June 16, 2025 • 45 mins
The Lincoln Project’s Rick Wilson examines the No King Protest, Trump’s sad birthday fascist display, and the rise of political violence. James Kimmel details his new book The Science of Revenge: Understanding the World's Deadliest Addiction—and How to Overcome It.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi, I'm Molly John Fast and this is Fast Politics,
where we discussed the top political headlines with some of
today's best minds, and Lisa Murkowski says it's dangerous for
us in the legislative branch. We have such a great
show for you today, the Lincoln Projects owen Rick Wilson
joins us to discuss the No Kings protest, Trump's sad
(00:23):
Birthday parade, and political violence. Then we'll talk to James
Kimmel about his new book, The Science of Revenge, Understanding
the world's deadliest addiction and how to overcome it. But
first the news.
Speaker 2 (00:36):
So, Molly, one of the things I feared the most
as being a pro union person is how much progress
we were making underbided and that the second Trump got
in that they would be doing everything they can to
call it back.
Speaker 3 (00:48):
Well, we're starting to see that.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
I didn't think it would be very high on their priorities,
And yeah, it seems like they're getting down to it fively.
Speaker 1 (00:55):
And by the way, can I just add the big
union right, the auto Workers did not endorse Harris. They
refused to endorse right.
Speaker 3 (01:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
One of the things that I think is very interesting
about union culture, right, now is that we are seeing
such partisanship of their ranks that the leadership is actually
fearful of what happens. We're even seeing that at our
mayoral election right now with a lot of the unions.
Speaker 1 (01:20):
Yeah, so here are unions, a lot of their members
are voting for Trump, and there people are getting punished
by trump Ism. The arrest and violent man handling of
the president of the Service Employees International Union of California
suggests that Trump is targeting union leaders for arrest. So
(01:41):
this is like right out of the authoritarian playbook, right.
You don't want collective fargeting because it makes workers more powerful.
You don't want powerful workers because it makes the president
less powerful. Remember when whenever you see stuff like this happening,
ask yoursel who does it hurt? Who does it help?
And with so much of this, Trump's whole goal is
(02:04):
to expand presidential power, right as we saw in Project
twenty twenty five. He wants to grow the executive branch
and shrink the other branches. Now, Republicans in Congress are
happy to do this, They're happy to give him the power.
But this is a really good example of ways in
which the Trump administration is trying to grow its power. Look,
they want to silence dissent, right Their labor unions are
(02:26):
trying to push back. But you know, they they have
really kneecapped themselves by electing Donald Trump. It's one of
these things where I don't know how you know, a
lot of this late the labor protection, the negotiating protection
is being rolled back right now at the state level
and a lot of red states, and at the federal
level too. And you know, these people, a lot of
(02:48):
these people voted for Trump. They voted for Republicans. You know,
they didn't make the connection between being in a union
and the Republicans war with unions.
Speaker 3 (02:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
So, speaking of unforeseen consequences, the washingt Post has some
great journalism about how vaccine critics appointed by RFK Junior
are going to limit access to shots.
Speaker 1 (03:10):
This is not even unforeseen, this is foreseen. Well, this
fucking guy was going to make it hard to get vaccines.
Speaker 3 (03:19):
We saw it.
Speaker 2 (03:20):
But I would argue that a lot of people were like, no, no,
it's fine.
Speaker 1 (03:23):
Well we've had people on this podcast who said you're
not going to be able to get somebody. Yes, that's
where we are right now. So Robert F. Kennedy Junior's
overhaul of the Federal Immunization Panel will create uncertainty about
how widely vaccines will be available. So these recommendations will
mean that the vaccines that are covered by insurance or
medicaid may not be covered anymore, because my man RFK
(03:50):
Junior will say he doesn't think that people need measles
or mumps, or rubella or chicken pox or all the
vaccines that keep us safe. Look, this is because of COVID. Right.
COVID made everyone lose their brains. A significant, small, but
significant part of the American population decided that they were
(04:10):
going to get tripped by grifters and snake oil salesmen
like RFK Junior. And this is how we got here.
So our FK Junior now running our country's house, we're
all completely fucked. Did I mention that we have children
dying of measles that was never needed? So many things
(04:31):
could have been prevented. We're seeing the Trump administration just
once again falling apart, elevating people who are incompetent. Now
we have RFK Junior, a complete grifter. Every day, we
don't have a pandemic as a miracle.
Speaker 2 (04:47):
Yeah, and you know a funny thing would I went
to Canada last week. I was very funny the subtle
shade that the border crossing through at Americans of like
measles is.
Speaker 3 (04:56):
Now on the rise in Canada.
Speaker 2 (04:58):
I wonder why, please please be sure to not bring
it here, Thank you very much.
Speaker 1 (05:04):
Yeah, the worst so by.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
One of the things we discussed last week is Trump
had all these tweets where it's started to seem like
he's going a little soft on Steven Miller's vision of
a white no state.
Speaker 3 (05:16):
And Axios has some interesting reporting here. What do you see?
Speaker 1 (05:20):
You'll be shocked to know that rich guy talks to
other rich people. Other rich people say, you know, as
much as we love the visual of your guys hunting
farmers in the field, hunting agriculture workers, as much as
that's fun for us, it's hurting our business. These are jobs,
(05:40):
and Americans do not want agricultural workers. They're tough jobs,
they're hard work, they're in the field. We can get
Americans to take like manufacturing jobs, let alone jobs working
in the field. The people who do these jobs keep
us from starving, and we're so lucky to have them.
So we have Hatum King a senior ice official. I'm
(06:02):
sure this person is a great person, sending an email
to agency officials nationwide telling them to please hold on
all work site enforcement investigations, operations on agriculture including aquaculture
and meatpacking plants, restaurants, and operating hotels, especially Trump hotels. Look,
(06:23):
this was always bullshit. This whole administration is built on
a lie. Donald Trump always employed workers that had, you know,
sketchy immigration statuses, always always, So of course they're going
to make sure that those people don't get to ported
they need them for these jobs. So here we are.
(06:46):
Yet again, we could have seen all of this coming
a million miles away, But here we are. Rick Wilson
is the founder of the Lincoln Project and the host
of the Enemy's List Welcome Back, Too Fast Politics fan
favorite bestie, Rick Wills.
Speaker 3 (07:05):
Man about town, the whole thing? Thank you? How are
you today?
Speaker 1 (07:08):
Right? Man? About town? If that town is in Florida, Yes,
under kind of kind of undermines the whole thing, kind
of Yeah.
Speaker 3 (07:17):
Speaking of Florida, I live, as you know, in the
middle of a giant ocean of red. Yes, and yet
somehow in the capital of Florida yesterday five thousand people
turned up at a protest for No Kings like I
had never I mean, I've lived here a long time
and it ordinarily the progressive world manages to get a
(07:37):
protest with about a half a dozen people on the
steps of the capitol and one weird sign. This thing
was wall to wall blocks around the capitol, which.
Speaker 1 (07:45):
Was nuts in Tallahassee.
Speaker 3 (07:48):
Tallahassee, a state that has been dominated by the Republican
Party for the last twenty five years, managed they managed
to have two sort of sort of scrubby looking maga
kids three blocks away hold one sign as a counter protest.
So I don't know what's going on, but that seemed
to be iterating across the whole country. Had a buddy
of mine in Billings, Montana, crowds in the street like
(08:10):
you couldn't believe he's like he's he goes when I
tell you, this is half the city, I mean it,
it's crazy.
Speaker 1 (08:16):
What do you think that means? The numbers I saw
Elliott Morris, h smart guy, used to run five thirty eight,
and he had he had sort of calculated the numbers
as higher than five million. I saw five million in
the New York Times, but Ellie Morris thinks it's closer
to more than that.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
Yeah he said. I think he said something like it
could be up to thirteen million people, yes, which is nuts.
Speaker 1 (08:41):
So up to thirteen million people gets us to a
level where about we're almost too I think a little
bit less than one percent of the of America protesting.
Speaker 3 (08:55):
That's what they call the Color Revolution line. When you
have one or two percent of the population out protesting,
the deer leaders have lost a lot of power.
Speaker 1 (09:07):
And some are saying, I'm going to use a jesse
Can in fact check here. Uh. Some are saying that
this was the biggest protest in American history.
Speaker 3 (09:17):
Listen, I could I could make that argument. I think there.
I think there was something yesterday in the air across
the country. I think there was a little bit of
whistling past the graveyard at first, like people are like,
oh god, what if it doesn't turn out? What if
this doesn't work? And and it was. It was bonkers everywhere.
Speaker 1 (09:36):
And I was nuts. So I was in Nantucket because
I have a book that just came out, which I
don't know if.
Speaker 3 (09:45):
Do you do people know about it? Is it a
New York Times bestseller? Yes?
Speaker 1 (09:49):
It is number six on the combined list. I have
to tell you there are no words for the level
of thrill. But anyway, I was in it. But you know,
it's I'm the meme where it's like the world is
burning down and I'm like, so I have a book,
but but but I was in Nantucket for this book.
For Nantucket is known to be well in the Northeast,
(10:12):
a very Republican island, so much so that the guy
sitting in front of me was wearing a Trump a
Trump golf club a shirt that had a sort of
small insignia that said Trump Jupiter or whatever. But I
want to talk about this. It was a huge protest
in Nantucket, which is a Republican island. So it is
(10:34):
really does feel like these places where you don't expect
to see protests, we're seeing big right test.
Speaker 3 (10:40):
Right. I think this happened to the surprise of a
lot of the Maga folks yesterday because the gigantic Maga
media machine was in full throttle, like there's no there
are no there, nobody's at the no Kings rallies, there
are no no Kings rallies whatsoever. No one's out at all,
but five million people are in Washington for President's Military
(11:01):
dictatorship Parade.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
Right, so let's talk about the military dictatorship parade, because
there's a really smart thing. I saw that the individual
No Kings Rally organizers wrote on their website which said,
and even Axios, which is known to.
Speaker 3 (11:24):
Not be not exactly like friend of progressive politics, Axios.
Speaker 1 (11:29):
Yes exactly, said that the people they wanted to provide
a kind of counter programming and not a competition, and
that's why they didn't go to Washington, DC. Right. They
stayed away because they didn't because they wanted to sort
of dominate the news cycle and provide an alternative narrative
(11:50):
versus a sort of combative program, right, program around trump Ism,
which I think is really an important thought when you're
talking about sort of permeating the discourse.
Speaker 3 (12:04):
Look, I think I think that that the grassroots energy
in this thing was so unique and it's and I will,
I will, you know, went back to my my experience
at at one of these yesterday, I actually saw three
or four of my Republican friends who aren't even like
people I would have thought like, oh, he's a never trumper.
(12:26):
I was surprised. I talked to one guy I was like,
I'm shocked to see you here, he goes, I'm just done.
And I think that they that they correctly calibrated. That
did we get a broader uplift from this if it
didn't feel like it was just like one more sort
of generic fuck Trump thing, and you opened it up
and people felt a lot more sans of community about it.
(12:46):
I just I don't go to a lot of marches
and shit, but yeah, this was impressive and it was optimistic,
and there were a lot of American flags flying and
a lot of people who who who got the memo,
who stood the assignment as they say.
Speaker 1 (13:02):
I want to talk about UH disinformation because it is
really important when we talk about these protests to talk
about Twitter and what happened on Twitter and the political violence.
The woman and her husband.
Speaker 3 (13:17):
Minnesota former former House majority leader in the.
Speaker 1 (13:20):
Former House majority leader Melissa Horman and her husband murdered
in their bads. Two other members of the Minnesota State House,
both Melissa Horman and her husband and John Hoffman and
his wife Okay murdered in their bads by a conservative Christian,
(13:43):
anti choice, anti right UH worked in private security, carried weapons,
et cetera.
Speaker 3 (13:56):
Right the all the all the unsurprised, using descriptors of
this guy that once you knew them, you were like,
of course.
Speaker 1 (14:03):
So this happens, he is now on the run. A
few thoughts here. One, these were the people who were
being watched by the FBI before cash Betel got in charge.
Right now, they are no longer You're no longer allowed
to watch these people because those people, right, because.
Speaker 3 (14:24):
The deep state was watching them in the We can't
have anybody monitored by the deep state anymore because obviously
they're just they were the same sort of innocent tourists
that were just visiting with love on January Seanuary sixth.
Speaker 1 (14:37):
So the day this happened, Twitter became a sea of
disinformation and the magas works trying to sell a story
that these people had voted against healthcare for non citizens
and that was why they got murdered by a Marxist.
Speaker 3 (14:52):
Right, and so you get guys like Mike Cernovic and
Mike Lee and the rest of the sort of Trump
is set.
Speaker 1 (15:00):
One is an online influencer who started Pizzagate.
Speaker 3 (15:05):
Right right, Well, they're basically, look, these these are not
they're not sending their best moly, right, but but what
we're talking about here, when you get down to it,
is this alternate ecosystem that cannot confront reality. They cannot
confront what is actually happening here, which is that the
(15:25):
right wing maga media ecosystem feeds these people a constant
diet of lies and bullshit that that that every Democrat
is a is a cannibal, pedophile, child trafficker, blah blah blah.
And when they when one of their own commits a
crime like this, a horrifying crime, they believe they control
(15:49):
their way out of the problem, right, and and so
we end up with a situation like yesterday, which a
US Senator, Mike Lee, who absofrikingly know better.
Speaker 1 (16:00):
Okay, yes, is a United States senator.
Speaker 3 (16:04):
Yes, let's let's emphasize that point again, a United States
senator is out talking the worst weird ass smack about,
you know, pretending that this was a political assassination because
of wokeness. And it's so disgusting at every level. It's
so weak at every level, because they are they recognize
(16:29):
that that what they've created as a monster, and that
monster is now out roaming the world. And it's frankly,
yesterday murdered two people. The guy in his car had
a hit list of seventy other elected Democratic.
Speaker 1 (16:46):
Officials, but my friend Tim Walls.
Speaker 3 (16:50):
Yes, and and folks you know, like Ilhan Omar and
a whole variety of other people that does not exactly
fit the profile of left wing on a murder spree.
This was a right wing assassin. He's been motivated by
people like well, by by institutions like Breitbart and Fox News,
(17:11):
because they're told over and over again, you're you're being
pursued by the evil left wingers. They're trying to destroy you.
They're not human. They deserve everything we can give them
in terms of political and personal violence. And the whole
thing is a utterly predictable and repulsive set of behaviors
(17:33):
that I don't I don't think. I don't think. I
sometimes think I've lost the capacity to be shocked, but
I clearly haven't because I'm and this one is shocking
even to me.
Speaker 1 (17:44):
First of all, Mark Cuban, if you listen to this podcast,
you should buy Twitter, Okay, because somebody rich should buy
Twitter and make it normal again, because Elon has made
it completely unusable and it has a really good purpose
and it's really a public util and you know, Elon
is down the rabbit hole now of whatever. It's time
(18:06):
to buy Twitter.
Speaker 3 (18:07):
Yeah, I mean look and frankly, you could probably get
Twitter at a pretty reasonable price at this point.
Speaker 1 (18:12):
Yeah, so that is number one, because the site has degraded,
But it also is what you see, it's it's completely
without use at this point.
Speaker 3 (18:20):
But it's also But here's the thing, the degree to
which the right values Twitter because it is this normative
force for them. It is this powerful thing that keeps
them in line, that keeps them on message and over
and over again. I don't I've said this to a
lot a lot of wealthy people recently. Like the power
(18:43):
of Fox, Facebook and Twitter to control what the maga
world thinks and does is beyond comprehension. It is. It
is super powerful as as a way of shaping what
they believe, what they see, what they read. And it
(19:03):
also empowers people who again think they control their way
out of a mass murder or an attempted mass murder
by one of Donald Trump's fervent supporters. Yeah, and it,
you know, it did blow up in their faces a
bit like oh yes, obviously, he's just like every other
liberal who's been a registered Republican for twenty two years
(19:23):
has a private security company and so on and so on. Yeah,
it's the silliness of this shit is beyond Yeah.
Speaker 1 (19:31):
No, of course, and it's totally ridiculous. But there was
also I want to talk about. There was a little
bit of violence that happened yesterday that I want to
talk about because I think it's really important and it
didn't get reported because there's no local news, so you
may be listening to this podcast and you may not
know about it. So most of the rallies were peaceful,
(19:53):
but okay, there were in Salt Lake City somebody got
critically injured into the crowd and in Culpeper, Virginia, somebody
throw their suv into the crowd. So those are two
real things that happened.
Speaker 3 (20:11):
Oh you mean political violence.
Speaker 1 (20:13):
Yeah, oh, I mean political.
Speaker 3 (20:15):
I was told that only happens on the left.
Speaker 1 (20:18):
Weird political violence. You know, I don't think it should
be brushed over, right.
Speaker 3 (20:22):
We should address it more honestly than than the right
would like. And they really don't want to talk about this.
They want to pretend that they are the set upon victims,
they're the they're the the David to the Goliath of
some sort of violent progressive action, which is has been
and has always been garbage. And look, I believe me
(20:44):
if I would if I saw it on the left,
I'd call it out because it benefits no one.
Speaker 1 (20:51):
Yeah, it's certainly true. I wonder if we could talk
for a minute about how Trump actually had to watch
the parade. Oh, it was so beautiful, Like, I wonder
if he didn't think.
Speaker 3 (21:04):
This through No, he never thinks anything through Molly. He
has no ability to think outside of his of his
like tiny animal brain, and he thought this will be
a great triumph. I will look strong, I will I
will buy association, absorb the strength of these warriors. And
he looked like a dip shit half asleep behind the
(21:27):
glass at a poorly attended and by poorly attended folks,
I mean poorly attended. Yeah, they were expecting a million
people and they maybe got a maybe got fifty thousand.
The mall was empty. Trump's reviewing stand had empty seats
directly across from it, which, if you're a political advance guy,
(21:49):
get another job tomorrow because you fucked up.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
But also, can we just talk about, like why did
this need to be sponsored by Coinbase and Boeing or
I think coin Base. It was coin Base and Lockheed Martin.
Speaker 3 (22:06):
Yeah, look, it was a bunch of there were a
bunch of bunch of corporate sponsors in bold.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
But weren't the taxpayers really the sponsors of this?
Speaker 3 (22:15):
That was exactly what I was about to say, Mali.
But the real the real sponsor was the US taxpayer.
The real sponsor was was every American who had to
fork over their tax dollars for this eighty five million dollar,
eighty nine million dollar horseshit. And and the reality is
Trump begged for a missile parade in the first administration.
Speaker 1 (22:36):
He was ab he saw one in France, that's right,
Steel day.
Speaker 3 (22:41):
That he was obsessed with it. And now he finally
got one. He didn't have an esper or a Millie
who said, no, sir, you can't do this.
Speaker 1 (22:48):
Yeah. Millie was like, no dice.
Speaker 3 (22:50):
Yeah, Millie was like a no loss, no chief, the
same how this works. Yeah, but you know, he he
desperately wanted this again. Donald Trump, the draft dodging, chicken
shit coward who demeaned diminished John McCain, who called our
troop suckers, and losers, who has over and over again
(23:13):
essentially except pressed his contempt for the service of others,
wanted to absorb the heroism of American military men and women.
I mean, I found the whole thing so crass and
stupid and badly run because you know, you have these
guys marching by it. It's like brought to you by Coinbase,
(23:34):
sponsored by UFC, and it's just like, oh, come on, dude.
Speaker 1 (23:40):
Yeah, it was incredible stuff. Incredible stuff. Rick Wilson, John joining.
Speaker 3 (23:48):
Me a pleasure as always.
Speaker 1 (23:50):
Will you be back?
Speaker 3 (23:51):
I will always be back for you. You know that.
Speaker 1 (23:55):
James Kimmel is the author of the Science of Revenge,
Standing the world's deadliest addiction, and How to overcome it.
Welcome to Fast Politics, James.
Speaker 4 (24:08):
Thank you, mollly happy to be here and really appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (24:11):
So talk to me about this book.
Speaker 4 (24:13):
So recent neuroscience revelations have given us some exciting new discoveries,
most importantly that your brain on revenge looks like your
brain on drugs, which is a big discovery in the
sense it is it is it is your brain on revenge.
(24:35):
It looks like your brain on drugs. And that's a
big discovery because it gives us the first notion of
a biological cause of violence and how to prevent and
treat it.
Speaker 1 (24:45):
So, you know, I'm sober twenty seven years, but who's counting.
Will this show us how to treat alcoholism, drug addiction,
or revenge?
Speaker 4 (24:56):
No, it'll show us that by using alcohol and other
substance use, addiction, prevention and treatment strategies, we can prevent
and treat violence, which is a big revelation. It's kind
of the reverse order where we're bringing those techniques into
something that has eluded human prevention and treatment for thousands
(25:20):
of years.
Speaker 1 (25:21):
I need you to explain this more to me. Neuroscience
finds that revenge and addiction look the same. So what
you mean by revenge more is the sort of anger impulse, right, So,
revenge is.
Speaker 4 (25:35):
The desire to punish people who either violate social norms
or wrong you in some way, whether it's real or imagined.
So you know, it starts with the grievance, and a
grievance is a real or imagined perception of having been mistreated,
treated unjustly, humiliated, shame betrayed, victimized in any way. That's
(25:57):
the beginning point of this process.
Speaker 1 (26:00):
Okay, So if revenge is like addiction and it is
a similar kind of situation that can prevent violence, but
it also perhaps might give us a little insight into
what's happening in Trump's second administration.
Speaker 4 (26:14):
It does, and what's happening across the country in response.
Because this is a it's a human problem, so it transcends,
you know, political boundaries. Let's just go into this for
a second. So a grievance, we've all experienced those. That
can be somebody you know who cuts you off while
you're driving, or an unkind word from you know, your
partner or spouse or a parent, or something you know
(26:37):
from some exchange with a coworker or your boss, or
something even more broadly like a mean tweet or something
that comes out of the Trump administration or a democratic administration.
It wouldn't matter. But those grievances are registered in your brain.
And we can see this now in brain scans. That
activates your brain's pay network area, which is known as
(27:00):
the anterior insulo. And your brain hates pain, so it
wants to do something to stop that pain or cover
it up. And the strategy that we've evolved to do
is we get pleasure from trying to hurt the person
who rolled us or their proxy, and that is very pleasurable,
and it activates the pleasure and reward circuitry of the brain,
(27:22):
which is the nucleus occumbents, and the dorsal strata. All
of this is also happening for every other form of addiction,
and we want to gratify that craving, the craving for
revenge which is stimulated by a dopamine rush to motivate
us toward harming the person who rolled us, because we
get a little high from it. I mean, revenge acts
(27:44):
inside your brain like a drug, doest.
Speaker 1 (27:47):
One of the things that I've been interested in as
a sober person who comes from a family is they
tell my children all the time riddled with alcoholism. As
I tell my three teenage children, I got sobern as nineteen.
So whenever I see that, I say, you know, you
come from a family. I swear to that I am
become my grandfather. You come from a family riddled with alcoholism.
(28:08):
My grandfather wouldn't say things like that, but he would
say other things about you know whatever. So I wonder
if one of the really interesting things about Trump's motivations
which I think are worth looking at because he's now
running the entire federal government, is that he had this
brother who died of alcoholism, Mary's father, and he has
(28:31):
committed to never drink or take drugs, right like I
don't know about drugs, but has committed has made a
you know, very clear about the fact that he never
drinks and will never drink. Joe Biden children who struggled
with alcoholism also never drinks ever take drucks, similar like
non drinkers, both of them from families filled with alcoholism.
So talk to me about kind of if there's a
(28:53):
connection here between being sober or being alcoholic and having
trouble managing your emotion.
Speaker 4 (29:00):
It's possible, And I don't want it to be focused
on emotions, because this is much more than just what
we think of as emotions like I feel happy or sad.
This is a brain biological process that drives us toward
revenge seeking for pleasure. We seek revenge to make ourselves
feel better after we've been hurt. There is a theory
(29:23):
that the vulnerable brain that suggests that people who are
vulnerable to other forms of addiction are more vulnerable to
addictions in general. So if you're vulnerable to a substance
use disorder, you may we don't have evidence for this yet,
but you may also be more vulnerable to a gambling addiction.
(29:44):
You may also be more vulnerable to a revenge addiction,
which is what we're talking about. So it's possible, but
it's important to know that all humans, we all feel
good when we take an opioid, but we also all
feel good by fantasizing about or enacting our fantasies about
revenge seeking, in other words, hurting the people who wrong
(30:05):
us or their proxy, so that we don't even have
to hurt the direct person who's wronged to us to
get this gratification. And the good example of that is,
like you know, you're at work, your boss says something
that you don't like and hurts your feelings or worse,
and you can't retaliate against your boss because you might
lose your job, so you go home and pick a fight,
maybe with your spouse or significant other or a child,
(30:26):
or you kick the dog. Those are what we would
call revenge by proxy, or some psychologists would call that
displaced revenge seeking. But it makes you feel better in
that moment. But like all drugs, it's a temporary high,
doesn't last very long, usually leaves you hurting and wanting more.
Donald Trump seems to have had a lifetime of perhaps
(30:48):
sobriety from alcoholism, but has professed in many interviews to
being a huge fan of retaliation and revenge seeking, right,
And so you could make a case. I've never examined him,
and I'm not a psychiatrist, so I couldn't diagnose it,
but you could make a pretty strong case that he
and others in his administration look like they're struggling with
(31:11):
revenge addiction in a pretty mighty way and not able
to control it. And that's always going to be harmful
to anybody that's caught up in that and the people
around them.
Speaker 1 (31:21):
Yeah, it's interesting. I mean, I just wonder if you
could talk to us about what this larger idea of
a culture that is so set on revenge.
Speaker 3 (31:30):
Right.
Speaker 1 (31:30):
We're seeing a lot of like the cultural questions of revenge.
Speaker 4 (31:35):
Yeah, I refer to it as a revenge addicted nation.
Right now. America seems like a revenge addicted nation in
many ways, and part of that is the advent for
which humans have not been prepared for.
Speaker 3 (31:47):
At all.
Speaker 4 (31:48):
And that's the advent of social networking platforms, and they're
a unique ability to spread a grievance, right of feeling
of victimization twis of other people at light speed, almost simultaneously.
So we are getting perhaps millions of people with real
or imagined grievances about the same thing at the same time.
(32:11):
And these platforms also give all of those people the
ability not only to spread that grievance further, but to
either retaliate instantly, right, So we're also the platform gives
you the grievance, and then it gives you the way
to gratify the desire for revenge by firing back, you know, aggressive, mean,
nasty tweets and other messaging, and also to plan and
(32:34):
inspire and encourage other people to join in, you know,
real world outside of the virtue their iOS right acts
of retaliation, such as the you know, the January sixth insurrection,
in which an imagined grievance about the election caused a
group of people that using social networking to come together
(32:56):
and then have a real world riot at the Capital
revenge riot, you.
Speaker 1 (33:01):
Know, yeah, revenge. Rt I interviewed a guy called to
Read Hoffman on Morning Joe. A couple months ago, he
was talking about how good the Internet is an AI
and I was proposing all of it. I have this
theory that while the Internet created a lot of disruptions,
so did the printing press, right and he said something
(33:22):
that was actually really smart that has really stuck with me,
which is he said, the printing press it turned out
to be really great, but it was like about one
hundred years of just complete disaster between those two things.
I mean, is that what we're in right now? Are
we in this sort of I want to say, like
postmodernization of the culture dysfunction? Is that where we are
(33:43):
at this moment?
Speaker 4 (33:44):
I think that's possible, and it's a pretty good analogy. There.
There was a lot of warfare and a lot of
revenge seeking right back in those days after let's say,
the Reformation in Martin Luther was spread by that new
technology renting press. And we're seeing something similar to that,
but across much bigger population and much more quickly than
(34:07):
we did then. But people at that time didn't understand
and wouldn't have that the printing press was able to
spread grievance and retaliation and the ability to retaliate so well,
and it didn't do one thing that modern technology does,
which is it's based on algorithms that actually further that.
So the algorithms want to us to engage more often,
(34:31):
and since revenge is such an addictive process, it's like
the you know, the social networking platforms are feeding us
the drug, right, They're the system that enable us to
get these painful experiences of grievance and then these amazingly
pleasurable experiences of retaliation twenty four to seven, you know,
(34:52):
seven days a week exactly.
Speaker 1 (34:54):
So online is obviously making a problem worse. But is
the problem existing just because of the internet, or is
this a problem that's always happened, And is it getting
less bad because it's not happening in real life even
though it is sort of happening in real life.
Speaker 4 (35:11):
Yeah, I think it's more about it's a problem that's
always existed. So evolutionary psychologists theorize the leading theory is
is that we developed this pleasurable experience in retaliating maybe
eleven thousand years ago or or longer, as humans came
to live in societies and needed ways to cooperate and
(35:32):
cause people to obey social norms and you know, not
steal things from you, your cave, or from your neighbor.
So the desire for revenge is natural, and it was
an adaptive strategy back then. Where it becomes pathological and dangerous,
in particular, is now in modern society, where instead of
(35:52):
retaliating for survival purposes or to pass on our genetic
imprint to the next generation, we retaliate for just because
our egos have been offended or her or our politics
or our you know, we have revenge born. We have
all these types of experiences of grievance, insult, and victimization
(36:18):
that are not that our retaliation for those are not
driven by a need to survive. It's not a flight
or flight kind of situation. And it's always for a
wrong of the past, so you're not presented. Revenge is
always past looking. It's you know, it's always going to
be punishing somebody for something they did, you know, minutes, hours, days, weeks, months,
(36:39):
years and years ago. That's where that goes. So I
think today the systems are making it much worse because
it's able to spread grievance like a virus. It's blowing
grievances into our faces right out of our cell phones
and computers all day long, and we've never had to
face that kind of onslaught before from something that we
(37:03):
spend platforms like these that we spend so much of
our time on. And the last part of the addiction
puzzle is the prefrontal cortex, that executive function, self control
area of our brain. And when that is hijacked or
inhibited so that we're actually carrying out revenge seeking despite
(37:27):
the negative consequences, that's when it moves pathological, because it
moves out of an adaptive strategy into one that is
harming ourselves and harming others. And you can't become the
instrument of someone else's pain without feeling that pain yourself.
And you also are putting yourself in harm's way because
your act of just revenge seeking. Justice seeking in the
(37:47):
form of revenge becomes the targets unjust victimization and spurs
them to experience a new desire for revenge back against you.
And we see that in politics.
Speaker 1 (38:02):
So it makes everything worse, that's right, And this is
the hyper polarization.
Speaker 4 (38:06):
Thing, right, right, But this is the hyperness of it, yes, correct.
Speaker 1 (38:10):
How do you get out of this? Give everyone prozac? Right?
The huge doses of prozac.
Speaker 4 (38:17):
And that probably the prozac probably wouldn't help because that's
going to take down anxiety, which is a great thing,
but isn't really this problem so our problem with revenge seeking.
Prozac hasn't been found, for instance, to be the cure
for addictions. It's not really prescribed for addictions. So that's
really not the right one what we need to think about.
So we have two options.
Speaker 1 (38:38):
Wait, hot, take here for one second, not to hijack
this interview with my own mental health problems, but what
I've noticed from myself and my own mental health problems
is that prozac does not work on me as someone
who's sober a long time, but effects or for whatever reason,
effects or is just the greatest drug ever.
Speaker 4 (38:56):
That is interesting, And I can't comment because you know,
I'm not that kind of docs, so I don't know.
Are you my doctor, and nor are your doctor? That's correct,
for sure, that's right. What is probably more likely to work,
right are going to be the addiction prevention and treatment
strategies that are already in our toolkit for other addictive disorders.
(39:19):
So that can mean to start with, that can be
cognitive behavioral therapy, counseling, motivational interviewing, self help strategies, and
things like that. We may also find and it hasn't
been studied yet, but I'm hoping that this will start soon.
Things like meloxone and maybe even GLP one, drugs like
ozema and we go v that are have been shown
(39:42):
to help people control craving, because that seems to be
where this is all centered in the brain. It's that
addiction craving desire that motivates us to go out and
harm the people who we think are all on us
or their proxies, including not only if somebody cuts you off,
raising ahead to either flip the finger or cut them off,
(40:03):
or even worse, pulling a gun up through mass shootings,
intimate partner violence, school bullying, gang violence and street violence, extremism, terrorism,
and even war. All of those are born out of
this grievance desire for revenge brain biological process that we're
(40:25):
just now understanding. But if we see it as an
addictive process, we can use these addiction prevention to treatment strategies,
starting with things like as well public health campaigns to
warn people about the dangers of what happens when you
have a grievance and this desire for revenge, and that
although it's going to happen, there are things you can
do about it. The other that's just one side of it.
(40:46):
The best thing you can do, and there's a whole
body of brand new neuroscience on this. That's even more
exciting to me than the revenge side is what happens
in your brain when you simply imagine forgiving a grievance
or somebody that's done something wrong to you, even without
communicating with them. It's not a gift to them, it's
a gift of healing for yourself. And what happens when
(41:07):
you forgive is it reverses. It turns out all of
these things that I just described inside your brain for
revenge seeking. It shuts down the pain network inside your brain,
It shuts down the craving circuitry, and it restores your
self control circuitry.
Speaker 1 (41:23):
So basically everything we do in AA is right.
Speaker 4 (41:28):
That whole forgiveness piece and the the you know this,
you know kind of owning that. And although AA is
really strong about going out right and making that apology
to the person you're wrong, and that's nice and it's
very powerful, But what we're finding is is that forgiving
of yourself is critical.
Speaker 1 (41:48):
Which is what you do when you do that?
Speaker 4 (41:52):
Yes, right, and if you're forgiving yourself and anybody that
is wronging you just internally and your listeners can experience
this like right away. I mean, if it's safe to
close your eyes right now, think about a grievance that
you have against someone, and you know you have them,
because we all do. We have maybe hundreds of them
every day. But think about that and then think about
(42:12):
just imagine what it would feel like. Just imagine what
it would feel like if you decide, you know what,
I'm going to forgive this. Usually when people do that,
they'll respond and go, oh, I would feel better. I
guess I would feel pretty great. I would feel relieved,
I would feel like this weight off my shoulders, and
and it happens that quickly. Then the matter is simply
doing it again and again and again, until every time
(42:34):
that memory of that grievance comes back in your head
you go, oh, yeah, I'm forgiving this. I'm done with
this one now, and you know, kind of kaboom, it's gone.
It's kind of this wonder drug superpower. If if humans have
that we've sort of, you know, ignored because we think
that maybe it's a weakness or it makes us a doormat,
which is not what it's supposed to do. It doesn't
(42:55):
stop you from acting in self defense or getting out
of a toxic relationship, but it does help you heal
from the wrongs of the past in those relationships very quickly.
It's cheap. You can get it without a prescription. I mean,
there's just you can use it as off as you
want with no side effects. It's just like, there is
nothing better than forgiveness for anybody.
Speaker 1 (43:15):
Yes, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 3 (43:19):
Fair welcome, No, no moment.
Speaker 1 (43:25):
Rick Wilson, Holly Jogfast, I flew here this morning.
Speaker 3 (43:30):
And your pilot who flew you there had two certifications,
once called an ATP and the others called a commercial
pilot certificate.
Speaker 1 (43:39):
Why do we bring this up?
Speaker 3 (43:40):
Well, the new head of the FAA claimed it turns
out you're going to be shocked to hear this from
somebody in the Trump administration claimed falsely that he had
a commercial pilot certificate. He has an instrument rating as
a multi engineer rating, but he does not have a
commercial pilot certificate. It's not that hard to get, but
it's really stupid to lie about having one when you don't.
Speaker 1 (44:01):
But also, why does Trump World keep elevating people who
can't tell the truth.
Speaker 3 (44:07):
They're not sending their best, They're not the endless parade
of weak, weird, shitty, non effective candidates for these jobs.
It's not coming because Donald Trump has a rich portfolio
of options. This is what he's got. These are the
people that will work for him. Now, it's not a
(44:28):
great world to live in if you're a Trump appointee
at this point, you're in such a group of scales
and weirdos and fuck ups that honestly, why bothered a lie?
Just say I'm a mid range, middling talent nobody who
would like this job. Please, mister Trump, love me. Don't
bother to lie in overstate your qualifications. It just doesn't
(44:48):
work anymore. Rick Wilson, Molly John Fast We'll see you
next week.
Speaker 1 (44:54):
That's it for this episode of Fast Politics. Tune in
every Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday to hear the best
minds and politics make sense of all this chaos. If
you enjoy this podcast, please send it to a friend
and keep the conversation going Thanks for listening,
Hi, I'm Molly John Fast and this is Fast Politics,
where we discussed the top political headlines with some of
today's best minds, and Lisa Murkowski says it's dangerous for
us in the legislative branch. We have such a great
show for you today, the Lincoln Projects owen Rick Wilson
joins us to discuss the No Kings protest, Trump's sad
(00:23):
Birthday parade, and political violence. Then we'll talk to James
Kimmel about his new book, The Science of Revenge, Understanding
the world's deadliest addiction and how to overcome it. But
first the news.
Speaker 2 (00:36):
So, Molly, one of the things I feared the most
as being a pro union person is how much progress
we were making underbided and that the second Trump got
in that they would be doing everything they can to
call it back.
Speaker 3 (00:48):
Well, we're starting to see that.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
I didn't think it would be very high on their priorities,
And yeah, it seems like they're getting down to it fively.
Speaker 1 (00:55):
And by the way, can I just add the big
union right, the auto Workers did not endorse Harris. They
refused to endorse right.
Speaker 3 (01:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
One of the things that I think is very interesting
about union culture, right, now is that we are seeing
such partisanship of their ranks that the leadership is actually
fearful of what happens. We're even seeing that at our
mayoral election right now with a lot of the unions.
Speaker 1 (01:20):
Yeah, so here are unions, a lot of their members
are voting for Trump, and there people are getting punished
by trump Ism. The arrest and violent man handling of
the president of the Service Employees International Union of California
suggests that Trump is targeting union leaders for arrest. So
(01:41):
this is like right out of the authoritarian playbook, right.
You don't want collective fargeting because it makes workers more powerful.
You don't want powerful workers because it makes the president
less powerful. Remember when whenever you see stuff like this happening,
ask yoursel who does it hurt? Who does it help?
And with so much of this, Trump's whole goal is
(02:04):
to expand presidential power, right as we saw in Project
twenty twenty five. He wants to grow the executive branch
and shrink the other branches. Now, Republicans in Congress are
happy to do this, They're happy to give him the power.
But this is a really good example of ways in
which the Trump administration is trying to grow its power. Look,
they want to silence dissent, right Their labor unions are
(02:26):
trying to push back. But you know, they they have
really kneecapped themselves by electing Donald Trump. It's one of
these things where I don't know how you know, a
lot of this late the labor protection, the negotiating protection
is being rolled back right now at the state level
and a lot of red states, and at the federal
level too. And you know, these people, a lot of
(02:48):
these people voted for Trump. They voted for Republicans. You know,
they didn't make the connection between being in a union
and the Republicans war with unions.
Speaker 3 (02:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
So, speaking of unforeseen consequences, the washingt Post has some
great journalism about how vaccine critics appointed by RFK Junior
are going to limit access to shots.
Speaker 1 (03:10):
This is not even unforeseen, this is foreseen. Well, this
fucking guy was going to make it hard to get vaccines.
Speaker 3 (03:19):
We saw it.
Speaker 2 (03:20):
But I would argue that a lot of people were like, no, no,
it's fine.
Speaker 1 (03:23):
Well we've had people on this podcast who said you're
not going to be able to get somebody. Yes, that's
where we are right now. So Robert F. Kennedy Junior's
overhaul of the Federal Immunization Panel will create uncertainty about
how widely vaccines will be available. So these recommendations will
mean that the vaccines that are covered by insurance or
medicaid may not be covered anymore, because my man RFK
(03:50):
Junior will say he doesn't think that people need measles
or mumps, or rubella or chicken pox or all the
vaccines that keep us safe. Look, this is because of COVID. Right.
COVID made everyone lose their brains. A significant, small, but
significant part of the American population decided that they were
(04:10):
going to get tripped by grifters and snake oil salesmen
like RFK Junior. And this is how we got here.
So our FK Junior now running our country's house, we're
all completely fucked. Did I mention that we have children
dying of measles that was never needed? So many things
(04:31):
could have been prevented. We're seeing the Trump administration just
once again falling apart, elevating people who are incompetent. Now
we have RFK Junior, a complete grifter. Every day, we
don't have a pandemic as a miracle.
Speaker 2 (04:47):
Yeah, and you know a funny thing would I went
to Canada last week. I was very funny the subtle
shade that the border crossing through at Americans of like
measles is.
Speaker 3 (04:56):
Now on the rise in Canada.
Speaker 2 (04:58):
I wonder why, please please be sure to not bring
it here, Thank you very much.
Speaker 1 (05:04):
Yeah, the worst so by.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
One of the things we discussed last week is Trump
had all these tweets where it's started to seem like
he's going a little soft on Steven Miller's vision of
a white no state.
Speaker 3 (05:16):
And Axios has some interesting reporting here. What do you see?
Speaker 1 (05:20):
You'll be shocked to know that rich guy talks to
other rich people. Other rich people say, you know, as
much as we love the visual of your guys hunting
farmers in the field, hunting agriculture workers, as much as
that's fun for us, it's hurting our business. These are jobs,
(05:40):
and Americans do not want agricultural workers. They're tough jobs,
they're hard work, they're in the field. We can get
Americans to take like manufacturing jobs, let alone jobs working
in the field. The people who do these jobs keep
us from starving, and we're so lucky to have them.
So we have Hatum King a senior ice official. I'm
(06:02):
sure this person is a great person, sending an email
to agency officials nationwide telling them to please hold on
all work site enforcement investigations, operations on agriculture including aquaculture
and meatpacking plants, restaurants, and operating hotels, especially Trump hotels. Look,
(06:23):
this was always bullshit. This whole administration is built on
a lie. Donald Trump always employed workers that had, you know,
sketchy immigration statuses, always always, So of course they're going
to make sure that those people don't get to ported
they need them for these jobs. So here we are.
(06:46):
Yet again, we could have seen all of this coming
a million miles away, But here we are. Rick Wilson
is the founder of the Lincoln Project and the host
of the Enemy's List Welcome Back, Too Fast Politics fan
favorite bestie, Rick Wills.
Speaker 3 (07:05):
Man about town, the whole thing? Thank you? How are
you today?
Speaker 1 (07:08):
Right? Man? About town? If that town is in Florida, Yes,
under kind of kind of undermines the whole thing, kind
of Yeah.
Speaker 3 (07:17):
Speaking of Florida, I live, as you know, in the
middle of a giant ocean of red. Yes, and yet
somehow in the capital of Florida yesterday five thousand people
turned up at a protest for No Kings like I
had never I mean, I've lived here a long time
and it ordinarily the progressive world manages to get a
(07:37):
protest with about a half a dozen people on the
steps of the capitol and one weird sign. This thing
was wall to wall blocks around the capitol, which.
Speaker 1 (07:45):
Was nuts in Tallahassee.
Speaker 3 (07:48):
Tallahassee, a state that has been dominated by the Republican
Party for the last twenty five years, managed they managed
to have two sort of sort of scrubby looking maga
kids three blocks away hold one sign as a counter protest.
So I don't know what's going on, but that seemed
to be iterating across the whole country. Had a buddy
of mine in Billings, Montana, crowds in the street like
(08:10):
you couldn't believe he's like he's he goes when I
tell you, this is half the city, I mean it,
it's crazy.
Speaker 1 (08:16):
What do you think that means? The numbers I saw
Elliott Morris, h smart guy, used to run five thirty eight,
and he had he had sort of calculated the numbers
as higher than five million. I saw five million in
the New York Times, but Ellie Morris thinks it's closer
to more than that.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
Yeah he said. I think he said something like it
could be up to thirteen million people, yes, which is nuts.
Speaker 1 (08:41):
So up to thirteen million people gets us to a
level where about we're almost too I think a little
bit less than one percent of the of America protesting.
Speaker 3 (08:55):
That's what they call the Color Revolution line. When you
have one or two percent of the population out protesting,
the deer leaders have lost a lot of power.
Speaker 1 (09:07):
And some are saying, I'm going to use a jesse
Can in fact check here. Uh. Some are saying that
this was the biggest protest in American history.
Speaker 3 (09:17):
Listen, I could I could make that argument. I think there.
I think there was something yesterday in the air across
the country. I think there was a little bit of
whistling past the graveyard at first, like people are like,
oh god, what if it doesn't turn out? What if
this doesn't work? And and it was. It was bonkers everywhere.
Speaker 1 (09:36):
And I was nuts. So I was in Nantucket because
I have a book that just came out, which I
don't know if.
Speaker 3 (09:45):
Do you do people know about it? Is it a
New York Times bestseller? Yes?
Speaker 1 (09:49):
It is number six on the combined list. I have
to tell you there are no words for the level
of thrill. But anyway, I was in it. But you know,
it's I'm the meme where it's like the world is
burning down and I'm like, so I have a book,
but but but I was in Nantucket for this book.
For Nantucket is known to be well in the Northeast,
(10:12):
a very Republican island, so much so that the guy
sitting in front of me was wearing a Trump a
Trump golf club a shirt that had a sort of
small insignia that said Trump Jupiter or whatever. But I
want to talk about this. It was a huge protest
in Nantucket, which is a Republican island. So it is
(10:34):
really does feel like these places where you don't expect
to see protests, we're seeing big right test.
Speaker 3 (10:40):
Right. I think this happened to the surprise of a
lot of the Maga folks yesterday because the gigantic Maga
media machine was in full throttle, like there's no there
are no there, nobody's at the no Kings rallies, there
are no no Kings rallies whatsoever. No one's out at all,
but five million people are in Washington for President's Military
(11:01):
dictatorship Parade.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
Right, so let's talk about the military dictatorship parade, because
there's a really smart thing. I saw that the individual
No Kings Rally organizers wrote on their website which said,
and even Axios, which is known to.
Speaker 3 (11:24):
Not be not exactly like friend of progressive politics, Axios.
Speaker 1 (11:29):
Yes exactly, said that the people they wanted to provide
a kind of counter programming and not a competition, and
that's why they didn't go to Washington, DC. Right. They
stayed away because they didn't because they wanted to sort
of dominate the news cycle and provide an alternative narrative
(11:50):
versus a sort of combative program, right, program around trump Ism,
which I think is really an important thought when you're
talking about sort of permeating the discourse.
Speaker 3 (12:04):
Look, I think I think that that the grassroots energy
in this thing was so unique and it's and I will,
I will, you know, went back to my my experience
at at one of these yesterday, I actually saw three
or four of my Republican friends who aren't even like
people I would have thought like, oh, he's a never trumper.
(12:26):
I was surprised. I talked to one guy I was like,
I'm shocked to see you here, he goes, I'm just done.
And I think that they that they correctly calibrated. That
did we get a broader uplift from this if it
didn't feel like it was just like one more sort
of generic fuck Trump thing, and you opened it up
and people felt a lot more sans of community about it.
(12:46):
I just I don't go to a lot of marches
and shit, but yeah, this was impressive and it was optimistic,
and there were a lot of American flags flying and
a lot of people who who who got the memo,
who stood the assignment as they say.
Speaker 1 (13:02):
I want to talk about UH disinformation because it is
really important when we talk about these protests to talk
about Twitter and what happened on Twitter and the political violence.
The woman and her husband.
Speaker 3 (13:17):
Minnesota former former House majority leader in the.
Speaker 1 (13:20):
Former House majority leader Melissa Horman and her husband murdered
in their bads. Two other members of the Minnesota State House,
both Melissa Horman and her husband and John Hoffman and
his wife Okay murdered in their bads by a conservative Christian,
(13:43):
anti choice, anti right UH worked in private security, carried weapons,
et cetera.
Speaker 3 (13:56):
Right the all the all the unsurprised, using descriptors of
this guy that once you knew them, you were like,
of course.
Speaker 1 (14:03):
So this happens, he is now on the run. A
few thoughts here. One, these were the people who were
being watched by the FBI before cash Betel got in charge.
Right now, they are no longer You're no longer allowed
to watch these people because those people, right, because.
Speaker 3 (14:24):
The deep state was watching them in the We can't
have anybody monitored by the deep state anymore because obviously
they're just they were the same sort of innocent tourists
that were just visiting with love on January Seanuary sixth.
Speaker 1 (14:37):
So the day this happened, Twitter became a sea of
disinformation and the magas works trying to sell a story
that these people had voted against healthcare for non citizens
and that was why they got murdered by a Marxist.
Speaker 3 (14:52):
Right, and so you get guys like Mike Cernovic and
Mike Lee and the rest of the sort of Trump
is set.
Speaker 1 (15:00):
One is an online influencer who started Pizzagate.
Speaker 3 (15:05):
Right right, Well, they're basically, look, these these are not
they're not sending their best moly, right, but but what
we're talking about here, when you get down to it,
is this alternate ecosystem that cannot confront reality. They cannot
confront what is actually happening here, which is that the
(15:25):
right wing maga media ecosystem feeds these people a constant
diet of lies and bullshit that that that every Democrat
is a is a cannibal, pedophile, child trafficker, blah blah blah.
And when they when one of their own commits a
crime like this, a horrifying crime, they believe they control
(15:49):
their way out of the problem, right, and and so
we end up with a situation like yesterday, which a
US Senator, Mike Lee, who absofrikingly know better.
Speaker 1 (16:00):
Okay, yes, is a United States senator.
Speaker 3 (16:04):
Yes, let's let's emphasize that point again, a United States
senator is out talking the worst weird ass smack about,
you know, pretending that this was a political assassination because
of wokeness. And it's so disgusting at every level. It's
so weak at every level, because they are they recognize
(16:29):
that that what they've created as a monster, and that
monster is now out roaming the world. And it's frankly,
yesterday murdered two people. The guy in his car had
a hit list of seventy other elected Democratic.
Speaker 1 (16:46):
Officials, but my friend Tim Walls.
Speaker 3 (16:50):
Yes, and and folks you know, like Ilhan Omar and
a whole variety of other people that does not exactly
fit the profile of left wing on a murder spree.
This was a right wing assassin. He's been motivated by
people like well, by by institutions like Breitbart and Fox News,
(17:11):
because they're told over and over again, you're you're being
pursued by the evil left wingers. They're trying to destroy you.
They're not human. They deserve everything we can give them
in terms of political and personal violence. And the whole
thing is a utterly predictable and repulsive set of behaviors
(17:33):
that I don't I don't think. I don't think. I
sometimes think I've lost the capacity to be shocked, but
I clearly haven't because I'm and this one is shocking
even to me.
Speaker 1 (17:44):
First of all, Mark Cuban, if you listen to this podcast,
you should buy Twitter, Okay, because somebody rich should buy
Twitter and make it normal again, because Elon has made
it completely unusable and it has a really good purpose
and it's really a public util and you know, Elon
is down the rabbit hole now of whatever. It's time
(18:06):
to buy Twitter.
Speaker 3 (18:07):
Yeah, I mean look and frankly, you could probably get
Twitter at a pretty reasonable price at this point.
Speaker 1 (18:12):
Yeah, so that is number one, because the site has degraded,
But it also is what you see, it's it's completely
without use at this point.
Speaker 3 (18:20):
But it's also But here's the thing, the degree to
which the right values Twitter because it is this normative
force for them. It is this powerful thing that keeps
them in line, that keeps them on message and over
and over again. I don't I've said this to a
lot a lot of wealthy people recently. Like the power
(18:43):
of Fox, Facebook and Twitter to control what the maga
world thinks and does is beyond comprehension. It is. It
is super powerful as as a way of shaping what
they believe, what they see, what they read. And it
(19:03):
also empowers people who again think they control their way
out of a mass murder or an attempted mass murder
by one of Donald Trump's fervent supporters. Yeah, and it,
you know, it did blow up in their faces a
bit like oh yes, obviously, he's just like every other
liberal who's been a registered Republican for twenty two years
(19:23):
has a private security company and so on and so on. Yeah,
it's the silliness of this shit is beyond Yeah.
Speaker 1 (19:31):
No, of course, and it's totally ridiculous. But there was
also I want to talk about. There was a little
bit of violence that happened yesterday that I want to
talk about because I think it's really important and it
didn't get reported because there's no local news, so you
may be listening to this podcast and you may not
know about it. So most of the rallies were peaceful,
(19:53):
but okay, there were in Salt Lake City somebody got
critically injured into the crowd and in Culpeper, Virginia, somebody
throw their suv into the crowd. So those are two
real things that happened.
Speaker 3 (20:11):
Oh you mean political violence.
Speaker 1 (20:13):
Yeah, oh, I mean political.
Speaker 3 (20:15):
I was told that only happens on the left.
Speaker 1 (20:18):
Weird political violence. You know, I don't think it should
be brushed over, right.
Speaker 3 (20:22):
We should address it more honestly than than the right
would like. And they really don't want to talk about this.
They want to pretend that they are the set upon victims,
they're the they're the the David to the Goliath of
some sort of violent progressive action, which is has been
and has always been garbage. And look, I believe me
(20:44):
if I would if I saw it on the left,
I'd call it out because it benefits no one.
Speaker 1 (20:51):
Yeah, it's certainly true. I wonder if we could talk
for a minute about how Trump actually had to watch
the parade. Oh, it was so beautiful, Like, I wonder
if he didn't think.
Speaker 3 (21:04):
This through No, he never thinks anything through Molly. He
has no ability to think outside of his of his
like tiny animal brain, and he thought this will be
a great triumph. I will look strong, I will I
will buy association, absorb the strength of these warriors. And
he looked like a dip shit half asleep behind the
(21:27):
glass at a poorly attended and by poorly attended folks,
I mean poorly attended. Yeah, they were expecting a million
people and they maybe got a maybe got fifty thousand.
The mall was empty. Trump's reviewing stand had empty seats
directly across from it, which, if you're a political advance guy,
(21:49):
get another job tomorrow because you fucked up.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
But also, can we just talk about, like why did
this need to be sponsored by Coinbase and Boeing or
I think coin Base. It was coin Base and Lockheed Martin.
Speaker 3 (22:06):
Yeah, look, it was a bunch of there were a
bunch of bunch of corporate sponsors in bold.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
But weren't the taxpayers really the sponsors of this?
Speaker 3 (22:15):
That was exactly what I was about to say, Mali.
But the real the real sponsor was the US taxpayer.
The real sponsor was was every American who had to
fork over their tax dollars for this eighty five million dollar,
eighty nine million dollar horseshit. And and the reality is
Trump begged for a missile parade in the first administration.
Speaker 1 (22:36):
He was ab he saw one in France, that's right,
Steel day.
Speaker 3 (22:41):
That he was obsessed with it. And now he finally
got one. He didn't have an esper or a Millie
who said, no, sir, you can't do this.
Speaker 1 (22:48):
Yeah. Millie was like, no dice.
Speaker 3 (22:50):
Yeah, Millie was like a no loss, no chief, the
same how this works. Yeah, but you know, he he
desperately wanted this again. Donald Trump, the draft dodging, chicken
shit coward who demeaned diminished John McCain, who called our
troop suckers, and losers, who has over and over again
(23:13):
essentially except pressed his contempt for the service of others,
wanted to absorb the heroism of American military men and women.
I mean, I found the whole thing so crass and
stupid and badly run because you know, you have these
guys marching by it. It's like brought to you by Coinbase,
(23:34):
sponsored by UFC, and it's just like, oh, come on, dude.
Speaker 1 (23:40):
Yeah, it was incredible stuff. Incredible stuff. Rick Wilson, John joining.
Speaker 3 (23:48):
Me a pleasure as always.
Speaker 1 (23:50):
Will you be back?
Speaker 3 (23:51):
I will always be back for you. You know that.
Speaker 1 (23:55):
James Kimmel is the author of the Science of Revenge,
Standing the world's deadliest addiction, and How to overcome it.
Welcome to Fast Politics, James.
Speaker 4 (24:08):
Thank you, mollly happy to be here and really appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (24:11):
So talk to me about this book.
Speaker 4 (24:13):
So recent neuroscience revelations have given us some exciting new discoveries,
most importantly that your brain on revenge looks like your
brain on drugs, which is a big discovery in the
sense it is it is it is your brain on revenge.
(24:35):
It looks like your brain on drugs. And that's a
big discovery because it gives us the first notion of
a biological cause of violence and how to prevent and
treat it.
Speaker 1 (24:45):
So, you know, I'm sober twenty seven years, but who's counting.
Will this show us how to treat alcoholism, drug addiction,
or revenge?
Speaker 4 (24:56):
No, it'll show us that by using alcohol and other
substance use, addiction, prevention and treatment strategies, we can prevent
and treat violence, which is a big revelation. It's kind
of the reverse order where we're bringing those techniques into
something that has eluded human prevention and treatment for thousands
(25:20):
of years.
Speaker 1 (25:21):
I need you to explain this more to me. Neuroscience
finds that revenge and addiction look the same. So what
you mean by revenge more is the sort of anger impulse, right, So,
revenge is.
Speaker 4 (25:35):
The desire to punish people who either violate social norms
or wrong you in some way, whether it's real or imagined.
So you know, it starts with the grievance, and a
grievance is a real or imagined perception of having been mistreated,
treated unjustly, humiliated, shame betrayed, victimized in any way. That's
(25:57):
the beginning point of this process.
Speaker 1 (26:00):
Okay, So if revenge is like addiction and it is
a similar kind of situation that can prevent violence, but
it also perhaps might give us a little insight into
what's happening in Trump's second administration.
Speaker 4 (26:14):
It does, and what's happening across the country in response.
Because this is a it's a human problem, so it transcends,
you know, political boundaries. Let's just go into this for
a second. So a grievance, we've all experienced those. That
can be somebody you know who cuts you off while
you're driving, or an unkind word from you know, your
partner or spouse or a parent, or something you know
(26:37):
from some exchange with a coworker or your boss, or
something even more broadly like a mean tweet or something
that comes out of the Trump administration or a democratic administration.
It wouldn't matter. But those grievances are registered in your brain.
And we can see this now in brain scans. That
activates your brain's pay network area, which is known as
(27:00):
the anterior insulo. And your brain hates pain, so it
wants to do something to stop that pain or cover
it up. And the strategy that we've evolved to do
is we get pleasure from trying to hurt the person
who rolled us or their proxy, and that is very pleasurable,
and it activates the pleasure and reward circuitry of the brain,
(27:22):
which is the nucleus occumbents, and the dorsal strata. All
of this is also happening for every other form of addiction,
and we want to gratify that craving, the craving for
revenge which is stimulated by a dopamine rush to motivate
us toward harming the person who rolled us, because we
get a little high from it. I mean, revenge acts
(27:44):
inside your brain like a drug, doest.
Speaker 1 (27:47):
One of the things that I've been interested in as
a sober person who comes from a family is they
tell my children all the time riddled with alcoholism. As
I tell my three teenage children, I got sobern as nineteen.
So whenever I see that, I say, you know, you
come from a family. I swear to that I am
become my grandfather. You come from a family riddled with alcoholism.
(28:08):
My grandfather wouldn't say things like that, but he would
say other things about you know whatever. So I wonder
if one of the really interesting things about Trump's motivations
which I think are worth looking at because he's now
running the entire federal government, is that he had this
brother who died of alcoholism, Mary's father, and he has
(28:31):
committed to never drink or take drugs, right like I
don't know about drugs, but has committed has made a
you know, very clear about the fact that he never
drinks and will never drink. Joe Biden children who struggled
with alcoholism also never drinks ever take drucks, similar like
non drinkers, both of them from families filled with alcoholism.
So talk to me about kind of if there's a
(28:53):
connection here between being sober or being alcoholic and having
trouble managing your emotion.
Speaker 4 (29:00):
It's possible, And I don't want it to be focused
on emotions, because this is much more than just what
we think of as emotions like I feel happy or sad.
This is a brain biological process that drives us toward
revenge seeking for pleasure. We seek revenge to make ourselves
feel better after we've been hurt. There is a theory
(29:23):
that the vulnerable brain that suggests that people who are
vulnerable to other forms of addiction are more vulnerable to
addictions in general. So if you're vulnerable to a substance
use disorder, you may we don't have evidence for this yet,
but you may also be more vulnerable to a gambling addiction.
(29:44):
You may also be more vulnerable to a revenge addiction,
which is what we're talking about. So it's possible, but
it's important to know that all humans, we all feel
good when we take an opioid, but we also all
feel good by fantasizing about or enacting our fantasies about
revenge seeking, in other words, hurting the people who wrong
(30:05):
us or their proxy, so that we don't even have
to hurt the direct person who's wronged to us to
get this gratification. And the good example of that is,
like you know, you're at work, your boss says something
that you don't like and hurts your feelings or worse,
and you can't retaliate against your boss because you might
lose your job, so you go home and pick a fight,
maybe with your spouse or significant other or a child,
(30:26):
or you kick the dog. Those are what we would
call revenge by proxy, or some psychologists would call that
displaced revenge seeking. But it makes you feel better in
that moment. But like all drugs, it's a temporary high,
doesn't last very long, usually leaves you hurting and wanting more.
Donald Trump seems to have had a lifetime of perhaps
(30:48):
sobriety from alcoholism, but has professed in many interviews to
being a huge fan of retaliation and revenge seeking, right,
And so you could make a case. I've never examined him,
and I'm not a psychiatrist, so I couldn't diagnose it,
but you could make a pretty strong case that he
and others in his administration look like they're struggling with
(31:11):
revenge addiction in a pretty mighty way and not able
to control it. And that's always going to be harmful
to anybody that's caught up in that and the people
around them.
Speaker 1 (31:21):
Yeah, it's interesting. I mean, I just wonder if you
could talk to us about what this larger idea of
a culture that is so set on revenge.
Speaker 3 (31:30):
Right.
Speaker 1 (31:30):
We're seeing a lot of like the cultural questions of revenge.
Speaker 4 (31:35):
Yeah, I refer to it as a revenge addicted nation.
Right now. America seems like a revenge addicted nation in
many ways, and part of that is the advent for
which humans have not been prepared for.
Speaker 3 (31:47):
At all.
Speaker 4 (31:48):
And that's the advent of social networking platforms, and they're
a unique ability to spread a grievance, right of feeling
of victimization twis of other people at light speed, almost simultaneously.
So we are getting perhaps millions of people with real
or imagined grievances about the same thing at the same time.
(32:11):
And these platforms also give all of those people the
ability not only to spread that grievance further, but to
either retaliate instantly, right, So we're also the platform gives
you the grievance, and then it gives you the way
to gratify the desire for revenge by firing back, you know, aggressive, mean,
nasty tweets and other messaging, and also to plan and
(32:34):
inspire and encourage other people to join in, you know,
real world outside of the virtue their iOS right acts
of retaliation, such as the you know, the January sixth insurrection,
in which an imagined grievance about the election caused a
group of people that using social networking to come together
(32:56):
and then have a real world riot at the Capital
revenge riot, you.
Speaker 1 (33:01):
Know, yeah, revenge. Rt I interviewed a guy called to
Read Hoffman on Morning Joe. A couple months ago, he
was talking about how good the Internet is an AI
and I was proposing all of it. I have this
theory that while the Internet created a lot of disruptions,
so did the printing press, right and he said something
(33:22):
that was actually really smart that has really stuck with me,
which is he said, the printing press it turned out
to be really great, but it was like about one
hundred years of just complete disaster between those two things.
I mean, is that what we're in right now? Are
we in this sort of I want to say, like
postmodernization of the culture dysfunction? Is that where we are
(33:43):
at this moment?
Speaker 4 (33:44):
I think that's possible, and it's a pretty good analogy. There.
There was a lot of warfare and a lot of
revenge seeking right back in those days after let's say,
the Reformation in Martin Luther was spread by that new
technology renting press. And we're seeing something similar to that,
but across much bigger population and much more quickly than
(34:07):
we did then. But people at that time didn't understand
and wouldn't have that the printing press was able to
spread grievance and retaliation and the ability to retaliate so well,
and it didn't do one thing that modern technology does,
which is it's based on algorithms that actually further that.
So the algorithms want to us to engage more often,
(34:31):
and since revenge is such an addictive process, it's like
the you know, the social networking platforms are feeding us
the drug, right, They're the system that enable us to
get these painful experiences of grievance and then these amazingly
pleasurable experiences of retaliation twenty four to seven, you know,
(34:52):
seven days a week exactly.
Speaker 1 (34:54):
So online is obviously making a problem worse. But is
the problem existing just because of the internet, or is
this a problem that's always happened, And is it getting
less bad because it's not happening in real life even
though it is sort of happening in real life.
Speaker 4 (35:11):
Yeah, I think it's more about it's a problem that's
always existed. So evolutionary psychologists theorize the leading theory is
is that we developed this pleasurable experience in retaliating maybe
eleven thousand years ago or or longer, as humans came
to live in societies and needed ways to cooperate and
(35:32):
cause people to obey social norms and you know, not
steal things from you, your cave, or from your neighbor.
So the desire for revenge is natural, and it was
an adaptive strategy back then. Where it becomes pathological and dangerous,
in particular, is now in modern society, where instead of
(35:52):
retaliating for survival purposes or to pass on our genetic
imprint to the next generation, we retaliate for just because
our egos have been offended or her or our politics
or our you know, we have revenge born. We have
all these types of experiences of grievance, insult, and victimization
(36:18):
that are not that our retaliation for those are not
driven by a need to survive. It's not a flight
or flight kind of situation. And it's always for a
wrong of the past, so you're not presented. Revenge is
always past looking. It's you know, it's always going to
be punishing somebody for something they did, you know, minutes, hours, days, weeks, months,
(36:39):
years and years ago. That's where that goes. So I
think today the systems are making it much worse because
it's able to spread grievance like a virus. It's blowing
grievances into our faces right out of our cell phones
and computers all day long, and we've never had to
face that kind of onslaught before from something that we
(37:03):
spend platforms like these that we spend so much of
our time on. And the last part of the addiction
puzzle is the prefrontal cortex, that executive function, self control
area of our brain. And when that is hijacked or
inhibited so that we're actually carrying out revenge seeking despite
(37:27):
the negative consequences, that's when it moves pathological, because it
moves out of an adaptive strategy into one that is
harming ourselves and harming others. And you can't become the
instrument of someone else's pain without feeling that pain yourself.
And you also are putting yourself in harm's way because
your act of just revenge seeking. Justice seeking in the
(37:47):
form of revenge becomes the targets unjust victimization and spurs
them to experience a new desire for revenge back against you.
And we see that in politics.
Speaker 1 (38:02):
So it makes everything worse, that's right, And this is
the hyper polarization.
Speaker 4 (38:06):
Thing, right, right, But this is the hyperness of it, yes, correct.
Speaker 1 (38:10):
How do you get out of this? Give everyone prozac? Right?
The huge doses of prozac.
Speaker 4 (38:17):
And that probably the prozac probably wouldn't help because that's
going to take down anxiety, which is a great thing,
but isn't really this problem so our problem with revenge seeking.
Prozac hasn't been found, for instance, to be the cure
for addictions. It's not really prescribed for addictions. So that's
really not the right one what we need to think about.
So we have two options.
Speaker 1 (38:38):
Wait, hot, take here for one second, not to hijack
this interview with my own mental health problems, but what
I've noticed from myself and my own mental health problems
is that prozac does not work on me as someone
who's sober a long time, but effects or for whatever reason,
effects or is just the greatest drug ever.
Speaker 4 (38:56):
That is interesting, And I can't comment because you know,
I'm not that kind of docs, so I don't know.
Are you my doctor, and nor are your doctor? That's correct,
for sure, that's right. What is probably more likely to work,
right are going to be the addiction prevention and treatment
strategies that are already in our toolkit for other addictive disorders.
(39:19):
So that can mean to start with, that can be
cognitive behavioral therapy, counseling, motivational interviewing, self help strategies, and
things like that. We may also find and it hasn't
been studied yet, but I'm hoping that this will start soon.
Things like meloxone and maybe even GLP one, drugs like
ozema and we go v that are have been shown
(39:42):
to help people control craving, because that seems to be
where this is all centered in the brain. It's that
addiction craving desire that motivates us to go out and
harm the people who we think are all on us
or their proxies, including not only if somebody cuts you off,
raising ahead to either flip the finger or cut them off,
(40:03):
or even worse, pulling a gun up through mass shootings,
intimate partner violence, school bullying, gang violence and street violence, extremism, terrorism,
and even war. All of those are born out of
this grievance desire for revenge brain biological process that we're
(40:25):
just now understanding. But if we see it as an
addictive process, we can use these addiction prevention to treatment strategies,
starting with things like as well public health campaigns to
warn people about the dangers of what happens when you
have a grievance and this desire for revenge, and that
although it's going to happen, there are things you can
do about it. The other that's just one side of it.
(40:46):
The best thing you can do, and there's a whole
body of brand new neuroscience on this. That's even more
exciting to me than the revenge side is what happens
in your brain when you simply imagine forgiving a grievance
or somebody that's done something wrong to you, even without
communicating with them. It's not a gift to them, it's
a gift of healing for yourself. And what happens when
(41:07):
you forgive is it reverses. It turns out all of
these things that I just described inside your brain for
revenge seeking. It shuts down the pain network inside your brain,
It shuts down the craving circuitry, and it restores your
self control circuitry.
Speaker 1 (41:23):
So basically everything we do in AA is right.
Speaker 4 (41:28):
That whole forgiveness piece and the the you know this,
you know kind of owning that. And although AA is
really strong about going out right and making that apology
to the person you're wrong, and that's nice and it's
very powerful, But what we're finding is is that forgiving
of yourself is critical.
Speaker 1 (41:48):
Which is what you do when you do that?
Speaker 4 (41:52):
Yes, right, and if you're forgiving yourself and anybody that
is wronging you just internally and your listeners can experience
this like right away. I mean, if it's safe to
close your eyes right now, think about a grievance that
you have against someone, and you know you have them,
because we all do. We have maybe hundreds of them
every day. But think about that and then think about
(42:12):
just imagine what it would feel like. Just imagine what
it would feel like if you decide, you know what,
I'm going to forgive this. Usually when people do that,
they'll respond and go, oh, I would feel better. I
guess I would feel pretty great. I would feel relieved,
I would feel like this weight off my shoulders, and
and it happens that quickly. Then the matter is simply
doing it again and again and again, until every time
(42:34):
that memory of that grievance comes back in your head
you go, oh, yeah, I'm forgiving this. I'm done with
this one now, and you know, kind of kaboom, it's gone.
It's kind of this wonder drug superpower. If if humans have
that we've sort of, you know, ignored because we think
that maybe it's a weakness or it makes us a doormat,
which is not what it's supposed to do. It doesn't
(42:55):
stop you from acting in self defense or getting out
of a toxic relationship, but it does help you heal
from the wrongs of the past in those relationships very quickly.
It's cheap. You can get it without a prescription. I mean,
there's just you can use it as off as you
want with no side effects. It's just like, there is
nothing better than forgiveness for anybody.
Speaker 1 (43:15):
Yes, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 3 (43:19):
Fair welcome, No, no moment.
Speaker 1 (43:25):
Rick Wilson, Holly Jogfast, I flew here this morning.
Speaker 3 (43:30):
And your pilot who flew you there had two certifications,
once called an ATP and the others called a commercial
pilot certificate.
Speaker 1 (43:39):
Why do we bring this up?
Speaker 3 (43:40):
Well, the new head of the FAA claimed it turns
out you're going to be shocked to hear this from
somebody in the Trump administration claimed falsely that he had
a commercial pilot certificate. He has an instrument rating as
a multi engineer rating, but he does not have a
commercial pilot certificate. It's not that hard to get, but
it's really stupid to lie about having one when you don't.
Speaker 1 (44:01):
But also, why does Trump World keep elevating people who
can't tell the truth.
Speaker 3 (44:07):
They're not sending their best, They're not the endless parade
of weak, weird, shitty, non effective candidates for these jobs.
It's not coming because Donald Trump has a rich portfolio
of options. This is what he's got. These are the
people that will work for him. Now, it's not a
(44:28):
great world to live in if you're a Trump appointee
at this point, you're in such a group of scales
and weirdos and fuck ups that honestly, why bothered a lie?
Just say I'm a mid range, middling talent nobody who
would like this job. Please, mister Trump, love me. Don't
bother to lie in overstate your qualifications. It just doesn't
(44:48):
work anymore. Rick Wilson, Molly John Fast We'll see you
next week.
Speaker 1 (44:54):
That's it for this episode of Fast Politics. Tune in
every Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday to hear the best
minds and politics make sense of all this chaos. If
you enjoy this podcast, please send it to a friend
and keep the conversation going Thanks for listening,
Host
Molly Jong-Fast
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Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
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If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.