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"Putin Chooses War in Ukraine." · Pod Save America

0:01
Speaker 1: Thank you.
0:21
Speaker 2: Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.
0:23
Speaker 1: I'm Dan Pfeiffer.
0:24
Speaker 3: And I'm Ben Rhodes.
0:25
Speaker 2: On today's show, Ben is here with us to talk
0:27
Speaker 2: about Vladimir Putin's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, as well as
0:30
Speaker 2: the response from the U.S. and the world. And later,
0:33
Speaker 2: Democratic strategist and pollster Celinda Lake joins to talk about
0:35
Speaker 2: the National Republican Senatorial Committee's midterm manifesto, which includes raising
0:40
Speaker 2: taxes on more than 100 million Americans. But first, check
0:44
Speaker 2: out the latest episode of Pod Save the World, where
0:46
Speaker 2: Ben covers the latest in Ukraine with the Financial Times
0:49
Speaker 2: Moscow bureau chief Max Sedin. and our good friend and
0:52
Speaker 2: USAID administrator, Samantha Power. Also check out Hysteria, where Aaron
0:56
Speaker 2: and Alyssa dive into a shocking pro-publica piece that exposes
0:59
Speaker 2: states for sitting on $ 5. 2 billion in welfare funds while
1:03
Speaker 2: needy families struggle to survive. New episodes of Pod Save
1:06
Speaker 2: the World drop every Wednesday, and Hysteria drops every Thursday.
1:10
Speaker 2: All right, let's get to the news. Vladimir Putin has
1:13
Speaker 2: launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, saying that his goal
1:17
Speaker 2: is the demilitarization and denazification of of Russia's peaceful, democratic neighbor.
1:23
Speaker 2: The nuclear-armed dictator also said, quote, Massive numbers of Ukrainians
1:36
Speaker 2: have started to flee the capital and other places under
1:39
Speaker 2: attack by Russian forces. Governments all over the world condemned
1:42
Speaker 2: Putin's war. NATO, a security alliance of European and North
1:46
Speaker 2: American countries formed to guard against Russian aggression. has announced
1:49
Speaker 2: an emergency summit, and President Biden joined other world leaders
1:53
Speaker 2: in imposing severe economic sanctions on Russia, which he talked
1:57
Speaker 2: about during a speech at the White House on Thursday.
1:59
Speaker 3: Putin is the aggressor.
2:02
Speaker 4: Putin chose this war, and now he and his country
2:06
Speaker 4: will bear the consequences. Today, I'm authorizing additional strong sanctions
2:12
Speaker 4: and new limitations on what can be exported to Russia.
2:17
Speaker 4: This is going to impose severe cost on the Russian economy,
2:20
Speaker 4: both immediately and over time. We have purposely designed these
2:25
Speaker 4: sanctions to maximize the long-term impact on Russia and to
2:29
Speaker 4: minimize the impact on the United States and our allies.
2:32
Speaker 2: Ben, what did you think of Biden's speech and how
2:35
Speaker 2: would you rate the severity of the sanctions that he announced?
2:39
Speaker 5: Well, I think that they've been foreshadowing these particular sanctions
2:44
Speaker 5: for some time now. And what this is is the
2:48
Speaker 5: financial sanctions target some of the largest Russian banks. Russian
2:52
Speaker 5: banks have been targeted in the past, but it's usually
2:54
Speaker 5: been smaller military-associated banks. These are the really big financial
2:58
Speaker 5: institutions in Russia. It freezes their assets in the United
3:01
Speaker 5: States and essentially aims to cut them off from the
3:04
Speaker 5: capacity to do business in the international financial system. The
3:09
Speaker 5: oligarchs are the broader network of wealthy Russians who've helped
3:15
Speaker 5: subsidize Putin's corruption and benefited from his reign and kind
3:18
Speaker 5: of the lifeblood of his regime. And the export controls
3:24
Speaker 5: are an effort to use U.S. capacity to block the
3:28
Speaker 5: export of certain materials into Russia that are important to
3:33
Speaker 5: certain critical sectors of the Russian economy. You know, their
3:35
Speaker 5: defense industrial base, their high tech sector. And so further
3:39
Speaker 5: trying to limit Russia's capacity to develop and grow its economy.
3:44
Speaker 5: And so look, this will have a hit on the
3:47
Speaker 5: Russian economy. You've already seen the Russian currency plummet. You've
3:51
Speaker 5: already seen the Russian markets plummet. But these are not
3:56
Speaker 5: the most severe sanctions. The two notable things that President
4:00
Speaker 5: Biden and the Europeans did not yet do are essentially
4:04
Speaker 5: evicting Russia from the SWIFT system. That's the payment system.
4:09
Speaker 5: We impose this sanction on Iran. This essentially kind of
4:12
Speaker 5: kicks you out of the international financial system. And energy sanctions,
4:17
Speaker 5: sanctions on the capacity of Russia to export oil and gas,
4:21
Speaker 5: which is obviously its biggest revenue generator. So this is
4:24
Speaker 5: about as far as they could go without going all
4:27
Speaker 5: the way to a place where there would either be
4:30
Speaker 5: really big disruptions in the international financial system, which the
4:34
Speaker 5: swift step might do, or you know, bigger disruptions or
4:39
Speaker 5: inflationary pressure or pressure on gas prices in Europe and
4:43
Speaker 5: the United States, which is what broader energy sanctions would do.
4:46
Speaker 3: But I mean, it's a big, you know, it's a
4:48
Speaker 3: big deal.
4:49
Speaker 5: It's obviously not going to deter Vladimir Putin, but it
4:51
Speaker 5: is going to impose a bigger cost than Russia has
4:54
Speaker 5: faced before when it comes to sanctions.
4:57
Speaker 2: And is it right that we couldn't kick them out
5:00
Speaker 2: of the SWIFT system on our own, that we need
5:02
Speaker 2: the Europeans to go along with this? And I know
5:04
Speaker 2: that Germany and Italy are at least are blocking this move?
5:09
Speaker 6: Yeah.
5:09
Speaker 5: So you want, you know, consensus with Europeans and on Swift,
5:14
Speaker 5: you'd want, you know, Japan and Canada and others on board.
5:18
Speaker 5: It does sound like Germany and Italy have been the outliers,
5:21
Speaker 5: which is, you know, I got a bit of deja
5:23
Speaker 5: vu when we were imposing sanctions on Russia after the
5:27
Speaker 5: annexation of Crimea and the initial invasion into eastern Ukraine,
5:32
Speaker 5: which obviously wasn't as substantial as the military operation we're
5:36
Speaker 5: seeing now Germany and Italy, well, Italy in particular was
5:39
Speaker 5: often an outlier in wanting to minimize disruptions to their
5:44
Speaker 5: own economy. We'll see what happens, but Biden made the
5:49
Speaker 5: point that the sanctions that they already did are as
5:51
Speaker 5: consequential as SWIFT. I think cumulatively, obviously, if you added
5:55
Speaker 5: SWIFT on top of that, it would have an impact,
5:58
Speaker 5: and the Ukrainians have been calling for that. But this
6:01
Speaker 5: is still a pretty significant hit to the Russian economy
6:04
Speaker 5: and one that's going to ripple out across the global economy,
6:07
Speaker 5: including our own economy.
6:10
Speaker 1: Ben, a couple of things seem true here. One is
6:12
Speaker 1: what we have promised thus far has not deterred Putin,
6:17
Speaker 1: but also that there is no appetite anywhere for the
6:20
Speaker 1: use of force. Is there anything the US or the
6:23
Speaker 1: EU can do to, or any of our global allies
6:26
Speaker 1: can do to actually cause Putin to second guess this move?
6:30
Speaker 1: Or would Swift do that? Or are we sort of
6:33
Speaker 1: very limited here and he has sort of free reign?
6:36
Speaker 3: I don't think so, Dan, at this point.
6:39
Speaker 5: I mean, in part because, you know, the psychology of
6:42
Speaker 5: the person we've seen in Vladimir Putin the last few
6:45
Speaker 5: days looks like literally the man in the high castle.
6:49
Speaker 5: You know, it feels like he's a decision maker of one.
6:52
Speaker 5: This is not even like a there's no Kremlin ology here.
6:55
Speaker 3: There's no Politburo. This is Putin.
6:57
Speaker 5: And this feels not even like a strategic move by him,
7:01
Speaker 5: but like a deep seated grievance fueled move by him.
7:06
Speaker 5: You know, today you saw Putin summon literally all the
7:09
Speaker 5: oligarchs who were in Russia to a meeting where he
7:12
Speaker 5: basically told them, hey, look, I had to do this.
7:14
Speaker 3: You're just going to have to deal with this.
7:15
Speaker 7: Right.
7:16
Speaker 5: I do think that, you know, that the energy sanctions
7:19
Speaker 5: would obviously hit the hardest, but it would obviously hit
7:23
Speaker 5: us the hardest as well. So in terms of the
7:26
Speaker 5: near term, stopping somehow this current military operation, it doesn't
7:33
Speaker 5: feel like there's anything at all that could do that.
7:36
Speaker 5: I do think, and I've been thinking about this overnight,
7:38
Speaker 5: watching how dramatic this is. You know, the conversation is
7:41
Speaker 5: so much about sanctions. And, you know, actually, you know,
7:45
Speaker 5: we were going back and forth last night about the
7:48
Speaker 5: UN Security Council and what a farce it was to
7:50
Speaker 5: watch Russia chair a meeting that was called because of
7:54
Speaker 5: its own invasion of another country. And, you know, I
7:58
Speaker 5: think another point to make here, beyond needing to enforce
8:01
Speaker 5: these sanctions, go after all this wealth, is that what
8:05
Speaker 5: can be done to just kind of kick Russia out
8:08
Speaker 5: of every club that we can? You know, the UN
8:11
Speaker 5: is obviously a difficult piece of business to reform that.
8:15
Speaker 5: But there's a lot of institutions that Russia belongs to,
8:17
Speaker 5: you know, from Interpol, which they've abused, to more symbolic
8:22
Speaker 5: things that they care a lot about, like international sports federations.
8:26
Speaker 5: But essentially, really just, you know, Russia has now made itself,
8:30
Speaker 5: I mean, if this really is kind of analogous, it's
8:32
Speaker 5: not analogous to, but it has echoes of, you know,
8:36
Speaker 5: Hitler's invasion of Poland, right?
8:38
Speaker 3: Hopefully not as consequential, obviously, in the long run.
8:41
Speaker 5: But, you know, this is one big nation invading a
8:45
Speaker 5: smaller democracy to conquer it. I mean, this is of
8:49
Speaker 5: a scale of aggression that we just haven't seen in
8:51
Speaker 5: Europe in our lives. And so I do think a
8:56
Speaker 5: really systematic effort to just kind of evict Russia from
9:02
Speaker 5: everything community of nations and club and organization that is
9:06
Speaker 5: practical is the kind of thing that would impose a
9:11
Speaker 5: different type of.
9:12
Speaker 3: Cost over time. Again, it might not stop him in
9:15
Speaker 3: his tracks or anything, but I.
9:17
Speaker 5: Think we have to be thinking creatively about how to
9:20
Speaker 5: register that, hey, you just can't do this and expect
9:23
Speaker 5: things to get back to some business as usual. I
9:25
Speaker 5: think some people have talked about suspending any diplomatic relations.
9:29
Speaker 5: You know, look, you still need to talk to other countries.
9:31
Speaker 5: So I'm not sure about that. But you saw, like,
9:33
Speaker 5: for instance, the United Kingdom took a step today where
9:36
Speaker 5: they banned flights into Heathrow from the Russian airline. You know,
9:39
Speaker 5: things like that that are just like, hey, you guys
9:41
Speaker 5: are out. You know, that will have a big impact and,
9:45
Speaker 5: you know, could create pressures internal to Russia that could
9:49
Speaker 5: create problems for Putin again over time.
9:51
Speaker 3: I mean, this is not going to happen overnight.
9:55
Speaker 6: Ben.
9:56
Speaker 1: Just watching the scene last night with the UN and
9:59
Speaker 1: sort of just the completely feckless nature of what was
10:02
Speaker 1: happening there, you know, you have NATO, you have the
10:06
Speaker 1: world united against Russia, you have the UN, yet Russia
10:08
Speaker 1: proceeding and invading a sovereign nation anyway. Does this represent
10:12
Speaker 1: some sort of turning point or breaking point for the
10:14
Speaker 1: post-World War II order? in the world about the power
10:18
Speaker 1: of these institutions who were designed to stop exactly this
10:21
Speaker 1: thing from happening?
10:22
Speaker 4: Yes.
10:23
Speaker 3: I mean, I think that's exactly right, Dan.
10:27
Speaker 5: And you had this whole system set up after World
10:30
Speaker 5: War II to prevent this, to prevent a war, particularly
10:34
Speaker 5: a war in Europe, let's face it. I mean, obviously,
10:36
Speaker 5: we should care equally about human life that is lost
10:38
Speaker 5: in wars in other places. But that's what the UN
10:41
Speaker 5: was set up to do after World War II. And
10:46
Speaker 5: the way I think about this is.
10:49
Speaker 3: We are in a new era.
10:51
Speaker 5: You had the post-World War II era through the Cold War,
10:54
Speaker 5: and then you had the kind of post-Cold War era,
10:57
Speaker 5: and that kind of ended definitively last night. I mean,
11:01
Speaker 5: it had already been unraveling for some time. The Trump presidency, obviously,
11:05
Speaker 5: was an accelerant. But this kind of period of time,
11:09
Speaker 5: the post-Cold War globalization on top of the post-World War
11:14
Speaker 5: II institutions, that clearly doesn't work anymore. And it's not
11:20
Speaker 5: working across the board. It's obviously not working in stopping Russia,
11:23
Speaker 5: but you know, we, you know, this is really what
11:26
Speaker 5: my last book was about is essentially that that order
11:29
Speaker 5: has fallen and something else is going to have to
11:32
Speaker 5: take its place. And so I think part of what's
11:34
Speaker 5: going to happen here is a rethinking of how the
11:36
Speaker 5: whole international system works, because when one of the big
11:40
Speaker 5: nuclear superpowers, Russia completely opts out of, of any norms
11:44
Speaker 5: and frankly, uses those institutions to shield itself. They use
11:49
Speaker 5: their UN Security Council veto to block the UN from
11:52
Speaker 5: doing anything.
11:52
Speaker 3: They use their.
11:53
Speaker 5: Oil and gas to leverage the whole global economy, which
11:56
Speaker 5: is dependent on the kind of free flow of oil
12:00
Speaker 5: and gas. They're using all these mechanisms to prevent consequences
12:04
Speaker 5: for them doing this kind of stuff. And then they
12:07
Speaker 5: have China pretty much backing them up on that and
12:11
Speaker 5: doing in their own way the same thing, although not
12:14
Speaker 5: nearly as dramatically. it's time for like a pretty fundamental
12:18
Speaker 5: rethink here.
12:20
Speaker 2: Your point earlier about Putin having made this decision on
12:25
Speaker 2: his own and being all by himself on this, like
12:28
Speaker 2: I saw even some Russia experts express surprise that he
12:32
Speaker 2: chose to go this far. So reports that there have
12:36
Speaker 2: been protests in Moscow and Russian celebrities speaking out, Russian
12:40
Speaker 2: oligarchs telling Putin himself during that meeting you referenced that
12:43
Speaker 2: he needs to make sure Russia remains part of the
12:45
Speaker 2: global economy. There was a report that captured Russian soldiers
12:49
Speaker 2: were saying that they didn't know they were being sent
12:51
Speaker 2: to kill Ukrainians. Can you talk about how much of
12:54
Speaker 2: a risk there is to Putin that he may have
12:58
Speaker 2: overreached and miscalculated and the Russian people may turn against him?
13:02
Speaker 3: I think that that's like a real risk. And, you know,
13:07
Speaker 3: And watching Putin for years, you know, when we came.
13:10
Speaker 5: Into government in 2009, he had, you know, he was
13:15
Speaker 5: Prime Minister Medvedev, Dmitry Medvedev was president, but Putin called
13:19
Speaker 5: the shots, everybody knew that. But there were like power centers,
13:22
Speaker 5: you know, Putin was the kind of guy who was
13:25
Speaker 5: the shot caller, but he kind of adjudicated between some
13:27
Speaker 5: more liberal advisors and some hardliners and some oligarchs and
13:30
Speaker 5: some military types. By the end of the Obama years,
13:34
Speaker 5: that had changed and it was like Putin with a
13:36
Speaker 5: pretty tight circle of hardliners.
13:39
Speaker 2: And now in.
13:39
Speaker 5: Talking to people, you know, I know in Moscow and
13:43
Speaker 5: actually Max Sedin made this point on Patsy of the World,
13:45
Speaker 5: like it's just Putin. Like he spent the last two
13:48
Speaker 5: years in COVID pretty much in total isolation. And if
13:52
Speaker 5: you watch that crazy Security Council meeting he had the
13:57
Speaker 5: other day before he launched this invasion, we kind of
14:00
Speaker 5: went around and, you know, kind of, demanded to know
14:04
Speaker 5: what everybody thought. And clearly, they were all nervous that
14:09
Speaker 5: one guy said the wrong thing. And it looked like
14:11
Speaker 5: he thought a hook was going to come out from
14:13
Speaker 5: behind him and take him out. And meanwhile, that guy's
14:16
Speaker 5: the head of their foreign intelligence service. Those guys didn't
14:18
Speaker 5: look like they even necessarily knew exactly what they were
14:22
Speaker 5: supposed to say.
14:24
Speaker 3: And so you've got to have.
14:26
Speaker 5: The sense that this isn't like there's some big cabal
14:29
Speaker 5: of hardliners who cook this up.
14:31
Speaker 3: This feels like Putin cooked this up.
14:33
Speaker 5: And I think the risk for him, therefore, is if
14:37
Speaker 5: you have the Russian public pissed off about this over time.
14:41
Speaker 5: And let's be clear, I think there's going to be
14:43
Speaker 5: pissed off Russians. And we've already seen protests today. But,
14:46
Speaker 5: you know, when Crimea happened, there were like very little casualties,
14:50
Speaker 5: very little fighting, very little cost to Russia. And Crimea
14:54
Speaker 5: is the one part of Ukraine that most Russians felt
14:57
Speaker 5: like was a part of Russia. That was a very
15:00
Speaker 5: popular thing that Putin did. That's not what most Russians
15:03
Speaker 5: think about the whole country of Ukraine. And so if
15:05
Speaker 5: you start to have Russian casualties, a bloody insurgency, military
15:12
Speaker 5: expenditures into Ukraine at the same time that sanctions are
15:15
Speaker 5: hurting their economy, there could be general public dissatisfaction. But also,
15:20
Speaker 5: I've been wondering, are there generals who are beginning to
15:23
Speaker 5: whisper to each other, hey, what's this guy doing? How
15:27
Speaker 5: far is he willing to go? They're probably asking the
15:29
Speaker 5: Russian generals, the same kind of questions that we are.
15:33
Speaker 5: Where does this end with this guy? And these oligarchs
15:36
Speaker 5: are losing all their money. They're not going to stand
15:39
Speaker 5: up to Putin anytime soon. But those guys have kind
15:43
Speaker 5: of financed a lot of this stuff over the years.
15:46
Speaker 5: And so I think the risk for him, and who
15:48
Speaker 5: knows how long it takes, is whether or not different
15:52
Speaker 5: forces inside of Russia start to think, hey, this is dangerous.
15:56
Speaker 3: And there have been leaders.
15:57
Speaker 5: Who looked really strong, including leaders of superpowers, who, you know,
16:02
Speaker 5: once they start losing both elite and public support, it
16:04
Speaker 5: can go south for them. Again, I don't think that's
16:07
Speaker 5: going to happen anytime soon. But this could be the
16:12
Speaker 5: domino that Putin knocked over that ultimately circles back around
16:16
Speaker 5: to him.
16:19
Speaker 1: Ben, invading Ukraine is one thing, occupying it is another.
16:23
Speaker 1: Does Russia really have the ability and the will to
16:27
Speaker 1: occupy Ukraine over the long term? What's the end game
16:31
Speaker 1: here for Putin?
16:32
Speaker 3: So I don't think that they do or want to.
16:36
Speaker 5: You heard him talk about denazification and demilitarization, which is
16:41
Speaker 5: chilling and crazy, especially given the fact that the president
16:44
Speaker 5: of Ukraine is Jewish. But we've heard this in the past.
16:47
Speaker 5: I mean, in Crimea, they said there were Ukrainian Nazis.
16:50
Speaker 5: It's a kind of weird allusion to the fact that
16:53
Speaker 5: some elements of Ukraine.
16:56
Speaker 3: Were on the other side in World War II. it's
16:59
Speaker 3: obviously totally false today.
17:01
Speaker 5: But I think what their end game is to decapitate
17:04
Speaker 5: the government, tragically, I think to probably round up and
17:09
Speaker 5: kill or detain a lot of the pro-Western Ukrainian political elite.
17:14
Speaker 5: So essentially wipe out that government and wipe out the
17:17
Speaker 5: forces and leadership in Ukrainian society and civil society that
17:21
Speaker 5: has been behind this turn towards democracy and turn towards
17:25
Speaker 5: the West. Install some pro-Russian apparatchik to be the president
17:32
Speaker 5: of Ukraine, and then to kind of treat it like
17:35
Speaker 5: a vassal state in the same way that they treat,
17:37
Speaker 5: you know, Lukashenko, the kleptocrat in Belarus, or, you know,
17:43
Speaker 5: some of these separatist regions that they've recognized in Georgia.
17:46
Speaker 3: I think there's a problem with that, though.
17:50
Speaker 5: I don't think that the people of Ukraine, this country
17:53
Speaker 5: of 44 million people, are going to go for that,
17:56
Speaker 5: you know.
17:57
Speaker 3: It's a big country.
17:59
Speaker 5: And if you look at the, you know, everybody talks
18:00
Speaker 5: about what a, you know, chess, 3D chess player Putin is.
18:05
Speaker 5: These other pieces of territory that he's kind of bitten
18:08
Speaker 5: off chunks of countries of since the invasion of Georgia
18:12
Speaker 5: in 2008 are small. They're really relatively small, concentrated areas.
18:16
Speaker 5: And they are areas that usually have a majority of
18:20
Speaker 5: kind of Russian speakers or ethnic Russians.
18:22
Speaker 3: That's not Ukraine. So I think his endgame is that.
18:27
Speaker 5: To install a friendly government and turn it into almost
18:30
Speaker 5: like a Soviet republic. But I don't think that's going
18:33
Speaker 5: to work. I think you're going to find a mix
18:36
Speaker 5: of civil disobedience and violence and insurgency. And this thing
18:40
Speaker 5: could drag out and lead to all manner of unintended consequences.
18:45
Speaker 5: Once a war starts, as our country learned in Iraq,
18:48
Speaker 5: you start a big war.
18:50
Speaker 3: You don't get to choose how it ends.
18:53
Speaker 2: Speaking of consequences, I think one of the more chilling
18:56
Speaker 2: lines from Putin's speech last night was that any country
18:59
Speaker 2: that interferes will be met with consequences as you've never
19:02
Speaker 2: experienced in history. I was wondering when I heard that,
19:07
Speaker 2: because obviously a lot of people expressed alarm about that
19:09
Speaker 2: on Twitter for good reason. But I was wondering, like,
19:12
Speaker 2: how do you think your old colleagues at the NSC
19:14
Speaker 2: and the Defense Department and state and the White House
19:18
Speaker 2: reacted to that line in the speech, which was taken
19:20
Speaker 2: by many as an overt threat of nuclear retaliation.
19:26
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think it was a threat.
19:27
Speaker 5: And if you remember, part of his like run a
19:30
Speaker 5: show leading up to this war was to kind of
19:32
Speaker 5: oversee these nuclear exercises.
19:35
Speaker 3: So I think it was all of a piece.
19:37
Speaker 5: Look, I think that they probably, you know, they're not
19:38
Speaker 5: sitting there thinking that we're on the precipice of nuclear war.
19:41
Speaker 5: And I think people can can chill a little bit
19:44
Speaker 5: about that in the sense that, I do think Putin's objectives,
19:49
Speaker 5: at least in this chapter, are really focused on Ukraine.
19:54
Speaker 5: But I think what they probably started to do is like, hmm,
19:57
Speaker 5: we're going to start watching for any signs of anything
19:59
Speaker 5: changing in the kind of deployment or posture of Russia's
20:04
Speaker 5: nuclear arsenal. And And I saw some comments out of
20:08
Speaker 5: the Defense Department today, kind of senior defense official comments,
20:13
Speaker 5: that they hadn't seen any change. That's kind of Cold
20:16
Speaker 5: War shit. That's the kind of stuff that we used
20:19
Speaker 5: to do. You're watching silos. And so just the fact
20:24
Speaker 5: that we're even having this conversation is alarming. And I will, again,
20:28
Speaker 5: I don't want to be overly alarmist here. The one
20:33
Speaker 5: thing that has given me the most cause for concern
20:37
Speaker 5: in the last couple of weeks is this kind of
20:40
Speaker 5: window we've had into Putin's psychology.
20:42
Speaker 3: He's really, and people who know better than us, right?
20:45
Speaker 3: People who.
20:47
Speaker 5: Are in Moscow, people who watched him for a long
20:49
Speaker 5: time that I know are like, this guy seems kind
20:52
Speaker 5: of unhinged, you know?
20:54
Speaker 3: Doesn't seem even like the Putin of like a decade.
20:56
Speaker 5: Ago, you know, who was already a pretty scary guy.
21:00
Speaker 5: So that, you know, I think we're being reminded like history,
21:04
Speaker 5: you know, an un, stable or maybe that's not the
21:08
Speaker 5: right word, uh, but, but a deeply aggrieved kind of
21:12
Speaker 5: messianic leader who is increasingly isolated from advisors and increasingly
21:17
Speaker 5: doesn't listen to people. That's a scary thing.
21:19
Speaker 2: True in Russia, true in the United States, true all
21:22
Speaker 2: over the world. It's always never good. Aggrieved, deranged dictators
21:25
Speaker 2: with nuclear arsenals. Not a good mix. Not a good mix. Um, Ben,
21:29
Speaker 2: thank you so much for walking us through all this, uh,
21:32
Speaker 2: both today and in the last couple of weeks. And, um,
21:36
Speaker 2: When we come back, Dan and I will talk through
21:38
Speaker 2: some of the politics.
21:39
Speaker 6: Of all this.
21:41
Speaker 2: All right, Dan, now that it's just us two hacks,
21:52
Speaker 2: let's talk about how this war is already affecting American politics.
21:56
Speaker 2: New polling this week shows how tricky this issue is
21:59
Speaker 2: for Biden. Politico Morning Consult says only 40% approve of
22:03
Speaker 2: how he's handling this crisis. with 45% disapproving. 58% say
22:08
Speaker 2: they'd hold Biden responsible if gas prices go up as
22:11
Speaker 2: a result of the invasion, though thankfully a higher percentage
22:14
Speaker 2: said they'd hold Putin responsible. And 42% said that their
22:19
Speaker 2: midterm vote will be about economic issues, which dwarfs every
22:23
Speaker 2: other set of issues listed in the poll, including national
22:26
Speaker 2: security issues, which were second place, listed issues like terrorism,
22:30
Speaker 2: foreign policy, and border security. That came in at 14%. Meanwhile,
22:34
Speaker 2: An Associated Press poll found that only 26% of Americans
22:38
Speaker 2: think the U.S. should play a major role in Ukraine.
22:40
Speaker 2: And a CBS poll found that 53% of Americans think
22:43
Speaker 2: the U.S. should stay out of negotiations between Ukraine and
22:46
Speaker 2: Russia altogether. Now, of course, this polling was all done
22:50
Speaker 2: before the full invasion took place on Wednesday evening. So,
22:55
Speaker 2: of course, public opinion shifts very quickly in a situation
22:59
Speaker 2: like this. But did anything in the polling surprise you
23:03
Speaker 2: And were there any other important takeaways that I missed
23:05
Speaker 2: just now?
23:06
Speaker 1: Well, I think if you take all these individual data points,
23:09
Speaker 1: there are two conclusions to draw. The first is, is
23:12
Speaker 1: the American people do not see this as connected to
23:16
Speaker 1: their lives. It's not just that low percentages of American
23:20
Speaker 1: people to be involved in Ukraine. Low percentages of Americans
23:23
Speaker 1: want the U.S. to be involved in the negotiations around Ukraine.
23:26
Speaker 1: We're not even talking about sanctions, troops on the ground,
23:29
Speaker 1: higher gas prices. We're just talking about just the use
23:31
Speaker 1: of of American government time. This is not a focus
23:35
Speaker 1: of them. And in the AP NORC poll, they asked
23:39
Speaker 1: people a series of questions. There's a running battery they have,
23:42
Speaker 1: a series of questions about how concerned they are about
23:45
Speaker 1: various foreign policy issues. 53% of Americans are either extremely
23:51
Speaker 1: or very concerned about Russia's influence in the world, which
23:54
Speaker 1: seems like a lot, right? It is a majority. But
23:57
Speaker 1: people concerned about China's influence in the world was higher, 59%.
24:00
Speaker 1: People concerned about cyber attacks generally was at 63%. And
24:05
Speaker 1: so this is for all, you know, and as you say,
24:07
Speaker 1: this could change because of what people are seeing on
24:10
Speaker 1: their television. But it is the idea they are not
24:14
Speaker 1: yet connecting why what happens in Ukraine matters in their lives.
24:19
Speaker 1: And that therefore puts the Biden administration in a very
24:22
Speaker 1: challenging position because they are all they are seeing the
24:26
Speaker 1: Biden administration do, for good reason, right? This is not
24:29
Speaker 1: a critique of it, is doing stuff about Russia, talking
24:32
Speaker 1: about Russia, going to meetings about Russia, photos about them
24:35
Speaker 1: talking about Russia, and not the things that they say
24:39
Speaker 1: is going to be the economy, inflation, et cetera, that's
24:41
Speaker 1: going to be at the top of their agenda when
24:42
Speaker 1: they go vote this fall.
24:45
Speaker 2: And I will say, this isn't some new sentiment in America.
24:49
Speaker 2: There's been a long tradition in public opinion of not
24:53
Speaker 2: wanting American leaders to focus on challenges overseas when there
24:59
Speaker 2: are so many challenges here at home. And that sentiment
25:03
Speaker 2: became even stronger after the debacle in Iraq. And so
25:07
Speaker 2: as long as we've been in politics, you know, some
25:11
Speaker 2: of the best lines from politicians that are the highest
25:13
Speaker 2: polling lines are, we don't want to do X overseas.
25:15
Speaker 2: We want to build more X here at home, right?
25:18
Speaker 2: You fill in whatever the policy issue is. So there
25:21
Speaker 2: is that sentiment that elected leaders have been facing for
25:24
Speaker 2: quite some time. But again, you know, I do think
25:27
Speaker 2: especially after the images of the last couple of days,
25:30
Speaker 2: that sentiment could shift, especially since this is a war
25:33
Speaker 2: that is being live tweeted on cable all the time.
25:36
Speaker 2: I mean, you know, it's just obviously even with the
25:40
Speaker 2: Iraq invasion, you saw cable news cover this nonstop. This
25:44
Speaker 2: is now every single second following it on social media,
25:47
Speaker 2: which is something that we haven't seen in quite a while,
25:49
Speaker 2: at least with a war this large. You've been in
25:52
Speaker 2: plenty of situations where challenging an unpopular foreign policy crisis
25:56
Speaker 2: dominates both media coverage and the president's attention. Like, what
26:01
Speaker 2: advice would you be giving to the White House right now?
26:04
Speaker 1: I think you ultimately just have to ignore the domestic
26:06
Speaker 1: politics of it. There is no good political position here.
26:10
Speaker 1: There is no good political message.
26:11
Speaker 2: I do not.
26:12
Speaker 1: I think they should do everything they can, as the
26:13
Speaker 1: president did in the speech he just gave, trying to
26:16
Speaker 1: explain to the American people why what happens in Ukraine
26:18
Speaker 1: matters to the American people. I do not think that
26:21
Speaker 1: is an argument they're going to win. It just it
26:23
Speaker 1: is even in more like, as you point out, other
26:26
Speaker 1: than the period right at between 9-11 and when it
26:29
Speaker 1: became pretty clear the Iraq war was a giant mistake.
26:33
Speaker 1: For the vast majority of the last 50 years of
26:35
Speaker 1: American politics, foreign policy has created this paradox for presidents
26:40
Speaker 1: where you pay a price for the chaos abroad, but
26:44
Speaker 1: you get no credit for preventing that chaos or returning
26:47
Speaker 1: the world to stability. And so it is almost, almost
26:50
Speaker 1: a lose-lose. And they're in this situation. So all you
26:53
Speaker 1: can do is do the substantively right thing. And I
26:55
Speaker 1: think continue to seem like you're doing everything you can,
26:58
Speaker 1: be out there publicly talking about it. But recognize you're
27:03
Speaker 1: still going to pay a price on some level because
27:06
Speaker 1: you were not talking about the things that people want
27:08
Speaker 1: you to be talking about. But you couldn't talk about
27:09
Speaker 1: the things you want to talk about because there was
27:11
Speaker 1: a war happening in Russia, right? Even if they were
27:13
Speaker 1: to come out and launch a new inflation plan today
27:17
Speaker 1: or some other sort of new COVID guidance or something
27:20
Speaker 1: that would address people's concerns, that would get no coverage
27:22
Speaker 1: and no one would consume it. So this is what
27:24
Speaker 1: they have to deal with. They just have to sort
27:26
Speaker 1: of bear down and get through it and hopefully bring
27:28
Speaker 1: it to a resolution and the most optimal resolution possible
27:33
Speaker 1: as soon as possible. But I don't think there's no
27:36
Speaker 1: message or communication strategy that's going to alter the fact
27:39
Speaker 1: that this is going to put some downward pressure on
27:41
Speaker 1: the president politically.
27:43
Speaker 2: Yeah, the president has the biggest megaphone in the country,
27:45
Speaker 2: but he does not control this news cycle when there
27:48
Speaker 2: is a war in Europe. I do think, look, in
27:53
Speaker 2: his speech today, he had to announce a lot of
27:55
Speaker 2: the sanctions and explain what the sanctions were and all that.
27:59
Speaker 2: But towards the end of the speech, he did try
28:02
Speaker 2: to make that case about why Ukraine should matter to us.
28:07
Speaker 2: And it does fit in with a message he's delivered
28:10
Speaker 2: many times in his presidency and even in the course
28:12
Speaker 2: of his campaign about the global struggle between autocracy and democracy.
28:17
Speaker 2: And I do think the strongest case for him is,
28:20
Speaker 2: like we were just talking about with Ben, this is
28:23
Speaker 2: an autocrat, an aggrieved, deranged autocrat with nuclear weapons. And
28:29
Speaker 2: if we do not stand up to him here, what
28:31
Speaker 2: else might happen? And what other autocrats in other places
28:35
Speaker 2: in the world, some of whom also have nuclear weapons,
28:38
Speaker 2: what are they going to do? And this is a
28:41
Speaker 2: global struggle that we're facing right now between autocracy and democracy.
28:44
Speaker 2: And democracy, as frustrating as it can be, as maddening
28:49
Speaker 2: as it can be, as messy as it can be,
28:52
Speaker 2: this is why democracy is worth the struggle. And I
28:56
Speaker 2: do think that like, Like you said, I still think,
28:58
Speaker 2: you know, I can hear the focus groups now. You
29:00
Speaker 2: have plenty of voters in this country like, yeah, but
29:03
Speaker 2: what about my life? And so they are going to
29:05
Speaker 2: take a hit for this probably. But I think your
29:07
Speaker 2: best shot at telling people why this matters to them
29:11
Speaker 2: is talking about that global struggle, which really exists right now.
29:15
Speaker 1: Yeah, it is. It is an uphill climb, to say
29:17
Speaker 1: the least.
29:18
Speaker 2: It is an uphill climb. We talked on Tuesday's pod.
29:22
Speaker 2: about how Putin's invasion is splitting the Republican Party. That
29:24
Speaker 2: has continued all week to this day. Some Republicans praised
29:28
Speaker 2: Biden's sanctions. Some criticized them for being too late and
29:31
Speaker 2: too weak. And some are in the leave Putin alone camp.
29:35
Speaker 2: Here's Tucker Carlson the other night.
29:36
Speaker 8: That hatred of Vladimir Putin could bring the United States
29:39
Speaker 8: into a conflict in Eastern Europe. Before that happens, it
29:43
Speaker 8: might be worth asking yourself, since it is getting pretty serious,
29:46
Speaker 8: what is this really about? Why do I hate Putin
29:49
Speaker 8: so much? Has Putin ever called me a racist? Has
29:52
Speaker 8: he threatened to get me fired for disagreeing with him?
29:55
Speaker 8: Has he shipped every middle class job in my town
29:57
Speaker 8: to Russia? Did he manufacture a worldwide pandemic that wrecked
30:00
Speaker 8: my business and kept me indoors for two years? Is
30:03
Speaker 8: he teaching my children to embrace racial discrimination? Is he
30:07
Speaker 8: making fentanyl? Is he trying to snuff out Christianity? Does
30:10
Speaker 8: he eat dogs? These are fair questions, and the answer
30:13
Speaker 8: to all of them is no. Vladimir Putin didn't do
30:16
Speaker 8: any of that.
30:17
Speaker 2: Where do you think the does he eat dogs thing
30:20
Speaker 2: come from? I had no idea what that reference was.
30:24
Speaker 1: It seems like it might be the regurgitation of a
30:28
Speaker 1: 2012 Romney campaign hit on Barack Obama. People can Google it.
30:35
Speaker 1: We don't have the energy or time to explain it,
30:37
Speaker 1: but you remember what I'm talking about.
30:40
Speaker 2: So that's Tucker. He's doing his thing. He's getting featured
30:45
Speaker 2: on Russian state TV because he's basically just giving them
30:48
Speaker 2: free propaganda.
30:49
Speaker 7: And then.
30:50
Speaker 2: There's elder statesman Donald Trump who weighed in on the
30:53
Speaker 2: crisis a couple of days ago during his interview on
30:56
Speaker 2: the Clay Travis and Buck Sexton show. Here's a clip
30:59
Speaker 2: of Trump.
31:00
Speaker 9: I went in yesterday and there was a television screen
31:03
Speaker 9: and I said, this is genius. Putin declares a big
31:08
Speaker 9: portion of the Ukraine of Ukraine. Putin declares it as independent. Oh,
31:15
Speaker 9: That's wonderful. So Putin is now saying it's independent, a
31:19
Speaker 9: large section of Ukraine. I said, how smart is that?
31:23
Speaker 9: And he's going to go in and be a peacekeeper.
31:26
Speaker 9: That's the strongest peace force. We could use that on
31:29
Speaker 9: our southern border. By the way, this never would have
31:31
Speaker 9: happened with us had I been in office. Not even thinkable.
31:36
Speaker 9: This would never have happened. And you know what the
31:38
Speaker 9: response was from Biden? There was no response.
31:41
Speaker 2: Of course, there was a response. Now, you may be
31:43
Speaker 2: thinking to yourself, OK, That was pretty nuts. Pretty nuts. But,
31:47
Speaker 2: you know, it was a few days before the full
31:49
Speaker 2: scale invasion. So maybe Trump will change his tune once
31:54
Speaker 2: he actually saw that there were bombs raining down on Kiev. Well,
31:58
Speaker 2: here's Donald Trump talking to Laura Ingraham last night live
32:03
Speaker 2: as the invasion was taking place.
32:05
Speaker 6: I think you're exactly right. I think that's what happened.
32:08
Speaker 6: He was going to be satisfied with the peace. And
32:10
Speaker 6: now he sees the weakness and the incompetence of the
32:12
Speaker 6: stupidity of this administration. And as an American, I'm angry
32:16
Speaker 6: about it and I'm saddened by it. And it all
32:19
Speaker 6: happened because of a rigged election. This would have never happened.
32:23
Speaker 7: Well, I think the whole thing again would have never happened.
32:25
Speaker 7: It shouldn't happen. And it's a very sad thing. But
32:28
Speaker 7: you know what's also very dangerous is you told me
32:31
Speaker 7: about the amphibious attacks by Americans. You shouldn't be saying
32:35
Speaker 7: that because you and everybody else shouldn't know about it.
32:38
Speaker 7: They should do that secretly, not be doing that through
32:42
Speaker 7: the great Laura Ingraham. They should be doing that secretly.
32:45
Speaker 7: Nobody should know that, Laura.
32:46
Speaker 6: And, you know, you.
32:49
Speaker 7: Now, those are the Russian amphibious landing. I thought you
32:53
Speaker 7: said that we were sending people in.
32:56
Speaker 10: No, I did not. No, no, no.
32:57
Speaker 7: That would be news.
32:59
Speaker 2: Yeah, that would be news, you fucking moron who used
33:02
Speaker 2: to be the commander-in-chief of the armed forces. You thought
33:05
Speaker 2: that last night at the beginning of the invasion that U.S.
33:08
Speaker 2: forces were launching attacks in Ukraine? I mean, also, there's that.
33:14
Speaker 2: There's also the fact that, like, that was maybe the
33:17
Speaker 2: quickest path ever between... here's something happening in the world.
33:22
Speaker 2: How can you make it about yourself? This never would
33:24
Speaker 2: have happened if it wasn't for the rigged election. It
33:26
Speaker 2: took him like two sentences to get from what's going
33:29
Speaker 2: on in the world to the big lie, which is
33:31
Speaker 2: a record, I think.
33:34
Speaker 1: I would just love a follow-up question on exactly how
33:36
Speaker 1: those two things are connected. Is it because of the
33:38
Speaker 1: mysterious fake DNC server that he thought was in Ukraine?
33:41
Speaker 1: Is it because of his phone call? Like how exactly,
33:44
Speaker 1: what led the Russians to invade Ukraine? uh, you know,
33:47
Speaker 1: was it Dominion? What led the Russians to invade Ukraine
33:50
Speaker 1: because of the big life like that, that we were
33:52
Speaker 1: in need of a follow-up question there.
33:54
Speaker 5: Yeah.
33:54
Speaker 2: Let's remember that he did withhold military assistance to Ukraine
33:58
Speaker 2: in order to make sure that he could dig up
34:01
Speaker 2: dirt on Joe Biden. That was, that was the source
34:04
Speaker 2: of the first impeachment. Lest we forget, lest we forget.
34:07
Speaker 2: I don't know what else to say about Trump here.
34:09
Speaker 2: Like Do you think it's politically wise for him to
34:12
Speaker 2: be saying what he's saying right now? It does seem
34:16
Speaker 2: like a moment where Donald Trump and the Tucker Carlsons
34:21
Speaker 2: of the world are out of step with most elected
34:26
Speaker 2: Republicans right now. Even Josh Hawley, who had been on
34:30
Speaker 2: Tucker's program, and his interview was also used as Russian propaganda,
34:35
Speaker 2: today put out a statement saying, okay, we stand with
34:38
Speaker 2: the people of Ukraine, we've got to stand up to Russia, blah, blah, blah.
34:41
Speaker 2: It's getting pretty lonely in the Leave Putin Alone caucus
34:45
Speaker 2: among Republicans right now. It's like Tucker Carlson and some
34:48
Speaker 2: of the wingnuts in right-wing media. Not a lot of
34:51
Speaker 2: elected officials there.
34:53
Speaker 3: Well, there's not a lot.
34:54
Speaker 1: Of elected officials, but it is the most prominent and
34:56
Speaker 1: powerful Republicans in the country who have adopted that position.
34:58
Speaker 1: And it is not a popular position. In the CBS
35:01
Speaker 1: YouGov poll you cited earlier, they asked... Who do you
35:05
Speaker 1: support in the negotiations around Russia and Ukraine? And they
35:09
Speaker 1: asked them, should the US support Russia? 4% of people.
35:12
Speaker 1: 4% of Republicans support that position. And so there is a, like,
35:19
Speaker 1: I don't think it's getting enough attention that the most
35:22
Speaker 1: important prominent figures, including the leading contender to be the
35:27
Speaker 1: next Republican nominee, has offered words of support. His praise
35:33
Speaker 1: has complimented Putin at this exact moment in time. And
35:37
Speaker 1: every Republic should have to answer for that.
35:39
Speaker 2: Every Republican should have to answer for that. Everyone who's interviewed. Um,
35:43
Speaker 2: I mean, do you think it's a problem that Republican
35:45
Speaker 2: messaging is contradictory between the, you know, the leader of
35:49
Speaker 2: the party still Donald Trump and so many other Republicans
35:52
Speaker 2: and the, and the media apparatus and elected Republicans? Like,
35:55
Speaker 2: is this a problem that it's contradictory and is it
35:58
Speaker 2: possible for Democrats to exploit these divisions?
36:02
Speaker 1: Well, I think the reaction to the invasion is contradictory, right?
36:07
Speaker 1: Or the analysis of why the invasion is happening is contradictory.
36:11
Speaker 1: There is pro-Putin. There is pro-fascist. There's fascist adjacent. There
36:16
Speaker 1: is Putin apologist. There's a whole set of different sort
36:19
Speaker 1: of camps here. But there is a very consistent message
36:24
Speaker 1: as it relates to Biden, which is every Republican, whether
36:29
Speaker 1: they love Vladimir Putin or or they pretend to love
36:32
Speaker 1: Vladimir Putin, or they, you know, sort of Putin neutral,
36:36
Speaker 1: has argued that this is a direct result of Biden's weakness.
36:39
Speaker 1: And this has been the message Republicans have been hammering
36:42
Speaker 1: since last summer, when the withdrawal around Afghanistan led to
36:46
Speaker 1: sort of the beginning of Biden's political troubles. And I mean,
36:49
Speaker 1: they're starting their statements about this. They blame Biden's weakness
36:53
Speaker 1: for why Putin did this, as opposed to blaming Putin's aggression.
36:57
Speaker 1: And there is some political power in that message. Strength
37:00
Speaker 1: and weakness is the paradigm on which Republicans always handle
37:03
Speaker 1: and discuss politics. And it is why they find themselves
37:07
Speaker 1: praising Putin as a way to draw a contrast between
37:10
Speaker 1: Putin and Biden. He is strong. Biden is weak. That's
37:13
Speaker 1: why this is happening. And so yes, they are incoherent.
37:17
Speaker 1: But I think it's not necessarily that we have to
37:19
Speaker 1: drive division between those two sort of confusing camps of
37:24
Speaker 1: dumb people saying dumb things. But I think what we
37:28
Speaker 1: can do is point out That the Republicans are blaming America, right?
37:33
Speaker 1: That they are reeking of political opportunism at this time.
37:37
Speaker 1: That their leaders are supporting Putin or complimenting Putin at
37:42
Speaker 1: this time. This is not for Joe Biden to do.
37:46
Speaker 1: His job is to stay above the fray. But for
37:47
Speaker 1: every other Democrat, for all of us, they are punching
37:51
Speaker 1: Biden at every opportunity to try to use this tragedy,
37:55
Speaker 1: this global crisis, to score political points for the midterm.
37:57
Speaker 1: And they have to be called out on it.
38:00
Speaker 2: Also, all of them spent the entire Trump administration supporting
38:05
Speaker 2: a president lockstep who cozied up to Putin and praised
38:10
Speaker 2: Putin every single chance he got. And none of the
38:13
Speaker 2: very few of them, a handful ever spoke out about
38:17
Speaker 2: that ever. So I and that's that's just a completely
38:21
Speaker 2: true observation. So I think Democrats pointing that out is
38:23
Speaker 2: very fair if they're going to talk about Joe Biden
38:26
Speaker 2: and his weakness. OK, when we come back. We will
38:28
Speaker 2: bring in Democratic strategist Celinda Lake to talk about the
38:32
Speaker 2: Republican midterm manifesto. There was some big news about the
38:44
Speaker 2: 2022 midterms this week. Just a month after Mitch McConnell
38:47
Speaker 2: told reporters that his party wouldn't be releasing any kind
38:50
Speaker 2: of governing agenda before the election. The Republican senator in
38:53
Speaker 2: charge of winning back the majority went ahead and did
38:56
Speaker 2: it anyway. Rick Scott laid out an 11-point policy platform
39:00
Speaker 2: that includes massive cuts to education, discrimination against transgender children,
39:05
Speaker 2: naming a border wall after Donald Trump, and raising taxes
39:09
Speaker 2: on nearly 100 million Americans. Here to talk about how
39:13
Speaker 2: this might fly with voters is Democratic pollster and strategist
39:17
Speaker 2: Celinda Lake. Celinda, welcome to the show.
39:19
Speaker 10: Hey, thanks. It's really a pleasure to be here. And
39:22
Speaker 10: it wasn't just 11 points. It was 228 points underneath that.
39:25
Speaker 10: Most of us can't count. that on.
39:31
Speaker 2: Yeah. Fortunately, I did not get through the entire manifesto.
39:36
Speaker 2: You conduct polling and focus groups all the time. How
39:38
Speaker 2: do you think voters in swing districts and swing states
39:41
Speaker 2: will respond to the Senate Republicans campaign plan, particularly the
39:44
Speaker 2: part about raising taxes so that everyone has, as they
39:48
Speaker 2: put it, skin in the game.
39:50
Speaker 10: Yeah, I love that. Like we don't already have enough
39:53
Speaker 10: skin in the game. I also love that they plan
39:56
Speaker 10: to tax seniors and disabled people and veterans because they
40:00
Speaker 10: really weren't contributing enough already. I think this is, you know,
40:06
Speaker 10: this is an abundance of riches. And I can't believe
40:10
Speaker 10: that it's really designed for primary politics. It's really designed
40:14
Speaker 10: for the mega nation faction. And our problem is going
40:19
Speaker 10: to be that we are going to have to be
40:20
Speaker 10: disciplined in picking out of the 228 proposals, which 516
40:25
Speaker 10: things do we have problems with? So one of the
40:29
Speaker 10: things that I love, it reminded me kind of of
40:31
Speaker 10: Newt Gingrich's contract for America. And I think that's what
40:35
Speaker 10: they were saying. really basing it on. But if you'll
40:39
Speaker 10: remember when we took on the contract and we said
40:44
Speaker 10: it was a contract on America, not for America, we said,
40:48
Speaker 10: look at the fine print. And this is a case where, boy,
40:51
Speaker 10: look at the fine print. And there are just so
40:54
Speaker 10: many policies in here that are wildly unpopular and so
40:59
Speaker 10: much intrusion of the government in people's personal lives. that
41:05
Speaker 10: is just astounding and trying to take things that are
41:08
Speaker 10: working to our advantage, like let's look at the science
41:10
Speaker 10: and perverting completely what science is. Let's look at what
41:14
Speaker 10: contributing to our society is and turning that on its
41:17
Speaker 10: head and saying seniors and disabled people and veterans don't contribute.
41:21
Speaker 10: This is just an abundance of riches. And we've got
41:23
Speaker 10: to figure out which two or three things are we
41:25
Speaker 10: going to drive home first.
41:27
Speaker 2: Do you think that the, um, raising taxes on 100
41:30
Speaker 2: million Americans is at the top of the list there?
41:33
Speaker 10: Yeah, I think it might be, particularly because during the
41:37
Speaker 10: Biden campaign, as you'll remember, we had to keep emphasizing
41:41
Speaker 10: that we were not going to raise taxes on anybody
41:44
Speaker 10: with incomes under $ 400, 000. Well, now you've got a plan.
41:47
Speaker 10: Not only is it raising it on half of America,
41:51
Speaker 10: but it's raising it on the half that's under $ 400, 000.
41:55
Speaker 10: So now there's a real clear choice. Everybody gets their
41:58
Speaker 10: taxes raised, including seniors who make up a record number
42:02
Speaker 10: of the electorate. And our proposal, which said nobody gets
42:07
Speaker 10: their taxes raised under $ 400, 000. And we're asking corporations and
42:11
Speaker 10: wealthy individuals to pay their fair share.
42:14
Speaker 2: Dan, why do you think Rick Scott did this? McConnell
42:17
Speaker 2: wanted no plan. Scott released an 11-point manifesto. with, as
42:22
Speaker 2: Cylinda noted, 200 and something points under that. Which option
42:25
Speaker 2: gives the Republicans a better chance at winning the Senate?
42:28
Speaker 1: Well, I think Rick Scott did this because he's just
42:32
Speaker 1: dumb enough to think he's a serious person. And so
42:36
Speaker 1: every politician we've ever worked for thinks they have to
42:39
Speaker 1: be for something. They have to have an agenda. What
42:41
Speaker 1: am I running on? And of course, McConnell is right
42:43
Speaker 1: in this situation because Republicans want, their agenda is less
42:47
Speaker 1: popular than Democrats. They themselves, the Republican Party, is in
42:50
Speaker 1: most polling less popular than Democrats. They just want to
42:52
Speaker 1: be a generic alternative to the things people are pissed about.
42:55
Speaker 1: So when they remind, if you have a plan to
42:57
Speaker 1: go out and remind people what they don't like about
42:59
Speaker 1: you and how unpopular positions are, that is, at least
43:02
Speaker 1: based on my expertise, or limited as it may be,
43:05
Speaker 1: bad political strategy.
43:07
Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean, it's clear from the polling I've seen
43:09
Speaker 2: that the economy is far and away the top issue
43:12
Speaker 2: for voters. Democratic economic policies are more popular than Republican
43:16
Speaker 2: economic policies. That said, Republicans seem obsessed with banning books,
43:21
Speaker 2: banning classroom discussions about gay people, a bill in Florida
43:24
Speaker 2: that just passed the House today, and banning health care
43:28
Speaker 2: for trans kids, as Governor Greg Abbott is trying to
43:30
Speaker 2: do in Texas. And the polling I've seen also shows
43:33
Speaker 2: that all those bans are also fairly unpopular with most
43:36
Speaker 2: voters as well. So, Linda, how do you think Democratic
43:39
Speaker 2: candidates should handle this? You know, Voters want to focus
43:42
Speaker 2: on the economy. Republicans want to get involved in people's
43:45
Speaker 2: lives in an unpopular way. How do you handle that
43:47
Speaker 2: if you're a Democratic campaign?
43:48
Speaker 10: Well, the thing that I think that's amazing about this
43:51
Speaker 10: is that the Republicans here are intervening and fixing a
43:56
Speaker 10: whole bunch of problems that don't exist. One of my
43:59
Speaker 10: favorites was God determined that the nuclear family is God
44:03
Speaker 10: driven and only traditional nuclear families are families. Well, that
44:07
Speaker 10: in a country with a 50 percent divorce rate, a
44:09
Speaker 10: lot of single moms and dads were working darn hard.
44:12
Speaker 10: a lot of grandparents raising kids. And as one person
44:15
Speaker 10: said in our focus groups, I got enough problems figuring
44:17
Speaker 10: out who's in my family. I don't need you telling
44:20
Speaker 10: me who's my family. They're fixing problems that don't exist
44:25
Speaker 10: and ignoring the problems that do or making them worse.
44:27
Speaker 10: You don't try to get your kids caught up on
44:30
Speaker 10: education by doing away with the department of education, a
44:33
Speaker 10: wildly unpopular policy. You don't tell seniors who are really
44:38
Speaker 10: struggling on fixed incomes with inflation that that your problem
44:41
Speaker 10: is you don't work and you don't pay enough taxes.
44:44
Speaker 10: So I think that the most important thing, I think,
44:47
Speaker 10: for Democrats is to lay out our positive agenda. Ironically,
44:52
Speaker 10: I don't think the Republicans needed to lay out an agenda.
44:55
Speaker 10: I think that we do need to remind people of
44:58
Speaker 10: what we have gotten accomplished. And then now we have
45:01
Speaker 10: the fodder for the starkest contrast of what an America
45:06
Speaker 10: under Rick Scott would look like. versus what we are
45:09
Speaker 10: struggling with right now to help all Americans. And what
45:13
Speaker 10: problems we're trying to deal with that are real problems
45:15
Speaker 10: at your kitchen table, unlike these made up problems, half
45:19
Speaker 10: of which have no definition. I mean, I love the one,
45:22
Speaker 10: they added in a little socialist everywhere they could. Half
45:25
Speaker 10: of the Americans don't know what a socialist is.
45:28
Speaker 1: So, you know.
45:30
Speaker 2: Sprinkle in some socialism whenever.
45:32
Speaker 10: You're in doubt. That's right, just a little socialist stuff.
45:35
Speaker 2: Dan, you and I have talked about how Democrats should
45:38
Speaker 2: handle these cultural issues. You know, obviously what Greg Abbott
45:43
Speaker 2: is trying to do in Texas is gross, disgusting, hateful.
45:49
Speaker 2: There hasn't been enough discussion about how it's unpopular as well.
45:52
Speaker 2: I mean, I looked at some PBS Marist polling from
45:55
Speaker 2: last April. Fewer than 30% of all Americans support state
45:59
Speaker 2: laws that prohibit gender affirming care for minors or that
46:02
Speaker 2: criminalize providers of that care. even a majority of Republicans
46:07
Speaker 2: oppose such laws. Obviously, there's also polling showing that banning
46:11
Speaker 2: books in schools is very unpopular, even with Republican voters.
46:14
Speaker 2: Banning classroom discussions about gay people, which I haven't seen
46:18
Speaker 2: polling up, but I'm going to guess, not being a pollster,
46:21
Speaker 2: you can tell me if I'm wrong, Celinda, I'm going
46:23
Speaker 2: to guess that that's not popular with a lot of
46:24
Speaker 2: voters either. So Dan, how do you think Democrats should
46:26
Speaker 2: handle these?
46:27
Speaker 1: Well, I think, you know, you and I've talked to
46:28
Speaker 1: this before about how we tend to create this fake
46:31
Speaker 1: wall between quote unquote cultural issues and economic issues. So
46:34
Speaker 1: we have to knock that down because anytime your opponent
46:36
Speaker 1: decides to adopt unpopular solutions to issues that people do
46:41
Speaker 1: not think is a problem or are not concerned about,
46:44
Speaker 1: you have to take advantage of that. And I think
46:46
Speaker 1: One way to handle this and connect it to what
46:50
Speaker 1: we have talked about many times is everyone's number one concern,
46:52
Speaker 1: inflation in the economy, which is this is what Republicans
46:55
Speaker 1: are focusing on. They're not focusing on lowering your gas
46:59
Speaker 1: prices or making it easier to pay for food or
47:00
Speaker 1: raise your wages. They're focusing on banning books and criminalizing
47:04
Speaker 1: parents and attacking gay people and attacking trans people. They're
47:07
Speaker 1: focused on these things. And we're focused on the things
47:09
Speaker 1: that affect your lives. And I think this is what
47:11
Speaker 1: the great gift of the Rick Scott manifesto is. He
47:15
Speaker 1: does it, and I actually gave him almost credit for
47:17
Speaker 1: the fact that he sat down at the computer and
47:19
Speaker 1: put together a document that took the least popular corporatist
47:24
Speaker 1: elements of the Mitt Romney-Paul Ryan agenda and combined it
47:28
Speaker 1: with the least popular, most bigoted parts of the MAGA
47:32
Speaker 1: agenda and put it in one document and said, enjoy, Democrats.
47:35
Speaker 1: So thank you, Rick Scott.
47:38
Speaker 10: I think the other thing that's really important here is
47:41
Speaker 10: to assert what the motivation is. They're trying to divide
47:44
Speaker 10: and divert us because they want to win political power
47:47
Speaker 10: and they want to hide their real agenda. Their real
47:50
Speaker 10: agenda is there is price gouging going on right now.
47:53
Speaker 10: And that's part of the contribution of inflation. And they
47:55
Speaker 10: don't want to take it on. We will. They don't
47:59
Speaker 10: want to take on the supply chain issues. We will.
48:03
Speaker 10: We will bring manufacturing back. And some of this stuff
48:07
Speaker 10: is just so non-common sense to women. It is so
48:11
Speaker 10: out of touch with their lives. I love the one.
48:13
Speaker 10: about we're going to ban discussion of any LGBTQ issues
48:17
Speaker 10: in the classroom. Okay, so what happens when Susie very
48:22
Speaker 10: innocently asks the teacher, why does Molly have two mommies?
48:26
Speaker 10: We're not going to answer that question. And when Molly,
48:31
Speaker 10: every child in America has a child of LGBTQ parents
48:35
Speaker 10: in their classroom now. Really, that's the biggest thing you
48:38
Speaker 10: can be focused on. You're going to run in there
48:41
Speaker 10: and be the teacher police. on whether you're going to
48:44
Speaker 10: answer the question, why does Molly have two mommies? That's ridiculous.
48:48
Speaker 2: It's obscene. It's obscene. So Republicans did not really get
48:54
Speaker 2: too excited about this Rick Scott manifesto. There's been a
48:57
Speaker 2: lot of reports that they're all grumbling about it. The
48:59
Speaker 2: NRSC itself was like, that's Rick Scott's own agenda. Rick
49:04
Speaker 2: Scott was trying to clarify things. He's like, oh no,
49:07
Speaker 2: the tax increase won't hit seniors. So this is all
49:10
Speaker 2: a mess. Do you think Democrats... will be able to
49:14
Speaker 2: tag the entire party with this agenda, and do you
49:18
Speaker 2: think that voters will agree? buy that?
49:20
Speaker 10: Well, in some ways, I'm a little sorry that they're
49:23
Speaker 10: pushing back so fast. And Republicans do cut their losses
49:26
Speaker 10: pretty fast sometimes. I was hoping they would ask. But
49:29
Speaker 10: the MAGA faction may well ask for endorsements of these
49:33
Speaker 10: positions in these primaries. And a lot of these Republicans
49:36
Speaker 10: are in pretty difficult primaries. And if you win the
49:40
Speaker 10: nomination as a MAGA candidate and you've endorsed this agenda,
49:44
Speaker 10: you are going to have a lot of explaining to
49:46
Speaker 10: do to suburban voters, to swing voters, to independents who
49:51
Speaker 10: will wonder what the heck were your priorities and what
49:55
Speaker 10: is going on with these positions.
49:58
Speaker 2: Dan, if you were running a Democratic campaign, how would
50:00
Speaker 2: you use this manifesto?
50:02
Speaker 1: I would force them. our opponent to answer for it,
50:06
Speaker 1: I would take every unpopular position advocated by any Republican
50:10
Speaker 1: anywhere in the country, whether it's Greg Abbott or Ron DeSantis,
50:13
Speaker 1: some random person with a Twitter account, and I would
50:15
Speaker 1: make the Republican answer for it. I mean, if you
50:17
Speaker 1: think about it, the Republicans took a position on defunding
50:22
Speaker 1: the police that was pushed forward by activists, but was
50:24
Speaker 1: not the official position of almost any Democrat on the
50:27
Speaker 1: ballot anywhere in the country, successfully ascribed it to Every
50:31
Speaker 1: single Democrat, including the Democratic nominee in the 2020 election,
50:35
Speaker 1: there is no reason that we can't take the positions
50:37
Speaker 1: adopted by the person in charge of their campaign arm,
50:41
Speaker 1: the governors of the largest state, leading presidential contenders, and
50:45
Speaker 1: make Republicans answer for it and try to use that
50:47
Speaker 1: to drive a wedge between, as Celinda said, the MAGA
50:49
Speaker 1: faction and what is in their broader political interests after
50:53
Speaker 1: the primary in these swing states.
50:56
Speaker 2: So, Linda, what else are you hearing from the voters?
50:58
Speaker 2: We need to win the midterms. Can you give us
51:00
Speaker 2: the good, the bad and the ugly?
51:01
Speaker 10: Yeah, three things we're hearing. First of all, everybody's in
51:05
Speaker 10: a pretty bad mood and feel that things are really
51:08
Speaker 10: going bad. They're looking for strong leadership. They're looking for
51:12
Speaker 10: people in touch with their lives. They're looking for an
51:15
Speaker 10: economic agenda. The single most important thing that Democrats have
51:18
Speaker 10: to do. is we have to get out our economic agenda.
51:21
Speaker 10: And we've been doing a lot on the economy, but
51:23
Speaker 10: voters don't know it. They're confused about what's BBB versus infrastructure.
51:27
Speaker 10: Did infrastructure even pass? Did Republicans support the rescue package?
51:32
Speaker 10: We have to take a couple of issues and get
51:34
Speaker 10: out there and really emphasize what we got accomplished.
51:39
Speaker 2: So there's talking about what Democrats accomplished. And I imagine
51:43
Speaker 2: there's also talking about what Democrats would accomplish if if
51:47
Speaker 2: the voters returned us to power and even if they
51:50
Speaker 2: enlarged the majority, what would you include in sort of
51:53
Speaker 2: a proactive democratic agenda going forward?
51:55
Speaker 10: Well, you're going to hear me say the economy. It's
51:58
Speaker 10: back to 1992, right? It's the economy, stupid. So the
52:02
Speaker 10: number one thing. And also we run so many women
52:06
Speaker 10: candidates and we're running so many people of color. And
52:09
Speaker 10: in our research, women candidates in particular need to prove
52:13
Speaker 10: that they are good on the economy. And Democrats need
52:16
Speaker 10: to prove that right now. So you made a very
52:18
Speaker 10: important distinction. Our policies are popular, but we're behind 10
52:22
Speaker 10: points on the economy. We need to get our policies
52:25
Speaker 10: out there. The second thing we need to do is
52:29
Speaker 10: set up some clear contrast. And, you know, it's really interesting, Dan,
52:34
Speaker 10: what you say. This is so seductive. This is like
52:37
Speaker 10: crack for political consultants, right? There is so much here.
52:40
Speaker 10: We could be on this and we could raise a
52:42
Speaker 10: ton of money on it. And we could be on
52:44
Speaker 10: it forever. But I think we need to set up
52:46
Speaker 10: a couple of economic contrasts as well. And the tax
52:50
Speaker 10: one is a huge issue. It's not surprising to me
52:52
Speaker 10: that they're backing off that tax provision right away. And
52:56
Speaker 10: note that 60% of the electorate is going to be
53:00
Speaker 10: over 50 years of age. The last thing we can
53:03
Speaker 10: do is this is a ready-made template to get out
53:05
Speaker 10: our vote. We have faced the challenge that Trump voters
53:08
Speaker 10: and MAGA voters are supercharged. And Rick Scott's worried about that.
53:12
Speaker 10: We are the ones who really ought to be worried.
53:15
Speaker 10: And now we have a ready-made agenda. Do you really
53:17
Speaker 10: want someone who has this agenda being nominated? Are we
53:24
Speaker 10: going to stop them now?
53:27
Speaker 2: Celinda, last question. Dan and I and Ben Rhodes were
53:30
Speaker 2: just talking about the political challenge Biden faces when it
53:32
Speaker 2: comes to dealing with Putin's invasion of Ukraine. With public
53:36
Speaker 2: opinion where it is, how would you advise him to
53:39
Speaker 2: communicate about this issue?
53:40
Speaker 10: I think he's doing a great job, honestly. And I
53:43
Speaker 10: think this is a real opportunity to establish some character
53:46
Speaker 10: traits that are really, really important, independent of the topic.
53:50
Speaker 10: And that, frankly, took a hit after the Afghanistan exit.
53:55
Speaker 10: So he has come across to voters as a very
53:57
Speaker 10: strong leader. He has come across as expert. He has
54:00
Speaker 10: done a fantastic job of communicating regularly with the voters.
54:05
Speaker 10: Here's what the experts say. here's what we're going to do.
54:09
Speaker 10: We're going to be tough. This is the implications that
54:11
Speaker 10: might have for you. I'm going to keep you posted.
54:14
Speaker 10: If we had had this kind of communication during COVID,
54:17
Speaker 10: we would be in so much better shape right now.
54:19
Speaker 10: And in our focus groups, just a couple of nights ago,
54:22
Speaker 10: one voter said, you know, if he can be this
54:24
Speaker 10: strong on Ukraine, maybe he can finally get the economy
54:28
Speaker 10: turned around.
54:30
Speaker 2: That's interesting. That's very interesting. Um, Celinda Lake, thank you
54:33
Speaker 2: so much for joining us on Pod Save America and
54:37
Speaker 2: for all your good insights and advice. Appreciate it.
54:40
Speaker 10: Thanks for having me. You all are the best.
54:46
Speaker 2: Thanks to Ben Rhodes and Celinda Lake for joining us today.
54:48
Speaker 2: Everyone have a great weekend and we will see you
54:50
Speaker 2: next week. Bye, everyone. Pod Save America is a Crooked
54:53
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54:57
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