Latest / Pod Save America / "Putting the Mess in Messaging."

Transcript

"Putting the Mess in Messaging." · Pod Save America

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Thank you. Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: I'm Jon Lovett.
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: I'm Tommy Vitor. We're all doing different inflections. Yeah, interesting.
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: On today's show, President Biden reboots his midterm agenda and
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: message in order to fend off a red wave in November. Communism?
• 0:35
  Speaker 2: Let's be careful when we talk about red waves.
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: Okay, okay. Democratic strategist Adisu Demisi joins to talk about
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: a DNC proposal to potentially dethrone Iowa and change the
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: presidential nominating process. And... We try to break up some
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: of the tough news with a few fun mailbag questions
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: about Pete Davidson, Elon Musk, and Tom Brady. In that order.
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: How about that? How about that for a lineup? But first,
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: we are very excited to announce Stuck with Damon Young,
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: a Spotify original podcast from Gimlet and Crooked Media. This
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: is a show where award-winning author Damon Young explores the uncomfortable, hideous,
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: and hilarious absurdity of being black in America. He's joined
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: by some of the brightest minds and bold voices of
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: the black community, including Nicole Hannah-Jones, Sam Irby, Jason Reynolds,
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: and more. The trailer is live right now, and the
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: first episode drops on March 22nd. Listen to Stuck with
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: Damon Young for free, only on Spotify. So exciting. It's
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: been in the works for so long. Damon is so
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: smart and so funny.
• 1:32
  Speaker 3: I read his book several years ago, and it's brutally
• 1:35
  Speaker 3: honest and hilarious and great, and the show is going
• 1:37
  Speaker 3: to be incredible.
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: So excited for this show.
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: Great show. Great, great show.
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: Also.
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: Check out the latest episode of America Dissected. This week, Dr.
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: Abdul El-Sayed talks to Dr. Adil Rishi, lead author of
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: a position paper from the American Academy of Sleep Medicine,
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: get ready, love it, about daylight savings time, as well
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: as the long-term health consequences that can come with it.
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: Listen, all right, I'll just say this. I interviewed this
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: doctor about this very topic, and while it is true
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: that he came on Love It or Leave It after
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: what I believe was like a 20-hour shift in the hospital,
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: I still gave it to him pretty hard, and honestly...
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: I don't know. I don't know. I think he's right.
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: What are you, fucking Joe Rogan? Yeah, I am. I am.
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: I am. I'm sorry.
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: I'm Joe Rogan who took keeps.
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: You gave it to him pretty hard. It was an
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: interview about sleeping.
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it was. And he was exhausted.
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: And an hour on your clock, you know?
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Here's the thing. Here's the thing. I'll tell you.
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: Here's the thing. There is a very good argument against
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: the time switch. His case for why it should be
• 2:33
  Speaker 2: standard time versus daylight saving time is spurious at best
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: because it depends on what state you're in. All I'm
• 2:37
  Speaker 2: saying is, It's more nuanced than Big Pharma would have
• 2:43
  Speaker 2: you believe.
• 2:44
  Speaker 3: He gives it to his guests hard and gives it
• 2:46
  Speaker 3: to us straight, huh?
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: That's what we're getting here.
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: Dear Diary.
• 2:49
  Speaker 4: Oh, by the way.
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: I like the extra hour daylight right now. I'm just
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: going to turn it off.
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: Pete Davidson.
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: We're not at Pete Davidson yet.
• 2:58
  Speaker 2: Pete Davidson, Elon Musk.
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: We have a whole show to get to. Tom Brady. Wait, no.
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: I'm playing a new game. It's called Fuck, Kill, Kill.
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: Should we get to the news? What do you guys think?
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: Let's get to the news. President Biden, you know, he's
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: in the White House. President Biden's... Fucking Putin over here
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: with his incursion into the show. We have a tone
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: shift here that we need to really nail. President Biden's
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: biggest challenge right now is dealing with Vladimir Putin's invasion
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: of Ukraine, but he's also trying to fend off a
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: bunch of wannabe autocrats here at home. He just spoke
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: about the war and the midterms at the House Democratic
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: retreat in Philadelphia, which led to a pair of big
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: picture stories in the Washington Post and the New York Times.
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: about a new message and a new confidence among Democrats.
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: How about that, guys?
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: Won't last.
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah, okay. Well, the Post story says, quote, Biden's record
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: on Ukraine has offered what Democrats hope is a chance
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: to resurrect the pitch he made to voters as a candidate,
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: that he represents an antidote to the chaos of the
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: Trump administration and is capable of restoring the United States'
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: leadership on the world stage. And the Times says, quote,
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: Biden's advisors acknowledge that the crisis in Ukraine presents a
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: chance for a reset, perhaps the president's best opportunity to
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: restore his standing before November. On the other hand, the
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: economic fallout from sanctions against Russia and now lockdowns in
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: China because of Omicron finally hitting that country could lead
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: to supply chain issues and double digit inflation that last
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: at least through the rest of the year. Here's Joe
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: Biden laying out the stakes in his speech to Democrats
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: last week.
• 4:26
  Speaker 5: This off year election, in my view, may be the
• 4:27
  Speaker 5: most important off year election in modern history. because we
• 4:32
  Speaker 5: know what happens. We know the fundamental change that shifts
• 4:35
  Speaker 5: if we lose the House and Senate. The only thing
• 4:39
  Speaker 5: I'll have then is a veto pen.
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: What do you guys think? Is Biden's handling of Ukraine
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: a chance for a midterm reset, or will this crisis
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: just make everything more difficult? Love it.
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: I don't know what a midterm reset is.
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: It's something the Democrats spin reporters on just to say,
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: things are better now.
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: Well, you know, it's interesting. It's like, Look, now that
• 5:01
  Speaker 2: there are tanks rolling through Eastern Europe, it really makes
• 5:03
  Speaker 2: a case for the Biden leader. I actually think what
• 5:07
  Speaker 2: I think is true is Biden's handling of the crisis
• 5:12
  Speaker 2: in Ukraine, the rallying of allies, the leadership and the gravitas,
• 5:17
  Speaker 2: the sense that he and his team have his arms
• 5:20
  Speaker 2: around this highlights what I think has been a little
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: bit lost in the last year or so, which is
• 5:26
  Speaker 2: this is a president that came to office in a
• 5:28
  Speaker 2: period of incredible crisis and peril, years of chaos and
• 5:32
  Speaker 2: incompetence under Trump, a pandemic, a country that was reeling.
• 5:37
  Speaker 2: And I think it puts him back in that place
• 5:39
  Speaker 2: as a person who was chosen because he understood how
• 5:43
  Speaker 2: to lead in a moment of peril.
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I do go to bed every night thinking, thank
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: God Joe Biden is president right now and not Donald
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: Trump as we're dealing with a madman with nuclear weapons.
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: We have one over there. We don't need one here
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: as well. Tommy, what do you think?
• 5:56
  Speaker 3: I think you both are painting an accurate picture and
• 5:59
  Speaker 3: one that is sort of understood by an informed voter.
• 6:01
  Speaker 3: I do think that when you're trying to sell maybe
• 6:04
  Speaker 3: a less engaged, less informed voter on there being less
• 6:06
  Speaker 3: chaos in the world as they're watching a massive war
• 6:10
  Speaker 3: in Europe spiral out of control, that's going to be
• 6:12
  Speaker 3: a tough sell. I felt like we dealt with a
• 6:14
  Speaker 3: little bit of this when we were at the White House,
• 6:16
  Speaker 3: whether it was during the Arab Spring or the Fukushima
• 6:20
  Speaker 3: nuclear meltdown or the BP oil crisis. Like you can
• 6:24
  Speaker 3: have a process in place and be doing the right
• 6:26
  Speaker 3: things and the outcome can still be god awful. And
• 6:28
  Speaker 3: that's kind of what people are going to see on
• 6:29
  Speaker 3: the nightly news. And really the chaos piece of the
• 6:33
  Speaker 3: Trump era was the tweets and just being a shithead
• 6:37
  Speaker 3: all the time publicly. And he's kind of disappeared off
• 6:39
  Speaker 3: the world stage. And so that element is gone now.
• 6:42
  Speaker 3: And so You know, I think the challenge for Biden
• 6:44
  Speaker 3: is going to be maybe this will.
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: Be the reset they need. Who knows?
• 6:47
  Speaker 3: Maybe now he's a wartime president. But I think the
• 6:49
  Speaker 3: truth about being president is your power is far more
• 6:52
  Speaker 3: limited than people think. And they just want you to
• 6:54
  Speaker 3: fix everything, even if it's not within your power to fix.
• 6:58
  Speaker 3: And I'm worried that really what people are going to
• 7:00
  Speaker 3: see at the end of the day is high gas
• 7:02
  Speaker 3: prices and inflation and scary stuff in the world. And
• 7:05
  Speaker 3: I'm not sure that that cuts to the benefit of
• 7:08
  Speaker 3: the incumbent most times.
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: Oh, I agree. I mean, my comment was I really
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: do thank God every night I go to bed that
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: he's president and not Trump. That's my personal thing. I
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: want to be wrong. No, I think, first of all,
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: it's a very small approval bump right now. I don't
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: even know if you could call it that. If you
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: look at the 538, it's going up a little bit,
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: but I think it might be due to two things. One,
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: a sort of a rally around the flag effect that
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: happens at the beginning of a conflict like this. We
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: have no idea where this conflict is going to go,
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: so let's not even try to predict it. And also...
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: improving pandemic conditions right now, case levels, hospitalizations, ICU, especially
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: are like as low as they were even, you know,
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: before Delta and that wonderful spring of 2021. But ultimately
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: double digit inflation, global instability, and the trend of a
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: president's party losing seats in a midterm election anyway, is
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: an incredibly challenging mix, incredibly challenging. And I think the
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: big question is, to your point, Tommy, if you're the
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: Democratic Party, and you're dealt this hand, and you're Joe Biden,
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: you dealt this hand, your job is to make the
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: election a choice and not a referendum.
• 8:16
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: It's all you can do. That's, that's funny.
• 8:18
  Speaker 2: Yeah. That, that's, uh, we should get to it, but
• 8:20
  Speaker 2: that's what I sort of, when there's this, that Nancy
• 8:23
  Speaker 2: Pelosi's big pitch is Democrats deliver.
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: I know I want to get to that. I know
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: we should.
• 8:28
  Speaker 2: That will, that you're already at it with. I know.
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: Okay. Go ahead. Go ahead.
• 8:31
  Speaker 2: Well, it's like that. I can't think of a worse pitch,
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: to be honest. You want to make it a referendum
• 8:37
  Speaker 2: about whether or not Democrats deliver? Like, The Democratic message,
• 8:41
  Speaker 2: whatever the Democratic message may be, whatever the phrase you
• 8:44
  Speaker 2: want to use to describe what you're doing, the second
• 8:46
  Speaker 2: half of your sentence should be something along the lines of,
• 8:49
  Speaker 2: Rick Scott said he wants to raise taxes on the
• 8:52
  Speaker 2: American people by a trillion dollars for basically everyone under $ 100, 000.
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: And then this other fucking goofball, Ron Johnson, wants to
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: take away your health care, wants to repeal Obamacare. We
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: got one of them saying they want to raise your taxes,
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: and the other one saying they want to take away
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: your health care.
• 9:07
  Speaker 2: It's not like we're making it up. The head of
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: the Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee, one of the most important
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: leaders in the Republican Party, put out his plan for
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: the Republicans. And it is sunsetting Medicare. It is sunsetting
• 9:17
  Speaker 2: Social Security. It is raising taxes by $ 1 trillion. That,
• 9:21
  Speaker 2: to me, is the Democratic message. That's it.
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: I mean, I do think we should unpack for our
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: listeners about why Democrats deliver is not really going to work.
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: Because look, I think there is, we've been there in
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: the White House as well. There's this feeling in the
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: White House. There's this feeling among Democrats in Congress and
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: there's this feeling among, I think, Democratic partisans who pay
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: a lot of attention to political news that Joe Biden
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: has done all these wonderful things. There's the American Rescue Plan. There's,
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: you know, and we've done all these things and he's
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: not getting credit for any of it. And, you know,
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: there's the reporters are picking out the highest gas station prices,
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: you know, problem. And if the mainstream media is helping
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: the Republicans with message because all they do is say
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: that things are bad and blah, blah, blah. And things
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: are actually much better than they are. And there's this
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: tremendous frustration that Joe Biden is not getting more credit
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: for the fact that the economy overall, aside from inflation,
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: is doing pretty well. What do we think about that?
• 10:17
  Speaker 2: I think there is not to be snarky. I think
• 10:20
  Speaker 2: that there is a way to kind of put those
• 10:21
  Speaker 2: things together, which is sort of what I was getting
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: at at the beginning. And like, if what's happening in
• 10:26
  Speaker 2: Ukraine offers any kind of like narrative change, it kind
• 10:30
  Speaker 2: of puts Biden back at the beginning of the administration,
• 10:33
  Speaker 2: kind of taking, being a leader at a moment of crisis,
• 10:36
  Speaker 2: like there's a president that came into office while the
• 10:38
  Speaker 2: country was in crisis, both at home and around the world.
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: They took these incredibly important steps to pass a rescue plan,
• 10:45
  Speaker 2: to pass an infrastructure plan. They did it in the
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: face of Republican deception and intransigence and wacko extremism. And
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: they got those things done. We are not out of
• 10:53
  Speaker 2: the woods. Things are still difficult. Things are still hard.
• 10:56
  Speaker 2: What are your choices? Do you want to go with
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: the people that want to go back to how Trump governed?
• 10:59
  Speaker 2: Do you want to go back to the kind of
• 11:01
  Speaker 2: craziness and the corporate welfare and all of that? Or
• 11:03
  Speaker 2: do you want to keep making progress through this difficult time?
• 11:06
  Speaker 2: Something like that.
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: Doesn't that remind you of our 2010 message?
• 11:10
  Speaker 3: I don't think I can remember back that far anymore.
• 11:12
  Speaker 3: The Democrats deliver is so funny. It's like, we have
• 11:15
  Speaker 3: such a tarnished brand and we're like, Let's make it
• 11:17
  Speaker 3: 50 percent.
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: Of the slogan.
• 11:19
  Speaker 2: Democrats deliver high gas prices.
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: Just so you know, we're not. And Ron delivers. Just
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: so you know, we're not like freelancing here and being
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: snarky about it. The Times pointed out that Pelosi and
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: the House Democrats go to President Biden and are like, oh,
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: we really want Democrats to be the message. And unbeknownst
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: to them, Biden and his advisers or his advisers had
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: tested the message as one of many messages that they tested.
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: And Democrats deliver was literally at the bottom of the list.
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: It was the least popular message that they tested.
• 11:46
  Speaker 3: Tell a story about what you've done, but also what
• 11:48
  Speaker 3: you want to do and who is standing in the way.
• 11:50
  Speaker 3: But I don't think a lot of voters are going
• 11:51
  Speaker 3: to be like, look, yeah, this war is scary. Inflation
• 11:54
  Speaker 3: is terrible. But I got that stimmy two years ago.
• 11:57
  Speaker 3: So I'm feeling good about these guys. Whatever you've done
• 12:00
  Speaker 3: for me lately, it's a very Janet Jackson electorate here.
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: I mean, the other thing that Democrats can control aside
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: from their message, hopefully, is the policies they enact. The
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: Times reports the Democrats, quote, are considering a handful of
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: executive orders that would please their base on matters including
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: the cancellation of some student loan debt. and are determined
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: to enact legislation lowering the cost of prescription drugs. What
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: do you guys think? Is that enough? What else should
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: Democrats be doing or at least pushing for?
• 12:25
  Speaker 3: So did you know that this show also goes out
• 12:28
  Speaker 3: on Thursdays? And there's this guy, Dan, who's really smart.
• 12:31
  Speaker 2: Oh, what does Dan have to say?
• 12:32
  Speaker 3: He interviewed this person, Elizabeth Warren. This is like a
• 12:34
  Speaker 3: genius senator from Massachusetts. And she made a case for
• 12:36
  Speaker 3: student loan debt that I thought was so compelling that
• 12:39
  Speaker 3: 40% of people who were paying off student loans didn't
• 12:43
  Speaker 3: actually get a college degree. So they're paying off their
• 12:46
  Speaker 3: college debt with a high school level salary, which is
• 12:50
  Speaker 3: clearly unfair. Also, that it would do more to close
• 12:53
  Speaker 3: the racial wealth gap than almost any other policy you
• 12:55
  Speaker 3: could afford.
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: So I think it's a no-brainer, especially.
• 12:58
  Speaker 3: I've always assumed that Biden was waiting on student debt
• 13:01
  Speaker 3: relief to get Build Back Better done because he figured
• 13:04
  Speaker 3: Joe Manchin would freak out about the cost of it.
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: And now, you know, that's not an issue. It seems
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: like from what Ron Klain said to us on that
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: Thursday pod that you mentioned, that Thursday, Pod Save America.
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: That got mentioned this morning on NPR. Did it really? Oh, wow.
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: Look at that. That interview got likes.
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: Huge likes. And I think some people on Twitter were
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: confused about this, too, just from Ron's answer to this.
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: The extension of the pause on student loan debt repayment
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: goes until May. I think then when it's done, when
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: this pause is done, that's when it seems like they
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: will make a decision on executive action debt relief. Right.
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: Because no one's paying right now anyway. Right. And it
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: sounded like from Ron's tone that either they're leaning towards
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: doing it or that Ron... wants them to do it.
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: I couldn't quite tell, but from the tone, I got
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: that that's what they're going for.
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: Yes, I mean, sort of, I said this, it's like,
• 13:59
  Speaker 2: they're a little bit at this point now kind of
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: standing over the country with a wax candle, kind of like,
• 14:04
  Speaker 2: gonna drop a little wax on the, this is more
• 14:06
  Speaker 2: of a love it or leave it joke.
• 14:08
  Speaker 3: Is this, are we, it's like, season one, episode one
• 14:11
  Speaker 3: of Billions?
• 14:12
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a little bit like, you know what I mean,
• 14:13
  Speaker 2: a little bit like, it's a little S & M
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: vibe now, you know what I mean? Are you gonna
• 14:17
  Speaker 2: cancel the debt or not?
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: Well, look, I think, Sometimes I think Democrats have a
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: policy discussion over here. I'm just going to keep going.
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: Come back on that one.
• 14:25
  Speaker 2: I'm going to wear a place today.
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: They have a policy discussion over here and then they
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: have like a where it's our slogan, our bumper sticker
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: over here. And I actually think when you think when
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: they come up with the policy that they're pushing forward,
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: they should think about it in terms of a message. Right.
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: As well as in terms of the policies they pursue.
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: So you lower the cost of it. It's all about costs. Right.
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: Biden did this in the State of the Union, I think,
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: quite well. It's all about lowering costs for people. It's
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: lowering the cost of health care. both prescription drugs and
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: healthcare premiums, which they would do with some of the
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: healthcare subsidies that were in the bill, which shall not
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: be named.
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: It's called the Democrats Deliver Bill.
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's called the Democrats Deliver Bill. Education, student debt,
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: and then energy, both gas rebates, which some Democrats have
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: been talking about, and long-term clean energy transition. I think Biden,
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: the State of the Union, said that his clean energy
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: investments would reduce the average family energy bill by $ 500, right?
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: And then you say the real popular part, And we're
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: paying for it all by getting rid of huge tax
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: cuts for the 1%, big corporations, and oil companies. And
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: you say that over and over. Healthcare, education, energy, taxing
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: the rich, oil companies. You just do it over and
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: over and over again. And then you actually push for it.
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: And some stuff you can do executive action. And some stuff,
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: it seems like Joe Manchin is amenable to. I know.
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: I know this was controversial at the time.
• 15:39
  Speaker 3: But I wonder if you could get a $ 12 federal
• 15:41
  Speaker 3: minimum wage floor from this Congress. Didn't they all just
• 15:46
  Speaker 3: feel like 15 was too high when we made a
• 15:48
  Speaker 3: run at it then? I wonder if you could lower
• 15:49
  Speaker 3: that down and still say, okay, we delivered on 12. Well,
• 15:52
  Speaker 3: you'd have to get 10 Republicans on that.
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: I thought we could do it through reconciliation. I think
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: you need the Republicans. It's a brainstorm. We're spitballing here.
• 16:03
  Speaker 3: I think you're right that that is a very important
• 16:06
  Speaker 3: message in terms of your proactive agenda. The other agenda,
• 16:09
  Speaker 3: the counterpoint is the extremity of the Republican Party. And luckily,
• 16:12
  Speaker 3: they're helping us out there. One, you know, a lot
• 16:15
  Speaker 3: of these candidates that are emerging are just insane people.
• 16:20
  Speaker 3: You know, the person running for Senate in Arizona stormed
• 16:24
  Speaker 3: off the set of 60 Minutes Australia a couple of
• 16:26
  Speaker 3: days ago, which begs the question, why are you doing
• 16:28
  Speaker 3: 60 Minutes in Australia?
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: Nar!
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: Right? So we can get into some of their positions.
• 16:39
  Speaker 3: You know, like Biden, I think, could very credibly argue
• 16:42
  Speaker 3: that Roe versus Wade is on the way to being overturned.
• 16:47
  Speaker 3: Idaho today passed a Texas-style bill that would outlaw abortion
• 16:51
  Speaker 3: after six weeks, which, for all practical reasons, makes it
• 16:55
  Speaker 3: impossible to get access to abortion care in many states.
• 16:58
  Speaker 3: And I think, you know, you can argue that keeping
• 17:00
  Speaker 3: the Senate is the only way to balance out the
• 17:01
  Speaker 3: courts in the long term, right? So there's an extremity
• 17:03
  Speaker 3: of the Republican Party piece of this that could be compelling, too.
• 17:07
  Speaker 3: You know, the Katonji Brown-Jackson nomination is, in some polls,
• 17:12
  Speaker 3: it looks like, has excited Voters of color and made
• 17:14
  Speaker 3: them more likely to turn out made young people more
• 17:16
  Speaker 3: likely to turn out. So there's some enthusiasm there, too.
• 17:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I was actually pleasantly surprised that uh, according to
• 17:22
  Speaker 2: like a morning consult the latest shows that like Democrats
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: are slightly more enthused about voting in the midterm the
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: Republicans I'm skeptical of that to be honest, but it's there.
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: Yeah Here's a real gem from The Washington Post about
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: what happened at last week's Democratic House retreat in Philadelphia
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: In terms of message now that we're into the message
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: conversation Quote, a sitcom showrunner and a bestselling fiction writer
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: encouraged them to tell stories rather than give voters the
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: usual laundry list of reasons Democrats should remain in the majority.
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: Three marketing executives.
• 17:51
  Speaker 2: Shame it was Louis C.K.
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: And J.K. Rowling. Three marketing executives, including one from Pepsi.
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: Pepsi urged them to craft their messages like sharp advertisements
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: and leaders echoed a new slogan unveiled by the National Party.
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: They can deliver. What sitcom? I don't know. It's just,
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: I mean. Was it Love?
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: No.
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: Was it me? Was it me? Now that advice, should
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: you tell stories instead of laundry? Yeah, of course. That's
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: good advice. Do they need a sitcom showrunner and a
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: best-selling fiction writer? Probably not. It depends on the sitcom. Friends?
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: Yeah. If you know who, get me the information. If
• 18:24
  Speaker 2: you're hearing this and you're in Los Angeles and you
• 18:26
  Speaker 2: know what showrunner went to the retreat, tell me.
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: Everybody loves Raymond's. Again, I do think the most telling
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: a story is important. Love it. I think you laid
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: out one story that that works. I also just think
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: it's a constantly a choice. Like they want to raise
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: your taxes to take away your health care. And and
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: we are fighting to do all these things. Some of
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: them they'll be able to do before the midterm. Some
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: of them give us a bigger majority and we'll do them.
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: Be funny if it was like the new message is
• 18:51
  Speaker 2: like Democrats deliver and we're going to fuck up those
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: assholes at Coke.
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: How'd that get in there? What the hell?
• 19:01
  Speaker 3: When I was working on the Edwards campaign, this was 2004,
• 19:05
  Speaker 3: before all the really bad stuff happened. And someone forced
• 19:10
  Speaker 3: us to bring in some Madison Avenue ad campaign.
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: Happens all the time.
• 19:17
  Speaker 3: And it was the guys who did the Absolute Vodka campaign,
• 19:20
  Speaker 3: which just led to endless jokes about Absolute Edwards.
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: It was just, you know. It's all the same advice.
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: It's all the same silly, Hail Mary tactical things. Who's
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: the guy who did the don't think like an elephant?
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: What's his name? George Lakoff. George Lakoff. Remember when Barack
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: Obama told me to take that meeting?
• 19:36
  Speaker 3: I think Obama did that with him, too, and he
• 19:37
  Speaker 3: kept referring to it as a mem. Remember there was-
• 19:39
  Speaker 3: Not a meme. This was at the Senate office. This
• 19:42
  Speaker 3: was when he was all the rage.
• 19:44
  Speaker 2: Then it became like, don't refer to your opponent by name,
• 19:46
  Speaker 2: and then you can't don't ever use their attack in
• 19:49
  Speaker 2: your sentence it looks like completely incomprehensible rhetoric just absolutely incomprehensible.
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: I think the important thing the important takeaway here from
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: this whatever this was which was great is that the
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: message does have to flow from the policy you can't
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: just slogan your way and your identity your values the
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: story you tell the policies you're pursuing the fights that
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: you're going to take on and what your opponents stand for.
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: All of that comes together for a message. It's not like, again,
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: we said this on Thursday, it's not like there's some
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: secret bumper sticker out there. The magic, the right combination
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: of words is going to unlock the majority for us.
• 20:21
  Speaker 2: And also, like, whatever the slope, yes, I think that's right.
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: I remember, like, in 2006, remember, there was this moment,
• 20:26
  Speaker 2: it was America can do better, together we can do better.
• 20:30
  Speaker 2: Remember all those slogans?
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: We can do better, yeah.
• 20:32
  Speaker 2: And, like, maybe those were.
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: Make it in America.
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: Maybe those were of value, maybe not, but, like.
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: HBO show. About 10 of them.
• 20:40
  Speaker 2: Incredible uh win the future that was one that we
• 20:43
  Speaker 2: had some bad ones but i do think that like
• 20:46
  Speaker 2: i think sometimes you can get wrapped around the axle
• 20:48
  Speaker 2: and like what i i do think that like people
• 20:51
  Speaker 2: do respect the fact that this country has been through
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: a really hard time and i think starting from that
• 20:56
  Speaker 2: is like a really like start with those emotions i
• 20:58
  Speaker 2: always think so like democrats deliver is so anodyne it
• 21:01
  Speaker 2: starts it starts from such a kind of what yeah
• 21:04
  Speaker 2: like like.
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: This is a it's basically like We're pissed. We've been
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: working hard and we've done a good job. Why won't
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: you believe us? Give us credit. That's what that message is.
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: Start from where people are. The country has been through
• 21:14
  Speaker 2: a trauma. We talk about it all the time, but
• 21:17
  Speaker 2: it's easy to lose that. It may not always appear
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: in the polls. It may be hard to suss out,
• 21:20
  Speaker 2: but don't lose the forest for the trees. This is
• 21:24
  Speaker 2: a country that has been through a very, very hard
• 21:26
  Speaker 2: time and is shaken and a little bit confused and
• 21:29
  Speaker 2: anxious and angry. You have to meet people there.
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: And a lot of people... feel forgotten and not seen
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: by their government. They do. And, and it's not that
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: they don't, you know, it's not that they buy all
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: the bullshit that the Republicans are selling, but they feel like,
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: you know, I, I want, I want to see more progress.
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: And I at least want to know if I can't
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: see progress that the people that I elected are fighting
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: like hell to make that progress. And they're fighting for
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: me and they're not fighting for the assholes who are
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: running oil companies and super rich and all that. That's
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: what they're looking for.
• 22:02
  Speaker 3: And that's hard when, uh, you're, controlling all branches of
• 22:05
  Speaker 3: government and you can't get everything done, right? And you
• 22:07
  Speaker 3: end up having to explain Kyrsten Sinema and Joe Manchin
• 22:10
  Speaker 3: for two years like we've been doing.
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: Question. I think this happened when I was out for
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: a while.
• 22:15
  Speaker 3: Remember when Frank Luntz wanted a media company to send
• 22:18
  Speaker 3: him to Ukraine to do focus groups?
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: There was. I did see that. He tweeted that. He
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: was like, send me. I'll do a focus group. How
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: do you feel about Vladimir Putin invading your country? What
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: do you think you're going to get out of that
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: focus group? How did Crooked Whip on that one? Next
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: season in the wilderness. Okay.
• 22:34
  Speaker 2: Oh, man.
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I will say that one... I didn't know about that.
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: It was confusing. It was an interesting tweet. One good
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: piece of news here is, and Sean Patrick Maloney, who's
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: the chair of the DCCC, was saying this in some
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: of the pieces about the retreat, that we've gotten good
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: news on the maps, on redistricting, and that now there's not...
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: After all the worries we had about gerrymandering, and obviously gerrymandering,
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: still bad, but basically Democrats decided... Not what we do
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: at that. If you're going to do it, we're going
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: to do it in the states that we control... And
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: Republicans also decided to protect more of their incumbents than
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: to draw the maps in a way that could win
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: in the short term.
• 23:09
  Speaker 2: Something I've said for a long time, because if you
• 23:11
  Speaker 2: gerrymander too hard, you get to kind of make some
• 23:14
  Speaker 2: thin Republican districts. You can lose some of those incumbents.
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: So the path is that the gerrymandering has not given
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: Republicans the advantage we thought they would get in the
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: House and in the Senate. There are still a bunch
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: of Senate primaries where the potential Republican nominee is very
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: far to the right and extreme, more so than usual.
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: And so you might have some extremist Republican Senate candidates
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: that aren't their strongest. You have a house map that's
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: more fair than we thought it would be. So, you know,
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: the playing field could be a little more even, but again,
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: double digit inflation. And yeah, it's tough.
• 23:45
  Speaker 2: Yeah. The good and bad news is if we lose,
• 23:48
  Speaker 2: it'll be fair and square. But it does argue for
• 23:51
  Speaker 2: just remembering that one other piece of what our message
• 23:54
  Speaker 2: is going to be about the Republicans is don't forget
• 23:56
  Speaker 2: a lot of these wackos think the vaccine was a
• 23:58
  Speaker 2: conspiracy to have Bill Gates chip you like a dog.
• 24:00
  Speaker 2: You know, like that's sort of just getting that in
• 24:02
  Speaker 2: there a little bit too.
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's interesting. It's out there, that take from them. Anyway.
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: Is that Mehmet Oz?
• 24:11
  Speaker 2: I saw a video of him, I think, drunk at
• 24:12
  Speaker 2: a high school wrestling tournament. I don't know. His campaign's
• 24:15
  Speaker 2: a journey. His campaign is a journey.
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: That primary's wild. The Ohio primary.
• 24:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: I mean, again, we all dislike J.D.
• 24:22
  Speaker 4: Vance.
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: You don't have to convince me, but losing to Josh Mandel...
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: It's tough. Josh Mandel is a tough nominee. One of
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: the worst human beings. Yeah, maybe it'll be neither of them.
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: That's what the polls are looking like. Okay, when we
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: come back, Tommy and I will talk with former Cory
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: Booker campaign manager Adisu Demissi about the potential change to
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: the Democratic nomination calendar. Last week, there was a heated
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: discussion during the Democratic National Committee's winter meeting about a
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: leaked proposal to change the presidential nomination process by potentially
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: adding a fifth state to the early nominating window, favoring
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: primaries over caucuses and requiring states to reapply for their
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: early state status, which could end up removing Iowa and
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: or New Hampshire from the top spots. Joining us to
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: talk about this is the former campaign manager for Cory
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: Booker's presidential campaign, the current executive director of More Than
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: a Vote, and someone who got his start in politics
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: as an Iowa field organizer for John Kerry's 2004 campaign,
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: our pal, Adisu Demetri. What's up, man?
• 25:34
  Speaker 4: Very nice introduction. I'm good. How are you guys doing?
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: You know. Good.
• 25:38
  Speaker 4: I'm a four-time Iowa caucus veteran, actually.
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: Wow. You got Tommy beat. I thought Tommy was the
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: Iowa guy here. Mine's all branding.
• 25:47
  Speaker 3: This is perfect, Adisu, because Both of us, I think,
• 25:50
  Speaker 3: are coming into this conversation with a fondness for some
• 25:53
  Speaker 3: of our experiences in Iowa, right? We've seen how the
• 25:55
  Speaker 3: caucuses can be good. We can see how the process
• 25:58
  Speaker 3: can be bad. Some of this conversation we're having about
• 26:01
  Speaker 3: like a bunch of DNC members in a smoke-filled room
• 26:04
  Speaker 3: making decisions about a fifth state versus fourth. It could
• 26:06
  Speaker 3: probably sound a little esoteric for people, like how does
• 26:08
  Speaker 3: this matter? You ran Cory Booker's 2020 presidential campaign. You've
• 26:13
  Speaker 3: run a whole bunch of campaigns, but that was your
• 26:15
  Speaker 3: recent presidential experience. How did the schedule of how the
• 26:19
  Speaker 3: primary and caucus process was structured impact the way you
• 26:23
  Speaker 3: planned and executed that race?
• 26:27
  Speaker 4: I mean, really, it's everything. It's the rules.
• 26:29
  Speaker 6: It's like a basketball court is so many feet wide,
• 26:33
  Speaker 6: a football field is 100 yards long.
• 26:35
  Speaker 4: This is the rules of the game. It dictates every
• 26:39
  Speaker 4: decision you make.
• 26:40
  Speaker 6: And so for us, and I think for most candidates
• 26:43
  Speaker 6: who aren't universally known, The early states are where the
• 26:48
  Speaker 6: playing field potentially, at least in theory, gets leveled a
• 26:51
  Speaker 6: little bit, right? It's your chance to compete on a
• 26:58
  Speaker 6: relatively equal footing with candidates that may have more money
• 27:01
  Speaker 6: or may have more name recognition or whatever it may be.
• 27:03
  Speaker 6: So for us in 2019 to 2020, we invested, I
• 27:05
  Speaker 6: would say, 80% of our time in the four early states.
• 27:07
  Speaker 6: The other 20% was split basically between Super Tuesday states
• 27:17
  Speaker 6: and fundraising, maybe 75-25, something along those lines. But we
• 27:21
  Speaker 6: thought our path to victory, honestly, was very similar to
• 27:24
  Speaker 6: what Barack Obama did in 2008, 2007-2008, which was use
• 27:29
  Speaker 6: the early states as a springboard to get better known,
• 27:32
  Speaker 6: to raise money and ultimately make it Super Tuesday when
• 27:34
  Speaker 6: we knew that was going to be the deciding date
• 27:37
  Speaker 6: for a plurality delegate.
• 27:39
  Speaker 4: So it was everything. It is what dictated our entire
• 27:43
  Speaker 4: strategy from day one.
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: Yeah. And what do you think is the drawback to
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: having this particular schedule of states, these early states, particularly
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: Iowa and New Hampshire going first?
• 27:55
  Speaker 6: Look, I hesitate because like Tommy said, I have love
• 27:59
  Speaker 6: for the early states in general. I think what Iowa
• 28:03
  Speaker 6: caucus goers, New Hampshire primary voters have going for them
• 28:06
  Speaker 6: is that they're professional voters in a way that is,
• 28:10
  Speaker 6: they respect the process. And I'm not suggesting that the
• 28:12
  Speaker 6: other 48 states don't, but from years, decades of experience,
• 28:16
  Speaker 6: like they, they take the responsibility very seriously. And so,
• 28:21
  Speaker 6: but I think what they aren't is diverse, uh, and
• 28:24
  Speaker 6: certainly racially diverse. Um, and also in many ways, not
• 28:28
  Speaker 6: representative of the democratic party and where it is and
• 28:30
  Speaker 6: where it's going. And so that said, I'm sure we're
• 28:33
  Speaker 6: going to get into this. Like they have things going
• 28:35
  Speaker 6: for them. The biggest is that they are small. And
• 28:37
  Speaker 6: I do think that really matters a lot in this process. Uh,
• 28:41
  Speaker 6: having small states at least part of the early mix.
• 28:43
  Speaker 6: And all four of our early states are relatively small.
• 28:46
  Speaker 6: South Carolina is the biggest and it's not huge. It
• 28:50
  Speaker 6: allows you to not just level the playing field, but
• 28:53
  Speaker 6: actually do a little bit of retail politics in a
• 28:55
  Speaker 6: way that wouldn't exist if my home state of California
• 28:58
  Speaker 6: or Illinois, which is actually the most sort of representative
• 29:01
  Speaker 6: and diverse state in the union, if one of those
• 29:03
  Speaker 6: went first, it would be an air war. The campaign
• 29:06
  Speaker 6: would ultimately end up being about raising money and spending it.
• 29:09
  Speaker 6: on TV, mail, digital, and what have you. And so
• 29:12
  Speaker 6: there's positives and negatives. And anybody who says this is
• 29:15
  Speaker 6: an easy decision, like I respect the folks who are
• 29:18
  Speaker 6: ultimately in the DNC have to make it.
• 29:19
  Speaker 4: It's not easy. It's not slam dunk.
• 29:22
  Speaker 6: What states go first, whether Iowa and New Hampshire are part.
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: Of that or not. I mean, there's the problem that
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: both Iowa and New Hampshire aren't as diverse as other states.
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: Iowa has the additional challenge of being a caucus over
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: a primary. Can you sort of talk about the challenges
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: of a caucus versus a primary?
• 29:38
  Speaker 6: Yeah, caucus organizing, like I said, I've done it four times.
• 29:43
  Speaker 6: It is much more difficult from an organizing perspective. Ultimately,
• 29:46
  Speaker 6: it helps, you know, in theory, it helps the party
• 29:49
  Speaker 6: and the Democratic Party in that state organize internally for
• 29:53
  Speaker 6: their state looking forward to their races, you know, in
• 29:56
  Speaker 6: the general election. But caucuses are party organizing affairs run
• 30:01
  Speaker 6: by the party. And that requires a lot of resources
• 30:04
  Speaker 6: and a lot of time, as we saw in 2020
• 30:05
  Speaker 6: and 2016, can go sometimes horribly wrong. And so in 2017,
• 30:11
  Speaker 6: we did this coming out of the 2016 caucuses. A
• 30:17
  Speaker 6: lot of states actually switched from caucuses to primaries as
• 30:20
  Speaker 6: part of the last go around of this process we're
• 30:23
  Speaker 6: about to go through here. And I think most of
• 30:24
  Speaker 6: them liked it because state-run primaries, ultimately run by the
• 30:28
  Speaker 6: government where more people can participate, are easier on the
• 30:32
  Speaker 6: state parties that otherwise are going to have to kill
• 30:35
  Speaker 6: themselves to pull off a caucus. And ultimately, sometimes it's
• 30:38
  Speaker 6: too much for a state party organization to pull off.
• 30:42
  Speaker 3: Yeah, sort of thinking about sort of good and bad
• 30:44
  Speaker 3: parts about Iowa. I mean, diversity of the state is
• 30:45
  Speaker 3: something you mentioned that is not fixable, right? Like John said, caucuses,
• 30:49
  Speaker 3: they're at a set time. they take a long time.
• 30:53
  Speaker 3: That can make it difficult, if not impossible, for the elderly,
• 30:56
  Speaker 3: the disabled, working people to attend. I think you can
• 31:02
  Speaker 3: begin to address that challenge by creation of like a
• 31:04
  Speaker 3: virtual caucus or other, you know, means to sort of
• 31:07
  Speaker 3: amend the format, but not totally get away from it.
• 31:11
  Speaker 3: The other problem with Iowa, though, is it's not a
• 31:13
  Speaker 3: competitive state. And so you do all this organizing for
• 31:15
  Speaker 3: a year in the primary and it doesn't help you
• 31:17
  Speaker 3: in the general. And, you know, that's something that might
• 31:18
  Speaker 3: shift over time. But to your point, it needs to
• 31:20
  Speaker 3: be like, This point about them being professional voters and
• 31:23
  Speaker 3: taking the process serious is real. It also incentivizes actual
• 31:27
  Speaker 3: face-to-face conversations, not just with the candidates, but between voters themselves.
• 31:32
  Speaker 3: You have community meetings, literally, where people are arguing and
• 31:35
  Speaker 3: talking in a constructive way. There also are rules at
• 31:38
  Speaker 3: a caucus, at least in Iowa, that incentivize positive campaigning
• 31:41
  Speaker 3: because you don't want to piss off the other guy's
• 31:43
  Speaker 3: supporters because you want to be their second choice. And
• 31:45
  Speaker 3: that forces candidates to do retail politics and take hard questions.
• 31:49
  Speaker 3: So to your point about these are professional voters, you
• 31:52
  Speaker 3: need a small state. Do you think that like some
• 31:54
  Speaker 3: of the good parts about these early states are replicable
• 31:58
  Speaker 3: if you just kind of found the right location?
• 32:02
  Speaker 6: Yeah, I do over time because, you know, it's only
• 32:05
  Speaker 6: been 50 years that Iowa, I think it was 1972
• 32:11
  Speaker 6: that Iowa, you know, came into play here and sort
• 32:14
  Speaker 6: of came to prominence in 1976 when it catapulted Carter
• 32:18
  Speaker 6: to the presidency. But that's 50 years of experience, which
• 32:21
  Speaker 6: it's going to take 50 years to replicate, but it
• 32:23
  Speaker 6: doesn't mean that you can't find it somewhere else. But
• 32:25
  Speaker 6: the one thing I feel most strongly about is, is
• 32:28
  Speaker 6: the small state, big state thing. I think we would
• 32:30
  Speaker 6: do ourselves a huge disservice if we just pick the
• 32:34
  Speaker 6: states that were the most representatively, you know, diverse in
• 32:37
  Speaker 6: terms of racial or ethnic or economic or whatever it
• 32:41
  Speaker 6: might be, uh, uh, diversity, but ultimately we're huge. And, uh,
• 32:48
  Speaker 6: I guarantee you if that happened, what would happen is
• 32:50
  Speaker 6: a lot of candidates would end up in California and
• 32:52
  Speaker 6: New York raising money so they could spend it on
• 32:54
  Speaker 6: television as opposed to in those states campaigning on the ground.
• 32:57
  Speaker 6: It's just the nature of the beast right now. So
• 33:00
  Speaker 6: I do think it's replicable. I think it will not
• 33:03
  Speaker 6: be the same if Iowa and New Hampshire or either
• 33:05
  Speaker 6: one of them does not stay early, meaning it will be,
• 33:10
  Speaker 6: I think it might be qualitatively worse the first time
• 33:12
  Speaker 6: because you've lost that experience just like with anything else.
• 33:15
  Speaker 6: But Is that a reason alone to keep it as is?
• 33:18
  Speaker 6: I think the answer to that is probably no.
• 33:20
  Speaker 2: No.
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: I mean, the other thing is the goal of the
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: primary process here is to nominate the strongest possible general
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: election candidate. And I do worry about caucuses in particular.
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: And again, I have very fond memories of the Iowa
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: caucuses because it's how Barack Obama won the presidency. But
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: the more I think back on it, the people who
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: pretend to participate in caucuses are the most hardcore activists.
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: And in a general election, you're going to have to
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: face all of the voters. And so in the primary,
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: you hope that the candidate who ultimately becomes the nominee
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: has had to face a lot of different voters and
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: not just the voters who are most committed to politics,
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: who tend to be much more liberal than other voters.
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: And I think we saw that in 2020. when obviously
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: biden didn't do so well in iowa and uh but
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: then did quite well in south carolina which was a
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: primary and a very diverse primary at that.
• 34:15
  Speaker 3: Do you see how he's erasing his 2004 john kerry
• 34:18
  Speaker 3: experience there i just want to make sure you caught
• 34:20
  Speaker 3: that as well because.
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: It's kind of exactly four jk before iowa that we
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: had after.
• 34:27
  Speaker 6: I remember i remember it well yeah uh Yeah, you're
• 34:32
  Speaker 6: a two-time Iowa caucus winner. You should be beating your
• 34:34
  Speaker 6: chest about that.
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: I'm a two-time, yeah, exactly.
• 34:37
  Speaker 4: No, look, I think you're right.
• 34:40
  Speaker 6: I think, though, that the one thing that I think
• 34:43
  Speaker 6: has changed, even since we were there in 2003 now,
• 34:46
  Speaker 6: not even two decades ago, is.
• 34:49
  Speaker 4: Politics is more nationalized now.
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 34:52
  Speaker 2: And it is, I.
• 34:54
  Speaker 4: Think in theory you're correct, but in practice....
• 34:59
  Speaker 6: Your Iowa caucus goer or your South Carolina primary voter,
• 35:03
  Speaker 6: or your super Tuesday primary voter are probably getting some
• 35:06
  Speaker 6: of their political information from the same sources, which was
• 35:09
  Speaker 6: not true in 2003. Right.
• 35:10
  Speaker 4: It's, it's, you know, it's pod save America. No, I'm
• 35:14
  Speaker 4: not trying to get your ass, but true.
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: It's like how many.
• 35:16
  Speaker 4: Pods it's Matt, it's Rachel Maddow. It's New York times.
• 35:19
  Speaker 6: Like, you know, if you're obviously that's not true of every,
• 35:23
  Speaker 6: you know, primary voter across the country, what have you,
• 35:25
  Speaker 6: but it's, primaries are, it's something I think I got
• 35:28
  Speaker 6: wrong in 2019 and running bookers races that I was
• 35:32
  Speaker 6: running a strategy, I think much more tailored to a 2004,
• 35:36
  Speaker 6: 2008 media environment. But now if your caucus goer or
• 35:41
  Speaker 6: primary voter or whatever in New Hampshire is ultimately kind
• 35:45
  Speaker 6: of similar in a lot of ways to your primary
• 35:47
  Speaker 6: voter in other places, then it matters less. The retail
• 35:50
  Speaker 6: matters less and actually the state matters less. And so
• 35:53
  Speaker 6: I'm toying with this. I haven't come to a conclusion
• 35:55
  Speaker 6: about this myself, but it is not the same as
• 35:58
  Speaker 6: it was, certainly not in 1972. And I would say
• 36:01
  Speaker 6: even in 2008 when Barack Obama was president. And that
• 36:04
  Speaker 6: means that we should at least be looking at everything
• 36:07
  Speaker 6: and putting it all on the table as the DNC
• 36:09
  Speaker 6: does every four years.
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: And the reason you're saying that is because of the
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: unfortunate collapse of local media, right? That like people, like
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: someone in Manchester, New Hampshire isn't going to the union
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: leader For their news about what happened on the campaign
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: trail that way. Thank God.
• 36:22
  Speaker 6: Yeah, they're watching Ari Melber or Rachel Maddow.
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: Ari Melber, also a John Kerry field organizer.
• 36:28
  Speaker 4: I know. Sat next to me in our field office.
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: Look how far everyone's come. Wow, you got some stories,
• 36:34
  Speaker 1: I bet.
• 36:34
  Speaker 4: I sure did.
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: I remember hearing that from you.
• 36:36
  Speaker 3: I remember hearing that from a bunch of the field
• 36:38
  Speaker 3: organizers I'd meet when I'd go to Iowa.
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: Because I went like five or six times.
• 36:42
  Speaker 3: Do you think that that shift was a Trump thing?
• 36:44
  Speaker 3: And like everyone being like an electability, you know, like
• 36:47
  Speaker 3: Nate Silver downloading 538 poll average, you know, like just
• 36:51
  Speaker 3: little ball of anxiety about losing again, or is this
• 36:55
  Speaker 3: sort of like a John, the environment thing?
• 36:57
  Speaker 6: I think it's a media thing. I think it is again,
• 37:00
  Speaker 6: especially among democratic primary voters. I think it's Twitter. I
• 37:03
  Speaker 6: think it's Facebook. I think it's, I think it is
• 37:07
  Speaker 6: that the way that we consume information now and political
• 37:11
  Speaker 6: information in particular, is we have self-segregated in some ways
• 37:15
  Speaker 6: into bubbles and particularly folks who are primary voters, Republican
• 37:19
  Speaker 6: primary voters are the same, right? If you're, you know,
• 37:23
  Speaker 6: Steve Bannon's podcast or whatever crazy lunatic shit they're listening
• 37:27
  Speaker 6: to this week, like is probably where you're trying, you're
• 37:31
  Speaker 6: competing to get on that if you're in the Republican
• 37:33
  Speaker 6: primary more than you're trying to compete for the union leader.
• 37:36
  Speaker 6: And similarly on the Democratic side, I think we have
• 37:38
  Speaker 6: segregated ourselves into media bubbles. I think it's bad for politics.
• 37:42
  Speaker 6: I think it's also something that if I'm sitting at
• 37:45
  Speaker 6: the DNC, I'm not sure. The question you have to
• 37:48
  Speaker 6: ask is, do I want to play into that or
• 37:50
  Speaker 6: do I want to push against the tide?
• 37:51
  Speaker 4: Are things going to go.
• 37:52
  Speaker 6: Further down this way or are we actually going to go,
• 37:57
  Speaker 6: the pendulum going to swing back? I don't know the
• 37:59
  Speaker 6: answer to that, but I think it's an important analysis
• 38:03
  Speaker 6: point here, which is that retail politics is not the
• 38:08
  Speaker 6: same and the nationalization of politics is a real phenomenon
• 38:10
  Speaker 6: that has accelerated in the last decade.
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: So Kevin Sheeky, who ran Mike Bloomberg's campaign, floated an
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: idea that the closest state in the last general election
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: becomes the first primary in the next presidential election and
• 38:22
  Speaker 1: then so on. So the first five would be Georgia, Arizona, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania,
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: North Carolina. What do you think about that? I mean.
• 38:31
  Speaker 4: No, I don't think, I mean, I'm like, it's a,
• 38:35
  Speaker 4: it's a, it's a cute idea.
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: It's a cute idea.
• 38:39
  Speaker 6: But no, I don't think that, I mean, that's, I
• 38:41
  Speaker 6: think some of that is living in the past, right? Like,
• 38:44
  Speaker 6: would you have said that Arizona was going to be
• 38:45
  Speaker 6: the closest or? Was it Georgia or Michigan, actually, the
• 38:48
  Speaker 6: closest state when all is said and done?
• 38:49
  Speaker 1: It's so funny because Pfeiffer was the one who brought
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: this up to me. And I said Michigan, too. And
• 38:53
  Speaker 1: then I went and looked. And by the end, even
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: though there was all that. It might have been Wisconsin.
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: Wisconsin was in this list. But Michigan ended up being
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: like three points. And North Carolina was only a point.
• 39:03
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: Even though there was just Trump thinking he won Michigan.
• 39:07
  Speaker 6: Dude, on November 7th, when they called it, I think
• 39:09
  Speaker 6: I was like drunk for a week. But I think
• 39:15
  Speaker 6: it's a little bit of living in the past. I mean, look,
• 39:16
  Speaker 6: things change very quickly. This is also a reason I
• 39:19
  Speaker 6: think counterpoint to your Iowa point, Tommy, which is like,
• 39:22
  Speaker 6: who knows where Iowa is going to be a decade,
• 39:25
  Speaker 6: 12 years from now, right? If someone had said, this
• 39:27
  Speaker 6: is where Arizona is going to be a decade ago,
• 39:29
  Speaker 6: you would have maybe chuckled at them or Georgia was
• 39:31
  Speaker 6: going to be a blue state. or Virginia back before
• 39:35
  Speaker 6: Barack Obama, things change pretty quickly. And so I think
• 39:39
  Speaker 6: we have to have diversity of every kind in the
• 39:42
  Speaker 6: early states. I think it needs to be geographic. I
• 39:44
  Speaker 6: think it needs to be racial. I think it needs
• 39:46
  Speaker 6: to be rural urban, which is not a small thing.
• 39:49
  Speaker 6: Democrats are losing in rural areas. And if we force
• 39:51
  Speaker 6: our candidates early to compete for rural votes, I think
• 39:54
  Speaker 6: that'll help them in the general election. Regional, which we
• 39:59
  Speaker 6: do a good job of right now. But This is
• 40:01
  Speaker 6: why it's a puzzle that's not as easy as just
• 40:04
  Speaker 6: a formula or just as easy as picking the states
• 40:07
  Speaker 6: that are most racially or otherwise diverse.
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's not easy.
• 40:10
  Speaker 3: And look, one of the biggest challenges to previous efforts
• 40:13
  Speaker 3: at reform is political inertia. As you know very well,
• 40:17
  Speaker 3: you're Cory Booker, you're Barack Obama, you go to Iowa,
• 40:19
  Speaker 3: you try to get the endorsement from the such and
• 40:22
  Speaker 3: such muckety muck. the first thing you're committing to is,
• 40:25
  Speaker 3: you know, keeping Iowa and New Hampshire's primacy in the process, right?
• 40:29
  Speaker 3: You end up feeling like you owe them, or at least,
• 40:32
  Speaker 3: you know, candidates or elected officials in these states.
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: Tell you you owe them.
• 40:36
  Speaker 3: Do you think that Biden, because he did so poorly
• 40:41
  Speaker 3: in Iowa and New Hampshire, could be uniquely positioned to
• 40:45
  Speaker 3: actually make these changes?
• 40:47
  Speaker 1: Because he doesn't really owe those states anything?
• 40:49
  Speaker 6: Yes, but I don't think that I mean, ultimately, this
• 40:54
  Speaker 6: is a decision that's going to be made by DNC members,
• 40:57
  Speaker 6: 450 people who are elected by their states. It's not
• 41:03
  Speaker 6: like Congress. And sure, they'll listen to the president of
• 41:06
  Speaker 6: the United States, but they're going to listen to their
• 41:10
  Speaker 6: home state interests first. And if one of their states
• 41:14
  Speaker 6: has somebody who might run for president in 2028, like
• 41:17
  Speaker 6: that's going to come into play probably more than what,
• 41:19
  Speaker 6: you know, the white house says.
• 41:20
  Speaker 4: Et cetera.
• 41:21
  Speaker 6: So the answer to your question is, is yeah, but
• 41:24
  Speaker 6: there are so many provincial interests at play. I think
• 41:26
  Speaker 6: with this, that it's going to be, I mean, this
• 41:29
  Speaker 6: is a DNC decision and it's important for people to
• 41:31
  Speaker 6: know and to remember out there, this is literally why
• 41:34
  Speaker 6: the DNC exists. Like everybody talks about the big, bad DNC.
• 41:38
  Speaker 4: And controls the message and the policy.
• 41:41
  Speaker 6: And no, the DNC exists to create the rules for
• 41:44
  Speaker 6: nominating president, and vice president of the United States. Article one,
• 41:47
  Speaker 6: section one of the charter. So this is why people
• 41:51
  Speaker 6: get elected to the DNC is.
• 41:52
  Speaker 4: To do this. They're going to take it seriously and
• 41:54
  Speaker 4: take their power seriously, I think, too.
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: To do that and rig the primary. And to turn
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: off two-factor education. I mean, but that, so my last
• 42:05
  Speaker 1: question on this from that is, how difficult do you
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: think this will be to get done? Do you think
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: it will get done? Like, I mean, this was a
• 42:11
  Speaker 1: leaked proposal. You know, the Jamie Harrison, the DNC chair
• 42:14
  Speaker 1: during the winter meeting sort of says, okay, I know
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: there's rumors, so I'm going to address it, but it's
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: early stages. Like, do you think this gets done by
• 42:21
  Speaker 1: 2024 or 2028? I mean, if Biden, you know, runs again,
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: then it's not going to be as big of a
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: deal in 2024, but.
• 42:27
  Speaker 4: I think it will definitely get done.
• 42:28
  Speaker 6: I think it happens, it being, we will revisit the
• 42:32
  Speaker 6: process and create a new primary calendar. It happens every
• 42:36
  Speaker 6: four or eight years. We did it in 2017. We
• 42:38
  Speaker 6: got rid of several caucuses for primaries. We I believe
• 42:42
  Speaker 6: it was in 2007 when we added, or before the
• 42:47
  Speaker 6: 2008 primaries when we added South Carolina. So this is
• 42:51
  Speaker 6: not a new thing. Like it happens all the time.
• 42:54
  Speaker 6: It will get done this summer probably. And to your point,
• 42:57
  Speaker 6: if and when President Biden runs for reelection, it will
• 42:59
  Speaker 6: be a moot point probably for 2024. But we'll all
• 43:03
  Speaker 6: be talking about this in 2026 and 2027 again. But
• 43:08
  Speaker 6: I definitely think it will get done. It is, again,
• 43:10
  Speaker 6: it's why the party exists. the DNC exists and the RBC,
• 43:15
  Speaker 6: that's the whole body is going to go through their
• 43:18
  Speaker 6: process and figure it out by, I would guess by
• 43:20
  Speaker 6: the August meeting.
• 43:21
  Speaker 1: All right. Poor Jamie Harris.
• 43:22
  Speaker 3: I mean, just think for a second, new DNC chair
• 43:25
  Speaker 3: trying to host a thoughtful meeting about this discussion and
• 43:28
  Speaker 3: someone leaks a working draft staff level proposal.
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: To the Des Moines register. That's just the beginning of
• 43:35
  Speaker 1: all places.
• 43:36
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 43:37
  Speaker 4: It will, it will be a mess. It will be messy,
• 43:38
  Speaker 4: but like that's Democrat, you know?
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 43:41
  Speaker 4: That's Democratic Party politics, and that's okay. It's part of
• 43:44
  Speaker 4: the deal.
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: And at least with us, we keep these messages internal
• 43:48
  Speaker 1: and quiet. That's the good thing. Oh, boy. Adisu Tamisi,
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: thank you so much for coming on the show. Come
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: back again soon. This was fun, man.
• 43:56
  Speaker 4: Anytime, man. Good to see y'all.
• 44:07
  Speaker 1: All right, before we go, we put a call out
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: on social media for a few fun questions to break
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: up some of the heavier news we've been covering lately.
• 44:12
  Speaker 1: And boy, did you deliver. At Van Weezer just replied
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: with a picture of Pete Davidson and a moon superimposed
• 44:20
  Speaker 1: on the head of what appears to be Ariana Grande's body.
• 44:23
  Speaker 1: Two of many questions that come to mind here. One,
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: what do you guys think of the news that Davidson
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: is among six passengers who will be on the next
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: launch of Jeff Bezos' space travel venture Blue Origin? And two,
• 44:35
  Speaker 1: in case that wasn't enough, What do you think about
• 44:37
  Speaker 1: the alleged leaked text between Davidson and Kanye West in
• 44:40
  Speaker 1: which he tells the rapper to grow the fuck up
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: after Kanye's public feud with him over Kim Kardashian? Got
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: a lot in there, huh? They released a reason why
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: he's a passenger on the Blue Origin. Yeah, I read
• 44:51
  Speaker 1: the stories and I could not detect. So it's just like, hey,
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: we're chasing clouds. Someone wanted to go to space who's
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: been in the news a lot.
• 44:57
  Speaker 2: It's Pete Davidson's world. We're all just living in it.
• 45:00
  Speaker 2: Of course Pete Davidson gets to go to space. Why
• 45:02
  Speaker 2: the fuck not? That Dutch rich kid got to go.
• 45:05
  Speaker 2: He's just as deserving. Uh, remember the, remember that, that
• 45:10
  Speaker 2: maybe Danish.
• 45:11
  Speaker 1: Sure.
• 45:11
  Speaker 2: Don't come at me in the comments. I don't know
• 45:13
  Speaker 2: if he's Dutch or Danish and I'll never know. I
• 45:16
  Speaker 2: think that they're the same, but, uh, uh, and then
• 45:20
  Speaker 2: he had, and he got to go with this woman,
• 45:21
  Speaker 2: this incredible test pilot who like fought through misogyny and
• 45:24
  Speaker 2: sexism for decades. And he's like, my dad bought me ticket.
• 45:28
  Speaker 2: Terrible accent. I'm in a weird place today and it's
• 45:30
  Speaker 2: fine on the Pete Davidson front.
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: Here's the thing.
• 45:33
  Speaker 2: I saw these leaked texts and all I can think
• 45:35
  Speaker 2: is everyone involved in this is so full of fucking shit.
• 45:40
  Speaker 1: So it seems like it was Pete Davidson's friend that
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: leaked the text?
• 45:42
  Speaker 2: But what are we doing here?
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: Don't leak any texts. Oh, I thought Pete did it.
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: I am anti-leaking texts.
• 45:48
  Speaker 2: But the idea that, what's so funny about the text
• 45:50
  Speaker 2: is Pete Davidson is like, come on, Kanye. I'm just
• 45:52
  Speaker 2: a guy trying to support my girlfriend and his family.
• 45:56
  Speaker 2: And you're like, it's like, Pete Davidson, you're on SNL.
• 45:59
  Speaker 2: You seem to have a pretty cool life. there are 3.5
• 46:02
  Speaker 2: billion women on earth, and you're like, the one I
• 46:05
  Speaker 2: want puts me in a position of being with a
• 46:08
  Speaker 2: woman who has kids with a famous guy who's in
• 46:11
  Speaker 2: some kind of a mental health episode that requires me
• 46:14
  Speaker 2: reaching out to him to create a detente. Why do
• 46:17
  Speaker 2: you want your life to be so complicated?
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: Buyer beware is what you're saying. That's a lot.
• 46:20
  Speaker 2: It's a weird, weird, weird situation that I don't fully believe.
• 46:23
  Speaker 3: Have you guys watched the Kanye three-part documentary on Netflix?
• 46:28
  Speaker 1: I'm an hour into the first episode. So... It is, uh,
• 46:33
  Speaker 1: very excited to continue. It's very much.
• 46:35
  Speaker 2: No, I, I've, I've got to finish. I'm, I just
• 46:38
  Speaker 2: finished the Tinder swindler. I'm going to do this one.
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: Enjoy that.
• 46:41
  Speaker 3: It's very much in, in that category of documentaries where
• 46:46
  Speaker 3: it's kind of like, um, you know, like Michael Jordan
• 46:49
  Speaker 3: is the EP on the last dance kind of vibe, right?
• 46:51
  Speaker 3: It's kind of his close friends of a collaborator over
• 46:54
  Speaker 3: many years. It's amazing and worth watching because in, it's
• 46:58
  Speaker 3: like the classic, like a casino arc, right? Like, starts
• 47:03
  Speaker 3: challenges first act two is a blast. And the third
• 47:06
  Speaker 3: episode is so sad and depressing as hell, but it's
• 47:09
  Speaker 3: worth watching just to remember like that. Kanye actually made
• 47:12
  Speaker 3: some of the most amazing music of that era was
• 47:16
  Speaker 3: a producer on more tracks than you ever realized that
• 47:18
  Speaker 3: he actually didn't get the respect he deserved in hip
• 47:21
  Speaker 3: hop community as a rapper for a very long time.
• 47:24
  Speaker 3: And then clearly when his mother died, like, that seems
• 47:27
  Speaker 3: to have been a triggering point for a lot of
• 47:29
  Speaker 3: the really hard times lately. So it's like, you know, look,
• 47:33
  Speaker 3: I don't like him as a person.
• 47:35
  Speaker 1: Those early albums were incredible. A good window into sort
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: of what he's been through. Here's one. Does anyone have
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: any thoughts on Elon Musk's tweet in which he challenged
• 47:44
  Speaker 1: Vladimir Putin to single combat? I mean, hey, what nerd?
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: Putin would probably kick his ass. He's like a Taekwondo player. expert. Man,
• 47:54
  Speaker 1: he wants attention all the time. He loves attention.
• 47:57
  Speaker 2: You know, when Ben Carson ran for president, I thought
• 48:00
  Speaker 2: to myself, I guess being a brain surgeon is easy.
• 48:05
  Speaker 2: When Elon Musk tweets, it makes me think, oh, inventing
• 48:10
  Speaker 2: and transforming the electric car industry must have been simpler
• 48:14
  Speaker 2: than it seemed from the outside. Because there is no
• 48:17
  Speaker 2: one who seems dumber when compared to the actual output
• 48:22
  Speaker 2: of his company's than Elon Musk.
• 48:25
  Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, Dave Weigel at the Washington Post pointed
• 48:27
  Speaker 3: this out in a tweet. On March 4th, Elon Musk tweeted,
• 48:31
  Speaker 3: hold strong Ukraine with six Ukrainian flags. And then 10
• 48:35
  Speaker 3: days later, he tweeted like this meme, which says, I
• 48:39
  Speaker 3: support the current thing, which is sort of like the,
• 48:42
  Speaker 3: sort of angry incel-faced man with a Ukrainian flag and
• 48:45
  Speaker 3: then kind of like the LGBT flag. You know, sort
• 48:48
  Speaker 3: of like the idea being that.
• 48:50
  Speaker 1: Mocking performative support for Ukraine is what he's trying to do.
• 48:52
  Speaker 2: He realized that he was doing something cringy and normcore
• 48:56
  Speaker 2: because it happens to be correct. And he had to signal...
• 48:59
  Speaker 2: to his weird fanboys. Like, don't worry. I know that
• 49:02
  Speaker 2: anything normal is bad.
• 49:03
  Speaker 3: But he also was like positioning his satellites over Ukraine
• 49:07
  Speaker 3: to help them get internet access.
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: Which is a good thing.
• 49:10
  Speaker 2: Which is a good thing.
• 49:10
  Speaker 1: He talked to Zelensky, I believe. He's been engaged in this,
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: but then he also has to mock the people who care.
• 49:16
  Speaker 1: It's very frustrating. He's very online and he likes attention.
• 49:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah, too online.
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: Too online and too much attention. He's a genius at
• 49:23
  Speaker 1: many things. He's just, when you're a genius at some things,
• 49:25
  Speaker 1: it doesn't mean you spout off about everything. Right.
• 49:27
  Speaker 3: But yeah, by all means, engage him in one-on-one combat.
• 49:31
  Speaker 3: Because Vladimir Putin will certainly fight fair and not slap
• 49:33
  Speaker 3: you in the face with polonium or some other fucking.
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: Now we're getting into what the actual combat would look like. Well,
• 49:39
  Speaker 1: he murders his opponents.
• 49:42
  Speaker 2: I don't think you'd have to worry about polonium in
• 49:44
  Speaker 2: a hand-to-hand fight.
• 49:45
  Speaker 1: Well, you never know. I don't know how he's going
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: to kill the guy. Next question. Putin. Tommy, do you
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: have thoughts on Tom Brady un-retiring?
• 49:55
  Speaker 2: It was so good, it made me want to kiss
• 49:57
  Speaker 2: my son on the mouth.
• 49:58
  Speaker 1: He was retired for less than six weeks. It was
• 50:00
  Speaker 1: February 1st he told us he was retired. Such a
• 50:03
  Speaker 1: drama queen.
• 50:03
  Speaker 2: I'm now performing just for Elijah, who's in town, so
• 50:06
  Speaker 2: I can just.
• 50:06
  Speaker 1: Get laughs out of Elijah. I don't really have thoughts.
• 50:11
  Speaker 1: I don't know. It's weird. Football is his whole, I mean.
• 50:15
  Speaker 1: It's your whole identity. Well, it's. It's your whole identity
• 50:17
  Speaker 1: if you're like, for many NFL players, but I think
• 50:20
  Speaker 1: for Tom Brady especially, like there is, that's it. There
• 50:23
  Speaker 1: is nothing outside of football. Football is every, you know,
• 50:26
  Speaker 1: it's like, and he's 44 years old. So you're like,
• 50:28
  Speaker 1: and he's, you know.
• 50:29
  Speaker 3: Listen, I'm 41 and I currently can't go jogging because
• 50:33
  Speaker 3: I have a injured butt muscle.
• 50:36
  Speaker 1: So that, get out of here, love it. So that's embarrassing.
• 50:39
  Speaker 3: So like, there is this annoying, like sort of paternalistic
• 50:43
  Speaker 3: sort of sentiment.
• 50:43
  Speaker 2: Horseplay got out of hand. Jesus Christ.
• 50:45
  Speaker 1: It's been normal. I hate this episode.
• 50:48
  Speaker 3: This is annoying.
• 50:52
  Speaker 1: Let us know if you do too.
• 50:53
  Speaker 2: A mess of an episode.
• 50:55
  Speaker 3: See this annoying paternalistic thing on social media or elsewhere
• 50:58
  Speaker 3: that's like, I just want him to resign and be happy.
• 51:00
  Speaker 3: Make sure you don't get the CTE, Tom. It's like,
• 51:02
  Speaker 3: you don't know why he loves playing. You don't know
• 51:04
  Speaker 3: what drives this guy.
• 51:05
  Speaker 2: If he got CTE, how would anyone even fucking know?
• 51:08
  Speaker 1: I loved Tom Brady.
• 51:11
  Speaker 3: Tom Brady was there for me for a decade and
• 51:15
  Speaker 3: a half of my life and gave me a lot
• 51:16
  Speaker 3: of joy.
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: So you shut up. He should do whatever he wants.
• 51:19
  Speaker 2: Leave that in, but know that I know it's wrong.
• 51:21
  Speaker 1: I just don't get why you retire. Why retire and
• 51:22
  Speaker 1: not retire?
• 51:23
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I think he spent five minutes at his NFT
• 51:26
  Speaker 2: business and realized it was a fucking nightmare.
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: I understand him staying more than I understand him announcing
• 51:31
  Speaker 1: it in the first place. That's what I'd say about that.
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: Love it. Thoughts on Elden Ring? I almost regret this
• 51:36
  Speaker 1: question the second that it came out of my mouth,
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: but go ahead.
• 51:40
  Speaker 2: It's a great game, and I think people are going
• 51:41
  Speaker 2: to have a lot of fun playing it.
• 51:42
  Speaker 1: What do you do in it?
• 51:43
  Speaker 2: What do you do?
• 51:45
  Speaker 3: Help me understand gaming. I have a 20-year gap in
• 51:48
  Speaker 3: my gaming experience.
• 51:49
  Speaker 1: Same with me. 15 years.
• 51:50
  Speaker 2: Here's the thing. So in the PlayStation 2, they added
• 51:53
  Speaker 2: a second set of triggers. And that really alienated a
• 51:55
  Speaker 2: lot of people. Yes, that's what happened.
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: And we lost them forever. These controllers today with these kids,
• 51:59
  Speaker 1: there's too many buttons on them. You have to use
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: like all five fingers. Use ten fingers. How about that?
• 52:03
  Speaker 2: I'm telling you.
• 52:04
  Speaker 1: How about that for old sounding?
• 52:05
  Speaker 2: I really think when they added those second triggers, it
• 52:07
  Speaker 2: really threw a lot of people off.
• 52:08
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 52:10
  Speaker 2: Elden Ring is great. It seems an impossible triumph, an
• 52:14
  Speaker 2: open world Soulsborne game. And I love it. I can't
• 52:19
  Speaker 2: wait to get back into it. I'm doing a strength build,
• 52:21
  Speaker 2: but I saw Jason Concepcion's kind of magic build on
• 52:24
  Speaker 2: the internet, and it made me very excited to do
• 52:26
  Speaker 2: a magic build as well. These are incredibly difficult games.
• 52:30
  Speaker 1: What are we building?
• 52:31
  Speaker 2: You build a character. You can have a strength build,
• 52:33
  Speaker 2: a dexterity build, which is more of a trick weapon.
• 52:35
  Speaker 1: Can you make the character look like you?
• 52:37
  Speaker 2: You can, although it's a very, very... Even the way
• 52:40
  Speaker 2: in which you have to design a face is extremely
• 52:42
  Speaker 2: complicated in order to understand.
• 52:44
  Speaker 1: This is exhausting. It's harder than Zelda Adventures of Link.
• 52:48
  Speaker 2: Sure, but Breath of the Wild I do think is inspiring.
• 52:51
  Speaker 2: Breath of the Wild has been a very influential game,
• 52:54
  Speaker 2: and I do think it influenced Elden Ring in a
• 52:55
  Speaker 2: very good way.
• 52:57
  Speaker 1: Question from Hannah DeGroot. What is your personal favorite miniseries
• 53:01
  Speaker 1: in the scammer genre? Dropout for me. Dropout is great.
• 53:05
  Speaker 2: I'm very excited for We Crash, which is coming soon,
• 53:08
  Speaker 2: but right now I am very into the Dropout.
• 53:11
  Speaker 1: It's really well done.
• 53:12
  Speaker 2: Liz Merriweather.
• 53:14
  Speaker 1: Love Liz Merriweather.
• 53:15
  Speaker 2: Absolutely.
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: Friend of the show. Incredible.
• 53:18
  Speaker 2: Incredible series.
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: And Amanda Seyfried is great. Like the cast is great.
• 53:22
  Speaker 1: Everyone's great. So you want to talk about inventing?
• 53:26
  Speaker 3: I know that I constantly dig my own grave by
• 53:30
  Speaker 3: talking about how I'm watching just super basic, lame shit.
• 53:35
  Speaker 3: And I, you know, it is what it is, but
• 53:38
  Speaker 3: I've been watching inventing Anna and I will say it's
• 53:41
  Speaker 3: such a frustrating show because the underlying story is actually
• 53:44
  Speaker 3: pretty interesting, but they made it like four episodes too long.
• 53:46
  Speaker 1: And I love Anna Klumski since way back. My Girl.
• 53:51
  Speaker 1: My Girl days.
• 53:52
  Speaker 3: But she's so funny in Veep. She's one of the
• 53:54
  Speaker 3: funniest characters in Veep. And they make her character, this journalist,
• 53:57
  Speaker 3: so annoying.
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: He needs his glasses.
• 53:59
  Speaker 3: They dramatize the process of the journalism for this story.
• 54:03
  Speaker 3: And it's not the fucking Pentagon Papers. You're figuring out.
• 54:07
  Speaker 3: Like why this scammer scammed people.
• 54:09
  Speaker 1: And it just, it's. I watched, we watched an episode.
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: I was just, Emily, I think kept going. I could,
• 54:13
  Speaker 1: I was not a fan. I couldn't do it. And
• 54:15
  Speaker 1: then I, then I started watching the dropout and I
• 54:16
  Speaker 1: was like, this is, this is what I.
• 54:18
  Speaker 2: Was looking for.
• 54:18
  Speaker 1: Loving the dropout. You mentioned Veep. Cause someone asked like,
• 54:21
  Speaker 1: have we been watching funnier shows? Because obviously these are
• 54:24
  Speaker 1: some dark times. I rewatched, Emily started it from season one.
• 54:29
  Speaker 1: I jumped in at season six and I rewatched season
• 54:31
  Speaker 1: six and seven of Veep. I think it's the greatest
• 54:34
  Speaker 1: comedy of all time on television. I really do.
• 54:36
  Speaker 3: You told me that, so I started watching season six,
• 54:38
  Speaker 3: and some of the funniest, hardest jokes ever delivered are
• 54:41
  Speaker 3: from that show.
• 54:42
  Speaker 1: I was in tears laughing at that again.
• 54:44
  Speaker 2: I will always remember we were on a bus between
• 54:47
  Speaker 2: two cities. I don't remember what the cities were during
• 54:50
  Speaker 2: a tour, but both of you had edibles, and then
• 54:53
  Speaker 2: you were.
• 54:56
  Speaker 2: Laughing through Veep like the like I've never like two
• 55:00
  Speaker 2: old men like there was something so old about it
• 55:02
  Speaker 2: like when you see old men really laughing at their
• 55:04
  Speaker 2: programs it was you guys were inconsolable it was unreal
• 55:10
  Speaker 2: we weren't happy you had a great time it was
• 55:12
  Speaker 2: so funny it was so funny it was.
• 55:13
  Speaker 1: Not before it was at the end it was at
• 55:15
  Speaker 1: the end of the night we were going back to
• 55:16
  Speaker 1: the hotel we weren't yeah it was it.
• 55:18
  Speaker 2: Was five o'clock somewhere it was fine so.
• 55:24
  Speaker 1: Funny what other good scammer shows are there Oh, well,
• 55:28
  Speaker 1: there's the Tinder swindler. I mean, I know that's not
• 55:31
  Speaker 1: like a.
• 55:32
  Speaker 2: Here's the thing.
• 55:33
  Speaker 1: Here's the thing.
• 55:34
  Speaker 2: I get it. I'd fall for the Tinder swindler.
• 55:37
  Speaker 1: I'd be in.
• 55:38
  Speaker 2: You had the Rolls Royce. You went on the date.
• 55:39
  Speaker 2: You went on the jet. Next thing you know, his
• 55:41
  Speaker 2: bodyguard's getting beat up.
• 55:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 55:44
  Speaker 2: What do you need?
• 55:44
  Speaker 1: It seemed real.
• 55:45
  Speaker 3: There's a point in the conversation in all these types
• 55:47
  Speaker 3: of narratives, inventing Anna, all of them, where the person
• 55:50
  Speaker 3: says to you, I can't get international transfers to work.
• 55:55
  Speaker 3: My credit card got hacked. Can you loan me.
• 55:59
  Speaker 1: $ 16, 000? At which point you say no.
• 56:00
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you have to say no.
• 56:02
  Speaker 1: All right. Well, that's all the time we have for today.
• 56:04
  Speaker 1: It was a fantastic political analysis. That's what you come
• 56:07
  Speaker 1: here for. At least Adisu offered us some insight. Yeah,
• 56:10
  Speaker 1: he was smart. Thank God for that guy. Anyway, we'll
• 56:14
  Speaker 1: talk to you on Thursday.
• 56:15
  Speaker 2: There were good nuggets even in the parts that were
• 56:17
  Speaker 2: just us.
• 56:18
  Speaker 1: The Thursday episode of this show is actually really good.
• 56:20
  Speaker 2: And also, if you add this plus Thursday, real good stuff.
• 56:24
  Speaker 1: Huh?
• 56:24
  Speaker 2: This plus Thursday divided by two? Now that's a podcast.
• 56:27
  Speaker 1: Dan says enough smart stuff for five of us. Yeah.
• 56:29
  Speaker 2: Usually I just listen to Dan and then add a
• 56:31
  Speaker 2: couple jokes.
• 56:37
  Speaker 1: Pod Save America is a Crooked Media production. The executive
• 56:40
  Speaker 1: producer is Michael Martinez. Our senior producer is Andy Gardner Bernstein.
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: Our producer is Haley Muse and Olivia Martinez is our
• 56:46
  Speaker 1: associate producer. It's mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Kyle
• 56:50
  Speaker 1: Seglin is our sound engineer. Thanks to Tanya Somanator, Sandy Gerard,
• 56:54
  Speaker 1: Hallie Kiefer, and Justine Howe for production support. And to
• 56:57
  Speaker 1: our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Phoebe Bradford, Milo Kim, and
• 57:00
  Speaker 1: Amelia Montu. Our episodes are uploaded as videos at youtube.com
• 57:04
  Speaker 1: slash cricketmedia.