Latest / The Death Of Journalism / Episode One Hundred Eighty Two: Popping The Joy Balloon

Transcript

Episode One Hundred Eighty Two: Popping The Joy Balloon · The Death Of Journalism

0:00
Speaker 1: Welcome to episode number one hundred and eighty two of
0:03
Speaker 1: the Death of Journalism podcasts. My name is John Zickler.
0:05
Speaker 1: I'm your host on today's show. The Democratic Convention begins
0:09
Speaker 1: in Chicago, but it will not go down the way
0:11
Speaker 1: it should if Democrats were really the Democracy Party. Kamala
0:16
Speaker 1: Harris reveals she may really be a communist, and the
0:20
Speaker 1: Washington Post of New York Times makes some startling admissions. Meanwhile,
0:24
Speaker 1: ESPN further embarrasses itself with extreme wokeness. This week, the
0:32
Speaker 1: Democratic Convention begins in Chicago. Now, in the modern era,
0:37
Speaker 1: Republican and Democratic conventions have become really totally superfluous, meaningless shows.
0:45
Speaker 1: The media coverage of them has diminished greatly, at least
0:49
Speaker 1: in prime time on the major networks, and for good reason,
0:53
Speaker 1: because very little actually happens that is significant, other than
0:57
Speaker 1: maybe the presidential candidates speech accepting the nomination. This year,
1:03
Speaker 1: the Republican convention was a bit different in theory because
1:06
Speaker 1: of the assassination attempt against Donald Trump just a couple
1:10
Speaker 1: of days before. But in this era generally conventions are
1:14
Speaker 1: totally antiquated. However, under the circumstances, the very unique circumstances
1:21
Speaker 1: of this particular election, This Democratic Convention should should, if
1:29
Speaker 1: everybody was remotely consistent with their public beliefs, should have
1:34
Speaker 1: been the most dramatic in modern history. And it should
1:38
Speaker 1: not even be close. The reason I say that is
1:41
Speaker 1: because if the Democratic Party was really the party of democracy,
1:48
Speaker 1: if they really believed in democratic principles, what would have
1:52
Speaker 1: happened after Joe Biden decided to drop out is that
1:56
Speaker 1: they would have an open convention, a convention where the
2:01
Speaker 1: delegates actually voted on who will be the Democratic presidential
2:07
Speaker 1: and vice presidential nominees. This is the way things used
2:11
Speaker 1: to happen at conventions. And then eventually the party bosses realized,
2:15
Speaker 1: you know what, this is probably not sustainable in this
2:19
Speaker 1: quote unquote democratic world in which we're now living, and
2:23
Speaker 1: it became a situation where the primaries and caucuses mattered,
2:27
Speaker 1: and by the time the conventions came around, they were
2:30
Speaker 1: now irrelevant. Now, there's so many different aspects of this
2:34
Speaker 1: story that I'm leading with partially because nobody else, nobody
2:38
Speaker 1: else is going to tell this story about conventions this
2:43
Speaker 1: week of the Democratic Convention. At least, that's my instinct
2:46
Speaker 1: that because the mainstream news media is so completely in
2:50
Speaker 1: the tank for the Democratic Party, they're not going to
2:52
Speaker 1: tell you the way things should actually be operating right now.
2:56
Speaker 1: If the Democratic Party was not a bunch of hypocrites. See,
2:59
Speaker 1: I have no problem really. It's a little bit dirty pool,
3:03
Speaker 1: but that's what politics is. I have no problem really
3:06
Speaker 1: with Joe Biden deciding to step down after the Republican
3:10
Speaker 1: convention and after the first debate. I mean, it's sketchy,
3:15
Speaker 1: but okay, fine. We have a process for that. It's
3:19
Speaker 1: called the convention. So the person that got all the
3:22
Speaker 1: almost all the delegates during the primary season has dropped out.
3:28
Speaker 1: That means that the delegates are now all free agents
3:32
Speaker 1: and they will vote in an open and democratic process
3:36
Speaker 1: at the convention. But Democrats realized, you know what, we
3:42
Speaker 1: can't do that in this particular situation, especially because if
3:46
Speaker 1: we do that, it's going to be chaos. It's going
3:50
Speaker 1: to be a free for all. There's very little assurance
3:53
Speaker 1: that the candidate that we have to have, which is
3:56
Speaker 1: Kamala Harris because she's a woman of color and she's
4:00
Speaker 1: the vice president the United States, is going to win
4:02
Speaker 1: that nomination, or at the very least no evidence that
4:05
Speaker 1: she would win it easily. We would probably lose control
4:09
Speaker 1: over who the vice presidential nominee would be because it
4:11
Speaker 1: would have to be used as a bargaining chip in
4:15
Speaker 1: order to make sure that Kamala got enough votes from
4:18
Speaker 1: the delegates. And by the way, I'm not pretending that
4:21
Speaker 1: Kamala Harris wouldn't eventually have been the nominee anyway, I
4:25
Speaker 1: think that would be the most likely scenario. But I
4:28
Speaker 1: think it would have been brutal. I think it would
4:31
Speaker 1: have been beyond chaotic. I think it would have allowed
4:35
Speaker 1: many in the Democratic Party and at that convention to
4:38
Speaker 1: let their freak flag fly. It would have been ugly
4:42
Speaker 1: as hell. There would have been no consensus. There would
4:45
Speaker 1: have been all sorts of criticisms of Kamala Harris and
4:50
Speaker 1: every other candidate that put their hat in the ring.
4:53
Speaker 1: And that's even under the circumstances where the Democratic Party
4:56
Speaker 1: tried to fix it so that Kamala would win. Now
4:58
Speaker 1: you may recall, right Biden announced he was withdrawing that
5:03
Speaker 1: there were Democrats and those in the media that were
5:06
Speaker 1: pretending that we were going to have at least somewhat
5:10
Speaker 1: of a pretend open process, not an open convention, but
5:13
Speaker 1: an open process, and I said at the time, well,
5:16
Speaker 1: that's going to be a sham. Well, they were so
5:19
Speaker 1: terrified of opening up this Pandora's box that there would
5:23
Speaker 1: be chaos that would ensue. They were so afraid of
5:27
Speaker 1: their own base of support, and I think rightfully so,
5:30
Speaker 1: that they decided, you know what, we can't even have
5:32
Speaker 1: a pretend process because that we have a pretend process
5:36
Speaker 1: and we opened the Pandora's box. We have no idea
5:39
Speaker 1: where this might end up. So we're gonna shut this
5:41
Speaker 1: thing down from the start. We are going to tell
5:45
Speaker 1: everybody that it's Kamala and that's it. And so the
5:49
Speaker 1: party bosses, the party elites, they all decided, Okay, it's
5:53
Speaker 1: Kamala Harris, everyone else, shut the fuck up, and this
5:56
Speaker 1: is what we're doing. And everyone just went along. The
6:00
Speaker 1: entire Democratic Party just went along. There were a couple
6:03
Speaker 1: of minor murmurs, but by and large, everyone just went along.
6:09
Speaker 1: It was interesting to me, very interesting to me that
6:12
Speaker 1: Maureen Dowd, a very liberal famous columnist for the New
6:15
Speaker 1: York Times, this past weekend wrote a column the Dems
6:19
Speaker 1: are delighted, but a coup is still a coup. I
6:24
Speaker 1: was like, Wow, somebody at least stood up and said,
6:27
Speaker 1: this is crazy what's happened here, especially since we're just
6:31
Speaker 1: going to pretend. That's the part I hate about this.
6:33
Speaker 1: I always hate playing pretend, and we play pretend so
6:36
Speaker 1: much in this day and age. But we're all just
6:38
Speaker 1: supposed to play pretend that this is the proper process,
6:42
Speaker 1: That there isn't such a thing as an open convention,
6:45
Speaker 1: that there isn't such a situation that would be perfectly
6:48
Speaker 1: normal and keeping within democratic norms that the Democratic Party
6:52
Speaker 1: in the media like to talk so much about, where
6:55
Speaker 1: you simply open up the process. You have the delegates there,
6:59
Speaker 1: that's what they're there, and then they vote after a
7:04
Speaker 1: what would seemingly be a rigorous debate over who should
7:07
Speaker 1: be the presidential nominee and who should be the vice
7:10
Speaker 1: presidential nominee. That's the price the Democrats should have had
7:15
Speaker 1: to pay going through that process, going through the conflict
7:19
Speaker 1: that it would create, the chaos that it would create,
7:22
Speaker 1: the division that it would create. That's the price they
7:25
Speaker 1: should have had to pay for having a presidential nominee
7:30
Speaker 1: Joe Biden who couldn't get to the finish line because
7:34
Speaker 1: he physically wasn't capable of doing so, and because he
7:37
Speaker 1: was going to lose. And that's the part of that
7:40
Speaker 1: about this that drives me so crazy as someone who
7:43
Speaker 1: doesn't like Donald Trump, but who fears the hell out
7:46
Speaker 1: of Kamala Harris. I thought for sure this was a
7:49
Speaker 1: great miscalculation on my part. I thought for sure there
7:53
Speaker 1: would be some price to pay forgetting to Kamala Harris
7:58
Speaker 1: as the presidential nominee, whether that was in the division
8:03
Speaker 1: created by the process or in the price that they
8:07
Speaker 1: would have to pay for avoiding any sort of democratic
8:11
Speaker 1: process while simultaneously claiming to be the party of democracy.
8:16
Speaker 1: That's so frustrating to me. And I blame in part
8:20
Speaker 1: the Trump campaign and Trump himself for not forcing Democrats
8:25
Speaker 1: to pick a lane, especially during the Republican Convention. I've
8:29
Speaker 1: talked about this many times before, where there was a
8:32
Speaker 1: great opportunity to close off escape patches and to force
8:35
Speaker 1: there to be pain, forced there to be punishment for
8:39
Speaker 1: Democrats doing what it was obvious they wanted to do.
8:43
Speaker 1: And there are only a couple of scenarios that were plausible.
8:46
Speaker 1: There are early only two at the time of the
8:48
Speaker 1: Republican Convention. Either Biden hangs on for dear life. Because
8:53
Speaker 1: Democrats were afraid of an open process or two, they
8:58
Speaker 1: decided to get rid of Biden finally caves in. They
9:02
Speaker 1: rally around Harris, and they avoid any sort of democratic
9:05
Speaker 1: process because they know the dangers involved in that. And
9:10
Speaker 1: unfortunately Trump and the Republican Party allowed them to escape
9:16
Speaker 1: from this news that this was a situation where they
9:20
Speaker 1: were trapped and they got out of it. Now, to
9:22
Speaker 1: be clear, part of how the Democrats got out of
9:25
Speaker 1: this was that other than Maureen Dowd, nobody in the
9:29
Speaker 1: media was willing to call them out on this. Nobody
9:32
Speaker 1: in the mainstream news media. Everyone just went around along
9:36
Speaker 1: with it. Why because they knew it was the only
9:41
Speaker 1: way to plausibly beat Trump. They knew the dangers politically
9:46
Speaker 1: of it. And I've talked a lot about how in
9:48
Speaker 1: the last couple of months, especially brazenly openly, the mainstream
9:53
Speaker 1: news media has acted as if they are the campaign
9:58
Speaker 1: managers for the Democratic Party. They saw that Biden wasn't
10:02
Speaker 1: going to be able to get the job done, and
10:04
Speaker 1: they got rid of him, and they saw that the
10:06
Speaker 1: only option going forward was to route down Kamala, So
10:10
Speaker 1: they decided to facilitate that and there was going to
10:13
Speaker 1: be no dissent, none, and forget about this whole idea
10:17
Speaker 1: of an open convention. And this is what is so
10:20
Speaker 1: amazing and maybe the primary point considering this is the
10:24
Speaker 1: death of journalism podcast. You know, when I was younger,
10:28
Speaker 1: I'm fifty seven now, but I mean I've been following
10:31
Speaker 1: politics closely for almost all my life, since I was
10:34
Speaker 1: about ten years old. And you know, when I was
10:37
Speaker 1: a younger man, the ultimate dream, the dream of political
10:42
Speaker 1: reporters was an open convention. That was the dream that
10:48
Speaker 1: someday the circumstances may conspire to where we have an
10:53
Speaker 1: old fashioned open convention, real democracy, right out in front
10:57
Speaker 1: of everybody, and it would be dramatic, and you know,
11:02
Speaker 1: your sources would matter, your reporting would matter, the conventions
11:05
Speaker 1: would matter, the audiences would be engaged because this is
11:09
Speaker 1: something we haven't seen in a very long time. It
11:12
Speaker 1: would be a reality show. This was the dream. And
11:17
Speaker 1: then in two thousand and eight, I've talked so many
11:19
Speaker 1: times and I will continue to do so, including later
11:21
Speaker 1: on this podcast, about all the remarkable parallels between two
11:26
Speaker 1: thousand and eight election and the twenty twenty four election.
11:29
Speaker 1: They are increasing almost on a daily basis. But as
11:33
Speaker 1: I was doing my documentary film Media mal Practice, Obama
11:36
Speaker 1: got elected in Panlin was targeted. One of the many
11:38
Speaker 1: things that I found to be striking about what happened
11:42
Speaker 1: in two thousand and eight. To this day, nobody ever
11:45
Speaker 1: talks about We just pretend, we just ignore it. We
11:50
Speaker 1: had a situation in two thousand and eight where if
11:53
Speaker 1: the news media had wanted there to be an open
11:57
Speaker 1: convention on the Democratic side between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton,
12:02
Speaker 1: it was there for the taking. And nobody ever talks
12:08
Speaker 1: about this. We just pretend that Barack Obama clearly won
12:13
Speaker 1: the Democratic nomination from Hillary Clinton. He did not. He
12:18
Speaker 1: did not. He actually got fewer votes than Hillary Clinton.
12:23
Speaker 1: He only got more delegates than Hillary Clinton because they
12:28
Speaker 1: took delegates away from Florida and Michigan where Hillary had
12:32
Speaker 1: won because of technical issues, and the news there was
12:38
Speaker 1: a whole debate about this. They had like a panel
12:41
Speaker 1: to appeal what was happening with these delegates, and there
12:45
Speaker 1: was some media coverage of it. But in the rational
12:50
Speaker 1: journalism world, the world that I grew up in the world,
12:54
Speaker 1: it was kind of expecting to happen, at least a
12:56
Speaker 1: little bit in two thousand and eight, there would have
12:59
Speaker 1: been a self interest on the part of the news
13:02
Speaker 1: media to say, hey, wait a minute, why don't we
13:05
Speaker 1: decide this at the convention. We have two candidates with
13:08
Speaker 1: virtually the same number of delegates. Why is Hillary being
13:12
Speaker 1: cheated out of her delegates in Florida and Michigan. Let
13:16
Speaker 1: the process go forward. That would have been one democratic
13:20
Speaker 1: and two and not to mention legal, but in three
13:24
Speaker 1: this would have been exactly in the media's self interest
13:28
Speaker 1: because they would have had their their open convention. But
13:33
Speaker 1: there was something bigger going on, much bigger, that actually
13:38
Speaker 1: trumped their personal self interest, the media self interest to
13:42
Speaker 1: have an open convention, and that was Barack Obama. We
13:47
Speaker 1: could not do anything I'm talking about from the media's
13:50
Speaker 1: perspective here. We could not do anything to jeopardize the
13:54
Speaker 1: nomination of the first black man to be the Democratic
13:58
Speaker 1: presidential nominee. No, no, no, no, forget about the fact
14:02
Speaker 1: that Hillary was trying to be the first female president.
14:06
Speaker 1: No no, no, no, no, Sorry, Sorry, Hillary. We have
14:10
Speaker 1: decided Barack is more interesting, he's better for ratings, and
14:14
Speaker 1: we've decided that being black is more powerful than being
14:18
Speaker 1: a female. Sorry, and we're just going to go along
14:22
Speaker 1: with this whole idea of usurping an open convention, and
14:27
Speaker 1: Hillary lost her guts and decided, you know what, this
14:30
Speaker 1: is hopeless. If I push this too hard, I'm going
14:33
Speaker 1: to get destroyed because the media made it clear they
14:36
Speaker 1: were on Obama's side and not on hers. And we
14:42
Speaker 1: have a somewhat similar situation happened. I get twenty twenty four,
14:46
Speaker 1: where the news could have easily and should have, given
14:51
Speaker 1: the fact that the Democratic Party has placed so much
14:53
Speaker 1: of their identity on the idea that they are the
14:56
Speaker 1: Party of democracy and Donald Trump is their anti democracy candidate,
15:02
Speaker 1: that they would have, in a remotely rational world been saying, Okay,
15:07
Speaker 1: so Joe Biden has decided to drop out. That frees
15:10
Speaker 1: up all the delegates. So what's going to happen at
15:13
Speaker 1: this open convention? Boy, this is going to be interesting.
15:14
Speaker 1: Whoa wha wait wait wait, whoa wait. Democrats, you're not
15:17
Speaker 1: going to have an open convention. How can you possibly
15:20
Speaker 1: be the party of democracy? You're going to nominate somebody
15:24
Speaker 1: for president with no open process, no open convention, without
15:29
Speaker 1: one single vote ever being cast on their behalf in
15:33
Speaker 1: their entire life for the office of president. How could
15:38
Speaker 1: you possibly do that, and how could you possibly do
15:41
Speaker 1: that claiming to be the party of democracy? And yet
15:47
Speaker 1: there was none of that. Why Because, very similar to
15:50
Speaker 1: what happened in two thousand and eight, the news media
15:54
Speaker 1: put the interests of the Democratic Party over their own
15:59
Speaker 1: personal interest and the interests of journalism and the interests
16:03
Speaker 1: of democracy and a transparent democratic process, because they realized,
16:09
Speaker 1: once again, acting as the campaign managers for the Democratic Party,
16:13
Speaker 1: they realized, Okay, we got rid of the guy who
16:16
Speaker 1: couldn't win for you, Joe Biden, and now we're gonna
16:19
Speaker 1: sit on our hands and allow you to be complete
16:22
Speaker 1: and total hypocrites by imposing Kamala Harris as your nominee
16:29
Speaker 1: without even an open process, without an open convention. You
16:33
Speaker 1: did it before the convention even happened, for technical reasons,
16:38
Speaker 1: and we're just gonna allow this to happen. We're not
16:40
Speaker 1: going to call any foul here, we're not going to object.
16:44
Speaker 1: In fact, we're going to give Kamala Harris unprecedentedly positive
16:48
Speaker 1: media coverage. Why Because we are smart enough to know
16:52
Speaker 1: that if this were to be an open process at
16:55
Speaker 1: an open convention in Chicago, it would make nineteen sioked
17:00
Speaker 1: like a picnic, and they know they understood that. And
17:04
Speaker 1: by the way, it was true. Again, I think Kamala
17:08
Speaker 1: probably would have ended up as the nominee, but it
17:10
Speaker 1: would have come at a major, major price. And I
17:14
Speaker 1: doubt very seriously that Tim Waltz would have been, for
17:18
Speaker 1: better or for worse, the vice presidential nominee because of
17:20
Speaker 1: the reasons I already stated, involving the brok ring for
17:24
Speaker 1: delegates votes. And so this drives me crazy, and it
17:29
Speaker 1: actually manifest itself in two different conversations I had over
17:33
Speaker 1: the weekend in person with liberals, and they went very,
17:38
Speaker 1: very differently. One actually gave me a little bit of hope,
17:41
Speaker 1: and the other doused whatever hope I had that rationality
17:46
Speaker 1: might still went out here. I had a conversation with
17:50
Speaker 1: my sister in law who was in town visiting with
17:52
Speaker 1: the cousins. She is a liberal from a non swing state,
17:57
Speaker 1: a blue state, and I was acting her to vote
18:01
Speaker 1: for Harris, and she actually initiated a conversation with me
18:07
Speaker 1: where the bottom line was. She said, no, I was
18:10
Speaker 1: gonna vote for Biden, but now I can't. I can't
18:14
Speaker 1: vote for Harris because I just don't trust her. I
18:16
Speaker 1: don't trust this process, And much to my shock, she
18:20
Speaker 1: said she would actually vote for Trump. And even more
18:23
Speaker 1: shocking than that, she said that she has two liberal
18:27
Speaker 1: mom friends who are in the exact same boat that
18:30
Speaker 1: they would have voted for Biden. They don't like Trump,
18:33
Speaker 1: they're liberals, but they just don't like the specifically the
18:38
Speaker 1: process by which Harris became the nominee. Now, this was
18:43
Speaker 1: stunning to me. One that, you know, I hate anecdotal evidence.
18:48
Speaker 1: It's only three people, but three people proactively all in
18:53
Speaker 1: the same boat, seemingly all for basically the same reasons,
18:56
Speaker 1: reasons that I had thought we're gonna have. There's some
19:00
Speaker 1: impact here. I thought, if you recall back when Biden
19:05
Speaker 1: dropped out, I thought there was at least hope that
19:08
Speaker 1: there was gonna be a decent chunk of non conservatives
19:12
Speaker 1: who were just like, yeah, no, this smells This just
19:16
Speaker 1: doesn't feel right. This feels like dirty pool. You're foisting
19:20
Speaker 1: Harris upon us. What happened to democracy? I thought there
19:24
Speaker 1: might be some impact, that people would be able to
19:27
Speaker 1: figure this out on their own, even at the media
19:29
Speaker 1: decided to not make it an issue, and Trump was
19:31
Speaker 1: terrible at making an issue. I thought maybe just maybe
19:35
Speaker 1: there might be some people out there that had that reaction. Well,
19:39
Speaker 1: much to my surprise, my sister in law did, and
19:42
Speaker 1: she again proactively. I did not suggest this to her.
19:46
Speaker 1: I did say to her, so, what changed your mind?
19:49
Speaker 1: And it was all about her being very uncomfortable with
19:52
Speaker 1: this process, that it just doesn't feel right, that there's
19:55
Speaker 1: something about Harris that she just doesn't like. Now. I
19:58
Speaker 1: tweeted about this over the week and it got a
20:00
Speaker 1: lot of response, like, well over a thousand likes and
20:04
Speaker 1: over fifty thousand views, and I was kind of surprised
20:07
Speaker 1: by that, because again I don't like antidotal evidence. I
20:10
Speaker 1: don't think it's all that significant unless it's backed up
20:13
Speaker 1: by some semblance of data, and I've not seen any
20:16
Speaker 1: data to back this up at all. But when I
20:19
Speaker 1: asked about it, it was very interesting that my sister
20:24
Speaker 1: in law was willing to say that this was a
20:27
Speaker 1: process situation, a lack of trust situation. And when I
20:30
Speaker 1: posted about it, the general reaction seemed to be, well,
20:34
Speaker 1: there could be something to the idea that women are
20:38
Speaker 1: tougher on women than men are sometimes, and that's partially
20:42
Speaker 1: why Hillary Clinton didn't come up with the votes that
20:45
Speaker 1: were expected in twenty sixteen. I think there could be
20:47
Speaker 1: something to that. I don't know, it's hard to quantify,
20:52
Speaker 1: but I did find this story that was backed up
20:55
Speaker 1: by two of her friends in very similar situations, to
20:58
Speaker 1: be at least worthy of me. But then I had
21:01
Speaker 1: a conversation with a male liberal, a friend of ours
21:05
Speaker 1: that we spend a lot of time at the pool
21:07
Speaker 1: with in the summertimes, and his son has been great
21:10
Speaker 1: to my daughters, so occasionally we have conversations. This guy
21:15
Speaker 1: is one of those liberals that pretends he's not really
21:18
Speaker 1: that liberal, but he's super liberal, which is one of
21:22
Speaker 1: the more frustrating varieties of liberal to me. If you're
21:25
Speaker 1: going to be liberal, five, just own it. But this
21:28
Speaker 1: guy could not understand my objections to the process part
21:33
Speaker 1: of this at all. And the reason why we got
21:36
Speaker 1: into this conversation was he he went down the road
21:38
Speaker 1: of he doesn't like Trump because he's against democracy, and
21:42
Speaker 1: I went bananas on the whole issue of okay, so
21:46
Speaker 1: you're the Democracy party and you just did this, this
21:49
Speaker 1: and this, and you're avoiding the actual process. And he
21:52
Speaker 1: could not understand what I was talking about at all,
21:55
Speaker 1: or refused to understand what I was talking about at all,
21:58
Speaker 1: about an open convention. There was a process, a democratic
22:02
Speaker 1: process that was set up for this exact situation that
22:07
Speaker 1: Democrats just decided to do an end run around with
22:10
Speaker 1: the help of the media because they knew it would
22:13
Speaker 1: be very, very bad for them, and it had no
22:18
Speaker 1: impact on this guy whatsoever. So I'm not, as usual,
22:23
Speaker 1: particularly optimistic that people are going to be able to
22:26
Speaker 1: figure this out on their own. I did find my
22:28
Speaker 1: sister in law story to be interesting. I'll keep my
22:32
Speaker 1: eye out for whether or not there's any actual evidence
22:36
Speaker 1: of this being a more widespread phenomenon, but it gave
22:39
Speaker 1: me at least a little bit hop that some people,
22:41
Speaker 1: even if the media is trying to pretend that this
22:44
Speaker 1: isn't an issue, are going wait a minute, how did
22:47
Speaker 1: this happen? How did we get a person who has
22:51
Speaker 1: never received a vote for president as the nominee of
22:54
Speaker 1: the Democratic Party without any actual open process less than
23:00
Speaker 1: ninety days before the election. And as I said many
23:05
Speaker 1: times before, Trump deserves a lot of blame for allowing
23:09
Speaker 1: this horse to get out of the barn. And it's very,
23:13
Speaker 1: very difficult to put it back in the barn once
23:14
Speaker 1: it's escape. Because of all the reasons I've already stated
23:18
Speaker 1: regarding what happened with the Republican Convention and not closing
23:22
Speaker 1: off these escape patches. Now, the news media has done
23:26
Speaker 1: a typically very bad job of getting to the bottom
23:29
Speaker 1: of what really happened with regard to the Biden dropout
23:32
Speaker 1: which set up this entire situation to begin with. The
23:36
Speaker 1: real drama here has clearly been with Nancy Pelosi. It
23:40
Speaker 1: has been hilarious, and we played a few clips on
23:43
Speaker 1: this podcast related to this. It has been hilarious to
23:47
Speaker 1: watch Pelosi do these interviews and try to dance around
23:51
Speaker 1: these questions of what her role was in forcing Biden
23:55
Speaker 1: to drop out. She has convicted herself many times. She
23:59
Speaker 1: has dodged many of these questions. A lot of the
24:02
Speaker 1: things that she says doesn't make any damn sense. And
24:05
Speaker 1: there's a new report out over the last few days.
24:07
Speaker 1: This is how it was reported in the New York Post,
24:10
Speaker 1: although the Post was not the source of the original
24:13
Speaker 1: report that it really was Nancy Pelosi, just as Joe
24:17
Speaker 1: Biden implied in his one interview that he's done since
24:21
Speaker 1: withdrawing from the race where he name dropped Nancy Pelosi
24:25
Speaker 1: in what I found to be a very significant way.
24:28
Speaker 1: But here's what the New York Post wrote about the
24:29
Speaker 1: most recent developments. Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi had threatened
24:33
Speaker 1: to publicly trash President Biden if he didn't end his
24:38
Speaker 1: re election bid, forcing the then ailing commander in chief
24:42
Speaker 1: into a quote unquote come to Jesus' decision to finally
24:47
Speaker 1: call it quits, according to a new report about the
24:50
Speaker 1: final moments of his campaign. Now, when I saw the
24:53
Speaker 1: come to Jesus moment, I thought, well, that's kind of weird. Odd.
24:58
Speaker 1: I wonder if that was used on because, as you
25:01
Speaker 1: may remember, Biden told George Stephanopolis unequivocally that it would
25:08
Speaker 1: take the Lord Almighty to tell him to drop out
25:11
Speaker 1: for him to do so. And my number one question
25:14
Speaker 1: I have many in the aftermath of the withdrawal was okay,
25:19
Speaker 1: so did the Lord Almighty make their voice heard to you?
25:24
Speaker 1: Did the Lord Almighty tell you to drop out? Or
25:27
Speaker 1: is his Nancy Pelosi actually the Lord Almighty when it
25:31
Speaker 1: comes to democratic politics. So to come to Jesus phrasing
25:35
Speaker 1: was quite interesting. Back to the article, Pelosi sent an
25:39
Speaker 1: urgent message to the eighty one year old president last
25:43
Speaker 1: month while he was still nursing his COVID nineteen infection
25:46
Speaker 1: at his Delaware beach house. Insiders told The Daily Mail
25:52
Speaker 1: Pelosi reportedly threatened to publicly trash her longtime friend and
25:56
Speaker 1: political ally if he continued to ignore thunderous to drop
26:00
Speaker 1: out of the twenty twenty four the election over fears
26:04
Speaker 1: for his cognitive abilities. Four sources close to the campaign
26:10
Speaker 1: told the outlet Pelosi threatened to go public whether her
26:13
Speaker 1: believed that her fellow Democrat wouldn't beat the Republican nominee,
26:17
Speaker 1: former President Donald Trump in a rematch, and threatened to
26:20
Speaker 1: release humiliating pulling data to back it up. The sources
26:24
Speaker 1: alleged the demand was reportedly forceful enough for Biden to
26:28
Speaker 1: experience it quote unquote come to Jesus moment where he
26:32
Speaker 1: and his step began drafting the letter that ended his
26:34
Speaker 1: twenty twenty four political campaign, which was released on July
26:38
Speaker 1: twenty first. Now, again, I don't know one hundred percent
26:43
Speaker 1: how accurate that is. It's the Daily Mail, though they
26:45
Speaker 1: claim to have four sources. It does seem to make
26:48
Speaker 1: some sense, but there's been no price to be paid
26:52
Speaker 1: for that. I mean, it's amazing that Democrats have gotten
26:55
Speaker 1: away with this, that Kamala Harris gets to unscaled be
27:01
Speaker 1: hand the denomination without anybody even saying, well, wait a minute,
27:05
Speaker 1: wasn't she part of the coup? I mean, if Wreen
27:07
Speaker 1: doubt is saying a coup is still a coup, then
27:12
Speaker 1: wasn't Harris part of the coup? She's the one that
27:15
Speaker 1: benefited by far more than anybody else, and Trump and
27:21
Speaker 1: the Republican Party in the news media have done very
27:24
Speaker 1: little at all to force Harris to at least bear
27:28
Speaker 1: that burden. I mean, that's that's the part that drives
27:32
Speaker 1: me crazy. Make them pick a lane. You can't have
27:36
Speaker 1: it both ways, and yet Democrats have been somehow been
27:40
Speaker 1: able to have it both ways when it comes to
27:43
Speaker 1: the Biden coup. By the way, somewhat related to the
27:47
Speaker 1: Biden coup, Chuck Todd, who's normally an idiot, actually made
27:52
Speaker 1: a pretty good point on NBC's Meet the Press, I
27:55
Speaker 1: believe it was on NBC's Meet the Press, where he
27:57
Speaker 1: used to be the host this weekend, where he said,
28:01
Speaker 1: you know, part of why the Biden withdraw has thrown
28:06
Speaker 1: Trump for such a loop is that psychologically it means
28:11
Speaker 1: that Trump can never avenge his twenty twenty loss, and
28:18
Speaker 1: I hadn't really thought about it. It's one of those
28:19
Speaker 1: most very obvious things that you go, oh, okay, actually,
28:23
Speaker 1: when you put that through the Trump prism, that makes
28:28
Speaker 1: some sense. Now. I would counter that by saying, Trump
28:32
Speaker 1: probably thinks he just did avenge. By the way, somebody
28:36
Speaker 1: ought to tell him this. If I was close to Trump,
28:39
Speaker 1: I would say, but, mister president, sir, because he loves
28:43
Speaker 1: being called sir, sir, you did avenge the twenty twenty
28:46
Speaker 1: election because you forced Joe Biden out of the race
28:50
Speaker 1: through that debate. So you did win. You avenged the
28:53
Speaker 1: twenty twenty loss that you claim you didn't actually lose.
28:56
Speaker 1: But apparently you know. That message has not been given
29:01
Speaker 1: to Donald Trump, And according to Chuck Todd, he's been
29:04
Speaker 1: hearing people saying that this has been mentally debilitating to
29:08
Speaker 1: Trump because not only does he have a new opponent
29:11
Speaker 1: and you know, like a boxer, you're preparing for a
29:15
Speaker 1: right hander and then all of a sudden, you get
29:16
Speaker 1: a south paw and who's a lot younger, and you're
29:19
Speaker 1: not prepared for it. But also from the standpoint psychologically
29:24
Speaker 1: that Trump really wanted to beat Biden to show that
29:28
Speaker 1: the twenty twenty election was in fact a fraud, and
29:31
Speaker 1: now he can never do that, And so I do
29:34
Speaker 1: think that psychologically there could be some impact there when
29:37
Speaker 1: it comes to the way that Trump is handling this
29:40
Speaker 1: situation and why he has been rather slow to pivot,
29:44
Speaker 1: even to the point publicly on multiple occasions theorizing de
29:50
Speaker 1: lougionally that Joe Biden will actually try to get the
29:54
Speaker 1: nomination back at the GEO the Democratic Convention, which was ever, ever, ever, ever,
30:01
Speaker 1: ever gonna happen, even if Harris didn't suddenly surge in
30:06
Speaker 1: the polls and take the lead. I mean, Democrats are
30:09
Speaker 1: thrilled with this whole thing, and so there's a zero
30:12
Speaker 1: chance even if Biden had the inclination that he could
30:16
Speaker 1: even get out of the batter's box and getting denomination back,
30:19
Speaker 1: even though all those delegates had originally been pledged to him.
30:24
Speaker 1: So that's the situation with regard to the political element
30:27
Speaker 1: of the convention and the story that no one else
30:30
Speaker 1: is going to tell you, By the way, I doubt
30:32
Speaker 1: even the right wing media is going to tell you
30:34
Speaker 1: the story that I just did with regard to what
30:36
Speaker 1: this convention should be about. If the Democratic party really
30:41
Speaker 1: was the Party of Democracy. There are other stories revolving
30:45
Speaker 1: around the Democratic Convention, including the issue of protests and
30:49
Speaker 1: demonstrations by the pro Hamas crowd the anti Israel crowd.
30:55
Speaker 1: As of this taping, I am skeptical that this is
30:59
Speaker 1: going to be as big a deal or as negative
31:02
Speaker 1: and influence over this convention as a lot of Republicans are,
31:07
Speaker 1: I think being too hopeful about based upon what I've
31:10
Speaker 1: seen online. This is just a gut instinct. I could
31:13
Speaker 1: be totally wrong about this, but I've seen it happen
31:15
Speaker 1: many times before, where you see a story or a
31:18
Speaker 1: potential problem emerging and Republicans get too hopeful that, Aha,
31:23
Speaker 1: this is going to get the popcorn out, this is
31:25
Speaker 1: gonna be great. We're gonna see all this infighting and
31:28
Speaker 1: Democrats are going to look like creating people and they're
31:31
Speaker 1: not going to know how to handle this, and we're
31:33
Speaker 1: gonna see the campus protests all over again. My guess
31:36
Speaker 1: is we'll probably see something like that. But whenever Republicans
31:41
Speaker 1: get prematurely hopeful, I automatically think, Okay, this isn't going
31:45
Speaker 1: to pan out the way that they they think that
31:47
Speaker 1: it will. But again, I'm no expert on this issue
31:50
Speaker 1: as to how prepared Chicago is, how how determined the
31:55
Speaker 1: pro Hamas anti Israel crowd is to cause trouble. Anything's possible.
32:01
Speaker 1: But here's what I do know. The news media is
32:04
Speaker 1: going to be very, very very hesitant to create a
32:10
Speaker 1: lot of attention and focus on these protests demonstrations, and
32:14
Speaker 1: if they turn into riots, this is not going to
32:17
Speaker 1: be a major theme of the Democratic Convention if the
32:20
Speaker 1: news media can help it at all. You know, there
32:23
Speaker 1: are a lot of people who understandably are making connection
32:27
Speaker 1: to what happened to the nineteen sixty eight Democratic Convention
32:31
Speaker 1: in Chicago, which really was a complete cluster fark. I
32:36
Speaker 1: was just watching a CNN documentary about it the other day,
32:39
Speaker 1: and what was interesting from a media perspective about that
32:42
Speaker 1: is that the news media and I only did nothing
32:45
Speaker 1: to diminish the impact of those protests. It seems like
32:50
Speaker 1: the news media went out of its way to pour
32:52
Speaker 1: gasoline on that story. I mean, Dan Rather, who's a
32:58
Speaker 1: complete total liberal Democrat, was forcing himself into physical confrontations
33:04
Speaker 1: on the floor of the convention at least partially related
33:08
Speaker 1: to all this. The media embraced it because they did
33:11
Speaker 1: not see themselves in nineteen sixty eight, even though they
33:14
Speaker 1: were made up of liberals, mostly, they did not see
33:17
Speaker 1: themselves as the campaign managers for the Democratic Party. They
33:22
Speaker 1: did not see everything through the prism of Okay, is
33:25
Speaker 1: this going to be good or bad for the Democrats
33:28
Speaker 1: in their efforts to de beat Donald Trump and the Republicans.
33:32
Speaker 1: But that's how they're going to view whatever happens when
33:34
Speaker 1: it comes to protests or demonstrations or potential riots surrounding
33:39
Speaker 1: this Democratic Convention. They know that's not good. So they're
33:43
Speaker 1: going to do everything they can to diminish, to mute,
33:46
Speaker 1: to ignore, and they're not going to do anything to
33:48
Speaker 1: pour gasoline on that fire. So I am very skeptical
33:53
Speaker 1: that that is going to become nearly as big a
33:55
Speaker 1: deal as a lot of Republicans are hoping that it
33:58
Speaker 1: will during this Democratic Convention. In a related issue, I've
34:03
Speaker 1: got to talk about what happened with regard to Senator
34:06
Speaker 1: John Fetterman from Pennsylvania and his communications director. Now, this
34:12
Speaker 1: is interesting on a couple of different levels. It's also
34:14
Speaker 1: just frankly hilarious. But you know, Fetterman has been by
34:18
Speaker 1: far one of the strongest pro Israel voices in the
34:23
Speaker 1: Democratic Party since the war broke out, and to a
34:27
Speaker 1: lot of conservatives, Fetterman has been basically turned into to
34:33
Speaker 1: a borderline conservative, certainly on the issue of Israel. And
34:38
Speaker 1: you know, Fetterman did an interview related to this on
34:43
Speaker 1: the on the eve of the Democratic Convention, and then
34:46
Speaker 1: something absolutely extraordinary happened. Fetterman communication director, a woman by
34:52
Speaker 1: the name of Kerrie Adams, actually told the reporter, told
34:58
Speaker 1: the reporter with whom Fetterman had just done an interview
35:04
Speaker 1: that she does not agree with Fetterman on Israel. Now,
35:11
Speaker 1: for those that don't understand the political process, aren't familiar
35:14
Speaker 1: with this type of situation, I mean, this is this
35:16
Speaker 1: is as verboten as it gets. This is this is
35:21
Speaker 1: like showing up to work without your pants on it.
35:23
Speaker 1: I mean, this is unprecedented. Then an active communication director
35:29
Speaker 1: would proactively contradict their boss to a member of the
35:36
Speaker 1: news media. And the reasons why this happened I find
35:40
Speaker 1: to be very telling. I think I have to do
35:43
Speaker 1: a lot with the differences in the generations and specifically
35:47
Speaker 1: just how totally incompetent and lacking in any institutional memory
35:53
Speaker 1: generation Z is when it comes to politics and media
35:57
Speaker 1: and just frankly, the normal way of doing things. But
36:01
Speaker 1: here's the story. Quote, I don't agree with him unquote
36:06
Speaker 1: about Israel and Gaza. Carrie Adams, Fetterman's communication director, pulled
36:11
Speaker 1: me in a phone call after my interview with the
36:14
Speaker 1: senator ended. Quote. This is again from Fetnerman's communication director.
36:20
Speaker 1: I have a sense that his international views are a
36:24
Speaker 1: lot less nuanced than my generation, because when he was
36:31
Speaker 1: growing up it was might makes right. And for my
36:37
Speaker 1: generation and younger, who of course are the ones protesting this,
36:43
Speaker 1: they have a much more nuanced view of the region.
36:49
Speaker 1: Adams added, by the way, it's import important to point
36:52
Speaker 1: out Fetterman is I think fifty five years old. He's
36:55
Speaker 1: actually younger than Kamala Harris's case, you know, an elder
37:02
Speaker 1: statesman here or you know, should be mummified. This was
37:08
Speaker 1: the reporter then added after that quote, I've been a
37:11
Speaker 1: reporter since the summer of nineteen ninety eight, when I
37:16
Speaker 1: covered Bill Clinton's trip to Martha's Vineyard for the Vineyard Gazette.
37:22
Speaker 1: This was the first time I'd ever encountered anyone on
37:28
Speaker 1: Capitol Hill or anywhere else on the record, off the record,
37:33
Speaker 1: on background whatever criticizing quote the principle meaning their boss.
37:41
Speaker 1: I mean, this is astonishing. And as if this taping,
37:45
Speaker 1: you know, Carrie Adams is apparently still employed by Veterman's office.
37:50
Speaker 1: I will not be surprised if she's not by the
37:53
Speaker 1: time you hear this or by the time we do
37:55
Speaker 1: the next episode of the podcast, although you know that'll
37:58
Speaker 1: be interesting. What is Fetterman do in this situation? I
38:02
Speaker 1: mean this carry Adams has only been employed with him
38:06
Speaker 1: for a few months. I mean, imagine the audacity. I
38:10
Speaker 1: think that's really the most There's two parts of this
38:12
Speaker 1: story that are important. One that's how strong the anti
38:17
Speaker 1: Israel belief system is within democratic circles. That even John
38:26
Speaker 1: Fetterman's communication director could feel so strongly about this as
38:32
Speaker 1: to publicly disagree with him about Israel and Gaza. That
38:38
Speaker 1: doesn't happen in a vacuum. That does not happen unless
38:41
Speaker 1: this is real. By the way, kind of makes me
38:44
Speaker 1: wonder whether I'm right about the level of protests and
38:48
Speaker 1: demonstrations at the convention, because again, this is unless it's
38:53
Speaker 1: a complete fluke, how does this get to this level.
38:57
Speaker 1: There's got to be a very very strong anti Israel
39:01
Speaker 1: belief within the Democratic Party for this to ever happen. Now.
39:06
Speaker 1: The only caveat to that is we're living in a
39:08
Speaker 1: brand new world when it comes to Generation Z. And
39:11
Speaker 1: that's the second part of the story that I think
39:13
Speaker 1: is significant, maybe it is the most significant part of
39:16
Speaker 1: the story, because we've been hearing all sorts of horror
39:19
Speaker 1: stories about how Gen Generation Z just doesn't get it,
39:23
Speaker 1: that they are completely out of the loop, they're completely clueless,
39:27
Speaker 1: they're completely self absorbed, that they have no concept of
39:32
Speaker 1: the way things are supposed to work. And this is
39:35
Speaker 1: the you know, the participation trophy generation. This is a
39:39
Speaker 1: generation that's been brought up on social media. They completely
39:43
Speaker 1: I truly do believe in this. I realized, I'm fifty
39:46
Speaker 1: seven years old, and you know, I'm an old man
39:49
Speaker 1: yelling at clouds. I get that. But I truly do
39:53
Speaker 1: believe that Generation Z is fundamentally different than any other
39:56
Speaker 1: generation in American history because they've been brought up deletely differently.
40:01
Speaker 1: And this is potentially seemingly an example of what happens
40:07
Speaker 1: when it comes to Generation Z. That this person has
40:11
Speaker 1: the audacity to contradict their boss to a reporter and
40:16
Speaker 1: seemingly you know, it's hard to tell from the print,
40:19
Speaker 1: but seemingly didn't even understand what they were doing, the
40:22
Speaker 1: significance of what they were doing, or how inappropriate what
40:26
Speaker 1: they were doing was. And so I found that to
40:30
Speaker 1: be an amazing story and really very telling about one
40:35
Speaker 1: generation Z and two just how prevalent the anti Israel
40:39
Speaker 1: sentiment is within the very highest orders of the Democratic Party.
40:46
Speaker 1: There are other elements of what's happening at the Democratic
40:49
Speaker 1: Convention that if the news media was doing their job,
40:52
Speaker 1: would be highlighted and would maybe potentially have an impact
40:57
Speaker 1: on moderate voters who would be a fan what's been
41:01
Speaker 1: going on. Two of these stories that of course will
41:04
Speaker 1: be muted by the mainstream news media acting as the
41:07
Speaker 1: Democratic Party's campaign managers are as follows. One deals with
41:12
Speaker 1: the issue of diversity or inclusivity or my mind, segregation
41:18
Speaker 1: and reverse racism. Here is the schedule for the first
41:23
Speaker 1: day of the convention when it comes to caucus meetings.
41:28
Speaker 1: This is amazing and this has gotten some play online,
41:32
Speaker 1: but it's almost exclusively within right wing circles. This shows
41:37
Speaker 1: you what the Democratic Party is really all about. From
41:40
Speaker 1: nine thirty to eleven thirty am, they have the black
41:43
Speaker 1: Caucus meeting, and simultaneously to that there's the Hispanic Caucus meeting,
41:51
Speaker 1: and then there's the AAPI Caucus meeting, and also the
41:56
Speaker 1: Native American Caucus meeting and the Ethnic Council meeting. This
42:03
Speaker 1: is the DNA of the Democratic Party. It is literally
42:07
Speaker 1: in their DNA. Now DEI diversity, Equity and inclusion, Diversity
42:15
Speaker 1: over everything. Segregation is good. You notice, of course there
42:19
Speaker 1: was no white people caucus there. That would never happen,
42:23
Speaker 1: especially at a Democratic convention. I mean, this is inherently discriminatory,
42:28
Speaker 1: but it's an indication of who the Democratic Party really is,
42:32
Speaker 1: and that, to me is maybe the only hope for
42:35
Speaker 1: Trump to regain a footing here is if Democrats so
42:40
Speaker 1: overplay their hand with this convention that it actually turns
42:43
Speaker 1: people off. But of course people have to be exposed
42:47
Speaker 1: to the truth, they have to understand what's actually happening,
42:50
Speaker 1: and the news media is not going to focus on
42:53
Speaker 1: things that they know are not going to be positive
42:56
Speaker 1: for the Democratic Party. So you're not going to hear
42:58
Speaker 1: about just how seated and Frank Brace's elements of this
43:02
Speaker 1: Democratic Convention aren't. You're also probably not going to hear
43:05
Speaker 1: very much about the free abortions and vasectomies that are
43:10
Speaker 1: being given out, and not making this up. Folks, this
43:13
Speaker 1: sounds like a fake story, but it's real, the free
43:15
Speaker 1: abortions and vasectomies that are being given out to people
43:20
Speaker 1: attending the Democratic Convention, and that the response has been
43:25
Speaker 1: so dramatic that there's a waiting list, a waiting list
43:30
Speaker 1: for free abortions and vasectomies at the Democratic Convention. Now,
43:35
Speaker 1: of course, a lot of conservatives online have understandably been commenting, well,
43:40
Speaker 1: maybe we just let them do what they want to
43:41
Speaker 1: do here, because in the long run that's not going
43:44
Speaker 1: to bode very well for the Democratic Party and their demographics.
43:48
Speaker 1: That's something I've talked about previously. It might be the
43:50
Speaker 1: one hope for America is that it does appear as
43:54
Speaker 1: if conservatives reproduce much more proficiently than Democrats do. This
44:00
Speaker 1: is another indication of that. But we may not have
44:03
Speaker 1: enough time to get there. We may not have enough
44:05
Speaker 1: time for that to kick in, partially because Kamala Harris
44:10
Speaker 1: at the end of last week basically admitted acknowledged, although
44:15
Speaker 1: not in words but in proposals, that she's effectively a communist.
44:21
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to today's free drop of the abbreviated show.
44:24
Speaker 1: If you're interested in listening to the entire show, you
44:28
Speaker 1: must become a patron. Please go to Patreon. That's p
44:32
Speaker 1: A T R e O N dot com. Patreon dot
44:36
Speaker 1: com slash the Death of Journalism with John Ziggler. My
44:43
Speaker 1: name is j hn z I E G L e R.
44:47
Speaker 1: That's patreon dot com. Slash the Death of Journalism with
44:53
Speaker 1: John Zigler. Good luck to you on that. But that's
44:57
Speaker 1: how you can subscribe