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“Bernie is my friend.” (Debate recap special!) · Pod Save America

• 0:20
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: I'm Jon Lovett.
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: I'm Tommy Detour.
• 0:23
  Speaker 3: I'm Dan Pfeiffer.
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: On today's pod, we'll talk about some wild new evidence
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: that has emerged just in time for Donald Trump's impeachment trial,
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: which starts next week. And we'll talk about last night's
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: Democratic debate, the first of 2020 and the last before
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: the Iowa caucuses. First, a few housekeeping notes from us. Tommy,
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: I believe there's a new pod, Save the World, out today.
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: There is.
• 0:44
  Speaker 4: First, the headline out of it was Ben Rhodes knows
• 0:47
  Speaker 4: a lot about Megxit. which is Meghan Markle and Harry leaving.
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: He's a royal watcher. The UK for a guest candidate.
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: He's our royal correspondent.
• 0:55
  Speaker 4: But we spent most of the conversation talking about the
• 0:58
  Speaker 4: latest from Iran, tragic shoot down of a civilian airliner,
• 1:02
  Speaker 4: the protests in response and what it all means with
• 1:05
  Speaker 4: a great guest, Jason Rezaian, who is a former Tehran
• 1:08
  Speaker 4: bureau chief for.
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: The Washington Post. So don't miss that one.
• 1:10
  Speaker 3: And something else.
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: CNN contributor.
• 1:13
  Speaker 3: Wasn't he in prison in Iran for?
• 1:15
  Speaker 4: Yeah, he was in prison for 544 days, Dan, but
• 1:18
  Speaker 4: do you want to be defined by the worst thing
• 1:20
  Speaker 4: that happened to you?
• 1:21
  Speaker 3: He wrote a book about it.
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm just kidding. He wrote a book about it.
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: It's better than being defined by a CNN contributor. Sorry, Dan.
• 1:28
  Speaker 3: Former CNN contributor. Like Corey Lewandowski and Jeffrey Lord, I'm
• 1:33
  Speaker 3: a former CNN contributor.
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: And sometimes CNN contributors do feel pretty trapped.
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: That was so devastating. God, John. It was just right there.
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: I didn't know you had that in you. Also, If
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: you haven't yet subscribed to The Wilderness and you listen
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: to this show, which is most of you, please do
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: me and yourself a favor. Go subscribe right now. I
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: promise you'll like it. You'll learn something. You'll be inspired.
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: You'll be energized for 2020. So go subscribe.
• 1:58
  Speaker 4: Look, if you hate groupthink and conventional wisdom, thank you
• 2:01
  Speaker 4: for listening anyway. But The Wilderness will break you out
• 2:04
  Speaker 4: of that because you'll go to real focus groups with
• 2:06
  Speaker 4: people all across the country.
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: But yeah, you'll be uncomfortable, but you'll also be inspired too.
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: David Plouffe might scare the shit out of you.
• 2:12
  Speaker 5: Right.
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: Dan, what's going on with Untrumping America?
• 2:16
  Speaker 3: As folks may remember, last week we announced a promotional
• 2:19
  Speaker 3: giveaway where if you pre-order the book between now and
• 2:22
  Speaker 3: this Friday, you can get a poster of the cover
• 2:26
  Speaker 3: that has.
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: Not of Dan.
• 2:27
  Speaker 3: Not of me.
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: Which I thought.
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: Not yet. Stay tuned. It's a calendar. They get more
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: racy as we go.
• 2:33
  Speaker 3: That is exactly Lovett admitting he did not listen to
• 2:36
  Speaker 3: the Thursday.
• 2:36
  Speaker 2: I listened to it. I did listen to it. I
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: know exactly. I know. You know what, Dan? I will
• 2:41
  Speaker 2: prove I listened to it because you're signing every single
• 2:43
  Speaker 2: one and they offered you the opportunity to have an
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: auto pen. And you said no. Eat shit, Pfeiffer.
• 2:48
  Speaker 3: Like Joe Biden on a rack?
• 2:50
  Speaker 2: I apologize.
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: This is like the Warren Sanders part of the debate
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: right now.
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: I'm not shaking your hand.
• 2:56
  Speaker 5: Yes.
• 2:57
  Speaker 3: And so this is a reminder that if you pre-order
• 2:59
  Speaker 3: the book, you go to untrumpingamerica.com and you upload your purchase,
• 3:02
  Speaker 3: you can get a poster. We are extending the deadline
• 3:05
  Speaker 3: from midnight Friday to midnight Monday, which is in part
• 3:10
  Speaker 3: because of high demand. And also because it's a holiday weekend.
• 3:13
  Speaker 3: I think no one at my publisher wanted to update
• 3:16
  Speaker 3: the website over the weekend. So you now have till Monday.
• 3:19
  Speaker 3: The poster says on November 3rd, let's untrump America. It's
• 3:23
  Speaker 3: a great thing to hang up to annoy the MAGA
• 3:25
  Speaker 3: people in your life. And to remind the people in
• 3:27
  Speaker 3: your life who are disengaged from politics that they have
• 3:29
  Speaker 3: to fucking vote on November 3rd.
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: Perfect. No one talks more shit about their publisher than
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: Dan Pfeiffer.
• 3:34
  Speaker 3: You know, it really attests to whether they listen to
• 3:36
  Speaker 3: the pod.
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's true. Finally, some fun news from all of us.
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: Pod Save America is going on tour for 2020. The
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: pre-sale is live today from January 15th to January 17th
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: on Crooked.com slash events with code Crooked2020. Tickets go on
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: sale to the public on Saturday, January 18th. Get those tickets.
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: Come hang out. Crooked.com slash events. We're going everywhere. We're
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: not going everywhere. I know there's a lot of... Every
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: time we announce this, people complain that we're not coming
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: to their city. But, you know, we'll be somewhere nearby you. Yeah.
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: And we're excited. We're pumped.
• 4:09
  Speaker 5: All right.
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: Before we get to the debate, we've got quite a
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: bit of news on impeachment. The House is voting today
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: to send articles of impeachment to the Senate for a
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: trial that may begin as early as next Tuesday. Speaker
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: Nancy Pelosi announced this morning that the impeachment managers from
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: the House... The people who will act as prosecutors will
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: be Adam Schiff, Jerry Nadler, Hakeem Jeffries, Zoe Lofgren, Val Demings,
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: Sylvia Garcia, and Jason Crowe. The Impeachment Avengers. That's who
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: it is. What do you guys think of this crew?
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: I think we had all hoped that it might include
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: former Republican Justin Amash. It does not. But, you know,
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: what do you guys think? Any thoughts on the crew here?
• 4:47
  Speaker 3: They seem great.
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: It's a good group of people. They seem great. I
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: think so. Look, you got Adam Schiff on that team.
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: He's a fucking all-star.
• 4:54
  Speaker 3: No complaints. Val Demings is great.
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Val Demings is great. Zoe Lofgren has been through.
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: We were just talking.
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: She worked on the Nixon impeachment.
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: Two impeachments. She's been through two impeachments.
• 5:04
  Speaker 2: She's been involved in two out of the three so far.
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: This is the fourth. God, I wonder who the Republicans
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: are going to pick. Just the worst people on the planet.
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: Which, you know, they have a big pool. One thing
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: that unites all the Democrats is they all have backgrounds
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: as litigators, which Pelosi pointed out.
• 5:21
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: So that's it for the House. House is done now.
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: Over in the Senate, White House officials told CBS News
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: on Monday that they expect a group of at least four,
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: likely more, Republican senators who will force a vote to
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: call witnesses and vote for witnesses, a group that might
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: include Mitt Romney, Lisa Murkowski, Susan Collins, Cory Gardner, maybe
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: even Rand Paul, Lamar Alexander. President Trump has pressured Republican
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: senators to dismiss the charges entirely before the trial begins.
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: But Missouri's Roy Blunt told reporters on Monday that the
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: Republicans don't have the votes to make that happen. So
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: we are going to get ourselves a trial. We're going
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: to get ourselves a vote on witnesses. I'd say this
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: is a pretty big win for Pelosi's strategy of withholding
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: the articles of impeachment to highlight McConnell's attempt at a
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: cover up. What do you guys think? Yes. Unequivocally, yes. Absolutely.
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: I know Chris Eliza doesn't think so, but.
• 6:16
  Speaker 4: I didn't know that, and I'm going to continue to
• 6:17
  Speaker 4: not know that. I mean, the polling suggested the American
• 6:20
  Speaker 4: people wanted to hear from more witnesses. There now seems
• 6:23
  Speaker 4: like there's a good chance we'll hear from key witnesses.
• 6:25
  Speaker 4: Never did I think we'd get John Bolton to testify. Somehow,
• 6:28
  Speaker 4: Nancy Pelosi pulled a rabbit out of a hat here.
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: This is great.
• 6:32
  Speaker 3: I disagree with Chris Eliza. I think that Nancy Pelosi
• 6:37
  Speaker 3: did not gamble on losing this. I will say that I.
• 6:41
  Speaker 2: Will believe that.
• 6:43
  Speaker 3: We are going to get witnesses when John Bolton walks
• 6:45
  Speaker 3: into the Senate floor because no one ever got.
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: You want to see the mustache on your TV.
• 6:48
  Speaker 3: Yes, I want to see the mustache. No one ever
• 6:51
  Speaker 3: got rich betting on the good faith and patriotism of
• 6:53
  Speaker 3: Senate Republicans. So let's see it happen first.
• 6:56
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that's right. I mean, we don't know.
• 6:59
  Speaker 2: Here's what we do know. We know that Nancy Pelosi
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: holding the article has made it possible to have this
• 7:03
  Speaker 2: very long and lengthy and difficult debate for Republicans about
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: whether to have witnesses. It seems... that we've gotten to
• 7:08
  Speaker 2: a place where many of those Republicans are open to witnesses.
• 7:11
  Speaker 2: If we end up in a trial and they, you know,
• 7:14
  Speaker 2: Mitch McConnell somehow manages to wrangle them all back in
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: and there are no witnesses, it doesn't mean Nancy Pelosi's
• 7:19
  Speaker 2: gambit was a mistake. It means it was worth trying.
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: If we do end up with witnesses, then it's unequivocal
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: that it worked.
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, working backwards here from a Highly likely acquittal, right? And,
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: you know, a couple weeks of fucking headlines. Donald Trump
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: is acquitted. Are Democrats screwed now in 2020? It's going
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: to be a horrible couple weeks. Just getting ready for that.
• 7:39
  Speaker 2: It's been a horrible couple years.
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's right. But what are the wins here? What
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: counts as a win for Democrats? I think it's a
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: win if we get witnesses. It's a win if John
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: Bolton is one of those witnesses and testifying. It's a
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: witness if some Republicans break to vote for those witnesses
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: and to vote for, to hear from John Bolton. It's also,
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: by the way, I think, Because Pelosi withheld the articles,
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: they now think that it's likely that Donald Trump will
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: have to give his State of the Union on February
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: 4th while the trial is happening. We don't know that
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: for sure yet. But yeah, if that happens, if he's
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: not able to give the State of the Union after
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: he's acquitted, I also think that is a very big
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: win because that sucks for him.
• 8:18
  Speaker 3: Here's my take. Democrats have already won.
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: All right, let's hear that. Why? Why do you think that?
• 8:22
  Speaker 3: Because the period by which Donald Trump had the best
• 8:26
  Speaker 3: chance to strengthen his hand for the 2020 election was
• 8:29
  Speaker 3: the period between Labor Day of last year and now.
• 8:34
  Speaker 3: And he spent all of that time having a Twitter
• 8:36
  Speaker 3: tantrum about impeachment instead of talking about the economy. Time
• 8:40
  Speaker 3: is the only non-renewable resource in politics. And so every
• 8:44
  Speaker 3: interview statement tweet about impeachment is an interview statement tweet,
• 8:48
  Speaker 3: not about the economy or making an argument about promises,
• 8:52
  Speaker 3: capture any of the other things we will see in
• 8:53
  Speaker 3: his Super Bowl ad. It was just flailing. And he
• 8:56
  Speaker 3: enters this year no stronger than he was before impeachment.
• 9:01
  Speaker 3: He missed his opportunity.
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: Maybe not weaker, but definitely not stronger. And he was
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: pretty weak already.
• 9:04
  Speaker 3: We've talked about this before as it relates to Obama,
• 9:07
  Speaker 3: is Obama's numbers on Labor Day 2011 were very similar
• 9:12
  Speaker 3: to Trump's on Labor Day 2011. Obama spent the rest
• 9:17
  Speaker 3: of that year making a case on the economy, talking
• 9:19
  Speaker 3: about inequality, rolling out a jobs package, staring down Republicans
• 9:23
  Speaker 3: on a budget vote. And he exited that year in
• 9:27
  Speaker 3: both external and internal polling, he went from 41% to 49%.
• 9:31
  Speaker 3: His approval on election day in 2012 was 49%.
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: And Trump is right now at like 42.8%.
• 9:39
  Speaker 3: Same where he was that time. So there is an
• 9:40
  Speaker 3: opportunity cost here. So for all the predictions about the politics,
• 9:44
  Speaker 3: we don't know what's going to happen. We don't know
• 9:45
  Speaker 3: how it's going to play out. People will probably flush
• 9:47
  Speaker 3: it down the memory hole between now and then. But
• 9:49
  Speaker 3: we do know what has happened to date. And there
• 9:51
  Speaker 3: was a massive opportunity cost for Trump. And most importantly,
• 9:54
  Speaker 3: Democrats did the right thing.
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: What about McConnell made a promise yesterday, Tommy, that if
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: Democrats do, if we do call witnesses, if there's a
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: vote to call witnesses, that he'll promise to call witnesses
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: that Democrats don't like?
• 10:08
  Speaker 4: You know, I think that would maybe be challenging for
• 10:12
  Speaker 4: the Biden campaign. And there's a chance that we will
• 10:15
  Speaker 4: care a lot about bad stories for the Biden campaign
• 10:17
  Speaker 4: if Joe Biden is the nominee. But I do think
• 10:20
  Speaker 4: it's worth it. I mean, look, if he calls Hunter
• 10:22
  Speaker 4: Biden and presses a private citizen who happens to.
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: Be the son of a U.S.
• 10:26
  Speaker 4: Senator on his business activities, I think that's a hell
• 10:29
  Speaker 4: of a lot less significant than Donald Trump using the
• 10:32
  Speaker 4: power of the presidency to get a foreign government to
• 10:35
  Speaker 4: go after his political opponents. It seems self-evident to me.
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think you kind of just, you got to
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: show up at that point and just deal with it.
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: And we sort of know the story right now. They're
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: going to try to do their best to smear Hunter
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: Biden and to smear Joe Biden using Hunter Biden. But
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: I think the story is pretty clear what happened. We
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: shouldn't be afraid of it.
• 10:54
  Speaker 3: So you would make that trade?
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think if they're trying to call Joe Biden,
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: which is fucking absurd, then I wouldn't make that trade.
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: But I don't think the votes are there for that.
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: I think if they call Hunter Biden, then yeah, I
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: think I would make that trade for John Bolton.
• 11:07
  Speaker 3: 50 vote per witness situation?
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: I believe so, yeah. Yeah. So yet another reason that
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: Pelosi's strategy to wait was smart is that new evidence
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: came to light on Tuesday by way of Lev Parnas,
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: one of the goons who's been indicted for the work
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: he apparently did on behalf of Rudy Giuliani to dig
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: up dirt on the Bidens in Ukraine. It includes damaging
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: notes and text messages, including a crazy note that Parnas
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: wrote on Ritz-Carlton stationery at the Ritz-Carlton in Vienna that said, quote,
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: Get Zelensky to announce the Biden case will be investigated.
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: It also included a set of texts to Parnas from
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: a failed Republican congressional candidate named Robert Hyde, who said
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: he'd been tracking Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch's movements in Ukraine, knew
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: when her phone and computer were off, and wrote, quote,
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: they are willing to help if we, you would like
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: a price. Guess you can do anything in the Ukraine
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: with money. If you want her out, they need to
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: make contact with security forces. What in the fuck is
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: going on here?
• 12:10
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it does seem as though the Pine Barrens episode
• 12:15
  Speaker 2: of Sopranos was sort of playing out in Ukraine as
• 12:18
  Speaker 2: they were following this woman. I mean, it's worth noting, too.
• 12:22
  Speaker 2: It's scary. It sounds as bad as it sounds, and
• 12:26
  Speaker 2: it sounds incredibly nefarious. It's also worth noting that these texts,
• 12:30
  Speaker 2: the most damning texts you just read, were the last
• 12:33
  Speaker 2: week of March in 2019. Within weeks, Yovanovitch is recalled
• 12:41
  Speaker 2: and told she needs to come back and perhaps because
• 12:43
  Speaker 2: of threats against her in Ukraine. So we don't know
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: how those things fit together. But, you know, Yovanovitch herself
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: has now said that, you know, she finds this disturbing
• 12:51
  Speaker 2: and it should be investigated. And the scale of it,
• 12:53
  Speaker 2: I mean, we're so used to Trump scandals. The president
• 12:56
  Speaker 2: of the United States, his personal lawyer may have deployed
• 13:00
  Speaker 2: goons and henchmen to trail a U.S. ambassador, possibly threaten
• 13:04
  Speaker 2: that ambassador with violence. You know, I'm gobsmacked. That's what
• 13:08
  Speaker 2: I am.
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: What did you think, Tommy? I just, look, we'll figure out.
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: This guy, Mr.
• 13:12
  Speaker 4: Hyde, seems like he's got a few sandwiches short of
• 13:16
  Speaker 4: a combination platter. But if it's true, the kinds of
• 13:21
  Speaker 4: people who would track an ambassador in Ukraine are the
• 13:25
  Speaker 4: kinds of people you should really worry about. These are
• 13:29
  Speaker 4: like mafia, maybe KGB or, you know, Russian intelligence connected
• 13:34
  Speaker 4: types of people. I mean, that's a big, scary deal.
• 13:37
  Speaker 3: I mean, I'm sure this is a coincidence, but remember
• 13:39
  Speaker 3: the very ominous thing that Trump said to Zelensky?
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: He's going to go through some things. What were those things, pal?
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: I mean, there's also another connection here we learned is, um,
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: there were text messages where the former corrupt prosecutor, uh,
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: in Ukraine that Biden got fired, Yuri Lutsenko, um, tells
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: Parnas that there's a quid pro quo. If Trump fires Yovanovitch,
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: who he hates, he'll make allegations about Biden, which is
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: just connecting Yovanovitch to all of the other quid pro
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: quo stuff, because there was always a question, well, how's
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: she related to this, other than they wanted to get
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: her out of the way because they think that she
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: was non-corrupt. Well, it turns out that Lutsenko wanted her
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: out and said, oh, I'll make allegations to fucking John
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: Solomon about Joe Biden that are fake. Upstanding prosecutor. Yep, exactly.
• 14:23
  Speaker 3: I mean, it is worth noting that Lev Parnas and
• 14:27
  Speaker 3: all the other people involved have never seen the wire
• 14:30
  Speaker 3: because they took copious notes on a motherfucking criminal conspiracy.
• 14:34
  Speaker 2: I mean, literally like just he's, he's, he's on, he's good.
• 14:37
  Speaker 2: He's on the phone at the Ritz. He picks up
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: the pen. He's just, jotting things down on that piece
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: of stationery.
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: One of them was, get rid of Lanny Davis. It
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: said nicely.
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: Nicely. Hey, Lev, I have some bad news. Lanny Davis
• 14:48
  Speaker 2: does not take social cues.
• 14:49
  Speaker 4: But also, like, Lev Parnas is the Forrest Gump of corruption.
• 14:53
  Speaker 4: There's photos of him with Rudy. There's photos of him
• 14:55
  Speaker 4: with Mike Huckabee. There's photos of him in the White
• 14:58
  Speaker 4: House with Trump.
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: I mean, with McCarthy.
• 15:02
  Speaker 4: The leader in the house. I mean, this guy is
• 15:04
  Speaker 4: actually everywhere.
• 15:05
  Speaker 2: And didn't Hines show up?
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: And he's ready to cooperate and he's ready to talk.
• 15:08
  Speaker 2: And didn't Hines show up at Mar-a-Lago and make a scene?
• 15:11
  Speaker 6: Yes.
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: I think it was Dural.
• 15:13
  Speaker 5: Dural.
• 15:13
  Speaker 7: Oh, Dural.
• 15:14
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: Anyway, yeah, he showed up and he's, like Tommy said,
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: he's not, I don't think he's well.
• 15:18
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, it's just also like the quality of
• 15:21
  Speaker 2: people that Donald Trump has sort of brought into American politics.
• 15:25
  Speaker 8: I know.
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: Yeah, well, next... And if there's a term, too, Hyde
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: will be the Secretary of State, so watch out. Look
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: forward to that.
• 15:33
  Speaker 2: And also, you know, I gotta say, I'm not sure
• 15:35
  Speaker 2: if this has been good for the Ritz-Carlton Vienna.
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: We'll think about the Ritz.
• 15:40
  Speaker 2: You know, no one... I mean, obviously, it's not the
• 15:42
  Speaker 2: most important piece of this, but I'm sure it's a
• 15:44
  Speaker 2: beautiful place that doesn't want to be associated with this scandal.
• 15:46
  Speaker 4: Not since Eliot Spitzer has a hotel been so defiled
• 15:49
  Speaker 4: by a politician.
• 15:50
  Speaker 3: The Ritz-Carlton has been involved in multiple impeachments.
• 15:53
  Speaker 9: Oh, yeah.
• 15:53
  Speaker 3: Yeah, also where Monica Lewinsky was questioned by.
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: Oh, God.
• 15:57
  Speaker 3: Ken Starr.
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: Oh, that's right. At the Pentagon City Mall. They fucking
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: scared the shit out of her there.
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: Assholes. It is a great mall. All right, let's talk
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: about last night's debate. Is it? I'm standing up for
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: the mall.
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: Sean.
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: All right.
• 16:09
  Speaker 3: It's a great mall.
• 16:12
  Speaker 4: No one fights for the awesome blossom, the mall, and other.
• 16:15
  Speaker 4: No one likes a mall like me.
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: Let's talk about last night's debate, which was hosted by
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: CNN and the Des Moines Register at Drake University in
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: Des Moines. It was the final debate before the Iowa
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: caucuses and the smallest one yet, featuring Biden, Bernie, Warren, Buttigieg, Klobuchar,
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: and Steyer. So we're going to talk about some of
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: the most notable moments in this debate. But what did
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: you guys think overall? It seemed to me that they
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: were all trying to balance the need to draw contrast
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: with their opponents with the need to avoid seeming nasty,
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: which doesn't usually help you with Iowans who don't like
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: candidates to be nasty and also who are thinking about
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: who their second choice is. But what did you guys think?
• 17:02
  Speaker 3: Some debates make me feel great and some debates make
• 17:04
  Speaker 3: me feel terrible. This one left me emotionless.
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: Emotionless. Dan was emotionless. Love it. What'd you think?
• 17:11
  Speaker 9: Yeah.
• 17:11
  Speaker 2: I mean, other than Sanders drawing a very stark contrast
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: on the Iraq vote with Biden, there weren't that many
• 17:22
  Speaker 2: true contrast drawn throughout the debate. So I do think
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: that's right. Yeah, I had the same sort of dull
• 17:29
  Speaker 2: feeling that Dan did, honestly.
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: Two thoughts.
• 17:32
  Speaker 4: One, if you want to understand why being nice in
• 17:35
  Speaker 4: the Iowa caucuses is important and why second choices matter,
• 17:37
  Speaker 4: listen to episode two of my Iowa series.
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: On the ground.
• 17:42
  Speaker 4: But the gist of it is if your candidate doesn't
• 17:45
  Speaker 4: have a 15% support in a precinct location, you have
• 17:48
  Speaker 4: to go to your second choice. And so you don't
• 17:50
  Speaker 4: want people to hate you. You want to be their
• 17:51
  Speaker 4: second choice. That's why it was a nicer debate. I
• 17:54
  Speaker 4: agree with you that the contrasts were relatively substantive. Big picture,
• 17:59
  Speaker 4: I was glad that foreign policy came up a lot
• 18:01
  Speaker 4: in this debate because that's where the president actually has
• 18:02
  Speaker 4: the most leeway. Once we got into the taped portion
• 18:06
  Speaker 4: of the debate about Medicare for all, I was less excited,
• 18:11
  Speaker 4: but the beginning was exciting.
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: The beginning was a world of delight. I honestly, yeah,
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: I was in heaven. All right, so let's start with
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: the toughest and most uncomfortable exchange of the evening. which
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: came when Bernie was asked about a 2018 meeting where
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: he reportedly told Elizabeth Warren that he did not believe
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: a woman could win the presidency. Sanders has denied the report,
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: while Warren has stated that he did in fact say this.
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: They were both pressed on it last night, and things
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: got a little heated. Let's play the clip.
• 18:39
  Speaker 8: So Senator Sanders, Senator Sanders, I do want to be
• 18:42
  Speaker 8: clear here. You're saying that you never told Senator Warren
• 18:46
  Speaker 8: that a woman could not win the election.
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: That is correct.
• 18:50
  Speaker 8: Senator Warren? What did you think when Senator Sanders told
• 18:54
  Speaker 8: you a woman could not win the election?
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: I disagreed.
• 18:59
  Speaker 10: Bernie is my friend, and I am not here to
• 19:02
  Speaker 10: try to fight with Bernie. But look, this question about
• 19:06
  Speaker 10: whether or not a woman can be president has been raised,
• 19:09
  Speaker 10: and it's time for us to attack it head on.
• 19:13
  Speaker 10: And I think the best way to talk about who
• 19:15
  Speaker 10: can win is by looking at people's winning record. So
• 19:19
  Speaker 10: can a woman beat Donald Trump? Look at the men
• 19:23
  Speaker 10: on this stage. Collectively, they have lost 10 elections. The
• 19:27
  Speaker 10: only people on this stage who have won every single
• 19:30
  Speaker 10: election that they've been in are the women, Amy and me.
• 19:42
  Speaker 10: And the only person on this stage who has beaten
• 19:46
  Speaker 10: an incumbent Republican any time in the past 30 years
• 19:52
  Speaker 10: is me. And here's what I know. The real danger
• 19:55
  Speaker 10: that we face as Democrats is picking a candidate who
• 19:59
  Speaker 10: can't pull our party together or someone who takes for
• 20:02
  Speaker 10: granted big parts of the Democratic constituency. We need a
• 20:07
  Speaker 10: candidate who will excite all parts of the Democratic Party,
• 20:11
  Speaker 10: bring everyone in, and give everyone a Democrat to believe in.
• 20:17
  Speaker 10: That's my plan, and that is why I'm going to win.
• 20:20
  Speaker 3: Okay.
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: So we heard Warren's response. What did you guys think of, first,
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: how Bernie responded to this, and then Warren's?
• 20:32
  Speaker 2: First of all, just on what Warren said, I thought
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: it was really smart. I thought it was smart because,
• 20:36
  Speaker 2: you know, it takes something that is really a debate
• 20:39
  Speaker 2: about her liabilities, right? About whether, you know, whether she
• 20:42
  Speaker 2: as a woman can win, right? Which is what the
• 20:44
  Speaker 2: core of this question. And she says, A, that she
• 20:47
  Speaker 2: can win. And B, I think she makes her best
• 20:51
  Speaker 2: offensive argument for her electability, which is, you know, we
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: talked a lot about the Democratic nominee needing to be
• 20:56
  Speaker 2: someone who can bring the various factions of the Democratic
• 20:58
  Speaker 2: Party to the table. And she's you know, in some
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: way implying like, look, you have Bernie who appeals to
• 21:03
  Speaker 2: the left, but may struggle with moderates. You have Biden
• 21:06
  Speaker 2: who appeals to moderates and may struggle with the left.
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: Well, I am somebody who- It was certainly, and it
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: was an oblique shot at Pete, who takes taking African-Americans
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: for granted.
• 21:17
  Speaker 2: And she's saying, I am somebody who can bring all
• 21:18
  Speaker 2: these different factions together. And the person who can do
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: that best is the best person in position to win.
• 21:24
  Speaker 2: So I thought that was very smart. You know, that said,
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: you know, we have now have Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren,
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: I think two people that are both.
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: Thought of as.
• 21:35
  Speaker 2: People who are honest, people who have integrity to their
• 21:40
  Speaker 2: politics and the way they conduct their campaigns, disagreeing about
• 21:44
  Speaker 2: just a fact about what took place in that meeting.
• 21:46
  Speaker 2: And that disagreement, she can say, she is saying, Bernie
• 21:54
  Speaker 2: is my friend and I don't want to dwell on this.
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: Bernie can say, Elizabeth Warren is my friend and I
• 21:57
  Speaker 2: don't want to dwell on this. But They're both basically
• 22:00
  Speaker 2: saying that the other person is not being honest. I
• 22:02
  Speaker 2: do wonder if the truth is that these are two
• 22:05
  Speaker 2: people honestly recounting what they believe took place and simply
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: having a disagreement as to the actual words Bernie used
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: in that moment. And it is a shame that it
• 22:15
  Speaker 2: has led to such acrimony online because, again, these are
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: the two most progressive members of the United States Senate
• 22:23
  Speaker 2: who in any other race, if they weren't a part
• 22:25
  Speaker 2: of it themselves, would.
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: Be for the other.
• 22:28
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, there's a ton of science on the
• 22:31
  Speaker 4: fact that, one, we have terrible memories. We think we
• 22:34
  Speaker 4: have good memories. We do not, even in important moments.
• 22:36
  Speaker 4: And we all tend to interpret different events differently. So
• 22:39
  Speaker 4: both can sincerely think they're telling the truth here. I'm
• 22:43
  Speaker 4: really struck by the fact that there's a lot of people,
• 22:45
  Speaker 4: including reporters, who are just asserting as a fact that
• 22:48
  Speaker 4: Warren's campaign leaked this story about this conversation because they
• 22:53
  Speaker 4: wanted to.
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: Talk about this issue of the debate. That is.
• 22:57
  Speaker 4: A, it's not backed up by any sourcing that I've seen. B,
• 23:01
  Speaker 4: it is completely illogical to suggest that Warren would want
• 23:04
  Speaker 4: to have an electability conversation that can only hurt her
• 23:07
  Speaker 4: and Amy Klobuchar in the last weeks of a campaign.
• 23:10
  Speaker 4: So I think people need to stop asserting that bullshit.
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: Especially if it's a conversation she's been studiously avoiding for
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: the entire campaign, as Rebecca Traster pointed out in her
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: excellent piece about this in the cut that I suggest
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: you all go read yesterday. It's just, if someone did
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: leak it from her campaign, that person did something pretty stupid.
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: And they're a pretty smart campaign. So I don't know
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: why you would leak it. Right.
• 23:32
  Speaker 4: And I'll also say, like, I think that Warren handled
• 23:34
  Speaker 4: it masterfully. That answer where she roped in Klobuchar was,
• 23:38
  Speaker 4: it seemed big.
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: It was funny. It was poignant.
• 23:41
  Speaker 4: It also probably will help her get some of those
• 23:43
  Speaker 4: second choice voters from the Klobuchar team if they are
• 23:46
  Speaker 4: not viable. Bernie, in some ways, had the best talking
• 23:49
  Speaker 4: point about how a woman can win because he was
• 23:51
  Speaker 4: just like, Hillary got 3 million more votes than Trump.
• 23:54
  Speaker 4: Of course a woman could win. I was like, oh yeah,
• 23:56
  Speaker 4: that's a really good point. I wish people would mention that.
• 23:58
  Speaker 4: So like we almost got out of the woods on
• 24:00
  Speaker 4: this and then Bernie kind of well actuallyed Warren about
• 24:05
  Speaker 4: the statistic about who had won in the past 30 years.
• 24:08
  Speaker 4: And that was a little bit weird, but- 30.
• 24:10
  Speaker 2: Years inclusive or 30 years not inclusive? Are you including
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: this year and the first year? You know what I mean?
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: I don't think it helped. It was weird.
• 24:17
  Speaker 3: I think Bernie legitimately did not hear that part of
• 24:19
  Speaker 3: Warren's answer. So he was just like, yeah, I defeated
• 24:22
  Speaker 3: an incumbent. You didn't give me credit for that. Online,
• 24:25
  Speaker 3: that transition to the difference between 30 years and 29
• 24:28
  Speaker 3: years and nine months.
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: Honestly, I tried to avoid, except this morning when you
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: said Twitter is fucking awful this morning, then I went
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: and looked, but I tried to avoid it all last night,
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: and I have muted so many of those people over
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: the last months that I'll tell you, my Twitter experience
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: is a lot better. But yeah, it was pretty bad.
• 24:46
  Speaker 3: I agree, certainly, that I don't think Elizabeth Warren's campaign
• 24:49
  Speaker 3: leaked this. It's just, regardless of, even if you think that,
• 24:53
  Speaker 3: even if it's discordant with how she has run her campaign...
• 24:56
  Speaker 3: just for people who have leaked lots of, like, done
• 24:58
  Speaker 3: things like this in campaigns where you try to lay
• 24:59
  Speaker 3: out an attack or make a strategic move, a CNN
• 25:02
  Speaker 3: online story is not the way in which you.
• 25:04
  Speaker 2: Would do that, right?
• 25:05
  Speaker 3: It has all the makings of a story that has
• 25:09
  Speaker 3: been circulating for a long time, and finally some very
• 25:11
  Speaker 3: good reporters got enough people to confirm it, to put
• 25:14
  Speaker 3: it into print, and then we were off to the races.
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah, credit to MJ Lee, right?
• 25:17
  Speaker 2: And maybe at a moment where there was a little
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: bit of tension between them and somebody was mad in
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: the heat of a moment.
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: Yeah, totally, 100%, right?
• 25:24
  Speaker 3: I think a couple of things. I think it is Tommy,
• 25:26
  Speaker 3: your point about how two people can remember two things
• 25:28
  Speaker 3: differently is exactly right. I also think it's very possible
• 25:32
  Speaker 3: for a man to say something that would be and
• 25:34
  Speaker 3: not understand how it could be interpreted by a woman.
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: Right. Yeah.
• 25:36
  Speaker 3: And I think that is very, I think that's very
• 25:38
  Speaker 3: likely what happened in this situation. And the other point is,
• 25:41
  Speaker 3: I don't know whether Elizabeth Warren wanted this conversation or not,
• 25:44
  Speaker 3: but I am glad we're having it because it has
• 25:46
  Speaker 3: been the unspoken elephant in the room for this entire
• 25:49
  Speaker 3: fucking election where everywhere you go, you talk to people. who, like,
• 25:53
  Speaker 3: they ask this question. People who are, and this is
• 25:57
  Speaker 3: not that the people themselves do not think a woman
• 25:59
  Speaker 3: should be president. They think the mythological group of voters
• 26:02
  Speaker 3: in Wisconsin who will decide the president don't think a
• 26:04
  Speaker 3: woman could be president. So therefore, we have to reverse
• 26:06
  Speaker 3: engineer our nominee from that process. And that has been
• 26:10
  Speaker 3: hanging over Warren's campaign from the very beginning. Everything about
• 26:15
  Speaker 3: Warren's Medicare for all electability issues was a proxy for
• 26:19
  Speaker 3: this conversation because Bernie Sanders, has all the same Medicare
• 26:23
  Speaker 3: for all potential political vulnerability issues that Warren does, and
• 26:27
  Speaker 3: we never talk about it. We talk very specifically about Warren.
• 26:29
  Speaker 3: And so, like, let's have the conversation, make the case
• 26:32
  Speaker 3: against it. Everything that we saw in 2018, put aside 2016,
• 26:36
  Speaker 3: which is a very good point that Bernie made, 2018
• 26:39
  Speaker 3: suggests that perhaps the best candidate to mobilize an electorate
• 26:42
  Speaker 3: that wins in the post-Trump realignment of the Democratic Party
• 26:46
  Speaker 3: would be a woman. You know, Dave Wasserman, who you
• 26:49
  Speaker 3: talked to in The Wilderness, has made the point repeatedly
• 26:52
  Speaker 3: that a moderate woman from the South or the Midwest
• 26:54
  Speaker 3: would be the ideal most electable Democratic candidate based on
• 26:58
  Speaker 3: what he knows about the voters you need to persuade.
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah, he thinks like Stacey Abrams could be the most
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: electable candidate for those reasons. No, look, I agree with
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: this all. And I think it reminded me a little
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: bit of, right, you don't want to have this conversation, right?
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: Like to Tommy's point, I don't think the campaign wanted
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: to leak this and have a conversation about can a
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: woman be elected president, right? But it reminded me a
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: little of, Obama and the race speech and Reverend Wright, right?
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: Did we want those tapes of Reverend Wright to come out?
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: Dan leaked them. We certainly did not. But after everything
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: was said and done and Obama gave that race speech,
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: I think we all agreed it was an important moment
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: and he needed to make that speech eventually. If he
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: was going to be the first black president elected to
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: the United States, he needed to take on the issue
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: of race directly. And I think even though she has
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: avoided it through most of the campaign, what she did
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: last night was very effective in making the case that yes,
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: and like you said, Tommy, Bernie did too. Yes, Hillary
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: Clinton won 3 million more votes than Donald Trump. Elizabeth
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: Warren saying, yes, look at all the women that won
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: in 2018. Look at the only two people on this
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: stage who have beaten Republicans, beaten Republican incumbents, and the
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: men lost 10 elections combined. You know, I think it's
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: probably good that she took it on. The one thing
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: I was curious about is we didn't, we never got
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: to the bottom of what was actually said, which I
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: thought the moderators would try to do. The fact that
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: Abby Phillip, one of the moderators, after Bernie denied it,
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: then went to Warren and said, so what did you
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: say when he said a woman couldn't win? As opposed
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: to asking Elizabeth Warren, Bernie says he didn't say it.
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: What did he say?
• 28:29
  Speaker 3: That was a poorly worded question. And Bernie World is
• 28:31
  Speaker 3: very upset about that.
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: I understand why they're upset about that. Abby Phillip did not.
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: I think she handled that wrong as the moderator. Didn't
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: bother me. Well, she basically said, well, yeah, Bernie, you're
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: just lying. She accepted it. That's fair, yeah. That's what
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: she did by saying that.
• 28:46
  Speaker 3: It would be one thing if just the way it
• 28:49
  Speaker 3: played out, Bernie was like, I didn't say that. And
• 28:51
  Speaker 3: she's like, Elizabeth Warren, what is your response to the
• 28:53
  Speaker 3: thing Bernie said?
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: Yeah, because everyone laughed. Like, oh, wow.
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: It was cheeky. It seemed cheeky to me. But the
• 29:00
  Speaker 2: truth is, I don't think it really matters exactly what
• 29:03
  Speaker 2: was said. What I thought was so good about what
• 29:06
  Speaker 2: Warren said, and to the Tracer piece, that is, to
• 29:08
  Speaker 2: talk about the fears of misogyny and sexism preventing a
• 29:11
  Speaker 2: woman from winning is to add to the perception that
• 29:14
  Speaker 2: misogyny and sexism will prevent a woman from winning. And
• 29:17
  Speaker 2: it is just, to be Elizabeth Warren is to be
• 29:22
  Speaker 2: trying to defeat the fears that a woman can't win
• 29:25
  Speaker 2: while combating the latent, ingrained, deep misogyny that makes it
• 29:30
  Speaker 2: harder for a woman to win every day, that to
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: have moments in which you're seen as an intellectual leader, brave, courageous, smart, gritty,
• 29:38
  Speaker 2: to have positive attributes given to you, the threshold is
• 29:42
  Speaker 2: raised so much higher for a woman. To be embroiled
• 29:45
  Speaker 2: in a scandal about your authenticity and your ability to
• 29:47
  Speaker 2: win and to be a leader, to be seen as
• 29:51
  Speaker 2: flawed is so much lower. The difficulty of navigating that
• 29:55
  Speaker 2: has just been so central to her incredibly smart and
• 29:58
  Speaker 2: deft way of managing not just this issue, but every
• 30:01
  Speaker 2: issue throughout the campaign.
• 30:02
  Speaker 4: It really sucks that she both has to deal with
• 30:04
  Speaker 4: sexism and now is getting attacked for mentioning what she
• 30:07
  Speaker 4: thinks happened in this conversation. That is bullshit and it's unfair.
• 30:11
  Speaker 4: It was little noticed, but I thought Amy Klobuchar actually
• 30:13
  Speaker 4: had a very funny line at the end of that
• 30:15
  Speaker 4: segment where she said every opponent she beat got out
• 30:18
  Speaker 4: of politics.
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: After the election.
• 30:20
  Speaker 4: So how about that precedent for Donald Trump? It was
• 30:22
  Speaker 4: like very well done.
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: It also, by the way, talking about all the men
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: who had lost a combination of 10 elections, exposed something
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: that we've talked about before in this Democratic primary, which
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: is the concept of electability, while real and important to
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: a lot of voters because Donald Trump is president, is
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: incredibly hard to measure. And this field, who we have left,
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: doesn't have a lot of people who can run around saying, oh, well,
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: I'm electable because look at all the elections that I won.
• 30:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, in the last.
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: Bernie Sanders has been winning in Vermont and lost to
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: Hillary Clinton. Joe Biden... One, by being on the ticket
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: with Barack Obama and then being senator from Delaware for
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: a long time, Pete Buttigieg won a couple of mayoral
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: elections in South Bend.
• 31:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, in the last debate.
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: Tom Cyrus never won anything.
• 31:05
  Speaker 2: Amy Klobuchar basically ripped Pete's arms from his body and
• 31:07
  Speaker 2: started attacking them with him. And basically the point that
• 31:10
  Speaker 2: she was making is that if he was a woman,
• 31:12
  Speaker 2: he probably wouldn't be on that stage.
• 31:13
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 31:13
  Speaker 2: And just true.
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: So first half of the debate we talked about was
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: very heavy on foreign policy. Right off the bat, Joe
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: Biden was once again pressed on his 2003 vote in
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: favor of the Iraq war, both by the moderators and
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: by Bernie. Let's hear it.
• 31:28
  Speaker 9: But what I understood right away in terms of the
• 31:32
  Speaker 9: war in Iraq, the difference here is that the war
• 31:35
  Speaker 9: in Iraq turned out to be the worst foreign policy
• 31:38
  Speaker 9: blunder in the modern history of this country. As Joe
• 31:41
  Speaker 9: well knows, we lost 4,500 brave troops Hundreds of thousands
• 31:47
  Speaker 9: of Iraqis died. We have spent trillions of dollars on
• 31:50
  Speaker 9: that endless war money, which should go into health care
• 31:54
  Speaker 9: and education and infrastructure in this country. Joe and I
• 31:59
  Speaker 9: listened to what Dick Cheney and George Bush and Rumsfeld
• 32:03
  Speaker 9: had to say. I thought they were lying. I didn't
• 32:07
  Speaker 9: believe them for a moment. I took to the floor.
• 32:09
  Speaker 9: I did everything I could to prevent that war.
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: Joe saw it differently.
• 32:14
  Speaker 3: Vice President Biden.
• 32:15
  Speaker 6: I was asked to bring 156,000 troops home from that war,
• 32:18
  Speaker 6: which I did.
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: I led that effort.
• 32:20
  Speaker 6: It was a mistake to trust that they weren't going
• 32:22
  Speaker 6: to go to war. They said they were not going
• 32:24
  Speaker 6: to go to war. They said they were just going
• 32:26
  Speaker 6: to get inspectors in. The world, in fact, voted to
• 32:29
  Speaker 6: send inspectors in, and they still went to war. From
• 32:32
  Speaker 6: that point on, I was in the position of making
• 32:34
  Speaker 6: the case that it was a big, big mistake. And
• 32:37
  Speaker 6: from that point on, I voted to, I moved to
• 32:40
  Speaker 6: bring those troops home.
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: So I thought that this was Biden's best answer on
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: the issue because he acknowledged the mistake, tried to talk
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: about the lessons that he learned from it. What did
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: you think, Tommy?
• 32:51
  Speaker 4: So like big picture, you know, Bernie clearly obviously has
• 32:55
  Speaker 4: the cleanest answer on the Iraq war. And it's also
• 32:58
  Speaker 4: funny to think back to 2016 where foreign policy was
• 33:00
  Speaker 4: seen as a weakness for him because he sounds very
• 33:03
  Speaker 4: fluent on these issues. He makes a compelling case and
• 33:05
  Speaker 4: he's done real work in the Senate since on war
• 33:07
  Speaker 4: powers resolutions in Yemen and Iran. That is impressive and
• 33:10
  Speaker 4: he deserves credit for. I agree that I thought Biden's
• 33:13
  Speaker 4: first answer in calling the Iraq war a mistake.
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: It was good. It was crisp.
• 33:19
  Speaker 4: And then he pivoted to his relevant experience since then
• 33:22
  Speaker 4: under Obama and his family experience of having a son
• 33:24
  Speaker 4: who served. I just don't know how voters feel about
• 33:28
  Speaker 4: this issue and how salient this vote is all these
• 33:31
  Speaker 4: years later. It was also interesting, by the way, to
• 33:33
  Speaker 4: hear Bernie pressed on his vote for the war in
• 33:36
  Speaker 4: Afghanistan and the fact that he recently said that was
• 33:38
  Speaker 4: a mistake. I didn't realize he had said that Um,
• 33:41
  Speaker 4: and I thought it, you know, maybe voters will watch
• 33:44
  Speaker 4: that and think, well, this is a wash. I don't
• 33:45
  Speaker 4: really know, but you know, I'd love to see some
• 33:47
  Speaker 4: research on it.
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: Dan, what'd you think?
• 33:49
  Speaker 3: I thought it was Biden's best answer on this. And
• 33:51
  Speaker 3: he has struggled from the very beginning on this as
• 33:53
  Speaker 3: has everyone who voted for the war, right? Like forever, right?
• 33:57
  Speaker 2: We've been through that.
• 33:57
  Speaker 3: We were through this with Kerry in 2004, Hillary Clinton, 2008,
• 34:00
  Speaker 3: Hillary Clinton, 2016 Biden up until this point. And the,
• 34:03
  Speaker 3: cause the answer just seems so obvious, but people are
• 34:06
  Speaker 3: so tortured over how they got that vote wrong and
• 34:09
  Speaker 3: the in sort of the circumstances around that vote seemed
• 34:11
  Speaker 3: so far and now to the people who were there
• 34:13
  Speaker 3: at the time. The answer is like, I got it wrong.
• 34:18
  Speaker 3: I learned lessons from it. Despite that, the most famous
• 34:21
  Speaker 3: opponent of the war, Barack Obama, picked me to be
• 34:24
  Speaker 3: his vice president. And then I led the effort to
• 34:25
  Speaker 3: get us home like that. It's like, it's an obvious
• 34:28
  Speaker 3: answer and he has just struggled to get there, but
• 34:30
  Speaker 3: he did it last night. Like Tommy, I'm just incredibly
• 34:33
  Speaker 3: curious how much vote, I think the, substantive fact that
• 34:37
  Speaker 3: Bernie got this right and Biden got it wrong and
• 34:39
  Speaker 3: other people got it wrong is very important because I
• 34:44
  Speaker 3: worked in the Senate when this was all happening and
• 34:46
  Speaker 3: Bernie's position was very brave and we were like Because
• 34:50
  Speaker 3: you have to remember that America went fucking insane at
• 34:52
  Speaker 3: that time We scary changed the name of french fries
• 34:54
  Speaker 3: because we were pissed at the French the Dixie Chicks
• 34:56
  Speaker 3: were cancelled before cancel culture was a thing if you
• 34:58
  Speaker 3: spoke out in the slightest way a right-wing propaganda White
• 35:03
  Speaker 3: House supported by mainstream media anvil fell on your head
• 35:07
  Speaker 3: and Bernie did the right thing there and he should
• 35:09
  Speaker 3: get credit for that. I do not know politically whether
• 35:12
  Speaker 3: voters in Iowa, how they think about that in terms
• 35:16
  Speaker 3: of whether they want to pick, is that really matter?
• 35:19
  Speaker 3: They would prevent someone who might vote for Biden to
• 35:21
  Speaker 3: vote for Biden. It's an open question.
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I was watching for, to see which candidates would
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: try to move the foreign policy debate forward from a
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: vote in Iraq. And I think you know, Biden did
• 35:31
  Speaker 1: that a little bit. Eventually, Bernie got there on Iran.
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: I thought Pete did a pretty good job with that
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: during the foreign policy section. What do you think, Levin?
• 35:38
  Speaker 2: No, I think that's right. I mean, my overall, I mean,
• 35:41
  Speaker 2: I think what Dan said is actually important. I do
• 35:44
  Speaker 2: think sort of that we've been having every Democratic candidate
• 35:48
  Speaker 2: who voted for the war has been struggling with it.
• 35:51
  Speaker 2: And I think one of the reasons that they've been
• 35:52
  Speaker 2: struggling with it is that, do you think a big
• 35:54
  Speaker 2: part of this conversation is to look at not just
• 35:58
  Speaker 2: who was right and who was brave and who was
• 36:00
  Speaker 2: wrong and who didn't, who went along with the decision,
• 36:02
  Speaker 2: but also the context of the decision and what happened
• 36:05
  Speaker 2: to this country after 9-11 and the kind of fever
• 36:08
  Speaker 2: that took hold and what it meant and what we've
• 36:10
  Speaker 2: learned from it. Because I do think that's a big
• 36:12
  Speaker 2: part of what it means to learn from what happened
• 36:15
  Speaker 2: in the year since 9-11. That said, you know, Pete
• 36:19
  Speaker 2: did try to pitch forward on foreign policy, talk about
• 36:22
  Speaker 2: cyber threats, talk about the way, uh, the next president will, um,
• 36:26
  Speaker 2: inherit a bunch of new and evolving challenges. But overall,
• 36:30
  Speaker 2: I think one thing that was missing throughout the debate
• 36:33
  Speaker 2: on this question and a bunch of other questions was
• 36:36
  Speaker 2: taking cable news questions that were either designed to elicit
• 36:43
  Speaker 2: conflict or they were just simply on the axis of
• 36:46
  Speaker 2: what cable news talks about every day, often framed the
• 36:50
  Speaker 2: way Republicans would frame it, and go bigger, talk about values,
• 36:55
  Speaker 2: talk about principles, talk about what guides a president in
• 36:58
  Speaker 2: making a decision to use force or not use force,
• 37:01
  Speaker 2: or on education, what the goals of education, on healthcare,
• 37:06
  Speaker 2: why this issue isn't so important, the pain that people feel,
• 37:08
  Speaker 2: what have you. And so my feeling on this foreign
• 37:11
  Speaker 2: policy debate, and I do think one reason I felt
• 37:13
  Speaker 2: certainly a kind of dull feeling after the debate is
• 37:16
  Speaker 2: too often questions were taken at face value. And I
• 37:19
  Speaker 2: was so longing for candidates to kind of step beyond
• 37:22
  Speaker 2: that and have a greater sense of vision and heart
• 37:26
  Speaker 2: and humanity and how they thought about these questions.
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: I thought Bernie is usually pretty deft at doing that
• 37:32
  Speaker 1: from a big picture values perspective. And then I think
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: Pete Warren and Klobuchar sometimes are pretty deft at taking
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: it to a more personal story or personal stories to
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: talk about people. So There was another more policy-based issue
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: that separated Warren and Sanders last night. Warren recently announced
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: that she'd be supporting the USMCA, which is the trade deal,
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: to replace NAFTA. This is one of the biggest policy
• 37:56
  Speaker 1: differences between her and Bernie. She defended her support of
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: the deal, and Bernie took the opportunity to explain his
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: opposition to it. Let's hear it.
• 38:03
  Speaker 2: I wasn't here.
• 38:04
  Speaker 10: I'd been in Congress long enough to have voted against NAFTA,
• 38:07
  Speaker 10: but I led the fight against the trade deal with
• 38:10
  Speaker 10: Asia and the trade deal with Europe because I didn't
• 38:12
  Speaker 10: think it was in the interests of the American people.
• 38:14
  Speaker 10: the American workers, or environmental interests. But we have farmers
• 38:19
  Speaker 10: here in Iowa who are hurting, and they are hurting
• 38:22
  Speaker 10: because of Donald Trump's initiated trade wars. We have workers
• 38:26
  Speaker 10: who are hurting because the agreements that have already been
• 38:30
  Speaker 10: cut really don't have enforcement on workers' rights. This new
• 38:35
  Speaker 10: trade deal is a modest improvement. Senator Sanders himself has
• 38:39
  Speaker 10: said so. It will give some relief to our farmers.
• 38:42
  Speaker 10: It will give some relief to our workers. I believe
• 38:46
  Speaker 10: we accept that relief. We try to help the people
• 38:48
  Speaker 10: who need help. And we get up the next day,
• 38:51
  Speaker 10: and fight for a better trade deal. We need a
• 38:54
  Speaker 10: coherent trade policy. We need a policy that actually helps
• 38:59
  Speaker 10: our workers, our farmers. We need them at the table,
• 39:02
  Speaker 10: not just a trade policy written for big international companies.
• 39:07
  Speaker 10: I'm ready to have that fight, but let's help the people.
• 39:10
  Speaker 6: Thank you.
• 39:10
  Speaker 3: Senator Sanders, can you please respond to Senator Warren?
• 39:13
  Speaker 9: Well, I think that It is not so easy to
• 39:17
  Speaker 9: put together new trade legislation. If this is passed, I
• 39:21
  Speaker 9: think it will set us back a number of years.
• 39:24
  Speaker 9: Senator Warren is right in saying we need to bring
• 39:26
  Speaker 9: the stakeholders to the table. That is the family farmers
• 39:30
  Speaker 9: here in Iowa and in Vermont and around the country.
• 39:33
  Speaker 9: That is the environmental community.
• 39:35
  Speaker 2: That is the workers.
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: So Bernie is the only candidate to oppose the trade deal. Dan,
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: you also oppose the trade deal. Why do you think
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: that everyone else, including Warren, came out in support for it?
• 39:49
  Speaker 3: I believe that Warren substantively thinks this is the right
• 39:52
  Speaker 3: thing to do because I don't understand the politics for her.
• 39:55
  Speaker 3: I think Klobuchar thinks it's something right thing to do.
• 39:58
  Speaker 3: It's probably on balance in the short term, at least
• 40:02
  Speaker 3: better for the people in Klobuchar state than in probably
• 40:05
  Speaker 3: better for the people, Iowa than status quo. But I
• 40:09
  Speaker 3: think that's the wrong question to have. I think the
• 40:12
  Speaker 3: question is not, is this, is the USMCA better than NAFTA?
• 40:18
  Speaker 9: Sure.
• 40:19
  Speaker 3: I mean, if Sherrod Brown's for it, some of the
• 40:21
  Speaker 3: AFL-CIOs for it, some individual unions may be against it,
• 40:25
  Speaker 3: but is it better than that?
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: Sure.
• 40:27
  Speaker 3: But that's not the right test in my view. Substance, right?
• 40:29
  Speaker 3: Politics is a different question. Substance, the test is, is
• 40:32
  Speaker 3: the USMCA better than a deal that a President Sanders, Biden, Warren, Klobuchar, Buttigieg,
• 40:37
  Speaker 3: Steyer would negotiate in a year from now? Because we
• 40:40
  Speaker 3: went through this in 2007 with a bunch of Bush
• 40:43
  Speaker 3: trade deals, which were not, they were not the worst
• 40:46
  Speaker 3: trade deals, but they were not good. And we waited
• 40:48
  Speaker 3: The Democrats did not pass and they control the House
• 40:50
  Speaker 3: and the Senate and waited for President Obama to renegotiate
• 40:53
  Speaker 3: those on a better deal that was more favorable to
• 40:56
  Speaker 3: workers and environmental standards. The fact that climate change is
• 40:58
  Speaker 3: not mentioned in this deal sort of proves that point.
• 41:02
  Speaker 1: So Jonathan Cohn at HuffPo had a smart piece about this,
• 41:06
  Speaker 1: I thought, which I agree with, that this is also
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: like the difference that there now is between Bernie Sanders
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: and Elizabeth Warren on Medicare for all. And that in
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: both cases, she is focused on what can I do
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: to deliver for people in the near term right now,
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: as opposed to having an issue to fight about. And,
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: you know, she brought up when she talked about health
• 41:32
  Speaker 1: care last night, all the executive action she was going
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: to take to lower the cost of prescription drugs. She's
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: now going to try to get a robust public option
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: passed in her first year with 51 votes. She's got
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: a plan to eliminate student debt with an executive order.
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: And I do think this is partly because having talked
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: to all these voters for the wilderness, too, one of
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: the reasons people are so cynical and disappointed with government
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: is that they can't remember any time that it's actually
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: delivered for them. And, you know, I talked to Stacey
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: Abrams about this, and she said, you know, the low
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: propensity voters, the people who don't vote often in Georgia,
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: where I come from, their big problem is they come out,
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: they vote once in a while, and then nothing changes
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: and no one delivers anything for them. And I don't
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: know if Elizabeth Warren is thinking about this or not,
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: but one argument that I could see her making against
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: Bernie Sanders as the primary continues is Bernie Sanders has
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: been very successful at moving the debate. He has moved
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: the debate on health care. He has moved the debate
• 42:29
  Speaker 1: on climate, and good for him for doing so. He
• 42:32
  Speaker 1: hasn't done a lot over the many years in Congress
• 42:34
  Speaker 1: to actually deliver on this kind of stuff. And she has,
• 42:38
  Speaker 1: and she's not only a progressive, but she has a
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: plan to actually make it happen. Maybe she'll take that argument.
• 42:43
  Speaker 3: Maybe she won't, but I think that your point about
• 42:46
  Speaker 3: delivering now as opposed to winning another fight, to delay
• 42:51
  Speaker 3: a policy or substantive benefit of the American people in
• 42:53
  Speaker 3: order to win a political fight is a very legitimate point.
• 42:56
  Speaker 3: And I think if it was, let's say hypothetically, somehow
• 42:59
  Speaker 3: Trump and the Democrats negotiated some sort of public option
• 43:02
  Speaker 3: or legislation to strengthen the ACA.
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: You do it. You do it.
• 43:06
  Speaker 3: You have to do it. The benefits of trade are
• 43:09
  Speaker 3: much more amorphous and much more downstream.
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: I do agree with that.
• 43:12
  Speaker 2: I mean, look- I think both Bernie and Warren, though,
• 43:15
  Speaker 2: go into this debate knowing that this is not like
• 43:17
  Speaker 2: an easy win for either of them. Like the way
• 43:19
  Speaker 2: they approached it. I mean, this Bernie Sanders, when he
• 43:22
  Speaker 2: wants to, can be much tougher. I mean, what he
• 43:25
  Speaker 2: said was, well, you're going to make it harder to
• 43:27
  Speaker 2: do the new trade deal because this one has passed,
• 43:29
  Speaker 2: which is a very.
• 43:30
  Speaker 1: Partly because he had admitted it is a modest improvement,
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: as she pointed out.
• 43:33
  Speaker 2: And, you know, the debate as to whether you take
• 43:36
  Speaker 2: a modest improvement... now versus something better you can negotiate
• 43:40
  Speaker 2: in the future is one of the central debates of politics.
• 43:43
  Speaker 1: Over and over and over again.
• 43:44
  Speaker 2: But it does seem like everyone on that stage recognize
• 43:47
  Speaker 2: that the politics of this are pretty nuanced and difficult,
• 43:50
  Speaker 2: and nobody is looking to really have a big fight
• 43:53
  Speaker 2: about it.
• 43:54
  Speaker 3: I think the politics in the Democratic primary are nuanced
• 43:56
  Speaker 3: and difficult. I think the politics in the general election
• 43:59
  Speaker 3: are quite simple. And Bernie's position is much stronger than
• 44:01
  Speaker 3: everyone else's. Bernie has made the point about Biden and
• 44:04
  Speaker 3: against Biden's electability is that Trump can say, Biden voted
• 44:07
  Speaker 3: for NAFTA. He can't say that Bernie voted for NAFTA.
• 44:11
  Speaker 3: I think that is also true here because, as we
• 44:13
  Speaker 3: know from our own polling, Trump's support for a new
• 44:16
  Speaker 3: NAFTA deal that is supported by the big drug companies,
• 44:20
  Speaker 3: the Wall Street banks, other corporations, is a big net
• 44:22
  Speaker 3: negative for him in battleground states like Wisconsin and Arizona.
• 44:26
  Speaker 3: Bernie can make that case against him. The others can't.
• 44:28
  Speaker 4: Bernie spoke pretty compellingly last night and several times about
• 44:31
  Speaker 4: climate change as an existential threat. And him framing his
• 44:34
  Speaker 4: opposition to USMCA around climate was smart and believable. And
• 44:37
  Speaker 4: it made it seem like this was a good faith
• 44:39
  Speaker 4: policy dispute. I thought in this exchange, I was grateful
• 44:42
  Speaker 4: that Amy Klobuchar brought it back to Trump and started
• 44:45
  Speaker 4: highlighting the ways Trump's trade policies have hurt real people
• 44:48
  Speaker 4: in Iowa and have hurt people she knew. That was
• 44:50
  Speaker 4: smart and important. To his credit, Pete did a good
• 44:53
  Speaker 4: job of bringing it back to Trump several times during
• 44:55
  Speaker 4: the foreign policy discussion. He talked about Trump sending more
• 44:58
  Speaker 4: troops to the Middle East, Trump lying about opposing the
• 45:01
  Speaker 4: Iraq War. He talked about the need to renew the
• 45:03
  Speaker 4: New START treaty. So I was just grateful to the
• 45:05
  Speaker 4: candidates who remembered that we're going to run against Trump someday.
• 45:08
  Speaker 4: Would have been nice if there was a little bit
• 45:10
  Speaker 4: more of that.
• 45:10
  Speaker 2: If there was a Democratic Trump, it would be so
• 45:13
  Speaker 2: clear what they would be doing, which is worse than NAFTA.
• 45:16
  Speaker 2: All the jobs are going to go away. They're going
• 45:18
  Speaker 2: to ruin the Midwest because the results are diffuse and
• 45:21
  Speaker 2: hard to see.
• 45:21
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's right. So the moderators ended the debate by
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: asking each candidate a question about their electability. I want
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: to go through each of the candidates' answers, and then
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: we can talk about sort of each of their overall
• 45:40
  Speaker 1: debate performances before we go. Let's start with Joe Biden.
• 45:44
  Speaker 8: Vice President Biden, the eventual nominee will face President Trump,
• 45:47
  Speaker 8: who has no problem mocking people, using insulting nicknames, slinging mud,
• 45:51
  Speaker 8: and telling lies. The debate against him will make tonight's
• 45:55
  Speaker 8: debate look like child's play. Are you prepared for that?
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: I am prepared for that.
• 45:59
  Speaker 6: Look, I've been the object of his affection now more
• 46:01
  Speaker 6: than anybody else in this state. I've taken all the
• 46:05
  Speaker 6: hits he can deliver, and I'm getting better in the polls,
• 46:07
  Speaker 6: my going up. And by the way, I have overwhelming
• 46:11
  Speaker 6: support from the African-American community, overwhelming, more than everybody else
• 46:15
  Speaker 6: in this operation, number one. Number two, working-class people where
• 46:18
  Speaker 6: I come from in Pennsylvania and the places I come
• 46:21
  Speaker 6: from in Delaware, I have great support. I have support
• 46:24
  Speaker 6: across the board. And I'm not worried about taking on
• 46:27
  Speaker 6: Donald Trump at all. And with regard to the economy,
• 46:29
  Speaker 6: I can hardly wait to have that debate with him.
• 46:31
  Speaker 6: Where I come from, the neighborhoods I come from, they're
• 46:34
  Speaker 6: in real trouble. Working class people and middle class people.
• 46:37
  Speaker 6: When the middle class does well, working class has a
• 46:39
  Speaker 6: way up and the wealthy do well. But what's happening now?
• 46:42
  Speaker 6: They're being clobbered. They're being killed. They now have in
• 46:45
  Speaker 6: a situation where if the vast majority believe their children
• 46:49
  Speaker 6: will never reach the stage that they've reached in economic security.
• 46:55
  Speaker 6: I love that debate because the American public is getting clobbered.
• 46:59
  Speaker 6: The wealthy are the only ones doing well, period. I'm
• 47:02
  Speaker 6: looking forward to the economic debate.
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: So it was, I thought, a very good response to
• 47:09
  Speaker 1: a fairly weird question, like what are you going to
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: do when Trump's mean to you in terms of electability?
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: But what did you guys think overall of Joe Biden's,
• 47:17
  Speaker 1: you know, debate performance and sort of where he stands
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: at the end of the debate?
• 47:21
  Speaker 3: I think he came out of the debate right where
• 47:24
  Speaker 3: he went in, which is still the front runner for
• 47:26
  Speaker 3: the nomination and probably by a significant amount with the
• 47:29
  Speaker 3: giant caveat of what happens in Iowa could change that.
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: Huge.
• 47:32
  Speaker 3: And people and he I don't it's I'm not saying
• 47:36
  Speaker 3: he is lucky, but in debate after debate after debate,
• 47:40
  Speaker 3: People preview an idea that they are going to go
• 47:42
  Speaker 3: after Biden. They're going to take him on on his record.
• 47:44
  Speaker 3: They're going to take him on his electability. And it
• 47:46
  Speaker 3: never happens.
• 47:47
  Speaker 1: No bankruptcy hit that Warren had sort of previewed. No
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: Social Security hit that Bernie had sort of previewed. Except
• 47:54
  Speaker 1: for the Iraq thing, no one really challenged Joe Biden.
• 47:58
  Speaker 3: And Biden will benefit tremendously from that because that is
• 48:01
  Speaker 3: the last debate between now and Iowa. I thought in
• 48:05
  Speaker 3: that answer itself, we saw the Biden that we have
• 48:08
  Speaker 3: seen before. before this campaign, which is the happy warrior
• 48:12
  Speaker 3: Biden and the one who is very, very passionate about
• 48:16
  Speaker 3: middle and working class people in this country. Like that
• 48:18
  Speaker 3: answer is one that we have heard a thousand times
• 48:21
  Speaker 3: in a White House economic meeting whenever someone's putting forward some,
• 48:26
  Speaker 3: you know, I'm sure well-meaning, but eggheaded policy. And Biden
• 48:29
  Speaker 3: will very passionately make the case, like, how does this
• 48:31
  Speaker 3: help the people where I'm from? How does this help
• 48:33
  Speaker 3: the people of Claymont, Delaware, where he grew up? And
• 48:35
  Speaker 3: that's the Biden who is, that is that Biden who
• 48:39
  Speaker 3: that is carrying the electability hopes of a lot of
• 48:42
  Speaker 3: these primary voters thus far.
• 48:45
  Speaker 1: What do you think, Lovett?
• 48:47
  Speaker 2: You know, it was, I think, I think it was
• 48:49
  Speaker 2: a good debate for him. I think we see the
• 48:51
  Speaker 2: strengths and weaknesses of Biden again and again. The strengths
• 48:54
  Speaker 2: are what he laid out in that answer. The weaknesses are,
• 48:57
  Speaker 2: I think, in the way in which that answer is
• 48:59
  Speaker 2: still not that smooth. You know, I mean, we're now,
• 49:01
  Speaker 2: I think, accustomed to grading Biden on a curve. And
• 49:05
  Speaker 2: the curve is, did he get to the end of
• 49:07
  Speaker 2: his answer, you know, without anything making us truly uncomfortable
• 49:11
  Speaker 2: or hard to follow or incoherent, and he didn't. He
• 49:14
  Speaker 2: delivered the answer, I think, reasonably well. That said, on
• 49:18
  Speaker 2: the whole, there is a kind of absence of the
• 49:21
  Speaker 2: joyful warrior throughout this debate. There's a kind of darkness
• 49:27
  Speaker 2: to his presentation in the debates that I don't think
• 49:30
  Speaker 2: is as evident in the campaign trail or in the.
• 49:34
  Speaker 1: Person that.
• 49:36
  Speaker 2: That got him the name recognition, that made him the
• 49:39
  Speaker 2: person that's at the top of the polls.
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: But yeah, that's it. Tommy, what'd you think?
• 49:44
  Speaker 2: I thought he was very good.
• 49:45
  Speaker 1: It's one of his better performances.
• 49:46
  Speaker 4: And look, I mean, the headline coming out of this
• 49:47
  Speaker 4: thing is like, what did Warren and Bernie talk about
• 49:52
  Speaker 4: at their non-handshake after the debate? It's either the storyline
• 49:54
  Speaker 4: is largely a fight between Bernie and Warren, and that's
• 49:58
  Speaker 4: a win for Biden.
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I think one of the other reasons that he
• 50:02
  Speaker 1: was fortunate that no one came after him is that
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: At these debates, Biden is usually at his worst when
• 50:07
  Speaker 1: he is attacked because then he gets defensive. And when
• 50:10
  Speaker 1: he gets defensive, then he can sort of go on
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: and on. And that's when he's made some of his
• 50:14
  Speaker 1: mistakes in these debates. And because he really wasn't that
• 50:16
  Speaker 1: defensive or because when Bernie challenged him on Iraq, he
• 50:20
  Speaker 1: actually had his best answer. He sort of made it
• 50:22
  Speaker 1: through this time. I agree that the only thing with
• 50:24
  Speaker 1: Biden is we were talking about this last night. I
• 50:27
  Speaker 1: remember him in 08 debates. both in the primary and
• 50:32
  Speaker 1: then when he was VP in his debates with Sarah Palin,
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: again in his debates with Paul Ryan. And the defining
• 50:39
  Speaker 1: characteristic of Joe Biden in those debates was that he
• 50:41
  Speaker 1: was the happy warrior. Emphasis on happy, right? Because he
• 50:44
  Speaker 1: certainly was a warrior in this last question when he
• 50:47
  Speaker 1: talked about fighting for the middle class. But I would
• 50:49
  Speaker 1: love to see in future debates Joe Biden... I'm sure
• 50:53
  Speaker 1: he's not having a great time up there.
• 50:55
  Speaker 3: Who is, frankly?
• 50:56
  Speaker 1: Who is, right. But look like he's having a better time.
• 51:00
  Speaker 1: Smile a little more. Crack a joke a little more.
• 51:02
  Speaker 1: And Bernie's pretty good at doing that for a grumpy
• 51:07
  Speaker 1: old man. But Bernie can do that pretty well. And
• 51:11
  Speaker 1: I know Biden has that in him. I would just
• 51:13
  Speaker 1: love to see it a little bit more.
• 51:14
  Speaker 2: Yeah, there's that... you know, he did it at the, uh,
• 51:17
  Speaker 2: at that, that I was the, uh, LJ speech. He
• 51:19
  Speaker 2: did it. It's been his closing at a few of
• 51:21
  Speaker 2: these things. And when he does it well, I do
• 51:23
  Speaker 2: think it's his best argument, which is he kind of
• 51:27
  Speaker 2: ties the soul of America, part of his argument to
• 51:31
  Speaker 2: this hype speech. He sort of like tries to hype
• 51:34
  Speaker 2: people up, like, come on, let's get up. Let's like, look, not.
• 51:36
  Speaker 2: And I do think I do think that sort of the, the,
• 51:39
  Speaker 2: the water we're swimming in throughout this campaign is a
• 51:42
  Speaker 2: feeling of decline, a feeling of loss, a feeling of pain,
• 51:45
  Speaker 2: a feeling of not knowing your country, a feeling of seeing,
• 51:48
  Speaker 2: a feeling kind of, I mean, I think there's a
• 51:50
  Speaker 2: lot of, uh, white liberal voters who for the first
• 51:54
  Speaker 2: time in their lives are experiencing what it's like to
• 51:56
  Speaker 2: feel disenfranchised and they hate it and they're not, and, uh,
• 52:01
  Speaker 2: that kind of get up and go spirit that he
• 52:03
  Speaker 2: can bring when matched with him being a happy warrior
• 52:06
  Speaker 2: is I think Biden at his best and helps him
• 52:08
  Speaker 2: overcome some of the limitations he has as a candidate.
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: Okay, let's hear from Bernie.
• 52:12
  Speaker 8: Senator Sanders, you call yourself a democratic socialist, but more
• 52:16
  Speaker 8: than two thirds of voters say they are not enthusiastic
• 52:19
  Speaker 8: about voting for a socialist. Doesn't that put your chances
• 52:23
  Speaker 8: of beating Donald Trump at risk?
• 52:24
  Speaker 3: Nope, not at all.
• 52:26
  Speaker 9: And that is... because the campaign that we are going
• 52:30
  Speaker 9: to run will expose the fraudulency of who Donald Trump is.
• 52:37
  Speaker 9: Donald Trump is corrupt, he is a pathological liar, and
• 52:41
  Speaker 9: he is a fraud. Now, when Trump talks about socialism,
• 52:45
  Speaker 9: what he talks about is giving hundreds of billions of
• 52:48
  Speaker 9: dollars in tax breaks and subsidies to the fossil fuel industry.
• 52:53
  Speaker 9: Donald Trump is a businessman, received $ 800 million in tax
• 52:58
  Speaker 9: breaks and subsidies to build luxury housing. My democratic socialism
• 53:04
  Speaker 9: says healthcare is a human right. We're going to raise
• 53:08
  Speaker 9: the minimum wage to 15 bucks an hour. We're going
• 53:11
  Speaker 9: to make public colleges and universities tuition-free. We're going to
• 53:15
  Speaker 9: have a Green New Deal and create up to $ 20
• 53:18
  Speaker 9: million saving the planet for our children and our grandchildren.
• 53:22
  Speaker 9: We are going to take on the greed and corruption
• 53:26
  Speaker 9: of the pharmaceutical industry and the insurance company. That is
• 53:30
  Speaker 9: what democratic socialism is about. and that will win this election.
• 53:35
  Speaker 1: Will it, Dan?
• 53:37
  Speaker 3: As we have talked about in 08, is it possible
• 53:40
  Speaker 3: for an African American to win the White House? At
• 53:42
  Speaker 3: the conversation we just had about whether a woman can win,
• 53:46
  Speaker 3: this is also an untested proposition, right? This is a
• 53:48
  Speaker 3: person who identifies as a socialist, which is a term,
• 53:51
  Speaker 3: even if the policies that Bernie advocates are quite popular
• 53:55
  Speaker 3: across party lines in a lot of places and a
• 53:56
  Speaker 3: lot of the people in your focus groups, believe in
• 54:00
  Speaker 3: and support.
• 54:00
  Speaker 1: Also could easily be labeled democratic policies and progressive policies
• 54:05
  Speaker 1: and not socialist policies, as Bernie himself tried to lay
• 54:08
  Speaker 1: out in a speech a while back when he said
• 54:10
  Speaker 1: that it's just like FDR, and yet for some reason
• 54:12
  Speaker 1: calls them democratic socialism.
• 54:14
  Speaker 3: And so I think that answer was fine. I think
• 54:19
  Speaker 3: his definition of democratic socialism is probably the best way
• 54:21
  Speaker 3: you can deal with that. His critique of Trump that
• 54:27
  Speaker 3: where Trump actually engages in corporate socialism by bailing out
• 54:31
  Speaker 3: corporations and all of that. I think it's a good argument.
• 54:34
  Speaker 3: I just want to see more. I would like to
• 54:36
  Speaker 3: hear more from Bernie in his campaign about how they
• 54:38
  Speaker 3: are going to navigate several billion dollars and a right-wing
• 54:44
  Speaker 3: media machine that is going to try to otherize him
• 54:47
  Speaker 3: around this term. And I think this was the beginning
• 54:51
  Speaker 3: of that conversation. Electability, like as we said, no one
• 54:54
  Speaker 3: knows what electability means. I want to hear candidates. The
• 54:57
  Speaker 3: only way that I can possibly interpret is hearing candidates'
• 54:59
  Speaker 3: plans for how they plan to navigate the challenges they
• 55:01
  Speaker 3: may have. We've heard that from Warren on that question,
• 55:04
  Speaker 3: and I want to hear more from Bernie on it.
• 55:05
  Speaker 2: I thought it was interesting. To me, it was like,
• 55:08
  Speaker 2: you know, Trump in 2016, he'll say it now. There's
• 55:12
  Speaker 2: this sort of quality where the version of it is that, yeah,
• 55:15
  Speaker 2: I'm a greedy sleaze, but I'll be a greedy sleaze
• 55:17
  Speaker 2: for you. And this is the mirror image of that,
• 55:20
  Speaker 2: which is to say, uh, Trump is a socialist for
• 55:23
  Speaker 2: corporations and the wealthy and people he knows, and I'll
• 55:27
  Speaker 2: be a socialist for you. It is the kind of
• 55:28
  Speaker 2: mirror image of the Trump argument. And in that way,
• 55:31
  Speaker 2: I found it interesting and compelling. Beyond that, I have
• 55:36
  Speaker 2: the same kind of uncertainty around these questions that we
• 55:39
  Speaker 2: all do, but I found it to be a fair
• 55:42
  Speaker 2: and compelling argument.
• 55:44
  Speaker 1: What do you think, Tom?
• 55:45
  Speaker 4: It's a very untested proposition. It's a thing that So
• 55:49
  Speaker 4: electability concerns about every single candidate on that stage make
• 55:52
  Speaker 4: me quite nervous. And this is one that's gotten somehow
• 55:55
  Speaker 4: the least discussion. I think that if Elizabeth Warren were
• 56:01
  Speaker 4: really looking to throw a punch about electability, she could
• 56:04
  Speaker 4: have tried to drill him on this.
• 56:05
  Speaker 1: She notably did not.
• 56:07
  Speaker 4: I think we are whistling past the graveyard if we
• 56:10
  Speaker 4: don't vet these issues out in the primary.
• 56:12
  Speaker 1: So I hope it is discussed. in a bigger way.
• 56:15
  Speaker 4: But, you know, Bernie's betting on the fact that he
• 56:17
  Speaker 4: can bring in new voters and young voters and build
• 56:20
  Speaker 4: a big new coalition. And if he is the nominee,
• 56:24
  Speaker 4: my God, I hope he is right. And I'll do
• 56:25
  Speaker 4: everything I can to support him. But you're going to
• 56:27
  Speaker 4: have to prove it by winning.
• 56:29
  Speaker 1: And, you know, I know that some folks on the
• 56:31
  Speaker 1: left will say, well, Donald Trump and the Republicans are
• 56:33
  Speaker 1: going to call Democrats all Democrat socialists. They've called us
• 56:36
  Speaker 1: all socialists for decades. That is true. But it's a
• 56:43
  Speaker 1: And when you say, yeah, he's right, I am a socialist.
• 56:46
  Speaker 1: But I'm a democratic socialist, and that's better. I mean, look,
• 56:50
  Speaker 1: I sat in these four focus groups, and there was
• 56:53
  Speaker 1: mixed reviews here. In Wisconsin, in Milwaukee, with the Obama-Trump voters,
• 56:58
  Speaker 1: and with some Democrats in Philadelphia, they did not care
• 57:00
  Speaker 1: about democratic socialism. One of them actually said, I don't
• 57:03
  Speaker 1: care what you call yourself. I like your policies, I
• 57:05
  Speaker 1: like your policies. So that's good. In Florida, in Miami,
• 57:09
  Speaker 1: when the group was primarily... you know, these were sort
• 57:12
  Speaker 1: of disaffected voters who had sat home. They were primarily
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: black and Latino. There were a number of immigrants in
• 57:17
  Speaker 1: that group. And they were very, very concerned about socialism,
• 57:21
  Speaker 1: partly because a couple of them had come from socialist countries.
• 57:24
  Speaker 1: And they said it was horrible in this country. And
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: you try to explain to them that democratic socialism, they
• 57:29
  Speaker 1: don't care about all that. They just, socialism is a
• 57:31
  Speaker 1: word that carries quite a connotation in this country because
• 57:35
  Speaker 1: of history. And you can explain the differences for sure.
• 57:39
  Speaker 1: And a lot of college-educated liberals will understand those differences
• 57:42
  Speaker 1: for sure. The question is, what happens with those voters
• 57:45
  Speaker 1: I talked to in Miami, in the Arizona group, which
• 57:47
  Speaker 1: was Romney-Clinton voters? They were very upset with socialism. They
• 57:51
  Speaker 1: didn't like it at all. So I think it's something
• 57:53
  Speaker 1: they have to navigate. And like you said, Elizabeth Warren,
• 57:55
  Speaker 1: some of these other people have been dealing with their
• 57:56
  Speaker 1: electability concerns, and Bernie Sanders has not really addressed them.
• 57:59
  Speaker 3: This has been an unexamined question because in 2016, the
• 58:03
  Speaker 3: consensus of the media the entire time was Bernie was
• 58:05
  Speaker 3: never going to win. So what was the point? And
• 58:08
  Speaker 3: a lot of establishment folks thought Bernie was never going
• 58:10
  Speaker 3: to win. So why poke the bear here, right? And
• 58:12
  Speaker 3: then this time, Bernie, up until very recently, had been
• 58:16
  Speaker 3: sort of unfairly and inaccurately written off as, look, he's
• 58:20
  Speaker 3: polling below where he was in 2016. It's either going
• 58:24
  Speaker 3: to be Biden or Warren or Pete, Bernie. And then
• 58:27
  Speaker 3: he had his health issues. But now he is surging
• 58:30
  Speaker 3: here or has strengthened at the end and is a very, very,
• 58:34
  Speaker 3: very legitimate contender. And you could argue in some cases,
• 58:36
  Speaker 3: maybe the favorite to navigate the next part of the
• 58:39
  Speaker 3: calendar and be the nominee. And I think that question
• 58:42
  Speaker 3: is going to come up and his campaign is going
• 58:43
  Speaker 3: to have to.
• 58:43
  Speaker 1: Deal with it. Yeah. Let's hear from Elizabeth Warren.
• 58:46
  Speaker 8: Senator Warren, what do you say to voters who like
• 58:48
  Speaker 8: your policies, but they're worried they will scare away swing
• 58:51
  Speaker 8: voters you need to win this race in November?
• 58:54
  Speaker 10: So I was born and raised in Oklahoma. I have
• 58:58
  Speaker 10: three older brothers who are all retired, who are all
• 59:00
  Speaker 10: back there still. And two of my three brothers are Republicans.
• 59:05
  Speaker 10: And sure, there are a lot of things we disagree
• 59:07
  Speaker 10: on and we can take to our corners and do
• 59:09
  Speaker 10: the damn thing. talking points. But the truth is, there's
• 59:13
  Speaker 10: a whole lot we agree on. You know, my brothers
• 59:15
  Speaker 10: are just furious over Chevron and Eli Lilly and Amazon
• 59:20
  Speaker 10: and that our giant corporations make billions of dollars in taxes,
• 59:25
  Speaker 10: make billions of dollars in profits and pay nothing in taxes.
• 59:28
  Speaker 10: My brothers say, I don't get this. I have to
• 59:30
  Speaker 10: pay my taxes. Somebody has to keep the roads paved
• 59:33
  Speaker 10: and the schools open and pay for our defense. They
• 59:37
  Speaker 10: understand that we have an America right now that's working
• 59:41
  Speaker 10: great for those at the top. It's just not working
• 59:45
  Speaker 10: for anyone else. We have a chance to unite. unite
• 59:50
  Speaker 10: as Democrats, but also with independents and Republicans who are
• 59:55
  Speaker 10: sick of living in a country that's working great for
• 59:57
  Speaker 10: the politicians that are taking the money. It's working great
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 10: for the lobbyists. It's working great for the corporate executives.
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 10: It's just not working for everyone else. I'm building the
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 10: grassroots movement, leading the fight. We're going to make this
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 10: America work for everyone else. That is how we're going
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 10: to beat Donald Trump.
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 1: Tommy, what do you think about that electability argument from Warren?
• 1:00:17
  Speaker 1: I think it's strong.
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 4: I mean, look, all of them are untested, but she
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 4: makes a compelling case for herself.
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 1: It was pretty much the argument she gave me on
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: Pod Save America a couple episodes ago. This is her
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 1: argument on electability. She talks about her brothers. She talks
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 1: about sort of building a coalition of people against corruption
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 1: and special interests, which I think is probably the best
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 1: way to go.
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 3: An argument she used in the last debate that puts
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 3: us on a more finer point is the best person
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 3: to take on a corrupt president is someone who's willing
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 3: to fight corruption. And that, I think, is the shorthand
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 3: version of that answer. That's the why her part, right?
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 3: Everything else there other than the brothers is something that
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 3: certainly Bernie and some other folks on stage who have
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 3: been on stage could make that case. I think the
• 1:01:02
  Speaker 3: part that she can uniquely do, because she's made it
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 3: a bigger part of her campaign, although it's gotten sort
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 3: of washed away in the sea of Medicare for All discussion,
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 3: is she has the most aggressive anti-corruption plan of anyone
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 3: in this race. And I think you remember when you
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 3: talked to her, You talked to her, and when Tommy
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 3: talked to her in the Privacy of America, it was,
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 3: what is your first piece of legislation? Was it going
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 3: to be the wealth tax? Was it going to be
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 3: Medicare for All? Was it going to be Green New Deal?
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 1: No.
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 3: It was her corruption plan because she believed that would
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 3: make all the subsequent pieces more interesting. And that is
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 3: her theory of change, and it also can be her
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 3: theory of electability.
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 1: Let's hear from Pete.
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 8: Mayor Buttigieg, you say you've had trouble earning the support
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 8: of black voters because you're unknown. But you've been campaigning
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 8: for a year now, and polling shows you with next
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 8: to no black support. support that you'll need in order
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 8: to beat Donald Trump. Is it possible that black voters
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 8: have gotten to know you and have simply decided to
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 8: choose another candidate?
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 7: The black voters who know me best are supporting me.
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 7: It's why I have the most support in South Bend.
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 7: It's why among elected black officials in my community who
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 7: have gotten into this race, by far most of them
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 7: are supporting me. And now, nationally, I am proud that
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 7: my campaign is co-chaired by a member of the Congressional
• 1:02:12
  Speaker 7: Black Caucus and to have support right here in Iowa
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 7: from some of the most recognizable black elected leaders from
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 7: Mayor Hart of Waterloo to former Representative Barry in Black
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 7: Hawk County. Now, the biggest mistake we could make is
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 7: to take black votes for granted, and I never will.
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 7: The reason I have the support I do is not
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 7: because any voter thinks that I'm perfect. is because of
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 7: the work that we have done facing some of the
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 7: toughest issues that communities can. Not from the luxury of
• 1:02:42
  Speaker 7: a debate or a television panel or a committee room,
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 7: but on the ground. Issues from poverty to justice in policing.
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 7: And I'm proud to say we've been nationally recognized for
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 7: our work as a race-informed city on delivering greater economic justice.
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 7: That we have reduced use of force by leading the
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 7: region in transparency around the use of force in policing.
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 7: Of course, there is a much longer way to go
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 7: in my community and around the country. But I will
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 7: be a president whose personal commitment is to continue doing
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 7: this work.
• 1:03:13
  Speaker 1: What do you think, Lovett?
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 2: I think it's the best answer he's given on this question.
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 2: And I did appreciate the way the question was asked
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 2: because there has been something a little bit patronizing in
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 2: the way Pete has answered them before. They haven't gotten
• 1:03:24
  Speaker 2: to know me yet. And it sort of put him
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 2: in a position to make more of a direct case.
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 2: You know, that said, this has been dogging him. It
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 2: will continue to dog him. you know, both Pete and
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 2: Warren have sort of political challenges to their electability case.
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 2: And so they tend to read down to an argument
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 2: that is rhetorical, that's around the case that they're going
• 1:03:45
  Speaker 2: to make, right? So Pete has seen this as a
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 2: huge liability for him. So when he makes an argument
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 2: about electability, he makes a rhetorical argument about his contrast
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 2: versus Trump. Elizabeth Warren faces questions about her electability. And
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 2: so she makes a rhetorical argument about how strong the
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 2: case she's going to make against Trump. Biden and Bernie
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 2: opposite to that. Biden just flat out walks through the
• 1:04:07
  Speaker 2: demographics and says, here's how I'm doing in these demographics.
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 2: Here's how I'm going to win. And Bernie talks about
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 2: bringing in new voters and make some more kind of
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 2: on the ground political argument about how he's going to
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 2: overcome some of the liabilities you're talking about. But on
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 2: that on that answer, I thought it was a new
• 1:04:24
  Speaker 2: a better answer than he's given in the past.
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 1: Anyone else have thoughts on Pete's overall performance? We haven't
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 1: talked about that too much. Pete speaks in paragraphs.
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 4: You know, I mean, everything is a well thought through
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 4: complete thought. There are dependent clauses. There are emotional portions.
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 4: Like the risk with that is it can sometimes sound
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 4: very practiced. The benefit is that he gives great answers
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 4: and makes important points that other people are forgetting to make.
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 4: This is completely superficial. I thought he looked very young
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 4: last night. I've never felt that way about him in
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 4: a debate before. Maybe it was too much makeup or
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 4: something or the haircut, but I don't know. And then
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 4: Tom Steyer, funnily, kept trying to jab Pete over random
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 4: things about his age, trade he might have dogged him
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 4: on something. So maybe that highlighted it for me.
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 3: I thought Pete, in his electability case, got back to
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 3: first principles, which is he is the candidate who represents
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 3: the biggest change from the status quo that is Donald Trump.
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 3: his life choices, his experience, his age, his background, where
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 3: in the country he's from. And over the last several months,
• 1:05:28
  Speaker 3: the campaign had taken that Pete electability argument and transitioned
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 3: it to, I'm the most talented moderate candidate in the field.
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 3: And I am more electable because I'm for a public option,
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 3: not Medicare for all. But his best argument is that
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 3: he is the embodiment of change. He is different than
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 3: the other people in the top four because they are
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 3: politicians in a more typical sense with longer records and
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 3: that he is sort of the high variance candidates, the
• 1:05:51
  Speaker 3: replica versus the replacement candidate. theory where Pete is, at
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 3: least among this group, the biggest contrast to Trump.
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 1: I agree with that. And I think he has to,
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 1: in these next 20 something days, make that case quite
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 1: a bit more since he got a Des Moines register
• 1:06:04
  Speaker 1: poll that wasn't as great for him because he, you know,
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 1: he had a little bit of a slide there and
• 1:06:08
  Speaker 1: I think he was steady last night, but he's at
• 1:06:10
  Speaker 1: the point where I think he needs to get something going.
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 1: and have a moment or two in these next couple
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 1: of weeks because, you know, in order to win the caucuses.
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 1: He's going to have to.
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 3: Stay to himself.
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 1: Well, that's, yeah.
• 1:06:22
  Speaker 3: He's like, witnesses, five witnesses, Hunter Biden testified, Joe Biden testified,
• 1:06:26
  Speaker 3: keep this going for a month.
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 2: It'd be so funny if he put out a statement
• 1:06:28
  Speaker 2: calling on Hunter Biden to testify. The other just, one
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 2: thing also just to remember too, like, Pete is so smart. Like,
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 2: he's on this stage, he's made it this far because
• 1:06:38
  Speaker 2: he's very, very smart. And I think to Tommy's point, sometimes,
• 1:06:41
  Speaker 2: He has the right words. He has the right thing
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 2: to say. He has the right contrast. But sometimes it
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 2: just feels a little bit rehearsed.
• 1:06:49
  Speaker 1: Amy Klobuchar.
• 1:06:49
  Speaker 8: Senator Klobuchar, you're pitching yourself as a practical candidate who
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 8: can get things done. And even tonight, you've dismissed some
• 1:06:58
  Speaker 8: of the ideas that are offered in this primary as
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 8: pipe dreams. How are you going to inspire Democratic voters
• 1:07:04
  Speaker 8: with a message of pragmatism?
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 11: Our voters, actually all Americans, have seen now a number
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 11: of years of a guy that has, I think, told
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 11: over 15,000 lies. He is someone that literally has a
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 11: rap sheet of divisive rhetoric. And I think what Americans
• 1:07:26
  Speaker 11: want is something different. I am going to be able
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 11: to stand across from him on that debate stage and
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 11: say to my friends in Iowa, the Midwest is not
• 1:07:36
  Speaker 11: flyover country for me.
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 2: I live here.
• 1:07:39
  Speaker 11: I'm going to be able to look at him and say,
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 11: you've treated these workers and farmers like poker chips. For me,
• 1:07:47
  Speaker 11: these are my friends and these are my neighbors. I'm
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 11: going to be able to look at him and say,
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 11: you know what? You got $ 413 million over the course
• 1:07:55
  Speaker 11: of your career.
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 2: That's how you built your fortune. And what I'm going
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 2: to say is this.
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 11: My grandpa worked 1500 feet underground in the iron ore mine,
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 11: saved money in a coffee can in the basement to
• 1:08:06
  Speaker 11: send my dad to a two year community college. That's
• 1:08:09
  Speaker 11: my family trust. And when you have been given an
• 1:08:13
  Speaker 11: opportunity like that, you go into the world not with
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 11: a sense of entitlement, Donald Trump, but with a sense
• 1:08:21
  Speaker 11: of obligation.
• 1:08:23
  Speaker 1: What do you guys think of that? It was similar
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 1: to Pete's case about the Midwest, too.
• 1:08:28
  Speaker 4: She made the most Iowa-specific case throughout the debate, I thought,
• 1:08:32
  Speaker 4: and in her electability point there at the end. I mean,
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 4: I think Klobuchar had a good debate last night. She
• 1:08:37
  Speaker 4: didn't have a game-changing debate, and I think she probably
• 1:08:39
  Speaker 4: needs to... I was expecting her to do a little
• 1:08:41
  Speaker 4: better in that most recent Des Moines Register poll than
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 4: what was it, 7%. I kind of thought Amy might
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 4: have jumped to 10%, and she's going to need to
• 1:08:48
  Speaker 4: really double or triple her support to actually get delegates
• 1:08:51
  Speaker 4: out of the caucus process. She needed to have a
• 1:08:53
  Speaker 4: big night last night. I don't know that that happened
• 1:08:55
  Speaker 4: I also talked to a couple of random Iowans who
• 1:08:58
  Speaker 4: thought that the.
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 1: Constant talking over the moderators came off as rude.
• 1:09:04
  Speaker 3: Are you conducting a focus group as we do this?
• 1:09:06
  Speaker 1: Dan, I got sources all over the place, man. In
• 1:09:09
  Speaker 1: campaigns outside, I'm a, you know, I'm a renaissance man.
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 1: He's connected to the 515.
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 4: But it's just a funny thing. It's a funny thing
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 4: people take away from these events, right? I mean, the big,
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 4: the cable news, brouhaha last night was what happened in
• 1:09:21
  Speaker 4: that little five second conversation after the debate, not what
• 1:09:25
  Speaker 4: was discussed. And then you talked to a couple of
• 1:09:26
  Speaker 4: Iowans and it's like these stylistic things.
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 1: I'm so proud of us for not talking about that
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 1: because we forgot.
• 1:09:31
  Speaker 2: We still haven't.
• 1:09:33
  Speaker 1: We could. Can I say one more thing about Klobuchar?
• 1:09:34
  Speaker 3: I think Klobuchar is perhaps the most strategic debater of
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 3: all of them. She comes in with a plan. She
• 1:09:40
  Speaker 3: does not care what the question is. She doesn't care
• 1:09:43
  Speaker 3: what the dynamics are. She is going to execute her plan.
• 1:09:46
  Speaker 3: She's going to tell her story. She's going to draw
• 1:09:48
  Speaker 3: the contract.
• 1:09:48
  Speaker 1: Debate coach's dream.
• 1:09:49
  Speaker 3: She, I mean, really like, I think, and like.
• 1:09:51
  Speaker 2: I agree with Tommy.
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 3: I don't think she had the game changing moment that
• 1:09:54
  Speaker 3: a candidate who was polling so far behind the top
• 1:09:57
  Speaker 3: group needed, but just, she's very good in this format.
• 1:10:01
  Speaker 2: It's, you know, it's fine. I actually think Klobuchar, it's
• 1:10:04
  Speaker 2: actually one reason it's quite useful to see her is
• 1:10:06
  Speaker 2: I do think she is really strong in these debates
• 1:10:07
  Speaker 2: and she does have a plan and she does, she
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 2: does execute on it. And even in the last debate,
• 1:10:11
  Speaker 2: she did even better. But the fact that it hasn't
• 1:10:14
  Speaker 2: resonated in the polls, I think just, speaks to how
• 1:10:16
  Speaker 2: hard it's been for someone to be an alternative to
• 1:10:19
  Speaker 2: Biden in the race and why so many people that
• 1:10:22
  Speaker 2: were on that stage three, four debates ago aren't there anymore,
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 2: not for lack of talent or even for lack of
• 1:10:29
  Speaker 2: a strategy, but because simply Joe Biden has held that
• 1:10:34
  Speaker 2: moderate vote so tightly for this entire campaign, no matter
• 1:10:38
  Speaker 2: how well Amy Klobuchar has performed.
• 1:10:40
  Speaker 1: Last but not least, Tom Steyer. Mr.
• 1:10:42
  Speaker 8: Steyer, you've spent more than $ 100 million of your own
• 1:10:45
  Speaker 8: dollars on television ads. How do you convince voters that
• 1:10:49
  Speaker 8: you're more than just your money?
• 1:10:51
  Speaker 5: Look, we know how Donald Trump is going to run
• 1:10:54
  Speaker 5: for president. He's going to run on the economy. He's
• 1:10:58
  Speaker 5: already told Americans last month in Florida, you don't like
• 1:11:03
  Speaker 5: me and I don't like you. But you're all going
• 1:11:06
  Speaker 5: to vote for me because the Democrats are going to
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 5: destroy the economy in 15 minutes if they get in control.
• 1:11:13
  Speaker 1: So let's be clear.
• 1:11:14
  Speaker 5: I started a business by myself in one room. I
• 1:11:18
  Speaker 5: didn't inherit a penny from my parents. I spent 30
• 1:11:21
  Speaker 5: years building that business into a multi-billion dollar international business.
• 1:11:26
  Speaker 5: Then I walked away from it and took the Giving
• 1:11:28
  Speaker 5: Pledge and started organizing coalitions. of ordinary Americans to take
• 1:11:32
  Speaker 5: on unchecked corporate power. But whoever is going to beat Mr.
• 1:11:36
  Speaker 5: Trump is going to have to beat him on the economy.
• 1:11:38
  Speaker 5: And I have the experience and the expertise to show
• 1:11:41
  Speaker 5: that he's a fake there and a fraud. Look, Mayor
• 1:11:45
  Speaker 5: Pete has three years as an analyst at McKinsey. I
• 1:11:48
  Speaker 5: have 30 years of international business experience. I can beat
• 1:11:51
  Speaker 5: Trump on the economy. We're going to have to beat
• 1:11:53
  Speaker 5: him on the economy. And I look forward to taking
• 1:11:56
  Speaker 5: him down in the fall on the debate stage.
• 1:11:59
  Speaker 4: I was too distracted last night by Tom Steyer's eyes
• 1:12:02
  Speaker 4: just boring into my fucking soul. Who told him to
• 1:12:06
  Speaker 4: stare at the camera like that?
• 1:12:07
  Speaker 1: It's weird. Worst advice.
• 1:12:08
  Speaker 4: But then I rewatched the debate this morning and half-watched,
• 1:12:12
  Speaker 4: mostly listened, and actually thought he had some sneaky good
• 1:12:16
  Speaker 4: points along the way. He had some moments that exposed
• 1:12:20
  Speaker 4: him as a very new candidate, like one of the
• 1:12:23
  Speaker 4: commander in chief questions, his response was like, I did
• 1:12:26
  Speaker 4: a lot of business travel and like, I don't know
• 1:12:27
  Speaker 4: that hitting diamond on Delta is going to, you know,
• 1:12:32
  Speaker 4: have the nuclear codes.
• 1:12:33
  Speaker 3: But, um, in our defense, Obama did argue about, did
• 1:12:36
  Speaker 3: point out he lived in Indonesia as a small child.
• 1:12:38
  Speaker 3: Once it is similar questions.
• 1:12:39
  Speaker 4: And I also remember staffing him in an interview where
• 1:12:41
  Speaker 4: he talked about like minoring in foreign relations.
• 1:12:44
  Speaker 1: And I was like, Please don't say that again. Yeah.
• 1:12:46
  Speaker 3: Doing travel around the world is no less lame than
• 1:12:49
  Speaker 3: I served X number of years on this Senate committee.
• 1:12:51
  Speaker 1: You think so? I disagree.
• 1:12:52
  Speaker 2: I think it's more lame. I think that's way more lame.
• 1:12:54
  Speaker 1: I agree with Tommy.
• 1:12:55
  Speaker 4: I think Elizabeth Warren being like, we haul up these
• 1:12:57
  Speaker 4: generals and we press them on why the war in
• 1:12:59
  Speaker 4: Afghanistan is ended.
• 1:13:00
  Speaker 1: I don't know.
• 1:13:02
  Speaker 4: I wish Warren, on these commander chief questions, spent more
• 1:13:05
  Speaker 4: time talking about her three brothers and what it meant
• 1:13:07
  Speaker 4: for them to serve and what it meant for their family,
• 1:13:09
  Speaker 4: because I think.
• 1:13:09
  Speaker 1: That's more likely to resonate. But anyway.
• 1:13:12
  Speaker 2: I mean, the clip you played of Tom Steyer, I think,
• 1:13:15
  Speaker 2: captures why he's been surprisingly good as a candidate, but also...
• 1:13:19
  Speaker 2: Because he paid us $ 7 million to air it? Yeah, no,
• 1:13:22
  Speaker 2: and obviously, that was something we weren't going to talk about. But, no,
• 1:13:28
  Speaker 2: we have to say Tom Steyer... Wait till the mid-roll. Yeah,
• 1:13:31
  Speaker 2: we have to say Tom Steyer 14 times in this
• 1:13:32
  Speaker 2: episode just to get the money.
• 1:13:33
  Speaker 5: But.
• 1:13:35
  Speaker 2: But no, you see the strengths he has and why
• 1:13:37
  Speaker 2: he's actually been, I think, better than people even expected
• 1:13:39
  Speaker 2: in these debates, given that he is someone who bought
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 2: a ticket. But you also see that he is a
• 1:13:45
  Speaker 2: new candidate. I mean, he just ran through in great
• 1:13:48
  Speaker 2: detail Trump's main argument. He just like walked, he's like,
• 1:13:51
  Speaker 2: he basically quoted Trump. He launched it as a hit
• 1:13:55
  Speaker 2: on his fellow Democrats. And I do actually think what
• 1:13:57
  Speaker 2: he said was true. This is what Trump is going
• 1:13:59
  Speaker 2: to say about the economy. But I did notice that
• 1:14:01
  Speaker 2: it was Donald Trump quoting it on Twitter after the
• 1:14:04
  Speaker 2: debate because Tom Steyer did a little bit of Trump's
• 1:14:06
  Speaker 2: work for him.
• 1:14:07
  Speaker 1: Look, it's always tough when the reason that everyone's talking
• 1:14:09
  Speaker 1: about you after the debate is because you couldn't tell
• 1:14:12
  Speaker 1: people what Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders were saying to
• 1:14:15
  Speaker 1: each other in that exchange.
• 1:14:17
  Speaker 2: The one time he didn't make eye contact all fucking night.
• 1:14:22
  Speaker 1: Every interview post-debate, they're like, what did they say? And
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 1: he's like, well, I didn't hear what they said. Well,
• 1:14:26
  Speaker 1: why didn't you hear what they said? What's your fucking problem?
• 1:14:29
  Speaker 2: Your face looked like you heard what they said.
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 4: There was a journalist named Reid Epstein, who we believe
• 1:14:33
  Speaker 4: was joking, who was like, what does it say about,
• 1:14:35
  Speaker 4: shouldn't a president be able to hear that conversation between
• 1:14:38
  Speaker 4: Warren and Bernie? Which is kind of a funny joke.
• 1:14:40
  Speaker 4: Kind of funny, though he said it in an annoying way.
• 1:14:43
  Speaker 1: Okay, that's it. That's the debate, guys. So again, there
• 1:14:46
  Speaker 1: will be no Thursday pod, but we will see you
• 1:14:49
  Speaker 1: all again on Thursday. Tuesday for a pod, because Monday
• 1:14:52
  Speaker 1: is Martin Luther King Day, and we'll be taking that
• 1:14:54
  Speaker 1: day off, and so there'll be a pod on Tommy's dancing.
• 1:14:57
  Speaker 1: Fuck yeah, day off. We'll see you on Tuesday. Pod
• 1:15:03
  Speaker 1: Save America is a product of Crooked Media. The senior
• 1:15:05
  Speaker 1: producer is Michael Martinez. Our assistant producer is Jordan Waller.
• 1:15:09
  Speaker 1: It's mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Kyle Seglin is
• 1:15:11
  Speaker 1: our sound engineer. Thanks to Carolyn Reston, Tanya Somanator, and
• 1:15:15
  Speaker 1: Katie Long for production support. And to our digital team,
• 1:15:18
  Speaker 1: Elijah Cohn, Narmel Cohnian, Yale Freed, and Milo Kim, who
• 1:15:21
  Speaker 1: film and upload these episodes as a video every week.