WEBVTT - Will a THIRD Party Ever Beat Democrats & Republicans? 0:00:03.360 --> 0:00:06.680 Hello there, Welcome to my Thursday edition of the Chuck Podcast. 0:00:06.760 --> 0:00:09.560 I got a great episode for you today if you're 0:00:10.080 --> 0:00:13.080 frustrated by the two political parties. And there's actually been 0:00:13.119 --> 0:00:16.319 some news about that, right The former White House Press 0:00:16.320 --> 0:00:20.080 secretary for Joe Biden announced that she's leaving the Democratic Party, 0:00:20.200 --> 0:00:23.040 Kareem Jean Pierre, who one time we used to work 0:00:23.079 --> 0:00:26.800 for move On, which was in itself a force that 0:00:26.840 --> 0:00:31.440 was more progressive than Democratic. Interesting decision there, And she's 0:00:31.480 --> 0:00:33.120 got a book that's going to be coming out about 0:00:33.159 --> 0:00:36.200 her experience at the White House. But launching her book, 0:00:37.360 --> 0:00:40.599 launching the book, news was this idea that she is 0:00:41.240 --> 0:00:45.920 unregistering as a Democrat. Well, guess who I've just interviewed 0:00:46.120 --> 0:00:48.440 and what this episode is going to feature. It's the 0:00:48.440 --> 0:00:51.600 CEO of the Forward Party. You may remember the Forward 0:00:51.600 --> 0:00:54.880 Party from the days of Andrew Yang, who was a 0:00:54.920 --> 0:00:59.480 presidential candidate in twenty twenty one. Of many he actually 0:00:59.480 --> 0:01:02.560 caught a little bit of fire the Yng Gang at 0:01:02.600 --> 0:01:04.760 one time. He had a friend of mine reminded me 0:01:04.840 --> 0:01:07.560 he may have had the best political paraphernalia in a 0:01:07.680 --> 0:01:11.400 big shot glass and it was like the ultimate long shot. 0:01:12.560 --> 0:01:16.320 Andrew Yang for President, which was terrific, but he his 0:01:16.440 --> 0:01:19.560 experience running as a Democrat working with the Democrats caused 0:01:19.600 --> 0:01:21.679 him to think that there's got to be a better way, 0:01:22.240 --> 0:01:25.080 so he started the Forward Party. It has since sort 0:01:25.080 --> 0:01:29.200 of combined forces with what former New Jersey Governor Christy Whitman, 0:01:29.360 --> 0:01:33.520 one time a Republican, now I think an independent now 0:01:33.760 --> 0:01:37.759 member of this Forward Party. Kerrie Healy, who was Romney's 0:01:38.640 --> 0:01:42.040 lieutenant governor when he was governor of Massachusetts, is also 0:01:42.080 --> 0:01:45.440 active in this and so there is a growing coalition 0:01:45.520 --> 0:01:50.920 of sort of what you would call refugee political refugees 0:01:50.920 --> 0:01:53.960 from the two parties. Now, I think we're going to 0:01:54.000 --> 0:01:56.040 have this conversation with Lindsay and you'll see what they're 0:01:56.080 --> 0:01:59.200 trying to be. They Are they an outpost for the 0:01:59.240 --> 0:02:02.920 frustrated man major party adherents or are they going to 0:02:02.920 --> 0:02:04.880 try to be something more. I'm not going to give 0:02:04.880 --> 0:02:10.360 that away, but there's a lot of people frustrated by 0:02:10.960 --> 0:02:13.400 the direction of both parties, and there's always been this 0:02:13.480 --> 0:02:17.840 question why do we have only two? Obviously, battled access 0:02:17.919 --> 0:02:21.960 is one reason the two parties have created duopoly. If 0:02:22.000 --> 0:02:24.880 any other business work this way, there'd be the government 0:02:24.919 --> 0:02:28.320 would force some sort of change here. But there's no 0:02:28.400 --> 0:02:31.359 doubt that the political party structures in this country need 0:02:31.400 --> 0:02:34.200 to be disrupted or we're going to continue to have 0:02:34.320 --> 0:02:38.840 these unhappy elections where we continue to vote out whatever 0:02:38.840 --> 0:02:41.519 parties in power. And if you look at basically, that's 0:02:41.560 --> 0:02:44.440 the twenty first century, and to me, it is a 0:02:44.480 --> 0:02:49.280 sign of wholesale dissatisfaction with political leadership. And so the 0:02:49.320 --> 0:02:50.960 only thing we can do if we don't like our 0:02:50.960 --> 0:02:54.480 political leadership is vote the other party in. And if 0:02:54.520 --> 0:02:56.200 you look, I mean it is amazing. We've only had 0:02:56.240 --> 0:03:01.280 two elections this century where the status quote prevailed completely. 0:03:01.360 --> 0:03:03.080 It was in two thousand and four and twenty twelve 0:03:03.080 --> 0:03:06.840 the Bush reelect and the Obama reelect, and both Congress 0:03:06.880 --> 0:03:08.480 and the Senate did not change hands in either of 0:03:08.520 --> 0:03:10.840 those cycles sations the only time that's happened. Every two 0:03:10.960 --> 0:03:13.760 years we have tossed some party out of power of 0:03:13.800 --> 0:03:16.680 either the White House, control of the House, or control 0:03:16.680 --> 0:03:25.840 of the Senate every single election two six, eight, ten, twelve, fourteen, sixteen, eighteen, twenty, 0:03:26.120 --> 0:03:31.399 twenty two, twenty four, likely twenty six. Right, we'll see 0:03:31.440 --> 0:03:35.240 what's coming. So it is to me a primal screen 0:03:35.280 --> 0:03:39.040 from the American public that they want to stop picking 0:03:39.480 --> 0:03:41.680 going to the clothing store and only having the choice 0:03:41.680 --> 0:03:44.480 of extra small or extra large. I think they would 0:03:44.560 --> 0:03:48.720 like some some sort of choice of political of parties 0:03:48.720 --> 0:03:52.680 somewhere in between those two. But before we get to that, 0:03:53.240 --> 0:03:56.400 I've got a there's been in some ways this goes 0:03:56.440 --> 0:04:00.360 to the distrust of the two political parties. Well, first, 0:04:00.440 --> 0:04:03.560 let me touch quickly on the Elon Musk Donald Trump feud. 0:04:03.600 --> 0:04:06.839 What are we to make of this? Right? What I'll 0:04:06.880 --> 0:04:10.520 say is be careful lumping all of the opposition to 0:04:10.640 --> 0:04:14.360 the big beautiful Bill into one camp. Right, Elon Musk's 0:04:14.400 --> 0:04:17.720 opposition is different than Josh Holly's opposition, is different than 0:04:17.720 --> 0:04:21.800 Lisa Murkowski's opposition, is different than Akim Jeffrey's opposition. There 0:04:21.839 --> 0:04:25.400 is and so while there is a growing collection of 0:04:26.120 --> 0:04:30.200 people of all politicians of various stripes, if you will, 0:04:30.320 --> 0:04:34.599 and political leaders of various stripes, most of them have 0:04:34.680 --> 0:04:38.200 a different reason for what they're upset about. I will 0:04:38.240 --> 0:04:40.920 just say this, if the Republican Party, or if the 0:04:40.960 --> 0:04:44.240 Trump White House is frustrated by this process, they only 0:04:44.240 --> 0:04:47.440 have themselves to blame. They have chosen not to govern 0:04:48.600 --> 0:04:50.520 for the entire country they have chosen to try to 0:04:50.560 --> 0:04:53.560 govern via one party rule. Governing via one party rule 0:04:54.240 --> 0:04:58.160 never works. You do not get what you want. Obama 0:04:58.200 --> 0:05:01.280 got forced into one party rule. But the reason Obamacare 0:05:01.320 --> 0:05:03.840 stuck is at least he spent a year trying to 0:05:03.839 --> 0:05:07.160 get bipartisan support. He went and sat there and let 0:05:07.520 --> 0:05:11.279 invited Republicans to Blairhouse to give their perspective on healthcare. 0:05:11.480 --> 0:05:15.120 It was a bipartisan effort, even though the ultimate result 0:05:15.960 --> 0:05:18.479 in order to pass it was a partisan was a 0:05:18.480 --> 0:05:22.360 partisan vote. But at least the process was bipartisan. They 0:05:22.360 --> 0:05:26.760 were trying hard, and it was essentially a Republican idea. 0:05:29.120 --> 0:05:32.839 The mandates and just remember Obamacare is just a derivative 0:05:33.240 --> 0:05:36.560 of the original Heritage Foundation idea from the mid nineties 0:05:36.600 --> 0:05:39.000 that Bob Dole was a fan of. That met Romney 0:05:39.000 --> 0:05:41.440 built the Massachusetts health Care Plan. So the point is 0:05:41.480 --> 0:05:45.279 it was an effort to so the idea was bipartisan, 0:05:45.279 --> 0:05:48.080 even if the result getting it done was. But ever 0:05:48.120 --> 0:05:51.039 since then, and in some ways perhaps it's the wrong 0:05:51.120 --> 0:05:54.279 lesson that both parties took from that experience from Obama 0:05:54.360 --> 0:05:56.680 is like, well, just do it with one party. It's 0:05:56.680 --> 0:06:00.000 the only way. In that way, you're only negotiating with yourself. 0:06:00.880 --> 0:06:02.800 But this is not how you govern, and this is 0:06:02.800 --> 0:06:04.920 not how you get anything done. And then you end 0:06:05.000 --> 0:06:08.920 up creating these Frankenstein bills, right Biden had a Frankenstein bill. 0:06:09.640 --> 0:06:12.640 Trump put together a Frankenstein tax bill the first time, 0:06:12.760 --> 0:06:15.760 you know, and they had to create this expiration date 0:06:16.520 --> 0:06:20.279 in order to prevent the deficit from look from the 0:06:20.360 --> 0:06:25.880 debt projections from just blowing people, blowing the markets out 0:06:25.920 --> 0:06:28.320 of the water. And now they're stuck with another version 0:06:28.360 --> 0:06:32.040 of a Frankenstein bill that if they would actually try 0:06:32.080 --> 0:06:34.240 to get bipartisan buy in, they might have a more 0:06:34.360 --> 0:06:37.560 durable bill. It might not be have everything that they 0:06:37.600 --> 0:06:40.240 wish that they had, but they wouldn't have the political 0:06:40.320 --> 0:06:42.240 nightmare that they're dealing with right now. And of course 0:06:42.240 --> 0:06:44.040 it doesn't matter what gets past. It is not going 0:06:44.080 --> 0:06:45.800 to say half of it is going to get overturned 0:06:45.839 --> 0:06:48.720 by the next administration, just like this administration is trying 0:06:48.760 --> 0:06:50.839 to overturn half of what Biden got done. There'll be 0:06:50.880 --> 0:06:52.880 some things they won't be able to get rid of, 0:06:53.120 --> 0:06:55.040 just like there'll be some things the next administration won't 0:06:55.040 --> 0:06:56.920 we get rid of Trump, but it will be a 0:06:57.000 --> 0:06:59.240 much easier to wipe away his legacy, just like it's 0:06:59.279 --> 0:07:02.400 pretty easy to way boy the Biden legacy simply because 0:07:02.400 --> 0:07:06.200 of this decision by everybody. And they blame it. You know, 0:07:06.200 --> 0:07:07.839 it's the other party's fault that we have to do 0:07:07.880 --> 0:07:10.680 this one party. You got to get caught trying. And 0:07:10.760 --> 0:07:14.520 one thing Barack Obama did is got caught trying. And 0:07:15.080 --> 0:07:17.600 you know, even though he didn't get any Republican support 0:07:17.640 --> 0:07:20.720 for Obamacare, he went through the motions. You don't even 0:07:20.720 --> 0:07:23.800 see Biden didn't go through the motions. Trump certainly is 0:07:23.840 --> 0:07:25.640 going out of his way not to go through the motions. 0:07:25.640 --> 0:07:29.840 In fact, the fact that they are purging people based 0:07:29.880 --> 0:07:32.160 on whether they gave money to Democrats, what they did 0:07:32.200 --> 0:07:34.400 to this NAS employee, which of ken I think? And 0:07:34.440 --> 0:07:37.880 this gets me to Elon Musk. So what do we have? 0:07:38.000 --> 0:07:40.440 What do we make of this? Right, there was plenty 0:07:40.440 --> 0:07:42.480 of us that said, we know this relationship is going 0:07:42.520 --> 0:07:44.320 to end badly. We just don't know when it's going 0:07:44.360 --> 0:07:47.240 to end badly. And you know, there was always going 0:07:47.280 --> 0:07:48.800 to be a test of wills. Right, one is the 0:07:48.840 --> 0:07:51.240 most powerful person in the world and one is the 0:07:51.360 --> 0:07:55.520 richest person in the world. One is term limited. The 0:07:55.600 --> 0:07:58.240 rich guy is not, and so I had always assumed 0:07:58.280 --> 0:08:00.600 it's and it was it felt as if and if 0:08:00.600 --> 0:08:02.240 you want to just look at it through the terms, 0:08:02.280 --> 0:08:05.600 and Trump is a power guy first and foremost, right, 0:08:05.640 --> 0:08:08.000 That's why he always, you know, sits a certain way. 0:08:08.040 --> 0:08:10.320 He always wants to be in a power position. He 0:08:10.800 --> 0:08:13.600 believes in just sort of doing things every once in 0:08:13.600 --> 0:08:16.360 a while to make sure people know where they who they, 0:08:16.520 --> 0:08:19.360 where they sit, as far as is Orbit's concerned. So 0:08:19.400 --> 0:08:20.920 it's not a shock to me that he wanted to 0:08:20.920 --> 0:08:24.600 send little shot at Elon that says, hey, just remember 0:08:24.960 --> 0:08:29.680 you know you still need me. So he dumps the 0:08:29.800 --> 0:08:33.079 NASA guy. Well, in some ways, I think Musk took 0:08:33.200 --> 0:08:35.960 that as oh, okay, well then I can go public 0:08:36.000 --> 0:08:38.240 criticizing you if that's the shot at them. And so 0:08:38.280 --> 0:08:41.320 here we are, do I think it will escalate more. 0:08:41.920 --> 0:08:44.000 I kind of have my doubts. One thing about the 0:08:44.000 --> 0:08:47.240 pattern of Donald Trump is anybody who's wealthier than he is, 0:08:48.120 --> 0:08:50.520 he doesn't quite go after with the same vigor as 0:08:50.520 --> 0:08:53.440 he will say me and other people in the press, 0:08:53.480 --> 0:08:55.520 for instance, Right, I mean, look at how he softened 0:08:55.520 --> 0:08:58.000 on Zuckerberg and softened on Bezos anybody with money he 0:08:58.040 --> 0:09:00.680 will eventually soften on. Part of it is that he 0:09:00.840 --> 0:09:02.920 just usually because he wants a piece of the piece 0:09:02.920 --> 0:09:05.280 of their action, and if they come in with some 0:09:05.280 --> 0:09:09.480 sort of transactional aspect to it, then he's there to 0:09:09.520 --> 0:09:12.080 do business. So I think he will. He will be 0:09:12.160 --> 0:09:15.720 careful here too much. So I have to tell you 0:09:15.720 --> 0:09:17.480 there's one thing I want to single out, and I 0:09:17.520 --> 0:09:19.720 actually i'm hoping to. I'm going to, you know, I'm 0:09:19.720 --> 0:09:21.840 going to publicly say that I want to book Ari 0:09:22.400 --> 0:09:26.319 Fleischer and have a discussion with something he tweeted. Ari 0:09:26.480 --> 0:09:28.160 was reacting to what Elon Musk was doing, and he 0:09:28.160 --> 0:09:29.880 tweeted this. He said, Elon Musk is on his way 0:09:29.880 --> 0:09:32.680 to becoming Scott Scott McClellan. Scott McLellan was a press 0:09:32.679 --> 0:09:36.160 secretary during the Bush forty three administration who did a 0:09:36.240 --> 0:09:39.120 tell all book and suddenly everybody hated him in the 0:09:39.160 --> 0:09:41.720 Republican Party because he did a tell all anyway, so 0:09:41.720 --> 0:09:45.200 Ari Fleischer said, that's he's becoming Scott McClellan. That's not good, 0:09:45.400 --> 0:09:48.160 smart or principal thing to be. These will always hate him, 0:09:48.200 --> 0:09:50.400 even if they may now quote him before he destroys 0:09:50.440 --> 0:09:52.080 the good will he still has with ours. I hope 0:09:52.080 --> 0:09:53.880 he'll think twice he's done great things. I hope he 0:09:53.880 --> 0:09:57.240 doesn't burn all his bridges. So basically, what what Fleischer 0:09:57.320 --> 0:10:02.640 is implying, it's like, hey, if you have an independent thought, 0:10:02.640 --> 0:10:05.199 be careful expressing it because you're going to need one 0:10:05.240 --> 0:10:07.080 party or the other and those guys are always going 0:10:07.160 --> 0:10:11.640 to reject you. Don't you want don't you want our support? 0:10:11.679 --> 0:10:15.080 And this I just hate that this is the mindset. 0:10:15.200 --> 0:10:18.000 And ri might be right. I'm not going to sit 0:10:18.080 --> 0:10:21.240 here and say he's wrong that. You know, if Elon 0:10:21.320 --> 0:10:23.640 thinks this is going to help him get back into 0:10:23.640 --> 0:10:27.520 the good graces of a democratic leadership administration, should that 0:10:28.000 --> 0:10:31.719 be what comes next? Maybe he's right and these will 0:10:31.760 --> 0:10:34.280 never you know, forgive him for his relationship with Trump 0:10:34.400 --> 0:10:36.280 or what he did, you know, his sort of what 0:10:36.320 --> 0:10:39.760 he did at AID, which is just a ridiculous way 0:10:39.800 --> 0:10:44.000 to go about this with DOJE. But this shouldn't be 0:10:44.040 --> 0:10:47.760 the mindset, right. This assumes that basically the goal of 0:10:47.800 --> 0:10:50.800 governing is only one party, right, and if you're in 0:10:50.920 --> 0:10:53.560 charge your part, you do everything with your party, and 0:10:53.640 --> 0:10:56.080 you better be a team player. God forbid you. You 0:10:56.080 --> 0:11:00.680 you somehow disagree, don't ever say you're disagree. This is 0:11:00.760 --> 0:11:02.679 kind of what's wrong, right. This is why both parties 0:11:03.080 --> 0:11:07.840 have had this outsider explosion at the elites and the 0:11:07.920 --> 0:11:11.760 establishment of these two parties because of this type of behavior. 0:11:11.880 --> 0:11:16.360 So I you know, like I said, I hope to 0:11:16.640 --> 0:11:19.439 have of a more robust conversation with Ari about this 0:11:19.880 --> 0:11:22.040 because I think he will. He's willing to have thoughtful 0:11:22.040 --> 0:11:25.840 conversations like this about you know, this is this is 0:11:25.840 --> 0:11:28.560 no way to do This is no way to governor country. 0:11:28.600 --> 0:11:32.240 We cannot keep having this mindset. We are just going 0:11:32.320 --> 0:11:34.480 to keep going down the road that we've been going 0:11:34.520 --> 0:11:37.560 down for the last ten years. One other topic I 0:11:37.559 --> 0:11:39.520 want to get to before we get to my conversation 0:11:40.000 --> 0:11:42.800 with Lindsay Draft and the future of third party politics, 0:11:42.840 --> 0:11:46.240 independent politics in this country. Andrew Cuomo, we are three 0:11:46.360 --> 0:11:48.400 June twenty fourth, We're going to have the New York 0:11:48.440 --> 0:11:53.920 City Democratic primary, and in probably the winner of the 0:11:53.960 --> 0:11:56.959 primary probably is the next mayor. I say probably Eric 0:11:56.960 --> 0:12:00.480 Adams and company is running on an independent line. Things 0:12:00.480 --> 0:12:04.280 have happened, but you have a primary that looks like 0:12:04.360 --> 0:12:09.520 it's going to be fairly competitive with Cuomo one and 0:12:09.880 --> 0:12:13.480 a progressive candidate coming close but probably coming up short. 0:12:14.720 --> 0:12:17.000 But I have to say, and you've heard me with 0:12:17.000 --> 0:12:18.560 some a couple of these interviews I've had with New 0:12:18.640 --> 0:12:20.760 York City Members of Congress Dan Goldman, who is not 0:12:20.800 --> 0:12:26.400 supporting Cuomo, Richie Torres, who is supporting Cuomo. I didn't 0:12:26.480 --> 0:12:28.520 you know, I don't know if there's an enthusiastic amount 0:12:28.520 --> 0:12:30.160 of support for Cuomo, but there is a lot of 0:12:30.200 --> 0:12:32.760 people who are looking at the options and going, well, 0:12:32.760 --> 0:12:35.640 what choice do we have? Cuomo's might be the most competent, 0:12:35.840 --> 0:12:39.840 even if it's not clear whether he deserves this access 0:12:39.920 --> 0:12:42.280 or not. And that's that's where I want to get 0:12:42.280 --> 0:12:44.040 at something. So Cuoma did this interview at the Times. 0:12:44.040 --> 0:12:46.280 He hasn't done many interviews, but he did this interview 0:12:46.280 --> 0:12:49.000 at the Times. And there were two things that stuck 0:12:49.040 --> 0:12:53.240 out to me on this interview. One had to do 0:12:54.280 --> 0:12:57.760 with him admitting that he hadn't lived in New York 0:12:57.760 --> 0:13:00.000 City since he was thirty two. He's now sixty seven, 0:13:00.559 --> 0:13:02.320 so it's been thirty five years since he had a 0:13:02.360 --> 0:13:06.439 domicile in New York City until the last six months. 0:13:08.080 --> 0:13:11.040 You know, yes, you know, it's not as if Cuomo 0:13:12.240 --> 0:13:14.599 isn't of New York City. You know, he worked on 0:13:14.679 --> 0:13:19.760 his dad's campaign for mayor that was unsuccessful in seventy seven, certainly, 0:13:19.760 --> 0:13:21.320 and he said he lived there till he was thirty two, 0:13:21.360 --> 0:13:23.880 until he ended up in the Clinton administration. But I 0:13:24.080 --> 0:13:26.520 that's a you know, that that could leave a mark. 0:13:27.640 --> 0:13:31.440 If if the the candidates that have lived in New 0:13:31.520 --> 0:13:34.080 York City longer than six months are likely to make 0:13:34.120 --> 0:13:36.800 an issue of that, that could that could matter. That 0:13:36.800 --> 0:13:38.679 could matter. Although I just don't think anybody's going to 0:13:38.720 --> 0:13:41.840 think Cuomo's not a New Yorker, right given how how 0:13:42.320 --> 0:13:44.640 sort of you know, he's just a part of the 0:13:45.160 --> 0:13:49.520 of the of the fabric of New York on that front. 0:13:50.320 --> 0:13:52.640 But it was something else he said that I think 0:13:52.679 --> 0:13:56.320 deserves a little more. He said he regrets resigning, and 0:13:56.360 --> 0:13:58.680 it gets me to something. You know what, He's right, 0:13:59.000 --> 0:14:01.440 he shouldn't have resigned. But I have a different reason 0:14:01.440 --> 0:14:05.040 why he shouldn't have resigned because we did not get 0:14:05.800 --> 0:14:09.920 closure on whether what he was accused of doing is 0:14:09.960 --> 0:14:13.720 something he did. He said he chose to resign to 0:14:13.800 --> 0:14:16.920 avoid an impeachment process, that he chose to resign to 0:14:16.960 --> 0:14:20.360 avoid the distractions to governing that would have created the 0:14:20.400 --> 0:14:23.200 Attorney general. Leticia James came out with a scathing report 0:14:23.240 --> 0:14:27.040 and you know, just to take you back into that moment, right, 0:14:27.200 --> 0:14:32.560 you know, the allegations emerge. You know, in in mid March, 0:14:33.400 --> 0:14:36.200 he was still you know, a majority of New Yorker 0:14:36.240 --> 0:14:41.040 said no, they didn't want him to resign. Then on August, 0:14:41.040 --> 0:14:43.480 that was March of twenty twenty one, so it was 0:14:43.520 --> 0:14:46.680 sitting out there. Then you had various leaks of different 0:14:46.680 --> 0:14:50.880 women coming out in different media reports, but his numbers, 0:14:50.880 --> 0:14:53.680 for the most part, you know, there were you know, 0:14:53.760 --> 0:14:55.960 his personal fable ratings went down. It was very similar 0:14:55.960 --> 0:14:57.600 to what Bill Clinton happened to Bill Clinton in the nineties. 0:14:57.640 --> 0:14:58.840 But there was a there was a chunk of New 0:14:58.880 --> 0:15:01.920 Yorkers that are like, no, he should stay governor. Then 0:15:02.040 --> 0:15:08.120 Letitia James releases her report on August third, and the 0:15:08.160 --> 0:15:10.880 next day Maris comes out with a poll and it 0:15:10.960 --> 0:15:13.560 was fifty nine percent of New Yorkers thought Quoma should resigned. 0:15:13.640 --> 0:15:17.480 Fifty two percent of Democrats thought the same thing. By 0:15:18.720 --> 0:15:21.400 a few days later, as more people absorbed the information, 0:15:21.440 --> 0:15:23.960 a Quinnipiac poll had the number up to seventy percent 0:15:25.480 --> 0:15:29.080 of New Yorkers who wanted him to resign, and basically, 0:15:29.120 --> 0:15:32.440 you know, within a week he were to resigned and 0:15:32.560 --> 0:15:37.800 he was out. Here's what we didn't get. And this 0:15:37.880 --> 0:15:42.000 is where I think. I think these these forced resignations 0:15:42.680 --> 0:15:48.760 of democratically small d democratic elected officials without a full 0:15:48.800 --> 0:15:51.680 accounting of what they did when you resign in disgrace, 0:15:52.240 --> 0:15:53.960 I think we need to have and this is something 0:15:53.960 --> 0:15:57.440 that would probably take constitutional amendments in some states, but 0:15:57.480 --> 0:16:00.280 I think that there should be an extra penalty if 0:16:00.280 --> 0:16:03.240 you resign in disgrace before the end of your term. 0:16:03.240 --> 0:16:05.680 You shouldn't be allowed to immediately come back and run 0:16:05.680 --> 0:16:08.160 for another office. Right if you resign in order to 0:16:08.240 --> 0:16:11.960 avoid an ethics investigation in the House or the Senate. 0:16:12.640 --> 0:16:14.960 Right if that's what happens. Literally, if the Ethics Committee 0:16:14.960 --> 0:16:17.720 has opened a probe on a member of Congress and 0:16:18.280 --> 0:16:22.760 that member of Congress decides to resign, the probe is dropped. Right, 0:16:22.800 --> 0:16:24.960 So then all you have are the allegations which do 0:16:25.080 --> 0:16:27.800 stick to that, but there's no sort of due process 0:16:27.800 --> 0:16:30.000 for the individual. Now you could argue they would have 0:16:30.000 --> 0:16:33.560 had due process, that they'd chosen to go through the process. Well, 0:16:33.600 --> 0:16:37.360 that brings me to Andrew Cuomo. So these allegations come out, 0:16:37.920 --> 0:16:40.200 there is no you know, in some ways, there's no 0:16:41.240 --> 0:16:45.320 We have not had them litigated under oath. Had there 0:16:45.360 --> 0:16:48.640 been an impeachment proceeding in the New York legislature, there'd 0:16:48.640 --> 0:16:50.880 have been a trial and we would have at least 0:16:50.920 --> 0:16:55.160 been able to let the public decide whether or not 0:16:55.200 --> 0:16:58.200 he should he should, you know, with all the evidence 0:16:58.200 --> 0:17:00.840 out there. But this was you know, so in some 0:17:00.960 --> 0:17:05.479 ways you know I this, you know this, And sometimes 0:17:05.520 --> 0:17:07.359 the media plays a role in this, right, which is 0:17:07.680 --> 0:17:09.760 to sort of create the drum beat to just force 0:17:09.840 --> 0:17:12.840 these individuals out, when that is the worst thing for 0:17:12.880 --> 0:17:16.119 the democracy. We need to air the dirty laundry. In 0:17:16.160 --> 0:17:19.200 some ways, the impeachment proceedings of Bill Clinton and Donald Trump, 0:17:19.280 --> 0:17:23.040 while horrendous perhaps to watch and certainly created a lot 0:17:23.040 --> 0:17:25.959 of acrimony and dysfunction in the country, was also a loot. 0:17:26.600 --> 0:17:30.760 Was also an education of the process for the country, 0:17:31.280 --> 0:17:33.480 and so it gave them an idea, Okay, what is 0:17:33.560 --> 0:17:37.200 serious and what isn't you know? In fact, I think 0:17:37.240 --> 0:17:42.679 going through the impeachment process cured voters of the idea that, 0:17:42.800 --> 0:17:45.880 you know, how much should character impact whether someone should 0:17:45.920 --> 0:17:48.560 stay in office or not. And of course we have 0:17:48.600 --> 0:17:51.480 selective outrage when it comes to character. If we're mad 0:17:51.520 --> 0:17:53.600 at somebody about something else, then we look for a 0:17:53.680 --> 0:17:55.399 character excuse in order to get rid of him. I 0:17:55.440 --> 0:18:00.239 would argue that Andrew Cuomo, you know he was at 0:18:00.240 --> 0:18:02.080 first it looked like he was handling COVID Well. I 0:18:02.080 --> 0:18:04.760 think now history shows that he didn't do the best 0:18:04.840 --> 0:18:09.600 job that was possible there and certainly seemed to worry 0:18:09.640 --> 0:18:12.520 more about his self image during the COVID thing than 0:18:12.560 --> 0:18:20.040 actually getting stuff done. But we didn't. We didn't have 0:18:20.160 --> 0:18:22.800 So I think he's right. He shouldn't have resigned. And 0:18:22.840 --> 0:18:25.159 I think this of everybody I went through, I'm going 0:18:25.200 --> 0:18:27.520 to go through some. We've of all the people since 0:18:27.600 --> 0:18:30.359 nineteen eighty that have statewide governors that have resigned while 0:18:30.359 --> 0:18:33.600 in office. You've had John Rowland of Connecticut who just 0:18:33.640 --> 0:18:36.359 got a pardon from Donald Trump, Jim McGreevy in New 0:18:36.440 --> 0:18:41.879 Jersey who basically resign due to an extra mental affair, 0:18:42.160 --> 0:18:45.239 Robert Bentley in Alabama in twenty seventeen, he resigned due 0:18:45.240 --> 0:18:48.240 to an extra medical affair. John Kitzeber of Oregon resigned 0:18:48.280 --> 0:18:50.800 early because he didn't want more information about an extra 0:18:50.840 --> 0:18:53.880 marital affair. Eric Brighten's essentially very similar things in named 0:18:53.920 --> 0:19:00.920 crew Cuomo, but all of them essentially ducked an opportunity 0:19:01.000 --> 0:19:04.160 to defend themselves. And to me, if you resign in disgrace, 0:19:04.240 --> 0:19:06.240 we really there should be an extra penal. We should 0:19:06.240 --> 0:19:12.160 be forcing due process for the voter. Right, it is 0:19:12.320 --> 0:19:16.280 that the voter deserves a full accounting and a full story. 0:19:16.880 --> 0:19:21.719 And it's also not fair to that potentially disgraced politician 0:19:22.520 --> 0:19:26.560 that the innuendo and accusations, because when you resign, then 0:19:26.560 --> 0:19:31.480 everybody believes it. Right, If Andrew Cuomo believes he was railroaded, 0:19:32.160 --> 0:19:35.320 then why did he resign? Right the minute he resigned, 0:19:35.359 --> 0:19:40.520 he ended up essentially con confirming the entire report. Now 0:19:40.520 --> 0:19:44.000 he may believe he wasn't doing that by resigning, but 0:19:44.040 --> 0:19:46.280 as far as a majority of the New York public, 0:19:46.680 --> 0:19:49.520 that's the message he was sending. Well, she got me, 0:19:51.480 --> 0:19:54.040 when maybe society would have been better served to like, 0:19:54.160 --> 0:19:56.840 let's let's get the detail of the allegations out there 0:19:57.040 --> 0:19:59.560 and if it's too again, if it's too embarrassing for you, 0:19:59.600 --> 0:20:03.159 then you want to resign early. You have put the 0:20:03.320 --> 0:20:06.919 state in a bind. You sometimes resignation forces a special 0:20:06.960 --> 0:20:10.480 election sometimes resignation, so there should be a higher penalty, 0:20:11.440 --> 0:20:13.679 and that penalty should be a six year ban, an 0:20:13.680 --> 0:20:15.879 eight year ban, a ten year ban from running for 0:20:16.000 --> 0:20:21.959 any office in that state. Again because the Andrew Cuomo campaign. 0:20:22.000 --> 0:20:23.640 Here we are he resigns in twenty one. Now he's 0:20:23.720 --> 0:20:26.520 running for marin twenty five, and we don't know, we 0:20:26.560 --> 0:20:29.760 don't really have the full accounting. We know why I resigned, 0:20:29.800 --> 0:20:32.879 we know what he was accused of. He denies some 0:20:33.000 --> 0:20:37.040 of it, but we've not had a formal, a formal 0:20:37.080 --> 0:20:40.159 process to sort of litigate this and to hear his 0:20:40.240 --> 0:20:42.640 side of the story under oath rather than his side 0:20:42.640 --> 0:20:47.480 of the story via via political campaigning. You know, I 0:20:47.480 --> 0:20:52.080 mean it is you look at the Senate resignations. The 0:20:52.119 --> 0:20:54.959 most egregious is clearly the Al Frankin one where Al 0:20:55.000 --> 0:20:58.200 Franklin was basically forced to resign by his own party 0:20:58.480 --> 0:21:01.400 all because Chuck Schumer wanted to win the Alabama Senate race, 0:21:01.920 --> 0:21:04.560 right if the Alabama Senate race doesn't happen. And you 0:21:04.600 --> 0:21:08.160 know it was also loud calls by Senator Kirsten Jillibrand 0:21:08.280 --> 0:21:11.360 was the first she was getting ready to run for president. 0:21:11.440 --> 0:21:14.119 You know, so there was a lot of political factors 0:21:14.240 --> 0:21:17.879 outside of Franken's control. But what we never got and 0:21:17.920 --> 0:21:21.679 Franken went ahead and resigned, but we never got a 0:21:21.720 --> 0:21:25.000 full accounting of the ethics committee. That's not fair to Franken, 0:21:25.080 --> 0:21:28.960 nor is that fair to the voters of Minnesota. But again, 0:21:29.119 --> 0:21:32.159 all that was done because in the moment, Democrats were 0:21:32.200 --> 0:21:35.879 trying to embarrass Roy Moore in Alabama and that mess, 0:21:36.560 --> 0:21:40.520 and they wanted to look cleaner than the Republicans, and 0:21:41.040 --> 0:21:44.560 you know, essentially they sacrificed Franken in order to get 0:21:44.600 --> 0:21:47.600 a Senate seat for Doug Jones. You might say that 0:21:47.680 --> 0:21:50.840 was politically smart, What was that really good for the process? 0:21:50.920 --> 0:21:52.760 Was that really good for democracy? And does that really 0:21:53.080 --> 0:21:58.119 increase trust in politicians anyway? I just it was it 0:21:58.160 --> 0:22:01.800 was an interesting thought experiment. I agree with Cuomo, but 0:22:01.840 --> 0:22:05.040 not for the reasons perhaps he thought he shouldn't have resigned. 0:22:05.240 --> 0:22:07.320 He really I think it would have been better for everybody, 0:22:07.359 --> 0:22:10.760