Speaker 1: Hey, guys, ready or not, twenty twenty four is here
Speaker 1: and we here at breaking points, are already thinking of
Speaker 1: ways we can up our game for this critical election.
Speaker 2: We rely on our premium subs to expand coverage, upgrade
Speaker 2: the studio ad staff give you, guys, the best independent.
Speaker 3: Coverage that is possible.
Speaker 2: If you like what we're all about, it just means
Speaker 2: the absolute world to have your support.
Speaker 3: But enough with that, let's get to the show.
Speaker 2: Good morning, everybody, Happy Thursday. We have an amazing show
Speaker 2: for everybody today. What do we have, Crystal?
Speaker 1: Indeed, we do lots of interesting stories percolating this morning.
Speaker 1: So we have some new very bad poll numbers for
Speaker 1: Joe Biden in a series of swing days.
Speaker 4: We'll break that down for you.
Speaker 1: We also want to cover this big abortion ballot initiative
Speaker 1: that is going to be there for voters in November.
Speaker 1: What impact could that have on a state that was
Speaker 1: not so long ago a swing state but it's pretty
Speaker 1: firmly in the red column now, very interesting potential fallout there.
Speaker 1: We also have some RFK Junior news, a focus group
Speaker 1: of voters showing which voters are favoring RFK Junior.
Speaker 4: What are their common characteristics. That's very interesting.
Speaker 1: We also have a revelation from Tulci Gabbard that she
Speaker 1: was asked to be his VP and turned it down,
Speaker 1: So we'll break all of that down for you.
Speaker 4: Also have a couple of media stories for you. Stephen A.
Speaker 1: Smith sounding off on some recent Hillary Clinton comments that
Speaker 1: our friends over at Counterpoints had covers. Will get you
Speaker 1: the fallout here from Steven A. Smith, who is always
Speaker 1: interesting to listen to and charismatic. We also have a
Speaker 1: former ESPN anchor who is telling all about the dynamics
Speaker 1: of her Biden interview that she did at that network.
Speaker 1: You definitely want to hear that one as well. Major
Speaker 1: fallout after those AID workers were targeted and killed by Israel.
Speaker 1: Joe Biden losing all sorts of folks on this one,
Speaker 1: including the folks over at Morning Joe, his favorite morning
Speaker 1: news program, really sounding off. Reportedly his wife has told
Speaker 1: him he needs to wrap up the war.
Speaker 4: So a lot to get you there.
Speaker 1: Sager is taking a look at McKenzie humiliated on DEI
Speaker 1: and also we have the Teamsters calling for a nationwide
Speaker 1: Mulsen Corps boycott. The Teamster's international president is going to
Speaker 1: be here in studio talking to us about that and
Speaker 1: also about their average to organize Amazon and a number
Speaker 1: of other issues. So very much looking forward to having
Speaker 1: Sean O'Brien back here in the studio.
Speaker 2: I'm excited as well. It's always good to have actual
Speaker 2: union leaders here in the studio. So thank you all
Speaker 2: to people who support our work. That's why we're able
Speaker 2: to do what we do Breakingpoints dot com. If you
Speaker 2: can help us out and continue to build with that.
Speaker 2: Let's get to these poll numbers. So absolutely shocking poll
Speaker 2: numbers for Joe Biden. Let's go and put this up
Speaker 2: there on the screen, very high quality poll out from
Speaker 2: the Wall Street Journal, registered voters in each state that
Speaker 2: was conducted in mid March. Margin evera here keep in
Speaker 2: mind plus or minus four points, but even within that,
Speaker 2: we can see in the state of Arizona we've got
Speaker 2: Trump plus five. In Georgia we've got Trump plus one,
Speaker 2: Michigan Trump plus three, North Carolina Trump plus six, Nevada
Speaker 2: Trump plus four, Pennsylvania Trump plus three, and Wisconsin remains tied.
Speaker 2: So obviously I think we could say that that's not
Speaker 2: exactly looking very good for Joe Biden. And the reason
Speaker 2: why it's particularly noteworthy, he's either in the margin of
Speaker 2: error tied with Trump or Trump is outright leading him
Speaker 2: all in very very critical states. This does not even
Speaker 2: necessarily include the RFK Junior factor. And that is one
Speaker 2: where when we begin to think about the chaos and
Speaker 2: we begin to think about the falling apart of the
Speaker 2: Democratic coalition. On the polls alone, Crystal, we can see
Speaker 2: that there are such major warning signs that we have
Speaker 2: not even that we didn't even see for Biden back
Speaker 2: in the twenty twenty election whenever he was going up
Speaker 2: against Trump and overall, actually, if you dig within it,
Speaker 2: what you see is a crumbling of the Democratic coalition
Speaker 2: at the exact same time that Trump is actually increasing
Speaker 2: his vote margin, both with minorities and with younger voters,
Speaker 2: so headlines both in terms of his overall lead, but
Speaker 2: also in terms of the coalition of people that Trump
Speaker 2: is actually bringing to the table whenever he's voting.
Speaker 1: Keep this up on the screen for another minute, guys,
Speaker 1: because they did do a poll that included the options
Speaker 1: of RFK Junior, undecided or or other. Because you know,
Speaker 1: it's obviously RFK Junior, but you have other third party
Speaker 1: candidates in the race. As well, in particular Jill Stein
Speaker 1: and Cornell West, who are on the left end of
Speaker 1: the spectrum. And when you put RFK Junior in, Trump
Speaker 1: still is outperforming Biden in every state saved for Wisconsin,
Speaker 1: it doesn't change the picture all that much. So the
Speaker 1: reason I want to keep this up on the screen,
Speaker 1: I'll go through what the top line is with RFK Junior,
Speaker 1: undecided and other as a factor. So in Arizona it's
Speaker 1: still plus five Trump. In Georgia it's plus one, it's
Speaker 1: plus three Trump. In Michigan it goes from plus three
Speaker 1: Trump to plus two Trump, so not a big difference there.
Speaker 1: In North Carolina it goes to plus eight Trump right
Speaker 1: now without RFK Junior and those other options, plus six Trump.
Speaker 1: In Nevada it stays at plus four Trump. In Pennsylvania
Speaker 1: it stays at plus three Trump. And in Wisconsin it
Speaker 1: actually does improve the picture a little bit for Biden.
Speaker 1: It becomes a plus three Biden lead, which does get
Speaker 1: into the question of, you know, who does RFK Junior
Speaker 1: take away from more who will be in the ballot
Speaker 1: in which states? You know, these undecided voters, who when
Speaker 1: they're forced to where do they actually land? So there's
Speaker 1: still a lot of fluidity and a lot of question marks.
Speaker 1: But this comes at a particularly bad time for Joe
Speaker 1: Biden because there was a little bit of a hopeful
Speaker 1: trend going on, whereas approval rating looked like it was
Speaker 1: getting a little better, people feel a little bit better
Speaker 1: about the economy. There are a number of national polls
Speaker 1: we cover them here that showed a trend towards Joe Biden.
Speaker 1: But you know, if the national polls are improving but
Speaker 1: the battleground states are still going Trump, well that's the
Speaker 1: ballgame right now.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: There's also been some very critical developments in the state
Speaker 2: of Nebraska, undernoticed actually but now very important. It's going
Speaker 2: to put this up there on the screen so people
Speaker 2: will remember that Nebraska does not have currently a winner
Speaker 2: take all electoral vote system. It's kind of complicated, but
Speaker 2: it effectively meant that Nebraska was President Biden was able
Speaker 2: to capture a single electoral vote from the Nebraska second
Speaker 2: District because of the previous way that they would allocate votes. Well,
Speaker 2: the Nebraska Republican governor is now calling on the state
Speaker 2: to move forward quote with the winner take all system.
Speaker 2: He says it will just simply bring Nebraska into line
Speaker 2: with forty eight of our fellow states. It will better
Speaker 2: reflect the founder's intent. The real intent here, because Nebraska
Speaker 2: and Maine are the only states which have split electoral
Speaker 2: college by electoral by election district, means that the blue district,
Speaker 2: which previously Biden was able to win, in which Democrats
Speaker 2: had normally been able to rely on, you take away
Speaker 2: that single electoral vote. Now, a single electoral vote isn't
Speaker 2: usually something that you should be all up in arms about,
Speaker 2: but it was one that's very critical for some two
Speaker 2: seventy math in a very very tight race for Joe Biden.
Speaker 2: Even those over at MSNBC are now beginning to take notice.
Speaker 3: Let's take a listen.
Speaker 5: Spinner there has thrown his support behind an effort that
Speaker 5: would no longer outate electoral votes by a congressional district
Speaker 5: because right now it's five votes there. Typically Republicans get
Speaker 5: four and President Biden Democrats get the one from Omaha.
Speaker 5: If that changes, and we don't know that it will,
Speaker 5: it's the state legislator is going to look at it.
Speaker 5: But if that changes, that takes away Biden's best path
Speaker 5: to win, because if you get if he wins Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Michigan,
Speaker 5: but loses the other swing states and no longer picks
Speaker 5: up the one in Nebraska two sixty nine that leads
Speaker 5: Playbook this morning.
Speaker 3: The alarm among Democrats that this is possible.
Speaker 6: What do you think?
Speaker 7: I think this is what the modern Republican Party has become.
Speaker 7: They're now changing the rules in the middle, trying to
Speaker 7: benefit themselves. This is the hell that Donald Trump has
Speaker 7: wrought in the middle of this. Changing the rules two
Speaker 7: hundred days before the election is ridiculous.
Speaker 6: I think you're right.
Speaker 7: I think there are real simulation problems when you look
Speaker 7: at the map that one electoral vote really matters in
Speaker 7: the combination of other things. Then you need another state.
Speaker 7: And so the easiest path way to victory has always
Speaker 7: been in the Midwestern three states combined with Nebraska. Something
Speaker 7: tells me they're not going to get away with this easy,
Speaker 7: and there will be a national outcry if they're trying
Speaker 7: to change the rules here.
Speaker 2: Okay, all right, we're they're trying to change the rules
Speaker 2: middle of the game.
Speaker 1: There's going to be a national outcry over the Nebraska
Speaker 1: electoral delegation system.
Speaker 4: First, Kajim Messina, it's.
Speaker 8: Already weird that they do this.
Speaker 3: No, it's it's weird. Can we all admit that? And
Speaker 3: that's why that they're changing the rules here.
Speaker 2: Now obviously, look, I think they're clearly doing it for
Speaker 2: Trump reasons. But regardless, I mean, it's a single electoral vote.
Speaker 2: Why don't you worry a little bit more about maybe
Speaker 2: holding Arizona or Georgia than you do about whatever the
Speaker 2: hell's going on in Nebraska because there's some strange rule
Speaker 2: where you could have gotten that one. But you know,
Speaker 2: the fact is the fact that they're so worried here
Speaker 2: because as he says, quote, the easiest path to victory
Speaker 2: is the Midwestern three combined with Nebraska. Yeah, right now,
Speaker 2: even those Midwestern three is a little bit of a
Speaker 2: question mark there, Crystal, But you know it is a
Speaker 2: smart strategy on the Republican side.
Speaker 1: This is the hell that Donald Father, I mean, this
Speaker 1: is why you can't take these people seriously.
Speaker 4: True election rules.
Speaker 1: Get changed state by state on a regular basis. Now, personally,
Speaker 1: I would like to have an even bigger change and
Speaker 1: get rid of the electoral college altogether, which is a preposterous, outdated,
Speaker 1: ridiculous system in my opinion, And we can just actually
Speaker 1: have everybody's vote count in the same manner, and I
Speaker 1: would wager that Jim Messina would probably support that change
Speaker 1: as well. So is that a hell that Donald Trump
Speaker 1: hath rot changing the election rules, etc. Obviously they're doing
Speaker 1: it for partisan reasons. How about instead of panicking about that,
Speaker 1: you actually try to win an election by offering something
Speaker 1: to the American people. You have an incredibly weak candidate.
Speaker 1: Your opponent is incredibly weak, Donald Trump, He's a criminal.
Speaker 1: People freaking hate this guy. They find him completely toxic.
Speaker 1: His unfavorables are ridiculously high. And yet you're panicked over
Speaker 1: one Electoral College vote because you are lacking in such
Speaker 1: confidence in your own can that you know the very
Speaker 1: best he would be able to do is to once
Speaker 1: again eke ount this very narrow victory like he did
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty. These people are just pathetic, They're just ridiculous.
Speaker 1: And it's very clear what Biden's problems are. I mean,
Speaker 1: number one, the age issue, which I guess you know,
Speaker 1: since they've decided to stick with this guy, there's nothing
Speaker 1: you can really do about that. But number two, it's
Speaker 1: very apparent in the pulling is a massive issue with
Speaker 1: the Democratic base, especially among young people because of the
Speaker 1: Israel policy. So how about you get a little more
Speaker 1: upset about the genocide this guy is enabling that his
Speaker 1: own voters are disgusted by, and we'll have war on
Speaker 1: that specifically later in the show. Versus you know, this
Speaker 1: one electoral college. But they're just ridiculous people. They're just
Speaker 1: utterly ridiculous.
Speaker 3: People, certainly.
Speaker 2: But look from the you know, it's just like every
Speaker 2: data point that we possibly have tells us that this
Speaker 2: is going to be an uphill climb. From the young
Speaker 2: voter piece, the Hispanic voter piece for Trump, the widening
Speaker 2: of his minority vote share, the crumbling of the Democratic
Speaker 2: coalition arefk J. Yes, he does take away from Trump,
Speaker 2: but Trump has made at least enough, you know, inroads
Speaker 2: with new coalitions of voters combined here the electoral college move.
Speaker 2: Republicans seemingly, at least from what I can tell, have
Speaker 2: somewhat embraced mail in voting and some of the other things.
Speaker 2: Now that they've decided that they have to quote steal
Speaker 2: the election to by playing within the existing rules of
Speaker 2: some of these bluer states, you.
Speaker 4: Know what, it just to pause.
Speaker 1: You remember last time around in twenty twenty, all the
Speaker 1: Republican freak out about how Pennsylvania had like and all
Speaker 1: these other states have made it more permissive to have
Speaker 1: mail in balloting because you had COVID, etcetera. I mean,
Speaker 1: what Jim Messina is saying here is very much like
Speaker 1: what they were. How dare you use the legislative process
Speaker 1: in illegal fashion to change the rules?
Speaker 4: Again?
Speaker 1: Listen, if you want to have a federalized election system
Speaker 1: where it comes down from the top, I actually personally
Speaker 1: open to some of that, because I do think there
Speaker 1: should be more of a standardized system. That's not the
Speaker 1: system we have anyway. I just can't get over.
Speaker 3: That's a good point.
Speaker 4: Annoying and irritating.
Speaker 3: His comments are agree with these about it. I mean,
Speaker 3: I don't know.
Speaker 2: I'm not really for total federalization of the elections. I
Speaker 2: like a lot of the state control that we have,
Speaker 2: and I think it actually, in general, it gives more
Speaker 2: trust within the system.
Speaker 3: That's kind of what the original intent is.
Speaker 1: But it'd be I just personally would be in favor
Speaker 1: of more uniformity of rules. It seems sort of preposterous that,
Speaker 1: like you know, in Georgia, the rules are totally different
Speaker 1: than in California, et cetera. But anyway, that's another fight, right.
Speaker 2: And it's like, I mean, for example, I think Oregon
Speaker 2: has all mail in voting. You know, it has for
Speaker 2: a long time actually a very very high voter participation.
Speaker 2: That's something I've always thought about and looked at, and
Speaker 2: at the end of the day, that's actually what I
Speaker 2: care probably the most about. Yeah, let's go and put
Speaker 2: this up there on the screen, though, because this is
Speaker 2: another indication of just where things are moving in the
Speaker 2: overall direction. Currently, the Cook political has moved the Nevada
Speaker 2: Senate race from a lean Democrat to a toss up. Now, obviously,
Speaker 2: why does that matter because they already have three toss
Speaker 2: ups including Ohio, Montana, and Arizona, all seats that they
Speaker 2: have to hold if they want to retain control. Then
Speaker 2: you throw in Nevada, which not a lot of people
Speaker 2: have been paying attention to, but Nevada traditionally, I mean, look,
Speaker 2: Trump never was able to fully compete there, but it's
Speaker 2: been enough on the razor's edge in the past, and
Speaker 2: it's one of those where in a so called red
Speaker 2: waves scenario, you definitely could see a Republican senator from
Speaker 2: the state, and most importantly, it's about the balance of
Speaker 2: power in the overall individual Senate. So just another sign
Speaker 2: I think to me that things are a lot more
Speaker 2: difficult for the Democrats, both at the sub presidential level
Speaker 2: and the presidential level. Really all they can hope for
Speaker 2: is abortion, and don't get me wrong, they will and
Speaker 2: they should bet on that because we're.
Speaker 3: About to talk. But anything else, Crystal want to get into.
Speaker 1: Now, let's just put up this next piece up on
Speaker 1: the screen, which gives a little bit more insight into
Speaker 1: how voters feel about these two presidential candidates, and specifically,
Speaker 1: I think the most important thing to note here is
Speaker 1: the way that Biden has really lost a lot of
Speaker 1: ground on some key metrics with guards to just character
Speaker 1: ratings since the last time you ran in twenty twenty.
Speaker 1: So they asked this question, you know, can they manage
Speaker 1: the government effectively? Back in twenty twenty, a majority fifty
Speaker 1: two percent said yes. Now that has fallen off a
Speaker 1: cliff only thirty nine percent. Is he likable used to
Speaker 1: be sixty six percent. It's still pretty high at fifty
Speaker 1: seven percent, but he has lost significant ground there. Displays
Speaker 1: good judgment in a crisis. He was almost at a
Speaker 1: majority last time, forty nine percent. Now that is down
Speaker 1: at forty percent. Is a strong and decisive leader went
Speaker 1: from forty six to thirty eight. Cares about the needs
Speaker 1: of people like you went from fifty five to forty eight.
Speaker 1: I mean that is like the most core Biden value
Speaker 1: and strength that he has had as a political candidate
Speaker 1: throughout his career, and now not even a majority believes
Speaker 1: that is honest and trustworthy has also fallen from a
Speaker 1: majority at fifty two down to forty six. Just keep
Speaker 1: it up a second so I can talk through the
Speaker 1: Trump numbers as well. It's not like Trump's numbers are
Speaker 1: amazing on these metrics either. The only one that he
Speaker 1: has a majority rating on is a strong and decisive leader.
Speaker 1: But you can see his ratings have held more or
Speaker 1: less steady since twenty twenty. The two metrics where he
Speaker 1: lost a little bit of ground is cares about the
Speaker 1: needs of people like you, Okay, forty five down to
Speaker 1: forty two. And is honest and trustsworthy went from forty
Speaker 1: to thirty five. So a five point loss on that one,
Speaker 1: which is actually significant. But overall, people you know tend
Speaker 1: to think Trump is more of a strong and decisive
Speaker 1: leader than Biden, and people tend to think Biden cares
Speaker 1: more about the needs of people like you than Trump.
Speaker 1: That's always been the dynamic. But I think, Sager, one
Speaker 1: of the things that I really noted is that Biden
Speaker 1: has lost a lot of ground on these things and
Speaker 1: Trump hasn't. Now I that's probably a result of the
Speaker 1: fact that Biden is President of the United States. He's
Speaker 1: in the news every day. People are paying very close attention.
Speaker 1: Trump has been a little bit out of the limelight
Speaker 1: for a while, and I think the fact that his
Speaker 1: ratings on honest, you know, telling the truth basically have
Speaker 1: taken a hit is indicative of the fact that some
Speaker 1: of these trials and court appearances and indictments, etc. Are
Speaker 1: He is taking on some water from that, but it's
Speaker 1: interesting to see the way that they stack up in
Speaker 1: these magics.
Speaker 2: It's still that when he's leading, though in some of
Speaker 2: those critical times. One of the things that you know,
Speaker 2: the managed government effectively. That's actually a very important question.
Speaker 2: Another thing I would posit is this everybody in the
Speaker 2: in the world made up their mind about Trump, Like
Speaker 2: who in this country doesn't have an opinion that is
Speaker 2: well set now of seven years or so. About Trump Biden,
Speaker 2: one of his great strengths was people didn't feel a
Speaker 2: particular way about him all that much. You can project
Speaker 2: whatever you want in the twenty twenty election. Well, now
Speaker 2: he's in the government and people actually do have a
Speaker 2: very negative view of the way that he is running
Speaker 2: the country, whereas with Trump it's so locked in. Biden
Speaker 2: also doesn't have that level of face fervent support of
Speaker 2: people who are right or dies and will never leave him.
Speaker 3: They're very happy to leave him if they do disagree.
Speaker 2: And I think, you know, you combine all these things
Speaker 2: and you could definitely see some strength for Trump there
Speaker 2: in the numbers. But again, don't get me wrong, Like
Speaker 2: you said, the convictions and the criminality, you know, in
Speaker 2: terms of charges and all that, that certainly could be
Speaker 2: a problem.
Speaker 3: We don't know.
Speaker 2: And then finally, abortion, I mean, that's just the blaring
Speaker 2: red sign for the Republicans because it is clearly one
Speaker 2: of those issues that people are very willing even if
Speaker 2: they freaking hate the Democrats on nine out of ten issues,
Speaker 2: if you're with them on one, they are willing to
Speaker 2: overlook it. And we have enough data to prove that
Speaker 2: right now.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, that's a good transition on what's going on
Speaker 1: in Florida.
Speaker 2: There you go, let's put it up there on the screen.
Speaker 2: So this was a major case from the State Supreme Court.
Speaker 2: So they issued a ruling on Monday that will allow
Speaker 2: state voters actually to decide whether to protect abortion and
Speaker 2: also whether to legalize recreational use of marijuana. This rejected
Speaker 2: the state attorney general argument that the measures should be
Speaker 2: kept off of the November ballot. Now, I'll let you
Speaker 2: guess why they want to keep that off of the
Speaker 2: November ballot. The court had not ruled on the merit
Speaker 2: of the measure, only whether they meet the requirement for
Speaker 2: clarity and don't violate the state constitution mandate that they
Speaker 2: cover only one subject. That came when the state actually
Speaker 2: upheld the current legislative ban on most abortions after fifteen
Speaker 2: weeks of presidency, and state lawmakers then tighten that ban
Speaker 2: to six weeks while that issue is still before the court. Monday, however,
Speaker 2: makes it so that this will pave the way for
Speaker 2: the six week ban two definitely go into effect. But
Speaker 2: now to give Florida voters the right and the ability
Speaker 2: to decide, said measure at the state ballot box. So
Speaker 2: I actually cannot think of a worst possible outcome for
Speaker 2: the Republicans in the state because now you have legal weed,
Speaker 2: you have abortion, the most potent political issue of our lifetime,
Speaker 2: and you have a restrictive six week ban go into
Speaker 2: effect crystal in interim between now and election day.
Speaker 3: So fifteen weeks.
Speaker 2: Look, I think a lot of people can stomach fifteen
Speaker 2: weeks the pulling on it to shift. But previously Europe
Speaker 2: and a lot of other countries that's where they are.
Speaker 2: I think that's fine. But six weeks that's a lot
Speaker 2: more restrictive. That's a lot more in line with Alabama,
Speaker 2: Georgia and some of these other states. It's much more
Speaker 2: directional towards that. It's actually very a very very small
Speaker 2: amount of public opinion. You put legal weed on top
Speaker 2: of that, and then you have the restriction come in
Speaker 2: on top of the overwhelming like the ability to come
Speaker 2: to the ballot box and to change your vote and
Speaker 2: to change that policy which you hate. And at the
Speaker 2: same time, why don't you just mark d while you're there.
Speaker 2: I mean, I can't think of a greater gift to
Speaker 2: Joe Biden.
Speaker 1: Very motivating for any sort of Democratic supporters, because you know,
Speaker 1: it was very clear that there is a significant amount
Speaker 1: at stake, and you know, important for them to show
Speaker 1: up and express their opinion on this. I was just
Speaker 1: recalling the numbers from the last election. Trump got fifty
Speaker 1: one point two percent in the state of Florida, Biden
Speaker 1: got forty seven point eight. So it's not like it
Speaker 1: was a total blowout.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 1: It's not like it's preposterous to imagine that Florida could
Speaker 1: go back in the Democratic column. Now, I don't even
Speaker 1: really necessarily want Florida to be a swing state because
Speaker 1: the Cuban politics there have screwed up our relationship and
Speaker 1: our policy views of a Cuba for decades and decades
Speaker 1: at this point. So I'm not even that excited about
Speaker 1: the idea that Florida could come back into being a
Speaker 1: critical swing state. But if anything was going to make
Speaker 1: it possible, it would be this abortion initie. Now, let's
Speaker 1: recall that last time around, there was a ballot initiative
Speaker 1: to lift the minimum wage, and there were some other
Speaker 1: Democratic leaning or left leaning ballot initiatives that passed handily,
Speaker 1: even as Donald Trump won a historic victory in the state.
Speaker 1: So the fact that you have a ballot initiative that
Speaker 1: goes in one direction and voters that go in another
Speaker 1: direction in terms of the party, no one should find
Speaker 1: that crazy idea or put that out of the possibility whatsoever.
Speaker 1: Although I do think the abortion issue there is more
Speaker 1: fervent emotion around that at this point than there was
Speaker 1: like around the minimum wage last time around. And the
Speaker 1: port for the pro choice position on this ballot initiative,
Speaker 1: based on the polling, is massive. The support for legalizing
Speaker 1: weed also quite high. And you know, we've seen the
Speaker 1: way that abortion has shaped not only ballot initiatives, which
Speaker 1: the pro choice position is one in every single state
Speaker 1: where it's been tested, including places like Kentucky, but we've
Speaker 1: also seen the way that abortion and other women's issues
Speaker 1: related to that have completely shifted different you know, state
Speaker 1: legislative districts, congressional districts, et cetera, towards Democrats. So it
Speaker 1: does have a very potent impact even on you know,
Speaker 1: people's choice of candidates outside of specific ballot initiative.
Speaker 2: The pulling on this is genuinely shocking the state of Florida.
Speaker 2: Let's go and put this up there on the screen,
Speaker 2: So it says that over sixty percent of Florida voters
Speaker 2: both support the abortion and marijuana amendments. But actually, when
Speaker 2: you dig into it, it's even more interesting. Sixty two
Speaker 2: percent of voters said that they would vote yes on
Speaker 2: the abortion ballot measure in meaning that they want to
Speaker 2: keep the right to abortion on the.
Speaker 3: In the state.
Speaker 2: But more more than half of Republicans actually in the
Speaker 2: state said that they would vote affirmatively. When you go
Speaker 2: to weed, it's actually roughly the same number, fifty five
Speaker 2: percent of Republicans expressing support and sixty seven percent support overall,
Speaker 2: independent voters splitting dramatically in both of those directions. Sixty
Speaker 2: eight nine percent on the weed issue, fifty eight percent
Speaker 2: on abortion. So you've got independent Republicans and Democrats. You
Speaker 2: got majorities in all three of these coalitions that are
Speaker 2: going to come out in favor. As you said, let's
Speaker 2: be real, the minimum wage position passed with over sixty
Speaker 2: percent last time.
Speaker 3: Trump was still able to win.
Speaker 2: But this time around, if you have Biden tie him
Speaker 2: self to pro choice in a way that neither candidate
Speaker 2: did previously with minimum wage, I do think it will
Speaker 2: have a significant more chain. Now, don't get me wrong,
Speaker 2: I think Trump is probably still going to win the state.
Speaker 2: But yeah, this is just one of those like spending
Speaker 2: money where we shouldn't have to be spending money.
Speaker 1: It makes it at least a little bit interesting exactly
Speaker 1: whereas previously it was not. The state of Flora was
Speaker 1: not interesting at all. One of the things that has
Speaker 1: been extraordinary to watch in the wake of Roe versus
Speaker 1: way being overturned in the Dobb's decision is the way
Speaker 1: that the pro choice position has.
Speaker 4: Become more and more and more popular.
Speaker 1: It's not like people had their pre existing views and
Speaker 1: they just were locked into them and then now it's
Speaker 1: the pro choice side that's just more energized. No, you've
Speaker 1: seen a dramatic public shift towards the pro choice position.
Speaker 4: And also it didn't all happen at once.
Speaker 1: It's continued to trend in that direction when Zago wasnt
Speaker 1: Emily and I actually covered some of the polls with
Speaker 1: regards to that that there's a continual trend towards the
Speaker 1: pro choice direction that has basically shaken loose what was
Speaker 1: a fifty to fifty divide for decades on this issue,
Speaker 1: where it really just depended you know, which side seemed
Speaker 1: to be more extreme at the moment. Now you have
Speaker 1: a very clear majority in favor of the more pro
Speaker 1: choice side, and you have a dwindling minority in a
Speaker 1: very small minority that's in favor of, you know, the
Speaker 1: most extreme positions like a complete national ban or abortion
Speaker 1: being illegal in all or most circumstances. There is a
Speaker 1: very very small minority that supports that position at this point.
Speaker 1: So that's been one of the things that's been extraordinaated
Speaker 1: as well, because I think predobs if you had asked
Speaker 1: Republicans what they thought about about an initiative like this,
Speaker 1: I don't think there's any chance you'd have a majority
Speaker 1: on the pro choice side. So that has been a
Speaker 1: pretty dramatic and honestly a shift that I did not anticipate.
Speaker 4: In the wake of that decision.
Speaker 1: I didn't anticipate that this would be such a central issue,
Speaker 1: driving so many electoral results in basically every state across
Speaker 1: the country. Still now, you know, significant amount of time
Speaker 1: out from that decision, So Republicans, you know, they're in
Speaker 1: a really hard buying here. We've seen the way that
Speaker 1: Trump has tried to navigate it. You know, he's trying
Speaker 1: to shift it back to that rhetoric they used to
Speaker 1: use about Oh well democrats, you know they favor these
Speaker 1: end of late term abortions and you know, even making
Speaker 1: up these scenarios of even after the baby's born, etc.
Speaker 1: But it just doesn't land when the landscape that is
Speaker 1: being fought over right now is on where are the
Speaker 1: restriction is going to lie.
Speaker 4: So in a state like Floria, we have.
Speaker 1: A six week ban actually going into effect, so people
Speaker 1: are going to get to see what that looks like
Speaker 1: and hear the horror stories before they go vote.
Speaker 4: It's pretty potent.
Speaker 3: It's bad. It's bad. Let me just one word of caution.
Speaker 2: Miami Beach, you guys were already you were one of
Speaker 2: the strictest places in the boy in the world in
Speaker 2: America for weed. They actually just put in new measures
Speaker 2: to go against weeds. So I would just I would
Speaker 2: urge the voters of Miami Beach, if you want to
Speaker 2: protect your air.
Speaker 3: Down in that city, you may want to think a
Speaker 3: little bit differently.
Speaker 2: Let's put this last part up on the screen because
Speaker 2: this is another flashing red sign. And look, this is
Speaker 2: the other thing too course, so we shouldn't erase this
Speaker 2: it's actually very possible, I would say, within the realm
Speaker 2: of possibility that.
Speaker 3: Biden could win the state of Florida.
Speaker 2: It went from Trump plus three to then DeSantis plus
Speaker 2: what twenty But that was only two years ago, we
Speaker 2: don't know. And here in front of us we have
Speaker 2: how special election where the Democrats actually flipped a Republican
Speaker 2: Florida House seat in central Florida. On this was just
Speaker 2: what a couple of months ago, So we have to
Speaker 2: be real here. This was January thirtieth, in twenty twenty four.
Speaker 2: Abortion politics, as you just said, has shifted so rapidly
Speaker 2: and wildly that it's actually pretty difficult to really get
Speaker 2: a sense of where things will land. The polls were
Speaker 2: totally off in the Democratic direction on in twenty twenty two.
Speaker 2: Nobody anticipated that Dessanta's blowout. They thought he would win
Speaker 2: by ten. It ended up winning by twenty. Well, then
Speaker 2: in this case too, we shouldn't underestimate that such rapidly
Speaker 2: shifting parts of the coalition as we saw in twenty sixteen,
Speaker 2: so we saw in twenty twenty two, are so difficult
Speaker 2: to pull that you really won't find out till election day.
Speaker 1: Bien's highest approval ratings are among the elderly. True, they
Speaker 1: don't really mind. Large have an issue, which is Israel policy.
Speaker 1: So hey, you never know, guys, you never know. Crazier
Speaker 1: things have certainly happened in our policy.
Speaker 3: There you go, you had no idea.
Speaker 2: All right, let's get to RFK. Junior's some very interesting
Speaker 2: news with the guards to Tulsi Gabbard.
Speaker 3: Let's go ahead and put this up there on the screen.
Speaker 2: Tulsi gave an interview actually to ABC News, or at
Speaker 2: least a statement to ABC News, where she says she
Speaker 2: turned down his offer to be his running mate. Quote
Speaker 2: it didn't work out, so she said in a statement, quote,
Speaker 2: I met with Kennedy several times. We have become good friends.
Speaker 2: He asked if I would be his running mate. After
Speaker 2: careful consideration, I respectfully declined. She declined to explain why
Speaker 2: she turned down the offer, which has not previously been reported. Obviously,
Speaker 2: she was included on the list, and he eventually went
Speaker 2: with Nicole Shanahan.
Speaker 3: He says.
Speaker 2: A person even close to the Kennedy campaign said, quote,
Speaker 2: there were definitely meetings, but it didn't work out.
Speaker 3: She claims.
Speaker 2: We talked to a bunch of people Tulsea's a rock
Speaker 2: star no matter what, all that, but not denying it
Speaker 2: so affirmatively he did ask her.
Speaker 3: I think it was a mistake.
Speaker 2: I'm not sure that this was Look, I understand that
Speaker 2: Nicole Shanahan picked purely from a it takes dollars to
Speaker 2: get on the ballot, so from an actual practical point
Speaker 2: of view, totally get it. But Telsea Gabbard actually was elected,
Speaker 2: and she much more I think. I mean, Look, Nicole
Speaker 2: has not given an interview as of yet from what
Speaker 2: I looked, and by the way, we're asking for it,
Speaker 2: we'd like to have her here on the show, but
Speaker 2: she hasn't. She hasn't been as battle tested. I mean,
Speaker 2: Tulsa's the very least she's run for her office before.
Speaker 2: She's been in the public sphere. She knows how to
Speaker 2: take criticism. You know, she's somebody who look a lover
Speaker 2: hate her whatever she's given interviews, she goes all over
Speaker 2: the place, comfortable, you know, more in the public eye.
Speaker 2: I actually am given the fact that RFK is trying
Speaker 2: to especially capture a lot of the podcast spaces, as
Speaker 2: somebody who's already been all over the podcast space continues
Speaker 2: to go on kind of being alternative media. So I
Speaker 2: think it's actually a blow to the Kennedy campaign for her.
Speaker 2: I don't really get it. I mean, I've seen that
Speaker 2: she's been on the short list for Trump. I just
Speaker 2: have a very hard time believing that. I just think
Speaker 2: he'll ever pick her. I can't see it.
Speaker 1: I agree, Yeah, So, I mean that's the only thing
Speaker 1: I can figure too, is that maybe she's holding out
Speaker 1: hope that she ends up being Trump's VP, and so
Speaker 1: she thinks she's got a better horse in Trump than
Speaker 1: inn R K Junior.
Speaker 2: No way that I do would pick her. It would
Speaker 2: piss off so many parts of the republic coalition. I mean, look,
Speaker 2: outside of the online people don't even know who she is.
Speaker 2: Those would be like, oh, she's a former Bernie Democrat.
Speaker 2: I'm not saying that she is, but I'm saying, like,
Speaker 2: that's what the attack would be. It's just a lot
Speaker 2: easier and safer for Trump to pick at least Dephonic,
Speaker 2: Tim Scott or jd Vance, depending on what misside christinom
Speaker 2: any of these people traditional box check.
Speaker 3: You know, it's just about being safe. Everything is about
Speaker 3: Trump anyway.
Speaker 1: It feels like the hyper online Yeah, pick or like
Speaker 1: there's a hyper online pick. But yeah, do I actually
Speaker 1: think Trump has really any serious interest in Aaron No.
Speaker 4: I don't think it's very skeptical of that.
Speaker 1: With regards to RFK Junior and a potential Tulsi ticket,
Speaker 1: you know, obviously both of them are like former Democrats.
Speaker 1: Both of them have way higher approval ratings at this
Speaker 1: point with Republicans than Democrats. I think if you put
Speaker 1: Tulsi on the ticket, you are locking yourself more into
Speaker 1: an exclusively like former Trump conservative Republican right wing base.
Speaker 1: Nicole Shanahan is a blank slate. You know, She's got
Speaker 1: more liberal positions in terms of the causes she's funded
Speaker 1: in the past and things she said and supporting Pee
Speaker 1: Boota jij and whatever. So it keeps the ticket a
Speaker 1: little bit more plausibly neutral. So in that way, I
Speaker 1: actually think it might be a better thing. I think
Speaker 1: actually Biden should have hoped that he would pick someone
Speaker 1: like Tulci, who clearly codeses you know, right wings. She's
Speaker 1: filling in on Fox and they love her at this point,
Speaker 1: so I think that would have made it more clear
Speaker 1: that the RFK ticket was going to take more from
Speaker 1: the Trump column. I still actually think it is going
Speaker 1: to take more from the Trump column because I just
Speaker 1: continue to look at the approval writings. Actually that Wall
Speaker 1: Street Journal Battleground state pole that we showed, even though
Speaker 1: once you add in RFK Junior and the other candidates
Speaker 1: and undecided, Trump actually picks up a little bit of
Speaker 1: ground in all the states. When you just look at
Speaker 1: the RFK Junior support, it actually did in that poll
Speaker 1: hurt Trump more than it hurt Biden. It's not overwhelming,
Speaker 1: but it was a little bit of an edge for
Speaker 1: Joe Biden. So given where his approval ratings are with Democrats,
Speaker 1: which are really in the toilet, and you have a
Speaker 1: majority of Republicans who personally like and you know, have
Speaker 1: an approval high approval for RFK Junior, I still think
Speaker 1: at the end of the day, it probably is more
Speaker 1: of a problem for Trump than it is for Biden.
Speaker 4: But the Nicole Shanahan.
Speaker 1: Pick makes it a little less clear cut than if
Speaker 1: he had picked like a Tulsi Gabbard or someone else
Speaker 1: who really codes his right wing.
Speaker 2: At this point, that's not a bad point. I still
Speaker 2: thinks I wish you picked Jesse Ventura would be.
Speaker 1: That would have been a crazy guy was right.
Speaker 2: I love that guy because he's all over the place
Speaker 2: and he's he's a og if you are anti.
Speaker 4: But Jesse is.
Speaker 1: Such a big person he can't be in anyone's number two.
Speaker 1: He's such a big personality. Having interviewed him and he
Speaker 1: just takes over. Let me tell you, I love him.
Speaker 1: I love him such a character.
Speaker 2: I was reading nine to eleven conspiracy theory books in
Speaker 2: college station in my mid teens because of jesseve Internal.
Speaker 1: I also feel like I kind of doubt that Jesse
Speaker 1: and RFK Junior in the same place with regard to
Speaker 1: Israel and Palestine, So that would be hard hard for
Speaker 1: me to imagine, but I haven't. I haven't seen him
Speaker 1: way in there specifically Jesse Ventura, but I would. I
Speaker 1: would imagine that that would be a major rub. And
Speaker 1: we know that's been a rub for you know, some
Speaker 1: previous RFK Junior campaign staffers who were with him when
Speaker 1: he was you know, against the Ukraine War and wanting
Speaker 1: to stop funding there and thought he was like, oh,
Speaker 1: this is an anti war candidate. And then suddenly October
Speaker 1: seventh happens and he's on the total opposite end of
Speaker 1: the anti war positioning for that, and that was very
Speaker 1: disillusioning for a number of his staffers who left and
Speaker 1: who explained that was the reason that they left, and
Speaker 1: also for a number of previous supporters who had been
Speaker 1: interested in him genuinely occupying that anti war space, and
Speaker 1: you know, saw that as diametrically opposed to the way
Speaker 1: he positioned himself in the Israel.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So the last time that he's made the news in
Speaker 2: the last six days is he has now joined forces
Speaker 2: with a local ban Creed to launch his own brand
Speaker 2: of THC edibles.
Speaker 3: So it looks like God bless, it appears God bless.
Speaker 3: I don't. I don't support the product, but I will
Speaker 3: always support you, Jesse.
Speaker 1: There was one more interesting piece on this RFK Junior.
Speaker 1: There was Washington Post talk to a number of RFK
Speaker 1: Junior supporters. We can put this up on the screen.
Speaker 1: This is yeah b three. So they talked to a
Speaker 1: number of people who have said, you know, they're all
Speaker 1: in for RFK Junior, and they were kind of all
Speaker 1: over the political spectrum. The one thing they had in common,
Speaker 1: unsurprisingly is they all hate Biden and Trump, which you
Speaker 1: know is a pretty common sentiment out there in America
Speaker 1: and I think speaks to the wisdom of like the
Speaker 1: Super Bowl ad that he ran and the general attempt,
Speaker 1: like what we've been saying is probably his strongest lane
Speaker 1: is to try to be as vague and neutral as
Speaker 1: possible and just be a vessel for as many people
Speaker 1: as possible who just hate both of these candidates and
Speaker 1: you know, want some one else and aren't too concerned
Speaker 1: about all of the details.
Speaker 3: So according to his campaign, here's what he's got so far.
Speaker 2: He's got New Hampshire, Hawaii, Nevada, North Carolina.
Speaker 3: They say they're on track for a few others.
Speaker 1: But are those places do they specify there that he
Speaker 1: has actually made the ballot, or where he's collected enough signature.
Speaker 3: Which is he's only made the ballot in once.
Speaker 4: In Utah, right, yeah, right, And that's not.
Speaker 3: Going to matter.
Speaker 2: Unfortunately, everywhere else actually will matter, and when he actually
Speaker 2: does get that ballot access, that's going to be the
Speaker 2: big thing. But I mean that is where, you know,
Speaker 2: maybe I'm coming back to Nicole Shanahan. She's got a
Speaker 2: ton of money. She's been given meal. I think she's
Speaker 2: got a billion dollars or something like that, twenty five
Speaker 2: to fifty million that'll probably get you on the ballot
Speaker 2: in a decent number of states, that'll buy you the
Speaker 2: operation that you need. And if we can just project
Speaker 2: whatever we want onto the Kennedy Shanahan ticket, then you're
Speaker 2: going to ride at least somewhere to a decent percentage
Speaker 2: of the vote in this And at the end of
Speaker 2: the day, I mean, you know, everyone keeps talking about
Speaker 2: the spoilerism and all of that. I just he's got
Speaker 2: he's at this point has had enough, you know, on
Speaker 2: the record statements against Trump, on the record statements abou
Speaker 2: how he doesn't like others on the record statements and
Speaker 2: you know, always and not necessarily wanting to slip into
Speaker 2: a lane where he would drop out in order to
Speaker 2: help Trump, even if you do see polling and he
Speaker 2: said previously he's f Trump. You know, I think it
Speaker 2: was in the theom of Bonn interview and all that,
Speaker 2: because the Democrats really do, at least from what I've
Speaker 2: seen the DNC, they really have this conspiracy theory that
Speaker 2: you know, he is one hundred percent a spoiler back ticket.
Speaker 2: I just I don't see that in the data, and
Speaker 2: I definitely don't see it in some of the voters yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean I don't really either. Now, I think it's
Speaker 1: possible that some of the people who are donating to
Speaker 1: that's different, right, but that's not like they may have
Speaker 1: that in mind. I certainly think that's that's possible himself.
Speaker 1: I don't really see that either. And if you were
Speaker 1: going to design someone who was going to be a
Speaker 1: spoiler for Biden, I don't think you'd pick RFK Junior
Speaker 1: at this point, because, like I said, it's really not
Speaker 1: clear to me that he's going to take more from
Speaker 1: Biden than from Trump. In fact, again, at this point,
Speaker 1: even in spite of the Kennedy name and the past positioning, whatever,
Speaker 1: I do think at the end of the day, his
Speaker 1: upprov writings are just so much higher with Republicans that
Speaker 1: it seems like more of a threat to Trump.
Speaker 4: So if that's the plan, you.
Speaker 1: Know, I also think if that's the plan, you wouldn't
Speaker 1: be asking Tulci Gabbard to be on your ticket, right,
Speaker 1: you would be going immediately to someone who had more
Speaker 1: sort of liberal or lefty cred to try to win
Speaker 1: over Biden voters. If that was really the whole play
Speaker 1: is just to serve as a spoiler. So, like I said,
Speaker 1: I'm not saying there aren't people who are supporting him
Speaker 1: who have that agenda in mind, but I don't think
Speaker 1: it's the wisest course if that's ultimately your goal. Really, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's much more clear. For example, that Cornell Wester jill
Speaker 1: Stein absolutely would cut into his piece of the pie.
Speaker 1: So if you're just looking to you know, move things
Speaker 1: around nefariously, I think you would put more effort into
Speaker 1: that end of the ticket.
Speaker 4: But I don't know.
Speaker 1: I know, like I said to me, with him personally,
Speaker 1: it doesn't add up that that's the whole goal of
Speaker 1: what he's doing. So you know, ultimately, these Biden and Trump,
Speaker 1: they got to make their case to the American people
Speaker 1: and actually win. And you can't cry about RFK Junior
Speaker 1: exercising his right to participate in the democracy. And you
Speaker 1: can't cry about people who hate both of you and
Speaker 1: really want other options considering the other options that are
Speaker 1: available to them.
Speaker 2: You know, I hadn't even considered the lame duck argument
Speaker 2: that he makes there, and I was like, you know,
Speaker 2: that's not a bad point in terms of if you
Speaker 2: want actual new leadership. You know, you have four year
Speaker 2: tenures on both of these candidates. It actually is a
Speaker 2: pretty good one if you think in terms of really
Speaker 2: wanting something new, and it gets to some of the
Speaker 2: doom what exists me.
Speaker 4: Remember Ronda Santis was trying to make that argument about it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, he was, Yeah, and he was working. I didn't
Speaker 3: hit with that primary. It's a very different render.
Speaker 4: I don't know.
Speaker 1: I think that if anything, the fact that we would
Speaker 1: only be you know, tortured with one war Biden or
Speaker 1: one war Trump administration is probably a plus for voters,
Speaker 1: not like, oh darn, I wish we could have him
Speaker 1: for eight years.
Speaker 4: That's such a shame.
Speaker 1: I don't think anyone out there is really feel that way.
Speaker 1: So have some interesting new comments from former ESPN anchor
Speaker 1: Sage Steal with regard to her previous interview at that
Speaker 1: network with President Joe Biden mistake.
Speaker 4: Listen what she has to.
Speaker 9: Say here as we get set for a wonderful day
Speaker 9: in sports, opening day for America's national pastime. This was
Speaker 9: about two months after he took office. That was an
Speaker 9: interesting experience in its own right because it was so
Speaker 9: structured and I was told, you will say every word
Speaker 9: that we write out, you will not deviate from the script,
Speaker 9: and go to the word like every single question was scripted,
Speaker 9: gone over dozens of times by many executives, editors and executives. Absolutely,
Speaker 9: I was on script and was told not to deviate
Speaker 9: because it was very much this is what you will ask,
Speaker 9: this is how you will say it, no follow ups,
Speaker 9: no follow ups. Next, I knew that this was a
Speaker 9: lot bigger than just the wonderful editors that I worked with.
Speaker 9: This went up to the fourth floor, as we said,
Speaker 9: that where all the bosses, the top executives, the decision
Speaker 9: makers are the president of our company.
Speaker 1: So very interesting there, saga. I'm curious what you make
Speaker 1: of her comments. Now, listen, she's not a Joe Biden fan,
Speaker 1: so perhaps you know there's some motivation behind what she's
Speaker 1: saying here.
Speaker 4: But it also kind of attracts.
Speaker 1: I mean, we know how careful they have been about
Speaker 1: who and where they give Joe Biden interviews. Jomini almost
Speaker 1: never does an actual like mainstream interview where he could
Speaker 1: be asked those follow ups, and it's just a bunch
Speaker 1: series of scripted, pre written softball questions.
Speaker 4: We can put this up on the screen.
Speaker 1: This is something that Azraclient actually pointed out back when
Speaker 1: he had his moment of being like, maybe we should
Speaker 1: get rid of Joe Biden before watching the State of
Speaker 1: the Union and having all of his fears to put
Speaker 1: to rest in deciding no, actually, Joe Biden is a
Speaker 1: great savior of America. But the next piece up on
Speaker 1: the screen, he says, Biden's on fewer interviews than any
Speaker 1: recent president. It's not close by this point in their
Speaker 1: presidency's Barack Obama given more than four hundred interviews, Trumpet
Speaker 1: given more than three hundred. Biden has given fewer than
Speaker 1: one hundred, and a bunch of them are softball interviews.
Speaker 1: He'll go on Conan o'briden's podcast or Jay Shetty's Mindfulness podcast.
Speaker 1: The Biden team says this is a strategy they need
Speaker 1: a political voters, the ones who are not listening to
Speaker 1: political media. But one, this strategy is not working. Biden
Speaker 1: is down, not up. And two, no one really buys
Speaker 1: this argument. I don't buy this argument. This isn't a
Speaker 1: strategy chosen from a full universe of options. This is
Speaker 1: a strategic adaptation to Biden's perceived limits as a candidate.
Speaker 1: And what's worse, it may be a wise one. And
Speaker 1: that trend of course, has continued of him doing you
Speaker 1: know these exclusively softball interview.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and Sage actually just gave an interview recently to
Speaker 2: Adam Carolla, I think to clarify this, and she says, actually,
Speaker 2: the worst part for me is I wasn't even allowed
Speaker 2: to ask a follow up question.
Speaker 3: And look, I.
Speaker 2: Don't know, you know, whether she's telling the truth or not.
Speaker 2: What I do know is it's been over twenty four
Speaker 2: hours and ESPN has not denied any of this. So
Speaker 2: I mean, if you real as a journalistic organization, a
Speaker 2: charge as big as this, you know even you know
Speaker 2: I've interviewed Trump. If somebody came out, no matter how small,
Speaker 2: and said and claimed that my interviews or something were scripted,
Speaker 2: that would be immediately I'd be like, that is absolute bullshit.
Speaker 2: I have the tape. You can come and listen to
Speaker 2: it anytime you want. You can come and sit with me.
Speaker 2: We'll go through it and I'll show you exactly how
Speaker 2: I prepped it, the follow ups, etc. They haven't said that.
Speaker 2: And this is a major news organization. So look, clearly
Speaker 2: this lady has an act to grind. Right, She's been
Speaker 2: all over the podcast scene, and that she's starting her
Speaker 2: own thing, and that's fine. People have a right and
Speaker 2: the ability to do that. This is a serious charge.
Speaker 2: She accused them of scripting her interview. The other thing is,
Speaker 2: and why I believe it's scripted, is at the very
Speaker 2: top there, as you saw when she was like America's
Speaker 2: pastime or something.
Speaker 3: People don't talk that way.
Speaker 2: People don't talk that way, period, and especially you and I,
Speaker 2: we can smell when people are reading off a prompter
Speaker 2: or not. I was watching a Hot Ones interview, for example,
Speaker 2: not exactly a journalistic organization, but just give me an example.
Speaker 2: It was the wing show that we covered previously. Was
Speaker 2: the interview with somebody, and the host was like, tell
Speaker 2: me about this experience that you in high school. Whenever
Speaker 2: I'm told you were, I was like, people don't talk
Speaker 2: this way. You're literally reading clearly off of a Q card.
Speaker 2: And for me the moment, even that small snippet, it
Speaker 2: was obvious that that was a scripted question.
Speaker 1: I also think it's kind of embarrassing for her though,
Speaker 1: that you accept those terms.
Speaker 3: Point.
Speaker 4: I wouldn't.
Speaker 3: I would never do that.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't, and you know, I'm perfectly willing to admit
Speaker 1: my human frailties, and you know, we're all subject to
Speaker 1: like the incentives set of systems around and so I'm
Speaker 1: not saying it wouldn't be a big deal for her
Speaker 1: to have pushed back on that, But there's no way
Speaker 1: I would just accept that and.
Speaker 4: Then go out there and read their little script.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Really, chance that's a good point, not a chance.
Speaker 4: That's humiliating.
Speaker 1: And you know, for her to admit it, like I
Speaker 1: would be, I would be embarrassed to admit that I
Speaker 1: just like was a good little girl and you know,
Speaker 1: did the thing that I was told to do and
Speaker 1: ask no follow ups and do their little softball interview.
Speaker 1: We have the president of the United States there. I mean, look,
Speaker 1: I get it. You're not a political reporter. You're not
Speaker 1: a political journalist, but you did see yourself as a journalist,
Speaker 1: and you have the most powerful person that entire world there,
Speaker 1: and you're just going to stay in your lane and
Speaker 1: you know, do the thing they told you to do.
Speaker 1: I don't know, I personally I would be embarrassed about that.
Speaker 1: But obviously the more important story is if this is
Speaker 1: actually true about aus pan Infe's the question, Okay, well,
Speaker 1: was their coordination with the Biden team on what those
Speaker 1: questions were. Is this the sort of thing that's happening
Speaker 1: at other quote unquote news organizations when they are getting
Speaker 1: Biden interviews on the very rare occasions that they do,
Speaker 1: are there some stipulations about where the conversation can go,
Speaker 1: what type of questions can be asked or is it
Speaker 1: and which is more typical and frankly extraordinarily common where
Speaker 1: these networks Because they want to preserve their access, they
Speaker 1: know what sort of questions they're allowed to ask, and
Speaker 1: what sort of questions, what sort of follow ups, how
Speaker 1: aggressive they can be, and their pushback in their follow
Speaker 1: ups because they don't want to lose access to the
Speaker 1: President of the United States or his team, or his
Speaker 1: advisors or top Democrats, et cetera. That's the way the
Speaker 1: game is usually played. It's not usually so explicit as like, no,
Speaker 1: these are the scripted questions that you're going to ask,
Speaker 1: but hey, it does. It does bag a lot more
Speaker 1: questions about the overall Biden media strategy and specifically about
Speaker 1: ESPN and how they handle this particular interview.
Speaker 2: I will also say Sage did have a very weird
Speaker 2: incident where she appeared to confuse Joe Rogan with Dana
Speaker 2: White and called him Joe like twice. And by the way,
Speaker 2: all this was also caught on camera, which makes it
Speaker 2: more insane. She claimed that she just got their names
Speaker 2: mixed up, but you should go watch the clip.
Speaker 3: For yourself, because that's it that did.
Speaker 2: That is the only thing that stuck in my mind
Speaker 2: is that because this is such an incident, recent incident,
Speaker 2: I was like, well, I don't know if this is
Speaker 2: the most trustworthy person, because that was actually legitimately crazy
Speaker 2: confusing the two of those even if you aren't all
Speaker 2: that familiar, like they don't look exactly all the same,
Speaker 2: and they're so famous in their own right.
Speaker 3: So I just wanted to put that out.
Speaker 1: There, all these white guys look the same sock.
Speaker 3: That's a whole other conference.
Speaker 1: All right, Let's get to some additional interesting comments that
Speaker 1: we wanted to cover for you here, which is Stephen A.
Speaker 1: Smith sounding off on CNN about Hillary Clinton's recent comments
Speaker 1: Ryan and not only played them for you, but just
Speaker 1: as a reminder, just so snide and condescending and filled
Speaker 1: with contempt towards undecided voters, telling them to get over
Speaker 1: it when it comes to their dissatisfaction with Joe Biden
Speaker 1: typical Hillary Clinton's stuff.
Speaker 4: Of course, Stephen A.
Speaker 1: Smith had some real choice words for her though, lastigalism.
Speaker 10: I don't think it was a very wise statement on
Speaker 10: her part. How did that work out fore her in
Speaker 10: twenty sixteen. I think that's something that we have to
Speaker 10: recognize here. She won the popular vote, but at the
Speaker 10: end of the day, she wasn't the president of the
Speaker 10: United States.
Speaker 6: It was him.
Speaker 10: You can look at her not campaigning in Wisconsin in
Speaker 10: the last days, not campaigning in Pennsylvania in the last days.
Speaker 10: You can look at some of the stuff that they
Speaker 10: were saying about her that sort of distracted things from
Speaker 10: where it should have been in terms of Comby and
Speaker 10: his report from the FBI. You can bring up a
Speaker 10: whole bunch of things, but at the end of the day,
Speaker 10: the last thing you need to do is to do
Speaker 10: anything that could agitate potential voter in this particular election.
Speaker 3: What do you make about the actual argument that she's making.
Speaker 11: I mean, she's basically saying two old people, yes, yes,
Speaker 11: but there's substantively different.
Speaker 6: I mean absolutely one.
Speaker 10: Nobody's brought that up more than me, for you know,
Speaker 10: fore indictment's ninety one counts, impeached twice. I'm not voting
Speaker 10: for him. I've said that to a lot of people.
Speaker 10: I've said that to you. But at the end of
Speaker 10: the day, what I'm saying is is that at some
Speaker 10: point in time, you got to take into account what.
Speaker 6: The voter's thinking about. The voters.
Speaker 10: A lot of them out there, tens of millions of
Speaker 10: them out there, by the way, don't care what he's
Speaker 10: going through right now. They don't care about his guilt
Speaker 10: or innocence, his perceived guilt or innocence. They don't care
Speaker 10: about the ninety one counts. They're thinking about their lives.
Speaker 10: And a lot of times we see politicians taking the
Speaker 10: positions that they're taking, and why we can respect their
Speaker 10: candidate and their honesty, they do seem a bit detached
Speaker 10: that time from what the voters are actually feeling and
Speaker 10: what the voters are actually thinking. Nobody wants to hear
Speaker 10: that from Hillary rod and Clinton at this particular moment
Speaker 10: in time, because especially if you Joe Biden, what are
Speaker 10: you really really worried about right now? You're worried about
Speaker 10: folks coming to the polls. You're worried about them showing
Speaker 10: up to the polls to vote for you. You're not
Speaker 10: worried even about them voting for Trump. You're worried about
Speaker 10: them not showing up to vote for you. That doesn't
Speaker 10: exactly encourage them to get up out of their seat.
Speaker 2: So how did this man have better political analysis than
Speaker 2: every other pundit that's currently on sere? Where did this
Speaker 2: come from? I love it too when he's like, I mean,
Speaker 2: clearly he's a partisan. He's like, I don't like Trump,
Speaker 2: criminal charges, all this stuff, But the wisdom of calling
Speaker 2: out Hillary also clearly showing the wisdom of people not
Speaker 2: wanting to show up to vote. I just think it
Speaker 2: just confirms to me that if you're outside of the system,
Speaker 2: you have even somewhat of a brain.
Speaker 3: It's so obvious what all the problems here are.
Speaker 9: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I love when he's like, nobody wants to hear that's
Speaker 1: rosy at this point, absolue God, When is she going
Speaker 1: to end the grievance to tour? Like everything from her
Speaker 1: comes from this place of like, you know, cope and
Speaker 1: bitterness and trying to cast blame on anyone other than
Speaker 1: herself for her dramatic failure in twenty six. I mean,
Speaker 1: she is the most proximate reason that Donald Trump was
Speaker 1: ever president of the United States, and somehow she's still
Speaker 1: held up and applauded as some great, wonderful savior. And
Speaker 1: when you know, wise stage of the Democratic Party, give
Speaker 1: me a break. So his basic point here, it's actually
Speaker 1: so heartening to hear it articulate in this blunt way
Speaker 1: of like, why are you sneering and condescending at these
Speaker 1: voters who wish they had other choices than Biden and Trump?
Speaker 1: Why don't you get busy actually trying to appeal to
Speaker 1: them and actually listening to their concerns instead of lecturing
Speaker 1: to them about how they should feel about the situation.
Speaker 4: So listen, Stephen A. Smith is not some.
Speaker 1: Like leftist Bernie bro He really prides himself on being
Speaker 1: this kind of middle of the road guy.
Speaker 4: He's got a friendship with Sean Hannity.
Speaker 1: They go back and for you know, he's not like,
Speaker 1: you know, some lefty, lefty kind of a fella. So
Speaker 1: for him to have that just like normy instinct of
Speaker 1: what are you talking about and who do you think
Speaker 1: you're winning over with this?
Speaker 4: Is it's nice to see.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was enjoyably agree. I also liked Stephen. Our
Speaker 2: producers informed me he is a fellow traveler in the
Speaker 2: anti weed movement and for else saying stay off the weeds.
Speaker 3: So Stephen, we appreciate you. Love brotherhood. There's very very.
Speaker 1: Few I vicariously consume a lot of Stephen A.
Speaker 4: Smith content because Kyle.
Speaker 1: Loves this fan. He watches everything he puts out. We
Speaker 1: listened to his thoughts on Diddy last night.
Speaker 3: Was what did he say?
Speaker 1: You know, he's very careful on that, fun, very careful
Speaker 1: on this. It was kind of interesting is and he
Speaker 1: kept brazing the point of like, was it really necessary
Speaker 1: to have all this force and you know, this big
Speaker 1: show before the helicopters and the boats and everything compromised.
Speaker 1: So he was clearly he's trying to be a little careful,
Speaker 1: a little more diplomatic than normally.
Speaker 4: Stephen A. Smith is very un I was kind of surprised.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but I don't know.
Speaker 1: I watched the whole Jason Whitlock back and forth again
Speaker 1: vicariously through Cox.
Speaker 4: I appreciate that in.
Speaker 2: A political context, I truly do not understand the appeal
Speaker 2: of watching grown men yell at each other sports and
Speaker 2: having like full on major disagreements about like who's bad
Speaker 2: and who's I'm just like, this is psychotic.
Speaker 3: I'm sorry.
Speaker 2: But at the same time, you know, if you're going
Speaker 2: to live, and that's gonna make your whole personality and
Speaker 2: that's the thing that you care most about.
Speaker 3: I guess I could see the entertainment value. I get it.
Speaker 4: I used to.
Speaker 1: I mean I used to be a really big sports fan.
Speaker 1: I watched you know, pardon interruption and all this stuff,
Speaker 1: so and I was really into it. So I totally
Speaker 1: get the appeal. It's not that different from the appeal
Speaker 1: that people get in like the political horse race. It's
Speaker 1: kind of a similar similar energy. But his podcast it's
Speaker 1: wide ranging. I mean he interviews presidential cannons and all
Speaker 1: kinds of different cultural figures and whatever wass in on
Speaker 1: things like you know, Diddy and Joe Biden and whatever
Speaker 1: else you can imagine. So anyway, he's the thing that's
Speaker 1: extraordinary about him is politically he's not where I am
Speaker 1: at all. But he's so talented of a communicator that
Speaker 1: you just want to listen to him anyway. And he's
Speaker 1: so charming that even when he says something that coming
Speaker 1: from someone else would really irritate me or piss me off.
Speaker 3: I'm like, eh, fair enough.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so anyway, sign of a talented communicator.
Speaker 3: I say, we go.
Speaker 1: Massive fallout over Israel striking three times that humanitarian aid
Speaker 1: convoy of you know, international aid workers trying to feed
Speaker 1: starving gosens. We've got the reaction now from the Biden
Speaker 1: White House. Let's put this up on the screen. Here
Speaker 1: is from Politico. They say Biden's not changing the Israel
Speaker 1: policy after deadly strike on aid workers. Some of the
Speaker 1: senior officials think that is a blatantly and horrific and
Speaker 1: stupid mistake. The tweet that they sent out of this article,
Speaker 1: the headline they put with it was quote angry Biden
Speaker 1: not changing Israel policy, which really kind of sums everything up.
Speaker 1: He pretends like he's mad. Maybe he really is mad.
Speaker 4: I don't know.
Speaker 1: But what does it matter if you're not going to
Speaker 1: change the policy at all, because that's the message that
Speaker 1: Israel gets, like, oh, we just killed seven aid workers
Speaker 1: for jose Andrece, who's this famous, you know, worldwide known
Speaker 1: liberal chef who's very close with any people in the
Speaker 1: Biden administration. And even that we can get away with
Speaker 1: and there's zero change in terms of policy. You know,
Speaker 1: this comes at a time where there's just a report
Speaker 1: that officials from the US Agency for International Development warned
Speaker 1: that the enclave was now already experiencing famine. They say,
Speaker 1: the level of hunger is unprecedented in modern history. So
Speaker 1: now you have all of these aid organizations that have
Speaker 1: suspended work in the Gaza strip because they cannot keep
Speaker 1: their workers safe. So huge consequences for you know, this
Speaker 1: territory that is now where people are starving to death.
Speaker 1: And you have some quotes here from within the administration,
Speaker 1: you say, they say in the article, President Joe Biden
Speaker 1: was privately enraged by the deadly strike and in a
Speaker 1: public statement upgrade at Israel for calling for accountability to
Speaker 1: those responsible, demanding more humanitarian assistants be allowed into Gaza.
Speaker 1: But two senior administration officials say that that is as
Speaker 1: far as he in the White House will go for now.
Speaker 1: They go on to say this has caused some fishers
Speaker 1: within the administration. It's just rinse and repeat with the Israelis.
Speaker 1: The American political system can't or won't draw real line
Speaker 1: with them, and that is regrettable. According to a senior
Speaker 1: US official. So Sager, same old Samuel from Joe Biden. Oh,
Speaker 1: he's upset, he's angry, he's gonna have a difficult conversation
Speaker 1: with BBNT Yahoo.
Speaker 4: But that's it.
Speaker 1: No actual change to policy, which is the only thing
Speaker 1: that matters.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the entire thing is actually insane because what we
Speaker 2: are watching is the even previous Israel supporters, people like
Speaker 2: Richard Haas, like Mourning Joe, all these other people, even
Speaker 2: they are sounding off. I will say, I mean personally,
Speaker 2: just like annoyed at the idea that these people look,
Speaker 2: these aid workers. I have nothing against him, but for
Speaker 2: some reason they're held up as like more human than
Speaker 2: everybody else who has died. I think that's we will
Speaker 2: get to that, and we will get to that. But
Speaker 2: I think it's that is just the point to me
Speaker 2: where I'm like, okay, guys, like you know, all human
Speaker 2: beings are are equal. And I don't know why thie
Speaker 2: level democratic donor liberal darling staff is enough to ignite
Speaker 2: in international right.
Speaker 1: No, No, I do know, because they and this actually,
Speaker 1: can you guys put up which number is this in
Speaker 1: this block?
Speaker 7: Nine?
Speaker 4: It's the very last this twelve?
Speaker 1: Yeah, put up the twelfth element here because this is
Speaker 1: from this Aaron David Miller interview in The New Yorker
Speaker 1: with Isaac Chattner, who's famous for these sort of like
Speaker 1: tough interviews. And I'm going to read a little bit
Speaker 1: more than what is up here on the screen, because
Speaker 1: this gets to exactly your point, Soccer, two hundred AID
Speaker 1: workers had already been murdered before these seven individuals, not
Speaker 1: to mention tens of thousands of Gossen's. So why is
Speaker 1: there a different reaction here? Why wasn't this upset and concern,
Speaker 1: you know, the moment that there were so many innocent
Speaker 1: civilians being killed. Okay, so before we get to this quote,
Speaker 1: they say, you're Chattner says, you're saying you have no
Speaker 1: investment in one analysis or another. I could be wrong,
Speaker 1: but when I was listening to you talk, and this
Speaker 1: is Aaron David Miller, who's this former State Department official
Speaker 1: and wise by Beltway Foreign Affairs Morning Joe type of guy,
Speaker 1: and you discuss the words of October seventh, I sense
Speaker 1: an emotion in your voice that I haven't heard at
Speaker 1: any other time in this conversation. I don't want to
Speaker 1: criticize that, but I do wonder if the people make
Speaker 1: policy in America don't have that same emotion when it
Speaker 1: comes to Palestinian lives. Do you think that's fair? Aaron
Speaker 1: David Miller says, I think it's fair to say, yes,
Speaker 1: that American Americans have a pro Israeli sensibility. I don't
Speaker 1: think there's any question about that. Clinton wrote in his
Speaker 1: memoir he loved Yitzak Rabin as he loved no man
Speaker 1: rarely loved any other man, which is extraordinary. I watched
Speaker 1: Clinton grieve in the wake of Raben's murder, and when
Speaker 1: Biden gave the speech on October tenth, you watch the
Speaker 1: tears well up in his eyes.
Speaker 4: He talked about the black hole of loss.
Speaker 1: He's conflated the tragedies in his own personal life with
Speaker 1: what Israeli's felt on that day, and then we come
Speaker 1: to this quote. Yes, that's very moving, Chatner says, but
Speaker 1: there is another kind of loss going on now, which
Speaker 1: he apparently can't conflate with his own experience, to which
Speaker 1: Aaron David Miller replies, Oh, if you're asking me, do
Speaker 1: I think that Joe Biden has the same depth of
Speaker 1: feeling and empathy for the Palestinians of Gaza as he
Speaker 1: does for the Israelis. No, he does it, nor does.
Speaker 4: He convey it.
Speaker 1: I don't think there is any doubt about that. And
Speaker 1: that's what it comes down to. That's true for Joe Biden.
Speaker 1: The Israelis are human, he relates to them, he sees
Speaker 1: his own life in them. Palestinians they're not. There's no
Speaker 1: I mean, there's no other conclusion you can come to.
Speaker 1: So it took having aid workers, including an American, who
Speaker 1: are affiliated with an organization run by a man that
Speaker 1: he knows who's an actual human being to him. It
Speaker 1: took them being killed before he really seems to have
Speaker 1: any sense of the humanity and the loss that's being
Speaker 1: experienced here. So I actually think that's a very key
Speaker 1: point soccer, because listen, I'm glad to see that they're
Speaker 1: upset about these individuals being killed. But you do have
Speaker 1: to ask yourself, you know where was this upset so
Speaker 1: much earlier on? When you see children starving to death,
Speaker 1: That doesn't, you know, elicit your sympathy. That doesn't hit
Speaker 1: in the same way it's it's but this is this
Speaker 1: is what.
Speaker 4: It comes down to.
Speaker 1: I really think those comments are so revealing and so
Speaker 1: accurate as to the dynamic.
Speaker 4: That's going on here.
Speaker 3: Oh, I totally agree.
Speaker 1: But as you were mentioning, Biden has lost all kinds
Speaker 1: of resistance liberals at this point with regards to his
Speaker 1: Israel policy. And perhaps most implematic of that was a
Speaker 1: segment on Morning Joe with Elise Jordan, who is a
Speaker 1: former Conda Lisa Rice staffer and worked at the NSC,
Speaker 1: and she went off with regards to Biden's lack of
Speaker 1: policy reaction to the killing of these AID workers.
Speaker 4: Let's take a listen to that.
Speaker 5: This has been bubbling up from behind the scenes for
Speaker 5: a while. President by Franklin is furious at Prime Minister
Speaker 5: den Yahoo, but yet still his administration has not conditioned
Speaker 5: sale weapons sales conditioned AID. They haven't done it yet. Now,
Speaker 5: maybe this is the moment that comes. This also happens
Speaker 5: just we think a week or two perhaps before this
Speaker 5: RAFA offensive, which really could be a flashpoint.
Speaker 11: Okay, I'm so sick of hearing how upset President Biden is.
Speaker 8: The butt stops with him.
Speaker 11: If he wants to stop arm cells, if he wants
Speaker 11: to stop the bombs that are indiscriminately killing civilians.
Speaker 8: He can, he has the power.
Speaker 11: We don't need him going and his aids, going to
Speaker 11: reporters and talking all background about how upset they are.
Speaker 11: What happened yesterday is still going to happen. When at
Speaker 11: Miika's conference, the head of the Palestinian Red Crescent spoke
Speaker 11: and she was incredibly moving this.
Speaker 8: It was an Abu Dhabi and she spoke.
Speaker 11: About the difficulty of aid getting in the country period
Speaker 11: from the north or south, and she's described a process
Speaker 11: that was kind of like the TSA, changing the rules
Speaker 11: every single day going through airport security. Until those checkpoints
Speaker 11: are working and aid is going through, we don't need
Speaker 11: to be giving any more armsaled their money. It needs
Speaker 11: to stop. It needs to be conditional. It's ridiculous that
Speaker 11: it's going on unchecked and unfettered, and we're sitting around
Speaker 11: and talking how upset we are while we hembrhage billions
Speaker 11: of dollars.
Speaker 5: It's the worst of all worlds right now for the president.
Speaker 12: The criticism looks increasingly empty.
Speaker 4: So there you go.
Speaker 1: Morning Joe very importedly Joe Biden's favorite morning show program
Speaker 1: turning on him and I mean Alis Jordan quite aggressive.
Speaker 1: They're are saying no more military aid. This is ridiculous.
Speaker 1: I'm sick of hearing about how upset they are. They
Speaker 1: need to actually do something, So that was quite striking.
Speaker 1: We also had Barck revied, who is a reporter from Axios.
Speaker 1: It has actually been I think one of the favored
Speaker 1: reporters of administration in terms of the information that they've
Speaker 1: given him throughout this conflict. He also previously served in
Speaker 1: the IDF, so that we ken not some big lefty
Speaker 1: out there, but with some pretty striking comments made actually
Speaker 1: multiple appearance on CNN, but this was with Anderson Cooper.
Speaker 1: Take a listen to what he had to say about
Speaker 1: the approach of the Israelis.
Speaker 8: It is clear to everybody that what happened with this
Speaker 8: strike was a serious violation of the idea of protocols
Speaker 8: and rules of engagement. Okay, to call it a misidentification
Speaker 8: or a mistake, you know, that's the understatement of the century.
Speaker 6: Okay.
Speaker 8: And this is not an isolated incident. The reason that
Speaker 8: we talk about it here is because it's WCK. It's
Speaker 8: a very well known and famous NGO. But those incidents
Speaker 8: happen every few days in Goz. There is a disconnect
Speaker 8: between how the IDF senior brass is looking at this
Speaker 8: and how it develops the rules of engagement and the orders,
Speaker 8: and what happens when those percolate down to the forces
Speaker 8: in Goz especially to the field commanders, the lieutenant colonels,
Speaker 8: the colonels, the brigade commanders, the battalion commanders. They're not
Speaker 8: in the same place as the senior commands.
Speaker 13: But do you say they're not in the same place
Speaker 13: both literally, they're in Gaza, they're not in headquarters, and
Speaker 13: they're also the ones fighting, and they have a different
Speaker 13: attitude about let's just get this done.
Speaker 8: I think they're they each commander on the ground has
Speaker 8: a different interpretation of the orders. And this is why
Speaker 8: you see what you see. And this is not a disaster.
Speaker 8: This is a recipe for a disaster, not only in Gaza,
Speaker 8: but for the destruction of a professional military. Okay, this
Speaker 8: is not how professional military conducts its operations. Three Israeli
Speaker 8: hostages that manage to escape their captors were killed by
Speaker 8: Israeli soldiers who fired at them even though they were
Speaker 8: holding a white flag. Okay, And you know, I spoke
Speaker 8: to an Israeli reserve officer who was in the same
Speaker 8: unit of those soldiers who shot those hostages. And remember
Speaker 8: him telling me that the orders are basically from the
Speaker 8: commanders on the ground is just shoot every man in fighting.
Speaker 1: Age, shoot every man in fighting age. He also, I mean,
Speaker 1: he makes a number of comments there that are quite striking.
Speaker 1: He says to call this a mistake or a misidentification
Speaker 1: understatement of the century, says, this is not an isolated incident.
Speaker 1: We're paying attention now, as Saga is pointing out, because
Speaker 1: of who Jose Andreas is and so it's joked this
Speaker 1: international outrage, but he points out this is happening in
Speaker 1: Gaza all the time, and also dovetail Saga with reporting
Speaker 1: from Haretz you recently about how the Israeli military is
Speaker 1: basically identified these quote unquote kill zones, where anyone who
Speaker 1: enters these areas they just assume as a militant and
Speaker 1: they kill them, and they stack them up on their.
Speaker 4: Account of supposed militants killed.
Speaker 1: So when they say, oh, we've killed nine thousand Hamas terrorists,
Speaker 1: that includes any military age man that happened to get
Speaker 1: in their way or anyone who happened to wander into
Speaker 1: these kill zones, they count them as terrorist. So really
Speaker 1: important comments there from Barack Ravine. And again the fact
Speaker 1: that even someone like him, who really tried to be,
Speaker 1: you know, a neutral reporter and who has had a
Speaker 1: direct line to administration in many instances, that he's saying
Speaker 1: these sorts of things is pretty extraordinary.
Speaker 3: Of course.
Speaker 2: And he has more insight really than any of us.
Speaker 2: He does some of the best reporting, just like pure
Speaker 2: info both from the Israeli side and the White House side.
Speaker 2: He's got like a direct line to the NSC.
Speaker 3: Seemingly.
Speaker 2: Just last night, jose Andres actually spoke about this incident
Speaker 2: and accused the Israeli government of directly actually targeting his workers.
Speaker 3: Here's what he had to say.
Speaker 14: But I know is that we were targeted deliberately, not
Speaker 14: a stuff until everybody was dead in this convoy. This
Speaker 14: happened over more than one point five one point eight
Speaker 14: y dometer, So this was not use bad luck situation
Speaker 14: where oops, we dropped the bomb in the wrong place
Speaker 14: or no. This was over one point five one point
Speaker 14: in eight kilometers with a very defined humanitarian convoy that
Speaker 14: had signs in the top, in the roof. That cannot
Speaker 14: be the role of an army. That cannot be the
Speaker 14: role of an army that has hundreds of drones above
Speaker 14: Gaza in any single moment. Humanitarians and civilians should never
Speaker 14: be paying the consequences of war. This is a basic
Speaker 14: principle of humanity. At the time, this looks like it's
Speaker 14: not a war against Rism anymore. Seems this is a
Speaker 14: war against humanity itself.
Speaker 2: Very extraordinary comments there for him to say something like
Speaker 2: that on top of the op ed that he was
Speaker 2: written Crystal, But it look, I do think this will
Speaker 2: be a change in US policy or be a big change,
Speaker 2: but we have just a return to Look, we've been
Speaker 2: covering this stuff day in and day out, and it's like,
Speaker 2: if it's really this is what it takes. I mean,
Speaker 2: look at a certain point, I do, of course care
Speaker 2: that an American citizen here was killed. But it's like
Speaker 2: all of this, the patterns that people have been able
Speaker 2: to observe now for almost six months. Yeah, it's like
Speaker 2: April fourth, so we're coming up on the six month
Speaker 2: anniversary of October seventh. That's been present for several several months,
Speaker 2: you know, for a lot of people. But you know,
Speaker 2: if anything, you know, if that's what it takes to break.
Speaker 1: It, So be it well, and what jose Andres is
Speaker 1: speaking there too is really the obvious and ultimately unavoidable
Speaker 1: conclusion that they were directly and intentionally targeted.
Speaker 4: When you look at.
Speaker 1: The facts, three cars, three separate drone strikes, the cars
Speaker 1: clearly marked, the cars in a deconfliction zone, the cars
Speaker 1: having coordinated directly with the IDF. We're leaving our warehouse
Speaker 1: now where our food is stored, we are traveling up
Speaker 1: this road, and still they are hit, not once, not twice,
Speaker 1: but three times. The first car that is struck, the
Speaker 1: other two cars stop, and the survivors of that strike
Speaker 1: get into one of the other cars and continue down
Speaker 1: the road.
Speaker 4: Then they hit again, and once again.
Speaker 1: The third car stops and the remaining survivors the third car,
Speaker 1: and then they hit that third car. And you expect
Speaker 1: us to believe this was misidentification and complex circumstances. Anyone
Speaker 1: with half a brain can see that is total and
Speaker 1: complete bullshit. And by the way, the story that's coming
Speaker 1: out from the IDF, you know, is told to Haretz
Speaker 1: and others, has already been changing. You know, originally there
Speaker 1: was a supposed someone who was armed.
Speaker 4: That was at the warehouse.
Speaker 1: Well, yeah, you're in a war zone. First of all,
Speaker 1: the fact that there's someone with a gun doesn't make
Speaker 1: them harmas when you're trying to escort an AID convoy.
Speaker 1: Second of all, is it really justified for that's your
Speaker 1: your rules of engagement is even if this was some
Speaker 1: Hamas person who was in this convoy at some point,
Speaker 1: that gives you license to murder everyone in this convoy.
Speaker 1: So that was disgusting and preposterous to start with. And
Speaker 1: now we're getting into like, oh well, it was confusing,
Speaker 1: and it was complex, and it was a mistake and
Speaker 1: it was accident, and as jose andres Here himself is saying,
Speaker 1: that just does not hold water whatsoever. By the way,
Speaker 1: it's not just people like him or the folks on
Speaker 1: Morning Joe or a Barack Revied who are sounding notes
Speaker 1: like that.
Speaker 4: Put this up on the screen.
Speaker 1: There's a report that from Al Jazeera that UK's Rishi
Speaker 1: Studina Prime Minister has informed Netanyahu that the UK is
Speaker 1: now considering declaring that Israel has been violating international law.
Speaker 1: So the UK getting way ahead of our administration in
Speaker 1: terms of actually acknowledging what is at this point I
Speaker 1: think undeniable reality based on the facts that we've all
Speaker 1: been witnessing now for months at this point, and I
Speaker 1: also don't want to lose sight of you know, the
Speaker 1: American citizen who was killed here, and Biden previously said,
Speaker 1: you know, when American is hard or injured or killed,
Speaker 1: we will respond to put this up on the screen.
Speaker 1: This is Jacob Flickinger. He was the US Canadian citizen
Speaker 1: who was killed by the IDF while he's delivering food
Speaker 1: aid in Gaza. He was a retired Master corporal, served
Speaker 1: eleven years in the Canadian Army, including a tour in Afghanistan.
Speaker 1: He was a father and he was the sole provider
Speaker 1: to a one year old baby boy. So you know,
Speaker 1: a real loss to him, to that child, to you know,
Speaker 1: his family, his loved ones.
Speaker 4: Our hearts go out to them.
Speaker 1: And let me put this next piece up on the screen,
Speaker 1: because this speaks to the shifting stories that we've heard
Speaker 1: at this point from the IDF. The latest report from Haretz,
Speaker 1: as explained here by a great journalist Dumi reader, is
Speaker 1: that the bombing of the convoy was not a communication,
Speaker 1: as have commanders and units in the field ignoring instructions
Speaker 1: and disobeying orders, not for the first time. One, an
Speaker 1: IDF intelligence source says the general staff know exactly why
Speaker 1: World Central Kitchen was bombed because in the Strip everyone
Speaker 1: does whatever they like. It's unclear whether the commanders asked
Speaker 1: for more senior officers permission to target the they were
Speaker 1: meant to be doing for standing orders. Same sources dismissed
Speaker 1: the line taken by the Chief of Staff Hertzy Halevi
Speaker 1: and Defense Minister yo Of Galant, who suggested the bombing
Speaker 1: was the result of coordination issues. Quote this has nothing
Speaker 1: to do with coordination. They can set up another twenty
Speaker 1: coordination hubs. But if someone doesn't put an end to
Speaker 1: how some forces in the Strip have been operating, we'll
Speaker 1: see this happen time and time again.
Speaker 4: End quote.
Speaker 1: One of the perplexing things perhaps here at Sagar is,
Speaker 1: you know, Israel has very aggressively, you know, sought to
Speaker 1: undermine the UNRA, which was the primary aid organization on
Speaker 1: the ground. The US has all you know, completely gone
Speaker 1: along with that, by the way, and so they also
Speaker 1: have been trying to do a propaganda effort to deny
Speaker 1: what has been you know, made clear by the photos
Speaker 1: and images coming out of the Gaza Strip and also
Speaker 1: by the analysis of aid organizations on the ground that
Speaker 1: the people of Gaza are starving, they're starving to death.
Speaker 4: And it's because of Israeli policy. So interesting.
Speaker 1: They've actually been using World Central Kitchen as like a
Speaker 1: propaganda point to that, Look we're working, we don't need UNRA.
Speaker 1: We've got these guys. Look they're feeding people, et cetera.
Speaker 1: And World Central Kitchen was genuinely doing fantastic work and
Speaker 1: was important. They were not a replacement for UNRA. Obviously
Speaker 1: it is wildly inadequate for the amount of need. But
Speaker 1: that was part of what was so wild about this
Speaker 1: targeting and this killing was the fact that these rallies
Speaker 1: were actually propping them up. Is this like propaganda piece?
Speaker 1: So you know, on the one hand, this report that oh,
Speaker 1: it's just because of these like rogue units on the
Speaker 1: ground seems to be a bit of a blame shifting
Speaker 1: and ignoring the fact that you know, you've had two
Speaker 1: hundred AID workers killed and it's clearly these reelies, certainly
Speaker 1: at the very least, don't care. And you've had this
Speaker 1: targeting of the entire civilian population through the policy of
Speaker 1: siege and you know, destroying civilian infrastructure destroying the healthcare system,
Speaker 1: et cetera. But in the same respect, you know, it
Speaker 1: seems it's it's pretty wild that they went ahead and
Speaker 1: murdered the AID workers with the organization that they have
Speaker 1: themselves been propping up as an alternative done right, and they.
Speaker 2: Have offered no alternative explanation to why anything like that
Speaker 2: even happened. Final and important piece here, let's put this
Speaker 2: up there on the screen. Haretz actually issued an editorial
Speaker 2: saying that the war must end in Gaza now. They
Speaker 2: say the incident in which seven people were killed, among
Speaker 2: them various citizens were killed in Israeli attack cannot end
Speaker 2: with a comprehensive and transparent investigation as was promised what
Speaker 2: it happens, and that we will do everything that's so
Speaker 2: called not to happen again, it is not sufficient. They
Speaker 2: say that the an end to the war is the
Speaker 2: only possible way.
Speaker 3: To move forward.
Speaker 2: I think that's where people like Barak Ravid and any others,
Speaker 2: you know, people who are supportive of Israel are seeing
Speaker 2: is they're like, hey, you know, our nation is not
Speaker 2: going to recover from something like this for a long time.
Speaker 2: You know, in terms of international legitimacy, is basically scrambled
Speaker 2: the board in a way that very least has not
Speaker 2: happened since the nineteen seventies, and it took a long
Speaker 2: time for Israel to climate itself out of that. Obviously,
Speaker 2: a lot of stuff has changed, so I do think
Speaker 2: that those will be very significant. And definitely watching the UK,
Speaker 2: the European Union knew some news coming out that Spain
Speaker 2: and the EU intend to officially recognize a Palestinian state
Speaker 2: sometime in the next few months. That too could actually
Speaker 2: significantly change things up and change relationships with Israel as well,
Speaker 2: So we'll see it's going to be interesting.
Speaker 1: Let's talk a little about a little more of the
Speaker 1: political fallout for Joe Biden. So really, in recent years
Speaker 1: there's been a tradition at the White House of hosting
Speaker 1: Ramadan if Tar dinner inviting prominent Muslim Americans to that dinner. Well,
Speaker 1: this year that if Tar dinner had to be canceled
Speaker 1: because no one was willing to show up.
Speaker 4: Let's put this up on the screen.
Speaker 1: This says White if Tar canceled after many Muslims decline invite.
Speaker 1: And if you read the article, they say that several
Speaker 1: Muslim Americans declined to go and protests of Joe Biden's
Speaker 1: support for Israel's war on Gaza.
Speaker 4: The sources who spoke to al Jazeer on.
Speaker 1: Condition of anonymity in this reporting is backed up by
Speaker 1: Washing Post and other outlets as well. So the cancelation
Speaker 1: on Tuesday came after those Muslim community members warned leaders
Speaker 1: against attending the White House meal. Quote the American Muslim
Speaker 1: community said very early on, it would be completely unacceptable
Speaker 1: for us to break bread with the very same White
Speaker 1: House that is enabling Israeli government to starve and slaughter
Speaker 1: the palaestinating people in Gaza.
Speaker 4: Both CNN and NPR.
Speaker 1: Had previously reported the White House was preparing a community
Speaker 1: if Tar, so they had planned to do this and
Speaker 1: had to back out of it when they couldn't get
Speaker 1: anyone outside of their own staffers to attend. Hours later
Speaker 1: on Tuesday, the White House announced instead it would be
Speaker 1: hosting a meal from Muslim government staffers and holding a
Speaker 1: separate meeting with a few Muslim American community figures.
Speaker 4: Apparently, that meeting that was held did not.
Speaker 1: Go particularly well, based on the reports of those who
Speaker 1: participated in the meeting. Here is one doctor who said
Speaker 1: that he was forced to walk out of the meeting
Speaker 1: because he was so disgusted with the Biden administration.
Speaker 4: Let's listen to his explanation.
Speaker 15: You know, we had shown up to this meeting really
Speaker 15: concerned about what was taking place in the Gaza strip,
Speaker 15: and I'm glad that you mentioned that we were insisting
Speaker 15: that there not be any food. There made no sense
Speaker 15: for us to sort of break bread while talking about
Speaker 15: a famine taking place. We had shown up in the
Speaker 15: President and the Vice President, the National Security Advisor in
Speaker 15: the room, and it was very brief comments by the
Speaker 15: President saying he wants to hear from us, and he
Speaker 15: wants to listen to us. And so I spoke first,
Speaker 15: and I let him know that I am from a
Speaker 15: community that's reeling. We are grieving, and our heart is
Speaker 15: broken for what's been taking place over the last six months,
Speaker 15: and that the rhetoric that has been coming out of
Speaker 15: the Biden administration that's been coming out of the White House,
Speaker 15: it's frustrated a lot of people, especially people who are
Speaker 15: Palestinian Americans, Muslim Americans, aut of Americans. We are not
Speaker 15: satisfied with what has taken place. There has been no
Speaker 15: concrete steps, but keep in mind We're very concerned about
Speaker 15: the people that are over in the Gaza strip, that
Speaker 15: are in Palestine right now, who are not just starving,
Speaker 15: but are facing the threat of allumining a off invasion.
Speaker 15: And so I was able to share that with the
Speaker 15: President and let him know that out of respect for
Speaker 15: my community, out of respect for all of the people
Speaker 15: who have suffered and who have been killed in the process,
Speaker 15: I need to walk out of the meeting, and I
Speaker 15: want to walk out with decision makers and let them
Speaker 15: know what it feels like for somebody to say something
Speaker 15: and then walk away from them and not hear them
Speaker 15: out and not hear their response.
Speaker 3: Wow. I mean, how did President Biden respond to that?
Speaker 15: You know, there wasn't a lot of response. He actually
Speaker 15: said that he understood, and I walked away.
Speaker 1: So pretty extraordinary for that to be that interview to
Speaker 1: be occurring on CNN. Also NBC News at additional reporting
Speaker 1: of some of the commentary from inside of meeting, other
Speaker 1: indications this did not go particularly well. Another doctor can
Speaker 1: put this up on the screen. Who attended was taken
Speaker 1: aback when she showed Biden Prince of photos of malnourished
Speaker 1: children and women in Gaza to which Biden responded he
Speaker 1: had seen those images before. The only problem, the doctor
Speaker 1: said was that she had printed those photos from her
Speaker 1: own iPhone, so there was no way he could have
Speaker 1: seen those photos before, Soger, which speaks both to the
Speaker 1: fact that you know, to him, all the starving gosins
Speaker 1: that he'd say I was all the same, and it
Speaker 1: also speaks to like an age befuddlement issue as well,
Speaker 1: So you got a double whammy there. But I think
Speaker 1: it speaks to what we were discussing earlier, which is
Speaker 1: just you know, to him, Israeli's are full human beings
Speaker 1: that he has full empathy for, and Palestinians are not.
Speaker 1: And you know, the only reason he's at this height
Speaker 1: of anger but still not changing his policy, by the way,
Speaker 1: right now, is because he has a personal connection to
Speaker 1: Jose Andres. But all of these images of starving children,
Speaker 1: children who are buried under rubble, you know, body parts
Speaker 1: drewn about a hospital.
Speaker 4: Courtyard, none of this is really landing for him.
Speaker 1: It's not really impacting him, certainly not in the way
Speaker 1: that the atrocities committing committed on October seventh did. And
Speaker 1: there was one other interesting piece of reporting that I
Speaker 1: just saw this morning from this meeting, which is, according
Speaker 1: to what Joe Biden said inside of this meeting, his
Speaker 1: own wife has begged him to stop this war, saying, quote,
Speaker 1: stop it, stop it now.
Speaker 4: This is from a report in the New York Times.
Speaker 1: Again per Joe Biden, and what he said in this meeting,
Speaker 1: so interesting that even his own wife potentially is very
Speaker 1: distressed by what she is seeing coming out of the
Speaker 1: Gaza strip and begging him to put an end to it.
Speaker 1: And Jill Biden herself has faced, you know, plenty of
Speaker 1: chart testers. Well, she's tried to go out and campaign
Speaker 1: as well. So you know those people who are out there,
Speaker 1: activists who are forcing Jill Biden, Joe Biden, Kareem Jompierre,
Speaker 1: all of these officials to have to reckon with what
Speaker 1: they're doing and what they're enabling every single day, potentially
Speaker 1: having an impact here on Jill Biden at least.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think this is definitely significant. The fact is
Speaker 2: is that, I mean, this is part of what is
Speaker 2: annoying too. It's like they're like it's a Muslim problem.
Speaker 2: It's not just Muslims, you know that object to this.
Speaker 2: They in general, from what we can see is that.
Speaker 2: I think that he in particular as this emotional connect.
Speaker 2: Plus he's stubborn, plus he's old, and it's a media
Speaker 2: issue where at the end of the day, you know,
Speaker 2: Biden doesn't even live in reality. He lives in basically
Speaker 2: like nineteen nineties America. He watches a little bit of
Speaker 2: cable news a little bit, and then he reads like
Speaker 2: hardcover newsprint. That's not how the vast majority of people
Speaker 2: are experiencing news around this conflict. And I think that
Speaker 2: when you think, you know, considering that informs the worldview
Speaker 2: that he brings to this, and it also I think
Speaker 2: probably informs us as to just why he is so
Speaker 2: steadfast and refusing to change the policy, even if his
Speaker 2: advisors may tell him different.
Speaker 3: He's a stubborn old man. He's not going to listen
Speaker 3: to them.
Speaker 2: He is.
Speaker 3: I think that's a huge part of it.
Speaker 1: Completely ideologically committed to design asm period end of story.
Speaker 1: It is he's willing to risk it all to maintain
Speaker 1: that commitment. I mean, at this point, I don't think
Speaker 1: you can really come up with any other explanation because
Speaker 1: you have so many members of his administration lee and
Speaker 1: at this point that they're upset with the direction of
Speaker 1: the policy you've got. He's lost Morning Joe, he lost
Speaker 1: the Pod, Save lost Jose Andres He's losing the UK
Speaker 1: doesn't matter. And you know, we continue to have significant
Speaker 1: uncommitted vote. There was a larger uncommitted vote in Wisconsin
Speaker 1: this week than you know, the size of his margin
Speaker 1: against Trump last time around. There was reporting about how
Speaker 1: Biden himself is seeing the poll members, is upset about
Speaker 1: how much of an impact this is having on his
Speaker 1: reelection prospects. We've brought to you so many polls about
Speaker 1: how the Democratic base is disgusted with this policy, but.
Speaker 4: He apparently doesn't care.
Speaker 1: None of it really lands, even his own He's even
Speaker 1: lost his own wife apparently, and even that isn't having
Speaker 1: any sort of a real impact.
Speaker 4: There you go, all right, sagerway, looking.
Speaker 2: At well over the last few years, it feels like
Speaker 2: DEI has become a meaningless buzzword. I see it thrown
Speaker 2: around by conservatives all the time. It's unfortunate because it
Speaker 2: actually is a term with real meaning. I say this
Speaker 2: to someone who hates DEI been warning about it for years,
Speaker 2: So I thought it would be fun if we dug
Speaker 2: into some of the origins of DEI defined actual terms,
Speaker 2: and then we check to see how's it doing about
Speaker 2: a decade or so into implementation.
Speaker 3: Let's start with the basics. What is DEI?
Speaker 2: DEI shorthand for diversity, equity and inclusion. DEI is the
Speaker 2: ugly sister of the lean in movement of the early
Speaker 2: twenty tens, where corporations and the media became obsessed with
Speaker 2: twin concepts. One is that women make less than men
Speaker 2: for exactly the same job, and two is that diversity
Speaker 2: of color, gender, or any other cosmetic attribute is an
Speaker 2: inherent good in and of itself, as long as it's
Speaker 2: a minority. The reason that I've always hated these movements
Speaker 2: is specifically because they are cosmetic. They are the embodiments
Speaker 2: of the memes showing a female pilot dropping bombs and
Speaker 2: the victims saying, at least it was a woman who
Speaker 2: killed me this time. If the corporation itself doesn't change,
Speaker 2: and just the makeup of who runs that corporation does,
Speaker 2: why should we care. Nonetheless, the financial elites embrace lean
Speaker 2: in DEI in the twenty tents, specifically to dispel ruling
Speaker 2: class consciousness and especially to weaponize identity. Thus, effectively legalizing
Speaker 2: sexism and racism became legal in corporate America, where people
Speaker 2: were specifically hired and promoted for the color of their skin,
Speaker 2: their gender, or any other cosmetic attribute. Now, obviously, when
Speaker 2: you put it that way, it sounds illegal and awful.
Speaker 2: So what corporate America had to do was twofold. One
Speaker 2: they had to legitimize the racial and gender obsessed worldview
Speaker 2: through the media. Two, they have to prove why this
Speaker 2: is actually an inherent good for the business. This is
Speaker 2: where the corporate consultants come in. As the Fortune five
Speaker 2: hundred CEOs clamored to justify DEI, they had to answer
Speaker 2: to their shareholders, of course, and so they do what
Speaker 2: they always do.
Speaker 3: They turned to McKinzie to justify their decision.
Speaker 2: Mackenzie is, of course happy to oblige, and for the
Speaker 2: first near decade has been churning out research after research
Speaker 2: propping up this false religion. From twenty fifteen to twenty
Speaker 2: twenty three, Mackenzie published four studies that titled quote Diversity Matters,
Speaker 2: Delivering through diversity, Diversity wins, How inclusion matters, and diversity
Speaker 2: matters even more.
Speaker 3: The case for holistic impact. As the spectator writes quote.
Speaker 2: The core claim of each study is that DEI leads
Speaker 2: to better corporate performance, thus more DEI, more profit. It's
Speaker 2: the same logic as past ESG studies from the last decade. Hilariously, though,
Speaker 2: just like the collapse of ESG, there has been actual,
Speaker 2: now independent review of said studies, and the results are
Speaker 2: not as clear cut as McKinsey may have led us
Speaker 2: to believe. In fact, a new paper from the ECON Journal,
Speaker 2: which tested the data within each one of these studies,
Speaker 2: has concluded that they cannot be replicated at all independently.
Speaker 2: In fact, they find these studies quote should not be
Speaker 2: relied on to support the view that US publicly traded
Speaker 2: firms can expect to deliver improved financial performance if they
Speaker 2: increase racial and ethnic diversity of their executives. So basically,
Speaker 2: diversity of executives has no impact whatsoever on whether you
Speaker 2: make money as a company, which means two things. Corporations
Speaker 2: just paid billions of dollars to race huckster consultants who
Speaker 2: set up entire firms guiding ds eye policies at these companies.
Speaker 2: And two, most importantly, they discriminated against people based upon
Speaker 2: the color of their skin or gender when making hiring decisions.
Speaker 3: We have proof of this definitively.
Speaker 2: Bloomberg in September of twenty twenty three ran data to
Speaker 2: show that in twenty twenty twenty one alone, the number
Speaker 2: of so called people of color hired at eighty four
Speaker 2: S and P five hundred companies had a ninety four
Speaker 2: percent increase then the year previously. So there was a
Speaker 2: ninety four percent increase possibly in the number of qualified applicants,
Speaker 2: or there were a whole lot of people who were
Speaker 2: hired explicitly because of the color of their skin over others. Now,
Speaker 2: keep in mind, this is a data set of nine
Speaker 2: million people who work at the largest and most lucrative
Speaker 2: firms in the US, including per Bloomberg, Apple, Walmart, Wells, Fargo,
Speaker 2: Major Fortune, five hundreds across the board sector bisector in
Speaker 2: twenty twenty one. That revolution in hiring occurred, and it
Speaker 2: is a certainly a direct violation of equal Opportunity provision
Speaker 2: in the law, which dictates specifically that people should not
Speaker 2: be hired on race alone. And of course, keep in
Speaker 2: mind that's just twenty twenty one data. We have no
Speaker 2: idea what insanity has been wrought in the last three years.
Speaker 2: This is all done for the sake of diversity itself,
Speaker 2: with no discernible impact that we can now show on
Speaker 2: the bottom line.
Speaker 3: And that's why I'm doing this monologue.
Speaker 2: If you want to defend the merits of hiring people
Speaker 2: based purely on the color of their skin or whatever pronouns,
Speaker 2: then be my guest. But do not hide behind fake
Speaker 2: studies that are trotted out at these shareholder conferences. If
Speaker 2: you want legalized racism, stand up and defend it on
Speaker 2: its own merits. I suspect that they will not, and
Speaker 2: they will ignore the results, because when you do, it's
Speaker 2: just abhorrent to the American character, which is founded in
Speaker 2: a fundamental belief of actual equality before the law and
Speaker 2: in striving for equality of opportunity. The farther that we
Speaker 2: have strayed from that, the more we have only exacerbated
Speaker 2: and expanded the very class consciousness that DEI was invented
Speaker 2: to try and to destroy. Very interesting, isn't it greasing?
Speaker 1: And if you want to hear my reaction to Sagre's monologue,
Speaker 1: become a premium subscriber today at Breakingpoints dot Com. Very
Speaker 1: lucky to be joined in studio today by the President
Speaker 1: of the International Brotherhood of Teams, Stirs Sean O'Brien, who
Speaker 1: is here to update us on a variety of important
Speaker 1: organizing issues you have been focused on.
Speaker 3: So welcome. Great to have you back, Thank you very much.
Speaker 4: Yeah, of course. So first let's start with this.
Speaker 1: Guys put this first element up on the screen calling
Speaker 1: for a nationwide boycott of Mulsen Cores.
Speaker 4: So just tell us what's going on here. They use an.
Speaker 1: Influencer, you guys, didn't like something like that, or maybe
Speaker 1: something a little more significant.
Speaker 9: No, they are.
Speaker 12: So we just settled the historic Anheuser Busch contract and
Speaker 12: you know, it was a tough, long, contentious negotiation, but
Speaker 12: at the end of the day, you know, we got
Speaker 12: with our members deserved and demanded and this company is
Speaker 12: very profitable and they actually recognized that at the last day,
Speaker 12: how important that our members were. They're American, you know,
Speaker 12: American company, American brewed bear, and they're very very they
Speaker 12: recognize who makes them the success they are, and you know,
Speaker 12: we want to set industry leading standards with all our
Speaker 12: content tracks. So next up was Molson Cores and they
Speaker 12: have had their way with concessions over the last several contracts.
Speaker 12: So we took a strong position that you know, if
Speaker 12: it's good enough for Anheuser Bush, it's good enough for
Speaker 12: molten cores. Molten cause is very very profitable. CEO makes
Speaker 12: a ton of money. Typical story, and they wouldn't do
Speaker 12: it right, and they chose to strike themselves. And our
Speaker 12: members have been on strike well over forty days right now,
Speaker 12: holding strong, and we're not going to concede until we
Speaker 12: get the best tale for our members.
Speaker 3: Very good. Well, we wanted to make sure we highlighted
Speaker 3: that I know.
Speaker 6: It is a national boycott.
Speaker 2: Okay, well there you heard it here, not first, but
Speaker 2: you definitely heard it here as well. I wanted to
Speaker 2: reach out to you so in particular about this self
Speaker 2: driving car issue. I know this bubbled up a couple
Speaker 2: of months ago. We could put this up here, please
Speaker 2: on the screen. This is just about the you know
Speaker 2: they say self driving tru semi trucks coming to America's highways.
Speaker 2: I know that there was a split here with the
Speaker 2: California Governor Gavin Newsome, and I was wondering if you
Speaker 2: could break some of that down for us, because I
Speaker 2: know that this is something that bubbled up and really
Speaker 2: bothered you guys in the past. It bought ye are today?
Speaker 12: Yeah, And you know, the one thing that Governor Newsom
Speaker 12: has proven that he's bought and paid for by big tech.
Speaker 12: And he fails to remember when there was a recall
Speaker 12: who supported him the most. That was organized labor. And look,
Speaker 12: we don't want autonomous vehicles. We're all about protecting jobs.
Speaker 12: More importantly, it could be a major public safety issue.
Speaker 12: You know, you have an eighty thousand pound vehicle, you know,
Speaker 12: going up and down these roads, family of four. You know,
Speaker 12: the best computer that I know is you've got instinct
Speaker 12: in your mind. And if you have a human operator,
Speaker 12: they're going to react a lot quicker to a potential
Speaker 12: safety risk and everything else.
Speaker 6: But you know, it's.
Speaker 12: Unfortunate Governor Newsom is bought and paid for by big
Speaker 12: tech and he chose the wrong side in this one.
Speaker 12: And we are going to do everything in our power
Speaker 12: legislatively to fight autonomous commercial vehicles and autonomous vehicles in general.
Speaker 6: And we have to do that on a state level,
Speaker 6: we have to do it on a federal level.
Speaker 12: We have the ability through collective bargaining to protect against
Speaker 12: autonomous vehicles and women very successful in all the negotiations
Speaker 12: that we have had with you know, major corporations like
Speaker 12: UPS and others, so we have that ability to limit
Speaker 12: them doing collective bargaining. But we want to make sure
Speaker 12: that we protect jobs as a whole nationwide.
Speaker 1: In the safety Where are we in the trajectory of
Speaker 1: the adoption of this technology.
Speaker 4: Is this a state by state issue? Is it a
Speaker 4: federal issue? Is it both? And how much of a
Speaker 4: threat is it to your membership.
Speaker 6: It's a major threat.
Speaker 12: All technology, whether it's AI or autonomous vehicles, is a
Speaker 12: major threat to jobs. And it's a major threat to
Speaker 12: the infrastructure that you know we're investing as tax payers
Speaker 12: day in and day out for roads and bridges. It's
Speaker 12: a credible threat. It's state by state, we've got to
Speaker 12: fight it, and then we have to take it on
Speaker 12: at a national level.
Speaker 3: Something I'm curious about in the way that you guys
Speaker 3: think about it.
Speaker 2: Obviously I agree in terms of job protection and all
Speaker 2: that they you know, I believe that the justificationers, they're like, oh, well,
Speaker 2: you're standing in the way of progress. You of course
Speaker 2: rise safety. How do you and your drive your members
Speaker 2: how do you guys think about you know, things in
Speaker 2: the future. Is it accommodation, is it just fighting it
Speaker 2: back against it? Like, how do you think about, you know,
Speaker 2: with the role of technology your own jobs and what
Speaker 2: I believe is one of the most critical things that
Speaker 2: you guys, So put.
Speaker 6: A totonomous vehicles aside from them. Yeah, technology is coming.
Speaker 12: It's hair, you know, and you know, companies you know
Speaker 12: want to utilize it, you know, for efficiencies, and that's
Speaker 12: all well and good, But there's other jobs that can
Speaker 12: be created as a result of technology, and that's what
Speaker 12: we've been focused on.
Speaker 6: It's look, technology is common, it's hair. We can either
Speaker 6: do one or two things.
Speaker 12: We can either pout about it and do nothing and
Speaker 12: or be creative and find a way to who's programming
Speaker 12: this technology, who's maintaining this technology, and create jobs. And
Speaker 12: we've been successful in the warehouse industry, grocery warehouse industry
Speaker 12: where there has been implementation of technology, but we've created
Speaker 12: just as many jobs as a result of you know,
Speaker 12: finding ways to service this technology, finding ways to program
Speaker 12: this tech chnology, helping design this technology. So there is
Speaker 12: opportunity as a result of technology.
Speaker 1: Can you talk a little bit about the sort of
Speaker 1: overall organizing landscape because for really the first time in
Speaker 1: my lifetime, labor seems to be securing some big wins.
Speaker 1: I'm used to the nineties EERO of all these concessionary contracts.
Speaker 1: After concessionary contracts, you all had big wins with regards
Speaker 1: to ups. We saw, you know, significant contract improvements from UAW.
Speaker 1: There seems to be a lot of energy in terms
Speaker 1: of organizing news shops. What are you seeing in terms
Speaker 1: of what's possible for labor right now?
Speaker 12: I think we're at a we have a great opportunity
Speaker 12: and we haven't taken advantage of it. We have a
Speaker 12: younger workforce that is passionate about organizing, passionate about the unions,
Speaker 12: which is you know, very very encouraging for an old
Speaker 12: guy like me. You know, we always full generation. I
Speaker 12: always want to leave this organization better than we found it.
Speaker 12: But organizing is key.
Speaker 6: Right now.
Speaker 12: We're organizing in the Teams's Union and traditional industries like construction,
Speaker 12: but we're also looking at obviously Amazon's our biggest target.
Speaker 12: We are focused on cannabis, where there's four hundred and
Speaker 12: twenty five thousand W two employees that are cultivating warehousing
Speaker 12: and they'll be distributions. So we have focused, we have
Speaker 12: been organizing getting contracts there. So yeah, I mean we
Speaker 12: have to look at every opportunity. When you look at
Speaker 12: these young worker's like at Starbucks, you look at Chipotle,
Speaker 12: it's encouraging because you know, we we have proven our
Speaker 12: value through the pandemic organized labor. How we provided our
Speaker 12: members were essential. They provided goods and service to keep
Speaker 12: this country moving. And now you know, with this opportunity
Speaker 12: with the younger generation who is thirsty to fight and
Speaker 12: not afraid to stand up, it's great. I think it's
Speaker 12: I think the sky's the limit moving forward. We just
Speaker 12: have to keep this momentum going.
Speaker 1: How much has the more pro worker Biden administration LRB
Speaker 1: helped to enable some of those victories and expand what's possible, Well, clearly, I.
Speaker 12: Mean when you make a change from you know, the
Speaker 12: previous administration who is anti worker union, you know has
Speaker 12: made a lot easier. I mean, elections have gone a
Speaker 12: lot smoother. There's a lot more due diligence and violations
Speaker 12: and stuff like that. But at the end of the day,
Speaker 12: it's about getting our message out. What can we do
Speaker 12: for work is what can we do as far as
Speaker 12: representing people and I think to your point earlier we've
Speaker 12: negotiated as teams is the strongest contract thirty billion at
Speaker 12: ups DHL record contract Anheuser Busch. The proof is in
Speaker 12: the putting, and this new generation of work is when
Speaker 12: it comes to organizing, they want to see what they're
Speaker 12: actually going to get. So what we've been focused on
Speaker 12: as an organization is getting the best contract and that's
Speaker 12: a true template to what we're doing moving forward. People
Speaker 12: want to see this new generation want to see actually
Speaker 12: information and you know, social media has played a huge
Speaker 12: role in getting our messaging out, has played a huge
Speaker 12: role in you know, basically bringing solidarity connecting people. So again,
Speaker 12: I'm very excited about the direction of the unions in
Speaker 12: the American workforce.
Speaker 2: You may reference he to the previousstration. I know you
Speaker 2: went down to mar Lago, you met with the former
Speaker 2: president Trump. Did you tell them any of this? How
Speaker 2: is he thinking about?
Speaker 6: The reality is this?
Speaker 12: We we had roundtables with every single candidate, and you know,
Speaker 12: our message is clear.
Speaker 6: You know this.
Speaker 12: You have to earn our endorsement and you have boxes
Speaker 12: you need to check off, whether it's not supporting national
Speaker 12: right to work. We need to have a Proact where
Speaker 12: it makes you know, organizing easier, but more importantly, it
Speaker 12: mandates you know, arbitration to get a first contract. We
Speaker 12: need bankruptcy reform. When these companies just run from their
Speaker 12: obligation and our members don't get their benefits. You know,
Speaker 12: we've got anti trust. There's a lot of issues out
Speaker 12: there that are important to US autonomous vehicles technology. And
Speaker 12: you know, the one thing we said is the government,
Speaker 12: for some reason, when you deal with a company like Amazon,
Speaker 12: for example, why do we reward a bad employer. We
Speaker 12: know they're a bad employer. We know they skirt all
Speaker 12: kinds of obligations. With this independent contractor model, there's one
Speaker 12: hundred and fifty percent turnover ratio.
Speaker 6: They focus on distressed communities.
Speaker 12: Why would we as a government as a nation keep
Speaker 12: rewarding bad employers with lucrative contracts. So you know, we've
Speaker 12: gotten our message out to everyone, President Biden as well,
Speaker 12: former President Trump.
Speaker 6: RFK.
Speaker 12: Everybody knows our issues and those issues and that script
Speaker 12: when we brought them in was not tailored towards anyone
Speaker 12: can It was just focused on our issues that our
Speaker 12: members face every day in the potential risk.
Speaker 1: All right, The point about the contracts is so important
Speaker 1: because you know, it's easy for politicians to make an
Speaker 1: excuse about the pro Oh we tried really hard. Sorry guys,
Speaker 1: we'll give it another shot again. But you know, we
Speaker 1: had these opponents in Congress. We just can't get across
Speaker 1: the line. Well, you're talking about the contracts. That's something
Speaker 1: the president can do unilaterally. There's no excuse for rewarding
Speaker 1: a company, a union busting company like Amazon that is
Speaker 1: bad to their workers, as you point out, and if
Speaker 1: you look at the injury statistics much higher than industry average.
Speaker 1: I wonder if you could just give us an update
Speaker 1: on where you guys are with Amazon organizing, what's the
Speaker 1: latest progress and what's the big picture.
Speaker 12: So we have been working on Amazon. I mean, you
Speaker 12: see what's going on in southern California. We've committed to
Speaker 12: invest three hundred million dollars organized Amazon. It is going
Speaker 12: to be a We're working on some affiliations that are
Speaker 12: going to position us to go after the direct employees.
Speaker 12: But look, we need to put pressure on Amazon from
Speaker 12: all fronts and people have to understand that. You know,
Speaker 12: although it's a convenience and it's you know, Amazon is
Speaker 12: everywhere they are not good employers. They are not good people,
Speaker 12: and they do not treat their work as well. We
Speaker 12: are going to, you know, spend every resource we have
Speaker 12: to make certain that we organize Amazon workers. And you know,
Speaker 12: the best part about it is, you know, again we
Speaker 12: talked about that young generation. They are all in on this,
Speaker 12: which is very, very important.
Speaker 4: So you're seeing a lot of receptivity.
Speaker 12: Absolutely, we are, especially after the UPS contract, right, Yeah,
Speaker 12: of course they do the same work that UPS workers do.
Speaker 12: Are part timers, are making over well over twenty one
Speaker 12: dollars an hour, They get full medical, they get full pensions,
Speaker 12: but more and more importantly, they get a to a career.
Speaker 12: There's no path to a career in Amazon.
Speaker 1: What's the next thing that we should be looking for
Speaker 1: in terms of that organizing drive, Well.
Speaker 12: You're going to look for us turning it up, focusing
Speaker 12: on major cities and you know, getting out there and
Speaker 12: continuing the spread the word. We have a great volunteer
Speaker 12: organizing committee of pairs that work at UPS, that work
Speaker 12: at DHL where we've had another huge victory at CVG
Speaker 12: where we organize fifteen hundred eleven hundred members. We have
Speaker 12: another fifteen hundred got a first contract there right at
Speaker 12: that hub, right next to where Amazon has a million
Speaker 12: square foot warehouse on that facility, and that's going to
Speaker 12: be our next target.
Speaker 3: All right.
Speaker 1: The last question I had for you is a number
Speaker 1: of unions have put down statements with regard to isra'swar
Speaker 1: and Gaza specifically calling for a cspire. To my monology,
Speaker 1: you all haven't put on anything of the like. I
Speaker 1: just wanted to ask if that's something that you all
Speaker 1: are considering, and more broadly, what your philosophy is with
Speaker 1: regard to the role of unions when it comes to
Speaker 1: the sort of international solidarity.
Speaker 12: Look, we all know that this world is in a
Speaker 12: very difficult time and it's unfortunate that, you know, innocent
Speaker 12: people are being victimized, but by this terrible situation not
Speaker 12: only there, but also Ukraine and Russia. I'm focused on
Speaker 12: fighting the war that I've been fighting for the last
Speaker 12: thirty four years my life. That's the war on corporate America.
Speaker 12: It's the war on politicians that don't support us. And look,
Speaker 12: it's unfortunate and hopefully there'll be a resolution. You know,
Speaker 12: people talk about the genocide, and you know there's a
Speaker 12: higher court, higher power that's going to decide that. I'm
Speaker 12: just focused on, you know, the labor movement, focused on
Speaker 12: my members, and focused on, you know, making certain that
Speaker 12: workers are taken care of.
Speaker 6: That's my war.
Speaker 3: Fair enough, Well, we really appreciate your time, sir. You're
Speaker 3: welcome back here anytime.
Speaker 6: Thank you very much.
Speaker 4: I appreciate itsutely appreciate it.
Speaker 3: Thanks for watching. We'll see you later.