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Transcript

Full Episode - New Polling Portends A Midterm Wipeout + How To Navigate The Medicare Maze · The Chuck ToddCast

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: This episode of the Chuck Todd cast is brought to
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: you by Chapter. Now, almost everything you hear about Medicare
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: is somebody quietly trying to steer you somewhere. And you're
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: skeptical of that, as you should be. I get it.
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: I mean, there's a federal lawsuit going on right now
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: over exactly this. Companies that branded themselves as unbiased while
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: allegedly pointing people toward whatever would pay them the most
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: as some sort of broker. So if your default is
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: to distrust everyone in this space, honestly, I get it.
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: I'm a bit distrustful these days myself. That's the whole
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: reason I want to tell you about Chapter. They're independent
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: Medicare advisors whose entire model is that their advisors are
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: not paid to push any one plan. They're just trying
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: to help. Yes, there's compensation that goes with it. but
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: it's across the board is what they're trying to do.
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: At the end of the day, they're advocating for you.
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: They're not the insurance companies themselves. They're an actual person
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: who actually goes through your doctors, your prescriptions, your needs,
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: and then compares them to every single plan available to
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: find the best one that will work for you and
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: hopefully save you a couple dollars too. And here's the
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: part that sets chapter apart. They don't disappear once you've
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: been in They will keep advocating for you. They're kind
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: of like almost like a concierge service. You're just there.
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: I need help. You're like customer service. You know, the plan,
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: you know, help me navigate this again. So you ever
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: get hit with a wrongful medical bill, they'll help you
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: fight it. They want to stay an advocate for you
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: even after you've done this. So look, I get it.
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: I think there's all sorts of space. You see a
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: lot of people are throwing themselves in this healthcare space.
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: What I like about these chapter folks, I've spent time
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: with them. This is a very transparent organization. It is
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: Medicare and all of its affiliated stuff can be very confusing.
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: The whole point of this is to make this easier
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: and less confusing. OK, so look, take the skepticism you
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: already have in all of this, point it at your
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: own plan for 20 minutes. It's free. There's no pressure.
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: And then call chapter today at 980-734-4200. Hello there and
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: welcome to the Wednesday episode of the Chuck Todd cast.
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: You just got the Super Tuesday with Chris Eliza. And
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: I am enjoying this rhythm now, and especially with the
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: midterms coming up. You know, the second we hit publish
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: on our Super Tuesday episode. We got a little interesting
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: nugget out of Gavin Newsom and things like that. So
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: having the ability to update and sort of continue this,
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: what I look at it as a long running conversation
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: I'm having with you folks. And you're checking in with me.
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: I'm hopefully checking in with you. And hopefully I'm talking
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: about the issues that you're curious about, like you read something.
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: What does that mean? And hopefully I'm on that mark.
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: And of course, if I'm not, Uh, I hope you
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: write in and tell me, um, where I'm missing the mark, but, um,
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: we are thrilled here at the world headquarters of the
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: Czech podcast, uh, at our growing, um, listener base, subscriber base,
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: watching me. I say it's listeners, it's viewers, it's all
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: of these things. Um, and on socials are the amazing
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: audience we're building and I've gotten on Facebook. So I just, uh,
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: as always, I am grateful.
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: I appreciate it.
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: Um, I'm well aware that in some ways these are
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: very personal decisions. And these can be, you know, as
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: much as I think I'm talking to hundreds of thousands
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: and millions of people at the same time. These are
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: very intimate one-on-one relationships. And who you choose to listen
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: to on your AirPods or your headphones is you got
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: a wide variety of places to go. So I appreciate
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: you spending a few minutes with me. So hello and
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: thank you. Look, it's a Wednesday episode. I got an
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: interview coming up about sort of how Medicare works. I'll
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: tell you more about that down the road, but it's
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: more of almost an informational type interview that I think
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: if you are a listener of a certain age or
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: have parents of a certain age, you're going to learn
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: a lot from this. So I do definitely want you
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: to hang on that. I got my top five list.
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: I'm going to touch on presidential politics and including the
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: interesting declaration that Gavin Newsom made, uh, as he was
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: fly fishing with my friend, Jake Tapper. Um, and, uh,
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: when he said that he would not run for president,
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: if Kamala Harris ran for president, I want to get,
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: I want to, I want to talk more about that. Um,
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: but I'll do so when we get to my top
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: five list, because I'm going to put somebody in the
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: front runner position that nobody else has. Uh, and I'll
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: explain my rationale when I get there, you'll just have
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: to wait.
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  Speaker 3: Right.
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: Um, But hey, the beauty of these top five lists,
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: when you do them, is you can update them. But
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: I will let you know where I think things stand now.
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: And of course, I'll take your questions. But look, I'm
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: going to spend a lion's share of my time on
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: essentially the three biggest issues that are dominating American politics
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: at the moment, right? The war in Iran and its
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: terrible economic consequences that we're all facing at the moment.
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: The midterm elections and an increase at a very important
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: New York Times-Siena poll that is the best national poll
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: we've gotten post-Labor Day yet. And so I'm going to
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: spend a lot of time with it because I know
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: how much work Nate Cohn, who's the director of this poll,
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: has put in. As I've said before about the New
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: York Times-Siena surveys, these are as much about using the
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: current feelings of this electorate and making sure they're forecasted
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: towards a what is a realistic electorate going into November.
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: And the electorate that they paint so far is one
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  Speaker 1: that is borderline blue tsunami. And I'm going to get
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: to that in a few minutes. But look, I want
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: to begin just simply with how out of touch President
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: Trump is at the moment and his constant obsession over
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: everything that isn't impacting everyday Americans, right? He's dismissive of
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  Speaker 1: all the concerns about AI and say, just trust me. Well,
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: for a man who has done nothing but so distrust
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  Speaker 1: in just about every institution he's ever laid his hands on,
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  Speaker 1: the idea that now anybody is going to trust him,
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  Speaker 1: I think is a joke. This is the ultimate Chicken
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  Speaker 1: Little of American politics, right? He has said so many
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: times what not to trust, what sky is falling, et cetera,
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: et cetera, that now when he's begging people to trust him,
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: everybody's going, really, you? We're going to trust something you
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  Speaker 1: have to say? You have never said a truthful statement
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: when talking about anybody other than... other than an aside
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: every once in a while. I guess he does accidentally
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: tell you the truth when he doesn't mean to at times.
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: But I want to begin with something that we're kind
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: of treating as a shrug and we really shouldn't. The
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: blatant politicization of the FBI and the Department of Justice.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, Todd Blanche, the confirmed attorney general, The United
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  Speaker 1: States Senate, in all of its supposed wisdom, consented to
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: having the president's personal attorney, who apparently has no idea
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  Speaker 1: how separation of powers should work, play White House press
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  Speaker 1: secretary on Tuesday in the Rose Garden. The fact that
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: the White House asked him to do it is. is
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: an attempt to essentially delegitimize the Office of the Attorney General.
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: And the fact that the Attorney General agreed to do
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  Speaker 1: it is him participating in the delegitimization of the Office
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: of Attorney General. But I guess fortunately or unfortunately, it's
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: not news anymore that Trump has made the Office of
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: the Attorney General and the person that holds the job
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  Speaker 1: an illegitimate figure when it comes to the rule of law. Certainly,
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: he's a spokesperson. He certainly knows how to be the
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  Speaker 1: president's lawyer. But that was, it was an abomination that
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  Speaker 1: he even participated in it. And for somebody, I do
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  Speaker 1: think at some point in his legal career, he really
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  Speaker 1: did have high aspirations. It's clear he wanted to be
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: attorney general and probably had a idealistic view of what
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: the Department of Justice should be. And I'm guessing about 80%
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  Speaker 1: of the time he is allowing the rule of law
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  Speaker 1: to win the day in the Justice Department. But on
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: the 20% of stuff that Donald Trump is watching and
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  Speaker 1: cares about, he is absolutely harming this institution that is
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  Speaker 1: going to take a generation to fix, right? I mean,
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: the harm that has been done to the Pentagon, the
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: harm that is being done to the public's ability to
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  Speaker 1: trust anything out of the Department of Justice, and then
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  Speaker 1: that clown show. that is the guy who runs the FBI.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, where do you even begin? John Kennedy, Republican
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: Senator from Louisiana was like, explain this whole bestiality thing.
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  Speaker 1: The fact that bestiality and recruitment for the FBI are
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: even in the same sentence, man, we have way lost
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  Speaker 1: the plot. We have way lost the plot here, right?
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  Speaker 1: You put a clown in charge of the FBI, don't
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  Speaker 1: be surprised if he turns the whole thing into a circus, right?
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  Speaker 1: I know that that was the little softball tee up
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: that you can do. But Patel really is just, this
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  Speaker 1: whole thing is an embarrassment. And I have no doubt,
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  Speaker 1: FBI recruiting is probably quite difficult. If you take it
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  Speaker 1: very seriously and you want to be a G-man, and
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  Speaker 1: you want to do the right thing, you don't believe
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  Speaker 1: Kash Patel's FBI is on the up and up. It's
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: hard to believe that Kash Patel's FBI is on the FDA.
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  Speaker 1: But ask yourself if you've got to lower the standards
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  Speaker 1: of what's on somebody's background check you're probably not doing
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  Speaker 1: a good job recruiting future FBI agents. But here was
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  Speaker 1: the thing. We had Todd Blanch performing the duties of
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  Speaker 1: a White House press secretary as the confirmed head of
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  Speaker 1: the Department of Justice. And you had Kash Patel on
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  Speaker 1: Capitol Hill just making an utter fool of himself. Frankly, look,
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: I'm not going to sit here and say I love,
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  Speaker 1: you know, I don't think the Democrats who are understandably outraged.
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  Speaker 1: And I think there are plenty of Republicans who are
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  Speaker 1: embarrassed by Patel. John Kennedy strikes me as he's a
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: bit embarrassed about this Patel. You don't feel like you
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: have to defend every dumb ass decision that Trump has
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: made in the personnel department, right? But this is just
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  Speaker 1: another day in Trump's Washington. We've just burned down the
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  Speaker 1: credibility of the Department of Justice. So it's already burned down.
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  Speaker 1: So sure, let them play press secretary in the Rose Garden.
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: And again, I don't know, what are we supposed to do?
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  Speaker 1: All the hand wringers, all those Senate Republicans who knew better,
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: didn't have the guts to stand up. when it was
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: time not to confirm a clearly unqualified person to the
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: Department of Defense. And they didn't have the guts to
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: stand up when it was clearly time. I mean, essentially,
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: Susan Collins voted against Blanche because her vote wasn't needed.
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: Everybody else went along for this ride. And, you know, look,
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: this is not about Blanche. I do think him, the individual, look,
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: he's clearly weak.
• 12:03
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: Because if you can't stand up to Donald Trump, I
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: just find you weak. Right. If you don't have the
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: ability to do it, you know, because you care more
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: about your job title or you care more about your access,
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: you know, you're you're screaming weakness.
• 12:23
  Speaker 3: Right.
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  Speaker 1: It's just incredibly weak and it's just such a disappointment.
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: And it's you just sit there and you're just like,
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: how did we get here? What happens when we have
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: a real, I mean, we already feel like the FBI
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: doesn't know what it's doing when Patel is calling the shots.
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: We've had embarrassing situations, whether it's what happened to my
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: friend's mother or the shooting of Charlie Kirk, Patel's behavior
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: and decision-making has been questionable at best. And that's just
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: the high profile stuff. We don't know what we don't
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: know here. And then what's truly offensive is that he's
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: decided to go up there and treat this like this
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: is some sort of social media show. And look, I'm
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: not saying the senators aren't being performative themselves, and I
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: wish they weren't. I want the dry type of questioning.
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: In order to make the clown be the clown, don't
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: try to out-entertain the clown. That would be my advice
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: to Cory Booker and others who I think I get it.
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: There are times I watch this Blanche and Patel shit show,
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: and I want to punch a hole in drywall. But
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: all I'm going to do is add more work to myself,
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: and apparently nothing's going to happen here.
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: But we'll see.
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: Maybe these guys, when they realize their budgets are controlled
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: by the other party, maybe they'll behave differently. I don't know.
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: But I start with that. It's just the whole thing.
• 14:02
  Speaker 2: And then.
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: Imagine you're a Republican running in this tough political environment.
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: Diesel has hit another record. Every day we're hitting a
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: new record of diesel fuel in this country. Saudi Arabia
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: is basically paralyzed from being able to ship out any,
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: participate at all right now in the energy markets for
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: the next couple of weeks. All that is doing is
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: driving up anxiety on Wall Street, driving up anxiety in
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: the energy markets, driving up anxiety on the roads. Right.
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: And what's Donald Trump focused on on Tuesday afternoon? He's
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: outraged that he can't put his name on the Kennedy Center.
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: That's essentially what he's he's throwing a hissy fit that
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: the government has decided not to allow this president to
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: put his name on somebody else's tombstone. I mean, how
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: sad and pathetic is it that he is dying? And
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: I apologize for using that word, that he's consumed with
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: putting his name on somebody else's memorial. Washington is a
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: town full of memorials. We have the Lincoln Memorial. That
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: is our memorial to Abraham Lincoln. We have the Washington Monument,
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: our memorial to George Washington. We have the FDR Memorial.
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: We have an MLK Memorial. And yes, we have a
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: John F. Kennedy Senator for the Performing Arts, which is
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: Washington's memorial to that dead president. I mean, is Donald
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: Trump going to start? I guess at this point, he's
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: going to try to figure out how to put his
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: name on the Lincoln Memorial, his name on the Jefferson Memorial,
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: on the Washington Monument. And maybe we should be thankful
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: he's only trying to put his name on one of
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: the memorials here in Washington. I notice he isn't bothering
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: to put his name on the Vietnam Memorial. And I
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: know that's for the Vietnam dead, but of course, he
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: did everything he could to avoid serving his country. At
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: some point, he'll remember which foot had the bone spur.
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: But I say all this because if Donald Trump is
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: the only answer left for Republicans to try to salvage
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: the midterms, right? That was the point of the midterm
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: convention last week. That is the point of all this
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: money that's been dropped in a lot of these races.
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: He's doing a terrible job helping his fellow Republicans with messaging.
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: Instead of worrying about the cost of the Iran war,
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: instead of worrying about how the Iran war is going sideways,
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: instead of worrying about how the financial costs that are
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: hitting everyday Americans, instead of worrying about the anxiety people
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: have about AI. He's basically given double shooters to everybody
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: on this. And instead, what is he consumed with? Putting
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: his name on somebody else's dead president's memorial. That's what
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: he's consumed with less than 50 days to go before
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: the midterms, where his party is on the precipice of
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: losing control of both the House and the Senate. That's
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: how much he cares about the Republican Party. It's amazing
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: to me that Republican officeholders stay loyal to him when
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: the last thing he is, is loyal to the Republican Party.
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: He is not loyal at all to the party. So
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: he couldn't be more off message. And then Democrats got
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: handed an interesting little, I don't know, call it a
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: helping hand or something from I guess somebody who's becoming
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: a reliable ally to the Democratic, at least, campaign to
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: defeat the Republican majority, and that's Thomas Massey. And he
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: may be bitter at Trump, and he may be bitter
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: about a lot of things, but he introduced, which is
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: a special privilege that any member of Congress can do,
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: he introduced articles of impeachment against the Defense Secretary, Pete Hegseth.
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: This is the type of headline that will make it
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: all over the country. This will break through a little bit.
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: But what it really breaks through on is it brings
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: the Iran war front and center. And, you know, in
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: some ways, the reason we're in the, folks are feeling
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: economically so insecure is due to this war with Iran.
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: A Republican has introduced articles of impeachment on Pete Hexeth, right?
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: So it allows this to be, hey, even, a Republican
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: is unhappy with how this war is being conducted. And again,
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: you know, I was on CNN on Tuesday and this
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: is the point I made. And Scott Jennings was also
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: on the panel. And he said, well, let me tell
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: you about Thomas Massey. He's just bitter and all these things,
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: that stuff all may be true. That isn't going to
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: be in the, to be, that isn't going to be
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: in the coverage of this story. It may be like
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: the last paragraph of the coverage, but it ain't gonna
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: be in the headline, you know, It may be, you know,
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: Republican critic of Trump introduces articles of impeachment, but it
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: will still be Republican and Republican political crime here. And it,
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: I think, gets at what is the truly the softest spot.
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: What's going on here? You know, part of that same
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: conversation that we had is how Kristen Soltis Anderson, a
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: Republican pollster who I've had on this podcast. She goes, hey,
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: I'm getting a lot of 2006 vibes. And you've heard
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: me talk about how similar things are with 2006 and
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: that midterm cycle. Pretty much the only... distinction now between
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: 06 and 26 is that the Democratic Party slate of
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: candidates aren't all super sort of center left, right? Like
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: that round of recruiting had a lot of candidates that, quote,
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: fit the state. fit the district, right? This midterm election
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: has at least enough of the socialist wing of the
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: Democratic Party to at least give the Republicans an opportunity
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: to try to paint Democrats as out of the mainstream
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: and that, hey, if you put Democrats in charge, we've
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: seen the advertising already. If you put Democrats in charge,
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: then you're going to get the extreme wing of the
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: Democratic Party is going to be in charge. But in
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: a midterm election, you know, I go back to what
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: I said the other day. Look, If one side is
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: making the case for status quo because the other person
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: is going to bring too much change, trust me, the
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: voter who's unhappy with the status quo is going to
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: roll the dice on change. And if any political party
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: should know that about its voters, it's this version of
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: the Republican Party. The only reason Donald Trump got there twice,
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: let alone once, is because he was the only change
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: candidate both times that he ran for president. right? Clearly,
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: Clinton was status quo. He was the only change alternative
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: available on the ballot. 2024, Kamala Harris went out of
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: her way to run as status quo. She would refuse
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: to run away from Joe Biden, and she paid the
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: political price for that, and Donald Trump was the change candidate.
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: It's the same situation that we're here now. So I
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: just think any time there is a story that reminds
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: the public with less than 50 days to go that
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: this war is not done. And this war is the
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: reason why we've had this, why the markets are feeling shaky,
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: why the energy markets are in turmoil. And, you know,
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: we're probably going to, you know, after this podcast posts,
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: We're probably going to see an interest rate increase simply
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: because of what's happened already with inflation. And that is
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: now having to anticipate what is going to be even
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: a bigger inflation number, I'm guessing, that we're going to
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: see next month. And that one's going to come out
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: with just days to go before Election Day. So there
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: really isn't. A lot of good news out there. And
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: Donald Trump is intentionally not on message. He is way
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: off message, worrying more about relitigating the 2020 election with
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: his crankiness about the Supreme Court and putting his name
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: on somebody else's tombstone. He is not focused on lowering
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: costs for you. He is not focused on making America secure.
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: for you. And he's certainly not concerned about what AI
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: may do to you and your family. And that is
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: something that if I were a Republican running for office,
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: it's time to cut bait on Trump. I get it.
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: I know you want his voters, but I'm about to
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: show you a poll where his voters aren't engaged. And
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: if you're trying to appeal to independent voters, you better
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: cut Trump off sooner than you think. This episode of
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• 24:59
  Speaker 1: am a customer. Which brings me to what I think
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: was the most interesting development in the midterms today. And
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: that is the release of this, one of our few
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: good polls. Look, there is so few good polls these days.
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: And those that I know are working really hard to
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: get their weightings right, to get their sample correct. There's
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: only a handful of them. There's Bill McInturff and Jeff
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: Horwitz that get to do the NBC News poll a
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: couple times a year. Wish they got to do it more.
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: That's not my decision anymore, unfortunately. Actually, maybe it's fortunately.
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: And there's just not a ton of good national polling
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: out there. But this New York Times-Santa poll is quite good.
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: And there's a few things that I thought were interesting
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: because the likely voter electorate is where I'm going to
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: focus here for a minute. And look, the headline number
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: was that Democrats had an eight-point lead in the generic.
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: And it was actually a little bit north of eight points.
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: To me, the big story within there was the break
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: on independents. Democrats had a 23-point lead in the generic
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: ballot among independents. Just to give you some context about
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: the independent vote and the importance of it. Look, independents
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: are obviously a growing constituency. You've heard me rant and
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: rave about why American voters are choosing not to register
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: with either of the major parties. And so independent voters
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: really do decide these national elections. So in 2016, Trump
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: won independents by six points and he won the presidency. 2018,
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: Democrats won independence by 12 points and they won control
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: of the House. In 2022, Democrats actually won independence, but
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: by only two points. And because of the narrow trading range,
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: you had redistricting that seemed to favor Republicans. It was
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: a very small trading range. It wasn't enough independence for
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: Democrats to overcome what was already a built-in Republican advantage
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: in the map, and they won there. And while Harris
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: won independence by three points in the presidential, three points
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: is table stakes, right? Because the more people identify as Republican,
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: or at least in 24, more people identified as Republican,
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: as Democrat. So in order to be even on par,
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: they have to win independence by about two or three points.
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: And in order to win the presidency, they need to
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: win independence by somewhere closer to eight to 10. So
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: I'm just giving you those ranges there, 23 points. Now,
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: I look at the independent crosstab this way. The generic
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: Democrat is sitting at 57 and the Republican number's at 34,
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: everybody else undecided. Do I think this 23 point margin
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: will be what it is on election day? I don't.
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: The question though is, even if the Democrats, if this number,
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: if this 57% number is accurate, It means they will
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: have a larger share of independence this cycle than they
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: did in 2018 when they won 40 seats in the House.
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: And I don't think they're just going to win it
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: by 14. If they won 18 by 12, I think
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: this is going to be closer to 18, 19, or
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: 20 points. We're sitting at 23 here, and that's, you know,
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: this is why I think when you look at the
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: this huge canyon here that Republicans are dealing with among independents.
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: Cutting bait on Trump, if you're in a swing area,
• 28:55
  Speaker 1: either a swing district or a swing state, might be
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: better politics than you realize. Because when you go into
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: this poll, Republicans are behind on every issue but one. Ironically,
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: it was AI. They were sitting at a 42-40 advantage there.
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: Democrats led on every issue. They led on the economy.
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: They led on the war. They led on immigration. They
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: led on every single... Now, a Republican might argue, well,
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: this Times poll was weighted with a Democratic advantage. That
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: is correct. Each electorate is a unique and different electorate.
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: And what this New York Times poll is indicating Trump's
• 29:40
  Speaker 1: base is not turning out. And if Trump's base doesn't
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: turn out, Democrats are going to win and they're going
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: to win a lot of races. The electorate that the
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: New York Times is painting here with this likely electorate
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: Kamala Harris would have won the popular vote by about
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: three points. So that's right now this advantage, it's a
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: combination of more Democrats are enthusiastic about voting than Republicans.
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: More Democratic voters have already made a decision than Republicans.
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: Democrats are winning a huge share of independence and you
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: put all those things together and there's a chunk of
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: Republican voters that aren't showing up. And you put all
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: of that together And this is why The Times is
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: projecting right now an electorate that favors Democrats somewhere in
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: the eight-point range. And what does that mean? It means
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: 15 to 25 House seats, and it means four to
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: six Senate seats. We could have an individual quirky thing
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: here or there, but if that's the environment we're looking at, right?
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: D plus eight, that is how Sherrod Brown wins Ohio.
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: That is how Maine happens. That is how Alaska happens.
• 30:59
  Speaker 1: And it may be how Texas happens. May not be
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: enough for Iowa. I don't know if it's enough for Kansas,
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: but it starts to put you, and it may make
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: it where Mike Rogers can't win in Michigan. Abdul Al-Sayed
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: may underperform the Democratic vote, but if you've got a
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: a flood wall that is D plus eight in Michigan,
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: maybe it's D plus 10, well, that will provide enough
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: padding for Abdul El-Sayed to hang on. And then your numbers,
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: and that's how Democrats get to picking up five or
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: six Senate seats because they hold all that. And it's
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: in that environment that I'm skeptical that a John Sununu
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: can pull off an upset in New Hampshire. You know,
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: it's interesting. in the Senate battles, you know, the two
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: best Republican candidates are in the two hardest states that
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: Republicans are targeting for the Senate races, right? They kind
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: of have mediocre to below average candidates in Michigan and Georgia,
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: which were always their two best targets. And I would
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: say it's a big recruiting fail. You know, obviously they
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: were hoping for Brian Kemp, but are you telling me
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: that that there was nobody in between Brian Kemp and
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: this Mike Collins guy. And in Michigan, I think they'd
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: have been better off with John Jaynes as their Senate
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: nominee and trying to rerun Mike Rogers. And he's just,
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: you know, I don't, he's tried to reinvent himself a
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: couple of times. He was a non-Trump Republican, then he's
• 32:33
  Speaker 1: been sort of a fake Trump Republican. And I think
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: that that hasn't been, meanwhile, Republicans found two really good
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: candidates in Minnesota and New Hampshire, Michelle Tafoya, the former
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: ESPN broadcaster, and John Sununu in New Hampshire. Just a
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: tough year for a Republican to win in a lean
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: blue state. If this were 2022 and the political environment
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: of 2022, Tafoya and Sununu and those two, we'd be
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: talking about them as much as we talk about Ohio,
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: as much as we talk about Maine and Texas. But
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: there is a little irony here is that the Republicans
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: did a better job of recruiting their second tier targets,
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: but totally, frankly, shit the bed on Georgia, number one.
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: And I think they turned out to make the wrong
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: call with Rogers. We'll see. He has not run, you know,
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: there's been some criticism that Abdul El-Sayed hasn't tacked to
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: the center enough. Neither has Mike Rogers. He's not really
• 33:31
  Speaker 1: made a compelling case to win over supposedly these Haley
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: Stevens primary voters that he thinks he can win over.
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: So I just don't see it there. But this New
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: York Times poll, it sets the electorate what it is.
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: And it's a pretty good timing, right? So we got
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: the big ad spending, the Republican advantage on ad spending, right?
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: They have dropped that big bank roll on all of
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: these races this week. We've got this Times poll that
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: sort of sets the benchmark survey of where this election
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: stands right now in mid-September, which means in two weeks,
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: in three weeks, when we get another Times poll, when
• 34:17
  Speaker 1: we're able to compare apples to apples, we'll see, did
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: this ad campaign make any inroads? And I think the
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: ways to look at it, as I told you yesterday,
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: it's less about whether the Republican number improves. It's about
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: whether the Democratic number starts to come down. Right. I
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: think that that's the you know, that's pulling Democrats back
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: into undecided because ultimately that's you're not going to you're
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: probably not going to get full flip. But that's what
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: you'll know, whether this ad campaign that basically questions whether
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: are you sure you want to elect these folks? Right.
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: If that is having any impact at all. then you'll
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: start to see some shifts into undecided. So this is
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: why I love this poll and the timing of this poll,
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: because it does give us essentially a benchmark to take
• 35:06
  Speaker 1: a look at. But there's just not any good news
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: for Republicans in this Times poll. And again, for those
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: of you that have followed me a long time, I've
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: not been a huge fan of the Times polling in
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: the past, but what Nate Cohn is doing over there now,
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: what he's done with Sienna, where it's sort of one
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: part survey, one part making sure that he's got the
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: correct forecast coming so that he doesn't let his poll
• 35:32
  Speaker 1: get a little outlawry-y, like we see either with the
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: Harris poll on the Republican side or sometimes in Quinnipiac
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: on the Democratic side. So to have an eight-point lead
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: now for the Democrats, and I like the electorate that
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: looks like the way it does, this is smack in
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: the blue wave. And the only, and I tell you,
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: when you look in the crosstabs, the difference between blue
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: wave and blue tsunami for Democrats is gonna be turnout
• 36:05
  Speaker 1: among voters under 45. Because when you look at it, right,
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: voters over 45, this is kind of a 50-50 race.
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: Democrats narrowly lead among 65 plus, generic Republicans lead among
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: my age group, Gen X, that 45 to 64. It
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: is with millennials, double digit lead, and Gen Z even
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: bigger lead? That is the question mark, right? It's not about,
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: we know how those young voters are gonna vote. The
• 36:34
  Speaker 1: question is how many of them are showing up? What
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: is the turnout level? And the bigger the turnout is
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: among voters under 45, the closer to blue tsunami that
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: we're gonna get. If somehow, and this will be interesting
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: to see, if I were sitting, if I were in
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: the dirty tricks office of the Republican Party, I'd be
• 36:55
  Speaker 1: looking for ways to demoralize young voters and try to
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: get them not to be engaged. I don't know if
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: they're going to get there. I think that all of
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: the things that you might be able to disillusion younger
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: voters about trumps disillusion them more, right? And I think
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: that this feeling that, hey, we need a check. And
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: that's the most powerful message in politics in any given year.
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: but especially one where people feel like they can't trust
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: this current administration, 50% believe. Times asked various sort of
• 37:33
  Speaker 1: if this type of questions and if that type of questions,
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: let me read a couple of them to you here,
• 37:38
  Speaker 1: but essentially saying, what's more important to you, electing somebody
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: that will support Trump's agenda or electing somebody that will
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: provide a check on Trump and his agenda? And no
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: matter how they've asked that, It comes across advantage with no, no, no, no.
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: We need to put a check on the Republican Party.
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: And that is, I think, everything about this. This isn't
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: a hard closing message for Democrats to come up with.
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: It is an extraordinarily hard closing message for Republicans to
• 38:18
  Speaker 1: have to. And I don't know what they're going to
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: come up with other than Democrats are crazy. They're going
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: to end up letting the socialists in charge. They can
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: try it. It's basically the closing argument Democrats made against Trump,
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: the two times that they've lost to him. And it
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: didn't work. I go back to when voters want change,
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: they're not going to calibrate what kind of change that
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: they want. When they have soured on the status quo,
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: they'll take anything. Anything. in their minds will be better
• 38:53
  Speaker 1: than this. And in all of these cases, Trump's numbers
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: are worse now than they were in 2018. And we
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: already saw what the 2018 midterm were. So look, like
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: I said, two things caught my attention with this poll.
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: The big one is that independent number and that independent gap.
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: That even if everything about this Times poll is true
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: and they don't win a single another independent in the
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: undecided category, they still will win independence by a larger
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: margin than they did in 2018. when they won over
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: 40 seats. And I think it's likely, and that assumes
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: a minimum of a 14 point advantage The closer they
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: get to 20, the closer they get to tsunami. And
• 39:35
  Speaker 1: then the other thing is how important young voters are
• 39:38
  Speaker 1: going to be to Democrats being able to turn what
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: is an opportunity for a blue wave into something that's
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: even more substantial. They have all the support that they
• 39:51
  Speaker 1: would want among voters under 45. The question is, are
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: they going to show up? And if they show up,
• 39:59
  Speaker 1: it's going to be a wipeout. Pure and simple. Hey,
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  Speaker 1: times may vary. The rates may vary. That Trustpilot rating
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: was as of August of 2026. A couple other nuggets
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: I want to bring up before I get to a
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: quick Todd talk here. J.D. Vance campaigned in Kansas on
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: Tuesday for Roger Marshall. And it was the sort of
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: what he did. He went after.
• 41:58
  Speaker 1: How Adam Hamilton, who was a Methodist pastor, practices his faith.
• 42:05
  Speaker 1: And this is not the first time Vance has done this, right?
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: I mean, shoot, he lectured the Pope about Catholicism, right?
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: I think this is very dangerous territory for a politician
• 42:15
  Speaker 1: to go on. When you start to question how somebody
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: practices their faith, people get their back up. And I
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: think attacking people on, you know, at a time, you
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: would think if if you care about where religion is going, right?
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: You know, more Americans are not participating in religious services
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: on a weekly basis than ever before. And if you
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: believe that Americans need more faith, why attack when somebody
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: is preaching for Americans to have more faith? But that's
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: what Vance did. I don't think this, I think that's an,
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: First of all, it's un-American. And it's like, talk about
• 42:57
  Speaker 1: somebody totally disconnected with the history of this country. You know,
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: he didn't merely say, I disagree with the pastor and
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: some of his, and some of how he's interpreted the Bible.
• 43:12
  Speaker 1: He basically said that his version of Christianity is not Christianity. Well,
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: last time I checked, there's a lot of versions of Christianity.
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: There's a lot of versions of Islam. There's a lot
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: of versions of Judaism. But Christianity has probably more flavors,
• 43:27
  Speaker 1: a little more Baskin Robbins on the Christianity scale than
• 43:29
  Speaker 1: there is with Judaism or Islam. But there are a
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: lot of different ways people practice their faith.
• 43:34
  Speaker 2: Do you know.
• 43:35
  Speaker 1: What this country was founded on, Mr. Vice President? It
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: was founded by a bunch of people who felt as
• 43:42
  Speaker 1: if the state wouldn't allow them to practice their faith
• 43:46
  Speaker 1: the way they wanted to practice their faith. This country
• 43:51
  Speaker 1: was founded on the idea of pluralism, And when it
• 43:54
  Speaker 1: came to religious, religious pluralism, you're going to let people
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: be when it comes to their faith. And the fact
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: that he attacked it, like, look, and I get, you know, look,
• 44:05
  Speaker 1: Vance is trying to acquire an identity. He's been somebody
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: that's constantly, you know, identity one was hillbillyology. Then he
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: sort of morphed into identity two, which was the Peter
• 44:18
  Speaker 1: Thiel techno millennial conservative thing. Now he's, you know, become
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: a culture warrior with another evolution with Trump. And, you know,
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: he's not natural at this. So he's sort of, he's made,
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: he's trying to find moments where he can look like
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: he is a committed culture warrior. And this, what he's
• 44:47
  Speaker 1: done on religion, I really think borders on the offensive
• 44:51
  Speaker 1: to a lot of Americans. And sometimes he treats it
• 44:54
  Speaker 1: like a dorm room fight and whatever. But I thought
• 44:59
  Speaker 1: this was the wrong, you know, it was just, this
• 45:05
  Speaker 1: was a decision. And it must tell me that somebody
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: told him, hey, this Hamilton's having an impact on believers.
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: And a lot of maybe religious Kansans are open to
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: supporting him. And so the decision was made, you've got
• 45:26
  Speaker 1: to delegitimize him. You've got to delegitimize his faith. You've
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: got to delegitimize his views of Christianity. It just, if
• 45:34
  Speaker 1: this is how he, if he becomes president of the
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: United States and he's a heartbeat away, a cheeseburger away,
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: this is how he's going to practice the presidency? He's
• 45:45
  Speaker 1: going to divide Americans on faith like this? We already
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: have this problem. I think we shouldn't be You know,
• 45:53
  Speaker 1: and I've got my own views of how much I
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: think there's too much religion in our political life, but
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: it is what it is. We're a democracy. And if
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: this is what the voters want to appoint, that's fine.
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: But the inability to respect it is pretty damaging. And
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: those kind of intentional, to do intentionally divide like this
• 46:15
  Speaker 1: and intentionally divide somebody who's, you know, practicing their faith.
• 46:25
  Speaker 1: You may not agree with their version of Christianity. Some
• 46:28
  Speaker 1: Catholics don't agree with Mormons. Some believe that Mormons are
• 46:32
  Speaker 1: not part of Christianity. Mormons certainly feel like they're a
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: part of Christianity. But the point is, it's religious bigotry,
• 46:43
  Speaker 1: pure and simple. And I guess it's a tell about
• 46:48
  Speaker 1: how nervous Republicans are that Hamilton might win over some
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: swing voters. And that his faith is sort of a reason,
• 46:57
  Speaker 1: it makes, reassures them that he, you know, that maybe
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: Hamilton isn't going to go off the deep end on culture.
• 47:06
  Speaker 1: But it just, I just thought it was beneath the
• 47:09
  Speaker 1: office of the vice presidency. But I know, I just
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: opened my podcast with how we've like destroyed any sort
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: of respectful ways that any part of the executive branch runs, right,
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: particularly Department of justice the fbi so why shouldn't the
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: vice president go into the gutter like this in the
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: religious bigotry but to go down that road to question
• 47:33
  Speaker 1: the authenticity of somebody's religious belief at this stage i
• 47:40
  Speaker 1: think another way to look at this is.
• 47:43
  Speaker 2: Guess what.
• 47:45
  Speaker 1: Kansas is in play let me close with um my
• 47:51
  Speaker 1: sort of third straight podcast expressing some frustration, but I
• 47:54
  Speaker 1: have a prescription on how do we deal with this
• 47:59
  Speaker 1: AI anxiety. Now, Donald Trump had his own answer for Americans.
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: And I can't believe he said, he declared the only
• 48:07
  Speaker 1: controller guardrails that AI needs is quote, a strong and
• 48:11
  Speaker 1: smart high IQ president. And actually he added that the
• 48:15
  Speaker 1: United States has one of those in spades. I think
• 48:18
  Speaker 1: we'd all love to see what his IQ actually is, but,
• 48:22
  Speaker 1: you know, well, there you go. But imagine being a
• 48:27
  Speaker 1: guy that says, no, no, no, no, just trust me.
• 48:31
  Speaker 1: Is there a worse messenger imaginable for an argument that
• 48:34
  Speaker 1: begins with the words, trust me? This is a guy
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: who has spent the better part of a decade teaching
• 48:41
  Speaker 1: millions of Americans not to trust any institutions. Don't trust
• 48:45
  Speaker 1: the government. Don't trust the media. Don't trust the intelligence community.
• 48:50
  Speaker 1: Don't trust scientists. Don't trust election administration officials. Don't trust judges.
• 48:56
  Speaker 1: Don't trust experts. If somebody tells you something you don't
• 49:01
  Speaker 1: want to hear, assume they've gotten an agenda, right? And
• 49:06
  Speaker 1: now we are confronting a technology that even some of
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: the people building it tell us they cannot completely predict.
• 49:12
  Speaker 1: Donald Trump's answer is, don't worry, trust me. Yes, you're
• 49:16
  Speaker 1: supposed to trust Donald Trump You can't spend a decade
• 49:22
  Speaker 1: telling Americans to trust nobody and then suddenly demand trust
• 49:25
  Speaker 1: for yourself. And frankly, I'm not particularly interested in replacing
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: trust Trump with trust Silicon Valley either, because those guys
• 49:33
  Speaker 1: have their own trust problem. And this is where I
• 49:36
  Speaker 1: find this entire AI conversation increasingly maddening.
• 49:40
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 49:41
  Speaker 1: Look, there's I see it. I use AI. We're all
• 49:44
  Speaker 1: fascinated by it. It is it is. And I'm not
• 49:48
  Speaker 1: interested in the choice being it's, you know, accelerate AI
• 49:53
  Speaker 1: development or destroy the machines. But I'm not interested in
• 50:00
  Speaker 1: being told that the machines are coming. There's nothing any
• 50:02
  Speaker 1: of us can do about it. So everybody climb aboard
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: and hope the people driving know where we're going. especially
• 50:09
  Speaker 1: when the people driving occasionally turn around and say, by
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: the way, we're not entirely sure where we're going either.
• 50:18
  Speaker 1: That's essentially what Dario Amadei of Anthropic is warning about
• 50:23
  Speaker 1: the risks from increasingly powerful AI. And Sam Altman and
• 50:27
  Speaker 1: Elon Musk are also warning about it. But they're not
• 50:30
  Speaker 1: so nervous about it that they're stopping what they're doing, right? Trump, meanwhile,
• 50:36
  Speaker 1: is just saying, well, this is just a hoax. The
• 50:37
  Speaker 1: Chinese are involved. And maybe that's the case. But I
• 50:42
  Speaker 1: don't think the Chinese want AI to go rogue either.
• 50:47
  Speaker 1: I think we underestimate China's concerns and nervousness. Because if
• 50:53
  Speaker 1: AI gives intellectual freedom to their population, watch out. So
• 50:59
  Speaker 1: oddly enough, they're concerned about AI safety, but not for
• 51:03
  Speaker 1: the same reasons we should be concerned about AI safety.
• 51:11
  Speaker 1: But why does this debate have to come down to
• 51:13
  Speaker 1: choosing which powerful entity we're supposed to trust? Trump says
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: trust Trump, which again, you just ask Americans, they don't
• 51:21
  Speaker 1: trust him. Majority of Americans don't trust Trump to tell
• 51:24
  Speaker 1: us the truth about what's in his wallet, let alone
• 51:29
  Speaker 1: about how he's managing AI. The AI companies say, trust
• 51:32
  Speaker 1: us when we tell you there are dangers. And the
• 51:36
  Speaker 1: skeptics say, don't trust the companies because regulation could protect
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: the companies that already dominate the industry. Well, guess what?
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: I don't trust any of these folks. I don't trust
• 51:45
  Speaker 1: the AI companies. I don't trust Trump. I don't trust
• 51:49
  Speaker 1: any individual entity here, right? And that's the whole point.
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: You know who else didn't trust anybody? James Madison, who
• 51:59
  Speaker 1: was writing the Constitution, the whole point was to create
• 52:01
  Speaker 1: a whole series of checks and balances. So you didn't
• 52:05
  Speaker 1: have to decide who to trust, but there was essentially
• 52:08
  Speaker 1: enough checks and balances where everybody would check each other.
• 52:18
  Speaker 1: So maybe the first question Washington needs to answer isn't,
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: how do we regulate artificial intelligence? I don't know if
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: we're ready to answer that yet. But the first question
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: is much simpler. What do we know? And what don't
• 52:32
  Speaker 1: we know? And who, other than the people building these systems,
• 52:36
  Speaker 1: is allowed inside the room to find out? Because that's,
• 52:41
  Speaker 1: we actually know how to do this. We do it
• 52:44
  Speaker 1: in other industries all the time. Think about food. We
• 52:47
  Speaker 1: don't have a food safety system where a meatpacking company
• 52:49
  Speaker 1: sends Washington an email once a year saying, everything looks
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: good here.
• 52:53
  Speaker 3: Trust us.
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: We have inspectors and they're embedded in these companies. People
• 52:59
  Speaker 1: whose job is to go inside, be like an employee,
• 53:02
  Speaker 1: look around, understand the process, make sure the rules are
• 53:05
  Speaker 1: being followed, find problems before they blow up. And that's
• 53:10
  Speaker 1: the principle we need to be borrowing here for AI.
• 53:17
  Speaker 1: We need independent technical experts who have actual continuing access
• 53:22
  Speaker 1: to these so-called frontier AI development systems. People who understand
• 53:26
  Speaker 1: the technology, people with appropriate security clearances, people that can
• 53:31
  Speaker 1: protect legitimate proprietary information. Not everything should be an NDA.
• 53:36
  Speaker 1: People don't work for the company they're inspecting, and they
• 53:40
  Speaker 1: need full access. What can this model actually do? What
• 53:45
  Speaker 1: has the company discovered that it can do? What happened
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: during testing? What safeguards worked? What failed? And that's where
• 53:53
  Speaker 1: we ought to begin. Inspection before prescriptions. knowledge before regulation.
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: And I'd like to see real congressional hearings on AI,
• 54:05
  Speaker 1: not the five-minute speeches that are masquerade as questions so
• 54:09
  Speaker 1: that 30 members of Congress can chop them into social
• 54:12
  Speaker 1: media fundraising clips. We need hearings whose purpose is actually
• 54:16
  Speaker 1: to educate the American public. I want to see a
• 54:21
  Speaker 1: hearing that starts incredibly basic, Because we need to bring
• 54:25
  Speaker 1: everybody into this conversation. I do not want to hear, well,
• 54:29
  Speaker 1: it's complicated. It's hard to explain.
• 54:31
  Speaker 2: Bullshit.
• 54:33
  Speaker 1: If it's hard to explain, you're not doing a good
• 54:34
  Speaker 1: enough job explaining it. So start with an LLM. What
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: is it? And then what happens when I type into one?
• 54:43
  Speaker 1: What actually happens? How does this work? Explain it to
• 54:47
  Speaker 1: me like I'm a 10-year-old. I'm just a caveman, as
• 54:51
  Speaker 1: Phil Hartman's great character once said. But even I know
• 54:56
  Speaker 1: that the more complicated you make an answer, the more
• 55:00
  Speaker 1: you don't want me to know the truth. I want
• 55:05
  Speaker 1: to see hearings that explain how this works to the
• 55:08
  Speaker 1: American public. And then when somebody says, well, ordinary people
• 55:11
  Speaker 1: couldn't possibly understand this, then I want my member of
• 55:15
  Speaker 1: Congress to ask again and tell this person, then explain
• 55:18
  Speaker 1: it in American. Because everything is understandable if somebody explains
• 55:23
  Speaker 1: it correctly. And I keep coming back. There's one of
• 55:29
  Speaker 1: my favorite movies that sort of captured a moment like
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: this is the movie Contact. It was a Jodie Foster movie,
• 55:41
  Speaker 1: I think late 90s, early aughts. I can't remember now everything,
• 55:44
  Speaker 1: you know, and I don't want to admit stuff is
• 55:46
  Speaker 1: as old as it might actually be. But the basic premise, right?
• 55:50
  Speaker 1: A lot of people probably remember that the signal from
• 55:52
  Speaker 1: outer space and the giant machine, right? But go back
• 55:55
  Speaker 1: and watch what happens after humanity realizes that this signal
• 56:00
  Speaker 1: from outer space is real. Suddenly, the movie portrays it
• 56:05
  Speaker 1: as this is simply no longer a science story. It
• 56:08
  Speaker 1: became a government story, a political story, an ethical story,
• 56:11
  Speaker 1: a religious story. Remember Matthew McConaughey's character in that movie?
• 56:14
  Speaker 1: Who speaks for humanity? What does this discovery mean for faith?
• 56:19
  Speaker 1: What happens to institutions built around assumptions about humanity's place
• 56:23
  Speaker 1: in creation? The government in Contact, the movie, doesn't have
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: all the answers.
• 56:28
  Speaker 2: That's the point.
• 56:29
  Speaker 1: But they hold these tremendous congressional hearings, or they portray
• 56:34
  Speaker 1: it this way. And what's interesting is back then, the
• 56:38
  Speaker 1: assumption was the government... the government would likely understand that
• 56:43
  Speaker 1: something transformative has happened and that society needs institutions capable
• 56:47
  Speaker 1: of asking the questions before everyone understands the consequences. And
• 56:55
  Speaker 1: I keep thinking that we're living through our own version
• 56:57
  Speaker 1: of this moment, except it's not, you know, we're not
• 57:01
  Speaker 1: receiving the machine's instructions from Vega. We're building the machine ourselves.
• 57:06
  Speaker 1: And somehow that has made us less curious about the consequences.
• 57:11
  Speaker 1: There's nothing AI isn't going to change. From education to medicine,
• 57:16
  Speaker 1: to war, to privacy, to how we work, to relationships,
• 57:19
  Speaker 1: to religion. What happens when people start taking questions about
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: grief and morality and purpose to an LLM instead of
• 57:29
  Speaker 1: a rabbi or a priest or a pastor or an imam?
• 57:34
  Speaker 1: What happens when a machine can convincingly imitate somebody you
• 57:38
  Speaker 1: loved who died? AI doesn't have to become conscious for
• 57:44
  Speaker 1: any of those questions to matter. Human beings simply have
• 57:49
  Speaker 1: to start treating it as if it is. And then
• 57:52
  Speaker 1: there's this other piece of the trust problem, Silicon Valley.
• 57:54
  Speaker 1: I'm going to give you another TV show. If you
• 57:57
  Speaker 1: haven't seen the TV show, The Audacity, watch it. It's
• 58:03
  Speaker 1: on Netflix. It's an AMC production. Yes, it's television. Yes,
• 58:09
  Speaker 1: it's exaggerated. It sort of does for Silicon Valley what
• 58:12
  Speaker 1: House of Cards did for politics. Made people like me go, well,
• 58:15
  Speaker 1: that's not really, that's an exaggerated version.
• 58:17
  Speaker 3: Okay.
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: Exaggerated version, right? So in Audacity, just like in House
• 58:26
  Speaker 1: of Cards, the villains are drawn very broadly. I'm sure
• 58:30
  Speaker 1: there are people in Silicon Valley who watch it just
• 58:32
  Speaker 1: like I watched House of Cards and said, come on,
• 58:35
  Speaker 1: we're not totally like that. Okay, maybe you're not. But
• 58:39
  Speaker 1: that's not what should worry you about this show. What
• 58:42
  Speaker 1: should worry you is that the caricature is recognizable. Because
• 58:45
  Speaker 1: an awful lot of Americans increasingly look at Silicon Valley
• 58:49
  Speaker 1: and see a small collection of extraordinarily wealthy, slightly strange
• 58:54
  Speaker 1: people living inside their own culture who suddenly have enormous
• 58:58
  Speaker 1: power over everybody else's lives. The engineers may see themselves
• 59:05
  Speaker 1: building the future. A lot of the rest of the
• 59:08
  Speaker 1: country sees people they don't know don't understand and don't
• 59:12
  Speaker 1: necessarily trust deciding what happens to their jobs, their children's future,
• 59:18
  Speaker 1: their privacy, their relationships and their information. That's the problem.
• 59:26
  Speaker 1: And Silicon Valley can't solve it by saying, trust us.
• 59:29
  Speaker 1: We're the smart people. How'd that work out during COVID?
• 59:35
  Speaker 1: And Donald Trump can't solve it by saying, trust me,
• 59:37
  Speaker 1: I'm the smart president. We've heard that one before, too. Now,
• 59:43
  Speaker 1: this is why democratic societies build institutions, because you can't
• 59:46
  Speaker 1: trust a single individual. You don't trust the king and
• 59:49
  Speaker 1: you don't want to trust the company. We create systems
• 59:52
  Speaker 1: that allow us all to verify what both of them
• 59:55
  Speaker 1: are telling us. Another place Washington ought to begin. Create
• 59:59
  Speaker 1: an independent AI inspection capability. Put serious technologists in it.
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 1: Give them access. Give them independence. Give them the ability
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 1: to tell Congress and the public what we know and
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 1: what we don't know and what questions nobody has been
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 1: able to answer yet. Then let's create other broad institutions
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 1: around it. A public-private advisory council on education and children.
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 1: This is going to transform how we, I mean, we
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 1: went through this with social media and did nothing about it.
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: We're not gonna let AI do this again, are we?
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 1: And we need to focus on the impact on jobs,
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 1: the impact on privacy, national security, the law, faith. And
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 1: we need to see engineers at the table, teachers at
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 1: the table, parents at the table, workers at the table,
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 1: regular retail business owners, clergy, ethicists, civil libertarians, national security folks,
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 1: and a variety of ordinary Americans that I have not
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 1: name checked what they do for a living. This is
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 1: gonna happen to all of us. And like I said,
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 1: we've run this experiment once. Social media, technology first, business
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: model second, consequences somewhere like 58th on the list. And
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 1: years later, we held earrings asking, how did this happen?
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 1: We yelled at Mark Zuckerberg, go apologize to what you did, right? Well,
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 1: this time the warning lights are blinking before we've destroyed
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 1: the minds of young people. The people building AI are
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 1: publicly telling us they're worried. They didn't do that when
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 1: they were building social media. They are doing it now.
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 1: So why are we waiting? You know, we're really good
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 1: at investigating catastrophes after they happen. We assemble a terrific commission,
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 1: 9-11 commission, one of the better things that Washington's done.
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 1: But it was an after action report, right? We find
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 1: the documents. We interview everybody. We discover that all sorts
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 1: of people saw warning signs and we shouldn't have missed this,
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 1: shouldn't have missed that.
• 1:02:12
  Speaker 2: And we should do this. We should do that.
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 1: And then we produce a beautiful report explaining exactly what
• 1:02:17
  Speaker 1: we should have done before the disaster.
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 2: How about we do it?
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 1: In the other order this time. Let's not wait for
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 1: an AI version of a catastrophe that forces us to
• 1:02:30
  Speaker 1: have the 9-11 commission for AI. Let's build the institutions now.
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 1: Let's have the commission before there's a meltdown. Let's find
• 1:02:39
  Speaker 1: out what's happening. Let's get people inside the room. Let's
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 1: help explain this to Americans. We just want our own agency.
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 1: Silicon Valley has taken away so much from us. They
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 1: want us to go along for the ride. But we
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 1: don't want to be taken for one. I'm not anti-AI.
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 1: I'm pro-technology and pro-future. But let's bring everybody along. And
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 1: let's do it before we blow something up that we
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 1: regret that we blew up. We made all these mistakes
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 1: with social media. We literally can just apply all of
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 1: these terrible lessons that we learned and apply it to
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 1: as we build this new technology. But that would be logic.
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 1: And as I said, when the orange haired man came
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 1: down the escalator, sometime after that, we banned logic in
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 1: Washington and we're all the worst for it. We can
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 1: do better, but we need leaders to meet this moment,
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 1: and we don't have the leaders. Nobody in Silicon Valley
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 1: knows how to meet this moment. Nobody in Washington is
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 1: meeting this moment. It takes us, the people, to meet
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 1: this moment. We have to demand it, and you've been
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 1: demanding it in the only ways you know how to do,
• 1:04:14
  Speaker 1: as I've been saying. You've been doing it to ballot box,
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 1: and you've been doing it in which part of the
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 1: The fact that you choose not to register in either party.
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 1: But you're going to have to say it louder. Because
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 1: at some point they will hear you. But you're going
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 1: to have to speak once again at the ballot box.
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 3: All right.
• 1:04:36
  Speaker 1: Coming up, it's my conversation with Kobe Blumenfeld-Gantz. He is
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 1: the co-founder and CEO of Chapter, as you know, is
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 1: a sponsor of this program. And I thought it'd be
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 1: good to have a conversation with him to frankly explain, look,
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 1: they're sponsoring me. And I want to, as I've told
• 1:04:58
  Speaker 1: you before, you know, I have more, you know, it
• 1:05:04
  Speaker 1: used to be there was an ad salesperson between me
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 1: and the sponsors when I worked for another entity. When
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 1: you work for yourself, these are more personal relationships. So
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 1: I've had these conversations with other sponsors with John Morgan.
• 1:05:15
  Speaker 1: And I think, you know, I.
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 1: I hopefully am asking the questions about this entity, about chapter,
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 1: that you want me to answer. But if you're trying
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 1: to understand how to navigate signing up for Medicare, it's
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 1: a pretty good conversation for you to listen to. So
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 1: let's sneak in a break in my conversation with the
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 1: co-founder of chapter. And then on the other side, my
• 1:05:43
  Speaker 1: surprise number one in my top five presidential list. So
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 1: my guest today is a co-founder of one of my sponsors, Chapter.
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 1: You have probably heard at least some of my content
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 1: being sponsored by Chapter. And Chapter is a company that
• 1:06:12
  Speaker 1: really is designed to help people navigate the Medicare system.
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 1: And if any of you are of a certain age
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 1: or have parents of a certain age, you have come
• 1:06:21
  Speaker 1: to learn that it ain't easy And if you get
• 1:06:24
  Speaker 1: the right policy, it's fantastic. You end up in the
• 1:06:28
  Speaker 1: wrong one, not so good. And one of the things
• 1:06:30
  Speaker 1: that I do want to make a priority here is
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 1: I have worked really hard. I don't want any of
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 1: my content behind a paywall. But I just don't want
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 1: any kind of sponsor. And we do get to know
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 1: sponsors here. And I think it's important for you to
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 1: know who these folks are and spend a little time
• 1:06:49
  Speaker 1: with them. So joining me now is Kobe Blumenfeld. Feld Gantz,
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 1: a co-founder of Chapter. And believe it or not, Chapter
• 1:06:56
  Speaker 1: is not that old of a company. And in many ways,
• 1:06:59
  Speaker 1: it's a company that is here because of technology in
• 1:07:04
  Speaker 1: some ways. Kobe, let's start there. Fill in some of
• 1:07:10
  Speaker 1: the blanks. You heard my introduction. Tell me what I
• 1:07:15
  Speaker 1: left out that you wish I hadn't.
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 3: Yeah, thank you so much for having me. We started
• 1:07:20
  Speaker 3: the company a few years ago. after seeing my parents
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 3: go through the Medicare process and just have a really
• 1:07:25
  Speaker 3: tough time. It took them many months, a lot of faxes,
• 1:07:30
  Speaker 3: a lot of going in person to the social security office,
• 1:07:33
  Speaker 3: which from my perspective was just like, what is going
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 3: on here? And ultimately they ended up on a plan
• 1:07:39
  Speaker 3: that charged them a lot more than it needed to.
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 3: And my mom is now subject to late Part D
• 1:07:44
  Speaker 3: enrollment penalties. which is just unfortunate because she got bad
• 1:07:48
  Speaker 3: guidance and that could have been prevented. So I used
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 3: to work at a big technology company. I used to
• 1:07:54
  Speaker 3: do a lot of work with the US government supporting
• 1:07:57
  Speaker 3: lots of different missions that the government has from military
• 1:08:00
  Speaker 3: intelligence to federal healthcare. And just coming from a data
• 1:08:05
  Speaker 3: and technology background thought that the way that people have
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 3: to go through Medicare today just makes no sense. The
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 3: technology is bad. The data is bad. The incentives are misaligned.
• 1:08:15
  Speaker 3: And I didn't see a company or a way for people,
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 3: a company that was really supporting seniors in navigating this process.
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 3: And so I wanted to try to start that.
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 1: You know, it's funny you say that. So my mother,
• 1:08:26
  Speaker 1: of course, she's, I'm not going to say her age
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 1: because she's a listener, right? I'm not going to do
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 1: that to her, but she's on Medicare and she got...
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 1: got lucky she got some good advice early and got
• 1:08:39
  Speaker 1: i think it's it's the schedule f right that's the
• 1:08:42
  Speaker 1: one yep yeah that that's this magic plan and i'm
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 1: like how did she goes i don't know somebody told
• 1:08:48
  Speaker 1: me f is the one i needed to be focused
• 1:08:51
  Speaker 1: on and she you know sort of did and and
• 1:08:53
  Speaker 1: i'm thankful for it now she's very happy it's always
• 1:08:55
  Speaker 1: been a a pretty good a pretty good policy, but
• 1:08:59
  Speaker 1: she didn't have a lot of knowledge. And, and so,
• 1:09:02
  Speaker 1: you know, I was thinking about what's the best way to,
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 1: for us to have a conversation that, that is productive
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 1: for the listener. And it is sort of like, let's
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 1: start with you're 61 years old. Let's assume someone on here, 61,
• 1:09:17
  Speaker 1: you know, that at 62, that I believe, right. Correct
• 1:09:20
  Speaker 1: me if I'm wrong. 62, you can start to buy
• 1:09:22
  Speaker 1: into Medicare. 65. You still have to wait till 65.
• 1:09:25
  Speaker 1: I thought you could do some early. You can't do
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 1: it early at 62.
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 3: That's social security. Yep.
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 1: That is, okay. So let's, somebody's in their early 60s.
• 1:09:36
  Speaker 1: Let's say it's their last year of private insurance. They
• 1:09:39
  Speaker 1: know Medicare is coming. Let's start the preparatory process. Give
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 1: me how you would advise people how to prepare for
• 1:09:48
  Speaker 1: that transition from private health insurance to Medicare?
• 1:09:53
  Speaker 3: Yeah, to your point, people should start getting educated a
• 1:09:56
  Speaker 3: few years before. So if they are 61, 62, it's
• 1:09:59
  Speaker 3: a good time to start learning the basics, just to
• 1:10:03
  Speaker 3: familiarize yourself. You don't need to do anything until you're
• 1:10:06
  Speaker 3: about 64 and a half, a few months before your
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 3: 65th birthday. But really the key things to think about
• 1:10:13
  Speaker 3: are what are the healthcare needs you might have, not
• 1:10:16
  Speaker 3: just next year, but over the next few years. So
• 1:10:20
  Speaker 3: are there specific doctors you care about being able to see?
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 3: Are there particular procedures or health systems you want to
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 3: go to? Are there certain prescriptions you're going to need
• 1:10:29
  Speaker 3: to take? And what type of flexibility do you care about?
• 1:10:34
  Speaker 3: Are you willing to have a little bit less flexibility
• 1:10:36
  Speaker 3: and pay less? Or do you want to pay a
• 1:10:38
  Speaker 3: little bit more to have Maximum flexibility.
• 1:10:40
  Speaker 1: You mean by flexibility, just a wider variety of doctor networks?
• 1:10:45
  Speaker 3: Wider variety of doctor networks, not requiring a referral to
• 1:10:49
  Speaker 3: see a specialist, having more covered when you do go
• 1:10:55
  Speaker 3: get healthcare as opposed to paying as you go. These
• 1:10:59
  Speaker 3: are just some of the different things to think about. Really,
• 1:11:03
  Speaker 3: Medicare advisors like Chapter and others exist to help people
• 1:11:07
  Speaker 3: with this. It's funny you mentioned your mother was not
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 3: particularly knowledgeable. I really don't think anyone in this country,
• 1:11:13
  Speaker 3: unless it is your profession, really understands how the system goes.
• 1:11:15
  Speaker 3: And frankly, most Medicare advisors don't understand how this works either.
• 1:11:19
  Speaker 3: But I was listening to a podcast over a year ago,
• 1:11:25
  Speaker 3: but a Stanford professor of health economics was doing a
• 1:11:29
  Speaker 3: podcast on just a health insurance system and the healthcare system,
• 1:11:32
  Speaker 3: not Medicare specifically. And he made a side comment that
• 1:11:36
  Speaker 3: even he, as a professor of health economics at Stanford,
• 1:11:40
  Speaker 3: does not understand how to sign up for Medicare. So
• 1:11:43
  Speaker 3: it is very challenging for most people.
• 1:11:46
  Speaker 1: So I think most people think, well, Medicare, everything's covered.
• 1:11:51
  Speaker 1: And then you get Medicare and you find out, and
• 1:11:54
  Speaker 1: a lot of people go, oh, no. A lot, you know, Yes,
• 1:12:00
  Speaker 1: a lot of stuff is covered maybe in the basic
• 1:12:03
  Speaker 1: policy compared to other basic policies if you're younger, but
• 1:12:09
  Speaker 1: less is covered than you think, which I guess some
• 1:12:13
  Speaker 1: people might say is a Congress problem. But what is
• 1:12:17
  Speaker 1: the shock that you find that most new Medicare applicants
• 1:12:23
  Speaker 1: find out about when it comes to Medicare?
• 1:12:26
  Speaker 3: Most people assume, as you said, that Medicare is just
• 1:12:29
  Speaker 3: kind of this thing that happens, you get it, and
• 1:12:31
  Speaker 3: it's done. I wish that's how it worked. It's unfortunately
• 1:12:35
  Speaker 3: not how it works. There's a lot of different parts
• 1:12:39
  Speaker 3: of Medicare, but the simplest way to think about it
• 1:12:40
  Speaker 3: is original Medicare, which is known as Parts A and B,
• 1:12:44
  Speaker 3: covers up to 80% of medical expenses. But because 20%
• 1:12:48
  Speaker 3: of medical expenses can be a lot, if you go
• 1:12:51
  Speaker 3: to the hospital and it's 10, 20, $ 30, 000, 20% of
• 1:12:53
  Speaker 3: that is a lot, most people get some type of
• 1:12:58
  Speaker 3: supplemental coverage. And that supplemental coverage can take the form
• 1:13:02
  Speaker 3: of Medicare Advantage, which you see a lot of ads for,
• 1:13:05
  Speaker 3: or Medicare Supplement, or also known as Medigap. And that's
• 1:13:07
  Speaker 3: what your mom has, a Medigap Plan.
• 1:13:10
  Speaker 1: F.
• 1:13:11
  Speaker 3: So those are the two different paths people can go
• 1:13:13
  Speaker 3: down to really get the coverage that they should have. Yeah.
• 1:13:19
  Speaker 1: No, no, no, go ahead, finish your thought.
• 1:13:21
  Speaker 3: Those two plan types operate quite differently. A Medicare Advantage
• 1:13:25
  Speaker 3: plan in many ways operates like the commercial health insurance
• 1:13:28
  Speaker 3: plan most people have had when they've been employed through
• 1:13:32
  Speaker 3: most of their lives. It usually has a provider network,
• 1:13:35
  Speaker 3: So there are some doctors you can go to, some
• 1:13:37
  Speaker 3: doctors are in-network, there's sometimes some out-of-network coverage, sometimes less.
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 3: There are specific prescriptions on formulary and different costs of
• 1:13:44
  Speaker 3: those prescriptions. There are different hospitals that are in and
• 1:13:46
  Speaker 3: out of network. You get some hearing, some dental, some vision,
• 1:13:49
  Speaker 3: some other benefits that are partially subsidized. So if you
• 1:13:54
  Speaker 3: want to get a hearing aid, they'll say, instead of
• 1:13:56
  Speaker 3: paying cash pay price might be two, three, $ 4, 000 for
• 1:13:59
  Speaker 3: a hearing aid, you can get it for one or
• 1:14:01
  Speaker 3: $ 2, 000 through us. But again, you have to get a
• 1:14:03
  Speaker 3: specific type of hearing aid from an audiologist that we recommend.
• 1:14:09
  Speaker 1: I wanna ask about Medicare Advantage because there's cynic in
• 1:14:12
  Speaker 1: me and it's always been my, a lot of people
• 1:14:15
  Speaker 1: assume Medicare Advantage is run by the government and Medicare
• 1:14:18
  Speaker 1: Advantage is a brand name that private insurance companies use
• 1:14:24
  Speaker 1: And I'll be honest, I wish it weren't called Medicare
• 1:14:26
  Speaker 1: Advantage because I do think it creates an expectation from
• 1:14:32
  Speaker 1: the end user that, hey, this is a government policy
• 1:14:37
  Speaker 1: when it is not, correct?
• 1:14:38
  Speaker 3: That's right. I actually, I find, I take issue with
• 1:14:42
  Speaker 3: the name Medicare Advantage less on the Medicare side and
• 1:14:44
  Speaker 3: more on the Advantage side in that it's not necessarily better.
• 1:14:49
  Speaker 3: So that's my issue with it. But to your point,
• 1:14:52
  Speaker 3: the way the Medicare Advantage programs are run by private
• 1:14:55
  Speaker 3: insurance carriers. So all the insurance carriers we know, United, Atena, Anthem.
• 1:15:00
  Speaker 3: They have their own Medicare Advantage plans. The government pays them,
• 1:15:04
  Speaker 3: and it's known as value-based care or at-risk care. What
• 1:15:07
  Speaker 3: happens is the government pays a given Medicare Advantage insurance
• 1:15:12
  Speaker 3: carrier a fixed amount per person that they're covering. And
• 1:15:16
  Speaker 3: it is up to the insurance carrier to manage that
• 1:15:20
  Speaker 3: person's risk and that person's health below that cost. And
• 1:15:23
  Speaker 3: any amount that they can do below that cost, they
• 1:15:27
  Speaker 3: can take as margin, as profit. So that's what value-based
• 1:15:30
  Speaker 3: care at risk care means. Medicare Advantage is a form
• 1:15:32
  Speaker 3: of value-based care.
• 1:15:35
  Speaker 1: So that's one of those, though, where you wish, I mean,
• 1:15:38
  Speaker 1: and this gets it to a philosophical, you know, which
• 1:15:41
  Speaker 1: is who should be monitoring the value-based care? The patient?
• 1:15:46
  Speaker 1: or the insurance company. And then when the insurance company's
• 1:15:49
  Speaker 1: doing it, you don't feel as if there's concern that
• 1:15:51
  Speaker 1: the patient isn't coming first.
• 1:15:53
  Speaker 3: Certainly, and those are very valid concerns. And we've seen
• 1:15:57
  Speaker 3: a lot of news stories over the past few years
• 1:15:59
  Speaker 3: about prior auth denials. There was one news story a
• 1:16:03
  Speaker 3: few months ago. There was an investigation into a couple
• 1:16:06
  Speaker 3: insurance carriers, and what they found was most prior auth
• 1:16:11
  Speaker 3: requests are denied. Of those denials, when they are appealed,
• 1:16:17
  Speaker 3: they're almost all approved. All it is saying is the
• 1:16:21
  Speaker 3: insurance carrier is default denying you and just making it
• 1:16:25
  Speaker 3: harder for you to get the procedure that you need.
• 1:16:28
  Speaker 1: We wonder why health insurance companies are so unpopular. Right, exactly.
• 1:16:35
  Speaker 3: It's hard for a lot of reasons. It's not just
• 1:16:37
  Speaker 3: the insurance carrier's fault, to be clear. It is a
• 1:16:39
  Speaker 3: really Frankenstein system that's very complicated and they control a
• 1:16:43
  Speaker 3: lot of it, but they are operating within a system
• 1:16:45
  Speaker 3: and regime that they don't control entirely themselves, but there's
• 1:16:49
  Speaker 3: a lot they can do better, certainly.
• 1:16:53
  Speaker 1: With these Medicare Advantage policies, Who's regulating them? Is the
• 1:16:57
  Speaker 1: federal government regulated or is it back being regulated by
• 1:16:59
  Speaker 1: state insurance industry?
• 1:17:01
  Speaker 3: Great question. So Medicare Advantage is regulated by CMS, by
• 1:17:04
  Speaker 3: the federal government.
• 1:17:05
  Speaker 1: It is regulated by CMS.
• 1:17:07
  Speaker 3: Under HHS, yes. So they regulate Medicare Advantage. Medicare Supplement,
• 1:17:13
  Speaker 3: to your point, is regulated at the state level. State
• 1:17:16
  Speaker 3: departments of insurance or departments of finance, depending on how
• 1:17:19
  Speaker 3: the state has set it up, regulate Medicare Supplement carriers.
• 1:17:22
  Speaker 3: So it is a totally different regime.
• 1:17:27
  Speaker 1: There's a part of what you guys do that some
• 1:17:29
  Speaker 1: people will say, how come the federal government doesn't do this?
• 1:17:33
  Speaker 1: Why isn't this just, and as a tech guy, I'm
• 1:17:37
  Speaker 1: sure that's a question you've probably asked yourself.
• 1:17:40
  Speaker 3: Exactly. If the federal government did it, we would be
• 1:17:42
  Speaker 3: in a different business, which would be great. There's a
• 1:17:44
  Speaker 3: lot of things we can help seniors with. The federal
• 1:17:48
  Speaker 3: government does a couple of things. They do have a
• 1:17:50
  Speaker 3: Medicare.gov website. They do have a 1-800-Medicare call center. The
• 1:17:54
  Speaker 3: challenge is with any government-provided service, it's usually not going
• 1:17:58
  Speaker 3: to be very good. And so they're not going to
• 1:18:02
  Speaker 3: have the best people. They're not going to have the
• 1:18:03
  Speaker 3: best technology. They're not going to have the best support.
• 1:18:08
  Speaker 1: I'll be honest. I'm sure certain people are going, why
• 1:18:10
  Speaker 1: don't they have the best technology?
• 1:18:12
  Speaker 3: That's a much broader question.
• 1:18:14
  Speaker 1: Right, I know, I know. We're not solving that here, yeah.
• 1:18:17
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, so I worked at Palantir for a
• 1:18:18
  Speaker 3: long time and I built technology for the government. So
• 1:18:21
  Speaker 3: happy to talk about that if you're curious. I think
• 1:18:24
  Speaker 3: there are a couple of reasons why the government is
• 1:18:26
  Speaker 3: quite bad at using technology. I think one is that
• 1:18:30
  Speaker 3: the procurement, it's very boring, but the procurement process to
• 1:18:34
  Speaker 3: buy technology is very antiquated.
• 1:18:37
  Speaker 1: Oh, it's agency to agency. I mean, what's interesting about
• 1:18:40
  Speaker 1: it is, And this gets– we're going to go down
• 1:18:45
  Speaker 1: rabbit holes here and I want to try to avoid it.
• 1:18:47
  Speaker 1: But I'll just quickly do cybersecurity. I went deep into
• 1:18:51
  Speaker 1: this when I was covering cybersecurity for a bit of time,
• 1:18:55
  Speaker 1: which is it's both a feature and a bug. The
• 1:19:00
  Speaker 1: fact that the technology is not uniform, the fact that
• 1:19:06
  Speaker 1: the procurement procedure is not uniform, is actually good for security,
• 1:19:12
  Speaker 1: but it's bad for consumers. And the trade-off, right, the
• 1:19:16
  Speaker 1: efficiency that you might get would also potentially supercharge fraud,
• 1:19:23
  Speaker 1: which is something that they're also gonna, I mean, is
• 1:19:26
  Speaker 1: that what you ran into when you worked as a
• 1:19:29
  Speaker 1: contractor on the other end?
• 1:19:31
  Speaker 3: Yeah, in some cases, definitely. I think the... Different parts
• 1:19:37
  Speaker 3: of the federal government have gotten a lot better. So DOD,
• 1:19:39
  Speaker 3: Department of Defense, or Department of War, has actually gotten
• 1:19:42
  Speaker 3: a lot better at working with newer technology companies and
• 1:19:45
  Speaker 3: getting good technology into the hands of the warfighter, as
• 1:19:48
  Speaker 3: it were. It's certainly not perfect, but it is a
• 1:19:51
  Speaker 3: lot better. And I think it's better because we've had
• 1:19:53
  Speaker 3: this existential risk from China to force us to be better.
• 1:19:58
  Speaker 3: I think throughout the rest of the government, we haven't
• 1:20:00
  Speaker 3: actually had that revolution to make it much better for
• 1:20:04
  Speaker 3: the government to buy and work with other technology companies.
• 1:20:08
  Speaker 3: I think it's been a lot slower throughout the rest
• 1:20:10
  Speaker 3: of the government. When I was working on the other side,
• 1:20:15
  Speaker 3: directly with the government, It's not just the procurement process.
• 1:20:19
  Speaker 3: It's also, you know, the government is a very large,
• 1:20:22
  Speaker 3: slow-moving organization, and there's bureaucracy by design. So it's going
• 1:20:25
  Speaker 3: to take a lot of time. There's going to be
• 1:20:26
  Speaker 3: a lot of checks and balances, and there's a reason
• 1:20:30
  Speaker 3: that the government doesn't run like a company.
• 1:20:33
  Speaker 1: Well, as I always say, they have to be a service.
• 1:20:35
  Speaker 1: You know, I joke, you know, when people complain about
• 1:20:38
  Speaker 1: the postal service, oh, it should be run like a business. Well,
• 1:20:41
  Speaker 1: it's not a business. It's a service, and you've got
• 1:20:44
  Speaker 1: to deliver mail to rural Alaska. And if you were
• 1:20:47
  Speaker 1: doing a business, you'd say, hmm, that isn't cost effective
• 1:20:50
  Speaker 1: to deliver mail to rural Alaska. We're going to just
• 1:20:52
  Speaker 1: give you mail once a week and we're going to
• 1:20:55
  Speaker 1: ship it. And it's easy to do to a private customer.
• 1:20:58
  Speaker 1: But when you at the federal government, everybody has to
• 1:21:01
  Speaker 1: be treated the same.
• 1:21:04
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 1:21:04
  Speaker 1: The government can't do that. They can't pick and choose
• 1:21:07
  Speaker 1: which customers they don't want, which is both good for
• 1:21:10
  Speaker 1: the average person. but it does make creating efficiencies very difficult, correct?
• 1:21:17
  Speaker 3: That's exactly right. And this is, again, quite philosophical, but
• 1:21:23
  Speaker 3: our bureaucracy was set up to be slow moving. That
• 1:21:26
  Speaker 3: is a feature.
• 1:21:28
  Speaker 1: I say this all the time. Our constitutional republic, we
• 1:21:33
  Speaker 1: are set up to not do things whipsaw because stability
• 1:21:39
  Speaker 1: is always what our founders prioritized and you know, with
• 1:21:43
  Speaker 1: stability comes impatience sometimes.
• 1:21:46
  Speaker 3: Yes, slowness and their trade-offs. And, you know, in most cases,
• 1:21:51
  Speaker 3: I think it is correct that this is how it works.
• 1:21:55
  Speaker 3: Of course, I wish the government were more efficient in
• 1:21:57
  Speaker 3: a lot of ways. I wish they had better technology,
• 1:22:00
  Speaker 3: trying to help them get better technology in a lot
• 1:22:02
  Speaker 3: of ways. But I don't think that will, I don't
• 1:22:04
  Speaker 3: think the government will magically in Medicare or any regime
• 1:22:07
  Speaker 3: just wake up and have, you know, 10X better technology tomorrow.
• 1:22:09
  Speaker 3: It's just unfortunately not going to happen.
• 1:22:11
  Speaker 1: So walk me through what is supposed to be the
• 1:22:15
  Speaker 1: idealized experience for somebody on chapter. Yeah.
• 1:22:18
  Speaker 3: So when people have Medicare questions, when they're figuring out
• 1:22:21
  Speaker 3: if they need to sign up, when to sign up,
• 1:22:23
  Speaker 3: how to sign up, they give us a call. They
• 1:22:26
  Speaker 3: can schedule a time via our website and get an
• 1:22:29
  Speaker 3: appointment or they can just- Is it.
• 1:22:31
  Speaker 1: Always a human being or how automated are you?
• 1:22:35
  Speaker 3: It is always a human being interacting with the customer directly.
• 1:22:40
  Speaker 3: On occasion, we will use different AI to help scheduling
• 1:22:44
  Speaker 3: or to help with admin tasks or to help get
• 1:22:48
  Speaker 3: an answer faster. But for the core, I have questions
• 1:22:51
  Speaker 3: at Medicare and I need to sign up for a plan,
• 1:22:53
  Speaker 3: that is always a human being. There are actually times
• 1:22:58
  Speaker 3: when we could be automating that away, but we've decided
• 1:23:00
  Speaker 3: not to. We build a lot of AI and we
• 1:23:02
  Speaker 3: use a lot of technology that's facing our team internally
• 1:23:06
  Speaker 3: so that our licensed Medicare advisors have the best information
• 1:23:09
  Speaker 3: at their fingertips and know what's going on. But we
• 1:23:12
  Speaker 3: think it's really important to have a relationship with the
• 1:23:15
  Speaker 3: end user. And the reality is most people want to
• 1:23:17
  Speaker 3: talk to a human, especially seniors. I think most Americans do,
• 1:23:21
  Speaker 3: but particularly seniors.
• 1:23:23
  Speaker 1: Oh, I have this theory that the next... wave of
• 1:23:28
  Speaker 1: incremental revenue streams for tech companies are going to be
• 1:23:32
  Speaker 1: to charge more for human connectivity. That human customer service,
• 1:23:39
  Speaker 1: you can get free customer service from an AI or
• 1:23:41
  Speaker 1: you can get human customer service. You may have to
• 1:23:46
  Speaker 1: pay for it, which is, some people aren't going to
• 1:23:48
  Speaker 1: like that I said that. I'm just saying, I'm not
• 1:23:51
  Speaker 1: saying it should be that way. I think we both
• 1:23:53
  Speaker 1: know Right. We both know that this could get there.
• 1:24:06
  Speaker 1: You just used a phrase, licensed Medicare advisor. How does
• 1:24:09
  Speaker 1: one become a licensed Medicare advisor?
• 1:24:13
  Speaker 3: There are a number of different regulatory steps you have
• 1:24:17
  Speaker 3: to go through. So you have to be licensed at
• 1:24:18
  Speaker 3: the federal level. There is a third party organization that
• 1:24:21
  Speaker 3: runs it to get the accreditation. It's an accident health
• 1:24:26
  Speaker 3: insurance license.
• 1:24:28
  Speaker 1: So do you have literally every employee goes to a
• 1:24:30
  Speaker 1: class or what is, you know, just walk me, I'm
• 1:24:34
  Speaker 1: just curious.
• 1:24:35
  Speaker 3: There's how do you get licensed, which frankly is not
• 1:24:37
  Speaker 3: a particularly high bar. How do you be a Medicare advisor?
• 1:24:40
  Speaker 3: A chapter is a much higher bar that we control.
• 1:24:42
  Speaker 3: The licensure is done by a third party. Every Medicare
• 1:24:45
  Speaker 3: advisor in the country has to go through the same test.
• 1:24:48
  Speaker 3: It's a standardized test to get, think of it as
• 1:24:50
  Speaker 3: like a real estate license. It's a credential you have
• 1:24:53
  Speaker 3: to get. Again, it's not a particularly high bar. For chapter,
• 1:24:58
  Speaker 3: we set up our own training program, which covers not
• 1:25:01
  Speaker 3: only the basics, but all the edge cases to make
• 1:25:03
  Speaker 3: sure people are getting the best guidance. Our philosophy around Medicare,
• 1:25:09
  Speaker 3: which is unique, most Medicare advisors really prioritize Medicare Advantage,
• 1:25:13
  Speaker 3: largely because that pays a higher commission. We don't do that.
• 1:25:17
  Speaker 3: We do what's right for the individual. And on net,
• 1:25:20
  Speaker 3: we tend to support more people into Medicare supplement because
• 1:25:23
  Speaker 3: we think it's the correct move for people. even if
• 1:25:26
  Speaker 3: it's not the best for our revenue, but we don't care.
• 1:25:29
  Speaker 3: And then we set up a lot of training on
• 1:25:33
  Speaker 3: our technology because the way that our Medicare advisors get
• 1:25:36
  Speaker 3: the most up-to-date data is via our technology platform that
• 1:25:39
  Speaker 3: we've built. So the way I like to think about
• 1:25:42
  Speaker 3: it and talk about it is if... let's say if
• 1:25:46
  Speaker 3: you were looking for directions in a town you just entered,
• 1:25:50
  Speaker 3: you could ask a gas station attendant, that's what you
• 1:25:53
  Speaker 3: might've done 20 years ago, like what's the fastest way
• 1:25:55
  Speaker 3: to get to this place? Or today you could ask
• 1:25:58
  Speaker 3: Google Maps, which not only will have all the roads,
• 1:26:00
  Speaker 3: it'll have any detours, it'll have live traffic, which the
• 1:26:03
  Speaker 3: gas station attendant probably won't have. And so we've built
• 1:26:05
  Speaker 3: kind of that Google Maps analog. So we know everything
• 1:26:08
  Speaker 3: that's going on on every plan with every doctor, with
• 1:26:11
  Speaker 3: every prescription, with every health system. in someone's local area
• 1:26:15
  Speaker 3: because that's what they care about. It doesn't really matter
• 1:26:18
  Speaker 3: that we're not the gas station attendant who lives there
• 1:26:21
  Speaker 3: because we have all the data.
• 1:26:27
  Speaker 1: The average person uses you the first time they sign
• 1:26:30
  Speaker 1: up and is that the last time they interact with Chapter?
• 1:26:34
  Speaker 3: No. So when people first connect with us, if it's appropriate,
• 1:26:38
  Speaker 3: we'll help them sign up for a plan. If they're
• 1:26:39
  Speaker 3: already on the right plan, we'll tell them that. Once
• 1:26:41
  Speaker 3: they enroll in a plan, we are there 24-7, 365
• 1:26:44
  Speaker 3: days a year. We have a full, what we call
• 1:26:46
  Speaker 3: our member advocate team, which helps people find doctors who
• 1:26:49
  Speaker 3: are in network, get lower price prescriptions, appeal bills and claims,
• 1:26:55
  Speaker 3: understand their Medicare benefits. and really just answer any question
• 1:26:59
  Speaker 3: they have. Our job is really to be the layer
• 1:27:01
  Speaker 3: between them and the insurance carrier, because frankly, insurance carriers
• 1:27:04
  Speaker 3: aren't that much fun to deal with. So we offer
• 1:27:08
  Speaker 3: that sort of layer of support in between.
• 1:27:10
  Speaker 1: Is the individual paying that, or is that part of your...
• 1:27:14
  Speaker 1: B structure, the commission you're getting or.
• 1:27:17
  Speaker 3: A lot of it, yeah. So we never charge the
• 1:27:19
  Speaker 3: individual for our services. The way we earn revenue and
• 1:27:21
  Speaker 3: build a business is we do earn revenue from the
• 1:27:23
  Speaker 3: insurance carrier, like other Medicare advisors. But one of the
• 1:27:27
  Speaker 3: many things that's unique about our model is we blind
• 1:27:29
  Speaker 3: all of that information from our team and our team's
• 1:27:32
  Speaker 3: compensation doesn't vary. So what that means is we will
• 1:27:35
  Speaker 3: still enroll you in a Medicare plan, even if we
• 1:27:38
  Speaker 3: are nothing on that plan. And the amount we pay
• 1:27:42
  Speaker 3: our Medicare advisors does not vary.
• 1:27:44
  Speaker 1: On average, how many Medicare plans are you guys, are
• 1:27:48
  Speaker 1: they paying to be part of chapter and how many
• 1:27:51
  Speaker 1: Medicare plans that you might guide people in where you're
• 1:27:54
  Speaker 1: not getting compensated? Is this... 50% of the market, 20%
• 1:27:58
  Speaker 1: of the market, 75%, you sure I'm asking?
• 1:28:01
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it actually varies a lot based on month because
• 1:28:04
  Speaker 3: different plans are commissionable or non-commissionable. We get more contracts
• 1:28:07
  Speaker 3: with more plans, but between 60 and 90% of people
• 1:28:12
  Speaker 3: we support, we earn revenue on, depending on the month.
• 1:28:15
  Speaker 3: So sometimes as low as 60%, sometimes as much as 90%.
• 1:28:18
  Speaker 1: You know, there's plenty of, a cynic is going to
• 1:28:20
  Speaker 1: hear that like, I'm sure they're always guiding into wherever
• 1:28:22
  Speaker 1: they get a commission.
• 1:28:23
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's just not true.
• 1:28:24
  Speaker 1: And that's just, it's, it's, but, When you say it's interesting,
• 1:28:31
  Speaker 1: you said the Medicare Advantage plans, that sounds like they're
• 1:28:37
  Speaker 1: the most aggressive at trying to get people into their plans.
• 1:28:40
  Speaker 3: That's right.
• 1:28:40
  Speaker 1: Why is that? Why do you think they don't, you know,
• 1:28:44
  Speaker 1: because Medigap is something you do with the government, right?
• 1:28:47
  Speaker 3: Medigap is also administered by these private insurance carriers.
• 1:28:51
  Speaker 1: Why do they not like it? They just get more
• 1:28:54
  Speaker 1: profit off of Medicare Advantage?
• 1:28:55
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's not that they don't like it. It's that
• 1:28:57
  Speaker 3: a Medicare Advantage plan tends to be more profitable than
• 1:29:00
  Speaker 3: a Medicare supplement plan to the insurance carrier, which if
• 1:29:03
  Speaker 3: you think about insurance, means that it should be the
• 1:29:07
  Speaker 3: inverse to the customer, that a Medicare supplement plan should
• 1:29:10
  Speaker 3: be more profitable to the customer. because it's a zero
• 1:29:13
  Speaker 3: sum game, there's a fixed number of dollars. If the
• 1:29:16
  Speaker 3: plan is making more, the customer is making less. That's
• 1:29:19
  Speaker 3: not strictly correct, but that's one directional way to think
• 1:29:21
  Speaker 3: about it. Broadly, Medicare Advantage carrier is making more money
• 1:29:28
  Speaker 3: on a plan than a Medigap carrier is making on
• 1:29:30
  Speaker 3: a plan. Medicare Advantage plans pay more to the distribute
• 1:29:36
  Speaker 3: what they would consider to user acquisition or marketing of
• 1:29:40
  Speaker 3: which Medicare advisors are part to get that to work.
• 1:29:46
  Speaker 1: You know, in your, and I know in these days
• 1:29:50
  Speaker 1: being bipartisan, I don't know if that's a good thing
• 1:29:52
  Speaker 1: or a bad thing. It depends on the person, right?
• 1:29:54
  Speaker 1: Like the way people feel about politicians in general. But
• 1:29:57
  Speaker 1: you've got, whether it's Donna Shalala Al Gore on the left, J.D. Vance,
• 1:30:04
  Speaker 1: I think Peter Thiel was a founder. Is that bipartisanship,
• 1:30:11
  Speaker 1: I mean, you guys believe it's a feature, is that
• 1:30:13
  Speaker 1: helpful to you? Or do you wish you had less
• 1:30:16
  Speaker 1: politicians involved?
• 1:30:18
  Speaker 3: We actually never had any intention of having politicians involved.
• 1:30:22
  Speaker 3: It was pure happenstance. So the backstory is Vivek Ramaswamy,
• 1:30:28
  Speaker 3: who's now a prominent Republican.
• 1:30:29
  Speaker 1: I forgot about Ramaswamy. Yes. a co-founder as well, right?
• 1:30:33
  Speaker 1: Was he a full co-founder? Yeah.
• 1:30:35
  Speaker 3: He was a full co-founder. Peter was not. But I
• 1:30:37
  Speaker 3: became very good friends with Vivek well before he ever
• 1:30:39
  Speaker 3: entered politics. He was just a successful entrepreneur. He founded
• 1:30:42
  Speaker 3: a very successful public biopharma company called Roivant, which is
• 1:30:46
  Speaker 3: a very good company. We had just gotten connected via
• 1:30:50
  Speaker 3: mutual friend because that person knew we were both interested
• 1:30:52
  Speaker 3: in helping older Americans. And so we just started getting
• 1:30:55
  Speaker 3: to know each other, became very good friends, started working
• 1:30:59
  Speaker 3: on the idea of chapter together. And then a few
• 1:31:02
  Speaker 3: years later, a couple of years later, he decided to
• 1:31:05
  Speaker 3: run for office, but that was never the context under
• 1:31:08
  Speaker 3: which we started working together, got to know each other. Similarly,
• 1:31:12
  Speaker 3: for JD, JD was a professional investor for a decade
• 1:31:16
  Speaker 3: before he entered politics as a senator in Ohio. He
• 1:31:20
  Speaker 3: was really interested in chapter actually because he grew up
• 1:31:22
  Speaker 3: largely reliant on his community on Medicaid. He cared a
• 1:31:26
  Speaker 3: lot about Medicare and Medicaid. When he was a senator,
• 1:31:28
  Speaker 3: he actually was very supportive of both programs. And so, again,
• 1:31:34
  Speaker 3: I met him under the context of him being a
• 1:31:36
  Speaker 3: professional investor. He was never a politician. Both of them
• 1:31:39
  Speaker 3: happened to be prominent politicians. One, the vice president, of course, today.
• 1:31:44
  Speaker 3: But that just sort of happened. It was never intentional.
• 1:31:46
  Speaker 3: And then similarly, We met Al Gore under the context
• 1:31:52
  Speaker 3: of him being a professional investor. He hasn't been in
• 1:31:54
  Speaker 3: politics in a very long time. Donna, of course, it's
• 1:31:58
  Speaker 3: political because she was the Secretary of Health, but again,
• 1:32:00
  Speaker 3: it was under the context of her being one of
• 1:32:02
  Speaker 3: the foremost experts of Medicare because she actually ran the
• 1:32:06
  Speaker 3: Medicare program for a very long time, for eight years
• 1:32:08
  Speaker 3: under Clinton. It was more just we got to know
• 1:32:12
  Speaker 3: people who were excited by our mission and excited by
• 1:32:14
  Speaker 3: what we're doing. and less about the politics, I think
• 1:32:18
  Speaker 3: it has actually been quite helpful to have people on
• 1:32:21
  Speaker 3: both sides of the aisle because Medicare is inherently a
• 1:32:25
  Speaker 3: government program, which even though it's, I'd say, nonpartisan, bipartisan,
• 1:32:30
  Speaker 3: everyone supports it, there are political components to it. And
• 1:32:35
  Speaker 3: in order to get anything passed, if we want to
• 1:32:37
  Speaker 3: pass any regulations, it does have to go through Congress.
• 1:32:40
  Speaker 3: So that's been helpful.
• 1:32:42
  Speaker 1: Do you guys have lobbyists or do you use a
• 1:32:44
  Speaker 1: trade association?
• 1:32:47
  Speaker 3: Sort of neither. So for the first four years, all
• 1:32:52
  Speaker 3: government engagement, I did just myself. I reached out to
• 1:32:57
  Speaker 3: Congress members. I cold emailed people.
• 1:32:58
  Speaker 1: You had sort of been working on government contracts in
• 1:33:02
  Speaker 1: the past. You felt pretty familiar with the process.
• 1:33:05
  Speaker 2: Yes. Yes.
• 1:33:06
  Speaker 3: When I was at Palantir, again, I've never been a
• 1:33:09
  Speaker 3: lobbyist as a technical legal term. I've never been a lobbyist.
• 1:33:12
  Speaker 3: I've never technically lobbied, I don't think. I've spent a
• 1:33:16
  Speaker 3: lot of time with legislators, with federal government. I felt
• 1:33:21
  Speaker 3: pretty good about how to engage with them and how
• 1:33:23
  Speaker 3: to educate them. I was very fortunate to be invited
• 1:33:26
  Speaker 3: to testify at the Senate in 2023. At the Senate
• 1:33:28
  Speaker 3: Finance Committee, they were doing a hearing on how to
• 1:33:31
  Speaker 3: improve Medicare marketing for seniors. Um, and so that was
• 1:33:34
  Speaker 3: a really cool life experience to be able to testify
• 1:33:36
  Speaker 3: in front of the Senate. Um, but, uh, the past,
• 1:33:39
  Speaker 3: the past, uh, the past year I've been leaning on
• 1:33:41
  Speaker 3: some more, some more additional support, um, as we've been
• 1:33:44
  Speaker 3: trying to expand, uh, the messaging and get more pro-consumer, uh,
• 1:33:49
  Speaker 3: regulations in front of Congress members.
• 1:33:51
  Speaker 1: Are you only focused on Medicare or are you, uh,
• 1:33:57
  Speaker 1: do you, do you plan to expand into, um, the
• 1:34:00
  Speaker 1: regular health insurance system, you know, the portals, healthcare.gov.
• 1:34:05
  Speaker 2: Medicaid, and any of that?
• 1:34:07
  Speaker 3: Our vision as a company has always been from day
• 1:34:10
  Speaker 3: one to help older Americans live the best chapter of
• 1:34:14
  Speaker 3: their lives of retirement. And so we want to redefine
• 1:34:17
  Speaker 3: what it means to be older, what it means to
• 1:34:18
  Speaker 3: be retired in this country. And I think healthcare and
• 1:34:22
  Speaker 3: health insurance is a really important part of that, but
• 1:34:25
  Speaker 3: it's not the only part.
• 1:34:26
  Speaker 1: So if you expand, you're not expanding in healthcare. You're expanding,
• 1:34:30
  Speaker 1: sticking with the same demographic group, not to sort of,
• 1:34:33
  Speaker 1: you know, it's like there are two directions your business
• 1:34:37
  Speaker 1: plan could have gone, right? One would have been the
• 1:34:40
  Speaker 1: entire healthcare system, insurance system, and you could have gone
• 1:34:43
  Speaker 1: in different directions. You've decided to stick to, we're going
• 1:34:47
  Speaker 1: to be an organization for seniors. And so maybe you
• 1:34:51
  Speaker 1: end up getting into life insurance or fiduciary or things
• 1:34:54
  Speaker 1: like that. Is that what you're thinking?
• 1:34:56
  Speaker 3: The first part, yes. Our goal is to help seniors,
• 1:34:59
  Speaker 3: and we think about how do we earn the right
• 1:35:01
  Speaker 3: to help people with more and more aspects of their lives.
• 1:35:05
  Speaker 3: I don't particularly want to sell insurance. We only sell
• 1:35:09
  Speaker 3: Medicare because it's so important. I think, frankly, most people
• 1:35:13
  Speaker 3: who are buying life insurance should probably buy it before
• 1:35:15
  Speaker 3: their 60s. Otherwise, it's not necessarily... a good product to buy.
• 1:35:19
  Speaker 3: I don't know that we want to go selling life insurance,
• 1:35:21
  Speaker 3: but more specifically, we do want to help people with
• 1:35:23
  Speaker 3: their finances. We will be rolling out a product later
• 1:35:27
  Speaker 3: this year actually to monitor people's health expenses and tell
• 1:35:30
  Speaker 3: them when they're being overpaid. Because we know everything about
• 1:35:32
  Speaker 3: your health insurance, about your Medicare, we can tell you,
• 1:35:35
  Speaker 3: are you being charged the in-network copay as opposed to
• 1:35:39
  Speaker 3: the out-of-network copay? Are you being charged the right amount
• 1:35:42
  Speaker 3: from your doctor and from your health insurance carrier? Starting
• 1:35:44
  Speaker 3: to monitor people's expenses to save them money. That type
• 1:35:47
  Speaker 3: of thing I'm very excited about.
• 1:35:50
  Speaker 1: I think about, you know, being with the entrepreneurial myself
• 1:35:56
  Speaker 1: in different areas, you always think, okay, who could disrupt
• 1:35:59
  Speaker 1: my business? And it feels to me your only challenge
• 1:36:04
  Speaker 1: is the federal government, right? I guess medicare.gov, in theory,
• 1:36:09
  Speaker 1: could offer the services you offer. It just sounds like
• 1:36:15
  Speaker 1: you think, well, Maybe they'll eventually figure this out. But
• 1:36:19
  Speaker 1: for a good 10 to 15, maybe 20 years, this
• 1:36:21
  Speaker 1: is going to be a good business.
• 1:36:23
  Speaker 3: Frankly, if the government is my main competition, I feel great.
• 1:36:29
  Speaker 1: And is that how you view it? Or do you
• 1:36:31
  Speaker 1: right now as you're- It's not. I don't think you
• 1:36:34
  Speaker 1: can be a successful, run a good business if you
• 1:36:37
  Speaker 1: don't measure yourself against it. So I always love to
• 1:36:40
  Speaker 1: ask this question. Who do you measure yourself against?
• 1:36:43
  Speaker 3: I appreciate that question. To answer the first part, I
• 1:36:45
  Speaker 3: don't view myself in competition with the government at all.
• 1:36:51
  Speaker 3: Even if the government had better technology, there will be
• 1:36:53
  Speaker 3: at least 50% of Americans who don't trust, unfortunately, who
• 1:36:56
  Speaker 3: don't trust the government.
• 1:36:57
  Speaker 1: You're right. No matter what, they want some third-party verifier.
• 1:37:00
  Speaker 1: You're 100% correct.
• 1:37:02
  Speaker 3: I don't view it as competition. I view it as, hopefully, complementary.
• 1:37:07
  Speaker 3: We don't view ourselves, alluding to it as really a
• 1:37:10
  Speaker 3: Medicare company, we view ourselves as a technology company that
• 1:37:13
  Speaker 3: builds great products to help redefine retirement. When we think
• 1:37:16
  Speaker 3: about that, we're thinking about how do we build the
• 1:37:19
  Speaker 3: best technology? I think about the best technology companies. How
• 1:37:24
  Speaker 3: do we build great products that people love, like Apple?
• 1:37:27
  Speaker 3: How do we build great AI products, like some of
• 1:37:30
  Speaker 3: the AI labs? How do we build great applications of AI,
• 1:37:34
  Speaker 3: like some of the verticalized application companies that are building
• 1:37:41
  Speaker 3: really good products? That's more how we think of ourselves.
• 1:37:44
  Speaker 3: To your point, though, it's a very strange When I
• 1:37:48
  Speaker 3: started the company, as happens in any investor-backed category, there
• 1:37:53
  Speaker 3: were a lot of other companies that from the outside
• 1:37:55
  Speaker 3: looked pretty similar to us. There were seven or eight
• 1:37:57
  Speaker 3: other venture-backed companies trying to revamp Medicare or the Medicare process.
• 1:38:02
  Speaker 3: We're the only one that exists today of those 78.
• 1:38:06
  Speaker 3: They've all gone out of business. So in a lot
• 1:38:10
  Speaker 3: of ways, we don't really have competition today, at least
• 1:38:13
  Speaker 3: in our core sort of what we do, which is strange.
• 1:38:16
  Speaker 1: What do you think the failure was of those other
• 1:38:18
  Speaker 1: businesses they were just technologically behind?
• 1:38:22
  Speaker 3: There's a number of different aspects, and obviously I wasn't there. Oh,
• 1:38:25
  Speaker 3: of course. But my hypothesis is there are two things.
• 1:38:29
  Speaker 3: One is it's a very hard... business to execute well.
• 1:38:32
  Speaker 3: It's just very hard from a data perspective, from an
• 1:38:35
  Speaker 3: insurance carrier relations perspective, from a user acquisition perspective, it's
• 1:38:37
  Speaker 3: very hard to execute. And so execution is one component.
• 1:38:40
  Speaker 3: And then the other component is Because my background in
• 1:38:43
  Speaker 3: data and technology, I think I understand the value of
• 1:38:46
  Speaker 3: having accurate data and how much that affects people's interaction
• 1:38:51
  Speaker 3: with the company. Most of these other companies really just
• 1:38:53
  Speaker 3: tried to make the user interface a little bit better
• 1:38:56
  Speaker 3: without fixing the underlying data challenges and the underlying incentive challenges.
• 1:39:00
  Speaker 3: So I think we solved a lot of the actual
• 1:39:03
  Speaker 3: foundational issues that other people either weren't aware of or
• 1:39:06
  Speaker 3: couldn't solve.
• 1:39:07
  Speaker 1: All right. So you have a unique perspective. And you
• 1:39:10
  Speaker 1: have a unique insight on this sort of, you know,
• 1:39:15
  Speaker 1: we have this quasi public private health care relationship, health
• 1:39:19
  Speaker 1: insurance relationship in this country. Right. It's always ours is different.
• 1:39:24
  Speaker 1: Wave a magic wand. If you were starting this from scratch,
• 1:39:28
  Speaker 1: what would it look like? Is there anything out there
• 1:39:30
  Speaker 1: that's familiar today that you'd be like, you know, this
• 1:39:34
  Speaker 1: model would if we had only started it this way,
• 1:39:37
  Speaker 1: we'd be in a better place.
• 1:39:40
  Speaker 3: It's really hard to come up with a perfect healthcare
• 1:39:43
  Speaker 3: system for the US. Other countries have in many ways
• 1:39:47
  Speaker 3: more effective healthcare systems, but it's largely because they're much
• 1:39:50
  Speaker 3: more homogenous. They're much smaller. And homogeneity matters when you're
• 1:39:56
  Speaker 3: dealing with healthcare because there are genetic correlations that affect
• 1:40:01
  Speaker 3: the type of care people need.
• 1:40:03
  Speaker 1: We're not an ethnic-based nation. We're an idea. So it
• 1:40:05
  Speaker 1: means we've got the whole world's DNA in our country.
• 1:40:10
  Speaker 1: in a way that no other country has this much
• 1:40:12
  Speaker 1: different DNA in it than ours.
• 1:40:14
  Speaker 3: Which is a beautiful thing for our country, but a
• 1:40:16
  Speaker 3: very hard thing for.
• 1:40:16
  Speaker 1: Our health system to deal with.
• 1:40:19
  Speaker 3: I do think there are a couple of core principles
• 1:40:21
  Speaker 3: that if we implemented would make our system 100X better.
• 1:40:26
  Speaker 3: One is today there's no longitudinal incentive for an insurance
• 1:40:30
  Speaker 3: carrier to proactively keep us healthy. What I mean by
• 1:40:33
  Speaker 3: that is If you're.
• 1:40:35
  Speaker 1: On, you know- They make more money when we use
• 1:40:37
  Speaker 1: the system. They don't make more money when we don't.
• 1:40:40
  Speaker 2: Exactly.
• 1:40:40
  Speaker 3: And so how do we flip that incentive? And not
• 1:40:42
  Speaker 3: only that, but I am going to be, you know,
• 1:40:45
  Speaker 3: I'm employed by chapter. I get my health insurance through chapter.
• 1:40:50
  Speaker 3: Chapter may switch its health insurance carrier next year. So
• 1:40:53
  Speaker 3: all of Chapter's employees may go from insurance carrier A
• 1:40:57
  Speaker 3: to insurance carrier B. So why should insurance carrier A
• 1:41:00
  Speaker 3: think about how healthy I'm going to be in 10 years?
• 1:41:02
  Speaker 3: They only care about how healthy I'm going to be
• 1:41:04
  Speaker 3: when I'm covered by them and I can make money
• 1:41:05
  Speaker 3: by them, right?
• 1:41:06
  Speaker 1: Interesting.
• 1:41:07
  Speaker 3: Similar for Medicare. Again, it depends on the type of
• 1:41:10
  Speaker 3: Medicare and the specifics, but many people switch their plan
• 1:41:13
  Speaker 3: every year. And so if you are switching your plan
• 1:41:15
  Speaker 3: every year, why should an insurance care care about your
• 1:41:19
  Speaker 3: health in 15 or 20 years? And that's a rational response.
• 1:41:22
  Speaker 3: It's not, I'm not blaming the insurance care. It's actually rational.
• 1:41:25
  Speaker 1: No, it's, I was just going to say, right. It's a,
• 1:41:27
  Speaker 1: this is logic, right? It's human.
• 1:41:29
  Speaker 3: And so what I would love to see is some
• 1:41:32
  Speaker 3: type of longitudinal incentive. And I think there's a lot
• 1:41:36
  Speaker 3: of ways that could be implemented. But one way is
• 1:41:39
  Speaker 3: you basically have a reinsurance carrier that who is basically,
• 1:41:44
  Speaker 3: it would have to be government facilitated in some way
• 1:41:46
  Speaker 3: because they'd have to be with you for at least
• 1:41:49
  Speaker 3: 30 years. I'd say you get assigned a reinsurance carrier
• 1:41:53
  Speaker 3: who's with you for, I don't know, 18 to until
• 1:41:58
  Speaker 3: you pass away or something like that, where they actually
• 1:42:02
  Speaker 3: are compensated and are incentivized to improve your health over
• 1:42:07
  Speaker 3: the long term.
• 1:42:08
  Speaker 1: It's almost like they get paid more the longer we live.
• 1:42:11
  Speaker 3: Exactly.
• 1:42:12
  Speaker 1: Exactly.
• 1:42:13
  Speaker 3: Or they get paid for preventative care or, you know,
• 1:42:17
  Speaker 3: there's a lot of ways to, to, and the details
• 1:42:19
  Speaker 3: matter a lot and are hard to pontificate on an abstract,
• 1:42:22
  Speaker 3: but I think that concept would dramatically.
• 1:42:26
  Speaker 1: I mean, we sort of dabbled in it with the, with, when,
• 1:42:30
  Speaker 1: with the smoking, right. If you're a smoker, you get
• 1:42:33
  Speaker 1: charged more. And, and I guess in the law, we
• 1:42:37
  Speaker 1: decided that was okay to do that. Right. There was
• 1:42:39
  Speaker 1: always some, you know, it is, you know, obviously the
• 1:42:43
  Speaker 1: big fight during Obamacare was, okay, if you're gonna cover
• 1:42:46
  Speaker 1: preexisting conditions and make it sort of a neutral deal,
• 1:42:52
  Speaker 1: a healthier person doesn't get to pay less, right? You're
• 1:42:54
  Speaker 1: in this larger pool. And, you know, if you don't,
• 1:42:59
  Speaker 1: as we've all learned, if you don't do it that way,
• 1:43:02
  Speaker 1: you know, you basically disincentivize insurance companies from helping unhealthy people, right?
• 1:43:07
  Speaker 3: Yes, yes. The second element, which actually isn't health insurance related,
• 1:43:12
  Speaker 3: so much of our health is determined by our food
• 1:43:15
  Speaker 3: and our food quality is so much worse than most
• 1:43:19
  Speaker 3: other developed countries. And so I just think if we
• 1:43:22
  Speaker 3: had better food and it were more cost-effective to buy
• 1:43:26
  Speaker 3: good food, to me, it's always been crazy that if
• 1:43:28
  Speaker 3: I want to buy just lettuce, like good quality lettuce
• 1:43:33
  Speaker 3: or good quality apples, that is more expensive than buying
• 1:43:37
  Speaker 3: a hamburger or Right.
• 1:43:39
  Speaker 1: In theory, had more people had to do work to
• 1:43:44
  Speaker 1: create that hamburger, there was more, you know, whether it's
• 1:43:47
  Speaker 1: the right processes to create the hamburger than there is
• 1:43:51
  Speaker 1: to create the apple. And yet the apple, you know,
• 1:43:55
  Speaker 1: fresh apples can be as expensive as a McDonald's hamburger.
• 1:43:59
  Speaker 3: Exactly. And so I think we need better quality food
• 1:44:02
  Speaker 3: that's more affordable. And again, it's rational that especially people
• 1:44:07
  Speaker 3: who have less income are relying on cheaper food, and
• 1:44:11
  Speaker 3: that cheaper food is predominantly not healthy. And so I
• 1:44:14
  Speaker 3: think if we could fix a lot of our food
• 1:44:16
  Speaker 3: supply and food economics, it would also dramatically improve the
• 1:44:19
  Speaker 3: health of this country.
• 1:44:21
  Speaker 1: So 10 years ago, when you were learning, when you
• 1:44:25
  Speaker 1: got to Silicon Valley, you started Did you think you
• 1:44:28
  Speaker 1: were going to be in the healthcare space?
• 1:44:30
  Speaker 3: I did not, I still often don't think of ourselves
• 1:44:34
  Speaker 3: in the healthcare space. Obviously, we interact with health insurance carriers,
• 1:44:36
  Speaker 3: but so much of what we do is we think
• 1:44:38
  Speaker 3: about the world so differently than anyone who has grown up,
• 1:44:42
  Speaker 3: so to speak, in healthcare. But no, I didn't expect
• 1:44:46
  Speaker 3: us to, I didn't expect myself to be here. As
• 1:44:49
  Speaker 3: you alluded to, it's always kind of funny to think
• 1:44:51
  Speaker 3: about the current vice president as someone that was involved
• 1:44:56
  Speaker 3: with the company, a former vice president, someone who was
• 1:44:58
  Speaker 3: involved with the company.
• 1:44:59
  Speaker 1: Sure.
• 1:45:00
  Speaker 3: Uh yeah yeah these.
• 1:45:01
  Speaker 1: Were really got a lot of vice presidents yeah yeah
• 1:45:03
  Speaker 1: we'll see if we can get some more we'll find
• 1:45:07
  Speaker 1: out what uh what kamala harris is up to right
• 1:45:10
  Speaker 1: yeah exactly and all that stuff um well uh look
• 1:45:14
  Speaker 1: i uh and full disclosure you guys are a sponsor
• 1:45:18
  Speaker 1: your sponsor also my partner on super tuesday's chris eliza
• 1:45:23
  Speaker 1: um and so look i i think these conversations are useful,
• 1:45:28
  Speaker 1: they're helpful, and I want to make them sort of
• 1:45:30
  Speaker 1: where people learn something. I appreciate that. I appreciate that
• 1:45:34
  Speaker 1: you were comfortable and forthcoming talking about all this. Of course.
• 1:45:38
  Speaker 3: Thanks so much for having me.
• 1:45:53
  Speaker 1: All right, now it's time for my top five list
• 1:45:55
  Speaker 1: for the week. And so I thought I'd dabble into
• 1:45:57
  Speaker 1: presidential politics. Before I get there, I want to talk
• 1:46:00
  Speaker 1: about what Gavin Newsom said to my friend Jake Tapper.
• 1:46:04
  Speaker 1: And I thought it was a very interesting comment he
• 1:46:07
  Speaker 1: made about, you know, that he's not going to run
• 1:46:10
  Speaker 1: if Kamala Harris runs for president. Now, there are plenty
• 1:46:16
  Speaker 1: of ways that somebody may want to read subtext into that.
• 1:46:20
  Speaker 1: Does Gavin Newsom already think she's not going to run
• 1:46:22
  Speaker 1: and he thinks that's safe to say? Does Gavin Newsom
• 1:46:25
  Speaker 1: think that if they both run, they both blow up
• 1:46:27
  Speaker 1: each other's candidacy anyway, so it's no good? Does he
• 1:46:30
  Speaker 1: realize that if it's him and Kamala, that the most
• 1:46:34
  Speaker 1: important constituency in Democratic politics, African-American voters, are going to
• 1:46:38
  Speaker 1: punish him for not showing deference to the former vice president?
• 1:46:43
  Speaker 1: There's a variety of ways you can read into that.
• 1:46:48
  Speaker 1: My point is, I think he gave the right answer.
• 1:46:51
  Speaker 1: And I think that is the right way to think
• 1:46:53
  Speaker 1: about this. And I think of Gavin Newsom, like, do I? Look,
• 1:46:57
  Speaker 1: I think Gavin Newsom's best chance at a Democratic presidential
• 1:47:00
  Speaker 1: nomination was 2024.
• 1:47:01
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 1:47:04
  Speaker 1: Some of you know I've gone through my what ifs
• 1:47:06
  Speaker 1: over the years that, you know, Hillary Clinton's best chance
• 1:47:08
  Speaker 1: at the presidency was the year she didn't run, 2004.
• 1:47:13
  Speaker 1: I believe that the best chance Chris Christie had to
• 1:47:16
  Speaker 1: become president had he been in 2012. which he thought
• 1:47:19
  Speaker 1: at the time was a cycle too soon. I think
• 1:47:21
  Speaker 1: we've all learned it's never a cycle too soon. And
• 1:47:25
  Speaker 1: I think that Gavin Newsom's best chance was to follow
• 1:47:33
  Speaker 1: in the footsteps of his political hero, Bobby Kennedy, the
• 1:47:37
  Speaker 1: father of the one that serves in the Trump administration,
• 1:47:41
  Speaker 1: and challenge a sitting president. But I understand that that
• 1:47:48
  Speaker 1: was a That was a tough decision and one he
• 1:47:52
  Speaker 1: chose not to do. I do think a California Democrat
• 1:47:57
  Speaker 1: is going to have a hard time playing in the
• 1:48:00
  Speaker 1: middle of the country. But when I see, look, this
• 1:48:07
  Speaker 1: is a reminder that he is thinking about this very carefully.
• 1:48:11
  Speaker 1: He's self-aware. He's correctly understanding where the Democratic electorate may
• 1:48:20
  Speaker 1: be right now. And I just thought it was a,
• 1:48:28
  Speaker 1: it's a reminder to myself to be careful underestimating them.
• 1:48:32
  Speaker 1: Like I said, it is easier to make the case
• 1:48:36
  Speaker 1: that Gavin Newsom's not going to be the Democratic nominee
• 1:48:39
  Speaker 1: for president. than it is to make the case. It
• 1:48:41
  Speaker 1: is hard to make the conventional case. But there's always
• 1:48:44
  Speaker 1: one thing I never want to, that does matter in
• 1:48:46
  Speaker 1: presidential politics is, are you willing to do the things
• 1:48:50
  Speaker 1: you need to do to win? Are you going to listen?
• 1:48:55
  Speaker 1: You know, I watch, for instance, take Tallarico in Texas.
• 1:49:00
  Speaker 1: You know why he impresses me as a candidate? He's
• 1:49:02
  Speaker 1: not being stubborn. He's like, yeah, that non-binary comment is, It,
• 1:49:07
  Speaker 1: you know, it's been taken out of contest and that's weird.
• 1:49:09
  Speaker 1: And I'm not going to stand by it or I'm
• 1:49:10
  Speaker 1: not going to stand by this meat comment or whatever.
• 1:49:12
  Speaker 1: Like he is, he just is not allowing, he's not,
• 1:49:17
  Speaker 1: you know, a lot of times, you know, when, when
• 1:49:20
  Speaker 1: people get caught saying something that was probably something that
• 1:49:24
  Speaker 1: was politically inconvenient, they want to defend why they said it. No, when,
• 1:49:31
  Speaker 1: you know, what do they say about when you're, when
• 1:49:33
  Speaker 1: you're in a hole, stop digging. And Tallarico has shown
• 1:49:37
  Speaker 1: me that he is, look, he will not get caught digging.
• 1:49:41
  Speaker 1: Anytime he has been, somebody has tried to put him
• 1:49:44
  Speaker 1: on the defensive on something he said previously, he literally
• 1:49:47
  Speaker 1: pivots it back to Paxton, pivots it back to Koss,
• 1:49:50
  Speaker 1: and just says, hey, my, you know, yeah, some of my,
• 1:49:53
  Speaker 1: you know, comments were either taken out of context or,
• 1:49:58
  Speaker 1: you know, that was kind of a nutty thing to say.
• 1:50:00
  Speaker 1: I don't know what I was thinking or whatever.
• 1:50:02
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 1:50:06
  Speaker 1: And I get the sense that Gavin Newsom has this
• 1:50:10
  Speaker 1: gene in him. Now, look, like I said, I have
• 1:50:13
  Speaker 1: a lot of, I think he's, I think his record
• 1:50:15
  Speaker 1: in California is tough to sell, right? This is, I
• 1:50:18
  Speaker 1: don't think Americans outside of California think it is an
• 1:50:24
  Speaker 1: affordable place to live. I think it's more affordable than
• 1:50:27
  Speaker 1: people realize if you live there, but it does like
• 1:50:29
  Speaker 1: those gas prices are high. And the cost of living
• 1:50:32
  Speaker 1: does seem high, particularly if you live in San Francisco
• 1:50:34
  Speaker 1: and that homeless problem, all these things. And I think
• 1:50:37
  Speaker 1: the picture people that don't live in California get of
• 1:50:40
  Speaker 1: California is one that's just going to be a stereotype
• 1:50:43
  Speaker 1: that's going to be hard for him to overcome. But
• 1:50:50
  Speaker 1: the man wants it, and he seems to be trying
• 1:50:56
  Speaker 1: not to make any mistakes. Which brings me to my
• 1:51:02
  Speaker 1: top five list at the moment. And I know, and
• 1:51:07
  Speaker 1: I think the last time I did this, I had
• 1:51:09
  Speaker 1: AOC in the one slot. And I believe it for
• 1:51:11
  Speaker 1: a variety of reasons, as I said at the time.
• 1:51:14
  Speaker 1: One is I do think that, I think that if
• 1:51:16
  Speaker 1: she does run, she sucks up all the oxygen. Kind
• 1:51:21
  Speaker 1: of what Trump did to the 2016 Republican field. And
• 1:51:25
  Speaker 1: I don't think we all saw that coming. And this time,
• 1:51:27
  Speaker 1: I think we will probably more likely see it come.
• 1:51:29
  Speaker 1: But I think just the amount of attention she got
• 1:51:33
  Speaker 1: for her presidency, for sharing with the public the process
• 1:51:39
  Speaker 1: of freezing her eggs and how much attention she got
• 1:51:42
  Speaker 1: from that. It's just a reminder that there is just,
• 1:51:44
  Speaker 1: in the same way there was with Trump, there's a
• 1:51:46
  Speaker 1: huge fascination and just her everyday movements could be dominant
• 1:51:52
  Speaker 1: in this attention economy. But the question is whether, has
• 1:51:55
  Speaker 1: presidential politics been changed so much that the attention economy
• 1:52:00
  Speaker 1: is what will matter? That is what happened in the
• 1:52:03
  Speaker 1: Republican side of things. We did not yet have seen
• 1:52:07
  Speaker 1: that happen on the Democratic side of things, right? You
• 1:52:10
  Speaker 1: could argue Bernie Sanders won the attention economy primary in 16,
• 1:52:13
  Speaker 1: but lost the nomination. You could argue that Pete Buttigieg
• 1:52:17
  Speaker 1: and Bernie Sanders and everybody else won the attention economy
• 1:52:20
  Speaker 1: of 2020, but Joe Biden ended up with the nomination.
• 1:52:26
  Speaker 1: I think if Democrats win control of both of the
• 1:52:29
  Speaker 1: House and Senate, and especially if Abdul El-Sayed is seen
• 1:52:35
  Speaker 1: as sort of, even if he won, but it was underperforming.
• 1:52:40
  Speaker 1: I think the front runner to begin this thing is
• 1:52:44
  Speaker 1: Pete Buttigieg. I don't think people fully appreciate that his
• 1:52:50
  Speaker 1: organization is more mature, not just more mature than what
• 1:52:53
  Speaker 1: it was before, but it's more mature than anybody else
• 1:52:56
  Speaker 1: running at the moment. When I, in the shadow campaigns,
• 1:52:59
  Speaker 1: I'm talking about all the governors, whether it's Brett Skirbashir, Moore, Shapiro,
• 1:53:03
  Speaker 1: you name it. I think that when you think of–
• 1:53:08
  Speaker 1: if you look at who the winning candidates can be
• 1:53:12
  Speaker 1: for these 2026 races, an Ossoff in Georgia, a Tallarico
• 1:53:17
  Speaker 1: in Texas, a Turek in Iowa, even a Troy Jackson
• 1:53:25
  Speaker 1: in Maine, an Adam Hamilton in Kansas. you know, the
• 1:53:34
  Speaker 1: veterans that are running both in Montana. Pete Buttigieg is
• 1:53:40
  Speaker 1: the one Democrat that candidates in all those places are
• 1:53:45
  Speaker 1: comfortable standing next to. And that matters. Biden was that
• 1:53:48
  Speaker 1: person in 2018. And certainly there are places where Bernie
• 1:53:54
  Speaker 1: is being invited that not a lot of other Democrats
• 1:53:56
  Speaker 1: get invited either. And I think Bernie has his own
• 1:53:59
  Speaker 1: connection with the electorate that is different than the frankly,
• 1:54:03
  Speaker 1: a standard socialist adjacent candidate. You're not going to, I
• 1:54:07
  Speaker 1: think Bernie Sanders can go places that AOC cannot, for instance,
• 1:54:12
  Speaker 1: at least as far as the 2026 midterms are concerned.
• 1:54:16
  Speaker 1: And so in my top five at the moment, and
• 1:54:19
  Speaker 1: what I'm trying to do is projecting it out based
• 1:54:21
  Speaker 1: on if Democrats sweep, I think it's Buttigieg that's the
• 1:54:25
  Speaker 1: front runner. It's sort of the institutional front runner. And
• 1:54:30
  Speaker 1: then we'll see what AOC does. And if she does, she's,
• 1:54:32
  Speaker 1: you know, if the Democrats, you know, will their primary
• 1:54:40
  Speaker 1: process change to the point where the attention economy matters
• 1:54:44
  Speaker 1: as much as on the ground organization? That has not
• 1:54:47
  Speaker 1: always been the case.
• 1:54:50
  Speaker 3: Right?
• 1:54:51
  Speaker 1: We know what happened on the Republican side of things.
• 1:54:54
  Speaker 1: Can she be that transformative in how her primary works?
• 1:54:58
  Speaker 1: That would be, you know, and so, so I'm putting
• 1:55:02
  Speaker 1: Pete in my one slot AOC in the two slot.
• 1:55:05
  Speaker 1: And then I think there's a bit of a gap.
• 1:55:08
  Speaker 1: I think if you're going to make me do three, four,
• 1:55:09
  Speaker 1: and five, I'm going to put Gavin in the third
• 1:55:11
  Speaker 1: spot because he certainly has higher name ID than any
• 1:55:15
  Speaker 1: of the other governors that are looking at running, right?
• 1:55:17
  Speaker 1: His name ID is higher than Beshear, than Moore, than Shapiro,
• 1:55:20
  Speaker 1: than Pritzker. He is, of all the Democrats who've never
• 1:55:25
  Speaker 1: run for president before, he probably has, you know, only
• 1:55:28
  Speaker 1: AOC has probably a higher name ID than Gavin Newsom.
• 1:55:32
  Speaker 1: So I think you have to say he starts, uh,
• 1:55:34
  Speaker 1: in the, in the third slot there. And then number four,
• 1:55:37
  Speaker 1: I would put Mark Kelly. I think he's another one
• 1:55:42
  Speaker 1: that in this political environment has been seen as an
• 1:55:47
  Speaker 1: asset to invite, you know, being a former astronaut, military veteran,
• 1:55:52
  Speaker 1: you know, he can go to, he can go to
• 1:55:53
  Speaker 1: Iowa and go to Kansas. He can go to Texas.
• 1:55:55
  Speaker 1: He can go to Maine. He can go, he can
• 1:55:56
  Speaker 1: go to any of these places. Um, And so I
• 1:56:03
  Speaker 1: think he's had a better 26 than people have given
• 1:56:06
  Speaker 1: him credit for. And then I'm going to put Beshear
• 1:56:09
  Speaker 1: in my fifth slot because he's the DGA chair. And
• 1:56:12
  Speaker 1: if Democrats do well nationally, they're going to do well
• 1:56:15
  Speaker 1: in these governor's races. You know, and if a couple of,
• 1:56:17
  Speaker 1: you know, what if a Democrat wins the governor's race
• 1:56:20
  Speaker 1: in Florida? What if a Democrat actually pulls an upset
• 1:56:23
  Speaker 1: in Texas? You're going to have a new Democratic governor
• 1:56:26
  Speaker 1: likely in Iowa that very much is kind of in
• 1:56:29
  Speaker 1: the Beshear mold, right? Now, what's interesting about my list
• 1:56:35
  Speaker 1: is that you could argue I have sort of two
• 1:56:38
  Speaker 1: more on the conservative sort of center left side of
• 1:56:44
  Speaker 1: the island, Kelly and Beshear. I have sort of mainstream
• 1:56:50
  Speaker 1: liberal in Gavin Newsom. And I guess Pete, you would
• 1:56:53
  Speaker 1: put in there, who I think sort of has the
• 1:56:54
  Speaker 1: temperament of a center left, but the policy positions of
• 1:56:58
  Speaker 1: a mainstream liberal. And then one socialist adjacent. I guess
• 1:57:01
  Speaker 1: she's a member of the DSA. in AOC. But that's
• 1:57:06
  Speaker 1: my top five at the moment. Pete, AOC, Gavin, Kelly,
• 1:57:11
  Speaker 1: Mark Kelly, and Andy Beshear. Probably doesn't look like what
• 1:57:15
  Speaker 1: Polymarket looks like or CalShe or any of those other places.
• 1:57:20
  Speaker 1: But that's where I see things, particularly based on where
• 1:57:24
  Speaker 1: this environment appears to be headed in 26 and what
• 1:57:27
  Speaker 1: will seem to be the most appealing going in to 28.
• 1:57:38
  Speaker 1: All right, we're going to start with Michael R. He goes,
• 1:57:43
  Speaker 1: longtime listener, proud resident of Maryland's fourth congressional district. I
• 1:57:47
  Speaker 1: believe that's PG County, parts of PG County. And Michael writes,
• 1:57:53
  Speaker 1: given the political environment and candidate quality of the cycle,
• 1:57:55
  Speaker 1: could Democrats have made solidly red states like Kentucky and
• 1:57:58
  Speaker 1: Louisiana more competitive with recruits like Andy Beshear or Mitchell Andrew?
• 1:58:02
  Speaker 1: Louisiana in particular feels like a missed opportunity. Love the show,
• 1:58:05
  Speaker 1: Michael R. Well, look, I think would John Bel Edwards
• 1:58:10
  Speaker 1: have been a potentially good candidate in Louisiana?
• 1:58:13
  Speaker 3: Maybe.
• 1:58:14
  Speaker 1: And I guess in hindsight, if you knew Cassidy was
• 1:58:18
  Speaker 1: going to, but I don't know if Julia Letlow is
• 1:58:21
  Speaker 1: an unelectable conservative in Louisiana. Like, I don't think she's
• 1:58:25
  Speaker 1: too mega-y. There were people that could have been to
• 1:58:29
  Speaker 1: the to the right of her that might've done that.
• 1:58:32
  Speaker 1: I think the better question is Andy Beshear in Kentucky. Um,
• 1:58:38
  Speaker 1: now it probably ends up about as successful as Phil
• 1:58:42
  Speaker 1: Bredesen was by a democratic governor of Tennessee who ran
• 1:58:46
  Speaker 1: for the Senate and came up short, but, um, it
• 1:58:51
  Speaker 1: would have been highly competitive, would have had a bunch
• 1:58:53
  Speaker 1: of money.
• 1:58:55
  Speaker 2: Um, so, you know, it's a, It's a fair ask.
• 1:59:02
  Speaker 2: But as I hope.
• 1:59:03
  Speaker 1: You hear me saying this before, voters are willing to
• 1:59:08
  Speaker 1: cross party lines on governor because governor's races are personal
• 1:59:12
  Speaker 1: to people. Senate races are jersey colors. And at the
• 1:59:17
  Speaker 1: end of the day, there's a ton of voters who
• 1:59:19
  Speaker 1: say to themselves, well, you know, which side of the
• 1:59:22
  Speaker 1: Supreme Court am I going to be on? You know,
• 1:59:26
  Speaker 1: we've turned the Senate into some sort of parliamentary system.
• 1:59:29
  Speaker 1: And so I think that we don't see candidate as
• 1:59:34
  Speaker 1: much as we do. But, you know, look, I think
• 1:59:39
  Speaker 1: Republicans nominated a very electable Republican in Andy Barr and
• 1:59:42
  Speaker 1: Andy Beshear would have had a hard time, I think,
• 1:59:46
  Speaker 1: being able to paint Andy Barr as outside the mainstream
• 1:59:50
  Speaker 1: the way he successfully did to Matt Bevin, for instance,
• 1:59:55
  Speaker 1: or even the attorney general, the former attorney general that
• 1:59:59
  Speaker 1: he beat. But, you know, I guess you could say, and,
• 2:00:05
  Speaker 1: you know, who knows, maybe you suggested Mitch Landrieu for
• 2:00:08
  Speaker 1: Louisiana State. He's an interesting candidate, and you're right. But
• 2:00:13
  Speaker 1: I'll tell you, I think Mitch Landrieu ought to run
• 2:00:16
  Speaker 1: for governor in 27. I think this Governor Landrieu is
• 2:00:21
  Speaker 1: more concerned about LSU football than he is about running
• 2:00:24
  Speaker 1: the state. And if LSU football is a disaster, does
• 2:00:28
  Speaker 1: not end well this year, I actually think it's going
• 2:00:30
  Speaker 1: to make him vulnerable in 27. Now, if LSU and
• 2:00:33
  Speaker 1: Lane Kiffin win the national title, maybe it's harder to
• 2:00:37
  Speaker 1: run against Landry for being more obsessed with LSU football
• 2:00:40
  Speaker 1: than with worrying about healthcare in rural Louisiana. But that
• 2:00:47
  Speaker 1: is something I am curious about. I think Landry has
• 2:00:51
  Speaker 1: been way too caught up in worrying about LSU athletics
• 2:00:56
  Speaker 1: and not focused enough on governing the state. for what
• 2:01:00
  Speaker 1: it's worth. Next question. Cam from Virginia's eighth district right here.
• 2:01:08
  Speaker 1: I started listening years ago for your political analysis and
• 2:01:10
  Speaker 1: now I find myself enjoying the sports conversations too. It's
• 2:01:13
  Speaker 1: a nice balance.
• 2:01:13
  Speaker 3: Thanks.
• 2:01:14
  Speaker 2: As a sports fan, what do you.
• 2:01:15
  Speaker 1: Make of James Franklin and Virginia Tech's first two outings
• 2:01:17
  Speaker 1: and how do you think they'll impact the rest of
• 2:01:19
  Speaker 1: the ACC, especially our hurricanes? I also appreciate your thoughtfulness
• 2:01:22
  Speaker 1: and willingness to shift your perspective when the data changes.
• 2:01:24
  Speaker 1: And as someone who isn't a fan of excessive gambling
• 2:01:27
  Speaker 1: in sports, That you take the time to slowly read
• 2:01:29
  Speaker 1: the help numbers at the end of the ads. I do.
• 2:01:33
  Speaker 1: I actually take that seriously. I want people. Look, I do.
• 2:01:39
  Speaker 1: I gamble what I can afford, but it's gambling. I
• 2:01:44
  Speaker 1: don't pretend it's a side hustle, but it's a way
• 2:01:46
  Speaker 1: to make money. It is more a competition with myself.
• 2:01:50
  Speaker 1: That's how I view sports gambling. Do I know this
• 2:01:53
  Speaker 1: stuff as much as I think I do? How good
• 2:01:56
  Speaker 1: is my gut? I'm going to put my money where
• 2:01:58
  Speaker 1: my mouth is. But I view it as almost a
• 2:02:01
  Speaker 1: competition with myself on that front. But I appreciate you
• 2:02:05
  Speaker 1: noticing that. I do intentionally, I can't stand the idea
• 2:02:10
  Speaker 1: that the helpline numbers are always spit through. But you
• 2:02:15
  Speaker 1: asked a question about Franklin. Look, James Franklin is a
• 2:02:19
  Speaker 1: monster recruiter. And this is an underrated, the Mid-Atlantic is
• 2:02:23
  Speaker 1: an underrated region. You know, it's interesting, Virginia Tech, And
• 2:02:28
  Speaker 1: Penn State basically have, between the two of them, dominated
• 2:02:32
  Speaker 1: recruiting in this region from essentially New Jersey, Maryland, Virginia,
• 2:02:38
  Speaker 1: and even parts of North Carolina. You know, and they've
• 2:02:42
  Speaker 1: out-recruited UVA and all that stuff. And then Virginia Tech
• 2:02:45
  Speaker 1: sort of fell off. And Franklin at Penn State kind
• 2:02:48
  Speaker 1: of vacuumed up all of it. And I think, and
• 2:02:52
  Speaker 1: then whatever he didn't vacuum up, Clemson was coming up
• 2:02:55
  Speaker 1: a little bit to get some of this. some of
• 2:02:57
  Speaker 1: these quality athletes in the Mid-Atlantic region. Look, I think Franklin,
• 2:03:03
  Speaker 1: he's only, he improves every program he shows up in.
• 2:03:08
  Speaker 1: He may not have met the expectations that Penn State
• 2:03:10
  Speaker 1: fans had, but he brought them to an elite level
• 2:03:15
  Speaker 1: and they weren't at an elite level when he got there.
• 2:03:19
  Speaker 1: So I know he's going to make Virginia Tech better.
• 2:03:22
  Speaker 1: And that makes me nervous because when Virginia Tech's good,
• 2:03:25
  Speaker 1: Blacksburg's a hard place to play. I've been there with
• 2:03:28
  Speaker 1: Enter Sandman. When you look at Miami's schedule, one of
• 2:03:35
  Speaker 1: the games that I'm like, okay, if Miami runs into
• 2:03:38
  Speaker 1: a problem, if this Wake Forest game were in October
• 2:03:48
  Speaker 1: on a Friday, I'd be more worried about it than
• 2:03:51
  Speaker 1: it being our third game of the year. And the
• 2:03:54
  Speaker 1: fact that we've yet We've only had Thursday or Friday games,
• 2:03:57
  Speaker 1: so I don't think it's an oddity for us at
• 2:03:59
  Speaker 1: the moment. So I'm glad this Friday night game with
• 2:04:03
  Speaker 1: Wake's happening in the week that it's happening. But this
• 2:04:06
  Speaker 1: is one of those that could easily in October, in
• 2:04:08
  Speaker 1: the way that I think Louisville was a Friday night game,
• 2:04:11
  Speaker 1: that sort of bit us in the, you know what,
• 2:04:13
  Speaker 1: in SMU it was a Saturday game. So that Virginia
• 2:04:17
  Speaker 1: Tech game has been one I've been a little nervous
• 2:04:19
  Speaker 1: about this year. Because, look, he's... I'll be, look, if
• 2:04:28
  Speaker 1: Virginia Tech does to Maryland what I expect them to do,
• 2:04:32
  Speaker 1: then I won't be the only one starting to get
• 2:04:34
  Speaker 1: a little nervous about the Virginia Tech-Miami game. Because here's
• 2:04:37
  Speaker 1: another thing. Virginia Tech cares about the Miami rivalry. Miami
• 2:04:42
  Speaker 1: has always, you know, thought, you know, we, again, you
• 2:04:44
  Speaker 1: know the way rivalries work, right? When you have these,
• 2:04:47
  Speaker 1: you know, I think if you have some Virginia Tech fans,
• 2:04:50
  Speaker 1: they would care more about beating Miami than they do VUVA.
• 2:04:54
  Speaker 1: And then when they sort of, took a step back,
• 2:04:57
  Speaker 1: then it became, then UVA mattered to them again. But
• 2:04:59
  Speaker 1: there was a time when I think they cared about
• 2:05:01
  Speaker 1: beating Miami more than they cared about beating UVA. Now,
• 2:05:06
  Speaker 1: Miami's never seen Virginia Tech as its chief rival, right?
• 2:05:09
  Speaker 1: They see, you know, it's Florida State. And of course,
• 2:05:12
  Speaker 1: we think Notre Dame's a bigger rival than Notre Dame
• 2:05:14
  Speaker 1: thinks we are, right? That sort of thing. But I'm
• 2:05:19
  Speaker 1: glad for the ACC that James Franklin is a coach.
• 2:05:24
  Speaker 1: in the ACC. It's good for strengthening the ACC. He's
• 2:05:27
  Speaker 1: a good recruiter. He's going to improve. He's going to
• 2:05:31
  Speaker 1: expand the top tier of the ACC. I'd like to
• 2:05:35
  Speaker 1: see the ACC get to six or seven deep before
• 2:05:39
  Speaker 1: Miami leaves for another conference. I have kid. But I
• 2:05:43
  Speaker 1: definitely think that there was an A-plus hire by the
• 2:05:49
  Speaker 1: administration of Blacksburg. And I suspect If he chooses to,
• 2:05:56
  Speaker 1: James Franklin finishes his coaching career highly successful at Virginia Tech.
• 2:06:01
  Speaker 1: And what's interesting is if he has the same success
• 2:06:04
  Speaker 1: that he had at Penn State, they might give him
• 2:06:08
  Speaker 1: a statue in Blatchford. All right, Tom in Maine, 2nd
• 2:06:15
  Speaker 1: District writes, hey, I'd like to donate a couple of campaigns,
• 2:06:17
  Speaker 1: but I'm hesitant because I don't want to be bombarded
• 2:06:20
  Speaker 1: with endless solicitations from other campaigns and political groups afterward.
• 2:06:23
  Speaker 1: Is there a way to make a political donation while
• 2:06:25
  Speaker 1: keeping your information from ending up on every fundraising list imaginable?
• 2:06:28
  Speaker 1: Thank you. Yeah, don't give more than $ 199. You do
• 2:06:34
  Speaker 1: not have to give any information to a campaign if
• 2:06:39
  Speaker 1: you give less than $ 200. It is federal law that
• 2:06:43
  Speaker 1: they have to get your employer, name, address, all those
• 2:06:47
  Speaker 1: things for anybody that gives $ 200 or more. So that's
• 2:06:51
  Speaker 1: the simplest way for me to tell you is you
• 2:06:55
  Speaker 1: can give less than, now, they're gonna wanna have your
• 2:07:01
  Speaker 1: name in case you give more than once. And then
• 2:07:03
  Speaker 1: all of a sudden, you know, you give five or
• 2:07:06
  Speaker 1: six $ 199 contribution, you've crossed the threshold. But I've got
• 2:07:10
  Speaker 1: plenty of colleagues and friends over the years who don't
• 2:07:14
  Speaker 1: want to show up in the FEC list, don't want
• 2:07:16
  Speaker 1: to show up on other people's lists. And on federal
• 2:07:19
  Speaker 1: campaign spending, just give, essentially, you give up to $ 1
• 2:07:23
  Speaker 1: less than the magic number that it takes that they
• 2:07:27
  Speaker 1: have to get their information, which is, in this case, $ 200.
• 2:07:30
  Speaker 1: So don't give more than $ 200. $ 199 is your max.
• 2:07:36
  Speaker 1: You don't have to give up any of your personal information.
• 2:07:40
  Speaker 3: On that.
• 2:07:41
  Speaker 1: I hope that helps. Steve W. in Colorado's first district,
• 2:07:44
  Speaker 1: all right, heart of Denver, writes, and longtime listener, second
• 2:07:47
  Speaker 1: time writer, last week you made a compelling argument that
• 2:07:49
  Speaker 1: pardoning Nixon ultimately hurt the country by helping establish the
• 2:07:53
  Speaker 1: idea that a president could escape accountability. And I can't
• 2:07:55
  Speaker 1: help applying that to our current situation. That's exactly why
• 2:07:59
  Speaker 1: I do the time machine. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
• 2:08:03
  Speaker 1: Thank you, Steve. If Democrats take control of Congress in November,
• 2:08:06
  Speaker 1: but still lack the Senate votes needed to convict after
• 2:08:08
  Speaker 1: an impeachment, should they pursue impeachment over conduct they believe
• 2:08:11
  Speaker 1: is unlawful anyway, or would that ultimately do more harm
• 2:08:14
  Speaker 1: than good? So I think what you do is you
• 2:08:19
  Speaker 1: pursue the investigations without calling them impeachment. And you do
• 2:08:25
  Speaker 1: all of these reports and you, you know, first it's
• 2:08:29
  Speaker 1: about maybe the crypto money and the building fund money
• 2:08:34
  Speaker 1: and all of, you know, you start to, you sort
• 2:08:36
  Speaker 1: of systematically do it. You look at how DHS was managed.
• 2:08:40
  Speaker 1: You look at what's happening at the Kennedy Senator, you know,
• 2:08:43
  Speaker 1: all these, what these things. And you put out these very,
• 2:08:46
  Speaker 1: you need to have these very public hearings and these
• 2:08:48
  Speaker 1: very public reports. And they need to be matter of fact.
• 2:08:51
  Speaker 1: The reports can't be overly, they can't have political documents,
• 2:08:57
  Speaker 1: hyperbolic language, all of that. And then you lay it
• 2:09:03
  Speaker 1: out there. And You let, you find it, you know,
• 2:09:12
  Speaker 1: you hope that there's a Thomas Massey still left in
• 2:09:14
  Speaker 1: the Republican Party and he won't be gone in the
• 2:09:16
  Speaker 1: next Congress. But I do think if you're going to
• 2:09:21
  Speaker 1: pursue impeachment, you better have bipartisan support going in, right?
• 2:09:27
  Speaker 1: The second impeachment of Trump, the reason a lot of
• 2:09:30
  Speaker 1: people thought it might be successful is he had Liz Cheney.
• 2:09:33
  Speaker 1: You had 10 Republicans sign on to that. And the
• 2:09:37
  Speaker 1: assumption was every one Republican candidate You know, there was
• 2:09:40
  Speaker 1: five more that didn't have the guts to do it,
• 2:09:45
  Speaker 1: but shared the sentiment. But that's the only, you know,
• 2:09:52
  Speaker 1: what you do is you want to overwhelm with information
• 2:09:59
  Speaker 1: and facts and reports. And they need to be, you know,
• 2:10:04
  Speaker 1: they can't be done in back rooms. They've got to
• 2:10:05
  Speaker 1: be very public. And then you start connecting the dots
• 2:10:09
  Speaker 1: and like, here we are. Because here's the, I mean,
• 2:10:14
  Speaker 1: to be totally politically cynical here, here's the reason to
• 2:10:18
  Speaker 1: do it and not call it impeachment. It's essentially the
• 2:10:21
  Speaker 1: indictment you would issue if J.D. Vance chooses to seek
• 2:10:26
  Speaker 1: Trump's third term. This is what the first two terms brought.
• 2:10:31
  Speaker 1: And it basically just lays out the case. So I
• 2:10:35
  Speaker 1: don't think it's a waste of time. But I will
• 2:10:40
  Speaker 1: say this, I'd vote count before I pursued a third impeachment.
• 2:10:45
  Speaker 1: And at a minimum, don't do it in the House
• 2:10:47
  Speaker 1: unless there's a bipartisan majority. And more than one is
• 2:10:52
  Speaker 1: bipartisan in this case. Eight to 10 is eight to 10.
• 2:10:56
  Speaker 1: Especially if it's a diminished majority, that would be a
• 2:10:58
  Speaker 1: bigger deal. But that's how I would pursue it. All right,
• 2:11:06
  Speaker 1: last question for the episode. Jason Woodbury from Minnesota's 4th
• 2:11:10
  Speaker 1: District chimes in. First-timer and Packers part owner here. Nice
• 2:11:15
  Speaker 1: to see a Minnesotan be a Packers owner. I've got
• 2:11:19
  Speaker 1: a lot of grumpiness about that. I appreciate the go-pack
• 2:11:23
  Speaker 1: sentiment there, but it's ugly in Packer land right now.
• 2:11:27
  Speaker 1: Germany's far-right AFD just had a major electoral showing amid
• 2:11:30
  Speaker 1: economic anger over energy prices tied to the Iran war.
• 2:11:33
  Speaker 1: and a weaker Germany with a stronger far right would
• 2:11:35
  Speaker 1: seemingly benefit Putin. Is it possible the Iran war was
• 2:11:38
  Speaker 1: ultimately served Russia's interest more than America's? And how should
• 2:11:41
  Speaker 1: we think about claims that this outcome was intentional?
• 2:11:44
  Speaker 3: Wow.
• 2:11:44
  Speaker 1: Well, it's interesting that you say it benefited Russia. I
• 2:11:48
  Speaker 1: actually think, I do not agree that it's benefited Russia.
• 2:11:52
  Speaker 1: I think it's benefited China. Here's why I don't think
• 2:11:55
  Speaker 1: it benefited Russia, because Iran's an important war weapons manufacturer.
• 2:12:02
  Speaker 1: And essentially, you know, provide, you know, help. They've been
• 2:12:05
  Speaker 1: helping with Russia's drone operation and all of that. And
• 2:12:10
  Speaker 1: now that they have to worry about their own effort,
• 2:12:12
  Speaker 1: that takes away from how they can help the Russians.
• 2:12:15
  Speaker 1: So I'm not as convinced. Sure, you know, the war
• 2:12:20
  Speaker 1: has given them some relief on oil sanctions, right? They've
• 2:12:26
  Speaker 1: been able to make a few extra bucks. And I
• 2:12:28
  Speaker 1: get where you're going there. But to me, the unequivocal
• 2:12:32
  Speaker 1: winner in this decision is China, right? China now is
• 2:12:37
  Speaker 1: the stable global partner, right? I mean, between the tariff
• 2:12:41
  Speaker 1: war that he launched against our allies all over the
• 2:12:45
  Speaker 1: world and this Iran war, he has made our allies
• 2:12:51
  Speaker 1: in the Gulf start to think they need to start
• 2:12:54
  Speaker 1: to make their own relationships. He's made our allies in
• 2:12:57
  Speaker 1: the West start to think they need to make their own.
• 2:12:59
  Speaker 1: I mean, my goodness, Canada's thinking about joining the EU.
• 2:13:03
  Speaker 1: That's a direct result of Donald Trump's trade war and
• 2:13:12
  Speaker 1: just bizarre attacks on Canada. I mean, there's so many
• 2:13:17
  Speaker 1: own goals with Trump and this economy. Canada is probably
• 2:13:22
  Speaker 1: as biggest of an own goal as there's been. And this,
• 2:13:26
  Speaker 1: you know, again, Do I expect the next president to
• 2:13:29
  Speaker 1: repair 70% of this?
• 2:13:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I hope so.
• 2:13:35
  Speaker 1: But this stuff takes so much longer to repair than
• 2:13:37
  Speaker 1: we realize. And this damage, this is why sometimes I
• 2:13:42
  Speaker 1: watch this, whether it's this ridiculous Blanche guy doing a
• 2:13:47
  Speaker 1: performing as press secretary. Just like whatever credibility was left
• 2:13:52
  Speaker 1: at the Justice Department, he just pissed away into the
• 2:13:55
  Speaker 1: concrete floor of the Rose Garden. And what we've done
• 2:14:03
  Speaker 1: to destabilize Europe, which does in its own way, certainly
• 2:14:09
  Speaker 1: accrue to Putin's benefit. But I mean... You know, I
• 2:14:15
  Speaker 1: was talking with somebody who's quite familiar with how the
• 2:14:18
  Speaker 1: Chinese really view Trump. And they, one person was joking
• 2:14:22
  Speaker 1: with me that his nickname in China is something having
• 2:14:24
  Speaker 1: to do with like, you know, the Trump is like
• 2:14:27
  Speaker 1: the nickname they give him is gift is essentially it
• 2:14:29
  Speaker 1: stands for the word gift because they view Trump has
• 2:14:32
  Speaker 1: been a gift to China. He has been an enormous
• 2:14:36
  Speaker 1: gift to China. If you believe this is a world
• 2:14:39
  Speaker 1: that is dividing in between those with the West and
• 2:14:42
  Speaker 1: those with China, Donald Trump has basically abdicated America's leadership
• 2:14:50
  Speaker 1: of the West, made the West feel leaderless a bit.
• 2:14:57
  Speaker 1: I think Mark Carney, in some ways, is at least
• 2:15:01
  Speaker 1: the philosophical leader of the West. And yet, what is
• 2:15:05
  Speaker 1: everybody doing? Trying to figure out how to forge a
• 2:15:10
  Speaker 1: working relationship with China. China's been the big winner in
• 2:15:15
  Speaker 1: all of this. That's, and I get what the question
• 2:15:20
  Speaker 1: you're asking, that the outcome was intentional. I don't know.
• 2:15:28
  Speaker 1: I get it. This is, if it is, it's a
• 2:15:33
  Speaker 1: hell of a, it's a hell of a game. That's been,
• 2:15:35
  Speaker 1: it's a, it's a hell of a operation that's been
• 2:15:38
  Speaker 1: run against the United States. Um, But regardless whether it's
• 2:15:46
  Speaker 1: intentional or not, the outcome is the same, which is
• 2:15:52
  Speaker 1: Russia's hand is short-term strengthened by all of this dystopia. But,
• 2:15:57
  Speaker 1: you know, he's going to fall sooner than you think.
• 2:16:04
  Speaker 1: Putin's going to be taken out by his own people.
• 2:16:08
  Speaker 1: I'm more, you know. Ukraine's bringing this war into the
• 2:16:12
  Speaker 1: heart of Moscow. I am pretty optimistic that Putin's days
• 2:16:18
  Speaker 1: truly are numbered. But the real winner in all this
• 2:16:23
  Speaker 1: is China. All right, on that upbeat note, I will
• 2:16:30
  Speaker 1: see you in 24 hours. I won't waste my time
• 2:16:33
  Speaker 1: hand-wringing about the Packers. But let me just throw out
• 2:16:38
  Speaker 1: this one question with you about the Packers. If the
• 2:16:40
  Speaker 1: Jets beat the Packers in week two, is that a
• 2:16:44
  Speaker 1: fireable offense?
• 2:16:46
  Speaker 2: I'm just asking.
• 2:16:47
  Speaker 1: I'm just asking. All right. I'll see you in 24 hours.