necessarily how you win elections. Yeah, Like Hillary Clinton's problem
Speaker 1: was nobody was she had. She had this small group
Speaker 1: that was really excited about her, but in general, people
Speaker 1: weren't excited about it. I was just qualified and most qualified,
Speaker 1: et cetera. But people intensely disliked her on the other side,
Speaker 1: and it became a contest, if you remember, in the
Speaker 1: polling at the very end of who was the least
Speaker 1: disliked by the American public And Biden ended up beating
Speaker 1: Trump four years later because he was less disliked than
Speaker 1: Trump was. That's a good point with Trump. He has
Speaker 1: very high favorables and very unfavorable nobody feels ambivalent to right,
Speaker 1: whereas which everyone's ambivalent to problem. Yeah, everyone is basically,
Speaker 1: and he's fine. I mean, only the thing I keep
Speaker 1: coming back to with Biden and his reelect is, I
Speaker 1: don't know if you remember ron Klain after Emmanuel Macron
Speaker 1: won reelection in France, where his approval rating was total trash, right,
Speaker 1: it was like in the thirties, and he's able to win,
Speaker 1: and he won pretty easily over Marine La Penn because
Speaker 1: people really hated her a lot. And so you know,
Speaker 1: ron Klain tweets a sound was like, oh interesting, he
Speaker 1: won re election with a thirty six percent approval rating
Speaker 1: or whatever. I mean, that kind of seems like the
Speaker 1: path that they are hoping for for Biden. And so
Speaker 1: that's why you see, you know, not only in the speech,
Speaker 1: he really did front load with what he's done and
Speaker 1: what he wants to do and where we are, etc.
Speaker 1: On the economy, but there's also quite a bit in
Speaker 1: there which obviously Republicans got upset about about the Republican
Speaker 1: plans and why they were the wrong directions. So, I mean,
Speaker 1: in some ways, I think his re elect hinges on
Speaker 1: how much people dislike the Republicans, how extreme they are,
Speaker 1: and how much they want to avoid going in that direction. Again, right,
Speaker 1: and that's why it totally depends on the nominee, and
Speaker 1: we've seen that show up in polling. But it's a
Speaker 1: really important point because I think American politics is lurching
Speaker 1: towards that reality for the foreseeable future period where you
Speaker 1: have people with really low approval ratings, maybe even low
Speaker 1: favorability ratings, that are just able to muster the right,
Speaker 1: cobble together the right coalition and just scraight past or
Speaker 1: get to that fifty percent mark or forty nine, whatever
Speaker 1: it is. And that's the reality I think we're facing
Speaker 1: in the country that we're too divided to have. I think,
Speaker 1: like Ronald Reagan's re election, you know, where he's just
Speaker 1: trouncing absolutely everybody. This is not gonna happen. Or Bill Clinton.
Speaker 1: I mean, we're just we're not in that world anymore.
Speaker 1: And so Republicans, I think, need to realize that if
Speaker 1: they want to create this dichotomy of normal versus crazy,
Speaker 1: they need to figure out how to make that stick.
Speaker 1: To Joe Biden, they need to be there, not be crazy.
Speaker 1: Well yeah, yeah, yeah, you can't have to do both.
Speaker 1: Got through the grill of the viill thing and stand
Speaker 1: up and yell. It's a tough thing. I really don't
Speaker 1: know how they get their way out of it, because
Speaker 1: it's like I can make the case on either side,
Speaker 1: like if I'm Ron DeSantis look like Okay, let's say try.
Speaker 1: We had a fun debate at our live show, what
Speaker 1: happens if Trump and DeSantis both die? But what's more
Speaker 1: likely let's say Trump's wrong with it was a funny.
Speaker 1: It was a fun Honestly, it was a fun second
Speaker 1: so many times. All right, if they what they both do,
Speaker 1: they both get arrest. My scenario was that they were
Speaker 1: both on Air Force one and Air Force one crash
Speaker 1: on the way, they blow up the Chinese balloon floor
Speaker 1: and the debris takes them both out and Santos arrested
Speaker 1: for Santos actually know George Santos killed them both. Okay,
Speaker 1: so move on. Part of what we got too much
Speaker 1: from that. Part of what we got from that dialogue
Speaker 1: was that they need to try and reconcile the craziness
Speaker 1: of Trump and the energy of that with the fact
Speaker 1: that they still won six percent of the national popular
Speaker 1: vote during the midterms. Like this can be done. Joe
Speaker 1: Biden is weak. We have all of the pulling data
Speaker 1: to show that it is Trump and that wing which
Speaker 1: is dragging them down electorally. However, they hold so much
Speaker 1: power institutionally go ahead of Yeah, no, I think that's
Speaker 1: one hundred percent true. And Biden is picking up on
Speaker 1: this with his own party in a way that Republicans
Speaker 1: who have seen the culture war sort of path to
Speaker 1: victory in a Virginia or of Florida. You cannot just
Speaker 1: translate that to Sarah, How could be standards going all
Speaker 1: in and having absolutely no answer to Biden's very sort
Speaker 1: of like Normy aimed square at the middle economic speech.
Speaker 1: That's like a kitchen table, real person speech. You can't
Speaker 1: just come out swinging with that kind of stuff. And Biden,
Speaker 1: for instance, he didn't say much, as you guys pointed
Speaker 1: out earlier, on abortion. He didn't say much about the border.
Speaker 1: You didn't say much about LGBTQ issues. He said, we
Speaker 1: had one mention of young of transgender young people, but
Speaker 1: the bulk of the speech was on the economy, on
Speaker 1: the he didn't even talk about Ukraine that much at
Speaker 1: the bottom thirty well, right, And so the I think
Speaker 1: Democrats have realized probably picked up on the number from
Speaker 1: the midterms, which the midterm narrative was one thing, but
Speaker 1: it is true. Republicans did have a decent night, not
Speaker 1: nearly what it was projected to be, but they did
Speaker 1: okay in the popular vote. So if Democrats see that,
Speaker 1: they do have a lot of culture war problems, there's
Speaker 1: just no question about it. You did a great podcast
Speaker 1: this week, I'm Deconstructed, where you sort of talked through
Speaker 1: some of this. They do have those issues, but Republicans
Speaker 1: can't fight them in a way that handicaps themselves going
Speaker 1: into those battles. Siden doesn't give them a lot of ammunition.
Speaker 1: And I'm not aware of a national election that has
Speaker 1: ever been won on the question of what local schools
Speaker 1: should be teaching or not teaching. That is our destiny, though,
Speaker 1: to have presidential elections. Hinge on who gets to play
Speaker 1: on the lacrosse across team will be like eventually where
Speaker 1: this system is heading. I don't know if it'll be
Speaker 1: this one or four years from hour, but it's part
Speaker 1: of the like the process of just removing more and
Speaker 1: more decision making away from elections. But you still have
Speaker 1: to give people something to fight over. But speaking of
Speaker 1: not having anything to fight over, it's like the Democratic
Speaker 1: Party seems like they don't have the civil war that
Speaker 1: they had over the last kind of six seven, eight years.
Speaker 1: It's it was basically won by the establishment with you know,
Speaker 1: Biden finally beat beating Bernie, but they also absorbed a
Speaker 1: decent amount of what Bernie was fighting for. And so
Speaker 1: that's why you see so much frustration on the outside
Speaker 1: that Bernie's not fighting more than you know, Bernie's become
Speaker 1: a big supporter of Joe Biden. Because Bernie, as you know,
Speaker 1: budget chairman, writing the reconciliation package, he's you know, he's
Speaker 1: he's seeing trillions of dollars of spending go through. You're
Speaker 1: seeing you know, unemployment knocked down to what three point
Speaker 1: four percent, lowest and lowest since like nineteen sixty nine,
Speaker 1: and so you have this. He talked about the four
Speaker 1: hundred billion dollars in climate spending, and so he called
Speaker 1: himself a capitalist. Yeah, they said, yes, yes, right exactly.
Speaker 1: So they kind of they kind of ended this civil
Speaker 1: war by a beating Bernie, but then uh b bringing
Speaker 1: in a decent amount of what he was fighting for,
Speaker 1: just enough to kind of keep them happy together. And
Speaker 1: because Democrats, Democratic voters are so fired up about electability
Speaker 1: and beating the evil Republicans. You know, they're going to
Speaker 1: keep putting forward people like Biden probably, whereas Republicans still are,
Speaker 1: you know, fired by the by the cultural issues, and
Speaker 1: because I think they were told that Trump was unelectable,
Speaker 1: they said, screw it, we don't care. We're electing him anyway.
Speaker 1: And he got nominating him anyway, he won. They don't
Speaker 1: they don't want to hear about electability crap anyway, great people,
Speaker 1: and they're not going to want to hear that for
Speaker 1: a long time ago. Emily, what do you see as
Speaker 1: the contours of the coming Republican I mean, the Republican
Speaker 1: civil wars sort of upon us. You know, people are
Speaker 1: kind of choosing their sides and the battle lines are
Speaker 1: breaking down, Like is there are there economic issues that
Speaker 1: are involved in that Republican civil war? Is it primarily
Speaker 1: around culture warriors? She's clearly Ronda Santis is positioning himself
Speaker 1: as like the you know I was during COVID, I
Speaker 1: was the guy who was open for business. Donald Trump
Speaker 1: was shuting things down, whether or the facts of that whatever.
Speaker 1: That's how he's positioning himself. Is that going to be
Speaker 1: the key dividing line, how do you see this playing out?
Speaker 1: So it looks like Nikki Haley is going to announce
Speaker 1: formally and do a roll out next week, and that's
Speaker 1: already what I've seen some on the kind of new
Speaker 1: right talking about is like, what an embarrassment that this
Speaker 1: is just a tea party ghost who has not updated
Speaker 1: herself whatsoever. But then the question is what is the
Speaker 1: substantial difference between Ronda Santis and Nikki Haley? Because with
Speaker 1: Donald Trump, we know to some extent that it's just
Speaker 1: a mixed bag. It's the same thing with his foreign policy.
Speaker 1: You're going to get some new, some shocking new, and
Speaker 1: some of the old stuff. It depends on who wins
Speaker 1: the fight at any given moment, the tug of war
Speaker 1: at any given moment. But how substantially different is Ronda
Speaker 1: Santis or Glenn Younkin mister p Patagonia vest going to
Speaker 1: be on that issue? And I think that's a really
Speaker 1: open question, and the primaries are going to be a
Speaker 1: place where that's sorted out because Republicans do face pressure
Speaker 1: now after Donald Trump, this is post Paul Ryan era
Speaker 1: not to do things to Social Security and Medicare, Like
Speaker 1: this is a huge source of pressure on Republicans, so
Speaker 1: I think a lot of it will be hashed out
Speaker 1: in the midterms. I think it's completely up in the
Speaker 1: air now. I think anybody who says the Republican Party
Speaker 1: has been, you know, permanently changed for good and turned
Speaker 1: into the party of the working class is absolutely wrong.
Speaker 1: That's not to say there isn't some reason it's possible, right,
Speaker 1: Stolar talks about that like this is good for everybody.
Speaker 1: The Republican Party is never going to be a beautiful, wonderful,
Speaker 1: pure party of the working class. It's not going to happen.
Speaker 1: The Democratic Party is not going to be either. One
Speaker 1: might be better than the other, but the Republican Party
Speaker 1: at least being dragged, kicking and screaming to say things like,
Speaker 1: if we're going to balance the budget, we're not going
Speaker 1: to do it from stealing and rating from your entitlement funds.
Speaker 1: That's a good day for everyone. But the question is
Speaker 1: still open. I mean, I see that, and I don't,
Speaker 1: because at the end of the day, the McCarthy holdouts
Speaker 1: also begged and demanded a vote for the freaking fair Tax,
Speaker 1: which is you know, terrible, terrible, regressive, like total tea
Speaker 1: Party throwback stuff and the whole contours of the debts
Speaker 1: healing fight outside of them just not publicly wanting to
Speaker 1: be accused of cutting Social Security medicare. This is tea
Speaker 1: Party two point zero stuff. I mean, this is all
Speaker 1: tea party tactics. Their asks are tea party asks. So
Speaker 1: it's you know, when I look at something like that,
Speaker 1: I'm like, this is really change. Is really different because
Speaker 1: now that Trump is sort of less clearly in command too,
Speaker 1: you know, a lot of their talking points and their
Speaker 1: economic policy has just floated right back to that Mitt Romney,
Speaker 1: Paul Ryan era ultimately, and I mean it's Trump himself.
Speaker 1: His bigges accomplishment was a jug into corporate tax gut
Speaker 1: that they all are perfectly happy with. Well and the
Speaker 1: other thing. You'll definitely have thoughts on this, But anti
Speaker 1: trust is huge, and I'm actually very curious if Sarahuckaby
Speaker 1: Sanders had a word about anti trust because Republicans have
Speaker 1: actually made significant motions. Some of the most powerful anti
Speaker 1: trust suits have been filed by people like Ken Paxton
Speaker 1: and Texas and the Trump administration against Google. There's some
Speaker 1: real meat on the bones. That's like one of the
Speaker 1: areas where there is actually truly a realignment. To borrow
Speaker 1: word from Sager and Marshall that you can see happening.
Speaker 1: And what's who is Ronda Santis, Sarah Hackaby Sanders, is
Speaker 1: Nikki Haley? What are they going to say about that?
Speaker 1: How would they govern? That's a complete Nicky Haley is
Speaker 1: already He's already on record against what is knocking her
Speaker 1: lane out of it. Now is not the time to
Speaker 1: rethink capitalism, is what she famously said in her speech.
Speaker 1: So good luck, Nikki. I'm going to enjoy watching you fail.
Speaker 1: I really will. I could say that is the Indian
Speaker 1: American who doesn't want to see you be the first
Speaker 1: one on the stage for all of us. But Ryan,
Speaker 1: I'm curious here also on the Democratic side. So at
Speaker 1: the end of the day, you know, the laundry list
Speaker 1: of here's what I want and all this, it's not
Speaker 1: going to happen. This was all just oppositional. So to
Speaker 1: that extent Biden we were talking about this is the
Speaker 1: kickoff of his campaign. It seems like it did pretty
Speaker 1: good job. Like overall, this is probably as good as
Speaker 1: you could probably hope for. And he didn't step into
Speaker 1: any of the pitfalls I saw that he's on his
Speaker 1: way to Wisconsin and Florida. In Florida, I'd just be like,
Speaker 1: give up, mister president. That ship sailed, sir, Wisconsin. That's
Speaker 1: a smart move. But yeah, like going into those two
Speaker 1: states in the next couple of days, like this is
Speaker 1: probably going to be a pretty high point for him,
Speaker 1: and especially coming off the midterms. Right, there were two
Speaker 1: paths he could have taken when when Republicans said we're
Speaker 1: going to hold the debt stealing hostage to force demands.
Speaker 1: He could have taken the last Joe Biden approach, which
Speaker 1: was great. You know, we all need to get together.
Speaker 1: We'll do a commission and we'll Simpson bowls and balls,
Speaker 1: will hold hands together. I got Bruce Reid here, he
Speaker 1: was my staff guy and he's still in the White House. Yeah,
Speaker 1: dust the plans off, and yes, like people want to
Speaker 1: work longer, and Medicare is too generous, and Medicaid you know,
Speaker 1: you know people people need to be incentivized to get
Speaker 1: back to work. Like they could have been that Joe Biden, right,
Speaker 1: or it could be the Joe Biden that we saw tonight.
Speaker 1: It's like who baits them with the Rick Scott plan,
Speaker 1: and then he could have baited them with the Kevin
Speaker 1: McCarthy plans, saying that we're going to strengthen solid security
Speaker 1: and medicare. He gets them to call him a liar,
Speaker 1: and he said, oh wait, we got a lot of
Speaker 1: converts here. I'm so great. We're not going so so
Speaker 1: he goes the other direction and says we're not going
Speaker 1: to go down that path, which means that the Biden
Speaker 1: who came out of the gate with the you know,
Speaker 1: he said, here's my offer on the American Rescue plan
Speaker 1: one point nine trillion dollars, and Susan Collins comes back,
Speaker 1: She's like, here's our offer, five hundred and fifty billion
Speaker 1: dollars or six hundred whatever it is. Two hours later
Speaker 1: he puts out a statement. He's like, we're doing this alone.
Speaker 1: We're not taking six months like Obama did, and like
Speaker 1: allowing Susan Collins to just like dictate this to us,
Speaker 1: that was a shocking moment in democratic political history. But
Speaker 1: as he did, then you know how he's been like
Speaker 1: conferring with John Meacham and trying to step into the
Speaker 1: FDR shoes and this is like actually reported accesses head
Speaker 1: repeat on Biden like genuinely trying to rescue the soul
Speaker 1: of the nation and seeing himself as this FDR figure,
Speaker 1: not like FDR light, but like FDR next generation truly.
Speaker 1: And he had a line in the speech where he
Speaker 1: talked about I think it's the Inflation Reduction Act provisions
Speaker 1: of it not going into effect until January one. So
Speaker 1: people are just starting to feel the economy heating up,
Speaker 1: and the economy is heating up in different ways. And
Speaker 1: that might explain the disconnect between the mood of the
Speaker 1: country and polling and what Biden sees as a hot
Speaker 1: economy or heating up economy. But to that point, is
Speaker 1: it some of that seeing him slotting himself into that
Speaker 1: care charter, this FDR like figure, that has made him say,
Speaker 1: I'm not the old Joe Biden. Screw it, We're not
Speaker 1: waiting for Susan Collins. But at the same time he
Speaker 1: did say Republican friends over and over again in that speech.
Speaker 1: Notice that I mean this is in particular a real
Speaker 1: break from the old Joe Biden. Here's the line from
Speaker 1: the speech. If anyone tries to cut Social Security, I
Speaker 1: will stop them. If anyone tries to cut Medicare, I
Speaker 1: will stop them. I will not allow them to be
Speaker 1: taken away, not stay, not tomorrow or not ever. Now
Speaker 1: he doesn't say, and they're not yesterday because he's multiple times,
Speaker 1: so it's forty years. I tried to cut security. But
Speaker 1: if you say no, not tomorrow, not ever, take a
Speaker 1: week in the future. Yes, So yeah, I mean, listen,
Speaker 1: I don't want to oversell it because on the other hand,
Speaker 1: you know, went on of his way to like bust
Speaker 1: the potential rail strike and hand power to the bosses there, like,
Speaker 1: hasn't fought for lifting the minimum wage. You know, mentioned
Speaker 1: the pro act here that fell off the table, didn't
Speaker 1: really put the screws to mansion and cinema over build
Speaker 1: back better and so you know, we were all happy
Speaker 1: when we got something in the Inflation Reduction Act, but
Speaker 1: it's easy to forget how much the actual original vision
Speaker 1: was trimmed by a lack of willingness to play hardball
Speaker 1: and willingness to like just accept the rulings of the
Speaker 1: parliamentarian and things like that. So I don't want to
Speaker 1: oversell it here, but I do think there are some
Speaker 1: noteworthy shifts in terms of I mean even just industrial
Speaker 1: policy and anti trust. These were like anti trust. I mean,
Speaker 1: the Obama administration was terrible on anti trust, terrible allowed
Speaker 1: some of these gigantic mergers to go through that. Now
Speaker 1: people are raging about, right the Ticketmaster being a primary
Speaker 1: example there. And you know, so industrial policy was basically
Speaker 1: a dirty word in both parties for my entire life
Speaker 1: until now, up until literally I think three years ago.
Speaker 1: Do you remember when Biden put out what was it?
Speaker 1: Just like Made in America? I praised it on Rising
Speaker 1: in here. I was like, hey, listen, that's pretty good.
Speaker 1: I was like, you can tell you whatever, you know.
Speaker 1: I was like, by the way, I was like, Jared,
Speaker 1: please release the maid in America thing from the National
Speaker 1: Security Council, which I know that you held up for
Speaker 1: two years and then didn't end up passing for literally
Speaker 1: no reason. So in a lot of ways for Trump,
Speaker 1: this is dangerous territory. I mean, Biden is taking the
Speaker 1: two most singular popular things that he did, which was
Speaker 1: China and it was made in America. Look at that,
Speaker 1: you know the way that he talked about China in
Speaker 1: the speech and then no he didn't talk about it much,
Speaker 1: but look he did not say that what seven years ago,
Speaker 1: what he was trying to say in that whole switch
Speaker 1: places with she I speak by niece is because I
Speaker 1: used to watch him whenever he was coherent, and he
Speaker 1: would always talk about how he was one of those
Speaker 1: people he was so pro engagement with China. He often
Speaker 1: says this, I'm the only person I've spent more hours
Speaker 1: with Shishingping than any other Western leader in the world.
Speaker 1: I've sat there and I've talked with him across the table.
Speaker 1: That was his big selling point. He was so excited,
Speaker 1: he oh, I know, yeah. Actually, there's a lot of
Speaker 1: business dealings going on. That was a side of the
Speaker 1: big guy. That's all on air Force too, another story
Speaker 1: for another day, of which we have covered several times.
Speaker 1: But the point is is that he has gone from
Speaker 1: engagement to confrontation. Clearly that is without Trump, that doesn't happen.
Speaker 1: And he's also now gone completely with Made in America,
Speaker 1: the full embrace of all that. I do want to
Speaker 1: know who he is. He goes Many people don't like
Speaker 1: when I say this, but we're going to buy American.
Speaker 1: I'm like, who is saying that, outside of like JP
Speaker 1: Morgan CEO, who is saying that. I like that. Most
Speaker 1: people like that Larry Summers. Yeah, okay, got some got
Speaker 1: some flap in the country club. One last thought and
Speaker 1: then I want to hear you guys' final thoughts as well.
Speaker 1: But you know, one thing we talked about going into this,
Speaker 1: which maybe it shouldn't matter, maybe it should matter. I
Speaker 1: think it's reasonable for people to have concerns about a
Speaker 1: man who would be eighty six by the end of
Speaker 1: a next term. And so as much as The New
Speaker 1: York Times was running a story that I know was
Speaker 1: planned by Biden AEDs about how he's preparing to overcome
Speaker 1: a stutter in this speech, sort of trying to set
Speaker 1: the bar low that if it doesn't go well, don't
Speaker 1: be an asshole, it's because he has a stutter. It's
Speaker 1: not because he's old. Guys, don't say that. But ultimately,
Speaker 1: you know, I mean, he's still Joe Biden at eighty
Speaker 1: years old. It's still not what he used to be.
Speaker 1: It wasn't like an incredibly masterful oratory, but Ryan, I think,
Speaker 1: you know, in terms of what he's capable of, this
Speaker 1: was a pretty well delivered speech and as Emily was saying,
Speaker 1: you know, being able to do a little give and
Speaker 1: take with the audience, that's not easy to do. So
Speaker 1: I think also he did himself some favors in terms
Speaker 1: of persuading people that this is a man who is
Speaker 1: still capable of conducting the business of the presidency and
Speaker 1: that we're not all going to be left in the
Speaker 1: hands of Kamala Harris, your guy. I think we're also
Speaker 1: starting to all grade him on a curve relative to
Speaker 1: what we expect from him. Like, I think he has
Speaker 1: successfully set the bar really low his public performances. Every
Speaker 1: time he tried to go off the teleprompter, off script
Speaker 1: with a little riff. Yeah, you're almost holding your breath
Speaker 1: for him. Outside of the Medicare thing, they were all bad,
Speaker 1: every single one. He starts out by saying, I get
Speaker 1: to be here because Jill's going to get the game.
Speaker 1: Marwin anyway, are you talking about the Super Bowl and
Speaker 1: the Eagles. Yeah, you have Donovan McNabb perform like he should.
Speaker 1: He should have. He should have finished with the go
Speaker 1: Birds at the end because he's not winning. That's doctor,
Speaker 1: but a doctor's saying flag yes, well on that point.
Speaker 1: And he did seem to get Tyree Nichols name wrong.
Speaker 1: It wasn't old Tyler, it wasn't great, sounding like Tyler, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it wasn't a perfect performance, but I do think that
Speaker 1: because the bar is so low for him every time
Speaker 1: he clears it and looks like he can give a
Speaker 1: normal presidential speech for an hour. Again, because the bar
Speaker 1: is so low. And part of that, by the way,
Speaker 1: is because Donald Trump was the preceding president. That's good.
Speaker 1: And Donald Trump's State of the Unions tended to be
Speaker 1: pretty boilerplate and conventional. That wasn't true of the rest
Speaker 1: of his communications. So Joe Biden being able to just
Speaker 1: give a speech for an hour, talk about his Republican
Speaker 1: friends and make America at least sort of be back
Speaker 1: in the political theater that people are comfortable with. I
Speaker 1: guess that's a win for him. Yeah, all right, Okay, guys,
Speaker 1: thank you so much for your analysis. I hope everybody
Speaker 1: enjoyed this stream. Thank you so much also to our
Speaker 1: premium members who help support the show and keep all
Speaker 1: of these things going. They are expensive to put on,
Speaker 1: so we really much appreciate you and we love you all.
Speaker 1: We're going to have some content for you guys tomorrow.
Speaker 1: Hint it involves a congressman attacking Crystal Ball, my partner
Speaker 1: over here and Joe Rogan as a vicious attack calling
Speaker 1: them anti Semitic. We will get into all of that tomorrow.
Speaker 1: We'll have a full show for everybody on Thursday. Lots
Speaker 1: of great content in the interim, and we will see
Speaker 1: you all later. We've been tracking a lot of Jeff
Speaker 1: Bezos news and respect to the Washington Commanders, and it
Speaker 1: looks like there could be some developments here. Let's put
Speaker 1: it up there on the screen. So Charles Gasperano. He
Speaker 1: reports that Bezos is considering buying the Washington Commanders and
Speaker 1: that the commander's sale will take place weeks after the
Speaker 1: Super Bowl and owners meeting in March. Despite the denials,
Speaker 1: people inside the NFL think that Bezos's bid will come
Speaker 1: after the initial bids because given his wealth, he is
Speaker 1: capable of making any numbers work for a purchase. So
Speaker 1: he's going to see what other people put on the table,
Speaker 1: and then he's going to be like a little bit more,
Speaker 1: here's a billion more. So can we just wrap this
Speaker 1: up and everybody be like, yeah, all right, let's do
Speaker 1: a handshake. Yeah. I don't know how it's gonna work out.
Speaker 1: As you pointed out as well, Dan Snyder doesn't like
Speaker 1: Jeff Bezos. Why because Bezos's paper, The Washington Post, is
Speaker 1: the one that exposed a lot of his wrongdoing in
Speaker 1: his organization. At the same time, money's green, no matter
Speaker 1: whether somebody took you down or not. But these guys
Speaker 1: are billionaires, so they operated at a different level. You know,
Speaker 1: it's an extra billion here or there. But the other
Speaker 1: question is that the previous reporting from The New York
Speaker 1: Post said that Bezos was exploring a sale of The
Speaker 1: Washington Post to possibly finance this. So maybe Snyder would
Speaker 1: be like, Okay, you can have the you can have
Speaker 1: the Commanders, but you have to sell the Post if
Speaker 1: you want to do that. So I could see him
Speaker 1: being petty enough to do that. Bezos, I think he
Speaker 1: absolutely is going to end up with the Commanders because listen,
Speaker 1: I mean, these guys are like gods in America, these
Speaker 1: NFL owners, like nothing comes close to being like a
Speaker 1: pop culture icon. That's what he loves. You know, Bezos
Speaker 1: loves me in Hollywood and you know the Instagram thing.
Speaker 1: He doesn't even work anymore Amazon. Yeah, he loves Lizzo.
Speaker 1: Apparently the guy is like he's no longer interested in
Speaker 1: being quote respectable, which is what the post bottom. He's
Speaker 1: interested in just being super rich and being culturally relevant,
Speaker 1: So buying the NFL an NFL team is the best
Speaker 1: way to do that. Yeah, you know, he could turn
Speaker 1: the stadium into one of like the biggest stadium or
Speaker 1: the best or what. He could outcompete Jerry Jones and
Speaker 1: be one of those sizes of people and you know, like,
Speaker 1: I'm sure people would like it. That absolutely would. And
Speaker 1: don't forget Amazon HQ two being built right here in
Speaker 1: the DMV area in Crystal City where thousands of Amazon
Speaker 1: employees are going to be. Already, he already owns the
Speaker 1: biggest house in Washington, d C. This would just step
Speaker 1: it up even more. Yeah, this is what it looks
Speaker 1: like to go through a midlife crisis when you're one
Speaker 1: of the richest man on the FA. Yeah. Right, Like,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna buy and I'm a NFL team. Maybe I'll sell.
Speaker 1: This newspaper's kind of a pain in my ass. Let
Speaker 1: me get rid of it. I don't know, some far
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna lie. It looks pretty fun. The other
Speaker 1: thing I have to contribute to this conversation is as
Speaker 1: a long suffering Washington football sports fan, Dan Snyder has
Speaker 1: got to be one of the worst owners in the
Speaker 1: history of the NFL and perhaps all of sport. And
Speaker 1: one of the good things that The Washington Post has
Speaker 1: done under Bezos's leadership is exposed all of that. But
Speaker 1: you know that being said, I'm like not cheering for
Speaker 1: either one of these men. So we'll see how it
Speaker 1: all unfolds. He continues to deny it. They're also, I mean,
Speaker 1: the Washington Post is in not great financial straits. They've
Speaker 1: been having to make lays off telling you they bet
Speaker 1: all the way in on like Trump and political news coverage.
Speaker 1: They didn't really diversify in the way that New York
Speaker 1: Times did, so the financial position there for them is
Speaker 1: not very good. That being said, you know, he's a billionaire.
Speaker 1: He could prop them up easily without any problem. But
Speaker 1: does he want to do that? And more importantly, does
Speaker 1: he want you know, I think he didn't like that
Speaker 1: when he was going back and forth with Biden on
Speaker 1: like tax policy or whatever. He didn't like that people
Speaker 1: were like, hey, dude, you own a really important newspaper.
Speaker 1: Maybe you shouldn't be putting your hand on the scale
Speaker 1: the way that you are here. Ultimately, and by the way,
Speaker 1: we see this as sort of like reflected in your
Speaker 1: paper's coverage, which is a problem as well. And I'm
Speaker 1: not sure that he liked that and the implications of
Speaker 1: having actually some real responsibility with owning the Washington Post.
Speaker 1: So oh that's what happened. Look, the best move for
Speaker 1: him sell the Post, get rid of it. Don't put
Speaker 1: your hands in this and become a pop culture figure.
Speaker 1: You already kind of are, you know, the whole Jack
Speaker 1: Bezos meme with his girl. And and also look Washington
Speaker 1: like people have ever been suffering for a long time.
Speaker 1: By the way, Chris, we actually have some fans on
Speaker 1: the Washington Commanders. So shout out to them. Two guys. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and I won't out anymore. I'm not going to out
Speaker 1: them before they out themselves as breaking points. They have
Speaker 1: made it known to me that they are fans of
Speaker 1: the show. What I think would be cool is that, Look,
Speaker 1: there are a lot of people who you know, they
Speaker 1: have very low season ticket holders. It's very hard to
Speaker 1: sell the game, and DC doesn't have a good enough
Speaker 1: sports community. Ever. You know, when the Caps are good,
Speaker 1: then people get excited. Us used to be different. It
Speaker 1: was the I mean, this was the most valuable franchise
Speaker 1: in all of sports when I was growing up. I mean,
Speaker 1: these are Super Bowl winners, and when the stadium was
Speaker 1: here in the city, it was totally Ever since they
Speaker 1: moved out to Maryland and it's a still FedEx field
Speaker 1: wherever that gets called, it's the expand experience is terrible.
Speaker 1: The vibes of the team are terrible, like all that
Speaker 1: tradition history was kind of swept away. Daniel Snyder terrible owner.
Speaker 1: So yeah, listen, I'm not super excited about Bezos owning
Speaker 1: the team, but getting someone different in there, I would
Speaker 1: hope it would kind of revive what this great team
Speaker 1: used to be. An extremely dangerous situation in Ohio, five
Speaker 1: thousand people had to actually be evacuated from one part
Speaker 1: of that state after a Norfolk Southern train derailed. It
Speaker 1: was carrying some toxic chemicals, burst in flames when it derailed,
Speaker 1: and then there was a danger that would actually explode.
Speaker 1: They had to do a so called controlled release that
Speaker 1: also released a gigantic fireball. So a really terrifying situation,
Speaker 1: one that could have gone bad. Pun off the rails.
Speaker 1: And now we're getting some reporting from our friends at
Speaker 1: the Lever about how corruption may have provided the backstory
Speaker 1: that led to this extraordinarily dangerous situation. Let's go ahead
Speaker 1: and bring Julia, Roxy's journalist with Lever News to break
Speaker 1: down the story. Great to see, Julia, thanks so much
Speaker 1: for having me. Yeah, of course, So let me go
Speaker 1: ahead and read the headline that you have here. You
Speaker 1: say rail companies blocked safety rules before Ohio derailment, Norfolk
Speaker 1: Southern helped convince government officials to repeal brake rules, and
Speaker 1: corporate lobbyists watered down has met safety regulation. So tell
Speaker 1: us exactly what you found here. Yeah, so this is
Speaker 1: basically a story about how, you know, over the past
Speaker 1: decade or so, as the biggest railroads were spending a
Speaker 1: lot of their profits on executive pay and stock buybacks,
Speaker 1: they were declining to upgrade their Civil War era braking systems,
Speaker 1: which basically make it impossible to stop all of the
Speaker 1: cars on a train at once, to electronically controlled braking
Speaker 1: systems where you can stop the entire train simultaneously. And
Speaker 1: the sort of point of these upgraded safety systems is
Speaker 1: that you know, in the US, lots of trains are
Speaker 1: carrying things like crude oil, hazardous, flammable chemicals and so
Speaker 1: the stakes are very high if something goes wrong and
Speaker 1: the train derails. So during the twenty tens, the Obama
Speaker 1: administration tried to impose some more stringent safety measures on
Speaker 1: these trains carrying flammable, hazardous materials. But the railroads came in,
Speaker 1: including Norfolk Southern, They lobbied really hard against these rules.
Speaker 1: When a limited version of the rule was finally put
Speaker 1: into place, they got the Trump administration and congressional Republicans
Speaker 1: to strike it down. I mean, I think we all
Speaker 1: got a close up look at how much these freight
Speaker 1: companies really don't care, particularly about health and safety, given
Speaker 1: the way they laid off workers and push them out
Speaker 1: the limited amount of time off if they got any
Speaker 1: at all. And you know, these are like it's not
Speaker 1: easy to conduct a train and you can have we've
Speaker 1: had an increase in derailments as a result in part
Speaker 1: of the way that they have their workforce. What is
Speaker 1: their side of the story here, Why did they push
Speaker 1: back against what seems like an obvious important safety innovation
Speaker 1: in terms of these braking systems. Well, so you're right,
Speaker 1: the backdrop is exactly the same as what they've done
Speaker 1: with their workforces. You know, like you said, they slashed
Speaker 1: them by about thirty percent in the past decade or so.
Speaker 1: You know. The argument of the railroads wasn't even that
Speaker 1: these brakes are not safer norfolks. Southern had actually tested
Speaker 1: out some of these breaks back in two thousand and
Speaker 1: seven and said, like, they are way better than the
Speaker 1: conventional air brakes that we use. They reduce stopping distances
Speaker 1: by up to sixty percent. But then when the Obama
Speaker 1: administration turned around and said, okay, install them on your
Speaker 1: trains you know carrying hazardous chemicals and oil, they said
Speaker 1: it's too expensive. The benefits of it do not justify
Speaker 1: the high costs. That was their argument. It wasn't that
Speaker 1: the brakes weren't effective, It wasn't that they would make
Speaker 1: the trains more safe. It was simply that they were
Speaker 1: too expensive. You have another piece here. It's not just
Speaker 1: regarding the brakes, but they also sought to limit what
Speaker 1: could be classified as hazardous materials. Let me read a
Speaker 1: little bit from your piece. You say, alongside their campaign
Speaker 1: to kill the brake rule, industry lobbyists push to limit
Speaker 1: the types of chemical compounds that be covered by new regulations,
Speaker 1: including the brake rule. They propose limiting the definition of
Speaker 1: high hazard flammable trains, mostly to cover oil trains, but
Speaker 1: not trains carrying the industrial chemical on the Norfolk Southern
Speaker 1: train that necessitated evacuations in Ohio. So I want everybody
Speaker 1: to think about this. This train derails, catches on fire,
Speaker 1: you have to evacuate the area. They do a controlled
Speaker 1: release that results in a gigantic fireball, and this was
Speaker 1: not classified as being a high hazard flammable train. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so people in the area were told that the railcars
Speaker 1: could explode and launch deadly shrapnel as far as a mile.
Speaker 1: But this train was not being regulated, like you said,
Speaker 1: as a a highly hazardous flammable train. And that's in
Speaker 1: part because of successful lobbying efforts by the chemical industry
Speaker 1: as well as other industries to very narrowly limit the
Speaker 1: types of sub substances that would give trains this classification
Speaker 1: as high hazard flammable trains, as well as sort of
Speaker 1: create this high threshold whereby a certain number of cars
Speaker 1: had to be carrying the material, and the cars had
Speaker 1: to be sort of either next to each other, there
Speaker 1: had to be even more cars spread out over the train,
Speaker 1: so they create a very high threshold for a train
Speaker 1: to even be subject to these regulations that are supposed
Speaker 1: to impose more safety features on trains carrying really dangerous chemicals.
Speaker 1: And finally, Julia, help us understand who were the political
Speaker 1: players involved here? How much of this happened under the
Speaker 1: Obama administration versus the Trump administration. Has the Biden administration
Speaker 1: had anything to do with it? Yeah, So the Obama administration,
Speaker 1: you know, if you look at the coverage from the time,
Speaker 1: sort of surprised people in imposing this requirement on railroads
Speaker 1: to install these breaks, I think, surprise them because there's
Speaker 1: been so much industry pushback. And as we know all
Speaker 1: too well, the Obama administration was was always welcome to
Speaker 1: folding under industry pushback. Trump Trump moves to repeal it,
Speaker 1: and and the Biden administration has not attempted to reinstate
Speaker 1: these rules. You know, Biden railroad regulators say, yes, these
Speaker 1: breaks are much better, we endorse them, but it's not
Speaker 1: on their rulemaking agenda. They haven't. They haven't indicated, you know,
Speaker 1: any intention to do it. And and and you know,
Speaker 1: the point you made early on I think is worth
Speaker 1: again highlighting here that again the backdrop is, uh, workforces
Speaker 1: have been slashed on these trains, Inspection times are getting
Speaker 1: much shorter. You know, workers are exhausted, they're coming to
Speaker 1: work sick. Of course, that is making all of this
Speaker 1: more dangerous. And there's also plenty, as you've talked about
Speaker 1: on the show, that the Biden administration could do, you know,
Speaker 1: to help these workers and and and and force better
Speaker 1: safety standards on these railroad companies in all sorts of regards,
Speaker 1: and they haven't done it yet. Yeah, I'm just shocked
Speaker 1: that Mayor Pete hasn't gotten right on top of that, Julia.
Speaker 1: You know workers when we were covering the potential rail
Speaker 1: strike and their negotiations, this is exactly the type of
Speaker 1: accident that they were warning about, saying, I mean listen,
Speaker 1: and when you stretch people so thin and you are
Speaker 1: working them to the bone and they have no time
Speaker 1: off even for the basics of going to a doctor appointment,
Speaker 1: guess what's going to happen. It's not just their health
Speaker 1: and safety that's going to be compromised, but they're going
Speaker 1: to be massive spillover effects. And this is just a
Speaker 1: really sad and horrifying example of that great reporting on
Speaker 1: this getting this backstory, helping us understand how we got
Speaker 1: to this point really super important. Julia, great to see you,
Speaker 1: Thanks so much. Yeah, our pleasure. Thank you guys for watching.
Speaker 1: We'll have more for you later