Michael Weiss: The Clown Car at the Pentagon

On and there are around 2013.

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We've got a double header for you today. And segment two, I've noticed a little bit of a gap in the political commentary at Marketplace. The Democratic consultants who get called to go on TV and talk about politics are people from the Clinton Bush Obama era.

We love them all. A lot of experience, a lot of judgment comes from successful presidential campaigns. But getting along the tooth, a lot of things are changing in politics these days. And then the younger people who talk about Democratic politics are mostly like 23-year-old Instagram influencers.

And we honor Instagram influencing. That's a noble profession. That's a noble pursuit. But it isn't like a lot of experience in the field. And so between now and the mid-terms, once a week,

I'm going to bring somebody on who's actually doing campaigns in the Trump era on the Democratic side and chat with them. And so we're bringing on my old friend Radarica Appleweight and segment two, she's unbelievable. Please stick around for that.

But first, I've got an exciting announcement.

He's an old friend. He writes it for an office on Substack. But I'm pumped to reveal to you right now that he's the co-host of a new board podcast reporter in the spy with Mark Polymerapolis. Which is going to be launching soon.

It's Michael Weiss. We're officially colleagues and buddies in life partners now. Common law marriage has been sanctified.

“That makes Mark my sidepiece, which is I think what his wife already calls me.”

So that sounds right. That sounds right. The great news is now that you're officially in the fold. We'll have the budget to get like a high quality blackout blanket for the birds. The birds are covered in a blanket.

So my daughter decided these are her pets, but they're moving into our bedroom. So I now have dog, fish, and birds surrounding me at all time. In the house. In the house.

We might get you an office. We'll see how well the podcast does in the audience. We'll get a high-falutin already. Okay, cool. Do you want to give people forget to the news?

What's the pitch? What's the elevator pitch? The podcast? Yeah.

It's basically Mark and I have been friends and he's been a source

for my reporting for a long time. And we talk all the time about the state of the world, national security, spy stuff. And I thought it would be fun to click record on some of these conversations,

just because he brings it perspective. That's obviously different from my own. But parallel to my own. I mean, doing the work of journalism. I like in it to being a case officer, right?

You get to know people. You cultivate them. You get them to tell you things that they otherwise might not want to say. And you advance in agenda. In my case, what's in the public interest in his case.

National security in the great state of America, making it great again or keeping it great. I don't even know what stage we're in now. But anyway, yeah. It's a fun one.

The way I see it is akin to there was a great conversation between John La Carre and Ben McIntyre and the New York Times at the height of like the Trump Russia saga.

“I thought it was the best thing I'd read about it.”

I'm like, that's what I want to do, right? A historian reporter talking to a practitioner. And it's sort of like talking shop. But as I say, from slightly different perspectives. I love it.

All right. It's going to have its own feed soon.

I'll make sure to announce that for every second subscribe to it.

And the meantime, there's going to be some road YouTube episodes. But it will be up this fall. I'm pumped. All right. To the news.

The end of this dress goal. Army secretary has resigned. This is interesting for a couple of reasons. I don't know. Usually, you know, covering, you kind of like random.

Well, it would be HR moves inside the military on this podcast, right? But this is relevant for a lot of political reasons. I mean, he's been a foil of techsouth for a while.

He's an old friend of JD Vance.

There's been kind of a lot.

“He's been at the center of a lot of the turmoil behind the scenes”

in the White House. According to the Atlantic, when he went to inform Trump that he was leaving, Trump was surprised to hear how many generals and other top officers have been fired pushed out or passed over for promotion under Higgs F. Not surprising.

He's pretty focused on the marble and the new ballroom, not on the sort of material. The army now has no secretary, no deputy under secretary, no chief of staff, no Senate confirmed top general, no confirmed army general and charge of operations,

or confirmed commander of army troops in Europe. That's right. Boy. And we're in a state of war with Iran. So no big deal there.

I mean, there's a lot of things to say about this. Number one, the scuddle butt is, this has been long in the making and Driscoll is most likely to be part of if not leading JD Vance, 2028. So expect to see him involved in the Vice President's presidential campaign soon.

They're best friends. They went to Yale Law School together. Driscoll seemed to be pretty well regarded, though. In spite of his attachment to JD Vance, the thing that impressed me about him is,

you remember he was sent to Kiev several months ago to kind of deliver this ultimatum to Zelensky and the Ukrainians, you know, sign on the dotted line.

We got to wrap this war up, basically shaking them down,

make concessions. He came away favorably disposed toward the Ukrainians, because he's a military tech guy. He's into drones. He's into 21st century warfare.

He wants to modernize the state of the US military. And the Ukrainians have a lot of know-how and sophisticated tools with which to do that.

“So he kind of came back more pro-Ukraine than I think he went in.”

There's a missing piece to this story. I've read all the reports about this, and you know, great stuff in the Atlantic, and great stuff in the Wall Street Journal. But there's a guy who keeps not coming up

with respect to all of the shenanigans going on at DOD. Like Pete Higgs-F is, we've talked about him on the show. Everybody knows him. He's probably the one the most. Reviled secretaries of defense since Rumsfeld. Maybe even more so than Rumsfeld?

Yeah. Nobody talks about his chief of staff, a guy called Ricki Berea, or Rasputin Ricky as DOD sources have dumped him. The Ricki Berea was a US Marine. He retired at the level of colonel,

even though he didn't do the full three years of service. Signed his own papers, by the way. This was a guy who was not supposed to be chief of staff, not liked by Susie Wiles, not like by Carolyn Leave it,

not like by anybody of a White House, but somehow has managed to jepeto himself into a position of power. And essentially, from what I'm given to believe, he's kind of controlling Pete Higgs-F.

There's a report in the New York Post.

“They went on some clandestine whiskey soil”

when Higgs-F is living in Pentecost City. He was in disguise. He's not supposed to be drinking at all, because Trump kind of read in the riot act. If I catch you,

you know, the boo's are out of here. And so he's doing this on a slide. Was that a real thing where they were actually drinking in disguise, or they pretend to know? Well, we don't know.

But why would you pretend to sneak out and not go on some kind of boys night? I don't know. Maybe they don't know much about Ricki Berea. And I don't really believe in Fizzi Agnomy.

Yeah. Well, you judge somebody based on the shape of their face and skull. Right. But he's got a bad one. He's got a concerning one.

You look at it. He's got an untrustworthy face. Yes. And the news item here is, you remember signal gate?

Of course, yeah.

When Higgs-F was basically putting in classified

about bombing the hoothees in Yemen into Signal and Whoopsie Daisy. Mike Walts had added Jeffrey Goldberg of the Atlantic to that chat. Ricki Berea was the guy who was putting in Pete Higgs that's messages into Signal.

Okay. And he thought he was going to be fired as a result of that. And instead, he climbed over all the corpse as including of Mike Walts and slotted himself in his chief of staff.

Failed a polygraph, by the way, which is slightly concerning. You know, the US Air Force is the one that does counterintelligence for the military at large or the Pentagon rather.

And somehow he's in this position of great influence and power. And from what I understand, you know, a lot of the reporting that Driscoll is at odds with Leniv, the general. He's acting chief of staff just to be clear.

I don't acting is important.

Because I never like to give Ricki now his fake

child access to security devices. Yeah, Mark, he's acting for national security advisor. But like, I think, well, actually that role doesn't even exist. I think in this administration.

But long story short, what I was told this morning is, you know, Driscoll wanted to hell out of DOD because of Beria and the kind of clown car that's being run there.

And his sort of, I use Rasputin, right?

His kind of weird control

over the secretary of defense.

“So I would encourage people to dig into that story more.”

The fact that we don't hear about him at all is interesting. The people know that Ricki was the one that typed it into signal. Has that been reported? No.

I'm reporting it now on your podcast. Wow. Confirm by two DOD sources, by the way. So it's one of these things that, you know, a lot of people know this stuff,

but it doesn't get said or put out there. And I think once it is, people will come and confirm it even more. I use a Democrat, too, which is bizarre,

because how does Donald Trump let somebody like this be acting chief of staff to the secretary of war, Mr. Anti-DI, Anti-Woke, Macho Macho Man, Pete Heggset.

It's a very strange state of affairs going on there. But anyway, this is the reason you have a Pentagon press corps, you know, that usually, or did,

that don't consist of influencers and people who used to be on the Russian state payroll, like Tim Poole, you have actual journalists digging into stuff like this.

Yeah. At least when he generals, admirals and civilian defense leaders have been fired or left their jobs since Heggset became defense secretary,

correct? Including the Army Navy and Air Force's highest ranking officers, leaders of key units. I like,

this is crazy. Like you got a weekend talk show host and Ricky Beria,

“putting emojis into signal chat with Jeffrey Goldberg,”

like, kind of running things. Yep. While we're in multiple, multiple conflicts.

We're in multiple conflicts and possibly getting into new ones in future. So, yeah, I know, I mean, it's a total shit show.

What can I say? We do have a replacement over at the Navy, so if you're concerned about what's happening on the seas, I've got a better idea.

You should be even more concerned. A man named hung cow, hung for secretary, is being nominated today. I encountered hung,

I've encountered several hungs, but I've encountered hung cows. I was waiting for him. If you didn't walk through the door, I was going to have him.

I had to do it. I don't even know. We've got, we've got some fans out there that just, that want me to sneak up.

I encountered him, not in that way. And I got to tell you, he is a weird dude. He's one weird fella.

And he ran for Congress and Senate failed Senate campaign. Over the course of those campaigns, he said, we don't need NATO called NATO officials in Europe lazy, so they don't do shit.

A lot of conspiracy theories about the elections, obviously he was big on freeing the insurrectionists. He's very concerned about witchcraft and the wicked community. He's Vietnamese,

but he said he's African-Americans. He lived in Africa. I don't know man. The dude is, it's not,

we're not doing our best. Yeah, not the best in the brightest. Yeah. I mean, look, you tick the boxes.

You play to the kind of conspiratorial base. You don't have to have the qualifications. In fact,

“you can use you to cank the people who do general suits or in their stars, right?”

But are telling you what civilian leadership needs to be told. We don't have the capacity to do the things you want to do.

We're running low on critical munitions to fight a war against Iran,

which is now, unfortunately impacting other wars going on, such as the one in Ukraine. There's a float of Brian Masht, his army secretary,

I don't know, this is a leak. That is a Congressman from Florida. I did a media training forum once back in the old days. When I was a Republican,

he was a dick and a crazy person then. And he's gotten worse since, I guess he was a volunteer for the IDF, was wearing around an IDF uniform. Floor of Congress,

as a American representative, this is where, I don't know if he could read the room given the current political environment, by the way. We'll see if he gets picked.

We know that hung cows, in fact, I was asking herling about this this morning. And he's like, you know, we've had some good army and navy secretaries.

We've had some mediocre ones. We haven't really had total clowns in those roles, but we're putting on the clown nose right now. Yeah. I think that's accurate.

So, okay. Meanwhile, over at the Pentagon, when there are a lot of people in the building doing the works, it's pretty easy to slip things through the cracks, such as this story from pro-publica.

Last year,

a $620 million loan was announced to a small North Carolina start-up

to do some military contracting. They start up with linked to Donald Trump Jr. There were some reports that, you know, the possibly this was crony, as I'm obviously just another example of Trump corruption.

That was getting battered down by the firm defense. Pro-publica has done some interviews and reviews and defense over and records. And they showed that the loan to the firm, the request for this loan was made by Peter Navarra.

(laughs)

White House advisor, friend.

Just looking jacked at a prison according to Donald Jr.

Yeah. So, again, it's just all the stuff just to pile up, right? We just look at what's happening in the defense department. You have like,

headset, maybe being under the spell of his, like, unqualified or a sputin, all qualified military leaders being pushed out, contracts being handed out to Donald Jr. on Peter Navarra's wreck.

And 1789, what is the private equity or venture capital firm that he runs with, this guy named Omir Malik, who's fundraising for JD Vance in the Hamptons,

“or was this summer raised like $5 million for the RNC?”

Yeah, no, look, I mean, it's corruption all the way down, which is why after the midterms, everything is going to be gummed up because the Democrats are just going to have hearings

into, you know, violation of the emoluments clause, payola and cronyism, the cushioners, cashing in on things,

with cough, what kind of side action is he doing, either with the Russians, or with Russia aligned countries, and as well they should.

I mean, you know,

this pentagon deal is basically US taxpayer money

going to enrich the children of the president of the United States, right? Again, again,

you know, the interesting thing too though about Don Jr. I mean, you got to love the grift here, so he's one of the most outspoken

anti Ukraine people in the president's orbit, right? Denoun Solinski is a dictator and all that stuff on social media. He's an investor, along with his brother,

who looks developmentally disabled, but that's not a story. And a company called Power Us, it's a Florida-based drone company, and guess who,

“or what power us is looking to invest in?”

Ukraine and drone technology. They want to buy licenses. They want to acquire the kit that the Ukrainians are manufactured. So it's okay to cash in or capitalize on this country

that you despise, and would have no problem seeing overrun by the Russians. Oh, but maybe you do now because it's going to affect your bottom line. If this is,

I mean, the classic Trump story going back half century now, you know, putting your name on other people's work

and taking money for it, and then screwing over people on the back end, and that was basically the business model of the Trump work. And you know what? I mean,

I would be all for that kind of corruption if I thought it was going to actually change the president's mind about Ukraine. But unfortunately, it doesn't sell.

There you go. This segment has been sponsored by the New York Times. When I'm doing podcast prep in the morning, you know,

I'm always looking at that morning's shots newsletter

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making sure I am up to speed and all of the latest. This morning, for example, I was reading the Times takeout

on a hung cow, the nominee for Navy Secretary. It's like,

“it's hard for me to keep track of everything”

that's going on today. So, you know, scrolling through my little NYT app, and I'm going, oh fuck,

it's hung cow. And, you know, you gotta have the reporters out there. They're doing the work

that are informing us. And what's happening behind the scenes of the Navy. We've got Times Fortress Year all the time. Tone of Maggie's reporting

has been informing the podcast recently. We've got David Wallace, well's on a couple weeks ago, who is doing such important reporting on what's happening with the climate,

as well as AI and other issues. It's tough. It's tough to get good information out of the White House these days. It's tough to follow

just the avalanche of shit that is being dumped on us from this administration, and you need outlets that have the reach of the resources

that have the sources to go out there and do that reporting so that I can bring it to you, so we can contextualize it, so we can fire out some hot takes.

The basic building blocks that undercurrent all that is the reporters out there doing the work. I mean,

for example, this is in New York Times, but how would you have known about the woman that was running as a Republican

in two different states, and also is allegedly under indictment for fire fraud, if it wasn't for Andrew Eggers reporting. I'm not doing that reporting.

He's out there doing that. All of us depend on fact based journalists easily breed their beats of the rest of us are well informed and it comes time

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wherever you see it out, nationally, locally. Support fact based reporting, thanks to our friends at New York Times. Let's go to that and you crane.

There's a bunch of stuff actually happening in the war that I want to get your take on. And there's a G20 meeting in Asheville, so I'm going to start with that.

First, Russia finance minister, Anton Sulinos. Is that right? Yes.

Sulinos? He was there at the table. There's the first time there's been a Russia representative at the G20 since they invaded Ukraine

in 2022, Europeans were pissed.

Reporters were banned,

so we don't really know why.

You get the side DL, and you get the side DL, and you get the side DL, and you get the side DL, and you get the side DL,

and you get the side DL, and you get the side DL, and you get the side DL, and you get the side DL, and you get the side DL,

and you get the side DL,

You get the side DL,

and you get the side DL, and you get the side DL, and you get the side DL, and you get the side DL, and you get the side DL,

and you know,

we've discussed this as well,

“and this has been confirmed to me about the Ukrainians,”

the only reason I believe it. You know, Radcliffe is the most pro-Ukrain actor in the administration. Radcliffe is responsible for giving the Ukrainians intelligence how to bypass Russian air defense systems,

so when they bomb oil refineries, or now logistics hubs, warehouses, containing dual-use equipment, like the Russian Amazon,

they can get their drones in, and they can hit the target, right? So Radcliffe is responsible for blowing shit up in Russia, to send him to Moscow, to say it's time to make a deal,

is itself an implicit threat, right, because they know that Radcliffe is doing this. That's an improvement on… Which to make this messaging, right?

Yeah, very mixed messages. That's the problem. And Radcliffe, it's kind of a low bar, just because on this point, I wanted to play this for you.

This was this morning. The Treasury Secretary, who's kind of playing like a military role, also lately, as well. Yeah.

They're sending out a fit, got best sent to be the heavy, on the Iranians economically. It's an interesting choice. Operation Outcast.

Yeah, he did take a $5 billion

in hedge fund, investment fund, and end it with gentlemen's 527 million in the bank account. So that was pretty good.

So he's threatening the Iranians. Also, the Ukrainians, weirdly, this was him, this morning, trying to explain, like gas prices are up.

And we are going through an energy shock right now, due to both the war and Ukraine, because Ukraine has decided that they want to blow up

“Russian energy assets and refine products.”

So that is creating upward price pressure on a global basis. Ukraine has decided to do that. So Ukrainians. Yeah, I wonder why.

Yeah, they just took that random decision to do this. First of all, this is the guy who allowed waivers that were implemented

on the back of the Iran war to allow gross nerf the Russian state oil company to sell oil in the global market. So we put in these waivers

to bypass the sanctions

that Donald Trump did impose

a year ago or whatever. Those waivers have expired. So if he's so concerned about Russian not making money from selling oil,

he could simply re-up the waivers. He hasn't done that. So when you talk about mixed messages, the Jonas here is not on Ukraine, and as I said,

the US intelligence community is helping Ukraine in this effort. I've confirmed that within an inch of my life on both sides,

the American and the Ukrainian side. So, you know, which is it man? You know, you want to blow up

over fine-reason Russia, but you're like, hey, you know, that's the reason it's not me.

You know, we're all trying to find the guy who did this. Right. Maybe that's just politics and lying

and you know, that's just a common sense. Yeah. Exactly. Exactly.

I'm trying to get a handle on. There's now a debate about how much oil is getting through the straight-of-war moose Goldman Sachs as it's returned to about

two thirds of the pre-war level. Yes. Another oil tanker tracker, which is highly reputable and relied upon by journalists

and they enclose to that. So there's a debate about this. It does seem though that the blockade is having an impact and it's making life more difficult

“for the Iranians and the Iranian economy”

is already in the toilet. So the question is, is this going to alter their calculations with respect to how they talk to the Americans? I'm very skeptical it will.

But this is, you know, operation outcast

Or maximum pressure as it used to be now.

Right. You sanction them. You block their ability to make revenue the only way they can exporting their energy.

And you hope for the best that maybe, you know, been working. They give you some more kidneys to get an ignition to decide, like as J.D. said, they're just a bunch of cool

revolutionary guard terrorists now

who want to make a deal with the United States. I don't know. Yeah. Let's be clear. This is a crisis of our making

because we went to war with Iran. It's not Ukraine's fault that they're fighting back against Russia. It's true and blunt.

“I don't think that's what's going to happen”

just trying to be. When you're trying to explain why gas prices are up, it's like, well, you know. It was sad. It's not out of our hands.

Cranians. It's the straight form. Who's we got that under control? There are around 130 of us. We're standing right here.

The biggest advantage of Shopify for me is that we don't need any technical information for us. We all know about the back end and the front end of it. And so we're going to go to the online shop.

We're going to go to Shopify. Then we're going to the platform that's actually going to go. It's simply the main task. Our whole business is going to go over Shopify.

Now we're going to have a look at Shopify. I want to talk about a run. But there's a story in the F.T. about the kind of nexus between these two conflicts and Russia's kind of increasing

involvement in trying to help her on. It actually is this. There's secretly helping Iran develop a supersonic cruise missile. Some of Russia's most experienced missile specialists.

Kind of laughed when you hear that phrase though. I do think about like a kind of mockumentary where you have Russia's most experienced missile specialists. Yes. So it's an old guy's from the soutenic era coming through.

But anyway, they're helping Iran develop a new class of weapon capable of threatening U.S. aircraft carriers and warships. Yes. I mean, nobody should be surprised by this. It's just one story in there.

Russia is cooperating at a degree really unprecedented with not just Iran, but also China. We did a story at the insider about how the Chinese came to them and said, you know, we're very worried about star link

and what it can do to, for instance, to disrupt our ability to invade Taiwan. So let's come up with a joint air defense and aerospace defense, because this is happening in lower orbit, to maybe shoot down star link, satellites out of space

or do cyber warfare or somehow introduce these systems. The Russian sharing this kind of tech with the Iranians is absolutely an escalation. It doesn't surprise me so much. So, you know, one of the other things we noticed

is in the last several years. The Russians were sending their black ops team unit 29155 of the GRU. These are the guys that poisoned the script balls and Sal'sberry.

These are the guys who are responsible for all of these state sponsored terrorist attacks happening throughout Europe,

beginning in 2011 before the first invasion of Ukraine

all the way until now. They sent their top men from that unit, including the founding commander, Andriyavriyana of Tuthehram. To liais with basically the IRGC counterparts.

And the question we had at the inside and when we're investigating this, what the hell are they talking about? You know, these guys don't do arms deals. They don't do, you know, intelligence liais on surface.

They do kinetic things. So, we were kind of waiting to see

“what's the grand reveal here of this Russian Iranian partnership?”

And look, I mean, our intel community has concluded that both the Russians and the Chinese are sharing intelligence with the Iranians to target American soldiers in the Persian Gulf. And you might say, well, the Russians would do that

because as I just mentioned, we're doing the same thing with the Ukrainians inside Russia. But why are we not talking about penalizing the Russians for trying to kill Americans? Right.

We're inviting the Russian finance minister to the G20. We're talking about how it's the Ukrainians fault the gas prices are. We're doing like simultaneously the fact that Russia's trying to help Iran kill our men and women.

It's a pretty weak, frankly, posture. Very weak. And, you know, you had this Lindsey Graham sanctions bill which passed the Senate and was rewritten to be pretty robust and also frankly speaking written in such a way

that it would be hard for Donald Trump not to enforce certain provisions in this thing. And it wouldn't have passed the Senate if Trump hadn't allowed it to because the Senate, like the House on the Republican side, is just hostage to this personality cult.

But now it's gummed up in the House. And it's gummed up in the House. How's it going back in the session yesterday that they've added on some things to that make it? No.

I haven't seen the latest this morning. But last I heard there are a lot of sticking points for people including, I mean, on the Democratic side is the the cudgel here tariffs, right? Which that party does not like.

And is against Donald Trump in doing the sort of trade war.

“But it's the best thing you're going to get”

out of this administration to hurt third parties

importing. It's Russian oil, gas, uranium, petroleum products, right? And that's what you would want.

If you if you were interested, it's strategically

defeating this country. Yeah.

I might guess is that it's Mike Johnson sitting on this because

they don't want to do anything that's going to hurt that. Correct. And it's an incident. Or, you know, we have a situation where President United States doesn't really care about

his parties political fortunes in the midterms. He cares about his quote legacy. So he will do things to advance what he sees as his legacy. So if he can defeat the Islamic Republic of Iran or denuclearize it as he puts it,

that's going to be for him. That that will trump no pun intended. Republicans losing perhaps both houses. Right? It just doesn't care.

But they, of course, care. And they're very nervous and worried. And which is why they want the Iran war to add.

“Any other thoughts on the latest from the Iran war?”

And this is, you know, more kinetic action this week.

And we've seen in a little bit.

We had targets in Iran on Tuesday. To run fire missiles and drones at sites across the region yesterday. Yeah. I mean, look, I said at the beginning of this thing, you're in for a penny, you're in for a pound.

It's easy to start a war like this, but it's going to be incredibly difficult to get out of it. And once they close the straight to foremost, that's not. You know, that's not a motive for any of the United States can live with because, you know, 20% of the world's oil supply

bypasses that waterway. We can't allow the Irish you see to take it hostage. But, you know, our strategy thus far has failed. I said, the blockade is operationally speaking. It's being met with some success.

But I don't see this thing being wrapped up. And, you know, I said at the beginning, the Israelis have this doctrine called mowing with the law. Or mowing the grass, right? So they have a conflict with an adversary.

It's either a state like Iran or a non-state actor, his balla Hamas. And they don't try to strategically destroy the adversary. They contain them. And they contain them when they feel they're being armed with weapons

that are just not sustainable for the Israelis to allow them to be armed with. They go in and they bomb. And they do this periodically. You know, they did this in Syria for 10 years during the Syrian civil war. The Israelis would bomb his balla and IRGC weapons transfer

is going to his balla. And they did this with impunity. I think the American strategy and I saw Axios reported some U.S. official called it mowing the law. So the question is, how long can we allow this law

mowing operation to continue? Because as I said, our resources are very straightened. We're running out of munitions. If we expanded 100 patriot interceptors in one night and we're down to like 500 of them.

Do the math. How many of these sort of, you know, tick for tap exchanges? Five nights. Yeah.

Yeah. Unless we start knocking on the doors of our allies

“and saying you must give us your interceptors.”

Oh, and by the way, the Russians might invade you. So you're on your own if that happens. You see? Yeah. There's a Wall Street Journal report that like

that this was really impacting Russia's thinking on some of this stuff about attacks. How could it not? If you're, if you're Putin. If you're she.

I mean, you're sitting there saying, okay, well, our adversary is running out of kit. So now is the time to start probing, getting provocative and seeing what we can get away with. So for, for a guy like Putin, for rack lift to go to,

to Moscow. By the way, according to Russian media, he was meant to meet with Putin and Putin declined the meeting. Because he had told Norwegian and Bortnikov,

the heads of the SVR and the FSB, the wars is going misery. Putin doesn't want to hear this. Putin doesn't believe this because he's being lied to, by his generals and by his intelligence services,

the wars going fight. He just has to fight for time, press on, and eventually all of done boss will fall. If you're Putin now, the intelligence you're being fed, which is accurate.

It's credible is that the United States does not have the resources to sustain this war in Iran indefinitely. Much less do they have the resources to sell

to third parties, NATO allies in Europe

to then donate that kit to the Ukrainians. So this is why the Russians are escalating their missile attacks

“on key even other population centers on a nightly basis.”

Because they know that we don't have the missiles to give the Ukrainians. According to one Senate Armed Services Committee source I've talked to, they need about 200 plus interceptors to withstand the winter. They're not going to get anything close to them.

So a lot of people are going to die in Ukraine. Now I say that, and I don't mean what I'm going to say next, I don't mean to be callous or cynical. I'm just kind of giving you an objective reading. That fact does not change the military dynamics at the front.

Because these missiles are not being directed at Ukrainian soldiers. And that front is largely governed by unmanned systems drones. But it does affect the humanitarian crisis. Citizens, people in Kiev. Correct.

He has brutal, and I don't know. You mentioned earlier that there's a lot of ghost ships and such going through the straight. And so there is analysis saying that we're at what two-thirds. So I even saw one person said three-fourths before the war.

But it's still the cost is so high.

Correct.

Insurance costs.

And if you look at oil prices right now, they're back up over 90 dollars of barrel.

And it's like, who wants to do this?

“Who wants to ride a ghost ship through the Omanee side of the straight-of-armus?”

So there's a chance that the Iranians are going to fire drone at you. Right. And I mean, you've seen the reporting on the state of the USS Lincoln, and the morale and the mass sort of psychological state of the sailors. And by me, I'd pour things just pulled into port and Thailand. I mean, you won't hear from them for a while.

It's going to make hangover part two, look like a fucking walk-through kindergarten. Yeah, no. I mean, these things have costs, right? We're paying for this blockade on an hourly basis. But also our servicemen and women in the field are, they're not seeing their families. And they're being rotated in and out.

But a lot of them being told, you're going to be in there till 2027. And of course, this doesn't even account for the fact that in these little series of escalations. I mean, what if the Iranians hit a ship and kill dozens of American sailors? Yeah. That's the kind of thing where I could see Trump.

And I could see General Kane. And I could see whoever's left in the Pentagon to hold our military together, saying we have to put boots on the ground, right? So yeah. Yeah, this is not happy times right here.

“Another uplifting report from Michael Weiss.”

Abraham Lincoln sailors, when you hit port in Thailand. If you see Sam Rockwell's character from White Lotus season three, go the other way. Yeah, that's just a trouble. That's just a problem. Yeah.

My love to mark. I'm very excited about the new show. Thanks, man. Order in the spy. Everybody here ready for it.

It is going to be great. Up next, we're doing some politics with my friend Roderick Apple. [Music] On and there are over 2,013. We're done with the news.

The biggest advantage of the show is that we don't need any technical evidence for it. We all know about the background and the front end. And as soon as we're done with the online show. If your show is ready, then your platform will be ready for the real show. It's just the main thing.

Our whole show is ready for the show. Now we're going to show the show. [Music] Alright, we are back.

“She is a rapid response director for Majority Democrats.”

I definitely can't be growing the Democratic Party so that it can compete everywhere. Previously she was the White House's director of Black Media during the Biden administration. She worked for Pete and a bunch of other campaigns. It's Rederick Apple Lighter just wrote to me. What's up, bro?

Hey Tim, how are you? I'm doing great. Thank you for doing this. I already guessed you up in the intro. So we don't need to go over that.

But we'd like you to introduce you to people. Maybe give us a little bit of your political origin story. How you got into all this. How you ended up in South Bend. And I checked your link in this morning.

I knew it was early, but April 2019. So you were the one of the OGs in South Bend. Yes. So I took a very long career short. I got my start as an obstacle researcher and actually transitioned to comms over this campaign.

I was one of the first hires because I am a psycho and sent my resume cold to every jobs at info at for all of the exploratory campaigns.

So I was like 20 of them. I was like, I've worked at every level of campaign except for presidential. So it is happening this cycle. Liz called me out of the blue and the rest is kind of history. Pete actually left me a voicemail when I accepted the offer.

It was it was that early in the campaign. He got his own name wrong in the voicemail, which was kind of funny. And the judge. He missed pronounced. He dripped over a little bit.

And as someone with a difficult name, I get it. So we won't hold that against him. But yep, April 2019. I was in South Bend a couple days before the launch. And gotten to the rocket ship.

And then that's kind of how it remained until we dropped out in March of 2020. Which family are your friends? Like this is crazy. The gay South Bend mayor. Like what are you doing?

You're going to send us some last place. Yeah, I was, you know, I told my boyfriend at the time. I was like, hey, I'll be back in six weeks. This is, I don't even know who this guy is. But it ended up being such an incredible ride.

I still talk to a lot of people I worked with every single day. What were they? Like Pete and Chaston Mike in the early days. Do you have any fun behind the scenes? Goss for me.

Yeah, I mean, the same as they are now. Which is really heartening to see in this line of work. A lot of people switch apps when they get more eyeballs on them.

But Pete and Chaston have always been unbelievably sincere.

You know, there are so many different things to point to. But anytime he or Chaston or the dogs were in the office, it was just, it felt like he were the only person in the room.

He had to kind of go around to all of our pods and ask us how things were loo...

What are some things that we're hearing online and things that he should be thinking about ahead of the next debate.

But yeah, I was the keeper of his debate Bible, which beyond the book was just the catalog of drama between all of the other campaigns happening. So he would know what to jump in and what to jump out. And so being one of the last people, he would kind of hear from before getting on stages of personal importance today. Yeah, keeper of the tea.

Did you ever get drunk brunch with Chaston? You know, do you have any drunk Chaston stories? I do not know. We tried to let them have normal lives as much as possible. Okay.

I have drunk Jeff's story. So I was going to trade one for one. But we'll do it another day. All right. Let's talk about the news.

Yesterday, there was some weirdness on the hill. Like, there was some drama over a rule vote. Anytime someone talks about a vote on the rule, I immediately start to pass out. So I like it's soon about a lot of nonsense to me. The thing that I did notice was, um, uh, built Christmas.

I talked about this on Monday. The house did vote to pass.

It's like bipartisan continuing resolution, which, which basically funds the government

off to the election. A couple of no votes from friends of the pot. Brendan Boyle, friend of the pot majority dam, Robert Garcia. But a lot of dams voted for it. I don't really get it.

It's like my personal take on it is. I just, I, I feel like there should be more foot on the gas pedal. More aggression, more, you know, using every tool in the toolkit to, like, draw attention to the corruption and all the stupid shit we're funding. And just really fun on principle.

It's been like, I'm not funding this fucking corrupt government. The counter arguing to that is kind of basically like, well, things are going well. Like, we don't, who the hell now? So you have a government shutdown. We could be blamed and, and, you know, we don't want to rock the boat.

You know, whether about that vote in particular in general, like my concern is sort of about like this pre-vent defense. I think they'll call it on Monday. Like, what, what do you think about all that?

“And like, how the, how the dam should be hand by the next couple of months?”

Yeah. I mean, I think there's a real reticence to rock the boat a little bit, especially from leadership. I mean, we've been conducting focus groups across the country. And I'm shocked as someone that's been doing this for a minute.

How specifically voters are naming. And these are everyday voters. These are not freaks like you and me. These are people that are just living their lives. And, and feeling how the Trump administration and how congressional Republicans have been impacting

their lives. And they are naming and shaming quite specifically. So, I mean, to put myself in, like, what, specific, like tearoffs, like the ballroom.

So, one of the first questions that it's that is asked is, you know, how are you feeling about

the economy in the world? And they're like, well, the Iran war, it makes my gas expensive. I go to the grocery store. It's expensive. Health care is up.

All of these cost of living issues are making or putting the squeeze in me and my family and my communities. And it's because Trump is not addressing any of these things and getting us into long, drawn out conflicts.

“So, the fact that people can name that, I think, has Democrats in a situation of maybe”

we should just continue to let the main thing be the main thing. And not get to involved in procedural fights that, honestly, for the most part, end up making Democrats look bad. The last shutdown that we had was over healthcare, which voters gave that to us of, like, oh, you know, this is a win, right?

It was a win. But when you drag it out, especially as we're in the middle of an affordability crisis, I think it makes it kind of hard to square that with Democrats, also saying that they're trying to make your lives more affordable. And the party that's in the minority tends to do the one that takes the blame when you

have long drawn out shutdowns. And if you're going to instigate one, you know, eight to nine weeks out from election day, I don't see the how that helps. Democrats show how they're going to actually be fun. I'm in yellow mode.

Okay. I want to start going in, like, multiple guns blazing, like, screw these guys. I understand that perspective. I think that there's a broader, you know, putting aside, like, that's specific point tactical, though, because I don't think that Democrats success.

And whether they take the Senate, it's going to make a break on whether this budget passed or not. But, like, I do think that in a mindset of let's not rock the both things are going our way. I grisks, like, leading, like, falling up short, because, like, there are, like,

these red states and we're going to get into some of them. That the you need doing in the Senate, the Texas is the Iowa's. Oh, oh, hot. Like, you could outperform Harris by nine points and not win any of them. Yeah.

I feel it's absolutely right. But, you know, the still have to show voters that they're actually going to do something.

“And I think there's not going to be a lot of patience and rightfully so the voters”

are going to have for Democrats if we retake both of these chambers. So, I think losing the battle to win the war, I do think is a calculus that's worth considering when we're this close to election day. Okay. Let's look at the Trump ad.

He's making life easier about for Democrats for going on offense.

'Cause he's not really on offense either.

I don't know how you'd explain this. This just popped today.

They're spending a million dollars on this to Trump's super PAC.

They got a ton of money. Yeah, I mean, they've got it. Yeah. This is the thing the Iowa Demons are the most concerned about the local strategists. I was talking to that they're just like, well, a historic and, and Rob Santorine, good

races, but like, it's a small state. They could just blow it out with money, just, just smearing Turk in sand. And so, to spend a million dollars on this, I find curious. Let's watch. We gave you no tax on tips, no tax on overtime, and no tax on social security.

The largest tax cuts in American history. The price of eggs is down 60%. I took prescription drugs from the highest price in the entire world through the lowest, which is telling the major tech companies that they have the obligation to provide for their own power need so that no one's prices will go up.

He's fighting for you every day. Help him finish the job. Strange that it's about Trump.

It's like a million dollars.

Yeah.

“I mean, I think what's interesting, I would love to, I wish I knew exactly when this audio”

was from. But I'm going to guess it was from a while ago, because Trump has been kicking in screaming. Not wanting to talk about affordability, calling it a con job, and a hoax by Democrats. I think this is the result of probably very long discussions of sir. We need to do something like we are getting killed on affordability.

And cost of living arguments, folks want to see that we've got something, and Trump said fine, but no more than a million dollars. Which if you know how much he has in his coffers, it's like a penny. I guess that's true. It's just, maybe even him talking about how things are getting better.

Yeah. Again, some ways, like part of that, the Democrats could have run. Right. Absolutely. I think he's got kind of nothing, and they know that they have to address this in some way.

So they're doing the best I can. What's it got? Yeah.

I didn't, I just think that any million that's not spent trying to turn.

Whatever James Tellerico into. Woke one comma, or whatever, you know what I mean? Like trying to turn him into like a crazy far-left activist, disaviliant dollars that I'm happy that they're spending on something else. Republicans are basically begging for Trump to do something,

and to support Ken Paxton and Texas and actually hence it in Iowa, and it's very interesting that we are not seeing any movement there. Yeah. And it's September two.

“Like it's kind of like, you know, I infer to normal people, right?”

It feels like, well, you know, the elections two months out, et cetera, et cetera. And I think we've seen this. I remember God, it was it all the years get mixed up. It was 2020 now where Adelson came in really, really late and spent, like a ton of money for Trump in the last couple of weeks.

Obviously that didn't end up working by and wins. But like, you know, the Texas has so many media markets. I guess they're kind of like losing valuable time here to use that or chest. It seems like to me.

It's a very expensive state to run in. And, you know, for all his faults, Trump does like a scoreboard on the end of the day. James Delrico has outraged Ken Paxton significantly. And there comes a point where you don't want to throw good money after bad. And that might be where Republicans are at Texas right now.

It's crazy. It's not plot today. There's a coin flip. And it just, it is really expensive versus Iowa, but there was this Atlantic story maybe last week from Ashley Parker about how Trump had a meeting in the White House for he's like, I want more ads featuring me.

And then this ad came out. So I don't know, maybe that leaked because they knew the ad was going out. And so there's some CYA, but to me, this is like this Trump ad is, if anything in that plus for the dams. All right, I want to go through the map.

Not the whole map, just a couple of the races that you have your eye on. And getting some of the majority dams races over in the Michigan Senate, though, first, where there's a lot of buzz around that. I try to be out of the prediction business ever since 2016. When I made some very bad, very public predictions that ended up on like,

mega highlight reels on YouTube of like, of like, dempundits crying, and now is one of the cries, and so I try not to do that.

“So I'm hedging a little bit, but I just, I think that the pundits are really wrong”

about what's happening in Michigan. I think that McRodger is like appeals mostly to like people that show up in the CNN green room, no offense. I saw you on CNN recently, but, and I keyed does. And like, you know, there's a handful of like rich Wall Street Journal Republicans

and some Jewish Democrats that there's maybe some crossover there. One percent. Like this idea that he is like a moderate. This has this huge crossover. I just don't buy.

And I think that I've do as a lot of skills that don't map along. What like traditional people, you know, want from politicians. So I look at that race. And I think that that race will end up being a clean victory for Abdulens, I think, you know, I will probably end up in closer.

What do you think about that? I certainly think this is the cleanest shot he's got.

I mean, it's no denying that voters are very much looking for fighters

and doers this cycle.

And he has messaged himself very successfully.

And I say that as somebody that worked for what this opponent's knowledge of tomorrow. He did a really good job of sticking to the message of, you know, money out of politics, money in your pocket and medicare for all. And anywhere we would go in Michigan, people were able to

rattle that off. It's effective. It's good. However, when he strayes from that, that's when he gets into trouble a little bit, you know,

this proximity to Hassan Piker. You know, just now getting to apologizing for his comments after a synagogue got attacked earlier this year. All of these things make it, they trip him up and make some distracted and spend time apart from talking about the issues

that Michigan does care about. Mike Rogers also very distracted. He's been going after all of this culture war stuff.

“I think any of the points he might have about, you know,”

the dangers of electing somebody as far as the left is a dual get really buried under all the Islamophobia and all of this other

stuff that he's wrapping this campaign around.

It's going to be hard for him to separate himself from Trump, especially in a state like Michigan that is getting particularly squeezed on this tear for. We decided to start with the Canadians getting squeezed on manufacturing.

Just a lot of these issues that it's going to make it hard for Mike Rogers to actually tell Michigan how he's going to be, you know, a senator that's going to act independently and not necessarily just be a rubber stand for Trump. He's in nothing.

He's offered no independence. I don't have any to work for Mallory in the primary. I know to shout out Mallory. I mean, she's been out campaigning for Abdul. We have seen that not happen in Texas, for example.

So, you know, good on her. Well, like what is your sense though, not at kind of the politician level, like the voter level, to make more of voters to Steven's voters. Like, is there any risk there any vulnerability?

I kind of understand there's some hurt feelings,

you know, among the people that know each other.

But like, from the actual voters, I don't know. Sarah's Michigan focus group. It's just one focus group, like, didn't really seem to indicate that the same thing was true among just average voters, which is your sense.

No, I mean, the primary was very messy, but primaries are also inside baseball.

“So, you know, I mean, the only thing I'd like to do is”

ask for voters in Michigan who have actual lives. And aren't like us just like pumping this into ourselves every single day. Yes, it looked very cohesive, especially right after Abdul was elected. I mean, Michigan has a very late primary. It was it was not even a month ago.

So, you need to be able to turn around very quickly, demonstrate unity to focus on hitting my brothers and making sure he has a bad day every day between now and November. And I think that's a very important thing. I think that's a very important thing.

I think that's a very important thing. I think that's a very important thing. I think that's a very important thing. I think that's a very important thing. I think that's a very important thing.

I think that's a very important thing. I think that's a very important thing. The most part have seen productive until of course then Hassan Piker through a whole bunch of cold water on that. So I think as much as he can focus on his race in Michigan and keep it about what Michiganers are going through. It'll make it a lot easier for him to show really good sharp effect of contrast against my projects.

Yeah. I'm bullish on it. I'm a Michigan against interest. So I think it's useful to hear from me. But I'm bullish on Abdul.

Any thoughts on Jasmine? What's happening with her? I have. Oh, okay. Let me find it.

Let me find it. On Jasmine look. She does not have to endorse James Taylor ago. Let me say that up front. She doesn't.

No. She doesn't. She doesn't. She is allowed to manage her legacy in the way that she sees fit. I don't see the value in having somebody who is like going to do half-assed endorsement work when we need people who are enthusiastic about.

She doesn't want to do that. That's on her. However, she's dragging this out in a way that is making her look bad.

“At the end of the day, if you want to just say asked and answered,”

I will not be supporting James Taylor. Thank you so much. I'll be supporting these downpilot candidates. It would be helpful if you could actually name those candidates and point to some events. You've been sharing up to on their behalf.

That'd be really helpful. But she couldn't manage herself. However, however, she sees fit. I, you know, I am a black woman myself. I hate when people come in and tell black people what to do.

So I'm not doing that. But just be honest. If you don't want to support them, then okay, that's fine. We got a lot of other stuff to do. James Taylor, who has been making very productive inroads with the black community.

The polling has been very positive for him. It's around like 75, 76%. A black voters will be supporting him. Obviously, there's still a lot of work to do. I trust that his campaign is sophisticated enough to do it.

I did too, very diplomatic of you. That's nice. I don't know. Ken Paxon is the other choice. I can't go back to that's what Trump.

People kept being like, well, I didn't.

I mean, I voted for fucking Hillary.

Okay, I started an anti-elary super PAC. All right. And then voted for Hillary. Sometimes it's like the choice of the choice. You're right.

You can do whatever you want. I could do what I want to. And it's insane. And she's really kind of embarrassing herself. Let's talk about that Florida race.

I had another country-oriented view from my kind of moderate rap on the on the Angie Nixon win. I thought Vinnman is really good honorable man. I know personally and he wrote really. I also thought the campaign was kind of like today's a goal. And that having jolly end Vinnman on the ticket.

It's kind of tough to motivate some demographics of the Democratic party. This is kind of like my just hot take view as an outsider though. I don't actually have any evidence of that. So I'm wondering what you think about Nixon jolly. Whether there's any hope for jolly in the governor's race.

And don't what you think about how Nixon's been running.

“Yeah, I mean, I think this is very emblematic of one with Florida.”

And two that this is a big, a tent party. You have David jolly who's a former Republican running with Glenn Graham, who ran statewide for governor a few cycles back. Running a very no nonsense adult in the room. Republicans are crazy and not meeting your needs.

That's very straight-laced kind of like quintessential Florida-dem campaign. It worked for them very well in the primary. And I think it's the exact contrast we want to see going into the general. And then you have the complete other side, which, you know, by your to your point like Altsmanman maybe should have one that primary based on,

you know, where he was ideologically. However, and you Nixon was the person who people were actually seeing. Show up to their union halls. And their women's democratic meetings and all of that. She's been a staple in Florida politics for quite some time.

She's a staple in a community. And she shoots straight. I mean, I've been really happy to see the no nonsense attitude she has when she's been doing some of the national press when they try to tie the worst facets of DSA's polish of like platform to her and have some piker.

And she's like, I don't know about any of that.

Here's what I'm hearing in Florida.

“People can't afford health care that their roads are messed up. Their education is bad.”

And they can't afford to go to the grocery store. And she's stayed laser focused on that when they try to get her on to fund the police. She's like, I want to defund flock, which more and more seems like a bay by partisan issue. She's been doing a really, really good job of staying focused on what she's hearing on the ground from fridians.

And that's why she won her problem. Yeah, total media training. Darryl Lee's on some of these folks should just watch Angie Nixon videos. Even if she doesn't win, she's doing a service for DSA. Candidates as far as I know how you handle this stuff.

She's been awesome. But there's also another recent Florida, if you'll allow me that I want to highlight being that the bench is one of the organizations I work with. Pia Dan Dia in Florida's 22nd district is running as well. I know nothing about Pia.

So just give it to me. Give me the. Let me tell you. She's a, she's a teacher. She's a principal.

Um, a private sector leader and a rising star. She is extremely passionate about why she's running for office. What she's going to actually do in Congress and she's been doing a really good job laying out how she's going to get that done and building the coalition necessary. What is the district?

The district is of Florida 22.

“I believe it's in the Fort Lauderdale area.”

Um, but. Yeah, but it's far. I don't know anything. Yes. So it got redrawn and it was a district that trump 155% of the vote in 2024.

And in normal year, this would be kind of a done deal and Pia would not be successful. But this is kind of a testament to the type of candidates that we've been backing across the country with the bench. Let's do more about that. Um, because that race. I didn't think I did an article.

A couple months ago now. Wait a minute. It's the Pia race. Is she running against the guy that's trying to rename 75 Trump highway? Yes.

That's correct. He. That's Casey Astur. He's a self-funded wealthy neighbors businessmen that his run before although very interestingly. And I think this is finding reflective of the dam starting to burst a little bit for Republicans.

He's been slowly wiping mentions of his working with Trump on his web. Sorry. Once you come out for renaming things, Trump highway. There's you can only do so much with your website. People remember that.

Nobody notices, but this is me outing him right now. We see a lot of these candidates. So as I mentioned about a month ago or two, I'm going to update this.

The primaries are finally fucking over next Tuesday.

So I'm going to update this here in a week with some other candidates. So maybe you can make some recommendations to me. But I wrote basically about that 55 is like right on the outer edge. Right. Like I was trying to look at districts that Trump won 53 54 55 52 many 50 seconds.

Like like where it's like a Democrat. And if there's a strong candidate. In particular, like this could be a wave here where you can win one of those seats.

I wrote about a bunch of them.

We'll put the link in the show notes.

As I was wondering, you just mentioned for 22.

“What else are you either working on or kind of monitoring that you're interested in if people are looking to kind of support these stretch candidates?”

In particular, because I think about the big swinging candidates. Like, I know that the bench you guys also have cake con leaves running its Mike Lawlar. That's nothing. She's going to put you money. She's going to have ton of money in that race.

Like because everybody's going to go in because that's a big swing race.

There's that like next layer like that Florida 22 that I think that I won't be able to look at. So is there anything else you're monitoring in that kind of vein? Yeah. A lot of overlap with the candidates that you mentioned in your piece. So it was nice to see that.

But it's the same forstag in Montana 1, Jamie Ager and North Carolina 11. Bobby Palito in Texas 15 in Johnny Garcia in Texas 35th.

Mary Peltolla running for Alaska Senate and Josh Turek running for Iowa Senate.

These are all candidates who are running very different races. But all in the same vein of building the coalitions necessary and showing their voters in their constituents. What they're actually going to do for them in Congress versus being focused on 10 year leadership. Whose name is on what door who gets what office just actually focus on delivering wins for their people. Right. One of the other candidates I highlighted was in the news this morning.

Brian Point Dexter Ohio seven allegedly in 1998. Legislative police. I guess we're, you know, going to some, some young guys hanging out getting a little trouble. And allegedly he swallowed a crack cocaine rock in 1998. Yeah, that's got to like cool. I don't know. Like that's not so dissimilar for my how my odds went.

Maybe 1998. But shout out Brian Point Dexter. He's one of the against max Miller. Yeah, I was for so I won't be speaking on the just. I was for just in general in these races. Like just is there any big picture of like from your focus groups from these campaigns that you're helping out with like. What is working like in these kind of red districts, you know, kind of besides like obviously I've been talking about affordability.

“Is there anything else that like jumps out as like candidates that are resonating?”

What's working is not getting caught in the binary of progressive versus moderate or Democrat versus Republican. I think Republicans are caught a little flat foot at this time because they're going after all of this culture war stuff that frankly. I don't care about what the economy is good. Like then they can focus on that stuff. But right now they're like, okay, but like cut the bullshit. What are you actually doing to lower cost for me and what has been so effective across the ideological spectrum on the left has been.

The candidate that makes that argument the most effectively of what they're actually going to do for people upon election is the candidate that has survived the primary regardless of, you know, if there are a progressive or a moderate. I think the binary we're seeing here is doers versus sitters and those are the people that are really making Republicans have to answer for why they've given Trump a rubber stamp to do everything but tackle the issues that voters actually care about. I just think having that outsider thing. I mean, it's a little I really sometimes, but it's like it's so it's what voters react to when you hear from them. They don't like in this day and age.

I'm particularly like they don't want to see normal politicians and like just sometimes people talk about it like the sister soldier context. I mean, you're punching laugh, but I don't even mean it like that. Like I just mean like just differentiating your brand in some way from the party. And like even in some ways, it could be left ways, right? Like we're the parties to tie it into corporate interests or whatever.

“Like it doesn't even have to math, but like you just see that that either it's bio, it's policy, like getting some separation from it is important.”

Absolutely, I think I think a good case study of that was the race that we saw in Connecticut between representative John Larsen and Luke Ronin, who challenged him not from the left, but just from the issue of gerontocracy, the issue of how older representatives don't necessarily understand the issues that voters are facing today and don't seem particularly open to understanding how to pivot for the world we're living in right now. That's the argument that Ronin focused on throughout the primary and I mean you saw in the results, it was pretty significant.

I have two more hot takes for you and then I want from you. Actually, I have no more hot takes left on you to provide hot takes. What is really to kind of what were the lessons from these primaries, probably because it's obviously you know any time one faction or another gets a win in a prime. But it's kind of a mix bag, right? Like in that sense, like Ronin wins, Connecticut or issue mentioned last night Seth molten loses to marquee where it's kind of a similar type bios of the two candidates. You know, I've dual wins and then Hong loses, right? Like so like you're seeing kind of a mix out there.

I'm wondering if you're looking ahead to 28, I know you're focused on Novembe...

You know, somebody might call you someone one of the 32 28. Yeah, one of the 30 people that run for president might call you.

You know, and say hey, you were engaged in all these primaries like what did we learn? Like what is the electorate want right now the democratic prime. And I go we're off to talk about swing photos now like the democratic primary lecture like why did some lefties resonate now there's didn't why did some generation arguments win and others did it in your opinion.

“Yeah, I mean, it really comes down to candidate authenticity. I think voters were very, very savvy more savvy than I think a lot of people in the built way give them credit for”

Of really taking the time to understand and I mean in a voter way, feel the vibe of the candidate that is running.

And the candidates that were successful in these primaries are the ones that did that most effectively and were the most authentic.

The voters aren't engaged in these ideological battles. They're not. They just want things in their community to feel like they're solved and at least or at least getting addressed. And being able to show some wins, especially going into hopefully a congress that is controlled by Democrats, being able to point to that is going to be really effective for candidates considering running for president pointing to their own wins throughout the two Trump administrations will also be really helpful. I think anything that really shows voters and I know this seems pretty common sense, but I'm, I'm saying you'd anyway anything that shows voters that you actually care and that you see them.

Those are the candidates that you're going to see emerge victorious.

“So I want to put a fan of putting that because I think it's something that is like actual wins like also over Republicans like democratic voters are mad at Trump, right?”

And so like I think that in a weird way, I thought it was a little bit with roads on Friday about how like the resistance candidates didn't do that well, whatever nothing obviously George has a new podcast coming on the bowl or platform we love George, I love being Goldman, but like Trump got back in, right? So obviously the impeachment thing didn't work, you can't see that say that as a win, right? And so it's like okay, what are other things like I think a lot of left candidates were saying, well, we're providing a new framework for how we can win by focusing on popular stuff.

And you saw and and broken in or some of these other center candidates that have been successful like they were offering, okay, well, I have a different path for fighting Trump that's going to be successful, right? And I think that to me is what was like missing from some of these other campaigns. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I mean, this was, this was, no, no, none taken. This was Vennman's downfall as well in Florida like nobody cares about impeachment like yes didn't work.

Bad for the arc of justice, sure, but at the end of the day people are like, what is an impeachment proceeding going to do for my bottom line and the answer is like nothing.

And so, you know, people who can actually say not just I opposed Trump and Trump's bad, but here's what I would do instead, here's what I'm actually going to do for you versus just help you continue to yell at Trump.

“So these are the candidates that voters are gravitating towards and they more more often not having to be progressive just because I think from residents have done a really good job with nailing that message.”

They have a model and they also have the whiteboard, you know, I've just mentioned it, I've dual had the fucking hat. People knew what he was for that matters, okay, final hot take you did black media, this feels like very outside my wheelhouse, right, because like I just, you know, it's it's hard for me to kind of like grasp like with the undercurrents of this are like Trump does do better with black voters last time than he didn't 20. Right with Harris at the top of the ticket. So it's like, is that just same economic trends as every other voter demographic or was there something to find in Harris or was there something to have the message?

You mentioned the Taloreco number in the polls, like, that's still a little soft from where you would like want Democrats to be like, what what's your take on that it does feel like Democrats. It's on the margins and it's mostly black men, it seems like you're like the numbers not like women, but like, you know, like you're still winning overwhelming numbers, but it does matter if this is the beginning. If this is the basis of the party if you're winning 88% versus 82% like that matters, right? So I don't know what you're what is you take about that softness and whether whether that's reversing at all or what Democrats should do.

It could be the difference between a win and a loss for a lot of these races that we're seeing, especially the very tight ones. I fully understand that the black community feels a little bit baited and switched that, you know, you see candidates in your churches and barber shops eight weeks out from election day and then you don't see these candidates are here from them again until the next time they're on the ballot. That's a problem and it's something that the Democratic party is going to have to specifically work to fix it is not on black voters to just show up to bail out Democrats every single time that we're on the ropes that just that's not how works and that's not what we should we should not expect that if because it's not fair.

What we need to do and this was a lot of work that I did at the White House working directly with black owned and operated outlets is engage those outlets way more these are outlets that fully understand their communities they write like their communities and they tell stories that are being overlooked by more mainstream type of outlets.

That's really important and then I think something that really hamstrung us i...

Biden Harris administration did for black Americans because there was really just not a willingness to kind of talk about it from the top like sure I can do by job and did talking to these outlets as a spokesperson but it was really important to the community to hear that directly from. Biden Harris because when you don't hear it from them it's not no one says oh look how humble they are they're looking towards the noise of Republicans saying that they're not doing anything for them and so I think that's why especially with black men you saw a lot of them vote for Trump last cycle because they didn't hear what was happening on their behalf from the left.

“All right, any mayors out there you're going to go find visit in April 2027. I will be no mayor.”

No, no one trans by LGBTQ plus mayors out there that might be there. I mean anybody is welcome to give me a call and we would be happy to talk to them about how they can work and further the benches mission going into the next cycle.

I appreciate you. Thanks for coming on the show. Thanks also my friend Michael Lice new show coming up soon reporter and the spy everybody else we back here tomorrow with my bestie field and.

“I can see right through the ground. If you want to be a spy, let me mostly listen and you must really see if you want to be a spy like me.”

The board daily is brought to you. Thanks for the work of lead producer Katie Cooper associate producer Ansley Skipper and with video editing by Dante de Chico and audio engineering and editing by Jason Brown.

Transcript

On and there are around 2013.

He's an old friend of JD Vance.

His kind of weird control

White House advisor, friend.

Reporters were banned,

You get the side DL,

Or maximum pressure as it used to be now.

If you if you were interested, it's strategically

Correct.

He had to kind of go around to all of our pods and ask us how things were loo...

'Cause he's not really on offense either.

I mean, it's no denying that voters are very much looking for fighters

People kept being like, well, I didn't.

I wrote about a bunch of them.

I'm wondering if you're looking ahead to 28, I know you're focused on Novembe...

That's really important and then I think something that really hamstrung us i...

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