Latest / Pod Save America / “A Kansas of Whoop-Ass.”

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“A Kansas of Whoop-Ass.” · Pod Save America

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  Speaker 2: Go to simplisafe.com. Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.
• 1:29
  Speaker 4: I'm Dan Pfeiffer.
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: Dan, it's been a minute. This is the first pod
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: that you and I have done together, or like a
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: Thursday pod in a couple weeks. Yeah, we picked that.
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: We had the tour.
• 1:39
  Speaker 4: Then vacation that we somehow managed to schedule the exact
• 1:43
  Speaker 4: same week in a 52-week year, which was impressive.
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah, for the amount of time we communicate during any
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: given day, it was funny that we didn't realize both
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: of us were going to be on vacation.
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: But you know what?
• 1:54
  Speaker 4: You know who won from that? The planet. Because you
• 1:56
  Speaker 4: and I go on vacation, and all of a sudden
• 1:58
  Speaker 4: we got a climate deal.
• 1:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, that's right.
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: And Tommy and Adisi got to talk about it. Well, fortunately,
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: we have some good news to talk about on today's pod, too.
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: On today's show, Kansas voters deliver a victory for abortion rights.
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: Arizona voters deliver a victory for MAGA extremists, unfortunately. Missouri
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: voters deliver a victory for just one Eric. And we
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: are going to be joined in studio a little later
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: for a special take appreciator by the host of Positively Dreadful,
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: Crooked's editor-in-chief, Brian Boitler is in town. Exciting. All right,
• 2:32
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  Speaker 1: has something new launching next week. Is it a light roast? Well,
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  Speaker 1: I'm getting a few hints here. It says you can
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  Speaker 2: You know what, Dan?
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  Speaker 1: Anyway, go to crooked.com slash coffee. I drink a certain
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  Speaker 1: kind of coffee. I don't want to give anything away,
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  Speaker 1: but I drink a certain kind of coffee all year
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  Speaker 1: doesn't have to be for summer. Crooked.com slash coffee. All right,
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: let's get to the news, which somehow continues to be
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: good in Kansas. a state that Donald Trump won by
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: nearly 15 points in 2020, voters overwhelmingly rejected a constitutional
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: amendment that would have allowed the state legislature to ban abortion.
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: And they did so by a margin of 58 to 41%.
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  Speaker 1: Anti-abortion activists targeted Tuesday's primary because it was mostly Republican races,
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: and so they thought that mostly Republicans would turn out.
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  Speaker 2: They were wrong.
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  Speaker 1: Turnout was twice as large as it was in the
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  Speaker 1: 2018 primaries. Nearly a million voters turned out, including 100,000
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  Speaker 1: independent voters who couldn't even cast a ballot in either
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  Speaker 1: party's primary. They were just independent voters who turned out
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  Speaker 1: purely to vote on this amendment. And the abortion amendment
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  Speaker 1: results were to the left of the 2020 presidential results
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  Speaker 1: in every single county, even the most.
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  Speaker 2: Rural areas of Kansas. Dan?
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: How the hell did this happen? I mean, Nate Cohn
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  Speaker 1: wrote about this in the New York Times today. There
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: was like a Times compilation of national polling before the
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  Speaker 1: election that showed 48% of Kansas voters said abortion should
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: be mostly legal. 47% said mostly illegal. They also showed
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: the 2020 cooperative election study also showed an even split
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  Speaker 1: in that state.
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  Speaker 2: So what happened?
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  Speaker 4: Well, it had to happen one day, John, that polls
• 5:02
  Speaker 4: would be wrong.
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  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 5:07
  Speaker 4: No, look, I think it is worth just taking a
• 5:11
  Speaker 4: moment to feel really good about this. I mean, this
• 5:14
  Speaker 4: is Kansas. This is not a blue state. It's not
• 5:18
  Speaker 4: a purple state. We're not on the coast. It is
• 5:20
  Speaker 4: a state so Republican that one of the most famous
• 5:22
  Speaker 4: books written about Republicans is called What's the Matter with Kansas?
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: Hey, everyone making your What's the Matter with Kansas jokes
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: on Twitter.
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  Speaker 2: We've seen them. We've seen them all.
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  Speaker 4: They are. So that's a no on the pod title.
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: Oh, my God.
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  Speaker 1: It's just every single fucking person has some play on
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: what's the matter with Kansas. I'm like, none of them
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  Speaker 1: are funny.
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  Speaker 4: They rank up there with the BFD jokes around the
• 5:48
  Speaker 4: Inflation Reduction Act.
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  Speaker 1: It's also a sign of how old you are, by
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  Speaker 1: the way.
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  Speaker 4: Yes. Were you digging deep into the Democratic Party problems
• 5:55
  Speaker 4: in the early aughts?
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  Speaker 2: If so, this joke's for you.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, that's right.
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  Speaker 1: They know what that book is called.
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  Speaker 2: Anyway, sorry. That was just my thing.
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  Speaker 4: All right. But this is saying they voted for Donald
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  Speaker 4: Trump by 15 points.
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  Speaker 2: And I think.
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  Speaker 4: It is worth just stepping back and feeling good about
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  Speaker 4: it in part because it shows the absolute power of
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  Speaker 4: this issue. Because when we have like this, we're stuck
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  Speaker 4: in this mentality that it's reasonable and well-worn that nothing matters.
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  Speaker 4: Or even when things do matter, there's like marginal shifts, right?
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  Speaker 4: Donald Trump sparks an insurrection. He goes down two points
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  Speaker 4: in the poll. compelling evidence of Donald Trump committing crimes
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  Speaker 4: means that we're up to a whopping two in 10
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  Speaker 4: Republicans who think he should go to jail.
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  Speaker 2: Right.
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  Speaker 4: The, you know, they pass an incredibly unpopular tax cut.
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  Speaker 4: Nothing really changes. And that, you know, in a polarized country,
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  Speaker 4: things change on the margin, matters a lot. But the
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  Speaker 4: way this has played out thus far since the deposition
• 6:52
  Speaker 4: suggests that big shifts can happen. And I think we
• 6:56
  Speaker 4: have to, abortion is not just like a new health
• 6:59
  Speaker 4: care bill, a new tax law, minimum wage passes, it doesn't.
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  Speaker 4: It is the fact that two-thirds of this country was
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  Speaker 4: born after the Roe decision, which means two-thirds of them
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  Speaker 4: have lived their entire lives where you had a constitutional
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  Speaker 4: right to make a fundamental decision about your own body.
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  Speaker 4: Then an unelected group of six people, most of whom
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  Speaker 4: appointed by people who got less votes than their opponent
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  Speaker 4: in presidential elections, took away that right. This is something about,
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  Speaker 4: it's about the issue of abortion. It's about freedom. And
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  Speaker 4: it clearly has sparked something very powerful in the electorate.
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  Speaker 4: And so I think that is how we ended up here.
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  Speaker 4: This is not an accident. This is not a low
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  Speaker 4: turnout situation where sometimes in these situations, the side where
• 7:44
  Speaker 4: the passion is, turn out more people, and it doesn't
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  Speaker 4: reflect the large electorate. This is a high turnout primary.
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  Speaker 4: And so it says a lot about Where politics has
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  Speaker 4: shifted since the Supreme Court decided to meddle with people's rights.
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  Speaker 1: The turnout was two-thirds of the 2020 presidential election. Two-thirds
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  Speaker 1: of a presidential election for a mostly Republican primary in
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  Speaker 1: the middle of August in a midterm year.
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  Speaker 2: That's unheard of.
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  Speaker 4: We call that light roast season.
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  Speaker 1: Registered democrats turned out at higher rates than registered republicans
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: which almost never happens in american politics these days uh
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  Speaker 1: steve kornacki crunched the numbers one-fifth of all the no
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  Speaker 1: votes no to the amendment which is the pro-choice position
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  Speaker 1: uh came from republicans one-fifth came from republicans so you
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  Speaker 1: know speaking of republicans like should these results scare the
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  Speaker 1: shit out of every republican candidate in every competitive race
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  Speaker 1: in the country Yes.
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  Speaker 4: Yes, they should. They absolutely should. And I think you
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  Speaker 4: hit on in your intro the number that scared them
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  Speaker 4: the most, which is 100,000 independents turned out only to
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  Speaker 4: vote on this issue. They had no other reason to
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  Speaker 4: turn out. They were barred by law from voting on
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  Speaker 4: any other office. This is not a case of there
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  Speaker 4: is a highly contested gubernatorial primary or Senate primary that
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  Speaker 4: caused a bunch of people to turn out and they
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  Speaker 4: voted on abortion. They turned out An election they'd never
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  Speaker 4: turned out in before. They have no history of voting
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  Speaker 4: in primaries because Kansas has a closed primary process, and
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  Speaker 4: they voted because they believed this was worth voting on
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  Speaker 4: and worth their time and energy. And I think that
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  Speaker 4: should be very, very alarming to Republicans.
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  Speaker 1: Well, I also think it's worth noting that just about
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  Speaker 1: every Republican candidate in the most high-profile competitive races in
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  Speaker 1: the country has taken a position on abortion that is
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: so extreme that And so out of step with most
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: of the country. And it didn't necessarily have to be
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: like that after Dobbs. We remember after Dobbs was decided, Republican,
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  Speaker 1: it was either the RNC or the NRSC or one
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: of those official committees uh put out a bunch of
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  Speaker 1: talking points because they could they knew the danger in
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  Speaker 1: this issue and they tried to try to tell their
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: candidates to take a middle middle path here and say
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: yeah of course we're against abortion but you know there
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  Speaker 1: should be exceptions and we would never want to uh
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  Speaker 1: arrest doctors or women or anything like that and they
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  Speaker 1: put all these bullshit talking points that we all knew
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: were bullshit but a whole bunch of republican candidates whether it's,
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: and we're going to talk about some of the other results,
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: but whether it's, you know, Blake Masters or our Tudor
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: Dixon in Michigan, they have taken positions on abortion that
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: say we are going to criminalize all abortion with no exceptions.
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: By the way, some states are trying to say if
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: abortion is banned in one state and you try to
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: travel out of state to get an abortion somewhere else,
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: we're going to criminalize that too. These positions are so
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: out of step.
• 10:45
  Speaker 2: With most people.
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: The share of Republicans, Republicans, this is not all voters,
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: the share of Republicans who believe that abortion should be
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: illegal in all cases is now only 18%. 18% of Republicans.
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: So like going back to that first poll result that
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: I read you, that, you know, 48% of Kansans thought
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: abortion should be mostly legal. 47% thought mostly illegal. You know,
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: the mostly is doing a lot of work there and
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: has been for a while. After Dobbs, Republican politicians, decided
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: that they were going to polarize the issue as much
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: as possible on the wrong side of public opinion by saying,
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: we want abortion illegal in all cases everywhere. That position
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: is not only out of step with the country, it
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: is out of step with most of the people in
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: their party. And I don't think they fully realize, or
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: maybe they just don't care, what a horrible political mistake
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: they have made by taking a position like that.
• 11:45
  Speaker 4: You know, there are times when Republican politicians... are lying
• 11:50
  Speaker 4: for the purpose of appealing to primary voters. There are
• 11:53
  Speaker 4: definitely some true believers in the big lie. Some of
• 11:57
  Speaker 4: them got nominated on Tuesday. But a lot of them
• 12:01
  Speaker 4: just pretend because it's price of admission to MAGA voters,
• 12:04
  Speaker 4: to Trump's endorsement, all of that. But on this one,
• 12:08
  Speaker 4: this is their real position. This is what they have
• 12:10
  Speaker 4: always believed. It has always been their position that abortion
• 12:13
  Speaker 4: should be illegal in every instance. Rape, incest, life of
• 12:18
  Speaker 4: the mother. That is their belief. And they were given
• 12:21
  Speaker 4: sort of permission to avoid acting on that belief in
• 12:24
  Speaker 4: a world in which Roe and Casey were the law
• 12:27
  Speaker 4: of the land. Now that they are not, they are
• 12:29
  Speaker 4: allowed to let their extremist flag fly and push these
• 12:34
  Speaker 4: incredibly cruel and irresponsible and very unpopular positions.
• 12:38
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: And look, I mentioned Blake Masters in Arizona and Tudor Dixon,
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: who's running for governor in Michigan. This is also going
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: to be a central issue in the Pennsylvania governor's race,
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: where Doug Mastriano has said that if he is governor,
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: he will sign an abortion ban into law. If Josh
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: Shapiro is governor, he will not. Abortion will be protected
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: in that state. It's a very clear-cut decision in Pennsylvania.
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: You're going to have this issue in Arizona. You're going
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: to have it in Michigan. There's going to be a
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: ballot initiative likely in Michigan, much like there was in
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: Kansas in where in the midterm election, Gretchen Whitmer, the
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: governor of Michigan, will be on one side, be on
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: the pro-choice side of the ballot initiative, and Tudor Dixon
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: will be on the other side.
• 13:21
  Speaker 2: That will probably get more people out to vote as well,
• 13:23
  Speaker 2: or hopefully it should.
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: In Georgia, where there is a very close Senate race,
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: Herschel Walker, once again, has said that he would ban
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: all abortion, no exceptions whatsoever. That's in Georgia. And then
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: there will also be direct ballot initiatives in Kentucky and Montana. Dan,
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: if you were running a Democratic midterm campaign, campaign right now.
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: What advice would you be giving your candidate about two things? One,
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: how to talk about abortion access, and two, how to
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: prioritize abortion as an issue in this midterm race?
• 13:54
  Speaker 4: So I think we have to recognize that public opinion
• 13:58
  Speaker 4: on abortion is overwhelming on the side of access to abortion,
• 14:02
  Speaker 4: but it is quite nuanced, right? If you have majorities
• 14:05
  Speaker 4: of people who say, who identify as pro-choice, who support,
• 14:08
  Speaker 4: supported Roe, who oppose its overturning, Of that majority, according
• 14:12
  Speaker 4: to a lot of polls, about 3 in 10 of
• 14:15
  Speaker 4: those people who identify as pro-choice or are angry about
• 14:17
  Speaker 4: the Dobbs decision will tell pollsters they themselves are personally
• 14:21
  Speaker 4: opposed to abortion. You find that some of the limits
• 14:24
  Speaker 4: that are well below the extremist thing which you put forward,
• 14:28
  Speaker 4: but ones that a lot of Democrats ourselves oppose, are
• 14:32
  Speaker 4: more popular than strictly overturning or banning abortion. And so
• 14:36
  Speaker 4: what I think we have to recognize is And the
• 14:40
  Speaker 4: people in Kansas did an excellent job in how they
• 14:45
  Speaker 4: frame their messaging. And there are some Twitter threads that
• 14:46
  Speaker 4: go through all of their ads that I would encourage.
• 14:48
  Speaker 4: Bill Scheer from Politico, I think, has one of those
• 14:51
  Speaker 4: threads that's worthwhile, is that we have to have a
• 14:54
  Speaker 4: message that is broadly appealing to that majority. And the
• 14:58
  Speaker 4: polling shows that the most popular message by far in
• 15:02
  Speaker 4: that case is about government interference in the personal decision
• 15:09
  Speaker 4: to have an abortion. You're going to have politicians, government,
• 15:13
  Speaker 4: et cetera, involved in that. And that is the one
• 15:15
  Speaker 4: that works for people who identify as pro-choice personally and
• 15:20
  Speaker 4: for the broader community, people who identify as opposed. It
• 15:24
  Speaker 4: gets to a lot of those 100,000 independents we talked about.
• 15:27
  Speaker 4: It is this broader issue of freedom.
• 15:29
  Speaker 6: And I think.
• 15:31
  Speaker 4: The messaging is going to be a little bit different
• 15:33
  Speaker 4: in every state because in some cases– so if you
• 15:35
  Speaker 4: have this broad coalition of people who are much more
• 15:39
  Speaker 4: progressive on the side and others who would identify as
• 15:41
  Speaker 4: moderate on the issue of abortion but do not go
• 15:43
  Speaker 4: so far as the overturning of Roe or the outright banning,
• 15:47
  Speaker 4: the mix of those two groups is going to differ
• 15:50
  Speaker 4: state by state. I imagine in Kansas, it leans more
• 15:53
  Speaker 4: heavily towards the people who identify as moderate because you're
• 15:55
  Speaker 4: getting more Republican voters, people who have spent their lives
• 15:57
  Speaker 4: voting for politicians who identify as anti-choice. as opposed to
• 16:02
  Speaker 4: it might be different in a bluer or more purple state.
• 16:05
  Speaker 4: The second thing is, I think it's absolutely essential that
• 16:09
  Speaker 4: we center the issue of abortion here. And there are
• 16:12
  Speaker 4: two ways to do that. One, if you're running for
• 16:13
  Speaker 4: federal office, is to make sure that everyone understands two things. One,
• 16:19
  Speaker 4: if Republicans get control of the House and the Senate,
• 16:22
  Speaker 4: they will ban abortion nationally. So if you are in
• 16:25
  Speaker 4: one of those states that could decide the election But
• 16:30
  Speaker 4: where abortion remains legal, that is not a given for
• 16:33
  Speaker 4: the rest of time. Like California, for example. This is
• 16:36
  Speaker 4: one of the most progressive states when it comes to
• 16:38
  Speaker 4: abortion access. It is making itself a sanctuary state. We
• 16:41
  Speaker 4: talked to our friend, Assemblywoman Biff Puffy Wicks about that
• 16:43
  Speaker 4: a month or so ago. But we need people to
• 16:47
  Speaker 4: turn out in the House races that are our only
• 16:50
  Speaker 4: chance of preserving our majority as if abortion was on
• 16:53
  Speaker 4: the line for themselves as well. Because it is. And
• 16:56
  Speaker 4: the other half of that argument is that if you
• 16:58
  Speaker 4: send two more pro-choice, anti-filibuster Democratic senators to the Senate
• 17:03
  Speaker 4: and we maintain the House, we can codify, we can
• 17:05
  Speaker 4: make abortion legal everywhere by codifying. And so I think
• 17:09
  Speaker 4: that's part. For state candidates, it's going to be different.
• 17:11
  Speaker 4: It's going to have to do with what is on
• 17:12
  Speaker 4: the ballot in that state, who you're running against. But
• 17:16
  Speaker 4: we have to center it. And then the last piece
• 17:18
  Speaker 4: of this is we have to make it about freedom.
• 17:22
  Speaker 4: It is about your personal choice and tied to this
• 17:24
  Speaker 4: larger narrative, one you have articulated on this podcast many times,
• 17:27
  Speaker 4: about a Republican Party who wants politicians in the government
• 17:30
  Speaker 4: to decide whether you can have an abortion, what kind
• 17:32
  Speaker 4: of health care you can get, who you can marry,
• 17:34
  Speaker 4: what books you can read, what teachers can say, what
• 17:37
  Speaker 4: companies can believe, on and on and on, and make
• 17:40
  Speaker 4: it a part of that larger extremist agenda of the
• 17:44
  Speaker 4: far right and the MAGA Republicans.
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, you can imagine.
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: And you don't have to imagine, I've talked to these
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: voters for the focus groups of the wilderness, voters who
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: feel cross-pressured, which are most voters, even though we don't
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: think that. And they are horrified by Dobbs, and they're
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: very pro-choice, but they are upset about inflation. They're disappointed,
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: and they don't think anyone in Washington has done anything
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: for them. And I think that the way that this
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: election becomes a choice and not a referendum is on
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: Biden and the Democrats is by pointing out the ample
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: examples of Republican extremism over the last several months, year,
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: two years, and abortion and the positions that they have
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: taken on abortion, I believe are central to that case.
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: You can then talk about them coming for same-sex marriage,
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: coming for contraception, coming for interracial marriage, coming for kids,
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: gay and trans kids, Book banning, you can talk about
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: all of that. I think abortion is central. It's the
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: central example since they have now moved to ban it,
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: criminalize it with no exceptions in states all across the country.
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: And I think making that central to your campaign about
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: Republican extremism is important because on the other side of this,
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: if you're worried about, you know, you're also worried about
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: inflation and you're also worried about costs, then you can say, look,
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: which party, who do you trust to fight for you?
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: You think the Republicans are going to fix inflation and
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: cost of living when all they've been doing for the
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: last several months is trying to tell you when you
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: can start a family, tell you who you can marry,
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: who you can be, who you can love, how many
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: kids you can have? That's what they've been concerned about
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: for the last several months. They haven't been concerned about inflation.
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: They haven't been concerned about the cost of living. Or
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: do you want to go with the party that has
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: been fighting for a couple of years for To make
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: sure that you can have all those freedoms and also,
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: by the way, are trying to pass a bill. to
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: make sure that your energy bills are lower, that your
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: prescription drug bills are lower, that your healthcare premiums are lower,
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: and that we're going to try to save the planet
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: and save democracy? Which party do you think is going
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: to fight for you? And that's the choice. And that,
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: to me, is the best chance to get out of
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: the whole referendum frame, which is usually what happens in
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: a midterm election.
• 20:10
  Speaker 4: Yeah, this election should be, and we should do everything
• 20:12
  Speaker 4: we possibly can to make it a referendum on Republican extremism.
• 20:16
  Speaker 4: And there's obviously a fear here that we're going to
• 20:20
  Speaker 4: overly simplistically read the results of this election. In Kansas,
• 20:23
  Speaker 4: it's a just say abortion as many times as possible,
• 20:26
  Speaker 4: or just say pro-choice, or just say Roe, or just
• 20:28
  Speaker 4: say Dobbs. It's this singular issue in and of itself.
• 20:31
  Speaker 4: And it is a preeminent issue. It absolutely has tremendous power,
• 20:35
  Speaker 4: and we should lean into it. but it is a
• 20:38
  Speaker 4: more nuanced story. People's position on abortion is a signifier
• 20:42
  Speaker 4: of something about them. Every campaign boils down to a
• 20:46
  Speaker 4: battle over convincing voters you're going to fight for them.
• 20:49
  Speaker 4: Who is the politician going to stand for when they
• 20:51
  Speaker 4: get to Washington? And the fact that these candidates would
• 20:54
  Speaker 4: take these extremist positions is a sign that they are
• 20:58
  Speaker 4: not going to fight for you on every issue, right?
• 21:01
  Speaker 4: On abortion, on healthcare, on inflation. And This is why
• 21:05
  Speaker 4: it's important to raise it, but the candidate that says
• 21:10
  Speaker 4: Roe v. Wade the most times is not going to
• 21:11
  Speaker 4: win this election. It's more sophisticated than that.
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: Well, I think what's true about abortion has been true
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: about other issues as well. A challenge we've seen in
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: the past is that ballot measures like minimum wage or
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: Medicaid expansion win in red states where Democratic candidates who
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: support those policies lose elections. Or same thing we saw
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: in Florida with enfranchising voters who've spent time in prison.
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: And I think the question is, how can Democrats avoid
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: that dynamic on an issue like abortion, where if it's
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: a standalone ballot measure, it does very well, just like
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: minimum wage and Medicaid expansion and all these policies that
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: we care about. But somehow when the Democratic candidate runs,
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: we don't. Now, I think that, you know, the initial
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: reaction would be, well, why do we have such shitty
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: Democratic candidates? But I think it's a little more complicated
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: than that, partly because, look, I think one caution in
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: Kansas here is we talked about how the rate of
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: Democratic turnout was higher than Republican turnout. In the midterms,
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: more Republicans might turn out for other reasons when it's
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: not just abortion on the ballot, right? There might be
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: some Republicans who abortion isn't the issue that gets them
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: to the polls, or maybe they're pro-choice Republicans, or maybe
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: they're just Republicans who don't want it banned in all circumstances.
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: But in a midterm election, when there are a whole
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: bunch of other issues there, that may get more Republicans
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: to turn out. So how should Democrats handle that challenge?
• 22:33
  Speaker 4: I think it's largely about issue salience. The example we've
• 22:38
  Speaker 4: given recently is the minimum wage ballot initiative in Florida
• 22:43
  Speaker 4: in 2020 got to the 60% threshold. Biden got like
• 22:46
  Speaker 4: 46% in the state, which means that there's a huge
• 22:49
  Speaker 4: majority for minimum wage, but they did not think the
• 22:52
  Speaker 4: minimum wage was central to their presidential vote. And so
• 22:55
  Speaker 4: this is where if you want to narrow that delta
• 22:59
  Speaker 4: between what the pro-choice majority in this country and the
• 23:04
  Speaker 4: Democratic vote share. You have to make the congressional vote,
• 23:09
  Speaker 4: the gubernatorial vote, the state legislative vote be around that issue.
• 23:13
  Speaker 4: It has to be high in voters' minds when they
• 23:15
  Speaker 4: think about it and when they think about who they
• 23:17
  Speaker 4: vote for. That if you want abortion, if you want
• 23:19
  Speaker 4: access to abortion, you want to be legal in the state,
• 23:22
  Speaker 4: then you have to, or in this country, you have
• 23:24
  Speaker 4: to vote for a Democrat. And so It's about raising
• 23:26
  Speaker 4: the salience. Obviously, salience is very high right now, but
• 23:29
  Speaker 4: that could certainly change over the next two and a
• 23:31
  Speaker 4: half months until the election.
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: And I do think to the point about messaging, the
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: Republican extremism has also given Democrats space, much more space
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: to talk to a broader audience of voters, which is
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: certainly what they did in Kansas. And you mentioned the ads,
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: like two ads I thought were interesting. One, they're both
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: from the no side. Um, one was say no to
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: more government mandates, which you mentioned. They didn't even mention
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: the word abortion in the ad. They just said, say
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: no to more government mandates. And they actually superimposed it
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: over a picture of a COVID mask mandate sign. This
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: is clearly not an ad for, for Democrats, even for independents.
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: Like that's an ad for Republicans, no more government mandates
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: and they do a COVID thing, but again, effective in
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: turning out some Republicans to vote for this measure. So, okay,
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: it works. There was another one that I think is
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: a very powerful ad and it was, um, A woman
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: who is a mother of a three-year-old boy who talked
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: about how she would have died if she hadn't had
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: an abortion. And, again, there are places all over this
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: country right now where when they say no exceptions, they
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: mean no exception for the life and the health of
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: the mother as well. And I think for people who
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: might feel conflicted about abortion, which, again, of all the
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: people who support making sure that abortion is legal— a
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: third of those people personally oppose abortion, even though they
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: want to make sure that it remains legal, that group
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: of people, you see an ad like that, and that's
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: probably pretty powerful. So I do think, um, understanding that
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: you are messaging not only to different parts of the country,
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: but to different groups of people. And there are messages
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: that can hold this larger coalition together because of the
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: extreme positions that Republicans have taken is important for Democrats
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: to remember as well. Um, You know, millions of dollars
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: were spent on each side of this ballot initiative. I
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: think it was $ 12 million altogether. Organizers were on the
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: ground for months before Dobbs was even announced. I remember
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: far before the Supreme Court, Kathleen Sebelius, who's the former
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: governor of Kansas, served in the Obama administration with us,
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: was telling us to talk about this on Pod Save
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: America and telling us this was coming and talking about
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: how they've been organizing around it for a long time. Like,
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: are there any lessons learned other progressive organizers should take
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: from Kansas from the success of this organizing effort?
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 25:51
  Speaker 4: I mean, obviously, if this can win in Kansas, it
• 25:55
  Speaker 4: can win anywhere. And I don't think that's just true
• 25:57
  Speaker 4: of abortion. That's on a whole host of progressive issues.
• 25:59
  Speaker 4: And if you do the hard work of politics, the organizing,
• 26:03
  Speaker 4: the registering, the grassroots canvassing, et cetera, you can have
• 26:08
  Speaker 4: real success. But I think what in this camp comes
• 26:11
  Speaker 4: through and what the stories I've heard about how how
• 26:13
  Speaker 4: people organized around it in the ads that were done
• 26:17
  Speaker 4: is persuasion, right? This was all about persuasion, persuading people
• 26:21
  Speaker 4: that it mattered, persuading people what it was about. It
• 26:24
  Speaker 4: wasn't just, you know, we're going to find a bunch
• 26:26
  Speaker 4: of base Democrats. We're going to send them a piece
• 26:27
  Speaker 4: of mail. We're going to tell them the selection they're
• 26:28
  Speaker 4: going to turn out. It was about persuasion. And I
• 26:30
  Speaker 4: think like that applies to everything. The combination of strategic,
• 26:34
  Speaker 4: well thought out, long-term organizing with a persuasion mentality, anything
• 26:39
  Speaker 4: is possible in politics.
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Never give up on voting. Never give up on organizing.
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: Never give up on persuasion. All three of those things.
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: I think that's what's there. And by the way, the
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: debate is not over in Kansas. This November, all but
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: one state Supreme Court justice is on the ballot. And
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: currently there's a pro-choice majority. This is the majority that
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: actually ruled that there is a right to an abortion
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: in the Kansas Constitution. So anti-abortion activists are now going
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: to be targeting the court. So in Kansas and elsewhere,
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: this fight isn't over, which is another thing to keep
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: in mind is we win these victories and we think, okay, great.
• 27:15
  Speaker 2: Now everything's protected. We can go home.
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: You can't. It is an ongoing battle because the forces
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: arrayed against us here are not going to quit and
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• 30:28
  Speaker 1: Now, let's talk about some of the bleaker results from
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: Tuesday's primaries.
• 30:43
  Speaker 4: Boo!
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah, we did the good stuff. In Arizona, just about
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: every statewide candidate is now a MAGA Republican who wants
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: the last election overturned. Blake Masters will be the nominee
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: for Senate. MAGA media star Carrie Lake will likely be
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: the nominee for governor, though her race hasn't officially been
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: called yet. And Mark Fincham, a member of the fucking
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: Oath Keepers, the Oath Keepers, the domestic extremist group that
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: was charged with seditious conspiracy for January 6th, he's going
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: to be the nominee for secretary of state.
• 31:15
  Speaker 2: Unbelievable.
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: Arizona's top election officials. That's who the nominee is on
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: the Republican side. On the Democratic side, obviously, Mark Kelly
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: will be our Senate candidate. Secretary of State Katie Hobbs
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: will be the nominee for governor. And former Maricopa County
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: recorder Adrian Fontes is leading in the race for secretary
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: of state. Before we get to the MAGA bozos, what
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: do you think about Hobbs and Fontes as candidates?
• 31:40
  Speaker 4: I think they're both very, very interesting candidates. Katie Hobbs
• 31:44
  Speaker 4: was thought for a long time as the Democrats' best
• 31:47
  Speaker 4: chance to win this governorship. She was a secretary of state.
• 31:50
  Speaker 4: who stood up against the big lie believers and the
• 31:53
  Speaker 4: insurrectionists and the cyber ninjas in the 2020 election. I mean, look.
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: I stood up to the cyber ninjas. That's her.
• 32:03
  Speaker 4: The ad will be that Carly Lee sided with the
• 32:05
  Speaker 4: cyber ninjas and she fought them, right? Big cyber ninja.
• 32:10
  Speaker 4: And Fontes is a Maricopa County recorder. He also was
• 32:15
  Speaker 4: someone who dealt with the election issues in 2020 and
• 32:19
  Speaker 4: is someone who, by all reports from folks in Arizona,
• 32:23
  Speaker 4: is a very strong candidate. Arizona is a tough state.
• 32:26
  Speaker 4: This is a tough year. But these are good Democratic
• 32:29
  Speaker 4: candidates against incredibly flawed Republican ones. So we absolutely have
• 32:34
  Speaker 4: a shot. And winning the Arizona governorship and Secretary of
• 32:38
  Speaker 4: State would really stop Insurrection 2.0 in its tracks. And
• 32:43
  Speaker 4: losing it would have the exact opposite effect and would
• 32:46
  Speaker 4: raise real questions about the ability to actually legitimately count
• 32:50
  Speaker 4: the electoral votes for Joe Biden or a Democrat to
• 32:53
  Speaker 4: win Arizona in 2024.
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: Yeah, remember, it's the job of both the governor of
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: Arizona and the secretary of state of Arizona to certify
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: the election results, something that both the secretary of state
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: Dobbs and governor, Republican Governor Doug Ducey did in 2020.
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: And Carrie Lake and Mark Fincham have basically said they're,
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: you know, they'll only certify if they want to certify.
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: So very dangerous stuff. Let's talk about the best way
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: for the Democratic candidates to frame their opponents. And let's
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: start with Mark Kelly and Blake Masters. There are obviously
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: a lot of contrasts for Kelly to choose from. Here's
• 33:31
  Speaker 1: his first ad out of the gate. Just released it
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: this morning about Blake Masters. Let's take a listen.
• 33:37
  Speaker 3: Blake Masters has made his dangerous ideas on abortion easy
• 33:40
  Speaker 3: to understand.
• 33:41
  Speaker 2: I think Roe v.
• 33:42
  Speaker 5: Wade was wrong.
• 33:43
  Speaker 2: I think it's always been wrong.
• 33:45
  Speaker 4: It's a religious sacrifice to these people.
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: I think it's demonic.
• 33:49
  Speaker 3: For Blake, taking away health care freedom for Arizona women
• 33:52
  Speaker 3: is just the beginning.
• 33:53
  Speaker 2: I actually think we should go further.
• 33:55
  Speaker 7: The federal government needs to step in so no state.
• 33:57
  Speaker 4: Can permit abortion.
• 33:59
  Speaker 5: You make it illegal and you punish the doctors. Blake Masters,
• 34:02
  Speaker 5: too dangerous for Arizona.
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: What did you think of that ad?
• 34:06
  Speaker 4: It's an excellent ad. Look, I think Blake Masters is
• 34:11
  Speaker 4: perhaps the most dangerous Republican candidate on the ballot in
• 34:14
  Speaker 4: a very long time. J.D. Vance is an absolute fraud
• 34:19
  Speaker 4: doing MAGA karaoke. You can see the flop sweat from
• 34:23
  Speaker 4: him trying to be something he isn't. He may win anyway,
• 34:25
  Speaker 4: but he is just ridiculous. Blake Masters is a far-right, true-believing,
• 34:34
  Speaker 4: militant cultural revolutionary who believes like he, like MAG has
• 34:38
  Speaker 4: a slogan to Trump. It is a philosophy for black masters.
• 34:42
  Speaker 4: He believes this country is in an apocalyptic downward spiral
• 34:46
  Speaker 4: because the country is changing demographically. Women have too many rights.
• 34:50
  Speaker 4: The LGBTQ plus community has too many rights. He is
• 34:53
  Speaker 4: trying to return America through any means necessary through the
• 34:56
  Speaker 4: power of the state to a different era. He's talked
• 35:00
  Speaker 4: about the importance of women staying home from work, about
• 35:03
  Speaker 4: taking away people's freedoms, about getting rid of marriage equality.
• 35:07
  Speaker 4: And he does all of that. We had a bunch
• 35:09
  Speaker 4: of really extreme Republican candidates out there, but they all
• 35:12
  Speaker 4: sort of do, they're all like brains pickled by Fox News, right?
• 35:16
  Speaker 4: Herschel Walker, Ted Budd, et cetera. Blake Masters is young.
• 35:22
  Speaker 4: He has deep ties in Arizona. He is dangerously smart.
• 35:26
  Speaker 4: And he knows what he is doing, and he knows
• 35:30
  Speaker 4: the ways in which he's going to try to sand
• 35:32
  Speaker 4: the edges of his incredibly radical extremist philosophy in order
• 35:37
  Speaker 4: to win this election.
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, he's already started doing that. His first
• 35:42
  Speaker 1: ad was out this morning, and it's just an ad
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: of his wife. And she's like, you know, Blake's upset
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: about the direction of the country. There's inflation. You know,
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: they do the gas station shot. And then there's Blake
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: pushing his three kids on a swing. And it does
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: not seem like a MAGA extremist candidate kind of thing
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: at all. It seems like you're just your typical white
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: middle-class family in Arizona. Everything seems fine. It's like very,
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: it worried me a little bit only because I'm like, oh, they,
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: he's not, he's not going with his true beliefs here.
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: He knows, he knows he has to sand the edges down.
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: The DSCC had an ad out before Mark Kelly's ad
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: about masters that was similar to Mark Kelly's ad, but
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: went broader than abortion. It had the, I think it's
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: demonic quote, but it also talked about, it had a
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: quote from him saying, Blake Masters saying, maybe we should
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: privatize social security. We have to cut the knot sometime.
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: I think that's going to be pretty effective. Arizona has
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: an older population and I don't think they're going to
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: like the privatizing of social security. Again, that doesn't sound
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: as extremist to some of the things that you mentioned,
• 36:48
  Speaker 1: but I think for a lot of people who don't
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: follow politics closely and don't know who Peter Thiel is
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: and don't know what, like, you know, Blake Masters' philosophy is,
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: just hearing that he wants to privatize social security is
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: probably going to be a pretty damaging hit. I've noticed
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: that too, because I've been doing this myself. I'm like,
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: I just call him like a Peter Thiel protege. But like,
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: I don't know if a lot of people know who
• 37:08
  Speaker 1: Peter Thiel is or how fucking fascist his views are.
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: You know, like, unless you follow this stuff closely, right?
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: You can read plenty of, there's a lot of good
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: pieces out there that I have been reading lately about
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: how fucking scary Peter Thiel is and Blake Masters and
• 37:22
  Speaker 1: their philosophy.
• 37:23
  Speaker 2: You're right.
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: It's like a, Trump, in their view, Sam Adler Bell
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: wrote a great one in the New York Times about this. Trump,
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: in their view, was like the disruptor. He was just
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: breaking everything apart. But they actually have a very specific
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: philosophy of why we need to get rid of democracy, essentially.
• 37:39
  Speaker 4: Yeah, there's sort of three types of Republicans in this era.
• 37:44
  Speaker 4: There are the ones who think Trump is a doofus,
• 37:49
  Speaker 4: but do not have any sort of morality or shame.
• 37:51
  Speaker 4: So they just pretend like they like him as a
• 37:53
  Speaker 4: vehicle for their right-wing extremist conservative views. They're sort of
• 37:58
  Speaker 4: like all ambition. There are true Trump believers who believe
• 38:03
  Speaker 4: in the man Donald Trump, right? That is Hershel Walker.
• 38:08
  Speaker 4: That is Kari Lake. That's probably Mark Fincham. And then
• 38:11
  Speaker 4: there are the people who like Blake Masters, who view
• 38:14
  Speaker 4: Trump as nothing more than a vehicle for their even
• 38:16
  Speaker 4: more extremist views. They disagree with Trump on a lot
• 38:20
  Speaker 4: of the things that helped Trump get elected. Heterodox views
• 38:23
  Speaker 4: on preserving Social Security. Like, you never heard Trump say
• 38:25
  Speaker 4: he wanted to privatize Social Security. Preserving Medicare. Those sorts
• 38:29
  Speaker 4: of things, they just, they let Trump, you know, as
• 38:32
  Speaker 4: you said, he was the disruptor. He was, they were
• 38:34
  Speaker 4: going to, um, you know, stay in here. I can't
• 38:38
  Speaker 4: even think of which is the most democratic thing in
• 38:40
  Speaker 4: the world, what the racing analogy is for when you drag,
• 38:43
  Speaker 4: when you drag behind someone. But I mean, I don't
• 38:47
  Speaker 4: even watch F1. So I'm like really falling by the way.
• 38:49
  Speaker 4: So that's F1 liberals NASCAR. I think it's what that is.
• 38:52
  Speaker 4: It's neither here nor there, but I think he is.
• 38:56
  Speaker 4: Masters is deeply, deeply dangerous. In addition to the Sam
• 38:59
  Speaker 4: Adler bell piece in New York times, there was an
• 39:00
  Speaker 4: incredible mother Jones piece from a few weeks ago. There was,
• 39:03
  Speaker 4: they dug deep into, uh, into Masters' writings when he
• 39:07
  Speaker 4: was in college that is very much worth reading.
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: With Lake and Fincham, how much would you focus on
• 39:12
  Speaker 1: the prospect of them refusing to certify a Democratic victory
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: in Arizona?
• 39:17
  Speaker 4: I think their belief in the big lie and their
• 39:20
  Speaker 4: promises to not allow Arizona voters to pick the next
• 39:24
  Speaker 4: president is once again a signifier of their radical agenda.
• 39:28
  Speaker 4: I think it's much more important. It should be much
• 39:30
  Speaker 4: more central for Mark Fincham because he's the person in
• 39:32
  Speaker 4: charge of the election apparatus. But most people do not
• 39:36
  Speaker 4: believe most political attacks. So you have to give them
• 39:38
  Speaker 4: reason to believe it. And I think the big lie,
• 39:41
  Speaker 4: like support for total bans on abortion and overturning Roe,
• 39:45
  Speaker 4: is a proof point that this person really is out
• 39:47
  Speaker 4: of touch, which will then allow them to believe a
• 39:49
  Speaker 4: whole bunch of other things like privatizing social security, stealing elections,
• 39:54
  Speaker 4: gun policies, et cetera, et.
• 39:55
  Speaker 2: Cetera, et cetera.
• 39:57
  Speaker 1: With Fincham, I don't think we have to complicate the
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: simple here. Like the guy was a member of the
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: Oath Keepers, violent extremist group that's been charged with seditious
• 40:03
  Speaker 1: conspiracy around January 6th. He wants to decertify the last
• 40:07
  Speaker 1: election and he marched to the fucking Capitol. He marched
• 40:11
  Speaker 1: to the Capitol on January 6th. It's not more difficult
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: than that. That's who that guy is.
• 40:18
  Speaker 4: Look, in today's politics, being a member of a right-wing
• 40:21
  Speaker 4: domestic terror organization is a plus in a primary.
• 40:24
  Speaker 1: Plus in a primary.
• 40:25
  Speaker 4: And a downside in general. That's right.
• 40:27
  Speaker 2: Topfer in a general.
• 40:28
  Speaker 1: So Tuesday night was a pretty good night for Trump
• 40:31
  Speaker 1: in other races as well. Most of the MAGA candidates
• 40:34
  Speaker 1: he endorsed won, including John Gibbs in Michigan, who defeated
• 40:36
  Speaker 1: Representative Peter Meyer, one of the 10 Republicans who had
• 40:39
  Speaker 1: voted to impeach Trump. And in the Missouri Senate race,
• 40:43
  Speaker 1: Trump's last-minute endorsement of Eric... may have been the boost
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: that Eric needed to put Eric over the top.
• 40:50
  Speaker 2: That's right.
• 40:50
  Speaker 1: There were two Erics in the race, Missouri Attorney General
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: Eric Schmidt, the winner, and former Missouri Governor Eric Greitens,
• 40:56
  Speaker 1: the loser. And Donald Trump decided to pick between them
• 40:59
  Speaker 1: by putting out a press release that said he was endorsing, quote, Eric.
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: I can't decide if this is one of the dumbest
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: Trump stories yet or one of the funniest.
• 41:12
  Speaker 4: Why can't it be both?
• 41:13
  Speaker 2: I think it can be both. I think it could
• 41:15
  Speaker 2: be both.
• 41:16
  Speaker 4: I mean, did you read the Politico article?
• 41:17
  Speaker 1: I sure did.
• 41:20
  Speaker 4: It's an article by Alex Eisenstadt, who I'm sure who
• 41:22
  Speaker 4: was a good reporter. But this article is just an absolute,
• 41:27
  Speaker 4: should be in a museum for journalists trying to make
• 41:31
  Speaker 4: Trump's absolute insanity seem like something normal. Like it just, like,
• 41:37
  Speaker 4: you know, you can, I can tell the reporter probably
• 41:39
  Speaker 4: want to say like, what the fuck is wrong with
• 41:40
  Speaker 4: these people? Because at one, like, They have this scene
• 41:43
  Speaker 4: where Trump has been– I mean, the story is just amazing.
• 41:46
  Speaker 4: He's at Bedminster, his club in New Jersey, because it's
• 41:48
  Speaker 4: too hot to be at Mar-a-Lago. He's a sweater, I imagine.
• 41:55
  Speaker 4: And he's trying to decide with hours left which Eric
• 42:00
  Speaker 4: he's going to endorse. And he had a previous scheduled
• 42:03
  Speaker 4: meeting with Romney McDaniel, who's trying to convince him not
• 42:05
  Speaker 4: to endorse Eric Greitens. Calls up Kimberly Guilfoyle, who he
• 42:09
  Speaker 4: finds out just happens to be on the property at
• 42:11
  Speaker 4: the moment, who supports Greitens. At one point, he calls
• 42:15
  Speaker 4: the guy who's the head of bikers for Trump, who
• 42:17
  Speaker 4: also just happens to be at Bedminster at the moment,
• 42:23
  Speaker 4: comes to the meeting. Then the guy says that he's
• 42:27
  Speaker 4: for Greitens, says, let me go pull my members. I'll
• 42:30
  Speaker 4: come back, leaves to another room, calls a bunch of bikers,
• 42:33
  Speaker 4: I guess, returns, says they're for Greitens. And then Trump
• 42:37
  Speaker 4: has his idea that he's going to endorse these Eric's
• 42:39
  Speaker 4: and he's, you know, it's like, There are these moments
• 42:41
  Speaker 4: in these stories where Trump just morphs into Homer Simpson
• 42:44
  Speaker 4: and he's like, sure, it's brilliant. And he like seriously
• 42:47
  Speaker 4: wants to confirm like three times that they spell Eric
• 42:50
  Speaker 4: the same way so that the Eric ploy will work.
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: That to me was the funniest part of this whole
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: story is that Trump's like, wait a minute, wait a minute.
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: Are they both E-R-I-C? Because if one of them is E-R-I-K,
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: this whole fucking plan is not going to work. I
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: need to know. I need to know that they're both
• 43:07
  Speaker 1: with a C because it's a story that's funny and
• 43:12
  Speaker 1: dumb because it does like not just the political story,
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: but then other reporters are asking both of the Eric's
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: about it. And like when you ask the candidate about it,
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: you feel like it makes everyone fucking dumb, including us.
• 43:27
  Speaker 4: Yes, we're talking about it.
• 43:28
  Speaker 1: It's such a dumb story. He put it off, but
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: he couldn't endorse a candidate anymore. But their names were Eric,
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: so he just said, I endorse Eric. What the fuck?
• 43:37
  Speaker 4: But he called both of them and told them, I
• 43:40
  Speaker 4: think you'll be happy with my statement. And they assumed
• 43:43
  Speaker 4: they were getting the endorsement. And then they got what
• 43:45
  Speaker 4: they just said, Eric. It's honestly, up until Tuesday, the
• 43:51
  Speaker 4: dumbest endorsement thing in the history of politics was when
• 43:54
  Speaker 4: the New York Times endorsed two candidates in the primary.
• 43:58
  Speaker 4: But this so far exceeded.
• 44:00
  Speaker 6: It, right?
• 44:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah, no, he- He fucking beat out those eggheads.
• 44:04
  Speaker 2: Yes. Wow.
• 44:07
  Speaker 1: Well, how do you feel about the, and all kidding aside,
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: how do you feel about the fact that Eric Greitens lost?
• 44:13
  Speaker 1: Because even, I mean, he, again, Eric Greitens, horrific human being,
• 44:18
  Speaker 1: accused of both sexual assault and physical assault.
• 44:23
  Speaker 2: Kidnapping.
• 44:23
  Speaker 5: Kidnapping.
• 44:24
  Speaker 4: He's accused of kidnapping someone to physically assault, sexually assault them.
• 44:28
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and physically assaulting his ex-wife, his children. Um, just
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: horrible person. Um, but, but Republicans, the RNC thought that
• 44:37
  Speaker 1: if Greitens won that either they might lose the Missouri
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: Senate seat or at the very least they'd have to
• 44:43
  Speaker 1: put a bunch of money into Missouri that they need to,
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: to win other races. So the Republicans like didn't RNC
• 44:49
  Speaker 1: in that story that he told Ronald McDaniel did not want, um,
• 44:52
  Speaker 1: to not want Eric Greitens to win. How, so how
• 44:55
  Speaker 1: do you feel about the fact that he lost? Cause
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: it probably would have been better for Democrats if he won.
• 44:59
  Speaker 4: Even if Greitens had won, I think it would have
• 45:00
  Speaker 4: been an absolute long shot for Democrats to win the race.
• 45:03
  Speaker 4: A better chance than without Greitens on the ballot. But
• 45:06
  Speaker 4: I'm skeptical that Democrats would have had the time, energy,
• 45:09
  Speaker 4: and money to try to take advantage of that long shot. Look,
• 45:12
  Speaker 4: the world is better without Eric Greitens controlling anything in power.
• 45:16
  Speaker 5: I should probably be in prison.
• 45:17
  Speaker 2: I agree with that.
• 45:18
  Speaker 4: But at the end of the day, I think this
• 45:20
  Speaker 4: is true of whether we're talking about the race in
• 45:22
  Speaker 4: Michigan or anything else, is the true danger to democracy
• 45:24
  Speaker 4: is not the individual Republicans who are in office. It's
• 45:27
  Speaker 4: the Republicans controlling government.
• 45:30
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: And the reason they're controlling government is because Republican voters
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: are coming out to vote for them.
• 45:38
  Speaker 4: Yeah. Right.
• 45:39
  Speaker 2: That's what's happening. Okay.
• 45:41
  Speaker 1: When we come back, we will do a special round
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: of Take Appreciator with our Chief Take Officer, Elijah Cohn,
• 45:47
  Speaker 1: and Crooked's Editor-in-Chief, Brian Boitler, is here when we come back.
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: Today's episode is brought to you by FX's Reservation Dogs.
• 46:00
  Speaker 1: The Hollywood Reporter called the first season of the original
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: comedy a distinctive, wonderfully cast triumph of representation and ranked
• 46:07
  Speaker 1: it the number one best TV show of 2021. This season,
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: Reservation Dogs continues to follow our favorite gang of indigenous
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: teens in rural Oklahoma, with each of them trying to
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: forge their own path in hopes of one day making
• 46:19
  Speaker 1: it to California. FX's Reservation Dogs is now streaming only
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: on Hulu.
• 46:29
  Speaker 2: All right, we are.
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: Back for a special round of Take Appreciator, a very
• 46:33
  Speaker 1: special round. First of all, we have Chief Take Officer
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: Elijah Cohn in studio, which is a rare pleasure.
• 46:41
  Speaker 6: Great to be here.
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: It's great to have you here. And playing with us today,
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: in addition to Dan Pfeiffer remotely, we have Crooked Media's
• 46:49
  Speaker 1: Editor-in-Chief and the host of the positively dreadful podcast, Brian
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: Boitler in studio. Hey, Brian.
• 46:56
  Speaker 6: Hey, guys.
• 46:57
  Speaker 2: How's it going?
• 46:57
  Speaker 5: It's going pretty well.
• 46:59
  Speaker 1: It's good to see you in person.
• 47:00
  Speaker 5: I'm very excited to appreciate some takes.
• 47:02
  Speaker 1: Before we get into the takes, can you tell us,
• 47:05
  Speaker 1: for those who haven't listened, even though I'm sure everyone
• 47:07
  Speaker 1: here has.
• 47:07
  Speaker 5: All the traitors who haven't listened.
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: All the traitors who haven't listened. Tell us a little
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: bit about Positively Dreadful and what you got going on there.
• 47:13
  Speaker 7: Yeah, we're four or five episodes in. It's a new
• 47:16
  Speaker 7: interview show that I host. It's sort of inspired by
• 47:22
  Speaker 7: the popular internet phrase, shit is fucked up and bullshit.
• 47:25
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 47:26
  Speaker 7: And the idea is to basically take people seriously when
• 47:30
  Speaker 7: they notice trends in society and in law and in
• 47:33
  Speaker 7: politics that are alarming to them or troubling to them
• 47:36
  Speaker 7: and acknowledge that in many cases those concerns are real.
• 47:40
  Speaker 7: But also to give them an ability to kind of
• 47:43
  Speaker 7: grasp them more fully so that they don't just become
• 47:46
  Speaker 7: demoralized or deflated or assume that we're just basically on.
• 47:50
  Speaker 2: A road to hell.
• 47:52
  Speaker 7: Uh, and that we're in the, you know, no good
• 47:54
  Speaker 7: can come out of these situations or that they can't
• 47:57
  Speaker 7: be made better.
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: It is a fantastic podcast. Uh, and, and, and you're
• 48:01
  Speaker 1: a perfect host for it as one of the, as
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: one of the people who's often sounding the alarm and
• 48:05
  Speaker 1: unfortunately is right often about.
• 48:07
  Speaker 2: Sounding the alarm.
• 48:08
  Speaker 1: Um, but I do think there's, there's a lot of,
• 48:11
  Speaker 1: there's a lot of hope and optimism that I get
• 48:12
  Speaker 1: out of it as well from, from, from, um, talking
• 48:15
  Speaker 1: it through with the guests that you have on.
• 48:16
  Speaker 5: That's the idea.
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: Yeah. It's a really, it's, it's really well done. So
• 48:19
  Speaker 1: everyone should positively dreadful. Um, Take a listen. All right,
• 48:23
  Speaker 1: Chief Take Officer. Let's hear it. Let's do it. Let's
• 48:26
  Speaker 1: get some takes.
• 48:26
  Speaker 6: All right, let's do it. I'm a little nervous. I
• 48:28
  Speaker 6: feel like I'm going to get exposed because when I'm
• 48:30
  Speaker 6: on my laptop, it looks like I'm looking at the camera,
• 48:33
  Speaker 6: but now I can't really read the takes and look
• 48:35
  Speaker 6: at you guys at the same time.
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you think it's easy what we do here? You
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: think we're just.
• 48:42
  Speaker 4: Don't worry. It's primarily an audio format. Don't you worry
• 48:44
  Speaker 4: about it.
• 48:45
  Speaker 6: Kills me every time i do.
• 48:46
  Speaker 7: You want to hang on do you want it do
• 48:48
  Speaker 7: you want to switch with me so that you can
• 48:49
  Speaker 7: like look up at the camera no i got my
• 48:50
  Speaker 7: own oh you got your own okay.
• 48:53
  Speaker 6: All right all right let's do it welcome back to
• 48:55
  Speaker 6: the take appreciators brian i'm really excited to finally get
• 48:59
  Speaker 6: to play this.
• 48:59
  Speaker 5: With you i've been yeah i've been waiting brian is.
• 49:02
  Speaker 6: A true take appreciator let me explain how it works
• 49:05
  Speaker 6: i'm going to share some takes with you all the
• 49:07
  Speaker 6: producers have seen these takes john dan and brian have not.
• 49:11
  Speaker 5: I actually tried to get Elijah to give me a
• 49:13
  Speaker 5: peek and he refused.
• 49:14
  Speaker 1: So this is like a real rule.
• 49:16
  Speaker 6: I'm a big integrity of the game guy.
• 49:17
  Speaker 5: Rule follower.
• 49:20
  Speaker 6: So they will react to the takes and then rate
• 49:22
  Speaker 6: them on a scale of one to four politicos with
• 49:24
  Speaker 6: four being the worst. Brian, Dan, John, are you guys ready?
• 49:28
  Speaker 5: I'm ready.
• 49:29
  Speaker 6: All right.
• 49:30
  Speaker 4: Born ready.
• 49:31
  Speaker 6: Let's start with this very requested piece. Thank you to
• 49:33
  Speaker 6: everyone who sent it to me. It's from the Washington Post.
• 49:37
  Speaker 6: It is titled, Most third parties have failed. Here's why
• 49:41
  Speaker 6: ours won't. So right off the bat, the opening line
• 49:45
  Speaker 6: of the piece is political extremism is ripping our nation
• 49:47
  Speaker 6: apart and the two major parties have failed to remedy
• 49:49
  Speaker 6: the crisis. And then throws out some stats about how
• 49:52
  Speaker 6: a lot of Americans don't believe the country's headed in
• 49:55
  Speaker 6: the right direction and there are more independents than ever.
• 49:57
  Speaker 6: And then we get this quote. The United States badly
• 50:01
  Speaker 6: needs a new political party, one that reflects the moderate
• 50:04
  Speaker 6: common sense majority. Today's outdated parties have failed by catering
• 50:08
  Speaker 6: to the fringes. As a result, most Americans feel they
• 50:12
  Speaker 6: aren't represented. Now, before I ask who wrote it, I'm
• 50:15
  Speaker 6: going to point out that there's an easy mode and
• 50:17
  Speaker 6: a hard mode here because it was written by three people.
• 50:20
  Speaker 2: Okay.
• 50:21
  Speaker 6: So if you can get all three, you get a
• 50:24
  Speaker 6: bonus point, I guess.
• 50:25
  Speaker 5: I know I can get one.
• 50:26
  Speaker 2: I got two, I think.
• 50:27
  Speaker 6: Okay.
• 50:28
  Speaker 1: But I can't figure out the third, even though in
• 50:30
  Speaker 1: my mind's eye, I remember seeing the headline and the byline,
• 50:34
  Speaker 1: and now I can't. Andrew Yang.
• 50:37
  Speaker 5: That was mine. Christy Todd Whitman is two.
• 50:39
  Speaker 1: That's going to be two, right? And then I don't
• 50:41
  Speaker 1: know the third. Dan, do you have the third?
• 50:43
  Speaker 4: I was going to say Jill Stein.
• 50:45
  Speaker 6: Josh Barrow.
• 50:46
  Speaker 1: No.
• 50:47
  Speaker 6: It is David Brooks. But the first name is correct.
• 50:52
  Speaker 6: If you can get the last name, it is a David.
• 50:55
  Speaker 4: Mark Penn.
• 50:56
  Speaker 6: David Duke. This is David Jolly.
• 51:00
  Speaker 2: Oh, David.
• 51:02
  Speaker 4: Oh, of MSNBC.
• 51:04
  Speaker 5: Yeah, liberal MSNBC.
• 51:05
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 51:06
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 51:07
  Speaker 7: I feel like the take that didn't make the cut
• 51:11
  Speaker 7: of the take was in the Reuters write-up of this op-ed,
• 51:15
  Speaker 7: which says, the party, which is centrist, has no specific
• 51:19
  Speaker 7: policies yet. It will say at its Thursday launch, how
• 51:22
  Speaker 7: will we solve the big issues facing America? Not left,
• 51:26
  Speaker 7: not right, forward.
• 51:28
  Speaker 4: Yes.
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 51:29
  Speaker 2: You know what?
• 51:32
  Speaker 1: I don't know how you guys feel about this one,
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: but in the true spirit of Take Appreciators, where you
• 51:37
  Speaker 1: give the full playbook for people who really tried to
• 51:40
  Speaker 1: be as trollish as possible, I want to give this
• 51:44
  Speaker 1: only two because I feel like it's so lazy. Specifically
• 51:49
  Speaker 1: from what Brian just cited in the Reuters piece, they're
• 51:52
  Speaker 1: not even trying. They're not even trying. Oh, we're a
• 51:55
  Speaker 1: centrist party who just wants to who just wants to
• 51:57
  Speaker 1: take on the big issues. There's no effort there. There's
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: no effort there.
• 52:01
  Speaker 7: Okay, so I agree with that. On the flip side,
• 52:05
  Speaker 7: it is like the ultimate Politico take, right? I believe
• 52:09
  Speaker 7: Jim VandeHei.
• 52:10
  Speaker 5: Almost launched a third party.
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: Yeah, the Innovation Party.
• 52:12
  Speaker 5: Right, right.
• 52:13
  Speaker 7: And so almost as like an homage to the game,
• 52:17
  Speaker 7: I think I'm going to give it the full playbook.
• 52:19
  Speaker 1: Yeah, he wanted to launch the Innovation Party, but instead
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: he just wrote a book called Smart Brevity.
• 52:25
  Speaker 2: Ha ha ha!
• 52:26
  Speaker 5: And somebody can get that at your local bookseller. It
• 52:31
  Speaker 5: was David Roberts or somebody else.
• 52:34
  Speaker 7: I forget who said the thing that I love most
• 52:38
  Speaker 7: about this like annual ritual of the centrist third party
• 52:42
  Speaker 7: that doesn't have like a specific plan or whatever is
• 52:45
  Speaker 7: that they eventually get bullied into putting out a policy agenda.
• 52:47
  Speaker 7: And it's like the Democratic Party policy agenda. And they
• 52:52
  Speaker 7: just didn't realize that they've been Democrats all along but
• 52:55
  Speaker 7: want to brand themselves differently.
• 52:56
  Speaker 1: Dan, what do you think?
• 52:58
  Speaker 4: I'm going to give it one Politico. I appreciate Brian's take.
• 53:02
  Speaker 4: I think anytime we can re-bring up the Innovation Party,
• 53:05
  Speaker 4: that is good for laughs. So I support it. It's
• 53:06
  Speaker 4: one of the great moments because people forget that the
• 53:09
  Speaker 4: Innovation Party ticket was Mark Zuckerberg and Jim Mattis, I think.
• 53:11
  Speaker 2: Oh, my God.
• 53:12
  Speaker 6: Oh, my God.
• 53:13
  Speaker 1: Wow.
• 53:13
  Speaker 2: Good memory.
• 53:14
  Speaker 6: I didn't even know that existed.
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 53:21
  Speaker 4: But it gets one playbook or one politico for the
• 53:24
  Speaker 4: reason John said, which is like they're not even trying.
• 53:26
  Speaker 4: This is basically a shell corporation for Andrew Yang relevance.
• 53:31
  Speaker 4: That's what it is.
• 53:32
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 53:32
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 53:32
  Speaker 6: I mean, again, the article is titled Here's Why Our
• 53:35
  Speaker 6: Third Party Won't Fail. And the reason they cite is
• 53:37
  Speaker 6: because there are more independents now than ever. As if
• 53:40
  Speaker 6: independents are a block.
• 53:43
  Speaker 1: All right.
• 53:43
  Speaker 2: Next take.
• 53:44
  Speaker 6: Okay. This next one is a suggestion from our friend
• 53:46
  Speaker 6: John Lovett. You guys know him.
• 53:49
  Speaker 5: Heard of him.
• 53:49
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 53:50
  Speaker 6: This article is a bit old.
• 53:52
  Speaker 1: Host a weekly variety show.
• 53:54
  Speaker 6: I laughed really hard when he called it a variety
• 53:55
  Speaker 6: show on Monday. This article is a bit old, but
• 53:58
  Speaker 6: he said we should do it just for Brian, and
• 53:59
  Speaker 6: I agree. It's from The Hill. It is a piece titled,
• 54:03
  Speaker 6: Prosecuting Trump Will Ruin Our Nation and Might Not Hold
• 54:07
  Speaker 6: Him Accountable. Here's a quote. There may be a viable
• 54:14
  Speaker 6: criminal case that Trump corruptly obstructed congressional proceedings, namely January 6th.
• 54:20
  Speaker 6: But that is highly debatable. If the Justice Department brought
• 54:24
  Speaker 6: such a case, much of the country would condemn the
• 54:25
  Speaker 6: indictment as political payback. Such a prosecution of a former
• 54:29
  Speaker 6: president could take years and meshing the federal courts in
• 54:32
  Speaker 6: unprecedented questions. President Trump should be held to account. Prosecution
• 54:36
  Speaker 6: would be the wrong vehicle. Here's hoping cooler heads prevail.
• 54:39
  Speaker 6: Anyone want to guess who wrote that?
• 54:44
  Speaker 5: Andy McCarthy.
• 54:45
  Speaker 4: Wow. Yeah.
• 54:48
  Speaker 1: Very good from downtown. That was Andy McCarthy.
• 54:51
  Speaker 7: So, uh, I was, I actually assumed I was wrong
• 54:55
  Speaker 7: about that because, but I thought if I'm right about that,
• 54:58
  Speaker 7: then that's like the greatest indication, uh, we have that
• 55:01
  Speaker 7: Trump is hyper guilty of all these crimes and definitely
• 55:04
  Speaker 7: needs to be prosecuted because Andy McCarthy is like, you know,
• 55:08
  Speaker 7: sort of very right wing legal writer for national review
• 55:12
  Speaker 7: whose job seems to be, uh, painting over crimes Republicans
• 55:16
  Speaker 7: commit and explaining why there's actually nothing wrong there. So
• 55:19
  Speaker 7: if he's basically saying, yeah, Trump did it, but it
• 55:21
  Speaker 7: would just be really, it would be really bad for
• 55:23
  Speaker 7: the country to do anything about it.
• 55:25
  Speaker 5: Then I think the jig is basically up.
• 55:27
  Speaker 7: Like there's nobody with even a skosh of credibility on
• 55:30
  Speaker 7: the right who can say, no, actually everything he did
• 55:32
  Speaker 7: here is like by the book, there's no laws against
• 55:35
  Speaker 7: any of it.
• 55:36
  Speaker 5: Trump's fine.
• 55:38
  Speaker 4: I would say that I am equal parts impressed that Biden,
• 55:42
  Speaker 4: Brian can identify an Andrew McCarthy take from months ago
• 55:47
  Speaker 4: and alarmed. And I really, I don't know what Brian
• 55:50
  Speaker 4: does on Sunday mornings, but I really think he needs
• 55:52
  Speaker 4: to listen to this podcast.
• 55:53
  Speaker 5: I read the Hill takes every day of the week.
• 55:56
  Speaker 1: I was going to say what's so impressive about it
• 55:58
  Speaker 1: is that like, if you said it was a national
• 56:00
  Speaker 1: review take, I would start having Andy McCarthy as one
• 56:03
  Speaker 1: of my thoughts, but the fact that it's Andy McCarthy
• 56:05
  Speaker 1: in the Hill, which was just, they publish any trash
• 56:08
  Speaker 1: in the Hill.
• 56:09
  Speaker 6: A true take appreciator.
• 56:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that is. So, okay.
• 56:13
  Speaker 1: So ratings on this one, um, because he decided not
• 56:16
  Speaker 1: to do, here's the legal case why Trump shouldn't get prosecuted,
• 56:20
  Speaker 1: but did the, he might be guilty, but it'll tear
• 56:22
  Speaker 1: the country apart. That's getting me to, I'm, I'm at
• 56:25
  Speaker 1: like three and a half. I'm at three and a
• 56:27
  Speaker 1: half on that.
• 56:28
  Speaker 5: Um, I want Dan to go first. I'm still thinking.
• 56:32
  Speaker 4: I'm going to say two and a half just because
• 56:34
  Speaker 4: we're doing, you know, price is right rules here. Um,
• 56:38
  Speaker 4: And I want to leave room for some full playbooks
• 56:40
  Speaker 4: later on. But it's a bad and particularly stupid take.
• 56:45
  Speaker 7: See, in my mind, you get more politicos as you
• 56:48
  Speaker 7: get more silly or stupid or trollish.
• 56:53
  Speaker 4: Hot takey.
• 56:55
  Speaker 7: This is like a different family of not really offered
• 57:00
  Speaker 7: in good faith. Running interference for Republicans because it's pretty
• 57:05
  Speaker 7: clear that Andy McCarthy's really worried. that if Trump gets prosecuted,
• 57:08
  Speaker 7: he doesn't really give a shit what happens to Trump.
• 57:11
  Speaker 1: He does.
• 57:12
  Speaker 7: He knows that that will reflect poorly on the right
• 57:14
  Speaker 7: and Republicans. And, um, you know, if it was David
• 57:19
  Speaker 7: Brooks or somebody making the same point, which we'll get
• 57:22
  Speaker 7: to at some point, I'm, I'm certain I'd give it
• 57:25
  Speaker 7: three to four, but I'm going to give this one too,
• 57:30
  Speaker 7: because it's, it's not, it's not coming from a place
• 57:32
  Speaker 7: of trolling.
• 57:32
  Speaker 5: It's coming from a place of fear and lying.
• 57:35
  Speaker 2: Gotcha.
• 57:36
  Speaker 6: I mean, Brian, do you think he's going to get prosecuted?
• 57:38
  Speaker 6: Do you think about this kind of thing?
• 57:41
  Speaker 1: Should I?
• 57:42
  Speaker 7: You know who does think he's going to get prosecuted
• 57:43
  Speaker 7: more likely than not is this week's Positively Dreadful guest.
• 57:48
  Speaker 1: Tell us.
• 57:50
  Speaker 4: Merrick Erland? Boy, that's a get, man. Talk to your bookers.
• 57:57
  Speaker 5: Maybe I should just leave it hanging. Maybe people will
• 57:59
  Speaker 5: think that I really got the attorney general. No, guest
• 58:02
  Speaker 5: this week was Pete Strzok.
• 58:04
  Speaker 6: Oh, wow.
• 58:05
  Speaker 7: And and we got to talk all about this basic issue,
• 58:08
  Speaker 7: plus surrounding issues of the complexity of charging former president,
• 58:14
  Speaker 7: whether it makes sense to approach the investigation the way
• 58:18
  Speaker 7: Merrick Garland has or not from a from a guy
• 58:21
  Speaker 7: who has, you know, one of the few people in
• 58:23
  Speaker 7: the country who has done investigations along these lines.
• 58:27
  Speaker 5: So it was a very interesting conversation.
• 58:29
  Speaker 1: That's great.
• 58:30
  Speaker 5: Yeah. And, you know, I just gave away the main.
• 58:33
  Speaker 7: Scoop of the show is that he thinks that there's
• 58:35
  Speaker 7: just too much criminal activity out there in the open
• 58:39
  Speaker 7: for Trump to wind up with zero indictments.
• 58:42
  Speaker 6: Still worth listening.
• 58:42
  Speaker 4: In this media environment, Brian, you have to put the
• 58:45
  Speaker 4: best scenes in the trailer.
• 58:47
  Speaker 1: Especially if the ponderous judge who runs DOJ is listening.
• 58:53
  Speaker 1: We want to make sure he tunes in. All right, Elijah,
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: you got one more for us?
• 58:56
  Speaker 6: Yes, I do.
• 58:57
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 58:57
  Speaker 6: I have a big note here to ask. How do
• 58:59
  Speaker 6: you guys think this segment is going so far?
• 59:05
  Speaker 1: It's in such large font.
• 59:09
  Speaker 6: But how do you think it's going?
• 59:10
  Speaker 1: I think it's going just wonderfully.
• 59:13
  Speaker 5: This is the best take appreciators you've ever hosted.
• 59:15
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you've nailed it.
• 59:16
  Speaker 2: You nailed it.
• 59:17
  Speaker 6: All right.
• 59:17
  Speaker 1: That was a very Nathan Fielder sort of move right there.
• 59:21
  Speaker 6: I'll take it. Oh, yeah, Elijah.
• 59:22
  Speaker 1: I've been watching the rehearsal, so it's been in my head.
• 59:26
  Speaker 6: Me too. All right. So this last one is a
• 59:30
  Speaker 6: true take appreciators take. It's not a pure take per se.
• 59:35
  Speaker 6: So this is from the AP, a rare offender on
• 59:38
  Speaker 6: this segment. It's a piece titled election skeptics rise in
• 59:43
  Speaker 6: GOP races to run state elections. Oh, this piece sets
• 59:48
  Speaker 6: up that like really intense election deniers are winning Republican primaries.
• 59:51
  Speaker 6: As you guys discussed in the news segment, it references
• 59:53
  Speaker 6: Doug Mastriano. It references Mark Fincham in Arizona, as well
• 59:57
  Speaker 6: as others. Just as a recap, Mark Fincham is part
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 6: of the Oath Keepers and was at the January 6th riot.
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 6: And then, like I said, it doesn't have takes, but
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 6: he uses this language. Here's a quote. Election experts say
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 6: candidates who dispute the results of a valid election in
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 6: which there's been no evidence of widespread fraud or manipulation
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 6: of voting systems pose a danger of interfering in future elections.
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 6: They warn it could trigger chaos if they refuse to
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 6: accept results they don't like. That's what we think of
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 6: this kind of reporting.
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 1: Oh, because it's... Yeah, it's an election that the experts
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 1: are saying that if you deny an election and want
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 1: to overturn it, that could be bad. Yeah.
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 4: As a.
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 7: Mostly retired reporter, I feel a little for whoever wrote
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 7: the story.
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 2: Was it Zeke?
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 4: Get off of this set. No, no, no, no, no.
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 5: No, it's all, it is always hard to tell from
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 5: the story. And you're right. Depending on the byline, I
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 5: might want to take it back.
• 1:01:02
  Speaker 7: But, you know, whether the instinct and the pressure to
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 7: couch all that behind the voices of experts instead of
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 7: just saying what's obviously true could have been pressure put
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 7: on them by the company or their editor or whatever
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 7: their stupid rules are.
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Just calling them election skeptics is also.
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 4: A cop out. Did you read their other story? Gravity
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 4: skeptic injured after walking out of a second story window?
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 1: Gravity experts say that walking out of a second story
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 1: window without believing in gravity could cause chaos.
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 5: Sir Isaac Newton claimed, what a fool.
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 6: So, John, it was not Zeke. You guys want to
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 6: take a guess at who wrote this?
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 1: I feel like I don't know that many more people
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 1: at the AP anymore.
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 6: I know they're rare founders.
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 1: Sometimes their headlines are a little rough.
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 5: Is Lemire still an AP?
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 4: He's a Politico.
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 6: It's Bob Christie and Christina Cassidy.
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 5: I'm not even sure.
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 4: Those aren't even real people. Those are bots.
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 6: Those are Dolly generated.
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 7: Look, I remember what reporting say on climate change was
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 7: like 10, 15 years ago, and it was all like this.
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 7: It was all reporters who knew that climate change was
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 7: a real thing. Um, and that essentially knew what its
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 7: effects would be if left unchecked, but always compelled by
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 7: the sort of, you know, the, the rules of the,
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 7: of the outlets they worked for to phrase that as
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 7: experts say, or climate experts say, and, you know, pair
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 7: that off with, uh, you know, some industry groups saying it's,
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 7: it's all overblown. And it was a 10 year process
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 7: or so of like bullying, uh, mainstream outlets out of
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 7: doing that and just basically saying you can't leave settled
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 7: science in a he said, she said framework. And unfortunately,
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 7: like they're doing the same thing for for democracy. And
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 7: there's like the timeline is much shorter.
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I look, I remain a skeptic that Bob and
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 4: Christie are real people. But if they are, this is
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 4: likely not their fault. It's the fault of their editors
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 4: and the Associated Press's absurd both sides ism balance over
• 1:03:13
  Speaker 4: accuracy sort of approach. But so we don't really want
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 4: to attack them personally. But you can't call the election
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 4: skeptic is that is a serious offense. And that gets
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 4: a full playbook.
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 1: One for Bob and Christy, three for the editors.
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 4: A full playbook for journalistic culture.
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 1: What a great note to end on. On that note,
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 1: Elijah Cohn, Chief Take Officer, thank you for a fantastic
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 1: round of Take Appreciator.
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 6: It went very well.
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 1: And Brian Boitler, thanks for being here. And everyone, go
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 1: check out Positively Dreadful. Subscribe. Listen to this week's episode
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 1: with Pete Strzok.
• 1:03:49
  Speaker 4: Merrick Erland.
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 1: Yeah, especially you, Merrick Erland, who could be a future guest.
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 1: Thank you, everyone, and have a good weekend. We will
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 1: talk to you all next week.
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 4: Bye, everyone.
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 1: Hot Save America is a Crooked Media production. The executive
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 1: producer is Michael Martinez. Our senior producer is Andy Gardner-Bernstein.
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 1: Our producer is Haley Muse, and Olivia Martinez is our
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 1: associate producer. It's mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Kyle
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 1: Seglin and Charlotte Landis sound engineer the show. Thanks to
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 1: Tanya Sominator, Sandy Gerard, Hallie Kiefer, Ari Schwartz, Andy Taft,
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 1: and Justine Howe for production support. And to our digital team,
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 1: Elijah Cohn, Phoebe Bradford, Milo Kim, and Amelia Montuth. Our
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 1: episodes are uploaded as videos at youtube.com slash crookedmedia.