Latest / Pod Save America / Trump's Shooting Upends 2024

Transcript

Trump's Shooting Upends 2024 · Pod Save America

• 0:20
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: I'm Jon Levitt. I'm Dan Pfeiffer. Tommy Vitor.
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: Well, quite a bit has happened since Friday's show, and
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: absolutely none of it has been good. Donald Trump was
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: shot in an assassination attempt at a campaign rally. His
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: handpicked judge threw out his classified documents case. He picked
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: MAGA heir J.D. Vance as his running mate on the
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: opening day of the Republican convention. And new swing state
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: polls give him an even larger lead over Joe Biden,
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: who spent the last few days giving a number of
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: high-profile speeches and interviews as he tries to convince Democrats
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: and all Americans that he's still the best chance to
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: beat Trump. But let's start with the assassination attempt. Words
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: that still feel just awful and shocking to say out loud.
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: The investigation is still underway. Here's some of the new
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: details we've learned as of this recording, Monday night. Head
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: of Secret Service did an interview with ABC News today
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: where she said, quote, the buck stops with me, but
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: she's not resigning. So far, the picture that's emerging of
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: the shooter, 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks, does not suggest he
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: was a Trump hater, a Trump fan, or even that political.
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: It looks like he once made a $ 15 donation to
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: one of those scammy progressive groups that fucking emails you
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: all the time. But after that, he registered as a
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: Republican and neighbors just told a Pittsburgh news station they've
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: seen Trump signs around the family's house. Some classmates have
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: said he was conservative. Others said he was bullied. Others
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: said he liked guns. Meanwhile, the wife of Corey Comprator,
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: the rally goer who died, told the New York Post
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: that President Biden did reach out but she didn't take
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: the call because her husband was a Trump guy and
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: wouldn't have wanted her to. But even though she's voting
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: for Trump, she said that she doesn't blame Biden for
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: her husband's death and that President Trump has not yet
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: contacted her family. So before we get to all the politics,
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: obviously just terrifying, horrendous news for the country. I heard
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: about it from you, Tommy. You texted. How did you
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: hear it? How did you learn about this whole thing?
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: Were you watching the rally?
• 2:16
  Speaker 3: I was just sitting at home. I was with James,
• 2:18
  Speaker 3: my two-month-old and doing nothing, sitting on Twitter. And all
• 2:21
  Speaker 3: of a sudden, this is coming through. Shots fired at
• 2:22
  Speaker 3: a Trump rally. I turned on the news and I
• 2:24
  Speaker 3: think watched it live like a lot.
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: Of people did. It's just wild that the footage was
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: just there for everyone to see and play over and
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: over again. Dan, you were like not home, right?
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: I was driving back from a trip with my daughter.
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: And the last text before I got in the car
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: was from time. It said shots fired at a Trump rally,
• 2:43
  Speaker 2: which I thought just there were shots at the rally, right?
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: And not someone had shot at Trump. And then I
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: didn't look at my phone. for an hour and a half,
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: got home to one million texts, mostly from you guys,
• 2:54
  Speaker 2: about everything that happened. Just that I couldn't believe that
• 2:58
  Speaker 2: Trump had, someone had shot at Trump. Trump had been hit,
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: that he was fine. But then there was the, you
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: saw the image of Trump with his fist in the air,
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: the bloody image. Some of the photos of, the one
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: from Doug Mills, who we used to, we know from
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: the White House.
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: Great guy.
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: Where the incredible, great guy, incredible photographer of the bullet, like,
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: right at Trump's head, just, just like almost an impossible
• 3:18
  Speaker 2: thing to process, to learn all about like in one
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: fell swoop.
• 3:22
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 3:23
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: I just sort of felt sick. I said, cause I
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: was like, what, what is going to happen now?
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I felt sick. I really did. That was my
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: instant reaction.
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: I felt sick.
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: I was.
• 3:33
  Speaker 4: Instantly worried even after we knew that it was only
• 3:39
  Speaker 4: an attempt about the implications about the potential of for
• 3:44
  Speaker 4: retaliatory violence, about what we might learn about the shooter.
• 3:47
  Speaker 4: I also just was instantly worried about what it would
• 3:52
  Speaker 4: be like for this to be processed by social media.
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: And the other strange- Good worry, good concern. And the
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: other- Because that was the right, yeah.
• 4:01
  Speaker 4: And the other strange piece about it too was in
• 4:05
  Speaker 4: the same way, you know, you see, oh, you see
• 4:06
  Speaker 4: the shots fired at a Trump rally. My first instinct is, oh,
• 4:10
  Speaker 4: this is some kind of false or overblown- made-up story on.
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: Partly because you want it to be.
• 4:17
  Speaker 4: You want it to be and you expect it to
• 4:18
  Speaker 4: be because there's so much misinformation, there's so much sensationalism
• 4:21
  Speaker 4: out there. So you, at first, oh, it's just an
• 4:23
  Speaker 4: airsoft gun. Oh, it was shrapnel from a teleprompter. Oh,
• 4:27
  Speaker 4: it wasn't actually a shooting, right? All that is circulating
• 4:30
  Speaker 4: and then it's slowly becoming clear from real sources what's
• 4:33
  Speaker 4: going on. And I really did, I had a pit
• 4:36
  Speaker 4: in my stomach the whole day, even after we knew
• 4:39
  Speaker 4: that it was only an attempt because of... And angry,
• 4:44
  Speaker 4: and I was angry, just because it takes control of
• 4:48
  Speaker 4: our ability to talk about politics, about our ability to
• 4:51
  Speaker 4: talk about anything, and just takes it away from us
• 4:55
  Speaker 4: in favor of what a random mass shooter or assassin
• 4:59
  Speaker 4: wants us to talk about, which is whatever their intention
• 5:02
  Speaker 4: or act is.
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: Tommy, just quickly, what do you make of the Secret
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: Service's lapse here in their response so far? I mean,
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: it seems like having Eyes on a shooter who was
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: on top of an elevated building within sight of the
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: president is like the most basic part of the job
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: that Secret Service does to protect any event with either
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: a president, next president, or whoever they're assigned to protect.
• 5:28
  Speaker 3: Yeah, the idea that an elevated position 140 yards away
• 5:32
  Speaker 3: with a sight line, a direct sight line to the
• 5:34
  Speaker 3: candidate was not covered by someone somehow is shocking to me.
• 5:37
  Speaker 2: I mean, there might have been.
• 5:38
  Speaker 3: So Secret Service, there's a bunch of different parts of it.
• 5:41
  Speaker 3: There's PPD, who are the men and women around the president,
• 5:45
  Speaker 3: the personal protective detail for the president, what you saw
• 5:48
  Speaker 3: on TV was them reacting and dive on him pretty quickly.
• 5:50
  Speaker 3: And those people are incredibly brave. You know, those individuals
• 5:53
  Speaker 3: literally threw themselves in front of a bullet to protect
• 5:55
  Speaker 3: the president and they did their job and they did
• 5:57
  Speaker 3: it pretty quickly. But then there are, you know, they
• 6:00
  Speaker 3: partner with local law enforcement. It's not at all clear
• 6:02
  Speaker 3: if local law enforcement was supposed to be securing this building.
• 6:06
  Speaker 3: It's not clear to me why the sniper teams that
• 6:08
  Speaker 3: were on other elevated positions didn't see the gunman sooner.
• 6:13
  Speaker 3: So we'll figure it out. There will be an investigation.
• 6:17
  Speaker 3: I think it's a massive fuck up. I mean, obviously.
• 6:20
  Speaker 3: I'm surprised that the Secret Service director is not offering
• 6:25
  Speaker 3: her resignation. If a president or candidate got shot on
• 6:29
  Speaker 3: my watch and I was running Secret Service, I would
• 6:31
  Speaker 3: feel like I'd fail to my job and resign. I'm
• 6:33
  Speaker 3: sure there will be independent investigations. There will be internal investigations.
• 6:37
  Speaker 3: Biden's in a weird place on this because he's standing
• 6:40
  Speaker 3: by an agency that he is in charge of through
• 6:43
  Speaker 3: Homeland Security. But I mean, I hope that, you know,
• 6:46
  Speaker 3: Congress will get involved. Maybe there'll be some sort of
• 6:48
  Speaker 3: slick committee set up to look into what happened because
• 6:51
  Speaker 3: the secret service has had a bunch of near misses, uh,
• 6:54
  Speaker 3: and a bunch of bad scandals. And I think as
• 6:57
  Speaker 3: an organization, uh, they are not doing great.
• 7:01
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: And that's been true for a while.
• 7:03
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 7:03
  Speaker 2: I mean, it was true when we were in the,
• 7:04
  Speaker 2: I mean, even though we knew a lot of secret
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: services did an incredible job, but there were, I was
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: at the White House when the guy made it into
• 7:10
  Speaker 2: the White House, the guy who jumped the fence.
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's right.
• 7:12
  Speaker 2: I was there when they found the bullet holes at
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: the top of the White House that no one knew
• 7:16
  Speaker 2: when they came from. So this has been a problem
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: for a while. Biden did ask for an independent investigation
• 7:22
  Speaker 2: of this, which I think it becomes the basis for
• 7:24
  Speaker 2: making a decision on the future of the head of
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: the Secret Service.
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: So after the shock passed and it was clear Trump
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: was OK. The first understandable reaction from a lot of
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: folks in politics and media was that, you know, everyone
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: needs to tone down the rhetoric and lower the temperature
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: of the political debate in this country. Biden said as
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: much a number of times over the weekend. Trump himself
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: posted UNITE AMERICA in all caps. And he did a
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: print interview with Selena Zito of the Washington Examiner where
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: he said he tore up the draft of his convention speech.
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: He said was the original draft was a humdinger and
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: was rewriting it about bringing the country together. Axios ran
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: a piece Sunday evening about how Trump advisors are planning
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: a more unifying convention. The piece quoted Tucker Carlson. They
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: interviewed him. He said, quote, getting shot in the face
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: changes a man. And an unnamed Trump advisor said that
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: Trump's view is, quote, now Democrats can't come after me
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: anymore as a fascist. So what are they going to
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: do now? So lots to unpack there. Let's start with
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: the timeless classic. Can Trump pivot? To become someone who's
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: unrecognizable to those who've watched him for the last 77 years? Dan,
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: what do you think?
• 8:38
  Speaker 2: I'm going to go out on a limb and say no.
• 8:39
  Speaker 6: No.
• 8:40
  Speaker 2: I do not think he's become a uniter and not
• 8:42
  Speaker 2: a divider. I do think that the press seems very
• 8:46
  Speaker 2: thirsty to believe this narrative in a way in which
• 8:48
  Speaker 2: they haven't with Trump in a very long time. He's
• 8:50
  Speaker 2: been very credulous.
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: COVID. COVID was the last time. Remember the beginning of COVID?
• 8:53
  Speaker 2: Even that lasted like six seconds, right?
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: Yeah, the first six seconds of his first press conference.
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: No, I think it was the moment when he went
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: and got into the Secret Service vehicle with all the
• 9:03
  Speaker 2: Secret Service agents infected with COVID for the driver on
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: the block.
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: Oh, yeah, there's that too. Well, that was later. That
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: was when he had, I was saying when COVID initially hit.
• 9:10
  Speaker 4: Oh, yeah.
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: Remember in March, the first couple of weeks, everyone was like, oh,
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: he's a new president. He's great, blah, blah, blah. Then
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: he became crazy. Then he got COVID.
• 9:17
  Speaker 4: The point being, whether it was our collective near-death experience
• 9:20
  Speaker 4: or his personal.
• 9:20
  Speaker 2: Near-death experience, we have yet to see a fucking change.
• 9:24
  Speaker 2: I do think he can be just less divisive enough
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: to get a disproportionate amount of undeserved credit in his
• 9:34
  Speaker 2: speech on Thursday night.
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, it's, can you hang on for four months?
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: And before the shooting, we were saying this about his,
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: how he reacted to the trials and like he the
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: fear of potentially going to jail has really driven him
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: in this campaign to be slightly more disciplined than usual
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: not because it's out of the goodness of his heart
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: but because he's like, this is how I'm going to
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: win this thing. I've got to just be a little
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: normal for a little while longer.
• 10:05
  Speaker 4: Well, he already says, what does unity mean?
• 10:07
  Speaker 2: It means dropping all the charges against me. Right, of course.
• 10:10
  Speaker 2: He's given up the game pretty quickly.
• 10:12
  Speaker 3: But I think in 2016, was it Super Tuesday when
• 10:14
  Speaker 3: he won the election and then did a giant product
• 10:17
  Speaker 3: placement thing where he had all the Trump products he'd
• 10:19
  Speaker 3: ever made on a table before him? The stakes have
• 10:21
  Speaker 3: gone up since that time, to your point.
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: Very much so.
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: Sitting out of jail.
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and again, like you said, already in this campaign,
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: he has said, I mean, every day has said something
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: that would sink any other candidate for office and it
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: just completely makes him unfit to hold the office. Just
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: want to put that out there. But relative to Trump
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: and what people expect of Trump, it's been a little different.
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: What do you guys think about the whole Democrats can't
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: call him a threat to democracy anymore thing?
• 10:47
  Speaker 5: Love it.
• 10:48
  Speaker 4: Political violence is destructive in a democracy for a lot
• 10:53
  Speaker 4: of obvious reasons. But one reason is that it gives
• 10:57
  Speaker 4: control over our ability to make decisions to random bad actors.
• 11:02
  Speaker 4: We should not give to a random person, whatever their motivations,
• 11:08
  Speaker 4: whatever we discover, we should not voluntarily give up what
• 11:12
  Speaker 4: that person wasn't able to successfully take by force, which
• 11:14
  Speaker 4: is our ability to make a decision about the fate
• 11:16
  Speaker 4: of the country. And that requires being honest about the
• 11:19
  Speaker 4: threat Donald Trump poses, that requires being honest about what
• 11:22
  Speaker 4: it will take to win this election. That is you know,
• 11:24
  Speaker 4: the fact that this event took place does not remove
• 11:27
  Speaker 4: Trump's menace or the challenge Biden faces. And the sooner
• 11:30
  Speaker 4: we get back to having that debate, the more of
• 11:32
  Speaker 4: a failure this assassination attempt will be.
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: Tommy, go ahead.
• 11:35
  Speaker 2: No, that's a good point.
• 11:36
  Speaker 3: I mean, I also think like politics is how we
• 11:38
  Speaker 3: resolve differences without resorting to violence. And those debates are
• 11:42
  Speaker 3: inevitably going to get emotional and heated at times. And
• 11:44
  Speaker 3: they should, because that's our release valve. That's how we
• 11:47
  Speaker 3: settle differences. But that said, like there are limits. You
• 11:50
  Speaker 3: can't encourage violence. You can't condone violence. That's why what
• 11:53
  Speaker 3: Trump did on January 6th is unforgivable in my mind.
• 11:56
  Speaker 3: But I do think people take cues from leaders and
• 11:58
  Speaker 3: it's important not to take it too far because once
• 12:00
  Speaker 3: political violence starts, it can be very, very hard to
• 12:02
  Speaker 3: stop and it can just get out of control.
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: Donald Trump told his supporters to beat the shit out
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: of protesters at his rallies. He has amplified calls for violence.
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: Remember the video of one of his supporters? This was
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: after George Floyd's murder. And one of his supporters said
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: in a video, the only good Democrat is a dead Democrat.
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: And then he posted that. That was one thing he did.
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: He told police and the military to shoot protesters in
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: the legs, to shoot immigrants who crossed the border, to
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: shoot suspected shoplifters, suspected shoplifters.
• 12:33
  Speaker 2: To rough up suspects when putting them in the car.
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: Rough up suspects. He, of course, sent a mob of
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: his armed supporters. He knew they were armed. We know
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: this now. He sent them to the Capitol so they
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: could intimidate our representatives into throwing out our votes. He
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: refused to do anything to stop the violence. Kevin McCarthy,
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: the Republican Speaker of the House, calls him. He says,
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: they're trying to fucking kill me. Do something. And Donald
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: Trump said in response, well, Kevin, I guess they're more
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: upset about the election than you. That's what he said. Like,
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: and then now he wants to pardon them. Has Joe
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: Biden done any of those things? Has any Democratic official
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: done any of those things? Anywhere close to those things?
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: No.
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: So, of course, you're going to talk about Donald Trump
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: as a threat to democracy and that you have to
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: oppose through democratic means, peaceful means, at the ballot box,
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: by convincing other people to vote against him. It's just
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: so stupid.
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: Also, Donald Trump is a threat to democracy. He's a
• 13:21
  Speaker 2: threat to freedom.
• 13:22
  Speaker 3: For all those reasons.
• 13:23
  Speaker 2: But also, don't take my word for it. He says
• 13:25
  Speaker 2: it himself. He's the one who said he'd be a
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: dictator on day one. Over the last couple of weeks,
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: the media, people in politics, us, have not been paying
• 13:31
  Speaker 2: as much attention to Trump. He has been truthing about
• 13:34
  Speaker 2: how he thinks that various people should have military tribunals.
• 13:37
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 13:37
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: Liz Cheney, military tribunal.
• 13:39
  Speaker 2: Yes, he has talked about jailing his opponents.
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: Is that how democracy works? Is that not a threat
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: to democracy? I guess that's just democracy, right? Military tribunals
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: for Liz Cheney?
• 13:46
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: And so the idea that after this horrible thing happened,
• 13:49
  Speaker 2: and it would be wonderful that if we could lower
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: the temperature on politics in this country, we could get
• 13:54
  Speaker 2: back to sort of normal debates. But Donald Trump is
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: an abnormal candidate. He has offered a dangerous policy agenda.
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: He has been a danger to democracy. And the press cannot...
• 14:06
  Speaker 2: all of a sudden become the civility police and try
• 14:08
  Speaker 2: to chastise Democrats into not saying what is true about
• 14:11
  Speaker 2: Donald Trump.
• 14:12
  Speaker 4: And by the way, one of the reasons that's actually
• 14:15
  Speaker 4: important is because it gives to allow this act of
• 14:21
  Speaker 4: violence to dictate what we can or cannot say, even
• 14:24
  Speaker 4: when it is true, is to give power to this
• 14:26
  Speaker 4: person and potentially to inspire people in the future to
• 14:29
  Speaker 4: think they have the power at any moment to change
• 14:31
  Speaker 4: the landscape of American politics.
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: The reason.
• 14:34
  Speaker 4: like I am very, look, if people want to say, oh,
• 14:37
  Speaker 4: this is an opportunity for all of us to come
• 14:39
  Speaker 4: together and turn down the rhetoric, great, that's fine. But
• 14:43
  Speaker 4: the reason we talk about the danger posed by violent
• 14:47
  Speaker 4: rhetoric is not because it creates some miasma of risk that,
• 14:52
  Speaker 4: it's because it can inspire people. It's because people will
• 14:55
  Speaker 4: take it literally and act on it. We have seen
• 14:57
  Speaker 4: that happen multiple times. We violence in multiple places and
• 15:01
  Speaker 4: multiple times. We have seen mass shootings. We've seen what
• 15:03
  Speaker 4: happened in Charlottesville. We've seen what happened at the insurrection.
• 15:05
  Speaker 4: There is a trend. The reason you worry about the
• 15:07
  Speaker 4: rhetoric is because you start to see it manifest in
• 15:09
  Speaker 4: a trend of violence.
• 15:12
  Speaker 2: We don't know anything yet about this versus motive, but
• 15:15
  Speaker 2: there is no evidence as of yet that they were
• 15:18
  Speaker 2: motivated by some sort of political rhetoric, right? If that
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: evidence comes back and shows that, we should talk about that.
• 15:24
  Speaker 2: But as of right now, everyone is just jumping to
• 15:26
  Speaker 2: the conclusion, especially people in the who love this conversation
• 15:29
  Speaker 2: are jumping to the conclusion they want.
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: But also, yeah, right. Even if it, even if for
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: some reason it did, like there are going to be
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: people who are inspired by political rhetoric, whether it's on
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: the right or left, to commit violence. And what you
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: can do about that as a political leader is to
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: condemn that unequivocally and to do everything in your power
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: to avoid inciting or condoning that kind of violence, which
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: I think most leaders in this country and previously the
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: Republican Party before Donald Trump a lot of elected officials
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: would take care to do that. Donald Trump has not
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: taken care to do that at all.
• 16:01
  Speaker 4: And even worse, he's joked about and mocked when there
• 16:06
  Speaker 4: has been violence, like the attack on Paul Pelosi or
• 16:09
  Speaker 4: the attempted kidnapping of Gretchen Whitmer, right? All of that
• 16:12
  Speaker 4: was something they either, they claim is some sort of
• 16:15
  Speaker 4: false flag or make fun of or mock. It was
• 16:19
  Speaker 4: a lover's quarrel, right? When this guy was, when Paul
• 16:22
  Speaker 4: Pelosi is like nearly beaten to death.
• 16:24
  Speaker 3: Or when his VP was almost hung. He was cool
• 16:27
  Speaker 3: with that, too. Very, very cool with that, apparently.
• 16:31
  Speaker 2: Swapped him out.
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: We're not in the prediction business. We don't have a
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: lot of polling numbers yet. It's only a couple of
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: days in. But I'm sure you guys were getting this
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: message from friends. You saw it online. Like when he,
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: the picture of Donald Trump that's now the cover of
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: Time magazine, fist up in the air.
• 16:46
  Speaker 2: It's the cover of Time?
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: Oh, yeah. Well, I mean, both candidates did do lengthy
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: interviews with Time, Dan.
• 16:51
  Speaker 2: Oh, I know.
• 16:52
  Speaker 4: I know.
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: Even though you're shitting all over the magazine.
• 16:56
  Speaker 2: The polls in the 1986 election just shifted six points.
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: Anyway, we all know the picture now. We all know
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: the picture. Everyone who's listening to this. And a lot
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: of people are like, that's it.
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: It's over.
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: It's over. He's won. This is like a show of strength.
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: So that was some of the more extreme. Then there's
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: other people like, oh, this is going to help him.
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: There was a quote from Axios on Sunday that immediately
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: was everywhere on the internet. It was about Democrats feeling
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: worried that Biden's going to stay in the race and
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: then lose. And then it also combined with the assassination
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: attempt and Trump, you know, looking strong and surviving an
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: assassination attempt. And the senior house Democrat said anonymously to Axios,
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: we've all resigned ourselves to a second Trump presidency thoughts
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: on the political implications.
• 17:35
  Speaker 3: I mean, that person is a defeatist idiot. And I
• 17:38
  Speaker 3: please just don't talk to the press. If you have
• 17:40
  Speaker 3: those thoughts, keep them inside your head. Like Donald Trump's instinct,
• 17:45
  Speaker 3: he has some political genius in him. We have to
• 17:47
  Speaker 3: be honest, like his instinct to stand up and pump
• 17:49
  Speaker 3: his fist after getting shot in the ear It's incredible
• 17:52
  Speaker 3: because it created this iconic image. And if you want
• 17:54
  Speaker 3: to run an entire election that where you're arguing I'm
• 17:57
  Speaker 3: strong and my opponent is weak, it's pretty powerful. You know,
• 18:02
  Speaker 3: that said, I think what will likely happen is it
• 18:05
  Speaker 3: will make the people who support Donald Trump even more
• 18:09
  Speaker 3: certain to turn out for him.
• 18:10
  Speaker 5: Right.
• 18:10
  Speaker 3: They seems to have inspired the base. It's certainly it's
• 18:15
  Speaker 3: it's the image is traveling in U.S. culture in ways
• 18:18
  Speaker 3: that Donald Trump doesn't usually consider. Like 50 Cent put
• 18:22
  Speaker 3: up a photo of his Get Rich or Die Trying
• 18:25
  Speaker 3: album cover at his concert a couple nights ago with
• 18:28
  Speaker 3: Donald Trump's head on it. It's probably the first time
• 18:30
  Speaker 3: that's happened. So you're seeing people talk about Trump, calling
• 18:32
  Speaker 3: him a badass. There was, you know, the Barstool Sports
• 18:35
  Speaker 3: affiliates were selling t-shirts with the image on it right away.
• 18:38
  Speaker 3: So I'm sure it will appeal to a subset of people.
• 18:41
  Speaker 3: But four months is a lifetime in politics. That's just
• 18:43
  Speaker 3: what everyone has to remember. We have no idea what
• 18:45
  Speaker 3: could happen between now and then. So giving up and
• 18:48
  Speaker 3: giving up in a background quote to Axios, on July
• 18:51
  Speaker 3: 14th is ridiculous.
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: Yeah, go to Politico, you know? Dan, what do you think?
• 18:56
  Speaker 2: I think we have had major events in this race already, right?
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: Donald Trump was convicted of a crime like 60 days ago.
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: Amazing.
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: The polls move like about a point and a half.
• 19:07
  Speaker 2: In front of 50 million people, Joe Biden had the
• 19:09
  Speaker 2: worst debate performance of any presidential candidate in modern history.
• 19:12
  Speaker 2: The polls move two and a half points. The idea
• 19:14
  Speaker 2: that this will dramatically shift the race is absurd. It
• 19:17
  Speaker 2: belies everything we have seen to date. And there's no
• 19:20
  Speaker 2: real obvious historical precedents here. Like Reagan went up in
• 19:24
  Speaker 2: the polls after he was shot in 1981. He was
• 19:26
  Speaker 2: a freshly elected president at the time. And he was
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: seriously wounded.
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 19:31
  Speaker 2: And it was a different era where you would get,
• 19:33
  Speaker 2: with much less polarization, where you would get Democrats and
• 19:37
  Speaker 2: independents who did not like Reagan to approve of him
• 19:39
  Speaker 2: in a moment like that. You saw that up until
• 19:41
  Speaker 2: just a few presidents ago. It does matter, I think,
• 19:44
  Speaker 2: that this happened in Pennsylvania, the single most important state
• 19:50
  Speaker 2: in both Biden and Trump's electoral college calculus. But the
• 19:54
  Speaker 2: race is basically where it was before this, is Trump
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: has an advantage nationally and the battleground states. That advantage
• 20:03
  Speaker 2: is slight but steady. And I would be shocked if
• 20:07
  Speaker 2: this were to dramatically change the equation. We're never really
• 20:09
  Speaker 2: going to know because this happened. Basically, no poll can
• 20:12
  Speaker 2: really go into the field that won't include the Republican
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: convention as well.
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: It's very hard to untangle this.
• 20:16
  Speaker 2: Because you're going to have a convention bounce, which is
• 20:18
  Speaker 2: usually two to three points. We'd be surprised if it
• 20:20
  Speaker 2: was that big this time around because the race is
• 20:21
  Speaker 2: so steady. But happening at the same time, those are
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: usually very temporary. So we're never, Trump may go up
• 20:26
  Speaker 2: in the polls in the next week. Whether that'll stay
• 20:28
  Speaker 2: or not, I'm not sure. But we're not going to
• 20:30
  Speaker 2: know if it's from the shooting of the convention or
• 20:31
  Speaker 2: something else.
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: Yeah, there's polling and then there's just trying to think
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: about the person who was like, I think I'm going
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: to vote for Joe Biden. But then Donald Trump, you know,
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: survived an assassination attempt and put his fist up in
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: the air. I like, I have a hard time imagining
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: that person saying, oh, I'm going to vote for Donald
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: Trump now. I have an easier time imagining someone who
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: was like leaning Trump. And then this gives them like
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: a permission structure to be like, yeah, it's okay. He's
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: like a badass. I'm going to do it. Like if
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: I think they're.
• 20:57
  Speaker 3: Going after young men, they're going after men like 18
• 20:58
  Speaker 3: to 29.
• 20:59
  Speaker 2: It's like, you see that image. You're like, oh, this
• 21:01
  Speaker 2: guy's a badass. Maybe I'll vote for the first time.
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: I think you had to have, I mean, I don't know.
• 21:05
  Speaker 5: I don't know.
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: We'll see. But I think you had to have leanings
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: that way anyway. And I wonder if those people were
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: already like sort of priced into that.
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: I think that is, you're moving someone from undecided to Trump,
• 21:14
  Speaker 2: not from Biden to Trump.
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: That's what I was going to say.
• 21:16
  Speaker 2: And that's really how most of the movement is going
• 21:17
  Speaker 2: to happen in this race, is there is this small
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: but still significant pool of undecided voters. And Trump may
• 21:24
  Speaker 2: pick some up from that. Will those people stay with him?
• 21:26
  Speaker 2: Will they actually vote? Open question. What happens over the
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: next four months? We'll decide that. But he may get
• 21:30
  Speaker 2: some of those votes. Also, by the way, it's an open.
• 21:33
  Speaker 4: this is why it is so important that this debate
• 21:35
  Speaker 4: not be about Trump as a person versus Joe Biden
• 21:37
  Speaker 4: as a person that has to be at the stakes.
• 21:39
  Speaker 4: Cause if someone's going, thinking about abortion and taxes, I
• 21:42
  Speaker 4: don't think Trump's fist pump is going to matter. The,
• 21:44
  Speaker 4: the other, you know, I add the same reaction to,
• 21:46
  Speaker 4: to the photo that Tommy did, but I also like
• 21:49
  Speaker 4: there's been reporting over the years about how much Donald
• 21:51
  Speaker 4: Trump has actually thought about this, that he has thought
• 21:53
  Speaker 4: that he is, he's afraid of this kind of thing.
• 21:55
  Speaker 4: He has thought about it and about assassination, about, about
• 21:59
  Speaker 4: being in crowds. He has, he has thought about this
• 22:01
  Speaker 4: in the past and I have no doubt that, that
• 22:03
  Speaker 4: Donald Trump, who is a creature of the 80s, is
• 22:05
  Speaker 4: very aware of how Ronald Reagan said, honey, I forgot
• 22:08
  Speaker 4: to duck, that there's this video, I think it's years after,
• 22:13
  Speaker 4: but Ronald Reagan is at an event and a balloon
• 22:15
  Speaker 4: pops and he goes, they miss me.
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: And the whole crowd goes wild.
• 22:19
  Speaker 4: He is a showman in the same way Reagan was
• 22:22
  Speaker 4: a showman. And I think he, in that moment, that
• 22:24
  Speaker 4: part of him that's been worried and thinking about this
• 22:27
  Speaker 4: moment his whole life, was there, and he made the
• 22:30
  Speaker 4: most of it.
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: And he's like, I'm okay now. Yeah.
• 22:33
  Speaker 3: I would have been thinking about a second gunman myself
• 22:36
  Speaker 3: before I got up there and Jersey Shore'd it, but
• 22:38
  Speaker 3: I guess do what works for you, Don.
• 22:40
  Speaker 2: Maybe, yeah. GTL.
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: But yeah, resigning ourselves, come on, people. It's like we're
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: not resigning ourselves. If you do that, you're definitely going
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: to get another Trump presidency. Guaranteed. If you try, at least,
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: to avoid that by going and talking to voters who
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: are undecided or who haven't made up their mind whether
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: they're going to vote yet, then we have a chance
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: to avoid a second Trump presidency. So let's do that.
• 23:00
  Speaker 2: Is there a place that people who would take you
• 23:02
  Speaker 2: up on your call to action could go to undertake
• 23:04
  Speaker 2: such activities?
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: You could go to Vote Save America. And what we
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: will do is make sure that your time and money
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: is spent on the most efficient candidates and organizations and
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: places to make sure that you have the biggest impact
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: on politics. How's that?
• 23:16
  Speaker 2: That was pretty... I thought it was pretty good. It
• 23:17
  Speaker 2: was unclear... Was that quote.
• 23:19
  Speaker 4: saying we should resign ourselves to Trump winning because of
• 23:21
  Speaker 4: the assassination attempt, or we should resign ourselves to Trump
• 23:24
  Speaker 4: winning because the assassination attempt means we can't have an
• 23:26
  Speaker 4: honest conversation about Joe Biden. And therefore, because we can't
• 23:28
  Speaker 4: have that conversation, Joe Biden is going to.
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: It was unclear from the quote. It was a story
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: about both. So it was sort of all mixed up.
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: One of the weirder strains of post-shooting we need to
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: tone down our politics reactions came from people like Senator
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: Mike Lee, who wrote right afterward that the Justice Department
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: now needs to drop all charges against Trump. That's unity.
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: That's how we come together. Sure enough, after Mike Lee
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: tweeted that on Monday morning, Judge Eileen Cannon did just that.
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: She dismissed classified documents case entirely, basically out of nowhere,
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: saying that the appointment of a special counsel violates the Constitution.
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: which also Clarence Thomas had said in the immunity case.
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: He was like the one justice that said that in
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: one of his concurring opinions. Jack Smith's appealing. Experts think
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: the dismissal is almost certain to be overturned on appeal,
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: particularly because none of the other justices signed on to
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: Thomas's concurrence, not even Alito. But who knows? Trump seized
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: on Cannon's ruling, writing on Truth Social that all the
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: other judges should now do the same thing, framed, of course,
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: as a way, again, to unite the nation. Here's what
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: I can't figure out. Cannon had already made sure there
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: was no chance that this case was going to trial
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: before the election. It was not going to happen. She
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: succeeded in delaying. Why did she do this? Was she
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: just like feeling emboldened? Is she just, as some legal
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: scholars have said, not that bright? Well, it's a.
• 24:57
  Speaker 4: It seems like Clarence Thomas gave her an idea. I
• 24:59
  Speaker 4: don't think it has to be more complicated than that.
• 25:01
  Speaker 4: She had not thought of that before. Clarence Thomas gave
• 25:03
  Speaker 4: her a roadmap for what she could do to get
• 25:05
  Speaker 4: out of this.
• 25:05
  Speaker 2: She's like, well, I better copy his work. He's a
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: smart guy. In his dissent. I'm just some schmuck who
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: got confirmed during a lame duck.
• 25:12
  Speaker 3: In his dissent in the immunity case that came out, what,
• 25:14
  Speaker 3: two weeks ago? So she saw that, read it, and
• 25:16
  Speaker 3: was like, ooh.
• 25:17
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 25:17
  Speaker 2: I think she wanted to get rid of this case.
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: Not just for Trump. As you said, she'd already delayed
• 25:22
  Speaker 2: it past the election. She'd already done him the favor,
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: but- Also, this is a way to not have to
• 25:27
  Speaker 2: deal with this every single day.
• 25:28
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: She's also, though, been she's been playing this game where
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: she didn't want to give Jack Smith anything to appeal
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: to the 11th Circuit and then ask that she be
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: removed from the case, which like it really has to
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: be pretty extreme. He can now like so a lot
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: of the legal nerds think this is getting overturned for sure,
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: like that she's not able to throw it out. But
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: they think it's now possible for her to get booted
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: from the case for doing this. Not probable, but possible.
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: So it's a little risky.
• 25:56
  Speaker 3: Did you see Matt Gaetz's tweet? It said, future Supreme
• 25:59
  Speaker 3: Court justice cannon.
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: Good troll. Good troll and possibly a solid prediction.
• 26:06
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 26:06
  Speaker 2: And also, future middle judge decider. She's the swing vote.
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: She's the swing vote. I like Joe Biden. I couldn't
• 26:12
  Speaker 2: think of the term. Swing vote. Swing vote.
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: Anyway.
• 26:19
  Speaker 2: I shouldn't go on.
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: Speaking of Speaking of way too young MAGA leaders, the
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: other huge news on Monday was Trump's announcement that his
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: running mate will be J.D. Vance of Ohio, the 39-year-old senator,
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: author of Hillbilly Elegy, and former CNN contributor who went
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: from calling Trump America's Hitler to becoming the MAGA heir
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: apparent and one of Project 2025's best friends. Here he
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: is talking to Sean Hannity at the convention on Monday night,
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: giving us a preview of what his potential debate with
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: current Vice President Kamala Harris might sound like.
• 26:51
  Speaker 2: First of all, the Democrats want to try to run
• 26:53
  Speaker 2: from this, and they're.
• 26:54
  Speaker 5: Saying that Joe Biden has to step down, or Joe
• 26:57
  Speaker 5: Biden can't run for president. That's not public spiritedness, that's
• 27:01
  Speaker 5: political cynicism, because they should have been saying it three
• 27:03
  Speaker 5: years ago. Kamala Harris has allowed America to be saddled
• 27:07
  Speaker 5: with a president who clearly doesn't have the mental capacity
• 27:10
  Speaker 5: to do the job. It is not public spiritedness to
• 27:13
  Speaker 5: call for him to step down when he's about to
• 27:15
  Speaker 5: lose an election.
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: They should have been doing it years ago. And it's
• 27:18
  Speaker 2: not just Kamala Harris.
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: It's Nancy Pelosi.
• 27:21
  Speaker 5: The entire Democratic apparatus lied about this guy.
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: I just want you guys to know we did add
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: that music. Every time we will play a J.D. Vance clip,
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: we will be playing that music.
• 27:31
  Speaker 2: That's Tommy's weekend dad band.
• 27:34
  Speaker 3: That's a cover band called Six Wire.
• 27:37
  Speaker 2: And they're just shredding at the RNC.
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: He's always doing the research. I did do Google just now. Okay.
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: What do you guys think about the Vance pick? What's
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: your take on why Trump took a pass on our
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: boy Doug Burgum, little Marco Rubio, and dozens of others
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: in favor of J.D.? Dan?
• 27:55
  Speaker 2: Well, I think in the interview that Trump did that
• 27:57
  Speaker 2: you and I talked about on the pod last week,
• 27:58
  Speaker 2: Trump kind of answered these questions. Doug Burgum, it was
• 28:01
  Speaker 2: the abortion issue. legislation in North Dakota. They have gone
• 28:05
  Speaker 2: to great lengths to try to essentially lie about what
• 28:09
  Speaker 2: their abortion plans are and their abortion policy is. So
• 28:11
  Speaker 2: that takes Doug Burgum off. Marco Rubio, one, the Florida
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: residency thing I think was probably a little bit complicated. Also,
• 28:17
  Speaker 2: he doesn't like Marco Rubio. He doesn't want to spend
• 28:19
  Speaker 2: time with him. He doesn't trust him. He thinks he's
• 28:23
  Speaker 2: a huge wuss and not that bright. So that probably
• 28:26
  Speaker 2: takes him off.
• 28:26
  Speaker 4: You take, you talk, Marco Rubio talks a good game now,
• 28:28
  Speaker 4: but a couple of years from now, you're going to
• 28:29
  Speaker 4: have to hang him.
• 28:31
  Speaker 2: That's what he's thinking. Really?
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: Right? Is he, is he a good hang?
• 28:39
  Speaker 2: He's not a good hang. He's a good hang. JD
• 28:41
  Speaker 2: Vance is a good hang. Pod title.
• 28:43
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 28:44
  Speaker 2: JD Vance is a good hang. Rubio is going to
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: be someone you're going to hang good. Can we put
• 28:47
  Speaker 2: in the, uh, stability alert, please? Guys, guys, can we
• 28:51
  Speaker 2: please lower the temperature?
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: What have you done to lower the temperature? So you
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: think it was process of elimination then?
• 28:59
  Speaker 2: It was process of elimination because there's no good political
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: argument for J.D. Vance. He adds almost nothing to the ticket.
• 29:06
  Speaker 2: There is no... He doesn't bring it... He has no
• 29:09
  Speaker 2: geographic appeal.
• 29:10
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 29:10
  Speaker 2: He doesn't moderate the ticket ideologically. He doesn't address a
• 29:13
  Speaker 2: specific weakness.
• 29:14
  Speaker 6: Right?
• 29:14
  Speaker 2: If you go through people's picks in the past, they
• 29:17
  Speaker 2: either bring a state into play. That's a little more pre-pollization,
• 29:21
  Speaker 2: but that was a typical reason. They... They appeal to
• 29:26
  Speaker 2: a group that the nominee is weak with, like the
• 29:28
  Speaker 2: reason Trump picked Pence for the evangelicals, or they address
• 29:31
  Speaker 2: a weakness, right? Bill Clinton picked Al Gore because Bill
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: Clinton was scandal plagued and Al Gore had a reputation
• 29:36
  Speaker 2: as the most ethical and frankly boring member of the Senate.
• 29:39
  Speaker 2: And so he picked him. But Vance offers nothing in
• 29:43
  Speaker 2: that way, right? He's doubling down. The only group that
• 29:46
  Speaker 2: Vance has appeal with are the voters that Trump already has,
• 29:48
  Speaker 2: which are hardcore MAGA voters. He doesn't even, like Rubio
• 29:51
  Speaker 2: at least would have given some signal to like normie
• 29:54
  Speaker 2: Republicans that there's like an establishment person there. Vance doesn't
• 29:58
  Speaker 2: do that either. I was like, I was like two things.
• 30:00
  Speaker 4: I think one, I think, I think one, one thing
• 30:02
  Speaker 4: he does do is he signals to a certain set
• 30:06
  Speaker 4: of rich Republicans or libertarian types that Trump's fully on
• 30:11
  Speaker 4: board with their program. And then I think the second
• 30:13
  Speaker 4: thing is JD Vance can articulate, he does it with
• 30:17
  Speaker 4: Sean Hannity. He can articulate a version of Trumpism that
• 30:21
  Speaker 4: is more sophisticated and rational sounding than it, than it
• 30:25
  Speaker 4: sounds when it comes out of Donald Trump's mouth. And
• 30:27
  Speaker 4: I think that is of some utility.
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: My thought on the political aspect, I don't think it's
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: about necessarily winning a state or even winning the election.
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: First of all, I think J.D. Vance is a pick
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: Trump made because he is confident that he is ahead.
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: And so he felt like he could take a little
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: bit more of a risk. We'll see whether that's right.
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: But if you read Tim Alberta's interview in The Atlantic
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: with Susie Wiles and Chris Lasavita, very long interview, spent
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: a lot of time with them about their strategy, they're
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: running the Trump campaign. And they basically say in that
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: interview that they don't care that much about losing suburban women.
• 30:59
  Speaker 1: to either Dobbs or Trump's character, things like that, and
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: that they are going after younger voters, particularly younger working
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: class men, white, black, Latino. And when you talk to
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: these younger working class men, when you listen to them,
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: and I just thought about this because we did our
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: wilderness focus groups with a whole bunch of young people
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: a couple weeks ago all over the place. And what
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: do they talk about? They talk about they're struggling financially.
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: They blame corporate greed. but they also blame government. They
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: talk about spending too much money on foreign aid and
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: foreign wars. They're more isolationist. They talk about, some of
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: them talk about immigrants taking their jobs. So there's this
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: weird sort of populist anti-establishment. It sounds like J.D. Vance's
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: version of MAGA and Trumpism. And Trump doesn't really articulate.
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: Trump has like a sort of gut instinct about it.
• 31:49
  Speaker 6: J.D.
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: Vance actually, whether he believes it or not, it's a
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: whole conversation for another time, but he articulates it, right?
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: And I do think that if you are the Trump campaign,
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: they're thinking, we're going to go, we're not trying to
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: bridge the gap with the Nikki Haley old establishment part
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: of the Republican Party. We're changing the party. This is
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: a new party and we want to go after younger,
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: a new generation. This is now the first millennial on
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: a ticket, right?
• 32:15
  Speaker 2: J.D.
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: Vance is 39 years old. And obviously, Ohio is not
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: going to matter as much because Donald Trump will win Ohio.
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: But maybe they think, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, those three
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: states are Joe Biden's last chance. And maybe whatever appeals
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: to Ohio voters about J.D. Vance could similarly appeal to
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: him in those Midwestern states.
• 32:33
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 32:33
  Speaker 2: I also wonder, I mean, Donald Trump Jr. is extremely
• 32:37
  Speaker 2: close to J.D. Vance.
• 32:38
  Speaker 3: And it's interesting, look, we make fun of the Trump
• 32:42
  Speaker 3: relationship with his children because he's a narcissist and only
• 32:44
  Speaker 3: cares about himself. But I do think having your son
• 32:46
  Speaker 3: constantly in your ear about this one person and his
• 32:49
  Speaker 3: charisma and his political abilities is probably powerful. And Look,
• 32:52
  Speaker 3: Doug Burgum, he's not necessarily lighting up a room. He's
• 32:54
  Speaker 3: got a lot of money, and I assumed that Trump
• 32:56
  Speaker 3: would like the old rich guy, but he didn't land there.
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: Also, he put all that time in with Tiffany. That
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: was stupid.
• 33:03
  Speaker 4: I do think also the Don Jr. piece of it, too,
• 33:05
  Speaker 4: is Don Jr. is loyal, and he's saying, this is
• 33:08
  Speaker 4: our guy. Burgum, maybe, but Rubio's never going to be
• 33:12
  Speaker 4: your good hang. But Vance did this long interview with
• 33:17
  Speaker 4: Ross Daffod, in which he lays.
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: Out close listeners of the pod would know that I
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: already brought up this long interview and everyone made fun
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: of me for it.
• 33:26
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, I remember that. Love and I specifically made
• 33:28
  Speaker 2: fun of you. Well, first of all... And Tommy brought
• 33:31
  Speaker 2: it up literally three minutes ago. Did you bring it
• 33:34
  Speaker 2: up on the pod? You said do the.
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: Jill Biden over here.
• 33:39
  Speaker 2: I didn't say that.
• 33:40
  Speaker 4: But first of all, I think we should embrace Republican
• 33:43
  Speaker 4: politics in which hypocrisy is a sign of strength. But anyway,
• 33:48
  Speaker 4: you go through that interview and he is... articulating a
• 33:52
  Speaker 4: populist economic message. And as a reminder too, that when
• 33:55
  Speaker 4: Donald Trump wins in 2017, the biggest worry was that
• 33:58
  Speaker 4: he would pursue a more economically populist agenda. And instead
• 34:02
  Speaker 4: he embraced repealing Obamacare and tax cuts for corporations and
• 34:06
  Speaker 4: the kind of Paul Ryan.
• 34:07
  Speaker 2: Uh, style of governance.
• 34:09
  Speaker 4: And, uh, it was to our benefit. And so I
• 34:12
  Speaker 4: think it is very, like, this is a kind of,
• 34:14
  Speaker 4: it's a scary version of Trumpism because I think it
• 34:16
  Speaker 4: is a far more sophisticated version.
• 34:18
  Speaker 3: Look, just in simple terms, he's got a compelling personal story.
• 34:20
  Speaker 2: Like Hillbilly Elegy was a good book.
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: It just was.
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: I enjoyed reading it.
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: He's a veteran.
• 34:26
  Speaker 2: And I think J.D.
• 34:27
  Speaker 3: Vance can be, can talk about how, look, liberals loved me.
• 34:30
  Speaker 2: You know, they, Rob Ryan, was it Rob Ryan or someone?
• 34:33
  Speaker 2: Ron Howard. Ron Howard made my book into a film.
• 34:35
  Speaker 2: Gone close in a muumuu.
• 34:36
  Speaker 3: Hollywood loved me until I came out for Trump. And
• 34:38
  Speaker 3: then Trump can point to how J.D. Vance used to
• 34:41
  Speaker 3: criticize him, but he came to love him and now
• 34:43
  Speaker 3: he bent the knee. So I think there's a compelling
• 34:44
  Speaker 3: story there. The one thing that's just worth pointing out
• 34:46
  Speaker 3: is that the Washington Post had a good analysis of, J.D.
• 34:51
  Speaker 3: Vance's political weakness in Ohio. In 2022, Vance won by
• 34:55
  Speaker 3: six points, but he underperformed every other statewide official. Mike
• 35:00
  Speaker 3: DeWine won by 26 points. The attorney general won by
• 35:03
  Speaker 3: 20 points. The secretary of state won by 19. Even
• 35:06
  Speaker 3: the Supreme Court nominees won by double digits.
• 35:08
  Speaker 2: J.D.
• 35:09
  Speaker 3: Vance had the closest race in part because he had
• 35:12
  Speaker 3: extreme views on a lot of policy areas.
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: So there could be some risk here.
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: And Tim Ryan.
• 35:16
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and Tim Ryan.
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: And a lot of credit to Tim Ryan there.
• 35:19
  Speaker 2: Well, you know. I mean, he basically ran, J.D. ran
• 35:22
  Speaker 2: even with Trump. I think, John, you are right that
• 35:25
  Speaker 2: this is a pick that is made from a confident
• 35:28
  Speaker 2: view of the Trump standing in the race. I just
• 35:30
  Speaker 2: think it is more about what J.D. Vance does after
• 35:35
  Speaker 2: they win, not what J.D. Vance can do to help
• 35:37
  Speaker 2: them win. Because if they were really trying to go
• 35:40
  Speaker 2: for the kill shot here, you really would pick Rubio
• 35:43
  Speaker 2: or Tim Scott or Byron Donalds. Because if you can
• 35:46
  Speaker 2: make real inroads, or even the inroads the polls suggest
• 35:49
  Speaker 2: right now with black and Latino men, that's the difference
• 35:53
  Speaker 2: between a narrow victory and a landslide, right? That's the
• 35:56
  Speaker 2: kind of thing that could.
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: Be a permanent realignment. I think their view is probably, again,
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: no idea if it's right or wrong, their view is
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: just because he picks a black or Latino candidate does
• 36:05
  Speaker 1: not mean that's going to make it easier to get
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: younger black and Latino men, like that it's just as
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: possible with a younger white man like J.D. Vance. Again,
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: who knows, but I'm sure that's their view.
• 36:16
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I just think J.D. Vance is the pick you
• 36:18
  Speaker 2: make if you want to turn the MAGA agenda into
• 36:21
  Speaker 2: an actual policy agenda.
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: Which is why he's so scary.
• 36:24
  Speaker 2: Right. I think I said this. I never know what
• 36:26
  Speaker 2: we say on Mike and off Mike, but at some
• 36:28
  Speaker 2: point in the last week around the time you and
• 36:30
  Speaker 2: I recorded a podcast together.
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: Do you hear this Ross Douthat calling?
• 36:33
  Speaker 2: Oh, he writes for the Times, right? Yes. Did you
• 36:35
  Speaker 2: talk to J.D. Vance recently? By the way, shame on us.
• 36:38
  Speaker 2: None of us know how to say the guy's fucking name.
• 36:40
  Speaker 2: I don't care.
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: No one does. That's his fault. I didn't name him.
• 36:44
  Speaker 2: I think it's Douthat. Yeah.
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: I think that's correct.
• 36:46
  Speaker 6: You're right.
• 36:47
  Speaker 2: I thought that J.D. Vance was the best case scenario
• 36:50
  Speaker 2: in terms of the election because he has less upside
• 36:52
  Speaker 2: than the other ones and some risk because he's so extreme,
• 36:55
  Speaker 2: but the worst case scenario if Trump wins. And I
• 36:58
  Speaker 2: think that's correct.
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: So the Biden campaign statement about J.D. Vance said that
• 37:04
  Speaker 1: Trump picked him because he'll, quote, do what Mike Pence
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: wouldn't do on January 6th, bend over backwards to enable
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: Trump and his extreme MAGA agenda. enact Trump's Project 2025 agenda.
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: And then they also said this is someone who supports
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: banning abortion nationwide while criticizing exceptions for rape and incest survivors.
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: And he has admitted he wouldn't have certified the free
• 37:22
  Speaker 1: and fair election in 2020. What do you guys think
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: of that message? Is that the most effective message? Because
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: you can do the hypocrisy thing. You know, he used
• 37:30
  Speaker 1: to criticize Trump and now he doesn't. But then there's
• 37:32
  Speaker 1: also he is for all of these extreme positions.
• 37:35
  Speaker 2: If you do the hypocrisy thing, wherever you are, I'm
• 37:37
  Speaker 2: going to come and find you.
• 37:38
  Speaker 1: Because it is You know how I feel about this.
• 37:40
  Speaker 2: The least effective message possible. Will you just threaten the audience?
• 37:44
  Speaker 4: Yes.
• 37:45
  Speaker 2: Turn the temperature down. Turn the temperature down, Dan. Get
• 37:48
  Speaker 2: that alarm going. I'm going to find you to give
• 37:50
  Speaker 2: you a hug. Where's the redhead alert? We already played
• 37:54
  Speaker 2: it earlier.
• 37:55
  Speaker 4: Dan's putting a bullseye on those kinds of talking points.
• 38:00
  Speaker 2: I'm going to come to your house for a civil
• 38:01
  Speaker 2: discussion of why your message is terrible.
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: And it's because, we should say, Every poll, every focus group,
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: every time you talk to voters, here's the problem. Voters
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: think all politicians are hypocrites. So when you go after
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: a politician on hypocrisy grounds, it just doesn't land. It
• 38:18
  Speaker 1: doesn't land with the voters that you need. They don't
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: care about hypocrisy.
• 38:21
  Speaker 4: Hypocrisy is about the person. Policies are about the people
• 38:25
  Speaker 4: they affect, right? Like hypocrisy is about the person's values,
• 38:28
  Speaker 4: what they represent. It's about their story.
• 38:29
  Speaker 2: And by the way, J.D.
• 38:31
  Speaker 4: Vance is very happy to talk about this and how
• 38:33
  Speaker 4: he evolved in Donald Trump and how it actually came
• 38:35
  Speaker 4: to realize that Trump was the the vehicle for taking
• 38:38
  Speaker 4: on the villains that he talks about in Hillbilly Elegy.
• 38:40
  Speaker 4: He has a story ready to go about how to
• 38:42
  Speaker 4: turn that into a feature from a bug.
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: So, yeah.
• 38:45
  Speaker 2: We should at least say that J.D. Vance is absolutely
• 38:47
  Speaker 2: more full of shit than anyone in American politics. Yes.
• 38:50
  Speaker 4: His position this week is prayers up for Hitler. So
• 38:53
  Speaker 4: we should just be clear about that. That's where he's at.
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: Well, I was just saying, I don't know how he squares,
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: you know, calling Trump America's Hitler, even though he has
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: evolved on that position, with what he tweeted last To me,
• 39:05
  Speaker 1: the reason he is completely unfit for office is hours
• 39:08
  Speaker 1: after the assassination attempt, before we knew almost anything, he
• 39:12
  Speaker 1: tweets that President Biden's rhetoric, quote, led directly to Trump's
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: attempted assassination, which is just not true. Baseless. Didn't know
• 39:21
  Speaker 1: that was true. Even if he suspected it, why would
• 39:24
  Speaker 1: you say it without any other information? It's crazy. And
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: um also it doesn't quite fit with the convention's unity message.
• 39:32
  Speaker 4: Ron johnson apparently called democratic policies a clear and present
• 39:35
  Speaker 4: danger to the nation and then he was asked by
• 39:36
  Speaker 4: reporter hey what happened to the unity message he goes
• 39:38
  Speaker 4: oh that was accidental actually the old pre-unity speech that
• 39:40
  Speaker 4: was loaded into the prompter they accidentally loaded the The
• 39:43
  Speaker 4: division speech.
• 39:44
  Speaker 2: Not my unity speech.
• 39:46
  Speaker 1: You know, they accidentally loaded in what we all believe,
• 39:49
  Speaker 1: not what we.
• 39:50
  Speaker 3: Think that we have to say now to win.
• 39:53
  Speaker 1: We're doing this because we want to win. Of course
• 39:54
  Speaker 1: they want unity.
• 39:55
  Speaker 2: We want to give them unity. This is also true.
• 39:57
  Speaker 2: Then no more unity. Then it'll only be unity.
• 40:00
  Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Unity, yes, that's a scary kind of unity.
• 40:05
  Speaker 4: But this is also, I think, why the post-assassination attempt
• 40:10
  Speaker 4: turned down the temperature... conversation is kind of twisted because
• 40:15
  Speaker 4: that's a good example of just right-wing rhetoric has become
• 40:19
  Speaker 4: completely divorced from reality. Even when it's not inciting direct
• 40:22
  Speaker 4: or even indirect violence, it is ascribing views, policies, and
• 40:27
  Speaker 4: outcomes to Democrats in ways that just are not true.
• 40:29
  Speaker 2: They're just making it up. They're saying things.
• 40:31
  Speaker 4: They say whatever they want to make the Democrats seem
• 40:34
  Speaker 4: as evil and terrible as possible and Republicans as the saviors.
• 40:37
  Speaker 2: And That is.
• 40:38
  Speaker 4: Part of why we are so divided. That polarization, right-wing
• 40:41
  Speaker 4: propaganda is why we are so divided. It is what
• 40:43
  Speaker 4: is raising the temperature, even if you can't point to
• 40:45
  Speaker 4: any specific example.
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: I didn't get to see a lot of the convention.
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: Did the unity thing work out? That was great.
• 40:50
  Speaker 2: It was awesome. It was a good time.
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: I was just sort of prepping for the show.
• 40:54
  Speaker 2: Let me put it this way.
• 40:55
  Speaker 1: I saw that Marjorie Taylor Greene gave a speech that
• 40:57
  Speaker 1: I was like, it was bad, but it wasn't bad
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: because it was.
• 41:01
  Speaker 1: As as extreme as she usually is but she wasn't
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: softening it was just sort of lame it was like
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: it was like matt it was like marjorie taylor green well.
• 41:07
  Speaker 4: They cut her big finish which was burning nancy pelosi
• 41:09
  Speaker 4: and effigies for her unity i thought she was gonna
• 41:12
  Speaker 4: be like crossfit.
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: Nothing really stuck out at me as is either super
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: unifying or like really mean i mean some pretty.
• 41:22
  Speaker 2: Gross disgusting attacks on trans people I didn't see that.
• 41:25
  Speaker 2: From Marjorie Taylor Greene. I missed that.
• 41:27
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: I did see like an image of Joe Biden falling
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: up the stairs. They did that one. They did do that.
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: But I didn't really hear, I don't know. Nothing too
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: exciting that first, this first night, right?
• 41:36
  Speaker 2: I'm shocked that the night where the primetime major speaker
• 41:39
  Speaker 2: was Tennessee Senator Marsha Blackburn.
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: I was waiting for like a big reveal.
• 41:43
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 41:44
  Speaker 4: Anyway.
• 41:45
  Speaker 2: Sort of a tough hit on Glenn Youngkin.
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah, he was there too.
• 41:47
  Speaker 2: Well, I mean, he had to open for Marsha Blackburn.
• 42:03
  Speaker 1: Let's talk about Joe Biden. Obviously, up until Saturday afternoon,
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: most of the focus has been on Biden and whether
• 42:11
  Speaker 1: he's still the party's best chance to beat Trump. The
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: assassination attempt to stop that chatter for now, at least.
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: President Biden gave an Oval Office address about the attack
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: on Sunday night, and he had a previously scheduled primetime
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: interview with Lester Holt at NBC News on the books
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: for tonight. He went ahead with it, and the attack
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: was a big focus there, too. Let's listen to a
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: clip of the Oval Office address, followed by a clip
• 42:34
  Speaker 1: of Biden's interview with Lester Holt.
• 42:36
  Speaker 6: Violence has never been the answer, whether it's with members
• 42:39
  Speaker 6: of Congress and both parties being targeted and shot or
• 42:43
  Speaker 6: a violent mob attacking the Capitol on January 6th or
• 42:46
  Speaker 6: an attempted assassination on Donald Trump. There is no place
• 42:50
  Speaker 6: in America for this kind of violence, for any violence ever.
• 42:54
  Speaker 6: But in America, we resolve our differences at the battle box.
• 42:59
  Speaker 6: You know, that's how we do it at the battle block,
• 43:01
  Speaker 6: not with bullets.
• 43:02
  Speaker 7: On a call a week ago, you said it's time
• 43:04
  Speaker 7: to put Trump in the bullseye. There's some dispute about
• 43:07
  Speaker 7: the context, but I think you appreciate that word better.
• 43:10
  Speaker 8: I didn't say crosshairs. I was talking about focus on.
• 43:13
  Speaker 6: Look, the truth of the matter was, what I guess
• 43:15
  Speaker 6: I was talking about at the time was there's very
• 43:18
  Speaker 6: little focus on Trump's agenda.
• 43:21
  Speaker 8: Yeah, the term is bullseye. It was a mistake to
• 43:25
  Speaker 8: use the word. I didn't say crosshairs. I meant bullseye.
• 43:27
  Speaker 8: I meant focus on him. Focus on what he's doing.
• 43:31
  Speaker 6: Focus on his policies. Focus on the number of lies
• 43:36
  Speaker 6: he told in the debate.
• 43:37
  Speaker 8: I mean, there's a whole range of things.
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: Crosshairs just coming out of nowhere there. So what do
• 43:43
  Speaker 1: you guys make of Biden's overall response to the shooting, Dan?
• 43:48
  Speaker 2: I think he has met the moment with the sobriety
• 43:51
  Speaker 2: and seriousness that it deserves, right? He did what he's
• 43:53
  Speaker 2: supposed to do. He went out and addressed the nation
• 43:56
  Speaker 2: after it happened, after getting briefed by his team, returned
• 43:59
  Speaker 2: immediately to Washington, met with his team in the situation room,
• 44:01
  Speaker 2: then came out and updated the country on what he
• 44:03
  Speaker 2: had learned. And then in an attempt, I think, to
• 44:07
  Speaker 2: bring the temperature down and return to what I think
• 44:11
  Speaker 2: he believes is his sort of core political identity to
• 44:14
  Speaker 2: try to give a call to unity in the wake
• 44:17
  Speaker 2: of this. Like that is, that is what you want
• 44:19
  Speaker 2: the president to do, right? At a time of great
• 44:22
  Speaker 2: stress and tension and fear and concern for the public,
• 44:25
  Speaker 2: the president should be out there. Put aside the election,
• 44:27
  Speaker 2: the debate about his political future. That's what you, this
• 44:30
  Speaker 2: is exactly what you would expect him to do in
• 44:32
  Speaker 2: that moment. And he did all of those things.
• 44:35
  Speaker 6: Love it.
• 44:35
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 44:35
  Speaker 4: I mean, I, I think Dan is, what Dan is saying,
• 44:39
  Speaker 4: I obviously agree with. I think he did all the
• 44:41
  Speaker 4: things that he was supposed to do. I think what is,
• 44:44
  Speaker 4: I think, so troubling in moments like this is the
• 44:46
  Speaker 4: best you can hope for from President Biden is that
• 44:50
  Speaker 4: he does no damage rather than going out there and,
• 44:53
  Speaker 4: I think, doing anything particularly inspiring or excellent. There's a
• 44:57
  Speaker 4: lot that could be said about what led to this moment.
• 45:00
  Speaker 4: There's a lot that could be said about the politics
• 45:04
  Speaker 4: and culture as we head into this election that he,
• 45:07
  Speaker 4: I don't think, can be a voice for. The best
• 45:10
  Speaker 4: we can do is to have a short, to the point, statement,
• 45:14
  Speaker 4: violence bad. I'm hearing a briefing. But for the most part,
• 45:19
  Speaker 4: you know, there's the Oval Office address was halting. He
• 45:23
  Speaker 4: manages to respond defensively to every question from Lester Holt,
• 45:27
  Speaker 4: even where he shouldn't be in a way turning every
• 45:31
  Speaker 4: question into a kind of gotcha question where he feels
• 45:33
  Speaker 4: as though he is, I think, reacting from a place
• 45:36
  Speaker 4: of weakness. And the whole thing is very dispiriting.
• 45:39
  Speaker 2: I kind of want to separate what he did basically
• 45:42
  Speaker 2: from the shooting on Saturday through Sunday night in the interviews.
• 45:46
  Speaker 2: I think those are two separate things. Yes, of course, right?
• 45:50
  Speaker 2: There's a long history of presidents rising to rhetorical heights
• 45:54
  Speaker 2: in times like this. Bill Clinton after the Oklahoma City bombing.
• 46:00
  Speaker 2: Reagan after Challenger, Obama after Newtown. Like we've seen that before.
• 46:04
  Speaker 1: Joe Biden has given a pretty inspiring moving speeches around
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: January 6th. I think his inaugural address, I think his
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: address on the anniversary of January 6th, he rose to
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: the moment for sure. Yes.
• 46:14
  Speaker 2: Sunday night was not that. I thought the message was
• 46:17
  Speaker 2: appropriate and fine. Like, yes, he stumbled over some words,
• 46:20
  Speaker 2: but he did fine. He did fine. And I think
• 46:23
  Speaker 2: that like we should at least point out when he
• 46:27
  Speaker 2: does fine, right?
• 46:28
  Speaker 1: There are times when- He landed the plane in the
• 46:30
  Speaker 1: Oval Office address.
• 46:31
  Speaker 2: The interview, less good.
• 46:32
  Speaker 1: A few bumps on the way down on the Oval Office,
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: but you know.
• 46:35
  Speaker 3: I mean, I really like Lester Holt, but I felt
• 46:38
  Speaker 3: the questions at the top that suggested that Biden's rhetoric
• 46:41
  Speaker 3: had anything to do with the shooter felt pretty baseless
• 46:44
  Speaker 3: and unfair. And I could see why Biden was annoyed
• 46:47
  Speaker 3: at those questions in particular, but the frustration really came through.
• 46:51
  Speaker 3: And I think I counted two or three times where
• 46:54
  Speaker 3: he kind of got annoyed and defensive and lashed back at,
• 46:57
  Speaker 3: at Lester and was like, why aren't you guys covering
• 46:59
  Speaker 3: Trump's lies?
• 46:59
  Speaker 2: Why aren't you covering this?
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: Why aren't you?
• 47:01
  Speaker 3: And like, I just don't think that that, that doesn't, it,
• 47:04
  Speaker 3: it didn't land great at times in the interview.
• 47:07
  Speaker 2: It felt defensive.
• 47:09
  Speaker 1: The question about the bullseye is extremely annoying question. And
• 47:13
  Speaker 1: what would have been the very easy answer is like,
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: what do you mean? I was talking about putting the
• 47:18
  Speaker 1: focus on, on Donald Trump, right? That's what I said
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: about his policies. I said it at a fundraiser with
• 47:22
  Speaker 1: a bunch of people. That's what I'm going to, So
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: I'm going to incite people at a fundraiser. I'm going
• 47:25
  Speaker 1: to say it's time to put the focus on Donald Trump.
• 47:27
  Speaker 1: That's what we should put the focus. I mean, it's
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: just such an easy response to an unfair, annoying question.
• 47:32
  Speaker 4: He could even, by the way, say, you know what, Lester,
• 47:34
  Speaker 4: if people found that term to be wrong, I won't
• 47:37
  Speaker 4: use it again. But I think everybody knew exactly what
• 47:39
  Speaker 4: I mean. You know, there's a lot of there's a
• 47:41
  Speaker 4: lot of things a person who is, I think, has
• 47:43
  Speaker 4: a more of a capacity to respond quickly and effectively
• 47:48
  Speaker 4: to a question could provide in those moments. But instead,
• 47:50
  Speaker 4: you get just a very hard to follow response. defensive,
• 47:55
  Speaker 4: confusing response.
• 47:56
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 47:57
  Speaker 1: Well, Lester also asked Biden about the debate and the
• 48:00
  Speaker 1: calls for him to step aside. Let's listen to some
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: of that.
• 48:03
  Speaker 7: The last TV interview you were asked if you had
• 48:05
  Speaker 7: watched the debate, your answer was, I don't think so, no.
• 48:08
  Speaker 2: Have you since seen it?
• 48:10
  Speaker 8: I've seen pieces of it. I've not watched the whole debate.
• 48:12
  Speaker 7: And the reason I ask is because I guess the
• 48:15
  Speaker 7: question is, are you all on the same page? Are
• 48:17
  Speaker 7: you seeing what they saw, which was moments of, frankly,
• 48:22
  Speaker 7: that appeared to be you appeared to be confused?
• 48:25
  Speaker 6: Lester, look, why don't you guys ever talk about the
• 48:28
  Speaker 6: 18 to 28 lies he told? Where are you on this?
• 48:34
  Speaker 6: Why didn't the press ever talk about that? 28 times
• 48:37
  Speaker 6: it's confirmed he lied in that debate. I had a bad,
• 48:42
  Speaker 6: bad night. I wasn't feeling well at all. And I
• 48:46
  Speaker 6: had been, I screwed up.
• 48:51
  Speaker 7: I just asked a question because the idea that you
• 48:54
  Speaker 7: may or may not have seen what some of these
• 48:57
  Speaker 7: other folks have seen, you're not on the same.
• 48:58
  Speaker 8: I'd have to say I was there. I had to
• 49:04
  Speaker 8: see it, I was there.
• 49:04
  Speaker 6: And by the way, seriously, you won't answer the question,
• 49:07
  Speaker 6: but why didn't the press talk about all the lies
• 49:09
  Speaker 6: he told? I don't know.
• 49:10
  Speaker 8: Anything about that.
• 49:11
  Speaker 7: We have reported many of the issues that came.
• 49:13
  Speaker 8: Up during that debate.
• 49:14
  Speaker 1: No, you haven't.
• 49:14
  Speaker 8: No, you haven't.
• 49:15
  Speaker 2: We'll provide you with them.
• 49:17
  Speaker 8: God love you. Okay.
• 49:19
  Speaker 7: But if the opportunity came up to do one between
• 49:21
  Speaker 7: now and then, is there a sense of wanting to
• 49:24
  Speaker 7: get back on the horse?
• 49:26
  Speaker 8: I'm on the horse. Where have you been?
• 49:29
  Speaker 6: I've done 22 major events with thousands of people, overwhelming crowds,
• 49:35
  Speaker 6: a lot happening.
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: A lot is happening. Tommy, what'd you think of the, uh,
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: what'd you think of the interview?
• 49:41
  Speaker 3: I think, I mean, I think Lester's question, are you
• 49:44
  Speaker 3: seeing what they saw is kind of the core question
• 49:47
  Speaker 3: that a lot of people are asking about the election generally.
• 49:50
  Speaker 3: Like is, does, does Joe Biden know how bad the
• 49:53
  Speaker 3: debate was or does he really think it was 90
• 49:55
  Speaker 3: minutes that didn't go well, but four great years of
• 49:58
  Speaker 3: policy is Biden seeing the bad polling that's out there or,
• 50:02
  Speaker 3: you know, uh, polling from swing districts from, people that
• 50:07
  Speaker 3: don't work for him? Is Biden hearing on Varner's concerns
• 50:10
  Speaker 3: from downed out elected officials? And again, I think what
• 50:13
  Speaker 3: you heard was a response that just felt very defensive
• 50:18
  Speaker 3: and angry at the question more than looking to find
• 50:22
  Speaker 3: an answer to kind of assuage those concerns more broadly.
• 50:27
  Speaker 4: There's another part in that towards the end of the
• 50:30
  Speaker 4: interview where Biden says, when he talks about the events
• 50:32
  Speaker 4: he's doing, I'm out there proving to people that I
• 50:34
  Speaker 4: have my faculties. So I have my faculties and it's
• 50:38
  Speaker 4: sad to see it's because if that's the threshold, right?
• 50:43
  Speaker 4: If that's what he's out there proving and we have that,
• 50:47
  Speaker 4: that's not enough. It's a massive problem, right? The fact
• 50:49
  Speaker 4: that we all, that he doesn't respond, Lester Holt's question, right? Like,
• 50:53
  Speaker 4: do you know what we saw? Like, were you confused?
• 50:56
  Speaker 4: We don't, it points out that we still don't feel
• 50:59
  Speaker 4: like we have gotten an adequate answer from Joe Biden
• 51:01
  Speaker 4: about what happened that night. And it just means that
• 51:06
  Speaker 4: Maybe he's right that the polls are closer and that
• 51:08
  Speaker 4: people are sensationalizing gaps that are closable. But the question is,
• 51:11
  Speaker 4: can he close them? And the fact that we're going
• 51:14
  Speaker 4: to get questions like this about Joe Biden over and
• 51:17
  Speaker 4: over and over again, and that the answers he provides
• 51:19
  Speaker 4: doesn't feel like they give us the space to move on,
• 51:22
  Speaker 4: is why people are so concerned. It's not just what
• 51:25
  Speaker 4: the polls are. It's the fear that he does not
• 51:27
  Speaker 4: have the capacity to close them.
• 51:29
  Speaker 1: Dan, I keep trying to think about when you're advising.
• 51:35
  Speaker 1: A president or presidential candidate and they keep screwing things
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: up in interviews, right? Like let's put the like age
• 51:42
  Speaker 1: coherence question aside. Let's just talk about his message, right?
• 51:45
  Speaker 1: So you see after the first couple of times, he's
• 51:48
  Speaker 1: getting very defensive. He only talks about his, I'm the
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: guy who did this. I'm the guy who did this.
• 51:53
  Speaker 1: Why aren't you reporting about the lies? The 28, all
• 51:55
  Speaker 1: of which we know from research polling, I'm sure his
• 51:59
  Speaker 1: advisors know this, are not effective responses, right? Even if
• 52:02
  Speaker 1: you said them like super coherently and crisply. And after
• 52:05
  Speaker 1: the first time you do that, like maybe in the
• 52:07
  Speaker 1: Stephanopoulos interview, I would imagine everyone gets together with Joe
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: Biden before the next interview and say like, hey, less defensive.
• 52:16
  Speaker 1: You don't want to be so defensive. You want to
• 52:19
  Speaker 1: talk about the choice in the election. You want to
• 52:21
  Speaker 1: pivot to the... And then what do you think is...
• 52:23
  Speaker 1: Do you think that's what they're telling him and that
• 52:24
  Speaker 1: he's just not doing it? Do you think he's stubborn? Like,
• 52:26
  Speaker 1: I can't figure... This is what I can't figure out
• 52:28
  Speaker 1: is like, why can he not just... get to the
• 52:31
  Speaker 1: right message when he has these same questions over.
• 52:34
  Speaker 2: And over again.
• 52:34
  Speaker 1: And you know, they're going to be annoying. You know,
• 52:36
  Speaker 1: you're going to get questions about what was happening at
• 52:38
  Speaker 1: the debate. Why was this bad? Like, that's just how
• 52:40
  Speaker 1: reporters are. And you just have to like, figure out
• 52:41
  Speaker 1: how to deal with it.
• 52:43
  Speaker 2: I am not sure he is getting all of the
• 52:47
  Speaker 2: information and advice that he needs. Yeah. It's like, there
• 52:50
  Speaker 2: have been multiple stories. There's one in the Washington Post
• 52:52
  Speaker 2: tonight about Biden shrinking his circle of advisors, right? Some
• 52:57
  Speaker 2: of the people who we know, we even know the
• 52:58
  Speaker 2: people on the inside of the circle and they're all
• 53:00
  Speaker 2: very smart. But I think that there is a process
• 53:02
  Speaker 2: to manage the president here, right? And it does not
• 53:06
  Speaker 2: include necessarily giving him information he does not want to hear.
• 53:09
  Speaker 2: And that includes that your answers are not working.
• 53:11
  Speaker 6: Right.
• 53:12
  Speaker 2: Because there is just no basis in research, strategy, or
• 53:15
  Speaker 2: recent political history to suggest the approach he has taken
• 53:17
  Speaker 2: to answering the questions. Put aside the delivery, right? Let's
• 53:20
  Speaker 2: just say he's delivered them perfectly.
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: That's what I wanted to do. Yeah. Let's just put
• 53:23
  Speaker 1: that aside.
• 53:23
  Speaker 2: The answers are almost a... masterclass in how not to
• 53:29
  Speaker 2: persuade a swing voter. Yes. Right. And that is, is just,
• 53:32
  Speaker 2: he is making the election all about himself. And there is,
• 53:36
  Speaker 2: everyone knows in the strategic imperative of their campaign, when
• 53:38
  Speaker 2: they say is what they have to do is why
• 53:40
  Speaker 2: they had that first in the, in they had that
• 53:43
  Speaker 2: early debate in the first place was to try to
• 53:45
  Speaker 2: shift the focus to Trump, to make it about Trump.
• 53:48
  Speaker 2: And Biden has been incapable of doing it. He's unwilling
• 53:51
  Speaker 2: to do that in his answers. Right. He keeps saying,
• 53:54
  Speaker 2: I'm the guy who did this. I'm the guy who
• 53:55
  Speaker 2: did this. I'm the guy who did this. And not,
• 53:56
  Speaker 2: he doesn't even talk about Trump in this interview or
• 53:59
  Speaker 2: the future, by the way.
• 54:00
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 54:00
  Speaker 2: I mean, he, like, I will say on Friday, I
• 54:03
  Speaker 2: think that was, he went to Michigan and he gave
• 54:05
  Speaker 2: a great speech.
• 54:06
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 54:06
  Speaker 6: Right.
• 54:07
  Speaker 2: It was well delivered. It was energetic.
• 54:09
  Speaker 1: It was one of the best speeches he's delivered in
• 54:12
  Speaker 1: many months.
• 54:12
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 54:12
  Speaker 2: And both in delivery and content. Yes. It had a proactive,
• 54:17
  Speaker 2: really impressive, very progressive second term agenda. It put the
• 54:21
  Speaker 2: focus on Trump. It took his age.
• 54:23
  Speaker 1: The word is focus.
• 54:24
  Speaker 2: The word is focus. And it used his age as
• 54:27
  Speaker 2: a asset, right? He took it on with some humility
• 54:30
  Speaker 2: and handled it. And that is not translating off the prompter.
• 54:34
  Speaker 4: But that to me, that was what I was, that's
• 54:36
  Speaker 4: why I brought up the future. Because what you want
• 54:39
  Speaker 4: is for Joe Biden to take the speech he gives, right?
• 54:41
  Speaker 4: That everyone's reviewing and saying, finally, he's doing it. He's
• 54:43
  Speaker 4: making the case he needs to make. Get in front
• 54:45
  Speaker 4: of Lester Holt and says, Lester Holt, people are worried
• 54:47
  Speaker 4: about what you're going to do, what's going to happen
• 54:49
  Speaker 4: in the next four years, whether you're up to it.
• 54:51
  Speaker 4: Not only am I up to it, here's what we're
• 54:52
  Speaker 4: going to get done. Here's what Donald Trump wants to do.
• 54:55
  Speaker 4: But he does not do that. He just doesn't in
• 54:58
  Speaker 4: these interview settings.
• 55:02
  Speaker 2: He's very defensive right now. He's in a defensive crouch
• 55:04
  Speaker 2: since the debate. And frankly, every conversation he's having with
• 55:09
  Speaker 2: any person who is not in his immediate inner circle
• 55:11
  Speaker 2: is a Lester Holt interview.
• 55:13
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 55:13
  Speaker 2: It just, he had these meetings with a nightmare. I mean,
• 55:18
  Speaker 2: he did these, uh, zoom calls with a bunch of
• 55:20
  Speaker 2: members of Congress. All the reports are, they went quite poorly.
• 55:23
  Speaker 1: Quite poorly. And he, people yelled at Jason Crow, who
• 55:27
  Speaker 1: was a representative from Colorado who, who asked him about like,
• 55:31
  Speaker 1: how do we make sure that, you know, foreign leaders
• 55:33
  Speaker 1: have confidence based on reporting. And he said, stop with
• 55:36
  Speaker 1: that enough with that. Don't give me. And then he
• 55:37
  Speaker 1: like walk. And then he left the call.
• 55:39
  Speaker 2: He has a, like, He could be right, his team
• 55:42
  Speaker 2: could be right, we could all be wrong, but he
• 55:43
  Speaker 2: has just a fundamentally different view of where the race stands,
• 55:49
  Speaker 2: the state of his campaign, and the state of his candidacy.
• 55:52
  Speaker 3: And I think it's challenging when the people closest to you,
• 55:54
  Speaker 3: and it's a very small circle, are telling you potentially
• 55:58
  Speaker 3: what you want to hear. I remember a story in
• 55:59
  Speaker 3: the 2004 campaign. Barack Obama went to some event. We
• 56:04
  Speaker 3: were running against Alan Keyes at the time. We were
• 56:05
  Speaker 3: winning by 30 points, 40 points, right?
• 56:07
  Speaker 2: It was not a real race.
• 56:09
  Speaker 3: And Obama let Alan Keyes walk up to him. They
• 56:10
  Speaker 3: got in some sort of verbal exchange and it became
• 56:13
  Speaker 3: a thing.
• 56:13
  Speaker 2: It was on all the news.
• 56:14
  Speaker 3: And Obama gets back in the car and Robert Gibbs
• 56:16
  Speaker 3: is sitting behind him and just silently staring daggers into
• 56:19
  Speaker 3: the back of the seat. And Obama kept turning around
• 56:21
  Speaker 3: being like, what?
• 56:22
  Speaker 4: What?
• 56:23
  Speaker 1: What is it?
• 56:23
  Speaker 2: You got something to say? You got something to say
• 56:24
  Speaker 2: to me? And Gibbs goes, you didn't just take the bait.
• 56:27
  Speaker 2: You swallowed the whole goddamn hook.
• 56:30
  Speaker 4: Right?
• 56:31
  Speaker 2: And just like got in his face and was like,
• 56:32
  Speaker 2: you fucked up, man. Don't do that.
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: I don't care that you're up dirty. When you say
• 56:37
  Speaker 1: that to the candidate, the candidate doesn't say, thank you,
• 56:39
  Speaker 1: you're right.
• 56:40
  Speaker 2: They hate you.
• 56:40
  Speaker 1: They hate you for days. But you're like, I'm just
• 56:43
  Speaker 1: going to do it because it's the important thing to do.
• 56:46
  Speaker 1: And look, I'm not saying, none of us are saying this,
• 56:47
  Speaker 1: that like this is not happening at all. We don't know.
• 56:50
  Speaker 1: Like it could be happening and Biden could just be saying,
• 56:52
  Speaker 1: fuck you, I don't care.
• 56:53
  Speaker 2: I just, knowing the people around him, I cannot imagine
• 56:57
  Speaker 2: that they are all telling him what he wants to hear.
• 56:59
  Speaker 1: We know all of these people. I know we know them.
• 57:03
  Speaker 3: Well, there's some reporting that like, Some of his closest
• 57:05
  Speaker 3: aides are saying that they don't believe in polling, and
• 57:08
  Speaker 3: maybe that's where kind of the rejection of polling language
• 57:11
  Speaker 3: you're coming from.
• 57:11
  Speaker 2: That's what I'm specifically talking about. But even then, like
• 57:13
  Speaker 2: I read that today, and it said like– it's the
• 57:15
  Speaker 2: quote that– there's some anonymous person quoting the post. Take
• 57:17
  Speaker 2: this for what it is. But it says that Mike
• 57:20
  Speaker 2: Donilon and Steve Reschetti, two of his closest advisors, do
• 57:23
  Speaker 2: not believe in polling. That is going to come as
• 57:24
  Speaker 2: a gigantic shock to the several pollsters on the Biden campaign.
• 57:29
  Speaker 1: Some of the best in the Democratic Party on the payroll,
• 57:31
  Speaker 1: especially in a general election. You get like, this is
• 57:33
  Speaker 1: on Kerry and Obama, you get like a collection of
• 57:35
  Speaker 1: five or six pollsters just so you have different strategies.
• 57:39
  Speaker 1: But yeah, you want a big, diverse crew of pollsters.
• 57:42
  Speaker 2: I think that they are managing Joe Biden's moods right now.
• 57:45
  Speaker 2: I think he is a very prideful person. And I
• 57:49
  Speaker 2: imagine this debate knocked him for a loop. He also
• 57:52
  Speaker 2: hates to be called old. He is prides himself, like
• 57:55
  Speaker 2: the aging, you see this in a lot of reporting,
• 57:58
  Speaker 2: he bristles at being, because he's been the youngest person,
• 58:01
  Speaker 2: he says this, but he's been the youngest person his
• 58:03
  Speaker 2: whole life, and now he is the oldest, to the
• 58:04
  Speaker 2: point where people are saying, and so you are trying,
• 58:06
  Speaker 2: because if you push, and Obama was a great boss
• 58:09
  Speaker 2: to work for, I've worked for more challenging bosses, where
• 58:12
  Speaker 2: you have to You want to tell them what they,
• 58:15
  Speaker 2: you can't, yeah, you can't do what Gibbs did to
• 58:17
  Speaker 2: Barack Obama there because you will get the opposite effect.
• 58:21
  Speaker 1: With Biden.
• 58:21
  Speaker 2: Right. So you got to, I can't say whether that's
• 58:24
  Speaker 2: how Biden is right now, but sometimes you have to
• 58:26
  Speaker 2: just sort of like take every inch you can get
• 58:28
  Speaker 2: because if you push too far, it's going to go
• 58:29
  Speaker 2: the other way.
• 58:30
  Speaker 4: I do remember that when there was a, we were
• 58:33
  Speaker 4: working on a speech for President Obama and in the speech,
• 58:38
  Speaker 4: is it something about how you can't make decisions based
• 58:40
  Speaker 4: on the polls? And as we're having that conversation with
• 58:42
  Speaker 4: David Axelrod, there was a giant binder that on his
• 58:44
  Speaker 4: desk that said polls on it.
• 58:45
  Speaker 2: And they were like, Hey, what, how, how big is
• 58:48
  Speaker 2: the binder when you do make decisions based on polls?
• 58:51
  Speaker 2: And he shouts out to his assistant at the time.
• 58:53
  Speaker 4: Now state legislator, Eric Lesser, uh, Eric, get in here
• 58:56
  Speaker 4: and change this binder to say research.
• 58:57
  Speaker 2: I remember that.
• 59:00
  Speaker 1: It was so funny.
• 59:00
  Speaker 2: I did just, but like, I do think like, this
• 59:04
  Speaker 2: is about politics.
• 59:05
  Speaker 4: We care about this because of the stakes for politics,
• 59:07
  Speaker 4: but it is what is happening with Joe Biden.
• 59:10
  Speaker 2: Is not political.
• 59:11
  Speaker 1: It is psychological.
• 59:12
  Speaker 4: It is human and personal. And I do think that
• 59:15
  Speaker 4: is really, really hard.
• 59:17
  Speaker 2: And it's hard.
• 59:17
  Speaker 4: I am sure for the people around him, whatever, whatever
• 59:22
  Speaker 4: they're trying to do to make the situation better. I,
• 59:24
  Speaker 4: it is an incredibly difficult situation.
• 59:27
  Speaker 1: Well, there was some, Well, a lot of discussion over
• 59:29
  Speaker 1: the weekend, you know, it does this sort of stop
• 59:32
  Speaker 1: the conversation about, you know, whether Biden should step aside
• 59:36
  Speaker 1: in favor of Kamala Harris or another candidate because, you know,
• 59:42
  Speaker 1: now we've gone through this assassination attempt and now we
• 59:45
  Speaker 1: have the Republican convention. So all the attention now is
• 59:47
  Speaker 1: on Trump and the Republicans for the week. I, you know,
• 59:51
  Speaker 1: based on it's Monday, but based on, some of the
• 59:55
  Speaker 1: polling that came out today, there was some New York
• 59:57
  Speaker 1: times Sienna, you know, a plus polls, swing state polls. Uh,
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 1: he's down, uh, four in Pennsylvania, three in Pennsylvania, three
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 1: in Pennsylvania. And he's only up three. Biden is only
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 1: up three in Virginia state that he went by 10 points.
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: That would be a seven point swing to the right.
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 1: He won Pennsylvania by one point. So that would be
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 1: a four point swing to the right. Uh, in those polls,
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 1: there was a number of other swing state polls. Uh,
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 1: you go have polls came out in every swing state.
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 1: He's behind four or five in every one. You know,
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 1: you can square some of this polling with, the Biden
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 1: campaign theory of the case that was laid out in
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 1: their memo last week, which is they said, you know,
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: we are, it is a margin of error race in
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 1: the battlegrounds we need to get to 270. So Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and,
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 1: you know, margin of error, error in those states could
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 1: be three points, four points behind. So yeah, they might
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 1: just be three or four points behind in those blue
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 1: wall states. But the question is, again, how do you
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 1: make up three or four points in an incredibly polarized
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 1: electorate where both candidates are at 100% name ID? And
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 1: every time he goes and does one of these interviews,
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 1: people who watch the interviews, forget about listening to us
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 1: or anyone else, people who watch the interviews are seeing this.
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 1: And if he just went out and gave the Michigan
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 1: speech every single day between now and November, it's like, yeah,
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 1: fighting chance for sure. But I just, maybe polarization gets
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 1: you there. Maybe you get close enough just based on
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 1: people not liking Donald Trump, people thinking and knowing that
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 1: Joe Biden is a good man who's done some great
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 1: things as president and that gets you close enough. And
• 1:01:27
  Speaker 1: if he wins, that's how he wins. But it's certainly
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 1: not because he is communicating well or making the case
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 1: as a candidate.
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 2: Like he obviously did not have some dramatic improvement as
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 2: a candidate or a state in the race since the shooting,
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 2: like nothing changed there. But something did change in terms
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 2: of how people, how things happen in Washington, even before
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 2: the shooting. In my head, my sort of deadline for
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 2: whether Biden would stay in the race was today, was Monday.
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 2: That if he could make it through the weekend and
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 2: make it to the Republican convention and the VP nomination,
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 2: that he would have survived long enough. Because these things
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 2: have momentum and momentum peters out. And it's just, people
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 2: were feeling pressure because the media was focused on this intently.
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 2: That is not the case. There are no stories about
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 2: this now. It's not as big a deal. And so
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 2: maybe something else will happen. But this is Joe Biden's decision.
• 1:02:12
  Speaker 1: It's only Joe Biden's decision.
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 2: And it's what has been abundantly clear is that nothing
• 1:02:17
  Speaker 2: that any other person says to him is going to
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 2: change his mind. And, you know, he met with Hakeem
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 2: Jeffries on Friday and Schumer on Saturday. We don't know
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 2: how those meetings went, but Joe Biden said he is
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 2: 1000% still in the race. And so this is just,
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 2: this is where he is. He is, at no point
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 2: do we have one piece of reporting or evidence that
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 2: he has ever seriously considered or been open to the
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 2: idea of stepping down. And that hasn't changed. And if
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 2: he does, if that, and I, I hesitate to see
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 2: what will change his mind because there's, I don't, I
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 2: think it's.
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 1: Like, you see like the, you know, the New York times,
• 1:02:51
  Speaker 1: Sienna polls, show him down five or six points in
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 1: those swing States. And like, is that going to do it?
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 7: I know.
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 1: Unless like Pelosi, unless like there's, you know, there's, there's
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 1: reporting that Nancy Pelosi does really want him to consider
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 1: stepping aside and is working the phones on this. Maybe
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 1: if Pelosi goes to him, I don't know. I don't know.
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 3: I have, I think I talked to a member of
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 3: Congress today. and asked this question, like, has the momentum
• 1:03:13
  Speaker 3: stalled out? And this person said, no, the only difference
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 3: between a couple of days ago and now is that
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 3: the conversation is quieted because of the assassination attempt. But
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 3: I've read in many news reports and heard from this
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 3: person that Pelosi still thinks there needs to be a
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 3: change and that she's working behind the scenes. And this person,
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 3: you know, is worried that Biden's strategy is basically a
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 3: run up the clock strategy. And that, you know, it
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 3: might be hard to do anything through the RNC. But
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 3: I think what could change his mind is a big
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 3: number of elected officials coming out publicly and saying you
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 3: need to go. Obviously, these Zoom calls, private conversations, gentle cajoling,
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 3: none of that works. This person thought that, you know, firm, harsh,
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 3: sort of like very public pressure effort's might actually change things,
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 3: but I don't know.
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 2: I'm just repeating what I was told. I also, I look, I.
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 4: Don't know that Joe Biden can be like pushed out
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 4: of the race, right? It seems like he can't, but I,
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 4: I do wonder of what happens in the quiet. I mean, look, I,
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 4: I just, I don't know if I'm using this term correctly, but,
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 4: but taking the under on Dan's point that of course,
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 4: Joe Biden has to be defiant. The second he is
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 4: not defiant, the second he leaves any opening to the
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 4: idea that he might not be in the race is
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 4: the moment he's going to have.
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 1: To step down.
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 2: That's what Ro Khanna said, basically.
• 1:04:36
  Speaker 4: The second he would even say to a member of Congress,
• 1:04:38
  Speaker 4: I'm thinking about it, is the second we're all talking
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 4: about that and it's happening before his eyes. So it
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 4: will go from I will never not be running to
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 4: I'm out.
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 2: Much like Joe Biden's interviews, the words you used were incorrect,
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 2: but I got your meaning. Not even close. Is it
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 2: the over? The over-under would be like.
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 3: You score 100 points in a game.
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 2: Over-under, yeah.
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 1: Oh, I see. I see.
• 1:05:01
  Speaker 2: So the odds. I'm saying I think the odds are
• 1:05:04
  Speaker 2: better than I say it is.
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 6: Yes.
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 2: So that's why. Wouldn't I then take the under? No, no, no.
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 2: That's about the spread? What's the spread?
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 1: Okay, we've gone on long enough. People love this shit.
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 2: Again, just another factless assertion.
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 1: Which advisors around Lovett will tell him the truth?
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 2: Hey, guys.
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 1: Is he getting good information?
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 2: This is the kind of rhetoric. How many podcasts have
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 2: to come to you publicly?
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 1: I will not step down.
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 3: Axio says Pelosi wants you to shut the fuck up.
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 2: I will finish the job.
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 1: That is our show for tonight. We'll be back tomorrow
• 1:05:43
  Speaker 1: with reactions to all the latest and night two. of
• 1:05:46
  Speaker 1: the Republican National Convention. What a good time we have
• 1:05:49
  Speaker 1: coming up this week, boys. Good times.
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 2: The best is yet to come.
• 1:05:54
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• 1:06:19
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