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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 discussed the top political headlines with some of

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Speaker 1: today's best minds and Donald Trump said he'll deport protesters. Yes,

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Speaker 1: mass deportations, go aheads what everybody wants. We have such

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Speaker 1: a great show for you today. Deputy editor for Balls

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Speaker 1: and Strikes, Medeeba Danny joins us to talk about her

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Speaker 1: new book, The Originalism Trap, how extremist stole the Constitution

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Speaker 1: and how we the people can take it back. Then

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Speaker 1: we'll talk to Newsguards founder Steve Brill about his new book,

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Speaker 1: The Death of Truth. How social media and the Internet

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Speaker 1: gave snake oil salesman and demagogues the weapons they need

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Speaker 1: to destroy trust and popolarize the world, and what we

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Speaker 1: can do. But first we have former Senator and host

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Speaker 1: of the Al Franken podcast, The One the Only Al Franken.

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Speaker 1: Welcome back to Fast Politics, Al Franken.

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Speaker 2: Thank you, Mollie. Great to be back.

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Speaker 1: Always a delight to have you. Dick Durbin is he

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Speaker 1: a friend of yours?

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Speaker 2: Let's yeah.

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Speaker 1: Are you and Dick Durbin buddies?

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Speaker 2: I don't know for buddies, but you we're friends?

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Speaker 1: Sure, Dick Durbin is the chair of Judiciary Samuel Alito.

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Speaker 1: Perhaps you've heard of him. Yes, he recently got a

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Speaker 1: Trump Truth, which is Trump's version of Twitter, and Trump untruthed.

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Speaker 1: Let's just say untruth because he's it.

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Speaker 2: Okay, well that's the biased I think that's biased.

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Speaker 1: But yes, fiaus, Trump untruthed about how happy he was

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Speaker 1: that Alito was not going to recuse and how good

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Speaker 1: it was that he had Justice Alito on his team.

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Speaker 1: Is that how the Supreme Court is supposed to work?

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Speaker 2: No? Now, I was on the Judiciary Committee and we

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Speaker 2: had we had rules about how it was supposed to work,

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Speaker 2: and that wasn't one of them. He didn't even nominate Alito.

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Speaker 1: Right, what is the solve for this? Like, doesn't the

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Speaker 1: Judiciary Committee have more power than just a strongly worded letter.

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Speaker 2: I suppose they could subpoena him. The committee could, and

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Speaker 2: then I don't know what happens, right.

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Speaker 1: I mean they could subpoena him, They could hold hearings.

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Speaker 2: Hearings are easy to do. I mean you could do

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Speaker 2: that because they're in the majority, and they have majority

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Speaker 2: on the committee, right, right, So yeah, they could have

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Speaker 2: hearings on this and I don't know if the Republicans

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Speaker 2: would show up or not, but so what right?

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Speaker 1: So why do you think they're not holding hearings on this,

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Speaker 1: because like if Ruth Bader Ginsburg was flying an Antifa

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Speaker 1: Forever flag in her house and Nantucket, I think that

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Speaker 1: Republicans would be upset, and Republicans controlled the Senate. I

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Speaker 1: think Ted Cruz would march her in.

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Speaker 2: I don't know that Antifa flag. I haven't. I haven't

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Speaker 2: seen it.

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Speaker 1: It's tied.

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Speaker 2: I oh, okay, was it flown in Portland when.

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Speaker 1: Ruth bader Ginsburg big Antifa person? I don't know if

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Speaker 1: you know this very into spray painting things.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, well they can't call her little known fact. They

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Speaker 2: can't call her in. These are all good questions. I

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Speaker 2: don't know if Sheldon, if you were the chairman, would

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Speaker 2: be doing something different than than Durbin. Is Sheldon White House?

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Speaker 2: Of course?

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Speaker 1: Yeah? Yeah? I mean, don't you think you'd be pushing harder?

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Speaker 2: I do. I don't know why Dick isn't.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, And I feel like, so here's a question for you.

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Speaker 1: It feels like we maybe, look, we don't know what's

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Speaker 1: going to happen in November. I continue to be a

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Speaker 1: cock eyed optimist. But if Democrats have a moment here

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Speaker 1: to protect democracy, shouldn't they be doing that?

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Speaker 2: Yes? And no, I don't know what they do. Frankly,

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Speaker 2: I don't know what the committee can do because all

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Speaker 2: I would happen is is that Alito wouldn't show up, right.

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Speaker 1: But I mean even that, like, don't you think the

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Speaker 1: more they can protect norms the better?

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Speaker 2: What are the norms? The norms are not to fly

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Speaker 2: a flag upside down, I mean.

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Speaker 1: Well, ruling on cases and then to have another flag

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Speaker 1: at your beach house. Your beach house flag is a

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Speaker 1: Christo fascisty flag. Yeah, it's a Christian Christian fundamentalist. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Also favored by the Speaker of the House, Donald Trump's favorite,

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Speaker 1: Mike Johnson.

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Speaker 2: Well, that legitimizes it.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, it makes me feel much.

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Speaker 2: I mean it goes like, hey, the Speaker of the

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Speaker 2: House has it in front of his office. Isn't that

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Speaker 2: where he has it?

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Speaker 1: Yes?

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Speaker 2: But these were flags that both the upside down American

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Speaker 2: flag and what's it the heaven?

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Speaker 1: It's the appeal to have in flag capital letters above

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Speaker 1: the tree. The pine tree is a symbolization is the

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Speaker 1: symbol of New York's of New England. The phrase appeal

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Speaker 1: to have it appears in John Locke's second Treatis on Government.

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Speaker 2: So originally it wasn't the fascist flag.

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Speaker 1: Where it is used to describe the right of evolution.

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Speaker 1: Stemmed from the belief that God would deliver the colonists

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Speaker 1: from tyranny.

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Speaker 2: Oh okay, that's where the religion comes in.

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Speaker 1: It's kind of it gets kind of dark in there.

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Speaker 2: Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Right, at first you're like, oh, it's a little green tree,

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Speaker 1: New England Bucolic, and then they're like, God free us.

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Speaker 2: Well, you know, some of the founders evoked God, right

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Speaker 2: or invoked God, and God we trust is on our money,

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Speaker 2: and so we're.

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Speaker 1: Back to this textureless thing, right.

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Speaker 2: Alito is always a what's the word dick? I know,

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Speaker 2: I mean so, And of course he when Barack Obama

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Speaker 2: spoke out against Citizens United, remember, right, he mouthed not true.

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Speaker 2: And then he hasn't come to ah. I don't think

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Speaker 2: he's come to a State of the Union address. Sense.

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Speaker 1: I heard when I was in DC this weekend, I

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Speaker 1: heard lots of like bad stories people complaining about Alito.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and then there's the trips and the money and

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Speaker 2: all that stuff.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, he didn't get an RV, so it's

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Speaker 1: not the RV. What I do think is interesting. You know,

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Speaker 1: you have two justices and this is like not a

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Speaker 1: left leaning court at all, but you have two justices

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Speaker 1: who are like expressly in the tank for Trump, right,

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Speaker 1: Alito and Thomas are basically like you know, and then

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Speaker 1: you have Thomas writing things.

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Speaker 2: Thomas has his wife that's very involved in trying to write.

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Speaker 1: The wife who was involved and yeah, trying to overturn

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Speaker 1: the election. Then you have Alito, who is the wife

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Speaker 1: who's flying the upside down flag. So clearly the real

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Speaker 1: housewives of the Supreme Court are not.

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Speaker 2: Okay, I would like to see that series.

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Speaker 1: You would not. Can you imagine? It's like it's like

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Speaker 1: missus Alito drinking and fighting with her neighbor.

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Speaker 2: And of course you know one of the liberal justices

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Speaker 2: have wives.

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Speaker 1: Yes, that's right, none of them have wives, and now

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Speaker 1: others mark against them no wives, but it would be

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Speaker 1: funny to have the spouses. But yeah, I mean, what

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Speaker 1: do you do with the problem like the Supreme Court?

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Speaker 1: I mean, I know what I would do if Biden

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Speaker 1: wins again, which all he wants is to not have

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Speaker 1: to do this, but he's going to have to fucking

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Speaker 1: put in term limits in the Supreme Court.

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Speaker 2: First of all, he won't be able to unless we

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Speaker 2: have And this is what the importance of the election is.

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Speaker 2: One he has to win and two we have to

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Speaker 2: hold fifty in the Senate and we have to win

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Speaker 2: the House. That's all we have to do.

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Speaker 1: It should be no big deal.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, right now things are looking great.

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Speaker 1: And this is the laugh to knock hery thing.

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Speaker 2: The thing is about invoking term limits. First of all,

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Speaker 2: if you can do that, if you're the one who

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Speaker 2: can do that, it's because you have both the House

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Speaker 2: and the Senate and the White House. And if you

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Speaker 2: have both the Senate and the White House, then you

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Speaker 2: presumably have may have an appointment if either Thomas or

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Speaker 2: Alito retire, which they won't with a Democratic president, but

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Speaker 2: if they were to, you know, if Biden wins, that

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Speaker 2: means he's president for the next four years. And those

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Speaker 2: guys hang on and Biden waits until he gets an appointment,

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Speaker 2: which he won't get unless one of those guys passes on.

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Speaker 1: But the whole thing with in my mind is like

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Speaker 1: they have to try, right, The American people have put

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Speaker 1: these these guys in office to try and whether or

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Speaker 1: not it works. I mean, like you'll say, say one

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Speaker 1: thing about Republicans, they have this insane base, but they

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Speaker 1: serve their fucking base, right, Republicans like Marjorie Taylor Green,

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Speaker 1: you know, has been trying to impeach Joe Biden for

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Speaker 1: fifty five million years, right, I mean she basically is like,

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Speaker 1: I mean, these people will do anything for their base. Meanwhile,

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Speaker 1: you have Democrats who are like, their base is writing

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Speaker 1: little postcards. They're begging them, they're saying please, And Democrats

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Speaker 1: are like, you know, I mean, it is kind of

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Speaker 1: amazing how little.

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Speaker 2: Wait a minut who's begging whom to write postcards.

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Speaker 1: I'm saying, the Democratic base does all this stuff, and

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Speaker 1: Democratic electeds are sort of like, yeah, well it might

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Speaker 1: not work. I mean, like, I think they should try.

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Speaker 1: I think the base would be pleased to see. And

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Speaker 1: it's not even about pleasing them, it's about keeping American

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Speaker 1: democracy going, which strikes me as a good cause.

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Speaker 2: So you're saying that Biden and a Democratic Senate and

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Speaker 2: a Democratic House should pass term limits, even though Biden

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Speaker 2: might be the one that get the first apployment.

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Speaker 1: Yes, aps of fucking lily. And I'm saying that, like,

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Speaker 1: even though Marjorie Taylor Green.

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Speaker 2: So, isn't that us shooting ourselves in the foot in

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Speaker 2: a sense, because then our guy who we get in

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Speaker 2: or our woman who we get in will be the

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Speaker 2: first one to have an eighteen year term limit.

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Speaker 1: No, make everybody be like, this is it? You know

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Speaker 1: we're going to start them now? I mean, here are

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Speaker 1: the choices, right you expand the court, you put in

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Speaker 1: term limits. I mean, there are just not a ton

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Speaker 1: of great choices at least term limits. And even if

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Speaker 1: you expand them five years for everyone, you know whatever,

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Speaker 1: you give eighteen years to everyone on the court right now,

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Speaker 1: or you do.

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Speaker 3: What I.

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Speaker 1: Mean, I just think that there's no reason to I

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Speaker 1: don't know.

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Speaker 2: You know who would have to maybe test the constitutionality

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Speaker 2: of that who the Supreme Court? Yes, that would be

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Speaker 2: very interesting.

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Speaker 1: I'm saying that trying that it's important to try.

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Speaker 2: I can just see, like, only Democrats with the President

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Speaker 2: and with the Senate and a chance to appoint someone

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Speaker 2: if Thomas or if Alido retires or passes on, only

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Speaker 2: Democrats to be the one to be able to choose

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Speaker 2: a justice and make that the first justice to have

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Speaker 2: an eighteen year limit, right, No, I know, and then

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Speaker 2: it'd be like, way to go, Democrats. You get a

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Speaker 2: gun and you shoot yourself in the foot.

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Speaker 1: What I'm saying here is that the Democrats have an

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Speaker 1: opportunity to behave more like Republicans, and they should take it.

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Speaker 2: I don't know. I understand you're saying play hardball, and

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Speaker 2: I understand that, yes, and that is a Sheldon white

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Speaker 2: House proposal, And a lot of people have proposed this,

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Speaker 2: the eighteen year thing, and that makes sense that and

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Speaker 2: starting with the first time you do it, then every

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Speaker 2: president gets I guess to a term.

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Speaker 1: The idea here is that Democrats should be obstreperous and

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Speaker 1: they should do whatever they can do to save American

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Speaker 1: democracy whatever that looks like.

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Speaker 2: Yes, and I'm saying the irony would be to save

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Speaker 2: democracy the first you know, the.

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Speaker 1: First, right, But I'm I think you're getting too stuck

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Speaker 1: on this idea of what of the like specifics of

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Speaker 1: what I'm saying. I'm saying that they should hold hearings

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Speaker 1: and make a rackus and do the kind of things

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Speaker 1: that people like Ted Cruz do, right, except do it

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Speaker 1: for the good Democrats continually they bring a stuffed animal

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Speaker 1: to a fucking knife fight every time. You know, Dick

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Speaker 1: Durbin has a strongly worded letter, the guy is like

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Speaker 1: Donald Trump is like, Alito, I'm so glad I have

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Speaker 1: you on my team, Like a strongly worded letter versus Alito,

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Speaker 1: I'm so glad you're on my team. Like this is

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Speaker 1: where American democracy dies. It's like one side is collegial

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Speaker 1: and the other side is like, I'm really glad we

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Speaker 1: have this all wrapped up.

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Speaker 2: Let me ask you when you said write letters.

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Speaker 1: You have these democratic base they write postcards to get

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Speaker 1: people to isolate, and that's good. I mean they kill themselves,

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Speaker 1: you know.

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Speaker 2: Well I would encourage people to do that and also

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Speaker 2: encourage people to door knock.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, but their fucking representatives should be killing themselves too, Like,

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Speaker 1: if you're working so hard to get these people elected,

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Speaker 1: they should be.

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Speaker 4: I mean.

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Speaker 1: The thing about Marjorie Taylor Green is that she's a

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Speaker 1: complete lunatic and not very smart. But imagine if we

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Speaker 1: had someone on the left, if we had Democrats who

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Speaker 1: were doing things like that, who were pushing so hard

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Speaker 1: and filing resolutions and you know, holding hearings and doing

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Speaker 1: all of those things. But for American democracy.

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Speaker 2: Well, I do think that if Sheldon white House were

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Speaker 2: the chairman, that you would be having hearings right now.

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Speaker 1: Yes, and you know, let Republicans not show up. You know,

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Speaker 1: that says as much as anything. I mean, look, the

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Speaker 1: one thing that Donald Trump has done that has been

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Speaker 1: I don't want to say brilliant because it's going to

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Speaker 1: destroy American democracy ultimately very likely, is that he has

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Speaker 1: not acted within the kind fines of the American government.

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Speaker 1: Right every He's taken his situation to his base. So

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Speaker 1: he said, you know, they're trying to impeach me, but

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Speaker 1: they're really trying to impeach you. Everyone thought, oh, it's

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Speaker 1: too stupid to work, but in fact his people are like,

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Speaker 1: they're trying to impeach us. So obviously it has worked

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Speaker 1: not to get too obstreperous.

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Speaker 2: It worked that the last one was the one that

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Speaker 2: is the tragedy that McConnell took the position he took,

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Speaker 2: which was he did one of those speeches where the

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Speaker 2: keyword was butt, you know, because it was like, there's

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Speaker 2: no doubt that you know that Donald Trump is responsible

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Speaker 2: for what happened on January sex and then blah blah

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Speaker 2: blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah.

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Speaker 2: But and that's the most important word. I think Howard

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Speaker 2: Feynman taught me that that's the most important word in

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Speaker 2: the speech is but. And then, of course he completely

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Speaker 2: negated the argument on immunity by saying, you know, this

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Speaker 2: can be adjudicated in court. And now, of course they

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Speaker 2: were trying to get Alito to recuse himself on this

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Speaker 2: immunity thing, and of course he won't.

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Speaker 1: Right, It's shocking that Alito won't do the right thing

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Speaker 1: despite the fact that he has got every point. I mean,

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Speaker 1: if you listen to those oral arguments, like you know,

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Speaker 1: both oral abortion arguments, you immediately have Alito and Thomas

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Speaker 1: and they're being like, well, what about the section three

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Speaker 1: four seven six the Comstock Act, which hasn't been has

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Speaker 1: been dormant since eighteen sixty four. What about that? Because

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Speaker 1: people have fucking plans and designs on American democracy and

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Speaker 1: we're writing strongly worded letters.

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Speaker 2: Yep, Well, let's talk about something more optimistic. How about

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Speaker 2: you know, I've been following the trial, and I know

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Speaker 2: that there's been a lot, a lot of coverage of

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Speaker 2: this on MSNBC, and yet as much as I watch,

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Speaker 2: I've still confused about like what the original crime was,

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Speaker 2: et cetera. But I think he's going to be convicted.

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Speaker 2: Shocked if he was acquitted, but there could be hung.

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Speaker 1: Jury or mix split charges.

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Speaker 2: But let's say he does get convicted. I asked my

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Speaker 2: wife this, asked Franny, what would you sentence him to

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Speaker 2: if you were the judge? And my wife said five years,

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Speaker 2: which one the maximum is four years in this But

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Speaker 2: so this is what I said, thirty days.

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Speaker 1: Thirty days, Okay.

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Speaker 2: The reason for that is I think he has to

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Speaker 2: go to jail. Now, not everyone who gets convicted of

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Speaker 2: this crime evidently goes to prison, and in fact most don't,

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Speaker 2: but I feel like he should go. But I think

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Speaker 2: that anything maybe beyond ninety days or something like that

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Speaker 2: is just seems punitive and political. So I thought thirty days,

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Speaker 2: which I can imagine he could do without going crazy.

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Speaker 2: I mean, he's not going to jail, that's what you're saying.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, there's no way.

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Speaker 2: So that there's no sentence of this.

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Speaker 1: This is Look, why it's good it is because you

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Speaker 1: do crimes, you should be treated like other people who

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Speaker 1: do crimes. We don't have special justice for affluent white guys.

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Speaker 1: I mean, we actually do, but we shouldn't.

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Speaker 2: It's always in the opposite direction.

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Speaker 1: Yes, he's just not going to jail. It's not going

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Speaker 1: to happen. I think there's a scenario where he loses reelection,

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Speaker 1: and you know, remember he is running for reelection basically

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Speaker 1: to stay out of jail. That's not me saying that.

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Speaker 1: That's well heard. So what I think I think a

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Speaker 1: likely scenario. And by the way, this is not some

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Speaker 1: contrary thought. I mean pretty much everyone. You know he

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Speaker 1: announced in the hopes of not getting indicted, and if

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Speaker 1: the Justice Department had moved a little faster, none of

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Speaker 1: us would be here right now. You know, Biden would

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Speaker 1: be running against Nikki Haley. And you know, while a

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Speaker 1: lot of us don't like Nikki Haley, she is not

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Speaker 1: going to end American democracy, not in those heels. So,

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Speaker 1: by the way, one last thing about Nikki Haley. She's

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Speaker 1: always like underestimate me. That you know, there are all

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Speaker 1: these like Nikki Haley tweets that are like underestimate me.

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Speaker 1: That'll be fun. I'm like, I actually thought you had

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Speaker 1: a spine. And now I know you don't, so that's

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Speaker 1: not underestimated. That's like overestimating.

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Speaker 2: I don't know why she endures Trump other than she maybe,

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Speaker 2: you know, speaking circus, she.

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Speaker 1: Wants to be HUD secretary.

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Speaker 2: Really, no fucking with you.

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Speaker 1: We got away over time. But yes, but you're fun.

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Speaker 1: We're fun. We're all fun.

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Speaker 2: You're fun. I'm not.

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Speaker 5: We're depressed. We're pretty depressed. What's there to be depressed about?

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Speaker 5: Really nothing. We got a good six months left on

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Speaker 5: American democracy.

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Speaker 2: We didn't even get into Gaza, so yeah, yeah, there

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Speaker 2: we go. So there's nothing.

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Speaker 1: Nothing to be depressed about. Alf Franken, thank you. Spring

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Speaker 1: is here, and I bet you are trying to look fashionable,

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Speaker 1: so why not pick up some fashionable all new Fast

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Speaker 1: Politics merchandise. We just opened a news store with all

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00:19:09,840 --> 00:19:13,600
Speaker 1: new designs just for you. Get t shirts, hoodies, hats,

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00:19:13,920 --> 00:19:18,960
Speaker 1: and top bags. To grab some, head to fastpolitics dot com.

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Speaker 1: Medeeba Denny is deputy editor for Balls and Strikes and

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Speaker 1: author of The Originalism Trap. How extremists Stole the Constitution

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Speaker 1: and how we the people can take it back.

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Speaker 6: Welcome to Fast Politics. Medeeba its Hello there.

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Speaker 1: Very excited to have you one of the things when

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Speaker 1: you listen to this Supreme Court, this insane Supreme Court,

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Speaker 1: is that you hear a lot of the time that

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Speaker 1: the conservative justices, but especially Alito and Thomas, have embraced

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Speaker 1: this very insane the school of thought which is called originalism.

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Speaker 1: So talk to me about this book and explain to

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Speaker 1: us what originalism is if you can, please sure well.

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Speaker 6: Originalism, like you said, is the idea that the conservative

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Speaker 6: legal movement has really embraced to justify all of said

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Speaker 6: bad decision making. The idea of originalism is that the

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Speaker 6: meaning of the Constitution is fixed in time. It's frozen

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Speaker 6: at the moment of enactment. And most originalists will say

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Speaker 6: that the way we understand the Constitution today has to

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Speaker 6: be how the public would have originally understood it when

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Speaker 6: the Constitution was ratified.

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Speaker 1: Tell us what America looked like when the Constitution is ratified.

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Speaker 6: Not great, molly. It was not a good time for

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Speaker 6: the majority of the population. Political and economic and social

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Speaker 6: power was really concentrated in the hands of a elite

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Speaker 6: class of wealthy white men who were landowners, right, Yeah,

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Speaker 6: that's where the wealth came from, and everyone else had

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Speaker 6: little to no rights to speak of and so when

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Speaker 6: you are linking the upper bounds of constitutional interpretation to

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Speaker 6: those historically low standards, it basically sets most of the

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Speaker 6: country up for failure because they're not going to be

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Speaker 6: able to exercise equal rights.

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Speaker 1: Can you explain to us how originalism got going and

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Speaker 1: how it sort of became the thing that Thomas and

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Speaker 1: Alito pretty much hitting their hats on for everything.

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Speaker 6: Sure, well, the idea that you can use history and

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Speaker 6: tradition or what we think might be the original public meaning.

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Speaker 6: I'm saying we think might be because there's a lot

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Speaker 6: who knows, yes, that idea has been pretty long standing

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Speaker 6: that you could look to these things. It's a very

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Speaker 6: modern recent innovation that the only way you can say

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Speaker 6: what the Constitution means is by looking at the purported

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Speaker 6: original public meeting. That's something that didn't really develop until

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Speaker 6: as a backlash the Civil rights movement, we saw that

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Speaker 6: the Ronald Wakens Justice Department was really pushing back and

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Speaker 6: working to formalize this new idea of originalism. It didn't

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Speaker 6: even really have a name back then. It was in

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Speaker 6: the seventies and eighties that they began using the term

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Speaker 6: originalism and the express goal of it basically was to

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Speaker 6: push back against the perceived excesses of the Warren Court era,

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Speaker 6: which gave us some of the major decisions like Brown

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Speaker 6: view Board that we cherished today, or at least that

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Speaker 6: most of us shariesh today.

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Speaker 1: Right, I shouldn't laugh because this is like when I

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Speaker 1: laugh when I'm so depressed, and not because it's funny,

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Speaker 1: because it's not funny. And will you just explain for

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Speaker 1: our listeners why brownby board is back in the vernacular.

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Speaker 6: Yeah, there are a couple different reasons why. But most recently,

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Speaker 6: in a decision the Supreme Court handed down a few

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Speaker 6: days ago where the Court is effectively blessed racial jerrymandering.

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Speaker 6: Justice Thomas wrote a concurring opinion in that case where

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Speaker 6: he said that he doesn't think that the Court has

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Speaker 6: any role admunicating cases about racial jerrymandering, and he said

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Speaker 6: that this sort of remedy that the Court was using

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Speaker 6: really stems out of brownview Board, and that that type

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Speaker 6: of grand equitable relief that the Court at the Court

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Speaker 6: had used then, and his wording it was something to

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Speaker 6: the effect of this may have been necessary then, but

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Speaker 6: it is not necessary now. So, first of all, the

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Speaker 6: idea that it may have been like like, he's unsure

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Speaker 6: about whether or not Brownvie Board was above board, so

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Speaker 6: to speak. And then the second part of that is

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Speaker 6: saying even if it was necessary, then it's not necessary now.

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Speaker 6: And so yeah, this is part and parcel of the

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Speaker 6: Court's work to de faying all of the teeth that

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Speaker 6: the civil rights movement had and take away all of

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Speaker 6: the whether constitutional or statutory protections for marginalized people that

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Speaker 6: folks have fought for over the last few hundred years.

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Speaker 1: And we recently learned that just as Sodomaya goes to

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Speaker 1: her office to cry after some decisions, which yeah.

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Speaker 6: She is not the only one.

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Speaker 1: I was wondering if you could explain to us a

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Speaker 1: little bit about so sort of there have been a

436
00:24:31,960 --> 00:24:36,120
Speaker 1: number of truly insane decisions out of this court. Their

437
00:24:36,200 --> 00:24:40,920
Speaker 1: decision that racial jurymandering is a okay with them overturning Row.

438
00:24:41,400 --> 00:24:44,800
Speaker 1: Now they're looking at bringing back the Comstock Act. I mean,

439
00:24:45,119 --> 00:24:48,040
Speaker 1: explain to us where originalism fits in with this.

440
00:24:48,760 --> 00:24:54,160
Speaker 6: Yeah, well, originalism by its own terms is like focused

441
00:24:54,200 --> 00:24:58,720
Speaker 6: on this idea of history based on resetting our understanding

442
00:24:58,720 --> 00:25:03,679
Speaker 6: of the Constitution. To however, conservatives say basically it was

443
00:25:03,800 --> 00:25:07,800
Speaker 6: understood two hundred years ago. It's a jurisprudence of rolling

444
00:25:07,840 --> 00:25:11,560
Speaker 6: back the clock. That's been the through line of all

445
00:25:11,600 --> 00:25:14,240
Speaker 6: of these sorts of cases that you mentioned, whether undoing

446
00:25:14,400 --> 00:25:19,400
Speaker 6: voting rights protections, or taking away the constitutional right to abortion,

447
00:25:20,040 --> 00:25:24,840
Speaker 6: or reinvigorating the Undead Comstock Act. The idea here with

448
00:25:24,960 --> 00:25:28,240
Speaker 6: all of these is putting things as we think they

449
00:25:28,280 --> 00:25:33,320
Speaker 6: once were are sort of idealized, nostalgic version of the past,

450
00:25:33,800 --> 00:25:39,200
Speaker 6: where the hierarchies that they care about, hierarchies of patriarchy

451
00:25:39,240 --> 00:25:42,880
Speaker 6: and racism and capitalism, where all of these structures were

452
00:25:43,600 --> 00:25:48,080
Speaker 6: more enforced, and where the government didn't have, or rather

453
00:25:48,320 --> 00:25:52,320
Speaker 6: unless say they didn't have, didn't utilize tools to address these.

454
00:25:52,440 --> 00:25:56,120
Speaker 6: I think that's a really cool part, is that there

455
00:25:56,200 --> 00:26:00,720
Speaker 6: are tools that we can use. The reconstruction and men exist.

456
00:26:00,920 --> 00:26:03,320
Speaker 6: The whole purpose of the post Civil War and members

457
00:26:03,400 --> 00:26:06,600
Speaker 6: to the Constitution was to rid the country of its

458
00:26:06,640 --> 00:26:12,520
Speaker 6: government sanctioned and mandated subordination and creating an inclusive democracy

459
00:26:12,600 --> 00:26:15,159
Speaker 6: for the first time that worked for everybody. That was

460
00:26:15,200 --> 00:26:18,560
Speaker 6: the whole point. And so I would argue that we

461
00:26:18,760 --> 00:26:23,280
Speaker 6: have these tools there, and the conservative legal movement is

462
00:26:23,440 --> 00:26:27,199
Speaker 6: desperately trying to ensure that we don't use them and

463
00:26:27,200 --> 00:26:29,320
Speaker 6: that they cut off access to those tools.

464
00:26:29,480 --> 00:26:32,679
Speaker 1: It's funny because I think trump Ism is this last

465
00:26:32,840 --> 00:26:35,400
Speaker 1: gasp against a multi racial democracy.

466
00:26:35,560 --> 00:26:35,760
Speaker 2: Right.

467
00:26:36,240 --> 00:26:39,159
Speaker 1: It's like, you know, we're on the cost of it,

468
00:26:39,359 --> 00:26:42,200
Speaker 1: and trump Ism is like, oh no, what your talking

469
00:26:42,200 --> 00:26:45,200
Speaker 1: about is so important and it really does speak to reconstruction.

470
00:26:45,320 --> 00:26:48,919
Speaker 1: Can you talk about where reconstruction figures into this a

471
00:26:48,920 --> 00:26:49,480
Speaker 1: little more?

472
00:26:49,720 --> 00:26:54,000
Speaker 6: Yeah, to briefly review what their reconstruction amendments were.

473
00:26:54,160 --> 00:26:56,399
Speaker 1: Yes, please, And you could even if you want to

474
00:26:56,400 --> 00:26:59,720
Speaker 1: give even a little more backstory on sort of the

475
00:27:00,040 --> 00:27:04,320
Speaker 1: detail on reconstruction and exactly how it influenced the law. Right.

476
00:27:04,480 --> 00:27:07,080
Speaker 6: So the idea like reconstruct is in the name, right, like,

477
00:27:07,119 --> 00:27:09,800
Speaker 6: we had to rebuild the nation in the wake of

478
00:27:09,840 --> 00:27:15,680
Speaker 6: the Civil War and construct a new foundation for law

479
00:27:15,920 --> 00:27:19,520
Speaker 6: that would apply equally across the country, regardless of race,

480
00:27:19,920 --> 00:27:24,159
Speaker 6: no longer the explicit subjugation that had existed before. And

481
00:27:24,240 --> 00:27:28,640
Speaker 6: so you had the thirteenth Amendment, which finally formally abolished slavery,

482
00:27:28,720 --> 00:27:31,840
Speaker 6: with the notable exception as for punishment for a crime.

483
00:27:32,320 --> 00:27:36,399
Speaker 6: You got the Fourteenth Amendment, which created birthright citizenship. It

484
00:27:36,680 --> 00:27:40,919
Speaker 6: established equal protection under law, do process under law. You

485
00:27:40,960 --> 00:27:45,000
Speaker 6: have the fifteenth Amendment, which prohibited racial discrimination in voting.

486
00:27:45,400 --> 00:27:49,840
Speaker 6: Like all of these things came together to create a

487
00:27:49,960 --> 00:27:53,199
Speaker 6: new multi racial democracy, like to actually establish that for

488
00:27:53,280 --> 00:27:58,360
Speaker 6: the first time in the nation's charter. And they should

489
00:27:58,400 --> 00:28:04,280
Speaker 6: be viewed as reframing and recontextualizing the whole Constitution. We've

490
00:28:04,280 --> 00:28:08,320
Speaker 6: been seeing this really chipped away in the past month actually,

491
00:28:08,320 --> 00:28:10,080
Speaker 6: as we say, the past several decades, but really as

492
00:28:10,119 --> 00:28:12,560
Speaker 6: soon as they were made, folks tried to undercut them.

493
00:28:13,040 --> 00:28:16,199
Speaker 6: They just had a lot of successes recently. Reconstruction is

494
00:28:16,240 --> 00:28:21,040
Speaker 6: important because those amendments are at the heart of so

495
00:28:21,240 --> 00:28:24,639
Speaker 6: many of the major civil rights victories that folks care about,

496
00:28:24,880 --> 00:28:28,280
Speaker 6: Like brownree Board was a fourteenth Amendment decision. Roby Wade

497
00:28:28,359 --> 00:28:31,240
Speaker 6: was a fourteenth Amendment decision. Oberga Felipe Holdgius was a

498
00:28:31,280 --> 00:28:34,920
Speaker 6: fourteenth Amendment decision. So all of these things have their

499
00:28:35,000 --> 00:28:40,800
Speaker 6: source in the liberatory mission of the Reconstruction Amendments, and

500
00:28:40,840 --> 00:28:44,000
Speaker 6: that's why there is such a resistance to them and

501
00:28:44,600 --> 00:28:48,000
Speaker 6: an unwillingness to apply them as they should. I think

502
00:28:48,160 --> 00:28:52,920
Speaker 6: Sherilyn Eiffel, the former director BET and WAZP Legal Defense Fund,

503
00:28:53,320 --> 00:28:56,360
Speaker 6: I think She described this someone recently as a fear

504
00:28:56,480 --> 00:29:00,360
Speaker 6: of the fourteenth Amendment. That people are afraid of how

505
00:29:00,480 --> 00:29:03,840
Speaker 6: radical and how good the amendments are, which is why

506
00:29:03,880 --> 00:29:06,400
Speaker 6: we haven't seen them apply it as they should be.

507
00:29:06,680 --> 00:29:13,719
Speaker 1: It really is this fear of giving everyone the same right. Yeah, no,

508
00:29:13,880 --> 00:29:18,160
Speaker 1: I think that's correct. We are in this insane Supreme

509
00:29:18,200 --> 00:29:21,360
Speaker 1: Court season. It is almost June, which is like the

510
00:29:21,400 --> 00:29:24,040
Speaker 1: month I dread the most because time of the year,

511
00:29:24,640 --> 00:29:27,360
Speaker 1: you know they're going to just do insane stuff. I

512
00:29:27,440 --> 00:29:29,960
Speaker 1: do feel like sometimes I'll have one decision come out

513
00:29:29,960 --> 00:29:32,440
Speaker 1: and you'll be like, this isn't so bad, and then

514
00:29:32,520 --> 00:29:35,440
Speaker 1: you know the next one is going to be like

515
00:29:35,720 --> 00:29:37,479
Speaker 1: just shockingly bad.

516
00:29:37,640 --> 00:29:40,520
Speaker 6: Don't you feel like that's kind of what happened. Oh, definitely,

517
00:29:40,880 --> 00:29:44,000
Speaker 6: if I'm remembering correctly, I think that one of the

518
00:29:44,560 --> 00:29:48,960
Speaker 6: positive gay rights decisions a decade and change ago came

519
00:29:49,000 --> 00:29:51,280
Speaker 6: out like right around the same time as one of

520
00:29:51,320 --> 00:29:54,200
Speaker 6: the worst voting rest decisions, and I really felt like

521
00:29:54,240 --> 00:29:56,480
Speaker 6: the Court was sitting in chambers and was like, all right,

522
00:29:56,560 --> 00:29:58,200
Speaker 6: you know, we'll get them a little on this one,

523
00:29:58,520 --> 00:30:01,640
Speaker 6: but we'll hold this one back, like we'll do a

524
00:30:01,680 --> 00:30:04,880
Speaker 6: little tradz ease and hopefully we can keep things calm

525
00:30:04,960 --> 00:30:08,440
Speaker 6: if they have one ruling. We have Flaggate for Alito.

526
00:30:08,720 --> 00:30:13,840
Speaker 1: We have January six Gate for Thomas and his wife's involvement,

527
00:30:13,960 --> 00:30:18,040
Speaker 1: and stop this deal. These are two pretty large things.

528
00:30:18,280 --> 00:30:21,720
Speaker 1: They have been asked to recuse. Neither will recuse.

529
00:30:22,000 --> 00:30:25,480
Speaker 6: I mean, were you a u United States senator, what

530
00:30:25,560 --> 00:30:29,360
Speaker 6: would you do here? M It's an interesting question. I mean,

531
00:30:29,360 --> 00:30:32,640
Speaker 6: if I were a United States Senator, I would have

532
00:30:32,760 --> 00:30:37,880
Speaker 6: them hauled to Congress. Yeah, I think I would be Yeah,

533
00:30:37,960 --> 00:30:40,360
Speaker 6: I would be holding hearings. And if they refuse to

534
00:30:40,360 --> 00:30:42,520
Speaker 6: be hauled to Congress, I would show up at their door.

535
00:30:43,400 --> 00:30:46,480
Speaker 6: That's all I would play it. It's very clear that

536
00:30:46,800 --> 00:30:51,120
Speaker 6: the Supreme Court, particularly the far right members of the

537
00:30:51,160 --> 00:30:54,680
Speaker 6: Supreme Court, think that they're untouchable, of which there are

538
00:30:54,720 --> 00:30:58,160
Speaker 6: five right, but there are two who are old. Yes,

539
00:30:58,280 --> 00:31:01,160
Speaker 6: there's a super majority of them, and two in particular

540
00:31:01,240 --> 00:31:03,400
Speaker 6: who are just wildin ow at a class of their own.

541
00:31:03,560 --> 00:31:07,360
Speaker 6: And I think that the reason why they do that

542
00:31:07,600 --> 00:31:11,480
Speaker 6: is because they believe they can. They believe nothing is

543
00:31:11,520 --> 00:31:13,520
Speaker 6: going to happen to them, They're not going to face

544
00:31:13,600 --> 00:31:17,880
Speaker 6: any consequences, and so it's incumbent on the other branches

545
00:31:17,920 --> 00:31:22,760
Speaker 6: of government to impose consequences and to exercise its powers

546
00:31:22,880 --> 00:31:27,800
Speaker 6: to perform the court and also exercise basic accountability and oversight.

547
00:31:28,080 --> 00:31:31,960
Speaker 1: Let's just play pretend here. Let's say that Joe Biden wins,

548
00:31:32,680 --> 00:31:35,800
Speaker 1: they keep the Senate, and they flip the House.

549
00:31:35,880 --> 00:31:39,200
Speaker 6: Okay, say there's a trifecta. Yes, go along with me.

550
00:31:39,480 --> 00:31:41,840
Speaker 1: What should Joe Biden do about the Supreme Court? And

551
00:31:41,880 --> 00:31:43,600
Speaker 1: by the way, he's not going to want to, But

552
00:31:44,120 --> 00:31:47,440
Speaker 1: what would you if you were there? What would you

553
00:31:47,760 --> 00:31:50,480
Speaker 1: tell him to do? And how would you solve a

554
00:31:50,560 --> 00:31:52,160
Speaker 1: problem like the Supreme Court?

555
00:31:52,440 --> 00:31:54,840
Speaker 6: In an ideal world, if you had all of those

556
00:31:54,920 --> 00:31:58,400
Speaker 6: tools available, like you said, both Chambers of Congress and

557
00:31:58,520 --> 00:32:01,880
Speaker 6: have the White House a clear chance you have to

558
00:32:01,920 --> 00:32:06,680
Speaker 6: take to implement structural reforms. That's where you can do

559
00:32:06,760 --> 00:32:12,560
Speaker 6: things like expanding the court, establishing term limits, implementing an actual,

560
00:32:12,920 --> 00:32:16,360
Speaker 6: binding and forcible code of ethics. That's a chance you

561
00:32:16,400 --> 00:32:20,200
Speaker 6: could be reconsidering what kinds of cases the Court easie

562
00:32:20,320 --> 00:32:23,280
Speaker 6: has jurisdiction over. I would also add, and this is

563
00:32:23,680 --> 00:32:26,520
Speaker 6: what I really talk about in my book, that in

564
00:32:26,520 --> 00:32:29,560
Speaker 6: addition to changing, I'm talking about like what the court

565
00:32:29,640 --> 00:32:32,440
Speaker 6: looks like, what the core is capable of doing, and

566
00:32:32,480 --> 00:32:35,760
Speaker 6: in the book I lean into how the Court should

567
00:32:35,800 --> 00:32:38,720
Speaker 6: do what it does, because we talked a little about

568
00:32:38,800 --> 00:32:43,959
Speaker 6: originalism earlier as being this nonsensical way the Court uses

569
00:32:44,080 --> 00:32:47,680
Speaker 6: to justify as decisions. But even if the Court did

570
00:32:47,800 --> 00:32:51,560
Speaker 6: have three more, four more, shoot five more and justic

571
00:32:51,560 --> 00:32:55,440
Speaker 6: sys tomorrow, they would still need guidance on what to

572
00:32:55,520 --> 00:32:58,920
Speaker 6: do beyond not that. Something I try to do in

573
00:32:58,960 --> 00:33:03,080
Speaker 6: the book is l out this vision of what courts

574
00:33:03,120 --> 00:33:07,320
Speaker 6: should be doing a different model of interpretation, and also

575
00:33:07,400 --> 00:33:09,200
Speaker 6: calling on the public to be a part of that

576
00:33:09,280 --> 00:33:12,880
Speaker 6: as well. In the same way that we saw jurisprudence

577
00:33:12,920 --> 00:33:16,400
Speaker 6: shift so rapidly in all of these types of issues

578
00:33:16,400 --> 00:33:19,720
Speaker 6: that we care about. It's extremely demoralizing on one hand,

579
00:33:19,840 --> 00:33:21,480
Speaker 6: but I think on the other hand, it should be

580
00:33:21,560 --> 00:33:25,360
Speaker 6: a reminder that change is possible and that people make

581
00:33:25,520 --> 00:33:28,320
Speaker 6: change possible. These are things that we should be very

582
00:33:28,360 --> 00:33:33,320
Speaker 6: attuned to and demand that the Court interpret the Constitution

583
00:33:33,360 --> 00:33:35,640
Speaker 6: in a different way. And I think that's something that

584
00:33:35,720 --> 00:33:39,800
Speaker 6: the elected branches like Congress and the Executive, if they

585
00:33:39,800 --> 00:33:42,120
Speaker 6: can make a point of that as well. They too

586
00:33:42,240 --> 00:33:45,800
Speaker 6: have a role in saying what they think the Constitution

587
00:33:46,080 --> 00:33:49,040
Speaker 6: means and what they think the right way of interpreting

588
00:33:49,040 --> 00:33:51,800
Speaker 6: the Constitution is. It wouldn't be the first time that

589
00:33:51,880 --> 00:33:53,840
Speaker 6: Congress or the President did that, and I'm sure it

590
00:33:53,840 --> 00:33:57,480
Speaker 6: won't be the last either. But we've seen recently the

591
00:33:57,560 --> 00:34:02,160
Speaker 6: Supreme Court accumulate more and more power and acting as

592
00:34:02,160 --> 00:34:05,680
Speaker 6: if it has this exclusive domain to have any say

593
00:34:05,760 --> 00:34:08,200
Speaker 6: over what the law means. And I think that the

594
00:34:08,320 --> 00:34:12,399
Speaker 6: public and elected officials all need to say that. I'll

595
00:34:12,440 --> 00:34:15,280
Speaker 6: have to say not so and put forth a different

596
00:34:15,320 --> 00:34:20,160
Speaker 6: idea of thinking about the Constitution instead. So interesting, so important.

597
00:34:20,640 --> 00:34:23,560
Speaker 1: Just to really appreciate you and the work you're doing

598
00:34:23,600 --> 00:34:24,640
Speaker 1: at the Brennan Center.

599
00:34:24,800 --> 00:34:28,400
Speaker 6: So thanks for coming on. Thank you. Yeah, I was

600
00:34:28,880 --> 00:34:31,840
Speaker 6: at the Brennan Center in a previous list. I'm currently

601
00:34:32,000 --> 00:34:35,640
Speaker 6: the deputy editor and senior contributor at Balls and Strikes.

602
00:34:35,800 --> 00:34:38,480
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's Balls and Strikes. We love Balls and Strikes.

603
00:34:38,600 --> 00:34:40,239
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for coming on.

604
00:34:40,640 --> 00:34:43,319
Speaker 6: Yeah, thank you.

605
00:34:43,360 --> 00:34:47,000
Speaker 1: Steve Brell is the founder of NewsGuard and author of

606
00:34:47,080 --> 00:34:49,880
Speaker 1: the Death of Truth. How social media in the Internet

607
00:34:49,960 --> 00:34:55,600
Speaker 1: gave snake oil salesmen and demigogs the weapons they needed

608
00:34:55,840 --> 00:34:59,000
Speaker 1: to destroy trust and polarize the world, and what we

609
00:34:59,080 --> 00:35:01,279
Speaker 1: can do. Welcome ast politics.

610
00:35:01,480 --> 00:35:04,160
Speaker 3: Steve Brell, thank you, glad to be here.

611
00:35:04,239 --> 00:35:07,120
Speaker 1: I'm very excited to have you because you have such

612
00:35:07,120 --> 00:35:11,800
Speaker 1: an interesting story and you have done so many cool things.

613
00:35:12,120 --> 00:35:14,960
Speaker 1: Can we do a minute or two on Court TV?

614
00:35:15,480 --> 00:35:18,480
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean we absolutely should, because I'll tell you,

615
00:35:18,520 --> 00:35:21,920
Speaker 3: it drives me nuts that there aren't cameras in the

616
00:35:21,960 --> 00:35:22,680
Speaker 3: Trump corporate.

617
00:35:22,960 --> 00:35:26,719
Speaker 1: Explain to us how you started Court TV. How that happened.

618
00:35:27,080 --> 00:35:28,280
Speaker 1: I'm quite interested.

619
00:35:28,520 --> 00:35:32,319
Speaker 3: Well, I was running a legal publication that I had

620
00:35:32,360 --> 00:35:36,240
Speaker 3: started years before, called The American Lawyer, which was for lawyers,

621
00:35:36,440 --> 00:35:40,439
Speaker 3: and it was quite successful, and a bunch of publishers

622
00:35:41,320 --> 00:35:45,080
Speaker 3: Conde Nassharst, the New York Times had come to me

623
00:35:45,120 --> 00:35:48,919
Speaker 3: and said, why don't you start a consumer magazine about law?

624
00:35:49,280 --> 00:35:51,400
Speaker 3: And every time I thought about it, I thought it

625
00:35:51,440 --> 00:35:55,319
Speaker 3: was really a stupid idea because the only thing you

626
00:35:55,360 --> 00:35:58,399
Speaker 3: would do would be you cover true crime stuff, which

627
00:35:58,440 --> 00:36:01,200
Speaker 3: I thought would just get really sleazy, or you would

628
00:36:01,239 --> 00:36:03,680
Speaker 3: do things like what to do when You're arrested for

629
00:36:03,800 --> 00:36:07,080
Speaker 3: drunk driving and going to buy a magazine about what

630
00:36:07,120 --> 00:36:09,879
Speaker 3: to do when you're arrested for drunk driving except at

631
00:36:09,920 --> 00:36:11,839
Speaker 3: two or three in the morning on a Saturday night,

632
00:36:11,880 --> 00:36:14,320
Speaker 3: when you get pulled up a cop and there is

633
00:36:14,360 --> 00:36:18,040
Speaker 3: in a magazine store open. But I did think because

634
00:36:18,080 --> 00:36:20,360
Speaker 3: I had spent a lot of time over the years

635
00:36:20,440 --> 00:36:26,120
Speaker 3: interviewing jurors in important, high profile cases, and jurors always

636
00:36:26,200 --> 00:36:29,239
Speaker 3: came away with one thing in common, which is they

637
00:36:29,239 --> 00:36:32,400
Speaker 3: were fascinated by the system of the legal system and

638
00:36:32,480 --> 00:36:35,480
Speaker 3: had more confidence in the legal system as a result

639
00:36:35,600 --> 00:36:38,520
Speaker 3: of having served on a jury. They thought it really worked,

640
00:36:39,000 --> 00:36:44,080
Speaker 3: interesting and fascinating, even if the trial itself had its long,

641
00:36:44,360 --> 00:36:47,520
Speaker 3: boring moments. So I'm sitting in the back of a

642
00:36:47,600 --> 00:36:51,560
Speaker 3: cab one day and the cab driver has this radio

643
00:36:51,680 --> 00:36:54,720
Speaker 3: on and it's playing a sound clip from a trial

644
00:36:54,840 --> 00:36:59,080
Speaker 3: because the courts in New York had just allowed trials

645
00:36:59,120 --> 00:37:01,960
Speaker 3: to have, you know, audio, And I said to myself,

646
00:37:02,000 --> 00:37:04,400
Speaker 3: that's the idea, That's what I should do. And I

647
00:37:04,440 --> 00:37:07,479
Speaker 3: went to Steve Ross, who was the chairing of Want

648
00:37:07,480 --> 00:37:10,240
Speaker 3: of Communications at the time, was someone that I knew,

649
00:37:10,360 --> 00:37:13,239
Speaker 3: and I said, I have this really crazy idea to

650
00:37:13,280 --> 00:37:19,200
Speaker 3: a combination of c span and tabloid journalism. And he said, oh,

651
00:37:19,239 --> 00:37:22,120
Speaker 3: you want to start a cable channel with cameras. In

652
00:37:22,160 --> 00:37:23,920
Speaker 3: the course, I said, well, how'd you know that? Anyway,

653
00:37:24,000 --> 00:37:26,680
Speaker 3: long story short, that's what we started, and the whole

654
00:37:26,719 --> 00:37:31,840
Speaker 3: idea was to show people at home what jurors were seeing.

655
00:37:32,160 --> 00:37:34,960
Speaker 3: Not a lot of spin, you know, not defendants or

656
00:37:35,160 --> 00:37:37,600
Speaker 3: lawyers you know, coming out of the courtroom and talking

657
00:37:37,600 --> 00:37:39,759
Speaker 3: about how great the day was for them or how

658
00:37:40,160 --> 00:37:44,160
Speaker 3: outrageous the judge was, but what the jury was actually

659
00:37:44,200 --> 00:37:47,799
Speaker 3: seeing in the court room, which takes us to you know,

660
00:37:47,880 --> 00:37:51,480
Speaker 3: the week we've all been experiencing where it's a major

661
00:37:51,520 --> 00:37:54,920
Speaker 3: trial going on in case you didn't know, and nobody

662
00:37:55,040 --> 00:37:58,319
Speaker 3: seeing what's happening in the courtroom. What they're seeing is

663
00:37:58,520 --> 00:38:02,840
Speaker 3: the spin that the defending is putting on what's happening courtroom.

664
00:38:03,400 --> 00:38:06,400
Speaker 3: And my belief is that no matter what the verdict is,

665
00:38:06,560 --> 00:38:08,919
Speaker 3: we're all going to be debating it, you know, from

666
00:38:08,960 --> 00:38:13,080
Speaker 3: now until forever. Whereas that debate would be different if

667
00:38:13,120 --> 00:38:16,120
Speaker 3: people were debating from the same set of facts, which

668
00:38:16,200 --> 00:38:19,680
Speaker 3: is what did the jury see and hear in the courtroom.

669
00:38:19,920 --> 00:38:22,600
Speaker 3: And the world that I now live in, which is

670
00:38:23,000 --> 00:38:26,600
Speaker 3: NewsGuard where we rate the reliability of the news and

671
00:38:26,600 --> 00:38:31,560
Speaker 3: information online, is the opposite world. It's a world where

672
00:38:31,719 --> 00:38:35,359
Speaker 3: you know, social media platforms, you have no idea what

673
00:38:35,400 --> 00:38:38,520
Speaker 3: the credentials are of the people who are to tell

674
00:38:38,520 --> 00:38:42,160
Speaker 3: you these things. It's all rumor, it's hearsay, it's made up.

675
00:38:42,320 --> 00:38:45,880
Speaker 3: Whereas in a courtroom, the witnesses are carefully screened by

676
00:38:45,920 --> 00:38:49,160
Speaker 3: the judge, they're challenged by the opposite side, you know,

677
00:38:49,200 --> 00:38:52,640
Speaker 3: what their credentials are. The evidence that's put into play

678
00:38:53,200 --> 00:38:56,200
Speaker 3: is vetted first. It's the total opposite of what you

679
00:38:56,280 --> 00:38:59,880
Speaker 3: see online. So that's why I'm really frustrated that the

680
00:39:00,160 --> 00:39:03,719
Speaker 3: world hasn't been able to see what happened in the courtroom,

681
00:39:03,880 --> 00:39:06,280
Speaker 3: and it's just going to debate it, you know, endlessly,

682
00:39:06,360 --> 00:39:09,279
Speaker 3: without having seen it, and without having seen what the

683
00:39:09,400 --> 00:39:11,400
Speaker 3: jury saw when they made their decisions.

684
00:39:11,560 --> 00:39:14,359
Speaker 1: I could not agree with you more. And in fact,

685
00:39:14,480 --> 00:39:17,200
Speaker 1: every time I talk to anyone who's in that courtroom,

686
00:39:17,719 --> 00:39:20,319
Speaker 1: I always say, like, you know, people say, well, I

687
00:39:20,360 --> 00:39:22,600
Speaker 1: was in the overflow room, I wasn't in the courtroom,

688
00:39:22,640 --> 00:39:25,120
Speaker 1: and I was like, I think being able to see

689
00:39:25,160 --> 00:39:29,160
Speaker 1: the jury, I mean, like, how are they responding to

690
00:39:29,320 --> 00:39:32,840
Speaker 1: the witnesses Like that seems so relevant to me.

691
00:39:33,440 --> 00:39:36,400
Speaker 3: Well, even more so than the jury, the witnesses themselves.

692
00:39:36,440 --> 00:39:39,920
Speaker 3: I mean, the whole constitutional idea of being able to

693
00:39:39,960 --> 00:39:45,600
Speaker 3: confront your accuser is that the defendant, and the public

694
00:39:45,960 --> 00:39:48,399
Speaker 3: has a right to see what happens in a court.

695
00:39:48,719 --> 00:39:52,960
Speaker 3: One hundred years ago, courtrooms were built with giant places

696
00:39:52,960 --> 00:39:55,200
Speaker 3: for the audience. You know, it used to be the

697
00:39:55,239 --> 00:39:58,480
Speaker 3: courtroom was the center of town and people would go

698
00:39:58,560 --> 00:40:02,480
Speaker 3: to town and go in to the courtroom and watch the trial.

699
00:40:02,800 --> 00:40:05,759
Speaker 3: So a camera there is simply a substitute for that.

700
00:40:06,000 --> 00:40:06,200
Speaker 4: You know.

701
00:40:06,239 --> 00:40:08,840
Speaker 3: You don't have to have lights and noise or anything.

702
00:40:08,840 --> 00:40:12,759
Speaker 3: It's just one unobtrusive camera. In fact, that courtroom, if

703
00:40:12,760 --> 00:40:15,399
Speaker 3: it's like most other courtrooms in the United States, has

704
00:40:15,400 --> 00:40:17,600
Speaker 3: a security camera there already. You woudn't even have to

705
00:40:17,600 --> 00:40:20,239
Speaker 3: put a camera there, it's already there. But anyway, it's

706
00:40:20,280 --> 00:40:23,160
Speaker 3: the it's the opposite of the world that I now

707
00:40:23,239 --> 00:40:26,279
Speaker 3: live in. And that world you know, as you know,

708
00:40:26,520 --> 00:40:29,200
Speaker 3: is captured in the book that I've written, which is

709
00:40:29,239 --> 00:40:31,520
Speaker 3: The Death of Truth. And the Death of Truth is

710
00:40:31,600 --> 00:40:35,919
Speaker 3: really about the fact that people debate opinions and they

711
00:40:36,000 --> 00:40:38,600
Speaker 3: don't work from the same set of facts.

712
00:40:38,880 --> 00:40:42,520
Speaker 1: Yes, and this is something that I am obsessed with.

713
00:40:43,080 --> 00:40:45,960
Speaker 1: One of the things that I noticed is where this

714
00:40:46,120 --> 00:40:49,680
Speaker 1: enormous country, three hundred and thirty three hundred and fifty

715
00:40:49,760 --> 00:40:54,040
Speaker 1: million people, maybe twenty million people read the newspaper, maybe

716
00:40:54,120 --> 00:40:59,200
Speaker 1: last where and you know some percentage, watch cable news,

717
00:40:59,440 --> 00:41:03,000
Speaker 1: watch local. Where are the three hundred million other people

718
00:41:03,000 --> 00:41:03,840
Speaker 1: getting their news?

719
00:41:04,080 --> 00:41:09,360
Speaker 3: TikTok, YouTube, Facebook, all the places you arguably would not

720
00:41:09,520 --> 00:41:13,800
Speaker 3: want people to get news, and on those platforms. Everything

721
00:41:13,920 --> 00:41:17,680
Speaker 3: is a matter of opinion. Everything is debated. My book

722
00:41:17,719 --> 00:41:21,319
Speaker 3: opens with a story from thirty years ago when our

723
00:41:21,440 --> 00:41:24,200
Speaker 3: daughter was in the sixth or seventh grade at a

724
00:41:24,239 --> 00:41:27,759
Speaker 3: private school in Manhattan, and it was a parent's visiting day,

725
00:41:27,840 --> 00:41:29,960
Speaker 3: and we're staying in the back of the room and

726
00:41:30,000 --> 00:41:32,919
Speaker 3: the teacher asked one of the kids, luckily not my daughter,

727
00:41:33,080 --> 00:41:36,000
Speaker 3: how much is six times seven? And the kid says

728
00:41:36,120 --> 00:41:42,919
Speaker 3: it's forty one, And the teacher says, I disagree. Disagreeable. Well,

729
00:41:43,080 --> 00:41:46,040
Speaker 3: that is the state of the world today. We disagree

730
00:41:46,280 --> 00:41:49,280
Speaker 3: over who got the most votes. We disagree over whether

731
00:41:49,360 --> 00:41:53,000
Speaker 3: the COVID vaccine is killing people or not killing people.

732
00:41:53,400 --> 00:41:56,279
Speaker 3: Fifty one percent of all the people in the United

733
00:41:56,320 --> 00:42:00,000
Speaker 3: States who refused to get vaccinated for COVID fifty one percent,

734
00:42:00,000 --> 00:42:02,360
Speaker 3: saying up those people in them were high percentage. It

735
00:42:02,520 --> 00:42:06,319
Speaker 3: was something like twenty five percent of adults refused to

736
00:42:06,320 --> 00:42:10,640
Speaker 3: get vaccine. More than half of them believed that Bill

737
00:42:10,719 --> 00:42:14,560
Speaker 3: Gates had planned it a microchip in the vaccine in

738
00:42:14,680 --> 00:42:18,839
Speaker 3: order to control their minds. Fifty one percent. Just as

739
00:42:19,040 --> 00:42:21,560
Speaker 3: you know, a very high percentage of Republicans and in

740
00:42:21,600 --> 00:42:26,120
Speaker 3: fact the country don't believe that Trump lost the last election.

741
00:42:26,640 --> 00:42:28,480
Speaker 3: One of the seats in my book that I just

742
00:42:28,560 --> 00:42:31,600
Speaker 3: keep coming back to is I wrote a story just

743
00:42:31,719 --> 00:42:37,440
Speaker 3: before the twenty sixteen election about Trump University. Remember Trump University,

744
00:42:38,560 --> 00:42:41,120
Speaker 3: You know it was a total fraud. For thirty five

745
00:42:41,200 --> 00:42:43,680
Speaker 3: thousand dollars, you were going to learn the secrets of

746
00:42:43,760 --> 00:42:48,239
Speaker 3: Trump's real estate genius. And everybody who enrolled. There are

747
00:42:48,239 --> 00:42:51,800
Speaker 3: lots of people who envolved decided the thirty five thousand

748
00:42:51,800 --> 00:42:54,239
Speaker 3: dollars later they had learned nothing and the whole thing

749
00:42:54,320 --> 00:42:57,239
Speaker 3: was a scam, and they sued they were about to

750
00:42:57,360 --> 00:43:00,839
Speaker 3: win when Trump was settled by basically giving them all.

751
00:43:00,760 --> 00:43:01,479
Speaker 2: Their money back.

752
00:43:01,680 --> 00:43:04,919
Speaker 3: This is just before the election. Well, I found two

753
00:43:04,960 --> 00:43:07,840
Speaker 3: of the plainers. These are people who swore out the complaint,

754
00:43:07,880 --> 00:43:10,880
Speaker 3: who said they would defrauded, and they were a retired

755
00:43:10,960 --> 00:43:14,280
Speaker 3: couple who had spent their last thirty five thousand dollars

756
00:43:14,719 --> 00:43:18,160
Speaker 3: us on university. And I'm talking to them, and they're

757
00:43:18,160 --> 00:43:20,239
Speaker 3: telling you about how awful this was. And then sort

758
00:43:20,280 --> 00:43:22,560
Speaker 3: of just as an afterthought, this is just before the election.

759
00:43:22,800 --> 00:43:24,560
Speaker 3: I said, well, you know, I guess you're not going

760
00:43:24,600 --> 00:43:27,359
Speaker 3: to vote for Trump and they said, oh no, we're

761
00:43:27,440 --> 00:43:29,320
Speaker 3: voting for it. I said, what are you talking about.

762
00:43:29,440 --> 00:43:32,160
Speaker 3: You know, you swore in a document that he defrauded you.

763
00:43:32,480 --> 00:43:34,440
Speaker 3: And they said, yeah, well we since you know, we've

764
00:43:34,520 --> 00:43:37,400
Speaker 3: learned on social media. And he said he really didn't

765
00:43:37,400 --> 00:43:39,920
Speaker 3: have anything to do with that university. He lent his

766
00:43:40,000 --> 00:43:42,239
Speaker 3: name into it, but you know, he really wasn't part

767
00:43:42,280 --> 00:43:44,800
Speaker 3: of it, and he's a good guy and he's really

768
00:43:44,840 --> 00:43:47,120
Speaker 3: going to fight for us. These are people who were

769
00:43:47,200 --> 00:43:50,200
Speaker 3: swindled by it, who were voting for it. And the

770
00:43:50,360 --> 00:43:53,600
Speaker 3: other incident like that, which I think demonstrates that there

771
00:43:53,760 --> 00:43:56,719
Speaker 3: is the death of truth, is there's a patient in

772
00:43:56,760 --> 00:44:00,680
Speaker 3: a hospital who's on a respirator. He's breathing his last

773
00:44:00,960 --> 00:44:04,840
Speaker 3: breaths because he has COVID, and just as he's about

774
00:44:04,880 --> 00:44:07,880
Speaker 3: to die, he takes the respirator off and says to

775
00:44:08,040 --> 00:44:11,399
Speaker 3: his doctor, this COVID thing is all bullshit. Now Here's

776
00:44:11,800 --> 00:44:15,000
Speaker 3: doesn't even believe his own lungs. He thinks that COVID

777
00:44:15,080 --> 00:44:17,520
Speaker 3: is a matter of opinion. You think there's COVID. I

778
00:44:17,520 --> 00:44:21,120
Speaker 3: don't think there's COVID. There's no fact, there's no shared

779
00:44:21,600 --> 00:44:22,440
Speaker 3: set of facts.

780
00:44:22,800 --> 00:44:25,799
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, I agree. I mean it's just such an

781
00:44:25,800 --> 00:44:29,480
Speaker 1: insane moment in American life. So what do you think

782
00:44:29,560 --> 00:44:30,759
Speaker 1: this solve is for this?

783
00:44:31,200 --> 00:44:34,400
Speaker 3: There are a couple of solves in different areas. On

784
00:44:34,440 --> 00:44:39,840
Speaker 3: the technology front. The two biggest inventions were advances in

785
00:44:39,920 --> 00:44:42,799
Speaker 3: technology that have to do with information. First of the

786
00:44:42,800 --> 00:44:46,759
Speaker 3: social media platforms, which were given an exemption from any

787
00:44:46,800 --> 00:44:50,120
Speaker 3: liability before they were social media platforms. This was a

788
00:44:50,200 --> 00:44:53,240
Speaker 3: law passed in called Section two thirty, which was part

789
00:44:53,280 --> 00:44:57,600
Speaker 3: of a massive telecommunications reform law in nineteen ninety six,

790
00:44:58,040 --> 00:45:01,120
Speaker 3: and it was really aimed at giving what were then

791
00:45:01,400 --> 00:45:05,400
Speaker 3: America Online and Prodigy and Compuser, which are three companies

792
00:45:05,440 --> 00:45:06,520
Speaker 3: you may not have ever heard of.

793
00:45:06,960 --> 00:45:11,000
Speaker 1: We're actually compuserved years all with Jesse and I.

794
00:45:11,120 --> 00:45:14,399
Speaker 3: They got exempted from liability if someone went into one

795
00:45:14,400 --> 00:45:17,880
Speaker 3: of their chat rooms related to finance or sports or

796
00:45:18,040 --> 00:45:22,279
Speaker 3: you know whatever and said something, you know, defamatory. So

797
00:45:22,719 --> 00:45:26,520
Speaker 3: the idea was to protect them from that kind of liability,

798
00:45:27,040 --> 00:45:29,680
Speaker 3: but had nothing to do with the social media platforms

799
00:45:29,680 --> 00:45:33,279
Speaker 3: as we now know them, who are exempt from any liability.

800
00:45:33,440 --> 00:45:35,520
Speaker 3: But it turns out, as I explained in the book,

801
00:45:35,840 --> 00:45:38,239
Speaker 3: you don't have to amend the Walk. Congress doesn't have

802
00:45:38,280 --> 00:45:40,879
Speaker 3: to do anything because right now, Molly, when we get

803
00:45:40,920 --> 00:45:44,360
Speaker 3: off this conversation, you go to your Facebook account or

804
00:45:44,400 --> 00:45:47,120
Speaker 3: your Twitter account and look at the terms of service.

805
00:45:47,640 --> 00:45:52,080
Speaker 3: The terms of service say that Facebook will not tolerate

806
00:45:52,520 --> 00:46:00,319
Speaker 3: harmful misinformation or disinformation or other harmful speech, bullying, hates, etc.

807
00:46:00,600 --> 00:46:02,640
Speaker 3: They say, we will not tolerate it. That's a term

808
00:46:02,680 --> 00:46:05,960
Speaker 3: of service. That's a contract. They are not living up

809
00:46:05,960 --> 00:46:09,239
Speaker 3: to their contract. The FTC or you as an individual,

810
00:46:09,280 --> 00:46:11,879
Speaker 3: but the FTC on behalf of you and everybody else

811
00:46:12,120 --> 00:46:15,680
Speaker 3: today could sue them for violating their terms of service.

812
00:46:16,000 --> 00:46:19,520
Speaker 3: The terms of service don't say, well, we don't like

813
00:46:19,880 --> 00:46:23,200
Speaker 3: misinformation and disinformation, we don't like hate speech, but you

814
00:46:23,239 --> 00:46:27,239
Speaker 3: know so many people post online to us that we

815
00:46:27,440 --> 00:46:29,279
Speaker 3: really can't. You know, we don't want to cut into

816
00:46:29,360 --> 00:46:33,040
Speaker 3: our profit margins by limiting people can post or by

817
00:46:33,160 --> 00:46:36,400
Speaker 3: hiring more people to screen it. So it's just going

818
00:46:36,480 --> 00:46:38,759
Speaker 3: to get through. The terms of service doesn't say that.

819
00:46:39,200 --> 00:46:42,440
Speaker 3: It says we don't tolerate it, and that's a promise

820
00:46:42,480 --> 00:46:45,040
Speaker 3: they are not keeping, and that promise is a contract.

821
00:46:45,040 --> 00:46:47,319
Speaker 3: So that's one thing you could do. The second thing

822
00:46:47,360 --> 00:46:52,280
Speaker 3: has to do with another technological advance, which is programmatic advertise.

823
00:46:52,719 --> 00:46:57,080
Speaker 3: Advertising today is placed by algorithm. It's not you know

824
00:46:57,160 --> 00:46:59,360
Speaker 3: the days of mad Men where people go out to

825
00:46:59,440 --> 00:47:02,279
Speaker 3: lunch and to side. Do I want to advertise on

826
00:47:03,080 --> 00:47:07,120
Speaker 3: you know, Vanity Fair or Wired, or would I want

827
00:47:07,160 --> 00:47:10,759
Speaker 3: to be on NBC or CBS. It's all done by

828
00:47:10,840 --> 00:47:14,840
Speaker 3: algorithm with no regard for the content where the head appears,

829
00:47:15,280 --> 00:47:20,040
Speaker 3: and that has ended up financing the worst kinds of

830
00:47:20,080 --> 00:47:25,000
Speaker 3: misinformation and disinformation without the advertisers even knowing it. That's

831
00:47:25,040 --> 00:47:28,000
Speaker 3: probably the most eye opening chapter in the book, which

832
00:47:28,120 --> 00:47:32,040
Speaker 3: opens with the following, which is a couple of years ago.

833
00:47:32,840 --> 00:47:37,680
Speaker 3: Guess who the biggest single advertiser was on Spotnik, which

834
00:47:37,719 --> 00:47:40,880
Speaker 3: is the Russian uh, you know aganda hand. Guess to

835
00:47:40,960 --> 00:47:45,080
Speaker 3: the biggest advertizments Warren Buffett. Now it's not like Warren

836
00:47:45,080 --> 00:47:47,400
Speaker 3: Buffett wakes up every morning and says, how do I

837
00:47:47,440 --> 00:47:51,480
Speaker 3: send more money to Vladimir Putin? It He owns Geico,

838
00:47:52,160 --> 00:47:56,440
Speaker 3: and Geico does a programmatic advertising and a lot of

839
00:47:56,440 --> 00:47:58,960
Speaker 3: it ends up on spot Neck, it ends up on

840
00:47:59,120 --> 00:48:03,440
Speaker 3: stop the Steel sites, it ends up on COVID misinformation sites,

841
00:48:03,480 --> 00:48:07,120
Speaker 3: it ends up sites that say that the October seventh

842
00:48:07,200 --> 00:48:11,080
Speaker 3: attack was a false flag by Israel. So billions of

843
00:48:11,120 --> 00:48:15,480
Speaker 3: dollars is going to support the misinformation and disinformation that

844
00:48:15,600 --> 00:48:18,760
Speaker 3: I really outlined the look. So that's the second tech

845
00:48:19,160 --> 00:48:22,120
Speaker 3: great advance that is booberrang Dogs.

846
00:48:22,560 --> 00:48:25,919
Speaker 1: Yeah, so it sounds like some of the problem here

847
00:48:26,120 --> 00:48:31,440
Speaker 1: is that we just have a social media ecosystem that

848
00:48:31,719 --> 00:48:34,600
Speaker 1: has no content moderation, right.

849
00:48:34,440 --> 00:48:37,840
Speaker 3: And I'm not talking about content censorship, you know, far

850
00:48:37,880 --> 00:48:41,160
Speaker 3: from it. I'm talking about content moderation in the sense

851
00:48:41,200 --> 00:48:45,400
Speaker 3: that what NewsGuard does is we assess the reliability and

852
00:48:45,480 --> 00:48:50,279
Speaker 3: credibility of online sources, so if something is owned by

853
00:48:50,280 --> 00:48:53,160
Speaker 3: the Russians. I mean, we just did a report this

854
00:48:53,239 --> 00:48:58,839
Speaker 3: week that identified a Russian disinformation operative in Moscow who

855
00:48:59,040 --> 00:49:02,399
Speaker 3: used to be a sheriff in Florida but fled after

856
00:49:02,440 --> 00:49:05,840
Speaker 3: he was tided. This guy has set up one hundred

857
00:49:05,920 --> 00:49:10,640
Speaker 3: and sixty seven one hundred and sixty seven fake local

858
00:49:10,719 --> 00:49:14,759
Speaker 3: news sites in the United States that he has set up.

859
00:49:14,800 --> 00:49:19,080
Speaker 3: He's a Russian disinformation operative. Jesus and those local news

860
00:49:19,080 --> 00:49:24,800
Speaker 3: sites are feeding all kinds of Russian propaganda, pro Trump

861
00:49:25,160 --> 00:49:29,440
Speaker 3: propaganda on sites throughout the United States that are posing

862
00:49:29,480 --> 00:49:33,560
Speaker 3: as legitimate local news, so that disorients everybody. No one

863
00:49:33,680 --> 00:49:37,600
Speaker 3: knows what to believe anymore, because it's just you know,

864
00:49:37,760 --> 00:49:43,040
Speaker 3: it's a cesspool of you know, chaos and misinformation. If

865
00:49:43,920 --> 00:49:48,680
Speaker 3: the platforms had to identify who owns various sites, who

866
00:49:48,680 --> 00:49:49,920
Speaker 3: owns them, just.

867
00:49:50,000 --> 00:49:53,959
Speaker 1: That little fix might solve, right, because if you could

868
00:49:54,000 --> 00:49:58,080
Speaker 1: see something was owned by a company in Russia, right,

869
00:49:58,080 --> 00:49:59,840
Speaker 1: wouldn't that solve a lot of problems?

870
00:50:00,080 --> 00:50:02,319
Speaker 3: It would sure help, And wouldn't you like to know that?

871
00:50:02,800 --> 00:50:06,520
Speaker 1: Listen, all I do is think about why, you know,

872
00:50:06,600 --> 00:50:11,480
Speaker 1: our percentage of the country doesn't seem to be interfacing

873
00:50:11,520 --> 00:50:14,800
Speaker 1: with normal news and wondering where they've gone.

874
00:50:15,280 --> 00:50:18,480
Speaker 3: Well, just think of that couple that retired eighty year

875
00:50:18,760 --> 00:50:22,800
Speaker 3: old plus couple in New Jersey who enrolled in Trump

876
00:50:22,920 --> 00:50:25,880
Speaker 3: University and got swindled and are still voting for you.

877
00:50:26,080 --> 00:50:26,560
Speaker 2: Think about that.

878
00:50:26,600 --> 00:50:29,200
Speaker 3: I mean, just that is the state of you know,

879
00:50:29,360 --> 00:50:33,480
Speaker 3: the chaos of the information ecosystem. They're voting for him

880
00:50:33,520 --> 00:50:36,440
Speaker 3: because they heard online that he really wasn't responsible.

881
00:50:36,840 --> 00:50:39,320
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, that's so nuts. One of the things

882
00:50:39,360 --> 00:50:42,920
Speaker 1: that I've been struck by is that it feels like

883
00:50:43,360 --> 00:50:47,319
Speaker 1: the government really fell down on regulation. You clearly have

884
00:50:47,400 --> 00:50:48,960
Speaker 1: thought about this more than I have.

885
00:50:49,239 --> 00:50:51,680
Speaker 3: No I think it's more the private sector. I mean,

886
00:50:51,719 --> 00:50:54,040
Speaker 3: you know, I don't want the government regulating speech, but

887
00:50:54,120 --> 00:50:58,520
Speaker 3: I want the government to regulate in a content neutral

888
00:50:58,520 --> 00:51:02,239
Speaker 3: way what people know about speech, the informat what they

889
00:51:02,280 --> 00:51:05,000
Speaker 3: know about their sources of information. And I want the

890
00:51:05,040 --> 00:51:08,719
Speaker 3: government to regulate the way they typically do when when

891
00:51:08,760 --> 00:51:12,440
Speaker 3: a private company, you know, promises that you're going to

892
00:51:12,520 --> 00:51:15,680
Speaker 3: have a safe experience with their product, that they keep

893
00:51:15,719 --> 00:51:18,920
Speaker 3: that promise. I mean, Elon Musk right now, would not

894
00:51:19,040 --> 00:51:21,920
Speaker 3: be allowed to say that so many people want to

895
00:51:21,920 --> 00:51:24,400
Speaker 3: buy a Tesla that he has to step up production.

896
00:51:24,800 --> 00:51:27,320
Speaker 3: And stepping up production, he's not going to have time

897
00:51:27,400 --> 00:51:30,400
Speaker 3: to mess around with pesky things like air bags and

898
00:51:30,520 --> 00:51:33,560
Speaker 3: seat belts, because you know that slows down production and

899
00:51:33,640 --> 00:51:35,839
Speaker 3: costs more money. They would never let him do that.

900
00:51:36,120 --> 00:51:38,080
Speaker 3: But look at what they let him do on his

901
00:51:38,160 --> 00:51:39,200
Speaker 3: social media pledge.

902
00:51:39,600 --> 00:51:42,360
Speaker 1: Yeah, because there's no government regulation right.

903
00:51:42,600 --> 00:51:45,319
Speaker 3: Right, there's no government regulation, And in the case of

904
00:51:45,400 --> 00:51:49,440
Speaker 3: advertisers who are supporting it, they have done nothing, almost

905
00:51:49,440 --> 00:51:53,160
Speaker 3: nothing but to worry about where their ads appear, and

906
00:51:53,520 --> 00:51:55,640
Speaker 3: all of that has happened in a world in which

907
00:51:55,640 --> 00:51:58,520
Speaker 3: where if you have you know, partisan gerrymandering. I know

908
00:51:58,560 --> 00:52:01,440
Speaker 3: I'm coming off the subject, but if you have partisan

909
00:52:01,520 --> 00:52:05,640
Speaker 3: gerrymandering and a primary system in most states where the

910
00:52:05,680 --> 00:52:09,719
Speaker 3: Republicans you know, fire to be the furthest right Republican

911
00:52:09,800 --> 00:52:12,960
Speaker 3: and the Democrats by to be the furthest left Democrat,

912
00:52:13,160 --> 00:52:16,760
Speaker 3: you have a polarized electorate. And that is a formula

913
00:52:16,840 --> 00:52:19,920
Speaker 3: for what we have today, which is again, you know,

914
00:52:20,120 --> 00:52:23,160
Speaker 3: the death of truth. No one is signing on to

915
00:52:23,239 --> 00:52:25,840
Speaker 3: believe in a common set of facts or to believe

916
00:52:25,920 --> 00:52:29,839
Speaker 3: in you know, institutions and people. We used to believe it.

917
00:52:30,000 --> 00:52:32,360
Speaker 3: We used to believe in as a country that you know,

918
00:52:32,480 --> 00:52:35,920
Speaker 3: people you know working on election day at polling centers

919
00:52:36,080 --> 00:52:39,960
Speaker 3: were honest people, They were honest referees. Now a certain

920
00:52:40,000 --> 00:52:42,680
Speaker 3: segment of the population thinks these people are you know,

921
00:52:42,960 --> 00:52:46,560
Speaker 3: crooks or hustlers. We used to believe in doctors. Now

922
00:52:46,760 --> 00:52:51,480
Speaker 3: more people get their medical information online than they get

923
00:52:51,600 --> 00:52:56,000
Speaker 3: from you know, real doctors. We used to believe in judges.

924
00:52:56,640 --> 00:52:59,880
Speaker 3: Now you know, people being told that every judge is

925
00:53:00,520 --> 00:53:04,120
Speaker 3: on the take, is biased, is on one side of

926
00:53:04,200 --> 00:53:07,040
Speaker 3: the other. So it has undermine our belief in the

927
00:53:07,280 --> 00:53:12,399
Speaker 3: you know, in basic American institutions, whether it's medicine or elections,

928
00:53:12,840 --> 00:53:15,440
Speaker 3: everything is a matter of opinion. Who got the most votes.

929
00:53:15,480 --> 00:53:18,600
Speaker 3: That's your opinion versus someone else's. It never used to

930
00:53:18,600 --> 00:53:20,239
Speaker 3: be that way. It shouldn't be that one.

931
00:53:20,480 --> 00:53:23,520
Speaker 1: Steve Brill, thank you, thank you, thank you.

932
00:53:24,560 --> 00:53:25,359
Speaker 3: Happy to do it.

933
00:53:27,719 --> 00:53:30,359
Speaker 2: No moment, we.

934
00:53:30,440 --> 00:53:33,920
Speaker 1: Have a special surprise appearance from the one, the only,

935
00:53:34,080 --> 00:53:37,320
Speaker 1: Rick Wilson. He has come for a moment of fuckery

936
00:53:37,360 --> 00:53:40,239
Speaker 1: because everything old is new again when it comes to

937
00:53:40,280 --> 00:53:44,959
Speaker 1: Donald Trump and racial slurs. Let's get going.

938
00:53:45,360 --> 00:53:49,799
Speaker 4: We have heard this story for a decade now that

939
00:53:50,160 --> 00:53:53,759
Speaker 4: somewhere in the bowels of Mark Burnett's media empire are

940
00:53:53,840 --> 00:53:57,040
Speaker 4: the outtakes of Donald Trump saying the inWORD. Now, anyone

941
00:53:57,120 --> 00:53:59,920
Speaker 4: who doesn't think that the guy who took two weeks

942
00:54:00,080 --> 00:54:02,600
Speaker 4: denounced David Duke might not have said the inWORD. I

943
00:54:02,680 --> 00:54:05,360
Speaker 4: have many bridges to sell you. But what has happened

944
00:54:05,360 --> 00:54:07,480
Speaker 4: now is a producer who was on the team. His

945
00:54:07,600 --> 00:54:10,279
Speaker 4: NDA has expired, and because his NDIA has expired, he

946
00:54:10,320 --> 00:54:13,240
Speaker 4: is now saying, why, yes, he did say the inWORD

947
00:54:13,320 --> 00:54:17,160
Speaker 4: it's on tape. Now Mark Burnett, who is a major winger,

948
00:54:17,360 --> 00:54:21,239
Speaker 4: and his wife who was a major winger, she's a

949
00:54:21,360 --> 00:54:24,879
Speaker 4: queen Trumper. All this has added up to this really

950
00:54:25,000 --> 00:54:28,920
Speaker 4: ugly moment where the guy saying the inWORD on tape

951
00:54:29,000 --> 00:54:33,560
Speaker 4: has now had somebody, another eyewitness who was verifiably on

952
00:54:33,760 --> 00:54:36,319
Speaker 4: the show come out and say, yep, I heard it.

953
00:54:36,480 --> 00:54:37,719
Speaker 2: I heard it. He said it.

954
00:54:37,840 --> 00:54:41,040
Speaker 1: And one of the things about this particular moment of

955
00:54:41,080 --> 00:54:43,640
Speaker 1: fuck ray is that Rick and I talked to Tom

956
00:54:43,760 --> 00:54:48,120
Speaker 1: Arnold in the first season of Trump Ruining America twenty

957
00:54:48,200 --> 00:54:54,280
Speaker 1: twenty during a pandemic Trump Ruins America Season one pandemic pandemic,

958
00:54:54,680 --> 00:54:57,000
Speaker 1: and Tom Arnold told us that there was a tape

959
00:54:57,120 --> 00:55:00,520
Speaker 1: of Trump saying the N word. We were unable to

960
00:55:01,120 --> 00:55:02,799
Speaker 1: have enough sources to back that up.

961
00:55:02,840 --> 00:55:04,760
Speaker 2: We couldn't go with it because.

962
00:55:04,719 --> 00:55:07,800
Speaker 1: We weren't able to track it down. But Donald Trump

963
00:55:08,000 --> 00:55:10,640
Speaker 1: saying the N word and all of America non finding

964
00:55:10,680 --> 00:55:15,480
Speaker 1: out about it for eight years is our moment of fuckery.

965
00:55:15,719 --> 00:55:18,280
Speaker 4: That's down to you, Mark Burnett. Your moment of fuckery

966
00:55:18,360 --> 00:55:20,759
Speaker 4: has arrived. But then again, what do we know about

967
00:55:20,760 --> 00:55:23,720
Speaker 4: people in the MAGA right now? None of that stuff matters.

968
00:55:23,840 --> 00:55:26,680
Speaker 4: Only winning matters to them. I mean, Donald Trump could

969
00:55:26,719 --> 00:55:30,399
Speaker 4: say things one hundred times worse because he allegedly said

970
00:55:30,440 --> 00:55:33,520
Speaker 4: on the tape, how will America feel about the inward

971
00:55:33,600 --> 00:55:36,520
Speaker 4: winning or a inward winning? I mean, I don't care.

972
00:55:36,680 --> 00:55:39,040
Speaker 4: I promise you they will go through the normal phases

973
00:55:39,080 --> 00:55:41,680
Speaker 4: of trump Ism. It's a lie by the mainstream media. No,

974
00:55:41,840 --> 00:55:44,959
Speaker 4: it never happened. No, he never said that. No, Joe

975
00:55:44,960 --> 00:55:47,160
Speaker 4: Biden's the one who actually said that they're going to

976
00:55:47,200 --> 00:55:50,200
Speaker 4: do the whole thing they always do. And of course

977
00:55:50,320 --> 00:55:52,560
Speaker 4: we'll end up getting headlines in the Times in places

978
00:55:52,640 --> 00:55:55,000
Speaker 4: like both Trump and Biden have faced racial issues.

979
00:55:56,040 --> 00:56:01,520
Speaker 1: Rick Wilson, thanks anytime. That's it for this episode of

980
00:56:01,560 --> 00:56:05,360
Speaker 1: Fast Politics. Tune in every Monday, Wednesday and Friday to

981
00:56:05,400 --> 00:56:08,279
Speaker 1: hear the best minds in politics makes sense of all

982
00:56:08,400 --> 00:56:11,879
Speaker 1: this chaos. If you enjoyed what you've heard, please send

983
00:56:11,880 --> 00:56:15,000
Speaker 1: it to a friend and keep the conversation going. And again,

984
00:56:15,239 --> 00:56:16,200
Speaker 1: thanks for listening.