Speaker 1: You're gonna jump right in step because we're talking. Before
Speaker 1: we went live, I said, I feel like we we
Speaker 1: have to talk about Matt Gains like we can't, can't
Speaker 1: ignore the literal elephant in the room. All right, So
Speaker 1: give me your okay, let me ask you this way,
Speaker 1: and then you go take it the way you want.
Speaker 1: Will Matt Gates serve a day as the attorney general
Speaker 1: in a Donald Trump administration? No? Okay, tell me.
Speaker 2: Why, No, he's not. He's not going to get confirmed.
Speaker 2: And I think that there's a couple of things going
Speaker 2: on right now. So I look at the numbers and
Speaker 2: I actually think this is gonna be a big deal
Speaker 2: in the weeks ahead. Small moral victory, but Donald Trump
Speaker 2: will not wind up with majority support in the electorate.
Speaker 2: It will be a plurality victory. He will drop down,
Speaker 2: I suspect looking at the numbers coming in under that
Speaker 2: fifty percent mark. And so this is and still is
Speaker 2: a closely divided country.
Speaker 1: Yep. So I could go on for a long time about.
Speaker 2: Some of the deficiencies that led to the scene that
Speaker 2: we saw today in the White House with Trump and Biden,
Speaker 2: and we moved in to that, and.
Speaker 1: That's Biden's legacy.
Speaker 2: There it is, And a couple of hours later we
Speaker 2: have Tulca Gabbert, who's as equally unfit to be the
Speaker 2: Director of National Intelligence, joining Pete head Seth, who's as
Speaker 2: equally unfit nominated as Defense Secretary. So the American people
Speaker 2: are fickle. And I just would remind everybody watching the
Speaker 2: approval level for the Iraq War on the day the
Speaker 2: bombing began with seventy seven percent yep, and it doesn't
Speaker 2: end up like this. So experience and suffering are great teachers.
Speaker 2: I would say to everybody, like, we're gonna get into this.
Speaker 2: There is no department that Elon Musk is heading. It
Speaker 2: doesn't exist. Nope, there is no agency. There's no budget,
Speaker 2: there's no statute, there's no authority.
Speaker 1: I mean literally, just like you and I could make
Speaker 1: up it and that would happen.
Speaker 3: You and I could say Chrystmalas and Stever doing the
Speaker 3: you know, the department of whatever substack in YouTube, like
Speaker 3: it has the exact same current authority as the thing
Speaker 3: for Ramswami and Buster are doing.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 2: Trump won the election. Trump controls the Senate, MAGA controls
Speaker 2: the Senate. It's supposed to be a coequal branch of government.
Speaker 2: Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins plus plus plus, And I
Speaker 2: guess my question is what is the line? Because no
Speaker 2: serious person who cares about civil liberties the constitution vote
Speaker 2: for Matt Gays, who was under investigation until literally the
Speaker 2: moment he resigned Congress for illegal drug use, hard drugs, coke,
Speaker 2: sleeping with underage women Attorney General of the United States
Speaker 2: is just unacceptable and it gives you a glimpse into
Speaker 2: the future of what this is gonna be like. And
Speaker 2: literally tomorrow morning is seven hundred and thirteen days until
Speaker 2: the midterm election, which is right. The years are right,
Speaker 2: the years are short, the days are long and gonna
Speaker 2: We're gonna have some long days over the next two
Speaker 2: short years.
Speaker 1: I think. I think my favorite reaction like just so
Speaker 1: people know, like Matt Gates is not for everything. Steve said,
Speaker 1: I'll add one thing. Matt Gates is very I don't know,
Speaker 1: I don't know if reviled this white word, but very
Speaker 1: disliked among Republicans even in Congress. My favorite response was
Speaker 1: Mike Simpson, who's like an old timey Republican. He's from Idoh,
Speaker 1: he's been there. Forever kind of established and guy he said,
Speaker 1: some reporter said, what did you hear that Gates got
Speaker 1: a denomination from Trump? For ag? He said, you gotta
Speaker 1: be shitting me, which is like my favorite, like honest response.
Speaker 1: And I do think I'm stunned that he You know, what,
Speaker 1: were you sur Let me ask you this and then
Speaker 1: we'll move on. Were you surprised when you heard the
Speaker 1: Gates thing or not? I am?
Speaker 2: I have an emotional dissonance that every time one of
Speaker 2: these is revealed, I'm simultaneously shocked yet not surprised. So
Speaker 2: the experience of it sitting and I'm not happy about this.
Speaker 2: Let's just say that my public disposition towards this has
Speaker 2: been worst case scenario for a long time. And so
Speaker 2: there are people that are close to me that, in
Speaker 2: the twenty four to forty eight hours after the election,
Speaker 2: you know, call up and say, I don't think you
Speaker 2: should use the word fascist, which I've used to describe
Speaker 2: and I think is appropriate. You are catastrophizing this, And
Speaker 2: I listen, and I try to be humble, and I
Speaker 2: try to look in the mirror and say, but then
Speaker 2: when he makes disappointment, I know that I am right
Speaker 2: and that everything that I have said is going to
Speaker 2: come to pass, that this will be a catastrophe. You
Speaker 2: have in the form of Tulci Gabbert for those of
Speaker 2: you you know listening may or may not remember her
Speaker 2: trip to Syria to bascharel Assade. Extremely strange. This a
Speaker 2: just a fringe congresswoman. No difference between her and a
Speaker 2: Marjorie Taylor Green, same same person. Uh, this is a deeply,
Speaker 2: deeply unfit person who parrots all the time Vladimir.
Speaker 1: Putin talking points.
Speaker 2: So the she is what is called a useful idiot, right,
Speaker 2: and she's gonna be the director of National Intelligence and
Speaker 2: a nothing nothing of the Fox News loom who's been
Speaker 2: nominated as Defense secretary. And the reality is is the
Speaker 2: is the Senate has to kill all three of these
Speaker 2: these nominees. I mean, if you're a United States senator
Speaker 2: and you give a fuck at all, and I and
Speaker 2: I mean that at all. There's some conversation that takes
Speaker 2: place in Washington, and I'm encouraged, and by encouraged, I
Speaker 2: mean a cintilla of encouragement with John fun because that
Speaker 2: signals that of the three, the Senate was sending a
Speaker 2: message to Maga that we're the United States Senate. We're
Speaker 2: gonna be independent, so I don't know what happens here,
Speaker 2: but but these people right are unfit.
Speaker 1: And by the way, the.
Speaker 2: Senate Democrats have some prerogatives here. They're gonna get the
Speaker 2: FBI reports on these people, They're they're going to vet them,
Speaker 2: they're gonna get to question them.
Speaker 1: And these processes should be brutal.
Speaker 2: And this idea that Trump is going to circumvent the
Speaker 2: Senate confirmation process and collusion, I cannot imagine that it's
Speaker 2: gonna happen.
Speaker 1: But if it does.
Speaker 2: If it does, and Trump is able to assemble the
Speaker 2: most unfit cabinet in American history with a capitulation on
Speaker 2: the part of the US Senate regarding their advice and consent,
Speaker 2: then we're at a place in the country really where
Speaker 2: our democracy.
Speaker 1: Is under a deep threat by action, not just word.
Speaker 2: And at that point we start having questions about civil disobedience,
Speaker 2: about mass protests, or it's all gone in six months
Speaker 2: to a year.
Speaker 1: I think that it's so interesting you mentioned and we're
Speaker 1: gonna move on. It's interesting you mentioned Telsea Gabbert because
Speaker 1: I had a friend in the intelligence world say, after
Speaker 1: the Gate thing, which was right almost simultaneous with the
Speaker 1: Gabbart things, say, look, I know the Gates thing is
Speaker 1: gonna get the most attention, you know, like, I get it,
Speaker 1: but that the Gabbert thing was what he was more
Speaker 1: concerned about because of who she is, in her back
Speaker 1: and the role right and his estimation of the likelihood
Speaker 1: that she would she was more likely to get confirmed
Speaker 1: than Gates, which which I thought was like, I know,
Speaker 1: we focused on Gates. I get why we focus on Gates,
Speaker 1: but I actually think I'm glad you mentioned that because
Speaker 1: I think it's a good point.
Speaker 2: I'm Steve Schmidt. This is the warning, and I invite
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Speaker 2: follow us. Welcome to the community.