Latest / Normally / Normally Podcast: The JD Vance Meme Craze

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Normally Podcast: The JD Vance Meme Craze · Normally

0:02
Speaker 1: Hey guys, we are back on normally the show with
0:05
Speaker 1: normal it takes or when the news gets weird. I'm
0:07
Speaker 1: Mary Catherine Ham.
0:08
Speaker 2: And I'm Carol Marco. It's him, Mary Catherine. How is
0:10
Speaker 2: your weekend?
0:12
Speaker 1: Weekend was good and my week will not be so
0:16
Speaker 1: good because we're doing a potty training and intensive over here.
0:18
Speaker 1: So I won't get into details, but there's a lot
0:20
Speaker 1: of work on us this week.
0:23
Speaker 3: Nice. Yeah, I don't miss those days. I have to
0:26
Speaker 3: tell you.
0:27
Speaker 2: People are like, oh, you're going to miss stuff when
0:28
Speaker 2: it's gone.
0:29
Speaker 3: I miss some things, but I don't miss that.
0:32
Speaker 2: I don't miss like having different sized bottles all over the.
0:35
Speaker 4: Place, A lot of things I could live without.
0:37
Speaker 1: Really, Yeah, this is definitely one of them. This transition
0:42
Speaker 1: is the one that is u It's not a delight,
0:44
Speaker 1: but we're going to make it through. Yeah, we're having
0:46
Speaker 1: to have success.
0:48
Speaker 3: So let's speaking of babies exactly.
0:53
Speaker 1: So there's a new meme craze on the internet, and Carol,
0:58
Speaker 1: you probably have this too. But I have to bring
1:00
Speaker 1: my husband up to speed on memes.
1:04
Speaker 2: I had to bring my husband up to speed on everything.
1:06
Speaker 2: A few days ago. My husband was like, wait, what
1:09
Speaker 2: are the dancing Israelis from the like nine to eleven
1:11
Speaker 2: Conspiracies and like, you're a little late on this.
1:14
Speaker 1: Yeah, So it's a funny thing when you have an
1:17
Speaker 1: offline mostly offline normally husband. Normally husband is that you know,
1:22
Speaker 1: he knows politics. He's sort of generally clued in and smart.
1:26
Speaker 1: But there are things on the Internet that get so
1:28
Speaker 1: far away by the time I'm explaining to them to
1:31
Speaker 1: him that they get it's just a little off the rails.
1:34
Speaker 1: And this week there's one of them, which is the
1:36
Speaker 1: meaning of jd Vance. Jd Vance, the Vice President of
1:40
Speaker 1: the United States of America, is now being turned into
1:43
Speaker 1: everything under the sun thanks to AI and photoshop on
1:47
Speaker 1: the interwebs, and The Atlantic has written about it, which,
1:53
Speaker 1: on one hand, I find helpful because I did not
1:55
Speaker 1: know where this started, and I was like, it's fun.
1:59
Speaker 1: It's fun. We're making him into Star Wars characters and
2:02
Speaker 1: garbage pale kids and Willy Wonka extras. But I don't
2:06
Speaker 1: know where it started. So it turns out The Atlantic
2:08
Speaker 1: reports that this started in October when a user on
2:12
Speaker 1: x posted an image of Vance captioned for every one
2:15
Speaker 1: hundred likes, I will turn jd Vance into a progressively
2:18
Speaker 1: apple cheeked baby but baby faced. Vance has gone fully
2:21
Speaker 1: viral since last week after the clash in the Oval
2:25
Speaker 1: office with Zelensky and Trump. So and then they have
2:29
Speaker 1: phrases over them like you have to say please and
2:31
Speaker 1: Tank you miss to Zinski, so they give him a
2:33
Speaker 1: funny voice. Okay. The Atlantic writer says, of course, people
2:37
Speaker 1: love making memes that portray their political adversaries as hapless
2:40
Speaker 1: and incompetent. That's not exactly what's happening with these images
2:43
Speaker 1: of Vance. The memes are going viral on the left
2:46
Speaker 1: wing internet, but they are equally, if not more, popular
2:49
Speaker 1: on the right, explicitly pro Trump accounts on x that
2:52
Speaker 1: otherwise spend their time bashing liberals or posting embarrassing memes
2:56
Speaker 1: of their parties second in command. The headline of this
3:00
Speaker 1: piece is, wait, who's posting these unflattering JD. Vance memes?
3:04
Speaker 1: The online wrote, right is trolling one.
3:06
Speaker 3: Of its own, right, What they yeah, go ahead, you.
3:11
Speaker 1: Can diagnose it if you would like.
3:12
Speaker 3: Can we all join it?
3:13
Speaker 2: They don't get is that we're able to laugh at ourselves,
3:16
Speaker 2: and they don't understand that because they are so used
3:19
Speaker 2: to only laughing at us and never at themselves, and
3:22
Speaker 2: when Saturday Night Live or late night comedian makes fun
3:26
Speaker 2: of the left, they don't appreciate it at all. Meanwhile,
3:29
Speaker 2: Orange Man Bad became something that people on the right
3:32
Speaker 2: say because it's funny and it's okay.
3:34
Speaker 4: To laugh at yourself.
3:36
Speaker 1: Yeah, and we we are used to being trolled constantly, right,
3:39
Speaker 1: that's part of our day to day life. That's why
3:41
Speaker 1: I can enjoy art that's created by people I don't
3:44
Speaker 1: agree with, because it happens all the time. I have
3:45
Speaker 1: a lot of practice, that's right. The other thing I
3:48
Speaker 1: think they're missing, and I think it was Michael Duncan
3:50
Speaker 1: who who posted this making fun of each other is
3:54
Speaker 1: dudes rock one oh one totally.
3:56
Speaker 2: Yeah, this is and it's why you and I get
3:59
Speaker 2: along well with men, because who like to make fun
4:02
Speaker 2: of everything and each other and ourselves and all of it.
4:05
Speaker 1: And so I think this is yet another example of
4:09
Speaker 1: the left illustrating why it's not reaching men. Yeah, because
4:13
Speaker 1: I've been enjoying this JD Fance thing so much good. Yeah,
4:17
Speaker 1: and it's it's so fun to see what people turn
4:19
Speaker 1: him into.
4:20
Speaker 3: And he's enjoying it, and that is.
4:22
Speaker 1: The other part. He's enjoying it, and he I gotta say,
4:26
Speaker 1: I got to give him props on this. Usually when
4:30
Speaker 1: a politician tries to join in on a trend or
4:34
Speaker 1: a meme fest, it doesn't go that well. They're usually behind, right,
4:40
Speaker 1: they're usually cringe, they're usually not tonally correct, because there's
4:44
Speaker 1: a lot of as dumb as the Internet is, there's
4:46
Speaker 1: a lot of nuance in what these things mean and why,
4:49
Speaker 1: and which is why it's hard to bring your normal
4:50
Speaker 1: husband up to speed on memes.
4:52
Speaker 3: Right.
4:54
Speaker 1: But jd Vance, as part of this, posts himself as
5:00
Speaker 1: Leonardo DiCaprio in the Tarantino film Once Upon a Time
5:03
Speaker 1: in Hollywood, because there is a famous meme of Leonardo
5:07
Speaker 1: DiCaprio's character in this, pointing at the TV, acknowledging like,
5:11
Speaker 1: oh no, I know what that is.
5:12
Speaker 3: Right, it's like a meme within a meme.
5:16
Speaker 1: It's a meme within a meme.
5:17
Speaker 5: Yeah, it perfectly deployed, perfect tone, right, funny, clever and
5:24
Speaker 5: joined in perfectly with the whole thing, thereby gaining respect
5:30
Speaker 5: because he's illustrating that he's fine with being made fun of,
5:33
Speaker 5: and he's seeing all of it and enjoying it.
5:36
Speaker 2: It's great and so anchy comedy is the callback, right,
5:39
Speaker 2: Like so many stand up comedians will start with something
5:41
Speaker 2: and then like at the end of their act like
5:43
Speaker 2: callback to that.
5:44
Speaker 3: The meme within the meme is exactly that, and it's
5:47
Speaker 3: it's so good. You're absolutely right.
5:49
Speaker 4: It's what the left is lacking. They are lacking a
5:53
Speaker 4: lightness right now, and.
5:55
Speaker 3: I think they did it to themselves.
5:56
Speaker 2: We talk about a lot that they don't get negative press,
6:00
Speaker 2: so they don't know how to react to press that
6:02
Speaker 2: is negative. They don't get difficult interviews, so they don't
6:06
Speaker 2: know how to handle, you know, even slightly difficult interviews.
6:09
Speaker 4: Kamala Harris just collapsed.
6:12
Speaker 2: In any interview because she was unable to deal with
6:14
Speaker 2: any conflict or any pushback at all. This is the
6:17
Speaker 2: same thing in humor format.
6:19
Speaker 6: There.
6:20
Speaker 4: They don't know what to do with themselves because they're
6:22
Speaker 4: not a part of it.
6:24
Speaker 1: Yeah, it is. It is their their inability to sort
6:29
Speaker 1: of goof and the misunderstanding of the idea of I mean,
6:35
Speaker 1: there's there's been an old meme that is the left
6:36
Speaker 1: camp meme. Yes, and it does appear that they are
6:39
Speaker 1: having some trouble with that, especially if you consider the
6:42
Speaker 1: pretty cringe videos from Democrats of the past week, including
6:46
Speaker 1: the CHOOSU Fighter.
6:48
Speaker 2: The day.
6:50
Speaker 1: Yeah, the dancing the Doloro Rose Doloro, who's an older
6:55
Speaker 1: liberal congresswoman on the Hill who has purple hair, and
6:58
Speaker 1: it's very funny shed around doing gen Z slang on
7:02
Speaker 1: the Hill. It was cringe and this was not. And
7:07
Speaker 1: I don't think it's just because I am more favorable
7:10
Speaker 1: to jd Vance than Rose Doloro. I think it's because
7:13
Speaker 1: he got it right. He got it And if you
7:16
Speaker 1: do not understand the concept of excuse me, busting balls,
7:19
Speaker 1: you will not be reaching mail voters. Yeah.
7:22
Speaker 2: Absolutely, they love that. They are all about that. I mean,
7:25
Speaker 2: I think all male on mail interaction is just like
7:28
Speaker 2: poking fun at each other and that's how they connect.
7:31
Speaker 1: And to the extent that my normy husband does understand memes,
7:35
Speaker 1: it's because he sends them back and forth between between
7:39
Speaker 1: friends on like a real people text chain, as opposed
7:42
Speaker 1: to the fake people I talked to on the Internet.
7:44
Speaker 2: And I have to say, as a mom, I also
7:47
Speaker 2: stress to my kids that they have to be able
7:49
Speaker 2: to laugh at themselves and if somebody makes fun of you,
7:52
Speaker 2: it's almost always better to lean into it and make
7:55
Speaker 2: fun of yourself too, rather than like, go tell the
7:58
Speaker 2: teacher about it.
7:59
Speaker 3: That is never work. You want to be the.
8:01
Speaker 2: Kind of person who can laugh at themselves, laugh it off,
8:05
Speaker 2: move on with your life.
8:06
Speaker 1: Life lessons from my father, by the way, because when
8:09
Speaker 1: I had these giant teeth, when they grew in, grew
8:11
Speaker 1: in at about like a forty five degree angle to
8:13
Speaker 1: the ground, it was very tragic. No one could take
8:16
Speaker 1: me serious and teeth. Thank there was no way I
8:19
Speaker 1: wasn't going to be made fun of. And my father
8:21
Speaker 1: understood this. And I grew up with two brothers, so
8:23
Speaker 1: like I was gonna get made fun of in the
8:26
Speaker 1: house regardless. But my father, my father would always say, hey,
8:29
Speaker 1: look on the bright side, you can eat corn on
8:31
Speaker 1: the cop through a picket fence. And so various, mister ham,
8:37
Speaker 1: various barbs of this nature prepared me for what I
8:40
Speaker 1: would endure in public school. And yeah, it is important
8:44
Speaker 1: just to understand that, you know, you gotta you can
8:48
Speaker 1: stick up for yourself by laughing at yourself.
8:51
Speaker 2: Right, we all have mockable things about us. It's okay,
8:54
Speaker 2: let's lean into it and not.
8:56
Speaker 3: Take it too serious.
8:57
Speaker 1: I'm not scarred.
8:58
Speaker 2: Fine, we're going to take a short break and come
9:01
Speaker 2: right back with normally.
9:06
Speaker 1: What's up next in the news.
9:07
Speaker 2: Well, this is also on the culture side. But the
9:11
Speaker 2: Gavin Newsom Charlie Kirk interview has been circulating and has
9:17
Speaker 2: been just kind of a big story because Gavin Newsom
9:21
Speaker 2: seems able to do that lightness thing. I am very
9:25
Speaker 2: worried about a Gavin Newsome future. I think that you know,
9:31
Speaker 2: he is able to present himself as a moderate even
9:34
Speaker 2: though he is far far left and things that he does,
9:39
Speaker 2: like I didn't think that Governor Ron DeSantis should have
9:43
Speaker 2: debated Gavin Newsom last year. Even though I thought that
9:46
Speaker 2: DeSantis won, I thought it was still better for Newsome
9:50
Speaker 2: because he got to kind of show himself off to
9:53
Speaker 2: the country at a time where a different Democrat was
9:55
Speaker 2: running for president, kind of keep his name at the
9:58
Speaker 2: top of people's mind, and to really get to spar
10:02
Speaker 2: and do the thing that you and I say that
10:03
Speaker 2: they don't do, which is take criticism, learn how to
10:06
Speaker 2: fight back, formulate the arguments.
10:09
Speaker 3: And he did that here with Charlie Kirk.
10:11
Speaker 4: We're going to play the clip that has mostly gone viral.
10:14
Speaker 1: Here we go.
10:15
Speaker 7: You right now should come out and be like you
10:17
Speaker 7: know what, the young man who's about to win the
10:20
Speaker 7: state championship in the long jump in female sports, that
10:23
Speaker 7: shouldn't happen. You as the governor, should step out and
10:25
Speaker 7: say no, no, And I appreciate and like, would you
10:28
Speaker 7: do something like that, would you say no men in
10:29
Speaker 7: female sports?
10:30
Speaker 8: Well, I think it's an issue of fairness. I completely
10:32
Speaker 8: agree with you on that. It is an issue affairs.
10:34
Speaker 7: So it's deeply Would you speak out against this young man,
10:37
Speaker 7: baby Hernandez, who right now is going to win the
10:39
Speaker 7: state championship in the long time, I can see you
10:41
Speaker 7: wrestling with it.
10:42
Speaker 3: No, I'm not wrestling.
10:43
Speaker 8: I'm not relection with the fairness issue. I totally agree
10:46
Speaker 8: with you. By the way, as someone with four kids.
10:47
Speaker 8: You got two daughters, right, two daughters I had, and
10:50
Speaker 8: a wife that went god forbid to Stanford and played
10:53
Speaker 8: on the junior national soccer team, and a guy who
10:55
Speaker 8: got into college only because I was left handed and
10:59
Speaker 8: could throw baseball a little bit or hit the ball
11:01
Speaker 8: for a little bit. So I revere sports and so
11:05
Speaker 8: the issue of fairness is completely legit. And I saw
11:09
Speaker 8: that the last couple of years. Boy did I saw
11:12
Speaker 8: how you guys were able to weaponize that.
11:13
Speaker 7: Issue at another weaponize, don't that's.
11:15
Speaker 8: Well, weabinize maybe pejoriti of you're right, but you were
11:18
Speaker 8: able to shine a light on highlight it in a
11:20
Speaker 8: way that frankly, there are not that many we're talking about.
11:23
Speaker 8: I think N two A what five hundred and ten thousand? No, No,
11:26
Speaker 8: but I just didn't realize.
11:27
Speaker 7: It's eight hundred and ninety medals and trophies that we
11:30
Speaker 7: know of in the last five years.
11:31
Speaker 5: That's a lot.
11:31
Speaker 8: No, So I'm gonna let me step back say completely
11:34
Speaker 8: fair on the issue of fairness, I completely agree. So
11:37
Speaker 8: that's easy to call out the unfairness of that. There's
11:40
Speaker 8: also a humility and a grace. You know that that
11:43
Speaker 8: these poor people are more likely to commit suicide, have
11:45
Speaker 8: anxiety and depression, and the way that people talk down
11:49
Speaker 8: to vulnerable communities is an issue that I have a
11:51
Speaker 8: hard time with as well. So both things I can
11:54
Speaker 8: hold in my hand. How can we address this issue
11:57
Speaker 8: with the kind of decency that I think you know
12:00
Speaker 8: inherent in you but not always expressed on the issue, No,
12:03
Speaker 8: I get it. At the same time, deal with the
12:05
Speaker 8: under you're asked.
12:06
Speaker 7: You asked a good faith question like how do we
12:08
Speaker 7: Democrats get out of the wilderness? Yeah, this one is
12:10
Speaker 7: an eighty twenty issue New York Times poll, Right, that's all.
12:13
Speaker 1: I agree with you.
12:13
Speaker 7: We're getting crushed on and like crush and you have
12:15
Speaker 7: an opportunity in the state to be like. Look, I
12:17
Speaker 7: have a heart for Ady Hernandez. I have a heart
12:19
Speaker 7: for the San Jose volleyball player. Yeah, let's give them compassion.
12:22
Speaker 7: But what's not fair is just for like a woman's
12:25
Speaker 7: entire woman's sports.
12:26
Speaker 8: I agree, you know, by the way I agree with you.
12:28
Speaker 8: I agree with you, and it's sterty. I stress tested
12:30
Speaker 8: this child. I was wondering. I said, you know, in California,
12:33
Speaker 8: and I've been a leader in the LGBTQ places as
12:35
Speaker 8: face as you know, back in two thousand and four
12:37
Speaker 8: was marrying sane sex couples. And I know we have
12:39
Speaker 8: different opinion on marriage equality, and so I've been at
12:43
Speaker 8: this for years and years. I take a bad seat
12:44
Speaker 8: to no one, but I was actually on the issue
12:46
Speaker 8: of sports, which in the last few years has just exploded,
12:50
Speaker 8: trying to understand and understand the ten athletes in the
12:53
Speaker 8: NC two A five hundred and ten thousand athletes, but
12:55
Speaker 8: ten athletes and what but how profound, And even my
12:58
Speaker 8: own friend Cohort people saying, the hell is going on?
13:01
Speaker 8: Why aren't you calling this out? When did this happen?
13:04
Speaker 8: So in two thousand, turns out in twenty fourteen, years
13:07
Speaker 8: before I was governor, there was a law established that
13:09
Speaker 8: established the legal principles that allow the allowed trans athletes
13:14
Speaker 8: and women's sports. But the issue of fairness is completely jit.
13:18
Speaker 8: So I completely align with you, and we've got to
13:20
Speaker 8: own that. We've got to acknowledge it. I don't say
13:22
Speaker 8: that through the prism of politics because you disagree with
13:25
Speaker 8: same sex marriage on principle, and so I'm not. And
13:29
Speaker 8: by the way, I value the fact that you're not
13:32
Speaker 8: trying to walk away from that principle because electorally, I'm
13:36
Speaker 8: in the side, yeah, in the minority, and I don't
13:38
Speaker 8: want to walk away from this principle because of electoral
13:41
Speaker 8: But it is an issue of fairness.
13:43
Speaker 3: Yeah.
13:44
Speaker 2: Well, it's interesting. I wanted to play the longer version
13:47
Speaker 2: of that clip because he gets into so much stuff.
13:49
Speaker 2: He's like, you know, for example, his pointing. By the way,
13:53
Speaker 2: Charlie was masterful in this interview. I thought he did
13:55
Speaker 2: a fantastic job. He really he maintained friendliness, he was
14:00
Speaker 2: able to get to the bottom of things with him.
14:02
Speaker 2: They had an exchange that I thought Charlie did a
14:06
Speaker 2: terrific job. In this clip, he is saying Charlie takes
14:10
Speaker 2: unpopular positions like against same sex marriage, and Gavin Newsom
14:15
Speaker 2: is basically saying we're going to stick with our unpopular position,
14:19
Speaker 2: but also manages to say I don't think it's fair.
14:23
Speaker 2: He really is very sneaky and Republican should be extremely
14:27
Speaker 2: careful with him.
14:28
Speaker 1: Look, I am very uncharitable toward Gavin Newsom, and I
14:33
Speaker 1: really thought that the mismanagement of the fires in California
14:36
Speaker 1: would just end him right, end him right. And when
14:41
Speaker 1: I hear him talk about the fires in a politician's capacity,
14:45
Speaker 1: I'm like, this is a lizard man, Like, what's happening here?
14:48
Speaker 1: He's terrible at this. And then I watched this and
14:51
Speaker 1: I go, oh, he's having a real He's having a conversation,
14:55
Speaker 1: which is the thing that many of them cannot do.
14:58
Speaker 1: And I think he also did in the Dysantas Knew
15:02
Speaker 1: some debate, which I'm in slight disagreement with you on that,
15:06
Speaker 1: just because I enjoyed the counterfactual of watching these two
15:09
Speaker 1: people debate each other versus the Biden Trump matchup. And
15:13
Speaker 1: I do think that hearing those voices and those arguments
15:17
Speaker 1: from those two folks as the foils was helpful to
15:22
Speaker 1: America just to see that conversation happen. But yeah, he's
15:25
Speaker 1: pretty good at having that conversation. Sometimes. I agree with
15:29
Speaker 1: you that he is tricky here because he's better at
15:34
Speaker 1: doing the Kamala Harris thing, which was I'm going to say,
15:38
Speaker 1: I don't think the things I used to think. Yeah,
15:41
Speaker 1: but I'm not going to do anything about it.
15:43
Speaker 3: Definitely right.
15:46
Speaker 2: He mentioned that the law precedes him, but you're a
15:49
Speaker 2: governor and you could change that.
15:52
Speaker 3: That's what Governor DeSantis does.
15:54
Speaker 2: He affects change in the state of Florida and moves
15:57
Speaker 2: things in his direction in California.
16:01
Speaker 1: This is the second major Democrat in a couple of
16:07
Speaker 1: weeks to say something along these lines, and I would
16:09
Speaker 1: say Ram Emmanuel went even further. And this one didn't
16:13
Speaker 1: go viral, but it was on Bill Maher's show, and
16:16
Speaker 1: I kid you not, as part of a discussion of
16:18
Speaker 1: how democrats governing major cities have gotten off the rails.
16:23
Speaker 1: He said, I know me. If in high school or
16:27
Speaker 1: middle school I could have said I'm a they and
16:29
Speaker 1: gotten into the women's bathroom, I would have done it
16:32
Speaker 1: for sure.
16:33
Speaker 2: That's the truth about so many of these men, like
16:36
Speaker 2: they know what they would have done.
16:37
Speaker 1: Come on, well, but it he conceded the point we've
16:42
Speaker 1: all been making. When this is subjective, it becomes dangerous
16:46
Speaker 1: to people. He did it in sort of a coarse way.
16:51
Speaker 1: I am very surprised that didn't go viral or get
16:55
Speaker 1: him in trouble. What kind of heat is Newsome taking
16:58
Speaker 1: for saying these very like but common sense things.
17:01
Speaker 2: Right well, Newsom got ripped by Democrats. A column in
17:05
Speaker 2: The Sacramento be titled Governor Gavin Newsom's civility displayed on
17:09
Speaker 2: his new podcast looks Spineless noted and this is what
17:14
Speaker 2: they said.
17:15
Speaker 1: Quote.
17:15
Speaker 2: Newsom nodded in agreement so much with Kirk. I would
17:18
Speaker 2: be surprised if he didn't strain his neck. He allowed
17:20
Speaker 2: Kirk to say whatever he wanted and didn't provide much
17:23
Speaker 2: in the way of opposition. If you told someone who
17:25
Speaker 2: doesn't follow politics to watch this podcast episode and choose
17:29
Speaker 2: who was the conservative, I'm sure they would say both.
17:33
Speaker 4: That's what he nails.
17:34
Speaker 3: Yeah, he really did. He nailed that. The problem for him,
17:38
Speaker 3: of course.
17:38
Speaker 2: Is he's going to have to go through the Democratic
17:41
Speaker 2: primary first, and this is where they all return to
17:43
Speaker 2: the ridiculous positions that they have to have last time around.
17:47
Speaker 2: I think all of them are almost all of them
17:50
Speaker 2: raised their hands.
17:51
Speaker 4: For should we have free health care for legal immigrants?
17:54
Speaker 2: I mean, they get caught up in this nonsense in
17:56
Speaker 2: the primary that gets very hard to walk back in
17:59
Speaker 2: the general. And him doing it this early is almost
18:02
Speaker 2: like a sign that he thinks he is the standard
18:04
Speaker 2: bear and that he's going to be the one that
18:06
Speaker 2: the rest of the squad has to be.
18:08
Speaker 4: So we'll see.
18:09
Speaker 1: You know what I found interesting too, he mentions his
18:11
Speaker 1: own friend cohort, which is very liberal, very rich donor
18:18
Speaker 1: class Californians. Yeah, okay, so that should tell him how
18:25
Speaker 1: potent this is, right, because if the people, if the people.
18:30
Speaker 1: I think it is because David Frums written about it too,
18:32
Speaker 1: where he was sitting around before the election and all
18:35
Speaker 1: sorts of actually liberal people were like urbane liberals were like,
18:39
Speaker 1: I don't know about this one, guys. So I do
18:42
Speaker 1: think that it's an eighty twenty issue. It's going to
18:45
Speaker 1: encompass some of every single class in America. And if
18:49
Speaker 1: you're hearing that at the French laundry table where you
18:52
Speaker 1: go during COVID, Gavin Newsom, when no one else can
18:55
Speaker 1: go to a rescue, then that's a that's a red
19:00
Speaker 1: flag for you. It's a red flag. So he's dancing
19:03
Speaker 1: around it, but he needs to actually do something if
19:05
Speaker 1: he if he wants to on the right, but then
19:08
Speaker 1: he's on the wrong side of lefty politics.
19:11
Speaker 3: It's very, very tough spot for him.
19:12
Speaker 2: He also mentions that his thirteen year old son is
19:15
Speaker 2: a big fan of Charlie's and that's.
19:18
Speaker 4: That was an interesting point too.
19:21
Speaker 2: I don't know how i'd feel if my you know,
19:24
Speaker 2: one of my kids was a huge fan of like
19:26
Speaker 2: somebody really far on the opposite side politically from me.
19:30
Speaker 2: But he laughs it off, and he talks about how
19:33
Speaker 2: his son wanted to take the day off to go
19:35
Speaker 2: see this interview, but you know, obviously he can't because
19:37
Speaker 2: he has school. And Charlie delivers the greatest line actually
19:40
Speaker 2: of the interview, and he says, you close schools for
19:42
Speaker 2: two years, what's another day? Yeah, Gavin new some his
19:45
Speaker 2: kids did go to school because they went to private
19:47
Speaker 2: schools as still mad.
19:49
Speaker 1: At that bro forever or ever. By the way, no,
19:53
Speaker 1: that's a great line.
19:54
Speaker 3: We'll be right back on normally.
20:00
Speaker 1: You know, it's the fifth anniversary of the COVID two
20:05
Speaker 1: weeks to stop the spread. And I actually I have
20:09
Speaker 1: a fun COVID story, Carol. You were at my wedding, yes,
20:13
Speaker 1: which I don't know how Providence chose for us. It
20:16
Speaker 1: was amazing seventh, twenty twenty. Yeah, and we got married
20:20
Speaker 1: on a beach in Aruba, and we had a great
20:22
Speaker 1: party and almost no one dropped from the wedding list.
20:26
Speaker 1: People were a little like, are we cool to go
20:29
Speaker 1: out of the country right now? There was a little rumbling.
20:32
Speaker 1: I think two people dropped. We had a huge, giant,
20:36
Speaker 1: guilt free fun party and then everyone went home and
20:41
Speaker 1: like three days later the world was shut down.
20:43
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was wild. It was amazing.
20:47
Speaker 2: It was an incredible wedding, and it was the perfect
20:50
Speaker 2: way to celebrate the end of the world, yes, which.
20:54
Speaker 1: We did not know was coming. But by the way,
20:56
Speaker 1: I posted about that on X the other day. And
20:59
Speaker 1: just so you know that there are a few dead
21:01
Speaker 1: enders who will still shame you for having a wedding
21:05
Speaker 1: in March of twenty twenty, at which zero people got.
21:09
Speaker 2: Sick, right right, yeah, And like I it was the
21:12
Speaker 2: Jewish holiday of Perham back home, and my kids were
21:16
Speaker 2: with my in laws and we called them and they
21:19
Speaker 2: were like, yeah, the Perham party was canceled.
21:21
Speaker 3: And we were like what.
21:22
Speaker 2: That's crazy, what a crazy thing to do. How could
21:25
Speaker 2: they just cancel the Perham party?
21:27
Speaker 4: You know, little did we know? Of course, then life
21:30
Speaker 4: would be canceled very shortly thereafter.
21:32
Speaker 1: Well, as we're revisiting everyone on this fifth anniversary, someone's
21:38
Speaker 1: revisiting Fauci.
21:40
Speaker 2: If you have a story, right, So, David Scharfenberg in
21:44
Speaker 2: the Boston Globe has a book review.
21:46
Speaker 3: A lot of people are.
21:47
Speaker 2: Passing it around without reading it, because that's what people
21:50
Speaker 2: do on the internet.
21:52
Speaker 1: But we go the extra mile here.
21:54
Speaker 2: Normally we actually read the articles. The article is called
21:59
Speaker 2: the Case Against Fauci, so yes, it gets you know,
22:02
Speaker 2: the kind of article that just gets passed around without
22:04
Speaker 2: anybody reading it. But it's actually a book review of
22:07
Speaker 2: Stephen Mersito and Francis Lee's scathing new book called In
22:11
Speaker 2: COVID's Wake, How Our Politics Failed Us, And people are
22:16
Speaker 2: praising this book and this review because finally Fauci is
22:20
Speaker 2: being seen as the villain of that era, which you
22:24
Speaker 2: know certainly how I see him, and it's being passed
22:28
Speaker 2: around by what I would call our people, the ones
22:31
Speaker 2: still mad bro So Scharfenberg reviews the book and in
22:34
Speaker 2: the In his review of it, he writes this line
22:36
Speaker 2: that really pissed me off. He writes, much of in
22:39
Speaker 2: COVID's Wake feels convincing, in no small part because Messito
22:42
Speaker 2: and Lee are of the liberal data driven tribe they
22:46
Speaker 2: critique are they?
22:48
Speaker 3: Are they really?
22:48
Speaker 2: And the rest of us like who aren't in the
22:50
Speaker 2: in the liberal tribes just.
22:53
Speaker 3: Exactly right. I don't remember those names.
22:55
Speaker 2: I don't remember them being around at the time when
22:58
Speaker 2: when it really did matter. And he says, quote, but
23:01
Speaker 2: it's fair to say that Fauci, knowing what he knew
23:03
Speaker 2: at the time, was wrong to argue that many schools
23:06
Speaker 2: would have to remain shuttered in the fall of twenty twenty. Later,
23:09
Speaker 2: he voiced regret over how long remote learning lingered No No.
23:14
Speaker 2: In February of twenty twenty one, and we're going about
23:17
Speaker 2: to play the clip, Fauci said that Biden's spending plan
23:21
Speaker 2: had to be.
23:21
Speaker 4: Passed before schools could open.
23:23
Speaker 2: And I get that this was a throwaway line to
23:26
Speaker 2: be fair to Fauci, but I'm just not having it.
23:28
Speaker 8: Let's play that clip, and I think that the schools
23:30
Speaker 8: really do need more resources.
23:33
Speaker 2: And that's the reason why the National Relief Act that
23:36
Speaker 2: we're talking about getting passed. We need that the schools
23:39
Speaker 2: need more. Look, the review acknowledges things like, quote, the
23:43
Speaker 2: liberal follow the science crowd was certain it was right
23:46
Speaker 2: and had little tolerance for dissent. And ultimately the review
23:49
Speaker 2: is like, well, liberals were wrong. Sure, but have you
23:53
Speaker 2: heard of Donald Trump? So you know, I'm just not
23:56
Speaker 2: as thrilled as a lot of other people are about
23:58
Speaker 2: this story.
24:00
Speaker 1: No, I don't think you should be. So much of
24:03
Speaker 1: this stuff is far too little, too late. Although I
24:06
Speaker 1: do appreciate some movement, because some of these people really
24:10
Speaker 1: freak me out with the way they still talk like
24:13
Speaker 1: it's twenty twenty. I was on Howie Kurtz's show on
24:17
Speaker 1: Fox Sunday and Leslie Marshall, who's one of our Democrats
24:22
Speaker 1: who I appreciate very much, who's on Fox with us,
24:25
Speaker 1: and we usually have a pretty good back and forth,
24:27
Speaker 1: but we had a real back and forth this weekend
24:29
Speaker 1: because when asked about an RFK story, she went hard
24:36
Speaker 1: on we understand that public health and science are not political.
24:44
Speaker 1: We are the party that gets at that this shouldn't
24:48
Speaker 1: be a Republican or a democratic issue. They demonized vaccines
24:53
Speaker 1: and here we are referring to the measles outbreak in Texas.
24:58
Speaker 1: It came back to me and I was somewhat flower
25:01
Speaker 1: gas and I said, how I say to hear from
25:03
Speaker 1: a dem after COVID that the science is not political
25:09
Speaker 1: is laughable. And here are the eighty one reasons why.
25:16
Speaker 3: Went through all of my turns out. I have it
25:18
Speaker 3: all on the tip of my tongue.
25:19
Speaker 1: I was like, oh, when, for instance, Collins was covering
25:22
Speaker 1: up the origin of the virus and didn't tell us
25:25
Speaker 1: things we should know, and we have Floyd emails that
25:27
Speaker 1: tell us he was lying at the time, when FALCI
25:29
Speaker 1: was doing the same thing, when they were smearing jaboditaria
25:31
Speaker 1: it was now the head of the NIH, when they
25:33
Speaker 1: were closing schools for two years, when they were forcing
25:35
Speaker 1: COVID vaccines on children who didn't need them for RASK
25:37
Speaker 1: original rets, that's right. Risk analysis. Yeah, I can say
25:41
Speaker 1: words see, I'm still mad about it.
25:43
Speaker 3: You're still mad about it. I'm still mad about it.
25:45
Speaker 2: And we're going to continue to be the voice of
25:47
Speaker 2: this because it really hasn't been that long. We are
25:50
Speaker 2: constantly being threatened with new viruses possibly emerging. It does
25:54
Speaker 2: not seem that a lot of people learn the right lessons.
25:57
Speaker 2: I still hear, you know, from people who say, we
26:00
Speaker 2: just didn't try hard enough, we just didn't mask hard enough.
26:02
Speaker 2: I mean, there's still obviously so many people who are
26:05
Speaker 2: saying that, you know, we just didn't do it good.
26:08
Speaker 1: The COVID vaccine is still on the schedule for six
26:11
Speaker 1: month olds, right, It's on the vaccine schedule. If you
26:14
Speaker 1: want people to trust the rest of it, you got
26:16
Speaker 1: to take that off. That's part of the that's part
26:18
Speaker 1: of how public easy call.
26:19
Speaker 3: Yeah.
26:20
Speaker 1: One last one of our favorite characters just getting from
26:24
Speaker 1: this era is Randy Winegarden, head of a national teacher's union,
26:28
Speaker 1: who held public school students' education's ransom for two years
26:36
Speaker 1: to get their payout. That was the desire. They wanted
26:39
Speaker 1: to do less work for more money and more benefits,
26:42
Speaker 1: and she saw that as an opportunity, and so she
26:45
Speaker 1: made sure that she made the metrics in concert with
26:49
Speaker 1: the Biden administration, and she made all the headlines about
26:54
Speaker 1: how dangerous it would be to go back to school.
26:56
Speaker 1: She scared a bunch of people unnecessarily, she kept kids
26:58
Speaker 1: out of school. Turns out it hurt the poor and
27:01
Speaker 1: the those who are already struggling. Worm. Yeah, we all
27:06
Speaker 1: said this would happen. Well, she's out talking again, which
27:11
Speaker 1: I have to say, I think is probably good for
27:13
Speaker 1: anyone who's against Randy Wingarten because she's not great at this.
27:17
Speaker 1: Let's hear clip number one. This is from an NBC
27:19
Speaker 1: show explaining she's so mad about the idea of cutting
27:24
Speaker 1: any of the Department of Education.
27:26
Speaker 6: Is why so many people are so mad about it,
27:29
Speaker 6: because they're just taking opportunity away from kids and have
27:33
Speaker 6: it so billionaires. Kids are billionaires, they have it. They
27:36
Speaker 6: go to private schools. Everyone else ninety percent go to
27:40
Speaker 6: public schools. Don't take away their opportunity.
27:44
Speaker 1: So let's stay on the fact.
27:45
Speaker 6: Sorry, no, I do not really angry about this, because
27:48
Speaker 6: I'm really angry.
27:49
Speaker 9: I taught kids in Clara Barton High School and Brooke.
27:52
Speaker 1: She was a teacher for what like three years, by
27:55
Speaker 1: the way, before she became a very high paid teacher's
27:57
Speaker 1: union head. I love the reporter here. It's like, don't apologize.
28:00
Speaker 3: Yeah, you're doing the right thing, Randy, you feel your feelings.
28:05
Speaker 1: She kept children out of school for two years. There
28:08
Speaker 1: has not been a figure in my living memory who
28:11
Speaker 1: has hurt public schools more than this person did. Yep,
28:15
Speaker 1: and students. Yeah, it's like all everyone else is to blame.
28:21
Speaker 1: Let me play one more clip of her on Molly
28:23
Speaker 1: jong FAST's podcast talking about why she's angry, and when
28:28
Speaker 1: she's with an even friendlier voice, she tells you the
28:31
Speaker 1: real thing, the real deal here.
28:33
Speaker 9: It is equally pernicious. They're saying, Oh, don't worry, let's
28:38
Speaker 9: block rant it so we'll give it to a state
28:41
Speaker 9: education department. So and then let the state education department
28:45
Speaker 9: decide what to do, so we know, for example, what
28:47
Speaker 9: Texas would do. They'll use it for vouchers, so that
28:51
Speaker 9: you don't give it to the kids who have it now.
28:54
Speaker 9: They'll just give it for balacy for schools, religious schools.
28:58
Speaker 2: Yeah, she keeps saying things like billionaires kids will have
29:02
Speaker 2: opportunities if we do this, Like billionaires kids.
29:04
Speaker 3: Already have opportunities. You didn't say one word that private
29:07
Speaker 3: schools were open while public schools were closed. I think
29:10
Speaker 3: that's that remains to me.
29:12
Speaker 2: Actually, the thing about the whole school closures during the pandemic,
29:17
Speaker 2: it clearly wasn't about health reasons. Otherwise, why wouldn't the
29:20
Speaker 2: private schools also be closed. Why did Gavin new some
29:23
Speaker 2: kids get to go to school. So this is a
29:25
Speaker 2: complete red herring from her. Oh, the billionaire's kids are
29:27
Speaker 2: going to get something that the public school kids were
29:29
Speaker 2: entitled to.
29:30
Speaker 4: It's all nonsense.
29:31
Speaker 3: The rich kids are already doing very well.
29:34
Speaker 1: And a voucher system would give money to parents of
29:37
Speaker 1: children who are suffering in the schools that she is
29:42
Speaker 1: such a cheerleader for, except she degraded them over two years. Like, oh,
29:48
Speaker 1: they might do something crazy like give money to parents
29:50
Speaker 1: to go to schools that work, right or because caath
29:54
Speaker 1: Catholic schools have a much better performance record they do
29:57
Speaker 1: than public schools do in many, many places. I would
30:00
Speaker 1: wager all the places, and that would give opportunity to
30:05
Speaker 1: people who are not billionaires. But the truth is what
30:08
Speaker 1: she's saying here is this money's mine, right. This money
30:12
Speaker 1: belongs to the union, it belongs to teachers. It should
30:15
Speaker 1: not follow students because students as usual are not the priority.
30:21
Speaker 3: That's right, And look, it is a lot of money.
30:23
Speaker 2: Also, I think that I think people don't know that
30:26
Speaker 2: the Department of Education, Federal Department of Education has a
30:29
Speaker 2: budget of nearly seventy billion dollars, which you're like, oh, wow,
30:34
Speaker 2: that pays for all the schools around the country, So
30:36
Speaker 2: that seems correct. No, schools only get about eleven percent
30:39
Speaker 2: of funding from the federal government. The rest comes from
30:42
Speaker 2: state and local moneies. This is a boondoggle.
30:45
Speaker 3: This is money.
30:46
Speaker 2: You know, Doge can get in here and find all
30:49
Speaker 2: kinds of waste and fraud because seventy billion, when you're
30:53
Speaker 2: only sending eleven percent of the school funding is just
30:57
Speaker 2: an insane number.
30:58
Speaker 1: It's a pass through. And she's the middle woman, right,
31:02
Speaker 1: so what's coming out of there? Also, I would love
31:05
Speaker 1: to see her be upset even close to this upset
31:09
Speaker 1: about the national report card we saw a couple of
31:11
Speaker 1: weeks ago about which she said basically nothing except for like, oh,
31:14
Speaker 1: we need more money to fix.
31:15
Speaker 3: This, right more money is necessary to fix this right now. Please. Yeah.
31:20
Speaker 2: In New York that number was only twenty three percent
31:24
Speaker 2: of eighth graders are proficion in math, and only twenty
31:27
Speaker 2: eight percent are a profession in reading. And I have
31:29
Speaker 2: all these numbers handy because I'm writing about it for
31:31
Speaker 2: the New York Post and you can read about it
31:33
Speaker 2: later this week.
31:35
Speaker 1: Very nice. Well, I'm still mad.
31:37
Speaker 3: I'm still mad.
31:38
Speaker 1: Bro.
31:38
Speaker 2: Yes, thank you so much for joining us on normally
31:41
Speaker 2: Normally airs Tuesdays and Thursdays, and you could subscribe anywhere
31:45
Speaker 2: you get your podcasts. Get in touch with us at
31:47
Speaker 2: Normallythepod at gmail dot com. Thanks for listening, and when
31:51
Speaker 2: things get weird, act normally