Latest / The Chuck ToddCast / Chuck’s Commentary - The Democrats’ Primary Calendar Is Built To Stymie The Progressive Left In ‘28 + Ken Martin’s Leadership At The DNC Has Been A Disaster

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Chuck’s Commentary - The Democrats’ Primary Calendar Is Built To Stymie The Progressive Left In ‘28 + Ken Martin’s Leadership At The DNC Has Been A Disaster · The Chuck ToddCast

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Speaker 1: three four three nine eight five. Hello thereon, Welcome to
2:18
Speaker 1: the Monday episode of the Chuck Podcast. Got a lot
2:22
Speaker 1: that has happened in the last four days, whether it's
2:25
Speaker 1: small stuff or big stuff. Nuclear proliferation in the Middle East.
2:29
Speaker 1: I'd argue, that's big stuff, unbelievable rhetoric that is literally
2:34
Speaker 1: not believable when all things coming to a run. How
2:40
Speaker 1: Donald Trump is trying to make life harder for Republicans
2:43
Speaker 1: in the mid terms with his constant celebration of tax
2:47
Speaker 1: hikes on American consumers. He calls them tariffs, but they
2:50
Speaker 1: are what they are on that front. Got obviously, this
2:54
Speaker 1: is the Monday episode. We'll have a time machine. My
2:56
Speaker 1: time machine is about an anniversary that'll be celebrating this
3:00
Speaker 1: week that I would argue is as important as July fourth,
3:08
Speaker 1: seventeen seventy six. That's how important what happened on July
3:15
Speaker 1: twenty eighth, eighteen sixty eight. So I gave you a big, big, big, big,
3:22
Speaker 1: big big clue. But how important that date is. And
3:26
Speaker 1: we're going to spend a lot of time there, and
3:27
Speaker 1: of course I will take your questions, but look, I'm
3:30
Speaker 1: spending my alliance share of my podcast on the primary
3:36
Speaker 1: calendar You may think, wait, what the primary calendar? A
3:39
Speaker 1: whole podcast about a primary calendar? Right? Are we talking
3:43
Speaker 1: about practice now? And it may sound like inside baseball,
3:47
Speaker 1: But after covering presidential campaigns for more than thirty years,
3:51
Speaker 1: I can tell you this, If you want to understand
3:52
Speaker 1: what kind of nominee a political party wants, don't start
3:57
Speaker 1: with the speeches. You start with the rules. This announcement
4:01
Speaker 1: of the calendar is this not a logistics announcement, This
4:04
Speaker 1: isn't a scheduling announcement. This is the entire frickin' ballgame
4:08
Speaker 1: about who's of who the party wants to be or
4:12
Speaker 1: what kind of candidate they want to have as their
4:15
Speaker 1: standard bearer in twenty twenty eight. Right, Because the primary
4:19
Speaker 1: calendar determines a lot, particularly the state that goes first
4:23
Speaker 1: and then of course the state that goes last in
4:25
Speaker 1: the early window, which we're going to get into. But
4:27
Speaker 1: this calendar determines where candidates spend their time, which means
4:31
Speaker 1: what actual voters are they absorbing information from That matters
4:35
Speaker 1: a lot. We saw what Iowa being first in the
4:37
Speaker 1: nation meant we have ethanol all over the place. Okay,
4:42
Speaker 1: corn based fuel is a thing because Iowa was first
4:46
Speaker 1: in the nation. Right, the first state matters a ton.
4:50
Speaker 1: Where candidates spend their time matters a ton, and that
4:53
Speaker 1: has now changed. While it's technically this is secically the
4:56
Speaker 1: second cycle in a row, South Carolina is leading off,
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Speaker 1: this is the first cycle. It's really going to mean
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Speaker 1: something that it is leading off since twenty twenty four,
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Speaker 1: in theory was a reelection. It tells you what kind
5:07
Speaker 1: of voters they have to deal with, who they want
5:09
Speaker 1: to persuade, which issues get emphasized, what organizations get built,
5:13
Speaker 1: who survives, who disappear. So the point is I've watched
5:16
Speaker 1: these campaigns over the years, spend millions of dollars building organizations,
5:22
Speaker 1: and ultimately what you end up realizing is and why
5:24
Speaker 1: this calendar. What matters is the first date. This is
5:27
Speaker 1: the Ricky Bob Rickey Bobby rule. You ain't first, your
5:30
Speaker 1: last because no other state matters. If you don't survive
5:35
Speaker 1: campaigning in the first day doesn't mean you have to
5:37
Speaker 1: win the first contest, but you can't come in last.
5:42
Speaker 1: You can't essentially be rejected by the elector. And so
5:48
Speaker 1: in that sense, just remember the on the other states
5:52
Speaker 1: only matter. New Hampshire, Michigan, all these other Nevada, New Mexico,
5:58
Speaker 1: and Virginia, who are the two new addition, none of
6:01
Speaker 1: them matter until you survive South Carolina because there is
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Speaker 1: only one first stay. And that's the biggest lesson I've
6:11
Speaker 1: taken away from covering presidential politics is that no matter
6:14
Speaker 1: how many times they tried to tweak the calendar to
6:17
Speaker 1: dilute the importance at the time of Iowa New Hampshire
6:20
Speaker 1: as basically first caucus, first primary, and it has been
6:22
Speaker 1: that way essentially going we really haven't had a serious
6:26
Speaker 1: presidential campaign in either side where Iowa didn't start, and
6:30
Speaker 1: now twenty twenty eight, we are going to have our
6:32
Speaker 1: first one in my lifetime where Iowa doesn't start, at
6:37
Speaker 1: least on the Democratic side. I was likely to still
6:39
Speaker 1: start on the Republican side for what it's worth, but
6:42
Speaker 1: this is a huge deal and it is going to
6:46
Speaker 1: change because look, Iowa was a swing state because of
6:51
Speaker 1: how much organization was created there and spent and built. Okay,
6:57
Speaker 1: there is only one first state because the first date,
7:02
Speaker 1: unlike every other state on the primary calendar for president
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Speaker 1: the first date gets every candidate gets, every donor gets,
7:09
Speaker 1: every national reporter gets, every activist gets every endorsement battle
7:13
Speaker 1: gets every volunteer. They get it all first, and they
7:17
Speaker 1: always get it all as candidates don't make it out
7:20
Speaker 1: of the first state, those organizations don't survive in a
7:25
Speaker 1: New Hampshire, in a Nevada, in a New Mexico, in
7:28
Speaker 1: a Michigan, in all right, in a Virginia the rest
7:31
Speaker 1: of this calendar here, whoever's too on the calendar, you get.
7:36
Speaker 1: Whoever survives, you get to help explain momentum. There's some fundraising,
7:41
Speaker 1: there's media narratives, but the first date creates the reality
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Speaker 1: of the presidential race, and every other state and every
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Speaker 1: other state's voters is a reaction to it, and every
7:52
Speaker 1: other state gets a drive by the campaign. Only the
7:55
Speaker 1: first date is nurtured. Only the first date gets candidates
7:59
Speaker 1: who do you know, long bus trips and you know, look,
8:03
Speaker 1: New Hampshire, being at co first state, also experienced this.
8:07
Speaker 1: You get to You get perhaps tens or even, in
8:12
Speaker 1: the case of John McCain, over the years, hundreds of
8:14
Speaker 1: town halls in a New Hampshire. You get candidates visiting
8:17
Speaker 1: all ninety nine counties in Iowa. So the point is,
8:21
Speaker 1: that's why first matters more than anything else. So South Carolina.
8:28
Speaker 1: Let's dig into it. South Carolina isn't just replacing Iowa.
8:31
Speaker 1: It is replacing the function that Iowa had, because yes,
8:37
Speaker 1: South Carolina was in the early window, but it wasn't
8:39
Speaker 1: really an early state. It was kind of a decider state, right.
8:43
Speaker 1: It helped essentially send the message to Super Tuesday, who
8:46
Speaker 1: was the most viable candidate in the South. And this
8:48
Speaker 1: has worked on the Republican side and the Democratic side,
8:51
Speaker 1: and usually the winter, South Carolina went on to win
8:53
Speaker 1: the whole thing. By the times campaigns reached South Carolina.
8:58
Speaker 1: Previously there were maybe two candidates left, sometimes three if
9:02
Speaker 1: you counted John Edwards back in Oa. Right, and South
9:05
Speaker 1: Carolina turned into an electability test among Democrats turned into
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Speaker 1: a test of black voter support among Democrats. It was
9:12
Speaker 1: an establishment consolidation state see Jim Cliburn with Joe Biden. Rights.
9:18
Speaker 1: And again it usually served as a as a preview
9:22
Speaker 1: of what was to come on Super Tuesday. Well, so
9:26
Speaker 1: now South Carolina becomes the introduction, right, it's not the
9:29
Speaker 1: conclusion anymore. And this does change everything. And before I
9:33
Speaker 1: get into more of the details of this calendar, I'm
9:36
Speaker 1: not saying that d nc's motivation was the following that
9:39
Speaker 1: I'm about to say. But if I were to create
9:41
Speaker 1: a calendar that was going to do two things make
9:44
Speaker 1: it much harder for a progressive to get the nominee
9:46
Speaker 1: and much harder for progressives to say the calendar was
9:49
Speaker 1: designed to stop a progressive from getting the nomination. This
9:52
Speaker 1: is the calendar I would come up with. And by
9:54
Speaker 1: the way, at the end of my at the end
9:56
Speaker 1: of this, I'm going to coming up, I'm going to
9:58
Speaker 1: give you what a pro progressive nominee calendar would look
10:02
Speaker 1: like if this party wanted to see a progressive win.
10:05
Speaker 1: But this calendar is design and that's the Virginia closer there, right,
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Speaker 1: Virginia now becomes the last stand for the establishment to
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Speaker 1: stop a progressive if indeed a progressive has the momentum.
10:19
Speaker 1: But let's start with South Carolina becoming the introduction and
10:24
Speaker 1: why this is going to be an interesting experiment. I
10:27
Speaker 1: believe being first has allowed the state of Iowa for
10:32
Speaker 1: years and the state of New Hampshire to have very
10:34
Speaker 1: robust state party organizations. Right when every four years you
10:39
Speaker 1: have all of this influx of outside organizations starting things up,
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Speaker 1: building all of these various organizations in ninety nine counties
10:49
Speaker 1: trying to get caucus captains in New Hampshire, or ex
10:52
Speaker 1: me in Iowa, trying to get people to host town
10:54
Speaker 1: halls in New Hampshire. What you leave behind when you
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Speaker 1: leave this state is a whole bunch of new Act
11:00
Speaker 1: of Us, right, And this is this is what makes
11:05
Speaker 1: going first, We're gonna have a grand experiment. I've always
11:07
Speaker 1: believed there were two states in the South that the
11:09
Speaker 1: Democrats had sort of underinvested in. One is Mississippi, and
11:12
Speaker 1: I've talked about it a lot in this podcast. In
11:14
Speaker 1: the other South Carolina, where if they organized essentially their
11:19
Speaker 1: side of the aisle better, had a little bit better
11:22
Speaker 1: voter registration, had better rural black outreach. Right. The Democrats
11:28
Speaker 1: problems in the rural black South is what's cost them
11:32
Speaker 1: North Carolina multiple times in the last decade. It is
11:35
Speaker 1: why they can't make South Carolina competitive and statewide elections,
11:39
Speaker 1: and frankly, it's why Georgia has ended up as close
11:41
Speaker 1: as it has. But there is opportunity in the so
11:45
Speaker 1: called black belt, right, the rural African American South that
11:50
Speaker 1: South Carolina and Mississippi more so than any other two states.
11:54
Speaker 1: There's just a big chunk of voters who have just
11:57
Speaker 1: never been engaged. Some of them Obama await engaged them,
12:01
Speaker 1: which is why carried North Carolina, right, the only Democrat
12:03
Speaker 1: to carry North Carolina in this century, and that was
12:08
Speaker 1: the one cycle that it worked in you saw. So
12:12
Speaker 1: now you're gonna have in North in South Carolina somewhere
12:16
Speaker 1: between ten and fifteen campaigns running around the state over
12:19
Speaker 1: the next nine months. This is going to start almost immediately.
12:22
Speaker 1: You're going to start to see all of a sudden,
12:24
Speaker 1: and Andrews, the Democratic Senate nominee, is going to get
12:27
Speaker 1: more national Democrats calling her campaign, Abay, you want me
12:30
Speaker 1: to hold a fundraiser for you? Can I help this?
12:32
Speaker 1: Can I help that you're a Democrat running in that
12:35
Speaker 1: The Democratic nominee in the first congressional district in Charleston
12:37
Speaker 1: is going to see, you know, and you know, depending
12:40
Speaker 1: on how these Democrats want to portray themselves, they'll probably
12:44
Speaker 1: say yes to the Josh Shapiros of the world. I
12:47
Speaker 1: don't know if they're gonna want the Bernie Sanders's of
12:49
Speaker 1: the world to come, but we're going to That's going
12:51
Speaker 1: to be interesting to interesting to see. But you're going
12:53
Speaker 1: to see it. And that's what you know because the
12:58
Speaker 1: being first, I mean, look at the competitive of Iowa
13:00
Speaker 1: basically until the last five years, right, I think it
13:05
Speaker 1: has been driven by being an early state. I think
13:07
Speaker 1: it has been driven by every four or eight years.
13:10
Speaker 1: And by the way, both parties have benefited from this
13:13
Speaker 1: over time, depending because they both have had numerous campaigns
13:16
Speaker 1: just pour millions and millions of dollars. And so for instance,
13:20
Speaker 1: for years both the state parties in Iowa, the state
13:23
Speaker 1: Dems and state GOP both punched above their weight, way
13:27
Speaker 1: above their weight. And that's because of all the presidential
13:30
Speaker 1: resources that come in. Now we are going to see
13:33
Speaker 1: the first experiment Democrats have an investment in South Carolina
13:36
Speaker 1: like this. Ever, not since, not in the modern Democratic Party,
13:41
Speaker 1: not since it was the Dixiecrats. Okay, has there been
13:44
Speaker 1: a Democratic investment in the state of South Carolina. So
13:48
Speaker 1: not really with the with with this modern era. So
13:51
Speaker 1: now you're going to have probably for the next couple
13:53
Speaker 1: of cycles. Right, You're going to see every county organized.
13:57
Speaker 1: You're going to see volunteer coordinators, You're going to see
14:00
Speaker 1: county chairs, You're going to see voter registration drives. There's
14:03
Speaker 1: going to be all sorts of new organizations created. You know,
14:07
Speaker 1: right now, you got the Jim Cliburn fish Fry. I
14:09
Speaker 1: promise you there's gonna be a slew of other Democrats
14:12
Speaker 1: kind of come up with annual events like we saw
14:14
Speaker 1: develop over the years in Iowa and New Hampshire. But
14:20
Speaker 1: what this stuff does is it it organizes within that state.
14:24
Speaker 1: You know the history of Jeanie Shaheen in politics, she's
14:27
Speaker 1: now the retiring senator from New Hampshire. She got her
14:30
Speaker 1: start organizing for Gary Hart in nineteen eighty four New Hampshire.
14:33
Speaker 1: Well what did that do? Right, these organizations, these outside
14:37
Speaker 1: organizations hiring locals doing well well, all of a sudden,
14:41
Speaker 1: she became a future candidate for office. She became a
14:44
Speaker 1: future multi term governor and multi term senator. By the way,
14:50
Speaker 1: New Hampshire arguably was not necessarily a battleground state until
14:55
Speaker 1: years and years and years of this sort of organizing
14:59
Speaker 1: of the state. Right, and this is this is the center.
15:04
Speaker 1: Look at Iowa, right, the Iowa Caucus has become very
15:08
Speaker 1: mainstream starting in seventy six and eighty and by eighty
15:10
Speaker 1: four that's when Tom Harkin wins, Grassley wins in eighty
15:15
Speaker 1: and there's one D and one R senator in Iowa
15:18
Speaker 1: for the next thirty years basically, and that's all thanks
15:23
Speaker 1: to the Iowa caucuses. Right Grassley statewide machine in part
15:28
Speaker 1: helped built by the Republicans nationally coming in for the
15:33
Speaker 1: Iowa caucuses. Tom Harkin statewide network enhanced and funded thanks
15:39
Speaker 1: to the Democratic candidates coming into Iowa. So look, I'm
15:43
Speaker 1: not saying correlation isn't causation here, but after watching this
15:47
Speaker 1: for forty years, it is hard for me to ignore
15:50
Speaker 1: the importance of this early state investment. Having so many
15:54
Speaker 1: people from all over the country spend so much time,
15:57
Speaker 1: so much money thrown in, it has a benefit. So
16:00
Speaker 1: we're going to this is the great experiment that I'm
16:03
Speaker 1: looking forward to because I've always maintained, with a little
16:06
Speaker 1: more TLC the Democrat that South Carolina should be a
16:09
Speaker 1: swing state. There is enough, the population there is more
16:15
Speaker 1: evenly divided than the politics would indicate, and it's just
16:19
Speaker 1: been an under investment by the Democratic Party. And now
16:23
Speaker 1: you're going to see what this is going to turn.
16:25
Speaker 1: So that's what's going to fascinate. We're going to find
16:27
Speaker 1: out for sure if my theory of the case here,
16:31
Speaker 1: particularly being a first day, right being the because it's
16:34
Speaker 1: different all the others. Yes, they will be. Candidates will
16:38
Speaker 1: come early, you know, but they'll parachute in. They'll do
16:41
Speaker 1: a day or two, and then they'll go back to
16:44
Speaker 1: South Carolina because lack Iowa. South Carolina will have three,
16:48
Speaker 1: maybe four tickets out of it, depending on the number
16:50
Speaker 1: of candidates. Maybe everybody over double digits will be seen
16:52
Speaker 1: as viable coming out of South Carolina, and anybody in
16:55
Speaker 1: single digits kind of unviable. You know, they'll be We'll
16:58
Speaker 1: see how many. You know, it'll depend. But watching ten
17:03
Speaker 1: to twelve serious presidential campaign spending an entire year organizing
17:06
Speaker 1: South Carolina, those hundreds of organizers, those thousands of volunteers,
17:11
Speaker 1: those millions spent on voter contact, church outreach, college campuses,
17:16
Speaker 1: military communities, rural black turnout. So we'll know in twenty
17:23
Speaker 1: thirty if Democrats on the statewide level are much more competitive.
17:27
Speaker 1: If they are, I think that will tell you something.
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Speaker 1: give you this prediction. The Democratic nomine in twenty twenty
19:28
Speaker 1: eight may not matter as much as what all those
19:30
Speaker 1: campaigns leave on all right. By the way, one thing
19:35
Speaker 1: it's worth noting here, South Carolina's presidential primary isn't primarily
19:38
Speaker 1: financed by the Democratic Party. This is a weird system
19:41
Speaker 1: they have. The state Election Commission conducts it. Taxpayers bear
19:44
Speaker 1: most of the costs. Parties do pay exorbitant candidate filing
19:48
Speaker 1: fees to try to try to essentially cut back how
19:51
Speaker 1: much taxpayer money is used. So this one, it's sort
19:56
Speaker 1: of this quad that's always been, this quasi partnership. Both
19:59
Speaker 1: Republicans and Democrats get this help from the state. But
20:02
Speaker 1: it's just help, right because the state organizations themselves. You
20:05
Speaker 1: don't necessarily want. I'm running these firehouse primaries, so I
20:12
Speaker 1: do think a huge deal. That's South Carolina. Now for
20:16
Speaker 1: my other part of this calendar thesis, it's this calendar
20:19
Speaker 1: designed to favor moderates. So look, to me, this is
20:24
Speaker 1: what this calendar looks like. This looks like an attempt
20:27
Speaker 1: to so, for instance, by starting in South Carolina, you
20:30
Speaker 1: already are saying this has been where progressives where Bernie
20:35
Speaker 1: Sanders twice, it's just gotten thumped by the time he
20:39
Speaker 1: goes through. Right, South Carolina has not been very open
20:42
Speaker 1: to these progressive, socialist adjacent white campaigns. It has not
20:47
Speaker 1: gone well. So the fact that the party wants to
20:50
Speaker 1: start here right again. If I were a progressive conspiracy theorist,
20:54
Speaker 1: be like now, the argument I'd make to progressives to say, oh, no, no, no,
20:57
Speaker 1: this is different this time is that there might be
21:00
Speaker 1: multiple candidates trying to win over the more moderate vote
21:03
Speaker 1: it splinters, and a progressive consolidating the progressive support in
21:07
Speaker 1: the state. Well, guess what twenty percent is. A is
21:11
Speaker 1: a terrible number in a two way race. Twenty percent
21:13
Speaker 1: might be a great number at a six way race,
21:18
Speaker 1: but still The more I study this map, the more
21:20
Speaker 1: I think, whether intentionally or simply by consequence, though I
21:24
Speaker 1: don't think there's any accidents in presidential politics, this calendar
21:28
Speaker 1: is intended to make life harder for an insurgent progressive.
21:32
Speaker 1: That's its intent. Right. The sequence itself is the story, right,
21:38
Speaker 1: opening with South Carolina and closing with Virginia, a state
21:42
Speaker 1: that is not that has been very friendly to Democrats,
21:46
Speaker 1: but not very friendly to progressive democrats. Right, But the
21:51
Speaker 1: sequence here does tell you something. South Carolina, Nevada, New Hampshire,
21:54
Speaker 1: New Mexico, Michigan, Virginia not a not a place that's
21:58
Speaker 1: home to many super progressive electorates. Right, there was a
22:01
Speaker 1: Wisconsin on here, progressives would be happier. Shoot, if Iowa
22:05
Speaker 1: were here, progressives would be happier. But that is not
22:09
Speaker 1: the case. So I would say, if I were trying
22:12
Speaker 1: to maximize the odds of nominating a broadly more so
22:17
Speaker 1: called acceptable center left democrat, I might build a calendar
22:22
Speaker 1: that looks something like this. Right, just look at Bernie
22:25
Speaker 1: Sanders's to South Carolina performances twenty six percent and sixteen
22:28
Speaker 1: twenty percent twenty and historically we've seen South Carolina has
22:33
Speaker 1: been a huge ceiling for white progressives. But this is
22:36
Speaker 1: where I would tell progresses, Okay, here's your potential left side.
22:41
Speaker 1: Because sometimes these calendars, no matter what a national party
22:43
Speaker 1: wants to do, they don't always follow the designers blueprint.
22:47
Speaker 1: Trust me. The primary calendars in the eighties were all
22:50
Speaker 1: designed to nominate southern governors. Well, guess what the Democrats
22:53
Speaker 1: did nominate a Southern governor until nineteen ninety two. Right
22:57
Speaker 1: in eighty four they got the northern liberal in Walter Mondale,
23:01
Speaker 1: and in eighty eight they got the northeastern liberal in
23:03
Speaker 1: Michael Ducakas. Again, the intent of the calendar and of
23:07
Speaker 1: Super Tuesday was to try to let the South decide,
23:11
Speaker 1: but Jesse Jackson's candidacy sign of disrupted their plans there.
23:15
Speaker 1: So the point is you can design where you think
23:19
Speaker 1: this calendar is going to go, and it may not
23:23
Speaker 1: produce the results you're hoping for. Trust me. All those
23:25
Speaker 1: southern governors in the eighties thought that the calendar they
23:28
Speaker 1: helped push the DNC to implement back back then was
23:32
Speaker 1: supposed to get a Southern Whether it's Al Goren eighty eight,
23:36
Speaker 1: Chuck Rob sam Nunn, it was designed to nominate a
23:40
Speaker 1: Southern Democrat, and they didn't get there until ninety two,
23:43
Speaker 1: so that caveat of side. I'm going to give you
23:47
Speaker 1: an example of why South Carolina could end up being
23:50
Speaker 1: a great state for a progressive insurgent candidate, and it's
23:56
Speaker 1: let me tell you the story of John McCain. So
23:58
Speaker 1: John McCain in two thousand loses South Carolina with roughly
24:01
Speaker 1: forty two percent of the vote. Again, in a one
24:03
Speaker 1: on one race with George W. Bush in two thousand
24:07
Speaker 1: and eight, John McCain does worse in South Carolina. He
24:12
Speaker 1: gets thirty three percent, but because there were five viable
24:17
Speaker 1: campaigns still actively campaigning in South Carolina, thirty three percent
24:22
Speaker 1: became a winning number, much more crowded field. And then
24:25
Speaker 1: it handed McCain though the narrative and the sort of
24:30
Speaker 1: the narrative momentum he needed to convince donors. This race
24:34
Speaker 1: was basically over. Hey, he did what he couldn't do
24:37
Speaker 1: the last time he won South Carolina. So take a
24:40
Speaker 1: Bernie Sanders, or take AOC if you want to put
24:44
Speaker 1: her in the Bernie Sanders space or Roe Conna, Okay,
24:47
Speaker 1: and the progressive candidate gets so Bernie got twenty one,
24:50
Speaker 1: twenty sixty. Other time, let's let's put the number at twenty.
24:52
Speaker 1: Let's take his low number, this his first twenty percent.
24:58
Speaker 1: Twenty percent could be good enough for second place. Right,
25:01
Speaker 1: you know, we don't know how many are in I'm
25:03
Speaker 1: going to get to the Kamala Harris wes Moore, all
25:05
Speaker 1: this stuff, right, But twenty five percent in a with
25:10
Speaker 1: six candidates getting double digits not totally out of the question.
25:14
Speaker 1: Certainly four will be in double digits, but maybe more
25:18
Speaker 1: then that can be a winning number. This is what
25:22
Speaker 1: worked for John McCain in sort of him to sort
25:26
Speaker 1: of quiet the conservative wing of the party who was
25:29
Speaker 1: who is not a big fan of his. So that
25:33
Speaker 1: would be my case to progressive saying, hey, yes it's
25:38
Speaker 1: not this is not the most favorable terrain. But suddenly,
25:42
Speaker 1: if the you know, take the take the black vote,
25:44
Speaker 1: if you have Kamala, Harris wes Moore and Rafael Warnock,
25:47
Speaker 1: I'll run it. That's not an unreasonable field to see
25:51
Speaker 1: throwing a Joshapiro, JB. Pritzker, all of whom will be
25:54
Speaker 1: working hard to court the African American vote. I'm not
25:57
Speaker 1: saying Pete bootageits I'm not saying that, and I'm gonna
25:59
Speaker 1: SA the progressive candidate's not gonna be out there doing
26:01
Speaker 1: that either. But if the perception that the more moderate Canada,
26:04
Speaker 1: there's more of them in there, well, I don't think
26:06
Speaker 1: you're going to see the consolidation, right because trust me,
26:09
Speaker 1: Jim Cliburn, who could consolidate the black vote within a
26:12
Speaker 1: big endorsement, he wants more money being spent. He's gonna
26:16
Speaker 1: he's gonna if he endorses at all, he's gonna wait
26:20
Speaker 1: till the very last minute because he's going to make
26:22
Speaker 1: sure his endorsement is decisive. Right. If his endorsement, if
26:25
Speaker 1: he doesn't think it can be decisive, he's not going
26:26
Speaker 1: to do it. So the possibility that you have a
26:31
Speaker 1: splintered field like that, look, this is what has what
26:36
Speaker 1: benefited you know other Like I said, the McCain example
26:40
Speaker 1: is probably the strongest example of that where he got
26:42
Speaker 1: a lower percentage, but it was a winning number because
26:45
Speaker 1: the field was more crowded. That is what I would
26:48
Speaker 1: hang my hat on if I were a progressive And
26:53
Speaker 1: before I take a tour of the rest of the
26:55
Speaker 1: calendar very quickly, so I saw there's been some developing
27:01
Speaker 1: conventional wisdom that this calendar is good news for Kamala Aero's.
27:04
Speaker 1: I get why in theory because look, being the highest
27:07
Speaker 1: name ID, she's going to pull well in the immediate
27:11
Speaker 1: but this is actually a disaster for her because it
27:14
Speaker 1: puts expectations right at the top. She has to start
27:16
Speaker 1: as the front runner. Basically, if she doesn't win South Carolina,
27:19
Speaker 1: she's out right. It becomes you can say that's not fair,
27:24
Speaker 1: but if you're going to start as the front runner,
27:26
Speaker 1: you can't lose, right. It was it was the tyranny
27:29
Speaker 1: of it is what made Hillary Clinton's candidacy in hindsight
27:32
Speaker 1: in two thousand and eight so difficult. To her expectations,
27:35
Speaker 1: management and all that stuff. She starts as the big
27:37
Speaker 1: front runner. As Obama closes the gap, it looks like
27:40
Speaker 1: she's getting weaker, when really it was just sort of
27:43
Speaker 1: his name id and and it was you know, sort
27:45
Speaker 1: of an even race, but it wasn't an even race,
27:48
Speaker 1: right Like, once he caught her, it felt like she
27:50
Speaker 1: was losing steam. He was gaining steam. And then that's
27:52
Speaker 1: the problem for her. If you're to ask me, this
27:56
Speaker 1: calendar on paper is best for wesmore Right, this is
28:03
Speaker 1: African American governor military veter Hello, South Carolina, home of
28:09
Speaker 1: quite a few African American, big African American electorate, particularly
28:13
Speaker 1: in the Democratic primary, and a huge chunk of independence.
28:16
Speaker 1: And by the way, it's a non registration state, meaning
28:19
Speaker 1: everybody can come in just like iowall. That's what makes
28:21
Speaker 1: it interesting. You're going to learn who is going to
28:24
Speaker 1: have more success getting independence to participate into this primary
28:28
Speaker 1: and all this stuff. So look, I think if you're
28:30
Speaker 1: just looking at all of the candidates before they this
28:33
Speaker 1: thing is this is the best news for Warnock and more.
28:38
Speaker 1: And I think in a weird way, it's not good
28:40
Speaker 1: for Harris simply because she has to start first while
28:45
Speaker 1: everybody is going to be trying to chip away, and
28:48
Speaker 1: she's constantly going to have to be defending that. And
28:50
Speaker 1: so I'm not as I think in some ways she
28:53
Speaker 1: would have been better off starting in a state that
28:56
Speaker 1: would have been perceived to be a weak state for her.
28:59
Speaker 1: Then it gave her a way to quote overperform and
29:02
Speaker 1: prove some of the donor detractors wrong on this. This
29:06
Speaker 1: is in some ways the exact wrong place. So again,
29:09
Speaker 1: I know I've seen some sort of developing conventional wisdom,
29:11
Speaker 1: but I get it right. Early polling is going to indicate.
29:14
Speaker 1: But you know, essentially, never pay any attention whoever's in
29:18
Speaker 1: first place this far out of presidential it's just a
29:22
Speaker 1: measurement of name might be almost more than anything else.
29:25
Speaker 1: And that's why I would be careful. All right, let's
29:26
Speaker 1: take let me run through the rest of the calendar.
29:28
Speaker 1: Here's talk about New Hampshire. The New Hampshire State Party
29:32
Speaker 1: was throwing a hissy fit. Boy. I look, I've known
29:36
Speaker 1: Ray Buckley a long time. I get that New Hampshire.
29:39
Speaker 1: It's in their DNA. They have to. If they're not first,
29:41
Speaker 1: then they're going to write and moan. But here's the thing.
29:44
Speaker 1: They have no constituency outside of New Hampshire. One. Two.
29:48
Speaker 1: This has turned out not to be a voting issue, right,
29:50
Speaker 1: Democrats basically taunting them doing that whole right in, you know,
29:56
Speaker 1: with Dean Phillips and all that stuff, that didn't harm
29:58
Speaker 1: the Democrats Democratic candidates in the state. Right, it is
30:02
Speaker 1: not a voting issue for voters. So they've not been
30:05
Speaker 1: able to successfully sort of golluop, you know, make Democrats
30:08
Speaker 1: pay a price for doing this, because obviously if they
30:12
Speaker 1: did they'd be cutting off their noses, bite their face right,
30:14
Speaker 1: they'd be handing races to Republicans there. So New Hampshire
30:18
Speaker 1: ought to be thankful they were included. But look that
30:23
Speaker 1: this ship has sailed, and I think if they try
30:27
Speaker 1: to go ahead and do it Bill Gardner, the former
30:31
Speaker 1: Secretary State, used to do all the time and just
30:33
Speaker 1: whatever the parties decide, leap frog it and sort of
30:35
Speaker 1: dare the candidates to go. I don't think the candidates
30:38
Speaker 1: feel like they own New Hampshire anything. I don't think
30:41
Speaker 1: there's this you know. I think there's look that the
30:45
Speaker 1: legacy media has gone away. I don't think there's this
30:47
Speaker 1: natural tendency, you know, and if media were built the
30:51
Speaker 1: old way. So I just think if they try to
30:53
Speaker 1: make this a fight, they can, but they're only going
30:56
Speaker 1: to marginalize their place even more. Bottom line is I'm
31:00
Speaker 1: not convinced New Hampshire has as much leverage as New
31:03
Speaker 1: Hampshire thinks it has. And the more they do it,
31:05
Speaker 1: the fewer candidates they're going to see. Nevada. This is
31:09
Speaker 1: my am I say this. One of my favorite professional
31:13
Speaker 1: relationships in journalism is with John Ralston, the founder of
31:18
Speaker 1: the one of the most important local news organizations out
31:21
Speaker 1: on the West, the Nevada Independent. This guy is you
31:26
Speaker 1: want to understand Nevada politics, John Ralston is the first, second, third,
31:31
Speaker 1: and fourth places to go to find out what the
31:33
Speaker 1: heck is going on. So this is by no means
31:37
Speaker 1: a critique of John Ralston. But Nevada is a terrible
31:43
Speaker 1: early primary state if the intent is to build, is
31:48
Speaker 1: to party build. Nevada is a great early primary state
31:51
Speaker 1: if this is about appeasing a special interest group. And
31:55
Speaker 1: that's the bottom line, because Nevada is not the test
31:58
Speaker 1: that Democrats are claiming it right. I'm not saying the
32:04
Speaker 1: culinary Union decides everything because they technically didn't endorse in
32:08
Speaker 1: twenty twenty, but the entire campaign that everybody runs in
32:14
Speaker 1: Nevada is organized around the possibility of not alienating the
32:19
Speaker 1: culinary union and hoping to earn the culinary union support,
32:23
Speaker 1: so it shapes the entire state. This is not a
32:25
Speaker 1: way to build an organization. This is not a way.
32:29
Speaker 1: This is this is throwing a bone to labor, right
32:36
Speaker 1: the South Carolina is a week labor state. Frankly, Virginia
32:39
Speaker 1: is a week labor state. You know, Nevada is a
32:42
Speaker 1: strong labor state. So this is about throwing a bone
32:45
Speaker 1: to labor because Iowa was a strong labor state and
32:49
Speaker 1: since they're not going to have this is why there
32:51
Speaker 1: was such a push for Nevada to be first over
32:53
Speaker 1: South Carolina. But Nevada had a couple of problems. Even
32:58
Speaker 1: though they've changed from a caucus to a primary, they
33:00
Speaker 1: couldn't guarantee in the all mail in ballot or mostly
33:02
Speaker 1: mail in ballot structure that Nevada has that you'd get
33:06
Speaker 1: results in the same night. And it's interesting to me
33:08
Speaker 1: that the DNC prioritize states that could deliver results on
33:14
Speaker 1: the same night, right, given the mess in Iowa. Look,
33:17
Speaker 1: Iowa was not in this window simply because they couldn't
33:19
Speaker 1: run the caucuses correctly and couldn't produce They couldn't produce
33:27
Speaker 1: a result that wasn't questioned. Right, They ended up producing
33:30
Speaker 1: a result, but they couldn't produce one question. And part
33:33
Speaker 1: of it goes back to twenty sixteen, where there was
33:35
Speaker 1: clear there was clear examples of the state party trying
33:41
Speaker 1: to marginalize Sanders's support, which blew up in their face
33:46
Speaker 1: and frankly, you know it was this is where the
33:50
Speaker 1: ioa Democratic party did themselves in by trying to essentially
33:55
Speaker 1: help the Clinton campaign back in sixteen, which as a
33:59
Speaker 1: you know, did she do more for the party than
34:01
Speaker 1: Bernie Sure. So I understand that you could say, if
34:04
Speaker 1: you if you're going to play favorite you play favorites
34:06
Speaker 1: with the one that's a Democrat, not the one that's
34:07
Speaker 1: not interested in the party. But they but that's the thing.
34:11
Speaker 1: They played unfair and they got caught it, and it
34:14
Speaker 1: just sort of blew up the process from the get go.
34:18
Speaker 1: But the only reason Tovada lost this bout is because
34:21
Speaker 1: they couldn't figure out how to how to promise results
34:24
Speaker 1: on the same night. I'll let everybody else still in
34:27
Speaker 1: the blank and on the irony of the d n
34:29
Speaker 1: C sharing the same the ship, the same hopes and
34:35
Speaker 1: dreams of election nights that Donald Trump has, where everything
34:37
Speaker 1: needs to be counted on the same night and a
34:39
Speaker 1: president in the in the world of presidential politics, this
34:42
Speaker 1: is suddenly a priority of the d n C. But
34:44
Speaker 1: this is the wrong place in the West to test
34:46
Speaker 1: Latino vote because again it is all wrapped up And
34:50
Speaker 1: so I think I think the Bata is a terrible
34:52
Speaker 1: state to be using out West if the whole intent
34:55
Speaker 1: is to help your future nominee learn how to campaign
35:01
Speaker 1: to win over Hispanic votes better, Arizona would be a
35:04
Speaker 1: much better place to go. It's a much more geographically
35:08
Speaker 1: diverse state. And me that's the other problem. It's like
35:10
Speaker 1: a one market state in Nevada. Yes, Reno is not
35:13
Speaker 1: a not an unimportant market there, and yes you can
35:16
Speaker 1: argue Arizona's a big one market, but in some ways
35:18
Speaker 1: that market is so big it's five markets within a market.
35:21
Speaker 1: So I think that was a I think Nevada again,
35:26
Speaker 1: I get I know why they're there. They're there because
35:28
Speaker 1: of their insider influence. Nevada is not doing anything to
35:32
Speaker 1: help the Democratic Party be better about wooing Latino voters
35:36
Speaker 1: or Western voters or getting them smarter. So I think
35:38
Speaker 1: Nevada complete waste of time here, Sorry John Ralston, but
35:43
Speaker 1: it does not test what it should test. And by
35:45
Speaker 1: the way their last I mean, it's just in some
35:48
Speaker 1: ways too dominated by a sort of a one special
35:54
Speaker 1: interest group. Not necessarily. Now Michigan. In theory, Michigan is
35:57
Speaker 1: a great state, but oh my god, are we going
36:02
Speaker 1: to have the week before the Michigan primary. Nothing but
36:05
Speaker 1: this horrible divisive debate about Israel. Oh yes, we will
36:10
Speaker 1: now right, Michigan being in the early window. Look, was
36:13
Speaker 1: this issue going to be potentially let us test issue
36:15
Speaker 1: for plenty of voters anyway, maybe, but now you have
36:19
Speaker 1: put it in the calendar. There was a huge unforced
36:22
Speaker 1: error by the National Party and I get it right,
36:27
Speaker 1: Michigan in some ways, there's a lot of other good
36:30
Speaker 1: things going for it, geographically diverse, electorate, diverse, different factions
36:35
Speaker 1: even within the Democratic Party right, but of all cycles
36:40
Speaker 1: to throw Israel, which is really dividing, particularly in the
36:43
Speaker 1: donor community, activist community, you name it. I wonder if
36:49
Speaker 1: this becomes so divisive that it hurts the party in
36:52
Speaker 1: a general election, whether they will regret putting Michigan in
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38:51
Speaker 1: And then finally, let me get to Virginia. This is
38:54
Speaker 1: why if I was suspicious about creating a calendar to
39:01
Speaker 1: make it life as difficult as possible for progressives, it
39:05
Speaker 1: was the inclusion of Virginia here at the end that
39:08
Speaker 1: sort of cemented that belief. Right now, and it's a
39:14
Speaker 1: former DNC chair who happens to be also a former
39:16
Speaker 1: Democratic governor who was working really hard to champion Virginia
39:20
Speaker 1: in the window. But now Virginia, Right, it's the Ricky
39:22
Speaker 1: Bobber rule. If you ain't first, your last. So all right,
39:25
Speaker 1: Virginia got first, but now Virginia's last. In the early window,
39:28
Speaker 1: Virginia is the last primary on an island before we
39:32
Speaker 1: get to Super Tuesday. Virginia will be the either last
39:37
Speaker 1: stand of the moderates to try to stop a progressive right.
39:40
Speaker 1: We saw it on the Republican side, remember Marco Rubio
39:43
Speaker 1: consolidated the moderate vote. It was the last chance to
39:46
Speaker 1: stop Trump right. They came close, but they didn't get there.
39:50
Speaker 1: But it served as that Virginia served as a place
39:55
Speaker 1: to essentially give Obama momentum back after losing in New
40:00
Speaker 1: Hampshire and he needed some Yes, he was winning South Carolina,
40:04
Speaker 1: but that kind of got written off, so he needed
40:06
Speaker 1: another proof point here, and then he just sort of
40:08
Speaker 1: swept those If you recall the mid Atlantic was all
40:11
Speaker 1: together that day, I think it was Virginia, DC and
40:13
Speaker 1: marilynd went it all on the same day, and the
40:15
Speaker 1: timing of that was just sort of a huge momentum,
40:20
Speaker 1: a huge burst of momentum for Obama right before going
40:23
Speaker 1: into Super Tuesday. And I think now Virginia's put itself there.
40:28
Speaker 1: Remember this is a non registered party state, and we've
40:30
Speaker 1: seen you know, Ralph Northam one on one with a
40:33
Speaker 1: progressive It was Ralph Northam on sort of the moderate wing.
40:37
Speaker 1: You had Tom Perriello who was on the progressive side
40:42
Speaker 1: in that primary for governor, and you saw the results
40:44
Speaker 1: on there North fum One quite handily. So it Virginia
40:49
Speaker 1: has been a bit allergic to sort of the progressive wing.
40:52
Speaker 1: It's a blue state, but it is not a progressive state. Yes,
40:56
Speaker 1: there are pockets of progressive support, and certainly in parts
40:59
Speaker 1: of northern Virginia. You can find it in Arlington. Certainly
41:02
Speaker 1: you can find it in parts of Alexandria, and certainly
41:04
Speaker 1: parts of Fairfax. But the state is much more of
41:08
Speaker 1: a sort of center. It is an Abigail Spanberger state, right.
41:12
Speaker 1: It is not Tom Perriello state on that front. So
41:17
Speaker 1: the fact that this calendar closes with Virginia tells me
41:23
Speaker 1: that this is again the democratic establishment here has put
41:29
Speaker 1: in a few sort of in case of emergencies as
41:34
Speaker 1: far as and this goes to their belief that the
41:37
Speaker 1: progressive socialist adjacent wing of the party can't win a
41:41
Speaker 1: general election. Now, a lot of this conventional wisdom could
41:44
Speaker 1: change depending on what we see in Michigan Senate the
41:46
Speaker 1: cycle right, well, right now, that's the conventional wisdom, and that,
41:51
Speaker 1: my friends, is how this calendar was built. It is
41:58
Speaker 1: not a good calendar for aoc rocanna for the progressive wing.
42:02
Speaker 1: It is potentially a fantastic calendar if you're Wes Moore,
42:06
Speaker 1: I mean, think about it, right, Virginia neighboring state being
42:10
Speaker 1: last in the window South Carolina. I mean, I go,
42:16
Speaker 1: if you believe in the Wes Moore candidacy, it is
42:21
Speaker 1: literally the perfect primary calendar for him. The table is
42:26
Speaker 1: set for him better than any other candidate. Better path
42:31
Speaker 1: than Gavin, better path than Pritzker, better path than Shapiro.
42:35
Speaker 1: Maybe you know again, Raphaeld Warnock, neighboring state of Georgia
42:39
Speaker 1: going in South Carolina. That's good for him too. But
42:42
Speaker 1: I look at there and I think that if I
42:46
Speaker 1: looked at and said, who is the single biggest beneficiary
42:50
Speaker 1: of all of these folks, it is that And to
42:53
Speaker 1: a lesser extent, Pete Putages. Now I think the Biden
42:57
Speaker 1: baggage is going to be a little heavier for him.
43:00
Speaker 1: He still needs to have a proof point of winning
43:02
Speaker 1: over African American voters. That's been a huge challenge for him.
43:05
Speaker 1: But the same test that progressives get to pass in
43:10
Speaker 1: South Carolina due to splintered if the African American vote splinters,
43:14
Speaker 1: is actually a similar a similar test that pet Budagen
43:20
Speaker 1: might be able to pass and suddenly make it seem
43:23
Speaker 1: as if, hey, look he's doing better with black voters
43:26
Speaker 1: than we thought he could do. So, since I characterize
43:30
Speaker 1: this calendar as very much a calendar designed for the
43:35
Speaker 1: mainstream wing of the Democratic Party, I thought, well, we
43:38
Speaker 1: can build our own calendars here, and I'd love to
43:40
Speaker 1: hear back from you if you've got better ideas. So,
43:43
Speaker 1: because look, the calendar, this is my point here. The
43:47
Speaker 1: calendar here does have impact on the campaigns, has impact
43:52
Speaker 1: on which candidates. So let's build one if you want
43:55
Speaker 1: it to ensure a progressive, to give a progressive insurgent
44:00
Speaker 1: every chance they had ab nominee. What calendar would would
44:04
Speaker 1: I build? I'd start, believe it or not. With Iowa.
44:06
Speaker 1: We've seen it before. Progressives have always been able to
44:10
Speaker 1: right and and the socialist adjacent wing and the progressive
44:13
Speaker 1: wing are better canvassers, better door knockers, and that that
44:17
Speaker 1: is what Iowa rewards. So you know, I'd probably put
44:20
Speaker 1: Iowa one, but you could have other Midwestern states too.
44:23
Speaker 1: Wisconsin would be a good one for them, and and Minnesota,
44:28
Speaker 1: but all of those would be the Midwest state that
44:31
Speaker 1: I would pick there because you know Minnesota too, but
44:35
Speaker 1: they both they're sort of their activist states. There's there's
44:38
Speaker 1: there's a there's a place to start, you're organizing from
44:44
Speaker 1: and uh and again if Iowa you want to punish
44:47
Speaker 1: it because they didn't know how to run their caucuses.
44:49
Speaker 1: Minnesota is almost similar on that. In the South. Look,
44:53
Speaker 1: there's no great state for the progressive wing in the South,
44:56
Speaker 1: but if you're if you're on the progressive side of things,
44:58
Speaker 1: you'd probably rather have Georgie in that early window than
45:01
Speaker 1: South Carolina because Atlanta does have a younger electorate, there's
45:04
Speaker 1: a different African American coalition, it's a bit more urban
45:08
Speaker 1: than South Carolina is, and so then of course it's
45:11
Speaker 1: going to be a bit more progressive in New England.
45:14
Speaker 1: I think you've got a bunch of other states to
45:16
Speaker 1: choose for am other than New Hampshire. Right, Massachusetts could work,
45:20
Speaker 1: of Vermont could work. Maybe even a Connecticut might be
45:22
Speaker 1: the best of the three if you're on the progressive side,
45:25
Speaker 1: thanks because you know this calendar would reward campaigns that
45:29
Speaker 1: are much more people powered, much more volunteer energy focused,
45:33
Speaker 1: much more essentially enamored with movement politics, ideological intensity. In
45:38
Speaker 1: all of these cases, those states would be better states
45:42
Speaker 1: for progressive than the states that they picked, and for
45:47
Speaker 1: shits and giggles, I thought I would put together what
45:49
Speaker 1: a mega calendar would look like, right, the perfect mega calendar,
45:53
Speaker 1: I'd still probably start with Iowa. That's a big evangelical
45:57
Speaker 1: Christian base to start from there, and that's part there's
46:00
Speaker 1: sort of you know, there's two parts to the mega coalition.
46:02
Speaker 1: One is one is sort of a bit more God
46:05
Speaker 1: fearing than the other one. Right, one is one is
46:07
Speaker 1: sort of the non the non religious sort of populist,
46:12
Speaker 1: and the other one is more of the religious populist.
46:14
Speaker 1: And the Iowa Republican electorate has always rewarded movement conservative
46:20
Speaker 1: candidates right with their retail politics. The evangelical organization there
46:24
Speaker 1: in the West. I would want Arizona. I mean, we
46:27
Speaker 1: just saw the Arizona primary continue to produce the further
46:32
Speaker 1: right winners in a Republican primary. So again this is
46:35
Speaker 1: if you're coming from you want to ensure a mega nominee,
46:39
Speaker 1: you would want Arizona in your early window, judging by
46:42
Speaker 1: the results we saw in the Arizona primary last week.
46:45
Speaker 1: And oh, by the way, you get your you get
46:47
Speaker 1: the two issues that really supposedly motivate MEGA these days, right,
46:51
Speaker 1: which is election administration, which has been a constant theme
46:55
Speaker 1: of of maga's grievances with Maricopa County, and of course
47:01
Speaker 1: the border and immigration. In the South, it's an easy choice.
47:05
Speaker 1: It's Alabama. Right. Alabama has been right the probably the
47:09
Speaker 1: friendliest state there's been to Trump. It is where sort
47:13
Speaker 1: of arguably where MEGA had its first big moment. I'll
47:16
Speaker 1: never forget his first big rally and mobile right, his
47:19
Speaker 1: first endorsement from a US senator came from then the
47:23
Speaker 1: junior Senator from Alabama and Jeff Sessions. So to me,
47:27
Speaker 1: Alabama much easier than getting involved in the complicated politics
47:31
Speaker 1: of South Carolina. And then in New England, it's sort
47:35
Speaker 1: of the way. There's no ideal candidate for Progressives in
47:37
Speaker 1: the South, there's no ideal candidate for MAGA in New England.
47:40
Speaker 1: And in the northeast, New Hampshire is probably still their
47:43
Speaker 1: best bet. Right. Trump has repeatedly shown unusual strength there.
47:49
Speaker 1: But you know, here's the irony right, the far left,
47:51
Speaker 1: the Progressives and MAGA wanted to forge a coalition to
47:55
Speaker 1: agree on one early state that they both would love
48:00
Speaker 1: to have, right, Wisconsin. Bernie Sanders, Scott Walker, Ron Johnson,
48:07
Speaker 1: Tammy Baldin right, they may nominate a progressive socialist for
48:13
Speaker 1: governor on the democratic side. The state, though, really rewards
48:18
Speaker 1: hardcore conservatives, hard core progressive right. It is a state
48:22
Speaker 1: without sling voters, basically so. And they've always been open
48:27
Speaker 1: to movement politics left and right. So if they if
48:31
Speaker 1: you wanted some sort of unholy coalition between the populace
48:35
Speaker 1: left and the populist right. When it comes to the
48:37
Speaker 1: primary calendar, Wisconsin is probably the number one draft pick
48:41
Speaker 1: as being that. So, look, you may think at primary
48:44
Speaker 1: calendar tells candidates where a campaign where to campaign, No,
48:49
Speaker 1: it doesn't. What the calendar actually tells is who they
48:51
Speaker 1: have to become in order to succeed. And that's why
48:55
Speaker 1: this calendar is a much bigger deal than just putting
48:59
Speaker 1: dates in your daybook. Okay, this is one of the
49:02
Speaker 1: few documents in politics that actually reveal a political party's
49:08
Speaker 1: assumptions about what it wants to be, what coalition doesn't trust,
49:13
Speaker 1: What voters do the party want candidates talking to first,
49:19
Speaker 1: What style of campaign do they want rewarded, What kind
49:22
Speaker 1: of nominee do they believe can win? Candidates are going
49:27
Speaker 1: to spend the next year arguing over all sorts of
49:29
Speaker 1: issues that will sound probably be mostly the same. But
49:33
Speaker 1: how they do now change is because of where they start,
49:38
Speaker 1: and starting in South Carolina is already going to reshape
49:42
Speaker 1: this conversation. So I know you probably thought, God, I
49:48
Speaker 1: can't believe you wanted to spend that much time on
49:50
Speaker 1: the primary calendar. I think it is that important. I
49:53
Speaker 1: think it is that instructive. Again where and again best
49:59
Speaker 1: laid plans can totally get changed because again I go
50:03
Speaker 1: back to the intent of the Democratic primary calendar of
50:07
Speaker 1: the eighties was to nominate southern governors, and they got
50:10
Speaker 1: Walter Mondale and Michael Dacaccas. They didn't get their southern governors. Right,
50:15
Speaker 1: the Jackson campaign totally upended.
50:18
Speaker 2: That that intent of the party bosses and what they
50:24
Speaker 2: were trying to do by creating Super Tuesday in the
50:27
Speaker 2: first place, Right, they created Super Tuesday to try to
50:31
Speaker 2: balance out base voters that were dominating the early state.
50:36
Speaker 1: Votes, particularly Iowa New Hampshire. Well, now it's all being
50:40
Speaker 1: done within the inside of that early window and primary calendar.
50:45
Speaker 1: And really the two most important things that happened is
50:48
Speaker 1: where they decided to start and where they decided to end,
50:52
Speaker 1: and to me, those are the real tells as to
50:55
Speaker 1: what direction they hope this nomination fight takes. Love to
51:01
Speaker 1: get your feedback on this, because we're going to be
51:05
Speaker 1: probably strategying, strategorizing on this calendar, oh between now and
51:12
Speaker 1: January twenty second, twenty twenty eight, when the actual South
51:16
Speaker 1: Carolina primary takes place. All Right, I got a few
51:20
Speaker 1: a handful of notebook items that normally would have been
51:23
Speaker 1: bigger segments, but I wanted to devote essentially this call
51:28
Speaker 1: it a primary calendar primer, right, but the Democratic Party
51:32
Speaker 1: And again, by the way, this isn't technically the final
51:34
Speaker 1: calendar yet, but it might as well be. This has
51:36
Speaker 1: been improving, Tom Bettie, I will get approved by the
51:38
Speaker 1: full DNC. I throw that caveat out there, because you
51:40
Speaker 1: never know, right, Maybe me pointing out that this is
51:44
Speaker 1: in good progressives means that there's this huge progressive revolt
51:47
Speaker 1: about this calendar, but they were. There's one other aspect
51:51
Speaker 1: of this. Dan Pfeiffer alerted me of this because I
51:53
Speaker 1: used to it. I had a tweet over the weekend
51:56
Speaker 1: about how uninspiring I felt this primary calendar bait was
52:00
Speaker 1: and He concurred, but he said, remember they're sort of
52:03
Speaker 1: they're they're blocked in by you know what states do
52:07
Speaker 1: they have legislative control where they can actually change the
52:10
Speaker 1: data of a primary, meaning that they were sort of
52:12
Speaker 1: stuck where there were blue legislatures. South Carolina was already
52:16
Speaker 1: sort of it's baked into the law so that they
52:18
Speaker 1: know they can that's already done. They don't have to
52:20
Speaker 1: ask the legislature for something else. But if you know,
52:24
Speaker 1: I think Kansas would be a better place in the
52:25
Speaker 1: Midwest than Iowa for instance. You know, go for a
52:28
Speaker 1: state you're trying to grow in the problem they're Republican
52:30
Speaker 1: legislature that probably wouldn't cooperate about moving dates. That would
52:35
Speaker 1: have been a challenge in Arizona if you wanted to
52:37
Speaker 1: shift from Nevada to Arizona, because Arizona is not a
52:40
Speaker 1: legislature that is controlled by the Democrat. By the way,
52:43
Speaker 1: Oregon would have been an interesting place too, but they
52:45
Speaker 1: have the mail in ballots, and it's clear in these
52:47
Speaker 1: states with mail in ballots, the DNC doesn't want to
52:50
Speaker 1: have to wait multiple days to find out a result. Again,
52:56
Speaker 1: there's there's there's a lot of critical t being circulated
53:01
Speaker 1: right on that very issue. But this is how definitional
53:09
Speaker 1: and how important this announcement and this decision is. So
53:16
Speaker 1: get ready to learn a lot more about South Carolina
53:20
Speaker 1: politics and a lot more about the geography. You're going
53:22
Speaker 1: to hear things like the Piedmont, the Upstate. You're going
53:26
Speaker 1: to hear all sorts of things that in eighteen months
53:30
Speaker 1: will become second nature to you, particularly if you're a
53:33
Speaker 1: listener to this podcast. All right, before we get to John, alright,
53:36
Speaker 1: I do have a few things. Call it my notebook
53:39
Speaker 1: from the weekend. And again, all of these might have
53:41
Speaker 1: been bigger segments, but I really and again I get
53:45
Speaker 1: you may think it's a little wonky to spend that
53:46
Speaker 1: much time on a calendar, But the calendar is the campaign, folks,
53:52
Speaker 1: And you know, ultimately, presidential politics is the is the
53:56
Speaker 1: super Bowl here that we're all that we're all focused on.
54:00
Speaker 1: So look, since we're talking about the DNC, you know,
54:04
Speaker 1: oh my goodness, who's going to referee the presidential primary?
54:09
Speaker 1: Because I think if you have lost faith in, if
54:13
Speaker 1: you hadn't lost faith in Ken Martin is DNC chair,
54:16
Speaker 1: after reading Sunday's New York Times, you will now, the
54:20
Speaker 1: biggest thing that jumped out of me, it's not just
54:22
Speaker 1: the massive money problem, because yes, the DNC isn't being
54:27
Speaker 1: trusted with money, but it's not like Democrats are being
54:29
Speaker 1: denied money. The money is just money is just not
54:32
Speaker 1: being written to the DNC, still getting sent to the
54:35
Speaker 1: d SCC, the the Triple C, the DGA directly to candidates.
54:39
Speaker 1: So it's not necessarily the money problem per se. But
54:42
Speaker 1: you got to ask yourself, is Ken Martin just the
54:45
Speaker 1: right person in this job to oversee you know he does?
54:48
Speaker 1: The DNC chair at a presidential race is essentially the referee.
54:52
Speaker 1: Is this the person democrats want serving? Is their lead
54:54
Speaker 1: referee for what's likely to be a wide open and
54:58
Speaker 1: frankly pretty rough presidential nomination fight, Because when you read
55:03
Speaker 1: this story, apparently Ken Martin thinks every disagreement is the
55:06
Speaker 1: start of a coup against him. His paranoia has gotten
55:10
Speaker 1: the best of him. The fact that his tone to
55:14
Speaker 1: staff is if I fail, you fail, boy. It's like
55:20
Speaker 1: it's the other way around. I mean, I mean, the
55:22
Speaker 1: guy is a terrible leader. If that's how he's speaking,
55:25
Speaker 1: he's basically making everybody feel as if they owe him,
55:29
Speaker 1: don't you work for the organization, don't you work for
55:31
Speaker 1: the party first, not for Ken Martin first. So if
55:34
Speaker 1: he views every leak as personal, I mean, I just
55:38
Speaker 1: think he's not in the right head space. Look, it's
55:41
Speaker 1: a debacle. Perhaps he wasn't ready for the job. Perhaps
55:44
Speaker 1: he thought the job was you know, state party chair
55:47
Speaker 1: on steroids. But you know, this, to me was the
55:51
Speaker 1: mistake of electing somebody who's never been in a swing state. Yeah,
55:54
Speaker 1: you know, Minnesota's not a swing state. Minnesota is an
55:57
Speaker 1: easy state to be Democratic Party chair for. You can
55:59
Speaker 1: screw it up, screw it up, don't get me wrong.
56:01
Speaker 1: You can screw it up. But he didn't screw it up.
56:03
Speaker 1: So he's certainly a good party chair in a blue state.
56:06
Speaker 1: But that doesn't mean you're a good national party chair.
56:08
Speaker 1: So I you know, the piece is troubling if you're
56:13
Speaker 1: a donor to the party, if you're a longtime supporter
56:16
Speaker 1: of the party, if you're a former president watching all
56:18
Speaker 1: this this guy again, I mean, he sees he sees
56:23
Speaker 1: paranoia around every corner. That's not what you want out
56:27
Speaker 1: of your DNC chair. Heading to what's likely to be
56:29
Speaker 1: the most competitive Democratic primary we've had since two thousand
56:32
Speaker 1: and eight. My word, what it just not good on
56:39
Speaker 1: that front. And yeah, the money thing is disastrous, don't
56:44
Speaker 1: get me wrong. It's terrible for the DNC. But it's
56:48
Speaker 1: clearly a reflection on him. I don't think it's a
56:50
Speaker 1: reflection on the party itself. It's a reflection on lack
56:53
Speaker 1: of trust in him. So you've got to get a
56:54
Speaker 1: different party chair at this point. And the thing is
56:58
Speaker 1: is that given the trust there is in the base
57:01
Speaker 1: with the you know, it's like, who do you want
57:03
Speaker 1: to picking it right or trust? You know, it has
57:06
Speaker 1: to come from the membership. You can't have it being
57:08
Speaker 1: decided by Schumer and Jeffries. I get that that's a
57:11
Speaker 1: bad look too, but you know, you had I wonder
57:15
Speaker 1: if there was a do over, right, if you just
57:18
Speaker 1: had the same vote among DNC members ben Wickler or
57:22
Speaker 1: ken Mark. Benckler, of course, was now the former state
57:26
Speaker 1: party chair of the Wisconsin Democratic Party, versus a swing
57:29
Speaker 1: state Democratic Party chair versus somebody who'd never had to
57:33
Speaker 1: be involved in a swing state per se. You know,
57:36
Speaker 1: semi competitive races, but Minnesota in a swing state could
57:40
Speaker 1: be but it ain't there yet. Now I want to
57:50
Speaker 1: move to around over the weekend. Some of you may
57:52
Speaker 1: have seen a social video that I put out there
57:55
Speaker 1: just sort of. It was one of those he's doing
57:58
Speaker 1: it again. You know, he's below v on Thursday. You know,
58:02
Speaker 1: if you listen, if he saw it. Apparently the United
58:05
Speaker 1: States once again he spoke to Axios and he told
58:08
Speaker 1: Axios major escalation in Iran is on its way. Here
58:11
Speaker 1: it comes, and you're like, oh, here he goes again.
58:14
Speaker 1: This is the boy who cried war, right instead of
58:17
Speaker 1: the boy who cried wolf, and he's his rhetoric is
58:21
Speaker 1: my god. We know it's meaningless, but he's somehow making
58:24
Speaker 1: it less meaningful with every utterance he makes about Iran.
58:30
Speaker 1: He keeps using civilization and enduring the rhetoric, only to
58:33
Speaker 1: back away. The guy eats tacos now every day. It
58:36
Speaker 1: ain't just Taco Tuesday, because less than twelve hours after
58:39
Speaker 1: he once again made some over the top threat at
58:43
Speaker 1: the Iranians, he halted the new strikes. So here's the
58:48
Speaker 1: larger problem this is created. He is completely cheap in
58:51
Speaker 1: presidential rhetoric. And yes, you could say, oh geez, that happened.
58:55
Speaker 1: You know that his inaugural address when he sort of
58:58
Speaker 1: created this Dystope in View of the World, where George W.
59:03
Speaker 1: Bush was caught on a hot light saying that was
59:05
Speaker 1: some crazy shit. And yeah, I think former President Bush
59:11
Speaker 1: was speaking for all of us when he used the
59:14
Speaker 1: word carnage and all that sort of garbage. So we
59:16
Speaker 1: know that Trump's presidential rhetoric has been garbage and carnage
59:21
Speaker 1: if you will, from the get go. But my goodness,
59:23
Speaker 1: has he cheapened it and this harms it. Right, nobody
59:27
Speaker 1: can take the president's word to mean anything, you know,
59:31
Speaker 1: And that's the thing. It's not because every threat is false,
59:33
Speaker 1: but nobody knows which stud is real. And now markets discountant,
59:38
Speaker 1: allies discountant, adversaries discountant. He's gribed more so many times.
59:42
Speaker 1: People no longer know what deserves attention. And here's the
59:45
Speaker 1: bigger issue, why is he doing this? He's completely out
59:48
Speaker 1: of ideas. On Iran, the air campaign didn't produce the
59:51
Speaker 1: outcome he wanted, right, that was the shortcut he wanted
59:54
Speaker 1: to take. Here, the economic pressure has not produced the
59:58
Speaker 1: outcome he wanted. The block aid, the financial inducements i e.
1:00:02
Speaker 1: Bribery of Iranian officials hasn't produced the outcome that he wanted,
1:00:07
Speaker 1: and he's stuck. What's left. He's totally in a box.
1:00:09
Speaker 1: He's out of ideas because all he has left is
1:00:12
Speaker 1: full scale war and regime change, and he doesn't have
1:00:16
Speaker 1: the political capital to do that. So he's stuck. And
1:00:20
Speaker 1: ironically this him being stuck has only strengthened Iran's position
1:00:26
Speaker 1: more than a wee can. And speaking of strengthening Iran,
1:00:29
Speaker 1: let's talk about the pretty much the dumbest thing an
1:00:33
Speaker 1: American president has now done this century. And this is
1:00:39
Speaker 1: over and above starting the Iraq War in search of
1:00:42
Speaker 1: WNB that didn't exist, and over and above starting the
1:00:44
Speaker 1: Iran War that in theory was to prevent nuclear proliferation, right,
1:00:50
Speaker 1: And in some ways, why did we go to War
1:00:52
Speaker 1: of the rack worried about WMD's weapons of mass destruction
1:00:57
Speaker 1: in theory nuclear proliferation. So what does the United States
1:01:01
Speaker 1: do basically, say We're going to help Saudi Arabia start
1:01:07
Speaker 1: a nuclear program? Does that do undermine the entire rationale
1:01:12
Speaker 1: for pretty much the entire foreign policy of the United
1:01:16
Speaker 1: States in the last twenty years in the Middle East. Honestly,
1:01:21
Speaker 1: for forty years, the American Middle East policy is that
1:01:24
Speaker 1: we really had one central principle beyond defending Israel, preventing
1:01:28
Speaker 1: nuclear proliferation, preventing a Middle East arms race, right, preventing
1:01:35
Speaker 1: a Ran from getting the bomb was to make sure
1:01:37
Speaker 1: Saudis didn't think they had to get the bomb, and
1:01:40
Speaker 1: to make sure the Egyptians didn't think so. And you
1:01:42
Speaker 1: name it. And now the United States is facilitating a
1:01:50
Speaker 1: civilian nuclear agreement with Saudi Arabia, and I get it.
1:01:55
Speaker 1: The administration's answer might be, hey, better we supervise it
1:01:58
Speaker 1: than letting the Saudis run to a China or Russia
1:02:01
Speaker 1: or use bad technology from Pakistan to do it. It's
1:02:05
Speaker 1: a legitimate argument. I'm not gonna discount. But if that's
1:02:10
Speaker 1: your argument, then you have to answer this. How do
1:02:12
Speaker 1: you explain denying Iran a similar civilian framework under even
1:02:15
Speaker 1: tougher expections. Sit on that front a minute, because whether
1:02:22
Speaker 1: you support the Saudi agreement or not, it fundamentally changes
1:02:24
Speaker 1: the entire logic we've used to justify forty years of
1:02:28
Speaker 1: Iran policy, let alone our policies in the rock. This
1:02:32
Speaker 1: is just insanity to me. And again, you can I
1:02:39
Speaker 1: accept the argument. I'm not saying I fully agree with it.
1:02:43
Speaker 1: I accept the premise. If your argument is, hey, this
1:02:45
Speaker 1: cat's out of the bag. If we don't help them,
1:02:48
Speaker 1: you know, they'll just do what everybody else has done
1:02:50
Speaker 1: over the last twenty years, which is go find, you know,
1:02:54
Speaker 1: go bribe, rogue nuclear scientists in Pakistan. Right, That's how
1:02:58
Speaker 1: North Korea started, It's it's system, It's how the Iranians worked. Right.
1:03:04
Speaker 1: The Pakistani have not been very secure with their nuclear
1:03:08
Speaker 1: knowledge and their technology, and it is certainly helped spread
1:03:12
Speaker 1: and proliferate nuclear weapons and nuclear programs around the world.
1:03:17
Speaker 1: But if the United States is now going to actively
1:03:20
Speaker 1: nuclearize a country like Saudi Arabia, then who are we
1:03:25
Speaker 1: to tell the Iranians? Know? Who are we to tell
1:03:27
Speaker 1: anybody now? And we're going to do this or look,
1:03:30
Speaker 1: we've already looked the other way with the Israelis on
1:03:33
Speaker 1: nuclear proliferation. I mean, good grief, and look, I get it.
1:03:42
Speaker 1: I'm not going to sling a I'm with most people
1:03:48
Speaker 1: where I assume there's some sort of financial gain that
1:03:52
Speaker 1: Trump and his family and cronies are going to have
1:03:54
Speaker 1: out of this. You know that that may have accelerated this.
1:04:03
Speaker 1: But if you were going to do this, then why
1:04:05
Speaker 1: bother starting they ran war. What the hell were you thinking? Uh,
1:04:15
Speaker 1: main Senate, the dog that didn't bark? Think about where
1:04:19
Speaker 1: we were three weeks ago. Looked like demons in disarray.
1:04:24
Speaker 1: This is a disaster. Take Maine off the board. Democrats
1:04:28
Speaker 1: are going to have to find another seat to go
1:04:30
Speaker 1: find therefore, to see if they can win control the Senate. Well,
1:04:36
Speaker 1: this replacement primary was the dog that didn't bark. Troy
1:04:43
Speaker 1: Jackson was essentially ran away with this nomination. Out organized
1:04:48
Speaker 1: everybody pretty quickly, and what looked like a total and
1:04:50
Speaker 1: complete mess for the Democrats is suddenly back to being
1:04:54
Speaker 1: a very winnable race for the Democrats because the biggest
1:04:58
Speaker 1: development that's taken place her main set in the last
1:05:00
Speaker 1: two weeks is that nothing dramatic has happened. Domination was orderly.
1:05:05
Speaker 1: Republicans are trying really hard to make Graham Platner the issue.
1:05:08
Speaker 1: They did this little video, that AI video that morphed
1:05:10
Speaker 1: Plattner's face into into Jackson's face. I think it's kind
1:05:16
Speaker 1: of weak tea. I see what they were doing for
1:05:18
Speaker 1: their for their supporters, and I don't think anybody's gonna
1:05:21
Speaker 1: care about Graham Platner. In literally three weeks I'm not
1:05:23
Speaker 1: sure they care now, right, That is all feels like
1:05:26
Speaker 1: it's already it's already sort of gone away, if you will, right,
1:05:33
Speaker 1: I think the biggest story here is that Democrats avoided
1:05:35
Speaker 1: a devisive nomination Right now and now, it's not automatically
1:05:42
Speaker 1: bad news for Susan Collins, but it's certainly worse news
1:05:46
Speaker 1: than where Republicans thought this race was headed a month ago.
1:05:48
Speaker 1: And then, of course, if you look at the last
1:05:50
Speaker 1: two weeks, right, not only have Democrats not had a
1:05:52
Speaker 1: divisive primary fight over replacing Platner, but Donald Trump went
1:05:56
Speaker 1: out of his way to say, hey, hang on, I'm
1:05:58
Speaker 1: want to make sure that where Republicans are suddenly feeling
1:06:01
Speaker 1: better about Maine, in Michigan, Donald Trump is saying, no, no, no, no, no,
1:06:05
Speaker 1: hold my non alcoholic beer. I'm going to make sure
1:06:08
Speaker 1: Republicans cannot win in Maine in Michigan because I'm going
1:06:11
Speaker 1: to announce more tariffs against Canada and I'm going to
1:06:14
Speaker 1: make sure Ice does crazy shit in Maine to make
1:06:17
Speaker 1: Susan collins life miserable. I mean, it is what he
1:06:21
Speaker 1: has done to Mike Rodgers over tariffs in that Gordy
1:06:25
Speaker 1: Howbridge in Michigan and what he's done to Susan Collins. Donald.
1:06:28
Speaker 1: If those two both lose, they literally can point the
1:06:33
Speaker 1: finger at Donald John Trump. He is actively making those
1:06:38
Speaker 1: can campaigns harder to win. He is actively going out
1:06:44
Speaker 1: of his way to do it. But I mean again,
1:06:47
Speaker 1: we you know, Dems in disarray, not in Maine and
1:06:52
Speaker 1: not anymore. And speaking of tariffs again, you know, look,
1:07:00
Speaker 1: we're at that hundred day mark and I did my
1:07:02
Speaker 1: whole hundred day spiel for you last week, and you're
1:07:05
Speaker 1: seeing a lot of it. And there's no doubt, right,
1:07:07
Speaker 1: Republicans have benefited from the redistricting, the better maps and
1:07:10
Speaker 1: all this stuff. But the biggest problem Republicans have is
1:07:15
Speaker 1: not the structure of how many battleground House seats there are,
1:07:18
Speaker 1: how many Senate seats are in play. The Publicans' biggest
1:07:20
Speaker 1: problem is Donald Trump just does not have any idea
1:07:23
Speaker 1: what's going on in American politics at the moment. It
1:07:29
Speaker 1: is the fact that this White House just just has
1:07:31
Speaker 1: no idea how to read a room. Right. The following
1:07:35
Speaker 1: came directly from the White House's own weekly call it
1:07:39
Speaker 1: their bragging sheet. Right, they put out all the stuff
1:07:42
Speaker 1: that they thought was good things that happened to the
1:07:46
Speaker 1: administration this weekend. One of their top accomplishments was putting
1:07:50
Speaker 1: more tariffs on Europe. And why were they doing it?
1:07:54
Speaker 1: The White House release said, in ordered to protect big tech.
1:07:58
Speaker 1: What the EU was unfair to Google, Apple, Meta, and Amazon.
1:08:03
Speaker 1: They were unfairly regulating those companies, unfairly targeting them with fines.
1:08:08
Speaker 1: So we're going to reciprocate and find the EU for
1:08:12
Speaker 1: finding those good American big tech companies. So think about that,
1:08:17
Speaker 1: the populist administration raising tariffs that, by the way, are
1:08:23
Speaker 1: all just tax heights for American consumers, right, tax heikes
1:08:27
Speaker 1: on us, in order to defend big tech in this
1:08:32
Speaker 1: political environment. Talk about misreading a room. Susie Wiles, I'm
1:08:40
Speaker 1: surprised you agreed to this release going out this. I
1:08:44
Speaker 1: get that this is what he did this week, and
1:08:46
Speaker 1: it is notable that Donald Trump goes out of his
1:08:49
Speaker 1: way to protect big tech from European regulation. So if
1:08:54
Speaker 1: he's going to protect them from European regulation, imagine what
1:08:57
Speaker 1: he's doing to protect Americans. Not protect Americans from American
1:09:03
Speaker 1: regulation of big tech. I mean, it just hands you know,
1:09:09
Speaker 1: I mean, these ads are easy to write. This administration
1:09:11
Speaker 1: cares so much about protecting the profits of big tech
1:09:15
Speaker 1: that he literally punishes other countries for trying to regulate them.
1:09:20
Speaker 1: He's so intent on handing the country over to big
1:09:23
Speaker 1: tech and handing them your farm land for data centers.
1:09:26
Speaker 1: I mean, it just rights itself and they put it
1:09:30
Speaker 1: in their own Look at all the great accomplishments we
1:09:33
Speaker 1: made this week. I'm gonna have a lot more to
1:09:37
Speaker 1: say about data centers of what's going on here. It
1:09:39
Speaker 1: came up twice in a row in my Newsphere interviews
1:09:42
Speaker 1: over the last two weeks, one with Meyern Donalds two
1:09:44
Speaker 1: weeks ago, my most recent one on Newsphere with Doug Jones.
1:09:47
Speaker 1: He basically said, it's the single biggest issue in Alabama
1:09:50
Speaker 1: right now, the fact that the White House has not
1:09:55
Speaker 1: understand how angry America is at every one of these
1:10:00
Speaker 1: Silicon Valley companies, and they are going to brag about
1:10:03
Speaker 1: protecting these companies from European regulation. Who that is a
1:10:10
Speaker 1: big giant political cell phone or I guess you'd call
1:10:15
Speaker 1: it an own goal on this one for the White
1:10:18
Speaker 1: House Obama, Caitlin Clark, Donald Trump, Lebron James of all days, right,
1:10:26
Speaker 1: the culture wars are politics. We know it's all been
1:10:29
Speaker 1: fused together, but if you needed to understand the difference
1:10:33
Speaker 1: between Barack Obama and Donald Trump, we got a clear
1:10:38
Speaker 1: contrast on Thursday. On the same day, Donald Trump is
1:10:42
Speaker 1: asked about Lebron James. You know, you've got any thoughts
1:10:45
Speaker 1: on Lebron James going to Philadelphia? And what did he do?
1:10:49
Speaker 1: He turned it into some grievance thing, something about, wow,
1:10:51
Speaker 1: I've never liked Lebron James. And he basically said he
1:10:54
Speaker 1: doesn't like Lebron James because Lebron James doesn't like him.
1:10:57
Speaker 1: And then he just throws out there, well, maybe Lebron
1:10:59
Speaker 1: James is a racist. No idea how he's trying to
1:11:02
Speaker 1: you know, it's sort of everything Trump says. When he
1:11:05
Speaker 1: says stuff like that, it's sort of like in the
1:11:07
Speaker 1: old days when we were kids, you know, when you
1:11:09
Speaker 1: had nothing to say back to somebody, you just say, well, yeah,
1:11:12
Speaker 1: your mama, right, And that's in some way. Trump didn't
1:11:16
Speaker 1: know how to attack James, he says racist, right, He
1:11:21
Speaker 1: just defaulted a grievance. But his instinct was to divide.
1:11:25
Speaker 1: That's always his instinct. Divide, divide, divide, personal tax. Meanwhile,
1:11:29
Speaker 1: Barack Obama on that same day happened to stop by
1:11:32
Speaker 1: the practice session for the WNBA al starting and you
1:11:36
Speaker 1: see this video and he and he goes out of
1:11:38
Speaker 1: his way. He seeks out Caitlyn Clark. Right, she's been
1:11:41
Speaker 1: someone who's become a political symbol, not because she's asked
1:11:44
Speaker 1: to be, but because it gets weaponized, particularly by the right,
1:11:48
Speaker 1: and they sort of use Caitlyn Clark to attack the
1:11:50
Speaker 1: cultural left. And Kaitlyn Clark gets just shoved and she
1:11:54
Speaker 1: is you show me anywhere where she is asked for
1:11:58
Speaker 1: to be a political anything in this right. Yet she's
1:12:03
Speaker 1: been turned into a political symbol by other people. And
1:12:06
Speaker 1: I think the fact that she is just she's just
1:12:10
Speaker 1: about mostly kept her cool on this is pretty impressive.
1:12:14
Speaker 1: What was interesting is Obama went out of his way,
1:12:17
Speaker 1: and he didn't have a political message for it was
1:12:19
Speaker 1: a personal message, Hey, keep being yourself, don't lose your joy,
1:12:22
Speaker 1: don't let everybody else define you. So here you had
1:12:25
Speaker 1: the same day, we had two presidents, two completely different instincts.
1:12:30
Speaker 1: One uses culture to divide and thinks he's scoring a
1:12:33
Speaker 1: political point with his base. The other tries to lower
1:12:37
Speaker 1: the temperature. I could tell you the type of president
1:12:42
Speaker 1: I'm looking for, and I don't care if it's left
1:12:44
Speaker 1: or right. I want one that it's trying to speak
1:12:47
Speaker 1: to a majority of Americans. And Donald Trump does not.
1:12:54
Speaker 1: Donald Trump goes out of his way not to. It
1:12:58
Speaker 1: is one of the most amazing things. One the best
1:13:01
Speaker 1: attribute Barack Obama had was he was always looking to
1:13:05
Speaker 1: turn the temperature down. The irony is that the base
1:13:09
Speaker 1: of the right wing has convinced themselves that Barack Obama's
1:13:12
Speaker 1: presence was divisive. So they always said he was divisive,
1:13:15
Speaker 1: and the only evidence they had is because he was black.
1:13:18
Speaker 1: It was one of the most disingenuous attacks that the
1:13:21
Speaker 1: right has ever put on, and it is you want
1:13:24
Speaker 1: to talk about gaslighting, right. There's an entire right wing
1:13:27
Speaker 1: ecosystem that has been convinced that Barack Obama was a
1:13:29
Speaker 1: divisive political figure. It was talk about manufactured divisiveness. Donald
1:13:36
Speaker 1: Trump actively wants to be a divisive political figure. Barack
1:13:40
Speaker 1: Obama did not, does not, and still practices it that way.
1:13:46
Speaker 1: And I want to get out of here on this
1:13:47
Speaker 1: one last thing. Missus Todcast had an idea that I love,
1:13:50
Speaker 1: so I thought i'd share it with you. So I look,
1:13:53
Speaker 1: I didn't I did not go back to the White
1:13:55
Speaker 1: House Correspondence dinner. I'm I'm not going to leave where
1:14:01
Speaker 1: I am right now to go back to the Waldorf
1:14:05
Speaker 1: Astoria in Washington, DC. But look, it was ridiculous and
1:14:10
Speaker 1: nobody looks good doing it. And missus Todcast had a
1:14:13
Speaker 1: great idea. She said, why the White House Correspondence annual
1:14:17
Speaker 1: event should be turned into a family day that basically
1:14:20
Speaker 1: open the White House, Invite the spouses, the kids, celebrate
1:14:24
Speaker 1: the families who are stuck living the crazy schedules of
1:14:27
Speaker 1: the White House Correspondence, the late nights, the constant travel,
1:14:31
Speaker 1: the pressure of covering any president, let alone this president.
1:14:36
Speaker 1: And you're celebrating the First Amendment at the people's house.
1:14:39
Speaker 1: This is not a celebration that the president would host. Instead,
1:14:45
Speaker 1: the President opens up the South Lawn to the White
1:14:49
Speaker 1: House Press Corps to do this, and it's a better
1:14:55
Speaker 1: way to celebrate yourself. It should be about the White
1:14:58
Speaker 1: House Press Corps. It shouldn't be about the culture of
1:15:01
Speaker 1: Washington or anything else. But the White House Press Court
1:15:04
Speaker 1: deserves to have It's you know, this idea that they're
1:15:06
Speaker 1: not allowed to celebrate themselves. But the dinner is ridiculous,
1:15:12
Speaker 1: there's no in our divisive politics, it doesn't work. I'm sorry,
1:15:15
Speaker 1: it doesn't. A better way to celebrate the White House
1:15:20
Speaker 1: press cort just open up the White House South Lawn.
1:15:22
Speaker 1: And because you know, the biggest the people that pay
1:15:26
Speaker 1: the biggest price for the for the for the White House,
1:15:29
Speaker 1: for people that work in the at the at the
1:15:31
Speaker 1: White House press shops are the families. And you know,
1:15:35
Speaker 1: give them one thing a year, right, kids get to
1:15:37
Speaker 1: hang out at the White House South Lawn something like that. Uh,
1:15:41
Speaker 1: it would be a better way to celebrate the First
1:15:43
Speaker 1: Amendment and the symbol of this being done at the
1:15:46
Speaker 1: people's you know, yes, it's the house the president lives in,
1:15:50
Speaker 1: but it does not belong to the president, which is
1:15:53
Speaker 1: why it's a. It's a it's the right place for
1:15:56
Speaker 1: this celebration, to be kind.
1:16:04
Speaker 3: It is all right.
1:16:10
Speaker 1: It is time machine time. Let's go back into the
1:16:13
Speaker 1: time machine. Where we go in? Ah, we're in July
1:16:17
Speaker 1: twenty eighth, eighteen sixty eight. It is one of the
1:16:22
Speaker 1: least remembered anniversaries in American history. There are no fireworks,
1:16:25
Speaker 1: there's no federal holiday that marks it. There's not a
1:16:27
Speaker 1: famous painting that denotes it. Yet you could make a
1:16:33
Speaker 1: persuasive case that this is one of the most important
1:16:36
Speaker 1: dates in the life of the United States of America
1:16:40
Speaker 1: and the American Constitution itself. It was on this day
1:16:44
Speaker 1: that the then Secretary of State WILLIAMS. Seward certified the
1:16:48
Speaker 1: fourteenth Commandment. Now, if you've heard reconstruction described as America's
1:16:52
Speaker 1: second founding, you've encountered an idea popularized by historian Eric Fohoner,
1:16:57
Speaker 1: including in his book The Second Founding. But here's one
1:17:00
Speaker 1: of the stranger parts. One of the most consequential moments
1:17:02
Speaker 1: in American constitutional history nearly dissolved into what looked like
1:17:07
Speaker 1: a clerical dispute, because by July ninth, enough states had
1:17:11
Speaker 1: ratified the amendment for it to become part of the
1:17:13
Speaker 1: Constitution provided every ratification counted. It turned out to be
1:17:19
Speaker 1: a small problem. Ohio, New Jersey had ratified it, then
1:17:22
Speaker 1: after political control changed hands, both tried to withdraw their ratifications,
1:17:28
Speaker 1: and the question, of course, was could they do that? Well?
1:17:32
Speaker 1: The Constitution never said. Secretary of State Seward wasn't sure e,
1:17:37
Speaker 1: So on July twentieth, he issued a proclamation saying, in effect,
1:17:41
Speaker 1: if those recisions didn't count, then the amendment had been adopted. Well,
1:17:47
Speaker 1: Congress hated that equivocation. The next day it declared the
1:17:51
Speaker 1: amendment ratified. So then on July twenty eighth, Seward issued
1:17:55
Speaker 1: a second proclamation, no conditions, no ifs. The paper were
1:18:00
Speaker 1: was complete. The paperwork was never really the story, right.
1:18:03
Speaker 1: The real story, of course, was that the Constitution was
1:18:06
Speaker 1: finally going to answer a question that Americans had been
1:18:09
Speaker 1: arguing about since the founding, which was this, who gets
1:18:12
Speaker 1: to be an American? And if that sounds like an
1:18:15
Speaker 1: old historical question, remember this just a month ago the
1:18:19
Speaker 1: Supreme Court was answering it again. And one of the
1:18:22
Speaker 1: things that I like to remind people of is, in
1:18:24
Speaker 1: some ways, the same fights we were having in the
1:18:27
Speaker 1: nineteenth century about who gets to be an American are
1:18:30
Speaker 1: the same fights we're having right now in twenty twenty six.
1:18:34
Speaker 1: So look, let's start with this. It was the question
1:18:36
Speaker 1: the founders left open. We often treat the Declaration of
1:18:39
Speaker 1: Independence and the Constitution as though they're telling the same story,
1:18:42
Speaker 1: which of course they didn't. The Declaration tells us what
1:18:46
Speaker 1: America believes. The Constitution tells us how American governs. The
1:18:51
Speaker 1: Constitution gave Congress the authority to establish a uniform rule
1:18:55
Speaker 1: of naturalization. Congress acted almost immediately. The Naturalization Act of
1:19:01
Speaker 1: seventeen ninety limited naturalization to quote free white persons. So
1:19:08
Speaker 1: there was a federal rule for becoming an American. What
1:19:10
Speaker 1: the Constitution never clearly answered was something different. If you
1:19:14
Speaker 1: were born here, were you already one? That wasn't a
1:19:18
Speaker 1: technical question. It became one of the defining constitutional questions
1:19:23
Speaker 1: of the entire nineteenth century. Were free black American citizens?
1:19:27
Speaker 1: Did citizenship come from the states or did it come
1:19:30
Speaker 1: from the nation. In eighteen fifty seven, the Supreme Court
1:19:33
Speaker 1: supplied an answered the infamous dread Scott decision. Then Chief
1:19:38
Speaker 1: Justice Roger Teney ruled that black Americans, even those born free,
1:19:41
Speaker 1: could not be citizens under the Constitution. So think about
1:19:46
Speaker 1: what happened next. The Declaration proclaimed universal principles. The Constitution
1:19:51
Speaker 1: had left the citizenship question open. Supreme Court just filled
1:19:54
Speaker 1: in the blank, and it filled it in with one
1:19:56
Speaker 1: of the worst constitutional decisions in American history. Because four
1:20:00
Speaker 1: years after that horrible decision, the nation went to war.
1:20:07
Speaker 1: So freedom was easier to declare than to secure. As
1:20:10
Speaker 1: it turns out, the Union won the Civil War, the
1:20:13
Speaker 1: constitutional crisis survived. You had four million formally enslaved Americans
1:20:19
Speaker 1: were now free. The Thirteenth Amendment would be ratified that December.
1:20:24
Speaker 1: They made a movie about it. You'd probably remember the
1:20:26
Speaker 1: Lincoln movie. Some of people. That finally abolished slavery throughout
1:20:30
Speaker 1: the United States, but the effort to rebuild slavery's legal
1:20:35
Speaker 1: architecture had already begun, particularly in the South. Mississippi enacted
1:20:38
Speaker 1: the first and most sweeping Black Code in November of
1:20:42
Speaker 1: eighteen sixty five. It was a month before the Thirteenth
1:20:45
Speaker 1: Amendment became officially part of the Constitution, and other states
1:20:50
Speaker 1: quickly followed that. You had vagrancy laws, you had these
1:20:52
Speaker 1: coercive labor contracts, apprenticeship systems that often bound black children
1:20:58
Speaker 1: to white employers. Legal tools, but the same objective, essentially
1:21:02
Speaker 1: slavery by another dame. So Congress saw this and they
1:21:05
Speaker 1: realized something. Abolishing slavery and securing freedom had turned out
1:21:09
Speaker 1: to be two different things. It wasn't the same thing.
1:21:12
Speaker 1: Freedom without citizenship was not freedom. Citizenship without equal protection
1:21:17
Speaker 1: wasn't citizenship. So Congress's first answer wasn't a constitutional amendment.
1:21:22
Speaker 1: They actually tried a statute. First, the Civil Rights Act
1:21:26
Speaker 1: of eighteen sixty six, passed over Andrew Johnson's veto. It
1:21:32
Speaker 1: declared that nearly everyone born in the United States was
1:21:34
Speaker 1: a citizen, while preserving an exception for many Native Americans
1:21:37
Speaker 1: living under tribal sovereignty. It was a direct repudiation of
1:21:42
Speaker 1: dread Scott. But Congress did immediately see a weakness in
1:21:46
Speaker 1: its statue because the statute could be repealed. A future
1:21:51
Speaker 1: court could strike it down as unconstitutional if the Court chose.
1:21:55
Speaker 1: If citizenship was going to survive changing political majorities. Couldn't
1:22:00
Speaker 1: have it rest on a law. It had to rest
1:22:03
Speaker 1: in the Constitution. So here's what Congress wrote. It was
1:22:07
Speaker 1: one sentence, All persons born or naturalized in the United States,
1:22:10
Speaker 1: and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the
1:22:13
Speaker 1: United States. Every word matters in that sense, especially the
1:22:19
Speaker 1: middle phrase, subject to the jurisdiction thereof. Those words were
1:22:23
Speaker 1: back before the Supreme Court this summer in Trump versus Barbara,
1:22:29
Speaker 1: Chief Justice John Roberts writing for basically a six to
1:22:32
Speaker 1: three majority, right, you could call it five and a
1:22:33
Speaker 1: half to three and a half. With the weird Kavanaugh
1:22:36
Speaker 1: split split decision, there but they did conclude that children
1:22:40
Speaker 1: born in the United States to parents here unlawfully or
1:22:42
Speaker 1: temporarily satisfy both requirements of the citizenship clause. They are
1:22:47
Speaker 1: born here, and they are subject to American jurisdiction. Whatever
1:22:51
Speaker 1: your views on immigration policy, Notice what the court was doing.
1:22:53
Speaker 1: It wasn't deciding what immigration policy ought to be. It
1:22:56
Speaker 1: was simply deciding what those constitutional words mean. You were
1:23:00
Speaker 1: subject of the jurisdiction of than you're a citizen. Roberts
1:23:03
Speaker 1: didn't invent doctrine. He was relying on one that was
1:23:06
Speaker 1: more than one hundred years old. Now let me tell
1:23:12
Speaker 1: you the story of Wang kim Arc. He was born
1:23:17
Speaker 1: in San Francisco in eighteen seventy three. Remember the Naturalization Act.
1:23:22
Speaker 1: Congress expanded it in eighteen seventy to include persons of
1:23:24
Speaker 1: African nativity and descent, but Chinese immigrants remained excluded from
1:23:31
Speaker 1: that act. Wang's parents could legally live in America, they
1:23:36
Speaker 1: could never become American citizens through naturalization. Then, in eighteen
1:23:40
Speaker 1: ninety five, twenty two year old Wang kim Ark returned
1:23:43
Speaker 1: home after visiting family in China. When he stepped off
1:23:46
Speaker 1: the ship in San Francisco, the government told him he
1:23:49
Speaker 1: might not belong. Its argument deserves to be understood. His
1:23:54
Speaker 1: parents were lawfully domiciled in California, but they remained subjects
1:23:58
Speaker 1: of the Emperor of China. Perhaps government lawyers argued their
1:24:02
Speaker 1: son therefore wasn't fully subject to the jurisdiction of the
1:24:04
Speaker 1: United States. Well, the Supreme Court disagreed, and in the
1:24:08
Speaker 1: United States versus One kim Ark in eighteen ninety eight,
1:24:10
Speaker 1: it held that a child born in the United States
1:24:13
Speaker 1: two parents lawfully domiciled here was an American citizen from birth.
1:24:19
Speaker 1: That decision became the constitutional foundation beneath this summer's one,
1:24:24
Speaker 1: because remember the exception Congress left in the Civil Rights
1:24:27
Speaker 1: Act of eighteen sixty six. The Court had already faced
1:24:31
Speaker 1: that same question fourteen years before onekimar In Elk versus
1:24:36
Speaker 1: Wilkins in eighteen eighty four, it held that John Elk,
1:24:39
Speaker 1: a Native American who had left his tribe, still wasn't
1:24:42
Speaker 1: a citizen at birth under the Fourteenth Amendment. Leaving tribal
1:24:46
Speaker 1: life wasn't enough. Congress eventually addressed that gap through the
1:24:49
Speaker 1: Indian Citizenship Act of nineteen twenty four. But notice what
1:24:54
Speaker 1: happened in all of this. The constitutional text itself never changed.
1:24:58
Speaker 1: That fix came by statute, not by a court ruling.
1:25:01
Speaker 3: Either.
1:25:02
Speaker 1: Congress solved the remaining gap exactly the way it had
1:25:05
Speaker 1: first tried to solve the citizenship gap pre Fourteenth Amendment
1:25:08
Speaker 1: in eighteen sixty six, by simply passing a law. Now,
1:25:11
Speaker 1: let's step back. America's approach wasn't unique across the Western Hemisphere.
1:25:16
Speaker 1: Broad birthwright citizenship became common throughout much of the Americas.
1:25:21
Speaker 1: Settlers societies confronted similar questions, how do you turn newcomers
1:25:25
Speaker 1: and especially their children into fellow citizens? Now? Europe generally
1:25:29
Speaker 1: answered that question much differently, relying more heavily on ancestry, parentage,
1:25:34
Speaker 1: or even settled residents. Now, you can make an argument
1:25:38
Speaker 1: neither approach is inherently more or less democratic. They're just
1:25:41
Speaker 1: products of different histories. The nations of Europe largely grew
1:25:45
Speaker 1: out of older civilizations. The nations of Americas were actually
1:25:49
Speaker 1: trying to build new ones. Right, there were a bunch
1:25:51
Speaker 1: of literal immigrants. More than a century later, Ronald Reagan
1:25:57
Speaker 1: captured that distinction in language no constant situtional lawyer ever could.
1:26:02
Speaker 1: In the final speech of his presidency was on January
1:26:04
Speaker 1: nineteenth nineteen eighty nine. It was not the televised federal
1:26:07
Speaker 1: address that most people remember, but it was literally his
1:26:10
Speaker 1: last remarks before leaving office. He was doing a Medal
1:26:13
Speaker 1: of honor ceremony. I believe. He paused, and he says,
1:26:19
Speaker 1: he said the following. He says, it was best stated
1:26:20
Speaker 1: in a letter I received not long ago. He said,
1:26:23
Speaker 1: And he says, a man wrote me, and the writer
1:26:25
Speaker 1: observed that someone could move to many countries without ever
1:26:27
Speaker 1: fully becoming any of them. Right, you could move to
1:26:30
Speaker 1: France and not become a Frenchman. You moved to Japan
1:26:32
Speaker 1: not become to Japanese. But someone from any corner of
1:26:35
Speaker 1: the earth could come to America and become a citizen
1:26:38
Speaker 1: and become an American. Those weren't just Reagan's wors He
1:26:41
Speaker 1: was quoting someone else, but the fourteenth Amendment itself had
1:26:44
Speaker 1: already made that idea constitution. So look, we Americans have
1:26:49
Speaker 1: not ever stopped arguing about who belongs here. We've argued
1:26:54
Speaker 1: about Black Americans, Chinese immigrants, Native Americans, Catholics, Jews, the Irish,
1:27:00
Speaker 1: the Japanese, Muslims, refugees. Today we argue about immigration and citizenship.
1:27:06
Speaker 1: Those arguments will continue. Democracy requires them. But after July
1:27:11
Speaker 1: twenty eight, eighteen sixty eight, one thing changed. The Constitution
1:27:15
Speaker 1: stop leaving the citizenship question unanswered. We have an answer.
1:27:18
Speaker 1: You don't have to like it. You can debate it,
1:27:21
Speaker 1: but we have an answer. John Elk, the Native American,
1:27:25
Speaker 1: reminds us of that. Jim Crow reminds us of that.
1:27:28
Speaker 1: Japanese Internment reminds us of that. Every generation has found
1:27:31
Speaker 1: new ways to fall short of that promise. But after reconstruction,
1:27:36
Speaker 1: those failures increasingly had to justify themselves against the actual Constitution.
1:27:42
Speaker 1: Thanks to the fourteenth Amender that said, rather than claim
1:27:46
Speaker 1: the Constitution was on their side. That may be the
1:27:50
Speaker 1: greatest achievement of the fourteenth Amender. It didn't end America's
1:27:53
Speaker 1: oldest argument. It just simply changed the Constitution's answer. Because
1:27:59
Speaker 1: the Declaration of Independence imagined that America would be an identity,
1:28:03
Speaker 1: not an ethnicity, an idea not an ethnicity or identity.
1:28:07
Speaker 1: The original Constitution built the government that was supposed to
1:28:09
Speaker 1: be responsive to that, and the Fourteenth Amendment finally answered
1:28:13
Speaker 1: one of the hardest questions any neighbor nation ever faces.
1:28:16
Speaker 1: Who belongs inside that promise? So That's why certification. That
1:28:22
Speaker 1: certification signed in July twenty eight, eighteen sixty eight, still
1:28:27
Speaker 1: shapes so many constitutional debates today. It is what makes
1:28:31
Speaker 1: us different. And if you like the fact that there
1:28:37
Speaker 1: is something called American exceptional, this is what makes us exceptional.
1:28:41
Speaker 1: Not only Canada and the G seven has birthright citizenship.
1:28:45
Speaker 1: The rest of the G seven does not. They're afraid.
1:28:50
Speaker 1: They don't have people come into their countries to be
1:28:53
Speaker 1: part of an idea. They have people coming to be
1:28:57
Speaker 1: part of their identity. And that's a big desis ask Chuck,
1:29:10
Speaker 1: all right, let's take a few questions here. I know
1:29:13
Speaker 1: I've gone along a little bit long today, but hey,
1:29:16
Speaker 1: let's do right, all right, We're going to start with
1:29:19
Speaker 1: Mark each and Allen, Texas. And he writes he had
1:29:22
Speaker 1: a thought the other day beyond the church photo op
1:29:24
Speaker 1: or ai images portraying him as a doctor. Have you
1:29:26
Speaker 1: seen Donald Trump do or say anything that genuinely suggests
1:29:29
Speaker 1: he has a personal religious faith. Given a strong support
1:29:32
Speaker 1: among evangelical voters, I'm curious whether you think they view
1:29:35
Speaker 1: his faith differently than his public PERSONA suggests, thanks, you mean,
1:29:39
Speaker 1: mister two Corinthians. Look, he does not have any serious
1:29:44
Speaker 1: faith if you have followed him closely. He basically created
1:29:53
Speaker 1: this illusion that he was God fearing and a serious
1:29:56
Speaker 1: Christian when he started running for president, when he was
1:29:59
Speaker 1: desperate for them evangelical vote. In fact, it's all goes
1:30:01
Speaker 1: back if you remember, and you want to talk about
1:30:04
Speaker 1: one of one of my I think the most important.
1:30:08
Speaker 1: There's all sorts of what ifs to the twenty sixteen election, right,
1:30:11
Speaker 1: you know, sort of butterfly effects. The biggest one for
1:30:14
Speaker 1: me has always been Scalia's death. Right, and Scalia's death
1:30:18
Speaker 1: sort of put the issue of Supreme Court and certainly
1:30:24
Speaker 1: religious conservatives in particular for many of them that are
1:30:27
Speaker 1: political activists, Supreme Court picks for the b all end
1:30:31
Speaker 1: all of presidential politics. So you know, this is why
1:30:35
Speaker 1: he had to agree to like a list that somebody
1:30:37
Speaker 1: else provided. Nobody trusted him he is. Look this is
1:30:43
Speaker 1: you know, you could you could go through. He has
1:30:45
Speaker 1: never been a serious religious scholar. I don't think he knows.
1:30:49
Speaker 1: You know, he knows as much about the New Testament
1:30:51
Speaker 1: as I do. And I wasn't raised on it. He
1:30:53
Speaker 1: supposedly was. And so no, he is not a man
1:30:58
Speaker 1: of faith, never has been a man of faith. How
1:31:00
Speaker 1: often do you see him? I mean, just look at
1:31:03
Speaker 1: how few times he goes to church, right, and compare
1:31:07
Speaker 1: it to how often Biden went weekly. He was very
1:31:10
Speaker 1: serious about his Catholicism, didn't necessarily shove it down the
1:31:13
Speaker 1: throats of everybody else in the country. Barack Obama regularly
1:31:17
Speaker 1: went to church, and he went to different churches around DC.
1:31:20
Speaker 1: George W. Bush regularly went, Bill Clinton regularly went. I mean,
1:31:24
Speaker 1: for somebody who claims to be as religious as he
1:31:27
Speaker 1: claims to be, he never goes, right, He does not
1:31:31
Speaker 1: go very often. And I think that if you really
1:31:33
Speaker 1: are looking for the tell, where does he where? Where's
1:31:36
Speaker 1: he going to be on a Sunday morning? Nine times
1:31:38
Speaker 1: out of ten on a golf course, He's not going
1:31:40
Speaker 1: to be at a few. And I think he's just
1:31:43
Speaker 1: he's never it's never been who he is. And you
1:31:45
Speaker 1: could say, is that the New Yorker in him? Right?
1:31:48
Speaker 1: You know, there's this perception that New Yorkers aren't very religious,
1:31:50
Speaker 1: and you know, but he's he It's clear. Put it
1:31:56
Speaker 1: this way. There was never any history of him with
1:31:58
Speaker 1: religion until twenty fifteen twenty sixteen, when he saw it
1:32:01
Speaker 1: as a political necessity in order to leave the Republican
1:32:04
Speaker 1: Party in that era. And yes, if you're saying I'm
1:32:08
Speaker 1: pretty cynical about that, I am pretty cynical about that
1:32:11
Speaker 1: because I think, I mean, I am. I can't stand
1:32:14
Speaker 1: people that use religion for political purposes if they're not
1:32:18
Speaker 1: even serious about their religion, I'm not crazy about it.
1:32:20
Speaker 1: If you're serious about religion and you insert politics and
1:32:22
Speaker 1: do it, it's not my favorite thing, but I'll respect
1:32:25
Speaker 1: your faith. But he's not serious about his faith. There's
1:32:28
Speaker 1: no there's no there there, and it's it's pretty obvious. Hey, Chuck,
1:32:33
Speaker 1: it's Donovan from Anna Arundo County, Maryland. It's go Nats
1:32:37
Speaker 1: till the day I die. All right. I appreciate that, DOCTA.
1:32:40
Speaker 1: I've seen discussion about a provision in the NDAA that
1:32:43
Speaker 1: would deepen US it's rarely military and technological cooperation. What
1:32:46
Speaker 1: do you think the long term strategic goal is? And
1:32:47
Speaker 1: do you see any connection between the effort and the
1:32:49
Speaker 1: growing religious rhetoric about Israel. It's in circulating media and
1:32:52
Speaker 1: social media discussions. Thanks, don Look, I think this has
1:32:56
Speaker 1: been oversold on what it is, and I think it's
1:33:00
Speaker 1: certainly been a bit over sold, probably because I think
1:33:04
Speaker 1: there's folks on both sides of the aisle that would
1:33:08
Speaker 1: like to see this deal lesson. Look these this has
1:33:17
Speaker 1: been happening over the last ten years, We've been deepening.
1:33:19
Speaker 1: I mean, Barack Obama probably did more for Israeli defense
1:33:23
Speaker 1: than any president this century, Donald Trump included. He was
1:33:28
Speaker 1: president when so much technology was shared and offered. You know,
1:33:33
Speaker 1: iron Dome wouldn't it wouldn't be a thing without the
1:33:36
Speaker 1: United States military. So and do I think there are
1:33:40
Speaker 1: some people that vote for this who view look, there
1:33:45
Speaker 1: is this is the uncomfortable part of sort of what
1:33:48
Speaker 1: I would call Israeli politics in Congress, which is the
1:33:52
Speaker 1: state of Israel has used evangelical beliefs about Jews and
1:33:58
Speaker 1: the necessity of Jews is going back to Israel for
1:34:02
Speaker 1: the second coming as as almost like a lobbyist weapon
1:34:07
Speaker 1: if you will, to get support for this. It's you know,
1:34:13
Speaker 1: this is the part of the conversation that we never
1:34:16
Speaker 1: talk about out loud because it's so uncomfortable. Right, I'm
1:34:22
Speaker 1: very uncomfortable with the fact that there are many people
1:34:24
Speaker 1: who support Israel's right to exist, who want me to
1:34:27
Speaker 1: leave this country and go to Israel. It's just a
1:34:34
Speaker 1: it's it's a it's been it's you know. And look,
1:34:37
Speaker 1: Israel is sort of leaned into it right by leaning
1:34:41
Speaker 1: into the evangelical tourism, right, my kuckaby being it that
1:34:47
Speaker 1: entire sort of the mythology of the New Testament. And
1:34:51
Speaker 1: you know, I for those of you that are believers,
1:34:54
Speaker 1: you may be offended that I use mythology. I'm sorry,
1:34:57
Speaker 1: you know. And by the way, if you've seen the Odyssey,
1:35:00
Speaker 1: hopefully you realize and if you've read the Odyssey how
1:35:03
Speaker 1: much how much the Bible borrows from ancient Greece. But
1:35:09
Speaker 1: I will digress there. I leave that to other scholars
1:35:15
Speaker 1: who can make the point a lot better than I can.
1:35:19
Speaker 1: But Donovan, you've gotten into what I think is what
1:35:22
Speaker 1: makes this such a weird debate sometimes about is that
1:35:29
Speaker 1: it does feel as if the use of again, you know,
1:35:35
Speaker 1: in order to accelerate the Second Coming, what does it take? Right?
1:35:38
Speaker 1: Has been used as a way to build support for
1:35:40
Speaker 1: Israel in Congress. And it's a it's just it's one
1:35:48
Speaker 1: of those things that we all know is true and
1:35:50
Speaker 1: we don't talk about it very much. I'll just be honest.
1:35:55
Speaker 1: I find it very uncomfortable.
1:35:57
Speaker 3: That is.
1:36:01
Speaker 1: I'd rather somebody support on the merits, not on a
1:36:05
Speaker 1: not on a on a hopeful religious belief. That's a
1:36:09
Speaker 1: that's you know, not all of us believe that these
1:36:14
Speaker 1: religious texts are somehow a prophecy that's going to happen. Uh,
1:36:19
Speaker 1: And so that it's a it's a it's certainly I think,
1:36:22
Speaker 1: not the best way to make defense policy. But let's
1:36:25
Speaker 1: talk about the larger politics here. I mean, this is
1:36:28
Speaker 1: this is the last bill that's going to be this
1:36:30
Speaker 1: helpful to the Israelis that comes out of this Congress,
1:36:33
Speaker 1: the next Congress or the congress after that. I think
1:36:35
Speaker 1: it's pretty clear Israel has Israel and bb NET Yahoo
1:36:39
Speaker 1: in particular is the worst lobbyist now on behalf of Israel.
1:36:44
Speaker 1: And if they don't change leaders this year, they're only
1:36:47
Speaker 1: going to see support you official US support for Israel
1:36:51
Speaker 1: decline further and further and further. But it all starts
1:36:55
Speaker 1: with bb UH and the Israeli people realizing that Beebe
1:37:01
Speaker 1: is the single biggest impediment just peace and security for Israel.
1:37:07
Speaker 1: I believe that, and I think a lot of American
1:37:10
Speaker 1: Jews believe that as well. All Right, I'll do. I've
1:37:13
Speaker 1: got a return question. Mark Mark H had a second
1:37:15
Speaker 1: question in here, and I apologize for not reading it.
1:37:17
Speaker 1: I read it out of order. Mark H is from
1:37:20
Speaker 1: allent TeX's. The second question was, Hey, I'm still basking
1:37:23
Speaker 1: in the socks? Is historic winning street? Hey? And then
1:37:26
Speaker 1: that's just had a great trait with the socks. I
1:37:30
Speaker 1: think taking one of your pictures on starting pictures on
1:37:33
Speaker 1: an il giving you our one year rental of Curtis Meat.
1:37:36
Speaker 1: So enjoy. We've loved Curtis Meat. Here is match you
1:37:39
Speaker 1: guys will love him too. He's got the Australian accents.
1:37:42
Speaker 1: Go play well in Boston. I have a feeling, especially
1:37:44
Speaker 1: if he keeps playing as well as he's been playing
1:37:46
Speaker 1: for us, he goes. But you've been But your real
1:37:48
Speaker 1: question is this. I've been thinking about impeachment lately. If
1:37:50
Speaker 1: a president were convicted and removed from office, what actually
1:37:53
Speaker 1: happens next? How immediate is the transition of power? What
1:37:56
Speaker 1: benefits or protections would they keep her lose? And who
1:37:59
Speaker 1: would physically move them if they refuse to leave. Also,
1:38:02
Speaker 1: from a legal standpoint, is it more effective to pursue
1:38:04
Speaker 1: the clearest provable offense rather than the broadest allegations, which
1:38:07
Speaker 1: you'll think, well, Mark, look at this point, I just
1:38:12
Speaker 1: wouldn't do it. And you know, we have the best
1:38:14
Speaker 1: case to remove a president. Happened in twenty twenty one,
1:38:20
Speaker 1: and Mitch McConnell, in what will be a legacy defining decision,
1:38:26
Speaker 1: chose not to vote to convict, probably the single biggest
1:38:30
Speaker 1: mistake of his political career, and it will be a
1:38:34
Speaker 1: stain on his legacy forever. And I will tell you this,
1:38:40
Speaker 1: you know, I think it belongs in the second paragraph.
1:38:42
Speaker 1: It's not the first paragraph of his obituary, but it
1:38:45
Speaker 1: certainly belongs to the second paragraph because it was consequential.
1:38:48
Speaker 1: He alone could have rid his party of this of
1:38:52
Speaker 1: this mess, and he chose not to do it for
1:38:54
Speaker 1: fear of not being able to win the Senate majority
1:38:58
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty two. Which, right, that's always what Mitch
1:39:02
Speaker 1: McConnell was consumed by. Could he keep or get Senate control?
1:39:06
Speaker 1: That's all that that was his north star all the time.
1:39:09
Speaker 1: So as a party leader, he was very effective. As
1:39:12
Speaker 1: a institutionalist for the United States Senate, he was very weak.
1:39:17
Speaker 1: So anyway, but your question on impeachment, look, it's immediate, right,
1:39:26
Speaker 1: and then I mean it is immediate president and Senate
1:39:30
Speaker 1: Speaker of the House. It's done. The vice president should
1:39:34
Speaker 1: be basically supposed to get sworn in, you know, immediately,
1:39:37
Speaker 1: and he's removed from office, escorted from office. However it works,
1:39:42
Speaker 1: and even if he did refuses to leave the office,
1:39:44
Speaker 1: he will be all of his the Congress will have
1:39:47
Speaker 1: taken away his duties like he doesn't have any. He
1:39:49
Speaker 1: has no constitutional support for any actions he attempts to take.
1:39:54
Speaker 1: So and because the but this is why the bar
1:39:58
Speaker 1: is so high for conviction. So you have bipartisan You
1:40:02
Speaker 1: have to have bipartisan support for a conviction of a
1:40:06
Speaker 1: duly elected president to stick like that. So I do
1:40:09
Speaker 1: think the system the bar is high for a reason
1:40:13
Speaker 1: in order to guarantee this transition actually happens. If you
1:40:17
Speaker 1: had a lower bar, then you might have more problems
1:40:20
Speaker 1: than that. But you're asking me a question. We've never done, right,
1:40:24
Speaker 1: We've never We've never seen We've never had a successfully
1:40:29
Speaker 1: convicted president. We've successfully indicted a president, which is what
1:40:33
Speaker 1: an impeachment is, but we've never convicted one successfully, so
1:40:37
Speaker 1: we really have no precedent for it. But there's there's
1:40:41
Speaker 1: there's no provision that says, you know, you wait a
1:40:43
Speaker 1: week or you wait till they get that new I
1:40:46
Speaker 1: mean it is immediate. Uh. And it's always these things
1:40:50
Speaker 1: have always been treated as immediate, right, you know, as
1:40:53
Speaker 1: soon as you take the earth, you've been sworn in. Uh.
1:41:00
Speaker 1: Next question comes from Adam B of Davy, Florida, as
1:41:04
Speaker 1: he says he's newly in the twenty fifth district. Now
1:41:10
Speaker 1: he wanted to know what happened to that silly jerrymandering
1:41:12
Speaker 1: amendment he voted for that apparely Florida lawmakers and the
1:41:16
Speaker 1: spread Court just totally ignored. But anyway, as probably the
1:41:22
Speaker 1: at least the vice president of the Five Timers asked
1:41:25
Speaker 1: Chuck Club, Adam writes, as someone who's pretty much consumed
1:41:30
Speaker 1: contemporary politics daily since nine to eleven, I've never had
1:41:33
Speaker 1: the desire to read a political book. I saved my
1:41:34
Speaker 1: reading for escapism, But now I want to dabble in
1:41:37
Speaker 1: political literature. What are a couple of books that would
1:41:39
Speaker 1: be fun, non preachy read, offer plenty of behind the
1:41:41
Speaker 1: scenes access, and be an easy vacation read around two
1:41:44
Speaker 1: to three hundred pages. Thanks again, Adam. Look, I think
1:41:47
Speaker 1: Regime Change is a great read. It was a terrific
1:41:51
Speaker 1: read because it's sort of one right, you know, but
1:41:56
Speaker 1: you know, it's funny about these Trump books, And I
1:41:58
Speaker 1: felt the same way after reading Regime Change. I learned
1:42:03
Speaker 1: a lot of anecdotes, but I didn't learn anything new,
1:42:06
Speaker 1: and I don't that's no disrespect to the two authors.
1:42:09
Speaker 1: I think it was important that they chronicle like that
1:42:12
Speaker 1: everything we were concerned about in the first term. It
1:42:14
Speaker 1: was on steroids in the second term. So I learned
1:42:17
Speaker 1: a lot of specifics about the people around him, but
1:42:21
Speaker 1: in some ways I didn't learn anything new about who
1:42:23
Speaker 1: Trump is and what kind of presidency he wants to have,
1:42:26
Speaker 1: et cetera. But it's a very easy read and a
1:42:31
Speaker 1: good read, and it's well written. It's easy to consume,
1:42:34
Speaker 1: and so I don't don't dismiss Regime Change here. I
1:42:37
Speaker 1: think it's very good. And at some point we're gonna,
1:42:39
Speaker 1: you know, Maggie and or Jonathan on I know Maggie
1:42:42
Speaker 1: a lot better than I know Jonathan, But either way,
1:42:43
Speaker 1: I look forward to those guys and we're gonna we're
1:42:46
Speaker 1: going to have them sort of after they've made one
1:42:48
Speaker 1: run through all the all the different places to go
1:42:53
Speaker 1: to sell your book, but that that that is one.
1:42:58
Speaker 1: There's one other book, Who I, which I think was
1:43:00
Speaker 1: also an easy read, and frankly is I think the
1:43:04
Speaker 1: single best primer to understand what is what happened? What
1:43:09
Speaker 1: was happening inside the Republican Party before Trump took it over?
1:43:13
Speaker 1: And it's the McKay coppins book Romney A Reckoning. I
1:43:18
Speaker 1: think it's very easy to read because it feels first person.
1:43:22
Speaker 1: You're getting Romney's innermost thoughts. So those would be you're
1:43:27
Speaker 1: asking for two that are consumable. I know what you
1:43:30
Speaker 1: mean by this, right I would tell you. I'm not
1:43:32
Speaker 1: going to tell you to read to share a Judas
1:43:35
Speaker 1: book about Where All the Democrats Gone, which is an
1:43:37
Speaker 1: incredibly important book, what is probably a tag dryer. But
1:43:40
Speaker 1: if you're looking for funny weird, you know, both Regime
1:43:44
Speaker 1: Change and Romney A Reckoning, I think or as as
1:43:47
Speaker 1: good as any two for today's politics. But you know
1:43:55
Speaker 1: I'm with you, man, I do more escapism than ever before.
1:43:58
Speaker 1: Give me a good lawyer who'd done it it, which
1:44:01
Speaker 1: is where I gravitate towards. I fully confess. But give
1:44:05
Speaker 1: me that, or give me my friend Danny Silva uh
1:44:08
Speaker 1: and a Gabriell Lelan Mystery, which which in some ways
1:44:12
Speaker 1: I think does a good job of feeling like you're
1:44:16
Speaker 1: you're not just eating dessert, You're getting a little bit
1:44:19
Speaker 1: of a of an educational meal about European politics, for instance,
1:44:24
Speaker 1: in this most recent one. So don't dismiss ah really
1:44:31
Speaker 1: well researched fiction, and Daniel Silva is probably the best
1:44:37
Speaker 1: example of well researched fiction in temporary fiction. All right,
1:44:44
Speaker 1: last question goes to another Oregon A, Scott C. I
1:44:50
Speaker 1: know you're you might be a five timer at this
1:44:51
Speaker 1: point orgon sixth Congressional District. I am an advocate of
1:44:55
Speaker 1: Oregon being first on the West. I think there's enough
1:44:58
Speaker 1: well geographical diversity and constituency diversity and elector diversity of
1:45:05
Speaker 1: make to make Oregon unique. Some rural, some urban, growing
1:45:09
Speaker 1: Latino population, et cetera. I'd love to hear from you
1:45:12
Speaker 1: about that. Obviously, the mail in battling and taking an hour,
1:45:15
Speaker 1: taking a week to get the results would be a
1:45:17
Speaker 1: pain in the you know what, But I'm curious for
1:45:19
Speaker 1: you anyway. Let me get to your question, he says,
1:45:21
Speaker 1: I'm reaching out once again for your insight. CNN recently
1:45:23
Speaker 1: covered Republicans comparing olive gardens requirement to show ID for
1:45:26
Speaker 1: its unlimited past to pass to voter ID laws, and
1:45:29
Speaker 1: the reporter said, voter fraud has almost never affected the
1:45:32
Speaker 1: outcome of an election. Has the kind of voter fraud
1:45:33
Speaker 1: often cited by Republicans, Dead voters, don't identity undocumented immigrants
1:45:37
Speaker 1: casting ballots ever actually change the outcome an election. If not,
1:45:40
Speaker 1: why do journalists say almost never in stead of simply
1:45:42
Speaker 1: never appreciate you as always got sea well, because we
1:45:46
Speaker 1: have had a couple of results the most. There are
1:45:48
Speaker 1: two infamous ones. One is the one in the ninth
1:45:52
Speaker 1: Congressional district, Republican voter fraud that ride in That was
1:45:55
Speaker 1: pretty well documented about six years ago. And then there
1:45:59
Speaker 1: was one in my neck of the It was absentee
1:46:01
Speaker 1: ballot fraud by Xavier of Suarez when he ran for mayor,
1:46:06
Speaker 1: and it was documented, it was they had to redo
1:46:08
Speaker 1: the election. It was it was so so No, you
1:46:11
Speaker 1: can't say it's never happened. There's you know, the almost never.
1:46:15
Speaker 1: There's a reason they say almost never, because those are
1:46:17
Speaker 1: the there are two glaring examples where it did impact
1:46:20
Speaker 1: an outcome and it didn't. And in the case of Miami,
1:46:23
Speaker 1: they essentially redo an election on that front. So see,
1:46:29
Speaker 1: you can't say it it didn't change. But that Miami
1:46:32
Speaker 1: mayor's was I think it was ninety seven. I think
1:46:35
Speaker 1: it was nineteen ninety seven if memory served, maybe a
1:46:37
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety nine, but it was definitely towards the end
1:46:40
Speaker 1: of the twentieth century. And it was Suarez, the father
1:46:43
Speaker 1: of the most of Francis Suarez, if you're keeping score
1:46:45
Speaker 1: at home, who of course, was the mayor of Miami
1:46:48
Speaker 1: that ran for president for a hot second there, but
1:46:51
Speaker 1: that is the one, by the way, just a quick rant.
1:46:55
Speaker 1: If Republicans really wanted just making sure that everybody had
1:46:59
Speaker 1: to show a valid form of ID, a valid federal ID, passport,
1:47:04
Speaker 1: state issue driver's license, et cetera before they've voted, it
1:47:07
Speaker 1: would pass. That is not what the Save Act is about.
1:47:11
Speaker 1: The Saved Act is not about that at all. It
1:47:13
Speaker 1: is about it is creating all sorts of bureaucracy and complications,
1:47:18
Speaker 1: particularly for women. And really it's a pretty really essentially
1:47:24
Speaker 1: punishes any woman that takes their husband's last name. Kind
1:47:28
Speaker 1: of ironic that the Republicans are pushing this bill. They
1:47:31
Speaker 1: want more traditional family units and traditional practices like taking
1:47:35
Speaker 1: the you know, having one last name. And yet they're
1:47:39
Speaker 1: making it that much harder for women who change their
1:47:44
Speaker 1: names and take their husband names to actually participate in
1:47:48
Speaker 1: our democracy should they pass that law. So it's exhausting
1:47:53
Speaker 1: to watch this incorrect rhetoric constantly. I mean, Mike Lee,
1:47:59
Speaker 1: Rick Scott, Donald Trump are probably the three biggest purveyors
1:48:02
Speaker 1: of this. Everybody else knows that this quote Save Act
1:48:06
Speaker 1: is not about voter ID, because if it were just
1:48:08
Speaker 1: about voter ID, it would have seventy votes in the Senate,
1:48:11
Speaker 1: maybe eighty. But it's not about voter I D. Which
1:48:16
Speaker 1: tells you something. If they cared about this issue, then
1:48:19
Speaker 1: they would just do this photo I D though. But
1:48:22
Speaker 1: they don't care about the issue. This is it. They
1:48:24
Speaker 1: don't want this to pass. This Save Act was created
1:48:28
Speaker 1: so that it wouldn't pass, so they could have the
1:48:30
Speaker 1: issue so they could keep create the illusion of doubt.
1:48:36
Speaker 1: Remember that every time they refuse to pare down the
1:48:40
Speaker 1: save AC. If they claim this is about voter ID,
1:48:42
Speaker 1: then just make it a valid photo I D. But
1:48:50
Speaker 1: they won't because they know that will pass. All right,
1:48:55
Speaker 1: that's enough questions. It's trade deadline week. So far, so
1:49:00
Speaker 1: good for the Nats. I'm gonna miss Curtis Mead as
1:49:02
Speaker 1: I said earlier, but I like that we turned a
1:49:05
Speaker 1: one year signing because look, we didn't have him under
1:49:07
Speaker 1: multi year contract. He was kind of a flyer. He
1:49:10
Speaker 1: was on the DFA pile. We pick him up, our
1:49:14
Speaker 1: our hitting coaches transform him into something. He's finally living
1:49:18
Speaker 1: up to his to what he was as a prospect.
1:49:21
Speaker 1: We were able to turn that into a multi year
1:49:25
Speaker 1: to a left handed starting pitcher from Boston kind of
1:49:27
Speaker 1: on anio, but who's on a who's under contract for
1:49:31
Speaker 1: a couple of years. So score one for Team Washington
1:49:35
Speaker 1: on that one. Uh, this was Boston looking for help
1:49:39
Speaker 1: right now, and Curtis mean is a type of guy
1:49:43
Speaker 1: I think could probably even play any position. But he
1:49:47
Speaker 1: he he had sort of you know, with a right
1:49:50
Speaker 1: and plus right handed right handed powerheading right now is
1:49:53
Speaker 1: h There's there's a huge demand for it. So so far,
1:49:58
Speaker 1: so good. I don't like the chatter I'm hearing about Abrams.
1:50:07
Speaker 1: If you think you're going to have a winner in
1:50:09
Speaker 1: the next two to three years, Abrams should be part
1:50:11
Speaker 1: of that plane. If you do not believe the Nats
1:50:14
Speaker 1: can be a winner in the next two or three years.
1:50:16
Speaker 1: Or if you believe you have a better shortstop than
1:50:18
Speaker 1: c j Abrams in the in the system, which I
1:50:20
Speaker 1: believe we do not, then sure, go ahead and trade.
1:50:26
Speaker 1: But you want to kick the fan base and the
1:50:28
Speaker 1: total nuts trade c j abams at this trade deadline.
1:50:32
Speaker 1: Please don't kick us in the nuts Learner family, all right,
1:50:36
Speaker 1: And with that, I'll see in about I'll see you
1:50:38
Speaker 1: later this week. I'll see in super Tuesday for sure
1:50:41
Speaker 1: with my pal Crystalizo of course that comes to your
1:50:43
Speaker 1: feet every Tuesdays. We'll have more on Thursday. And yes,
1:50:48
Speaker 1: check out Doug Jones and might sit down with him
1:50:49
Speaker 1: my one on one on Newsphere which you can get
1:50:52
Speaker 1: on the new Sphere app. With that until we upload
1:50:55
Speaker 1: the gap, yeah,