Speaker 1: Welcome to Talking Politics. I'm your host, Si Cup. What
Speaker 1: a wild week it's been. I mean I don't remember
Speaker 1: a week that hasn't been wild, but this one's been
Speaker 1: particularly wild.
Speaker 2: Let's go through it.
Speaker 1: We started off on Easter Sunday with President Trump posting
Speaker 1: the following profane message on.
Speaker 2: His truth social for all the world to see.
Speaker 1: Tuesday will be power plant Day and bridge Day, all
Speaker 1: wrapped up in one.
Speaker 2: In Iran.
Speaker 1: There will be nothing like it. Open the fucking straight,
Speaker 1: you crazy bastards, or you'll be living in hell.
Speaker 2: Just watch Praise be to Allah.
Speaker 1: That's a real That's a real thing that the President
Speaker 1: of the United States posted on his social media. Now,
Speaker 1: there's so much in that post that's alarming, obviously, but
Speaker 1: promising to commit war crimes, you know, isn't something that
Speaker 1: presidents usually just come out and say before they do them. Well,
Speaker 1: if that wasn't bad enough, on Monday, he threatened to
Speaker 1: run again, sounding very much like a cross between a
Speaker 1: Sith lord and Andrew dice Clay. He wrote, a whole
Speaker 1: civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again.
Speaker 2: I don't want that to happen, but it probably will.
Speaker 1: However, now that we have complete and total regime change
Speaker 1: where different, smarter and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something
Speaker 1: revolutionarily wonderful can happen.
Speaker 2: Who knows what the fuck?
Speaker 1: He gave it Ron an eight pm deadline on Tuesday
Speaker 1: night to open the straight or else, and then about
Speaker 1: two hours before that deadline, Trump announces he's reached a
Speaker 1: quote double sided ceasefire with Iran, which I guess is
Speaker 1: his way of saying both parties will adhere to it, which, yep,
Speaker 1: that's understood. That's what a ceasefire is, two parties agreeing
Speaker 1: to stop shooting for a time being. But like whenever
Speaker 1: he talks about war, it's always it always sounds like
Speaker 1: he just discovered a new war or a new word
Speaker 1: or a new concept, Like someone just told him there's
Speaker 1: this thing called a ceasefire and we can ask for one,
Speaker 1: and he's like, oh, do both.
Speaker 2: Sides agree to it? So it's like double sided cool.
Speaker 1: Yes, a double sided seasfire anyway, With plans to wipe
Speaker 1: out an entire civilization on hold for now, Trump said
Speaker 1: he's agreed to suspend the bombing in attacks on Iran
Speaker 1: for a period of two weeks.
Speaker 2: He wrote the.
Speaker 1: Reason for doing so is that we have already met
Speaker 1: and exceeded all military objectives and are very far along
Speaker 1: with a definitive agreement concerning long term peace with Iran
Speaker 1: and peace in the Middle East. This isn't relevant, but
Speaker 1: I'd like you to know that Trump capitalized the first
Speaker 1: letter of the words agreement and long term for no
Speaker 1: apparent reason.
Speaker 2: I just find that amusing.
Speaker 1: So with peace and victory declared, I guess we can
Speaker 1: all breathe a huge sigh of relief and move on
Speaker 1: with our lives, knowing that this excursion was a huge success.
Speaker 1: The world's a safer place. America got what it wanted.
Speaker 1: Right well, I hate to be the bearer of bad news,
Speaker 1: but not exactly. The so called double sided ceasefire that
Speaker 1: Trump bought into so just a bluff by Iran.
Speaker 2: He bought into it.
Speaker 1: It lasted mere hours, Iran's Levon oil refinery was hit,
Speaker 1: and a word on whether that was Israel or US,
Speaker 1: of course, just silence. Iran has continued to strike Gulf
Speaker 1: Arab states including Kuwait, Bahrain, Uae, Israel is intensified strikes
Speaker 1: and Lebanon, with Israel and JD Vans both saying Lebanon
Speaker 1: and Hezbala weren't.
Speaker 2: Included in the ceasefire.
Speaker 1: Our supposed Pakistani mediator disagrees with that.
Speaker 2: It's such a mess and we don't even know who
Speaker 2: to believe.
Speaker 1: Traffic in the Strait remained negligible, with reports that Iran
Speaker 1: briefly opened the Strait of Hormuz as directed by President Trump,
Speaker 1: and then closed it in response to Israeli strikes. Oil
Speaker 1: and gas prices have come down, but still remain significantly
Speaker 1: higher than they were before the war. We've retrieved none,
Speaker 1: none of the one thousand pounds of enriched uranium that
Speaker 1: was supposedly obliterated by US in our strikes last year.
Speaker 1: It's still under twenty feet of rubble waiting, I guess
Speaker 1: for Iranians to dig it up and then start, you know,
Speaker 1: enriching it again.
Speaker 2: There's been no regime change.
Speaker 1: The same guys are running it today that we're running
Speaker 1: it a month ago. So, in other words, other than
Speaker 1: degrading Iran's military somewhat, we've accomplished nothing, well, nothing good anyway.
Speaker 1: Here's what we have accomplished. Global energy prices are up,
Speaker 1: our allies are rattled.
Speaker 2: The Gulf States are.
Speaker 1: Being bombed, Iran sees no point in taking Trump seriously
Speaker 1: or doing what he says, because they don't respect him
Speaker 1: at all. And the president of the United States has
Speaker 1: already committed a war crime just by threatening to commit
Speaker 1: a war crime.
Speaker 2: So I'm sure you're asking the same question that I am.
Speaker 1: What are Republicans doing in response to Trump's illegal and
Speaker 1: ill advised war. What are they doing about his messing
Speaker 1: with the markets, his threats to leave NATO, his threats
Speaker 1: to commit war crimes, his failure to get anything meaningful
Speaker 1: out of a war that's already seen US casualties. What
Speaker 1: are they doing about his decision to ignore the issues
Speaker 1: that matter most to voters, like lowering inflation and the
Speaker 1: cost of goods. What are you doing about his obvious
Speaker 1: signs of cognitive failure. I'm so glad you asked nothing. Nothing,
Speaker 1: not a thing. They're not doing one thing about it.
Speaker 2: Nothing.
Speaker 1: Of the fifty three Republicans currently in the Senate and
Speaker 1: the two hundred and nineteen Republicans currently in the House,
Speaker 1: guess how many have come out to condemn Trump's threat
Speaker 1: to end to civilization? Four four, that's it, four Republicans
Speaker 1: in all of Congress.
Speaker 2: Both houses had.
Speaker 1: The courage to say what should be obvious and easy,
Speaker 1: which is that the president of the United States shouldn't
Speaker 1: be threatening to end to civilization.
Speaker 2: There are more obvious and easy.
Speaker 1: Things to say, like the President of the United States
Speaker 1: doesn't know how to get us out of a war
Speaker 1: that he started. And President of the United States is
Speaker 1: an incompetent fool, and the President of the United States
Speaker 1: went to war to distract us from this terrible economy,
Speaker 1: and the Epstein files. You could also say all of
Speaker 1: those things very easily because they're obvious.
Speaker 2: But no, they're totally silent.
Speaker 1: Goose stepping along as Trump self destructs and tries to
Speaker 1: take America down with him. What profiles encourage from this crowd, Right,
Speaker 1: the guy is a lame duck, Like, how hard would
Speaker 1: it be to say, it's time to take our country back,
Speaker 1: it's time to do our jobs again, it's time to
Speaker 1: reign in this obviously compromised president who's threatening nuclear war.
Speaker 2: Shouldn't be hard and yet nothing silence, cowardice.
Speaker 1: No Democrats for their part, well, they're weighing their options
Speaker 1: and being in the minority, none.
Speaker 2: Are particularly good or feasible.
Speaker 1: Talking about impeachment hearings, and that would be a purely
Speaker 1: political exercise, and.
Speaker 2: Trust me, one that Maga is dying for.
Speaker 1: They'd love to be back on defense, where they and
Speaker 1: Trump can play poor put upon victims again. They would
Speaker 1: love the distraction and time suck that impeachment would create.
Speaker 1: They'd love the news media to focus on something other
Speaker 1: than Trump's abject failures. They are hoping for impeachment Democrats
Speaker 1: should be wary of that. What about the twenty fifth
Speaker 1: Amendment that allows for the involuntary removal of a president
Speaker 1: during his term sort of And we're going to get
Speaker 1: into the details of that with my next guest after
Speaker 1: the break. But twenty fifth Amendment is tough too, because
Speaker 1: the process requires the vice president and a majority of
Speaker 1: the cabinet to declare the president unfit, and then Congress
Speaker 1: needs to confirm the removal with two thirds of a
Speaker 1: vote if the president disputes it. Now, considering jd. Vance
Speaker 1: has abandoned everything he once stood for and I mean everything,
Speaker 1: just to lick Trump's boots, I doubt we're going to
Speaker 1: get jd Vance to turn on the president. And considering
Speaker 1: Trump's acting ag Todd Blanche said that he'd thank the
Speaker 1: President and tell him I love you, sir. If he
Speaker 1: were fired. I don't think you're going to get this
Speaker 1: cabinet to turn on him either. So what can the
Speaker 1: legislative branch do?
Speaker 3: Well.
Speaker 1: It isn't as sexy as impeachment or the twenty fifth Amendment,
Speaker 1: but it's something if Republicans suddenly to wake up to
Speaker 1: their sworn oaths and duties as lawmakers. First, they should
Speaker 1: vote down Trump's ask for two hundred billion dollars in
Speaker 1: supplemental appropriations to fund continued war operations. They should put
Speaker 1: conditions on future funding, like no boots on the ground
Speaker 1: or nuclear threats, whatever they deem necessary. They should invoke
Speaker 1: the War Powers Resolution and for so withdrawal of troops
Speaker 1: if we get to that point, and they can and
Speaker 1: should pass new laws restricting the first use of nuclear
Speaker 1: weapons without a congressional mandate. They could also hold people
Speaker 1: like Marco Rubio and Pete Hegseth accountable with public hearings
Speaker 1: to find out once and for all, and on the record,
Speaker 1: what our mission is in Iran, what was our reason
Speaker 1: for going in? Like get on the record, because we've
Speaker 1: hat Telsea Gabbert d and I on the record saying
Speaker 1: there was no intel of an.
Speaker 2: Imminent threat from Iran. That's on the she's under oath.
Speaker 1: Now, either you believe her, which means you have to
Speaker 1: believe that Trump's justification for this war was a lie,
Speaker 1: or you believe she is lying and therefore hiding intel
Speaker 1: from us. Neither is a good scenario. Again, these things
Speaker 1: aren't sexy, but this is what we've got, and I
Speaker 1: think this is where we are. The good news is
Speaker 1: if there is any that it's a Trump and his
Speaker 1: war are so unpopular they're dragging Republicans down with them,
Speaker 1: which will make mid terms quite the reckoning. And that's
Speaker 1: where you come in. You just got to vote.
Speaker 2: You just got to vote, like this might be. I
Speaker 2: know we say this, I know I say this.
Speaker 1: I have been guilty of saying these are the most
Speaker 1: important mid terms of your lifetime.
Speaker 2: I think I've said that before. But like we're on
Speaker 2: the brink of nuclear war.
Speaker 1: You guys like these are the most important midterms of
Speaker 1: your lifetime.
Speaker 2: I don't know how the stakes could be any higher.
Speaker 1: As President's out of control, we Republicans in Congress are
Speaker 1: not being the check on him that they are supposed
Speaker 1: to be. We need everyone to go out and vote.
Speaker 1: Midterms are going to be bad, and if Republicans were smart,
Speaker 1: they'd start speaking up right about now about.
Speaker 2: It saving themselves, saving their their.
Speaker 1: Majority or what's left of it come midterms. Okay, when
Speaker 1: we come back, we'll go a little deeper on the
Speaker 1: twenty fifth Amendment with the author of a new book
Speaker 1: on the subject, Don't Go Anywhere.
Speaker 2: Welcome back.
Speaker 1: Joining me now is Rebecca Lubau. She's CEO and founder
Speaker 1: of Luba's Strategies. She's worked in government and in the
Speaker 1: nonprofit sector. She's author of the new book Keeping a
Speaker 1: Finger on the Button, Presidential Continuity and the Nuclear Age.
Speaker 2: Welcome doctor Lubau.
Speaker 4: Thank you great to be here with you.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean this book is so timely as we're
Speaker 1: engaging with a nuclear threshold state like Leke Iran, as
Speaker 1: our president is threatening to wipe out a civilization off
Speaker 1: the planet, which many took to mean nuclear strikes, but
Speaker 1: also as we're hearing more and more about the twenty
Speaker 1: fifth Amendment being invoked, and you deal with the twenty
Speaker 1: fifth Amendment quite a bit in your book, So I want.
Speaker 2: To start there. Take us back a little bit.
Speaker 1: What led to the ratification of the twenty fifth Amendment
Speaker 1: in the first place.
Speaker 3: Great, so it was about one hundred and seventy nine
Speaker 3: years since the Constitution before the ratification of the twenty
Speaker 3: fifth Amendment, and basically Article two, Section one provides for
Speaker 3: the vice president taking over for the president should the
Speaker 3: president die in office, but that left.
Speaker 4: The vice presidency vacant.
Speaker 3: There were no provisions for if a president was left
Speaker 3: enabled and could not assume the powers and duties at
Speaker 3: the office. There was no line of succession past the
Speaker 3: vice president. So all of these were debated from time
Speaker 3: to time throughout history until the ratification. In fact, there
Speaker 3: were eight unplanned presidential successions and sixteen unplanned you know,
Speaker 3: vice presidential vacancies. And then there was activity in earnest
Speaker 3: really around the time of the dropping of the bomb.
Speaker 3: So there was originally that was like seventeen ninety two
Speaker 3: provided for some legislative succession after the vice president, so
Speaker 3: this Speaker and the Senate President pro tempop would step
Speaker 3: into that role. Then eighteen eighty six there was some activity.
Speaker 3: It changed the order of success became just a cabinet
Speaker 3: line of succession, so they skipped over the speaker and
Speaker 3: the Senate President pro tem and then and then you
Speaker 3: really see you know, nineteen forty five is the dropping
Speaker 3: in the bomb. Nineteen forty seven, you see with Truman
Speaker 3: the Presidential Succession Act, and Truman had a great relationship
Speaker 3: with House Speaker Rayburn, so in part for that reason
Speaker 3: and in part because he felt that executive succession was undemocratic,
Speaker 3: because these cabinet officials were not elected by the charity
Speaker 3: of the populous. So he put in place, you know,
Speaker 3: the Presidential Succession Act of nineteen forty seven put in
Speaker 3: place this executive line of succession. And then you see
Speaker 3: Eisenhower and Nixon had a letter agreement. Kennedy and Johnson
Speaker 3: also did the same, and then Kennedy was assassinated.
Speaker 4: So in this the wake of the Kennedy.
Speaker 3: Assassination and this period of great anxiety around nuclear their warfare,
Speaker 3: that's when you see this activity really pick up. And
Speaker 3: so February tenth, nineteen forty seven, after much debate, and
Speaker 3: then of course three quarters of states have to ratify
Speaker 3: you see, finally and amendments that addresses these issues, although
Speaker 3: it left us with some holes and gaps, some purposeful
Speaker 3: that my book keeping a finger on the button towards
Speaker 3: the and I suggest some ways in which we can
Speaker 3: build some of these gaps.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I want to ask you about the gaps,
Speaker 1: but before I do, you also say that multiple administrations
Speaker 1: amplified that anxiety of the nation. Was that was that
Speaker 1: intentional or was that just how they maneuvered through the time.
Speaker 4: Yeah. So, and it's a lot about the rhetoric of
Speaker 4: the president.
Speaker 3: You see this in particular, you know, during the colds
Speaker 3: War and you know other things.
Speaker 4: Is that that take place?
Speaker 3: In fact, I listened to your podcast on Artemis too
Speaker 3: and really great and nineteen fifty seven's Buttnick for example.
Speaker 3: Finally there was this this method to deliver bombs. So
Speaker 3: not only did the Soviets develop the bomb quite quicker
Speaker 3: than American scientists thought they would, but now this this
Speaker 3: what was science fiction became reality. Right, there was this
Speaker 3: ability to deliver these nuclear missiles. So you see, you know,
Speaker 3: the rhetoric change, and and you also see politicians preparing
Speaker 3: for both continuity the president and and then you know
Speaker 3: the civil preparedness, continuity of government and continuity of you know, society.
Speaker 4: And then that's also echoed in culture.
Speaker 2: Right, So do you think like without.
Speaker 1: The advent of nuclear energy, would we not get the
Speaker 1: twenty fifth Amendment?
Speaker 3: You know, that's that's an interesting because it does seem
Speaker 3: like Kennedy's assassination and this you know, now that we're
Speaker 3: in this modern era of globalization, the speed, time and
Speaker 3: pace of communications has increased. So I think it was
Speaker 3: the proximate and prime cause. But a really important reason
Speaker 3: was this nuclear anxiety. And so I've examined unline archives.
Speaker 3: I was fortunate to talk with the author of the amendment,
Speaker 3: US Senator birch By before he passed, and he said,
Speaker 3: I said, you know, Senator, was nuclear anxiety on like
Speaker 3: in the back of your mind, you know, early on
Speaker 3: in my research process. And he said it was impossible
Speaker 3: for it not to be on the forefront rather back
Speaker 3: of his mind, And so I would dug into the archives.
Speaker 4: I was fortunate to have access the US Senate Historians.
Speaker 3: Archives, and you can see throughout congressional debate in both
Speaker 3: houses and in the States, how this fear of a
Speaker 3: nuclear armageddon pushed the process forward.
Speaker 2: So interesting.
Speaker 1: So you mentioned there are gaps in this amendment just
Speaker 1: relevant for today.
Speaker 2: Talk about what some of those gaps are.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So the first one is I think perhaps most
Speaker 3: relevant is inability. What constitutes inability, and that hasn't been decided.
Speaker 3: So usually when like the I think we're up to
Speaker 3: eighty five the congressional members who are calling for the
Speaker 3: twenty fifth Amendment right now, but when they're calling for
Speaker 3: the twenty fifth Amendment, they're usually calling for Section four
Speaker 3: of the amendment. And so really the twenty fifth Amendment
Speaker 3: allows for the president to decide that he's enabled and
Speaker 3: then take back the responsibilities, the powers and duties when
Speaker 3: he decides he's able.
Speaker 4: The section four says, well, if he's in a.
Speaker 3: Position of inability and he can't make that call, then
Speaker 3: the vice president and a majority of cabinet or a
Speaker 3: body that Congress so provides designates by law will.
Speaker 4: Make that decision.
Speaker 3: So the Congress has not designated a body, which I
Speaker 3: think they should do, and that body should be composed
Speaker 3: of experts that are nonpartisan, impartial and there yeah, and
Speaker 3: that don't owe their positions of power to the president
Speaker 3: like the vice president and the cabinet do, right, right,
Speaker 3: So that's the first issue is what constitutes inability.
Speaker 1: So that part inability that has never gone up to
Speaker 1: a court level that adjudicated or delineated codified exactly what
Speaker 1: that means.
Speaker 2: That hasn't done that yet.
Speaker 3: No, And there's been a number of you know, commissions
Speaker 3: and studies and fat former President Carter was on a
Speaker 3: commission to determine and you know what would comprise this body?
Speaker 3: You know what type of medical experts? Who gets to decide?
Speaker 3: Does the president shoose, does Congress get to choose members?
Speaker 3: Does it include maybe psychiatrists? And for example, to you know,
Speaker 3: determine to make this determination and then you know, this
Speaker 3: body would be more likely than the president and the
Speaker 3: majority of the cabinet to suggest invoking Section four.
Speaker 4: And I think it would probably still be up to
Speaker 4: the vice.
Speaker 3: President because all of the mechanisms of the twenty fifth
Speaker 3: Amendment revolve around the vice president.
Speaker 1: Right, So for all the folks, and we talked about
Speaker 1: this a little bit before the break, for all the
Speaker 1: folks talking about invoking the twenty fifth Amendment, just in
Speaker 1: today's political landscape, with what we know about JD Vance
Speaker 1: for example, for what we know about this cabinet. We've
Speaker 1: all seen a cabinet meeting where they go around obsequiously,
Speaker 1: you know, praising the president. Does it impossible that the
Speaker 1: vice president and a majority of the cabinet would vote
Speaker 1: to invoke this.
Speaker 3: In short, no, And I did study this in periods
Speaker 3: of high nuclear tensions during the Cold War. And for example,
Speaker 3: if you look at Reagan and the assassination attempts in
Speaker 3: March in nineteen eighty one, you know, his lung was
Speaker 3: punctured and he you know, he made a show and
Speaker 3: he sort of stumbled into the hospital and then you know,
Speaker 3: he was joking and things like that.
Speaker 4: But that was exactly.
Speaker 3: When if he was going to be knocked out with anesthesia.
Speaker 3: That's exactly a situation in which the framers of the
Speaker 3: twenty fifth Amendment thought that it should be invoked, whether
Speaker 3: my president and the cabinet, if he was already enables
Speaker 3: or if he knew that he was going into surgery and.
Speaker 4: You know, should invoke it.
Speaker 3: So it shows these these patterns where you know that
Speaker 3: it's not going to be invoked because the individuals around
Speaker 3: the president are concerned about their power, and the president
Speaker 3: himself is concerned about his imagery. Because the thought with
Speaker 3: Reagan was he might recover from this punctured lung, but
Speaker 3: he wouldn't recover from the imagery of appearing week and
Speaker 3: an Aga and yeah, so that is so it's very
Speaker 3: unlikely that Section four would be invoked successfully.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and then I can't believe I'm asking this question,
Speaker 1: but it is relevant what what happens to the nuclear
Speaker 1: codes during this period of transition, if that were ever
Speaker 1: to happen.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So that's interesting because, as you know, the president
Speaker 3: has someone who follows him with this nuclear football, and
Speaker 3: the nucletar football itself is really interesting because in some
Speaker 3: ways is the only physical manifestation of the nation's head
Speaker 3: of stage right, because King Charles, for example, as the
Speaker 3: orb and the scepter and the crown and all the
Speaker 3: president as head of statelely has is this.
Speaker 4: Nuclear football and the codes.
Speaker 3: And during the Reagan assassination attempt right after that, you know,
Speaker 3: the codes were in a soup pocket, you know, kept
Speaker 3: by the.
Speaker 4: FBI as evidence.
Speaker 3: They weren't even with you know, the president at the time,
Speaker 3: and so it was it's just really, you know, importance
Speaker 3: is such an important, you know, like topic though we
Speaker 3: haven't really considered. And after January, during January sixth, during
Speaker 3: the insurrection of the Capitol, when the mob was sort
Speaker 3: of looking for Vice President Pence, they got within about
Speaker 3: one hundred feet of him and his nuclear football, and
Speaker 3: he just escaped down a different card.
Speaker 4: So and you know, had they gotten hold of them,
Speaker 4: they probably couldn't have done much with it.
Speaker 3: But you know there's really you know, terrorist groups and
Speaker 3: things would have paid for that information to try to
Speaker 3: figure out how it worked.
Speaker 4: So really really scary. But and and of course.
Speaker 3: One of the other things I suggest in the book
Speaker 3: is that we really need to take a look at
Speaker 3: the president and the fact that he is the sole
Speaker 3: authority over nuclear weapons.
Speaker 1: Yeah, especially this president, right, this president has in many
Speaker 1: ways become sort of the test case for so much
Speaker 1: of what's in the Constitution and why it's in the
Speaker 1: constitution for a president like this who wants to test
Speaker 1: it constantly and really doesn't have.
Speaker 2: A ton of affection.
Speaker 1: For its legitimacy, and it's and it's supremacy. So it's
Speaker 1: really interesting. And I can't think of more like high
Speaker 1: stakes than nuclear war at this time.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's right, And and so that's why I mean,
Speaker 3: I think people are thinking the fact that he threatens
Speaker 3: the end of civilization, which implies potentially the use of
Speaker 3: a nuclear weapon, and the fact that the chances of
Speaker 3: him using a nuclear weapon are not zero.
Speaker 4: That on zero should.
Speaker 3: Make I think everyone around the globe concerned and hopefully
Speaker 3: make policymakers focus on this issue and act.
Speaker 4: But the thing with the.
Speaker 3: Twenty fifth Amendment and these eighty five members of Congress
Speaker 3: that are so far that are calling for it, is
Speaker 3: that the twenty fifth Amendment was never designed to remove
Speaker 3: a president permanently. So it was designed to address these
Speaker 3: issues of inability, but it wasn't designed to be used
Speaker 3: for political disagreements, policy disagreements, or even you know what
Speaker 3: might be unfitness or even like some people say, well
Speaker 3: his presidential temperament, right, he's rash, and so it wasn't
Speaker 3: designed to be used in any of these cases.
Speaker 1: So that kind of makes it sound like a pipe
Speaker 1: dream for those of those people who are wishing that
Speaker 1: would happen.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean I think, well two thoughts on that.
Speaker 3: I think impeachment is actually more plausible, and it requires
Speaker 3: seventy more votes in the House the twenty fifth Amendment
Speaker 3: than impeachment.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and so the lower threshold exactly.
Speaker 3: And my other thought is something I suggest it's actually
Speaker 3: a constitutional law scholar Brian Calls, who originally suggested it,
Speaker 3: but that perhaps taking a flexible view of the twenty
Speaker 3: fifth Amendment and the Constitution in cases of irreparable catastrophe.
Speaker 3: So something like this where the president has this finger
Speaker 3: on the nuclear button and is about to press it,
Speaker 3: that perhaps at that point the twenty fifth Amendment could
Speaker 3: be invoked, even though perhaps he's not enabled, just so
Speaker 3: that his head, he'd like cooler heads would prevail. He
Speaker 3: would be temporarily removed, you know, his hot head could
Speaker 3: cool off, and then you know, at then perhaps you know,
Speaker 3: he could regain the presidency, because again it was not
Speaker 3: the twenty at the moment wasn't designed for permanent removal.
Speaker 2: Whereas oh, yeah, it's so interesting.
Speaker 1: The book is keeping a finger on the button, presidential
Speaker 1: continuity and the nuclear age. Doctor Rebecca Lubou, thanks so
Speaker 1: much for joining us. This was really interesting. And before
Speaker 1: I before I let you go, we like to end
Speaker 1: with an exit poll of three questions of varying degrees
Speaker 1: of seriousness. So my first question to you is what's
Speaker 1: your favorite movie about presidential power?
Speaker 3: That's interesting and I do address you know, this anxiety
Speaker 3: in culture culture, yeah, around nuclear weapons, and so I
Speaker 3: do trace some that by film books. Yeah, movies song TV,
Speaker 3: and I would think that relevant to the topic that
Speaker 3: the nineteen sixty four is Stanley Kubrick movie Doctor Strangelove
Speaker 3: or How I Stopped Worrying and Learned to Love the
Speaker 3: Bomb is the quintessential movie on their topic, right, So
Speaker 3: that's the one where it insane. US General orders a strike,
Speaker 3: orders a strike on Moscow, and so the US President,
Speaker 3: in order to avoid additional retaliation by the Soviets, offers
Speaker 3: to strike New York with a nuclear missile.
Speaker 4: Not that it's on the National.
Speaker 3: Registry, you know, the Film Registry and the Library of Congress,
Speaker 3: I think speaks to its enduring cultural significance.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a good one. I you know, as a kid,
Speaker 2: I was really captivated by war games. Yeah, that's a
Speaker 2: good one.
Speaker 1: And then later in life, Some of All Fears is
Speaker 1: a really really good movie about how bad things could
Speaker 1: go because of miscommunication and bad actors and the messiness
Speaker 1: of those moments.
Speaker 2: So there's some some a bunch of really good ones. Second,
Speaker 2: who's a policy person.
Speaker 1: That you really like on this topic for our listeners
Speaker 1: to go and find besides yourself?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think maybe Ted lu right, he has the
Speaker 3: twenty seventeen restricting first use of NIKO the Weapons Act
Speaker 3: that was reintroduced you know, in every Congress from least
Speaker 3: from one hundred and sixteenth to the one hundred and nineteenth.
Speaker 3: Jamie Congressman right, and Jamie Raskin too, he's more than one.
Speaker 3: The second time with Speaker Nancy Pelosi at the time,
Speaker 3: introduced one on inability and creating a medical body.
Speaker 4: So I would like to see that.
Speaker 2: They're on the forefront of this. Yeah, okay.
Speaker 1: And finally, how do we ensure that our democracy continues?
Speaker 4: Wow?
Speaker 3: Well, I think we've been talking about how to ensure
Speaker 3: that human kind and continue.
Speaker 4: So I think that that's first and foremost.
Speaker 3: Yes, But also our democracy, I believe is also imperiled.
Speaker 4: And I think you know, it's if.
Speaker 3: The people lead, eventually the leaders will follow.
Speaker 4: You've you've heard that saying, so.
Speaker 3: You know, continue to you know, reach out to your
Speaker 3: legislators and and your vote is your voice, so keep
Speaker 3: keep voting.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we're in it.
Speaker 1: We're in an election year, guys, you're going to get
Speaker 1: your chance just a few months.
Speaker 2: Get out there. Okay.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much to uh doctor Rebecca Lubou and
Speaker 1: thank you for joining.
Speaker 2: We'll see you next time.
Speaker 1: Off the Cup is a production of iHeart Podcasts as
Speaker 1: part of the Reason Choice Network.
Speaker 2: If you want more, check out the other.
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Speaker 1: For Off the Cup, I'm your host, SI Cup editing
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Speaker 2: Our executive producer are me A se cop Lauren Hanson,
Speaker 2: and Lindsay Hoffman.
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