Speaker 1: Cool Zone Media. Welcome to it could happen here a
Speaker 1: podcast about it happening here, it being the slow crumbling
Speaker 1: of the old world and the painful birth of the new.
Speaker 1: And here to talk about the painful birth of the
Speaker 1: new world is someone who was compared to me very
Speaker 1: recently born, Garrison Davis. How are you doing, Garet.
Speaker 2: Good Good as a new member of the KHive nation,
Speaker 2: I have a new life under me now.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you've embraced the Kamala of it all and are
Speaker 1: now are now just vibing? Yeah, it's a beautiful place
Speaker 1: to be. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Unfortunately it might be just as a delusional as Biden's
Speaker 2: own insistence that he should be the one to run.
Speaker 2: And that's kind of what we're talking about here today.
Speaker 1: Oh good, I love delusion and its impact on American
Speaker 1: political life.
Speaker 2: So our initial post debate comments, we're a little bit frenzied,
Speaker 2: little bit chaotic, as was the debate, I suppose, and
Speaker 2: post debate polls were also just kind of a mess
Speaker 2: initially with wildly differing results from source to source, but
Speaker 2: over time they have since stabilized and kind of synced
Speaker 2: up to like phyciically put it, essentially, the debate undid
Speaker 2: most of the pro Biden shifts that had happened in
Speaker 2: the wake of Trump's felony conviction.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I've seen some poles have shown it tightening
Speaker 1: up a little bit again. But it's it's very I mean,
Speaker 1: I always wonder like how much you've got kind of
Speaker 1: two camps, broadly speaking in terms of the people who
Speaker 1: seem like they're not completely insane. One of them is
Speaker 1: kind of the Nate Silver side of things, which shows
Speaker 1: Biden as having fallen fairly far behind and having you know,
Speaker 1: he's got Biden at about a thirty percent chance, which
Speaker 1: is where Trump was in twenty sixteen, so that doesn't
Speaker 1: mean z zero. Whereas the new five thirty eight polling average,
Speaker 1: and I kind of have been following their new head
Speaker 1: of statistics for a while, has it still close to
Speaker 1: a dead heat. And then obviously, you know, there's arguments
Speaker 1: that people will make that Trump or that Biden is
Speaker 1: actually very far behind, which have more to it than
Speaker 1: the arguments that Biden that Biden is going to win
Speaker 1: in a landslide, the kind of democratic like the polls
Speaker 1: are wrong entirely. I don't think that's likely, but I
Speaker 1: think we're looking at somewhere between Biden as a definite
Speaker 1: like underdog, or more or less tied. I guess that's
Speaker 1: where it seems to me like the evidence still is yep.
Speaker 2: A USA Today Suffolk University poll conducted immediately after the
Speaker 2: debate gave Trump a four point boost. The week after
Speaker 2: the debate, a New York Times Siena poll found Trump's
Speaker 2: lead had increased by three percent, now leading by six
Speaker 2: points with likely voters. Other questions were pulled in the
Speaker 2: wake of the debate. A CNN found that seventy five
Speaker 2: percent of Democrats believe the party would have a better
Speaker 2: chance at defeating Trump with a candidate to other than Biden.
Speaker 2: And overall, yes, his number dropped or kind of coasted
Speaker 2: with what it had been in like, you know, April, March, February,
Speaker 2: and according to Politico, other than Trump in twenty twenty,
Speaker 2: no incumbent has trailed this far behind in horse race
Speaker 2: polling since Jimmy Carter's re election bid forty four years ago,
Speaker 2: which does not make me feel super optimistic.
Speaker 1: It's not great, and man, it would be. I suspect
Speaker 1: the polls are still over emphasizing it to a degree
Speaker 1: because if if Biden losing by six percent would be
Speaker 1: like the big the worst performance of a Democrat really
Speaker 1: like a generation, like in a long long time, and
Speaker 1: I just don't believe it's going to be that far off,
Speaker 1: but like it is. Definitely things are a lot uglier
Speaker 1: than they were when we recorded our last horse race episode, right,
Speaker 1: Like the debate was somewhere between pretty bad and catastrophe
Speaker 1: in terms of its impact on the polls.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, but Trump, what Trump actually gained himself as a
Speaker 2: candidate is not very much. It's mostly it's mostly, it's
Speaker 2: mostly decreases on Biden. And five pollsters did pre and
Speaker 2: post debate polls, and Trump is gaining on the margin,
Speaker 2: but in none of the polls did he gain anything
Speaker 2: more than a four point swing. So they're all pretty consistent,
Speaker 2: and it's it's not all the end of the world
Speaker 2: here either. A poll released last Saturday by Bloomberg and
Speaker 2: Morning Console showed Biden narrowing Trump's post debate lead, specifically
Speaker 2: in swing states, with only a two percent difference between
Speaker 2: all seven swing states, with Biden being ahead in Michigan
Speaker 2: and Wisconsin. Yeah, two percent is within that margin of error,
Speaker 2: So things are also starting to level up over time.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I think some of this may have to
Speaker 1: do We're going to talk a bit about Project twenty
Speaker 1: twenty five, which which I tend to think, uh, and
Speaker 1: we've been chatting about this online all week in our
Speaker 1: work chat. People are overemphasizing as opposed to what Trump
Speaker 1: is that because Agenda Project twenty twenty five is basically
Speaker 1: a blueprint for a Christian fascist takeover of the US,
Speaker 1: published by the Heritage Foundation, and a lot of people
Speaker 1: who have been affiliated with Trump, who were in his
Speaker 1: administration last time, have are on board with it, have
Speaker 1: talked about it, have boosted it, so people are obviously
Speaker 1: scared of it. I think what Trump is actually promised
Speaker 1: to do in office, which is the Agenda forty seven,
Speaker 1: we did a whole week of stuff on it, is
Speaker 1: a more realistic thing to be afraid of. But either way,
Speaker 1: I think that some of that tightening is probably a
Speaker 1: mix of you've got everywhere, you had a bunch of
Speaker 1: kind of on the fence, voters swing away from Biden
Speaker 1: because he performed so badly in the debate, and then
Speaker 1: it has dims have done a pretty intensive job of
Speaker 1: spreading out a lot of you know, what you might
Speaker 1: call fear porn over a fascist takeover of the country.
Speaker 1: And I think that's part of why things might be
Speaker 1: tightening back up.
Speaker 2: I mean, it would be nice to eventually, one year
Speaker 2: vote for vote for something instead of just be voting
Speaker 2: against something. But again, I'm not sure if we'll ever
Speaker 2: get to that point.
Speaker 1: Again. Yeah, hasn't happened yet. Well no, no, no, I
Speaker 1: mean I was. I remember I got to vote for
Speaker 1: Obama the first time he ran, and it was hard
Speaker 1: not to be optimistic.
Speaker 2: So immediately after the debate, we had a whole bunch
Speaker 2: of like friends of Biden, kind of upper level Democrat
Speaker 2: not like online influencers, but like actual like influential, like
Speaker 2: like pundits and people you know, call for perhaps Biden
Speaker 2: should step down, perhaps we should find somebody else. And
Speaker 2: this has kind of been the ongoing post debate ever
Speaker 2: since the debates has been this question and we'll get
Speaker 2: I we'll kind of get to this a little bit
Speaker 2: more later. Honestly, I think we had a stronger chance
Speaker 2: at this possibility a week or two ago. I think
Speaker 2: by now Democrats have largely kind of closed ranks around Biden.
Speaker 2: But this is this is definitely still developing. And I've
Speaker 2: been keeping up with all of Biden's appearances in the
Speaker 2: media since the debate, just because I've been interested to
Speaker 2: see how he will handle this kind of universal flub.
Speaker 2: I watched his ABC interview and his recent phone calls
Speaker 2: into various morning news shows. In all of those, he
Speaker 2: did not perform especially well as expected. They were slow
Speaker 2: and sometimes kind of like mumbly, But neither have they
Speaker 2: been like the death blow to his campaign needed to
Speaker 2: finalize the shift to an alternative candidate. Instead, we're just
Speaker 2: kind of coasting along with this general uncertainty regarding the
Speaker 2: Democratic candidacy, and meanwhile, Biden is just continuing to affirm
Speaker 2: that he will be the one to lead the ticket.
Speaker 2: I'm going to quote from Washington Post here. Quote. As
Speaker 2: of Sunday, nine House Democrats, four privately and five publicly,
Speaker 2: had called for Biden to exit the race. In addition,
Speaker 2: at least to eighteen current and former top Democrats as
Speaker 2: of Saturday had publicly raised concerns about Biden's fitness for
Speaker 2: office and his ability to defeat Trump unquote, And it
Speaker 2: has remained the same since then. There's gonna be meetings
Speaker 2: in the next few days. Including the day after we
Speaker 2: record this. We're recording this on Monday, so there's gonna
Speaker 2: be meetings in the Senate and in the House about
Speaker 2: kind of this issue. So this is definitely still developing,
Speaker 2: but you're starting to see more and more politicians fall
Speaker 2: into rank. AOC just put in a statement saying, no,
Speaker 2: we're gonna we're gonna all support Biden. So like there
Speaker 2: was this uncertainty for a while, and now I think
Speaker 2: people are kind of being told to like, come on,
Speaker 2: get on the platform. Yeah, but Biden hasn't been handling
Speaker 2: this well like personally either. He's come across like very angry.
Speaker 1: No, the emails I've been getting from the Biden campaign
Speaker 1: have been wild, and I've been belaving podcasters.
Speaker 2: He's been blaming.
Speaker 1: Past the media, and I'm kind of bummed that it's
Speaker 1: the pods save guys. He got angry. Yet we've been
Speaker 1: We've been shitty to Joe Biden for so much longer
Speaker 1: than those assholes.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but he's been treating it very weirdly. He's been
Speaker 2: doing a lot of like a denial of the polling.
Speaker 2: He's been doing some revisionist.
Speaker 1: History, very magical thinking.
Speaker 2: Regarding like twenty twenty pulling I think, I think kind
Speaker 2: of referencing the Democratic primary, but still the way that
Speaker 2: he's talking about it, it's making it sound like he,
Speaker 2: you know, like he was behind in the polls in
Speaker 2: twenty twenty, that he was that Democrats were behind in
Speaker 2: the polls in twenty twenty two, which just wasn't true.
Speaker 2: The red wave comment was was certain pundits and Republicans
Speaker 2: trying to conjure a red wave, but the actual polls
Speaker 2: were very accurate in twenty twenty two. And he's also
Speaker 2: crediting himself for that red wave not happening in twenty
Speaker 2: twenty two. So he's been having a lot of weird statements,
Speaker 2: like blaming media and blaming the elites for trying to
Speaker 2: replace him on the ticket. I'll include one clip here
Speaker 2: from the morning Joe, come on.
Speaker 1: Give me a break.
Speaker 2: I'm getting so frustrated.
Speaker 1: But by the lease, now, I'm not talking about you guys,
Speaker 1: but about the elase in the party who.
Speaker 2: They know so much more.
Speaker 1: But any of these guys, I don't think I should
Speaker 1: run against me.
Speaker 2: Announced for president, challenge a man to convention. Kind of
Speaker 2: his continuous line to justify his own candidate. See is
Speaker 2: has been him claiming that he won the primary, which
Speaker 2: is a ridiculous thing to say as an incumbent, because like,
Speaker 2: come on, come on, and he has repeatedly said that
Speaker 2: that that Democratic voters in the primaries have quote spoken
Speaker 2: clearly and decisively. They've chosen me to be the nominee
Speaker 2: of the party, which is not how it worked. Quote.
Speaker 2: Do we now just say that process didn't matter, that
Speaker 2: the voters don't have a say, I declined to do that.
Speaker 2: How could we stand for democracy in our nation if
Speaker 2: we ignore it in our own party. I cannot do that.
Speaker 2: I will not do that, unquote, which is just absurd,
Speaker 2: right because like especially there was many people who actually
Speaker 2: voted in the like false primary for like the like
Speaker 2: other option.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, but like seventy five percent of Americans
Speaker 1: would prefer to vote for someone besides Biden.
Speaker 2: Like it's it's absurd, especially when you're running like an
Speaker 2: uncontested as an incumbent. If you want people to challenge you,
Speaker 2: you could have said so, like it's come on, like
Speaker 2: this is there was there was no pretty goofy.
Speaker 1: No real primary for the dims, and there usually isn't.
Speaker 1: That's not abnormal with an incumbent, But in this case,
Speaker 1: people have severe questions about the incumbent's fitness to do
Speaker 1: the job in a physical way. Like I hate to
Speaker 1: say it, but like Trump might physically be better able
Speaker 1: to survive a four year term than Biden. Is, you know,
Speaker 1: not that I think he's mentally a better president. I
Speaker 1: don't think honestly. Part of what we are accepting here
Speaker 1: is that, like that's so that doesn't really matter, right,
Speaker 1: Like we're all kind of acknowledging if you're on team
Speaker 1: anything but Trump, because he might end the concept of
Speaker 1: democracy in this country, then you're accepting that, like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I am not. I am voting for a guy who
Speaker 1: probably can't really do the job anymore, and just assuming
Speaker 1: that the people around him will not be as evil
Speaker 1: like you do. Kind of have to accept that. Otherwise
Speaker 1: you're just lying to yourself about the state that Joe
Speaker 1: is in because he's he's not He's not all there.
Speaker 1: He's not all there the way he was in twenty twenty.
Speaker 2: No, but do you know what still is here just
Speaker 2: like it was back in.
Speaker 1: Twenty twenty, capitalism, Baby, We didn't manage to take it out,
Speaker 1: even though we elected this our Communist leader Joseph Biden
Speaker 1: chairman Joe.
Speaker 2: Enjoy these capitalism sponsored ads.
Speaker 1: All right, we are back. Yeah. So there was a
Speaker 1: report that came out from CHIP fifty, which is like
Speaker 1: an analytics project. It's like the Civic Health and Institution Project,
Speaker 1: So it's like a survey of all fifty US states,
Speaker 1: and they did a survey on like opinions of voters
Speaker 1: before and after the debate, and there showed like fairly
Speaker 1: small movement, like very little was changed at all in
Speaker 1: terms of like and primarily what was changed wasn't people
Speaker 1: going from Biden to Trump, but from people preferring from
Speaker 1: preferring Biden to preferring other rights like someone else, someone
Speaker 1: else right. And so that does kind of go back
Speaker 1: to what we're like, people are not making their minds
Speaker 1: up about Trump like now. And I think what the
Speaker 1: DIMS can do if Biden stays in and he doesn't
Speaker 1: seem like he's leaving. It seems like the primary thing
Speaker 1: that will make progress for them is hitting on how
Speaker 1: dangerous Trump having a second term will be. That seems
Speaker 1: to be what moves the needle, which.
Speaker 2: Is part of their current strategy. But their shategy is
Speaker 2: kind of all influx right now because of the poor
Speaker 2: performance in the debate, They're trying to save face on
Speaker 2: Biden's part as well as emphasizing that Trump is like
Speaker 2: a dangerous possibility. And again, like, even if Biden does
Speaker 2: decide to drop out or step down, He's going to
Speaker 2: keep saying he's running until literally the day that happens,
Speaker 2: right because that is that is what you do as
Speaker 2: a politician. You were gonna you were going to keep
Speaker 2: insisting it until one day you are no longer doing that.
Speaker 2: And that's just kind of how politics goes. But he
Speaker 2: has it's made continuous, continuous gestures towards the fact that
Speaker 2: he is he is going to stay. He has no
Speaker 2: plans on stepping down. He wants to win in November.
Speaker 2: This Monday, he personally made twenty calls to congressional members
Speaker 2: trying to convince them that he is going to be
Speaker 2: the one on the ticket.
Speaker 1: No, really, guys, it's going to be me again.
Speaker 2: Really, And I think part of what he's doing here
Speaker 2: is like he does not have to demonstrate at the
Speaker 2: moment that he will like survive until like November. All
Speaker 2: he has to do right now is run out the
Speaker 2: clock until the convention and then it'll be too late
Speaker 2: to swap him out for anyone else. There's a few
Speaker 2: other people kind of saying this, and I believe that
Speaker 2: is kind of what is what is happening. All they
Speaker 2: need to do is just keep delaying this question, keep this,
Speaker 2: keep this uncertainty until the convention, and then it's going
Speaker 2: to get locked in there. And that's all he needs
Speaker 2: to do. He doesn't need to demonstrate his viability come November.
Speaker 2: He just needs to make sure that he gets he
Speaker 2: gets the official nomination this August. And I don't know.
Speaker 2: Biden supporters' reactions to this have been really weird, including
Speaker 2: we've kind of had like a new upgrowth of a
Speaker 2: pro Biden personality cult among liberals because I feel like,
Speaker 2: largely like a culmination of like MSNBC Russia Gate, like
Speaker 2: bluing on type stuff that people are just now convinced
Speaker 2: there's like a secret conspiracy to take down Biden, and
Speaker 2: any attempts to question Biden's legibility as a candidate could
Speaker 2: only be rooted in some secret agenda to get Trump elected.
Speaker 2: So I think this is why they're so volatile about this,
Speaker 2: is that they think like the only one who would
Speaker 2: ever propagate questions over Biden's like legibility would be someone
Speaker 2: who secretly wants Trump to be in office again, and
Speaker 2: that is such a threat to them that they they're
Speaker 2: lashing out very very oddly and very conspiratorially against anyone
Speaker 2: raising questions about maybe Biden's not the best guy actually,
Speaker 2: and they're spinning this into like actually being secret Trumpers.
Speaker 2: It's odd because even the way Biden talks about his
Speaker 2: own drive to beat Trump is kind of wishy washy,
Speaker 2: certain like more polished statements will be like, yes, this
Speaker 2: is like a threat to democracy. We have to we
Speaker 2: have to do this to keep Trump out of office.
Speaker 2: This is an existential threat. But in that in that
Speaker 2: ABC interview, he gave a really kind of soft answer
Speaker 2: to this question, saying that all that he needs to
Speaker 2: do is just give it his all.
Speaker 1: And if you stay in and Trump is elected and
Speaker 1: everything you're warning about comes to pass, how will you
Speaker 1: feel in January? I'll feel as long as I gave
Speaker 1: it my all and I did the goodest jobs I
Speaker 1: know I can do.
Speaker 2: That's what this is about. It. That's not convincing.
Speaker 1: That's such like a like ninth like cartoons for a
Speaker 1: ninth grader's way of saying it, like, well, what matters
Speaker 1: is that I tried put it all my best work board. No, man,
Speaker 1: that doesn't matter at all.
Speaker 2: Yeah it is. It's not great, it's it's it's not
Speaker 2: it's not reassuring because it doesn't matter if you give
Speaker 2: it your all, people's lives are are on the right
Speaker 2: and you're just like, eh, I'll give it the old
Speaker 2: college try, You're like, okay.
Speaker 1: It means one of two things. He's either is completely
Speaker 1: delusional to the point where he doesn't realize how nonsensical
Speaker 1: that is, or he doesn't really think that Trump is
Speaker 1: a threat to democracy in people's lives. And I guess
Speaker 1: the third option would be he doesn't care, like if
Speaker 1: he loses reelection, fuck everybody, if he doesn't get to
Speaker 1: keep being president. Like maybe he is just that kind
Speaker 1: of person. I do have a feeling that only that
Speaker 1: kind of person can become president of the United States.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I mean, like that was kind of my
Speaker 2: read after the ABC interviews that he seemed just kind
Speaker 2: of like delusional and narcissistic, like he really believes after
Speaker 2: twenty twenty that he's the only one that can beat
Speaker 2: Trump and this feels like like a very genuine view
Speaker 2: of himself that he's the only one strong enough to
Speaker 2: beat Trump. Yeah, And the more and more that there's
Speaker 2: been pushback against his legibility, the more he's been digging
Speaker 2: his heels in. And I think if things continue like this,
Speaker 2: I don't think the Democratic Party will be able to
Speaker 2: organize and unite enough to do like a soft coup
Speaker 2: and convince Biden to step down. And without a complete
Speaker 2: united front against Biden, he himself would need some kind
Speaker 2: of like excuse to allow himself to step down without
Speaker 2: sacrificing his pride and showing weakness both in himself and
Speaker 2: the party. This could be like a convenient medical diagnosis, right,
Speaker 2: although the increasing number of calls for him to undergo
Speaker 2: thorough neurological examination will probably have the same backfire effect
Speaker 2: of Biden attempting as much as he can to avoid
Speaker 2: any in depth medical and neurological testing. He's been making
Speaker 2: these comments like every day I take a neurological test
Speaker 2: by doing my job, and like, come on, man, we
Speaker 2: also we're watching you do your job. It's not the.
Speaker 1: Problem, bro, Like you got up in front of the
Speaker 1: like again referred to the last episode. Do you what
Speaker 1: I did on the horse race? Our attitude was like, yeah,
Speaker 1: things have really improved for Biden. I think he's probably
Speaker 1: the smart money bet. And like sitting down and watching
Speaker 1: that it was horrifying, Like, yeah, there's no dinner. That's
Speaker 1: part of why this. You have to if you're still
Speaker 1: on team, Like, I don't think it's fair what people
Speaker 1: are saying to Joe if you're on team, This was
Speaker 1: bad strategy from the beginning expressing any kind of doubt. Well,
Speaker 1: maybe that's right, but I don't know what else people
Speaker 1: are supposed to do if you don't if you really
Speaker 1: think that this is he is not demonstrated, like is
Speaker 1: seriously concerning incapacity for the work. Think about how unprecedented
Speaker 1: having this degree of open challenging of him as the
Speaker 1: candidate this close to an elections. I've never seen anything
Speaker 1: like that.
Speaker 2: Especially as especially on like in incumbent yes the president, Yeah,
Speaker 2: and an incumbent who's served two times as vice, Like
Speaker 2: that's ridiculous. And like the last real neurological medical examination
Speaker 2: that he undertook was last February, which for an eighty
Speaker 2: one year old is a very long time, especially if
Speaker 2: you compare like news clips of him from like a
Speaker 2: debate two clips of him from last February or last year.
Speaker 2: There actually is like a decent difference, And I don't know,
Speaker 2: it seems it seems kind of absurd that he that
Speaker 2: he keeps harping on this line. For his ABC interview,
Speaker 2: he declined to take a cognitive test and make the
Speaker 2: results public in order to reassure voters that he was
Speaker 2: fit to serve another term, saying that I have a
Speaker 2: cognitive test every single day doing this job. Everything I
Speaker 2: do is a test. No, not great.
Speaker 1: No.
Speaker 2: He also said that only the Lord Almighty could persuade
Speaker 2: him to change his mind and drop out of the race.
Speaker 1: What the fuck? What the fuck? Show?
Speaker 2: There we go? Seriously, man, So that's again not not
Speaker 2: super reassuring. But do you know what I can be
Speaker 2: reassured by Robert.
Speaker 1: The fact that sweet lady capitalism is always there for us.
Speaker 2: It's always there, like a good uncle or something.
Speaker 1: I don't know, Yeah, yeah, yeah, something something that state farmad.
Speaker 1: I agree.
Speaker 2: All right, we are back. It is certainly feeling like
Speaker 2: nineteen sixty eight all over again, isn't it.
Speaker 1: Yeah? Uh yeah, I mean, And that's obviously having an
Speaker 1: open convention in sixty eight. The chaos around that did
Speaker 1: not help the Democrats. They did not know that election. No,
Speaker 1: we got fucking Dick Nixon. So that's not good.
Speaker 2: No, it's not granted with with campus protests and everything,
Speaker 2: it all is starting to feel like sixty eight over here.
Speaker 1: So yeah, a lot of people are saying.
Speaker 2: If Bien does step down before the DNC in Chicago
Speaker 2: this August, we could have ourselves an open convention to
Speaker 2: nominate a new candidate. The last time this method was
Speaker 2: used by Democrats was in sixty eight at the also
Speaker 2: Chicago DNC, after the leading candidate, Senendate Robert F. Kennedy,
Speaker 2: was assassinated weeks before the convention by twenty five four
Speaker 2: year old Palestinian man for his support of Israel during
Speaker 2: the Six Day War. So again, there is a lot
Speaker 2: of a lot of parallels here. And if it's not
Speaker 2: going to be Biden, then who is it going to be? Right,
Speaker 2: This was a bigger question last week and it still
Speaker 2: is kind of a lingering question in a lot of
Speaker 2: people's minds. Who's it going to be? Probably Kamala I
Speaker 2: don't know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, there's really for a lot of reasons
Speaker 1: in terms of including like I think what would have
Speaker 1: to happen with like the donations, like if it would
Speaker 1: to be a totally new group of people, that would
Speaker 1: cause insurmountable bullshit. And also like if you're talking about
Speaker 1: from a war gaming this out perspective, you know, Kamala
Speaker 1: does not look bad in the polling and might might
Speaker 1: in fact be just for a variety of reasons, one
Speaker 1: of the better choices, Like I can, I can in
Speaker 1: my head think, wow, I sure wish it was you know,
Speaker 1: Pritzker and Whitmer maybe, but like, I think that a
Speaker 1: lot of what I've seen in the polls has kind
Speaker 1: of convinced me that Kamala is probably our are best
Speaker 1: all around bet and if you include practicality and actually
Speaker 1: like beating Trump.
Speaker 2: Yes, in the polls, she is consistently higher than any
Speaker 2: other potential Democratic replacements and doing, if not as well,
Speaker 2: often better than Biden against Trump, usually closing that race out.
Speaker 1: I think.
Speaker 2: A CNN poll from last Wednesday showed that she's in
Speaker 2: the margin of error against Trump nationally with forty five
Speaker 2: to his forty seven, which is much better than Biden
Speaker 2: is doing nationally, and she's projected to do much better
Speaker 2: in an electoral college race than Biden specifically. So there
Speaker 2: we go. I'm gonn quote from CNN here quote. An
Speaker 2: anonymously written Google doc titled Unburdened by What has been
Speaker 2: the Case for Kamala, written by self described senior operatives
Speaker 2: within democratic political institutions, has been popping up in group
Speaker 2: chats of Democratic donors and leading coalition groups. It lays
Speaker 2: out a detailed argument and plan for a campaign. So
Speaker 2: this doc I was able to get a hold of
Speaker 2: a copy, and parts of it definitely read like an
Speaker 2: aaronsor counscript like that is that is the closest thing
Speaker 2: I can I can describe this thing as But I
Speaker 2: think it is worth digging into here for our last section.
Speaker 2: So I'm gonna I'm gonna read some some small parts
Speaker 2: of this doc and Robert, and I'm curious to hear
Speaker 2: what your thoughts are on this. It starts by saying,
Speaker 2: we are currently losing. We need to do something different
Speaker 2: to win. The number one most important priority above all
Speaker 2: others is defeating Donald Trump. Nothing is more important, and
Speaker 2: we need to be very real that we are currently losing.
Speaker 2: So off to off to a good start okay, that is,
Speaker 2: I would uh, I would, I would argue accurate. Quote.
Speaker 2: Biden's debate performance, the campaign's defensive response, and the total
Speaker 2: lack of plan to reassure his base and the voters
Speaker 2: about his about his capability should shake everyone's confidence that
Speaker 2: he can win this election. Now we have three possible options.
Speaker 2: Biden can take the necessary step to demonstrate that he
Speaker 2: is up to the job, he can step aside for
Speaker 2: another candidate, or Trump will win. The discourse around potential
Speaker 2: alternative candidates and the event that Biden does step down
Speaker 2: is increasingly detached from reality. Donors, pundits, and democratic elites
Speaker 2: are freely slinging around wild ideas about dream tickets. This
Speaker 2: chaos is used as a shield by stay the Course
Speaker 2: advocates who frame the choice as Biden or chaos. The
Speaker 2: swirl over different possible candidates is obscuring the fact that
Speaker 2: there's a single clear path forward. There's one path out
Speaker 2: of this mess, and it's Kamala unquote. And this is
Speaker 2: one of the interesting things I found about this doc
Speaker 2: is that the way that they view this kind of
Speaker 2: current chaos as we win just as a deliberate strategy
Speaker 2: and as a deliberate tactics just to continue this uncertainty
Speaker 2: all the way to the convention. And a lot of
Speaker 2: the what this dock advocates for is that we need
Speaker 2: to call this as soon as possible to give whatever
Speaker 2: option we're going to go forward with the most amount
Speaker 2: of success, whether that's Biden, whether that's Kamala, it needs
Speaker 2: to we need to decide what it is so we
Speaker 2: don't spend the next few months doing weird like democratic
Speaker 2: party infighting and instead actually like lock down what's happening.
Speaker 2: So there's a cohesive strategy. And they argue that Kamala
Speaker 2: has the strongest claim to democratic legibility among all other
Speaker 2: alternative candidates. Quote, she's the only candidate that can take
Speaker 2: the reins right now instead of in late August with
Speaker 2: less than three months ago. To be clear, this isn't
Speaker 2: an argument about deservedness or why should personally love Kamala.
Speaker 2: It's about strategy and winning in the face of unimaginable
Speaker 2: electoral stakes.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Now, the doctors point out that only Biden himself has
Speaker 2: the power to drop out and choose to head off
Speaker 2: chaos by anointing Harris. But Biden does listen to people
Speaker 2: and the people that he listens to, listens to other people,
Speaker 2: and that is the audience for the people reading this doc.
Speaker 2: That's what this is circulating among. That was like the intention,
Speaker 2: and they argue that if Biden does drop out, Democrats
Speaker 2: have to unite quickly behind the elected successor, as opposed
Speaker 2: to inviting this extended period of chaos. And although Kamala
Speaker 2: has limitations in polls regarding her name recognition, she currently
Speaker 2: wins any poll of alternative Democratic candidates by a very
Speaker 2: wide margin. This doc dos pointed out that Kamala is
Speaker 2: by no means a perfect candidate. She does have real deficits,
Speaker 2: but they are mostly addressable. The doc mentions her Biden
Speaker 2: level approval, rating her involvement with Biden's immigration shortcomings and
Speaker 2: her kind of awkward camera moments reminiscent of a drunk
Speaker 2: aunt and quote. After years of a relatively low profile,
Speaker 2: voters don't see her as a strong leader for the country,
Speaker 2: but running as a presidential candidate will allow Harris to
Speaker 2: present herself in a more commanding light. She'll be a
Speaker 2: prosecutor going up against a convicted felon, a woman fighting
Speaker 2: against the man who ended Roe V. Wade unquote and
Speaker 2: that is a lot of the tight sort of messaging
Speaker 2: that they are promoting if Kamala does end up being
Speaker 2: the option. A Morning consoled political poll on the vice
Speaker 2: president from June reflects a number of advantages she would
Speaker 2: have over Trump in a head to head match based
Speaker 2: on his greatest vulnerabilities. A majority of voters se Kamala's
Speaker 2: mentally fit, level headed, and prepare contrast to Trump and
Speaker 2: even Biden, and a majority of voters trust Kamala on jobs, abortion,
Speaker 2: climate change, and LGBTQ rights. Public opinion is already moving
Speaker 2: towards Harris over Biden. Forty three percent of voters indicate
Speaker 2: Harris is fit to run, compared to Biden's thirty five
Speaker 2: And while the issue is complex and the distance here
Speaker 2: is relative, she's broadly considered to be on Biden's left
Speaker 2: on Israel Palestine, an issue where he has major vulnerabilities.
Speaker 2: Kamala also has advantages with the younger and POC voters
Speaker 2: that the Democrats are currently bleeding in the dock. Here
Speaker 2: they contain some stats on this, saying Biden won the
Speaker 2: twenty twenty election by just forty four thousand votes, and
Speaker 2: most of those are votes that he is bleeding. A
Speaker 2: New York Times cenpol in February found that Harris is
Speaker 2: nearly ten points ahead of Biden with black voters, and
Speaker 2: fifteen points up with Latino voters, twenty points up with
Speaker 2: young voters. These are massive advantages. Now that is older data,
Speaker 2: but it's probably worth some consideration. Part of the reason
Speaker 2: why she is also favored among other Democratic contents is
Speaker 2: that she has direct access to the Biden Harris campaign
Speaker 2: war chest of over ninety one million dollars in cash,
Speaker 2: which would create a smoother transition.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and is probably I mean again, just given the
Speaker 1: amount of chaos that would be inherent in a totally
Speaker 1: open convention, it just seems like the only feasible option.
Speaker 2: And what they're advocating for is that if Kamla takes
Speaker 2: a position now or soon to now, she'll have an
Speaker 2: extra month and massive structural advantages. Quote, if we can
Speaker 2: unite behind Harris in July, we have an extra month
Speaker 2: of party unity and message unity. That's a month where
Speaker 2: we can keep the media focused on Donald Trump, Project
Speaker 2: twenty twenty five and mega extremism instead of waiting in
Speaker 2: dread for the next Biden misstep or talking about democrats
Speaker 2: fighting it out to win delicate count Fear of racism
Speaker 2: and sexism is playing an outsized role not supported by data.
Speaker 2: The impact of sexism and racism on the vote is
Speaker 2: marginal compared to the potential to make gains in the
Speaker 2: crucial block that will decide the election. Right now. This
Speaker 2: race hinges on alienated and unenthusiastic double haters who dislike
Speaker 2: both Biden and Trump and want an alternative choice. Some
Speaker 2: polls put the size of this group at twenty five
Speaker 2: percent nationally, or even higher nearly thirty percent amongst.
Speaker 1: The basically everyone I know well.
Speaker 2: Especially among inconsistent voters who are likely who are likely
Speaker 2: to decide the election in key battleground states. For these
Speaker 2: double haters, vote choices being driven not by prejudice but
Speaker 2: by anti enthusiasm for the two currently eighty year old
Speaker 2: white men presented here as the only options. YEAH voters
Speaker 2: more likely. These voters are also more likely to be young, Hispanic, black,
Speaker 2: and women in urban or suburban areas, the exact kind
Speaker 2: of voter profile that Kamala is gaining appeal with.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And I find this little bit to be the most
Speaker 2: compelling statement in this entire document. Because like that lays
Speaker 2: out an actual map towards how Kamala would have a
Speaker 2: better election viability than Biden, especially in the voters that
Speaker 2: he's been bleeding dramatically in the past six seven months. Now.
Speaker 2: The DOCA does close by saying, if Biden stays the course,
Speaker 2: we need Kamala to be strong. The most likely outcome
Speaker 2: is that President Biden declines to step back. In that case,
Speaker 2: Kamala's role is more crucial than ever. She will be
Speaker 2: the strong communicator on the ticket, especially on our most
Speaker 2: important issue abortion. Second, many voters will understand her to
Speaker 2: be Biden's near guaranteed successor, and we will need to
Speaker 2: feel comfortable with her potential assent to the presidency to
Speaker 2: vote for the Biden Harris ticket. For anyone in the
Speaker 2: Biden's nominee, we must rally around him camp. It's essential
Speaker 2: that we project confidence in his selection of a running
Speaker 2: mate by one pushing the administration to stop sidelining Kamala,
Speaker 2: by two promoting Kamala as the leader of the party
Speaker 2: and country. Three be prepared to align with political and
Speaker 2: financial support, and three debate over and ultimately organize around
Speaker 2: a new running mate. Consolidation around Vice President Harris will
Speaker 2: not guarantee victory in November. No option is free of
Speaker 2: risk at this point. But this is our clearest path
Speaker 2: to win. We should take it. And that's how the
Speaker 2: document ends. And I like some of the arguments they
Speaker 2: make here. I don't like Kamala as a person. I
Speaker 2: think she is many many and I don't like cops,
Speaker 2: but absolutely, especially if their messaging will be like Kamala
Speaker 2: the prosecutor against Trump the felon, which I personally don't like.
Speaker 1: But that could work.
Speaker 2: That's not going to lose her important voters. That's not
Speaker 2: going to lose her all of the anarchists who already
Speaker 2: aren't going to vote.
Speaker 1: Like that, that might be a really good strategy, because
Speaker 1: Americans do not feel the same way about prosecutors as
Speaker 1: I do, and these you do right, like we have
Speaker 1: to accept that at a certain point, I think so.
Speaker 1: I I the think that's most frustrated to me about
Speaker 1: the fact that it doesn't look like Biden's going to
Speaker 1: step down is that like the smartest thing they could
Speaker 1: do strategy wise would be to drop that announcement on
Speaker 1: like Monday of next week and utterly like cut the
Speaker 1: wind out of the sales of the r NC, Like
Speaker 1: suddenly the biggest story is that and not you know,
Speaker 1: everything that the Republicans are putting out, like you could
Speaker 1: actually really do some damage to them, because there's there's
Speaker 1: not really anything that they could do in response.
Speaker 2: And so much media attention right now is being focused
Speaker 2: on Biden very clearly not being fit for office, and
Speaker 2: all of that would go away if Kamala gets put
Speaker 2: into the spot, then then then everyone will start focusing
Speaker 2: once again on how bad Trump is. And I can
Speaker 2: understand some of like the Biden camps like upsetedness at
Speaker 2: at like the fact that currently there is just so
Speaker 2: much attention on Biden and everyone kind of is ignoring Trump,
Speaker 2: but that just is due to how poorly he himself
Speaker 2: has been behaving like that, Like that that is ultimately
Speaker 2: the Biden campaign's fault that they didn't plan for this constituency.
Speaker 2: And if they want all of that like discourse to stop,
Speaker 2: they have a very easy option to And it's just
Speaker 2: reliant on Biden not being too personally prideful and acknowledging
Speaker 2: that he's just too old for office and there are
Speaker 2: better candidates out there. So yeah, that is that is
Speaker 2: the current, that is the current situation on the rise
Speaker 2: of the case Hive, something I at this point am
Speaker 2: very skeptical to think will actually happen. But it may
Speaker 2: be actually a viable strategy for the Democratic Party.
Speaker 1: Yep. I mean, we'll see what they actually do. Probably
Speaker 1: keep running Joe Biden and hope that Americans panic enough
Speaker 1: about Trump to But you know, we can all dream.
Speaker 2: I dream to that point. We could also dream that
Speaker 2: like that, that like the delegates will just like rebel
Speaker 2: against they're like polite duty. Yeah, by by not committing
Speaker 2: to their to their non binding promises. Although that would
Speaker 2: be extremely unprecedented and it would make the DNC a
Speaker 2: lot more fun.
Speaker 1: Oh, we would. We would have a great DNC if
Speaker 1: that were to go down. Yep.
Speaker 2: Anyway, well, we're gonna have fun at the R and
Speaker 2: C instead.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we sure will. Garrison, You and I are going
Speaker 1: to be on the ground in the exclusion zone and
Speaker 1: at the convention itself where we cannot have backpacks or.
Speaker 2: Gas masks or canned food.
Speaker 1: But I might be able to carry a gun. Let
Speaker 1: me see if they do reciprocity. Uh, where what is
Speaker 1: this is Minnesota?
Speaker 2: No, this is not Minnesota.
Speaker 1: This is Wisconsin, Wisconsin.
Speaker 2: This is Milwaukee, Milwaukee.
Speaker 1: We can see how well prepared I am. Let me see.
Speaker 1: That could make a fun episode all its own.
Speaker 2: I do have an idea for an episode that I
Speaker 2: will mention to you off air that I really want.
Speaker 1: To do for the rn C. Wait, it looks like
Speaker 1: yes with restrictions.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I love restrictions.
Speaker 1: That's great. We'll see what those are.
Speaker 2: Stay tuned to you, but the restriction.
Speaker 1: Stay tuned, everybody.
Speaker 2: It could happen here as a production of cool Zone Media.
Speaker 2: More podcast from.
Speaker 1: Cool Zone Media, visit our website cool zonemedia dot com,
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Speaker 2: You can find sources for It could Happen here, updated
Speaker 2: monthly at coolzonemedia dot com slash sources. Thanks for listening.