LIVE(ish) from the Obama Presidential Center

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That's half off at simplysafe.com/curcode. There's no safe, like simplysafe. (upbeat music) - Welcome to Plads A.V. America. I'm John Favre.

I'm Dan Fifre. - I'm John Levitt. - Tommy B. Torch. - We are coming to you from the Obama Presidential Center. In Chicago, I think this is the first ever podcast

recorded from the Obama Presidential Center. I just made that up. - Yeah. - But if you get a writing library.

“- I mean, it opened today, so that's what I'm saying.”

It opened today, so I think that we, yeah. - Yeah. - How are you? - It's fine. - It's really good.

- Thank you. - This is the Presidential Presidential Reading Room in the Branch of the Chicago Public Library. - I don't see our book. - Yeah, what should probably donate.

- One. - One. - Do you see Dan's books anywhere? - Dan's book? - I've heard rumors that our books are in here,

but I can't see it. - Oh, I see life of pie. - Anyway, we'll come back to this. - I see what it takes. Oh, I see my book right there.

- Oh, wow. - Two over from what it takes. - Now, if you're just listening on the audio, I know this is riveting. - Yeah.

- Yes. - I was looking around at the books. - Hey, let's stop nail-gazing about the books. Start nail-gazing about the event. (laughing)

(laughing) - So we just came from the event,

and we just toured the museum for the first time.

Were you calling the museum? - The center. - The center. - Library? - Yeah.

“- I think it's the Obama Presidential Center”

is the official name, and we just took a little tour. Would you guys think? Not of the event of what we just saw on all the floors, Dan? - I mean, I was a very emotional,

for us to walk through it and see from the beginning of the campaign. Through the White House, the good moments, the bad moments. But it's, I mean, it's really, it's very, very powerful.

- Yeah. - Love it. What, how do you feel about what you tried so hard to stop from happening? - Yeah, I mean, I think.

- So poorly. Try it. (laughing) - I think that the beginning of the museum, about the ways in which I could

and prevent this from happening. As you move up through the floors, I become more and more excited to be a part of it. (laughing) - Every time we went by an exhibit

and wanted to like take a picture there, I love it would say, like, no, no, this is still in valor, I couldn't do that. - Before, yeah, as you get into the administration, then I feel like I, I can,

I can celebrate, but when it's, you know, the science-yield delivered speech in your hamster.

I feel like, well, it's kind of, I never decided that.

(laughing) - It was weird when you started yelling about caucus rules, that was strange. - Yeah, super delicate. - Yeah, super delicate.

They are legitimate, the super delicate. - It's part of the process, respect the process. But it's strange to see something set up. It's, it's great to experience it for us, but it isn't really set up for us.

It's set up to kind of take people through something they might not know about, and it is set up for a longer. Timeline, it's set up for people to experience over a very long time, and it is interesting to see things you experience written in such a declarative past tense.

Like, this is what happened. This was the history of this right. - It's history now. - It's history. - It's so old.

- Our jobs are in a museum. (laughing) - Yeah, that is true. - Tommy, what do you think? - I mean, the museum's amazing.

I've just come check it out. I mean, Michelle Obama talked about how they wanted it to be interactive. So there's lots of exhibits and speeches and stories of individual people,

but you can shoot hoops, and we're literally in a library. We can take out a book, or you can hang on to a picnic.

“I think the thing that's been amazing for me”

and emotional is just all the people we've gotten to just run into. It's like, when I go back to DC, you run into a lot of people in a lot of the time, you don't want to run into them.

Here I've run into a lot of people in every time.

It's a blast from the past.

“Like, Hannah and I were dealing with a snafu”

on our bracelets to get in, and we ended up in a 10 minute line behind Adromic Raven. And I was like, oh, Hannah, this is the guy who did the bin Laden operation.

He's like, that's a conversation that I don't have every day. His bracelet was also incorrect. (audience laughing) He was not allowed into the event. Our friend Joshua Dubois, who's like,

we known forever, who used to play pranks in the office in one time, changed it. So my outlook every time I wrote the word "the," it auto-corrected to bag of assholes. He gave the prayer and invocation.

I just wanted to say that when Tommy realized this, he didn't think it was a prank and Tommy who's just typing emails, and he's like, "We're in the Senate office at the time." It's 2006.

He's like, "Every time I write an email, all of a sudden, just says bag of assholes." It's like, I'm sure that I'm like, "I'm almost positive. I didn't write bag of assholes."

- Almost. - And it's not more sure. It's like when Matt reporter thought that she was hacked because she had spilled water on her spacebar. - Yes.

- But it was the first story I thought of,

and I'm like, "And now he's the pastor at this event." - Josh walked up to me last night and said, "What's up, you bag of assholes?" Anyway, Eddie Vetter was here. He did a musical number with some 13 to 14-year-old kids.

They composed it, they put it together, they played it in front of four presidents of the United States. Like, the whole thing has just been, it's very cool and inspiring and a home game for us. - The other thing about the museum,

“just that I think is really not where they is.”

It is about how people can learn from what Obama did, what people were on Obama did and do similar things going forward. The whole idea is to inspire people to take their community, their country, their lives, and their own hands, and try to bring things like that.

The entire thing from top to bottom, at every place of this is about the core of agency. - He's a very young ex-president, as he mentioned today, not that young, but young enough. And also, start as a community organizer here in Chicago.

And so I do think they were very, the intention of the home museum or in the whole center from the beginning was that it wasn't just somewhere we could walk around and see exhibits, or just like a traditional presidential library,

but that it would be a place to be a community center, where people can go be inspired to run for office or help their community or. And so I threw the thing they achieved that, I love the museum.

I mean, I went, I first came Tuesday with Emily and the kids,

Charlie and Teddy, and they lasted a couple hours before Teddy had a meltdown when he tried to eat the fake apple

“and the fake oval office and didn't go off.”

- Didn't, couldn't eat it, wanted a real apple. - Yeah. - cried a lot. - We love it there. But before that, I do think that the campaign, there's a whole level dedicated to the campaign,

and it tells the whole story of the campaign from beginning to end. And the last panel, after you watch the video, is Grant Park, and the way they tell the Grant Park story is through newscast from all over the world,

announcing that he won and it just like interviews people in like Africa and people in Europe and people in like Selma here and just talking about what it meant to them and I was just watching that. I'm like, oh yeah, I see, this is a great country.

And we complain about it a lot and there's a lot of bad things going on right now, but I'm like, this is a great country. - The, you know, we'll talk about the speeches more, but I was just thinking about nostalgia, walking through the museum and this poll that came out the other day

that's at which of the previous presidents do you think was did the best job? And Obama is the leading president of people who have a positive view of him in hindsight. And you walk around this museum and it has this hopeful view

of the country about the relationship between organizing a community and democracy, civic responsibility, empathy and, you know, the old-fashioned civic virtues. And I did by myself thinking walking around, okay. This was and is persuasive to people.

And I'm leaving thinking, okay, but let's be honest, this were, oh, this museum is opening at a time which is part of the speeches that is part of the event that people are aware of what's happening in the country and like what are the ways in which this was not made durable

after, right? What are the ways in which either this vision of the country wasn't as persuasive as we hoped it would be or we did not uphold it and use it to make the best case possible to prevent Trump from winning not once by twice.

And that was also on my mind. Because I'm not an nostalgic person by nature. And so I was sort of stuck on that. And I was trying to like, challenge myself to think, okay, this obviously is a vision that I respect and appreciate.

What are the ways in which it wasn't able to fully bring more people along after Obama was gone? - That was what was stuck in my head before coming here. I was thinking about a lot and then having a spent today listening to President Obama and Michelle

and going through the center.

I think that the answer is, at least their answer is

Like that is the whole point of not just America,

but like human nature that like we're always going

to have these moments where, you know, people's, I would talk about better angels, people's worst angels take over and that's in my progress doesn't happen in a straight line.

“And so I think their answer is everyone has to just get to work.”

- Right, it never has to just keep going and keep and like and don't give into like cynicism and don't, you know, and don't give up. - And the first part of the museum doesn't actually start with the Obama stories.

It actually starts with the key moments in history. They're like the one we're in right now where bad things are happening. We know whether it, or there are real problems in the country of the French way, the civil rights movement,

the suffrage movement, all of that stuff, the labor movement. And I think the answer to that is it's like at every point, it's not always going to be good. And but every time it's been bad and we have dealt with it, it is because regular people came together,

they started organizing, they started working, they started voting, and they brought change. And that we can, I think the true message of that. So we can do that again, and they didn't write, like obviously this museum was not made for the Trump era.

- Yeah. - 'Cause it's going to be around for a hundred, two hundred years after that.

But like, and this is like always core in what Obama talked about.

It's in the summer speech that adorns the building itself is that we are always going to have moments like these. And we're going to have to come together to get out of them. And so, you know, maybe a few years from now things will look much more like they did in 2008.

“- And then it will look like 2016 again, who knows?”

- Yeah, I think it's the idea that, yes, that is that you step back to, all right, this is the path of progress. Two steps forward, one step back, there are times where you, where people give into their fears in there, whatever, their smallness.

But part of the work of getting out of it is not just stepping back and saying, we will come together and figure it out. It's like, what happened, right? What are the ways in which this vision of America

seemed to some people to be either false or hollow in some way or, you know, not able to be replicated by the candidates, if not. - Two things, one, back to Teddy. It's really cool.

And the thing people probably didn't know that you could walk into the Oval Office. And there was a bowl of apples on the coffee table between the two catches. And people would just take them and eat them.

And actually, the actual bowl that was on Barack Obama's coffee table for eight years is now in this museum because our friend Fariel just had it at her house. And now it's here. That's, I think, a fun little anecdote people don't know.

And two, on the speeches, I mean, I literally was just talking to Josh Shapiro, Governor Pennsylvania, no big deal. - Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you, fuck you guys. - Fuck you guys.

- And as I'm talking to you, and I come up, she's like, "Cleak us and have some food." It's like, "This can't come." Anyway, well, and he and I were talking about, like, whether it's a Jewish energy train.

(laughing) You and I were talking about whether, you know, we watched the speech and felt like the reaction to this piece, part of the conversation.

“Like, do we think what he was saying is still real?”

Like, that there are, that people really do want decency and to bring people together and a politics that's just delivers for them. Because it's so easy to see the social media part of politics and the owning each other

and the viciousness from Trump. And the moments I feel myself falling into being a shittier person online. - Yeah. - Like, dunking on people and Twitter.

And honestly, my reaction to Barack Obama's speech was, it made me want to be a better person. - Yeah. - It made me want to be more like him and more like, civically engaged.

And to pay more attention to the messages we're hearing out of people like Shapiro in James Talereco that are asking us to kind of get back to that brand of politics. - I won thousand percent believe that the winning,

2020, a candidate will be someone who offers some version of that message. - Yes. - So to turn the page on this era of division, a terribleness for something better.

Is that, is more exactly the same as Obama's, as the world has changed, people eat out everyone's. We have a lot of calluses and scar tissue over the last decade, but something that's more like that than the liberal inverse of Trump.

- It's funny, I think just the nature of the trip and we've been doing a whole bunch of things last couple of days that I haven't really been on my phone as much and then where we were sitting. We were data and I were like really trying to get service

and then trying to figure out how to get on the Wi-Fi and it just wasn't happening. And so I have seen no takes of any of the speeches that didn't know nothing was happening. And it really like, I sat there like good.

I don't want to know what all that takes our out there of what this event is and like letting all the cynicism creep back in because I felt like you and like it didn't make me want to be a better person

and Michelle and we'll talk about her speech in a second,

but she had this riff in the speech where she talked about how hope is a choice. And you know, it can just sound hokey when you just hear it like that. But I think what she meant is like yes, you can decide that things are gonna be bad

or that it's not worth trying. Or you can decide like yeah, things could still be bad, but I'm actually just gonna stop complaining and try and like put my shoulder to the wheel and see if I can make a difference.

- Yeah, I do think that part of the guy. You know, what is Trump's skill as a politician and he can really make people's worst qualities

He just has the ability to make something bad.

We have good parts in bad parts in us. I mean the other day I was like, you can, we go do a torso in Detroit and we say is anyone here from Michigan and someone raises their hand in the says,

they're from Ohio, the whole crowd like booze them like fucking crazy. - Right. - Right, I say it in every heart. (laughing)

- But there is, but so like there's this, what I like about that part of the Michelle speech specifically is choosing Trump is takes your agency and it is, we do not have to ignore people's culpability, the harm of that choice,

“the fact that they could have made a different one, right?”

Like we should take people responsible and treat them like adults. And I think, I think one thing that Barack Obama does as a politician is he tries to treat people like adults and it politics that treats people like adults.

- The other thing he does that I think we as a party or sometimes missing is he is unabashedly patriotic. - Yes.

- And talks about his love for the country

and that doesn't mean he hides the imperfection to the country. He's a living embodiment of the worst stains in our history, but he is patriotic and he talks about the love of the country. And I think people want that

and they want to be a part of a movement that is patriotic. And I was reminded of this. We went to the USA Paraguay soccer game the other day and just being with thousands of people chanting USA, USA and loving their country and cheering for the players

and the fact that a bunch of them are immigrants, right? And one was literally like his mother, like the Ben Shapiro's out there calling him an anchor baby right in this kind of score two goals. Like it's just getting back to that brand of politics

is so important. - I talked to Jerusalem Dempsis about this for offline this week and she was saying there's this, I haven't seen it, but there's this whole discourse online around the world cup

where all of these people are coming to America and then they're like posting America's really great. - People are so nice. - I want to waffle houses. - Because of everything that they knew about Trump,

they thought coming here would be this like dark dystopian. And then like this is a wonderful country and I thought about that walking through the center too and I was like, this has been my feeling the last two days here though,

like this is a fucking great country. Like it is a great country. And just because Trump is president and we don't like what's happening though it doesn't mean that we should say

all of this country sucks now. - It doesn't. - Don't let the take this from you. - Yeah, it's the, yeah.

“I think like holding just the like this is not who we are.”

Well, you know, Trump is who we are, but also what we're talking to are too. The part where in this speech where he started, he talked about the 250th anniversary and it just was a small moment for me

if just like there's so much noise around Trump politicizing the 250th birthday and the UFC fight on the lawn and the Trump rally on the national mall and the reflecting pool and all the rest.

And that's a terrible price. Just this is what he's doing with his, with this moment, but also the opportunity cost just like what it would have been like to have literally any other person in that job who just had some modicum of patriotism

or respect for the country to understand to how to make it a genuinely uniting moment and the fact that he doesn't even have us. - I know, right a bit. - It's like, it's good about a Republican president.

Like I wouldn't have been happy about that, but like could have been our Republican president that brought the country together on the America's 250th. - Easily.

- I have no doubt that George W. Bush is 250th America. I think would have annoyed me in certain respect. - That's true, that's true, but like you looked like, but there would have been really nice moments when we'd been like, "Okay, I feel good."

- It was nice also. - It's a mission. - Yeah. - Yeah, when Obama gave a shout out to, he was like, John McCain loved this country.

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(upbeat music)

“- Speaking of that, I think we do have a clip from Obama speech”

that we can play and then react to. - How are you? - That's it, Tommy Digit. - Tommy has the clip. - The exhibits in the center are not meant to evoke nostalgia for some gauze-bygone era.

Some unattainable past that we can dream about and say, "Oh, we miss you, Barack." They're meant to remind us, of who we can be. To remind us of what's possible,

so we can forge ahead, clear ahead and confident and do the work that still needs to be done. - I wanted to play that clip because I think he had done a few interviews before today, where I think he got questions from reporters

that were in the vein of, like, isn't this nostalgia or isn't this like a long-lost era and doesn't it feel like a different reality because of what we're dealing with right now and he actually wanted to respond to that in the speech.

And I think in a way it's the mission of the whole center, which we're just talking about, and I think they're very sensitive to the idea that this is either a monument to them or about the accomplishments of the administration

or about some gozzy past and what it is supposed to be

is basically like a pep talk for America.

- Yeah, which was today, was I think a badly needed one, but yeah, I think a lot of people are frustrated that he's not more engaged with kind of like the politics of the day today, and I think we've even a time to express like wishing he was just talking about things,

but he talked about the Twin Cities and the way they stood up to ICE and came together as a community. I thought that was clearly about this moment. He talked about government is more than one

that divvies up the spoils, that punishes enemies, that keeps those that are different from them in their place. - Shot a George W. Bush. (laughing)

“- He's like, I don't believe how that's how the story of America ends,”

like we'll talk about Michelle's speech and then it which is a little more directed and the Trump administration, but I thought Obama was very much commenting on the politics of Trump today.

- I would just say criticizing museum for being tuna nostalgic is just, yeah. - Yeah, it's just our point. - Yeah, it's how this museum looks backwards, which way does your museum feel?

(laughing) - I think it's also a story with that. - I think it was that in New York times, it was bigger bigger. - It was bigger bigger.

- And it was like, and I think I mean, I get why reporters would write that, right? Because we are living in this reality and then you step in here and you're like, okay, is this just a planning for the past kind of thing?

- Sure. - And I, you know, what they're really trying to say and this goes to your point about how people complain like Obama's not more involved in politics

and what Obama always says is like,

I don't want to be out there forever because I want the next generation of progressive leaders to be out there and to like have their moment. And maybe this will be the election cycle that happens. - Right.

(laughing) - I think the point of the center, the point of the foundation. - Let's see what the football is. (laughing)

- The point of the center of the point of the foundation, especially is to train and inspire young leaders here

And I think that is, it finally makes sense to me now

because like, it is nice when Obama goes out there and he's great on the campaign trail and he gives great speeches and he motivates people

“and that's important to have in democratic politics”

but we do need leaders who are not Obama and who take the spotlight in the next 10 years, 20 years. - Yeah, also I agree with all that, but also it's okay to be nostalgic. I'm not as dumb.

Nostalgia doesn't do it for me in the same way. I'm not really like a whole person and I'm more of an anger and rage person. But I understand it's value in the same way that Trump appeals to.

- You're more of an experienced person. - Yeah, yeah. (laughing) - And it's all this. - It's the best and the best and the best.

- And especially when experience plus strength. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

- But right, and obviously as I've said,

change equals one divided by-- - No way, one of the most experienced people's change or change divided by strength plus experience equals one. But back to the museum. It's okay to be nostalgic, right?

Like, yes, this was a moment where people were really hopeful and a lot of really good was done, a lot of things weren't finished, but people believed in the mission. They cared about it, they fought to make it happen

and they elected him twice in it, led to really good things. That nostalgia is a good thing to feel. And there's a way in which to, especially if it is inspired as you to act. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, it's a good deal.

But it's also good to be like, "Oh, well, then I'm gonna go do something." - And there's a whole, and there's a lot of people who are very, very high-prungation politics. It applies to a lot of people that are partisan,

it applies to a lot of people that are non-partisan journalists that they see that is inherently naive, that there's something inherently naive about having that warm and good feeling about politics in any way, that it's cringe, right?

- It applies to us sometimes, of course. - I've been in those moments all the time. - But like, but I had this, but what I was watching, I think it was, there was a moment where Bano was singing Michelle my bell,

and boy, I have a photo of him. - I'm cringing, I got a photo of a time and he just cringed just a full body cring. And I get, and like, but why do we cringet it? I think it's sometimes because we're uncomfortable

with a display of care or like a direction that we might agree with but takes something too far in a way that feels syrupy or saccharin in some way. - Anywhere wondering, is he hitting on her? - Yeah, that was a way that was so hard.

- Well, I mean, Obama did say, I don't know how I feel. - But it was a lot of your point, like, the 2020 election, like, it was a thing you'd hear online that people were like, oh, oh, we're just gonna vote

our way out of this problem. It's like, oh yeah, actually, that's the whole thing. - That's kind of a democracy.

“- I mean, that's not the only thing you're gonna do,”

but at some point, you do have to be at the other way. - If you don't do it a lot of the other stuff, you're gonna try as it's gonna do much, right? - Right, well, there was it's not a democracy, and then we're the other system that we say

that we're against. - Right, yeah. - So you do have to have voted some point. So, let's say about Michelle's speech. We'll just listen to a clip because then we can comment on it.

- The native kid showing us that resilience and pride can never be stolen. The four ages and FFA members with calluses on their hands from feeding livestock, the immigrants proving what it truly means to be a dreamer.

These folks, these folks aren't Americans too. They are America. They are the beating heart of this country. They are us and we are them.

Deep down in our hearts and souls, we all know right from wrong. We know selflessness from greed, righteousness from injustice. All of us, all of us are created equal.

That each of us is a child of God within Earth value and no one, and I mean no one has the right to sit in judgment of who's American enough. - So I will say,

I got like a little misty when I saw the Grand Park panel at the center, but the first time this whole week that I actually just cried was during her speech. - Oh yeah, for sure.

- I saw the sign language interpreter waiting to hear this. - I did too, I did too. - It was a fantastic speech. - Listen, it's almost cliche to say that Michelle

I'm always knocked out of the park,

but it really was this thing. - I thought Obama's speech was really good.

“I can't remember the last time I didn't see her”

there's kind of knock the cover off the ball. - Yeah, I'm trying to think of a bad Michelle. - There's no, there's no. - The park there also was really moving was she, she says at the beginning I'm gonna do

what Barack won't want me to do and just like brag about him. And she talks about how he carried himself in the eight years as president, and that's what really did it for me.

- I lost it at that point. - I lost it at that point. - It is the him crying. - It is like what she said about him, it's like what we know, but just like he is such like a decent human, like just truly to his core decent.

but he's a decent human.

“I think all the time about like the one thing,”

and this is like at the core of what Michelle was saying, but he's think all the time about how every like I'd be in meetings with Obama where it just be like, people who you saw a lot, he would be pretty great. Right, like shit is bad, it's going on.

But then someone would come in the room who'd be like a younger staff, briefing on something, or someone coming in for a visit, and he like instantly knew that that interaction with him, and that's the only time that led me to president in their life

was going to be matter, life changing for them, and he wouldn't matter how shitty the day was. He would pull it together and just like treat that person with the utmost respect to make that like a special moment.

And that is like, that means always like summed up who he is,

and it was really just powerful to hear Michelle talk about it that way. I always thought that it was there was an irony in the Obama campaign being about change, and that that carrying him all the way to the nomination,

but ultimately he was able to defeat John McCain because in the weeks of the financial crisis, what actually carried him all the way to the presidency,

“which was not a quality that I think was necessary”

for his rise until then, was a kind of preternatural, evenness, reliability, consistency, trustworthiness, a calm that was sort of in his bones that infused everything that he did, and it gave people the assurance on spoken

that they could take a chance on him when John McCain was supposed to be the more senior and seasoned person, but had seemed erratic in the lead up to the election, and when people would say things like with Michelle reference that oh, he wasn't qualified, he wasn't this, that's like,

why is he qualified, well look at what he is, look at how he is modeling, what it means to be a senator and a candidate in a way that's a Sarah Palin, right, who could claim a similar, whatever experience in the public, in elected office that didn't have the same effect,

and now we're all these years later, and it just stands in contrast to what Trump is, and the fact that there were so many Republicans who spent eight years denigrating as a person, pretending he was some threat or some alien,

or some evil and socialist extreme force, when, of course, the whole time, he was this, even killed center-left consensus-building reliable figure which now and hindsight, the country laterally misses. - Yeah, I think what I just think about

why I was lucky to work for him, like, yeah, he was cool. Yes, he was a great communicator and speaker, but the thing, upon a long time of reflection, that I've come to realize was the best part about working for him, is that on literally anything,

you could go to him and he had a core belief about whatever it was. And that was from a good place that was from a sense of decency and, yes, politics are part of everything, but it was about doing the right thing,

and you just never doubted that, or their motivation,

of their family, and it's just, I could contrast that to, you walk in the old office now, and they're fucking day trading on the world with Iran. You know, it's just the same thing where we've got, one of my favorite lines about Obama, ever,

is that Tana has he co-eds line at the beginning of that long piece about him at the end of the administration, which was for eight years, he walked on ice and never fell. And it was about race and how he handled race and being the first black president,

but I also think it's about, was about so much more than that, is that like the job president and the job of him being president and being the first black president as Michelle also mentioned today, it requires so much care and thoughtfulness and like balance of so many different competing interests

and competing desires within yourself and trying to channel your emotions and trying to suppress some emotions. And I feel like Michelle's speech was that line and that Tana has he co-eds line.

“And I think that's why it was so affecting”

because I was like, you know, I think we all get that having been in politics, like we all do that. We all done that throughout our time in politics as you realize that so much of the job is constant thinking about like, what is the right balance of this and that?

And how do I not piss this person off and how do I persuade this person and like so much care goes into it? And the fact that he was able to do that and get through eight years, it's still intact,

it's just like, you know, it's inspiring. I think the being the first black president, like what Michelle's, that like we like anyone who worked with him or worked from the very beginning, knew the historic nature of his candidacy

and the different set of rules were applied to him, the didn't can't. And it's the same way different set of rules were applied to women candidates. And he refused to complain about it.

He refused to complain about it and he could, and Michelle's, like that was subtext of everything

that we always talked about.

But Michelle made it text, right? And said very clear that he, for eight years, could not make a mistake. He could not slip up.

He could not lash out. He could not set an angry tweet. He had to bear the expectations and the pressure

of being the first black president

because how he did it was going to dictate if and when we had a second black president. - Right. For example, literally just pointing out that Trayvon Martin looked like what his son would look like.

- Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. - She said that today and I was like, yeah, she leaned in. - Yeah.

“- And I think she got some stuff off her cheeks today.”

- Yeah, it was right. - Yeah, that's right. - Yeah, it was great. - It was funny. - We should talk, yeah, we should talk about the back drop

of all of this invisible in the back drop, sometimes very visible as a drop in how they all kind of, how they both handled that today. - Yeah, well, yeah, the, it's funny. I felt the same way that you mentioned to you

that when Michelle's speech is there's like an edge and a kind of darkness to them that I'm like,

oh, I'm like, I'm always caught off guard by it.

I'm like, oh, she's pistol a bit. She's gonna say some things that she's feeling about what's going on right now and it always works because I do think like, yeah, she taps it. It's a very, it's, you know, it's, it matches what he does.

There's her compliments what he does because she has this, it understands how to use that feeling. People have, that's all, we're living through the Trump era. We're always a little bit mad. We're always a little bit upset.

It's always there. It is a cloud over our society and she just, without saying the name, she's just, you know what? That's part of today and it makes me upset, too, because not just because of what's happening right now,

because of, but because of what the other standard that was applied to Barack Obama when I saw what kind of a man he was. And the thing that I think will probably like it clicky is like, you know, he actually want a peace price, right?

That was like a fun shot. Trump, the thing that I thought to your point love it about the darkness was failing to see the humanity and others puts us on a slippery slope when we talk about immigration, right?

She's like talking about this slide to fascism in her remarks. I can't remember who said this, but someone said about Michelle after her convention speech in 2024 that she is your friend who just tells you like it is.

There's not be around the bush.

“Just tells you exactly what you need to hear”

in her speech is always just a flag.

Like there's no, like there's a way to make those points that are so subtle that maybe, or you get it, but you've basically wasted a bunch of words to it. She just says it always. And it's what makes this a powerful.

I always wear my eyes when people are like, Michelle Obama should run for president 'cause we obviously know she's never gonna run for anything. She despises politics, but again today, like halfway through this speech.

I know. As I was crying and then Emily was also crying next to me. She was like, I mean, maybe she should run for something. I would say, make that sense. We crazy, I was like, I got things off that I slapped myself.

I was like, I'm like, we can water all we want. She's not gonna do it. But like, she just, she really, she can command a stage. By the way, we're in a working building. There's some, you might hear some background noise.

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stamps.com/PSA, taxes and fees apply. (upbeat music) One more thing before we go on Dan, you had a message box today, in honor of today. I did about what Democrats can learn from Barack Obama,

which I thought would be a nice way to end this section.

“- Well, I think Obama sets every election cycle,”

he goes out, he goes on the trail and everyone says, like, why can't we ever press lock at this? And Obama's obviously is, we all know that everybody's a generationally talented communicator. And so it's just telling people to be more like Obama's,

like not helpful advice, it's like, people like Michael Jordan, like, dunk more. - Yeah, but I think there are like a few things that any communicator can take from him, and I'll just give you a couple.

is that there is this inherent patriotism in everything he says, like he owns it. He will not let Republicans take patriotism. He will, you know, in often does talk about all the flaws in his country, but makes the point about

what a special place is that you heard that today. The other one is that he, you know,

“and I remember this early on the administration,”

we were gonna do a YouTube town hall, which was like very innovative at the time, which was just a town hall that's streamed on the internet, and but YouTube is hosting it. And we were taking, we were doing YouTube podcasts.

And they were taking questions over the, over, I guess in YouTube comments, I can't remember, but the number one topic, by far, was legalization of marijuana. And so we went in to say, like,

this is a normal question, but you don't, like, we don't have to take it.

And he's like, you always have to talk,

he's like, well, if it's the number one question, we're gonna talk about it, it's like a thing. It's like, we'll always say, it's like, you always have to talk about the thing, right? The elephant in the room, you cannot avoid it,

just take it head on, you know? And then the last thing I think is really powerful is we talk all the time about, like, how Democrats need a better affordability message, economic message all this.

And what Obama always understood is that the discussion of the economy is not really about policy. It's not about how many times you say affordability, it's not whether you say bottom up or middle out.

It is a story about values, about who you're fighting for, and who you're fighting against. Like, that is the frame to bring to all of this. Like, and this is, like, ultimately,

I think the biggest thing to take from Obama over the whole time is that politics and messaging is a storytelling exercise. It's not a slogan, it's not a sound bite, it's not a tweet. It is an overall narrative about the country

about why you are the person who should be elected or why the other side should not be elected and fitting things into those stories.

“- What do you have to say about this moment”

that we're in right now in the country and where you wanna take us? What do you have to say about it? Like, and everything has to flow from there, message flows from there, policy flows from there.

Like, that's where you have to start. And like, you know, Michelin and Barack Obama has something to say today, right? And people can have something completely different to say, but you still need to run for president,

having something to say about this moment that is beyond just Donald Trump and what policies you want to enact when you're president. - Okay, let's get to some news before we leave 'cause I guess news has been happening.

- We've got an access to it, but we hear this happening. - Yeah, we got the text of the aroundil, apparently, the MOU, and boys, is it a stinker? - Tommy, was the Treaty of Versailles at MOU? - Yeah, it's a good question.

- Yeah, so we have a Treaty of Versailles, he signed it in Versailles with Macron. - Which is an insane choice.

- Wait a second, didn't they auto-pen it?

- I'm sorry, I'm learning this in real time. Do you're telling me they signed this piece of paper in literal Versailles? - Yes, he stayed in extra day just to go - It's in literal.

- And it's not like it's real gold. - And it won't even be signing ceremony. It was just like, he decided to just sign it in Versailles. - That's crazy, yeah. - And it's like the 20th crazy thing about the text,

which Versailles is the administration, administration official read all the text of the MOU. - We couldn't just copy paste, we was like,

“and Bloomberg got it and then CNN got it, I think,”

but then the administration's even China's like, they're just wrong, that's not the text. - Dude, I got it from the president of Iran's Twitter. - And the real one it up being a couple words were different, but not by any, not anything significant.

So the memorandum of understanding the MOU, the Treaty of Versailles. - Yeah, the MOU of Versailles, yeah. (laughing) We got Versailles.

- We got Versailles right, yeah. The memo calls for this suspension of the naval blockade of Iran's ports and for Iran to use its best efforts to allow traffic through the straight of hormones

without total traffic. - Try your best. - For 60 days, it calls for a permanent end to a war in Israel and Lebanon, Iran is allowed to resume exporting oil.

We'll get access to a $300 billion redevelopment

and reconstruction fund, the MOU creates a six day window for negotiations over Iran's nuclear program and in the meantime, Iran reaffirms its law and commitment not to procure her developed nukes. So it's not playing super well, no.

You got your Bill Cassidy's John Corinans, all the people who feel liberated now that Trump has defeated them. They have been voicing some criticism, other Republicans are just sort of hiding.

- So funny, these guys, he threw off a mountain and then while you're rolling down towards your demise over cliff. - It's bad, it's bad, it's bad, it's bad. - They're like, dude.

(laughing) - The Iran Hawks are very mad, you've probably, oh yeah. - You can soon do a lot more of Mark Levine content. - Those bench appears tears on there,

they're like, I've been playing clips, I might have downloaded a commentary podcast from John Podhorsan. - Oh God, Tommy's got the daily wire open in incognito window.

(laughing) - It's in the mouth, yeah. (laughing) - That kind of thing. Here's a, we think we have a clip of Trump talking

about the MOU of Versailles in France.

if it doesn't get done in 60 days,

“since then we go back to bombing, unlike Barack Hussein Obama”

who sent a ran-pallence of cash and he relieved they received under this deal, where they'll have to get based on merit. And it won't be from us, we don't have to get many things. But some people may want to invest.

I said, well, what am I gonna do? We're gonna let Saudi Arabia have missiles, but they can't have a, yes sir, missiles are at the problem, missiles are, they heard a little location,

but they don't blow up the planet. And it all fairness to be Netanyahu happens to be, a good man, it's a little excited sometimes. We have a little dispute over Lebanon and I say, you can do a little softer touch, baby.

You don't have to knock down a building, every time somebody walks into it, that's from Hisbula. - That was bad, that got there, I'm sorry, that got, and the other one too is it's like,

every time the best case, the other line was, you shoot a couple of missiles down, they don't hurt you, but it does, they're knocking down a building in Beirut. It was like, imagine, the, the, the,

the, the different kinds of things. A Democrat, I don't know, did that we brought down on these people. And I'm sorry, no, I, I just, the idea of the, the number of times, these fucking anti JCPOA people, we're like, this doesn't even address ballistic missiles,

ballistic missiles, ballistic missile.

- This is impossible. - So we've said it in a million times

at the beginning of the time. - This is why the deal is so shameful. You're gonna give them money, but they're not addressing the core problem of the ballistic missiles and the con,

and Hezbollah and their proxies, and then Trump gives up completely, and $300 billion is what? Twice, three times, four times as much as what was, ever contemplated, but also either around deal.

- They got an immediate license to sell oil and gas, so they're gonna be making money off of that. Then they're clearly planning to, you know, they call it fees, but they're gonna be told ships in the straight-of-home moves.

Iran's gonna make so much money off of this. I mean, look, big picture, the best outcome is the war being over. So like, I'm happy that the original scene here

“is this war starting, and the best thing that come out of this”

is that the fucking linty gram foundation

for the defense of democracies, neocon, hawk, world view

is smothered to death, right? And that Trump hates these people, and then you run them out of DC, but they clean this clock in this deal, and then just hearing him just on this ballistic missile thing,

clearly the reason you go to, the core national security priority with Iran is preventing them from getting a nuclear weapon, right? Like non-proliferation is a good thing, generally. I think the way you do that is through negotiations,

not bombing them. We did, you know, fuck up a lot of their infrastructure, but whatever they can rebuild that. But to hear Trump from going from these maximum positions, to being like, eh, who cares about the nuclear dust?

We got eyes on it, maybe we'll get it out, maybe we won't, it's like, heads spinning. And then on the ballistic missiles, like remember when Rubio went up to Capitol Hill, and he did that press conference where he blamed Israel

and then ran away and didn't talk to the press for two months, the core argument they were making there is that Iran was on the cusp of having a ballistic missile arsenal that would make their nuclear weapons program like impregnable.

And then we couldn't go after it, right? And now Trump is like, eh, who gives the fuck? They can have some ballistic missiles. It's no big deal. - Did the Saudi Arabia, Saudi Arabia?

Rubio also said, this is our goal to stop them from their ability to project power in the region. - Right, ballistic missiles is how you project power. It is the definition of their power in the region.

- Right, right, the MOU this morning, the text. I was like, did we get anything from this? - No, the straight, the straight, the theoretical opening of the straight for 60 days. If theoretical opening of the straight that Iran and Oman

are going to jointly control and can charge fees whenever they want and before the war, the straight used to be open and controlled by no one 'cause it was international waters, right? And there were no tools.

So like, I don't think we got anything. - And if you're the case on the nuclear negotiations, your leverage is military action in sanctions, and he just gave up both of those in advance of the 60 days of talks over the nuclear program.

And he says like, oh, we can just go back to bombing them, but Iran knows that as we get closer to the midterms, he's not going to go back to bombing them. - And he shouldn't go back to bombing them. They're not going to get bombed out of their nuclear know-out.

- We just unleashed a bombing campaign for weeks. It cost us tens of billions of dollars, and the end result is an unconditional surrender in Versailles. So I don't know what additional bombs are going to do for anybody.

The other thing is, I don't know if you're going to go to it, but you had vans sort of brushing back the Iran hawks, and specifically referring to pro-Israel Iran hawks saying, Trump is the only leader on Earth that is sympathetic to Israel's point of view,

and we're the leader of the world's super power, which for Vans, I'm glad Vans said that, right? It's like, look at what, for all these people that claim to be so pro-Israel, right, that have turned a pack into this partisan weapon,

that have alienated Democrats, that have turned Israel into a pariah state. You feel good about where Israel is at now, alone in the world, beholden on Donald Trump, a guy that has not given a fuck what happens,

“who could turn on a dime, that do you think this was a long term?”

Great play now, the Democratic Party is opposed

on popular and its entire history, it's never been more isolated.

“You guys feel good about where you landed.”

After all this, while calling everybody out there, anti-Semite, and anti-Israel, you think the people that might have been saying that Benjamin Netanyahu was terrible for Israel, you might have had a fucking point,

rather than calling us all what self-hating Jews, like, anyway, that's just a little point that I wanted to make about that. - It just won't root very quickly, like, I want Democrats to just stand up

and support the JCPOA and say that it was better. Stop all the fucking throat clearing about its flaws and what was emitted, the JCPOA is better than what Trump may eventually get here, be as with the JCPOA around shipped out,

97% of its stockpile is out of the country and went to Russia. In this case, we're talking about downblending it to making it less usable for nuclear weapons. In the JCPOA, that went through the UN Security Council.

So this was the sanctions and the backing of all, they're close to satellites, like the P5+1, et cetera. This will have none of that.

And now this $300 billion slash fund,

like, what were we doing here? All these Gulf countries are now going to be told they're on the hook to rebuild Iran when Iran was firing ballistic missiles at them. Can we talk about, before we move on to this,

you mentioned JD events. I want to sort of ask a hacky political question, which is, I read and play about this morning, I think that a lot of JD events is like opponents or detractors

are trying to let your hang this deal around his neck and say, let's JD events is deal. And there's people from JD events as office that basically pushed back and said, those people obviously can't read a poll

because this war was very unpopular. And the idea that this is going to be bad for JD events to be associated with this deal, this treaty is crazy because people don't want war anyway. And so it's not going to be a real political risk

for him at all. What do you guys make of that? Because I think it brings up the question of how this war and how it ended sort of plays out politically or whether it even does, whether it has a lasting

political impact as we head towards the midterms and beyond that. I think the, on my guess, substance of political level, no one is going to remember the war by the time that voting happens in November.

And well, not in this November.

“I think the question is about JD events as president, right?”

So by the time we had to, yeah, I think the war will matter, this November and a couple of ways we know about, when it comes to the Republican primary or the general election in 2020 at JD events that I mean, I think it was going to remember.

I think the damage of the war to JD events is I think it has ensure that Donald Trump will be a very unpopular president when JD events possibly try and to be the third term of that very unpopular president. I think that is bad for him.

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Sign up at get 10% off at betterhelp.com/PSA. That's better, h-e-l-p.com/PSA. I've been on a book tour about his conversion to catalog timing. My first experience with JD on the view, so let's take a look. Everybody knows that Americans are struggling.

What is he spending all this money for? Well, I got to spend the present on the hoax point. What the president said is the idea that Republicans caused the affordability problem is a hoax. He said he loves the inflation.

What he said, and what he said is that he loves the fact that the inflation is going to come down when this war is over. That's what he said. That wasn't a terrible way.

“Who is a interpreter, or are you his vice president?”

I believe, as a Christian, I can tell my kids why it's important to have borders. I get that. There are laws, there are resources. I get all that things.

It's much harder to explain when I see someone dragged out of a house or wrongly taken to a thing. Isn't a violent thing, right? That is, that is, it's a little more nuanced as a parent

when I teach them in school about people that have done that

before, but this is different. It's very hard as a parent and a Christian to say both things. I would urge you as a Christian, and as a father, to visit those detention centers where the children are being held.

So you guys have thrown a lot at me. And I see we got 30 seconds left here. Let me say, no, no, no, no, no. - You can go along. - It sounds like that one, well. Where'd you guys think? - I was okay.

Anyone watching more of it? - I watched a bunch of it. They did a great job.

“And what they did, that I think we heard there was,”

the questions weren't like, from a shitty liberal perspective. It was like, as a Christian, as a human being, how can you as a parent, like see what's happening, the deli detention center and be okay with that? Now, I think JD Vance, credit to him, I guess,

we're going there, right? That's, he's clearly trying to make an argument that he's the kind of candidate that can build bridges and reach new voters by going on the view, right? Like, that's like a thing you tell people you did.

He answered the questions, but I don't think he did a good job. And he also just cannot help but sound like a whiny little bitch. He is the victim of everything. - Yeah, he also says Democrats are terrible at one point. I feel like it's just not possible to be,

it's not possible to fairly answer questions, defend Donald Trump and Bill Day, and sort of be tilting at any kind of broader, sort of a non-partisan coalition. Like, there's no talent on earth

that could both defend Donald Trump and pretend to be some kind of broader and more appealing figures. It's not, can't be done. And so I don't think he could do it,

but I don't think, I think there are people that are far more talented than JD Vance that would make it look a little bit easier. - He's just so bad, he's terrible. Like, in those answers, like he thinks he's being smart

by basically just gaslighting about what it is,

Trump actually said. And he just doesn't, like, there's a way, like, defending Donald Trump's in a possible task, it's just, you cannot do that and remain any sort of dignity or a seriously human being.

You just can't, but there's ways to do it with more charm, sort of humor. - Yeah, he just has no charisma.

“- Yeah. - And I think he goes on the view,”

and I think he was, I think in his mind, maybe he wants to show that he can go to this place. I also think he wants to show that he can go on the lips. - Remember, he went on blue sky for like a hot minute to take people off. - Well, you just referenced

a little bit that he calls Democrats, terrible people. So he did that, something making Kelly. - Yeah, I was on the later, I was like, I just thought he was gut-filled. - Yeah, I was gut-filled out here, 'cause I saw that clip,

and I realized that, yeah, his whole play was, I'll go on the view, and then they'll beat me up, and then I'll go to the right-wing outlets,

and I'll be like, oh, I survived the view,

and they were such assholes, and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But he did, and they didn't even beat him up though, they were like, very substantive. - And the way he said that too, it was such a, he's like, and the thing about Democrats,

then it's not the policies necessarily, it's that they're terrible people, and they're not grateful to the country, he did the grateful thing. - Well, the thing that's even worse than it's just, it's like, he couldn't stop himself.

He wanted, started by saying like, the thing that virus me about Democrats is, it's not what they, it's not their policies, it's not this, it's that they're not,

“I think the grateful thing I think in this context,”

but he was trying to awkwardly do was that, like to try to suggest we run down America, but he knew he was on Fox. We couldn't just say that, so he had to say, it also bothers me that some of them are terrible people,

like that's, he looks like it aside. - What does he mean some? - It's just terrible people, terrible people. - It's terrible people, and I was like, that's a wild thing, like, does he think that he can just,

I mean, I know he's gonna run in a primary here, but does he realize that kind of undermines the whole softening your image effort, and something like, he's just crazy. - He is no deafness, he isn't no deafness.

- I really use on the book tour. It is crazy that Marco Rubio has just gone into witness protection. He's the National Security Advisor in the Secretary of State. He's done a single interview about the surroundings. - There's a picture of him over Trump

when Trump's assigning the treaty in Versailles. - Yeah. - And he looks like, did you guys watch him behind Trump in the press conference list? - Yes, yes.

- Shifting back and forth, like, dead eyed. He looks like he'd taken like 6,000 pro v and hadn't slept in a month, like just looked miserable. - Well, before we go, I do think we should talk about briefly the reflecting pool, I guess that's the thing

in the news now, because the reflecting pool, so let me get this straight, please correct me if I've got this. - This is important to me, because I've been on vacation for two weeks, so in my lat trying to avoid learning some things, this is the thing that I know very little about.

- I'm excited to learn. - I'm very loving fashion. - Explain it to Dan. - Here's what I think. Obviously, Trump decided to paint the reflecting pool.

- Yes. - He did the American flag blue, then they reset. - Well, was it, how do you describe the paint? - It was like thick rubber rubber. - Rubbering, Rubbering, Rubbering, Rubbering, Rubbering, Rubbering.

- Rubbering, Rubbering. - And then he painted it, they filled it up again, and then it quickly turned green, because of algae. And so then there's a green reflecting pool after spending however much he spent to make it blue.

And then they just quickly had parks, people, or interior people, or whatever, run over there and start dumping hydrogen peroxide. - I just like, or chloride, or whatever. - Hydrogen peptide, yeah, into the,

just dumping it into the reflecting pool

It's Donald Trump showed us on his chart,

and just like doing a couple of buckets and it was not really gonna do anything. And then they have like algae scoopers in there. - And then getting the algae off the bottom. - And then the Department of Interior,

this morning, just had to post a series of tweets that was like, it's back, and they have a picture

“of the water is blue again, which I think”

it's just a fake picture. And they said, and the algae is gone from the algae's now just at the bottom of the reflecting pool, just like the Iranian navy. - Yeah, they literally say that.

- And the Department of the Interior. - I was so sure. They're like, the Department of Interior, which in a previous era, I might have posted a picture of, say, Zion National Park.

(laughing) Boy, check out Zion National Park. We think everybody's gonna love it. You fucking cuff bitches, they think he's boomed out. It's crazy.

(laughing) So let's do, they drain the pool. They painted it at darker color, but a blue or color, whatever. Okay, they claimed because, oh, you know, Obama and Biden, they didn't have the stuff to fix the roof.

They couldn't get it done, but as we all complained about for years, the big thing we really cared about. So they're gonna do it, they're gonna fix it. And then the algae comes back, why? Well, maybe because Donald Trump isn't magic.

(laughing) Acre, the short fucking swamp painted black in the middle of one of the, like in a middle of the, of a swamp, and there's algae. - Yeah, maybe the paint-puller American flag blue

doesn't have magical properties that can hurt if else. (laughing) I regret to say that I read a long Washington Post article about this, 'cause there's all this like drainage and filtration infrastructure that they didn't actually

choose to fix, and that's the core problem. - Well, well, painted it. - So, together part of this too. - Anyway, perfect metaphor for the entire fucking issue. - Well, the energy, so, I'm telling you to drain the swamp

if you will, yeah, so, but so, of course, the algae comes back now, the interior department that puts out a statement saying, "Actually, this is residual algae." And it's like, hey, it's not, we don't believe

in spontaneous creation of life anymore. We're not Lemarkians, or whatever it was. Who are the fucking people? Oh, that's evolving quickly. Who's the ones that thought the maggots became the,

that maggots spontaneously arise? It's legit, yes, yes, thank you read. - I didn't even know this read, yeah. - 'Cause, 'cause we didn't have sports. - Yeah, I'm saying it, yeah.

Nobody invited us to flip cups, so we learned about these things.

But, so, so, yeah, it's always residual algae.

That's where the algae fucking comes from.

“Now, they did, now, how do you procside, can shock a pool?”

However, the percentages, the kind they were using, the 12%, that's for a hot tub. This is a seven million gallon tank. (laughs) You would need, at least five,000 to seven thousand.

Those in gallons of this stuff. And that's just to get it cleaned for a week. And then they're like, well, the new nano rubber tubes you're gonna work, and it's like, there is runoff, because this is a park in the middle of a city

that has, like, from the Potomac and all the rest. So, the algae's just gonna keep coming back, and it is a great metaphor for Donald Trump thinking, for people thinking that the only problem has been that our leaders were stupid or didn't care,

or didn't break enough rules. - Yeah, Donald Trump does something cheap and easy, that he thinks is a magic solution. It's not, and then he pretends it is anyway. - And news, flash, Donald Trump Jr.,

now owns, I hatched in Parkside Company. (laughs) - Did you guys see the news max guy who was down at the reflecting poll, doing interviews, suggesting that the Democrats had, like, sabotaged us.

- Yes, sabotages everywhere. Everyone thinks we've been pouring phosphates. We've been utilizing the fuck the ass. - And then Jesse Waters sent his, like, baby, dork, goon down there, to be like,

well, at least our president cared enough to fix it and try, like, what are we doing here? - I'll put it here about this. - The Washington Post did report, by the way, that the ballroom, that there's,

they found a invoice to a contractor

that, for, like, six, a million dollars,

and that half of it was going to be tax-parented. - Yeah. - And so they've been lying the whole time.

“And, Josh, then notice reported, I believe,”

that they found out that OMB has been moving money from the Secret Service budget into, because they couldn't get a pass through Congress. So, so, it, like, we are paying for the ballroom after all. - Well, famously, Secret Service

is had a great run recently. (laughs) - Yeah, that's some loose change for you. (laughs) - So, that's happened.

Anyway, we started burning money by a couple pairs of binoculars, boys. (laughs) - Well, we started very inspiring when we ended up with algae in the pool.

- Yeah. - So, it's a tail for our times. - Mm-hmm. - This has been fun, guys. Everyone, everyone have a great weekend.

That's our show for today. Alex Wagner will be back in the feed on Sunday with a conversation with historian and sub-stack Titan, Heather Cox Richardson. - And thanks to the Obama Library for letting us in you.

- Absolutely. - Okay, now let's go find our books in. - The positive America is a crooked media production. Our show is produced by Austin Fisher, Saul Rubin, McKenna Roberts and Ferris Safari,

with Reed Turlin, Elijah Cohen, and Adrian Hill. Our team includes Matt de Groat, Ben Hefko, Jordan Cantor, Charlotte Landis, Kirill Pelavive, David Toll's Mia Kalman, Ryan Young, and Naomi Single. Our staff is probably unionized

with the writer's guild of America East. (upbeat music)