Latest / The Chuck ToddCast / Chuck’s Commentary - Corruption Might Be The Dems’ Best Closing Argument + The Most Disgusting Campaign Ad Of The Cycle

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Chuck’s Commentary - Corruption Might Be The Dems’ Best Closing Argument + The Most Disgusting Campaign Ad Of The Cycle · The Chuck ToddCast

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: This episode of the Chuck Todd cast is brought to
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  Speaker 1: And then call chapter today at 980-734-4255. Hello there. Happy
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: Wednesday and welcome to the Chuck Todd cast. We are
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: now under two weeks. We're getting really close. We're not
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: quite there. We're measuring it in days. So we're 13
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  Speaker 1: days until election day. And we're not that far away
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: where we'll start measuring it in hours. If you will,
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: let me give you a quick rundown of today's episode.
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  Speaker 1: I've got two big stories that I think are very
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  Speaker 1: connected that will that if this is the closing argument,
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  Speaker 1: we may be moving into something bigger than just simply
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  Speaker 1: a wave. But we'll get to that in a second.
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: It is Wednesday, which means I'll give you an updated set.
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: At this point, I'm just going back and forth. My
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  Speaker 1: updated Senate rankings. Last week, you got my updated gubernatorial rankings.
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: And I make a few movements here and it will
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: be a top 10, not just a top five. Because realistically,
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: we've got probably 16 Senate races that are going to
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  Speaker 1: be decided by single digits. This cycle could climb closer
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: to 20. But we have 10, arguably 10 right now,
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  Speaker 1: that have a chance of flipping. And really, you could
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: expand that definition and say we're getting close to a
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: dozen that have a chance of flipping. Most of them
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  Speaker 1: are Republican-held seats that Democrats have a shot at flipping,
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: but there are at least three Democratic seats that at
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: least are sitting in single-digit territory. But I want to
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  Speaker 1: begin with what could be the closing argument for Democrats.
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: And if it's a successful closing argument, it could be
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  Speaker 1: how they take a good year and turn it into
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: a generational wipeout of the party in power. So let
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  Speaker 1: me explain. I'm beginning to wonder whether corruption now is
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  Speaker 1: emerging as the closing argument of this election. And it
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  Speaker 1: is something I've been saying for a while that I
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  Speaker 1: thought one of the things that could turn what already
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: was looking like a significant democratic wave into something considerably
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: bigger is corruption. This idea that everything's pay to play, right?
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  Speaker 1: It's the kind of issue that can accelerate corruption. an
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  Speaker 1: existing political trend. We've seen it in previous election cycles
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  Speaker 1: because it gives voters who might otherwise be reluctant to
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  Speaker 1: vote against their own party a permission slip to do
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: so because it's a temporary decision, right? And like I said,
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: there's some real history here. If you just go back
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: 20 years to 2006 midterms, directionally, we knew it was
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: going to be a good Democratic year. The question was,
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: could it be something bigger than what was anticipated? And
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  Speaker 1: they ended up with a big They won a big
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  Speaker 1: chunk of House seats. They were able to take control
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: of the Senate. Turned out to be a bigger, more
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: successful year. And it was about this time where they
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: got a corruption issue, right? Democrats were in this very
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: strong position. The Iraq war was going badly, right? Very similar.
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: I've always said that 2006 cycle and this cycle have
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  Speaker 1: a lot in common. Unpopular war in the Middle East,
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: unpopular war in the Middle East. An economy that wasn't
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: working for everybody, an economy that wasn't working for everybody, right? And,
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: you know, there was also a sense that Republicans have
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: been in charge, particularly for Congress. They've been in charge
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: for Congress for over a dozen years. Right. There hadn't
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: been a flip. There had been a sort of a
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: less than two year flip in the Senate thanks to
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: a party switcher in 2001. But there hadn't been the
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: voters hadn't flipped, flipped the party in some way. And
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: then came the Mark Foley scandal. Now, Foley was a
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: Republican congressman from Palm Beach County, Florida. He ended up
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: resigning after revelations about some sexually explicit instant messages that
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: he had sent to teenage congressional pages. And the scandal
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: quickly became about something bigger than Foley himself. What did
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: the Republican leadership know? When did they know it? And
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: why hadn't they done more? And it allowed for a
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: larger argument that, hey, this is what happens when a
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: party's been in charge for too long. You know, they
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: sort of, they sweep things under the rug. And suddenly
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: in the final weeks of an election, that was already
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: moving decisively towards the Democrats. Republicans had to deal with
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: this scandal that reinforced every single negative impression that voters
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: had already had about the party in that window, in
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: that period of time. So it didn't create the wave. Essentially,
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: it made the wave bigger, right? It was already there.
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  Speaker 1: It became one more reason for voters who were already
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: unhappy with how Republicans were governing to conclude, maybe it's
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: time to clean house. It's time to send a message.
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  Speaker 1: And that's what I mean when I talk about corruption
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  Speaker 1: being an accelerant here. You can be unhappy with the
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  Speaker 1: economy and still vote for your party. You can disagree
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: with your party's handling of a war and still vote
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: for your party. You can even be disappointed with a
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: president you supported and still vote for his party. But corruption,
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  Speaker 1: that's a different story. Corruption allows you to say, I'm
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  Speaker 1: not abandoning my principles. I'm not suddenly embracing the other
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: party's ideology. It's a permission slip, though, to vote against
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: my party because because it needs to be cleaned up.
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: And for voters who have spent their entire adult lives
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: identifying with one political party, that distinction can matter enormously, right?
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: It's not about persuading someone to change their mind. You
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: don't have to persuade this voter to change their mind.
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: You just have to persuade this voter, hey, the best
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: way for you to clean up this mess inside of
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: your party is to really punish the party and vote
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: this person out, vote the party out of power. For
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: two years, you can come right back and do what
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: you want to do in two years. Now, I want
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: to be careful. I'm not saying corruption has already become
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  Speaker 1: the dominant issue in this election. It hasn't. But we're
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  Speaker 1: starting to see it percolate. Right. And I think there's
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  Speaker 1: an opportunity here that Democrats can take the frustration about
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  Speaker 1: costs and lump them in with sort of the kleptocracy
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  Speaker 1: that essentially Donald Trump has tried to turn the Republican
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  Speaker 1: Party into. And I think we're beginning to see the
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  Speaker 1: ingredients that could make all of this work. And if
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: it does, there are enormous implications for the size of
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  Speaker 1: this democratic wave. About a month ago, I'd laid out
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: three broad scenarios for the midterms, the blue mirage, the
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: blue wave, and the blue tsunami. Well, the blue mirage,
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: of course, was the scenario where Democrats did well enough
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  Speaker 1: to win the House. Perhaps they picked up a Senate
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: seat or two, but they couldn't quite break through in
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: the more Republican states, in the more red-leaning states. Blue
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  Speaker 1: wave is something a bit more substantial, a national rejection
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  Speaker 1: of the governing party that reached into states and districts
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  Speaker 1: Republicans assumed were relatively safe. And then my blue tsunami
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  Speaker 1: scenario is where the bottom just falls out, you know,
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: where wait a minute, they're sending money to Wyoming? Yes,
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: they're sending money to Wyoming for that open house seat,
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: meaning like they can't take anything for granted in a
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: cycle like this. My goodness, the DGA is sending money
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: to Oklahoma, right? They think they have a shot at
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: winning Oklahoma government. So the political environment has become so
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  Speaker 1: difficult for Republicans and candidates who might ordinarily survive, may
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: not survive in an environment like that. That's what a
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: tsunami could mean. It's what happened you know, there was
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  Speaker 1: a big chunk of Democrats who lost in 94, who
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  Speaker 1: immediately saw new Democrats win those congressional seats back in 96, right?
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  Speaker 1: They were just sort of, but it was more of a,
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: that was just where the momentum is. And that's what
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: a tsunami looks like. 1994 was a tsunami against the Democrats.
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: It was a red tsunami. And I think, you know,
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: so I think at the moment, right, we are looking
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: at some form of a democratic way. There's a reason
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: all the markets prediction markets indicate that there's over a 50%
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: chance that Democrats take the House and the Senate, right?
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: The path to the Senate, but for Maine and Michigan,
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: You know, I'd be very bullish. I'm still pretty bullish
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: on Democratic chances to take control of the Senate. But
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: I do think that the Democratic candidates in Maine and
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: Michigan are struggling. And, you know, if Democrats got to
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: win one of those two, they cannot afford to lose
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: them both if they want to win the Senate here.
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: But I digress. So look, on the tsunami front, I'm
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: still a bit skeptical this turns into a 1994 style election.
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: I do think at this point we're looking at either
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: a 2018 wave or a 2006 wave, right? The 2006
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: wave was a bit bigger than 2018. 2018 allowed Democrats
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: to win pretty much everywhere they could in swing districts
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: and in blue states, but they couldn't really reach into
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: Republican territory. 2006 allowed them to reach into Republican territory.
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: And that's the big distinction between the two. And of course,
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: this election cycle, because there's so many Senate seats in
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: red territory, Democrats don't succeed in winning in red territory.
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: They're not going to win the Senate. That said, the
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: idea of a blue tsunami, I think that possibility is
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: somewhere in the 15 to 20 percent category, right? This
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: isn't a 5 percent chance. I think about, you know,
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: you run this election, you know, 100 times and I
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: think maybe in 15 to 20 of them. you get
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: some sort of tsunami. And what do I mean by that?
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: It's 30, 40, maybe more seats in the House. It's
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: something like, you know, where they end up with over
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: 250 House seats and they end up with, say, 53
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: or 54 Senate seats when all is said and done.
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: But the reason I'm keeping the possibility of a tsunami
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: on the table is that I think there's still room
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: for this political environment to deteriorate further for Republicans. And
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: we've gotten a few news stories over the last couple
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: of days that indicate how that could happen. Which brings
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: me back to the corruption issue, because there's another example,
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: a much more recent one that I've been thinking about
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: as well. I've brought it up with you in previous episodes,
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: and that's Hungary. Peter Magyar's challenge to Viktor Orban was
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: built in significant part around corruption. The idea that this
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: government and power had created a kleptocracy. I mean, that's
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: what Orban had built. That's what Donald Trump is turning
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: the Republican Party into, which is a full on kleptocracy.
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: And there are more and more Republicans uncomfortable with what
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: Trump is doing. And in Hungary, what made the argument
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: especially potent for Magyar was the connection that he took
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: with the corruption to everyday economic life, right? It wasn't
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: simply an argument that Orban and his political cronies had
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: become too powerful or that the system had become too corrupt.
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: It was the idea that a politically connected class had
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: enriched itself while ordinary Hungarians were struggling with the cost
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: of living. That's when a corruption issue becomes something more
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: than a good government issue, right? This isn't about norms anymore, right?
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: When voters believe that the people running their government are
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: making themselves and their friends richer while everybody else is
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: paying more for groceries, paying more for energy, especially while
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: your cronies get to build data centers. more to get by,
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: corruption becomes an economic issue, right? That's when it becomes
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: really potent, right? I'm not doing well and these SOBs
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: are making money off of my back, screw them, right?
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: That's the mindset. That can reach voters who aren't particularly
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: interested in debates about democratic institutions or constitutional norms, right?
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: These are voters that aren't thinking that way, but instead
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: they're like, Well, if they're just out for themselves, they're
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: certainly not out for me. And corruption is almost an
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: easier way to make that case than trying to lay
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: it out with, hey, look, they got this donation, then
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: they did this, et cetera, et cetera. Now, these voters
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: may not follow every controversy involving the courts or the
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: Justice Department. They may not care about the finer points
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: of executive authority. They understand the idea that people in
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: charge are taking care of themselves while everybody else gets
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: stuck with the bill. Now, Are we beginning to see
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: this argument develop into a full-on closing argument for the Democrats?
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: I don't know yet. But I think the potential is there.
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: I think the latest reporting involving Elon Musk, Donald Trump, Russia,
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: and Ukraine makes the question considerably more relevant than it
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: was even a week ago. Let's dig into Musk here
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: a little bit. I want to return to something that
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: I raised on the last podcast. Because the sequence of
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: events involving Elon Musk deserves a ton of attention than
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: it's getting And I think that this needs to be
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: louder from some Democrats on this. Frankly, Republicans, this shouldn't
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: be a partisan issue. The wealthiest man in the world
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: is hijacking the United States foreign policy and the American government.
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: That's a problem. That's a scandal. And that should be,
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: you know, in blaring three-inch letters. So let's start with
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: the money. Musk has become the most prominent financial benefactor
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: of the Republican Party. And in September, he made two
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: enormous contributions to the Senate Leadership Fund. The first was
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: a $ 75 million check, and the second was an $ 83
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: million check. It was a total of $ 158 million. And
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: in each instance, the following day, an equivalent amount was
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: transferred to a Texas super PAC that was supporting Ken Paxton. Now,
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: I've talked a lot about Paxton. And the fact that
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: Senate Republicans spent a considerable amount of time and money
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: trying to keep him from becoming their nominee was pretty telling.
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: And so the idea that they spent all this money
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: to try to stop him, that they were suddenly going
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: to have to spend all this money to rescue him,
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: seemed a bridge too far for some Senate Republicans. But
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: once he became the nominee, they had a problem. They
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: needed to help him, particularly if they cared about holding
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: control of the Senate and because James Tallarico was raising
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: enormous amounts of money. But they also had to deal
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: with an entire Senate map that was starting to deteriorate.
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: And along comes Elon Musk. This episode of the Chuck
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  Speaker 1: get free shipping on your order, 365-day returns. Now available
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: in Canada and the UK, too. And when Quince asks
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: where you heard about them, please let them know it
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: was the Chuck Todd cast. It's the best way to
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: support the show and the best way to make sure
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: you're getting every discount. This is the part of this
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: arrangement that I find especially revealing, right? The Senate Republican
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: leadership isn't particularly shy about explaining that the Texas money
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: is essentially Musk's money. It's almost as though they're reassuring
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: their traditional donors that don't worry, their contributions aren't being
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: diverted away from other Senate races to rescue Ken Paxton,
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: who probably doesn't deserve to be rescued, right? This unethical
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: sort of just unworthy candidate for Senate. There are quite
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: a few Republican donors who don't want to see their
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: money wasted trying to rescue this unrescuable person. And it's
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: almost like Senate Republicans, oh, don't worry, guys, your money,
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: we're not wasting your money on Ken Paxton. We got
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: somebody else that's going to pay this Ken Paxton bill.
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: And of course, that somebody is Elon Musk. It's an
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: extraordinary arrangement, right? Ken Paxton can't find anybody else to
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: fund his super PAC other than Elon Musk. We know
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: the Republican establishment didn't want to fund Paxton. Donald Trump
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: has made it clear he does, but God forbid he
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: ever spend his own money to help somebody else. So
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: he gets his trillionaire buddy to do this. So the
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: richest man in the world has effectively stepped in to
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: finance the effort to save one entire Senate campaign. And
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: what's funny is that in the last, and this is
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: where I don't know what's connected here with our foreign policy,
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: but the fact that all this is happening all at
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: the same time. So Elon Musk is writing these checks
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: to rescue Paxton clearly at the behest of Trump, right?
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: Trump is desperate to help Paxton, not desperate enough to
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: write his own checks, but desperate enough to get Elon
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: Musk to write checks. Why do we know he's upset?
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: Because he went on Truth Social and being moaned about
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: John decided he was going to blame John Cornyn and
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: Karl Rove for their handling of the Paxton. If it
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: wasn't for them, Paxton would be in better shape. How
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: about if it wasn't for Ken Paxton, the Texas Senate
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: race would be in better shape? How about if it
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: wasn't for Donald Trump that supporting a loser like Ken Paxton,
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: a corrupt figure like Ken Paxton, that Republicans would be
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: better shape? Now, we don't know whether any of this
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: is a quid pro quo. The Musk donations happened in September.
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: This slowdown of Starlink happened in October. You know, we're
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: not sure what's connected. But guess what? That's what Congress's
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: job is. But it's all part of this same political story, right?
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: You've got the president. You got Senate Republican leadership. You
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: got a candidate they didn't want. You got a man
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: who is now providing an extraordinary amount of money being
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: used to help elect them. And he wants to have
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: an extraordinary amount of influence on the war between Ukraine
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: and Russia. Wall Street Journal, they're the latest to report
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: that this time, according to the journal, it was Musk
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: who personally ordered the slowdown of the military grade version
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: of Starlink that Ukrainian forces were relying on to operate drones,
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: including drones used to intercept Russian attacks. The restrictions began
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: on October 14th. Happened to be the day before we
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: found out he was the sole funder of Ken Paxton.
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: by the way, for what it's worth. This also happened
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: after both Trump and Musk had publicly criticized Ukraine for
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: attacking Russian energy infrastructure. I missed the part where Trump
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: and Musk attacked Russia for everything it's been doing to Ukraine,
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: but I digress. Trump is particularly angry about Ukrainian attacks
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: on Russian refineries because he he has manufactured... Remember, Donald
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: Trump's decisions aren't what's harming the American people. He's always
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: got to blame somebody else. His decision to be talked
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: into a war with Iran by Israel apparently is not
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: his fault and is not the reason why diesel prices
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: have skyrocketed. He wants people to believe it's the war
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: between Russia and Ukraine that explains the rise in diesel prices. Now, again,
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: None of this, there's no evidence that supports that. All
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: the evidence supports that what's happened in the Middle East
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: is why energy prices have skyrocketed. But Trump needs a
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: different foil, and it's very important to him. He always, right,
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: he's got to self-soothe. It's never his fault, right? That's,
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: you know, that's not what the narcissist believes. It is
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: clear it's the Iran war that has done this. But
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: Trump continues to want to blame Ukraine. There's a variety
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: of reasons for this. Right. A week ago, he complained
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: that he told Zelensky not to attack the refineries and
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: that Zelensky had done it anyway. And Musk responded saying
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: Zelensky had gone too far. Again, Russia has invaded this
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: man's country, killed thousands, hundreds of thousands of civilians. And
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: somehow it's Ukraine's fault. This blame the victim mentality by
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: Musk and Trump. It really it's borderline treasonous as far
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: as I'm concerned. It's a traitor to the it's a
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: traitor to American foreign policy. It just is, you know,
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: it's it's it isn't supportive of democracy. And I know
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: these are buzzwords and this will get aggregated and all
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: of that and fine. Right. But this is I know
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: we've run out of adjectives to describe the damage that
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: Donald Trump has done to America's standing in the world.
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: And if we're not going to stand up for democracies,
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: then what the hell are we going to do? What's
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: the point of the American experiment if we're not going
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: to support democracies when they are threatened by thugs like
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: Vladimir Putin? But here we are. So now we learn,
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: according to the journal, that it was Musk who ordered
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: the slowdown. Now, we still don't have a clear explanation
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: of who authorized it. Musk publicly suggested that these decisions
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: were technically up to the American military and the president.
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: Trump said he didn't know who was responsible. Pete Hegseth
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: said the Pentagon hadn't ordered any restrictions, but he acknowledged
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: that Starlink could make decisions about its own terms of service.
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: So Hegseth was kind of implying in his own way
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: that Musk could do this if he chose to do this.
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: And the journal reports the conflicting accounts about whether Trump
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: knew about the decision beforehand or not. But here's the
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: question that this all introduced. Who is actually making American
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: national security policy? Is it the president? Is it the Pentagon?
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: Is it the National Security Council? Or can the richest
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: man in the world, who also happens to be the
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: Republican Party's biggest political donor, make a decision that directly
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: affects the battlefield in Ukraine? Bottom line is Congress ought
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: to be asking some of these very specific questions about
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: this right now. Who talked to whom? When did those
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: conversations take place? What did the president know? What did
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: the Pentagon know? Why did the administration initially seem so
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: confused about who was responsible? By the way, who asked
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: for this check to Paxton? Who made the request to
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: Musk for this money? When was this request made? Did
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: it come with strings attached? Did Musk say he'd give
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: this money if he had more control over Starlink? All
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: of these are questions that Congress has is obligated to
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: ask on behalf of the American people, pure and simple.
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: And if Congress isn't curious about this, then we've got
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: a bigger problem than we realize. What was asked for?
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: What was promised? Was there any relationship between the enormous
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: financial support that Musk is providing to the president's party
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: and the national security decisions being made around the same time?
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: Just because we don't have evidence of a quid pro
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: quo doesn't mean we shouldn't be asking questions whether there was.
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: And that's the problem, right? The totality of moves that
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: Donald Trump has made as president indicate that this is
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: how he operates. We know there's a pay for play
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: on pardons. We know he does this. In some ways,
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: he advertises it because he wants people to know that
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: if you want something from him, you have to write
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: a check. Pure and simple. This is not like something
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: he hides because he wants people to come with their
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: check in hand before they show up in the Oval.
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: So if Congress can't do oversight on something like this,
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: then it is completely lost the plot. But there's another
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: dimension to the story that may ultimately become politically pretty important.
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: Let's go back to what I was saying about Hungary.
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: The most potent corruption argument isn't necessarily that somebody broke
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: a law. It's that the government has become a system
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: in which the politically connected seem to have access and
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: influence that ordinary people don't. And then you connect that
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: to the cost of living. So think about the situation
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: we have right now. Americans are paying more for energy.
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: The president is blaming Ukraine's attacks on Russian refineries. His
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: administration has been easing restrictions involving Russian diesel. And he's
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: publicly pressuring Ukraine to stop attacking Russia's energy infrastructure, right?
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: Which when, why does Russia need its energy so we
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: can finance its war against Ukraine? Meanwhile, Donald Trump's most
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: important political benefactor has made a decision that restricts Ukraine's
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: ability to use a critical communications system. All of this
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: is happening while Musk is pouring hundreds of millions of
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: dollars into Republican campaigns. We have no idea what Musk
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: is personally profiting from the price of diesel, or maybe
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: he just needs certain relationships with Russia because of his
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: space issue. Maybe you have a bunch of rich guys
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: whispering into Trump's ear that they want to do business
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: with Russia again, and he needs to hurry up and
• 28:55
  Speaker 1: solve this thing. Whatever it is, something smells here, and
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: it smells to Hayek. But the question I'm asking is
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: whether voters are beginning to see a government that appears
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: more responsive to the interests and preferences of powerful insiders
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: and extraordinarily wealthy individuals rather than worrying about ordinary Americans.
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: That is where the economic argument and the corruption argument
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: begin to overlap. If voters start connecting those dots politically,
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: that becomes an extraordinarily significant problem for the GOP generally.
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: You have a president who promised to bring down prices.
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: Voters are still unhappy with the cost of living. You
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: have an administration filled with people who have enormous financial
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: interests in industries affected by government decisions. You have a
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: political system in which one individual can provide hundreds of
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: millions of dollars in campaign financing while simultaneously exercising extraordinary
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: influence over a matter of of national security. Is that
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: how most Americans think government ought to work? And more importantly,
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: are they beginning to see that those things are connected?
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: That's the question I keep coming back to. Do they
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: see the connection? I don't know that corruption is going
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: to become the closing argument of this election, but I
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: can see how it could. We've been hearing anecdotes all
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: over that people keep bringing up. When you're not doing well,
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: the corruption really pisses you off. If you were doing fine,
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: you roll your eyes. So Trump 1.0 corruption, people eye
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: rolled because they were doing OK. Trump 2.0 corruption is
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: a different story. And it could become an accelerant that
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: turns an already difficult election for Republicans into something considerably
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: more consequential. Right. The economy has already created dissatisfaction. Trump's
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: behavior has already created exhaustion and fatigue. The Iran war
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: has created questions about his judgments. And there's a growing
• 30:59
  Speaker 1: sense among voters that this administration hasn't delivered the stability
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: or the lower prices that Trump promised were going to
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: take place on day one. Remember, all of our economic
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: instability is caused by Donald Trump. These are not Biden policies.
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: Biden did not do Liberation Day tariffs, did not start
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: the trade war with Canada, did not start a war
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: with Iran. All of these things are Donald Trump decisions.
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: And then what happens if corruption becomes the explanation voters
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: settle on for why those promises by Trump have not
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: been kept? What happens if the closing argument becomes that
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: the president and his wealthy friends are doing just fine
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: while everybody else is still struggling to pay the bills?
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: And oh, by the way, the president wants to sell
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: your land out from under you to these tech companies
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: as well and make your energy bills go up even higher.
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: It's a different kind of argument. from the usual red
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: versus blue, D versus R, debate over taxes, spending, or immigration.
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: And it's the one that could provide exactly the kind
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: of permission slip to voters that I've been talking about.
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: Voters don't have to be persuaded. They can still think
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: the Democrats are too close to the socialist wing of
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: their party. But a Republican voter doesn't have to decide
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: that Democrats are right about any of this. They don't
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: even have to like the Democratic Party. They just have
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: to decide their own party has become too comfortable with
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: the way power is being exercised, and that somebody needs
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: to be able to hold it accountable. This is part
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: of what happened in 06. The Foley scandal didn't cause
• 32:39
  Speaker 1: the wave. It reinforced the sense that the Republican Party
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: had been in power too long and didn't know how
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: to police itself anymore. And I'm wondering if we're approaching
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: a similar moment now. It is how Democrats could overperform
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: in so many of these red states because it's voters
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: who perhaps ideologically are more comfortable with the Republicans than
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: the Democrats. But they may think the Republicans are, you know,
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: that the Trump era is just so corrupt that they
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: have to clean house. And I think the next 10
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: days are going to tell us quite a bit about
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: whether corruption is simply one more issue in this election
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: or whether it's becoming the issue that helps voters make
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: up their mind. I'll just say this. I had somebody
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: come up to me at the airport the other day
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: and say that they had never voted for a Democrat before,
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: but that they were likely going to vote Democrat on
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: a number of races this time. They said they were
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: from Texas. And it was it was the rationale was housecleaning.
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: He was not becoming a Democrat. He was not becoming
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: a liberal. He was not becoming a progressive. I think
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: he believes he's not changed who he is. I think
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: he thinks that Donald Trump has changed the Republican Party
• 33:52
  Speaker 1: in a way he doesn't like and that it's time
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: to clean house. How many of those voters exist? And
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: are there enough of them that it has a significant
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: impact on the psyche of whoever is left inside the
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: Republican Party if this indeed is the type of election
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: we're facing? I don't know if we're there yet, but
• 34:12
  Speaker 1: I say we're closer. And I think the corruption issue
• 34:17
  Speaker 1: is an interesting way I think now there's enough ways
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: to connect it to the cost of living. All right,
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: speaking of character and accountability, I want to spend a
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: few minutes in Ohio because something happened in the governor's
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: race there on Tuesday that I think deserves a lot
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: of attention than just a typical campaign controversy. And it
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: deserves a lot of outrage. It's as disgusting and despicable
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: of an attack ad that I can think of any
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: candidate ever coming up with In my adult lifetime. Now, look,
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: I've been pretty bullish on Democratic prospects in Ohio than
• 34:56
  Speaker 1: perhaps other people have. I was earlier on this that, hey,
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: I don't think I think Vivek Ramaswamy is perhaps the
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: worst Republican you could find to lead the ticket in
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: Ohio in a campaign year like this. And this was
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: before his his campaign did something that is just extraordinarily disgusting.
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: And we're going to get there in a minute. You know,
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: but I thought for a while that Ramaswamy was exactly
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: the wrong kind of Republican candidate for this moment. Right.
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: Simply because of what he represents. Here's somebody whose political
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: identity was built around his success in the tech and
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: biotech world. Somebody who became enormously wealthy and then used
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: that wealth and the celebrity that came with it to
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: enter politics. Kind of a poster child of, you know,
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: it's kind of the poster child of the Republican Party
• 35:44
  Speaker 1: that Donald Trump has built. Now, on the surface, there's
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: nothing inherently wrong with what he did. We've had plenty
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: of successful business people in our politics. Maria Cantwell struck
• 35:58
  Speaker 1: it rich with, I think it was the real videos.
• 36:01
  Speaker 1: I think it was what it was back in, used
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: the money she made in stock options to finance a
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: Senate race in 2000 to get back into politics. So again,
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: people have done it, Democrats and Republicans. But I have
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: been struck by how much of Ramaswamy's public reputation rests
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: on the success of making money rather than on any.
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: He doesn't really have a clear record of improving people's lives.
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: He's made money, but he's not accomplished a lot. Right.
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: His companies haven't solved problems. They haven't saved lives. They've
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: just been vehicles to make him money. And I do
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: think that that distinction matters in this election and that
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: it was mattering even before this latest controversy. Because we're
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: living through a period when Americans are becoming increasingly skeptical
• 36:48
  Speaker 1: of the motivations of these wealthy tech execs. They're skeptical
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: of the influence these individuals have of our government simply
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: because they can write big fact checks to super PACs.
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: They're skeptical of the data centers that are appearing in
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: their own communities, skeptical of the idea that a handful
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: of people who have made fortunes in technology ought to
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: have somehow an outsized role in deciding public policy. And
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: Ramaswamy is associated with precisely this world. He's associated with
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: Elon Musk, right? He was the partner with Musk in
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: the Doge effort at the beginning of Trump's second term.
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: He's associated with the idea that government ought to be
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: run more like a tech company. You think that's what
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: Americans want? And I think that has become much more,
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: it's a very difficult political identity to sell than Republicans
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: had anticipated. And if you look at Ohio polling, right?
• 37:37
  Speaker 1: I mean, Acton hasn't trailed Ramaswamy in a single poll
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: in the last two months, to my knowledge. And she's
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: been running further ahead of Ramaswamy, Amy Acton has, than
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: Sherrod Brown has been running ahead of John Huston. And
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: I think it's that Ramaswamy is just, you know, Huston
• 37:56
  Speaker 1: is more of a known quantity in Ohio Republican circles
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: than Ramaswamy in his own way. We're talking about a
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: Republican candidate for governor who was already struggling. in a
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: state Donald Trump carried comfortably three times. And in fact,
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: I think Ramaswamy is part of the reason why the
• 38:22
  Speaker 1: entire Republican ticket is struggling in Ohio. I mean, he
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: is pretty much the worst nominee they could have come
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: up with. And that's before he did this disgusting, egregious
• 38:34
  Speaker 1: attack on Amy Acton. Because I think just Ramaswamy's presence, right?
• 38:40
  Speaker 1: He's sort of a, cheap version of Elon Musk, right?
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: A less successful version of Elon Musk. But if you
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: don't like Elon Musk and Trump and the relationship with tech,
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: you're not going to like Ramaswamy. He's got a likability problem, right?
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: And now he got desperate. We have this extraordinary story
• 39:00
  Speaker 1: involving Amy Acton and her mother. So if you haven't
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: followed it, let me explain what happened. A video began
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: circulating online this week featuring Acton's estranged birth mother, a
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: woman named Donna Arthur. The last time that Acton saw
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: her was in 1978 when she was a child. And
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: this woman, who is Acton's birth mother, is in this video,
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: it appears to be an ad paid for by Ramaswamy,
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: accusing her daughter of lying about her childhood. Now, let
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: me tell you something about Amy Acton's childhood. She's spoken
• 39:35
  Speaker 1: publicly about growing up in some extremely difficult circumstances, including
• 39:40
  Speaker 1: periods of homelessness, neglect, and abuse. The history here is
• 39:46
  Speaker 1: deeply disturbing. When Acton was 12 years old, her stepfather
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: was arrested and subsequently indicted on charges of sexually abusing her.
• 39:55
  Speaker 1: Acton and her brother were removed from their mother's custody.
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: Her stepfather fled prosecution and her mother remained married to
• 40:05
  Speaker 1: this evil guy. Now, Acton has said she hasn't seen
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: her mother since they were together in a courtroom in 1978.
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: That's 48 years ago. Now imagine having that history. Imagine
• 40:18
  Speaker 1: having spent your adult life dealing with what happened to
• 40:20
  Speaker 1: you as a child, building a career, raising a family,
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: serving your community, and eventually deciding that you want to
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: run for governor. And then two weeks before election day,
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: a video appears featuring the mother from whom you've been
• 40:32
  Speaker 1: estranged for nearly half a century, publicly attacking your credibility
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: and suggesting you've lied about your childhood. What are we
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: doing here? What are you doing here, Vivek? The video
• 40:47
  Speaker 1: has circulated among Ramaswami supporters and Acton and her brother
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: have accused Ramaswami of being behind it. Now, as of
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: this recording, the recording is not established who produced or
• 40:57
  Speaker 1: financed the video, but it's, you know, the problem is
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: Ramaswami's morals and ethics aren't exactly tip top shape, right?
• 41:07
  Speaker 1: What do you believe? Now, the video itself doesn't carry
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: a sponsorship disclosure, and we don't know whether Acton's mother
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: was compensated for the video. But what do you think?
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: What are you suspicious of? All of those are important facts,
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: and I don't want to skip over them. But here's
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: what we know. When Ramaswamy's campaign was asked about the video,
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: it didn't simply say this was inappropriate or that the
• 41:32
  Speaker 1: candidate wanted nothing to do with an attack involving an
• 41:35
  Speaker 1: opponent's childhood sexual abuse. Instead, the campaign continued attacking Acton's credibility.
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: The Ramaswamy campaign made a choice. They made a choice
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: to go down this disgusting gutter, this horrendous gutter, vile gutter.
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: It's a choice about the kind of campaign you're willing
• 41:58
  Speaker 1: to run, the kind of political behavior you're willing to tolerate.
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: It's quite revealing, right? Character reveals itself. And we now
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: know Ramaswami is pond scum, pure and simple. If you
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: green light an attack like this, trying to exploit the
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: pain and hurt of somebody who was abused when they
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: were in middle school, junior high, you're a piece of shit.
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: You're a scumbag. Those words are worthy here. Just absolutely
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: gross and disgusting. And if you're not denouncing this, if
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: you're an Ohio politician and you're not denouncing this, then
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: get out of politics. Look, I've covered campaigns for more
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: than three decades. I know politics ain't beanbag. It's ugly.
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: It's gross. It's terrible. We've seen candidates attack. Ex-wives, we've
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: seen ex-wives exploited, ex-husbands exploited, families, finances, all of that.
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: We've seen plenty of this that arguably is indefensible. And
• 43:16
  Speaker 1: I know there are political professionals who will tell you
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: that sometimes the ugliest attacks, they work. That voters may
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: tell pollsters they don't like negative campaigning, but they still
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: absorb the information. Okay. This doesn't feel like one of those.
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: I think there are moments when the public's tolerance for
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: this kind of behavior is misjudged. I think this is
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: going to be one of them. I think Ramaswamy just
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: got himself canceled from polite company. I wouldn't stand next
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: to this man under any circumstance. I wouldn't want to
• 43:47
  Speaker 1: do business with somebody who goes down this gutter unless
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: he is a full, if he's going to just candidate
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: to camera, apologize for this type of intolerable behavior. Because
• 44:00
  Speaker 1: think about the calculation involved in using somebody's estranged mother
• 44:04
  Speaker 1: to question her account of a childhood that included documented
• 44:09
  Speaker 1: sexual abuse. What is the political theory here? That Ohio
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: voters are going to watch this ad and decide that
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: Amy Acton's greatest vulnerability is that her mother, who remained
• 44:20
  Speaker 1: married to the man accused of sexually abusing her, now
• 44:24
  Speaker 1: says she wasn't telling the truth about her childhood? Is
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: that where we are? We spend a lot of time
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: in this country complaining about the quality of people who
• 44:35
  Speaker 1: run for public office. We complain that good people don't
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: want to enter politics. Well, that we don't have enough
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: public servants who are motivated by something other than ambition, money,
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: or celebrity. It's moments like this that's part of the reason.
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: If you know that running for office means somebody may
• 44:55
  Speaker 1: go digging through your most traumatic experiences of your childhood
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: and look for a way to weaponize them and use
• 45:02
  Speaker 1: them in political ammunition. They knew this story and they
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: went with it anyway. They wanted to go down this
• 45:11
  Speaker 1: road of trying to weaponize somebody's childhood trauma. The number
• 45:21
  Speaker 1: of people who greenlit this, whoever is involved in this,
• 45:25
  Speaker 1: I hope they never get hired in American politics ever again.
• 45:31
  Speaker 1: The people who run campaigns decide, if we sit here,
• 45:35
  Speaker 1: if we decide there are no boundaries at all anymore,
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: then don't be surprised when the people most reluctant to
• 45:41
  Speaker 1: enter politics are often the people we'd like to see participate.
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: I wanted to see Admiral McRaven run. It's my understanding
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: that his spouse said, no way. They didn't want that
• 45:52
  Speaker 1: type of scrutiny or whatever it was. I've had people
• 45:56
  Speaker 1: ask me if I'd run for office. I won't do
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: it because I'm not going to put my family through
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: something like that. So in some ways, the bad guys
• 46:05
  Speaker 1: are winning, right? The bad guys are chasing away good
• 46:07
  Speaker 1: people from running for office. Now, look, I think there
• 46:12
  Speaker 1: is an electoral question here. Ramaswamy was already dealing with
• 46:15
  Speaker 1: a difficult race before this video surfaced or before he
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: chose to surface this. First of all, if you needed
• 46:22
  Speaker 1: more proof that the polls are accurate on this one
• 46:26
  Speaker 1: or that Ramaswamy thinks the polls are accurate, then the
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: mere existence of this tactic is proof that the polls
• 46:33
  Speaker 1: are accurate in Ohio. But I think this thing is
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: so gross, so disgusting, that this could drag down the
• 46:46
  Speaker 1: entire Republican ticket in Ohio. I think it's that awful.
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: And I don't think anybody wants to be caught supporting
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: this kind of garbage. This isn't going to stay in
• 46:57
  Speaker 1: the governor's race. It's about what kind of behavior Republicans
• 47:01
  Speaker 1: in Ohio are prepared to defend, condemn, or simply ignore.
• 47:05
  Speaker 1: What does Mike DeWine think about this? What does my
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: friend John Kasich think about this? What does John Husted think?
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: I bring up Husted specifically because he's trying to win
• 47:15
  Speaker 1: a Senate race in an environment where the Republican brand
• 47:17
  Speaker 1: is already facing significant problems. Does he want to spend
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: the final two weeks of his campaign answering questions about
• 47:23
  Speaker 1: a video, about the decision of Ramaswamy to exploit child
• 47:27
  Speaker 1: abuse that took place when Amy Acton was a child
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: and the victim of child abuse? Does he want to
• 47:34
  Speaker 1: be asked whether he thinks this is an acceptable way
• 47:36
  Speaker 1: to campaign? And if he doesn't think it's acceptable, is
• 47:40
  Speaker 1: he prepared to say so? There are legitimate questions. He's
• 47:47
  Speaker 1: running on the same ticket as Ramaswamy. Ramaswamy has done
• 47:51
  Speaker 1: this to Houston. And I've seen like the Trump people
• 47:55
  Speaker 1: want to blame John Houston, please. John Husted is 10x
• 47:59
  Speaker 1: better of a candidate than anybody else on that ticket
• 48:01
  Speaker 1: right now. His problem is he's just not Trumpy. He
• 48:07
  Speaker 1: doesn't fit their definition of what they want to see
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: in a candidate. You want more Ramaswamis? Is that what
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: this MAGA world wants? More shitbags who think this is
• 48:18
  Speaker 1: an appropriate way to conduct politics? And this goes directly
• 48:25
  Speaker 1: at what I've made this whole intro about today. Corruption, character, accountability,
• 48:32
  Speaker 1: the willingness to hold people on your own side to
• 48:35
  Speaker 1: the same standards you would demand of your political opponents.
• 48:40
  Speaker 1: So we'll see. I don't know. Maybe I'm wrong here.
• 48:43
  Speaker 1: Maybe I'm Pollyannish and this thing won't have any impact
• 48:45
  Speaker 1: on the governor's race. We don't know yet. We haven't
• 48:50
  Speaker 1: had a lot of time. We don't have the voter reaction.
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: And obviously, social media outrage does not always translate into
• 48:57
  Speaker 1: real voter outrage. But this raises a bigger question that
• 49:02
  Speaker 1: goes beyond Ohio. Have we reached a point in American
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: politics where campaigns believe there is virtually nothing they can't do,
• 49:10
  Speaker 1: provided they think it might help them win? And if
• 49:14
  Speaker 1: that's where we are, what responsibility do the other people
• 49:17
  Speaker 1: in the party have to draw a line? Is anybody
• 49:19
  Speaker 1: going to draw a line? The only people that can
• 49:22
  Speaker 1: draw a line on this are the voters. Politicians are
• 49:25
  Speaker 1: going to do whatever it takes, whatever they think they
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: can get away with. The fact that Ramaswamy, think about
• 49:30
  Speaker 1: the cocoon he lives in, that he and his cronies
• 49:34
  Speaker 1: thought this was appropriate. Think about the information bubble he
• 49:39
  Speaker 1: lives in that he thought, yeah, this is a good idea.
• 49:42
  Speaker 1: We're going to go down this road. Let's traumatize a
• 49:49
  Speaker 1: fellow human being simply because we want to win a
• 49:52
  Speaker 1: governor's race because he failed at everything else he'd done
• 49:56
  Speaker 1: in his life. He's failed to have a successful business,
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: but he's cashed in on it. He's successfully made money,
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: but he's failed at actually translating that business into helping
• 50:07
  Speaker 1: other people. But this is what the Trump era has brought.
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: Donald Trump has done to American politics. This is what
• 50:14
  Speaker 1: he's done. He's bankrupted it on the morality front completely.
• 50:21
  Speaker 1: He's changed the incentives for people who work around him.
• 50:27
  Speaker 1: I mean, look what he's done to the Republican Party.
• 50:29
  Speaker 1: There are people still left in it. They used to
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: care about character. We've watched politicians who once claimed to
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: care deeply about personal character, honesty, and standards of public conduct,
• 50:41
  Speaker 1: that they should decide that those things should matter to voters.
• 50:48
  Speaker 1: Donald Trump comes along and half of those people said,
• 50:51
  Speaker 1: what standards? Winning is everything. So now what's the result?
• 50:57
  Speaker 1: The result is behavior that might once have ended a
• 51:00
  Speaker 1: political career now gets defended rationalized or simply ignored. This
• 51:06
  Speaker 1: is not healthy for the system, folks. I don't care
• 51:08
  Speaker 1: what party you're in. It's not healthy for the country.
• 51:12
  Speaker 1: And it brings me back to the question of this
• 51:14
  Speaker 1: closing argument. This is one of those things where the
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: unintended consequence here is that Ramaswamy, this thing blows up
• 51:21
  Speaker 1: and it helps crystallize that the Republican Party has just
• 51:27
  Speaker 1: gone off. Trump has driven it into a ditch. And
• 51:31
  Speaker 1: the only thing in that ditch are a couple of termites,
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: one named Elon Musk and one named Vivek Ramaswamy. And
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: they have absolutely eaten away at the core of what
• 51:44
  Speaker 1: used to make up the Republican Party. And now it's
• 51:47
  Speaker 1: just rot. Who knows? But that's the connection I see
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: between Musk, Ramaswamy, and what we're seeing in Ohio. They're
• 51:58
  Speaker 1: different stories. One involves enormous sums of political money and
• 52:02
  Speaker 1: a national security decision. The other involves an attack on
• 52:05
  Speaker 1: a candidate's deeply painful family history. But they raise a
• 52:10
  Speaker 1: question about power, accountability, about what the political actors are
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: prepared to justify in pursuit of power. So corruption and character.
• 52:23
  Speaker 1: They haven't mattered in, they haven't really mattered in the
• 52:26
  Speaker 1: Trump era. Right? In the Trump era, corruption issues haven't hit.
• 52:30
  Speaker 1: And neither is character issues. But boy, are we testing
• 52:35
  Speaker 1: the voters' patience on this. Trump is testing the voters' patience.
• 52:39
  Speaker 1: Elon Musk is testing the voters' patience. Vivek Ramaswamy is
• 52:43
  Speaker 1: testing the voters' patience. So I, I'm so, it's just so,
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: it's another level of gross and disgusting and awful what
• 52:56
  Speaker 1: Ramaswamy's doing. Again, I think it, it, it ends his
• 53:02
  Speaker 1: political career. I mean, I think this thing is over.
• 53:07
  Speaker 1: I think this is gross and disgusting and this thing
• 53:11
  Speaker 1: is going to boomerang and they're going to regret ever
• 53:13
  Speaker 1: doing it. And the after on effect. I know in
• 53:18
  Speaker 1: our fragmented media ecosystem, you don't know what's going to
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: break through. But the political party that once cared about
• 53:27
  Speaker 1: Jeffrey Epstein, until they realized there were too many people
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: on their own side that might be connected, is playing
• 53:34
  Speaker 1: games like this. If a Democratic campaign can't connect these
• 53:38
  Speaker 1: dots and turn this into a closing argument, then there's
• 53:40
  Speaker 1: some competency issues on that side of the aisle that
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: we may talk about post-election. But for now, I think
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: we've seen this has not been a good, you know,
• 53:53
  Speaker 1: good gets better, bad gets worse. I think when it comes,
• 53:56
  Speaker 1: if the fact that corruption and character are creeping into
• 54:00
  Speaker 1: the top tier of this conversation, that's how a wave
• 54:04
  Speaker 1: becomes a tsunami. All right. It is. We are two
• 54:22
  Speaker 1: weeks down as I'm literally going to alternate back and forth.
• 54:24
  Speaker 1: We did governors last week. This week we'll do senators
• 54:27
  Speaker 1: and you will see. I have messed around with my
• 54:34
  Speaker 1: arrangement a little bit. So we start with my top 10. Look,
• 54:38
  Speaker 1: number one is still number one. And that is North Carolina.
• 54:42
  Speaker 1: It is. Republicans have pulled money out of North Carolina. Apparently,
• 54:45
  Speaker 1: Donald Trump feels sorry for Michael Whatley and his super PAC.
• 54:49
  Speaker 1: threw them, I think, a little bit more than a
• 54:51
  Speaker 1: million dollars. So they're not totally dark on the air,
• 54:54
  Speaker 1: but they're getting close to being dark on the air.
• 54:55
  Speaker 1: I think the real question is, does Cooper's victory have
• 54:59
  Speaker 1: coattails in North Carolina? Right. There's a couple of House
• 55:02
  Speaker 1: seats that Democrats think, you know, they're reach seats because
• 55:06
  Speaker 1: the state's pretty gerrymandered. But does Cooper's ability to fund
• 55:14
  Speaker 1: a bigger ground game and sort of be at the
• 55:17
  Speaker 1: top of the ticket? Do you see, does it have
• 55:19
  Speaker 1: trickle-down effect down the ballot? That's one thing to look
• 55:22
  Speaker 1: for in North Carolina. Number two, Ohio. I don't know
• 55:26
  Speaker 1: if I need to talk more about what's happened in Ohio,
• 55:28
  Speaker 1: but bottom line is The fact that you have Washington
• 55:32
  Speaker 1: operatives trying to blame the candidate rather than the environment,
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: rather than Trump, rather than Ramaswamy. Right. Bottom line is
• 55:39
  Speaker 1: John Husted has everything going against him and not a
• 55:42
  Speaker 1: lot going for him at this point, other than the
• 55:46
  Speaker 1: weird admiration of his physical looks by Trump, which is
• 55:52
  Speaker 1: just I'm I'm sure years from now, John Husted is
• 55:56
  Speaker 1: going to say, did the president of the United States
• 55:58
  Speaker 1: really objectify my ass? Yes, Mr. Husted, I think the
• 56:03
  Speaker 1: president really objectified you. But keep an eye on Husted.
• 56:11
  Speaker 1: You know, I think, you know, here's the irony to
• 56:13
  Speaker 1: John Husted. He'd been looking to run for governor and
• 56:17
  Speaker 1: he sort of got boxed into the Senate seat, you know,
• 56:20
  Speaker 1: the advance, the appointment, all of those things. Had Husted
• 56:25
  Speaker 1: been the Republican nominee for governor? They might have dodged
• 56:29
  Speaker 1: all things Ramaswami. But now Ramaswami could lead the entire
• 56:33
  Speaker 1: ticket to one of its worst showings in 20 or
• 56:36
  Speaker 1: 30 years. Number three on the list is Texas. I mean,
• 56:39
  Speaker 1: I think it's I think the I don't think Elon
• 56:43
  Speaker 1: Musk helps Paxton here. The money may help. But the
• 56:48
  Speaker 1: fact that it's so public, the fact that it's there,
• 56:50
  Speaker 1: the closing Tallarico's closing argument is pretty strong. He's closing
• 56:54
  Speaker 1: on corruption. It's allowed Gina Inosin, the gubernatorial race, to
• 56:59
  Speaker 1: bring up Greg Abbott's connections to Elon Musk. The fact
• 57:03
  Speaker 1: that he's made himself a main character in this race, again,
• 57:05
  Speaker 1: I just don't think that's good politics. Americans on both
• 57:08
  Speaker 1: sides of the aisle don't like tech execs right now,
• 57:11
  Speaker 1: don't like big tech in general. Elon Musk is not
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: a very well-liked individual. There are those that love him.
• 57:18
  Speaker 1: I'm not saying he doesn't have his fans. He does
• 57:20
  Speaker 1: have his fanboys. Don't get me wrong. But I think
• 57:23
  Speaker 1: he's becoming... politically toxic. And I don't think that I
• 57:30
  Speaker 1: don't think his his attachment to Paxton improves Paxton's image
• 57:35
  Speaker 1: that much. So Texas is number three. But I'll tell you,
• 57:39
  Speaker 1: those are the three I'm most confident in for Democrats.
• 57:42
  Speaker 1: And then I'm going to be honest with you that
• 57:43
  Speaker 1: I would draw a line on my list on the
• 57:46
  Speaker 1: top 10. Right. So I'm pretty confident they're going to
• 57:49
  Speaker 1: net those three. Everything else, my confidence wanes a little bit.
• 57:54
  Speaker 1: Let's start with Alaska. I think Democrats are the favorite here,
• 57:57
  Speaker 1: but it's a narrow margin. Polo Sullivan is going to
• 58:00
  Speaker 1: be really close. It's going to go to rank choice voting.
• 58:03
  Speaker 1: If we're waiting on Alaska to find out who controls
• 58:08
  Speaker 1: the Senate, it's already been a better night for Republicans
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: than expected. That's another way to look at this list.
• 58:14
  Speaker 1: But they're in my number four slot. My number five
• 58:16
  Speaker 1: slot is Maine. I've said this before. I think the
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: debates did not go well for Troy Jackson. I think
• 58:22
  Speaker 1: the debates have helped Collins. I think she certainly has
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: found her comfort zone on how to campaign in this cycle.
• 58:32
  Speaker 1: It may be it doesn't matter. It may be just
• 58:35
  Speaker 1: having the R next to her name is enough for
• 58:37
  Speaker 1: her to lose. But Jackson has not run the greatest campaign.
• 58:41
  Speaker 1: And this is one of those where if she wins,
• 58:47
  Speaker 1: I think you have to say, well, Democrats really just,
• 58:50
  Speaker 1: you know, had a massive candidate problem. Right. They went
• 58:54
  Speaker 1: through to two nominees. Neither one of them. Probably. I
• 58:59
  Speaker 1: don't know if either one of them. If Collins wins
• 59:03
  Speaker 1: in this environment, then perhaps neither one of them could
• 59:05
  Speaker 1: have won Plattner or Jackson. And then there's– it could
• 59:09
  Speaker 1: be that she just knows– she just has a better
• 59:14
  Speaker 1: relationship with the state than Jackson does. But we'll see.
• 59:18
  Speaker 1: I think she's– again, we could– and here's the thing
• 59:22
  Speaker 1: about Maine. They take forever to count their vote. So–
• 59:26
  Speaker 1: it's possible we know which party controls the Senate before
• 59:30
  Speaker 1: we know the result in Maine. Number six, Kansas. And
• 59:35
  Speaker 1: so I clump Alaska, Maine, Kansas, and Michigan is in
• 59:39
  Speaker 1: my next tier, right? If I put in North Carolina, Ohio, Texas, Alaska, Maine, Kansas, Michigan,
• 59:44
  Speaker 1: I think these are pure toss-ups. Pure, pure toss-ups. I've
• 59:51
  Speaker 1: already said the reason why Maine, Kansas, You know, he's
• 59:55
  Speaker 1: Roger Marshall's campaign has decided, hey, they just are going
• 59:58
  Speaker 1: to try to make this a red versus blue. If
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 1: they can just get enough turnout out, they can survive this.
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 1: Marshall has not tried to pivot. He's not tried to
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 1: seek distance from Trump. I think that's been a strategic mistake.
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 1: We'll find out. Right. He sort of got into the rally.
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 1: I don't know if I would have. I certainly don't
• 1:00:17
  Speaker 1: think that is necessarily good politics for him. But we'll see. Right.
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 1: There's certainly some super red areas of Kansas, but the
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 1: the reddest areas have been hurt the most by Trump's
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 1: economic policies. So and I think it's interesting. Adam Hamilton
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 1: has been you know, his his tone in this has been, hey,
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 1: Trump voters, we welcome the president and you've got a
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 1: home in this campaign. He is not trying to necessarily
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 1: run against Trump voters other than just Trump policies. So.
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 1: We'll see. But I'm I definitely think that's turning a
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 1: pure toss up. And then last on my pure toss
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 1: up list is Michigan. Look, Abdul Al-Sayed is a very
• 1:01:02
  Speaker 1: good campaigner, but I think he's missed a ton of
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 1: opportunities to do what needs to be done to outreach
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 1: in the African-American community and outreach in the skeptical Jewish community.
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: But I also think Mike Rogers could have done more
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 1: to distance himself from Trump and And he hasn't done that.
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 1: So you sort of have neither campaign is doing what
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 1: I think the opportunity they have to do, they should
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 1: be doing. Maybe it's a pure environmental play. Maybe Abdul
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 1: El-Sayed gets dragged across by Jocelyn Benson. Maybe for every
• 1:01:40
  Speaker 1: vote he loses to Rogers, he gains with a bigger
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 1: turnout among Arab-Americans that we've ever seen before. And then
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 1: the other wild card is the youth vote, right? If
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 1: youth turnout is up, if voters under 30 show up
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 1: in a bigger percentage than they would show up in
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 1: a normal midterm, well, that's the secret sauce for Abdul El-Sayed, right?
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 1: And that would be the difference between him narrowly winning
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 1: and narrowly losing. My final three in the top 10, eight, nine,
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 1: and 10 are Iowa, South Carolina, and Nebraska. All of
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 1: these are close and all of these right now have
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 1: the Republican slightly favored. Right. Ashley Hinson, slightly favored over Turek.
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 1: Darlene Graham, slightly favored over Annie Andrews. Although I do
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 1: think what Donald Trump has done with Putin in Ukraine
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 1: and the sort of gutting of Lindsey Graham's legacy and
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 1: the Lindsey Graham sanction act that was supposed to be
• 1:02:39
  Speaker 1: the heart of the sanctions against Russia. Do enough voters
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 1: care about that in South Carolina? Can Annie Andrews exploit that?
• 1:02:51
  Speaker 1: I don't know. But you got to ask. I mean,
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 1: it is she is running on her brother's legacy and
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 1: Donald Trump is eviscerating that legacy in foreign policy. That's
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 1: got to matter to some Charleston Republicans. Right. So, look,
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 1: there's a reason the National Party. Republican Party's putting more
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 1: effort in this race. There's a reason Trump's going twice,
• 1:03:13
  Speaker 1: doing two different rallies for her. He's got to drag
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 1: her across the finish line. This, after all, was his idea, right?
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 1: It's funny, all the places that Trump has gotten more
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 1: involved in the Senate race than the party wishes it had,
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 1: that Senate races are either already done or close to it, right?
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 1: North Carolina, Georgia, he personally handpicked South Carolina. Now that's
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 1: a problem. Texas. That's a problem, right? Wherever Trump has
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 1: done his magic, it has cost the Republican party millions
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 1: and millions of dollars that they otherwise could have spent
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 1: trying to play a little bit of offense. Uh, and
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 1: then number 10, uh, if you're keeping score at home,
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 1: I basically swapped South Carolina, Nebraska. Um, I just don't
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 1: see the path yet for Osborne. I see the path
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 1: to 48. I don't see the path to 50. And
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 1: I do think Osborne's a bit... It's tough to run
• 1:04:14
  Speaker 1: the trick play twice. It's tough to run the Philly
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 1: special twice in a row and think you're going to
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 1: score touchdowns each time. But it is remarkable that something's
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 1: happening out there in Nebraska. The governor's race is tight.
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 1: So everything is going to be tight and it's going
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 1: to be a while before we call it. But I...
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 1: The fact that he had apologized for using the B
• 1:04:36
  Speaker 1: word to describe Deb Fischer, not exactly the best headline
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 1: in a state like Nebraska. That's a question I have.
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 1: There's a there's a is Osborne. I know in the
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 1: Trump era, you think somebody is coarse and is and
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 1: is undignified as Donald Trump. If he can do well
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 1: in Nebraska, then what's the big deal if Dan Osborne
• 1:04:58
  Speaker 1: curses like a sailor? Yeah. But there's sort of a
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 1: I just think that that isn't I don't buy that
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 1: Nebraskans want that in their elected officials. So I wonder
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 1: if that did a little bit more damage than it
• 1:05:14
  Speaker 1: would have, say, to a Donald Trump. Right. Which we know,
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 1: you know, he's sort of in some ways immune to
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 1: those things. But there you go. That's my top 10.
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 1: Like I said, North Carolina, Ohio, Texas, I think, frankly,
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 1: are in the lean already lean category. Alaska, Maine, Kansas, Michigan,
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 1: my pure toss ups in my top 10 at the moment. Right.
• 1:05:32
  Speaker 1: Numbered four, five, six and seven. And then Iowa, South Carolina, Nebraska's,
• 1:05:37
  Speaker 1: you know, very close. But right now tilting to the GOP,
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 1: not sort of also receiving votes. If we're playing the
• 1:05:46
  Speaker 1: AP poll game here, Minnesota, Mississippi, South Dakota, New Hampshire, Idaho, Montana.
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 1: That is my order of likelihood to flip. I think
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 1: all of these could be single digit races. Right. You know,
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 1: Michelle Tafoya is running a very good race. She's keeping
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 1: her distance from Trump. But this is a tough national
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 1: environment for her to run in. Mississippi, it's interesting. You're
• 1:06:06
  Speaker 1: seeing individual Democrats try to help Scott Collum. I'm pretty
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 1: bullish on this, but I don't have the polling to
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 1: prove that it belongs in the top 10 yet. My
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 1: gut is that Mississippi flips before Nebraska. But there's more
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 1: data to support Nebraska flipping before Mississippi. South Dakota, we've seen.
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 1: I wanted to talk earlier. I left this on the
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 1: cutting room floor, but the Matthew McConaughey sort of pledged that, hey,
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 1: guess what? Voting for an independent is not a wasted vote.
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 1: As he argued, what's a wasted vote? Vacillating between these
• 1:06:38
  Speaker 1: two parties and watching them both screw things up when
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 1: they control Congress. So I still think that Mike Rounds
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 1: is going to and Jim Risch in Idaho are going
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 1: to be in some seriously close reelection battles to independent candidates.
• 1:06:54
  Speaker 1: And then there's New Hampshire and Montana, which I suspect
• 1:06:59
  Speaker 1: will be close. But in New Hampshire's case, I think
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 1: Sununu is going to come up short. In the Montana case,
• 1:07:04
  Speaker 1: the independent just, there's just, there's too many guys on,
• 1:07:07
  Speaker 1: too many people on the ballot for the independent to
• 1:07:10
  Speaker 1: overtake the Republican in that one. This next question comes
• 1:07:22
  Speaker 1: from somebody who actually I've been friendly with. I've appeared
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 1: on his show at times. It's Andrew Zee in Toledo.
• 1:07:28
  Speaker 1: And he lets me know he's from Ohio's 43rd Statehouse District.
• 1:07:33
  Speaker 1: I love that, Andrew. He had a fun question for
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 1: me and I decided to share it with you. He'd
• 1:07:37
  Speaker 1: actually texted it to me, but he had said, I
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 1: answered him and then he had said, oh, I thought
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 1: you were going to answer this on the pod. So
• 1:07:44
  Speaker 1: here it is. He goes, Chuck, I know you've been
• 1:07:46
  Speaker 1: a big supporter of a viable third party, but let
• 1:07:48
  Speaker 1: me throw a different idea at you. Why do we
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 1: need political parties at all? Why not eliminate the parties
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 1: altogether and make elections about individual candidates, their ideas and
• 1:07:57
  Speaker 1: their positions on issues instead of Republican versus Democrat, put
• 1:08:00
  Speaker 1: an idea on the table, debate its merits and vote
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 1: on it? No party loyalty, no red team versus blue team.
• 1:08:06
  Speaker 1: Instead of fighting for a third party, why not fight
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 1: for a no party system? Is that completely unrealistic or
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 1: could something like that actually work in America? So as
• 1:08:15
  Speaker 1: I told Andrew, I wanted to look into this a
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 1: little bit more. We sort of have one, we have
• 1:08:18
  Speaker 1: a few experiments with what I would call less party,
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 1: not quite no party. You have the unicameral legislature in Nebraska,
• 1:08:26
  Speaker 1: which technically is nonpartisan. Now, do people know which way
• 1:08:32
  Speaker 1: people lean? Yes. It's like in some of these state
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 1: Supreme Court races that are supposed to be nonpartisan. People
• 1:08:38
  Speaker 1: identify themselves as liberal or conservative or this or that.
• 1:08:44
  Speaker 1: But I will tell you this, it is less, the
• 1:08:46
  Speaker 1: unicameral legislature gets more done They get along a little
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 1: bit better. There is less pressure. What you eliminate, what
• 1:08:55
  Speaker 1: you're describing here, Andrew, you're eliminating that sort of party pressure. right?
• 1:09:01
  Speaker 1: This group think that can be that party caucuses, right?
• 1:09:06
  Speaker 1: The pressure you feel, well, if the entire party's voting
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 1: one way, I may feel another. Do I want to
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 1: take the incoming from the party's base when they find
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 1: out I'm not with where everybody else is, right? where
• 1:09:18
  Speaker 1: if there isn't a formal structure, then being somebody that's
• 1:09:24
  Speaker 1: an outlier on one issue, but maybe is with the
• 1:09:26
  Speaker 1: majority on another issue, that's not that distinctive. So I
• 1:09:33
  Speaker 1: will say that the experience in Nebraska is that it's
• 1:09:36
  Speaker 1: a less ideological and less partisan acting body, which to me, uh, gives,
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 1: gives you some ammunition about your idea. The other is
• 1:09:48
  Speaker 1: how we elect mayors in this country. Most mayors are
• 1:09:51
  Speaker 1: elected in, um, in, uh, nonpartisan races where there is
• 1:09:55
  Speaker 1: no party label next to the candidate. I've often, you know,
• 1:09:59
  Speaker 1: you talk about, um, I've had on here, the mayor
• 1:10:02
  Speaker 1: of Oklahoma city, he happens to be a Republican, but
• 1:10:05
  Speaker 1: he talks about that when you're on an all party ballot,
• 1:10:08
  Speaker 1: all party primary ballot, um, You're just you're going to
• 1:10:12
  Speaker 1: talk to the to the to the voter, you know,
• 1:10:15
  Speaker 1: to the consensus voter, which is a bit more somewhere
• 1:10:18
  Speaker 1: in between. Right. Where where the extremes actually are. And,
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 1: you know, I saw it firsthand in Miami. Carlos Jimenez,
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 1: you know, you tell me how your election is run
• 1:10:28
  Speaker 1: and I'll tell you how partisan your elected official will be.
• 1:10:31
  Speaker 1: Carlos Jimenez, as mayor of Miami-Dade County, was not an
• 1:10:35
  Speaker 1: extraordinarily ideological or partisan actor as mayor. because the race
• 1:10:40
  Speaker 1: itself had no party label. It was technically a nonpartisan race.
• 1:10:44
  Speaker 1: Did Republicans know who the Republican-leaning candidate was? Yes. That is,
• 1:10:49
  Speaker 1: it's not like it's a mystery. They don't pretend that
• 1:10:52
  Speaker 1: they don't have proclivities of being on the left or
• 1:10:55
  Speaker 1: the right or whatever. But once he became, when he
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 1: ran for Congress, he put an R next to his name,
• 1:11:02
  Speaker 1: and he got elected in 2020. And one of the
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 1: first things he had to decide was whether to vote
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 1: to certify the election on January 6th. And he chose
• 1:11:13
  Speaker 1: not to. And I remember being a bit surprised. And
• 1:11:16
  Speaker 1: then somebody pointed out this, you know, he carried it.
• 1:11:19
  Speaker 1: He was in a district that Donald Trump carried and
• 1:11:22
  Speaker 1: he won his primary thanks to Trump voters and that
• 1:11:25
  Speaker 1: his district was very concerned about this. And if he
• 1:11:29
  Speaker 1: didn't vote the way his district wanted, he'd have been primaried.
• 1:11:32
  Speaker 1: He probably made the right political decision at the time.
• 1:11:36
  Speaker 1: But it goes to Right. Had he been elected without party,
• 1:11:41
  Speaker 1: the pressure to worry about what the party was going
• 1:11:44
  Speaker 1: to think would have lessened. But because he got elected
• 1:11:48
  Speaker 1: via the political party mechanism, he had to worry about
• 1:11:52
  Speaker 1: what the party thought, not just what his constituents thought.
• 1:11:56
  Speaker 1: So I've helped provide it. So we the bottom line
• 1:12:01
  Speaker 1: is you're not wrong. So you and by the way,
• 1:12:03
  Speaker 1: you're in good company. Right. George Washington. It's not a bad.
• 1:12:07
  Speaker 1: Not a bad person to share an idea with. Thought
• 1:12:12
  Speaker 1: parties were terrible and were only going to lead to
• 1:12:15
  Speaker 1: more problems than any good that comes with it. Look,
• 1:12:21
  Speaker 1: you know, the question is, can you organize a legislative
• 1:12:26
  Speaker 1: body without party? Well, guess what? Nebraska's figured it out.
• 1:12:32
  Speaker 1: So we have there are a few models that sort
• 1:12:35
  Speaker 1: of prove that if we wanted to get out of
• 1:12:37
  Speaker 1: the political party business, we could and just had political parties.
• 1:12:42
  Speaker 1: You know, I'm a member of the Elks Club. I'm
• 1:12:44
  Speaker 1: a member of the Republican Party. I'm a member of
• 1:12:46
  Speaker 1: the Working Families Party, whatever it is. Right. It can
• 1:12:49
  Speaker 1: certainly be on your resume. But as a as a
• 1:12:55
  Speaker 1: label on the ballot, it is it is sort of
• 1:12:58
  Speaker 1: it is almost like is it. we're trying to insert
• 1:13:03
  Speaker 1: the parliamentary system when we actually made a, we made
• 1:13:05
  Speaker 1: a decision not to be a parliamentary system. So, um,
• 1:13:09
  Speaker 1: I love the thought. Um, I will just tell you this,
• 1:13:13
  Speaker 1: you know, I, this is why we should have all
• 1:13:14
  Speaker 1: party primaries, you know, everybody on the same ballot and yeah,
• 1:13:19
  Speaker 1: it'd be great. If you didn't have party labels, you'd
• 1:13:21
  Speaker 1: make people have to learn more about the candidates themselves.
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 1: And maybe candidates would feel more comfortable being more nuanced
• 1:13:28
  Speaker 1: or being more, um, being more honest about their positions
• 1:13:34
  Speaker 1: and what they support. All right, next question comes from
• 1:13:37
  Speaker 1: Andrew K. in Redmond, Washington, home of Microsoft. Andrew from Redmond,
• 1:13:42
  Speaker 1: Washington's first district, long-time listener, first-time writer, avid solo hiker also. Well,
• 1:13:47
  Speaker 1: if you live in Northwest, that's a good place to
• 1:13:50
  Speaker 1: be a hiker. I play your podcast out loud on
• 1:13:53
  Speaker 1: Washington's backcountry trails to avoid startling bears and cougars as
• 1:13:57
  Speaker 1: you've accompanied me on quite a few adventures. Wow. Well,
• 1:14:00
  Speaker 1: I appreciate that. I just hope you don't ever have
• 1:14:02
  Speaker 1: to gnaw off your arm if you get stuck anywhere.
• 1:14:05
  Speaker 1: When prediction markets favor Roger Marshall in Kansas, but polls
• 1:14:07
  Speaker 1: show a tight race with Adam Hamilton, what do bettors
• 1:14:10
  Speaker 1: know that pollsters don't? Also, wouldn't expanding the Supreme Court
• 1:14:13
  Speaker 1: from 9 to 13 just invite Republicans to expand it
• 1:14:15
  Speaker 1: again when they regain power, creating an endless cycle? Kind regards,
• 1:14:19
  Speaker 1: Andrew Kaye in Redmond, Washington. Hey, two fun questions there. Well,
• 1:14:22
  Speaker 1: I think it's because the look, one of the things
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 1: that many betters, if you want to call them betters, traders. Right.
• 1:14:29
  Speaker 1: I think my friends at Kalshi would prefer if I
• 1:14:32
  Speaker 1: use the word trader on this than betters. But what
• 1:14:36
  Speaker 1: I would tell you is, you know, a lot of
• 1:14:39
  Speaker 1: times when you see a candidate overperforming in a state
• 1:14:42
  Speaker 1: that their political party doesn't normally do well in. you
• 1:14:45
  Speaker 1: see a, you know, their number in the poll will
• 1:14:49
  Speaker 1: be their number and the undecided vote will all end
• 1:14:53
  Speaker 1: up back being in the incumbent party. And I think
• 1:14:56
  Speaker 1: that's what folks are assuming is going to happen in Kansas,
• 1:15:00
  Speaker 1: that somehow, while, you know, Hamilton's sitting at 45, 46,
• 1:15:07
  Speaker 1: that that'll be his number, maybe he gets to 47, 48,
• 1:15:09
  Speaker 1: and all of the undecided vote ends up in Kansas.
• 1:15:14
  Speaker 1: in Marshall. So I think that explains that phenomenon. I
• 1:15:17
  Speaker 1: think that's more likely something you might see in a Mississippi.
• 1:15:20
  Speaker 1: I think Kansas is, I think the worm has turned
• 1:15:23
  Speaker 1: on Kansas, right? And I think Kansas is genuinely swingier
• 1:15:29
  Speaker 1: than frankly what the prediction markets are saying. You know,
• 1:15:34
  Speaker 1: if I were making an investment, I think you have
• 1:15:36
  Speaker 1: an idea of where I would invest because where I
• 1:15:38
  Speaker 1: think the thing, where I think a certain stock price
• 1:15:42
  Speaker 1: is going with Team Hamilton there. But that would be
• 1:15:46
  Speaker 1: my explanation as to why you're seeing that distinction. Look,
• 1:15:49
  Speaker 1: as for the expansion of the Supreme Court, thank you
• 1:15:51
  Speaker 1: for writing it that way. I've often thought the same thing. Like,
• 1:15:56
  Speaker 1: you know, I don't know if expanding the Supreme Court
• 1:15:59
  Speaker 1: isn't going to fix the Supreme Court. You know what
• 1:16:00
  Speaker 1: fixes the Supreme Court? If we change the way we
• 1:16:04
  Speaker 1: nominate judges in this country, if we change the way
• 1:16:07
  Speaker 1: the confirmation process for judges works, right? If 50 plus
• 1:16:12
  Speaker 1: one is how we decide judges in the United States Senate,
• 1:16:15
  Speaker 1: then we're going to get partisan hacks in the judiciary,
• 1:16:18
  Speaker 1: left and right, hard stop. If you want more referee-like justices,
• 1:16:24
  Speaker 1: then raise the threshold of confirmation to 60, 65, 70.
• 1:16:30
  Speaker 1: In fact, I certainly think for Supreme Court, it ought
• 1:16:33
  Speaker 1: to be 75. It should be three quarters of the Senate.
• 1:16:37
  Speaker 1: You should have to get a significant chunk of the
• 1:16:40
  Speaker 1: other party's support in order to sit on the Supreme Court.
• 1:16:45
  Speaker 1: Hard stop. These are choices. Senators can make this choice.
• 1:16:50
  Speaker 1: You don't need a constitutional amendment. Senators can decide this.
• 1:16:53
  Speaker 1: They at one time had the threshold basically at 60,
• 1:16:56
  Speaker 1: and then they chose to get rid of it. All
• 1:16:59
  Speaker 1: it's done is made the judiciary less trusted and more partisan.
• 1:17:05
  Speaker 1: Good job. Way to go. United States Senate. Thanks for
• 1:17:09
  Speaker 1: ruining the judiciary for us and creating this. Look, trying
• 1:17:15
  Speaker 1: to just expand the Supreme Court as a workaround on
• 1:17:18
  Speaker 1: this fails to deal with the problem of the confirmation
• 1:17:22
  Speaker 1: process itself. That, if you want to reform, if you
• 1:17:26
  Speaker 1: want to try to departisanize the judiciary, reform the confirmation process.
• 1:17:33
  Speaker 1: It's not about expanding the Supreme Court. So thank you
• 1:17:36
  Speaker 1: for the question. Next question comes from Mark N. Greetings
• 1:17:39
  Speaker 1: from an American expat living in Austria. Potential first timer here. Well,
• 1:17:44
  Speaker 1: congrats and welcome. And by the way, Vienna is one
• 1:17:47
  Speaker 1: of my bucket list cities as a classical music fan
• 1:17:53
  Speaker 1: and wannabe musician, French horn player. There's lots of things
• 1:17:58
  Speaker 1: I'd like to visit in Vienna in that realm that
• 1:18:01
  Speaker 1: I would miss. So I'd love to. So if you
• 1:18:06
  Speaker 1: could figure out Mr. Expat, how to sort of get
• 1:18:10
  Speaker 1: me hired to do something out there in Vienna. Count
• 1:18:13
  Speaker 1: me in. Anyway, he goes, I thought defense contractors were
• 1:18:16
  Speaker 1: barred from making political donations, considering Elon Musk was contracted
• 1:18:21
  Speaker 1: to provide Starshield for the U.S. government. Why has he
• 1:18:24
  Speaker 1: been exempt from this? It's a great question, Mark. It's
• 1:18:28
  Speaker 1: an amazing question. Obviously, we have no rules. And I
• 1:18:33
  Speaker 1: guess he can, you know, he's individual citizen rather than
• 1:18:36
  Speaker 1: the The donation didn't technically come from Starlink. It came
• 1:18:41
  Speaker 1: from an individual. Look, there's all sorts of ways that
• 1:18:46
  Speaker 1: this Elon Musk money is dirty, is unethical. And you
• 1:18:52
  Speaker 1: might be able to make a case that it's illegal
• 1:18:55
  Speaker 1: on this front. But this is why the calls for
• 1:19:05
  Speaker 1: campaign finance reform are coming left and right now. because
• 1:19:09
  Speaker 1: a single individual is essentially propping up a Senate candidate
• 1:19:14
  Speaker 1: in a way that, that, that frankly isn't, you can't
• 1:19:18
  Speaker 1: really call democracy. That's a change that we ought to,
• 1:19:22
  Speaker 1: we ought to be startled about. So, but that's a
• 1:19:26
  Speaker 1: fair point, you know, and it certainly means it's like,
• 1:19:31
  Speaker 1: how do you trust anything Elon Musk touches, right? Everything
• 1:19:36
  Speaker 1: in his orbit is about in either enriching himself or
• 1:19:40
  Speaker 1: his company or giving his company more access to something.
• 1:19:44
  Speaker 1: He is not interested in helping the greater good here.
• 1:19:49
  Speaker 1: He is interested in helping himself here. Melanie in Sparks, Nevada,
• 1:19:56
  Speaker 1: 2nd Congressional District, which, by the way, you want to
• 1:19:59
  Speaker 1: talk about the upset? It really looks like... Nevada's lone
• 1:20:04
  Speaker 1: Republican congressional district might temporarily flip because of a bad,
• 1:20:10
  Speaker 1: flawed nominee. Somebody with stolen valor in their background. Anyway,
• 1:20:15
  Speaker 1: your question, though, is not about that, I believe. If
• 1:20:18
  Speaker 1: it were proven that someone in the White House or
• 1:20:19
  Speaker 1: Pentagon deliberately interfered with Starshield for Ukraine, could that constitute
• 1:20:24
  Speaker 1: a war crime? I know charges are unlikely, but it
• 1:20:26
  Speaker 1: feels like a really big deal. And I'm trying to
• 1:20:27
  Speaker 1: understand just how serious it would be. Also, has there
• 1:20:30
  Speaker 1: ever been a secretary of state less visible during a
• 1:20:32
  Speaker 1: war than Marco Rubio? I honestly keep forgetting he's even
• 1:20:34
  Speaker 1: in the cabinet. Really enjoy your long form interviews and
• 1:20:37
  Speaker 1: the Super Tuesday podcast. Thank you, Melanie. Yes. I mean,
• 1:20:43
  Speaker 1: you know, it's funny. I hope I've satisfied you on
• 1:20:46
  Speaker 1: some of these questions with what's going on with Musk.
• 1:20:49
  Speaker 1: But I do think that Elon Musk being the main
• 1:20:52
  Speaker 1: character here You know, is that the October surprise? Donald
• 1:20:55
  Speaker 1: Trump siding with Putin. Is this the October surprise that
• 1:20:59
  Speaker 1: basically cements the Republican repudiation that might be coming? I
• 1:21:08
  Speaker 1: could just tell you if you were if you were
• 1:21:10
  Speaker 1: a campaign running against Washington, running against Trump, running against
• 1:21:16
  Speaker 1: big money. Isn't this exactly what you would want to
• 1:21:19
  Speaker 1: see happen in the last few weeks of the campaign?
• 1:21:22
  Speaker 1: I mean, in many ways, what Musk and Trump are
• 1:21:24
  Speaker 1: doing are only helping to write the closing argument television
• 1:21:28
  Speaker 1: commercials for the party out of power. So I'm certainly
• 1:21:34
  Speaker 1: convinced this is going to backfire on them, but we'll see.
• 1:21:39
  Speaker 1: As for Rubio, it has been a gift, right? A talent.
• 1:21:45
  Speaker 1: I mean, we're involved in a war and you wouldn't
• 1:21:47
  Speaker 1: know he's involved. He is... Constantly Homer Simpson backing into
• 1:21:54
  Speaker 1: the bushes and disappearing. And then suddenly he reappears to
• 1:21:57
  Speaker 1: let you know, I don't know why Starlink wasn't working,
• 1:22:01
  Speaker 1: but it's working now. Right. And he's in a baseball hat, too,
• 1:22:05
  Speaker 1: by the way, which is there. Look, Rubio made it.
• 1:22:11
  Speaker 1: Made a decision. He's kept his political career alive. For
• 1:22:17
  Speaker 1: the rest of his life, he's going to be finding
• 1:22:18
  Speaker 1: out whether it's worth it. Right. If he has a
• 1:22:21
  Speaker 1: political career following Trump, he'll probably feel like this was
• 1:22:24
  Speaker 1: worth it. If he doesn't, then maybe he goes back
• 1:22:30
  Speaker 1: and quotes himself. Right. The infamous Marco Rubio quote that
• 1:22:34
  Speaker 1: years from now, people are going to have to ask
• 1:22:36
  Speaker 1: themselves how they got taken by this con man. Don't
• 1:22:40
  Speaker 1: don't quote me. Quote Marco. All right. Last question here.
• 1:22:49
  Speaker 1: Chris in Fredericksburg, Virginia, Virginia's seventh district. Yes. The swing
• 1:22:53
  Speaker 1: district of Virginia. I really enjoy your perspective and appreciate
• 1:22:56
  Speaker 1: all you do. Do you think voters are starting to
• 1:22:58
  Speaker 1: grow tired of Trump, even if his MAGA base remains loyal?
• 1:23:02
  Speaker 1: I wonder if he's becoming like a television series that's
• 1:23:04
  Speaker 1: been on for seven or eight seasons where even new
• 1:23:07
  Speaker 1: storylines and cast members can't stop viewers from losing interest
• 1:23:10
  Speaker 1: and eventually canceling the show. Could voters finally be ready
• 1:23:13
  Speaker 1: to change the channel? Thanks for all you do, Kristen
• 1:23:16
  Speaker 1: and Frederick, Virginia. Well, I can't tell you, you know,
• 1:23:19
  Speaker 1: I'm going to use a line that I've used so
• 1:23:21
  Speaker 1: many times that it's no longer funny or effective. And
• 1:23:24
  Speaker 1: that is, I used to say, and I've said this before,
• 1:23:26
  Speaker 1: I think we're in the Gary Busey stage of the
• 1:23:28
  Speaker 1: Trump era. But I think I've said that like so
• 1:23:31
  Speaker 1: many times that, no, I guess it got renewed, right? Look,
• 1:23:38
  Speaker 1: one of the things I've said about Trump over the
• 1:23:40
  Speaker 1: years that has been true is that everybody has a
• 1:23:42
  Speaker 1: line on Trump, but everybody's line is in a different spot.
• 1:23:46
  Speaker 1: But over time, Trump eventually alienates everyone. He's done this
• 1:23:50
  Speaker 1: throughout his entire business career. Every circle of advisors he's
• 1:23:55
  Speaker 1: had has never survived more than about six years. And
• 1:23:59
  Speaker 1: you can go all the way back to 1974. And
• 1:24:02
  Speaker 1: whoever has been in his circle rarely, I mean, there's
• 1:24:04
  Speaker 1: a handful of people that have been able to sort
• 1:24:07
  Speaker 1: of come back into his circle. Roger Stone is probably
• 1:24:11
  Speaker 1: the most prominent of those. But, you know, rarely do
• 1:24:15
  Speaker 1: people go in and out. Right. They just sort of in.
• 1:24:18
  Speaker 1: He tires and he tires in such a way that
• 1:24:21
  Speaker 1: he alienates all these people. They end up walking away
• 1:24:24
  Speaker 1: hating the guy. Right. When people leave Trump, they seem
• 1:24:28
  Speaker 1: to leave him for good. Right. It's never a it's
• 1:24:31
  Speaker 1: never a, you know, a breakup. And then you go
• 1:24:34
  Speaker 1: running back with the with the exception of Michael Cohen. Right.
• 1:24:39
  Speaker 1: Who probably has his own motivation. Maybe he wants pardon.
• 1:24:42
  Speaker 1: Maybe you want something else. Um, who knows, but, um,
• 1:24:47
  Speaker 1: for the most part, once people just, you know, leave Trump,
• 1:24:53
  Speaker 1: they never go back, but everybody's on their own timeline.
• 1:24:59
  Speaker 1: And I do think that the voters are catching up
• 1:25:03
  Speaker 1: to where some of us may have been sooner. Um,
• 1:25:06
  Speaker 1: and it's also why I try to tell people don't
• 1:25:08
  Speaker 1: judge people, um, Don't judge people that leave Trump for
• 1:25:16
  Speaker 1: when they left Trump. Judge the people that don't leave Trump.
• 1:25:21
  Speaker 1: Save your disdain for those that don't leave. Save your
• 1:25:24
  Speaker 1: disdain for people like Vivek Ramaswamy who choose to take
• 1:25:28
  Speaker 1: a Trump method and exploit it. But those that eventually
• 1:25:32
  Speaker 1: realize that this is, that's what, you know, welcome them.
• 1:25:39
  Speaker 1: It's better for the country. It's better for the future.
• 1:25:43
  Speaker 1: So I think we're going to learn a lot on
• 1:25:46
  Speaker 1: November 3rd about whether how many people have grown tired
• 1:25:50
  Speaker 1: of this. I think they have. Right. I think they
• 1:25:54
  Speaker 1: were exhausted in 2020, which is why they threw him
• 1:25:56
  Speaker 1: out once. I think this this feels even more acute
• 1:26:01
  Speaker 1: than it did just before the 2020 election. But, you know,
• 1:26:09
  Speaker 1: I am self-aware that I'm in my own information bubble.
• 1:26:14
  Speaker 1: But boy, the anecdotes are piling up. The polling numbers
• 1:26:19
  Speaker 1: are piling up. The examples of people wanting to being
• 1:26:23
  Speaker 1: done with this are piling up. The people not showing
• 1:26:27
  Speaker 1: up to his rallies are, you know, there's, there's certainly
• 1:26:30
  Speaker 1: a ton of evidence indicating that perhaps after me using
• 1:26:38
  Speaker 1: this joke, probably three years ago, the first time I
• 1:26:40
  Speaker 1: used it, um, that we may finally be at the
• 1:26:44
  Speaker 1: Gary Busey portion of the Trump era, where it is,
• 1:26:49
  Speaker 1: you know, I would think ranting about a golf course
• 1:26:52
  Speaker 1: two weeks before an election, you know, it almost feels
• 1:26:55
  Speaker 1: like the exclamation point of, hey, dad, how did the
• 1:26:58
  Speaker 1: Trump era end? Sit down, son, let me tell you
• 1:27:02
  Speaker 1: the story, all right? All right, with that, I'm gonna
• 1:27:06
  Speaker 1: take a break for 24 hours, but we will be
• 1:27:09
  Speaker 1: right back here. In fact, I've got, A special episode
• 1:27:13
  Speaker 1: for you. It will be the four things that if
• 1:27:17
  Speaker 1: I knew right now, I'd know for sure what was
• 1:27:20
  Speaker 1: going to happen in the midterms. I'll be sharing that
• 1:27:23
  Speaker 1: with you on Thursday's podcast. So with that, until we
• 1:27:27
  Speaker 1: upload again, thanks for listening. Don't forget to like and subscribe,
• 1:27:30
  Speaker 1: whether it's this podcast, Dynastic, Super Tuesdays, the entire empire
• 1:27:35
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• 1:27:38
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• 1:27:40
  Speaker 1: some emails. You feel like, oh, there's too many ads. Well,
• 1:27:44
  Speaker 1: guess what ads allow me to do? Bring you all
• 1:27:47
  Speaker 1: this content for free. So look, I appreciate my advertisers
• 1:27:53
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• 1:27:58
  Speaker 1: do not want to make you pay for another subscription.
• 1:28:01
  Speaker 1: So thank you. Thank you for listening. Thank you for
• 1:28:04
  Speaker 1: supporting me. My advertisers, and even if you don't support
• 1:28:08
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• 1:28:13
  Speaker 1: And with that, I'll see you in 24 hours.