1
00:00:00,640 --> 00:00:04,160
Speaker 1: Hi, I'm Molly John Fast and this is Fast Politics,

2
00:00:04,360 --> 00:00:07,120
Speaker 1: where we discussed the top political headlines with some of

3
00:00:07,160 --> 00:00:11,440
Speaker 1: today's best minds and civil rights I gone. Jesse Jackson

4
00:00:11,480 --> 00:00:14,080
Speaker 1: has died at eighty four years old. We have such

5
00:00:14,080 --> 00:00:17,040
Speaker 1: a great show for you today. To the contraries, Charlie

6
00:00:17,120 --> 00:00:20,640
Speaker 1: Syke stops by to talk about CBS cowering to Trump's

7
00:00:20,760 --> 00:00:25,280
Speaker 1: FCC and not airing an interview with Texas Senate candidate

8
00:00:25,360 --> 00:00:29,760
Speaker 1: James Telerco. Then we'll talk to Bullitzer Prize winning biographer

9
00:00:30,040 --> 00:00:34,720
Speaker 1: John Meachum about his latest book, American Struggle, Democracy, Dissent,

10
00:00:34,920 --> 00:00:39,159
Speaker 1: and the Pursuit of a More Perfect Union in anthology.

11
00:00:39,640 --> 00:00:40,720
Speaker 1: But first the news.

12
00:00:41,240 --> 00:00:44,519
Speaker 2: Smile. One of the things we've heard is now the

13
00:00:44,520 --> 00:00:47,279
Speaker 2: Epstein files have fifty percent release, and then we hear

14
00:00:47,320 --> 00:00:50,720
Speaker 2: it's three percent. Well, the latest report now says it's

15
00:00:50,800 --> 00:00:54,200
Speaker 2: two percent. And a thing I noticed this weekend is

16
00:00:54,240 --> 00:00:57,240
Speaker 2: I was talking to normal people and I could not

17
00:00:57,400 --> 00:01:00,720
Speaker 2: believe how fucking angry they were. When I was talking

18
00:01:00,800 --> 00:01:03,200
Speaker 2: to CENTERUS, I was talking to people, you know, a

19
00:01:03,200 --> 00:01:04,839
Speaker 2: little conservative. They are so.

20
00:01:04,880 --> 00:01:05,640
Speaker 3: Pissed about this.

21
00:01:06,120 --> 00:01:09,000
Speaker 1: Yeah, why do you think the American people are mad

22
00:01:09,200 --> 00:01:14,600
Speaker 1: about its government? Protecting the largest sex trafficking ring in history.

23
00:01:14,680 --> 00:01:17,800
Speaker 1: I wonder it's a mystery. Look, if the government can't

24
00:01:17,959 --> 00:01:21,080
Speaker 1: prosecute people who sex traffic children, then what the fuck

25
00:01:21,120 --> 00:01:24,400
Speaker 1: are they even doing? Okay, so this isn't a report

26
00:01:24,440 --> 00:01:27,600
Speaker 1: from news Channel four, a British news outlet, that says

27
00:01:27,600 --> 00:01:32,160
Speaker 1: that only two percent of the Epstein files have been released.

28
00:01:32,200 --> 00:01:36,240
Speaker 1: Now again, American news outlets have not run with this,

29
00:01:36,440 --> 00:01:38,800
Speaker 1: And does that mean it's not true? I think it's

30
00:01:38,840 --> 00:01:42,640
Speaker 1: not verified yet. So this is what this investigator wrote

31
00:01:42,680 --> 00:01:45,760
Speaker 1: in an email dated June twenty twenty. We expect the

32
00:01:45,840 --> 00:01:49,400
Speaker 1: data to be somewhere between twenty and forty terabytes because

33
00:01:49,760 --> 00:01:53,440
Speaker 1: there were so many videos from so many houses, and

34
00:01:53,480 --> 00:01:57,320
Speaker 1: Epstein had videos. I mean, you hear Virginia Jeffrey talk

35
00:01:57,360 --> 00:02:00,440
Speaker 1: about cameras in the bathrooms, cameras in the bedrooms, the

36
00:02:00,440 --> 00:02:04,360
Speaker 1: message rum and they like another forty to fifty terabytes

37
00:02:04,400 --> 00:02:08,400
Speaker 1: from the other properties. But what we've seen is about

38
00:02:08,440 --> 00:02:10,800
Speaker 1: two percent of that. Now, I hesitate to say that

39
00:02:10,919 --> 00:02:13,720
Speaker 1: ninety eight percent of the information we haven't seen, because

40
00:02:13,880 --> 00:02:15,920
Speaker 1: I think it's a little more complicated than that. But

41
00:02:15,919 --> 00:02:19,160
Speaker 1: we're certainly not seeing This is not half of it.

42
00:02:19,520 --> 00:02:23,160
Speaker 1: Or all of it. And part of that is because

43
00:02:23,880 --> 00:02:27,480
Speaker 1: this FBI is covering, right. You remember that it was

44
00:02:27,560 --> 00:02:32,079
Speaker 1: reporting that originally Donald Trump had his FBI go in

45
00:02:32,560 --> 00:02:37,519
Speaker 1: and people were just redacting the word Trump, right. Don

46
00:02:37,960 --> 00:02:41,560
Speaker 1: We see some files where his photo is redacted or

47
00:02:41,560 --> 00:02:44,359
Speaker 1: his face is covered with the black box and it's

48
00:02:44,360 --> 00:02:48,000
Speaker 1: a newspaper clipping. So obviously there's a fair amount of

49
00:02:48,000 --> 00:02:51,000
Speaker 1: Trump protection and god knows what else they've seen. But

50
00:02:51,160 --> 00:02:54,520
Speaker 1: also we also know that the FBI didn't take this

51
00:02:54,680 --> 00:02:58,240
Speaker 1: seriously and did not follow up, and did not investigate

52
00:02:58,440 --> 00:03:01,600
Speaker 1: some of these places, and did not sergezro Ranch. And

53
00:03:01,680 --> 00:03:05,520
Speaker 1: so I think that there are both things happening here, right.

54
00:03:05,560 --> 00:03:08,760
Speaker 1: There's inconfidence and there's also corruption in covering.

55
00:03:09,120 --> 00:03:11,520
Speaker 2: So one of the things people keep saying is in

56
00:03:11,560 --> 00:03:14,920
Speaker 2: Europe we're seeing heads roll and things happening. But I

57
00:03:14,919 --> 00:03:17,680
Speaker 2: think what is actually interesting is the first place we're

58
00:03:17,680 --> 00:03:20,560
Speaker 2: seeing some progress in America is the corporate world. We

59
00:03:20,639 --> 00:03:23,640
Speaker 2: first have seen Casey wasseran head of the Wasserbon Agency,

60
00:03:23,639 --> 00:03:26,320
Speaker 2: which represents about a quarter of music artists, having to

61
00:03:26,360 --> 00:03:29,480
Speaker 2: sell his steak in hit the agency that is his namesake.

62
00:03:29,760 --> 00:03:34,680
Speaker 1: Yeah, partially because we saw artists leaving the agency because

63
00:03:34,840 --> 00:03:37,480
Speaker 1: of Wasserman's evidence of him in the files.

64
00:03:37,720 --> 00:03:40,720
Speaker 2: Yeah. And so now we have seen higattchair Thomas Pritzker

65
00:03:40,800 --> 00:03:43,280
Speaker 2: step down because of his links to the Epstein files.

66
00:03:43,600 --> 00:03:47,720
Speaker 1: Yeah. So this is really important because the high chair,

67
00:03:47,840 --> 00:03:51,160
Speaker 1: Thomas Pritzker, his family owns the company. Right, So this

68
00:03:51,280 --> 00:03:54,720
Speaker 1: is like Trump has doubled down on the many, many

69
00:03:54,800 --> 00:03:58,040
Speaker 1: members of his cabinet that are in the Epstein files,

70
00:03:58,120 --> 00:04:02,240
Speaker 1: people like Howard Latton. There's just a ton of people

71
00:04:02,240 --> 00:04:05,520
Speaker 1: in the Trump cabinet who are in the Epstein files.

72
00:04:05,560 --> 00:04:08,960
Speaker 1: It's a Venn diagram that is almost a complete circle.

73
00:04:09,200 --> 00:04:12,160
Speaker 1: And Trump himself, but in both Europe and in the

74
00:04:12,200 --> 00:04:16,320
Speaker 1: corporate world, we're seeing people step down or be removed

75
00:04:16,400 --> 00:04:20,839
Speaker 1: from their positions, including lawyer Brian Karp, who is no

76
00:04:20,960 --> 00:04:22,799
Speaker 1: longer the chair of Tall Wives.

77
00:04:22,960 --> 00:04:23,239
Speaker 3: Yeah.

78
00:04:23,360 --> 00:04:26,000
Speaker 2: So this is interesting progress coming out of our home state.

79
00:04:26,000 --> 00:04:29,160
Speaker 2: And it's actually the state senator who represents my district

80
00:04:29,160 --> 00:04:32,240
Speaker 2: pushing at Kristin Gonzalez, who does great work that Fearing

81
00:04:32,279 --> 00:04:35,680
Speaker 2: Trump interference in the midterms, the New York Democrats are

82
00:04:35,680 --> 00:04:38,440
Speaker 2: pushing a voting rights package to try to protect our

83
00:04:38,640 --> 00:04:39,359
Speaker 2: right to vote.

84
00:04:39,560 --> 00:04:43,360
Speaker 1: Yeah, Democratic state lawmakers are renewing a push for legislation

85
00:04:43,440 --> 00:04:47,599
Speaker 1: to strengthen voter protections. Donald Trump cannot nationalize elections. This

86
00:04:47,760 --> 00:04:51,880
Speaker 1: is like it's going against the Constitution. He may try,

87
00:04:52,040 --> 00:04:54,440
Speaker 1: he doesn't have the votes for the Voting Rights Act.

88
00:04:54,480 --> 00:04:57,120
Speaker 1: It passed the House, but he would need sixty votes

89
00:04:57,120 --> 00:05:01,000
Speaker 1: to pass the Senate. He doesn't have sixty publicans. Now,

90
00:05:01,160 --> 00:05:04,160
Speaker 1: whether or not they try to break the filibuster, it's possible,

91
00:05:04,240 --> 00:05:06,560
Speaker 1: but I think it's unlikely. And the truth is, it

92
00:05:06,640 --> 00:05:09,960
Speaker 1: is not the federal government's purview election So it's good

93
00:05:10,000 --> 00:05:13,040
Speaker 1: that they're doing this. Of course, like you know, we're

94
00:05:13,080 --> 00:05:15,680
Speaker 1: going to be in so much trouble if Donald Trump

95
00:05:15,680 --> 00:05:20,279
Speaker 1: tries to federalize elections that local laws will be the

96
00:05:20,400 --> 00:05:23,920
Speaker 1: least of our problems. But again, it's good lawmakers are

97
00:05:23,920 --> 00:05:27,120
Speaker 1: doing this, and you know, blue states protecting people's rights

98
00:05:27,200 --> 00:05:27,960
Speaker 1: never a bad thing.

99
00:05:28,440 --> 00:05:28,760
Speaker 4: Yeah.

100
00:05:29,080 --> 00:05:33,000
Speaker 2: So now we're seeing that thing that is very not shocking,

101
00:05:33,040 --> 00:05:36,520
Speaker 2: which is that the FBI is not cooperating on the

102
00:05:36,560 --> 00:05:40,080
Speaker 2: Alex Pretty investigation. This is the least bit shocking after

103
00:05:40,120 --> 00:05:42,880
Speaker 2: we've seen that they were trying to cover up this

104
00:05:43,080 --> 00:05:45,560
Speaker 2: Renee Good at another shooting in Minnesota.

105
00:05:45,680 --> 00:05:50,280
Speaker 1: So we knew this was coming because when these killings happened,

106
00:05:50,440 --> 00:05:54,800
Speaker 1: the federal authorities tried to prevent the state authorities from investigating.

107
00:05:54,839 --> 00:05:57,240
Speaker 1: So that was a pretty good sign that we were

108
00:05:57,320 --> 00:06:01,039
Speaker 1: going to end up here, because why would you take

109
00:06:01,120 --> 00:06:03,680
Speaker 1: this away from the state authorities if you didn't want

110
00:06:03,720 --> 00:06:05,960
Speaker 1: to cover it up? And here we go. Officials in

111
00:06:06,000 --> 00:06:09,000
Speaker 1: the US state of Minnesota say, the Federal Bureau of

112
00:06:09,040 --> 00:06:12,400
Speaker 1: Investigations has refused to cooperate with the investigation into the

113
00:06:12,440 --> 00:06:16,160
Speaker 1: death of Alex Preddy. Again, like, this is the kind

114
00:06:16,160 --> 00:06:20,000
Speaker 1: of stuff, just like with Brendan Carr and the FCC,

115
00:06:20,520 --> 00:06:23,800
Speaker 1: This is the kind of thing that makes people not

116
00:06:24,160 --> 00:06:29,680
Speaker 1: trust the government. So it refusal to investigate this, which

117
00:06:29,880 --> 00:06:33,680
Speaker 1: it's just a clear violation of all of our norms

118
00:06:33,720 --> 00:06:36,200
Speaker 1: and laws, is the kind of thing that makes people

119
00:06:36,279 --> 00:06:41,200
Speaker 1: really angry. And ultimately, these agents have qualified immunity, so

120
00:06:41,400 --> 00:06:44,599
Speaker 1: they don't have complete immunity the way JD. Vance told

121
00:06:44,640 --> 00:06:48,160
Speaker 1: them they do, but they have some immunity. So investigating

122
00:06:48,200 --> 00:06:51,640
Speaker 1: it would, if nothing else, show that the government was

123
00:06:51,720 --> 00:06:54,760
Speaker 1: operating in good faith. So the fact that they refuse

124
00:06:54,839 --> 00:06:57,200
Speaker 1: to even do that shows that this federal government really

125
00:06:57,279 --> 00:06:59,720
Speaker 1: is not acting in good faith and that they really

126
00:06:59,760 --> 00:07:03,240
Speaker 1: want this to be as much of a black eye

127
00:07:03,240 --> 00:07:05,799
Speaker 1: as it's going to be for them, and is really

128
00:07:05,839 --> 00:07:08,280
Speaker 1: going to be a thing that makes some public lose

129
00:07:08,320 --> 00:07:11,400
Speaker 1: trust in this administration quite quickly. I mean, that's the thing,

130
00:07:11,520 --> 00:07:14,560
Speaker 1: is like some of these norms that governments do are

131
00:07:14,680 --> 00:07:18,280
Speaker 1: just because it works better that way, and it makes people,

132
00:07:18,480 --> 00:07:23,200
Speaker 1: It makes constituents more pleased with what their government does.

133
00:07:23,520 --> 00:07:26,760
Speaker 1: And the staunch refusal of this administration to do these

134
00:07:26,880 --> 00:07:29,760
Speaker 1: kind of norms and protect them and to sort of

135
00:07:29,920 --> 00:07:32,160
Speaker 1: behave like a normal government is one of the many,

136
00:07:32,200 --> 00:07:38,960
Speaker 1: many things that is unraveling them quickly. Charlie Sykes is

137
00:07:39,000 --> 00:07:41,400
Speaker 1: the author of the newsletter to the Contrary in the

138
00:07:41,400 --> 00:07:45,200
Speaker 1: book How the Right Lost Its Mind. Welcome Charlie Sykes.

139
00:07:45,360 --> 00:07:46,320
Speaker 4: Hey, good to be back with.

140
00:07:46,280 --> 00:07:50,480
Speaker 1: You, so Stephen Colbert. CBS refused to air an interview

141
00:07:50,760 --> 00:07:57,160
Speaker 1: with a Democratic senatorial candidate, James tell Rico put it

142
00:07:57,320 --> 00:08:01,960
Speaker 1: on YouTube because Brenda Carr said it violated the fair

143
00:08:02,200 --> 00:08:06,320
Speaker 1: use doctrine, which has not been enforced for late night

144
00:08:06,720 --> 00:08:09,840
Speaker 1: or dayside programming in decades.

145
00:08:10,560 --> 00:08:14,120
Speaker 4: Discuss No, I mean I wrote yesterday you know that

146
00:08:14,320 --> 00:08:16,760
Speaker 4: it speaking truth to power has become kind of a

147
00:08:16,800 --> 00:08:19,640
Speaker 4: cliche because we see it so seldom in action, and

148
00:08:19,680 --> 00:08:22,480
Speaker 4: we saw it with Stephen Colbert, and this is how

149
00:08:22,480 --> 00:08:26,200
Speaker 4: it's done. He leaned in, he exposed what they were doing,

150
00:08:26,200 --> 00:08:28,880
Speaker 4: and they defied them. Now there's two aspects of this.

151
00:08:28,960 --> 00:08:32,120
Speaker 4: I mean, number one is the continuing bullying by the

152
00:08:32,200 --> 00:08:35,440
Speaker 4: FCC saying they're going to enforce the equal time rule

153
00:08:35,880 --> 00:08:38,679
Speaker 4: in a way that it has not been enforced in decades.

154
00:08:38,880 --> 00:08:41,760
Speaker 4: So so much for the Trump administration being a defender

155
00:08:41,840 --> 00:08:45,240
Speaker 4: of free speech, so Rendon Carr continues to be a bully.

156
00:08:45,800 --> 00:08:48,520
Speaker 4: The more extraordinary aspect of that was the way that

157
00:08:48,640 --> 00:08:54,360
Speaker 4: CBS preemptively cowered, preemptively surrendered, and then of course we

158
00:08:54,400 --> 00:08:58,480
Speaker 4: had this amazing scene where Colbert comes out says, you're

159
00:08:58,520 --> 00:09:01,200
Speaker 4: not going to see this. It's going to be on YouTube.

160
00:09:01,679 --> 00:09:04,520
Speaker 4: But you know, my bosses, the lawyers told me I

161
00:09:04,559 --> 00:09:07,080
Speaker 4: couldn't air it, couldn't say that I'm not airing it,

162
00:09:07,440 --> 00:09:10,240
Speaker 4: and couldn't tell you what the URL or the QR

163
00:09:10,360 --> 00:09:13,600
Speaker 4: code for you to find it is. So not only

164
00:09:13,640 --> 00:09:16,800
Speaker 4: did CBS cower, but then they tried to cover it up. So,

165
00:09:17,480 --> 00:09:19,240
Speaker 4: I mean, you want to talk about I'm sorry to

166
00:09:19,320 --> 00:09:21,800
Speaker 4: use this language. I mean, you know, a clusterfuck inside

167
00:09:21,800 --> 00:09:23,680
Speaker 4: of shit storm for CBS.

168
00:09:23,880 --> 00:09:27,880
Speaker 1: I want to point out that Barry Wise, in her

169
00:09:27,920 --> 00:09:32,760
Speaker 1: infinite wisdom, has managed to drive away a person that

170
00:09:32,840 --> 00:09:35,960
Speaker 1: she had wanted to be her late night or not

171
00:09:36,080 --> 00:09:40,400
Speaker 1: her late night her news host Anderson Cooper, leaving sixty

172
00:09:40,520 --> 00:09:42,680
Speaker 1: Minutes discuss Yeah, well.

173
00:09:42,559 --> 00:09:44,520
Speaker 4: I mean, now, Barry Wish is not responsible for what

174
00:09:44,559 --> 00:09:47,840
Speaker 4: happened with Colbert, but it's part of this corporate culture

175
00:09:48,559 --> 00:09:53,600
Speaker 4: of being absolutely so so desperate not to anger Donald Trump,

176
00:09:53,840 --> 00:09:56,160
Speaker 4: and so from the Ellssons on down, it's like they're

177
00:09:56,160 --> 00:09:58,440
Speaker 4: sitting around, we can't make him mad, we can't have

178
00:09:58,480 --> 00:10:02,360
Speaker 4: any kind of retaliation. So, yeah, you're continuing to see

179
00:10:02,360 --> 00:10:04,440
Speaker 4: the fallout from this. It was a very bad day

180
00:10:04,440 --> 00:10:08,719
Speaker 4: for CBS. Anderson Cooper had been with sixty Minutes for

181
00:10:08,880 --> 00:10:14,600
Speaker 4: I believe twenty years. Wow, and becomes merely the latest

182
00:10:15,040 --> 00:10:19,960
Speaker 4: high profile resignation from CBS because they're looking around. They're

183
00:10:20,000 --> 00:10:22,920
Speaker 4: looking around, and they're seeing what Barry Weiss and the

184
00:10:22,960 --> 00:10:25,199
Speaker 4: Ellisons are doing to CBS and saying, we don't want

185
00:10:25,200 --> 00:10:27,719
Speaker 4: to be part of this anymore. So, just the way

186
00:10:27,800 --> 00:10:32,040
Speaker 4: Jeff Bezos destroyed the legacy in the brand of the

187
00:10:32,120 --> 00:10:36,360
Speaker 4: Washington Post, they are in the process of destroying the

188
00:10:36,360 --> 00:10:38,800
Speaker 4: brand and the legacy of what used to be known

189
00:10:38,800 --> 00:10:40,000
Speaker 4: as the Tiffany Network.

190
00:10:40,240 --> 00:10:43,640
Speaker 1: It is so interesting how much easier it is to

191
00:10:43,920 --> 00:10:49,439
Speaker 1: break something than it is to fix something, or even

192
00:10:49,559 --> 00:10:51,720
Speaker 1: just to keep it going. I mean, we see this

193
00:10:51,800 --> 00:10:53,520
Speaker 1: as Trump and the federal government.

194
00:10:53,880 --> 00:10:57,680
Speaker 4: That's a very good you know, that's a very good point,

195
00:10:57,840 --> 00:11:01,120
Speaker 4: because it is and it's always been easier, you know,

196
00:11:01,160 --> 00:11:03,680
Speaker 4: to run through the china shop, you know, with hammers

197
00:11:03,800 --> 00:11:06,679
Speaker 4: and break everything than to craft. Then, you know, take

198
00:11:06,720 --> 00:11:08,960
Speaker 4: the time to craft, you know, all of the of

199
00:11:09,000 --> 00:11:11,200
Speaker 4: the art. And so that's one of the things that

200
00:11:11,240 --> 00:11:14,280
Speaker 4: I think is so depressing and discouraging about the particular moment.

201
00:11:14,360 --> 00:11:16,319
Speaker 4: I hope we end on on a more hopeful note,

202
00:11:16,800 --> 00:11:20,840
Speaker 4: which is that the work of decades is being destroyed

203
00:11:20,880 --> 00:11:24,080
Speaker 4: by people who don't know what they do. They don't

204
00:11:24,120 --> 00:11:27,240
Speaker 4: know what they are destroying, and they're not creating anything

205
00:11:27,679 --> 00:11:30,800
Speaker 4: in its place that is going to be enduring. You know,

206
00:11:30,920 --> 00:11:34,320
Speaker 4: Barry Weiss is not going to be remembered for you know,

207
00:11:34,480 --> 00:11:38,320
Speaker 4: her balanced reporting. She's going to be remembered for walking

208
00:11:38,360 --> 00:11:41,640
Speaker 4: in and throwing this massive bomb in the middle of CBS.

209
00:11:41,679 --> 00:11:45,120
Speaker 4: And and again Stephen Colbert, I mean we go back

210
00:11:45,160 --> 00:11:47,120
Speaker 4: to Colbert for a moment, play did you want to

211
00:11:47,160 --> 00:11:51,680
Speaker 4: talk about how badly handled this was? So CBS not

212
00:11:51,760 --> 00:11:56,400
Speaker 4: only looks terrible, they've given James Tallerico probably the best

213
00:11:56,400 --> 00:12:00,640
Speaker 4: political ad of twenty twenty six. That going to use

214
00:12:00,880 --> 00:12:03,560
Speaker 4: drys and effect right exactly.

215
00:12:03,760 --> 00:12:07,040
Speaker 1: I don't want the people to see something they want

216
00:12:07,080 --> 00:12:09,360
Speaker 1: to see it more exactly.

217
00:12:09,440 --> 00:12:12,920
Speaker 4: And Stephen Colbert, whose show ends in May, is going

218
00:12:12,960 --> 00:12:16,000
Speaker 4: to go out in a blaze of glory. And what

219
00:12:16,120 --> 00:12:19,679
Speaker 4: is CBS left with this? You know, you guys caved

220
00:12:19,720 --> 00:12:22,960
Speaker 4: into Donald Trump? Well great, you know, looking back four

221
00:12:23,000 --> 00:12:25,520
Speaker 4: or five years from now, how's that going to look?

222
00:12:25,559 --> 00:12:27,680
Speaker 4: How's that going to work out for you? And I

223
00:12:27,720 --> 00:12:32,760
Speaker 4: am amazed that more of these corporate entities don't think

224
00:12:32,800 --> 00:12:36,120
Speaker 4: that through. Okay, So when I look back on this

225
00:12:36,200 --> 00:12:37,719
Speaker 4: four or five years now, how am I going to

226
00:12:37,760 --> 00:12:39,439
Speaker 4: think about my choices? How am I going to think

227
00:12:39,480 --> 00:12:41,320
Speaker 4: about the way that I'm going to remember? How am

228
00:12:41,360 --> 00:12:43,800
Speaker 4: I going to tell that particular story If we're in

229
00:12:43,840 --> 00:12:47,040
Speaker 4: a post Maga era, which I hope we are someday.

230
00:12:47,240 --> 00:12:50,400
Speaker 1: It's a good point because like we're coming off a

231
00:12:50,440 --> 00:12:55,000
Speaker 1: two week period where Jeff Bezos paid millions of dollars

232
00:12:55,040 --> 00:12:58,480
Speaker 1: for a documentary that was essentially a bribe to the

233
00:12:58,480 --> 00:13:03,040
Speaker 1: Trump administration for gulatory favor. Lost a ton of money

234
00:13:03,040 --> 00:13:05,079
Speaker 1: and nobody went to see it. And that's the thing

235
00:13:05,120 --> 00:13:08,040
Speaker 1: about these media companies. I think they've lost touch with

236
00:13:08,080 --> 00:13:11,720
Speaker 1: the fact that they still are service companies. They serve

237
00:13:11,760 --> 00:13:12,960
Speaker 1: a consumer, they.

238
00:13:12,840 --> 00:13:15,400
Speaker 4: Do, and so I want to shift back to a

239
00:13:15,440 --> 00:13:19,480
Speaker 4: slightly more positive story, and I apologize for my slight

240
00:13:19,520 --> 00:13:22,200
Speaker 4: obsession with all of this. I did think that the

241
00:13:22,240 --> 00:13:26,280
Speaker 4: attempt by the Trump administration to cancel Jimmy Kimmel was

242
00:13:26,400 --> 00:13:29,880
Speaker 4: kind of an interesting cautionary note from their point of view,

243
00:13:29,920 --> 00:13:32,960
Speaker 4: because what happened was they kicked Jimmy Kimmel off the air,

244
00:13:32,960 --> 00:13:37,320
Speaker 4: and what happened the consumers of the product of Disney

245
00:13:37,600 --> 00:13:41,200
Speaker 4: and of ABC revolted and forced them to bring him back.

246
00:13:41,240 --> 00:13:43,640
Speaker 4: And I think that Kimmel is more potent than ever.

247
00:13:43,920 --> 00:13:46,520
Speaker 4: So what you have to think about is what we'd

248
00:13:46,520 --> 00:13:49,160
Speaker 4: hope they would think about, is who is their audience

249
00:13:49,480 --> 00:13:51,240
Speaker 4: and what are they doing to their audience? They are

250
00:13:51,280 --> 00:13:55,400
Speaker 4: a service company and simply serving the whims of Donald Trump.

251
00:13:55,520 --> 00:13:58,280
Speaker 4: First of all, it's a fool's errand because you're never

252
00:13:58,320 --> 00:14:00,960
Speaker 4: going to be able to suck up sufficiently to Donald Trump.

253
00:14:01,120 --> 00:14:04,600
Speaker 4: You're going to eventually have to report something that he

254
00:14:04,679 --> 00:14:08,440
Speaker 4: does not like, some facts, some truth, some reality. And

255
00:14:08,480 --> 00:14:12,960
Speaker 4: so all of those cavins, all of those surrenders, you

256
00:14:13,000 --> 00:14:15,400
Speaker 4: know what do they add up to? Because Trump's gonna

257
00:14:15,400 --> 00:14:18,640
Speaker 4: turn on you sooner or later. Right, because unless unless

258
00:14:18,640 --> 00:14:21,160
Speaker 4: you close down and shut down and just go out.

259
00:14:21,040 --> 00:14:24,800
Speaker 1: Of business, you know, that goes to Fox. Right, Fox

260
00:14:25,360 --> 00:14:29,320
Speaker 1: didn't do what Trump wanted around the twenty twenty election,

261
00:14:29,680 --> 00:14:32,680
Speaker 1: one chop a lie, and so Donald Trump just went

262
00:14:32,720 --> 00:14:36,680
Speaker 1: to Oan, he went to Real America Voice and its

263
00:14:37,480 --> 00:14:40,560
Speaker 1: right Newsmax. And now I think is a fundamental problem

264
00:14:40,600 --> 00:14:43,360
Speaker 1: is you can't live on Earth one and support Donald Trump.

265
00:14:43,400 --> 00:14:45,640
Speaker 1: You have to live on Earth too. And if you

266
00:14:45,680 --> 00:14:47,880
Speaker 1: live on Earth too, there are fewer and fewer people

267
00:14:47,880 --> 00:14:48,840
Speaker 1: who live there.

268
00:14:49,360 --> 00:14:52,040
Speaker 4: Great great point. And right now we live in an

269
00:14:52,120 --> 00:14:55,400
Speaker 4: environment where there are alternatives. There is a market for

270
00:14:55,520 --> 00:14:58,720
Speaker 4: now trusted voices. So it used to be that you

271
00:14:58,880 --> 00:15:02,200
Speaker 4: had to go to say, you know, NBC, ABC or CBS,

272
00:15:02,280 --> 00:15:04,240
Speaker 4: and well, now you can go to this podcast, you

273
00:15:04,240 --> 00:15:06,760
Speaker 4: can go to substack, you can go to so many

274
00:15:06,840 --> 00:15:12,600
Speaker 4: different outlets that are providing information and the audience will

275
00:15:12,720 --> 00:15:17,280
Speaker 4: flow to places they trust, and so when something like

276
00:15:17,320 --> 00:15:20,880
Speaker 4: this happens, it erodes trust in a way that's incredibly

277
00:15:20,920 --> 00:15:23,400
Speaker 4: difficult to get back. I mean, look, it's it's like

278
00:15:23,440 --> 00:15:27,440
Speaker 4: a relationship with a person. Once you, you know, broken

279
00:15:27,520 --> 00:15:30,400
Speaker 4: faith with somebody, or you no longer trust somebody, it

280
00:15:30,520 --> 00:15:34,840
Speaker 4: is extremely difficult to restore that. And that's even more

281
00:15:35,160 --> 00:15:37,640
Speaker 4: so when it comes to say a media company or

282
00:15:37,640 --> 00:15:38,800
Speaker 4: a service company like this.

283
00:15:39,760 --> 00:15:43,160
Speaker 1: So I wanted to talk for a minute about Teller

284
00:15:43,200 --> 00:15:47,800
Speaker 1: Rego because I think it's interesting. Brendan Carr was mad,

285
00:15:47,960 --> 00:15:51,040
Speaker 1: tell Rico was on the view and Brandan Carr shot

286
00:15:51,120 --> 00:15:55,720
Speaker 1: back that, you know, he wanted fair use for the

287
00:15:55,960 --> 00:15:59,120
Speaker 1: fair time doctor at equal time doctorate for both the

288
00:15:59,200 --> 00:16:03,320
Speaker 1: day side and late night. This has not been indoor,

289
00:16:03,520 --> 00:16:05,400
Speaker 1: you know, has not been the kind of thing that

290
00:16:05,560 --> 00:16:08,000
Speaker 1: was done for years and years and years usually was

291
00:16:08,040 --> 00:16:10,440
Speaker 1: only on the news side. Do you think that this

292
00:16:10,640 --> 00:16:15,120
Speaker 1: is really like this administration worried that they might lose

293
00:16:15,160 --> 00:16:17,680
Speaker 1: a Texas Senate seat or do you think that it's

294
00:16:17,960 --> 00:16:21,040
Speaker 1: just Brendan Carr freelancing to try to make Donald Trump

295
00:16:21,080 --> 00:16:22,080
Speaker 1: happy all of.

296
00:16:22,000 --> 00:16:24,480
Speaker 4: Those things, all of all of the above. You know,

297
00:16:24,520 --> 00:16:27,480
Speaker 4: the Texas Senate seat is going to be in play

298
00:16:27,520 --> 00:16:31,160
Speaker 4: if if Ken Paxton wins the Republican primary. You want

299
00:16:31,200 --> 00:16:34,080
Speaker 4: to talk about a flawed candidate in a state that

300
00:16:34,480 --> 00:16:37,280
Speaker 4: I think is trending more purple. So, you know, maybe

301
00:16:37,320 --> 00:16:38,920
Speaker 4: a lot of it has to do with Tolerico. But

302
00:16:38,960 --> 00:16:43,440
Speaker 4: then again, Brendan Carr has shown no independence whatsoever and

303
00:16:43,440 --> 00:16:47,040
Speaker 4: no real fundamental understanding of the First Amendment or what

304
00:16:47,120 --> 00:16:49,720
Speaker 4: the role should be. And by the way, I do think,

305
00:16:50,000 --> 00:16:52,840
Speaker 4: I mean I've been a broadcast for a very long time.

306
00:16:53,480 --> 00:16:59,880
Speaker 4: The whole notion of the FCC threatening and regulating outlets

307
00:16:59,880 --> 00:17:04,200
Speaker 4: for speech for what is said on the air strikes

308
00:17:04,240 --> 00:17:08,479
Speaker 4: me as as as is so antithetical to the spirit

309
00:17:08,520 --> 00:17:12,160
Speaker 4: of the First Amendment. Understand that what you saw this

310
00:17:12,240 --> 00:17:17,760
Speaker 4: week was an attempt at state sponsored censorship, the government

311
00:17:17,960 --> 00:17:23,160
Speaker 4: using its power to stop someone from speaking or appearing. Now,

312
00:17:23,320 --> 00:17:26,399
Speaker 4: leaving aside you know the broadcast, just you know, all

313
00:17:26,440 --> 00:17:29,120
Speaker 4: the all all of those details, this strikes me as

314
00:17:29,160 --> 00:17:33,800
Speaker 4: exactly what the First Amendment was designed to prevent. And

315
00:17:33,840 --> 00:17:36,440
Speaker 4: so when Donald Trump, remember when Donald Trump was inaugurated,

316
00:17:36,480 --> 00:17:39,000
Speaker 4: he gave that speech saying, you know, we will you know,

317
00:17:39,560 --> 00:17:41,440
Speaker 4: you know, we don't have a country if we don't

318
00:17:41,440 --> 00:17:43,800
Speaker 4: have free speech, I am issuing an executive order that

319
00:17:43,840 --> 00:17:46,720
Speaker 4: we will never use government power. I mean, what a

320
00:17:46,760 --> 00:17:50,960
Speaker 4: bunch of bullshit, because think about almost every single week

321
00:17:51,160 --> 00:17:54,800
Speaker 4: we get another attack on free speech First Amendment rights

322
00:17:54,800 --> 00:17:58,600
Speaker 4: from this administration, whether you're talking about going after the

323
00:17:58,680 --> 00:18:02,800
Speaker 4: legislators who made the video, or kicking the ap out

324
00:18:02,800 --> 00:18:05,280
Speaker 4: of the White House for not calling the Gulf of

325
00:18:05,359 --> 00:18:08,919
Speaker 4: Mexico the Gulf of America, or all of the libel suits.

326
00:18:08,920 --> 00:18:10,960
Speaker 4: And then of course what's going on with the FCC.

327
00:18:11,200 --> 00:18:15,280
Speaker 4: So the hypocrisy of all the people who argue the well,

328
00:18:15,560 --> 00:18:17,800
Speaker 4: we need to vote for Donald Trump because we need

329
00:18:17,840 --> 00:18:21,040
Speaker 4: a free speech advocate in the White House. I mean,

330
00:18:21,440 --> 00:18:27,240
Speaker 4: the hypocrisy is actually stunning, yeah to say.

331
00:18:27,720 --> 00:18:30,520
Speaker 1: And it's also moving that stuff to YouTube is really

332
00:18:30,560 --> 00:18:34,359
Speaker 1: interesting because Trump world has been really committed to no

333
00:18:34,800 --> 00:18:38,400
Speaker 1: Internet regulation, no AI. I mean, in fact, they've tried

334
00:18:38,760 --> 00:18:42,520
Speaker 1: to prevent states from passing laws to regulate AI. So

335
00:18:42,920 --> 00:18:46,560
Speaker 1: they're pretty committed to not having regulation. So that means

336
00:18:46,600 --> 00:18:48,719
Speaker 1: that you can do whatever you want on your YouTube

337
00:18:48,800 --> 00:18:49,760
Speaker 1: channel for now.

338
00:18:49,920 --> 00:18:53,040
Speaker 4: You know, I have limited faith in the tech bros.

339
00:18:53,440 --> 00:18:57,119
Speaker 4: You know, the tech broligarchy but yeah, and and the

340
00:18:57,200 --> 00:18:59,359
Speaker 4: fact is that you know, like, let's take this taller

341
00:18:59,400 --> 00:19:02,560
Speaker 4: ECO story so they don't ERRt on CBS, it does

342
00:19:02,600 --> 00:19:06,200
Speaker 4: not go away. It then flows to YouTube, which will

343
00:19:06,240 --> 00:19:10,320
Speaker 4: probably have by the time, you know, our conversation airs

344
00:19:10,760 --> 00:19:15,240
Speaker 4: probably three million views. So what have you accomplished? Again,

345
00:19:15,560 --> 00:19:20,120
Speaker 4: the only real consequence will be the destruction of much

346
00:19:20,119 --> 00:19:22,840
Speaker 4: of the legacy media and the corporate media, and why

347
00:19:22,880 --> 00:19:26,080
Speaker 4: the corporate media does not understand that every act of

348
00:19:26,359 --> 00:19:31,000
Speaker 4: appeasement basically you know, makes makes the beast hungrier.

349
00:19:31,400 --> 00:19:34,440
Speaker 1: Yeah, it never works, and it makes the beast hungrier

350
00:19:34,480 --> 00:19:38,359
Speaker 1: and signs their own death warrant with consumers because consumers

351
00:19:38,359 --> 00:19:38,960
Speaker 1: don't Yes.

352
00:19:39,680 --> 00:19:42,320
Speaker 4: Yeah, exactly. Amid all of this.

353
00:19:42,880 --> 00:19:47,960
Speaker 1: It is interesting right now we see Donald Trump. There's

354
00:19:48,040 --> 00:19:50,359
Speaker 1: like a lot of movement behind the scenes with the

355
00:19:50,440 --> 00:19:55,640
Speaker 1: Munich Security Conference and Democrats and Republicans trying to sort

356
00:19:55,680 --> 00:19:59,000
Speaker 1: of position themselves on a global stage for what's next.

357
00:19:59,280 --> 00:20:02,400
Speaker 1: I often I think like it's charming that Republicans think

358
00:20:02,440 --> 00:20:04,719
Speaker 1: they're going to get to be the heir apparent, like

359
00:20:04,800 --> 00:20:07,600
Speaker 1: there is no air apparent to Trump according to Trump.

360
00:20:07,760 --> 00:20:09,960
Speaker 4: Well, I do think it's important to point out that

361
00:20:10,320 --> 00:20:13,960
Speaker 4: just in the last few days, he's raised the possibility

362
00:20:14,000 --> 00:20:16,600
Speaker 4: once again of a third term. You know, people go

363
00:20:16,720 --> 00:20:19,320
Speaker 4: always just saying those things. The one thing we know

364
00:20:19,400 --> 00:20:21,439
Speaker 4: about Donald Trump is Donald Trump is not going to

365
00:20:21,680 --> 00:20:25,560
Speaker 4: easily give up power. And even if it means another Republican,

366
00:20:25,680 --> 00:20:29,360
Speaker 4: I mean that person is going to be I mean,

367
00:20:29,400 --> 00:20:32,359
Speaker 4: they're going to be in in Trump's shadow. The Munich

368
00:20:32,400 --> 00:20:35,320
Speaker 4: Security Conference, I am intrigued by all the people that

369
00:20:35,359 --> 00:20:39,639
Speaker 4: are so desperate to find, you know, some scrap of rationality.

370
00:20:39,400 --> 00:20:43,040
Speaker 4: And in Marco Rubio's speech, I mean, look, Marco is

371
00:20:43,080 --> 00:20:47,560
Speaker 4: still a cat of Trump. Well I did a podcast

372
00:20:47,080 --> 00:20:49,320
Speaker 4: that and were you like I watched the video of it.

373
00:20:49,640 --> 00:20:52,000
Speaker 1: Yeah, were you just scap joed?

374
00:20:52,400 --> 00:20:55,679
Speaker 4: No? I mean he wasn't. He wasn't as you know,

375
00:20:55,720 --> 00:20:59,000
Speaker 4: overtly vicious as jd vance. Apparently people have lowered the

376
00:20:59,040 --> 00:21:01,200
Speaker 4: bar to the point where the well, that was wonderful.

377
00:21:01,320 --> 00:21:03,280
Speaker 4: I did a podcast the other day with Susan Glasser

378
00:21:03,320 --> 00:21:05,359
Speaker 4: who pointed out that in this speech, you know what,

379
00:21:05,359 --> 00:21:08,800
Speaker 4: he didn't mention the number one security threat facing Europe,

380
00:21:09,119 --> 00:21:11,800
Speaker 4: which is the Russian war against Ukraine. He didn't even

381
00:21:11,800 --> 00:21:14,159
Speaker 4: mention it. And we're supposed to think of, well, this

382
00:21:14,240 --> 00:21:17,560
Speaker 4: is this is kind of a Reaganist speech. No, you know,

383
00:21:18,359 --> 00:21:21,680
Speaker 4: what's important is not what Marco Rubio says, it's what

384
00:21:22,080 --> 00:21:24,680
Speaker 4: he and Donald Trump do. And just think that there's

385
00:21:24,680 --> 00:21:28,320
Speaker 4: any sort of independence is just incredibly incredibly naive.

386
00:21:28,520 --> 00:21:32,119
Speaker 1: It's funny because it's like you had Harris Go be

387
00:21:32,320 --> 00:21:36,399
Speaker 1: so careful, so worried, end up giving a good speech

388
00:21:36,400 --> 00:21:39,840
Speaker 1: and everyone being like it's amazing, and you had Jade

389
00:21:39,960 --> 00:21:43,760
Speaker 1: Vans Goo be like fuck all you all, yeah right,

390
00:21:43,760 --> 00:21:47,520
Speaker 1: a bunch of you know users, we don't need you.

391
00:21:47,520 --> 00:21:50,639
Speaker 1: You know, you need to support your far right parties.

392
00:21:50,800 --> 00:21:55,080
Speaker 1: You hate free I mean, just like pretty horrendous stuff.

393
00:21:55,800 --> 00:21:59,800
Speaker 1: And then follow that by Marco Rubio, who basically did

394
00:21:59,800 --> 00:22:01,560
Speaker 1: that but less awful. Yeah.

395
00:22:01,600 --> 00:22:04,520
Speaker 4: I mean it's sort of like, so daddy didn't come

396
00:22:04,520 --> 00:22:07,200
Speaker 4: home drunk and beat up mommy, so everything's fine now.

397
00:22:07,280 --> 00:22:09,359
Speaker 4: And then what did he do? He went from the

398
00:22:09,400 --> 00:22:14,520
Speaker 4: Munich Security Conference to suck up to Victor Orbon in Hungary,

399
00:22:14,840 --> 00:22:22,280
Speaker 4: you know, the the fascist adjacent authoritarian there. Yeah, right,

400
00:22:22,760 --> 00:22:26,119
Speaker 4: I mean, Victor Orbon has made that country much poorer

401
00:22:26,119 --> 00:22:29,240
Speaker 4: than it otherwise would have been. But it is interesting

402
00:22:29,320 --> 00:22:31,560
Speaker 4: that Marco Rubio felt the need to go there and

403
00:22:31,600 --> 00:22:34,359
Speaker 4: give him a Valentine in advance of the election. That

404
00:22:34,440 --> 00:22:36,560
Speaker 4: a lot of people think that Orbon is going to lose.

405
00:22:37,280 --> 00:22:40,760
Speaker 4: So no, I'm not seeing a new tone or a

406
00:22:40,800 --> 00:22:44,160
Speaker 4: new flavor, and people need to take a deep breath.

407
00:22:44,160 --> 00:22:46,680
Speaker 4: I think Ann Applebaum said it was kind of a

408
00:22:46,760 --> 00:22:50,080
Speaker 4: Rorshock test, and people in Germany are watching that and

409
00:22:50,119 --> 00:22:52,520
Speaker 4: going did you catch all the dog whistles to the

410
00:22:52,520 --> 00:22:55,280
Speaker 4: far right parties in Germany? You know, and the other

411
00:22:55,280 --> 00:23:00,800
Speaker 4: people in Europe are noticing, you know, his praise for colonialism. Look,

412
00:23:00,920 --> 00:23:04,960
Speaker 4: it's I hope that we don't get to that that

413
00:23:04,960 --> 00:23:08,159
Speaker 4: that phase where will take any scrap from the table

414
00:23:08,200 --> 00:23:11,639
Speaker 4: and go okay, now things are better. R No.

415
00:23:11,840 --> 00:23:15,760
Speaker 1: And I think it's important, as like being in America

416
00:23:16,160 --> 00:23:19,800
Speaker 1: to say, like we've had over the last month, we've

417
00:23:19,800 --> 00:23:23,479
Speaker 1: had some really horrendous stuff happen, the murder of Alex Pretty,

418
00:23:23,920 --> 00:23:28,640
Speaker 1: the murder of Renee Good. We've had some backtracking on

419
00:23:29,080 --> 00:23:33,280
Speaker 1: you know, Ices hasn't murdered any United States citizens in

420
00:23:33,320 --> 00:23:36,439
Speaker 1: a couple of weeks, so bowie for them. But I

421
00:23:36,480 --> 00:23:38,320
Speaker 1: mean things are still pretty dark.

422
00:23:38,600 --> 00:23:40,520
Speaker 4: Oh, things are extremely dark. And I think that this

423
00:23:40,600 --> 00:23:42,840
Speaker 4: is this is the point. Are the people who were

424
00:23:42,880 --> 00:23:45,760
Speaker 4: the architects of that are still in power. We still

425
00:23:45,840 --> 00:23:49,520
Speaker 4: have tens of thousands of people in warehouses and we

426
00:23:49,560 --> 00:23:51,879
Speaker 4: don't know what's happening to them. We get to report

427
00:23:51,920 --> 00:23:54,239
Speaker 4: about a two month old baby who's choking on his

428
00:23:54,280 --> 00:23:57,320
Speaker 4: own vomit, who's being held in ice custody.

429
00:23:57,440 --> 00:23:58,440
Speaker 1: I mean, think about that.

430
00:23:58,720 --> 00:24:00,560
Speaker 4: So we know what they do on the street when

431
00:24:00,560 --> 00:24:03,199
Speaker 4: people are watching, and I think the question has to

432
00:24:03,200 --> 00:24:06,040
Speaker 4: be what are they doing when no one's watching, when

433
00:24:06,040 --> 00:24:09,359
Speaker 4: there are no cameras. I really think that, you know,

434
00:24:09,400 --> 00:24:12,040
Speaker 4: we may look back on this and go, how did

435
00:24:12,080 --> 00:24:14,120
Speaker 4: we not know what was going on? In our name?

436
00:24:14,760 --> 00:24:16,879
Speaker 4: Is this how history is going to remember us? And

437
00:24:16,880 --> 00:24:18,600
Speaker 4: by the way, can I just mention the most insane

438
00:24:18,600 --> 00:24:19,800
Speaker 4: debate that we're having right now?

439
00:24:20,000 --> 00:24:20,840
Speaker 1: Yeah?

440
00:24:21,000 --> 00:24:23,240
Speaker 4: Okay, So the Democrats are not going along with the

441
00:24:23,240 --> 00:24:25,920
Speaker 4: funding of DHS, which I think is a good thing. Yeah,

442
00:24:26,560 --> 00:24:30,240
Speaker 4: And have you seen what they're asking for, things like

443
00:24:30,400 --> 00:24:35,160
Speaker 4: body cams and no masking? How can the masking thing

444
00:24:35,320 --> 00:24:38,200
Speaker 4: be an issue? If you ask the average American, should

445
00:24:38,720 --> 00:24:42,439
Speaker 4: agents of the government, the police have to identify themselves

446
00:24:42,480 --> 00:24:44,440
Speaker 4: when they rough you up or when they arrest you.

447
00:24:44,760 --> 00:24:47,440
Speaker 4: The American, the average American is going to say absolutely,

448
00:24:47,480 --> 00:24:51,240
Speaker 4: of course, why would you wear masks? And yet somehow

449
00:24:51,640 --> 00:24:55,080
Speaker 4: that has become the breaking point that the Trump administration

450
00:24:55,240 --> 00:24:58,000
Speaker 4: is not going to d mask. I mean, there's the

451
00:24:58,080 --> 00:25:02,120
Speaker 4: face of twenty twenty five, twenty twenty six, the masked

452
00:25:02,600 --> 00:25:05,960
Speaker 4: jack booted thug that the right used to warn us about,

453
00:25:06,280 --> 00:25:08,880
Speaker 4: that is now the agent of the Trump administration.

454
00:25:09,320 --> 00:25:14,160
Speaker 1: Yeah, and the Trump administration's complete disinterest in backing down

455
00:25:14,720 --> 00:25:18,879
Speaker 1: at every point. You know, there have been opportunities for

456
00:25:19,000 --> 00:25:23,440
Speaker 1: this administration to fire someone. For example, I think about Lutnik.

457
00:25:23,640 --> 00:25:26,399
Speaker 1: It was featured prominently in the Epstein files, and instead

458
00:25:26,440 --> 00:25:29,920
Speaker 1: the administration was like, no, we never fire anyone. Lutnik

459
00:25:30,000 --> 00:25:33,080
Speaker 1: is the greatest. He's flying back from Pomby to a Trump.

460
00:25:33,680 --> 00:25:36,359
Speaker 1: But the reality is like, if you want to get

461
00:25:36,359 --> 00:25:40,640
Speaker 1: re elected, there's a reason that people fire people who

462
00:25:40,640 --> 00:25:43,880
Speaker 1: are cross Absolutely, yeah, talk, this isn't.

463
00:25:43,680 --> 00:25:46,200
Speaker 4: That okay, this is their trap. And this is you

464
00:25:46,280 --> 00:25:47,919
Speaker 4: know the people out there who are thinking, you know

465
00:25:48,040 --> 00:25:50,480
Speaker 4: that Trump is playing you know, four dimensional chess. I

466
00:25:50,560 --> 00:25:54,040
Speaker 4: think he's actually boxed himself in because you know, internally

467
00:25:54,440 --> 00:25:56,720
Speaker 4: he doesn't want to fire anyone, because he doesn't want

468
00:25:56,760 --> 00:25:59,600
Speaker 4: to give the libs any wins. He does not want

469
00:25:59,640 --> 00:26:02,520
Speaker 4: to give the Libs any scalps, which means that he's

470
00:26:02,560 --> 00:26:05,080
Speaker 4: going to stick with people even after they've been proved

471
00:26:05,080 --> 00:26:08,679
Speaker 4: to be incompetent, deplorable, and corrupt. Well, that would describe

472
00:26:08,760 --> 00:26:11,120
Speaker 4: him as well. But you know, Christy Nome, how does

473
00:26:11,160 --> 00:26:13,840
Speaker 4: Christy Nome still have a job with her? With everything

474
00:26:13,840 --> 00:26:16,760
Speaker 4: going on with her and Lewandowski? How does Lutnik actually

475
00:26:16,800 --> 00:26:19,840
Speaker 4: still have a job. You're going into you know, as

476
00:26:19,840 --> 00:26:23,560
Speaker 4: you point out, in a normal political environment, you basically,

477
00:26:23,600 --> 00:26:26,240
Speaker 4: you know, cut off the you know, these cancerous growths

478
00:26:26,280 --> 00:26:29,600
Speaker 4: in your cabinet. But Trump has convinced himself that, you know,

479
00:26:29,640 --> 00:26:32,480
Speaker 4: you can never admit you're wrong, you can never apologize,

480
00:26:32,800 --> 00:26:37,120
Speaker 4: you can never throw you know, you know, any went away. Look,

481
00:26:37,160 --> 00:26:40,200
Speaker 4: there are so many easy ways of doing it. Named

482
00:26:40,280 --> 00:26:45,480
Speaker 4: Christy Noam ambassador to you know, Uzbekistan or something whatever. Yeah,

483
00:26:45,560 --> 00:26:47,200
Speaker 4: I mean that's how they got rid of Don Don

484
00:26:47,280 --> 00:26:51,560
Speaker 4: Junior's fiance. They centered to Greece, Right, this is like

485
00:26:51,600 --> 00:26:53,280
Speaker 4: the perfect way to do it.

486
00:26:53,280 --> 00:26:56,440
Speaker 1: It is just sort of amazing, and I do think

487
00:26:56,480 --> 00:27:00,160
Speaker 1: it is the double downing is ultimately, I mean, there's

488
00:27:00,200 --> 00:27:02,440
Speaker 1: just so many things they're doing wrong. But the double

489
00:27:02,480 --> 00:27:06,520
Speaker 1: downing feels like a really easy thing. You know. It's

490
00:27:06,560 --> 00:27:09,000
Speaker 1: like he just was mad that Mattow had a wall

491
00:27:09,240 --> 00:27:11,320
Speaker 1: of the people he fired, so he's like, I'll just

492
00:27:11,440 --> 00:27:12,960
Speaker 1: never fire anyone this time.

493
00:27:13,359 --> 00:27:15,879
Speaker 4: I think that's exactly right. And the thing about you know,

494
00:27:15,960 --> 00:27:19,159
Speaker 4: talking about backing down with ice, keep in mind how

495
00:27:19,240 --> 00:27:21,600
Speaker 4: much money is in the pipeline for ICE. I mean,

496
00:27:21,640 --> 00:27:25,320
Speaker 4: there are tens of billions of dollars heading toward ice.

497
00:27:25,920 --> 00:27:28,720
Speaker 4: They have just didn't I read that. They They've set

498
00:27:28,720 --> 00:27:33,400
Speaker 4: aside something like more than thirty billion dollars to buy warehouses. Yeah,

499
00:27:33,440 --> 00:27:36,760
Speaker 4: put migrants in Oh my god, what can possibly go wrong?

500
00:27:36,920 --> 00:27:40,640
Speaker 4: So the problem is that, first of all, you're trapped

501
00:27:40,680 --> 00:27:44,080
Speaker 4: with the agenda. You have all of this momentum, all

502
00:27:44,160 --> 00:27:47,000
Speaker 4: of this money. There's no way that Donald Trump is

503
00:27:47,040 --> 00:27:49,040
Speaker 4: going to slam his brakes on and said, yeah, you

504
00:27:49,080 --> 00:27:52,399
Speaker 4: know what, maybe we shouldn't wear a house. You know,

505
00:27:52,520 --> 00:27:56,159
Speaker 4: somebody he ran on the wall. They held up signs

506
00:27:56,200 --> 00:28:00,920
Speaker 4: here in Milwaukee at the Republican conventioned mass deportation. Donald

507
00:28:00,920 --> 00:28:03,280
Speaker 4: Trump's not going to say never mind right now as

508
00:28:03,320 --> 00:28:05,200
Speaker 4: long as he's got Stephen Miller in the White House.

509
00:28:05,440 --> 00:28:08,679
Speaker 4: How he fired Steven Miller get back to me on this,

510
00:28:08,840 --> 00:28:10,159
Speaker 4: but I don't see it happening.

511
00:28:10,920 --> 00:28:13,080
Speaker 1: Thank you, Charlie Sikes.

512
00:28:13,720 --> 00:28:15,600
Speaker 4: Hey anytime, Molly, anytime.

513
00:28:17,840 --> 00:28:21,040
Speaker 1: John Meachum is a Pulitzer Prize winning biographer and the

514
00:28:21,080 --> 00:28:25,760
Speaker 1: author of American Struggle, Democracy, Descent, and the Pursuit of

515
00:28:25,800 --> 00:28:32,239
Speaker 1: a More Perfect Union, and anthology Welcome, Welcome, John Meetchum.

516
00:28:31,840 --> 00:28:33,680
Speaker 3: Thank you, thank you. This is a great honor.

517
00:28:33,920 --> 00:28:38,880
Speaker 1: Yes, the honor is mine. American Struggle. It's like this

518
00:28:38,960 --> 00:28:41,920
Speaker 1: is coming up, this two hundred and fiftieth, this is

519
00:28:42,160 --> 00:28:45,360
Speaker 1: your super Bowl. As an American historian.

520
00:28:45,160 --> 00:28:50,000
Speaker 5: I am the bad bunny of dorky white male historian.

521
00:28:50,480 --> 00:28:51,960
Speaker 1: Yes, welcome.

522
00:28:52,360 --> 00:28:54,680
Speaker 5: That's a complicated image, isn't it. To cut to the

523
00:28:54,720 --> 00:28:59,200
Speaker 5: chase here. I wanted to pull together the world's most

524
00:28:59,240 --> 00:29:04,840
Speaker 5: fascinating inner party, and it would be you know, when

525
00:29:04,880 --> 00:29:10,480
Speaker 5: you have Frederick Douglass talking to Alexander Stevens. Douglas who articulated,

526
00:29:11,200 --> 00:29:15,680
Speaker 5: arguably as powerfully as Lincoln, the American promise and the

527
00:29:15,720 --> 00:29:22,120
Speaker 5: American the perils that that promise always faces with people

528
00:29:22,800 --> 00:29:25,800
Speaker 5: like Alexander Stevens, the vice President of the Confederacy, who

529
00:29:25,840 --> 00:29:31,280
Speaker 5: said that Negro slavery quote unquote is the cornerstone on

530
00:29:31,320 --> 00:29:36,800
Speaker 5: which the Confederacy is built, and wanted to try to

531
00:29:36,840 --> 00:29:40,000
Speaker 5: stay out of the way of the competing voices. So

532
00:29:40,680 --> 00:29:47,360
Speaker 5: if you believe that this particular moment is utterly unprecedented today,

533
00:29:47,840 --> 00:29:51,200
Speaker 5: well it's a difference of degree, with a couple of

534
00:29:51,480 --> 00:29:54,720
Speaker 5: differences of kind. But what I want to be very

535
00:29:54,720 --> 00:29:58,440
Speaker 5: clear about is that for neither right nor left, well

536
00:29:58,480 --> 00:30:02,280
Speaker 5: maybe for the right, there's not some sort of fairyland

537
00:30:02,640 --> 00:30:07,960
Speaker 5: where everything was wonderful, and so it's not a project

538
00:30:08,080 --> 00:30:12,640
Speaker 5: of restoration. It's a project of learning from the past

539
00:30:13,160 --> 00:30:15,480
Speaker 5: so that the next chapter is better.

540
00:30:15,720 --> 00:30:18,280
Speaker 1: I think that's really a great point. And this is

541
00:30:18,320 --> 00:30:21,160
Speaker 1: sort of my dream book. So you put together are

542
00:30:21,400 --> 00:30:25,840
Speaker 1: pieces of writing from everyone from Lincoln to Obama, Jackson

543
00:30:26,200 --> 00:30:31,760
Speaker 1: to Theodore Roosevelt, Ronald Reagan, everyone's favorite actor and sorry

544
00:30:31,840 --> 00:30:34,040
Speaker 1: I had to get that in. You know, I'm not

545
00:30:34,200 --> 00:30:35,760
Speaker 1: a non partisan actor.

546
00:30:35,840 --> 00:30:37,880
Speaker 3: He now looks like the Serrow.

547
00:30:38,200 --> 00:30:42,520
Speaker 5: Yes, okay, so you wait long enough, you get a toga.

548
00:30:46,120 --> 00:30:49,880
Speaker 1: Yes, Ronald Reagan looks like Lincoln. So the idea here,

549
00:30:49,920 --> 00:30:52,160
Speaker 1: and I think this is something that I also think

550
00:30:52,200 --> 00:30:55,160
Speaker 1: about a lot, is that these are struggles that we

551
00:30:55,240 --> 00:30:57,720
Speaker 1: have been having over the last two hundred and fifty years.

552
00:30:57,880 --> 00:31:01,720
Speaker 5: It's perennial, and that's because it's a democracy. Is the

553
00:31:01,760 --> 00:31:04,960
Speaker 5: fullest manifestation of all of us. We have not been

554
00:31:05,000 --> 00:31:08,920
Speaker 5: invaded by aliens. A dispositive number, not a majority, but

555
00:31:09,000 --> 00:31:12,960
Speaker 5: a dispositive number of American voters have now twice chosen

556
00:31:13,240 --> 00:31:16,920
Speaker 5: to put the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.

557
00:31:16,760 --> 00:31:18,520
Speaker 3: To a test that we did not need.

558
00:31:19,000 --> 00:31:23,240
Speaker 5: So let's think about what has happened at other moments

559
00:31:23,280 --> 00:31:26,360
Speaker 5: when the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution have been

560
00:31:26,360 --> 00:31:27,120
Speaker 5: put to the test.

561
00:31:27,560 --> 00:31:28,520
Speaker 3: The lesson is.

562
00:31:29,200 --> 00:31:37,760
Speaker 5: That it requires careful, arduous, often bloody, always costly work

563
00:31:38,120 --> 00:31:41,800
Speaker 5: to force the country to live up to its own

564
00:31:41,960 --> 00:31:43,760
Speaker 5: self professed mission statement.

565
00:31:44,240 --> 00:31:47,280
Speaker 1: Yeah. So one of the things that we talk about

566
00:31:47,280 --> 00:31:51,120
Speaker 1: a lot here is this idea that there must be

567
00:31:51,200 --> 00:31:54,720
Speaker 1: a sort of way out of this. And I wonder

568
00:31:54,800 --> 00:31:59,080
Speaker 1: if the history provides some way out of this moment.

569
00:31:59,760 --> 00:32:03,240
Speaker 5: A thrilling and a terrifying answer, And it's the same one.

570
00:32:03,320 --> 00:32:06,320
Speaker 5: It's up to us. That's thrilling because it's okay, enough

571
00:32:06,320 --> 00:32:11,200
Speaker 5: of us act on our agency and we can prevail

572
00:32:11,440 --> 00:32:17,000
Speaker 5: against the forces of illiberalism and authoritarianism that are flowing

573
00:32:17,040 --> 00:32:19,600
Speaker 5: in the country. They are always there. The question is

574
00:32:19,640 --> 00:32:22,720
Speaker 5: whether they add or they flow. And what's terrifying is that,

575
00:32:22,880 --> 00:32:25,640
Speaker 5: Oh Christ, it's up to us, right. No one's coming

576
00:32:25,640 --> 00:32:28,600
Speaker 5: to save us. Fortenbross is not coming in and Act

577
00:32:28,680 --> 00:32:31,640
Speaker 5: five right, Daddy and Mommy aren't coming home.

578
00:32:31,760 --> 00:32:32,080
Speaker 3: This is it.

579
00:32:32,040 --> 00:32:35,480
Speaker 5: It's up to us, and we're all driven by appetite

580
00:32:35,520 --> 00:32:37,800
Speaker 5: and ambition. If we do the right thing a little

581
00:32:37,880 --> 00:32:39,880
Speaker 5: more than half the time, it's a pretty good day.

582
00:32:40,160 --> 00:32:41,960
Speaker 5: I don't know about you. I don't have many of those,

583
00:32:42,200 --> 00:32:44,240
Speaker 5: and so the country would be the same way. The country,

584
00:32:44,240 --> 00:32:46,280
Speaker 5: by the way is yes, you can argue that the

585
00:32:46,280 --> 00:32:48,760
Speaker 5: Declaration of Independence is two hundred and fifty years old,

586
00:32:49,120 --> 00:32:53,280
Speaker 5: but a multi racial democracy was founded in nineteen sixty five,

587
00:32:53,400 --> 00:32:56,240
Speaker 5: so we are basically a developing democracy.

588
00:32:56,480 --> 00:32:58,760
Speaker 1: One of the things that I have been thinking about

589
00:32:58,800 --> 00:33:01,360
Speaker 1: I'm writing about is this idea that my grandfather, who

590
00:33:01,520 --> 00:33:05,240
Speaker 1: was jailed by McCarthy during the House in an American activities,

591
00:33:05,240 --> 00:33:07,760
Speaker 1: Howard Fast, that some of the ways in which he

592
00:33:07,920 --> 00:33:11,160
Speaker 1: was able to survive are useful to today. And I'm

593
00:33:11,160 --> 00:33:13,840
Speaker 1: actually going to write a book about that. Spoiler, but

594
00:33:14,400 --> 00:33:18,040
Speaker 1: I wondered if you could think of other you know,

595
00:33:18,840 --> 00:33:20,200
Speaker 1: moments like.

596
00:33:20,240 --> 00:33:23,200
Speaker 5: That April Morning, by the Way, vital book when I

597
00:33:23,240 --> 00:33:26,720
Speaker 5: was growing up. And yeah, the fact that they pulled,

598
00:33:26,840 --> 00:33:30,320
Speaker 5: you know, Roy Cohene and David Dye pulled his books

599
00:33:30,320 --> 00:33:34,000
Speaker 5: out of embassy libraries and insisted that the American Legion

600
00:33:34,080 --> 00:33:36,600
Speaker 5: magazine being all of them. That was the high level

601
00:33:36,880 --> 00:33:40,560
Speaker 5: Cold War security they were doing. So McCarthy is a

602
00:33:40,880 --> 00:33:42,560
Speaker 5: hugely important example.

603
00:33:42,560 --> 00:33:44,360
Speaker 3: I don't need to tell you.

604
00:33:44,160 --> 00:33:47,520
Speaker 1: Please do we'd love to hear the your historical.

605
00:33:47,600 --> 00:33:50,400
Speaker 3: So McCarthy wins in forty six.

606
00:33:50,920 --> 00:33:53,680
Speaker 5: He comes down to us as a kind of cartoonish

607
00:33:53,760 --> 00:33:58,479
Speaker 5: sweaty guy. Actually, I advise everybody, suggest everybody go actually

608
00:33:58,520 --> 00:34:02,400
Speaker 5: watch the footage of him. He was not a sweaty caricature.

609
00:34:02,600 --> 00:34:05,040
Speaker 5: He was kind of a big guy. He had a

610
00:34:05,040 --> 00:34:08,719
Speaker 5: certain presence on I kind of see if this sounds familiar.

611
00:34:09,239 --> 00:34:14,640
Speaker 5: He was, despite everything, seemed kind of charming. And he

612
00:34:14,920 --> 00:34:17,560
Speaker 5: was now after lunch, he was always drunk. But so

613
00:34:17,800 --> 00:34:19,880
Speaker 5: you got yet to get him in the morning. But

614
00:34:20,000 --> 00:34:23,440
Speaker 5: he understood the means of media of the day. Richard

615
00:34:23,520 --> 00:34:27,040
Speaker 5: Rodbecker has this great riff, the New Yorker, author of

616
00:34:27,040 --> 00:34:29,960
Speaker 5: the Letter from Washington from New Yorker in those years,

617
00:34:30,320 --> 00:34:34,640
Speaker 5: this great insight into and again see translate this to

618
00:34:35,239 --> 00:34:39,759
Speaker 5: where we are now. He understood newspaper deadlines, and so

619
00:34:40,320 --> 00:34:43,719
Speaker 5: he would make his most outrageous charges at about noon,

620
00:34:44,120 --> 00:34:47,960
Speaker 5: because the afternoon newspapers went to press about.

621
00:34:47,680 --> 00:34:49,879
Speaker 3: One and they didn't have time to check them out.

622
00:34:50,120 --> 00:34:52,320
Speaker 5: But a United States senator had just said there was

623
00:34:52,360 --> 00:34:57,120
Speaker 5: a nest of communist spies at the Social Security office

624
00:34:57,120 --> 00:34:58,480
Speaker 5: in Des Moines or whatever the hell.

625
00:34:58,719 --> 00:35:01,200
Speaker 3: And so you have these headlines go across America.

626
00:35:01,280 --> 00:35:02,600
Speaker 5: And one of the things, you know, we all talk

627
00:35:02,640 --> 00:35:06,600
Speaker 5: about Walter Cronkite, the really the most powerful force in

628
00:35:06,640 --> 00:35:09,960
Speaker 5: the middle of the twentieth century were the wire services,

629
00:35:10,440 --> 00:35:14,080
Speaker 5: because so many papers, I mean, you go, you look

630
00:35:14,120 --> 00:35:17,839
Speaker 5: at this, and what the AP and the UP said,

631
00:35:18,440 --> 00:35:21,640
Speaker 5: millions and millions of Americans, and so if the wire

632
00:35:21,800 --> 00:35:28,600
Speaker 5: reporter reports this usually baseless charge, it goes everywhere.

633
00:35:28,760 --> 00:35:31,000
Speaker 3: So he understood the means of media.

634
00:35:31,520 --> 00:35:33,800
Speaker 5: He was sort of dive, was sort of in spite

635
00:35:33,800 --> 00:35:35,960
Speaker 5: of yourself kind of effective.

636
00:35:36,360 --> 00:35:38,520
Speaker 3: And he had no real convictions.

637
00:35:39,000 --> 00:35:41,520
Speaker 5: Roy Cone said, And if you're doing this book you

638
00:35:41,600 --> 00:35:44,480
Speaker 5: have if you don't have it, Cone's book on McCarthy

639
00:35:45,120 --> 00:35:49,680
Speaker 5: nineteen sixty eight is vital. It's really honest actually, and

640
00:35:49,760 --> 00:35:52,000
Speaker 5: not a sentence you often hear about Roy Coke, but

641
00:35:52,120 --> 00:35:57,440
Speaker 5: he said McCarthy bought anti communism in the way you

642
00:35:57,520 --> 00:36:00,799
Speaker 5: might buy a used car, right.

643
00:36:00,880 --> 00:36:02,320
Speaker 3: He just wanted to get somewhere.

644
00:36:02,560 --> 00:36:08,200
Speaker 5: And so you have a master of media, a devilish

645
00:36:08,440 --> 00:36:13,480
Speaker 5: kind of in spite of yourself charm, you have no conviction,

646
00:36:13,960 --> 00:36:21,200
Speaker 5: but a seemingly bottomless capacity for wreaking damage on people,

647
00:36:22,080 --> 00:36:27,200
Speaker 5: all for the cause of ambition, and so g that.

648
00:36:27,640 --> 00:36:30,360
Speaker 5: I don't know if that brings anyone to mind. And

649
00:36:30,440 --> 00:36:32,919
Speaker 5: the other part of the McCarthy story that I think

650
00:36:33,000 --> 00:36:36,960
Speaker 5: is vital here is that even after he fell the

651
00:36:37,000 --> 00:36:40,799
Speaker 5: censure in December of nineteen fifty which, by the way,

652
00:36:41,560 --> 00:36:44,840
Speaker 5: Armie McCarthy right after the Army McCarthy hearings, which is

653
00:36:44,840 --> 00:36:48,719
Speaker 5: a whole different podcast. But it's important to remember when

654
00:36:48,719 --> 00:36:50,719
Speaker 5: people look at the Senate and they say, oh, how

655
00:36:50,719 --> 00:36:54,400
Speaker 5: could the senators not stand up, you know, against President

656
00:36:54,400 --> 00:36:57,240
Speaker 5: Trump and all that only one member of the Republican

657
00:36:57,360 --> 00:37:03,560
Speaker 5: leadership voted to censure. The rest voted with him, and

658
00:37:03,719 --> 00:37:08,680
Speaker 5: the vote only happened after the Republicans lost the nineteen

659
00:37:08,760 --> 00:37:12,120
Speaker 5: fifty four midterm. They'd lost the majority and so it

660
00:37:12,239 --> 00:37:15,359
Speaker 5: kind of didn't matter. So all of this these are

661
00:37:15,480 --> 00:37:18,480
Speaker 5: pickaun things, But what's picka youn to.

662
00:37:18,560 --> 00:37:19,520
Speaker 3: Us was vital?

663
00:37:19,640 --> 00:37:23,440
Speaker 5: Then thirty five percent of the country, thirty five percent

664
00:37:23,480 --> 00:37:26,680
Speaker 5: of the country still approved of Joe McCarthy after he

665
00:37:26,800 --> 00:37:27,640
Speaker 5: fell from power.

666
00:37:28,000 --> 00:37:29,760
Speaker 1: Wow, so like Trump.

667
00:37:30,160 --> 00:37:33,160
Speaker 5: So to me, the folks that put Trump in office

668
00:37:33,680 --> 00:37:36,799
Speaker 5: aren't the thirty five percent. It's the fourteen point nine

669
00:37:36,880 --> 00:37:40,040
Speaker 5: percent of what I call the Peter Malar Republicans.

670
00:37:40,520 --> 00:37:42,560
Speaker 3: You know, the guys at the driving range.

671
00:37:42,640 --> 00:37:47,640
Speaker 5: And the men's grill who worry about taxes and judges

672
00:37:47,680 --> 00:37:51,000
Speaker 5: and just don't like Democrats. So you ask about getting

673
00:37:51,000 --> 00:37:53,920
Speaker 5: out of it. We get out of this not if

674
00:37:53,960 --> 00:37:56,759
Speaker 5: you get ninety percent of the country to suddenly see

675
00:37:56,800 --> 00:37:57,839
Speaker 5: the world the way you do.

676
00:37:58,600 --> 00:38:02,040
Speaker 3: If you get seven to eight percent of the modern

677
00:38:02,160 --> 00:38:07,439
Speaker 3: Republicans to sober up, then you'd then MAGA becomes a

678
00:38:07,600 --> 00:38:10,399
Speaker 3: force in the Republic, which it has a right to.

679
00:38:10,400 --> 00:38:12,719
Speaker 1: Be right, but not the majority.

680
00:38:12,960 --> 00:38:15,360
Speaker 3: But it has never been the majority.

681
00:38:15,040 --> 00:38:17,759
Speaker 1: Right, but not a governing majority.

682
00:38:17,719 --> 00:38:19,400
Speaker 3: Not a dispositive force.

683
00:38:19,880 --> 00:38:23,640
Speaker 1: All of this is so important because I think when

684
00:38:23,680 --> 00:38:27,440
Speaker 1: you're living through history, it's hard to see the president

685
00:38:27,960 --> 00:38:32,920
Speaker 1: absolutely and there clearly is such a strong historical precedent.

686
00:38:33,040 --> 00:38:37,520
Speaker 1: Here we're seeing hearings right now. Pambondi is up on

687
00:38:37,560 --> 00:38:41,320
Speaker 1: the hill testifying. I wonder if you could talk about

688
00:38:41,640 --> 00:38:45,640
Speaker 1: the power of hearings in this moment, because I wonder

689
00:38:45,680 --> 00:38:47,880
Speaker 1: if you could, Like the Army McCarthy, hearings are a

690
00:38:47,920 --> 00:38:51,880
Speaker 1: great example of how the public turns on a figure

691
00:38:52,239 --> 00:38:54,840
Speaker 1: can at least theoretically.

692
00:38:54,560 --> 00:38:58,880
Speaker 3: There are precedents with Trump, obviously.

693
00:38:58,719 --> 00:39:01,480
Speaker 5: But I will say this, for the first four years

694
00:39:02,239 --> 00:39:05,640
Speaker 5: sixteen to twenty, I thought he was the difference of

695
00:39:05,760 --> 00:39:09,840
Speaker 5: degree but not kind. Everything he did except for the behavior,

696
00:39:09,960 --> 00:39:14,600
Speaker 5: which is reprehensible, but even his most devoted folks kind

697
00:39:14,600 --> 00:39:16,279
Speaker 5: of at least sort of nod to a back.

698
00:39:16,520 --> 00:39:20,360
Speaker 3: But the policy stuff was extreme. But you know, I

699
00:39:20,360 --> 00:39:21,200
Speaker 3: could see it right.

700
00:39:21,239 --> 00:39:23,680
Speaker 5: Here's a little Huey Long, Here's a little George Wallace,

701
00:39:23,719 --> 00:39:25,000
Speaker 5: here's a little Joe McCarthy.

702
00:39:25,080 --> 00:39:26,440
Speaker 3: You know, he sort of saw it.

703
00:39:26,920 --> 00:39:33,080
Speaker 5: The new virus, the wuhan of illiberalism is the lie

704
00:39:33,080 --> 00:39:37,440
Speaker 5: about the election. That is a new thing for the

705
00:39:37,560 --> 00:39:41,200
Speaker 5: principal leader of a political party in the United States

706
00:39:41,200 --> 00:39:47,320
Speaker 5: of America to argue and to foment distrust in elections

707
00:39:47,320 --> 00:39:50,040
Speaker 5: simply because they don't like the result. Aaron Burr didn't

708
00:39:50,080 --> 00:39:53,400
Speaker 5: do it, John Adams didn't do it, Andrew Jackson didn't

709
00:39:53,400 --> 00:39:56,120
Speaker 5: do it. Hubert Humphrey didn't do it, Richard Nixon didn't

710
00:39:56,160 --> 00:39:58,920
Speaker 5: do it. Al Gore didn't do it. And so that

711
00:39:59,120 --> 00:40:02,680
Speaker 5: is going to be a a virus that is good,

712
00:40:03,120 --> 00:40:05,960
Speaker 5: I predict is going to prove stubborn. So that is

713
00:40:05,960 --> 00:40:08,560
Speaker 5: a difference of kind, not degree. And it's not just

714
00:40:08,680 --> 00:40:12,399
Speaker 5: January sixth, it's the fake electors. It's the whole unfolding

715
00:40:12,520 --> 00:40:13,200
Speaker 5: January sixth.

716
00:40:13,560 --> 00:40:16,480
Speaker 1: And it's used as a litmus test, which makes it

717
00:40:16,520 --> 00:40:18,200
Speaker 1: even worse awful.

718
00:40:18,600 --> 00:40:23,000
Speaker 5: And so you ask about hearings, interesting question for a

719
00:40:23,040 --> 00:40:29,280
Speaker 5: PhD candidate somewhere would be our hearings causal or.

720
00:40:29,520 --> 00:40:33,160
Speaker 3: Are they monstrative? Are they the fruit of something?

721
00:40:33,360 --> 00:40:33,520
Speaker 1: Right?

722
00:40:34,200 --> 00:40:38,880
Speaker 5: Armie McCarthy is really interesting. The moment we all remember

723
00:40:39,680 --> 00:40:43,719
Speaker 5: is when Joe Welch, the Boston lawyer who had been

724
00:40:43,719 --> 00:40:46,560
Speaker 5: brought in by Tom Dewey, says, you know, have you

725
00:40:46,600 --> 00:40:47,480
Speaker 5: no decency sir?

726
00:40:47,640 --> 00:40:48,560
Speaker 3: At long past.

727
00:40:49,000 --> 00:40:51,440
Speaker 5: That comes at the very end of a long process

728
00:40:51,560 --> 00:40:55,760
Speaker 5: in which the Armie McCarthy hearings were actually about Roy Cone.

729
00:40:56,000 --> 00:41:00,480
Speaker 5: They were about Roy Cone using influence to protect a

730
00:41:00,520 --> 00:41:03,080
Speaker 5: guy named David Shine, the most famous private in the

731
00:41:03,120 --> 00:41:06,040
Speaker 5: history of the US Army. And again it's a whole

732
00:41:06,080 --> 00:41:10,800
Speaker 5: different thing. But what you saw there, and I think

733
00:41:11,080 --> 00:41:15,040
Speaker 5: what's relevant to us is if you are a devoted

734
00:41:15,080 --> 00:41:20,080
Speaker 5: political participant, it's very hard sometimes or maybe all the

735
00:41:20,160 --> 00:41:25,439
Speaker 5: time to recognize that other people. Why can't everyone see

736
00:41:25,480 --> 00:41:27,400
Speaker 5: the world the way I see it? I wake up

737
00:41:27,400 --> 00:41:29,480
Speaker 5: every morning thinking this, right, I know.

738
00:41:29,520 --> 00:41:30,279
Speaker 3: You know you're.

739
00:41:32,239 --> 00:41:34,600
Speaker 1: I'm much more involved than you are, John Micha.

740
00:41:35,840 --> 00:41:36,560
Speaker 3: That's not hard.

741
00:41:36,880 --> 00:41:40,280
Speaker 5: But the point of the Constitution, and this is why

742
00:41:40,840 --> 00:41:44,480
Speaker 5: the MAGA stuff is so I think corrosive in its

743
00:41:44,960 --> 00:41:51,080
Speaker 5: full impact, is they don't see the opposition as legitimate.

744
00:41:51,360 --> 00:41:55,719
Speaker 3: And when you move our politics to.

745
00:41:55,480 --> 00:42:00,960
Speaker 5: Total war as opposed to a politics of the deliberative,

746
00:42:01,719 --> 00:42:09,040
Speaker 5: virulent but still rules based resolution of problems, then you're

747
00:42:09,040 --> 00:42:13,200
Speaker 5: in a place where the Constitution can't endure because the

748
00:42:13,200 --> 00:42:18,680
Speaker 5: constitution depends on our common ascent a s s NT

749
00:42:19,080 --> 00:42:22,840
Speaker 5: our common assent to being willing to lose for a season,

750
00:42:23,040 --> 00:42:25,280
Speaker 5: and these guys don't want to lose for a minute.

751
00:42:25,360 --> 00:42:27,239
Speaker 5: And that's a huge part of the struggle. And it's

752
00:42:27,280 --> 00:42:30,600
Speaker 5: really hard here I am saying to the left. You

753
00:42:30,719 --> 00:42:34,880
Speaker 5: gotta be willing to watch these hearings. And you know,

754
00:42:34,920 --> 00:42:38,600
Speaker 5: you can dislike the Attorney General, you can whatever it is,

755
00:42:38,880 --> 00:42:42,280
Speaker 5: but you know he did win the election. The Senate

756
00:42:42,440 --> 00:42:46,719
Speaker 5: did confirm all these people, and the way to combat

757
00:42:46,800 --> 00:42:52,840
Speaker 5: it is to organize and win the next one, which

758
00:42:52,880 --> 00:42:57,320
Speaker 5: is why to pull my own seemingly diffuse points.

759
00:42:57,560 --> 00:42:58,600
Speaker 3: That's why the election is.

760
00:42:59,239 --> 00:43:03,080
Speaker 5: That's why the elect integrity matters, and that's why you know,

761
00:43:03,160 --> 00:43:06,160
Speaker 5: if I were if I had unlimited me, I would

762
00:43:06,200 --> 00:43:11,800
Speaker 5: be investing in I'd find every Secretary of state candidate

763
00:43:11,840 --> 00:43:14,560
Speaker 5: who was a profile and courage and support them because

764
00:43:14,680 --> 00:43:17,120
Speaker 5: they're going to have to stand in the breach.

765
00:43:18,000 --> 00:43:21,680
Speaker 1: Yeah, it is just an incredible moment. I wonder if

766
00:43:21,719 --> 00:43:24,960
Speaker 1: you could, just for those who are very freaked out

767
00:43:25,160 --> 00:43:28,000
Speaker 1: about these midterms, give us some hope.

768
00:43:28,320 --> 00:43:30,040
Speaker 5: I'm not going to get false hope. I think if

769
00:43:30,080 --> 00:43:34,000
Speaker 5: the votes are counted fairly and if there is trust

770
00:43:34,120 --> 00:43:37,440
Speaker 5: in the system, it feels that this hour, as often

771
00:43:37,480 --> 00:43:40,720
Speaker 5: happens in American life, we're going to quickly change our minds.

772
00:43:40,920 --> 00:43:44,160
Speaker 5: My favorite example of this is in nineteen sixty four,

773
00:43:44,280 --> 00:43:48,160
Speaker 5: Lyndon Johnson won the largest landslide in American history. In

774
00:43:48,239 --> 00:43:51,200
Speaker 5: nineteen sixty six, he lost more than sixty seats in

775
00:43:51,239 --> 00:43:54,719
Speaker 5: the House. Ronald Reagan becomes governor of California, and the

776
00:43:54,960 --> 00:43:58,359
Speaker 5: stage is kind of set for ultimately the politics that

777
00:43:58,520 --> 00:44:01,080
Speaker 5: lead to Richard Nixon winning in nineteen sixty eight. So

778
00:44:01,880 --> 00:44:05,480
Speaker 5: what we all in a traditional world where gravity is

779
00:44:05,560 --> 00:44:09,440
Speaker 5: actually a force, which President Trump is in many ways repealed,

780
00:44:09,760 --> 00:44:13,799
Speaker 5: we tend to decide something in a president election and

781
00:44:13,840 --> 00:44:15,759
Speaker 5: then rethink it almost immediately.

782
00:44:16,120 --> 00:44:18,080
Speaker 3: And I don't think that's.

783
00:44:18,239 --> 00:44:23,279
Speaker 5: Terrible because if you want, if you're not willing to

784
00:44:23,360 --> 00:44:26,360
Speaker 5: live with ambiguity, the United States of America is not

785
00:44:26,440 --> 00:44:31,040
Speaker 5: a good place to live, right. Chesterden said this about Christianity.

786
00:44:31,480 --> 00:44:35,959
Speaker 5: You have to be able to embrace the twilight. That's

787
00:44:35,960 --> 00:44:38,239
Speaker 5: easy for me to look again, look at me. I'm

788
00:44:38,239 --> 00:44:40,920
Speaker 5: an incredibly privileged guy. But I will say this, that

789
00:44:41,120 --> 00:44:45,239
Speaker 5: is the lesson of history. And as Frederick Douglass said,

790
00:44:45,239 --> 00:44:49,160
Speaker 5: I mean powers never conceded anything without a fight. But

791
00:44:49,200 --> 00:44:52,480
Speaker 5: if Frederick Douglas can say in the eighteen fifties, after

792
00:44:52,520 --> 00:44:55,759
Speaker 5: being born into enslavement, that I for one do not

793
00:44:55,920 --> 00:44:58,719
Speaker 5: despair of the Republic, the fiat of the Almighty let

794
00:44:58,719 --> 00:45:01,719
Speaker 5: there be liked, has not spent its force. If he

795
00:45:01,760 --> 00:45:05,520
Speaker 5: can believe that, then folks worried about the midterms can

796
00:45:05,560 --> 00:45:06,200
Speaker 5: believe that too.

797
00:45:06,600 --> 00:45:13,640
Speaker 1: Oh, John Mey, John, thank you, thank you, no more.

798
00:45:15,480 --> 00:45:19,840
Speaker 2: Jesse Cannon Molly over in Kansas, a state that is

799
00:45:20,120 --> 00:45:23,520
Speaker 2: I think all one of the interesting battlegrounds of how

800
00:45:23,640 --> 00:45:26,160
Speaker 2: things are being pushed back as left and right kind

801
00:45:26,160 --> 00:45:29,080
Speaker 2: of go back and forth. We saw the wedge issue

802
00:45:29,120 --> 00:45:32,440
Speaker 2: of the twenty twenty four election being trans and that

803
00:45:32,520 --> 00:45:35,120
Speaker 2: was a big thing Republicans tried to push. We see

804
00:45:35,200 --> 00:45:38,880
Speaker 2: Kansas Governor Laura Kelly vetoing an anti trans bathroom bounty

805
00:45:38,880 --> 00:45:44,160
Speaker 2: bill that would have made these vigilante report bathroom transactions.

806
00:45:44,680 --> 00:45:48,719
Speaker 1: So, Kansas Governor Laura Kelly's a Democrat. She is a

807
00:45:48,719 --> 00:45:51,360
Speaker 1: blue Democrat in a red state, a red state that

808
00:45:51,719 --> 00:45:56,040
Speaker 1: started electing Democrats soon after Governor brown Back did the

809
00:45:56,120 --> 00:45:58,839
Speaker 1: same thing that Donald Trump is doing. Right. He made

810
00:45:58,920 --> 00:46:04,359
Speaker 1: Kansas so so read and so poor and so just

811
00:46:04,680 --> 00:46:07,800
Speaker 1: you know, all of the sort of bad Republican policies

812
00:46:07,880 --> 00:46:09,799
Speaker 1: that they ended up flipping to Democrats.

813
00:46:09,800 --> 00:46:11,799
Speaker 2: So do you mean to tell me people don't like

814
00:46:11,840 --> 00:46:13,919
Speaker 2: when the schools would run out of money every year

815
00:46:14,000 --> 00:46:15,360
Speaker 2: to not be able to finish school.

816
00:46:15,640 --> 00:46:19,399
Speaker 1: Really, this is like the original dumb bathroom bill. You'll

817
00:46:19,400 --> 00:46:22,720
Speaker 1: remember the North Carolina bell. By the way, my favorite

818
00:46:22,760 --> 00:46:24,359
Speaker 1: part of this bill is it's like, if you don't

819
00:46:24,440 --> 00:46:27,239
Speaker 1: use the sex you are assigned to birth, you are

820
00:46:27,440 --> 00:46:29,680
Speaker 1: you know, you can be subject to bounties, which is

821
00:46:29,800 --> 00:46:32,800
Speaker 1: something you do with abortion too. But what is even

822
00:46:33,000 --> 00:46:38,120
Speaker 1: dumber is that it would ban multi occupancy gender neutral

823
00:46:38,200 --> 00:46:42,080
Speaker 1: restrooms in government buildings and it would impose a fine

824
00:46:42,120 --> 00:46:45,440
Speaker 1: of one thousand dollars for violation of the law. Is

825
00:46:45,480 --> 00:46:49,840
Speaker 1: so stupid. And here are these Republicans who say they're

826
00:46:49,880 --> 00:46:54,320
Speaker 1: the Party of Freedom and they're the party of small government,

827
00:46:54,600 --> 00:46:59,560
Speaker 1: and they're obsessed with writing bills about bathrooms, and that

828
00:47:00,320 --> 00:47:04,319
Speaker 1: in itself should be the greatest explainer of why these

829
00:47:04,360 --> 00:47:08,880
Speaker 1: people are humongous hypocrites. That's it for this episode of

830
00:47:09,000 --> 00:47:15,759
Speaker 1: Fast Politics. Tune in every Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday

831
00:47:15,920 --> 00:47:19,239
Speaker 1: to hear the best minds and politics make sense of

832
00:47:19,560 --> 00:47:23,799
Speaker 1: all this chaos. If you enjoy this podcast, please send

833
00:47:23,800 --> 00:47:27,480
Speaker 1: it to a friend and keep the conversation going. Thanks

834
00:47:27,520 --> 00:47:28,200
Speaker 1: for listening.