Ta-Nehisi Coates: Obama's Legacy in a Trump World

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“The people who have been in cheese, cheese, cheese, cheese.”

Now to the gratis test. Time for 18 years. The coffee and the coffee and the coffee are ready. The volume is now ready. Only so long the preparation is ready. Let's take a look at the production package and the cheese minus action. Hello and welcome to the boiler podcast. I'm your host Tim Miller.

Have a exciting guest for a pre-taped Juneteenth show. I'm going to the buy you tomorrow. So we're taping this on Thursday afternoon. So I've Donald Trump. I don't know. Decides to invade coat of war or something between now and then. We'll get to that on Monday show.

In the meantime, he's a contributing editor of Andy Fair. He's a sterling brown and downchair in the English department at Howard. He's an author with a bunch of works, including we were eight years in power at American tragedy about the Obama presidency. And it's townhousey coats. Hey, hey, hey.

Thanks for having. Welcome back. You wrote a bunch of other books. You wrote a bunch of other books. You wrote a bunch of other books.

“You wrote a bunch of other books. You wrote a bunch of other books.”

You wrote a bunch of other books. You wrote a bunch of other books. You wrote a bunch of other books. I hate when people do that. Well, I just picked out one because it's relevant today as we're taping the festivities at the opening of the Obama library.

Our ending. We've had some speeches from the former president, First Lady and others.

Unmay play a clip from in a minute. I assume you do have Obama legacy takes. And you wrote the book. It's been a bit now. And so, you know, there's been more time to kind of stew in the aftermath. And I'm just wondering what hops to mind today on the opening of the library.

Does he watch this show? The press. Because if he does, yes, I have to tell him our remarks. I have no evidence that he does, which is unfortunate. Because I've been trying to get him on. I didn't get him on.

And I don't know why he won't do it. But I didn't think he has some friends who listen. So if you're hearing this now, I would love to have him on and have a growing respect for him every year. I'd be going the other direction. No, I bet he does listen. This is his sort of...

I guess actually. I know, which is why it's upsetting is not on. That agree with you. Right. No, this is a sweet spot, man.

Do I have... What was the question again? Updated legacy thoughts. And he's opening the library. Oh, yeah. No, I mean, my thing on him is pretty much, you know, what it was at the time. And it was that...

Only like Parakobama could have been the first black president.

Only somebody like him could have been the first black president. And what I mean about that is someone who had the kind of historical background where they had been in intimate spaces with a white parent, white grandparents, who had treated him as equal, who were not racist themselves. And I guess he would say extended white family also.

Raised in Hawaii, which is not to say that Hawaii is like a non-racist paradise, but certainly a place. You know, I've been to Hawaii and the black white dynamic is not the major thing going on there. You know, as it would have been in Chicago, you know, had he been raised there. And so what I've thought is that that just gave him a very, very different perspective.

You know, and allowed him to see the best in, you know, the largest, you know, voting population in this country. I think he communicated that. And I think there really was no other way that you were going to see a black president. Unfortunately, I think the downside of that was I don't think he could have imagined the past 10 years. I don't think that that was really possible for him.

He could have imagined a, you know, Trump winning and then Trump winning again too. You know, I mean, maybe by 24 he could imagine it happening again. But I certainly think the first time, you know, he just, he just said. How does that lack of imagination, like what, what did not having that ability to imagine that? Because I guess that was me too.

How did that leave his presidency, like poor or reflect on his presidency? I think he did not see the vulnerability of it. It's so much harder to build things than it is to destroy things. And, you know, Trump excels at destroying. Doge was easy.

That's easy. You know, you went to president.

“You should bring somebody in it, you know what I mean to destroy.”

Obama couldn't say any money. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

It's not easy to say money, but I never took that as the intent.

You know what I mean? I never took that as the true intent of those to begin with. But Obama care is hard. Whatever you think of it, that was hard. You know what I mean?

Pulling together a consensus to, you know, help and build something that's going to be enduring. That's really, really hard. And I think, I just don't think there was an appreciation of how easily, you know, things

And so, if you had that appreciation, like what types of things, what you've done differently,

do you think? Like, I guess the reason why this strikes me is because when I was working on a profile of him at the end of the presidency, like, you know, he said, you know, and I'm sorry to keep mentioning this. If he does listen to this show, I know he's probably tired of me saying this over and over.

But he said, he said, look, Trump can't win it. He said, the American people, he said, they go for, like, they are generally, you know, a people who, you know, prefer an optimism. You know, in their candidates, you know, Nixon aside, you know, and so I just don't, he just didn't see it as a possibility.

Maybe for instance, you know, in this argument is made, but been made before.

“Instead of mad gollin, you get a Kataji Brown Jackson nomination, right?”

And you force it through, you force it through. Yeah, you can't even say this. Like, in retrospect, I, he was spent political capital making sure it gets through rather than assuming that, you know, that the norm's so prevailing. Oh, Tim, Tim, even if you don't get it through, even if you don't, it becomes a rallying cry. That's true.

You know, I mean, people who, you know, maybe are not, you know, as activated, become activated by this thing, you know, and I just think, his way was, can I find the candidate? Or can I find the nominee who the people that hate my guts will accept? And I just, I don't, I don't know that he ever just understood the extent to which,

you know, he was loved by the opposition party, you know?

And how active and how powerful, you know, that hatred was, you know?

Well, I was going to skip this clip, but since you mentioned that, this is the type of thing that Obama would be into this podcast. I feel compelled to prove you right. I'm okay playing something that he said earlier today at the library. Let's play the clip where he talks about how great Mitt Romney is.

“And I believe that qualities of character, honesty, integrity, kindness,”

compassion, sense of duty, and honor, those things matter in our public dealings, just as they do in our private lives. These are not, that these are the values and traditions I believe in. And they are not Republican or Democratic values. They're American values we can all share, regardless of party.

Values every president here today, as different as we are, has tried our best to uphold. Values the John McCain and Mitt Romney believed in no less than I did. It is our greatest inheritance. You can see why I'm loving him more more every minute. All right, what do you want you to make?

I mean, I think I want to wish I like your shot.

I think like the one has to be sympathetic first of all to the work of electoral politics,

right, and to the position of a president. And so like this is what I'm, you know, was kind of alluding to earlier. Like his politics can't be my politics and be who he is.

“It just can't, you know, he can't get up there and say what I think.”

And I don't have an expectation either by the way. You know, like I just, so on some level, I guess I understand the politics of saying things that way. I am compelled to also say in my role did the past. And I'm speaking, you know, very conservatively hit. Did the past 10 years of the Republican Party not happen?

Is that not what Republican values are? Like I mean, was, was J6 not not that. Not made in three times. Yeah, I mean, three times. I mean, so at what point is this a statement about who people are and what people are?

And you also have to say that like Mitt Romney tried to go work for Donald Trump. Like that's not all, that's not all of who Mitt Romney is, right? Like I get it. I get it. That's not all, you know, he's done other things that, you know, a worthy.

And so I, you know, I don't want to, but, but that's also, you know what I mean, part of the story, you know? And so this is not, you know, so much a slam on Mitt Romney. Whereas it is to reflect the complication of it. I guess to me, like you are asking what is the danger in this. And what I see in that is still not quite, this is, you know, my critique on my worry.

Still not quite grappling or not quite understanding like how bad it is and where we are. But there is, you know, a part of me that, um, Why do people feel everyone's better angels? I think politicians should do that.

I actually do think like this kind of like when Trump, you know, during COVID,

“said, well, it's only going to hurt blue cities.”

Like that wasn't just bad for blue cities. That's bad for like that, that is how you get 50 years from now. Like a civil war, like it starts with that. You know what I mean? And so like, I guess, you know, I'm, I'm, I'm conflicted myself in that.

If I'm, if I'm being honest, you know? No, I hear you. I'm also conflicted out because it's like, I hear those words. And I did not, I, I did the opposite initial reaction to you, which is kind of like, yeah, I love that.

Like, yeah, you're right. Mitt Romney, John McCain, we're honorable. That's nice. And then I heard you talk and I was like,

you have it also fucked between both.

And I don't know. You know what I mean? And maybe there's a way to do both. And it's a little more art. I don't know.

Not to nitpick. This speechmaking. But like, I mean, there's a way to do both. Also, most people are complicated. Like, you're not like, like, they have been honorable.

Like, our moments, you know, I mean, you can't wait. They really were, you know, honorable. And, you know, so, I don't know, look, look, as a writer, I guess much less interested in the heroism or the particular weakness or dishonor of certain people.

And the more interested in the structures that make them possible. You know what I mean? I mean, I can't sit here and give 10 minutes on why Mitt Romney sucks. So why John McCain sucked a while. Like, I can't, you know, they're probably very honorable.

I feel like they're talking about. Like, you throw in some books. That's in there too, but yeah, Joe Biden. Yes.

“Yes, I think, you know, people had a product of situations, you know, one and anything.”

I want to tell you, because it does time more directly to your article, that you hadn't been any fair. That we're going to dig into, which looks into, you know, what an ex-black president could look like within the Kamal Harris's campaign and in particular her relationship with activists in Gaza

and how that interplay negatively impacted her campaign is lead into that, though. Obama does start talking about foreign policy and tries to contrast himself with Trump and is views on foreign policy. And I think that the way he does that, he talks a lot about the structures

that you're talking about. And so I just want to listen to that and get your reaction to, whether this is a workable framework anymore, for how the world should work. And what I heard on every continent as president

is that when America, when American foreign policy lives up to our highest ideals, when we champion human rights and democracy and the sound stewardship of our planet,

“when we take the lead in eradicating disease”

and feeding the hungry and educating children, when we encourage cooperation between nations. Instead of trying to dominate and bully and squeeze every advantage just because we can. And most of all, when we show through our example here at home,

that even a country is big and diverse as ours can make democracy work, it turns out all nations, including ours become more prosperous and secure. And the world gets a little bit bright. The case for benevolent globalism, benevolent hegemony, I guess.

Yeah, I mean, I was pretty good. That's pretty good. That's probably generally true. The complication for that is, I mean, and this is what I spent much of the article doing is,

and I didn't notice, you know, when I certainly, you know, the last time I really wrote about, at length, you know, about President Obama, I did not have the requisite knowledge and understanding of the amount of times and agree to which we have not actually done that though.

And I actually think one of the things that we're really avoiding on the foreign policy front is the extent to which Trump is actually an extension of some of our worst impulses. That that actually might be the area where he's most American. Ben Rhodes has a piece that I'm going to quote quote from.

It's a New York review of Secretary of Defense during the Vietnam War. I really am getting back in America. Some review of his biography. And one of the things that Ben, who, you know what I mean,

was in the Obama administration as close as anybody to Obama for our policy, but what he comes to at the end of that

is that, you know, we have basically allowed ourselves to believe

that our, you know, mythology of good intentions was enough, but as it turns out around the world, they remember other things. You know, and I don't know that we grapple with that enough.

I don't know, you and Julian Casablanca struck on the same page

“because when the strokes were playing a Coachella this year,”

they did a little thing today. Yeah, they put up on the video screen all the things, all the people we fucked over over the season. You know, it's from the CIS, like over the last 40 years. And then I was like, "Reading your list."

And I was like, "It's kind of similar to what the stroke's playing at Coachella." I was like, "I'm going through all of our worst hits. I'll tell this worst hits." But why thought about it?

It feels like the case that you made there and Ben Rhodes has changed a part of it into this. The narrative on this domestically is changing. And like when you're last on, we're talking a lot about the power of narrative.

And I do feel like, "I don't know. I feel like I had Harris won the narrative that Obama kind of lays out there. The best of what America has done makes up for our failings.

And that we're a force for good in the world.

It was still kind of the dominant one.

You know, like there were people who disagreed, obviously. But it was still the dominant narrative. And it kind of feels like to me, certainly on the left, but even in the kind of JD Dance Tucker, wing of the Republican Party,

that narrative is being challenged and it might be hard to really ever get it back. I think that's true.

“And I think what, I think I haven't seen a polling on this,”

but perhaps I'm being too optimistic about this. But my general sense of Americans is, look, they may not understand the details of this or that. It may not be up on what arguments being made for what. But I don't think we love foreign wars in general.

In general. Now, we do it. That's not to, you know, exempt the country of it. And then, like, Iran is so dumb. It's so dumb.

Like it's so dumb. The war, the war, sorry, not the country. Oh my God.

Well, I mean, the country doesn't know.

No, thanks. No, thanks. Exactly. That just America doesn't. The war was so dumb.

The war was so dumb. But the war was so dumb that it's hard to mask it. You know what I mean? Yeah. But there's not any sort of, you know, narrative,

and Trump didn't try really hard about it. Right. You know, to provide much, it's just the violence. But here's where I want to push people a little bit. All right.

It was dumb too. Right. All right. It was dumb too. And look, this strong argument that Libya was actually dumb too.

That doesn't make codophia a good guy. You know what I mean? It doesn't make him okay. But, you know, Obama himself says, "That's the biggest mistake I was president."

You know, he himself says that. And so, like, Gaza was a lot of other things, but certainly dumb is one of those. You know? And so, and that respect,

“I think we let ourselves off a little easy.”

And I think it's easier to accept. Like when you talk about like the narrative changing, it's easier to see it with Trump because he's so profane. You know what I mean? And, and, and brags about, you know,

violence doesn't make any sense in the flag. And it doesn't make any sense in the flag. And it doesn't make any sense in the flag. And it doesn't make any sense in the flag. And it doesn't make any sense in the flag.

No. And so, that that, you know, lays it a lot more bare. That's right. That's right. And so, I think that makes it a lot easier for people to see certain things.

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I'm going to start with the article. You start with Fanny Lou Heimer who was, I guess you described kind of the hero and of the 2024 convention. Just like loads to her. Just talking to why you can start with her and how you tie it to the

broader critique of the Harris campaign. So I was there in 2024. And what I was aware of immediately was the fact that, you know, Fanny Lou Heimer was being praised and you know, everybody, you know, she's going to everybody's lips.

“But what I remember is that actually the democratic party did not,”

you know, ultimately seated a segregated delegation and did not allow her integrated delegation to be seated. That was the end result. There's a failed back in '64 or whatever. In '64, excuse me, of the struggle in '64,

that the democratic party actually didn't do the right thing. Yeah. And the reason why it did not do the right thing is because Johnson was deeply afraid of losing the deep silence.

Which he ultimately did, by the way,

or many of the states and the deep thoughts, I should say it like that. And then at the same time, you know, I was watching the people of Palestinian Democrats and people who were sympathetic to, you know, Palestinian cars there. Who, when I was asking, you know,

for delegates to be seated, many of them are already delegates. But we're asking for a speaker. And you know, I was made aware that they hadn't been at Arab Americans to be going to the stage since 1988. And so what I saw is I was watching this phrase or this person

who had been, you know, pushed out of the frame in '64 and was being claimed as his hero

“was another group of people being pushed out of the frame too.”

That was, you know, like my initial thing. And then after, you know, during the research, what became clear to me was that Fannie Wilhelmah was not just a champion of black folks in Mississippi and not just a champion of black folks at all.

But a champion of human rights, spoke out at a time against the Vietnam War when, you know, it was still not popular within the civil rights movement. That in fact, she was not the only black woman that did that. That karate Scott Kings woke out against the Vietnam War

at a delicate moment and against Johnson. You know, at a very, very delicate moment before her husband did, much to the angst of the SCLC. And I guess I was struck by the contradiction, of praising people who in their time were radicals.

Or seen as radicals, I should say. But not really living up to the example. So in the article, you talk. And there's a moral critique and kind of historical critique of the Harris campaign and lack of grappling with Gaza.

There's also a political critique, which is basically that,

that it simultaneously could have been the right thing to do. And politically, salient for her to align herself more with the protesters who were concerned about was happening in Gaza. Before I give any push back to that, I guess you want to just explain that point of view.

I mean, look, I'll just take it from Harris. Here are from numerous people that she pulled folks aside. And, you know, disproportionately black women told me this. And she pulled them aside and said, "And as far as she was running, by the way,

before I like Joe Biden and John, and communicate her deep discomfort, you know, and her deep feeling and empathy." And when I talked to them, afterwards, their thing was,

I don't know why she didn't communicate this publicly. So let me just start from the perspective of what my reporting told me was, like, what she presented publicly, was not what she actually believed. And I could be wrong about that.

I could be wrong, but this was told to me, I heard this numerous times. I heard this numerous, it's not like something that I just heard from one person. And so the first thing is, I would say is,

"Why are you true to your own beliefs? And why are you true to your own beliefs about the value of human life?" Human life, excuse me. Secondarily, to that,

are you being true to the people you claim as I talked about with them, fan even humor, and correct us. And the third thing is, I can't give an ultimate verdict on whether Gaza lost her the election or not.

And I can't give a verdict on whether they would have won her the election. But I do want to say this. There are some things worth losing for. And there are some things

“that people will remember you differently”

when you lose for them. And I just think that had Kamala Harris lost and I was certainly a possibility. Simply because she echoed it and stated the beliefs as they were communicated to me.

I think people would think about, and I'm just not solely talking about Palestinian and Americans. I think the party would think about her a lot differently in this moment. I guess I have two thoughts on that.

One is, and this goes to kind of this broader question about like harm reduction and candidates.

before the election he asked me to come on.

He was like, I'm here in front of a lot of my listeners. He's a gay sex advice person. He lives in Seattle. He's like, I'm here for aggressive activist types. And he's like, I'm here for a lot of my listeners

that they might want to set it out. Because they're mad at Harris but Gaza and they're mad at her about various things. And he's like, I want you to kind of talk it out with me. And during that conversation,

he was making the point that like, I've had to be a harm reduction voter my whole life. Like up until just now. Right.

You know, like out in the 80s, my friends were dying. And I was voting for the Democrat because they were less so. And I vote for Barack Obama when he said I shouldn't be right to get married.

And we're not to go through the whole list. You know, and so he was, I think, rightly kind of frustrated with this notion that people were not going to do that. In this case, when the stakes were so high

and that the gap between the two candidates was so great when it comes to harm or potential harm even including Gaza. And there's no sense of Trump. It's going to be any better.

And so when the stakes are that high, does that change that question at all, or that calculus over whether there are things worth losing for? Yeah, I mean, look, I voted for. You know, I mean, and I told people,

and I went in front of, you know, majority Muslim and Arab American audiences and Taduk's blame myself. Taduk, which I did. And pretty much what I said is,

look, we, you know, as a black American general have not had the luxury of voting in presidential elections for people that, you know, we felt fully saw our humanity. And that is just what it's been for us.

“Having said that, I'll never forget, man,”

I was in, and this is not the only time this happened. But I was in Houston, Texas, and I was, you know, with the group of Palestinian Americans, very, very accomplished group

by the way. And the woman's house, who was hosting me, beautiful, large, large mansion. And she sat next to me. She said, you know, I'm from Gaza.

200 members of my family have been killed. And she said, I don't go outside anymore. I don't, I don't talk to my neighbors about this because they think it's right that my family be killed.

I think I choose every question. There's one question for, you know, people like me about what we should have done without vote. And the answer to that, you know, for that,

to me is very, very clear. You know, I mean, we should have voted for Harris, you know? I feel the loss of some measure of my humanity. I felt the loss of some measure of my humanity by turning to this woman.

And telling her, you have to vote for a member of the administration that was shipping bonds for this department. That you have to now, you know, let me have a conversation with your family,

tell them why you tell my, I couldn't do that, man. I couldn't do that. And I got to be honest with you. If I were in her shoes, I don't know what I would do. I don't know.

Because I think the thing we also have to face is everybody that makes a decision that we made. Everybody that make, like they're Palestinian Americans and Arab Americans who make the harm reduction decision. In fact, Kamala won the plurality of the vote.

So most of them did, you know what I mean? Like the plurality of them made the harm reduction as decision. Yeah. You know what I mean?

But look, I get it. The thing I would ask you is, and the thing I've been asking myself is, man, at what point do we stop doing this? At what point?

What is the point when we stop saying to people?

This is the most important election of your lifetime.

And you must accept things that

“you must accept the murder of your family members,”

the killing of your family members, for the greater good. Like at some point, like we have to figure out how to have a different kind of politics. Now, maybe that's not when you go in the voting booth,

but I feel like we go in the voting booth and then there's no discussion of it afterwards. It's just, you know what I mean? We wrap up for another four, another four, another four. Yeah.

And it's like, when are we going to do some different? Now, there's cheese. A new kind of reaction to the crisis of the crisis. Now, there's a lot of pressure on the people. The best thing is to have a free test.

If you want to have a free test, then cheese is cheese. Now, the free test. The number of times, the number of times, the number of times, the number of times, the number of times, the number of times, the number of times, the number of times,

the number of times, the number of times, the number of times, the number of times, the number of times. The also-tosed, deemed, emotionally, and it's just going to read the article. I mean, you tell some just really hard-wrenching, like brutal stories about people who have gotten out of Gaza and what happened to their family.

And I do think that color is the conversation.

“And I think people who've better serve it as reading the article.”

My answer to your question is, like, yeah, never.

It's never going to be a better politics. And like, you just have to accept it. Like, we live into a system and-- You have to read--

Well, I think better things are possible.

I think better things are possible. I think better things are possible. Things are possible.

“I'm not the mean that's like, oh, that person--”

You know, they think better things are possible. Fuck them. I think better things are possible. I think we can improve. But like, we live in a country of 330 million people.

Like, there's-- I don't know. I'd look at the way people communicate now with AI and the internet. And how easy it is to manipulate people and how frail we all are. And how much fragility, you know, all of--

You know, the demons that we all have inside of us that we're trying to navigate. And it's just like, the idea that we're going to be able to get to a place where you can organize a country, this diverse, this big, in a way that is like totally pure. I just think it's kind of a fantasy.

And I think--

Wait, but there's never--

I just want to separate-- I just want to separate-- Well, I just want to separate-- I'm not sure. I can't make sure.

I hear that. But like, I don't know, man. I just think that the 2024 election is such a strange prism with which to throw this complaint on. That I'm tired of people telling me about like every four years.

It's a big selection of our lifetime. Sorry. I get the only election that we've had in any of our lifetimes where one of the candidates was a legitimate threat to end the system of government that we have. I get the only one.

And so I got-- you can tell me, like, oh, we can look back at 2012 or whatever and say I was a silly thing to say between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney. And it was our 1996 between Bob Dole and Bill Clinton, most pretty silly. Also, we don't predict a lot of things. I don't know.

20,000 looks pretty important. If we start to play in the counterfactual game, I know. I don't go or when's that? We probably don't go into a rock and who the hell knows. We don't have Trump probably.

You know, I mean, a lot of little blocks fall. A lot of ways is to mean where the person touches one block and then something crazy happens at the end of it. You know, like who knows that happens without going. So I don't know. I just-- I am sympathetic.

Obviously, I would not look at somebody who has had 200 people die in their family and say, you should do this. I'm going to tell you what to do.

“I think we can also just say that the choice between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump was like the clearest choice.”

So we've had in a long time. And we probably not going to have a better one after that. I don't think. Look, it was going to mean. It was for me, but one of the reasons why I want to say two things.

Sure.

It is certainly logically possible that every four years it really is the most important.

In the last year of your life, but that is certainly logically possible. But what I find is that we have a level of sympathy for a certain group of people and not for others. And in this case, I mean like non-voters. And so like for somebody that's just trying to live their life and go through their day, I guess I understand how at a point that message stops a resident later.

Right. Like at a certain point, they just stop, you know, they stop, stop hearing it. But the second thing, you know, I want to say is like the choice was clear for me with my particular history. But one of the reasons why I went through the history of those events in that article is because I was trying to reconstruct the memories of other people. That is to say, if you are an Arab American or you're a Muslim American, you're a Palestinian American.

And you're in this country in 2024. And let's say you're 30 years old. What you remember is you remember about Iraq, you remember Afghanistan. You remember innocent wedding parties being hit by drones. You remember Abu Gareb, you remember ice.

You know what I mean? Like your memory is fuck man, these people have always over it. Like I get calls from our relatives. You know what I mean? Like this violence over there. I come here and the cops are like spying on my mask. Like this is just constant. Yeah.

You know, it's constant. And it was constantly for my parents, too. And it was constantly for my grandparents. And now here we are with, you know, and I can't, I don't have to stat, you know, in front of me. But, you know, with the killing of the, you know, the largest amount of children. You know, of any war, you know, in the 21st century.

And I see all of y'all waving these flags for Ukraine. And then it's me and I can't even speak at the convention.

“Like what, where am I in this party? Where is my life? Where are the lives of my family members?”

And in this case, look, I'm with you. I'm with you. Kamala was the right choice. But I feel like I can also say that and say, We ought to do a better job. Like we have to do a better job. Making people feel like we see their humanity.

And I don't think we did a good one, you know? I think that's a totally compelling critique. And I think a critique that unites the fact that like Kamala didn't provide motivation to people. And it just takes back to Obama. The topic has provided that aspiration of that reason to believe that they should help make their lives better.

And I think ties to other things besides gossip.

You know, you know, there's other things happening though. There's also the other side of this we're talking at the top. It was sometimes a critique of the, of the gossip folks, not the people there, but like the pro-pouncing activist crowd. Uncommit a crowd that like, it's kind of, in retrospect, it's easy to be like,

Well, she lost because of this, this my pet issue. When like all that advertising that went against her was about trans surgeries and prisons.

“So it's like, well, maybe it was that Trump, Trump campaign didn't think that's why you lost.”

Like Trump campaign thought you lost because this other stuff, right? So it's complicated, but I do think I think that you make compelling point about how to, how to think about these things from the perspective of people that, you know, are coming from a different history. Can we go back to something that I just, I'm interested in.

Because I'm not interested, because I necessarily think you're wrong. You may well be right, man. And so I just want to stock with that, because I don't, I don't have a, a real answer to this, but I want to go back to this, the extent to which things can get better.

Okay. It's not somebody that's the fact that, you know, and I don't, I don't mean this any sort of pie in the sky sort of way, but that in other democracies, not every other democracy, but certainly in other democracies, you're not necessarily,

you know, put into, not just two parties, but a presidential system that is not really representative of, you know what I mean of everybody in the country equally, because of how I, you know, the intellectual college, and how I, I just think if some of those structural things were different,

“I think people might feel differently about about, about their politics”

and about their vote. Yeah. I have two thoughts on this. One is, I do think, in this place, my like original, my former, it's been a while now.

My former Republican, like my salt small sea conservative comes in, this Edmund Burke and me. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

You know, shaking a lot worse actually. And maybe just like focusing on making things incrementally better, making incremental positive change is a safer bet than like trying to make big structural change and not seeing what the unintended consequences are going to be and not being able to predict that I should only move this thing

within this other thing over here, actually made it easier for the, you know, authoritarian, Instagram, power, whatever. So I, like that is an impulse within myself.

It doesn't always right, but it's just, that's just one.

The structural part of this is like obviously true though. This goes back to the like kind of narrative question about America and the force for good in the world and how the world, the best democracy. And one of the priors that I've changed a lot is like, our system is fucked actually.

And when we start going and try to start, I mean, Iraq, for all the horrible things about the Iraq war, shut up to the Iraqis. They've had nine peaceful transfers of power. They're on a longer streak than us right now.

And like what do we do with their system? We didn't give them a system with like ours. We give them a system with more like Germany after World War II. You know, we learn things about the nature of the system. And I do think that's right.

Like I do think fundamentally that's right, but it's like,

“okay, well, hey, how do you get the motivation to change that?”

And B, if you're like, let's say you're 28. This takes this 28. What you talk about kind of how Gauze will be a litmus test issue in 2028. But let's say that that person, whoever it is, has said and done the right things on Gauze.

And has presented themselves in a way that people will leave them. But that is an authentic view. And then they say, I'm going to get in there in 2029. What I'm going to do is instead of fixing the healthcare system or dealing with inflation or dealing with your particular needs.

What I really want to spend my first year on is we're going to do

fundamental structural democratic change. We're going to expand this, we're in court, we're going to, you know, whatever, you know, empower that Congress, we're going to, I expand the house, we're going to do all these different things. I think most people just be like,

I don't, I think that's really challenging. Like somebody has to really get in there and say, I'm going to eat this one. Because because people are going to feel like I'm out of touch, and this is some, you know, concern of the elite, right? And so I think that's, that's where I get kind of pessimistic.

The challenges feel such that I don't know that we, that we have another option. In other words, look, I understand that the conservative instinct and to some extent, I share it myself. Look, what I don't want, A is for another 9/11,

and B for another 9/11, where we stand around and look at each other and say, why would someone do this to us? You know, I feel that we are doing things in the world, and we are empowering things in the world, and we are empowering forces in the world that, that endanger us, and endanger humanity.

If everything Barack Obama said is true about the positive aspects of America, that, you know, people follow us and dial it out and all it out, what is A is a Trump done then? Because the inverse of that is true, too. You know, what is, you know, that, that, you know, long history that,

you know, I tried to outline an article, what did it do? What is it seated in the world?

a uniquely evil power to grapple with that.

It doesn't require that, but I don't know how we have a future going, like painting our entire lives. It feels like every four years around these presidential elections. Like I, it doesn't feel like a good long-term plan.

“Rotten I talked about this last time that he is on, and I think he's, he's really good on this,”

which is, you can simultaneously be able to talk about the way that our role in the world has been pernicious to certain extent, and that we need to redeem ourselves and reconsider exactly what our engagement is in other parts of the world. That doesn't mean we completely retreat, but like reconsider that. And simultaneously recognize that like there are malign forces out there that would like to take that power.

And then it gets worse. And it gets back to my small seat. You know, it's like one thing, it's like, is the Chinese just, is a Chinese-run world going to be better? No, I got the people at Hong Kong, right? Like as a people in Guangzhou, you know what I mean?

I think as the weegers, right? So like that complexity is there, but I don't know, man. I do think politically there's more space for kind of reconsidering this than before. I don't know. When I look back at some of my silly Republican stuff in the past, like the one thing that was the silliest was,

when we made fun of Obama's apology tour in LA. Right. Right.

Like the standard, which was like 95 percent.

You're all wrong there. Like if you go look at those speeches in five percent. Like you know, but we made some mistakes to hear there. And I, and I just think that people are looking for a different narrative. I know the ones that's more in touch with their experience.

Okay, let's just your third time on with every six months. So I'm going to get to see you again at Christmas. Which is nice. Yes. I look forward to it.

I want to end with the NBA, but I do. I feel like it's incumbent upon me to at least do one question of woke revisited every time you're on. Okay. To respect our people. I think we've got a lot.

Okay. Last time we were on, I brought up to you, white fragility. And you're like, fuck you. You can't make an entire movement. Answer for this book.

You can't. Fair. Fair. Fair. Okay.

So fast forward those since then. James Taloreco has become the nominee for Senate in Texas. Good man. Interviewed a couple months ago. Good dude.

Hard in the right place. Yeah. And one of the show I was like, didn't even read this book quite originally. I don't know if you had the book or not. But here's something that he said in 2020.

He's going to be on TV screens in Texas this fall. White skin gives me and every white American immunity from the virus. But we spread it wherever we go through our words, our actions and our systems. We don't have to be showing systems like the white hood to be contained. It's like, man, this is how the fashion's getting charged, man.

We're telling like, the white like a working class white dude in Texas. We can be back up. No, no, no.

Actually, the problem is not that.

I'll tell you the problem is. Okay. Don't talk about human beings as diseases. Okay. Thank you.

Don't let me do that. Don't do that. Just don't. Just don't. Look.

I'm about to know what. In my criticism of white people. You know, like, I don't pull any punches. I don't. I don't.

You can't talk about people as diseases. I just object to that. Like, if it was just, you know, us and our, you know, that that woke sort of

“secret society, we have, you know, when we don't let certain people in.”

And I'm like, man, you can't do that. What was the circumstance in which he said that? Was he running for office? He was in office. He was in the state legislature.

I felt this up. This was during COVID. This was during COVID. And he was talking about it. And he's like, one of the ways that we fight the disease is by saying,

Black Lives Matter. I mean, it's a fucking poor. It's a poor land. I don't, I don't have it. You can't just read it one more time for me.

Yes, sure. And if we could pull up the next tweet, I thought I'd have. They got the Elon Musk has ruined Twitter search. He's not even. He's not even.

He's not even. He's a lot of things, but like, he's really ruined Twitter search. OK, if we could find a follow-up, like, David, here's the, here's the quote that he said, James tell us. Who we love? White skin gives me and every white American immunity from the virus.

But we spread it wherever we go through our words, our actions and our systems. We don't have to be showing symptoms to be contagious.

“It's like a COVID metaphor about how with COVID, you should mask.”

You can still spread. Like, I actually don't understand what now I don't understand what it means.

Are the, and you're, and you can, because you're white. That's the metaphor. Yeah. And like you, and you could spread it. We'll read it to you from the start.

“So that was the second tweet in the third.”

The first one was about a lot, our very IP.

And he was like, he said, he's the latest American killed by the virus of racism. So racism is the virus. Racism is the virus. All right, and he, white skin gives me and every white American immunity from the virus. But we spread it wherever we go through our words, our actions and our systems.

We don't have to be showing symptoms. We don't put on a white hood to be contagious. The only cure is diagnosing the virus within ourselves and taking dramatic actions to contain the spread. Two weeks to stop the spread of racism. Uh, the first small step is proclaiming loudly and unaclyvocably the Black Lives Matter.

I mean, the guys hearts in the right place. You hate to, like, dump on a bulletin. Yeah, I mean, okay, actually hearing it. I understand it a little bit. It's still not what I would say, but for other reasons.

Certainly, I've seen in other discourse that racism is a virus. Okay, let's just start there, right? I actually think the error in that is the notion that white people are being from it. Because I actually think one of the most, you know, compelling aspects of, you know,

my heroes and the writers that I've loved and that I've modeled myself after is the notion that nobody gets out of this unscathed. I mean, look, let me make this very literal for you. So that it's not, you know, just, you know, Tana Hasi being nice to white people or whatever, trying to say something. You know, nice to Tim, what's going on?

Uh, hopefully I do say nice things to Tim. I'll take a look at him. I can take me and thanks to, listen. I believe that if there were one singular force that I had to identify to explain how Trump becomes president and why, you know, he's been president.

I would tell you white supremacy in a second, right?

I would not tell you that white people have been immune from the effects it had. In fact, I would tell you the count. I would tell you, I actually, it makes us all very, very vulnerable, you know, that it hurts all of us ultimately. And I don't, like, I don't mean it's symbolic.

I mean that literally, like it literally endangers everyone. It is endangered so much. Listen, January 6th wasn't just an attempted coup. Like it was an attempt to overthrow the democratic, you know, will. Of a lot of white people actually.

You know what I'm saying? It was like, like there were white cops who got beat up, you know.

“And like, you know, just as a matter of basic truth, I think it's important to say that.”

For politicians, it's probably even more important to say it, but I think as a basic truth. It's like, it's really important to speak in that way.

Not, you know, because it's accurate first and foremost, you know.

But like the damage to this democracy, that's been done, which will not be healed quickly. The damage that was done by Doge, which will not, you know, be healed quickly. Yes, white supremacy isn't explanatory for us for how this was able to happen. But the notion that somehow white people are immune to it is just not. I mean, I feel bad for them a little bit, you know, because as I think my way through it, you know,

I think I'm kind of being a little too hard on them. Are you? I think you're being a little too hard on them. I like it. I like it.

I like it. It's like you man, if you're running for office, you can, I don't, like there's no, your first instinct was correct. So I'm sorry. You cannot tell anybody that they got a virus inside of them because of the color of their skin. Like you can't, even if you're doing it out of good nature.

Like, I know, because a lot of people, it's complicated. We're both very educated people. You're a 10 year professor. We're trying to translate this. If like you're just a fucking white kid who's dead beat you and like you can't get a good job.

And you know, like, man, this guy was wants to be my representative. He thinks I got a virus inside of me. It's just like, and I just think that there was like too much of this kind of mindset happening. You know. Okay.

A lot of times out of good intentions. And it's not, you know, the worst people, the white supremacists are worse. But like we got a, you got a self critique. I'm with you. I'm with you.

I don't disagree with the critique. I don't disagree with the critique is not it. It's not I think I would, first of all, right? And certainly, I think I would advise a politician to say having said that I often find one of the privileges of any, you know, for any sort of group.

Is that ignorance, right? Like, like, ignorance of other people. Okay. Like, when you are with, with Gala's of, you know, whether you're gay, regardless of whether you're black, regardless of whether you're a woman, you have to know the people who, you know,

rule things and run shit.

“Like you have to know that culture and their history better than they have to know yours, right?”

And so with that means, you know, when you talk about race is. Why people suddenly become aware of things. You know what I mean? Like they, they, then it's like holy shit.

Yeah. And I didn't realize this.

“And, you know, and you said, okay, so how do I talk about this?”

And maybe you don't always have, hey, there's no guarantee you've got to have the best people around.

You talk about it. Be, you know, you just self, you know, don't necessarily have, you know, the vocabulary, look to articulate it. And so I just, I guess the reason why I want to be easier on him is because. Tell me what's trying to figure it out.

He was trying, and we're on a journey. I'm trying to figure it out. I'm trying to figure it out. I'm trying to figure it out. I'm like, I'm with you.

I'm trying to figure it out. But I'm also, you know, trying to not have a magic dictatorship. And it'd be nice if there'd be some people who are trying to figure it out, that I don't make it as easy as possible on the bad guys to hit him up. He should have done it. Like, how do you, like, okay, so I just, I've just placed with him, right?

So he's just, he's figuring out, like, you want it, like, a mod, Audrey's been killed. And you are not, is only within, you know, the recent history of your life, that you have started to see these black people killed or care, right? Just shocked.

Oh, my God, the cops do this.

Like, how do you know, man? How do you do it? And then at the same time, you know. And I have to get asked about the stuff. The thing that I was come back to, Jeb had a lot of stuff. We disagreed with it.

So there's one thing, so that I like to, which is that the job of government is that, you know, we're trying to make sure people have an opportunity to live a life of purpose and meaning. Mm-hmm. And like, that's a good north star. Nobody ever lives all the way up, but I like, I would frame it up like that, man.

Like, the mod, Audrey needed the chance to have a life of purpose and meaning. We did, we failed them. We didn't protect them. And, and the fact that he is black, contributed to that, and we got to do better. We got to make sure the people are accountable, and we got to start, you know, I don't know. And, and we, like, have a more of a positive aspirational way of talking about it,

rather than a wagon your finger at the white people hard to and good enough. I don't know. I mean, everybody deserves a finger wag from time to time, too. So this is not like a hard and fast rule. But I don't know.

I wouldn't have talked about the virus inside. There's the virus scared. You know, you know, the thing is like, one of the things that, and I'll agree with you on this is, I do think we as a movement, you know, for those of us who, you know, within that work movement, I still use the words, I put myself in it.

I don't know. We got woke Bill Crystal now. You want him over? Yeah. Yeah.

It's converts everywhere. We're working on some merch. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I'm here.

I'm here. I'm not going to ban it just because it's got taken. But I do think I'm one thing that would be more useful is when we use language that, as you and I just did, takes five minutes to figure out what is actually trying to say, we probably have a problem.

Yeah. That's not a rule for the benefit of why people actually. That's actually my rule as a writer. Like, as a writer, when I write things and like, I don't know what the fuck you're talking about. I got it, but it took me, then I have to rewrite.

You know what I mean? Because so much of our job actually is communication.

“I think there were a number of us doing that period who felt that it was not our job to explain things to other people.”

And I will say that, yes, for a lot of people, it was not your job to explain to other people. If you're a writer, if you're a politician, I'm sorry it is. It is. That is what your job. It is part of part of my job is to, and I had some conflicts about this myself.

But yes, part of my job is to explain people things to white people. It was not my total job. Sure. But that is part of my job. And it's actually honorable work because what do you want?

Do you want people to remain ignorant? Is that what we're saying now? You know? And that's good. All right.

Did you see Zauron today? After the next round. I'm going to leave you with it. I'm going to leave people with it. He was so fucking good.

The Republicans are so lucky. He was born in Uganda, man. Yeah. Because that guy was born in Queens. Yeah.

They'd be in a world of hurt. But maybe it's good he can't run no. Because maybe he'd be different if he wasn't. Yeah, man. That's true. He's good to talk about the next. I don't know.

You don't have any next deep thoughts for me. You want to leave people with? No, man. I mean, I'm happy day one. You know, I was a New York Nickfan before I was in New Yorker.

You know, because I was a literal spree. Well, you know, Alan Allen Houston fan. I was, you know, Patrick, you and John stocks. You know, Charles Smith. This was part of Zauron speech.

“You know, if you want to talk to a middle age guy and get some”

to feel emotions, all you do is just name name athletes and and just so rounded that it's not the part I'm going to play. But there was a period of like two minutes where he was just like, and when John starts dunked on y'all being, I'm just very well.

It's been said to be just like, maybe people, man. And it's like, that's good. That's a good speech. Yeah. All right, brother.

I appreciate the time as always.

We'll leave you for Zauron and we'll see you Christmas, all right. All right. All right. Thanks, too. I already got check out his article on Vanity Fair.

But there is one thing that the pundits just don't get about this team.

“But they just don't get about this city.”

It is in that point four percent that we go to work. [ Cheers and applause ] It is in that point four percent that Jalen Grunson, the same guy that so many said was too small. [ Cheers and applause ]

Proves that not only is he good enough.

He is the new standard for greatness.

[ Cheers and applause ] It is in that point four percent that OGN and Obi. [ Cheers and applause ]

“Watch as the ball flow from the top of the arc”

and start running toward the basket fingers reaching towards the heavens. It is in that point four percent that Carl Anthony Towns. [ Cheers and applause ] Find the strength to mourn his mother

and still pull in rebound after rebound. Make block after block. It is in that point four percent that Jose Alvarado shows every kid. [ Cheers and applause ]

Growing up in public housing that a son of Brooklyn and Queens

“can win for everyone of the five burrows.”

[ Cheers and applause ] It is in that point four percent that Mitch breaks his finger before game one and says go get the tape. It is in that point four percent

that Josh Hart gets rebounds the break teams. The McCall bridges proves he was worth every single draft pick. [ Cheers and applause ] That landry shamit pulls up from downtown.

[ Cheers and applause ] That every one of these 18 players transforms the franchise. That Mike Brown keeps this team believing. [ Cheers and applause ]

Most of all, it is in that point four percent

that the next do what New Yorkers have always done

when we are told something is impossible. We find a way. We win. The board podcast is brought to you. Thanks to the Lord of lead producer Katie Cooper,

associate producer Ansley Skipper and with video editing by Katie Loots loops and audio engineering in editing by Jason Brown.