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Application times may vary 0:01:40.959 --> 0:01:48.440 and rates may vary. Hello Aaron, Welcome to another episode 0:01:48.520 --> 0:01:51.520 of the Chuck Podcast. Let me give you a quick 0:01:51.720 --> 0:01:55.320 rundown of what we have for today's episode. Look, I've 0:01:55.320 --> 0:01:58.400 got a little more fallout from the events on Saturday 0:01:58.800 --> 0:02:01.720 and frankly a laments, I'm not gonna lie to Yeah, 0:02:01.760 --> 0:02:04.120 this is you know, I know we're all shocked that 0:02:04.160 --> 0:02:06.480 our leaders aren't meeting the moment, but our leaders aren't 0:02:06.480 --> 0:02:10.720 meeting the moment. Let's not take our eye off the 0:02:10.760 --> 0:02:15.359 ball of Iran. We have just hit essentially a new 0:02:15.480 --> 0:02:17.840 high and gas prices since the start of this war. 0:02:17.880 --> 0:02:20.359 We're now at a high on gas prices that we 0:02:20.440 --> 0:02:22.239 had to deal with at the start of the Ukraine 0:02:22.280 --> 0:02:25.280 Russian War. The problem here is that there doesn't seem 0:02:25.320 --> 0:02:29.000 to be a near term solution on the horizon. Then 0:02:29.000 --> 0:02:30.640 we have a bunch of political updates. We have a 0:02:30.639 --> 0:02:34.160 new house map in Florida. It's a fascinating new map. 0:02:34.919 --> 0:02:37.000 My quick headline is this is a great map for 0:02:37.080 --> 0:02:40.320 Republicans in a presidential year. This is a shaky map 0:02:40.360 --> 0:02:43.440 for Republicans in a midterm year, particularly a midterm year 0:02:43.480 --> 0:02:46.600 where they could where they're the party in power. I 0:02:46.639 --> 0:02:49.959 will dig into that a few Senate race developments, and 0:02:50.000 --> 0:02:53.000 then my conversation today is with Atima Omara. She's the 0:02:53.040 --> 0:02:55.480 author of a new book called The Instigators. It's basically 0:02:55.560 --> 0:02:58.600 about the role black women in particular have played as 0:02:58.639 --> 0:03:04.080 sort of the leading voices inside the Democratic Party at 0:03:04.160 --> 0:03:06.280 least in the twenty first century. But there's also more 0:03:06.320 --> 0:03:10.239 historical elements here. A Teama is not necessarily a full 0:03:10.280 --> 0:03:13.600 time historian. She's a political strategist. She has been in 0:03:13.639 --> 0:03:18.519 the trenches on democratic politics and on the politics of 0:03:21.200 --> 0:03:25.000 particularly in the African American community, and she's got some 0:03:25.120 --> 0:03:28.200 interesting insights. We talk a lot about sort of twenty 0:03:28.200 --> 0:03:31.400 twenty four, the future, what the future of the party is, 0:03:31.480 --> 0:03:34.880 the very splits and divides. Plus her book. Just trust me, 0:03:34.880 --> 0:03:37.120 if you're a political junkie're trying to understand where it's 0:03:37.120 --> 0:03:39.920 the Democratic Party headed, you know what could work, what 0:03:40.040 --> 0:03:42.600 might not work. This good conversation for you. I think 0:03:42.600 --> 0:03:45.640 you're going to enjoy it. Obviously, it's Wednesday, so it's 0:03:45.640 --> 0:03:47.880 Top five day, and I've got a fun little take 0:03:48.000 --> 0:03:50.320 on a top five list today. The top five races 0:03:51.440 --> 0:03:54.680 that are that are the most dangerous for Donald Trump 0:03:55.760 --> 0:03:59.160 to cement lame duck status. Right, The test of his 0:03:59.280 --> 0:04:04.360 political strength inside the Republican Party is these are five 0:04:04.520 --> 0:04:08.920 Republican primaries that will tell us how lame the duck 0:04:09.040 --> 0:04:11.880 in the Oval office is these days. Right, So I 0:04:11.880 --> 0:04:13.360 think you're going to enjoy that. And Plus I'm gonna 0:04:13.360 --> 0:04:16.680 take some questions. But let me begin with a lament. 0:04:18.400 --> 0:04:20.600 And I know this isn't a shock or a surprise, 0:04:20.760 --> 0:04:23.200 but it is still striking to me over the last 0:04:23.200 --> 0:04:31.680 couple of days that you know, to see what didn't happen. 0:04:31.880 --> 0:04:35.680 After last Saturday night's events, we had a man show 0:04:35.720 --> 0:04:39.440 up at the White House Correspondent Center armed had written 0:04:39.440 --> 0:04:42.840 a manifesto anti Trump's screed. He was stopped at a 0:04:42.839 --> 0:04:45.960 security checkpoint, and the response from the White House has 0:04:46.040 --> 0:04:52.000 essentially been, well, we should tighten security and build my ballroom. 0:04:52.400 --> 0:04:56.480 And it's the Democrats and the left's fall. And that 0:04:56.560 --> 0:04:58.279 tells you something because there was a time in this 0:04:58.320 --> 0:05:01.799 country not that long ago, when something like this would happen. 0:05:02.000 --> 0:05:05.520 A president in particular would treat it very differently. There 0:05:05.560 --> 0:05:07.719 would have been an attempt, at least in an attempt 0:05:08.040 --> 0:05:11.000 to study the country to lower the temperature, like what 0:05:11.080 --> 0:05:17.040 George W. Bush did after nine to eleven, making it 0:05:17.480 --> 0:05:19.720 crystal clear that the United States was not at war 0:05:19.800 --> 0:05:22.400 with Islam. Right, there was an important he had to 0:05:22.400 --> 0:05:24.800 say it, and it took an American president to say it. 0:05:24.839 --> 0:05:26.720 There isn't there was nobody else that could say it 0:05:26.760 --> 0:05:30.680 that would have any sort of meaning beyond the President 0:05:30.680 --> 0:05:34.159 of the United States in that moment. Presidents are in 0:05:34.320 --> 0:05:39.000 charge of the thermostat of the political temperature of the 0:05:39.080 --> 0:05:43.960 country period, and he chose to turn down the thermostat, 0:05:44.560 --> 0:05:47.120 saw what was building, feared what was building, and he 0:05:47.160 --> 0:05:54.200 turned down that thermostat. But we haven't really had that moment, right, 0:05:55.160 --> 0:05:57.400 they even had the moment where this president said this 0:05:57.440 --> 0:06:00.480 isn't who we are, this is not acceptableybe, it's time 0:06:00.520 --> 0:06:02.840 to take a breath here. I know we've all allowed 0:06:02.839 --> 0:06:06.080 political rhetoric to get out of hand, right, And yet 0:06:06.120 --> 0:06:08.920 that's not the instinct right now, is it? And that's 0:06:08.960 --> 0:06:13.000 the problem. So instead of reltigating how we got here, 0:06:13.720 --> 0:06:15.120 and I think that's part of the problem, right, that 0:06:15.200 --> 0:06:17.920 everybody feels pretty confident that they're right and the other 0:06:18.000 --> 0:06:20.880 side is wrong. I have felt it. I wrote sort 0:06:20.880 --> 0:06:23.960 of a similar thing on in my column this week 0:06:24.000 --> 0:06:29.440 for Newsphere and substat that essentially argued that, look, we're here, 0:06:29.520 --> 0:06:32.560 and you know, yes, there's no doubt that Donald Trump's 0:06:32.640 --> 0:06:36.760 arrival in twenty fifteen accelerated this moment, but that doesn't 0:06:36.800 --> 0:06:40.240 excuse the behavior now on the laugh to just say, well, 0:06:40.279 --> 0:06:42.640 donald Trump started eight, you'r reporce you. So that's not 0:06:42.760 --> 0:06:48.359 good either. So that's why you know, we can re litigate. 0:06:49.480 --> 0:06:53.880 I mean, there's definitely nobody can deny how this began, 0:06:55.000 --> 0:06:58.719 but everybody's in charge of their own behavior here. And 0:06:58.760 --> 0:07:02.240 I still believe ultimately it takes a president, and we 0:07:02.320 --> 0:07:04.880 may have a president who is not interested in turning 0:07:04.960 --> 0:07:10.200 the temperature down. But here's the simplest way I can 0:07:10.240 --> 0:07:14.200 explain it, because we've produced a new kind of political 0:07:14.280 --> 0:07:19.720 environment that's quite scary. For years, we treated certain rhetoric 0:07:20.000 --> 0:07:21.840 as performance. And I know we're going to go through 0:07:21.880 --> 0:07:23.440 this again, and some of you may roll your eyes, Oh, 0:07:23.480 --> 0:07:27.000 we've been through here before. Yeah, we have, and apparently 0:07:27.040 --> 0:07:28.640 we haven't learned the lesson, so we've got to keep 0:07:28.680 --> 0:07:33.960 going here, right, But we treated the rhetoric that's campaign stuff, 0:07:34.000 --> 0:07:37.000 and there was you know, you know, I think, frankly, 0:07:37.040 --> 0:07:39.160 I have a higher tolerance than most right because I'm 0:07:39.240 --> 0:07:43.560 used to heated campaign rhetoric. It's crowd stuff. It's right 0:07:43.560 --> 0:07:47.640 out of the WWE and that's what Trump thinks, that 0:07:47.800 --> 0:07:52.320 he's doing it for entertainment purposes and things like that. 0:07:53.560 --> 0:07:56.040 He doesn't really mean it, and I believe that. I 0:07:56.080 --> 0:08:00.160 don't think he really meant it. But that's me. That 0:08:00.160 --> 0:08:02.560 doesn't mean what other people and then there are people 0:08:02.600 --> 0:08:05.960 that act in his name that did mean it right. 0:08:06.880 --> 0:08:09.160 But when this has started to when this is when 0:08:09.240 --> 0:08:11.640 this starts happening at scale over time, it stops being 0:08:11.720 --> 0:08:16.080 performance and it gets turned into a permission slop and 0:08:16.120 --> 0:08:19.560 then after a while becomes something bigger, becomes the environment itself. 0:08:21.760 --> 0:08:24.080 We can trace that shift pretty quickly. Right. We know 0:08:24.160 --> 0:08:28.040 Donald Trump didn't invent anger in politics, but he absolutely 0:08:28.160 --> 0:08:32.559 changed what was acceptable to say out loud, punching protesters, 0:08:32.640 --> 0:08:37.520 carrying them out on stretchers, personalizing everything, turning all personal 0:08:37.520 --> 0:08:43.319 opponents into enemies. Many of us felt it personally. And 0:08:43.360 --> 0:08:45.840 you know, with fellow Republicans who are not MAGA members, 0:08:46.320 --> 0:08:48.679 many of them don't speak out for fear. Out of fear. 0:08:48.960 --> 0:08:54.240 Trust me, I've had every single mainstream reporter has had 0:08:54.240 --> 0:08:59.080 this conversation with an elected Republican, every single one in Washington. 0:08:59.559 --> 0:09:01.920 We all all have an off the record, and I 0:09:01.960 --> 0:09:06.080 have multiple off the record conversations with elected Republicans essentially 0:09:06.240 --> 0:09:08.360 saying I don't call it out because you have no 0:09:08.440 --> 0:09:10.520 idea what his people do to me or due to 0:09:10.559 --> 0:09:14.880 my family, or the threats that are made. Right it is, 0:09:14.920 --> 0:09:19.480 there is a coercion that has taken place here, and 0:09:19.480 --> 0:09:22.600 that's why it's sometimes frustrating to watch this. Right, some 0:09:22.600 --> 0:09:24.560 people only want to look back the last four years 0:09:24.600 --> 0:09:26.280 and say, boy, look what the Democrats have done. And 0:09:26.320 --> 0:09:28.280 there's some truth to that, right, the democratic cretoric has 0:09:28.280 --> 0:09:31.720 gotten harshir the violence that being prone to violence, it 0:09:31.760 --> 0:09:33.640 does seem in the last couple of years coming more 0:09:33.679 --> 0:09:37.040 from the left than the right. But you're sticking your 0:09:37.080 --> 0:09:39.240 head in the sand if you don't realize we're living, 0:09:39.360 --> 0:09:42.679 if you don't pull back the camera more and realize, oh, 0:09:43.040 --> 0:09:46.640 how did we get here? This is how we got here, right, 0:09:47.040 --> 0:09:49.280 And the fact is, anybody that's been doing this for 0:09:49.320 --> 0:09:51.719 a decade knows this is how we got here. Now 0:09:51.760 --> 0:09:55.880 you can choose to put your partisan blinders on and 0:09:55.960 --> 0:10:00.000 say it's their faults. Look at how nasty and awful 0:10:00.080 --> 0:10:02.440 the left is. Look at how nasty and awful Donald 0:10:02.480 --> 0:10:04.320 Trump is. The fact is both things can be true 0:10:04.320 --> 0:10:08.480 at the same time, you know, and that's something. And 0:10:08.520 --> 0:10:12.280 this isn't both siding everything. This is you know, two 0:10:12.440 --> 0:10:16.240 wrongs don't make right. Our politics is fucked up because 0:10:16.559 --> 0:10:20.680 of too many people believing that two wrongs make a right, 0:10:21.640 --> 0:10:24.319 and this sort of idea that you fight fire with fire, 0:10:24.360 --> 0:10:31.200 and whether it's on things as sort of arcane as 0:10:31.400 --> 0:10:35.400 drawing congressional district lines to the rhetoric that is used 0:10:35.440 --> 0:10:37.800 to describe a political opponent that you don't agree with. 0:10:39.520 --> 0:10:42.240 But the bottom line is the line has been moved 0:10:42.280 --> 0:10:45.080 and we have created the conditions for more of this, 0:10:45.320 --> 0:10:50.480 not less. Now, we spent years talking about January sixth 0:10:50.480 --> 0:10:53.240 in that matters, But here's the thing I think we've missed. 0:10:53.920 --> 0:10:55.880 That wasn't the end of something. That was actually the 0:10:55.880 --> 0:11:00.000 beginning of something, especially after he pardoned everybody in January sixth. 0:11:00.960 --> 0:11:03.320 So the real question now is what happens after that 0:11:03.440 --> 0:11:06.400 kind of permission has been established and what is it 0:11:06.480 --> 0:11:11.160 going to take to create a safer sense of normal 0:11:11.280 --> 0:11:16.000 in our political discourse. Because here's what we've learned right now, 0:11:16.040 --> 0:11:22.599 the permission slip of January sixth has has not stayed contained. 0:11:23.120 --> 0:11:26.920 It has spread, and it didn't spread ideologically. It's not 0:11:27.040 --> 0:11:29.120 on one side of the aisle. It has spread culturally, 0:11:30.720 --> 0:11:32.559 and you can see it big and small. You see 0:11:32.559 --> 0:11:34.439 it in moments that would have been unthinkable before. A 0:11:34.520 --> 0:11:37.560 sitting president reacting to the death of a former FBI 0:11:37.640 --> 0:11:40.520 director Robert Muller by saying, good, I'm glad he's dead. 0:11:42.320 --> 0:11:44.120 You know that moment, the fact that he couldn't even 0:11:44.200 --> 0:11:46.920 fake it until the man was buried. In that moment, 0:11:47.520 --> 0:11:52.959 he couldn't think about people that loved that man, who 0:11:53.000 --> 0:11:56.760 were children and grandchildren and nieces and nephews and spouses. 0:11:59.200 --> 0:12:02.880 That was the President of the United States's reaction. And 0:12:02.920 --> 0:12:06.479 then we're surprised when people who don't like this president decide, 0:12:07.080 --> 0:12:11.360 you know, they're going to fight fire with fire. It 0:12:11.400 --> 0:12:14.400 should be an earthquake in American politics, and it's barely 0:12:14.440 --> 0:12:20.480 a tremor. So why does that moment matter? Not because 0:12:20.480 --> 0:12:24.360 it's shocking, but because it's not shocking. Nobody's batted an 0:12:24.400 --> 0:12:27.800 eye at it. It just simply got absorbed, filed away, 0:12:28.600 --> 0:12:31.760 added to the pile of incendiary rhetoric that we've now 0:12:32.320 --> 0:12:37.520 decided is normal. And that was the tell. That was 0:12:37.559 --> 0:12:42.400 the normalization. And once you get there, this is how 0:12:42.440 --> 0:12:44.199 it works. It doesn't take a movement and it doesn't 0:12:44.200 --> 0:12:48.880 take coordination. It just takes one broken person who may 0:12:48.880 --> 0:12:52.280 have their own problems and who may decide maybe their 0:12:52.280 --> 0:12:57.040 own sociopathic tendencies and their own narcissism they think somehow 0:12:57.080 --> 0:12:59.640 they can solve a problem, or they can be a hero. 0:13:01.760 --> 0:13:05.440 One unstable, angry person who looks around, seize the tone, 0:13:06.240 --> 0:13:09.839 seize the language, thinks that this is now more acceptable 0:13:09.840 --> 0:13:13.480 than ever, or that it's the only thing left in 0:13:13.520 --> 0:13:16.960 the arsenal to do, and then they decide to act 0:13:17.000 --> 0:13:26.960 within it, within that environment. That's it, that's the mechanism. 0:13:28.280 --> 0:13:30.240 Now let's layer something else on the top of all this. 0:13:30.280 --> 0:13:32.880 The last decade has made a lot of people feel 0:13:32.880 --> 0:13:35.840 like they've lost control. These technological changes are fast. Our 0:13:35.880 --> 0:13:40.480 cultural changes are super fast. Right, Economically, culturally, socially, it 0:13:40.559 --> 0:13:45.000 feels we've all we feel less stable in all parts 0:13:45.040 --> 0:13:48.280 of our lives today. And then we have an information 0:13:48.320 --> 0:13:53.000 ecosystem that is exploitive, reinforces one idea over and over. 0:13:54.280 --> 0:13:57.600 Someone else is responsible for the situation. Point the finger, 0:13:57.679 --> 0:14:00.160 don't look in the mirror. There's no such thing his 0:14:00.240 --> 0:14:04.640 personal responsibility anymore, no self reflection, right, you see it. 0:14:04.720 --> 0:14:11.320 Politicians refuse to take to take stock in their own behavior. 0:14:11.880 --> 0:14:14.360 They just point a finger. Political parties won't take stock 0:14:14.400 --> 0:14:16.880 in their own behavior. They point fingers or exploit for 0:14:16.920 --> 0:14:21.000 political gain. Quote the system, right, and this is what 0:14:21.040 --> 0:14:23.640 the system looks like. And once you've believed that, the 0:14:23.680 --> 0:14:30.440 distance between blame and justification gets a lot smaller. And 0:14:30.480 --> 0:14:31.880 here's the part. A lot of people are going to 0:14:31.880 --> 0:14:37.680 miss or ignore the guy on Saturday Night right, and 0:14:37.760 --> 0:14:41.880 the left has to deal with this. And this wasn't caught, 0:14:42.040 --> 0:14:45.320 This wasn't somebody acting on Trump's behalf. His grievances ran 0:14:45.520 --> 0:14:49.400 in the other direction. But he chose to believe this 0:14:49.560 --> 0:14:57.080 was the way out. He'd lost faith in the political system. 0:14:57.200 --> 0:14:59.800 It's not a contradiction, it's a confirmation that we have 0:15:00.040 --> 0:15:04.960 The environment has changed. American politics is now brutal, it's 0:15:05.000 --> 0:15:10.560 now violent, and this cold civil war is warming up. 0:15:14.480 --> 0:15:20.520 We should not want this environment to set in. It 0:15:20.640 --> 0:15:26.560 takes and there's only one president at a time. And 0:15:26.600 --> 0:15:32.000 now we've learned this doesn't stay directional. It gets adapted, 0:15:32.000 --> 0:15:39.400 it gets mirrored, and it gets thrown back. And you know, 0:15:40.280 --> 0:15:43.240 I've been disappointed in watching the reactions from the left, 0:15:44.240 --> 0:15:47.000 which has been frankly similar to the reactions on the right. 0:15:47.120 --> 0:15:49.280 Just coming up with the evidence of why it is 0:15:49.320 --> 0:15:53.400 all Donald Trump's fault. And there's a strong case that 0:15:53.520 --> 0:15:57.440 he created the conditions for this moment. But it doesn't 0:15:57.480 --> 0:16:01.840 justify the behavior, and it doesn't justify amping up your rhetoric, 0:16:02.160 --> 0:16:05.240 and it doesn't justify any of the behavior with fighting. No, 0:16:07.160 --> 0:16:09.680 all you're doing is accelerated your tape. It's a race 0:16:09.720 --> 0:16:12.280 to the bottom, and you're trying to win. Nobody wins 0:16:12.280 --> 0:16:17.960 a race to the bottom. Yeah, you can comfort yourself 0:16:18.000 --> 0:16:21.840 by saying Trump's reaping what he sewed, but it doesn't 0:16:21.880 --> 0:16:25.840 solve the problem. You and I aren't any safer with 0:16:25.920 --> 0:16:28.720 that attitude. The question is what are you doing to 0:16:28.960 --> 0:16:35.240 change this. I'm sorry that most people don't think Michelle 0:16:35.280 --> 0:16:39.400 Obama was right. I don't even know if Michelle Obama 0:16:39.440 --> 0:16:44.480 believes she was right that when a political opponent goes low, 0:16:44.560 --> 0:16:58.160 you go high. Because the minute you start rationalizing your violence, 0:16:58.680 --> 0:17:03.520 well they started it even rhetorically, you've crossed the same line. 0:17:03.640 --> 0:17:07.920 You're no longer arguing about politics. You're justifying outcomes, different side, 0:17:07.920 --> 0:17:13.280 same logic. And that's what this environment is produced. That's why, unfortunately, 0:17:13.320 --> 0:17:14.919 we don't have a president that can deal with this 0:17:15.000 --> 0:17:17.160 moment and take it head on, because it would take 0:17:17.200 --> 0:17:22.720 self reflection. He doesn't have it. It would take an 0:17:22.720 --> 0:17:26.760 admission that he was a big contributor to what's to 0:17:26.840 --> 0:17:32.199 this broken environment that we're living in. But I don't like. 0:17:32.480 --> 0:17:36.320 But at the same time, those on the left should 0:17:36.320 --> 0:17:40.520 take no comfort that he started. It doesn't justify the 0:17:40.560 --> 0:17:46.480 actions or the behavior. So what would leadership Would a 0:17:46.520 --> 0:17:51.240 good leadership moment look like right now? Well, it certainly 0:17:51.240 --> 0:17:54.960 would sound different. You'd hear a president acknowledging the moment, 0:17:56.240 --> 0:17:59.760 not spin it, not assign blame, just simply acknowledging it. 0:18:02.359 --> 0:18:04.880 You'd hear something like, we've all contributed to this own here, 0:18:06.119 --> 0:18:07.800 we need to say it back, we need to lower it, 0:18:07.840 --> 0:18:12.199 and I need to do a better job myself. How 0:18:12.200 --> 0:18:14.479 do you know some of you are probably laughing if 0:18:14.520 --> 0:18:20.000 Trump would ever admit anything. I'm just telling you what 0:18:20.040 --> 0:18:22.600 it would look like if we were modeling this moment correctly, 0:18:23.119 --> 0:18:25.560 you'd at least see an effort, a small one, to 0:18:25.640 --> 0:18:30.760 create space to try to interrupt this cycle. That's what 0:18:30.880 --> 0:18:36.000 leadership in this moment would look like. That's not what 0:18:36.040 --> 0:18:44.040 we have. And now we have leadership on the Democratic 0:18:44.080 --> 0:18:53.160 side who's like, screw them, let's go. We don't have 0:18:53.400 --> 0:18:55.960 the president we need right now to get through this moment, 0:18:57.000 --> 0:18:58.560 and we're not going to get what we need from 0:18:58.560 --> 0:19:01.400 this White House. So instead, what we're going to get 0:19:01.400 --> 0:19:04.639 as finger pointing, one sided explanations and political framing of 0:19:04.680 --> 0:19:07.720 this moment. There'll be no acknowledgment of how we got here, 0:19:07.720 --> 0:19:09.439 and without that, there's no way to actually deal with 0:19:09.480 --> 0:19:11.679 this moment. So we're going to end up moving on, 0:19:13.920 --> 0:19:17.200 not because we should, but because we can't get out 0:19:17.200 --> 0:19:20.679 of it. Right we don't have the people at the table. 0:19:21.359 --> 0:19:23.400 The voters are going to have to give us new 0:19:23.480 --> 0:19:27.560 leaders to see if they can get the country unstuck here. 0:19:31.119 --> 0:19:35.040 And look, we might hear a lot about security, more barriers, 0:19:35.080 --> 0:19:38.600 more distance. Boy, is that that's not the issue. And 0:19:38.640 --> 0:19:43.520 if anything, ratcheting up security only makes this worse. You 0:19:43.560 --> 0:19:47.360 want to create more barriers between the elected officials, the powerful, 0:19:47.440 --> 0:19:49.600 and the actual rank and file people. That's not a 0:19:49.640 --> 0:19:54.040 free society anymore. Security is not the problem. Fact, security 0:19:54.080 --> 0:19:59.600 worked here can't secure your way out of a culture. 0:20:00.800 --> 0:20:03.439 This is not about just going into a bunker or 0:20:03.480 --> 0:20:07.160 finding a ballroom on grounds that are impossible to get 0:20:07.160 --> 0:20:22.119 on unless you've given biometric issues. So right now we 0:20:22.280 --> 0:20:27.280 don't have the leadership that's interested in reversing this. We 0:20:27.400 --> 0:20:34.400 are escalating. We believe that you can't show weakness, and 0:20:34.440 --> 0:20:38.320 because there's this fear of ever showing weakness politically, we 0:20:38.440 --> 0:20:45.560 now default to confrontation. And the problem is that confrontation 0:20:46.760 --> 0:20:49.920 is only going to make us less safe. We're less stable. 0:20:52.200 --> 0:20:55.600 So it's a lament. I'm not going to be labor 0:20:55.680 --> 0:20:59.840 this anymore. I am going to do my best to 0:20:59.840 --> 0:21:03.280 canntinue to highlight why we have You know, we've this 0:21:03.359 --> 0:21:07.440 is a This is a collective failure of American leadership. 0:21:08.000 --> 0:21:18.040 Donald Trump's on top, but he's not alone. Get to 0:21:18.080 --> 0:21:23.600 the ballot box and realize that character matters, that morality matters, 0:21:24.200 --> 0:21:31.919 that temperament matters. Policy goals matter too, But how do 0:21:31.920 --> 0:21:33.440 you want to achieve those goals? How do you plan 0:21:33.480 --> 0:21:39.120 to achieve those goals? Persuasion or coercion. It's a big difference. 0:21:39.880 --> 0:21:43.320 One is something you do in a democracy, the other 0:21:44.480 --> 0:21:51.040 is something you do in an authoritarian regime. It's the 0:21:51.119 --> 0:21:52.800 decision we have to be and we have to make. 0:21:53.600 --> 0:21:59.439 Speaking of pouring fuel on this fire. As I was 0:22:01.160 --> 0:22:05.520 putting this monologue together, we got news that at federal 0:22:05.520 --> 0:22:10.520 grand jury North Carolina, somebody went shopping for a grand 0:22:10.560 --> 0:22:14.080 jury and dieted former FBI director Jim Comey the Justice 0:22:14.080 --> 0:22:18.360 Departments to attempt to criminally charge the former FBI director 0:22:18.640 --> 0:22:22.800 that President Trump fired. The charges are not immediately clear, 0:22:24.240 --> 0:22:28.119 but apparently the case stems from a photograph that James 0:22:28.160 --> 0:22:32.639 Comy posted online last year showing seashells on a beach 0:22:32.680 --> 0:22:37.119 that were arranged to write out the numbers eighty six 0:22:37.960 --> 0:22:42.879 and forty seven, with forty seven supposedly being representative of 0:22:42.920 --> 0:22:46.600 the president in eighty six meaning banning or removing someone, 0:22:47.520 --> 0:22:52.399 or slang for killing someone. So you can see exactly 0:22:52.440 --> 0:22:55.520 what the Trump administration is up to. They are taking 0:22:55.920 --> 0:22:59.359 they are trying to weaponize this moment to prove that 0:22:59.440 --> 0:23:01.960 all of this is on the backs of Trump critics 0:23:02.359 --> 0:23:06.159 and that somehow they have clean hands and they have 0:23:06.320 --> 0:23:10.560 nothing to do with amping up this rhetoric. The amount 0:23:10.720 --> 0:23:15.199 of exploitive ways the president has ordered his government to 0:23:15.359 --> 0:23:18.720 harass the Komi family, including his daughter, who had a 0:23:18.800 --> 0:23:22.040 job in the federal government, and she's now in the 0:23:22.080 --> 0:23:28.679 middle of a lawsuit about her firing. Look, I'm not 0:23:28.720 --> 0:23:31.280 going to sit here and justify Komy doing what he did. 0:23:31.359 --> 0:23:34.200 It was stupid, and I think a lot of Komy's 0:23:34.240 --> 0:23:39.240 actions while he was FBI director, were just horrendous. He 0:23:39.359 --> 0:23:42.880 had the disease of eye alone can fix it disease, right, 0:23:47.160 --> 0:23:55.560 But the First Amendments, the first Amendment, and unless this 0:23:55.800 --> 0:24:00.280 government can prove that this is connected to anything, was 0:24:00.320 --> 0:24:03.560 an instigated Actually somehow somebody took it as an order. 0:24:03.600 --> 0:24:05.280 I don't know where this case is going, if this 0:24:05.400 --> 0:24:08.520 has anything remotely to do with that, with that social 0:24:08.560 --> 0:24:10.920 media post, but that is pouring fuel on this fire. 0:24:11.720 --> 0:24:15.080 That is not an administration interesting in turning down the temperature. 0:24:16.080 --> 0:24:18.200 And this is my fear of Democrats get into office 0:24:18.200 --> 0:24:20.000 and win a majority in the House and the Senate 0:24:20.320 --> 0:24:25.280 and immediately go for impeachment. We are just going to 0:24:25.280 --> 0:24:27.359 be in a cycle and a race to the body. 0:24:31.359 --> 0:24:34.359 I know the elected officials I'm looking for. I'm looking 0:24:34.359 --> 0:24:38.280 for people that are going to turn the page, that 0:24:38.359 --> 0:24:43.040 want to restore honesty and credibility and trust into government 0:24:46.520 --> 0:24:50.120 and they show a little bit of humility and character 0:24:50.240 --> 0:24:54.320 and morality while in office. That might be too much 0:24:54.359 --> 0:24:59.280 to ask for in our politicians, huh, But if this 0:24:59.359 --> 0:25:02.280 is what we ask for in our friends, this is 0:25:02.320 --> 0:25:04.600 what we ask for and how we raise our kids, 0:25:05.440 --> 0:25:07.120 and you know what it should be what we ask 0:25:07.200 --> 0:25:10.760 for and what kind of representatives that we have in 0:25:10.760 --> 0:25:17.840 this country. Character is destiny. It's a cliche for a 0:25:17.880 --> 0:25:22.439 reason because it's amazing how often it turns out to 0:25:22.480 --> 0:25:26.560 be true. By the way, one final point, I'm the 0:25:26.680 --> 0:25:36.520 Jimmy Kimmel's stuff. Jimmy Kimmel should apologize. Do I think 0:25:36.560 --> 0:25:38.919 the government should be going after him like this? Of 0:25:38.920 --> 0:25:43.240 course not. He's got First Amendment rights. But the joke 0:25:43.440 --> 0:25:47.800 in hindsight after the events on Saturday, looks terrible. So 0:25:47.880 --> 0:25:58.119 say it, Admit it. It's okay. You can say I 0:25:56.720 --> 0:26:03.960 was not intended for what it got interpreted as, which 0:26:04.000 --> 0:26:05.960 means you've got to write a better punchline or you 0:26:05.960 --> 0:26:10.280 got to write a better joke. I'm not sitting here 0:26:10.280 --> 0:26:15.600 defending the behavior of this government or the president in 0:26:15.640 --> 0:26:19.400 targeting Kimmel. But see, this is sort of the problem, right, 0:26:19.840 --> 0:26:21.720 Everything is about you got to pick a side, or 0:26:21.720 --> 0:26:24.400 you're on Jimmy Kimmel's side or you're not on his side. 0:26:24.960 --> 0:26:27.080 I'm on Jimmy Kimmel's side. I'm on the side of 0:26:27.119 --> 0:26:31.560 free speech. But if I said that and then that 0:26:31.600 --> 0:26:36.320 event happened and somebody got mad, I'd have apologized because 0:26:36.320 --> 0:26:39.280 I'd have felt like shit because it wasn't what he 0:26:39.400 --> 0:26:42.080 I do believe it was not what he intended, but 0:26:42.119 --> 0:26:46.959 I'm not here to explain him. I just think that again, 0:26:47.119 --> 0:26:48.679 it goes back to are you going to be a 0:26:48.720 --> 0:26:51.960 de escalator or do you want to be an accelerant 0:26:52.000 --> 0:26:58.680 in this moment. 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I really want to highlight an 0:28:57.680 --> 0:29:03.920 interview I did for Newsphere with a long time intelligence 0:29:04.520 --> 0:29:08.400 analyst from in US government, Beth Saner. She's now out 0:29:08.440 --> 0:29:10.800 of government, but one of her last jobs was being 0:29:11.600 --> 0:29:16.000 basically the only effective daily briefer to the president in 0:29:16.040 --> 0:29:18.520 the first term. To President Trump, she built a rapport 0:29:19.640 --> 0:29:23.280 with him where he at least started to accept some intelligence. 0:29:24.680 --> 0:29:29.080 I urge you to watch the interview in WHULL. I 0:29:29.080 --> 0:29:31.040 hope some of you have subscribed a newsphere. I'm just 0:29:31.080 --> 0:29:34.120 telling you it's really it's a high end news product 0:29:34.840 --> 0:29:38.840 and if you really really want not just reporting, but 0:29:39.120 --> 0:29:43.240 really smart analysis, looking around the corner type of stuff, 0:29:43.840 --> 0:29:45.880 newsphere is the place for you. But I want to 0:29:45.920 --> 0:29:48.840 share a little bit because look, we're in the middle around. 0:29:49.440 --> 0:29:51.840 We just hit a new high end gas price. This 0:29:51.880 --> 0:29:55.920 is not getting resolved tomorrow. And the impact on our economy, 0:29:55.960 --> 0:29:58.760 I mean it is. You know, there's been this sort 0:29:58.800 --> 0:30:01.360 of like stick the markets have been sticking their head 0:30:01.360 --> 0:30:04.920 in the sand, very hopeful, almost like on some sort 0:30:04.960 --> 0:30:13.120 of AI high if you will, right. But I can 0:30:13.160 --> 0:30:15.160 tell you the way consumers are going to feel. Consumers 0:30:15.160 --> 0:30:16.880 are going to hate this economy, and they already hate 0:30:16.880 --> 0:30:20.920 this economy. But I just want to sum up a 0:30:20.920 --> 0:30:23.480 few things. My conversation with best Sayer, I would call 0:30:23.640 --> 0:30:26.640 was very sobering, and she kept returning to one basic 0:30:26.680 --> 0:30:28.880 point in our thirty minute sit down that the US 0:30:28.920 --> 0:30:31.880 may be measuring this war one way, bomb damage, destroyed ships, 0:30:31.920 --> 0:30:36.360 degraded assets, but Iran is measuring it another way. Entirely, 0:30:36.720 --> 0:30:40.680 as Sanner put it, Iran's measuring stick is regime survival. 0:30:41.280 --> 0:30:43.800 Something I've been emphasizing here that the problem we have 0:30:44.800 --> 0:30:47.600 is what does our victory look like and what does 0:30:47.600 --> 0:30:51.320 their victory look like? Right now? Their victory simply surviving 0:30:51.520 --> 0:30:55.800 gives them leverage, and that means we may be winning 0:30:55.840 --> 0:30:58.800 tactically while still moving farther away from what was supposed 0:30:58.840 --> 0:31:02.200 to be a strategic solution. So her argument is that 0:31:02.200 --> 0:31:07.240 we've fallen into a very familiar American pattern assuming military 0:31:07.280 --> 0:31:12.120 superiority can solve a political problem. She compared it to 0:31:12.200 --> 0:31:17.200 Vietnam to Iraq to Afghanistan, moments when we misunderstood the culture, 0:31:18.040 --> 0:31:22.480 the leadership, the decision making, and the resilience of the adversary. 0:31:24.120 --> 0:31:26.040 I mean, how many times do we have to wash 0:31:26.120 --> 0:31:28.720 rents and repeat? Apparently we had to do it again. 0:31:29.680 --> 0:31:31.480 And one of her sharpest lines in this interview was 0:31:31.520 --> 0:31:35.920 we're fighting the Iranians in time, right, that's the warning. 0:31:36.240 --> 0:31:38.800 We're focused on what we can destroy and they're focused 0:31:38.800 --> 0:31:42.360 on what they can survive. And that brings us to 0:31:42.400 --> 0:31:45.520 the Strait of hormones. Sander said, the strait is now 0:31:45.600 --> 0:31:48.480 the immediate crisis, not because the nuclear she has gone away, 0:31:49.040 --> 0:31:50.720 but because this is the thing that can blow up 0:31:50.720 --> 0:31:54.000 the global economy right now. I love this line she 0:31:54.040 --> 0:31:57.480 gave me. She said, the strait is an emergency, which 0:31:57.520 --> 0:32:01.360 is the alligator closest to the boat. Yes, and our 0:32:01.440 --> 0:32:05.280 nuclear armed iron is bad. You know what's the worst 0:32:05.280 --> 0:32:08.360 thing right now? And a rhine in control of the 0:32:08.400 --> 0:32:13.320 Strait of hormones. It's the alligator closest to the boat. 0:32:13.640 --> 0:32:16.080 You can't get to the other one until you deal 0:32:16.080 --> 0:32:20.720 with this one. That's the frame. The nuclear program is 0:32:20.760 --> 0:32:23.560 still the long term strategic threat, but the strait is 0:32:23.560 --> 0:32:27.320 the crisis sitting in front of us. Shipping, insurance, energy prices, allies, China, Russia, 0:32:27.400 --> 0:32:30.440 all of it, all of it choked off at this 0:32:30.560 --> 0:32:34.280 choke point. And Sander's broader critique is that we are 0:32:34.320 --> 0:32:38.280 not sequencing our power very well. We actually sequenced our 0:32:38.280 --> 0:32:41.360 power really well in Venezuela. She used Venezuela as a 0:32:41.400 --> 0:32:48.120 net positive comparison. Right, we had diplomacy, we had information, military, force, economics. 0:32:48.200 --> 0:32:49.960 These are all the tools that she outlined that are 0:32:50.000 --> 0:32:52.520 supposed to work together, but you need to do them 0:32:52.520 --> 0:32:55.600 in a certain order. And instead she's arguing we're relying 0:32:55.640 --> 0:32:58.719 too heavily on the military hammer and then wondering why 0:32:58.800 --> 0:33:02.400 the diplomatic door is hard to to reopen. And she 0:33:02.480 --> 0:33:07.640 made this chilling observation, the Iranians understand us better than 0:33:07.680 --> 0:33:13.360 we understand them. That does seem like a scary proposition. 0:33:13.960 --> 0:33:18.120 They see the threats, they see the pauses right, they're 0:33:18.160 --> 0:33:21.360 paying attention, they see the extensions of the ceasefire, and 0:33:21.400 --> 0:33:23.920 every time we threaten something and don't do it, they 0:33:23.960 --> 0:33:28.320 read that as proof that they're winning. The bottom line 0:33:28.320 --> 0:33:32.680 from Santa is this, you can have overwhelming military success 0:33:32.800 --> 0:33:35.560 and still not have an endgame, or she put it, 0:33:35.720 --> 0:33:39.520 you can have overwhelming conventional military success and still be 0:33:39.640 --> 0:33:43.719 no closer to a solution. Welcome to the Iran that 0:33:43.760 --> 0:33:47.240 we have in front of us right now. That's the warning. 0:33:47.360 --> 0:33:49.680 This doesn't end with a bomb damage assessment. It's going 0:33:49.720 --> 0:33:52.440 to end with diplomacy and right now. The question is 0:33:52.480 --> 0:33:55.760 not just whether Iran comes back to the table. It's 0:33:55.800 --> 0:33:58.480 whether we know who exactly we're supposed to be negotiating 0:33:58.480 --> 0:34:02.120 with and whether we know how to get to an endgame. 0:34:05.840 --> 0:34:08.040 All right, let me get through a few political questions 0:34:08.120 --> 0:34:11.560 that I know you guys are interested in. Let's start 0:34:11.560 --> 0:34:16.759 with the Florida remap here, and it is, like I 0:34:16.800 --> 0:34:24.279 said at the top, this is a map that if 0:34:24.320 --> 0:34:26.960 you're Republicans, you would have loved to run on in 0:34:27.000 --> 0:34:29.440 twenty four, and you may like to run on it 0:34:29.480 --> 0:34:31.800 in twenty eight, especially if Marco Rubio's on the ticket. 0:34:33.600 --> 0:34:39.879 It basically dilutes some Republican some big Republican congressional districts 0:34:39.920 --> 0:34:43.200 in central Florida, both near Tampa Bay and near Orlando, 0:34:43.840 --> 0:34:48.799 and makes them a little bit more competitive. Ditto in 0:34:48.840 --> 0:34:52.719 South Florida. And that all makes sense in a presidential year. 0:34:52.920 --> 0:34:56.800 The problem with this map for Republicans is it's made. 0:34:57.000 --> 0:35:01.080 It has now put more seats in play for Republicans. 0:35:01.120 --> 0:35:06.480 It now means they have to spend more money than ever. Yes, 0:35:06.560 --> 0:35:09.319 they can claim Democrats have to spend a bunch of 0:35:09.360 --> 0:35:13.480 money because the Democratic seats they have to fight for 0:35:14.600 --> 0:35:16.160 and then they have to see if they can win 0:35:16.200 --> 0:35:21.920 a couple of others. So let me give you a 0:35:21.920 --> 0:35:25.200 few little highlights for those of you that are familiar. Basically, 0:35:25.239 --> 0:35:27.200 it didn't make any changes in the northern part of 0:35:27.239 --> 0:35:29.520 the state. It really is sort of Tampa Bay, Orlando, 0:35:29.600 --> 0:35:33.960 and the Miami mostly the Miami for Lauderdale market, a 0:35:33.960 --> 0:35:36.319 little bit of Palm Beach. So let's start with Jared 0:35:36.360 --> 0:35:39.239 Moscowitz W Washerman Sultz. This is Districts twenty three and 0:35:39.280 --> 0:35:43.600 twenty five. This is parts of so Moscow. It's basically used. 0:35:43.920 --> 0:35:47.919 It's been the congressman for Parkland, right, and so it's 0:35:47.960 --> 0:35:49.600 both I think, a little bit of Palm Beach and 0:35:49.600 --> 0:35:51.439 a little bit of Broward County and W. Washerman Soults, 0:35:51.440 --> 0:35:54.120 who used to be almost all exclusively browd County. It's 0:35:54.160 --> 0:36:00.880 gotten more Miami, so there's less now a Broward County 0:36:00.880 --> 0:36:03.960 base in District twenty three, which was Moscowitz, and that 0:36:04.000 --> 0:36:07.640 puts them in danger. Meanwhile, you've got W. Washerman Soultz's 0:36:07.680 --> 0:36:10.920 twenty fifth district now essentially is a coastal seat and 0:36:10.960 --> 0:36:17.200 now is Delray Beach to Miami Beach. So it's both 0:36:17.560 --> 0:36:25.799 heavily Latino and really wealthy. You know, she's if she 0:36:25.960 --> 0:36:28.439 were not pro Israel, I'd say she'd have a hard 0:36:28.440 --> 0:36:31.279 time holding that seat. But she can hold the seat. 0:36:31.440 --> 0:36:33.120 It may be a swing district now, and she's not 0:36:33.200 --> 0:36:36.680 running swing districts very often, and that's something that might 0:36:36.680 --> 0:36:39.200 be different, you know, to me. You know, there's certain 0:36:39.239 --> 0:36:41.240 members of Congress. When you're always in a swing district, 0:36:41.280 --> 0:36:44.880 you're sort of you have muscle memory for it, you develop. 0:36:44.880 --> 0:36:47.640 It's like anything when you have one workout routine. If 0:36:47.680 --> 0:36:49.440 you do the same thing over and over again, that's 0:36:49.440 --> 0:36:53.160 what I do. Unfortunately, I don't diversify my workouts. I'm 0:36:53.400 --> 0:36:56.040 you know, I sort of I'm really I'm really good 0:36:56.080 --> 0:37:02.080 at handling treadmill running. I'm really bad at handling anything else. So, 0:37:02.640 --> 0:37:05.239 you know, I think what's new for w Wasserman Chols 0:37:05.320 --> 0:37:08.240 is going to be being in a swing district mindset. 0:37:08.239 --> 0:37:13.200 But she's kind of I've noticed she has lowered her 0:37:14.040 --> 0:37:20.320 national profile a bit and gone more I think frankly 0:37:20.400 --> 0:37:23.680 in response to I mean, her district has been getting 0:37:23.680 --> 0:37:27.080 a little bit more competitive over time. Meanwhile, the twenty 0:37:27.120 --> 0:37:30.680 second district, this is lowis Francle, this was mostly Palm Beach. Well, 0:37:30.840 --> 0:37:35.759 it now is shifting parlis and balances across both Palm 0:37:35.800 --> 0:37:39.640 Beach and Broward in central Florida. The ninth district, this 0:37:39.680 --> 0:37:44.560 is Darren Soto. This one gets dramatically. This one essentially 0:37:44.600 --> 0:37:48.080 gets erased. It's moved from a majority Latino seat to 0:37:48.160 --> 0:37:51.000 a plurality white one. And if you just look at 0:37:51.040 --> 0:37:53.800 the data, goes from a plus three point five Harris 0:37:53.800 --> 0:38:00.000 district to a plus eighteen Trump district. Meanwhile, Kathy Casters 0:38:00.080 --> 0:38:04.080 seat in Tampa Bay fourteenth district, it's been we've drawn 0:38:04.120 --> 0:38:05.799 to be much more competitive, and it shifts to a 0:38:05.840 --> 0:38:08.600 narrow plus three Republican edge. The point is that Castor 0:38:08.600 --> 0:38:14.200 has been targeted, but this is not an automatic loss here. Meanwhile, 0:38:14.239 --> 0:38:18.320 there's been some huge fallout, right. So Daniel Webster, longtime 0:38:18.320 --> 0:38:21.200 member of Congress in Florida, he'd been one of the 0:38:21.239 --> 0:38:25.120 louder voices saying don't do this. He walked. He's like, 0:38:25.160 --> 0:38:27.960 I'm not defending this new seat. Here's what happened to 0:38:28.000 --> 0:38:30.400 his seat. The seat is no. He had a R 0:38:30.480 --> 0:38:35.799 plus twenty fortress. The new lines moved parts. He had 0:38:35.800 --> 0:38:38.600 the villages in his district, so it took the deep 0:38:38.640 --> 0:38:43.799 red villages and put them into some adjacent districts, and 0:38:43.880 --> 0:38:48.200 it's just turned what was a very Republican district into 0:38:48.280 --> 0:38:51.760 essentially a lean R And I think they just assumed 0:38:51.840 --> 0:38:54.719 Daniel Webster, who's been everybody, Yes, he could hold it, 0:38:55.920 --> 0:38:59.080 but he doesn't want to hold it. And as an 0:38:59.080 --> 0:39:03.920 open seat midterm year, this is the first district created 0:39:05.280 --> 0:39:08.759 that could start to get us into dummy mandar territory. 0:39:09.480 --> 0:39:12.200 And then to make Castor work, they had to pull 0:39:12.239 --> 0:39:18.400 Republican voters from neighboring thirteen and fifteen districts. Well, the 0:39:18.480 --> 0:39:22.799 thirteenth is represented by Anna Paulina Luna, who was already 0:39:23.280 --> 0:39:28.719 in a fairly competitive district as it is, and she 0:39:29.200 --> 0:39:32.200 is somebody who's always been seen as a little bit 0:39:32.680 --> 0:39:35.279 too conservative for the district she's represented. Well, now what 0:39:35.440 --> 0:39:37.640 is it Now? She's even more you know, so she 0:39:37.680 --> 0:39:39.440 might not be the right person to hold that for 0:39:39.520 --> 0:39:44.640 the Republicans. So that seat arguably now has become more vulnerable. 0:39:45.280 --> 0:39:47.880 And then in South Florida, in order to do this 0:39:47.880 --> 0:39:49.840 this sort of cracking and packing of they did that 0:39:49.880 --> 0:39:52.520 they to spread out the Broward County voters a little 0:39:52.560 --> 0:39:59.520 bit so that they didn't all get consolidated. They had 0:39:59.520 --> 0:40:04.160 to move some reliably Republican voters into these more competitive districts. 0:40:04.880 --> 0:40:07.439 What it is left is, it's left both Mario Diaz 0:40:07.440 --> 0:40:11.040 Billard and Carlos Sementez with more diverse and less predictable 0:40:11.040 --> 0:40:14.200 red electorates in Dade County. And it wasn't that long 0:40:14.239 --> 0:40:17.000 ago that both of those districts had plenty of Democratic 0:40:17.120 --> 0:40:21.040 voteds Miami. Dade County is a swing county. It's still 0:40:21.080 --> 0:40:24.640 a swing county. Yes, a lot of Republican money has 0:40:24.640 --> 0:40:28.200 moved to Miami, a lot of major private equity firms 0:40:28.239 --> 0:40:30.840 have moved to my All of that is true. But 0:40:30.920 --> 0:40:33.560 all the people they bring are they're bringing, They're not 0:40:33.600 --> 0:40:36.600 necessarily bringing Republican voters. And it is not clear that 0:40:36.680 --> 0:40:38.719 the Latino vote is going to be as Republican in 0:40:38.760 --> 0:40:41.080 twenty six as it was in twenty four. And if 0:40:41.080 --> 0:40:44.080 it is not, then suddenly these two districts are in play. 0:40:44.680 --> 0:40:49.120 And Maria Salazar was already in play, although that got 0:40:49.160 --> 0:40:54.759 configured a bit too so bottom line, I know I 0:40:54.760 --> 0:41:01.880 went through it individually. Bottom Line, this will be a 0:41:01.920 --> 0:41:05.480 good map for Republicans in twenty eight, but they may 0:41:05.880 --> 0:41:10.400 this basically may not pick up four, probably is maybe 0:41:10.400 --> 0:41:12.560 it picks up one or two, could be break even. 0:41:16.760 --> 0:41:19.840 But it has done this. It's made Florida. It's actually 0:41:20.280 --> 0:41:22.560 this is what it did is that Florida was not 0:41:22.600 --> 0:41:24.480 going to be home to many swing districts, and now 0:41:24.560 --> 0:41:27.160 it is. Now there's going to be more money spent. 0:41:27.239 --> 0:41:31.640 Right Virginia created a situation where there's much fewer swing districts, 0:41:31.719 --> 0:41:35.400 much less money will be pouring in from either party. 0:41:35.440 --> 0:41:39.760 This new Florida map actually increases the need for campaign spending. 0:41:39.840 --> 0:41:44.319 You'll see there's a bit more competition. And then we've 0:41:44.360 --> 0:41:46.600 already seen that both the governor's race and the Senate 0:41:46.640 --> 0:41:54.000 race aren't cakewalks for the Republicans. So it's Florida battle 0:41:54.000 --> 0:41:57.799 around state again. I'm not quite ready to go that far, 0:41:57.960 --> 0:42:02.120 but it is more competitive and might have as many 0:42:02.200 --> 0:42:04.440 house seats in play, certainly more house seats in play, 0:42:08.160 --> 0:42:10.040 or maybe as many a house season play as a 0:42:10.080 --> 0:42:16.560 state larger than it than Texas. A few other nuggets 0:42:16.600 --> 0:42:21.320 just to share with you. One interesting new Democratic poll 0:42:21.440 --> 0:42:27.640 out of Texas that shows tall Rico within a high 0:42:27.640 --> 0:42:30.480 single digit lead over Paxton and a low single digit 0:42:30.600 --> 0:42:33.760 lead over Cornyn. That's not surprising. I think what's surprising 0:42:33.800 --> 0:42:35.680 that there is still a lead over Cornan. I think 0:42:35.719 --> 0:42:38.160 the real question is if Cornyn wins this runoff, is 0:42:38.160 --> 0:42:41.960 this still a competitive race? Now? The problem that Tallarrica's 0:42:41.960 --> 0:42:43.640 going to have is that I think if Cornan wins 0:42:43.640 --> 0:42:47.040 a runoff, they'll be less national. There'll be less money 0:42:47.040 --> 0:42:50.120 coming from the Senate packs because there'll be a belief 0:42:50.120 --> 0:42:53.200 that it and we know John Thune's going to be 0:42:53.200 --> 0:42:54.960 more willing to spend more money than ever. Now, Look, 0:42:55.000 --> 0:42:56.919 do I think no matter who the Republican nominee, there's 0:42:56.920 --> 0:42:59.320 going to be a ton of money poured into Texas. 0:42:59.400 --> 0:43:02.680 I do, But there'll be more if it's Corny than 0:43:02.680 --> 0:43:05.680 if it's Paxton. So that's a note there. And I 0:43:05.719 --> 0:43:07.960 still you know, you still see all the and I'm 0:43:07.960 --> 0:43:09.640 going to get to this in my top five list, 0:43:09.680 --> 0:43:16.200 but you're still going to see You're still going to 0:43:16.239 --> 0:43:19.160 see Paxton still seems to have the advantage of the runoff. 0:43:20.640 --> 0:43:23.279 Susan Collins deciding to go negative on Graham platter before 0:43:23.280 --> 0:43:26.319 the primary. If you're Jana Mills, this is exactly what 0:43:26.360 --> 0:43:30.000 you were hoping for. But it might but there's another 0:43:30.040 --> 0:43:31.960 way to look at this, The fact that the Colins 0:43:31.960 --> 0:43:35.960 superPAC has decided to engage Platiner now rather than after 0:43:36.000 --> 0:43:40.000 the primary sort of gets there was this growing conventional 0:43:40.000 --> 0:43:43.600 wisdom that if Collins could choose, she'd rather face Platiner 0:43:43.600 --> 0:43:48.719 than Mills. Well, guess what the super pac has decided. No, no, no, no, no. 0:43:48.840 --> 0:43:51.640 They want to kill Platiner. Now they want to face Mills. 0:43:51.680 --> 0:43:54.839 And you know what, I think the Collins people are right, 0:43:56.000 --> 0:43:59.520 and I think we've been watching this race together. You've 0:43:59.520 --> 0:44:02.280 probably seen me evolve on this a little bit myself. 0:44:02.320 --> 0:44:04.239 I was a little skeptical, and now I see the 0:44:04.239 --> 0:44:09.040 strength of Platiner, don't get me wrong. And so it's 0:44:09.080 --> 0:44:12.200 interesting now you see the Colins super pack essentially deciding, 0:44:12.239 --> 0:44:16.680 oh no, we much rather face Janet Mills. Look, she's 0:44:16.880 --> 0:44:19.759 just not a good candidate. Doesn't mean she might now 0:44:19.800 --> 0:44:21.680 make a great senator. She's just not a good candidate, 0:44:21.719 --> 0:44:25.560 whether a primary candidate or general electric candidate. It's been 0:44:25.600 --> 0:44:27.839 exposed in the primary by Platner, who's a very good 0:44:27.880 --> 0:44:30.920 political athlete, and now the Collins people see it in 0:44:30.960 --> 0:44:34.719 their numbers. Right, This just reinforces what we've all been 0:44:34.719 --> 0:44:39.040 seeing in these public polls. Platner's a strong is in 0:44:39.040 --> 0:44:41.200 a strong position at the moment to win this senencee. 0:44:42.160 --> 0:44:45.040 Collins would much prefer to face an opponent who also 0:44:45.160 --> 0:44:51.759 is an incumbent politician. Pretty logical to me. All right, 0:44:52.080 --> 0:44:55.600 let's sneak at a break when we come back my 0:44:55.680 --> 0:44:58.120 conversation with a Tim O'Mara. Like I said, she's a 0:44:58.160 --> 0:45:02.040 Democratic strategist, but also look, she's written this great book 0:45:02.080 --> 0:45:04.560 called The Instigators about the history of sort of and 0:45:04.680 --> 0:45:08.920 power of black women in politics. So you know, whether 0:45:08.960 --> 0:45:11.160 she wants to be known as an historian or not, 0:45:11.239 --> 0:45:14.040 she now is as well when you go down this road. 0:45:14.239 --> 0:45:17.520 So I think you'll enjoy the conversation, especially if you're 0:45:18.040 --> 0:45:20.520 truly trying to understand what the future of the Democratic 0:45:20.560 --> 0:45:22.520 Party and the Democratic Coalition is going to look like. 0:45:23.360 --> 0:45:30.719 All right, let's take a break. This episode of the 0:45:30.800 --> 0:45:33.480 Check podcast is brought to you by Soul. So if 0:45:33.520 --> 0:45:35.680 you love that end of the day unwined but hate 0:45:35.680 --> 0:45:39.560 the hangover, Soul's out of Office is for you. These 0:45:39.600 --> 0:45:42.960 sparkling THHC drinks and gummies give you the same relaxed 0:45:42.960 --> 0:45:47.320 social feeling without the alcohol, without the calories, and without 0:45:47.320 --> 0:45:50.320 the crash. 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I do not 0:46:28.200 --> 0:46:30.600 partake in alcohol. For the most part, I think this 0:46:30.640 --> 0:46:32.960 stuff is a lot safer than alcohol, a lot less 0:46:32.960 --> 0:46:35.840 addictive than alcohol. And yes, I have to say I 0:46:35.880 --> 0:46:38.680 love these drinks. It is the glass of wine and 0:46:38.719 --> 0:46:42.120 you know after work that's what this is. So no 0:46:42.239 --> 0:46:46.399 hangover and no excess calories like this. I'm a big fan. 0:46:46.880 --> 0:46:49.080 So bring on the good vibes and treat yourself to 0:46:49.160 --> 0:46:52.120 Sold today right now. Soul is offering my audience thirty 0:46:52.160 --> 0:46:54.959 percent off your entire order. Go to getsoul dot com 0:46:54.960 --> 0:46:58.440 and use the word podcast. That's getsol dot com promo 0:46:58.480 --> 0:47:02.160 code podcast for thirty percent off. And yes, I too, 0:47:02.440 --> 0:47:09.919 am a customer. So joining me now is a first 0:47:09.960 --> 0:47:13.520 time author. The book is called The Instigators, And as 0:47:13.560 --> 0:47:16.600 you can see the author here Atima O'Mara, she's even 0:47:16.719 --> 0:47:19.759 she's got merch. I love it like you know, you 0:47:19.880 --> 0:47:22.080 got a shirt with it there. I mean, you are 0:47:22.640 --> 0:47:28.320 extraordinarily well prepared. What this book is about. It's essentially 0:47:28.360 --> 0:47:32.400 about the role that black women in particular have played 0:47:32.840 --> 0:47:36.600 and are playing right now in American politics, and the 0:47:36.640 --> 0:47:40.600 influential role that younger Black women are playing these days 0:47:40.600 --> 0:47:44.279 in American politics. So this book is part analysis because 0:47:44.280 --> 0:47:48.000 she's in the advocacy space, political strategy space, but also 0:47:48.120 --> 0:47:51.919 historical because this is not a new thing. Black women 0:47:51.960 --> 0:47:55.240 in many ways have carried the banner for civil rights 0:47:55.360 --> 0:47:59.640 and for voting rights and for just rights in general. 0:48:00.000 --> 0:48:02.320 Teama joins me now, team, Welcome to the podcast. 0:48:03.120 --> 0:48:04.080 Thanks for having me. 0:48:06.280 --> 0:48:06.360 So. 0:48:08.360 --> 0:48:11.239 Obviously, one of the big pushbacks that your book is 0:48:11.360 --> 0:48:16.239 attempting to do, Rich is there's the general consensus that 0:48:16.320 --> 0:48:20.920 the that it's white swing voters, suburban moderates that decide elections, 0:48:21.520 --> 0:48:24.359 And in some ways this is an attempt to blow 0:48:24.440 --> 0:48:26.880 up that myth a little bit. And I think we 0:48:26.920 --> 0:48:29.840 all have realized that swing voters are not people that 0:48:30.640 --> 0:48:34.720 swing between two sides. Actually, most swing voters swing between 0:48:34.760 --> 0:48:38.440 voting and not voting as much as they swing actually 0:48:38.480 --> 0:48:40.160 between the two parties. Not saying that there aren't some 0:48:40.239 --> 0:48:43.359 voters that do this and they become incredibly decisive when 0:48:43.400 --> 0:48:46.600 the margins are super thin. But is that a fair 0:48:46.920 --> 0:48:48.640 is that? Is that a fair marker here? That it 0:48:48.719 --> 0:48:50.920 was one of the big MythBusters you wanted to do, 0:48:51.040 --> 0:48:51.279 was that? 0:48:52.440 --> 0:48:53.719 Yes? Definitely. 0:48:54.520 --> 0:48:58.560 I wanted to challenge sort of a narrative that if 0:48:58.600 --> 0:49:02.959 we are are focusing on trying to get this why 0:49:04.040 --> 0:49:08.759 moderate swing voter, you know, trying to think of thinking 0:49:08.840 --> 0:49:10.520 of that particular guy and you would know this from 0:49:10.560 --> 0:49:12.600 your coverage, I'm forgetting him. 0:49:12.600 --> 0:49:15.640 But he's like the guy and like the plumber. 0:49:15.960 --> 0:49:18.880 Well yeah, the plumber, he's one, and there's like another 0:49:18.920 --> 0:49:21.520 one where he's just like I'm still deciding and everybody 0:49:21.520 --> 0:49:22.120 off his park. 0:49:22.239 --> 0:49:25.200 Dad, Right, We've got that one, right. 0:49:25.880 --> 0:49:28.840 You know, Sometimes you get like the NASCAR mom or 0:49:29.040 --> 0:49:30.600 soccer mom who's. 0:49:30.400 --> 0:49:32.160 Just trying to make decisions. 0:49:32.440 --> 0:49:35.960 And I get that that is is fascinating sort of 0:49:35.960 --> 0:49:40.240 in coverage in media, but it's it's it's not great 0:49:40.320 --> 0:49:43.480 as the basis as the foundation of a political strategy 0:49:44.440 --> 0:49:46.280 for certainly the Democratic Party. 0:49:46.320 --> 0:49:49.680 Anyway, Well, you start your book, you start with Virginia. 0:49:49.760 --> 0:49:52.680 So this is something I'm very familiar with, and certainly 0:49:52.719 --> 0:49:55.360 my listeners over the last few weeks have gotten very familiar. 0:49:55.400 --> 0:50:00.960 We've talked a lot about Virginia in general. But it's it's, uh, 0:50:01.080 --> 0:50:03.640 you start talking about the Ralph Northam scandal and his 0:50:03.760 --> 0:50:07.200 black face scandal and sort of the role walk me 0:50:07.280 --> 0:50:10.720 through the role you think black women played in that, 0:50:10.920 --> 0:50:12.680 and I guess would be his political survival. 0:50:13.239 --> 0:50:13.479 Yeah. 0:50:14.360 --> 0:50:18.880 Uh, So you had elected officials, You had cabinet members 0:50:19.120 --> 0:50:23.239 of his as well as advocates who were like, all right, 0:50:24.280 --> 0:50:27.319 if you want to stay in political power, we are 0:50:27.400 --> 0:50:29.719 going to make you put in the work for it. 0:50:30.640 --> 0:50:34.319 So you had organizers like Chelsea Higgs Wise who had 0:50:34.360 --> 0:50:39.600 started ah, you know, marijuana advocacy organization that was grassroots 0:50:39.600 --> 0:50:43.120 to push for the legalization, Like, forget the criminalization, We're 0:50:43.120 --> 0:50:46.240 just going to go the full legalization and organizing people 0:50:46.239 --> 0:50:49.239 around that young you know, black single mother. 0:50:50.040 --> 0:50:52.200 And then you had Adam McClure. 0:50:52.280 --> 0:50:55.760 She's now a state House representative House of Delegates in Virginia, 0:50:55.840 --> 0:50:58.280 but was head of the Virginia Legacity of Black Caucus. 0:50:58.280 --> 0:51:01.480 That's use this to put together a very ambitious legislate 0:51:01.520 --> 0:51:03.960 of agenda. Maybe not everything's going to get passed on 0:51:04.040 --> 0:51:07.960 criminal justice reform, social safety and such, but we are 0:51:08.000 --> 0:51:10.239 going to put it forth in this in the in 0:51:10.280 --> 0:51:11.160 this opportunity. 0:51:12.239 --> 0:51:14.520 And then you have a Voting Rights Act. 0:51:15.000 --> 0:51:17.440 We have our own state Voting Rights ac modeled off 0:51:17.440 --> 0:51:20.239 the sixty five Voting Rights Act thanks to then State 0:51:20.320 --> 0:51:23.360 Senator Jennifer McClellan. And then you had a lot of 0:51:23.360 --> 0:51:26.560 the initiatives just in state government and policy that were 0:51:26.600 --> 0:51:29.560 being pushed by cabinet secretaries at the time who were 0:51:29.600 --> 0:51:30.480 younger black women. 0:51:30.640 --> 0:51:36.160 And so you know, a lot of this happened as Northern. 0:51:35.920 --> 0:51:39.279 Was trying to figure out how to rebound and take 0:51:39.320 --> 0:51:44.600 advantage of trying to stay in place. And it came 0:51:44.719 --> 0:51:48.800 right into the spring of twenty twenty when George Floyd 0:51:48.880 --> 0:51:51.560 was murdered. And now we're all inside and now it 0:51:51.640 --> 0:51:55.520 was really an additional captive audiences. As they say in 0:51:55.520 --> 0:52:00.920 public policy, the Overton window had shifted traumatically, and they 0:52:00.920 --> 0:52:04.359 were poised to take all that work and knowledge and 0:52:04.560 --> 0:52:07.160 strategy and push for a lot of the change that 0:52:07.160 --> 0:52:08.160 we now have in Virginia. 0:52:09.320 --> 0:52:12.600 Well, it look you had leverage over him, he decided, 0:52:13.160 --> 0:52:14.680 and it was I don't want to say it was 0:52:14.719 --> 0:52:19.319 accidental leverage, but it was. It was almost leverage that 0:52:19.440 --> 0:52:21.400 was lost. I mean not to get into the tragedy 0:52:21.440 --> 0:52:24.040 of the of the of the late now late lieutenant governor, 0:52:25.880 --> 0:52:30.640 but because he politically was essentially paralyzed at the moment 0:52:30.719 --> 0:52:36.799 then and unable to be seen as the as the alternative. Uh, 0:52:36.920 --> 0:52:39.800 if there was a if, if Northam decided to resign 0:52:42.920 --> 0:52:45.080 in the in this case, was it easier to get 0:52:45.160 --> 0:52:48.279 leverage on him or was it actually harder when it 0:52:48.400 --> 0:52:52.560 when he felt quote politically safer because his LG had 0:52:53.239 --> 0:52:58.839 separate political issues that made him a fraud potential replacement governor, It. 0:52:58.840 --> 0:53:01.680 Probably and I lluded to it there in the book 0:53:01.719 --> 0:53:05.120 that I think it made him feel like, Okay, I've 0:53:05.120 --> 0:53:08.760 got more room to try and assert that I stay. 0:53:09.600 --> 0:53:13.359 And that is where that sentiment that winter and going 0:53:13.360 --> 0:53:15.759 into spring of twenty twenty, where folks were like, all right, 0:53:15.800 --> 0:53:18.319 if you won't stay, we're gonna make it work for it, 0:53:19.960 --> 0:53:23.960 and how a lot of those policies, and you know, 0:53:24.040 --> 0:53:26.640 he made himself very amenable to that because I think 0:53:26.680 --> 0:53:28.320 he realized, certainly. 0:53:29.800 --> 0:53:31.399 Politically, it was going to be hard. 0:53:31.440 --> 0:53:34.840 Their cabinet members are elected officials, we're going to resign 0:53:35.640 --> 0:53:38.960 or certainly make his political life not very uncomfortable if 0:53:39.000 --> 0:53:43.680 he had not been as amenable. So credit to him 0:53:43.719 --> 0:53:45.319 being amnimal, but I also think he was put in 0:53:45.320 --> 0:53:48.399 a position where, you know, he felt that he had 0:53:48.440 --> 0:53:51.480 to be a lot more to prove to folks that 0:53:52.360 --> 0:53:55.880 he was what he believed himself to be as a 0:53:55.920 --> 0:53:56.960 better changed person. 0:53:57.760 --> 0:54:00.440 How often do you think, I actually think sometimes interest 0:54:00.440 --> 0:54:03.600 groups don't take advantage of what I would call transactional 0:54:03.680 --> 0:54:07.600 leverage moments, meaning you know where, look, this is not 0:54:07.719 --> 0:54:09.799 somebody that would normally be your ally, but they kind 0:54:09.840 --> 0:54:11.640 of need you more than you you know, and you 0:54:11.640 --> 0:54:14.359 know what, maybe we can extract some concessions out of here. 0:54:14.960 --> 0:54:18.360 And there's so much pressure these days, frankly not to 0:54:18.400 --> 0:54:21.160 be seen as working with somebody who maybe was against 0:54:21.200 --> 0:54:25.960 your interests six months ago, six years ago, you know 0:54:26.000 --> 0:54:29.120 the you know what always invited, what always made to 0:54:29.160 --> 0:54:31.480 me what the most inviting thing of our democracy in 0:54:31.520 --> 0:54:35.080 general is that even at its founding, it was intended 0:54:35.120 --> 0:54:38.800 to be a negotiation, right that it was always a negotiation. 0:54:38.920 --> 0:54:41.520 So if we if you think of politics as a negotiation, 0:54:41.560 --> 0:54:44.080 it means you're going to actually make some common cause 0:54:44.080 --> 0:54:46.000 with people you don't normally agree with, because it's a 0:54:46.080 --> 0:54:49.359 quote negotiation. And yet I feel like that art has 0:54:49.440 --> 0:54:54.400 been lost in modern politics, more so in the democratic 0:54:54.480 --> 0:54:56.560 side of the eye. I am I being a little 0:54:56.600 --> 0:55:00.200 overly critical here, not. 0:55:00.600 --> 0:55:05.359 I mean there are moments where, you know, listen, there 0:55:05.360 --> 0:55:08.720 are folks realizing, okay, I voted for something three times 0:55:08.719 --> 0:55:15.760 that is now pretty terrible, and I'm not super interested 0:55:16.120 --> 0:55:18.000 in being buddies with these folks. 0:55:18.760 --> 0:55:22.840 However, if there is an operation, I. 0:55:22.840 --> 0:55:25.480 Don't want to be lectured at for supporting this entity 0:55:25.520 --> 0:55:29.279 for the less right right yea lecturing like telling me 0:55:29.360 --> 0:55:32.759 I was wrong, Okay, I was wrong, And for me. 0:55:32.960 --> 0:55:35.920 It's like okay, listen, like you're going to be on 0:55:35.960 --> 0:55:40.200 the same page and voting great, but you don't want 0:55:40.239 --> 0:55:42.239 to do this again. We don't want to have to 0:55:42.280 --> 0:55:45.440 go through this again. We are going to on the 0:55:45.480 --> 0:55:49.480 other side of this, have to have a conversation about 0:55:49.920 --> 0:55:51.399 why you did what you did and why you thought 0:55:51.440 --> 0:55:54.880 that this made the most sense. So I'm one of 0:55:54.880 --> 0:55:58.400 those people where it's like I understand the point of coalitions, 0:55:58.520 --> 0:55:59.920 where it's like, all right, let's just be in the 0:56:00.080 --> 0:56:04.160 room on this one point and win, so that we 0:56:04.160 --> 0:56:07.440 can at least have a conversation. 0:56:07.320 --> 0:56:11.240 On the other side about how we retain this victory. 0:56:13.080 --> 0:56:16.440 Let's talk about twenty four because in here you're pretty 0:56:18.480 --> 0:56:21.279 you're pretty tough on the Democrats. Walk me through it. 0:56:21.320 --> 0:56:24.480 What could have been was it was this an election 0:56:24.560 --> 0:56:27.960 that was lost on persuasion or mobilization. 0:56:28.480 --> 0:56:29.720 Very much mobilization. 0:56:29.960 --> 0:56:32.320 I think some of the things that have been leaking 0:56:32.800 --> 0:56:36.000 from the twenty twenty four Action Report point. 0:56:35.880 --> 0:56:37.279 That we're never going to see. 0:56:37.400 --> 0:56:39.400 You're ever going to see it? Yeah, you're never going 0:56:39.440 --> 0:56:39.719 to see. 0:56:39.840 --> 0:56:43.080 And you know, I've had an opportunity to get some 0:56:43.200 --> 0:56:46.279 insights into into what it was from some briefings that I. 0:56:46.320 --> 0:56:49.600 Who did it, who took in charge of this briefing 0:56:49.880 --> 0:56:51.640 of this autopsy, of. 0:56:51.560 --> 0:56:53.200 This autopsy, I actually don't know. 0:56:53.280 --> 0:56:55.520 There was like a whole committee formed, and I know 0:56:55.560 --> 0:56:57.279 that there's like a couple of strategists who. 0:56:57.200 --> 0:56:59.560 Did some of the probably just two or three people 0:56:59.560 --> 0:57:00.799 that did like ninety percent of. 0:57:00.719 --> 0:57:03.280 The work the work, right, Yeah, and then there's like, yeah, 0:57:03.520 --> 0:57:06.560 so there's just generally this committee And so we definitely 0:57:06.560 --> 0:57:11.600 lost it in mobilization. Not to say that racism and 0:57:11.760 --> 0:57:13.759 estotrapy didn't play a role, because there were certainly these 0:57:13.760 --> 0:57:19.280 people who were like, well, I remember distinctly Arizona, some 0:57:19.800 --> 0:57:22.640 young person being interviewed and why you know, who are 0:57:22.640 --> 0:57:24.000 going to vote for Trump? 0:57:24.040 --> 0:57:27.680 And why well, I'mala didn't show up on the Joe 0:57:27.720 --> 0:57:28.600 Rogan podcast. 0:57:28.680 --> 0:57:31.880 I was just like, okay't I don't think that was 0:57:31.920 --> 0:57:34.200 the deciding factor. I feel like that was a good excuse, 0:57:34.240 --> 0:57:38.400 but okay, sure, so you had those, but when you 0:57:38.640 --> 0:57:42.040 have Trump didn't actually get as much as he was, like, 0:57:42.120 --> 0:57:43.400 this was a landslide. 0:57:44.280 --> 0:57:45.760 It was small amounts. 0:57:45.400 --> 0:57:49.200 Of margins of votes in all the seven states, And 0:57:49.240 --> 0:57:52.160 when you looked at what happened in twenty twenty, where 0:57:52.200 --> 0:57:54.320 we were trying to make it more accessible to vote for. 0:57:54.360 --> 0:57:56.320 Folks, and obviously that rolled back. 0:57:56.600 --> 0:57:59.040 But then you also looked at Trump's margins. You didn't 0:57:59.040 --> 0:58:02.560 do that much better than twenty It was the Democratic 0:58:02.560 --> 0:58:05.080 turnout that was lower. And it's not a combination of 0:58:05.160 --> 0:58:08.280 voter suppression and not having dealt with that, but also 0:58:08.840 --> 0:58:11.720 the mobilization is now and I cite it in the book. 0:58:12.920 --> 0:58:18.560 Lots of stories from black staffers who were trying to renegade, 0:58:18.640 --> 0:58:21.520 just figure out how to do operational work on the 0:58:21.560 --> 0:58:24.360 ground in communities that we needed to vote, as well 0:58:24.400 --> 0:58:28.440 as you know, black consultants who weren't sort of getting 0:58:28.560 --> 0:58:32.000 the resources they needed and black led, brown led organizations 0:58:32.040 --> 0:58:33.920 to turn out their communities that they got in twenty 0:58:34.000 --> 0:58:36.000 twenty by comparison. 0:58:36.680 --> 0:58:39.920 Well, to me, you know, I've always said that the 0:58:40.000 --> 0:58:43.960 damning part of this election on the mobilization front is 0:58:44.040 --> 0:58:48.000 not the seventh the results in the seven states, it's 0:58:48.040 --> 0:58:51.520 actually the results in the other forty three. Right when 0:58:51.560 --> 0:58:55.880 you look at the the number of blue states that 0:58:56.040 --> 0:58:59.960 ended up single digits close to five points, like Illinois, 0:59:00.080 --> 0:59:03.280 New Jersey to me or the probably the best examples, 0:59:03.280 --> 0:59:05.800 but this was across the board, right, It just felt 0:59:05.840 --> 0:59:08.800 like that there was somewhere, you know, I do think 0:59:09.200 --> 0:59:11.840 I go back to what I believe more so today 0:59:11.840 --> 0:59:13.920 than I even believed a decade ago, which is that 0:59:14.880 --> 0:59:17.720 swing voters are those that swing between voting and not voting, 0:59:18.200 --> 0:59:21.000 which means it is a mobilization tool, But it doesn't 0:59:21.040 --> 0:59:24.360 mean you don't have persuasion. Right, Yeah, And this is 0:59:24.360 --> 0:59:26.240 why I hate saying, you know, and I did it 0:59:26.240 --> 0:59:29.400 to you, right, I said Pick one was a mobilization persuasion. Well, 0:59:29.480 --> 0:59:31.720 the fact of the matter is you couldn't persuade those 0:59:31.760 --> 0:59:34.440 who normally are with you to go vote. So guess what, 0:59:34.720 --> 0:59:38.520 you had a mobilization problem that was also a persuasion problem. 0:59:38.840 --> 0:59:39.120 You know. 0:59:39.240 --> 0:59:43.440 That is like, there just weren't people excited. Now we 0:59:43.600 --> 0:59:45.640 all have our theories. Were they not excited about her 0:59:45.680 --> 0:59:48.000 because she was trying to straddle the fence between sort 0:59:48.040 --> 0:59:52.000 of the old guard of the party and the progressive wing. 0:59:52.480 --> 0:59:55.360 Was it because she was saddled with an unpopular president? 0:59:55.440 --> 0:59:58.080 Which is frankly, sometimes I look at things and it's like, 0:59:58.160 --> 1:00:01.880 let's stop being complicated. Where to Humphrey didn't win, al 1:00:01.920 --> 1:00:05.800 Gore didn't win, Kamala Harris didn't win. It's hard to 1:00:05.920 --> 1:00:10.280 succeed a president who is unpopular for one reason or 1:00:10.280 --> 1:00:14.520 the other, either personally or professionally, and my goodness, look 1:00:14.520 --> 1:00:17.720 how close she came, and yet and yet he was 1:00:17.720 --> 1:00:20.000 holding it right. So I still at the end of 1:00:20.040 --> 1:00:22.240 the day put this on Biden that we could sit 1:00:22.280 --> 1:00:24.760 here and nitpick all we want. If Biden had been 1:00:24.760 --> 1:00:28.320 a more popular president, Kamala Harris would be president. 1:00:28.840 --> 1:00:32.600 Yeah it was, and yeah, there was a the fact 1:00:32.640 --> 1:00:36.840 that the margins were so tight, and then the fact 1:00:36.920 --> 1:00:38.400 that you had she had one. 1:00:38.400 --> 1:00:39.240 Hundred and seven days. 1:00:40.360 --> 1:00:43.120 And as somebody pointed out when they were talking about 1:00:43.120 --> 1:00:43.840 the election, I. 1:00:43.760 --> 1:00:44.840 Was going out and thought about it. 1:00:44.880 --> 1:00:49.200 But she's like a voting started basically after the convention, 1:00:49.960 --> 1:00:55.680 so she was already behind before she started. And so 1:00:55.840 --> 1:00:58.120 that is you know, that's where I sort of am 1:00:58.160 --> 1:01:02.600 as well in thinking there was not a lot that 1:01:02.720 --> 1:01:06.840 between his popularity and then the operation that was handed 1:01:06.840 --> 1:01:08.480 to her that set her up for. 1:01:08.520 --> 1:01:10.040 Success, and she closed that gap. 1:01:10.160 --> 1:01:12.440 Like the stories about him being under the water and 1:01:12.440 --> 1:01:14.920 then he couldn't have pulled it out were as we 1:01:15.040 --> 1:01:17.680 now know true, And she really didn't as much as 1:01:17.680 --> 1:01:18.920 she could to close. 1:01:18.760 --> 1:01:20.720 The gap and came very close. 1:01:20.920 --> 1:01:23.760 She saved three or four Senate seats. I look at it, 1:01:24.000 --> 1:01:25.480 you know, I don't think people, I mean, you know, 1:01:25.560 --> 1:01:31.280 let's Wisconsin, Arizona, Nevada. What am I leaving out here? 1:01:31.320 --> 1:01:35.040 Is it Michigan? Yeah, it's Michigan. Right, four Senate seats 1:01:35.560 --> 1:01:37.680 Joe Biden would have lost. Joe Biden been the nominee, 1:01:37.680 --> 1:01:40.280 he'd lost all four of those Senate seats go down. 1:01:40.560 --> 1:01:44.520 I'm pretty convinced to that because he probably has something. 1:01:45.040 --> 1:01:47.720 He's probably performs two or three points lower than she does. 1:01:48.160 --> 1:01:48.440 Yeah. 1:01:49.320 --> 1:01:52.840 Yeah, I felt that as well. That was the failing. 1:01:52.880 --> 1:01:56.280 Even just the energy on the ground in volunteer enthusiasm 1:01:56.360 --> 1:02:00.200 is completely shifted of people who were of the the 1:02:00.280 --> 1:02:04.760 diehards wanted to get work done, and volunteer shifted with 1:02:04.880 --> 1:02:06.720 her at the top of the ticket. 1:02:07.280 --> 1:02:11.880 I'm going to go back to black women voters, and 1:02:11.920 --> 1:02:14.280 it is more and more Democrats talk about that black 1:02:14.320 --> 1:02:16.960 women are the heart and soul, certainly in primary politics. 1:02:19.640 --> 1:02:21.880 One of the things though, that I think is nobody 1:02:21.960 --> 1:02:24.520 quite knows the answer to. And I see people in 1:02:24.560 --> 1:02:28.720 the media just as presume that black women are primary 1:02:29.080 --> 1:02:31.920 are are super voters, so that must mean they're super lefty, 1:02:32.600 --> 1:02:34.920 and that's not the same. I think that that's always 1:02:35.000 --> 1:02:39.160 the biggest mistake most amateur analysts make with black voters, 1:02:39.680 --> 1:02:43.200 but walk me through sort of the ideological spectrum of 1:02:43.240 --> 1:02:46.880 black women and what works and what ideological arguments don't. 1:02:46.920 --> 1:02:50.560 Like why do some progressives have such a hard time 1:02:52.400 --> 1:02:55.000 convincing black voters to support them? 1:02:55.400 --> 1:02:58.000 I think oftentimes, and I'll say this from my own 1:02:58.040 --> 1:03:02.600 perspective and the conversations in my cohort, is that you're 1:03:02.760 --> 1:03:05.840 you're having conversations with people who are not having an 1:03:05.920 --> 1:03:11.320 analysis of an economic issue that takes into account the 1:03:11.400 --> 1:03:14.760 experiences of what it means to be black, brown, or 1:03:14.840 --> 1:03:19.040 woman in this country. You know, every single time I 1:03:19.120 --> 1:03:22.840 heard Bernie Sanders say, all right, but it's about the economy, 1:03:22.840 --> 1:03:26.560 and I'm like abortion rights, and in response to abortion 1:03:26.640 --> 1:03:28.840 rights or anything that just wants. 1:03:28.640 --> 1:03:33.720 To do it, he kept saying, oh, it's downplaying it 1:03:33.800 --> 1:03:37.800 when every single, every single sort of study that has 1:03:37.840 --> 1:03:42.360 come out says that, you know, the essentially the discussion 1:03:42.400 --> 1:03:44.560 around whether you grow a family or not. 1:03:44.680 --> 1:03:49.000 I know, it's personally is based around how many children 1:03:49.040 --> 1:03:52.600 you have, whether whether you can feed that child, provide 1:03:52.600 --> 1:03:55.560 for that child, and with things, yes, costs or rising, 1:03:56.120 --> 1:03:59.600 but it is it is that's taken away, that's a 1:03:59.600 --> 1:04:02.840 big part part of an economic discussion. So as an example, 1:04:03.800 --> 1:04:07.200 you know, talking about criminal justice reform and and not 1:04:08.040 --> 1:04:12.160 you not talking about it in a way that at 1:04:12.200 --> 1:04:16.680 all takes into account the humanity of black people, you know, 1:04:16.800 --> 1:04:19.280 not talking about the environment. What's happening right now in 1:04:19.320 --> 1:04:22.960 this country around you know, data center organizing, like anti 1:04:23.040 --> 1:04:28.160 data center organizing, and not really realizing it's very much 1:04:28.160 --> 1:04:33.800 of an environmental justice issue. And you know that we 1:04:33.840 --> 1:04:36.800 have a great opportunity because it's like a multi racial 1:04:36.960 --> 1:04:39.160 now sort of organizing. It's happening in some of the 1:04:39.200 --> 1:04:43.760 redist areas to some of the more blue areas against 1:04:43.880 --> 1:04:47.360 this this sort of pushing of corporate stuff, but not 1:04:47.440 --> 1:04:50.520 really kind of capturing a lot of that energy or 1:04:50.640 --> 1:04:54.960 understanding or proposing policies that really take into account the 1:04:55.040 --> 1:04:58.320 experiences of what it means to be black or brown 1:04:58.360 --> 1:04:58.960 in the US. 1:04:59.400 --> 1:05:06.080 So, So let me ask you this, do you describe 1:05:06.160 --> 1:05:11.280 a two track system of insiders and instigators? Are they? 1:05:12.240 --> 1:05:14.520 How much do those worlds trust each other? And how 1:05:14.600 --> 1:05:18.000 much are they just fundamentally intentioned? 1:05:20.000 --> 1:05:22.320 They know, there's always been attention and there should be 1:05:22.320 --> 1:05:24.640 a sort of a natural attention to somebody who's like 1:05:24.640 --> 1:05:28.600 an elected official and government highest and you know, halls 1:05:28.600 --> 1:05:31.600 of power as it were, and those who are doing 1:05:31.600 --> 1:05:36.320 the activism. I do think that that has become even 1:05:36.360 --> 1:05:39.080 more tense in recent years, and there's. 1:05:38.960 --> 1:05:40.880 Like less respect. 1:05:42.800 --> 1:05:46.600 Really on either side, you know, certainly for the roles 1:05:46.600 --> 1:05:47.720 that everybody has to play. 1:05:47.880 --> 1:05:50.320 And that's sort of why is there less respect? What's 1:05:50.400 --> 1:05:54.320 your sense is it? Is it money has sort of 1:05:55.040 --> 1:05:57.600 clouded the picture for the groups, and the groups are 1:05:57.600 --> 1:06:00.480 just so driven by finances. What is it? 1:06:01.360 --> 1:06:05.000 I think on the elected official side, I think it's like, 1:06:05.000 --> 1:06:05.920 why don't you trust me to. 1:06:05.880 --> 1:06:08.640 Just get the work time? I think it's that's their 1:06:08.720 --> 1:06:09.280 their feeling. 1:06:10.040 --> 1:06:14.800 And I think on the activist side, I think it's 1:06:14.920 --> 1:06:19.840 more so that because we don't see you doing a 1:06:19.880 --> 1:06:21.560 lot of that. We don't even see you trying to 1:06:21.560 --> 1:06:25.919 put together piecemeal reform in the direction of. 1:06:27.360 --> 1:06:29.440 You know, making change, and so. 1:06:29.400 --> 1:06:32.960 You're asking us to trust you based off of And 1:06:33.000 --> 1:06:36.720 a good example I think of is like right after 1:06:37.680 --> 1:06:43.880 twenty twenty get the Senate and granted Mansion Cinema were 1:06:43.960 --> 1:06:46.320 the hold up on why we couldn't get a lot 1:06:46.360 --> 1:06:50.880 of things through Build Back Better Voting Rights Act. 1:06:51.040 --> 1:06:53.960 I guess what they call for the people was the legislation. 1:06:55.400 --> 1:07:00.600 And and and so it's like, okay, literally, well you know, 1:07:00.640 --> 1:07:02.360 we can't get it through, and they're like. 1:07:02.640 --> 1:07:06.600 What do we just push to put you in power? 1:07:06.640 --> 1:07:06.840 For? 1:07:07.640 --> 1:07:09.200 What are the ways around? 1:07:10.280 --> 1:07:13.240 You know, what are alternative things that we can do 1:07:13.760 --> 1:07:16.840 to expand the right to vote? Because we're telling you like, 1:07:16.920 --> 1:07:19.919 if we don't, we're seeing a whole slew of voter 1:07:20.040 --> 1:07:24.560 suppression bill is going to come, which they did. And 1:07:24.680 --> 1:07:26.959 so I think it's that that's like, Okay, you're asking 1:07:27.040 --> 1:07:29.440 us to trust where there isn't something, and officials are like, 1:07:30.320 --> 1:07:31.920 I need you to trust that we're going to do 1:07:32.200 --> 1:07:33.800 the right thing. And it's like got to be a 1:07:33.880 --> 1:07:37.520 little goob and take in that relationship. 1:07:37.560 --> 1:07:39.120 It's a dance. You know. 1:07:48.840 --> 1:07:51.919 Do you think democrats in the Biden White House spot 1:07:52.000 --> 1:07:52.360 aren't it. 1:07:54.000 --> 1:07:55.200 Not as much as they should have known? 1:07:55.960 --> 1:07:58.480 What would that have looked like? I mean they certainly 1:07:58.560 --> 1:08:02.760 risked now part Look, I think you had President Biden 1:08:02.920 --> 1:08:05.600 has the heart of a legislator, not an executive. So 1:08:05.680 --> 1:08:08.080 we had more patients for sort of the Senate games 1:08:08.080 --> 1:08:12.800 been shipped and perhaps other presidents would have And you know, 1:08:12.880 --> 1:08:14.640 I think that that's if you want to know the 1:08:15.160 --> 1:08:18.400 real secret difference between a senator becoming president and a 1:08:18.439 --> 1:08:21.920 governor becoming president. It is probably that level of patience. Right, 1:08:22.040 --> 1:08:25.240 Obama had more patience for the process then maybe I 1:08:25.240 --> 1:08:27.840 remember a lot of people thought that he should. Biden 1:08:27.880 --> 1:08:30.240 had a lot more patients for the process, because you know, 1:08:30.320 --> 1:08:32.120 they've been on the other side. You know, even if 1:08:32.160 --> 1:08:35.439 briefly they you know, they're too personally friendly with those 1:08:36.360 --> 1:08:38.120 But what would that have looked like? And what if 1:08:38.120 --> 1:08:40.120 the whole thing had blown up and you wouldn't have 1:08:40.120 --> 1:08:42.680 gotten anything? And perhaps you just think, you know what, No, 1:08:43.240 --> 1:08:45.960 they would have you know, a little hardball wouldn't have 1:08:46.040 --> 1:08:46.960 hurt them. 1:08:47.520 --> 1:08:49.800 Yeah, I actually don't think a little hardball would have 1:08:49.840 --> 1:08:50.160 hurt them. 1:08:50.160 --> 1:08:52.880 And I think about because you. 1:08:52.840 --> 1:08:56.840 Know, channeling his inner LBJ, you know lb J. 1:08:57.240 --> 1:08:59.519 Like one of my favorite stories I read about olbi J. 1:08:59.640 --> 1:09:03.800 It's lesser known, was he was trying to get the 1:09:03.920 --> 1:09:06.599 voting right ZAC pass. He did a whistle stop tour 1:09:06.920 --> 1:09:10.760 like and he had Lady Bird Johnson go through the 1:09:10.840 --> 1:09:14.559 South have teas with all the Southern senators. There was 1:09:14.680 --> 1:09:19.040 one senator in Virginia. If I'm not mistaken, I believe 1:09:19.280 --> 1:09:25.120 that he was the father of one of our evangelical leaders, 1:09:25.160 --> 1:09:29.799 Pat Robertson. I believe I think it was his father, right, yes, yes, yeah, 1:09:29.840 --> 1:09:33.840 And so he was like, absolutely, I am not meeting 1:09:34.040 --> 1:09:37.160 with her. I am not voting for this thing. The 1:09:37.240 --> 1:09:39.639 Jenet was like, Okay, that's how you want to play ball. 1:09:40.760 --> 1:09:45.360 Found a primary opponent, groomed him and did an operation 1:09:45.840 --> 1:09:46.920 to essentially take. 1:09:46.720 --> 1:09:52.120 Out Senator Robinson. And I think about that, I'm like, wow. 1:09:52.280 --> 1:09:55.479 That is sounds like Donald Trump. By the way, when 1:09:55.520 --> 1:09:57.360 he doesn't get his way, what does he do? What 1:09:57.680 --> 1:10:00.799 he always said? Right? No, there's like parts of Trump 1:10:01.479 --> 1:10:04.280 that are a little LBJ and a little Teddy Roosevelt, right, 1:10:04.400 --> 1:10:06.680 you know which is you know, it's a little showmanship, 1:10:06.720 --> 1:10:09.800 but he's you know, it's always like you know, one 1:10:09.840 --> 1:10:12.479 of the worst mistakes opponents of Donald Trump make is 1:10:12.479 --> 1:10:14.759 that they assume everything he says is wrong or everything 1:10:14.800 --> 1:10:16.439 he does is wrong. It's like, you know, there's some 1:10:16.720 --> 1:10:18.760 there's some things to learn from him. You know, he's 1:10:18.800 --> 1:10:21.320 won twice. Don't don't think he doesn't know what he's 1:10:21.360 --> 1:10:23.519 doing here. That doesn't mean you have to emulate him, 1:10:23.840 --> 1:10:27.680 but there is tactics you can learn from him, just 1:10:27.720 --> 1:10:30.000 like you would learn from your enemy in a war. 1:10:30.320 --> 1:10:32.360 Oh wow, that was pretty smart. Well you got to 1:10:32.400 --> 1:10:34.639 try that, you know, when it comes to drones or whatever. 1:10:35.200 --> 1:10:40.200 Yeah, And sort of what Trump shows is that the 1:10:40.360 --> 1:10:44.679 example of LBJ are the example of FDR even because 1:10:44.680 --> 1:10:45.920 there was like a point where he thought he was 1:10:45.920 --> 1:10:47.040 going to expand. 1:10:47.240 --> 1:10:52.080 The supreme and he did primaries, you know, primary somebody. 1:10:51.840 --> 1:10:55.960 Yeah, totally. And is that to push for what you 1:10:56.120 --> 1:10:58.719 believe in and what you want to get done? 1:10:59.320 --> 1:11:03.160 And most of our legislation that passed in this country 1:11:04.600 --> 1:11:07.639 was through very much not on the dogged persistence of activists. 1:11:07.640 --> 1:11:09.880 But then you know, when it came leg slatively, these 1:11:09.880 --> 1:11:12.400 folks were like, all right, I'm going to make this happen. 1:11:12.479 --> 1:11:13.800 I don't know how I'm gonna make this happen. 1:11:13.920 --> 1:11:15.960 We're gonna find ways to do it, whether that's breaking 1:11:16.000 --> 1:11:18.559 up the bill, doing an executive. 1:11:18.080 --> 1:11:19.559 Order, what have you. 1:11:19.840 --> 1:11:22.639 And not surprising you, though, are some of our most 1:11:22.680 --> 1:11:26.519 popular farm more fondly remembered presidents for their agendas too. 1:11:27.800 --> 1:11:33.160 What's a how does an act? I'm a little skeptical 1:11:33.160 --> 1:11:36.400 of advocacy advocacy groups these days that they don't have 1:11:36.479 --> 1:11:38.719 the influence they once had, and I sit there because 1:11:38.760 --> 1:11:42.080 I fear as if the only influence that matters now 1:11:42.200 --> 1:11:45.599 is money or votes in a primary. And maybe I'm 1:11:45.600 --> 1:11:48.680 being a tad cynical, but you know, how would you 1:11:48.720 --> 1:11:51.600 advise today's activist groups to get more leverage in the 1:11:51.680 --> 1:11:53.160 non campaign seasons. 1:11:54.200 --> 1:11:58.400 I mean, first to just continue to do advocacy and 1:11:58.600 --> 1:12:02.160 organizing in need on campaign seasons as someone who you 1:12:02.200 --> 1:12:05.960 know does this work through you know, my own advocacy 1:12:05.960 --> 1:12:06.720 and consulting firm. 1:12:06.760 --> 1:12:07.120 I just. 1:12:08.800 --> 1:12:13.400 I have, I have counseled often. All Right, you want 1:12:13.479 --> 1:12:18.080 folks to mobilize and come out around these issues as 1:12:18.120 --> 1:12:21.920 we are getting into the time of as you know, 1:12:21.960 --> 1:12:24.600 many folks call it lake stage capitalism, where housing is 1:12:24.640 --> 1:12:27.200 more expensive, you're working more jobs, and need used to 1:12:27.360 --> 1:12:29.200 your distraction is kind of all over. 1:12:29.040 --> 1:12:30.519 The place with social media. 1:12:30.560 --> 1:12:33.240 You've got to find a way to break through and 1:12:33.320 --> 1:12:35.960 let people know, all right, some of these things that 1:12:35.960 --> 1:12:38.559 you're frustrated with you. 1:12:38.520 --> 1:12:39.679 Can do something about. 1:12:40.439 --> 1:12:43.160 And I know that there are some organizations that's just 1:12:43.160 --> 1:12:45.439 recently at the America Votes Conference who would love to 1:12:45.439 --> 1:12:49.080 spend more time on the doors and organizing, and they're 1:12:49.120 --> 1:12:51.479 not getting the funding at the levels they should something 1:12:51.520 --> 1:12:53.720 I talk about in the book, and how that has 1:12:53.840 --> 1:12:58.880 led to sort of an erosion of this support in 1:12:58.960 --> 1:13:02.840 election years. If somebody is not talking to the not 1:13:03.000 --> 1:13:08.720 politically engaged like you and I, you know, there is 1:13:08.800 --> 1:13:10.040 just more challenging. 1:13:09.640 --> 1:13:11.800 To do it. It is amazing to me how this 1:13:11.920 --> 1:13:15.879 is flipped within twenty years. Yeah, Democrats used to dominate 1:13:15.920 --> 1:13:19.080 the off year messaging, and it was Republicans that sort 1:13:19.120 --> 1:13:23.240 of just sort of campaign hopped, and now it's sort 1:13:23.280 --> 1:13:27.000 of you know, you know, basically since Obama it has 1:13:27.040 --> 1:13:30.240 been you know, oh it's election season. Let's you know, 1:13:30.520 --> 1:13:33.440 round up the usual suspects, round up the usual billionaires, 1:13:33.840 --> 1:13:35.519 Let's fund what are we going to call the super 1:13:35.520 --> 1:13:38.160 pac this year future forward? Okay, we'll try that. Like 1:13:38.520 --> 1:13:43.240 it's just like redoing whatever they thought worked in twenty twelve, 1:13:43.360 --> 1:13:45.400 right the last time it all kind of came together, 1:13:45.720 --> 1:13:51.439 and it's just a consistent attempt to replicate twelve. And 1:13:51.479 --> 1:13:54.360 they're almost thinking that these you know, and there's been 1:13:54.439 --> 1:13:57.599 something missing here right in the off year. What did 1:13:57.720 --> 1:14:00.639 what did the right do? Well? They used crypto organize 1:14:00.680 --> 1:14:04.200 young men and that had a bigger impact, and I 1:14:04.240 --> 1:14:06.840 think I expected it also wasn't just young white men, 1:14:06.880 --> 1:14:09.160 it was young men of color. Right. I think crypto 1:14:09.240 --> 1:14:12.120 has been you know, I think I've got a lot 1:14:12.120 --> 1:14:14.040 of skepticism about it. I got a lot of concerns 1:14:14.080 --> 1:14:17.400 about it. But politically it has been very effective for 1:14:17.439 --> 1:14:21.200 the right to woo young men under forty, regardless of race. 1:14:21.240 --> 1:14:23.280 Am I not wrong about that? No? 1:14:23.400 --> 1:14:25.679 I mean they have taken the media. 1:14:26.040 --> 1:14:29.800 The growth of social media, the growth of podcasts is 1:14:29.800 --> 1:14:32.200 the reason they call twenty twenty four the podcast election. 1:14:32.400 --> 1:14:35.120 The matisphere is quite real. We see it now, even 1:14:35.240 --> 1:14:37.960 for those who might not be engaged in politics, seeing 1:14:37.960 --> 1:14:38.400 it in there. 1:14:38.520 --> 1:14:39.880 You know, I see it. 1:14:39.880 --> 1:14:44.519 My son's nineteen, My youngest iseteen, nineteen year old boy. 1:14:45.320 --> 1:14:48.720 Young man. I'm sorry, he's nineteen now, and you know 1:14:48.800 --> 1:14:52.400 he's he certainly has knows what I do for a living, 1:14:52.479 --> 1:14:55.000 but so he keeps He lets me know, but he'll 1:14:55.000 --> 1:14:56.960 be down in one of his sports things or whatever, 1:14:57.000 --> 1:15:00.800 and it's like, man, it gets political real quick. And 1:15:01.280 --> 1:15:02.920 he's a little more aware of it because of what 1:15:03.040 --> 1:15:07.200 dad does for a living. But I see it. It 1:15:07.360 --> 1:15:10.599 is quite effective because you don't really know you're being 1:15:10.600 --> 1:15:13.040 given a political argument. You realize it. 1:15:13.520 --> 1:15:18.400 Yeah, they have moved into pop culture and fitness and 1:15:18.520 --> 1:15:22.559 healthcare and and we're still like, all right, let's have 1:15:22.720 --> 1:15:23.759 political podcasts. 1:15:23.800 --> 1:15:25.320 And it's like, Okay, that's great for you, and I'm. 1:15:26.920 --> 1:15:29.320 They're only talking to you and I I know, you. 1:15:29.360 --> 1:15:33.360 Know, but that's not you know, there are amazing podcasts 1:15:33.360 --> 1:15:38.040 that I listened to with some very thoughtful people who 1:15:38.080 --> 1:15:42.600 are talking about like what's happening on reality TV that 1:15:42.600 --> 1:15:43.759 that's a right audience. 1:15:45.200 --> 1:15:49.960 I'm curious, do you do you want to know what 1:15:50.000 --> 1:15:52.320 the what the politics of your hosts are for your 1:15:52.360 --> 1:15:56.160 non political podcast or do you fear finding out what 1:15:56.200 --> 1:15:59.240 the politics are of some of your favorites, Like I 1:15:59.320 --> 1:16:01.519 do this with this World and I'm like, you know, 1:16:01.560 --> 1:16:04.200 they'll they'll hint at something political, going well, we're not 1:16:04.240 --> 1:16:07.040 touching that because of this, And then I'm like, wait, 1:16:07.080 --> 1:16:08.720 where are they coming down? Like I don't maybe I 1:16:08.760 --> 1:16:10.400 don't want to know. I enjoy this too. 1:16:10.320 --> 1:16:13.920 Much, right, I mean, it's funny. 1:16:14.040 --> 1:16:17.240 I have I have sort of discerned in some of 1:16:17.280 --> 1:16:19.280 the stuff that I listened to, and I think because 1:16:19.280 --> 1:16:22.640 I'm like my ear is like, oh, oh's. 1:16:22.120 --> 1:16:23.880 You look for the red coded or the blue coated? 1:16:23.960 --> 1:16:27.040 Yeah, but you know, and there are some who are 1:16:27.160 --> 1:16:28.480 who are talking about. 1:16:29.680 --> 1:16:32.160 I mean, what's happening on Summerhouse right now, that's the 1:16:32.160 --> 1:16:32.680 topic of. 1:16:32.680 --> 1:16:38.280 Conversation pop culture, and they have very thoughtful takes on 1:16:38.479 --> 1:16:40.760 raise and gender analysis and easily. 1:16:40.560 --> 1:16:42.479 Just doing it through the prism of this TV show 1:16:42.640 --> 1:16:47.320 rather than yeah yeah, mm hmm. So that's the space 1:16:47.439 --> 1:16:50.400 you think that that the left needs to get better at. 1:16:50.720 --> 1:16:52.760 What funny is that the right was convinced that the 1:16:52.840 --> 1:16:54.400 left was always better than them at. 1:16:54.240 --> 1:16:57.800 This Yeah, that's that's the irony, and maybe that paranoia 1:16:58.680 --> 1:17:01.799 gave you know, got them that funding and that energy 1:17:02.000 --> 1:17:07.400 to sort of, you know, really take over podcasts and 1:17:08.040 --> 1:17:11.520 you know, influencers they pay that they compensate their influencers 1:17:11.600 --> 1:17:14.599 in a way that left wing influencers are not. 1:17:14.840 --> 1:17:17.960 To be compensated. Yeah, they're just and that's a whole 1:17:18.000 --> 1:17:18.800 chapter in the book. 1:17:18.800 --> 1:17:23.640 It's just on on how that influence has allowed you know, 1:17:23.840 --> 1:17:27.760 very much of a of a perspective to thrive us. 1:17:27.720 --> 1:17:29.599 Kind of gone challenge in a lot of quarters. 1:17:30.000 --> 1:17:32.920 So it totally has. Let me ask you this about 1:17:33.479 --> 1:17:38.719 you think the two parties are going to sustain themselves 1:17:38.720 --> 1:17:40.720 as the two major parties in this country for the 1:17:40.880 --> 1:17:43.600 for the foreseeable future, or do you think that our 1:17:43.640 --> 1:17:46.280 two party systems vulnerable right now? 1:17:47.960 --> 1:17:50.320 I always feel like, you know, the duo, I have 1:17:50.680 --> 1:17:53.599 like love hate relationship with the duopoly as somebody who's 1:17:53.640 --> 1:17:56.479 like done a lot in the Democratic Party. But I 1:17:57.000 --> 1:17:59.880 approach to sort of with that pragmatic sense of things, 1:18:00.000 --> 1:18:03.040 all right, you know, the mechanisms of change, and I 1:18:03.200 --> 1:18:08.160 still for the foreseeable future see it that way because structurally, 1:18:08.360 --> 1:18:12.400 to build, you know, to have a country with multiple 1:18:12.400 --> 1:18:16.160 political parties requires some structural changes to electoral college and 1:18:16.920 --> 1:18:18.559 our districts. 1:18:17.880 --> 1:18:21.760 Just simply primary rules, right, primaries perhaps or something like that. 1:18:21.800 --> 1:18:23.439 I mean that that's sort of my head is at. 1:18:23.479 --> 1:18:25.680 I feel like, yeah, I do feel like we are 1:18:25.720 --> 1:18:29.760 a nation that is more diverse than the options we 1:18:29.880 --> 1:18:33.559 offer on our politics, right, Like, Yeah, imagine going into 1:18:33.600 --> 1:18:37.840 a store or even go on a website and buying 1:18:37.880 --> 1:18:40.840 a couple of T shirts and the only sizes available 1:18:41.240 --> 1:18:46.040 were extra small and extra large, Right, that a lot 1:18:47.360 --> 1:18:50.559 because it's usually the last two that sell, right, those 1:18:50.560 --> 1:18:53.000 the last two sizes that sell. Well, that's essentially what 1:18:53.000 --> 1:18:55.559 we've done with our politics. We have two choices. You know, 1:18:55.720 --> 1:18:57.320 good luck if you want a different you know, the 1:18:57.360 --> 1:19:01.000 spybe got a different size. Good luck that. And I know, 1:19:01.080 --> 1:19:04.679 are we have a structural you know, there's no doubt 1:19:06.320 --> 1:19:10.080 the people have spoken about their dissatisfaction with the two parties. 1:19:10.080 --> 1:19:12.160 How do we know they're not registering in either one 1:19:12.200 --> 1:19:15.920 of them? It's a rejection, collective rejection. But we don't 1:19:15.960 --> 1:19:20.880 have a way. This group of voters is begging for 1:19:20.920 --> 1:19:22.760 something different, but we don't know how to offer it. 1:19:22.800 --> 1:19:25.679 And I say we, meaning the collective, we left and right. 1:19:26.160 --> 1:19:29.000 Yeah, Well, one of the things that I wanted to 1:19:29.080 --> 1:19:33.600 really address in the book is somebody who's just been inside, 1:19:33.880 --> 1:19:36.840 you know, all the way from local to national party 1:19:36.880 --> 1:19:40.040 politics and Democratic Party is that you know, in the 1:19:40.160 --> 1:19:42.360 entire time even that I've been involved in, Democratic Party 1:19:42.360 --> 1:19:47.320 has evolved in change. You couldn't talk about abortion at all, 1:19:47.400 --> 1:19:49.920 and people were like third rail. 1:19:50.479 --> 1:19:55.599 Now if you're not, you know, pro choice, that's a problem. 1:19:55.680 --> 1:19:57.640 And most pretty much most parts of the country as 1:19:57.640 --> 1:20:01.200 a Democrat now and that's because of folks who got 1:20:01.240 --> 1:20:04.439 involved in the party and were active and activists, and 1:20:04.520 --> 1:20:07.280 so you know, people look at the DNC and they 1:20:07.280 --> 1:20:09.360 think of it as an entity that cannot be moved 1:20:09.360 --> 1:20:12.559 and changed, and this party has evolved over time because 1:20:12.560 --> 1:20:15.880 of the people who got involved and moved and changed it. 1:20:16.439 --> 1:20:18.400 And you know, I say that, you know, you may 1:20:18.479 --> 1:20:20.840 even be frustrated with the structure of the party as 1:20:20.840 --> 1:20:23.840 it is now. For me, I found, you know, common 1:20:23.840 --> 1:20:26.479 cause of people who felt similar to me in what 1:20:26.520 --> 1:20:29.680 we were advocating for. You know, Working Families Party has 1:20:29.720 --> 1:20:31.880 become a good holding space for a lot of those 1:20:31.920 --> 1:20:35.040 folks who are pretty frustrated you can vote a certain 1:20:35.080 --> 1:20:37.479 line and not have to run a Democratic party in 1:20:37.520 --> 1:20:40.720 New York. They're building power in other places. But I 1:20:40.800 --> 1:20:44.040 you know, say, hey, Working Families Party exists primarily to 1:20:44.880 --> 1:20:49.040 organize people who agree on some of these issues around 1:20:49.080 --> 1:20:52.360 a multiracial democracy, as you know, a stronger social safety 1:20:52.479 --> 1:20:53.000 and all of that. 1:20:53.080 --> 1:20:54.839 And you know, use that. 1:20:54.720 --> 1:20:58.960 Community to sort of change your Democratic party in your area, 1:20:59.520 --> 1:21:02.559 within whatever the structure that we have now. But I 1:21:02.640 --> 1:21:06.960 never like to talk about our duopoly like we cannot 1:21:07.520 --> 1:21:11.200 in a democracy as a people moved to change it 1:21:11.240 --> 1:21:13.479 because there are many people who have made it a 1:21:14.439 --> 1:21:17.120 better on a lot of fronts as it is now. 1:21:18.200 --> 1:21:21.160 Well it's funny, it's both parties are coalitions and they 1:21:21.200 --> 1:21:24.559 have been. It's just you know, I think twenty sixteen 1:21:25.080 --> 1:21:27.439 actually gave us our most vivid version of this. We 1:21:27.479 --> 1:21:31.000 saw that both parties actually had pretty bright line divisions, 1:21:31.280 --> 1:21:33.120 you know. And if we had been a four party 1:21:33.160 --> 1:21:35.800 European sort of like the French, we would have had 1:21:35.800 --> 1:21:38.800 four finalists, you know, Bernie with the Greens, yeah, and 1:21:38.880 --> 1:21:41.880 Hillary Clinton with the you know labor, let's center labor, 1:21:42.000 --> 1:21:44.680 you know, and maybe Marco Rubio with the sort of 1:21:44.800 --> 1:21:48.280 center right party, and then the nationalists being Donald Trump 1:21:48.360 --> 1:21:50.680 right like, that would have been your European breakdown. And 1:21:51.040 --> 1:21:52.960 who knows what that coalition would have looked like. It's 1:21:53.000 --> 1:21:56.360 possible Sanders and Trump would have bound together in a 1:21:56.479 --> 1:21:59.840 run off situation, you know, or Rubio or Clinton or 1:21:59.840 --> 1:22:02.559 maybe not right, it could have been based on the 1:22:02.600 --> 1:22:07.120 cultural lines that are drawn. So it is. I do 1:22:07.200 --> 1:22:10.240 think Americans want that kind of flexibility in their politics. 1:22:10.280 --> 1:22:12.680 We just don't know how to deliver that system. 1:22:12.960 --> 1:22:17.120 Yeah, yeah, And I think that it will take electing 1:22:17.320 --> 1:22:23.720 people into office who are willing to push, you know, 1:22:24.040 --> 1:22:27.880 for those changes, certainly so that we have a system 1:22:28.400 --> 1:22:29.320 that it's better reflective. 1:22:29.320 --> 1:22:30.679 There's a lot of folks who are just not happy 1:22:30.720 --> 1:22:31.840 with the electoral. 1:22:31.360 --> 1:22:36.080 College for obvious and good reasons, right, and we haven't 1:22:36.200 --> 1:22:38.600 you know, organized the will around changing it. 1:22:38.640 --> 1:22:39.759 Maybe that will change. 1:22:40.080 --> 1:22:42.120 Well, I will tell you my obsession with dealing with 1:22:42.160 --> 1:22:44.240 the electoral college is to actually double the size of 1:22:44.280 --> 1:22:48.080 the House. And then you actually make the numerator. The 1:22:48.080 --> 1:22:51.200 electoral college issue goes away. And it doesn't mean it 1:22:51.200 --> 1:22:56.240 doesn't exist, It just goes away if you raise the numerator, right, 1:22:56.320 --> 1:22:59.920 like that's been And oh, by the way, if we 1:23:00.080 --> 1:23:03.240 have more members of Congress than you actually have more 1:23:03.280 --> 1:23:05.679 people with access to power, and you've opened the door, 1:23:06.120 --> 1:23:09.080 you've lowered the barrier to entry, and you may diversify 1:23:09.360 --> 1:23:13.439 in all sorts of ways what Congress looks like. You 1:23:13.479 --> 1:23:16.400 know that for some reason, that's an easy reform to 1:23:16.439 --> 1:23:18.560 do without a constitutional amendment. And it's really hard to 1:23:18.600 --> 1:23:19.519 get people engaged in. 1:23:20.240 --> 1:23:23.800 Yeah, and I think it's, uh, it'll be interesting. I'm 1:23:24.080 --> 1:23:27.000 I'm actually curious to see if some of the energy 1:23:27.040 --> 1:23:32.000 for those changes really kind of takes hold with a 1:23:32.040 --> 1:23:34.479 lot of a lot more folks as as they are 1:23:34.520 --> 1:23:39.320 realizing now you know everyday folks that it's not working well. 1:23:39.479 --> 1:23:43.320 AI job, fear of AI job displacement could be that trigger. 1:23:43.920 --> 1:23:50.719 Yeah, yeah, job a spliceman not be able to afford homes, right, 1:23:52.000 --> 1:23:54.320 jobs just not paying what they used to. 1:23:54.920 --> 1:24:06.720 Yeah, talk to me right now about what you think 1:24:06.760 --> 1:24:09.599 a winning Democratic coalition looks like in twenty twenty one. 1:24:11.200 --> 1:24:14.559 Winning Democratic coalition, Well, it's definitely going to have to 1:24:14.560 --> 1:24:23.080 be somebody who is very unapologetic about addressing the previous 1:24:23.280 --> 1:24:24.600 harms of the administration. 1:24:24.800 --> 1:24:27.760 I don't I don't know that people. 1:24:27.400 --> 1:24:30.599 Who and you do it without looking like you're looking backwards. 1:24:30.680 --> 1:24:33.280 You get my drift like, yeah, get you got to 1:24:33.400 --> 1:24:36.000 right wrongs And I'm with you there, but you got 1:24:36.000 --> 1:24:37.680 to look like you're worried about the future. Right, it's 1:24:37.680 --> 1:24:39.720 a it's a it's a tough it's a tough It's 1:24:39.720 --> 1:24:40.559 tougher than you think. 1:24:40.960 --> 1:24:43.000 Yeah no, And it's one of those things where I 1:24:43.080 --> 1:24:48.599 feel like, you know, all science point to unless something 1:24:48.640 --> 1:24:52.320 goes really weird, Democrats will get the House. They will 1:24:52.360 --> 1:24:58.760 have an opportunity to attempt to pass legislation and draft 1:24:58.840 --> 1:25:00.360 legislation that. 1:25:00.200 --> 1:25:03.000 Speaks to the concerns of the American. 1:25:02.600 --> 1:25:09.800 People, housing economy, and a winning coalition looks like a 1:25:09.880 --> 1:25:17.360 lot of people at the table who it's diverse. It's 1:25:17.520 --> 1:25:21.519 racially diverse, it's people from all different walks of life. 1:25:21.800 --> 1:25:24.799 The base of the party might be very racially diverse, 1:25:24.880 --> 1:25:27.000 but those who have sort of made the decisions you 1:25:27.000 --> 1:25:29.080 said earlier about twenty twelve. 1:25:28.720 --> 1:25:30.679 And it seems like we're stuck on twenty twelve. 1:25:30.680 --> 1:25:32.639 And I would say that that is very much because 1:25:32.680 --> 1:25:34.280 a lot of the people who are still running it 1:25:34.439 --> 1:25:37.080 are some of the folks who were involved in twenty twelve. 1:25:38.600 --> 1:25:42.120 Yes, it's Look, it happens to every generation of operatives. 1:25:42.479 --> 1:25:44.920 There's a moment where they become the geniuses, and then 1:25:44.960 --> 1:25:48.280 there's the moment when they're the past. And right, I 1:25:48.320 --> 1:25:51.840 think the geniuses of the Obama era haven't accepted the 1:25:51.840 --> 1:25:53.439 fact that they're no longer genius. 1:25:53.640 --> 1:25:58.080 They're no longer the geniuses and are not the future. 1:25:58.560 --> 1:26:02.000 And it will be a hopefully a lot more. 1:26:02.600 --> 1:26:04.519 You know, I don't want to throw my gen x 1:26:04.600 --> 1:26:06.439 ers completely out the window just yet. 1:26:07.040 --> 1:26:09.400 Please, we never got our chance to lead. I am, 1:26:09.640 --> 1:26:12.680 I am, I have this like you know, it is 1:26:12.720 --> 1:26:14.960 one of these like we're I fear that we're the 1:26:15.000 --> 1:26:16.880 generation that's just going to get skipped, all right, We've 1:26:17.160 --> 1:26:20.080 we like sucked up to the boomers for like my 1:26:20.320 --> 1:26:23.280 entire lifetime, and now we're going straight to millennials and 1:26:23.280 --> 1:26:31.240 Gen Z you know, as my generation screamed reality bites, right, So, yes, 1:26:31.320 --> 1:26:31.879 I mean. 1:26:31.800 --> 1:26:35.680 Where it is the next generation. You know, we have 1:26:35.760 --> 1:26:39.720 the gen xers. Finally millennials and gen Zers who are 1:26:39.760 --> 1:26:41.960 are really and it's you know, millennials and a Z 1:26:42.080 --> 1:26:44.000 are much more racially diverse generation. 1:26:44.520 --> 1:26:47.200 But it's large, and it is large generation. 1:26:47.360 --> 1:26:50.439 She isn't a combined Is that fifty percent of the population, right? 1:26:50.640 --> 1:26:54.360 Just yeah, right, yeah, yeah, just about just about, if 1:26:54.360 --> 1:26:55.639 not by twenty eight for sure. 1:26:56.360 --> 1:26:58.640 So and especially voting. 1:26:58.600 --> 1:27:04.160 Vot voting popular, yeah yeah, and having a Folks have 1:27:04.200 --> 1:27:06.240 different walks of life. Because one thing that struck me 1:27:06.439 --> 1:27:09.920 when I was really looking at data is not only 1:27:10.080 --> 1:27:15.400 these racially diverse generations, but also the different perspectives that. 1:27:15.320 --> 1:27:17.200 You have as a result of it. 1:27:17.240 --> 1:27:19.680 You know, you're more likely to have grown up in 1:27:19.960 --> 1:27:25.400 household where parents are no longer together, you're blended families. 1:27:26.560 --> 1:27:32.799 You likely maybe have related to immigrant people, folks who 1:27:32.800 --> 1:27:36.280 came from somewhere else in the world. You know, you 1:27:36.840 --> 1:27:42.120 are likely to have okay, counter economic strubles. You're likely 1:27:42.160 --> 1:27:45.599 to have been in debt. You know these are people, 1:27:45.880 --> 1:27:48.080 you know, Ayana Presley says, the people who are closest 1:27:48.080 --> 1:27:50.719 to the pain should be closest to the power. And 1:27:50.920 --> 1:27:53.920 those are the definitely the folks who should be at 1:27:53.920 --> 1:27:55.880 the table. I mean one thing, even just to go 1:27:55.960 --> 1:28:00.679 back to sort of the David pluffs and Carvill's Carvil 1:28:00.720 --> 1:28:04.040 who's long since been eating out on his time. 1:28:05.080 --> 1:28:07.080 So he kind of admits it, like he will go 1:28:07.160 --> 1:28:10.760 out there, right, Remember he called out. You got to 1:28:10.760 --> 1:28:12.519 give him credit for this. He goes, he called out 1:28:13.080 --> 1:28:15.320 and I'm not going to name names, but certain them 1:28:15.360 --> 1:28:18.000 consultants who are worried about their carried interest clients and 1:28:18.080 --> 1:28:21.120 not putting together a populous economic plan. So I hear 1:28:21.160 --> 1:28:23.519 you on James, but he's still a populist at heart, 1:28:23.600 --> 1:28:25.559 you know, I mean at heart. 1:28:25.640 --> 1:28:28.840 But he has his moments. We're like get it. It's like, okay, sir, 1:28:29.120 --> 1:28:31.919 like we are getting to be a more diverse America. 1:28:32.000 --> 1:28:34.560 Let's let's start to sound like that that populace is 1:28:34.920 --> 1:28:36.280 reflecting that the people. 1:28:36.520 --> 1:28:39.559 And you know, when you think back on sort. 1:28:39.400 --> 1:28:42.479 Of that, when you when you think of where this 1:28:42.600 --> 1:28:45.400 country could be if you have those people at the 1:28:45.439 --> 1:28:47.280 table making those decisions. 1:28:48.040 --> 1:28:52.880 That is, that can be a coalition that wins. 1:28:53.400 --> 1:28:57.559 Let me throw I I've I've made this observation a 1:28:57.560 --> 1:29:00.520 few times, and I think it it always lands awkwardly. 1:29:00.760 --> 1:29:05.240 I'm curious how, but I think we sometimes don't fully 1:29:05.280 --> 1:29:09.880 appreciate the fact that we still have a large chunk 1:29:10.240 --> 1:29:15.679 of voting Americans who grew up in segregated America. And 1:29:15.880 --> 1:29:20.160 you know, I'm look, I started kindergarten nineteen seventy seven 1:29:20.200 --> 1:29:23.880 in Miami. I believe if I had started kindergarten eight 1:29:23.960 --> 1:29:27.519 years sooner, I'd have been in a segregated system, right, 1:29:27.960 --> 1:29:34.720 And you know that when that generation, as I like 1:29:34.760 --> 1:29:40.080 to say, ages out of voting, that's like a big 1:29:40.360 --> 1:29:45.080 structural like I don't I sometimes think we don't fully appreciate, 1:29:46.120 --> 1:29:49.400 you know, how young are. Multi ethnic and multi racial 1:29:49.439 --> 1:29:52.160 democracy really is, right. It has only been around since 1:29:52.240 --> 1:29:56.200 nineteen sixty five, and there's you know, a third of 1:29:56.400 --> 1:30:00.400 American of the American electorate lived a in a free, 1:30:00.560 --> 1:30:06.880 multi racial society. It didn't mean it didn't exist, but 1:30:06.920 --> 1:30:08.520 one that we actually recognized. 1:30:08.920 --> 1:30:09.160 Yeah. 1:30:10.040 --> 1:30:14.120 Yeah, I kind of allude to that. I think I 1:30:14.120 --> 1:30:17.120 say it very directly in the book which is that 1:30:18.240 --> 1:30:22.439 you know, when you don't realize how good you had it, 1:30:22.520 --> 1:30:27.519 because a lot of the freedom's joid, the rights that 1:30:27.560 --> 1:30:30.120 we've had has been because of sort of the work 1:30:30.160 --> 1:30:34.320 that came before. And you know, I think at the 1:30:34.520 --> 1:30:41.160 organizing muscle for a long time of keeping a democracy 1:30:41.320 --> 1:30:45.240 vibrant and pushing back against encroaching on sort of those 1:30:45.320 --> 1:30:49.519 rights kind of atrophy. Right, Like you're like, okay, everything, 1:30:49.640 --> 1:30:50.320 everything's working. 1:30:50.360 --> 1:30:54.040 Look, we've we've we've equalized voting. Okay, yes, you've equalized voting, 1:30:54.040 --> 1:30:56.519 but we didn't equalize opportunity, and you still have an 1:30:56.520 --> 1:31:00.559 equalized opportunity. We still have an equalized education attainment we got. 1:31:00.600 --> 1:31:03.799 In fact, I would argue that the single most underrated 1:31:03.840 --> 1:31:09.000 issue going into twenty eight is our fracturing public education system, 1:31:09.160 --> 1:31:13.759 and I think it is I admire that Ram Emmanuel 1:31:13.800 --> 1:31:15.479 is one of the few talking about it on the 1:31:15.520 --> 1:31:18.400 democratic side. I mean, I've got my skepticism about Ram, 1:31:18.560 --> 1:31:22.519 whether Ram can shed the establishment baggage of his previous 1:31:22.520 --> 1:31:25.160 eras and all that stuff, but he's right about this topic. 1:31:25.880 --> 1:31:29.439 And I think the shattering of the public education system 1:31:29.880 --> 1:31:33.600 actually brings us apart as a society as well, Like 1:31:33.640 --> 1:31:38.680 I think this is a polarization issue. It's not just 1:31:38.880 --> 1:31:43.479 bad for education outcomes, it's actually bad for the culture. 1:31:44.040 --> 1:31:46.640 If we don't have a shared public education. 1:31:46.439 --> 1:31:49.080 System, we not have a shared public education, we don't 1:31:49.080 --> 1:31:51.800 have a shared memory. 1:31:51.920 --> 1:31:54.360 And other Well, that leads to that, like I think 1:31:54.439 --> 1:31:58.400 one leads to the other. That's why I think it's important. 1:31:58.760 --> 1:32:02.000 What was brilliant about our public education systems and in theory, 1:32:02.600 --> 1:32:06.400 and it didn't work this way everywhere. I'd like to 1:32:06.520 --> 1:32:08.880 argue that I just got a taste of it living 1:32:08.920 --> 1:32:12.280 where I lived, because Miami was its own little unique experiment. 1:32:12.320 --> 1:32:15.120 I always say, we're you know, Miami had this reputation 1:32:15.160 --> 1:32:17.200 of being where the city of the future, meaning you know, 1:32:17.240 --> 1:32:20.360 tomorrow's problems are happening right now in Miami, and then 1:32:20.800 --> 1:32:22.960 we solved. We went through all this in the eighties, 1:32:23.439 --> 1:32:28.519 right then. And yet now it's you know, you don't 1:32:28.560 --> 1:32:32.519 have socioeconomically wealthy people and socioeconomically poor people in the 1:32:32.520 --> 1:32:34.760 same schools, and you don't it's not even a close call. 1:32:34.840 --> 1:32:36.400 That actually was a reality in the eighties. 1:32:36.680 --> 1:32:39.599 You had that, Yeah, and more of that, and yeah, 1:32:39.680 --> 1:32:43.720 it's changing in ways that is intentional. 1:32:45.320 --> 1:32:47.840 And of course this voucher system. Yes, it is. It's 1:32:47.840 --> 1:32:48.240 all about it. 1:32:48.360 --> 1:32:53.080 Yeah, in religion, ye, and you know the running joke. 1:32:53.240 --> 1:32:54.920 You may have heard it, but you know a lot 1:32:54.920 --> 1:32:55.680 of folks it's like. 1:32:55.640 --> 1:32:58.920 All right, I mean Iraq and Afghanistan war is bad, 1:32:59.040 --> 1:33:03.880 but really no child left behind is legacy in you 1:33:03.920 --> 1:33:07.720 know what what it sort of opened the door to 1:33:07.960 --> 1:33:12.439 which it's like the kind of this acceleration of you know, 1:33:12.560 --> 1:33:16.080 not a set of agreed to ways to make sure 1:33:16.120 --> 1:33:18.800 that everybody is getting sort of like a shared public education. 1:33:18.840 --> 1:33:20.720 Because in the countries where they're all like on the 1:33:20.800 --> 1:33:22.920 same page about the Holocaust and. 1:33:22.840 --> 1:33:26.840 What happened in Germany, right, I mean you never again 1:33:27.000 --> 1:33:32.200 mean something right, And it's the same where twenty twenty. 1:33:32.080 --> 1:33:32.760 Was interesting to me. 1:33:32.880 --> 1:33:34.920 I was luckily raised by people who made sure that 1:33:35.000 --> 1:33:39.480 I understood the history of this country and the contributions 1:33:39.479 --> 1:33:41.800 of many people. But when you have somebody who's like, 1:33:42.200 --> 1:33:46.800 I didn't know about Tulsa, like so many things, so 1:33:46.920 --> 1:33:50.640 many people like wait that happened. 1:33:50.560 --> 1:33:52.960 You know, and look we had it similar in Florida. 1:33:53.000 --> 1:33:55.360 I'm taught Florida history. I wasn't taught about axe Handle 1:33:55.439 --> 1:33:58.680 Sunday in Jacksonville right, you know, And that was one 1:33:58.720 --> 1:34:00.519 of those you realize you don't know which you haven't 1:34:00.520 --> 1:34:02.960 been taught. If it never gets introduced. 1:34:02.520 --> 1:34:07.040 It never gets introduced, right, And there is an intention 1:34:07.200 --> 1:34:10.120 obviously behind that, because then if we're not exploring those things, 1:34:10.120 --> 1:34:12.240 then we're not trying to think of what led to 1:34:12.280 --> 1:34:13.719 that and how can you do better? 1:34:14.600 --> 1:34:20.280 Fascination and so you know when I I. 1:34:19.160 --> 1:34:21.559 One of the points I wanted to make about sort 1:34:21.560 --> 1:34:25.000 of pluff to some extent Carve Believen though he's Southern, 1:34:25.520 --> 1:34:30.720 but many of the strategists from the Avamba universe are southers, 1:34:32.320 --> 1:34:38.400 and I think that and I think that has contributed 1:34:38.439 --> 1:34:43.320 to some of the issues we've had because our politics 1:34:43.320 --> 1:34:46.920 in a way at large, while it's like this American thing, 1:34:46.960 --> 1:34:52.240 but it's very much affected by the seg The. 1:34:52.080 --> 1:34:55.560 South is the mood music for our politics still. 1:34:55.360 --> 1:34:58.800 Yeah, yeah, in a lot of ways. 1:34:58.320 --> 1:35:02.880 And it and soul of the Republican Party, right, and 1:35:02.960 --> 1:35:06.720 it's it's cultural base is in the South, right, And. 1:35:06.720 --> 1:35:08.920 If you don't understand it and you didn't grow up 1:35:08.960 --> 1:35:13.120 around it, which most black people have. And there's a 1:35:13.160 --> 1:35:16.080 chunk of white strategists to have, but they're not the 1:35:16.120 --> 1:35:21.280 one sort of of of leading that work, and then 1:35:21.320 --> 1:35:23.720 you're going to have some tone deaf responses like I 1:35:23.760 --> 1:35:28.320 remember as reclined at some point after you know, Kirk 1:35:28.439 --> 1:35:31.479 was murdered, where he said, you know, what is it like, 1:35:31.640 --> 1:35:33.640 what would it be if we like went into a 1:35:33.720 --> 1:35:38.120 church and argued about abortion rights and folks from like 1:35:38.680 --> 1:35:41.439 in the South and the Midwest are like, we'd be dead, Like, 1:35:42.320 --> 1:35:48.240 we don't, that's not how we organize here around that. So, yeah, 1:35:48.280 --> 1:35:52.000 that lack of understanding when we have people who are 1:35:52.120 --> 1:36:00.040 polsters and strategists, and. 1:35:57.560 --> 1:35:59.680 I want to I want to ste in that a 1:35:59.680 --> 1:36:03.760 little bit more because I do think that you know, 1:36:03.800 --> 1:36:10.960 there's always been that joke about, you know, in the South, 1:36:12.000 --> 1:36:14.800 whites and blacks are more honest about race. In the North, 1:36:14.880 --> 1:36:17.920 everybody's more polite, but they're more dishonest about race. Do 1:36:17.960 --> 1:36:19.600 you still feel that in sense that. 1:36:21.320 --> 1:36:26.080 Yeah, And there is this belief that because. 1:36:26.080 --> 1:36:33.560 Oh, you know, we're the North, that we're not subject 1:36:33.640 --> 1:36:37.200 to the same you know ills the South. 1:36:37.280 --> 1:36:39.880 We're not the racist we're the Northerners. Yeah, we don't 1:36:39.880 --> 1:36:40.559 have a history. 1:36:40.439 --> 1:36:45.759 Right yet when you could point to so many many. 1:36:45.600 --> 1:36:47.400 Different right yeah. 1:36:47.840 --> 1:36:51.759 So yeah, and it's it's interesting. 1:36:51.800 --> 1:36:54.480 I mean, I mean, somebody was like, I found Confederate 1:36:54.520 --> 1:36:58.160 flags in the hard parts of rural New York, and 1:36:58.160 --> 1:36:59.599 I'm like, do you know what part of the country 1:36:59.640 --> 1:37:02.720 you're in, Like, yeah, and I remember it was I 1:37:02.720 --> 1:37:05.400 think it was Trusty McMillan Cottam I heard or say, like, 1:37:05.560 --> 1:37:08.559 you know, because it was it clicked for me when 1:37:08.600 --> 1:37:11.439 she was saying, like, you know, the culture of the 1:37:11.560 --> 1:37:16.360 South has very much migrated into other in other parts 1:37:16.360 --> 1:37:17.920 of the US and even other parts of the world, 1:37:17.960 --> 1:37:20.400 you can find Confederate flags and other parts of the world. 1:37:20.680 --> 1:37:23.040 Even no, I mean even just country music is more 1:37:23.040 --> 1:37:27.160 mainstream today in the Midwest than it was back in 1:37:27.360 --> 1:37:30.840 you know, back in even the eighties, seventies or eighties 1:37:30.840 --> 1:37:33.800 on that. You know, though, it's interesting you say that. 1:37:34.280 --> 1:37:38.520 I always thought that Barack Obama's superpower as a political 1:37:39.280 --> 1:37:44.439 victor was being from Illinois. You know, when you looked 1:37:44.479 --> 1:37:48.360 at the just the simple power of the states you 1:37:48.360 --> 1:37:52.799 know that were that touched Illinois were all important moments 1:37:52.840 --> 1:37:55.280 for him in the primary. First of all, there was 1:37:55.320 --> 1:37:59.000 Iowa Indiana late in the process, a statey loss, but 1:37:59.080 --> 1:38:02.920 almost one Missouri on Super Tuesday, one that he eked out. 1:38:03.240 --> 1:38:06.080 It was important to eke one out against her and 1:38:06.520 --> 1:38:09.920 the power in general, and he did really well and 1:38:10.040 --> 1:38:15.800 basically anything that was touched in Illinois. But you know, 1:38:15.800 --> 1:38:20.800 because there's this assumption to does the swing vote is 1:38:20.840 --> 1:38:25.080 the swing area of America still the Midwest? Or you know, 1:38:25.160 --> 1:38:27.240 is that the last time the Midwest sort of was 1:38:27.320 --> 1:38:29.880 the swing area and just everything is down south? Now? 1:38:30.520 --> 1:38:33.960 Yeah, I mean I think I think, you know, biased 1:38:33.960 --> 1:38:36.439 here being in Virginian, but I think a lot of 1:38:36.439 --> 1:38:36.960 it is. 1:38:37.560 --> 1:38:40.679 Well, I took that Virginia seceded from the Confederacy sometime 1:38:40.760 --> 1:38:45.479 in twenty twenty eight. But that's yeah, right, you know 1:38:45.680 --> 1:38:48.799 that Mason Dixon line keeps moving, you know, right, Yeah. 1:38:48.600 --> 1:38:53.560 We'll be having a very different conversation if Georgia, North Carolina, Florida, 1:38:53.680 --> 1:38:57.160 and Texas were different electorally. There's a reason that most 1:38:57.200 --> 1:39:01.760 of the pushback to progress, some of the most horrific, 1:39:02.040 --> 1:39:06.080 you know, voter suppression bills that you've seen, anti abortion, 1:39:06.400 --> 1:39:11.280 anti liber all happen in the South, some of it 1:39:11.400 --> 1:39:12.240 in the Midwest. 1:39:12.439 --> 1:39:14.600 Well, look at the National Party. They seem allergic to 1:39:14.600 --> 1:39:17.719 actually trying to work on the South. Outside of Georgia, 1:39:17.720 --> 1:39:20.320 and North Carolina and that yeah, I mean, I'm sorry, 1:39:20.400 --> 1:39:25.719 Mississippi and South Carolina are totally underfunded and have enough 1:39:26.240 --> 1:39:29.240 potential vote to be competitive. You just have to put 1:39:29.280 --> 1:39:32.519 a little elbow grease into it. In Texas and Florida 1:39:32.600 --> 1:39:36.400 arguably the same way. They're expensive, but there's this consistent 1:39:36.560 --> 1:39:39.400 well the money will go further if we just lock 1:39:39.479 --> 1:39:41.639 down Michigan, right, And. 1:39:41.600 --> 1:39:43.160 I think it's because of those are the areas in 1:39:43.200 --> 1:39:46.320 which they feel comfortable. And that goes back to saying, oh, okay, 1:39:46.320 --> 1:39:49.839 well we don't have like Southern strategies, especially come brown organizers. 1:39:49.880 --> 1:39:53.240 You've had to navigate around all of these challenges if 1:39:53.240 --> 1:39:56.200 you're from Chicago and you go down to you know, 1:39:56.880 --> 1:40:00.240 the South. I mean, when I think of some tomes 1:40:00.240 --> 1:40:02.640 of stories I would hear from like fellow, you know, 1:40:03.160 --> 1:40:03.720 folks in. 1:40:03.720 --> 1:40:05.200 Virginia other parts of the South. 1:40:05.240 --> 1:40:08.439 Then they would get somebody who mentioned the name of 1:40:08.479 --> 1:40:11.880 a street where it was and then said it incorrectly 1:40:12.560 --> 1:40:15.680 or didn't have sort of an understanding of a cultural 1:40:15.800 --> 1:40:20.679 nuance of why you refer to, you know, a black 1:40:20.800 --> 1:40:26.439 elder in a certain way, or the nuances of food 1:40:26.680 --> 1:40:27.599 or anything like that. 1:40:27.760 --> 1:40:29.320 I'll give you one that I ran into when I 1:40:29.320 --> 1:40:32.040 first joined NBC, which was like, well, we can't poll 1:40:32.080 --> 1:40:33.760 on a Wednesday night. Why can't you poll on a 1:40:33.800 --> 1:40:36.439 Wednesday night? And this was in South Carolina, like Wednesday 1:40:36.479 --> 1:40:39.599 night's church night. And if you don't know the culture 1:40:39.600 --> 1:40:41.479 of the South, you wouldn't know that you'd get a 1:40:41.479 --> 1:40:43.640 bad poll number on a Wednesday night. You know, just 1:40:43.640 --> 1:40:46.000 special eating, you know, because there's just all sorts of 1:40:46.080 --> 1:40:48.439 noise because and it's like, just because people go to 1:40:48.439 --> 1:40:51.200 their church on Wednesday nights doesn't mean they're religious fervor 1:40:51.600 --> 1:40:53.920 it might just simply be that's what the community does 1:40:53.960 --> 1:40:55.280 to get together on a Wednesday. 1:40:55.000 --> 1:40:58.120 Night, that's what the community does. My first campaign, I 1:40:58.160 --> 1:41:02.200 remember he was in the deeper southern part of our district, 1:41:02.479 --> 1:41:04.639 was a real southern district, and he said, yeah, I'm 1:41:04.680 --> 1:41:07.000 not even a religious person, but I am definitely putting 1:41:07.040 --> 1:41:09.320 up the sign on Sunday morning that says gone to 1:41:09.520 --> 1:41:14.040 church if anybody's coming by the campaign or whatever. And 1:41:14.200 --> 1:41:19.439 understanding the culture of the district. And so yeah, I 1:41:19.479 --> 1:41:22.720 think that that has absolutely presented challenges and to the 1:41:22.760 --> 1:41:23.439 type of work that. 1:41:23.400 --> 1:41:23.880 We can do. 1:41:23.960 --> 1:41:25.360 And one of the things I was going to say 1:41:25.479 --> 1:41:28.280 was that. You know, Obama's superpower to me was that 1:41:29.000 --> 1:41:32.840 he he at least I think, because he had grown 1:41:32.920 --> 1:41:36.040 up living around the world, had lived in a multiracial 1:41:36.120 --> 1:41:41.400 place like Hawaii. He kind of really early on understood 1:41:41.400 --> 1:41:45.559 how to talk to everyone. That was his talent. 1:41:46.200 --> 1:41:47.280 And you still. 1:41:47.040 --> 1:41:50.400 See a lot of election no scar tissue, no scar tissue. 1:41:51.160 --> 1:41:53.640 Everybody does what you get through. But he didn't have 1:41:53.640 --> 1:41:57.080 a lot of scar tissue in that. There's something freeing 1:41:57.120 --> 1:41:58.320 about that as a politician. 1:41:58.760 --> 1:42:01.840 Yeah, and I think that that is having something. 1:42:01.840 --> 1:42:04.360 I mean, Jimmy Carter also had that talent too, Like 1:42:04.439 --> 1:42:08.719 I mean, you know, his primary, you know, he did 1:42:08.800 --> 1:42:11.360 well because he knew and was comfortable in the room 1:42:11.400 --> 1:42:15.160 with black people, like just soon how to deal with them, 1:42:15.880 --> 1:42:17.840 Unlike a lot of other folks he was you know, 1:42:17.840 --> 1:42:19.920 I think, yeah, other folks he was in the primary 1:42:19.920 --> 1:42:20.599 with at that time. 1:42:21.000 --> 1:42:22.600 All right, let me get you out of here on this. 1:42:23.479 --> 1:42:26.920 Give me four. Give me four people, one of you know, 1:42:27.560 --> 1:42:29.479 the four people in your head who think are most 1:42:29.520 --> 1:42:32.960 likely to be the actual Democratic nominee, not who you 1:42:33.000 --> 1:42:37.000 want right now, Give me four. You know, it's sort 1:42:37.000 --> 1:42:39.000 of like it's way early, but I'll give you. That's 1:42:39.000 --> 1:42:41.280 why I'm going to give you four of which one 1:42:41.320 --> 1:42:43.680 of whom you know you're You're just sort of like, 1:42:43.720 --> 1:42:46.400 it's like, look, this is my field, so narrow, this 1:42:46.520 --> 1:42:51.760 giant field of about forty mentionables these days. Who give 1:42:51.800 --> 1:42:55.080 me a quartet where you think, yeah, the VP or 1:42:55.160 --> 1:42:56.439 P is going to come out of this? 1:42:57.400 --> 1:42:57.599 Yeah? 1:42:57.760 --> 1:43:04.600 Yeah, I you know, I see Pritzker. I'd be interested in, 1:43:04.680 --> 1:43:06.880 especially if he kind of fashioned himself in a modern 1:43:06.960 --> 1:43:09.840 day sort of FDR that same sort of. 1:43:09.880 --> 1:43:13.240 Fact I am. I was a skeptic until I saw 1:43:14.080 --> 1:43:18.320 him play party machinist in a very effective way, and 1:43:18.400 --> 1:43:21.240 during the primary he did for Juliana Stratton. I'm like, 1:43:21.240 --> 1:43:23.439 you know what, I'm not going to dismiss him anymore. Yeah, 1:43:23.479 --> 1:43:24.240 I'm not dismissive. 1:43:24.600 --> 1:43:26.639 That's yeah, that's kind of where I'm with him too. 1:43:28.160 --> 1:43:29.920 You know, he says no, because I think I was 1:43:29.920 --> 1:43:31.439 the thing of the thing you say when you're running 1:43:31.479 --> 1:43:32.479 again for you a senate. 1:43:32.560 --> 1:43:36.320 But I see as off in the mix somehow more. 1:43:36.160 --> 1:43:39.280 So than made Warnock too right in that like a 1:43:39.280 --> 1:43:41.599 little bit of the only one can run. 1:43:42.000 --> 1:43:45.160 Yeah, well only one can run, and that is like 1:43:45.200 --> 1:43:47.280 warn Oxhmbison I wouldn't be surprised if it is. He's 1:43:47.840 --> 1:43:51.759 you know, preternaturally talented on stump and inlakable. 1:43:52.680 --> 1:43:53.960 And gosh. 1:43:54.120 --> 1:43:58.920 I mean, I will see her in the mix, whether 1:43:59.000 --> 1:44:02.200 she is whether she's actually successful again in the d 1:44:02.200 --> 1:44:04.880 of the nomination of no but I could see the 1:44:04.920 --> 1:44:07.320 Vice President Kamala Harris back in the mix as well. 1:44:07.880 --> 1:44:12.800 She got a we're all in Washington underestimating her strength 1:44:12.880 --> 1:44:13.960 at the current elector in army. 1:44:15.520 --> 1:44:18.760 I feel so, I do, and I think she could 1:44:18.800 --> 1:44:22.320 be an interesting candidate again now that she's less tied 1:44:22.439 --> 1:44:28.720 to trying to essentially accommodate an administration that she's part of. 1:44:29.120 --> 1:44:31.040 I you know, I've been through this, and I hate 1:44:31.280 --> 1:44:32.960 I know they hate when people like me put them 1:44:33.000 --> 1:44:36.400 on the couch. I will go to my grave believing 1:44:36.479 --> 1:44:38.920 that she's yet to run a campaign that was her campaign, 1:44:38.960 --> 1:44:42.000 yet that she's always been running somebody else's race or 1:44:42.040 --> 1:44:45.959 somebody else's, you know, suggestion. I found her primary campaign 1:44:46.000 --> 1:44:49.080 to be this attempt to be all things to all people. 1:44:49.160 --> 1:44:51.760 She was trying to straddle write the Medicare for All 1:44:51.920 --> 1:44:53.920 mindset sort of told you everything you needed to know. 1:44:54.280 --> 1:44:56.880 She was trying to be all things. To all parts 1:44:56.920 --> 1:45:01.080 of the party. It felt very consultant driven her twenty 1:45:01.080 --> 1:45:04.040 sixteen race per Senate with Holp, consultant driven her twenty 1:45:04.080 --> 1:45:06.840 ten campaign. You know, so she's always had I think, 1:45:07.040 --> 1:45:11.000 and so my guess is you're right, we will see 1:45:11.040 --> 1:45:12.960 a different version of her. And I'm very curious what 1:45:13.000 --> 1:45:16.840 it is. Yeah, Sam, very curious what it is. So 1:45:16.920 --> 1:45:20.960 that's three Pritzker awesof and common don't think I didn't 1:45:21.000 --> 1:45:21.679 keep count. 1:45:23.680 --> 1:45:29.160 Oh my goodness, all right, I'm not keen on it, 1:45:29.360 --> 1:45:31.240 but he gonna find some way into it. 1:45:31.280 --> 1:45:36.800 Gavin Dewson, Yeah, I don't know what he's four. 1:45:37.320 --> 1:45:38.960 I don't know what he's four either. That's why I 1:45:39.000 --> 1:45:41.640 said I'm not Yeah, but I. 1:45:42.400 --> 1:45:46.040 Know what he's good at, which is being a resistance leader. Right. 1:45:46.120 --> 1:45:47.720 He knows how to do that. And that's what I 1:45:47.720 --> 1:45:50.639 think about Pritzkert. I don't know what they're for, although 1:45:50.640 --> 1:45:54.439 there's a little bit more meat on the bones with Pritzker, right, 1:45:54.600 --> 1:45:55.160 I get that. 1:45:55.800 --> 1:45:57.920 I would say, Yeah. 1:45:57.840 --> 1:46:01.719 No's he's sort of he's in charge of the Illinois 1:46:01.760 --> 1:46:04.000 Democratic Party. Kevin Newsom is not in charge of the 1:46:04.000 --> 1:46:07.160 California Democratic Party. And you can feel that difference in 1:46:07.479 --> 1:46:09.280 their government styles and their campaign style. 1:46:09.720 --> 1:46:10.120 Mm hmm. 1:46:10.640 --> 1:46:16.880 Yeah, And if I knew what Newsom was for, it's 1:46:16.960 --> 1:46:19.360 kind of interesting. I saw him when he was speak 1:46:19.400 --> 1:46:23.439 when he was an elected mayor. He's very different and 1:46:23.560 --> 1:46:26.280 you evolved in your politics. But I'm like, okay, was 1:46:26.320 --> 1:46:27.200 that for version? Real? 1:46:28.920 --> 1:46:33.320 This version he's all sorts of talented. Yeah, there's no doubt, 1:46:33.400 --> 1:46:35.320 like he is a I used that. I like to 1:46:35.400 --> 1:46:40.440 use the expression political athlete. He's a really good political athlete. 1:46:40.560 --> 1:46:43.360 But you've got to have a specialty, right, You've got 1:46:43.360 --> 1:46:46.000 to be what are you fighting for? Right, It's got 1:46:46.040 --> 1:46:47.800 to be it's got to be a thing, not a 1:46:48.200 --> 1:46:51.559 not a not just winning. That isn't the idea, you know, 1:46:51.880 --> 1:46:55.920 And we'll see. Look, this book's a great you know 1:46:56.040 --> 1:46:59.600 the instigator. Do you when do you think this translates 1:46:59.600 --> 1:47:02.679 to more black women getting elected on their own right statewide? 1:47:02.680 --> 1:47:05.200 Although I think we're finally starting to see that breakthrough. 1:47:05.520 --> 1:47:10.080 I think we are some of the treatin also Brooks. 1:47:10.840 --> 1:47:14.639 Yeah, I'm actually hopeful in this next couple of years, 1:47:14.680 --> 1:47:18.160 like twenty six and setting up for twenty eight, that 1:47:18.240 --> 1:47:21.360 we'll start to maybe finally get that, you know, black 1:47:21.360 --> 1:47:22.880 woman governor, So I haven't got one yet. 1:47:24.840 --> 1:47:27.000 You know that could have lands bottoms is probably the 1:47:27.080 --> 1:47:27.519 best shot. 1:47:27.640 --> 1:47:30.479 This probably be shot this year, I think, yeah, this 1:47:30.680 --> 1:47:34.679 year for sure, but I do see an increase just great. 1:47:35.560 --> 1:47:39.120 Yeah, well a team of this has been great to 1:47:39.120 --> 1:47:41.240 talk with you, great to meet you. I mean, yeah, 1:47:41.280 --> 1:47:43.840 I'm sorry that we've not met before. Where are you 1:47:43.920 --> 1:47:45.479 in Virginia? Where did you grow up in Virginia? 1:47:46.479 --> 1:47:50.799 Northern? Well, actually I grew up in just outside of Richmond, and. 1:47:51.280 --> 1:47:54.880 Now I love northern Virginia. Where does Northern Virginia d now? 1:47:57.200 --> 1:47:58.240 Fredericksburg. 1:47:58.840 --> 1:48:02.880 Yeah, it's like this blob that keeps growing, right, Yeah, 1:48:03.479 --> 1:48:06.680 what's bigger? Northern Virginia or the Atlanta suburbs? Right, it's 1:48:06.720 --> 1:48:08.320 almost it's a very similar thing. 1:48:08.360 --> 1:48:11.000 And yeah, no, I'm like when they say Atlanta suburbs 1:48:11.000 --> 1:48:13.360 and I'm like, that's not that's like an hour out 1:48:13.400 --> 1:48:14.679 and they're like, now still the suburbs. 1:48:16.080 --> 1:48:19.519 Oh, I know. Right. It's like it's well, if we 1:48:19.520 --> 1:48:27.040 were all one state, we'd talk about Washington Baltimore as one. Yeah, well, 1:48:27.080 --> 1:48:29.200 what do you think about if we you know, if 1:48:29.200 --> 1:48:32.280 Trump had really been clever about this whole Arlington splitting 1:48:32.320 --> 1:48:34.600 putting Arlington back to d C. You know what he 1:48:34.680 --> 1:48:37.840 really would have done. What is is we're going to 1:48:37.920 --> 1:48:40.519 put give Arlington back to d C and advocate for 1:48:40.600 --> 1:48:43.639 d C statehood. Then if you really want to put 1:48:44.479 --> 1:48:48.320 pressure like that would be a fault line. They're not 1:48:48.360 --> 1:48:50.640 that clever. This is why I'm like, they're terrible at this, 1:48:50.800 --> 1:48:53.120 Like they could be much smarter about their policy. Like 1:48:53.160 --> 1:48:56.240 you want to drive a wedge. Yeah, offer offer to 1:48:56.280 --> 1:48:59.479 give Arlington back in exchange for statehood? You want state? Hup, 1:48:59.520 --> 1:49:00.519 you got to take Arlington? 1:49:00.920 --> 1:49:05.759 Yeah, I mean, yeah, gosh, that would be kind of interesting. 1:49:05.840 --> 1:49:08.040 I mean they're never that Like I said, they're never 1:49:08.080 --> 1:49:10.800 that clever. It's all a sledgehammer everything, you know, every 1:49:10.840 --> 1:49:14.760 problem is a nail, every hammer. Anyway, Well, the book is, 1:49:15.120 --> 1:49:17.960 it's terrific. It's a good especially I've got a lot 1:49:18.000 --> 1:49:20.080 of political nerds in a good way. I say that 1:49:20.080 --> 1:49:23.280 it's a compliment. Thank you know that listen that want 1:49:23.280 --> 1:49:25.240 to know more. And this has also got plenty of 1:49:25.280 --> 1:49:28.840 data in it too, So thank you for coming on. 1:49:29.280 --> 1:49:31.800 All right, thank you again for having me Jack, and I. 1:49:31.720 --> 1:49:33.200 See you down the road and I love the merch. 1:49:33.320 --> 1:49:35.519 Well then, well, thank you you can order on the 1:49:35.520 --> 1:49:37.360 website as well The Instigators book dot com. 1:49:39.439 --> 1:49:52.320 Well said he have a great evening. Well, I hope 1:49:52.320 --> 1:49:54.840 you enjoyed that conversation. As you saw, got a little 1:49:54.840 --> 1:50:02.000 blunt there about twenty twenty four and Joe Biden. But 1:50:02.040 --> 1:50:05.920 it's definitely I think a book a book worth getting 1:50:05.960 --> 1:50:10.479 to understand just how big the importance is in a 1:50:10.520 --> 1:50:14.840 primary particularly. But I found what I found really fascinating 1:50:14.840 --> 1:50:18.240 when Atimo was making the case is sort of, do 1:50:18.800 --> 1:50:21.720 Democratic strategists who aren't from the South just not get 1:50:21.760 --> 1:50:26.519 it right? Let's just say there might be something to that, 1:50:26.680 --> 1:50:29.160 right too many I could tell you this, if I 1:50:29.200 --> 1:50:31.400 were running for national politics, I wouldn't hire anybody that 1:50:31.400 --> 1:50:34.759 lived in New York or DC. Right, you want people 1:50:34.800 --> 1:50:41.240 that are grounded somewhere else. I think you know it 1:50:41.360 --> 1:50:43.960 just is, you know, certainly at least as one foot 1:50:44.040 --> 1:50:47.120 outside the coast. I certainly would be as far away 1:50:47.120 --> 1:50:50.679 from New York as I possibly could culturally in California, 1:50:50.720 --> 1:50:53.200 because I think right now for the Democratic Party, the 1:50:53.280 --> 1:50:58.559 coasts coastal connections are sort of radioactive. All right, let's 1:50:58.560 --> 1:50:59.759 go with the top five list. 1:51:01.479 --> 1:51:05.800 Chest top top chest. 1:51:07.240 --> 1:51:09.519 Then this is a fun one today, which it's the 1:51:09.560 --> 1:51:15.800 top five races that are essentially that are going to 1:51:15.880 --> 1:51:21.120 decide win. Lame duck status kicks in for Donald Trump, right, 1:51:21.160 --> 1:51:24.400 every second term president becomes a lame duck at some point. 1:51:24.439 --> 1:51:27.479 And I've condentned it's very possible Trump's already a lame duck. 1:51:27.520 --> 1:51:30.120 We just haven't fully realized it yet. Sometimes you have 1:51:30.160 --> 1:51:32.639 to go back, you have to go forwards, and then 1:51:32.680 --> 1:51:34.400 you'll go, oh, it turns out that he was a 1:51:34.479 --> 1:51:37.439 lame duck starting, you know, with the with the you know, 1:51:37.479 --> 1:51:39.960 it could could have begun all the way on tariff day, right. 1:51:40.000 --> 1:51:41.920 It was like with Joe Biden. You know, in the 1:51:41.920 --> 1:51:44.479 moment of the Afghanistan withdrawal, it you didn't realize, oh, 1:51:44.479 --> 1:51:46.639 that's the beginning of the end of his presidency. Then 1:51:46.680 --> 1:51:49.200 the farther away we got from it, and the less 1:51:49.280 --> 1:51:52.360 unless he recovered from that moment, the more you're like, oh, hey, 1:51:52.360 --> 1:51:53.840 that turned out to be the beginning of the end 1:51:53.840 --> 1:51:56.880 of his presidency. Right. In some ways, that's when it began, right, 1:51:57.320 --> 1:51:59.360 And it is one of those things you sometimes it 1:51:59.439 --> 1:52:03.879 takes takes a beat to look back. But I definitely 1:52:03.920 --> 1:52:07.320 think in this midterm cycle, especially with the way that 1:52:07.400 --> 1:52:10.559 Donald Trump has tried to exert a grip on the 1:52:10.560 --> 1:52:13.920 Republican Party, right is he took over he you know, 1:52:14.000 --> 1:52:16.320 at first it was hijacking, and now he's done a 1:52:16.360 --> 1:52:22.439 purge and this is his party. His endorsements usually lead 1:52:22.479 --> 1:52:26.920 to victories. And that's what I'm framing my top five 1:52:26.960 --> 1:52:30.320 list around, which is the top five primaries where Trump 1:52:30.400 --> 1:52:36.800 is most vulnerable to seeing his choice lose and essentially 1:52:37.640 --> 1:52:41.360 which would then trigger the narrative that perhaps his grip 1:52:41.439 --> 1:52:44.200 on the party itself is loosening. And we know that 1:52:44.200 --> 1:52:48.360 that has all sorts of contagion effects, right, And there's 1:52:48.360 --> 1:52:51.000 no doubt you can probably guess what the number one 1:52:51.080 --> 1:52:53.200 race is going to be. But all of this begins 1:52:53.200 --> 1:52:55.880 in the next couple of weeks. Okay, four of my 1:52:56.000 --> 1:52:59.439 five primary races are all in the month of May, 1:53:00.280 --> 1:53:01.920 So we're going to find out in the month of 1:53:01.960 --> 1:53:05.120 May whether Trump's grip on the party is as strong 1:53:05.640 --> 1:53:09.479 as it has been over the last few cycles. So 1:53:11.200 --> 1:53:14.439 my top five races that will be to me are 1:53:14.479 --> 1:53:18.920 a measurement of his strength in the party and will 1:53:18.960 --> 1:53:24.360 be a essentially success. Right, Well, then the critics quiet 1:53:24.400 --> 1:53:29.160 down and his grip on the party. Titans failure and 1:53:29.200 --> 1:53:34.160 the grip starts to loosen. How many multiple failures and 1:53:34.240 --> 1:53:37.120 the whole thing could collapse. So number five on my 1:53:37.160 --> 1:53:39.400 list is actually not a primary. It's the only non 1:53:39.400 --> 1:53:41.160 primary I've put on the list in his North Carolina 1:53:41.200 --> 1:53:47.760 Senate because Michael Wattley essentially got handed the nomination right 1:53:47.880 --> 1:53:51.719 he was the de facto candidate after Laura Trump decided 1:53:51.760 --> 1:53:54.280 she didn't want to be a senator. But this was 1:53:54.400 --> 1:53:58.439 essentially Trump blessed. This was Trump's rn Sea chair, so 1:53:59.080 --> 1:54:01.400 you know, he walked. So this is somebody that Trump 1:54:01.400 --> 1:54:07.679 has groomed to be a party leader, essentially shifting him 1:54:07.720 --> 1:54:11.240 to the top spot at the RNC and now shifting 1:54:11.320 --> 1:54:15.280 him into the nomination slot for the open US sendency 1:54:15.360 --> 1:54:18.000 to replace Tom Tillis. And oh, by the way, he 1:54:18.160 --> 1:54:22.240 essentially chased Tom Tillis out of the party. Don't believe me. 1:54:22.320 --> 1:54:24.519 Just look at Tom Tillis's behavior right now in the Senate. 1:54:25.760 --> 1:54:29.479 He ain't doing Trump's bidding. Look, losing to Roy Cooper 1:54:29.600 --> 1:54:32.240 is not a sign that Donald Trump has lost his fastball. 1:54:32.560 --> 1:54:34.760 Okay that I'm not going to sit there. But if 1:54:34.800 --> 1:54:38.560 Michael Wattley loses by double digits. Then this is proof 1:54:38.600 --> 1:54:43.680 that Trump really just absolutely made a gigantic mistake. Right, 1:54:43.880 --> 1:54:46.720 probably should have let if he didn't really have confidence 1:54:46.720 --> 1:54:50.360 in Watleys as a statewide candidate, well, let a primary happen. 1:54:50.800 --> 1:54:53.080 In some ways, a competitive primary might have given new 1:54:53.160 --> 1:54:55.440 name id to somebody that's a rising up, might have 1:54:55.480 --> 1:54:57.880 been a member of Congress. But that is not how 1:54:57.880 --> 1:55:00.760 they wanted to handle things. So I do this race, 1:55:01.560 --> 1:55:04.360 and for me, the marker is double digits versus single digits. 1:55:04.400 --> 1:55:08.360 A double digit Roy Cooper victory really is an indictment 1:55:08.440 --> 1:55:13.000 on Trump's political acumen, right, and will be will cause 1:55:13.040 --> 1:55:15.080 all sort because this is a former R and C chair. 1:55:15.120 --> 1:55:21.640 We'll cause all sorts of handwringing and blind quotes and 1:55:21.680 --> 1:55:23.760 all of this stuff saying, you know, this was crazy, 1:55:23.800 --> 1:55:27.200 what was even made the nominee? This is all Trump? Right, 1:55:27.600 --> 1:55:30.680 So he is just large ownership of the North Carolina 1:55:30.720 --> 1:55:32.960 center race, more so than Maine, more so than really 1:55:33.040 --> 1:55:38.640 any other competitive center race. Right, this is his creation. Right, 1:55:38.760 --> 1:55:41.480 He bullied the till Us out of the party, he 1:55:41.600 --> 1:55:45.920 put his person in there, He cleared the primary field, right, 1:55:46.000 --> 1:55:48.680 so there is no Senate race. He in some ways 1:55:48.720 --> 1:55:50.880 owns more than this one. So that's number five of them, 1:55:50.960 --> 1:55:54.000 list number four. It's another center race Louisiana Senate. Now 1:55:54.000 --> 1:55:56.400 we've got the primary on the sixteenth of May, and 1:55:56.400 --> 1:55:58.560 then there's likely to be a run off because we've 1:55:58.560 --> 1:56:01.320 got a three way competitive race, and with of course 1:56:01.920 --> 1:56:06.640 Bill Cassidy the incumbent, Julia Letlowe congresswoman, and then John Fleming, 1:56:06.680 --> 1:56:08.440 who's been in this race before. So it's a three 1:56:08.440 --> 1:56:11.480 way race. They've all got reasonable money and there's going 1:56:11.560 --> 1:56:14.320 to be two that make it through. If Cassidy's one 1:56:14.360 --> 1:56:19.640 of the two, you know, Cassidy is a puncher's chance 1:56:21.080 --> 1:56:24.200 in this thing. Now, look, they've rigged the rules in 1:56:24.240 --> 1:56:26.600 Louisiana to try to punish Cassidy. Right, this is the 1:56:26.600 --> 1:56:29.800 first time they're ever doing a cartisan primary. That Louisiana 1:56:29.840 --> 1:56:31.800 used to be an all party primary, one ballot and 1:56:31.800 --> 1:56:36.680 then there was sort of a runoff situation. Frankly, it's 1:56:36.760 --> 1:56:39.120 actually a model that I wish more states would have adopted. 1:56:39.160 --> 1:56:40.920 And so it's a shame to see this go the 1:56:40.960 --> 1:56:42.400 other way. But we know why it went the other way. 1:56:42.440 --> 1:56:46.800 Cassidy voted to convict Donald Trump after the second impeachment 1:56:47.480 --> 1:56:51.120 and this was they knew that in the old system 1:56:51.200 --> 1:56:53.760 Cassidy would survive. How do we know this, Well, there's 1:56:53.800 --> 1:56:58.560 still two impeachers in the House, Dan Newhouse in Washington 1:56:58.560 --> 1:57:01.240 State and David Valade. And what do they both have 1:57:01.320 --> 1:57:03.840 in common? They are in all party primaries. They did 1:57:03.880 --> 1:57:06.280 not have a partisan primary that they had to get through. 1:57:06.520 --> 1:57:08.720 Anybody that had to get through a partisan primary lost. 1:57:09.640 --> 1:57:15.480 So look, I am I certainly think Cassidy's the underdog here. 1:57:15.600 --> 1:57:18.160 I think he'll get into the runoff. I assume he loses, 1:57:19.840 --> 1:57:25.760 But what a repudiation to Trump. If he doesn't. It's 1:57:25.800 --> 1:57:27.960 a big win for Trump. If Cassidy doesn't even make 1:57:27.960 --> 1:57:32.320 the runoff, it's a small win for Trump. If he 1:57:32.400 --> 1:57:37.200 knocks him off in the runoff, it's a humiliation. If 1:57:37.240 --> 1:57:41.640 Cassidy wins renomination Texas Senate. This is number three on 1:57:41.680 --> 1:57:46.879 the list. Look, even though Trump is supposedly not endorsed, 1:57:47.040 --> 1:57:50.720 it's pretty clear Paxton's Maga Cornin is not right. So 1:57:52.680 --> 1:57:56.400 Trump is. You know. My guess is if he the 1:57:56.440 --> 1:57:58.640 fact that he hasn't endorsed now means he's probably not 1:57:58.720 --> 1:58:01.160 going to because he's afraid. I think of this one 1:58:01.160 --> 1:58:04.600 because it's not clear. I don't know, you know, I 1:58:04.600 --> 1:58:06.760 don't think he has the standing with the party anymore 1:58:06.800 --> 1:58:09.560 that endorsing Cornan would put automatically put him over the top. 1:58:10.640 --> 1:58:12.880 Put it this way, he's afraid to find out, and 1:58:12.920 --> 1:58:15.240 the lack of him not wanting to get involved in 1:58:15.240 --> 1:58:22.680 this race says more about his own fear of exposing himself. Right, 1:58:22.760 --> 1:58:26.760 does the Emperor have clothes on or not moment than 1:58:26.800 --> 1:58:32.480 anything else. So you know, he'll take credit for a 1:58:32.560 --> 1:58:34.640 corn and win if Cornin somehow gets out of this runoff. 1:58:34.640 --> 1:58:36.280 By the way, this runoffs May twenty six, end of 1:58:36.280 --> 1:58:38.920 the month, right after Memorial Day, so likely to be 1:58:39.000 --> 1:58:41.880 low turnout, usually not a good sign for the for 1:58:41.960 --> 1:58:45.920 the for the more center right candidate or center left candidate, 1:58:46.000 --> 1:58:49.800 you know, always usually an advantage for the base. But 1:58:49.960 --> 1:58:53.640 this is one that I think, you know, Cornyn surviving 1:58:53.720 --> 1:58:58.680 this is a repudiation Omega, and that in it indirectly 1:58:59.280 --> 1:59:02.680 is a repudiation a Trump or a loosening of the grip. 1:59:03.280 --> 1:59:05.320 Next time, this is Georgia governor, and this is going 1:59:05.360 --> 1:59:07.720 to be an interesting test. So Trump's already endorsed in 1:59:07.720 --> 1:59:10.760 Georgia Governor. He endorsed the Lieutenant Governor Burt Jones, and 1:59:10.760 --> 1:59:12.960 he's endorsed him from the beginning. And Burt Jones has 1:59:12.960 --> 1:59:15.160 been somebody that has flirted with some of these conspiracies. 1:59:15.240 --> 1:59:17.320 He's been on the MAGA train from the beginning, very 1:59:17.360 --> 1:59:22.120 much like Paxton in Texas well. A new candidate jump 1:59:22.120 --> 1:59:25.160 in this race, sort of a former healthcare executive named 1:59:25.200 --> 1:59:28.680 Rick Jackson. Got a terrific personal story that really I 1:59:28.680 --> 1:59:32.600 think resonates with people. He's essentially a foster kid that 1:59:32.720 --> 1:59:35.880 built his own life after that and he's been incredibly 1:59:35.920 --> 1:59:39.560 charitable with Foster organization. So he's just he's got a 1:59:41.560 --> 1:59:45.240 he doesn't have the usual political narrative for a biography. 1:59:45.800 --> 1:59:47.520 I think it's quite syllable, and I think him is 1:59:47.640 --> 1:59:49.360 you know, you know, if you're gonna ask me, I 1:59:49.360 --> 1:59:51.280 think Brick Jackson's the favorite to be the next governor, 1:59:51.320 --> 1:59:55.880 let alone the primary winner. Now. Rick Jackson, in some 1:59:55.880 --> 1:59:57.800 ways he's been He jumped in this race, and he 1:59:57.880 --> 2:00:01.080 proclaimed himself, you know, very much a Trumper, basically trying 2:00:01.120 --> 2:00:07.240 to trying to trying to triangulate a little bit and 2:00:07.400 --> 2:00:10.080 sort of either forced Trump to duel endorse like he's 2:00:10.080 --> 2:00:12.800 done in the past when he sees somebody playing up 2:00:12.800 --> 2:00:17.560 to him or in some ways dare Trump to back 2:00:17.640 --> 2:00:20.360 up his endorsement. And I think that's you know, if 2:00:20.400 --> 2:00:23.240 Trump doesn't come to Bert Jones's aid here because Rick 2:00:23.320 --> 2:00:27.600 Jackson is self funding, well, what's Trump raised all this 2:00:27.680 --> 2:00:30.839 money for? Right? Is he going to use his money 2:00:31.240 --> 2:00:34.760 to show to defend those that stood with him and 2:00:34.800 --> 2:00:38.920 that you know, got in early or not. And if 2:00:38.920 --> 2:00:41.720 he doesn't come in and help Jones here, if this 2:00:41.840 --> 2:00:44.480 Maga super pac, I really think it does send this 2:00:44.520 --> 2:00:49.520 broader message and it's a bad look for the Trump 2:00:49.560 --> 2:00:53.360 movement that hey, it's a one way loyalty street and 2:00:53.440 --> 2:00:55.920 he's going to he will run away from you if 2:00:55.920 --> 2:00:58.720 you look like you're weak or losing, even if it's 2:00:58.760 --> 2:01:02.480 not on you. And you know, the idea that he 2:01:02.560 --> 2:01:04.600 is not a reliable ally, I know is going to 2:01:04.640 --> 2:01:07.440 shock people. But you know, if Burt Jones wants to 2:01:07.480 --> 2:01:09.120 know what this feels like, he can go ask the 2:01:09.240 --> 2:01:13.080 Lensky what it feels like. Right. And the number one 2:01:13.120 --> 2:01:16.560 on the list that to me probably matters more than 2:01:16.600 --> 2:01:18.960 any of the other races on this list is the 2:01:18.960 --> 2:01:23.920 May nineteenth primary in Kentucky's fourth congressional district and Thomas Massey. 2:01:25.160 --> 2:01:28.760 A Thomas Massey victory, I think cements the narrative that 2:01:28.800 --> 2:01:34.840 Trump's Elaine Duck, his his his control of the party 2:01:34.880 --> 2:01:37.280 is loosening and there's no going back from it, like 2:01:37.360 --> 2:01:41.800 it becomes just it is. It is probably the single 2:01:41.840 --> 2:01:45.960 most powerful narrative reaction of anything on this top five list. 2:01:46.000 --> 2:01:48.200 That's why it's number one for me on this list. 2:01:48.200 --> 2:01:51.440 I think this has the you know, he has repeatedly 2:01:51.480 --> 2:01:53.400 gone after Massey. This is one of the few races 2:01:53.400 --> 2:01:56.640 he's put his money where his mouth is. Massey has 2:01:56.680 --> 2:01:59.879 done his thing, and he's gone back, and he's certainly 2:02:00.480 --> 2:02:03.160 not been shy about trying to fight fire with fire 2:02:03.360 --> 2:02:10.640 back on him. You know, past is if past is 2:02:10.640 --> 2:02:17.200 any guide here, Massy's gonna lose. But there is risk 2:02:17.280 --> 2:02:19.720 if Massy wins this, and he's pretty connected to this 2:02:19.800 --> 2:02:24.440 district and Kentucky Republicans tell you talk about a group 2:02:24.480 --> 2:02:29.280 of Republicans that just aren't cookie cutter, right, and there's 2:02:29.320 --> 2:02:30.880 none of them you can point to and say, well, 2:02:30.880 --> 2:02:34.120 they're you know, look at the Senate race, right, There's 2:02:34.600 --> 2:02:36.640 it's easier to make the case that they're non Maga 2:02:36.680 --> 2:02:41.720 than Maga there is this own sort of independent streak 2:02:41.760 --> 2:02:44.680 that they have. McConnell is no Maga Republican for different 2:02:44.720 --> 2:02:48.200 reasons than Ran Paul is no Maga Republican for different reasons, 2:02:48.280 --> 2:02:50.680 and Tom is Massey, And then you could keep you 2:02:50.760 --> 2:02:52.760 got the Secretary of State, Michael Adams is a different 2:02:52.760 --> 2:02:55.680 type of Republican, but so is Daniel Cameron, and so 2:02:55.840 --> 2:02:59.000 is Andy Barr. I mean, it's just been you know, 2:02:59.240 --> 2:03:02.280 in some ways, I'm going to be culturally surprised if 2:03:02.280 --> 2:03:05.520 Massey loses, because it's not in the culture of Kentucky politics. 2:03:05.960 --> 2:03:09.680 And at the same time, right history shows that when 2:03:09.720 --> 2:03:12.360 Trump really wants to weigh in on something and throws 2:03:12.480 --> 2:03:15.480 actual money behind that way, he can have some success. 2:03:16.040 --> 2:03:19.120 But if you're trying to keep track, when does lame 2:03:19.240 --> 2:03:23.280 duck status officially begin for Donald Trump? Thomas Massey victory 2:03:23.280 --> 2:03:30.080 on May nineteenth would cement the narrative that is that 2:03:30.120 --> 2:03:42.840 he's fully in lame duck status. Ask Chuck, all right, 2:03:42.920 --> 2:03:45.880 let's do a little last chuck here. First question comes 2:03:45.880 --> 2:03:52.880 from Doug and Shaker Heights, a wonderful community in Cleveland, 2:03:53.280 --> 2:03:55.120 and he goes new listener here, really appreciate the measured 2:03:55.120 --> 2:03:57.560 analysis on the show. I'm wondering if Ohio Democrats made 2:03:57.560 --> 2:04:00.320 it a strategic mistake by backing shared Brown again, given 2:04:00.320 --> 2:04:02.960 concerns about his age, branding and his association with the 2:04:03.040 --> 2:04:06.160 national party leadership. With nominating younger, newer candidates be a 2:04:06.160 --> 2:04:08.600 better way for Democrats to rebuild their image and compete 2:04:09.360 --> 2:04:11.520 more effectively in states like Ohio. Curious to hear you 2:04:11.560 --> 2:04:14.920 take thank you, Doug and chicker Wright. So I think 2:04:14.960 --> 2:04:18.040 big picture your instinct. I could see where you're thinking, 2:04:18.080 --> 2:04:20.840 and I kind of tend to agree with it. And 2:04:20.880 --> 2:04:23.760 I'll be honest, I was surprised that Brown got into 2:04:23.760 --> 2:04:25.960 this race because do you realize and I bet I 2:04:25.960 --> 2:04:27.360 don't know if you do, And I don't know if 2:04:27.360 --> 2:04:32.760 many Ohioans realize this. This is technically not the time 2:04:32.800 --> 2:04:34.600 for this seat to come up, but this is a 2:04:34.640 --> 2:04:38.840 special election to fill out the JD Vance's term that 2:04:38.920 --> 2:04:42.960 began in the twenty twenty two cycle, right, and John 2:04:43.000 --> 2:04:46.440 Houstad was the appointed successor. He was the lieutenant governor 2:04:46.840 --> 2:04:49.040 before that, the Secretary of State sort of really sort 2:04:49.080 --> 2:04:52.160 of a more of an Ohio Republican and anything on 2:04:52.480 --> 2:04:57.560 the megaside of things. But this was DeWine's appointment and 2:04:58.160 --> 2:05:01.160 it's only for two years, and you're reward for winning 2:05:01.200 --> 2:05:06.360 this massive, expensive Senate race in twenty twenty six, is 2:05:06.400 --> 2:05:09.000 you got to run again in twenty twenty eight? And 2:05:09.040 --> 2:05:11.080 I just couldn't believe that Shared Brown was going to 2:05:11.120 --> 2:05:14.720 sign up after running in twenty twenty four. We know 2:05:14.800 --> 2:05:17.880 he already did this running in twenty twenty six and 2:05:17.920 --> 2:05:20.280 then running in twenty twenty eight. Is he really going 2:05:20.320 --> 2:05:25.200 to have run three straight Senate races? If he wins, 2:05:25.280 --> 2:05:28.160 does he not run for reelection? And then if he 2:05:28.200 --> 2:05:30.280 doesn't run for reelection, who the hell are Democrat's going 2:05:30.360 --> 2:05:33.000 to find that can somehow hold a seat when it 2:05:33.040 --> 2:05:36.960 apparently is going to be proof that only only a 2:05:37.000 --> 2:05:39.320 Shared Brown can hold the seat. So yeah, it was 2:05:39.360 --> 2:05:41.800 a head scratcher to me on a number of levels. 2:05:42.840 --> 2:05:45.160 And I expect that Shared Brown I knew he wasn't 2:05:45.200 --> 2:05:47.920 done running like he just certain people his motor was 2:05:47.960 --> 2:05:51.760 still going right. The one office he never ran for 2:05:51.920 --> 2:05:54.000 was governor. He's run for a lot of state wide offices. 2:05:54.040 --> 2:05:55.760 I think he was Secretary State at one time. I 2:05:55.800 --> 2:05:58.000 think he ran for another state white office. I mean, 2:05:58.040 --> 2:06:00.440 he and Mike de Wine have you know, and the 2:06:00.440 --> 2:06:02.280 one you know, he could have and there would have 2:06:02.280 --> 2:06:05.400 been some sort of poetic irony, you know, following Mike 2:06:05.440 --> 2:06:08.680 de Wine, because the one office Mike the Wine always 2:06:09.160 --> 2:06:15.000 that he had eluded him before finally winning in uh 2:06:15.160 --> 2:06:21.120 back in twenty eighteen was governor. So I figured Shared 2:06:21.080 --> 2:06:22.840 Brown would run for governor because it's a four year term. 2:06:22.880 --> 2:06:25.000 Number one, I think it was an open seat, it 2:06:25.040 --> 2:06:27.240 was winnable. I think Ramaswami has proven to be two 2:06:27.280 --> 2:06:32.839 week a very weak Republican nominee, and maybe Amy Acton, 2:06:32.920 --> 2:06:35.480 who's going to be the likely Democratic nominee for governor, 2:06:35.480 --> 2:06:37.480 switches over to the center race. Now I don't you know. 2:06:37.600 --> 2:06:43.120 And and my concern about Shared Brown as the nominee 2:06:43.440 --> 2:06:47.400 is that Houston. You know, normally what makes a midterm 2:06:47.480 --> 2:06:50.200 year advantageous for the out party is you get to 2:06:50.240 --> 2:06:54.840 run against incumbents, and I guess Shared Brown could run 2:06:54.840 --> 2:06:57.120 against Trump, and he's going to run against Republicans. But 2:06:57.160 --> 2:06:59.840 it's it's hard not for voters to see him as 2:06:59.840 --> 2:07:03.400 any anything but part of the establishment, just the Democratic establishment. 2:07:03.440 --> 2:07:06.040 So all your choices, do you want the Republican establishment 2:07:06.120 --> 2:07:10.120 or do you want the democratic establishment? That's it. I 2:07:10.120 --> 2:07:13.480 don't know if there's a stronger Democrat that anybody that 2:07:13.520 --> 2:07:15.320 you could have found other than Chuck Schumer for the 2:07:15.360 --> 2:07:18.839 center race. I think governor's races are still winnable in Ohio. 2:07:18.880 --> 2:07:21.080 I don't know if center races are, but maybe Shared 2:07:21.080 --> 2:07:23.880 Brown's the one Democrat that can win. Maybe Tim Ryan 2:07:23.920 --> 2:07:27.840 could have you know, maybe there's somebody new or younger. 2:07:28.320 --> 2:07:30.200 Maybe there's a taller Rico out there. I've always sad, 2:07:30.200 --> 2:07:32.280 you know, you know it is. I do believe Ohio 2:07:32.360 --> 2:07:33.960 is a light red state, not a dark red state. 2:07:34.360 --> 2:07:37.000 So the right type of Democrat can still win out there. 2:07:37.680 --> 2:07:41.520 You know, maybe maybe Greg Landsman from the Cincinnati area. Right. 2:07:41.680 --> 2:07:49.560 So let's just say I've I've gone at this one 2:07:49.600 --> 2:07:54.360 hundred ways from Sunday, I think from sixty thousand feet. 2:07:54.400 --> 2:07:57.480 I agree with your take on this that this is, 2:07:58.560 --> 2:08:00.960 but there's also an argument to be made who else 2:08:00.960 --> 2:08:05.160 could have done it in this environment for the cost 2:08:05.240 --> 2:08:07.360 of this race. And when you look at the larger 2:08:07.440 --> 2:08:11.720 map that the Democrats were facing, this was you know, 2:08:11.840 --> 2:08:15.440 a tried and trude and proven voke get her in Ohio. Right, 2:08:17.640 --> 2:08:19.680 But there's a lot of and I've given you all 2:08:19.800 --> 2:08:23.960 the reasons why I'm surprised he said yes, and that 2:08:24.000 --> 2:08:26.280 to me is, to me still the biggest surprise because 2:08:27.440 --> 2:08:30.000 by saying yes, I think you've inadvertently signed that if 2:08:30.040 --> 2:08:33.120 you win, you've signed up for one more ride on 2:08:33.160 --> 2:08:36.480 twenty eight And my god, I know he used to 2:08:36.520 --> 2:08:40.000 be a House member and you're used. But senators usually 2:08:40.040 --> 2:08:42.560 don't like to have to run every two years, and 2:08:42.600 --> 2:08:46.160 if he wins, his reward is to run again, literally 2:08:46.200 --> 2:08:52.000 in two years. Dean from Long Island rights with Donald 2:08:52.040 --> 2:08:54.960 Trump paying off wind companies to abandon offshore Win project, 2:08:55.080 --> 2:08:58.840 I we thank you for writing this in I have 2:08:58.960 --> 2:09:00.840 a piece of my monel that I put together that 2:09:00.960 --> 2:09:02.400 was going to be on this, and then I just 2:09:03.080 --> 2:09:05.000 there's so many other things that piled on top of it. 2:09:05.040 --> 2:09:07.160 So I'm so glad this is a question. So thank you, Dean. 2:09:08.160 --> 2:09:10.440 But let me bears repeating with Donald Trump paying off 2:09:10.480 --> 2:09:12.680 win companies to abandon offshore win products, so you know, 2:09:13.080 --> 2:09:15.720 if that would be considered interference with contracts, could be 2:09:15.800 --> 2:09:17.720 allowing the States to sue the administration and keep the 2:09:17.720 --> 2:09:20.600 companies involved. Thanks Deem from Long Island. Look, I think 2:09:20.640 --> 2:09:23.080 it's an interesting way to go. I think there could 2:09:23.080 --> 2:09:26.400 be lots of lawsuits on this, but I just this 2:09:26.440 --> 2:09:31.960 whole thing, you know. Again, it goes back to sort 2:09:31.960 --> 2:09:34.560 of what's wrong with our politics in general. Not everything 2:09:34.640 --> 2:09:39.480 is either or. Some things are ants, okay, and we 2:09:39.520 --> 2:09:44.560 need energy badly. Why are we ruling out parts of energy? Right? 2:09:45.120 --> 2:09:48.520 I think you know, weaning yourself off of any energy 2:09:48.560 --> 2:09:50.680 is a bad idea at the moment. All of the above, 2:09:51.720 --> 2:09:54.440 but it's really foolish not to be thinking about alternative 2:09:54.560 --> 2:09:58.919 energy sources at a time when literally wars get started 2:09:59.040 --> 2:10:05.240 over access to energy. So this is just stupidity. This 2:10:05.320 --> 2:10:09.640 is bad policy, This is bad for the country long term, 2:10:10.200 --> 2:10:14.200 all because of a fetish about climate change. I mean 2:10:14.400 --> 2:10:16.920 this is literally like, well, I don't want to I 2:10:16.920 --> 2:10:18.880 don't want to do these wind farms because somehow it'll 2:10:18.920 --> 2:10:20.720 make us think we believe in climate change and we 2:10:20.720 --> 2:10:22.800 will need to prove that renewables don't work. Why don't 2:10:22.800 --> 2:10:24.440 we want to prove that renewables don't work. All we're 2:10:24.440 --> 2:10:29.000 doing is handing more more power to China. Right. The 2:10:30.000 --> 2:10:34.000 war of choice against Iran has absolutely scared a whole 2:10:34.080 --> 2:10:36.200 bunch of smaller and middle sized countries who don't have 2:10:36.240 --> 2:10:39.960 their own energy access who rely on buying oil from 2:10:40.000 --> 2:10:42.280 the Strait from the Gulf, and it comes to the 2:10:42.280 --> 2:10:44.280 Strait of hormones, it go man. We got to find 2:10:44.320 --> 2:10:47.440 alternative sources. And it isn't all just finding alternative sources 2:10:47.480 --> 2:10:51.560 for oil and gas. There's going to be a surge 2:10:51.560 --> 2:10:54.320 in interest in renewables. And guess what country they're going 2:10:54.360 --> 2:10:57.000 to go to for the supplies to tap into solar 2:10:57.040 --> 2:10:58.760 and to tap into wind. It ain't going to be 2:10:58.760 --> 2:11:02.600 the United States because this administration is gutting the entire industry. 2:11:04.440 --> 2:11:09.880 It's again, this is self inflicted. There's no part of 2:11:09.920 --> 2:11:14.200 this that makes any sense. And the amount of people 2:11:14.200 --> 2:11:19.960 that don't say this is nonsense. This is not about 2:11:20.120 --> 2:11:28.080 climate change. This is about preparation by the freaking insurance policy. Sorry. 2:11:28.160 --> 2:11:31.320 I find the war against climate change to be just 2:11:31.400 --> 2:11:37.320 so asinine because at this point, who cares whether it's 2:11:37.360 --> 2:11:40.800 man made or not. The climate's changing. We have more 2:11:40.840 --> 2:11:44.960 wildfires happening, we have stronger hurricanes, we have coastal erosion. 2:11:46.240 --> 2:11:50.120 Why does it matter how it started? We should all 2:11:50.120 --> 2:11:52.720 be trying to mitigate it, and all be trying to 2:11:52.760 --> 2:11:55.760 and there's no interest. Literally, this ideology on the right 2:11:56.080 --> 2:12:00.480 is to pretend it doesn't exist, that it's made up up. 2:12:01.080 --> 2:12:03.720 You want to disagree in the origin story, fine, but 2:12:03.800 --> 2:12:07.120 the results not made up. This is the world we're 2:12:07.160 --> 2:12:09.880 dealing with. The climate has changed. Do you want to 2:12:09.920 --> 2:12:14.080 fight over whether it was a hidden hand above or 2:12:14.080 --> 2:12:21.360 an actual person or an industry or entity? Sorry, I 2:12:21.400 --> 2:12:23.480 know I get a little rant about this. I just 2:12:23.600 --> 2:12:25.600 find this one of the dumber things. Where did we do? 2:12:27.360 --> 2:12:30.400 I just you know, why wouldn't we want the insurance policy? 2:12:30.960 --> 2:12:33.280 Next question comes from Pete. What do you make of 2:12:33.280 --> 2:12:35.640 the what if scenario where Trump bought the Buffalo Bills 2:12:35.680 --> 2:12:38.280 in twenty fourteen? Could owning an NFL team have kept 2:12:38.320 --> 2:12:40.360 him from unning for president of twenty sixteen? And if so, 2:12:40.760 --> 2:12:42.600 how differently do you think that election in the broader 2:12:42.600 --> 2:12:46.720 political landscape since might have played out? Pete, that's a 2:12:46.720 --> 2:12:50.520 good one. It is a what if. You know, when 2:12:50.560 --> 2:12:53.320 I did my original what if on twenty sixteen, I 2:12:53.320 --> 2:12:56.800 think I was riffing with Jonathan Martin. I worry this 2:12:56.840 --> 2:12:59.640 is on the old NBC feed. The their own They 2:12:59.640 --> 2:13:01.160 didn't get to own the name, but they owned my 2:13:01.960 --> 2:13:07.160 intellectual property there. But we went through all these various 2:13:07.160 --> 2:13:09.520 scenarios on that. Do I think if he were the 2:13:09.520 --> 2:13:11.520 owner of the Buffalo Bills he wouldn't have run president? Yes, 2:13:11.560 --> 2:13:17.480 I do, And I think the NFL would be something. 2:13:18.000 --> 2:13:22.440 Put it that way, and you'd have, you know, the 2:13:22.480 --> 2:13:26.720 war between Jerry Jones, Bob Craft and Donald Trump, those 2:13:26.760 --> 2:13:31.800 three egos fighting each other for supremacy among owners, right, like, man, 2:13:32.320 --> 2:13:35.800 let's let's let's get that. Forget the TV series running 2:13:35.840 --> 2:13:39.800 point about you know, loosely about the Genie bus Lakers. 2:13:40.480 --> 2:13:44.920 Let's do that, right, Craft, Jones and Trump NFL owners, right, 2:13:45.120 --> 2:13:49.720 you know, the New Housewives of the NFL, but starring 2:13:49.800 --> 2:13:53.280 Jerry Jones, Donald Trump and there. So what would happen 2:13:53.320 --> 2:13:58.040 in twenty sixteen? I will tell you so if Trump 2:13:58.120 --> 2:14:04.480 never runs, there's sort of two what ifs that I've 2:14:04.600 --> 2:14:09.760 entertained on this and they and I have to talk 2:14:09.760 --> 2:14:14.680 about them sequentially because this if there's no Bridge Gate, 2:14:15.600 --> 2:14:22.880 Chris Christie's the nominee in sixteen. Chris Christie's personality fit 2:14:22.960 --> 2:14:26.600 the moment, right, because Donald Trump proved that this is 2:14:26.640 --> 2:14:29.640 what kind of the country was looking for. It fit 2:14:29.720 --> 2:14:31.160 the moment. But he'd have been a lot He's he 2:14:31.200 --> 2:14:35.560 probably wins big, not small, Christy versus Clinton, Christy probably 2:14:35.600 --> 2:14:37.320 gets fifty one to fifty two, fifty three percent of 2:14:37.320 --> 2:14:42.720 the vote, and Christy would have been challenged from the 2:14:42.840 --> 2:14:45.680 right by you know, by the Ted cruises of the world, 2:14:45.760 --> 2:14:48.120 would have been hit hard on judges, on abortion and 2:14:48.200 --> 2:14:50.560 some of these cultural issues that I think wouldn't have 2:14:50.600 --> 2:14:53.040 mattered because Christy was just a better debater and he 2:14:53.040 --> 2:14:56.120 would have been, you know, without Donald Trump involved, Christy 2:14:56.200 --> 2:14:58.880 would have been the star of that show. All right, 2:14:58.920 --> 2:15:02.320 that that's one scenario. But bridge Gate did happen, and 2:15:02.480 --> 2:15:05.600 it was a different It was a you know, it's funny. 2:15:05.600 --> 2:15:07.360 It was sort of like a wounded version of Chris 2:15:07.400 --> 2:15:10.360 Christy in that primary, and we didn't get the best 2:15:10.440 --> 2:15:12.840 version of him it would have been, because I do 2:15:12.920 --> 2:15:15.240 think if Christy's in that race, Trump's just an endorser 2:15:15.240 --> 2:15:18.000 of Christy. He never jumps in because he doesn't think 2:15:18.000 --> 2:15:21.480 he can be Christie. So that's sort of where one 2:15:21.560 --> 2:15:23.640 of my head. That's one of my what if scenarios. 2:15:23.680 --> 2:15:25.560 The second one if on this is so let's say 2:15:25.560 --> 2:15:28.800 bridge Gate happened, and so what you essentially have is 2:15:28.800 --> 2:15:31.720 is I think Rand Paul would have been a much 2:15:31.760 --> 2:15:36.680 bigger factor because Paul had the non traditional Republicans that 2:15:36.720 --> 2:15:40.120 were interested in something new. Now, the minute Trump got in, 2:15:40.640 --> 2:15:43.400 it was like a vacuum cleaner on Paul's support. Right 2:15:43.760 --> 2:15:47.040 the first chunk that he took, first, lunch money he 2:15:47.120 --> 2:15:49.480 took was not Jeb Bush's lunch money, it was actually 2:15:51.080 --> 2:15:56.800 Ran Paul's lunch money. And so I think without Trump, 2:15:56.840 --> 2:16:01.160 Paul's a much bigger player Rand Paul. You know, there's 2:16:01.200 --> 2:16:04.400 a scenario where Ran Paul's nominee and Paul versus Clinton 2:16:04.480 --> 2:16:07.760 is very similar to Trump versus Clinton, except probably a 2:16:08.000 --> 2:16:13.200 little less personal. And I think given what we saw 2:16:13.920 --> 2:16:17.880 with the with the vote and the desperation that there 2:16:18.000 --> 2:16:20.480 was among you know, there's sort of the obstinates that 2:16:20.520 --> 2:16:22.960 there was and the electing Hillary Clinton right, there definitely 2:16:23.040 --> 2:16:26.920 was a strong anti Clinton chunk of voters that just 2:16:27.440 --> 2:16:30.920 were put a low ceiling on her ability to gain votes. 2:16:31.120 --> 2:16:35.240 So I think Paul, so Christy, Paul, and then probably 2:16:35.280 --> 2:16:38.200 Ted Cruz. That's probably the order of likely nominee with 2:16:38.240 --> 2:16:42.760 no Donald Trump and no Bridgegate. I think Christy with Bridgegate, 2:16:44.360 --> 2:16:49.039 I probably think the nominee is still Paul or Cruise. 2:16:50.120 --> 2:16:52.280 I don't think Rubio. I think we found out that 2:16:52.800 --> 2:16:57.480 Rubio was trying to straddle too much there. Now, maybe 2:16:57.520 --> 2:17:04.480 Rubio looks like a better candidate, but you know it's 2:17:04.520 --> 2:17:06.560 pot You know you could, you could if you want 2:17:06.600 --> 2:17:08.520 to argue with me, that maybe Rubio gets in there. Now, 2:17:08.640 --> 2:17:10.720 Rubio and no nominee probably wins by a bigger margin 2:17:10.720 --> 2:17:14.119 over Clinton too than Trump. I do think both Rubio 2:17:14.160 --> 2:17:16.400 and Christy would have been stronger candidates than Trump. I 2:17:16.400 --> 2:17:18.920 think both Crews and Paul would have been kind of 2:17:18.920 --> 2:17:22.959 the exacts, very similar races where we're some sort of 2:17:22.959 --> 2:17:28.600 split decision. That was fun. Pete, all right, Next question 2:17:32.320 --> 2:17:36.520 comes from Ben s from Tona, Wanda, New York. One 2:17:36.560 --> 2:17:39.000 of my favorite undergrad courses I took at the University 2:17:39.000 --> 2:17:41.400 of Rochester was titled the Mythology of the Founders. I 2:17:41.480 --> 2:17:45.680 remember writing my final paper on Congressman Raoul Labrador on 2:17:45.760 --> 2:17:47.760 behalf of the Tea Party advocating for the repeal of 2:17:47.800 --> 2:17:50.560 the seventeenth Amendment because it deviated too far from the 2:17:50.560 --> 2:17:54.280 Founding Father's intentions, for better or worse, Many Americans mythologize 2:17:54.280 --> 2:17:56.920 our founding documents and their authors, and I wanted to 2:17:56.959 --> 2:17:58.560 know how you might navigate that with some of the 2:17:58.560 --> 2:18:01.000 proposed constitutional members you have to discussed on the podcast 2:18:01.200 --> 2:18:04.600 Go sabers ps. Did you have a favorite course from 2:18:04.640 --> 2:18:09.960 your college days? I did. I had all. I would say, 2:18:11.040 --> 2:18:13.640 you're gonna you know, it's gonna be a bit dorking out. 2:18:14.120 --> 2:18:16.840 I loved all my history classes. It didn't matter which is, 2:18:17.160 --> 2:18:18.600 you know, I had a general one. I had an 2:18:18.600 --> 2:18:21.600 at least history that I took. Two different mid least 2:18:21.640 --> 2:18:25.840 history courses I took, but I always say this the 2:18:25.840 --> 2:18:29.080 two courses that I used the most in life, in 2:18:29.120 --> 2:18:32.160 my professional life, after I took an elective on the 2:18:32.200 --> 2:18:35.280 federal budget, which is the type of the type of 2:18:35.280 --> 2:18:37.600 course that only at GW is going to offer. Right 2:18:37.640 --> 2:18:39.840 you're in DC, and it was taught by somebody that 2:18:39.879 --> 2:18:43.400 worked at OMB, and I just it was you know, 2:18:44.800 --> 2:18:47.800 it is certainly benefited me in my ability just simply 2:18:47.840 --> 2:18:50.400 learning how to read a federal budget right when you 2:18:50.440 --> 2:18:52.600 see how you look at it and things like that, 2:18:52.640 --> 2:18:54.600 and how it's done and how the math works. Right, 2:18:54.720 --> 2:18:58.400 the math isn't the rules of math for federal budgets 2:18:58.440 --> 2:19:02.920 don't necessarily follow the general rules of bath. That was 2:19:03.160 --> 2:19:08.520 that was a big one for me as well, but 2:19:08.760 --> 2:19:13.560 as for your So, I I believe in founders intent, right, 2:19:13.879 --> 2:19:16.720 but that doesn't mean you don't modernize with founders intent. 2:19:17.000 --> 2:19:19.880 The seventeenth Amendment is an interesting debate. You know, in 2:19:20.680 --> 2:19:25.240 my class how Washington works that I briefly talked about 2:19:25.280 --> 2:19:28.200 here that I teach part time at USC for for 2:19:28.240 --> 2:19:32.959 the visiting students that have internships in DC. We just 2:19:33.120 --> 2:19:35.879 did our final They just did their final prison. They 2:19:35.920 --> 2:19:38.400 just did their oral presentations on what their final paper 2:19:38.440 --> 2:19:41.600 is going to be on, and one of them is 2:19:41.680 --> 2:19:44.800 for And the whole is what's what's a you know, 2:19:44.800 --> 2:19:47.120 how would you try to make Washington work better? What's 2:19:47.200 --> 2:19:49.600 run reform you would do to make Washington work better? 2:19:52.200 --> 2:19:55.960 And there's one gentleman who picked repealing the seventeenth Amendment 2:19:56.160 --> 2:19:59.640 and about how you know it would and one of 2:19:59.680 --> 2:20:02.040 the best of fits that he believed brought to it 2:20:02.080 --> 2:20:05.680 was that it would actually make state legislative elections more important, 2:20:05.720 --> 2:20:10.920 more people would look into that, more senators would be 2:20:10.959 --> 2:20:15.879 more representative of their states, rather than an ideology. So 2:20:16.440 --> 2:20:23.360 it's an interesting argument on the seventeenth On the seventeenth Amendment, 2:20:27.000 --> 2:20:29.080 we know what the intent, but the intent of the 2:20:29.120 --> 2:20:31.320 Electoral College was to actually be a bit of a 2:20:31.400 --> 2:20:34.280 vetting mechanism in case the public went too far off 2:20:34.360 --> 2:20:38.480 out of the mainstream. And we've let the states essentially 2:20:38.560 --> 2:20:44.039 create what are likely unconstitutional faithless elector laws on that. 2:20:44.120 --> 2:20:48.520 But we've never tested the faithless elector issue in court 2:20:48.840 --> 2:20:52.760 per se. But right now states just bound electors, and 2:20:52.800 --> 2:20:55.039 so they've kind of made the electoral college no longer 2:20:55.040 --> 2:20:58.080 a vetting issue. So I think I am a believer 2:20:58.160 --> 2:21:02.680 in Founder's intent, which means to me, if my amendment 2:21:03.520 --> 2:21:06.360 couldn't easily be defended by something already written in the 2:21:06.360 --> 2:21:11.440 federalist papers, then I might I might be willing no 2:21:11.520 --> 2:21:14.959 longer to defend that addition to the Constitution. And in staid, 2:21:15.080 --> 2:21:17.440 just why don't you just codify this? Look, there's certain 2:21:17.440 --> 2:21:21.359 ideas that should just simply be codified into law by Congress. 2:21:22.120 --> 2:21:24.040 Like I don't think there should be a constitutional amendment 2:21:24.600 --> 2:21:28.360 for reproductive rights. I think that's something that should just 2:21:28.400 --> 2:21:32.400 simply be codified into law, why you know, And it's 2:21:32.480 --> 2:21:35.520 sort of a fear of doing it that now makes 2:21:35.520 --> 2:21:36.600 you think, well, I guess you got to do it 2:21:36.680 --> 2:21:39.000 as a constitutional amendment. And it's perhaps if you make 2:21:39.040 --> 2:21:42.720 a better argument about equal protection that the equal protection 2:21:42.840 --> 2:21:47.440 argument on reproductive rights Trump's the original back and forth 2:21:47.480 --> 2:21:51.920 on Row and Dobbs anyway, but set that aside. But 2:21:51.959 --> 2:21:54.879 I'm sort of it. I take your point here. Like so, 2:21:54.959 --> 2:21:58.560 for instance, I think the nullification of a presidential pardon, 2:21:58.760 --> 2:22:03.960 the way it is framed, this constitutional amendment actually fits 2:22:04.000 --> 2:22:06.879 the vision of the Founders, right. It uses the same 2:22:06.959 --> 2:22:09.840 logic of a supermajority that a that overwriting a veto 2:22:09.879 --> 2:22:13.760 would use it, doesn't you know. It's still it respects 2:22:14.920 --> 2:22:18.039 the idea that a president does have this power. It 2:22:18.200 --> 2:22:22.960 just offers a nullification by Congress if it's if Congress 2:22:23.000 --> 2:22:25.960 deems it so. So I could argue that that, you know, 2:22:26.240 --> 2:22:29.480 But I think that I I where I generally agree 2:22:29.480 --> 2:22:34.720 with you is that proposed constitutional amendments that there should 2:22:34.760 --> 2:22:38.440 already be federalist papers written that already would defend the 2:22:38.480 --> 2:22:41.360 concept even if the amendment hadn't been proposed back then. 2:22:42.160 --> 2:22:44.279 And I could argue in some of these proposed amendments, 2:22:44.320 --> 2:22:53.720 whether it's on whether it's on money campaign money, I 2:22:53.760 --> 2:22:57.080 think they're you know, whether it's on the election of judges. Right, 2:22:57.160 --> 2:23:01.160 there's there's certainly the Founders have made their made their 2:23:02.160 --> 2:23:06.119 They've told us what they meant based on the Federalist papers, 2:23:06.440 --> 2:23:08.600 so I'd sort of think that should be the guidepost, 2:23:10.000 --> 2:23:13.600 all right. Last question it comes from fred a. Hey. 2:23:13.600 --> 2:23:15.760 I've been thinking about Thomas Jefferson's quote that the tree 2:23:15.760 --> 2:23:17.720 of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with 2:23:17.760 --> 2:23:20.080 the blood of patriots and tyrants, and now it's often 2:23:20.160 --> 2:23:22.440 used to justify a more extreme interpretation of the Second 2:23:22.440 --> 2:23:25.560 Amendment parts of the country. That idea still resonates deeply, 2:23:25.920 --> 2:23:27.680 but I wonder if it's something we should be moving 2:23:27.680 --> 2:23:29.760 beyond as a modern democracy. How do you interpret that 2:23:29.840 --> 2:23:33.480 quote today's political context? Best regards freda A. Look, I 2:23:33.520 --> 2:23:38.520 think that that you know, we didn't there wasn't many 2:23:38.600 --> 2:23:43.840 democracies and free societies that even existed when Jefferson said 2:23:43.840 --> 2:23:49.720 that quote, and there were a lot more authoritarian regimes 2:23:49.720 --> 2:23:52.240 we called the monarchies, but they were just that you know, 2:23:52.520 --> 2:23:54.720 you know my attitude on this. I think the monarchies 2:23:54.720 --> 2:23:58.960 are just a just a way to beautify the term dictator. 2:24:00.400 --> 2:24:06.000 And I do think that we you know, one of 2:24:06.000 --> 2:24:08.000 the things and the sort of fits hand in glove 2:24:08.000 --> 2:24:10.880 with the last question. Actually, one of the things that 2:24:11.800 --> 2:24:15.200 we failed to do is understand, you know, what moment 2:24:15.240 --> 2:24:17.480 were they living in at the time. And that's why 2:24:17.560 --> 2:24:19.879 I would emphasize this, what moment was he living in 2:24:19.959 --> 2:24:22.240 at the time, Right, he was living in a moment 2:24:22.280 --> 2:24:25.720 where there was some where you had revolution brewing in France, 2:24:25.760 --> 2:24:27.800 and he certainly had been an ambassador there. He knew 2:24:27.840 --> 2:24:30.400 that there was right we had it brewing, and and 2:24:30.440 --> 2:24:34.080 it already happened in the United States. So there was 2:24:34.120 --> 2:24:39.119 definitely we definitely had you know, you could you could 2:24:39.160 --> 2:24:44.560 feel it. I find it hard to believe that he 2:24:45.040 --> 2:24:49.400 thinks this would apply to our democracy that instead it 2:24:49.440 --> 2:24:53.199 applies if democracy you know that, you know, every once 2:24:53.240 --> 2:24:57.039 in a while, you got to fight for democracy. I 2:24:57.040 --> 2:25:04.840 think that's what it is. But there's no doubt that 2:25:04.959 --> 2:25:11.600 quote gets gets weaponized by those who rationalize or justify 2:25:12.959 --> 2:25:17.959 behavior that is that a mature democracy shouldn't be dealing 2:25:17.959 --> 2:25:25.200 with right that with a steadier instead of leaders. But 2:25:25.320 --> 2:25:34.560 we're not in a stable place right now, and so 2:25:35.080 --> 2:25:38.560 what I think that quote really means is that you 2:25:38.680 --> 2:25:40.640 got to fight for democracy and freedom every once in 2:25:40.680 --> 2:25:43.959 a while, because notice it says the blood of patriots 2:25:43.959 --> 2:25:49.920 and tyrants. Right So, now where what may be subjective 2:25:49.959 --> 2:25:53.840 is one person's patriot is another person's tyrant. It just 2:25:53.879 --> 2:25:56.520 like I've always said, one person's patriot is another person's terrorist. 2:25:58.040 --> 2:26:04.560 Right the British monarchy thought the American those that were 2:26:04.600 --> 2:26:16.000 revolting were terrorists. We call them patriots. So yeah, I 2:26:16.080 --> 2:26:18.600 sort of think that Jefferson is responding to the moment 2:26:18.600 --> 2:26:23.240 he was living in, and then it didn't apply to 2:26:23.360 --> 2:26:26.520 a mature, modern, two hundred and fifty year old democracy 2:26:26.560 --> 2:26:32.320 that we're supposedly celebrating this year. All Right, love the 2:26:32.400 --> 2:26:34.400 Q and A. You guys got made to pop off 2:26:34.400 --> 2:26:36.160 on the environment. I've been waiting to find a way 2:26:36.200 --> 2:26:37.560 to pop off on that, and I think even my 2:26:37.600 --> 2:26:40.200 producer might split that out. You might see that part 2:26:40.200 --> 2:26:44.360 of the Q and A separated out. We rarely rarely 2:26:44.400 --> 2:26:47.840 do that with the ass Chuck segment, but to say 2:26:47.840 --> 2:26:50.240 you touched a nerve as an understating on that way. 2:26:50.320 --> 2:26:51.920 So with that, I'll see you twenty four hours