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Speaker 1: Hi, I'm Molly John Fast and this is Fast Politics,

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Speaker 1: where we discuss the top political headlines with some of

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Speaker 1: today's best minds. And after the Jacksonville shooting, Joe Biden

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Speaker 1: says white supremacy has no place in America, a stark

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Speaker 1: contrast to our previous president. We have such a show

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Speaker 1: packed with amazing guests. New Yorker writer Susan Glasser joins

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Speaker 1: us to talk about where Russia is headed after the

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Speaker 1: death of yet another Putin Foe. Then we'll talk to

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Speaker 1: Strongman author Ruth ben Giatt and the Gopiece continued march

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Speaker 1: towards authoritarianism. But first we have Washington Post columnist and

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Speaker 1: close personal friend George Conway. Welcome back, Too Fast Politics,

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Speaker 1: My friend George Conway.

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Speaker 2: How fast are your politics?

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Speaker 1: Lobely, They're very fast, and it'll be very fast if

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Speaker 1: you listen to this at one point seven speed, which

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Speaker 1: I highly recommend.

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Speaker 3: I listen to.

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Speaker 1: All my podcasts at one in seven five, which makes

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Speaker 1: everyone sound like mini mouse.

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Speaker 3: But it's great, Gus exactly. Let's go. George Conway.

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Speaker 2: You're a lawyer, last night check, Yeah, I am, I

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Speaker 2: gotta do. I gotta do my continuing legal education in

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Speaker 2: the next like six days in order to maintain my

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Speaker 2: bar membership. But you know, other than that, things are

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Speaker 2: really well.

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Speaker 1: I know yesterday was like all mugshot. He really did

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Speaker 1: plan this completely right. Nobody is talking about that GOP

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Speaker 1: debate anymore. It's just mugshot. Mugshot, mudshot. If you were

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Speaker 1: Donald Trump's lawyer, what would you tell him?

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Speaker 2: Who's lawyer?

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Speaker 3: Forty five forty known?

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Speaker 2: Oh no, no, you're referring to PO one one three

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Speaker 2: five eighth nine. Yes. Yeah. If I were Bolton County

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Speaker 2: Jail inmate number PO one one three five eight oh

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Speaker 2: nines attorney, I would ask for a seven million dollars

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Speaker 2: up retainer, and assuming I got that, I would I'd

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Speaker 2: be happy to send him and give him lengal advice.

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Speaker 3: What would you tell him, though?

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Speaker 2: I would tell him to throw himself at the mercy

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Speaker 2: of Jack Smith, Letitia, James Alvin Bragg and Fannie Willis

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Speaker 2: and try to cut the best deal he can and

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Speaker 2: promise to go away and never be heard from it again,

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Speaker 2: because that, I think is the only There are only

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Speaker 2: two ways that he could avoid dying in prison, and

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Speaker 2: one would be to get himself elected president of the

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Speaker 2: United States, which I think is a very low probability event,

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Speaker 2: but would be calamitous or of the country and the planet,

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Speaker 2: and would only happen if some crazy third party candidate

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Speaker 2: managed to siphen sufficient votes away from the principal major

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Speaker 2: party candidate right p zero one, one, three, five, eight oh.

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Speaker 3: Nine aka no layables.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, the only other way he can get out of

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Speaker 2: it is by cutting some kind of deal, and maywhell

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Speaker 2: be too late to do that. He has very various

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Speaker 2: new cards to play at this point. He can't really

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Speaker 2: buy his way out, except maybe he could pay a

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Speaker 2: tremendous tremendous buying buying like nobody has ever seen a

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Speaker 2: fine that When people would say sir, they would say

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Speaker 2: with tears in their eyes, they would say, sir, we

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Speaker 2: have never seen a colossal fine like that. It just

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Speaker 2: we are in amazement of your ability to pay restitution.

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Speaker 2: It's just awesome, sir. I don't think that's going to

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Speaker 2: be worth a lot here. I do think that one

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Speaker 2: of the things that a criminal defendant who is in

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Speaker 2: public life has as a chip to play, and I

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Speaker 2: think there are numerous examples of this in history, and

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Speaker 2: in fact, it's recognized in the Department of Justice is

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Speaker 2: manual that one of the objects of prosecutions in the

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Speaker 2: public corruption sphere is to get the corrupt people out

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Speaker 2: of office and out of public life. If he actually

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Speaker 2: offered to leave public life and never be heard from again,

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Speaker 2: I you know, maybe move to I mean, I'm sure

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Speaker 2: Putin has a nice daha ready for him in the crimea.

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Speaker 3: But you think that if he did that he would

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Speaker 3: get off.

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Speaker 2: I don't know that he can do that, and I

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Speaker 2: don't know that he would get off, but it is

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Speaker 2: I think other than destroying the world and getting himself

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Speaker 2: elected president and destroying democracy and the constitution I think,

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Speaker 2: which I don't think he's going to be able to do,

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Speaker 2: because I think he's going to become increasingly unstable as

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Speaker 2: time goes on. And even though there's going to be

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Speaker 2: half of the Republican Party at least that will voke

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Speaker 2: for him, no matter what, I don't think there's going

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Speaker 2: to be enough to win a general election unless something

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Speaker 2: very very very very screwing happens in American politics, which could,

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Speaker 2: which which could, but I think it's a likely I

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Speaker 2: think that's his only play. The problem is he should

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Speaker 2: have played that a long time ago. He wouldn't play

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Speaker 2: that alone time ago because he's never going to play it.

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Speaker 2: He's not capable of it, because that would be an

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Speaker 2: act of submission. And when narcissistic psychopaths megalomaniacs get past

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Speaker 2: a certain point, they'll just try to take everyone down

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Speaker 2: with them. I mean, our best ehiple of that is Hitler,

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Speaker 2: who was kind of the quintessential narcissistic psychopath. In fact,

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Speaker 2: he's the psychiatrist or psychologist Eric from, very famous writer.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I know who is.

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Speaker 2: I think he was a survivor of the Holocaust and

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Speaker 2: he's trying to figure out like, what is this? What

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Speaker 2: is this mental disorder that causes people to be so destructive?

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Speaker 2: And E coined the term liligant narcissism, and it reflects basically,

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Speaker 2: you know, I mean, you don't have to be a

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Speaker 2: mass murderer to be a milligan narcissist, right right, right,

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Speaker 2: And this guy certainly is. And when they get past

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Speaker 2: a certain point, when they achieve a certain amount of power,

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Speaker 2: there's just no turning back. They can't let go and

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Speaker 2: they can't stop. They can't control themselves. And that's part

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Speaker 2: of the reason why he's running he's just he just

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Speaker 2: can't stop himself. And there's also a bit of rationality

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Speaker 2: in there. He knows that his only ticket to freedom

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Speaker 2: in deep Town. He knows his only ticket of freedom

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Speaker 2: that he is willing to take is to get himself

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Speaker 2: elected president, which has the added benefit of being able

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Speaker 2: to allow him in his own line to seek vengeance

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Speaker 2: upon all of us who are going to have to

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Speaker 2: move to Canada or New Zealand. I could take New Zealand.

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Speaker 2: In Canada.

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Speaker 1: You said to me, this party is done, it's fucked,

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Speaker 1: it's over. It's the Whigs. It's going to have to

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Speaker 1: burn down in order to come back. And I was

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Speaker 1: thinking about was watching that debate and watching Nikki Haley,

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Speaker 1: who is on Earth One. I mean, the stuff she

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Speaker 1: was saying. I was like, oh my god, there's a

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Speaker 1: Republican saying stuff that is actually like, you know, she

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Speaker 1: was saying, Trump can't get elected.

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Speaker 2: Watching that debate and I only made it through about

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Speaker 2: two thirsty three quarters of it, after which I decided

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Speaker 2: that I was losing too many brain cells, which is

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Speaker 2: what happens when you heard on Fox News, so I

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Speaker 2: turned it off. I was profoundly disoriented. Yeah, A Celestial

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Speaker 2: Way because I was watching that and wondering what planet

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Speaker 2: and aisle and what planet are they? Because I started

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Speaker 2: watching this and there was basically other than Nikki Haley

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Speaker 2: taking a shot at Trump running up the nationals at

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Speaker 2: which I really love.

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Speaker 1: Right, which I don't know who that's for, but I

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Speaker 1: appreciated it too.

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Speaker 2: It is for George Conway, who actually cares about fiscal responsibility.

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Speaker 3: Only person.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm like it, really, you know, like one of

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Speaker 2: five people in the United States, you know, and Pete

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Speaker 2: Peterson and has this group or somebody you know, Nobody

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Speaker 2: ever listens to them, right, We all want to run,

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Speaker 2: we all have credit cards that like to spend money.

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Speaker 2: But anyway, so I'm watching this and for the first

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Speaker 2: fifty seven minutes, literally fifty seven minutes I checked, there

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Speaker 2: was virtually no mention of Donald Trump. And I'm watching

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Speaker 2: this and I'm saying, yeah, and then there are a

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Speaker 2: couple of there's Salooney Tunes stuff going on. The vec

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Speaker 2: is a nut.

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Speaker 3: Job for Veke it rhymes with cake.

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Speaker 2: Oh. I thought it was like the Veka is a

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Speaker 2: Vivek section, which is what no Paley did to him later.

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Speaker 2: But anyway, and we have DeSantis, who clearly has some

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Speaker 2: I am not sure if he's human. I can't figure

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Speaker 2: out exactly what species he is, or maybe he's just

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Speaker 2: a bot.

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Speaker 3: His terrible can today.

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Speaker 2: Right, there's always weirdness in American politics. I'm back on

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Speaker 2: old Earth. Even when the Republican Party was almost normal,

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Speaker 2: we had strange politicians, and you know, Democrats had strange politicians,

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Speaker 2: and we had strange into you know, we had Lyndon

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Speaker 2: LaRouche out.

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Speaker 3: There, right, Lyndon Laruge I remember him.

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Speaker 2: You get the wackos. So it's fine. I could take that.

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Speaker 2: But the rest of it was like, oh my god.

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Speaker 2: They were talking about policy. Oh, we need to cut

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Speaker 2: the budget, we need to reduce the size of government.

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Speaker 2: And that's great. I love that stuff because you know

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Speaker 2: that's I grew up on that stuff on Earth one

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Speaker 2: and on Earth one. No, it's partly bullshit because nobody

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Speaker 2: actually ever says what they want to cut. Because if

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Speaker 2: you actually say what you want to cut, people get mad.

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Speaker 3: It's wildly unpopular.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, right, I like the sentiment. It's like it's like

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Speaker 2: the old days. It made me feel like the Earth

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Speaker 2: I grew up on, and it was actually sucking me

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Speaker 2: in a letter. I'm saying, oh, this is so nice.

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Speaker 2: They're speaking classic political platitudes about the need to cut

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Speaker 2: government and so on and so forth. And then fifty

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Speaker 2: seven minutes passes, and then the moderators finally decide we

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Speaker 2: have to talk about Trump between now and the next

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Speaker 2: commercial break. In the next forty five seconds, What do

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Speaker 2: you think of Donald Trump?

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Speaker 4: No?

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Speaker 2: And they asked the question, right, They asked that very

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Speaker 2: good question. Would you support Donald Trump even if he

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Speaker 2: were a convicted felon in somestance six and a half

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Speaker 2: in Christie, I don't know what tell Christy was doing

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Speaker 2: with his hand, said yes. And I'm like, and all

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Speaker 2: of a sudden, it's like I'm looking at these people

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Speaker 2: and they're no longer on this planet that I like,

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Speaker 2: right back on Earth, the earth I grew up on.

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Speaker 2: You don't vote for criminals.

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Speaker 3: Whose mugshot is being released the next day.

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Speaker 2: You don't vote for somebody who has been found by

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Speaker 2: a judge and jury in a federal district court, the

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Speaker 2: United States District Court for the Southern District of New

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Speaker 2: York to be a rapist. You don't vote for that

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Speaker 2: kind of person. You say, that's a bad person. And

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Speaker 2: then the other people run ads say look at how

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Speaker 2: bad my opponent is, and the guy gets trounced. That's

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Speaker 2: what should happen on a nice planet. What planet are

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Speaker 2: these people? And they realize they're on my planet. They

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Speaker 2: are on my planet, and that's the problem. This is

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Speaker 2: the planet we have that they've created. And these people

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Speaker 2: are actually going to the people who are out in

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Speaker 2: the audience hooting and hollering for Trump and then booing

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Speaker 2: anybody who says, you know, Trump may have done something wrong.

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Speaker 2: I mean, those people they're insisting on making as their

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Speaker 2: standard bearer in twenty twenty four a man who will

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Speaker 2: die in prison in all likelihood. After a bunch of that,

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Speaker 2: I left and I was thinking, I don't know what

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Speaker 2: planet and I'm on and I can't take any more

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Speaker 2: of this.

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Speaker 1: There was some polling release today three and five say

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Speaker 1: Trump's sensitive documents and twenty twenty elections subversion trial should

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Speaker 1: happen before November twenty four, and of that sixty one

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Speaker 1: percent of all Americans. I mean, that seems like bad

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Speaker 1: news for the Republican nomine Yeah.

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Speaker 2: I really do not think it's possible for PO one one, three,

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Speaker 2: five eighth nine to find himself back in the White House,

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Speaker 2: with the exception that if you have some kind of

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Speaker 2: a screwball no labels candidate that somehow manages to steal

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Speaker 2: fifty thousand votes from Joe Biden or one hundred thousand

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Speaker 2: votes in each of a certain number of particular states.

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Speaker 1: Swingy states, like it would be an electoral college.

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Speaker 2: When right, you could come in second in a popular

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Speaker 2: vote and win two hundred and seventy one elector vote

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Speaker 2: electural vote, in which case it's you know again, as

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Speaker 2: I say, it's basically the end of the world. So

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Speaker 2: that's the reason why I feel overall optimistic, is that

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Speaker 2: I just think that, you know, he, as I said

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Speaker 2: the other day on oneing Joe P three five eight

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Speaker 2: oh nine is playing Russian Roulette with the law and

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Speaker 2: he's loading all the chambers. Is that there's just no

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Speaker 2: way he should be able to get past all this,

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Speaker 2: whether or not any of the trials occur before November

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Speaker 2: twenty twenty four, but I do think at least one

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Speaker 2: or two of them will, So I think he's got

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Speaker 2: a big problem.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, besides having five indictments being highly stressful.

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Speaker 2: For where we're not a five yet, well.

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Speaker 3: Five because we have a superseding indictment.

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Speaker 1: So oh, we two federal, two state, and then the superseding.

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Speaker 3: Four and a half.

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Speaker 2: When I lived, the Trump World Tower was a seventy

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Speaker 2: two story building, but they labeled the top floor ninety

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Speaker 2: because he skipped a bunch of So I'm all four

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Speaker 2: saying five indictments. In fact, I'll say seven.

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Speaker 1: Let's just say four and a half. But logistically this

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Speaker 1: is a scheduling nightmare. Not for me, but I mean

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Speaker 1: for the courts. The courts are not set up in

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Speaker 1: a way.

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Speaker 2: But it's not courts problem.

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Speaker 3: Well, it is Donald Trump's problem. Yes, it's p O.

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Speaker 2: One, one, three, five, eight h Nine's problem because he's

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Speaker 2: the one who has to defend all these cases. Okay,

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Speaker 2: if I'm a judge, I can just order a trial date.

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Speaker 2: And if somebody says, oh, I have to be in

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Speaker 2: Iowa to you know, milk some cows, I'll just look

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Speaker 2: at them and say, what.

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Speaker 5: Is your problem?

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Speaker 2: You know this defendant behind you in the next case,

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Speaker 2: the robber, the suspect, I ain't letting him milk, no cows.

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Speaker 2: He's over at the MCC you know, the county jail

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Speaker 2: or whatever it is. I just don't see that. So

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Speaker 2: who goes first? Do you think Jack Smith goes first?

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Speaker 2: I think it will be one or both of the

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Speaker 2: federal trials are most likely to go first. In New York,

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Speaker 2: DA Bragg has said that he will give up his

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Speaker 2: trial date if necessary because he's he's willing to facilitate

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Speaker 2: the other trials because he understands that his case isn't

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Speaker 2: quite as significant from the historical or legal standpoint as

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Speaker 2: the other cases. So that's very good of him. And

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Speaker 2: you know, and the New York is slow anyway.

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Speaker 4: And it's the least sort of structural case, right, Judges

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Speaker 4: are entitled to call each other. I usually it happens

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Speaker 4: in a federal court house. But there's no reason why

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Speaker 4: these things can't be scheduled so that they don't all conflict.

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Speaker 4: Because yes, I mean, a criminal defendant does have the right,

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Speaker 4: within certain limits, to be president a trial. In fact,

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Speaker 4: it is required generally.

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Speaker 2: Now, you know, he's got these other cases, like the

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Speaker 2: second civil trial in the rape case, which is now

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Speaker 2: just the defamation case because he's already been found to

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Speaker 2: be a rapist. Is this case is about the defamation

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Speaker 2: that that he did after p one one three five

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Speaker 2: to eight OHO nine committed when he was president p

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Speaker 2: One one three five eight ZO nine. But he doesn't

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Speaker 2: have to show up for that. And I actually think

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Speaker 2: there's a good chance that our friend Egene is going

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Speaker 2: to get summary judgment on that and that there'll be

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Speaker 2: no trial.

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Speaker 3: So what does that mean she just gets the money.

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Speaker 2: There will have to be a trial in damages, and

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Speaker 2: I don't you know, he didn't show up for the

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Speaker 2: first one where you was a used a rape sexual assault.

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Speaker 2: He doesn't have anything to say about the damage to

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Speaker 2: Jean's reputation that he caused when he was president of

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Speaker 2: the United States and defends her, so he doesn't have

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Speaker 2: to go to that trial. The other trial that he's

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Speaker 2: got coming up is another civil trial, which is a

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Speaker 2: class action in the Southern District of New York for

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Speaker 2: the Ponzi scheme that he participated in along with Monkey,

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Speaker 2: where he basically ran these ads during the apprentice where

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Speaker 2: you say, you send us money and you'll get money back,

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Speaker 2: and it was this weird kind of thing it was,

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Speaker 2: but it was basically what they call a multi level

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Speaker 2: marketing scheme where you know, sooner or later somebody gets

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Speaker 2: holding the bag and they don't have any money and

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Speaker 2: a la signor Ponzi is how you're saying in Italian.

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Speaker 3: I don't know, but George Conway, will you come back?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I'd come back. I have a whole riffa I

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Speaker 2: wanted to do.

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Speaker 3: Okay, you're coming back. I have a feeling Trump is

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Speaker 3: going to have more legal troubles.

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Speaker 1: Susan Glasser is a writer The New Yorker and author

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Speaker 1: of Divider Trump in the White House. Welcome back to

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Speaker 1: Fast Politics, Susan Glasser.

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Speaker 3: Great to be with you, Mollie.

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Speaker 1: I'm so delighted to have you because everything that's happening

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Speaker 1: falls into your skill set. First, I want to talk

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Speaker 1: about what's happening in Russia. Because you lived in Moscow,

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Speaker 1: you and Peter lived in Moscow. You have seen the

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Speaker 1: rise of Putin, and now another chapter emerges.

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Speaker 3: What is happening over there?

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Speaker 5: Obviously you now have what appears to be the outright

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Speaker 5: assassination of You have Guinny Progosian, who emerges in some

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Speaker 5: ways the kind of most visible serious threat to the

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Speaker 5: Kremlins monopoly on state power. You know, in the entire

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Speaker 5: twenty years of Putin's time in office, and you know

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Speaker 5: to me, it's all part of the spillover effect of

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Speaker 5: this disastrous war in Ukraine that Putin has unleashed. And

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Speaker 5: you know, I don't see think any of this would

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Speaker 5: have been happening if it weren't for that Russia is

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Speaker 5: isolated in the world. It is absorbing, if you believe

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Speaker 5: research reports in the New York Times, extraordinary amounts of

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Speaker 5: casualties in this conflict, more than one hundred thousand dead

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Speaker 5: and injured Russians. This is just an incredible number. By

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Speaker 5: the way, at least officially, more than the number of

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Speaker 5: Russian two were allegedly killed in the entire Soviet Afghan conflict,

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Speaker 5: which lasted a decade.

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Speaker 3: Again, those are probably suspect numbers.

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Speaker 5: But the point, and I think that's a really important point,

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Speaker 5: is that Vladimir Putin, almost single handedly, he had the

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Speaker 5: power to do so on his own, made.

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Speaker 3: This decision to unleash the biggest.

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Speaker 5: Land war in Europe since the end of World War Two.

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Speaker 3: And it's not going well for Russia.

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Speaker 5: And so I think it's all in the context of

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Speaker 5: that that this extraordinary PREGOTIONI saga played out.

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Speaker 1: It's such an interesting problem that Russia finds itself in

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Speaker 1: do you think Russia is sort of the same as

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Speaker 1: North Korea or China, Like we don't get really accurate

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Speaker 1: reporting out of the country because there are so few

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Speaker 1: members of the free press still there.

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Speaker 5: I think it's been very, very hard and very opaque

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Speaker 5: to understand the kind of high politics of this era,

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Speaker 5: right that what's really going on among Putin and his

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Speaker 5: ever shrinking inner circle. Right these are mostly people drawn

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Speaker 5: from the security services by all accounts, and Western intelligence

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Speaker 5: has been pretty public about this and seeing that they

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Speaker 5: believe Putin has consulted with a smaller and smaller circle

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Speaker 5: of advisors, especially during COVID, but not exclusively so and

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Speaker 5: so you know, I think that the robustness of our

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Speaker 5: interactions with this system have just atrophied over the years.

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Speaker 5: In some ways, we knew a lot more about the

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Speaker 5: late Soviet era when when Gorbachev was in power, and

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Speaker 5: where many were closer in some ways to senior officials

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Speaker 5: in Gorbachev's Kremlin than we are, certainly to those in

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Speaker 5: Putent's kremlin.

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Speaker 3: Number one.

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Speaker 5: Oh, yes, we don't really know what's going on. I

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Speaker 5: think North Korea is a more extreme case still, But

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Speaker 5: the fear is that Putin is hurtling Russia down the

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Speaker 5: track of becoming a sort of European North Korea, which

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Speaker 5: would be a disaster for so many reasons. It's a bigger,

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Speaker 5: more significant country, and its role in the world supermanent

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Speaker 5: member of the UN Security Council is a very different one.

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Speaker 5: It's just it's a disastrous scenario all around. But I

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Speaker 5: do think I should say, you saw those images of

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Speaker 5: that plane that purportedly had promotion on board, plummeting out

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Speaker 5: of the sky.

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Speaker 3: Message sent message.

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Speaker 5: See the message is strength, and Putin is always believed

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Speaker 5: in intimidating, unsettled, overwhelming displays of force and often went

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Speaker 5: back into a corner. That's what he does, is he escalates,

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Speaker 5: He looks for opportunities to send a message. And it's

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Speaker 5: very interesting somebody I was on TV and somebody asked

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Speaker 5: me this question, a very American kind of question in

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Speaker 5: a way to this set of events in Russian said, well,

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Speaker 5: you know, would Russians be upset if this action was

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Speaker 5: really pinned on the Kremlin? And I thought, you know,

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Speaker 5: it's almost the exact opposite. I think by the logic

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Speaker 5: of Putin's Russia, which is we want you to get

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Speaker 5: the message that if you betray us, this is what

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Speaker 5: will happen to you.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and Progosian was a bad dude. He rose to

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Speaker 1: power in this Putin world through really the most deplorable

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Speaker 1: kind of stuff.

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Speaker 5: Absolutely, he was a murderer, He was a thug. He

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Speaker 5: came out of a sort of criminal background in Saint

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Speaker 5: Petersburg and was patronized by Vladimir Putin. His success was

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Speaker 5: a result of the opportunities that came to him by

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Speaker 5: being in Vladimir Putin's orbit. And it's the diffusion of

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Speaker 5: the state and the sort of criminal elements surrounding it

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Speaker 5: that has been one of the very negative, unfortunate aspects

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Speaker 5: that defined the Putin era in Russia, and Progosian was

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Speaker 5: sort of a symbol of that. Of course, many Americans

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Speaker 5: first heard of him not so much in the context

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Speaker 5: of the Wagner Group as mercenary force that he created

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Speaker 5: and led, but in the context of his role as

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Speaker 5: Putin's chef quote unquote and the creation of the Internet

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Speaker 5: Research Agency that's documented in the famous Mueller Report. But

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Speaker 5: he played a particularly pernicious role as a sort of

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Speaker 5: executor and carrier out of schemes that Russia, for a

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Speaker 5: variety of reasons, wanted to maintain plausible deniability for even

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Speaker 5: though of course it wasn't all that plausible and all

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Speaker 5: that deniable. They used progosion and the Vagner Group as

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Speaker 5: an unofficial arm of the Russian state, embroiled in conflicts

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Speaker 5: in Africa, in Syria, Ukraine, and read my colleague Joshua Yafa,

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Speaker 5: it did a terrific kind of after action, you know,

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Speaker 5: history of progotion in the Vomitor group in the New

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Speaker 5: York a few weeks ago. I highly recommend I.

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Speaker 1: Want to pull back for a minute on Russia, because

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Speaker 1: there is this war in Ukraine.

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Speaker 3: It continues.

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Speaker 1: We don't know how well Russia is doing, though it

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Speaker 1: certainly the sense is not that well. Russia is a

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Speaker 1: problem if it remains under Putin, but it's also really

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Speaker 1: a problem if it doesn't well.

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Speaker 5: And for many years Mali, for many years, that's what

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Speaker 5: many Russia watchers heard, is like, oh, well, you know

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Speaker 5: you don't like Putin, but it'll be even worse. So

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Speaker 5: he's just holding back the really crazy extreme forces, the

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Speaker 5: kind of people, the military bloggers who have.

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Speaker 3: Been demanding even more.

439
00:22:45,680 --> 00:22:49,119
Speaker 5: And brutal actions in Ukraine, for example, And so that

440
00:22:49,280 --> 00:22:52,800
Speaker 5: for a long time was the weird argument that was advanced,

441
00:22:53,040 --> 00:22:55,080
Speaker 5: kind of pro Putin argument in the West, with like

442
00:22:55,440 --> 00:22:58,479
Speaker 5: after him the deluge. But of course now Putin has

443
00:22:58,520 --> 00:23:00,800
Speaker 5: gone ahead and done, you know, pretty much the worst

444
00:23:00,840 --> 00:23:03,639
Speaker 5: thing you can do. And you think about the millions

445
00:23:03,640 --> 00:23:07,840
Speaker 5: of lives up ended and destroyed by this catastrophic war

446
00:23:07,960 --> 00:23:11,920
Speaker 5: in Ukraine. You think of hundreds of thousands of casualties

447
00:23:11,960 --> 00:23:16,920
Speaker 5: on both sides. You think of mass roundups and deportations

448
00:23:16,960 --> 00:23:21,080
Speaker 5: of Ukrainian children and families to Russia against their will.

449
00:23:21,160 --> 00:23:24,919
Speaker 5: I mean, it's just it's criminality upon criminality. That the

450
00:23:25,000 --> 00:23:29,040
Speaker 5: horrible tortures in Bhusa were not an exception, but you know,

451
00:23:29,160 --> 00:23:33,520
Speaker 5: a part of the Russian playbook in this war of extermination.

452
00:23:33,840 --> 00:23:37,719
Speaker 5: And so I think the question that many people have

453
00:23:37,800 --> 00:23:39,600
Speaker 5: right now, and I think it's a very important one,

454
00:23:39,760 --> 00:23:42,399
Speaker 5: is a different question. It's not well, g well, there'd

455
00:23:42,400 --> 00:23:44,960
Speaker 5: be some terrible person after Putin, which is certainly a

456
00:23:45,000 --> 00:23:48,720
Speaker 5: very likely scenario, But because it's so associated with being

457
00:23:48,720 --> 00:23:53,080
Speaker 5: Putin's war, is it's still nonetheless more possible to end

458
00:23:53,240 --> 00:23:56,840
Speaker 5: the war, even if the person who follows Putin into

459
00:23:56,880 --> 00:24:00,879
Speaker 5: the Kremlin is an extreme right wing National List he

460
00:24:01,359 --> 00:24:03,800
Speaker 5: and it will be a he. There are basically no

461
00:24:03,880 --> 00:24:06,640
Speaker 5: women in the upper echelons of power in Russia. Day

462
00:24:06,960 --> 00:24:10,760
Speaker 5: he is nonetheless possibly could end the war if you look.

463
00:24:10,920 --> 00:24:16,120
Speaker 5: It's almost inconceivable, right that Ukraine, Vladimir Zelenski or any

464
00:24:16,160 --> 00:24:19,760
Speaker 5: American president not named Donald Trump would actually make a

465
00:24:19,840 --> 00:24:22,440
Speaker 5: deal with Putin that results in the end of the war.

466
00:24:22,560 --> 00:24:25,840
Speaker 5: I feel that that's inconceivable. However, it often is the

467
00:24:25,880 --> 00:24:29,200
Speaker 5: person who doesn't start the war who ends up having

468
00:24:29,240 --> 00:24:31,440
Speaker 5: to end a war, whether that's in the Soviet Union,

469
00:24:31,640 --> 00:24:35,040
Speaker 5: it was Brezhnev who and his colleagues who agreed to

470
00:24:35,080 --> 00:24:39,119
Speaker 5: invade Afghanistan. It was Gorbatov who decided to end it.

471
00:24:39,119 --> 00:24:45,000
Speaker 5: It was Nixon, not LBJ who ended Vietnam. That's history

472
00:24:45,160 --> 00:24:47,879
Speaker 5: strongly suggests that nobody's going to be sitting down in

473
00:24:47,880 --> 00:24:51,280
Speaker 5: some parish peace talks with Vladimir Putin insign dot line.

474
00:24:51,359 --> 00:24:51,560
Speaker 2: Right.

475
00:24:51,680 --> 00:24:55,520
Speaker 1: It's also the question of instability, right, this is a

476
00:24:56,000 --> 00:24:58,040
Speaker 1: huge country with nuclear weapons.

477
00:24:58,440 --> 00:24:59,960
Speaker 3: That could be anybody's guest.

478
00:25:00,119 --> 00:25:03,400
Speaker 1: What happens in Russia has been notoriously unable to has

479
00:25:03,440 --> 00:25:05,320
Speaker 1: had trouble stabilizing itself.

480
00:25:05,440 --> 00:25:06,200
Speaker 3: Absolutely.

481
00:25:06,280 --> 00:25:09,600
Speaker 5: In fact, Maley One of the kind of periodive horribles

482
00:25:09,640 --> 00:25:12,840
Speaker 5: that US and other Western officials have long worried about

483
00:25:12,880 --> 00:25:16,800
Speaker 5: is the possibility of the disintegration of the Russian state,

484
00:25:16,840 --> 00:25:19,639
Speaker 5: the fragmentation, the further fragmentation.

485
00:25:19,080 --> 00:25:19,880
Speaker 3: Of the Russian state.

486
00:25:19,960 --> 00:25:22,880
Speaker 5: In many ways, that was part of how Putin came

487
00:25:22,920 --> 00:25:26,400
Speaker 5: to power by promising people that this era of instability

488
00:25:26,440 --> 00:25:29,879
Speaker 5: and possible disintegration inside Russia was going to come to

489
00:25:29,920 --> 00:25:33,400
Speaker 5: an end. That Russia fought not one but two wars

490
00:25:33,640 --> 00:25:37,480
Speaker 5: with a breakaway province of Chechnya after the collapse of

491
00:25:37,480 --> 00:25:40,640
Speaker 5: the Soviet Union, and there were constant, you know, kind

492
00:25:40,640 --> 00:25:44,760
Speaker 5: of palpable fears played upon by Putin and other Russian

493
00:25:44,880 --> 00:25:48,080
Speaker 5: nationalists throughout the nineteen nineties. Things fall apart, right, you

494
00:25:48,119 --> 00:25:51,040
Speaker 5: know that Boris Yelton had gone too far in encouraging

495
00:25:51,520 --> 00:25:56,639
Speaker 5: individual regions in Russia to take autonomy and Putin that

496
00:25:56,800 --> 00:25:59,320
Speaker 5: was what we witnessed when we were there in the

497
00:25:59,359 --> 00:26:02,440
Speaker 5: early years of Vladimir Putin's tenure, as he was sort

498
00:26:02,440 --> 00:26:04,960
Speaker 5: of consolidating power, and that was what he said to

499
00:26:04,960 --> 00:26:07,120
Speaker 5: the Russian people, is like, I will stop this kind

500
00:26:07,160 --> 00:26:10,720
Speaker 5: of civil war. So that's part of the fear scenario.

501
00:26:10,960 --> 00:26:14,040
Speaker 5: I think in Washington and other Western capitals. Is that

502
00:26:14,320 --> 00:26:19,000
Speaker 5: a defeat in Ukraine or even a bad piece could

503
00:26:19,080 --> 00:26:23,080
Speaker 5: lead to further fragmentation and destabilization of Russia.

504
00:26:23,200 --> 00:26:27,040
Speaker 1: Right, we have this pretty scary situation happening over seas,

505
00:26:27,080 --> 00:26:29,879
Speaker 1: and the idea here is that it's the protection of

506
00:26:29,960 --> 00:26:32,879
Speaker 1: NATO countries. I don't think anyone puts it past, putin

507
00:26:33,119 --> 00:26:36,440
Speaker 1: to roll in past, you know, into Poland. I mean,

508
00:26:36,480 --> 00:26:40,720
Speaker 1: it's not impossible, but we have in America it seems

509
00:26:40,800 --> 00:26:44,879
Speaker 1: very much that the appetite for intervention is as low

510
00:26:44,920 --> 00:26:49,400
Speaker 1: as I've ever seen it, and with Republican candidates it's

511
00:26:49,520 --> 00:26:52,320
Speaker 1: even lower than that. Can you talk a little bit

512
00:26:52,359 --> 00:26:53,600
Speaker 1: about this sea change?

513
00:26:54,000 --> 00:26:56,320
Speaker 5: Yeah, I think you're right. We have just moved into

514
00:26:56,359 --> 00:26:57,800
Speaker 5: a different era. I don't know that we have a

515
00:26:57,920 --> 00:27:03,040
Speaker 5: name for it yet. Very interesting because it's certainly a recognition.

516
00:27:03,359 --> 00:27:08,000
Speaker 5: I think that the unipolar kind of single superpower moment

517
00:27:08,160 --> 00:27:10,879
Speaker 5: in which the United States was this kind of dominant

518
00:27:10,880 --> 00:27:14,439
Speaker 5: player on the world stage in the immediate aftermath of

519
00:27:14,600 --> 00:27:18,520
Speaker 5: the collass suit Union, that that period is now definitively over,

520
00:27:18,600 --> 00:27:23,360
Speaker 5: with the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan just basically sapped.

521
00:27:23,600 --> 00:27:27,040
Speaker 5: I think the interest across the political spectrum inside the

522
00:27:27,119 --> 00:27:30,560
Speaker 5: United States in what people now perceive to be a

523
00:27:30,640 --> 00:27:34,720
Speaker 5: kind of international adventurism. Certainly, the war in Iraq, even

524
00:27:34,760 --> 00:27:38,880
Speaker 5: in Republican Party, is largely not supported as a decision.

525
00:27:39,040 --> 00:27:43,520
Speaker 5: That being said, what's remarkable and enduring given all that

526
00:27:44,000 --> 00:27:48,000
Speaker 5: has been this US both sympathy and support for Ukraine

527
00:27:48,040 --> 00:27:52,200
Speaker 5: and a level of backing of Ukraine in its fight

528
00:27:52,280 --> 00:27:55,520
Speaker 5: with Russia and beating back Russian aggression that almost has

529
00:27:55,520 --> 00:27:57,560
Speaker 5: no precedent in history. I don't know how much people

530
00:27:57,680 --> 00:28:01,040
Speaker 5: really realize the billions I've done that the US is

531
00:28:01,080 --> 00:28:03,639
Speaker 5: giving right now. I've just been been looking this up

532
00:28:03,680 --> 00:28:05,359
Speaker 5: as part of a bigger piece. I'm ready for the

533
00:28:05,400 --> 00:28:10,200
Speaker 5: New Yorker magazine, and we're running essentially in inflation adjusted

534
00:28:10,320 --> 00:28:13,760
Speaker 5: terms head even of the extraordinary mounts that the US

535
00:28:13,800 --> 00:28:16,440
Speaker 5: invested in the Marshall Plan in the three years following

536
00:28:16,480 --> 00:28:19,240
Speaker 5: World War Two. That's how big of a commitment we've

537
00:28:19,240 --> 00:28:21,320
Speaker 5: made to Ukraine. Now, of course, we're a huge and

538
00:28:21,440 --> 00:28:24,159
Speaker 5: rich country. We have an enormous defense budget. It's a

539
00:28:24,240 --> 00:28:27,360
Speaker 5: very small overall percentage of that defense budget that we're

540
00:28:27,400 --> 00:28:29,840
Speaker 5: spending on Ukraine. So it depends on how you look

541
00:28:29,840 --> 00:28:32,520
Speaker 5: at it. But it's still a bigger commitment to Ukraine

542
00:28:32,680 --> 00:28:35,720
Speaker 5: than any analogy you can think of in the last

543
00:28:35,760 --> 00:28:38,720
Speaker 5: one hundred years, and I include Vietnam and all the others.

544
00:28:38,760 --> 00:28:39,920
Speaker 5: So it's pretty amasy.

545
00:28:40,040 --> 00:28:42,600
Speaker 1: And when you look at this Republican field and you

546
00:28:42,640 --> 00:28:45,200
Speaker 1: look at sort of Biden has stayed the course and

547
00:28:45,280 --> 00:28:49,480
Speaker 1: been very steady, but you could see a Republican Party that,

548
00:28:49,800 --> 00:28:53,960
Speaker 1: especially with the Senate map, that pushes against you know,

549
00:28:54,000 --> 00:28:56,000
Speaker 1: and again I think we're about to see the government

550
00:28:56,040 --> 00:29:00,120
Speaker 1: shut down on this very not sending aid to Ukraine.

551
00:29:00,320 --> 00:29:03,160
Speaker 1: There will be come to Jesus moment here.

552
00:29:03,200 --> 00:29:06,400
Speaker 5: I think, well, Milly, I happen to agree with you,

553
00:29:06,480 --> 00:29:10,120
Speaker 5: and I have been noting with great interests. How and

554
00:29:10,280 --> 00:29:12,800
Speaker 5: perhaps they don't have any other choice. But the Biden

555
00:29:12,800 --> 00:29:17,880
Speaker 5: administration has been pretty sanguine and confident that they could

556
00:29:18,000 --> 00:29:22,360
Speaker 5: keep getting more funding and more support for the war

557
00:29:22,360 --> 00:29:27,640
Speaker 5: in Ukraine, given that the overall deterioration of the politics.

558
00:29:27,840 --> 00:29:31,080
Speaker 5: The ascended faction in the Republican Party to day, no

559
00:29:31,240 --> 00:29:36,080
Speaker 5: question is the trumpest Magaist faction. It is not a majority, right.

560
00:29:36,160 --> 00:29:38,520
Speaker 5: I think what we saw we saw again the other

561
00:29:38,640 --> 00:29:41,000
Speaker 5: night in the Republican debate is that the Republican Party

562
00:29:41,040 --> 00:29:44,520
Speaker 5: is a party divided over Ukraine. It's in conflict over

563
00:29:44,560 --> 00:29:49,800
Speaker 5: this issue. There are amazing strong voices who are now

564
00:29:49,840 --> 00:29:56,120
Speaker 5: amplifying and echoing Trump's bizarre and inexplicable admiration for Vladimir

565
00:29:56,120 --> 00:30:02,320
Speaker 5: Putin and by extension, adopting rumps and Russian talking points

566
00:30:02,720 --> 00:30:06,080
Speaker 5: about the war. Ukraine isn't really a legitimate state, and

567
00:30:06,160 --> 00:30:09,400
Speaker 5: you know, we shouldn't be investing in it. We're somehow

568
00:30:09,400 --> 00:30:12,320
Speaker 5: getting ripped off, et cetera, et cetera. That's real, and

569
00:30:12,360 --> 00:30:15,480
Speaker 5: it's growing, and sure, the polls are sort of all

570
00:30:15,520 --> 00:30:18,680
Speaker 5: over the map, but essentially show a kind of waning

571
00:30:18,840 --> 00:30:23,400
Speaker 5: of support over time. For now, the Senate Republicans remain

572
00:30:23,480 --> 00:30:25,120
Speaker 5: pretty strongly committed to this.

573
00:30:25,200 --> 00:30:25,920
Speaker 3: If anything, they.

574
00:30:25,840 --> 00:30:29,360
Speaker 5: Criticized Biden from the other direction not doing it not

575
00:30:29,520 --> 00:30:32,480
Speaker 5: fast enough. I think the trend line is pretty clear

576
00:30:32,520 --> 00:30:36,360
Speaker 5: and should be concerning for anyone who's realizing that the

577
00:30:36,400 --> 00:30:39,880
Speaker 5: war is not going to magically be over on our

578
00:30:39,920 --> 00:30:41,800
Speaker 5: political calendar here in the United States.

579
00:30:42,040 --> 00:30:46,120
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's so true. I listened to the podcast you

580
00:30:46,160 --> 00:30:46,640
Speaker 3: guys do.

581
00:30:46,880 --> 00:30:50,240
Speaker 1: I'm a fan, but this moment that we're in, can

582
00:30:50,320 --> 00:30:53,160
Speaker 1: you give me a sort of historical precedent for this,

583
00:30:53,400 --> 00:30:54,080
Speaker 1: like or something.

584
00:30:54,120 --> 00:30:54,800
Speaker 3: It doesn't have to.

585
00:30:54,920 --> 00:30:58,440
Speaker 1: Match because obviously nothing matches this, but a moment where

586
00:30:58,520 --> 00:31:01,160
Speaker 1: you feel like there's the same sort of Mesanzene, there's

587
00:31:01,200 --> 00:31:02,560
Speaker 1: the same kind of feeling.

588
00:31:03,000 --> 00:31:05,400
Speaker 5: Well, by the way, thank you for listening, Molly, because

589
00:31:05,480 --> 00:31:08,000
Speaker 5: you are the you know, sort of the definition of

590
00:31:08,440 --> 00:31:13,640
Speaker 5: premium excellence in podcasting. But it's fun for me actually

591
00:31:13,680 --> 00:31:16,600
Speaker 5: to talk each week with my colleagues Janewaere and Evan

592
00:31:16,600 --> 00:31:20,600
Speaker 5: Aso's because they're like, they have so much incredible variety

593
00:31:20,640 --> 00:31:22,720
Speaker 5: of experience, right It's like, you know, we'll be talking

594
00:31:22,720 --> 00:31:24,400
Speaker 5: about something and Jane will be like, well, you know

595
00:31:24,480 --> 00:31:27,440
Speaker 5: when I was covering the Reagan White House. You know,

596
00:31:27,600 --> 00:31:31,120
Speaker 5: there's like Evan at a moment when we're so interested in,

597
00:31:31,440 --> 00:31:33,760
Speaker 5: you know, the rise of China as a you know.

598
00:31:33,920 --> 00:31:37,800
Speaker 3: Adversary and competitor of the United States. You know, he's

599
00:31:37,840 --> 00:31:38,640
Speaker 3: he's just.

600
00:31:38,560 --> 00:31:40,840
Speaker 5: Happened to have lived there and written a National Book

601
00:31:40,880 --> 00:31:43,960
Speaker 5: award winning book about China. But the question we often

602
00:31:44,000 --> 00:31:48,320
Speaker 5: struggle with actually is this question of how to contextualize

603
00:31:48,320 --> 00:31:51,920
Speaker 5: and to understand this historical moment. You know, where are

604
00:31:51,920 --> 00:31:54,280
Speaker 5: we kind of like maybe getting too amped up or

605
00:31:54,320 --> 00:31:58,000
Speaker 5: too hysterical, and it falls within the realm of what's

606
00:31:58,000 --> 00:32:01,280
Speaker 5: happened before in American politics and what's really unprecedented, right,

607
00:32:01,320 --> 00:32:04,560
Speaker 5: like what's truly crazy, like dial it up to ten,

608
00:32:05,280 --> 00:32:08,360
Speaker 5: like man the battle stations, like democracies at risk, and

609
00:32:08,400 --> 00:32:12,400
Speaker 5: what is kind of awful and annoying. And Ikeyan nonetheless

610
00:32:12,480 --> 00:32:16,800
Speaker 5: resonates with other periods like the mccarsey era or god forbid,

611
00:32:16,880 --> 00:32:20,320
Speaker 5: the eighteen fifties leaning up to a real rift in

612
00:32:20,360 --> 00:32:23,600
Speaker 5: the country. I do think that, certainly in the foreign

613
00:32:23,680 --> 00:32:27,239
Speaker 5: policy conversation we're having, there are some real echoes of

614
00:32:27,280 --> 00:32:30,840
Speaker 5: that period leading up to World War II, or the

615
00:32:30,840 --> 00:32:33,800
Speaker 5: interwar period from the end of World War One to

616
00:32:34,520 --> 00:32:38,320
Speaker 5: the beginning of US involvement in World War Two. Late

617
00:32:38,760 --> 00:32:42,560
Speaker 5: the actual name America firstures by these debates about what

618
00:32:42,640 --> 00:32:45,280
Speaker 5: kind of power we would be in the world. At

619
00:32:45,280 --> 00:32:49,920
Speaker 5: that time, of course, in America was arising ascendant power economically,

620
00:32:50,040 --> 00:32:53,600
Speaker 5: but hadn't yet fully really come to terms with what

621
00:32:53,640 --> 00:32:57,160
Speaker 5: that meant in terms of its geopolitical role. Now it's

622
00:32:57,200 --> 00:32:59,960
Speaker 5: a different situation, but you know, I think we told

623
00:33:00,120 --> 00:33:05,400
Speaker 5: ourselves a pretty compelling fairy tale about the end of

624
00:33:05,440 --> 00:33:08,080
Speaker 5: the Cold war and the collapse of the sum Union

625
00:33:08,280 --> 00:33:13,240
Speaker 5: and the march of history being towards democracy and interdependence.

626
00:33:13,360 --> 00:33:14,640
Speaker 3: And it didn't work out.

627
00:33:15,200 --> 00:33:18,000
Speaker 5: But that's not the story that Putin and those who

628
00:33:18,080 --> 00:33:21,000
Speaker 5: brought him to power told the Russian people. It's not

629
00:33:21,120 --> 00:33:24,880
Speaker 5: the story that Xi Jinping has for the Chinese people.

630
00:33:25,080 --> 00:33:27,280
Speaker 5: So it's a hard moment, I think for us children

631
00:33:27,320 --> 00:33:31,239
Speaker 5: of the seventies and eighties, Right, we grew up in

632
00:33:31,280 --> 00:33:34,120
Speaker 5: a world that felt like, even when it was screwed up,

633
00:33:34,120 --> 00:33:37,360
Speaker 5: that was moving in the right direction eventually. I don't know,

634
00:33:37,560 --> 00:33:41,080
Speaker 5: as the famous Nixon in China moment, right, and Joan

635
00:33:41,200 --> 00:33:44,240
Speaker 5: Lie he's talking with and he brings up the French Revolution,

636
00:33:44,400 --> 00:33:46,880
Speaker 5: and Chinese leader says, yeah, well it's a little bit

637
00:33:46,880 --> 00:33:48,560
Speaker 5: too early to tell how it worked out.

638
00:33:49,840 --> 00:33:51,480
Speaker 3: Thank you, Susan Glasser.

639
00:33:53,600 --> 00:33:57,400
Speaker 1: Ruth ben Jiot is the author of Strong Men, Musolini

640
00:33:57,520 --> 00:34:01,680
Speaker 1: to the Present and an MSNBC car mess Welcome to

641
00:34:01,920 --> 00:34:03,760
Speaker 1: Fast Politics.

642
00:34:03,120 --> 00:34:05,480
Speaker 5: Ruth, Thank you delighted to be here.

643
00:34:05,520 --> 00:34:07,280
Speaker 3: It's nothing to talk about, Ray, I.

644
00:34:07,360 --> 00:34:11,560
Speaker 1: Mean, yeah, and especially not on the democracy beat. I

645
00:34:11,800 --> 00:34:18,440
Speaker 1: long for the days of January twenty twenty one, when

646
00:34:19,200 --> 00:34:21,800
Speaker 1: we had one and democracy was safe.

647
00:34:22,120 --> 00:34:28,400
Speaker 5: What happened January sixth was just this profoundly radicalizing event

648
00:34:29,120 --> 00:34:34,080
Speaker 5: for the GOP. And of course there were already numerous

649
00:34:34,200 --> 00:34:36,879
Speaker 5: elites of the party who are willing to work since

650
00:34:36,920 --> 00:34:40,520
Speaker 5: November to try and overturn the democracy in other ways,

651
00:34:40,920 --> 00:34:46,920
Speaker 5: but breaking that taboo, having that rally transmute into violence,

652
00:34:47,400 --> 00:34:51,279
Speaker 5: seeing the Capitol police have their heads bashed in and

653
00:34:51,320 --> 00:34:53,480
Speaker 5: this is supposed to be the pro police, law and

654
00:34:53,600 --> 00:34:57,160
Speaker 5: order party, all of that was this really a watershed

655
00:34:57,200 --> 00:35:03,000
Speaker 5: moment where the unscrupulous, violent oriented people in the party

656
00:35:03,080 --> 00:35:06,880
Speaker 5: realized that anything was possible, and so the wavering that

657
00:35:07,320 --> 00:35:10,880
Speaker 5: a few of them had on January seventh was swiftly

658
00:35:10,960 --> 00:35:13,839
Speaker 5: replaced by we're going to go all in for this

659
00:35:14,040 --> 00:35:15,560
Speaker 5: because anything is possible.

660
00:35:16,080 --> 00:35:16,279
Speaker 3: Right.

661
00:35:16,840 --> 00:35:20,640
Speaker 1: There was a moment, I feel like a conscious moment

662
00:35:21,440 --> 00:35:26,200
Speaker 1: somewhere in January when Kevin McCarthy decided to go down

663
00:35:27,120 --> 00:35:31,160
Speaker 1: to mow Lago and fundraised with trumpet Like, if we

664
00:35:31,239 --> 00:35:35,160
Speaker 1: look back at one decision to another decision to another decision,

665
00:35:35,440 --> 00:35:38,520
Speaker 1: to the end of democracy, at least a republican party

666
00:35:38,520 --> 00:35:41,320
Speaker 1: that no longer believes in democratic values.

667
00:35:41,800 --> 00:35:46,000
Speaker 5: Yeah, Unfortunately, that's often how it happens, especially if it's

668
00:35:46,440 --> 00:35:49,600
Speaker 5: nowadays or but also like that happened with Mussolini, who

669
00:35:49,680 --> 00:35:53,000
Speaker 5: was prime minister in a democracy for three years, and

670
00:35:53,280 --> 00:35:57,040
Speaker 5: people don't understand what this kind of leader is capable of.

671
00:35:57,360 --> 00:36:00,279
Speaker 5: They think, okay, you know, he's done this, now going

672
00:36:00,320 --> 00:36:04,400
Speaker 5: to be satisfied. They don't understand, or if they understand

673
00:36:04,400 --> 00:36:07,400
Speaker 5: about examples abroad, they don't think it's going to happen

674
00:36:07,480 --> 00:36:10,480
Speaker 5: to them. It's a lack of vision in a negative sense.

675
00:36:11,000 --> 00:36:14,000
Speaker 5: And because of the people I study and I'm in

676
00:36:14,040 --> 00:36:16,759
Speaker 5: their heads, unfortunately, it was very clear to me what

677
00:36:16,840 --> 00:36:20,200
Speaker 5: was going on. And also what you mentioned with Kevin

678
00:36:20,280 --> 00:36:24,560
Speaker 5: McCarthy going to Mari Lago, this was the proverbial, you know,

679
00:36:25,000 --> 00:36:27,799
Speaker 5: checking in with the cult leader and he got his

680
00:36:27,880 --> 00:36:31,160
Speaker 5: instructions and then the party fell into line, and very

681
00:36:31,239 --> 00:36:35,120
Speaker 5: soon there was an actual party line, and this sped up,

682
00:36:35,480 --> 00:36:39,880
Speaker 5: you know, the kind of process of making the gop autocratics.

683
00:36:39,920 --> 00:36:42,600
Speaker 5: So in those months it's very interesting. I'm glad you

684
00:36:42,640 --> 00:36:46,560
Speaker 5: took us back there because you know, Ted Cruz, for example,

685
00:36:46,600 --> 00:36:50,000
Speaker 5: made a mistake where he said that January sixth had

686
00:36:50,000 --> 00:36:53,480
Speaker 5: been a domestic terror operation. Well this wasn't what you're

687
00:36:53,480 --> 00:36:56,480
Speaker 5: supposed to say, so Tucker Carlson hauled him on his

688
00:36:56,560 --> 00:37:00,080
Speaker 5: show and humiliated him. And I thought that was very

689
00:37:00,080 --> 00:37:02,760
Speaker 5: interesting because it was a bad sign for the future

690
00:37:03,200 --> 00:37:07,400
Speaker 5: because Ted Cruz's status as a senator had no interest

691
00:37:07,719 --> 00:37:11,480
Speaker 5: or relevance for Tucker Carlson, who was the enforcer of

692
00:37:11,520 --> 00:37:15,239
Speaker 5: the party line, And that showed me that they were

693
00:37:15,280 --> 00:37:18,440
Speaker 5: all in for reinventing the narrative of January sixth, and

694
00:37:18,480 --> 00:37:20,640
Speaker 5: they've been very successful two years later.

695
00:37:21,040 --> 00:37:23,120
Speaker 3: Yeah, let's talk about Mussolini.

696
00:37:23,320 --> 00:37:25,680
Speaker 1: Italy has been in some ways, even though it's very

697
00:37:25,719 --> 00:37:29,320
Speaker 1: small and it's got an insane economy that's not so good,

698
00:37:29,440 --> 00:37:34,880
Speaker 1: and they're an agent population, but they do have Burlasconi

699
00:37:35,320 --> 00:37:38,720
Speaker 1: walked so Donald Trump could run talk to me about

700
00:37:38,800 --> 00:37:42,839
Speaker 1: Mussolini and sort of what the kind of similarities they are.

701
00:37:43,200 --> 00:37:46,120
Speaker 5: So he was the one who wrote the template for

702
00:37:46,239 --> 00:37:50,319
Speaker 5: everybody else, including Hitler who was watching. And Mussolini is

703
00:37:50,320 --> 00:37:52,920
Speaker 5: so relevant because when he came in as he was

704
00:37:52,960 --> 00:37:56,680
Speaker 5: appointed as Prime Minister of democracy coalition government, and he

705
00:37:56,719 --> 00:37:59,279
Speaker 5: spent the next three years trying to figure out how

706
00:37:59,280 --> 00:38:02,040
Speaker 5: to expand his power and this had never been done,

707
00:38:02,480 --> 00:38:05,319
Speaker 5: so you know, he attacked the press, he posed as

708
00:38:05,320 --> 00:38:09,040
Speaker 5: a victim and again Hitler adored him and was watching

709
00:38:09,120 --> 00:38:11,160
Speaker 5: to see if he could do the same thing, and

710
00:38:11,160 --> 00:38:13,520
Speaker 5: that's partly why he did is beer Hawk putch in

711
00:38:13,640 --> 00:38:17,440
Speaker 5: nineteen twenty three. But the key thing is that Mussolini

712
00:38:18,000 --> 00:38:22,719
Speaker 5: was very corrupt, and there was the Socialist leader of Italy, Mattiotti,

713
00:38:23,080 --> 00:38:27,080
Speaker 5: was denouncing him in parliament. He was denouncing election fraud

714
00:38:27,360 --> 00:38:30,000
Speaker 5: that they were trying to pull off, and so Mussoleni

715
00:38:30,040 --> 00:38:33,640
Speaker 5: had him murdered and they opened an investigation, and there

716
00:38:33,680 --> 00:38:36,360
Speaker 5: were calls for him to resign and he was probably

717
00:38:36,360 --> 00:38:39,640
Speaker 5: going to go to prison, so he declared dictatorship to

718
00:38:39,920 --> 00:38:42,520
Speaker 5: escape an investigation and be able to shut it down.

719
00:38:43,080 --> 00:38:47,000
Speaker 5: So this is all very relevant to started a series

720
00:38:47,080 --> 00:38:51,360
Speaker 5: of a strongman some operating in democracy like Netta Nahou

721
00:38:51,680 --> 00:38:56,319
Speaker 5: or bare Lusconi, where if you have problems, you run

722
00:38:56,360 --> 00:38:58,640
Speaker 5: for office and you have to get more back into

723
00:38:58,680 --> 00:39:01,920
Speaker 5: office so you can shut down down the investigation and

724
00:39:01,960 --> 00:39:03,880
Speaker 5: you can make yourself feel safe forever.

725
00:39:04,239 --> 00:39:06,600
Speaker 1: One of the things I think about when I think

726
00:39:06,640 --> 00:39:10,680
Speaker 1: about Mussolini is he was charismatic in a way that

727
00:39:11,000 --> 00:39:14,840
Speaker 1: Hitler wasn't quite ascarse as will you talk about. Because

728
00:39:14,920 --> 00:39:18,280
Speaker 1: one of the things with Trump and with the vague.

729
00:39:18,520 --> 00:39:24,520
Speaker 1: Is there's a certain kind of huckster quality that I

730
00:39:24,600 --> 00:39:28,560
Speaker 1: think is really how Donald Trump has gotten so far.

731
00:39:29,000 --> 00:39:32,319
Speaker 5: Well, yeah, in his case, he sees a con man

732
00:39:32,680 --> 00:39:36,160
Speaker 5: and had a long history of dealing with criminals through

733
00:39:36,200 --> 00:39:39,960
Speaker 5: his businesses. But a lot of these strong men who

734
00:39:40,000 --> 00:39:42,560
Speaker 5: have success, it's very interesting that a lot of them

735
00:39:42,640 --> 00:39:47,000
Speaker 5: come from a background of journalism or entertainment, and they

736
00:39:47,040 --> 00:39:50,000
Speaker 5: know how to work a crowd. Indeed, they scan the

737
00:39:50,000 --> 00:39:55,400
Speaker 5: political marketplace before venturing out, and they see what is lacking,

738
00:39:55,480 --> 00:39:59,439
Speaker 5: what is needed, and then they address those needs and

739
00:40:00,000 --> 00:40:02,480
Speaker 5: they will be whatever they need to be to get

740
00:40:02,480 --> 00:40:06,520
Speaker 5: to power. And so that's where they pick up endorsers

741
00:40:06,560 --> 00:40:09,600
Speaker 5: and enablers along the way, and they often throw them

742
00:40:09,640 --> 00:40:11,960
Speaker 5: under the bus when they don't need them anymore. But

743
00:40:12,040 --> 00:40:16,920
Speaker 5: their charisma is extremely important in them being able to

744
00:40:16,960 --> 00:40:20,640
Speaker 5: have these kind of this loyalty, this fanatic loyalty, but

745
00:40:20,719 --> 00:40:24,279
Speaker 5: it's cultivated. So Trump knew he's a showman. He's very

746
00:40:24,280 --> 00:40:27,720
Speaker 5: good at that, and he's superb propagandist. But he built

747
00:40:27,800 --> 00:40:31,640
Speaker 5: up this loyalty very early on, having loyalty oaths as

748
00:40:31,640 --> 00:40:36,200
Speaker 5: early as twenty fifteen, twenty sixteen. And so when we

749
00:40:36,239 --> 00:40:41,879
Speaker 5: look back we see somebody who ceaselessly, relentlessly cultivated this

750
00:40:41,960 --> 00:40:45,040
Speaker 5: kind of leader cult and used his charisma to build

751
00:40:45,120 --> 00:40:48,440
Speaker 5: up his base. Here we are seven years later, and

752
00:40:48,480 --> 00:40:51,719
Speaker 5: there's a recent poll that has people talking because it

753
00:40:51,800 --> 00:40:56,080
Speaker 5: said that among the most fervent, they trust Trump more

754
00:40:56,120 --> 00:40:58,040
Speaker 5: than they trust their family members.

755
00:40:58,360 --> 00:41:01,320
Speaker 3: Yeah, that was a really interesting and worrying Paul.

756
00:41:01,200 --> 00:41:04,360
Speaker 5: And that's why I've been saying for years that Trump

757
00:41:04,600 --> 00:41:06,840
Speaker 5: is a cult leader. He has a leader cull and

758
00:41:06,880 --> 00:41:09,440
Speaker 5: that's why he's in my book because there are things

759
00:41:09,480 --> 00:41:11,719
Speaker 5: that are very different today. Right, we don't have as

760
00:41:11,719 --> 00:41:14,480
Speaker 5: many one party states, we have social media. But the

761
00:41:14,520 --> 00:41:18,719
Speaker 5: process of cultivating your followers and having a cult and

762
00:41:18,840 --> 00:41:22,880
Speaker 5: using your machismo and being brutal and lawless and having

763
00:41:22,880 --> 00:41:27,160
Speaker 5: that be glamorized, that's the same as Mussoline.

764
00:41:26,680 --> 00:41:29,160
Speaker 3: Right, but also the same as Berlsconi.

765
00:41:29,480 --> 00:41:33,239
Speaker 5: Yeah, and Berlisconi. He you know, he's not taken seriously. Oh,

766
00:41:33,239 --> 00:41:36,040
Speaker 5: there's not much interest in him. But he's absolutely fundamental

767
00:41:36,200 --> 00:41:41,160
Speaker 5: because he broke taboos in the nineteen nineties after you know,

768
00:41:41,360 --> 00:41:45,000
Speaker 5: right after communism had fallen. He was the first to

769
00:41:45,160 --> 00:41:49,479
Speaker 5: bring fascist into power into the government, and he broke

770
00:41:49,560 --> 00:41:54,160
Speaker 5: that taboo for all of Europe, and he normalized neo fascism,

771
00:41:54,440 --> 00:41:56,600
Speaker 5: and he normalized Mussolini.

772
00:41:56,880 --> 00:41:58,800
Speaker 3: And I actually had.

773
00:41:58,600 --> 00:42:02,560
Speaker 5: A full bright there during his first government, and I

774
00:42:02,600 --> 00:42:05,960
Speaker 5: saw this happening. And I'd been going to Italy and

775
00:42:06,160 --> 00:42:08,520
Speaker 5: I would go to the dry cleaner or wherever, and

776
00:42:08,640 --> 00:42:10,600
Speaker 5: I would, you know, the woman would say, oh, your

777
00:42:10,640 --> 00:42:13,480
Speaker 5: talent's so good when you studying, and I'd say fascism

778
00:42:13,840 --> 00:42:17,560
Speaker 5: and there would be this embarrassed silence. After Breosconi had

779
00:42:17,600 --> 00:42:21,400
Speaker 5: these three different, you know, center right governments with neo fascists,

780
00:42:21,920 --> 00:42:26,120
Speaker 5: it became like the people could say what they previously

781
00:42:26,160 --> 00:42:29,759
Speaker 5: said only in private. So I heard Pauh Mussolini was

782
00:42:29,800 --> 00:42:33,760
Speaker 5: such a good ruler, and one woman said he only

783
00:42:34,000 --> 00:42:38,240
Speaker 5: harmed subversives and Jews, like, okay, that was fine, right, It's.

784
00:42:38,120 --> 00:42:39,520
Speaker 3: Only subversives and Jews.

785
00:42:40,040 --> 00:42:43,719
Speaker 5: So I lived through this normalization of neo fascism, and

786
00:42:44,120 --> 00:42:48,520
Speaker 5: that experience of seeing how it changed among the general

787
00:42:48,560 --> 00:42:52,840
Speaker 5: public allowed me to see very early that Trump was

788
00:42:52,880 --> 00:42:55,320
Speaker 5: going to do the same thing with you. Signaling to

789
00:42:55,440 --> 00:42:59,600
Speaker 5: extremists and calling neo Nazis very fine people. All of

790
00:42:59,640 --> 00:43:05,440
Speaker 5: this was calculated to create an environment conducive to accepting him.

791
00:43:05,480 --> 00:43:09,040
Speaker 5: As an authoritarian, accepting violence and all that goes with it.

792
00:43:09,320 --> 00:43:14,160
Speaker 1: Right, it's such an interesting, important piece of this puzzle.

793
00:43:14,480 --> 00:43:20,440
Speaker 1: So let's talk about sort of authoritarianism as it is now.

794
00:43:21,000 --> 00:43:24,920
Speaker 1: It's crisscross the globe in different places, but right now

795
00:43:25,000 --> 00:43:28,440
Speaker 1: Italy has yet again a pretty scary government.

796
00:43:28,560 --> 00:43:30,719
Speaker 3: Will you talk about Maloney?

797
00:43:31,160 --> 00:43:35,640
Speaker 5: Jojo Maloney is the first prime minister to come from

798
00:43:35,680 --> 00:43:40,840
Speaker 5: neo fascism, and she masquerades as a conservative and she

799
00:43:41,239 --> 00:43:45,080
Speaker 5: is pro you know, helping Ukraine, that's kind of her alibi.

800
00:43:45,520 --> 00:43:49,960
Speaker 5: But in her domestic policies she is a hardcore extremist

801
00:43:50,440 --> 00:43:53,800
Speaker 5: and she always has been. She insisted when she founded

802
00:43:53,800 --> 00:43:57,440
Speaker 5: her brother's a Italy party, she insisted on leaving the

803
00:43:57,480 --> 00:44:01,480
Speaker 5: frame in the party logo and that flame goes all

804
00:44:01,480 --> 00:44:04,719
Speaker 5: the way back to the original neo fascist party that

805
00:44:04,840 --> 00:44:08,560
Speaker 5: was founded after Mussolini's party died in nineteen forty five.

806
00:44:08,800 --> 00:44:12,200
Speaker 5: The flame stands for keeping the spirit of Mussolinia alive.

807
00:44:12,880 --> 00:44:16,600
Speaker 5: She is a creature of Mussolini, who is her spiritual leader,

808
00:44:16,680 --> 00:44:20,240
Speaker 5: let's say, but also Berlusconi. Berlusconi was the first person

809
00:44:20,280 --> 00:44:22,960
Speaker 5: to make her a minister. She was very young and

810
00:44:23,080 --> 00:44:27,000
Speaker 5: so all of that heritage of both ber Lusconi and

811
00:44:27,280 --> 00:44:30,799
Speaker 5: Mussolini goes into her government, and it's important to know

812
00:44:31,440 --> 00:44:35,640
Speaker 5: how extreme she is because she's covering it up very

813
00:44:35,640 --> 00:44:40,080
Speaker 5: well now. So on the subject of great replacement theory,

814
00:44:40,160 --> 00:44:44,040
Speaker 5: which is an international talking point that Gop shares with

815
00:44:44,160 --> 00:44:48,640
Speaker 5: Orebon with her party, she doesn't just believe that Italy,

816
00:44:49,160 --> 00:44:52,800
Speaker 5: being a white Christian nation, is threatened by demographic change.

817
00:44:53,080 --> 00:44:57,080
Speaker 5: She thinks there's a plot by George Soros, of course,

818
00:44:57,200 --> 00:45:01,400
Speaker 5: by the by NATO, by the e to flood Italy

819
00:45:01,560 --> 00:45:06,759
Speaker 5: with non white immigrants and thus make white Italians extinct.

820
00:45:06,920 --> 00:45:10,040
Speaker 5: And she has a very scary phrase for this, called

821
00:45:10,160 --> 00:45:14,480
Speaker 5: ethnic substitution. I'm focusing on this because she's getting a

822
00:45:14,480 --> 00:45:16,520
Speaker 5: lot of press and she had a nice visit with

823
00:45:16,560 --> 00:45:20,600
Speaker 5: Biden because of her stance on Ukraine. But that's allowing

824
00:45:20,719 --> 00:45:24,520
Speaker 5: her to seem normal to the outside world, so that

825
00:45:24,600 --> 00:45:27,279
Speaker 5: she can more easily be extreme at.

826
00:45:27,239 --> 00:45:31,120
Speaker 1: Home, and I think that is a really important data point.

827
00:45:31,160 --> 00:45:34,520
Speaker 1: She's also made it harder for gay couples to adopt right.

828
00:45:34,920 --> 00:45:39,520
Speaker 5: Yeah, she's against same sex marriage, adopting against surrogacy, and

829
00:45:39,560 --> 00:45:43,200
Speaker 5: so here we in Italy of course got the Vatican inside.

830
00:45:43,560 --> 00:45:45,920
Speaker 5: It's its own state, of course, and the people she

831
00:45:46,000 --> 00:45:50,000
Speaker 5: has in your government as ministers either come from the

832
00:45:50,120 --> 00:45:53,560
Speaker 5: very far right Catholic. Her Minister of Family, who's in

833
00:45:53,640 --> 00:45:56,640
Speaker 5: charge of a lot of this family policy that's that's

834
00:45:56,719 --> 00:46:00,239
Speaker 5: courting LGBTQ people, is from that far right Catholics like

835
00:46:00,560 --> 00:46:03,320
Speaker 5: or They were actually neo fascists like her in their youth.

836
00:46:03,600 --> 00:46:07,279
Speaker 5: I've analyzed all of her cabinet and it's basically neo

837
00:46:07,320 --> 00:46:09,239
Speaker 5: fascist and fanatic Catholics.

838
00:46:09,600 --> 00:46:12,520
Speaker 1: So let's pull back and talk a little bit about Orbon.

839
00:46:13,120 --> 00:46:16,840
Speaker 1: Orbon is a favorite, a GOP favorite. I was hoping

840
00:46:16,920 --> 00:46:20,520
Speaker 1: you could just zoom in on where he is now

841
00:46:20,560 --> 00:46:22,160
Speaker 1: and where the GOP.

842
00:46:22,000 --> 00:46:22,520
Speaker 3: Is with him.

843
00:46:22,800 --> 00:46:23,000
Speaker 2: Yeah.

844
00:46:23,040 --> 00:46:26,000
Speaker 5: One thing that we need to focus on a bit

845
00:46:26,000 --> 00:46:29,520
Speaker 5: more is so, as you know, I consider the GOP

846
00:46:29,680 --> 00:46:32,279
Speaker 5: and autocratic party now, it is a party with a

847
00:46:32,360 --> 00:46:35,520
Speaker 5: leader cult. It is a party that is dependent on

848
00:46:36,239 --> 00:46:38,560
Speaker 5: lying on corruption and election.

849
00:46:38,360 --> 00:46:40,640
Speaker 3: Denial as a form of corruption. It's not just.

850
00:46:40,800 --> 00:46:44,719
Speaker 5: A lie, it's on violence. Of course, the GOP has

851
00:46:44,920 --> 00:46:49,080
Speaker 5: officially declared in twenty twenty two that January sixth was

852
00:46:49,160 --> 00:46:53,759
Speaker 5: quote legitimate political discourse. Okay, So that's all of that

853
00:46:53,880 --> 00:46:56,839
Speaker 5: and much more. They are an autocratic party, they're not

854
00:46:56,920 --> 00:47:02,080
Speaker 5: interested in democracy. But ever free party, especially a huge

855
00:47:02,120 --> 00:47:05,720
Speaker 5: party in a bipartisan country, has a kind of foreign

856
00:47:05,800 --> 00:47:10,440
Speaker 5: policy stands. And the GOP, it's not known enough that

857
00:47:10,560 --> 00:47:13,840
Speaker 5: it has very close relations with all kinds of autocracies.

858
00:47:14,400 --> 00:47:17,000
Speaker 5: And we see it in the talking points, whether it's

859
00:47:17,040 --> 00:47:23,040
Speaker 5: on immigration or great Replacement theory or Ukraine where they circulate.

860
00:47:23,200 --> 00:47:26,239
Speaker 5: And the one that's gotten the most attention is the

861
00:47:26,280 --> 00:47:31,080
Speaker 5: GOP in Orbon because Tucker Carlson broadcast for a week

862
00:47:31,200 --> 00:47:35,600
Speaker 5: there and Seatpack has its conferences there. So the GOP

863
00:47:35,880 --> 00:47:39,760
Speaker 5: is seen by these people, including Maloney. Maloney right before

864
00:47:39,760 --> 00:47:42,960
Speaker 5: she was elected, she said that she sees the GOP

865
00:47:43,040 --> 00:47:45,960
Speaker 5: as a kindred spirit. So I think Americans need to

866
00:47:46,040 --> 00:47:49,759
Speaker 5: understand that the GOP is seen by these autocrats and

867
00:47:49,880 --> 00:47:54,520
Speaker 5: neo fascists as one of their own, and Orbon is

868
00:47:54,520 --> 00:47:57,160
Speaker 5: the mentor of in a way, because he's been so

869
00:47:57,200 --> 00:48:02,200
Speaker 5: successful at what's called electoral autop. You keep the trappings

870
00:48:02,200 --> 00:48:05,640
Speaker 5: of elections, but over time, and he's been there, you know,

871
00:48:05,680 --> 00:48:07,640
Speaker 5: over a decade, so he's had time to do this.

872
00:48:08,360 --> 00:48:12,839
Speaker 5: You rig this system by purging non loyalists not only

873
00:48:12,880 --> 00:48:17,000
Speaker 5: from the election around apparatus, but the judiciary, you domesticate

874
00:48:17,080 --> 00:48:20,360
Speaker 5: the media. It's very hard for in the last election,

875
00:48:20,480 --> 00:48:24,600
Speaker 5: the opposition coalition didn't get a lot of national media

876
00:48:24,640 --> 00:48:29,160
Speaker 5: airtime because his cronies have taken over the media. So

877
00:48:29,600 --> 00:48:33,319
Speaker 5: you do all these things so that the elections are

878
00:48:33,360 --> 00:48:35,440
Speaker 5: weighted to come out the way you need them to.

879
00:48:35,880 --> 00:48:39,800
Speaker 5: And the Republicans who go there and love him, that's

880
00:48:39,880 --> 00:48:42,000
Speaker 5: one of the lessons that they're taking away.

881
00:48:42,520 --> 00:48:46,400
Speaker 1: One of the things you see again and again with

882
00:48:47,239 --> 00:48:51,880
Speaker 1: Ron de Santis is like he's constantly targeting the media.

883
00:48:51,960 --> 00:48:54,880
Speaker 1: And even when we saw that super Pack memo that

884
00:48:55,040 --> 00:48:57,360
Speaker 1: was released, every bit of it was like, let's just

885
00:48:57,440 --> 00:48:59,760
Speaker 1: go for the media. And even last night he was saying,

886
00:49:00,120 --> 00:49:02,000
Speaker 1: this is really the fault of the media. This has

887
00:49:02,040 --> 00:49:03,960
Speaker 1: nothing to do with anyone but the media. I mean,

888
00:49:04,160 --> 00:49:06,799
Speaker 1: you really do see how hatred of the media is

889
00:49:07,320 --> 00:49:11,360
Speaker 1: and shutting down the media itself is really a crucial

890
00:49:11,480 --> 00:49:13,760
Speaker 1: aspect of this authoritarian regime.

891
00:49:14,160 --> 00:49:16,879
Speaker 5: Yeah, it is, and I talk about this in my book.

892
00:49:16,920 --> 00:49:21,719
Speaker 5: That is absolutely essential. And the smart authoritarian starts this

893
00:49:21,880 --> 00:49:25,640
Speaker 5: campaign against the media while they're still running for office

894
00:49:25,880 --> 00:49:29,759
Speaker 5: and they have to build and Trump did this very effectively,

895
00:49:30,360 --> 00:49:32,759
Speaker 5: and so DeSantis, of course being a mini Trump has

896
00:49:32,880 --> 00:49:35,879
Speaker 5: learned from this. So in Trump's case, for example, there

897
00:49:35,880 --> 00:49:39,799
Speaker 5: were plenty of people who are already racists, plenty of

898
00:49:39,800 --> 00:49:43,360
Speaker 5: people hated immigrants and so on, and there was a

899
00:49:43,480 --> 00:49:47,560
Speaker 5: very robust tea party and other discourse against the quote

900
00:49:47,600 --> 00:49:51,400
Speaker 5: mainstream media. Fine, but Trump was the first to truly

901
00:49:51,520 --> 00:49:55,840
Speaker 5: focus on journalists as enemies and demonize them, and he

902
00:49:55,920 --> 00:49:59,440
Speaker 5: did that spatially with his rallies. How he penned them up.

903
00:50:00,040 --> 00:50:03,320
Speaker 5: So the reason they do this is they must become

904
00:50:03,360 --> 00:50:05,840
Speaker 5: the only arbiter of truth. This is part of the

905
00:50:05,880 --> 00:50:11,319
Speaker 5: loyalty business. Also, more practically, they are all corrupt, and

906
00:50:11,880 --> 00:50:15,440
Speaker 5: if their secrets come out, whether it's during the campaign

907
00:50:15,560 --> 00:50:18,280
Speaker 5: or when they're elected, they need the public to already

908
00:50:18,320 --> 00:50:21,400
Speaker 5: be turned against the media, to already believe that the

909
00:50:21,560 --> 00:50:24,840
Speaker 5: media are partisan hacks. And so it's part of a

910
00:50:24,960 --> 00:50:30,120
Speaker 5: process of cultivation and it's worked brilliantly. So Ronda Santis

911
00:50:29,640 --> 00:50:33,239
Speaker 5: He's watched all this and he thinks he has to

912
00:50:33,239 --> 00:50:36,920
Speaker 5: do this too. He's also an unlikable, disagreeable person who

913
00:50:37,000 --> 00:50:40,040
Speaker 5: has not had good media because of this and is

914
00:50:40,160 --> 00:50:43,760
Speaker 5: just very bitter. But there's also a political strategy behind it.

915
00:50:43,960 --> 00:50:47,200
Speaker 1: So interesting Ruth, I hope you'll come back anytime.

916
00:50:47,440 --> 00:50:47,799
Speaker 3: Thank you.

917
00:50:50,160 --> 00:50:53,960
Speaker 2: They're as.

918
00:50:54,160 --> 00:50:59,960
Speaker 3: Jesse Cannon, Molly John Fast for vic Ramaswami cannot disappear

919
00:51:00,160 --> 00:51:03,600
Speaker 3: fast enough. This fucking guy, Oh my god.

920
00:51:04,040 --> 00:51:08,160
Speaker 1: Vivek was on Dana Bashi's show, A State of the Union,

921
00:51:08,320 --> 00:51:13,320
Speaker 1: and she asked him about his KKK comment that he

922
00:51:13,520 --> 00:51:18,160
Speaker 1: compared Democrats to the KKK, and then instead of saying,

923
00:51:18,200 --> 00:51:21,600
Speaker 1: you know, obviously Democrats are not members of the KKK,

924
00:51:22,239 --> 00:51:26,080
Speaker 1: he instead just doubled down and he said something to

925
00:51:26,080 --> 00:51:28,520
Speaker 1: the effect of Democrats judge people on their skin color,

926
00:51:28,760 --> 00:51:33,080
Speaker 1: which there's no evidence to support this, and thus they

927
00:51:33,120 --> 00:51:37,279
Speaker 1: are the same as the KKK. I mean, I guess

928
00:51:37,440 --> 00:51:43,640
Speaker 1: when everything is false equivalencies, then these two false equivalencies

929
00:51:43,680 --> 00:51:49,000
Speaker 1: can be falsely equivalent. But for that the veak rhymes

930
00:51:49,000 --> 00:51:53,440
Speaker 1: with cake is our moment of fuckery. That's it for

931
00:51:53,560 --> 00:51:57,360
Speaker 1: this episode of Fast Politics. Tune in every Monday, Wednesday

932
00:51:57,360 --> 00:52:00,319
Speaker 1: and Friday to hear the best minds in politics makes

933
00:52:00,360 --> 00:52:03,640
Speaker 1: sense of all this chaos. If you enjoyed what you've heard,

934
00:52:04,000 --> 00:52:06,920
Speaker 1: please send it to a friend and keep the conversation going.

935
00:52:07,320 --> 00:52:09,000
Speaker 1: And again, thanks for listening.