Speaker 1: Hello, They're happy Wednesday, and welcome to another episode of
Speaker 1: the Chuck Podcast. Today's is somewhat a thematic day most Wednesdays,
Speaker 1: I'm trying to be in the habit of doing a
Speaker 1: little bit of updating of what I'm seeing on the
Speaker 1: campaign trail, and frankly, my campaign notebook has been overflowing
Speaker 1: with things and it matches up really well with who
Speaker 1: my guests plural are today. I have a joint interview
Speaker 1: today with two candidates for the US Senate. One is
Speaker 1: running as an independent in South Dakota and another is
Speaker 1: running as an independent in Idaho. It's Brian Bangs and
Speaker 1: Todd Achilles. They both run for office previously as Democrats
Speaker 1: and basically have decided the Democratic brand makes it impossible
Speaker 1: for them to have a conversation with voters. You'll hear
Speaker 1: better letting them describe their attempts at doing this. Both
Speaker 1: of them, I think, do feel they've always been independent
Speaker 1: and only aside to run for office because of the
Speaker 1: so called doopoly, and in this case this cycle we've
Speaker 1: seen and they're working pretty closely with Dan Osborne, who
Speaker 1: was a pretty successful independent candidate in Nebraska last cycle.
Speaker 1: He ended up getting over forty percent. Now he benefited
Speaker 1: from the fact that the Democratic Party in Nebraska essentially
Speaker 1: took a knee right, didn't really compete. And that's obviously
Speaker 1: what these two independent candidates in Idaho where Jim Reisch
Speaker 1: is the nominee, that's who Todd A. Chilles is running against,
Speaker 1: and Brian Bangs is running against Mike Bround's a Republican
Speaker 1: senator there. Now I think they both it's it's I
Speaker 1: think it really goes to underscore sort of the brand
Speaker 1: problem the Democratic Party has in Read America that even
Speaker 1: though there is you know, and both of them will
Speaker 1: argue that there is there is a there is you know,
Speaker 1: there is a mainstream middle in all of these places,
Speaker 1: it's just that the Democratic brand, particularly in Red America,
Speaker 1: where there's only been essentially one side competing one side branding,
Speaker 1: it's really put the Democrats in a hole. Even though
Speaker 1: there's an electorate that they're not a one hundred percent MEGA.
Speaker 1: There might not even be fifty percent MEGA. So there's
Speaker 1: an opening, but there's not the Democrat. Putting a D
Speaker 1: next to your name in some of these places makes
Speaker 1: it impossible to have a conversation with some voters and
Speaker 1: it is, you know, in some ways, this is where
Speaker 1: we you know, it's it's a result of the of
Speaker 1: the the polarized politics that have that are arguably paralyzing
Speaker 1: us as a nation right now. Look, and I'm going
Speaker 1: to be honest. This has been I always say when
Speaker 1: people use that phrase, I use it as a crutch.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be honest as if I'm not being honest before.
Speaker 1: I'm trying to cure myself of using that crutch. But
Speaker 1: what I'm trying to say is is that I'm letting
Speaker 1: you in on sort of some personal feelings that I
Speaker 1: normally don't like to share, and that is I just
Speaker 1: feel rotten about the state of the country. I'm not
Speaker 1: sleeping very well about it. And because I don't see
Speaker 1: a path out of this right now, I'm long term optimistic.
Speaker 1: And I'm still going to be a long term optimistic.
Speaker 1: We've gone through a lot of bad things in this
Speaker 1: country and gotten out better each time. Each time we
Speaker 1: have formed a more perfect union. Whether it was the
Speaker 1: scourge of slavery, whether it has been then giving civil
Speaker 1: rights and Jim Crow, whether it has been the internment
Speaker 1: of the Japanese, whether it was prohibition The point is
Speaker 1: is that we've gone down. We've had a lot of
Speaker 1: the red scare, which I'm bringing that up for a
Speaker 1: reason because I think we might be seeing a fervor,
Speaker 1: particularly on the right, that wants to try to essentially
Speaker 1: stain an entire political party with an ideological belief that
Speaker 1: I don't think the country shares, but one side of
Speaker 1: the aisle shares. I mean, the initial what folks around
Speaker 1: the president have been promising when it comes to retribution,
Speaker 1: going after the left, sort of being blind to the
Speaker 1: violent outbursts that have taken place that people have, you know,
Speaker 1: violence and murders that have been done in the name
Speaker 1: of a far right ideology. The fact of the matter
Speaker 1: is we have got a poisonous information ecosystem that can
Speaker 1: radicalize somebody on the left or somebody on the right
Speaker 1: to do bad things. Our system is rigged towards it.
Speaker 1: I spend my sub stack this week talking about this,
Speaker 1: and I know I've brought it up here before. In
Speaker 1: some ways, it's you know, some of you may be
Speaker 1: listening and going, oh, there's Chuck on his soapbox about
Speaker 1: big tech. But the fact of the matter is, we
Speaker 1: know we have two problems right, we all know this
Speaker 1: is a problem, which is social media has completely screwed
Speaker 1: up our information ecosystem, and the tech companies, for some
Speaker 1: reason are getting no blame and not being held accountable
Speaker 1: for this their algorithms, and they're look, it's the efficiency
Speaker 1: of technologies. And I say this was sort of without
Speaker 1: sort of animus in this point. Right, technology, every time
Speaker 1: you know, we advance, you know, it creates an efficiency.
Speaker 1: And when it came to sharing information, we created an
Speaker 1: efficiency that it turns out is actually bad for public
Speaker 1: discourse and it's bad for democracies. And what is that efficiency.
Speaker 1: It's the efficiency of getting information, of boiling it down
Speaker 1: to the one thing that matters. It's the efficiency of
Speaker 1: being able to eliminate people that you don't want to
Speaker 1: hear from. It's the efficiency of only being able to
Speaker 1: see like minded people. And so that may make sense
Speaker 1: if you're a quilter and you just want information about quilting,
Speaker 1: or if you're a baseball card dealer and you just
Speaker 1: want information about trading baseball cards. But it's when it's
Speaker 1: on politics and suddenly you're only getting one side and
Speaker 1: these algorithms, you know, I don't want to sit here
Speaker 1: I will. I've been trying to sort of right. I
Speaker 1: want to turn down the temperature too. I want big
Speaker 1: tech to participate in this. But I do believe the
Speaker 1: second an algorithm is created to curate how I see
Speaker 1: information that has made these companies publishers. And once you're
Speaker 1: a publisher, you should be held accountable for how the
Speaker 1: information you're curating is being used and manipulated. But ultimately
Speaker 1: it's going to take some leadership from Washington to do this.
Speaker 1: And you know, I look at what's happening in the
Speaker 1: state legislatures at the moment. Over the last two years,
Speaker 1: particularly post COVID, state legislatures have been passing have been
Speaker 1: very aggressive on two things. And it hasn't matter whether
Speaker 1: it's a red state or a blue state. They've all
Speaker 1: been passing essentially the same laws. Which is a tougher
Speaker 1: age verification to try to limit the exposure kids are
Speaker 1: getting to pornography and it is and guess what, the
Speaker 1: fact that the pornographers are complaining about this shows you
Speaker 1: that the just forcing age verification, which you have to
Speaker 1: do if you want to buy booze in you're underage,
Speaker 1: or cigarettes or anything other vice you want to participate
Speaker 1: in and you know, we've never the Internet's always been
Speaker 1: very loosey goosey on identification and forcing a tougher standing there,
Speaker 1: and we're suddenly seeing, oh, so you can put in
Speaker 1: some some guard rails here that can do a better
Speaker 1: job of protecting young people from this extreme pornography. And
Speaker 1: the other thing that has been passing in state legislatures
Speaker 1: all over the country, whether it's in a red state
Speaker 1: or a blue state, is getting rid of cell phones
Speaker 1: and classrooms. Right, private schools had been doing it earlier, Right,
Speaker 1: the public schools are now following suit. Look, there are
Speaker 1: and I think i've we've discussed this before. I mean,
Speaker 1: I am, I am empathetic to divorce parents who need
Speaker 1: to have want need to make sure they have access
Speaker 1: to their kid during the school day. But there are
Speaker 1: ways to do this, right, you put you know, you
Speaker 1: can look at your phone in between classes. You can
Speaker 1: have it in your backpack, in your locker, you can
Speaker 1: have it in a in a pad which you don't
Speaker 1: have it while you're learning. You take one hundred percent
Speaker 1: attention to your teacher, one hundred percent attention to what
Speaker 1: you're to what you're doing, and maybe as our friend
Speaker 1: Spencer Cox and Uteh likes to say, you know, maybe
Speaker 1: touch grass every now and then, which, as a kid,
Speaker 1: touching grass is pretty important. But when you think about it,
Speaker 1: we're so worried about what social media and the and
Speaker 1: the tech companies are doing to our kids that we're
Speaker 1: trying to do something about it. Guess what, if it's
Speaker 1: toxic for our kids, it means it's toxic for us too,
Speaker 1: isn't it. And so look, I'm a free speech absolutist.
Speaker 1: I am. I do think bad speech is fixed with
Speaker 1: good speech. But amplification is not free speech. Right, dialing
Speaker 1: up and dialing down what you see and what you hear,
Speaker 1: that's not free speech. That's curative speech. Right, that's a campaign.
Speaker 1: That's that's that's that's something that that and it should
Speaker 1: be up to the user. If I want to curate
Speaker 1: my feed a certain way, it should be in my hands.
Speaker 1: I don't need the tech companies suggesting what I should
Speaker 1: be looking at. A for you tab like our friends
Speaker 1: a X do, which is just nothing, but you know,
Speaker 1: it thinks it knows my interests. But it will always
Speaker 1: be the most incendiary thing about a topic I care about,
Speaker 1: even when it comes to Miami Hurricane football, Green Bay
Speaker 1: Packer football, or Washington Nationals baseball, let alone the various
Speaker 1: political things, you know, attacks on the media, sometimes personal
Speaker 1: attacks on me. They make sure it shows up in
Speaker 1: the four U tab. What does that accomplish. I didn't
Speaker 1: ask for this. In fact, I've gone out of my
Speaker 1: way to mute the idiots, and yet it's still you know,
Speaker 1: these things still show up. So you know, we are
Speaker 1: in that sense, we're powerless on this. And then you
Speaker 1: have the two parties who have been very reticent to write.
Speaker 1: You know, they talk a big game. Individual members talk
Speaker 1: a big game about regulating big tech, but they don't
Speaker 1: end up doing it. And part of the problem is
Speaker 1: I just was talking to a former US senator and
Speaker 1: you know, you'll you'll figure it out in a couple
Speaker 1: of weeks when you when you see the interview that
Speaker 1: pops up in a and when I do it. But
Speaker 1: I was talking to a US senator who said to me,
Speaker 1: he said in passing that you know, you know, I
Speaker 1: think we have to do something about tech. And he
Speaker 1: said within two within an hour, he had he suddenly
Speaker 1: had Sheryl Sandberg and Jack Dorsey calling him to like,
Speaker 1: are you sure, what are you talking about? What are
Speaker 1: you concerned about? With what tech is doing? Tech, the
Speaker 1: big tech companies have really just saturated Washington with money
Speaker 1: left and right. They've hired up all sorts of strategists
Speaker 1: and former staffers left and right. It is frankly standard
Speaker 1: practice for a powerful industry. Okay, this is no different
Speaker 1: than big oil in the eighties and things like that.
Speaker 1: And so what you've seen is kid glove treatment. Right.
Speaker 1: We haven't had anything on maybe repealing Section two thirty.
Speaker 1: We haven't had anything remotely close to trying to have
Speaker 1: a digital bill of rights that protects our data, right
Speaker 1: rather than allows so many other entities to own and
Speaker 1: buy and sell our data. And you know they've done
Speaker 1: a good job with that. And so what you have
Speaker 1: now is twenty years of elected officials who don't know
Speaker 1: how to attain power without the tech tools. Right. So
Speaker 1: that makes him hesitant. I mean, look, I'm not going
Speaker 1: to be labor this point. I want the president to
Speaker 1: rise above his partisan instincts and meet this moment the
Speaker 1: way it needs to be met, the way George Bush
Speaker 1: met nine to eleven, the way Barack Obama did Charleston,
Speaker 1: the way Bill Clinton handled Oklahoma City. We haven't gotten
Speaker 1: that from him yet. If anything, he views it, he's done.
Speaker 1: What about ism? You know, when he was questioned on
Speaker 1: Fox about extremists on the right, he essentially rationalized their extremism, saying, well,
Speaker 1: they care about they're upset about crime, I think, is
Speaker 1: what he said. And when you see these leading partisan
Speaker 1: politicians saying that they're going to investigate the left, that's
Speaker 1: red scare stuff, right. That's what happened in the fifties,
Speaker 1: and it was an ugly It was an ugly period
Speaker 1: in Washington where guilt by association was the coin of
Speaker 1: the realm. And that seems to be what's happening here
Speaker 1: is that you have a lot of folks here that
Speaker 1: see an opportunity right for political exploitation. But here's the
Speaker 1: other thing. If you attained power in this polarized era,
Speaker 1: you don't want it to change, do you. You don't
Speaker 1: want to go back to an era that might be
Speaker 1: a bit more unifying, a bit more bipartisan. Bypartisanship is
Speaker 1: not good for Donald Trump, right, by partisanship hasn't been
Speaker 1: you know, partisanship has been you know, the Democrats arguably
Speaker 1: have done better because of reactionary partisanship with Trump. You know,
Speaker 1: the brand has been problematic now arguably going back to
Speaker 1: the Hillary Clinton nomination, but their success has been due
Speaker 1: to polarization. Trump's ability to get a second term was
Speaker 1: due to polarization. And so you know, when you're sort
Speaker 1: of stuck, you know, the only way you know how
Speaker 1: to win is this way. Then the incentives are all.
Speaker 1: You know, our incentive structures are broken. And you've heard
Speaker 1: me use that phrase before. You've heard a lot of
Speaker 1: people say this, Okay, so how do we create better
Speaker 1: incentive structures? Well, the only way I think, which then
Speaker 1: fits the theme where I have today, which is the
Speaker 1: rise of the independence. The fastest growing political party in
Speaker 1: America is no party right. People are registering are you
Speaker 1: know if they were registered? A lot of former Republicans
Speaker 1: registered is Independent because they don't like Trump. You now
Speaker 1: have a lot of former Democrats registering is Independent because
Speaker 1: they don't like what's happened to the Democratic brand under
Speaker 1: Biden Harris, and you're starting to see that. We're seeing
Speaker 1: gen z is sort of be on the on the
Speaker 1: age front. You're seeing a lot more of registered independence.
Speaker 1: And you know, I always love I always love to
Speaker 1: go around. I mean, and we're up to I think
Speaker 1: half the states where non party or no party or
Speaker 1: registered independence outnumber at least one of the two major parties.
Speaker 1: And I believe it's in ten states where independence actually
Speaker 1: outnumber both major parties. So there's a huge constituency out
Speaker 1: there who don't like what's happened to the two parties. Now, look,
Speaker 1: I am I am done sitting here making the do
Speaker 1: I think in a perfect world, I think we should
Speaker 1: be a four party system. I think it would actually
Speaker 1: provide some relief bout would force coalition politics. But I'm
Speaker 1: not going to go down that rabbit hole today because
Speaker 1: I do I want to stick to topic here. What
Speaker 1: the two parties need is a time out, right, they
Speaker 1: both need to lose at the same time, or they
Speaker 1: both need to be punished, essentially in order to force
Speaker 1: an inward Look, you know, I railed on Monday about
Speaker 1: the fact that there's there is zero incentive to call
Speaker 1: out your own party. If anything, if you call out
Speaker 1: your own party for bad behavior, you're seen as a trader,
Speaker 1: not as somebody looking out for the best interests of
Speaker 1: the country or the party. And if you're going to
Speaker 1: sort of get them out of their partisan rabbit holes.
Speaker 1: They're going to have to be set back at the
Speaker 1: same time or be under threat. And we've had an
Speaker 1: example of two independent presidential candidacies that didn't win, Teddy
Speaker 1: Roosevelt and Ross Purot, but effectively forced both parties to
Speaker 1: reform themselves and forced you forced an issue. You know,
Speaker 1: I look at a guy like Spencer Cox, and he's
Speaker 1: decidedly on MAGA. Okay, in a in the pre Trump world,
Speaker 1: Spencer Cox would be already identified as a rising star
Speaker 1: in the Republican Party. He has no chance right in
Speaker 1: the Maga Republican Party. But his voice and how in
Speaker 1: his north star about what the tech companies have done
Speaker 1: to us and how this has happened. I kind of
Speaker 1: think because he's a little bit younger than I am.
Speaker 1: He's in his forties, so he's a millennial governor, and
Speaker 1: I think he's in some ways more digital native and
Speaker 1: unders and is better. He's just more conversant at explaining
Speaker 1: the harm. Right. I did this interview with this older
Speaker 1: senator and they've identified the harm, but they're not very
Speaker 1: conversant in explaining the harm. You know, Donald Trump doesn't
Speaker 1: really you know, he's not as conversant and couldn't explain
Speaker 1: it if he chose to. Right, that's just just in
Speaker 1: some ways he's just demographically out of touch. But it
Speaker 1: feels like we're in a moment that if we're going
Speaker 1: to force the two parties to sort of wait a minute,
Speaker 1: we've got to put the country first every now and
Speaker 1: then they have to be punished for their ways. And
Speaker 1: if the public won to just like they're exhausted from this,
Speaker 1: it may be that that you need a third party scare.
Speaker 1: And whether it's a third party scare, can you know
Speaker 1: every every political party needs needs a check on itself, right,
Speaker 1: The whole point of checks and balances are good whether
Speaker 1: you're organizing a government or you're organizing policy, you're organizing
Speaker 1: a political party. You know, you a political party doesn't
Speaker 1: needs to have a check on its potential ideological excesses.
Speaker 1: There's nobody checking the maga wing of the party anymore.
Speaker 1: There was a lot of checks in the first term.
Speaker 1: There's not many checks this term, and we've seen fewer checks.
Speaker 1: You know, you had you had your Joe manchiins and
Speaker 1: cinemas that were kind of the centrist check on the
Speaker 1: Democrats before they're both gone, and there really isn't a
Speaker 1: lot of space. I guess John Fetterman has suddenly sort
Speaker 1: of kind of adopted that role, but I don't think
Speaker 1: he has I don't think he has really the credibility
Speaker 1: yet to be that check with the middle of the
Speaker 1: road voter right. I think some of the right love
Speaker 1: what he's doing, but but I think only for owning
Speaker 1: the Lib's purposes, right, this whole trolley, this whole trolley mindset.
Speaker 1: So that's what's frustrating is that we do have a problem.
Speaker 1: We're going to have a part of it. Looks like
Speaker 1: partisans on the right want to just try to harass
Speaker 1: the left in under the name of trying to you know,
Speaker 1: root out political violence, but without it all sort of
Speaker 1: accepting the premise that hey, it's it's sadly a bipartisan affair,
Speaker 1: and that basically it's the Internet that radicalizes folks and
Speaker 1: it doesn't matter whether they come from stage left or
Speaker 1: stage right. The one thing that we haven't that we
Speaker 1: haven't common here is the Internet has has been, has
Speaker 1: been what's radicalized them. And if we're not going to
Speaker 1: confront this problem this way right now, it is going
Speaker 1: to get worse. Okay, if you ratchet up a radical
Speaker 1: view of what you think the other side is doing,
Speaker 1: I promise you the other side is going to respond
Speaker 1: in a radical way, right and radicalism, reactionary radicalism. And
Speaker 1: here we are right, and this is this escalatory polarization
Speaker 1: that we've been experiencing. I mean, you know, it's we've
Speaker 1: seen it in the US Senate with the absurdity of
Speaker 1: how how we've destroyed the judiciary branch. And make no mistake,
Speaker 1: we've destroyed the judiciary branch with this, with this partisan
Speaker 1: gamesmanship in the Senate, and there's always this attempt to well,
Speaker 1: but they started it. It doesn't matter which side I
Speaker 1: of the eylight talking about, but they started it. The
Speaker 1: right will scream foror the left will scream, will scream
Speaker 1: about Ruth Bader Ginsberg and Merrick Carlan. The fact is
Speaker 1: they they both chose punishing the other side without thinking
Speaker 1: about what it would do the judiciary itself. Right, we
Speaker 1: turned the judiciary into the freaking House of Representatives where
Speaker 1: a whole bunch of fifty percent plus one judges are
Speaker 1: out there. So you either have super liberal or super maga.
Speaker 1: There is no, you have sixty sixty five votes, you
Speaker 1: would have this sort of moderate temperaments, you know, which
Speaker 1: is really what our politics could use. I'm not suggesting
Speaker 1: we all ideologically have to move to the center. You
Speaker 1: know where I stand. I'm an incrementalist, but what we
Speaker 1: need is moderate temperament to lead us. When you're trying
Speaker 1: to lead three hundred and fifty million people, a moderate
Speaker 1: temperament goes a long way. And our most successful presidents
Speaker 1: have been of moderate temperaments, regardless of how you know.
Speaker 1: Reagan and Obama pretty mainstream liberal dem are crap mainstream
Speaker 1: conservative Democrat almost identical temperaments, and in many ways they
Speaker 1: had I'm sure there's some of you out there that
Speaker 1: that have been voting long enough where you voted for
Speaker 1: both of them almost as much because of their temperament.
Speaker 1: You know, it's it's a huge factor with my vote.
Speaker 1: I want to know how this person's going to handle
Speaker 1: a crisis. I want to know how this person's going
Speaker 1: to handle you know. I certainly have issues, and there
Speaker 1: are you know, there are there are veto there are candidates,
Speaker 1: there are issues that I might veto at candidate on
Speaker 1: because the issue matters to me. That much. But for
Speaker 1: the most part, I'm a character and temperament guy, and
Speaker 1: we could use a moderate temperament. But we have a
Speaker 1: we have an information ecosystem and a political and a
Speaker 1: political system that punishes moderation, not in ideology, which it
Speaker 1: does do that too, but even punishes it in style.
Speaker 1: I think that's what we would prefer as a body politic,
Speaker 1: But the way our information ecosystem works, it seems it
Speaker 1: seems to almost force us into the exact opposite persona.
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Speaker 1: unless they win. All right, I, like I said, I
Speaker 1: wanted to mostly focus on a little bit of update
Speaker 1: on the campaign trail. I do think as you as
Speaker 1: those of you that listen to me because you're campaign
Speaker 1: junkies and trying to figure out where's the party going,
Speaker 1: I really think you're going to where both parties going.
Speaker 1: I think you're going to enjoy this conversation with these
Speaker 1: two independent candidates because you know they are trying to
Speaker 1: to say, hey, look i'm a little bit on the
Speaker 1: left over here, and I'm a little bit on the
Speaker 1: right over here, and this is how I want to
Speaker 1: work in the se And they even have an interesting
Speaker 1: idea the answer to the question. And I'll let the
Speaker 1: interview speak for itself. But the answer to the question
Speaker 1: of Okay, if you win, you have to pick a
Speaker 1: side who you're going to work with, Well, they have
Speaker 1: a plan for this, and let's just say it's a
Speaker 1: plan that I've heard others talk about in the past,
Speaker 1: and I've seen senators chicken out at the time. The
Speaker 1: pressure party leaders put on these folks who would make
Speaker 1: the who could become committee chairs versus becoming ranking members,
Speaker 1: which means being in the majority versus being the minority,
Speaker 1: is quite you know, the pressure can be quite quite aggressive.
Speaker 1: But I think that's that's most interesting, interesting challenge assuming
Speaker 1: they get traction. And I have to tell you, in
Speaker 1: this political environment right now, I think anything in the
Speaker 1: thirties is a huge story for these independent candidates. But
Speaker 1: I'm betting you know, I you know, I'd set the
Speaker 1: line at thirty seven, thirty eight percentage points and I'd
Speaker 1: take the over. I think we're going to see a
Speaker 1: lot more. I think there's a there's certainly, and this
Speaker 1: is something I'm watching for in these off off year
Speaker 1: elections in twenty twenty five. I think it's going to
Speaker 1: be a tough time for incumbents and we're seeing some
Speaker 1: incumbent mayors struggle, and I think that across the board,
Speaker 1: if there is a viable alternative to an incumbent, especially
Speaker 1: they don't come from one of the two major parties.
Speaker 1: But they seem normal. Boy, I tell you, I think
Speaker 1: there's a constituency out there that's quite large. We'll see,
Speaker 1: we'll see if they have the funding to get their
Speaker 1: message out. That's always a huge challenge with third party candidates.
Speaker 1: But in some of these smaller states, at least, the
Speaker 1: ballot access issue isn't isn't a huge challenge. We're not
Speaker 1: talking these large states like California, New York, Florida, where
Speaker 1: it can be very difficult to get on the ballot
Speaker 1: of the Florida you can usually just pay. But it's
Speaker 1: definitely definitely something that I have made a priority to
Speaker 1: keep track of this year, which is these these well
Speaker 1: organized independent candidacies, particularly in states where one of the
Speaker 1: major parties is willing to quote unquote take a knee.
Speaker 1: By the way, stay tuned after the interview, I've got
Speaker 1: my new top five list for the week. This week,
Speaker 1: it is the top five states most likely to elect
Speaker 1: an independent to the US Senate, which I think is
Speaker 1: a much harder thing to pull off than it is
Speaker 1: to elect an independent as governor. And I will explain
Speaker 1: that on the other side. But before we get to
Speaker 1: the other side, which I'll also take some questions, just
Speaker 1: a few interesting updates on the campaign trail that you
Speaker 1: might have missed. We have the redistricting horse, obviously, and
Speaker 1: one of the questions is going to be, you know,
Speaker 1: the big the big campaign fight on the ballot is
Speaker 1: going to be in California where essentially the maps are
Speaker 1: going to be on the ballot for this Novembers election
Speaker 1: up or down. You have a huge amount of money.
Speaker 1: There are now three different entities essentially trying to stop
Speaker 1: this remap. You have Charlie Munger Junior, who is the
Speaker 1: son of Charlie Munger, longtime business partner to Warren Buffett
Speaker 1: back in the day. He's really been a political lately.
Speaker 1: He used to be a big Republican donor. I don't
Speaker 1: think he's a big trumpy is not as trumpy as
Speaker 1: some other Republicans, but he was a big supporter of
Speaker 1: the original redistricting commissions that are out there. So he
Speaker 1: wants to defend what he did. Arnold Swarzenneker. He said
Speaker 1: he's going to campaign, but interestingly, it sounds like he's
Speaker 1: agreed to sort of not be the face of any
Speaker 1: of the no movements. He's chosen not to work directly
Speaker 1: with Munger's group, he doesn't plan to work with Kevin
Speaker 1: McCarthy's group. He does seem to be focused on keeping
Speaker 1: his independence. I think he doesn't want to look like
Speaker 1: he seems to be trying to find a way he
Speaker 1: wants to be. He wants to be pro reform, but
Speaker 1: not necessarily looking like he's help I don't think he
Speaker 1: wants to use the Republicans to help him get that
Speaker 1: message across. I think he's trying to have it. But
Speaker 1: that's a real challenge if you're Gavin Newsom and the
Speaker 1: Democrats who are trying to get this referendum pass, and
Speaker 1: that you have sort of you have three different entities
Speaker 1: that are all trying to spend money to get those
Speaker 1: in different ways. Right, You're going to have now Arnold
Speaker 1: who is going to not associate himself with the Republican
Speaker 1: groups but sort of be talking straight to the independence
Speaker 1: you got. Charlie Munger's put a ton of money in there.
Speaker 1: Kevin McCarthy's got a hundred million to spend. We'll see.
Speaker 1: It's my understanding and focus groups that the surprising thing
Speaker 1: to my sources who've been talking to about this are
Speaker 1: is how engaged voters are in California about it. They're
Speaker 1: pretty well educated, they get it, and those that believe
Speaker 1: they can get this map passed think that this is
Speaker 1: not a bank shot. That it is important to these voters.
Speaker 1: If you want to get them to approve this map,
Speaker 1: they really have to believe it's temporary, and they have
Speaker 1: if they don't believe that this will revert back to
Speaker 1: the public process, the sort of the commission process for
Speaker 1: twenty thirty and beyond that. That's the key when a
Speaker 1: voter is is here's the message for it, and they
Speaker 1: believe that aspect of it, that this is just temporary
Speaker 1: justify what Texas is doing. They think it's enough to
Speaker 1: get a majority. So I do think this is still
Speaker 1: a campaign and it's infancy, but it is obviously in
Speaker 1: some ways. May even have Virginia governor, you have New
Speaker 1: Jersey governor, you have New York City mayor. It's you
Speaker 1: could argue this California referendum is suddenly the most important
Speaker 1: election this in twenty twenty five, even as the Virginia
Speaker 1: and New Jersey are traditionally a little more high profile.
Speaker 1: And of course Mayor of New York City. Speaking of
Speaker 1: the redistricting, watch Missouri very closely because Missouri did its map,
Speaker 1: but they have an interesting addendum to their constitution. So
Speaker 1: under state law, if a petition reaches roughly one hundred
Speaker 1: thousand signatures in six of eight congressional districts, the law
Speaker 1: that the Missouri legislature passed with this new redistricting proposal
Speaker 1: that would eliminate all but one Democratic leaning congressional district,
Speaker 1: basically getting rid of the Kansas City Democratic seat. The
Speaker 1: law would actually go before voters for an up or
Speaker 1: down vote, and it could get repealed, and the lines
Speaker 1: don't go into effect until that ballot referendum happened. So
Speaker 1: if they get it, the Missouri would potentially have to
Speaker 1: put a special election if they wanted to count for
Speaker 1: November twenty twenty six, and they successfully have a challenge
Speaker 1: to the state law that qualifies for the ballot, we
Speaker 1: may have a special spring election in like March or April.
Speaker 1: Perhaps the August primary Missouri is in August primary state.
Speaker 1: Perhaps it goes on there, although that seems super late, right,
Speaker 1: because that's when congressional candidates got to know which district
Speaker 1: am I running in? So keep an eye out on
Speaker 1: wather and it's going to tell me how organized are
Speaker 1: the Democrats nationally? Right? The California Democrats turned out to
Speaker 1: be very organized. I mean, whatever you think of the idea,
Speaker 1: what Gavin Newsom has pulled off is something that I
Speaker 1: was circumspect. I thought that with so many different stakeholders,
Speaker 1: so many different people wanting caring about their district lines
Speaker 1: and all of this stuff, the fact that Gavin Newsom
Speaker 1: got that whole party to row in the same place,
Speaker 1: it's just, you know, you got to admire the political
Speaker 1: leadership there. That is not an easy thing he has
Speaker 1: pulled off. Is that him or is there a pretty
Speaker 1: strong national Democratic Party organization behind him. We're going to
Speaker 1: find out a Missouri, right, whether there is a whether
Speaker 1: the Democrats are as organized nationally is they clearly were
Speaker 1: in California to push back on this, because there is
Speaker 1: a you know, essentially a plan B in Missouri to
Speaker 1: go to the voters and get an up or down there.
Speaker 1: I just think it'll be really telling, But I have
Speaker 1: to tell you there was an item in my old
Speaker 1: my old publication I worked at before NBC, the hotline,
Speaker 1: and they and it was just a simple construction, which
Speaker 1: is what's always the beauty of the hotline covering the coverage, right,
Speaker 1: and they note, I'm just going to read you the
Speaker 1: item verbatim. Former Transportation Secretary Pete Boodage will return to
Speaker 1: his old state this week and rally with the Indiana
Speaker 1: Democratic Party against redistricting. That came from a press release. Meanwhile,
Speaker 1: Hacking Jeffrey spent the weekend in California raising millions for
Speaker 1: Fournia Proposition fifty, the Democrats redistricting ballot initiative. This is
Speaker 1: the second trip Jeffries is made to California to support
Speaker 1: the redistricting effort. This is to me the real sort
Speaker 1: of challenge for the Democrats. On one hand, they're trying
Speaker 1: to stop redistricting efforts, bringing in a national star to
Speaker 1: try to do it in Indiana. Simultaneously, they're going to
Speaker 1: California to raise money to try to support a re
Speaker 1: redistricting effort out there. You know, it doesn't take a
Speaker 1: communications genius to say, yaganta messaging problem right. Gone are
Speaker 1: the days where you could message in isolation. You could
Speaker 1: somehow talk to one group over here, tell them something,
Speaker 1: talk to another group one hundred miles away, and somehow
Speaker 1: they wouldn't hear. You know, you promised that you were
Speaker 1: going to deal with this landfill issue in this county
Speaker 1: over here. You told them, don't worry, the landfill's not
Speaker 1: coming to your county. It'll stay there. And you know,
Speaker 1: back when when communication wasn't shared so quickly, you know,
Speaker 1: a politician could essentially talk out of both sides of
Speaker 1: their mouth and get away with it for a period
Speaker 1: of time until reporters over time shared information quick enough
Speaker 1: that you couldn't do that. And I think this is
Speaker 1: what I was reading this item. You're like, it just
Speaker 1: made my head hurt. On one hand, a major Democratic
Speaker 1: Party star is trying to stop a redistricting effort in Indiana.
Speaker 1: On the other hand, a major Democratic star is going
Speaker 1: out to California to raise money to help a redistricting
Speaker 1: effort in another stay it. I think it goes to
Speaker 1: why this is again, I understand the tactical decision that
Speaker 1: the Democrats made here. Uh they feel as if, hey,
Speaker 1: look what they're doing they they had no choice, but
Speaker 1: it is a reminder of how complicated, uh this effort
Speaker 1: is going to be.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 1: One of the candidacy that I think you should keep
Speaker 1: an eye on that sort of fits. It's a little
Speaker 1: bit more on which which which wing of the Democratic
Speaker 1: Party is more ascended, right, the progressive wing or the
Speaker 1: moderate peacemaking wing. The Georgia primary for the Georgia Democratic
Speaker 1: primary for governor is becoming fascinating. You now have a
Speaker 1: former Republican Lieutenant governor, Jeff Duncan, right, who was an
Speaker 1: early Trump critic, was on a glide path. He was
Speaker 1: Brian Kemp's essentially, you know, on a you know, kind
Speaker 1: of running mate. I mean, you run for LG on
Speaker 1: your own, uh in a in a primary. But you
Speaker 1: know he was seen as potentially assumed era par to Kemp.
Speaker 1: Duncan became, you know, particularly after the attempt by Trump
Speaker 1: to essentially overturn the Georgia election, you know, twisting the
Speaker 1: arms of party operatives. Over time, became more and more
Speaker 1: of a Trump skeptic to the point where he is,
Speaker 1: you know, he has now changed parties completely elected as
Speaker 1: a Republican in Georgia. So you're not a moderate Republican
Speaker 1: when you're winning a primary, you're pretty conventional conservative Republican.
Speaker 1: As lieutenant governor in twenty eighteen and now eight years later,
Speaker 1: hopes to be the Democratic nominee for governor in twenty
Speaker 1: twenty six. Now, look so he clearly is more in
Speaker 1: that supermoderate lane. You now have a state Senator Jason Stevies,
Speaker 1: your former Atlanta mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms, who has worked
Speaker 1: for Biden, state repend Derek Jackson, to a chief executive
Speaker 1: Michael Thurman, who I believes run for state wide office.
Speaker 1: Before it's suddenly a pretty crowd primary. There's a lot
Speaker 1: of Atlanta Democrats in there, which could give Duncan an
Speaker 1: opportunity if there's enough vote outside. If all of that,
Speaker 1: all of this vote gets split up there. But it's
Speaker 1: a just like the Michigan Democratic primary for Senate, there's
Speaker 1: a handful of Democratic primaries that if they all go
Speaker 1: in the same direction right the progressive wins or the
Speaker 1: or the more center center left person wins, it may
Speaker 1: directionally tell us where where are rank and file Democrats right?
Speaker 1: Are they angry and ready to go left? Or are
Speaker 1: they exhausted and frustrated? And looking for what I call
Speaker 1: our peacemakers right trying to trying to win win over
Speaker 1: the middle. But in particular now Georgia Democratic Primary for governor,
Speaker 1: Michigan Democratic Primary for Senate. Both of them feature candidates
Speaker 1: from all wings of the Democratic Party, so they're all
Speaker 1: going to be pretty good tests where the energy of
Speaker 1: the party is A couple more things to talk about quickly.
Speaker 1: On twenty twenty five, we're now seeing the real money
Speaker 1: is coming into both New Jersey and Virginia. There was
Speaker 1: some question with the National Republicans invest is heavily in
Speaker 1: Virginia as they did the last time. They now have
Speaker 1: and there's a real reason for that. Like it Ultimately
Speaker 1: in the Republicans I've talked to about the Virginia races,
Speaker 1: it's not that they're conceding the governor's race to Abigail Spamberger,
Speaker 1: but they're conceding that it's an uphill battle, but they
Speaker 1: don't want to get swept. And if there's one candidacy
Speaker 1: that they're trying to save, it is the Attorney General
Speaker 1: Jason Miaris. And I had a smart Democrat say that
Speaker 1: he thinks it's the single most important race to understand
Speaker 1: whether Democrats truly have a shot at the midterms or
Speaker 1: whether Republicans can hold off the flip. And it's because
Speaker 1: of the you know, you're seeing. You have a Republican
Speaker 1: incumbent with a lot of financial advantages. You have a
Speaker 1: Democratic challenger who's being painted as soft on crime, which
Speaker 1: is what both Republicans and Democrats tell me is is
Speaker 1: likely to be among the bread and butter issues you
Speaker 1: see in the midterms, especially if the economy is not good.
Speaker 1: Republicans are going to be running against Democrats is sort
Speaker 1: of softened the border, soft on crime, soft on law
Speaker 1: and order stuff, especially if they can't run in the economy,
Speaker 1: and right now things don't look great with the economy.
Speaker 1: And by the way, it may not matter, right the
Speaker 1: economy may be everything, and it may overwhelm that. But
Speaker 1: we're going to find out how effective can a law
Speaker 1: and order campaign overcome sort of momentum that autumn sort
Speaker 1: of sort of the momentum that the Democrats have as
Speaker 1: simply being the out party. Right, you know, they have
Speaker 1: a few advantages going for them in these off yer
Speaker 1: elections in Virginia, federal government workers being laid up, they
Speaker 1: have a lot of advantages can munt Can the financial
Speaker 1: advantage they will have, and the issue of law and
Speaker 1: order combat that right. That Virginia AG race this cycle
Speaker 1: could foreshadow what the midterms look like. In particular, we're
Speaker 1: seeing a little bit in the governor's race, and don't
Speaker 1: get me wrong, I think there'll be some culture war
Speaker 1: type back and forth between the two governors candidates. But
Speaker 1: in many ways all that, you know, there's Spamburger's now
Speaker 1: up with a lot of negatives, almost just exclusively in
Speaker 1: Northern Virginia hitting win some earl sears on just simply
Speaker 1: being supportive of Trump, which ironically she doesn't have Trump's
Speaker 1: endorsement yet I think she'll get it because everything is
Speaker 1: about helping turn out for the pot of the ticket
Speaker 1: there the AG candidate, and if you don't have people
Speaker 1: enthused about the gubernatorial candidate, he's going to you know,
Speaker 1: you're just going to have a turnout issue that's going
Speaker 1: to trickle down and cost you down the ballot. So
Speaker 1: I suspect Trump comes in. It's why the RGA, I think,
Speaker 1: has come in with real money to help the top
Speaker 1: of the ticket, because ultimately the one they're trying to
Speaker 1: seek and they save one of the three seeds that
Speaker 1: they currently hold in Virginia. As for New Jersey, you've
Speaker 1: seen the Republicans have also sort of equalized money there.
Speaker 1: We're going to have our first debates, They're going to
Speaker 1: have two debates. I want to watch those debates. I
Speaker 1: think that they may matter more than we fully appreciate.
Speaker 1: I think gubernatorial debates voters care a little bit more
Speaker 1: about than Senate debates. To be frank, I think Senate
Speaker 1: campaigns are always read versus blue again, one of the
Speaker 1: challenges for these independent candidates. But governor's races, I think
Speaker 1: more often there are voters that will, well, we'll choose
Speaker 1: a person over a party if there's a specific issue
Speaker 1: that really animates them. And that's why I actually want
Speaker 1: to withhold judgment. I have a sneaking suspicion that New
Speaker 1: Jersey is going to be awfully closed. But let's see
Speaker 1: how the debates play out on that front. And then
Speaker 1: we've seen it looks like Donald Trump is conceding the
Speaker 1: New York City mayor's race to Mom Donnie. It is
Speaker 1: fascinating to watch these progressive pressure campaign on a Keem
Speaker 1: Jeffries and Chuck Schumer, who have not yet endorsed Mom Donnie.
Speaker 1: The governor of New York did. But remember, everybody, you know,
Speaker 1: I talked about incentive structures at the top. Why does
Speaker 1: Kathy Hulkkele have to endorse Mom Donnie because she's got
Speaker 1: a primary challenger from the left. Neither Jeffries or Schumer
Speaker 1: are worrying about that at the moment. Hochel has to
Speaker 1: worry about that in the very very near term. Her
Speaker 1: numbers aren't that great anyway. She can't afford a very
Speaker 1: competitive primary that would likely be negative, ugly, and only
Speaker 1: make her potential campaign against the leastaphonic that much harder.
Speaker 1: So I look at the whocal endorsement as a She's
Speaker 1: got primary opponents, that's what she's worried about, and she
Speaker 1: can't afford to alienate the progressive flank as much. Jeffries
Speaker 1: has got a whole other He's got a whole bunch
Speaker 1: of Democrats running all over the country who are don't
Speaker 1: want the future Speaker of the House looking like they
Speaker 1: endorse a socialists. And so I don't envy the situation
Speaker 1: Jeffries finds himself in. But I go back Jeffries and
Speaker 1: Schumer should have been more hands on when Cuomo jumped
Speaker 1: into that race and basically screwed it all up for
Speaker 1: the for the for the mainstream wing of the Democratic Party.
Speaker 1: The fact that they sort of look the other way
Speaker 1: is arguably why they're in this situation they're in. But
Speaker 1: that's a tough that's a tough position he's in politically.
Speaker 3: I know.
Speaker 1: I'm guessing Jeffries will end up endorsing him or voting
Speaker 1: for him, not endorsing him. We'll see. But I do
Speaker 1: think this is as much about his branding. What happens
Speaker 1: to his branding as the guy who's essentially running to
Speaker 1: be Speaker of the House in the midterms. There's a
Speaker 1: lot of Democrats running in House races that are nervous
Speaker 1: that he gets painted as a socialist. So I do
Speaker 1: think that is what's, among other things, politically, what's making
Speaker 1: it very uncomfortable for Jefferies. All right, So with that,
Speaker 1: let's have the interview. You're going to enjoy this conversation
Speaker 1: with two candidates running for the US Senate as pure independence. Well,
Speaker 1: we got a fun a little different type of interview today.
Speaker 1: Instead of one person, I have two candidates for the
Speaker 1: United States Senate running in super red states running as independents,
Speaker 1: not as major party candidates. We have Brian Bangs from
Speaker 1: South Dakota Todd Achilles from Idaho. They've agreed to appear
Speaker 1: together in some ways their campaigns are trying to be
Speaker 1: helpful to each other, share best practices, try to figure
Speaker 1: out what's the easiest way to raise money without getting
Speaker 1: sucked into one of the partisan vortexas which seem to
Speaker 1: can blow up independent candidacies in some cases. It's the
Speaker 1: model is a bit of what we saw in Nebraska
Speaker 1: with Dan Osborne. But that also But I hesitate to
Speaker 1: throw the Dan Osborne example out there because I don't
Speaker 1: think I think well, Brian and Todd probably share some
Speaker 1: issues where they agree with them. They may not agree
Speaker 1: with Dan on all issues, and everybody wants to be
Speaker 1: seen when you're running as an independent. You're an independent
Speaker 1: for a reason, as I like to say. And both
Speaker 1: Brian and Todd joined me. Now, thanks for agreeing to
Speaker 1: do this. And obviously you guys are familiar with each other,
Speaker 1: so you're, in fact you guys pitch this, so I
Speaker 1: appreciate it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely, thanks you, Yeah, thank you us.
Speaker 1: Look, I'm going to try to ping pong like my
Speaker 1: job as moderator, right, my job is to make sure
Speaker 1: so I will do my best to do this. So Brian,
Speaker 1: let me just start. Our simple question is going to
Speaker 1: be the same question for both of you. But why are
Speaker 1: you running? And why as an independent?
Speaker 3: You have?
Speaker 1: And you know why did you reject the major party?
Speaker 2: Well, I think South Dakota's won of multiple states where
Speaker 2: the national party politics don't serve regular folks, so the
Speaker 2: regular voters being left behind. Republicans take us for granted
Speaker 2: and Democrats forget we exist. And I've been a registered
Speaker 2: independent for ninety seven percent of my life, which is
Speaker 2: similar to a quarter of South Dakota's registered voters and
Speaker 2: nearly half of national voters. If you're paying attention to everybody,
Speaker 2: regular people like me, And obviously the independents are angry
Speaker 2: at the DC establishment and the party system that doesn't
Speaker 2: work for them, and I think justifiably so, So that's
Speaker 2: why I'm running because the system hasn't worked for regular
Speaker 2: folks for quite a while.
Speaker 1: Now, you ran as a Democrat once, talk about that.
Speaker 1: Obviously that experience soured you.
Speaker 2: Why Yeah, as I said, I was a registered independent,
Speaker 2: registered an independent when I was eighteen years old. Tinety
Speaker 2: seven percent of my life except for that experience. I
Speaker 2: was infuriated watching Americans beating law enforcement officers with polls
Speaker 2: and chanting for the murder the vice president. On January sixth,
Speaker 2: when the South Dakota Democratic Party was poised to give
Speaker 2: now Senate Majority leader John Thune an unchallenged free pass
Speaker 2: for reelection, I felt somebody needed to do something, so
Speaker 2: I stepped up to run.
Speaker 4: And of course I am not a.
Speaker 2: Multimillionaire by any step of the words, and I am
Speaker 2: a political novice. That was my first time doing anything,
Speaker 2: so I thought I could only be a legitimate candidate
Speaker 2: with one of the two parties, and I set aside,
Speaker 2: had to set aside my independent affiliation for what I
Speaker 2: thought was the pragmatic alternative to John Thune. What I learned,
Speaker 2: which is why I shaped why I'm doing this now,
Speaker 2: is that my approach in that race was I would
Speaker 2: go up to people introduce myself as a candidate, and
Speaker 2: I would go up to people wearing trump hats, introduce
Speaker 2: myself and literally say, I'm going to guarantee with one
Speaker 2: hundred percent certainty that you and I will agree on
Speaker 2: at least two, but probably three, and then I'd run
Speaker 2: down my list and they're not in along and typically
Speaker 2: it was all three and we get to the end
Speaker 2: and I'd say, so can I count on your vote November?
Speaker 4: And what do you think? The first words out of
Speaker 4: the mouthware which party do you belong to?
Speaker 3: What do you?
Speaker 2: What are you?
Speaker 4: So?
Speaker 1: What are you?
Speaker 2: And then you say, well, I was a lifelong independent,
Speaker 2: but I'm running as a Democrat. And far, far too
Speaker 2: many times I heard the I'll never vote for a
Speaker 2: Democrat and that was it. You know, we'd agreed on
Speaker 2: these things, and then they just said, no.
Speaker 1: What happened to the Tom Dashel voter? What happened to
Speaker 1: the Tim Johnson voter?
Speaker 5: They have gone away?
Speaker 3: I would say they.
Speaker 1: I mean, no, I don't. I mean, that's my curiosity.
Speaker 1: Do those same voters exist and they've just left the party,
Speaker 1: or do they leave the state.
Speaker 2: I will say that the current head of the South
Speaker 2: Dakota gop was a thirty year Democrat, so he was
Speaker 2: a registered Democrat for thirty times longer than I was,
Speaker 2: and he is now a hardcore mega individual. So the
Speaker 2: voters there, I think it's summed up in the I
Speaker 2: vote for the person, not the party. People still say
Speaker 2: that I heard it in twenty two, but they don't
Speaker 2: actually mean it, because as I said, yeah, I'll never
Speaker 2: vote for a Democrat. That is where those voters went.
Speaker 1: All right, Todd, your turn? Why independent? Why not either
Speaker 1: a Republican primary or the Democrats?
Speaker 5: Yeah, well, I think the core thing for me, I'm
Speaker 5: just I'm profoundly worried about what's happening in Congress and
Speaker 5: what's happening to the country. And it doesn't matter who's
Speaker 5: in power, we have the same get division and dysfunction.
Speaker 5: You know, I actually served as a Democrat in the
Speaker 5: Idaho Legislature for two sessions. You know, my district is
Speaker 5: twenty five percent registered Dems, and I won with sixty
Speaker 5: percent of the vote. And I'll tell you the number
Speaker 5: one thing I heard when I was knocking on doors is, wow, town,
Speaker 5: you're a better Republican than that crazy on the ballot.
Speaker 5: And when you look at Idaho, there's you know, there's
Speaker 5: multiple factions of the Republican Party. There's no good definition
Speaker 5: of what it means to be look and so now
Speaker 5: you know, the question is what does it mean to
Speaker 5: be conservative? And how do you meet the needs of
Speaker 5: the state. But you know, when you look at Idaho,
Speaker 5: we have this really strong tradition of being independent. So
Speaker 5: when we close the primaries in twenty twelve, seventy percent
Speaker 5: of Idahoans were unaffiliated with the party. Seventy percent. That
Speaker 5: was the highest in the country. Noise State University does
Speaker 5: an annual public policy survey, sixty five percent of Idahoans
Speaker 5: said they were they were independent, or they self identified
Speaker 5: as independent or I'm a Republican but I leaned independent.
Speaker 5: And importantly, a couple of years ago, when we passed
Speaker 5: medicaid expansion, we did it with sixty one percent of
Speaker 5: the vote. That was by far the highest of any
Speaker 5: red state in that country. Eighty percent of accountings voted
Speaker 5: for medicaid expansion. And so there's this, you know, on
Speaker 5: these consensus issues, Idahoans can come together, and that's what
Speaker 5: we're you know, we're trying to get back to those
Speaker 5: core values by being in an and not being part
Speaker 5: of the Republicans.
Speaker 1: Is it is it specifically the dem brand on cultural
Speaker 1: issues that made it impossible for you to talk to
Speaker 1: that voter that agreed with medicaid expansion.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it is.
Speaker 5: I mean, you know, you've had a decade of under
Speaker 5: investment in the DEM Party. You know, it's the same
Speaker 5: thing at South Dakota as Idaho, where the brand is
Speaker 5: is you know, there's there's been no pushback, there's no
Speaker 5: been no countervailing force. And and listen to DEM Party.
Speaker 5: The longest serving governor in the history of Idaho was
Speaker 5: Cecil Andrews.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he was all right time he served in the
Speaker 1: Carter administration right as Interior Secretary.
Speaker 5: Of that's exactly right. Yeah, okay, yeah, you're exactly right
Speaker 5: for four terms and the DEM. But it was those
Speaker 5: you know, there were kind of these core Idaho values
Speaker 5: where everybody could get behind ces and and I think
Speaker 5: the you know, the Republican Party itself, for i'll call
Speaker 5: the GOP leadership has really been taken over by John
Speaker 5: Bircher's and some Christian nationalists. So they don't represent Idahoans.
Speaker 5: You know, the DEM Party's got all of its own
Speaker 5: issues in the state. They're not really representing outa ho.
Speaker 5: And so if you think about both parties have kind
Speaker 5: of gotten into the corners, and you look at this
Speaker 5: big distribution of people in the middle who feels underrepresented,
Speaker 5: and that those are the folks we're trying to meet.
Speaker 1: What's interesting is both and I might address this to
Speaker 1: both of you because both of your states, the delegation
Speaker 1: out of South Dakota is not really Look, John Thune
Speaker 1: and Mike Rounds are not mega guys. They are sort
Speaker 1: of mega adjacent and have had to figure out they're
Speaker 1: trying to stay you can. I watch it, and I've
Speaker 1: interviewed Mike Rounds and John Thune a million times. I
Speaker 1: know them pretty well. I think I do at least
Speaker 1: so I know Jim Rish and Mike Simpson and Idaho
Speaker 1: are very much what i'd call Bush Republicans. Okay, whatever,
Speaker 1: that what the definition of conventional conservative Republican from the
Speaker 1: first decade of the century. You know that's Mike Simpson, right,
Speaker 1: That's that's Jim Reish. And yet, so I guess let
Speaker 1: me ask you. I'll start with you, Brian. You know
Speaker 1: why because in Kansas, when it was one party, basically
Speaker 1: the split and basically the Chamber of Commerce, Republicans said,
Speaker 1: you know, we are going to go support a Democrat
Speaker 1: for governor to create some balance. Now, we're not going
Speaker 1: to support Democrats for federal offices, but we're going to
Speaker 1: do that. Do you sense that the Republican Party is
Speaker 1: going to split in two? I mean where the mainstream
Speaker 1: sort of Mike Simpson Republicans going to go if the
Speaker 1: state Party keeps moving further and further to the right.
Speaker 2: Well, there is a fight going on right now in
Speaker 2: the state party state GP. We have I think last
Speaker 2: count was four candidates for governor right now. And you've got,
Speaker 2: you know, a super hardcore Mega and then you've got
Speaker 2: hardcore Omega, and then you've got Dusty Johnson is currently
Speaker 2: our representative in the House who's running. And he's tried.
Speaker 2: He's a former Truman scholar, He's a smart.
Speaker 1: Guy, he's not a mega guy, and he's trying to
Speaker 1: fit in. He's tried just enough. Like I say, look,
Speaker 1: I watched Mike Grounds, I watched Thune, right, I get
Speaker 1: I understand strategically what they're trying to do. The question
Speaker 1: is to vull voters by it, right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So that'll be the challenge for them coming up
Speaker 2: in the primary for the governor's race of what's going
Speaker 2: to happen. And then our current Attorney General, Marty Jacklee
Speaker 2: is going to run for the House, and as far
Speaker 2: as I know, he's the only one who's announced for that.
Speaker 2: So he's got a pretty easy glide path and he
Speaker 2: I don't know that he's a mega guy, hardcore mega guy.
Speaker 2: He may be like softcore, but yeah, So what how
Speaker 2: this going to shake out? I don't know, because they're
Speaker 2: going to fight and they're gonna fight hard about this.
Speaker 2: And I agree with you that John Thune and Mike
Speaker 2: Rounds they're not hardcore mega and Mike Rounds has gotten
Speaker 2: criticized for that before. He's been labeled to Rhino Trump
Speaker 2: and fact labeled him rhino himself before changing his mind
Speaker 2: later when he fell in line. So what's going to happen?
Speaker 2: I don't know. I can't predict what the voters, that
Speaker 2: the GOP voters are going to do. But we've heard
Speaker 2: from several multiple GPO voters that are unhappy with the
Speaker 2: situation because this is obviously farm country. So the tariff
Speaker 2: situation and John Thune and Mike Rounds going like, oh no,
Speaker 2: do what you want with the tariffs, even though that
Speaker 2: is the legislative branch's power explicitly in the Constitution.
Speaker 3: It's all you.
Speaker 2: So is that hands off position going to help them?
Speaker 5: I don't know.
Speaker 4: This is a wild card.
Speaker 1: Well, that's what your candidacy is kind of test. I mean,
Speaker 1: I look, I there is to me the farm belts loosely, right,
Speaker 1: and it's the states that in particular have have got
Speaker 1: a lot of people that make a living exporting excess
Speaker 1: egg product.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 1: We already feed ourselves, so we're exporting it. It's Kansas
Speaker 1: at Nebraska, that's Iowa, that's South Dakota, that's uh, frankly,
Speaker 1: you can you could say it's everybody grows soybeans, right,
Speaker 1: it's almost every state, and we're going to have soybeans
Speaker 1: literally just rotting. I have a feeling and not being
Speaker 1: able to get rid of it. Todd same in Idaho
Speaker 1: in some ways. How how have the Mike Simpsons and
Speaker 1: Jim Reisch's and even the look the governor got pushed
Speaker 1: from the right, you know kind of I'm still I
Speaker 1: think it was Governor little who you know, was was
Speaker 1: sort of so distraught over the mask wars that he
Speaker 1: that he got emotional about it, like what are we doing?
Speaker 1: Like you know, I'm not making anybody do this, but
Speaker 1: don't criticize somebody who does. And that was like how
Speaker 1: is that controversial? Right? And here was a very conservative
Speaker 1: guy being seen as not mega enough.
Speaker 5: Yeah, And I think that's just an indicative of where
Speaker 5: the Republican Party is is being cooled and ied be
Speaker 5: pulled from mainstream conservative values. And Governor Little, who I
Speaker 5: spent a lot of time with Governor Little when I
Speaker 5: was in legislature. I have a ton of respect for him. Uh,
Speaker 5: but it's he's in a really, really hard place. And
Speaker 5: I would push back on this idea of risk being
Speaker 5: a Bush Republican. Frankly, I'm a better Bush Republican than
Speaker 5: than Senator Rishes.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 5: You know, he he goes wherever he needs to go.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 5: He played games with public lands over the last couple
Speaker 5: of months, you know, when Senator Mike Lee was trying
Speaker 5: to trying to push that through. And you know, and
Speaker 5: public lands are sacred in Idaho, right, I mean this
Speaker 5: is hunter's Herder's.
Speaker 1: Tree huggers around the West and Midwest on that stuff,
Speaker 1: Like it's one of the reasons you live out there.
Speaker 1: It's for the land, not to develop it. Frankly, that's
Speaker 1: exactly it.
Speaker 5: And he played games with this thing and finally finally
Speaker 5: came around the last minute. And for the ag industry, right,
Speaker 5: there's only once the strategic industry the state of Idaho,
Speaker 5: and that's egg, right, It's about seventeen percent of the economy.
Speaker 5: And these tariffs are really scary for ag not only
Speaker 5: the terriffs, but but also all the market concentration going on.
Speaker 5: It's fertilizer and seed and chemicals and everything else. I mean,
Speaker 5: that's you know, farmers and growers are getting squeezed and
Speaker 5: it's not getting better. And I think the fundamental problem
Speaker 5: with Rish is that he's a career politician. And listen,
Speaker 5: the far right in idahook don't like him. The moderate
Speaker 5: Republicans don't like him. He hasn't done town halls. I've
Speaker 5: done more town halls in two weeks. And you know,
Speaker 5: we think he's done in ten years as best as
Speaker 5: we can account. And he's just lost touch with the
Speaker 5: challenges of Ida owns. And it's, you know, it's it's
Speaker 5: tough to live in our state. Wages are low, costs
Speaker 5: are high, and everybody's getting squeezed. And you know, Jim
Speaker 5: Yish just seems to be a loop of all these
Speaker 5: these challenges.
Speaker 1: One of the tougher questions you're going to have to
Speaker 1: answer for that swing voter that May who's probably a
Speaker 1: Republican but doesn't necessarily like the direction of the Republican Party,
Speaker 1: but isn't ready to be a Democrat? Okay, isn't ready
Speaker 1: to support the Democrats. The toughest question you're both going
Speaker 1: to be answered if you win, which party do you
Speaker 1: caucus with? That you still are going to have to
Speaker 1: make a choice. Right are you voting for Schumer? Are
Speaker 1: you voting for Thune? Right? Are you going to who
Speaker 1: do you organize with? And I'm going to preface this
Speaker 1: with a what a poster friend of mine described if
Speaker 1: it was the campaign, the Evan McMullen campaign against Mike Lee,
Speaker 1: where this poster is convinced that Evan McMullen said, definitively,
Speaker 1: if he wins, he'll vote he is going to vote
Speaker 1: with the Republicans to organize the Senate. That doesn't mean
Speaker 1: he'll vote with Republicans from all these issues, but he
Speaker 1: will vote that. Had he said it, it would have
Speaker 1: been the difference between winning or losing. U Tah's a
Speaker 1: pretty conservative state. So's Idaho. So I'll start with you.
Speaker 1: There's a populism to South Dakota that might might be
Speaker 1: slightly different to me than I think Idaho's electric. But
Speaker 1: I'm willing to be persuaded. But where are you on
Speaker 1: this question?
Speaker 2: Uh?
Speaker 3: Uh?
Speaker 5: Brian and I and Dana Nebraska and Tye in Mississippi.
Speaker 5: We've spent a lot of time talking about this. We
Speaker 5: listen to the root problem in Congress right now is
Speaker 5: the money is the corruption. And you know, we decided
Speaker 5: we're going to we're going to cauc us on our own, right,
Speaker 5: And if you just if you just look through the
Speaker 5: numbers and.
Speaker 1: How did that look? I get it, right? But those
Speaker 1: of us that cover that, you know, what does that mean?
Speaker 1: I think there's power in that person, right. I think
Speaker 1: if you guys, you know, one person can't do this,
Speaker 1: but four of you could, right, four or five of
Speaker 1: you could sort of say, hey, you got to work
Speaker 1: for our support, you know, and maybe if he gives
Speaker 1: me a committee chairmanship, I'll think about it.
Speaker 5: Right, And I think the mental strategies you deny a
Speaker 5: majority to either party. Right, So right now, it's fifty
Speaker 5: three Republicans, forty five Dems and two independents. You know,
Speaker 5: Dems may pick up two. Best case, you know that's
Speaker 5: probably you in a stretch. But you know, if two
Speaker 5: out of four of us win, you know, now you're
Speaker 5: you're forty nine Republicans, forty seven Dems, and four independents, right.
Speaker 3: So there's no majority.
Speaker 5: If all four of us win, it's forty seven, forty
Speaker 5: seven and six, yeah, right, counting counting Sanders and King.
Speaker 1: I might count Markowski in that. I don't think. You know,
Speaker 1: she's sort of in some ways arguably just like Bernie
Speaker 1: and King, which is she's one as an independent but
Speaker 1: caucuses with one side, right, yeah.
Speaker 5: Yeah, And you know I could from a policy standpoint,
Speaker 5: I'm incredibly aligned with Josh Holle, what he's doing around
Speaker 5: big tech, what he's doing on you know, minimum wage
Speaker 5: and other things. You know, I think there's another person
Speaker 5: where you can find some alignment on this thing. But
Speaker 5: the fundamental strategies you deny the majority to either party.
Speaker 5: You know, the independent has become the folk room. We're
Speaker 5: not beholden to these just massive money machines that both
Speaker 5: parties have built up. And then that's how you try
Speaker 5: this reform on campaign finance, on stock trading, on ending
Speaker 5: these revolving doors, all of this stuff to get the
Speaker 5: you know, all of these misincentives out of the out
Speaker 5: of the institution.
Speaker 1: Brian, I think your challenge is slightly greater because one
Speaker 1: thing about small states, they're aware that you need congressional
Speaker 1: leaders to make sure you don't get run over, right,
Speaker 1: And and I'm curious if you think Thune's leadership is
Speaker 1: actually an impediment to your candidacy.
Speaker 2: No, Actually, I would view it more as a benefit
Speaker 2: because when you contrast Senator Thune, who defeated majority leaders
Speaker 2: back in the day to get his seat in the Senate,
Speaker 2: Dashel delivered for South Dakota. So we have roads that
Speaker 2: were funded only because Dashel was there, and a variety
Speaker 2: of other infrastructure projects. So if that's how you judge things,
Speaker 2: then Dashell brought money in. If you look at Thune
Speaker 2: and Rounds now they are literally taking money out. So
Speaker 2: we're losing Medicaid funds, Medicare funds, and this and that
Speaker 2: and the other thing. Infrastructure funding goes away. So the
Speaker 2: point too, If that's the point, then the existence of
Speaker 2: Thune and the silence of Rounds as not advocating for
Speaker 2: things that South Dakota's want because hey, the party says
Speaker 2: we don't want to do this.
Speaker 4: That's not advocating for South Dakotins.
Speaker 2: So I am all on board with the discussion that
Speaker 2: Tie Todd and Dan and we are having about we
Speaker 2: need to change the status quo. The status quo is
Speaker 2: a product of both parties the dysfunction. So if we
Speaker 2: have people that say, I reject both parties, and here's
Speaker 2: what we stand for, the good government reforms and a
Speaker 2: variety of other things that we commonly agree on, and say,
Speaker 2: you are not going to be able to have a majority,
Speaker 2: and you are not going to be able to have
Speaker 2: a majority, but if you want our votes, you have
Speaker 2: to earn it. And we're looking out for the regular
Speaker 2: folks that work for a living. So that is the power.
Speaker 2: That's what we're selling here. I think fundamentally is the disruption,
Speaker 2: entire disruption of how the system is dysfunctional right now
Speaker 2: in the Senate. If you get three four of us
Speaker 2: in there, things have to change because there's no majority
Speaker 2: to do whatever you want to do.
Speaker 1: I like to think there is an appetite for disruption
Speaker 1: or else Barack Obama and Donald Trump wouldn't have been
Speaker 1: president right In some ways, both of their candidacies will
Speaker 1: prepace on the Hey, are you tired of the way
Speaker 1: the system has worked. Let's try something different. And I
Speaker 1: do think it explains each of their initial successes. So
Speaker 1: I buy the disruptive aspect, but it is here's another
Speaker 1: thing that aligns against you, frankly, it aligns against what
Speaker 1: I'm trying to build here. It's the information ecosystem really
Speaker 1: punishes the middle and nuance and independence. Right, it's very
Speaker 1: hard for you to get your message out. So Brian,
Speaker 1: let me start with you. You know, right, the the
Speaker 1: the way algorithms work, right, you either get pushed to
Speaker 1: the left or pushed to the right.
Speaker 3: And it's.
Speaker 1: Is that the biggest impediment you face, almost more than
Speaker 1: it is money or anything else. Is is the way
Speaker 1: the information stream works against the independent candidacies or independent media.
Speaker 2: I would say it doesn't work necessarily against independence only
Speaker 2: it works against all all candidates with out the money
Speaker 2: to just force their way in. Like on my I'm
Speaker 2: going to call it Twitter because that's what was born.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 1: I know I did.
Speaker 2: I get these ads from the super hardcore mega candidate
Speaker 2: for governor and I've canceled them before, but he's forcing
Speaker 2: his ads in front of my eyes.
Speaker 1: Geolocation. I assume right, you're a South Dakotain.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so.
Speaker 2: It's the way to force yourself in. So if you
Speaker 2: have the money, you can get yourself in there. The
Speaker 2: problem is that it takes money to buy getting in
Speaker 2: the information stream. So is it a problem for you
Speaker 2: if you don't have enough money? In twenty two Yeah,
Speaker 2: I was outspent fourteen to one, and I'm told that
Speaker 2: we had ads on TV, you know, right at the
Speaker 2: end when I could afford some, But I never actually
Speaker 2: saw any myself. So can't you know voters didn't They
Speaker 2: fundamentally just did not have any idea who I was
Speaker 2: or what I stood for. But when they heard who
Speaker 2: I was and what I stood for, they liked it.
Speaker 2: They just didn't know. So that is the big problem,
Speaker 2: I would say, And that's why the elections are now
Speaker 2: so expensive, because you have to spend so much to
Speaker 2: get the attention of people.
Speaker 1: What are you trying to do differently this time that
Speaker 1: you did in twenty twenty two.
Speaker 2: Well, I'm trying to have more money, So that's the making.
Speaker 2: But now we've got a different game that we've organized.
Speaker 2: I learned a lot, so and your point about the
Speaker 2: fact that Nuance is lost. I'm a former professor and
Speaker 2: I'm an attorney by training, so I'm very much.
Speaker 1: You live in the gray area. You know how to
Speaker 1: work gray.
Speaker 2: Area details where you make your money. So I want
Speaker 2: to dive into that stuff. But that's my biggest difficulty
Speaker 2: as a candidate is I have to be able to
Speaker 2: shorten it down to a slogan. That is a problem
Speaker 2: for me because I need to talk about the details.
Speaker 2: And so we're using substack to explain policy positions that
Speaker 2: I'm putting out of like, hey, here's this background and
Speaker 2: here's why I think this.
Speaker 4: So when I put it.
Speaker 2: Up on my website where I have like a sentence
Speaker 2: or something, ideally I can have a link to the
Speaker 2: substack that says here's a whole bunch of backstory to this.
Speaker 2: But yeah, fundamentally, we need to be able to afford
Speaker 2: to put it out and force it in front of
Speaker 2: people's eyes because they're going to like what they see.
Speaker 2: I know that already from the twenty two race.
Speaker 1: Todd, how would you describe that challenge? Right? Which is
Speaker 1: just the way the algorithms are aligned against the middle.
Speaker 1: I mean, they're just look, I think this is our problem, right,
Speaker 1: we're all of the incentive I have been channeling the
Speaker 1: Milton Friedman quote, a great Milton Freedman quote that said,
Speaker 1: you can elect all the good people in the world.
Speaker 1: If you don't have good incentive structures, they're not going
Speaker 1: to do the right thing. Bad people will do the
Speaker 1: right thing if you have really good incentives. So there's
Speaker 1: some truth to that. Right, we have terriblest incentive structure,
Speaker 1: and the incentives work against moderation and work against sort
Speaker 1: of if you don't fit into left right paradigm, how
Speaker 1: are you trying to be? Back at this?
Speaker 5: I guess I push back that, you know, being being
Speaker 5: moderate or being in the middle, is it? Is it
Speaker 5: necessarily boring?
Speaker 3: Uh?
Speaker 2: You know?
Speaker 5: I I was inspired by John Hay and.
Speaker 1: I think it's quite interesting because you end up having
Speaker 1: interesting debates in the middle when you're when you're a
Speaker 1: bunch of people you agree with, it's boring, you know.
Speaker 5: But just an example of this. So so in the
Speaker 5: last session of the Idaho legislature, you know, I was
Speaker 5: I was thinking about how to highlight just some of
Speaker 5: these really dumb bills that come across and I was
Speaker 5: sort of inspired by you remember John McCaine used to
Speaker 5: have those pork awards. So there was a dumpster outside
Speaker 5: the Idaho capital and I would do my dumpster bill
Speaker 5: of the week and people love that. And you know,
Speaker 5: it was just thirty seconds. And you know, here are
Speaker 5: the three reasons why this bill is just ridiculous. And
Speaker 5: uh and I got a ton of traffic people coming
Speaker 5: up to me in coffee shops and in restaurants.
Speaker 1: You know, yeah, just we.
Speaker 5: Just uh you know, continued that thing, and uh, you know,
Speaker 5: and these these platforms are are difficult, but with the
Speaker 5: right message targeted in the right way, they can actually
Speaker 5: be used. But honestly, Chuck, I think the fundamental thing
Speaker 5: in the state, like I, I mean, we're only two
Speaker 5: million people, uh, is you got to get out and
Speaker 5: have the conversations and meet with people. And I you know,
Speaker 5: I've been doing a statewide tour. We just wrapped up
Speaker 5: the third leg of this thing. I've done twenty more
Speaker 5: than twenty town halls, traveled all over the state, I mean,
Speaker 5: and just reinforcing what an incredible place Idaho is. But
Speaker 5: this is it. It's these face to face conversations. It's
Speaker 5: it's talking with local reporters and the local weekly paper
Speaker 5: and this is you know, we're building a huge volunteer organization.
Speaker 5: This is how we're going to win in November twenty
Speaker 5: six it's it's face to face, it's conversations.
Speaker 1: Let's talk about the national climate. Brian, Uh, what's your
Speaker 1: what's what's your diagnosis at how we got here where
Speaker 1: political violence is now no longer shocking that it just happens.
Speaker 1: I mean, we may have been surprised that Charlie Kirk
Speaker 1: was killed, but I wasn't shocked that political violence erupted again.
Speaker 1: We've had it all year long. We've had it for
Speaker 1: the last I would argue that we've had a decade
Speaker 1: of escalating violent episodes. January sixth We can rattle them off,
Speaker 1: and you can, and they're sadly pretty bipartisan. How do
Speaker 1: you think we got here?
Speaker 2: Well, which you were just talking about information. So we
Speaker 2: live in information silos where the logarithm pushes you to, Hey,
Speaker 2: you like that one, so you like this one. Oh,
Speaker 2: here's another one that you'll like and you didn't like
Speaker 2: these other things, so you're not going to hear anything
Speaker 2: from the other side. So it by design functions that way,
Speaker 2: and we get the anger and fear motivates people. So
Speaker 2: that's where we are. And not to dismiss the fact
Speaker 2: that we've had increasing not political violence, but increasing violence
Speaker 2: with guns over the last you know, several decades, but fundamentally,
Speaker 2: democracy is supposed to be a pressure relief valve for
Speaker 2: these conflicts, for these arguments that we're having. And if
Speaker 2: we think that democracy isn't working, which is one of
Speaker 2: the things that I believe that it's the system is
Speaker 2: corrupted by money, principally to serve some aspect of society
Speaker 2: and leave the rest of us down here fighting for scraps.
Speaker 2: When we're fighting for scraps. You know, if you think
Speaker 2: about a pack of dogs that are hungry, they fight
Speaker 2: each other for things, and that's what we're seeing. If
Speaker 2: we can fix democracy, I think we can fix the
Speaker 2: prospect of political violence and minimize it. If you can
Speaker 2: just vote and say, hey, I disagree with you, here's
Speaker 2: my vote, and it actually matters.
Speaker 1: Brian, what do you do with the following voter? Because
Speaker 1: I ran into this in twenty four you know, which
Speaker 1: is the voter that says, yeah, I'm concerned about the democracy,
Speaker 1: but I got to make ends meet first. What do
Speaker 1: you say to that voter who says I will get Yeah,
Speaker 1: I agree with you on democracy, but that feels like
Speaker 1: a that's something I'm gonna worry about down the road.
Speaker 1: In the meantime, I got to figure out healthcare, I.
Speaker 2: Would say those that's the same question. You've just highlighted
Speaker 2: the same thing. Why do you have that? Why is
Speaker 2: our healthcare so expensive? Why do we pay the highest
Speaker 2: per capital colls in the world, because the system rewards that.
Speaker 2: If you look at who the donors are for the
Speaker 2: Blue Cross Blue Shield, who they given money to, it's
Speaker 2: kind of split down the middle between the Democrats and Republicans.
Speaker 1: Yeah, what if I tell you right, I just want
Speaker 1: to keep it well right.
Speaker 2: The money has corrupted the system. And if you have
Speaker 2: the politicians that are beholden to who wrote me the
Speaker 2: biggest check. And I felt this pressure in twenty two
Speaker 2: of if I got a large check, if somebody maxed
Speaker 2: out to me, then the next time they call, I'm
Speaker 2: taking the call. Just because that's how the system works.
Speaker 2: I'm doing a different approach time. So the bolt my
Speaker 2: average contribution for the first quarter that I was in
Speaker 2: was twenty one dollars, and if you contrast that with
Speaker 2: Mike Rounds, he had two hundred large dollar contributors and
Speaker 2: he had eighty seven percent of his funds came from
Speaker 2: two hundred packs and the big money individuals. So the
Speaker 2: way we do politics and the fact that this is
Speaker 2: allowed and the Supreme Court says, oh no, there's no
Speaker 2: problem with you know, given money, you should have more
Speaker 2: money in politics. This is the problem. Why are things
Speaker 2: bad for you? Why is healthcare so expensive because of politics?
Speaker 2: Why is there inflation that's not being addressed because of politics? This,
Speaker 2: this is the issue. It's the same thing. We need
Speaker 2: to fix democracy to make it work.
Speaker 1: Look, I don't disagree with you with your resc The
Speaker 1: problem is voters. I mean, I want to get to
Speaker 1: the campaign finance thing a little bit, but in a minute,
Speaker 1: because it is one of the great conundrums when when
Speaker 1: you present voters with the data that you just present
Speaker 1: that they agree You're right. This system is messed up.
Speaker 1: But it has been really hard to make campaign finance
Speaker 1: a voting issue, right the way people will vote on
Speaker 1: gun rights. They don't seem to vote on this on
Speaker 1: this issue with that same fervor. But I'm going to
Speaker 1: put a pin in that because Todd, I'm curious where
Speaker 1: you are in the climate issue. Yeah, I mean from
Speaker 1: the Charlie Kirk situation and this. Look, there's a race
Speaker 1: to blame, right and I can already feel it right
Speaker 1: each side. It's yeah, budding, Yeah, we have our crazies,
Speaker 1: but they're worse. And you're like, that's not how we get.
Speaker 3: Out of this.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, I mean it's it's wrong because political and
Speaker 5: violence is wrong. Charlie was exercising against first and themment
Speaker 5: and not heiden, you know, or pounding away on a keyboard.
Speaker 5: He was there in these groups having these conversations. He
Speaker 5: was doing exactly what we what we need.
Speaker 1: He said that, we said, this is how you're supposed
Speaker 1: to conduct politics, which is you go out there and
Speaker 1: make your case. You know, whether you may not like
Speaker 1: the cases making, but that's how you're supposed to do it,
Speaker 1: not you know, not rig the system. And he wasn't
Speaker 1: you know, trying to do that.
Speaker 5: That's that's exactly it. And you know, so much of
Speaker 5: this is where we're spending you know, where Americans are
Speaker 5: spending their hours during the day on these platforms with
Speaker 5: these you know, algorithms that are driving outrage because that's
Speaker 5: where the profit is, right, Uh, And I think just
Speaker 5: you connecting, connecting these these economic issues, these reform issues.
Speaker 5: I mean one of the things I've I've really been
Speaker 5: highlighting on. And you know, I spent twenty years on
Speaker 5: the tech sector, working for you know, T Mobile and
Speaker 5: Hewlett Packard through the biggest companies in the US, and
Speaker 5: you just see these these outrageously bad corporate practices going on.
Speaker 5: And you know, I was driving back from me sir
Speaker 5: in Idaho a couple of weeks ago, stopped off at
Speaker 5: a Sinclair station to gas up. You know, one woman
Speaker 5: about my age running the convenience store late at night.
Speaker 5: She was working until midnight. You know, she makes eighteen
Speaker 5: bucks an hour in a part of Idaho where you
Speaker 5: need twenty three just to live, no healthcare. And Sinclair,
Speaker 5: if you look at their twenty twenty four financials, twenty
Speaker 5: nine billion dollars of revenue, a billion dollars of operating income,
Speaker 5: and what do they do with that operating income? It
Speaker 5: didn't go back to their employees and went to their
Speaker 5: freaking and institutional investors in the form of dividends and
Speaker 5: share buybacks. Right, that's the kind of stuff that makes
Speaker 5: a difference in these lives. Walmart's the same thing. Walmart's
Speaker 5: the largest private employer in the state. And guess when
Speaker 5: you talk to Idahoans wore in the Medicaid expansion program, right,
Speaker 5: they have jobs, but not enough to qualify for the
Speaker 5: health exchange. The number one employer of the eighty thousand
Speaker 5: Idahoans in the Health Exchange or sorry, Medicaid expansion is Walmart,
Speaker 5: followed by McDonald's, followed by Amazon. Right, I mean it's
Speaker 5: these and Walmart did close to three billion dollars to
Speaker 5: share buybacks last year. That's about two thousand dollars for
Speaker 5: every one of their US employees. I mean, this kind
Speaker 5: of stuff is just fundamentally un acceptable that we allow
Speaker 5: corporations to push their costs onto taxpayers and the particularly
Speaker 5: in a you know, in a small state like Idaho,
Speaker 5: where Walmart does three billion dollars of revenue in the state.
Speaker 5: You know, this is the kind of stuff that guys
Speaker 5: like Jim Risch, they just chipped away at these guardrails
Speaker 5: we've had on what's acceptable in the private sector over
Speaker 5: the last decade or two, and now we just got
Speaker 5: this where folks are running amok and you've got. You know, basically,
Speaker 5: sixty percent of Idahoes aren't earning a livable wage of
Speaker 5: the state chuck. And that's just flat fricking wrong, right,
Speaker 5: we cannot tolerate that.
Speaker 1: And how many of those folks just and and look,
Speaker 1: this gets at to where the issues that the economic
Speaker 1: populist issues are popular. But the this is where the
Speaker 1: culture sort of gets in the way of the conversation,
Speaker 1: doesn't it.
Speaker 5: And this is why as an independent I can have
Speaker 5: a conversation with these folks in a way I never
Speaker 5: could as a debt and you know, all the corruption
Speaker 5: the dem Party, what happened with you know, Biden running
Speaker 5: a can and handing it over to Harris. I mean
Speaker 5: that was all. That was all just that was all unacceptable.
Speaker 5: But you know, I tell you I was in a
Speaker 5: rural community up in the mountains in the Idaho Panhandle
Speaker 5: hanging out with the vets for coffee, and one of
Speaker 5: them came up to me afterwards and he said, you
Speaker 5: know what, I'm an extreme conservative, Like, all right, cool man,
Speaker 5: what does that mean? Oh? He had a great conversation,
Speaker 5: you know, and he's he is deeply concerned about the
Speaker 5: national debt. I'm like, man, I'm right there with you.
Speaker 5: That has to be a bright d lot. We can't
Speaker 5: grow this thing. And then as we talked about it
Speaker 5: some more, you know, the guy had a heart attack
Speaker 5: six months ago in that little rural hospital in this
Speaker 5: town that is just barely keeping their doors open right now,
Speaker 5: saved his life. And with the one big beautiful bill
Speaker 5: and the Medicaid cuts that are going to come out
Speaker 5: of that, And I sat down with that hospital CEO,
Speaker 5: He's like, I don't know how we're going to keep
Speaker 5: the doors open out to this. I mean, this is
Speaker 5: the kind of stuff where what the hell are you know?
Speaker 5: We've got two of the most powerful senators out of
Speaker 5: the hundred and Idahope, the state is punching way above
Speaker 5: its weight in terms of influence in the Senate. And
Speaker 5: what the hell do we get?
Speaker 3: What do you get get?
Speaker 1: What do you get in return? Interesting, Brian, Let's go
Speaker 1: back to the issue of campaign finances, because you know
Speaker 1: everything you say is true and in fact, you know,
Speaker 1: I've been hawking a book at a friend of mine
Speaker 1: wrote with its brother Mullin's brothers, and it was the
Speaker 1: basically the Wolf of Case, the Wolves of k Street.
Speaker 1: It's called and it's sort of how how did we
Speaker 1: go from essentially, you know, the rise of lobbyists, which
Speaker 1: really didn't exist in the sixties and seventies. It just
Speaker 1: sort of began sort of, you know, the rise of
Speaker 1: Ralph Nader got Corporate America to say, hey, we got
Speaker 1: a response to this, and lo and behold, we got
Speaker 1: K Street and it's a very professionalized thing. And now
Speaker 1: we have it where it's no longer used to be
Speaker 1: a corporate entity versus a people powered entity. Now it
Speaker 1: is literally one corporate entity hiring one set of lobbyists
Speaker 1: to fight for a certain regulation that helps their business
Speaker 1: and screws their competitor, and another setup like we now
Speaker 1: have K Street is just arguing about who's splitting up
Speaker 1: this piece of pie that never trickles down to the
Speaker 1: rest of us. Like you know, I used to sort
Speaker 1: of be like, well, the system's the system, blah blah blah.
Speaker 1: Now you're just like, we've sort of it's become too
Speaker 1: efficient where now you need lobbyists to decide who gets
Speaker 1: to get to rig the regulatory process. But it's always
Speaker 1: been a challenge to get the public fired up about money.
Speaker 1: And you know, you know, have you what are different
Speaker 1: ways you've thought of trying to send this message. I mean,
Speaker 1: you've been using it with me here tonight, Brian, But
Speaker 1: what other thoughts of you tried to get the public
Speaker 1: to sort of be a bit more self aware about
Speaker 1: corporate influence.
Speaker 2: That was actually one of the things of the when
Speaker 2: I mentioned, hey, I'm going to guarantee will agree on
Speaker 2: the least two, but probably three things. Money in politics
Speaker 2: corrupts the system. Everybody literally one hundred percent across the
Speaker 2: board agreement about it.
Speaker 1: Yes, everybody's that's true, right, Yeah, they notice, right.
Speaker 2: People have the elected officials wearing NASCAR jackets with patches
Speaker 2: of who they actually.
Speaker 5: Yeah, why not?
Speaker 1: It might help, uh talking.
Speaker 2: To people about everybody knows it from top to bottom.
Speaker 2: But I think the what got in the way again
Speaker 2: I'm going to say, was the fact of I'll never
Speaker 2: vote for a Democrat. We can have this discussion as
Speaker 2: an independent and not deal with the I'll never vote
Speaker 2: for a Democrat. And so if I walk up to
Speaker 2: people and say the same thing today and say well
Speaker 2: I'm running as an independent, I still have them, I
Speaker 2: still have their attention. So if we can tie this
Speaker 2: all back to why is healthcare so expensive. Well, hey,
Speaker 2: look at the system. Let's look at who gives money to.
Speaker 2: Who are they going to you know, stop that gravy train. No,
Speaker 2: So if we can tie it back directly to why
Speaker 2: is this so expensive?
Speaker 5: Why is that?
Speaker 4: What is the problem here?
Speaker 2: Everybody implicitly knows that already.
Speaker 1: You know, my first year professionally covering politics was nineteen
Speaker 1: ninety two, and that's the rise of Ross Perot. And
Speaker 1: I bring him up because Ross Parot that we used
Speaker 1: to describe it as a crescent moon, and that he
Speaker 1: over performed in states that kind of formed a crescent moon.
Speaker 1: It was sort of Texas that was like the bottom
Speaker 1: of the crescent, and the right up through Minnesota right
Speaker 1: to the Great Lakes was sort of the top of
Speaker 1: the crescent, and it went all along and he was
Speaker 1: over nineteen percent basically in all of those states. He
Speaker 1: did really pour in the Deep South, did okay? In
Speaker 1: New England, Atlantic not so much. But really, look was
Speaker 1: in the mid twenties and both Idaho and South Dakota.
Speaker 1: I just double checked that twenty seven percent in Idaho
Speaker 1: and ninety two to twenty six percent in South Dakota.
Speaker 1: Do you think those voters still exist. Todd, I'll start
Speaker 1: with you, because that is five years ago.
Speaker 5: Yeah, but I think it's I do think they do,
Speaker 5: because again going back to the numbers that I was
Speaker 5: just talking about, right, seventy percent on affiliate with the
Speaker 5: party in twenty twelve, So that's not that long ago.
Speaker 1: Oh way, par O came within one point of being
Speaker 1: in second place in the state above above Bill Clinton
Speaker 1: at the time.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and uh and sixty five percent of Idahoa is
Speaker 5: just you know this survey this year identifying as independent
Speaker 5: or Leana Inde Pennant. So so the values are there,
Speaker 5: and you know, I think a lot like you know,
Speaker 5: with Brian and our part of the world here.
Speaker 3: I mean, you don't you.
Speaker 5: Live in these states because you want to define yourself.
Speaker 5: Nobody's the boss of you, and those values are I
Speaker 5: think those values are timeless. That's that's why folks come here.
Speaker 1: Brian, the independent mantra, what is a way how do
Speaker 1: you make the case that you're going to at times
Speaker 1: represent you know, the Republican lean of the state and
Speaker 1: at times the independent lean of the state. How do
Speaker 1: you divvy that up?
Speaker 2: Okay, well, obviously one of the things that I've told
Speaker 2: people is I'm running as independent because I like to
Speaker 2: think for myself, which has always been true as a
Speaker 2: lifelong registered independent. The best question I think is how
Speaker 2: do I differ from both parties? How am I going
Speaker 2: to represent both parties? So if we take immigration, that
Speaker 2: has been I would say, probably the hottest issue electoral issue,
Speaker 2: at least in twenty four and for years before that
Speaker 2: as well. It's one of the big ones. So the
Speaker 2: last comprehensive immigration reform was the same year that Maverick
Speaker 2: and Goose first felt the need for speed. Do you
Speaker 2: know what year that wasn't? Yes, we're going back to
Speaker 2: eighty seven, eighty eight.
Speaker 4: Eighty six, eighty six, Yeah, year I get my driver's license.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So eighty six was the last big one, and
Speaker 2: you know top Don was on the screens today. Pragmatic
Speaker 2: reform requires two parts, the first one being strong border
Speaker 2: security and the second one being overhaul of the legal
Speaker 2: immigration system. I believe to allow more people, more immigrants
Speaker 2: in and to streamline the path to citizenship to make
Speaker 2: it easier and you know, something that can be accomplished
Speaker 2: with the reasonab amount of time. Now, I support both
Speaker 2: of those components, which is not the position of either
Speaker 2: the Democratic or the Republican Party for different reasons. Republicans
Speaker 2: obviously support sealing the border, that's what they're they're trying
Speaker 2: to do now, and they impose apparently improving the legal
Speaker 2: immigration process, while Democrats support improving the legal immigration process,
Speaker 2: but they balk at stronger border security. So if we
Speaker 2: look back, President Biden's first bill when he took office
Speaker 2: was immigration reform, and the Democrats controlled both the Senate
Speaker 2: and the House. Yet you heard crickets for the first
Speaker 2: two years because the Democrats couldn't agree on border security
Speaker 2: until they finally had to late, you know, running up
Speaker 2: to the election. Without a united position, why are they
Speaker 2: going to go talk to the Republicans about, like, Hey,
Speaker 2: here's what we're working on. Do you want to sign
Speaker 2: on board to this? So they let it go. So
Speaker 2: that would be one of the ways. I'm a pragmatic person.
Speaker 2: I look at things. I'm trained this way as attorney,
Speaker 2: I'm trained this way as an Air Force officer. You
Speaker 2: look at things and say, hey, that didn't go the
Speaker 2: way we wanted or we're having this outcome, how can
Speaker 2: we tweak things to make it work properly? And if
Speaker 2: there's a Republican plan that does that, I'm on board.
Speaker 2: If there's a democratic plan that I think does it,
Speaker 2: I'm on board. So it's an issue by issue thing
Speaker 2: of what is going to work. And I'm going to
Speaker 2: stay right now after forty years, I believe the trickle
Speaker 2: down economics horse and sparrow economics, if you will, doesn't work.
Speaker 2: So despite our efforts to keep cutting our taxes for
Speaker 2: the billionaires and the large corporations to make us wealthy
Speaker 2: and to pay down the debt, that's not working. So
Speaker 2: things need to change.
Speaker 1: Tom. One of the things that it's already been disappointing
Speaker 1: in the wake of the Charlie kirk and assassination and
Speaker 1: the assassination of the Minnesota lawmakers, is that the only
Speaker 1: complaints you here in Capitol Hill or what about security
Speaker 1: for me? Right, rather than hey, maybe we ought to
Speaker 1: do a special committee here of some of our best
Speaker 1: and brightest minds and figure out how can we de
Speaker 1: escalate and actually, you know, build a better discourse. That
Speaker 1: the two parties don't know how to work with each
Speaker 1: other anymore in a horrendous way. And I think which
Speaker 1: I guess it's yeah, yeah, And I think Chuck it's
Speaker 1: it's it's baked in them system.
Speaker 5: That's part of the incentive, right.
Speaker 3: You you make more money when.
Speaker 5: You say outrageous things on the floor, outrageous things in committee,
Speaker 5: and you feed that outrage economy, and that feeds the
Speaker 5: donor cycle. You know, when I when I'm I got
Speaker 5: a pointed two sessions ago by by Governor little Uh
Speaker 5: and I you know, I showed up halfway through the
Speaker 5: session and I talked to my Republican colleagues and they're like, hey,
Speaker 5: don't even bother. I'm sorry, my Democratic College, don't even
Speaker 5: bother talking to that that kind of third of the room.
Speaker 5: You know, you're not going to get anywhere with them.
Speaker 3: They're they're far riders.
Speaker 5: I'm like, all right, well you've been here six years.
Speaker 3: I've been here six days. Fine.
Speaker 5: But last session, after I won my race, I made
Speaker 5: a point of just connecting with every single member of
Speaker 5: the chamber, finding those points of commonality, Chuck, I was
Speaker 5: so much more effective in that building by having those relationships,
Speaker 5: and you never knew where I mean, listen, I I
Speaker 5: would argue like hell with somebody about marriage equality, and
Speaker 5: you know, there was this far right effort overturn you know,
Speaker 5: a letter passed by the legislature calling for us to
Speaker 5: overturn our burgfelt and I fought that thing tooth and nail.
Speaker 5: And the person who was a sponsor of that, guess what,
Speaker 5: she dislikes monopoly power as much as I do, and
Speaker 5: so she co sponsored and some others did my build
Speaker 5: up prohibit algorithm price fixing. So and I caught a
Speaker 5: lot of crap from from Democrats in the state for
Speaker 5: even you know, for working with this woman. But like, guys,
Speaker 5: guess what, These purity tests are the reason why you're
Speaker 5: irrelevant in the state. Right, find these points of commonality.
Speaker 5: You don't have to agree on one hundred percent. But
Speaker 5: you know, I'm trying to save Idaho renters who are
Speaker 5: being taken advantage of. And there are other people that
Speaker 5: want to work.
Speaker 3: With me on that.
Speaker 5: I'll do that all day long. And we protected absentee voting,
Speaker 5: We protected citizen initiatives, we killed a bad bill to put,
Speaker 5: you know, make it easier to carry guns and schools.
Speaker 5: I did all of these things on a bipartisan basis.
Speaker 5: And that's what you got to bring you the chamber,
Speaker 5: and it's and I you know, I'll echo Brian here,
Speaker 5: it's these financial incentives that are just sending the chamber
Speaker 5: in the wrong direction, and we got to break those
Speaker 5: financial incentives. I think that's the that's the root issue.
Speaker 1: All right, let me get you guys out of here
Speaker 1: on sort of it's a little bit of a cheap stunt,
Speaker 1: but it's a it does I think. I think listeners
Speaker 1: like these things because it does help them paint a
Speaker 1: picture of you guys. So, Brian, I'll start with you.
Speaker 1: Give me give me two senators you look forward to
Speaker 1: working with if you get elected, and then give me Yeah,
Speaker 1: just let me start there, and then I got one
Speaker 1: more for both of you too, But go ahead, give
Speaker 1: me give me a couple of senators you're looking forward
Speaker 1: to working with if you get there.
Speaker 2: Uh, Bernie Sanders comes to mind immediately, and I would
Speaker 2: have said John Fetterman when he was first elected, but
Speaker 2: I would not say him.
Speaker 3: Now. Let's see, all right, you're stopped.
Speaker 2: I'm stuck because I'm gonna have to say Republican to
Speaker 2: be balanced here, or I could just cheap out and
Speaker 2: go angus king.
Speaker 1: There here. I hear you, all right, Todd, same question.
Speaker 1: You got what I'll do, Brian I'll make him answer
Speaker 1: the other question I have for you first, so that
Speaker 1: way you get you get a second. So, Todd, what's
Speaker 1: your give me your two senators.
Speaker 5: That you're looking for, Elizabeth Warren and Josh Holly.
Speaker 1: Okay, all right, you dropped the Holly name, so I
Speaker 1: figured figure to get there. Look, Holly and Shats are
Speaker 1: working together on quite a few of the kids first issues.
Speaker 1: When it comes to tech algorithms, you know, there's there's
Speaker 1: no doubt. All right, So you get to answer this
Speaker 1: next question, Tod, give me your favorite Democratic president and
Speaker 1: your favorite Republican president.
Speaker 5: Favorite Republican President Eisenhower, m favorite Democratic President FDR.
Speaker 1: All right, uh, mister Banks, same question to you.
Speaker 4: I'm gonna favor yeah, the power for sure.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And I'm torn between the Roosevelts, Teddy Roosevelt and FDR.
Speaker 2: I'm going to go with tr for a personal reason
Speaker 2: that I'll debut here, and just because you know, he's
Speaker 2: so connected to this area of South Dakota and what
Speaker 2: he stands for with.
Speaker 1: This North Dakota wanting his library there, fighting gets a
Speaker 1: battle between the Dakotas. Who gets tr right, you know?
Speaker 3: But but on a.
Speaker 2: Fun fact, I learned last year that TR is a distant,
Speaker 2: distant cousin on my mother's side, So that's just a
Speaker 2: cool thing.
Speaker 1: To So you're related to TR but not FDR. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Robert Lee different brands of the Eleanor side, Right, Eleanor
Speaker 1: was closer to TR than Yeah.
Speaker 4: Yes, exactly.
Speaker 2: So, uh, that's what the genealogy things that you're in
Speaker 2: go like, hey, you might be related to these individuals.
Speaker 2: And they said you might lose FDR. And then I
Speaker 2: looked I was like, no, it's it's Roosevelt. Then that
Speaker 2: occurred to me, Well, if I'm alledged to Eleanor Roosevelt,
Speaker 2: I'm ready.
Speaker 4: So yeah, that's the wind.
Speaker 1: Well, you guys should also know this. Later this week
Speaker 1: is the anniversary of a farewell address by our truly
Speaker 1: only independent president we've ever had, and it's George Washington,
Speaker 1: who absolutely eviscerates partisan politics in his farewell address. And
Speaker 1: I will say, I'm I'm not surprised you both picked Eisenhower.
Speaker 1: I look at Eisenhower. He's the closest thing we've ever
Speaker 1: had to an independent being elected president, especially since both
Speaker 1: parties were recruiting him. And to me, Washington and Eisenhower
Speaker 1: sort of the are the are the North Stars for
Speaker 1: me in that sense too, And it's because when you've
Speaker 1: had to lead Americans in battle, then you see everybody
Speaker 1: as an American before you see him as a as
Speaker 1: a Republican or a Democrat. Anyway, Well, you guys go ahead.
Speaker 5: Sorry, sorry, Chuck, I was just gonna say one comedy,
Speaker 5: you know again, the with the four of us with Brian, Tye, Dan,
Speaker 5: and me. I mean, we we all served, right, we
Speaker 5: were all probably eighteen or nineteen when we when we
Speaker 5: took the oath.
Speaker 1: You guys are all veterans, right, you guys have all
Speaker 1: were as that doesn't you know what I mean that
Speaker 1: somebody coming from the military being an independent makes a
Speaker 1: lot more sense to me than being a partisan.
Speaker 5: Yeah, And I think for me, what I when we
Speaker 5: get on the phone together, Uh, it's great. I mean,
Speaker 5: I we're completing each other's sentences in terms of why
Speaker 5: we're doing this and what we're trying to accomplish. Although
Speaker 5: we've got totally different backgrounds, right. You know, Brian's an attorney.
Speaker 5: He taught at the Air Force Academy. You know, I
Speaker 5: spent twenty years on a tech sector and I teach
Speaker 5: public policy now. But uh, it's it's those core values
Speaker 5: right that that I think we're all driving towards. And
Speaker 5: you know, I was a tank commander, right, There's four
Speaker 5: guys inside of a tank and if we can't along,
Speaker 5: we're dead, right. I mean, it's very simple.
Speaker 1: Get me fighting over who's right about about you know,
Speaker 1: gun ownership when you're in the middle of a battle exactly.
Speaker 5: I mean, like we all learned in the military, You've
Speaker 5: got a random bunch of people all thrown together, uh,
Speaker 5: and you got a mission to do, and you just
Speaker 5: you figure out how to do it. And those are
Speaker 5: the values I think we're trying to bring bring back
Speaker 5: to this bring back to Congress.
Speaker 1: Brian, are you a Jack Rabbits fan South Dakota side.
Speaker 1: I love Tucker Kraba Packer fans. So Tucker Craft man,
Speaker 1: we just love this guy. We love this guy.
Speaker 2: I can't really comment on that because that would not
Speaker 2: be good for me. I'll just say that I originally
Speaker 2: I'm from Iowa originally, so I went to Iowa State
Speaker 2: in Iowa, Ah and then on those things.
Speaker 1: No you can't, I got you there and Todd but
Speaker 1: Boise State, man, you know, how did the University of
Speaker 1: Idaho allow Boise State to become the power in football
Speaker 1: in that state.
Speaker 5: This is the this is the difference between North Idaho
Speaker 5: and Sunnadaho. But oh, interesting, it's too bad genty. We
Speaker 5: don't have genty anymore. And boiss day and he was incredible, buddy.
Speaker 5: It looks like he's going to have a good career
Speaker 5: with the Raiders.
Speaker 1: It's a he's he is fun to watch. That is
Speaker 1: old school football. Look, Brian and Todd, I I hope
Speaker 1: to talk to you guys again. I mean, look, there's
Speaker 1: not you know, we need to disrupt the duopoly is
Speaker 1: what got us to this place. I am you know, Look,
Speaker 1: we've got a lot of problems. The duopoly is pretty
Speaker 1: much number I think the tech companies are number one
Speaker 1: and the duopoly is number two. But if you want
Speaker 1: to argue the other way, I wouldn't dissuade you. So
Speaker 1: good luck out there. I'll be watching, paying attention, and
Speaker 1: hopefully more more independent voices show up as well. So
Speaker 1: thank you, guys, would be good.
Speaker 3: Thank you. I appreciate it.
Speaker 1: All right. I hope you enjoyed that interview with those
Speaker 1: two independent candidates. So and in fact, my top five
Speaker 1: lists this week is on independence, and it's my top
Speaker 1: five list of states most likely to elect an independent
Speaker 1: to the Senate to.
Speaker 2: Top five top jest top.
Speaker 1: Some of it is going to be based on history,
Speaker 1: some of it is going to be based on, you know,
Speaker 1: the electorate and just sort of how you know, do
Speaker 1: you have an electorate that thinks that is very partisan,
Speaker 1: Like you know, you take state of North Carolina, which
Speaker 1: is a very evenly divided state, but it's it's sort
Speaker 1: of divided by polls. It's a polarized electorate. It is
Speaker 1: basically forty five or forty five d in a very
Speaker 1: small size of independence versus a place like a lack
Speaker 1: Asca which is sort of filled with sort of this
Speaker 1: sort of independent you know, little left, little right, little libertarian,
Speaker 1: little of this. And it's just a more fluid electorate
Speaker 1: as it's not as partisan, it's not as hardcore. So
Speaker 1: my top five list of states most likely they elect
Speaker 1: an independent to the Senate, well, obviously I got to
Speaker 1: start with two states that have done it. I don't
Speaker 1: count Bernie Sanders in this one, I know, although Vermont
Speaker 1: has arguably had two independent one that was independent that
Speaker 1: caucused with Republicans. Still he switched parties and caucus with
Speaker 1: Democrats and Jim Jeffords and then you had Bernie. But
Speaker 1: in some ways I don't put Vermont there anymore. I
Speaker 1: think it's decidedly I think it's going to be very
Speaker 1: difficult for somebody. You can get elected as an independent
Speaker 1: if you're further to the left of the Democratic Party,
Speaker 1: but I don't know if you can do that, you know,
Speaker 1: from the other way. So look, I think you have
Speaker 1: to put Alaska in Maine is one and two because
Speaker 1: they've done it, and there's their electorates are fluid enough
Speaker 1: that it's supportive. They've elected independence for governor, right, and
Speaker 1: I think that that is, you know, these are the
Speaker 1: states that are most ripe for non major party candidates
Speaker 1: to have some success. Alaska and Maine obviously are too.
Speaker 1: The next state on my list, number three is Minnesota,
Speaker 1: And in fact, you could argue now that if you're
Speaker 1: right of center in Minnesota and this is going to
Speaker 1: actually get I got some interesting feedback about my battleground
Speaker 1: state list and a little bit of pushback of having
Speaker 1: Minnesota ranked higher than New Hampshire of states on the
Speaker 1: Republican side most likely to make it into the battleground
Speaker 1: right blue states that Republicans might be able to contest.
Speaker 1: And the argument is that while Minnesota is always very close,
Speaker 1: Republicans never seem to be able to, you know, to
Speaker 1: crack the code. That in twenty fourteen, for instance, Al
Speaker 1: Frankin's reelection year, he won ten points and that was
Speaker 1: a great Republican year. So I Republicans couldn't make Franklin
Speaker 1: sweat in twenty fourteen. Then the argument goes that this
Speaker 1: is a this is a much harder state. You know
Speaker 1: that there's a hard ceiling on the Republicans, and I
Speaker 1: you know, it's an old hotline buddy that was pushing
Speaker 1: back on me. And I think my buddy Quinn is right. Quinn,
Speaker 1: I'm throwing I'm giving I'm throwing you at this bone.
Speaker 1: I do agree New Hampshire probably it should be New
Speaker 1: Hampshire over Minnesota. I still think there's an opportunity there
Speaker 1: in Minnesota. But I think you're right. I think the
Speaker 1: track record of New Hampshire recently they just elected a
Speaker 1: Republican governor. It's been a long time since Minnesota's elected
Speaker 1: a statewide Republican has been at least over a decade.
Speaker 1: I think, I think you make a compelling case at
Speaker 1: New Hampshire should be ranked higher than Minnesota. So Alaska one,
Speaker 1: Main two, Minnesota three, and my next two are sun
Speaker 1: Belt states. Arizona, who arguably had a couple of independent
Speaker 1: acting senators even though they didn't get elected as independents,
Speaker 1: and John McCain and Kirsten Cinema. And there's something about
Speaker 1: it's electorate, right, there's a there's a there's a it's
Speaker 1: a state that has a huge independent voter registration. And
Speaker 1: when you're a transient state, right that where a majority
Speaker 1: of the voters weren't born in that state, that means
Speaker 1: you don't have as strong a ties on partisanship as much.
Speaker 1: And I think, and so we should give away what
Speaker 1: my number five state is of a chance electing independent.
Speaker 1: That's Florida. Florida also is a huge growing no party
Speaker 1: UH registration vote, and I think the opportunity and ballot
Speaker 1: access isn't very difficult. Ditto in Arizona. That also matters here, right,
Speaker 1: how difficult is ballot access to get on there? You know,
Speaker 1: Texas is extraordinarily hard to run as an independent, And
Speaker 1: even though you in theory. Texas is the type of
Speaker 1: electorate that maybe could be supportive of it. I'm skeptical
Speaker 1: of it. So my top five this week, top five
Speaker 1: states most likely with electorates it would be open to
Speaker 1: electing an independent. And you could actually picture it happening.
Speaker 1: Two places they've already happened Alaska in Maine right with
Speaker 1: Lisa Murkowski and and Angus King both did get elected
Speaker 1: as independents. Now they caut us with one side or
Speaker 1: the other, but they're I think, and they both have
Speaker 1: elected independent governors, So I think there is a tradition there. Minnesota, right,
Speaker 1: they've they've had some you know, this is a party
Speaker 1: that even the Democratic Party is not named. It's the
Speaker 1: Democratic Farm Labor Party. It was a coalition party. There
Speaker 1: used to be the Farm Labor and then the Democrats
Speaker 1: and they merged. And in fact that back in the
Speaker 1: day the Minnesota Republican Party was referred to as the
Speaker 1: Independent Republican Party. There was almost an over emphasis on
Speaker 1: the word independent and less so unrepublican. So Minnesota number three,
Speaker 1: number four, Arizona, and number five Florida. Other states that
Speaker 1: I contemplated Nebraska, I do think the fact that they
Speaker 1: have a unit cameral legislature where you do not run
Speaker 1: or hold office by party. Does create an electorate that
Speaker 1: is comfortable with candidates for office that don't associate with
Speaker 1: a major party. The fact that their unit camera legislature
Speaker 1: works that way, I think does. I think it does
Speaker 1: help explain why Osborne, Dan Osborne, who's running again, has
Speaker 1: gotten into the forties. On that front, Kansas, I think
Speaker 1: there's something there. I think the Democratic brand is probably
Speaker 1: not quite strong enough to elect a senator, but an
Speaker 1: independent that leaned to the left but had a few
Speaker 1: things that were appealing to right leaning independence, you could
Speaker 1: see it. I put Idaho, South Dakota down here as well,
Speaker 1: because we're going to find out, right, I do think
Speaker 1: you're going to have a little better in general running
Speaker 1: again against the two major parties, as there's usually a
Speaker 1: bit more of an appetite for it out west than
Speaker 1: there is out east here, particularly in some of the
Speaker 1: in some of the states that have been around a
Speaker 1: while that have of you know that have that have
Speaker 1: certainly have very very very strong state and local political parties.
Speaker 1: All Right, so there's my top five lists. With that,
Speaker 1: Let's do a few questions.
Speaker 5: Ask Chuck.
Speaker 1: All right. First question comes from Greg al and he writes,
Speaker 1: thanks for the show. I want to ask about your
Speaker 1: call for a politician to run as a uniter. It's
Speaker 1: what the country needs, but is it possible as a
Speaker 1: moderate who has voted for both parties less presidential Canada.
Speaker 1: I recall running as a uniter is President Obama, who
Speaker 1: came to prominence with his unifying One America speech back
Speaker 1: in two thousand and four. However, we call family members
Speaker 1: who perceived Obama as a divisive radical who hated capitalists
Speaker 1: and Americans. In the Obama years, I also noticed that
Speaker 1: compromise and unity were tough promises to deliver on. Even
Speaker 1: if a politician followed through with concessions, the opposing party
Speaker 1: could force failure by refusing to cooperate, even when offered
Speaker 1: policies they previously supported. I hope you can share some optimism. Well, look,
Speaker 1: I mean this is why I don't think either either party.
Speaker 1: I think this has to this almost has to be
Speaker 1: a pirate type of situation where you just sort of
Speaker 1: where you have an independent that calls time out. You know,
Speaker 1: you guys have lost your privileges to lead. You need
Speaker 1: to learn how to lead it's sort of it was
Speaker 1: the It was how Jesse Ventura won his election in
Speaker 1: ninety eight. He basically turned the two parties into tweetled
Speaker 1: the and tweedled dumb, and it gained quick traction. It
Speaker 1: was it was actually a short campaign. He was polling
Speaker 1: in the high single digits, low double digits for the
Speaker 1: longest time they have a debate. He's an outsized charismatic figure.
Speaker 1: The two nominees, I think it was I think, if
Speaker 1: memory serves, it was Norm Coleman future you a Senator
Speaker 1: and Skip Humphrey, the son of Hubert Humphrey, and they
Speaker 1: just they came across a stale compared to the charismatic
Speaker 1: ex wrestler right and former actor you know who's uttered
Speaker 1: one of my favorite movie lines of all time, I
Speaker 1: don't got time to bleed from the first Predator, which
Speaker 1: I think he used in his campaign ads. I think
Speaker 1: it was the title of his memoir, of his political memoir.
Speaker 1: But the point is is that he didn't run as
Speaker 1: saying this is you know. Yes, it was sort of
Speaker 1: with the Pero Reform Party at the time, but in
Speaker 1: some ways it was, Hey, I want to send a
Speaker 1: message these two parties and just sober up. And I
Speaker 1: think what you outline here, the inability for one party
Speaker 1: to concede anything to the other party right now, it's
Speaker 1: not going to happen. If you want to know how
Speaker 1: nineteen nineties by partisanship happened. It happened because Ross Perot
Speaker 1: essentially threatened his candidacy, threatened the success of both parties
Speaker 1: at one point or another, and so it almost served
Speaker 1: as a as a force, as a mechanism to force bipartisanship.
Speaker 1: You know, the nineties recipe for bipartisanship also had one
Speaker 1: party controlling Congress, one party controlling the presidency. In the
Speaker 1: twenty first century, the handful of times we've had that
Speaker 1: it didn't, it didn't. It didn't lead to in many
Speaker 1: bipartisan successes. And in some ways I think this is
Speaker 1: thanks to the Internet age to be fair filthy, Frank,
Speaker 1: I mean, that's that's what I think has done it.
Speaker 1: I think that in the you know where anytime you
Speaker 1: quote helped the other party, it becomes a problem for
Speaker 1: the base and they amplify it and they get everybody
Speaker 1: fired up, and they threatened primary h challenges and all
Speaker 1: of a sudden, this wayward moderate r moderate d has
Speaker 1: been tamed by the outrages of the base. We saw
Speaker 1: a version of that on the Republican side with Joni
Speaker 1: Ernst and the confirmation of Pete Hegseth right, she was
Speaker 1: basically shamed and threatened and harassed until she agreed to
Speaker 1: do it. In the pre internet days, haig Seth never
Speaker 1: makes it. Eg Seth probably doesn't even even get out
Speaker 1: of committee in the pre internet days. But he saidially
Speaker 1: making it public and forcing it that way did so.
Speaker 1: I concur with you that it's not going to come
Speaker 1: from one of the two major parties and that they
Speaker 1: would successfully do it. I do think a term with
Speaker 1: an independent basically just highlighting the fact that both parties
Speaker 1: have failed us and have helped tear this country apart,
Speaker 1: would could could serve as that as sort of return,
Speaker 1: sort of Like I said, I refer to sobering up
Speaker 1: the two political parties. Next question comes from Lincoln from Columbus, Ohio,
Speaker 1: but he makes it clear he's not a Buckeye fan. Well,
Speaker 1: that's why I'm taking your question. Lincoln. By the way,
Speaker 1: I love it Lincoln from Columbus. Maybe I could meet
Speaker 1: Columbus from Lincoln anyway, Hey, Chuck La Cheeseri if you
Speaker 1: know you know I love the todcast and appreciate the commentary,
Speaker 1: extended interviews and deep dives into all things politics and
Speaker 1: politics adjacent news stories. You're right, we need more in
Speaker 1: depth conversations and fewer sound bitdes. I have a question
Speaker 1: about Senate and House hearings. Do the people testifying have
Speaker 1: an idea of the questions in advance? Obviously this would
Speaker 1: be more partisan, because when RFK testified, I can't imagine
Speaker 1: Democrats would provide their questions, but I can see Republicans
Speaker 1: trying to curry favor with the White House, if not
Speaker 1: overtly providing questions in advance, perhaps in a meaning mentioning
Speaker 1: that a question like that may come up with a
Speaker 1: link and a not Thanks for the work and information
Speaker 1: to look forward to the mornings when I see the
Speaker 1: pod drop, Well, it's great to hear. Thanks Lincoln, appreciate that.
Speaker 1: On hearings, you know, it depends. There's some people do
Speaker 1: mock hearings. A friendly hearing, right your friendly side, you
Speaker 1: will know, you know, you might know they might have Hey,
Speaker 1: I'll uh, I know you're going to get attacked for
Speaker 1: this issue. I'll be able to ask you this question
Speaker 1: on follow up. So the point is the answer is yes, okay,
Speaker 1: what you suspect is true partisan. You know, anybody that
Speaker 1: is that is favorable to the person testifying, If that
Speaker 1: person is in government and has a relationship, that likely
Speaker 1: means they have some sort of professional relationship with that senator,
Speaker 1: with that Senate staffer, with that House member, with that
Speaker 1: House staffer. So in that sense, yes, they're told, hey,
Speaker 1: I'm going to ask about this, this, and this if
Speaker 1: they're friendly. Obviously you don't you don't get the questions
Speaker 1: in advance of the others. But you know, if you
Speaker 1: don't know what's coming, you're not very good at your job,
Speaker 1: or you don't have a staff that's very bright about this.
Speaker 1: I've never watched one of these congressional hearings and been
Speaker 1: surprised by a question. Right, Sometimes you might get surprised
Speaker 1: if it's like arcane, it'll be like oh, and again,
Speaker 1: when you're surprised as a person testifying, it means your
Speaker 1: staffers blew it. You know, a good staffer should know, Hey,
Speaker 1: Senator Schmengi is obsessed with this one arcane issue. No
Speaker 1: one else is going to ask about it. But you
Speaker 1: may be asked about it from him or her, you
Speaker 1: better know it. But no, your suspicion on essentially partisans
Speaker 1: helping helping the friendlies is one hundred percent trough. There's
Speaker 1: always by the way it happens in the White House
Speaker 1: press room, there are certain reporters that are essentially used
Speaker 1: by the person at the podium. Maybe they don't know
Speaker 1: the question that's going to be asked, but they know
Speaker 1: it's not going to be antagonistic, and they go to
Speaker 1: them as almost like a break if they're if they're
Speaker 1: getting attacked. And every press secretary has had those in
Speaker 1: their back pocket, this one has more friendlies than most
Speaker 1: that I've noticed. Next question, boy, you absolutely nail it
Speaker 1: in your nine to fifteen commentary. Politics should be about
Speaker 1: I believe in A and you believe in Z, and
Speaker 1: we meet somewhere around l M n OP. But Congress
Speaker 1: now seems allergic to compromise, acting as a blank check
Speaker 1: for Trump's agenda. I also agree that social media fuels division.
Speaker 1: I even deactivated my own accounts after hearing every network
Speaker 1: link the latest shooting to online extremism. Podcasts can be
Speaker 1: similarly insular, Yes they can, though yours stands out for
Speaker 1: presenting multiple viewpoints, which I really appreciate. Michael C. From Douglasville, Georgia, Well,
Speaker 1: I appreciate you noticing that. It's what I'm trying to do.
Speaker 1: That's a frustration of the sort of the architecture that
Speaker 1: the tech companies have created for those of us in
Speaker 1: this independent space. I you know, I appreciate substack. You
Speaker 1: can sort of curate yourself. They don't feel I don't
Speaker 1: feel like they use algorithms to push stuff on me.
Speaker 1: It's you're you only get pushed stuff from the actual
Speaker 1: publisher of the content or people that you know. If
Speaker 1: you decide to subscribe, then you're asked to to to
Speaker 1: spread the word. It's a it's a it's a healthier
Speaker 1: way to do it on that front. But the you know,
Speaker 1: that's the problem, right And you see, I don't want
Speaker 1: to build an audience where I feel like I'm captured
Speaker 1: by the audience. Now, I just I I am a
Speaker 1: podcast listener because I'm trying to get more information. I
Speaker 1: I sort of listened to three types of podcasts. One
Speaker 1: is deep dives on history, one is on economic and
Speaker 1: a bunch of sports. Not Gonna lie uh, maybe one
Speaker 1: or two. And it's gambling. A few in sports cards,
Speaker 1: but quite a few in history on that stuff. And
Speaker 1: I want information over commentary, right, I don't necessarily want
Speaker 1: left right commentary. I can read the left right commentary
Speaker 1: on that front. But I do think that, you know,
Speaker 1: I'm very mindful. I don't want I don't want to.
Speaker 1: I don't want an audience. I don't want to feel
Speaker 1: like I've been captured by my subscribers or my audience,
Speaker 1: or however you want to look at it. I think
Speaker 1: that you've seen that. I feel like I see that
Speaker 1: in the New York Times, you know, when they chased
Speaker 1: away James Bennett from being editorial page editor of the
Speaker 1: opinion section. He didn't do anything wrong, he didn't he
Speaker 1: didn't do anything fireable by the editors, but there was
Speaker 1: a revolt among subscribers, and they were concerned about losing
Speaker 1: subscribers and losing it. And it seems like he was
Speaker 1: sacrificed for that. Well, when you make a decision based
Speaker 1: on viewership or who's watching. Look, I don't want to
Speaker 1: get into too many details, but you know that these
Speaker 1: were these were some of the struggles when when when
Speaker 1: I was trying to do a a a non ideological
Speaker 1: partisan show on politics on a cable channel that had
Speaker 1: a history of being partisan, and it was the audience.
Speaker 1: The audience was uncomfortable with it. They didn't like when
Speaker 1: I would put Republicans on and it would become a thing,
Speaker 1: and I didn't like that I was being used by
Speaker 1: the right at times to try to do it was
Speaker 1: just a mess. But it's what happens when you have
Speaker 1: audience capture, and it is something I'm trying really hard
Speaker 1: not to have audience capture. I appreciate you noticing it,
Speaker 1: and I'm trying, so thank you, and we'll spread the word.
Speaker 1: Uh all right, I'm gonna sneak in at least one
Speaker 1: more question here. I've got I've got a little I'm
Speaker 1: on the clock before taping, so I want to see
Speaker 1: how mannyn't get in. James E writes, Is it me
Speaker 1: or does it seem the right are being opportunity to
Speaker 1: utilizing their friend's death as a reason to go after
Speaker 1: the left. I don't think it's just you. If you
Speaker 1: hear my commentary top, that's I think exactly what's happening.
Speaker 1: Seems like such an odd time to go on the
Speaker 1: attack rather than to mourn a supposed friend. Have there
Speaker 1: been other instances in the past of a political death
Speaker 1: or assassination being used to attack the other side so
Speaker 1: soon after the incident. Well, here's the thing. In the
Speaker 1: Internet era, we see it all, you know, and it
Speaker 1: gets It's something that I think social media also provides
Speaker 1: us with that. God, this is why I think it's
Speaker 1: an experiment gone haywire on our brains. I can't remember
Speaker 1: if I shared this earlier with you guys or with
Speaker 1: my friend Crystalizza on the weekly podcast I do for
Speaker 1: his feed. But John pot Horitz, who's an editor at
Speaker 1: Commentary Magazine from He's a conservative commentator, had a fascinating
Speaker 1: thread over the weekend about how the real issue with
Speaker 1: social media is that too many good people have allowed
Speaker 1: too much of their of their inner thoughts go public.
Speaker 1: And what he was saying is that look, in any
Speaker 1: given second, if our thought, if every thought that was
Speaker 1: in our head, do this exercise and think about everything
Speaker 1: you may have thought about for a split second involving
Speaker 1: your life, anything about it, right, relationships, you name it.
Speaker 1: If if all those thoughts were broadcast on social media,
Speaker 1: do you think you'd have any friends left. Would you
Speaker 1: still be married, would you still be in relationships? Would
Speaker 1: you be seen as a madman? Would you be seen
Speaker 1: as crazy? Right? I think you sort of get what
Speaker 1: I'm saying, or maybe maybe I'm the weirdo that that
Speaker 1: that is admitting that you know, you get. There's plenty
Speaker 1: of things you think that you don't say, and somehow
Speaker 1: social media, like I was reading, I was reading a
Speaker 1: quote from somebody who was who oh, I know what
Speaker 1: it was.
Speaker 3: It was.
Speaker 1: An elected official down in my hometown in South Florida,
Speaker 1: in Miami, Palmetto Bay, one of these invented towns in
Speaker 1: Dade County, I say invented there. When I was growing up,
Speaker 1: there were thirty one municipalities. I think we're up the
Speaker 1: thirty six down there in Miami Dade County. Palmetto Bay
Speaker 1: is now one of them. It all used to be
Speaker 1: unincorporated Dade County, so we all wrote Miami is our address,
Speaker 1: which is I grew up an unincorporated Dade County. Otherwise
Speaker 1: I describe it as East Kendall if you're scoring at home.
Speaker 1: But an elected official went out there and said something
Speaker 1: really you know, said something really not good about Charlie Kirkstaff.
Speaker 1: I don't remember the exact things. I'm hesitant to characterize
Speaker 1: it other than it was in a and certainly the
Speaker 1: timing was inappropriate, and the guy had said he goes
Speaker 1: he woke up the next morning and regretted sending it, right,
Speaker 1: it was heat of the moment. I bring this up
Speaker 1: because I think that that's where we've let why social
Speaker 1: media is so so toxic and so bad for our brains. Right,
Speaker 1: there's no there's no uh, there's no sort of it
Speaker 1: should sit in drafts, right, Like you know, if you
Speaker 1: if you're worried about your inner id saying something that
Speaker 1: you'll regret in the morning, It's almost like you should
Speaker 1: be able to put a small g governor and your
Speaker 1: Twitter feed and just say send all tweets to draft,
Speaker 1: and then the next morning reread them and see if
Speaker 1: you want to send them. But of course, you know,
Speaker 1: nobody wants to do that because they want to be
Speaker 1: in the moment. You want to see if you go
Speaker 1: viral or whatever. Right, And so I just bring that
Speaker 1: up because I have a feeling in the pre social
Speaker 1: media world, there were plenty of people who had unpopular
Speaker 1: opinions about political attacks or assassinations that if they shared them,
Speaker 1: and if there had been social media at the time,
Speaker 1: would have probably gotten them, you know, canceled, and maybe
Speaker 1: in some cases deservedly. So I'm not going to even
Speaker 1: I don't want to sit here and defend that idea.
Speaker 1: But I think this is where social media is just
Speaker 1: it incentivizes stupidity, and it sometimes you know, remember the
Speaker 1: advice I assume everybody has heard this advice, if you
Speaker 1: don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all.
Speaker 1: It's certainly a rule of thumb I have or about
Speaker 1: people that die in politics. You know, if you know you,
Speaker 1: you certainly if you've got a disagreement you want to highlight.
Speaker 1: Maybe wait, let the family mourn, have some grace, right,
Speaker 1: whatever it is. And for some reason social media has
Speaker 1: made us think that the rules of the korum don't
Speaker 1: apply when how would you behave in you know, if
Speaker 1: you were face to face with that person, if you
Speaker 1: were trying, if you put yourself saying, if I was
Speaker 1: face to face, how would I say this? It probably
Speaker 1: would make Twitter less interesting. But maybe that's a good
Speaker 1: thing on this front. But I'm really worried about a
Speaker 1: sort of red scare vibe as I said at the
Speaker 1: top here, and a disingenuous attack on this that this
Speaker 1: is just trying to do guilt by association, which is,
Speaker 1: you know, it's a very dangerous. It's you know, it's
Speaker 1: our polarization is bad. Are the increase in political violence
Speaker 1: that we've been experiencing is bad, and scapegoating and guilt
Speaker 1: by association is only going to make all of these
Speaker 1: things worse. All right, On that happy note, I think
Speaker 1: I'm going to pause here for twenty four hours. This was,
Speaker 1: like I said, I wanted to make it a little
Speaker 1: canpain heavier episode. But look, we're we're living in a
Speaker 1: rough period, and if we don't have the leaders to
Speaker 1: get us out of this rough period, do little things
Speaker 1: on your own, right, you know, just say thank you,
Speaker 1: say hi to somebody you don't know, Acknowledge somebody's existence
Speaker 1: when you walk by them, you know, on a street corner.
Speaker 1: And Spencer Cox said, touch grass, right, but turn it off.
Speaker 1: You know, I have I all the time try to
Speaker 1: do better when it comes to when I'm a news junkie.
Speaker 1: I'm an information junkie, so I'm always looking for more information.
Speaker 1: But I have found different ways now to get information
Speaker 1: without using social media. Not totally gone. I'm not totally
Speaker 1: kicked the habit. You know, I might be smoking one
Speaker 1: cigarette a day, but I'm not smoking twenty and I
Speaker 1: think that's the I think if everybody took that advice,
Speaker 1: you know, wean themselves off, we might have a better
Speaker 1: digital atmosphere. So with that, I'll take a break until
Speaker 1: we upload again. See in twenty four hours.