Latest / 3 Martini Lunch – Political Humor & Commentary / Graham Platner’s Campaign Implodes After New Allegations

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Graham Platner’s Campaign Implodes After New Allegations · 3 Martini Lunch – Political Humor & Commentary

0:03
Speaker 1: Welcome to the three Martini Lunch.
0:05
Speaker 2: Grab a stool next to Greg Corumbus of Radio America
0:07
Speaker 2: and Jim Garrity of National Review.
0:10
Speaker 3: Free martinis coming up.
0:12
Speaker 4: That is right, It is time for another three martini lunch.
0:15
Speaker 4: My name is Craig Collins, filling in just one more
0:17
Speaker 4: time for the great Greg Corumbus. Jim Garretty is here,
0:20
Speaker 4: and we will definitely at some point talk about I
0:23
Speaker 4: think we're both wearing black on purpose because of the
0:25
Speaker 4: gm USA. I don't know if we are, but we'll
0:28
Speaker 4: definitely talk about that at some point. Some predictions were made.
0:30
Speaker 4: They were wrong. There is a lot of other stuff
0:33
Speaker 4: going on though, as far as the good Graham Platner
0:36
Speaker 4: seems to have finally maybe finished his political career, maybe
0:41
Speaker 4: based on some new stories that have come out, there
0:44
Speaker 4: is a continued cease fire that seems to be something
0:48
Speaker 4: no one cares about that we'll talk about a little
0:50
Speaker 4: bit later on.
0:51
Speaker 3: And then finally, and this does seem to make sense.
0:54
Speaker 4: If you have a health condition that takes you away
0:56
Speaker 4: from a job for a while, you need to inform
0:59
Speaker 4: the people you work for. In this case, it would
1:01
Speaker 4: be the American people. If you're a politician. That much
1:04
Speaker 4: more coming up in just a bit, but first we'll
1:07
Speaker 4: take it right to Graham Platner. A huge, huge story broke,
1:12
Speaker 4: although I think it's just a further explanation of an
1:15
Speaker 4: individual who had made some mild accusations before. Jim, what
1:20
Speaker 4: do we have here?
1:21
Speaker 1: Sure?
1:21
Speaker 2: Well, we should point out that Graham Platner, as of
1:24
Speaker 2: this recording time, is still the Democratic nominee for a
1:28
Speaker 2: Senate in Maine, has not ended his campaign. It's kind
1:30
Speaker 2: of put on pause. He's taking the time to reflect
1:34
Speaker 2: on the best path forward, in his words, because one
1:38
Speaker 2: of his ex girlfriends, Jenny Raischio I hope I'm pronouncing
1:41
Speaker 2: that correctly, gave a full scale interview to Politico yesterday,
1:45
Speaker 2: followed up with an on camera interview with CNN describing
1:49
Speaker 2: Graham Platner raping her. That's not a matter of you know,
1:53
Speaker 2: I'm not going to sugarcoat it now. I would note
1:56
Speaker 2: that what this woman is describing is not that dramatically
2:00
Speaker 2: different from what Lindsay Fifeld described about a month.
2:03
Speaker 1: Ago to The New York Times.
2:05
Speaker 2: Firefold described Plattner's being violent, grabbing him by the shoulders,
2:09
Speaker 2: grabbing her by the shoulders, and leaving hard enough to
2:11
Speaker 2: leave Marx angry erratic, locking her in a room once,
2:16
Speaker 2: but did not describe sexual well, I would describe it
2:18
Speaker 2: as violent assault, not necessarily sexual assault. Now everybody said
2:23
Speaker 2: with about a month ago, these are very serious allegations.
2:27
Speaker 2: But I believe Platiner's denials, and I'm standing by my
2:29
Speaker 2: endorsement of him. Blah blah blah, at least of the
2:32
Speaker 2: vast majority of the Democratic Party. Yesterday, this was the
2:36
Speaker 2: straw that broke the Campbell's back. And as we should
2:39
Speaker 2: point out that, like several times throughout this campaign, people
2:42
Speaker 2: have asked Graham Plattner, do you have any other issues
2:45
Speaker 2: in your past that really ought to be disclosed? Do
2:47
Speaker 2: you have any other skeletons in your closets or anything else?
2:50
Speaker 2: And every single time he said no, my life is
2:53
Speaker 2: an open book. I have nothing left to hide. Every
2:56
Speaker 2: single time he lied. So you know, main Democratic Party
3:01
Speaker 2: Congressman Roecanna, Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee said a majority of
3:05
Speaker 2: pack and Elizabeth Warren also they're withdrawing their past endorsements.
3:09
Speaker 2: I would point out that Elizabeth Warren also said Platner
3:11
Speaker 2: was quote my kind of man, unquote right when a
3:14
Speaker 2: poll came out a couple of days ago showing Susan
3:17
Speaker 2: Collins with a lead and you saw a bunch of people,
3:19
Speaker 2: Republicans and people who can't stand Platiner were feel good
3:21
Speaker 2: about him, like, look, this is a good sign. But
3:24
Speaker 2: this is compared to the Allied victory at Elamine in
3:27
Speaker 2: North Africa. This is not the Fall of Berlin. Hold
3:32
Speaker 2: on the downfall memes. People don't watch the movie. It's
3:35
Speaker 2: a movie about the last days of Adolf Hitler and
3:37
Speaker 2: it mostly consists of him.
3:38
Speaker 1: Ranting and raving in a like so over the top way.
3:41
Speaker 2: It's kind of funny, And I should point out that,
3:43
Speaker 2: like Graham Plattner as a guy who was let's just
3:46
Speaker 2: say at least neo Nazi curious in his younger days
3:49
Speaker 2: and not wanting people to know about it, that's funny.
3:53
Speaker 2: Graham Plattner, the guy who violently assaults and sexually assaults
3:55
Speaker 2: his six girlfriends, is not funny at all and is
3:58
Speaker 2: deeply disturbing.
3:59
Speaker 4: Now I would say that I'm shocked that the guy
4:01
Speaker 4: with the Nazi tattoo's a bad person, Like, I'm just
4:04
Speaker 4: shocked in that that's crazy as far as this goes,
4:07
Speaker 4: And I said it before. She is an individual whose
4:10
Speaker 4: name had come up before. It's just the description of
4:13
Speaker 4: what occurred between them has changed profoundly, and it's amazing
4:18
Speaker 4: to watch some of the Democratic people who, as you said,
4:21
Speaker 4: supported him.
4:22
Speaker 3: Start to slowly pull that back.
4:24
Speaker 4: I think that some of the people have rescinded their
4:27
Speaker 4: endorsements of him, and so it feels like this is
4:30
Speaker 4: the end of a political career that probably shouldn't have existed.
4:33
Speaker 4: My favorite of that You also quoted this gym my
4:35
Speaker 4: favorite of the times, where he was asked do you
4:38
Speaker 4: have anything else to hide? He said something about how
4:41
Speaker 4: the opposition will likely lie, and that caused one of
4:44
Speaker 4: the people interviewing him to follow up with are you
4:47
Speaker 4: sure there's nothing you're trying to get in front of?
4:49
Speaker 4: Because when you accuse someone of lying before stories out there,
4:52
Speaker 4: you wonder if you're thinking about something that you think
4:55
Speaker 4: might come out. I don't even know if this is it,
4:58
Speaker 4: to be honest, I don't know if this would be
4:59
Speaker 4: the last story if he retains this run, or if
5:04
Speaker 4: he's likely to have another one come out.
5:05
Speaker 2: Yeah, there are two examples that I point to in
5:08
Speaker 2: Today's Morning Joelt and I really I think it's worth
5:10
Speaker 2: discussing here. John Favreau, former Obama speech writer, one of
5:14
Speaker 2: the Pause Save America guys right at the end of April.
5:17
Speaker 2: But Favreau was not the guy who interviewed Platner way
5:20
Speaker 2: back when when you first discussed the Nazi tattoo. By
5:22
Speaker 2: the way, I would ask people go back and watch
5:24
Speaker 2: that interview. Platner asks like everyone's being ridiculous for being
5:28
Speaker 2: upset about his tattoo, and he acts like it's the
5:31
Speaker 2: most commonplace mistake that could happen. Yeah, I went there,
5:35
Speaker 2: I got a little that I know. It turns out
5:37
Speaker 2: it's the symbol of the SS. Right, Like, no, people
5:40
Speaker 2: don't relate to that. That is not a normal problem.
5:42
Speaker 2: Most people have. Nobody it's not like, oh, we've all
5:45
Speaker 2: been there, right, He really acted like there's he really
5:47
Speaker 2: kind of like blows up. So that's one of the
5:49
Speaker 2: reasons why, like, if you act like that's not a
5:51
Speaker 2: big deal, you are not as opposed to Nazis as
5:54
Speaker 2: you want everyone to believe you are. Right because like
5:56
Speaker 2: as I you know, I put this to Greg Craig
5:58
Speaker 2: out and probably ask you if you found out you
6:01
Speaker 2: accidentally got a Nazi tattoo, Craig, would you run people
6:04
Speaker 2: over on the way to getting the tattoo removed? Or
6:07
Speaker 2: would you like just grab a steak knife cut if
6:10
Speaker 2: it's on your arm, maybe a cut off. By the way,
6:12
Speaker 2: the fact that it was on his heart that tea,
6:14
Speaker 2: he says something right like that. That's a symbol of like,
6:17
Speaker 2: this is important to me.
6:18
Speaker 1: This matters to me.
6:19
Speaker 2: Oh, by the way, when he's on kick, you know,
6:22
Speaker 2: the teen hookup site, he just happens to hold his
6:25
Speaker 2: phone in a way.
6:26
Speaker 1: That covers up the tattoo.
6:28
Speaker 2: But he says he had no idea what the tattoo meant, right,
6:30
Speaker 2: So none of his story adds up. By the way,
6:33
Speaker 2: John Favreau is talking about the end of April and
6:34
Speaker 2: he says, quote, Graham Plattner isn't just our best and
6:38
Speaker 2: only chance to beat Susan Collins. He's a good, decent
6:41
Speaker 2: man who has struggled and grown and is always trying
6:44
Speaker 2: to do better. I hope everyone with reservations takes a
6:47
Speaker 2: little time to know the real life version of him,
6:49
Speaker 2: not what the algorithm throws in our faces. All of
6:52
Speaker 2: that is horse crap. All of that what was like,
6:55
Speaker 2: John Favreau, you have no idea, you don't know this man.
6:58
Speaker 2: You sat with him for again, I don't even know
6:59
Speaker 2: if honestly met him. But you're going out, You're telling people,
7:02
Speaker 2: you're putting your credibility on the line, saying this is
7:04
Speaker 2: a good and decent man and you should see him
7:06
Speaker 2: as worthy of your support. Now, last night, all of
7:09
Speaker 2: a sudden, John Favreau was like, Platner needs to drop
7:11
Speaker 2: out asap. These are awful, credible allegations set on the
7:15
Speaker 2: pod after the also credible June New York Times story
7:18
Speaker 2: that his biggest problem going forward would be credibility. To
7:21
Speaker 2: quote nor MacDonald Craig, I think actually the worst part
7:24
Speaker 2: was all the raping. But nonetheless, you know, it's now
7:28
Speaker 2: abundantly clear that he just hasn't been honest about his
7:31
Speaker 2: past and can't be trusted as a candidate for office.
7:34
Speaker 2: On the one hand, like, I guess I'm glad he's
7:36
Speaker 2: recognizing how wrong he was. But the reason people believed
7:39
Speaker 2: in him, John Favreau, is you told them he was
7:42
Speaker 2: a good and decent person.
7:44
Speaker 1: Right. Yeah.
7:44
Speaker 2: Then the second example comes out just this morning. New
7:47
Speaker 2: York Times columnist Michelle Goldberg quote last October, when stories
7:50
Speaker 2: about Platner's tattoo and Reddit posts first broke, I went
7:53
Speaker 2: to Maine to write about him. I tried to convey
7:56
Speaker 2: what I saw a campaign that was electrifying angry Maine voters,
8:00
Speaker 2: but I deeply regret that. Impressed by Plattner's political charisma,
8:03
Speaker 2: I wrote that he was quote nothing like the edge
8:05
Speaker 2: lord caricature I encountered online, and Goldberg concludes, if anything,
8:10
Speaker 2: he seems to be significantly worse. I do not say
8:13
Speaker 2: this lightly, Michelle Goldberg. If Graham Plattner fooled you, maybe
8:19
Speaker 2: you should find something to do with your life besides
8:20
Speaker 2: right columns about politics. Because this was not a hard call,
8:24
Speaker 2: This was not well obscured. This was not a lack
8:27
Speaker 2: of red flags. There were more red flags than a
8:29
Speaker 2: Chinese army parade. There was like every single sign that
8:33
Speaker 2: this guy was a scumback. This guy was a really
8:35
Speaker 2: rotten guy. Never mind the Nazi, Like the Nazi tattoo
8:38
Speaker 2: was bad enough, and for most people, that's the first
8:40
Speaker 2: thing that eliminates you. Everything he said about his past
8:42
Speaker 2: wasn't true. Everything you said, it was just one thing
8:45
Speaker 2: after another. He said he was a He got very offended.
8:48
Speaker 2: People were calling him a communist when he called himself
8:50
Speaker 2: a communist in the Reddit post in the year twenty
8:53
Speaker 2: twenty one.
8:53
Speaker 1: That's post COVID.
8:55
Speaker 2: That's not ancient history, right, So if you look at me,
8:59
Speaker 2: if you went to Maine and you went to his ralits.
9:00
Speaker 1: You're like, wow, this is a really good guy.
9:03
Speaker 2: The body politic really doesn't need your analytical skills. You
9:07
Speaker 2: have proven to have botched the easiest call ever. And
9:11
Speaker 2: I know and like, if the media has any purpose,
9:14
Speaker 2: it is everybody who a whole bunch people gonna run
9:16
Speaker 2: for office. Some of them are going to be bad people,
9:18
Speaker 2: some of them gonna be really bad people. They're all
9:19
Speaker 2: going to tell you that they're good people.
9:21
Speaker 1: Right.
9:21
Speaker 2: Your job in the media is to look beyond but
9:24
Speaker 2: the campaign and the candidate are telling you, and sort
9:27
Speaker 2: it out and give the public the fullest picture they can.
9:31
Speaker 2: If they still choose to elect them, that's on them.
9:33
Speaker 2: But like, you have to give them the best as
9:36
Speaker 2: you can tell. This gets very deep to the core
9:38
Speaker 2: of why I think journalism should exist. And like Michelle
9:41
Speaker 2: Goldberg's oopsie.
9:42
Speaker 1: No, no, this is not so anyway. So that's Craig.
9:46
Speaker 1: Can you tell them fired up about this?
9:47
Speaker 3: Yeah?
9:47
Speaker 4: I can't, and honestly, I agree with you, because I
9:50
Speaker 4: think that the biggest problem for a lot of people
9:52
Speaker 4: in the world of journalism now is they walk into
9:54
Speaker 4: certain rooms with expectations and they allow those expectations to
9:59
Speaker 4: guide how they behave. And if you don't ask the
10:01
Speaker 4: right questions to the type of person that you think
10:04
Speaker 4: you support walking into the room because of what political
10:06
Speaker 4: side of the aisle they're on, you don't get the
10:08
Speaker 4: right answers and you don't give us the right information.
10:11
Speaker 4: So so much journalism and media fails based on their
10:14
Speaker 4: own preconceived notion of who the good guys and bad
10:17
Speaker 4: guys are, based on a simple letter, and it's uniquely terrible.
10:21
Speaker 4: I do know that if Platner is to drop out,
10:24
Speaker 4: they only have a few days until they're capable of
10:27
Speaker 4: replacing him.
10:27
Speaker 2: Right, yeah, and so, but he's got to do it
10:30
Speaker 2: by July thirteenth, and I believe the twenty second is
10:32
Speaker 2: the deadline for the State party to decide who the
10:35
Speaker 2: substitute is going to be. But Craig, it's not like
10:37
Speaker 2: the Democratic Party would like have a candidate drop out
10:40
Speaker 2: late in the process and bring in a substitute without
10:43
Speaker 2: a new library or you know what about They've never
10:45
Speaker 2: done that, Craig. If I got any more upset about this,
10:47
Speaker 2: I'm going to have an aneurysm. And if I do,
10:50
Speaker 2: I'm going to need a doctor.
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11:41
Speaker 4: We now move on to our second martini and as
11:44
Speaker 4: you described it in the email that we exchange for
11:46
Speaker 4: this show, I thought that was great. The world's most
11:48
Speaker 4: violent ceasefire continues because technically it does. Although there was
11:53
Speaker 4: yet another attack this morning in the Strait of Hormuz.
11:57
Speaker 4: This comes in the heels of some other things going
11:59
Speaker 4: on in the world of and their political whatever turmoil.
12:03
Speaker 4: It makes no sense to me, and I wonder if
12:06
Speaker 4: at this point the inevitability of actual fighting, not just
12:09
Speaker 4: the version of fighting we have now, but that we're
12:12
Speaker 4: not pretending we're doing a ceasefire anymore.
12:14
Speaker 3: Fighting is what we're barreling toward. What do you think
12:17
Speaker 3: about this, Jim.
12:18
Speaker 2: My ideal outcome of our conflict with Iran would be
12:20
Speaker 2: the collapse of the Iranian regime and the replacement something better,
12:23
Speaker 2: a very low bar to clear. It does not appear
12:26
Speaker 2: that's likely to be an outcome. The next best outcome,
12:28
Speaker 2: I suppose, would be a genuine ceasefire that allows all
12:32
Speaker 2: the oil tankers and liquid natural gas ships and cargo
12:35
Speaker 2: ships to go through the Strait of Horror moves without
12:37
Speaker 2: being shot at, and some sort of lasting piece in
12:40
Speaker 2: which you know Iran no longer threatens its neighbors or
12:43
Speaker 2: allies or things like that. That is not what is happening.
12:46
Speaker 2: And from the Wall Street Journal just this morning, Iran's
12:48
Speaker 2: for Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps fired missiles at two commercial
12:52
Speaker 2: ships nor the Strait of Horror moves early Tuesday, according
12:54
Speaker 2: to a senior US official, marking an escalation that contends
12:57
Speaker 2: to complicate negotiations to the US Iran war. And basically
13:02
Speaker 2: like so, apparently they're sending messages to ships you know,
13:05
Speaker 2: our missiles and drones are ready to fire at you.
13:08
Speaker 2: They attacked the l Recayacht, a liquified natural gas tanker
13:11
Speaker 2: owned and part of Hutter's liquid natural gas history. By
13:16
Speaker 2: the way, you talk about things you don't want to explode,
13:18
Speaker 2: I'm gonna put liquid natural gas.
13:20
Speaker 1: Very high on that list. Sure.
13:22
Speaker 2: And then secondly, there was another ship, a tanker was
13:25
Speaker 2: hit by an unknown projectile on the port side. About
13:27
Speaker 2: eight mile nautical miles lost of lima Aman because of
13:30
Speaker 2: a fire. Thankfully no casualties or environmental impact were reported.
13:33
Speaker 2: But like again, Iran is saying, well, we want negotiations
13:38
Speaker 2: for peace, or at least that theoretically the administration is
13:41
Speaker 2: telling us they want that, while at the same time
13:43
Speaker 2: they keep firing chips at missiles, and the whole reason
13:47
Speaker 2: you've had the world energy crisis is because oil tankers,
13:50
Speaker 2: liquid natural gas bankers, and you know, cargo they don't
13:53
Speaker 2: want to go through there. It's not a matter of insurance,
13:55
Speaker 2: it's a matter of guys like it's not safe. And
13:58
Speaker 2: that's also point out the oil tankers. These ships are
14:00
Speaker 2: big targets. They're not particularly fast moving.
14:02
Speaker 1: Not hard to hit.
14:04
Speaker 2: And it just kind of feels like we are in
14:05
Speaker 2: this lucy in the football circumstance in which you know,
14:08
Speaker 2: we keep saying, oh, we got this great breakthrough in
14:10
Speaker 2: negotiations and then a ran fires at chips again, and
14:13
Speaker 2: you know, you're kind of waiting for the administration to say, Okay,
14:16
Speaker 2: we realize you're not serious about this. We're going to
14:18
Speaker 2: do something about this. But it does not appear this
14:21
Speaker 2: as far as I know, negotiations is still on course.
14:24
Speaker 2: And I kind of wonder, like, what's the point of
14:26
Speaker 2: the negotiations if their actions are completely contradictory to their words.
14:30
Speaker 4: Well, especially when you say that this organization, this country,
14:34
Speaker 4: these leaders are people you can't trust if you're saying
14:37
Speaker 4: again and again that they're the type of people that
14:39
Speaker 4: break any agreement we'll create with them, and they're literally
14:43
Speaker 4: still firing missiles in the Strait of Hormuz. We'll be like, no, no,
14:46
Speaker 4: but we're going to agree this time. It does seem
14:48
Speaker 4: like the kind of group that you should say, all right.
14:50
Speaker 4: I would say this, though, Jim, I don't know what
14:52
Speaker 4: a better path forward is because I don't know what
14:56
Speaker 4: that next attack from the United States legitimate one looks like.
14:59
Speaker 4: And I've i heard the President say that he'd be
15:02
Speaker 4: targeting all kinds of energy and whatnot sources, and that
15:05
Speaker 4: devastates the totality of a country in a way that
15:09
Speaker 4: a lot of people criticized him before of almost committing
15:12
Speaker 4: a war crime.
15:13
Speaker 2: Yeah, do you want to hit a desalinization plant when
15:15
Speaker 2: Iran can target the desalinization plants of our golf allies
15:19
Speaker 2: and you know, to really create water crises in these
15:22
Speaker 2: places as well as energy crises. Yeah, no enough, you know,
15:25
Speaker 2: no difficult or no easy options here. You kind of
15:29
Speaker 2: wonder how many Iranian targets are left, how many Iranian
15:32
Speaker 2: targets of value are left. It sounds like the Ayatola,
15:36
Speaker 2: assuming he's still alive and when nobody's seen him since
15:38
Speaker 2: he took over. Seems like Iranian leaders do not spend
15:41
Speaker 2: a lot of time above ground these days, which makes
15:42
Speaker 2: it much harder to take them out, So difficult decisions
15:46
Speaker 2: for the administration. But you know, when you start a war,
15:48
Speaker 2: these are the situations that you're you're, you know, likely
15:50
Speaker 2: to find yourselves in. So yeah, I'm going to say
15:52
Speaker 2: right now, the ceasefire seems like it's on life support,
15:56
Speaker 2: and I'm hoping that's the only thing that's on life
15:58
Speaker 2: support these.
15:58
Speaker 4: Days, that's true. Yeah, we have to transition to our
16:01
Speaker 4: third topic in just a second. Talking quite a bit
16:04
Speaker 4: about Mitch McConnell and what is going on there from
16:06
Speaker 4: a health perspective. So, Mitch McConnell was admitted to the
16:14
Speaker 4: hospital on June fourteenth. The most surprising aspect of this story,
16:18
Speaker 4: although I guess it shouldn't be at this point we've
16:20
Speaker 4: seen this sort of thing before in the world of politics,
16:23
Speaker 4: is that his administration refuses to tell us why. Anyone
16:26
Speaker 4: who asks what is going on, the simple answer is
16:30
Speaker 4: he is recovering in the hospital.
16:32
Speaker 3: From what is usually the follow up question, and there
16:35
Speaker 3: is no answer.
16:36
Speaker 4: So Mitch McConnell has been hospitalized for many days now,
16:40
Speaker 4: and we don't really know definitively what's going on.
16:43
Speaker 3: What do you say about this one.
16:44
Speaker 2: Jim, Yeah, yeah, it feels very familiar for those who remember,
16:46
Speaker 2: let's discussing Tom Keen Junior, the new Jersey Republican congressman
16:50
Speaker 2: who did come back to Congress glad to hear it
16:52
Speaker 2: turned out, who's being treated for depression. Again, I think
16:54
Speaker 2: you probably have an obligation to tell your constituents if
16:56
Speaker 2: something like that's going on. Mitch McConnell has been hospitalized
17:00
Speaker 2: more than three weeks now. He's eighty or four years old.
17:02
Speaker 2: We've seen the incidents of him freezing up on camera. Look,
17:06
Speaker 2: you know, wish him the very best, hope that he
17:08
Speaker 2: makes a full recovery, but it's really not looking good.
17:12
Speaker 2: There's some more details that the EMS dispatch audio from
17:15
Speaker 2: the morning of June fourteenth suggests that they were sent
17:17
Speaker 2: to his home to attend to an unconscious person in
17:20
Speaker 2: cardiac arrest. Medic relay that CPR was in progress and
17:24
Speaker 2: said describe the dispatcher related that the emergency as cardiac arrest.
17:27
Speaker 2: They don't name McConnell, but the addresses his His office
17:31
Speaker 2: is offering no details about his condition and one that's
17:34
Speaker 2: ominous too.
17:35
Speaker 1: I think that serves your constituents poorly. Well.
17:38
Speaker 2: I hope the guy lives to be one hundred, you know.
17:40
Speaker 2: I hope he's this is his last years of his term.
17:42
Speaker 2: I hope he is doing great. But if he's not,
17:46
Speaker 2: you know, and also the question like is he unconscious?
17:48
Speaker 2: Is he conscious? Is he let us know? And if
17:51
Speaker 2: he's in a situation where he's going to be facing
17:53
Speaker 2: a lengthier recovery, does it make sense for him to,
17:57
Speaker 2: you know, resign his office? Does it make sense to
17:59
Speaker 2: declare if bake and see, doesn't make sense to have
18:01
Speaker 2: somebody now like it just feels like this is keeping
18:06
Speaker 2: constituents in the dark about something they have a right
18:08
Speaker 2: to know about. We know he's not doing well, and
18:11
Speaker 2: that's not enough. I think we need to know more.
18:13
Speaker 2: But hopefully we get information and hopefully McConnell makes a
18:16
Speaker 2: full recovery. But it makes sense to prepare for less
18:20
Speaker 2: optimal outcomes.
18:23
Speaker 1: Sure.
18:24
Speaker 4: The one thing I wonder all the time when I
18:25
Speaker 4: see stories like this, and this might be a naive
18:27
Speaker 4: thing to say or to ask you about, Jim, is
18:29
Speaker 4: why these politicians want to hold onto their jobs this bad.
18:33
Speaker 4: I would never want something so badly that, say, if
18:37
Speaker 4: I were going through any of the health crises that
18:39
Speaker 4: some of these people have gone through.
18:41
Speaker 3: I would stick into the gig.
18:43
Speaker 4: I would be willing to surrender the job and go
18:45
Speaker 4: live my life and focus on my health. If I
18:48
Speaker 4: was one of a multitude of people we've seen in
18:50
Speaker 4: the last few years, why is this job so uniquely
18:54
Speaker 4: valuable to these I have answers, I'm sure you might tell,
18:57
Speaker 4: But it's just interesting to see.
19:00
Speaker 2: Tune in in an episode in about four decades when
19:03
Speaker 2: Craig and I are in our eighties or nineties and
19:07
Speaker 2: people are saying, you know, Jim sounding Jim sounds senile.
19:11
Speaker 2: He's making wild and crazy predictions about the World Cup.
19:13
Speaker 1: That are never going to come true.
19:15
Speaker 2: You know, let's seeah like I look, I imagine, retirement is
19:18
Speaker 2: tough for a lot of people, you know, retirement. You know,
19:21
Speaker 2: also those of us who've seen grandparents, those of us
19:23
Speaker 2: who have seen parents get older, know that it's very
19:26
Speaker 2: hard to admit you can't do things the way you
19:28
Speaker 2: used to. It is very hard to take the car
19:30
Speaker 2: keys away from from dad or from Grandpa, so to speak.
19:33
Speaker 2: We saw this with Democrats and Joe Biden and the
19:35
Speaker 2: absolute denial that so many people were about the effects
19:38
Speaker 2: of age on him. So on the one hand, I
19:41
Speaker 2: get it. On the other hand, I figure if you're
19:43
Speaker 2: the people around an elderly politician, it's kind of on
19:47
Speaker 2: you to say, look, you know, spouse, dad, grandpa, you
19:52
Speaker 2: can't do the job the way you used to and
19:55
Speaker 2: you're not serving your constituents well because of this, it's
19:57
Speaker 2: time to hang it up. You can teach, you can
20:00
Speaker 2: be a guest lecturer, you can write a book, there's
20:02
Speaker 2: a lot of things. You could be a talking head.
20:05
Speaker 2: There are a lot of things you can do that
20:06
Speaker 2: are the lesser responsibilities at an advanced age. But at
20:10
Speaker 2: some point you just have to recognize it. And it
20:12
Speaker 2: seems like we've got the gerontocracy, the governing class that
20:16
Speaker 2: does you know, gots to get stuff wrong. And I'm
20:18
Speaker 2: just looking forward to the scoop from Nino Totenberg of
20:21
Speaker 2: NBR all about.
20:22
Speaker 4: This amen to that, Yes, absolutely, I think that leaving
20:26
Speaker 4: is also beneficial to them, much like it will be
20:29
Speaker 4: beneficial to me to no longer be a World Cup
20:31
Speaker 4: soccer fan or a USA soccer fan for my own health,
20:35
Speaker 4: we'll talk about that in a second. It is time
20:40
Speaker 4: to move on to our chaser. The World Cup is
20:43
Speaker 4: over for the United States, and it was horrible. I
20:46
Speaker 4: watched the entirety of that match, including part of it
20:49
Speaker 4: on the drive home from work, which is terribly irresponsible,
20:53
Speaker 4: but I couldn't help myself. I wanted to see what
20:55
Speaker 4: was going on, and about eight minutes in, I think
20:57
Speaker 4: we knew it was going to be a bad, bad night.
21:00
Speaker 1: Correct.
21:00
Speaker 2: I think you want to say that you were listening
21:02
Speaker 2: to the game while you were driving. You know, I'm
21:04
Speaker 2: beturing you, like you know, eyes down on the so
21:07
Speaker 2: we go. Yesterday's prediction of a forty nine to nothing
21:11
Speaker 2: US victory did not pan out. I hope you did
21:13
Speaker 2: not bet money on that. It turned out to be
21:15
Speaker 2: four to one. And look, I recognize you know, like
21:19
Speaker 2: look disappointment. After a terrific run for Team USA. Going
21:23
Speaker 2: into the game, the US was ranked sixteenth in the
21:26
Speaker 2: world out of like two hundred some teams. So on
21:28
Speaker 2: the one hand, like sixteenth, ou, that's pretty darn good.
21:31
Speaker 2: The bad news is Belgium was ranked eighth, and this
21:34
Speaker 2: was the round of sixteen to advance to the Round
21:36
Speaker 2: of eight, Belgium was a better team. Belgium was a
21:39
Speaker 2: considerably you know, better team. Hoisted a bottle of Lefty tonight.
21:43
Speaker 2: Good job, Belgian's all the credit in the world. I
21:46
Speaker 2: think what was also frustrating is like, you know, so
21:49
Speaker 2: they score, we score a goal on a penalty kick.
21:52
Speaker 2: We're feeling terrific, and then they come back and score
21:55
Speaker 2: again like two minutes later. It's like we you know,
21:57
Speaker 2: we enjoyed a tie for like you know, on a
21:59
Speaker 2: stop watch. And that third goal where our goalie came
22:03
Speaker 2: way out of the box and you know, botched it,
22:07
Speaker 2: and then there's a defenseman. The defenseman is in a
22:09
Speaker 2: position like that one hurt that. I was like, oh,
22:12
Speaker 2: I know this feeling from watching jet games. I've you know,
22:17
Speaker 2: if the defenseman had just fallen down and lied horizontal,
22:20
Speaker 2: he probably would.
22:21
Speaker 1: Have stopped the ball. That's that's how they Yeah.
22:23
Speaker 2: And then for that last one in the final minutes,
22:26
Speaker 2: that was just like the cherry on top of pain
22:28
Speaker 2: of making it not like, well, it's other four to one,
22:31
Speaker 2: it's it's kind of a route.
22:33
Speaker 4: Mean, the last one just felt mean, I felt like
22:35
Speaker 4: it's I'm the coach and the group of kids who
22:37
Speaker 4: are definitely not as good as the other kids, and
22:39
Speaker 4: I just want everybody to go home.
22:40
Speaker 1: Now we should have invoked the mercy rule.
22:42
Speaker 2: But yes, like we kind of knew that at some
22:45
Speaker 2: point Team USA was going to run into a better
22:47
Speaker 2: team and it was going to our magical run was
22:50
Speaker 2: going to come to an end.
22:52
Speaker 1: And should this take away the accomplishments.
22:54
Speaker 2: Of this team, No, this is still you know, okay,
22:57
Speaker 2: sure right, the part was going to say it like
22:59
Speaker 2: we were this is still ill tied for the most successful,
23:01
Speaker 2: the first advance we've made in this tournament, Like, there
23:05
Speaker 2: are a lot of good things that happened, but yeah,
23:07
Speaker 2: that was a really ugly one. As of this recording,
23:09
Speaker 2: we don't know the ratings. You figure it was really
23:11
Speaker 2: huge and you just you want to do your best.
23:13
Speaker 2: I kind of figure like the moment may have been
23:15
Speaker 2: bigger for these guys. I've also heard people speculating that,
23:19
Speaker 2: you know, did the controversy with Trump and the red
23:21
Speaker 2: card effect the game? And let's face it, no, Graig,
23:25
Speaker 2: wasn't it great that Baluken chose not to play in
23:28
Speaker 2: honor of Oh he was oh.
23:31
Speaker 3: Yeaheah, Okay, he didn't seem like he was playing. The
23:33
Speaker 3: only thing I would I would say about all of.
23:35
Speaker 4: It is we like being good at stuff in this country,
23:38
Speaker 4: and last night we were definitely not good at something,
23:41
Speaker 4: and I think it did kill a lot of the
23:43
Speaker 4: casual fandom of many people who thought they were quite
23:46
Speaker 4: good when we were playing lesser opponents. The minute we
23:49
Speaker 4: played a world class opponent, we looked like the version
23:52
Speaker 4: of the United States playing soccer that most of us
23:54
Speaker 4: expected if we were going to tune into a game
23:56
Speaker 4: and not seen anything. So all all the value you
24:00
Speaker 4: that came from that run did seem to be decimated
24:03
Speaker 4: for the casual fan like myself in one soccer game.
24:07
Speaker 2: Well, yo, the good news is in four yeah, we
24:09
Speaker 2: now have four years to not think about soccer and
24:12
Speaker 2: then we'll come back and hopefully we'll be even better
24:14
Speaker 2: next time.
24:14
Speaker 1: We'll see, you know, like.
24:15
Speaker 3: They're getting in until they're in the elite eight. I refuse.
24:18
Speaker 2: Okay, So Craig, this is our your your last day
24:21
Speaker 2: with us for a little while.
24:22
Speaker 3: Yes, yeah, no, it was fun to be here, Jim,
24:24
Speaker 3: thank you so much for everything.
24:25
Speaker 2: Well, thank you for enjoying joining us. Greg Corumbus will
24:28
Speaker 2: be back tomorrow. I will be back tomorrow and we'll
24:30
Speaker 2: see how the rest of the week goes on the
24:32
Speaker 2: Three Martin Lunch