Words Matter: The One and Only Way to Truly Defeat the Trump Crime Family

subbasement of the Ministry of Snark in Washington, D.C. and from other undisclosed locations

across America and around the world. Hello and welcome to DSR's Words Matter, I'm David Rothkoff and I'm joined this week as every week where the man who knows what's going on in Washington, D.C. you didn't think it was possible, you thought it was all chaos, but to one person, it all makes perfect

“sense and that's norm or insane, norm is it all making sense to you today?”

It's all perfect nonsense, but it does hang together actually what's interesting

David is, there are very few anomalies now, it's not like you can find moments where you can say, "ooh, they're actually doing something sensible" or "ooh, there's actually somebody honest" or "ooh, here's somebody with courage" it just doesn't happen. And there's not even somebody out there with minimum degrees of politeness and that's where I want to start, I literally just moments ago was watching a press conference that

“involved your Treasury Secretary Scott Besson, a man who when he was hired, the universe”

of pundits out there, left, right, center said, "this is a grown-up, this is somebody who is going to, you know, at least ground what happens in this administration with some degree of normalcy." And he was so kind of sending and rude and disgusting, and when he was asked questions about perfectly normal things, things that he should be prepared for, he was calling people stupid, he was saying, "I will not take questions on that," and there

is this thing that has infused the Trump cabinet. And it doesn't get talked about a lot,

“but it's everywhere these days, contempt for the Congress, contempt for the voters, contempt”

for opposition, treating the opposition like they are criminals, literally and figuratively, treating them like criminals, no concept of public service, no concept of humility, no concept that even the President works for somebody else. And I was just saying, you know, when they leave, it is going to be such a change of just the vibe of D.C. because right now, it's a horrible place, nobody wants to deal with these people. I don't know if this

gets to you, but to me, it makes me furious, they don't know what public service is about. You know, it makes me furious with another twist to this, which is, I fear that none of these people will be held accountable. Brendan Carr, the Chairman of the FCC, the Federal Communications Commission, is an authoritarian thug using his position to try to intimidate or punish anybody who criticizes Donald Trump and reward right-wing billionaires by waving the FCC rules for

how many broadcast stations and entity can own and, you know, giving an okay to mergers that he

shouldn't. And when he leaves, if I had to guess, I would guess he'll get a multi-million dollars

centicure at Wiley Rine, the law firm that takes all the communications people, the telecom people in, because they have no moral standards when it comes to any of this stuff. And Todd Blanche, we will get to in a bit, who is a fascist. Not a term one once musely. This week, today, yesterday, we learn that the Justice Department is planning to bring criminal charges against E. Jean Carroll for alleged perjury when she said that Donald Trump had assaulted her.

All retribution and Blanche announced he was refusing himself because he had been

it. And my guess is that Todd Blanche, if he's not disparate and nobody gives much credence to

bar associations doing their jobs, we'll end up at Jones Day, the firm that takes in, you know, the people who have blown up campaign finance and other assorted thuggery and give him a large cynicure. And the same with Harme Dillon, who has blown up the civil rights division,

“and we could go on and on. Scott Bascent was viewed in a positive light. I think for a couple of reasons.”

One, for many years, he was in charge of, or at least a major figure, a George Soros' fund. Investment fund. So people assumed that even if he didn't buy into Soros' world view, that he must have been a decent human being. And at the same time, he's gay. So I think people thought maybe he has a little bit of sensitivity to the problems of those who are discriminated against. It turns out that just like every other member of this cabinet,

we saw at the cabinet meeting yesterday again, every one of the, despite the fact that Donald Trump is clearly unhinged, suffering significant

“mental decline. The cabinet meeting yesterday, he went into a nine minute,”

crazy exposition filled with lies about the reflecting tool, which he's now screwing up and spending huge amounts of taxpayer money with an outfit that was not competent to do it, but happened to be buddies of his. And they all just sat there. They sat there, either stone-faced, or trying to look intrigued. And the, as the New York Times pointed out in a terrific piece, going into detail about how the cabinet meetings are all about

falling over and giving outrageous praise to their dear leader. And with Scott Bessent, now, saying people are stupid, going after reporters for questions. There is no doubt in my mind that what he is doing is believing that Donald Trump watches TV all the time and watches them on TV. And, of course, he picked half of his cabinet, and the Dan Bungino's and Crash Patels and others, for the cabinet, Pete Higgs said, because he liked what they were saying on Fox News. So this

is Scott Bessent trying to show Donald Trump that he is just like his dear leader, who, of course, calls reporter Bitches and stupid and biased. And, well, the White House press court does nothing about it. The level of moral decay, the level of spinalicness, the level of cowardice of the Scott Bessent and Howard Lutnic, not like I call him. And worse, maybe than any of the others,

“because he, I believe, really does no better. Marco Rubio, it just boggles the mind. Marco Rubio,”

just to pick one example, following on their nihilistic policies, is basically denying entry

into the United States for anybody with Ebola. Despite the fact that in the past, what the United States would do because we have the most advanced facilities to be able to keep people from dying from Ebola, which they do not have in the Congo or Kenya or these other countries, means more people dying for performative reasons, the same guy who presided over the dismanlement and destruction of the agency for international development, AID, claimed after this began that he had

issued a directive saying, "We're not going to take away any of the lifesaving elements of the aid going to foreign countries." Then they were all taken away and lied about whether he had

followed every action that was taken. And now, probably at least a million people have died

unnecessarily as a consequence. And it's all to be sympathetic to Donald Trump and to preserve the possibility that maybe he can win the next Republican nomination. How can you have anything but utter contempt for these monstrous cowardly human beings? To stay up to date on all the news that

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experience access to our discord community, exclusive content, early episode access, and more. Use code DSR 26 for a 25% off discount on sign up at the DSR network.com. That's code in DSR 26 at the DSR network.com/by. Thank you and enjoy the show. Well, you don't have to say, contempt is one thing. The culture of this administration is one thing.

“But you know, you get to a more important point when it comes to accountability. Donald Trump”

is not the sole criminal in this administration. Donald Trump is not the only corrupt individual

in this administration. His family are not the only ones who are shaking down the government today. There's a new story about us somebody at the White House directed funds from the Department of Defense to a business run by one of Trump's sons, hundreds of millions of dollars. It's not just about the Trump's or even just the Trump's and the Wittcuffs and the Latinx who are out there trying to profit from this. You would be hard pressed to find a member of the

“cabinet of the Trump administration. You mentioned Rubio. You mentioned besin't, but we could just”

as easily talk about Pete Higgsith or we could talk about RFK Jr or we could talk about you mentioned that of the FCC. We could mention Russ Vort of the OMB. We could talk about the people who had every cabinet agency and every single one of them is not just kissing up to Trump. Not just saying outrageous and offensive things. They're committing crimes wholesale crimes, ignoring the law, whether it's besin saying, "Well, I just don't see any reason why we can't have Donald Trump

on a $250 bill." Except the law says he can't, right? Or we don't see any reason why we can't go and have vindictive prosecutions. Except the law says you can't. And the point is what we have had happened is that a mob, a criminal organization, the Trump prime family, has seized power in the United

“States. And I don't think half of them know what fascism is. But I think all of them live to be”

corrupt, vindictive, mean-spirited to take for themselves and their friends and those who support them and to punish everybody else in our society. They don't understand that they work for us. They don't understand that the law's applied to them. They think because of John Roberts and the his pernicious activities of the court that they work for themselves and they don't answer

to anybody. And the we've never seen anything like this. No, no, you know, if you look at previous

administrations that have had scandals, there may have been one or two. Occasionally something that we viewed as pretty big tipot dome, the credit mobugier scandal, all the way up to burnt lands in the Carter administration and Iran, contra and watergate, of course, put all of those and every other scandal together from every previous presidency. And that goes back to lots of scandals around U.S. has grants administration and more and hardings administration. Put them all together,

they lag far behind in their blatant corruption of policy and of every value to what we're seeing in this current administration. And you're right. There is in a single one immune from it. Many of them, of course, completely unqualified for the positions that they're holding and let's not leave out a Craven Republican Senate that has confirmed all of these people. And now even when they're dealing with people, they know are completely incompetent

doing unblocked confirmations of 50 to 100 to the time so they can sneak in one or two who would

honor virus epidemic, the same virus that we know now can be transmitted from humans to humans

“that starts with exposure to wrathfuls, that killed Gene Hackman's wife, that potentially could”

become a big problem because it's fatal. They put in charge a guy who is a conspiracy theorist and a neurologist known for his specialty, Penile Implants. Now, Penile Implants have nothing to do with the Honda virus and then we've got RFK Junior speaking of the Penile Area saying that circumcision can cause autism, which I don't know if you're circumcised, David, but actually I do know that you're circumcised. How do you know? How do you know? Yeah, that's about you.

Yeah, I know. Okay, I'm so glad that we finally arrived at a discussion about our four

skins here. But you know, just returning it to your core point, you know, which is Penile Implants. Yeah, and the Penile focus of RFK Junior related to that and what you're talking about is that

“all of these people belong in a Penile institution. Yeah, has the only way to get them into a Penile”

institution is if there is actually an organized effort. And I think you're landing on something here that doesn't get talked about enough. And that is this is a crime family. It is a big organization, conspiring to commit thousands of crimes, using a host of techniques we've

never seen before because we have never in the history of the United States, seen criminals as

empowered by the US government as these criminals are. And you know, in our history periodically during prohibition there was Jake or Hoover and Elliott Nasson during the 50s there were commissions

“going after the mafia and there were, you know, you know, many haunted examples of people in the”

Department of Justice going after organized crime, the development of the Rico statutes and so forth. If we leave this to happen stance to the occasional US attorney or the occasional attorney general going after the occasional person, we're not going to address the fact that the country is run by an organized crime family. We need to have an independent body, an independent individual, a commission hundreds or thousands of people granted real investigative privileges, true independence for them,

true non-political status for them to dive into the records of these agencies to dive into and this will not be divisive and there will be Lord knows many of our beloved moderate democratic friends who will start weeping crocodile tears and talking about how we must all get along and Jared Polis will throw himself in front of whatever we're doing because there are assholes in the democratic

party too. And the reality is we need an organized effort with real strong leaders to go after

the comprehensive criminal activities, really empowered to do it and to prosecute or it's going to happen again. It's going to, you know, because it's, you know, Trump will be dead, but Peter Teal and Elon Musk and each one of these cabinet people is going to get elected and, you know, or continue on and some job or work in some law firm as you say unless we say, "No, you can't have a criminal take over a US government." And I'm just, I have no confidence. I don't hear

anybody talking about this kind of comprehensive, independent commission, independent group of prosecutors, something way beyond the special counsel statute that will enable us to deal with the sweeping scope of the criminality that is now part of the daily activities of the United States government. You are so on target there and maybe going circling back what we need is to create the

some challenges here that we need to reflect on. You know, there's a Jewish disorder. We have to,

“you know, you have to make a joke. There's very even little substance, it's like something called”

vittles, which is, you know, people who feel obligated to turn everything into a punt. And beyond that, we just have to make a joke of everything. I totally get it. And yes, let's implant them all in penal institutions. But for Christ's sake, we can't believe it's just going to happen, magic. No. And what we have to keep in mind is Trump will issue universal burdens for everybody in his

administration. And we need now to figure out a way to make sure that people are in fact punished.

And that might mean finding for many of them states that are willing to prosecute these crimes just to pick one example that may end up happening and to pick another cabinet member who in

“this instance is not only unqualified, but dumb as opposed Mark Wayne Mullin, the head of the”

Department of Homeland Security, who is now floating the idea of blocking foreign international travel airplanes coming into states with sanctuary cities. No idea that this would not work, but also be incredibly disruptive of the economy. It's not, you're not going to have an airline saying, well, I can't fly into Detroit. So instead of flying into Dallas, even though people are going to Detroit. So if that happens and then it gets reversed because it obviously is going to

blow up a lot of the economy. But if that happens and Detroit airport, which is a hub for Delta, and which has a lot of traffic coming in, oh, here, then Illinois and Michigan need to prosecute

“the people who implemented a policy that hurt them. So we've got to find a way there.”

The other thing is that if you're pardoned for criminal activity from being prosecuted, can you have civil actions that attach large fines for people who have violated the law, and at least old people accountable in some fashion there. But I agree with you. We need an independent body to my mind. We need the equivalent of a Nuremberg because the crimes that they're committing are so extensive and involves so many people. I want now just to pick one example of what

should be done now. There is this story of an American citizen in Colorado picked up, had his birth, he was born in Denver, had his birth certificate, had proved that he was a citizen. The agents laughed at it and deported him to Mexico to a part of Mexico where he had nobody there and no connections. And he is now suing to come back into the United States. That's not enough assuming he wins and they have to bring a back. And even assuming that he gets

a large settlement from the Department of Homeland Security from ICE and the Border Patrol, which is after all just taxpayer money. Colorado, the state, not that I would trust Jared Polis to do anything, but the county officials should find out rich agents refused to take into a count, look at or take seriously the documents that proved that this was an American citizen and charged them with kidnapping. Yeah, well you're right and every single one of those

said I heard Mark Wayne Wellen's repulsive remarks today and you know he was saying well we're not running a holiday and we give them the minimum calories and these are the worst to the worst

and the reality is 93% of the people who are currently held under detention by DHS and it's various

agencies are normal hardworking people who have tax paying and pay you know contributed to our society and were treated and received cruel and unusual punishment and every single one of those people needs to sue the US government and where they can identify conspiracies to violate federal law in order to harm them to sue those individuals and I would go a step further and this goes

that is going to be highly resonant is what should the Congress of the United States do

by way of post Trump reforms and I think that one is going to need a kind of omnibus package over reforms that have to do we've talked about structure reforms in the past I just showed the court of the bigger or should there be additional states or should campaign finance law be changed

“and so and I believe all those things are absolutely essential but I think that it's also important”

that anti-corruption reforms reforms against allowing people in the government to trade participate in prediction markets to trade stocks to profit from work with the US government but I think also we need to look at what limitations can be placed on presidential pardon power and we need to challenge and court the idea that a president can pardon people in perpetuity for crimes can pardon himself can pardon his own family can pardon people for

crimes the president is complicit in because that is contrary clearly to the spirit and the letter and believe me the Supreme Court in the past has overturned things for less reason than that

“and we need to you know go about this in a systematic way again it can't be drip drip drip”

in oh yeah because if these things don't get passed in the first two years of the next administration and then one house or another goes back and becomes part of you know the mega movement or the post mega Christian nationalist JD events crazy whatever the fuck movement it is then these things are going to get undone and so it is a huge job of work and yet norm I've been at countless

meetings with big powerful Democrats that people see on TV all the time and they're like oh no no

what we've got to do is we've got to focus on kitchen table issues and I got to tell you if there has ever been an argument that this government needs how to walk and chew gum at the same time this is the moment you can't just deal with kitchen table issues and not deal with the kind of corruption that is harming every single individual by a probe you know by making inequality worse by launching illegal wars by stealing money by you know providing regulatory benefits for

people who donate money to campaign we there's it this is a massive job is the Congress is it possible that the Congress as they did post watergate is up to this kind of reform task I am nervous even skeptical about that it's why we need a much larger wave here and we may get it although I'm still worried about how they'll blow up the election processor even move

“to martial law if I think they're going to lose because there are too many to use the cliché”

nervous nellies among Democrats or others who have their heads completely in the sand about the realities of what we have and what we're facing because we're going to need big stuff I'll make a prediction here which is that if Democrats win the house and Senate this time and you know we wake up

the morning after the election and the first week of November and say wow look at that

between November 4th and January 20th we will see Clarence Thomas and Samolito resigned and have the Republican Senate still in place jam through two Republican nominees who are much younger than those two so that they can cement their hold on this supreme court for decades to come and if that happens then it becomes imperative that as soon as the opportunity avails itself Democrats enlarge the court to 13 members and and in post term limits which are

which affect the current members and at the same time I want a code of ethics that is that has teeth for the Supreme Court but that code of ethics that has teeth cannot simply leave enforcement either up to the justices themselves or even the judicial conference of the United

police themselves now you probably can't take the ability to patrol ethics and invoked penalties entirely away from the judiciary what I want to see done is passing a law that creates an independent body comparable to what we have in the house the office of congressional ethics consisting of former judges federal judges and legal ethics experts that takes every instance as you pass a tough code of a violation of that code and itself makes recommendations for the appropriate action

“to be taken maybe you have to give that to the judicial conference but you require them to indicate”

why they are rejecting something coming from a blue ribbon group of honest people to you know

basically whitewash the behavior of justice we need real ethics and we need to broaden the ethics

reform so that a president can't just put in complete flunkies for inspectors general the inspector general the defense department refuses to look at corruption by Pete Hakeseth and others around him and causes the department of war which shows you that there is no independence here because not the department of war and inspired the head of the office of governmental ethics you can't allow that stuff to happen we have to find ways around it now that's right and it's got look

“if the democrats take control of the senate and they take control of the house and that's we're”

long way from there and you're absolutely right to warn of martial law every every other method they may drop but if they do they should set up a joint senate house special committee on government reform and fighting corruption that is led by group of experienced prosecutors of the Jamie Raskin or Adam Schiff or you know some of the people that we've seen before types or constitutional scholars like Jamie Raskin and it needs to be put in as

a permanent functioning committee that this doesn't get left to one can you or another and that from the beginning they need to say your job is to identify corruption to ensure it is prosecuted

“and to identify the reforms that are needed to make sure it doesn't happen again and the people are”

held accountable and it should put out report after report after report and wherever possible new laws should be passed starting in January of 2027 now I know that Donald Trump will seek to veto those laws but the reality of course is if the laws are passed

and if he does them we can get a second bite of them later on as he's you know signing up for

the corruption but secondly if the laws are written properly then you're going to have to have two or you know more than a third of the Republicans in the United States Senate for example saying oh no we're going to defend this baby yeah and get them on the record set them on the record and and make this a central issue for 2028 but it but it this needs to be a grand national enterprise and I you know I I've read about bits and pieces of it but mostly when I talk to people

who are Democrats I read about projects that are designed to ensure they get good jobs in the next Democratic administration and frankly John that's Washington as usual there are still far too many who think that if you actually try to hold these people accountable that you're just being just like them and that's not the case you are actually going after genuine open crimes you're not doing this

for retribution and rewarding criminals you're not creating a $1.8 billion slush fund to give money

to the criminals who work with you to try to overthrow the government and trash the capital and threaten the life of Mike Pence you're not basically using the justice department to go after enemies for phony trumped up crimes uh pun that not intended but you're using it appropriately what I fear is there are far too many who are going to say you know they going low will go high

not to work if you allow them to get away with this stuff if they can do this amount of open

criminal activity of corruption of incompetence of having people die as a result of their sadistic incompetence uh we may end up with lots of people dying of Ebola because of their sadistic incompetence or whatever the next pandemic is whatever it can be because you've got a lunatic who likes to play with raccoon penises and snakes and whale ads and dead bears surrounded by a bunch of conspiracy theorists who have blown up our ability to protect ourselves

from illness you know and and the reality is I think it goes much deeper and and and I have to say

“I know a lot of people are skeptical about this and if you if you want to hear more about it go and”

listen to the deep state radio podcast we did this week with Max Boot and Rosa Brooks and Ethos but there are other kinds of crimes we're just not talking about and some of them make people a little nervous but for the entirety of Donald Trump's time and office is president in 25 ways that I can name for you if you want me to. Donald Trump has weakened the United

States and strengthened Russia, strengthened Russian oligarchs, strengthened Vladimir Putin,

removed our defenses against Russ and espionage, removed our defenses against Russian crime families, removed our defenses against Russian manipulation of our elections, it removed or weakened the alliances that have have helped Russia, it there is a not just a prima facia case but there is a comprehensive case that Donald Trump betrayed the United States in ways that come very very close to treason they're not actually treason because Russia is not a declared enemy and you can't actually

call it treason if it's not against a declared enemy but they are betrayal, traitorous and they are

“traitorous and that's why the book I wrote the book I wrote a few years ago is not called treason”

it was called traitor for just that reason yes but but but here this this is is another part of this corruption he has sold out the United States he has gutted our national patrimony in area after area and so this is not just small stuff this is stuff that cuts directly to our national security the health of our institutions the future of our democracy the future of global alliances peace on earth okay it's it's it's it's big big big stuff and I just think you know

we've got it look everybody listens to this podcast doesn't just have an adjada or you know wants to look at the equivalent of those two old muppet guys sitting up there in the balcony talking

“about the US government which somebody wants compared us to the what they want is change and the”

only way change is going to happen is if everybody listens to podcasts like this reaches out to the people who work for them in the United States government or who are running for office in their areas or who want them to donate money and say folks this has got to be priority number one you've got to fix this because if we don't fix this if we don't hold them accountable we can't fix the other stuff you know you don't get it if we don't fix this the billionaires stay in charge

keep siphoning off everything else out of themselves and everybody else gets left with less and less and less a smaller and smaller piece of the pie so I just I just this update everybody is listening yet listen to uncle noir he really knows what the fuck he's talking about we need to do something here and I want to add another message to those working in the executive branch there's a word in the last couple of days that Trump probably through Russell Vaughn is planning to require

everybody to sign a non-disclosure agreement now why is he doing NDAs because getting back to what you were saying we know that there are incredibly incriminating documents and other forms of evidence

you know one example from today that we just learned is that there's a company that

“Don Jr the Trump kids invested in that was seeking a I think a $630 million loan from the defense”

department and they were told to give that loan because the order came from the White House okay we know that there's more there we know that the relations that he's got with Russia we have documents everywhere we know that many of these corrupt acts we have and the justice department is probably filled with memos and other things pointing out the vindictive prosecutions the willingness to try and find ways to let off their bodies and we know that if we

win it all if Democrats win it all in 2028 then from early November till late January they will be in the process, visually, of destroying every bit of evidence this is what Orban tried to do during the period after the Hungarian election before Magyart took over and we know that there were many patriots inside the Hungarian bureaucracy who made a show of shredding documents but before that did thumb drives of them so that they could have the evidence we need a signal this is why I'm

talking to those of you in the federal government if you have the ability the opportunity to make sure that incriminating documents that prove widespread corruption and horrible criminal activity you've got to find a way to preserve them to make sure that we can hold them accountable you know destruction of evidence is itself a felony but from what pardon people who do it and we've got to have that stuff available we have to find ways to make sure that they

can be held accountable absolutely right Trump sort of main thing that he does other than stealing for himself and his friends and his family and trying to punish those who opposed him is obstruct

“justice and the department of justice obstruct justice and that's why if there were any criminal”

investigation undergoing right now the first thing that would go out is a letter saying do not

destroy the documents you know preserve all of the records that you've got and people need to assume personal responsibility to do that working within the law if you're not sure what the law says go see a lawyer but by all means it is only going to be through the independent action of courageous people in the federal government that these records will be preserved these crimes will be identifiable and we will be able to see the kind of accountability that we need and we will also

be able to understand what kind of reforms are essential but look you know we've sitting here

we've talked out our our whole time we barely taken a breath because this is so important it's such a critical central job and no doubt we will talk about it again but we've got it we've got a stir of action on this one because there is too high a chance that it will not be followed through on and that the problems that exist within our society and within our government will remain alive they will be allowed to fester they will spread they will take new forms and we will be

dealing with this throughout the period of the next several decades which will definitely be if we do not do this a period of protracted and irreversible American decline so we get to choose is that where we want to choose or do we want to use the fact that the US Constitution has this brilliant quality within it which is the ability to reinvent ourselves to reinvent itself to reinvent the country to face the issues that we need to face and we have to this is the

“moment where we have to take advantage of that. To do that you have to listen to Norm Arnstein”

that's where that's where it all starts so Norma do you want to have a last word here before I say my last word just to follow on what you said is for those who say it's about kitchen table

issues you're going to do everything that David and I have talked about today because if you don't

“their level of corrupt governance will destroy the economy destroy your livelihoods do more”

for billionaires while they take from you and this is the kitchen table issue it's not just what

happens with inflation and in the next couple of months or the next few months it's about whether

you have a functioning government that can make sure that the American economy and the global

“economy don't spin out of control. If you remember the way you felt the last time you paid your tax bill”

and how much money that was and how painful it was and how much you had to work to put that money into paying your taxes and then you think that money went to pay for Don Juniors Beach House that

“money went to pay for Donald Seniors Ballroom that money went to pay for a slush fund to reward”

people to attack the capital that money went to billionaires who don't need a penny more and it came out of your taxes but also benefits that you expected to get like health care benefits or veterans benefits or other kinds of benefits that would benefit you or your family and you have to realize corruption is a kitchen table issue and it is time that we see it for what it is, see the scope of it and do something about it and it's going to take all of us.

For now, thanks Norm. Thanks everybody. Bye bye.