The Bruised Hand in the Cookie Jar

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You can watch on YouTube, or listen, wherever you get your podcasts. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) - Welcome to Plad State of America. I'm John Favre.

- I'm John Loveett. - And today's show, we're gonna break down the new gold standard New York Times poll that shows Democrats opening on the 11 point lead in the mid-terks. That's how that election today, huh?

Please hurry up. We'll also talk about how Trump's revenge tour came for Louisiana Senator Bill Cassidy and is coming for Congressman Thomas Massey and Tuesday's Kentucky primary.

There's also some fresh new corruption to discuss.

Trump's new taxpayer funded $2 billion

or slush fund. He'll use to reward his favorite criminals and revelations that he's basically been day trading in his spare time, 3700 stock trades. And just three months.

- That's so many trades. - So many trades. - It's just that advice, just put it in an index fund. - I'm just kidding. - Yeah, we also got a new Iran taco brewing

and renewed interest in Cuba and Greenland, which is just one of the reasons we'll also dive into the latest debate over how much Democrats and commentators should be talking about old man Trump

losing his marbles. - Speaking old man, check out for us everywhere. (laughing) - I'm just gonna sit here with this guy's guy's fucking this fucking nerd's got his glasses on.

- I was waiting for you to do that. - Sorry, I scratched my eye. That's don't get used to it, everyone, hopefully. But first, before we start, tickets for Kirk at Khan, 2026 are on sale now for everyone.

Come hang with us November 5th through 7th in Washington DC for live shows, panels in a big fun party to celebrate and/or mourn the 2026 midterms. See, I added mourn 'cause it was Dan and Dan. So super-stitious, you know.

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that we do and a whole bunch of other stuff. Sub-stack newsletters, everything. Get the tickets for Kirk at Khan and all the info, you need at Kirk at Khan.com, go to Kirk at Khan/Friends to subscribe to Friends of the pod

and we can't wait to see you at Kirk at Khan. All right, Donald Trump and the Republican Party have been shooting the bed in nearly every poll for the last few months, but now, Nate Cone and the New York Times have come down

from the mountaintop with a stone tablet that confirms how screwed they are. Trump's approvals at 37% in their new poll that is a record low for him and for both terms and all New York Times see an appals.

And midterm voters also favored Democrats by 11.50 to 39%

President's biggest liability in the poll remains his handling of the cost of living, which is political strategists. Keep hoping he'll pretend to care about

“as evidenced by Monday's White House event”

on his discount drug website, Trump RX. Let's see how it went. I think outside of maybe a cure itself, it's the biggest thing to happen to health care and everything having to do with medical

and any way shape performed has never been anything like this.

- Really sold it, huh? - What? - What? - Trump RX is the biggest thing in medical. - The biggest thing in medical.

Biggest thing in medical. - Just tell 'cause there's a doctor here. (laughing) - You could tell he didn't like the event 'cause he cut it really short,

'cause it kind of looked like-- - We're worth it. - It looked like TEDx told you that or something. There's like Joe Gabby at front of a giant screen.

- The whole thing was embarrassing. Mark Cuban was there. Trump RX, by the way, it's not a platform for buying medications. It's just a facilitator, you go to the website,

it directs you to the other websites to buy the drugs. And sometimes it gives you coupons. - Just redirects you? - Yeah, basically. And then Amazon and Cubans thing,

what's his thing called? - Cost plus drug. - Cost plus drugs. You know, they work with the federal government to have some discounts on some extra drugs.

But also if you have insurance doesn't help you, meaning it's cheaper to buy the drugs if you have insurance 'cause the insurance covers the drugs. So really, it's where people who don't have insurance sometimes get some discounts on some drugs.

So it's not a bad thing, but it's not weird. It's certainly not the biggest thing since medical. - No.

“- What's that out to you guys in the New York Times poll?”

- So whenever we're talking about a poll that looks good for Democrats, you gotta go down and find a park where it's terrible for Democrats. And this was a new one, I think.

They said, "Are you satisfied or dissatisfied "with the Democratic Party?" And I'm used to seeing that voters maybe really unhappy with the Republicans and planning to vote for Democrats, but then are ultimately not super satisfied with Democrats.

Either, I was surprised to see that 70% of people say they are dissatisfied with the Democratic Party. And only 5% are very satisfied, which is a third of the number of people that are very satisfied with Trump.

And I get being, look, Republicans are in power. This is representing people that hate Democrats, it's represented by people that wish Democrats would fight more, it's represented by Democrats. Everyone who has a criticism of the Democrats

has represented in that number. But the fact that-- - Where would you be in that when there's someone else you? I would do it. - I would be in.

- I would be unsatisfied. - I'm unsatisfied, baby. (laughing) I'm unsatisfied. - But then when they gave me the generic ballot thing,

I'd be right there. But just the fact that right now, if this whole big, beautiful country of ours is only 5% of people that just love the Democratic Party. We talk a lot about the base, it's like,

you don't really have, you know, the Trump has a base that is-- - Who are those people like? - Right. - Who are those 5%?

I love everything they're doing. (laughing) Can't wait to see them on tour. - Looks like some of the staffers, maybe. - I don't know.

- I don't know. - I don't know. - A couple of folks on Blue Sky? - I don't know.

“So anyway, that was that's what stood out to you.”

- That stood out to me, and then there was a number on AI that I thought was just interesting and only 16% of people think AI is more good than bad. The vast majority are either undecided or think it's more bad than good.

So--

- It comes in a weekend where there's always commencement addresses

where students are booing the mere mention of AI. - Yeah. - Which I love. - You can tell there's a-- - Some of the foot there.

- Yes, there is. - Is there as time and would you think? - I liked that, and I liked that. I noticed that 64% in the Times Bowl said, they think they're going to war with Iran

was the wrong decision, including 73% of independence. That is pretty clear cut, and it's not going to get better as this thing kind of drags out in the straight of her moves remains close in the price of gas. Because up 76% rate economic conditions today

is only fair or poor. That is quite bad, and then the glass half-full thing of the Democratic Party was 50% say they will vote Democrat 39% say they will vote Republican in the midterm. So that's one of the better numbers of that nature.

I think we've seen it in a while. - We've been saying Trump bad for so long now. That when there's a poll this bad, it's sort of hard. It's almost like there's a crying wolf thing. - Yeah.

- Or like, not Trump's, I mean, Trump's always been bad,

but this is it for Trump, things that the walls are closing in. But Nate Cohen points out in his right up at the poll. No president's approval rating has been under 38% for more than a few days in the last 17 years according to our average.

Now we've got Donald Trump. And then he realized 17 years is George W. Bush which just makes us really old. But that is the last president to be this unpopular for this long.

Like it is, the fact that this is worse than January 6th now for him. - Well, the economic indicators are just so bad. I mean, 76% say they're concerned about their personal finances. It's a CBS poll.

67% say they're stressed. Like both of those have been ticked up in the last year. Only 29% in the CBS, the recent CBS poll said the economy is good. 77% say they're income is not keeping up with inflation.

- Yeah, to me, like you look at it too,

“what's hidden is just how many people have just,”

they're done, right?

You get, look at this poll and it's basically almost half

not quite half the country. They don't approve on a run. They don't approve on the economy. They don't approve on cost of living. They don't approve on immigration.

They are done. And the number of people who now say Trump has personally made their economic circumstances worse 44%. Which has gone up by like eight points. It's the last time.

So it's gone up from about the third of the country that's rising up to nearly half or no longer saying just, I don't just disapprove. Like I'm feeling personally that he's not doing what he said he was going to do.

So that to me was stood out. One other thing that said, I'll just about what's happening with Iran, that, you know, we a lot of internet debates about the anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism and the Democrats position on Israel.

Meanwhile, opposition to economic military support

to Israel has gone from 38% to 57% over the last two and a half to three or support has gone from 54% to 37%. And so a lot of numbers, Trump's approval. And so a lot of people support for Israel, financial aid, support for Israel is just about as popular

as Donald Trump in this country. And so look, this is not an argument that's being lost on the margins and it's not an argument that's being lost based on who gets platformed and who doesn't. There's a huge shift that has happened.

“I think you can lay that at the feet of Benjamin Netanyahu”

and Joe Biden in Donald Trump. But the sooner people make this less about the specific individuals they dislike, often with good reason and more about the deeper shift that is happening. I think the sooner people can actually

reckon with what is a real and lasting damage that has happened to America's relationship with Israel. - Yeah, I mean, Axiots were in a story this morning about some of this horrific anti-Semitism being directed towards members of Congress and voice males and threats

and all that's, and it's horrible. And I would just say that like, I do think it's important to separate like virulent anti-Semitism from people who are pro Israel and making the case for supporting Israel.

Like, I think we talked about this last week, but like Josh Godheimer's op-ed about anti-Semitism and my party has a problem too. Like it starts with talking about actual anti-Semitism and then halfway through it suddenly fears into,

oh and also Democrats are voting against funding, you know, military aid to Israel. - Which is a major opposition. - That should not be in the same op-ed. - Well, then yeah.

- I would just think he wants to lean off military supported for Israel, so. - Yeah. - Right, I wish, I would say the only other thing that's started to me is on the generic ballot

“'cause real movement just within the Times poll, right?”

Because every poll is a single poll, Snapchat and time, but you take a poll over time and it was D+2 to D+5 for the beginning part of Trump's term, second term in the Times sea and a poll and now it's D+11.

It's a big shift and then when they take it to only almost certain or very likely voters, it's D+14. So even that D+11 is like, may not be what we ultimately see

because, you know, the most motivated voters end up turning out in a midterm more so than in a general election. So, that's pretty big and it's late May, you know? Not a ton of time left.

- Not God would. - Yeah. - Well, I mean, look Trump still has time to become a different person. (laughing)

The bigger news from the White House on Monday was the announcement that President Trump's Justice Department is settling Donald Trump's lawsuit

against the IRS for $1.776 billion.

Get it? Get it? That is money that will be taken directly from taxpayers and funneled into a slush fund that apparently exists to pay Trump supporters

who were investigated or indicted or convicted during the Biden administration or I guess none of those things 'cause there's really no guardrails whatsoever. It seems like they did this, so Trump wouldn't be attacked

for directly pocketing taxpayer dollars, but I'm not sure this move is clever as they think. What about you, this is a Trump's second term is a political smash in grab job. Where he and his family and the people around him

and people who do is bidding, just take what they want. Get reward, they take it from taxpayers, they trade on polymarket, they frontrun the stock market and the fact that Trump is doing this before the midterms just shows that he doesn't give a shit about politics anymore.

It's all about money, and it's all about building money and it's to himself, and great shaving, which had been riching himself. And they made an end run around the judge in this case and they just cut a deal with another political pointy

that he had named to create the slush fund. And do you think they thought it was cute saying it was 1.776? Doesn't that just make the whole thing feel like made up in arbitrary?

More than anything else? They think it's like, oh, we've got patriotism in America's 250's coming up. And so if we call it a patriotic fund for patriots, then no one will get mad at us.

Shouldn't a fund to pay our restitution to people harmed be based on metrics? And not like the amount of what we're the number coming.

How many how much earnings did you lose? It's great. When you were at the capital on January 6th, when you're right. We'll say, Congress passed a law to give the Department

of Justice, basically on unlimited fund for restitution

for anyone who's who's the federal government.

“And so that's how they ended up doing this.”

So it's like, it is a one of those technically legal but extremely corrupt things that we have because of a stupid law that was passed, that no one thought to themselves, maybe they'll be at a administration

that just has the fund being unlimited because the president will sue himself. We'll sue it so much. Well, in fairness to people that wrote that law, you would also assume that if it were to be so completely

and obviously embracing the abuse by a president who's basically just going into the treasury and stuffing his pockets and leaving that there might be a Congress that would care about that, which we don't have, just like to Tommy's point,

the judge was like, hey, before this lawsuit by Trump against his own administration, which is unprecedented, that's being administered by his personal attorney, former personal attorney at the Department of Justice.

I want you to come in and explain to me how you're actually parties in opposition, how you're not on the same side of this thing. And they're like-- - It's like the deadlines may 20th.

That's when now it's may 18th.

- And so, basically proving the point

that the judge was worried about, they have decided to reach a deal beforehand. Now, the Justice Department, if it was actually advocating on behalf of taxpayers, the American people, which is what it's supposed to do,

it would fight this thing to the bitter end. Or the very least, settle for $0, which is happened in not exactly similar, but cases that are akin to this in the past. But instead they're doing this--

- Hang Griffin. - Yeah, doing this, exactly. - The same case, his taxpayer in FOA's leaked and he settled it for $0,000. - There's a lot of public apology for the IRS.

Because he didn't pay, and that is something that could have come of this. But it said, no, they are proving that there's they are in cohoots here by doing this kind of settlement. We have-- they're using a ridiculous justification

based on something that happened in the Obama administration, which even conservative legal scholars have batted down because that had actual specific people who were harmed by an actual specific policy on like this. My pitch is James Komi, Tisch James,

the Monica McEyeberg, Lisa Cook, Jerome Powell, they should all be submitting when this thing comes out. They should put their names in to get money from this fund. And if they do not receive a fair hearing, they should sue the federal government.

There are people that are being politically prosecuted by the government as far as we know publicly. Nobody on that list would not be kind of-- at least potentially included in the people hurt that could receive from this $1,176.

- My pitch is no one gets it. Give us the fucking money pack, that's our money. - Oh yeah, I don't think James Komi should get money

“from the federal government, but I think we should take this”

to put this thing through its pace. - This is fucking, yeah, well they're not gonna-- I mean, Trump points the board, it's five people. He gets to hire and fire the board. It should be five cronies, dishing out money.

They're like, this thing doesn't even have to be like, oh, and here was my case, and it was tried incorrectly. Like someone's just can go to fucking whoever Todd Blanche puts on the commission and be like, hey, I want $10,000 because I donated to the president and I'm mad

that Joe Biden sent the FBI after me. Oh, do you have proof for that? - No, but I just know they were watching me. - It's crazy. (laughs)

- It's just that, it's just that, I mean, like this is, it's just, they're at the point where they're just saying, we're gonna take money from the treasury and give it to our friends with us. - Particularly people just don't care.

- We're maybe criminals to let everyone else know that if you commit a crime on Trump's behalf, not only be you not go to jail, but perhaps you might get some compensation for it. - Yeah, but he was asked at the press conference today.

Well, could this potentially go to people who committed violence in January 6th, he said, oh, it's gonna be up to the committee. Absolutely, those people would be eligible could totally receive money from this fund.

- He pretends he doesn't know about it. - Okay. Also, it's a danger going forward, too, is we're heading into 28 and Donald Trump and J.D. Vance wherever the fuck it is.

Try to stay in the White House after they lose an election and a bunch of people do their bidding for them to help them out. What do you think they're gonna think? They're gonna be like, well, if he stays in there

and I help him out, I'm gonna be okay. I'm gonna get it hard and get paid. - Great. - You guys are only my idea that James Comey tries to get into that fund?

Come on. - I see you're saying,

“I think he tries to get out of the fund once.”

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Try it for free at zippercriter.com/cricket. Meet your match on Zipper Criter. (upbeat music) - Speaking of Trump allies getting away with crimes, what do you guys make of Jared Polis,

Governor Colorado Democrat, commuting the prison sentence of election denier, Tina Peters, she is the former county clerk from Mesa County, Colorado. She was in jail for orchestrating a security breach

of her county's voting system. Trump has been, Trump has been publicly and privately pressuring Polis to pardon her completely. They also tried to like transfer her from state prison

to federal prisons so that Trump could pardon her. Didn't do that, but now Polis has commuted her sentence through sentence to nine years. He cut it to four and a half years with parole next month.

I have to be honest, I know this is not a great answer for the purposes of a talk show. I just couldn't give less of a shit. I know people are like outraged about this.

I read JVL's long piece on this. I don't give a shit. I don't care. I have so much to be outraged or to worry about. I just can't even get myself to engage with this person.

I've even got a step further.

“I think Polis might have done the right thing.”

Like other sentence down. Wow. (laughing) I got a good excuse me, boys. If you need me, I'll be at the fucking bulwark.

(laughing) Where the real lips are now. (laughing) Go on. I'm not, I don't feel strongly.

I'm closer to Tommy's camp,

but like, here's the thing.

She was sentenced to nine years, right? She's a nonviolent first time offender. And three appellate judges who were appointed by a Democrat. They were a Democratic judges.

They all just ruled that they threw out the sentence the nine years sentence. So that was never gonna happen. And the reason they threw it out is because they thought that the judge basically

and giving her a nine-year sentence is opposed to a smaller sentence, violated her free speech rights because the judge basically said the reason I'm making your sentence longer

is because you sputtered election conspiracy. Right. Which is a horrible thing to do by studying elections in various areas, but that is protected first amendment speech.

I thought we have to be consistent. Well, there you go. But anyway. But hold on, hold on. I appreciate that, but we understand

that if someone were to say, hit somebody with their car, and then publicly say, that bitch deserved it. That is free speech of the right to say that, but it does potentially inform the sentence.

Sorry. Does it? Of course it does. Of course we allow remorse in people's motivations and feelings about the crimes they committed,

what they've learned from it. Well, she was, I mean, but the no remorse thing was already factored in because she was not remorseful when she was sentenced. But that's, he didn't say you didn't show remorse.

He said it's because you have these theories. I just think that's the same way. Not just first amendment that there are, we take people's motivations and expression. I agree that people are of the right

to believe elections are stolen. I'm just saying it's a little bit more than just first. Continue, sorry. I'm saying, if we believe that there is an incarceration problem in this country and that people are incarcerated

for too long and that prison is, it is a deterrent and yes, people should be jailed. They should be kept from society, but that unusually long sentences are bad, especially for first time nonviolent offenders.

Like, don't we have to extend that belief to people whose political beliefs we detest?

So I would say the answer is,

we should allow a process to play out. She would have been resentments. Why did this become a big public controversy is because the president states as public repressioning the government of Colorado

Now, look, I am sure Jared Poles would say that the pressure had nothing to do with it. Obviously, the fact that Donald Trump was threatening Colorado unless he did something, Donald Trump was saying this woman should be pardoned.

He is saying it's some kind of pushback against Trump that it's only a commutation. Like, she has kind of done the bare minimum of acknowledging that what she did was wrong, but if you go to her Twitter feed, her allies were saying,

it's just recently as I believe last week, I have to go look the exact timing that if Tina Peters isn't released, Trump should invade the state of Colorado. It is a nonviolent evidence.

“Yeah, I mean, I don't think that's what happens.”

Well, right, but it just goes to like the reason somebody who even commits and not look,

there are a lot of first time offenders who do something

that are part of a, that are part of something so dangerous that you have to say, wait a second. Yes, it's a nonviolent offense, but it goes to the core of what we are as a society, the safety of our democracy.

And so he has given into that pressure from Trump rather than let the process play out. So that I think is a huge problem. I don't know that we'd be having this conversation if Donald Trump hadn't personally intervened

to try to get the governor to do something. And then it seems as though he did it. That's where listening to this thoughtful debate, I still feel the shit. I might care less actually than what I'm just saying.

And also, I wouldn't say that I'm-- It is interesting. I would say that it's, yeah, it's more interesting to me and that like, I think that, I think he might have been there and I do think I would like to hear Jared Poles answer the question,

why don't you just wait for the resettensing of the three appellate judges, like what made you not want to just wait for their decision if they were going to throw out the sentence anyway? I would like to know that question.

I'd also say to you that the Republican prosecutor

“was against this and said that you should talk”

to the people that were impacted by Tina Peter's schemes before you'd make this decision. The council prosecutor? Well, sure, that's how prosecutors are. But, come in here.

But the-- It's also a defendant who pled guilty to almost the same charges in the Georgia Reggo case and was sentenced no time and probation. Yeah, we look.

There's all kinds of unfairness and unequal application of sentences all across the country all the time. Yeah. That, if that were the case, you'd go and say, oh, well,

there's somebody else who was given less. You can commute most sentences that way. But I think, look, in this-- In one candidate, it wasn't just her. He commuted like 30, it's like 35 or 50 commutations

or something like that in the same day. I think he has an answer for whether or not he gave in Trump's political pressure. And we are in a moment where, like, Donald Trump is threatening elections again.

Like, this is a grave threat to the republic. Why does our generosity, our sense of justice, our empathy turned for Tina Peter is when there are so many others who have who deserve it? That's all.

Yeah, and I don't think it should. I don't think it should. I don't think we should get be generous or empathetic at all.

“I think we should just be like, what is the standard?”

Like, is there a process to reach the decision and to meet a standard? I do think that criticizing Poles forward is completely fine. You can criticize and forward you have to say it's fine.

Some people are in people who I like in politics too and support are like calling for his impeachment. Over this, and I'm like, I don't, I just-- I do not think it rises to the level of unity. But is that good?

All the time these days? I can't get there, I can get there. I can get to, like, your criticism for sure. I can't get to, he shouldn't be pee and peached over this. I don't know if you guys saw that Trump's latest financial

disclosures show that he and/or his financial advisors made more than 3700 stock trades in the first quarter of the year.

But $1 million each in companies with business

before his administration like Nvidia Oracle, Microsoft Boeing, and Palantir, which he bought right before he praised the company on truth social in a post that, if you recall, even included the company's ticker symbol. Now, I know this may look suspicious,

but the White House did say that Trump's assets are in a blind trust. Managed by his children. So there are, quote, "no conflicts of interest." It seems fine, right?

This is, today, really, I thought there was no blind trust. I thought they'd already previously said there was no blind trust. Either way, managed by his children. That doesn't happen.

That's not a blind trust. They're like, again, this is part of the political smash and grab job. I mean, they're making money everywhere. This is crazy.

So Bloomberg reported, Trump had trades that involved Tesla and Videa Apple, Meta Visa, city Boeing, Qualcomm, and GE. Top executives from all of those companies were on his trip to Beijing to meet with Chinese President

in Xi Jinping. So you don't think he's getting inside or information? Haven't that access, talking to them, cut and deals with them? He, some of the stock trades included up to 680 grand worth of Eli Lilly, right as the administration

was preparing policies that would benefit their GLP1 business. He took a huge position-- a couple huge positions in Nvidia right before they announced major news.

There was $1 to $5 million position a week

before they announced a partnership with Meta, then there was a half a million to a million dollar position a week before the Commerce Department

They're buying and selling Intel stock, which the US government took a 10% stake in the company. This is insanity. He's just showing the consequences.

“Paul Pelosi, somewhere, is like, what the fuck, man?”

I could have been doing this so much better. I, like, we're sort of pat-- every single-- well, Jesus, I'm like Jim Kramer now. Do you see the clip of Jim Kramer? Yeah, he's doing a good job.

He's doing a good job. We drop it in here, let's drop it in the Kramer clip. The president's been trading some intel in the quarter. Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, yeah. You've traded. Yeah, yeah. You've got nothing to say about it. But--

Mm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Full.

Yeah. All right, don't worry. We're not attacking the goal this year, everybody. What's funny about the Jim Kramer clip is that it's like, people who, like, oh, wow, he's so-- he's stammering.

He's he can't figure out what to say about this.

“But when I was watching, he was like, is he stammering?”

Because he can't figure out to say about this or is he making a joke about how it's so

going to be on the pale, but he doesn't want to be critical of Trump in this moment.

Like, I didn't know what-- What are we-- why is he stammering? He knows what's going on. He didn't get in Jim Kramer's hood. But we're just-- no.

It's all right. Live in front, live in front for Ian's attitude in Kramer's head. But the-- like, we're at a new level of brazing corruption because every step along the way nobody has stopped him to get to this point, right? Like, he can't-- the thing that I find stunning about all this is that there's no--

like, the level of brazing this is going up, but the dollar amount isn't always. It's like, why are we doing 500 grand stock trades billion-dollar crypto theft and the watches? Like why? You know what I mean?

It's just all of it's left over from the old world. Right. You had to just do corruption. Well, like the watchers? You have the hotel rooms?

We're getting you the Trump phones, but they're not coming. Yeah, that part doesn't make sense.

But the aggregate stock trades was arranged between 211 and 687 million dollars.

So that's a pretty good quarter. So it's also like, just a volume of trading, Bloomberg interview this guy, Erick Dietin, who's the president manager director at the wealth alliance, and he said, "I'm baffled." In the 40 plus years of my time on Wall Street, this is an unusual amount of trading by any standards.

We need to see the actual trades to try and understand why anyone would want to do that much trading. So I did that. It's just a practical way. It's just a practical way.

Like the practical way in which this is being done, like, is there a team that is doing this? Right. Like, it feels like they've got like a Christopher multisante trying to like push what best they see.

Like he's got like some fucking back office and you jersey somewhere with computers. No, it's just very in Trump in the outer oval with a shitload of Adderall. It's just like my not already reporting it. Like I can see the future. I know what's going to happen at the Commerce meeting next week.

I know then I have the BLS down. That's just because he's got the briefing book. Yeah. But again, like, they took like seven transactions related to Boeing, one was between $1 to $5 million.

Like, the biggest deliverable of the China trip was to get the Chinese to buy a bunch of Boeing planes. And by the way, the announcement was so underwhelming that the stock went down because they did a shitty job. We're still using proof that C, we see, it was a good announcement.

It's like, yeah, you, you, you, you know what I tried to trade on inside information. It just turns out you suck into diplomacy. Like, that was the problem. You're, you're good at the crimes. You're bad to diplomacy.

And deliver on that. Yeah. All right. So Trump's also doing his best to drag the Republican party down with him. On Saturday, he sent yet another message that descent will not be tolerated when his chosen

primary challenger, Congresswoman Julia Letlow, took out Louisiana Senator Bill Cassidy, who's sin was voting to convict Trump in the January 6th impeachment trial. Cassidy went down in flames. He got third in Louisiana's primary. The first time an incumbent senator has come in lower than second place since 1944.

Trump's next target is Thomas Massey, who's trying to unseat in Tuesday's Kentucky primary. Massey has been the, uh, the strongest and kind of the only Republican in the house breaking with Trump on Epstein, Iran, and the big beautiful bill. Uh, Trump has been posting about Massey nonstop.

“I think, right before he recorded, he did like a video from the oval, which is very legal”

and normal, uh, to just to just tell people to vote against Thomas Massey. We could, we're going to run the midterm on the hatch act, I think. Right. Yeah. That's yeah.

He says he's grabbing the $2 billion for his slush fund and then trading on in video and Boeing.

Yeah. Peter Hexath was doing it in Kentucky today. His personal capacity. His personal capacity. And then Trump announces that he's delayed an imminent military assault on Iran that was supposed

to happen tomorrow. Yeah. What was peaking to do? That seems like bad timing. Because like you need him for that.

Yeah. You don't. Maybe it's now. Yeah. Maybe it's now.

Maybe it's now. Um, he's going to drink the boost. To really say what will happen in the, uh, in the Massey race, but it certainly seems like Massey himself is staying loose. Uh, here he is on Sunday doing his best Trump impression.

Whenever a call and I got a schedule a minute for the first thing he tells me every time I call it, Massey, your shot could you wait to give my IT? You know, my professor was, uh, my uncle was professor John G. Trump. He was an IT 41 years, it's a record. And, you know, I went to work, which is basically the hardest school of the world.

So, I kind of get even better genetics than you.

Alright. You're awesome. I kind of want him to lose now. That was, I was rooting for him until just then. I'm doing the sentence.

He's going for it. You know, you put that. You got that accent. We're going to be wearing a Trump impression. You know, don't, don't do it unless you're really feel good.

You got to nail it. There's just too many people doing it, and it's too, it's too big a target. Anyway, anyone have thoughts on the primary? Yeah, look. I mean, how big of a deal is it?

On Bill Cassidy, like, fuck back guy, I, you know, like, he thought he could, like, appease maga by voting for a Robert of Kennedy Jr and end up kind of like selling his soul in these credentials as a doctor and at being worst of all worlds. Any new better, and we know it because he told us as much before he flipped flopped. And so, what I rather have in the Senate than his replacement, yes, I would.

But ultimately, I don't think it'll make a big difference.

Thomas Massey is a different story, like, he's the reason we have the Epstein files because he worked with Rokana to get him released. He's a principal vote against wars and militarism and lots of other things. I don't agree with him on everything, and, you know, like, you don't share the same world view.

But, you know, Christmas cards with me and my kids with machine guns, like I think he did one time. But, yeah, you know, it would be a big loss.

“And I think it tells you everything you need to know about Donald Trump's political worldview”

that he will not lift a finger to help his party build what he will take down anyone who criticizes him. It is all about punishing his own critics and the cult of personality and protecting his personal power and not about the party or doing anything. Right.

I think he's far more passionate about defeating his enemies than he is about helping his friends. Yeah, with Cassidy, you go back to him approving RFK junior and accepting his fake assurances in his private meetings, pretending that RFK didn't believe what he obviously believed. And, like, no, you can't sell half your soul.

He doesn't work like that. They're not divided. They're not divisible in that way. And so these guys that end up being reluctantly for Trump, they don't, they're not better politicians.

They're just worse hores, you know, so our, you know, good ridins, I suppose. I will say this is, there's a lot being made because we had Indiana and then Cassidy and then, and then Massey. But this is sort of the last gasp of this.

It's the first internet too.

Well, what are you? It's just like an app. This is Trump's last midterms. And do we think he's going to spend, he's going to be spending time in 28 going around doing primary challenges.

“They may be, but like, also does it lose its force?”

It's something right, like the Trump's like a, he's already a lame duck, like he clearly has the juice to do it now, but as we get to 28 and then beyond that, like, what is, this is, it's what we learned from the, yeah, because he's an addicted prick who only cares about himself and, you know, and I think we'll still learn the, like, you know, nothing's breaking the fever in the Republican Party, the party's broken and you've got a, you've

just got to defeat them at every level because all the ones who are left are completely loyal to dear leader, and that's about that. And I do think also he might have, he might have fucked himself a little because now you got angry, Cassidy, who still got votes left to take between now and the end of the year. Massive masses.

Massive masses until us has already been doing it. And so they can make us like more difficult. And I do wonder now between now and November, if this makes it, like, harder for Republicans to break away from Trump, even though primaries are over because they're, they're, they worry that they're going to get punished.

I don't know. Oh, it's just, look, it remains extraordinary, right? Bill Cassidy, like, uh, uh, could not persuade his own voters. You would have voted for him multiple times in the past to stick with him once Trump turned, right?

Like, it just tells you something about the, the, the, the voters showing up in these Republican primaries and what they, what they want and there was no, the fact that Cassidy was a vote for impeachment and that Trump had fully turned against him. There was nothing he could do to convince them that he was worth saving. Nothing.

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restarted." Trump posted that the U.S. quote will not be doing the scheduled attack of Iran tomorrow, aka Tuesday, the day you're listening to this, because the leaders of Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE, asked him to hold off due to serious negotiations that are now taking place. Trump did add that the U.S. has prepared to attack Iran, quote, "on a moment's notice

in the event that an acceptable deal is not reached. On Monday, it was also reported that Iran sent its latest piece proposal through Pakistan to the U.S., which the White House seems likely to reject, even as the Pentagon and Israel are, quote, "engaged in intense preparations, the largest since the ceasefire took effect for the possible resumption of attacks against Iran according to the New York Times."

What do you make at the back and forth here, Tommy, like any chance that Trump's latest threat to destroy Iran got them closer to a deal, scared them into it? I don't think so, but we just talk about these statements where he name checks a bunch of autocrats. They're so weird.

You don't have to do that, but he's always on behalf of the Great and highly respected

field marshal, Assun Munir, I decided not to exterminate Iran, you know, the delivery date for that plane is supposed to be the fourth, but he once moved up for his birthday with the guitar, so he wants the guitar to get that plane there fast. It's the same way that he does the, you know, personalities stuff with G, like he enjoys the idea that governing doesn't involve anyone except the people in the room, but there's

no people inside it, right? They're just great men making big decisions together at a collaboration and friendship, and so he's not doing it for the good of the country, he's doing it because he has this great rapport with these leaders. The Pakistanis, in particular, like they cut a big crypto deal with the world liberty

“financial, so that's why he likes them, but like you do five seconds of research into”

the great and respected field marshal, and you find the UK authorities have charged him with torture and crimes against humanity, that's a guy he's like name checking, but regardless, that's a good character. That's a good character. Of course.

I don't think they're any closer to a deal. I don't know, I assume we're in the same place, Iran thinks they have a lot of leverage, because they can close straight or remove, they know Trump is weakened politically, they know that he wants out of this, he doesn't want to go back to war, and so they're going to wait for the United States to walk back some of the more Maxwell's positions, or just

get sick of the shit and move on. Just imagine, it's sort of some sort of Iranian underlying kind of going down the stairs into the, into the bunker where the, where the, the recuperating, I told us, like, pointing at the CNN numbers and saying, "Look, look, look, we got it, we got it, we got it right, we got it right, we got it right now."

Yeah.

And you know, Iran, there's always leaks still, like, Iran reportedly has up to 75% of its

missile stockpile, but all of its, basically, almost all of its infrastructure along the street or from loses operational for them to shut it down. So, I, they could always make things worse, straight to form moves, also now has its own Twitter account. Does it?

Yeah. Like, hurl the fog and just shampers this count. Yeah, they're calling it, you know, something more official, but it's like the Iranian government. Oh, yeah.

No, they're doing it in lego. They've made an official Twitter account, so we can get updates from the straight, just personifying the straight. Yeah. And it's going to cool.

That's sort of red green yellow, because there's a lot of red, like sort of when you get the, like, cigarettes and, like, California traffic, it's like, oh my God, the straight or move is red today. It's a fuck. I'm going to be like, honey, I'm going to be late, I'm going to have traffic, all the

helicopters.

“So, important on the nine's and five's, NBC reported last week to the administration's”

considering changing the name of the war from Operation Epic Fury to Operation Sledgehammer. We have to get a little more fall, again, or something else entirely in order to quote, effectively restart the clock with Congress. Is that how it works? New Operation name, now they can't get you.

No. Now you can do whatever words you want. They're like, I love this idea that, you know, the war power's act is such a weak piece of legislation that you can just do, like, a bureaucratic tweak and get around it. I mean, it's crazy.

Obviously, the same conflict, like, changing the name doesn't matter. Every president, since Nixon, this claim the war power's act is unconstitutional. They all hate it, but it was enacted over Nixon's veto in 1973. And so, Congress has leveraged here if they want to use it, Republicans refused to use it.

focused on wars far away from home.

He's focused on wars right now in our own backyards, so they're going to bunch of rumblings about the long rumored regime change move in Cuba, sources told the AP last week that the administration is looking to indict former Cuban president, Raul Castro, rather of Fidel, even though he's no longer in power, then over the weekend, Marco Pudo reported that, according to classified U.S., Intel, Cuba has over 300 drones, and has recently considered

launching them against U.S. military targets, and even Key West Florida, which could serve as a handy pretext for an invasion. Cuba's current president, Miguel Diaz Canal, responded on social media on Monday, writing the quote, Cuba poses no threat, nor does it have aggressive plans or intentions against any country, including the U.S., and that a U.S. attack would quote, "trigger a blood

bath." What should you make of the Cuba stuff? Seems like he's, uh, seems like he's gearing up. You want to kick us off on Cuba?

I don't think we should go to war with Cuba right now, uh, in the Times poll, there was

a question that was something like, when do you believe the U.S. should launch war against countries that have not attacked us, and he was like 70% or like, don't do that. Never. Don't do that. Unless someone has attacked us, we don't know.

We shouldn't go to war. I love being able to get into that. Whatever Trump had come to believe about killing Soleimani, the getting majority of Venezuela, and how fun that was, uh, he sees the polls showing how popular the war in Iran is. I hope that that has at the very least chasing them from the American of idea that they

can be, uh, regime topplers without it, kind of consuming their politics. But it's terrifying. It's terrifying to imagine that they were going to see what they're doing in the Middle East and to sign that, uh, it needs to be brought closer down. Yeah.

I mean, look, I, I, I'd read the story.

It was such an obvious pretext to me, but I mean, look, I don't doubt the intel, like, uh, is Cuba acquiring drones, well, it's 2026 and every military has or is acquiring drones. I'll be like not getting rifles or, you know, machine guns in World War I. So it also says like the intelligence suggests the Cubans would respond to a US attack with drones.

Yeah. That's good to say. This acts you story.

“You have to get way down to reality check, which is three paragraphs for paragraphs”

from the bottom to you find out that, uh, by the way, the intel that it's retaliatory. This is not a, a preemptive strike on Miami. This is what they would do if we attacked them because we all know if they did a preemptive strike on Miami, that would be suicidal because you would fucking flatten the country. So I also just would like to think that if we are on the verge of going to war with another

country, that the evidence would not be laundered during anonymous sources into a daily tip sheet that perhaps they're going to worry for. Well, I don't know where you were with you, but that was the, but that was in your time. Yeah. Sorry, you're right.

I do think though every indicator lead is flashing when it comes to possible regime change operations, because there's this leak, which creates the pretext of this being a minute threat. There was CI director John Rackliffe just went to Cuba and had this message from Trump. There is the indictment, the rumored indictment of Raul Castro, which was a very important

part of the case for why they had to do what they did against Maduro, which was extract him from Venezuela and bring him to New York for prosecution. There's been all these reports of a huge increase of intelligence over flights by the U.S. So I would be very worried if I were Cuban official and meanwhile, if you're a Cuban being or citizen, like the United States has a blockade on that's allowed no oil and gas into

your country and people are starving to death. They have one to two hours of electricity a day, hospitals can't operate, but what we're doing is criminal, it is absolutely evil. You're starving a population of people to death. And the most likely outcome is that the government collapses and there's a mass exodus

in migration crisis to the United States, which Naga has told us they do not want to happen. I don't understand what these lunatics are fucking doing here, but it is utterly immoral just horrific horrific policy right now.

“I think that the insane thought running through Donald Trump's head is his response to”

launching a disastrous war in Iran that is unpopular, that is cost us billions of dollars, that is spite gas prices everywhere, is I got a launch of war that's more popular and easy. I got to go back to the Venezuelan model because they all think that Venezuela was some big fucking success, right, and so it was like that was an easy one, so I got to get my

mojo back by going to invade Cuba now that Iran's a big fucking mess. It's also insane. Did you see Rubio in his Maduro tracks? Yes. This is all just a game.

It's all just trolling. It's all content. I don't think it was that flattering. No, I think I talked about his mother leave it, but I do think Maduro will work better, but I'm even joking, I'm just looking for more comfortable there, like Rubio looked like

the suit was wearing him, but I was looking at that like, why are you doing this? I said forget it, like, he was a little posed too, wasn't like something like that. There's a lot of pose, a lot of pose, but like I was looking at him, what are we supposed to, okay, what is this meant to boy your tough, you're wearing the same clothes, like, what

“what was the message and I now I'm like, oh, was this about how, how like what happened?”

We'll do this again, like, we're gonna do this, is it a Cuba thing, like what the fuck was the outfit? What are my men to take from this photo, Steven Chung?

I agree with you, I do think Trump wants to change the channel and kind of get us onto a

new topic that isn't around, that makes him sound tough again. I do think, though, that Cuba falls in the Venezuela, Iran, Cuba, Accessive Evil, Bucket of, like, theocons telling him, "Sir, you'll be a historic figure, sir, if you make big changes here." And he's down to--

Yeah, but we'll guard all your balls. Well, I mean, don't need to do something else to get that, that's already happening at the price, then. But, you know, he's also in Florida surrounded by a bunch of very, like, rich, hard-line, you know, Miami Cubans who, you know, have been waiting for this for a long time, and, you

know, want their real estate assets back on the island. So, I hope I'm wrong, maybe a whole fucking cubano, or, you know, like, whatever Wall Street will make up a new term for it, so I'm gonna be stupid, but, like, it does seem like it's nerve-racking.

“Well, if he doesn't do Cuba, then there's always Greenland, remember the critical”

national security issue of Greenland? A quick refresher of the back in January after threatening to invade Trump did a, did a taco in announced to the quote, "Frame work of a future deal with respect to Greenland."

And in fact, the entire Arctic region, well, the New York Times is now reporting that the

negotiations around that framework have Greenland officials, quote, "weread," as US proposals quote, "amount to a major imposition on Greenland's sovereignty." Yeah, I bet. Greenland specifically concerned about Trump's June 14th birthday and July 4th is upcoming dates where Trump's attention could swing back around to them, as he starts thinking about

his legacy. Unfuck and real. What do you think? Those concerns well-founded? What do you think about the Greenland at concerns expressed in the New York Times

piece? Let's just pause and sit in the idea that the Danes are concerned that Trump will get more bellicose around his birthday. That's where we're at. That's what we do.

Turn it 80. He's turn it 80. America's turn it 250. Yeah.

“I'm not going to be content with just the fireworks.”

No, no. You're going to want to get to know the Greenland. Somebody's got to give him a little. He wants it. He wants it the great at the end of his name.

He knows that when the Russians got more territory, they got to be the great. So we just got to find some fucking chunk of lands somewhere. Yeah, much cheaper. Get me Greenland. I just made Venezuela the 51st day.

He's just... Something. We got to expand the map. Can't believe we're talking about this again. This sucks.

It's not so crazy. Did you guys see the Tim Dillon dead? We said, "We're not the high school bully anymore. We're the weird kid who may or may not have a gun." Yes.

Not the quarterback. We're not the jock. We're the college kid who keeps going to high school parties. It might be a pedophile. It might be a pedophile.

And it has a gun. That is us. That's a country. Good work, everybody. That is it.

That is it. I think we've made a mistake collecting this guy. Yeah. This podcast is sponsored by Squarespace. Squarespace is the all-in-one website platform designed to elevate your online presence

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Now that we've just talked about Trump, potentially trying to conquer several additional nations, possibly because it would look cool on a map, it's probably a good time to mention that there's been a revival of the debate about Trump's age and fitness for the job. And whether Democrats should be making a bigger deal about it, Lauren Egan at the bulwark and Jonathan Lemire at the Atlantic are both out with big pieces arguing that it's time

for Democrats to make it a bigger issue. We get some subscriber questions about this a lot. We also see a lot of folks in social media making the argument that if you're not making as big of a deal about Trump's age, as you were about Biden's, you're being hypocritical. So in the spirit of open dialogue, I guess we're going to debate it.

That's the big, uh, Austin, Austin's bringing out a vote save America mug with three positions in it. So I'm not going to look till we all, let's all look at the same time. Pro, meaning it's something we should talk about more, anti, you can guess what that means. And moderator.

Okay, great. I am the moderator. I am the anti. Wow.

Okay. Bitch. It's fucking owned.

- Little, bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum.

- Look at me hitting me see music. - Tonight, all right, I'll be moderating this debate. John, you will be arguing that Democrats must make a greater issue out of Donald Trump's age, Tommy will take the con. You have the opening statement of 30 seconds.

- Did Joe Biden lose the last election

“or have to drop out of the last election because he was too old?”

- Yes. - Was it the biggest concern of every voter everywhere because everyone made a big issue and Republicans made a big issue of his age? - Yes.

- Yep. - So, Donald Trump's hands are falling off right now. He looks like he looks like it was like a fucking bad morg job on his hands before he got in the casket. - Sure.

- He's basically melting before our eyes. He's got all kinds of bruises all over the place. Aaron Roupar's feeds full of it. All it's just purple. - Okay.

- Just all of it. - And yet, and yet Democrats are out there just talking about affordability and not talking about the fact that the president of the United States is decomposing before our eyes and Democrats won't talk

about it even though these are the same Democrats that tried to push Joe Biden out of the race.

- Wow, a powerful argument.

Tommy, you're a counter. - John, you ignorant slut. I don't want to get in between you and Aaron Roupar's feed and you're a little hand job issue there with the Trump. But Trump is not running again.

So none of this matters. Democrats have zero credibility on this issue. After spending years pretending that they couldn't see Joe Biden's physical decline, as he was shuffling around sneakers and falling over sandbags,

every minute we spend talking about makeup on this decrepit old man's hands is a minute we are not spending talking about stock trades, the ball room, Medicare cuts, things that actually matter to people.

And yeah, the napping is weird, admittedly. It's also very funny when the White House says that he blinked for 10 seconds. - Yeah, long blanks. - These are long blanks.

- Admittedly, that's weird. But he still does a lot of events. He's out there all the time he's doing rallies. He looks vibrant. He's a big--

- Looks vibrant when he's talking about. He can't even stand up and make him a murderer. - All right, so let me just throw some questions at any Tribute Direction. I'll start with you, Tommy.

You do notice that there's this significant decline in how he communicates from today to how he communicates even four or eight years ago. That his cadence has changed, that he's not as clear, he is more meandering,

he's posting all hours of the night. These are things that should be a liability.

“- I think he's always done these things.”

I think he's always been kind of incoherent.

I think he's always posted these never slept. - But I'm curious how you would explain the difference, right? Like he is, yes, you're right. He has always been this way, but I think it's indisputable that it is all worse.

He is rambling more, he is the weave. But the weave is getting worse. Do you think it's getting-- - Or better changing. - Ending on your back.

- I think I agiant the jokes aside, I think. I don't know that I noticed him that much more rambling than he used to be because he's always been rambling. Like he does look tired. He's legitimately falling asleep in events.

It's noticeable, the hand stuff is weird. And by the way, they're clearly lying about the hand stuff, because they initially said it was his hand shaking hand, and then the other hand had the bruising too. So, he also keeps going to the dentist and no one is--

- Dude, how many annual dentists tripped? - Do you do a lot of dentists tripped? - Yeah. - He's doing a lot of fake toys and stuff. - No one's telling us why his health is the way it is.

- And there's no one's asking questions. - And there's the doctor's office in the West Wing, so you would only go to Walter Reed or Bethesda wherever he's going now to get like specialized equipment. - There's also dentists, there's also dentists office

in the White House. - So he's got to go to a special dentist. - So John, question to you, how would a Democrat who was somebody who defended Joe Biden's ability to run again make this argument without seeming

like their foolishness? - I was wrong about Joe Biden, and I should have said something earlier,

“and that's what I'm doing this time around,”

because Donald Trump is in bad shape, and he should not be a lead in the country. And any Republican that still supports him and that doesn't want to pressure the cabinet to invoke the 25th Amendment, then they are just feeding

into this cover-up for Donald Trump's age, and his dementia, and he is just putting us all at risk, and Republicans won't do anything about it. And so even though he's not running again, when we go into the midterms,

we know that Donald Trump's approval rating is highly correlated with how we're public because they're going to do in the midterms, and by talking more about how he has dementia, and he is losing his marbles, then we should,

we could get his approval even lower, and that Democrats can then do better in the midterms. - Last question for you, Tommy. Joe Biden's age, and Joe Biden's disapproval in the economy, became linked.

The fact that the economy was bad was a sign he wasn't up for the job, the fact that he was up for the job, made people doubt that he could fix the economy. We're trying to make an argument that Republicans, we have to win the house in the Senate,

and that Republicans refuse to tell the truth about Donald Trump. Shouldn't the fact that Donald Trump is decomposing for our eyes, rambling at all hours,

Shouldn't we be saying these Republicans won't be honest about that, that who? Why are they not telling the truth about this, what are we not knowing about this? Shouldn't we be making this one of the lines of argument

that we use when we try to accuse Republicans of not really Trump accountable? - Yeah, so I'll be to flip flop on the issue, respond to your leading question. Clearly, they're covering up something, right?

Like the guy's, the multiple annual doctor visits, like this crazy, it's all pre-texts, we should push for more information. There is muscle memory here, right?

“Like I think if we get people to a critical massive concern”

about this, they can, they will care. I also just, I think trouble hated. If we call him a sad sick old man, he would hate that. - So it's just working that in, there could be fun. - Now you argue the other side.

- Yeah, no, I'll argue the other side, 'cause I think Tommy's best point was, he's not running again. Like, and so what difference, as Hillary Clinton once said, what's difference does it make?

If he is decrepit, if they are covering something up, he's like, the reason this was a potent argument against Joe Biden is because Joe Biden was asking voters for four more years in office.

Donald Trump will never ask voters

for four more years in office. And you might try to say, no, he won't. He might try to stay in office, but he's not gonna ask voters for four more years. - I mean, he might run for a third turn.

- That's not a third turn. - He's gonna try to just sit there and be like, I got the military in the park. - Yeah, there's no one's gonna let him run. But so he's not gonna ask for it.

So what is the purpose of Trump, what is the, if we're trying to win a midterm, what is the story we're trying to tell about Donald Trump that is most true? And the story that is most true is what you said at the beginning

of this episode, which is this whole term, is a smash in grab, he wants to make as much money as he can. He's a megalomaniac who thinks that now he needs this legacy in history where he like conquers half the globe. And he doesn't give a shit about people.

He doesn't give a shit about people. And he's never given a shit about people. And that's a consistent story through time. And whether he has dementia now or losing his marbles or not, like, doesn't really matter.

“- So I think the way that I would square this is,”

I think that's right. Democrats are more passionate about these guys now. - Democrats paid a political price for defending Joe Biden and when people had concerns about his age, even after he dropped out because it came to be evidence

that Democrats couldn't be trusted more broadly. And my argument would only be, no, age should not be the central argument we make against Donald Trump. But if we can make the fact that Republicans refuse to be honest,

about not just Trump's corruption and an unaccountability and brazen theft, but also just his rambling and crazy nonsense. And you make every time he does that part of a story about how he's unfit, including because he's getting old,

then that's part of why these Republicans can't be trusted. That's the best I'm not, I don't think that's that I can do. - But even that is, you say that. You kind of just threw in corruption there, but it's like, so he doesn't know what he's doing.

He's crazy, but he's also smart enough to be out there stealing all the money. - I just think that the incoherence is priced in. Like the weave is a thing that's like a joke, but it's also not a joke.

You know what I mean? People know he's a goofball, he's all over a place, he says weird shit, but also like, he's funny. He's big and imposing, he seems sharp at events a lot of times. And like the hand shit is very odd,

but like, it's also weird, it's not weird to make an argument that he used to be sharp when we were all saying he's been fucking crazy since he came on the scene in 2016. - Yeah, it's weird for Democrats to be in the picture and be like, you know what, he's just not up for the job.

He used to be, but now he's not up for the job. - I think I think, I don't think anyone should make that argument. I think we go back and look at the debates with Jeb Bush

first that debate with Kamahar, it's like,

there's been a crazy time for him putting that aside.

“Here's the thing that I find very annoying about Elis.”

It's the same kind of practiced like, obtuseness that some people on our side love to do. Like, how could you say this? If you won't say the same exact thing about Trump that you said about Joe Biden, then you're being a hypocrite.

As if we can't see the difference between the way Joe Biden looked and the way Donald Trump has got that Joe Biden was disappearing from the public. Look, if you think Donald Trump is too old for the job, I'm sure.

- Sure. - I don't agree. - He is too selfish, too much of a fucking dictator for the job. - He's also the most accessible president we have ever had.

He is on camera. Every fucking day, he's answering questions every day and like he seems vital. Yeah, nuts loses the thread all the ways in which he's terrible and shouldn't be in office.

He should be impeached and removed immediately. I'm not in charge of this. But like to act as if there isn't a big difference between the way Donald Trump is aging and the way Joe Biden is aging is to, once again, deny what we can see

with our own fucking eyes. - Yeah, but to me that is like all beside the point. Even if you can argue that back and forth or whoever thinks Joe Biden was worse, Trump was worse,

whatever. But again, the question is, two what end?

Two like a second term president.

If Donald Trump was sitting here saying, I'm a lot full more years and we're trying to figure out how to defeat Donald Trump. - The two on that answer is, you try to drive down his negatives more.

You make it an issue that other Republicans need to speak to you and suddenly they're vouching for him not being seen higher or older or whatever. I think we're a long way from here to there. - Yeah, and it's also because if you had a choice

between what Republicans need to answer for,

too old or they're saying nothing about the fact

“that he's literally stealing from taxpayers out of their pocket”

and launched a war that's strut up gas prices. - Hand to make up or theft. - Thank you'd rather do that one. - And if he really-- - Why not both.

- And if he will, you'll have so many things

that you can say out of your mouth. - And if it was so clear, right? Like if he was like, look, I agree.

“It's in decline. There's not some magic words that Democrats”

can use to make something more. They can make it more of an issue, but they can't make it the issue.

If Donald Trump was having the kind of muttering debate

that Joe Biden had a guarantee you would be a big political issue and it wouldn't be because Chuck Schumer decided it was on some given day. - That's a comma-sad sickled man. - Yeah, a comma man.

- Go to town. - Let's go to town. - Go to town.

“- So you're, if you got the right words.”

- I won. - Okay. (laughs) - Good for you. - Congrats to our winner, John Love it. - That's our show for today.

Dan and I will be back with a new show on Friday. (upbeat music) - Pots in America is a crooked media production. Our show is produced by Austin Fisher, Saul Rubin, McKenna Roberts, and Ferris Safari

with Reed-Chirlin, Elijah Cone, and Adrian Hill. Our team includes Matt de Groat, Ben Hefko, Jordan Cantor, Charlotte Landis, Carol Pelave, David Tolz, Mia Kalman, Ryan Young, and Naomi Sengel. Our staff is probably unionized with the Writer's Guild

of America East. (upbeat music)