Speaker 1: When you're ready to ride Metro, we want you to
Speaker 1: know we're ready for you. Here are just a few
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Speaker 1: extras at Metro. We're doing our part to keep the
Speaker 1: DC area moving. Find out more at Well nota dot
Speaker 1: com slash doing our part. Deborah J. Saunders is the
Speaker 1: White House correspondent for the Las Vegas Review Journal and
Speaker 1: joins us. Hello, Debor, how are you? How are you
Speaker 1: doing good? We're just talking about the Nancy saying impeachment
Speaker 1: not a good idea, and various people are reacting and
Speaker 1: all we're trying to figure out all so earlier, what
Speaker 1: percentage of it was cold hearted political calculation and what
Speaker 1: part of it was being a good American realizing we
Speaker 1: shouldn't just impeach you know, Willie Nelly. All of it
Speaker 1: was cold political calculators. That's what Joe say man Man
Speaker 1: did that land with with with with a with a
Speaker 1: with a bang in in the DC world last night.
Speaker 1: Or we're not people were talking about why did she
Speaker 1: do this, which sort of surprises me because it seems
Speaker 1: pretty clear. For one thing, there's no way that the
Speaker 1: Senate is going to convict Donald Trump if he's impeached.
Speaker 1: That's right, that's right, exactly so. And we've seen this
Speaker 1: movie before with Bill Clinton, and we know what it did.
Speaker 1: It was not the most helpful thing for the Republicans.
Speaker 1: They had to walk around with it for a long time.
Speaker 1: So Nancy Pelosi sees the writing on the wall. She
Speaker 1: knows that she's got some people who really want impeachment
Speaker 1: and she's not going to do too much to rain
Speaker 1: them in. But she's given cover for moderates and she's
Speaker 1: told them, yeah, you know, not a good idea. And
Speaker 1: everyone knows him. Every Democrat knows that the going after
Speaker 1: Donald Trump to impeach him is a mistake. They may
Speaker 1: be doing overplaying the investigation card. I think they are.
Speaker 1: So I think it's a really savvy thing for her
Speaker 1: to say she's a smart. Look at she She didn't
Speaker 1: get where she is and stay where she is by
Speaker 1: being an air head. She's a very smart political operator,
Speaker 1: right right, Yeah, I suppose we could talk about the
Speaker 1: whole um over investigating thing. And if they found out
Speaker 1: if Trump passed passed some bad checks, you know how
Speaker 1: American reacts. I don't think it's gonna be that, but
Speaker 1: it's gonna be the over inflating the value of his
Speaker 1: properties to borrow and then you know, then lying about misleading,
Speaker 1: making statements that aren't accurate about the value for taxes.
Speaker 1: I could yeah, or I could definitely see him getting
Speaker 1: some oddly inflated rents from Russian oligarchs in the nineties,
Speaker 1: that sort of thing. But how does America care? I
Speaker 1: don't know. Oh, he was a New York real estate developer.
Speaker 1: He has problems in his past. I don't think there's
Speaker 1: any question. I think people had a good idea about
Speaker 1: that during the elections. I don't so. I think you
Speaker 1: have to find something new that people didn't know that
Speaker 1: has the material effect on how he governs it or
Speaker 1: how he got there, and that just hasn't happened. So
Speaker 1: we can touch on the budget really quickly. It's a
Speaker 1: political document, right, It's an expression of our priorities. The
Speaker 1: budget the White House just put out. Yes it is.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's I don't even know why they worked
Speaker 1: so hard on it. I don't know why either. I
Speaker 1: think every year when every president puts these out and
Speaker 1: gets way too much attention in the in the belt
Speaker 1: Way crowd. But why is that, Debra? I mean I
Speaker 1: I recently asked someone about that who was in a
Speaker 1: position to know, and it was in the off the
Speaker 1: record session. But I mean it just so let me
Speaker 1: just say, that's something I keep trying to figure out.
Speaker 1: And I guess I guess they're donors like it is.
Speaker 1: That's not an answer I got. That's my what I
Speaker 1: surmise from an answer that I got off the record,
Speaker 1: fair enough. So it's sort of like me announcing once
Speaker 1: a year, you know, if I can do anything I want,
Speaker 1: I would eat all all vegetables and fruits, and I
Speaker 1: would run thirty miles a week, and I get a
Speaker 1: gym membership, and I'd start going to church. Very admirable,
Speaker 1: can you Fancia? And then then nothing ever happens, super okay,
Speaker 1: fair enough. So it's it's like a campaign speech in effect,
Speaker 1: the issuing of the budget. This these are our priorities.
Speaker 1: But they're not even pretending that they care about the
Speaker 1: depthicit anymore. I mean, they're gonna you know that the
Speaker 1: Trump campaign that you can get rid of it in
Speaker 1: eight years, first two budgets, ten years now at fifteen,
Speaker 1: so even the charade is wearing thin. What what amount
Speaker 1: of time there in the White House do they spend
Speaker 1: dealing with the impeachment investigations all that sort of sort
Speaker 1: of stuff versus trying to accomplish some of the things
Speaker 1: you want to accomplish as president. Well, you know, I
Speaker 1: think that the question here is how much does Trump
Speaker 1: spend thinking about it? Because there's a whole room full
Speaker 1: of lawyers who are supposed to handle that, and one
Speaker 1: would like to think that with that happening, that uh,
Speaker 1: the O. M D people can just deal with the
Speaker 1: budget and you know, all the other departments can work
Speaker 1: that way. But we but we have as a president
Speaker 1: who just can't let it go. And that's the problem.
Speaker 1: He'd be watched less TV because the cable news channels,
Speaker 1: you know, are not a reflection of what's actually going
Speaker 1: on in the world. Yeah, right, I mean it to
Speaker 1: Donald Trump. Try you've got better access than us. Debra J. Saunders,
Speaker 1: White House correspondent for the Las Vegas Review Journal. On
Speaker 1: the line, you mentioned in your little notes that there's
Speaker 1: a briefing health or there's going to be what happened.
Speaker 1: There was a briefing yesterday, the first since January. It's
Speaker 1: pretty exciting. Um, I mean there, as you know, there
Speaker 1: used to be a daily briefing. Then it sort of
Speaker 1: whittled down during the mid terms, and uh, the government
Speaker 1: shutdown and basically we get them I don't know once
Speaker 1: every month or two. So, um, it's I got a
Speaker 1: question in yes, what was your question? I'll pretend to
Speaker 1: be Sarah Sanders and answered, you can say I can't
Speaker 1: hear you because I have laryngitis and it was worse yesterday.
Speaker 1: She speak up. Well. I asked her why they put
Speaker 1: funding for to realize in the Yucca Mountain in the
Speaker 1: skinny budget or this they don't call it a skinny
Speaker 1: budget this year, but why they put it in and
Speaker 1: what's the thinking was? That's the nuclear storage facility in Nevada,
Speaker 1: in Nevada. That's where I'm sorry, Thank you for explaining that.
Speaker 1: And that's a big that's a big question for the
Speaker 1: readers of my paper because here and here's I mean,
Speaker 1: so a lot of people think of this as a
Speaker 1: very parochial issue. Um, and that, but what bothers me
Speaker 1: about This issue is that Donald Trump has never really
Speaker 1: gone on the record and said what he really thinks.
Speaker 1: During the campaign in he said, I'll let you know,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna really look into and all that, you know,
Speaker 1: never did then we see it in his budget, right,
Speaker 1: And then he was campaigning and I'll go Nevada for
Speaker 1: Senator Dean Heller who did not win re election the
Speaker 1: Republican and he said, you know, I'm rethinking this whole
Speaker 1: duck a Mountain saying, and now it's back in the budget.
Speaker 1: So to me, it's it's not just an issue about
Speaker 1: Yucca Mountain, is also an issue about the Trump White
Speaker 1: House what it's thinking. M M. Interesting, And he thoughts
Speaker 1: on the Tucker Carlson mess, we're gonna be talking about
Speaker 1: that a little bit later on. Well, so Tucker Carlson
Speaker 1: is somebody Donald Trump loves to watch on table TV.
Speaker 1: And Tucker has irritated not just the left, but he's
Speaker 1: also irritated a lot of sort of the people who
Speaker 1: think through, the big thinkers on the right, the never trumpers.
Speaker 1: And so you've got two different groups who are really
Speaker 1: just ready to pounce on him, and they want they
Speaker 1: want him to go. But I don't you know. I
Speaker 1: conna tell you, the third most watched show on all
Speaker 1: of cable news, so he'd probably bringing in some revenue.
Speaker 1: And you know, some of the stuff he said ten
Speaker 1: years ago I find offensive, But you know, but you
Speaker 1: know what else I find offensive trolling through somebody's record
Speaker 1: for what they said ten years ago. And it didn't
Speaker 1: make a big stink ten years ago when he said it.
Speaker 1: And he worked for MSNBC at the time exactly, which
Speaker 1: is extra delicious, that's right. So then it was okay,
Speaker 1: But now they're going to go after it. I mean,
Speaker 1: it just looks that's the kind of opportunism that I
Speaker 1: think leaves a lot of people cold. Well, and I
Speaker 1: tell you what, my favorite analysis, And I wish I
Speaker 1: could remember who said this, because I like to give
Speaker 1: people credit. But the idea that, well, it doesn't matter
Speaker 1: that it was ten twelve years ago. Well if that
Speaker 1: were the case, then if they caught the governor of
Speaker 1: Virginia in black face today, he would still be the
Speaker 1: governor tomorrow because ten years ago matters there, twenty years
Speaker 1: ago matters the same as right now. No, it doesn't,
Speaker 1: It just doesn't. So there is no statute of limitation onwards.
Speaker 1: That's what they're that's what that's what, That's what these
Speaker 1: folks are saying. And we just know, we just know
Speaker 1: that there it's just so devoid of any principle that
Speaker 1: they don't really mean it. And you're absolutely right. If
Speaker 1: you look at Virginia, if you look at the governor,
Speaker 1: and you look at the attorney general and all of
Speaker 1: this stuff, you can just see that that women and
Speaker 1: black face and certain kinds of words are just issues
Speaker 1: that they used to throw at you, and they don't
Speaker 1: really mean it. White House, correspondent in Las Vegas Review Journal.
Speaker 1: Thanks Devra, good to talk to. Thank you, Thank you.
Speaker 1: When you're ready to ride Metro, we want you to
Speaker 1: know we're ready for you. Here are just a few
Speaker 1: of the people at Metro to tell you how we're
Speaker 1: doing our part to keep riders safe. We're cleaning like
Speaker 1: never before. Half to the great clean. You've found hand
Speaker 1: sund of signs of statist no mask, no Metro need one.
Speaker 1: We have a few extras at Metro. We're doing our
Speaker 1: part to keep the DC area moving. Find out more
Speaker 1: at well mata dot com. Slash doing our part