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Hello, 0:01:51.280 --> 0:01:54.720 They're happy Wednesday, and welcome to another episode of the 0:01:54.800 --> 0:01:58.800 Chuck Podcast A little rundown on today. It is Wednesday, 0:01:58.880 --> 0:02:02.080 which means you're gonna get a't a top five list. 0:02:02.440 --> 0:02:06.360 I got a fun one for you. It involves the 0:02:06.400 --> 0:02:11.360 president and prestigious awards, so I give you a big hint. 0:02:11.440 --> 0:02:14.720 But maybe you still won't quite know where I'm headed 0:02:14.760 --> 0:02:16.480 with that. We'll do some letters, but I want to 0:02:16.520 --> 0:02:21.200 begin today with you know, one of the things that 0:02:21.240 --> 0:02:23.960 I'm mindful of is that sometimes we're so dark and 0:02:24.120 --> 0:02:30.959 negative that we sometimes can miss a big deal taken 0:02:31.000 --> 0:02:35.119 place in plain sight. Right, And to start with an 0:02:35.160 --> 0:02:38.760 issue that has not really made the rounds on cable television, 0:02:39.320 --> 0:02:42.840 you haven't seen much of it on social media, and 0:02:42.880 --> 0:02:46.600 it certainly has yet to generate a Chiron countdown clock. 0:02:49.600 --> 0:02:51.440 But it might matter a lot more than most of 0:02:51.440 --> 0:02:54.880 the headlines we've been dealing with over the last few weeks. 0:02:55.919 --> 0:02:59.720 And it's a constitutional amendment proposal that is now circulating 0:02:59.760 --> 0:03:05.440 in Congress that would allow congressional lawmakers to nullify a 0:03:05.480 --> 0:03:09.880 presidential pardon. This is not a bill that, while you 0:03:09.919 --> 0:03:11.720 may have, it's not an idea that would have gotten 0:03:11.760 --> 0:03:15.000 much traction or must interest even five years ago. But 0:03:15.160 --> 0:03:18.480 something like this seems very plausible to me, and it's 0:03:18.520 --> 0:03:20.440 plausible enough that I wanted to give it a little 0:03:20.520 --> 0:03:24.280 extra attention. And that's sometimes the role I feel like 0:03:24.360 --> 0:03:27.080 I can play best here, which is like, hey, you know, 0:03:28.040 --> 0:03:31.520 I used to run a mainstream news supposed mainstream news organization, 0:03:32.320 --> 0:03:35.040 a couple of them. Here's what I would be leaning 0:03:35.080 --> 0:03:38.320 into there, and you should be too. And that's sort 0:03:38.360 --> 0:03:43.240 of a role I like to play sometimes, but we 0:03:43.320 --> 0:03:47.600 may be seeing a major structural shift in conversation at 0:03:47.600 --> 0:03:51.119 a time that we really needed, and it may be 0:03:52.720 --> 0:03:54.080 to me. I hope it gives you a little bit 0:03:54.080 --> 0:03:57.040 of hope, because it gives me. I'm granted, I'm looking 0:03:57.040 --> 0:04:00.200 for it. So I'm looking for this, which is that 0:04:00.280 --> 0:04:03.400 maybe we have begun a new era of reform that 0:04:03.560 --> 0:04:06.400 you know, like the progressive era of the early twentieth century, 0:04:06.440 --> 0:04:12.200 which created some needed constitutional reform that we're finally starting. 0:04:12.240 --> 0:04:14.080 I've been saying, we're going to get it, We're going 0:04:14.120 --> 0:04:16.920 to get it. Well, guess what. We're finally starting to 0:04:16.960 --> 0:04:20.080 see a concrete proposal, and the fact that it starts 0:04:20.080 --> 0:04:25.400 with pardons is actually not surprising to me, because we 0:04:25.480 --> 0:04:29.200 knew something was going to trigger. Right I think you know, 0:04:29.279 --> 0:04:32.960 in reform eras happen when enough people on both sides 0:04:32.960 --> 0:04:35.760 of the aisle side, it's the rules that need to 0:04:35.760 --> 0:04:39.599 be tightened or changed that a singular president can't do. 0:04:39.720 --> 0:04:43.400 The fixes that we now know are systemic or structural. 0:04:44.000 --> 0:04:45.920 So look, why did we start with pardons? Well, I 0:04:45.920 --> 0:04:48.320 think it's pretty obvious what triggered this right pardon power, 0:04:48.720 --> 0:04:51.960 and it's how it's been abused, particularly with this president. 0:04:52.279 --> 0:04:55.160 Under Donald Trump, the pardon power has become so politically 0:04:55.279 --> 0:04:59.359 charged in ways we haven't seen ever on the presidential level. 0:04:59.400 --> 0:05:03.440 We've seen governors sell pardons for profit, we have not 0:05:03.560 --> 0:05:11.320 seen presidents do it. It is aggressively as Trump has. 0:05:11.320 --> 0:05:14.280 We've seen what appear to be potential pay to play 0:05:14.279 --> 0:05:16.760 pardons in some form or another. But it would be 0:05:16.800 --> 0:05:20.560 one controversial pardon by a president, you know, not essentially 0:05:20.600 --> 0:05:25.679 the entire process being monetized, which is what's happened here today. 0:05:25.800 --> 0:05:29.039 And so under Trump, you know, some of the most 0:05:29.080 --> 0:05:33.240 controversial ones. Right, there's the broad January sixth partons for anybody, 0:05:33.240 --> 0:05:35.480 and that is that has allowed a lot of bad 0:05:35.520 --> 0:05:37.880 people who deserve to be behind bars not to be 0:05:37.880 --> 0:05:40.920 behind bars. Some of them have committed crimes as their 0:05:40.960 --> 0:05:47.599 pardon was made official. That's been a total a disaster 0:05:47.920 --> 0:05:49.720 by doing that. But we know why he did it. 0:05:49.720 --> 0:05:53.200 It's his own personal motivation, believing that somehow January sixth 0:05:54.040 --> 0:05:56.200 was not what it was, that it was somehow a 0:05:56.279 --> 0:05:59.880 lawful protest. We know he pardons people that are represented 0:05:59.920 --> 0:06:04.080 by longtime political allies or people like Roger Stone who 0:06:04.120 --> 0:06:09.280 get paid as sort of an intermediary for the pardons. 0:06:09.279 --> 0:06:12.960 We know that's taking place. I mean, you know, you 0:06:12.960 --> 0:06:16.320 don't think the former president of Hondura's got pardoned for free, 0:06:16.400 --> 0:06:21.159 do you. So you know that sits out there. And 0:06:21.200 --> 0:06:23.720 then there's this pattern of Trump where he pardons people 0:06:24.080 --> 0:06:27.440 that are accused of doing things that he's been accused of, 0:06:27.560 --> 0:06:32.320 always in the white collar space, in particular financial crimes 0:06:32.320 --> 0:06:35.839 and things like that. So we now know it's fair 0:06:35.880 --> 0:06:41.120 to say that the perception is that pardon power is 0:06:41.160 --> 0:06:46.120 now drifted towards the personal and political. It's no longer 0:06:46.760 --> 0:06:51.080 what its original construct was about, which was constitutional mercy, 0:06:51.320 --> 0:06:56.000 if you will. Now it's about political protection. And look, 0:06:56.040 --> 0:06:59.880 it's like everything Trump does he's not the first to do, 0:07:00.279 --> 0:07:02.120 and he's not the you know, it's not as if 0:07:02.120 --> 0:07:05.279 it's not been done by members of both parties. He's 0:07:05.400 --> 0:07:08.279 just done it more aggressively and more you know, sort 0:07:08.279 --> 0:07:11.120 of like rubbing our nose and dog manure face, right, 0:07:11.240 --> 0:07:15.360 like he's grotesque about it. But what Joe Biden did 0:07:15.440 --> 0:07:18.280 at the end of his term, I've always thought was 0:07:18.720 --> 0:07:20.760 just as bad as what Trump's doing because he almost 0:07:20.880 --> 0:07:23.920 gave Trump a license to do it when he did 0:07:23.920 --> 0:07:27.440 his preemptive pardons that involved family members that had no 0:07:27.520 --> 0:07:31.800 business getting a pardon at all or certainly seemed to 0:07:31.800 --> 0:07:34.160 get pardoned for, you know, not for the thing he 0:07:34.200 --> 0:07:37.040 claimed they were getting pardoned for, but you know, and 0:07:37.120 --> 0:07:41.600 even used clemency at times that did generate some partisan backlash, 0:07:41.760 --> 0:07:44.240 and it seemed like some of his sweeping commutations were 0:07:44.240 --> 0:07:48.400 tied to some political issues that he wanted to bring 0:07:48.440 --> 0:07:52.280 to the forefront. So again, while Biden didn't do it 0:07:52.320 --> 0:07:55.480 as ham handedly as Trump is, what he did with 0:07:55.520 --> 0:07:58.840 his family at the end was grotesque. The preemptive pardons 0:08:00.360 --> 0:08:02.840 using Trump as the as the as the rationale to 0:08:02.880 --> 0:08:06.120 do it was all the more awful, I'll be honest, 0:08:06.160 --> 0:08:10.679 because it just assumed corruption in the process itself. And 0:08:10.800 --> 0:08:14.200 so I understand you assume Trump is corrupt, but then 0:08:14.280 --> 0:08:18.760 to essentially do it before Trump actually does what you fear, 0:08:19.720 --> 0:08:24.520 you know, you've suddenly committed your own slate of corruption there. 0:08:24.880 --> 0:08:28.960 So it is. And frankly, in order to get institutional change, 0:08:28.960 --> 0:08:32.000 you need bad actors on both sides. So, you know, 0:08:32.000 --> 0:08:34.360 if we want to make the Biden pardons sort of 0:08:34.720 --> 0:08:36.959 the you know, the oh, by the way, I think 0:08:37.000 --> 0:08:41.080 it's worthy, those preemptive pardons. Let's not I'm not sure 0:08:41.559 --> 0:08:45.160 this is not equal both siderisms here. Okay, what Trump 0:08:45.200 --> 0:08:49.400 has done is on an unprecedented level. But to get 0:08:49.440 --> 0:08:52.920 this structural reform, you're going to need bipartisan buy in. 0:08:53.080 --> 0:08:56.679 And what Biden did was awful. What Trump does has 0:08:56.720 --> 0:09:00.560 been worse. So no matter what, whether you support the 0:09:00.800 --> 0:09:04.560 individual actions or oppose them, the structural concern has become 0:09:04.600 --> 0:09:09.360 the same that the power of pardoning presidential pardons has 0:09:09.440 --> 0:09:12.800 become a high stakes political instrument now in the last decade, 0:09:13.040 --> 0:09:16.520 and it's got to change. And now that both parties 0:09:16.840 --> 0:09:20.640 are fearing how the other might wield this power, that's 0:09:20.679 --> 0:09:25.760 when you actually start getting reform conversations, and it is 0:09:26.040 --> 0:09:29.680 incredibly important. So late last year, a Maryland Congressman by 0:09:29.720 --> 0:09:36.400 the name of Johnny Oulzuski introduced a constitutional amendment to 0:09:36.800 --> 0:09:42.280 give Congress the opportunity to nullify a pardon, and it 0:09:42.320 --> 0:09:45.520 would under certain conditions, and it would essentially it's the 0:09:46.160 --> 0:09:51.360 similar to what the power Congress has now to override vetos. Now, 0:09:51.400 --> 0:09:55.480 what made me interested in this story this last week 0:09:56.040 --> 0:09:59.160 is that this was a Democrat introducing it. So, and 0:09:59.200 --> 0:10:02.120 you sometimes can get these partisan ideas introduced and there's 0:10:02.120 --> 0:10:05.080 nobody on the other side that's interested. Well, Don Bacon, 0:10:05.400 --> 0:10:08.440 a Republican from Omaha, Nebraska who's not running for reelection, 0:10:08.880 --> 0:10:11.600 decided to sign on as an early co sponsor and 0:10:11.600 --> 0:10:14.720 it made him the first Republican to support this constitutional amendment. 0:10:15.200 --> 0:10:17.480 And it's always important. The minute you can get something 0:10:17.520 --> 0:10:22.439 by partisan it suddenly has traction and has an opportunity. Now, 0:10:22.480 --> 0:10:25.240 let me read you the proposal word for word here 0:10:25.880 --> 0:10:28.800 of this pardon amendment that Congress may, by a vote 0:10:28.840 --> 0:10:31.880 of two thirds of each House, nullify any pardon granted 0:10:31.880 --> 0:10:34.320 by the President of the United States upon petition of 0:10:34.360 --> 0:10:37.040 twenty members of the House of Representatives and five members 0:10:37.400 --> 0:10:39.760 of the Senate. A vote shall be held within a 0:10:39.760 --> 0:10:44.439 specified period to determine whether such pardon shall stand. So again, 0:10:44.520 --> 0:10:48.560 it's modeling. So this amendment specific amendment would model the 0:10:48.600 --> 0:10:52.440 process after what is the veto override structure, So they 0:10:52.440 --> 0:10:57.440 wouldn't abolish the presidential pardon. Something I might consider there's 0:10:57.480 --> 0:11:01.520 not partisan punishment, but it's a good old fashioned constitutional check. 0:11:01.559 --> 0:11:05.040 Would be something the founders would be impressed with because 0:11:05.440 --> 0:11:08.480 it's a it's a high threshold to nullify a presidential pardon. 0:11:08.679 --> 0:11:11.240 That's not easy. Two thirds of each House of Congress 0:11:11.240 --> 0:11:13.400 and to get your sort of twenty members of the House, 0:11:13.480 --> 0:11:15.640 five members of the Senate. That's probably the easy part. 0:11:15.800 --> 0:11:19.360 The hard part is getting that two thirds. I might 0:11:19.480 --> 0:11:22.520 argue that, you know, the I think the having leaving 0:11:22.600 --> 0:11:25.240 one person with any of that power is the mistake itself. 0:11:25.559 --> 0:11:27.720 And then maybe you create a pardon board that includes, 0:11:28.120 --> 0:11:32.760 you know, the two longest serving members of the Supreme Court, 0:11:32.880 --> 0:11:35.439 the you know, say, you know, the two longest serving 0:11:35.440 --> 0:11:38.440 members of the House and the Senate, the Attorney General, 0:11:38.559 --> 0:11:41.200 the president, and the Vice president, something like that. That 0:11:41.240 --> 0:11:44.640 would become a pardon board where no one individual could decide, 0:11:44.679 --> 0:11:49.880 but you would bring bring individual cases there. But either way, 0:11:50.000 --> 0:11:54.280 the fact that Congress has a bipartisan amendment to potentially 0:11:54.320 --> 0:11:57.320 at least put a check on the pardon power of 0:11:57.320 --> 0:12:01.600 the president is a big deal, not a small deal. 0:12:01.679 --> 0:12:04.319 And I think it signifies the start of something. So 0:12:04.400 --> 0:12:06.760 let's zoom out here. The last time Americans felt that 0:12:06.840 --> 0:12:11.600 the structure itself was compromised, we Americans amended the Constitution. 0:12:11.840 --> 0:12:14.560 And it wasn't an abstract it was all scandal driven. 0:12:14.760 --> 0:12:16.559 Let me tell you the story of the Seventeenth Amendment. 0:12:16.720 --> 0:12:20.600 All Right, before nineteen thirteen, state legislatures chose US Senators. 0:12:21.280 --> 0:12:24.600 The system had been rotting for years. Deadlocks had left 0:12:24.679 --> 0:12:28.720 too many Senate seats vacant. Party bosses essentially controlled the 0:12:28.760 --> 0:12:32.160 appointment process. Wasn't the voters hadn't much say at all. 0:12:32.360 --> 0:12:37.120 Wealthy interests with lobby state house votes. I mean, look, 0:12:37.160 --> 0:12:39.840 I'll be honest, I think you know, the lower down 0:12:39.880 --> 0:12:44.319 the ladder, you go the most corruptible institutions or state legislatures, 0:12:44.360 --> 0:12:46.840 then city councils, right, you keep going down. Right, The 0:12:46.920 --> 0:12:50.480 least corruptible these days has been Congress. So imagine all 0:12:50.520 --> 0:12:54.240 that power deciding a US Senate in the state level. 0:12:54.559 --> 0:12:57.920 It was a mess. But it took a big scandal 0:12:58.000 --> 0:13:00.360 to sober the public up and say, hey, enough of 0:13:00.400 --> 0:13:03.240 this shit. Let me tell you the story of a 0:13:03.320 --> 0:13:08.000 gentleman named William Lowermer in the state of Illinois. He 0:13:08.160 --> 0:13:11.080 was elected by the state legislature to the US Senate, 0:13:11.160 --> 0:13:14.719 I believe in nineteen oh nine. Well, soon after, a 0:13:14.760 --> 0:13:17.880 state legislator confessed that he was paid one thousand dollars 0:13:17.920 --> 0:13:20.400 to vote for the guy. That's roughly thirty five thousand 0:13:20.400 --> 0:13:24.080 dollars today. Investigators then uncovered and what was called a 0:13:24.200 --> 0:13:28.360 jackpot slush fund that allegedly used was used to secure 0:13:28.520 --> 0:13:33.760 enough votes in a Chicago hotel bathroom. So the Senate investigated. 0:13:33.800 --> 0:13:37.880 They cleared him once, but the public outrage exploded. New 0:13:37.920 --> 0:13:40.760 evidence emerged of just how this process worked, and so 0:13:40.800 --> 0:13:43.800 by nineteen twelve, the Senate declared his election corrupt and 0:13:43.840 --> 0:13:47.360 vacated the seat. But what America saw was a Senate 0:13:47.400 --> 0:13:51.280 seat that was effectively purchased. So guess what happened? We 0:13:51.320 --> 0:13:54.480 finally changed the constitution. It had been building for a while, 0:13:54.760 --> 0:13:56.880 but it took a scandal like that one to sober 0:13:56.880 --> 0:14:00.000 ebody up and say yeah, seventeenth Amendment suddenly moved Senate 0:14:00.000 --> 0:14:04.760 elections directly to voters. So corruption became visible and the 0:14:04.800 --> 0:14:13.240 reform followed. That's what we have here with partons. This 0:14:13.320 --> 0:14:15.400 episode of the Chuck Podcast is being brought to you 0:14:15.440 --> 0:14:18.360 by Quints. As you know, a well built wardrobe is 0:14:18.360 --> 0:14:20.920 about the pieces that work together, hold up over time, 0:14:20.960 --> 0:14:23.960 and frankly allow you to be flexible and sort of 0:14:24.000 --> 0:14:28.560 business casual to say, social casual. 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Working 0:17:23.560 --> 0:17:28.480 families paid disproportionately a larger share of tariff revenue to 0:17:28.520 --> 0:17:32.320 the government treasury than the wealthy people did. The wealthiest 0:17:32.359 --> 0:17:36.320 industrialists paid relatively little in any kind of taxation. Supreme 0:17:36.359 --> 0:17:38.480 Court even struck down an earlier attempt to create an 0:17:38.480 --> 0:17:42.160 income tax. He said it was unconstitutional. Well, so reformers 0:17:42.240 --> 0:17:46.080 amended the Constitution to make a federal income tax unquestionably legal. 0:17:47.200 --> 0:17:49.399 And the sixteen Amendment wasn't subtle. Subtle. It was all 0:17:49.440 --> 0:17:52.960 about shifting the burden upward. And why was there traction 0:17:53.080 --> 0:17:56.120 for that at that time? Because you had these wealthy industrialists. 0:17:56.200 --> 0:17:59.720 Income inequality was massive, you know, you had an explosion 0:17:59.720 --> 0:18:02.880 in sort of abused labor, child labor. It was terrible. 0:18:03.520 --> 0:18:06.600 So this is why the public appetite for this was huge. 0:18:07.359 --> 0:18:10.720 The public believed these elites, these robber barons. That's why 0:18:10.720 --> 0:18:14.040 they got the name. We're gaming the system, We're robbing 0:18:14.200 --> 0:18:18.720 the system. So the system was changed. And let's not 0:18:18.760 --> 0:18:21.280 forget the nineteen Amendment, which also came in this same period. 0:18:21.680 --> 0:18:23.960 Half the population wasn't allowed to vote simply because of 0:18:23.960 --> 0:18:26.879 their gender. Nineteen the amendment corrected that it was an 0:18:26.880 --> 0:18:30.560 incremental reform. It was structural expansion of small d democratic 0:18:30.560 --> 0:18:34.119 power at a time when the public felt that the 0:18:34.240 --> 0:18:38.800 democracy was slipping away. So it looked like the elites 0:18:38.800 --> 0:18:41.560 were gaming the system. The wealthy were getting wealthier while 0:18:41.600 --> 0:18:45.480 the rest of us were being left behind. And oh, 0:18:45.520 --> 0:18:48.040 by the way, the democracy wasn't really even representing the 0:18:48.400 --> 0:18:51.439 most of the country. Because half the country couldn't couldn't 0:18:51.520 --> 0:18:55.399 vote that structural reform. That's a reform era. Question is 0:18:55.400 --> 0:18:57.200 are we about to do the same thing now. Look, 0:18:57.440 --> 0:18:59.960 not every reform from that era was a good idea. 0:19:00.800 --> 0:19:04.800 The eighteenth Amendment Prohibition was born of moral urgency, right 0:19:04.920 --> 0:19:08.760 temperance movements believed alcohol was destroying families, corrupting politics, and 0:19:08.840 --> 0:19:13.040 undermining public virtues. So basically at the same time of 0:19:13.080 --> 0:19:16.119 distrust of politicians, distrust of elites, this is why one 0:19:16.160 --> 0:19:21.520 of these this moral amendment got through, right to ban 0:19:21.640 --> 0:19:24.600 the manufacturing and sale of alcohol. Well, that ended up 0:19:24.640 --> 0:19:29.479 actually jumpstarting crime, arguably created the modern mob system that 0:19:29.520 --> 0:19:32.800 we still deal with today. Black markets, organized crime, all 0:19:32.840 --> 0:19:35.880 that mess. And so within fourteen years we're like, ooh, 0:19:35.920 --> 0:19:38.200 that was a bad idea, and so the twenty first 0:19:38.200 --> 0:19:43.240 Amendment repealed prohibition. So it's an important lesson because reform 0:19:43.280 --> 0:19:46.560 eras are powerful and they're also potentially risky. When we 0:19:46.600 --> 0:19:49.679 amend the constitution, we are playing with the architecture of 0:19:49.760 --> 0:19:53.840 the country itself. Some reforms will stabilize the democracy. Direct 0:19:53.880 --> 0:19:56.800 election of senators, did the income tax, did women the 0:19:56.840 --> 0:20:00.880 right to vote? Did others overcorrect like prohibition It's something 0:20:00.920 --> 0:20:03.640 I think about about the balance budget Amendment. I'm sort 0:20:03.680 --> 0:20:06.720 of intrigued by it. I kind of in theory agree 0:20:06.760 --> 0:20:08.880 to it. And then you're like, what would this mean? 0:20:08.920 --> 0:20:13.119 Could this create an economic catastrophe for us in ways 0:20:13.160 --> 0:20:16.320 that we have not, you know, because of the unintended consequence. 0:20:16.359 --> 0:20:18.159 So and I'm mindful. I think we're going to have 0:20:18.200 --> 0:20:20.760 an era of reform. So the question is what does 0:20:21.480 --> 0:20:25.440 that look like. I do think this that historians may 0:20:25.440 --> 0:20:29.439 one day say see the Obama and Trump presidencies as 0:20:29.440 --> 0:20:34.280 bookends of the same structural frustration. They had different ideologies, 0:20:34.320 --> 0:20:36.480 but it was the same demand. They were elected to 0:20:36.520 --> 0:20:39.639 shake things up, to change the system, fix what feels broken. 0:20:40.560 --> 0:20:42.680 At the time, the public thought, well, maybe a president 0:20:42.960 --> 0:20:49.360 could restore some balance. Turns out structural corrosion requires structural repair, 0:20:50.280 --> 0:20:57.040 and structural repair requires constitutional thinking. They alone cannot fix it, 0:20:57.520 --> 0:21:01.119 meaning a singular president Obama couldn't do it. Trump clearly 0:21:01.119 --> 0:21:06.320 cannot do it. So if this pardon conversation gains traction, 0:21:06.560 --> 0:21:09.480 expect more to follow. And this one should. This one, 0:21:09.520 --> 0:21:12.040 to me is an easy one to get traction for. 0:21:12.720 --> 0:21:15.199 And I think, you know, it's one of those things 0:21:15.760 --> 0:21:19.520 that could be an interesting way for Republicans to show 0:21:19.520 --> 0:21:23.960 some independence from Trump but grounding it in the Constitution 0:21:24.160 --> 0:21:28.680 and for protection of future presidents abusing the power of 0:21:28.720 --> 0:21:32.639 the pardon. So it's also a pretty good way to 0:21:32.720 --> 0:21:36.520 sort of keep track of Huh. You know, it's almost like, 0:21:36.840 --> 0:21:39.919 you know, if I were a Republican strategist trying to 0:21:40.359 --> 0:21:43.639 mitigate the damage that's coming in this midterm year, I 0:21:43.760 --> 0:21:47.520 might want a vehicle like this pardon constitutional amendment where 0:21:47.520 --> 0:21:49.200 I can sign on as a co sponsor to show 0:21:49.200 --> 0:21:53.359 my independence, to show that I still care about some 0:21:53.400 --> 0:21:57.399 sort of I have some ethical lines that I'd like 0:21:57.480 --> 0:22:01.840 to draw here. So if this pardon thing gains traction, 0:22:02.160 --> 0:22:05.639 where else could we see some reform attempts of the 0:22:05.680 --> 0:22:08.159 constitutional sort. Well, I think we could have limits on 0:22:08.920 --> 0:22:12.240 executive emergency authority. If Congress won't do it, maybe we'll 0:22:12.280 --> 0:22:15.800 put a constitutional amendment into force Congress to realize it's 0:22:15.840 --> 0:22:19.960 authority there. Maybe there's clearly if we want to do 0:22:20.000 --> 0:22:24.879 anything in the in campaign finance, whether it's limits or transparency, 0:22:26.080 --> 0:22:31.159 basically outlawing anonymous contributions, you're going to need Since the 0:22:31.200 --> 0:22:35.280 courts have used the First Amendment as a shield on 0:22:35.400 --> 0:22:38.440 anything to reform and to reform in the campaign money 0:22:38.480 --> 0:22:42.280 era area, then you need a constitutional amendment. I think 0:22:42.320 --> 0:22:45.160 that will get traction in some form. I think transparency 0:22:45.200 --> 0:22:47.360 is the way to go, because again, when you're trying 0:22:47.400 --> 0:22:49.840 to pass the constitutional amendment two thirds support in the House, 0:22:50.119 --> 0:22:51.439 you know it's got to pass the House, in the 0:22:51.440 --> 0:22:54.359 Senate plus thirty eight states. You've got to have something 0:22:54.359 --> 0:22:57.399 that you can talk everybody into. You know, my pet 0:22:57.560 --> 0:23:01.520 issue on this run is indicates the expansion of the 0:23:01.520 --> 0:23:04.560 House representative. It's been capped at four and thirty five 0:23:04.840 --> 0:23:08.000 since their early twentieth century. It is, you know, we 0:23:08.000 --> 0:23:10.440 should not have congressional districts that are sized of major 0:23:10.480 --> 0:23:13.719 cities eight hundred thousand people. We should have congressional districts 0:23:13.720 --> 0:23:15.399 that are somewhere between three hundred and fifty and four 0:23:15.440 --> 0:23:18.640 hundred thousand. And you could put a constitutional amendment and 0:23:18.680 --> 0:23:21.320 say no congressional district can have a population more than 0:23:21.480 --> 0:23:23.680 you know, point oh three percent of the population. Basically 0:23:23.920 --> 0:23:26.639 you can. You can have it as right now, right 0:23:26.680 --> 0:23:28.679 if you base it on three hundred fifty million people 0:23:29.240 --> 0:23:32.879 you're looking at you know, I think it is I 0:23:32.920 --> 0:23:35.520 think it's point oh one point oh three would get 0:23:35.560 --> 0:23:40.359 you about three fifty four hundred. So that's the hope 0:23:40.520 --> 0:23:43.439 is that reform eras cascade. It doesn't stop at one idea, 0:23:43.920 --> 0:23:46.960 that you actually have a series of amendments. And that's 0:23:47.119 --> 0:23:49.879 that's the moment. I think we're headed to the And 0:23:49.920 --> 0:23:52.520 this this is why this symbolic decision by Bacon to 0:23:52.520 --> 0:23:56.400 become the first Republican on this particular constitutional amendment, one 0:23:56.440 --> 0:23:58.960