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“Democracy in Disarray.” · Pod Save America

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Thank you.
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: I'm Dan Pfeiffer.
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: On today's show, Joe Biden and just about every elected
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: Democrat in America make one final run at Joe Manchin
• 0:28
  Speaker 2: and Kyrsten Sinema on voting rights.
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: Dr.
• 0:30
  Speaker 2: Fauci says we're all getting Omicron and calls one Republican
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: senator a moron. And the one and only Alyssa Mastromonaco
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: joins us to break down the worst punditry of the
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: week in another round of Take Appreciator. But first, this week,
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: Keep It is celebrating its four-year anniversary. Four years without
• 0:51
  Speaker 2: a single solitary episode featuring me.
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: Me either.
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: You either, but it's not like an active vendetta against you.
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: You're just forgotten.
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's fine. Is it better to be forgotten than hated?
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: I'm not so sure.
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah, no, you might have it better. But anyway, congrats
• 1:10
  Speaker 2: to Ira, Louis, Aida, and the entire Crooked team who
• 1:13
  Speaker 2: works on Keep It for reaching this incredible milestone. New
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: episodes of Keep It drop every Wednesday. Please check it out.
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: All right.
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: Let's get to the news. The endgame on the Democrats'
• 1:25
  Speaker 2: crusade to change the filibuster and pass voting rights has
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: finally arrived. Over the next few days, the House is
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: expected to pass the Freedom to Vote Act and the
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: John Lewis Voting Rights Act, which have now been combined
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: into one bill called, wait for it, the Freedom to
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: Vote Act, colon, John R. Lewis Act. This is a
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: small thing in everything we're about to talk about. But
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: do they realize that the John Lewis Freedom to Vote
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: Act was just right there for the taking as a
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: combined name? Do they have to do the Democratic messaging
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: thing where you put a fucking colon in between two
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: titles and call it a message and call it a title?
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: You're right. It's small potatoes.
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: Very small. Very small.
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: But I mean, just even from the beginning, when everyone
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: ran on the John Lewis Voting Rights Act. as the
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: larger democracy reform bill. And they decided not to call
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: it that and call this other bill, the John Lewis
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: bill for reasons that make no sense.
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: The freedom to vote act to colon.
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: Too free to vote.
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: Too free to vote. All right. So house is going
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: to pass. There's a complicated procedure where the house is
• 2:37
  Speaker 2: going to pass both these bills combined into one. Senate
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: Republicans will then try to filibuster both bills. Senate Democrats
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: will then debate changes to the filibuster. And from there,
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: No one has any idea what will happen, but we
• 2:50
  Speaker 2: have some idea maybe at this point. Joe Manchin and
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: Kyrsten Sinema are still opposed to eliminating the filibuster. The
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: votes for a special voting rights exception to the filibuster
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: aren't there either. Manchin has said he's open to the
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: return of a talking filibuster where senators would have to
• 3:04
  Speaker 2: stay on the floor for as long as they want
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: to block the bill. But it's unclear if he'll vote
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: for that change without Republican support. And Sinema... just reiterated
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: her support for the filibuster in a no-labels Mad Libs
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: speech Thursday morning. Unity, division, partisanship. That's what her speech was.
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: That's what I heard. In any event, Joe Biden is
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: having what I can only imagine to be a deeply
• 3:28
  Speaker 2: enjoyable lunch with all 50 Senate Democrats today to get
• 3:31
  Speaker 2: all this squared away, fresh off his big speech in
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: Georgia where he delivered his most passionate call yet for
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: filibuster reform and voting rights. Let's take a listen.
• 3:40
  Speaker 3: I've been having these quiet conversations with members of Congress
• 3:43
  Speaker 3: for the last two months.
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: I'm tired of being quiet.
• 3:49
  Speaker 3: Sadly, the United States Senate, designed to be the world's
• 3:53
  Speaker 3: greatest deliberative body, has been rendered a shell of its
• 3:57
  Speaker 3: former self. It gives me no satisfaction in saying that
• 4:02
  Speaker 3: as an institutionalist, as a man who was honored to
• 4:05
  Speaker 3: serve in the Senate. But as an institutionalist, I believe
• 4:10
  Speaker 3: that the threat to our democracy is so grave that
• 4:13
  Speaker 3: we must find a way to pass these voting rights bills.
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: Debate them.
• 4:18
  Speaker 4: Vote.
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: Let the majority prevail. And if that bare.
• 4:23
  Speaker 3: Minimum is blocked, we have no option but to change
• 4:27
  Speaker 3: the Senate rules, including.
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: Getting rid of the filibuster for this.
• 4:32
  Speaker 3: When it comes to protecting majority rule, In America, the
• 4:36
  Speaker 3: majority should rule in the United States Senate.
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: So I kind of feel like the dog who caught
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: the car here, Dan. We have wanted a Democratic president
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: to come out against the filibuster for years now. Joe Biden,
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: one of the Senate's biggest institutionalists when he was a senator,
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: finally does it. And now where are we? Just waiting
• 4:58
  Speaker 2: for Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema to have a last-minute
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: epiphany that has eluded them for the last year? What?
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: Man, I don't know. I mean, no matter what happens
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: in the next 72 hours, even though we know what's
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: going to happen in the next 72 hours, the filibuster is.
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: We're from the future. Yes. You're listening to this podcast
• 5:17
  Speaker 2: probably in the future. We know what's happening.
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: The ghost of, I don't know, future obstruction. Fuck knows.
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: But look, the filibuster just put aside how it's being
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: used to stop... voting rights bills. The filibuster itself is
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: a stupid, misused rule that is bad. And there are
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: times in which that's going to come back on us
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: very poorly as the party out of power who has a,
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: where the Senate is greatly disadvantaged against us, right? Where
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: we have a great disadvantage in the Senate. But it's
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: still wrong. It's just, it's just a stupid, it's a
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: terrible way to run a government, particularly at a time
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: of great polarization to depend that the solution to anything
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: must be compromised means you'll do almost nothing. Like the
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: only things that have happened in recent years of consequence,
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: have happened on a majority vote using the budget reconciliation process.
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: So I think Joe Biden turning on the Senate, I
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: am for that. But it does– the way this has
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: played out this week and with Sinema going to the
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: floor of the Senate to announce her opposition to the
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: filibuster prior to Joe Biden showing up to make his
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: last case, it just sort of embodies how terrible this
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: week has gone for everyone involved. And I sort of
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: feel– We have said for years, you've got to get
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: caught trying. Sometimes it's better to fight and lose and
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: not fight at all. This week may be the counterpoint
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: to that.
• 6:40
  Speaker 2: I don't know that anyone's... I guess the question is,
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: what else was he supposed to do?
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: I don't blame Joe Biden. There are times when nothing
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: will go right.
• 6:47
  Speaker 2: This is for presidents and this is one.
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: Of those And I– he made a powerful case last
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: week on January 6th. He made a powerful case today.
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: I want him to be making that case to the
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: country more often as this year progresses. And we can
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: talk about later in this podcast why that is. But
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: this sort of idea that we're going to hold these
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: big votes, we're going to set a deadline and no
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: one– and the no one is primarily Senate Democrats here–
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: had any chance of success from the beginning. That is
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: the problem here. And we are today where we were yesterday,
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: where we were six months ago, where we were a
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: year ago. And nothing has changed, and I'm not sure
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: anything anyone would have done in the interim would have
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: changed that.
• 7:34
  Speaker 2: Well, Mrs. Lincoln, what did you think of Biden's speech?
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: The speech was great. The filibuster parts are– we care
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: about that, and I'm glad he made the case against
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: it because we need to get rid of it, and
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: it may not– it's obviously– Not going to be this
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: week that we do it, but at some point. And
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: to do that, you need powerful, important Democrats, particularly someone
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: with the credibility like Joe Biden, to make that case.
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: The part that's more important, I think, is his case
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: about the dangers to democracy, about the importance of the
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: right to vote. And I think that is very important.
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: That's what you want to hear more of, regardless of
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: what happened, because all the headlines are going to be
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: Democrats failed to pass filibuster reform or Democrats failed to
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: end the filibuster reform. But the real story here and
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: the one that really matters to people as we head
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: in November is Republicans block voting rights. Republicans block attempts
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: to stop election subversion. And like, that's the part of
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: the story we're going to have to get to.
• 8:32
  Speaker 2: Um, yeah. Like did, did the speech move Joe Manchin
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: and Kyrsten Sinema?
• 8:36
  Speaker 4: No.
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: Seems like no.
• 8:38
  Speaker 2: Seems like a no on that. Um, But just from,
• 8:42
  Speaker 2: I agree with everything you said about the speech itself.
• 8:44
  Speaker 2: From a speech-giving perspective, I would say he's good with
• 8:48
  Speaker 2: the crowd behind him. Like, he ad-libbed a few times.
• 8:52
  Speaker 2: Some of the ad-libs are funny. Some of them, I'm sure,
• 8:54
  Speaker 2: you know, people at the White House were covering their eyes, right? But, like,
• 8:58
  Speaker 2: it was still better. than just sitting in the White
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: House reading off a script in front of you out
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: in the East Room and then walking back by yourself.
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: It's good for him to have energy. He's more energetic.
• 9:10
  Speaker 2: He's more forceful. He should do it more often. I
• 9:13
  Speaker 2: thought the speech was great. I thought it was great
• 9:15
  Speaker 2: particularly for the reason you said, which is it was
• 9:18
  Speaker 2: about voting rights, but it wasn't just about voting rights.
• 9:20
  Speaker 2: It was about the larger threat to democracy, which I
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: think is really important. It's central to his message, has
• 9:24
  Speaker 2: been since he ran for office. You know, in the speech,
• 9:27
  Speaker 2: there's a bit of a John Meacham issue in these
• 9:29
  Speaker 2: speeches sometimes where the audience is history books when it
• 9:33
  Speaker 2: should be regular Americans, something that Joe Biden has always
• 9:37
  Speaker 2: understood more than most politicians. But that's a minor thing,
• 9:41
  Speaker 2: you know, that I'm sure. Biden speechwriter Vinay Reddy and
• 9:45
  Speaker 2: Mike Donilon can take care of while Meacham's busy telling
• 9:48
  Speaker 2: reporters that he wrote the speech.
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: A lot of attention to the speechwriter community coming out
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: here on the pod.
• 9:53
  Speaker 2: It's just a little, it's a weird thing to go
• 9:56
  Speaker 2: out to like have to help on a speech and
• 9:58
  Speaker 2: then go run around the day after. after being like, yep,
• 10:01
  Speaker 2: that was my line. That was my line because I
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: said it on Morning Joe earlier and now I put
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: it in the speech. It's a weird thing to do.
• 10:06
  Speaker 2: Weird thing to do.
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: One, just one thing I've been, that I thought from
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: this speech and from the speech last week is one
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: thing we all need is more Joe Biden out there
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: making his case. And I, look, I'm, We're in a pandemic.
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: He's got a lot of shit on his plate. It
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: is hard to do this. Like the logistics behind doing
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: the sorts of events he did yesterday or Tuesday, I guess,
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: are harder in this world. Traveling is harder. The staffing,
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: all of that. But as we ramp up, Joe Biden
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: making his case for his issues and his presidency is
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: by far the best weapon we have to try to
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: shift some of the political dynamics heading into November.
• 10:46
  Speaker 5: Right.
• 10:46
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: Because he's going to, like, I mean, other Democrats can
• 10:49
  Speaker 2: and should do that as well, but he's the president
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: of the United States, and that's going to get coverage.
• 10:54
  Speaker 2: And then the Biden message and the White House story
• 10:57
  Speaker 2: is going to be part of the cycle, right? Part
• 11:00
  Speaker 2: of the constant news cycle. And I think a lot
• 11:02
  Speaker 2: of times in the past year, it's been missing at times.
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: And you're right. Part of it's because it's hard anyway
• 11:08
  Speaker 2: to set up a White House event when you're president.
• 11:09
  Speaker 2: You have all the logistics and security and all that
• 11:11
  Speaker 2: kind of stuff. In the middle of a pandemic, I
• 11:12
  Speaker 2: can't imagine how much harder it is. But he is
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: better when he has people around him and he's on
• 11:17
  Speaker 2: the road.
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: And they've been playing the inside game, trying to get
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: these bills passed, which is also the right thing to do.
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: But it is worse. There's a shift happening here, I think,
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: which is very good.
• 11:27
  Speaker 2: Well, I think the key line was the one that
• 11:29
  Speaker 2: we started the clip with, which is he's been having
• 11:31
  Speaker 2: these quiet conversations for two months and he's tired of
• 11:33
  Speaker 2: being quiet, which I thought was a good line and
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: also one that felt very true.
• 11:37
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 11:38
  Speaker 2: Sometimes you say lines and you're like, oh, yeah, this
• 11:40
  Speaker 2: one is this one's real. Here's a sample media reaction
• 11:43
  Speaker 2: from CNN's Casey Hunt. President Joe Biden, freshly elected, changing
• 11:48
  Speaker 2: his position on the filibuster might have moved the needle
• 11:50
  Speaker 2: in the Senate. Might have. It's a much steeper climb
• 11:52
  Speaker 2: now as his approval rating downward trend clearly shows. What
• 11:56
  Speaker 2: do you think? Would Manchin and Sinema have supported getting
• 11:58
  Speaker 2: rid of the filibuster if Joe Biden had only asked
• 12:00
  Speaker 2: them 12 months ago? Was he just late? Was that
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: part of Sinema's speech today? You were too late. You
• 12:05
  Speaker 2: were 12 months too late, Joe.
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: Just to give people a little behind-the-scenes peek at how
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: things go. So I texted you this tweet Tuesday afternoon.
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: And what happened?
• 12:18
  Speaker 2: I can't remember.
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: Did you spill your Diet Coke in anger?
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: Oh, I was walking through the office. I had my phone,
• 12:26
  Speaker 2: and I had a Diet Coke. I was walking back
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: to my desk, and I saw your text. And I
• 12:30
  Speaker 2: got so mad, I dropped both the Diet Coke and
• 12:32
  Speaker 2: the phone on the floor.
• 12:33
  Speaker 4: Yes.
• 12:34
  Speaker 2: Fortunately, no one was in the office to see.
• 12:38
  Speaker 3: It.
• 12:38
  Speaker 2: It's just me yelling. But yeah, no, I think that
• 12:43
  Speaker 2: was ridiculous.
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: I mean, is there possibly a chance some way that
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: Joe Biden could have gotten, or anyone, or Chuck Schumer,
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: or everyone listening could have gotten Joe Manchin, Kyrsten Sinema
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: changed their mind? Maybe, but it seems unlikely. But I
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: certainly think that... Joe Biden really turning the screws on
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: Joe Manchin just weeks after losing Joe Manchin's state by
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: 39 points is not really good. That is not the
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: issue here. It's not Joe Biden's political capital that is
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: stopping this. It is the political incentives of the people involved.
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: And those have not changed.
• 13:17
  Speaker 2: Part of this is the coverage of politics is always
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: a narrative and you need twists and turns and stuff
• 13:21
  Speaker 2: like that. But I think we have all, us included,
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: fallen victim to this idea that There's going to be
• 13:30
  Speaker 2: some epiphany. They're going to change their mind. When you
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: listen to Manchin and Sinema, whatever you want to say
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: about them, their views on the filibuster have been very
• 13:40
  Speaker 2: consistent the whole year. And again, we've talked about this before,
• 13:45
  Speaker 2: there is leverage with Sinema. We should primary her in 2024. Great.
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: Looking for candidates. Joe Manchin is probably going to be
• 13:54
  Speaker 2: the last Democratic senator in West Virginia. There's no political
• 13:57
  Speaker 2: pressure that can move him. So we're fucking stuck. And
• 14:00
  Speaker 2: we've got to go win more elections and elect more
• 14:02
  Speaker 2: Democrats in order to enact these changes. And that's a
• 14:05
  Speaker 2: frustrating reality. And it is, as you are all very
• 14:08
  Speaker 2: much aware of, extremely boring to keep saying over and
• 14:12
  Speaker 2: over and over again. But that doesn't mean that it's
• 14:14
  Speaker 2: not the truth. What did you make of the rest
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: of the media coverage? I feel like the White House
• 14:18
  Speaker 2: didn't get the clean headlines they wanted. Here's one from
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: Business Insider that really sums it up. Biden voting speech
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: boycotted by activists, overshadowed by football win. Tough.
• 14:28
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: It's just like you can't catch a break. Like on paper,
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: doing this– they were trying to get Build Back Better
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: done before Christmas. That obviously didn't work. Then you have
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: the anniversary of January 6th and Chuck Schumer sets his deadline.
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: So this is the time when it makes sense and
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: going to Atlanta of all places makes sense.
• 14:49
  Speaker 2: It is the– Cradle of civil rights as he said
• 14:52
  Speaker 2: in his speech.
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: Yes, and it's also– the epicenter of Republican voter suppression,
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: all happening in one place, election subversion. There is a
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: Republican governor being primaried for not overturning the will of
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: the voters. It is where it's all happening. So going
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: there makes sense. And then on the week you want
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: to go there, you have just at the general backdrop
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: of a huge surge in the pandemic happening, you get
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: inflation numbers. We've put inflation at a 40-year high. Then
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: you get a Quinnipiac poll, which shows your approval rating
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: at 33%. I don't think that's right necessarily, but it
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: drives narratives. Then the day you scheduled your speech, this
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: is the only one they sort of control, but it's
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: also sort of hard to figure out how to plan
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: around is you have your speech in Atlanta, Georgia the
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: morning after the University of Georgia wins the national championship
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: also for the first time in 40 years, 40 years ago,
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: inflation was super high and Georgia was national champions. And
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: now we're back again. And so it's just, it's like,
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: what do you, let me.
• 15:51
  Speaker 2: Just, it's not great.
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: You can plan everything right in the white house and
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: get screwed by events. And that made this harder. It
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: does it. I mean, the speech is still good. People
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: will still consume it. The coverage and the headlines are,
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: that like people like you and I mainstream, like this
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: is a business headline. You have some business insider behind
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: a paywall. No one will ever cross. So it's not
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: like that's really affecting the electorate. And I, and I've
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: seen some of the local Georgia coverage, which has been excellent.
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: It's not the top story, mind you, because Georgia when
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: that's championship, but people in Georgia are getting the coverage,
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: but it's, it is suboptimal. And you're, they've been in
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: Biden's been in this bad news spiral for since August.
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: And it's hard to get out of it. It's really, and,
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: You know, there needs to be a circuit breaker and
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: they haven't been able to find it yet.
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: So if this goes down, as it is expected to
• 16:40
  Speaker 2: do over this weekend, Democrats have another option, which is
• 16:45
  Speaker 2: working with Republicans to reform the Electoral Count Act. We've
• 16:48
  Speaker 2: talked about this last couple of weeks. But Greg Sargent
• 16:52
  Speaker 2: at the Washington Post was told that Democrats are expected
• 16:55
  Speaker 2: to introduce their own bill on the Electoral Count Act.
• 16:59
  Speaker 2: I think Angus King, Amy Klobuchar is working on this,
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: that would do the following. One, require a supermajority in
• 17:06
  Speaker 2: each chamber in order to reject a state's electoral votes,
• 17:10
  Speaker 2: something like three-fifths. Two, create a judicial review for if
• 17:16
  Speaker 2: a state legislature tries to appoint its own electors. And three,
• 17:20
  Speaker 2: clarify that the vice president... can't overturn the election, which
• 17:23
  Speaker 2: is something that apparently needs clarifying. So this will be
• 17:26
  Speaker 2: much stronger than the previous proposals, which didn't really do
• 17:29
  Speaker 2: anything about state legislatures overturning an election. That was the
• 17:33
  Speaker 2: problem that I think I pointed out last pod. What
• 17:36
  Speaker 2: do you think about it?
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: I think the three-fifths bar to overturning an election is
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: the exact right thing to do. I mean, it's a
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: sad statement on the politics in this country that we
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: have to have a supermajority to stop people from overturning
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: the will of voters. But That is clearly where we are,
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: and that would make it very, very hard to steal elections.
• 17:55
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 17:55
  Speaker 2: And I think the state legislature provision, too, is actually
• 17:59
  Speaker 2: quite good. It depends on how you set up the
• 18:01
  Speaker 2: judicial review, of course, but I think it's pretty good.
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: Mark Elias pointed out that in the new Freedom to Vote, colon,
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: John Lewis Act bill, that there's some more election subversion
• 18:12
  Speaker 2: provisions there. Um, specifically there's, they included a federal right
• 18:17
  Speaker 2: to vote and to have that vote counted, which means
• 18:19
  Speaker 2: that if your vote does not, is not reflected in
• 18:22
  Speaker 2: the official tallies, you have the ability to sue in
• 18:25
  Speaker 2: the DC circuit court. So that's a good provision too.
• 18:27
  Speaker 2: I don't know if Democrats will include that in their
• 18:29
  Speaker 2: electoral count act. I don't know if Republicans will go
• 18:31
  Speaker 2: for it, but I do think if this goes down.
• 18:34
  Speaker 2: And somehow Democrats could find– I think they only have
• 18:37
  Speaker 2: like four Republicans in the Senate right now who are interested.
• 18:40
  Speaker 2: But if they could somehow find 10 Republicans to just
• 18:42
  Speaker 2: do basic election subversion stuff, you don't get all of
• 18:45
  Speaker 2: the provisions that we had in Freedom to Vote, which
• 18:47
  Speaker 2: are very important provisions and very good. But if you
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: could do something to prevent election subversion, I would fucking
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: do it. I would work on that.
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: Do you think we're making a mistake by tying our
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: hands behind our back and preventing Kamala Harris from– overturning
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: the election in 2025 if we need it.
• 19:07
  Speaker 2: That's, you're using your inside voice on the pot again.
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: Yes. I think it's so funny how many people think
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: that's like the biggest deal. And then it's like, that's
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: not going to stop the election from being sold in
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: 2024 because we have.
• 19:21
  Speaker 2: The vice president. It would be the most, it would
• 19:25
  Speaker 2: be the most Democratic Party thing to do.
• 19:27
  Speaker 4: Yes.
• 19:28
  Speaker 2: To pass this and then have a bunch of, well,
• 19:31
  Speaker 2: this is, this is what was my problem with Doing
• 19:34
  Speaker 2: the Electoral Count Act without doing anything about the states,
• 19:37
  Speaker 2: because the states, the Republican state legislatures are the real threat.
• 19:41
  Speaker 2: And if you don't do anything about the Republican state legislatures,
• 19:43
  Speaker 2: but you do tie the hands of the vice president
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: and Democrats in Congress, then you could be looking at
• 19:48
  Speaker 2: that kind of a bad outcome. but if you do
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: something to stop the states and then do something to
• 19:53
  Speaker 2: stop congress from overturning the election basically no one should
• 19:56
  Speaker 2: be able to overturn the election because the people who
• 19:59
  Speaker 2: vote should get to decide who wins wild wild that's
• 20:05
  Speaker 2: what i'm for that's what i'm for um So then
• 20:08
  Speaker 2: let's say, like, if all legislative solutions fail, or even
• 20:11
  Speaker 2: if the Electoral Count Act passes, but we still don't
• 20:13
  Speaker 2: have voting rights legislation, what should Democrats do and say
• 20:17
  Speaker 2: about the threat to voting rights and democracy? Is talking
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: about these issues on the campaign trail the best way
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: to win the power we need to actually pass these bills?
• 20:26
  Speaker 2: Should we make democracy a central issue in the midterm?
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: There's been a lot of discussion this week with people
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: throwing polls in people's faces that shows that the people...
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: The issues people care about most are the pandemic and
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: the economy. And then there is a set of focus
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: groups that Alex Rorty of McClatchy, I believe, tweeted out,
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: which showed that January 6th and the threats to democracy
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: were not top of mind. And that's sort of one
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: of those like no shit Sherlock poll findings, which is
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: in the middle of a once in a century pandemic
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: and the highest inflation in 40 years, people are probably
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: going to– those are going to be top of mind
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: for everyone. A pollster calls you and says, what are
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: you most worried about? It's probably– trying to keep your
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: family healthy and pay groceries before you get to a
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: threat to democracy, which won't even manifest itself necessarily for
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: till the end of this year, next year, whatever else.
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: But I think that, so some people look at that
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: and say, see, Democrats are making a mistake by doing this,
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: that you shouldn't talk about democracy. People don't care. And
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: there's just this fundamental difference between how Republicans and Democrats
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: think about messaging. Republicans, for the most part, decide what
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: they want to be top of mind of voters on
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: election day, and then they talk about that, regardless of
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: how it pulls down. And Democrats tend to say, this
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: is what voters care about now. This is what we're
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: going to talk about. And maybe it's the best thing
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: for us. Maybe it's not the best thing for us,
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: but we're going to try to win what's top of mind.
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: And obviously, Republicans have this advantage and they have this
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: giant megaphone, mega media, Fox, Facebook, that helps them shift
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: the conversation in ways we don't. But I think if
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: you were to sit here and say, what do we
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: want voters to care about? And it's not– I want
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: to be very clear. It's not a zero-sum game. You
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: can talk about threats to democracy and you can talk
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: about the economy and all those things. We don't have
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: to just pick one thing. But if you think about
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: how we built the coalition that gave us the House,
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: the Senate, and the White House, it was a bunch
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: of people who had never been involved in politics before,
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: people who had not previously supported Democrats, coming together with
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: the Democratic base because of the unique threat that Trump
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: and Trump is facing in this country. And therefore, I
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: think to keep that coalition together and engaged, we have
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: to make the case that the crisis that brought us
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: together in the first place, that got us engaged, is
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: not over and, in fact, may be growing. And that's
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: harder to do with Joe Biden in the White House,
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: but I think that is an argument for making the
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: threat of democracy and the threat of Trumpism writ large
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: a big part of our message. It doesn't have to
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: be the only part, but it has to be– we
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: need people to care about that and think about that
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: if we want them to get involved and vote for
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: us in 2022, if that makes sense.
• 22:50
  Speaker 2: It does make sense. I think the big challenge, we've
• 22:51
  Speaker 2: talked about this before, is figuring out a way to
• 22:56
  Speaker 2: fuse people's economic concerns with their concerns about democracy. And
• 23:04
  Speaker 2: so look, the focus groups that you talked about, that
• 23:07
  Speaker 2: Alex Rorty was tweeting about, there were two groups of
• 23:11
  Speaker 2: moderate voters, either Trump-Biden voters or Trump voters who regret
• 23:15
  Speaker 2: their vote. They did not bring up January 6th as
• 23:19
  Speaker 2: a big deal. Some of them thought that Biden and
• 23:22
  Speaker 2: Democrats embellished what happened when they talked about it. They
• 23:25
  Speaker 2: might have politicized a tragedy. There was a little bit
• 23:27
  Speaker 2: of that. But then there was a lot of people who,
• 23:30
  Speaker 2: towards the second half of the focus group, said the
• 23:31
  Speaker 2: attack was terrible. Democracy is in danger. It was right
• 23:34
  Speaker 2: for Biden to speak. In that Quinnipiac poll that you cited,
• 23:37
  Speaker 2: where Biden has a 33% approval rating, 58% of Americans
• 23:42
  Speaker 2: said the country's democracy is in danger of collapse. 53%
• 23:47
  Speaker 2: said they're worried there'll be another attack like 1-6. And
• 23:51
  Speaker 2: 61% thought that Trump bears some or a lot of responsibility.
• 23:54
  Speaker 2: 60% say they would not like him to run again.
• 23:57
  Speaker 2: So just to focus on the 58% who think that,
• 24:02
  Speaker 2: you know, the country's democracy is in danger of collapse,
• 24:04
  Speaker 2: that's a pretty big number. And I wonder if the
• 24:08
  Speaker 2: challenge is, it's not just like, yeah, do you keep
• 24:10
  Speaker 2: hammering January 6th and talking about January 6th? Or is
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: there something bigger and deeper that people are worried about
• 24:17
  Speaker 2: when they say that they're worried that democracy is about
• 24:20
  Speaker 2: to collapse? And I think that so far, partly because
• 24:23
  Speaker 2: we were trying to pass this legislation, we have talked
• 24:25
  Speaker 2: about the threat to democracy narrowly in terms of voting,
• 24:29
  Speaker 2: the right to vote. But I think we need to
• 24:32
  Speaker 2: broaden that as a message for the midterms and include
• 24:37
  Speaker 2: what it looks like. It's democracy in terms of voting.
• 24:40
  Speaker 2: It's economic democracy. There's just a country that is open
• 24:47
  Speaker 2: to everyone, where everyone has a chance. There's gotta be
• 24:50
  Speaker 2: a way to understand people's concerns that they're having in
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: their everyday lives while still talking about this larger threat
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: to the system, which is going to prevent us from
• 25:00
  Speaker 2: improving their lives. You know, like it's they got to
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: work it out. But I don't think people say, oh,
• 25:05
  Speaker 2: you got to do both, which is sort of like
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: a lazy answer. But like it's about it's about one
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: message that incorporates all of the different concerns and threats
• 25:14
  Speaker 2: that people face. And I don't think that Democrats are
• 25:17
  Speaker 2: close to it right now.
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: I mean, I've spent a lot of time to think
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: about it. It's very hard. I don't have a an
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: answer that I feel good about. I just one small
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: point here. I think we have to be I think
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: we have to be careful about the democracy is in
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: danger polling because that's like a Rorschach test, right? And
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: a lot of these polls, it's Republicans who– the ones
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: whose party are doing voter suppression, they support putting in
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: voter ID laws that they support, who think that January
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: 6th was a protest and that the election was– they
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: think democracy is in danger because Democrats are stealing elections.
• 25:51
  Speaker 2: Democrats– This one– party breakdown on this had Democrats, independents
• 25:55
  Speaker 2: and Republicans almost at the same levels.
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: Yeah, which is– sort of belies what's happening in the
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: real world. And so there needs to be a little
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: more specificity into some of these questions, which campaign polling
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: will have and media polling will not because they serve
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: different purposes.
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: Oh, I was going to say, I think this is
• 26:12
  Speaker 2: why you need both polling and focus groups, right? Focus
• 26:15
  Speaker 2: groups are only a small number of people, so they
• 26:17
  Speaker 2: can't tell you everything. But polling is just numbers, so
• 26:19
  Speaker 2: you don't really know what's behind the numbers. You need
• 26:21
  Speaker 2: to do both together. You'd love to see some focus
• 26:23
  Speaker 2: groups where you sat voters down and who are concerned
• 26:26
  Speaker 2: about democracy and concerned about democracy collapsing and say, why
• 26:30
  Speaker 2: do you feel that way? What are the things that
• 26:32
  Speaker 2: make you worried about the country? What would you like
• 26:34
  Speaker 2: to see happen? That kind of stuff. Um, cause I do,
• 26:37
  Speaker 2: I think it's an area for much more research as
• 26:40
  Speaker 2: we get closer to the midterms of like, what's really
• 26:43
  Speaker 2: like the, the right track, wrong track. Is it like
• 26:47
  Speaker 2: historic highs for right for a wrong track right now? Um,
• 26:51
  Speaker 2: would love to find out from people why they think that, right. Um,
• 26:54
  Speaker 2: not just random people in diners, um, but like, you know, Democrats, uh,
• 27:00
  Speaker 2: swing voters, people who sat out the last election, people
• 27:03
  Speaker 2: who might want to sit out this election. People have
• 27:05
  Speaker 2: never voted before independence, right? Like you'd want to go
• 27:07
  Speaker 2: through different groups and find out what exactly, what are
• 27:10
  Speaker 2: people are feeling right now? Um, as, as, as you
• 27:13
  Speaker 2: put together a message, um, we will end this segment
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: with some good news as we're talking about elections and, um,
• 27:20
  Speaker 2: and how we need to win them. Um, Here's a
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: note from Ben Wickler to Tommy since their interview on
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: Tuesday's episode. Quote, Fantastic. Thank you, everyone. Good job, Pod
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: Save America listeners. I think we should help Ben get
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: to 50% of their goal by Monday. Monday?
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: By next pod.
• 27:57
  Speaker 3: Right?
• 27:58
  Speaker 2: Well, next pod, sorry. We record Monday. Next pod, Tuesday.
• 28:01
  Speaker 2: Let's do it by Tuesday.
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: Chuck Schumer's not the only one who can have a
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: deadline around here. Let's do it. All right, yeah.
• 28:06
  Speaker 2: Except this deadline will come with good news. We'll accomplish
• 28:11
  Speaker 2: something with this deadline. WisDems.org is where you're going to
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: want to go to help donate to the Wisconsin Democratic
• 28:16
  Speaker 2: Party so that they have the resources they need to
• 28:19
  Speaker 2: beat Ron Johnson. Again, if the Democratic senators who are
• 28:24
  Speaker 2: up win and we beat Ron Johnson, that's one less
• 28:28
  Speaker 2: Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema that we have to care about.
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: Sounds good to me.
• 28:32
  Speaker 2: You flip a nut, you flip Pennsylvania. Now you don't
• 28:35
  Speaker 2: have to care about Joe Manchin or Kyrsten Sinema.
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: What a world.
• 28:40
  Speaker 2: What a world. What a world. Let's talk about Omicron.
• 28:52
  Speaker 2: Another cheery subject. There's been quite a bit of Omicron
• 28:57
  Speaker 2: news over the last week. We've had plenty of experts
• 28:59
  Speaker 2: on to talk about the health implications. Today, the two
• 29:02
  Speaker 2: of us are going to talk about the political challenges,
• 29:04
  Speaker 2: which are many. But let's start with some good news.
• 29:08
  Speaker 2: So the data suggests that the latest wave may be
• 29:11
  Speaker 2: peaking in cities that were hit early like New York
• 29:14
  Speaker 2: and Washington. The hope there is that the rapid surging
• 29:18
  Speaker 2: cases here in the U.S. will be followed by a
• 29:21
  Speaker 2: rapid decline like we've seen in South Africa and like
• 29:24
  Speaker 2: we're starting to see in the U.K., which means that
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: the Omicron wave would last four to six weeks. Here's
• 29:31
  Speaker 2: the tougher news. The wave has yet to hit some
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: of the most unvaccinated parts of America at a time
• 29:37
  Speaker 2: when health care workers and hospitals have been stretched to
• 29:39
  Speaker 2: their brim. point. And even after the surge is over,
• 29:43
  Speaker 2: here's what Dr. Fauci had to say this week about
• 29:45
  Speaker 2: the latest variant.
• 29:47
  Speaker 5: Omicron, with its extraordinary, unprecedented degree of efficiency of transmissibility,
• 29:55
  Speaker 5: will ultimately find just about everybody those who have been
• 29:59
  Speaker 5: vaccinated and vaccinated and boosted would get exposed.
• 30:04
  Speaker 4: Some, maybe a lot of them will get infected, but
• 30:08
  Speaker 4: will very likely with some exceptions do reasonably well in
• 30:13
  Speaker 4: the sense of not having hospitalization and death.
• 30:16
  Speaker 2: Cool, cool, cool, cool. Uh, so I think, I think
• 30:19
  Speaker 2: a lot of the debates we're seeing right now over
• 30:22
  Speaker 2: school closures and staff shortages and hospital hospital capacity will
• 30:26
  Speaker 2: change quite a bit. Um, when the Omicron wave is
• 30:30
  Speaker 2: over sometime in February after a very rough January. But
• 30:35
  Speaker 2: I want to talk about what happens then in a
• 30:38
  Speaker 2: situation where COVID, A, has likely infected most Americans, like
• 30:44
  Speaker 2: Fauci said, B, is still extremely transmissible, and C, is
• 30:50
  Speaker 2: a real threat to the unvaccinated, but is somewhere between
• 30:55
  Speaker 2: a bad cold and a bad flu for something like
• 30:58
  Speaker 2: 90 plus percent of fully vaccinated people who get it.
• 31:03
  Speaker 2: What do you do and say about that if you're
• 31:06
  Speaker 2: the Biden administration?
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: What Fauci is really saying without saying it is COVID
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: is a problem to be managed, not solved. And I
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: think it's going to be incumbent on the Biden administration.
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: I suspect we're probably about a week away from this happening.
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: This is not based on anything anyone's told me, just
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: my guess. Of a shift from the message that Joe
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: Biden had said from the beginning, which is we're going
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: to crush the virus, to we are going to– I
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: don't know what the right words are, but we are going.
• 31:36
  Speaker 2: To– Gently stomp on it.
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: It's we are going to– we're going to protect.
• 31:42
  Speaker 2: Americans from the virus. Put shit out of the way.
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: And I think– so what does that look like from
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: the Biden administration? I think there are a couple things.
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: One is changing the metric of success. when you have
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: told people that we are going to return to normal
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: and we're going to crush the virus, which I think
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: was a very legitimate expectation over a year ago when,
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: before we knew that the Republican Party was going to
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: shift from being boosters of the vaccine to refusing to
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: getting vaccines or boosters. So you have to shift from
• 32:10
  Speaker 1: we're going to crush the virus, everything's going to be
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: back to normal, to we are going to give you
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: the tools you need to live your life as normally
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: and safely as possible. And you saw Biden do some
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: of that today with with a commitment to more masks,
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: more high-quality masks and more testing, more testing sites, reinforcing
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: hospitals and essential and healthcare workers, keeping schools open, doing
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: everything we can to make it normal. Because even if
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: the virus were to mostly recede into the background, life
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: is not going to return to normal in America for
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: a long time because this was a traumatic event, right? Psychologically, economically,
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: And you just– it's hard to even fathom. I was
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: just trying to think back to– I saw a picture
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: from two years ago today, like an Apple Photos memory.
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: And it's like I'm out with people and no one
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: has masks on and we're just like having fun and
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: we have no fucking clue what's about to happen. And
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: to imagine what we've all been through and what our
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: kids have been through and the people who– this is–
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: we have not in this country suffered this scale of
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: death in such a short period of time since the
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: world wars. And so it's going to take us a
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: long time. And so I think you're shifting to a
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: different metric where you're focused on different things than just
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: stopping people from getting infected.
• 33:31
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 33:31
  Speaker 1: I think that's sort of how you have to talk
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: about it and think about it and guide your policy
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: to it. Cause I think we're running, we're running out
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: of people to vaccinate. Once we get once God willing,
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: soon as fucking possible, get kids zero to five vaccinated,
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: then we've just, there's not much more you can do
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: with the vaccine hesitant, I think, to get them there.
• 33:51
  Speaker 2: So this week we had six former Biden advisors laid
• 33:53
  Speaker 2: out a plan for what they call a new normal
• 33:57
  Speaker 2: that talks about how we can live with COVID-19 as
• 33:59
  Speaker 2: an endemic virus, which is basically what you're talking about.
• 34:02
  Speaker 2: I think part of the confusion among Americans, understandably, has
• 34:07
  Speaker 2: been it seems like there's all these shifting strategies from
• 34:10
  Speaker 2: public health officials, experts, the administration, But the reason that
• 34:15
  Speaker 2: they're shifting is because the virus changes with new variants.
• 34:17
  Speaker 2: And so if I was the Biden administration, I would
• 34:19
  Speaker 2: say new variants require new strategies. Here's ours, right? COVID-19
• 34:25
  Speaker 2: may not completely disappear from our lives, but it will
• 34:27
  Speaker 2: no longer control our lives. And then, as you said,
• 34:30
  Speaker 2: we have all the tools we need to move beyond
• 34:32
  Speaker 2: this pandemic. The most important are still vaccines. I would
• 34:36
  Speaker 2: go back to that because vaccines continue to offer, even
• 34:40
  Speaker 2: with this variant, extremely high protection against hospitalization and death.
• 34:45
  Speaker 2: They also, according to the one peer-reviewed published study we
• 34:50
  Speaker 2: have about long COVID among people who have been vaccinated,
• 34:55
  Speaker 2: vaccinations reduce the chance of long COVID by at least 50%,
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: if not more, in the one study we have. But
• 34:59
  Speaker 2: there's a lot more to be learned about that. Vaccines
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: are free and available to every single American above five.
• 35:05
  Speaker 2: Kids under five should be able to get them in
• 35:07
  Speaker 2: a few months. Wherever we can, we'll require vaccinations in
• 35:10
  Speaker 2: order to keep people alive, just as we have with
• 35:12
  Speaker 2: so many other illnesses in the past. We've also developed therapeutics,
• 35:16
  Speaker 2: therapeutic treatments for people who get COVID that will also
• 35:19
  Speaker 2: keep them out of the hospital, including, finally, for people
• 35:22
  Speaker 2: who are immunocompromised, the FDA finally approved one in December
• 35:27
  Speaker 2: that should help people who are immunocompromised. We're going to
• 35:31
  Speaker 2: ramp up treatments. all of these therapeutic treatments this year
• 35:35
  Speaker 2: so that we're going to have these pills for like
• 35:37
  Speaker 2: everyone who needs them eventually. If you want more protection
• 35:41
  Speaker 2: than the vaccine provides, you can wear an N95 mask
• 35:44
  Speaker 2: indoor in crowded settings. That will protect you. That will
• 35:47
  Speaker 2: protect you even if everyone around you is not wearing
• 35:49
  Speaker 2: a mask. We're going to send those to everyone. That's
• 35:51
  Speaker 2: what they announced today. They're going to send N95s to
• 35:54
  Speaker 2: people finally. They're going to make sure there's enough testing,
• 35:57
  Speaker 2: better ventilation in schools, offices, government buildings, keep developing better
• 36:00
  Speaker 2: treatments and better vaccines and double down on efforts to
• 36:03
  Speaker 2: vaccinate the world because it's the right thing to do
• 36:05
  Speaker 2: and because that's the best way to prevent other variants
• 36:07
  Speaker 2: from popping up. And if they do pop up, we'll
• 36:10
  Speaker 2: be ready. And if there are future surges or waves,
• 36:13
  Speaker 2: hopefully they're not, but they may be, we may need
• 36:17
  Speaker 2: to put in place temporary restrictions to prevent our hospitals
• 36:19
  Speaker 2: from filling up or our healthcare system from breaking. Other
• 36:22
  Speaker 2: than that, people should live their lives. You know? Like,
• 36:27
  Speaker 2: I just think you have to The trick with, I mean,
• 36:32
  Speaker 2: as soon as I saw Omicron and started learning about Omicron,
• 36:36
  Speaker 2: I thought a variant that is more transmissible, but milder,
• 36:42
  Speaker 2: especially milder in vaccinated people, only somewhat milder in unvaccinated people,
• 36:48
  Speaker 2: it's going to be the trickiest political challenge of all.
• 36:52
  Speaker 2: Because if it was something much more severe, then there'd
• 36:55
  Speaker 2: be sort of much more support for more restrictions. If
• 37:01
  Speaker 2: it was something that was much less severe, much less
• 37:04
  Speaker 2: milder and not as transmissible, there'd be more support for like, okay,
• 37:07
  Speaker 2: let's just go about living. Because it's this in-between where
• 37:12
  Speaker 2: it's more transmissible but milder, it raises a lot of
• 37:16
  Speaker 2: genuinely difficult political questions. But I do think it is
• 37:21
  Speaker 2: a variant that might prepare us for endemic COVID, which
• 37:26
  Speaker 2: for people who don't know, endemic COVID is basically you
• 37:29
  Speaker 2: live with a low level of virus circulating around low
• 37:34
  Speaker 2: levels of case numbers. They don't get to zero, but
• 37:36
  Speaker 2: they're low. They're not anything near what we're seeing now
• 37:39
  Speaker 2: for an indeterminate amount of time, maybe forever, much like
• 37:43
  Speaker 2: we live with the flu and with common colds. Now,
• 37:47
  Speaker 2: this was This was not the case at the beginning
• 37:50
  Speaker 2: of the pandemic when we did not have these vaccines,
• 37:53
  Speaker 2: these life-saving vaccines or these life-saving treatments. Now it is.
• 37:57
  Speaker 2: And I do think you're getting to the point where you,
• 38:00
  Speaker 2: once this, and again, this is all once this wave passes,
• 38:02
  Speaker 2: like we're in it now. But once this wave passes,
• 38:06
  Speaker 2: you've got to start having off-ramps, metrics. You have to
• 38:11
  Speaker 2: be prepared for the next possible variant. You have to
• 38:14
  Speaker 2: have all this stuff in place so that A, people
• 38:16
  Speaker 2: aren't caught off guard next time there may be a variant,
• 38:18
  Speaker 2: but B, there is a path for society to go
• 38:22
  Speaker 2: on living and people to go on living their lives.
• 38:26
  Speaker 2: I do think the politics around the pandemic already seem
• 38:29
  Speaker 2: to be changing for Democrats and Republicans. Over the last
• 38:31
  Speaker 2: few weeks, we've seen Democratic mayors and governors fight to
• 38:33
  Speaker 2: keep schools and businesses open. Meanwhile, just a few weeks
• 38:37
  Speaker 2: after Ron DeSantis refused to answer a reporter's question about
• 38:39
  Speaker 2: whether he's been boosted, Donald Trump said this in an
• 38:42
  Speaker 2: interview with OANN.
• 38:44
  Speaker 4: Many politicians, I watched a couple of politicians be interviewed,
• 38:48
  Speaker 4: and one of the questions was, did you get the booster?
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: Because they had the vaccine.
• 38:52
  Speaker 4: And they, oh, they're answering it like, in other words,
• 38:54
  Speaker 4: the answer is yes, but they don't want to say it.
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: Because they're gutless.
• 38:58
  Speaker 5: You've got to say it.
• 38:59
  Speaker 2: Gutless. What do you make of Trump's comments? What's his
• 39:03
  Speaker 2: game plan here? And I use the word plan extremely loosely.
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: Well, based on what reporters like Maggie Haberman have tweeted
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: and reported— It seems like this is largely about Ron DeSantis,
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: who Trump is angry at, jealous of, threatened by, and
• 39:21
  Speaker 1: DeSantis has sort of very prominently refused to say whether
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: he was boosted or not for fear of trying to
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: avoid that situation Trump found himself in when he was
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: at that rally in Alabama a few months ago and
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: talked about the vaccines and got booed by his own people.
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: And so this is like a dig at DeSantis, which
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: is ultimately at the end of the day, these Trump
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: things are never about some sort of strategy. They're just
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: sort of about a grievance with someone and a chance
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: to attack someone who he doesn't like or feels threatened by.
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: I think that's what this is. But It is, I
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: will say, great politics.
• 39:53
  Speaker 2: You think it's great politics for Trump? Yeah. I mean,
• 39:56
  Speaker 2: think about- How do you think it plays? I'm just
• 39:59
  Speaker 2: curious as how that plays with the Republican base, which
• 40:03
  Speaker 2: has been, you know, their opinions range from anti-vaccine to
• 40:08
  Speaker 2: vaccine hesitant to booster hesitant to anti-booster. Like this is
• 40:12
  Speaker 2: not a base that is in love with the vaccines, though,
• 40:15
  Speaker 2: you know, a good number of Republican voters, of course,
• 40:17
  Speaker 2: have taken the vaccine.
• 40:20
  Speaker 1: Well, a couple things. One, in the short term, and
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: the short term being this midterm election, the pandemic is
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: the Republicans' greatest weapon. And they have this message that
• 40:30
  Speaker 1: is more Americans have died from COVID under Biden than Trump. Now,
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: they're that really absolves Republicans of their exact role in
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: convincing their voters to not get the vaccine and therefore
• 40:43
  Speaker 1: making them die at an incredibly high rate. A bit,
• 40:47
  Speaker 1: a bit, yeah. Not substance, but soundbite, that is a message.
• 40:50
  Speaker 1: And it is Biden promised to end the pandemic and
• 40:53
  Speaker 1: the pandemic is not over. And it's like, as we've said,
• 40:55
  Speaker 1: that's not Joe Biden's fault personally. Like not that it's
• 40:57
  Speaker 1: been perfect, but it's a much thing bigger than one
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: president can end it. But that's the message. The biggest
• 41:02
  Speaker 1: vulnerability in that message is the anti-vaccine sentiment there. Among Republicans,
• 41:07
  Speaker 1: because it's not just that– it is true that the
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: majority of the unvaccinated are Republicans, but the majority of
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: Republicans are vaccinated. And so that is a small minority.
• 41:20
  Speaker 1: I think Trump's power over the base is– would greatly
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: exceed their qualms about the vaccine were he to run
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: again in 2024. I also don't think anyone of substance
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: is running against him if he does it, but I
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: went back on a project I've been working on that
• 41:35
  Speaker 1: will be announced at some point in the near future.
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: Went back and looked at all of the, how the
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: Republicans talked about the vaccine in November and December. They
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: fucking love the vaccine. When Trump was president, Ronnie Jackson
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: going to get the vaccine, Ron Johnson, applauding the vaccine,
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: love operation warp speed, uh, So if Trump decides that
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: he wants to get credit for developing the vaccine and
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: then attack Joe Biden for screwing up the rest of
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: the pandemic, I think the vast, like maybe not Ann Coulter,
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: but the actual voters are going to follow him right along,
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: right back to where they were two years ago.
• 42:11
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 42:11
  Speaker 2: And I think, and Trump is also doing what Youngkin
• 42:14
  Speaker 2: successfully did in Virginia, which is saying, I got the vaccine.
• 42:17
  Speaker 2: I like the vaccine. I got the booster. I like
• 42:19
  Speaker 2: the booster, but it's up to you. I don't like
• 42:21
  Speaker 2: the mandates, which is, you know, Why do you think
• 42:25
  Speaker 2: that so many elected Democrats have been fighting against closures
• 42:29
  Speaker 2: during this wave? What's changed there?
• 42:31
  Speaker 1: Well, one, we know a lot more, but parents are
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: sick of closures. I think we know and have enough
• 42:37
  Speaker 1: research to know that we can keep kids as safe
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: as possible in the situation and that the cost of
• 42:43
  Speaker 1: kids being out of school for the kids themselves, for
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: the community, for the family is so high. And you
• 42:49
  Speaker 1: look at the polling, it's very clear. It's like 30% support,
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: 65% opposition to closing schools or returning to remote learning.
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: So no one wants to be on the side of
• 42:57
  Speaker 1: the 30% issue.
• 42:59
  Speaker 2: Well, and the other big thing, I mean, kids over five,
• 43:03
  Speaker 2: unlike our kids, have access to vaccines. And if you're
• 43:08
  Speaker 2: a vaccinated child over five, then your chance of a
• 43:11
  Speaker 2: really bad outcome is extremely, extremely small. Now, the reason
• 43:18
  Speaker 2: that the debate right now is a little messy is
• 43:20
  Speaker 2: is because a lot of these schools aren't closing because
• 43:23
  Speaker 2: everyone's saying close them down. And it's, it's dangerous. It's
• 43:27
  Speaker 2: everyone's getting sick. And a lot of teachers are getting sick.
• 43:30
  Speaker 2: A lot of staff are getting sick and, you know,
• 43:32
  Speaker 2: they end up with, they end up recovering there. A
• 43:35
  Speaker 2: lot of them aren't going to the hospital, but they're
• 43:37
  Speaker 2: still out for a week. Um, or, you know, some,
• 43:41
  Speaker 2: someone has COVID or a student has COVID and they
• 43:43
  Speaker 2: shut a whole bunch of They shut classrooms down. They
• 43:46
  Speaker 2: shut whole schools down. They send people home. They quarantine, isolate.
• 43:49
  Speaker 2: I mean, it's like a real mess.
• 43:51
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: I mean, you raised a very important point. There is
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: a bit of a straw man argument here with other
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: than a couple of notable exceptions, like what was happening
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: in Chicago a few weeks ago. Almost no one is
• 44:01
  Speaker 1: arguing to close schools proactively because of a surge in
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: COVID cases. That's not what Democratic mayors are doing. That's
• 44:09
  Speaker 1: not what Democratic governors are doing. No one's doing that.
• 44:11
  Speaker 1: But as you point out, some schools are being forced
• 44:13
  Speaker 1: to close or have classrooms closed for the same reason
• 44:16
  Speaker 1: that flights are getting canceled. The Starbucks by my house
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: is closed. It's spreading so fast to so many people
• 44:24
  Speaker 1: because it's so transmissible, even if most of those people
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: are having relatively minor symptoms, that it is disrupting life
• 44:31
  Speaker 1: and schools are a part of that. This is not
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: 2020 all over again.
• 44:36
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 44:37
  Speaker 2: And just the other thing that's changed is the politics
• 44:41
  Speaker 2: around this. The USA Today poll from this week, do
• 44:44
  Speaker 2: you support or oppose the following policies to slow the
• 44:47
  Speaker 2: spread of Omicron? I thought these numbers were interesting. So
• 44:49
  Speaker 2: 54% approval for masks in public spaces, higher than I
• 44:54
  Speaker 2: even expected. 64% approval for social distancing in public spaces.
• 45:00
  Speaker 2: Only 41% approval for vaccine requirements for public spaces. It
• 45:05
  Speaker 2: is interesting that the support for vaccine requirements, which started
• 45:08
  Speaker 2: I would say majority support then sort of went down
• 45:12
  Speaker 2: to 50-50 and is now a little bit below that.
• 45:16
  Speaker 2: You know, I guess the Republican sort of disinformation machine
• 45:19
  Speaker 2: has been doing a really working overtime there. Support for
• 45:23
  Speaker 2: remote learning, 29%. Support for a full shutdown for six weeks, 22%.
• 45:29
  Speaker 1: That question is amazing. A global shutdown for six weeks
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: to stop the spread forever.
• 45:35
  Speaker 2: Who supports shutting the world down? Well, the exaggeration was
• 45:40
  Speaker 2: both on the world side and then to end the
• 45:41
  Speaker 2: pandemic forever.
• 45:43
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: I think one thing on the vaccine mandates, and we've
• 45:47
  Speaker 1: seen this throughout, is that support is generally higher when
• 45:52
  Speaker 1: the question is specific, right? Because public spaces is like,
• 45:55
  Speaker 1: do you mean you can't, people who don't have the
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: vaccine can't go to the grocery store?
• 45:59
  Speaker 2: Walk outside. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 46:00
  Speaker 1: But when they say for like gyms or concerts or
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: government office buildings, support is generally much higher.
• 46:05
  Speaker 2: It's a little higher. It's a little higher.
• 46:07
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 46:08
  Speaker 2: How do you see the pandemic shaping the midterm campaign?
• 46:12
  Speaker 1: I mean, like, I hope to God that it has
• 46:15
  Speaker 1: faded somewhat into the background, right? Like that maybe the
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: environment politically and socially and culturally in America looks more
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: like it did in that sort of late spring, pre-Delta summer,
• 46:28
  Speaker 1: where people were getting, things were starting back to normal.
• 46:30
  Speaker 1: People were, you know, were vaccinated. It was easy to
• 46:32
  Speaker 1: get a vaccine if you wanted one. And people were
• 46:35
  Speaker 1: living their lives again. And you just didn't have this
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: constant yin-yang between can we do the things we want
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: to do? Should we do the things we want to do?
• 46:43
  Speaker 1: And you sort of have reached a level of stability.
• 46:46
  Speaker 1: That seems, based on what a lot of the experts think,
• 46:49
  Speaker 1: not guaranteed, but very possible. And if that's the case,
• 46:52
  Speaker 1: then I think that will improve the national mood, which
• 46:55
  Speaker 1: would be better for the party in power.
• 46:57
  Speaker 2: I think that's right. I think if Democrats need a message,
• 47:01
  Speaker 2: either because the virus is still circulating or there's another variant,
• 47:04
  Speaker 2: or because Republicans decide to make a political issue of it,
• 47:07
  Speaker 2: I would make the message all about the vaccines. I
• 47:10
  Speaker 2: would remember our jobs chart in 2012. Like I would
• 47:13
  Speaker 2: carry around a chart of the death rate among vaccinated
• 47:16
  Speaker 2: versus unvaccinated when Republicans start doing the, oh, more Americans
• 47:20
  Speaker 2: have died under Joe Biden. And I would hit the
• 47:22
  Speaker 2: shit out of Republicans for lying to people about the vaccines,
• 47:25
  Speaker 2: which they have been doing for a long time now.
• 47:27
  Speaker 2: And then Democrats should talk about how They want to
• 47:30
  Speaker 2: keep our schools and our economy open by making sure
• 47:32
  Speaker 2: that more people are vaccinated so that we don't get
• 47:34
  Speaker 2: new waves and new variants. And Republicans are standing in
• 47:37
  Speaker 2: the way of that. I wouldn't make it much more
• 47:40
  Speaker 2: complicated than that.
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: It was right before everything went down in Afghanistan where
• 47:45
  Speaker 1: Biden went to the podium and then just kicked the
• 47:47
  Speaker 1: living shit out of Ron DeSantis for stopping, preventing local
• 47:53
  Speaker 1: communities and schools from having mask mandates if they wanted one.
• 47:56
  Speaker 1: I mean, Republicans are doing Crazy stuff. They are basically
• 48:00
  Speaker 1: paying people not to get vaccinated in Florida. If you
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: are unvaccinated and you lose your job, it's elsewhere. They'll
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: pay you to come to Florida. I mean, it is
• 48:08
  Speaker 1: like there's there's a real.
• 48:10
  Speaker 2: Strong examples abound of them attacking vaccines, lying about vaccines,
• 48:14
  Speaker 2: making it harder for people to get vaccines. They should
• 48:18
  Speaker 2: it should go. We should throw it right back in
• 48:19
  Speaker 2: their face. That's why Trump is do it. That's why
• 48:22
  Speaker 2: Trump is starting to be, you know, more positive about
• 48:24
  Speaker 2: the vaccines. He sees the politics. He gets it. Before
• 48:27
  Speaker 2: we go, we're going to bring a listen to do
• 48:29
  Speaker 2: our take appreciator segment next. But just as we were recording,
• 48:33
  Speaker 2: the Supreme Court did hand down their decision as expected
• 48:36
  Speaker 2: from the oral arguments. They knocked down the Biden vaccine
• 48:40
  Speaker 2: mandate for employers. So that's not great. What do you do?
• 48:48
  Speaker 2: What do you do for your Biden administration?
• 48:49
  Speaker 1: I think you use the message that you just laid
• 48:52
  Speaker 1: out for how you talk about the Republicans in the fall.
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: It is time. This is a Republican Supreme Court that
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: is making it easier for Republican governors and Republican politicians
• 49:02
  Speaker 1: to prolong the pandemic.
• 49:04
  Speaker 2: And I think, look, there are other vaccine mandates that
• 49:06
  Speaker 2: are being upheld, particularly around health care workers, things that
• 49:09
  Speaker 2: are directly related to the federal government. So I think
• 49:11
  Speaker 2: and I was saying this earlier, I think you try
• 49:14
  Speaker 2: to over the next year to two years institute vaccine
• 49:17
  Speaker 2: mandates anywhere you can.
• 49:19
  Speaker 5: Right.
• 49:20
  Speaker 2: Federal level, state level for democratic controlled states, local level, right?
• 49:26
  Speaker 2: Like you try to just get as much done as possible.
• 49:28
  Speaker 2: At this point, I wonder if they're going to look
• 49:30
  Speaker 2: at requiring vaccines for getting on a plane, which I
• 49:33
  Speaker 2: think they didn't look at before because they figured the
• 49:36
  Speaker 2: employer requirement would take care of that. Now that it's
• 49:40
  Speaker 2: not going to, maybe you look at that. So, again,
• 49:42
  Speaker 2: it's going to be patchwork. It's going to be messier
• 49:44
  Speaker 2: than we'd like. But I think you try to use
• 49:47
  Speaker 2: a lot of courts and a lot of other places
• 49:49
  Speaker 2: have upheld vaccine requirements, including the Supreme Court in other instances. OK,
• 49:54
  Speaker 2: when we come back, we'll bring on Alyssa for a
• 49:56
  Speaker 2: round of Take Appreciators. All right, before we go, we're
• 50:06
  Speaker 2: going to play another round of our favorite game, Take Appreciator.
• 50:09
  Speaker 2: But this time, we're joined by the co-host of Hysteria
• 50:12
  Speaker 2: and one of our favorite people on Earth, Alyssa Mastromonaco. Hey, Alyssa.
• 50:16
  Speaker 6: You guys, I could cry looking at you.
• 50:18
  Speaker 7: I mean, I really, you're like, the real downside of
• 50:21
  Speaker 7: this whole COVID pandemic has been not being able to,
• 50:24
  Speaker 7: you know.
• 50:24
  Speaker 6: See the both of you in person.
• 50:27
  Speaker 1: I know.
• 50:27
  Speaker 2: Same here. Soon. Soon, Alyssa.
• 50:29
  Speaker 5: Soon.
• 50:29
  Speaker 6: My hair will be brown by then.
• 50:33
  Speaker 2: Okay, Chief Take Officer Elijah Cohn, what do we got?
• 50:37
  Speaker 5: Hey, everyone.
• 50:37
  Speaker 8: Welcome back to the Take Appreciators. I'm going to share
• 50:40
  Speaker 8: some notably bad punditry with you. The producers have seen
• 50:42
  Speaker 8: these takes. John, Dan, and Alyssa have not. They'll give
• 50:44
  Speaker 8: their reactions and rate them on a scale of one
• 50:46
  Speaker 8: to four politicos. Let's just jump right into it, guys.
• 50:50
  Speaker 8: This one is hot off the presses. I just finished
• 50:52
  Speaker 8: adding it. There's a suggestion from EJ, who works on
• 50:56
  Speaker 8: our politics team. Very topical. From the Washington Post, titled...
• 51:02
  Speaker 8: how Kyrsten Sinema defended the filibuster and bipartisanship. There's the quote,
• 51:09
  Speaker 8: Sinema also exhibited passion about something that doesn't usually elicit
• 51:12
  Speaker 8: such emotions in politics these days, bipartisanship and moderation. Guys,
• 51:19
  Speaker 8: I know this one's fresh. Your reaction?
• 51:23
  Speaker 2: I want to hear Alyssa. I want to hear Alyssa
• 51:25
  Speaker 2: take this one.
• 51:25
  Speaker 6: You guys, I have real issues with her. They're many-fold.
• 51:33
  Speaker 7: I believe, Elijah, you tried to stump me, but I
• 51:36
  Speaker 7: did check out CNN before I got on here.
• 51:39
  Speaker 6: And I think in her speech, she talks about the
• 51:41
  Speaker 6: disease of division.
• 51:44
  Speaker 7: Also, you guys, she gave the speech as Joe Biden
• 51:47
  Speaker 7: was on her way up to the hill.
• 51:49
  Speaker 6: So anyway, it's the shittiest.
• 51:51
  Speaker 7: Grossest, like most disrespectful thing she could have done.
• 51:55
  Speaker 6: I think she's a cunt.
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: That's what I have to say.
• 51:58
  Speaker 5: Wow.
• 51:59
  Speaker 4: Wow.
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: I mean, do we have to beep that? No, you
• 52:01
  Speaker 1: don't because I'm a woman. That's the first ever use.
• 52:04
  Speaker 6: I'm a woman.
• 52:05
  Speaker 1: I mean, man.
• 52:06
  Speaker 6: And every, it was so many layers of asshole-ness.
• 52:11
  Speaker 7: That like, you know that she played like a combative
• 52:14
  Speaker 7: video game before she went down to the Senate floor
• 52:16
  Speaker 7: and was like.
• 52:17
  Speaker 6: You are a maverick. You are a maverick. And like, bitch,
• 52:20
  Speaker 6: you're not a maverick.
• 52:22
  Speaker 2: Okay?
• 52:23
  Speaker 6: No, you're trash.
• 52:26
  Speaker 2: There is. All she wants to be is John McCain.
• 52:30
  Speaker 6: Not John McCain.
• 52:31
  Speaker 2: We knew John McCain. We ran against John McCain.
• 52:33
  Speaker 6: She's no John McCain.
• 52:35
  Speaker 2: She's no John McCain.
• 52:36
  Speaker 6: So how was that hot take?
• 52:39
  Speaker 2: I'm guessing you're going to give it then four playbooks.
• 52:41
  Speaker 6: Four playbooks.
• 52:43
  Speaker 1: Are they politicos or are they playbooks? I think we're
• 52:45
  Speaker 1: having that.
• 52:45
  Speaker 2: I thought they were playbooks.
• 52:46
  Speaker 1: I think it's four.
• 52:48
  Speaker 8: They are politicos.
• 52:49
  Speaker 4: Whatever.
• 52:49
  Speaker 8: Four politicos is a full playbook.
• 52:52
  Speaker 4: Oh.
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: I almost called you out on Twitter yesterday for this.
• 52:55
  Speaker 4: Same.
• 52:56
  Speaker 2: I am sorry. I apologize. I apologize.
• 52:58
  Speaker 4: I'm wrong.
• 52:58
  Speaker 6: So yeah.
• 53:00
  Speaker 2: So full playbook. Full playbook.
• 53:02
  Speaker 6: Full playbook.
• 53:03
  Speaker 2: Get a new identity. Dan?
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: The best part about this take is the idea that
• 53:08
  Speaker 1: there's no one out there making the case for bipartisanship.
• 53:11
  Speaker 1: That's not the thing most fetishized by all people in
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: American politics. So I give it three politicos for that reason.
• 53:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I was going to say, I feel like If
• 53:23
  Speaker 2: we're talking about Kyrsten Sinema's speech, yeah, the full playbook.
• 53:26
  Speaker 2: If we're talking about specifically that Washington Post take, I
• 53:31
  Speaker 2: might do three just because I want to save some
• 53:33
  Speaker 2: gas for the next couple takes.
• 53:36
  Speaker 1: Kyrsten Sinema's speech gets something that's actually beyond a full playbook.
• 53:41
  Speaker 2: What is that?
• 53:41
  Speaker 1: It's a West Wing playbook.
• 53:45
  Speaker 2: That's for a very small audience and hopefully a vanishingly
• 53:49
  Speaker 2: small audience.
• 53:51
  Speaker 1: All right.
• 53:52
  Speaker 5: Wow.
• 53:52
  Speaker 2: All right, Elijah, what else you got?
• 53:54
  Speaker 8: Well, let's go to the future.
• 53:55
  Speaker 1: Let's get out of 2022.
• 53:56
  Speaker 8: I want to fast forward to 2024. So I think
• 54:00
  Speaker 8: a lot of people knew this one was coming. This
• 54:02
  Speaker 8: is a piece from the New York Times titled Biden
• 54:05
  Speaker 8: Cheney 2024.
• 54:07
  Speaker 3: 2024.
• 54:08
  Speaker 8: So this piece talks about Israel and how there's a large,
• 54:11
  Speaker 8: moderate-ish coalition that defeated Bibi Netanyahu's far-right government by putting
• 54:15
  Speaker 8: aside their differences and coming together. It then argues we
• 54:18
  Speaker 8: should do the same thing in America because democracy is
• 54:21
  Speaker 8: on the line by having Biden run in 2024 with
• 54:24
  Speaker 8: Liz Cheney as his running mate. Here's a quote. This
• 54:29
  Speaker 8: is the democratic way of defeating a threat to democracy.
• 54:32
  Speaker 8: Not doing it is how democracies die. So anyone want
• 54:36
  Speaker 8: to guess who wrote it?
• 54:36
  Speaker 2: I mean, It was obviously Tom Friedman.
• 54:41
  Speaker 6: Obviously.
• 54:43
  Speaker 2: Because it sounds like the opening paragraph reads like a
• 54:48
  Speaker 2: parody that someone would write about a Tom Friedman column
• 54:51
  Speaker 2: where he immediately starts talking about Middle Eastern politics with
• 54:56
  Speaker 2: Israel and Palestine in order to make his case for
• 54:59
  Speaker 2: a ticket that has Joe Biden on it. And Liz Cheney.
• 55:10
  Speaker 2: Liz Cheney with a... Liz Cheney who, again, we have
• 55:13
  Speaker 2: said many times, like, good for her. She's doing the
• 55:16
  Speaker 2: right thing. Really respect her. Thinks she's a great messenger
• 55:19
  Speaker 2: on TV. Her constituency is... I don't... What? What is
• 55:24
  Speaker 2: Liz Cheney's constituency? Like, like, like, 10 former Republicans at
• 55:29
  Speaker 2: this point?
• 55:30
  Speaker 1: The only thing I would say about this take, which
• 55:32
  Speaker 1: really takes itself down, is... What could possibly go wrong
• 55:40
  Speaker 1: with a member of the Cheney family as vice president?
• 55:45
  Speaker 7: See, I did see this because I replied to Pfeiffer's
• 55:49
  Speaker 7: tweet with, when I really feel passionately about something, I
• 55:53
  Speaker 7: go into the 90210 Dylan McKay eye roll emojis or
• 55:58
  Speaker 7: whatever they are.
• 55:59
  Speaker 6: And I was like, is he kidding?
• 56:01
  Speaker 7: Also- I mean, Netanyahu was prime minister for like 15 years.
• 56:07
  Speaker 7: So it kind of like, I'm all for Israel, but
• 56:09
  Speaker 7: like it took them a long time to get rid
• 56:10
  Speaker 7: of him too. And I thought that his article would
• 56:14
  Speaker 7: have been more compelling if he said like Bernie and
• 56:18
  Speaker 7: Liz Cheney. Now that's an interesting conversation starter, but like
• 56:21
  Speaker 7: who do Biden and Liz Cheney together actually appeal to?
• 56:25
  Speaker 7: It seems like he's missing something.
• 56:28
  Speaker 2: Also, maybe, maybe the Ed board, maybe the New York
• 56:31
  Speaker 2: Times editorial board. There's all those nerds.
• 56:36
  Speaker 1: I mean, in fairness to Tom Friedman, as anyone who
• 56:38
  Speaker 1: is a longtime reader of his column knows, he gets
• 56:40
  Speaker 1: all of his best ideas from cab drivers during international travel.
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: And because of the pandemic, he has been unable to
• 56:47
  Speaker 1: travel or get in cabs. So he's scraping the bottom
• 56:50
  Speaker 1: of the take barrel these days. All right. So Poetico,
• 56:53
  Speaker 1: what do you, uh, I.
• 56:56
  Speaker 7: Mean, I feel like he's probably a three. I'm going
• 56:58
  Speaker 7: to go with a three because it was very expected.
• 57:01
  Speaker 7: I don't expect better than this. It's on par for
• 57:05
  Speaker 7: his takes.
• 57:06
  Speaker 2: I'm going with the full playbook on this one just
• 57:08
  Speaker 2: because it was, again, the spirit of this game is
• 57:13
  Speaker 2: take appreciators and appreciating a real triggering take. And I
• 57:18
  Speaker 2: can't imagine a take more triggering than Tom Friedman's talking
• 57:22
  Speaker 2: about Biden and a Cheney joining forces, also by making
• 57:26
  Speaker 2: an analogy to Middle East politics. I can't imagine anything
• 57:30
  Speaker 2: more triggering. They did it. He did it. Congrats to you,
• 57:32
  Speaker 2: Tom Friedman.
• 57:33
  Speaker 1: I'm going three because I want to hold out hope
• 57:37
  Speaker 1: that Tom Friedman is going to give us an even
• 57:39
  Speaker 1: more Tom Friedman take before this election is over.
• 57:41
  Speaker 2: Cool. Cool.
• 57:42
  Speaker 4: Okay. Excellent.
• 57:43
  Speaker 5: All right.
• 57:44
  Speaker 2: All right, Elijah. Last one. Here we go.
• 57:45
  Speaker 8: So this one is from the Wall Street Journal. It's
• 57:49
  Speaker 8: a piece titled, Hillary Clinton's 2024 election comeback. The quote
• 57:55
  Speaker 8: is just the subheader of the article, which sums it up.
• 57:58
  Speaker 8: Joe Biden and Kamala Harris have become unpopular. It may
• 58:01
  Speaker 8: be time for a change candidate. And he guesses as
• 58:04
  Speaker 8: to who wrote this.
• 58:08
  Speaker 5: Yes.
• 58:09
  Speaker 2: Yes, I have a guess.
• 58:11
  Speaker 8: Please.
• 58:11
  Speaker 2: Doug Schoen.
• 58:13
  Speaker 1: That's correct.
• 58:14
  Speaker 8: I would note that Doug Schoen has wrote this piece
• 58:17
  Speaker 8: in the past. In 2011, he wrote a similar piece
• 58:22
  Speaker 8: encouraging Barack Obama to not run in 2012 in favor
• 58:27
  Speaker 8: of Hillary Clinton.
• 58:31
  Speaker 2: How about it, Alyssa? Should we haul out the helicopter?
• 58:34
  Speaker 2: Should we start calling some of the hill raisers?
• 58:37
  Speaker 7: You guys, I feel like when Hillary Clinton saw that
• 58:39
  Speaker 7: article in her clips, she was like, true crime thriller.
• 58:45
  Speaker 6: She's like, even I've moved on. Like, Jesus Christ.
• 58:49
  Speaker 2: Pokemon, go to the bookstore.
• 58:51
  Speaker 1: I mean, there's so many different ways to look at this. One,
• 58:58
  Speaker 1: a little background for people who may not know who
• 59:00
  Speaker 1: Doug Schoen is. He was the longtime consulting partner to
• 59:06
  Speaker 1: Mark Penn, America's worst political consultant in American history. He
• 59:11
  Speaker 1: advised Bill Clinton in his presidency, also helped lead Mike
• 59:17
  Speaker 1: Bloomberg to spend a quarter of a billion dollars in
• 59:21
  Speaker 1: order to win all the delegates in either American Samoa
• 59:24
  Speaker 1: or Guam, I can't remember which. And is a frequent
• 59:29
  Speaker 1: and very thirsty Fox News guest.
• 59:34
  Speaker 2: Very thirsty.
• 59:35
  Speaker 1: But I would just say, here's one way to think
• 59:37
  Speaker 1: about this take, which is why I think it should
• 59:39
  Speaker 1: get the full playbook, is in order to beat Trump,
• 59:43
  Speaker 1: we should replace the person who beat Trump with a
• 59:46
  Speaker 1: person who lost to Trump.
• 59:52
  Speaker 2: Just so crazy, it might work.
• 59:55
  Speaker 4: Sure.
• 59:56
  Speaker 2: Alyssa, what's your rating? What's your final word on this?
• 59:59
  Speaker 6: I'm going to go with three.
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 2: I'm going to go with three. I, too, am going
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 2: to go with three. I think it's a little, partly
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 2: because he wrote the same, like Elijah pointed out, he
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 2: wrote the same column in 2012. He's getting lazy. He's
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 2: getting lazy. Yeah, get a new take. Get a new take, Sean.
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 8: Daniel, rating?
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 1: Full playbook for this one.
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 5: Powerful.
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 2: Full playbook.
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 8: Get powerful i do want to say i do want
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 8: to race them with you guys like i like i'm
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 8: always watching the takes and the takes this week have
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 8: made me want to upgrade this from a take to
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 8: a full-blown narrative uh about you know 2024 other candidates
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 8: a lot of people have been talking about this you
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 8: guys make of this new narrative that we have like
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 8: obviously we had it in 2012 as we just talked
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 8: about but.
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 2: I will say that it is sped up even from
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 2: the usual pontification about presidential elections because it's the beginning
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 2: of 2022. We got an election to talk about that's
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 2: this year that's still several months away. 10 or 11.
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 2: And so I don't know if you people want to
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 2: do some, some wild pontificating. We got the midterms for you.
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 2: And then, then maybe you can think about 2024. I
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 2: don't know.
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 6: I agree. Not ready.
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 2: I make that, I make an exception for Donald Trump.
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 2: Who's everywhere, but who's everywhere all the time. So it's
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 2: hard to ignore, but on our side, it's take, take
• 1:01:27
  Speaker 2: it easy. Take it easy.
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 4: Cool.
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 8: Well, thanks guys for another great edition of the take appreciators.
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 2: Elijah, thank you. And Alyssa, thanks for joining us.
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 7: Guys, I thought we were going to hit on like
• 1:01:40
  Speaker 7: some sex in the city and just like that hot
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 7: takes because I was making an appearance.
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 6: But I guess we're going to stick with Liz Cheney
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 6: and Joe Biden.
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 2: Alyssa, can you give us your hot take on and
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 2: just like that since Lovett talks about it. Lovett's not
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 2: here because it's the Thursday pod, but he talks about
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 2: it now every day. He talks about it as much
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 2: as Tommy talks about Emily in Paris.
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 4: I know.
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 2: I'd love to hear your take.
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 7: The whole thing is very confusing, quite frankly. Mostly, I
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 7: think that Carrie has lost her sense of humor entirely.
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 7: And I'm not entirely loving how they're depicting women of
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 7: a certain age.
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 6: Because, like, I don't know.
• 1:02:12
  Speaker 7: Let Carrie have a hip replacement because her fucking hip
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 7: is fucked up.
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 6: Why does it have to be a genetic disorder that
• 1:02:17
  Speaker 6: she has?
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 7: I just, mostly I'm in it for Miranda and to see,
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 7: you know, to see if Carrie laughs by the end
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 7: or makes me laugh.
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 6: That's kind of where I'm at.
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 1: Her husband died three episodes ago.
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 3: Okay.
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 7: It was like six episodes ago, Pfeiffer.
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 6: Keep up. She's still not making me laugh. And she
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 6: was so judgy to Miranda.
• 1:02:39
  Speaker 4: So what?
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 7: Like if she really didn't want to pee in the
• 1:02:42
  Speaker 7: Snapple bottle, she could have just yelled, hey, Miranda. She
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 7: didn't have to be so dramatic about it and then
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 7: slut shame Miranda, who's clearly going through some shit.
• 1:02:51
  Speaker 6: Also, Miranda too let her hair go gray. Just saying.
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 2: Also, Alyssa, you're a much smarter and funnier podcast host.
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 2: They should have asked you about doing the whole podcast storyline.
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 2: You guys, what even is that?
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 6: What even is that podcast storyline? It's not funny.
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 5: Terrible.
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 6: It's not funny.
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 2: Terrible.
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 6: It's not reflective of the work that goes into them either.
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 1: I mean, that's my greatest critique. It's just a poor
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 1: depiction of the podcasting industry.
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 6: I mean, I really feel maligned.
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 4: Grievance.
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 2: Now we've turned to grievance here at the end of
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 2: the episode.
• 1:03:24
  Speaker 6: Oh, you guys, thanks for having me.
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 7: It was such a delight to see your faces, if
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 7: only for a few hot take minutes.
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 2: Let's do it again soon. I miss you.
• 1:03:33
  Speaker 6: I'm around.
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 2: Okay, good. Thank you, and we will see you guys
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 2: next week. Have a good weekend.
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 1: Bye, everyone.
• 1:03:45
  Speaker 2: Hot Save America is a Crooked Media production. The executive
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 2: producer is Michael Martinez. Our senior producer is Andy Gardner Bernstein.
• 1:03:52
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• 1:03:54
  Speaker 2: associate producer. It's mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Kyle
• 1:03:58
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• 1:04:02
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• 1:04:05
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