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Speaker 1: Pushkin. I feel like we got to start with the

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Speaker 1: Archive intro. Do you want to do it?

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Speaker 2: What do you imagine? Imagine a place in our world

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Speaker 2: where the known things go a quarridor of time bookshelves

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Speaker 2: lined with old ballots, political campaign posters, and television ads.

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Speaker 2: Step over a threshold to the Electoral College as if

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Speaker 2: it were an actual place, a university of knowledge about

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Speaker 2: the past of American politics, at.

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Speaker 1: Place many people hate. Not actually surprisingly, application numbers are

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Speaker 1: dropping this year. It's a very staid old college.

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Speaker 2: It used to be held in such high esteem electoral call. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: and now it's ratings have fallen.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, we're here to talk about the twenty twenty

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Speaker 1: four election in the context of history, but also in

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Speaker 1: the context of these three Last Archive episodes we've brought

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Speaker 1: back from the archives. But I thought maybe to start,

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Speaker 1: we could talk about how the Last Archive was kind

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Speaker 1: of born out of an election. It kind of came

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Speaker 1: from the twenty sixteen election and the panic over fake news,

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Speaker 1: alternative facts, the kind of Trump era epistemological crisis. And

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Speaker 1: I guess now that we're eight years past that moment,

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Speaker 1: those concerns you had when you started the show, like

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Speaker 1: what do you think about them now? Like, how do

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Speaker 1: they fit into this election cycle?

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Speaker 2: H Yeah, So when we came up with the idea

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Speaker 2: you and I for the last archive, it drew a

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Speaker 2: lot from a course that I'd been teaching at the

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Speaker 2: Harvard Law School on the history of evidence that looked

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Speaker 2: at changing ideas and standards of proof in history, the law, science,

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Speaker 2: and journalism since the Middle Ages, of the kind of

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Speaker 2: invention of trial by jury and the what historians call

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Speaker 2: the cult of the fact, And that course maybe itself

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Speaker 2: kind of came out of the the sort of two

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Speaker 2: thousand and five Stephen Colbert coining of truthiness and the

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Speaker 2: kind of panic in the first decade of the twenty

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Speaker 2: first century and the aftermath of the non existent weapons

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Speaker 2: of mass destruction, and the idea that was pursued that

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Speaker 2: somehow truth had died if the Second Push administration was

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Speaker 2: willing to present to the American people essentially fabricated evidence

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Speaker 2: to call for a war. But like any historian watching that,

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Speaker 2: did you not read the Pentagon papers? What part of

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Speaker 2: how the Vietnam War was also a war that depended

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Speaker 2: on wholesale misrepresentation of conditions in the other on other

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Speaker 2: parts of the world to the American people. So the

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Speaker 2: class was an attempt to kind of historicize a panic,

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Speaker 2: and then the podcast was.

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Speaker 3: Like, wait, the panic is even greater, and it's not.

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Speaker 2: Like it's a misplaced panic, right, Like there are all

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Speaker 2: kinds of reasons to think about the kind of crisis

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Speaker 2: of truth. The last archive was kind of an attempt

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Speaker 2: to say, well, here's a way to calm down. Not

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Speaker 2: that it's comforting, but like, let's try to historicize this

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Speaker 2: and have fun thinking about the history of some of

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Speaker 2: these ideas over the course of a century, at least,

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Speaker 2: not looking back five centuries or six centuries, but just

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Speaker 2: looking in the last one hundred years of American life.

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Speaker 2: What has been the kind of trajectory of our shared

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Speaker 2: ideas about evidence and proof and truth. And I remember,

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Speaker 2: like our big commitment was we didn't want to go

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Speaker 2: after the usual suspects, Like we didn't want to have

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Speaker 2: a podcast that attempted to prosecute Mark Zuckerberg or Trump

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Speaker 2: ultimately prosecute. Yeah, I'd much rather prosecute Mark zucker work. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: what was the third big postmodernism?

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Speaker 1: I've also got to.

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Speaker 2: Mention y yeah, yeah, yeah, So we didn't do the

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Speaker 2: best job steering clear of our easy.

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Speaker 1: Villains, but still, I mean, they are kind of mentioned

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Speaker 1: on the side, but I do think it amounts to

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Speaker 1: a more textra portrait of the thing.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I hope so. Well.

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Speaker 1: One thing I was thinking about when I was listening

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Speaker 1: back to Project X, it's like all about polling and forecasting,

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Speaker 1: and I feel like if the Trump era is kind

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Speaker 1: of like the mainstreaming of the panic about truthiness and

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Speaker 1: the epistemological crisis. One of the first experiences of that

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Speaker 1: for people, I think, was like, how could the polls

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Speaker 1: be so wrong? That was like the same moment as Brexit.

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Speaker 1: It's like, oh, we miscalled Brexit. You really miscalled the

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Speaker 1: twenty sixteen election and the like. There was you know,

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Speaker 1: that Princeton professor who was so certain that it would

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Speaker 1: be a Clinton victory that he was like, I'll eat

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Speaker 1: an insect on television and then you'll eat a cricket

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Speaker 1: on CNM. It was like that everybody was eating crickets.

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Speaker 1: Basically post twenty sixteen, a panic I now feel has

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Speaker 1: sort of vanished, Like you still hear this kind of

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Speaker 1: like oh well, like maybe Trump vhoters just don't answer polls.

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Speaker 1: But when we don't really know. We might be still

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Speaker 1: under representing his support. But Project X feels like a

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Speaker 1: kind of early history of some of that. We can

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Speaker 1: predict the future with these new machines. We don't even

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Speaker 1: really need to run the election anymore. And I was

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Speaker 1: wondering if you could contextualize our poll crisis if it

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Speaker 1: still exists in that historical context, like what is the

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Speaker 1: promise of polling originally?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I remember that in the twenty fifteen primary season.

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Speaker 2: For the twenty sixteen election, I did a lot of

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Speaker 2: reporting for The New Yorker, which I don't, you know,

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Speaker 2: often just do researched pieces from archives. And I had said,

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Speaker 2: you know, I really want to kind of go out

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Speaker 2: and repreests. So I went to, you know, rallies in

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Speaker 2: New Hampshire during the New Hampshire primary, and I ended

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Speaker 2: up going to both conventions. And one of the things

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Speaker 2: I did is I went to one of the debates

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Speaker 2: and I remember there going into I think it was

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Speaker 2: like a CNN media tent or something. I mean it's

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Speaker 2: like a jed. Those places like a circus, like with

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Speaker 2: all the kind of outbuildings that are popped up, and

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Speaker 2: they were doing kind of live polling through the whole

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Speaker 2: debate sort of moment by moment, and it was like, wait,

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Speaker 2: this is everything that is wrong with our political culture

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Speaker 2: and life. Like it was a like a Piranha like

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Speaker 2: frenzy on the America. That's what you think? What do

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Speaker 2: you think?

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Speaker 3: You know, I'm gonna eat your own head.

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Speaker 2: Like it was just it was it was just so

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Speaker 2: mannic and crazy and fruitless, and was.

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Speaker 1: Just people with like dials like well yeah, I don't

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Speaker 1: know like.

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Speaker 2: What methods they were using. Was like a kind of

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Speaker 2: like instapule web calling thing, and like it just defied

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Speaker 2: it possible scientific method around public opinion surveying, which is

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Speaker 2: a legitimate social science that has, you know, real standards

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Speaker 2: of evidence. And it was completely unhinged. And I wrote

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Speaker 2: a piece that year called Politics and the New Machine

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Speaker 2: that was about how data science is replacing polling because

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Speaker 2: you couldn't just call landlines. People don't have landlines. The

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Speaker 2: people own landlines don't represent most of the population. You know,

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Speaker 2: they tend to be really older, moral whiter. Like it's

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Speaker 2: just not you can't get a good sample of the

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Speaker 2: electric if you ever get a hold of like a

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Speaker 2: young Hispanic man on a landline. You have to wait

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Speaker 2: that person's opinion like seven thousand times because that person

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Speaker 2: has to represent like all young male Hispanics, whereas you know,

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Speaker 2: you talk to an old white woman, it's just her,

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Speaker 2: like she just represents one person. So it's just a

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Speaker 2: real field of distortion. So I wrote a piece about

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Speaker 2: that because I just was really surprised at the incongruity

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Speaker 2: of it all that the worst polling got, like the

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Speaker 2: less reliable polling seemed to be getting, the more our

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Speaker 2: political arrangements were dependent on it. So that was the

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Speaker 2: year that for the first time when Fox News they

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Speaker 2: hosted the first of the GOP primary debates, where they

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Speaker 2: used polling an average of I think four polls to

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Speaker 2: decide who would stand where, and they had try to

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Speaker 2: stand in the middle. And it was really early on,

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Speaker 2: and there had been very little coverage of anything, but

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Speaker 2: Trump's name was better known. He's a guy who had

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Speaker 2: add like a television show for years, and a lot

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Speaker 2: of the most reputable polling agencies I think you know,

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Speaker 2: Gallop and Pew and NBC, Wall Street Journal refused to participate.

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Speaker 2: They're like, you can't use our national polls that are

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Speaker 2: like two hundred and ninety days before the election to

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Speaker 2: determine who gets the most because where you stand on

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Speaker 2: the stage determines how many questions you get and how

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Speaker 2: much camera coverage you get. So you're just propping up

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Speaker 2: a candidate. You know, you're just deciding what would get

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Speaker 2: you the best audience. It's like one poll driving another poll. Right.

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Speaker 2: That's around when I was working on this piece, and

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Speaker 2: you know, the reputable polling people are like, yeah, this

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Speaker 2: is unconscionable, like, and then the polling organizations that did

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Speaker 2: participate in that had the least reliable polls, right, Like

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Speaker 2: there were the you know, least principled ones. But so

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Speaker 2: I know, it's like a trendy thing to talk about

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Speaker 2: the Overton window, but you do really kind of see

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Speaker 2: even with the history of polling, right, polling's not gotten

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Speaker 2: better since then, and it's only made our politics messier

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Speaker 2: and lousier. So I don't know, I mean to go

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Speaker 2: back to your question of historicizing it. One of the

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Speaker 2: things that's different about say, in nineteen forty eight, when

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Speaker 2: famously Gallop predicted that Dewey would win and then the

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Speaker 2: Chicago Tribune Prince Dewey beats Truman and then you see

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Speaker 2: that this is a photograph of Truman holding up the

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Speaker 2: paper with this giant you know, grin polling really righted

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Speaker 2: itself from that. There was a big invest mitigation. The

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Speaker 2: I think his social sciences counsel did an investigation. Gallup

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Speaker 2: investigated itself. You know, there was a kind of reckoning

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Speaker 2: with that because there were still in place institutional guardrails

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Speaker 2: against like a real failure. But even that, even that,

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Speaker 2: like if you look at the history of that, Gallup

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Speaker 2: had said, So Gallup, George Gallup, who's not an academic,

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Speaker 2: but he opens this organization called the American Public Opinion

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Speaker 2: Research Institute in Princeton, New Jersey, so that it can

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Speaker 2: so that people will think it's part of Princeton University.

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Speaker 2: So his address is Princeton. It's very canny. I mean,

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Speaker 2: he has guys a piece. Yeah, it is a town,

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Speaker 2: so listen not you know, he had a PhD. Like

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Speaker 2: the guy was a real quantitative social scientist. But he's

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Speaker 2: trying to sort of cloak his endeavor in the venew

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Speaker 2: year of academic legitimacy when really he's a syndicated newspaper column.

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Speaker 2: It's like that's what he's kind of churning out, but

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Speaker 2: in order to get newspapers to pick up his column

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Speaker 2: because the people like, who cares what you say? Like

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Speaker 2: with the American people believe about that, Like we have

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Speaker 2: reporters to go out on the street and they talk

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Speaker 2: to people in pubs and they go to pta meetings.

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Speaker 2: We have like man on the street stories all the time.

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Speaker 2: We know it are the people in our town, in

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Speaker 2: our city, whatever our newspaper is. We know what they're

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Speaker 2: reporting on, what they believe. We have reporters to do

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Speaker 2: that work. Why would we take your calum or like

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Speaker 2: you had, you know, you called people on telephone. How

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Speaker 2: many people have phones? It's nuts. So he did this

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Speaker 2: big gimmicky thing, which is he said that, you know what,

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Speaker 2: our opinion research is so good that we can ask

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Speaker 2: people who they're going to vote for and we will

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Speaker 2: successfully predict the next president. And that's when they started

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Speaker 2: doing it. And he said all the time, like this

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Speaker 2: would be a really dangerous thing to do if we

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Speaker 2: were doing this in order to guide candidates or you know,

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Speaker 2: drive funding of candidates. So this is just to demonstrate

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Speaker 2: that our public opinion research is sound. But then it

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Speaker 2: was such a big hit. People love that horse race

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Speaker 2: stuff that it kind of took on its own life.

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Speaker 2: So it kind of then came to a crescendo of

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Speaker 2: a crisis in nineteen forty eight, when like his whole

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Speaker 2: business model had then become like no, no, no, no, My

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Speaker 2: election predictions that were were making money, like that's how

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Speaker 2: we're gaining subscribers from my syndicated column. But then so

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Speaker 2: you kind of see a kind of writing of that ship.

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Speaker 2: But then this guy Lindsay Rodgers writes this book right

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Speaker 2: after that, or it comes out, you know, right after that,

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Speaker 2: and he was like, I don't care whether the polling

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Speaker 2: is accurate, interaccurate. It's bad for democracy. It's not how

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Speaker 2: our democracy is supposed to work. And I it was

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Speaker 2: surprising to me to discover how every critique that this

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Speaker 2: political theorist Lindsay Rodgers offered in this book called The

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Speaker 2: Pollsters in nineteen forty eight really still applies. And it's

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Speaker 2: just it's a business model that's extremely successful, and there's

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Speaker 2: not really a way you can say. And every generation

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Speaker 2: has its you know grouch like me who comes along

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Speaker 2: and says, wait, this stuff's actually really bad for our

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Speaker 2: political culture. But it's like, well, white sugar is really bad,

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Speaker 2: but all the food in the supermarket is laced with it.

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Speaker 2: Like it's not going to be like saying that sugar's

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Speaker 2: not so great for you. It's not going to stop it.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, it's funny because there was did you listen to

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Speaker 1: the Nate Cone interview recently where he talks about finding

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Speaker 1: a historical precedent for the twenty twenty four election, and

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Speaker 1: the one he finds is nineteen forty eight because Truman

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Speaker 1: suffered from high inflation, high prices and had actually successfully

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Speaker 1: managed them and the lead up to the election. But

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Speaker 1: the thing that's like not mentioned in his account is

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Speaker 1: that after nineteen forty eight there's a huge crisis. It's funny,

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Speaker 1: and then that ties into the Project XT thing where

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Speaker 1: it's like the reason they don't share the UNIVAC prediction

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Speaker 1: is because they're like, poles were so oft in forty eight,

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Speaker 1: we can't come out with this landslide prediction early in

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Speaker 1: the evening because it's just who knows. But I guess,

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Speaker 1: like from the episode perspective, I mean, you talk about

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Speaker 1: responsible polling, people who understand what the limitations of polling

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Speaker 1: actually are, what the appropriate use of it is. It

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Speaker 1: seems like it's a media demand or like a voter demand.

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Speaker 1: People want to know how things are going to turn out,

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Speaker 1: or even like a Wall Street demand, people want to

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Speaker 1: be able to project forward. Like there's already all this

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Speaker 1: attention given to predicting the next election because it's going

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Speaker 1: to bear on how the markets do. It has a

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Speaker 1: lot to do with futures in an economic sense and

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Speaker 1: also in a kind of like entertainment sense. But in

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Speaker 1: the Project X version of this has all of those things.

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Speaker 1: It's got the sort of like we're making a show

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Speaker 1: out of projections, but it also has the behind the

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Speaker 1: scenes blurring of the line between how the campaign is

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Speaker 1: being run, which is Rosser Reeves making the ad spots

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Speaker 1: based on the gallop polling about what are people most

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Speaker 1: concerned with, you know, like Miami gets after me about

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Speaker 1: high prices. The Dwight Eisenhower thing. Is that the moment

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Speaker 1: that those things really come together, or is it like

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Speaker 1: the thirties campaigns inc moment.

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Speaker 2: Or well, I think the nineteen fifty two story remains

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Speaker 2: deeply resonant because it's kind of the superbolification of election night. So,

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Speaker 2: you know, when we talk to Archanoi and his work.

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Speaker 2: You know, he kind of relays these tremendously interesting stories

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Speaker 2: about early technologies of reporting results, like yeah, we'll have

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Speaker 2: the New York Times building the you know, the the

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Speaker 2: will light up red if it's going this way and

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Speaker 2: green if it's going that way. They have this like yeah,

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Speaker 2: like we'll blink, you know, we'll blink fast if the

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Speaker 2: Democrats are ahead, and like just crazy, like it's lighthouses

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Speaker 2: and it's no one really knows and they're kind of

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Speaker 2: out in the street. Only in the city. Maybe you

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Speaker 2: would get like any kind of updates. But in nineteen

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Speaker 2: fifty two they do all this elaborate setting up of cables, right,

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Speaker 2: Like they have the studio and that's got all these

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Speaker 2: reports going on, and they have this map, and you know,

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Speaker 2: Kronkite's gonna go to the map, and then they have

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Speaker 2: the guy with the UNIVAC, the fake UNIVAC, and then

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Speaker 2: there's also the real UNIVAC, and they have people are

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Speaker 2: calling in with precinct results and they're trying to do tabulation,

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Speaker 2: and they have punch cards and and it's a whole

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Speaker 2: sort of fun circus to watch, and the clock is

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Speaker 2: in the background and we'll have new results at the

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Speaker 2: top of the hour, and they're trying desperately to make

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Speaker 2: people watch television instead of listen to the radio. And

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Speaker 2: there's very little to report. They're just not going to

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Speaker 2: have the results into the morning, but they're trying to

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Speaker 2: you know what we call must watch television, right, and

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Speaker 2: they're really pretty successful. People are like, well, this is fun.

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Speaker 2: I mean, if what else are you gonna do? It's

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Speaker 2: like a Tuesday night in the vent it's very cold

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Speaker 2: outside much of the country, Like it's you know, it's

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Speaker 2: a civic lesson for your kids. It is pretty interesting,

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Speaker 2: Like what are all these machines the TV's and brand new?

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Speaker 2: It's exciting that you even have one. And oh, it's

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Speaker 2: like it's like you're in the war room at the

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Speaker 2: White House, Like it's like you're part of a campaign.

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Speaker 2: You're wrapped into the drama of it all and there's

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Speaker 2: really nothing else quite like it. And it's really successful

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Speaker 2: for them, their Project X. And then there's a kind

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Speaker 2: of a level raising, like you have to up your

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Speaker 2: game every four years. You have to come up with

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Speaker 2: a more exciting election.

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Speaker 1: We have to invent both flits there, yeah, coman.

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Speaker 2: So like you know, and if then I write about

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Speaker 2: when the cinematics company is hired to go do election

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Speaker 2: prediction uh in nineteen sixty by CBS, and it's just mayhem.

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Speaker 2: No one knows how to program the mainframes. There's all

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Speaker 2: these women trying to type in you know, who are

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Speaker 2: the computers trying to type in the results that are

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Speaker 2: coming in by phone, and people are falling down tripping

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Speaker 2: over the cables and it's a comedy of hers. But yeah,

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Speaker 2: it's still great television. And it also obscures, you know,

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Speaker 2: the reality of like knocking on doors and driving people

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Speaker 2: to the polls and what election day is really about.

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Speaker 2: That's why I'm making the case that that's nineteen fifty

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Speaker 2: two Project X is more resonant than ever before. Is

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Speaker 2: because what happened in twenty twenty two, twenty twenty. In

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Speaker 2: twenty twenty, remember it was the pandemic. Most people did

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Speaker 2: not want to go to the polls and wait in

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Speaker 2: those lines or go indoors. And you know, the best

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Speaker 2: news organizations said every once in a while, like Orson

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Speaker 2: Welles saying in nineteen thirty eight at War of the

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Speaker 2: World's weally this is not real, you know, and they

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Speaker 2: would say, like we won't really know the results tonight

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Speaker 2: because mail in ballots and absentee ballots are not going

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Speaker 2: to be counted over to the next few days. And

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Speaker 2: right now really looks like, you know, Republicans are winning

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Speaker 2: all over the country and Trump's going to win enough

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Speaker 2: electoral votes. But this is a red mirage. It's you know,

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Speaker 2: most people expect this to change in the coming days

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Speaker 2: or even weeks as the late coming votes are counted.

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Speaker 2: But you know, they said that, look maybe once every

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Speaker 2: two hours. And meanwhile, except for the like thirty seconds

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Speaker 2: every two hours that they're pointing out that their results

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Speaker 2: are completely useless and meaningless, like really truly meaningless, the

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Speaker 2: most meaningless Election night results probably ever in American history.

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Speaker 2: They're selling the whole thing to keep their audience is

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Speaker 2: if they have to watch second by second because the

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Speaker 2: election is about to be called, and then they start

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Speaker 2: calling it. And so, I mean, this is where like

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Speaker 2: one can exert a lot of sympathy for Americans to

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Speaker 2: believe the election was stolen because they watched that coverage

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Speaker 2: and look, we watched, you know, we watched though John

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Speaker 2: King he had the panels and the thing flipped and

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Speaker 2: then the color turned and then we looked like this

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Speaker 2: state was going this way in Arizona, in Michigan, Pennsylvania.

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Speaker 2: And then you know, I went to bed and then

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Speaker 2: they're like no, we no, no, no no, And then they've

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Speaker 2: called it for Biden, No that was stolen. Like I'm like,

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Speaker 2: I know, it's just an incredible amount of perfidy in

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Speaker 2: terms of the planning up to the election, that Trump

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Speaker 2: knew he was going to lose, that his supporters expected,

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Speaker 2: you know, his inside like team knew he was going

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Speaker 2: to lose, and they came up with these cockamamie plans

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Speaker 2: to pursue a contest of the results they knew in advance. Like,

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Speaker 2: I don't mean to diminish the nefariousness of their planning,

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Speaker 2: but in terms of well people being willing to believe it,

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Speaker 2: when he said the election was stolen.

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Speaker 3: No one is ever held.

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Speaker 2: I'm not talking about the pollsters, but the television producers

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Speaker 2: accountable for what happened that night, you know, why not

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Speaker 2: say and you don't even hear this now. And there's

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Speaker 2: a ton of mail and we would expect a lot

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Speaker 2: of mail in voting in November. We would also, I

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Speaker 2: think expect really low turnouts in a lot of places

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Speaker 2: that I have and I couldn't really would be really

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Speaker 2: hard to account for with your polling results. And we

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Speaker 2: are not going to hear an election night people saying

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Speaker 2: we've decided tonight that we are gonna re examine the

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Speaker 2: results of the twenty twenty election and investigate our own

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Speaker 2: coverage as a public service to the American voter, and

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Speaker 2: explain one the ways in which we as a news

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Speaker 2: organization contributed to the chaos and American political life over

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Speaker 2: the last four years. We'll be getting back to you

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Speaker 2: tomorrow night. We'll have full coverage of amended election results,

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Speaker 2: but for tonight, we're going to set that aside and

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Speaker 2: we're going to do what we think is right. Maybe

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Speaker 2: that would be bad television. I think that'd be awesome television.

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Speaker 2: But I think that reckoning and accountability is genuinely required.

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Speaker 2: Like I just can't even picture like Jake Tapper or whoever, like,

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Speaker 2: and I don't know, these are the best people, right,

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Speaker 2: like saying we really screwed up, like we are in

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Speaker 2: big part responsible. It's just much easier to do something different.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, they're working within the framework that's established

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Speaker 1: in fifty two, which is received and can't be changed,

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Speaker 1: so they're not going to question it. I totally buy

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Speaker 1: that the election night coverage contributed to this, but it

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Speaker 1: does seem to me like over the last decade, you

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Speaker 1: have so many crazy lies that are just convenient lies

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Speaker 1: that people just like take up and believe just because.

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Speaker 2: No I mean, in the campaign, you know, the false

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Speaker 2: selectors that like this. I thought about this a lot

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Speaker 2: when I was asked to write a review of the

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Speaker 2: January sixth report from the House Select Committee.

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Speaker 1: You're like, could have been more fun?

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Speaker 2: Could? Yeah? Like it was like a I don't know,

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Speaker 2: fifteen hundred perce long, you know, I read every word

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Speaker 2: of it and that I wrote this piece, but I

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Speaker 2: was and it's in many ways, you know, an excellent report,

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Speaker 2: and it served basically as the bill of indictment for

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Speaker 2: the federal prosecution of Trump and other conspirators, and so

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Speaker 2: really meaningful kind of bill of indictment against Trump. But

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Speaker 2: it is laser focused on Trump, and it is a

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Speaker 2: list of really indictable allegations about Trump. And you know,

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Speaker 2: that was a decision that the committee made, you know,

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Speaker 2: I think partly to accommodate, largely to accommodate Liz Cheney,

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Speaker 2: who did not want to be indicting other Republicans aside

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Speaker 2: from Trump, and who did not want to lose sight

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Speaker 2: of Trump as the leader of the conspiracy. But among

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Speaker 2: the things that that committee had done in its hearings,

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Speaker 2: which I think are barely in the public eye at all,

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Speaker 2: was investigating the role of the media, and there was

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Speaker 2: another investigation into social media. And none of that stuff

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Speaker 2: is in the report. And so you read that report

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Speaker 2: and you're just like, wow, single handedly Trump and you

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Speaker 2: know the occasional like Giuliani, Sidney Powell, other lunatic you know,

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Speaker 2: you see their villainy, their outright criminality. Could there have

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Speaker 2: been like three paragraphs about you know, networking cable television

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Speaker 2: on election night and how it made it harder to

430
00:23:36,235 --> 00:23:38,075
Speaker 2: undo that, like because you kind of you do kind

431
00:23:38,115 --> 00:23:42,595
Speaker 2: of puzzle over all. Right, there were sixty one different

432
00:23:42,635 --> 00:23:45,995
Speaker 2: court cases and Trump lost sixty of them, and the

433
00:23:45,995 --> 00:23:48,915
Speaker 2: one that he won had no consequences in terms of

434
00:23:48,915 --> 00:23:51,915
Speaker 2: a recount. Like, there's so many ways in which there's

435
00:23:51,955 --> 00:23:55,675
Speaker 2: just such abundant evidence that strikes down, you know, the

436
00:23:55,715 --> 00:24:01,875
Speaker 2: criminal misrepresentations and lies of Trump and his lackeys. Remember,

437
00:24:01,915 --> 00:24:04,515
Speaker 2: like people remembers of the Republican parties still have not

438
00:24:04,635 --> 00:24:07,515
Speaker 2: essentially conceded the election to Biden and were, you know,

439
00:24:07,755 --> 00:24:11,755
Speaker 2: very close to the next election. So and you're like,

440
00:24:12,075 --> 00:24:15,355
Speaker 2: why they clearly don't want to disappoint their followers. They

441
00:24:15,395 --> 00:24:18,555
Speaker 2: think their constituents believe this, so they need to defy

442
00:24:18,595 --> 00:24:21,715
Speaker 2: their constituents. But why would their constituents keep believing this

443
00:24:21,755 --> 00:24:25,355
Speaker 2: has been disproven in every possible forum where we arbitrate truth,

444
00:24:26,395 --> 00:24:32,995
Speaker 2: and like, it's among the places where we might consider

445
00:24:33,795 --> 00:24:38,075
Speaker 2: asking for some accountability would be news organizations.

446
00:24:37,635 --> 00:24:39,795
Speaker 1: Especially because in twenty sixteen, that is what happened with

447
00:24:39,875 --> 00:24:41,795
Speaker 1: social media. There was like an attempt at that kind

448
00:24:41,835 --> 00:24:43,635
Speaker 1: of reckoning, and you don't really see any of that

449
00:24:43,675 --> 00:24:47,915
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty. It is interesting to think about Project

450
00:24:48,075 --> 00:24:51,275
Speaker 1: X as like a comparison for the twenty twenty election.

451
00:24:51,635 --> 00:24:54,595
Speaker 1: I was thinking about framing it as they are like

452
00:24:54,595 --> 00:24:58,955
Speaker 1: two separate epistemological crises. Twenty sixteen election, we no longer

453
00:24:58,955 --> 00:25:01,555
Speaker 1: can predict the future because we just don't understand what's

454
00:25:01,555 --> 00:25:06,635
Speaker 1: happening anymore, and then twenty twenty we lose faith in elections.

455
00:25:08,275 --> 00:25:10,795
Speaker 1: But I think it's compelling the idea that they are

456
00:25:11,555 --> 00:25:14,875
Speaker 1: linked in this way. I do wonder, though, to what

457
00:25:14,955 --> 00:25:18,155
Speaker 1: extent do you think voters earnestly believe the election was stolen?

458
00:25:18,675 --> 00:25:20,675
Speaker 1: And do you think it's going to have an impact

459
00:25:20,755 --> 00:25:25,275
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty four beyond how Trump campaigns.

460
00:25:25,475 --> 00:25:28,115
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I guess I'm not a you know,

461
00:25:28,235 --> 00:25:31,555
Speaker 2: inside Beltway DC reporter. I would love to talk to

462
00:25:31,595 --> 00:25:33,235
Speaker 2: someone who does that kind of work, you know, like

463
00:25:33,275 --> 00:25:35,795
Speaker 2: a Susan Glasser from the New York or Dan Baltz

464
00:25:35,795 --> 00:25:40,315
Speaker 2: from the Washington Post and say, are people preparing for

465
00:25:40,515 --> 00:25:44,635
Speaker 2: the election denihalism? Like what is in place? Not only

466
00:25:44,835 --> 00:25:48,955
Speaker 2: preparing for you know, assuring election integrity. I feel like,

467
00:25:49,595 --> 00:25:52,115
Speaker 2: you know, the states and down to the municipal and

468
00:25:52,155 --> 00:25:54,355
Speaker 2: town level actually do a ton of that stuff in place,

469
00:25:54,395 --> 00:25:57,635
Speaker 2: Like that's why the twenty twenty election actually went so

470
00:25:57,795 --> 00:26:01,635
Speaker 2: well as in terms of the election, the country is

471
00:26:01,675 --> 00:26:06,715
Speaker 2: really reliable reporting of results and you know, any audits

472
00:26:06,755 --> 00:26:12,835
Speaker 2: were revealed just really tremendously impressive accuracy with the counting.

473
00:26:13,515 --> 00:26:20,475
Speaker 2: So I'm not worried about the election results, but everybody

474
00:26:20,515 --> 00:26:24,115
Speaker 2: should be worried about the election denialism that is likely coming.

475
00:26:24,155 --> 00:26:27,075
Speaker 2: And I still think honestly, when we talk about we're

476
00:26:27,075 --> 00:26:30,635
Speaker 2: talking about polling that you know, if we had a

477
00:26:30,715 --> 00:26:33,675
Speaker 2: national popular vote, polling would be more reliable than any

478
00:26:34,515 --> 00:26:36,595
Speaker 2: When people do those national polls, they just don't talk

479
00:26:36,635 --> 00:26:38,635
Speaker 2: about the electoral college. So there's like so many ways

480
00:26:38,635 --> 00:26:43,755
Speaker 2: in which we are not positioned to know who is

481
00:26:43,795 --> 00:26:47,355
Speaker 2: going to win an election. And this is likely to

482
00:26:47,355 --> 00:26:49,235
Speaker 2: be an extremely close election. I don't think that we

483
00:26:49,275 --> 00:26:53,115
Speaker 2: can expect anything other than extremely close elections at the

484
00:26:53,195 --> 00:27:00,075
Speaker 2: presidential national level anytime soon. And surely the Trump campaign

485
00:27:00,115 --> 00:27:03,435
Speaker 2: is thinking of all kinds of ways to undermine the

486
00:27:03,475 --> 00:27:07,795
Speaker 2: outcome of the election. If Trump loses, which she's pretty

487
00:27:07,875 --> 00:27:10,955
Speaker 2: likely to do, He's pretty likely to have been convicted

488
00:27:10,995 --> 00:27:13,755
Speaker 2: of a felony by then, which is at least expected

489
00:27:13,795 --> 00:27:18,395
Speaker 2: to cut some dent in his support among independents at least.

490
00:27:18,635 --> 00:27:21,275
Speaker 2: So I'm sure they have a really elaborate plan in

491
00:27:21,355 --> 00:27:26,875
Speaker 2: place for exactly what to do. And Eve, I don't know.

492
00:27:27,555 --> 00:27:28,715
Speaker 2: I think it's really worrying.

493
00:27:29,675 --> 00:27:33,435
Speaker 1: Do you remember so one of the episodes that we've

494
00:27:33,755 --> 00:27:36,995
Speaker 1: rerun is Hush Rush, which is the Rush Limbaugh al

495
00:27:37,035 --> 00:27:41,715
Speaker 1: Franken episode, And I was remembering when I listened back

496
00:27:41,715 --> 00:27:44,555
Speaker 1: to it that one of the things we read for that,

497
00:27:44,675 --> 00:27:47,835
Speaker 1: but then didn't include in the episode. Was that David

498
00:27:47,875 --> 00:27:53,915
Speaker 1: Posen the Columbia Law Scholars that awesome article Transparency's ideological Drift,

499
00:27:55,755 --> 00:27:58,515
Speaker 1: and one of the claims in that essay that I

500
00:27:58,555 --> 00:28:00,835
Speaker 1: had never seen before, and it really stuck with me.

501
00:28:00,955 --> 00:28:03,395
Speaker 1: So we think of transparency laws like the progressive era

502
00:28:03,475 --> 00:28:06,675
Speaker 1: in the sixties and seventies, as these like super liberal

503
00:28:06,795 --> 00:28:10,235
Speaker 1: progressive reforms, but then actually they have these right wing

504
00:28:10,275 --> 00:28:12,675
Speaker 1: functions when you like Foia, the EPA to death or whatever.

505
00:28:12,995 --> 00:28:16,275
Speaker 1: But another way that they contribute to dysfunction and government

506
00:28:16,915 --> 00:28:21,035
Speaker 1: is when you have everything broadcast on c SPAN. Everything

507
00:28:21,075 --> 00:28:25,035
Speaker 1: is accessible to lobbyists and private interests especially, but like

508
00:28:25,075 --> 00:28:28,515
Speaker 1: really just everybody. You have to keep acting as if

509
00:28:28,635 --> 00:28:30,915
Speaker 1: the things you do as campaign strategies or the things

510
00:28:30,955 --> 00:28:34,755
Speaker 1: you think your constituents want from you are like exactly

511
00:28:34,795 --> 00:28:37,075
Speaker 1: how you believe and behave, and you refuse to make

512
00:28:37,115 --> 00:28:41,115
Speaker 1: any kind of compromises. And that I think it speaks

513
00:28:41,155 --> 00:28:43,795
Speaker 1: to that idea of we might have plenty of Congress

514
00:28:43,795 --> 00:28:46,315
Speaker 1: people who don't for a second and believe that the

515
00:28:46,355 --> 00:28:48,595
Speaker 1: election was stolen, but they have to act as if

516
00:28:48,675 --> 00:28:50,715
Speaker 1: because this is one of the consequences of the like

517
00:28:50,995 --> 00:28:53,715
Speaker 1: everything's a culture war because you can see everything behind

518
00:28:53,715 --> 00:28:58,075
Speaker 1: the scenes. Do you think a way of answering the

519
00:28:58,155 --> 00:29:01,235
Speaker 1: kind of crisis in the media is to take some

520
00:29:01,275 --> 00:29:05,155
Speaker 1: of the work of governing offline or would that just

521
00:29:05,195 --> 00:29:06,955
Speaker 1: create a whole other raft of problems.

522
00:29:07,435 --> 00:29:09,435
Speaker 2: I mean, I think there is a lot offline, but

523
00:29:09,515 --> 00:29:13,915
Speaker 2: we are kind of offered the illusion that we can

524
00:29:13,955 --> 00:29:16,195
Speaker 2: see at all. So you hear all the time, if

525
00:29:16,195 --> 00:29:19,035
Speaker 2: you know anybody involved in politics or you know members

526
00:29:19,035 --> 00:29:21,915
Speaker 2: of Congress that like, oh, yeah, these guys who still

527
00:29:21,915 --> 00:29:25,915
Speaker 2: say that publicly that Trump won the election, privately they'll

528
00:29:25,995 --> 00:29:28,315
Speaker 2: laugh and laugh and laugh at him and like, obviously

529
00:29:28,955 --> 00:29:32,795
Speaker 2: he totally lost. The guys a complete fraud, and they

530
00:29:32,875 --> 00:29:42,035
Speaker 2: want you to kind of forgive them privately, to allow

531
00:29:42,115 --> 00:29:45,675
Speaker 2: them to kind of make amends by being honest with you.

532
00:29:45,675 --> 00:29:47,595
Speaker 2: You know, that they can kind of feel like they're

533
00:29:47,635 --> 00:29:52,395
Speaker 2: acting in good faith because really, you know, it's like

534
00:29:52,395 --> 00:29:57,035
Speaker 2: a kind of weird penance for like I hear, I've

535
00:29:57,035 --> 00:30:00,595
Speaker 2: heard this multiple times, like to kind of confess and

536
00:30:00,915 --> 00:30:04,755
Speaker 2: try to like almost like erase your public persona by

537
00:30:04,955 --> 00:30:09,155
Speaker 2: insisting yes, like to kind of have a camaraderie around

538
00:30:09,195 --> 00:30:15,955
Speaker 2: that privately, and it's it's incredibly contemptible, right, Like I

539
00:30:17,915 --> 00:30:20,915
Speaker 2: you can think of more sinister ways to act as

540
00:30:20,915 --> 00:30:24,955
Speaker 2: a politician, like to vote for a war that you know,

541
00:30:24,995 --> 00:30:27,635
Speaker 2: for you know, new caster vote in Congress to declare

542
00:30:27,635 --> 00:30:29,395
Speaker 2: a war when you don't believe in it, or to

543
00:30:29,395 --> 00:30:31,635
Speaker 2: withhold funding for something that is a crucial kind of

544
00:30:31,715 --> 00:30:35,515
Speaker 2: humanitarian aid in order to gain some you know, really

545
00:30:37,915 --> 00:30:40,875
Speaker 2: self serving pork for your state, or like things that

546
00:30:40,995 --> 00:30:43,355
Speaker 2: kind of compromises that people make surely all the time

547
00:30:43,515 --> 00:30:49,475
Speaker 2: that largely involve money. And yeah, you can think of

548
00:30:49,515 --> 00:30:53,195
Speaker 2: worse things, but it's a pretty short list.

549
00:30:53,675 --> 00:30:56,955
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's just like you have this performance personality or

550
00:30:56,955 --> 00:30:58,835
Speaker 1: there's this like unreality to the way you behave and

551
00:30:58,875 --> 00:31:00,715
Speaker 1: everybody accepts it. But then it's like the only way

552
00:31:00,755 --> 00:31:03,355
Speaker 1: you're behaving in public, so it becomes real. Which is

553
00:31:03,395 --> 00:31:06,635
Speaker 1: this like reality TV phenomenon which is very trumpy.

554
00:31:07,515 --> 00:31:10,155
Speaker 2: But is it trumpy because I think regress is it's

555
00:31:10,235 --> 00:31:12,635
Speaker 2: the whole version of that. Like the progressives are really

556
00:31:12,715 --> 00:31:15,635
Speaker 2: trumpy too, Like that that's that's the that's the difference

557
00:31:15,635 --> 00:31:18,555
Speaker 2: between twenty sixteen and twenty twenty four. Right, the American

558
00:31:18,595 --> 00:31:22,515
Speaker 2: political style across the board imitates Trump.

559
00:31:22,595 --> 00:31:25,155
Speaker 1: Yeah, but that is like part of the premise of

560
00:31:25,195 --> 00:31:27,795
Speaker 1: the last archive is that this thing that appears to

561
00:31:27,835 --> 00:31:30,115
Speaker 1: have taken this this thing that like you might think

562
00:31:30,195 --> 00:31:33,035
Speaker 1: Trump has caused, is actually just like he's the man

563
00:31:33,075 --> 00:31:35,715
Speaker 1: for the moment because he fits all of the structures

564
00:31:35,715 --> 00:31:37,995
Speaker 1: we have in place, which are these varying degrees of

565
00:31:38,035 --> 00:31:41,555
Speaker 1: unreality and like right fantasies we have about the That's.

566
00:31:41,355 --> 00:31:43,435
Speaker 2: Why you know, when you look at Rush Limbo and

567
00:31:43,475 --> 00:31:45,115
Speaker 2: then you look at Al Frank and you're like, I

568
00:31:45,115 --> 00:31:50,275
Speaker 2: really wish Frank and were significantly different, And no he's not.

569
00:31:49,955 --> 00:31:53,275
Speaker 2: He's different. You know, he's not nearly as bad. But

570
00:31:53,315 --> 00:31:57,955
Speaker 2: there's you know, a real leaning in that direction of

571
00:31:58,755 --> 00:32:01,115
Speaker 2: you know, let me kick you in the crotch.

572
00:32:01,235 --> 00:32:03,835
Speaker 1: Like the entertainment, like politics is entertainment, which is the

573
00:32:03,915 --> 00:32:10,155
Speaker 1: CBS Election Night thing too. Yeah, well, I guess part

574
00:32:10,155 --> 00:32:12,835
Speaker 1: of the point of this conversation is to find precedence

575
00:32:12,875 --> 00:32:15,275
Speaker 1: for the twenty twenty four election, which is kind of

576
00:32:15,275 --> 00:32:17,515
Speaker 1: funny because I feel like a lot of the narrative

577
00:32:17,515 --> 00:32:20,755
Speaker 1: of the selection is that it's totally unprecedented, you know,

578
00:32:20,835 --> 00:32:24,835
Speaker 1: like Trump having so many criminal cases, Biden's age, like

579
00:32:24,835 --> 00:32:28,195
Speaker 1: two candidates who are historically old, And I guess maybe

580
00:32:28,275 --> 00:32:30,395
Speaker 1: that's a place to start in trying to think about

581
00:32:30,435 --> 00:32:33,795
Speaker 1: how you historicize these things that feel like they come

582
00:32:33,835 --> 00:32:36,355
Speaker 1: out of nowhere or like they've never happened before. So

583
00:32:36,395 --> 00:32:38,875
Speaker 1: like maybe to begin with the age questions, And we

584
00:32:38,915 --> 00:32:40,435
Speaker 1: don't need to think about this in terms of like

585
00:32:40,475 --> 00:32:42,875
Speaker 1: should Biden be the nominee for the Democratic Party, but

586
00:32:43,275 --> 00:32:45,235
Speaker 1: more just like how did we get to this place

587
00:32:45,275 --> 00:32:48,035
Speaker 1: where we have two historically old candidates and the bigger

588
00:32:48,075 --> 00:32:51,115
Speaker 1: picture thing behind that the tear intocracy? Where does that

589
00:32:51,155 --> 00:32:53,195
Speaker 1: come from? What does it mean for democracy?

590
00:32:53,475 --> 00:32:57,235
Speaker 2: Right? So, one of the reasons that I wanted to

591
00:32:57,235 --> 00:32:59,395
Speaker 2: do the last archive in the first place is because

592
00:32:59,435 --> 00:33:05,835
Speaker 2: as a historian, the rhetoric of the unprecedented development was

593
00:33:05,915 --> 00:33:09,115
Speaker 2: really driving me crazy. Like by the time we started,

594
00:33:09,915 --> 00:33:12,675
Speaker 2: I mean, I guess I really noticed that after Bush v.

595
00:33:12,795 --> 00:33:15,955
Speaker 2: Gore in two thousand, which you know was unprecedented, there's

596
00:33:15,995 --> 00:33:18,435
Speaker 2: like on an eighteen seventy six moment you could point to,

597
00:33:19,235 --> 00:33:26,115
Speaker 2: but the it became a very lazy journalistic move for

598
00:33:26,555 --> 00:33:29,395
Speaker 2: journalists writing about pretty much anything in American politics to

599
00:33:29,435 --> 00:33:35,515
Speaker 2: call their rolodex American presidential historians, right, which is like

600
00:33:35,635 --> 00:33:37,835
Speaker 2: five people that like you'd see David Gergan and Michael

601
00:33:37,835 --> 00:33:41,675
Speaker 2: beschlass Endors, Karns Goodwin, pretty much every story commenting on

602
00:33:41,715 --> 00:33:47,195
Speaker 2: whether this whatever it was, was unprecedented, and like it's

603
00:33:47,235 --> 00:33:51,435
Speaker 2: a stupid question, is the thing, And there's no answer

604
00:33:51,595 --> 00:33:56,315
Speaker 2: that can be satisfying because every answer reduces the past

605
00:33:56,595 --> 00:33:59,555
Speaker 2: to you know, like an ice cube training like you

606
00:33:59,555 --> 00:34:01,155
Speaker 2: pop out an ice cube. This one would be good

607
00:34:01,195 --> 00:34:03,795
Speaker 2: with this drink like it just it's like a meaningless thing.

608
00:34:03,915 --> 00:34:06,555
Speaker 2: So you know, when the two thousand and eight financial

609
00:34:06,595 --> 00:34:09,115
Speaker 2: crisis happened, I remember, because then you know I would

610
00:34:09,155 --> 00:34:12,475
Speaker 2: start getting these is this is this financial crisis unprecedented?

611
00:34:12,515 --> 00:34:14,315
Speaker 2: And you know, how does it compare it to nineteen

612
00:34:14,355 --> 00:34:18,795
Speaker 2: thirty one, nineteen thirty two? And what are you talking about?

613
00:34:18,835 --> 00:34:21,555
Speaker 2: It is like nothing, there's nothing in common between two

614
00:34:21,595 --> 00:34:24,035
Speaker 2: thousand and eight and nineteen thirty one nineteen thirty two,

615
00:34:24,195 --> 00:34:27,115
Speaker 2: Like we're not eating our shoes. This is a completely

616
00:34:27,155 --> 00:34:31,475
Speaker 2: different set of problems with finance and globalism and like

617
00:34:32,315 --> 00:34:35,795
Speaker 2: and chicanery among financiers.

618
00:34:35,835 --> 00:34:38,555
Speaker 1: Like it's a that's the argument that it is unprecedented,

619
00:34:38,595 --> 00:34:40,675
Speaker 1: that like everything is new because everything is a totally

620
00:34:40,675 --> 00:34:41,275
Speaker 1: different set of.

621
00:34:41,155 --> 00:34:44,715
Speaker 3: Com Yes, well, they're always you could always call upon say, well,

622
00:34:44,715 --> 00:34:47,755
Speaker 3: would actually be really quite interesting to compare two thousand

623
00:34:47,795 --> 00:34:51,275
Speaker 3: and eight to nineteen thirty two, But it's an act

624
00:34:51,315 --> 00:34:52,755
Speaker 3: of extended comparison.

625
00:34:52,795 --> 00:34:54,475
Speaker 2: There are some things that are similar. And one of

626
00:34:54,555 --> 00:34:56,955
Speaker 2: the things that as a historian you're interested in doing

627
00:34:57,075 --> 00:35:00,195
Speaker 2: is measuring the distance between two points and then trying

628
00:35:00,195 --> 00:35:02,715
Speaker 2: to figure out what's the engine that drives you from

629
00:35:02,715 --> 00:35:04,795
Speaker 2: point day to point b. You know, is it is

630
00:35:04,795 --> 00:35:08,195
Speaker 2: it changes in the economy, is it US foreign policy?

631
00:35:08,955 --> 00:35:11,955
Speaker 2: Is it changing to technology? Is it the circulation of

632
00:35:11,995 --> 00:35:15,755
Speaker 2: goods due to new transportation infrastructure? Like, there are a

633
00:35:15,755 --> 00:35:18,835
Speaker 2: lot of interesting questions you could ask, but you can't

634
00:35:19,115 --> 00:35:21,995
Speaker 2: ask those questions and answer them in you know, a

635
00:35:22,115 --> 00:35:26,075
Speaker 2: three minute phone call with a reporter or popping up

636
00:35:26,075 --> 00:35:29,995
Speaker 2: on MSNBC or something like. It's very hard to offer

637
00:35:30,155 --> 00:35:33,875
Speaker 2: up an account of the relationship between the past and

638
00:35:33,915 --> 00:35:37,595
Speaker 2: the present to the media as it is currently configured.

639
00:35:38,235 --> 00:35:41,755
Speaker 2: So the past is really flattened. It's like available for

640
00:35:42,395 --> 00:35:45,875
Speaker 2: the occasional bond mo oh fgr once said, you know,

641
00:35:46,075 --> 00:35:49,195
Speaker 2: this reminds me of something that Kennedy did, like what

642
00:35:49,875 --> 00:35:53,635
Speaker 2: like as the history, especially because everything becomes narrative presidential action.

643
00:35:54,235 --> 00:35:58,995
Speaker 2: So all those accounts fall prey to what historians call presidentialism, right,

644
00:35:59,035 --> 00:36:02,915
Speaker 2: just just inflating the presidency as the sole mover of

645
00:36:02,955 --> 00:36:06,115
Speaker 2: all events in the United States, like, oh, the economy's down,

646
00:36:06,155 --> 00:36:07,995
Speaker 2: Well it's President Biden, Like what the hell did he do?

647
00:36:08,075 --> 00:36:10,715
Speaker 2: I don't know, Like it's a weird. But then since

648
00:36:10,755 --> 00:36:13,835
Speaker 2: the go to people among historians are like these kinds

649
00:36:13,835 --> 00:36:18,555
Speaker 2: of celebrity presidential biographers, it's not their fault that they're

650
00:36:18,595 --> 00:36:20,475
Speaker 2: getting the phone calls, and their answer is going to

651
00:36:20,515 --> 00:36:23,875
Speaker 2: involve something that a president said or a president did,

652
00:36:24,035 --> 00:36:27,555
Speaker 2: and so those answers are just really not going to

653
00:36:27,555 --> 00:36:31,075
Speaker 2: be illuminating, and they're going to distort American's perception of

654
00:36:31,115 --> 00:36:34,475
Speaker 2: how change happens. There's nothing that's ever structural, and nothing's

655
00:36:34,515 --> 00:36:38,435
Speaker 2: really driven by economic forces or technological forces. Everything is

656
00:36:38,475 --> 00:36:41,955
Speaker 2: somehow driven from the White House, and it corrupts our

657
00:36:41,995 --> 00:36:46,675
Speaker 2: sense of our own capacity as voters and as citizens

658
00:36:46,675 --> 00:36:50,475
Speaker 2: to act right or as parents or as you know, children,

659
00:36:50,595 --> 00:36:55,555
Speaker 2: or as school principles or whatever. Like somehow everything's nationalized

660
00:36:55,595 --> 00:37:00,275
Speaker 2: and partisanized, so that like is this ever precedented? As

661
00:37:00,315 --> 00:37:02,795
Speaker 2: that go to or even like you know, the swine

662
00:37:02,795 --> 00:37:09,555
Speaker 2: flu panic or you know, the coronavirus, like everything has

663
00:37:09,595 --> 00:37:13,475
Speaker 2: to answered that question. And it sort of drove me

664
00:37:13,755 --> 00:37:18,475
Speaker 2: crazy because I don't know, Like it just seems like

665
00:37:18,515 --> 00:37:23,035
Speaker 2: you would you call up a chemist and say, can

666
00:37:23,075 --> 00:37:26,355
Speaker 2: we turn out, uh, you know, steal into gold? Like

667
00:37:26,435 --> 00:37:29,595
Speaker 2: it just doesn't. It's like that's not how chemistry works,

668
00:37:29,635 --> 00:37:33,115
Speaker 2: Like that's alchemy, Like that just doesn't. It defies the

669
00:37:33,155 --> 00:37:34,955
Speaker 2: method of being a chemist. Why would you ask me

670
00:37:34,995 --> 00:37:35,555
Speaker 2: such a question?

671
00:37:35,635 --> 00:37:39,075
Speaker 1: Because they want like unprecedented is another way of saying newsworthy, yeah,

672
00:37:39,075 --> 00:37:40,635
Speaker 1: which is then like I have a peg. This has

673
00:37:40,635 --> 00:37:41,355
Speaker 1: never happened before.

674
00:37:41,715 --> 00:37:44,795
Speaker 2: This happens before, Like so I get it, and I'm

675
00:37:44,875 --> 00:37:47,155
Speaker 2: like I do there's I mean, like I'm I get

676
00:37:47,195 --> 00:37:50,115
Speaker 2: why a journalist want to do that. But as a story,

677
00:37:50,115 --> 00:37:51,395
Speaker 2: and there is a lot to be learned from the past,

678
00:37:51,435 --> 00:37:52,795
Speaker 2: so you kind of want to say, like wait, but yeah,

679
00:37:52,795 --> 00:37:54,235
Speaker 2: actually there's something and let me tell you about the

680
00:37:54,275 --> 00:37:56,715
Speaker 2: election of eighteen seventy six. It's really different from this,

681
00:37:56,875 --> 00:38:00,155
Speaker 2: but here's how that went. So anytime I was asked

682
00:38:00,195 --> 00:38:02,435
Speaker 2: to do something because a story in like rhinesse or

683
00:38:02,475 --> 00:38:05,195
Speaker 2: whatever about something in the present, and I had to

684
00:38:05,195 --> 00:38:08,035
Speaker 2: be a way that something in the past illuminates it.

685
00:38:08,115 --> 00:38:10,955
Speaker 2: But then to try to tell that story in a

686
00:38:10,955 --> 00:38:14,955
Speaker 2: way that doesn't reduce the past to the prologue to

687
00:38:14,995 --> 00:38:17,835
Speaker 2: the present, like everything is somehow explained by the past,

688
00:38:18,795 --> 00:38:23,275
Speaker 2: and therefore we should either like get really worried or

689
00:38:23,435 --> 00:38:25,675
Speaker 2: not worry at all. Like people want to talk about

690
00:38:25,675 --> 00:38:27,875
Speaker 2: the lack of civility in Congress. Remember that guy who

691
00:38:27,955 --> 00:38:30,275
Speaker 2: screamed out you lie to Obama during the State of

692
00:38:30,315 --> 00:38:33,035
Speaker 2: the Union. And then there was all like everybody would

693
00:38:33,035 --> 00:38:34,995
Speaker 2: call this history and at Yale Joan Freeman who'd written

694
00:38:35,035 --> 00:38:39,115
Speaker 2: about the fisticuffs on the floor of Congress City in

695
00:38:39,195 --> 00:38:44,595
Speaker 2: eighteen fifties and eighteen forties, and it was like, somehow, sure,

696
00:38:44,715 --> 00:38:48,315
Speaker 2: that's important history. We should know that. But does it

697
00:38:48,995 --> 00:38:54,475
Speaker 2: mitigate the cruelty and just vulgarity of members of Congress today?

698
00:38:54,635 --> 00:38:58,875
Speaker 2: Does it make us sleep easier that people were crap

699
00:38:58,915 --> 00:39:01,155
Speaker 2: in the past? I don't know, Like what's the I

700
00:39:01,155 --> 00:39:03,675
Speaker 2: don't get. I don't even understand what that is meant

701
00:39:03,715 --> 00:39:07,315
Speaker 2: to offer, Like as a citizen, I just actually want

702
00:39:07,315 --> 00:39:09,035
Speaker 2: my members of Congress to being better. I get the

703
00:39:09,035 --> 00:39:11,075
Speaker 2: fact that people bashed each other over the head in

704
00:39:11,155 --> 00:39:13,595
Speaker 2: eighteen fifty six doesn't actually make me think it's okay

705
00:39:13,595 --> 00:39:14,275
Speaker 2: to do it today.

706
00:39:14,355 --> 00:39:16,075
Speaker 1: Well, it is interesting to think about this in the

707
00:39:16,155 --> 00:39:18,635
Speaker 1: context of the conversation we're having around polling though in

708
00:39:18,755 --> 00:39:23,675
Speaker 1: sofar as they're I mean, they're both entertainment oriented products

709
00:39:23,755 --> 00:39:26,675
Speaker 1: that are sort of like Newsy in a way, but

710
00:39:26,715 --> 00:39:29,395
Speaker 1: they're also about conveying a sense of security, like if

711
00:39:29,395 --> 00:39:32,155
Speaker 1: something is precedented, if it's happened before, we've seen this before,

712
00:39:32,435 --> 00:39:34,315
Speaker 1: we know everything's gonna be okay in the future, saying

713
00:39:34,395 --> 00:39:36,315
Speaker 1: if you think you can predict what the future is

714
00:39:36,355 --> 00:39:38,715
Speaker 1: going to be. So there is this way in which

715
00:39:38,715 --> 00:39:41,315
Speaker 1: they both serve to manage anxiety about shame.

716
00:39:41,475 --> 00:39:44,115
Speaker 2: But you know what it also did. It diminished the

717
00:39:44,115 --> 00:39:47,035
Speaker 2: threat that was Trump because I don't know if you

718
00:39:47,035 --> 00:39:49,475
Speaker 2: can mervous, but I have really strong people trying to

719
00:39:49,475 --> 00:39:52,875
Speaker 2: come with like he's he's like thirty percent Goldwater, forty

720
00:39:52,915 --> 00:39:57,115
Speaker 2: percent Nixon, and the other thirty percent is George Wallace,

721
00:39:57,635 --> 00:40:01,355
Speaker 2: or you know, he's fifty percent P. T. Barnum and

722
00:40:01,395 --> 00:40:04,675
Speaker 2: fifty percent Charles Lindberg. It'll be like what, like, yes,

723
00:40:04,755 --> 00:40:12,235
Speaker 2: there are frogs and tycoons and showmen and want to

724
00:40:12,235 --> 00:40:16,115
Speaker 2: be dictators in the American past. But wait, this guy's

725
00:40:16,195 --> 00:40:18,275
Speaker 2: looking like he's gonna win. Like, this guy is a

726
00:40:18,355 --> 00:40:21,515
Speaker 2: huge following, And I don't place myself outside of like

727
00:40:21,555 --> 00:40:25,075
Speaker 2: diminishing what that was, or what his presidency might do,

728
00:40:25,275 --> 00:40:31,715
Speaker 2: or his likelihood of getting elected. But it really was

729
00:40:31,755 --> 00:40:36,435
Speaker 2: a disservice to people's ability to understand him, and like,

730
00:40:36,515 --> 00:40:40,595
Speaker 2: as a voter, I would say to me, one of

731
00:40:40,595 --> 00:40:44,115
Speaker 2: the great mistakes of that the twenty fifteen twenty sixteen

732
00:40:44,195 --> 00:40:47,995
Speaker 2: moment was the Democratic Party deciding to defer to Hillary Clinton,

733
00:40:49,155 --> 00:40:53,235
Speaker 2: to drum Bernie Sanders off of all possible stages, and

734
00:40:53,315 --> 00:40:56,795
Speaker 2: to discourage anyone else from running. Elizabeth Warren wanted to run, right,

735
00:40:57,555 --> 00:41:01,035
Speaker 2: I would have so loved to see, Okay, they have

736
00:41:01,075 --> 00:41:05,915
Speaker 2: a lot of people lining up in these Republicans, and

737
00:41:06,035 --> 00:41:09,995
Speaker 2: have the Democrats say to themselves, let's see who's out there,

738
00:41:10,115 --> 00:41:13,155
Speaker 2: Like why Hillary Clinton, who was a terrible candidate and

739
00:41:14,995 --> 00:41:17,555
Speaker 2: a terrible candidate to put off against who became the

740
00:41:18,035 --> 00:41:20,835
Speaker 2: mentual nominee. But like that to your question of like,

741
00:41:20,955 --> 00:41:25,875
Speaker 2: what the how do we get here to twenty twenty

742
00:41:25,875 --> 00:41:32,275
Speaker 2: four with this gerontocracy? The from the Democratic point of view,

743
00:41:33,275 --> 00:41:39,315
Speaker 2: you see that real lack of faith in the people's

744
00:41:39,315 --> 00:41:42,595
Speaker 2: ability to discriminate and choose the best candidate, where the

745
00:41:42,635 --> 00:41:46,315
Speaker 2: party has the party will anoint Hillary Clinton, or the

746
00:41:46,355 --> 00:41:49,075
Speaker 2: party will you say, of course Joe Biden is going

747
00:41:49,115 --> 00:41:51,675
Speaker 2: to run. No one. Everyone has to agree not to

748
00:41:51,715 --> 00:41:54,795
Speaker 2: contest that, not to even publicly challenge it, but certainly

749
00:41:54,795 --> 00:41:57,115
Speaker 2: not to run against him or to give money to

750
00:41:57,155 --> 00:42:00,635
Speaker 2: someone who might run against him. It's completely anti democratic

751
00:42:00,715 --> 00:42:02,395
Speaker 2: with a lower case D. And the fact that the

752
00:42:02,435 --> 00:42:05,915
Speaker 2: Democratic Party is allegedly running as the Party of Democracy

753
00:42:05,955 --> 00:42:08,595
Speaker 2: when they can't actually even tolerate a competition for the

754
00:42:08,715 --> 00:42:13,035
Speaker 2: party's nomination for president is appalling. But I think that

755
00:42:14,795 --> 00:42:18,195
Speaker 2: risk aversion is somewhat I think as you're kind of

756
00:42:18,195 --> 00:42:23,475
Speaker 2: suggesting tied to that fetish around unprecedented, like, oh, well,

757
00:42:23,515 --> 00:42:26,315
Speaker 2: because this is the most important election that's ever happened,

758
00:42:27,715 --> 00:42:30,315
Speaker 2: you know, Hillary Clinton must be our candidate. She's you know,

759
00:42:31,035 --> 00:42:33,555
Speaker 2: or whatever like that. Somehow the nature of the rig

760
00:42:33,795 --> 00:42:36,835
Speaker 2: you have to be willing to lose. And yeah, I like,

761
00:42:36,875 --> 00:42:39,515
Speaker 2: if you don't trust the voters or the voters in

762
00:42:39,555 --> 00:42:44,955
Speaker 2: your own party, then you're not doing your job. I

763
00:42:45,355 --> 00:42:49,395
Speaker 2: think the reasons that that what looks like as the

764
00:42:49,395 --> 00:42:52,115
Speaker 2: moment we're talking that Trump and Biden will be the

765
00:42:52,155 --> 00:42:57,515
Speaker 2: major party nominees. I think the reasons for their elevation

766
00:42:57,635 --> 00:43:00,675
Speaker 2: to those positions are different, but I mean, they're both

767
00:43:00,755 --> 00:43:06,195
Speaker 2: representations of many political failures, the chain of political failures,

768
00:43:06,235 --> 00:43:08,675
Speaker 2: but the failures are different.

769
00:43:08,675 --> 00:43:10,875
Speaker 1: Along the way, we're talking last night about the calls

770
00:43:10,875 --> 00:43:13,275
Speaker 1: for an open convention from people who are concerned about

771
00:43:13,275 --> 00:43:16,915
Speaker 1: Biden's age, and it's kind of a lovely fantasy in

772
00:43:16,955 --> 00:43:19,155
Speaker 1: some sense, but one of the big concerns I have

773
00:43:19,235 --> 00:43:22,275
Speaker 1: about that is, like, do you really trust the Democratic

774
00:43:22,275 --> 00:43:25,555
Speaker 1: Party to pick a candidate that meaningfully represents what the

775
00:43:25,635 --> 00:43:29,555
Speaker 1: voting base would want? And it seems like twenty sixteen

776
00:43:29,635 --> 00:43:31,875
Speaker 1: is a good example of why you might be suspicious

777
00:43:31,875 --> 00:43:33,875
Speaker 1: that that's actually going to yield a result that they

778
00:43:33,875 --> 00:43:34,675
Speaker 1: would be happy with.

779
00:43:35,835 --> 00:43:40,795
Speaker 2: But it's not. Unlike there's currently a pretty major effort

780
00:43:40,955 --> 00:43:45,195
Speaker 2: on the part of Republicans of the kind of Greg Abbott,

781
00:43:45,395 --> 00:43:50,915
Speaker 2: Ted Cruz, Rick Santorum armed the party to get enough

782
00:43:50,915 --> 00:43:54,035
Speaker 2: state legislatures to call for a second constitutional convention that

783
00:43:54,115 --> 00:43:56,595
Speaker 2: there would be one, And that's been going on for

784
00:43:56,595 --> 00:43:58,675
Speaker 2: a number of years and they're getting closer year by year,

785
00:43:58,755 --> 00:44:03,075
Speaker 2: and it has been the position of the left since

786
00:44:03,115 --> 00:44:07,995
Speaker 2: the nineteen eighties to oppose such a convention on the

787
00:44:07,995 --> 00:44:13,795
Speaker 2: theory that it would lead to results that liberals and

788
00:44:13,795 --> 00:44:18,755
Speaker 2: progressives would not like. And you can keep doing that,

789
00:44:18,795 --> 00:44:21,875
Speaker 2: but you can't then also call yourself the party of Democracy.

790
00:44:22,555 --> 00:44:25,275
Speaker 2: And if there's going to be a convention, maybe you

791
00:44:25,315 --> 00:44:28,035
Speaker 2: should prepare for it and actually have a plan and

792
00:44:28,075 --> 00:44:30,595
Speaker 2: an agenda and a proposal for what the rules of

793
00:44:30,635 --> 00:44:32,995
Speaker 2: such a convention would be, and have a wish list

794
00:44:33,075 --> 00:44:38,955
Speaker 2: and have a platform. Start thinking about delegates, like maybe

795
00:44:39,395 --> 00:44:45,195
Speaker 2: start initiating smaller convention like meetings that involve not just

796
00:44:45,235 --> 00:44:50,715
Speaker 2: the party elites but actual voters. So a reason that

797
00:44:50,755 --> 00:44:52,635
Speaker 2: you don't have a lot of faith in a democratic

798
00:44:52,755 --> 00:44:55,715
Speaker 2: national convention choosing a candidate that you would be happy

799
00:44:55,715 --> 00:45:00,075
Speaker 2: with is you've probably never been a participant in any

800
00:45:00,115 --> 00:45:04,555
Speaker 2: kind of a convention of any kind. Whereas historically, you know,

801
00:45:04,635 --> 00:45:09,075
Speaker 2: state constitutional conventions were held all the time, constitutional like

802
00:45:09,835 --> 00:45:13,755
Speaker 2: constitution like conventions held in towns and cities for all

803
00:45:13,835 --> 00:45:16,595
Speaker 2: kinds of activities. It was like the main mode other

804
00:45:16,675 --> 00:45:20,275
Speaker 2: than voting, people participated as citizens and sometimes they're called

805
00:45:20,315 --> 00:45:24,115
Speaker 2: citizen assemblies. But that very act of like gathering together

806
00:45:24,155 --> 00:45:26,075
Speaker 2: with a bunch of random people to kind of make

807
00:45:26,075 --> 00:45:32,115
Speaker 2: a decision about something. That's what polling replaced. So we

808
00:45:32,235 --> 00:45:34,875
Speaker 2: now have this like weird now now it's like tech

809
00:45:34,995 --> 00:45:38,995
Speaker 2: driven thing instead of getting together at the town library.

810
00:45:39,315 --> 00:45:41,115
Speaker 2: You know, we're talking here in Vermont, where there's still

811
00:45:41,115 --> 00:45:42,875
Speaker 2: our town meetings, but a lot of the town meetings

812
00:45:42,915 --> 00:45:44,715
Speaker 2: have become zoom meetings. Like that was the kind of

813
00:45:44,715 --> 00:45:49,435
Speaker 2: consequence of COVID and also of diminishing attendance at town meetings.

814
00:45:49,475 --> 00:45:52,035
Speaker 2: But we just don't We're not in the habit of

815
00:45:52,035 --> 00:45:54,915
Speaker 2: sitting in a room and arguing things out, building a coalition,

816
00:45:55,195 --> 00:45:58,275
Speaker 2: arriving at some kind of decision. Excepting that nobody gets

817
00:45:58,315 --> 00:46:01,675
Speaker 2: what they want. That compromises important. And so no one

818
00:46:01,715 --> 00:46:06,075
Speaker 2: trusts the convention as a anymore than they trust elections.

819
00:46:06,115 --> 00:46:08,475
Speaker 2: I think people trust conventions a lot less because they

820
00:46:08,515 --> 00:46:11,595
Speaker 2: just don't even know what that means. Like there has

821
00:46:11,635 --> 00:46:13,835
Speaker 2: not been a state constitutional convention in the United States

822
00:46:13,875 --> 00:46:17,875
Speaker 2: since nineteen eighty six. Was Rhode Island like it was

823
00:46:17,955 --> 00:46:21,115
Speaker 2: voted on in nineteen eighty four as a ballot initiative?

824
00:46:21,155 --> 00:46:22,715
Speaker 1: Why was that a ballid initiative for them?

825
00:46:22,955 --> 00:46:26,155
Speaker 2: So they have a regular they're a number of I

826
00:46:26,155 --> 00:46:28,875
Speaker 2: think it's maybe ten states that it's it's in their

827
00:46:28,915 --> 00:46:32,595
Speaker 2: constitution that the voters will be asked at a regular interval,

828
00:46:32,595 --> 00:46:34,395
Speaker 2: would you like to hold a convention? So I think

829
00:46:34,475 --> 00:46:37,515
Speaker 2: Rhode Islands is every ten years. So there there were

830
00:46:37,555 --> 00:46:39,275
Speaker 2: some of these votes in twenty twenty two. They are

831
00:46:39,275 --> 00:46:41,475
Speaker 2: going to be some in twenty twenty four. Voters keep

832
00:46:41,515 --> 00:46:45,275
Speaker 2: saying no because they just don't trust conventions anymore because

833
00:46:45,275 --> 00:46:46,875
Speaker 2: no one even even really knows what that means. Well,

834
00:46:46,875 --> 00:46:48,715
Speaker 2: how do you picked delegates and how that happened? But

835
00:46:48,875 --> 00:46:52,435
Speaker 2: like a convention. I would love to attend a convention,

836
00:46:52,555 --> 00:46:55,115
Speaker 2: like like actually in a meaningful way to participate in one.

837
00:46:55,755 --> 00:46:59,835
Speaker 2: But it's one of the biggest holes in our system

838
00:46:59,875 --> 00:47:03,195
Speaker 2: of representative government because it's a major historically, it's like

839
00:47:03,275 --> 00:47:08,835
Speaker 2: a major way that Americans involved themselves in political decision making.

840
00:47:09,195 --> 00:47:11,275
Speaker 2: You know, no one's going to run for the legislature

841
00:47:11,875 --> 00:47:15,715
Speaker 2: and first pulling and now like social media posting is

842
00:47:15,715 --> 00:47:19,875
Speaker 2: somehow like you civic conusity. Yeah, and so I get

843
00:47:19,915 --> 00:47:22,075
Speaker 2: that not trusting, like or if you were a Republican

844
00:47:22,115 --> 00:47:23,195
Speaker 2: and they said, you know, we're going to have an

845
00:47:23,235 --> 00:47:26,755
Speaker 2: open convention because Trump's in jail now or whatever. People

846
00:47:26,795 --> 00:47:30,155
Speaker 2: would really freak out. It's not on either party, like

847
00:47:30,195 --> 00:47:32,755
Speaker 2: it's across the board. People don't trust the idea of

848
00:47:32,995 --> 00:47:34,315
Speaker 2: letting the people decide about.

849
00:47:34,155 --> 00:47:36,955
Speaker 1: Something there was I mean this, this connects to the

850
00:47:36,955 --> 00:47:39,635
Speaker 1: pos and thing also because there's that Okay, sure you

851
00:47:39,675 --> 00:47:43,355
Speaker 1: can put everything about everything Congress does is now on television,

852
00:47:43,515 --> 00:47:46,875
Speaker 1: but like, who's actually watching. It's lobbyists, it's private interest groups,

853
00:47:46,915 --> 00:47:48,995
Speaker 1: the people who actually have the time, which most of

854
00:47:49,075 --> 00:47:52,915
Speaker 1: us don't. And it reminds me of two moments in

855
00:47:52,955 --> 00:47:57,595
Speaker 1: the episodes that we just reran in Hush Rush. There's

856
00:47:57,635 --> 00:48:00,115
Speaker 1: the Rush Limbok quote, something that effective. If you listen

857
00:48:00,155 --> 00:48:03,275
Speaker 1: to me, you never have to read another newspaper, never

858
00:48:03,355 --> 00:48:05,835
Speaker 1: have to read another magazine. I do it for you,

859
00:48:06,195 --> 00:48:07,595
Speaker 1: and best of all, I tell you what to think

860
00:48:07,635 --> 00:48:11,515
Speaker 1: about these very complicated issues. And there's the Eisenhower ad

861
00:48:11,555 --> 00:48:14,195
Speaker 1: from the fifty sixth election that we love so much

862
00:48:14,355 --> 00:48:17,315
Speaker 1: that we almost made the avatar of the last archive,

863
00:48:17,395 --> 00:48:19,715
Speaker 1: that little cartoon guy who's surrounded by all his voices.

864
00:48:21,195 --> 00:48:25,955
Speaker 1: High prices, low prices, unemployment like full employment. Why stop?

865
00:48:26,275 --> 00:48:28,435
Speaker 1: I read the papers and the magazines, like you know,

866
00:48:28,515 --> 00:48:31,995
Speaker 1: but who's right what's right? How can I tell like

867
00:48:32,035 --> 00:48:36,235
Speaker 1: that that kind of increasing complexity, the like daily burden

868
00:48:36,275 --> 00:48:40,595
Speaker 1: of democracy is heavier every day because it's a more

869
00:48:40,635 --> 00:48:42,475
Speaker 1: and more complicated world.

870
00:48:42,995 --> 00:48:45,555
Speaker 2: And I mean, no, it's just a more and more

871
00:48:45,675 --> 00:48:49,395
Speaker 2: nationalized political conversation. So I think if you were just

872
00:48:50,355 --> 00:48:52,955
Speaker 2: do you participate, like in your neighborhood in a neighborhood

873
00:48:52,955 --> 00:48:57,555
Speaker 2: council or in your borrow in New York in borough meetings,

874
00:48:57,595 --> 00:48:59,795
Speaker 2: Like if you were doing those things, it wouldn't actually

875
00:48:59,795 --> 00:49:01,835
Speaker 2: be that hard to keep up with what you needed

876
00:49:01,835 --> 00:49:04,435
Speaker 2: to know, like, well, there's a new budget line about

877
00:49:04,435 --> 00:49:05,675
Speaker 2: our public library and this.

878
00:49:05,795 --> 00:49:06,955
Speaker 1: Mole, you know, like.

879
00:49:09,115 --> 00:49:14,635
Speaker 2: We've most of us completely abandoned our responsibility to the

880
00:49:14,675 --> 00:49:17,995
Speaker 2: civic institutions that are part of our local lives.

881
00:49:18,115 --> 00:49:19,995
Speaker 1: No, well, I mean we do do that, and it

882
00:49:20,075 --> 00:49:23,395
Speaker 1: is like we want to reroute traffic on this street. Maybe, yes,

883
00:49:23,475 --> 00:49:27,075
Speaker 1: that is still simple in a way that it was before.

884
00:49:27,195 --> 00:49:30,315
Speaker 1: Although I do think I mean, especially with neighborhood determinations

885
00:49:30,355 --> 00:49:33,475
Speaker 1: and building and things like that. There's environmental reviews, like

886
00:49:33,555 --> 00:49:38,115
Speaker 1: my dad is on the conservation committee. I think it's

887
00:49:38,115 --> 00:49:42,275
Speaker 1: called for the suburb where my parents live, and those

888
00:49:42,275 --> 00:49:44,675
Speaker 1: are like they have to do these really intensive reviews,

889
00:49:44,835 --> 00:49:46,795
Speaker 1: so like, in some way, I actually do think those

890
00:49:46,795 --> 00:49:48,995
Speaker 1: things are more complicated now than they were before. But

891
00:49:49,195 --> 00:49:52,515
Speaker 1: I guess I'm talking more about the you know, our

892
00:49:52,715 --> 00:49:57,955
Speaker 1: season two, episode five and six moon Landing argument of like,

893
00:49:58,035 --> 00:50:02,275
Speaker 1: there's just stuff now that you could not possibly understand

894
00:50:02,315 --> 00:50:07,155
Speaker 1: on your own, both geopolitically and technologically. The scale of

895
00:50:07,235 --> 00:50:09,555
Speaker 1: the problems we face, or at least the scale the

896
00:50:10,115 --> 00:50:12,475
Speaker 1: we can now comprehend that perhaps we could not before,

897
00:50:13,115 --> 00:50:14,755
Speaker 1: does feel master And if.

898
00:50:14,595 --> 00:50:17,955
Speaker 2: You really believe that, then then why does everybody get

899
00:50:17,955 --> 00:50:18,435
Speaker 2: to vote?

900
00:50:18,475 --> 00:50:21,515
Speaker 1: Because I do still believe in people's capacity to understand

901
00:50:21,515 --> 00:50:23,715
Speaker 1: these things. I'm just saying I think it takes more work,

902
00:50:24,395 --> 00:50:26,915
Speaker 1: and I think one of the problems is you get

903
00:50:26,915 --> 00:50:30,355
Speaker 1: all these shortcuts from doing the work, and some of

904
00:50:30,395 --> 00:50:34,035
Speaker 1: them can be trusted and others of them can. But

905
00:50:34,115 --> 00:50:37,675
Speaker 1: maybe there ultimately is no real substitution for like taking

906
00:50:37,675 --> 00:50:40,835
Speaker 1: the time to think hard about these issues, and we've

907
00:50:40,875 --> 00:50:43,235
Speaker 1: all just gotten comfortable with substitutions that we shouldn't be

908
00:50:43,235 --> 00:50:43,915
Speaker 1: comfortable with.

909
00:50:44,515 --> 00:50:47,715
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I think that the sense though, of helplessness

910
00:50:47,995 --> 00:50:49,875
Speaker 2: around do I even know enough to figure out how

911
00:50:49,915 --> 00:50:50,275
Speaker 2: to vote?

912
00:50:50,315 --> 00:50:50,515
Speaker 1: Here?

913
00:50:50,595 --> 00:50:54,395
Speaker 2: In this you know from the Senate seat in my

914
00:50:54,555 --> 00:51:01,955
Speaker 2: state is exacerbated by just a tremendous deterioration of support

915
00:51:01,995 --> 00:51:05,675
Speaker 2: for local news organizations, which means that the kind of

916
00:51:05,755 --> 00:51:08,995
Speaker 2: daily reporting about what's going on in your town, your neighborhood,

917
00:51:09,035 --> 00:51:12,715
Speaker 2: your state, at your state house is really hard to find,

918
00:51:12,715 --> 00:51:16,515
Speaker 2: and it's really hard it's hard to figure out who's

919
00:51:16,515 --> 00:51:18,395
Speaker 2: going to pay for that. So, you know, in the

920
00:51:18,395 --> 00:51:21,595
Speaker 2: absence of that local news coverage, people turn to the

921
00:51:21,675 --> 00:51:23,675
Speaker 2: drama of the national news coverage, and they get kind

922
00:51:23,675 --> 00:51:26,915
Speaker 2: of radicalized by their news sources. And you know, we

923
00:51:26,955 --> 00:51:28,955
Speaker 2: can think of all kinds of problems that fall from that,

924
00:51:29,035 --> 00:51:30,755
Speaker 2: but I don't think until we solve the problem of

925
00:51:30,795 --> 00:51:33,555
Speaker 2: local news we can solve those larger problems.

926
00:51:33,835 --> 00:51:38,115
Speaker 1: Yeah, something that's interesting about twenty twenty four is it's

927
00:51:38,115 --> 00:51:41,035
Speaker 1: the biggest selection year in history. You know, roughly four

928
00:51:41,035 --> 00:51:42,835
Speaker 1: billion people are going to go to the polls this year.

929
00:51:43,155 --> 00:51:46,715
Speaker 1: That's like about half the global population who are going

930
00:51:46,755 --> 00:51:51,435
Speaker 1: to participate in self determination. That's an incredible thing. But

931
00:51:51,475 --> 00:51:54,395
Speaker 1: then there's this sad undercurrent to that, which is that

932
00:51:54,435 --> 00:51:56,875
Speaker 1: in so many of these elections there's this you know,

933
00:51:56,995 --> 00:51:59,395
Speaker 1: cliched thing that's kind of true that democracy is on

934
00:51:59,435 --> 00:52:04,275
Speaker 1: the ballot, And I guess it brings me to this

935
00:52:04,875 --> 00:52:08,315
Speaker 1: question about twenty sixteen, in the panic around democratic norms,

936
00:52:08,955 --> 00:52:11,835
Speaker 1: how do you actually promote a democratic cast of mind?

937
00:52:11,915 --> 00:52:15,435
Speaker 1: Which we've talked about in the radio episodes too. What

938
00:52:15,675 --> 00:52:20,035
Speaker 1: is your answer to that? How do we inculcate in

939
00:52:20,235 --> 00:52:24,475
Speaker 1: voters the spirit of democracy, the tolerance for the complexity,

940
00:52:24,555 --> 00:52:25,635
Speaker 1: and the daily work of it.

941
00:52:25,795 --> 00:52:27,515
Speaker 2: I think a lot of really smart people have thought

942
00:52:27,515 --> 00:52:31,595
Speaker 2: about that like that. The new Zublett and Levitsky book

943
00:52:31,635 --> 00:52:33,595
Speaker 2: on the Tyranny of the Minority really kind of spells

944
00:52:33,635 --> 00:52:36,875
Speaker 2: out what the stakes are, but there have been some

945
00:52:36,915 --> 00:52:40,955
Speaker 2: great efforts made at thinking through what the solutions are too.

946
00:52:41,195 --> 00:52:43,515
Speaker 2: So one of my favorites is the report that the

947
00:52:43,555 --> 00:52:47,435
Speaker 2: American Academy Arts and Sciences put out several years ago

948
00:52:48,675 --> 00:52:52,195
Speaker 2: after like a multi year study involving, you know, hundreds

949
00:52:52,195 --> 00:52:54,595
Speaker 2: of people all over the country. Was led by Daniel Allen,

950
00:52:54,755 --> 00:52:59,635
Speaker 2: political theorist at Harvard, and among their recommendations were these

951
00:52:59,715 --> 00:53:02,515
Speaker 2: kind of small steps, like the kind of obvious thing

952
00:53:02,635 --> 00:53:05,075
Speaker 2: like election Day should be a national holiday, it should

953
00:53:05,115 --> 00:53:07,475
Speaker 2: be held on Veterans Day. It would honor veterans to

954
00:53:07,515 --> 00:53:11,355
Speaker 2: do so. Then you sort of kind of instead of

955
00:53:11,395 --> 00:53:14,155
Speaker 2: election night being a television and social media spectacle, you

956
00:53:14,155 --> 00:53:15,915
Speaker 2: could have the day itself as a kind of July

957
00:53:16,035 --> 00:53:18,755
Speaker 2: fourth celebration of the act of voting and the great

958
00:53:18,755 --> 00:53:21,275
Speaker 2: privilege that that is, and people wouldn't have to go

959
00:53:21,315 --> 00:53:23,515
Speaker 2: to work, and you know, the sort of federal holiday

960
00:53:23,555 --> 00:53:26,715
Speaker 2: piece of it. And so it was for instance, really

961
00:53:26,755 --> 00:53:29,395
Speaker 2: discouraging to me personally when Biden's big move was to

962
00:53:29,395 --> 00:53:33,675
Speaker 2: make Juneteenth a federal holiday. It was like, okay, you

963
00:53:33,675 --> 00:53:37,155
Speaker 2: could have met you Like there was another that was like,

964
00:53:37,435 --> 00:53:39,915
Speaker 2: this is this is a kind of real bipartisan project,

965
00:53:39,995 --> 00:53:43,035
Speaker 2: Like there's not. It's like just there's really not a

966
00:53:43,075 --> 00:53:45,835
Speaker 2: ton of objection to that. And the only objection is

967
00:53:45,875 --> 00:53:48,395
Speaker 2: it would make it possible for more people to vote.

968
00:53:48,395 --> 00:53:50,675
Speaker 2: So it's hard to state that as an objection publicly.

969
00:53:52,275 --> 00:53:54,835
Speaker 2: You know, there should be a year or two of

970
00:53:55,435 --> 00:53:58,395
Speaker 2: mandatory national service that could be civil or military, that

971
00:53:58,475 --> 00:54:01,315
Speaker 2: would bring together people, you you know, serve with people

972
00:54:01,355 --> 00:54:03,795
Speaker 2: from all over the country and it would sort of

973
00:54:03,835 --> 00:54:07,715
Speaker 2: mix Americans up more. Like things like that that just

974
00:54:07,795 --> 00:54:13,595
Speaker 2: seem they seem kind of you know, for giving student debt,

975
00:54:13,715 --> 00:54:16,475
Speaker 2: it's gonna was always going to be challenging to enforce,

976
00:54:16,635 --> 00:54:22,595
Speaker 2: to implement, to get through to defend budgetary grounds. But

977
00:54:22,755 --> 00:54:28,915
Speaker 2: the National Service, which would have also provided funds for

978
00:54:28,955 --> 00:54:31,515
Speaker 2: students to go to college, right like, in recompense of that,

979
00:54:31,555 --> 00:54:35,115
Speaker 2: there're you know, there's just like a much better idea

980
00:54:35,355 --> 00:54:42,115
Speaker 2: and it actually achieves in terms of support for college

981
00:54:42,195 --> 00:54:44,835
Speaker 2: education for people that can't afford. It is a much

982
00:54:44,875 --> 00:54:48,555
Speaker 2: better solution because it meets all these other civic goals,

983
00:54:48,595 --> 00:54:51,755
Speaker 2: whereas the forgiving student debt is like become a really

984
00:54:51,755 --> 00:54:57,155
Speaker 2: bad pub you know, partisan hot potato. Like. So it's

985
00:54:57,195 --> 00:55:01,275
Speaker 2: frustrating to see these really good ideas not having been

986
00:55:01,395 --> 00:55:04,635
Speaker 2: quite taken up yet. But that doesn't mean there aren't

987
00:55:04,635 --> 00:55:07,755
Speaker 2: really good ideas out there. So in terms of how

988
00:55:07,755 --> 00:55:09,755
Speaker 2: to implement those things or why they haven't been implement

989
00:55:09,875 --> 00:55:12,755
Speaker 2: men did because they're you know, they've been supported by

990
00:55:12,795 --> 00:55:16,635
Speaker 2: so many different people. I sidedly think you have to

991
00:55:16,635 --> 00:55:19,275
Speaker 2: look at who's making money off of not implementing that stuff.

992
00:55:24,555 --> 00:55:30,515
Speaker 2: If I think about twenty twenty four as the product

993
00:55:30,515 --> 00:55:36,475
Speaker 2: of a series of political failures, and you have made

994
00:55:36,475 --> 00:55:39,195
Speaker 2: the case for media accountability for some of those failures,

995
00:55:40,035 --> 00:55:44,355
Speaker 2: I really just think historically, so much of the blame

996
00:55:44,435 --> 00:55:46,035
Speaker 2: is going to be placed on the Republicans and the

997
00:55:46,035 --> 00:55:49,035
Speaker 2: Senate who voted against convicting Trump of impeachment and the

998
00:55:49,035 --> 00:55:52,355
Speaker 2: second of impeachment after the January sixth insurrection. That was

999
00:55:52,395 --> 00:55:56,835
Speaker 2: just a complete abdication of their constitutional duty as members

1000
00:55:56,875 --> 00:56:00,435
Speaker 2: of the Senate. It was a completely clear cut case.

1001
00:56:00,795 --> 00:56:06,235
Speaker 2: And among the arguments that you now see, For one thing,

1002
00:56:06,275 --> 00:56:10,035
Speaker 2: you know, Mitch McConnell famously said, oh, you know, he's

1003
00:56:10,115 --> 00:56:12,875
Speaker 2: subject to criminal indictment and prosecution, and that's the way

1004
00:56:12,875 --> 00:56:19,955
Speaker 2: this should happen. He's immune from criminal proscription. But for another,

1005
00:56:20,395 --> 00:56:22,155
Speaker 2: you know, when you read memoirs of people like Mitt

1006
00:56:22,195 --> 00:56:25,355
Speaker 2: Romney or Liz Cheney, you learned that a lot of

1007
00:56:25,355 --> 00:56:28,195
Speaker 2: those members of the Senate who voted against conviction did

1008
00:56:28,195 --> 00:56:31,515
Speaker 2: so because they had been subject to threats of violence

1009
00:56:31,555 --> 00:56:37,035
Speaker 2: against their wives and young children. And as terrifying as

1010
00:56:37,075 --> 00:56:39,995
Speaker 2: that isn't as terrible as that is, as itself, as

1011
00:56:40,035 --> 00:56:43,675
Speaker 2: you know, the symptom of the pathology of our politics.

1012
00:56:44,755 --> 00:56:47,715
Speaker 2: You are a member of the Senate and your obligation

1013
00:56:47,915 --> 00:56:50,355
Speaker 2: is to cast the correct vote. And it is like

1014
00:56:50,435 --> 00:56:52,435
Speaker 2: a trial by jury. It is a trial by jury,

1015
00:56:52,475 --> 00:56:56,555
Speaker 2: is it? It is our constitutional trial by jury? And

1016
00:56:56,595 --> 00:57:00,875
Speaker 2: you can't choose to vote not to convict out of

1017
00:57:00,955 --> 00:57:05,475
Speaker 2: fear and and and and stand by that. And I mean,

1018
00:57:05,515 --> 00:57:10,115
Speaker 2: I just think when we think about all the things,

1019
00:57:10,195 --> 00:57:12,555
Speaker 2: all the kinds of compromises to what is true and

1020
00:57:12,595 --> 00:57:15,515
Speaker 2: what is not true, how do people know what is true?

1021
00:57:15,875 --> 00:57:18,075
Speaker 2: How are we to know who to believe? At the

1022
00:57:18,195 --> 00:57:22,635
Speaker 2: end of the day, those guys, the guys who voted

1023
00:57:23,515 --> 00:57:26,675
Speaker 2: not to convict Trump in the Senate, I think they're

1024
00:57:26,755 --> 00:57:30,955
Speaker 2: the heaviest burden for you know, the New York catastrophe

1025
00:57:30,955 --> 00:57:33,635
Speaker 2: that is our current political culture.

1026
00:57:34,355 --> 00:57:40,035
Speaker 1: Yeah, to wrap up, We've talked about a lot of

1027
00:57:40,115 --> 00:57:45,275
Speaker 1: sort of bad habits of American democracy, and I think

1028
00:57:45,315 --> 00:57:48,875
Speaker 1: one of them is this idea that the election is

1029
00:57:48,915 --> 00:57:51,555
Speaker 1: all that matters. And it's hard to escape that idea

1030
00:57:51,755 --> 00:57:54,315
Speaker 1: in an election year. And obviously it is an extremely

1031
00:57:54,355 --> 00:57:57,115
Speaker 1: important thing, but it's not the only thing. If you

1032
00:57:57,155 --> 00:57:59,395
Speaker 1: were to come up with three rules for keeping your

1033
00:57:59,435 --> 00:58:02,315
Speaker 1: head during an election year, what would they be.

1034
00:58:03,315 --> 00:58:05,835
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that the rules that I live by

1035
00:58:05,995 --> 00:58:10,555
Speaker 2: are just like completely unpalatable. Most people never ever go

1036
00:58:10,675 --> 00:58:13,395
Speaker 2: on social media, just refuse to participate, and it is

1037
00:58:13,475 --> 00:58:15,755
Speaker 2: bad for the human condition. I've just never heard a

1038
00:58:15,755 --> 00:58:20,555
Speaker 2: really powerful defense of social media as being good for

1039
00:58:20,635 --> 00:58:26,995
Speaker 2: you psychologically, emotionally, politically, culturally. So that's me though I

1040
00:58:26,995 --> 00:58:29,435
Speaker 2: can't like, that's not a prescription. People don't live that way,

1041
00:58:29,515 --> 00:58:33,395
Speaker 2: Like that's just my own quirkiness. But I think, come

1042
00:58:33,475 --> 00:58:37,435
Speaker 2: up with some decision for yourself about what amount of

1043
00:58:37,475 --> 00:58:40,555
Speaker 2: that or what exposure to that, or what participation in

1044
00:58:40,595 --> 00:58:45,755
Speaker 2: that seems to you defensible and where does it cross

1045
00:58:45,755 --> 00:58:47,635
Speaker 2: the line. This is good. I feel good about this.

1046
00:58:47,635 --> 00:58:50,715
Speaker 2: This is how I learn about new music, this is

1047
00:58:50,755 --> 00:58:53,835
Speaker 2: how I stay in touch with these people. Whatever it is.

1048
00:58:53,875 --> 00:58:57,275
Speaker 2: That's good. But I think to think really carefully about

1049
00:58:58,595 --> 00:59:01,755
Speaker 2: where to draw the line yourself between what's good for

1050
00:59:01,835 --> 00:59:04,235
Speaker 2: you politically and not just good for you, good for

1051
00:59:04,275 --> 00:59:07,555
Speaker 2: your community, for the polity to which you belong, good

1052
00:59:07,555 --> 00:59:11,475
Speaker 2: for our political culture. More more people make more responsible

1053
00:59:11,475 --> 00:59:13,795
Speaker 2: decisions about that, things would things would better. I mean,

1054
00:59:14,595 --> 00:59:17,275
Speaker 2: you know, going to the neighborhood council meetings, getting involved

1055
00:59:17,275 --> 00:59:22,555
Speaker 2: in the local convening of whatever kind of convening it is.

1056
00:59:24,875 --> 00:59:29,555
Speaker 2: You know, the suggestion like join a knitting group, like honestly,

1057
00:59:29,675 --> 00:59:31,755
Speaker 2: like figure out a way to meet with other people

1058
00:59:32,035 --> 00:59:34,195
Speaker 2: in each other's houses and talk about what you're going

1059
00:59:34,235 --> 00:59:35,955
Speaker 2: to do next, Like are we going to knit a sweater?

1060
00:59:36,155 --> 00:59:38,515
Speaker 2: We gonna We're gonna work on a hat next time.

1061
00:59:38,435 --> 00:59:40,875
Speaker 1: Like just a massive campaign.

1062
00:59:41,435 --> 00:59:43,795
Speaker 2: I just disagree with people about something with very low

1063
00:59:43,835 --> 00:59:48,515
Speaker 2: stakes and accept that how compromises work, and like just

1064
00:59:48,635 --> 00:59:52,235
Speaker 2: kind of exercise those muscles around, like being with a

1065
00:59:52,235 --> 00:59:54,675
Speaker 2: group of people that are not your own family and

1066
00:59:54,755 --> 00:59:58,755
Speaker 2: not your workmates and which you make some decisions like

1067
00:59:58,875 --> 01:00:01,915
Speaker 2: don't really matter. You know, we're a book club or whatever,

1068
01:00:02,035 --> 01:00:04,355
Speaker 2: like get together, you know, talk about the podcast. I

1069
01:00:04,395 --> 01:00:05,955
Speaker 2: don't know, it doesn't really matter what you do, as

1070
01:00:05,955 --> 01:00:07,875
Speaker 2: so long as you like meet with other people like

1071
01:00:07,955 --> 01:00:11,635
Speaker 2: in person and make decisions that involve compromises. Like that's

1072
01:00:11,755 --> 01:00:14,595
Speaker 2: just a good place to be in terms of figuring

1073
01:00:14,635 --> 01:00:16,835
Speaker 2: out like what do you actually believe in? In terms

1074
01:00:16,835 --> 01:00:19,395
Speaker 2: of like if people get together and decide things together

1075
01:00:19,515 --> 01:00:22,075
Speaker 2: and consent to them as a group, was that a

1076
01:00:22,075 --> 01:00:25,555
Speaker 2: good outcome? I think the reason people are so vulnerable

1077
01:00:25,555 --> 01:00:29,675
Speaker 2: to authoritarianism is they have very little experience of civic

1078
01:00:29,675 --> 01:00:33,675
Speaker 2: participation any longer. Or you know, it's the declining church membership, right,

1079
01:00:33,755 --> 01:00:35,835
Speaker 2: Like if you were going to your church board meetings

1080
01:00:35,875 --> 01:00:38,555
Speaker 2: all the time, and many people do, but many people don't.

1081
01:00:38,795 --> 01:00:41,395
Speaker 2: You'd have a model for like, yeah, actually, when we

1082
01:00:41,435 --> 01:00:42,915
Speaker 2: get together with a bunch of other people and we

1083
01:00:42,995 --> 01:00:44,395
Speaker 2: argue it out, like we usually come up with a

1084
01:00:44,435 --> 01:00:46,875
Speaker 2: good app Like you have to find some way to

1085
01:00:46,875 --> 01:00:48,035
Speaker 2: have to be a part of your life. Yeah.

1086
01:00:48,035 --> 01:00:49,315
Speaker 1: It goes to the like at the end of the

1087
01:00:49,315 --> 01:00:52,035
Speaker 1: Epiphany episode when you're talking to Steve Shapin and he

1088
01:00:52,115 --> 01:00:56,115
Speaker 1: reads that passage from the Social History of Truth. Yeah,

1089
01:00:56,315 --> 01:00:58,915
Speaker 1: where a knowledge is a collective good. This kind of

1090
01:01:00,035 --> 01:01:03,075
Speaker 1: like bears on our social relationships. It bears on trusting people,

1091
01:01:03,155 --> 01:01:05,835
Speaker 1: and to trust somebody you have to know them, not

1092
01:01:05,875 --> 01:01:07,235
Speaker 1: just in the way you might know someone at a

1093
01:01:07,275 --> 01:01:08,155
Speaker 1: distance online.

1094
01:01:08,275 --> 01:01:11,195
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, so you know there has to be

1095
01:01:11,235 --> 01:01:13,395
Speaker 2: a way. Is it not that hard to put that

1096
01:01:13,555 --> 01:01:15,315
Speaker 2: back into your life if you had it once, or

1097
01:01:15,355 --> 01:01:18,315
Speaker 2: to find it if you don't have it yet. Third role,

1098
01:01:18,875 --> 01:01:21,995
Speaker 2: Oh oh, my third role is it's like actually expose

1099
01:01:22,115 --> 01:01:26,755
Speaker 2: yourself to ideas that you think you really disagree with

1100
01:01:29,235 --> 01:01:33,795
Speaker 2: and try to understand why they are persuasive to other people.

1101
01:01:34,795 --> 01:01:39,595
Speaker 2: It's you know, that's not a it's not a bold

1102
01:01:39,675 --> 01:01:42,155
Speaker 2: or new idea, but it's still that's I think that's

1103
01:01:42,235 --> 01:01:43,315
Speaker 2: much harder for people to do.

1104
01:01:43,835 --> 01:01:46,075
Speaker 1: Yeah, well this was awesome.

1105
01:01:46,315 --> 01:01:48,355
Speaker 2: Happy twenty twenty four, man, Yeah.

1106
01:01:48,195 --> 01:01:51,195
Speaker 1: Happy twenty twenty four. Maybe live to see twenty twenty five.