Speaker 1: Good morning, Peepsen, and welcome to Okay Daily with Meet
Speaker 1: your Girl Danielle Moody. Recording from the Long Island Bunker. Folks,
Speaker 1: I'm really excited to bring this episode to you today
Speaker 1: with John Idarola, who is the host of the Damage Report,
Speaker 1: which is a part of the Young Turk's Network. Because
Speaker 1: you know, John and I go through a host of
Speaker 1: headlines that we've been inundated with, but one of them
Speaker 1: I want to really lift up today, which is my
Speaker 1: absolute and total fucking aggravation with the way in which
Speaker 1: the media continues to cover mass shootings, particularly those that
Speaker 1: are directed and targeted at marginalized communities. So, whether it
Speaker 1: was the shooting that took place only six months ago
Speaker 1: in Buffalo where several black shoppers lost their lives at
Speaker 1: the grocery store there, whether it is you know what
Speaker 1: just happened in Colorado at Club Q and LGBTQ Club
Speaker 1: where five people were murdered and several more injured by
Speaker 1: a shooter that was subdued, thankfully by very brave patrons
Speaker 1: of the club. You know, I'm just tired of listening
Speaker 1: to the fucking media say, well, we don't have all
Speaker 1: of the details yet, so we don't know if it
Speaker 1: was a hate crime. If you are going into a
Speaker 1: fucking gay establishment and shooting it up and passing by
Speaker 1: a whole host of other bars in places that you
Speaker 1: could go to, what else are we supposed to fucking infer?
Speaker 1: And also if you don't leave behind a manifesto, as
Speaker 1: was the case with the Buffalo shooter, but it is
Speaker 1: all black people that are shot and killed, or all
Speaker 1: Asian people that are shot and killed as what happened
Speaker 1: at a salon a couple of months ago, as well, like,
Speaker 1: are we just supposed to pretend that white supremacy, white
Speaker 1: nationalist rhetoric does not have real fucking world consequences? Like
Speaker 1: are we just supposed to all act as if you know, words,
Speaker 1: sticks and stones may break my bones, but words don't
Speaker 1: actually hurt me? Are we dumb? Because that's what I
Speaker 1: think the mainstream media wants us to believe, right, is that, oh,
Speaker 1: there is no real link between Rhonda Santists passing don't
Speaker 1: Say gay legislation, between Greg Abbott passing anti trans and
Speaker 1: anti LGBTQ legislation and criminalizing parents that want to have
Speaker 1: and create an environment of affirmation for their trans child
Speaker 1: and the violence that we are seeing on the rise.
Speaker 1: Do we think that there's no correlation between Donald Trump
Speaker 1: referring to African nations as shit whole countries between that
Speaker 1: Trump administration referring to COVID nineteen as kung flu and
Speaker 1: then you seeing the escalation and anti black and anti Asian. Hey, Like,
Speaker 1: I'm just sick of the bullshit, and I'm sick of
Speaker 1: us allowing the media to continue to lie to us
Speaker 1: and place it on us in the vein of neutrality, Like,
Speaker 1: oh well, we need to get all of the fucking facts.
Speaker 1: Here are the facts, and let me make them really
Speaker 1: fucking clear. The facts are these. The facts are that
Speaker 1: the Republican Party has become a white supremacist stronghold. That
Speaker 1: is who their base is, that is who their people are.
Speaker 1: That white evangelical Christians that they hold up as this
Speaker 1: religious sort. Would rather vote for a man in Georgia
Speaker 1: who has repeatedly gotten abortions and paid for abortions for
Speaker 1: his girlfriends, couldn't pull together two sentences from the Bible
Speaker 1: if his life depended on it, as opposed to voting
Speaker 1: for an actual reverend who preaches at the same church
Speaker 1: that Martin Luther King Junior did right. So it's this
Speaker 1: idea we are supposed to allow all of the facts
Speaker 1: to come in and the chips to fall before we
Speaker 1: recognize that there are direct consequences between Marjorie Taylor Green
Speaker 1: and the Republican Party referring to queer people as groomers
Speaker 1: and pedophiles and then acts of violence that are taken
Speaker 1: out against that same community. Are you dumb? Right? And
Speaker 1: so that's kind of my feeling when I'm watching the
Speaker 1: news and I was doing so, you know, with my mom,
Speaker 1: and she was just like, I mean, does everyone need
Speaker 1: to walk in shooting and saying like anti Semitic slurs
Speaker 1: in order for us to recognize that there is anti
Speaker 1: Jewish attacks that are on the rise. Do you need
Speaker 1: to have the N word literally tattooed on somebody's body
Speaker 1: to recognize again that they are rabid racist? Like, I'm
Speaker 1: just so fucking tired of not providing contacts, not connecting
Speaker 1: the dots, and thinking that somehow you are unbiased. These
Speaker 1: journalists have a responsibility to tell audiences the fucking truth,
Speaker 1: to let them know that there is direct consequences between
Speaker 1: the rise and political violent rhetoric that is coming from
Speaker 1: only one goddamn party in this country. It is not
Speaker 1: a both sides issue because you do not see Democrats
Speaker 1: ever or hear Democrats ever other than referring to the
Speaker 1: actions that this party is taking as authoritarian and fascist,
Speaker 1: because they are right. But I'm not going to pretend
Speaker 1: that the ship that Donald Trump said while he was president,
Speaker 1: that the ship that you hear in the legislation that
Speaker 1: is being passed that is trying to erase black Indigenous
Speaker 1: people of color, that is trying to erase LGBTQ people
Speaker 1: from our classrooms, from our societies at large, is not
Speaker 1: directly correlated to the violence that is happening against these communities.
Speaker 1: That's just bullshit, right. The danger that we have here, folks,
Speaker 1: is people not holding these political leaders accountable and saying
Speaker 1: that what they're offering in the way of their thoughts
Speaker 1: and prayers are enough. If it was, folks, then there
Speaker 1: wouldn't have been a series of fucking mass shootings that
Speaker 1: have happened between May with the Buffalo shooting and what
Speaker 1: just happened at Club Q right like, there just wouldn't
Speaker 1: have been slew. And I'm tired of the lies because
Speaker 1: they are actually costing people their fucking lives and somebody
Speaker 1: on top of the gun manufacturers need to be held
Speaker 1: accountable for that. So John Iderola and I will get
Speaker 1: into a larger conversation about rhetoric about the mainstream media
Speaker 1: and about the Republican Party and where in fact Kevin
Speaker 1: McCarthy is going to fall in the elevation of members
Speaker 1: of Congress like Marjorie Taylor Green and others. That conversation
Speaker 1: is coming up next, folks. I am very excited to
Speaker 1: welcome to Okay f for the very first time the
Speaker 1: host of the Damage Report, John Idarola, who is part
Speaker 1: of the Young Turk's network and is daily daily you
Speaker 1: can find him breaking down all of the threats that
Speaker 1: we are facing in our country and the world. John, welcome,
Speaker 1: Thank you. So So where to begin? You know, it's
Speaker 1: like what part of the sewer would you like to
Speaker 1: dive into first that I refer to as our democracy.
Speaker 1: I think where I want to start is with the
Speaker 1: umpteenth mass shooting that we have now has all come
Speaker 1: on our radar, that took place in Colorado. Colorado has
Speaker 1: been the been ground zero for multiple mass shootings that
Speaker 1: make headlub that have made headlines over the years. This
Speaker 1: one at Club Q and LGBTQ plus nightclub. Five people
Speaker 1: are dead. I believe over fifteen or some odd had
Speaker 1: been shot and injured. Thank god, the gunman was taken
Speaker 1: down by patrons inside of the club that were able
Speaker 1: to hold them until police arrived. Let me just ask you,
Speaker 1: you know, another headline, another shooting. What do you make
Speaker 1: of this? Yeah? Well so, yeah, I don't know how
Speaker 1: many of these you've had to cover in your career,
Speaker 1: but yeah, they're pretty much constant. And the thing that's
Speaker 1: most amazing about these is how every one of these
Speaker 1: terrible acts of violence has its own unique flavor, either
Speaker 1: in geography or the particular type of establishment that was attacked,
Speaker 1: or the particular group that was targeted. And yet there
Speaker 1: are so many things that are almost always the same
Speaker 1: between all of them. You start to feel kind of
Speaker 1: sick that, you know, you know the phases that the
Speaker 1: media is going to go through, you know the phases
Speaker 1: that the politicians are going to go through. They're going
Speaker 1: to send out the stock canned responses, and almost nothing
Speaker 1: will change that will make it any less likely that
Speaker 1: the same or similar sorts of attacks will happen in
Speaker 1: the future. When we were talking about this on my
Speaker 1: show this morning, my co host Dan Evans said that
Speaker 1: he only briefly detoured due sadness before moving to rage,
Speaker 1: and I said, I, you know what, honestly, I don't
Speaker 1: even know that I was at sadness because I just
Speaker 1: instantly felt in my gut, I know what all of
Speaker 1: those who've been pushing hatred against the LGBTQ plus community
Speaker 1: are going to say. I know what those who are
Speaker 1: in the pocket of like of you know, the big
Speaker 1: gun manufacturers are going to do to stop any sort
Speaker 1: of reforms. It just feel it makes you feel so
Speaker 1: help you know. Yeah, it's just a consistent rinse and repeat,
Speaker 1: and you know, and and to your co host point,
Speaker 1: I don't even know. I was in bed right as
Speaker 1: many people were. The alert came across, you know, my
Speaker 1: phone from the New York Times, and I don't even
Speaker 1: think I paused at sadness. I think that I went
Speaker 1: directly into rage because what I realized is that it's
Speaker 1: only been six months since the Buffalo shooting that took
Speaker 1: place at the supermarket in Buffalo, where a white supremacist
Speaker 1: went in and killed supermarket shoppers, black supermarket shoppers on
Speaker 1: a Saturday morning for no other reason than they were
Speaker 1: black and had the audacity to you know, be living.
Speaker 1: Then fast forward and we had classroom of children killed.
Speaker 1: Then we had people picked off at the parade. Right
Speaker 1: They're out at a you know, at an Independence Day
Speaker 1: parade and they were shot from you know, from the
Speaker 1: roofs I just like, I don't know how we're supposed
Speaker 1: to continue to have these conversations in media without actually
Speaker 1: drawing attention to the fact that what you say, the
Speaker 1: rhetoric that these right wing politicians have have real world consequences,
Speaker 1: and every time that someone like us says these things,
Speaker 1: we're told now is not the time. Now is not
Speaker 1: the time John for us to make logical connection of dots.
Speaker 1: So what do you make of that pushback of now
Speaker 1: is not the time or you know, Lauren Bobert she
Speaker 1: also sent out tweeted out her thoughts and prayers on
Speaker 1: the issue. This is the one who everyone knows who
Speaker 1: had a restaurant where the servers carried nine millimeters on
Speaker 1: their hips, and she's tweeting out her thoughts and prayers
Speaker 1: on top of hoping that you know, our national school
Speaker 1: curriculum would turn into Florida, which is notorious now for
Speaker 1: the don't say gay bill. Yeah, yeah, Lauren Bobert, who
Speaker 1: I defy anyone to find a photo of her with
Speaker 1: her family that doesn't involve at least two a R fifteens. Yeah,
Speaker 1: she hates the community. She loves guns. That's it. That's
Speaker 1: what she's going to do. She put out a statement
Speaker 1: like ostensibly condemning the violence. Everyone should go look at
Speaker 1: that tweet and you tell me who was attacked, because
Speaker 1: you can't tell from the tweets she sent out. Who's
Speaker 1: to say what community was being targeted in this? She's
Speaker 1: certainly not going to say that, because then the line
Speaker 1: between who was attacked and the sorts of hate speech
Speaker 1: that she's been encouraging would be all too clear. Yeah,
Speaker 1: she's been an active participant in this. They all thought
Speaker 1: it was fun in games. The base lows it when
Speaker 1: you demonize people and you declare that your enemies are
Speaker 1: our groomers. This quannonization of Republican politics, where everyone disagree
Speaker 1: with wants to murder and or sexually assault your child,
Speaker 1: ye disgusting and it has clear consequences. I'm glad that
Speaker 1: you pointed out in Buffalo, but there was also the
Speaker 1: Walmart shooting in ye Passo. There were the women that
Speaker 1: were the Asian women that were killed in the SPA.
Speaker 1: Like how many incredibly clear targeting that immediately that follows
Speaker 1: the hatred, whether it's over COVID nineteen or supposed caravans
Speaker 1: and all that, it's just constant. And every time it happens,
Speaker 1: they'll say, well, it doesn't by the way, it doesn't
Speaker 1: even matter if the guy has like a manifesto, like
Speaker 1: super clear record, as with the guy who tried to
Speaker 1: bash in Paul Pelosi's skull. And by the way, we're
Speaker 1: not supposed to make links to politics, but they can
Speaker 1: start joking about this guy almost being killed. Immediately they
Speaker 1: will say, well, he's just crazy. This is a crazy loaner.
Speaker 1: And I will say, and many people will say what
Speaker 1: we always say, which is yes, America is a place
Speaker 1: that is filled with crazy loaners, and some of them
Speaker 1: are looking to be told who to target, and that
Speaker 1: Lauren Boberg is not going to take a totally sane
Speaker 1: person and get that person to go shoot up a target.
Speaker 1: But if they are crazy people and you fill them
Speaker 1: full of conspiracy, theories about George Soros organizing Guatemalan caravans,
Speaker 1: then maybe they'll pick up the gun for that. And
Speaker 1: that's my fear that they are weaponizing our mental health
Speaker 1: crisis for their own political ends. You know, I want
Speaker 1: to stay on this for a minute because I have
Speaker 1: to say too that you know, when you have the
Speaker 1: likes of a Marjorie Taylor Green who stood up at
Speaker 1: rally's saying that Democrats are trying to kill us, when
Speaker 1: you use terms like you brought up groomer and pedophile,
Speaker 1: and people are thinking to themselves, well, I have to
Speaker 1: save the children, right, and I have to do whatever
Speaker 1: it's going to take in order to save the children
Speaker 1: if it harms a few people. I mean, this was
Speaker 1: the logic behind blowing up abortion clinics, right, or shooting
Speaker 1: up abortion. I have to save the children. And so
Speaker 1: how do you think responsibly mainstream media makes these contextual
Speaker 1: contextualizes what is happening, and makes these links in a
Speaker 1: way where it's not um considered biased to tell the
Speaker 1: truth that when you put cross hairs, which Sarah Palin
Speaker 1: did you know years back, when you put crosshairs on
Speaker 1: members of Congress, and then you turn around and be
Speaker 1: surprised that they're that they're shot and all, and attempted
Speaker 1: murder happened. Like I how do you make that case
Speaker 1: in mainstream media these days? Yeah, I think it's difficult.
Speaker 1: I think that the media is still really bad at
Speaker 1: pointing out certain types of radical rhetoric and lies. They're
Speaker 1: they're hesitant to declare that extremely powerful people are just
Speaker 1: openly lying or openly soaking hate. They don't like to
Speaker 1: do that. But at the very least they do seem
Speaker 1: to be They seem to be pretty free to declare
Speaker 1: that like Marjor Green's a crazy person. They don't seem
Speaker 1: to be too worried about declaring that she's insane, or
Speaker 1: Paul Gosara is saying something dangerous, or Matt Gates is
Speaker 1: a creep. They'll do that, So that's important. People need
Speaker 1: to understand who these people are. Putting their current statements
Speaker 1: in the context of things they've said and done in
Speaker 1: the past can be useful. But I also think that
Speaker 1: at least this isn't gonna work in every area. But
Speaker 1: one thing they can do to disarm these sorts of
Speaker 1: attacks is to make it so that a fairly ignorant
Speaker 1: nation ignorant when it comes to certain communities, isn't ignorant.
Speaker 1: It's easier to demonize the trans community if the only
Speaker 1: thing people have heard about the trans community has come
Speaker 1: from a transphobic YouTuber. And there's a reason that I
Speaker 1: think that they're focusing on the trans community because other
Speaker 1: areas of the LGBTQ plus community aren't as unknown, aren't
Speaker 1: as hidden in the shadows as they were ten years
Speaker 1: ago when the Republics would have just been demonizing them.
Speaker 1: The trans community is still relatively new because there's not
Speaker 1: a lot of representation in media or on the news.
Speaker 1: Look at the conflation of the culture of drag queens
Speaker 1: with the trans community. The media would make sure that
Speaker 1: people understand that the being a drag queen is not
Speaker 1: the same as being trans. It isn't necessarily a statement
Speaker 1: about your sexuality at all. It is a culture, it's
Speaker 1: not a sexual thing. And so if America knew more
Speaker 1: about these communities, they might be a little bit more
Speaker 1: resistant to weaponizing the ignorance against these communities. I think, John,
Speaker 1: you're making too much sense, and clearly you're making you're
Speaker 1: making too much sense on the ways in which you
Speaker 1: know the media can actually educate audiences. But speaking of
Speaker 1: folks who weaponize ignorance, let's talk about Kevin McCarthy and
Speaker 1: the fact that he is about to get the gavel back.
Speaker 1: You know, if he can make it out of getting
Speaker 1: two hundred and eighteen other rabid Republicans to vote for
Speaker 1: him to be Speaker of the House again. You know,
Speaker 1: he is taking his direction from Marjorie Taylor Green, he
Speaker 1: is taking his direction from Jim Jordan and other members
Speaker 1: of the Freedom Caucus. So what do you perceive as
Speaker 1: Kevin McCarthy's, you know, next reign as as House Speaker.
Speaker 1: How do you think that that is going to unfold? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, look, I'm waiting to see how crazy we're
Speaker 1: going to get as a nation. I mean, we know
Speaker 1: that like best case scenario, the baseline is pretty crazy,
Speaker 1: pretty much a waste of time of Congress for the
Speaker 1: next two years, they we are going to hear way
Speaker 1: more about Hunter Biden than any regular person has any
Speaker 1: interest in hearing. It's going to be a constant thing.
Speaker 1: So that's going to be annoying. I'm sure that people
Speaker 1: like Anthony Fauci and Mark Garland are going to and
Speaker 1: more time testifying before Jim Jordan and all that, than
Speaker 1: they'd want to, and it's going to be mostly a
Speaker 1: waste of time where people like Jim Jordan and others
Speaker 1: are going to be just giving their little sound bites
Speaker 1: so that they can spread on social media. That doesn't
Speaker 1: bother me so much. I'm more bothered by the opportunity
Speaker 1: cost because having one Chamber of Congress who is letting
Speaker 1: you know ahead of time, but the next two years
Speaker 1: they're not going to accomplish literally anything might be fine
Speaker 1: in a country that's not facing any actual crises, like
Speaker 1: if we didn't need to fix these things, if we
Speaker 1: didn't need legislation, then that might be fine. But there's
Speaker 1: a lot of problems that are that are going to
Speaker 1: go unfixed at least for two years. And that's unfortunate.
Speaker 1: The fact that people like Marjorie Green and Paul Gossar,
Speaker 1: who thankfully were stripped of their committee positions after just
Speaker 1: countless instances in social media where they spread conspiracy theories
Speaker 1: and disinformation and normalize political violence, they're going to be
Speaker 1: back on their positions. So that's our country taking a
Speaker 1: big step backwards. So I'm worried about all of that.
Speaker 1: We'll see if we have weekly impeachments of Joe Biden,
Speaker 1: or you know, God only knows what else, the raising
Speaker 1: of the debt ceiling being weaponized to try to destroy
Speaker 1: social security and medicare, I mean, those sorts of things.
Speaker 1: When they go after these big social programs, that's where
Speaker 1: I think they can do the most actual damage. And
Speaker 1: so we'll have to see how willing they are to
Speaker 1: do that. They seem to think that doing as much
Speaker 1: damage as they can economically and making people's economic position
Speaker 1: as precarious as possible will benefit them going in to
Speaker 1: twenty twenty four. But that's only true if they can
Speaker 1: evade some responsibility for and they will technically be in
Speaker 1: power in the House. So I think it's going to
Speaker 1: be on the media and the Democrats to make sure
Speaker 1: that people understand that the Republicans are They've now they've
Speaker 1: gotten what they wanted. Okay, they caught up to the car,
Speaker 1: and now people need to understand the consequences of that.
Speaker 1: We'll see how successful they are. What do you think?
Speaker 1: You know? And my feeling is the same with regard
Speaker 1: to what the Democrats and the media needs to do,
Speaker 1: because I think that the appointments that Democrats make on
Speaker 1: these committees that are now going to be chaired by
Speaker 1: Republicans are and we're going to be constantly hammered with
Speaker 1: a circus day in and day out. Is that it's
Speaker 1: going to be up to Democrats to paint that picture,
Speaker 1: to show that narrative, like, here are these people that
Speaker 1: said that they want power, and this is what they
Speaker 1: are doing with it. What is the investigation of Hunter
Speaker 1: Biden's laptop doing for your day to day life? And
Speaker 1: if they fact in fact come back with a comparison
Speaker 1: of well, what was January sixth, Well, you're talking about
Speaker 1: thousands of people that broke into our capitol building, defecated
Speaker 1: in the halls of democracy, and beat, you know, police
Speaker 1: officers to death. I think that that may be different
Speaker 1: than an alleged conspiracy that came out of Quranon's fantasy land.
Speaker 1: But Democrats need to make that distinction, and if they don't,
Speaker 1: then we're just going to be inundated with bullshit, um
Speaker 1: for for as long as humanly possible. UM. You know.
Speaker 1: Kevin McCarthy though, on the tip in terms of getting
Speaker 1: rid of people who are crazy, which is what UH
Speaker 1: Speaker Pelosi did with Marjorie Taylor Green and Gosar. He's
Speaker 1: come out and said that he's going to strip Adam Schiff,
Speaker 1: Eric Swalwell and Ilhan Omar of their committee assignments. What
Speaker 1: do you think the pushback needs to be to that. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: that'll be that'll be interesting. I mean, the Democrats in
Speaker 1: the House don't necessarily have a lot of power to
Speaker 1: do anything about that, unfortunately, I mean they can, they
Speaker 1: can try to make a big deal out of it
Speaker 1: in the media, certainly. Um. I think Elan Omar is
Speaker 1: already set and Representive Omar should say, is already saying
Speaker 1: that this is effectively under the guise of being concerned
Speaker 1: about anti Semitism. This is them attacking her for being
Speaker 1: a Muslim, for being Somali Americans. Right, It's important to
Speaker 1: make clear to those communities that these are identities that
Speaker 1: the Republicans feel one hundred percent free to attack without
Speaker 1: any fear of consequences, which is one hundred percent true.
Speaker 1: And also they would they would love to say that
Speaker 1: they're against like censorship, they want free speech. Well, I
Speaker 1: think the case of Representative Omar is a very interesting
Speaker 1: one because, look, I understand that she apologized for them
Speaker 1: the tweet that she sent out a couple of years
Speaker 1: ago about being all about the Benjamin's, but to be clear,
Speaker 1: she was talking specifically about a lobbying organization, and so like,
Speaker 1: I think, especially in the modern area, with all of
Speaker 1: the anti semitism, I think that is acceptable to tread
Speaker 1: extra carefully to avoid invoking any anti Semitic tropes in
Speaker 1: that area. I believe that that is fair. However, we
Speaker 1: also have to be free to be able to criticize
Speaker 1: a very well funded lob organization that is weighing in
Speaker 1: on many different elections and in many different issue areas,
Speaker 1: and I feel like she needs to be free to
Speaker 1: do that. This is literally years ago. As many people
Speaker 1: pointed out, Representative Amor, a Republican who's now the number
Speaker 1: three amongst Republicans in the House. He said more recently
Speaker 1: that Jewish billionaires are buying the Congress for the Democrats,
Speaker 1: and yet he's not being stripped of any of his positions.
Speaker 1: So at least you could have some consistency there. Anyway,
Speaker 1: with all of the anti semitism we see coming out
Speaker 1: of the right just over the past couple of weeks,
Speaker 1: I don't think this is going to be very successful
Speaker 1: in them convincing Jewish Americans that the Democrats are against them.
Speaker 1: I don't like the precedent being said. I don't like especially,
Speaker 1: and I apologize for going on about this. I hate
Speaker 1: that when you finally get consequences for something in America,
Speaker 1: for instance, Gosar and Green being taken off their committees,
Speaker 1: which does not often happen, and brand even happened the
Speaker 1: first couple of times they did something completely unacceptable, but
Speaker 1: you finally got consequences, and we all kind of knew
Speaker 1: that as soon as that happened, the Republicans are going
Speaker 1: to be looking for literally any excuse to turn it
Speaker 1: around the Democrats. I wish that we had a system
Speaker 1: that didn't work that way. That, you know, if the
Speaker 1: Republicans commit an insurrection and we point that out and
Speaker 1: criticize that we don't have everything, the Democrats do be
Speaker 1: called an insurrection by the right. I don't like the
Speaker 1: like devolving everything down to everything's the same, everything's in
Speaker 1: the mud. What Green and Gosar did is not the
Speaker 1: same as what Representative Omar did. Now I don't think
Speaker 1: so either, And I think that what is really problematic
Speaker 1: to me is the fact that I want to see
Speaker 1: how Democrats are going to then if those three members
Speaker 1: are stripped, you unreasonably so, of their committee assignments, then
Speaker 1: how they're going to be elevated? Because I would make
Speaker 1: the three of them the messengers of the Democratic Party.
Speaker 1: I would have them on every single show all the time,
Speaker 1: talking about what the Democrats are fighting for, what it
Speaker 1: is that Republicans are doing. Like, I would turn them
Speaker 1: into the mouthpieces, right because if they're going to be
Speaker 1: freed up with their time, we know that the three
Speaker 1: of them are quite a really good at communications, particularly
Speaker 1: Swallowell and Ship who both played major roles in the
Speaker 1: impeachment trials. And I would turn them into the new
Speaker 1: managers of the Democratic Party and put them everywhere. So
Speaker 1: it's just like, oh, you thought that you were going
Speaker 1: to shut us up. No, I'm actually going to give
Speaker 1: them a microphone and a platform and say go with God.
Speaker 1: Last question for you, John, is you know again I
Speaker 1: have such I take such issue with the kind of
Speaker 1: complicity of mainstream media in the way that they covered
Speaker 1: the Trump administration, in the way that they covered the
Speaker 1: candidacy of Donald Trump, and in the way it seems
Speaker 1: that they are going to cover him again his twenty
Speaker 1: twenty four bid. What do you think needs to happen
Speaker 1: if you could control how the media was going to
Speaker 1: move forward in twenty twenty three with their coverage of
Speaker 1: Donald Trump, what would that look like? Oh, that's a
Speaker 1: big question. I'm sure there's a lot of newsrooms where
Speaker 1: a lot of people are debating that. My fear, and
Speaker 1: maybe you share this fear, is that a lot of
Speaker 1: those big news from CNN, MSNBC, who they've been hurting
Speaker 1: in terms of rating since twenty twenty, I'm worried that
Speaker 1: whether they acknowledge it or not, explicitly or not, they're
Speaker 1: going to lapse back into some of the same behaviors
Speaker 1: because it benefited them economically in terms of their rating
Speaker 1: and ad revenue, you know, the last time Trump was around.
Speaker 1: I hope that they don't forget how unprecedented he's been
Speaker 1: as even a Republican political figure. I hope that they
Speaker 1: remember that. I hope that, and maybe the events of
Speaker 1: this last weekend will be a reminder that they it's
Speaker 1: easy to talk in a general sense about the threat
Speaker 1: posed by Donald Trump and by the MAGA movement. I
Speaker 1: hope that they center the people who are actually at risk,
Speaker 1: because let's bear in mind, like when if Trump gets
Speaker 1: back into power, Anderson Cooper's gonna be fine. Probably he's wealthy,
Speaker 1: you know, like most people are gonna be fine. It's
Speaker 1: it's the people who's job. Like, I'll be fine, you know,
Speaker 1: whatever I'm I do media stuff, I'm a white male,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be just fine. You have to talk about
Speaker 1: the people who are actually going to be at risk,
Speaker 1: the people who might be deported in mass numbers, the
Speaker 1: people who might have some sort of federal don't say
Speaker 1: gay bill, you know, sponsored, or if the Supreme Court
Speaker 1: decides to go beyond just destroying Roe v. Wade and
Speaker 1: they get rid of same sex marriage, or they go
Speaker 1: after interracial marriage or whatever, like I would. I would
Speaker 1: like to see an approach to him that brings all
Speaker 1: the people who will be hurt and centers their anxieties,
Speaker 1: their fears about what another term for Trump could actually represent.
Speaker 1: And I also hope that they understand along the way
Speaker 1: that it isn't necessarily gonna be Trump, but if it isn't,
Speaker 1: and if it's Rhonda Santis, he's more normal in some ways,
Speaker 1: but that we can't let that lullis into a sense
Speaker 1: of complacency and assume that then everything's great and nobody's
Speaker 1: at risk. So I just I hope that they consider
Speaker 1: things beyond just how this is going to impact them
Speaker 1: and the experience of covering the news, because that's not
Speaker 1: representative of a lot of people's experience. Yeah, and I'm
Speaker 1: you know, basically what you're saying, and what I have
Speaker 1: said many many times on this show is that Donald
Speaker 1: Trump was really great for ratings and really bad for
Speaker 1: our democracy, and I wish that, you know, one took
Speaker 1: precedent over the other. John Idaolla, host of The Damage Report,
Speaker 1: thank you so much for making the time to join Woke,
Speaker 1: f and I hope that you will. I'm back soon.
Speaker 1: Thank you. I would love to as a pleasure. That
Speaker 1: is it for me today, Dear friends on Woke app
Speaker 1: as always, power to the people and to all the people. Power,
Speaker 1: get woke and stay woke as fuck.