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VP Picks Her VP · Pod Save America

• 0:20
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: I'm Jon Lovett.
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: Tommy's on vacation this week, though I'm not sure how
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: restful it's been. A lot of news. A few things
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: going on. On today's show, Kamala Harris adds some Democratic
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: all-stars to her staff as she and her new running
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: mate barnstorm the battlegrounds this week. Trump is in meltdown
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: mode as he refuses to debate Kamala Harris without a
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: security blanket of MAGA supporters and whines about her crowd
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: size in Atlanta. And RFK Jr. tweets a video of
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: him telling Roseanne about the time he hit a dead
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: bear cub in Central Park when he ran out of
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: time to eat it. More on that later.
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Following this developing story.
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: You can just go back a couple seconds. I did
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: say that sentence just to hear it again. Yeah. The
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: dead bear cub in Central Park.
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: Under a bicycle.
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: Under a bicycle. We're going to get into it. But first,
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: we are recording this Monday afternoon, but by the time
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: you hear it on Tuesday, it is highly likely that
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: Kamala Harris will have announced her running mate. Reporting indicates
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: the campaign will be releasing a video just before the
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: VP appears with her VP pick. at a rally in
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: Philly on Tuesday night. The campaign is looking to keep
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: their momentum going for the third straight week. The polling
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: averages and models are now showing a tied race, and
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: a few, like Nate Silvers, even have Harris in the
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: lead for the first time. Her outstanding campaign team is
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: also getting some help from some of the most successful
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: campaign operatives in the Democratic Party, who also happen to
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: be our good pals. David Plouffe, who led Barack Obama
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: to victory in 2008 and 2012, is joining as senior advisor.
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: Mitch Stewart, who ran the Iowa caucuses for Obama in
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: 08 and went on to oversee all the swing states
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: in 2012, will be a senior advisor for battleground states.
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: Longtime Democratic comms pro Stephanie Cutter, Jen Palmieri are heading
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: back in, and the list goes on. Gang's all here.
• 2:08
  Speaker 2: Obama's 11. That's pretty good. I didn't even prepare that.
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: That just happened.
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: I like that. David Binder's going to be there. It's just,
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: they've got a great crew. And Jen O'Malley Dillon, of course,
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: an Obama person before she was a Biden person, remains
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: campaign manager and her fantastic team that has been working
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: on this campaign now, probably in their minds, forever. So
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: we will get to the VP selection in a bit.
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: But first, what was your reaction to the staffing news?
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: And talk about some of the challenges of adding all
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: that new talent to an existing campaign.
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: I had like sort of two reactions, which was first
• 2:43
  Speaker 2: to once again, pause to note how well the campaign
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: has done under extraordinarily strange and unique circumstances that something,
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: there was such a dramatic shift in how the campaign
• 2:58
  Speaker 2: operated once Kamala became the person that they were rallying
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: behind that just spoke to how much talent was already
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: there waiting to be deployed if they had kind of,
• 3:09
  Speaker 2: I think, the right energy, the right enthusiasm, and the
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: right person to get behind the other strange aspect of
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: all of this is, now, we went through this in 2008.
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: After Obama secures the nomination, that campaign has to grow.
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: There's this Hillary Clinton campaign sitting side by side with
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: it that had been fighting it through every single state
• 3:31
  Speaker 2: that also had a lot of really great and talented people.
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: And so as that Obama campaign becomes a general election campaign,
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: as opposed to a primary campaign, you see them starting
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: to hire some of the people they fought so hard against.
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: And that integration process is It's interesting. It's personal. It's
• 3:46
  Speaker 2: people deciding that they're going to put the campaign fights
• 3:49
  Speaker 2: behind them. There's questions about like, you know, it's often
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: some of the hardest people are like spokespeople who might
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: have been out there saying things about the campaign. But
• 3:57
  Speaker 2: on the most part, everybody recognizes that we're now on
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: the same team. What's interesting here is there wasn't a primary.
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: That didn't take place. But the Biden campaign was, I think,
• 4:09
  Speaker 2: first of all, had fewer senior leaders in Delaware. It
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: was like more run out of White House. So they
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: just need these kind of voices to come into the
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: fold to help a team that's already doing so well. Yeah.
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: There's a few reasons why I think they needed this crew,
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: partly because Joe Biden had been in politics for so
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: long that he had this sort of small circle of
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: senior advisors that were really close to him. Mike Donilon,
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: Anita Dunn, who's now going to be at a super
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: PAC supporting Kamala Harris, Steve Ruschetti, a few others. So
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: I think that Kamala Harris inherited like everyone from Jen
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: O'Malley Dillon on down, that whole staff like could stay
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: right where they are and they're going to be fantastic.
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: And they've been, and they've been great, but she needs
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: people who have been like on a successful national presidential
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: campaign to be communications and messaging advisors and to sort
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: of be like your big think strategist kind of people.
• 5:04
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: And that's what Plouffe does. And that's what Cutter and
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: Palmieri do. And certainly Mitch when it comes to the
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: battleground states. So, it is a fantastic crew. It gave
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: me like a lot of, I just felt really good.
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah.
• 5:16
  Speaker 2: No, you said security blanket. It just, it felt like,
• 5:19
  Speaker 2: it felt like a security blanket. And then, and just
• 5:21
  Speaker 2: the fact that like, this is also like, they're not
• 5:24
  Speaker 2: drawing on a year of what it was like for
• 5:26
  Speaker 2: Kamala Harris to be campaigning in Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, which
• 5:29
  Speaker 2: you might've had if there had been a longer primary
• 5:31
  Speaker 2: or a longer campaign. So of course they need people
• 5:33
  Speaker 2: who have a ton of experience, you know, making strategy
• 5:35
  Speaker 2: for those kinds of places. Cause they haven't been on
• 5:37
  Speaker 2: the ground testing things and trying things and figuring out
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: what works.
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: And she knows them and they know each other, right?
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: Like Jen knows all the Obama people, obviously, because she
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: was one. And Kamala Harris, one of Barack Obama's earliest
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: supporters in 2007, she was like, I remember being in
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: the Des Moines, Iowa field office with her and Maya Harris,
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: like knocking on doors right before the caucuses in 08.
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: So the whole like, I know when everyone was waiting
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: for Obama to endorse Kamala Harris, there was like some
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: questions like, oh, does he really support whatever? Like they've
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: known each other for a long, long time and are
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: quite close. Was it?
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: I'm like, was there a joke where he got in trouble?
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: Yes, when he was president. He did say that she
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: was a great attorney general and one of the best-looking
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: attorney generals in the country, attorneys general.
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: And then we did a joke at the Correspondents' Dinner
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: where Barack Obama references the fact that he said this
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: about Attorney General Kamala Harris and said he had to
• 6:28
  Speaker 2: apologize for calling Kamala Harris the best-looking attorney general in
• 6:32
  Speaker 2: the country. He had to apologize to Eric Holder.
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: Right. That was a good joke. That was a good joke.
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: I remember that.
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: I'm glad he apologized. Anyway.
• 6:40
  Speaker 2: It's just something that happened.
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: Campaign's also bringing back our pal Liz Allen, who's currently
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: the Undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy to be the
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: Chief of Staff for Kamala's VP pick. Liz was VP
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: Harris's Communications Director when she was the VP pick back
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: in 2020. So this is a little inside baseball, but
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: I do think the other challenge with bringing on a
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: running mate is integrating the two teams because you pick
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: a running mate and then you need an entire staff
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: for the running mate, an entire campaign operation for the
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: running mate. What are some of the considerations there?
• 7:13
  Speaker 2: Well, just the day the person is chosen to be
• 7:16
  Speaker 2: the vice presidential candidate, they're plugged into an organization and
• 7:20
  Speaker 2: a schedule that is full right there. And that is
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: an operation that takes a ton of people. And whoever
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: it is, whether they're a senator or a governor or
• 7:30
  Speaker 2: a secretary of transportation or what have you, they don't
• 7:32
  Speaker 2: have that kind of operation. And more importantly, that operation
• 7:34
  Speaker 2: isn't plugged into the campaign. And because you don't know
• 7:38
  Speaker 2: maybe until the day before, you know, we're recording this
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: on Monday afternoon. The campaign is telling people right now
• 7:43
  Speaker 2: that she hasn't made her mind up. This will be
• 7:45
  Speaker 2: someone at an event tomorrow. Then you just have to
• 7:48
  Speaker 2: have that organization built. And then you assume that once
• 7:51
  Speaker 2: the person is chosen, they will bring along their people
• 7:54
  Speaker 2: that will plug into this operation. And then it just
• 7:57
  Speaker 2: becomes an organic question of personalities and people working together
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: and figuring out how to make it work in real time.
• 8:03
  Speaker 2: Sometimes it's easier than other times.
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you need You need some Harris people on the team,
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: in this case, Harris people, to make sure the VP
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: is on message and isn't like doing their own thing.
• 8:13
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: But you also want to make the VP pick feel
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: comfortable with some of their own people. So it's just
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: a question of it's, you know, it has almost always
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: worked in situations I've been in. We were on the
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: Kerry campaign when John Edwards was picked and those teams
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: integrated quite well. And to the point we were just
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: making about adding all the staff back then. when Kerry
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: won the primary and it was the general, a lot
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: of Bill Clinton's advisors and strategists joined the campaign in D.C.
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: as like pollster strategists, whatever else. And then in the
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: Obama campaign, Biden and the Biden people sort of fit
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: in very well and everyone got along and it was great.
• 8:48
  Speaker 2: I remember when the Obama campaign named Hillary Clinton's former
• 8:51
  Speaker 2: campaign manager, Patty Sleaze Doyle, to be the chief of
• 8:53
  Speaker 2: staff to whoever the VP would be, who it turned
• 8:55
  Speaker 2: out to be, Joe Biden. Do you remember in 2004,
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: when there was a tension because John Edwards wanted to
• 9:03
  Speaker 2: use hope is on the way versus help is on
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: the way. And there was like a, there was a
• 9:07
  Speaker 2: stupid thing. It was.
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: And so that then as a, as a placard at
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: the convention, yes, as.
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: A placard, he wanted to do. So the, the carry
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: campaign message was help is on the way and it worked.
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: Uh, Help never came.
• 9:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: And yeah.
• 9:21
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: Sort of. Yeah.
• 9:23
  Speaker 2: DoorDash has canceled your order. But but but Edwards wanted
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: to do hope because that was his. He wanted to hope.
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: So he wanted to do his version, which was hope
• 9:32
  Speaker 2: is on the way. So on his night, there were
• 9:33
  Speaker 2: just completely different signs for hope is on the way.
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: What does this have to do with Patti Sluice Doyle
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: and anything else?
• 9:38
  Speaker 2: Just to do something. There's tension between a vice presidential candidate.
• 9:42
  Speaker 2: Sometimes they bring their own. I thought that was clear.
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: I'm getting nods.
• 9:47
  Speaker 2: I'm getting nods. Adrian's in. No, great.
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: All right.
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: As for the VP pick, as much as we hoped
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: selfishly it would have leaked by the time of this recording,
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: I guess we still got time, it hasn't. The latest
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: reporting is that the final... choice has come down to
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro and Minnesota Governor Tim Walz. And
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: of course, the reporting could be wrong. We could all
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: be surprised by a dark horse. Who knows? But here's
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: what we're going to do, for all you fine people.
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: We're going to do one reaction as if it's Shapiro,
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: one reaction as if it's Walz, and one reaction as
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: As if it's a total surprise.
• 10:20
  Speaker 2: We're going to really try to put ourselves in that mindset.
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: All right. Let's do it. Ready? Here we go. Love it.
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: She did it. Kamala Harris chose Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: as her vice presidential pick.
• 10:32
  Speaker 2: Always knew it was going to be Shapiro. Always wanted
• 10:34
  Speaker 2: to be Shapiro. I love walls, but secretly, I really
• 10:36
  Speaker 2: wanted Shapiro.
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: What do you think? Why'd she do it? And what
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: does Josh Shapiro bring to the ticket?
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: So first of all, Josh Shapiro is a very popular
• 10:44
  Speaker 2: governor in Pennsylvania, a popularity that has exceeded... recent Pennsylvania
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: governors up to this point. And he has also won
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: in parts of Pennsylvania where he has outperformed even other
• 10:54
  Speaker 2: figures that are popular in the state, like John Fetterman.
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: He is a former attorney general. So now we have
• 11:01
  Speaker 2: two attorney generals going after a criminal. I really like
• 11:05
  Speaker 2: what that story says. And he fixed I-95.
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: Which is one of the biggest pluses for you.
• 11:12
  Speaker 2: In two fucking weeks.
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: You've been talking about that forever.
• 11:14
  Speaker 2: I have. So I'm a huge fan of Josh Shapiro.
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: I think she chose the person who is most likely
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: to help her win the election. And the reason is
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: because the importance of Pennsylvania cannot be overstated. If Kamala
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: Harris does not win Pennsylvania, it is very, very difficult.
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: She has very few paths to 270 without Pennsylvania. If
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: she does Arizona, Michigan, Nevada, Wisconsin, doesn't work. Without Pennsylvania, Arizona, Georgia, Nevada,
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: Wisconsin doesn't work without Pennsylvania. She has to basically run
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: the table on not just the other blue wall states,
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: but Arizona and Georgia and Nevada or some combination of
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: those three if she doesn't have Pennsylvania. So that's why
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: it's known as the tipping point state. So incredibly important
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: to win Pennsylvania. Now, does Josh Shapiro automatically get her Pennsylvania?
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: Absolutely not. But like you said, wildly popular, 60% approval rating,
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: doesn't happen a lot. including an approval rating of over
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: 90% with Democratic voters, with young voters, with black and
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: brown voters. He's super popular. He's young, dynamic, executive experience,
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: which is what she wanted. There were criticisms of Shapiro
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: on a few different issues. One was Israel. Some folks
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: on the left were concerned that Josh Shapiro, when he
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: was 20, he wrote a college essay, saying that he
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: didn't believe in a two-state solution. He now does believe
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: in a two-state solution. He said some other things in
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: that essay that I think he clearly doesn't believe anymore.
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: When he was in college.
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah, when he was in college, he was 20 years old.
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: There was also some concern about, like, what he said
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: about campus protesters, even though he said every campus protester
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: has a right to protest peacefully, and that, like, the
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: vast majority of encampments and college protesters were, like, he
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: had no problems whatsoever, and they were not anti-Semitic. He
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: said that specifically, but he said those protesters who were
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: spouting anti-Semitic tropes, specifically, explicitly, he said if white supremacists
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: were doing something like that, we would treat them differently. Yeah.
• 13:10
  Speaker 2: So in that, this is, I think people have said that, oh,
• 13:12
  Speaker 2: he's comparing student protesters to the KKK, which I think
• 13:15
  Speaker 2: is like a deeply ungenerous interpretation, not only of that sentence,
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: but the broader interview. He is simply saying that if
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: someone was spouting something really, really antisemitic, that if a
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: member of the KKK was saying something really, really racist,
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: that you should not put, you should hold these things
• 13:31
  Speaker 2: to the same standard. But in that same interview, he says,
• 13:35
  Speaker 2: because Jake Tapper confronts him and says, These are not
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: protesters coming from the right. These are protesters coming from
• 13:40
  Speaker 2: the left. And he says, even though we may disagree
• 13:43
  Speaker 2: on policy, that these are people with strongly held and
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: even righteous views. He says that in the same interview.
• 13:49
  Speaker 2: So obviously he is not in the same breath describing
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: student protesters as righteous members of the KKK. He's making
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: a distinction, which I like. He was obviously not saying that.
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: Let's leave it there. And then the other issue was
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: he had some opposition to his support for some kind
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: of school vouchers and charter schools. though I'll point out
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: that the Pennsylvania chapters of the American Federation of Teachers
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: and another Pennsylvania state union did endorse him. And they
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: actually said, we don't agree with everyone on every issue,
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: but he's been really good on education overall. And so
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: we're going to support Josh Shapiro. So I do think, look,
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: the divisions and opposition to Shapiro that have appeared on
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: Twitter and in the media, they are real, right? But
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: they are just not representative of how most voters or
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: most Democratic voters feel about Josh Shapiro, particularly Democratic voters
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: who know him in Pennsylvania, very progressive ones, very young voters,
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: all of them.
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: And by the way, that doesn't mean having these criticisms
• 14:42
  Speaker 2: of Josh Shapiro's positions isn't a valid thing to express
• 14:46
  Speaker 2: and to make sure that the Harris-Shapiro campaign doesn't honor
• 14:49
  Speaker 2: what your concerns are, right? Like this campaign will reflect
• 14:52
  Speaker 2: this big, broad coalition. And so the question is not
• 14:54
  Speaker 2: what is Josh Shapiro's position or what was his position?
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: It is what is the position of this campaign and
• 14:59
  Speaker 2: this presidency, which will obviously come from Vice President Kamala Harris.
• 15:02
  Speaker 2: So if people have concerns, they should express them, right?
• 15:04
  Speaker 2: But this campaign isn't a reflection of the views of
• 15:07
  Speaker 2: Josh Shapiro that you disagree.
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: And again, Pennsylvania in 2020, Joe Biden won by one
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: to two points. Okay. And right now the polls are tied.
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: And if Josh Shapiro even helps Kamala Harris half a
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: point in Pennsylvania, three quarters of a point in Pennsylvania,
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: it could mean the entire election. Right. And so like,
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: that's that everything that Kamala Harris has done since Joe
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: Biden stepped aside and she announced her campaign has screamed,
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: I'm in it to win it. I'm in it to
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: win this thing. I'm going to do it. And I
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: do think that's, that is the Josh Shapiro pick in
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: a nutshell. I think if Josh Shapiro, all things being equal,
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: if Josh Shapiro was the governor of Minnesota and Tim
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: Walz was the governor of Pennsylvania with everything else being equal,
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: I think that of course she would pick Tim Walz
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: and not Josh Shapiro because it's Pennsylvania. Yeah, I think
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: that's right. Yeah.
• 15:56
  Speaker 2: Okay. Love it.
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: She did it.
• 15:58
  Speaker 2: She did it.
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: Kamala Harris has been walls-pilled and selected the Minnesota governor
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: as her vice presidential pick. What do you think?
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: I knew it was going to be walls. And I secretly, honestly,
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: I didn't want to say it, but I always wanted
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: it to be fucking walls. I was walls-pilled from the
• 16:09
  Speaker 2: fucking beginning. It was always meant to be walls.
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: I think it was his appearance right here on Pod
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: Save America.
• 16:14
  Speaker 2: Friend of the show.
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: He came into the office just a month or two
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: before that with Tommy, before the whole walls-pilled craze started.
• 16:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah, he'd get a seat at the goddamn table.
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: All right, what does walls bring to the ticket? Why'd
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: she do it in the end? What's going on?
• 16:25
  Speaker 2: So, first of all, I think It is amazing how
• 16:28
  Speaker 2: Tim Walz has gone from who to the vice presidential
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: pick in a matter of weeks, in part just on this.
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: You were very clear about that with him. Yeah. In
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: the interview.
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: I was. Guys, why are we hiding this guy in
• 16:41
  Speaker 2: a bushel? You know? He should be shining.
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: In the tundra.
• 16:45
  Speaker 2: Yeah. He should be shining.
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: That's what they're missing? Yeah.
• 16:48
  Speaker 2: Just kidding, Minnesota.
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: We love you, Minnesota.
• 16:50
  Speaker 2: Hide him in the dairy. But first of all, it
• 16:52
  Speaker 2: is an incredible thing. to do a vice presidential audition
• 16:56
  Speaker 2: and issue a message that catches fire nationwide. That's first.
• 17:00
  Speaker 2: And then I think second, once people started hearing from
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: Tim Walz and seeing how he delivers a message and
• 17:05
  Speaker 2: then diving into his background and his story, not just
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: about where he comes from, but how he's governed, he
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: became an exciting kind of representation of what we want
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: this ticket to be, even if, obviously, Josh Shapiro might
• 17:19
  Speaker 2: bring more to one state that Tim Walz brings something
• 17:22
  Speaker 2: to the whole ticket to compete, not just in Minnesota,
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: but Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Michigan. Yeah.
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: If you're going just by what is going to help
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: Kamala Harris win, you could say that Tim Walz sounds
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: and looks like the kind of voter who may decide
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: the election, which is the Obama-Trump voter from a small
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: town or rural area who is tired of Trump, but
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: not necessarily sold on Kamala Harris. Maybe they might not
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: have been sold on Joe Biden. because of his age
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: or whatever else, they might not yet be sold on
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: Kamala Harris because, you know, she's portrayed as a San
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: Francisco liberal, right? But Tim Walls, you can send into
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: any small town in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, and he is
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: going to connect with people like he's been connecting with
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: people all through this audition process. I think that he's
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: obviously fantastic on TV. And according to John Heilman and Puck,
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: that caught the eye of Kamala Harris herself. and some
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: people close around her. So she really liked that he
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: performed so well on television. The resume, of course, is outstanding.
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: Veteran social studies teacher, football coach, rural town, wildly accomplished
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: record as governor in Minnesota with the Democratic trifecta.
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: With a one vote majority. I mean, they have put
• 18:31
  Speaker 2: places like California and New York to fucking shame. They
• 18:34
  Speaker 2: have used the power that they were given and they've
• 18:36
  Speaker 2: been unafraid of doing it. And it's been really awesome
• 18:38
  Speaker 2: watching Tim Walz defend that record when he's asked about it, right? Like, oh,
• 18:42
  Speaker 2: are you too liberal? And he's like, I'll never apologize
• 18:45
  Speaker 2: for making sure kids have food in their bellies when
• 18:46
  Speaker 2: they're learning in school. And so I think that was
• 18:48
  Speaker 2: all very inspiring. And like, obviously, there's a contradiction here.
• 18:51
  Speaker 2: And like, well, what are you looking to get out
• 18:52
  Speaker 2: of your VP, right? One is just like, we got
• 18:54
  Speaker 2: to win fucking Pennsylvania. And that's why we need Josh Shapiro.
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: The other is people don't vote based on who the
• 18:58
  Speaker 2: VP is, right? Paul Ryan didn't deliver Wisconsin. The VP
• 19:02
  Speaker 2: pick is a reflection of the person at the top
• 19:04
  Speaker 2: of the ticket. And what does it tell you about them?
• 19:06
  Speaker 2: And that what Tim Wall says is more powerful than
• 19:09
  Speaker 2: not just in Pennsylvania, but in Michigan, in Wisconsin, in
• 19:11
  Speaker 2: everywhere we have to win.
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: And also, like Shapiro would have been, he is young, dynamic,
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: executive experience, governor, right? That's what she wanted. And also,
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: he ended up getting a lot of endorsements at the end.
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: So everyone from, you had Nancy Pelosi endorsed him, Bernie Sanders,
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: the UAW, or at least said that they wanted him
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: to be picked. And I do think that speaks to
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: probably why she ended up with him over Shapiro is
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: this was the let's not rock any boats pick. And
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: like most people in party won't be upset. Some pundits,
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: some folks will say, oh, she caved to progressives. But
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: I don't really think that matters as much as like
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: what she says and does with regards to her own
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: position and message. right like whatever her her vp is
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: yeah now the the challenge is he probably he has
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: a bunch of votes in a record that probably haven't
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: been as vetted because he wasn't like the front runner
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: like shapiro but that's like a small that's a small thing.
• 20:02
  Speaker 2: Yeah the other i also like i i just like
• 20:04
  Speaker 2: the story of it and what it says about her
• 20:06
  Speaker 2: right like tim walls wasn't anyone's shortlist from the beginning
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: And the fact that like from this process, he emerges
• 20:12
  Speaker 2: and she kind of defies the expectation where which started
• 20:15
  Speaker 2: with Kelly and Shapiro and Pritzker and a few others
• 20:18
  Speaker 2: and ends up going with this Minnesota governor that doesn't
• 20:21
  Speaker 2: deliver that. That is from a state that if if
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: we need, we're in trouble elsewhere anyway. It'll kind of
• 20:26
  Speaker 2: like speak to the leadership qualities you want in your president. Right.
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: That they like that she sat down and felt most
• 20:31
  Speaker 2: comfortable with this person based on who he is, based
• 20:33
  Speaker 2: on some other not based on some like kind of
• 20:35
  Speaker 2: objective political calculus.
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: Love it. Wow.
• 20:39
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: Complete surprise. Maybe for you. A dark horse just fell
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: out of the coconut tree. Kamala Harris, for her running mate,
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: has selected George Santos? Yeah.
• 20:49
  Speaker 2: Weird. Look, I always knew it was going to be
• 20:51
  Speaker 2: somebody like Santos out of left field. I don't know.
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: I don't have it. I mean, I guess we could
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: still get a Kelly. We could still get a Bashir.
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: Who else?
• 21:02
  Speaker 2: You know, it seems like they're signaling that it's a
• 21:05
  Speaker 2: governor candidate. Um, but you know, it could also be
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: a Pete, right? I guess Pete's schedule.
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah. I just saw the Pete's schedule.
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: Pete's schedule suggests he's elsewhere. Yeah. I mean, look, I,
• 21:15
  Speaker 2: there's a lot of speculation and like, you know, this
• 21:17
  Speaker 2: is the person that she's leaning towards as a person.
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: It's like, nobody really knows the decision she's making right now.
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: It's just her and Doug.
• 21:23
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: I mean, look, I, and again, I'll say this before
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: we know who it's going to be. I genuinely will
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: be very happy if it's either Walls or Shapiro. I
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: haven't sat down with these people like she has, right?
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: Like I don't, I didn't do the interview process. I
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: didn't look at the internal polling in Pennsylvania to see
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: exactly how much Josh Shapiro helps or doesn't help. So
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: like in my mind, when I think about, you know,
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: I've been in it to win it the entire time.
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: This is why we thought that Biden should step aside, right?
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: This whole thing, it's like, this isn't about ideologies or personalities.
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: This is about how can we beat Donald Trump? So
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: I lean like slightly towards Shapiro for that. But again,
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: I think Walls has so much upside. and so much
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: talent that I would be like very happy with either
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: of them.
• 22:01
  Speaker 2: My feeling on this is that like, I also would
• 22:03
  Speaker 2: be happy either way and like have interviewed them both
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: and come away from my interviews with both being like
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: extraordinarily excited and impressed. And when we were, um, like I,
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: like when I interviewed, uh, Shapiro, when we were in, in,
• 22:16
  Speaker 2: in Pennsylvania, I was Shapiro pilled and I've been Shapiro pilled.
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: I'm taking both pills. All right. I got a Shapiro pill.
• 22:21
  Speaker 2: I got a walls pill. All right. I take them
• 22:23
  Speaker 2: both every morning with a glass.
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: Of whole milk. Maybe that gets you a dark horse.
• 22:26
  Speaker 2: But, um, There was a story that I think, I
• 22:31
  Speaker 2: don't remember when it came out, but it was a
• 22:33
  Speaker 2: story that came out after the Kerry Edwards campaign about
• 22:37
  Speaker 2: an uncomfortable moment between John Kerry and John Edwards where
• 22:40
  Speaker 2: Edwards said something to John Kerry about his son who
• 22:43
  Speaker 2: passed away and how he told John Kerry, I've never
• 22:47
  Speaker 2: told anyone this story, but I want to tell you
• 22:49
  Speaker 2: this story. And it was meant to convey to John
• 22:52
  Speaker 2: Kerry how much John Edwards was moved by the opportunity
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: to be vice president. But it made John Kerry deeply
• 22:57
  Speaker 2: uncomfortable because John Edwards had forgotten that he'd already told
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: John Kerry that story. And despite his misgivings about John
• 23:02
  Speaker 2: Edwards as a person, he chose John Edwards. He didn't
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: trust his gut.
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: He went a different direction.
• 23:08
  Speaker 2: Are you saying John Edwards is untrustworthy? He's in purgatory.
• 23:13
  Speaker 2: He can't get out of purgatory because of what happened
• 23:15
  Speaker 2: and everything else. But I don't even know. John Edwards
• 23:19
  Speaker 2: lives in another world between life and death. But anyway,
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: all that's a way of saying, like, I think all
• 23:25
  Speaker 2: the calculations aside, like, I think something about Walls feels
• 23:28
  Speaker 2: very exciting in this moment. And I don't know. You
• 23:31
  Speaker 2: can't put your finger exactly on why. But that makes
• 23:34
  Speaker 2: me lean a little towards my man, Walls.
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: There's one other big unresolved question about the next few months,
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: and that's whether there will be at least one debate
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump. Late last week, Trump
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: said he's backing out of the previously scheduled ABC debate
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: on September 10th because Joe Biden pulled out of the
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: race and because he's suing ABC over that contentious George
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: Stephanopoulos interview way back when, which I can barely even remember.
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: Trump said that he instead wants to attend a Fox
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: News debate on September 4th in Pennsylvania with, quote, a
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: full arena audience in attendance. The Harris campaign did not
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: take the bait. Kamala Harris wrote on Twitter, quote, it's
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: interesting how anytime, any place becomes one specific time, one
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: specific safe space. I like that. I'll be there on
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: September 10th, like he agreed to. I hope to see
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: him there. Awesome. Why do you think Trump backed out?
• 24:34
  Speaker 2: I think he's an undisciplined mess and wanted to give
• 24:37
  Speaker 2: Kamala Harris, like it doesn't realize he's giving Kamala Harris
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: yet another great news cycle. I also think he wants
• 24:43
  Speaker 2: to renegotiate these debates on more favorable terms. Like, The
• 24:46
  Speaker 2: reality is that like Donald Trump can't get more. No
• 24:50
  Speaker 2: one in history has ever gotten more out of a
• 24:51
  Speaker 2: debate than Donald Trump got out of the first debate.
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: It is not possible for him to get anything better
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: out of this debate. He really only I think it's
• 24:59
  Speaker 2: hard to see how he doesn't stand to lose. So
• 25:02
  Speaker 2: that means I think he has more to lose, which
• 25:04
  Speaker 2: means he has more reason to pull out and try
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: to renegotiate slightly better terms. Right.
• 25:10
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: First of all, we should say that his excuses are bullshit.
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: The suit against ABC was filed in March. before he
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: already agreed to the ABC debate with Biden. So the
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: whole George Stephanopoulos thing is not a real that's not
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: a real excuse. He's generally scared to debate. He was
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: in the primaries, the Republican primaries. He just wasn't scared
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: to debate Joe Biden. And then he had the appearance
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: we talked about last week at the National Association of
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: Black Journalists, where he just had a fucking meltdown and
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: was completely undisciplined and unhinged. And I think he he
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: probably feels like he's going to look old. and probably
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: too angry and a little unhinged next to Kamala Harris.
• 25:45
  Speaker 2: It's also a lot of work. He has to do work.
• 25:47
  Speaker 2: He doesn't want to do the work. He's doing one
• 25:48
  Speaker 2: event this week. He just really doesn't want to work
• 25:51
  Speaker 2: very hard. He was very pleased with the schedule Joe
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: Biden had him on, right? Because neither, because he could just,
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: he could, you know, go out on the golf course,
• 26:00
  Speaker 2: say hi to the bride and groom, do a couple videos.
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: Do an event. Get back to his iPad, DJing, Mar-a-Lago.
• 26:06
  Speaker 2: Once the trial was over.
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: Now he is probably thinking that by trying to go
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: for the Fox thing, it will be conflated in voters'
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: minds as like, she wanted her media outlet, he wanted
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: his media outlet, they couldn't agree, too bad, it's all
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: a mess. Like, that's what he's going for now. What
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: do you think of Harris's response?
• 26:22
  Speaker 2: I think it's great. I think it's like, everything is
• 26:24
  Speaker 2: about this new and energetic campaign versus this old and
• 26:27
  Speaker 2: lumbering and boring and spent Donald Trump. The fact that
• 26:31
  Speaker 2: he's playing into it is delightful and great. You know,
• 26:34
  Speaker 2: we talked about how it can be hard, especially this
• 26:36
  Speaker 2: phase of the campaign, to keep winning news cycles or
• 26:38
  Speaker 2: like to keep to keep out there. And this is
• 26:41
  Speaker 2: just a way to keep that going. Gets you to
• 26:43
  Speaker 2: the VP pick. The VP pick gets you to the convention.
• 26:45
  Speaker 2: The convention gets you to the fall.
• 26:46
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: The idea that Kamala Harris should ever agree to a
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: Fox News debate with an audience, with a Fox News
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: selected audience, is completely insane. It's just like, of course not.
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: Of course that's what Donald Trump wants. He wants to
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: turn this into a cage match, right? And I do
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: find it, It's interesting thinking about... So basically, the Harris
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: campaign believes that ABC has said, when they agreed, that
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: if one of them backs out, they will still hold
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: the debate and give that one candidate airtime. Now, that
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: is quite valuable for Kamala Harris to have 90 minutes
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: to herself on prime time. I do wonder if then...
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: I mean, she'll still have to prep for that because...
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: there's going to be journalists who are like, well, we're
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: going to ask her super tough questions, right? Now, if she,
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: you know, does well there, then she'll have been introduced
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: on her own terms and defined, been able to define
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: herself in front of an extremely large audience just weeks
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: before early voting starts in Pennsylvania on September 16th, by
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: the way. So like, that's a real, I guess, no,
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: it's September 10th. So six days before early voting starts.
• 27:57
  Speaker 2: It's a little bit, you know, the campaign saying, I'll
• 28:03
  Speaker 2: be there and this will be happening whether Trump comes
• 28:05
  Speaker 2: or not is quite a nice thing for the campaign
• 28:09
  Speaker 2: to be able to say. I wonder if ABC wouldn't
• 28:11
  Speaker 2: feel obligated to offer Trump an interview as well, kind
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: of in the same format.
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: They'll pull down the debate and do two interviews?
• 28:17
  Speaker 2: Yeah, they could do that. I also think it matters
• 28:22
  Speaker 2: what happens with the polling. We now see the Nate
• 28:27
  Speaker 2: Silver model now has Kamala ahead for the very first time.
• 28:30
  Speaker 2: But if you dive into the numbers, if you go
• 28:32
  Speaker 2: based on where the averages are at in every state,
• 28:34
  Speaker 2: it is right now, according to that model, 270 to 268, right?
• 28:39
  Speaker 2: Kamala winning by two electoral votes, one of which is
• 28:41
  Speaker 2: the Nebraska electoral vote. So this thing is fucking tied.
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: So close.
• 28:47
  Speaker 2: And if there's this $ 300 million war chest, the campaign
• 28:51
  Speaker 2: is getting into a good swing. Trump is having bad
• 28:53
  Speaker 2: news cycle after bad news cycle. Kamala Harris is having
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: good news cycle after good news cycle. If the polls
• 28:57
  Speaker 2: start to shift I think Trump will start to become
• 28:59
  Speaker 2: more and more open to a debate. And I do
• 29:02
  Speaker 2: think now the negotiations are back to being open. And like, honestly,
• 29:06
  Speaker 2: I don't think that that's unreasonable, right? Like it is
• 29:09
  Speaker 2: a different candidate. I think that he should just accept
• 29:11
  Speaker 2: the ABC debate because that's probably something more akin to
• 29:14
  Speaker 2: what the format should be and would be if they
• 29:16
  Speaker 2: just renegotiated this anyway. No, it's not going to be
• 29:19
  Speaker 2: the Fox News fucking Thunderdome with Sean Hannity and a
• 29:22
  Speaker 2: bunch of MAGA goons sitting behind him. Like that's obviously ridiculous,
• 29:25
  Speaker 2: but it's all just a negotiation.
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm trying to think, though, about your point about
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: the polls. Like, so she announces her VP. That usually
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: is a good couple news cycles. You know, if it's Shapiro,
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: I'm sure there'll be some some griping on the left
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: and there'll be a little demonstration. division thing here and there.
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: But overall, it'll probably be a good week. Then we
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: have next week and then there's the convention and a
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: convention for whichever party has the convention is always good
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: for them. You always get some kind of bounce or
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: at least you don't get overtaken during the convention, you know,
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: because you're on TV all the time. And so are
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: all of the other Democrats making the case for you.
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: So the convention then ends around August 22nd. So now
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: we're like... We're two weeks from voting beginning. Well, but
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: to the debate, because then... So then I'm trying to
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: think of like, if Kamala Harris is either still tied
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: or ahead, at what point would Donald Trump feel like
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: he actually needs that debate?
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: And then also, yes. But then there's also what happens
• 30:18
  Speaker 2: between Vance and whoever the Democratic person is.
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: Oh, yeah, that's right.
• 30:22
  Speaker 2: There's going to be a vice presidential debate while the
• 30:24
  Speaker 2: presidential candidate is refusing. Are they going to refuse to
• 30:27
  Speaker 2: do both? That's deeply strange. So now you got Walls
• 30:30
  Speaker 2: or Shapiro barnstorming the country saying they want to debate J.D. Vance,
• 30:33
  Speaker 2: which of course they do, because what a treat. And
• 30:35
  Speaker 2: for all of us.
• 30:36
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 30:36
  Speaker 2: And Kamala Harris is saying, debate me, Trump, debate me, Trump.
• 30:39
  Speaker 2: Like one of the reasons Biden proposed this early debate
• 30:42
  Speaker 2: was because they understood that they were in this sort
• 30:44
  Speaker 2: of vicious circle of Trump saying, debate me, debate me,
• 30:47
  Speaker 2: debate me, debate me. And so he had to like
• 30:49
  Speaker 2: break out of the tit for tat to make it
• 30:50
  Speaker 2: clear that he wanted to debate more than Trump wanted
• 30:53
  Speaker 2: to debate. So it didn't seem like a concession. like
• 30:55
  Speaker 2: Trump's backing himself into this, where showing up to debate
• 30:57
  Speaker 2: is going to seem like he's afraid.
• 30:59
  Speaker 1: Right. Which is why I don't know that he can,
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: even if he needs to, I don't know if he
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: can just show up now. They might have to do
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: like a third proposal of a debate. No, I think
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: that's where... Maybe we're headed for like one in October
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: or something.
• 31:08
  Speaker 2: Or it is the ABC debate, but there's some change
• 31:10
  Speaker 2: to the rules. Maybe they add like a fucking Bret
• 31:12
  Speaker 2: Baier or Fox News person or something like that. Who knows?
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: Regardless, Trump seems quite angry and scared right now, which
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: is always when he's at his most effective and disciplined.
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: We played the clip last week of Harris in Atlanta
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: saying to Trump, If you've got something to say, say
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: it to my face as the crowd went nuts. Trump
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: was in the same venue on Saturday at Georgia State.
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: He got a good crowd as well, and he was
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: in full insult and grievance mode. Let's listen.
• 31:36
  Speaker 4: Crazy Kamala, ultra left, you know that. She was here
• 31:41
  Speaker 4: a week ago, lots of empty seats. But the crowd
• 31:44
  Speaker 4: she got was because she had entertainers. I don't need entertainers.
• 31:49
  Speaker 4: I filled the stadium because I'm making America great again.
• 31:53
  Speaker 4: That's our entertainment. That's our entertainment, making America great again.
• 32:00
  Speaker 4: She's Bernie Sanders, but not as smart. That's the way
• 32:04
  Speaker 4: I feel. I said she's a dumb version of Bernie
• 32:07
  Speaker 4: Sanders and actually further left than him. And we're going
• 32:10
  Speaker 4: to defeat crazy Kamala Harris. Kamala, you know, there's about
• 32:15
  Speaker 4: 19 different ways of saying it. She only likes three.
• 32:18
  Speaker 4: The choice of this election could not be more stark.
• 32:21
  Speaker 4: On the one hand, you have a radical left freak.
• 32:26
  Speaker 4: You have a candidate who is fake, fake, fake. On
• 32:31
  Speaker 4: the other hand, you have a president who will fight, fight,
• 32:35
  Speaker 4: fight for America.
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: So he's really he's testing. He's throwing spaghetti at the
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: wall there.
• 32:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it sticks. Radical left freak we're at. Remember? We're
• 32:47
  Speaker 2: in trouble. We can't call these people weird.
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: I think this is challenging because he is used to, like,
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: the country had a very set opinion of Hillary Clinton
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: in 2016. The country has a fairly set opinion of
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: Joe Biden, right? Specifically in 2024. In 2020, they still
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: knew Joe Biden a lot, but, you know, he had
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: not been on the top of the ticket, right? Like,
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: Kamala Harris, people know. Her name ID is obviously very high. But, like,
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: they haven't successfully defined her yet. She hasn't maybe defined
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: herself yet. But so Trump sort of doing a shortcut
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: by just calling her freak left, Bernie Sanders, dumb. Like,
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: I don't know that that lands unless you lay the
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: predicate for it, which he and his campaign have not
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: done yet.
• 33:30
  Speaker 2: And which they couldn't do because there wasn't time, right?
• 33:32
  Speaker 2: It is, like, what I was thinking about, like, you know,
• 33:35
  Speaker 2: Donald Trump gets credited for being this, like, idiot savant
• 33:38
  Speaker 2: when it comes to branding, right? And it's like, well,
• 33:40
  Speaker 2: let's take a step back on that, right? Like, wow,
• 33:42
  Speaker 2: he managed to paint the dumbest fucking group of bozos
• 33:46
  Speaker 2: in the Republican Party as bozos. Like, was that that hard? Like,
• 33:49
  Speaker 2: Hillary Clinton had faced decades of right-wing attacks and misogynist
• 33:52
  Speaker 2: attacks that left her with an impression in the public
• 33:56
  Speaker 2: as a career politician, you know, Clinton corruption, all of that,
• 34:00
  Speaker 2: that Donald Trump could prey on. Joe Biden's biggest liability...
• 34:04
  Speaker 2: Joe Biden, first of all, he couldn't beat Joe Biden
• 34:05
  Speaker 2: the first time. Joe Biden's biggest liability... There's never been
• 34:08
  Speaker 2: a candidate with as clear-cut, a single, and powerful, and
• 34:14
  Speaker 2: widely accepted liability as Joe Biden had with age. So,
• 34:16
  Speaker 2: of course, that wasn't a fucking tough ball for Trump
• 34:20
  Speaker 2: to swing at. Kamala Harris is more difficult, right? Like,
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: saying she's an ultra-left freak and calling her a phony,
• 34:26
  Speaker 2: those are in conflict, right?
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: This would happen with how McCain dealt with Obama, too,
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: because it was... For a while, it was Obama's the
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: biggest celebrity in the world, and they tried to say, oh,
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: it's sort of like this, she has entertainers, but I'm
• 34:38
  Speaker 1: entertaining because I'm making America great again. The McCain campaign
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: did a little bit of that. Then they add Palin,
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: and then Barack Obama is palling around with terrorists, sinister, other.
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: There's Barack Obama, the lightweight, Barack Obama, inexperienced, Barack Obama, professorial.
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: I mean, they tried a whole bunch of different things.
• 34:55
  Speaker 2: And again, a lot of those are in conflict, right? Like, oh,
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: Barack Obama's too smart. Barack Obama's too inexperienced. Like, you know,
• 35:00
  Speaker 2: obviously- Too black, not black enough. All of that. And
• 35:02
  Speaker 2: like with, you know, he also, by the way, like
• 35:04
  Speaker 2: last week, you know, went into this racist and ridiculous
• 35:07
  Speaker 2: attack on her being biracial. And it was little noted
• 35:12
  Speaker 2: because it was in the middle of a larger freakout.
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: But like there was an insinuation in his post about
• 35:18
  Speaker 2: he was trying to use the racial attack to claim
• 35:20
  Speaker 2: that she's a phony in some way. Like she uses
• 35:22
  Speaker 2: her identity the way she uses everything.
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 35:24
  Speaker 2: Which I think is a subtle nod to all the
• 35:27
  Speaker 2: right wing freaks that are saying that Kamala Harris slept
• 35:29
  Speaker 2: her way to the top. which is an attack they
• 35:31
  Speaker 2: want to use against her, which is obviously a misogynist
• 35:34
  Speaker 2: and ridiculous libel. So like he's kind of casting about.
• 35:39
  Speaker 2: And a lot of these are kind of, I think,
• 35:41
  Speaker 2: the kinds of attacks that are really going to backfire. Like, obviously,
• 35:44
  Speaker 2: like this sort of like disgusting accusation that he's trying
• 35:47
  Speaker 2: to insinuate is not going to be effective. A lot
• 35:51
  Speaker 2: of people who understand that this is the kind of
• 35:52
  Speaker 2: attack that is basically pointed at anyone who's not a
• 35:55
  Speaker 2: straight white male who's had some success and people want
• 35:58
  Speaker 2: to slime.
• 35:59
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: Trump also made some news at the rally that I'm
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: sure his campaign was hoping for. He attacked the popular
• 36:05
  Speaker 1: Republican governor of a crucial swing state. Here's what he
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: said about Georgia Governor Brian Kemp.
• 36:10
  Speaker 4: Your governor, Kemp, and Raffensperger are doing everything possible to
• 36:15
  Speaker 4: make 2024 difficult for Republicans to win. What are they doing?
• 36:20
  Speaker 4: I don't know. They got something in mind, you know,
• 36:23
  Speaker 4: they got a little something in mind. Kemp, is very
• 36:26
  Speaker 4: bad for the Republican Party. If it wasn't for me,
• 36:29
  Speaker 4: he would not be your governor. I think everybody knows that.
• 36:32
  Speaker 4: He's the most disloyal guy I think I've ever seen.
• 36:36
  Speaker 4: Somewhere he went bad. And you know what? Your numbers
• 36:39
  Speaker 4: in Georgia are very average. Your crime numbers, your economic numbers,
• 36:43
  Speaker 4: all of your numbers, you're very average. You can do
• 36:46
  Speaker 4: a lot better, and you'll do a lot better with
• 36:48
  Speaker 4: a better governor.
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: He's running against Kamala Harris. It's unbelievable.
• 36:51
  Speaker 2: It's incredible.
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: In a post before the event, Trump also went after
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: Kemp's wife for not endorsing him. Kemp responded with the
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: tweet saying, my focus is on winning this November and
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: saving our country from Kamala Harris and the Democrats, not
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: engaging in petty personal insults, attacking fellow Republicans, or dwelling
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: on the past. You should do the same, Mr. President,
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: and leave my family out of it. Oof, message delivered,
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: Brian Kemp.
• 37:14
  Speaker 2: That has to be, put it in the fucking time capsule,
• 37:16
  Speaker 2: one of the most humiliating moments embarrassing statements I've ever
• 37:20
  Speaker 2: seen from a public figure. You keep this up, Mr. Trump,
• 37:22
  Speaker 2: and I'm going to fight for you just as hard.
• 37:27
  Speaker 2: The guy's negotiating. He's always negotiating.
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: Stop attacking my wife and let's focus on working together.
• 37:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Stop attacking my wife so that I can keep
• 37:34
  Speaker 2: helping you. You're making it harder for me to help
• 37:36
  Speaker 2: you because of all the attacks you're leveling against my family.
• 37:39
  Speaker 2: It's very Ted Cruz.
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: Very Ted Cruz. But also, is attacking the popular governor
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: of a swing state you need, is that a good strategy? What, what,
• 37:47
  Speaker 1: What was he doing?
• 37:48
  Speaker 2: He must have just like it's like he's upset. He's upset.
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: He's in a state.
• 37:52
  Speaker 2: He's in a state.
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: Trump has been in a state for the last three
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: weeks and he's lashing out.
• 37:57
  Speaker 2: Yes, he look, he just he'll settle down. He'll settle down.
• 38:00
  Speaker 2: He does num nums. But but yeah, like it's like
• 38:04
  Speaker 2: he saw a bad poll. And he pitched forward to
• 38:07
  Speaker 2: losing and needing somebody to blame. And so if he's
• 38:09
  Speaker 2: going to lose Georgia, he's not going down for this.
• 38:11
  Speaker 2: Brian Kemp's going down for this.
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: And by the way, Brian Kemp has a pretty big
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: and sophisticated campaign operation in the state of Georgia that
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: has helped him win several races. And, you know, do
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: I think Kemp's going to just like turn it off
• 38:25
  Speaker 1: and not help him from that tweet? Clearly not. But,
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: you know, there's things people can do short of like
• 38:31
  Speaker 1: giving it their all for for a candidate.
• 38:33
  Speaker 2: Absolutely. Yeah.
• 38:34
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 38:34
  Speaker 2: Like Brian Kemp's going to have a lot of like
• 38:36
  Speaker 2: a lot like he's going to have others. There's other seats.
• 38:39
  Speaker 2: There's local races. There's a ton of stuff that's going
• 38:40
  Speaker 2: to mean he's going to want to mobilize his operation.
• 38:43
  Speaker 2: But is he going to be as strongly barnstorming across
• 38:46
  Speaker 2: the state trying to help Donald Trump win? Like, I
• 38:48
  Speaker 2: don't see why he would.
• 38:49
  Speaker 1: I don't think so. And Georgia is now one of
• 38:52
  Speaker 1: the states where Kamala Harris is catching Donald Trump. And she,
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: you know, it's down to a couple points now in Georgia,
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: which it had not been when when Biden was running
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: this time around. It would obviously was You know, the
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: polling in Georgia in 2020 had Biden behind by a
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: couple points most of the time. And then at the end,
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: the Biden campaign was like, we're going to play in Georgia.
• 39:12
  Speaker 1: And there were a lot of eyebrows raised. I was
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: sort of like, what are they doing in Georgia? And
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: then they won and it paid off. So like Georgia
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: is one of those states where the very voters that
• 39:21
  Speaker 1: Kamala Harris is doing better with than Biden had younger voters,
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: black voters, brown voters, Asian American voters, that the state
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: of Georgia is becoming more diverse and becoming younger because
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: of all the people moving there and moving to like
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: the Atlanta metro area. So that is a, it's a,
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: it could be a good state for her. Yeah.
• 39:39
  Speaker 2: And I just like, one of the reasons Brian Kemp
• 39:41
  Speaker 2: is governor is, it is true. It is in part
• 39:44
  Speaker 2: because of Donald Trump, but not in the way Donald
• 39:46
  Speaker 2: Trump thinks is because Brian Kemp And by the way,
• 39:49
  Speaker 2: a lot of those people just like left the top
• 39:50
  Speaker 2: of the ticket blank in 2020. It's not even like
• 39:51
  Speaker 2: they voted for Joe Biden. They just didn't want to
• 39:53
  Speaker 2: vote for Donald Trump.
• 39:54
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: Okay, before we go, we're going to talk about someone
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: we haven't talked about in a while, RFK Jr. His
• 40:28
  Speaker 1: polling has fallen to single digits. His campaign barely has
• 40:31
  Speaker 1: any money left. And he's barely been seen out on
• 40:34
  Speaker 1: the trail since the Harris-Biden switch, even canceling some events.
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: But on Sunday night, he came out of hibernation. See
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: where that's going? By releasing a video in which he
• 40:44
  Speaker 1: admits to a bizarre story about planting the body of
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: a dead bear cub in Central Park. The details are
• 40:53
  Speaker 1: too nuts for me to even repeat here. So we're
• 40:56
  Speaker 1: going to let Kennedy do it for us in our
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: latest rendition of OK Stop. Elijah. Elijah is in studio today.
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: He's here in L.A. Elijah, are you ready with the tape?
• 41:05
  Speaker 2: It's actually Matt with the tape, but yeah.
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: Great. Well, my script says Elijah, so that's why I'm
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: saying Elijah.
• 41:11
  Speaker 2: But hey, Matt. Hey. One second. I would have been ready.
• 41:19
  Speaker 3: I was taking a group of people falconing up in Goshen,
• 41:23
  Speaker 3: New York, up in Hudson Valley, and that woman in
• 41:27
  Speaker 3: a van in front of me hit a bear and
• 41:29
  Speaker 3: killed it.
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: Okay, stop.
• 41:32
  Speaker 2: So first of all, fucking RFK Jr. out of the
• 41:35
  Speaker 2: gate at 100 miles an hour. I was taking people
• 41:38
  Speaker 2: falconing in upstate New York. You know who he's telling
• 41:42
  Speaker 2: this story to? The only person that is famously crazier
• 41:46
  Speaker 2: than he is, he is telling this story to Roseanne
• 41:48
  Speaker 2: Barr of all people.
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: Roseanne. And keep in mind, this is a video. That
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: was filmed by RFK Jr. 's campaign and tweeted out
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: last night in advance of a New Yorker profile about him.
• 42:03
  Speaker 1: And the point of this video is to get ahead
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: of the story. They thought they were pulling something over
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: on the New Yorker with this video of him telling
• 42:11
  Speaker 1: this story to Roseanne Barr about him falconing.
• 42:14
  Speaker 2: The... The tweet is, try to spin this one, New Yorker.
• 42:18
  Speaker 2: And you're like, okay, I guess probably the New Yorker
• 42:21
  Speaker 2: was going to probably put a pretty bad spin on
• 42:23
  Speaker 2: this story. So I'm glad we get to hear it
• 42:24
  Speaker 2: out of the horse's mouth.
• 42:26
  Speaker 3: A young bear. I picked up the bear and put
• 42:29
  Speaker 3: him in the back of my van because I was
• 42:30
  Speaker 3: going to skin the bear. And it was very good condition.
• 42:34
  Speaker 3: And I was going to put the meat in my refrigerator.
• 42:37
  Speaker 2: Okay, stop. So first of all, let's just, by the way,
• 42:42
  Speaker 2: I want to be clear about something. A lot of
• 42:43
  Speaker 2: the time, the focus on R. Cave Jr. is that
• 42:46
  Speaker 2: he's insane. And I think that that's valid. But there's
• 42:48
  Speaker 2: often two qualities that are not given as much attention,
• 42:52
  Speaker 2: which is one, he's super rich. And the other is
• 42:56
  Speaker 2: that he's a liar.
• 42:57
  Speaker 1: Right?
• 42:57
  Speaker 2: So are we meant to believe that he saw a van,
• 43:02
  Speaker 2: hit a bear, and then they pulled over and picked
• 43:05
  Speaker 2: up the bear?
• 43:06
  Speaker 1: And his first thought was, mmm. Mmm, delicious.
• 43:08
  Speaker 4: Yes!
• 43:09
  Speaker 2: Because, because.
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: Well, this is serendipitous because I was hungry for bear meat. Well,
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: it's just sort of like. And here it is.
• 43:14
  Speaker 2: It's like either you don't know how long the bear
• 43:16
  Speaker 2: has been there or you do. And so you would
• 43:19
  Speaker 2: like us to believe that.
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: Oh, yeah.
• 43:21
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 43:21
  Speaker 1: If the bear was there a long time, I don't
• 43:23
  Speaker 1: care if you put it in the refrigerator. Maybe that's
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: why he got the brain worms.
• 43:26
  Speaker 2: I leave a turkey sandwich out on my desk for
• 43:28
  Speaker 2: three hours. I have to Google whether or not I'm
• 43:30
  Speaker 2: allowed to eat it. You find a bear on the
• 43:31
  Speaker 2: side of the fucking Taconic.
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: Also, if you're listening to this, you got to watch
• 43:35
  Speaker 1: the video. Hopefully, if you're watching on YouTube, you've got
• 43:38
  Speaker 1: to watch Roseanne's. Do one viewing where you're just getting
• 43:42
  Speaker 1: the story. Then do a viewing where you're just watching
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: the expression on Roseanne's face. Because what you're seeing right
• 43:47
  Speaker 1: now is a crazy person herself raising her eyebrows even
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: further when he basically says that he was going to
• 43:56
  Speaker 1: eat the bear.
• 43:58
  Speaker 2: Because RFK Jr. 's tenor in this entire story is,
• 44:00
  Speaker 2: don't you hate it when this happens? And Roseanne is like, what...
• 44:06
  Speaker 2: Roseanne has lost it, obviously, but the comedian in her
• 44:11
  Speaker 2: is like, I can't believe this person thinks that this
• 44:14
  Speaker 2: is a cool story to tell. All right, let's keep going.
• 44:16
  Speaker 3: In New York City, you can get a bear tag
• 44:19
  Speaker 3: for a roadkill bear. Instead of going back to my
• 44:22
  Speaker 3: home in Westchester, I had to go right to the
• 44:24
  Speaker 3: city because there was a dinner at Peter Luger's.
• 44:28
  Speaker 2: Okay, stop.
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: I just.
• 44:30
  Speaker 2: First of all, just a window into a whole world,
• 44:33
  Speaker 2: a way of living that none of us knows about.
• 44:35
  Speaker 2: He drove upstate with some friends to go fucking falconing,
• 44:39
  Speaker 2: came back in time for dinner in Brooklyn at Peter Luger's.
• 44:43
  Speaker 2: Cash only, by the way, Peter Luger's. Something to keep
• 44:45
  Speaker 2: in mind.
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: And was held up by a baby bear cub on
• 44:49
  Speaker 1: the side of the road.
• 44:50
  Speaker 2: And also, by the way, he's like, so Roseanne, obviously
• 44:53
  Speaker 2: we picked the bear cub up off the ground and
• 44:55
  Speaker 2: put it in the trunk of my car because it's legal.
• 44:59
  Speaker 1: In New York State.
• 44:59
  Speaker 2: In New York State, you can do this.
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: If you're asking me about Idaho or Kansas, I couldn't
• 45:05
  Speaker 1: tell you. But I know that in New York State,
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: it is legal to get a tag and to eat
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: the bear meat.
• 45:09
  Speaker 2: You can take that bear meat right off the side
• 45:11
  Speaker 2: of the road.
• 45:11
  Speaker 3: And at the end of the dinner, it went late.
• 45:14
  Speaker 3: And I realized I couldn't go home. I had to
• 45:15
  Speaker 3: go to the airport. And the bear was in my car,
• 45:18
  Speaker 3: and I didn't want to leave the bear in the car.
• 45:20
  Speaker 2: Okay, so I just want to pause there and say,
• 45:23
  Speaker 2: what he's just describing, let's just know Mr.
• 45:25
  Speaker 1: Kennedy.
• 45:27
  Speaker 2: It is probably not a good idea to leave a
• 45:30
  Speaker 2: decomposing fucking bear carcass in the trunk of your car
• 45:36
  Speaker 2: when you head on a trip. I don't know where
• 45:39
  Speaker 2: you're going, my friend.
• 45:40
  Speaker 1: But no, you're right.
• 45:42
  Speaker 2: You're smart. You shouldn't leave the bear carcass.
• 45:45
  Speaker 1: What was the original scheduling idea, by the way? Taking
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: some people falconing back into the city at Peter Luger's.
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: Going home to Westchester and then going to the airport?
• 45:54
  Speaker 2: I don't know.
• 45:55
  Speaker 1: How late was it? What's going on here?
• 45:58
  Speaker 2: What is his life? Was it a red eye? Where
• 46:01
  Speaker 2: is this guy in a rush to fucking get? What
• 46:05
  Speaker 2: kind of environmental lawyer is this?
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: All right.
• 46:08
  Speaker 3: I wasn't drinking.
• 46:09
  Speaker 2: People were drinking with me who thought.
• 46:12
  Speaker 4: This was a good idea.
• 46:14
  Speaker 3: And I had an old bike in my car that
• 46:17
  Speaker 3: somebody asked me to get rid of it. I said,
• 46:18
  Speaker 3: let's go put the bear in Central Park and we'll
• 46:21
  Speaker 3: make it look like he got hit by a bike.
• 46:24
  Speaker 4: Okay, stop. What?
• 46:26
  Speaker 1: The bike happened to be in the car? I just
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: happen to have a bike that I needed to get
• 46:30
  Speaker 1: rid of.
• 46:31
  Speaker 2: So Roseanne's laughing there is awesome because he's like, so
• 46:34
  Speaker 2: he had this funny idea. Isn't that a funny idea
• 46:36
  Speaker 2: to sneak into Central Park? and hide the dead bear
• 46:39
  Speaker 2: under a bicycle. And she's like, yeah, no, I could
• 46:41
  Speaker 2: see how people would think that that was a funny idea.
• 46:44
  Speaker 1: Also, his excuse is like, well, people were drunk. I
• 46:47
  Speaker 1: wasn't drinking, but the people around me were drunk and
• 46:49
  Speaker 1: they had the idea.
• 46:50
  Speaker 2: Well, you can get like a contact high, you know,
• 46:52
  Speaker 2: kind of like you're around people who have been, who's stoned,
• 46:54
  Speaker 2: you feel stoned, even though you're not stoned. Clearly. For people.
• 46:59
  Speaker 3: So everybody thought that's a great idea. So we went
• 47:02
  Speaker 3: and did that and we thought it would music for
• 47:05
  Speaker 3: whoever found it or something. The New Yorkers somehow found
• 47:09
  Speaker 3: out about it and they just, they're going to do
• 47:11
  Speaker 3: a big article on me and that's one of the articles.
• 47:13
  Speaker 3: So they asked me, the fact checkers, you know, it's
• 47:16
  Speaker 3: going to be a bad story.
• 47:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it is.
• 47:20
  Speaker 2: It is going to be. The way Roseanne laughed there
• 47:22
  Speaker 2: is also fantastic. So, I just, this story.
• 47:25
  Speaker 1: It's going to be a bad story. That is, that is,
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: that is shrewd.
• 47:28
  Speaker 2: So just, so just, so 10 years ago, literally 10
• 47:32
  Speaker 2: years ago, in October 2017, of 2014, there was a
• 47:35
  Speaker 2: story in New York and the story was dead baby
• 47:40
  Speaker 2: bear found in Central Park under a bicycle. Bear appears
• 47:45
  Speaker 2: to have been murdered. And it was a wild whodunit.
• 47:50
  Speaker 2: The bike was compensated. RFK Jr. notes that they were
• 47:53
  Speaker 2: going to try to find prints on the bike. It
• 47:55
  Speaker 2: was an incredible mystery because why on earth would anybody
• 47:59
  Speaker 2: have snuck a bear cub dead into Central Park and
• 48:03
  Speaker 2: hid it where people could find it underneath a bicycle.
• 48:05
  Speaker 1: The New York Times reported it at the time, and
• 48:08
  Speaker 1: it was written by Tatiana Schlossberg, John F. Kennedy's granddaughter.
• 48:13
  Speaker 2: Which seems like actually was a coincidence.
• 48:15
  Speaker 1: Yeah, a coincidence because she said, I didn't know at
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: the time, how could she have known at the time
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: that it was her uncle that disposed of the bear
• 48:23
  Speaker 1: with the bike in an attempt to fool people because
• 48:27
  Speaker 1: they thought that was a great idea.
• 48:28
  Speaker 2: And I just, I really like the dilettante-ish quality of
• 48:32
  Speaker 2: a group of drunk assholes who just spent the day falconing, thinking,
• 48:37
  Speaker 2: wouldn't it be droll if we drive into the city
• 48:40
  Speaker 2: and put this dead bear in Central Park?
• 48:41
  Speaker 1: As they're downing their last martini at Peter Luger's. Unbelievable. Anyway,
• 48:49
  Speaker 1: that's amazing. You think that's going to get many votes?
• 48:53
  Speaker 1: Someone should do a poll. Are you more likely to
• 48:55
  Speaker 1: vote less likely or no difference?
• 48:57
  Speaker 2: This is one of the most disturbed people that we've
• 49:01
  Speaker 2: ever dealt with on the national public stage. Every story
• 49:04
  Speaker 2: out of him is about how there's something deeply, deeply
• 49:08
  Speaker 2: fucked up about him.
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: 10 out of 10. No notes on that story.
• 49:11
  Speaker 2: Also, this is not the most important thing, but I
• 49:14
  Speaker 2: don't know, even if he hadn't been traveling, if that
• 49:17
  Speaker 2: bear meat was going to be good after Peter Luger's. Really?
• 49:21
  Speaker 1: Now we know why he got brain worms.
• 49:23
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 49:24
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 49:26
  Speaker 4: Wow.
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: Good job, Claire Malone at The New Yorker for uncovering this.
• 49:31
  Speaker 2: Yeah, awesome.
• 49:32
  Speaker 1: It's quite a profile. Awesome.
• 49:33
  Speaker 2: And a photo. There's a photo.
• 49:34
  Speaker 1: There is a photo.
• 49:35
  Speaker 2: Where he's pretending to be bitten by the dead bear.
• 49:38
  Speaker 2: It's disgusting.
• 49:38
  Speaker 1: Weird shit, guys. Weird shit.
• 49:40
  Speaker 2: All right.
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: There are probably some people in your life who don't
• 49:42
  Speaker 1: listen to this show, but who could benefit from what
• 49:44
  Speaker 1: we're offering here. For example, processing the RFK bear cub
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: story while the fate of the Republic literally hangs in
• 49:49
  Speaker 1: the balance. You can't get that anywhere else.
• 49:51
  Speaker 2: No.
• 49:52
  Speaker 1: In all seriousness, we would love it if you take
• 49:53
  Speaker 1: a few seconds to share this episode of Pod Save
• 49:55
  Speaker 1: America with a friend or two. You guys sharing our
• 49:57
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• 49:59
  Speaker 1: we're able to do, and we hope you'll consider it.
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: That is our show for today. Dan and our pal
• 50:03
  Speaker 1: Melissa Murray of Strict Scrutiny will be in the feed
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: with a new show on Wednesday afternoon. And if you're
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: listening to this and Kamala Harris just picked you to
• 50:10
  Speaker 1: be her VP, give us a call. We'll book you.
• 50:13
  Speaker 2: Love to have you.
• 50:14
  Speaker 3: Bye.
• 50:17
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  Speaker 1: is a Crooked Media production. Our producer is David Toledo.
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• 51:25
  Speaker 2: Man, it feels like just yesterday we were watching two
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  Speaker 2: old unpopular men running for the world's most demanding job. My,
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  Speaker 2: how things change in between when the ad copy is
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