WEBVTT - Full Episode - Could A Government Shutdown Backfire On Democrats + Diagnosis Doesn’t Define You: Growing Up With Autism 0:00:05.160 --> 0:00:08.239 Hello, They're happy Wednesday, and welcome to another episode of 0:00:08.280 --> 0:00:11.480 the Check Podcast. It is October first, and apparently what 0:00:11.480 --> 0:00:14.640 that means. It's October first, twenty twenty five. Do you 0:00:14.680 --> 0:00:17.680 know if your government's open? Well, the answer is there 0:00:17.680 --> 0:00:21.520 are portions of the government not open today. What does 0:00:21.520 --> 0:00:25.040 it mean? Well, you heard, if you heard my last 0:00:25.320 --> 0:00:29.560 monologue about this, you know this is a manufactured moment. 0:00:29.760 --> 0:00:35.440 This is a created political a manufactured political drama based 0:00:35.479 --> 0:00:41.720 on legal interpretations of two Justice departments that go back 0:00:41.760 --> 0:00:45.600 to the Carter and Reagan era, and a whole bunch 0:00:45.640 --> 0:00:49.400 of members of Congress who claim they don't like these 0:00:49.520 --> 0:00:53.160 shutdowns but have refused to pass legislation that actually would 0:00:53.159 --> 0:00:57.720 make these showdowns moot. So I'm not going to bother 0:00:57.880 --> 0:01:01.120 to rehash that, but it really bothers me how that 0:01:01.120 --> 0:01:03.160 New York Times did a story about sort of, oh, 0:01:03.200 --> 0:01:05.920 we've had fifty years of this polarizing and sort of 0:01:06.080 --> 0:01:09.480 didn't sort of glossed over the fact that this is 0:01:09.560 --> 0:01:12.840 simply an interpretation. There's no law in the Constitution that 0:01:12.920 --> 0:01:15.240 says the government is open or closed on October first, 0:01:15.240 --> 0:01:19.000 depending on when you pass appropriations bills. This is essentially 0:01:20.000 --> 0:01:23.760 a decision that people in power made in order to 0:01:23.800 --> 0:01:29.679 create a point of drama or leverage, apparently for no 0:01:29.800 --> 0:01:32.520 particular good that's come from it. Right, this has just 0:01:32.600 --> 0:01:36.960 been a disaster. And I think this is the challenge 0:01:37.000 --> 0:01:40.800 that Democrats have being the instigators of this, which is 0:01:42.200 --> 0:01:46.560 for my entire adult lifetime, it has been the Republicans 0:01:46.560 --> 0:01:49.040 that have been the instigators of the shutdown we've had these. 0:01:49.080 --> 0:01:51.840 It was when there was a Democratic president that we 0:01:51.920 --> 0:01:55.120 had it in the nineties, democratic president, when we had 0:01:55.160 --> 0:01:58.320 it during Obama. It is with Trump. That's the first 0:01:58.320 --> 0:02:00.840 time we've had this with a Republican Now, the first 0:02:00.840 --> 0:02:03.680 time it was Republican. This is now the second time 0:02:03.680 --> 0:02:05.960 we've had a shutdown with Trump as president and Republicans 0:02:06.000 --> 0:02:08.040 in charge of both the House in the Senate now 0:02:08.560 --> 0:02:10.600 because of the filibuster. And I'm going to get to 0:02:10.680 --> 0:02:14.000 that in a minute, because you got to ask yourself, 0:02:13.560 --> 0:02:19.360 what if this is what ends the filibuster. I'm fascinated 0:02:19.760 --> 0:02:21.560 to see what the reaction would be among some of 0:02:21.600 --> 0:02:23.679 the left who've been agitating for getting rid of the 0:02:23.680 --> 0:02:26.640 philibuster for some time. Imagine if this is the trigger 0:02:26.639 --> 0:02:30.720 for it, just something to put a pin in that right, 0:02:30.800 --> 0:02:35.440 let's just file this away for a second. But we're here, 0:02:36.080 --> 0:02:40.720 and I think the issue and it's reflective. I've got 0:02:40.720 --> 0:02:42.000 some pull numbers I want to go through that are 0:02:42.040 --> 0:02:45.320 actually well timed, sort of end of September polls. They're 0:02:45.320 --> 0:02:49.320 well timed. But they we get at this question of shutdowns. 0:02:49.360 --> 0:02:52.359 And you know, the Democrats have messaged for twenty years 0:02:52.360 --> 0:02:55.480 the shutdowns are bad, and now here they are on 0:02:55.520 --> 0:02:59.000 the other side saying passing up the opportunity for a 0:02:59.040 --> 0:03:03.200 clean of temporary six week extension to keep the government 0:03:03.240 --> 0:03:09.040 open because you know they want their And this is 0:03:09.639 --> 0:03:14.080 I said this before. I think tactically they made a 0:03:14.120 --> 0:03:19.799 mistake not accepting this continuing resolution to November. I think 0:03:19.800 --> 0:03:22.440 they would be better off having this showdown over the 0:03:22.520 --> 0:03:27.280 exact same issue healthcare subsidies, the Obamacare subsidies. They'd have 0:03:27.320 --> 0:03:35.280 been better off, I think starting that fight in November 0:03:35.680 --> 0:03:38.640 after the twenty twenty five elections in Virginia, New Jersey, 0:03:38.680 --> 0:03:43.000 New York, et cetera. But here's you know, here's what's interesting. 0:03:43.040 --> 0:03:45.200 So the time says this new pulling out and let 0:03:45.200 --> 0:03:47.080 me read you one of a couple of the questions 0:03:47.320 --> 0:03:50.240 that had to do with the with a shutdown, who 0:03:50.240 --> 0:03:53.240 would you blame if there is a shutdown? The Democrats 0:03:53.240 --> 0:03:56.760 in Congress, Donald Trump, and the Republicans in Congress, both 0:03:57.680 --> 0:04:00.839 or both parties equally or all entities equally. Now they 0:04:00.840 --> 0:04:04.119 combined Republicans and Donald Trump into one column. There's other 0:04:04.160 --> 0:04:07.760 polling out there that has put Democrats in Congress, Republicans 0:04:07.760 --> 0:04:10.680 in Congress, and Donald Trump as separate three you know, 0:04:10.840 --> 0:04:14.920 three categories. So essentially, when you start to see it 0:04:14.960 --> 0:04:18.400 that way, if you separate it out, more people blame 0:04:18.520 --> 0:04:22.160 Democrats in Congress than Trump. But if you combined Republicans 0:04:22.160 --> 0:04:25.440 in Congress and Trump, you see where I'm going. But 0:04:25.520 --> 0:04:27.920 there's essentially a third, a third and a third right. 0:04:28.320 --> 0:04:30.320 A third are saying it's one party's fault, a third 0:04:30.320 --> 0:04:32.040 are saying it's the other party's fault, and a third 0:04:32.080 --> 0:04:37.320 just blame everybody type of mindset. But I thought this 0:04:37.480 --> 0:04:40.200 was interesting. They just asked a straight up question, which 0:04:40.240 --> 0:04:42.960 statement comes closer to you view your view, even if 0:04:43.040 --> 0:04:46.840 neither is exactly right. The Democrats should shut down the 0:04:46.839 --> 0:04:50.200 government if their demands are not met. Twenty seven percent 0:04:50.560 --> 0:04:54.240 agreed with that statement. The Democrats should not shut down 0:04:54.240 --> 0:04:57.400 the government even if their demands are not met. Sixty 0:04:57.560 --> 0:05:03.680 five percent agreed with that statement. That's the uphill battle 0:05:03.720 --> 0:05:06.880 here that I think Democrats are dealing with because you've 0:05:06.920 --> 0:05:13.640 got you've got a sort of a you've got a 0:05:13.920 --> 0:05:16.279 confluence of things that have happened over the last twenty 0:05:16.360 --> 0:05:21.719 years that frankly, have conditioned the public about shutdowns. One 0:05:21.760 --> 0:05:24.760 is they're not that serious. I explained this to you 0:05:24.800 --> 0:05:28.160 in the last episode. They exempt social Security, they exempt 0:05:28.160 --> 0:05:31.799 military pay, they exempt TSA, They're not going to disrupt 0:05:31.839 --> 0:05:36.160 the flights, They exempt food inspectors, they exempt so many 0:05:36.200 --> 0:05:40.200 things that it's sort of like, all right, it's it's 0:05:40.240 --> 0:05:44.679 sort of the operational part of government that matters, matters 0:05:44.720 --> 0:05:48.559 a lot. People will notice over time when those parts 0:05:48.560 --> 0:05:51.840 of government are shuttered, but they don't notice in the 0:05:51.880 --> 0:05:55.560 immediate right. So anything that the public might notice immediately, 0:05:56.360 --> 0:05:59.160 politicians over the years have tried to sort of, you know, 0:05:59.440 --> 0:06:03.880 shield that right. So that's how you've had these military 0:06:03.920 --> 0:06:07.320 gets paid. Back pay for federal government workers is now guaranteed. 0:06:07.680 --> 0:06:10.119 You know, you have all these little things in there 0:06:10.760 --> 0:06:13.480 that are done to sort of mitigate the consequences of 0:06:13.520 --> 0:06:16.320 a shutdown in the moment. But as I've said, what 0:06:16.400 --> 0:06:20.720 it's done is lowered the consequences for a shutdown, if 0:06:20.760 --> 0:06:25.280 the consequences were much higher, as in Social Security checks 0:06:25.279 --> 0:06:30.160 don't go out tomorrow morning, heart stop, Military doesn't get 0:06:30.160 --> 0:06:34.800 paid next Friday, heart stop. I promise you there'd be 0:06:34.839 --> 0:06:38.320 more urgency to this. But they took all of that out, 0:06:38.320 --> 0:06:41.960 which is again and so the public has gotten used 0:06:42.000 --> 0:06:47.760 to it that these shutdowns are annoying, their distractions. You know, 0:06:48.200 --> 0:06:52.080 they over time impact the economy negatively. They're not good. 0:06:52.560 --> 0:06:56.000 They slow down. I told you all the wasted government money, 0:06:56.320 --> 0:06:59.240 wasted time for people, particularly in your fear in a 0:06:59.279 --> 0:07:03.360 public private defense contractors have time wasted. They still get 0:07:03.400 --> 0:07:07.160 paid but and the government will eventually remburse him, but 0:07:07.200 --> 0:07:09.720 they don't do the actual work. And this could be 0:07:10.240 --> 0:07:13.040 this could be, could be a few weeks, could be longer. 0:07:15.600 --> 0:07:19.160 So I don't know what the exit ramp is here 0:07:19.240 --> 0:07:24.120 for anybody. It does seem as if the Trump administration 0:07:24.680 --> 0:07:28.680 would love to try this out. And the threats that 0:07:28.720 --> 0:07:33.560 Trump has made actually showcase an issue that I wish 0:07:33.640 --> 0:07:36.320 more voters cared about, which is Donald Trump does not 0:07:36.400 --> 0:07:38.720 believe he should govern for people that didn't vote for him, 0:07:39.160 --> 0:07:42.160 and if anything, he wants to punish anybody by getting 0:07:42.240 --> 0:07:47.560 rid of any program that the government funds that doesn't 0:07:47.600 --> 0:07:52.520 benefit him somehow politically. And he's essentially telegraphed this. He goes, 0:07:52.640 --> 0:07:54.120 I'm going to be able to reverse some things that 0:07:54.160 --> 0:07:56.480 they're never going to be able to get back. He 0:07:56.640 --> 0:08:01.480 is almost excited about the opportunity to govern with a 0:08:01.520 --> 0:08:06.360 political lens and a harsh one at that. Next week, 0:08:06.400 --> 0:08:08.480 I'm going to have an interview with the mayor of 0:08:08.520 --> 0:08:10.679 Oklahoma City. But I want to give you a little 0:08:10.680 --> 0:08:13.280 preview of something he said, which is, this is the 0:08:13.320 --> 0:08:17.119 consequences of these partisan primaries and the way we nominate people. 0:08:17.120 --> 0:08:20.560 If you're if you have to answer to everybody all 0:08:20.600 --> 0:08:22.760 the time in your voters, if you're a member of 0:08:22.840 --> 0:08:25.600 Congress and you're facing all voters in a primary rather 0:08:25.640 --> 0:08:31.960 than just this small slice of obsessed partisans, you're going 0:08:32.040 --> 0:08:34.960 to have a different incentive of who If you have 0:08:35.000 --> 0:08:36.800 to win over a middle of the road voter to 0:08:36.800 --> 0:08:40.400 get a nomination to get to the second uh, to 0:08:40.480 --> 0:08:43.400 get to actual general election, well you're going to comport 0:08:43.440 --> 0:08:47.680 yourself a hell of a lot differently than if all 0:08:47.720 --> 0:08:49.600 you have to do is deal with a partisan set 0:08:49.640 --> 0:08:53.480 of voters. And you know, for him, it was his 0:08:53.520 --> 0:08:57.760 explanation of my mayor's or the least polarized executive that 0:08:57.800 --> 0:08:59.959 you have in the country, that all across the country 0:09:00.200 --> 0:09:03.920 where where the Republican mayors or Democratic mayors, almost all 0:09:04.000 --> 0:09:07.200 of them treat a pothole as a pothole. They don't 0:09:07.240 --> 0:09:09.679 look to see what the precinct, how which way the 0:09:09.720 --> 0:09:12.480 precinct voted before deciding to fill the pothole. Now I 0:09:12.520 --> 0:09:15.000 know that they're back in the days of the machine 0:09:15.080 --> 0:09:17.440 political machines of Chicago and New York, there was always 0:09:17.600 --> 0:09:21.640 rumors that, you know, the daily wards got their potholes filled, 0:09:21.640 --> 0:09:23.600 and if you weren't a daily guy, you didn't get 0:09:23.600 --> 0:09:27.000 your pothole filled. But you can't get away with that 0:09:27.080 --> 0:09:28.880 being a mayor of a city these days, and you 0:09:28.920 --> 0:09:31.760 don't do that. But it is remarkable to me how 0:09:31.760 --> 0:09:35.079 often we're seeing some partisans governed this way as governors 0:09:35.679 --> 0:09:40.760 and as president. And it's particularly a hallmark of magga 0:09:40.880 --> 0:09:46.079 driven politicians because the whole owned the Libs like it's ok, 0:09:46.240 --> 0:09:49.080 you know, we're if if we're suffer, if we all suffer, 0:09:49.160 --> 0:09:51.920 and it makes the Libs cry, then it's a worthy 0:09:52.000 --> 0:09:55.280 cause to do anyway. That's sort of this mindset at 0:09:55.400 --> 0:09:58.920 times on the own the libs mentality, and so it's 0:09:58.960 --> 0:10:02.520 a it is this is the fact that Trump's going 0:10:02.559 --> 0:10:05.400 to do this. But the point is this gets to 0:10:06.040 --> 0:10:08.440 sort of all the times you have confrontations with Trump. 0:10:08.960 --> 0:10:10.840 And don't get me wrong, I do think that that 0:10:10.920 --> 0:10:16.040 Trump respects a fight er more than he respects a capitulator. 0:10:16.880 --> 0:10:21.360 So I do think that in some ways, if if 0:10:24.200 --> 0:10:27.320 the more resistance they put up in certain areas, that 0:10:27.440 --> 0:10:30.000 in a weird way, Trump will will will respect that 0:10:30.240 --> 0:10:34.559 because he's a he likes to be resistant, but he's 0:10:34.600 --> 0:10:37.319 also got a higher tolerance for this pain. 0:10:37.520 --> 0:10:37.679 Right. 0:10:37.800 --> 0:10:41.640 He doesn't care how the mainstream media coverage goes. In 0:10:41.720 --> 0:10:44.560 his mind, if if a major you know, if the 0:10:44.559 --> 0:10:47.240 New York Times polling is showing it somehow it's Republican's fault. 0:10:47.800 --> 0:10:51.160 He sees that as a political asset, not a political liability. 0:10:53.160 --> 0:10:56.280 And you know, as long as his base is happy, 0:10:56.600 --> 0:10:59.160 he believes his politics are doing well. And you sort 0:10:59.160 --> 0:11:01.440 of see that his base is happy, but the rest 0:11:01.440 --> 0:11:04.280 of the country is pretty sour in his leadership. This 0:11:04.480 --> 0:11:08.160 latest New York Times Santa Pol shows he is basically 0:11:08.200 --> 0:11:11.080 at his presidential average. He's sitting at forty three percent 0:11:11.160 --> 0:11:13.440 job approval in this bowl. It's about what he was 0:11:13.480 --> 0:11:15.760 the last time. It's about what he was for just 0:11:15.800 --> 0:11:19.560 about the entire first term that he had from seventeen 0:11:19.600 --> 0:11:24.920 to twenty. You know, he's never he's never really sniffed 0:11:24.960 --> 0:11:28.760 fifty percent. And in order to do that, you'd have 0:11:28.800 --> 0:11:31.680 to have at least fifty percent of independence happy. And 0:11:31.720 --> 0:11:36.680 that's the problem he's having. Is that independence or more 0:11:36.760 --> 0:11:42.640 sour about his presidency? Then you know they look they don't. 0:11:42.760 --> 0:11:45.000 They're not as they're not as sour at his presidency 0:11:45.000 --> 0:11:48.400 as Democrats, but they're closer to looking like Democrats than 0:11:48.440 --> 0:11:52.920 they do Republicans when it comes to this. So I'll 0:11:52.920 --> 0:11:56.199 fully confess here, I have no idea when this ends, 0:11:56.280 --> 0:12:02.840 or how this sends, whether in what kind of stomach 0:12:04.400 --> 0:12:06.240 senate Democrats are going to have for how long are 0:12:06.240 --> 0:12:11.160 they going to go on this? When I think about 0:12:11.160 --> 0:12:13.760 who the seven votes would be, we know Fetterman's one, 0:12:15.679 --> 0:12:20.920 Jean Shaheen could be two, she's retiring. Would Tina Smith 0:12:20.960 --> 0:12:25.320 be three as a retiring senator? I don't know uh 0:12:25.720 --> 0:12:28.880 as as a third one, Gary Peters. He could be right, 0:12:29.400 --> 0:12:31.000 you see where I'm going here that some of them 0:12:31.000 --> 0:12:32.920 who are not going to be in ballots could could 0:12:33.000 --> 0:12:35.680 do this, uh, if they so chose to. But I 0:12:35.679 --> 0:12:39.079 don't know if there's seven that are that are ready 0:12:39.120 --> 0:12:42.680 to break completely. But ask me again in a week, 0:12:42.760 --> 0:12:46.840 ask me again in two weeks. How aggressive does Russell Voight, 0:12:47.000 --> 0:12:53.400 the O and B director get and trying to potentially 0:12:53.520 --> 0:12:58.880 fire furloughed government employees? Is it? Is it aggressive? So 0:12:59.080 --> 0:13:03.199 I think some of the reaction and some of the 0:13:03.240 --> 0:13:06.400 stiffness of the spine. How stiff will the democratic spine 0:13:06.480 --> 0:13:11.400 be depends I think on how aggressive omb is in 0:13:11.640 --> 0:13:16.520 using the shutdown to maybe reorient government permanently in some 0:13:16.559 --> 0:13:21.600 form or another. So we're, you know, like with many 0:13:21.640 --> 0:13:27.680 things with Trump urban uncharted territory. Unlike the previous shutdown. 0:13:27.720 --> 0:13:32.920 With Trump, he's got a he's got two aids who 0:13:33.080 --> 0:13:35.720 know their way around the bureaucracy. Russell Void's been thinking 0:13:35.720 --> 0:13:38.360 about this for years as the author of Project twenty 0:13:38.360 --> 0:13:41.960 twenty five, and Stephen Miller understands how to manipulate the 0:13:42.080 --> 0:13:46.679 bureaucracy in ways that are pretty much second to none 0:13:46.720 --> 0:13:50.800 of any presidential aid I've ever covered. Regardless of what 0:13:50.880 --> 0:13:57.440 you think of his politics, he's extraordinarily knowledgeable on how 0:13:57.480 --> 0:14:04.040 to on the co essentially the legal code, and on 0:14:04.080 --> 0:14:08.559 the ability to sort of tinker with the federal government. 0:14:09.679 --> 0:14:11.520 We saw it during the pandemic, how he used it 0:14:11.559 --> 0:14:14.480 to shut down the border, came up with sort of 0:14:15.200 --> 0:14:20.600 some interesting unique ways in rationales to do it. And 0:14:20.680 --> 0:14:25.760 so you know, that's that to me, is the uncharted 0:14:26.200 --> 0:14:28.520 territory that we're entering and that we don't know a 0:14:28.560 --> 0:14:31.400 lot about, and we don't know how aggressive and where 0:14:31.400 --> 0:14:37.800 this has headed. But I think if there's a big 0:14:37.920 --> 0:14:40.320 danger for the Democrats besides what I just outlined with 0:14:40.400 --> 0:14:43.320 the aggressiveness of Trump, the other one is whether the 0:14:43.360 --> 0:14:49.120 public is just paying attention, whether even the activists, whether 0:14:49.200 --> 0:14:53.360 this is turning into action, whether it does fire up folks, 0:14:53.520 --> 0:14:57.040 or if there's sort of an exhaustion that comes with this, 0:14:57.200 --> 0:15:00.320 because again, the Democrats have never been on this side 0:15:00.360 --> 0:15:04.000 of a government shutdown, and we're going to see a 0:15:04.080 --> 0:15:09.720 lot of conservative media sites re treading all these quotes 0:15:10.520 --> 0:15:14.239 from the Chuck Schumers over the years of Nancy Pelosi's 0:15:14.280 --> 0:15:18.280 talking about clean CRS. Government shutdowns are bad, they should 0:15:18.320 --> 0:15:19.320 never happen, etc. 0:15:19.720 --> 0:15:20.600 Etc. Etc. 0:15:21.880 --> 0:15:26.120 And that could take a toll as well, and how 0:15:26.160 --> 0:15:28.720 much of all of that gets traction. But this gets 0:15:28.720 --> 0:15:31.000 into a larger issue, which is actually what I tackle. 0:15:31.640 --> 0:15:34.960 By the way, it's worth noting the Pew Center came 0:15:35.000 --> 0:15:37.920 out with some new poll polling that happened to hit today, 0:15:38.600 --> 0:15:41.320 and what they had is they had some favorable unfavorable 0:15:41.400 --> 0:15:45.840 ratings on the congressional leaders. And what's interesting is just 0:15:45.880 --> 0:15:48.760 how unpopular Chuck Schumer. Chuck Schumer is the new Mitch McConnell. 0:15:49.440 --> 0:15:52.240 Mitch McConnell was always the most unpopular of the four 0:15:52.280 --> 0:15:57.239 political leaders. When it was McConnell, Schumer, Pelosi, and McCarthy. 0:15:57.720 --> 0:16:00.560 McConnell was always far and away the most unpopular because 0:16:00.800 --> 0:16:03.200 McConnell was the only one that had negative ratings among 0:16:03.240 --> 0:16:09.160 Democrats and negative ratings among Republicans. Well, Chuck Schumer, welcome 0:16:09.200 --> 0:16:12.200 to Mitch McConnell country. He not only has negative ratings 0:16:12.200 --> 0:16:16.320 among Republicans, but he has a negative ratings just narrowly 0:16:16.840 --> 0:16:21.240 thirty nine unfavorable, thirty five favorable among Democrats. By the way, 0:16:23.680 --> 0:16:28.080 Jeffrey's numbers are not bad overall, he's got good numbers 0:16:28.080 --> 0:16:31.080 among Democrats two to one on that favorable rating overall. 0:16:31.120 --> 0:16:33.320 That allows him to have a thirty to twenty four, 0:16:33.400 --> 0:16:37.440 so he's he's got some he's got some room here. 0:16:37.480 --> 0:16:39.920 He's sort of got a net positive view, which is 0:16:40.040 --> 0:16:44.000 rare for a gouvernile. John Thune, the least known of 0:16:44.080 --> 0:16:47.720 the of the of the current set of four, also 0:16:48.040 --> 0:16:52.520 has a net positive. He's narrowly net negative. Je excuse me, 0:16:52.600 --> 0:16:54.960 I read this wrong. Jeffreys is narrowly net negative. But 0:16:55.080 --> 0:16:58.640 his positive rating with Republicans is with Democrats, is better 0:16:58.840 --> 0:17:01.680 than for instance, Thunes p a a rating is among Republicans. 0:17:01.680 --> 0:17:04.240 Sorry for confusing that there a little bit, but the 0:17:04.280 --> 0:17:08.159 real headline of this is Chuck Schumer is unpopped more 0:17:08.200 --> 0:17:12.480 unpopular among Democrats than he is popular among Democrats. And 0:17:12.520 --> 0:17:16.159 that also means he's going to be really resistant to 0:17:16.200 --> 0:17:20.320 caving because he's really afraid of the base. It's the 0:17:20.359 --> 0:17:23.479 base that's the most angry with Schumer. He sort of 0:17:23.520 --> 0:17:26.480 mismanaged the communication of the first one. I think he 0:17:26.640 --> 0:17:30.240 made the right call, but he spent a day talking 0:17:30.320 --> 0:17:33.119 up a shutdown and then completely reversed course, which is 0:17:33.119 --> 0:17:35.280 what really I think angered the left. He sort of 0:17:35.840 --> 0:17:40.320 he led him on and then he yanked the carpet 0:17:40.320 --> 0:17:43.760 from underneath them. I think on this one, he's going 0:17:43.840 --> 0:17:47.000 to want to stick it out longer. Well put it 0:17:47.080 --> 0:17:50.840 this way, If he's interested in running again and he's 0:17:50.920 --> 0:17:55.480 up in twenty twenty eight, he's going to probably care 0:17:55.640 --> 0:17:58.680 more about what the base thinks of this shutdown than 0:17:58.720 --> 0:18:02.280 what swing voters think of this. Show them. But this 0:18:02.400 --> 0:18:05.720 gets to the sort of larger dilemma that I think 0:18:05.760 --> 0:18:08.480 democrats face, and it's the subject of my substack column. 0:18:08.520 --> 0:18:10.880 I encourage you to go subscribe. I don't charge any 0:18:11.000 --> 0:18:13.680 it's all free. I don't charge for this podcast. It's 0:18:13.680 --> 0:18:17.480 all free. I do not want to be captive to 0:18:17.520 --> 0:18:19.680 an audience. I don't want to be captive to a paywall. 0:18:19.920 --> 0:18:22.760 I think that has been that is that becomes self fulfilling. 0:18:22.920 --> 0:18:29.679 I am trying to swerve away from that way of 0:18:29.720 --> 0:18:33.080 building an independent media operation. So it is free and 0:18:33.160 --> 0:18:36.600 I'm not going to triculator and charge it. Okay. The 0:18:36.640 --> 0:18:38.679 one place where you do have to pay to go 0:18:38.800 --> 0:18:40.919 check out what I'm doing is new Sphere. It's a 0:18:41.000 --> 0:18:43.159 unique app and there's some terrific journalists there. That do 0:18:43.320 --> 0:18:47.680 deserve the subscription revenue. So I view that as myself 0:18:47.680 --> 0:18:58.960 helping a whole bunch of independent journalists. There's a reason 0:18:59.040 --> 0:19:02.040 results matter more than promises, just like there's a reason 0:19:02.040 --> 0:19:05.560 Morgan and Morgan is America's largest injury law firm. For 0:19:05.600 --> 0:19:08.680 the last thirty five years, they've recovered twenty five billion 0:19:08.720 --> 0:19:11.800 dollars for more than half a million clients. It includes 0:19:11.840 --> 0:19:15.600 cases where insurance companies offered next to nothing, just hoping 0:19:15.680 --> 0:19:18.240 to get away with paying as little as possible. Morgan 0:19:18.280 --> 0:19:21.040 and Morgan fought back ended up winning millions. In fact, 0:19:21.119 --> 0:19:24.240 in Pennsylvania, one client was awarded twenty six million dollars, 0:19:24.720 --> 0:19:27.760 which was a staggering forty times the amount that the 0:19:27.760 --> 0:19:31.080 insurance company originally offered. That original offer six hundred and 0:19:31.080 --> 0:19:34.080 fifty thousand dollars twenty six million, six hundred and fifty 0:19:34.119 --> 0:19:36.320 thousand dollars. So with more than one thousand lawyers across 0:19:36.320 --> 0:19:38.800 the country, they know how to deliver for everyday people. 0:19:38.880 --> 0:19:41.600 If you're injured, you need a lawyer, you need somebody 0:19:41.600 --> 0:19:44.160 to get your back. Check out for Thepeople dot Com, 0:19:44.200 --> 0:19:48.800 Slash podcast or Dow Pound Law Pound five to two 0:19:49.040 --> 0:19:52.760 nine Law on your cell phone. And remember all law 0:19:52.800 --> 0:19:54.920 firms are not the same. So check out Morgan and Morgan. 0:19:55.000 --> 0:20:03.520 Their fee is free unless they win. But in the 0:20:03.520 --> 0:20:06.560 substec I talk about this democratic dilemma, and that is 0:20:06.720 --> 0:20:09.280 if Democrats want if a Democrat wants to win the 0:20:09.280 --> 0:20:14.080 White House in twenty twenty eight, just saying Donald Trump 0:20:14.520 --> 0:20:18.040 is an existential threat and a dictator and a fascist 0:20:18.119 --> 0:20:21.240 isn't going to cut it, because in order to win 0:20:21.320 --> 0:20:24.119 the presidency, you're going to have to win over some 0:20:24.160 --> 0:20:28.639 Trump voters. So and in order to have a conversation 0:20:28.680 --> 0:20:30.600 with us Trump voters, you're going to have to admit 0:20:30.600 --> 0:20:33.680 that Trump was right about some things. And you can 0:20:33.760 --> 0:20:36.040 do it in a way. You know that Trump has 0:20:36.080 --> 0:20:41.280 identified problems, He's just been terrible at solving them. In fact, 0:20:41.359 --> 0:20:44.840 his solutions make things worse in some cases. Right, he's 0:20:44.920 --> 0:20:52.720 trying to return manufacturing back to America. His transactional tariff policy, 0:20:52.760 --> 0:20:56.480 which is turning us into a kleptocracy, is a horrendous 0:20:56.480 --> 0:20:59.119 way to do this, Terrible for the economy, terrible for 0:20:59.160 --> 0:21:06.199 the consumer, and doing nothing to bring manufacturing back. But 0:21:06.280 --> 0:21:09.480 what the voters. You got to sort of understand what 0:21:09.520 --> 0:21:11.600 the voters were voting for when they voted for Trump 0:21:11.600 --> 0:21:14.400 in sixteen, and then they did it again in twenty four. 0:21:15.200 --> 0:21:17.880 It's almost like the old Verizon commercial. Can you hear me? Now? 0:21:20.520 --> 0:21:23.720 You know, Democrats misinterpreted the twenty twenty election. They thought 0:21:23.920 --> 0:21:27.640 the voters were like, Yep, Donald Trump was a mistake. 0:21:28.240 --> 0:21:34.320 This is an accident of history, and he needs to 0:21:34.359 --> 0:21:37.760 be Trump and Trump is that needs to be excommunicated 0:21:38.920 --> 0:21:46.359 essentially from mainstream American political debate. That's not what the 0:21:46.440 --> 0:21:50.760 voters were saying. By the way, if Joe Biden had 0:21:50.840 --> 0:21:54.040 had four hundred electoral votes, you could have made the 0:21:54.040 --> 0:21:56.240 case that that's what the voters were saying. If he 0:21:56.280 --> 0:22:01.280 did have, but Joe Biden, while he won every swing 0:22:01.400 --> 0:22:06.879 stay but North Carolina, it only would have taken a couple, 0:22:06.960 --> 0:22:09.280 you know, a couple of hundred thousand, basic, about one 0:22:09.359 --> 0:22:14.640 hundred thousand plus votes for Trump to win the electoral college. Right, 0:22:14.720 --> 0:22:19.440 It wasn't a landslide. It wasn't some sort of massive 0:22:19.520 --> 0:22:22.600 repudiation of trump Ism. What it was was a bunch 0:22:22.640 --> 0:22:25.320 of swing voters exhausted from COVID and wanting off the 0:22:25.400 --> 0:22:28.440 roller coaster. But it wasn't a repudiation of the reason 0:22:28.440 --> 0:22:31.760 why Trump got elected in the first place. You know, 0:22:31.960 --> 0:22:33.760 and I think when you now, I think we have 0:22:33.840 --> 0:22:38.120 to view Trump's election and this and this is sort 0:22:38.119 --> 0:22:42.840 of the blueprint that I think any successful Democrat in 0:22:42.840 --> 0:22:48.240 twenty twenty eight has to follow. And that is, you know, 0:22:48.280 --> 0:22:51.560 in fifteen, when Donald Trump essentially launched his candidacy by 0:22:51.600 --> 0:22:56.199 going after John McCain and the Bush family, many of 0:22:56.280 --> 0:23:01.800 us stuck in some conventional thinking, myself included, thought, well, 0:23:01.840 --> 0:23:04.600 that's a mistake. Republicans are not going to tolerate that. 0:23:04.640 --> 0:23:07.920 They're going to punish him for that. It turns out, 0:23:08.960 --> 0:23:11.280 and I don't think Trump knew this is what he 0:23:11.359 --> 0:23:13.600 was doing by doing it. He just did it because 0:23:13.640 --> 0:23:16.440 it was his instinct. He just got angry at people 0:23:16.440 --> 0:23:20.439 who didn't take him seriously. This was no strategy. But 0:23:20.720 --> 0:23:24.080 you know, and I think the biggest sometimes we all 0:23:24.080 --> 0:23:25.960 try to look for a strategy, and with Trump, Trump 0:23:26.000 --> 0:23:28.440 just sort of stumbles into these things. But the voters 0:23:28.480 --> 0:23:33.000 have a strategy, okay, And that's where I think Democrats 0:23:33.040 --> 0:23:35.520 in general have to respect voter decision here a lot 0:23:35.560 --> 0:23:41.880 better than they go about doing it right now, by 0:23:41.960 --> 0:23:44.880 signaling that he was willing to take on McCain and Bush. 0:23:44.920 --> 0:23:47.960 He signaled he was a different type of Republican, that 0:23:48.040 --> 0:23:50.400 he wasn't going to be the same type of Republican 0:23:50.400 --> 0:23:52.880 that they were used to that was doing essentially nothing 0:23:52.880 --> 0:23:56.080 but losing elections for them, Going back to George H. W. Bush, 0:23:56.119 --> 0:23:59.760 Bob Dole, George W. Bush winning only the popular vote 0:23:59.760 --> 0:24:07.280 once right, John McCain met Ronniey. It singles that he's different, 0:24:08.480 --> 0:24:12.199 he's willing a bucket. Party made him, gave him an 0:24:12.320 --> 0:24:18.199 independent credential. So suddenly you had non Republicans going, huh, 0:24:18.480 --> 0:24:20.800 I'm curious what that guy's up to. I want to 0:24:20.880 --> 0:24:28.800 check that out. And so, yes, the sixteen election was 0:24:29.920 --> 0:24:32.600 more of a vote against Clinton than it was a 0:24:32.680 --> 0:24:36.800 vote for Trump. But Trump was a vehicle to say, no, 0:24:36.920 --> 0:24:40.800 we don't want establishment status quote politics. 0:24:41.320 --> 0:24:41.600 Right. 0:24:42.880 --> 0:24:48.360 Biden essentially won promising status quot politics because the pandemic 0:24:48.400 --> 0:24:52.880 had so exhausted everybody from Trump's roller coaster that, yeah, 0:24:52.880 --> 0:24:55.760 that is what the public wanted. Now, Biden didn't bring that, right, 0:24:55.800 --> 0:24:59.720 Biden didn't do that. Biden instead governed very aggressively farther 0:24:59.760 --> 0:25:03.040 to the left than he had a mandate for, and 0:25:03.200 --> 0:25:06.800 they attempted repudiation in their form of Essentially, the movement 0:25:07.000 --> 0:25:11.480 wanted to excommunicate Trump and trump Ism. And I think 0:25:11.520 --> 0:25:13.840 the reason the voter ended up rallying around Trump was 0:25:13.840 --> 0:25:17.400 not because they liked Trump, but they didn't want all 0:25:17.440 --> 0:25:20.359 of us to forget the initial message in the first place, 0:25:20.840 --> 0:25:24.719 the same power, the same message that was sent by 0:25:24.720 --> 0:25:28.199 electing Barack Obama, the same message that was sent by 0:25:28.240 --> 0:25:31.600 electing Donald Trump, which is, we don't want the same old, 0:25:31.640 --> 0:25:36.560 same old. We want something entirely different. We want not 0:25:36.760 --> 0:25:43.480 restoration preservation, We want annihilation, if you will, of the 0:25:43.560 --> 0:25:47.280 way things work, and a rebuilding and a renewal of 0:25:47.320 --> 0:25:54.720 some sort. And in order to talk to that voter 0:25:54.880 --> 0:25:57.400 that didn't like the way things have been going, who's 0:25:57.400 --> 0:26:01.399 been a Literally they voted Obama, they voted Trump, they 0:26:01.480 --> 0:26:05.040 voted Biden, they went back to Trump. Right, who are 0:26:05.040 --> 0:26:06.399 these unsatisfied people? 0:26:06.960 --> 0:26:07.120 Right? 0:26:07.720 --> 0:26:11.600 They feel they don't love their ability to move up 0:26:12.240 --> 0:26:14.600 the economic ladder. It feels like there's a whole bunch 0:26:14.600 --> 0:26:18.240 of rungs missing between them and the upper middle class, 0:26:18.280 --> 0:26:19.800 Like they'd love to reach for it, but they can't 0:26:19.800 --> 0:26:27.000 even get there. Income inequality has gotten worse, So there's 0:26:27.680 --> 0:26:34.399 I think it's that disconnect that a future. So I 0:26:34.440 --> 0:26:38.040 say this and that in order to have a conversation 0:26:38.160 --> 0:26:40.800 with the very voters that reluctantly voted for Trump. These 0:26:40.800 --> 0:26:44.080 people don't like them. This is great. I was telling 0:26:44.119 --> 0:26:46.920 you about a focus group last week that I observed 0:26:46.920 --> 0:26:50.600 out of Michigan of Biden Trump voters. And there's one 0:26:50.720 --> 0:26:53.600 voter going on and on not liking all the power 0:26:53.640 --> 0:26:56.120 that he's accumulating. I worry he wants to be a dictator, 0:26:56.160 --> 0:26:58.560 this voter said. And then like, well, do you approve 0:26:58.560 --> 0:27:00.480 of the job he's doing? Yeah, i'd say it. Do 0:27:00.480 --> 0:27:03.879 you regret your vote? No? I don't regret my vote. 0:27:04.600 --> 0:27:07.040 So they, you know, they kind of already know that 0:27:07.119 --> 0:27:09.879 he doesn't really have the temperament for the job and 0:27:10.280 --> 0:27:13.800 isn't really and is going too far in what they 0:27:13.800 --> 0:27:17.640 want him to do the latter, but they wanted something. 0:27:17.680 --> 0:27:21.159 They wanted somebody to attempt something. Their biggest fear on 0:27:21.280 --> 0:27:24.000 Kamala Harris was that she wasn't going to change things. 0:27:24.040 --> 0:27:27.400 She was gonna be status quo. And you know, look 0:27:27.400 --> 0:27:29.359 it was revealing in her own memoir when she said 0:27:30.040 --> 0:27:33.320 she underestimated the need that people wanted to know she 0:27:33.440 --> 0:27:35.359 was going to be a lot different from Joe Biden. 0:27:35.760 --> 0:27:38.640 She thought her mere presence was enough to indicate she'd 0:27:38.680 --> 0:27:42.080 be different from Joe Biden. I think we've learned in 0:27:42.119 --> 0:27:44.680 politics you got to say something over and over again, 0:27:44.720 --> 0:27:49.040 and you sometimes have to make a symbolic sacrifice at 0:27:49.080 --> 0:27:52.000 the altar of sorts in order to prove to this 0:27:52.080 --> 0:27:54.600 group of voters no, no, no, no, you're going to be 0:27:54.640 --> 0:28:00.479 different in one form or another. And I say all 0:28:00.520 --> 0:28:03.920 that in that I know that some on the left 0:28:03.920 --> 0:28:06.119 don't want to hear that. That you can't acknowledge that 0:28:06.160 --> 0:28:15.159 Trump's gotten has identified some issues that the Democrats have 0:28:15.160 --> 0:28:21.280 failed to address, and that the threat to democracy that 0:28:21.320 --> 0:28:25.280 he presents is such a front and center threat that 0:28:25.280 --> 0:28:28.320 that needs to be the focal point. The problem is, 0:28:28.560 --> 0:28:32.320 I don't think the voters you need to win are 0:28:32.320 --> 0:28:37.679 interested in that conversation, and they still want to know 0:28:37.720 --> 0:28:40.640 what are you going to do for them? They understand 0:28:41.400 --> 0:28:44.600 what he's doing, it's still going to come back of 0:28:44.720 --> 0:28:46.880 what are you going to do for me? And what 0:28:46.920 --> 0:28:49.120 are you going to do about these problems he's identified? 0:28:51.200 --> 0:28:56.680 Are you going to do something about it? So you know, 0:28:56.720 --> 0:29:01.960 I think about it going back to Bill Clinton in 0:29:02.040 --> 0:29:05.560 the eighties. The Democrats spent the eighties trying to repudiate 0:29:05.600 --> 0:29:10.000 Reagan and Reaganism. Even in eighty eight, the campaign wasn't 0:29:10.040 --> 0:29:14.000 trying to sort of accept the premise that Reagan was 0:29:14.000 --> 0:29:19.320 a successful two term president. There was still the DNA 0:29:19.400 --> 0:29:23.560 of the Democrats in eighty eight was no, the Republicans 0:29:23.560 --> 0:29:28.320 were wrong about everything. By ninety two, after another shellacking 0:29:28.360 --> 0:29:33.240 in eighty eight, Bill Clinton's was not sitting here repudiating 0:29:33.280 --> 0:29:37.280 everything Reagan did. In fact, I always say that you know, 0:29:38.320 --> 0:29:42.360 you knew Reagan won the argument when in nineteen ninety 0:29:42.360 --> 0:29:44.040 five Bill Clinton said the air of big government is 0:29:44.080 --> 0:29:47.640 over right when a Democrat said that, just like I 0:29:47.640 --> 0:29:49.880 believe in some ways. Barack Obama won the argument on 0:29:50.000 --> 0:29:54.600 entitlements when Donald Trump is out there campaigning saying Social 0:29:54.600 --> 0:29:58.360 Security and Medicare cannot be touched, right, that is you know, 0:29:58.440 --> 0:30:00.840 that was the central argument he said of the twenty 0:30:00.880 --> 0:30:06.240 twelve campaign between Obama and Romney. Ryan and Donald Trump said, 0:30:06.280 --> 0:30:08.760 you know, Obama was right. He doesn't say it that way, 0:30:09.080 --> 0:30:12.520 but he's essentially saying it, which opened the door for 0:30:12.640 --> 0:30:14.440 him to have a conversation with a whole bunch of 0:30:14.440 --> 0:30:18.440 other voters who basically, while they may have agreed with 0:30:18.680 --> 0:30:21.040 Republicans and a lot of the cultural issues, just didn't 0:30:21.080 --> 0:30:25.840 trust them on issues like social security and healthcare. And 0:30:25.880 --> 0:30:28.040 then Donald Trump found a way to have that conversation 0:30:28.080 --> 0:30:29.720 by saying no, no, no, I hear you on that. 0:30:31.400 --> 0:30:36.360 It's a similar vibe. You got to get somewhere where, 0:30:36.720 --> 0:30:40.880 whether it's crime in the cities, security at the border, 0:30:43.080 --> 0:30:47.640 skepticism of big tech, getting other countries to share the 0:30:47.680 --> 0:30:51.480 burden of global security. You do it in a way. 0:30:51.680 --> 0:30:56.240 You could say, hey, look, he's identified these problems, but 0:30:56.360 --> 0:30:59.719 he's chosen ways that actually make it worse, doesn't make 0:30:59.720 --> 0:31:03.880 it better, or he you know, Essentially, Democrats would be 0:31:03.880 --> 0:31:08.760 better served by running Trump against Trump, saying, hey, you know, 0:31:08.800 --> 0:31:10.520 Trump said he was going to do this. I was 0:31:10.560 --> 0:31:12.680 hoping that he actually might follow through on something. The 0:31:12.680 --> 0:31:15.360 guy never follows through in everything. But it's too bad, 0:31:15.400 --> 0:31:21.360 and here's something but I And then you have days 0:31:21.480 --> 0:31:25.560 like what happened Tuesday, where Trump behaves in such an 0:31:25.640 --> 0:31:29.080 Unamerican way, behaves in pretty much the worst way a 0:31:29.120 --> 0:31:31.840 commander in chief could ever behave in front of America's 0:31:31.920 --> 0:31:36.440 uniformed military leaders. And I understand why there are some 0:31:36.520 --> 0:31:38.480 on the left that just can't stomach the idea that 0:31:38.600 --> 0:31:42.800 gift accept the premise that there are some things his 0:31:42.920 --> 0:31:49.040 presidency has identified that voters like. All Right, I get it. 0:31:50.160 --> 0:31:52.520 I mean what he did in front of the uniform 0:31:52.560 --> 0:31:59.320 military was outrageous, the essentially declaring war on American citizens. 0:32:02.200 --> 0:32:04.480 You know, he's really put these military leaders in an 0:32:04.520 --> 0:32:08.760 impossible situation. None of them have been given an illegal 0:32:08.840 --> 0:32:13.480 order yet, and I think the moment, you know, if 0:32:13.520 --> 0:32:16.360 you're wondering, why aren't there should there be mass resignations. 0:32:17.960 --> 0:32:21.600 I've talked to plenty of my friends that have served, 0:32:21.720 --> 0:32:25.200 and I've asked them about this, whether they're they're disappointed 0:32:25.240 --> 0:32:27.560 that there hasn't been resignations in the upper echelons and 0:32:27.600 --> 0:32:30.680 military rank to this just clown show that is Pete 0:32:30.680 --> 0:32:34.840 hag Saith and what Trump has been doing by essentially 0:32:35.040 --> 0:32:39.480 desperately trying to politicize the military, pit the military, you know, 0:32:39.560 --> 0:32:44.920 essentially say the military has to be pro MAGA and 0:32:45.000 --> 0:32:47.680 they say, you know, until he until he issues an 0:32:47.800 --> 0:32:54.360 un constitutional order, unlawful order. You know, if you're gonna 0:32:55.000 --> 0:32:57.320 if the whole goal of the military is to stay 0:32:57.360 --> 0:33:01.200 above politics, a political you salute whoever the people of 0:33:01.240 --> 0:33:04.800 the country decide to elect to that office. Then the 0:33:04.800 --> 0:33:07.920 way they behave today is exactly correct, or excuse me, 0:33:07.960 --> 0:33:12.160 behaved on Tuesday is exactly correct. Yes, I'm doing this 0:33:12.200 --> 0:33:14.600 on a Tuesday evening going into tomorrow. 0:33:17.120 --> 0:33:17.520 And. 0:33:20.280 --> 0:33:26.120 It's it's frankly, I think we should be proud of 0:33:26.360 --> 0:33:29.920 the fact that they stood there silently. They made it 0:33:29.960 --> 0:33:32.640 as awkward as possible for hag Seth and Trump up there. 0:33:33.560 --> 0:33:36.120 They put the country first. They put their rank and 0:33:36.160 --> 0:33:40.240 file first. They put the military ahead of politics, ahead 0:33:40.240 --> 0:33:42.760 of ahead of whatever they thought they had to do. 0:33:42.800 --> 0:33:46.240 They showed up because they were ordered to. Now, it's 0:33:46.320 --> 0:33:49.560 kind of pathetic that that hag Seth is trying to 0:33:50.080 --> 0:33:52.840 lecture a whole bunch of people that have gotten a 0:33:52.840 --> 0:33:54.880 whole lot of more promotions than he ever got went 0:33:54.960 --> 0:33:57.520 in the military, and he's trying to lecture these guys 0:33:57.560 --> 0:34:02.920 about what a warrior ethosays, Oh to be a oh 0:34:02.960 --> 0:34:04.960 to be a fly in their brains as they were 0:34:05.000 --> 0:34:12.280 thinking about about about this, but just think about where 0:34:12.760 --> 0:34:15.520 you don't you don't really you didn't earn the respect, 0:34:15.560 --> 0:34:17.520 but you have to beg for it. You have to 0:34:17.560 --> 0:34:23.480 demand it. Man whoever wants to be in a position 0:34:23.520 --> 0:34:27.239 where they have to beg for respect. If you are 0:34:27.280 --> 0:34:30.120 in a position of leadership and you have not earned 0:34:30.160 --> 0:34:34.600 the respect of the people you're leading, it's on you. 0:34:34.600 --> 0:34:39.480 You've done something wrong here. So today's spectacle is and 0:34:39.719 --> 0:34:44.000 it is it is alarming. It is everything that folks 0:34:44.040 --> 0:34:47.040 that plenty of folks are saying, and it is going 0:34:47.120 --> 0:34:49.120 to be the counter that many have to what I'm 0:34:49.160 --> 0:34:53.480 saying about. If you're gonna if you're gonna sort of 0:34:53.680 --> 0:34:58.120 win back voters who left the Democratic Party, you're gonna 0:34:58.120 --> 0:35:02.399 have to acknowledge the reason why they left, and you're 0:35:02.440 --> 0:35:04.440 going to have to acknowledge that there were some things 0:35:04.440 --> 0:35:11.680 that Trump tapped into that the Democrats failed on. So 0:35:12.520 --> 0:35:17.400 it's I get it instinctively, you're alarmed and want to 0:35:17.400 --> 0:35:21.719 fight over here. But in some ways he's the one 0:35:21.760 --> 0:35:25.720 trying to bait everybody. He wants those debates on his terms. 0:35:25.719 --> 0:35:28.759 He would love for people to spend all this time 0:35:28.800 --> 0:35:31.799 criticizing him about military and how he's trying to use 0:35:31.840 --> 0:35:36.799 it to deal with crime in the streets. What he 0:35:36.840 --> 0:35:41.080 would be have a harder time dealing with is when 0:35:41.120 --> 0:35:43.960 you're like, boy, you know, well, he's right about getting manufacturing. 0:35:43.960 --> 0:35:46.920 He's too bad. He's taking too many bribes from companies 0:35:48.719 --> 0:35:52.239 in different ways that he's been that he's had his 0:35:52.280 --> 0:35:56.160 own personal wealth enhands in lieu of actually doing what 0:35:56.200 --> 0:36:02.520 he promised to do. So you're better off, particularly in 0:36:02.600 --> 0:36:06.600 a democracy that I still think is functioning here. Okay, 0:36:07.040 --> 0:36:09.760 I know it's we are not in a great place. 0:36:10.400 --> 0:36:13.200 By the way, the number two most important issue to 0:36:13.360 --> 0:36:17.000 voters who volunteered, the New York Times did not give 0:36:17.040 --> 0:36:19.920 them a list. Number one was the economy and number 0:36:19.920 --> 0:36:22.880 two was political division. It was the only two issues 0:36:22.880 --> 0:36:25.319 that got double digits. And again I liked the way 0:36:25.360 --> 0:36:27.600 the Times did it. They did not offer a list 0:36:27.600 --> 0:36:30.640 of issues and asked the respondents to pick. They said, 0:36:30.640 --> 0:36:34.160 what's the most important issue, and they just waited for 0:36:34.239 --> 0:36:37.000 them to say. It is the better way to figure 0:36:37.000 --> 0:36:40.160 out what are the issues that voters care about most? 0:36:41.520 --> 0:36:44.040 You ask them and you let them. You don't prod them, 0:36:44.120 --> 0:36:47.160 you don't push them, You let them tell you. The 0:36:47.200 --> 0:36:49.640 fact that political division was two. The fact that we 0:36:49.680 --> 0:36:52.240 are now this poll and another one over sixty percent 0:36:52.280 --> 0:36:55.040 think we have a problem with political division in this country. 0:36:55.239 --> 0:36:58.279 Another poll identified it as a political crisis. There's no 0:36:58.400 --> 0:37:02.000 doubt that that that that the country is going to 0:37:02.000 --> 0:37:03.680 be looking for a leader that's going to figure out 0:37:03.719 --> 0:37:06.160 how to bring us together. But part of being able 0:37:06.160 --> 0:37:12.160 to bring us together is acknowledging you know what it 0:37:12.280 --> 0:37:19.680 is that that Trump tapped into that the Democratic Party 0:37:19.719 --> 0:37:27.960 needs to lean into more. So we'll see, UH coming up, 0:37:28.040 --> 0:37:33.000 I have a terrific interview with a journalist, Leland Vittert. 0:37:33.160 --> 0:37:36.239 He is an anchor and reporter for News Nation, used 0:37:36.239 --> 0:37:39.200 to be with Fox News UH, and he wrote a 0:37:39.239 --> 0:37:43.240 personal story he dedicated to his UH. It's called Born Lucky, 0:37:43.880 --> 0:37:48.160 A dedicated father, grateful son, and my journey with autism. Obviously, 0:37:48.239 --> 0:37:50.839 autism has been in the news a lot with with 0:37:51.600 --> 0:37:57.680 Kennedy and Trump out there trying to UH claim that 0:37:57.680 --> 0:38:02.399 that maybe they have found the cause of autism. And 0:38:02.760 --> 0:38:05.440 I think what Leland's story is, and I really I 0:38:05.440 --> 0:38:09.080 think you'll find it inspiring, is you know, it's sort 0:38:09.080 --> 0:38:12.640 of as the saying goes in the in the in 0:38:12.680 --> 0:38:16.719 the world of autism, when you've met one person with autism, 0:38:16.719 --> 0:38:20.080 you've met one person with autism, that every journey is different, 0:38:21.160 --> 0:38:29.320 every ability sort of ceiling is different, and in many ways, 0:38:29.480 --> 0:38:32.399 I think what what Leland and his father are trying 0:38:32.440 --> 0:38:37.360 to say is, look, the regular programming codes to raising 0:38:37.480 --> 0:38:42.799 a kid without autism didn't work with a kid with autism. 0:38:42.880 --> 0:38:47.680 But Leland's dad essentially figured out another code and another 0:38:47.719 --> 0:38:52.680 way to do this. And Leland's a very successful journalist, 0:38:54.239 --> 0:38:58.120 is married, is going to have is. So it is 0:38:58.160 --> 0:39:01.839 a remarkable story, particularly if you've got somebody in your 0:39:01.880 --> 0:39:05.400 family or you've dealt with this. I think the book 0:39:05.480 --> 0:39:10.239 is worthwhile because it's Look, it's not a book that 0:39:10.320 --> 0:39:12.840 tells you this is how you do it. It's simply 0:39:12.840 --> 0:39:15.560 a book that shares their story. So anyway, for those 0:39:15.600 --> 0:39:17.920 of you listening for the full thing, this is definitely 0:39:19.200 --> 0:39:21.120 that's what's coming up next. We'll sneak in a break 0:39:21.800 --> 0:39:38.160 and after the break my conversation with Leland and Vitter. Well, 0:39:38.200 --> 0:39:41.359 joining me now is a familiar face to many of you. 0:39:41.440 --> 0:39:44.919 It's Leland Vitter. He is a anchor at News Nation, 0:39:45.120 --> 0:39:48.879 long time before that, longtime correspondent and journalist for Fox News, 0:39:50.280 --> 0:39:53.760 and he's out with a new personal memoir of sorts. 0:39:54.000 --> 0:39:58.000 It's called Born Lucky. A dedicated father, a grateful son, 0:39:58.320 --> 0:40:02.919 and my Journey with autom It's a very moving book. 0:40:02.920 --> 0:40:07.080 And if you're somebody, if you're a parent, if you 0:40:07.640 --> 0:40:13.160 have a child struggling with some of these issues, I 0:40:13.200 --> 0:40:15.319 think you're going to find this story in this book 0:40:15.360 --> 0:40:19.000 quite inspiring. And with this issue in the news, it 0:40:19.120 --> 0:40:23.520 is worth looking at how families deal with this, not 0:40:23.600 --> 0:40:25.239 how governed. We're going to look at this from a 0:40:25.280 --> 0:40:31.560 family perspective, not necessarily a government perspective. Leland, Welcome to 0:40:31.600 --> 0:40:32.080 the podcast. 0:40:32.160 --> 0:40:34.279 Nice to see you, Dot, Great to be with you. 0:40:35.560 --> 0:40:37.279 I think we would say, as I've watched you for 0:40:37.400 --> 0:40:40.320 many many years on radio, they would say, right, you know, 0:40:40.440 --> 0:40:43.640 longtime listener, first time call. So it's great, great to 0:40:43.680 --> 0:40:46.839 be with So, you. 0:40:46.800 --> 0:40:50.120 Know, I had a I found your book very compelling 0:40:50.200 --> 0:40:52.600 and it reminded me of my friend and I'm sure 0:40:52.640 --> 0:40:56.120 you know this story because you're probably familiar with them, 0:40:56.120 --> 0:41:00.200 with my friend Ron Fournier, longtime political journals that the 0:41:00.200 --> 0:41:03.880 Associated Press, who wrote a book about his journey with 0:41:03.920 --> 0:41:08.080 his son and the battle that they had and how 0:41:08.160 --> 0:41:12.680 and just your stories about how Principles were treating you 0:41:12.960 --> 0:41:16.360 and your parents and there and it's just it's just 0:41:16.400 --> 0:41:20.920 such a reminder how little the public does understand autism, 0:41:21.120 --> 0:41:26.000 understand childhood development issues, and how little we understand is 0:41:26.040 --> 0:41:27.400 how you can overcome. 0:41:27.000 --> 0:41:29.320 Them, right, And I think yeah. 0:41:29.080 --> 0:41:31.880 And I think that to me feels like the purpose 0:41:31.920 --> 0:41:32.399 of this book. 0:41:32.520 --> 0:41:35.560 Yes, yeah, Look you said it right, and I think 0:41:35.600 --> 0:41:38.120 you've picked up on it. Chuck when you said, for 0:41:38.360 --> 0:41:43.799 any parent, grandparent, aunt uncle, who has a kid who 0:41:43.840 --> 0:41:48.879 is struggling, because it goes way beyond autism to ADHD, anxiety, 0:41:49.280 --> 0:41:53.399 physical disabilities, just the general bullying that goes on now 0:41:53.440 --> 0:41:55.560 and is so aggressive, and there's so many kids who 0:41:55.600 --> 0:41:57.480 are struggling having such a hard time. And when I 0:41:57.600 --> 0:42:00.839 was diagnosed, you know, when my parents I write this 0:42:00.880 --> 0:42:03.400 in the book, right, they know there's something wrong with me. 0:42:04.440 --> 0:42:06.319 If a kid would touch me, I'd turn around and 0:42:06.360 --> 0:42:09.680 slug them. I was really repellent to kids. And they 0:42:09.760 --> 0:42:12.640 go into one of those little psychology testing centers, you know, 0:42:12.760 --> 0:42:17.360 linoleum floors, crummy chairs, we've all been there, stale coffee, 0:42:17.360 --> 0:42:20.440 old magazines. And they bring me back and take one 0:42:20.480 --> 0:42:23.520 to take me over to, you know, play with blocks 0:42:23.560 --> 0:42:25.839 or whatever. They talk to my parents and they look 0:42:25.840 --> 0:42:29.279 at my parents, they said, we really can't imagine what's 0:42:29.280 --> 0:42:31.800 going on inside his head, and my dad goes, is 0:42:31.840 --> 0:42:35.280 there anything we can do? Anything? You know, he's desperate, 0:42:35.280 --> 0:42:38.360 and she goes, generally, not, what year is this? This 0:42:38.480 --> 0:42:41.480 is the mid eighties, right, nism wasn't understood what it was. 0:42:41.560 --> 0:42:43.319 I was just going to say, like, you know, it's 0:42:43.680 --> 0:42:46.920 I was my under I felt like this is a 0:42:46.960 --> 0:42:49.920 classic story of the eighties. I don't think that's the 0:42:50.000 --> 0:42:53.480 response the school gives you. If this is two thousand 0:42:53.080 --> 0:42:56.879 and seven or two thousand and eight, what do you think? 0:42:57.320 --> 0:43:00.439 Yeah, I think that's I think that's fair. I think 0:43:00.480 --> 0:43:03.520 those still to this point there are so many parents 0:43:03.560 --> 0:43:08.520 who feel helpless because there is this idea, right in 0:43:08.560 --> 0:43:10.759 my days, is there anything we can do? And she 0:43:10.840 --> 0:43:13.400 said generally not, But you know, if the kids smart 0:43:13.480 --> 0:43:16.359 me once it there are a few things. But there 0:43:16.400 --> 0:43:20.200 is now even more in our society, this desire to 0:43:20.239 --> 0:43:23.239 put kids who have any type of special need in 0:43:23.280 --> 0:43:27.600 bubble wrap, right, to give them medicine, and to say 0:43:27.640 --> 0:43:29.840 meet them where they're at, and you have to accept 0:43:29.840 --> 0:43:31.960 them as who you are they are, and you have 0:43:32.040 --> 0:43:34.839 to tell them that this is their superpower. And all 0:43:34.880 --> 0:43:37.920 of these things that if my dad had done to me, 0:43:38.320 --> 0:43:41.719 I would have had no chance to operate in the 0:43:41.760 --> 0:43:46.200 world that I operate in now, because his method was 0:43:46.239 --> 0:43:48.640 not about adapting the world to me. It was about 0:43:48.680 --> 0:43:51.440 adapting me to the world. And he was brutally honest 0:43:51.480 --> 0:43:54.200 about it, right, Chuck, And that's not something parents are 0:43:54.200 --> 0:43:56.319 told to do. You know, when I was in seventh grade, 0:43:56.400 --> 0:43:59.040 I wanted to play tennis. My dad was a phenomenally 0:43:59.080 --> 0:44:03.400 gifted athlete still and I writing born lucky. How he 0:44:03.440 --> 0:44:05.239 took me to a couple of tennis lessons and after 0:44:05.280 --> 0:44:07.400 the third or fourth one, he looked at me and 0:44:07.440 --> 0:44:09.520 he said, I'm your father. I love you. I will 0:44:09.520 --> 0:44:11.600 come to every tennis lesson. I will drive you, I 0:44:11.640 --> 0:44:14.759 will cheer you on. You will never be able to 0:44:14.800 --> 0:44:17.000 play tennis. You just can't do it. You don't have 0:44:17.000 --> 0:44:19.160 the coordination, you don't have the hand eye coordination, you 0:44:19.200 --> 0:44:21.960 don't have the depth perception, you don't have the motor skills. 0:44:22.040 --> 0:44:25.839 It's never going to work. Which, considering I really hope 0:44:25.880 --> 0:44:28.359 that tennis was my way into asking this girl out. 0:44:29.080 --> 0:44:32.080 I was heartbroken, but I knew then my dad would 0:44:32.080 --> 0:44:34.640 always tell me the truth. And then when he said 0:44:34.680 --> 0:44:38.320 you can do something, boy, that meant something. 0:44:38.320 --> 0:44:41.680 All of a sudden, it's interesting what you just said 0:44:41.719 --> 0:44:45.799 about you felt. You said your dad wanted you to 0:44:46.400 --> 0:44:48.719 adapt to the world that you live in, not make 0:44:48.760 --> 0:44:51.680 the world adapt to you. Right, boy, if this is 0:44:51.719 --> 0:44:55.040 not sort of what I would argue. You know, we 0:44:55.080 --> 0:44:58.359 sit here and we have these these fights sometimes through 0:44:58.440 --> 0:45:00.799 left right prisms, but I don't I think we're having 0:45:00.880 --> 0:45:05.120 left these are because that's how in many ways, that's 0:45:05.120 --> 0:45:08.400 how I was raised where and now, you know, especially 0:45:08.480 --> 0:45:10.600 if you're from a if you're if you're seen as 0:45:10.640 --> 0:45:13.400 from a group that isn't part of the majority, whether 0:45:13.719 --> 0:45:18.080 it's a religious minority, whether it's a gender minority, whether 0:45:18.120 --> 0:45:23.520 it's you know, something else. Those that succeed are the 0:45:23.520 --> 0:45:25.879 ones that learn how to adapt to the world as 0:45:25.880 --> 0:45:29.399 it is and then slowly but surely fight for acceptance 0:45:30.200 --> 0:45:35.640 versus trying to turn you know, three hundred and forty 0:45:35.719 --> 0:45:38.480 nine million people to your way right right, which is 0:45:38.680 --> 0:45:42.120 which is something that you know, if everybody behaved that way, 0:45:42.160 --> 0:45:44.400 we'd never get anything done as a country. 0:45:44.840 --> 0:45:47.480 Yeah, I think that's a perfect point. And I think 0:45:47.480 --> 0:45:49.080 it's one of those things, right, You've got to meet 0:45:49.080 --> 0:45:51.680 people where they're at, and the world is where it's at, 0:45:51.800 --> 0:45:54.719 especially you know, when I was a little kid, and 0:45:55.239 --> 0:45:57.320 I think about this story for fifth grade about my 0:45:57.400 --> 0:46:01.080 dad really realizing there's a problem fifth grade going to 0:46:01.080 --> 0:46:04.440 a small private school. He comes over to check on me. 0:46:04.520 --> 0:46:07.160 I'm getting bullied every day. I'm coming home crying every 0:46:07.239 --> 0:46:08.000 day my sister. 0:46:08.080 --> 0:46:10.719 And this is that private school. Yeah, your parents are 0:46:10.800 --> 0:46:17.400 paying Yeah, in theory extra right, well, you know, you know, 0:46:17.560 --> 0:46:20.719 or at least more personalized more. I mean, why did 0:46:20.760 --> 0:46:22.919 we move from public to private? It was for that 0:46:23.080 --> 0:46:24.120 right too, to be. 0:46:24.120 --> 0:46:27.480 Fair, though, you know, my parents didn't tell anybody. They 0:46:27.480 --> 0:46:31.320 didn't tell anybody that I was diagnosed with anything because 0:46:31.440 --> 0:46:33.080 my dad said, I didn't want you to be defined 0:46:33.080 --> 0:46:35.799 by it, and I didn't want you to all have that. 0:46:36.320 --> 0:46:38.759 And I think people can say, you know, good things 0:46:38.800 --> 0:46:41.400 are bad things about that, but it certainly was a 0:46:41.400 --> 0:46:44.319 different way, and it now forced me to know that 0:46:44.360 --> 0:46:50.680 I could work through anything. But fifth grade private school. 0:46:51.200 --> 0:46:53.560 He comes into c the pe teacher. I'm in Pe, 0:46:54.560 --> 0:46:57.279 and my dad goes, hey, how's he doing in this 0:46:57.320 --> 0:46:59.920 guy who he knew, big, big former football player, knew 0:46:59.920 --> 0:47:03.319 my dad from football. He said, I think he's doing 0:47:03.360 --> 0:47:05.239 better today, you know, better this week. But he goes great, 0:47:05.280 --> 0:47:07.040 let's go, let's go see him in pee. And the 0:47:07.080 --> 0:47:08.480 guy goes, I don't think that's a good idea, and 0:47:08.480 --> 0:47:11.640 they're looking down on all the fields and dad goes 0:47:11.640 --> 0:47:13.600 wise as well. He says, I've had to put him 0:47:13.600 --> 0:47:16.680 with the girls because I had to protect him from 0:47:16.680 --> 0:47:18.680 all the boys. So you think about that from a 0:47:18.680 --> 0:47:21.200 father's perspective, a fifth grade father hearing that the only 0:47:21.239 --> 0:47:23.759 way for the pe teacher to protect his kid is 0:47:23.800 --> 0:47:25.680 to put him with the girls. My dad said okay, 0:47:25.680 --> 0:47:30.239 thanks and walked off. But I think that sort of 0:47:30.239 --> 0:47:33.880 shows you where I was at in my social ability 0:47:34.800 --> 0:47:36.920 to interact with Some people were sort of magnetic in 0:47:36.960 --> 0:47:40.480 their attraction of friends and kids. I was repellent. 0:47:41.880 --> 0:47:47.560 So I remember my friend Ron describing the issue with 0:47:47.640 --> 0:47:51.000 his son, which was you know that you had to 0:47:51.120 --> 0:47:53.960 learn social cues, right, It sounds like that's what you 0:47:54.719 --> 0:47:57.399 that's what you your father really helped you with, which 0:47:57.400 --> 0:47:59.759 is sure how to how to read other In some 0:47:59.840 --> 0:48:03.839 way ways we don't realize that we're we quickly learn 0:48:03.920 --> 0:48:06.520 how to read people, but not everybody can. And sometimes 0:48:06.560 --> 0:48:08.319 you just like you might need extra help to learn 0:48:08.360 --> 0:48:11.160 actually read words. Some people need extra help to read 0:48:11.200 --> 0:48:14.320 social cues. Right, is that a fair description? 0:48:14.719 --> 0:48:19.240 Very fair? And I needed both, you know, two halves 0:48:19.239 --> 0:48:23.600 to an IQ test, twenty points spread between the two 0:48:23.680 --> 0:48:29.480 halves represents a learning disability. I was between genius and 0:48:29.760 --> 0:48:32.440 mentally retarded, so half the test I was genius. Half 0:48:32.480 --> 0:48:34.720 the tests test I was mentally retarded, so seventy plus 0:48:34.719 --> 0:48:37.000 points spread. So I needed a lot of help learning 0:48:37.040 --> 0:48:40.600 how to read words and forcing through that. And then 0:48:40.640 --> 0:48:42.640 also you pointed out social skills. So one of the 0:48:42.680 --> 0:48:46.160 things my dad did was he would take me to 0:48:46.760 --> 0:48:50.680 lunch with mister Todd, right. And it was easy because 0:48:50.719 --> 0:48:52.279 I didn't have any friends. I didn't have anything else 0:48:52.280 --> 0:48:54.120 to do with my life. My dad was my only friend. 0:48:54.480 --> 0:48:56.560 And I loved interacting with adults because I could talk 0:48:56.560 --> 0:48:58.160 to them about things that I talked to my dad 0:48:58.200 --> 0:49:01.320 about about politics, about sports out I think that's much sports, 0:49:01.320 --> 0:49:04.359 but politics, business, all that kind of stuff. And we'd 0:49:04.360 --> 0:49:05.719 go to munch with mister Todd. And this is a 0:49:05.719 --> 0:49:08.440 perfect example because I would just be badgering the hell 0:49:08.480 --> 0:49:11.360 out of you with questions, how do you book your guests, 0:49:11.400 --> 0:49:13.440 how do you decide what politician's telling the truth? How 0:49:13.440 --> 0:49:14.920 do you come up with your questions on and on 0:49:14.960 --> 0:49:18.560 and on, and my dad rather than sort of saying 0:49:18.600 --> 0:49:22.479 you know, okay, lucky, stop or enough, he would tap 0:49:22.520 --> 0:49:27.680 his watch, and that was my moment to be. 0:49:28.280 --> 0:49:30.200 That was a social cue. He was teaching you. 0:49:30.440 --> 0:49:33.080 That was a social que. So to tap his watch, 0:49:33.560 --> 0:49:37.719 that's my method message to stop talking, but also to bookmarket, right, 0:49:38.320 --> 0:49:40.400 because then we would go back and he'd say, okay, 0:49:40.880 --> 0:49:44.440 mister Todd was talking about going on vacation with his 0:49:44.520 --> 0:49:47.600 kids or taking his wife out to dinner on Saturday night, 0:49:47.800 --> 0:49:49.319 Why do you think that was the right time to 0:49:49.360 --> 0:49:55.520 ask him about his show or politics or whatever it was. 0:49:56.320 --> 0:49:59.479 And it was teaching me how to understand and see 0:49:59.520 --> 0:50:02.880 the world through, as you point out, the natural social 0:50:02.920 --> 0:50:07.040 skills that so many other people have. It's a small example, 0:50:07.040 --> 0:50:09.920 but it was a way to actually teach me in 0:50:10.000 --> 0:50:13.160 real time what was happening, rather than just say, look, 0:50:13.200 --> 0:50:16.640 you know, he can't he can't come out with anybody, 0:50:16.680 --> 0:50:18.319 which at the time I really couldn't. But at the 0:50:18.320 --> 0:50:22.840 same time, if you say to a kid okay, stop, okay, 0:50:22.880 --> 0:50:25.400 not now, okay, whatever, it embarrasses the kid. And so 0:50:25.480 --> 0:50:27.640 that was the line he had to tell. 0:50:28.680 --> 0:50:31.400 Was there a moment for you where it was like 0:50:33.280 --> 0:50:36.200 I get it, you read got it? Yeah? Or is 0:50:36.239 --> 0:50:39.279 this a gradual thing where all of a sudden your 0:50:39.360 --> 0:50:43.319 dad said, do you realize that, you know, you're no 0:50:43.440 --> 0:50:45.359 different than anybody else out there in the world. 0:50:47.200 --> 0:50:49.560 Look, he always made it clear to me that I 0:50:49.760 --> 0:50:52.839 was different and what he would tell me, you know, 0:50:53.440 --> 0:50:56.719 through the bullying and isolation of high school. I have 0:50:56.960 --> 0:50:59.680 had a teacher in eighth grade who said to me 0:51:00.520 --> 0:51:03.080 in an art class, you know, tables and art around, 0:51:03.280 --> 0:51:04.960 you know, in front of the whole class. He said, 0:51:04.960 --> 0:51:06.880 you know, if my dog was as ugly as you, 0:51:06.920 --> 0:51:09.920 I'd shave its ass and make it walk backwards. And 0:51:09.960 --> 0:51:13.080 I came home that night and just, yeah, yeah, try 0:51:13.080 --> 0:51:13.960 that one on for size. 0:51:14.160 --> 0:51:17.680 Gosh, that's something you don't forget. 0:51:17.719 --> 0:51:20.719 I guess, no, no, you don't. And I don't forget 0:51:20.760 --> 0:51:22.359 his name either, but we didn't put it in the book. 0:51:23.920 --> 0:51:27.160 I walked across the street back home that afternoon. My 0:51:27.239 --> 0:51:31.080 dad was waiting for me, as he was every every 0:51:31.160 --> 0:51:33.520 time that I came home from school, every day for 0:51:33.680 --> 0:51:35.480 twenty and I was just crying. I said, I was 0:51:35.480 --> 0:51:38.719 just humiliated today and told them what had happened, and 0:51:39.040 --> 0:51:41.080 he talked me through it and worked through it. And 0:51:41.160 --> 0:51:44.160 what was interesting at the end of the conversation every 0:51:44.239 --> 0:51:47.120 night he'd say to me, look, the qualities that make 0:51:47.200 --> 0:51:50.360 you unpopular now and that you are picked on now 0:51:50.480 --> 0:51:54.200 and that make you humiliated now, is what's going to 0:51:54.200 --> 0:51:57.400 be your strength later on. And it wasn't ever about academics. 0:51:57.440 --> 0:51:59.560 It wasn't ever about being smart or successful. It was 0:51:59.560 --> 0:52:03.759 about turn hard work and self esteem was earned, not 0:52:03.840 --> 0:52:06.160 given right. You know, I started as a kid doing 0:52:06.160 --> 0:52:09.000 two hundred push ups a day at six or seven 0:52:09.080 --> 0:52:11.839 years old, because Dad was like, I can teach you 0:52:12.040 --> 0:52:16.920 that hard work is rewarded and that goals matter. So 0:52:18.239 --> 0:52:20.560 that was where he would He was very clear to 0:52:20.600 --> 0:52:23.239 me that I was different. I think you'll appreciate this, Chuck. 0:52:23.520 --> 0:52:25.960 Living where you and I both live now. I used 0:52:25.960 --> 0:52:28.080 to say I never liked anyone who liked high school 0:52:28.560 --> 0:52:30.920 because the values of high school are so screwed up 0:52:30.920 --> 0:52:32.759 that if you like high school, there's something wrong with you. 0:52:33.080 --> 0:52:34.719 And there's a little bit to be said about that 0:52:34.800 --> 0:52:37.480 about Washington too, But if you really. 0:52:37.320 --> 0:52:40.000 Like one student council, I know. I have a friend 0:52:40.000 --> 0:52:43.040 of mine who grew up in Arlington, Leland, you'll appreciate this. 0:52:43.160 --> 0:52:45.239 I didn't mean to interrupt your train of thought there, 0:52:45.560 --> 0:52:49.000 but she loves to remind like she's a native Arlingtonian, 0:52:49.320 --> 0:52:52.080 which means she's grown up in Washington, much different than 0:52:52.200 --> 0:52:54.280 ninety percent of the people that live in this community 0:52:54.280 --> 0:52:58.439 of the DMB. And she said, just remember, everybody who 0:52:58.440 --> 0:53:02.200 comes to Washington wanted to be student council president. Doesn't 0:53:02.239 --> 0:53:05.600 mean they ever became student council president, but they all wanted. 0:53:05.760 --> 0:53:08.640 So you have. The point is it's a town of busybodies, 0:53:09.080 --> 0:53:11.920 right like it is. It is, it is, it is. 0:53:12.200 --> 0:53:15.040 It is that very part of high school on steroids. 0:53:15.280 --> 0:53:18.560 Yeah, look, you know the best training for a Washington 0:53:18.600 --> 0:53:19.920 newsroom may have been middle school. 0:53:23.560 --> 0:53:27.360 I think some people in Congress would say that as well. 0:53:28.200 --> 0:53:29.680 I think Congress is the only one who has a 0:53:29.680 --> 0:53:31.399 lower approval rating in the media right now. 0:53:31.800 --> 0:53:35.200 But it's interesting you say this about about high school 0:53:35.360 --> 0:53:39.560 and about Let me ask this, though, why did you 0:53:39.560 --> 0:53:42.640 go public with the story? You know, I didn't I 0:53:42.680 --> 0:53:45.719 didn't know this, and I wouldn't have I would have 0:53:45.800 --> 0:53:49.040 never picked up You know, sometimes I'd like to think, 0:53:49.040 --> 0:53:51.000 oh so and so you know, you hear this phrase 0:53:51.040 --> 0:53:54.480 on the spectrum. And at this point I don't love 0:53:54.480 --> 0:53:56.759 the phrase because aren't we all on the spectrum? It 0:53:56.880 --> 0:54:01.080 just depends, right, I mean, yeah, all on the spectrum. 0:54:01.200 --> 0:54:04.560 So it's this weird shorthand that we've given to Hey, 0:54:04.560 --> 0:54:08.640 they're a little bit off center from whatever the spectrum 0:54:08.760 --> 0:54:13.440 is and all this stuff. But why'd you choose to 0:54:13.480 --> 0:54:15.880 share your story? Because in some ways it sounds like 0:54:15.960 --> 0:54:20.520 your dad's goal was to help you adapt so that 0:54:20.600 --> 0:54:24.080 you didn't have to constantly say I'm different, treat me different. 0:54:24.480 --> 0:54:26.320 Yeah, no, look, I mean you think about where my 0:54:26.400 --> 0:54:28.520 dad was. I think you have to sort of baseline 0:54:28.560 --> 0:54:31.839 this seventh grade start a new school. My parents are 0:54:31.880 --> 0:54:35.000 hoping for this change, sitting in the they get called 0:54:35.040 --> 0:54:37.480 in two or three weeks into school, thinking like, hey, 0:54:37.480 --> 0:54:39.319 this is just a normal check in, right, you have kids, 0:54:39.360 --> 0:54:41.240 you know what you know this is like? And everybody 0:54:41.280 --> 0:54:44.320 sat in the principal's office and the principal looks, starts 0:54:44.320 --> 0:54:47.880 the meeting off cold of my parents, you know, most 0:54:48.160 --> 0:54:51.560 of the school here. In fact, everybody here really thinks 0:54:51.640 --> 0:54:55.319 Lucky is quite weird. That's a seventh grade prince Walchetize. 0:54:55.400 --> 0:54:57.319 You know, I saw that line, you know, and you're 0:54:57.320 --> 0:55:00.640 just sitting there going, yeah, how do you become a 0:55:00.680 --> 0:55:03.080 principal writing about a kid that way? Yeah? Like it 0:55:03.200 --> 0:55:05.560 really well, I'm not trying to like, you know, sound 0:55:05.600 --> 0:55:08.720 like you fire all these people, but my god, right. 0:55:09.600 --> 0:55:11.600 And then right? And then you know, so arrow number 0:55:11.640 --> 0:55:15.160 one through my parents' heart and and look, they know 0:55:15.320 --> 0:55:18.600 that in some ways it's true that I was really 0:55:18.600 --> 0:55:20.880 different and really odd. And then she follows up with 0:55:21.600 --> 0:55:24.720 and I think he and frankly, I think he's pretty 0:55:24.760 --> 0:55:27.480 weird too. So what told you is that people were 0:55:27.480 --> 0:55:30.920 supposed to protect me weren't going to and thought it 0:55:31.040 --> 0:55:34.200 was my fault. Again, great training for a newsroom. But 0:55:35.880 --> 0:55:38.839 the reason I went public with it is because I 0:55:38.880 --> 0:55:43.240 think we are in a reckoning about parenting in America, 0:55:43.920 --> 0:55:48.120 and I think parents need to know there is real hope. 0:55:48.560 --> 0:55:50.759 George Will wrote the forward to this, and he said, 0:55:50.800 --> 0:55:53.160 this is the proof of the mountain moving power of 0:55:53.200 --> 0:55:55.920 parntal love. And I think parents have been told for 0:55:55.960 --> 0:55:58.960 so long, you know, let the village raise your kid, 0:55:59.440 --> 0:56:03.520 you know, but let your kid be them and and 0:56:03.560 --> 0:56:05.759 sort of the experts know better, and there's this new 0:56:05.800 --> 0:56:08.160 methodology and on and on and on and told parents 0:56:08.560 --> 0:56:10.840 basically not to take control, and mine did. And I 0:56:10.840 --> 0:56:14.200 thought it was a really important story for people to hear. 0:56:14.880 --> 0:56:18.319 I well, that is a that is a great way 0:56:18.360 --> 0:56:23.360 to frame it, because you know, the fact is this 0:56:23.560 --> 0:56:28.600 is true not just when it comes to parenting, which 0:56:28.640 --> 0:56:32.440 is the parents need to take more control, right, And 0:56:32.480 --> 0:56:35.600 there's there is this perception that somehow you don't have 0:56:35.680 --> 0:56:37.839 the ability to change things. It's also true with the 0:56:37.840 --> 0:56:41.160 healthcare system, right if you if you don't take control 0:56:41.200 --> 0:56:44.440 of your own medical care. And and by the way, 0:56:44.560 --> 0:56:47.600 remember that the doctors work for you. You don't work 0:56:47.600 --> 0:56:50.439 for the doctors. These people work for you. You don't 0:56:50.480 --> 0:56:53.200 work for them type of mindset. But you, the parent 0:56:53.320 --> 0:56:56.200 have a lot more station here and that you also 0:56:56.200 --> 0:56:59.360 have a lot more responsibility when it comes to your kids. 0:56:59.360 --> 0:57:03.080 I mean, I love it when you when you it 0:57:03.120 --> 0:57:07.080 feels like we have a a lot of broken young 0:57:07.120 --> 0:57:12.440 men out there right who are susceptible to all sorts 0:57:12.440 --> 0:57:20.520 of violent ideologies or violent actions. Perhaps some of this 0:57:20.640 --> 0:57:23.680 is social media or you know, whatever we're doing here, 0:57:25.200 --> 0:57:27.880 but you know, there is a through line that I 0:57:28.080 --> 0:57:30.600 notice in some of these people, whether it's a school 0:57:30.600 --> 0:57:33.200 shoot or all that is, there is some sort of 0:57:34.160 --> 0:57:38.600 lack of parenting, or a parent not in the picture, 0:57:38.800 --> 0:57:42.280 or a parent sort of not seeing things. What I 0:57:42.480 --> 0:57:45.600 find your story to be inspiring, it's it's a reminder 0:57:46.280 --> 0:57:51.440 that the parent needs to take control here, because nobody 0:57:51.440 --> 0:57:54.200 else is going to love this kid enough to do 0:57:54.360 --> 0:57:57.240 the kid right. Only the parent. 0:57:57.840 --> 0:58:00.000 One thousand percent. I mean, there's so many different ways 0:58:00.160 --> 0:58:02.480 to go with that. Right when I was diagnosed with autism, 0:58:02.560 --> 0:58:04.760 I said this, you know, in the book, they didn't 0:58:04.760 --> 0:58:06.440 really know what it was. It wasn't a spectrum. Was 0:58:06.480 --> 0:58:11.400 either you're profoundly autistic, or you're nothing and a pervasive 0:58:11.400 --> 0:58:15.080 elemental dislay. Whatever. Now it's one in thirty one kids, boys, 0:58:15.080 --> 0:58:15.840 one in twelve. 0:58:15.880 --> 0:58:18.120 Do you think, by the way, communities, what is what 0:58:18.240 --> 0:58:21.240 is your understanding of it? Are we learning to diagnose 0:58:21.240 --> 0:58:23.640 it better? Or is it increasing in the society. 0:58:24.360 --> 0:58:27.200 I think the answer to that is both. And what 0:58:27.600 --> 0:58:32.680 I find interesting is is that there's there's lots of 0:58:33.640 --> 0:58:36.720 theories about what autism. What it's not. You know, Oh no, 0:58:36.760 --> 0:58:39.360 it's not rising, it's just we're diagnosing more. Oh no, 0:58:39.400 --> 0:58:41.600 it can't be vaccines don't know this. There's nobody who 0:58:41.680 --> 0:58:43.680 will tell you definitively, this is what it is. This 0:58:43.760 --> 0:58:46.400 is why we're seeing this. And by the way, you Leland, 0:58:46.440 --> 0:58:49.960 who clearly was diagnosed with what we now know to 0:58:49.960 --> 0:58:52.560 be autism, just got married to this wonderful woman who 0:58:52.560 --> 0:58:56.560 you want to have kids with. Here's we know that 0:58:56.600 --> 0:58:59.200 it's a higher chance that I will have an autistic child, 0:58:59.640 --> 0:59:02.920 but we don't know why, and we don't know if 0:59:02.920 --> 0:59:04.600 there's anything that can be done either during. 0:59:04.400 --> 0:59:06.960 Pregnancy or I mean that implies it's genetic. 0:59:07.440 --> 0:59:10.240 There's some genetic component, right, But at. 0:59:10.080 --> 0:59:12.480 The same time we are having this debate about is 0:59:12.480 --> 0:59:14.520 it outside chemicals or something? 0:59:14.720 --> 0:59:17.520 Yeah, no, I mean I think the answer is we 0:59:17.560 --> 0:59:21.800 don't know, and I think, you know, I think that 0:59:22.760 --> 0:59:25.920 intel science can tell us the answer to that. We 0:59:25.960 --> 0:59:27.800 need to keep looking. It should be you know, we've 0:59:27.880 --> 0:59:30.800 cured a not cured. You can live now with AIDS. 0:59:30.840 --> 0:59:33.400 Is no longer descence dozens of cancers you can live 0:59:33.440 --> 0:59:35.400 with over the past forty years that we're descence. Is 0:59:35.600 --> 0:59:37.480 we can replace your joints and have you become a 0:59:37.480 --> 0:59:40.840 bionic man. Diabetes, all this stuff and autism. 0:59:40.880 --> 0:59:45.040 They're like, you know it, it's not vaccines, but it 0:59:45.080 --> 1:00:00.960 could be like come on guys. 1:00:01.240 --> 1:00:06.480 Well, I just interviewed Michael Osterholme. It was an expert 1:00:06.520 --> 1:00:08.680 on pandemics and all this stuff, and he has a 1:00:08.800 --> 1:00:11.320 very good way that he described science. He says, science 1:00:11.400 --> 1:00:15.240 isn't truth. Science is the pursuit of truth. And we 1:00:15.360 --> 1:00:19.600 also have to be humble about science, meaning it does 1:00:19.720 --> 1:00:23.240 change as we learn more, right, And that's it. And 1:00:23.960 --> 1:00:27.200 the fact is, like we thought AIDS was a death sentence, 1:00:27.240 --> 1:00:29.280 as you point out, we thought cancer itself was a 1:00:29.280 --> 1:00:32.520 death Now now all cancers aren't. You know, we're getting that. 1:00:32.640 --> 1:00:35.640 It's from my father died of hepatitis C in nineteen 1:00:35.640 --> 1:00:39.440 eighty eight. If he gets diagnosed with hepatitis C. Today 1:00:39.480 --> 1:00:42.280 you take a pill and you're fine. But in nineteen 1:00:42.320 --> 1:00:46.440 eighty eight, by the way modern medicine we sort of 1:00:46.520 --> 1:00:49.040 you know, in the eighty eight you know, you know, 1:00:49.120 --> 1:00:51.479 I would have said, oh, the eighties are And yet 1:00:51.520 --> 1:00:55.600 in hindsight, right, that's like, you know, it feels like 1:00:55.680 --> 1:00:59.760 the nineteenth century. And it compares point what I. 1:00:59.760 --> 1:01:02.000 Think, you know, I had, I had doctor Jah and 1:01:02.360 --> 1:01:07.120 not doctor Jay Boticharia. I have doctor John tonight. It's 1:01:07.120 --> 1:01:09.520 amazing how TV works that way. But about a Charia 1:01:09.520 --> 1:01:12.400 ahead of the nih That was his message. He goes, 1:01:13.240 --> 1:01:15.040 we have to be humble enough to say we don't know, 1:01:15.960 --> 1:01:19.680 and he said very few scientists are. But to pick 1:01:19.760 --> 1:01:21.880 up on what you were saying about fatherhood and everything else. 1:01:22.560 --> 1:01:26.960 This tells fathers, you can make this enormous difference, and 1:01:27.000 --> 1:01:29.960 you should. And I again, over the past ten or 1:01:29.960 --> 1:01:32.200 fifteen years, fathers have been really sort of told to 1:01:32.200 --> 1:01:34.760 take a back seat and that, you know, not to 1:01:34.840 --> 1:01:37.840 sort of demand more of their sons and demand that 1:01:37.880 --> 1:01:41.200 their sons stand up and take responsibility. And I don't, 1:01:41.240 --> 1:01:42.680 you know, do it two hundred push ups to day 1:01:42.680 --> 1:01:44.480 when you were five or six years old is not 1:01:44.560 --> 1:01:48.160 you know. I'm sure now he would be counseled against 1:01:48.200 --> 1:01:50.880 that because you're, you know, doing whatever. And it was 1:01:50.920 --> 1:01:53.840 a very different way. And I write in the book 1:01:54.800 --> 1:01:57.200 you know and born lucky that how lucky I am 1:01:57.240 --> 1:02:00.600 also that I had two parents eighty you know, and 1:02:00.920 --> 1:02:03.360 a family say together, my parents have married for fifty 1:02:03.360 --> 1:02:07.040 plus years. Tell the story about how they got engaged 1:02:07.040 --> 1:02:13.160 in your rip joint after three dates, but they you know, 1:02:13.760 --> 1:02:16.880 that's not discussed at all. Eighty percent of kids who 1:02:16.960 --> 1:02:21.640 have a disability of some type, right especially autism in 1:02:21.680 --> 1:02:24.920 these other issues, eighty percent of them their parents get divorced. 1:02:25.880 --> 1:02:26.320 It's hard. 1:02:26.360 --> 1:02:29.200 Look, you see nobody talks to Nobody talks about how 1:02:29.280 --> 1:02:30.120 important that is. 1:02:30.440 --> 1:02:33.440 And you do a parent some parent, and look, I 1:02:33.480 --> 1:02:39.080 don't I'm very hesitant to judge those decisions one hundred percent, right, 1:02:39.120 --> 1:02:44.000 because none of us are in that bedroom. But you do. 1:02:44.120 --> 1:02:47.480 We see instances of this where one parent is willing 1:02:47.520 --> 1:02:51.560 to devote themselves and the other parent maybe isn't right, 1:02:51.680 --> 1:02:54.320 or the other parent feels overwhelmed or whatever it is, 1:02:55.280 --> 1:03:01.280 and when they walk away, they think are helping and 1:03:01.360 --> 1:03:03.640 they're making it worse. Yeah, I mean it sounds like 1:03:03.680 --> 1:03:05.800 that's the message. I mean, I don't want to get 1:03:05.840 --> 1:03:09.800 into specific examples out of privacy concerns, but there's some 1:03:10.000 --> 1:03:12.840 there's a lot of examples that way where I think 1:03:12.880 --> 1:03:15.120 when you have a single parent where the other parent 1:03:15.200 --> 1:03:19.440 walks away because it's just too hard right in their heads, right, 1:03:19.760 --> 1:03:22.800 it is too disruptive, you know. The sad fact is 1:03:22.840 --> 1:03:25.680 this is the reminder that we don't give out drivers, 1:03:25.680 --> 1:03:28.080 We don't give out the equivalent of a driver's license 1:03:28.120 --> 1:03:31.840 to be a parent, right, And if we did, that 1:03:31.880 --> 1:03:34.360 person probably wouldn't have qualified to be a parent if 1:03:34.360 --> 1:03:38.200 they're willing to walk at the first sign of struggle. 1:03:40.360 --> 1:03:44.000 But that is it is. It's funny you say it 1:03:44.040 --> 1:03:46.680 that you were lucky to be born with two parents 1:03:46.720 --> 1:03:50.920 willing to throw themselves into you, and if you didn't, 1:03:51.120 --> 1:03:53.160 you might not be where you are today. 1:03:53.680 --> 1:03:55.680 One thousand percent. And look, you know, it's important to 1:03:55.760 --> 1:03:57.959 keep in mind. This isn't a prescription, it's not a cure, 1:03:58.000 --> 1:04:00.320 it's not anything else, but it is it is a. 1:04:00.200 --> 1:04:02.440 Sure story, my story for you. 1:04:02.800 --> 1:04:04.240 It's my story. It worked for me, it worked for 1:04:04.240 --> 1:04:06.400 my Dad's a story of hope. And look, you know 1:04:06.560 --> 1:04:09.960 my dad wrote the afterword, which I think is. 1:04:10.120 --> 1:04:13.320 That was the first thing I thought of when I 1:04:13.320 --> 1:04:15.640 started reading, is I wonder how your dad feels about 1:04:15.760 --> 1:04:18.680 all this being public? And then of course you reward 1:04:18.720 --> 1:04:19.600 the reader with that. 1:04:20.160 --> 1:04:22.320 Yeah, the afterward from my dad and the forward from 1:04:22.360 --> 1:04:23.960 George will and I had to fill two hundred and 1:04:23.960 --> 1:04:28.080 forty pages in the middle. But he noted in the 1:04:28.120 --> 1:04:30.640 afterward that the real hero in this is my mother, right, 1:04:31.000 --> 1:04:34.920 and because she held not only me but him together. 1:04:35.000 --> 1:04:36.959 And you know, I didn't know this until I wrote 1:04:37.000 --> 1:04:39.720 the book. Okay, so I decided to write the book 1:04:40.280 --> 1:04:44.400 and tell this story, and I think, you know, try 1:04:44.400 --> 1:04:46.920 to inspire and give people a lot of hope. And 1:04:47.160 --> 1:04:48.920 I told you about all the times that you know, 1:04:48.920 --> 1:04:55.200 I would come home humiliated, bullied, pushed around, isolated at school, 1:04:55.600 --> 1:04:57.200 and I would take it out on my dad. You know, 1:04:57.200 --> 1:05:00.000 we go to my bedroom and he'd sit there and 1:05:00.040 --> 1:05:02.880 listen to me, just hammer away about how angry I 1:05:03.000 --> 1:05:05.000 was and how upset I was and how hard this 1:05:05.240 --> 1:05:06.760 was and why am I having to do this and 1:05:06.760 --> 1:05:09.720 why am I having to go through it? And he'd 1:05:09.720 --> 1:05:12.280 put me to bed or leave and I'd read or whatever. 1:05:12.440 --> 1:05:16.480 And I found this out now twenty five thirty years later. 1:05:17.040 --> 1:05:19.880 He'd go downstairs by ten eleven at night. My mom 1:05:19.960 --> 1:05:23.240 would have been asleep or watching TV, whatever goes to sleep, 1:05:23.440 --> 1:05:25.040 and she'd come out and find him in the living 1:05:25.120 --> 1:05:28.480 room all dark, just sitting on the couch, crying himself, 1:05:29.240 --> 1:05:32.959 having internalized everything that I had been through. 1:05:33.640 --> 1:05:36.400 She was his counselor sound yeah, And then you know. 1:05:36.440 --> 1:05:38.480 He would then talk to her. I mean, it really 1:05:38.560 --> 1:05:42.120 is it. I think, you know, the the amount of 1:05:42.160 --> 1:05:44.040 the role that my mother played and what we talked 1:05:44.040 --> 1:05:46.120 about that I had two parents and that they had. 1:05:46.360 --> 1:05:50.400 Changed your Has this changed your relationship with your mom 1:05:51.240 --> 1:05:52.680 today the more you learned. 1:05:53.720 --> 1:05:56.840 You know, it's a great question. I never went to therapy. 1:05:56.960 --> 1:05:59.600 Right now now every kid has a therapist, and on 1:05:59.480 --> 1:06:01.120 and on and on, Nora. 1:06:01.080 --> 1:06:04.840 Look, I that's you know, and to me, if you 1:06:04.880 --> 1:06:06.600 have somebody to talk to, you have a therapist. 1:06:06.840 --> 1:06:07.080 Yep. 1:06:07.200 --> 1:06:10.320 Well, and that's what therapy need is for us for 1:06:10.360 --> 1:06:11.760 those that don't have somebody to talk. 1:06:13.920 --> 1:06:16.440 No, I don't don't either. But it was just it 1:06:16.480 --> 1:06:19.320 was just funny, you know, the typically in these situations, 1:06:19.600 --> 1:06:21.920 and even I think kids who have great parents they 1:06:22.240 --> 1:06:25.040 have a therapist. And but anyway, I never ad anything. 1:06:25.120 --> 1:06:27.440 So this has been like going to therapy on national television. Right. 1:06:29.800 --> 1:06:33.840 But my dad and I still talk three or four 1:06:33.840 --> 1:06:35.800 times a day. I still call him every night to 1:06:35.800 --> 1:06:40.000 say good night. He is still my best friend. And 1:06:40.880 --> 1:06:43.320 that's just him and I. I don't know how else 1:06:43.360 --> 1:06:45.880 to say it. His our relationship changed because of it. No, 1:06:46.080 --> 1:06:50.200 I think certainly in the in the course of writing 1:06:50.240 --> 1:06:53.680 this book, and I talk about and tell the story 1:06:53.680 --> 1:06:56.560 of Rachel and I meeting and her sort of realizing 1:06:58.200 --> 1:07:00.960 that as we got to know each other, better that 1:07:00.960 --> 1:07:04.600 there were clearly moments that I revert back and there 1:07:04.680 --> 1:07:07.640 still are right to sort of my old tendencies when 1:07:07.680 --> 1:07:11.800 I'm less disciplined than I should be, and her learning 1:07:11.840 --> 1:07:14.200 to accept that. So yeah, I mean, I think I've 1:07:14.240 --> 1:07:18.800 gained through hearing the stories and experiencing the emotion, not 1:07:18.880 --> 1:07:21.320 as a kid living in it, but reliving it as 1:07:21.360 --> 1:07:25.480 an adult. I've gained an enormous more amount of respect 1:07:25.720 --> 1:07:31.040 and gratitude for my parents than I already had, which 1:07:31.120 --> 1:07:31.800 was significant. 1:07:32.840 --> 1:07:36.840 So you offer it up, so I would love for 1:07:36.880 --> 1:07:41.680 you to share how did how did you decide how 1:07:41.720 --> 1:07:48.000 to share your autism with your now wife? 1:07:49.680 --> 1:07:53.600 I think it just sort of came up, right. My 1:07:53.680 --> 1:07:55.680 parents didn't tell me until I was like twenty four, 1:07:55.840 --> 1:07:58.200 twenty five that I had been diagnosed with what we 1:07:58.280 --> 1:08:03.040 now know to be autism. Right, and Rachel and I 1:08:03.120 --> 1:08:05.439 met and we got set up on a blind date. 1:08:06.600 --> 1:08:08.720 Somebody said I'm gonna find you your wife. The next 1:08:08.760 --> 1:08:10.360 day that person sent me a picture of Rachel and 1:08:10.360 --> 1:08:14.040 said I found your wife, And there you go. I 1:08:14.080 --> 1:08:17.000 don't remember, like a Okay, we need to talk, you know, 1:08:17.840 --> 1:08:20.360 turns out that I have whatever it was, I think 1:08:20.400 --> 1:08:24.240 probably just came up in conversation, but she has an 1:08:24.280 --> 1:08:29.559 e Q that's off the charts. Mine was near freezing. 1:08:29.680 --> 1:08:32.120 Probably did she pick up on it. 1:08:32.400 --> 1:08:35.519 I think she picked up on that. There was, you know, 1:08:35.640 --> 1:08:37.200 sort of a peculiar you know, So there were there 1:08:37.200 --> 1:08:41.640 were different tendencies, and I've gotten pretty good at hiding them. 1:08:41.920 --> 1:08:45.639 It still comes out sometimes, and there's times that she'll say, Okay, 1:08:45.720 --> 1:08:49.360 like you know, you're not seeing this rite or hey, 1:08:50.000 --> 1:08:53.080 you need to be more thoughtful about whatever, that kind 1:08:53.120 --> 1:08:56.280 of stuff. And you know, I tell for people who 1:08:56.560 --> 1:08:58.400 watch this and are interesting. I tell the story in 1:08:58.439 --> 1:09:02.160 the Book of the Faithful interview on Fox News after 1:09:02.160 --> 1:09:05.519 the twenty twenty election when I went at it with 1:09:05.600 --> 1:09:09.920 Aaron Prainey, who was a Trump spokesperson over the Trump 1:09:09.960 --> 1:09:14.000 claims that he had won and was just going after her. 1:09:14.240 --> 1:09:17.280 And look, I think probably in the moment, did I 1:09:17.479 --> 1:09:21.200 know that that wasn't really what Fox wanted me to do. Probably, 1:09:22.760 --> 1:09:27.200 But I think there's part of condition personality, whatever you 1:09:27.200 --> 1:09:29.960 want to call it, that I kind of didn't care. 1:09:30.040 --> 1:09:31.800 You know, I'd always been taught to do the right thing. 1:09:31.840 --> 1:09:34.840 My dad always said, do the right thing, no matter 1:09:34.880 --> 1:09:39.040 the consequences, and I you know, it's sort of all 1:09:39.200 --> 1:09:44.560 social graces and social stop points in your brain were lost. 1:09:44.800 --> 1:09:47.559 Can I blame that on autism? I don't know, but 1:09:47.840 --> 1:09:50.680 it certainly goes to there's times that sort of there 1:09:51.040 --> 1:09:52.040 are miss social cues. 1:09:52.120 --> 1:09:54.639 So you thought you missed a social cue in that moment. 1:09:55.080 --> 1:09:56.559 I think if you go back and watch the tape, 1:09:56.600 --> 1:10:00.640 it's pretty clear that all of a sudden the guardrails 1:10:00.680 --> 1:10:01.200 came off. 1:10:02.640 --> 1:10:06.240 What and so you do you attribute it to your autism? 1:10:06.240 --> 1:10:08.160 What do you attribute it to? Here's a piece of 1:10:08.160 --> 1:10:10.200 information you know to be true and you can't believe 1:10:10.200 --> 1:10:11.120 someone is denying it. 1:10:11.320 --> 1:10:13.040 Yeah, I think that. I think that there's a there's 1:10:13.080 --> 1:10:16.240 an indignity to that that comes over me and sort 1:10:16.240 --> 1:10:19.479 of and I find it. And maybe it was because 1:10:19.520 --> 1:10:22.280 my dad taught me for so long how important telling 1:10:22.320 --> 1:10:23.599 the truth was and standing up. 1:10:24.240 --> 1:10:26.760 About blunt truth that you got from your father, right, 1:10:26.840 --> 1:10:28.680 and so in some ways that's going to get passed on. 1:10:28.960 --> 1:10:31.640 Yeah, And I found it sort of offensive that she 1:10:31.720 --> 1:10:35.840 kept saying something that was just objectively untrue. And there 1:10:35.880 --> 1:10:38.680 you go. I don't ever like to blame you know, 1:10:38.720 --> 1:10:41.120 I blame my autism, but I mean I'll give you 1:10:41.120 --> 1:10:43.280 another example that you know, people say, you know, well 1:10:43.320 --> 1:10:45.400 are you you know, how did you get over autism? Well, 1:10:45.400 --> 1:10:47.400 you never over it. You know. Two or three weeks ago, 1:10:47.479 --> 1:10:49.719 I was with my father in law at his golf 1:10:49.720 --> 1:10:53.040 club and I was putting my golf clubs in my 1:10:53.120 --> 1:10:56.240 travel bag and I was late, and I was focused 1:10:56.240 --> 1:10:58.080 on something else, and this older gentleman come over and 1:10:58.120 --> 1:11:03.040 wanted to talk. And one of the very you know, 1:11:03.320 --> 1:11:05.200 classic tendencies of autism is that you just sort of 1:11:05.200 --> 1:11:07.479 focus on a task and you just everything else gets 1:11:07.479 --> 1:11:11.200 blocked out and you kind of become obsessive. And I 1:11:11.240 --> 1:11:13.800 was obsessive by getting my golf backpacked, and I was 1:11:14.240 --> 1:11:15.599 horrifically rude to him. 1:11:16.000 --> 1:11:18.680 To the point that even he disrupted your routine in 1:11:18.680 --> 1:11:20.840 that moment, you were like, I can't be disrupted, and 1:11:20.880 --> 1:11:21.200 I just. 1:11:21.280 --> 1:11:23.519 Was focused on I have to get the backpacked. And 1:11:24.520 --> 1:11:28.120 I was really rude, and I afterwards thought, you almost 1:11:28.120 --> 1:11:29.799 in the moment, I knew I should have just stopped 1:11:29.800 --> 1:11:31.719 what I was doing and if I was five minutes late, fine, 1:11:31.760 --> 1:11:34.760 and I just didn't. And it was just and I 1:11:34.760 --> 1:11:36.920 thought to my you know, boy, you're better than this. 1:11:37.080 --> 1:11:39.400 You know, your dad really taught you and it so 1:11:39.439 --> 1:11:41.600 it's still there very much so. 1:11:42.080 --> 1:11:45.000 But you knew yeah in the moment. 1:11:44.840 --> 1:11:45.960 And almost couldn't help myself. 1:11:46.080 --> 1:11:49.680 But not not, but not all folks that have autism 1:11:49.800 --> 1:11:51.559 know that this is happening to them. 1:11:52.000 --> 1:11:55.400 Yeah, look, I think I think it's very true. And 1:11:55.840 --> 1:11:58.760 again born unlucky, not a cure, not a prescription. In 1:11:58.880 --> 1:12:02.759 my story, I can't remember IF's autism Society Autism speaks 1:12:02.800 --> 1:12:04.799 but says, you know, if you've met a kid with autism, 1:12:04.840 --> 1:12:09.080 you've met one kid with autism. Yeah, so that you 1:12:09.360 --> 1:12:13.200 have to meet. You have to understand where people are. 1:12:13.840 --> 1:12:18.920 So when you are where is it? What do you 1:12:18.960 --> 1:12:23.200 feel like you? Where is it showcased itself as this 1:12:23.520 --> 1:12:24.439 superpower for you? 1:12:25.360 --> 1:12:27.080 I don't know, because I don't know what it's like 1:12:27.120 --> 1:12:29.880 to live without it. I'm always me. 1:12:30.400 --> 1:12:32.759 I give that. I give that same answer when somebody says, 1:12:33.280 --> 1:12:35.040 when I tell people that my dad died when I 1:12:35.040 --> 1:12:37.360 was sixteen, oh, what was that like? I'm like, I 1:12:37.400 --> 1:12:39.639 don't know, because I don't know any other way. 1:12:40.240 --> 1:12:41.800 Well, you right, you. 1:12:41.880 --> 1:12:44.479 Just don't know, right, you don't know the other way. 1:12:44.680 --> 1:12:47.519 You just go right, And that's what you're saying is yea. 1:12:47.560 --> 1:12:49.479 And in fact, the second I answer the question, you 1:12:49.479 --> 1:12:52.160 answered that way, I almost That's why I just knocked 1:12:52.200 --> 1:12:55.120 myself for it, because I know exactly you don't know 1:12:55.280 --> 1:12:58.320 any different because you're living your life. 1:12:58.680 --> 1:13:01.439 Yeah, and look, you know you you write you just 1:13:01.520 --> 1:13:04.719 talked about your dad dying when sixteen that was really 1:13:04.760 --> 1:13:06.840 the defining moment in my dad's life. 1:13:07.760 --> 1:13:10.280 It's the fork in the road for me. Everything goes 1:13:10.320 --> 1:13:13.000 back to that moment. For me. It's now I'm fifty three, 1:13:13.160 --> 1:13:17.280 and I still like that. It's a yesterday moment I have. 1:13:17.600 --> 1:13:19.920 You know, the weirdest thing that I'm going through now 1:13:20.040 --> 1:13:23.840 is my son is now older than I was, and 1:13:23.880 --> 1:13:27.160 so now I'm having experienced father son experiences with my 1:13:27.240 --> 1:13:30.120 son as a freshman in college that I have nothing 1:13:30.120 --> 1:13:33.080 to compare it to with my relationship with my father 1:13:33.600 --> 1:13:36.640 because he wasn't there, So now they're all new to me. 1:13:37.560 --> 1:13:39.040 Well dad, Yeah. 1:13:38.880 --> 1:13:40.759 I think about this all the time because I wonder, 1:13:40.760 --> 1:13:43.320 am I screwing something up? What about what if I 1:13:43.360 --> 1:13:46.280 do it? You know, I don't have any role model anymore, right, I, 1:13:46.800 --> 1:13:48.920 in my head always had a role model up to 1:13:49.000 --> 1:13:49.760 a point. 1:13:50.720 --> 1:13:52.280 I hear you, I'm not a father I think this 1:13:52.360 --> 1:13:54.280 is the first parenting book ever written not by a 1:13:54.320 --> 1:13:56.719 father but by the kid, and. 1:13:58.120 --> 1:14:00.479 Which I think is makes it more compelling because we 1:14:00.560 --> 1:14:03.639 do a lot of these parenting books are written from 1:14:03.680 --> 1:14:07.320 the parent's perspective and you don't know whether it really 1:14:07.360 --> 1:14:10.720 worked or not for the child. And I think this 1:14:10.760 --> 1:14:13.320 book is in some ways more powerful because it's written 1:14:13.360 --> 1:14:17.760 from your perspective rather than And you know, it's one 1:14:17.760 --> 1:14:20.040 of those things I'd love to someday ask your father 1:14:20.800 --> 1:14:23.040 how he would have you know, now that he saw 1:14:23.160 --> 1:14:26.200 your version of this, does it change how he may 1:14:26.320 --> 1:14:28.599 describe what he did, if that makes sense? 1:14:29.560 --> 1:14:32.720 Yeah, I think it does. Good luck getting to talk 1:14:32.760 --> 1:14:33.160 about it. 1:14:34.320 --> 1:14:36.439 I imagine if you were willing to talk, the two 1:14:36.439 --> 1:14:38.800 of you would be here together. But yeah, this is 1:14:38.840 --> 1:14:39.639 your story to tell. 1:14:39.800 --> 1:14:43.519 Yeah, that's what he said. And he really objects to 1:14:43.680 --> 1:14:48.400 me calling him a hero, which I think is interesting. 1:14:48.439 --> 1:14:51.640 You know, he lost his dad at sixteen. Yeah, so 1:14:52.240 --> 1:14:54.360 I think it speaks exactly what you're saying. 1:14:55.120 --> 1:14:57.680 We got about five or so minutes here. Let's talk 1:14:57.680 --> 1:15:02.479 about our industry, the media industry. I'm really rooting hard 1:15:02.479 --> 1:15:08.920 for News Nation, thank you. And it's because what you 1:15:08.960 --> 1:15:13.639 know there is no one answer to our media problem. Right, 1:15:13.680 --> 1:15:16.840 we need more voice, Yes and right. It's a yes 1:15:16.920 --> 1:15:24.160 and situation. And yet what you guys are trying to do, 1:15:25.200 --> 1:15:27.599 what I'd like to think I'm trying to do, and 1:15:27.640 --> 1:15:30.599 what I tried to do before, and the media industry 1:15:30.640 --> 1:15:33.640 fights against us, which is, Hey, you know, I'm a 1:15:33.640 --> 1:15:38.800 person who looks at politics through the prism of incrementalism, 1:15:39.160 --> 1:15:41.599 Meaning when you're trying to govern three hundred and fifty 1:15:41.640 --> 1:15:45.640 million people who are pretty evenly divided, you can't do 1:15:45.760 --> 1:15:51.040 anything rashly. Right, if you want to turn an aircraft carrier, 1:15:51.080 --> 1:15:52.840 you do it slowly, and you do it sort of 1:15:52.880 --> 1:15:54.640 a little bit at a time, because you want to 1:15:54.640 --> 1:15:57.120 bring everybody along. If you do it too fast, you 1:15:57.200 --> 1:16:01.280 will do one step forward, two steps back. And yet 1:16:01.560 --> 1:16:05.320 we know in news or and information is I always 1:16:05.320 --> 1:16:09.320 say the people most interested have strong opinions. The people 1:16:09.479 --> 1:16:14.000 least interested are watching sports or are watching something else. Right, 1:16:14.600 --> 1:16:17.559 And yet I get the sense you're trying to appeal 1:16:17.640 --> 1:16:20.920 to that person somewhere between the thirty five yard lines. 1:16:21.479 --> 1:16:24.080 It's center left, center right. I'd like to say I'm 1:16:24.120 --> 1:16:26.919 doing the same thing. And yet we know the business 1:16:27.000 --> 1:16:29.280 is driven by those between the goal line and the 1:16:29.320 --> 1:16:30.639 thirty yard lines. Right. 1:16:31.680 --> 1:16:34.960 I think it's an excellent analysis. 1:16:33.720 --> 1:16:36.760 What do you think works and what do you think 1:16:36.800 --> 1:16:39.800 has been a struggle in this idea of trying to 1:16:39.800 --> 1:16:43.200 create something that's a bit more I don't know if 1:16:43.240 --> 1:16:46.200 you want to call it centrist, moderate, everybody's got their 1:16:46.200 --> 1:16:50.400 own description of it, but sort of somewhere broader than 1:16:50.400 --> 1:16:52.439 what we've seen on traditional cable. 1:16:52.920 --> 1:16:56.360 Well, I would say a few things. Number one, I 1:16:56.360 --> 1:16:59.439 think your analysis is right, yes, And I will add 1:16:59.479 --> 1:17:06.439 to it that the economic incentives have changed in media, right, 1:17:06.479 --> 1:17:11.240 because when there were three television networks, broadcasters and broadsheet 1:17:11.280 --> 1:17:14.360 newspapers one per town. In order to make money, they 1:17:14.400 --> 1:17:16.200 had to appeal to everybody. 1:17:16.040 --> 1:17:17.719 You wanted to pick up audience as possible. 1:17:18.280 --> 1:17:22.400 Then, as technology has changed, we've gone from broadcasting to cable, 1:17:22.400 --> 1:17:25.960 to narrow casting to YouTube everything else. So now nobody 1:17:26.040 --> 1:17:28.920 has to watch anything that questions their worldview or makes 1:17:28.960 --> 1:17:31.160 them uncomfortable or whatever it is, because of social media 1:17:31.160 --> 1:17:35.680 algorithms is actually sort of tailored to you personally. So 1:17:36.760 --> 1:17:42.040 what has been underserved is the Center because people mistook 1:17:42.120 --> 1:17:46.120 the Center for being bored and uninvolved and uncaring and 1:17:46.160 --> 1:17:49.280 watching sports and just sort of uninterested. And I think 1:17:49.320 --> 1:17:52.080 what we've found is that there is a radical center. 1:17:52.600 --> 1:17:56.040 There are people who are upset with both sides and 1:17:56.080 --> 1:18:00.000 that sleeping giant of the of most of America that's 1:18:00.040 --> 1:18:02.320 between the thirty five yard lines, as you point out, 1:18:03.479 --> 1:18:06.000 that's in a bell shaped curve. That's where most people live. 1:18:06.320 --> 1:18:09.759 They've been awoken and they don't they do care about sports, 1:18:10.200 --> 1:18:13.040 but now they're scared. They're scared of the extreme left 1:18:13.080 --> 1:18:16.360 and they're scared of the extreme right. So we're at NewsNation. 1:18:16.479 --> 1:18:20.320 We try to be is in the middle, calling out 1:18:20.360 --> 1:18:23.559 both sides. Both sides get a hard get a hard time, 1:18:24.040 --> 1:18:26.120 And I think, what's different about my show? And you 1:18:26.120 --> 1:18:29.360 know I say this, I got asked or invited not 1:18:29.400 --> 1:18:33.320 to return to Fox News because I've went after Donald 1:18:33.360 --> 1:18:37.960 Trump and I have had Trump send down the White House, 1:18:38.000 --> 1:18:40.240 send out stories and commentaries I've done and said, look, 1:18:40.240 --> 1:18:41.720 see how great of a job we're doing. Leland says, 1:18:41.720 --> 1:18:43.240 we're doing a great job. So to me, that's what 1:18:43.280 --> 1:18:47.639 a journalist should be. And I think people are yearning 1:18:47.760 --> 1:18:53.519 for and that radical center, for somebody to call balls 1:18:53.560 --> 1:18:56.960 and strikes in a sense on both sides so that's 1:18:57.000 --> 1:19:01.759 what we're trying to do. Book. So far, it's working 1:19:01.840 --> 1:19:05.480 two ways. One, ratings are up significantly. We beat MSNBC 1:19:05.640 --> 1:19:14.800 and CNN across the board last weekend. And two, I 1:19:14.840 --> 1:19:18.360 think when I meet people and see them. It used 1:19:18.360 --> 1:19:20.439 to be when I left Fox, like what happened to you? Oh, 1:19:20.479 --> 1:19:25.240 I went to News Nation News, And now I have 1:19:25.280 --> 1:19:28.040 people coming up to me saying, I see you on 1:19:28.120 --> 1:19:30.320 News Nation, and I love that you give both sides 1:19:30.360 --> 1:19:33.000 a hard time, and I love that I don't agree 1:19:33.040 --> 1:19:34.960 with you all the time. And it's like, oh, okay, 1:19:35.000 --> 1:19:35.880 so it must be working. 1:19:48.000 --> 1:19:50.639 That's a that's A. That second part. I mean, you're right, 1:19:50.680 --> 1:19:54.759 it's sort of like, frankly, I experienced a brief period 1:19:54.800 --> 1:19:57.280 of that, like you know, for a while too, where 1:19:57.280 --> 1:19:57.760 have you gone? 1:19:58.360 --> 1:19:58.479 Right? 1:19:58.520 --> 1:20:01.280 And then now just suddenly people saying, boy, you're in 1:20:01.280 --> 1:20:03.320 my feeds all the time. I now see you. I'm like, okay, 1:20:03.360 --> 1:20:07.519 I'm this This thing is is working. Breaking, it is, 1:20:07.600 --> 1:20:10.640 but it is a It does feel like one of 1:20:10.640 --> 1:20:12.599 my favorite expressions is peeing and a hurricane. 1:20:13.000 --> 1:20:13.160 Right. 1:20:13.439 --> 1:20:18.000 Sometimes it feels I'm a look, I grew up so 1:20:18.120 --> 1:20:20.840 far south. It's north, you know, Miami is the sixth 1:20:20.840 --> 1:20:24.040 Borough of New York, right and Florida. You know, I joke, 1:20:24.280 --> 1:20:26.200 we're so backwards in Florida to go you have to 1:20:26.200 --> 1:20:30.120 go north, to go south, because culturally, the farther north 1:20:30.160 --> 1:20:34.240 you go the But I love me a good Southern 1:20:34.280 --> 1:20:38.040 expression like that, and I cleaned it up a little bit, 1:20:38.400 --> 1:20:41.320 But that is the sense sometimes, right, you you sit 1:20:41.360 --> 1:20:46.000 here and I'll watch I'll watch a story go Haywire 1:20:46.920 --> 1:20:50.200 on cable, and I'll sit there and say, you know, 1:20:50.280 --> 1:20:53.120 there's a lot of other bigger stories happening that are 1:20:53.240 --> 1:20:57.759 much more consequent, and yet we're obsessing over a vote. 1:20:58.479 --> 1:21:01.040 And I don't want to be dismissive of the Epstein story. 1:21:01.080 --> 1:21:03.360 I'm not dismissive of it. I'm not dismissive of what 1:21:03.439 --> 1:21:06.679 happened to the victims. I think they deserve their say. 1:21:07.680 --> 1:21:11.400 But because of the way the incentive structure works in media, 1:21:11.439 --> 1:21:14.120 there was this obsession over covering it, and it was 1:21:14.160 --> 1:21:16.000 across the board. It didn't matter whether it was on 1:21:16.080 --> 1:21:19.080 sort of the legacy cable channels or on this And 1:21:19.120 --> 1:21:21.280 You're sitting there going, you know, these tariffs are a 1:21:21.320 --> 1:21:24.680 much bigger story. What's happening with the Venezuela, whether or 1:21:24.760 --> 1:21:27.960 not the president has authority to bomb a boat in Venezuela, 1:21:28.200 --> 1:21:32.000 whether or not. You know, there are much more consequential stories, 1:21:32.479 --> 1:21:35.479 but they're not as entertaining as Epstein, like, how do 1:21:35.560 --> 1:21:38.280 you how do you fight that? I've got the luxury 1:21:38.280 --> 1:21:40.880 where I don't have to have a boss these days, 1:21:41.360 --> 1:21:44.000 But I if I look, I remember those days where 1:21:44.680 --> 1:21:46.600 all right, I want to do this and if I 1:21:46.600 --> 1:21:48.880 want to do this story, I got to sort of 1:21:49.320 --> 1:21:51.559 do this story so that I can do this story. 1:21:52.400 --> 1:21:56.240 Look, I totally hear you. And that's the challenge in 1:21:56.240 --> 1:21:59.360 a newsroom every day. And and I think to a 1:21:59.400 --> 1:22:02.760 certain extent, you know, it's the challenge for all of 1:22:02.840 --> 1:22:05.479 us of what is important, right, because there. 1:22:05.360 --> 1:22:07.920 Is we're all curators. I look at it this way. 1:22:07.960 --> 1:22:09.920 In some ways, we're all the same, and that we're 1:22:09.960 --> 1:22:13.760 all trying to curate what we think people should be 1:22:13.800 --> 1:22:16.840 focusing on. Yeah, and you know, and and now there's 1:22:16.880 --> 1:22:18.479 a lot of curators out there. We used to have three. 1:22:18.479 --> 1:22:22.360 As you point out, it was Walter, it was mister Brinkley, right, 1:22:22.479 --> 1:22:26.240 and it was whatever combination of of unknown people. ABC 1:22:26.360 --> 1:22:32.760 would come up with, well said, right, yeah, un till 1:22:32.800 --> 1:22:35.840 Jennings really right, NBC and ABC had had some NBC 1:22:35.880 --> 1:22:38.680 and CBS had real stability, ABC less so because they 1:22:38.680 --> 1:22:40.559 were always the number three, right, they were always trying 1:22:40.600 --> 1:22:44.360 to catch Walter or mister Brinkley. I always call him 1:22:44.360 --> 1:22:46.439 mister Brinkley. I used his desk at NBC, so I 1:22:46.439 --> 1:22:50.679 have a very fond I I Brinkley at Russer type 1:22:50.680 --> 1:22:57.840 of mindset there. But but it is a Now there's 1:22:57.840 --> 1:22:59.640 a thousand of US curators. 1:22:59.600 --> 1:23:02.600 Yeah or more. Look, I think it goes back to 1:23:03.400 --> 1:23:05.879 all news is biased, right, because it's done by humans, 1:23:06.120 --> 1:23:07.280 and it's also you. 1:23:07.240 --> 1:23:08.839 Know what I like to do. I checked my pulse 1:23:09.600 --> 1:23:11.400 and people ask me about bias, and I'm like, you know, 1:23:11.400 --> 1:23:14.200 we're all born with original bias, right, No, you just 1:23:14.280 --> 1:23:17.160 talked about you had two parents. Not everybody's born to 1:23:17.240 --> 1:23:20.360 two parents. Not everybody's born right, like you know, not 1:23:20.439 --> 1:23:25.320 everybody's born in a situation that can survive a challenge 1:23:25.720 --> 1:23:31.679 that's in health or whatever, and it shapes you. I 1:23:31.720 --> 1:23:34.040 would call that a bias, right the fact. 1:23:34.479 --> 1:23:36.960 Look, I was always told bias isn't having an opinion, 1:23:36.960 --> 1:23:42.040 it's excluding opinions. That's how That's how I was taught, 1:23:42.360 --> 1:23:46.599 and I keep that in mind actually sort of as 1:23:46.600 --> 1:23:49.720 a north Star. And look, bias isn't so much how 1:23:49.760 --> 1:23:51.840 you cover the news, it's what you cover. Is you 1:23:51.920 --> 1:23:54.400 just pointed out because of all your cover is Epstein, 1:23:54.840 --> 1:23:58.360 there's a lot of other stories out there that have different. 1:23:58.280 --> 1:24:00.720 You've made a decision not to right right. 1:24:03.400 --> 1:24:10.719 So yeah, I mean, I think it is. It's huge 1:24:11.520 --> 1:24:15.160 in terms of what is decided to be covered. What 1:24:15.360 --> 1:24:18.240 I think I try to think about, and you know, 1:24:18.280 --> 1:24:22.080 I grew up in Missouri. I come from you know, 1:24:22.760 --> 1:24:25.040 middle class, upper middle class family. 1:24:25.160 --> 1:24:26.720 In the city or Saint Louis. 1:24:26.479 --> 1:24:29.080 Saint Louis, but I spent a lot of time outside 1:24:29.080 --> 1:24:31.479 of Saint Louis and I and I kind of try 1:24:31.520 --> 1:24:33.040 to go back and I spent a lot of time 1:24:33.080 --> 1:24:35.680 in local news and small markets, and I spent a 1:24:35.680 --> 1:24:38.160 lot of time, you know, in Colorado in small markets. 1:24:38.200 --> 1:24:40.719 So I I think that I tend to go back 1:24:40.760 --> 1:24:46.639 to when people are drinking with their buddies on Saturday afternoon, 1:24:46.680 --> 1:24:50.040 wh they're watching college football, when they're playing golf, what 1:24:50.120 --> 1:24:52.759 are people talking about, how is it how are their 1:24:52.800 --> 1:24:57.400 lives being changed and affected? And in trying to cover 1:24:57.520 --> 1:25:01.439 it through that prism. You know why why this matters. 1:25:02.080 --> 1:25:04.879 You came up through the business, through local markets. 1:25:05.000 --> 1:25:05.280 I did. 1:25:06.080 --> 1:25:09.599 Most people younger than you have not. I know, it's terrible, 1:25:09.920 --> 1:25:12.920 I and I didn't. I came in a different way. 1:25:13.120 --> 1:25:15.720 I was a I worked on a trade publication about 1:25:15.800 --> 1:25:18.760 campaign politics. I remember there was a moment. 1:25:19.080 --> 1:25:20.760 In the house, well I'm going to give you one 1:25:21.120 --> 1:25:24.360 quick thing, But you were out in the field. Sure 1:25:24.479 --> 1:25:28.280 know what it's like to hustle the stories, not in Washington, not. 1:25:28.640 --> 1:25:29.880 You know what it's like to be on the trail. 1:25:30.240 --> 1:25:32.120 But the reason I bring up local is that I 1:25:32.160 --> 1:25:35.080 really believe the loss of local is why they don't 1:25:35.120 --> 1:25:38.120 trust us as much as they used to do, because 1:25:38.200 --> 1:25:42.320 local was our character reference to the national. Right, your 1:25:42.400 --> 1:25:46.320 local people knew who the local journalists were. People's families knew, 1:25:46.320 --> 1:25:49.479 oh yeah, my son goes to school with his daughter 1:25:49.560 --> 1:25:51.840 or whatever it is, right, they knew they were members 1:25:51.880 --> 1:25:56.080 of the community, and that created a level of trust 1:25:56.360 --> 1:26:00.679 locally that could never be matched nationally because the national 1:26:00.720 --> 1:26:04.479 didn't live there, right, the local lived there. And I 1:26:04.520 --> 1:26:07.240 also view that local journalism is different from national journalism 1:26:07.280 --> 1:26:09.320 in that on the local level, you're there to help 1:26:09.360 --> 1:26:12.200 people live their lives. Ninety percent of the stories local 1:26:12.240 --> 1:26:15.240 news does is to help people live navigate their life 1:26:16.439 --> 1:26:20.960 in that community. National news is different, right, It's about 1:26:21.240 --> 1:26:23.360 telling you what you need to know in civics, like 1:26:23.400 --> 1:26:25.920 what you need to know about the country as a whole, which, 1:26:25.920 --> 1:26:27.880 of course in and out of itself, is more divisive. 1:26:28.280 --> 1:26:31.759 Local news much less divisive. But I think the loss 1:26:31.800 --> 1:26:33.960 of local news, as I joke, a man named Craig 1:26:34.000 --> 1:26:37.080 came along and said, you know, classified ads ought to 1:26:37.120 --> 1:26:39.599 be free. YadA, YadA, YadA. We destroyed the entire local 1:26:39.600 --> 1:26:43.920 news ecosystem, right. We didn't fully appreciate how much that 1:26:44.080 --> 1:26:49.559 revenue stream kept so many local publications together. And yet 1:26:49.640 --> 1:26:51.840 I look at our media problem today and I think 1:26:51.880 --> 1:26:55.120 the loss of local is what is the biggest. It's 1:26:55.120 --> 1:26:58.000 sort of like a house can stand up, but there's 1:26:58.040 --> 1:27:01.439 always one pillar that is keeping the whole thing up together. 1:27:01.800 --> 1:27:04.000 And it turned out local news was that pillar. And 1:27:04.040 --> 1:27:07.320 when we wiped it out, it collapsed the entire information 1:27:07.400 --> 1:27:12.040 ecosystem as far as I'm concerned, which given your experience 1:27:12.080 --> 1:27:15.519 coming through local, how would you revitalize it? O. 1:27:15.520 --> 1:27:18.559 Look, I got taught in one of the best parts 1:27:18.600 --> 1:27:22.400 of writing born lucky is having been able to say 1:27:23.120 --> 1:27:26.000 really nice things about people who helped me, who understood 1:27:26.040 --> 1:27:30.360 that I was a weird kid and socially awkward and 1:27:30.760 --> 1:27:32.840 therefore was a target and protected me or took a 1:27:32.920 --> 1:27:34.360 chance on me in one way or another. So we 1:27:34.479 --> 1:27:37.320 used the names of all the really nice people, and 1:27:37.560 --> 1:27:39.519 I didn't use the names of anybody who was mean 1:27:39.560 --> 1:27:42.519 to me, because it wasn't about settling scores, and I 1:27:42.520 --> 1:27:43.479 thought that was important. 1:27:43.760 --> 1:27:46.360 Some people would have done it the exact opposite way. 1:27:46.560 --> 1:27:51.040 Well, I am my father's son, but a guy named 1:27:51.040 --> 1:27:53.639 Brad Remington who was my first news director in Saint Louis, Missouri, 1:27:53.720 --> 1:27:55.679 when I was an intern at KTBI, and then hired 1:27:55.680 --> 1:27:59.920 me as an anchor at KTVR and Denver. Content drives viewers. 1:28:00.479 --> 1:28:04.120 If you put out good content, they will come because 1:28:04.160 --> 1:28:09.439 people are the viewer, and people are smart. They are 1:28:09.479 --> 1:28:17.880 extraordinarily interested in their own city, town, state, country, and 1:28:18.040 --> 1:28:22.360 that you if you fill that void with good, meaningful 1:28:22.439 --> 1:28:27.000 news and information, people will respond to it. And I 1:28:27.040 --> 1:28:30.200 think that that is the lesson that good journalism is 1:28:30.240 --> 1:28:33.800 rewarded because it's something that people crave and always have. 1:28:34.200 --> 1:28:38.439 People always want to know what the news is, and 1:28:39.040 --> 1:28:43.400 I so, yes, it's become commoditized. The flip side of 1:28:43.400 --> 1:28:45.360 that is, I think that if you if you offer 1:28:45.479 --> 1:28:52.120 something special, if you if you really offer people compelling, 1:28:52.280 --> 1:28:54.880 must read, must know information. I remember there was research 1:28:54.920 --> 1:28:57.519 done in the nineteen nineties about why people watch local news. 1:28:57.640 --> 1:28:59.840 The number one reason was the weather the number two 1:29:00.160 --> 1:29:02.280 and so they didn't sound stupid at the water cooler. 1:29:03.560 --> 1:29:07.800 So if you can provide them that information in that context, well, 1:29:07.840 --> 1:29:08.720 that's always a thing. 1:29:09.120 --> 1:29:12.960 That's always a reminder that what we really are as educators, 1:29:13.479 --> 1:29:17.280 we just never call ourselves that. I like that because 1:29:17.640 --> 1:29:22.559 ultimately we're helping. We're giving people information they didn't know. Hopefully, 1:29:22.600 --> 1:29:24.720 if we're a good teacher, we're putting it in context. 1:29:24.760 --> 1:29:27.920 If we're a great teacher, we're explaining, you know, the 1:29:27.920 --> 1:29:30.120 origin of it and all those things. But ultimately we're 1:29:30.200 --> 1:29:32.920 educators and are you are we good at Are you 1:29:32.960 --> 1:29:35.000 a good educator? Are you a bad educator? But you're 1:29:35.120 --> 1:29:37.519 educating no matter what you're doing when you're in the 1:29:37.680 --> 1:29:40.240 news and information business. Hey, Leland, I have to tell you, 1:29:40.240 --> 1:29:42.120 it's it's good to get to know you because reading 1:29:42.120 --> 1:29:46.719 the book, I find it, I find it weirdly unfair 1:29:47.200 --> 1:29:49.800 in a situation like this, Suddenly I feel like I 1:29:49.880 --> 1:29:53.640 know a lot about you right in this situation, and 1:29:53.680 --> 1:29:57.799 it almost feels upside down. I mean, you've put yourself 1:29:57.800 --> 1:30:01.960 out here well and so people and I admire it, 1:30:02.000 --> 1:30:05.200 but it's you gave up a little privacy. 1:30:06.120 --> 1:30:10.839 Well, if it helps people, and if it helps parents 1:30:11.080 --> 1:30:14.200 and family members of kids who are struggling, whatever it was, 1:30:15.000 --> 1:30:17.479 to be more supportive, to show up more for those 1:30:17.560 --> 1:30:20.880 kids to know that they're really making a difference, it's 1:30:20.880 --> 1:30:21.320 worth it. 1:30:21.840 --> 1:30:25.040 Look the number, you know. The simplest way I've described 1:30:25.080 --> 1:30:27.240 it is that this is a reminder that parenting is. 1:30:27.160 --> 1:30:33.440 Everything well, and I hope that there's enough parents who 1:30:33.520 --> 1:30:35.920 gain something from it that it makes it so that 1:30:36.000 --> 1:30:39.840 there's some lives that have been changed, and that then 1:30:39.880 --> 1:30:42.519 it'll be worth it. So, I mean, Born Lucky is 1:30:42.560 --> 1:30:45.559 my story. I always say, you know, it is my book. 1:30:46.520 --> 1:30:49.080 It's about me, but it's not for me. It's for 1:30:50.040 --> 1:30:53.840 parents and grandparents and aunts and uncles who have a kid. 1:30:53.840 --> 1:30:56.599 And what parent doesn't want to help their kid. 1:30:56.280 --> 1:30:59.160 One hundred percent. That's a reminder what we all have 1:30:59.200 --> 1:31:17.200 in common. He Leland, congratulations, Thanks Chew. Like I said, uh, 1:31:18.000 --> 1:31:20.720 I hope you enjoyed the conversation with Leland and if 1:31:20.720 --> 1:31:22.559 you want to check him out and check out his reporting, 1:31:22.600 --> 1:31:27.760 he's on News Nation in prime time. Formally, it's on 1:31:27.840 --> 1:31:31.200 the what used to be WGN, and Hey, as a 1:31:31.240 --> 1:31:33.800 baseball fan when I hear WGN, I think of the 1:31:33.800 --> 1:31:35.639 Cubs and Hey, we're in the middle of baseball season. 1:31:35.720 --> 1:31:35.920 Right. 1:31:37.120 --> 1:31:39.920 It is Wednesday, which also means I've got a new 1:31:39.920 --> 1:31:40.919 top five list. 1:31:40.840 --> 1:31:46.240 The top Jest, Top five, Top top Jest. 1:31:46.160 --> 1:31:51.640 Top And here's something that I am pledging to do 1:31:51.800 --> 1:31:55.040 is that the first the first Wednesday of every month 1:31:55.120 --> 1:31:58.559 when I have in which is October first, I will 1:31:58.560 --> 1:32:01.800 do Senate races up until November of twenty twenty six, 1:32:02.040 --> 1:32:04.400 and the second Wednesday of every month, I'll do a 1:32:04.439 --> 1:32:07.000 top five involving governor's races. So my top five involving 1:32:07.040 --> 1:32:10.080 center races today are simply this the top five center 1:32:10.160 --> 1:32:14.360 races that are most likely to switch parties. I'm not 1:32:14.400 --> 1:32:16.719 saying any of these five are going to switch parties, 1:32:17.320 --> 1:32:21.280 but they're the in order of most likely to switch 1:32:22.240 --> 1:32:27.600 to Essentially, in this case, it's the five most competitive 1:32:27.680 --> 1:32:30.880 races in the country, but in the order of most 1:32:31.000 --> 1:32:35.880 likely to flint. So number one on that list is 1:32:35.920 --> 1:32:39.360 North Carolina, the open seat. There. We've had a little 1:32:39.360 --> 1:32:43.040 bit of early polling. You've got somebody who's held state 1:32:43.040 --> 1:32:46.200 wide office versus somebody who hasn't. Right, Michael Wattley has 1:32:46.200 --> 1:32:49.760 it as essentially the Republican nominee to be and the 1:32:49.760 --> 1:32:53.439 Democratic nominee to be. Roy Cooper has one state wide 1:32:53.439 --> 1:32:57.559 office multiple times. But you already see it's I think 1:32:57.600 --> 1:33:00.400 I've seen two different polls and they both basically have 1:33:00.520 --> 1:33:03.599 shown the same thing. Cooper's got a lead, but it's 1:33:03.600 --> 1:33:05.680 all within the margin of era forty six, forty two, 1:33:05.920 --> 1:33:09.560 forty seven, forty four. And guess what, that's what the 1:33:09.640 --> 1:33:12.800 numbers are going to be between now and November. This 1:33:12.880 --> 1:33:16.559 will be, as the cliche goes, all about turnout. But 1:33:16.640 --> 1:33:19.040 I do think since this is a Republican held seat, 1:33:19.800 --> 1:33:22.680 the Democrats a slight favorite, right, I would probably make 1:33:22.720 --> 1:33:24.439 if you want to do it as point spreads here, 1:33:24.800 --> 1:33:27.559 I'd probably make Cooper a one and a half point 1:33:27.640 --> 1:33:32.880 favorite here a little bit, but you know that's when 1:33:32.880 --> 1:33:35.280 you're talking about margins that small. It doesn't take much 1:33:35.280 --> 1:33:37.439 to lose this race. But when you look at it 1:33:37.479 --> 1:33:40.280 for the rest of the map, and I think it 1:33:40.400 --> 1:33:43.280 shows you how tough the path is for Democrats to 1:33:43.280 --> 1:33:45.200 pick up the four seats they need to win the 1:33:45.240 --> 1:33:48.240 Senate when the best shot at flipping a seat that 1:33:48.280 --> 1:33:52.200 they have is essentially a coin flip on its own, right, 1:33:52.439 --> 1:33:54.360 you need your third or fourth seat to be the 1:33:54.400 --> 1:33:57.559 coin flip. And the fact is they're not anywhere near that. 1:33:57.640 --> 1:34:00.000 They might get there. We'll see with recruiting. So right now, 1:34:00.120 --> 1:34:03.120 this one year and one month out from election day 1:34:03.160 --> 1:34:07.000 twenty twenty six, number one most likely Senate seat to 1:34:07.000 --> 1:34:11.280 flip North Carolina number two. I didn't put an open 1:34:11.320 --> 1:34:13.280 seat there. I think the last time I did this, 1:34:13.400 --> 1:34:18.320 I said, I usually prioritize open seats, but I have 1:34:18.360 --> 1:34:21.120 as off there. I think the John Assoft seat Georgia's 1:34:21.160 --> 1:34:24.559 Senate seat is all the polling have indicated. He's got 1:34:24.560 --> 1:34:30.639 a narrow lead, just like Cooper, right, nothing's big I am. 1:34:31.200 --> 1:34:33.920 I am not as convinced as others that George's a 1:34:34.000 --> 1:34:38.040 pure swing state. I think Georgia is a organizing state 1:34:38.080 --> 1:34:41.200 that Democrats, you know, sort of have to a lot 1:34:41.200 --> 1:34:42.840 of things have to go right for them to win 1:34:42.880 --> 1:34:47.679 statewide races. The last time John Osoft was on the ballot, 1:34:49.720 --> 1:34:52.439 Rafael Warnock was also on the ballot with them when 1:34:52.479 --> 1:34:54.240 we had the two Senate seats at the same time. 1:34:55.479 --> 1:35:00.000 How much did that matter with mobilizing African American vote. 1:35:01.240 --> 1:35:06.479 I think it's worth something can Assoff generate the same 1:35:06.600 --> 1:35:12.439 enthusiasm as Reverend Warnock. That's an open question. When you 1:35:12.479 --> 1:35:16.519 look at other statewide races in Georgia, right, it is, Yes, 1:35:16.760 --> 1:35:20.680 Biden carried it in twenty twenty, Harris got close but 1:35:20.800 --> 1:35:25.040 lost it. One governor's race there has been fairly close, 1:35:25.080 --> 1:35:27.040 but the second but the one in twenty twenty two 1:35:27.080 --> 1:35:32.600 wasn't that close. It's still an uphill battle for Democrats 1:35:32.640 --> 1:35:34.439 to win. State wide race is sort of in a 1:35:34.479 --> 1:35:36.880 generic environment. I'm not saying this is going to be 1:35:36.920 --> 1:35:39.599 a generic environment, and a lot of this may depend 1:35:39.640 --> 1:35:41.559 on who the primary is. But when you just look 1:35:41.600 --> 1:35:44.920 at the demographics of the state and sort of just 1:35:45.000 --> 1:35:49.679 by the pure numbers, I put Georgia as the second 1:35:49.720 --> 1:35:53.559 most likely to flip. And again the fact that Georgia 1:35:53.640 --> 1:35:58.040 is above other Republican held seats. You know, this is 1:35:58.080 --> 1:36:01.479 why the Democratic path to winning four seats to get 1:36:01.479 --> 1:36:04.439 control of the Senate. The path is so narrow that 1:36:04.520 --> 1:36:07.400 right now it's not visible. I'm not saying it might 1:36:07.439 --> 1:36:09.920 not become visible, but right now it is not visible. 1:36:10.200 --> 1:36:12.639 Number Three, I'm the most likely to flip. I put 1:36:12.640 --> 1:36:15.680 the open seat in Michigan. Mike Rogers is not going 1:36:15.720 --> 1:36:18.680 to have a primary. That's a big advantage. The Democratic 1:36:18.720 --> 1:36:22.600 primary is gonna be messy, it's going to be fascinating, 1:36:22.720 --> 1:36:26.080 it's going to be telling in many ways. I think 1:36:26.080 --> 1:36:28.360 it's a preview of what to expect in a twenty 1:36:28.400 --> 1:36:32.799 twenty eight Democratic presidential primary. You have sort of different flavors. 1:36:32.840 --> 1:36:35.679 You have sort of an establishment favored in Hailey Stevens. 1:36:35.720 --> 1:36:38.280 You're going to have sort of an outsider but sort 1:36:38.280 --> 1:36:41.000 of in the mainstream wing of the party in Molly McMorrow. 1:36:41.360 --> 1:36:43.679 And then you have a more progressive candidate Abdul Sayed. 1:36:44.840 --> 1:36:50.000 And so I'll do ALLOL sayat sorry, And I think 1:36:50.040 --> 1:36:52.640 that's very representative of what you're going to see. Some 1:36:52.680 --> 1:36:55.680 outsiders that are mainstream. You're going to see some progressives 1:36:55.720 --> 1:37:01.120 that are exciting the base and could create a very 1:37:01.160 --> 1:37:04.840 messy primary. It could be very hard to unify. But 1:37:04.920 --> 1:37:09.240 we don't know yet. And I still think there's a 1:37:09.320 --> 1:37:13.280 slight blue lean to Michigan generically, which is why I 1:37:13.320 --> 1:37:17.479 have it further down on the list than Georgia on there. 1:37:17.880 --> 1:37:21.320 As remember, right now Michigan is a Democratic held seat, 1:37:21.800 --> 1:37:23.800 but it is you know, if you look at the 1:37:23.840 --> 1:37:29.480 open seats, the Democratic open seats Michigan, Minnesota, New Hampshire, Illinois, 1:37:30.760 --> 1:37:34.120 Michigan is the best shot that Republicans have of winning 1:37:34.120 --> 1:37:36.280 one of those open seats. But I still actually think 1:37:36.439 --> 1:37:40.080 Georgia right now is still a better shot for them 1:37:40.280 --> 1:37:44.240 than any of the open Democratic seats. I'll be doing 1:37:44.240 --> 1:37:47.080 these monthly, so this list could change. Number four on 1:37:47.120 --> 1:37:51.000 the list. I tell you I vacillated on this. I 1:37:51.040 --> 1:37:54.000 went back and forth. I had three different seats in 1:37:54.040 --> 1:37:57.960 this slot over the last few hours as I was 1:37:58.640 --> 1:38:01.640 having these debates. I ended up settling on Maine at 1:38:01.680 --> 1:38:05.120 number four. I do think Susan Collins is very difficult 1:38:05.120 --> 1:38:07.559 to beat, but I also think this is Susan Collins 1:38:07.600 --> 1:38:10.920 has never attempted to run for reelection this unpopular before. 1:38:11.240 --> 1:38:13.519 Her favorable ratings are as low as they've ever been. 1:38:14.000 --> 1:38:16.120 Her unfavorable rating in Maine is as high as it's 1:38:16.160 --> 1:38:21.839 ever been. I am not going to underestimate her ability 1:38:21.880 --> 1:38:25.559 to win elections, and this is not a presidential year. 1:38:26.080 --> 1:38:28.680 I always thought she'd be more vulnerable in a presidential year. 1:38:30.200 --> 1:38:35.920 So we'll see. We could have an intense primary here 1:38:35.960 --> 1:38:37.920 if the governor Janet Mills does get in and it 1:38:37.960 --> 1:38:41.840 becomes sort of establishment versus progressive primary with the oyster farmer. 1:38:44.640 --> 1:38:48.080 Let's see what happens. I will say this, I think 1:38:50.320 --> 1:38:53.720 if Janet Mills runs, she'd better come across more enthusiastic 1:38:53.760 --> 1:38:56.080 about wanting to be a Senator than she has so far. 1:38:57.000 --> 1:38:59.879 The way that she sort of kept her likely candidacy 1:39:00.120 --> 1:39:04.879 live has been this sort of if it's the mindset 1:39:04.880 --> 1:39:09.160 I have to if you twist my arm. You know 1:39:09.240 --> 1:39:11.519 one thing about Susan Collins, she loves being in the Senate. 1:39:14.240 --> 1:39:16.240 I don't know if it always plays well with voters. 1:39:16.479 --> 1:39:19.559 I get that you may be a reluctant partisan and 1:39:19.640 --> 1:39:21.439 maybe you don't want to do that, but are you 1:39:21.560 --> 1:39:24.400 reluctant to actually do the job. I don't want to 1:39:24.439 --> 1:39:27.599 be in Washington, Okay, then don't run for the office. 1:39:27.840 --> 1:39:34.719 Right So I'm a little I'm gonna be if she runs. 1:39:34.760 --> 1:39:37.000 I'm very curious to see what her rollout is because 1:39:37.000 --> 1:39:39.240 she needs to show a lot more enthusiasm for this race, 1:39:39.920 --> 1:39:42.599 I think to win it. Then she's shown so far 1:39:43.840 --> 1:39:47.479 and in the number five slot. If I vacillated a 1:39:47.479 --> 1:39:49.840 bunch with Maine, I always was gonna have Maine in 1:39:49.880 --> 1:39:54.519 my top five. For this fifth slot, I contemplated three 1:39:54.520 --> 1:39:59.960 different races. New Hampshire right, it's an open seat. Johnny Soon, 1:40:00.040 --> 1:40:02.080 who news being recruited heavily. It looks like he's more 1:40:02.160 --> 1:40:06.160 likely than not. Big baseball card collector, by the way, 1:40:07.200 --> 1:40:10.120 really great collection. His is all pre war. He's real 1:40:10.240 --> 1:40:14.120 super old school in that. Scott Brown has not been 1:40:14.120 --> 1:40:17.599 polling as well. I understand why Republicans think he's he's 1:40:17.640 --> 1:40:20.280 he's not electable there. I still think that he would 1:40:20.360 --> 1:40:24.920 run a competitive race against Chris Pappus, but there's no 1:40:24.960 --> 1:40:26.800 doubt all the polling has shown that, you know, the 1:40:26.880 --> 1:40:29.599 Chris sonun who hangover effect I think has really helped Johnson, 1:40:29.680 --> 1:40:34.400 who's name idea. What's funny is is well Johnson Who's 1:40:34.439 --> 1:40:39.320 no trumpy trumper. He was much more of a conservative 1:40:39.439 --> 1:40:43.360 ideologically than his brother. But his brother's governorship I've seen 1:40:43.479 --> 1:40:46.760 very much through a moderate lens, and I think that 1:40:46.960 --> 1:40:50.960 spillover has really helped because and I think John would 1:40:51.000 --> 1:40:53.240 agree with me, his poll numbers look better today than 1:40:53.280 --> 1:40:56.240 they did when he when he ended up losing reelection 1:40:57.439 --> 1:41:00.600 the last time he ran for the Senate. So I 1:41:00.600 --> 1:41:03.320 don't know if he wants to admit that his younger 1:41:03.360 --> 1:41:06.479 brother might have helped his political political brand a little bit. 1:41:08.880 --> 1:41:09.360 Ohio. 1:41:09.479 --> 1:41:11.519 With Shared Brown in the race, I cond of played 1:41:11.600 --> 1:41:15.519 putting that in five and then Iowa. I ultimately decided 1:41:15.520 --> 1:41:17.599 to go with New Hampshire because Sonunu looks like he's 1:41:17.640 --> 1:41:20.160 more likely to be in And I do think Sonunu 1:41:20.400 --> 1:41:24.000 that's a different ballgame, especially you're going to have real 1:41:24.040 --> 1:41:26.439 investment of a whole bunch of money that comes with it, 1:41:26.600 --> 1:41:29.559 so it'll become self fulfilling and we'll be staring at 1:41:29.600 --> 1:41:32.760 one of these one two three point races in New Hampshire. 1:41:34.040 --> 1:41:36.679 I'll tell you my thinking on Ohio. I just don't 1:41:36.720 --> 1:41:42.439 know how Shared Brown gets to fifty, right, I'm not 1:41:42.560 --> 1:41:45.480 ruling it out. I also think Brown has a complicated 1:41:45.840 --> 1:41:48.719 messaging challenge, which I've shared with you before. On tariffs. 1:41:49.320 --> 1:41:52.559 On one hand, the tariffs are are causing a lot 1:41:52.600 --> 1:41:55.839 of sort of consumer pain. On the other hand, tariffs 1:41:55.840 --> 1:41:58.440 are not a bad word to working people in Ohio. 1:41:58.680 --> 1:42:04.519 When it comes to goods, perhaps you'll see a shared 1:42:04.560 --> 1:42:09.960 brown say, the food tariffs are bad, the tariffs on 1:42:10.720 --> 1:42:13.760 autoparts are good, the tariffs on cars are good. They're 1:42:13.800 --> 1:42:17.080 bad on food. And I'm kind of wondering if we're 1:42:17.120 --> 1:42:20.639 going to start to see that split because I've had 1:42:20.640 --> 1:42:23.120 a lot of conversations with labor leaders where you know, 1:42:23.160 --> 1:42:26.639 they like that Trump is willing to use tariffs. They 1:42:26.800 --> 1:42:30.360 liked that Biden was willing to use tariffs, particularly when 1:42:30.360 --> 1:42:33.080 it came to some of the to steal into some 1:42:33.120 --> 1:42:37.479 of those some of the sort of the non food tariffs, right, 1:42:37.640 --> 1:42:40.680 but the tariffs on ag are really causing pain. The 1:42:40.720 --> 1:42:44.559 tariffs on coffee are causing all of us pain. So 1:42:44.800 --> 1:42:47.120 I wonder if you're going to start to see an 1:42:47.160 --> 1:42:50.639 attempt by Democrats who are still trying to win labor 1:42:50.720 --> 1:42:53.960 back and labor union members back, finding a way to 1:42:54.080 --> 1:42:58.760 split at the attack on tariffs and essentially go after 1:42:59.160 --> 1:43:02.400 the food tax, to griffs on agg and what's hurting 1:43:02.439 --> 1:43:05.839 farmers and try to sort of create a create a 1:43:05.920 --> 1:43:09.439 sort of a separate distinction with the steel tariffs and 1:43:10.000 --> 1:43:14.439 the auto tariffs, and then I contemplated Iowa because of 1:43:14.479 --> 1:43:18.360 the open seat. But I will tell you, h look, 1:43:18.360 --> 1:43:21.120 I've been impressed without quickly Republicans have rallied around at 1:43:21.160 --> 1:43:23.320 Ashley Hinson's campaign. I still think this is going to 1:43:23.320 --> 1:43:27.240 be a competitive race. But another reason I kept it 1:43:27.280 --> 1:43:29.360 out of the five slot is I've been following a 1:43:29.400 --> 1:43:30.840 story and I don't know how many of you have, 1:43:30.960 --> 1:43:33.720 but I keep an eye the story about the the 1:43:33.720 --> 1:43:36.519 Moines superintendent who turned out to be not an American 1:43:36.560 --> 1:43:39.320 citizen that came to as a shock to a lot 1:43:39.320 --> 1:43:41.760 of people in des Moines. He was apparently well regarded 1:43:42.040 --> 1:43:46.080 in his job, but somehow he was in this country 1:43:46.120 --> 1:43:50.559 illegally and had a de port deportation notice for over 1:43:50.600 --> 1:43:53.080 a year, and there was sort of an awkward you know, 1:43:53.160 --> 1:43:57.400 as usual. How Ice has been conducting itself has been horrendous, 1:43:57.960 --> 1:44:02.559 you know, sort of unnecessarily confrontational. But it doesn't mask 1:44:02.680 --> 1:44:06.840 the issue that apparently this the now former des Moines superintendent, 1:44:06.880 --> 1:44:11.479 I believe he's resigned at this point, essentially lied to 1:44:11.520 --> 1:44:13.479 the school board of des Moines. Well guess what one 1:44:13.479 --> 1:44:16.000 of the people running for the US, Nate Jackie Norris, 1:44:17.720 --> 1:44:22.679 is on the Des Moines school Board. This story hasn't 1:44:22.720 --> 1:44:30.639 finished playing out, but I wonder how much this sets 1:44:30.680 --> 1:44:37.760 back Democrats in the state. Generically, may not. It may 1:44:37.880 --> 1:44:40.400 end up being a non issue a year from now, 1:44:41.560 --> 1:44:45.600 but it isn't a net positive for the Democratic brand, 1:44:46.720 --> 1:44:52.160 and I think that's fair to say. Again, let's see 1:44:52.200 --> 1:44:54.320 this whole story play out, make sure we have all 1:44:54.360 --> 1:44:58.360 the facts on this, But it was I've been following 1:44:58.360 --> 1:45:01.719 the story pretty closely. It's like, you're just like, wait, 1:45:01.720 --> 1:45:06.400 what when I saw that Ice had detained the superintendent 1:45:06.439 --> 1:45:09.080 of schools? Wait? And he was not an American citizen? 1:45:10.120 --> 1:45:13.439 How did this happen? Right? There's a lot that needs 1:45:13.479 --> 1:45:17.000 to be unpacked with this story. But to say that 1:45:17.120 --> 1:45:22.120 it's it's super high profile in the largest media market 1:45:22.160 --> 1:45:24.559 in the state, so it's going to get its share 1:45:24.600 --> 1:45:27.799 of attentions. In what I would call my others receiving 1:45:27.880 --> 1:45:31.800 votes category, they're not near the top five yet, but 1:45:32.320 --> 1:45:37.000 who's to say they won't get there. Nebraska, Texas, Minnesota 1:45:37.560 --> 1:45:41.879 Republicans have had a surprisingly hard time finding a credible 1:45:42.040 --> 1:45:47.000 candidate in the Minnesota open seat. Alaska and Louisiana still 1:45:47.040 --> 1:45:49.599 waiting for some candidate things to develop there. But anyway, 1:45:49.640 --> 1:45:51.760 the five right now most likely to flip my top 1:45:51.800 --> 1:45:55.760 five right now thirteen months from election day North Carolina one, 1:45:55.800 --> 1:46:01.760 Georgia two, Michigan, three, Main four New Hampshire. So with that, 1:46:01.920 --> 1:46:03.000 let's do a few questions. 1:46:03.280 --> 1:46:08.000 Ask Chuck all right. 1:46:08.000 --> 1:46:14.200 First question comes from Luke anyways, Hey, Chuck, technical clarification question. 1:46:15.160 --> 1:46:17.360 I keep hearing Republicans saying that the Democrats are going 1:46:17.360 --> 1:46:20.000 to shut down the government for quote, illegal immigrants to 1:46:20.000 --> 1:46:22.320 get healthcare? Is this true? Are the subsidies in question 1:46:22.400 --> 1:46:25.400 really just for undocumented immigrants? If not, and I suspect not, 1:46:25.800 --> 1:46:28.160 then why is this lie so pervasive and unquestioned? I 1:46:28.160 --> 1:46:30.559 haven't heard left leaning outlets discuss this point, and it 1:46:30.600 --> 1:46:32.360 makes me wonder how much of a kernel of truth 1:46:32.400 --> 1:46:34.719 is in the claim that Dems are unwilling to admit. 1:46:34.760 --> 1:46:37.879 Are Democrats able to handle this talking point without fracturing 1:46:37.920 --> 1:46:40.760 what's left of their coalition? Thanks in advance, love the show, Luke. 1:46:41.120 --> 1:46:45.160 So Luke, look, no, the answer is no, it's not true. Now. 1:46:45.200 --> 1:46:47.799 What happened before is that they discovered that some people 1:46:47.800 --> 1:46:52.040 who were here, undocumented people were somehow accessing some benefits 1:46:52.080 --> 1:46:55.599 because perhaps they were with somebody or had a child 1:46:56.240 --> 1:46:59.519 who is an American citizen who was getting benefits. Right, 1:47:00.200 --> 1:47:03.400 if you're looking for the kernel of truth, it's not 1:47:04.120 --> 1:47:07.400 the parents may be here illegally, but their kid is 1:47:07.439 --> 1:47:11.920 here legally. They do have access to the medicaid, to 1:47:12.000 --> 1:47:18.840 these various things, but the parent doesn't. So I'll let 1:47:18.880 --> 1:47:21.840 you decide. Can you say, are the parents that are 1:47:21.840 --> 1:47:25.840 not of legal status in this country benefiting because their 1:47:25.920 --> 1:47:29.360 child who does have legal status is getting a benefit? 1:47:29.400 --> 1:47:31.639 You see where I'm going here. So, if you're looking 1:47:31.680 --> 1:47:34.720 for the kernel of truth, which many on the right 1:47:34.760 --> 1:47:39.400 would say, you know democrats are claiming it's not true, 1:47:39.439 --> 1:47:42.479 but you know they're benefiting from this, et cetera. So 1:47:44.640 --> 1:47:49.360 that's the semantic you'd be debating over. But no, nobody 1:47:49.439 --> 1:47:52.599 who's here illegally is supposed to be eligible for this. 1:47:53.680 --> 1:47:57.080 But if you are an American citizen, and then you are. 1:47:57.760 --> 1:48:02.600 And so where the gray area is is is the 1:48:02.720 --> 1:48:06.320 children who are here who were born here to folks 1:48:06.880 --> 1:48:09.920 who are not of legal status. I hope that helps 1:48:09.960 --> 1:48:13.599 a little bit in the clarification. Next question comes from 1:48:13.640 --> 1:48:17.280 will E says, Hey, Chuck, your commentary was spot on. 1:48:17.600 --> 1:48:22.240 I just don't know which commentary I'll keep going because 1:48:22.560 --> 1:48:25.120 aren't they all sorry? I think that's what you have 1:48:25.160 --> 1:48:26.760 to do as a podcast host now, right, is I 1:48:26.800 --> 1:48:30.040 have to overinflate my ego and how say how smart 1:48:30.080 --> 1:48:30.360 and great? 1:48:30.360 --> 1:48:30.760 I am? Right? 1:48:30.800 --> 1:48:33.160 Isn't that what I'm supposed to say? Anyway? I digress, 1:48:33.920 --> 1:48:37.080 But anyway, I went to my first Wisconsin game in 1:48:37.120 --> 1:48:39.880 over fifteen years and it was ugly student section channing 1:48:39.960 --> 1:48:43.599 fi or fickle friends texting me f fickle don't see 1:48:43.640 --> 1:48:45.000 how he makes it for the rest of the season. 1:48:45.000 --> 1:48:46.559 The bye this weekend is going to be our best 1:48:46.600 --> 1:48:48.599 weekend for the rest of the season. Enjoy the show. 1:48:48.840 --> 1:48:51.520 So obviously, what he's saying is my commentary on football 1:48:51.640 --> 1:48:54.519 was spot on. I appreciate, thank you, and I By 1:48:54.560 --> 1:48:56.639 the way, some of you are probably asking me, weren't 1:48:56.640 --> 1:48:58.240 you at a football game this weekend? How come you 1:48:58.280 --> 1:48:59.680 didn't talk about in the last show. I'll tell you 1:48:59.720 --> 1:49:00.960 the second here, but I want to get through a 1:49:00.960 --> 1:49:04.920 couple more questions. This next one comes from Deborah You. Hey, 1:49:05.000 --> 1:49:07.280 Chuck love the podcast. Your recent discussion on polls showing 1:49:07.320 --> 1:49:10.680 democrats less interested in talking with Republicans really resonated with me. 1:49:10.760 --> 1:49:13.240 Many of us have tried to have rational, civil conversations 1:49:13.280 --> 1:49:16.240 with Trump supporters, presenting facts, listening, seeking common ground, but 1:49:16.320 --> 1:49:19.400 it feels futile. I consider myself moderate and open to compromise, 1:49:19.439 --> 1:49:22.120 yet too often the loudest up voices drown out dialogue 1:49:22.120 --> 1:49:27.200 with outrage and hypocrisy, leaving me exhausted and disheartened. Well, Deborah, 1:49:27.200 --> 1:49:29.559 I would just say start with people in your family 1:49:29.720 --> 1:49:33.400 that that you know, Start with people you work with, 1:49:33.520 --> 1:49:36.320 or people in your neighborhood that that you that you 1:49:36.400 --> 1:49:38.519 know are on the other side, and try it that way. 1:49:39.200 --> 1:49:42.120 I think if you have some sort of previous relationship 1:49:42.200 --> 1:49:45.840 that isn't political with somebody, that's where you can start 1:49:45.880 --> 1:49:48.400 to break, to sort of break the ice and thaw 1:49:48.479 --> 1:49:57.559 things out a little bit. I try humor, you know. Look, 1:49:57.600 --> 1:50:01.880 I I have over I have my own ways that 1:50:02.040 --> 1:50:06.240 I you know, I consider myself pretty good at reading people. 1:50:06.280 --> 1:50:08.920 I kind of know where I think people will go. So, 1:50:09.040 --> 1:50:13.000 you know, if I don't know somebody very well, I 1:50:13.080 --> 1:50:16.760 usually try to connect on another subject first, sports or 1:50:17.320 --> 1:50:21.320 weather or you know, if you're on an airplane, you 1:50:21.360 --> 1:50:25.240 know the frustrations of flying or something, you know, sort 1:50:25.240 --> 1:50:31.519 of non controversial like that. But I think it feels 1:50:31.600 --> 1:50:34.200 like what you're describing is having a conversation with somebody 1:50:34.240 --> 1:50:38.519 that's super online. And I will say, there's no I've 1:50:38.640 --> 1:50:43.080 tried to have civil conversations with pen pals. I have 1:50:43.320 --> 1:50:47.360 quite a few pen and piles I've I've I've accumulated 1:50:47.400 --> 1:50:49.160 over the years. Some of you may be listening now 1:50:49.160 --> 1:50:52.000 that are regular pen piles with me. Where Frankly, if 1:50:52.000 --> 1:50:55.320 you if you email me, I usually will respond if 1:50:55.320 --> 1:50:58.680 you're fairly civil, even if you're tough and discree. You know, 1:50:58.840 --> 1:51:00.960 I don't think you you know, I really you're always 1:51:01.000 --> 1:51:03.479 you know, giving a pass to this side or give 1:51:03.520 --> 1:51:05.680 it a pass to that side. You know, as long 1:51:05.720 --> 1:51:08.479 as you're not like filled with venom, I'm usually going 1:51:08.560 --> 1:51:11.120 to respond and try to have a civil back and 1:51:11.160 --> 1:51:14.920 forth because frankly, I'm always trying to learn. I'm trying 1:51:14.960 --> 1:51:17.800 to understand the you know, what is it that has 1:51:17.840 --> 1:51:20.880 you exercised? Maybe it's something I'm missing, So I always 1:51:20.880 --> 1:51:23.880 think there's something to learn. But when the person's super 1:51:23.920 --> 1:51:27.040 online and they're just sort of you know, you know, 1:51:27.479 --> 1:51:31.680 they spend more time reading cat Turd fifty two or 1:51:31.720 --> 1:51:37.200 whatever that right wing meme, Twitter feed is or TikTok feed. 1:51:37.520 --> 1:51:40.720 I just call them all cat turns, but I think 1:51:40.760 --> 1:51:42.559 one of them is called cat turd fifty two. 1:51:42.680 --> 1:51:42.880 Is it? 1:51:42.960 --> 1:51:47.240 Maybe it's cat turn ninety six. I don't know, you know, 1:51:47.400 --> 1:51:49.920 I mean, it's like they're all Mike Lee, right, I 1:51:49.960 --> 1:51:52.160 don't know. Senator Mike Lee is like somebody who can't 1:51:52.160 --> 1:51:55.400 have a conversation with anymore because he's just gotten. He 1:51:55.479 --> 1:51:58.920 calls himself based Mike Lee, right, like in weird ways, 1:51:58.960 --> 1:52:02.559 at least admitting that he's, hey, I am drunk on this, 1:52:03.320 --> 1:52:06.599 and he is sort of drunk on online maga, right. 1:52:07.120 --> 1:52:10.080 And I guess he's sort of like the reverse reform smoker, right. 1:52:10.120 --> 1:52:12.960 He was. He was anti he was an anti trumper 1:52:13.000 --> 1:52:15.559 from the beginning, and then when he flipped a maga, 1:52:15.600 --> 1:52:21.960 he decided, I'm gonna smoke four packs a day. You're 1:52:21.960 --> 1:52:25.360 not going to have a rational debate with with somebody 1:52:25.400 --> 1:52:30.080 who's who's that online? So I guess, you know it. 1:52:30.080 --> 1:52:32.479 It's certainly a better conversation to be had in person 1:52:32.520 --> 1:52:36.240 then it will be, uh, you know, digitally anyway. But 1:52:36.320 --> 1:52:38.479 it probably is best to start off with somebody you 1:52:38.560 --> 1:52:40.760 might have a pre existing relationship with even if it's 1:52:40.760 --> 1:52:44.680 something as innocuous as you're dry cleaner, or you know 1:52:45.000 --> 1:52:47.280 somebody you just happen to see while you're walking your 1:52:47.280 --> 1:52:54.080 neighborhood all the time. Next question comes from Gail in Woodinville, Washington. Hey, Chuck, 1:52:54.120 --> 1:52:58.280 so glad I discovered the toodcast me too. Tell your friends, Uh, 1:52:58.960 --> 1:53:01.960 our numbers are growing a lot, that's for sure. You 1:53:02.000 --> 1:53:04.240 know again, I think of Sister paud in my chest. 1:53:04.240 --> 1:53:09.200 We're the fastest growing podcast in you know this section three, 1:53:09.240 --> 1:53:13.920 two four five. So anyway, I'm sort of kidding. I 1:53:13.960 --> 1:53:15.720 know hindsight is twenty twenty, but do you think the 1:53:15.760 --> 1:53:17.439 country would be better off now if Trump had been 1:53:17.479 --> 1:53:20.559 re elected in twenty twenty. I've heard this argument. For 1:53:20.600 --> 1:53:22.400 the sake of argument. Let's forget that many of us 1:53:22.439 --> 1:53:25.280 probably would have died from COVID under his leadership. But 1:53:25.320 --> 1:53:27.240 had he been reelected, Mike Pence would have been VP, 1:53:27.479 --> 1:53:30.559 and we might never have known of J. D. Varans. 1:53:30.640 --> 1:53:33.760 Trump and his clown posse might have been bumbled through 1:53:33.760 --> 1:53:36.160 the second term. With more guardrails. There would have been 1:53:36.240 --> 1:53:38.880 no indictments or prosecutions to trigger his revenge to her. 1:53:39.120 --> 1:53:41.519 There wouldn't have been the four years from twenty twenty 1:53:41.560 --> 1:53:43.639 one to twenty twenty five to develop Project twenty twenty 1:53:43.680 --> 1:53:46.559 five and give Stephen Miller the opportunity to consolidate power, 1:53:46.800 --> 1:53:49.439 and best of all, Trump would be out of office 1:53:49.520 --> 1:53:54.920 right now. What do you think? Keep up the great work, Gale. 1:53:55.120 --> 1:54:01.960 I have had this conversation. I have humored this conversation 1:54:02.120 --> 1:54:05.760 with various friends of mine on this front. It's a 1:54:07.000 --> 1:54:09.320 it's as as you know, I'm going to have a 1:54:09.360 --> 1:54:13.880 what if series coming up, and what I do is 1:54:13.880 --> 1:54:16.280 sort of forks in the road. You know, what if 1:54:16.479 --> 1:54:19.559 this would have happened instead of this? In the past, 1:54:19.600 --> 1:54:21.400 I've done what if Hillary Clinton had run for president 1:54:21.439 --> 1:54:23.320 in two thousand and four instead of two thousand and eight, 1:54:23.360 --> 1:54:25.479 which you've actually won the presidency in two thousand and four. 1:54:26.439 --> 1:54:29.400 I certainly make the argument that her best chance was 1:54:29.400 --> 1:54:32.200 two thousand and four, more so than eight or sixteen 1:54:32.840 --> 1:54:36.080 for a variety of reasons. What if Bill Clinton had 1:54:36.120 --> 1:54:39.360 resigned in nineteen ninety eight, as many Democrats wanted him 1:54:39.400 --> 1:54:43.960 do in the peak of Monica Lewinsky, then you would 1:54:43.960 --> 1:54:46.240 have had a President Gore running for a full term 1:54:46.280 --> 1:54:49.160 in two thousand what is that election like nine eleven 1:54:49.200 --> 1:54:51.800 still happens, but this time it's ten straight years of 1:54:51.800 --> 1:54:55.000 democratic So you see how you know, you start to 1:54:55.000 --> 1:55:00.240 go down these roads. And so anyway you have I'll 1:55:00.240 --> 1:55:04.240 tell you this, you have potentially helped preview one of 1:55:04.280 --> 1:55:06.600 the what ifs that I want to go down because 1:55:06.640 --> 1:55:10.600 I think this is it is true. This is a 1:55:10.720 --> 1:55:14.800 more damaging presidency to the sort of guard rails of 1:55:14.880 --> 1:55:21.720 American democracy than if he had served two consecutive terms. 1:55:21.760 --> 1:55:26.280 There's no doubt about it. It's an interesting question though, 1:55:26.320 --> 1:55:32.280 whether I think it's weirdly, I think we need another 1:55:32.320 --> 1:55:36.920 twenty years to figure out whether it was better or not. 1:55:40.640 --> 1:55:44.160 You know, do any of the Biden policies work, And 1:55:44.240 --> 1:55:46.440 if they do, you know you're going to have to 1:55:46.480 --> 1:55:51.200 consider those as well. So I think it's I understand 1:55:51.240 --> 1:55:54.600 where you're coming from. I think there's there's certainly when 1:55:54.600 --> 1:55:58.320 you look at the when you look at this the 1:56:00.560 --> 1:56:02.880 what he's done so far and we're not even through 1:56:02.960 --> 1:56:08.400 year one, and what I've said earlier about Steven Miller 1:56:08.440 --> 1:56:14.400 and we'll see how the shutdown goes. I think it's 1:56:15.040 --> 1:56:17.800 put it this way, Donald Trump is a much weaker 1:56:17.840 --> 1:56:21.400 figure inside the Republican Party if he had won reelection, 1:56:21.480 --> 1:56:24.680 and he'd have been a much weaker figure sooner inside 1:56:24.680 --> 1:56:29.480 the party. And maybe Democrats control the Senate after twenty 1:56:29.520 --> 1:56:33.760 twenty two in a bigger way, not a smaller way. 1:56:33.800 --> 1:56:37.320 Maybe their map is more navigable, right Like, I could 1:56:37.360 --> 1:56:40.640 certainly paint a very rosy picture for Democrats right now, 1:56:45.880 --> 1:56:51.680 but it's a anyway. The point is is I think 1:56:51.720 --> 1:56:55.160 this is a discussion that you should look forward to 1:56:55.320 --> 1:56:58.360 on the Chuck Podcast towards the end of the holiday season, 1:56:59.160 --> 1:57:01.240 when I will do my annual what if series that 1:57:01.280 --> 1:57:04.240 I've done in my previous iterations of the Chuck Podcast. 1:57:04.440 --> 1:57:08.240 If you search them, some of these episodes NBC's taken 1:57:08.320 --> 1:57:10.480 off the website, but some of them you can find. 1:57:10.720 --> 1:57:13.160 But it's I call it my what if series, so 1:57:13.160 --> 1:57:14.960 you can check it off from there. Do one more question, 1:57:15.000 --> 1:57:17.680 and then I'll give you a quick little update about 1:57:18.120 --> 1:57:25.440 my football travels. This next question comes from Cold Tea. Oh. 1:57:25.520 --> 1:57:28.160 The question is, Hey, Chuck, hopefully you've seen this crazy story. 1:57:28.400 --> 1:57:30.880 The Des Moines superintendent was arrested by ice, which is 1:57:30.880 --> 1:57:32.520 crazy enough, but it could also take down a leading 1:57:32.560 --> 1:57:34.720 Democratic Senate candidate, Jackie Norris, who was chair of the 1:57:34.720 --> 1:57:36.720 school board. Wild stuff in Iowa. No one seems to 1:57:36.760 --> 1:57:41.480 know what is true or not. You just summarized everything 1:57:41.520 --> 1:57:43.960 I was saying earlier with my top five list and 1:57:43.960 --> 1:57:46.680 why I didn't put Iowa in that fifth spot because 1:57:46.720 --> 1:57:49.920 I want to see this story finished playing out. It 1:57:49.960 --> 1:57:54.120 is wild. If you don't know the story, it does 1:57:54.200 --> 1:57:59.320 feel it's amazing people that love Look, the superintendent was 1:57:59.320 --> 1:58:02.200 beloved by any people, and they don't want to believe 1:58:02.240 --> 1:58:06.400 the facts that apparently are in this case. And that's 1:58:06.440 --> 1:58:10.560 why I think the the fallout from this could be 1:58:10.600 --> 1:58:14.760 more damaging to the Democratic brand. I again, I'm I 1:58:14.800 --> 1:58:18.880 want to wait. I'm not gonna lie. I want to 1:58:18.920 --> 1:58:21.400 wait a little bit to just let's get all the 1:58:21.440 --> 1:58:23.760 facts out. Let's see what everything looks like. Is he 1:58:24.600 --> 1:58:27.520 is everything that's been said true that he you know 1:58:27.680 --> 1:58:31.760 about a weapon in his car, cash, et cetera. He 1:58:31.920 --> 1:58:34.640 was the second superintendent job. I mean, it's sort of 1:58:34.640 --> 1:58:36.920 like does anybody do any vetting anywhere in this country 1:58:37.680 --> 1:58:42.120 on this front? So there's a there's a more information 1:58:42.200 --> 1:58:45.480 I want to know. But I thought Cole you summarized 1:58:45.480 --> 1:58:49.200 it well. Have you seen this crazy story? You couldn't 1:58:49.200 --> 1:58:52.080 have made up a story like this right as a 1:58:52.080 --> 1:58:56.120 plot line. And this is always a reminder when you're 1:58:56.160 --> 1:59:00.720 whenever I'm trying to write fictional political storyline, for the 1:59:00.800 --> 1:59:05.720 various attempts I've done for political fiction, story like this happens, 1:59:05.720 --> 1:59:09.120 and you're like, how do you manufacture fiction when the 1:59:09.240 --> 1:59:13.280 truth is so much crazier? All right, I will tell 1:59:13.280 --> 1:59:15.560 you I was at that crazy Dallas Green Bay game. 1:59:15.600 --> 1:59:17.320 I think I sort of hinted that I was going 1:59:17.360 --> 1:59:22.520 to that, which in full sort of toodcast behind the 1:59:22.600 --> 1:59:26.879 curtain plotting. You know what that meant is that Monday 1:59:27.000 --> 1:59:30.400 podcast I taped before I left for Dallas on Sunday morning. 1:59:30.680 --> 1:59:33.920 I went down Sunday, came back Monday, so it was 1:59:33.960 --> 1:59:38.680 a quick trip. My son's doing great. Thanks for asking. 1:59:38.720 --> 1:59:40.800 I know some of you are at least thinking that, 1:59:40.880 --> 1:59:45.240 so I thought I would pre answer that question. But 1:59:45.280 --> 1:59:48.360 I'll tell you this. I'll we get to the game 1:59:48.560 --> 1:59:53.800 and it feels it felt like sixty forty cowboys to 1:59:53.800 --> 1:59:57.720 Packers fans. There were Packers fans everywhere, and I know 1:59:57.840 --> 2:00:00.280 some of it is like, oh, you know, we're packers, 2:00:00.280 --> 2:00:02.320 so all we're seeing are the other Packers. Fans, But 2:00:02.400 --> 2:00:05.400 when the teams came out, you felt the cheers and 2:00:05.520 --> 2:00:07.960 early on, and of course the Packers got a quick 2:00:08.000 --> 2:00:12.120 start thirteen to nothing, and here they're about to kick 2:00:12.160 --> 2:00:14.760 the extra point, and you could just feel the Dallas 2:00:14.760 --> 2:00:17.280 fans were like, oh, this is going exactly as I feared. 2:00:18.680 --> 2:00:21.720 US Packer fans were as cocky as ever. And then 2:00:21.760 --> 2:00:24.640 they blocked that extra point and run back for two 2:00:24.680 --> 2:00:27.240 points and it's instead of fourteen to nothing, it's thirteen 2:00:27.280 --> 2:00:30.160 to two. And I just sit there and look at 2:00:30.200 --> 2:00:32.720 my son. I'm like, what the second week in a 2:00:32.800 --> 2:00:35.880 row we're getting We get that field goal block with 2:00:35.920 --> 2:00:38.880 the Browns and then this extra point block, so we 2:00:39.160 --> 2:00:41.760 just are stewing from here on out. We stopped and 2:00:41.840 --> 2:00:45.720 joined the game. We're angry at Rich Bisaccia, who's the 2:00:45.720 --> 2:00:48.480 special teams coach, who a bunch of US Packer fans 2:00:48.560 --> 2:00:51.200 have been like, get rid of this guy. The special 2:00:51.200 --> 2:00:54.840 teams is atrocious. It's been atrocious for two years now. 2:00:55.200 --> 2:00:58.960 And then every single time on the kickoff, the Packers 2:00:58.960 --> 2:01:02.400 didn't know the rules. They kept the ball would bounce 2:01:02.400 --> 2:01:04.000 in the landing zone and they'd take it in the 2:01:04.120 --> 2:01:06.040 end zone thinking they were getting it at the thirty five, 2:01:06.280 --> 2:01:08.560 and they did it multiple times, and it comes out 2:01:08.560 --> 2:01:12.120 to the twenty. All these little hidden yardages, and then 2:01:12.160 --> 2:01:14.800 there was the bizarre play calling of Lafleur at the 2:01:14.920 --> 2:01:17.600 end of the first half, end of the regulation, and 2:01:17.640 --> 2:01:21.240 at the end of the overtime. This was one of 2:01:21.280 --> 2:01:26.200 those where so the game ends in a tie and 2:01:26.240 --> 2:01:29.040 the Dallas fans felt like they won something and all 2:01:29.120 --> 2:01:31.960 of us Packer fans felt like we lost. This was 2:01:32.040 --> 2:01:34.600 not one of those where everybody, yeah, and you did. 2:01:34.920 --> 2:01:36.680 I'm sorry I didn't leave gone. Boy, that was a 2:01:36.680 --> 2:01:39.520 great game. It was not a great game. The Packers 2:01:39.560 --> 2:01:45.440 played terribly. The Cowboys. It was really interesting. They were 2:01:45.480 --> 2:01:48.600 playing afraid for the first quarter and a half. It 2:01:48.640 --> 2:01:51.000 was like they did not want Michael Parsons to even 2:01:51.000 --> 2:01:53.200 get a chance to sack doacks. They didn't even bother 2:01:53.280 --> 2:01:54.880 to pass the ball, or if they did, it would 2:01:54.880 --> 2:01:57.280 be like a quick strop and a little dump off. 2:01:58.360 --> 2:02:01.640 Then they get this two point conversion. Like Schottenheimer, the 2:02:01.720 --> 2:02:04.960 Dallas coach decided, you know what, there are other plays 2:02:05.000 --> 2:02:07.880 in the playbook, why not? And you know the way 2:02:07.880 --> 2:02:11.320 football is, right, it's like a this this game felt 2:02:11.320 --> 2:02:16.080 like one of those college games where a highly ranked 2:02:16.120 --> 2:02:19.200 team is visiting an unranked team and they let the 2:02:19.320 --> 2:02:22.120 unranked team hang around, and then all of a sudden, 2:02:22.160 --> 2:02:24.120 the unranked team realize they have a chance to win 2:02:24.440 --> 2:02:26.600 and they start playing the best game of their lives. 2:02:27.000 --> 2:02:31.360 George Pickens, who's never consistent when he's on a football field, 2:02:31.560 --> 2:02:35.480 paid attention and seem to actually participate in the offense 2:02:36.000 --> 2:02:39.080 almost one hundred percent of the plays. And guess what, 2:02:39.840 --> 2:02:45.200 when he's fully paying attention, he's a dangerous threat. The 2:02:45.240 --> 2:02:49.000 Packers couldn't get a pass rush. They were only you know, 2:02:49.040 --> 2:02:51.080 the whole key to the Packers is just that doing 2:02:51.080 --> 2:02:53.760 that four man pass rush, the assumption was they were 2:02:53.760 --> 2:02:56.720 going to get to Dak and they couldn't get to him. 2:02:57.400 --> 2:03:00.000 Really until the overtime did they finally seem to fit 2:03:00.000 --> 2:03:03.480 figure that out. But Schottenheimer out coached Halfley, and we 2:03:03.520 --> 2:03:07.320 hadn't seen Halfley out coach. So the Packers are are 2:03:07.440 --> 2:03:10.280 what are we now? Two to one and one? And 2:03:10.360 --> 2:03:14.480 it just feels off right, And now you got to 2:03:14.480 --> 2:03:19.000 ask yourself, was was the Lions game sort of an 2:03:19.000 --> 2:03:22.720 anomaly where the Packers simply a little bit more ready 2:03:22.760 --> 2:03:25.240 and the Lions weren't they were still in preseason mode, 2:03:26.520 --> 2:03:28.480 because all of a sudden, they look like the best 2:03:28.520 --> 2:03:31.240 team in that division, and the Packers are not playing 2:03:31.280 --> 2:03:34.880 like the best team in that division. So what I 2:03:34.880 --> 2:03:37.520 have to say, I think it's a full indictment on 2:03:37.560 --> 2:03:42.640 the coaching staff, from Halflee to Lafleor to Bisachia Basacia. 2:03:42.720 --> 2:03:46.840 This is I don't I admire that Lafleur is very 2:03:46.880 --> 2:03:49.840 loyal to his coaches, but he kept the defensive coordinator 2:03:49.840 --> 2:03:53.320 a season too long. And I think it's painfully obvious 2:03:53.320 --> 2:03:56.160 with these new special teams rules that nobody on the 2:03:56.200 --> 2:03:59.600 team seems to know that they probably kept the special 2:03:59.600 --> 2:04:03.600 teams coach a season too long on this front, And 2:04:03.680 --> 2:04:05.760 if you follow Packer, you know, for those of you 2:04:05.800 --> 2:04:08.760 that follow the Packer stuff closely, you know that most 2:04:08.800 --> 2:04:11.640 Packer fans are raging right now about that more than 2:04:11.640 --> 2:04:17.920 ever on the college front. Look, it was just a 2:04:17.920 --> 2:04:20.400 great game, great weekend of games, and it was great 2:04:20.440 --> 2:04:22.760 to not have to worry about the Hurricanes to be 2:04:22.880 --> 2:04:26.040 in that. I will say this, I'm a little bummed 2:04:26.160 --> 2:04:29.240 that Florida State lost that Uva game on Friday night 2:04:29.680 --> 2:04:32.280 because what that sets up is a more desperate Florida 2:04:32.320 --> 2:04:37.520 State team against Miami this Saturday. This is another big 2:04:37.560 --> 2:04:40.720 test for crystabal rights. There was a couple of coaches 2:04:40.760 --> 2:04:43.520 that have high ranked teams that have not been able 2:04:43.560 --> 2:04:46.200 to win the big game. James Franklin at Penn State, 2:04:46.880 --> 2:04:50.080 Mario Cristobal, whether it was at Oregon or at Miami. 2:04:50.520 --> 2:04:51.960 You know, are you going to be able to win? 2:04:52.480 --> 2:04:55.160 Be able to you know, not lose a dumb game. 2:04:56.120 --> 2:04:59.400 I think Christa Ball passed one test against Florida when 2:04:59.440 --> 2:05:03.000 they played not their best game. That's a game they 2:05:03.000 --> 2:05:05.280 would have lost last year, and they figured out how 2:05:05.280 --> 2:05:07.520 to win it this year. This is the first road 2:05:07.560 --> 2:05:11.720 test against a team that's more desperate to win than Miamias. 2:05:12.440 --> 2:05:16.240 You know, can we do? We do? We treat it 2:05:16.280 --> 2:05:18.120 as a business trip and we go up there and 2:05:18.200 --> 2:05:22.800 just out physical them. There's no reason why they shouldn't. 2:05:24.040 --> 2:05:26.560 But Florida State's now a bit more desperate. I would 2:05:26.600 --> 2:05:29.240 have preferred a more hyped up Florida State team thinking 2:05:30.680 --> 2:05:33.200 that they're going to go nose for nose and would 2:05:33.320 --> 2:05:35.800 would have had a little bit more attention on that. 2:05:35.920 --> 2:05:44.320 But it's uh. I'm looking forward to Saturday night in Tallahassee. 2:05:44.960 --> 2:05:47.960 But I'm not gonna lie. I wish they had won 2:05:48.160 --> 2:05:51.400 that Friday game because I think in some ways they're 2:05:51.440 --> 2:05:53.800 going to be a bit more desperate, which means they're 2:05:53.800 --> 2:05:58.120 going to be playing whatever that means, right, just slightly 2:05:58.600 --> 2:06:01.560 slightly with more urgent and see more in time, because 2:06:01.840 --> 2:06:04.840 Florid State has to win if they want to get there. 2:06:04.840 --> 2:06:09.240 Because I think one thing we know is true, ten 2:06:09.280 --> 2:06:11.720 and two ACC teams are not getting into the playoff. 2:06:12.560 --> 2:06:14.280 We already found that out. Might be found out the 2:06:14.280 --> 2:06:16.120 hard way. You're going to have to be eleven and 2:06:16.200 --> 2:06:18.080 one in the regular season. You can have two losses, 2:06:18.080 --> 2:06:20.120 but your second loss has to come in in that 2:06:20.280 --> 2:06:26.760 conference title game. So Florida State has to. If they 2:06:26.800 --> 2:06:30.400 accumulate their second loss, I think they go down where 2:06:30.440 --> 2:06:32.080 the only shot they have would be to win the 2:06:32.120 --> 2:06:35.680 conference a la Clemson last year. So we shall see 2:06:35.760 --> 2:06:39.080 that's coming up. By the way, I want to share 2:06:39.120 --> 2:06:42.560 one more totally inane fact and for five of you 2:06:42.560 --> 2:06:46.440 you'll find this funny or weird, or maybe you think, 2:06:46.480 --> 2:06:48.960 why the hell is he sharing this? But I did 2:06:49.000 --> 2:06:51.400 something that I have never done. I swear in my 2:06:51.520 --> 2:06:55.080 entire life. I got to the end of a chapstick too. 2:06:56.800 --> 2:06:59.000 I am one of those people. I never have chapstick 2:06:59.040 --> 2:07:00.480 when I need it. So you go and you're always 2:07:00.480 --> 2:07:02.000 buying new ones, always buying new ones, and then you 2:07:02.040 --> 2:07:04.200 find your old stuff and all this stuff, right, and 2:07:04.840 --> 2:07:07.800 over time I end up with my little sticks of chapstick. 2:07:07.880 --> 2:07:08.080 You know. 2:07:08.160 --> 2:07:10.360 I got one near my my keys are, and one 2:07:10.440 --> 2:07:12.960 in my car, and one near my bed and all 2:07:12.960 --> 2:07:16.600 these different things. Right, Well, I finally worked. I think 2:07:16.640 --> 2:07:19.840 I had this stick of chapstick for three years. I 2:07:19.880 --> 2:07:21.880 didn't know you could ever get to an end of 2:07:21.880 --> 2:07:26.000 a chapstick tube. But I finally, for the first time 2:07:26.000 --> 2:07:27.240 in my life, made it to the end of the 2:07:27.280 --> 2:07:30.400 chapstick tube. I feel like I've finally not wasted money 2:07:30.600 --> 2:07:33.960 for once on all the unused chapstick that I have 2:07:34.080 --> 2:07:36.800 lost over the years. I'm sure it's all with all 2:07:36.800 --> 2:07:40.360 of my missing pairs of sunglasses as well. So with 2:07:40.480 --> 2:07:44.320 that piece of inane trivia that I hear that podcasters 2:07:44.360 --> 2:07:46.960 are supposed to share with their with their listeners and viewers, 2:07:47.840 --> 2:07:50.080 I'm gonna call it for twenty four hours and we'll 2:07:50.080 --> 2:07:51.520 see it when we upload again.