Bill Kristol and John Heilemann: Taking a Wrecking Ball to the Military

It's a live fan, the wind is perfect for me, but the low name is not so good, and now comes our story from the field.

“Good, you're back, you're back, you're back, and you're back, you're back, you're back, you're back, you're back!”

Oh, the last two of the heroes of the Red Cross. The last two of the Red Cross. The last two of the Red Cross are the same, but we'll give you our best. We're back to the next round of the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross.

We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross.

We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross.

We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross.

We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross.

We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross.

We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross.

We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross.

We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross.

We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross.

We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross.

We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross.

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We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. We're back to the Red Cross. How could you be so disrespectful to him? He goes away for one week.

And you guys are jumping at him. Now it's great to have you, John. And you can fill Tim shoes. There are big shoes, but I'll do my best. And I got to say, it was an eventful weekend.

I also like the notion that it's a Monday podcast.

It's basically kind of a little bit of looking backward.

Because we don't have quiet weekends anymore in our politics. He used to be back in the day when you and I were younger men. We used to spend weekends in DC that padding around the tidal basement, taking a bike ride now and then, you know, switching off. But every weekend now is another complicated horse.

“Before we jump into all of the stuff, what's the end of this weekend in this week?”

What's like in the very kind of like, here's the biggest thing you were fixated on over the weekend. What was like really most front center in your mind? I mean, one of the bad things about Trump era is instead of being fixated on whatever your favorite baseball team is not doing too well or sticking back still to Spain's fine

victory in the World Cup. You do get fixated on the things that have to do with Trump. So I guess the military stuff, I guess we'll talk about this. But I mean, the degree to which one knows that Hank Seth is a very bad secretary of defense.

I'm not worried that he's doing much more damage to our military than I previously thought, which you know, that's one of the institutions you think holds up best under adverse circumstances and it has men, him at any time. And I had talked a couple of people who've served in the military just sort of randomly and it's so that we'll talk to them over the weekend and they did not disaduse me

at my fears. You know, so we headed into the weekend after I would say all of last week, the question up, there's war plans now in front of Trump. He's back into a corner, nothing he's doing is working and might he under those circumstances

just decide to finally go forward and do the things he's been threatening to do basically

for the last like five months, essentially, which is like rain, hellfire down on Iran and escalate the war in a really dramatic way. And the news of the weekend was, he was presented with those plans, there was a throwing going to bait and he decided, no, he was not going to do that. Although the reasons for it, or I would say, you know, it's they extent the reporting

“is suggest that the reasons are basically, we don't have enough bombs anymore.”

The munitions stockpile is so low that General Kane was basically like, I don't think this is a great idea. Talk a little bit about that and how we've managed to find ourselves, you're just talking about Hexith. There's a lot of things to criticize to Pete Hexith, but one of them, it would seem to

me as, it's the case that we've left ourselves in a situation now where we're basically can't fight a major war. We used to need to want to fight two major wars in two different theaters at the same time. We can't even really fight one now given the state of the munitions according to a lot

of the reporting. Yeah, and I really was striking, and I guess a little rattled by that. I mean, when you obviously the Donald Trump is not a great strategist or a strategist at all. And he's doing this based on a kind of hubris and a whim and it's very foolish and we were

going to pay a price for it. But the degree to which it's not just him being a bad commander-in-chief, but drawing down our stockpiles. I think especially if the things we used to shoot down incoming stuff, and that's presumably

Right.

Yeah, that was the way that is how people were killed.

You know, there's the casualties that Trump doesn't want to work in our election. The Trump Defense Department doesn't believe a part of the war on Iran, even really unbelievable, right, that thing on that. Actually, that thing was on my mind. I should have mentioned that.

I guess I wrote about it last Friday. What I was so furious when I read that Thursday night, right, that they've removed those four army soldiers killed in action from the, from the website, I mean, that's terrible. But then it turns out to be, I want to say the tip of the iceberg, but a kind of indication of something much bigger, which is the military is kind of complicit.

I would say in the cover-up of how bad things have gotten in terms of our, as you say, our munitions, especially anti-prone anti-emotional, anti-aircraft, maybe anti-aircraft, as well. munitions in the region, then over the weekend, there were stories weren't there about the appointment of the new chief of naval operations for the Navy, and how incredibly politicized that was.

You put that together all the firing. You know, obviously, so we have high rings and firings, politicized stories about West Point and the lack of free speech anymore of teaching at the military academy there, sort of one thing after another that just made you think, such as the Trump as a bad commander-in-chief, it's not just that Hexeth is really kind of repulsive, I'd say, a secretary of defense.

It's that they really are doing some real damage now to this one institution that has held up so well over the most of a recent decades through thick of then. And I had thought and do think still is probably holding up better than most of our institutions of the federal government against the Trump and Trumpist onslaught, but there's that you can do a lot of damage.

You know, when you've got a secretary of defense and people going to go along with him, he removes the people who might have stood up to him, and he's got the backing of the White House. And he, I guess, wanted to show Trump that everything was going great, so he just, they just, I can't believe the military thought this was wise.

They know how many interceptors they have, right?

And they don't think it's a good idea to shoot the wall off in the first two or three weeks,

but HECS has been insisting on it and sadly people in command seem to have gone along with it. What do you think about that? I mean, you've covered this stuff for a long time.

“I mean, well, I think that the, to your, your broadest points, Seeky Brown, who was the,”

the chairman of the Joint Chiefs on Trump came back for Trump to point out. He was an African-American gentleman, he was removed and, and the, the argument was, was the beginning of HECS this kind of war on DEI, right? And Bill, I think that, that to your point about the way in which the, the damage has been done to the culture of the military, that was the first thing, because the thing that

you and I both know, and I'm, I'm not a Pentagon reporter, but I've been around for a long time and talking to a lot of people who have been in military in the military, that the highest levels in, in all the way down, is that the military is the most meritocratic institution in America, it's a life and death thing, right? You don't get to be chairman of the Joint Chiefs on the basis of DEI.

They have no time for, for DEI, right? It is one of the wonders of the military, is that it's been this meritocratic institution that has also proved to be because of that, one of the great mechanisms of social mobility in America, where we've extraordinary figures from various parts of the American diaspora, the American, the, the, the, the Gorgesis-Azek, has been able to rise up to the top.

So, you know, Colin Powell, the most notable. The Seeky Brown thing was like, they're starting to wage war on a culture of DEI that doesn't even exist.

“And I think that you've seen that now, play out over the course last 16 months, not just the”

DEI thing, but the ways in which all of these things have become politicized. And I don't think there's literally an American institution that one should have more reverence for the military, for those reasons, not saying that everything the Pentagon has ever done is big, right? But that the institution itself, the damage that's been done, I think, is, you know, I don't

think we've yet counted the cost to it. And I don't think we yet have our arms around it. And I do think it's one of those things that when we get to the other side of Donald Trump, that is going to need a significant amount of repair and serious repair. What we think about, like, what the image has been done to American democracy by Donald

Trump over the last 10 years. This is one of those institutions where whoever decides that they're going to be in charge

of leading the Democratic Restoration America, the first place, one of the first place

they're going to have to start is on the military, accounting the actual cost and then doing that repair work. Sorry to go on a length about that, but I feel, I think it's like one of the things that most upset me, even though I am not a veteran, but I come over time to really appreciate the value of this institution in American life and to see it degraded the way it's been

degraded over the last 16 months, it's really upsetting. Now, absolutely. And I've been a critic of the military. I've not a veteran and I don't assume time great knowledge of military affairs. But I remember when I was a critic of Rumsfeld and Casey's original strategy in Iraq in

2003, 2004. I was following John McCain's lead, the late Lindsey Graham actually, and people who knew a heck of a lot more about it than I did in actual people who'd served and were serving quietly. We're talking to us about the lack of a counter insurgency strategy and so forth and it wasn't

“going as well as Rumsfeld's Pentagon was saying, even there, they made mistakes, I think.”

But, you know, there were mistakes that get made in an institution in a bureaucracy by individuals,

search work, but it was too late to really save the overall enterprise and probably shouldn't

have done it if it was going to be mismanaged the way it was. But having said all that, it was still a very well-functioning institution and people respected it and people respected people coming out of it as they should have the way I was putting someone over the weekend, actually, who's talking about this was, you know, he said, well, you've been a critic of the military.

Yeah, there are times when I thought their leadership was B or even C or C plus as opposed to A or A minus, but that's just life, right, I mean, that's different from taking a record ball to it. Yes. And that's really what we have now.

And I agree very much too, you don't know how many people have left, how many people I just talked to someone today this morning, actually, we are through as a relative in the military.

We had to leave it, I mean, just talking about this person and up for promotion, not

at the general officer level, but not too far below that. Uncertain what's going to happen, uncertain whether he or she should stay in, you know, I don't want to keep away maybe gender to give away too much. But, yeah, I mean, just the degree to which people have left, people have requested assignments to get them out of Washington, I talked to someone for whom this was the case recently.

And again, it's, it's probably not good for this person's career, it's less of a fast track, but it couldn't stand really being in the Pentagon and the kinds of things that were happening. And worried that at some point this person was worried that he or she would have to make a real decision that would be unethical or, you know, contrary to what they thought was

right.

“Again, this is a story in the Washington Post this morning, I think it's in the post about”

these drug boat hits, which I think you and I have both been very unhappy about and very

dubious legality and sort of seem like murder on the high seas.

He's happened last October, and we have, and they were, by the judgment of almost every military, senior military person, the person that I've spoken to was that no longer in the military across the spectrum, I mean, logically, they all are like, those look like work crimes to me. Yeah.

And it turns out they're not even cutting back on the flow of cocaine, so it's not just doing things you and I, and I think most people don't like, or don't like to, to my, I'll think really wrong to do when, and not the U.S. should not be doing them. It's also not working. It's like, if we want to, I mean, honestly, if we want to think if they were doing things

that we thought were over the line, that okay, you know, that's sort of how war is blah, blah, blah, blah. It's not if it's working. They're not showing the drug traffic, they're not winning the war in Iran, God knows. They're not strengthening our deterrence around the world, they're not making us more

respected, they're not really not making us more liked or more trusted, they're not even making us more feared. And if we're only 18 months in, your point just a minute ago, we've got two and a half four years of this. I mean, I could go on at great length about their drug boats, but you don't need to

be an expert.

“All you have to do is watch a few seasons of Narcos to know that, like, blowing the,”

the an isolated drug boat out of the water, you can blow 50 of them out of the water. And for the cartels, that's like cost of doing business. That's not going to change anybody. I think I changed them. A, it's not going to change the, the gross tonnage of drugs coming into the United States.

And number two, it's not going to create any kind of incentives, just incentive to keep trying because those are expendable, those are drug meals, they're expendable. That is all like in the, it's a rounding error on the P&L for Narcos states and the Narcos terrorists who who run the, the drug cartels in South America. So, again, you have to be a genius to know that this is not going to be effective.

In addition to being morally offensive and legally offensive, then it's going to be total waste of time. And that is what it's proving to be. And what a footnote that, in fact, I think the article shows that says that they've in fact, the drug cartels have adjusted their way of getting nearly go closer to the shore, they don't go into their national, they use bigger boats near the shore instead of small ones and international waters.

So, again, that's something that heckseth, I guess, unfortunately, I worry about cane and about some of the senior people. I assume they know better, but they're not speaking back, or they just overridden, or maybe they don't know better in some cases, or they just decided to go along. But, I mean, this lesson that, you know, what the enemy can change, it's motors up around it, it can change the way it's doing things. If we start to do things one way, that's kind of an elementary point about life in general.

I just met the military, and they seem not to have thought about that about Iran, or about the drug boats. This segment is sponsored by the New York Times. So, John and Bill's conversation today relied on a lot of original reporting we had, things like, "Loreny against deep dive into Kenmarans" woes at the NC. We had political star and BBN and Yahoo's efforts to get a meeting with Trump. We didn't be seeing the New York Times reporting on the state of the military and the conflict in Iran.

Before John and Bill could give their takes on these stories, however, these reporters had to track those stories down. They didn't have these sources, and they confirm the information and then write about it. The foundation of news commentary is fact-based reporting. This show, and every other show with commentary on current events, that depends on original, fact-based reporting. The board, political, NBC, the New York Times, your local paper, are all sources that you can trust for fact-based reporting.

Here's one example from John and Bill's conversation.

“Over the weekend, Eric Schmidt and Jonathan Swan at the New York Times published this crucial story about the White House's deliberations about the next move in Iran.”

Now, Eric and Jonathan, a lot of sources they have spent months and years developing to give us insight into the highest levels of decision-making.

At least in part, because of concerns about the join-dling stockpiles of munitions. This is a huge story. It reveals that under the Trump administration, the U.S. military has been so poorly managed that we don't have enough of our weapons we need to fight the war that we started.

And while this may not be a surprising story for those of us who have been critical of the administration,

without fact-based reporting like this, the rest of us are just guessing about what's actually happening inside our government. So wherever you seek it out, nationally, locally, support fact-based reporting. So let's just think about a little bit more about the Iran thing. Mike Walts went on and did a round of the Sunday shows, and basically said, "We have all the munitions we need." And also, at the same time, the munitions

have been left in a terrible state by Joe Biden. He's the one who screwed us here. And you're kind of like, dude, you're really literally contradicting yourself in every one of these

“interviews. He's saying, talking out of both sides of his mouth, the war now is on hold, right?”

The potential escalation of the war is on hold for the reasons that we've just talked about.

You now have this week, the funeral of Lindsey Graham, and it's got a lot of four leaders who are

in town. One of them, we'll talk about both of them, frankly, because they're both important in different theaters of operation right now. One of them is he is a Benjamin Netanyahu, who has been banging on the door at the White House trying to get him meeting with Donald Trump, has not been back to the Oval Office to see Trump since the meeting now famous meeting from Maggie Hibman and Jonathan Swans reporting where he made the case for why not only we should go to war, but why

it would be relatively easy to have regime change and have an uncorca in Iranian revolution from the streets. He's now back, and he's going to get to see Trump tomorrow. What do you imagine that meeting is going to look like? There's obviously a lot of attention between America and Israel. Now, attention between Trump and BB. Now, what do you imagine that meeting now is going

to try to get done in that meeting and what will be a win for him coming out of it?

You know, I don't know. I mean, I don't know how much his pressure or the pressure of his allies has caused Trump to not do what really was the obvious thing to have done after two or three or four weeks or even six or eight weeks, which was to say, okay, we did a lot of damage. You can put a nice face on it, so it doesn't look like a humiliation to the US, even though it is a little bit. I would have been that a little bit and say, you know, we're

getting out. Okay, in the straightaway, was this an open quite the way it was before, but they'll try to paper that over. And so that was the obvious exit for Trump. I kind of thought he would take

“it actually about to. I mean, I think I've been right about Trump that he didn't want to go to a”

full scale or in a ground operation. He knows that's not a good idea. But I was wrong that he would just take the L, as I say, put the best face on it and get out. So now he, here he is five months going on on the fifth anniversary, isn't it? What is today in the 27th year? He's showing up on the fifth anniversary of Trump and his show going to war against Iran. It has not been good for the US, not the good for Israel, it's not laying in my opinion. Will he try to persuade Trump that, yes,

you can still do it, go for it all. I just, I mean, with walk ground troops, I mean, to to seize the straight and then to try to go after the for regime change. I mean, whatever the possibility of doing that was five months ago, and it doesn't, it didn't work and it didn't, I don't think Trump was ever going to do quite enough. Well, I'm actually could have, honestly, but I don't think he's going to do it now. So I honestly don't know. I don't know. Do you have a thought about

what he's saying? Okay. I think Netanyahu at this point is is extraordinarily highly focused on his reelection. In addition to, obviously, I don't mean to say that all of the regional security

“concerns that everything else is real is doing is not in his mind. But I think, you know, his”

reelection is going to come before the midterms. We know what the midterms have done in terms of shaping Trump's calculus. It remains the case. I believe that Donald Trump was a lot more popular figure in Israel than being in Yahoo is. And that's not to say that Netanyahu has managed to turn his delicosity into a political strength for a long time, but he is barely holding together that coalition that he needs to hold together in order to continue to be Prime Minister

there. And he needs Trump's support. I mean, if Trump actively turning against Netanyahu and an election in that election would potentially be the end of Netanyahu. And so I think, you know, my guess is at least part of what Phoebe's doing in this meeting is trying to get things back on track enough with the White House that he doesn't have to worry about the prospect of Donald Trump turning actively against him and thereby ending his, his reign in Israel.

And then putting him in a position as we all know, where is the absence to go back and face these core cases against him for corruption and a whole bunch of other accountability that he would have to face if he doesn't get reelected. I think that's got to be pretty close to the top of his mind when he gets in there, which is just like, hey, boss, can we get back to being friends again? This kind of the kind of mounting degree of tension and tip of the is not

really good for my politics and therefore for my senior years. Now, that's a really good point. You know, I hadn't really, the election, how much of it for Phoebe will be an election visit. And it's not like that. Well, me and he will pull us punches. Well, it probably, I'm so, for example, the Saudi nuclear deal, which is not the very bad thing. I think the

Minister would, I think, feel it, compelled as, you know, from his point of view, it's just country's national interests to say, here are all the cautions about that. And if you don't have the kind of inspection standards even, what are we doing, giving this path to nuclear weapons to another regime, to another nation in the Middle East. I mean, but maybe it'll pull us punches on that, but then he'll get criticized maybe at home. I don't know, he's probably at

“a tough position. But you're right. I think for him, he needs, he needs Trump at least,”

normally on board. I guess they'll talk a lot about the Abraham Accords, we're both have touted as big change events in the Middle East. How's that worked out in Italy? There's Abraham Accords signed what 2018, 2019, there's something since then we've had, you know, suit your tack on Israel, the war, obviously in Gaza and elsewhere. And now the attacks on Iran and Iran being extremely stronger than it ever has been closing the

strait before moves. Something they never did, after all, Joe, all these decades of being

at odds to say the least with us. And, of course, with Israel, I mean, the whole thing is, that I guess they'll try to pay for it over. The level of inconstancy, foreign policy and inconstancy on Trump's part. And I don't didn't say inconstonence, although, you know, one could metaphorically go there, too. But inconstancy, which is like the notion of doing the nuclear deal with Saudi Arabia was on the table for, I mean, it felt like, basically,

it was like on the table for like a couple of heart beats, I mean, and before it was pulled off again, is the general matter not great for American foreign policy to be constantly, you know, we're doing this, no, we're doing that. We're doing this, no, we're doing that.

“Constancy, you know, the consistency is an important attribute. But do you think that there was ever,”

any, I mean, I looked at that deal from the very beginning and thought, there is no way this is going to happen, right? Given the kind of pushback you would get from Israel and from others, the notion of opening up another nuclear Pandora's box in the Middle East, I just sort of thought, somehow that thing is going to fall apart under pressure. And I don't know, maybe it's only temporarily falling apart, but the fact that it fell apart quite so quickly made me think,

you know, this is not really just another thing that's long for this world. Now you could be right on the other hand, they did sign something as the Saudis pointed out. So I don't know, and there's big business interests, real business as well as Trump family business interests interested in this. So I'm a god. I really don't know, but your point about the in Constancy is really important. And again, it's one thing to have obviously administration's

change policy over time and the country's change policy over time. But yes, to change it every 24 hours is not good on a matter or some real importance. I mean, this is where I do think everyone in the world looks at this and says, come on, we cannot depend on these people. It's not just that they're not nice to us, it's not just that, you know, they're not trustworthy either the way allies are supposed to be. They're just undependable in the most fundamental

sense. And the Saudis think they need to have nuclear weapons out, which is sort of what was signal by this, right? They're they're pushing for this even more than they have. And what are Japan and South Korea think, what are the other nations think? I mean, I just think that the degree to which the whole thing is praying because of really just because of Trump. But I mean, obviously, there were reasons it might afraid anyway. I don't want to deny that, but actually underpied

in a lot of this, the alliances and some ways to come back together a little bit more. I'm not going to defend every aspect of Biden's foreign policy. God knows. But and it wasn't inevitable.

“I think that this whole order would crumble to this with the speed it has. This war really has”

been really bad. It really is as dry. I think more than I thought it was going to be bad, I didn't quite expect it would do this much. The damage would radiate out in so many directions.

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on Tuesday, both these meetings same day. Another leader, it was in town for the Lindsey Graham funeral, and someone who, frankly, the Los Alensie Graham is a meaningful thing because there was was, well, you can say a lot of things about Lindsey Graham, a lot of things have been said about Lindsey Graham, but the one thing that Lindsey Graham was not inconsistent on was, as supportive Ukraine. And if you're a Vladimir Zelensky, you show up in town kind of thinking, you know, I have some work

to do here. He's got this meeting to go see Trump. And the most incredible thing about this story is

the way in which, which suddenly at the center of American foreign policy with respect to Ukraine, Laura Loomer, Laura Loomer, who, as batshit crazy as anybody who's ever been on the manga right, suddenly starts talking like a completely sensible, sane person. And says, you know what? I realized that a lot of the stuff that right-wing manga podcasters were saying seemed to be influenced by Russian propaganda. And I suddenly decided, you know what? I should go over to Ukraine and see,

for myself, she does this interview with the AP, where she explained why she's now done a total about face and is completely on the side of Zelensky. I put my other business on hold for about two weeks to come to Ukraine. I've received messages all day from different people and media and politics and people just who follow me online, he said, wow, I didn't realize how much we've been lying to. People love being keyboard warriors and saying things are fake, but they should come

themselves. I was one-sat person too, but then I decided to come to a war zone and see things

“for myself. So Bill, I saw JBL and some of your colleagues there, and Sarah, I think, saying, you know,”

in this one very narrow way, Laura Lumer sounds like she may be the last sane person or the biggest, still grown-up in the MAGA coalition, but she was quoted in that story that AP story. She says, it's looking good for Ukraine, right? Going into this meeting next week at the Oval Office is looking pretty good. And there was the interview, she did with Zelensky Trump on so true social, re-tweeted, re-truthed, or whatever they call it, the interview that Lumer did with Zelensky and

broke very good with about 14 exclamation points as his wand. What is going on there in your judgment about Zelensky standing with the White House and about suddenly him embracing, I mean, if you're if you're a Vladimir Zelensky, you'll embrace anybody who will help you help you with the White House presumably because you're trying to your the stakes are existential, but what is going on there from your vantage point? I mean, God knows, I guess two things, I guess I do know, I think Ukraine

is doing much better than anyone expected, including me 18 months ago, it really, and really, it kind of remarkable story, I bet. Historians, military historians, you know, 5, 10, 25 years from how old white the story of this country, 1/4 of the size of the dictatorship that invaded it, you know, written off at the beginning and then written off sort of later after Trump comes in and they could, we did cut off tensively as it was made. You know, and somehow it's own technological

development and innovation and ingenuity. I mean, the drone stuff is really kind of amazing.

I talk to some military types that they are amazed by it. I mean, then Trump sort of wants to be on the side of winners and so maybe that makes them less, less anti-Solensky plus Putin is disappointed

“to my stuff. So that's good. It's very important that Zelensky hold on, the Ukraine hold on,”

and possibly win. There have been some internal issues, Zelensky, Minister of Defense, stuff, and all I can't quite, but he, it being a democracy, there was a lot of pressure on him, and so he actually rescinded the initial appointment he made, sort of different from Putin's Russia. So that, Zelensky side. I mean, on the lower-aluminous side, I remember two mines, I imagine most people are about this on the one of you going, you don't want to give a lie.

At least two bucks. You don't want to give her a lot of credit, you know, as a kind of serious observer, as soon as these things, who knows what's really going on there. But having said that, I've got to think it's got to have some effective macro-world when one after another on different issues, Martin Taylor Greene, on Epstein, whatever, Luma Ron, Ukraine, start to say, "Wait, we relied to." I mean, I, it doesn't have some, I mean, it's kind of some effects, even on that

“impetitrable trump-based, I think. I don't know how much any of those individual, the individual”

people, like whether it's Luma or MTG. I think that the extent that their comments, they amplify a growing sense among a lot of people who voted for Trump that they have been lied to, that Trump either lied to them specifically on some specific set of issues, or that

different from every other politician that they just stayed. I think that rhymes with a growing

sentiment, and to that extent, it's kind of part of the atmospheric difficulty that Trump finds himself in right now in terms of not having that many people who willing to want to stand with

“him. And it's worth saying, as we kind of transition, I don't know this. I mean, I think one”

last thing about Zelensky here, interesting. I thought this one thing that I saw for the weekend, which was, that's one of the things Zelensky's going to do is share evidence with the White House, showing that Russia's assisting Iran, targeting American bases in the Middle East via satellites surveillance. And it said in this report, it said, they had specific dates, July 19th, the 20th, when four bases fell within the air of interest of Russian satellites, two in Bahrain, one in

Georgia, and what it could wait. I mean, Donald Trump likes to be with winners, as you said.

Donald Trump is also like to be with Vladimir Putin, who is, you know, I guess in his mind is a winner. For a long time, he thought Zelensky was a loser, even though Zelensky to your point, has done one of the most extraordinary things in the history of modern warfare and being able to do what he's done over the course of this conflict. But I just wonder when the rubber meets the road,

“where Zelensky sitting there trying to basically say to Trump, look, you want to win this war in”

Iran. I have specific evidence that Russia is helping Iran hear of the evidence. Here are the dates. Here's the the receipts, whether that cuts any ice with Trump or whether that is kind of thing that an irrational world would cut ice with any president, but just won't with him because of whatever kind of core reflexive Putin love that he didn't fear or admiration or whatever that he just won't let go of. Maybe at least helps Republicans and on the Hill say, well,

whatever the president might have reacted, this seems pretty convincing and we do need to pass this package. Zelensky Graham was working on actually for sanctions on Russia at least. So I was thinking about how Trump is various people inside the administration who are willing to say whatever he wants them to say, but anyone outside in the Republican Party, the reality of the bid terms coming into view is really starting to change certain things on the ground.

“And one of them is we've reporting this morning that the White House is now telling as I knew”

this day would come bill. I predicted it many times. The day has come where the White House is saying to encourage people in contested districts and to send it candidates and contested states, feel free to start putting some distance between yourself and the president. Something that you know, now who knows, Trump may decide to attack those people when they do it, when they actually comes to it. But the fact that the White House is now telling people,

yeah, it's time to start to cut Iran here, is really kind of extraordinary. And one of the ways one of the best illustrations I could think of as to why that might be the case was Donald Trump's rather extraordinary performance at the White House correspondent's dinner, which I would love this be with you about a little bit here. I know Tim does not like to play sound of Donald Trump on the show. And I'm respectful of that. I understand the rationale for it, but I was reliably informed that

it's not a hard and fast rule. And then if we're going to talk about this White House correspondent's dinner, we want to, we got to give, we let people see what we're talking about because I assume most normal people were not watching this on Friday night for reasons that we can get into. Donald Trump attacked a lot of people over the course of this hour and five minute long speech that he gave Bill, where he attacked, you know, every all of his normal political enemies,

and you know, when after Governor Newsom and Adam Schiff and Chuck Schumer and attacked Bruce Springsteen and said that Springsteen's tour was board in the USA. He's attacking all people, but the most extraordinary in this rambling insane lunatic performance was his decision to suddenly turn on J.B. Pritzker. You can't have somebody like a J.B. Pritzker who I understand is not present

sadly, but you know, some people say never use the fat word, and I know and I would never call

anybody if I had my own problems, you know, it's not like I'm perfect. Sir, in the back, don't call him a fat pig, okay? I'm sticking up for him. Don't call him you, you can't do that, sir. You can't call J.B. Pritzker a fat pig. Please. All right? Thank you very much. I appreciate everyone starting to figure out who is that guy doesn't exist. But the nice part is when you do that, the press can't get you because I'm defending a man who obviously has a problem. Actually,

he's lost a lot of weight. I saw him recently. He lost quite a bit of weight. I don't know what the hell. He's got no chance. Got no chance. I don't even know what to say about that. I'm sorry, Bill. I don't know if you've watched the full speech. I'll just like, I'll let you speak to the Donald Trump performance at this insane event that I can't believe anybody in my business thought it was like a reasonable thing to go, knowing that something like what happened would happen.

Well, I totally agree on that point. And I agree that he seems to have bombed. I didn't

Andrew, I got an excellent piece on it in one shot this morning, which we push to look at though about how pathetic it is to Trump. What still wants to appreciate himself with this White House correspondence dinner. You know, something he went to ten to figure out was a 14 years ago now.

I got insulted by he thought by President Obama. And he's just hasn't, like, he finally gets his

chance to insult everyone. I suppose. But how sad is that? You're President of the United States, you're the most famous person in the world. I suppose. And you still got to show that you

“can do it. But how lame was that thing? You hadn't seen the Fritzka clip honestly. You can read about it.”

I mean, it seems to be a piece with many other lame pseudo jokes that went over horribly. I mean, yeah, he was he was terrible. He was terrible. I mean, even but like I sometimes I will say, he can be funny. He can be funny. There are times when Trump is actually, you know, it's part of the secret to why the man is one election to play. So, of course, the last 10 years, not three times as he claims. But is that a lot of normal people think Trump is, you know,

is, it's not my, again, it's not my preferred mode of humor. But I understand that he sometimes can be quite funny. This was not funny. This was just like incoherent and adult and mean and sort of just, anybody who's ever found anything charming about Trump, they were not present in this speech. It was just a kind of rambling, adult, savage, stupid kind of performance that I think that even his biggest fans they watched it honestly would be sort of like, uh, he seems to have lost not

just as fastball but as curable as slider and as knuckleball all at once. Yeah, no, very much so. And so, I don't know what effect it has. And, you know, I hope you're right that even Republicans are moving away from it. I don't know. On the one hand, they vote too to flee for this stupid war that they don't support in reality and for the defense budget increase that is very unpopular that they probably some of them don't support. And they're going to vote for Todd Blanche to spite

directly. They probably know he shouldn't be a charity general. So, I do, I'm just curious, because you, you follow this stuff closely. You're, you're sure about it and look around the corners. Maybe very effectively sometimes. Do you think they really is erosion? Will be erosion in support for him on the hill or will it be more a little bit of just total change of attitude?

“I think it's important to make a distinction between erosion on the hill and the sense of what they”

are, when they're forced to vote on something versus what you're going to see in, uh, in ballagrad districts and in, in senate seats that are up for grabs where, I mean, Trump is in Michigan.

We'll talk about Michigan in a second, but Trump is in Michigan today. Um, I can tell you,

I think this will be the last time you'll see Donald Trump at Michigan. Um, my, my graduate is not going to invite Donald Trump to Michigan between now and election day. I don't know about Kim Paxton, that might be one exception, but if you're, uh, running for senate in Maine, if you're Susan Collins, Donald Trump said I could be, that could be in Maine. And what the way I was saying to people now effectively is not so much, hey, feel free to vote against us, but is, hey, feel free

to start making arguments on the campaign trail that are either implicitly or in some cases, maybe, you know, a little bit explicitly kind of contrary to Trump took to a Trump says to not have him, not invite him to the district to kind of put, kind of some distance between yourself.

“You don't have to be tied at the hip to Donald Trump going forward. And I think that's going to”

be an enormous relief for any Republican who is running in, uh, as I say, in a ballagrad district and a, in a purple district and a swing district or, or in one of these senate seats that that is to get a determine control of the upper chamber. I think you're going to see, you know, if you can go around the map, you're not going to see Donald Trump in Ohio. You're not going to see Donald Trump in North Carolina. You're not going to see Donald Trump in Iowa. No one's going to

want Donald Trump in their district or in their state if there's, if it's going to be a close election.

And I think the White House is just basically signals to those people. It's fine. You don't have to

pretend like you want Donald Trump to come here and going forward. I do think on things on high profile things like a lot of these nominations that, that it will still, there's still will be a lockstep loyalty. I want to see a situation in which the United States and it rejects something Donald Trump once before I'm willing to have countenance the notion that that might start happening with any frequency. There's not been a single example of it. No, the entirety of the last 60

months. So until there's one example of it, I'm not going to open my mind of the possibility of a whole bunch more examples of time. I'm totally with you on that on the other side. I'm just curious you've been through some of these midterms as I have. Do you think it will work? The just the quote distancing. I would say in the past, it doesn't work, right? I mean, I was old enough to remember 1994 and a bunch of Southern Democrats tend to see, for example. I really did distance themselves

from Clinton in pretty big ways. They lost just as badly as you know. It's a fair effort data and 2010. I mean, we've been through these ways. If it's a way-ish election, I kind of feel it will be. It feels like almost as the worst of both worlds, some of the Trump people want to turn out, and the normal swing voters, as it were, will say, whether you still need to check Trump, would be Democrats to control Congress? I don't know.

The elections have been more nationalized than they ever have been. Number one, and the overriding

Trump and that they've been basically operating on auto-pilot, but at Trump's behest,

they're right about that and putting a little bit of distance between themselves and Donald Trump, and Dubgiff's speech that says, "Hey, I know Donald Trump is kind of pretended like a

“affordability's a hoax or whatever. I don't think it's a hoax. I think it's real." It's like,”

that's not going to help anybody. People, the media and voters, like the Republican Party is the party of Trump, and if they are interested in punishing, Donald Trump, they're going to punish that party, and also to your point before Bill, they're the level of enthusiasm. And this is the thing that just been some reporting on over the weekend. In fact, I think a piece of good piece of the Washington Post that basically was said that Republicans

shunned just freak out over the lack of enthusiasm among core Republican voters, and I want to get to while we still have time. I want to get to a few of these domestic things. We'll go relatively quickly through them. Michigan is the one race in the Senate where Democrats are still nervous. Georgia, which was the other seat they worried about losing, they're not as worried about that anymore. They off-off has been better than expected, performer has been a way better than expected.

fundraiser, and they got the nominee that they wanted in my Collins, the Trump-backed nominee rather than the Bryan Kemper-backed nominee. So I think people are not as worried on the Democratic side about Georgia, but they're really worried about Michigan. And we have a debate tonight, the last debate between Abdul El Sayed and Haley Stevens. We also had Gretchen Whitmer, who remains a very popular governor in Michigan, who decided to endorse Haley Stevens. I think

not surprising it, but on Friday, let's take a look at that. As governor, I've had one strategy.

“Get things done. Next strategy informs everything that I do. And that's why I'm endorsing Haley”

Stevens for the U.S. Senate. Just like me, Haley will do whatever it takes to get things done for the people in Michigan. And we need her now more than ever. Republicans in DC are making your life harder and more expensive. Tariffs cuts to Medicaid, soaring gas prices, it's all piling on. Luckily, Haley is taking the money and putting money back in Michigan's pockets. She helped President Obama save the auto industry and protect 200,000 Michigan jobs, brought

billions home to rebuild Michigan manufacturing. Took on a big firm and a lower-the-cost prescription drugs, led the fight to block Republicans from defunding social security. And she's standing up to Republicans right now as they jack up the price of gas, groceries, and health care. Haley is as Michigan as it gets. She grew up in a middle-class household. Her parents ran a landscaping business out of their board F-150 and she'll tell anyone who will listen about her

first-holz mobile. She knows what Michigan families are going through. And that's how I know

she will always put Michigan first. Haley Stevens has been the candidate of the establishment,

the Washington DC establishment, not a good thing in this cycle. Objol Elsaid has been the candidate of his name but endorsed by basically everybody on the left from Bernie Sanders, AOC, Elizabeth Ward. This is a very nationalized race. And I would say it's like a microcosm of what's been going on this summer in the Democratic Party. You've got the wet hot DSA summer that we've seen in some of these primaries in New York and Colorado. You also saw the fallout from the platter thing

in Maine. And so the notion that possibly Abjol Elsaid, he's a rising figure, he's had all the heat. There's polling shows the races within the margin of error. But he's kind of had the momentum in that race. But now people are looking up for reasons that we can discuss and saying, this guy might be just too far left for this very, very, very purple electorate at Michigan. What do you see on their horizon there for that Michigan race? I mean, I guess with the

primaries just a week off. So one of the, yeah, pretty close. I kind of think Stevens might have, I think McMurray dropping out the third candidate and then having Whitmer, who's a bit of popular, obviously, and be elected and be elected governor of Michigan endorsing, I think, I don't know, I had that on Stevens. I mean, I also think she's just an underrated politician. She's tough. She's won in the past and in house races. So I think she has a pretty good chance.

I do think she has a better chance of beating my graduates than I'll say to you. I also think the only one thing I would say, tweak if I were writing Gretchen Whitmer's little thing there was good. Actually, I thought pretty effective. I'm sure she was advised what to say by the Stevens campaign. You know, I talk about what she's been, what she's done in the past and Congress. I actually leave all that out. First of all, as any, a lot of it was attempts to stop things from happening.

“It didn't happen. What you do with Obama 15 years ago is on the Carbel out, maybe if you want to”

mention that, I guess, in Michigan this big deal, I understandably, but still, it's got to be a little more, she will stop Trump from doing more damage over the next two years and my

graduates won't. There's always a campiest establishment and also before looking shouldn't be.

And there shouldn't be a reason why you can't be established, but it also saying, I'm going to be as effective, more effective in stopping Trump. Well, those slight tweaks, I thought it was a

but as you say, the would-a-loss money betting on the established one, people in some of these races

this year. So, I thought the most effective parts of that video are the parts of the end, which she starts talking about her being more, I mean, Michigan is Michigan can be. My mother was from that pencil, Michigan, and when I saw these videos going around of her, that was she was being mocked by the left for her kind of Chris Farley kind of, you know, you know, Michigan way and all that stuff. I'm like, "Everybody I have ever known in Michigan

from Mackinac Island, North. There's a Haley Stevens in every ice cream parlor, in every, in every rural ring." You know, like, there's that's that's someone who sounds a lot like

“a lot of normal people in Michigan, and you can make fun of it, but I think that that part of”

Whittner, the Whittner thing that kind of keyed in on the notion of, she's one of us, and that's, you know, that will obviously be to some years, will be coded as kind of an attack in a way on

El Syad, but the biggest concerns I think about him, if you're really, if you're focused,

mostly on electability, has been his unwillingness to climb down from things like his advocacy of defund the police, his embrace of Medicare for All, which is, you know, I understand that it's the, the pretty good side of the, what are the policy arguments are for it? It is a thing that, you know, I had Adam Jelson, I'm my podcast on, on Empolitic the other day, Adam had done, they, they're, the search light instituted, done a big piece of research about the political problems with

Medicare for All. He's going to be easier for my graduates. Now, it might be that because he's popular with the base, he can drive more turnout, but if I'm my graduates and I'm thinking, who do I want to run against in this race? I'd rather run against El Syad has nothing to do with the fact that he's hanging out with Hassan Piker or that he's, or that he's a Muslim American,

“that has, that he's a bunch of issues that I think are to the left of where the median”

voter is in the state of Michigan, and I think that that will be the big concern if El Syad does

pull his office that they've got the sub-bud. I'll let you find him candid. Who also is this, there's this reporting, plug a playbook this morning, who seems to be more interested in fighting with Democrats, that he is in fighting with Republicans, you know, they say, it's kind of like, if I win this race, we were going to primary John Fetterman, you're like, why are you talking about primary John Fetterman? What, when it rather talking about beating Donald Trump and winning

in the general election, I just think that the Internet is facing fights among Democrats, like your priorities are kind of screwed up if that's where your heads at when it comes to El Syad. I think that's right. I think that you think if Steven's wins, let's leave aside the merits, I mean, I prefer on the merits honestly, but still just on the elective look. I think Democrats end up, they got lucky in Maine, honestly, and I think they end up

with a pretty good slate of candidates in these key Senate races. I mean, if you just go one by one, it's kind of, there's some older ones, some younger ones, some more establishment ones, some more, you know, sort of progressive ones, like Cooper's a very different candidate from, I don't know, you know, from Hailey Stevens or from Atomicow, but really, if you just go, Iowa, Texas, Ohio, Alaska, even Kansas, it looks like Montana, maybe, but then also the key states that

we've mentioned, they ended up, I mean, it's not perfect when it, when is it ever, that when American politics, I mean, it's a pretty strong, I would say, electorally, and I would say even assassinatively, slate, and mostly younger, which is good for the Democratic party, it's good to look like Osloff, Atomicow and Hailey Stevens, not like, you know, necessarily, like with all the respect to Chuck Schumer and Victor, but in all these characters. So we should mention, of course,

Troy Jackson became the former nominee, and there's the early polling is heartening to Democrats who are

“thinking that maybe the plight or implosion will be the best thing that happened to them,”

because his support was looking pretty soft, and Troy Jackson is, you know, people have been saying for a while that a generic Democrat beats Susan Collins, the early polling suggests that he's got two or three point lead, even before he's really in the race. They are, so that's reason for Democrats to be cheerful. The one thing that is not, the thing that for Democrats to be cheerful about is, is the state of the national party that I got to get this in just because Laura Eacon,

for the board work today, a fabulous piece, that broke a bunch of news about just how bad the financial situation is that the DNC, I could go out about this at great length, but Bill, you know, you look at Ken Martin, and you think about, I mean, is that guy had a good news cycle, since he got, became the chair of the DNC, the party's broke. They're using the headquarters as collateral on loans. There's, like, literally, literally, mortgaging the furniture over there,

and, of course, there's the autopsy, and all the other things that he gets a heap for. I mean, I guess my question is, do you think that that guy will survive, and do you think it matters? I mean, I'm inclined not to think it doesn't matter too much. People I know who are really in real politics think a little more worried about the money stuff than I do. I assume the money can go to the other committees, and to obviously these days of superfacts and stuff, and to the campaigns

of sales, and get spent, probably just as well. There's some issues, I guess, to get a better rate, to the DNC, works with them, and all that TV rate, and all that stuff. But yeah, I don't think it matters that much. The irony will be Martin, probably if that horrible job, then they'll win the house and the Senate. Could you dump the chairman after you win both houses? I guess you can, right? They probably should, honestly, he really does seem unusual. When you and I have seen many

people say things like, well, you know, you wrong should do it, and you're kind of like, you know,

“I don't know, back in the day of Haley Barber at the RNC and Ron Brown at the DNC, when the parties”

were more powerful, you had serious people who wanted to be party chairs, like a part from the fact

that Ron is running for president probably never want to be the chair of the DNC. Again, I mean,

maybe you could maybe convince like Terry McCollough who doesn't seem like he's like over-employed right now to come back in and raise some money for the party, but like part of the issue here is that like the chairman of the Republican party, I had to look this up. Do you know who the chairman of the Republican party is right now? Yeah, that's a good question. No. Yes, I ask you that question because I looked at that guy's house Carolina, but isn't he running for something? No, it's

it's now the chairman of the Republican National Committee right now is a guy named Joe Grooters. Joe Grooters, who is a Florida state senator who Donald Trump likes a lot, and is someone who

I guarantee you not just me, not just you, but almost everybody who covers politics and lives

this stuff could not pick out of a lineup. This is a job that's been the value to an armistory armistory stand. And it's because the central parties, I mean, maybe in the wake of this Supreme Court decision about spending, this party's will start to re-build some power because they'll be able to direct funds in a different way. But man, this is not a job that a serious

“person wants anymore. And so, I mean, I don't know, I think, you know, unless the Democrats collapse”

completely and don't take control of either the house or Senate, I think that happens, Ken Martin's out pretty quick, but if they take control of one or both, it'll be very hard to get

rid of that guy. The last thing on my list, Bill, for you, is you did a conversation with an

Epstein survivor over the weekend that I think is worth promoting. So why don't you just, you know, be behind this on the bulwark site, talk a little bit about what that conversation was like and what you got out of it? Yeah, we'll work on Sunday with Danny Benzky. I mean, she really, I had seen clips of her and I actually testified against Blanche with the Thursday and so you could see clips of that and people saw them and they choose on a couple of talk of interviews afterwards and

stuff. But I actually, she was, it was really personally for me, kind of, not just the interest team of moving. I mean, she was just so eloquent and herself, but obviously moved about the situation, the, about the general, of course, the collective concern about the Epstein survivors, but about the rest, she made the point, it's not just about them. You know, this isn't just my getting justice for them, but what happened to them in the past with the truth out about them,

it's for the future. If we're going to have the attitude that, oh, well, I guess we're not going to investigate anyone, no one gets prosecuted, all think it's washed under the shrubbed under the rug, what does that say about going forward about attitude towards these terrible crimes? And so she was very eloquent on that and very, you know, just impressive. I have, as you have many, many people over the years online and on podcasts and otherwise, and she was one of the most impressive

that I've had to pleasure of talking with for over half an hour or so. Well, everybody should go take a look at that, make sure you go and read, Lauren, you can piece about the DNC, and actually, you know, Jonathan Cohen also has a piece of about why that Gretchen Whitmer endorsement in Michigan might matter in a way that endorsements don't generally in this day and age because of Gretchen

“Whitmer's not just being a two-term governor, but also, she's still sitting, I think, her approval”

ranks still north of 50%, which is, you know, almost unheard of for either party at this point, given people's unhappiness in general and their disdain for all elected officials in both parties. Bill Crystal is great to see you. Thanks for coming on. Thanks for everybody. Here at the Bullwerke. Thanks for having me on. Hopefully, I haven't totally destroyed the franchise and they'll still be left standing for when Tim returns from wherever the hell he is.

The Bullwerke podcast is brought to you. Thanks to the work of lead producer Katie Cooper, associate producer Ansley Skipper, and with video editing by Katie Lutz, an audio engineering in editing by Jason Brown.