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Chuck’s Commentary - Trump Staves Off Lame Duck Status In Indiana Primaries + America Has A “Congress Problem” · The Chuck ToddCast

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Speaker 1: dot com use the code toodcast. Hello, They're happy Wednesday,
1:55
Speaker 1: and welcome to another episode of the Chuck Toodcast. We
1:58
Speaker 1: are coming to you here right after the conclusion of
2:03
Speaker 1: the Indiana and Ohio primary nights. The big news Donald
2:07
Speaker 1: Trump's gambit works. He has a look a very successful
2:12
Speaker 1: night just about all. But so it looks like one,
2:15
Speaker 1: maybe two of the incumbents he targeted may survive too.
2:20
Speaker 1: At most, we'll see one is extraordinarily tight. As I'm
2:25
Speaker 1: coming on the air telling you this. But the but,
2:28
Speaker 1: the but the big deal is that we know he
2:30
Speaker 1: got at least six, and he knocked off six of
2:33
Speaker 1: the eight that they were attempting to target. Yes, technically
2:38
Speaker 1: one of the winners. There's somebody he didn't technically endorse,
2:42
Speaker 1: but he did jump on that bandwagon when somebody let
2:45
Speaker 1: him know that that person was going to win, because
2:49
Speaker 1: we know that when Donald Trump gets to win and
2:52
Speaker 1: he he doesn't celebrate quietly. Right, But let's be realistic here,
2:59
Speaker 1: I was looking at the this is the first test
3:00
Speaker 1: to find out. One is the duck in the Oval
3:04
Speaker 1: office limping right. His poll numbers are terrible with swing voters.
3:09
Speaker 1: His poll numbers are terrible with independence. He is at
3:12
Speaker 1: his lows pretty much across the board everywhere. So it
3:15
Speaker 1: was sort of like the next shoe to drop would
3:19
Speaker 1: have been, okay, has he lost his juice inside the
3:23
Speaker 1: Republican Party? And the month of May here provides two
3:27
Speaker 1: giant tests for his grip on the Republican Party. Test
3:32
Speaker 1: one he just passed with flying colors. Now let's put
3:35
Speaker 1: a few sort of to be shores here in the paragraph. Combined,
3:40
Speaker 1: in these eight GOP Senate primaries combined, there's not one
3:46
Speaker 1: hundred thousand total voters that participated, So we are talking
3:52
Speaker 1: super small primaries. Most of these total primary electorates were
3:57
Speaker 1: twelve thousand votes all. They spent thirteen and a half
4:04
Speaker 1: million dollars, okay, thirteen and a half million dollars to
4:09
Speaker 1: persuade a total of one hundred thousand people who voted,
4:17
Speaker 1: and they didn't win over all, one hundred thousand people
4:19
Speaker 1: with that thirteen million dollars. But they want enough and
4:24
Speaker 1: so what does this mean, Well, it doesn't mean anything
4:27
Speaker 1: for redistricting in Indiana this cycle. But the issue what
4:32
Speaker 1: mattered here was Trump following through in a threat. Right,
4:36
Speaker 1: he is known as Taco Taco Trump whenever he deals
4:42
Speaker 1: with anybody around the world. Right he makes threats to Iran,
4:46
Speaker 1: he backs off. I mean, I think he's backed on
4:48
Speaker 1: and off on the straight up Ormuz multiple times since
4:50
Speaker 1: I started speaking. We're you know, we're we're we're we're
4:55
Speaker 1: going to escort these ships through the straight No, we're
4:58
Speaker 1: not going to do it. So nobody takes his global
5:02
Speaker 1: threats seriously. He'll threaten tariffs, you know, one hundred percent tariffs,
5:06
Speaker 1: and he'll do it for a day and he'll back off.
5:09
Speaker 1: So his threats internationally ring hollow around the world. Whether
5:14
Speaker 1: you're in Iran, whether you're in the UK, whether you're
5:17
Speaker 1: in Germany. Even this, you know what he's threatening here
5:20
Speaker 1: with pulling troops from Germany. Look, the five thousand troops
5:23
Speaker 1: that are going away were just sent over there by
5:25
Speaker 1: Biden when they added more troops. So you know it's
5:28
Speaker 1: there is as many troops there today as there will
5:31
Speaker 1: be at the end of this calendar year as there
5:34
Speaker 1: were when he was in his first term. But inside
5:38
Speaker 1: the Republican Party, he couldn't afford to come across as
5:42
Speaker 1: taco as Taco Trump. He made a threat to these
5:46
Speaker 1: state senators, and he had to follow through with it,
5:49
Speaker 1: and he won. And that's and and it is. It
5:54
Speaker 1: is not a small deal. It is a big deal
5:57
Speaker 1: because losing would have been catastrophic. This is one of
6:01
Speaker 1: those where he had more to lose than he had
6:02
Speaker 1: to gain. Now, what does he gained from this? The
6:06
Speaker 1: big thing he gains is is potential creating new urgency
6:12
Speaker 1: among some of these Southern states that have been on
6:15
Speaker 1: the fence. Right. You know, we know the governor of
6:18
Speaker 1: Alabama said she wasn't going to call a special session.
6:21
Speaker 1: Donald Trump calls the governor's chief of staff. Suddenly minds
6:25
Speaker 1: get changed. They're doing a special session. There seems to
6:28
Speaker 1: be a little bit of squ squeamishness about doing this
6:31
Speaker 1: in South Carolina. After the Indiana results, I'm going to
6:35
Speaker 1: guess that those hesitations now become a little less hesitant
6:42
Speaker 1: in a South Carolina. So the importance of these victories
6:46
Speaker 1: for Trump is that he now has Hey, do you
6:50
Speaker 1: want me to do to you what I just did
6:53
Speaker 1: to these because he just ended their careers and you know,
6:57
Speaker 1: Crystalizin on the live lex and stream and some of
6:59
Speaker 1: you may he's talking about it. We are trying to
7:02
Speaker 1: come up, you know, really the only person that's truly
7:06
Speaker 1: defied him and not just survived but thrived his Brian
7:10
Speaker 1: camp the governor of Georgia. Most everybody else. When Trump
7:16
Speaker 1: targets you in a primary and you lose to sort
7:18
Speaker 1: of Trump the Trump side, it's game, set and match
7:22
Speaker 1: for the political career. You know, there's a there's an
7:25
Speaker 1: exception here or there, but for the most part, being
7:28
Speaker 1: on the wrong side of this, uh, it ends. It
7:31
Speaker 1: ends your current career in the Republican Party. Maybe you
7:34
Speaker 1: buide your time and maybe there's time in the future.
7:36
Speaker 1: Maybe some of them end up switch at parties running
7:38
Speaker 1: his independence. Who knows what they what they end up doing.
7:41
Speaker 1: But the fact is he still had enough juice here
7:44
Speaker 1: to win. Now what does this mean? The other big
7:47
Speaker 1: test this month is the Thomas Massey primary, and he
7:51
Speaker 1: has put Massy front and center and that has been
7:54
Speaker 1: a big deal to him. He's not alone in being
7:57
Speaker 1: irritated by Massy. Inside the Republican Party, mass See has
8:00
Speaker 1: been a constant thorn in the side of the Republican establishment,
8:05
Speaker 1: whether it was Mitch McConnell running the establishment, whether it
8:09
Speaker 1: was Kevin McCarthy, or whether it's Donald Trump. So Trump
8:16
Speaker 1: has a lot of allies here inside the Republican Party
8:20
Speaker 1: trying to get Thomas Massey. It's close primary Kentucky. On
8:27
Speaker 1: one hand, that should benefit Trump, meaning it's you know,
8:30
Speaker 1: self described Republicans are more likely to make MAGA. At
8:32
Speaker 1: the same time, Massey knows his electorate really well, and
8:36
Speaker 1: he's won these primaries multiple times, and he's been challenged
8:39
Speaker 1: before and he's not just survived and he's thrived a
8:46
Speaker 1: Massy victory. I don't think. Here's the question I have
8:52
Speaker 1: is the is a Massy beating Trump. It's a bigger deal.
8:59
Speaker 1: Had Trump sort of come up a bit short in
9:01
Speaker 1: these Indiana primaries, but the ability of him to swamp
9:06
Speaker 1: in Indiana and essentially, you know, most of these races
9:10
Speaker 1: weren't that close. Massey has survived before. And it's a quirk.
9:18
Speaker 1: You know, the Republican Party in Kentucky is just different. Right,
9:21
Speaker 1: Here's the state of Kentucky that has all sorts of
9:24
Speaker 1: flavors of people that don't like Trump, but they are
9:27
Speaker 1: all Republicans. Right, Mitch McConnell, Rand, Paul Thomas Massey. Right,
9:33
Speaker 1: the three of them don't actually together agree on much.
9:37
Speaker 1: They may agree on Hemp and even that, I think
9:40
Speaker 1: they disagree with some of the details on what parts
9:42
Speaker 1: of him, what can be legalized, on what can't. But
9:45
Speaker 1: the point is is that there is there is a
9:47
Speaker 1: different type of Republican that can win in Kentucky that
9:52
Speaker 1: doesn't have to be a saluter of the party. And
9:55
Speaker 1: if Trump doesn't win that prime, he doesn't knock off
9:57
Speaker 1: a Massy. Well, you know, he the first populace to
10:02
Speaker 1: fail at knocking off an incumbent Republican in the state
10:06
Speaker 1: of Kentucky. So the biggest thing that Donald Trump has
10:10
Speaker 1: postponed is the perception that he's now a lame duck
10:13
Speaker 1: with in his own party. Because here's the other thing
10:15
Speaker 1: he avoided by having the big night that he had
10:18
Speaker 1: in Indiana. There's plenty of Republicans I've talked to a
10:21
Speaker 1: few of them who are just waiting for the permission
10:24
Speaker 1: slip to just start to be able to publicly start
10:27
Speaker 1: to make get distance from Trump. And this is where
10:30
Speaker 1: this could be sort of a great victory for Trump,
10:33
Speaker 1: but bad news if you're a Republican on the ballot
10:36
Speaker 1: in twenty six. There's a lot of Republicans who have
10:40
Speaker 1: been looking for an opportunity to show some independence from Trump.
10:48
Speaker 1: There were some of these Republicans quietly hoping that the
10:51
Speaker 1: voters of Indiana would sort of deliver them the proof
10:54
Speaker 1: that it is okay to jump into that type of messaging,
10:59
Speaker 1: that the water is okay, that it is safe to
11:02
Speaker 1: do this. And the results in Indiana say, you may
11:07
Speaker 1: want to wait here, you may want to wait a
11:08
Speaker 1: few minutes, you may want to wait to see. Now
11:12
Speaker 1: doesn't look like things are getting any better anytime soon
11:15
Speaker 1: with Iran. And there's no doubt you looked at the
11:18
Speaker 1: polling that we discussed in the Monday podcast, this week.
11:22
Speaker 1: It is bad for Trump. Ye, he is at a
11:25
Speaker 1: low only in the days following January sixth, as he
11:29
Speaker 1: ever pulled lower than he's pulling at the moment. But
11:32
Speaker 1: he's hanging tough with Republicans. Right, he has still got
11:35
Speaker 1: eighty percent approval among Republicans. It's on the low end
11:40
Speaker 1: of what is sort of a governable rating to have
11:43
Speaker 1: right the minute that starts to dip into the seventies
11:47
Speaker 1: and then Trump has Trump then has to ask himself
11:50
Speaker 1: he's got some actual base Republicans starting to question his billy,
11:54
Speaker 1: but he hasn't. It hasn't dropped below eighty yet. And
12:01
Speaker 1: so look, when you're a second term president that can't
12:04
Speaker 1: seek reelection, you know the the uh, the lame duck
12:12
Speaker 1: gods are coming for you at any moment, and it's
12:16
Speaker 1: all about staving it us off as long as you
12:19
Speaker 1: possibly can. Right, Why is he so desperate to see
12:24
Speaker 1: if he can save at least one House of Congress,
12:26
Speaker 1: Although we can question whether he is really as desperate
12:29
Speaker 1: as he should be, because if he says only loses
12:34
Speaker 1: one instead of two, he can at least claim some
12:37
Speaker 1: sort of strength going into the last two years of
12:42
Speaker 1: his presidency. He loses both the House and the Senate,
12:45
Speaker 1: and his presidency as we know it is over. Yes,
12:49
Speaker 1: he's still got his executive authority, and yes there's all
12:52
Speaker 1: sorts of other ways that he can influence things, but
12:58
Speaker 1: ultimately he wants to push off being a lame duck.
13:00
Speaker 1: I have said it's possible we may look back and
13:02
Speaker 1: say February twenty eighth was really the beginning of his presidency,
13:06
Speaker 1: turning becoming a lame duck president, starting the Iran War.
13:09
Speaker 1: It went south. There was no recovering from that, and
13:11
Speaker 1: that's still possible that we may go back and say
13:15
Speaker 1: that's when it started. But here's what we can't say
13:20
Speaker 1: that he's lost, that he's lost his fastball with the
13:24
Speaker 1: Republican Party, because what Indiana has shown us that he's
13:27
Speaker 1: not lost his fastball with the Republican Party. He may
13:31
Speaker 1: it may come, but this was a big deal and
13:36
Speaker 1: it was decisive. Rights It's not like just over the top.
13:44
Speaker 1: It's not like just barely winning these races. It was
13:47
Speaker 1: decisive and again not a small deal, because any other
13:52
Speaker 1: outcome would have been politically catastrophic for all those reasons.
13:56
Speaker 1: I was online, you'd have had a race the number.
13:59
Speaker 1: It would have been the permission slip for Republicans to
14:03
Speaker 1: start getting their distance from Trump. And again that's where
14:08
Speaker 1: may make this a double edged sword. What's good for
14:10
Speaker 1: Trump may not be good for Republicans on the ballot
14:14
Speaker 1: come this November because they now don't yet have that
14:18
Speaker 1: permission slip to separate. We might as well talk a
14:23
Speaker 1: little bit about Ohio. There really weren't any big primaries
14:27
Speaker 1: in Ohio, but Ohio is setting up to be to
14:31
Speaker 1: give us flashbacks to win. It was one of the
14:33
Speaker 1: most important swing states in America. Both the governor's race
14:36
Speaker 1: and the Senate race look like nail biders. And there's
14:40
Speaker 1: a couple of reasons for it. Right, You've got the
14:45
Speaker 1: Democrats basically found the best candidate they could possibly have
14:48
Speaker 1: in the Senate race, Shared Brown, and it's an appointed
14:51
Speaker 1: center John Houston, the one time lieutenant governor who frankly
14:55
Speaker 1: whose ambition was to run for governor and he'd rather
14:58
Speaker 1: be running for governor. But Donald Trump, I mean, this
15:03
Speaker 1: is where look, it is not good to cross Donald Trump.
15:07
Speaker 1: His ability to pick primary winners can end political careers
15:13
Speaker 1: or change their trajectories. Donald Trump decided to endorse Ramaswami
15:17
Speaker 1: when Elon Musk wanted Vivek out of DOGE and they
15:21
Speaker 1: were created the soft landing. Ramaswami decided he run a
15:24
Speaker 1: run for governor of Ohio and Trump did him in
15:26
Speaker 1: the favor by endorsing him immediately, and it cleared the
15:29
Speaker 1: primary field. The outgoing Attorney General Dave Yos was likely
15:34
Speaker 1: going to run for governor, so was the sitting Lieutenant
15:36
Speaker 1: governor at the time, John Houston, and Donald Trump basically
15:42
Speaker 1: cleared he didn't. Basically he cleared the primary field. Yes,
15:46
Speaker 1: I think Ramaswamy technically had a primary challenger on Tuesday Night,
15:50
Speaker 1: but nobody of significance. But in doing so, it's like
15:56
Speaker 1: when Donald Trump endorsed Jade Vance in the Senate primary
15:58
Speaker 1: in twenty two. Trump has endorsed the weakest possible Republican
16:02
Speaker 1: you could have running for the Senate. If John Houston
16:06
Speaker 1: we're running to essentially as lieutenant governor to replace Mike
16:12
Speaker 1: DeWine and Amy acting where the Democratic nominee. I think
16:16
Speaker 1: it would be a competitive race, but Houston would be
16:19
Speaker 1: the favorite. And right now the betting markets have all
16:22
Speaker 1: flipped and have made act In the favorite. And it's
16:24
Speaker 1: because of Ramaswami. He's done a couple of things, and
16:28
Speaker 1: you know I've mentioned one of them before and you're
16:31
Speaker 1: gonna hear more about this, but you know he is.
16:36
Speaker 1: He is a polarizing figure, just like Jade Vance. And
16:40
Speaker 1: so it is going to make the race more competitive
16:43
Speaker 1: than you arguably should be. Throw in all the money
16:46
Speaker 1: that's going to go into this Senate race, and Ohio
16:50
Speaker 1: is going to be These are two coin flip statewide races.
16:53
Speaker 1: This feels like two thousand and six. Two thousand and
16:56
Speaker 1: six Ohio is when Shared Brown knocked off then incumbent
17:01
Speaker 1: Senator Mike DeWine. By the way, Mike Dewines held a
17:05
Speaker 1: whole bunch of offices in Ohio, but the office he
17:07
Speaker 1: cared about the most is the one he's retiring from now,
17:10
Speaker 1: and that is governor. I think if he weren't term limited,
17:13
Speaker 1: the Wine would be running for a third term. He
17:16
Speaker 1: loves being governor. Like I said, with two thousand and six,
17:19
Speaker 1: you had Shared Brown, who was sitting member of Congress,
17:23
Speaker 1: challenging Mike DeWine, the incumbent senator. He won, and the
17:26
Speaker 1: governor's race was an open governor's race. But the Republican
17:30
Speaker 1: Party was dealing with all sorts of baggage. There was
17:33
Speaker 1: a statewide a bunch of state wide scandals that were
17:36
Speaker 1: sort of nip it at their heels. The outgoing governor,
17:39
Speaker 1: his popularity was waning, but he was term limited Bob
17:42
Speaker 1: Taft and Republicans nominated somebody that was probably a bit
17:45
Speaker 1: too conservative to win the state and Ken Blackwell. And
17:50
Speaker 1: it's possible that Ramaswami is another Ken Blackwell and that
17:53
Speaker 1: he's just doesn't quite fit the Ohio Republican way. I
18:02
Speaker 1: will confess that I thought Amy Acting passed as sort
18:07
Speaker 1: of the COVID the the COVID health expert for the
18:12
Speaker 1: state of Ohio was going to be some political baggage, right.
18:17
Speaker 1: That COVID in general was something that voters didn't want
18:20
Speaker 1: to hear about and want to talk about. But it's
18:22
Speaker 1: turned out to be those that do remember her from
18:25
Speaker 1: COVID it's a net positive. I mean, she got high marks.
18:28
Speaker 1: I remember I got to know her a little bit.
18:31
Speaker 1: She is an incredibly competent health professional. Hardstop did not
18:36
Speaker 1: think of her as a politician sort of in that definition,
18:41
Speaker 1: and I wonder if other Ohio voters sort of see
18:43
Speaker 1: her as sort of more of a non politician than politician,
18:46
Speaker 1: which in this political environment might be a net positive.
18:50
Speaker 1: And ironically Aramaswami, who in twenty twenty three when he
18:54
Speaker 1: started running for president, was sort of Hey, I'm not
18:57
Speaker 1: the politician trying, you know, I'm a new guy. Now
19:01
Speaker 1: even though he's only sort of been around three years,
19:04
Speaker 1: he suddenly doesn't feel new. He was part of Doge,
19:07
Speaker 1: he was part of the sort of the whole Trump team,
19:11
Speaker 1: and so he's part of the incumbent party, right, so
19:15
Speaker 1: he brings with him actually some national baggage that I
19:18
Speaker 1: don't think many Republicans would want right now. So Ohio
19:24
Speaker 1: and Iowa, they were key states in the battleground throughout
19:29
Speaker 1: the throughout the first arguably the first two decades of
19:34
Speaker 1: this century, and Donald Trump sort of turned them from
19:37
Speaker 1: swing states to red states. Well, in the last midterm
19:41
Speaker 1: of the Donald Trump era, is it possible both Iowa
19:45
Speaker 1: and Ohio decide to make their way back into the
19:49
Speaker 1: battleground anyway? Just something to think about. This episode of
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Speaker 1: let me just tell you, let me just tell you
22:17
Speaker 1: about it. Sometimes you participate in something and it just lingers.
22:23
Speaker 1: And this has been lingering in my head a little
22:26
Speaker 1: bit because this whole experience revealed an assumption that I
22:32
Speaker 1: think a lot more people hold than we're comfortable admitting
22:36
Speaker 1: out loud, and it has a lot to do with Congress.
22:39
Speaker 1: So I participated in one of these political crisis simulations
22:43
Speaker 1: that's run by a group called the Atoll Society. And
22:47
Speaker 1: if you're not familiar with them, what the Atall Society
22:51
Speaker 1: is is essentially a collection of academics, technologists, former government officials,
22:57
Speaker 1: democracy scholars. It's people who build stress tests for political systems. Right,
23:03
Speaker 1: you've heard people say, hey, wargaming, you know, if China
23:06
Speaker 1: invades Taiwan, you know, and if you go back, you
23:08
Speaker 1: can go on YouTube and search meet the press reports
23:13
Speaker 1: Taiwan wargame and you can see what I mean by that.
23:16
Speaker 1: It's a simulation of sort of a real time sort
23:19
Speaker 1: of you know, somebody's playing Team China, somebody's playing Team
23:21
Speaker 1: USA and the invasion happens. This is in some ways
23:24
Speaker 1: a similar thing, but for a political a political where
23:28
Speaker 1: where it's not an actual hot war, it's a it's
23:31
Speaker 1: a political fight. So it's a tabletop exercise meets a
23:35
Speaker 1: wargame meets AI modeling. Because artificial intelligence played a big
23:39
Speaker 1: role in this. The whole point of this simulation is
23:43
Speaker 1: not prediction. The point is to pressure test what happens
23:47
Speaker 1: if institutions fail. What happens if norms collapse? What happens
23:52
Speaker 1: if political actors stop behaving small d democratically while still
23:55
Speaker 1: technically operating inside democracy? And the remiss of this simulation
24:02
Speaker 1: is pretty blunt. Let's assume January sixth was not an outlier,
24:07
Speaker 1: that it instead was a test run. It's a warning shot. Now.
24:12
Speaker 1: Ten years ago, the premise of what happened in January
24:15
Speaker 1: sixth would have sounded hysterical, but it actually happened, So honestly,
24:20
Speaker 1: this all now just sounds like something people in both
24:22
Speaker 1: parties quietly now have to game out, and that's what
24:25
Speaker 1: this was. So let me tell you about the simulation.
24:28
Speaker 1: It divides participants into three teams. One team is the institutionalists.
24:35
Speaker 1: These are the defenders of the current constitutional order, courts, elections, procedures, norms.
24:41
Speaker 1: Basically the people trying to preserve the republic as it
24:44
Speaker 1: currently exists. Doesn't mean they're Democrats only, it's just people
24:50
Speaker 1: that sort of are in that sort of belief system
24:54
Speaker 1: of the constitutional republic. Then there are the nationalists. Their
24:58
Speaker 1: goal is not necessarily dictated readership, and I think that
25:02
Speaker 1: distinction matters here, but they do not want a fundamentally different.
25:07
Speaker 1: They want a fundamentally different governing compact with the voters.
25:11
Speaker 1: They want a much stronger executive, a much more centralized
25:14
Speaker 1: form of power, a system where elections matter but institutions
25:20
Speaker 1: matter less. And then there was the third faction, the capitalists,
25:25
Speaker 1: basically the money people. And this is where the whole
25:27
Speaker 1: thing got fascinating because the capitalists, they're the least ideological
25:32
Speaker 1: of anybody in the exercise. They represented markets, investors, business leaders,
25:39
Speaker 1: economic actors. And when you go through the simulation, you
25:43
Speaker 1: quickly realize something. The entire simulation actually revolves around the capitalists.
25:49
Speaker 1: Who side are they going to be on, Who can
25:51
Speaker 1: win them over or who can capture them? Two? Do
25:55
Speaker 1: you persuade them or do you capture them? It isn't
26:01
Speaker 1: the voters you're worrying about. It isn't the courts. It's
26:03
Speaker 1: certainly not Congress. It's capital right. Whoever secures the confidence
26:08
Speaker 1: of the economic class effectively secures legitimacy. And once you
26:12
Speaker 1: see that dynamic play out in a simulation, it becomes
26:16
Speaker 1: hard not to think about history itself, because this is
26:21
Speaker 1: the lesson of a lot of unstable democracies. Political legitimacy
26:25
Speaker 1: often follows economic confidence. If the people with money believe
26:29
Speaker 1: the system can protect stability, contracts, assets, supply chains, they
26:33
Speaker 1: stay in. If they lose confidence, everything accelerates very quickly,
26:38
Speaker 1: and so the simulation becomes deeply transactional. Everybody is trying
26:42
Speaker 1: to reassure the capitalists or give them so much of
26:48
Speaker 1: something that they have a lot more to lose if
26:52
Speaker 1: your side loses. The institutionalists might say, stay with democracy,
27:00
Speaker 1: the system will stabilize. The nationalists might say, we can
27:08
Speaker 1: manipulate things to help you grow your business faster. And
27:13
Speaker 1: the capitalists are constantly asking, well, who can actually deliver
27:18
Speaker 1: both growth and stability. They're not looking for virtue, they're
27:25
Speaker 1: not looking for morality. They're looking for enrichment and stability.
27:30
Speaker 1: I don't know if they'll take enrichment alone if it
27:32
Speaker 1: comes with instability and they fear their money could be taken.
27:36
Speaker 1: But if you can guarantee enough stability in connection with
27:42
Speaker 1: the enrichment, they'll stick by some uncomfortable people. And honestly,
27:48
Speaker 1: that part of the simulation felt very realistic. But here's
27:51
Speaker 1: the part that really stayed with me. In this simulation,
27:55
Speaker 1: Congress itself barely existed, not formally, Congress was technically there,
28:01
Speaker 1: and the midterms were a part of the simulation. The
28:04
Speaker 1: institutionalists swept the midterms, and it was pointless. It didn't stop,
28:10
Speaker 1: in this case the nationalists from accomplishing what they wanted
28:14
Speaker 1: to do, what they wanted to accomplish, winning the presidency
28:17
Speaker 1: in twenty eight and keeping centralizing more and more power.
28:24
Speaker 1: But it was functionally that Congress was just simply irrelevant.
28:29
Speaker 1: The simulation simply assumed that Congress was too slow, too divided,
28:33
Speaker 1: too weak, too structurally incapable of responding to a fast
28:37
Speaker 1: moving constitutional crisis. That assumption wasn't even debated during the game,
28:44
Speaker 1: it was embedded in the architecture of the game itself.
28:48
Speaker 1: The presumption was Congress was ffeckless and a pointless part
28:52
Speaker 1: of this exercise. And so there was a part of
28:56
Speaker 1: me that wondered, are we sure this? If every serious
29:02
Speaker 1: democratic stress test now begins with the assumption that Congress
29:06
Speaker 1: cannot meaningfully constrain executive power, then maybe we've already identified
29:12
Speaker 1: the core problem in American government. Because think about this,
29:17
Speaker 1: the founders designed Congress to be the dominant branch, not
29:23
Speaker 1: an equal branch. Yes, they're equal branches, but one came first,
29:28
Speaker 1: and one was supposed to be the most important. One
29:31
Speaker 1: was supposed to be the one closest to the people.
29:33
Speaker 1: One was supposed to be that was actually the most
29:35
Speaker 1: representative of the people. One was supposed to be the
29:37
Speaker 1: one that was capable of forcing consensus. And now even
29:43
Speaker 1: these sophisticated democracy simulations effectively treat Congress as background scenery.
29:51
Speaker 1: The Presidency acts, the courts react, Capital decides, and Congress watches. This,
30:02
Speaker 1: my friends, is why this republic is not healthy. We
30:06
Speaker 1: have a broken Congress. Even the computer simulation models know this.
30:11
Speaker 1: And it was another thing that bothered me about this.
30:13
Speaker 1: The simulation often rewarded behavior that we would normally criticize
30:17
Speaker 1: in real life transactional politics, pressure campaigns, norms, violations, escalation tactics. Meanwhile,
30:27
Speaker 1: the players who simply trusted the simpsons would hold usually
30:31
Speaker 1: lost or were seen as naive. Perhaps that's realistic, Maybe
30:39
Speaker 1: that's the uncomfortable truth these exercises are trying to surface,
30:46
Speaker 1: because at some point you have to ask, are we
30:48
Speaker 1: modeling democratic collapse or are we psychologically training elites to
30:54
Speaker 1: expect it. That's a different thing. So I walked away
31:00
Speaker 1: from this exercise with an even stronger belief in something
31:02
Speaker 1: I've talked about lately. America does not simply have a
31:06
Speaker 1: polarization problem. We have a Congress problem. We have a
31:10
Speaker 1: structural problem within Congress. It's not just how Congress does
31:17
Speaker 1: its work, it's the structure itself that's broken. We've built
31:23
Speaker 1: a political culture where the legislature is now viewed by
31:27
Speaker 1: both the public and increasingly by experts, as too dysfunctional
31:31
Speaker 1: to even govern during crisis. And once that assumption takes hold,
31:37
Speaker 1: power naturally flows elsewhere to presidents, to the courts, to governors.
31:42
Speaker 1: You know, in these simulations, the governors had a lot
31:44
Speaker 1: more sway to corporations, to billionaires, to media ecosystems. Even
31:53
Speaker 1: in all of these instances, the weakest institution the entire
31:59
Speaker 1: time in the simulation Congress, and our founders designed Congress
32:05
Speaker 1: to be the most important of these institutions. And that's
32:09
Speaker 1: the irony. Everybody says that they're worried about authoritarianism, but
32:14
Speaker 1: very few people spend time talking about the vacuum that
32:17
Speaker 1: makes authoritarianism possible in our system. Weak legislatures create strong executives,
32:25
Speaker 1: and there's a fine line between a strong, small d
32:28
Speaker 1: democratic executive and an authoritarian figure. Historically, that pattern repeats
32:34
Speaker 1: itself over and over and over again. And that's probably
32:39
Speaker 1: the most unsettling part of this entire simulation. It wasn't
32:43
Speaker 1: the scenario that we dealt with itself. It's how many
32:47
Speaker 1: participants seem to accept the premise that the irrelevance of
32:52
Speaker 1: Congress is actually normal. It wasn't tragic, it wasn't alarming,
32:57
Speaker 1: it was just inevitable. And once this democracy starts treating
33:02
Speaker 1: democratic weakness as inevitable, that's potentially when the real danger begins.
33:09
Speaker 1: So I don't know, I'm I'm glad I did this.
33:14
Speaker 1: If you ever get an opportunity to participate in one
33:16
Speaker 1: of these, do it because I think the exercise itself
33:21
Speaker 1: is important because I think in the Donald Trump era,
33:24
Speaker 1: as a friend of mine likes to say, the thing
33:28
Speaker 1: with Trump is where that miss we miss about Trump
33:32
Speaker 1: sometimes as failure of imagination. And I don't think anybody
33:39
Speaker 1: saw January sixth coming until you know, sometime in twenty eighteen,
33:45
Speaker 1: twenty nineteen, you started to see people start to talk
33:47
Speaker 1: about it. And of course people but not in twenty
33:52
Speaker 1: fifteen or twenty sixteen. It seemed totally far fetched, right,
33:59
Speaker 1: But the bigger problem we have in our politics this
34:02
Speaker 1: is not you know, we're going to sit here and
34:04
Speaker 1: say it's it's Donald Trump problem. Donald Trump, as many
34:08
Speaker 1: people have said, is simply a system, a symptom. He
34:13
Speaker 1: is a creation of a broken that sort of filled
34:16
Speaker 1: a vacuum that it was created by a broken system.
34:20
Speaker 1: And this broken system is Congress. I spend a big
34:24
Speaker 1: chunk of my column this week on new Sphere and
34:27
Speaker 1: Substack focused on this, that Congress is the broken branch.
34:32
Speaker 1: We had Sarah Scaran with her book about the Supreme
34:35
Speaker 1: Court where she titled her book the Last Branch Standing,
34:38
Speaker 1: and that implies that the other two branches are not standing.
34:41
Speaker 1: I don't. The executive branch has never been stronger, so
34:46
Speaker 1: I think when she meant by last branch standing, the
34:48
Speaker 1: last branch that seems to have some ability to to
34:56
Speaker 1: give credibility, some ability to have credibilit with enough of
35:01
Speaker 1: the public. But the real crisis we have in our
35:05
Speaker 1: democracy is broken Congress. And what's frustrating is how few
35:09
Speaker 1: everybody wants to fix everything around it. We're not trying
35:13
Speaker 1: to tackle Congress itself, right, the institution, you know, it
35:17
Speaker 1: is too leadership driven. When Congress is leadership driven, it's
35:23
Speaker 1: partisan driven. When Congress is led by the committee chairs
35:27
Speaker 1: and the ranking members, they actually care about policy and issues.
35:31
Speaker 1: That is how Congress worked in the seventies and eighties
35:33
Speaker 1: and even a little bit in the nineties, but particularly
35:36
Speaker 1: after nine to eleven, Congress essentially washed its hands of
35:41
Speaker 1: more and more of everything, and the amounts of deference
35:45
Speaker 1: that Congress handed to the executive branch created the ability
35:50
Speaker 1: to create this stronger executive that has allowed somebody who
35:55
Speaker 1: wants to weaponize the strength of the executive to do
36:00
Speaker 1: things that suddenly don't feel small d democratic anymore. But
36:07
Speaker 1: you know, I'm going to jump on my other hobby horse.
36:09
Speaker 1: We are about to go. We are about to make
36:11
Speaker 1: Congress even less relevant. We're about to make Congress even
36:14
Speaker 1: more leadership driven, which means more partisan driven, more politically driven,
36:19
Speaker 1: and less issue driven with these gerrymandering wars. I mean,
36:24
Speaker 1: here's the other thing to take away from Tuesday Night's primary.
36:28
Speaker 1: Every state that can remap before the twenty eight general
36:32
Speaker 1: election is going to do it. Soliza and I set
36:35
Speaker 1: the over under at eight and a half states, and
36:37
Speaker 1: you would take the over I'll go to it now.
36:40
Speaker 1: Between now and April of twenty twenty eight, I think
36:45
Speaker 1: the following will likely happen. Georgia will remap South Carolina
36:49
Speaker 1: will remap, Maryland will remap New Jersey, will remap New York,
36:56
Speaker 1: will remap Ohio probably one more time. I think Texas
37:01
Speaker 1: goes and tries to take another bite at the apple.
37:03
Speaker 1: Would they realize how poorly they did the first remap.
37:07
Speaker 1: I think California goes again. If they get a Democratic governor,
37:11
Speaker 1: they go and get even more aggressive, and they go again.
37:15
Speaker 1: Oregon will do it. I assume Washington State will do it.
37:21
Speaker 1: I wouldn't rule out Minnesota. In the South, we know
37:26
Speaker 1: Alabama's going to do it, Louisiana's going to do it,
37:30
Speaker 1: Mississippi's going to do it. Georgia is going to do it.
37:33
Speaker 1: After the election, you know, some of these states may
37:35
Speaker 1: do it before. We know Tennessee so I know, actually
37:39
Speaker 1: I guess I should we should set that over under
37:41
Speaker 1: to over ten and if you get some look Minnesota,
37:45
Speaker 1: if they get the trifecta, and they might, if the
37:47
Speaker 1: wind is blowing in the in team Blues direction, you
37:50
Speaker 1: could see Minnesota doing it. I think if there's a
37:53
Speaker 1: Republican governor of Kansas. I think you throw Kansas into
37:58
Speaker 1: the mix so we could have this situation where we
38:02
Speaker 1: have these maximalist maps in every state where it was
38:06
Speaker 1: possible to create it. Ask yourself, are we going to
38:10
Speaker 1: have individual members of Congress or does this start to
38:13
Speaker 1: look like the electoral college where it's just individual widgets. Oh,
38:19
Speaker 1: the state of Tennessee is supposed to have nine members
38:21
Speaker 1: of Congress. Okay, well, these nine widgets will and in
38:25
Speaker 1: the minute the widget behaves like an individual, one of
38:29
Speaker 1: two things will happen. They'll either get primary or they'll
38:33
Speaker 1: get redrawn. That I mean it would. What the hell
38:41
Speaker 1: does this legislature become is it will no longer be
38:46
Speaker 1: a serious legislative branch. It will be filled with nothing
38:52
Speaker 1: but partisanship because if you stray, you're gonna lose your seat.
39:01
Speaker 1: It's not what founders intended. At some point, the public's
39:05
Speaker 1: gonna break from this, But as we always know, the
39:09
Speaker 1: breaking point is always a little bit further down the
39:13
Speaker 1: road than maybe some of us wish it were. I
39:19
Speaker 1: can't make it clear enough. I think there's all sorts
39:21
Speaker 1: of things we need to do to bring to make
39:25
Speaker 1: Congress great again. The number one thing we need to
39:28
Speaker 1: do is to right size Congress. Congress is right now
39:33
Speaker 1: as small in some ways as it's ever been, because
39:38
Speaker 1: it's the least representative of the country as it's ever been,
39:41
Speaker 1: and it's about to get even more or less representative.
39:44
Speaker 1: It is too big. It does not represent the diversity
39:48
Speaker 1: of the country, and it has to be expanded. My
39:56
Speaker 1: fear is that we are now in such a such
40:02
Speaker 1: a battle for power that when one side gets it,
40:09
Speaker 1: the last thing they're going to do is to do
40:12
Speaker 1: anything that might dilute it. So I wouldn't hold my
40:18
Speaker 1: breath expecting that if Democrats somehow win Congress that they're
40:22
Speaker 1: going to pass a law that somehow prevents gerrymandering. It
40:25
Speaker 1: ain't going to happen, But maybe they sober up and
40:31
Speaker 1: realize that Congress needs to be expanded. It is I
40:37
Speaker 1: really believe this, and I know maybe more and more
40:39
Speaker 1: people are starting to see the virtue in uncapping the House.
40:45
Speaker 1: But if you want to bring small d democracy back
40:49
Speaker 1: to Congress, if you want to bring diversity back to Congress,
40:53
Speaker 1: if you want to bring diversity of thought back to Congress,
40:56
Speaker 1: if you want to bring localized political views truly represented
41:03
Speaker 1: and the floors of Congress. You're going to have to
41:06
Speaker 1: expand it. And you wouldn't be doing something that is
41:11
Speaker 1: like packing the courts or something like that. You would
41:14
Speaker 1: be doing something that James Madison advocated. So if you
41:20
Speaker 1: consider yourself a Madisonian Conservative, if you consider yourself a constitutionalist,
41:29
Speaker 1: then expanding the House as a no brainer. But we
41:32
Speaker 1: have to do something because the biggest problem we have
41:36
Speaker 1: in our in our weak democracy, is the reason our
41:42
Speaker 1: democracy feels weak at the moment and vulnerable is because
41:46
Speaker 1: Congress doesn't work and Congress is the broken branch. That's
41:52
Speaker 1: that's the emergency. I know, it doesn't feel like one.
41:56
Speaker 1: I know, you know, there's it's sort of like, you know,
42:01
Speaker 1: there's there's some sort of glory in wanting to be
42:05
Speaker 1: able to find the righteous person to become prejudict president.
42:09
Speaker 1: Fixing Congress, you know, feels like cleaning your gutters. But
42:14
Speaker 1: you know what, you have to clean your gutters. We
42:18
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Speaker 1: I absolutely embrace, so use that codet Top five Top
44:16
Speaker 1: testp my top five list. This week, it's another twist.
44:22
Speaker 1: This one's on governor's races and it is on the
44:26
Speaker 1: five longest droughts of sort of one party dominance or
44:31
Speaker 1: one party deficits if you will, that have a realistic
44:37
Speaker 1: chance of being broken this cycle. Just to sort of
44:41
Speaker 1: update you, South Dakota right now has the crown of
44:45
Speaker 1: longest running one party dominance of any state in the
44:50
Speaker 1: Union for forty seven years. Since nineteen seventy nine, a
44:55
Speaker 1: Republican has held the governorship in South Dakota. Uninner uped it.
45:01
Speaker 1: No other state is at forty seven years. There are
45:04
Speaker 1: two other states that are over forty years. It is
45:07
Speaker 1: Washington State and Utah. Both have had the same party
45:12
Speaker 1: control the governorship going back to nineteen eighty five. And no,
45:15
Speaker 1: I don't think South Dakota. Both Washington Utah are not
45:19
Speaker 1: up this cycle. They're on the presidential cycle. The next
45:23
Speaker 1: longest streak that is up this cycle is Oregon at
45:28
Speaker 1: thirty nine years, and they've had a few competitive races
45:32
Speaker 1: where Republicans have come very very close. About early in
45:36
Speaker 1: the last decade, former Portland trailblazer Chris Dudley came offully
45:41
Speaker 1: close to pulling up. Sad he's actually running for governor again,
45:43
Speaker 1: but he trails in a fairly crowded primary, and she
45:47
Speaker 1: could be Tina Cotex running for reelection. We had a
45:50
Speaker 1: crazy we had sort of a very competitive three way
45:52
Speaker 1: election the last time. So you know, there's a chance
45:55
Speaker 1: Oregon pops on my radar, but it doesn't break my
45:57
Speaker 1: top five. But the point is, when I want to
46:00
Speaker 1: focus on this week, it's my top five lists, or
46:02
Speaker 1: the it's the five most likely droughts of fifteen years
46:09
Speaker 1: or longer. That's what I'm considering a real partisan drought
46:13
Speaker 1: fifteen years longer, because it's essentially four terms that you
46:16
Speaker 1: haven't won in four terms, you haven't won in four elections,
46:23
Speaker 1: a party out of power, and in this case it
46:26
Speaker 1: is because we are looking at a year that is
46:29
Speaker 1: all that is probably leaning blue. It is hard to
46:33
Speaker 1: imagine that a long Republican drought somehow comes to fruition. Now,
46:40
Speaker 1: one that could happen. It's California, right, there is a chance,
46:43
Speaker 1: it's not a zero percent chance. There's a chance that Moth,
46:46
Speaker 1: Steve Helton and Chad Bianco end up one and two
46:49
Speaker 1: in that top in the top two primary in California,
46:51
Speaker 1: and then you're guaranteed a Republican which would break a
46:55
Speaker 1: drought in California that goes back to Schwarzenegger. It's not
46:59
Speaker 1: as nearly as long as some of them, but that
47:01
Speaker 1: drought is about fifteen years. But now it looks like
47:05
Speaker 1: a Democrat is going to get in the second slot,
47:07
Speaker 1: whether it's Bisera, whether it's tire. Does feel like that
47:09
Speaker 1: the Trump endorsement of Hilton has prevented that. So when
47:13
Speaker 1: you really look at some of the Republican drought states,
47:17
Speaker 1: there really isn't There really isn't one that's in the
47:22
Speaker 1: double digits that's going to happen. I mean Kansas, I
47:25
Speaker 1: think is a Democratic held state that I would favor
47:27
Speaker 1: the Republicans in, but literally it hasn't been that long.
47:33
Speaker 1: It's been I think seven years. Basically, it's just been
47:36
Speaker 1: two terms since the Republican Party held the governorship in Kansas.
47:41
Speaker 1: So in the droughts this year, the big long droughts
47:47
Speaker 1: most likely to be broken are going to be Democrats
47:50
Speaker 1: sort of breaking their losing streaks in some of these states.
47:54
Speaker 1: So in that sense, my top five this year the
47:57
Speaker 1: five most likely states to to where the Democrats could
48:02
Speaker 1: end a two, three, a two or a three decade
48:08
Speaker 1: drought in winning that governor's race. So number five on
48:12
Speaker 1: the list is the one with the long with the
48:15
Speaker 1: longest drought that I think is going to at least
48:17
Speaker 1: be a single digit race. By no means do I
48:20
Speaker 1: think the Republicans are going to lose the Texas governorship.
48:23
Speaker 1: But I think Greg Abbott is much more vulnerable than
48:25
Speaker 1: people realize. Is trying to do something unprecedented. He's trying
48:31
Speaker 1: to become the longest serving UH Texas governor in history.
48:35
Speaker 1: As I've told you before, every state gets fatigue. Eventually,
48:39
Speaker 1: I apparently accept the Oregon in South Dakota, right, I kid,
48:43
Speaker 1: but party fatigues a real thing, especially when you're in
48:46
Speaker 1: a state that isn't that isn't as you know, that
48:50
Speaker 1: is more light blue or light red. And in this case,
48:52
Speaker 1: I think Texas is turning from dark red to light red.
48:56
Speaker 1: Democrats got to win something to actually prove that they
48:59
Speaker 1: can actually win something in the state. They have not
49:01
Speaker 1: won anything statewide yet in a long time, not since
49:04
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety four. It's the last time they won any
49:06
Speaker 1: state wide race. But they do. Look, it looks likely
49:10
Speaker 1: that both major state wide races are going to be
49:13
Speaker 1: decided by five points or less. And I can't I
49:16
Speaker 1: don't think that has happened certainly since nineteen ninety four,
49:20
Speaker 1: where multiple races decided by five point statewide races in
49:24
Speaker 1: the state of Texas decided by five points or less.
49:26
Speaker 1: So look, Gina Youinojosa is she's been on this podcast's
49:33
Speaker 1: There's never been a poll that has shown her anywhere
49:38
Speaker 1: more than four or five six points behind. Abbo. Abbot
49:43
Speaker 1: does not break fifty. I have not seen a poll
49:45
Speaker 1: where he has broke fifty in quite some time. This
49:48
Speaker 1: school voucher program that he pushed is very polarizing. Where
49:55
Speaker 1: it's popular, it's really popular. But he had to do
49:57
Speaker 1: a purge in his own party in order to get
49:59
Speaker 1: this through the party. The Republican Party in Texas is
50:02
Speaker 1: incredibly divided, and divided parties become vulnerable. Throw Paxton. If
50:09
Speaker 1: Paxton wins this runoff in the Senate race, you're just
50:12
Speaker 1: going to get more money into the state. More money
50:15
Speaker 1: into the state helps all boats rise on the blue
50:19
Speaker 1: side of things. So number five on my list it's
50:24
Speaker 1: you know, I do I think there's I think there's
50:27
Speaker 1: a greater than ten percent chance Democrats can win this,
50:30
Speaker 1: which is a big deal. You can look at the
50:33
Speaker 1: prediction markets and see what they put it at, but
50:36
Speaker 1: I think there is certainly a better than one in
50:39
Speaker 1: ten shot that Democrats could pull this off. All the
50:42
Speaker 1: ingredients are there. The question is whether he knows can
50:45
Speaker 1: present herself as sort of moderate enough. Is the Democratic
50:48
Speaker 1: brand too liberal for some of these swing voters who
50:52
Speaker 1: maybe are a little tired of Abbot, maybe think the
50:55
Speaker 1: Republican Party's gotten too far to sure, maybe are upset
50:58
Speaker 1: about what's been happening to their public school system. You know,
51:02
Speaker 1: that's the open question here. But number five on this
51:05
Speaker 1: list of drought breaking is Texas. Number four, I said, Alabama,
51:10
Speaker 1: there is And it goes to something I brought up
51:12
Speaker 1: the other day. I think the decision by the governor
51:19
Speaker 1: to first call a special session and then first and
51:22
Speaker 1: saying they weren't going to call a special session, then suddenly,
51:25
Speaker 1: after a phone call from President Trump, they decided to
51:27
Speaker 1: do a special session to redraw them map is going
51:31
Speaker 1: to fire up African American voters in Alabama in a
51:36
Speaker 1: way that I don't think Republicans have fully processed. You
51:42
Speaker 1: the fact that Doug Jones, who's run statewide recently, has
51:46
Speaker 1: certainly has a good relationship with the African American community,
51:51
Speaker 1: but is you know, it is not always easy to
51:55
Speaker 1: fire up voters if they don't think you can win.
52:00
Speaker 1: But now he's got something to run against, and suddenly
52:03
Speaker 1: they're going to do this special session. We're in the
52:05
Speaker 1: middle of campaign season and to be able to send
52:08
Speaker 1: the message that Doug Jones is going to be able
52:11
Speaker 1: to send and the message it's being received by African
52:14
Speaker 1: Americans in Alabama that white Republicans are so enthusiastic about
52:21
Speaker 1: disenfranchising you from those congressional seats that they can't even
52:25
Speaker 1: wait one election cycle. God forbid, there's two African American
52:31
Speaker 1: members of Congress for two more years coming from the
52:35
Speaker 1: state of Alabama. That is such a problem for the
52:39
Speaker 1: leadership of Alabama that they are rushing to do this. Now,
52:45
Speaker 1: you're going to tell me that's not going to fire
52:47
Speaker 1: up voters to come out in the polls. You already
52:50
Speaker 1: have a likely Republican nominee who it isn't clear he's
52:55
Speaker 1: even constitutionally eligible to hold the office. I mean, Tommy
52:59
Speaker 1: Tupperville is not making I don't think he's legally eligible
53:05
Speaker 1: to be governor. They have a seven year residency requirement.
53:08
Speaker 1: It seems pretty clear he doesn't meet the seven year requirement.
53:13
Speaker 1: And it's going to be fascinating to see how the
53:15
Speaker 1: courts end up doing this. And maybe you have to
53:16
Speaker 1: wait until the election is won and he's certified before
53:21
Speaker 1: courts there standing and this gets maybe this gets litigated there.
53:25
Speaker 1: But there is a seven year residency requirement, and he
53:29
Speaker 1: seems to not have any evidence to prove that he
53:32
Speaker 1: was a resident for more than seven years, seven straight years.
53:37
Speaker 1: So that's just a small issue that hangs over his campaign.
53:41
Speaker 1: He is he has not been somebody that is. Look,
53:48
Speaker 1: being a US Senator is not a lot of hard work.
53:52
Speaker 1: It's stressful in different ways, but it's not a lot
53:56
Speaker 1: of hard work. I think people expect their governors to
53:59
Speaker 1: have to work pretty hard. And I think the part
54:04
Speaker 1: time nature that Tupperville has treated politics, he has treated
54:11
Speaker 1: politics as if he sent me retired. Right. He literally
54:15
Speaker 1: lives in Florida while campaigning in Alabama, or did when
54:19
Speaker 1: he first started for the USN and now of course
54:21
Speaker 1: he's claims to have a residence in Alabama. I think
54:26
Speaker 1: this is a race that's always traveled under the radar.
54:29
Speaker 1: And I think this is a twenty three year drought
54:31
Speaker 1: right now, twenty four year drought by the time, by
54:35
Speaker 1: the time January comes around, and it's probably you know,
54:40
Speaker 1: it's number four on my list of a drought that's
54:42
Speaker 1: most likely to be flipped over. Number three on the
54:46
Speaker 1: list is for potentially the same reason, but also because
54:49
Speaker 1: it's just simply a swing state. Is the state of Georgia,
54:53
Speaker 1: you have. I mean, look, it's an open seat in
54:56
Speaker 1: a swing state, and the wind is blowing in the
55:00
Speaker 1: direction of the party out of power. The Democratic nominee
55:06
Speaker 1: is likely to be the former mayor of Atlanta, Keiser
55:08
Speaker 1: Lance Bottoms. In a governor's race, being to Atlanta can
55:11
Speaker 1: sometimes be a political problem, not an asset. I think
55:16
Speaker 1: if you're running in a Senate race, it's a little
55:19
Speaker 1: more of an asset than if you're running in a
55:21
Speaker 1: governor's race. And let's see what happens in the gubernatorial primary.
55:26
Speaker 1: I think there's going to be a runoff. In theory
55:30
Speaker 1: it is, you know, Donald Trump may engage in this primary.
55:34
Speaker 1: The candidate he endorsed is suddenly finding themselves in a
55:37
Speaker 1: real race. Bert Jones, who sitting lieutenant governor, has had
55:41
Speaker 1: Trump's endorsement. It seems like forever. A businessman jumped into
55:45
Speaker 1: this race about a month ago named Rick Jackson. He
55:47
Speaker 1: has transformed the race because he's spending a boatload of money.
55:50
Speaker 1: He's probably the stronger nominee if he gets there. I
55:53
Speaker 1: think Burt Jones is too ideologically rigid and probably just
55:59
Speaker 1: a much tougher And if I think he's a nominee,
56:01
Speaker 1: I think I think Democrats becomes a point flip raise.
56:05
Speaker 1: I think Greg Jackson makes a little bit different. I
56:07
Speaker 1: think if he's the nominee, I think he's a little
56:09
Speaker 1: bit more difficult because he's not He's not quote unquote
56:13
Speaker 1: the incumbent party. He doesn't he's embraced Trump without being
56:18
Speaker 1: the Trump endorsed candidate, and so he may be able
56:22
Speaker 1: to put together an outsider coalition without having the downsides
56:26
Speaker 1: of being part of the incumbent party. But it's still
56:29
Speaker 1: because it's a swing state, because of the way the
56:31
Speaker 1: winds are blowing it, because the Senate race is going
56:33
Speaker 1: to be one where I think it's advantage for the
56:35
Speaker 1: Democrats with John ossof there, it's a twenty four year
56:38
Speaker 1: drought for just like with Alabama, but it's a real shot.
56:42
Speaker 1: Basically the last time, you know, was that two cycle
56:46
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety eight, a bunch of Democratic governors won in
56:48
Speaker 1: the South, and a bunch of them lost reelection in
56:51
Speaker 1: two thousand and two, and it's the last time in
56:54
Speaker 1: many of these states that a Democrat was able to
56:57
Speaker 1: hold the governorship. That was true of Alabama, that was
56:59
Speaker 1: true Georgia, that was also true of South Carolina. And
57:02
Speaker 1: so I think both Georgia and Alabama certainly are going
57:05
Speaker 1: to be very competitive. Certainly are going to be single
57:07
Speaker 1: digit races and probably under five points and maybe a
57:10
Speaker 1: coin flip. Number two on the list. You got to
57:13
Speaker 1: go up North Ohio where dare we say it? The
57:16
Speaker 1: prediction markets actually have the Democrats with the slight advantage.
57:22
Speaker 1: The two nominees Amy Acton On the Democratic side, who
57:24
Speaker 1: was the Mike Republican Governor Mike Dewines, COVID advisor is
57:31
Speaker 1: the Democratic nominee. She's never run for public office before,
57:35
Speaker 1: sort of a newcomber to politics. I'll admit when she
57:38
Speaker 1: first got in, I thought, oh, being associated with COVID,
57:41
Speaker 1: isn't that bad politics? Is that going to be helpful?
57:44
Speaker 1: But she has run a very sort of, very much
57:47
Speaker 1: the tortoise and hair type of campaign, and she has
57:50
Speaker 1: just been building block after building block, slowly but surely,
57:54
Speaker 1: and suddenly she looks like a formidable nominee. Meanwhile, on
57:57
Speaker 1: the Republican side, you had Vivik Rabaswami who just ided
58:00
Speaker 1: to jump into this race. It cleared the field. There
58:03
Speaker 1: were others that had been waiting to become governor. There's
58:07
Speaker 1: a retiring attorney general that would have likely been one
58:10
Speaker 1: of the main candidates, perhaps Jim Trussel, the current Lieutenant
58:16
Speaker 1: governor and former football coach of Ohio state. He might
58:19
Speaker 1: have run, but Ramaswami came in, got Trump's endorsement, cleared
58:22
Speaker 1: the field, and he's becoming a He's a very polarizing figure.
58:27
Speaker 1: Doze is unpopular. And then he came up with a doge.
58:31
Speaker 1: He may have he may have already lost this race.
58:37
Speaker 1: So one of the things he did is he came
58:43
Speaker 1: out and he said that Ohio has a surplus of
58:45
Speaker 1: public universities that are quote replicas and clones of one another.
58:51
Speaker 1: And he his platform included this idea of merging various
58:54
Speaker 1: institutions to reduce administration, bureaucracy and overhead and to close
59:00
Speaker 1: the subpar schools. He may have a really good point,
59:05
Speaker 1: sort of from big picture, but you know who loves
59:09
Speaker 1: their universities, the communities that the universities are in. Everybody
59:14
Speaker 1: loves their own university. And Mike the Wine, in fact,
59:19
Speaker 1: the outgoing governor, has separated himself from Ramaswami in the issue.
59:22
Speaker 1: In fact, he says Ohio intentionally placed public colleges within
59:27
Speaker 1: thirty miles of every resident to ensure that commuters who
59:31
Speaker 1: may not be able to afford room and board would
59:33
Speaker 1: still have access to a college education. So basically Mike
59:37
Speaker 1: the Wine. This is so unpopular that the outgoing governor,
59:41
Speaker 1: who is never going to be on the ballot again,
59:43
Speaker 1: doesn't want to get near this idea. And let me
59:46
Speaker 1: tell you, on social media, the Ohio Democrats constantly beat
59:50
Speaker 1: up Ramaswami for this. And you know when this is
59:53
Speaker 1: going to be front and center every weekend right before
59:58
Speaker 1: election day college football season. You're going to have your
1:00:02
Speaker 1: Miami of Ohios, your Ohio Universities, your Toledos, and you
1:00:07
Speaker 1: name it. And every weekend they're going to be playing football.
1:00:11
Speaker 1: And every weekend their alumni are going to care what
1:00:14
Speaker 1: they do, and every weekend they're going to be reminded
1:00:17
Speaker 1: that Viva Ramswami might want to close that school. This
1:00:21
Speaker 1: is one of those cases. It reminds me of the
1:00:24
Speaker 1: back in the eighties and nineties when they were right
1:00:26
Speaker 1: after the Cold War, when there was attempts to sort
1:00:28
Speaker 1: of consolidate and shrinked military bases, and we had these
1:00:33
Speaker 1: military base closure commissions, and it look it made sense
1:00:38
Speaker 1: from the grand scheme of things, but the minute one
1:00:41
Speaker 1: actually was going to get closed, there was this uproar
1:00:44
Speaker 1: in the local community, uproar from that member of Congress,
1:00:48
Speaker 1: maybe even that governor, maybe that senator, and a lot
1:00:51
Speaker 1: of times they were stopped because the public was so
1:00:54
Speaker 1: upset about losing the military base that had become a
1:00:58
Speaker 1: piece of the fabric of their community. That's this is
1:01:03
Speaker 1: this stuff, this was this is an unforced heir that
1:01:08
Speaker 1: I look at this. This may be if he loses,
1:01:11
Speaker 1: this will be the reason Ramaswami loses. This is a
1:01:15
Speaker 1: fifth a sixteen year drought four terms Democrats pull it off.
1:01:19
Speaker 1: Twenty ten, twenty oh six was the last time they
1:01:22
Speaker 1: won a governor's race, and they lost it in twenty
1:01:26
Speaker 1: ten and hadn't hadn't won since. And the number one
1:01:30
Speaker 1: of the list is one that's frankly been on the
1:01:32
Speaker 1: top five when I say the top five most likely
1:01:35
Speaker 1: to flip no matter what. And then of course is Iowa.
1:01:37
Speaker 1: It is also a four election drought. That was twenty
1:01:42
Speaker 1: six is the last time Democrats elected a governor in Ohio.
1:01:46
Speaker 1: They lost it. That governor lost reelection in twenty ten
1:01:49
Speaker 1: and they haven't won since. Rob sand is probably the
1:01:53
Speaker 1: slight favorite here. Both Rob saying and Amy acton at
1:01:56
Speaker 1: this point in Iowa and Ohio, believe it or not,
1:01:58
Speaker 1: they think are both light favorites to win at this
1:02:02
Speaker 1: point in the cycle. I think we all knew they'd
1:02:04
Speaker 1: be more competitive than we expected. But the fact that
1:02:07
Speaker 1: they're already ahead says two things. One the national wind
1:02:11
Speaker 1: is definitely blowing in the Democrats direction. And two local
1:02:15
Speaker 1: stuff matters, and Rob saying has run a very effective
1:02:18
Speaker 1: local campaign, and so is Amy acting. You know, And
1:02:23
Speaker 1: there you go. There's the sweets top five. Lesson, ask Chuck.
1:02:36
Speaker 1: All right, let's do a little last chuck. First one
1:02:38
Speaker 1: comes from Kenny and massive mass a Pequa. I like
1:02:42
Speaker 1: to be able to say mass up Pequa, and he says,
1:02:45
Speaker 1: this is my submission for the five Timers Club. Well,
1:02:47
Speaker 1: Kenny massu Pequa, it's very proud of you in this one. Congratulations,
1:02:53
Speaker 1: thanks again for answering my previous questions. With the national
1:02:56
Speaker 1: debt now over one hundred percent of GDP, how did
1:02:58
Speaker 1: we go from a surplus a couple of debts kades
1:03:00
Speaker 1: ago to today's massive deficits without a major crisis driving it?
1:03:04
Speaker 1: What are the real risks if this continues? And should
1:03:07
Speaker 1: average Americans be concerned about long term consequences? Or is
1:03:10
Speaker 1: this less urgent than it sounds. I'd say let's go Mets.
1:03:13
Speaker 1: But thirty two games in and it's already looking like
1:03:15
Speaker 1: a rebuilding here. Sincerely, Kenny ah Man, I don't know.
1:03:22
Speaker 1: I mean, boy, this this whole Mets situation, it's uh,
1:03:26
Speaker 1: I guess this is why the uh, the sports tabloids
1:03:30
Speaker 1: are just are always going to have something something to cover,
1:03:34
Speaker 1: and if they didn't, maybe, you know, it's why New
1:03:36
Speaker 1: York City still, Thank goodness, we still have our backpage tabloids,
1:03:40
Speaker 1: because how else would be would we be able to
1:03:42
Speaker 1: chronicle this incredible Mets campaign that they're that they're embarking
1:03:49
Speaker 1: upon here in twenty twenty six. Look, I think the
1:03:54
Speaker 1: you know, the debt is one of these issues that
1:03:59
Speaker 1: I think we've chicken littled for forty years, and unfortunately,
1:04:08
Speaker 1: we have been telling people the debt is to at
1:04:13
Speaker 1: damn high, this is becoming unmanageable, and then we seem
1:04:16
Speaker 1: to manage it, and then we seem to manage it
1:04:19
Speaker 1: and nothing seems to and we've gone you know, I
1:04:22
Speaker 1: you know, Ross Perrot arguably used the issue of the
1:04:27
Speaker 1: debt as a way to sort of become relevant, and
1:04:31
Speaker 1: it got Bill Clinton, and certainly the markets rewarded Bill
1:04:35
Speaker 1: Clinton for his focus and trying to balance a budget
1:04:38
Speaker 1: and actually create a surplus. And look, we were in
1:04:40
Speaker 1: a brief period of time when it came after the
1:04:43
Speaker 1: Cold War, before nine to eleven, where it felt like
1:04:46
Speaker 1: we had we could, we could, we could sort of
1:04:52
Speaker 1: right size our defense budgets. I brought up base closures
1:04:56
Speaker 1: in the h in my top five list, right, those
1:05:00
Speaker 1: were some things we were trying to do in order
1:05:02
Speaker 1: to start to shrink other country's nut, if you will,
1:05:06
Speaker 1: just a little bit in a variety of places. And
1:05:10
Speaker 1: so there's two ways to look at our ability to
1:05:14
Speaker 1: have a surplus in the nineties. Number one is we
1:05:16
Speaker 1: had that he had to have the political will right,
1:05:20
Speaker 1: and we had between ross Pero, between the Republicans using
1:05:26
Speaker 1: it as a cudgel a little bit, and with Bill
1:05:30
Speaker 1: Clinton seeing the upside of economic prosperity and certainly how
1:05:35
Speaker 1: the markets Bob Ruben, his then National Economic Advisor eventual
1:05:39
Speaker 1: Treasury Secretary would talk him into it. It uh, it worked,
1:05:47
Speaker 1: and it worked then. But it may have been a
1:05:49
Speaker 1: unique period in that what I just described, right, cold
1:05:54
Speaker 1: War is over, nine to eleven hadn't happened yet, so
1:05:59
Speaker 1: we felt pretty secure in our in our place and
1:06:04
Speaker 1: and it was a time that we could start right
1:06:06
Speaker 1: sizing things. I mean, if you want to know what
1:06:12
Speaker 1: really blew a hole through the through the through this
1:06:14
Speaker 1: deficit and where we stopped taking it seriously is in
1:06:18
Speaker 1: the most recent time is nine to eleven happens, and
1:06:22
Speaker 1: we still went through with the Bush tax cuts. You
1:06:27
Speaker 1: know it is we have separated out the cost of
1:06:32
Speaker 1: military operations from the taxpayers, even though we all still
1:06:37
Speaker 1: pay for it. But essentially we debt finance our wars.
1:06:41
Speaker 1: We're debt financing, you know, parts of our social safety tad.
1:06:47
Speaker 1: And it's worked. And the longer it works, the more
1:06:54
Speaker 1: you're going to think you can keep doing it. So
1:06:59
Speaker 1: I do, here's what I'd like to understand better. And
1:07:03
Speaker 1: just so you know, I'm going to have the head
1:07:05
Speaker 1: of the pe Peterson Foundation, which is sort of the
1:07:09
Speaker 1: one of the leading sort of think tanks that focuses
1:07:11
Speaker 1: on the debt and is trying to get bipartisan interest
1:07:15
Speaker 1: in it in figuring out, you know, can can we
1:07:19
Speaker 1: start to you know, is We've had plenty of people
1:07:24
Speaker 1: say this is a national security risk, but I kind
1:07:27
Speaker 1: of think we need to outline it better. I think
1:07:28
Speaker 1: we need to educate the public better and explain it better,
1:07:32
Speaker 1: because you know, at first it was well, it turns
1:07:34
Speaker 1: out we can withstand a greater debt to GTP GDP
1:07:38
Speaker 1: ratio than we thought we could. And as long as
1:07:41
Speaker 1: the bond market doesn't complain, we're fine. But it does
1:07:46
Speaker 1: make us vulnerable to our foreign creditors if they ever
1:07:50
Speaker 1: choose to band together and make us pay, you know,
1:07:54
Speaker 1: and sort of call in their chits. But as long
1:07:59
Speaker 1: as the United States is essentially that the debt of
1:08:02
Speaker 1: the United States is the equivalent of a gold bar,
1:08:06
Speaker 1: will probably have even more room to run. You know,
1:08:10
Speaker 1: maybe we get to one hundred and twenty five percent
1:08:12
Speaker 1: of debt to GDP before the markets flinch. Maybe it's
1:08:17
Speaker 1: going to be one hundred and fifty percent. You're asking
1:08:21
Speaker 1: questions that I'd like a better because you know what
1:08:27
Speaker 1: plenty of experts said to us, we've blown past all
1:08:30
Speaker 1: these supposed yellow flags. Well, if we get past here,
1:08:34
Speaker 1: then it's going to become a problem. We get passed here. Ultimately,
1:08:37
Speaker 1: it's going to be the bond market that makes this
1:08:40
Speaker 1: decision for us, and so far it just hasn't. It
1:08:46
Speaker 1: hasn't budged. But we've now had you know, this president
1:08:52
Speaker 1: in particular, he's just blown a huge hole through this deficit,
1:08:56
Speaker 1: and again the fact that we didn't but I go
1:08:59
Speaker 1: back to that nine eleven, right, nine to eleven happens.
1:09:02
Speaker 1: We have to do this surge of spending changing, you know,
1:09:08
Speaker 1: basically reimagining our military posture all over the world, and
1:09:13
Speaker 1: we got to do it again. By the way, we're
1:09:17
Speaker 1: and we pursued tax cuts at the same time. Donald
1:09:19
Speaker 1: Trump just did it again. He's basically trying to He
1:09:23
Speaker 1: just made tax his tax cuts permanent and ask for
1:09:26
Speaker 1: a fifty percent defense budget increase. Well, what are you
1:09:32
Speaker 1: going to cut? Do you just want the government to
1:09:35
Speaker 1: be a military and that's it a military service, its
1:09:40
Speaker 1: debt and you know, pay out whatever whatever you can
1:09:44
Speaker 1: to Social Security and Medicare. So I don't have a
1:09:50
Speaker 1: good answer on this. I want to bring in more
1:09:52
Speaker 1: experts on this and understand, you know, it's about time.
1:09:55
Speaker 1: I'm going to have Mark Xandy on soon and this
1:09:57
Speaker 1: is going to be a big chunk of our conversation.
1:10:00
Speaker 1: You know, we've been told we can't handle certain things,
1:10:03
Speaker 1: and yet we still can't. At some point there's going
1:10:08
Speaker 1: to be a breaking point and I fear it's like
1:10:11
Speaker 1: most things, We're not going to deal with it until
1:10:16
Speaker 1: it's a crisis. We are not going to prepare for
1:10:19
Speaker 1: this crisis. We are going to simply manage it after
1:10:22
Speaker 1: the fact. And my guess is when the bond markets
1:10:25
Speaker 1: go crazy, you know, then it's going to be my
1:10:30
Speaker 1: generation that gets two thirds if it's so security benefit,
1:10:33
Speaker 1: rather than the whole thing, because god forbid we ever
1:10:37
Speaker 1: make the boomers pay for a fricking thing. All right. Sorry,
1:10:41
Speaker 1: I had to do a little boomer attack with that,
1:10:44
Speaker 1: because guess who's guess who's been the most responsible, Not
1:10:49
Speaker 1: just boomer leadership, but it's all been boomer demands of
1:10:53
Speaker 1: the government, whether it's for this, free that, so all
1:10:57
Speaker 1: of those things. And maybe these are all good things
1:10:59
Speaker 1: that we've built, they all cost money, and these same
1:11:03
Speaker 1: folks want their tax cuts to it. Can't have everything.
1:11:07
Speaker 1: And at some point that's going to be the break.
1:11:12
Speaker 1: That's what's going to break us. But we haven't done
1:11:15
Speaker 1: it yet. I guess it'll be up to the bomb markets,
1:11:19
Speaker 1: all right. Next question, if even if one or even
1:11:22
Speaker 1: two Supreme Court vacancies were to open up before November,
1:11:25
Speaker 1: could that re energize it currently soft Republican base and
1:11:27
Speaker 1: reshape the election dynamics. Given Republicans structural advantages and fundraising,
1:11:31
Speaker 1: could a high stakes confirmation fight serve as a catalyst
1:11:33
Speaker 1: that brings disengaged voters back into the fold. And on
1:11:36
Speaker 1: the flip side, are Democrats at risk of measuring the
1:11:39
Speaker 1: drapes too early in assuming the current political environment holds
1:11:41
Speaker 1: through the fall best David, Look, I think that at
1:11:47
Speaker 1: this point, if you're the Republican you're trying to save
1:11:50
Speaker 1: the Senate, you're giving up on the House. I mean,
1:11:55
Speaker 1: you know, maybe the redistricting will mitigate the losses from
1:11:58
Speaker 1: twenty seats to fifty seats, but I think we're you know,
1:12:03
Speaker 1: we're we're beyond. We're beyond the point where simply redistricting
1:12:11
Speaker 1: in a few states is going to save the Republican
1:12:13
Speaker 1: majority in the House. It is not. But what is
1:12:16
Speaker 1: potentially salvageable from the Republicans is saving their Senate majority.
1:12:20
Speaker 1: And you've outlined potentially what could do it a big
1:12:24
Speaker 1: fight over the Supreme Court. But I'm not one hundred
1:12:27
Speaker 1: percent sure it's going to go. The way is sort
1:12:32
Speaker 1: of just do what it's done in the past. For Republicans.
1:12:35
Speaker 1: There's no doubt the vacant Scalia seat. I think it's
1:12:39
Speaker 1: the sole reason Donald Trump won't. You know, you could
1:12:41
Speaker 1: pick a million things if you were say what was
1:12:44
Speaker 1: the one thing you would change that probably would have
1:12:47
Speaker 1: changed the outcome of the election. I think it's Scalia
1:12:49
Speaker 1: staying alive, Scalia lives, Trump doesn't win, but that that
1:12:54
Speaker 1: Senate seat matter. Excuse mean that Supreme Court seat matter
1:12:57
Speaker 1: just enough to voters who didn't like Trump, but who
1:12:59
Speaker 1: were deservative, who vote who decided to vote for And
1:13:05
Speaker 1: I think if you talk that I think I've said
1:13:06
Speaker 1: this before. If you talked to Claire mccaskell and Joe Donnelly,
1:13:09
Speaker 1: the now former senators of Missouri Indiana in twenty eighteen,
1:13:13
Speaker 1: they will tell you that the difference between them winning
1:13:17
Speaker 1: and losing in their minds was the Kavanaugh confirmation fight.
1:13:20
Speaker 1: And when that became a partisan fight, it wasn't just
1:13:24
Speaker 1: that there was a Supreme Court opening. It became the
1:13:27
Speaker 1: national story. So that's my unknown here. Conservatives are winning
1:13:39
Speaker 1: all the time in the court, and the two most
1:13:41
Speaker 1: likely vacancies are going to be conservative vacancies. So you're
1:13:45
Speaker 1: not talking about a change in the makeup of the court.
1:13:48
Speaker 1: I don't know if it's as motivating as Kavanaugh was,
1:13:52
Speaker 1: or as motivating as Ammy Cony Barrett or the open
1:13:54
Speaker 1: Scalia seat was where literally the election could change the
1:13:57
Speaker 1: balance of power on the court. Case nothing would change. Now,
1:14:02
Speaker 1: that'd be just more youthful conservatives on the court. And
1:14:09
Speaker 1: there's certainly been plenty of speculation. Now it's my understanding,
1:14:13
Speaker 1: and you've heard from better experts than me, better reporters
1:14:16
Speaker 1: than me, and Sarah's or that Thomas is going nowhere,
1:14:19
Speaker 1: Thomas is staying, but Alito, Alito might be ready to go.
1:14:28
Speaker 1: But if it's a low profile former clerk of Alitos,
1:14:32
Speaker 1: I just don't know if it galvanizes. Maybe it does.
1:14:37
Speaker 1: Kavanaugh galvanized because of the circumstances of the confirmation itself.
1:14:41
Speaker 1: It became sort of tabloid fodder that elevated it even
1:14:45
Speaker 1: more than it became this sort of It became part
1:14:49
Speaker 1: of the culture wars, and that did fire up the
1:14:52
Speaker 1: Republican base enough, but it didn't fire it up that much.
1:14:57
Speaker 1: That had helped Republicans and House races, right, so it
1:15:01
Speaker 1: helped in a couple of red states, Indiana and Missouri.
1:15:04
Speaker 1: So you know, does this save a Texas senenc I
1:15:09
Speaker 1: guess to save an Alaska senenc, a Nebraska sentence, Kansas
1:15:14
Speaker 1: senency that you know, maybe, But I think you at
1:15:18
Speaker 1: your your you're a you're assuming that conservatives don't feel satisfied.
1:15:24
Speaker 1: I think they, you know, I don't think the stuff
1:15:27
Speaker 1: that used to motivate them and what they wanted to
1:15:29
Speaker 1: get done, this court's done for them. Sometimes when you're satisfied,
1:15:35
Speaker 1: you're not as fired up about the next time it
1:15:38
Speaker 1: comes around, right, So that's I understand the thinking. I
1:15:43
Speaker 1: do think the Trumpet White House is going to push
1:15:46
Speaker 1: this idea. I think Alita my I think it's more
1:15:51
Speaker 1: likely than not Alito gets asked to step down, and
1:15:55
Speaker 1: they do this because they'd be fools not to. They're probably,
1:16:00
Speaker 1: you know, right now, they're more likely to lose a
1:16:02
Speaker 1: Senate than win the Senate. And you certainly aren't going
1:16:05
Speaker 1: to get a Supreme Court nominee through a Democratic you know,
1:16:08
Speaker 1: a Senate. I don't think you will. I just don't.
1:16:13
Speaker 1: So if you you know, if Alito wants to go
1:16:19
Speaker 1: in the next three years or four years, this might
1:16:23
Speaker 1: be the only political time to do it. If he
1:16:24
Speaker 1: wants to guarantee say his clerk replaces him. All right.
1:16:34
Speaker 1: Next question comes from Mark h of Alan, Texas, another Texan.
1:16:37
Speaker 1: All right, hey, Chuck, totally appalled by the attempted assassination
1:16:40
Speaker 1: at the Correspondent Center, but humored me on this. Can the
1:16:42
Speaker 1: alleged assailants initial defense plea be insanity due to Trump
1:16:47
Speaker 1: arrangement syndrome? Just so the government has to go on
1:16:49
Speaker 1: the record that this is not a real thing. There's
1:16:51
Speaker 1: no more infuriating way to display ignorance than to counter
1:16:54
Speaker 1: any valid critique of the administration with a made up
1:16:56
Speaker 1: psychological affliction. Well, we used to have Obama de arrangement syndrome,
1:17:00
Speaker 1: which which the left you still accuse the right of
1:17:03
Speaker 1: just so you know it's not in this case, it wasn't.
1:17:06
Speaker 1: And I do think there is some truth to it
1:17:09
Speaker 1: and with some people where everything is that right and
1:17:15
Speaker 1: and you kind of you kind of need to not
1:17:18
Speaker 1: get stuck in that. But this this has run the
1:17:21
Speaker 1: other way in the past. Anyway, you sign up, Mark
1:17:25
Speaker 1: H Allen, Texas the high school that produced Kyler Murray,
1:17:27
Speaker 1: who your packers will face twice a year now, Alas,
1:17:29
Speaker 1: I like your chances. Yeah, I don't think Kyler Murray
1:17:32
Speaker 1: is going to be starting in both games that the
1:17:34
Speaker 1: Packers face the Vikings in just my prediction there. That's
1:17:39
Speaker 1: a that's an interesting what's an interesting thesis you put
1:17:44
Speaker 1: out there that that you kind of hope that defense
1:17:46
Speaker 1: pleads insanity and says they have trumped arrangement syndrome. But look,
1:17:54
Speaker 1: I do you know, we talk about this a lot.
1:17:57
Speaker 1: The fact is Donald Trump has reshaped both parties right now.
1:18:01
Speaker 1: Right he reshaped the Republican Party, but in many ways,
1:18:03
Speaker 1: the Democratic Party is essentially being reshaped by resistance to him,
1:18:10
Speaker 1: and at some point when he goes away, the parties
1:18:12
Speaker 1: are going to resettle and reorganize themselves around perhaps what
1:18:17
Speaker 1: they want to be rather than what they're against. Look,
1:18:21
Speaker 1: the Republican Party, arguably, in fact, the reason Donald Trump
1:18:25
Speaker 1: was able to take over the party is they had
1:18:28
Speaker 1: organized themselves as just an own the Libs Party, right,
1:18:30
Speaker 1: They were not for anything anymore, you know, they were
1:18:34
Speaker 1: just simply about beating the cultural left. And it became
1:18:39
Speaker 1: and I would argue his wing of the party that
1:18:41
Speaker 1: they argument that they wanted to play was that, hey,
1:18:44
Speaker 1: politics is about culture. Politics isn't about ideas. Anymore, and
1:18:48
Speaker 1: you've got to win the culture wars, and you need
1:18:50
Speaker 1: to embrace this idea that politics is only about winning
1:18:53
Speaker 1: the culture wars. So in that sense, I think, I
1:18:56
Speaker 1: think the Republican Party also, so I think both parties
1:18:59
Speaker 1: frankly are organized as reactionary forces. They are not. There
1:19:04
Speaker 1: is there is not a coherent identity in either party
1:19:08
Speaker 1: that isn't framed as a reaction to the other other
1:19:14
Speaker 1: political movement in the country. And until you know, and
1:19:19
Speaker 1: you know, I think for now that is you know,
1:19:24
Speaker 1: you know, it's funny. I wonder it took the Democrats.
1:19:28
Speaker 1: It took the Democrats in some ways they let they
1:19:31
Speaker 1: were They were sort of consumed by Reagan, and so
1:19:34
Speaker 1: it may explain why they had such little success sort
1:19:40
Speaker 1: of winning in the Reagan era, and they needed it
1:19:42
Speaker 1: took another four years after Reagan before they were able
1:19:45
Speaker 1: to organize themselves as something different, not just as reaction
1:19:49
Speaker 1: to Reagan. And that is something I've been thinking about
1:19:53
Speaker 1: when it comes to Team Blue. Lateley. Next question, another
1:20:00
Speaker 1: Texas question, Austin from Austin. He might be a five
1:20:03
Speaker 1: time this morning, Austin Rights. I've been thinking about the
1:20:06
Speaker 1: potential impact if Texas were to move to close primaries
1:20:08
Speaker 1: requiring formal party registration without opening the door to a
1:20:11
Speaker 1: legal challenge from voters who participate in both parties primaries
1:20:14
Speaker 1: under the current system, arguing they're being forced to declare
1:20:16
Speaker 1: allegiance to a private organization in a publicly funded election.
1:20:20
Speaker 1: Do you think that kind of argument has any legal viability,
1:20:22
Speaker 1: especially in a place like Texas, and when a group
1:20:24
Speaker 1: like the Open Primaries Education Fund even take on that fight.
1:20:28
Speaker 1: Actually the open Primary folks are taking on this fight.
1:20:31
Speaker 1: I do think this equal protection argument that essentially you're
1:20:37
Speaker 1: outlining here has some validity to it, and it just
1:20:40
Speaker 1: hasn't been tested. I do think that taxpayer funded partisan primaries,
1:20:45
Speaker 1: where a taxpayer is being asked to join a private
1:20:49
Speaker 1: institution in order to participate in a publicly funded event
1:20:54
Speaker 1: like an election, is unconstitutional. And I think that's the
1:21:00
Speaker 1: way to go after these partisan primaries that are closed,
1:21:06
Speaker 1: that you have to open them up to everybody. That
1:21:08
Speaker 1: you can have partisan primaries, but they have to be
1:21:11
Speaker 1: open to all taxpayers, or you can have partisan primaries
1:21:14
Speaker 1: and they have to be privately funded what are sort
1:21:18
Speaker 1: of colloquially called firehouse primaries, meaning the party would pay
1:21:21
Speaker 1: for them. We have the South Carolina presidential primaries or
1:21:26
Speaker 1: quasi privately funded. The filing fees are absorbent. Are just
1:21:32
Speaker 1: gigantic because literally the state parties have to pay for
1:21:35
Speaker 1: the election. The state helps provide the infrastructure, but I
1:21:39
Speaker 1: believe the parties actually are for a long time actually
1:21:41
Speaker 1: had to essentially reimburse the state for conducting the election.
1:21:47
Speaker 1: So that would be to me, if you are a
1:21:50
Speaker 1: private organization and you want to use state resources to
1:21:55
Speaker 1: hold your events, then you've got to pay for it.
1:22:00
Speaker 1: So I think this is a very viable legal argument.
1:22:03
Speaker 1: I'd like to see it pursued harder. And I've been
1:22:06
Speaker 1: around these folks and I know some of the lawyers
1:22:09
Speaker 1: that are that are involved here, and I think this
1:22:13
Speaker 1: idea of an equal protection argument is pretty strong. And
1:22:20
Speaker 1: let's see, let's see how it goes. But you know,
1:22:23
Speaker 1: I I'll be curious to see if Republicans hold on
1:22:28
Speaker 1: to their majorities in Texas and they win everything. But
1:22:31
Speaker 1: it's close. I wonder if they decide to try to
1:22:36
Speaker 1: close their primaries. But I definitely definitely believe they're open,
1:22:42
Speaker 1: that they're open to some strong legal arguments there. So
1:22:44
Speaker 1: I think it's a strong legal argument and I'd like
1:22:46
Speaker 1: to see it pursued. All right, last question for the
1:22:50
Speaker 1: show number five here, Brian writes, Hey, I've listened to
1:22:53
Speaker 1: both of your points on uncapping the House and non
1:22:55
Speaker 1: partisan primaries, and I definitely see where you're coming from.
1:22:57
Speaker 1: Are there any members of Congress who are willing to
1:22:59
Speaker 1: push for the My concern is that since both changes
1:23:02
Speaker 1: threaten the two party status quo, they'll just be shut
1:23:05
Speaker 1: down by the establishment. If that's the reality, what's the
1:23:07
Speaker 1: next step for this movement? Always look forward to the podcast,
1:23:09
Speaker 1: keep up the good work. So look, I actually think
1:23:14
Speaker 1: the uncapping the House should get re energized. I write
1:23:17
Speaker 1: about it this week in my substacks and take a
1:23:19
Speaker 1: look again. I think I find a different way to
1:23:22
Speaker 1: argue and fight. I think the civil rights communities and
1:23:27
Speaker 1: civil rights groups around the country should be it should
1:23:33
Speaker 1: be taking a look at these proposals to uncap the House.
1:23:36
Speaker 1: You know, sometimes something hasn't happened in such a long time,
1:23:40
Speaker 1: there's no memory of it. And this is my fear that,
1:23:42
Speaker 1: like there's nobody in Congress who remembers a time when
1:23:46
Speaker 1: Congress used to always right size itself. Based on the
1:23:50
Speaker 1: population of the country. Right, there is no member of
1:23:53
Speaker 1: Congress who was there in nineteen twenty nine when they
1:23:56
Speaker 1: shut this when they put the hard cap on the
1:23:59
Speaker 1: house at four hundred thirty five. So that's my hope
1:24:05
Speaker 1: that you'll just get new energy because ultimately, if we're
1:24:11
Speaker 1: looking if the whole point of what we're trying to
1:24:15
Speaker 1: do is to create a House of Representatives that's representative
1:24:17
Speaker 1: of the country, well then right now it is not.
1:24:20
Speaker 1: And the only way too is not to fight over
1:24:23
Speaker 1: who gets to sit in the set number of chairs,
1:24:27
Speaker 1: make the table bigger, right, So honestly, that's I think
1:24:35
Speaker 1: that there is an opportunity here in in light of
1:24:40
Speaker 1: what's happened with the gerrymandering wars that were that are
1:24:45
Speaker 1: only going to get worse. I mean, if we now
1:24:49
Speaker 1: have everybody basically decides that if you get the trifecta
1:24:55
Speaker 1: in your state, then the first thing you're going to do,
1:24:58
Speaker 1: like they did in Virginia, is just remap everything for
1:25:01
Speaker 1: the maximum partisan advantage, where you're going to make every
1:25:05
Speaker 1: member of Congress basically just sort of a widget. Like
1:25:09
Speaker 1: I don't even know why we have human beings if
1:25:11
Speaker 1: everything is just partisan numbers game like that. I just
1:25:17
Speaker 1: think that that also should inspire other minorities, And there's
1:25:25
Speaker 1: all sorts of minorities depending on the state you live in.
1:25:28
Speaker 1: Right in Massachusetts, it's simply Republicans that are a minority
1:25:32
Speaker 1: who are underrepresented based on their numbers, Or in Louisiana
1:25:39
Speaker 1: the map that they're going to create, or at Tennessee
1:25:41
Speaker 1: where Democrats are a minority and basically being disenfranchised completely
1:25:48
Speaker 1: by that. Uncapping the House goes a long way to
1:25:52
Speaker 1: writing some of those wrongs. So that's I guess maybe
1:26:00
Speaker 1: all I have is hope on that, But I'm trying
1:26:03
Speaker 1: to mainstream the idea a little bit better, which is
1:26:06
Speaker 1: another reason why I think connecting it to real actions
1:26:10
Speaker 1: that sort of are putting up barriers to people actually
1:26:14
Speaker 1: being able to make it to Congress. Well, you know
1:26:17
Speaker 1: this is this was this is how the founders intended
1:26:22
Speaker 1: on making sure you were represented. They knew this was
1:26:26
Speaker 1: going to happen, so as the country got bigger, they
1:26:28
Speaker 1: knew they had to expand the table. So the idea
1:26:31
Speaker 1: that we are no longer paying attention to what the
1:26:34
Speaker 1: founders wanted to me this should engage constitutional conservatives who
1:26:41
Speaker 1: should be outraged that we're not following the founder's intent,
1:26:45
Speaker 1: and the founder's intent was to expand the size of
1:26:48
Speaker 1: the House or representatives. As for all party primaries. You know,
1:26:56
Speaker 1: it's it is about the best I can hope for
1:27:00
Speaker 1: is that, you know, if we're going to continue to
1:27:04
Speaker 1: have reactionary re elections, meaning all we do is throw
1:27:06
Speaker 1: out what we don't like, and it just keeps going
1:27:09
Speaker 1: back and forth, at some point there's going to be
1:27:13
Speaker 1: frustration that says enough of this stuff. And I do
1:27:17
Speaker 1: think there are enough people who don't like both parties.
1:27:21
Speaker 1: Both parties are so unpopular. The idea of allowing the
1:27:24
Speaker 1: free market to sort of have a little bit more
1:27:27
Speaker 1: say in our primary elections, in our political party selections,
1:27:33
Speaker 1: I think is only going to be seen as something
1:27:36
Speaker 1: particularly this younger generation who is entering adulthood not liking
1:27:42
Speaker 1: either major party. I guess I'm going to be hopeful
1:27:48
Speaker 1: that the opportunity to channel their frustration on the parties
1:27:53
Speaker 1: to these two reform ideas is more possible than ever.
1:27:59
Speaker 1: But yes, my analysis here is hope. That's all I
1:28:05
Speaker 1: got for you. All Right, hope you enjoyed our live
1:28:10
Speaker 1: election night on Tuesday. Don't forget our latest episode of
1:28:14
Speaker 1: Dynastic Jay Donde, an I sports history podcast where we
1:28:18
Speaker 1: do a deep dive everything you've ever wanted to know
1:28:21
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Speaker 1: I got a new substack up if you want to
1:28:49
Speaker 1: check it out. And if you don't check it out there,
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Speaker 1: it'll be up on newsphere in the next twenty four hours.
1:28:55
Speaker 1: And with that, I'll see you in twenty four hours. Hey,