Bill Kristol: What a Bunch of Jackasses

Hello and welcome in the board podcast.

I'm your host Tim Miller. It is Monday so we're here with Edgar at large Bill Crystal and you know last week was pretty heavy. It's pretty heavy. Lot of serious topics, lot of serious guests.

We appreciate it all of them and so I have saved a section of the end of the podcast for some laughs. I feel like we need some laughter and deserve some laughter Bill and so you know we'll can see. Have you do have a favorite stand-up comedian?

Is there an old timer that you're into? Yeah no, it's a good question. I'll think about it and get back to you at the end of the show you know. Okay. I can tell some of my favorite, my favorite had a young with jokes that it go over well

that'll take you up. That'll take you up. That'll take you back to 1946 or something like that. That's exactly what I was hoping for in the answer so you work on that. We need to start with serious matters abroad and domestically and I want to bike really

begin with our friend and colleague, well not really colleague, but your former colleague, my aspiring colleague Bob Cagan who is in the Atlantic yesterday with an article titled Checkmate in Iran, Washington, Can't Reverse or Control, the consequences of losing this war.

It's really well argued and just basically a full accounting of how

rough the situation is strategically in geopolitically right now for Trump and he goes into a lot of themes that he went into a month ago when he was on this podcast because now a lot has changed since then. I do think he kind of even broadens it out further as far as why this is such as geos, political, strategic defeat even more so than revervietnam, et cetera because of what some of the implications

are for us losing control of the straighted form is so I was wondering what your thoughts were on his assessment.

“Yeah, no, I think it's very strong piece and he's been arguing this for a while as you”

say, but I think he's being vindicated by events. Trump understandably does not want to escalate, just want to get an even bigger war and I think the conventionalism has been well, it's not great for Trump, but he kind of and I've had to excuse somewhat and he can slide out of it without too much damage to himself or I suppose to the US, Iran's capabilities have been degraded, we've paid a price, the

world economy's paid a price, but we can recover, I might still think it could be pretty serious to feed. Bob is more struck by the severity of that defeat, also struck by the fact that Iran, he's right about this for the last week or so we've been talking about it on the phone, Iran's not so eager to let Trump slither away, right?

I mean, that's really striking and Iran feels they have the upper hand. I kind of thought maybe they were just going to worry about being pummeled again and they just ended in a good situation, pocket their winnings and an a pretty good situation for them, but so far they haven't seemed to want to do that and Trump has, you know, bellowed and threatened but not done much so what's what happens, it means while the straight is closed

“and the economy, the global economy is more of a price, but I think Bob's big contribution”

is seeing that what a defeat it is for us to allow Iran to have allowed Iran to establish France with what they can close the straight and that's established going forward, whatever fake kind of agreement there is Iran says well we're low but they're pretty much making clear that it's at their sufferings. 40 years, if Trump likes to talk about 47 years, this nation's been plaguing the world,

it has been plaguing the world at us and others for 47 years and it's a very bad regime,

the one thing they've never done in the last 40 years been intimidated from doing was closing

the straight really. We're not kind of striking isn't all these wars going out of the region, you know, including with Iran and, you know, we hit Iran in 2020 and then again in June Israel, the US hit Iran, they didn't close the straight, that principle, they didn't want to challenge the principle that we upheld with many others of, you know, freedom of passage in its

natural waters and now they've established the principle they can do this, that's a huge defeat and then the damage is put on to our alliances in Europe and elsewhere, confidence and us by the Asians who depend much more in the straight, you know, for oil and for energy, the Gulf states now signaling who are hawkish and you're the beginning, if Trump might go ahead and take care of Iran, which, not a nation, not a regime they like,

they get along with very well and are scared by now they seem to be telling Trump, could you end this, please, this is just getting worse and worse, of course, I mean, so they are going to make their own deals with Iran and also their own deals with countries like China, which seem like maybe more reliable allies than us.

“So I think Bob is seeing the big picture of the damage to the US standing in the world.”

And I think that those are the two things that struck me just like Darab states maybe feeling like they need to take deals with Iran now, which is just a dramatic change for just a couple months ago, just for economic purposes and then just as general principle, you know, it's kind of a piece of a lot of that from the Trump era, there are these kind of general principles that just were things that existed since I was born that you didn't really have to think

Occasement leaves an election so far, you know, that President follows a Supreme Court ruling,

right? You know, that we are going to maybe have disagreements, but I generally, you know, working concert with our allies and the Democratic nations of Europe and like, like they're just all these general principles that Trump has upended and this one of like freedom of navigation on the seas.

It's something that just has been the norm on the post World War II era and the US through, you know, sometimes through military power, but also just like projection of strength and, you know, fear from other countries and wanting to incur the wrath of the US, you know, we've had like these freedom of the seas for commercial ships to travel globally and like that is now in question and if you listen to Trump and his interviews, he doesn't seem to

really prioritize or care about returning to that. And you hear him say a lot like we've got a lot of ports, you know, we've got ports in Alaska and Texas and people are getting our oil from us now, I don't know, I can some ways, you know, he, like BBO is on 60 minutes talking about how he talked to Trump about how Trump wants to send in troops to go get the nuclear stuff, who knows if that's true

or not, that's what BBO says. And so you have that kind of pushing for more aggressive action, where the other hand, you have Trump like not seem to really care that much that the straight of, again, maybe it's bluster, but like, if he decides that it doesn't really matter because we have our own ports and our own oil exports and, you know, if Iran decides to put a toll on the

straight, like that's a problem for Asia, but not a problem for us.

“Like that's what he decides, that's a major shift in kind of how the world has worked and”

won the decreases our power.

Yeah, I mean, it's America first and taking to its reasonable conclusion, you know,

not reasonable, but logical conclusion, I guess, yeah, which is who needs all this upholding the international order and providing a public good of, you know, free transit at the seas, you know, holding open straits that are thousands of miles away from us and so forth, let others do it. We've got our ports, maybe we'll take care of our immediate vicinity, and that's actually

in their strategy document. Western Hemisphere comes first, I mean, the price we will pay for letting the whole rest of the world outside the Western Hemisphere, maybe somewhat in the Western Hemisphere too, but certainly inside the Western Hemisphere, kind of just topple into or descend into, you know, man, it's dog, everyone, or doggy, it's man, whatever, which is that man, it's

dog, can't remember anywhere. Everyone from South, you know, countries just making their own arrangements, it can become, it can be sort of stable for a while, this country will watch out for themselves

“and they'll act in this off-interest, but that's what kind of got us into two world wars.”

It's not a recipe. Eventually, it'll come back to bite us, I mean, that didn't 1914, it didn't 1939, and it's certainly going to do huge damage to all of us. You say a lot of things, we just take this for granted, this global trading commerce, everything that we just sort of assume happens, that it gets to drugs over the pandemic, and that

was terrible, but that it got back on course again, and, you know, we'll quibble about argue about it, we should try to be permitted to have these particular chips and all that, that's a national security question, five, but in general, the principle of the weekend, all these goods will flow, and I mean, that, that ends, nations can't depend on us, they look to their own weapons, they certainly decide they have to arm themselves, you just get

mutual conflicts all over the place, mutual accommodations to all over the place to various dictators. No, it is the end. I mean, it's a lot of people have been writing about, we've been talking about, and this has been sort of on clearly getting to happen for the last year and a half, the end

of the post was where to order, but this war in Iran really has, I think, you think, been the exclamation point on that, on the end of that. Yeah, accelerantos, sort of doesn't use, but yeah, same thing, yeah, tend to trajectory. So, just to that point, I mean, the latest one talks to the same as it's been, but should mention that over the weekend, the Iran foreign ministry responded to a U.S. proposal

to end the war, and their response included, sovereignty over the state, sovereignty, people and man, I mean, whatever, over the state of foreign moves, and a bunch of other stuff that Trump responded and said was not reasonable. So, that's where that same as it ever was. But you're having, one thing, Trump seems to stress over and over is the nuclear material.

It's a little weird. I mean, honestly, this stuff is not usable right now. It seems to be varied away if they try to start getting at it, we will see it and can act to stop them, I should think, I'm not getting the stuff out of there, but the idea that we fought this whole war, because of stuff that we pulverized, obliterated, and was

at you in the last summer, it's just a ridiculous, but it is very revealing that that

“why he, I think he says, just because that's very important to Israel, obviously, if we”

be really stopping the nuclear program and not even giving them any remnant of one, it's so important.

It's not consistent with America first.

No. That nuclear dust has Trump calls it, "Fose Zero Threat to the Ice States of America,"

But it poses, in fact, Israel, which is a real thing, we should work in the old days. We worried about that because we worried about threats to other nations around the world and destabilizing influences and so forth, sort of left over in this case because of Trump's being close to Netanyahu, I suppose.

But so you keep repeating that, it never explains why that's so important.

But it is very striking how we, after a week or so, were opening the strait of our moves was important to us, that we closed it, so we can, I guess, seem for the sake of all of it again. Now, that seems to just recede. We have this blockade there.

What's the point of it? It is to tighten the screws on Iran, I guess, so they all have to be more reasonable on the nuclear thing. It's an awfully... I, to me, know, it just feels like a tangible, and Israel's part of it for sure, but also

it just feels like a tangible thing, Trump can wrap his head around, that's like, this is something that we did, that he wants, we'll get to a trophy, a statue, that he wants something right now, like the argument is as weak, so he can sense it. He tries to say, like, they've been obliterated and it's like, okay, so they've lost their ships, but like, the nuclear, the nuclear, that's the thing for him to say, like, we got

the nuclear. I do think that there's a simplicity and talking point element to it. This is kind of related to all this, but it struck me, Trump did an interview with Sheryl Atkinson, who is a little kooky, these days, who's got her on YouTube channel. Nothing wrong with doing news on the YouTube.

I'm doing that, subscribe to the board with YouTube if you haven't already, but she's got a pretty kooky channel, Trump did that, and he said this about the straight. NATO is food to be a paper tiger. We don't use the straight, we don't need it, we don't need the straight. We were doing it to help Israel and Saudi Arabia, we don't need it, we don't use it.

“I, like, there's just so much revealing about that there, right?”

Like, that we are doing this to help Israel and Saudi Arabia, like, he just comes out and says it.

Again, contra-American, for America first, but also just like the degree to which, like, NATO

is nothing to do with that. We didn't get NATO involved, like, this was not a defense issue, I guess nothing to do with the NATO treaty, but he is, like, looking for any excuse to kind of blame NATO and more, kind of formally separate from those countries, because he doesn't like them personally, because it's like they're mean to him, et cetera, et cetera.

Yeah, he wants to blow up the degree, has any view beyond the personality, he wants to blow up the post-World War II order, which he vaguely thinks has been bad for the US, though it's been very good for the US, and NATO is a key part of that. Yeah, I mean, the normal, it's not a person who does a little bit of national trade. He's a, who benefits a lot from the straight people would say, Japan and South Korea, two

kind of important allies of ours. He has no thought about them, they're probably the point to me, I don't think he stresses this in the peace. The Japanese, the Japanese prime minister, she went pretty far and trying to believe a comedy Trump and get along when she came here, swallowed hard when Trump made his Pearl Harbor

“joke, remember that and she was in the open office, I was surely after the war began,”

I think, and she got a lot of grief back at home apparently for not speaking up a little war in that, but whatever she felt at his point, Trump couldn't care less about that. Why do we have the troops in Japan from Trump's point of view? It's silly. And therefore, Japan starts thinking, we've got to take care of ourselves, South Korea starts

taking that suddenly Asia, which has been very stable for a long time and that's pretty good for the world, you know, that starts to fall apart.

I mean, the key thing I just, what were about Bows PC, he uses the word defeat, and I

think he does that on purpose to kind of really try to bring home to people. This is a real defeat. It's not, didn't quite work out as well as we hoped or didn't quite get all the things we wanted or kind of a stumble, it's an important defeat for the United States. When Trump went, she was there, Prime Minister was visiting and remember he makes this joke

about how, you know, we weren't warned about Pearl Harbor when she was complaining that like Japan wasn't consulted, and we were a sake of a time, it was like, hmm, how did Pearl Harbor work out for the Japanese? It's like not great in the end, ended up weakening them quite a bit, and really there are a lot more parallels than maybe he realized between our action and Iran and Pearl Harbor.

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that's joindelete.com/boltwork, code "Bull Work." On the NATO point, you had Philips O'Brien on your conversation with Bill Crystal. There is a pretty interesting development happening in the Russia Ukraine War. It started sounding a little bit of a different note and his hate to even call it a press conference, whatever you want to call it.

This kind of K-fave gatherings that he has to make pronouncements with state media in front of him. But he started talking about how maybe the war could be ending soon. Zelensky wants to come to Moscow, is doing kind of the Putin thing, where he was speaking and code a little bit, and trolling a little bit.

Also, definitely, it was different than the past, kind of like his bravado of how Russia was on the march, et cetera. He starts opening the door to maybe finding an off ramp. This is happening. I don't think coincidentally simultaneously with Ukraine, like gaining a lot of military

grounds for the first time in a while, and the front lines have been pretty stagnant thanks to drone warfare, so anyway, you had a long conversation with Phillips about this, I wonder, what your takeaways were? Yeah, I mean, Phil Willie is a military historian, as I really know who's the military stuff, and very early on he thought Ukraine would hold.

He's always been more bullish on Ukraine than the Givesh was, and was right for the first two years,

three years frustrated that the U.S. didn't do more, and Europe could have done more. But he was basically right, the Russia would not walk right over them. He was right on, like Trump who believed they would, and the Russia holds all the cards, and Trump holds all the cards, now Phil, and everyone else is very worried, obviously, a year ago.

“And when we started to cut off our egg, which was kind of important, but it turns out”

Ukraine's progress and the drone side of things, and the progress of drones as a military weapon and the transformation of the battle field that they have caused is pretty astounding, and he says really a kind of, he doesn't like you to turn revolutionary military warfare, you know, a real transformation. And so that's, they will have to stabilize the battle field, and maybe have a bit of a

advantage now. And also the Russian casualties, Kathy, I guess, and good piece on the website, on the bulwark website about this kind of sad victory day parade, bootenad, where they cut it back. First he went to Trump to get Trump to get Zelensky to promise not to attack it with

drones. Actually, Zelensky did, but he sort of trod, footen by kind of embarrassing him, and also the other pointy made that I hadn't really thought as much about his world happy or around lost.

But one real practical effect and we're about losing is that he's been blocking the 90 billion

dollars of aid from the EU to Ukraine, which probably is enough for them for the next year. So then keep on, not just keep on fighting, but take the fight to the Russians. So that looks much more promising. Ironically, I mean, in a weird way, Trump's forced the Europeans to step up, and they

are doing so much more, mostly it's Russia that's forced the Ukrainians to defend themselves and have this fantastic ability to, to make the drones, but still Trump's accelerated that probably.

“Yeah, that war looks like it's going better. I think Putin's sort of throwing something”

out here on the, well, could end if only Zelensky comes to Moscow, will negotiate something. But of course, Putin's terms are not going to be acceptable to Zelensky, Putin will want to keep probably 20% of Ukraine that they have, and that's not going to happen. So I'm, I'm dubious that they'll be in agreement. There might be a bit of, you could match those seized fires, though, and that kind of thing,

maybe what Phil is most worried about is Putin and Trump actually getting together, maybe with Chinese sort of back to really kind of agreed actually, you know, make things tough around Ukraine. Trump has been out of the war. He hasn't really been an aggressive adversary. It was the last kid at this point. But it could get a little worse.

I mean, the counter to that is, that's been disastrous and Iran, this kind of shift within Trump administration, but maybe, you know, points to a little less worry on that front. And he's going to align so much with Russia, is that like the people with his ear right now, at least, are the relatively more pro-U.k. not as pro-U.k. is real-life, but the relatively more hostile to Russia elements of his administration, be that Marco Ivaz, the administration

is talking to T.C. and I'm looking at it, et cetera. Like, you know, the war in Iran has been, you know, kind of more with that crowd once and less what the J.D. advances of the world want. So we'll see how that plays out. But it's interesting development.

is deciding to watch his hands of this altogether. You know, it is the inevitable destination

“of America first. Like, let's, well, I don't care about this at all. The Europeans can”

hash this out. The Arab nations, states can hash this out. And I'm going to pivot back to the Western Hemisphere and we'll focus on toppling Cuba. And we have a, a, a couple of out evidence of that. Many more surveillance flights over Cuba than previously, those reporting on that over the weekend. And that is in line with kind of what they were saying before, we went into Venezuela and Iran Trump expressed in that same YouTube interview a frustration

that the Cuban regime has already even toppled by the economic pressure. We've been putting

on Cuba and T's, you know, basically saying, once we deal with this one, we're on to the

next something that, in fact, about pushing towards Cuba. So that seems inevitable at this point. I guess so. I mean, Abysad or former colleague said the, the conversation with three weeks ago or so, I said, this could lead, you know, Iran could lead them to sort of the

“other, maybe I should avoid all this foreign, these foreign adventures and, you know, get back”

to Devago agagag and domestic issues and better luck with that. But she said, now, the psychology as he can't, he needs a big win. And Cuba is the easiest one. And he's got some support for it here, because Cuba is a terrible regime and we've been so at odds with it for so many decades. Yeah, I really wonder whether he's thinking, you know, August September before the midterms, maybe not even that far off, you know, to enjoy time for the, I guess,

the invasion of Cuba or just the pressure and kind of event as well a type of situation. I don't know, but, um, apart from the bad ideological elements of the Trump administration, it's driven so much now by his megalomania and vanity and all that, it really is dangerous. A lot of it could peed around into silly things. You know, I hate all the triumph of hard to the statute, all that stuff, but in a way, you know, part of, you paid this point

before, you know, maybe it's better if he just distracts himself with all that, you know, and doesn't go around causing huge foreign policy crises, which too yield damage to us and the world. But unfortunately, it's of a piece, you know, and I suspect the, I suspect we're going to see something with Cuba. Yeah. Summer is right around the corner and I love the heat. So that just means I get outside more and more, we moved here to

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doublework. That's mackw-e-l-d-o-n.com code the board. I want to move forward to the domestic stuff. Obviously, there's a bunch of panic and rage and anger and democratic circles over the redistricting ruling. We're discussing, this was kind of happening as we were taping on Friday with Adam Sarwar, the Virginia ruling comes down that negates the will of you and your fellow of Virginians who voted in a ballot initiative to redraw the maps. The courts overturned that.

A couple of things like happening simultaneously. There is complete righteous anger about what is happening in the south and the Republicans are going to redraw out all the districts that are represented by blacks in the old confederacy. Then you also have a real panic is the right word, but concern among Democrats about, "Okay, is there any way to mitigate this right now?" Because I think that the House of Representatives still looks quite likely to flip to the Democrats,

rigged the map in some of these states. A bunch there, I was wondering what your initial reactions

are. We'll go through a couple of the elements. They threw out a referendum and a pretty shaky technical, a large problem with the way the state legislature did it in the fourth three decision. I think the dissent stronger than the majority of the opinion, but it's not in the way to really overturn it. I wouldn't say. I think that would have moved from a 65 democratic portion meant to allow 10 to one properly. I think in any kind of decent democratic year,

that's 65 goes, the current 65 goes 7, 4, maybe 8, 3, a couple of those districts are pretty close. I vacate 30. Yeah, so it's a two-seat loss. That's a democratic reducing thrown up on the court, so we have a weird way of appointing churches here in Virginia, it's from court churches. I don't think to be fair, that's not clear that's racially driven. It's not a partisan.

The racially stuff in this out there is truly insane. I just really like, it's very pretty rare

that a court overturned an election result. There aren't a ton of examples of that, and now to do so on 4, 3 grounds. And a highly litigated one. Yeah, and that was a little

“one you should very unusual. And you know, forces, yeah, and turn to around what people were planning”

on. In terms of the districts they were going to run on in the drivers in August. The sudden stuff is pretty good task. I mean, I really feel like I just can't quite, you know, you see it happening in 2026. Vale, let's just have no blacks in our congressional delegation. And these states that have 20, 25% black. I heard a 33. Yeah, more than 35% black population. I mean, I don't know. I mean, and also it's so undisguised. I mean, now the partisanship of the racism

have a high correlation as in a G.L.M. forest point out. But of course, one of the reasons the court was able to get to the decision was sort of a fake statistical thing. But it was not really about racists about partisanship. You know what? If one party is gets 92% of the white vote. And the other party gets 90% of the black vote. What are you proving what you say? It's about party and not about race. I mean, it's the same thing. And this is about race. Literally, I mean,

the decision, the Supreme Court decision, the U.S. Court decision, was about race, you know, and got it section two of the Voto Reds Act, which had been passed and repassed by Congress by huge priorities. Again, it's a good case. So, like you're saying, whether referendum, this isn't just tweaking with something or an administrative interpretation of the Clean Air Act. This was a major legislation that was passed by Congress. That's three times.

Yeah, so three authorized under three authorized under Reagan and then reauthorized again under W book. Right. By big bipartisan majorities. And they've been chipping away when we're in shipping away at it, but under cutting it for quite a while. And this was maybe the final blow. So, Sarah, I just guess this is some of you said, I mean, I guess Sarah's very kind of persuaded more

“people and stuff, which is correct. I think I think also some of the anger can be beneficial in the sense”

of mobilizing democratic turnout, including minority turnout in some of these states. Which could help with the state with the Senate elections. Actually, they can't read just the Senate, you know. So, can't you remember the Senate in any way that it isn't ready in terms of, you know, for all our representation? I remain pretty optimistic. I actually don't, I mean, I think it's going to be a very big, a blue wave. And I think it's probably going to

swap these, the House will be plus 30 instead of plus 25 instead of plus 30, honestly. And and I think the Senate's in play. But maybe I'm kidding myself. And I don't blame the pros, the operatives for looking at it and thinking yikes. What we'll find a point that I'd say, people are a little too fatalistic about these districts and about the ability of the Republican legislatures to control them so brilliantly. And so, the Tennessee districts,

they've shot Memphis up into three pieces, so there's no black, no majority might already restrict. In 2018, when Braderson ran for Senate, I guess, right, and lost. He was a strong democratic candidate. So, that caveat stipulated. He got in the new districts if you go back

“and calculate what his vote was. 48 or 49% of the vote. I think in those three”

Memphis partial now Memphis districts, if 2026 is a good year, Democrats could win one or two of those seats. You know, maybe three, I mean, I, so I think that's true in some of these other states too. I think that they're not so sure that Democrats can't, but you know, can't, can't, can't do okay. But it is certainly a, it's a hurdle. And there are two things look at there. I, I, just on the, on that point about whether the Democrats can win, they can win some of these

districts. But it's not as if they'll win so many that are backfires on Republicans. And they can mitigate the Republican gains by winning some of the districts. And that is, that is definitely true. Right. I tend to see some of you very hard though. The states moved more to the right since 2018 and Braderson was a good candidate. And it is just a total out, outrage. Like, you, you're

mentioned, like, the cutout Memphis into a third, a third, a third. That's, they also cut out the black

vote, a third, a third, a third. I mean, it was a purely racial gerrymander in Tennessee to, to ensure the black voters in Memphis do not have the representation that they choose. Notably in this,

white representative Steve Cohen, though he was in a primary, it was just in Pearson. But like, however that, like, you know, ends up playing out, but they divide the city into thirds, which is illegal and an affront and racist and all of the things. Right. And so, look, I don't want to totally

demoralize people of Tennessee, because they simultaneously are living in a, basically, undemocratic

a state that is, like, basically done everything possible to minimize their democratic rights. They also defend if it's if having a couple of horrific candidates, like, Andy Ogles and Scott Desialet, or, like, particularly offensive, even within the construct of maga, right, wherever it is offensive, like, they stand out as uniquely offensive. So that's possible to go win some of those seats, but it's pretty, it's tough and more and he gains article, just as well reported,

and the way of the board yesterday, it was pretty depressing to me, you know, because it's just, like, what is a Democrats plan, and it's, oh, we've got to run candidates more suited to winning these districts, and I agree with that, we do, but it's, it's too late to recruit candidates now,

it's in May, and, and there are a lot of things preventing Democrats from doing that, and you can't

overcome this level of cheating solely with persuasion. In persuasion's part of it, but the cheating is pretty effective, at least in the south for, for the Republicans. It's spring cleaning time, which is a great time to address some of those household tasks you've been putting off. If you've noticed that you're not sleeping well, and it's time for a new mattress, our friends at Helix are here to help. We've got a ton of guests in and out around here,

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Helix is having the memorial day sale. Go to HelixSleep.com/Bullwork for 27% off site wide, exclusive to our listeners, that's HelixSleep.com/Bullwork for 27% off HelixSleep.com/Bullwork. The Virginia thing I just want to throw this at you, there's a proposal going around at some quarters about changing this rule to lower the, lower the mandatory retirement age of Virginia judges to 54, which would essentially fire all the judges on the court. And Suha's super-money

and we had on the podcast was a big supporter of the amendment said this, we have Republican states ignoring their constitutions in erupting early voting and ignoring their spring courts all together. We know based on that, Republicans will explore every single option possible to move this forward,

“so we should do the same. He's pushing for that. I think that that is interesting as a political”

matter that a quite moderate member of the Virginia congressional delegation is pushing maximum warfare here. I think that's notable and encouraging. This specific tactic feels like a bit of a stretch to me, but I don't know. I'm curious, I'm intrigued. What's your reaction? Yeah, I think it's a stretch. He's responding to what is happening in the other states, right? He doesn't act. I mean, right, did his spring court has been pretty, by partisan-ish,

that this was a pretty partisan decision. I think if people ahead of time had said this is a disaster, it shouldn't go to the court at all, whatever, but they argue the case. I think if I think we're going to win it in the state, so I don't think that's going to happen. Probably shouldn't happen. I'm certainly for all kinds of hardball. I was afraid that Virginia redistricting on that graph. With that was a legal constitutional matter. Precisely, they had to have the referendum because

the Virginia Constitution required it, and they also required the two state legislative sessions

“present, and that's why they did the October rule. Remember whatever was session, and then the”

next one, and that's what the little technicality is. I was at really voters went to the polls, and October, not knowing the members had voted or would vote in favor of this thing. Honestly, kind of ridiculous technicality. I would say, I mean, but anyway, technicality may have given it a little tuition. So, no, I'm not really with that particular move, but I'm certainly in favor of I agree with you. You can't wish way that you look. This is, we have all been saying for

year and a half, some of us are saying that they're going to do whatever they can. They're going to

it involves God knows what kinds of shenanigans in terms of the actual voting,

in September and October, and then in the counter to the balance. It also involves this kind of thing. So, it shouldn't be surprised by it. We should be ready for it. I suppose as much as we can be,

“I think going for the intro of Virginia, destroying the Virginia Supreme Court is a little bit of”

a weird way to fix this problem, I'd say. Yeah, I kind of with you. I love, I love the energy, though. Right. So, keep the energy there. People should be looking to Suha, so it's kind of a way to have the right answer. People really need to look at these states and districts. I, I think Lawrence Peace was excellent. Tennessee may be the worst case, but I don't know if some of these other states where there could be competitive Senate races, for example, really increased my priority for it.

I could make a difference in the Mississippi or something like that, and so I'd be very erotic. I

thought about this. Everyone's a quenchilism, I was like a quenchilism, could be, you know, as we're on, could be wrong or reversed. Everyone, the absolute quenchilism house is pretty easy for the damn Senate, pretty impossible. I was 6 months ago, then it became house, very easy, Senate, possible. I would be funny if the Senate ends up being sort of, you know, left because of this redistricting the house becomes more poetic, and the Senate starts to go fall into place. I

“don't think I think it's overstating it, obviously, but... Well, Jaymard wrote in political about”

worries about backlash, and I don't know. I think maybe I'm too beaten down by the last 10 years to to be helpful about that, but the point that he was making is that Republicans did make a lot of ground with black voters, not not really with black women, but with black men, I trump, it was the high water mark in a couple decades for Republicans, and just the overt effort to like overturn the progress made of the civil rights era, and to take away voting power from black folks. I think

could help on margins and on engagement turnout, and that could make a different some of these states. Again, we'll that make up for the rigging and the cheating. I don't know, but I could matter, and some of these districts, and I hope it's true, and people should be outraged, motivated, rather than disappeared, because I do think that while the house seems tougher today than did when we taped on Friday, the Democrats are still favored to take it. So I send border patrol

have a furyated Latino voters quite justifiably. I should have a furyated all of us. And now the court ruling shouldn't furyate, will infuriate, and the subsequent state legislator actually, which is so aggressive and beyond the pale, shouldn't furyate black voters. So you know, Trump doesn't win without better numbers and they're not huge. My blacks, they're pretty big among Latinos. It doesn't win in 2024. They don't win the house, the Republicans, without that

spillover from Trump. So it does matter if there's a real reaction, leaving aside like maybe some decent white people might be offended by this too. God willing, I'm a little disparate at about the hope for decent people because coming to the defense of others, but maybe it will happen, and they should be fucking right, justly pissed and hoping to make a difference this November, and maybe that will also come and concert with all some negative voters feeling not that

motivated to turn out. So I do think that's the, that's the caveat here, but boy, it's, it's in raging and, and pretty negative development. Let's get to the fun. Here's some other things that could cut against the Republicans. Just their total lack on focus about the concerns of the American people, of all races and genders and ages. The Secretary of Transportation,

“Sean Duffy, that like that important of a role, Secretary of Transportation, usually not at the”

center of our public debate, but in a moment where everybody is pissed off about gas prices, pissed off about the rising price of air travel. You'd think that he would be laser focused on trying to alleviate those concerns. Instead, he was on Fox and friends on Friday announcing this. So I want to lean into America's 250th birthday. Rachel and I actually met on a road trip on our reality video. And so over the course of seven months, we just kind of found these moments

where I might be able to do some work. I could take the kids with me to a road trip. Oh yeah. And our motto is to love America is to see America and there's so much to see in this beautiful country. A seven month road trip for the Secretary of Transportation, we're paying his salary. He's

going to do some work. He's going to do some work. Always on a seven month road trip. Well,

everybody is enraged about a skyrocketing gas prices. To call that tone death feels like an understatement. I couldn't agree more. They're also, they're also, they're so self-centered and swung and self-satisfied such jackasses. They don't see how this stuff looks. I hope it looks bad. I hope people take advantage of it. Honestly, I've never actually created fake road trips and have

our friends that we go to picking up putting little, you know, mockups of stuff he had his family

in some car and having them go around everywhere. Not doing his job. It isn't paid four hours of paid four by various corporations who put the money to some 501c3. Yeah. It's paid four by a non-profit run by a transportation industry lobbyists. And funded by various transportation companies that are seeking to a diverse favor, things like bright line in the private railway.

“That's, and I think Toyota was in there. It's like, what the swamp is buying off,”

Sean Duffy. So he can take his family to go see Mount Rushmore and the arch in the grain to see America, to love American. I can see America, Tim. You know, I know you're just anti-america. You're typical anti-america lefty board type. You know, people are going to be able to go on road trips this summer because I can't fucking afford it, Sean Duffy. Like, wow, people should make it. I prefer people than I should think of ways to bring this up. Yeah,

as they are playing tickets, it's playing ticket prices. So I'll figure some of the price of jet fuel and it's gas prices. So yeah, I absolutely got a really, make sure enough you were famous. They're really bad. You know, the Trump, maybe you have a notice that's the Trump cabinet. It's

“really bad. They're not just incompetent. It's just a small smug assholes if I could say so, you know.”

Yeah, it's true. You know, Sam and I a couple weeks ago had did our cabinet ranking worst cabinet officials and it's tough. And it's competitive. It's a, it's really tough choosing. You know, having to narrow it down to the worst four was a challenge. Just one of them to with them,

respectable, do you think? We always keep coming back to Doug Bergham is the respectable one.

Yeah, you know, but that said there's some, there's some stories about some pretty strange ways which he is treating his staff. So I don't know. It's really one of the worst collections of individuals. You could possibly imagine speaking of what we, why don't we get into the comedy, one of the other ones, this is Macabre, dark comedy, I guess, was our Secretary of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. We have the hunt to virus going around in a pretty

serious, the people on the ships. For some reason, we're bringing one person that was exposed to the virus. I'm one of these cruise ships back to America to quarantine. I'm kind of like, can't we can't we quarantine that person somewhere else? So they have to be quarantined here and there's some concerns that Robert F. Kennedy isn't charge of that, you know, given his past comments and beliefs about how to how to deal with these kinds of pandemics and epidemics.

John Malaney is a comedian who did the famous Trump is the horse in the hospital that just really good. He did, he had a comedy show at the Hollywood Bowl this weekend and some of the video leaked of that and it's so good I just want to play a point. Back on that in New York, he was in charge of a thing called the River Keepers. They were in charge of keeping the Hudson River clean.

“That was his job. That's how truly he is in jobs. His old job was keeping the Hudson River whose”

native fish is tied off use condom clean. That was in charge of your bones in your tummy. So that leads me pretty concerned about pandivirus. I think I'm staying off cruise. I was going to stay off cruise ships anyway for the next 10 years. Yeah, that's the way they see your way to say that. I think I'm staying off cruise. I was going to stay off cruise ships anyway for the next 10 years. Yeah, we're closer to the end of this year. Yeah, I have an update. There was a cruise of gay, mega influencers. For people who don't follow, who are just pod only. We do series of

videos with Will Summer and me and Sam Stein trio videos. We talked about the craziest stuff happening in maga. Over on the board takes feed and we did want on this and I didn't really know a whole lot about it. I just I'd seen a maga gay that I follow. I posted about his time there and so we kind of we watched that video and made fun of him and rift on that. That after we published a listener posted on the board credit page that they were on the ship that they hadn't like rented out a ship for the maga gay cruise. Like when you did the weekly standard

cruise, I assume it was all weekly standard people. No. No, no, it's a times you would get 250 cabins on a thousand. Okay. So I did not really. And you would eat together and you would have your own seminars and stuff in your own, you know, you'd

get a little room. No, no, no, no. So I did not realize that. And so in this case, that cruise is about a third and then this person was posting the pictures

of them like all of the gays and their red shirts like over on the corner of the boat and they weren't the cute gays. We should

but talk about the bad luck. And I guess we had to rank worse luck of getting on cruises, getting on the

“hand to virus cruise would be definitely number one, you know, since your life is at risk. The poop cruise,”

I think number two, it's like it worse. But then getting on a cruise and having to be the game record. That's true. It's a nice, nice three generation family from, you know, which are talk hands of the same. You know, this is going to the 75th birthday of the grandparent. This is not a lot of these crazy things, right? You know, the teenage kids, then he's the pin between the parents, your age and and then, yeah, showing up. You're on the point. There you are. It's a guy in a

Hillary for prison speed out. You're like, what? I want to go at the, your newsletter this morning was about, I told you there'd be laughs at the moves that is running is about the gold statue. Because we have the policy of not playing Trump's voice, we're not going to play the audio, but there was a dedication of a golden calf at Melalago. I don't know any other way. Say it, it looks just like Kim Jong-un's golden statue. It looks just like the calf and the old

testament. That's more of your area than mine. The old testament, some of you have some ruminations on that Trump calls into the dedication. Talks about how great it is, how excited it is, how excited he is, how excited he is. Talks about how you went to the golf course, people are complimenting him about the golden statue. Pastor Mark Burns, who was the pastor, I guess, in charge of the statue, posted this. Today, a Trump National D'Areal history was made.

I'm deeply honored to lead the dedication event for President Donald J. Trump and the unveiling of the 22 foot statue created this honor. This was far more than a ribbon coming. It was a moment for gratitude, honor, and remembrance. Let me say this plainly, this is not a golden calf. Statue is not about worship. It is about honor. So, I don't know, golf protests too much a little bit maybe. Let me say this plainly, this is not a golden calf. It's not a good thing you want to

have to say. If you're a pastor blessing and consecrating this wonderful protest, do I put a pastor or not worshiping it? Why was I a Christian? It's been a layman. I don't know what the clergy was necessary. They could put up the idiotic statutes. His own golf course, I guess it's private property. None of the rest of us has to see it anymore after this one video. Much well-deserved ridicule for pastor burns. A lot of people rallying to his defense like I Jeffrey's who's like an

anti-Gay anti-Semitic racist anti-Catholic pastor. I guess, is your policy that we don't call them pastors if we don't, I mean, I'm open to that. Pastor Doug, I didn't want to call a pastor, Pastor Doug Wilson, because he doesn't seem to even do any pastoring. I like his entire persona. It's just that he's a pastor that I want to bring slavery back. So, Jeffrey, I don't, I remember him being very bad. There's a big controversy around McCain. Yeah,

“terrible. I can't say he didn't want to tell him. I think. I mean, I don't know. I'm on defense.”

I'm okay with what we're just calling him Robert. Okay. Anyway, Pastor, yes. Pastor Pastor, Doug, for test to watch about this. It's not a golden calf. Everyone's immediately sees it. It's not only having this quote, consecration, and everyone immediately thinks I'll take care of it.

So the first words out of his mouth are, it's not a golden calf. But don't even think about that.

Yeah, raising some additional questions. I kind of made it silver. Could have made it orange. Trump's orange. I would have been an option. Purple. Trump tweeted that it's like, it's the real deal. It's gold. It's, of course, like one eighth inches last day, one sixteenth inch gold. Right. Whatever. It's, it's ghastly. But at least it's, I mean, I make this point in the newsletter. It's, it's, it's not as stupid. Golf people signed up for Trump to rail. I'll have to

“endure it. I suppose. I think the world leaders isn't the G20 meeting there at the end of the”

chair. They have to walk by it. How humiliating. I'm really, you know, 70 serious country and you have to walk by this 22 foot grotesque gold statue of Trump, which he's, he's put up. I mean, it'll actually dotor. So, foot up at his club, you know, and he's filled about it. He's filled the people. He's filled what he called in, that people are taking pictures of themselves with it. On the other hand, it's not good for Trump politically. It brings home even more. It's only cares about

himself. And then, of course, I do think the arts here in Washington, which would intrude on Arlington cemetery. So, that's not something that, that's one of our most sacred public spaces. That's a different matter than putting up some idiotic statue to yourself at your private club.

And the ballroom, he wants a billion dollars for. They don't have to really need to go crazy

about that stuff. I'm worried they're like being a little too, you know, we've got to focus

But he is, I mean, the, the solopsis and the narcissism focused on this, couldn't care less about

the gas prices, sure. And Duffy doesn't care about it. None of them cares about them. It's enough. Like I write the energy secretary, maybe just a little better job pretending to at least be concerned about them, I don't know. But they're not, it's pathetic, apparently. None of them cares about what actual people are going through. And I say this in the newsletter. I think you and I discussed this maybe shortly after 2016. When Trump said in 2016,

Hillary says, once you say, I'm for her, but I say, I'm with you. I'm with her. I'm with you.

“Right. That's what I'm with her. I'm with her. That was their proud slogan.”

Your first, what we present and, and I say, I'm with you. I remember thinking when I heard that

first, I think it's so sweet in New York, but then at the convention in Cleveland, that's a pretty effective line, you know. And he's done that of course with Kamala was the same thing. He's she's for, she's with them. She's for them. They, I'm with you. That I'm with you, think it's gone. And people need to just hammer home that he's from only to care less. He's a narcissist to cares only about himself. And the ball room to statue at the art should pretty good concrete

examples of it that people can understand I think. Hey, man, I think it's a big political opportunity.

It does make you a little sick of your stomach. I, I really consider the drill part. And just

“think, I like fact that the G7 is a drill is a total insane affront. So, you know, I'm at a”

glacier's post about this this weekend. It's just, I got mad all over again about the coverage of Hillary's email server from 2016. Like posted in Malice on it. It was like the three major nightly news spent like 4x more time on her email server than all policy issues combined. And it's like, they're not, I don't even cover the stuff anymore. I do. Yeah, what, what server is Jared Kushner talking to BB and NBS on? I don't think a public server that we that we can get access to.

You know, I like the whole thing is absurd. And, you know, so there's not even the commensurate level of outrage at all that the G7 is at the rail. But then on top of that, definitely like Friedrich Merz, walking by like the Trump golden calf when he comes to the G7. It's like fucking ridiculous. It's, it's crazy. It's, it's, it's, it's sickening and hopefully politically useful, but sickening. And I was thinking about that in the context when we're in the

green room discussing, we have our bull work, Count Fab and DC on Wednesday. And so, pod might be out of a weird time on Wednesday. If I, on that, we'll, we'll, a lot of the full announcement for you guys tomorrow and how we're going to do it. But I'm like, I don't want to have to go buy the buildings that have its face on it. I don't know how you all live there to be honest. Like that makes me kind of sick, just like thinking about it, about how gross it all is. And that's of a piece

with the calf, too. So, I don't want to end us on a down now. So, there was the Netflix was a joke thing last night. I don't, I didn't really have an angle for bring for like a deep political analysis angle for this Chelsea handler joke. It just was very satisfying. So, Bill, why don't I say goodbye to you and then we can just leave people with a little, we can just listen to Chelsea handler together of laugh. How does that sound for that? It's alright. Good being with you.

“A good being with you. That will listen to the joke. We'll laugh and I'll see you tomorrow, right?”

Yeah, so let's see it tomorrow now, see you Wednesday and DC. Everybody else, we back tomorrow with another edition of the podcast. Here's Chelsea. Now that your favorite leader is making the draft mandatory, I assume that all of you will be signing up to go fight in Iran. Or do you tough talking posties only go to the Middle East for comedy festivals? I'm so happy we can say Pussy again. Bye everybody, see you tomorrow. The board podcast is brought to you. Thanks to

the board of lead producer Katie Cooper, associate producer Ansley Skipper and with video editing by Katie Lutz and audio engineering and editing by Jason Brown.