Speaker 1: Do you worry about the death at all as a
Speaker 1: young person.
Speaker 2: Let's focus on getting the economy better, right, isn't that
Speaker 2: the best thing to do? Like, why wouldn't we build
Speaker 2: on the economic success we're enjoying right now under Joe
Speaker 2: Biden's policies and leadership, instead of stabbing ourselves in the
Speaker 2: foot and going back to Trump. You know, the best
Speaker 2: thing to pay off the debt. Let's have a great economy.
Speaker 2: Let's invest in America right, Let's succeed. That's step number one.
Speaker 1: I would think Payvon Shroff is the press secretary of
Speaker 1: Dream for America, and that organization is lucky to have him.
Speaker 1: He is smart, articulate, dedicated, and filled with conviction about
Speaker 1: being involved in politics, about fighting to make America a
Speaker 1: better place. That's why I was so happy that he
Speaker 1: was able to come on the Warning podcast. I learned
Speaker 1: a lot from listening to him, and I hope you'll
Speaker 1: listen to the conversation and its entirety. But I wanted
Speaker 1: to talk more directly about a couple of issues that
Speaker 1: came up during the interview. When I have these conversations,
Speaker 1: the point of them is not for me to challenge,
Speaker 1: not for me to assert my views over the guests.
Speaker 1: It's to listen, it's to provoke, it's to incite sometimes,
Speaker 1: but not to get into a debate. I offer my
Speaker 1: opinion on the podcast on the commentaries on a frequent
Speaker 1: enough basis that everybody knows where I'm coming from. There's
Speaker 1: an issue in American life, in our politics that is
Speaker 1: extremely important, that has always been understood to be important,
Speaker 1: and every president, regardless of party, comprehended in the moment,
Speaker 1: the moral obligation to make certain the nation was never bankrupt.
Speaker 1: When the country was new in the beginning, the United
Speaker 1: States had no credit. It was extended to us by
Speaker 1: the Dutch. The country was not wealthy. Visualize, for example,
Speaker 1: a cliff, and imagine, if you will, two ropes descending
Speaker 1: down that cliff, which is high enough to obscure the
Speaker 1: question of whether the rope is long enough to reach
Speaker 1: the bottom. Now, imagine coming across two people having a debate.
Speaker 1: The debate between them is whether they should stay where
Speaker 1: they are or descend down the ropes. And it's an
Speaker 1: angry debate of aterperative debate. But shouldn't there be room
Speaker 1: within the debate for somebody to ask the question is
Speaker 1: the rope long enough. That's what pragmatism is in politics.
Speaker 1: Here's how this is supposed to work with money. Objectively,
Speaker 1: both political parties, because they live in the same nation,
Speaker 1: swear an oath to the same constitution, are supposedly supposed
Speaker 1: to be able to look at out a problem, recognizing
Speaker 1: it's a shared societal issue, and come to a resolution
Speaker 1: about what measures to take to make it better as
Speaker 1: opposed to making it worse. Now, imagine that there's an
Speaker 1: issue that needs to be addressed. The way it's supposed
Speaker 1: to work is that people with different perspectives sit around
Speaker 1: the table and decide what to do, and often that
Speaker 1: involves spending money. Now, let's say the most progressive person
Speaker 1: in the room looks at the situation and says, in
Speaker 1: good faith, I think that's going to cost a billion dollars,
Speaker 1: And the most conservative person in the room looks at
Speaker 1: the most progressive person and says, a billion. That's crazy.
Speaker 1: I think it's a million. And sitting in the center
Speaker 1: on the center left, in the center right are two
Speaker 1: pragmatives who appreciate that everybody in the room identifies that
Speaker 1: there is a problem that must be solved, but rejects
Speaker 1: the dogma that holds it can be solved with nothing,
Speaker 1: or that every problem can be solved with the billion.
Speaker 1: Somewhere in the middle is the solution. The problem facing
Speaker 1: America in this moment that we talked about but no
Speaker 1: one thinks about, is this fundamental reality of the moment.
Speaker 1: There has never been a society broke more deeply in
Speaker 1: debt than the United States of America has been in
Speaker 1: twenty twenty four. And we're digging deeper and deeper and deeper.
Speaker 1: What does that mean when the debt of the nation
Speaker 1: is at thirty trillion dollars, at forty trillion dollars, at
Speaker 1: fifty trillion dollars, What does it mean when a trillion
Speaker 1: is added to the debt every one hundred days. It
Speaker 1: took north of two hundred years to reach one trillion
Speaker 1: dollars in debt, and now it accumulates in piles one
Speaker 1: trillion for every one hundred days. What is a trillion?
Speaker 1: The number gets thrown around all the time. Everybody knows
Speaker 1: what a millionaire is, and there are a thousand billionaires
Speaker 1: in the United States. There's a lot of them, but
Speaker 1: there are no trillionaires, at least not yet though there
Speaker 1: are some companies that are worth a trillion dollars, it's
Speaker 1: much easier to understand the difference between a million and
Speaker 1: a billion than a billion and a trillion. Maybe time
Speaker 1: is an easy way to understand the incredible levels of
Speaker 1: spending in debt that are going to beggar the young
Speaker 1: people that are going to live in America for the
Speaker 1: next eighty years. What is a million seconds. Let's say
Speaker 1: you were to say to somebody, I'll see you in
Speaker 1: a million seconds. What does that mean, Well, it would
Speaker 1: mean i'll see you in twelve days. Now, let's imagine
Speaker 1: saying to somebody, I'll see you in a billion seconds.
Speaker 1: What does that mean. What's the difference between a million
Speaker 1: and a billion, Well, it's the difference between twelve days
Speaker 1: and thirty one years. That's the difference. A billion seconds
Speaker 1: is thirty one years. What's a true seconds. That's the
Speaker 1: difference between thirty one years and thirty one thousand years.
Speaker 1: Thirty one thousand years, that's what a trillion is. That's
Speaker 1: how incomprehensibly big the number is. And yet the money
Speaker 1: is piled on, piled on, piled on, and so now
Speaker 1: the biggest expenditure that we spend on every year is
Speaker 1: paying interest for money we already spent, which is a
Speaker 1: type of theft from young people who have to pay
Speaker 1: for the profligacy of their grandparents at the expense of
Speaker 1: their children and grandchildren. And there has never, never, ever
Speaker 1: been one generation of Americans that has done this to
Speaker 1: the generation that has followed. So I thought this conversation
Speaker 1: was very, very interesting to hear the perspective of a
Speaker 1: young progressive. This is an urgent issue for the country.
Speaker 1: And let's understand something. America has no small government party,
Speaker 1: it has no limited government party. There are two giant
Speaker 1: spending parties in Washington, DC, and the most irresponsible party
Speaker 1: when it comes to spending in all of human history
Speaker 1: is the Republican Party and its fascist incarnation under Donald
Speaker 1: Trump is it's a most reckless spending incarnation in all
Speaker 1: its long history of spending irresponsibility. This is an important issue.
Speaker 1: George Washington would have understood this as an important issue,
Speaker 1: and so would have John Kennedy and Franklin Roosevelt would
Speaker 1: have understood it. Every president understood this until Donald Trump.
Speaker 1: And now it seems like the train has left the
Speaker 1: tracks and it's time to start talking about this issue,
Speaker 1: have a watch. Do you think that gen Z voters
Speaker 1: can be reached on political issues that go beyond self interest? Right,
Speaker 1: that we need to come out right and vote because
Speaker 1: we're going to get something right, We're going to get
Speaker 1: a financial we're gonna get a financial reward. Right that
Speaker 1: you know, we're for this person because this person's going
Speaker 1: to alleviate something, and that raises up, raises up, raises
Speaker 1: up a secondary issue about politics. But like, do you
Speaker 1: know what I mean by that? I do?
Speaker 2: I do know what you mean. I kind of find
Speaker 2: it a little bit intriguing only because I view, for example,
Speaker 2: the generation of Jamie Diamond who's gonna get up at
Speaker 2: Davos and say Trump is right about China, which is
Speaker 2: delusional and a list off a bunch of other things.
Speaker 2: And to me, that comes across as a super rich
Speaker 2: guy who wants to say extra super rich and really
Speaker 2: wants to keep those TAC cuts cuts. I view it
Speaker 2: that way. Whereas I view young voters in fact, what
Speaker 2: are they motivated by. Sure, they don't want to get
Speaker 2: shot in school? Is that selfish? Maybe? Sure, they want
Speaker 2: to be able to access, you know, healthcare. They want
Speaker 2: to be able to have women's rights, LGBT rights. I
Speaker 2: mean those are all showing up for groups allyship coalition building.
Speaker 2: I think that's what gen Z and millennials even are
Speaker 2: defined by. So I do see the student loan issue.
Speaker 2: That's one specific example, but I don't really know that.
Speaker 2: I think there's too many more that I would pin
Speaker 2: on gen Z specifically, as they're looking for, you know,
Speaker 2: some benefit from the government. I do think, by the way,
Speaker 2: just big picture, I mean, economists suggest and we could
Speaker 2: debate this, I'm sure, but that student loan forgiveness right,
Speaker 2: raises all tides in the country. It's good for the economy,
Speaker 2: it's for us to invest in our own people. I
Speaker 2: mean that used to be something I think people could
Speaker 2: agree on that. You know, investing in Americans is a
Speaker 2: good investment. So I see the point on student loan forgiveness.
Speaker 2: But you could say that about any type of loan forgiveness.
Speaker 2: You can say that about any type of government program, right,
Speaker 2: I mean it helps some people, not everyone.
Speaker 1: Do you worry about the debt at all? As a
Speaker 1: young person, register with you that the country is thirty
Speaker 1: trillion dollars in debt. That and let me give a
Speaker 1: caveat for this. This has freaked me out for a
Speaker 1: long time, right, and so full caveat here. People were
Speaker 1: predicting disaster at ten trillion, fifteen trillion, twenty trillion, thirty
Speaker 1: trillion dollars. But now right, you're at a point where
Speaker 1: because of spending that's gone, it's happened, right, The largest
Speaker 1: components of the budget every year, right are the interest
Speaker 1: payments right on the money that's already been spent. And
Speaker 1: so country's two hundred and fifty years old. Every leader
Speaker 1: in the country, regardless of party, really is a moral proposition,
Speaker 1: almost like a family business. You know, understood, we can't
Speaker 1: beggar the country. We can't steal from future generations right
Speaker 1: to party on today. So today we're talking about all
Speaker 1: of these issues that cost money that will matter for
Speaker 1: your generation. When the largest expenditure in the federal budget
Speaker 1: is the repayment of money spent five years ago, six
Speaker 1: years ago, I mean, there are some estimates that upwards
Speaker 1: over a trillion dollars a trillion got stolen right during
Speaker 1: the COVID relief packages, and it's in its totality. Does
Speaker 1: that issue you have any currency for you, for anybody
Speaker 1: your age does anyone ever sit around and talk about
Speaker 1: it and just look at it through the holy shit? Yeah?
Speaker 1: So yeah, studies spend in fucking money, right, that's the
Speaker 1: like like type of conversation, do they really? I do
Speaker 1: think so on a zones that the birthday party here.
Speaker 2: You know, I think it's interesting because you kind of
Speaker 2: mentioned that other generations understood this, but here we are,
Speaker 2: so they obviously didn't understand it too well. And I
Speaker 2: think that, you know what, I at least and this
Speaker 2: could be the liberal indoctrination they're talking about happening on
Speaker 2: college campuses. But I did study economics at Brown, and
Speaker 2: I went to business school at Yale, And really, honestly,
Speaker 2: I think the message is it doesn't matter. That is
Speaker 2: I think what a lot of leading economists think. And
Speaker 2: I think to your point, right, how many times has
Speaker 2: that been the conversation, And it doesn't seem like it's mattered,
Speaker 2: And especially when you are talking about the more urgent
Speaker 2: issues of gun violence, taking away people's human rights, all
Speaker 2: of these other things. People can't feed themselves, So you know,
Speaker 2: let's focus on getting the economy better, right, isn't that
Speaker 2: the best thing to do? Like, why wouldn't we build
Speaker 2: on the economic success we're enjoying right now under Joe
Speaker 2: Biden's policies and leadership, instead of stabbing ourselves in the
Speaker 2: foot and going back to Trump. You know the best
Speaker 2: thing to pay off the debt. Let's have a great economy.
Speaker 2: Let's invest in America.
Speaker 1: This is how I would see this issue, right. And
Speaker 1: I get part of some politics, right, I get. I
Speaker 1: get campaign politics. I've spent a long time in political campaigns.
Speaker 1: But the reality is is why do people think the
Speaker 1: economy is bad? Right when the stock market is performing
Speaker 1: and YadA YadA, YadA, YadA, YadA on all the on
Speaker 1: all the metrics. And the answer to that question is
Speaker 1: because forty percent of the country, right, doesn't have four
Speaker 1: hundred dollars of cash available. Right, You have an enormous
Speaker 1: percentage of people are dissociated from the concept of upward mobility,
Speaker 1: from the American dream. Thanks to Jamie Diamond, right who
Speaker 1: when you look at the key leaves, right, you kind
Speaker 1: of what powers this fascist movement. One of the things
Speaker 1: that's fueled by a cynicism, right, and the cynicism of
Speaker 1: the bankers is necessary for the fascist movement to take power.
Speaker 1: They're not a leading indicator, they're a lagging one. So
Speaker 1: those comments in Davos right have meaning? Right? But right?
Speaker 1: What is it right that you know a person who,
Speaker 1: for example, is unbanked, an enlisted person who is in
Speaker 1: the court has to get usery banking rates. The twenty
Speaker 1: seven year old woman who's arrested for discarding the miscarriage
Speaker 1: remains in the toilet. You have a fundamental question. Does
Speaker 1: she live in a democracy? She doesn't live in a democracy.
Speaker 1: The question about the economy, right, is in an environment
Speaker 1: we have forty percent of the people that don't have
Speaker 1: forty percent. I'm all for somebody go giving a speech
Speaker 1: like pr gave about launching a new progressive error. I'm
Speaker 1: entirely supportive, right of you know, somebody laying out the
Speaker 1: contours of a vision about what we're gonna do as
Speaker 1: a society. When right, the AI and computers and robots
Speaker 1: takeaway enormous percentages of jobs in a country where the
Speaker 1: number one living wage job for a working class white
Speaker 1: guy is driving something to somewhere. Right, So there's all
Speaker 1: this stuff falls under an umbrella of like what are
Speaker 1: we gonna do? Sure, I don't hear a lot of
Speaker 1: talk in either party, none in none in one one
Speaker 1: is one party is just it's completely off the wall.
Speaker 1: It's no symmetry, but the only party that's left. Right,
Speaker 1: I don't hear it, right, I don't. The accomplishments that
Speaker 1: he has I think are fine. I think he's been
Speaker 1: a good president, right. I think this year is just
Speaker 1: like warming up on the national security stuff. But respond
Speaker 1: to that, because when you talk about the next twenty years, right,
Speaker 1: do you believe really the foundation of that is the
Speaker 1: Biden agenda? Right? Or are you waiting right for the
Speaker 1: first like forty two, forty three, three, forty four year
Speaker 1: old candidate, first candidate who has real currency, real resonance
Speaker 1: with your generation, a Clinton figure, a JFK figure, right,
Speaker 1: you know who can connect like I've just talked to
Speaker 1: me about that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, I think I think of it in two parts.
Speaker 2: So number one on why isn't Biden getting credit for
Speaker 2: the economy that you notice strong? I mean that four
Speaker 2: hundred dollars statistic It was true under the Trump administration.
Speaker 2: So we can't explain that by talking about Joe Biden
Speaker 2: or his policies. I think we can explain it by
Speaker 2: talking about the media ecosystem. Frankly, that does seem antagonistic
Speaker 2: towards this administration, and I think we're seeing the same
Speaker 2: twenty sixteen playbook unfold. But what I'm excited to see
Speaker 2: is I do think that people are hip to that
Speaker 2: it's not going to be but her emails again, because
Speaker 2: we live through but her emails, So people are going
Speaker 2: to call it out now, not in twenty twenty five,
Speaker 2: and say, oh, looking back, we really should have said
Speaker 2: the New York Times was doing a bad job. And
Speaker 2: I do think I give Biden credit a lot of
Speaker 2: flak for saying that the media should cover the economy
Speaker 2: more fairly. But what happened a few weeks after he
Speaker 2: made that comment, They did finally point out that the
Speaker 2: economies are doing pretty well. And then what followed, of course,
Speaker 2: some perception changed and Americans started to see that it
Speaker 2: is doing well. But I think on the future vision,
Speaker 2: the future project can actually you know, I'm not a
Speaker 2: fan of his presidential bid, but Cornell West was a
Speaker 2: professor of mine, and he would constantly talk about, which
Speaker 2: I agree with, this idea that American democracy, the beauty
Speaker 2: of it was, this idea of experimentation and being creative
Speaker 2: with policy ideas, and we don't do that anymore that often.
Speaker 2: We don't have states trying out awesome, cool programs. I
Speaker 2: think part of that is because we're drowning right now.
Speaker 2: We just have to stabilize. We have to push out
Speaker 2: the MAGA movement. We have to fend off Donald Trump
Speaker 2: before we can actually build and invest in. I think
Speaker 2: Joe Biden's tried to do that.