Latest / Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar / 9/28/26: Ai Industry Data Center Party, Xi Plays Trump, Trump Gaslights In Midterm Ad

Transcript

9/28/26: Ai Industry Data Center Party, Xi Plays Trump, Trump Gaslights In Midterm Ad · Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Hey guys, Ready or Not 2024 is here, and we
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• 0:20
  Speaker 2: But enough with that, let's get to the show.
• 0:23
  Speaker 3: So there was a hot party in D.C.
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: Over the weekend sponsored by a lot of AI industry
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: and aligned think tanks pushing how awesome data centers are
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: in the face of mass public resistance across ideological and
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: rural and urban divides.
• 0:40
  Speaker 3: Let's go and take a look at why some.
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: Of the partygoers were so excited about our data center future.
• 0:47
  Speaker 4: I'm at DC's pro-data center party and I'm asking why
• 0:49
  Speaker 4: people love data centers.
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: Because I love the internet and it allows me to
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: be on the internet.
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: They're going to power the future.
• 0:55
  Speaker 3: Kind of necessary infrastructure.
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: It's ridiculous to be against them and I'd.
• 1:00
  Speaker 3: Rather have them here than in China.
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: I love data centers so I can stream sports. And
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: then cry about my sports teams for better or for worse.
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: But yeah, I love streaming sports and that's why I
• 1:10
  Speaker 2: love data centers. Let's go!
• 1:12
  Speaker 3: I love data centers because America is on the verge
• 1:14
  Speaker 3: of one of the most incredible scientific and technological revolutions.
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: And we need to build the infrastructure to make that possible.
• 1:21
  Speaker 3: When you think.
• 1:22
  Speaker 5: About why the S & P 500 is higher than
• 1:26
  Speaker 5: it's ever been, you think about artificial intelligence and how
• 1:30
  Speaker 5: this is transforming our economy, and there's only one engine
• 1:34
  Speaker 5: that can propel.
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: The S & P.
• 1:36
  Speaker 5: 500 to even greater heights, and that's data center, that's compute.
• 1:41
  Speaker 3: Amazing stuff there, Sagar. Are you persuaded? They changed your mind.
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: I am not. And I hate to say it, with
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: no shots at Robbie or Nathan Leamer, many friends that
• 1:50
  Speaker 2: were in the crowd, they're in attendance. I have sincere
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: disagreements with them. But I will say, the arguments that
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: are presented there, they always resort to, oh, so you're
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: against using the internet. Again, the number of data centers
• 2:08
  Speaker 2: in the United States that First of all, we actually
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: don't even know the full number. We have to use
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: estimates that are around. What we know is that they
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: were approximately a fourth a couple of years ago as
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: to what they are today. So what they are proposing
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: in terms of the new data centers are specifically hyperscale
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: data centers for AI use. Nobody is against streaming.
• 2:29
  Speaker 3: Nobody was complaining about this.
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah, nobody was complaining.
• 2:31
  Speaker 3: When it was just for internet and streaming your sports
• 2:34
  Speaker 3: or whatever.
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: For Netflix, for Twitter, people were like, oh, you're against
• 2:36
  Speaker 2: data centers and you use Twitter? I'm like, well, Twitter's
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: been around since I was like 17, and I'm 34,
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: so I think we kind of made it out of
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: that one. Okay, yeah, there were data centers. when was 2007, right? 2006,
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: I think was the very first tweet that was ever sent.
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: I was literally in high school. So you could see
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: that it's been around for 20 years. Okay, fine. So
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: for 20 years, yes, we lived in a, like a,
• 2:58
  Speaker 2: you know, moderate equilibrium of, yes, we knew data centers
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: were going up and they were largely going up for
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: internet purposes like Twitter or Amazon or any of these.
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: And there were legitimate questions, I think, to be asked
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: around that. But then the scale of that literally multiplied
• 3:14
  Speaker 2: over a three or four year period. And This is
• 3:18
  Speaker 2: the other key. It's not just the data centers themselves
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: because they always reduce it to the data center and
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: not the technology is for what, you know, by the way,
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: I mean, you could make a very good argument that
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: all of those data centers supporting short form video have
• 3:33
  Speaker 2: done more damage to human society than anything in the
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: history of mankind. I mean, almost single handedly. The internet
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: and short form video specifically is responsible for the greatest
• 3:43
  Speaker 2: reduction in IQ in modern human history. There is extensive
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: amounts of data to show that you are literally dumber
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: after you watch short form video. And the amount of
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: time you spend on short form video is directly correlated
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: to the same reduction. So do not watch it. You
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: should actually stay as far away from it as possible.
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: So even if they're like, oh, I love streaming. I'm like, well,
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: streaming's actually been pretty bad for people. Let's put that aside.
• 4:07
  Speaker 2: The second part is about hyperscale AI. And what we
• 4:11
  Speaker 2: just talked about with AI, hyperscale AI, is one of
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: existential questions, both around the technology, genuinely existential. We can
• 4:19
  Speaker 2: all sincerely disagree and or not as to how it's
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: getting out of control. But really what bothers me was
• 4:26
  Speaker 2: everything that was reduced there was about consumption and economic growth.
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: And I think that, again, is where the problem that
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: we had with, let's say, the first thing we just said,
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: where you know, that woman was talking about S &
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: P 500. I'm like, well, I don't care whether the
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: S & P 500 goes up or not. I mean,
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: I do, I guess personally in terms of my portfolio,
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: but like I care about people around me. Like I
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: want us to flourish. I want us to be happier.
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: The S & P 500 going up went 60% up
• 4:53
  Speaker 2: under Biden. I think the country is way worse off.
• 4:55
  Speaker 2: I think the country right now is not doing well,
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: despite that the S & P 500 is near a
• 4:59
  Speaker 2: record high. So that is not correlated in any way
• 5:03
  Speaker 2: with like human flourishing growth. At least the way that
• 5:06
  Speaker 2: I would define it. And so that's where I just
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: put it all together. And I'm like, look, that party
• 5:13
  Speaker 2: was apparently funded by a lot of these AI companies
• 5:16
  Speaker 2: and others. And I just think it's not going to
• 5:18
  Speaker 2: move the needle, in my opinion. Although they look like
• 5:20
  Speaker 2: they had fun. And so, like I said, I had
• 5:22
  Speaker 2: some friends. And I encourage you guys, listen, in-person socialization
• 5:26
  Speaker 2: is good. So that's fine. But, you know, I support it.
• 5:29
  Speaker 2: That is an irony, isn't it? Yeah, it is. Yeah,
• 5:31
  Speaker 2: it is.
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: I mean, I can't imagine a single rural American who's
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: right now like opposed to the data center being located
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: in their town.
• 5:38
  Speaker 3: That's like, you know what? Some people in D.C.
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: Had a cocktail party and they persuaded me that I'm
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: wrong in my belief.
• 5:45
  Speaker 2: Generally, just some advice. That's not really how you move
• 5:47
  Speaker 2: the needle. Personally, that's what I would say.
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: It does give you a little bit of glimpse into
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: the amount of money that they're splashing into. I mean,
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: they had all kinds of fancy drinks and whatever for
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: this thing. Put C9 up on the screen because in
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: a way, this motto or poster or sign or whatever
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: that they had posted here kind of gets to the
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: heart of the problem with the.
• 6:08
  Speaker 3: Whole data center push.
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: So Virginia's state motto is Virginia is for lovers. So
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: they did a play on that and said, Virginia is
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: for servers.
• 6:17
  Speaker 3: And as a... Native Virginian, let me say, no, the
• 6:22
  Speaker 3: fuck it's not. And this is the thing. It's an
• 6:25
  Speaker 3: anti-human ideology.
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: Not to go too deep here because obviously this is
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: just like a goof and it's sort of made to
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: rage bait people like me.
• 6:33
  Speaker 3: But it gets to the core of the issue, which.
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: Is that people in towns and suburban communities, rural communities,
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: urban communities are looking at this and saying, no, it's
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: not for your data center. It's not for your server's.
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: My town is for me, it's for my family, it's
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: for my community, it's for the creatures and the.
• 6:52
  Speaker 3: Trees that live here as well.
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: It is not for your weird techno-utopian future vision that
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: you're forcing on all of us with zero Democratic buy-in.
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: Virginia is not for servers. Virginia is for the humans.
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: who live here and want to have a say. You know,
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: even in Loudoun County, which is kind of like the
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: server data center capital of the world, which apparently they
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: shouted out. There was like a drink there named after
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: Loudoun County or something like that.
• 7:21
  Speaker 3: At the party.
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: But even there, the residents, which, again, this county is
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: held up as the model of, oh, look at all
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: the economic gains that they benefited from from these data
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: centers located in their town. there's a massive residents backlash
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: against how far they've gone with these number of data centers.
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: And then if you actually look at the economics across
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: the board, not in just industry selected examples that they
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: want to highlight, The economics of these things are not good.
• 7:51
  Speaker 2: Right. I'd point you to that study that we covered.
• 7:53
  Speaker 3: Exactly.
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: There was a comprehensive study that came out that found, no,
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: the economics of these things are not good for the
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: communities that they locate in. And there's a lot of
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: concern about water, about electricity usage, about the cost. that
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: come along with it. But I really think it goes
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: to this deeper issue of small D democratic control. We
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: didn't want this thing. Our town is not for your servers.
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: Our town is for us. It is for our community.
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: And we get to have a say over whether it
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: goes in or not. The irony of the fact that,
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: you know, DC is not going to be the place
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: where they're locating a bunch of these big data centers
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: also was not lost on people here as well.
• 8:27
  Speaker 2: Oh, I will say this too about, and I, you know,
• 8:29
  Speaker 2: I don't know. I was advised because I was talking
• 8:32
  Speaker 2: to a friend. I was like, you know, should we
• 8:34
  Speaker 2: talk to about like the beautification? Because I went to Loudoun.
• 8:38
  Speaker 2: I talked to the whole group. I was like, this
• 8:39
  Speaker 2: is the most hideous place I've ever been. The data
• 8:42
  Speaker 2: center alley that I drove down, every single corner, there's
• 8:46
  Speaker 2: a gym there, the gym that I go to, and
• 8:49
  Speaker 2: it was surrounded by data centers. I was like, this
• 8:51
  Speaker 2: is weird, man. It's like these small parking lots and
• 8:54
  Speaker 2: this giant... you know, hideous data centers. Like it almost
• 8:58
  Speaker 2: seems to me, and look, irony not lost, we're here
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: in Washington, like one of the ugliest cities in America
• 9:03
  Speaker 2: with like all this brutalist architecture and all this, but,
• 9:06
  Speaker 2: and you know, maybe, maybe it can be tweaked or something,
• 9:09
  Speaker 2: but there is something about it. It just puts me off.
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: That's all I can say. This could be personal. I
• 9:13
  Speaker 2: encourage you, if you live near Loudoun, go drive through,
• 9:16
  Speaker 2: like drive through the alley, go drive through that area
• 9:19
  Speaker 2: of town. And there's a lot of homes that are
• 9:20
  Speaker 2: around it too. It is very, I mean, again, to me,
• 9:24
  Speaker 2: very off-putting.
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: Sam Altman's vision that he has said publicly, again, you
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: can just go and listen to what these guys say.
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: This is, again, the positive vision that they're putting forward
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: for this tech is that the entire world is turned
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: into like a giant computer chip. And that these things
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: are literally everywhere. That is their vision. And their view
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: and their belief is that the more compute you add,
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: and so far this is true, like the way that
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: they unlocked these frontier models was they were just like, hey,
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: if we just throw more computing at it, what will happen?
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: And that has actually worked in terms of pushing the
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: frontier bleeding edge of the technology. And they want to
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: do that infinitely so that they can get super intelligence
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: that replaces every human in your job, even if you
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: don't get the existential risk, like if you don't buy
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: into that, which reason to be doubtful, it sounds very sci-fi, etc.
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: Their stated goal, their positive outcome from this is replacing
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: all of human labor.
• 10:22
  Speaker 3: That's what they're after.
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: So that's what we're talking about here, brass tacks, when
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: you get down to it with the data centers. Axios
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: had a few details about the people behind this. Put
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: this next element up on the screen. DC's latest viral
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: party celebrates data centers amid growing pushback. This was called
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: Data After Dark, a pro data center party. It happened
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: Saturday at PubKey, DC's crypto bro clubhouse. God, this is
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: so dystopian. 900 people were approved to attend. I think
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: hundreds ultimately did. Sponsored by groups like the 76 Crew,
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: the Manhattan Institute, the Bitcoin Policy Institute, and several AI companies.
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: We'll put the next element up on the screen a
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: little bit from Emily Kennard. who's with The Washington Sun.
• 11:07
  Speaker 1: This is the same new outlet that Jeff Stein is
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: with now, too. She went to the party. Apparently, one
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: attendee estimated the ratio of men to women was like
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: four or five to one. Not ideal, that person added.
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: I think probably not.
• 11:20
  Speaker 3: A surprise there.
• 11:20
  Speaker 2: That's a little snarky, in my opinion. That was a
• 11:23
  Speaker 2: little snarky, because I'll say this, that's pretty much the
• 11:26
  Speaker 2: same at every Washington Sun.
• 11:27
  Speaker 3: At many D.C.
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: Parties. This is not uncommon. I'm like, come on. That's Washington.
• 11:32
  Speaker 2: Especially when you add— So, Emily, that's bullshit.
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: When you add this is like a deeply libertarian group,
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: it's very.
• 11:38
  Speaker 2: Well, someone made a joke. They're like, yeah, it's a
• 11:41
  Speaker 2: tech party. It's like, have you ever been to a
• 11:43
  Speaker 2: party in San Francisco? That's what it looks like. Anyway,
• 11:48
  Speaker 2: I'll defend them on that one just because that's literally
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: what every gathering in Washington is. to look like unless
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: it's like the League of Women Voters or Emily's List
• 11:57
  Speaker 2: or something like that. But look, overall, it's pretty obvious.
• 12:01
  Speaker 2: These guys, I mean, they wanted the coverage. This is
• 12:04
  Speaker 2: literally what they wanted. They want a controversy. They want
• 12:06
  Speaker 2: the video. They want to go viral, et cetera. The
• 12:08
  Speaker 2: question is about why. I think a lot of their funders,
• 12:12
  Speaker 2: et cetera, they love this because it's going viral on Twitter.
• 12:15
  Speaker 2: It's creating discussion. I mean, it's really just, if you're
• 12:19
  Speaker 2: talking about brass tacks political judgment, And maybe they just
• 12:22
  Speaker 2: don't care, which is my guess. I don't think they
• 12:24
  Speaker 2: actually do because they want to win kind of the
• 12:27
  Speaker 2: fights in the elite discourse. But actual voters who, you know,
• 12:31
  Speaker 2: you can look across the nation to Greg Abbott, Byron Donalds,
• 12:37
  Speaker 2: Ron DeSantis, the governor of Ohio. I mean, you know,
• 12:41
  Speaker 2: bipartisan across the board, people who are in trouble. Everybody
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: seems to say, hey, I'm not so sure about this.
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: And you can call it a panic if you wish.
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: But doing cocktail parties in Washington in our history has
• 12:55
  Speaker 2: never really worked out in your favor to be like,
• 12:58
  Speaker 2: let's throw a celebratory cocktail party to show everybody why
• 13:01
  Speaker 2: this is such a good idea.
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: Let's throw a DC cocktail party in favor of data centers.
• 13:05
  Speaker 2: I've been doing some historical things. I just remembered one
• 13:08
  Speaker 2: from the Gilded Age. There was a couple, there was
• 13:11
  Speaker 2: like a depression or something in New York. And so
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: this couple, this super rich couple had an idea. Let's
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: throw a ball. And so what we'll do is we'll
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: throw a ball and everybody will have to go out
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: and get all of their dresses made. And so we
• 13:24
  Speaker 2: will influence the local economy. So by throwing this grand ball,
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: all of the other rich people in New York will
• 13:31
  Speaker 2: go and spend all of this money. It was very altruistic.
• 13:34
  Speaker 2: And so this was, I think it was like the
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: 1910s or 20s, something like that. And for the first time,
• 13:40
  Speaker 2: they're used to an 1870s mindset where people would be like,
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: oh my God, all these rich fancy rich people, the
• 13:45
  Speaker 2: public massively turned on them, and it was one of
• 13:48
  Speaker 2: the last grand balls in the Gilded Age. And so
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: that's kind of what this reminds me of, is they're like, oh, well,
• 13:53
  Speaker 2: we'll do it, you know, to show how awesome we
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: are and to make good arguments. The rest of the
• 13:58
  Speaker 2: public is like, I don't know. Yeah.
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: So there you go. All right, let's get to China.
• 14:05
  Speaker 2: Turning now to China, it's kind of a readout of
• 14:08
  Speaker 2: what happened in the grand Trump-Xi summit. Not all that much,
• 14:11
  Speaker 2: although some very interesting insights into how the Chinese are
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: approaching Trump. Let's start first with D1, just to show
• 14:19
  Speaker 2: you all, you know, kind of what it looked like
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: inside of the state dinner. I mean, here alone is
• 14:24
  Speaker 2: kind of fascinating to see. So this was the table
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: where Xi was seated. And so you can see President
• 14:31
  Speaker 2: Trump and Melania were next to Xi and his wife.
• 14:34
  Speaker 2: But look at the others that are surrounding the rest
• 14:37
  Speaker 2: of them. Every single one of them, major tech barons.
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: So you have there, that's Elon. He is the CEO, obviously,
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: of Tesla and of SpaceX. Seated next to him, CEO
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: of AMD, I believe. Then Jensen Wang. And then you
• 14:51
  Speaker 2: also have Tim Cook from Apple. So literally surrounded by
• 14:55
  Speaker 2: tech titans at the same table. I don't think it's
• 14:59
  Speaker 2: even lost that whenever we say tech titans, it wasn't
• 15:02
  Speaker 2: Sam Altman, Dario, or any of the AI people. It
• 15:04
  Speaker 2: was specifically the chips industry, the CEO of Apple, who's
• 15:08
  Speaker 2: such a major manufacturer, and then Elon, who is literally
• 15:12
  Speaker 2: reliant on China to build and manufacture a huge portion
• 15:16
  Speaker 2: of his cars. All of them have massive business interests,
• 15:20
  Speaker 2: specifically in China. NVIDIA, the CEO, having Jensen at the
• 15:24
  Speaker 2: same table as Xi is another statement, because The same administration,
• 15:28
  Speaker 2: Donald Trump, has been flirting with allowing Jensen to export
• 15:33
  Speaker 2: his most advanced chips into the Chinese economy. Remember, too,
• 15:36
  Speaker 2: when Jensen says, I want to beat China, no, he doesn't.
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: He wants to export to them. He doesn't care whether
• 15:43
  Speaker 2: the AI race is won by China or the U.S.
• 15:45
  Speaker 2: He's literally said that. He's like, as long as I
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: get to sell my chips, I get to do whatever
• 15:49
  Speaker 2: I want. I get to make money in the process.
• 15:51
  Speaker 2: So some interest in that. But belying this entire summit
• 15:56
  Speaker 2: there was some reporting that came out of how Trump
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: has been, how Xi has been deciding to play Trump.
• 16:03
  Speaker 2: And so Xi is not famous for smiling or for
• 16:06
  Speaker 2: being joking. And yet there were some public images in
• 16:10
  Speaker 2: particular of Xi kind of cracking up, laughing at Trump's
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: jokes and being jovial. Here's one in particular. Let's put
• 16:16
  Speaker 2: this up on the screen. This is at Trump's, you know,
• 16:19
  Speaker 2: wall of presidents. And he showed him, he's joking around
• 16:23
  Speaker 2: there with Trump showing him the auto pen which is
• 16:27
  Speaker 2: in place of Joe Biden's photo in the wall of
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: presidents joking around about Biden being the auto pen guy. Okay.
• 16:35
  Speaker 2: And so, you know, first of all, it's, it's pretty insane.
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: You know, you literally have a leader of a foreign nation.
• 16:40
  Speaker 2: You're on the previous president, whatever norms, et cetera, are,
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: have long been done in our society. But What came
• 16:47
  Speaker 2: out from the New York Times, let's put D3 up
• 16:49
  Speaker 2: here on the screen, is inside the room, apparently, Xi Jinping,
• 16:53
  Speaker 2: not known for lightheartedness, yet he sometimes smiled, even laughed,
• 16:57
  Speaker 2: projecting a warmth very unusual for a meeting between superpower rivals.
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: Behind the show of geniality, however, Xi's carefully chosen words
• 17:06
  Speaker 2: revealed a cooler calculus, an effort to steer Trump towards
• 17:10
  Speaker 2: Beijing's position on Taiwan, Japan, and the broader security order
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: in Asia. So on Taiwan, I'll give him this. This
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: is expected. Every Chinese leader has done this in their meetings. Mr.
• 17:23
  Speaker 2: Xi pressed Trump to limit American support for the self-ruled
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: island that Beijing claims as territory. But this is where
• 17:28
  Speaker 2: things get crazy. On Japan, she invoked history to portray Tokyo,
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: an American ally, as a resurgent military threat. This is
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: a country with no real military. A resurgent military threat.
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: Well, and we've been pushing them to build up their military.
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: So if they're a resurgent military, it's because we've been
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: pushing them in the past.
• 17:45
  Speaker 2: Reminding the president China and the United States had once
• 17:48
  Speaker 2: fought side by side. In fact, he brought up other things,
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: whenever it came to Japan, where he's like, you know,
• 17:55
  Speaker 2: take a look. And this is, he says, United States
• 17:59
  Speaker 2: and China, he's like, remember, we fought against the common
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: Japanese enemy in World War II. He described Japan as
• 18:06
  Speaker 2: fascist and militarist aggressors, reviving an image of Japan as
• 18:11
  Speaker 2: an enemy state that cannot be trusted on the global stage.
• 18:15
  Speaker 2: And this all falls in line with a month's long
• 18:18
  Speaker 2: effort by Beijing to punish Japan over the comments of
• 18:23
  Speaker 2: their prime minister in November made in defense of Taiwan.
• 18:27
  Speaker 2: And so that is where things should get scary. It's
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: fine to say Taiwan, longstanding issue. But they're like, hey, Japan. fascist, militarist.
• 18:37
  Speaker 2: I'm like, okay, well, it's been 80 years. They got nuked.
• 18:40
  Speaker 2: It's kind of a different entire society literally now. They
• 18:43
  Speaker 2: don't even have their own military. They have a self-defense force.
• 18:46
  Speaker 2: And yeah, to the extent that they're rearming, it's because
• 18:48
  Speaker 2: we've told them to because we want them to buy
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: more of our weapons. In fact, we sold them Tomahawk
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: missiles and then we were like, oh, actually, we can't
• 18:55
  Speaker 2: give them to you because we need them for ourselves.
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: I mean, this is the scary part, right? Where she
• 19:01
  Speaker 2: is open for business in terms of how they're diplomatically-
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: Trying to come towards Trump and he's like, oh, I'll
• 19:07
  Speaker 2: laugh at your silly Joe Biden joke. That's fine. But
• 19:11
  Speaker 2: he's like, you know, what's going on with Japan? And
• 19:13
  Speaker 2: don't forget, remember, Trump is a person who in the
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: past has been and made several jokes about Pearl Harbor
• 19:18
  Speaker 2: doesn't go off that well in Japan. I can tell
• 19:21
  Speaker 2: you that. I don't know, if I was a Japanese,
• 19:23
  Speaker 2: I would be very worried right now.
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: You know, the reason why it may land with Trump, too,
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: and the way they portray it in this article, which
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: I buy, is he's just sort of bringing these things up,
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: you know?
• 19:31
  Speaker 2: Yeah, he just, it's like a straight comment.
• 19:32
  Speaker 3: Just keep, you know, keep pushing the narrative, keep pushing
• 19:35
  Speaker 3: the narrative. We all know Trump's very suggestible.
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: Yes. But also, his mind is kind of locked in this, like,
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: late 80s, early 90s mentality. And Japan at that time,
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: this was before they had their, years of no growth
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: and zero interest rates and all this stuff. they were
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: seen as sort of like the China of the time.
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: There was all this panic and fear-mongering about the rise
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: of Japan and how Japan was going to destroy our
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: economy and they were going to be our near-peer rival
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: and all of this sort of stuff. And Trump very
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: much maintains mentalities from that era. So it would not
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: surprise me if this does sort of seep into his
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: mentality in this kind of way.
• 20:13
  Speaker 2: I 100% agree. And that is why when I was
• 20:16
  Speaker 2: reading this, I was like, this is a big problem.
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: I mean, Japan... You better start a nuclear weapons program
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: tomorrow because you can see here how this is all going.
• 20:27
  Speaker 2: And the thing is, too, for Trump, there's the hard
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: power calculus and there's also the suggestiveness. The Chinese are
• 20:33
  Speaker 2: very smart. They have studied Trump. They know. Laugh at
• 20:35
  Speaker 2: the jokes. Laugh at his silly Joe Biden thing. And
• 20:37
  Speaker 2: then you pepper in a few asks. That Taiwanese arms deal,
• 20:40
  Speaker 2: they even talk about it inside the story and in
• 20:42
  Speaker 2: multiple other ones. It was previously a go from Congress
• 20:46
  Speaker 2: and from the administration. It was not officially put on ice.
• 20:51
  Speaker 2: it hasn't yet been delivered. So the big question is,
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: is that going to go through? You could even see
• 20:56
  Speaker 2: how they could easily say, hey, we've got all this
• 20:59
  Speaker 2: stuff going on with Iran. We got to keep it
• 21:01
  Speaker 2: for ourselves, right? Well, the Taiwanese, I mean, they have
• 21:04
  Speaker 2: big questions to ask for themselves. They've just had this election. However,
• 21:08
  Speaker 2: the opposition leader recently was just feted in China. The
• 21:12
  Speaker 2: Chinese are trying to pursue the strategy where they don't
• 21:14
  Speaker 2: want a military to take over Taiwan. They've seen what
• 21:16
  Speaker 2: happened to Ukraine and Russia. They don't want to be
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: cast as some global pariah. They need to keep trade.
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: They want to convince the Taiwanese to vote for reunification.
• 21:26
  Speaker 2: And that way, they can do this under the guise
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: of diplomacy and, you know, nudge things a little bit
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: in the direction. But their nightmare is some sort, at
• 21:33
  Speaker 2: least from what I can tell, an actual military campaign
• 21:36
  Speaker 2: in the immediate future. Of course, all of their strategic
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: calculus could change depending on the situation, especially if they
• 21:42
  Speaker 2: think that the U.S. is completely weak. But I do
• 21:44
  Speaker 2: think it is very obvious inside of this that Xi
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: and the Chinese are really are kind of playing their
• 21:50
  Speaker 2: hands where they can. Like Japan and with South Korea,
• 21:53
  Speaker 2: they see an opening that there has not been in
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: East Asia for decades in terms of, I mean, think
• 21:59
  Speaker 2: about it. The U.S. security alliance with East Asia has
• 22:01
  Speaker 2: been rock solid for decades. Nobody, even no Chinese leader, has,
• 22:06
  Speaker 2: I think, been this brazen in these bilateral conversations to
• 22:10
  Speaker 2: be like, yeah, they're fascist militarists. We fought together. They're
• 22:13
  Speaker 2: a resurgent military. Any normal American person would be like,
• 22:16
  Speaker 2: what are you talking about? But this is the reality
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: in the post-Iran war situation. And I don't think that
• 22:22
  Speaker 2: this came up by accident at all. Now, do I
• 22:25
  Speaker 2: think it's going to lead to a war tomorrow? No,
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: that's not what I'm saying. But what I am saying is,
• 22:29
  Speaker 2: given the long-term trends of the declining US military power,
• 22:34
  Speaker 2: and especially the trade-offs that we've now made, and really
• 22:37
  Speaker 2: the sacrificing of a lot of defense in East Asia,
• 22:40
  Speaker 2: I don't think it's an accident that she is starting to,
• 22:42
  Speaker 2: you know, bring a lot of this up with Trump.
• 22:44
  Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely.
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: And Trump is also very inclined towards this view of
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: like spheres of influence. So you could see him being like, oh,
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: that's their sphere of influence. So they're allowed to do
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: what they.
• 22:53
  Speaker 3: Want to do.
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: Let's go and put the FT right up here of
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: what went down before their takeaway is pomp prevails over
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: substance as Donald Trump hosts Xi Jinping. I think that's
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: pretty accurate based on what I can tell. There wasn't
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: much that was agreed on. Probably the biggest two deliverables is,
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: number one, China's going to give us some more pandas.
• 23:12
  Speaker 3: Amazing. Adorable. I think they're going to the zoo in Atlanta, maybe.
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: And second of all, this AI red phone that we
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: discussed last week, where there will be a hotline where
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: if there's some sort of an AI incident, The leaders
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: can be in touch with each other. The countries can
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: be in touch with each other quickly, which I think
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: is good. I'm glad to see that. And there's some
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: sort of that starts to lead in the direction of
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: gaining confidence about our ability to collaborate on AI, which
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: is going to be necessary because it is a global technology.
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: This isn't something that you can keep within the borders
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: of one country. So that's positive to see. Other than that,
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: that's really about it. And Trump literally and figuratively rolled
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: out the red carpet for Xi Jinping. Very different, you know,
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: and all these things are sort of tedious, but they
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: matter a lot in diplomatic circles and especially in a
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: country like China. When Trump went to China, Xi did
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: not meet him coming off the plane. Trump did meet
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: Xi coming off the plane here, rolled out the red carpet,
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: had the big state dinner, brought in all the tech
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: conchos and all of that sort of stuff. That's a
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: win for China that wants to be seen as a
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: peer of the United States. So that for them is
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: a sort of, you know, symbolic victory there.
• 24:24
  Speaker 2: And this has been all over their state media. That
• 24:27
  Speaker 2: thing about Trump meeting him, I mean, I even said
• 24:29
  Speaker 2: it here. I was like, look, I know nobody here cares,
• 24:31
  Speaker 2: but over there, that stuff matters a lot. They're obsessed
• 24:33
  Speaker 2: with protocol. And it was all over their state media.
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: They're like, Trump met him there, and look at how
• 24:38
  Speaker 2: much respect he gives Chairman Xi. And apparently, there were
• 24:42
  Speaker 2: all these brawls at the White House between the Chinese
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: press and the American press about who could stand where.
• 24:48
  Speaker 2: That's kind of par for the course in terms of
• 24:51
  Speaker 2: State visits with China. But yeah, I mean, overall, it
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: was a fascinating visit because it was literally all pomp,
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: no circumstance.
• 24:58
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 24:59
  Speaker 2: And I mean, that does say something that the Chinese
• 25:01
  Speaker 2: were not in a position where they had to say, OK,
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: we'll give you this. OK, we'll give you this.
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: And we kicked the trade war piece down the road
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: a few more months.
• 25:09
  Speaker 2: Which always happens.
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: And, you know, I think the status quo there is
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: China basically, when we tried to impose these gigantic tariffs,
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: they were like, okay, well, we can hold your rare
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: earth minerals hostage. And ultimately we were like, okay, well,
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: you got us there. So I guess we're going to
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: basically cave. And so we're kind of in this, you know,
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: in between status quo situation with them on that piece
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: as well. So no real progress there, just sort of
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: kicking the can down the road in terms of any
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: larger economic dealings.
• 25:37
  Speaker 2: Correct.
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: All right.
• 25:38
  Speaker 2: Let's get to the midterms.
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: So as we get very close to the midterm elections,
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: Trump is now going up with a new political ad. However,
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: this ad is not being paid for by any PAC
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: or Super PAC or campaign. It is being paid for
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: by you. Blatantly political ad pumping up Trump coming from
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: taxpayer dollars. Sagar actually saw this yesterday live watching football.
• 26:07
  Speaker 3: Let's go and take a look at the ad.
• 26:09
  Speaker 2: This is the final battle.
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: With you at my side, we will demolish the deep state.
• 26:14
  Speaker 4: We will expel the warmongers.
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: From our government.
• 26:17
  Speaker 2: We will drive out the globalists.
• 26:19
  Speaker 4: We will cast out the communists, Marxists, and fascists. We
• 26:23
  Speaker 4: will throw off the sick political class.
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: That hates our country.
• 26:27
  Speaker 4: We will rout the fake news media.
• 26:30
  Speaker 2: And we will liberate America from these villains once and
• 26:34
  Speaker 2: for all.
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: So it literally at the bottom says paid for by
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: the U.S.
• 26:39
  Speaker 3: Government.
• 26:40
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I was.
• 26:41
  Speaker 3: You and me, our tax dollars going to that.
• 26:43
  Speaker 2: I was literally in shock. I'm watching. I think it
• 26:45
  Speaker 2: was the Chargers game. And I see and all of
• 26:48
  Speaker 2: a sudden I hear this. I'm like, oh, must be some.
• 26:51
  Speaker 2: campaign ad and then I thought to myself how ironic
• 26:54
  Speaker 2: will drive the warmongers out of Washington like bro look
• 26:58
  Speaker 2: like look inside the house you know it's like and
• 27:01
  Speaker 2: then I was I made that comment I was like
• 27:03
  Speaker 2: can you believe they just ran this ad and I'm
• 27:05
  Speaker 2: assuming it's like some local Republican Party and then it's
• 27:07
  Speaker 2: I was like There's no way. I said, I even
• 27:10
  Speaker 2: tweeted that. I go, did I really just watch a U.S.
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: government paid ad of Trump saying I'm going to drive
• 27:14
  Speaker 2: warmongers out of Washington? Like, look inside the building, man,
• 27:18
  Speaker 2: especially you're in the middle of the Iran war. That's
• 27:20
  Speaker 2: like a campaign speech from 2016. So a couple of things.
• 27:23
  Speaker 2: First of all, crazy that the U.S. government is paying
• 27:26
  Speaker 2: for that ad. Of course, Kirstie Noem has previously ran
• 27:29
  Speaker 2: ads like pumping her cell phone, which I remember also
• 27:32
  Speaker 2: watching live on Fox News. But I'd actually pay attention
• 27:36
  Speaker 2: to the message. The fact that they are running this
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: 2016 style ad of like, we're going to clean out Washington,
• 27:43
  Speaker 2: drain the swamp, no more warmongers, no more globalism, when
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: that is quite literally what you're engaged in right now.
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: So even they know that they have to run basically
• 27:54
  Speaker 2: a taxpayer funded gaslighting campaign on national television. And we
• 27:58
  Speaker 2: shouldn't underestimate how many people are going to see this ad. Now,
• 28:01
  Speaker 2: do I think that they're going to see it and
• 28:03
  Speaker 2: that it's going to be effective. No, I think a
• 28:04
  Speaker 2: lot of people are going to have the same reaction,
• 28:06
  Speaker 2: be like, dude, the guy who was in the middle
• 28:08
  Speaker 2: of the Iran war is saying we're going to drive
• 28:09
  Speaker 2: warmongers out of Washington. So I don't think it's necessarily
• 28:12
  Speaker 2: going to work out to their benefit. But they bought
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: hyper expensive real estate across the entire 1 p.m. slate
• 28:19
  Speaker 2: for all of NFL football. And I got a lot
• 28:22
  Speaker 2: of other people telling me, they're like, oh, I saw
• 28:24
  Speaker 2: it during this game. I know that it played in primetime.
• 28:27
  Speaker 2: They made a specific targeted ad buy. for the NFL,
• 28:30
  Speaker 2: which is when, you know, the best and most expensive
• 28:33
  Speaker 2: advertising real estate in the nation. Yeah.
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: And to your point about the efficacy of it, normally
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: what happens when you have a very unpopular president during
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: a midterm election, which Trump is now the most unpopular president,
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: incumbent president during a midterm election in modern history, normally
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: you want that person to kind of go away and
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: for candidates to be able to assert their independence from
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: that person. So the fact that he's making himself omnipresent
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: here with this gaslighting campaign, again, not sure that's exactly
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: what Republicans are hoping for. Interesting moment from Republican Senator Kennedy,
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: who is quite a character, by the way. You may
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: have appreciated his work in the Kash Patel bestiality questioning,
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: if you want to go back and look at some
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: of his previous comedic stylings. In any case, he was asked, hey,
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: how about this U.S. taxpayer-funded ad for President Trump? And again,
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: Republican had to be like, yeah, this is not really
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: something I support.
• 29:34
  Speaker 3: Let's take a look at that.
• 29:36
  Speaker 4: I don't think any public official, including President Trump or
• 29:40
  Speaker 4: Kristi Noem or John Kennedy, should spend public money on
• 29:46
  Speaker 4: private ads for themselves. Now, the White House sees it differently,
• 29:53
  Speaker 4: but I think there ought to be a rule that
• 29:55
  Speaker 4: you can't, well, there probably is a rule, you can't
• 29:57
  Speaker 4: spend public money to promote yourself. I may end up
• 30:03
  Speaker 4: with a sombrero on my head, but I also think
• 30:06
  Speaker 4: that we ought to have a rule that no politician
• 30:13
  Speaker 4: can have a building named after him while he's alive.
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: There you go.
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: So, you know, pushing back on Trump on two things here,
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: one of them near and dear to his heart, which
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: is the naming of public buildings in the city after him.
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: And the other one being this taxpayer-funded ad where I
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: like when he catches himself. He's like, there should be
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: a rule against this. And he's like, there probably is
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: a rule against this. Yes, it probably is illegal. It
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: is probably illegal to use taxpayer dollars for blatant electioneering
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: of this manner. Now, it can be contested. You don't
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: directly tell people to vote for the Republicans, et cetera.
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: So maybe it falls into a gray area.
• 30:48
  Speaker 3: I'm not sure. But I think most people will look
• 30:50
  Speaker 3: at this and go, this should be illegal.
• 30:51
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean— We should probably just say the U.S.
• 30:53
  Speaker 2: government should put ads, period. Because I was like, oh,
• 30:56
  Speaker 2: but Obama ran ads for Obamacare. And I'm like, yeah, well,
• 31:00
  Speaker 2: that was Obamacare. I mean, I get it. It's Obamacare. But,
• 31:04
  Speaker 2: you know, this seems to be a little bit different
• 31:06
  Speaker 2: in the lead up to a midterm election. Just look,
• 31:09
  Speaker 2: I'm going to put all this legality bullshit aside. The
• 31:11
  Speaker 2: fact is, the guy's paying for the ad. And literally
• 31:15
  Speaker 2: saying he's going to stop doing things or he's going
• 31:17
  Speaker 2: to stop things that he is doing.
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 31:20
  Speaker 2: So how is this going to work? Like, I can't
• 31:22
  Speaker 2: be the only person who was like, I cannot believe
• 31:24
  Speaker 2: that that was I can't believe that the person at
• 31:26
  Speaker 2: war with Iran is going to say I'm going to
• 31:28
  Speaker 2: drive the warmongers out of Washington. Like, that just seems
• 31:31
  Speaker 2: totally insane to me. And I think that that cognitive dissonance,
• 31:35
  Speaker 2: but basically like outright lying, is just going to massively backfire. Yeah.
• 31:38
  Speaker 2: Come midterm time.
• 31:39
  Speaker 3: Let's put E6 up on the screen.
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: So this is some more New York Times reporting about
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: some of the things we've already covered here. A number
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: of Republicans, including Mike Rogers, who is like quintessential neocon
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: for years and years and pushing for the Iran war,
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: celebrated the Iran war until he looked at the polls
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: and was like, I literally cannot win if I hold
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: this position. is now claiming he wants it to end.
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: Ashley Hinson in Iowa, a state that should never have
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: been even contested for Republicans and now appears to be
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: down in the polls. She has voted in favor of
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: this war multiple times and now all of a sudden
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: is like, oh, I want it to end.
• 32:16
  Speaker 3: In any case.
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: This, along with what you heard from John Kennedy, along
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: what we've seen from Senator Curtis in Utah, who wants
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: to investigate Don Jr. and his wedding funding, you are
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: starting to see some Republicans break with Trump. And there
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: is a question of whether this will be a trickle
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: and then Trump will reassert control and will replay the
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: same dynamics we've seen over and over again, which is
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: just ask Thomas Massey if you go too far in
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: terms of your Trump criticism, you're going to find yourself out.
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: of good standing with the Republican Party, or whether this
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: is the start of a larger, dam-breaking flood that could
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: potentially come after the midterm elections if you do have
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: some sort of a massive reckoning. And I think that
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: is really the kind of question on the table right now.
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: And it's in that light that I see— put E5 up
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: on the screen— This Trump freakout over this longtime congresswoman,
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: Maria Elvira Salazar, who, yeah, which one is it?
• 33:19
  Speaker 2: It's E5.
• 33:19
  Speaker 3: Put this up on the screen.
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: So she put out an ad where she straight to
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: the camera, you know, kind of chided Trump a bit
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: over the aggressive mass deportation policies.
• 33:33
  Speaker 3: This is very interesting. Her district's overwhelmingly Cuban.
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: Mm-hmm. And Cubans have long gotten a pass from other
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: major immigration pushes. They've literally by the law been treated differently.
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: And I was talking to Ryan about this because he's
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: got like family and professional ties in South Florida. And
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: he was like, look, there's a racism to this of like, oh, no,
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: we're not like those people. So the fact that Cubans
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: have also been included and treated the same way in
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: the mass deportation policy has been a big problem for them.
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: So she put out this ad like, you know, you're
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: going too far effectively in a very diplomatic language. He
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: had a total crash out over this, posted like 14
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: different times, was amplifying Laura Loomer saying Republicans should kick
• 34:12
  Speaker 1: her out and find a new candidate for this seat, etc.
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: And the reason I think he's crashing out so hard
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: over this is to try to make an example of
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: her and try to get people back in line. He
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: needs to enforce his control over the party right now
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: because he can also see these few little slippages of
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: people trying to distance themselves. And also worries that if
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: the midterm goes really poorly for Republicans, maybe he does
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: face a little bit of pushback from Republicans that he's
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: really never seen before during his time in office.
• 34:41
  Speaker 2: Salazar is an interesting case. She is best described as
• 34:45
  Speaker 2: one of these South Florida neocons, like, you know, literally. Oh, yeah.
• 34:49
  Speaker 2: in terms of, oh, we must liberate Venezuela, we have
• 34:52
  Speaker 2: to liberate Cuba, and then we should invite them all
• 34:54
  Speaker 2: here because we love them. You know, I mean, this
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: is why I have no sympathy for her. Like you said,
• 34:59
  Speaker 2: these people, like, they literally had all these laws like
• 35:04
  Speaker 2: wet foot, dry foot, and all this other nonsense in U.S.
• 35:06
  Speaker 2: immigration law, which basically exempted them from every other type
• 35:10
  Speaker 2: of asylum group on the planet. And then all of
• 35:12
  Speaker 2: a sudden, I'm like, yeah, you're here illegally. Sorry. It
• 35:15
  Speaker 2: turns out, you know, you're not different than everybody else.
• 35:18
  Speaker 2: In her district, I will also say she has always
• 35:21
  Speaker 2: been one of these immigration dove, I guess, for lack
• 35:26
  Speaker 2: of a better word. She basically introduced an amnesty bill
• 35:28
  Speaker 2: years ago. Trump didn't even say anything at the time.
• 35:32
  Speaker 2: In terms of this ad, the only reason that she's
• 35:34
  Speaker 2: coming under fire is because she said that Trump went
• 35:36
  Speaker 2: too far, ironically enough. I see it more in terms
• 35:42
  Speaker 2: of what you're saying. They need to enforce loyalty to
• 35:46
  Speaker 2: him within the party now. And I mean, that can
• 35:49
  Speaker 2: go both ways because politicians are deeply self-interested people. They
• 35:54
  Speaker 2: will only do what is in their best interest. For now,
• 35:58
  Speaker 2: like they showed with Massey, you break with Trump, you'll
• 36:01
  Speaker 2: have an ocean of money spent against you and Trump
• 36:03
  Speaker 2: will endorse your opponent. The question is how long that's
• 36:05
  Speaker 2: going to continue to work. I will not, though, let
• 36:09
  Speaker 2: people delude themselves. Salazar may win, to be clear, just
• 36:11
  Speaker 2: because South Florida is unique. It's kind of a different place.
• 36:14
  Speaker 2: But overall, Trump is still very popular with Republicans. People
• 36:17
  Speaker 2: need to grapple with that, especially primary. Primary boomers are
• 36:21
  Speaker 2: mainline in information that you and I would look at
• 36:23
  Speaker 2: and be like, I can't even believe this shit is real.
• 36:25
  Speaker 2: But that's the reality of Fox News, of Jesse Waters,
• 36:29
  Speaker 2: and all of this other stuff that they are getting
• 36:31
  Speaker 2: on an absolute daily basis. So I do think that
• 36:34
  Speaker 2: that's something I wanted to highlight, is that there is,
• 36:37
  Speaker 2: for them, they really are stuck in a very difficult place.
• 36:40
  Speaker 2: Because nationally, they can be unpopular. But inside the party,
• 36:44
  Speaker 2: there's still nobody like him. It's just not, there's nothing
• 36:48
  Speaker 2: like that. There's no kind of force or defection that
• 36:53
  Speaker 2: can actually, there's no defection with a positive incentive. And
• 36:57
  Speaker 2: Massey is perfect example, that kind of poster child of
• 37:00
  Speaker 2: all of that.
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 37:01
  Speaker 2: And this is kind of how I'm thinking about it
• 37:02
  Speaker 2: going into the midterms.
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: I think after the midterms though, you are going to
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: see some people who, okay, Trump is, he's old.
• 37:10
  Speaker 3: He's going to be done in just a couple of years.
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: He's deeply unpopular, less popular now than he was after
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: January 6th. OK, deeply unpopular. His committed diehard fan base
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: is dwindling. You have people who sort of like tepidly
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: support him versus he used to have this rock solid
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: fan base. You are going to see some entrepreneurial politicians
• 37:33
  Speaker 1: who think there's a lane to come out in some
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: way against Trump and position themselves differently. for 2028 as
• 37:41
  Speaker 1: the inheritors of the Republican Party and as a break
• 37:45
  Speaker 1: from what this past era has been. So I do
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: think that creates some dangers for him that perhaps didn't
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: exist in the past. But you're absolutely right to say
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: most of these politicians are cowards. They don't want to
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: be like Maria Salazar and be put on blast and
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: have their standing with Republicans threatened, which may hurt her reelection,
• 38:03
  Speaker 1: even though in a certain way you can look at
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: it and be like, well, the fact that Trump's mad
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: at her, maybe that helps establish her position as a
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: more independent voice. On the other hand, if you depress
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: Republican turnout or even have some right in Canada or
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: whatever that takes a few percentage points away from her,
• 38:18
  Speaker 1: that could absolutely be devastating. So in any case, most
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: of these people don't want to be put on blast
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: by the president of the United States. So it does
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: help to scare them back into line. I wanted to
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: put E7 up on the screen. This is from, again,
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: speaks to how in places like Iowa, there is, you know,
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: more possibility of Democrats winning than anyone would have expected.
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: And Chuck Grassley, who is the 93-year-old senator from Iowa,
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: who still has four years left on his term, meaning
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: that if he survives, he will be leaving office at
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: 97 years old. He said at this GOP dinner, quote,
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: one of the reasons I'm worried about who's going to
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: be elected governor, I don't plan on dying in office.
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: But if I did, I don't want a Democrat governor
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: choosing my replacement. And the Senate race is much closer.
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: The governor race, it looks like Rob Sand is going
• 39:15
  Speaker 1: to win. I mean, every poll I've seen has him up.
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: It looks like he is quite popular in the state
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: and that he is starting to pull away in the polling.
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: So just a real statement on the nature of our gerontocracy,
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: that one of the chief concerns here is that this
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: 93-year-old senator is worried about dying in the next couple
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: of years and having his replacement picked by a Democratic governor.
• 39:40
  Speaker 2: Let's go. Last thing I wanted to mention, E4, this
• 39:43
  Speaker 2: has been on my mind, and I'm going to ask
• 39:45
  Speaker 2: Logan about it tomorrow as well. This was from Lakshad Jain.
• 39:49
  Speaker 2: He had an interesting model and take about current polls.
• 39:52
  Speaker 2: He says, Our model is built on a lot of polling,
• 39:54
  Speaker 2: including our own. It really bothers me how absurdly different
• 39:58
  Speaker 2: the drop-off of white respondents are in our polling. Whites
• 40:02
  Speaker 2: who completed our polls swing 10% to the left. Whites
• 40:06
  Speaker 2: who don't barely swing at all. I'm guessing this is
• 40:09
  Speaker 2: not unique to our polling. If a model whiffs badly,
• 40:12
  Speaker 2: it'll probably whiff on whites and it would mean far
• 40:15
  Speaker 2: more low propensity Republicans showed up to vote. It means
• 40:19
  Speaker 2: that the ones who didn't respond to polls were attitudinally
• 40:22
  Speaker 2: very different and shifting far less than the ones who
• 40:25
  Speaker 2: did respond, but were underrepresented in polling, meaning that we
• 40:29
  Speaker 2: may over project the swing. I don't think this is
• 40:31
  Speaker 2: the case because people really hate Trump too. I just
• 40:34
  Speaker 2: don't expect him to show up in a midterm like this.
• 40:35
  Speaker 2: It nags me. In other words, If the polls are off,
• 40:38
  Speaker 2: they'll be off for the same reason they've been off
• 40:39
  Speaker 2: for the last 10 years, which is basically you have
• 40:43
  Speaker 2: whites who don't complete college degrees, who are unreachable, don't
• 40:46
  Speaker 2: complete polls, despite the fact that they've had over 12 years,
• 40:50
  Speaker 2: I guess now at this time, to fix this literal problem,
• 40:53
  Speaker 2: which predates even Donald Trump in 2016. I do wonder,
• 40:58
  Speaker 2: I mean, how much of this, we've talked about it before,
• 41:00
  Speaker 2: like with the DSA effect, where Yeah, I mean it's
• 41:03
  Speaker 2: easy to see that a highly motivated, college-educated, white base
• 41:08
  Speaker 2: is going to be massively– is going to respond and
• 41:12
  Speaker 2: be involved in politics. Angie Nixon aside, like that's who
• 41:15
  Speaker 2: they are. Well, the vast majority of the Republican base
• 41:19
  Speaker 2: is like low-propensity whites and Hispanics, and we have like some– data,
• 41:25
  Speaker 2: you know, whenever it comes to those groups, but lack
• 41:29
  Speaker 2: of response was the number one thing that killed the
• 41:32
  Speaker 2: polls in 2020. That's why I just want to flag
• 41:35
  Speaker 2: it where, remember, remember the polls in 2020, uh, Susan
• 41:38
  Speaker 2: Collins down by 13. She wins by a couple of points.
• 41:41
  Speaker 2: Remember South Carolina, uh, which had, uh, who's that idiot's name?
• 41:46
  Speaker 2: The guy who raised Harrison Harrison. He's up by 18
• 41:51
  Speaker 2: loses by the same margin that the previous opponent, the
• 41:53
  Speaker 2: Lindsey Graham had run against, you know, despite having like
• 41:57
  Speaker 2: hundreds of millions of dollars. I just think it's important
• 41:59
  Speaker 2: to flag. It could be off. I mean, look, we
• 42:01
  Speaker 2: could have D plus two, but in the way that
• 42:04
  Speaker 2: the media and everybody, including us, have reported this, that
• 42:07
  Speaker 2: would be an underperformance of expectations. It would be huge.
• 42:09
  Speaker 2: And that would mean the Republicans would either keep the
• 42:11
  Speaker 2: House or it would be in play.
• 42:12
  Speaker 3: Yeah, completely.
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: I mean, and we don't have to think back long.
• 42:15
  Speaker 1: We're talking about Iowa to remember a.
• 42:18
  Speaker 2: Very wildly off.
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: Ann Selzer, who was known as like the Iowa pollster.
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: I mean, she was the gold standard and she nailed it.
• 42:27
  Speaker 2: And she fell for this exact same problem.
• 42:28
  Speaker 3: Time after time after time.
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: And this was exactly the issue that she had is
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: that the people that responded to the poll were the
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: people who were very excited about voting for Democrats. And
• 42:38
  Speaker 1: then the people who didn't respond didn't get captured in
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: the survey. And so she wildly missed what was going
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: on in a state that she knows so well and
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: had previously polled so accurately. So you have to keep
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: those things in mind that that is certainly a possibility. Now,
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: one thing that's different is Trump is not on the ballot.
• 42:56
  Speaker 1: He's usually the one that causes the biggest miscounts with
• 43:00
  Speaker 1: the polls because he does inspire people. this different set
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: of voters that don't seem to just show up for
• 43:06
  Speaker 1: regular Republicans. This is part of why he said to
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: the electorate, pretend I am on the ballot. That may
• 43:12
  Speaker 1: seem insane given how unpopular he is, and it might
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: be insane ultimately, but that's the group he's trying to reach.
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: He wants that coalition that only turns up for him.
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: to show up for the rest of these Republicans. And
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: the last piece here is, you know, that it's important
• 43:28
  Speaker 1: to keep these grains of salt in mind when you
• 43:30
  Speaker 1: see polls like this one, which feel literally unbelievable. This
• 43:33
  Speaker 1: is a South Carolina poll by Trafalgar, which is known for,
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: I mean, frankly, they have gotten it right. When Trump
• 43:42
  Speaker 1: has been on the ballot, they have been able to
• 43:46
  Speaker 1: assess those sort of infrequent voters who don't pick up
• 43:49
  Speaker 1: the phone, etc., But in any case, they have this
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: South Carolina poll up that has Darlene Graham, the Republican,
• 43:57
  Speaker 1: Lindsey Graham's sister, up by a single point on Annie Andrews.
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: So it's 43.4 to 42.3 in this Trafalgar poll.
• 44:09
  Speaker 3: And so this is one I have an eye on.
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: Ryan and I were talking about this a little bit
• 44:12
  Speaker 1: last week. I, you know, I think Darlene Graham is
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: going to win if I had to, like, put some
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: money down or, like, really say or make a prediction today.
• 44:21
  Speaker 3: I would say Darlene Graham is going to win. It's
• 44:23
  Speaker 3: South Carolina.
• 44:24
  Speaker 1: We haven't had a South Carolina Democratic senator in a
• 44:26
  Speaker 1: very long time. It's a very red state, et cetera. However,
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: I can imagine people being like, who is this lady? Like,
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: they didn't even like Lindsey Graham very much. And now
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: you're just shoving his sister down our throat who clearly
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: knows nothing about anything.
• 44:40
  Speaker 3: It's, like, very disrespectful.
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: And I do think Americans, wherever they live and whatever
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: political affiliation they have, they really react very negatively to
• 44:49
  Speaker 1: that sort of thing of like, oh, your mom or
• 44:52
  Speaker 1: your dad or your brother was a senator.
• 44:55
  Speaker 3: And now you think we.
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: Should just show up and vote for you because we're
• 44:59
  Speaker 1: just mindless lemmings and you're trying to shove this down
• 45:02
  Speaker 1: our throat. So I could imagine I could imagine it
• 45:05
  Speaker 1: could imagine there being a backlash to her just being
• 45:08
  Speaker 1: pushed forward. and voters resenting that that is the choice
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: that's been put on them. And Andrew seems like a
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: good candidate, too. I mean, the big warning sign for
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: Democrats here is that they're, I mean, first of all,
• 45:19
  Speaker 1: they are behind by a point, but.
• 45:21
  Speaker 3: Also nowhere near 50%.
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: So those undecideds you would think are ultimately going to vote,
• 45:26
  Speaker 1: break for the Republicans. But it is one of these
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: polls where you look at it and you go, you know,
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: how far, how far could this go? Like, are we
• 45:34
  Speaker 1: going to see an election that is that crazy where
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: states like Iowa, Kansas, South Carolina, Alaska, Texas are truly
• 45:41
  Speaker 1: on the table for Democrats.
• 45:42
  Speaker 2: I just, I have a really hard time believing it.
• 45:45
  Speaker 2: You sent a good article. I think we'll talk about
• 45:47
  Speaker 2: it a lot tomorrow. Is this 94 or is it 2018?
• 45:49
  Speaker 2: And that's a great heuristic. 94, I was two years old,
• 45:54
  Speaker 2: so don't remember it. Have read about it. But the
• 45:57
  Speaker 2: question around it is, can we elect member Democrats in
• 46:03
  Speaker 2: red states and not the type of Democrat like a Collins-
• 46:07
  Speaker 2: or I guess Democrat or Republican, depending on how you
• 46:10
  Speaker 2: kind of think of it. Like, not the type of
• 46:12
  Speaker 2: maverick like Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, and or who am
• 46:16
  Speaker 2: I trying to think of? Joe Manchin. Joe Manchin, or
• 46:18
  Speaker 2: who is the guy in Alabama? Doug Jones, right? Are
• 46:21
  Speaker 2: those the type of people who are the last dying
• 46:24
  Speaker 2: breed who can get elected? Or is it a genuine
• 46:27
  Speaker 2: realignment election? an actual complete step change from the partisan era,
• 46:33
  Speaker 2: which has dominated American politics 2010 to 2026. That's a
• 46:38
  Speaker 2: 16-year run. If you look at history and maps and cycling,
• 46:41
  Speaker 2: we're on the table, actually, for a complete shift from
• 46:44
  Speaker 2: where things are. It would make sense that Trump, who
• 46:46
  Speaker 2: ushered in the first realignment, could break, you know, kind
• 46:49
  Speaker 2: of the previous paradigm, but in the wrong direction. So
• 46:52
  Speaker 2: that is the open question. I just, I don't know,
• 46:54
  Speaker 2: I always one lesson I have from 2016, 2020, 2024
• 46:58
  Speaker 2: is you cannot underestimate like hyper, like, and when I
• 47:03
  Speaker 2: say partisanship, I just, it's really not like I love Republicans.
• 47:07
  Speaker 2: It's discussed with like cultural leftism is kind of the
• 47:11
  Speaker 2: best way I can possibly describe it. That's the only
• 47:13
  Speaker 2: through line that runs through all three of those elections,
• 47:16
  Speaker 2: including with the midterms. Remember Kavanaugh, 2018 immigration concerns that
• 47:22
  Speaker 2: happened there at the time. So That's just the last
• 47:24
  Speaker 2: thing on my mind is despite all these polls and
• 47:26
  Speaker 2: all this coverage, they just keep coming back all the time,
• 47:29
  Speaker 2: you know, and we don't have reason to doubt that
• 47:31
  Speaker 2: it's over.
• 47:32
  Speaker 1: I was thinking about I was actually watching a thing
• 47:35
  Speaker 1: about 2016, which was giving me a total PTSD. But,
• 47:39
  Speaker 1: you know, Hillary famously takes for granted the blue wall.
• 47:42
  Speaker 1: barely goes to Michigan. Michigan doesn't go to Wisconsin at all.
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: They thought they were putting all these other states into play.
• 47:49
  Speaker 1: They're like spending time in North Carolina, which Obama had won,
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: but Democrats hadn't been able to maintain their, you know,
• 47:55
  Speaker 1: any sort of dominance in. So they were playing the
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: game of like, oh, we're going to expand the map.
• 48:00
  Speaker 1: It's going to be a shellacking. She didn't even write
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: a concession speech. She fell asleep while the results were
• 48:07
  Speaker 1: coming in because it was such a foregone conclusion in
• 48:10
  Speaker 1: their mind. And so and that's what the polls showed.
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: If you were looking at the polls, that's what you
• 48:15
  Speaker 1: would expect. Although if you do go back and look,
• 48:18
  Speaker 1: they were a lot more narrow than was sort of
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: like being felt at the time. But there was just
• 48:22
  Speaker 1: such a there was such confidence in polling at that point, too.
• 48:25
  Speaker 1: You hadn't had these gigantic misses. There were all kinds
• 48:27
  Speaker 1: of confidence in like the modelers, the Nate Silvers of
• 48:30
  Speaker 1: the world looking at this and like, oh, Hillary's going
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: to win. Hillary's going to win. It's not even going
• 48:34
  Speaker 1: to be close. And at the end of the day, obviously,
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: we know the history of that. So you could, after
• 48:40
  Speaker 1: election night, look back at it. I think Democrats are
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: going to have a good night. I think they're going
• 48:45
  Speaker 1: to do pretty well. I think the House is pretty
• 48:46
  Speaker 1: much like a foregone conclusion. However, they may look silly
• 48:52
  Speaker 1: the day after to have flirted with South Carolina. Mississippi,
• 48:57
  Speaker 1: we're going to, I want to talk to Logan about
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: this tomorrow. Democrats are putting.
• 49:00
  Speaker 3: Money into Mississippi Senate race.
• 49:04
  Speaker 1: You know, Florida, like, These states that it may end
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: up looking ridiculous that there was ever any thought that
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: these things were on the table. And it could end
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: up being much more like 2018 where the typical battleground
• 49:16
  Speaker 1: states continue to be the typical battleground states.
• 49:19
  Speaker 5: Right.
• 49:19
  Speaker 2: I have accepted my long out of touch nature. And
• 49:22
  Speaker 2: I could not imagine in 2020, I remember, and I
• 49:26
  Speaker 2: was looking at the way that the pandemic and everything
• 49:28
  Speaker 2: was going. And I was just like, you know, I
• 49:31
  Speaker 2: really don't see how Biden could lose this election. I'm like,
• 49:34
  Speaker 2: I just don't see it. I'm like, how is this
• 49:36
  Speaker 2: even possible? And then Trump comes, what, 100,000 votes in
• 49:40
  Speaker 2: three states from winning?
• 49:42
  Speaker 1: They were totally off. Biden winning like 18 points in Wisconsin.
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: I'm not remembering all the details, but by double digits
• 49:49
  Speaker 1: in some of those blue wall states. it looked like
• 49:52
  Speaker 1: it was going to be a landslide. And it did
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: make some sense because, yeah, the pandemic was going on.
• 49:57
  Speaker 1: Trump was unpopular.
• 49:58
  Speaker 3: It was a mess, right? A very chaotic time. And yet,
• 50:02
  Speaker 3: it ended up being.
• 50:03
  Speaker 2: Right. So, 100,000 votes. So, look, my thing is just
• 50:06
  Speaker 2: with Trump is... I'm not counting out until he's out. Like,
• 50:09
  Speaker 2: the guy literally won the popular vote two years ago.
• 50:11
  Speaker 2: And very few people... I forget what the odds of
• 50:14
  Speaker 2: that were. It was like 10% or something that were,
• 50:17
  Speaker 2: you know, in terms of a lot of the models.
• 50:19
  Speaker 1: So.
• 50:20
  Speaker 2: I just always caution people is, you know, you can
• 50:23
  Speaker 2: have a lot of hopium on either side, but Trump,
• 50:26
  Speaker 2: he's just always been this dynamic force in American politics.
• 50:31
  Speaker 2: But we have history to show that people like that,
• 50:34
  Speaker 2: Obama and others, have never had the immense amount of
• 50:36
  Speaker 2: success translating that into a midterm election. And so that's
• 50:40
  Speaker 2: always the counterbalance in our view. But I do think
• 50:43
  Speaker 2: it's important that people should, you know, you should consume
• 50:46
  Speaker 2: all the information and realize, like, Don't just take these
• 50:48
  Speaker 2: things at face value. You have too much data at
• 50:50
  Speaker 2: this point to do so. And we'll always continue to
• 50:53
  Speaker 2: remind you of that. So excited to talk to Logan
• 50:56
  Speaker 2: about that. And we'll see you all tomorrow.