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Full Episode - Trump Made The Midterms MUCH Harder For Republicans + A Statesman's Warning About Where American Politics Is Headed · The Chuck ToddCast

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  Speaker 1: so use that code. Well, Hello there, and happy Thursday.
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  Speaker 1: It's another episode of the Chuck Podcast. And this, of
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: course is a holiday weekend, the beginning of the of
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: summer as far as some people are concerned. Yes, Memorial
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: Day weekend. Memorial Day is Monday, which means that the
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: long weekend. And you know how Washington is. They're desperate
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: when there is a Monday holiday. They want to figure
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: out how to have a two week recess for every
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: three day weekend. Right the rest of us might get
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: an extra day off. Congress always wants to turn these
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  Speaker 1: three day weekends into two week recesses. But I digress. Still,
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  Speaker 1: I know this is the start of something, so let
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  Speaker 1: me give you a rundown of what we got today,
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: a little bit of clean up from Tuesday nights elections.
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  Speaker 1: A few more things I want to touch on, and
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  Speaker 1: this sort of a very divided Republican Party, but I'll
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  Speaker 1: explain how they're divided on this episode. I want to
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: spend a few minutes remembering Barney Frank. He passed away
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: in the last forty eight hours, and I just think
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  Speaker 1: he's not History is going to be quite kind to
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  Speaker 1: Barney Frank, but I think we're not fully appreciating just
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  Speaker 1: what a pioneer he was is And like I said,
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  Speaker 1: I think history is going to be quite kind. My
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  Speaker 1: interview today is with somebody of the era that Barney
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  Speaker 1: Frank served in Congress in and that is Lamar Alexander.
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  Speaker 1: I've known Lamar Alexander a very long time. My first
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  Speaker 1: mentor in politics, Doug Bailey, was Lamar Alexander's political consigliari
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  Speaker 1: for a good twenty twenty thirty years. You name it,
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  Speaker 1: helped him win his first campaign for governor, was a
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  Speaker 1: big advisor for him at times as governor and when
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  Speaker 1: he wanted to be Secretary of Education and to run
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  Speaker 1: for president. He's just been so I've through Doug gotten
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  Speaker 1: to know Lamar over the years, and he's written a
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  Speaker 1: tremendous memoir. And I the reason why I'm calling it
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  Speaker 1: tremendous is because it's very thorough without being boring, Okay,
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: because there's a little forced gumpishness to him, And I
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  Speaker 1: don't mean that in that He's been around, he's seen
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  Speaker 1: a lot, and he's been at different levels of government,
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  Speaker 1: and there's wisdom in that. In our conversation, I think,
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  Speaker 1: and I would like to hope reflects that. And of
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  Speaker 1: course I'm gonna spend some time taking your questions. So
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  Speaker 1: there's there's your rundown for the day. But let me
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  Speaker 1: first do a little cleanup from Tuesday night. I think
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  Speaker 1: at the time that I recorded for the Wednesday episode,
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  Speaker 1: we weren't one hundred percent sure about Derek Dooley in Georgia.
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  Speaker 1: Well we are now one hundred percent, obviously sure about
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  Speaker 1: Derek Dooley in Georgia. That was that, of course, and
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  Speaker 1: it's going to be an interesting split, right. You've got
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  Speaker 1: Mike Collins in that Georgia Senate race, who doesn't technically
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  Speaker 1: have an endorsement, but it's pretty clear Donald Trump's about
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  Speaker 1: to do that. Brian Kemp, the governor of Georgia, who
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  Speaker 1: has been who's famously stood up to Trump and survived. Right,
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  Speaker 1: there are not many Republicans who can say that. There's
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  Speaker 1: Brian Kemp, and there's Lisa Mkowski, and you know, it
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  Speaker 1: feels like and there's not many others left who have
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  Speaker 1: taken the wrath of Trump, have been targeted by Trump
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  Speaker 1: and have survived to tell about it. In the case
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  Speaker 1: of Governor Kemp, I mean, he he thrived in what
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  Speaker 1: he did. And the question is what's this primary going
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  Speaker 1: to be?
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  Speaker 2: Like?
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  Speaker 1: We know that we know what might be in the
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  Speaker 1: best interests of one entity isn't in the best interest
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  Speaker 1: of the other. So that's going to be interesting. Keish
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  Speaker 1: Lan's bottoms indeed one without a runoff. What's more significant
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: there is the total turnout in Georgia. Democrats basically outpolled,
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  Speaker 1: out voted Republicans in Georgia by about one hundred thousand votes,
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  Speaker 1: so that means collectively two million. Right, that's a sort
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  Speaker 1: of a five percent essentially, did you know improved you
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  Speaker 1: know on a five percent basis, that's that's pretty indicative.
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  Speaker 1: You know, this is a swing state. I care about
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  Speaker 1: and swing states more than anything else, right, and you
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  Speaker 1: had more competitive Republican primaries than you did Democratic primaries,
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  Speaker 1: certainly to Democrats. There was a competitive gubernatorial primary, we
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  Speaker 1: didn't have the near the amount of money being thrown
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  Speaker 1: at it as the Republican side. We've got business Manwick
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  Speaker 1: Jackson who spent a ton of money, and that's another race.
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  Speaker 1: We're all all tuned in to see what the President's
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  Speaker 1: going to do. But you know, there's one real reason
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  Speaker 1: why I want to play cleanup on this, and it's
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  Speaker 1: a couple of things that's out west. Right. I fully
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  Speaker 1: confess to have gone to bed before we knew everything
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  Speaker 1: that we needed to know in Idaho and in Oregon,
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  Speaker 1: and I wanted to make a special note of Idaho.
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  Speaker 1: First of all, I felt bad we didn't spend any
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  Speaker 1: time in our livestream talking about the Idaho primary. Look,
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  Speaker 1: everybody seems to have of the governor's likely going to
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  Speaker 1: get another term, the Senator Jim Risch that's up, is
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  Speaker 1: likely going to get another term. But there's something interesting
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  Speaker 1: taking place in you know, there's a there's an independent
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  Speaker 1: candidate running that I've featured, todd A Chillies, who's been
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  Speaker 1: on this show, and he's trying to run sort of
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  Speaker 1: in that in that sort of hey, I'm I'm not
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  Speaker 1: a conservative, but I'm not a liberal, right, He's trying
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  Speaker 1: to run in that sort of center leftish center center lane.
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  Speaker 1: When you're looking at a Idaho and if you're ever
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  Speaker 1: I think going to see a challenge to one party
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  Speaker 1: rule in a ruby red state like Idaho, you're more
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  Speaker 1: likely to get it from an independent candidate, from a
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  Speaker 1: from a from somebody who's who's sort of a disaffected
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  Speaker 1: Republican who decides to run as an independent. But Democrats
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  Speaker 1: have a candidate for percentate too, so that that's not
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  Speaker 1: going to probably get anywhere unless unless the Democrat's taken me.
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  Speaker 1: So we shall see on that, but it is worth
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  Speaker 1: noting what's interesting about Idaho is that the current governor,
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  Speaker 1: who won renomination again was targeted by Donald Trump four
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  Speaker 1: years ago. He didn't target the sitting governor this time,
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: Brad Little, who beat back a Trump endorsed challenger four
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  Speaker 1: years ago. So we always talk about Brian Kemp as
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  Speaker 1: the guy who stood up to Trump. Well, Brad Little,
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  Speaker 1: the governor of Idaho, maybe he doesn't get a lot
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  Speaker 1: of attention, but he was able to stand up to
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  Speaker 1: Trump and stay a Republican in good standing. And that's
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  Speaker 1: why I wanted to bring that up, because it seems
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  Speaker 1: now that in Washington you cannot oppose Donald Trump and
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  Speaker 1: be considered a Republican in good standing, at least as
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  Speaker 1: far as this Republican Party is concerned. And that is
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  Speaker 1: quite should send shivers down the spine of just about
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  Speaker 1: every elected Republican that has to be on the ballot
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  Speaker 1: in twenty six because if you are stuck having to
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  Speaker 1: salute the flag on everything Donald Trump that he supports
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  Speaker 1: at the moment, you're not going to win. You're you
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: have going to have a harder time winning reelection. Not
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: saying you're not going to win reelection, but you're gonna
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  Speaker 1: have a much harder time. The idea that there is
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  Speaker 1: no diversity allowed, right, you know, I thought the movement
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  Speaker 1: on the right of which Trump was able to get
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  Speaker 1: in front of and become the sort of parade leader
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  Speaker 1: for one of the more effective attacks on the Democrats
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  Speaker 1: is that, oh, you know, you're not allowed to be
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  Speaker 1: an independent thinker on the left, You're not allowed to
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  Speaker 1: sort of disagree on the left. Well, what has happened
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  Speaker 1: to the Republican Party. This is as bad, if not
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  Speaker 1: worse than anything the woke left.
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  Speaker 2: It.
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  Speaker 1: We really have a woke right that Donald Trump sort
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  Speaker 1: of leads this woke right right. If you don't he is,
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  Speaker 1: he is his own dei right, the way they use
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  Speaker 1: dei to lambass the left or lambas to anybody that
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: doesn't agree with him. He's kind of formed right. If
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: you don't do it exactly the way he says it,
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: which is again what the critics on the right had
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  Speaker 1: claimed the left was doing with programs like diversity, equity,
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  Speaker 1: and inclusion. Essentially in his own weird way, he's done.
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  Speaker 1: He has sort of instituted this stridency, this top down
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  Speaker 1: this you're not allowed to think independently, You're not allowed
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  Speaker 1: to be at all, fall out of line. You have
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  Speaker 1: to salute here. This is not a free thinking political movement.
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  Speaker 1: And the irony was what made Donald Trump's movement appealing
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  Speaker 1: to what was a cross section of Americans, is that, hey,
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  Speaker 1: you could say what you want. You didn't have to
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  Speaker 1: have the conventional beliefs of the supposed stringent establishment wing
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  Speaker 1: of the Republican Party. But it turns out the establishment
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  Speaker 1: wing of both parties are a hell of a lot
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  Speaker 1: more open minded than some of the bases are, and
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: particular the Trump movement. The Trump movement here as run
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  Speaker 1: by Trump, is not open minded at all, does not
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  Speaker 1: allow for any freethinking, and in fact, it is punished.
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  Speaker 1: He's gone on a rampage over the last forty eight
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  Speaker 1: hours complaining about Lauren Bobert, about Brian Fitzpatrick. Lauren Bobert
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  Speaker 1: a Republican who votes with Trump probably ninety eight percent
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: of the time. Brian Fitzpatrick in Pennsylvania, a swing district
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  Speaker 1: in Pennsylvania. He's about the only Republican that can hold
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: that district. So yeah, he votes against some Trump priorities
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  Speaker 1: like the ridiculous ballroom and what does Trump do attacks
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: that congresswoman's spouse who is a reporter, who wants to
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: hold the reporter, of course, in just a ridiculously inappropriate way,
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: and what Washington does too much, which is essentially sometimes
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: makes a spouse have to answer for the political opinions
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: of their spouse when hey, aren't we all independent freethinkers here,
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: but he's all mad well, he votes against Trump. So
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: if you criticize this taxpayer funding his private ballroom that
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: he promised would be privately funded. You're somehow out of
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: whack with Trump, Lauren Bobert. Her sin is that she
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: supported Thomas Massey because she wants to bring more public
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: disclosure on what happened with Epstein. That's her sin. So
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: the fact that he gets I will say this, you know,
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: I'm somebody who thinks that the conspiracies about Epstein are
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: probably a little overcooked and a little overcranked, and that
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: what people believe was taking place. I'm not saying what
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: he did was what he's actually done, and we know
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: that he's done was bad, disgusting, horrible and immoral. But
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: some of the things that people think he did is like,
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: you know, there are things it's like, no, that didn't happen,
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: And there isn't this larger cabal of folks that are
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: out there that said.
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  Speaker 2: Right.
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  Speaker 1: Donald Trump's behavior, You know, he behaves with the Epstein
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  Speaker 1: story the same way he always behaved with the Russia story.
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  Speaker 1: If there's nothing to hide, why are you so nervous
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: about disclosure? Wait, with Russia, there was nothing to hide,
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: that nothing happened, but he was nervous about sitting down
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: and instead he decided to obstruct justice. And he seems
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: to have the same attitude about Epstein, where he constantly
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: anybody that is you know again, basically what Lauren Bobertsin is.
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: He said, I'm looking to see if there's somebody I
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: can run against her. Since the filing deadline has passed again,
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: her sin is campaigning for Massy over this one issue.
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: She's literally with them on a bunch of other staff.
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: She may not be with him on the Iran war,
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: but a lot of Republicans aren't fully convinced of this
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: Iran war. Help I think his own vice president isn't
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: convinced of the Iran war. But it is one of
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: those where I'm thinking Shakespeare in my head, methinks you
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: doth protest too much. His bizarre denials on Epstein very
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: much or similar to me this second term. The way
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: he handled the Russia investigation. You know, there wasn't there
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: was a lot of circumstantial evidence with Russia, and there
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: was a lot of circumstantial evidence with Epstein, but there's
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: never been you know, the silver bullet, the actual thread
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: that you know, the aha, here's the form, here's the proof,
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: here's this right that's always been very circumstantial. But one
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: of the strongest pieces of circumstantial elevenance has always been
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: Trump's behavior. You know, Trump behaved as if he had
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: something to hide about his relationship with the Russians, and
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: Trump behaves like he has something to hive with his
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: relationship with Epstein. And you know, it's one of those
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: Hey man, nobody brought this up, yet you seem to
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: be angrier about Lauren Bobert over that than you are
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: about anything else. But it gets to this other larger
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: issue here, which is the what his purification process to
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: basically trumpify the party, because there's no ideological through line here,
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: like when FDR purged his party, there was an ideological
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: motivation about it. There was an agenda that was motivated
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: for Trump. The agenda's Trump, right, And so what he's
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: purging is are you going to support Trump no matter what?
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: Are you're not going to support Trump? And if you
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: support Trump no matter what, I'm with you, And if
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: you're not, I'm not with you, right, I mean, just
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: look at his Paxton endorsement in some ways, I you know,
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: for a guy who demands loyalty, if he didn't endorse
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: Paxton over Cornyn, Yeah, I would have. It's more proof
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: that he's you know, loyalty's a one way street to him.
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: I mean, uh, you know, I think Paxton is a
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: is a complete, you know, sort of unqualified public servant.
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: But if you're sitting in Donald Trump's shoes, the pen
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: Paxston's been quite loyal to Donald Trump and is crazy right.
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: You know, he helped create tried to build legal legitimacy
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: around his bogus claims around twenty twenty. So Paxton is
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: an important soldier in Trump's campaign to sort of overturn reality.
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: So in some ways it would have been disloyal of
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: Trump not to support Paxton on that. But that's why
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: Paxton's getting support, right, And he even said it. John
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: Corny didn't support me soon enough for president, so again,
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: you know, John Corny and Sin is not is daring
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: to perhaps not agree with Donald Trump one hundred percent
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: of the time Bill Cassidy, sin was believing that Donald
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: Trump's behavior on January sixth was unconstitutional, unethical, likely illegal.
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: But in all that, both Cornyn and Cassidy were willing
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: to support ninety percent of Donald Trump's agenda, and that
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: wasn't enough Meanwhile, the irony to all this is Donald
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: Trump is creating a situation where it makes it's going
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: to make governing for him and his agenda much harder.
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: He is pissed off Senate Republicans up and down. Now
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: are they coming out and saying it, you know, in
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: front of the camera. No, they're not going to. They
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: see what happened. They paid attention, and this is what
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: Trump is holding over their head. They see what happened
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: in Indiana, they see what happened in Kentucky, they see
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: what happened in I guess you could say he had
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: some success in Georgia, but I don't count Georgia's having
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: much success. But the fact is, we do know you've
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: had Trump's support in a primary, it matters more than
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: if you don't. And he can't end careers in primaries.
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: He can't end careers in general elections, but he can't
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: end careers in primaries. But he is making it that
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: much harder for Republicans to win in competitive states and
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: in competitive elections where there's a whole group of voters
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: who don't agree with Donald Trump, say but thirty percent
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: of the time, but might not be allergic to supporting
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: a Republican but if Donald Trump insists, it's always got
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: to be in support of Trump and not the Republican Party,
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: which I guess is what this is. I mean, I
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: guess that's the question right now. Is there a Republican
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: Party anymore? I do believe if Donald Trump said tomorrow,
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: you know what, the Republican Party brand sucks, I'm the brand.
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: I'm going to rebrand the party MAGA, and we're going
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: to rename the party MAGA. Who would stop him? I
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: don't think anybody would. So it is his party, but
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: he is setting it up for massive failure. He is
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: making twenty six even harder than it is.
• 18:55
  Speaker 2: Well.
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: This episode of the Chuck Toodcast is brought to you
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• 20:40
  Speaker 1: dirty little secret. By the way, on the on this
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: ballroom funding and the whole reconciliation, you know, he's been
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: going off on a rant about the Senate parliamentarian. You know,
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: thunone should fire the Senate parliamentarian. You know who is
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: ecstatic at the Senate parliamentarian's decision to take the ballroom
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: funding out of their reconciliation bill.
• 20:58
  Speaker 2: John Thune.
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: Okay, if he could give her her raise, I'm guessing
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: he would. I'm guessing I'm at least twenty five Republican
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: senators are relieved that they don't have to cast a
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: vote for that thing, because if it gets on the floor,
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: you know, there'll be a whole bunch of Republicans who
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: hold their nose to vote for it for fear of
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: being seen as the guy against it. But there are
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: now there's a growing Yolo caucus inside the Republican Senate.
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: The chair of the Yolo Caucus right now is mister
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: Tom Tillis. Lisa Murkowski's been a founding member of the
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: Yolo Caucus for some time. Bill Cassidy already showed his
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: independence this week voting against the president on the War
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: Powers Resolution, and John Cornyn is likely to be the
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: latest and newest member of that rand. Paul is already
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: there like he has. Trump has made his life in
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: the Senate so much harder. And now the likelihood that
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: Democrats are going to flip both chambers, especially if Ken
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: Paxton is the nominee for Senate in Texas, because as
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: I said on Wednesday, this has multiple layers to it. Right,
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: Ken Paxton is nominee means the Texas Senate race looks
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: winnable to Democrats. So if the Texas Senate race looks
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: winnable to Democrats, that's more rich people writing bigger checks
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: to the Texas candidate in Tallo Rico, to the super
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: PACs that are supporting Talla Rico, to the state party.
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: And in turn, what does that mean? That brings more
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: money into the state, and that trickles down the ballot
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: and it puts more Democrats in certain house races in
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: a competitive place. Probably means the governor's race becomes more competitive.
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: On top of that, you have a nominee in Ken Paxton,
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: who is a terrible fundraiser who does not have the
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: institutional support of the party. So there's going to be
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: a lot of people that don't want to write this
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: guy at check, don't want to be associated with him.
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: John Cornyn was a prolific fundraiser. I read one where
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: by one estimate since he's entered the Senate in two
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: thousand and two that he's raised over four hundred million
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: dollars for Senate Republicans over the years. Whatever you think
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: of John Cornyn, he's a hell of a fundraiser out
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: of Texas. Now, I'm old enough to remember when John
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: Cornyn was recruited to run for Senate because he was
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: the moderate that could win statewide. Then of course you
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: know he moved with the party. Look, John Cornyn's a Republican, okay,
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: And if being a Republican in Texas means you got
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: to run center, right, he's going to be that. If
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: it meant you have to run big conservative, he's going
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: to be that. I don't say that disparagingly, I just
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: say that as an explanation. Right, there are Democrats that
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: are that way, that are just oh, the Democrat you know,
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: it's sort of it's like Chuck Schumer. Chuck Schumer just
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: moves where the party is going, and I don't see
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: Joe Biden was one of those. He always Joe Biden
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: always put himself in the middle of wherever the party was.
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: So if the party leaned right, he looked like he
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: was center, a little little closer to the center. And
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: if the party was super progressive, he looked more like
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: a mainstream. But he was always in the he was
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: always in the middle, not in the center of the
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: country politically, but in the center of the party politically.
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: That's kind of where I would put John Cornyn. He's
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: always he always looks to be in the center of
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: where the Republicans are. He's not going to be a
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: liberal Republican and he's not going to be based Mike
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: Lee right, He's he's going to be a mainstream, pro
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: business Republican. Ken Paxton, I you know, look, he's just
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: a transactionalist that has you know, fused his personal life
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: and his political life and his professional life and created
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: all sorts of uncoming. I mean, in some ways he's
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: a mini Trump. And how he manages his personal life,
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: his professional life and his political life in the state
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: of Texas. So again I go back in some ways,
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: him supporting Paxton is is you know, is many Trump.
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: But this, this is really put the Republicans in a
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: in a government, in a in a governing hole, and
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: it's I'm not quite sure, you know, and it's really bizarre.
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: So Trump was really sort of flexing. He felt he feels,
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: he feels this weird sense of power because he was
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: able to get rid of Massey and all this stuff.
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: And he really seems to be completely clueless or in
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: denial that what he's doing is somehow setting his own
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: party up to go down in flames in the fall.
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: But he is really put because okay, so let me
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: finish my derivatives here. So so Paxton's nomination leads to
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: more Democratic money, all right, So what does that mean? Now?
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: The Senate Leadership Fund, which is the John Thune campaign ARM,
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: has to spend all this extra money into Texas two
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: hundred million, three hundred million formament. Trust me, this is
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: going to be a billion dollar center race. Now I'm
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: not saying it's going to cost them a billion, but
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: collectively we're going to see a billion. Right North Carolina
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: was already estimated to be close to a billion Paxton tallerco.
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: And this is Texas. I think it's all twenty eight markets,
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: twenty nine markets, some ridiculous number of media markets the
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: state has. This is going to be colossally expensive. And
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: it's by the way, let's not forget that the National
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: Republican Senatorial Committee has endorsed Cornan, has trashed Paxton, has
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: sort of made sure, you know, it's not this isn't
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: one of those oh we're just endorsing our guy. They
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: have gone after so they have to do a one
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: to eighty. But here's the thing, they really you know,
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: it all depends on where your point of view is.
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: And look, do I wish politicians behaved ethically and morally
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: the whole time? And you would say, you know what,
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: despite my party, Ken Paxton's too unethical and moral to
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: be a United States senator. Right? That is? I always
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: I cover politics as it is, not as it should be.
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: That is how politics should be. Right that good people
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: of America, regardless of party, saying Jesus chrimean this Ken
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: Paxton shouldn't be anywhere near the public goal should not
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: have any sort of responsibility This is not an ideological statement.
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: It's not a partisan statement. This is a moral an
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: ethical statement. But if it's a numbers game and you're
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: the Republican Party, you want to keep control of the Senate, well,
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: Paxton can win, all right, Tall Rico can be Paxton,
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: but he ain't going to win by ten points. If
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: he wins, we're looking at a fifty one to forty
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: nine you're looking at. This is not a state that
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: is elected a Democrat statewide since nineteen ninety four, and
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: that Democrat was Gary Morrow for Land Commissioner. Okay, that's
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: the last time. There are probably some of you listening
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: to this podcast who were not born in nineteen ninety four,
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: So this isn't so it's so if you're the Republicans,
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: you basically are like, all right, I got it. Is
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: it's a numbers game. You can't let that one go.
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: So that money is going to come from somewhere. Is
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: Donald Trump going to spend it? You know, one thing
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: about Donald Trump is he doesn't necessarily spend money to
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: help the party. He spends money to help him And
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: whether he cares or not, who knows. Does John Thune
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: and Tim Scott play a game of Chicken with Trump
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: and his political team and say, hey, you wanted this,
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: you do Texas and let the Senate Republicans will handle
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: Ohio and Iowa, at North Carolina, New Hampshire, Michigan, Georgia,
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: and Alaska. But if you if Trump does what I
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: suspect he might do, which is get a little flaky
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: with his political funds, which he's done before. Sometimes he
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: engages and sometimes he doesn't, it's going to fall on
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: the on the back of the Senate Leadership Fund and
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: they're gonna have to make some tough choices. Yes, they
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: have plenty of money. They had plenty of money in
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: an environment that had a Republican nominee in Texas that
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: was that wasn't they didn't have the cooties if you will,
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: to put this in polite PG. Thirteen words, so that
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: those recesses are going to be pulled from somewhere probably
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: is a bad sign for Michael Wattley in North Carolina. Right,
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: that's the that's the biggest reach race going right now
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: for you know, and it's certainly Michelle Tafoy in Minnesota
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: who's probably trying to convince the National Party that it's
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: worth investing. They're not gonna they they're not going to
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: be doing many experiments. And does this mean that that
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: the targeting of Georgia is not as is not as
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: aggressive because they don't have the money to spare. Because
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: when you start to look, if you're the Republicans, you're
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: playing defense. Now you're gonna go ahead and concede North Carolina.
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: You're not going to concede Maine. I mean, I think
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: that Republicans think that the Graham Platners, that they have
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: a shot at making this a referendum more on Platiner
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: than Democrats do making a referendum on Collins. And I
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: will say this, I do think Democrats have probably allowed
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: this race to become too much about Platner. Perhaps that
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: changes by the fall and we'll see, but that is
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: it is. You know, you could look, I've made the
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: argument that Platner Collins looks like Trump Clinton to me
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: from sixteen right, but just with the parties reversed right,
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: older establishment, longtime famous name versus news sort of as
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: Charlie Cook likes to call them, exotic candidates that has
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: a strange past, that doesn't see who somehow seems to
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: have a layer of Teflon where everything slips off of him.
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: So look, I think main and they fight to the end.
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: So look Alaska, Iowa, now Ohio is probably going to
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: be more of a priority. But and then we'll see
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: what happens in Michigan. I think the one place on
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: offense that Senate Republicans are going to try to play
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: probably no matter what is Michigan, just because of how divisive.
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: They have a strong nominee in Mike Rodgers. And it
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: looks like this Democratic primary is just going to end
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: in a divisive way that whoever's the winner, there's going
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: to be a bitter wing of the party right, either
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: the progressive wing is going to be bitter or the
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: establishment wing's going to be better. It's not going to
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: be It's not going to resolve itself as well, frankly
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: as Platinir Mills has resolved itself, so that that could
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: get But you're now here. I mean this is going
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: to become I think Texas, North Carolina and Ohio become
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: this incredibly expensive, you know trio, which is why I
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: think North Carolina is probably the odd odd one out there.
• 31:54
  Speaker 1: So you look, and the path holding the Senate for
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: for the Republicans, especially if Texas becomes too expensive, then
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: it makes Alaska, Iowa, Ohio, Maine. You know, they've got
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: a They're going to have to win three of those four.
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: And you know, and I haven't even brought up Nebraska.
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: I haven't even brought up Kansas. I haven't brought up Mississippi.
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: As you know, I'm bullish on Mississippi because of this
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: backlash in the Voting Rights Act. I think there's something
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: happening down south that are auto And that's the other
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: thing when you're bringing up Texas. I mean, you know,
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: one of the problems Democrats have had over the years
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: is funding a ground game. Well, look, there's a you know,
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: in Texas, a lot of people like to talk about
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: the Latino vote, but the African American vote is not
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: insignificant in Texas. And there was some concern after the
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: somewhat divisive Tallarico Jasmin Crockett primary that maybe black vote
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: wouldn't be as enthusiastic about Tall Rico. I don't think
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: that's going to be a problem anymore. And I do
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: think that that makes Georgia that much harder for Republicans
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: to target. But the bottom line is Donald Trump is
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: he is, you know, his attempts to manipulate the party, right,
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: he thinks he's helping on the House, but how he's
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: gone about it has only fired up Democrats in a
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: midterm year where his side's not as fired up. Then
• 33:31
  Speaker 1: he's gone about as purging of the party of anybody
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: that remotely is a free thinker inside the Republican Party.
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: And he's got he's sort of, like I said, a
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: woke right leader. Right, everything the Trump movement criticized the
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: left doing, you know, is not letting you know, you know,
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: not you know, being you know, being judge and jury
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: and how you speak, and they're not allowed to think
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: this and you're not allowed to think that. That now
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: is Donald Trump. He has taken everything that his movement
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: criticized in sixteen and the political incorrectness and all of
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: that stuff, and he's created his own perverted form of
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: political correctness inside the right. And at some point somebody's
• 34:12
  Speaker 1: going to figure out how to message against that on
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: inside the right wing coalition in that way. Well, this
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• 36:09
  Speaker 1: a few minutes. Given Barney Frank his due, longtime Democratic
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: member of Congress from Massachusetts. He was eighty six. He
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: was born in New Jersey. He served in Congress thirty
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: two years, nineteen eighty one to twenty thirteen. In his
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: own memoir, he just to give you a sense of
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: sort of how he got involved in politics. In his
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: own memoir, he said he was inspired. He was drawn
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: to public life the after Emmett Tilt was lynched in Mississippi,
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: and so in nineteen sixty four he volunteered during Freedom
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: Summer in Mississippi. Jewish kid from New Jersey became a
• 36:55
  Speaker 1: gay rights icon, got his start in the civil rights
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: movement in Mississippi substantively. Of course, he's most famous for
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: writing the Dodd Frank Legislation to try to bring some
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: guardrails to Wall Street after the financial collapse in two
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: thousand and eight. It certainly has Dodd Frank has got
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: plenty of people that shoot arrows at it, but it
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: has been remarkably sturdy what they've passed. And obviously, given
• 37:30
  Speaker 1: where the economy is today, given where markets are today,
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: certainly whoever thought what they were doing was going to
• 37:38
  Speaker 1: harm markets and harm wealth in America, well that didn't happen.
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: But look the reason I think history is going to
• 37:47
  Speaker 1: be a lot kinder to him than I think he
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: was treated during his life because he was a barrier breaker, right,
• 37:56
  Speaker 1: and sometimes barrier breakers never get to don't live to
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: see the fruits of all the pain that they had
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: to withstand. Now, he became the most prominent openly gay
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: elected official in the country when he came out in
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: nineteen eighty seven. He did so voluntarily and think about
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: what it was like to come out in nineteen eighty seven.
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: Nineteen eighty seven is the height of the AIDS crisis,
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: so not an easy moment. Just three years later he
• 38:32
  Speaker 1: would get reprimanded by the House and connection to a
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: two year relationship he had with a male prostitute that
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: was living in his basement in the House. There was
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: a bunch of Republicans wanted to vote to expel him.
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: The House voted to reprimand them rather than censure or
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: expel him. Frank had said that the pressures of hiding
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: his sexual orientation over the years had caused him to
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: quote act stupidly, but its constituents had no problem with it,
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: and they sent him back to Congress with sixty six
• 39:05
  Speaker 1: percent of the vote. And I don't think folks fully
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: appreciate how much crap that Barney Frank had to take
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: in Congress over the years. It is, you know, when
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: you think about, let me put it in this in
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: this respect, so he and knew Gingridge used to spark
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: quite a bit. The Republicans of the late eighties and
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: early nineties would use Barney Frank and his sexual orientation
• 39:40
  Speaker 1: as a cudgel, and they would try to weaponize it
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: nationally in different ways. Right, it was Gingridge that was
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: pushing to get him, you know, essentially over as Frank
• 39:54
  Speaker 1: would put it, if it had have been a heterosexual relationship,
• 39:57
  Speaker 1: there wouldn't have been nearly this attempted outrun age. Right.
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: So here's New Gingrich trying to get Barney Frank expelled,
• 40:07
  Speaker 1: and at the time that he's trying to get him expelled,
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: he's having his own affair with an aid in his office.
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: And it's I think what made Barney Frank such a
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: such a fascinating figure because he was not going to cowtow.
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: He was not going to fall on his sword in
• 40:30
  Speaker 1: order to make other people feel more comfortable. On one hand,
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: he knew what he did was wrong and that what
• 40:39
  Speaker 1: he when, as he said, he acted stupidly. On the
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: other hand, I think he felt and he wasn't going
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: to back down. He felt he was being essentially overly
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: punished simply because he was a gay man. And that
• 40:53
  Speaker 1: had the exact same scenario took place, but Stephen Gobee
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: was a woman instead of a man, he'd there wouldn't
• 41:01
  Speaker 1: have even been a vote to expel or anything like that,
• 41:07
  Speaker 1: and then to really get a sense, right we talk
• 41:09
  Speaker 1: about this with you know, it took the movie Jackie
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: during Jackie Robinson to sort of put people back into
• 41:17
  Speaker 1: the time in nineteen forty seven and forty eight and
• 41:20
  Speaker 1: forty nine and the words that would get shouted at
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: Jackie Robinson while he had to play baseball. It's something
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: nobody would you know what the black men of the
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: fifties had to go through in public playing professional baseball,
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: going to towns and communities that were going to make
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: sure that they were constantly harassed, sometimes verbally abused. Well,
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: that happened to Barney Frank in Congress. The House Majority
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: leader in nineteen ninety five, Dick Army of Texas just
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: casually decided to refer to Barney Frank as Barney Phack. Now,
• 42:00
  Speaker 1: Army claimed he misspoke. It's quite a misspeaker doing a
• 42:05
  Speaker 1: lot of work in that sentence. Now, he ended up
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: apologizing from the House floor. But it's probably worth noting
• 42:14
  Speaker 1: that that here he is sort of somebody says publicly,
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: So imagine in what Barney Frank's thinking, What are these
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: people saying about him behind the scenes, and yet he
• 42:32
  Speaker 1: just sort of went through, right, and he just sort
• 42:37
  Speaker 1: of powered through to come out in eighty seven. The
• 42:45
  Speaker 1: cultural backdrop wasn't just uncomfortable, it was actually threatening to
• 42:49
  Speaker 1: do what he did to come out in eighty seven.
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: But at the same time, he needed to give comfort
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: to other gay Americans who were suffering from a disease
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: that the country wasn't focused on enough at the time.
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: And Frank had to function daily in a building where
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: Army's vocabulary was used against him probably all the time.
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: We just happened to hear it slip once in public.
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: So he took all of that. He stayed in the
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: fight for thirty two years, and the institution that tried
• 43:30
  Speaker 1: to censure him now has his name and the most
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: important piece of financial reform law in our nation's history.
• 43:38
  Speaker 1: So he didn't just survive politically, he thrived. And you know,
• 43:43
  Speaker 1: even until his dying day, right, he's writing a book
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: sort of lecturing the left, if you will, and I
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: think he feels as if he's got a little better
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: standing than most. Right, he was on the front lines
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: fighting for a group that wasn't getting a lot of
• 44:00
  Speaker 1: love in Washington at the time. He started fighting and
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: he uh, He's had a warning to the left, Hey
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: don't don't let mistest your yourselves into oblivion essentially is
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: his is his message. But I just wanted to take
• 44:20
  Speaker 1: a moment because I think I think Barney Frank is
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: one of those figures that will grow in importance, you know,
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: with more time, and I think we don't fully appreciate
• 44:35
  Speaker 1: what he went through. Somebody had to, right, somebody has to.
• 44:43
  Speaker 1: There are gay members of Congress on both sides of
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: the aisle. Now, you know, one thing, Whatever you think
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: of Donald Trump, this has never usually been an issue
• 44:51
  Speaker 1: with him, right. This is just and it just it
• 44:58
  Speaker 1: just struck me that, you know, I'll say this, I
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: always got smarter when I interviewed Barney Frank. He was
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: a tough sob wasn't always the wasn't the warmest and
• 45:11
  Speaker 1: uh person all the time, but man was he whipped smart.
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: I got to know his sister over the years, Anne Lewis,
• 45:18
  Speaker 1: who is Clinton's communications director, and she's you know, it's
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: it's very much a political family. But anyway, I think
• 45:31
  Speaker 1: the moment we're living in politically means nobody gets to
• 45:34
  Speaker 1: do that maybe they deserve. I think this is a
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: case where he's he's he's a he's a larger public
• 45:43
  Speaker 1: figure than I think he's going to get the benefit
• 45:45
  Speaker 1: at the moment, But in due time, I think it'll come.
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: All Right, we're gonna sneak in a break. But when
• 45:53
  Speaker 1: we come back my conversation with MYR Alexander, and I
• 45:56
  Speaker 1: want to say, like I said, I've I've I've I've
• 46:00
  Speaker 1: watched him, I've been up close, I've gotten a front
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: row seat sort of starting from when he started running
• 46:05
  Speaker 1: for president. He started running for president ninety six, back
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: in nineteen ninety three, and I would get a glimpse
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: of that. But his origin story is quite an amazing one,
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: and it's the story we begin with. But imagine you're
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: elected governor and the person you're replacing before you take
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: the oath of office is literally emptying prisons and selling
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: pardons left and right to anybody who wants to purchase them.
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: That's what was happening in nineteen seventy eight, nineteen seventy nine,
• 46:39
  Speaker 1: after the November election of seventy eight, and a bipartisan
• 46:43
  Speaker 1: group of people in the state of Tennessee said we've
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: got to hurry up and have Alexander take office sooner
• 46:50
  Speaker 1: or these prisons could get emptied. It was an emergency.
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: Whether it was even constitutional still a question to this day.
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: Let's just say Lamar Alexander's political career started back in
• 47:03
  Speaker 1: the day when selling pardons was so upsetting that there
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: was bipartisan outrage in a place like Tennessee. Let's hope
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: we can get that outrage about selling pardons back nationally.
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: All right, let's take the break. This episode of the
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  Speaker 1: Chuck Podcast is brought to you by Soul. So if
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• 48:55
  Speaker 1: am a customer. Well joining me now is perhaps one
• 49:02
  Speaker 1: of full politicians I've ever personally known, and I feel
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: like I have watched at least the second half of
• 49:10
  Speaker 1: his career up close and personal because of a mutual
• 49:16
  Speaker 1: friend that Lamar Alexander and I have had over the decades.
• 49:21
  Speaker 1: A mentor of mine, I know an intellectual partner of his,
• 49:25
  Speaker 1: the late great Doug Bailey. But here's my guest. It's
• 49:28
  Speaker 1: Lamar a Lexander in his new book The Education of
• 49:30
  Speaker 1: a Senator Governor? Is that the title you prefer the most?
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: That's always my person I prefer Lamar. Well, there you go.
• 49:41
  Speaker 1: But the joke used to be every former governor that
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: was in the Senate was miserable. How did you not
• 49:46
  Speaker 1: become miserable?
• 49:47
  Speaker 2: Well, you're right about on your point, as Mitch McConnell says,
• 49:52
  Speaker 2: any senator who's been a governor tells you that he
• 49:57
  Speaker 2: prefers being a senator, will lie about other things, and
• 50:03
  Speaker 2: a lot of them have been miserable. Henry Bellman from
• 50:05
  Speaker 2: Oklahoma's you know, was governor and then he was in
• 50:08
  Speaker 2: the Senate two terms and he went back to governor.
• 50:10
  Speaker 2: He said, being in the Senate is about as exciting
• 50:14
  Speaker 2: as watching a stump rot. But your question was why
• 50:21
  Speaker 2: did I get along with it? It doesn't fit, It
• 50:23
  Speaker 2: doesn't fit my instincts. My instincts are to be governor
• 50:26
  Speaker 2: and just kind of a Moses job. You know, let's
• 50:28
  Speaker 2: go this way and help a strategy and persuade half
• 50:31
  Speaker 2: the people. You're right, But my advantage was I'd seen
• 50:36
  Speaker 2: the Senate. I've worked at it for Howard Baker. Then
• 50:39
  Speaker 2: I came back and worked in it for a few
• 50:41
  Speaker 2: months for Howard Baker when he was the leader. Then
• 50:43
  Speaker 2: I was, you know, education secretaries. I had to work
• 50:46
  Speaker 2: with the Congress, and the Senate is based almost suley
• 50:52
  Speaker 2: on relationships. And when I arrived at the Senate at
• 50:57
  Speaker 2: the advanced age of sixty two, I probably twenty five
• 51:00
  Speaker 2: twenty six of the senators. So if you have that
• 51:04
  Speaker 2: kind of relationships and a place that works on relationships,
• 51:07
  Speaker 2: that's a big advantage. So I help. I was able
• 51:09
  Speaker 2: to adapt.
• 51:11
  Speaker 1: There's something in my memory bank that says that our
• 51:13
  Speaker 1: mutual friend had relayed to me that when you first
• 51:16
  Speaker 1: got there, you weren't very impressed with the senator some
• 51:19
  Speaker 1: of your colleagues. But I get the impression that that
• 51:22
  Speaker 1: your impression of your colleagues improved over time.
• 51:26
  Speaker 2: That's, you know, both of that's true. You know, the
• 51:29
  Speaker 2: Senate is like any other group of one hundred people
• 51:32
  Speaker 2: in the country, except it has a lot of very
• 51:35
  Speaker 2: interesting talented people more than one might think. But there
• 51:40
  Speaker 2: are always eight or ten senators who are better than
• 51:43
  Speaker 2: the other eighty eight or ninety. And that's probably what
• 51:47
  Speaker 2: I noticed, is that they're just always are some who
• 51:51
  Speaker 2: are leaders or who have skills, who have a sense
• 51:53
  Speaker 2: of purpose and get things done. I mean the Howard Baker's,
• 51:56
  Speaker 2: the Everard Dierkson's attend kidneys, people like that.
• 51:59
  Speaker 1: McCain was, well, remember you say that about Ted Kennedy.
• 52:02
  Speaker 1: And I don't think you said it very publicly at
• 52:04
  Speaker 1: the time, but he was one of the more interesting
• 52:07
  Speaker 1: people in the Senate. And you're like, well, I got
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: to this place, why is a liberal Democrat one of
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: the more interesting people to work with? And that's true.
• 52:13
  Speaker 2: But you know, when I ran again, you know, when
• 52:15
  Speaker 2: I ran for the Senate in two thousand and two,
• 52:17
  Speaker 2: I used I was running to succeed Fred Thompson, and
• 52:19
  Speaker 2: I would I would tell the you know people, I
• 52:23
  Speaker 2: would say, if you elect my opponent, the Democrat, the
• 52:26
  Speaker 2: first thing he'll do is he'll go over and pick
• 52:28
  Speaker 2: up Fred Thompson's desk and he'll sit it down between
• 52:31
  Speaker 2: Hillary Clinton and Ted Kennedy and make it one vote
• 52:34
  Speaker 2: harder for George W. Bush to lead our country. So
• 52:37
  Speaker 2: I ran against Ted Kennedy and he stood at the
• 52:39
  Speaker 2: back of the Senate and fulminated, you know, in a
• 52:43
  Speaker 2: loud voice, on all these liberal things. But here's an
• 52:46
  Speaker 2: example of how he did things. When I made my
• 52:49
  Speaker 2: maiden address about American history and Civics teachers, he was there,
• 52:55
  Speaker 2: and he's scurried around the Senate while I was talking.
• 52:57
  Speaker 2: He got twenty Democratic co sponsors for the bill I
• 53:00
  Speaker 2: was introducing, and then he helped me pass it. So
• 53:04
  Speaker 2: he was that way the whole time he was there.
• 53:06
  Speaker 2: When I was there, he was as effective as any
• 53:10
  Speaker 2: any other senator at actually getting things done. And he
• 53:14
  Speaker 2: knew how to make his point, to keep his to
• 53:18
  Speaker 2: keep his people happy, and then then he would go
• 53:22
  Speaker 2: to work with the Republicans and try to get a result.
• 53:25
  Speaker 1: I want to go back to your early days as governor.
• 53:28
  Speaker 1: I think it's a story that well, they did make
• 53:31
  Speaker 1: a movie about it. I guess you got to help
• 53:35
  Speaker 1: on that front. But I don't think people know this
• 53:38
  Speaker 1: story very well, and it was I was glad to
• 53:40
  Speaker 1: read your account of it. I don't think that I'd
• 53:42
  Speaker 1: always gotten Bailey's account. I had never gotten your account,
• 53:45
  Speaker 1: But this was wild. A governor you were succeeding was
• 53:50
  Speaker 1: selling pardons up until the last days in office.
• 53:54
  Speaker 2: Well that was right. I mean it's hard for people
• 53:57
  Speaker 2: to believe today.
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: But it really that a chief executive would sell pardons. Yeah, no,
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: it's really hard to believe.
• 54:03
  Speaker 2: Lam. Well, we're in I'm not paiding you by going there.
• 54:10
  Speaker 2: We're in nineteen seventy nine. I just been elected governor.
• 54:13
  Speaker 2: I'm a Republican Tennessee still very democratic state. Everybody, what
• 54:18
  Speaker 2: were you?
• 54:18
  Speaker 1: The first Republican governors.
• 54:21
  Speaker 2: In nineteen seventy Winfield. Before that, it was nineteen twenty,
• 54:25
  Speaker 2: so I was we were just in transition. Still, most
• 54:29
  Speaker 2: everybody to state capital was a Democrat. All the people
• 54:31
  Speaker 2: I would be working with, and the governor's office. The
• 54:34
  Speaker 2: governor was selling pardons for case. The FBI had had
• 54:38
  Speaker 2: tapes of this, and the U. S Attorney called me
• 54:41
  Speaker 2: up three days before I was to be sworn in
• 54:43
  Speaker 2: and called me up on a Wednesday morning and said,
• 54:45
  Speaker 2: I'm calling now as the US Attorney, but as a
• 54:49
  Speaker 2: Tennesseean to ask you to take office early because we
• 54:53
  Speaker 2: have evidence the governor is about to release more prisoners
• 54:56
  Speaker 2: who paid cash for their release. Well, on two nights
• 54:59
  Speaker 2: before or he had just released fifty one, including many
• 55:03
  Speaker 2: who had paid cash for release. And so I put
• 55:06
  Speaker 2: the phone down and I said, I'll call you back.
• 55:09
  Speaker 2: I'll put the phone down because I want to make
• 55:11
  Speaker 2: sure one the prank. And I called him back and
• 55:15
  Speaker 2: he was a Democrat. And by five o'clock that afternoon,
• 55:18
  Speaker 2: after a lot of negotiation back and forth, the state
• 55:21
  Speaker 2: Attorney General ruled that it was constitutional and legal. And
• 55:26
  Speaker 2: I was sworn in as governor three days early, and
• 55:30
  Speaker 2: the Democratic governor was housted. He later went to jail
• 55:33
  Speaker 2: for selling whiskey licenses.
• 55:37
  Speaker 1: How did how was that legal? How did they they
• 55:41
  Speaker 1: just did it? I mean, I'm the What was the
• 55:46
  Speaker 1: provision in the constitution? Did the legislature have to go along?
• 55:49
  Speaker 2: Well, there was some dispute about it, but in Tennessee,
• 55:54
  Speaker 2: the state attorney General was appointed by the Supreme Court,
• 55:57
  Speaker 2: and his rulings of the you have the rule of
• 56:01
  Speaker 2: almost the rule of a of a court.
• 56:05
  Speaker 1: He was in.
• 56:06
  Speaker 2: He was a Democrat. He was involved in all the
• 56:09
  Speaker 2: discussions and he interpreted the constitutional provisions and the state
• 56:13
  Speaker 2: laws governing when you swear in the governor to to
• 56:18
  Speaker 2: to allow me to be sworn in three days before
• 56:21
  Speaker 2: the scheduled swearing out on Saturday. Now, later on, one
• 56:27
  Speaker 2: of the one of the Supreme Court members said he
• 56:30
  Speaker 2: didn't think that was good law.
• 56:33
  Speaker 1: Oh interesting, do you think if that was something that
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: that the governor had challenged, he just chose not to
• 56:39
  Speaker 1: challenge it.
• 56:39
  Speaker 2: He didn't challenge he would be out anyway in three days.
• 56:44
  Speaker 2: But uh, and and he was in deep trouble. I mean,
• 56:47
  Speaker 2: the to show you how far this had gone, the
• 56:50
  Speaker 2: US attorney who had called me had been part of
• 56:53
  Speaker 2: the investigation of the governor's staff that was selling partons.
• 56:56
  Speaker 2: They were down in Memphis at a hotel room, and
• 57:00
  Speaker 2: he said, let's try hil Mary. So they had the
• 57:03
  Speaker 2: they had the person who was who was the asking
• 57:07
  Speaker 2: the questions, the who was set up to ask the
• 57:09
  Speaker 2: governor's staff. He said, how much would it cost to
• 57:14
  Speaker 2: spring James Earl Ray? And James Earl Ray was Martin
• 57:18
  Speaker 2: Luther King's murlin, My gosh, he was brushing mountain and
• 57:21
  Speaker 2: the and the governor's staff guy who was selling pardons said,
• 57:26
  Speaker 2: m that's a tough one. He said, what about seventy
• 57:28
  Speaker 2: five thousand dollars for an escape. So that's what we're
• 57:32
  Speaker 2: and they had all this on video. So here I'm
• 57:34
  Speaker 2: presented with where you where you take office three days early,
• 57:38
  Speaker 2: and I'm thinking, we don't do that in the United States, right,
• 57:41
  Speaker 2: you know, we we passed power peaceably. I knew enough
• 57:44
  Speaker 2: to know that. And on the other hand, if I
• 57:47
  Speaker 2: didn't do it, the governor might empty the prisons. He
• 57:51
  Speaker 2: had the complete power to do that. There's no recourse
• 57:55
  Speaker 2: to a presidential or agubernatorial pardon. You're out, You're out.
• 57:59
  Speaker 2: So that's what I had to weigh, and so I
• 58:01
  Speaker 2: wanted to make sure that I had the entire democratic
• 58:04
  Speaker 2: establishment with me at the time I was sworn out.
• 58:07
  Speaker 2: The Democratic Chief Justice stare or the Secretary of State,
• 58:10
  Speaker 2: the Attorney General made is ruly and we announced it together.
• 58:14
  Speaker 1: You know, it's interesting, that's a that's a heck of
• 58:16
  Speaker 1: a honeymoon you ended up being able to have. Do
• 58:19
  Speaker 1: you think you feel as if it allowed you to
• 58:23
  Speaker 1: immediately hit the ground running because you sort of for
• 58:26
  Speaker 1: you forged these bipartisan relationships literally in fire.
• 58:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I think of it as a bipartisan boot camp.
• 58:33
  Speaker 2: I mean, we didn't really know each other, and we
• 58:36
  Speaker 2: had to absolutely trust each other and not miscommunicate with
• 58:40
  Speaker 2: each other. Then ever it was over, we had to
• 58:43
  Speaker 2: not take credit and say well I won, he lost,
• 58:46
  Speaker 2: he lost. I one. We didn't do any of that.
• 58:49
  Speaker 2: And so for a day we had that bipartisan boot camp,
• 58:54
  Speaker 2: and it really did make a difference over the next
• 58:57
  Speaker 2: eight years, my working with a Democratic legislature. Uh, you know,
• 59:01
  Speaker 2: better roads, better schools, better jobsily incomes when up states
• 59:04
  Speaker 2: confidence improved and and that was a big part of
• 59:08
  Speaker 2: the reason for it.
• 59:11
  Speaker 1: You know, I want to talk a little bit about
• 59:12
  Speaker 1: your time as governor because you were part of this
• 59:15
  Speaker 1: group of Southern governors, Republicans and Democrats that I feel
• 59:22
  Speaker 1: like was sort of the that brought the South out
• 59:27
  Speaker 1: of the fifties. I don't know how to put it,
• 59:29
  Speaker 1: but it was sort of the quote unquote new South,
• 59:33
  Speaker 1: a reinvigoration into public education, a sort of trying to
• 59:37
  Speaker 1: turn the page from the from the divisiveness of the
• 59:40
  Speaker 1: Civil rights era and sort of move to that. It
• 59:43
  Speaker 1: was you had Riley in South Carolina, yourself, Bill Clinton,
• 59:47
  Speaker 1: and particularly on education. It was on that issue where
• 59:50
  Speaker 1: I felt like there was a lot of cooperation best
• 59:54
  Speaker 1: practices between those between the Southern governors. Am I over
• 59:58
  Speaker 1: interpreting that, or is that is that the experience you had?
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 2: No, You're exactly right. I mean, and we were elected
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 2: the same day, I mean Clinton, Arkansas, Riley and in
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 2: South Carolina, Bob Graham in Florida.
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: Bob Graham was another one.
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 2: William Winter was already in Mississippi. And we worked together.
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 2: I mean we were. Florida was a little better shape,
• 1:00:17
  Speaker 2: but the rest of them has heard about the same place.
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 1: Ask you had really done a lot.
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 2: I think I had more money, more people, that kind
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 2: of thing. But Tennessee, Arkansas, Mississippi the three poor states.
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 2: So we worked on what to do about it, and
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 2: we worked together even though we were of different parties.
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah, what was I bring this up because I think
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 1: one of the you know, one of the bigger issues
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 1: we don't talk about is is I think we haven't
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 1: rethought our public school system. It's basically the same setup
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 1: we came up with over one hundred years now, and
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 1: it's clear that that this needs at best updating, uh
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 1: maybe total transformation, rethinking. And you know, I'm not crazy
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 1: about the silofication that we've done of public education. In
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 1: my home state of Florida, for instance, we have a
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 1: four tiered system in Miami Dade County. If you're really wealthy,
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 1: there's the privates. If you're got parents that really pay attention,
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 1: they can find the right charter or find the right
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 1: magnet school. But if you, you know, maybe your parents are,
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 1: you know, working two jobs and they can't, and all
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 1: of a sudden, you're just at the school in your
• 1:01:27
  Speaker 1: neighborhood and you may not be in the best school.
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 1: And so while school choice exists, it's it's in some
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 1: ways it's confusing, it's it's hard. And then there's a
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 1: part of me that says, you know, what, we really
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 1: ought to be educated together as Americans. There's some there's
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 1: some upside to that in pluralism and all of this.
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 1: So where's your head on this? And how would you
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 1: be advising today's governors and tackling and sort of reanimating
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 1: and modernizing public education.
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 2: Well, you're right about the last point. I was in
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 2: the meeting one time when I was president ever to
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 2: Tennessee and the president of Notre Dame asked, what is
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 2: the rationale for a public school? There was this embarrassing
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 2: silence until Albert Shanker, the head of the American Federation
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 2: teacher said, a public school is for the purpose of
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 2: teaching immigrant children the three ares and what it means
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 2: to be an American. So the idea would be that
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 2: we have public schools to take this country of many
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 2: different people, of many different backgrounds and turn us into
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 2: all Americans. And that's that's sort of the emplorbus Unham
• 1:02:33
  Speaker 2: reason we have public schools and the biggest argument against vouchers.
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 2: I'm for school choice. I think leading government money, especially
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 2: for low income families follow their kids to better schools,
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 2: is a good idea. But I'm also convinced that communities
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 2: can have the schools they want, and the recent examples
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 2: of that. I know that in Tennessee, Bill Frist has
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 2: had a former majority leaders had organization called score working
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 2: for seventeen years, and Tennessee has suddenly been leading leading
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 2: the South and moved way up in the state in
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 2: terms of reading and math achievement, even though we have spending.
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 2: I'm not sure exactly what, but I think the point
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 2: is probably phonics. Mississippi's doing the same thing.
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 1: Mississippi's leaving a great story that's going on in Mississippi.
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 2: Great great story. So I think what it is is
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 2: these different structures. I like charter schools, especially because that
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 2: liberates the teachers and give parents more choices. But these
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 2: different structures are not as important as the quality of
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 2: the teachers and the attention that the parents paid the kids,
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 2: and if you have good teachers and interested parents, the
• 1:03:49
  Speaker 2: children going to learn. If you say high standards, it's
• 1:03:51
  Speaker 2: about that simple, and it almost has to be done
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 2: community by community. So you have a national school board
• 1:03:59
  Speaker 2: with lots of rules from Washington probably didn't help very much.
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 1: No, it doesn't. I guess what role should Washington play?
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 1: You were Secretary of Education. There's a plan to sort
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 1: of get rid of the Department of Education. I'm curious
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 1: your thoughts on that, or would you reanimate the Department
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 1: of Education.
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 2: No, I've always thought we didn't need a Department of
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 2: Education for higher education colleges and universities. About all it
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 2: does is distribute money, grands and loans to about twenty
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 2: million college students every year. That can be done in
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 2: a ministerial fashion. And as a former college president, I
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 2: really don't want a national board of trust telling like
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 2: the one President Trump's proposed, and it's kind of backed
• 1:04:47
  Speaker 2: away from I think lately that would tell all six
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 2: thousand colleges what to do K through twelve. I think
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 2: the better thing to do would be to let the
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 2: money follow the low income children to the public school
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 2: of their choice. Now, some states may want to include
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 2: private schools, like Florida does, Tennessee does. That's fine, But
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 2: if you don't want to include the private schools for
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 2: a variety of reason, let them go to the public schools,
• 1:05:15
  Speaker 2: and you don't need all these federal programs. And that's
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 2: up to quite a bit of money. It would be
• 1:05:20
  Speaker 2: every child would have a few thousand dollars that would
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 2: follow them to a school if they were a low
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 2: income student, and those schools usually have less money. And
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 2: I think that would be the better way for the
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 2: federal government to spend this money. And that doesn't take
• 1:05:33
  Speaker 2: a department. So what you need really is an advocate
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 2: for high standards, high goals, high standards, good schools. You
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 2: need advocacy, but you don't need management from Washington and Education.
• 1:05:56
  Speaker 1: You think there should still be a debate about testing,
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 1: well testing, You know where are you in testing?
• 1:06:04
  Speaker 2: I ended up in twenty fifteen when we fixed no
• 1:06:08
  Speaker 2: Child Left Behind of keeping the test requirement that George W.
• 1:06:12
  Speaker 2: Bush put in as president.
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 1: Will you say you ended up? It sounds like you
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 1: were you were you were you waiting?
• 1:06:17
  Speaker 2: Yeah? Basically, well, I had to pass the bill and
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 2: and and so there were a lot of people, including
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 2: President Obama and others, who wanted to keep it, and
• 1:06:26
  Speaker 2: President Bush wanted to keep it. Margaret Spellings, who was
• 1:06:29
  Speaker 2: the Education secretary, came to see me about it, and
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 2: there's a good argument for it, because she would say
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 2: that was the whole purpose of no child left behind.
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 2: We at least could require the schools to let everybody
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 2: know how the kids are doing, and then they can
• 1:06:42
  Speaker 2: make their own decisions about what to do about it.
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 2: I found that hard to argue with.
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 1: I mean, you know, I we I'm sort of I
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 1: got my whole list here. I'm gonna need six hours
• 1:06:53
  Speaker 1: with you. I'm teasing, but I want to stay. I
• 1:06:58
  Speaker 1: want to sort of stay. Go back now in your
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 1: in your career a little bit. You wrote something in
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 1: the book that I've actually been also trying to rethink
• 1:07:06
  Speaker 1: how to use as descriptors. You talked about you hated
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 1: the label moderate. Yeah, and I totally get it. I
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 1: get accused of being a centrist or or whatever you
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 1: want to an institutionalist or whatever you want to call it.
• 1:07:18
  Speaker 2: I always say that's not too bad.
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 1: No, but it's not that. I call myself an incrementalist.
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 1: And I think and and so and what you described yourself.
• 1:07:28
  Speaker 1: It's it's look, you're a conservative, Tom Cotton is a conservative.
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 1: One is more moderate and temperament, and one is is
• 1:07:37
  Speaker 1: a little less moderate in temperament. I've always viewed moderate
• 1:07:40
  Speaker 1: as a thermostat uh descriptor. And but I you know,
• 1:07:47
  Speaker 1: I know it's gotten sort of conflated. I mean, what
• 1:07:49
  Speaker 1: would you prefer I used to call you a a
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 1: conservative who believes in legislating, because there are conservatives who
• 1:07:57
  Speaker 1: are like, no, let's shut this. You know, we don't
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 1: need it. Better government doing all this stuff. What would
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 1: be your preferred moniker or descriptive descriptor? Oh?
• 1:08:06
  Speaker 2: In my preferred as I'm a Republican who understands that
• 1:08:10
  Speaker 2: that you that there's no reason to be in politics
• 1:08:12
  Speaker 2: unless you want to accomplish something. I mean, when I
• 1:08:15
  Speaker 2: want to run for governor a second time, my wife
• 1:08:18
  Speaker 2: Honey said to me, now, wait a minute, We're not
• 1:08:20
  Speaker 2: going to go through this again unless you can tell me,
• 1:08:23
  Speaker 2: why are you running and what do you hope to accomplish?
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 2: And I used to tell my senate colleagues all the time,
• 1:08:28
  Speaker 2: it's hard to get here, it's hard to stay here.
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 2: So while you're here, you might as well try to
• 1:08:32
  Speaker 2: accomplish something good for the country. And if you want
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 2: to accomplish something, if you're a governor, I was working
• 1:08:38
  Speaker 2: with democratic legislature. You've got to get some Democrats to
• 1:08:42
  Speaker 2: agree with you to pay teachers more for teaching. Well,
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 2: does that make you a moderate. No, that makes you
• 1:08:47
  Speaker 2: a governor who wants to get something done. If you're
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 2: a senator and you want to pass the Great American
• 1:08:52
  Speaker 2: Outdoors Act, you you've got to get sixty votes, and
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 2: Republics have never had sixty votes in the history of
• 1:08:59
  Speaker 2: the country. So you've got to work with Democrats. So
• 1:09:02
  Speaker 2: I don't believe in being bipartisan. That's not my goal.
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 2: My goal is to get a result, and and and
• 1:09:09
  Speaker 2: to get a result, you sometimes get labeled as a moderate.
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 2: That's what makes that's what kind of made me angry,
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 2: because I mean, I'm a very Republican. Republican as a governor,
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 2: I'm you know, I fought the teacher's union and walked
• 1:09:22
  Speaker 2: across the state, and and and.
• 1:09:27
  Speaker 1: Vative.
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 2: He told people, I've he told I've he told the
• 1:09:33
  Speaker 2: picture driver's licenses three times because I thought it was
• 1:09:36
  Speaker 2: an interference with man.
• 1:09:39
  Speaker 1: Our libertarian friends would love you for that, That's right.
• 1:09:42
  Speaker 2: So so I think Bill Bennett used to say, who
• 1:09:46
  Speaker 2: was as I think everybody knows. He was the education
• 1:09:50
  Speaker 2: secretary for Reagan? Strong conservative, considered as such. He used
• 1:09:54
  Speaker 2: to say to me, you know, our views are almost identical.
• 1:09:58
  Speaker 2: But I'm Bill Bennett. Could make a speech, everybody would
• 1:10:00
  Speaker 2: say what a great conservative, And you could make a
• 1:10:03
  Speaker 2: speech and they'd say, what a nice person. And there's
• 1:10:07
  Speaker 2: a lot of truth that. A lot of it's style, yeah,
• 1:10:10
  Speaker 2: and a lot of it is the difference. The difference
• 1:10:13
  Speaker 2: between Republicans is not between moderates and conservatives, is between
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 2: Republicans who think you're finished with your job when you
• 1:10:22
  Speaker 2: finish your speech, and Republicans who want to call do something.
• 1:10:28
  Speaker 1: Well. I'm you know, I'm curious. You've watched, in some
• 1:10:32
  Speaker 1: ways from this perch. You've watched the changing ways that
• 1:10:36
  Speaker 1: politicians interact with the public, and the public interacts with
• 1:10:40
  Speaker 1: his politicians. I've been joking of late that the natural,
• 1:10:46
  Speaker 1: the next natural page turn in our politics is going
• 1:10:51
  Speaker 1: to be Stephen Colbert versus Tucker Carlson, you know, And
• 1:10:55
  Speaker 1: I hesitate to sometimes say it because it's kind of
• 1:10:58
  Speaker 1: a chuckle. And yet if I told you that was
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 1: the twenty twenty eight matchup, would you be totally shocked?
• 1:11:04
  Speaker 2: Well, I would be shocked. But in nineteen ninety nine,
• 1:11:08
  Speaker 2: when I dropped down the presidential race, that didn't you know,
• 1:11:11
  Speaker 2: I did pretty.
• 1:11:12
  Speaker 1: Well and nice, this line is amazing, it's amazing. Go ahead, I.
• 1:11:16
  Speaker 2: Said a similar line.
• 1:11:17
  Speaker 1: You know I was.
• 1:11:19
  Speaker 2: I was embarrassed. I didn't do well. In the nineteen
• 1:11:23
  Speaker 2: run up to two thousand, George W. Bush left me
• 1:11:26
  Speaker 2: and everybody else than the dusk and people said, what
• 1:11:28
  Speaker 2: do you learn? And I said, well, it's all money,
• 1:11:30
  Speaker 2: and media said it keeps going like this. By two
• 1:11:33
  Speaker 2: thousand and four, we're likely to have Donald Trump versus
• 1:11:37
  Speaker 2: the latest Power Bowl winner with chair as an independent candidate.
• 1:11:42
  Speaker 2: And I just picked Trump's name out of the blue.
• 1:11:44
  Speaker 2: I didn't know him, know anything about him, but I
• 1:11:48
  Speaker 2: missed by about twelve years his rival. Yeah, we've got
• 1:11:52
  Speaker 2: a different environment where people are you know, famous for
• 1:11:56
  Speaker 2: being famous or their presence on the screen makes a
• 1:11:59
  Speaker 2: big different and other people will vote for them. Their
• 1:12:03
  Speaker 2: ability to attract attention depends upon their extreme positions and
• 1:12:07
  Speaker 2: their ability to raise money. By the digital democracy we
• 1:12:11
  Speaker 2: live in, so all that provides not very much incentive
• 1:12:16
  Speaker 2: for people who are really interested in saying, Okay, what
• 1:12:21
  Speaker 2: can we do to advance medical miracles, or what can
• 1:12:25
  Speaker 2: we do to you know, take care of national park maintenance?
• 1:12:30
  Speaker 2: And if we're going to do that, can we get
• 1:12:33
  Speaker 2: enough of us together to get a result? That takes
• 1:12:36
  Speaker 2: some work, and it's a completely different style of serving
• 1:12:41
  Speaker 2: than just making the speech that will get the most
• 1:12:44
  Speaker 2: clicks on your cell phone.
• 1:12:48
  Speaker 1: Look, I think everything is cyclical and that at some
• 1:12:51
  Speaker 1: point the electorate's going to decide, no, we don't want
• 1:12:56
  Speaker 1: the best theater person. We need somebody, you know, we
• 1:12:59
  Speaker 1: want the course. And you know, I don't know if
• 1:13:02
  Speaker 1: we're there yet, and I don't know if our current
• 1:13:04
  Speaker 1: media climate even rewards that just yet. And I think
• 1:13:08
  Speaker 1: that that's an issue. But let me poke, let me
• 1:13:11
  Speaker 1: dig in here on money in politics. One of the
• 1:13:14
  Speaker 1: most fascinating things that I've been striking up a pretty
• 1:13:17
  Speaker 1: close relationship with John Kasick, and he's become a huge
• 1:13:22
  Speaker 1: sort of believer now in campaign financial perform and he
• 1:13:25
  Speaker 1: goes I never would have advocated for it twenty years ago,
• 1:13:27
  Speaker 1: you know, just you didn't have many conservative Republicans that
• 1:13:30
  Speaker 1: would say that. But it does feel like there's we've
• 1:13:34
  Speaker 1: hit a tipping point where we're like, whoa, whoa, whoa
• 1:13:37
  Speaker 1: this this money is on another level that is consuming
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 1: our politics. What do we do about it? I'm not sure. Well,
• 1:13:44
  Speaker 1: first of all, are you never are you there? Are
• 1:13:47
  Speaker 1: you there? Are you concerned about this?
• 1:13:48
  Speaker 2: I've never favored limits on on on I mean, I
• 1:13:52
  Speaker 2: ran for president in nineteen ninety six at a time
• 1:13:55
  Speaker 2: when you could only raise one thousand dollars per person,
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 2: and I raised about fifteen million dollars and did pretty well.
• 1:14:02
  Speaker 1: And you were one of the better fundraisers at that
• 1:14:04
  Speaker 1: time at that time, but I was no competition for
• 1:14:09
  Speaker 1: Steve Forbes, who got in late and wrote checks and
• 1:14:11
  Speaker 1: spent about thirty forty million dollars trashing Bob Dole.
• 1:14:15
  Speaker 2: So when you put limits on campaign contributions you that
• 1:14:22
  Speaker 2: may be good, but you advantaged somebody else. I agree
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 2: with you. It's a problem. I heard the other day
• 1:14:27
  Speaker 2: somebody said the Presidency is now billion dollar race. Senate
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 2: is a fifty million dollar race. Well, my last Senate
• 1:14:34
  Speaker 2: race in twenty fourteen, I spent ten million dollars.
• 1:14:39
  Speaker 1: So are you paying attention to the Roy Cooper Michael
• 1:14:41
  Speaker 1: Watley race in North Carolina? That's going to be a
• 1:14:43
  Speaker 1: billion dollar race? Lamar?
• 1:14:45
  Speaker 2: Is it really?
• 1:14:46
  Speaker 1: That's going to be? It's going to get close total
• 1:14:49
  Speaker 1: spending combined. There's some talk that could be the first
• 1:14:52
  Speaker 1: billion with a beat billion dollar center race. Obviously, it's
• 1:14:55
  Speaker 1: a fairly large state and there's just you know, huge
• 1:14:59
  Speaker 1: stakes and huge and two proven fundraisers, right, a former
• 1:15:03
  Speaker 1: governor and an RNC chair.
• 1:15:06
  Speaker 2: Well, our mutual friend Doug Bailey used to have a
• 1:15:08
  Speaker 2: solution to it, which you may remember. It was he
• 1:15:11
  Speaker 2: thought that the law ought to be that you can
• 1:15:13
  Speaker 2: only contribute to a race if you lived in the state.
• 1:15:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah, what do you think of that?
• 1:15:22
  Speaker 2: Almost all the rules that I've heard of that people
• 1:15:25
  Speaker 2: come up with the limit the flow of money, people
• 1:15:27
  Speaker 2: find a way to get around it, and it tends
• 1:15:29
  Speaker 2: up making it harder for someone else to write their
• 1:15:33
  Speaker 2: unanticipated consequences. So I don't have a solution. I've gotten
• 1:15:37
  Speaker 2: to the point in life for if I don't have
• 1:15:38
  Speaker 2: a solution, I'm not afraid to say so I don't
• 1:15:41
  Speaker 2: have a solution.
• 1:15:42
  Speaker 1: No, I look, I agree because I agree with you.
• 1:15:44
  Speaker 1: I used to quote there's this great line in the
• 1:15:48
  Speaker 1: movie Jurassic Park and it's also in the Michael Crichton book.
• 1:15:51
  Speaker 1: But the Jeff Goblum character that the old man talks
• 1:15:54
  Speaker 1: about how oh no, no, these dinosaurs they're not going
• 1:15:57
  Speaker 1: to mate. We've fixed that, and he says, he says
• 1:16:00
  Speaker 1: this great line. Life finds a way. And I've always
• 1:16:03
  Speaker 1: said that in my experience now watching attempts to limit money,
• 1:16:07
  Speaker 1: every new limit has opened the door to a bigger
• 1:16:12
  Speaker 1: spicket each time, because money finds a way. I mean,
• 1:16:16
  Speaker 1: it's pretty clear now, McCain. Fine goal was a massive
• 1:16:18
  Speaker 1: failure because it took money that was coming into the
• 1:16:22
  Speaker 1: system where there was a reporting mechanism and there was
• 1:16:26
  Speaker 1: transparency and you knew where who was giving the money
• 1:16:29
  Speaker 1: to the two parties and there were parties that's right,
• 1:16:32
  Speaker 1: and then it parties weakened the parties, right, It served
• 1:16:36
  Speaker 1: to weaken the parties number one, which in itself means
• 1:16:39
  Speaker 1: we don't have the the vetters. If you will right,
• 1:16:42
  Speaker 1: who can you know this is a bad person, it's
• 1:16:44
  Speaker 1: a good person, et cetera. And then it put money.
• 1:16:48
  Speaker 1: It basically created the dark money system that everybody hates
• 1:16:51
  Speaker 1: right now.
• 1:16:52
  Speaker 2: Well, it's fairly it's a fairly recent phenomenon. I remember
• 1:16:57
  Speaker 2: I was at the Harvard Kennedy School and I went
• 1:16:59
  Speaker 2: to Sagram House and took me to see John Carey,
• 1:17:01
  Speaker 2: and I said to John Carey, if you spend your
• 1:17:04
  Speaker 2: own money, you'll be the first serious candidate ever to
• 1:17:07
  Speaker 2: do it in a presidential primary, which he then did.
• 1:17:09
  Speaker 2: If you remember, he lost eye borrowed money from I
• 1:17:13
  Speaker 2: guess his wife's house or his and one New Hampshire.
• 1:17:18
  Speaker 2: But if he hadn't been able to inject a lot
• 1:17:22
  Speaker 2: of money into it, he would he wouldn't have been
• 1:17:25
  Speaker 2: able to do it.
• 1:17:27
  Speaker 1: Let me, I'm going to ask you about Howard Baker
• 1:17:29
  Speaker 1: because for me it's a bit personal. I think my
• 1:17:32
  Speaker 1: father was the only person in Miami that had a
• 1:17:35
  Speaker 1: Howard Baker for President bumper sticker on. It was seventy nine. Really,
• 1:17:42
  Speaker 1: I don't know if the campaign really made it.
• 1:17:44
  Speaker 2: Dad get off the ground.
• 1:17:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, Doug Bailey used to say that, had
• 1:17:50
  Speaker 1: you not been governor that that campaign might have been
• 1:17:52
  Speaker 1: gone better.
• 1:17:55
  Speaker 2: Now, why did he think that?
• 1:17:56
  Speaker 1: I think the implication was you'd have run the campaign.
• 1:17:59
  Speaker 2: Oh well, I don't know that I could have done that.
• 1:18:02
  Speaker 2: You know, President Ford asked me to run his campaign
• 1:18:04
  Speaker 2: in nineteen seventy five, and I couldn't because I'd lost
• 1:18:09
  Speaker 2: the governor's race and family circumstances wouldn't allow me to
• 1:18:14
  Speaker 2: go away. It would have been hard to beat Ronald
• 1:18:19
  Speaker 2: Reagan in nineteen eighty. He you know, that was really
• 1:18:24
  Speaker 2: the third try he'd run. He made a little try
• 1:18:27
  Speaker 2: in nineteen sixty eight and then he got seventy six,
• 1:18:30
  Speaker 2: was close, and then people were ready for him in
• 1:18:33
  Speaker 2: nineteen eighty. So Baker was an appealing candidate, but it
• 1:18:37
  Speaker 2: would be hard, hard to beat Reagan. Plus Reagan was
• 1:18:41
  Speaker 2: running on we bought it, we paid for it, the
• 1:18:44
  Speaker 2: Panama Canal, and Baker ran by the Treaty, so.
• 1:18:48
  Speaker 1: On some issues he would have been it was on
• 1:18:49
  Speaker 1: the wrong side of where the base was. Yeah, I
• 1:18:53
  Speaker 1: think so, well, what I mean, why else do you
• 1:18:56
  Speaker 1: think Baker couldn't get tracked? Why did it? Why didn't
• 1:19:00
  Speaker 1: Baker get traction? But Bush did.
• 1:19:05
  Speaker 2: That's a good that's a good question, Baker, and I
• 1:19:10
  Speaker 2: say this with love and respect. Was a little undisciplined.
• 1:19:15
  Speaker 2: You know, he was a legislator, and the custom to
• 1:19:19
  Speaker 2: uh moving around the center with relationships the kind of
• 1:19:26
  Speaker 2: thing that that's not efficient. And and I don't think
• 1:19:31
  Speaker 2: he was ready prepared for the discipline of a presidential campaign.
• 1:19:36
  Speaker 2: I mean, the difference between running for the Senate, running
• 1:19:39
  Speaker 2: for governor, and a presidential campaign is the difference between
• 1:19:43
  Speaker 2: eighth grade basketball and the NBA finals. And you you've
• 1:19:47
  Speaker 2: got to be really good, which he was, and then
• 1:19:49
  Speaker 2: you've got to really have a top flight organization, which
• 1:19:54
  Speaker 2: for example, George W. Bush did and when he when
• 1:19:56
  Speaker 2: he ran. So I don't I don't I think he
• 1:20:00
  Speaker 2: ran a disciplined campaign in nineteen eighty.
• 1:20:06
  Speaker 1: Well, what you're painting a picture of is are you
• 1:20:08
  Speaker 1: still a firm believer that the best job that prepares
• 1:20:11
  Speaker 1: you for the presidency, maybe besides the vice presidency, is governor.
• 1:20:16
  Speaker 2: Yes, yeah, I am. But because as I look at
• 1:20:20
  Speaker 2: the governor, as I look at you know, I worked
• 1:20:22
  Speaker 2: with tim presidents, knew a couple more. I came in
• 1:20:26
  Speaker 2: I was in the Kennedy Justice Department as a student
• 1:20:28
  Speaker 2: and then with Baker when LBJ was here. But I
• 1:20:32
  Speaker 2: worked with ten and I think the one who best
• 1:20:36
  Speaker 2: fit the job was Reagan because of his executive demeanor
• 1:20:40
  Speaker 2: and his comfort in doing what Lincoln did, which is
• 1:20:43
  Speaker 2: to gather a team of rivals to help me. And
• 1:20:46
  Speaker 2: brought in Bush as his vice president, Jim Baker as
• 1:20:50
  Speaker 2: his campaign you know, as a chief of staff, and
• 1:20:52
  Speaker 2: then is another rival, Howard Baker is the chief of staff.
• 1:20:55
  Speaker 2: So he brought in very broad gaged people who who
• 1:21:00
  Speaker 2: who were knew the nuances of Washington in the White House,
• 1:21:05
  Speaker 2: and he listened to them, unlike Jimmy Carter, who came in, uh,
• 1:21:09
  Speaker 2: not knowing much about Washington and brought a bunch of
• 1:21:11
  Speaker 2: people who didn't know anything either. And he was in
• 1:21:13
  Speaker 2: his third fourth year before he really got got his
• 1:21:16
  Speaker 2: feet on the ground. So I think that Clinton Clinton
• 1:21:19
  Speaker 2: was effective governor and such I mean president, and he
• 1:21:26
  Speaker 2: his moral failure has hurt him, but he was the
• 1:21:30
  Speaker 2: best politician of the president's I knew, and he proved
• 1:21:33
  Speaker 2: to be an effective governor. George W. Was the most
• 1:21:39
  Speaker 2: normal of the presidents I worked with.
• 1:21:42
  Speaker 1: I mean, it's a great description. I completely look. I've
• 1:21:47
  Speaker 1: my president's personally knowing begins with Clinton, and that's my
• 1:21:50
  Speaker 1: description of w He's.
• 1:21:53
  Speaker 2: He's a guy, you know, you know, you'd have a
• 1:21:57
  Speaker 2: cigar with him or or whatever. And he wasn't a
• 1:22:00
  Speaker 2: Rhodes Scholar president of Harvard Law Review, and that didn't
• 1:22:03
  Speaker 2: bother him.
• 1:22:04
  Speaker 1: And the other thing, but he was smarter than most
• 1:22:06
  Speaker 1: people you talk with.
• 1:22:07
  Speaker 2: Oh, he was pretty smart. And the thing that he
• 1:22:13
  Speaker 2: was born on third base, but he treated as an
• 1:22:17
  Speaker 2: He was comfortable with it being an opportunity to steal
• 1:22:20
  Speaker 2: home rather than an excuse for a therapy session every week.
• 1:22:24
  Speaker 2: And most of the people who run for president, when
• 1:22:27
  Speaker 2: you start from scratch and try to go all the
• 1:22:29
  Speaker 2: way to the top, that just squeeze so much life
• 1:22:32
  Speaker 2: out of you. There's not a lot of left by
• 1:22:35
  Speaker 2: the time you get there. Bush had it all, you know.
• 1:22:37
  Speaker 2: So he was gregarious. He was gregarious, friendly, easy to
• 1:22:41
  Speaker 2: get along with, and the most normal of the batch.
• 1:22:48
  Speaker 1: One of my favorite late moments in politics. And I
• 1:22:52
  Speaker 1: remember watching and observing it and wishing we saw more
• 1:22:58
  Speaker 1: of this more often than it happened, but for this
• 1:23:01
  Speaker 1: one event, and that was the infamous or famous, whatever
• 1:23:04
  Speaker 1: you want to call it. It's basically the debate you
• 1:23:06
  Speaker 1: had with Barack Obama over healthcare in the Blair House,
• 1:23:11
  Speaker 1: and it was one of those moments that I thought,
• 1:23:14
  Speaker 1: this is what the country should see is our political leaders.
• 1:23:19
  Speaker 1: Maybe they disagree, and they did and you did, and
• 1:23:22
  Speaker 1: you guys were having this debate, but it was out
• 1:23:25
  Speaker 1: in the open, and it felt so healthy for a moment,
• 1:23:29
  Speaker 1: and I thought, is this Obviously it was a little
• 1:23:32
  Speaker 1: bit of a publicity stunt, right, there was no doubt.
• 1:23:35
  Speaker 1: But it almost worked, didn't it.
• 1:23:39
  Speaker 2: It did almost work. And I'll give the president credit
• 1:23:43
  Speaker 2: for having the day of discussion. What he basically did, though,
• 1:23:47
  Speaker 2: is Kevin formed a Republicans we never could have gotten
• 1:23:50
  Speaker 2: on that much television to offer our point of view.
• 1:23:54
  Speaker 2: And then Senator McConnell and John Bainer asked me to
• 1:23:58
  Speaker 2: take the time for both the Republicans and the House
• 1:24:02
  Speaker 2: members and the Senate members, which is anybody who's been
• 1:24:05
  Speaker 2: in Washington long knows how in the city of Elbow
• 1:24:08
  Speaker 2: is how odd that is.
• 1:24:09
  Speaker 1: I was just going to say, the fact that they
• 1:24:11
  Speaker 1: all agreed to let you be the lead, right, that
• 1:24:14
  Speaker 1: is a little unusual.
• 1:24:15
  Speaker 2: Let me speak, And so I did, and that irritated
• 1:24:18
  Speaker 2: Obama because he thought I was going on too long.
• 1:24:22
  Speaker 2: And then we had a difference of opinion about whether
• 1:24:26
  Speaker 2: Obamacare would increase the cost of individual insurance, and I
• 1:24:30
  Speaker 2: had evidence from the CBO that it would. He thought
• 1:24:33
  Speaker 2: I was wrong. But what I decided to do in
• 1:24:36
  Speaker 2: the end, I remember saying to mister President, rather than
• 1:24:39
  Speaker 2: rather than pursue this debate further in public, I'd like
• 1:24:42
  Speaker 2: to give you my notes after the meeting and show
• 1:24:47
  Speaker 2: you why I said that. And I did that because
• 1:24:49
  Speaker 2: I think people have respect for the office of president,
• 1:24:53
  Speaker 2: and they don't like it very much when even a
• 1:24:56
  Speaker 2: senator just com berates the pres for too long a
• 1:25:01
  Speaker 2: period of time. So I arguid with him for a while,
• 1:25:04
  Speaker 2: but then i'd cut it off and gave him my
• 1:25:07
  Speaker 2: notes afterwards.
• 1:25:09
  Speaker 1: How did that go?
• 1:25:11
  Speaker 2: I don't think he ever agreed with me. I was
• 1:25:15
  Speaker 2: right about it.
• 1:25:17
  Speaker 1: I mean, I remember you saying to me once. Maybe
• 1:25:21
  Speaker 1: you said it to me or you said it the DOUG,
• 1:25:25
  Speaker 1: but it was like, I gladly trade medicaid back to
• 1:25:28
  Speaker 1: the federal government if you will, wanted it to take medicaid.
• 1:25:32
  Speaker 1: And part of it was just how much of a
• 1:25:34
  Speaker 1: budgetbuster it was for governors.
• 1:25:35
  Speaker 2: I did more than say it. I went to see
• 1:25:37
  Speaker 2: President Reagan in nineteen eighty eighty one I was governor.
• 1:25:41
  Speaker 2: He was president by then, and I proposed to him
• 1:25:45
  Speaker 2: a grand swap. I said, you take all of Medicaid,
• 1:25:49
  Speaker 2: which states pay about a third or forty percent of,
• 1:25:53
  Speaker 2: and we'll take all of K through twelve education, and
• 1:25:57
  Speaker 2: that belongs to the states anyway, and that would put
• 1:26:00
  Speaker 2: all of medicaid under one management, the federal government. It
• 1:26:03
  Speaker 2: would be better managed if you'd had one manager. Reagan
• 1:26:07
  Speaker 2: liked that, and he proposed it in his State of
• 1:26:10
  Speaker 2: the Union address, but it never went anywhere.
• 1:26:21
  Speaker 1: Ironically, I would argue, we basically that's what we have
• 1:26:26
  Speaker 1: is universal medicaid. In essence, it's just cobbled together by
• 1:26:32
  Speaker 1: the states and kind of funded by the feds.
• 1:26:35
  Speaker 2: Right. Well, I would check the latest numbers, but the
• 1:26:40
  Speaker 2: federal government probably pays sixty percent of Medicaid and the
• 1:26:47
  Speaker 2: states paid let's say forty But from the state budgets.
• 1:26:51
  Speaker 2: What happened in the eighties and the nineties was it
• 1:26:54
  Speaker 2: went from being three or four percent of the state
• 1:26:57
  Speaker 2: budget to twenty or thirty percent. Where did that come from.
• 1:27:00
  Speaker 2: It came from education, It came protectorarly from colleges and universities,
• 1:27:05
  Speaker 2: and also from K through twelve. So medicaid was cramping
• 1:27:10
  Speaker 2: our ability to improve schools.
• 1:27:14
  Speaker 1: Let me ask you. On the state level, I was
• 1:27:16
  Speaker 1: moderated a conversation call it a debate, conversation between Chris
• 1:27:21
  Speaker 1: Christy and David French about at the time, it was
• 1:27:24
  Speaker 1: really about sports gambling, and one of the issues I
• 1:27:28
  Speaker 1: brought up is how all these vices are actually important
• 1:27:33
  Speaker 1: funders for many state governments. Right, if you have an
• 1:27:37
  Speaker 1: allergy to raising taxes, well the best solution is a
• 1:27:41
  Speaker 1: vice tax, right, gambling tax, cigarette tax, alcohol tax, marijuana tax.
• 1:27:49
  Speaker 1: But there's a cost to legalizing all these vices. And
• 1:27:53
  Speaker 1: then you get where state governments are dependent on essentially
• 1:28:00
  Speaker 1: bad behavior in order to fund state services. Are you
• 1:28:04
  Speaker 1: worried where you know? Look, you didn't you didn't have
• 1:28:07
  Speaker 1: to make I think I think you brought the lottery in,
• 1:28:09
  Speaker 1: did you No?
• 1:28:10
  Speaker 2: Actually, actually it was the reverse. I kept the lottery and.
• 1:28:14
  Speaker 1: I kept it out. Okay, you know, I was.
• 1:28:15
  Speaker 2: Opposed to what I believe is state sponsored something for nothing.
• 1:28:20
  Speaker 2: I thought it was bad, bad policy. So when it
• 1:28:24
  Speaker 2: came time to raise money to try and build the
• 1:28:26
  Speaker 2: best highways to get all the Saturn plant suppliers right,
• 1:28:29
  Speaker 2: double the gas tax and paid for it so we
• 1:28:31
  Speaker 2: didn't have any death I and I literally kept kept
• 1:28:36
  Speaker 2: gambling out of Tennessee while I was governor. But the
• 1:28:38
  Speaker 2: lottery came in right after I left, and it's grown
• 1:28:42
  Speaker 2: to be very important and the money goes for education
• 1:28:45
  Speaker 2: and people like it.
• 1:28:47
  Speaker 1: But I think, but I guess the question is you
• 1:28:50
  Speaker 1: see where I'm going, right, And it's like, are are
• 1:28:54
  Speaker 1: we going down a slippery slope here and funding state government?
• 1:28:57
  Speaker 1: We're being so reliant on vice, is so relying on
• 1:29:01
  Speaker 1: stuff that we are worried or you know, like the
• 1:29:03
  Speaker 1: casinification of everything, young men getting quickly addicted to these
• 1:29:09
  Speaker 1: sports gambling apps, and yet we're yet state services can't
• 1:29:14
  Speaker 1: be funded without it.
• 1:29:16
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think it's a valid, a valid concern, and
• 1:29:21
  Speaker 2: I've found my experience was that when it came time
• 1:29:24
  Speaker 2: to do it, I just mentioned to do we want
• 1:29:28
  Speaker 2: the Saturn suppliers? We haven't had the auto industry. Saturn
• 1:29:31
  Speaker 2: is going to bring in hundreds of suppliers. Do we
• 1:29:33
  Speaker 2: want them in Tennessee? And they won't come unless we
• 1:29:37
  Speaker 2: have super four lane highways. So they can get their
• 1:29:39
  Speaker 2: parts to the plant that I could persuade Tennesseeans to
• 1:29:44
  Speaker 2: raise the gas tax read and borrow money or rely
• 1:29:48
  Speaker 2: on the syn attax, or use lottery money. And in
• 1:29:52
  Speaker 2: that case, every single Republican voted for it.
• 1:29:56
  Speaker 1: And now you think you could have made that case
• 1:29:58
  Speaker 1: in today's Republican party. I mean, you think about what
• 1:30:01
  Speaker 1: happened to Don Sunquist in your own state when he
• 1:30:03
  Speaker 1: tried that was.
• 1:30:03
  Speaker 2: That was an income tax and he tried, but that
• 1:30:07
  Speaker 2: it would be harder today. But but I think states
• 1:30:10
  Speaker 2: thought about if any better roads, there's no need to
• 1:30:12
  Speaker 2: have them built from Washington and and I don't And
• 1:30:16
  Speaker 2: the cost of to an individual of of you know,
• 1:30:22
  Speaker 2: an extra gallon of gas a year so you don't
• 1:30:25
  Speaker 2: sit in traffic jam. That's not a hard case to make.
• 1:30:29
  Speaker 1: All right. I got two more areas I want to
• 1:30:31
  Speaker 1: explore with you. One is our friend Doug Bailey, and
• 1:30:33
  Speaker 1: two is where's this Republican party going? So let's start
• 1:30:36
  Speaker 1: with Let's start with the Republican Party, and then we'll
• 1:30:39
  Speaker 1: end on it on some high notes about Doug.
• 1:30:41
  Speaker 2: That's good. Doug Bailey is a high note in my book.
• 1:30:45
  Speaker 1: The same with me. I miss him. I miss him
• 1:30:48
  Speaker 1: every day, especially in this in these moments, and we
• 1:30:51
  Speaker 1: I'm sure, I'm sure you've had I have a folder
• 1:30:56
  Speaker 1: of stuff that he was sending you having to do
• 1:30:59
  Speaker 1: with a certain hotel that was being built in DC.
• 1:31:03
  Speaker 1: But yeah, we will set that aside. But let's talk
• 1:31:06
  Speaker 1: about where this Republican Party is going. I was, like
• 1:31:12
  Speaker 1: I said, I was recently with Chris Christy and he
• 1:31:15
  Speaker 1: thinks that we're going to see a natural transition and that,
• 1:31:18
  Speaker 1: you know, like any president, if they get clobberd in
• 1:31:21
  Speaker 1: the midterms in their second term, you're going to start
• 1:31:23
  Speaker 1: to see the traditional shift away from that president by
• 1:31:28
  Speaker 1: the that party in power, in this case the Republicans.
• 1:31:31
  Speaker 1: I'm a little skeptical of that.
• 1:31:33
  Speaker 2: What about you depends on who votes in primaries. I think,
• 1:31:36
  Speaker 2: to Donald Trump's credit, he brought a lot of people
• 1:31:39
  Speaker 2: into the Republican primary who'd never even thought about voting before,
• 1:31:44
  Speaker 2: and they're still there basically doing what he thinks ought
• 1:31:48
  Speaker 2: to be done. So I think that to change that,
• 1:31:53
  Speaker 2: you have to get other people or more people voting
• 1:31:56
  Speaker 2: in the primaries. We've got in a situation, and this
• 1:32:00
  Speaker 2: is an answer to your question, but we've gotten in
• 1:32:02
  Speaker 2: a situation where as few as maybe five or six
• 1:32:06
  Speaker 2: percent of the registered voters can pick a primary winner,
• 1:32:12
  Speaker 2: and as a result, both the Democrats run to the
• 1:32:16
  Speaker 2: Democrats run to the left, the Republicans run to the right,
• 1:32:19
  Speaker 2: and that's who you get. So anybody who's center left
• 1:32:22
  Speaker 2: or center right, which a majority of people are, they're
• 1:32:27
  Speaker 2: left out. They don't have to vote, they don't have
• 1:32:29
  Speaker 2: anybody to vote for in the general election. So I
• 1:32:31
  Speaker 2: think for the Republican Party to shift gears, there will
• 1:32:36
  Speaker 2: have to be a lot of people go vote in
• 1:32:39
  Speaker 2: the Republican primary who have not been voting in it lately,
• 1:32:44
  Speaker 2: and then you'll get a different kind of nominee. Now,
• 1:32:47
  Speaker 2: how do you do that? I suppose what you do
• 1:32:49
  Speaker 2: is you use social media to do it. Social media
• 1:32:51
  Speaker 2: is what created what we've got now, and I don't
• 1:32:54
  Speaker 2: want any way to undo it except to use social media.
• 1:32:58
  Speaker 2: I don't mean be fouling and all that. I mean,
• 1:33:01
  Speaker 2: just use the skills of social media to attract more
• 1:33:04
  Speaker 2: people in the primary for a I mean it may
• 1:33:08
  Speaker 2: be a lot of Trump voters too. I mean there
• 1:33:10
  Speaker 2: may you know, people sometimes say, well, I like chocolate,
• 1:33:13
  Speaker 2: but I've had a lot of chocolate. Maybe I'll try vanilla.
• 1:33:15
  Speaker 2: There may be Trump voters like that, and then there'll
• 1:33:17
  Speaker 2: be people who don't like Trump of the Republican Party
• 1:33:20
  Speaker 2: who are ready for something different. Patty for a.
• 1:33:24
  Speaker 1: No, you remember seeing the rise of this wing of
• 1:33:26
  Speaker 1: the party in that O two race. I remember you
• 1:33:29
  Speaker 1: you had a serious primary challenger that was running to
• 1:33:31
  Speaker 1: your right. If I'm not mistaken, in the center, that's right.
• 1:33:35
  Speaker 2: I mean Ed bright Ran. He was a conservative Republican
• 1:33:39
  Speaker 2: from West Tennessee and and had been a prosecutor in
• 1:33:44
  Speaker 2: the Clinton impeachment trial. A very able, very able guy.
• 1:33:48
  Speaker 2: Ye know we I mean Tennessee is basically a populist, independent,
• 1:33:53
  Speaker 2: conservative state, and it shifted around. I mean the Confederates
• 1:33:58
  Speaker 2: have become Republican, and.
• 1:34:02
  Speaker 1: They used to be your neighborhood. I mean, I I
• 1:34:04
  Speaker 1: used to love that stat. Eastern Tennessee has the longest
• 1:34:08
  Speaker 1: continuous Republican representation in Congress, right, it was the only
• 1:34:12
  Speaker 1: the district I was from.
• 1:34:13
  Speaker 2: Was never elected a Democrat to Congress.
• 1:34:15
  Speaker 1: I mean they were Republican. They were Union the artists.
• 1:34:19
  Speaker 2: They when when Tennessee seceded from the Union, uh, they
• 1:34:24
  Speaker 2: voted against it and they went north to Kentucky joined
• 1:34:27
  Speaker 2: the Union Army, and.
• 1:34:28
  Speaker 1: I always thought you corker. I mean, it felt like
• 1:34:31
  Speaker 1: all of all of the Tennessee Republicans in my early
• 1:34:35
  Speaker 1: adulthood all were East Tennessee Republicans.
• 1:34:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah, Baker brought too. That's where I mean. My great
• 1:34:41
  Speaker 2: grandfather was asked about his politics, he said, I'm a Republican.
• 1:34:45
  Speaker 2: I fought to save the Union and I would vote
• 1:34:48
  Speaker 2: like I shot. So those are the Lincolnites and they
• 1:34:50
  Speaker 2: became Republicans.
• 1:34:53
  Speaker 1: Well, I only asked about that race because do you now,
• 1:34:55
  Speaker 1: in hindsight see the see the elements of the Trump
• 1:34:59
  Speaker 1: movement from that campaign.
• 1:35:03
  Speaker 2: There, Yes, is the answer to that. I mean, there's
• 1:35:06
  Speaker 2: always if you go back to there was a John
• 1:35:08
  Speaker 2: Bird Society in the sixties, and then there was let's see,
• 1:35:16
  Speaker 2: it was Reagan's movement. There was moral majority, there was parole,
• 1:35:22
  Speaker 2: there was I'm overlooking a couple, but there's always been
• 1:35:26
  Speaker 2: a strain of conservative populism the Republican Party then maybe
• 1:35:32
  Speaker 2: a third of the whole, maybe a third of the voter,
• 1:35:36
  Speaker 2: even in Tennessee. When Trump came along, the country had
• 1:35:40
  Speaker 2: gotten so unsettled. I don't think Trump caused it. I
• 1:35:43
  Speaker 2: think he's a cynic result of you know, it's the
• 1:35:48
  Speaker 2: ten years before Trump that were the that changed the country.
• 1:35:51
  Speaker 2: Not Trump. It's what happened with the arrival of social media, the.
• 1:35:58
  Speaker 1: Social media, the financial collapse, all that, all that post
• 1:36:01
  Speaker 1: nine eleven, all of that big stew Yeah.
• 1:36:04
  Speaker 2: The big that big stew and then then came job.
• 1:36:07
  Speaker 2: So that's the big change. How does that? How does
• 1:36:10
  Speaker 2: that change? What happened with the Democrats after McGovern which
• 1:36:13
  Speaker 2: is the only thing I can analogize it to, is
• 1:36:16
  Speaker 2: that Clinton and Gore and Dick Riley and some of
• 1:36:18
  Speaker 2: the Democratic son and governors, uh moved there.
• 1:36:22
  Speaker 1: They created Super Tuesday.
• 1:36:25
  Speaker 2: Yeah, moved the Democratic Party more than it was gonna.
• 1:36:27
  Speaker 1: I remember it was in theory going to be what
• 1:36:30
  Speaker 1: what was going to nominate Chuck Robb. That's a lot
• 1:36:33
  Speaker 1: of people thought was going to be that. This was
• 1:36:35
  Speaker 1: it was. Chuck Robb was the the LBJ son in law,
• 1:36:38
  Speaker 1: and the governor of Virginia was seen as the greatest
• 1:36:41
  Speaker 1: beneficiary of that.
• 1:36:42
  Speaker 2: And then of course also he Graham, Riley, Clinton Gore,
• 1:36:46
  Speaker 2: all of them and then Clinton Gore ran together. It
• 1:36:50
  Speaker 2: was hard enough to be they were considered at the
• 1:36:52
  Speaker 2: time to be centrist Democrats and carried a lot enough
• 1:36:57
  Speaker 2: of the South to win the national election. So I
• 1:37:00
  Speaker 2: think Republicans will need to nominate people who have a
• 1:37:04
  Speaker 2: different temperament, a different I think people would welcome a
• 1:37:10
  Speaker 2: change in language to mean, let's.
• 1:37:15
  Speaker 1: Talk about character in politics, all of that, and I.
• 1:37:20
  Speaker 2: Think there are plenty of people out there who can
• 1:37:22
  Speaker 2: provide that.
• 1:37:23
  Speaker 1: Why do you think character hasn't been a decisive issue
• 1:37:27
  Speaker 1: for a majority of voters right now?
• 1:37:30
  Speaker 2: I don't know what often it isn't. I know in
• 1:37:33
  Speaker 2: the Clinton years it wasn't. I mean Clinton was. He
• 1:37:38
  Speaker 2: did some pretty bad things.
• 1:37:39
  Speaker 1: But I contend you wouldn't have had Trump without Clinton.
• 1:37:43
  Speaker 2: Well maybe maybe so. And people put that second or third.
• 1:37:49
  Speaker 2: I don't. I mean, based upon working with ten presidents,
• 1:37:52
  Speaker 2: I put character and temperament first ahead of whether they
• 1:37:56
  Speaker 2: lean left or right, because I've seen the pressure responsibilities
• 1:38:01
  Speaker 2: that they have, and it may be that that after
• 1:38:04
  Speaker 2: Trump more people will value that more. They may say,
• 1:38:10
  Speaker 2: you know, just as my father took me to the
• 1:38:12
  Speaker 2: courthouse to meet Howard Baker's senior the congressman, I thought
• 1:38:16
  Speaker 2: he was probably the most respected man I was ever
• 1:38:19
  Speaker 2: likely to meet, other than my father and the preacher.
• 1:38:22
  Speaker 2: I think people would like a present they get introduced
• 1:38:24
  Speaker 2: to their grandson and say, I'd like you to grow
• 1:38:26
  Speaker 2: up and be like him. Right.
• 1:38:28
  Speaker 1: We don't have a role model in that way that
• 1:38:31
  Speaker 1: I would feel comfortable with for my son or future
• 1:38:34
  Speaker 1: grand kid.
• 1:38:35
  Speaker 2: But they're out there and that's the next for the next.
• 1:38:38
  Speaker 1: Well, I guess here's my concern, Lamar, is that good
• 1:38:41
  Speaker 1: people look at this terrain. It's not kind you. You
• 1:38:48
  Speaker 1: and I've had these conversations about how rough politics has
• 1:38:51
  Speaker 1: become for families now, not just the candidate themselves. Are
• 1:38:57
  Speaker 1: you concerned this is going to drive good people from running?
• 1:39:00
  Speaker 2: It will some? I mean my experience. I mean I
• 1:39:03
  Speaker 2: spent five years writing my memoir and it helped me
• 1:39:07
  Speaker 2: put things in perspective. And one of the lessons I
• 1:39:10
  Speaker 2: learned was that that the hardest thing in politics is
• 1:39:15
  Speaker 2: leaving it with your reputation and your family intact. So
• 1:39:20
  Speaker 2: most people don't want to put up with all the
• 1:39:23
  Speaker 2: indignities that go with it. But if you want to
• 1:39:26
  Speaker 2: do is Bill Frist did and save twenty three million
• 1:39:31
  Speaker 2: lives of people who had HIV AIDS, or if you
• 1:39:34
  Speaker 2: want to pass the Great American outdoors act or if
• 1:39:38
  Speaker 2: you want to produce a care for cancer, you about
• 1:39:42
  Speaker 2: have to be elected to do it or go to
• 1:39:45
  Speaker 2: work for someone else who has been. So if you
• 1:39:48
  Speaker 2: have a strong sense of purpose and a sense of humor,
• 1:39:52
  Speaker 2: I think you could suffer all the indignities, and I
• 1:39:55
  Speaker 2: think we'll have plenty of good people that will want
• 1:39:57
  Speaker 2: to try.
• 1:39:57
  Speaker 1: Who do you like out there?
• 1:40:00
  Speaker 2: I don't have a favorite. I like governors. I like
• 1:40:03
  Speaker 2: the governor of Georgia Yemp former governor of Virginia Youngkin.
• 1:40:09
  Speaker 2: Those are two talented people who have good credentials in
• 1:40:14
  Speaker 2: the Republican Party and who ought to be able to
• 1:40:17
  Speaker 2: mount a credible race.
• 1:40:23
  Speaker 1: Is Donald Trump been good or bad for the Republican
• 1:40:25
  Speaker 1: Party or is this a or do we not know yet?
• 1:40:30
  Speaker 2: Well, he's been both. I mean when he came up,
• 1:40:32
  Speaker 2: I mean the Republican Party had gotten ossified, you know,
• 1:40:35
  Speaker 2: in the eighties and the nineties, who developed a whole
• 1:40:38
  Speaker 2: structure of people in Washington, d c. Who constructed all
• 1:40:41
  Speaker 2: these litmus tests that you had that you had to
• 1:40:45
  Speaker 2: check off before you could even be considered a Republican candidate.
• 1:40:51
  Speaker 2: And he busted all that. I busted a lot of
• 1:40:54
  Speaker 2: that up. He completely blew a lot of that up,
• 1:40:57
  Speaker 2: So that needed to be done, and that was kind
• 1:41:00
  Speaker 2: of inviting a demolition, and he provided a demolition. What's
• 1:41:04
  Speaker 2: been bad about it is he's moved away from some
• 1:41:08
  Speaker 2: very critical things for our country that the Republican Party
• 1:41:11
  Speaker 2: has always supported, for example, a worldview that that values
• 1:41:18
  Speaker 2: allies such as NATO. He's also made some big errors
• 1:41:27
  Speaker 2: in terms of his pardon of people who charged the
• 1:41:31
  Speaker 2: capital on January sixth, and he.
• 1:41:35
  Speaker 1: Calls it ps lamari did it again this weekend and
• 1:41:37
  Speaker 1: going after Bill Cassidy.
• 1:41:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah, but anyone who looks careful. I went back there
• 1:41:45
  Speaker 2: three days after the mob hit the Capitol, and I
• 1:41:47
  Speaker 2: was my stomach turned about what I saw. George Washington
• 1:41:53
  Speaker 2: said that the most important thing about our new country
• 1:41:57
  Speaker 2: was not the first election, but the second, the peaceful
• 1:42:00
  Speaker 2: transfer of power. And to not accept the peaceful transfer
• 1:42:03
  Speaker 2: of power then to urge a mob to overturn the result,
• 1:42:11
  Speaker 2: that's bad for the country. And there are other things. See,
• 1:42:14
  Speaker 2: he's done a lot of good things. I mean, I
• 1:42:17
  Speaker 2: was glad to see the southern border controlled. I think
• 1:42:20
  Speaker 2: he's doing and Iran what some American president was going
• 1:42:25
  Speaker 2: to have to do sooner or later, which is to
• 1:42:28
  Speaker 2: use force to keep them from having a nuclear weapon. Now,
• 1:42:31
  Speaker 2: whether he's doing it as expertly as George H. W.
• 1:42:35
  Speaker 2: Bush and his team might have, that's another question. But
• 1:42:37
  Speaker 2: at least he's trying to do it. I like his
• 1:42:41
  Speaker 2: nuclear power policies. I can make a list of things
• 1:42:43
  Speaker 2: that I like that prinsident trumps dumb, but there are
• 1:42:46
  Speaker 2: other things that I think have damaged the country.
• 1:42:48
  Speaker 1: What's the line look like? I believe politics is a transaction.
• 1:42:54
  Speaker 1: I believe civilization invented politics that we could settle disputes
• 1:42:58
  Speaker 1: without violence. So I'm not I'm somebody who thinks politics
• 1:43:03
  Speaker 1: is a good thing. And I know it's a dirty
• 1:43:05
  Speaker 1: word to some people, but I think it's a good thing.
• 1:43:07
  Speaker 1: And transactionalism within reason is a good thing. But what's when?
• 1:43:11
  Speaker 1: When does transactionalism become harmful?
• 1:43:15
  Speaker 2: It depends what you mean by trans I mean transaction.
• 1:43:19
  Speaker 1: Well, right now, look, I'm gonna I'm I'm gonna put
• 1:43:21
  Speaker 1: words in your mouth, but this town feels like it's
• 1:43:25
  Speaker 1: for sale at times right now, and that everybody kind
• 1:43:28
  Speaker 1: of knows how you do it. And if you need
• 1:43:30
  Speaker 1: a regulation to go a certain way, there's a pretty
• 1:43:33
  Speaker 1: easy path to do it. That shouldn't be the way
• 1:43:36
  Speaker 1: Washington operates.
• 1:43:38
  Speaker 2: No, that's true. That shouldn't be and people should be
• 1:43:41
  Speaker 2: revolted by by anything. Then that is like that, there's
• 1:43:46
  Speaker 2: there are as you said, there's always a certain if
• 1:43:49
  Speaker 2: you mean that kind of transaction, there can't be contributions.
• 1:43:53
  Speaker 2: Sure will view that as as well.
• 1:43:56
  Speaker 1: It is donors give money not out of the goodness
• 1:43:59
  Speaker 1: of their heart, or at least donors that give a
• 1:44:01
  Speaker 1: certain amount of money, they at least at a minimum,
• 1:44:04
  Speaker 1: expect to have get your phone number.
• 1:44:06
  Speaker 2: Well, they they do, but I never felt I know,
• 1:44:11
  Speaker 2: the second time I ran for governor, I got Jim Haslam,
• 1:44:15
  Speaker 2: who didn't need anything, to be my finance chairman, so
• 1:44:18
  Speaker 2: that everybody who gave money would have to go through him,
• 1:44:22
  Speaker 2: because I was trying to insulate myself from people who
• 1:44:24
  Speaker 2: thought that just because they gave me a contribution, I
• 1:44:29
  Speaker 2: would do what they wanted me to do. Yeah, that's
• 1:44:32
  Speaker 2: not the way everybody operates. And I don't know the
• 1:44:35
  Speaker 2: law you could pass that makes everybody operate that way,
• 1:44:37
  Speaker 2: but people can sense it when things go too far.
• 1:44:43
  Speaker 1: Let's talk about Doug Bailey before I let you go.
• 1:44:46
  Speaker 1: You know you Doug was your political one of your
• 1:44:50
  Speaker 1: political consultants for a long time. I remember when I
• 1:44:53
  Speaker 1: first got to the hotline, everybody whispered to me, you know,
• 1:44:57
  Speaker 1: Doug's got a part time job. It's to get Lamar
• 1:44:59
  Speaker 1: Alexander the president and so and all that. So tell
• 1:45:05
  Speaker 1: me about your When did you and Doug connect first?
• 1:45:08
  Speaker 2: Well, I ran for governor in nineteen seventy four and F.
• 1:45:12
  Speaker 2: Clifton White was my consultant, Barry Goldwaters guy, and he
• 1:45:17
  Speaker 2: was delightful. But when I ran again in seventy eight,
• 1:45:21
  Speaker 2: I looked around and I saw that Doug Bailey and
• 1:45:23
  Speaker 2: John Diodorff had represented I don't know the exact number,
• 1:45:30
  Speaker 2: maybe seven out of the twelve Republican governors and.
• 1:45:34
  Speaker 1: Really owned the governors. Yeah, yeah, s were.
• 1:45:37
  Speaker 2: Left in the nation after the Watergate debacle in nineteen
• 1:45:42
  Speaker 2: seventy four. So White Stewart took me to see him.
• 1:45:45
  Speaker 2: And the great thing about Doug Bailey was he was
• 1:45:47
  Speaker 2: a professor as well as as a political guy.
• 1:45:51
  Speaker 1: So that's something you probably connected with immediately.
• 1:45:55
  Speaker 2: Yeah, And he wanted he didn't He wanted me to win,
• 1:45:57
  Speaker 2: So he created a spectacular campaign textbook campaign with a
• 1:46:01
  Speaker 2: big plan, and I walked across the state. I spent
• 1:46:04
  Speaker 2: the night with seventy three families, most of them I
• 1:46:07
  Speaker 2: didn't know it.
• 1:46:08
  Speaker 1: Was that cooked up with you and Doug walking across
• 1:46:10
  Speaker 1: the state.
• 1:46:11
  Speaker 2: My wife, really, my wife, Honey really was the one
• 1:46:13
  Speaker 2: who Doug was there. But she said that I wasn't
• 1:46:16
  Speaker 2: going to run again unless I could tell her why
• 1:46:19
  Speaker 2: I wanted to accomplish something. And she said, second, could
• 1:46:22
  Speaker 2: we have a different campaign mode? So we sat around
• 1:46:24
  Speaker 2: and talked about what I like to do. I like
• 1:46:28
  Speaker 2: to walk, I like music. So we ended up walking
• 1:46:31
  Speaker 2: across the state in my red and black shirt with
• 1:46:34
  Speaker 2: a band of four kids from the University of Tennessee
• 1:46:37
  Speaker 2: band and a flatbed truck playing Mama Milano music here
• 1:46:41
  Speaker 2: and it made me a better candidate and a better governor.
• 1:46:45
  Speaker 2: But what Doug Bailey was really good at was he
• 1:46:47
  Speaker 2: came to see me every week I was governor from Washington,
• 1:46:53
  Speaker 2: and the Democrats and the legislature thought he was coming
• 1:46:55
  Speaker 2: to give me political advice. He was he was coming
• 1:46:58
  Speaker 2: to give me advice about how to be a good governor.
• 1:47:01
  Speaker 2: And then we talked about the politics of how do
• 1:47:04
  Speaker 2: we persuade people were right.
• 1:47:07
  Speaker 1: Give me a few of his tips. What it wouldn't
• 1:47:10
  Speaker 1: you take from him on being a governor?
• 1:47:14
  Speaker 2: How do we go about this? Not who can we
• 1:47:18
  Speaker 2: get to do this job? But who would be the
• 1:47:20
  Speaker 2: best person for the job? Then let's go ask them.
• 1:47:23
  Speaker 2: So he was my advisor about how to be a
• 1:47:25
  Speaker 2: good governor for eight years and a remarkable, remarkable person.
• 1:47:30
  Speaker 1: Well, we did all sorts of fun little things together.
• 1:47:33
  Speaker 1: I don't think people realize, but I think we had
• 1:47:37
  Speaker 1: a lot of fun doing We were doing internet television
• 1:47:41
  Speaker 1: before anybody knew it was a thing back in nineteen
• 1:47:45
  Speaker 1: ninety nine and two thousand with the Yeah right with
• 1:47:48
  Speaker 1: Doug and it was a Tennessee businessman. I think that
• 1:47:51
  Speaker 1: we did some stuff with it. It was sort of
• 1:47:53
  Speaker 1: an early lesson and how that world worked or it
• 1:47:56
  Speaker 1: didn't work. Well, it didn't know. It didn't work then,
• 1:47:59
  Speaker 1: but you know what that stuff doesn't You know? It
• 1:48:02
  Speaker 1: doesn't work then, but it works now.
• 1:48:04
  Speaker 2: Doug wanted an internet democracy. See if he could see
• 1:48:09
  Speaker 2: it now, he would not because we.
• 1:48:10
  Speaker 1: Have it, We have a digital is that I know?
• 1:48:14
  Speaker 1: Do you think he was Yeah, he may have been.
• 1:48:17
  Speaker 1: His vision His vision was both correct and not good.
• 1:48:20
  Speaker 2: He may have not anticipated that the founders didn't want
• 1:48:24
  Speaker 2: too much democracy, and they wanted a republic was structure
• 1:48:28
  Speaker 2: and elected people who could make judgments about what's right
• 1:48:31
  Speaker 2: and what's wrong. And the influx of social media, et
• 1:48:36
  Speaker 2: cetera has has given us more democracy than the founders envisioned.
• 1:48:41
  Speaker 1: Well, at the end, he was working on trying to
• 1:48:44
  Speaker 1: figure out how to essentially blow up both parties, and
• 1:48:48
  Speaker 1: I wonder if he was onto something, then.
• 1:48:50
  Speaker 2: Well, maybe maybe we'll have more independent candidates in the future.
• 1:48:54
  Speaker 1: Yeah, Lamar, it's this was a serious memoir. This is
• 1:49:01
  Speaker 1: not every senator where their memoirs. Did you model this
• 1:49:06
  Speaker 1: off of other memoirs? Who do you think that a
• 1:49:08
  Speaker 1: good job? That you hope this gets compared to? Because
• 1:49:11
  Speaker 1: I found this both enjoyable and thorough.
• 1:49:15
  Speaker 2: Well, thanks Seank. I didn't really model it off anybody.
• 1:49:18
  Speaker 2: I had a purpose. My purpose was to try to
• 1:49:22
  Speaker 2: try to let people know that as governor or senator,
• 1:49:26
  Speaker 2: I woke up every day thinking I might do something
• 1:49:29
  Speaker 2: good for my state or country, and went to bend
• 1:49:31
  Speaker 2: most nights thinking that I had and that it was
• 1:49:34
  Speaker 2: still possible in this digital democracy we have today to
• 1:49:40
  Speaker 2: do that and feel that way and to encourage people
• 1:49:43
  Speaker 2: to go about it. Second, I've been at it so long,
• 1:49:46
  Speaker 2: you know, I'm working with ten presidents, nearly sixty years.
• 1:49:49
  Speaker 2: I've seen public life from about every angle, and I
• 1:49:53
  Speaker 2: thought the stories would be fun to tell. They'd be
• 1:49:56
  Speaker 2: fun for me to tell, and I thought maybe for
• 1:49:59
  Speaker 2: readers to read.
• 1:50:01
  Speaker 1: Well, let me let's leave folks with this. What is
• 1:50:05
  Speaker 1: your There are some people who listen to my podcasts
• 1:50:09
  Speaker 1: and some others who are worried about the state of
• 1:50:11
  Speaker 1: our democracy. Are you worried about it? Or do you
• 1:50:14
  Speaker 1: think it's going to or do you sort of follow
• 1:50:18
  Speaker 1: Churchill's belief of Americans that you know, we eventually figure
• 1:50:22
  Speaker 1: out and do the right thing after we've exhausted every
• 1:50:24
  Speaker 1: other path.
• 1:50:25
  Speaker 2: I use the word republic, and I borrowed from Senator
• 1:50:28
  Speaker 2: Howard Baker. He used to say whenever a senator was
• 1:50:32
  Speaker 2: causing trouble, or we had a war or some big problem,
• 1:50:35
  Speaker 2: he would say, the republic will survive. I think the
• 1:50:38
  Speaker 2: republic will survive too. But I think, and people have
• 1:50:42
  Speaker 2: asked that question for two hundred and fifty years, whether
• 1:50:44
  Speaker 2: it'll survive. But I think we've got some work to do.
• 1:50:47
  Speaker 2: To make it survive. And the only way it will
• 1:50:50
  Speaker 2: is have you know, talented people figuring out how to
• 1:50:54
  Speaker 2: be elected, get more people voting in primaries so they
• 1:50:56
  Speaker 2: can get elected, and then going and.
• 1:50:58
  Speaker 1: Are you for all party primary? Are you ready to
• 1:51:00
  Speaker 1: sign up for that? I am all I want to
• 1:51:02
  Speaker 1: get rid of. I think taxpayer funded partisan primaries I
• 1:51:05
  Speaker 1: think are unconstitutional. The idea that I've got to join
• 1:51:09
  Speaker 1: a private club in order to participate in a taxpayer
• 1:51:12
  Speaker 1: fund a primary seems seems like a poll tax to me.
• 1:51:15
  Speaker 2: Well, I'm for open primaries. The Tennessee is moving toward
• 1:51:19
  Speaker 2: closed primaries. But I never would have been elected if
• 1:51:22
  Speaker 2: we hadn't had open primaries because I had to attract
• 1:51:24
  Speaker 2: a lot of Democrats and independence in the Republican primary
• 1:51:27
  Speaker 2: forty years ago to win the nomination.
• 1:51:31
  Speaker 1: Well, it's funny. When parties get power, they want to
• 1:51:34
  Speaker 1: shut the doors, and when parties are seeking power, they
• 1:51:37
  Speaker 1: want to open the doors.
• 1:51:38
  Speaker 2: That's how that works, or when they win by too much,
• 1:51:41
  Speaker 2: they overreach. I think the biggest challenge we've got the
• 1:51:45
  Speaker 2: lack of two party competition. When we have it, it's
• 1:51:48
  Speaker 2: like Southeastern Conference where all the good players want to
• 1:51:52
  Speaker 2: play because they like to play with good players, and
• 1:51:55
  Speaker 2: then you have good games. What's happened in Tennessee is
• 1:51:59
  Speaker 2: the Democrats can anybody. It's like the University of Tennessee
• 1:52:01
  Speaker 2: win in seventy to five every week.
• 1:52:04
  Speaker 1: Are you surprised that Nashville hasn't become I don't want
• 1:52:08
  Speaker 1: to say Northern Virginia or the Atlanta suburbs, but that
• 1:52:11
  Speaker 1: Nashville hasn't become a moderating force for the Democratic Party.
• 1:52:18
  Speaker 2: Nashville is actually the most liberal part of the state now,
• 1:52:22
  Speaker 2: it most consistently democratic part of the state, and it's
• 1:52:25
  Speaker 2: the healthiest and most vigorous part of the state in
• 1:52:28
  Speaker 2: terms of growth. Our whole state's doing pretty well actually,
• 1:52:31
  Speaker 2: in terms of the growth. Our cities are democratic. Are
• 1:52:36
  Speaker 2: the rest of the states Republican and Democrats can't elect
• 1:52:40
  Speaker 2: anybody statewide, So that's not good for I didn't like
• 1:52:45
  Speaker 2: it when we had one party state for one hundred
• 1:52:47
  Speaker 2: years with the Republicans left out. I don't think it'll
• 1:52:50
  Speaker 2: be good for Tennessee if we have one party state
• 1:52:53
  Speaker 2: for one hundred years with all the Democrats left out.
• 1:52:57
  Speaker 1: Alexander a great public servant. It's been a pleasure to
• 1:53:01
  Speaker 1: know you over the years, and I appreciate your friendship.
• 1:53:03
  Speaker 2: Thank you, Chuck, Thank you for your time.
• 1:53:13
  Speaker 1: Ask Chuck, all right, let's do a little last Chuck
• 1:53:19
  Speaker 1: before we enjoy the long weekend. This one comes from
• 1:53:23
  Speaker 1: Mark h and Alan, Texas. He writes, Hey, Chuck, just
• 1:53:26
  Speaker 1: secured Pat's Packers tickets. How's divided over here? I've been
• 1:53:29
  Speaker 1: thinking about the national debt and how abstract it feels,
• 1:53:32
  Speaker 1: and I'm surprised we haven't heard more talk about something
• 1:53:34
  Speaker 1: as extreme as we're nigging on it. Is that truly
• 1:53:36
  Speaker 1: a bridge too far given the global consequences? Or is
• 1:53:38
  Speaker 1: it within the realm of scenarios you could imagine being
• 1:53:40
  Speaker 1: floated even rhetorically. Wow, writing just basically ignoring the debt. Well,
• 1:53:48
  Speaker 1: we've certainly seen other countries do that, right, What do
• 1:53:55
  Speaker 1: you think our creditors would do?
• 1:53:56
  Speaker 2: Right?
• 1:53:57
  Speaker 1: Some of our creditors are in the UAE and Saudi Arabia.
• 1:54:02
  Speaker 1: Some of our creditors, right are China, plenty of plenty
• 1:54:07
  Speaker 1: of sovereign wealth funds. Right? I guess the problem if
• 1:54:13
  Speaker 1: the United States did that? How does how is there
• 1:54:19
  Speaker 1: a trusted global financial system? Period? Right? So No, I
• 1:54:24
  Speaker 1: don't think we renig on it. Do we refinance it?
• 1:54:27
  Speaker 1: Do we print more money to pay it down with
• 1:54:30
  Speaker 1: cheaper dollars? Do we I could see some of that,
• 1:54:36
  Speaker 1: do we? You know, I am pretty convinced that my generation,
• 1:54:41
  Speaker 1: because it's so small compared to the other, compared to
• 1:54:45
  Speaker 1: the Boomers, and compared to millennials, and compared to Gen
• 1:54:47
  Speaker 1: Z and probably Gen Alpha, that will be the first
• 1:54:51
  Speaker 1: generation to take a to take a haircut on social
• 1:54:54
  Speaker 1: Security benefits. Now, what does that haircut look like? Right?
• 1:54:58
  Speaker 2: Is it?
• 1:54:58
  Speaker 1: Is it a small one?
• 1:55:00
  Speaker 2: Is it?
• 1:55:00
  Speaker 1: You know, it's ten percent less, but it's it's uh,
• 1:55:06
  Speaker 1: I think it, you know, I think that's more likely
• 1:55:08
  Speaker 1: because we don't have the we don't have the political
• 1:55:11
  Speaker 1: voting power Gen X does too, that the Boomers had,
• 1:55:15
  Speaker 1: that Millennials had, that Gen Z has. So I think
• 1:55:20
  Speaker 1: it's more likely we shrink the safety net a bit
• 1:55:23
  Speaker 1: before we go to something that extreme. But I just think,
• 1:55:29
  Speaker 1: I mean, the entire global financial system collapses if if
• 1:55:33
  Speaker 1: if somehow we're if somehow we don't if somehow we
• 1:55:38
  Speaker 1: renig on debt. Right, So, but it is You're right,
• 1:55:43
  Speaker 1: It's to the point where it's no longer feels like
• 1:55:46
  Speaker 1: it hasn't felt like a real number in a long time.
• 1:55:51
  Speaker 1: But you know, we're not. We're not anywhere. And the
• 1:55:54
  Speaker 1: only way we're going to deal with this is when
• 1:55:55
  Speaker 1: markets force us to deal with us, and when the
• 1:55:58
  Speaker 1: bond market says, you know, when suddenly people don't want
• 1:56:02
  Speaker 1: to when when our interest rates have to go up
• 1:56:04
  Speaker 1: to eight, nine, ten percent in order to convince people
• 1:56:06
  Speaker 1: to buy our treasuries, that's when that's when things would
• 1:56:10
  Speaker 1: get catastrophic, and when when you'd see some you know,
• 1:56:15
  Speaker 1: we have plenty of plans on the shelf of how
• 1:56:17
  Speaker 1: to do this. I heard a very good plan. It's
• 1:56:20
  Speaker 1: a simple three percent solution, all right. The compromises this.
• 1:56:23
  Speaker 1: You cut three percent of spending and you raise taxes
• 1:56:26
  Speaker 1: and you and you and you raise revenue, which is
• 1:56:28
  Speaker 1: taxes by three percent. Right you just you know, you
• 1:56:32
  Speaker 1: there there is a dollar for dollar thing that you
• 1:56:34
  Speaker 1: could do that probably politically, is the only way you
• 1:56:37
  Speaker 1: could pull it off. If you're going to do it,
• 1:56:38
  Speaker 1: if you're ever going to do spending cuts, you're not
• 1:56:39
  Speaker 1: going to do it without taxikes. You know, we have
• 1:56:45
  Speaker 1: we have got to stop fighting wars and cutting taxes
• 1:56:49
  Speaker 1: at the same time. If you want to know why
• 1:56:52
  Speaker 1: this has grown astronomically. That's the answer. The fact that
• 1:56:58
  Speaker 1: it has not been that it was. It was just
• 1:57:01
  Speaker 1: totally fine with everybody that we did the war in
• 1:57:05
  Speaker 1: Iraq and Afghanistan and cut taxes. Wars are expensive, they
• 1:57:13
  Speaker 1: should be one time costs, but we never asked the
• 1:57:20
  Speaker 1: country to participate in that. Instead, we've tried to do
• 1:57:23
  Speaker 1: a tax cut, and we wonder why we're in the
• 1:57:28
  Speaker 1: situation we're in. Matthew and Evans and Illinois rites. Hey,
• 1:57:31
  Speaker 1: I've been listening since the two thousand and four conventions. Wow,
• 1:57:35
  Speaker 1: and I'm increasingly concerned about jerrymandering and whether there's any
• 1:57:37
  Speaker 1: real off ramp. Do you think there's ever a scenario
• 1:57:39
  Speaker 1: where states like California and Texas coordinate reforms perhaps are
• 1:57:42
  Speaker 1: going to create a set number of competitive districts at
• 1:57:45
  Speaker 1: the same time, or is that kind of mutual draw
• 1:57:47
  Speaker 1: down just to unrealistic in today's environment. Thank you, Matthew
• 1:57:50
  Speaker 1: and Evans in Illinois. Look, I keep coming back to that.
• 1:57:57
  Speaker 1: The daytant here is to expand the house, and I
• 1:58:01
  Speaker 1: know I'm going to go down that rabbit hole, and
• 1:58:03
  Speaker 1: if you're going to ask me questions about jerry mandering.
• 1:58:04
  Speaker 1: I'm going to continue to promote the idea of expanding
• 1:58:06
  Speaker 1: the House. I think that is right. What is the
• 1:58:09
  Speaker 1: real problem? People feel underrepresented? What's the best way to
• 1:58:13
  Speaker 1: improve underrepresentation to get more representation? The reason go read
• 1:58:19
  Speaker 1: Madison's argument about expanding the size of the House of
• 1:58:22
  Speaker 1: Representatives as the population grows. It was simply so that
• 1:58:26
  Speaker 1: there was more direct represent so that every faction of
• 1:58:32
  Speaker 1: the American public had some representation here in Washington. And
• 1:58:36
  Speaker 1: what jerry mandering does is actually deny that very founding,
• 1:58:40
  Speaker 1: founding father belief. Right, this is un You know, we've
• 1:58:46
  Speaker 1: got plenty of friends who call themselves Madisonian Conservatives. Well
• 1:58:50
  Speaker 1: if you're if you want to claim to be one,
• 1:58:52
  Speaker 1: then you need to be for expanding the size of
• 1:58:55
  Speaker 1: the House. I ultimately believe that this is it is
• 1:58:59
  Speaker 1: looking we either do that. Maybe you've got to right size.
• 1:59:03
  Speaker 1: You know, I think, you know, plenty of people think
• 1:59:05
  Speaker 1: the Senate is is sort of becoming more and more
• 1:59:07
  Speaker 1: sort of undemocratic because of you know, Wyoming, Wyoming's two
• 1:59:13
  Speaker 1: senators only become more powerful as California and Texas grow
• 1:59:16
  Speaker 1: and their senators become weaker. But you know, not only
• 1:59:22
  Speaker 1: is California and Tennis in Texas punished in the Senate
• 1:59:27
  Speaker 1: with political power, but they're now being punished in the House.
• 1:59:30
  Speaker 1: So if I were California in Texas collectively, they're underrepresented
• 1:59:35
  Speaker 1: in the House of Representatives based on their population. They're
• 1:59:38
  Speaker 1: the two largest states. And in fact there are four
• 1:59:41
  Speaker 1: largest states. Two happen to be blue, two happened to
• 1:59:43
  Speaker 1: be red, California, Texas, Florida, New York. The four of
• 1:59:49
  Speaker 1: them ought to be arguing for more House seats to
• 1:59:52
  Speaker 1: represent their pot all of them the state. Those states
• 1:59:57
  Speaker 1: are under represented in the House of Representative and underrepresented
• 2:00:01
  Speaker 1: in the US Senate. I don't think we're going to
• 2:00:03
  Speaker 1: be able to change, you know, two senators each for
• 2:00:06
  Speaker 1: every state anytime soon. They can go to move to
• 2:00:09
  Speaker 1: some tiered system where large states get more senators than
• 2:00:12
  Speaker 1: small states. But there's all it takes is an Act
• 2:00:15
  Speaker 1: of Congress to uncap the House. So you know, that's
• 2:00:20
  Speaker 1: one way I could picture the two states because politically
• 2:00:23
  Speaker 1: they just don't have enough in common, right, even if
• 2:00:25
  Speaker 1: you have a democratic governor, they're just going to be
• 2:00:27
  Speaker 1: culturally different, all those things. But where all four states,
• 2:00:30
  Speaker 1: I think do have shared interest here is all of
• 2:00:33
  Speaker 1: them are underrepresented in the House of Representatives, and maybe
• 2:00:37
  Speaker 1: I'm look I am fully admit here, right, I do
• 2:00:41
  Speaker 1: two things now. I cover politics as it is, and
• 2:00:43
  Speaker 1: I want to promote politics as it should be. And
• 2:00:45
  Speaker 1: in this case, in my attempt to promote this idea better,
• 2:00:49
  Speaker 1: maybe going to the big states and letting them know, hey,
• 2:00:52
  Speaker 1: you're underrepresented. It is not fair to your own constituents.
• 2:00:58
  Speaker 1: What's happened to the House. The Senate was designed to
• 2:01:02
  Speaker 1: be this way, The House was not. I'm trying. Thanks
• 2:01:09
  Speaker 1: for the question. Matthew Andrew writes, what are Democrats supposed
• 2:01:13
  Speaker 1: to do right now? Voters often see them as weak
• 2:01:15
  Speaker 1: check but when they push back more aggressively, like in
• 2:01:18
  Speaker 1: the redistricting fights, they're criticized for being two partisan Also true?
• 2:01:21
  Speaker 1: Is this just damned if you do damned if you
• 2:01:23
  Speaker 1: don't situation or is there a clear path they should
• 2:01:25
  Speaker 1: be taking? Thank you, Andrew. Well, you're right, Like I've
• 2:01:28
  Speaker 1: always said that, you know, and you've heard me say this.
• 2:01:31
  Speaker 1: You know, some people think I'm too hard. I'm harder
• 2:01:33
  Speaker 1: on Democrats than I am Republicans, and I'm like, well,
• 2:01:37
  Speaker 1: the Democrats are promising to hold a higher standard. So
• 2:01:41
  Speaker 1: you know, I'm just holding you to the standard you
• 2:01:43
  Speaker 1: want to You said you wanted to set. So I
• 2:01:48
  Speaker 1: think that's you know, like like this redistricting thing. You
• 2:01:51
  Speaker 1: were the party of fairness until you weren't. Right now,
• 2:01:54
  Speaker 1: I understand, you know, And there's this frustration on the
• 2:01:57
  Speaker 1: left that, you know, Republicans do this all the time. Yeah,
• 2:01:59
  Speaker 1: but they don't come out and claim that they're going
• 2:02:01
  Speaker 1: to be anything else. This is where I can come
• 2:02:08
  Speaker 1: across a little Pollyannish Andrew. I just think over time,
• 2:02:12
  Speaker 1: doing what's right and standing on a set of principles
• 2:02:16
  Speaker 1: will eventually be the right thing to do, will eventually
• 2:02:19
  Speaker 1: be good strategy. Now that doesn't mean you don't, you know.
• 2:02:24
  Speaker 1: I think what I might suggest is that they got
• 2:02:27
  Speaker 1: to get tougher in their critiques while still being the
• 2:02:31
  Speaker 1: adult in the room. And I guess that's the balance.
• 2:02:33
  Speaker 1: I think they need to figure out how to strike.
• 2:02:36
  Speaker 1: You know, I will say this if there is I
• 2:02:45
  Speaker 1: think the fairest critique of Democrats falls into this idea
• 2:02:49
  Speaker 1: that there's almost too many lawyers involved in the Democratic Party,
• 2:02:52
  Speaker 1: too many elected officials or lawyers, and when you are
• 2:02:56
  Speaker 1: a lawyer. You're you're sort of taught that there's always
• 2:02:59
  Speaker 1: that there's rules to follow, and that that you can
• 2:03:03
  Speaker 1: sort of right or wrong via a court order or
• 2:03:07
  Speaker 1: a judicial decree or something like that rather than and
• 2:03:11
  Speaker 1: this is where they probably need to have a few
• 2:03:14
  Speaker 1: more emotionally driven candidates. Right. It may be why what
• 2:03:19
  Speaker 1: makes a grand Platiner appealing is that he's just not
• 2:03:21
  Speaker 1: speaking like a lawyer, right, And and what makes Bernie
• 2:03:25
  Speaker 1: Sanders appealing is he doesn't speak like a lawyer versus
• 2:03:30
  Speaker 1: you know, Al Gore, Hillary Clinton, and you know sometimes
• 2:03:34
  Speaker 1: you know would come up, you know there, you know,
• 2:03:37
  Speaker 1: they would make their technical argument, but it was like,
• 2:03:40
  Speaker 1: but it was lacking something, right, whatever was appealing on that.
• 2:03:47
  Speaker 1: I guess what I would say is is that is
• 2:03:50
  Speaker 1: it goes to the right. The famous Bill Clinton saying,
• 2:03:52
  Speaker 1: you know, voters are always going to be more attracted
• 2:03:54
  Speaker 1: as strong and wrong than we can right. Can you
• 2:03:57
  Speaker 1: be strong and right? Right, that's the balance you got
• 2:04:01
  Speaker 1: to try to do. Can you be strong and right?
• 2:04:04
  Speaker 1: Can you say, yeah, you dumb an effort, that's a
• 2:04:07
  Speaker 1: stupid way to do things, and this is what we're
• 2:04:09
  Speaker 1: going to do. So it's maybe don't bog yourself down
• 2:04:16
  Speaker 1: in length. I do think that many a Democratic politician
• 2:04:20
  Speaker 1: wants to explain too much, and I think it goes
• 2:04:26
  Speaker 1: back to just it, especially if you if you sort
• 2:04:31
  Speaker 1: of see yourself as a rule follower, and if you
• 2:04:34
  Speaker 1: get if you study in the law, you're studying with
• 2:04:36
  Speaker 1: the rules, right, and so in that sense, So I
• 2:04:39
  Speaker 1: don't know, I get what you're asking. Uh, it's a
• 2:04:44
  Speaker 1: it's on one hand, it's a fair that some of
• 2:04:46
  Speaker 1: the it does feel as if it's a it's in
• 2:04:49
  Speaker 1: an unfair situation. But I think it's more of the
• 2:04:56
  Speaker 1: attitude that it's taken right, don't be defensive about it,
• 2:05:00
  Speaker 1: lean into it, and be a bit more robust in
• 2:05:03
  Speaker 1: the language. So you know, I think I think you
• 2:05:09
  Speaker 1: can speak with more strength and still stick to principles.
• 2:05:20
  Speaker 1: So again little little Pollyannish on my front, but that's
• 2:05:25
  Speaker 1: what I'd like to see. I almost behave like you're
• 2:05:28
  Speaker 1: an independent and have nothing to lose, right. I do
• 2:05:34
  Speaker 1: think the problem the Democrats have right now is that
• 2:05:37
  Speaker 1: they're still too worried about what certain constituency groups think,
• 2:05:40
  Speaker 1: and they're still too worried that if they say something
• 2:05:43
  Speaker 1: the wrong way, even though that won't offend the swing voters.
• 2:05:47
  Speaker 1: It will offend a certain constituency group or a donor,
• 2:05:50
  Speaker 1: and that gets them all caught up. You know. It's
• 2:05:53
  Speaker 1: sort of a look, this is the Republicans now have
• 2:05:55
  Speaker 1: their version of this, and Donald Trump, right, he is
• 2:05:57
  Speaker 1: the super sensitive, you know, interest group that can't handle
• 2:06:01
  Speaker 1: any you know, Oh, you said it the wrong way.
• 2:06:03
  Speaker 1: Donald Trump's going to be mad, be very careful, right tiptoe.
• 2:06:06
  Speaker 1: And I think in some ways Democrats, you know, and
• 2:06:09
  Speaker 1: that's you know, that's how you get more aggressive, is
• 2:06:12
  Speaker 1: to sort of point out how they can't you think
• 2:06:14
  Speaker 1: for yourself anymore in the same way.
• 2:06:16
  Speaker 2: You know.
• 2:06:16
  Speaker 1: It's sort of so be aggressive, but it doesn't mean
• 2:06:22
  Speaker 1: you have to not stick to principal tactics.
• 2:06:28
  Speaker 2: Uh.
• 2:06:29
  Speaker 1: John from New Jersey Rights, Hey, I followed you since
• 2:06:32
  Speaker 1: you meet the press days and always appreciate your insight.
• 2:06:34
  Speaker 1: With recent primary dynamics and Trump back candidates gaining ground,
• 2:06:36
  Speaker 1: is there any realistic scenario where Republicans like Bill Cassidy
• 2:06:39
  Speaker 1: or John Corny break ranks in a meaningful way And
• 2:06:41
  Speaker 1: if that were to happen, could it actually impact center
• 2:06:44
  Speaker 1: control or create new guardrails on presidential power? Curious how
• 2:06:46
  Speaker 1: you see that playing out. Thanks, John, a forty two
• 2:06:48
  Speaker 1: year old farmer from New Jersey, never missed a podcast. Yes,
• 2:06:51
  Speaker 1: folks need to know that. You know, you may know
• 2:06:53
  Speaker 1: New Jersey as as as Newark, and you know a
• 2:06:57
  Speaker 1: suburb of Philadelphia, in a suburb of New York. There's
• 2:07:00
  Speaker 1: a big part of Jersey that's farm country, some beautiful farms. Anyway,
• 2:07:04
  Speaker 1: appreciate the question, John, And so I'll give you a
• 2:07:10
  Speaker 1: scenario that I think is very realistic that sort of
• 2:07:13
  Speaker 1: falls into what you're looking at. And it involves Lisa Rakowski.
• 2:07:18
  Speaker 1: She's not up until twenty eight right now, she is
• 2:07:22
  Speaker 1: part of the Republican majority. She's an independent who coxes
• 2:07:25
  Speaker 1: with the Republicans, right, and Gus King is an independent
• 2:07:28
  Speaker 1: who coxes with the Democrats. Let's say Democrats win North Carolina, Maine,
• 2:07:35
  Speaker 1: and Alaska, but they come up short in Texas, they
• 2:07:39
  Speaker 1: come up short in Iowa, Nebraska, Kansas, Ohio, and the
• 2:07:43
  Speaker 1: results fifty to fifty. Yeah, Republicans have the majority. Right,
• 2:07:49
  Speaker 1: Jade Vance would break the die' is Lisa Murkowski got
• 2:07:53
  Speaker 1: to stick with the Republicans. Lisa Murkowski has made it
• 2:07:57
  Speaker 1: clear that she's, you know, she can't be count on
• 2:08:03
  Speaker 1: one hundred percent of the time, and she cares about
• 2:08:07
  Speaker 1: what her state does if her state makes the decision
• 2:08:12
  Speaker 1: that they want a Democratic senator Lisa Murkowski again, who's
• 2:08:20
  Speaker 1: in theory up in reelection for twenty eight most of us,
• 2:08:22
  Speaker 1: most people don't believe she's going to seek reelection. Maybe
• 2:08:25
  Speaker 1: she does, but let's I can picture her saying, my
• 2:08:36
  Speaker 1: state voted for a Democratic senator, which tells me they
• 2:08:39
  Speaker 1: want the Democrats to control the Senate. I'm going to
• 2:08:42
  Speaker 1: organize and caucus with the Senate Democrats who have graciously
• 2:08:47
  Speaker 1: said I could be the Senate, keep my gavel being
• 2:08:53
  Speaker 1: natural resources, you know, et cetera. I don't think that's
• 2:08:58
  Speaker 1: an unrealistic thing. I will tell you another movement that
• 2:09:04
  Speaker 1: I that i'm a know about and would like to
• 2:09:06
  Speaker 1: see where there was. I do wish that there were
• 2:09:09
  Speaker 1: about five or six senators who would be a bit
• 2:09:11
  Speaker 1: cross partisan about it and demand certain rules changes, sort
• 2:09:15
  Speaker 1: of agree to vote, you know, withhold their support for
• 2:09:18
  Speaker 1: either caucus without certain significant rules changes, whether it's on
• 2:09:23
  Speaker 1: the filibuster, whether it's on judicial blue slips, whether it's
• 2:09:26
  Speaker 1: on committee things, and sort of make the parties court
• 2:09:31
  Speaker 1: the fulcrum right, make the two, Make the Brian Schatz,
• 2:09:35
  Speaker 1: who's likely to be the leading, you know, the candidate
• 2:09:37
  Speaker 1: that's organizing the Democrats. I have a feeling Schumer is
• 2:09:41
  Speaker 1: not going to be if Democrats win the Senate, is
• 2:09:43
  Speaker 1: not going to be the majority leader. I think he's
• 2:09:46
  Speaker 1: gonna I think there's going to be enough pressure to
• 2:09:49
  Speaker 1: him to say, you know, here's your gold watch. You
• 2:09:53
  Speaker 1: were terrific, thank you for an incredible run, but it's
• 2:09:57
  Speaker 1: time for a generational handover here. And so I'm assuming
• 2:10:02
  Speaker 1: it's Brian Shatz and John Thune, and if they had
• 2:10:08
  Speaker 1: to court a group of four or five senators versus them,
• 2:10:13
  Speaker 1: just you know, you know, maybe we get a better
• 2:10:17
  Speaker 1: functioning Senate. You know, maybe we get something that feels
• 2:10:20
  Speaker 1: as if swing voters who helped decide control actually have
• 2:10:26
  Speaker 1: a little more skin in the game than they do now.
• 2:10:29
  Speaker 1: But you know, I think certainly you're going to have Tillius,
• 2:10:36
  Speaker 1: Corning and Cassidy, you know, because they're not going to
• 2:10:38
  Speaker 1: be there. But I'm thinking the question you're asking to
• 2:10:40
  Speaker 1: me is more about how will these senators behave in
• 2:10:43
  Speaker 1: twenty seven? And I think there's Murkowski others that I
• 2:10:47
  Speaker 1: would keep an eye on on the Republican side of
• 2:10:49
  Speaker 1: the aisle that may not be comfortable with how Trump
• 2:10:51
  Speaker 1: conducts business and who may be willing to work with Democrats.
• 2:10:55
  Speaker 1: Todd Young of Indiana, Jerry moranav Kansas, John Kurt of Utah,
• 2:11:01
  Speaker 1: and of course Lisa Murkowski. That's probably a pretty good
• 2:11:10
  Speaker 1: place to start, all right. Last question comes from Michael
• 2:11:13
  Speaker 1: t in Chicago, and he says, Hey, you often say
• 2:11:16
  Speaker 1: Democrats shouldn't fight fire with fire, but I wonder how
• 2:11:18
  Speaker 1: that advice resonates with people who feel directly impacted by
• 2:11:21
  Speaker 1: policy decisions in very personal ways. For many issues like healthcare,
• 2:11:24
  Speaker 1: bodily autonomy, identity, and safety aren't abstract their deep lived experiences.
• 2:11:28
  Speaker 1: Do you think that perspective changes how we should think
• 2:11:30
  Speaker 1: about tone and strategy and politics and how can leaders
• 2:11:32
  Speaker 1: balance maintaining standards of conduct while also addressing the urgency
• 2:11:35
  Speaker 1: and the emotion behind those concerns. Very fair question, and
• 2:11:40
  Speaker 1: you know it's easy for me to be theoretical if
• 2:11:44
  Speaker 1: something that isn't isn't being taken away from a right,
• 2:11:49
  Speaker 1: isn't being taken away from me at the moment? Right,
• 2:11:52
  Speaker 1: who my right somebody hasn't come at one of my rights.
• 2:11:56
  Speaker 1: In my head, of course, I believe that if someone's
• 2:11:58
  Speaker 1: coming for one of your rights, you know I might
• 2:12:01
  Speaker 1: be next. And that's I usually how most Americans used
• 2:12:05
  Speaker 1: to rally around things like this. So all I would
• 2:12:11
  Speaker 1: say is, I understand the emotional response, but you have
• 2:12:16
  Speaker 1: to have what how are you going? You know, in
• 2:12:20
  Speaker 1: order in order to enact power, you have to get power.
• 2:12:24
  Speaker 1: And that's why there is a reasonable argument for the
• 2:12:28
  Speaker 1: fight fire with fire. Hey, well, look, we want to
• 2:12:30
  Speaker 1: do good things. If they're not going to even get
• 2:12:33
  Speaker 1: us a seat at the table, we got to fight,
• 2:12:34
  Speaker 1: like how to find a way to seat at the table.
• 2:12:36
  Speaker 1: I take that point, but I don't think anything gets
• 2:12:40
  Speaker 1: done unless we have a durable majority, and I think
• 2:12:42
  Speaker 1: that ultimately. Unfortunately, progress in this country happens both fast
• 2:12:48
  Speaker 1: and slow. Right when you look backwards, progress can look fast.
• 2:12:54
  Speaker 1: When you're in the moment, it can feel super slow.
• 2:12:57
  Speaker 1: I did it, you know that's I mean, just look
• 2:13:00
  Speaker 1: at the gay rights movement. It felt like it was
• 2:13:03
  Speaker 1: going you know, it was never going to break through,
• 2:13:05
  Speaker 1: and then all of a sudden, it all breakthrough. And
• 2:13:08
  Speaker 1: it was one of those where incremental progress eventually led
• 2:13:11
  Speaker 1: to a hockey stick moment. You always have to have
• 2:13:19
  Speaker 1: one eye on the long game, and that's and so
• 2:13:25
  Speaker 1: I think that I understand that for some this feels
• 2:13:32
  Speaker 1: like a you know, hair on fire moment, and I'm
• 2:13:34
  Speaker 1: not saying it isn't in certain particularly with certain issues.
• 2:13:41
  Speaker 2: But.
• 2:13:44
  Speaker 1: Responding this way doesn't succeed even if you have a
• 2:13:48
  Speaker 1: short term victory. It's so narrow that it's not a
• 2:13:52
  Speaker 1: governing majority. And ultimately, what's it going to take to
• 2:13:56
  Speaker 1: have durable change. It's a governing majority. In order to
• 2:14:00
  Speaker 1: get a governing majority, you're going to have to make,
• 2:14:02
  Speaker 1: you know, just enough compromises. Look, I'm I'm very intrigued
• 2:14:06
  Speaker 1: by what Mark Carney's doing in Canada. He wants a
• 2:14:09
  Speaker 1: durable majority, so he you know, I'm not you know,
• 2:14:14
  Speaker 1: he shifted the party's priorities, you know, a bit to
• 2:14:19
  Speaker 1: the towards the center, and in doing so attracted a
• 2:14:23
  Speaker 1: larger coalition, which gave him more stability to govern, a
• 2:14:30
  Speaker 1: stiffer spine to confront Trump if necessary. And he's suddenly
• 2:14:37
  Speaker 1: turning in the most successful labor prime minister we've seen
• 2:14:40
  Speaker 1: in Canada and quite some time. I think there can be.
• 2:14:45
  Speaker 1: I think there's something to learn from what Carney's doing
• 2:14:49
  Speaker 1: up there. But I understand the spirit of your question,
• 2:14:53
  Speaker 1: and I get it emotionally. I'm just I just you know,
• 2:14:59
  Speaker 1: and I know it's sounds like super fait. I just said,
• 2:15:01
  Speaker 1: long game, you know, do this. You know there's not
• 2:15:03
  Speaker 1: I don't have a concrete plan. The concrete plan is
• 2:15:07
  Speaker 1: just to more awareness. More people need to understand the
• 2:15:12
  Speaker 1: lived experiences that people have, because the more people see
• 2:15:16
  Speaker 1: and hear and feel those lived experiences, the more likely
• 2:15:18
  Speaker 1: they're actually going to understand why these rights shouldn't be
• 2:15:21
  Speaker 1: taken away. It's one of the lessons for me that
• 2:15:24
  Speaker 1: I take away from the gay rights movement over time.
• 2:15:31
  Speaker 1: The greatest impact was just people's lived experiences, and that
• 2:15:36
  Speaker 1: took something that we thought was never going to happen,
• 2:15:40
  Speaker 1: and now we can't believe it took us so long
• 2:15:41
  Speaker 1: to get her. All right with that, enjoy the long weekend,
• 2:15:50
  Speaker 1: and uh, I'd have and I look, look, I have
• 2:15:55
  Speaker 1: a pretty interesting Memorial Day special podcast that I have
• 2:16:02
  Speaker 1: a fascinating interview. Can't wait to share it, so I'll
• 2:16:05
  Speaker 1: have more to say about Memorial Day on Memorial Day
• 2:16:09
  Speaker 1: and with that, I'll see in seventy two hours. Enjoy
• 2:16:11
  Speaker 1: your weekend,