Latest / Pod Save America / Barack Obama on Democracy, Gaza and 2024

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Barack Obama on Democracy, Gaza and 2024 · Pod Save America

• 0:20
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: I'm Tommy's accountability partner, Jon Lovett.
• 0:24
  Speaker 3: I'm Tommy Pitor. That's my worst nightmare.
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: On today's show.
• 0:30
  Speaker 2: I have a different feeling about it.
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: Go. We'll get to that later. Speaker Mike Johnson uses
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: an app to monitor his son's porn intake. And later,
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: our interview with Barack Obama on the 15th anniversary of
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: his 2008 election. How about that for a description of
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: the show?
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: A couple of accountability partners getting together in Chicago.
• 1:04
  Speaker 4: Think you would have done this if we told him
• 1:08
  Speaker 4: what was his lead-in?
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: Probably not. But first, it's election day. Where Ohio will
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: vote on a ballot measure that would protect abortion access.
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: Virginia will decide whether to give Republican Governor Glenn Youngkin
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: the Republican legislature he needs to ban abortion. Kentucky will
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: decide what polls are now showing is a very close
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: race between Democratic Governor Andy Beshear and Republican anti-abortion extremist
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: Daniel Cameron. And Mississippi decides whether to elect a Democratic
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: governor for the first time in 20 years. If you
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: live in these states or other places with elections on Tuesday,
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: go vote.
• 1:44
  Speaker 3: Pennsylvania Supreme Court.
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: Thank you, Tommy.
• 1:46
  Speaker 3: Big election there.
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: There's some New York City elections as well, local elections there.
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: There's elections, people. If you need more info, if you
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: want to know whether there's an election near you or
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: how you can help, head to votesaveamerica.com as always, and
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: we'll be breaking down all the results later this week.
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: All right, let's get to the rest of the news.
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: We are a year out from Election Day 2024, and
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: the New York Times is kicking off the party with
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: a new poll of more than 3,600 registered voters. It's
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: a big sample. across the six most competitive battleground states
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: that show Donald Trump leading Joe Biden by an average
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: of 48% to 44%. So they did 600 voters per state.
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: Trump is up 52-41 in Nevada, 49-43 in Georgia, 49-44
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: in Arizona, 48-43 in Michigan, and 48-44 in Pennsylvania, with
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: Joe Biden leading only in Wisconsin, by 47 to 45 percent.
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: The results don't seem to reflect either Trump's strengths or
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: the Democratic Party's weaknesses. Trump is slightly more unpopular with
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: voters in this poll than he was in 2020. And
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: voters would choose in this poll an unnamed generic Democrat
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: over Trump by eight points. And at least in this poll,
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: even Vice President Kamala Harris performs two points better than
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: Biden against Trump. What is mostly bothering voters, at least
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: in this poll, is what we've seen in nearly every
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: single poll for the last several years. Biden's age, his
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: handling of the economy, and his ability to do the job.
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: I'll stop there so you two can get in on
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: the fun. And maybe we can start with your takes
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: on the reaction from the Biden folks and some Democratic strategists,
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: which I'd summarize as it's one poll. Obama was in
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: a similar spot back in 2011. The election is a
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: full year away. the campaign hasn't started yet, the economy's improving,
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: and Trump might be a convicted felon by the time
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: people start voting. What do you guys think?
• 3:48
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, the point that we're a year out
• 3:51
  Speaker 4: from the election is absolutely right. Lots of time, events
• 3:54
  Speaker 4: will change, there's time to campaign. The campaigning hasn't really
• 3:57
  Speaker 4: even started. There will be lots of paid media, billions
• 3:59
  Speaker 4: of dollars of paid media to try to sell Joe
• 4:02
  Speaker 4: Biden's message to America.
• 4:04
  Speaker 3: That's all right.
• 4:05
  Speaker 4: The response that grinds my gears a little bit is
• 4:09
  Speaker 4: the everyone stop bedwetting.
• 4:11
  Speaker 3: It's like, ah, we can't tell people that, you.
• 4:13
  Speaker 4: Know, the future of American democracy itself is at stake,
• 4:16
  Speaker 4: but also like chillax, you know, like I think everyone's
• 4:19
  Speaker 4: allowed to feel a little anxiety.
• 4:20
  Speaker 3: And so, you know, I think what you do with that.
• 4:22
  Speaker 4: Anxiety is up to you and those of us who
• 4:25
  Speaker 4: want to channel it into action by volunteering and donating
• 4:28
  Speaker 4: and getting involved.
• 4:29
  Speaker 3: I think that's the path forward here.
• 4:30
  Speaker 4: But in terms of what we learned from this poll,
• 4:32
  Speaker 4: I mean, it's clear that Joe Biden personally has real
• 4:36
  Speaker 4: challenges at the moment with younger voters, especially voters under 30.
• 4:40
  Speaker 4: He went from being up considerably in the last election
• 4:43
  Speaker 4: to basically tired. He has real challenges with voters of color,
• 4:47
  Speaker 4: both African-American and Latino voters. And there's real questions about
• 4:51
  Speaker 4: his age. And the challenge going forward is whether Biden
• 4:58
  Speaker 4: can convince these voters of color and young voters to
• 5:02
  Speaker 4: he's actually working for them and that his policies are
• 5:04
  Speaker 4: improving their lives because a lot of people are saying
• 5:06
  Speaker 4: in these polls they're not feeling that improvement. And then separately,
• 5:09
  Speaker 4: I think there's this age question of whether he can
• 5:12
  Speaker 4: convince voters who have been convinced by, I don't know,
• 5:16
  Speaker 4: maybe it's misleadingly edited social media videos on TikTok or
• 5:19
  Speaker 4: whatever that he's not fit for the job that in
• 5:21
  Speaker 4: fact he is. But, you know, a lot of different
• 5:24
  Speaker 4: tracks here for problems he needs to solve.
• 5:26
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean, also, by the way, like you don't
• 5:29
  Speaker 2: need to see misleadingly edited polls. footage of Joe Biden
• 5:32
  Speaker 2: to worry about Joe Biden's age. Joe Biden's age is
• 5:34
  Speaker 2: his biggest liability. He is very old. It makes a
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: lot of people, including us, nervous. And I think you
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: look at what the response has been and you say,
• 5:42
  Speaker 2: all right, Barack Obama went through a news cycle like this.
• 5:44
  Speaker 2: You can look at previous incumbents, George W. Bush, and
• 5:47
  Speaker 2: say these are all people that saw polls at around
• 5:50
  Speaker 2: this time that showed them down and they managed to
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: claw their way back. The uncertainty in all this, which
• 5:55
  Speaker 2: I think is a reason for a lot of grave concern,
• 5:57
  Speaker 2: is the effort you can make in the ways that
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: you would in any race to close some of these
• 6:05
  Speaker 2: gaps around making sure people understand your accomplishments, making sure
• 6:09
  Speaker 2: people understand the threat that Trump poses. I mean, one
• 6:12
  Speaker 2: number that I think is really bad in this poll,
• 6:15
  Speaker 2: but is actually in a strange way, like a glimmer
• 6:18
  Speaker 2: of hope is it says only 46% of voters say Mr.
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: Biden has the proper temperament to be president, barely higher
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: than the 43% who said the same of Mr.
• 6:25
  Speaker 5: Trump.
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: Like you can look at that and say, hold on
• 6:28
  Speaker 2: a second. That's how, look how badly Biden has lost
• 6:31
  Speaker 2: his edge. But then you say, well, hold on a second.
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: But then you say, reintroduce people to the Donald Trump
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: they know and hate. And all of a sudden you'll
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: see those numbers come down. But what we don't know is, okay,
• 6:41
  Speaker 2: you've done that. You've made a case for Joe Biden
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: and his accomplishments, his legacy as president. You've made a
• 6:46
  Speaker 2: case against Donald Trump. Does the age factor continue to
• 6:50
  Speaker 2: matter in a way that you can't control for it,
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: in a way that you can't change? Is it a
• 6:54
  Speaker 2: liability that is, is it an unwinnable assignment to overcome
• 6:59
  Speaker 2: the age question? That is, I think, the fear I.
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: Want to separate our analysis from our advocacy here. Obviously,
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: we want to do everything humanly possible to make sure
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: Donald Trump doesn't become president again. And that includes doing
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: everything humanly possible to reelect Joe Biden if he's the nominee.
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: But as always, we want to give you the most
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: honest analysis. And that means no sugarcoating. And it also
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: means no unnecessary doomerism either. So with that said, here's
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: where I think the Biden folks have a point. It
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: is just one poll, even excellent polls. which I think
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: the New York Times Sienna poll is, can only tell
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: you about how voters are feeling at that given moment.
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: And this happens to be a moment where the U.S.
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: and the world are in turmoil. And Barack Obama did
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: have approval ratings that were almost as bad as Biden's
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: one year out from the 2012 election. But here's where
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: I disagree with some of the rosier analysis. The polling
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: averages all show Trump slightly ahead right now, not just
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: this poll. And you can, you know, a lot of
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: people were like, the Susquehanna poll last week had Biden
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: up seven. Yeah, it did. But when you average all
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: the polls, Trump is slightly ahead. Unlike Barack Obama, Joe
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: Biden's approval rating has been stuck in the low 40s
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: for two years now. Two years. That was not the
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: case with Barack Obama. It went up and down, up
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: and down. For Joe Biden, it was in the low
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: 40s when other Democrats not named Joe Biden overperformed in
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: the midterms. Midterms where the New York Times poll basically
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: nailed the results of the most competitive Senate races. and
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: where most of the polls that weren't done by partisan
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: Republican firms were also pretty accurate. Polls did not predict
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: a red wave in 2022. The political coverage suggested a
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: red wave. The nonpartisan polls were actually really good. And
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: when Nate Silver wrote his trollish Is Obama Toast piece
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: in the New York Times that everyone's citing from 2011,
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: this is what the polls in the months of November
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: and December said about an Obama-Romney race when Nate had
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: that headline. Obama plus six, Obama plus six, Obama plus four,
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: Obama plus one. There were 13 polls in those months.
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: Only two had Romney ahead. The rest all had Barack
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: Obama ahead. And the other challenge, the age challenge, obviously,
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: inflation has come down. Prices have not. And so the
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: problem is you're pissed about a $ 15 cheeseburger. The $ 15
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: cheeseburger is no longer, the price isn't going up anymore,
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: but it's stuck at $ 15.
• 9:21
  Speaker 3: It's not going to be $ 12.
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: It's not going to be $ 12.
• 9:23
  Speaker 3: That's the issue.
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: And that is a source of real frustration for people.
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: People say, oh, it's just one poll. Yes, it is
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: a snapshot, and polls catch people at a moment in time.
• 9:32
  Speaker 2: What I find, to your point, this poll is a
• 9:35
  Speaker 2: reflection of a lot of other polls. This poll is
• 9:37
  Speaker 2: not an outlier of what we're seeing.
• 9:39
  Speaker 3: Oh, yeah.
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: That's what I'm saying.
• 9:41
  Speaker 3: I'm saying.
• 9:42
  Speaker 2: So it's like, yes, you can view this as a
• 9:43
  Speaker 2: snapshot in time, but you can't say, oh, don't worry
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: about one poll. Because this poll is capturing a mood,
• 9:49
  Speaker 2: is capturing a feeling, it is capturing a result that
• 9:51
  Speaker 2: we've seen across the board.
• 9:52
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 9:53
  Speaker 4: In the interest of not sugarcoating it, I mean, the
• 9:55
  Speaker 4: sort of biggest things that worried me are on the economy,
• 9:58
  Speaker 4: a majority of voters say Biden's policies have personally hurt them,
• 10:01
  Speaker 4: but they think Trump's policies helped them. So that means
• 10:05
  Speaker 4: that 59% said they trusted Trump over Biden on the economy.
• 10:10
  Speaker 4: It was 59% to 37%. That's a pretty large deficit
• 10:13
  Speaker 4: on the economy. And then when it comes to the
• 10:15
  Speaker 4: age question, 71% of voters think Biden is too old
• 10:18
  Speaker 4: to be an effective president. three years ago, only 30%
• 10:21
  Speaker 4: of voters said he was too old to be president. Now,
• 10:24
  Speaker 4: the Biden folks will push back and say in that
• 10:25
  Speaker 4: same poll, 39% of voters say Trump is too old.
• 10:28
  Speaker 4: And that's right, and that's fair. But I think that
• 10:30
  Speaker 4: speaks to probably a large subset of people in the
• 10:34
  Speaker 4: country who feel like they're both too old and are
• 10:36
  Speaker 4: looking for some sort of alternative, which might mean they
• 10:39
  Speaker 4: lead to the Green Party, they go to RFK Jr.
• 10:42
  Speaker 3: et cetera.
• 10:42
  Speaker 4: And so I think when it comes to the age question,
• 10:44
  Speaker 4: it's not guaranteed that you can change people's mind about
• 10:48
  Speaker 4: whether someone is too old to do a job, right?
• 10:50
  Speaker 4: That might be a view that gets hardened. The other
• 10:53
  Speaker 4: last thing that worries me is half of the respondents
• 10:57
  Speaker 4: think that Joe Biden profited from Hunter Biden's business dealings. Now,
• 11:02
  Speaker 4: all available evidence suggests that that is not true at all.
• 11:06
  Speaker 4: There's no evidence to back that up, but it again
• 11:08
  Speaker 4: speaks to how powerful right-wing disinformation ecosystem has been and
• 11:14
  Speaker 4: how much efforts on the Hill to just throw shit
• 11:17
  Speaker 4: at the wall and see what sticks have actually been effective.
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: I want to zero in on the voters that Biden
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: is losing here, as Tommy pointed out, young voters, especially
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: young non-white voters and also non-white voters in general. And
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: I think when you hear that, Maybe when a lot
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: of people listening in our audience hear that, they think, oh,
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: maybe those voters think that Joe Biden is not progressive enough.
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: That is not the case. The young voters and the
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: voters of color who have left Joe Biden in this
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: poll are more disengaged from politics. They are more moderate.
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: They do not necessarily think that Joe Biden isn't progressive enough.
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: They also don't think he's too liberal. Most of them
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: say that ideologically he's just fine. They are upset about
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: the age and they're upset about the economy. And abortion, democracy,
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: a lot of the social issues are not their top issue.
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: Their top issue is the economy. That is the number
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: one issue for a lot of these young voters. They
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: are extremely disaffected. And in general, they did not show
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: up in the midterms. So you must be thinking to yourself, like, OK,
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: what about all the young voters I know that are
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: very progressive and voters of color who are progressive? They
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: showed up in the midterms and they voted for Democrats
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: and they have supported Joe Biden in the past. So
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: those voters are with us. the voters who did not
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: show up, if you just correct Joe Biden's problems with
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: the voters who didn't show up in the midterms, he
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: would be ahead right now.
• 12:42
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 12:42
  Speaker 2: And if you just take the young voters who were
• 12:47
  Speaker 2: open to Kamala but not to Biden, you erase a
• 12:50
  Speaker 2: lot of the gap. And by the way, it's not
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: like Kamala Harris is beating Donald Trump. A generic Democrat
• 12:55
  Speaker 2: is beating Donald Trump. Kamala Harris is doing better than
• 12:57
  Speaker 2: Joe Biden is doing, but she still carries some of
• 12:59
  Speaker 2: the the effects of incumbency. 59% of voters under 30
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: rated the economy as poor. Zero respondents under 30 in Arizona, Nevada,
• 13:08
  Speaker 2: Wisconsin said the economy was excellent. The other thing about
• 13:11
  Speaker 2: this too is the message that's driving the midterms right now,
• 13:14
  Speaker 2: trying to turn people out against right-wing extremism and turn
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: people out in favor of abortion, which helped a great
• 13:21
  Speaker 2: deal in the midterms. These voters that we need to
• 13:25
  Speaker 2: bring back aren't the kind of voters who turned out
• 13:28
  Speaker 2: in the midterms. Now, the question is, are they people
• 13:31
  Speaker 2: that are receptive to an argument around abortion and democracy,
• 13:35
  Speaker 2: but it hasn't reached them yet?
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: 40% of voters who picked Trump in this poll said
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: that abortion should always or mostly be legal, and they
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: picked Trump anyway.
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: And so what is it that we need to do
• 13:44
  Speaker 2: to reach those voters with a message around abortion? Or
• 13:48
  Speaker 2: is it that questions around this, we've talked about this before, like,
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: you know, we have this belief that this argument for
• 13:54
  Speaker 2: democracy is really effective. It is for a certain segment
• 13:57
  Speaker 2: of voters, particularly engaged people. And also, by the way,
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: for a lot of like moderate older voters that are
• 14:03
  Speaker 2: the kind of people that have come to Joe Biden.
• 14:05
  Speaker 2: But for younger disaffected voters, we're making an argument for
• 14:09
  Speaker 2: democracy in a democracy they don't feel is working for them.
• 14:12
  Speaker 2: So what is it you need to do to make
• 14:14
  Speaker 2: that case around abortion, around democracy and around basic economic issues?
• 14:19
  Speaker 2: to bring those people in in a way that we're
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: currently not doing because clearly there is something really missing here.
• 14:24
  Speaker 4: You've got a real Nevada problem. 17% of Nevada Democrats
• 14:30
  Speaker 4: said they'll vote for Trump. Also, the most diverse state.
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: And it's very odd how for the first time in
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: a long time, racial polarization has gone the other way
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: in this poll. So someone was like, people are rightly
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: questioning like, well, then why is Biden leading by two
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: in Wisconsin? Wisconsin was a tight state. Wisconsin is the
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: whitest and one of the older states. And he's doing next,
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: the next two best states for him are Michigan and Pennsylvania.
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: And those are also pretty white states, but except for
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: the areas around Philadelphia and Detroit where he's not doing
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: that well.
• 15:01
  Speaker 4: And there's subsequent survey data that came that was done
• 15:04
  Speaker 4: after this New York Times poll that suggests that Biden
• 15:07
  Speaker 4: has some real problems with Arab American, Muslim American young
• 15:10
  Speaker 4: voters in Michigan that I think is just something to
• 15:12
  Speaker 4: keep in the back of your head.
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: The other interesting thing is when you, Biden is doing
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: better in this poll with likely voters than registered voters.
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: And if you just go by likely voters, he actually
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: catches up to Trump in Michigan and then he does
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: better in some other ones. And that's part of this is,
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: and Nate Cohn goes into this in the polling analysis,
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: which is like some of these younger voters, when you
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: ask them the first time, do you pick Biden or Trump?
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: They said neither. And then it was only when you
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: push them, they said, all right, maybe Trump, but they
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: don't really love Trump either. They're not like sold on Trump.
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: And the question is, do these voters just stay home
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: in 2024? And so we also could be headed for
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: a very bizarre situation where a lower turnout election helps
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: Joe Biden, which is again, why Democrats, one of the
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: reasons why Democrats did so well in the midterms, because
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: the type of voters who show up in the midterms,
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: college educated in cities, suburbs, like those are now more
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: democratic voters.
• 16:11
  Speaker 2: There's also, I mean, look, young people, uh, are not
• 16:15
  Speaker 2: suddenly discovering that they're open to Donald Trump in a
• 16:19
  Speaker 2: strange way. This poll to me is a little bit
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: of a bizarre version of what we started to see
• 16:24
  Speaker 2: in 2016 and, you know, didn't really accept as what
• 16:27
  Speaker 2: was happening, which is this idea of Trump is just
• 16:29
  Speaker 2: like this like giant middle finger you can pull like
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: a lever. Like, are you for Joe Biden? Are you
• 16:34
  Speaker 2: for Donald Trump? I'm for neither. Well, if you have
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: to pick, fine, then fuck you. I'll vote for Donald Trump.
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so there could be a little, there could be that,
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: or it could be serious.
• 16:41
  Speaker 3: But we don't know.
• 16:42
  Speaker 2: We don't know. I mean, the one thing I would say, look,
• 16:44
  Speaker 2: I think we've done I think we've done our penance
• 16:48
  Speaker 2: to the pessimism gods. I think we've paid our respects.
• 16:51
  Speaker 2: The fire is burning.
• 16:52
  Speaker 5: I know.
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: Just real analysis.
• 16:54
  Speaker 2: I know.
• 16:54
  Speaker 3: No, I know.
• 16:55
  Speaker 2: I'm agreeing. I'm glad we're having this conversation. There was
• 16:58
  Speaker 2: one piece of this is I think like there was
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: a little note of hope, a little, you know.
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: Oh, I have a couple. Yeah, I have a couple.
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: I'm getting to the good side.
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: Okay. Well, just the one I thought was interesting is
• 17:10
  Speaker 2: that if Trump is convicted of a crime, 6% of
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: voters across Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin said they
• 17:19
  Speaker 2: would switch their votes to Biden, which would change this
• 17:23
  Speaker 2: entire poll.
• 17:24
  Speaker 3: It's not just- 40.
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: No, that means. So it goes from Trump 48, Biden
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: 44 to Biden 49, Trump 39. I mean, that's it.
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: It's a ballgame, but it's just it's not even a
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: majority of the countries.
• 17:37
  Speaker 3: No, but that's all.
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: Yeah, no, I was I know 6% sounded small. But
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: then when I look at what you actually look at
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: what happens in each state, Biden's winning by double digits
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: in every.
• 17:44
  Speaker 4: No, it's the it's the 49 is from people, people
• 17:47
  Speaker 4: who switch from Trump to Biden and also people, Trump
• 17:49
  Speaker 4: voters who go to third party.
• 17:51
  Speaker 2: And but what I was going to say about that is, OK,
• 17:54
  Speaker 2: people are very bad. I think sometimes at imagining how
• 17:57
  Speaker 2: a changing circumstance will change how they feel, you'll see
• 18:00
  Speaker 2: one number that I think was quite abysmal that I
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: don't take very seriously is where people say they would
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: never do this or never do that. Several of our
• 18:06
  Speaker 2: presidents have been people who have had polls that said
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: more than the majority would never support them. But the
• 18:11
  Speaker 2: fact that even just imagining it, there are 6% of
• 18:14
  Speaker 2: people who switch tells you that the impact of what
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: happens with Donald Trump is convicted could have a massive
• 18:20
  Speaker 2: shift in polling.
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: It is the biggest... source of optimism in this poll
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: that if Donald Trump is convicted and, and, but it
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: also speaks to all of, we say it a million times,
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: but like all of us who pay such close attention
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: to politics and are like news junkies, like most voters
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: are just normies. They don't pay that close attention to politics.
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: And so, you know what, that because we're all like,
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: how could they see that Donald Trump did this and
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: said this, and how could they still vote for him?
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: And like, they're not paying that close attention. They forget
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: pretty easily. And you know what? They really care about
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: the economy. But there are also people who, if they
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: see a candidate for president get convicted of a crime,
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: they're going to be like, oh, no, I don't think
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: that's a good idea. I don't want to vote for
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: that person. I'm pretty unhappy with Joe Biden. I think
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: he's a little too old. But this guy's a criminal. Like,
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: it does make sense that, like, whenever you're confused about
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: the electorate, just think, like, what are normal people who
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: don't pay close attention to politics thinking right now?
• 19:14
  Speaker 2: I will say I had that thought. And then I
• 19:17
  Speaker 2: gave myself another thought. anxiety thought, which is, okay, there's
• 19:22
  Speaker 2: a huge concern among young people that Joe Biden is
• 19:24
  Speaker 2: too old. And that is especially pronounced among people who
• 19:28
  Speaker 2: are disaffected and don't pay close attention. Over the next year,
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: if they do start paying closer attention, if the coverage
• 19:34
  Speaker 2: starts shifting to a head-to-head race between Donald Trump and
• 19:37
  Speaker 2: Joe Biden, is Joe Biden on the campaign for the
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: next 11 months and 29 days, is that going to
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: leave people reassured around his age? Or is that going
• 19:48
  Speaker 2: to bring more attention, especially given the way it's edited
• 19:50
  Speaker 2: and shared on social media, more fodder for people's deep concerns?
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: That's up to him and the campaign. The other sign
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: of optimism is, look, the voters that are giving Trump
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: the lead in this poll are voters that have typically
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: supported Democrats and just supported Biden, in fact, by large margins, right?
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: Young voters, Black voters, Hispanic voters. So in theory, these
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: are easier voters to win back for Joe Biden, right?
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: Like this, the idea that, that Donald Trump could get
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: 20% of the black vote, something that has not happened
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: with forget about Donald Trump, any Republican president in the
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: post civil rights act era, like that would be, and
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: you know, Nate Cohn says this in the, in the analysis,
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: it would be like a earthquake in American politics and
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: it is probably unlikely right now. Does, Donald Trump can
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: still win without 20%. He can, he got 8% last
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: time he could get nine, 10, 11, and probably win
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: that way. But it does speak to the idea that
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: once you, like Tommy said, throw a billion dollars into
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: a campaign, um, start polar, you know, a campaign that
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: reminds people what they care about, what Donald Trump is
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: all about, what Democrats are all about, what's at stake
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: for them in their lives. Like the numbers could start shifting.
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: That's the other thing. And the other, look, an unnamed
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: generic Democrat led Trump by this poll. by three in 2019.
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: Now the unnamed generic Democrat leaves Trump by eight, right?
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: And that just goes to show that Trump has become
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: less popular between 2019 and now. The problem is Biden
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: led Trump by two in 2019 in this poll at
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: this time and now loses by five. So it is
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: a Biden issue.
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and just the other piece of this too is
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: people do not, again, this is not a poll that
• 21:27
  Speaker 2: shows Donald Trump's strengths, it shows his weaknesses. People that
• 21:30
  Speaker 2: are choosing between two options they're extremely unhappy with are
• 21:33
  Speaker 2: not making a firm and solid choice. This result may
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: mirror a lot of polls in the past, but it's
• 21:41
  Speaker 2: not stable because people's decision is firm. It is stable
• 21:46
  Speaker 2: because people are really unhappy with their choices and they
• 21:49
  Speaker 2: continue to have that feeling.
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: So our pal David Axelrod caused quite a stir when
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: he said that Joe Biden needs to decide whether it's
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: in his best interest or the country's best interest to
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: keep running. What do you guys think of Axe's Twitter
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: thread there?
• 22:02
  Speaker 4: I mean, let's just start with the fact that David
• 22:03
  Speaker 4: Axelrod is a good person who genuinely cares about the
• 22:06
  Speaker 4: future of the country. And he's not doing this to
• 22:08
  Speaker 4: be a dick or because he wants to hurt Joe
• 22:10
  Speaker 4: Biden or, you know, any other nefarious reason.
• 22:13
  Speaker 3: He's just worried like everybody else.
• 22:14
  Speaker 4: I think what is so hard about this situation we're
• 22:19
  Speaker 4: all in is nobody wants to make the mistakes of
• 22:21
  Speaker 4: 2016 again. Nobody wants to, you know, convince themselves that, oh,
• 22:26
  Speaker 4: there's no way a Democrat could lose Pennsylvania. There's no
• 22:29
  Speaker 4: way that Hillary Clinton can't win to someone as terrible
• 22:32
  Speaker 4: as a human being as Donald Trump. So we're all
• 22:34
  Speaker 4: going to ask the hard questions and kind of speak
• 22:37
  Speaker 4: truthfully about these polls. But you also don't want to
• 22:40
  Speaker 4: contribute to Joe Biden's political problems by helping generate unhelpful
• 22:44
  Speaker 4: narratives about his candidacies, right? So that's the hard place
• 22:49
  Speaker 4: we're all stuck in. But at the end of the day,
• 22:52
  Speaker 4: unless you're a Dean Phillips supporter or you're excited by
• 22:54
  Speaker 4: Marianne Williamson, there's no one else in the Democratic primary
• 22:58
  Speaker 4: for you to vote for. So, and I've seen no
• 23:01
  Speaker 4: evidence that Joe Biden's considering dropping out. So as much
• 23:03
  Speaker 4: as I respect Axelrod's opinion, like I don't think that
• 23:07
  Speaker 4: Joe Biden is going to listen to David Axelrod on
• 23:09
  Speaker 4: this question. I don't think he's going to listen to
• 23:11
  Speaker 4: us either. I think there's probably a very small group
• 23:13
  Speaker 4: of friends and family and advisors that Biden may or
• 23:16
  Speaker 4: may not talk to about a question like this. And so,
• 23:19
  Speaker 4: you know, I get where Axelrod is coming from, but
• 23:22
  Speaker 4: I also get why the White House is frustrated that
• 23:24
  Speaker 4: he tweeted it, you know?
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: So you're totally extremely small group of people, probably smaller
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: group of people than, than most others, right? Like Biden
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: has a very close circle and Joe Biden is going
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: to make this decision. And the only people he's going
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: to listen to probably Jill Biden and Valerie, his sister,
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: and probably not even Barack Obama, right? Like not like
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: it's a very small group of people. And so you
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: focus on the things you can control and not the
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: things you can't control. We cannot control. We're not going
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: to get like a, a hashtag trending on Twitter to
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: get Joe Biden to step aside. Like, we cannot control this, right?
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: And an ax can't control it. No one can control it.
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: So it's got to be something that he decides. Now,
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: if he did decide at some point to step aside,
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: then you have Kamala Harris, who's still in this poll
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: losing to Trump by just almost the same as Biden,
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: just slightly better. And then you've got Gavin Newsom, Josh Shapiro,
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: Gretchen Whitmer, J.B. Pritzker, maybe Raphael Warnock, none of whom
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: have been tested on the national stage or even in
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: the polls yet. they'd have to get on the ballot
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: in most primary states this month. Then when are the debates?
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: When and how do they all raise money? How's everyone
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: supposed to choose between them by January, February, March when
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: these primaries are? Now, I'm not saying that's all impossible.
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: It can happen. But the alternative scenario where Joe Biden
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: steps down tomorrow brings a bunch of challenges on its
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: own that I think we should just beware of before
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: everyone's like, oh, that's the That's that would be the
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: saving grace if you just step down like it's a
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: lot of challenges to that at this point.
• 24:52
  Speaker 3: I was really late.
• 24:53
  Speaker 2: I also, by the way, one reason there's a very
• 24:55
  Speaker 2: small circle of people that Joe Biden would listen to
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: on this question is Joe Biden. One reason Joe Biden
• 25:01
  Speaker 2: is president is because he didn't listen to the people
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: who told him why he.
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: Goes through his head all the time. It goes through
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: his staff's head all the time.
• 25:07
  Speaker 3: And I get it. And it's right. And like, you know.
• 25:10
  Speaker 2: Never, you know, Ron Klain said this, never underestimate how
• 25:13
  Speaker 2: much people will underestimate Joe Biden.
• 25:14
  Speaker 3: I think that's true.
• 25:15
  Speaker 2: I think about that. I think about that in my
• 25:16
  Speaker 2: own reaction to this because, you know, I have this,
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: we all have these, we're all in conversations. Everyone listening
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: to this show is talking to people about their concerns
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: about this and their concerns that as much as they
• 25:26
  Speaker 2: are worried about Joe Biden's age and his liabilities, that
• 25:29
  Speaker 2: you don't feel certain that you would want to live
• 25:31
  Speaker 2: in a world tomorrow where Joe Biden said he wasn't
• 25:34
  Speaker 2: running and all of a sudden, not the fantasy of
• 25:36
  Speaker 2: a perfect alternative, but the reality of a messy and
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: very quick and very contentious process to choose an alternative
• 25:42
  Speaker 2: is suddenly what we are dealing with. I don't know
• 25:45
  Speaker 2: what that's like, neither do you, neither does anybody.
• 25:49
  Speaker 3: And so I don't know.
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: You know, Democrats, we get along, we don't fight. I'm
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: sure a primary that lasted a month or two, I
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: think it would go well.
• 25:57
  Speaker 4: I have to say, I mean, if Joe Biden did
• 26:01
  Speaker 4: decide to drop out tomorrow, and I'm not saying I'm
• 26:03
  Speaker 4: calling for him or I want him to or anything
• 26:04
  Speaker 4: like that, but if he did, I'm actually fine with
• 26:06
  Speaker 4: a messy primary. I think messy primaries are good. It
• 26:08
  Speaker 4: gets a lot of attention.
• 26:09
  Speaker 3: Oh, I am too. It's totally fine. It's just, it
• 26:12
  Speaker 3: wouldn't be simple. No.
• 26:14
  Speaker 4: If you jumped in tomorrow, you already wouldn't be on
• 26:16
  Speaker 4: the ballot in Nevada, New Hampshire, and you have to
• 26:19
  Speaker 4: get on the ballots in Alabama, Michigan, and South Carolina
• 26:22
  Speaker 4: by the end of this week and California and Florida
• 26:24
  Speaker 4: by the end of the month. So it's an incredibly
• 26:26
  Speaker 4: complicated piece of business. And that's why I think people
• 26:29
  Speaker 4: find Dean Phillips so fucking annoying because even if people
• 26:33
  Speaker 4: were like, Hungry for some Dean Phillips in their lives.
• 26:37
  Speaker 4: He should have done this a year ago, not a
• 26:40
  Speaker 4: week or two ago. And also just and start playing out.
• 26:42
  Speaker 4: They're all going to want to differentiate themselves from each
• 26:44
  Speaker 4: other on issues. The progressive base activists are still going
• 26:48
  Speaker 4: to be there demanding certain positions. Just as an example,
• 26:52
  Speaker 4: everyone gets in. Joe Biden gets out and suddenly it's like,
• 26:55
  Speaker 4: who is going to call for a ceasefire?
• 26:56
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: And which of you are going to call this review?
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: Who's going to say no more aid to Israel, right?
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: And then you're going to start dividing up. And, like,
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: things are going to get— and that's just one issue.
• 27:04
  Speaker 3: Don't threaten me with a good time.
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: I know, you know, I know. But I'm saying that's
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: just one issue, right? Like, there's a whole bunch of
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: other issues that are contentious. And suddenly we're, like, off
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: to the issues. I agree, Tommy, that, like, I do
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: not fear primaries. I never have. But it's a scenario
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: that's not without challenges.
• 27:20
  Speaker 2: It is 44 years to the day since Ted Kennedy—
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: decided he was going to challenge Jimmy Carter. I think
• 27:24
  Speaker 2: that looms over a lot of this. People are worried
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: that they would jump in, lose, and leave behind a
• 27:28
  Speaker 2: weakened Joe Biden. But underneath that is also, I think,
• 27:33
  Speaker 2: the reality that, look, even Axelrod, when he was asked
• 27:35
  Speaker 2: about this, by the Times, he obviously did an interview after,
• 27:38
  Speaker 2: and he said, give me Joe Biden's record, chop off
• 27:40
  Speaker 2: 10 to 15 years, I'd be really confident, right? Dean
• 27:44
  Speaker 2: Phillips goes- Me too. Me too, we all would. Dean
• 27:46
  Speaker 2: Phillips goes on television and says, I'm not running against
• 27:48
  Speaker 2: Joe Biden, I'm running for the future.
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 27:50
  Speaker 3: Okay. What?
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: Why? What's different? Why are you better?
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: Dean Phillips kind of proves the point of how the
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: alternate scenario is not the easiest either.
• 28:02
  Speaker 2: Barack Obama can challenge Hillary Clinton and he can use
• 28:05
  Speaker 2: a generational frame, but that's an avatar for deeper cultural, political,
• 28:11
  Speaker 2: ideological differences.
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: Which he laid out over the course of the campaign.
• 28:14
  Speaker 3: The key one being supported for the Iraq war. Of course.
• 28:17
  Speaker 4: Gene Phillips is out there having voted with Joe Biden
• 28:20
  Speaker 4: 100% of the time saying I'm better than him.
• 28:21
  Speaker 3: Why?
• 28:22
  Speaker 2: I just like, we are in one year.
• 28:24
  Speaker 3: I think so.
• 28:25
  Speaker 5: Right.
• 28:26
  Speaker 2: In one year, there's four boxes. One of them is
• 28:30
  Speaker 2: Joe Biden wins. One of them is Joe Biden loses.
• 28:32
  Speaker 2: One of them is somebody else wins. And one of
• 28:34
  Speaker 2: them is somebody else loses. If Joe Biden stays in
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: the race, people will look back at this moment and say,
• 28:40
  Speaker 2: I told you so. If Joe Biden gets out and
• 28:42
  Speaker 2: a Democrat loses, people will look back at this moment
• 28:44
  Speaker 2: and say, I told you so. I don't care about
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: I told you so's. I just think collectively, collectively, we
• 28:49
  Speaker 2: have to be honest about our own uncertainty and anxiety
• 28:52
  Speaker 2: that it is legitimate, that it is real, but that
• 28:54
  Speaker 2: nobody has an easy or simple answer. Yeah, yeah.
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: And you know what? And I actually don't worry about
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: the conversation and having this conversation. And I don't really
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: worry about Axe's tweet because we just talked about the
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: voters who are worried about here. They are not paying
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: attention to this. They have no idea we're having this conversation.
• 29:11
  Speaker 2: It's just the freaks right now. Just us freaks.
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: You know, and like, if Joe Biden goes through and
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: he's running and he's the nominee, we're all going to
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: just do every fucking thing possible to get him elected
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: because Donald Trump in a second term is fucking terrifying.
• 29:26
  Speaker 4: I had a very smart, very thoughtful reporter today ask
• 29:28
  Speaker 4: me if Barack Obama commenting on the situation in Gaza
• 29:31
  Speaker 4: created political problems for Joe Biden. And I very, very
• 29:34
  Speaker 4: confidently said, no, the situation in Gaza creates political problems
• 29:38
  Speaker 4: for Joe.
• 29:38
  Speaker 5: Biden, right?
• 29:38
  Speaker 3: Because that is... the core thing that people know.
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: It's a DC story from a DC outlet.
• 29:44
  Speaker 4: So it is what it is, but it's like, yes,
• 29:47
  Speaker 4: in terms of the things that actually move people, the
• 29:49
  Speaker 4: voters are actually paying attention to, it's not going to
• 29:51
  Speaker 4: be this debate.
• 29:52
  Speaker 3: We're all having.
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: So the candidate who's somehow leading the race for the
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: presidency took the stand in the New York civil fraud
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: trial that could cost him his business empire. Donald Trump's
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: four-hour testimony included multiple rants. He was yelling at Letitia James,
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: the attorney general. He was yelling at the judge. The
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: judge at one point asked Trump's lawyer to control his client.
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: At one point told Trump, this isn't a political rally.
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: And then, of course, Trump couldn't help but talk to
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: the cameras as he left the courtroom.
• 30:36
  Speaker 3: Let's listen.
• 30:37
  Speaker 5: I think it's a very sad.
• 30:39
  Speaker 6: Day for America.
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: Seems like he's really impressed the guy who's going to
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: decide how much money he has to pay, huh?
• 31:01
  Speaker 2: I keep coming back to that. I keep coming back
• 31:03
  Speaker 2: to that. There's no jury.
• 31:04
  Speaker 3: Not a jury trial.
• 31:05
  Speaker 2: There's no jury.
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: It's not televised. He's not playing for the cameras.
• 31:08
  Speaker 2: The person he is antagonizing... is 100% in charge. And
• 31:12
  Speaker 2: by the way, not his guilt or innocence. This guy
• 31:15
  Speaker 2: already called him guilty a month ago. This is purely
• 31:18
  Speaker 2: about assessing how much this guy wants to punish Donald Trump.
• 31:22
  Speaker 2: And he walks in every day and just like puts
• 31:24
  Speaker 2: a thumb in his eye. Every fucking day comes up
• 31:27
  Speaker 2: with a new way to make this judge absolutely fucking
• 31:29
  Speaker 2: hate him.
• 31:29
  Speaker 3: And I love it.
• 31:30
  Speaker 4: And he does these little press avails from behind a
• 31:33
  Speaker 4: couple layers of bike rack that makes him look like
• 31:36
  Speaker 4: he's currently in prison, by the way. And then to
• 31:38
  Speaker 4: your point, though, about them, like, worrying about all the
• 31:41
  Speaker 4: wrong things.
• 31:41
  Speaker 3: Don Jr. and Eric testified last week. Ivanka testifies on Wednesday.
• 31:46
  Speaker 3: Don Jr.
• 31:46
  Speaker 4: And Eric, I believe, blamed their accountants or suggested they
• 31:50
  Speaker 4: didn't look at financial statements. But then Don Jr. went
• 31:55
  Speaker 4: on social media and basically spent three days whining that
• 31:58
  Speaker 4: Sam Bankman Freed got like a weirdly hot courtroom sketch
• 32:02
  Speaker 4: and that Don Jr. 's made him look ugly. And
• 32:05
  Speaker 4: it's like, hey man, maybe focus on the fact that
• 32:07
  Speaker 4: SBF is going to go to jail for a.
• 32:09
  Speaker 3: Very long time. And you don't want to do that either.
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: That courtroom sketch though. That was wild.
• 32:13
  Speaker 3: It was weird.
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: That did not look like him.
• 32:15
  Speaker 3: Yeah. No, it did not.
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: Anyway, that's just an aside. I just, I don't like,
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: I know that sometimes we assign strategy to Trump. And
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: even if it's not like a well thought out strategy,
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: it's like, he's got like a good instinct or he's
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: got an instinct for, for being a showman or media, whatever.
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: But like there isn't, this is not instinct pissing off
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: the judge. That's going to decide how much you owe.
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: This is him being an undisciplined fuck.
• 32:40
  Speaker 5: Yes.
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: The guy, when you, because when he walked into the
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: courtroom and they asked him questions, he did the like,
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: he pretended he was like zipping up his mouth, right?
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: Because he's under a gag order. So he like knew
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: that he shouldn't do this and then he just can't
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: help himself. This is why we got to get him
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: out on the campaign trail again. Got to get him
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: out there, cover him all the time. The guy can't
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: help himself. He always falls back into the undisciplined Donald
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: Trump that screws himself.
• 33:02
  Speaker 2: Well, it's also like, it's very, it's very much like, um,
• 33:06
  Speaker 2: an inner monologue that then pops out. So he's on
• 33:08
  Speaker 2: the stand and he's about the judge. He said, he
• 33:11
  Speaker 2: called me a front and he didn't know anything about me.
• 33:13
  Speaker 2: Trump said, referencing the judge, the judge who's in the room.
• 33:16
  Speaker 2: First of all, rude to talk about somebody in the
• 33:18
  Speaker 2: third person when they're sitting there.
• 33:19
  Speaker 3: But then the.
• 33:20
  Speaker 2: Judge retorts, read my opinion, perhaps for the first time.
• 33:24
  Speaker 3: That's a good one.
• 33:25
  Speaker 4: The New York Times live blog pointed out that he
• 33:28
  Speaker 4: even embarked on an impassioned ode to his Scottish golf course,
• 33:31
  Speaker 4: calling it the greatest golf course ever built.
• 33:33
  Speaker 3: Again, who is that helping, Don? I know.
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: So in case voters aren't put off by electing a
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: convicted felon who tried to overturn the last election, perhaps
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: Trump's plans for a second term will give people pause.
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: The Washington Post reports that Trump intends to use the
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: Justice Department to not only investigate Democratic opponents like Joe
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: Biden and his family, but also former allies who've turned
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: against him, like Bill Barr and John Kelly. He's got
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: the whole list. He's got the whole list. And this
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: is even more alarming because the Bill Barr, John Kelly thing,
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: I kind of laughed. It's really alarming. Trump's goons are
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: reportedly drawing up plans to invoke the Insurrection Act as
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: early as Inauguration Day to deploy the military against any
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: anti-Trump protesters.
• 34:16
  Speaker 2: It has a name. It's a group of outside people.
• 34:19
  Speaker 3: It has a name.
• 34:19
  Speaker 2: It's called Project 2025.
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think it's housed at the Heritage Foundation. What's
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: happening over there?
• 34:25
  Speaker 2: For the first time, nothing good.
• 34:27
  Speaker 4: Acceleration is madness.
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: But usually they're just talking about supply-side economics. Now they're
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: using the military against the American people. Like, can we
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: get enough people to care about that? Or would voters
• 34:38
  Speaker 1: rather a president who threatens them at gunpoint than Joe Biden,
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: who's a little too old?
• 34:44
  Speaker 7: Yeah, yeah.
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: Put this in a fucking ad. Put this in an ad.
• 34:47
  Speaker 5: I don't know.
• 34:50
  Speaker 4: I'm not convinced this one's going to work. Look, I
• 34:51
  Speaker 4: care a lot about this. Deploying the military against demonstrators
• 34:54
  Speaker 4: is very bad. He's told advisers that he wants the
• 34:57
  Speaker 4: Department of Justice to investigate all of his allies. Apparently,
• 35:00
  Speaker 4: John Kelly, his former chief of staff, said that in
• 35:02
  Speaker 4: the first term, Trump would tell his White House counsel
• 35:05
  Speaker 4: to have the FBI investigate his enemies, and they would
• 35:07
  Speaker 4: just kind of pocket veto those kind of crazy demands.
• 35:10
  Speaker 4: But in the second term, you're not going to have thoughtful,
• 35:13
  Speaker 4: reasonable people.
• 35:13
  Speaker 3: In any of these jobs.
• 35:14
  Speaker 4: It's going to be the lunatics chosen by this Heritage
• 35:17
  Speaker 4: Foundation organization. group of whoever it is, Stephen Miller.
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: I do not think, sadly, that people will give a
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: shit if Donald Trump goes after Bill Barr and John
• 35:28
  Speaker 1: Kelly or even Democrats. And I hate that, but I
• 35:31
  Speaker 1: worry about what the polls would say about that. I
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: do think military against the American people is something that
• 35:38
  Speaker 1: would get people going. And I could be wrong, but
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: I'd love to see some polls on it.
• 35:40
  Speaker 4: Yeah, but you've got to convince them it's like a
• 35:42
  Speaker 4: real story and not just like hyperbolic reporting from Democrats
• 35:45
  Speaker 4: or whatever.
• 35:46
  Speaker 2: That's how I, like, I don't, there's this, we're in
• 35:49
  Speaker 2: this vice grip again, which is that when Trump is
• 35:54
  Speaker 2: off the front pages, people forget how terrible he is
• 35:57
  Speaker 2: and how monstrous he is. And then when he's back
• 35:59
  Speaker 2: on the front pages, the tears of his horrors kind
• 36:04
  Speaker 2: of meld together and it ends up being a kind
• 36:06
  Speaker 2: of like fire alarm that's always going off about the
• 36:10
  Speaker 2: ways he'll abuse the Justice Department, his threat to abortion rights,
• 36:15
  Speaker 2: his chaos, the fact that You know, that the military
• 36:18
  Speaker 2: said they wouldn't launch nuclear weapons if he wanted to
• 36:21
  Speaker 2: launch them. Unleashing the cops into Lafayette Park. It's just, like,
• 36:25
  Speaker 2: the crime and the corruption and the scandal. And I
• 36:28
  Speaker 2: don't have an answer to it, but I do think that, like,
• 36:31
  Speaker 2: it does end up becoming either silence or noise. And
• 36:35
  Speaker 2: I don't know.
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: I don't think it's... We don't know because it's nothing
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: right now. No one's doing it. And I think, like,
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: even on that one, I would... There's the images of...
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: The trip across Lafayette Park, when he tried to do
• 36:48
  Speaker 1: it there, there's him saying he wished he did it.
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: He wished he invoked the insurrection act. We have that.
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: Then we have the Washington Post story. So you're right.
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: Just a story and a headline, I don't think you're
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: going to– I know there's challenges, but you can tell
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: a story.
• 37:01
  Speaker 3: Here's how I square the circle.
• 37:02
  Speaker 4: Bill Barr, John Kelly, General Milley, the top military and
• 37:06
  Speaker 4: political aides of Donald Trump. Maybe this can convince them
• 37:10
  Speaker 4: to sit down on camera and tell the stories that
• 37:13
  Speaker 4: they tell to the Atlantic on background. or when they
• 37:15
  Speaker 4: go to the Aspen Institute Forum and they get drunk
• 37:18
  Speaker 4: with the editors of some fancy magazine, like, sit down,
• 37:22
  Speaker 4: record these on camera, tell us what you heard, tell
• 37:24
  Speaker 4: us the worst stories, and maybe you can prevent this
• 37:27
  Speaker 4: outcome that includes you getting prosecuted.
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: I mean, we have some of them doing that during
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: the January 6th hearings, which I think had an effect
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: in their terms.
• 37:35
  Speaker 2: What I was going to add is Trump has now
• 37:37
  Speaker 2: taken to referring to the January 6th insurrectionists who've been
• 37:42
  Speaker 2: convicted as hostages. Did you see this?
• 37:44
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 37:45
  Speaker 2: I think the images of the Capitol and images of
• 37:48
  Speaker 2: what these people did and of the people who died
• 37:51
  Speaker 2: and the chaos. And you put video of Donald Trump
• 37:54
  Speaker 2: calling them hostages that he's basically saying, sometimes explicitly, sometimes implicitly,
• 37:59
  Speaker 2: that he will pardon and release. I think that's like
• 38:01
  Speaker 2: pretty fucking damning. Because, again, one of his lowest moments
• 38:06
  Speaker 2: is when people saw January 6th, they really internalized just
• 38:09
  Speaker 2: how dangerous he was. We have to put that back
• 38:11
  Speaker 2: in people's minds.
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I do. It's like turning the military against the
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: American people is going to be, it's chilling to people.
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: And I think that like, we got to, we got to,
• 38:18
  Speaker 1: I mean, you got to figure out a way to
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: make the case because it's the truth. It's not just
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: like a political attack. It's, it's what he's going to do.
• 38:25
  Speaker 1: It's what he wanted to do before. And like, if
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: for no other reason than that, you like, we have
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: to make that case.
• 38:31
  Speaker 3: I also just, I also think.
• 38:32
  Speaker 2: This ties back to the conversation we had about polling too.
• 38:35
  Speaker 2: Cause I do think that like we're, we're, you know,
• 38:39
  Speaker 2: where our minds go right to, all right, what do
• 38:41
  Speaker 2: you do?
• 38:41
  Speaker 3: How do you react?
• 38:42
  Speaker 2: What does it mean? But you step back from this
• 38:44
  Speaker 2: and it's like, I think a lot of people see
• 38:46
  Speaker 2: a poll like that. And like, to your point, they're like,
• 38:48
  Speaker 2: I don't understand.
• 38:48
  Speaker 3: I don't understand.
• 38:49
  Speaker 2: And you're like, the point you made is right. Like
• 38:51
  Speaker 2: people don't know, they're not seeing it. These are the
• 38:53
  Speaker 2: disaffected people. These are the people that aren't paying as
• 38:54
  Speaker 2: close of attention. That's a big part of it. But
• 38:56
  Speaker 2: another part of it too, is like the fact that
• 38:59
  Speaker 2: Joe Biden came in, in the wake of a, of a,
• 39:02
  Speaker 2: a pandemic and facing a, you know, recalcitrant Republican opposition
• 39:07
  Speaker 2: and managed to get as much done as he did
• 39:09
  Speaker 2: get done and that he's not getting any credit for it.
• 39:12
  Speaker 2: That is obviously something that Joe Biden campaign has to
• 39:14
  Speaker 2: deal with. It's something that we as people that want
• 39:16
  Speaker 2: to make sure a Democrat wins has to deal with.
• 39:18
  Speaker 2: But it is, I think, okay to point out, like
• 39:21
  Speaker 2: we are, we start with a handicap of a media
• 39:25
  Speaker 2: environment in which it is very hard for people to
• 39:27
  Speaker 2: get informed and understand what's going on in the world.
• 39:29
  Speaker 2: And that sucks. That is really frustrating. That makes politics
• 39:33
  Speaker 2: a slog. It makes it feel impossible. And that isn't even... Yes,
• 39:37
  Speaker 2: the Joe Biden campaign has to deal with that reality.
• 39:39
  Speaker 2: But that's not on Democrats... That's not on us as
• 39:43
  Speaker 2: individuals who care about this. That is the reality of
• 39:45
  Speaker 2: dealing with this broken system that made someone like Trump
• 39:48
  Speaker 2: eligible to be president in the first place.
• 39:49
  Speaker 5: That's all.
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: Let's not forget that if Trump wins, it's very likely
• 39:53
  Speaker 1: that Mikey Johnson remains Speaker of the House. And the
• 39:57
  Speaker 1: more we learn about this guy, the weirder he gets.
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: Here's a clip from all the way back in 2022.
• 40:03
  Speaker 1: I first saw this clip. I was like, oh, is
• 40:05
  Speaker 1: this someone unearthing this from the early 2000s?
• 40:07
  Speaker 3: No, no, no.
• 40:08
  Speaker 1: 2022. where Johnson talks about using an app that allows
• 40:13
  Speaker 1: he and his son to monitor each other's potential porn intake.
• 40:16
  Speaker 8: Covenant Eyes is the software that we've been using a
• 40:20
  Speaker 8: long time in our household. It's a subscription-based, we don't
• 40:24
  Speaker 8: make any money on this, I'm telling you, we use it, okay?
• 40:27
  Speaker 8: I'm endorsing it because I'm a user. It scans, you
• 40:30
  Speaker 8: obviously opt into it, but it scans all the activity
• 40:33
  Speaker 8: on your phone, or your devices, your laptop, tablet, what
• 40:36
  Speaker 8: have you.
• 40:37
  Speaker 3: We do all of it.
• 40:38
  Speaker 8: And then it sends a report to your accountability partner.
• 40:41
  Speaker 8: So my accountability partner right now is Jack, my son, right?
• 40:45
  Speaker 8: And so he's 17. So he and I get a
• 40:47
  Speaker 8: report of all the things that are on our phones
• 40:50
  Speaker 8: or all of our devices once a week. If anything
• 40:52
  Speaker 8: objectionable comes up, your accountability partner gets an immediate notice.
• 40:57
  Speaker 8: I'm proud to tell you my son has got a
• 40:58
  Speaker 8: clean slate, all right?
• 41:01
  Speaker 1: So who's going to be accountability? You two are going
• 41:02
  Speaker 1: to be accountability partners?
• 41:03
  Speaker 3: We are.
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: I got Dan.
• 41:06
  Speaker 3: First of all, I just.
• 41:07
  Speaker 2: It's hard enough being a teenager these days without big
• 41:09
  Speaker 2: brother stopping you from masturbating, you know? He's like, I'm
• 41:13
  Speaker 2: so proud my son's devices are clean. Like, okay, I
• 41:15
  Speaker 2: guess he's using his imagination. But he's a fucking teenage boy.
• 41:19
  Speaker 2: I don't care. I don't care how many Bibles.
• 41:21
  Speaker 3: Are in the house.
• 41:22
  Speaker 4: There is an unspoken understanding between fathers and sons that
• 41:29
  Speaker 4: you know that I know that you know what it's
• 41:30
  Speaker 4: like to be a teenage boy. And you know that
• 41:33
  Speaker 4: I know, but we're not going to talk about that.
• 41:35
  Speaker 4: We're not going to send any transparency reports. We're not
• 41:38
  Speaker 4: going to talk about any slate being wiped clean, wiped clean.
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: Of what, sir?
• 41:42
  Speaker 3: Like this is fucking madness.
• 41:44
  Speaker 4: And I've seen a bunch of people on Twitter be like, Oh,
• 41:46
  Speaker 4: you know, I grew up in the evangelical church. There
• 41:48
  Speaker 4: were apps like this, you know, like this is the,
• 41:51
  Speaker 4: that's the furthest thing from my upbringing. So culture, chalk
• 41:54
  Speaker 4: that's a cultural blind spot for me i guess but
• 41:56
  Speaker 4: having your accountability.
• 41:58
  Speaker 1: You know why you know why the spot's so blind.
• 42:00
  Speaker 4: Having accountability partner be your son that is that's a
• 42:04
  Speaker 4: myth john having your accountability partner be your son is
• 42:08
  Speaker 4: so fucking weird it's that is.
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: So weird i also like um someday he's gonna snap
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: and just to get back at his dad he's gonna
• 42:15
  Speaker 1: he's gonna go house on that phone look and mike
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: johnson's gonna get quite a report someday.
• 42:18
  Speaker 2: Um like there's sort of a there's a there's um
• 42:23
  Speaker 2: So Speaker Johnson, sorry to bring this up, but it
• 42:26
  Speaker 2: sounds like but for Covenant Eyes, you'd be whacking it
• 42:29
  Speaker 2: off constantly or what? What are we talking about here?
• 42:31
  Speaker 2: How badly do you need this app?
• 42:32
  Speaker 3: It is really sus.
• 42:33
  Speaker 4: If you need an app to keep you from looking
• 42:36
  Speaker 4: at porn, something's deeper there.
• 42:38
  Speaker 2: This is from the promotional materials for Covenant Eyes.
• 42:43
  Speaker 9: Install the sensor app on all of your devices to
• 42:45
  Speaker 9: form a network of protection.
• 42:46
  Speaker 6: The Victory app is where it all comes together.
• 42:49
  Speaker 8: You get access to exclusive content to help you grow.
• 42:52
  Speaker 2: The whole point of this is that you exclusive content
• 42:55
  Speaker 2: to help you grow what do you isn't the whole
• 42:58
  Speaker 2: point to stop that isn't that the thing isn't that
• 43:02
  Speaker 2: the enemy of these isn't that the isn't that what
• 43:04
  Speaker 2: god's trying to stop him from doing by the way
• 43:06
  Speaker 2: isn't god the covenant eyes why do you need an
• 43:09
  Speaker 2: app to stop you if god is seeing.
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: It all now we're getting into the the real rest
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: of it um just saying you know who i just
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: i really want to hear answer a question about mike
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: johnson in this app just for just for fun because
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: you know it's going to be a great response it's
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: all trump yeah don't you.
• 43:24
  Speaker 3: Want to hear a tight five don jr i.
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: Want i want to hear a tight five from donald
• 43:29
  Speaker 1: trump on the covenant.
• 43:30
  Speaker 2: Because everyone's in a while donald trump he won't say
• 43:32
  Speaker 2: anything bad but he'll just smile on his face like
• 43:34
  Speaker 2: he's like because we all know pence.
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: Is a freak because donald trump does not want to
• 43:38
  Speaker 1: be tied to the guy who's this fucking freaky like
• 43:42
  Speaker 1: he was he's just not like that I want it
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: to be a debate question this week. Let's ask. I
• 43:47
  Speaker 1: want to hear Tim Scott talk about it. I want
• 43:49
  Speaker 1: to hear Ron DeSantis talk about it.
• 43:52
  Speaker 4: We always hear in the media and in polling that
• 43:55
  Speaker 4: Democrats are too liberal and that we're pushing this cultural
• 43:58
  Speaker 4: agenda that some people don't.
• 44:00
  Speaker 3: Like and it's foreign to them.
• 44:02
  Speaker 4: This is so much weirder than anything that the Democratic
• 44:05
  Speaker 4: Party talks about.
• 44:06
  Speaker 3: This is batshit to me.
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: We thought it was cool to do the... the car
• 44:11
  Speaker 1: on the roof for Romney in the 2012 campaign. That was, this,
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: I would, I would be talking about this thing the
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: whole campaign.
• 44:17
  Speaker 2: I will say, I am sure to, I will, just to,
• 44:20
  Speaker 2: not to make, I don't want to go, I, like,
• 44:23
  Speaker 2: there are plenty of people, like, just to, internet porn,
• 44:27
  Speaker 2: like I am sure the next round of this story
• 44:29
  Speaker 2: is going to be what?
• 44:30
  Speaker 3: The way, what's going on in your head? And there's
• 44:33
  Speaker 3: so much hedging. I'm trying to articulate this.
• 44:35
  Speaker 2: I'm trying to articulate this.
• 44:35
  Speaker 1: I can't wait for this to be a clip.
• 44:37
  Speaker 2: I'm trying to articulate this, that I am, I think
• 44:39
  Speaker 2: the next round of this story is going to be
• 44:42
  Speaker 2: conservative saying that liberals, oh, you think kid, you think,
• 44:45
  Speaker 2: you think kids looking at porn is good and you want.
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: You think porn is good.
• 44:49
  Speaker 2: And, and that like, and, and look like the, the,
• 44:54
  Speaker 2: The creepiness of this aside, I am sure there's going
• 44:57
  Speaker 2: to be a round. That's all I was getting at.
• 44:59
  Speaker 2: It's going to be a round of story about internet
• 45:01
  Speaker 2: porn is bad for a lot of teens. And it
• 45:04
  Speaker 2: is actually, I think, really harmful for a lot of kids.
• 45:06
  Speaker 2: And it is on a list of things that we...
• 45:10
  Speaker 2: One thing I thought when I saw this is in
• 45:12
  Speaker 2: the same way that food is really unhealthy and there's
• 45:15
  Speaker 2: sugar and everything. So you need to either be more
• 45:18
  Speaker 2: disciplined than you could ever hope to achieve or internalize
• 45:21
  Speaker 2: body positivity despite the whole culture telling you that you
• 45:24
  Speaker 2: should feel ugly, that there's so much porn everywhere and
• 45:27
  Speaker 2: you need to be disciplined and stop looking at it.
• 45:29
  Speaker 1: We got a real Clinton V-chip staffer over here.
• 45:31
  Speaker 5: Well, I do.
• 45:31
  Speaker 2: What are you running for?
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: I'm not running for anything.
• 45:34
  Speaker 3: I'm not running for anything.
• 45:36
  Speaker 2: I'm running at home. I got some cool content I
• 45:38
  Speaker 2: need to watch.
• 45:39
  Speaker 4: Listen, all I know is that Mike Johnson is giving
• 45:41
  Speaker 4: me a priest of confession who wants to hear a
• 45:44
  Speaker 4: little too much about your masturbation vibes, and I don't
• 45:46
  Speaker 4: like it.
• 45:47
  Speaker 3: I don't like it at all. Wait, now what are
• 45:49
  Speaker 3: you picturing? Nothing. And what are they wearing? They're wearing... What?
• 45:54
  Speaker 8: Robes.
• 45:56
  Speaker 5: Oh, multiple.
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: I just think it's something for families to figure out. Oh, yeah.
• 46:00
  Speaker 3: And I think they have.
• 46:01
  Speaker 1: They have.
• 46:02
  Speaker 2: He's not making us download Covenant Eyes.
• 46:04
  Speaker 3: Not yet.
• 46:05
  Speaker 5: Not till Trump's second term.
• 46:06
  Speaker 6: Right.
• 46:07
  Speaker 3: Military in the streets.
• 46:08
  Speaker 2: Yeah, military in the streets, Covenant Eyes in the sheets.
• 46:12
  Speaker 4: That was really cute the way you guys did that together.
• 46:15
  Speaker 6: Yep.
• 46:16
  Speaker 3: Yep.
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: That's why we're accountability partners.
• 46:19
  Speaker 3: You get Dan. Yeah, you get Dan. You get to
• 46:21
  Speaker 3: find out what kind of porn Dan likes. Are we done?
• 46:25
  Speaker 1: Anyway, let's introduce our interview with Barack Obama.
• 46:27
  Speaker 3: That was way worse than I thought it was going
• 46:29
  Speaker 3: to be.
• 46:30
  Speaker 1: Before we get to our interview with Barack Obama, a
• 46:32
  Speaker 1: few quick housekeeping notes. Thank God. Join us tonight.
• 46:36
  Speaker 2: Knock, knock, knock. Housekeeper comes in. You forgot to pay me. Oh,
• 46:39
  Speaker 2: is there nothing I can do?
• 46:40
  Speaker 3: What? I'm just doing a porn story.
• 46:41
  Speaker 5: Oh, God.
• 46:43
  Speaker 1: Join us tonight, Tuesday night, from 4 to 9 p.m. Pacific.
• 46:47
  Speaker 1: For our election night support group on the Friends of
• 46:50
  Speaker 1: the Pod Discord, that'll be fun. Then on Wednesday, November 8th,
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: we'll be back on Discord for our group thread that
• 46:55
  Speaker 1: will cover the third Republican primary debate. That should be fun.
• 46:59
  Speaker 1: If you haven't joined Friends of the Pod yet, you're
• 47:02
  Speaker 1: missing out on lots of fun. Discord's lots of fun.
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: You get great content terminally online. We've got more shows
• 47:07
  Speaker 1: coming up. It's going to be really fun. Head over
• 47:09
  Speaker 1: to crooked.com slash friends and join. Also check out What
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: a Day in Hysteria. They're going to have their own
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: breakdowns of Tuesday's election results and what it all means.
• 47:17
  Speaker 1: So check all that out.
• 47:18
  Speaker 3: All right.
• 47:19
  Speaker 1: Last Thursday and Friday, we had the privilege of gathering
• 47:22
  Speaker 1: in Chicago with a couple thousand of our closest friends
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: to celebrate the 15th anniversary of Obama winning the 2008 election.
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: As part of the festivities that were hosted by the
• 47:32
  Speaker 1: Obama Foundation, Tommy, Dan, Alyssa, and I got to sit
• 47:34
  Speaker 1: down on stage with the man himself. We talked about
• 47:37
  Speaker 1: how Obama thinks about the election now, the future of democracy,
• 47:40
  Speaker 1: the war in Gaza. and what all of us can
• 47:42
  Speaker 1: do to help save democracy. And also, if you like
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: the 2008 Obama nostalgia, we have some great subscription-exclusive content
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: on this very topic coming your way. So again, sign
• 47:53
  Speaker 1: up at crooked.com slash friends to be the first to
• 47:55
  Speaker 1: hear it. When we come back, President Barack Obama.
• 48:11
  Speaker 5: What up, what up?
• 48:14
  Speaker 6: I was wearing a jacket, and then there was this
• 48:23
  Speaker 6: whole faux casual thing.
• 48:25
  Speaker 1: It's not faux.
• 48:26
  Speaker 5: I've been this way my whole life.
• 48:27
  Speaker 6: But then Alyssa did remind me that the whole shirt sleeve,
• 48:33
  Speaker 6: roll up the sleeves thing, that is kind of the brand.
• 48:37
  Speaker 6: That's the vibe for this crew. So, good to see everybody.
• 48:42
  Speaker 5: You too.
• 48:43
  Speaker 2: Hello.
• 48:43
  Speaker 5: Good to see everybody.
• 48:46
  Speaker 9: Okay, so first question's from me.
• 48:48
  Speaker 5: Okay.
• 48:49
  Speaker 3: Okay.
• 48:50
  Speaker 9: So 15 years ago, a lot of people in this
• 48:53
  Speaker 9: room were in Grant Park on arguably the nicest night
• 48:57
  Speaker 9: that Chicago ever could have given us, weather-wise.
• 49:00
  Speaker 5: Unbelievable.
• 49:01
  Speaker 9: And I know that all of us have talked over
• 49:04
  Speaker 9: the years about, well, do you remember this? And do
• 49:06
  Speaker 9: you remember that? And like, our memories have iterated.
• 49:09
  Speaker 5: And so.
• 49:10
  Speaker 9: I just wanted to ask you, can you tell us
• 49:13
  Speaker 9: what you think about that night when.
• 49:15
  Speaker 6: You look back on it? I'll be honest with you,
• 49:19
  Speaker 6: And some of you have heard me say this. I
• 49:26
  Speaker 6: felt pretty sober that night. Because I was fairly optimistic
• 49:37
  Speaker 6: at that point that we were going to win. And
• 49:41
  Speaker 6: I had said to everybody on the campaign trail, to staff,
• 49:48
  Speaker 6: that the point of winning was not the celebration, standing up.
• 49:56
  Speaker 6: The point of winning was then to do the work.
• 50:00
  Speaker 6: And I have to say, by the time the official
• 50:04
  Speaker 6: announcement was made, I was already spending a lot of
• 50:08
  Speaker 6: time thinking about.
• 50:10
  Speaker 5: The work.
• 50:11
  Speaker 6: And so there was a satisfaction. The thing probably that
• 50:16
  Speaker 6: I remember the most was sitting in the hotel waiting
• 50:23
  Speaker 6: for the final call. And Pete Souza took a picture
• 50:27
  Speaker 6: of this. Some of you may have seen it. Michelle
• 50:31
  Speaker 6: was off with the girls doing something in another corner
• 50:36
  Speaker 6: of the room. And I'm sitting there with Michelle's mom.
• 50:40
  Speaker 6: and we're just watching the television, and she's just quiet,
• 50:44
  Speaker 6: and she's just sitting there.
• 50:46
  Speaker 5: And I remember.
• 50:48
  Speaker 6: Thinking to myself, what does this mean for her? She
• 50:58
  Speaker 6: was born and raised in Englewood on the south side,
• 51:03
  Speaker 6: had moved then to South Shore, married, raised a family.
• 51:13
  Speaker 6: During her childhood, even her going or being taken to
• 51:23
  Speaker 6: Marshall Fields or one of the department stores downtown, if
• 51:31
  Speaker 6: she could go in, she wouldn't have been welcomed. She
• 51:38
  Speaker 6: had family. people smart, skilled tradesmen, some educators who could
• 51:48
  Speaker 6: never aspire to.
• 51:52
  Speaker 5: Do more than.
• 51:58
  Speaker 6: Work in a factory or work as a clerk. And
• 52:04
  Speaker 6: so she's sitting there and she's witnessing that her daughter's
• 52:09
  Speaker 6: about to be the first lady of the United States.
• 52:13
  Speaker 6: And I remember her just, she was very quiet. And
• 52:16
  Speaker 6: then she just, and she's not a demonstrative person. And
• 52:19
  Speaker 6: she just reached out and held my hand. And I
• 52:24
  Speaker 6: think that's something that stayed with me.
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: I was thinking about how much the world has changed
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: over the last 15 years. And obviously, you dealt with
• 52:38
  Speaker 1: your fair share of crises. in the White House. We
• 52:42
  Speaker 1: all remember that. But we were never living in fear
• 52:49
  Speaker 1: that if we lost the next election, that we might
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: lose our democracy. And obviously, that is a fear that
• 52:58
  Speaker 1: is very much with us right now. And I know
• 53:02
  Speaker 1: you've talked a lot about what it will take to
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: protect democracy. And you know, that involves policies that improve
• 53:12
  Speaker 1: people's lives and structural reforms and strengthening institutions and winning elections.
• 53:17
  Speaker 1: But you and I have talked a lot over the
• 53:20
  Speaker 1: years about the power of a really good story. And
• 53:25
  Speaker 1: I wonder if you were running for president today in
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: this political environment, in this media environment, what story would
• 53:35
  Speaker 1: you tell about why democracy is a better choice than
• 53:41
  Speaker 1: what the demagogues and authoritarians are selling?
• 53:47
  Speaker 6: I think the starting point is to talk about the
• 53:58
  Speaker 6: things that are uppermost on people's mind to give you
• 54:00
  Speaker 6: a permission structure to get to democracy. One of the
• 54:04
  Speaker 6: things that we learned about 2016, is, um, if you
• 54:12
  Speaker 6: are simply running against and fear, uh, uh, and you
• 54:21
  Speaker 6: don't have a positive story to tell about the concrete
• 54:26
  Speaker 6: challenges that people face, folks may not get to that
• 54:30
  Speaker 6: higher level, uh, story about the meaning of the country
• 54:34
  Speaker 6: and so forth. So, uh, uh, I remember during the
• 54:39
  Speaker 6: midterms when I was a surrogate helping folks out, one
• 54:46
  Speaker 6: of the things I really insisted on is, well, we
• 54:51
  Speaker 6: need to talk about inflation and we need to talk
• 54:54
  Speaker 6: about crime and we need to talk about immigration. We
• 54:57
  Speaker 6: need to talk about the things that are uppermost in
• 55:03
  Speaker 6: people's minds or are being fed to people and and
• 55:09
  Speaker 6: speak about those squarely, and that's the gateway to then
• 55:13
  Speaker 6: get to where we want to be. So that's point
• 55:19
  Speaker 6: number one. Look, if you think back to what we
• 55:23
  Speaker 6: did in 08, 12, ideally when we were on our
• 55:32
  Speaker 6: game during the course of the presidency, The story really
• 55:39
  Speaker 6: didn't change about America. And the story was you have
• 55:48
  Speaker 6: a bunch of people show up on these shores, many
• 55:53
  Speaker 6: of them outcasts, many of them escaping tyranny, escaping crushing poverty,
• 56:02
  Speaker 6: escaping discrimination, escaping caste.
• 56:11
  Speaker 5: And trying to.
• 56:15
  Speaker 6: Make of their lives what they, they, they, they could.
• 56:19
  Speaker 6: And even more importantly, trying to make sure that their
• 56:22
  Speaker 6: kids had something different. And it was always a, uh,
• 56:33
  Speaker 6: from the very beginning, uh, an experiment in overcoming the
• 56:40
  Speaker 6: gap between ideals and reality. And democracy was never exactly
• 56:46
  Speaker 6: as promised. And then we had a bunch of people
• 56:51
  Speaker 6: who worked together to realize that promise. And I think
• 56:58
  Speaker 6: the argument we can tap into right now is remembering
• 57:06
  Speaker 6: reminding people of the fact that we've been through stuff
• 57:14
  Speaker 6: like this before. We've been through eras in which, not
• 57:22
  Speaker 6: that long ago, in which black people were second-class citizens,
• 57:30
  Speaker 6: in which gay people were in the closet.
• 57:35
  Speaker 5: Out of necessity.
• 57:36
  Speaker 6: Because otherwise they might not be able to be employed,
• 57:43
  Speaker 6: or worse. We've been in situations in which women were subordinate.
• 57:52
  Speaker 6: And the good news is is that because we had
• 57:58
  Speaker 6: this system of being able to persuade each other about
• 58:04
  Speaker 6: the better angels of our nature in fits and starts,
• 58:11
  Speaker 6: we got better. We got kinder. We got more tolerant.
• 58:16
  Speaker 6: And it was, it's never been perfect. And it's never been,
• 58:22
  Speaker 6: it's always been messy. But, but there was a, there
• 58:26
  Speaker 6: was a pathway for us to express our best selves. And, and,
• 58:33
  Speaker 6: and that, was true not just for Democrats, it was
• 58:39
  Speaker 6: true for Republicans too. And so I think that's the
• 58:45
  Speaker 6: starting point for them to be able to say, and
• 58:50
  Speaker 6: some of you have heard me say this, it's not
• 58:52
  Speaker 6: as if the entire history of this country, Democrats were
• 58:56
  Speaker 6: on the right side of this thing. Democrats for most
• 59:01
  Speaker 6: of modern history up until the civil rights legislation, they
• 59:06
  Speaker 6: were anti-democratic. and terrorized people and killed them for trying
• 59:13
  Speaker 6: to exercise their democracy. So we don't have clean hands.
• 59:18
  Speaker 6: And I think acknowledging that is, again, an entryway. What
• 59:22
  Speaker 6: I'm always trying to look for is a way to
• 59:26
  Speaker 6: get to the point where somebody who otherwise wouldn't listen
• 59:35
  Speaker 6: and is fearful and is angry and suspicious can stop
• 59:41
  Speaker 6: because they feel as if I saw them for a
• 59:43
  Speaker 6: second and I understood their lives. And in that moment,
• 59:50
  Speaker 6: maybe then I can persuade them that this precious thing
• 59:58
  Speaker 6: we have which is our ability to sort things out
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 6: and exercise forbearance towards each other and understanding and just
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 6: getting along and listening. If I can get to that moment,
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 6: then I think we'll be okay. And that's really the
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 6: instinct that people have. Look, let's face it. We did
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 6: well in in this last midterm, not because all the
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 6: trend lines were in our favor. It was because the
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 6: majority of people believe in that story and they recognize
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 6: it in their own lives.
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 5: And so.
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 6: Speaking to them on those terms is what's vital, which
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 6: is why I think the last time we were together,
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 6: I said that kind of forbearance We have to model
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 6: and exercise as well. And a losing strategy for us,
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 6: I think, is when we are so insistent on our purity,
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 6: when we're so self-righteous about our positions, that we can't
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 6: see those folks.
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 5: Or we're talking down to them, or....
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 6: Our general attitude is that we're going to convince you
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 6: about how wrong you are. I have not seen that
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 6: work yet. Now, look, last point I'll make. I think
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 6: about this a lot because I've been writing about it.
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 6: There is There are times, there are moments, there is
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 6: room for a prophetic voice, just radical truth telling. And
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 6: not only is that sometimes satisfying, but our own base
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 6: sometimes needs to hear that. But you have to pick
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 6: and choose your spots and you always have to, even
• 1:02:19
  Speaker 6: when you're in that mode, you've gotta give people an opening.
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 6: You have to give them an invitation there's gotta be
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 6: room for them in that truth that you're speaking. I'm
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 6: telling you something maybe that you don't wanna hear, but
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 6: you know what? I'll bet you can understand it and
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 6: be a part of us addressing that truth.
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 1: So, all.
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 4: Speaking of those kinds of conversations, Last week, you wrote
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 4: this thoughtful, nuanced statement on the situation in Israel and Gaza. Unfortunately,
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 4: the debate online, especially on social media, is not that.
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 4: It can be very strident and dug in and a
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 4: lot of people fighting and.
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 3: Talking past each other.
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 4: I imagine there's a lot of people in this room
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 4: or people listening at home who see what's happening, care deeply,
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 4: want to be educated, want to participate in the conversation.
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 4: but they're scared of saying the wrong thing, hurting someone's
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 4: feelings unnecessarily, or just kind of not knowing enough to participate,
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 4: and therefore they kind.
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 3: Of tap out.
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 4: What's your advice to people who wanna participate in these
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 4: debates that can feel so fraught about what the path
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 4: forward is?
• 1:03:49
  Speaker 6: Look, I always say, I probably wouldn't have been elected
• 1:03:59
  Speaker 6: even to the Senate and certainly not the presidency had
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 6: there not been this weird convergence with, uh, the internet
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 6: and early social media. I, I, I, I was an outsider. Um,
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 6: I didn't have the backing of institutions and organizations. And, uh,
• 1:04:24
  Speaker 6: there was so much power in seeing all these young
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 6: voices being able to gather together from every walk of life.
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 6: But I'm dating myself now. It was mostly MySpace and Meetup.
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 6: And I always, because I've been working a lot on
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 6: social media issues and misinformation and now AI, I always
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 6: point out, you know what the thing about Meetup? Was
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 6: you had to meet up.
• 1:05:01
  Speaker 5: All right?
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 6: Because it's a pretty crude Flintstone tool, right? You send,
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 6: it's like, hey, we're going to be in the church
• 1:05:08
  Speaker 6: basement in Des Moines on Saturday.
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 5: Meet up. That was pretty much the extent of the technology.
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's like a cork board.
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 5: And But the reason I tell that story is that.
• 1:05:28
  Speaker 6: The power of meeting up is something that all of
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 6: you will remember whenever we'd walk into a campaign office.
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 6: Whatever your idea of what an Obama supporter was, when
• 1:05:40
  Speaker 6: you got into the campaign office, just as was true
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 6: if you went to a meet-up meeting, is you've got
• 1:05:49
  Speaker 6: a young black woman with a nose ring And you've
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 6: got some middle-aged white guy in a flannel shirt and
• 1:05:59
  Speaker 6: a buzz cut who's an Army veteran. And you've got
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 6: a Hispanic gay engineer. And the reason that was powerful
• 1:06:14
  Speaker 6: was because you imagine at the first meetup meeting, okay,
• 1:06:17
  Speaker 6: I've got an assumption about what an Obama supporter is.
• 1:06:21
  Speaker 6: But then when I sit there, it turns out that
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 6: that person's not actually completely like me. And if they're talking,
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 6: that means that they've got some quirky ideas. And I
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 6: promise you, you all know, we had some quirky volunteers.
• 1:06:41
  Speaker 6: And had some, who had some unexpected views that did
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 6: not correspond to you know, the litmus test of progressivism, right?
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 6: The reason I'm telling that story is because what that
• 1:06:58
  Speaker 6: allowed was for all of us to see each other
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 6: in their complexity and then still decide, all right, let's
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 6: work together. And then they had to all go out
• 1:07:12
  Speaker 6: and knock on doors and meet people who were even
• 1:07:15
  Speaker 6: more quirky, right? So going back to obviously a serious question,
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 6: there is always, there's no way to avoid in this
• 1:07:31
  Speaker 6: particular moment on this particular issue after so much blood
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 6: has been spilled against the backdrop of this history. It
• 1:07:43
  Speaker 6: doesn't matter whether it's online or in person. There is
• 1:07:47
  Speaker 6: going to be rage and anger and, and, and not
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 6: just generational traumas, right? I mean, this is century old
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 6: stuff that's coming to the fore and you are, and
• 1:08:05
  Speaker 6: you've witnessed the kind of worst cruelty and tragedy that
• 1:08:10
  Speaker 6: can befall people with involving children and spouses and grandparents and,
• 1:08:20
  Speaker 6: Passions are going to be high. But what I will
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 6: say is that if there's any chance of us being
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 6: able to act constructively to do something, it will require
• 1:08:42
  Speaker 6: an admission of complexity and maintaining what.
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 6: What on the surface may seem contradictory ideas, that what
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 6: Hamas did was horrific and there's no, justification for it.
• 1:09:03
  Speaker 6: And what is also true is that the occupation and
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 6: what's happening to Palestinians is unbearable. And what is also
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 6: true is that there is a history of the Jewish
• 1:09:25
  Speaker 6: people that may be dismissed unless your grandparents or your
• 1:09:32
  Speaker 6: great-grandparents or your uncle or your aunt tell you stories
• 1:09:40
  Speaker 6: about the madness of antisemitism. And what is true is
• 1:09:47
  Speaker 6: that There are people right now who are dying who
• 1:09:54
  Speaker 6: have nothing to do with what Hamas did and what
• 1:10:01
  Speaker 6: is true. I mean, we can go on for a while.
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 6: And the problem with the social media and trying to
• 1:10:13
  Speaker 6: TikTok activism and trying to debate this on that is
• 1:10:19
  Speaker 6: you can't speak the truth. You can pretend to speak
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 6: the truth. You can speak one side of the truth.
• 1:10:27
  Speaker 6: And in some cases, you can try to maintain your
• 1:10:31
  Speaker 6: moral innocence by virtue of just grabbing that slice of
• 1:10:39
  Speaker 6: the truth. But that won't solve the problem. And so
• 1:10:46
  Speaker 6: if you want to solve the problem, then You have
• 1:10:50
  Speaker 6: to take in the whole truth. And you then have
• 1:10:54
  Speaker 6: to admit nobody's hands are clean, that all of us
• 1:11:04
  Speaker 6: are complicit to some degree. I look at this and
• 1:11:08
  Speaker 6: I think back, what could I have done during my
• 1:11:11
  Speaker 6: presidency to move this forward as hard as I tried?
• 1:11:17
  Speaker 6: I've got the scars to prove it. But there's a
• 1:11:20
  Speaker 6: part of me that's still saying, well, was there something
• 1:11:22
  Speaker 6: else I could have done? That's the conversation we should
• 1:11:26
  Speaker 6: be having. Not just looking backwards, but looking forward. And
• 1:11:30
  Speaker 6: that can't happen if we are confining ourselves to our outrage.
• 1:11:38
  Speaker 6: And even what I just said, which sounds very persuasive,
• 1:11:45
  Speaker 6: does not... still doesn't answer the fact of, all right,
• 1:11:48
  Speaker 6: how do we prevent kids from being killed today? So,
• 1:11:54
  Speaker 6: which is why in conversations that I've had with some
• 1:11:57
  Speaker 6: of the young activists, I come with some humility and
• 1:12:00
  Speaker 6: I say, look, I get why you might not wanna
• 1:12:06
  Speaker 6: look at history and context, that's your primary concern. But
• 1:12:13
  Speaker 6: the problem is is that, If you are dug in
• 1:12:18
  Speaker 6: on that, well, the other side is dug in remembering
• 1:12:23
  Speaker 6: the videos that Hamas took of what they did on 7th,
• 1:12:25
  Speaker 6: and they're dug in too, which means we.
• 1:12:28
  Speaker 5: Will not stop those kids from dying.
• 1:12:31
  Speaker 6: So my advice to young people who want to get involved,
• 1:12:37
  Speaker 6: I guess it's not possible anymore to download Meetup.
• 1:12:44
  Speaker 1: Whatever it is.
• 1:12:46
  Speaker 5: But... but approximate that. I would rather see you.
• 1:12:56
  Speaker 6: Out there talking to people, including people who you disagree with.
• 1:13:01
  Speaker 5: If you.
• 1:13:04
  Speaker 6: Genuinely want to change this, then you've got to figure
• 1:13:08
  Speaker 6: out how to speak to somebody on the other side
• 1:13:11
  Speaker 6: and listen to them and understand what they are talking
• 1:13:16
  Speaker 6: about and not dismiss it. Because you can't save that
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 6: child without their help. Not in this situation.
• 1:13:28
  Speaker 5: So, all right.
• 1:13:31
  Speaker 6: We went over time, didn't we? That zero's been on,
• 1:13:35
  Speaker 6: you know, look. Come on, you guys know me. Don't
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 6: bait me with a question like that.
• 1:13:42
  Speaker 5: And then think I'm gonna, this is why I could
• 1:13:45
  Speaker 5: never Win these debates.
• 1:13:50
  Speaker 1: That's actually Dan's last question.
• 1:13:52
  Speaker 5: That's right. You know, I mean.
• 1:13:57
  Speaker 3: Put a one on it. That's all right.
• 1:14:00
  Speaker 7: Sir, you sat down with us on your last full
• 1:14:04
  Speaker 7: day in the White House, which is, I'm sure, how
• 1:14:06
  Speaker 7: you planned to celebrate the end of your presidency.
• 1:14:09
  Speaker 5: I did. You did.
• 1:14:10
  Speaker 7: And in that interview, you talked about how you saw
• 1:14:15
  Speaker 7: your legacy. And you said that you wanted your legacy
• 1:14:18
  Speaker 7: to be not necessarily the policies you passed, but what
• 1:14:22
  Speaker 7: the people who got involved in politics through your campaigns,
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 7: your administration, were still doing years later to affect change.
• 1:14:29
  Speaker 7: So here we are on the 15th anniversary of your election.
• 1:14:33
  Speaker 7: Thousands of alumni are here. And I just wanted to
• 1:14:36
  Speaker 7: close out here to get your reaction to what you
• 1:14:38
  Speaker 7: see from what the people in this room are doing
• 1:14:40
  Speaker 7: and how it makes you feel.
• 1:14:40
  Speaker 5: I mean, I am beaming. With pride.
• 1:14:48
  Speaker 6: I'm listening to Jesse and Lauren. I've had a chance yesterday, obviously,
• 1:14:58
  Speaker 6: I stopped by your drunken bacchanal. I had a chance
• 1:15:11
  Speaker 6: just now to speak to some of our senior team
• 1:15:18
  Speaker 6: and some of you have already heard this, but I'm
• 1:15:20
  Speaker 6: going to repeat it because it bears repeating.
• 1:15:27
  Speaker 5: I actually generally am not nostalgic.
• 1:15:33
  Speaker 6: As I'm writing about the presidency, as I think about
• 1:15:37
  Speaker 6: the presidency, as I look at current issues, I tend
• 1:15:42
  Speaker 6: to remember the mistakes I made and the doubts and
• 1:15:50
  Speaker 6: questions I have and the things I didn't get done.
• 1:15:56
  Speaker 6: And I don't look at things through rose-colored glasses. I
• 1:16:02
  Speaker 6: remember how hard every step of the way was. But
• 1:16:08
  Speaker 6: as I just.
• 1:16:09
  Speaker 5: Mentioned, the team.
• 1:16:16
  Speaker 6: the people, the family, the culture that we constructed, that
• 1:16:24
  Speaker 6: feels as true as anything in my life. And it
• 1:16:32
  Speaker 6: was reflected on the campaign and it was reflected in
• 1:16:37
  Speaker 6: the White House. It was, as Michelle said, reflected in
• 1:16:42
  Speaker 6: people in high profile positions, in the West Wing and
• 1:16:46
  Speaker 6: East Wing. It was reflected in people who were working
• 1:16:51
  Speaker 6: out of the limelight in agencies and embassies. It was
• 1:16:54
  Speaker 6: reflected by a bunch of kids dropped off in the
• 1:16:58
  Speaker 6: middle of farms and communities that they had never imagined
• 1:17:08
  Speaker 6: themselves being in. And yet somehow, a bunch of 25
• 1:17:15
  Speaker 6: and some younger would persuade these communities that we had
• 1:17:26
  Speaker 6: a chance to be better and listen to each other
• 1:17:31
  Speaker 6: and treat each other with respect. And the fact that
• 1:17:39
  Speaker 6: somehow that sustained itself across this many people, and this
• 1:17:48
  Speaker 6: is just a fraction of the people who were involved,
• 1:17:53
  Speaker 6: and that that now is carried forward, whether it's somebody
• 1:18:02
  Speaker 6: like Lauren in Congress or Deb Haaland.
• 1:18:06
  Speaker 5: You know, suddenly goes to, you.
• 1:18:09
  Speaker 6: Know, or It's somebody like Jesse or some of the
• 1:18:18
  Speaker 6: folks you saw in the video who are in their
• 1:18:23
  Speaker 6: own communities transforming.
• 1:18:29
  Speaker 5: The culture of those communities and modeling.
• 1:18:34
  Speaker 6: That kindness and hard work and responsibility and consideration and
• 1:18:40
  Speaker 6: openness to other people.
• 1:18:46
  Speaker 5: That gets me choked up.
• 1:18:51
  Speaker 6: That makes me proud. And that is something that I
• 1:19:00
  Speaker 6: think part of what sometimes all of us who were
• 1:19:03
  Speaker 6: part of this struggle with is we know that's out
• 1:19:09
  Speaker 6: there in the country. We can feel it. And we
• 1:19:14
  Speaker 6: know that when people have a chance to feel that
• 1:19:22
  Speaker 6: in themselves and in their communities and in their neighborhoods,
• 1:19:26
  Speaker 6: they feel better than they do when they're angry.
• 1:19:30
  Speaker 5: And hateful and closed off and lonely. Um, and feeling victimized.
• 1:19:43
  Speaker 5: We know that.
• 1:19:45
  Speaker 6: And so there's a part of us, I think sometimes
• 1:19:47
  Speaker 6: we just are, so often what we're trying to figure
• 1:19:55
  Speaker 6: out is how can we remind people of that? Not
• 1:20:03
  Speaker 6: any particular campaign, but the fact that that honest human
• 1:20:07
  Speaker 6: response is available to us. and will ultimately save us.
• 1:20:20
  Speaker 6: That's why I'm so proud of all of you. That's
• 1:20:23
  Speaker 6: the thing that doesn't get old and stays with me
• 1:20:30
  Speaker 6: and keeps me going.
• 1:20:34
  Speaker 1: President Obama, thank you so much for doing this. Thank
• 1:20:38
  Speaker 1: you for bringing us all together and thank you for
• 1:20:40
  Speaker 1: giving every single person in this room and countless others
• 1:20:43
  Speaker 1: the chance to go on this journey with you.
• 1:20:45
  Speaker 5: All right. Appreciate you guys. Love you.
• 1:20:54
  Speaker 1: Pod Save America is a Crooked Media production. Our producers
• 1:20:57
  Speaker 1: are Olivia Martinez and David Toledo. Our associate producer is
• 1:21:01
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• 1:21:05
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• 1:21:08
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• 1:21:11
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• 1:21:15
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• 1:21:17
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