Speaker 1: Hi, I'm Molly John Fast and this is Fast Politics,
Speaker 1: where we discussed the top political headlines with some of
Speaker 1: today's best minds, and President Biden says, you can't love
Speaker 1: your country only when you win. We have such an
Speaker 1: interesting show today. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buddha Judge stops
Speaker 1: by to talk to us about Democrats going on Fox
Speaker 1: News and mid term voter values. And then we're lucky
Speaker 1: enough to be joined by Justice Democrats will lead Shahid,
Speaker 1: who will tell us about what he's seeing as we
Speaker 1: head into the mid terms. But first we have the
Speaker 1: time of Monsters, podcaster and writer at the Nation. Get here.
Speaker 1: Welcome to Fast Politics. Jeet here, that's me. How happy
Speaker 1: are you that you live in Canada? Pretty happy? Dirk
Speaker 1: Clouds on the horizon. Even here we have the head
Speaker 1: of the Ontario Conservative Party to give you an idea
Speaker 1: of what things are like. Here is a huge fan
Speaker 1: of both Richard Nixon and Roger Storm that's been tweeting
Speaker 1: on how much he loves Roger Storm. Yeah. Unfortunately, you know,
Speaker 1: the old joke is America sneezes and Canada gets a cold.
Speaker 1: We're not going to prognosticate, but we can talk about
Speaker 1: this state of American democracy, because why shouldn't we Let's
Speaker 1: talk about it right now. Are you was worried as
Speaker 1: President Biden about the state of American democracy? Yeah, no, absolutely,
Speaker 1: I mean yeah, I think that uh you know, I mean,
Speaker 1: you're long time listeners will know all the reasons to
Speaker 1: be concerned about the authority in train of the GOP.
Speaker 1: What we're seeing in this election is like it goes
Speaker 1: far beyond Trump. One thing that struck out to me
Speaker 1: was the Republican governatorial candidate in Wisconsin basically said if
Speaker 1: he wins, you know, Republicans will never lose again in Wisconsin.
Speaker 1: You know, not a great sign for democracy right there.
Speaker 1: No mean, yeah, I just think like they are absolutely
Speaker 1: and one season in especially those great Lake states, but
Speaker 1: also places like North Carolina. You know what happens when
Speaker 1: Republicans take control of the state level, like they will
Speaker 1: jurymander in a way where like Democrats could as they
Speaker 1: have you know, get you know, not just fifty percent
Speaker 1: or eight percent and still being a minority party. So
Speaker 1: I just think it's a very dire situation. And yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, I you know, we won't predict, but there's
Speaker 1: a you know, a real possibility. You know, both the
Speaker 1: House and the Senate could be Republican. And I think
Speaker 1: beyond that, I mean beyond the sort of state of democracy.
Speaker 1: I think it's important to understand the dynamics within the
Speaker 1: Republican Party that are going to make things very dire.
Speaker 1: And I think it's good to go back to the
Speaker 1: sort of election with Nut Ingred and what happened there,
Speaker 1: because Ingred was able to win by, you know, by
Speaker 1: being very demogoguic painting the Democrats is corrupt and really
Speaker 1: stirring up the you know, the fruitcakes and you know
Speaker 1: people the black helicopter people like Helen Cheno, the militia people,
Speaker 1: and they want, they want, they want dirty, but they want.
Speaker 1: But the thing is that ging Ridge himself, you know,
Speaker 1: who's like not a wilthy flower. He could not control
Speaker 1: his own party because elected so many fire right people
Speaker 1: and they were a big part of the caucus and
Speaker 1: they thought, you know, ging Ridge didn't want the impeachment.
Speaker 1: And this is something worth remember. Gingli thought it was
Speaker 1: bad politics to impeach Bill Clinton over you know what
Speaker 1: is you know, like an activity that many people enjoy.
Speaker 1: That reminder, I think your your mother has written, Yes,
Speaker 1: another great reminder. But ging Ridge could not control his
Speaker 1: own caucus because they had, you know, had an extreme
Speaker 1: fringe caucus. You know, like ging Ridge looks like a giant.
Speaker 1: He looks like Abraham freaking Lincoln compared to like McCarthy
Speaker 1: and so McCarthy. If let's say the Republicans win in
Speaker 1: the House, McCarthy is like the speaker. He's not gonna
Speaker 1: be able to control the crazies. And they will absolutely
Speaker 1: at a minimum, I'm calling it out. We're gonna see
Speaker 1: the impeachment of Joe Biden what I don't know, and
Speaker 1: the Homeland Security secretary, I mean, my orcha. I think
Speaker 1: we're gonna see endless and impeachments and investigations and over
Speaker 1: like you know, you know, you you name your son Hunter.
Speaker 1: That's an impeachable offense, right like just I'm fully expecting
Speaker 1: to be called up there, you know, I mean, they're
Speaker 1: just gonna anyone who annoys them is going to end
Speaker 1: up with a congressional investigation, I think. And that is
Speaker 1: like both scary and also um I think imminent, But
Speaker 1: I do think ultimately that will backfire on them, hopefully
Speaker 1: if we have democracy in place. But if we don't
Speaker 1: have democracy in place, it won't matter. It will be
Speaker 1: an overreach. And you know, if the ninety nineties and
Speaker 1: even more recent histories any guide you kill him in
Speaker 1: twenty four thing, we should underestimate the amount of damage
Speaker 1: that they can do. And what is these investigations and
Speaker 1: probably a phony impeachment over nothing. The second is that
Speaker 1: they're gonna try to use the leverage the debt and
Speaker 1: leverage to the dead ceiling to try to push through
Speaker 1: like you know, Medicare and Social Security cards and you know,
Speaker 1: like again you're gonna have the most extreme Republican Congress
Speaker 1: ever and you know, like they might pull the trigger
Speaker 1: on stuff that other previous converses weren't willing to do,
Speaker 1: and you know, like we could have a real financial crisis.
Speaker 1: And they're already talking about working around with the dead sailing.
Speaker 1: They Yeah, they are talking about it. I think they're
Speaker 1: gonna do it. I mean, I think we have to
Speaker 1: take these people at their word. I think we have
Speaker 1: to understand the dynamic, which is that if they're not
Speaker 1: willing to like, you know, sanction Marguerite Taylor Green for
Speaker 1: like saying like just the most horrific stuff as really
Speaker 1: literally hanging out with Nazis. Then you know, like that
Speaker 1: that really means that Margie Taylor Green and that faction
Speaker 1: Republican Party is in charge, and they will they will
Speaker 1: be like in the driver's seat. I think it's gonna
Speaker 1: be great. I mean, like, you know, like American politics.
Speaker 1: I think, at least since Obama was like having a
Speaker 1: seesaw right, like it's a fifty you know, it's a
Speaker 1: fifty one forty nine eight, and so you know, like
Speaker 1: in off years, Republicans can gain some victories, but then
Speaker 1: they'll get pushed back. So they won't be pushed back.
Speaker 1: So that's the robust side of democracy. Like I think,
Speaker 1: I don't think they could end democracy quickly enough to
Speaker 1: stop like you know, like a democratic wave coming in.
Speaker 1: But it's gonna be really rocky and really dangerous. And
Speaker 1: I think they're gonna be fool around with stuff like
Speaker 1: the economy right in the dead ceiling and foreign policy,
Speaker 1: right money to Ukraine. They already said they're going to
Speaker 1: do that absolutely, and if you look at the polling,
Speaker 1: half of the Republicans already think, like, you know, Americans
Speaker 1: doing too much for Ukraine. I think that's gonna be
Speaker 1: like really, uh, but even beyond Ukraine, I mean, I
Speaker 1: think one of the interesting things is that, like you know,
Speaker 1: in the Cold War and even beyond the Cold War
Speaker 1: into Clinton and Bush, you did have a kind of
Speaker 1: foreign policy consensus, and you know, like Republicans Democrats agree
Speaker 1: on some issues. Some of the time that's kind of
Speaker 1: broken down and you really see like you know, Republicans
Speaker 1: like alligning themselves. One can say too much about like
Speaker 1: maybe Putin, but sir, only with like Netta Yah who
Speaker 1: certainly with the Crown Prince Mohammed been Salmon, like these
Speaker 1: are like foreign leaders who like are not like the
Speaker 1: foreign leaders of the past who think like, well, we
Speaker 1: got to keep both Democrats and Republicans happy because either
Speaker 1: one could be empowered. They've like really like put all
Speaker 1: their chips into the Republican Party. What happens to foreign
Speaker 1: policy when you have like, you know, one party that
Speaker 1: where there's no consensus and one party is willing to
Speaker 1: you know, work with regimes that are fairly hostile to
Speaker 1: the US. And Mohammed been Salmon already did the GOP
Speaker 1: a huge like favor, you know, like he did them
Speaker 1: like he did the Massola because of raising the gas prices. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: by by raising a gas prices a month before the election.
Speaker 1: Think about if a Republican had been president and Mohammed
Speaker 1: been Salmon had been like, fuck you, We're going to
Speaker 1: raise gas prices. This is fun for us who are OPEC.
Speaker 1: This is what we do. Imagine if Trump had been president,
Speaker 1: what do you think you would have done, I mean,
Speaker 1: gone to war with Yeah, it's really threatened. I mean
Speaker 1: think Obama was right in the sense that like Trump
Speaker 1: is a little bit where you've actually like full military action,
Speaker 1: but he was only remaking, you know, usually tweeting out
Speaker 1: like you know, like yeah, we're gonna bomb, we will
Speaker 1: take over the old fields. And to some degree, Democrats
Speaker 1: are a little bit playing catch up. But you did
Speaker 1: see some Democrats talking about ending the Saudia Alliance, and
Speaker 1: I think you can see more and more of that.
Speaker 1: But I mean what I want to say is the
Speaker 1: broader picture, which is that you can't have a normal
Speaker 1: system of the United States being allied with certain countries
Speaker 1: and making agreements if you have this sort of seesaw
Speaker 1: politics and then sort of polarized politics because whatever Biden
Speaker 1: agreement fighting makes with the Ukrainians or with sul or
Speaker 1: Saudi Arabia. He's got to know that that's all up
Speaker 1: for grabs now that and the Courbas actually has a
Speaker 1: lot of power. People think, well, the president runs more
Speaker 1: in Polosky, but you know, Comress Act has a bit
Speaker 1: a bit of power to like actually check that, and
Speaker 1: especially in terms of like where funding goes. I just
Speaker 1: kind of think it's gonna be a real period of instability.
Speaker 1: I just think, like, you know, I'm really not sure
Speaker 1: like how you govern a country in that situation where
Speaker 1: you have a party that is so nihilistic and so
Speaker 1: willing to like you know, like just do everything for
Speaker 1: partisan gain. Everything is just really so focused on power
Speaker 1: that everything else goes out the window, including you know,
Speaker 1: the idea that you shouldn't work with foreign regimes to
Speaker 1: undermine your own government. There's no idea of cheating in
Speaker 1: this new Republican party, right because all that's valued is winning.
Speaker 1: And so I do think we're ultimately you know, if
Speaker 1: truth doesn't exist, I wrote about this like post truth
Speaker 1: mid term phenomenon, and if truth doesn't exist and none
Speaker 1: of our norms exist, I mean, what stops anyone? I mean,
Speaker 1: maybe nothing stops any of them. Yeah, no, exactly exactly.
Speaker 1: And I mean I think that you know, the attack
Speaker 1: on the Pelosi household and you know, the horrifect thing
Speaker 1: with Pap Polos, he like kind of illustrates us just
Speaker 1: like on a very basic human level, like to have
Speaker 1: a functioning society and that includes you know, like just
Speaker 1: a society as well as the politics, but includes politics.
Speaker 1: You kind of have to like see other people as human, right,
Speaker 1: and you have to be like when Kennedy was shot,
Speaker 1: like Richard Nixon, you know, wrote a letter to Jackie
Speaker 1: onassas you know Kennedy, like you know Jackie Kenny at
Speaker 1: the time, you know, just saying like, you know, like
Speaker 1: how sare you was? And you know there weren't people saying, well,
Speaker 1: you know, was Oswald in a love triangle? That's why
Speaker 1: you regular shot? Excuse me, there may be more to
Speaker 1: this story, you know, a teeny bit more to this story. Yeah,
Speaker 1: when Reagan was shot, you know, like you know, there
Speaker 1: are a lot of people do that myself included doing
Speaker 1: like Reagan, you know, but they weren't saying like well,
Speaker 1: John Hinckley, you know, like maybe uh and uh and
Speaker 1: Reagan where we're sharing a trios with Nancy, like you
Speaker 1: wanted to get Reagan out of the picture so you
Speaker 1: can have Nancy for himself Like that, Yeah, some did
Speaker 1: not happen, and so when it happens, when you get
Speaker 1: the situation, just like even so you have like you know,
Speaker 1: some people come even remember the Congress spreading these lack
Speaker 1: of conspiracy theories, but then other people the lack of
Speaker 1: sympathy for Nancy Pelosi. That's just so striking on a
Speaker 1: human level, Like how do we love a society where
Speaker 1: you can't express sympathy for like a person that underwent
Speaker 1: something like that. I just don't know. He's eighty two
Speaker 1: years old. It's not like I mean, I feel like
Speaker 1: we've seen other political violence where you'd be like, well,
Speaker 1: you know, but with this, it's like he's eighty two
Speaker 1: years old. He's still in the hospital, right, I mean
Speaker 1: my parents are in their eighties. I don't know. I
Speaker 1: mean that was the thing I was surprised by when
Speaker 1: the Pelosi family was like, we know, he's gonna make
Speaker 1: a full recovery. I was like, really, I was like,
Speaker 1: because the eighty three year olds in my life are
Speaker 1: not I mean, I would not want them to be,
Speaker 1: you know, in the hospital having surgery like that, would
Speaker 1: you know, I'm not convinced that they would make full
Speaker 1: recovery race. No, absolutely, absolutely, It's just that it's a
Speaker 1: really horrific thing. But the reaction to it, I mean,
Speaker 1: it just shows how bad things have gotten. And I
Speaker 1: think that like to be more than anything, speaks to
Speaker 1: this democracy crisis. Like you know, we could talk about
Speaker 1: you know, Jerry rendering and like refusals to accept elections
Speaker 1: and all the attempts to like play around with elections
Speaker 1: and and that's all real and serious, but I think
Speaker 1: it's good to think about these things in human terms,
Speaker 1: like how do you have a society? Like if you
Speaker 1: can't express sympathy in that situation, If you have a
Speaker 1: horrific attack on you know, someone who's eighty two years old,
Speaker 1: you know, your first instinct is to politically maximize it
Speaker 1: and to like flame the victim and to just play
Speaker 1: these games. It really speaks to like a kind of
Speaker 1: you know, dehumanized view. And there's a hardcore visions which
Speaker 1: to the Q and On and you know, like I
Speaker 1: sort of wrote about this, but Q and On people
Speaker 1: need to understand that's just conspiracy theory. It an eliminationist ideology.
Speaker 1: That is to say, it's based on the idea that
Speaker 1: the leaders m Car Party are all pedophile monsters and
Speaker 1: they need to be executed and they need to and
Speaker 1: then you have these santasies that maybe Trump secretly executed
Speaker 1: some of these people. But but it is. It is
Speaker 1: the type of you know, three nineteen thirty three Germany situation,
Speaker 1: you know the Jews are cockroaches, or the Runda situation,
Speaker 1: you know, where you know that you call your enemies like,
Speaker 1: you know, sub human, and you create a warrant, you
Speaker 1: create a way in which you think about other people
Speaker 1: that justifies murder. And that's the hardcore version, and the
Speaker 1: software version is, well, you don't necessarily do that, but
Speaker 1: you kind of minimize it. You make up false theories
Speaker 1: about it, you don't confront it, and you don't express
Speaker 1: any sympathy towards the victims. Yeah. Yeah, I feel like
Speaker 1: there's a real sense in which we've like cross this rubicon.
Speaker 1: And I still think that if you had a critical
Speaker 1: mass of Republicans being like this is not how we
Speaker 1: do it, you could stop before things are too late.
Speaker 1: But the problem is, and I think about this a
Speaker 1: lot It's like the problem in inflation is that people
Speaker 1: then feel their money has less value and that makes
Speaker 1: everyone crazy. And this is coming from a pandemic where
Speaker 1: all of us are you know, not all of us,
Speaker 1: but I certainly thought for a couple of weeks there
Speaker 1: that this was the end of it. Right, So we
Speaker 1: have pandemic than inflation, and there's this sort of instability
Speaker 1: in American life that I think is feeding this craziness.
Speaker 1: I mean, obviously right wing leaders are playing up into it,
Speaker 1: but the reason it's so accessible to them is because
Speaker 1: of this destabilized American population. Do you agree or am
Speaker 1: I crazy? Yeah? No, I I think that's right. I
Speaker 1: think that's right. I think that, like they sort of
Speaker 1: what the pandemic and inflation, a lot of people are
Speaker 1: becoming on more than we are becoming destabilized, and you know,
Speaker 1: one sees it in you know, people were once normal
Speaker 1: people but have somehow something has happened to them, you know,
Speaker 1: like I often think of this woman Monica Crawley, who's
Speaker 1: kind of just a generic was just a generic Republican,
Speaker 1: very conservative Fox News type person, but with it, you know,
Speaker 1: had been an assistant to Richard Nixon, but still very
Speaker 1: stable person and now you like look at her and
Speaker 1: she's kind of like tweeting out stuff. You know, these
Speaker 1: conspiracy theories about the pack on pop Pelosi. There are
Speaker 1: people who like we're somehow at one point tethered to
Speaker 1: reality and have become untethered. And I think it's a
Speaker 1: bunch of different factors that are work. I mean, I think,
Speaker 1: you know, even before the COVID, I think Trump himself,
Speaker 1: you know, it was a huge gateway drug just in
Speaker 1: terms of what he was able to get away with,
Speaker 1: and he gave permission to other people to do the
Speaker 1: same thing, to be the kind of conspiratorial and nasty
Speaker 1: and win at any cost. But certainly, like, yeah, I mean,
Speaker 1: the lack of stability, uh in society. I mean, it's
Speaker 1: a big issue. And to be honest, like I just
Speaker 1: don't know, Like I mean, there's a real issue whether
Speaker 1: the Democrats did enough or I mean they didn't have
Speaker 1: them the numbers to do it. But like you know,
Speaker 1: one could imagine if they had like a bigger victory
Speaker 1: in two thousand twenty and more people in Congress in
Speaker 1: the Senate, they could have, like you know, spent a
Speaker 1: lot more money trying to stabilize American life and getting
Speaker 1: things back to normal. But unfortunately what we have is
Speaker 1: just they themselves have kind of embraced a lot of
Speaker 1: the austerity politics and especially to it, like with the Feds,
Speaker 1: you know, like like you know, Jerome pal was kind
Speaker 1: of like you know, raising up those interest rates, and
Speaker 1: you see a lot of like these Larry Summer's type,
Speaker 1: you know, saying that wages have gone up to pass
Speaker 1: and like it's gonna be a really bad combination if
Speaker 1: the Democrats become the party of austerity in a time
Speaker 1: whereas you said, we had both COVID and inflation and
Speaker 1: you know, like people not knowing where they are. To me,
Speaker 1: that's my big worry, Like I think that's the pathway
Speaker 1: where by democracy ins. We don't know how it's gonna go,
Speaker 1: and we're not pregnasticating. One of the many good things
Speaker 1: Jesse Cannon, are wonderful producer, has been drilling to my
Speaker 1: head is that we are not here to pronuncigate. And
Speaker 1: you see these polls and they're all over the place,
Speaker 1: so we really don't know how this is going to
Speaker 1: go down. But it seems to me like Republicans will
Speaker 1: control certainly some part of our government after January. So,
Speaker 1: I mean my sense is that in my mind, the
Speaker 1: thing that worries made the most are like the governorship
Speaker 1: in Arizona, the governorship in Nevada, the places where like
Speaker 1: their swing states where they might not count the votes
Speaker 1: because I don't care about the Senate, I mean I care,
Speaker 1: but where the rubber is going to meet the road
Speaker 1: is going to be the governorship in the Secretary of State,
Speaker 1: right because if Democrats get the votes in twenty four,
Speaker 1: but then the governor decides, we don't do that anymore
Speaker 1: and we need to, you know, keep recounting until Republicans win.
Speaker 1: That I think is more worrying. I mean, they're all worrying,
Speaker 1: but that's one of the many worries that keeps me
Speaker 1: up at night. Yeah, no, I absolutely agree. I mean,
Speaker 1: like we're gonna be entering a new world where, at
Speaker 1: least then on places you have really trump eys candidates
Speaker 1: at real levers of power, and we we don't know
Speaker 1: how to respond to that. We don't know. I mean,
Speaker 1: I just think it's just gonna be a rocky road.
Speaker 1: The positive side of polarization is that if as the
Speaker 1: Replicans do this, more people, more and more people wake up.
Speaker 1: And I think, like the fact that the Democrats are
Speaker 1: competitive at all should be like a saving grace. And
Speaker 1: like the fact is that, like you know, like a
Speaker 1: lot of what the Repicans are doing is brand popular.
Speaker 1: In a normal election year, this would be a democratic
Speaker 1: quite pote And like, actually the post shows something a
Speaker 1: little bit closer and some robustness in unexpected places, like
Speaker 1: while we gotta hope, I mean, the only way we
Speaker 1: hopefully going forward is that, like you know, one has to,
Speaker 1: people will start waking up and realizing what's going on.
Speaker 1: And as the danger increases, I hope the opposition to
Speaker 1: the danger increases. Yeah, no, exactly, And I think that's
Speaker 1: a really good point. Thank you so much, Cheat, This
Speaker 1: was so interesting, always that great to be here, and
Speaker 1: congratulations on your new ascension, your continued rise in the
Speaker 1: meat yet now invented. Pete Buddha Judge is the United
Speaker 1: States Secretary of Transportation. Welcome to Fast Politics, Mayor Pete.
Speaker 1: I know we shouldn't call you mayor Pete anymore, but
Speaker 1: I'll always answer I am so happy to have you,
Speaker 1: and I'm so I want you to explain to us
Speaker 1: a little bit about what your job is Transportation secretary
Speaker 1: and what you have been up to in this sort
Speaker 1: of time right before the midterms. So this is an
Speaker 1: amazing time for transportation. On one hand, we have never
Speaker 1: seen this many simultaneous disruptions to transportation system in my lifetime,
Speaker 1: and then something if you think about everything from container
Speaker 1: shipping to airline cancelations and delays and everything in between,
Speaker 1: but those are mostly for temporary reasons related to the them. Meanwhile,
Speaker 1: we've also never in my lifetime had this much of
Speaker 1: a chance to make investments around the country in making
Speaker 1: transportation better, and those are going to be permanent. So
Speaker 1: it's been a demanding time for anybody who works in transportation,
Speaker 1: but also an incredibly exciting time because while we fight
Speaker 1: these fires and the issues that that have come up
Speaker 1: affecting everything from from goods movement to passenger travel, we're
Speaker 1: also setting ourselves up for successes in country and a
Speaker 1: big part of how I spend my time is looking
Speaker 1: at how to prioritize the use of these funds to
Speaker 1: support projects around the country, from a sport that needs
Speaker 1: to be upgraded, to an airport that's ready for new dates,
Speaker 1: to bridges that need to be improved and keeping money
Speaker 1: flowing to two states and local governments that are actually
Speaker 1: gonna be doing the bulk of the work. We talked
Speaker 1: to us about electric car chargers because I feel like
Speaker 1: that is one of the one of the really kind
Speaker 1: of most important things that is going to be a
Speaker 1: transition for us hopefully. Yeah. So this is a big change,
Speaker 1: and this is the biggest change to driving really since
Speaker 1: the arrival of the modern auto age that started about
Speaker 1: a hundred years ago. It's where the industry is going.
Speaker 1: The industry is going electric here and around the world,
Speaker 1: but we need to work to make sure that it
Speaker 1: happens quickly, to make sure that America wins, that it's
Speaker 1: a native America evy revolution, that we don't get beat
Speaker 1: out by other countries, and to make sure that that
Speaker 1: it's one that that can reach everybody, because we need
Speaker 1: to make sure these evs are easy and affordable to use,
Speaker 1: to own into charge so that people can take advantage of.
Speaker 1: Part of that is making sure we have enough charger
Speaker 1: Now in some way, it's charging infrastructure for people who
Speaker 1: live in single family homes is quite easy. It's actually
Speaker 1: less like a traditional car and more like a phone
Speaker 1: because you can charge at home. On the other hand,
Speaker 1: if you're out on a road trip or if you're
Speaker 1: in a multifamily dwelling, if you're in a big city
Speaker 1: and it's not so simple as just plugging it in
Speaker 1: in your garage, then we've got to have solutions here,
Speaker 1: and it is going to look different than how we're
Speaker 1: used to filling up our cars. Again, easier in some
Speaker 1: ways because many Americans can do it, and how harder
Speaker 1: in other ways because you can't just do it in
Speaker 1: a couple of minutes. You were talking about the sort
Speaker 1: of disruption of the supply chain we saw, you know,
Speaker 1: these ports, like with the l A port, where there
Speaker 1: were lines and lines and lines, and some inflation has
Speaker 1: been caused by this pandemic disruption. Talk to me about
Speaker 1: where we are with that as a source of inflation.
Speaker 1: Dealing with supply chains is part of the fight against inflation.
Speaker 1: What happens is you had these backups of these bottlenecks.
Speaker 1: That means shipping prices go up, and prices are part
Speaker 1: of the cost of the things we pay for it,
Speaker 1: so it's definitely part of the equation when it comes
Speaker 1: to inflations. One of the reasons why We've been working
Speaker 1: on this with such urgency and we've seen a lot
Speaker 1: of improvements. But this time a year ago people were saying,
Speaker 1: as Christmas canceled, nobody's gonna be able to get gives right,
Speaker 1: And what wound up happening was the all time record
Speaker 1: high in terms of retail sales. This time a year ago,
Speaker 1: there were a hundred ships waiting off the coast of
Speaker 1: l A and Long Beach this year. Last time I
Speaker 1: checked it was it was eight or nine. So we've
Speaker 1: seen improvements, but we're definitely not out of the woods.
Speaker 1: We've got issues affecting our rail system, the availability truck drivers,
Speaker 1: in alability of warehouses. You know, good news is demand
Speaker 1: came back, and Rescue Plan and other actions that that
Speaker 1: I believe really are for the results of the President's
Speaker 1: leadership mean that people have the income and the inclination
Speaker 1: to to buy things. But that means that the supply
Speaker 1: chain has struggled to keep up, and that's something we're
Speaker 1: going to work on with immediate measures. But but also
Speaker 1: importantly a part of how we get at that is
Speaker 1: the long term investments. I've of talking about. When you
Speaker 1: can add a birth to a container report, we can
Speaker 1: add a rail line or improve the way of bridge works.
Speaker 1: All of that adds up to goods moving in a
Speaker 1: more fluid way, and that means lower shipping costs and
Speaker 1: ultimately that that's part of how we beat information. One
Speaker 1: of the things you've been really good at is going
Speaker 1: on talks news and sort of being able to message
Speaker 1: in that right wing ecosystem. How do you do it?
Speaker 1: And how can you get all the other Democrats to
Speaker 1: do it too? No pressure pressure. Well, I would never
Speaker 1: have guessed coming to last year that a place like
Speaker 1: Fox News would kind of be a specialty of mine.
Speaker 1: But I think I did form certain habits as a
Speaker 1: mayor in a place like Indiana, doing lots of local television,
Speaker 1: trying to render our priorities in plain English and reach
Speaker 1: people where they are. That doesn't mean that people are
Speaker 1: going to do an into Fox and immediately be converted
Speaker 1: to my point of view. But I do think we
Speaker 1: need to go into these spaces were certainly on my
Speaker 1: side of the I don't need to go into spaces
Speaker 1: where people don't often hear our view because otherwise they'll
Speaker 1: they'll believe whatever they're told. How can you blame them
Speaker 1: for believing the only messages they hear, and I do
Speaker 1: see more and more colleagues from officeholders who belong to
Speaker 1: my party who've been willing to do it. I think,
Speaker 1: you know, you have to draw certain lines. There's certain
Speaker 1: bad faith opinion shows, for example, that I'm just not
Speaker 1: going to go on. But if you can have a
Speaker 1: reasonably fair hearing, I think it's always worth a shot.
Speaker 1: Let's just talk about this for a second. We're coming
Speaker 1: up on the mid terms. Explain to me what if
Speaker 1: you're going to make a case for Democrats, can you
Speaker 1: talk about the infrastruate because infrastructure is a huge thing
Speaker 1: that by and passed. Sort of give us a little
Speaker 1: bit of the nuts and bolts of what is going
Speaker 1: on in your town that Biden has done with American
Speaker 1: Rescue plan. That should be sort of you know, when
Speaker 1: you're talking to your relatives about getting out there and voting.
Speaker 1: So I'll choose my words carefully, just because appearing as
Speaker 1: secretary means I can't elections. But but let me say this,
Speaker 1: the policy achievements of this administration are something I'm very
Speaker 1: very proud of, and we need, we do need to
Speaker 1: talk about that because it's easy to forget how far
Speaker 1: we've come in two years. Two years ago, we were
Speaker 1: millions of jobs shorter than where we are now, with
Speaker 1: the most people working in private sector at any time ever.
Speaker 1: A couple of years ago, we were you know, people
Speaker 1: were still saying, Oh, this infrastructure really going to happen
Speaker 1: or is it just gonna be one more talk of
Speaker 1: the game about it. It was infrastructure every week, infrastructure
Speaker 1: we call the time nothing happened. And then you know,
Speaker 1: as we were negotiating this bill last year, I think
Speaker 1: it was declared dead, you know, half a dozen times.
Speaker 1: We got it done. But you know, I think people
Speaker 1: really care that much about the ins and outs of
Speaker 1: legislative victories, seats and folks obviously want to know how
Speaker 1: this isn't affecting everyday life. And that's why I really
Speaker 1: try to make sure we're conveying. Look, this is how
Speaker 1: you got this new bridge that's under construction in your neighborhood.
Speaker 1: This is why you see these new gates coming into
Speaker 1: the airport that you come on. Is where that new
Speaker 1: bus line is going to come from. You know it's
Speaker 1: coming because the President led and we had a success
Speaker 1: and by the way, including a handful of Republicans crossing
Speaker 1: now to vote with Democrats to get this done. More broadly,
Speaker 1: I think it's also important for us to emphasize what's
Speaker 1: been achieved in terms of the fight against inflation. Right
Speaker 1: this is a global fight. I mean, every developed country
Speaker 1: is dealing with inflation. It's in a lot of European
Speaker 1: countries too, but there are different strategies on what to
Speaker 1: do with it. Now. I have yet to hear any
Speaker 1: congressional Republican answer to inflation. What I will say is
Speaker 1: that we have taken a number of us to take
Speaker 1: the edge off the cost of living someone wh you're
Speaker 1: outside of my transportation lane. But things like getting insulin
Speaker 1: down at thirty five bucks of for people on Medicare.
Speaker 1: You know, we couldn't get one Republican vote to do that,
Speaker 1: but we got it through. And when we think about
Speaker 1: coming back to e VS. Making its cheaper, you know
Speaker 1: we can get any couldn't get any Republicans to help
Speaker 1: us with that, but we did it. It passed, and
Speaker 1: that's going to mean money in the pockets of Americans
Speaker 1: who can get these vehicles more affordably to the tax
Speaker 1: credits and then say money on gas once they have them.
Speaker 1: I want to just go back again for this idea,
Speaker 1: like Republicans don't really have a plan for inflation. It
Speaker 1: would be one thing if we were debating our fight,
Speaker 1: our plans for fighting inflation with their plan for fighting inflation.
Speaker 1: I'd love to have that debate on the floor of
Speaker 1: the Senate, our house, right. Um, but we haven't seen
Speaker 1: any that they like to mention inflation. Because it's the problem,
Speaker 1: but the way they talk about it makes me sometimes
Speaker 1: wonder if they see more value in the problem than
Speaker 1: in solving it, because we haven't heard a lot of solutions.
Speaker 1: I mean that speaks to this idea. The same sort
Speaker 1: of issue with immigration, right, They don't really want to
Speaker 1: solve that problem either. Many of them have stood in
Speaker 1: the way of immigration reform that would put us in
Speaker 1: a much better position when it comes to these issues.
Speaker 1: We're saying it before, so again you'll you'll see an
Speaker 1: enthusiasm for mentioning the problem remarkably little by way of
Speaker 1: a solution. Let's talk about there. I'm not going to
Speaker 1: talk about Fox News as much as I want to
Speaker 1: talk about the rainbow fit. How they managed to get
Speaker 1: everyone upset about rainbow fent at all. Yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: this is something that that really upset me, not as uh,
Speaker 1: you know, a Democrat, but as transportations, because there is
Speaker 1: a very real documented risk for children going out on Halloween.
Speaker 1: And it's not drug dealers randomly deciding to give free
Speaker 1: opioids to two children. It's car catches. I mean that
Speaker 1: that's where kids get killed or hurt on Halloween every
Speaker 1: single year. I'm not sure of a single documented case
Speaker 1: where one of these urban legends of of you know,
Speaker 1: drugs or whatever being put into candy has been documented
Speaker 1: and resulting in a serious injury or death of a
Speaker 1: child randomly triggered treating. But I know of far, far
Speaker 1: too many heartbreaking stories of car crashes, and that's when
Speaker 1: we can do something about. I wish that for every
Speaker 1: story we got about you know, fentanel going into somebody's candy,
Speaker 1: we had a story about news you can use to
Speaker 1: keep your kid physically safe when they're trick or treating,
Speaker 1: because that really is something that that is a safety
Speaker 1: issue to to worry about. And by the way, not
Speaker 1: just on all the more generally, I mean road safety
Speaker 1: that kills forty people a year. We treat that like
Speaker 1: it's normal. It's on par with gun debts in this country,
Speaker 1: and it's not the same as what you see in
Speaker 1: other developed countries. Were taking a lot of steps to
Speaker 1: deal with that, and it deserves to be talked about.
Speaker 1: We should at least be talking about the real killers
Speaker 1: as often as we're talking about the urban leaging. Right. No,
Speaker 1: And I think that's an important point. I mean, this
Speaker 1: shift on reality that you're seeing through right wing media,
Speaker 1: how do you even begin to debunk some of this stuff? Well,
Speaker 1: facts matter, right, We start by talking about things that
Speaker 1: are most important, And it's tricky. Sometimes when you're debunking
Speaker 1: a myth, you wind up helping to spread the myth.
Speaker 1: Allogy is weird that way, So I think often you
Speaker 1: actually have to blow past it and just get to
Speaker 1: what actually matters most um and talk about the facts
Speaker 1: more than we talk about the lives, even if we're
Speaker 1: talking about the lives for the purpose of exposing them.
Speaker 1: I also think that we need to bring it back
Speaker 1: to everyday life. Right, So lots of people who will
Speaker 1: watch and perhaps believe a news story about and do
Speaker 1: not think that happened in there. They don't know anybody
Speaker 1: in their actual life that happens lots of people who
Speaker 1: were tricked into thinking that millions of illegal immigrants voted
Speaker 1: last year do not think that happened that their precinct.
Speaker 1: People who believe all kinds of wild things about elections
Speaker 1: generally actually trust their own local officials to fairly handle elections.
Speaker 1: So on issue after issue, it's one thing to talk
Speaker 1: about it in the abstract. It's another to talk about
Speaker 1: what we're actually experiencing in our actual lives and then
Speaker 1: your actual you know, our actual everyday lives. Infrastructure is
Speaker 1: getting improved, most of us have jobs. We are experiencing
Speaker 1: higher prices, and there are things that are helping with that.
Speaker 1: We need to bring this conversation back to the concrete
Speaker 1: so that you can't get caught up in all this nonsense.
Speaker 1: Such an interesting point. M mayor Pete, thank you so
Speaker 1: much joining us. My pleasure. Thanks for having me off
Speaker 1: while Lead she Heed is a senior Democratic strategist and
Speaker 1: the spokesperson for Justice Democrats. Welcome to Fast Politics. Will Ly,
Speaker 1: thanks for having me. I'm very excited to have you here.
Speaker 1: We are in the run up to the mid terms,
Speaker 1: big excitement. What is on your radar? Well, I am
Speaker 1: really concerned and you know, while I think it's really
Speaker 1: important for people to volunteer, donate, and vote for all
Speaker 1: the Democrats running up and down the ticket, I'm very
Speaker 1: nervous given the direction of the past few weeks of
Speaker 1: media coverage, particularly about the cost of living in inflation,
Speaker 1: and I'm concerned that Democrats haven't really addressed those concerns
Speaker 1: for a lot of working class and middle class families
Speaker 1: out there who are struggling to pay the bills, pay
Speaker 1: for groceries. And that's kind of what's been keeping me
Speaker 1: up at night. I've had horrible sleep since the weather
Speaker 1: ex changed. Also well, Jesse, and I too. So you
Speaker 1: are a very very senior Democratic strategist, and you've worked
Speaker 1: with a lot of our favorite candidates. And one of
Speaker 1: the things that Bernie has done so well is this
Speaker 1: ability to talk about the financial the way that Democrats
Speaker 1: are committed. And you know, my grandfather was like very
Speaker 1: big into labor unions and also communism, and so the
Speaker 1: idea here is that Democrats can help working people and
Speaker 1: that's been a message that is very tough for Democrats.
Speaker 1: For some reason, as a party, they've kind of gotten
Speaker 1: away from this message, which is really an important message
Speaker 1: especially when you're trying to get people to vote for you.
Speaker 1: On some level, like I can empathize because there's so
Speaker 1: much other stuff happening, Like the overturning of abortion rights
Speaker 1: is incredibly important. People are really fired up about that.
Speaker 1: The threat to our democracy from the Republican Party is
Speaker 1: incredibly important. There is a constituency of people who are
Speaker 1: really concerned about that. You know, at the end of
Speaker 1: the day, my feeling in my personal life, my conversation
Speaker 1: with people on my family and my friends, are that
Speaker 1: it's their pocketbooks, it's their expenses, it's how much money
Speaker 1: they have in their bank accounts, in their while It's
Speaker 1: that's also important. I think because there's been so many
Speaker 1: crises this past year, we've kind of forgotten the most
Speaker 1: simple effective message for Democrats is that where the party
Speaker 1: for working people, no matter where you're from, or what
Speaker 1: your gender is, or what your zip code is. But
Speaker 1: I don't know how many people know this, But like
Speaker 1: grocery prices have gone up thirteen percent this year, gas
Speaker 1: prices have gone up eighteen percent, rent has increased seven percent.
Speaker 1: Health insurance is up and these are the biggest increases
Speaker 1: in a single year in like the past fifty years,
Speaker 1: and so it's historic what we're witnessing. And I think
Speaker 1: because it's such a personal problem for so many people,
Speaker 1: and people have shame around money and that kind of stuff,
Speaker 1: it just hasn't been uplifted to the kind of crisis
Speaker 1: that it actually is. And Republicans are running away with
Speaker 1: the message even though they have zero solutions to address
Speaker 1: people's concerns. Well, that's something I think a lot about, right,
Speaker 1: because we have Republicans are like, we're good on crime
Speaker 1: and we're good on the economy. And it's like, I
Speaker 1: want to point out, like we elected in New York.
Speaker 1: We all live in New York. Here, we elected this
Speaker 1: mayor who was basically a Republican who was like, I
Speaker 1: am a cop. I was a cop, right and a promoter,
Speaker 1: and I sleep on a mattress and I live in
Speaker 1: New Jersey. But again, but he was like, I'm a
Speaker 1: cop and I'm going to stop crime. Okay, you're a cop, alright,
Speaker 1: we elected you. When does he stop crime. I live
Speaker 1: in a neighborhood, you know, a black, working class, black
Speaker 1: immigrant neighborhood where Eric Adams did very very well. He
Speaker 1: has an appeal to working class voters of color that
Speaker 1: I think liberals and progressive shouldn't underestimate. Look, politics is
Speaker 1: not what we would like it to be. It is
Speaker 1: often really terrible. And like the local media coverage in
Speaker 1: New York City, whether you're reading the New York Post
Speaker 1: or the New York Daily News on the subway, or
Speaker 1: you're watching local news or you're just looking at Facebook,
Speaker 1: it's all these kinds of crazy stories about how you
Speaker 1: will be murdered tomorrow. I think sometimes Democrats and progressive
Speaker 1: and liberals just like laugh at that, but also think
Speaker 1: that is like the reality of the media that people
Speaker 1: are consuming. And I think that there are progressive in
Speaker 1: liberal arguments to be made on crime that go beyond
Speaker 1: we fund the cops, because I see a lot of
Speaker 1: Democratic ads this year that are like, we will fund
Speaker 1: the police, and I understand why people are doing that,
Speaker 1: but that is the exact message that Republicans are using,
Speaker 1: and they will always outfund the police more than you.
Speaker 1: And so I would love to see democratic messages that like,
Speaker 1: we also think crime is a problem. We want to
Speaker 1: reduce crime. That's why we support affordable housing. That's why
Speaker 1: we support behavioral mental health treatment programs that have been
Speaker 1: you know, there's evidence that shows that those programs are
Speaker 1: significant in reducing crime, and I don't know. I just
Speaker 1: think that there could be more effective messages on some
Speaker 1: of these things that I haven't I haven't really seen
Speaker 1: this year. Yeah, I want to ask you about that.
Speaker 1: Like there was some messaging with this Inflation Reduction Act, right,
Speaker 1: like the ideas if you're not paying two or three
Speaker 1: dollars a month for insulind but you are paying thirty
Speaker 1: five dollars a month for insulin, that should write drug
Speaker 1: prices being cheaper will theoretically lower the effects of inflation
Speaker 1: on your lifestyle. Definitely. I mean that is one of
Speaker 1: the biggest things that Joe Biden has done. Canceling student
Speaker 1: debt puts money back in people's pockets. There are significant
Speaker 1: things that he was able to accomplish. But if Democrats
Speaker 1: lose the House on Tuesday, like the number one person
Speaker 1: they're gonna blame is Alexander kazy Cortez on Wednesday morning,
Speaker 1: the person who's most to blame on Wednesday is you know,
Speaker 1: Joe Manchion, Kirsten Cinema, Josh Gottheimer, who could have made
Speaker 1: the Inflation Reduction Act way more expansive on reducing childcare costs,
Speaker 1: on expanding Medicare to include hearing aids on paige family
Speaker 1: and sick leave. Like, I think things that people would
Speaker 1: have really the concrete material things that people would have
Speaker 1: been able to point to as having addressed some of
Speaker 1: the pressure that people are in. But I think it's very,
Speaker 1: very historically those three figures I think will go down
Speaker 1: as like, yeah, we'll just be infamous because there was
Speaker 1: a real moment where they could have delivered sweeping change,
Speaker 1: and I think they they really hamstrung the Democratic Party
Speaker 1: from being able to present the American people with a
Speaker 1: huge program that they were able to deliver at a
Speaker 1: time of crisis. You never want to be the person
Speaker 1: that black Masters is celebrating and black Masters declaring his
Speaker 1: love for kirston cinema. I didn't see that he did
Speaker 1: yes in the Daily Mail. Perhaps you've you may have
Speaker 1: missed the Daily Mail's political coverage, but he's like the
Speaker 1: Liz Cheney for the Republican parm right. She's look Liz Cheney.
Speaker 1: That's a really good point. I just want to get
Speaker 1: back to this idea of like some of the problem
Speaker 1: with messaging against Republicans is that Republicans are not bound
Speaker 1: by the truth. And this is becoming more and more true, right.
Speaker 1: You know, if you watch a Republican ad, you um
Speaker 1: will think that trans people, immigrants, Black Lives Matter are
Speaker 1: running the country at federal, state, and local off you know,
Speaker 1: I don't think it is factually true. But and then yeah,
Speaker 1: all the stuff that's been happening with Elon Musk this
Speaker 1: week on fact checking very just President Biden's tweets. It's
Speaker 1: incredibly dangerous and scary to think about, how, you know,
Speaker 1: one of the biggest ways that people get news in
Speaker 1: this country or in that you know, lots of journalists
Speaker 1: and political people are on like that. The owner of
Speaker 1: Twitter is just going out of his way to fact
Speaker 1: check only what only the Democrats Like. I'm like Marjorie
Speaker 1: Taylor Green every day is tweeting factually inaccurate statements who
Speaker 1: it never gets a fact check. Like just yesterday she
Speaker 1: was like, Mexicans are coming over the border and bringing
Speaker 1: in fentinel and Joe Biden is doing nothing about it.
Speaker 1: And I'm like, almost every word in that sentence is
Speaker 1: and is factually inaccurate, but there's no fact check being given.
Speaker 1: And yeah, it is it is scary. Yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: I do think that is a real worry. And and
Speaker 1: I mean also there's like a fundamental problem with billionaires
Speaker 1: owning our media, right, I mean, and then this is
Speaker 1: just another app worth of that. Yeah. I know, we
Speaker 1: wanted to talk about these um Stephen Miller ads that
Speaker 1: came out this week, like yeah, yeah, let's talk about
Speaker 1: the Stephen Miller related to factually inaccurate. But it's crazy.
Speaker 1: I keep getting text messages from people all over, like
Speaker 1: in San Francisco and Georgia and New York, in Chicago
Speaker 1: who are getting these ads from Stephen Miller where whether
Speaker 1: it's TV, whether it's on Hulu, whether it's on in
Speaker 1: Mailer's where the ad is basically saying that Democrats, whether
Speaker 1: it's in pandemic relief programs or whether it's employment programs,
Speaker 1: or whether it's social media, that Democrats are racist against
Speaker 1: white people. The ad has a really big sign that
Speaker 1: says whites and sometimes it says whites and Asians need
Speaker 1: not not apply. And this is a tax deductible organization,
Speaker 1: so whoever is funding them got a tax right off.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's so sinister and kind of ingenious of
Speaker 1: Stephen Miller to do this, which is like the logical
Speaker 1: outcome of where all of the republic, all the Trump
Speaker 1: messaging was gonna go, which is us to explicitly state
Speaker 1: that the Democrats are against white people. You know, they've
Speaker 1: been dog whistling at it for decades, but now they're
Speaker 1: just Stephen Millers like, let's just go, let's just go
Speaker 1: for what, go for the real thing, right. I Mean
Speaker 1: That's the thing that I think is like kind of crazy,
Speaker 1: is that we are in a situation now where like
Speaker 1: that is full on white supremacist talk. Right. Chris Hayes
Speaker 1: tweeted something where he was like, there is no difference
Speaker 1: between what David Duke says and what Steven Miller says
Speaker 1: at the spot. There's no and there hasn't been for
Speaker 1: a long time. I mean, Stephen Miller is basically I mean,
Speaker 1: he gets a lot of his ideas from, you know,
Speaker 1: all of this white nationalist stuff, and you know, his
Speaker 1: the only thing he has going for him that gives
Speaker 1: people pause that he might not be a white nationalist
Speaker 1: is that he's Jewish, right, because generally, as a Jew myself,
Speaker 1: I would say that, like, these are not the people
Speaker 1: you want to go with, you know, if you have
Speaker 1: a choice, these are not our people, man, So I
Speaker 1: just I'm curious, like, how are those those running with
Speaker 1: a tax deduction? So it's being run by this is
Speaker 1: an American first legal there five one C three nonprofit organizations,
Speaker 1: so that five one three basically means that if you
Speaker 1: donate to the organization, you can write it off with
Speaker 1: a tax deduction, which is like insane. I mean, I
Speaker 1: mean again, I know that it's watching Ted Cruz deep
Speaker 1: fund the i R s like that's the favorite rallying
Speaker 1: call of conservatives now, but isn't that an important issue.
Speaker 1: I'm not a lawyer. I don't know what the laws
Speaker 1: are on free speech and and what you can say
Speaker 1: in an ad or not, but it's definitely concerning. I
Speaker 1: think it's It's one of those things where and this
Speaker 1: is the struggle with Democrats generally is like if the
Speaker 1: Republican Party is increasingly just going to say that the
Speaker 1: Democratic Party is codd laying you know, is the Democratic
Speaker 1: Party fights for undeserving people of color and are being
Speaker 1: coddled by liberal elites and they're against white people. And
Speaker 1: now asia that the Democrats like they need a better
Speaker 1: message than just saying that ad is racist, and that's
Speaker 1: what a lot of people were saying once I posted
Speaker 1: the ad. That I I saw was like, this ad
Speaker 1: is so racist, and I'm like, yes, but I also
Speaker 1: think this ad is effective. I think if you're just like,
Speaker 1: if you're just receiving this at your house, you're like, yeah, like,
Speaker 1: maybe maybe I feel discriminated against in uh in some
Speaker 1: way and I think that or I feel left out. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I think Democrats need to get way better at saying
Speaker 1: something basically along the lines of like, the Republican Party
Speaker 1: is doing everything they can to make you think that
Speaker 1: they are fighting for you, when when as soon as
Speaker 1: they get power, they're gonna cut your soul security, they're
Speaker 1: gonna cut your Medicare, they're gonna cut your Medicaid, and
Speaker 1: they're gonna give tax breaks to their corporate donors. And
Speaker 1: all this race stuff is just a trick for you
Speaker 1: to think that they're fighting for you because of your
Speaker 1: skin color, when it's just deployed they're gonna swindle you.
Speaker 1: And I haven't seen Democrats really make that case so
Speaker 1: explicitly that all this stuff we hear during elections. Sason
Speaker 1: in the last two months about the election, when about
Speaker 1: Black lives matter, about crime, about trans kids, about you know,
Speaker 1: all the things they waive in the last two months
Speaker 1: of the election like that. It's all just a strategy
Speaker 1: for them to distract from their economic agenda, which is
Speaker 1: to you know, allow their corporate donors to jacob prices
Speaker 1: as high as they want and essentially lute working people
Speaker 1: across the country. Thank you so much, Wilde, thank you
Speaker 1: so much for having me. Jesse Cannon, Molly John Fast.
Speaker 1: We've hit our segment a moment of funckeray, and today
Speaker 1: for our moment of fuckery. We have media fuckery, which
Speaker 1: is its own kind of Fuckeray. Should that be muckery muckery?
Speaker 1: It should be muckery. We have muckery fuckery, which is
Speaker 1: media fuckery. And I want to talk about Biden gave
Speaker 1: a speech the journalists from NPR was like another speech.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's democracy, the death of democracy. It might
Speaker 1: merit more than one speech. He gave a speech at
Speaker 1: Union station in Washington, d C. It was a speech
Speaker 1: that is like, honestly, what I say when I'm interviewed
Speaker 1: by European television stations, which seems to happen weirdly a
Speaker 1: lot right now, which is you should vote for democracy.
Speaker 1: And there are certainly a few races like that Arizona
Speaker 1: Senate race, the Arizona Secretary of State race, the Nevada
Speaker 1: statewide races. All of those races are the Republicans on
Speaker 1: the ticket no longer believe in democracy and and even
Speaker 1: don't really even believe in counting the vote. President Biden
Speaker 1: found that upsetting. I can't imagine why, and so he
Speaker 1: gave a speech which basically said, please, let's try to
Speaker 1: vote to keep democracy going. This should not be a
Speaker 1: controversial statement, right we're representative democracy, but we are a democracy,
Speaker 1: and and it's worked for us for a long time,
Speaker 1: and so the side to fascism is in my mind,
Speaker 1: a bad choice. So but instead there was a lot
Speaker 1: of two sides of this. I don't know who suggested
Speaker 1: Biden give a speech at Union station, but it was
Speaker 1: a terrible idea. Don't you think most of these people
Speaker 1: who are mad about this are just meant the Starbucks
Speaker 1: closed and they're mad about the blue Bottle being in there.
Speaker 1: I don't understand, what is there not a Starbucks in there?
Speaker 1: I was like in there for like twenty minutes the
Speaker 1: other day trying to find the Starbucks. Any any time
Speaker 1: a Starbucks closes, you call me shocked, and I hate Starbucks.
Speaker 1: I still know that people value it. The topics that
Speaker 1: biden primetime presidential speech, the two topics that didn't make
Speaker 1: it inflation and the economy. Democracy is clearly where what
Speaker 1: Biden wanted to talk about. I mean, yeah, okay, it
Speaker 1: should be noted that the president had chosen an evening
Speaker 1: address to focus on the importance of democracy rather than
Speaker 1: topics that are proving difficult for Democrats. So a lot
Speaker 1: of the criticism was that, you know, there wasn't talk
Speaker 1: about inflation, but but ultimately people know about inflation. The
Speaker 1: thing that we should all be really concerned with this democracy.
Speaker 1: Another tweet terrible optics from the White House. Why isn't
Speaker 1: the presidential seal on there um? And of course you
Speaker 1: have to remember that this presidential White House is extremely
Speaker 1: worried about the Hatch Act. Before the Trump administration, the
Speaker 1: Hatch Act used to mean something. So for that, uh,
Speaker 1: the mockery fuckery gets a hearty fuck you from this
Speaker 1: here podcast. That's it for this episode of Fast Politics.
Speaker 1: Tune in every Monday Wednesday and Friday to your the
Speaker 1: best minds, and politics makes sense of all this chaos.
Speaker 1: If you enjoyed what you've heard, please send it to
Speaker 1: a friend and keep the conversation going. And again, thanks
Speaker 1: for listening.