Chuck’s Commentary - The Public Is Souring On Trump 2.0 + America’s Imperial Past Looms Large Over Venezuela - The Chuck ToddCast

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello, They're happy Monday, Happy Election week.

Speaker 2 (00:03):
It is.

Speaker 1 (00:05):
We are here Monday, November third. I am taping on
November second, so full disclosure on that.

Speaker 2 (00:11):
I just got back from.

Speaker 1 (00:13):
The first annual Todd Bowl as somebody, as a friend
of mine tweeted with me, was the University of Miami
playing SMU in Dallas. I have one child at Miami,
one child at SMU. Many of you know my love
for the Miami Hurricanes. I have a lot to say
about a lot going on in college football and the
future of the University of Miami, but I will hold

(00:36):
off on those comments, like every Monday to the end
of the podcast, to sort of it is good not
to react in the immediacy. That's always. It's good in politics,
it's good in sports, it's good in life in general.
You always want to take a breath. So I believe,

(00:57):
especially for my fellow Hurricane fans who care about the
program as much as I do, would like to see
another national title in our lifetime.

Speaker 2 (01:06):
I'd like to.

Speaker 1 (01:07):
Think I'm looking at this with some very sober eyes.
So I encourage you, if you care about that stuff,
to go back.

Speaker 2 (01:16):
There.

Speaker 1 (01:16):
A few other thoughts in general about what is turning
into a coaching massacre in college football with yet another
one gone there. But let's be honest, this is a
big deal. We are essentially at the one year mark
of the election, of the second election of Donald Trump.
And what happens at the one year mark. You get
a slew of polling, of good polling, particularly my favorite poll,

(01:39):
the poll that I helped keep around and update and upkeep,
and it is still in some existence at NBC. Doesn't
come out as frequently as it used to, but it
does come out two or three times a year. The
NBC poll with Hart mcinturf, the bipartisan poll that essentially
still is seen by everybody else as the gold standard

(01:59):
in American election polling. And so I've gone through it
pretty deeply, and I want to share with you sort
of my takes on it. I know you've seen. There's
a few things out there are eye popping headline. Democrats
have an eight point advantage on the generic ballot in
the NBC poll.

Speaker 2 (02:16):
When you see a.

Speaker 1 (02:19):
You take that here, you see that anywhere else, you think, oh,
they must have had a banded sample. We are the
NBC poll, and Heart and McInturff are so careful not
to let it be volatile, if you will, that it
is a remarkable showing, especially as the same poll shows
such unpopularity for the Democratic Party even as they have

(02:39):
this huge lead. So this is a massive, I think,
new place that we are in in American politics. We've
not had a situation like this before where you have
extraordinarily unpopular president, extraordinarily unpopular opposition party. Something's going to
have to give. Come the midterm elections, we are going
to get a first taste of where stand I think

(03:01):
nationally for both parties, with of course the elections on Tuesday,
and a huge reminder, I will be anchoring a live
election night special with my friends at Decision to s
h Q, my friend Chrysalizzo and a slew of people
that I think. Let me tease out some of the
guests that we already have confirmed. I will tell you now.

(03:25):
We've got Jacob Rubashkin, Jaron Zao, Jessica Taylor, David Wildstein,
Lisa Miller, Abigail Turner, Bill Baronihn Couvoyan Couvalleon, Sorry if
I messed that up. Kirk Beto of the Hotline, Nathaniel Rakitch,
Leon Sid Adam Carlson, Lakeisha, Jane Arminge, Thomas, John Fleisman,

(03:49):
Garrett Heron. That's just again, we're going for five hours minimum,
from about six thirty to eleven eleven thirty, so maybe
four or four and a half hours minim. We're going
to go until we call California, and of course make
sure we're called every race has been called in Virginia,
New Jersey, New York City, and California. We're not going
to go to bed, but we're going to touch on

(04:11):
mayor's races. Is a fascinating pattern that we're starting to
see develop in these urban primary fights, mostly on the left.
You got those Pennsylvania Supreme Court judges that are going
to are up there for an up or down vote,
which if they go down, then we have very partisan,
important judicial elections taking place in twenty twenty seven, which

(04:31):
could have huge impacts on the twenty twenty eight presidential race.
Given Pennsylvania standing in the battleground. There's a slew of
ballot props that I want to tease out a little
bit when it comes to Texas in particular and Maine,
two sort of testing issues that may appear local but
could have some national ramifications. So I do want to

(04:54):
discuss that today, and I want to begin with essentially
the first year report card for Donald Trump. Yes, it's
not yet one year into his presidency, but it's one
year since he was elected president. And I know, you know,
it's funny. I've been in this business a long time.
Where we do we always do a November polls, and
you always do January polls that essentially are serving as

(05:17):
checks where are we one year from the election? Where
are we one year from when he took office? So
in this case, we are one year from the election.
And let's look at some basics, if you will, the
big the direction of the country. And this is one
of those where you can and this is a reminder
of how a partisan media person would work. Okay, so

(05:40):
here's right direction, wrong track. It is thirty seven sixty one,
thirty seven percent right track. That is not a great number.
That is down from forty four percent the first NBC
poll of the Trump presidency. So at the start of
his presidency, it was a pretty high right track number
considering we've been in a what I would call a
political recession most of the century, where a majority of

(06:02):
people have consistently said we're on the wrong track. There
was just one brief period, one brief period during the
start of Obama's presidency that those two lines were essentially
dead even right track wrong track, And we've been essentially
on the wrong track really going back since since I'd
say about a year into the Iraq War post nine

(06:23):
to eleven, and it has been a consistent wrong track,
wrong track, wrong track. However, if you wanted to spin
the thirty seven percent right direction in Donald Trump's direction,
you'd say this, Well, thirty seven percent of the country
says we're on the we're in the right direction, sixty
one percent on the wrong track. That thirty seven percent,

(06:45):
we haven't been that high, that high since. Obviously there
was forty four percent of March, but before then, it
hasn't been as high as thirty seven Since going back
to the start of COVID in March of twenty when
there was a a bit of almost rally around the
president moment when everybody was trying to unify for a

(07:07):
very brief period on dealing with COVID, you saw that
number inch up and then it dramatically fell down to
nineteen percent right direction, seventy two percent wrong track, and
that was pretty that's seventy percent plus consistent wrong track
essentially July of twenty was pretty consistent all the way
until the summer of twenty twenty four, and still at

(07:28):
election day in twenty twenty four, we were sitting at
sixty six percent wrong track. So you could make the
case if you just wanted to spin this in Trump's direction, Hey,
there's still more people say we're on the right track
than any time during the Biden presidency, and that would
be true. But it's the trend line that you've got
to be aware of, where the fact is that it

(07:48):
is now directionally going back to what was the norm
during the end of Trump's presidency, most of Trump's presidency
and going in to that. So that is a yellow
flashing yellow light. Thirty again, thirty seven is still higher
than at any moment in Biden's presidency, but it is
eight points lower, excuse me, seven points lower than it

(08:09):
was at the start of the year. And it does
appear when you see other polling in there, that it
is trending downward. Now here's my favorite aspect of sort
of trending. You know I've pointed this out to you before,
but Donald Trump in many ways, he can't really move
his numbers. The country has made up its mind on
Donald Trump. How do I know this? So I went

(08:31):
through our all of the polling we did on Donald Trump.
NBC News did on Donald Trump from twenty seventeen through
twenty twenty. Okay, NBC conducted. He keeps saying we, it
is not we. It's been a long time since it's
we almost a year now. Thirty nine polls in his
first term, all thirty nine polls, and when you average

(08:52):
out his job approval rating in those thirty nine polls,
just the entire just average it out, his job approval
rating was forty three point seven percent. What is the
job approval rating in this latest NBC News poll released
this weekend, forty three percent. His number doesn't budge. His

(09:15):
trading range is really small. It is can get. It
has gotten as high as he got. Forty seven percent
was his honeymoon. That was March of twenty twenty five.
He hit forty seven percent. In October of eighteen, when
he got his tax cut passed, he hit and then
he's never been over forty seven in the NBC Player

(09:36):
forty seven percent in February at the start of COVID,
it's never been north of forty seven. Now, his lows
have all been were super early in his presidency, at
thirty nine percent in April of eighteen, thirty nine percent
in January of eighteen. Uh he was at thirty eight
percent in October of seventeen. Other than that, though he

(09:58):
has not visited the thirties. The last time he was
in the thirties essentially was April of eighteen. He has
essentially been And I'm just forty four, forty five, forty six,
forty four, forty four, forty seven, forty six, forty three,
forty three, forty six, forty three, forty six, forty four,
forty five, forty three, forty five, forty Am I making
my point here. I'm not going to keep going and
going and going. But that is just remarkable stability. Okay,

(10:22):
that forty forty three percent there is. That's the chunk
of voters that you know are going to be with
the republic Trump led Republican Party. And I say Trump
led Republican Party here because there's another interesting question that
again will depend on how you want to present the question,
will kind of give a hint at your partisan perspective.

Speaker 2 (10:41):
If you're not careful.

Speaker 1 (10:43):
A few other things to note, you are starting to
see Donald Trump's favorable rating go back. He again had
a bit of a honeymoon. He had a thirty six
percent positive rating. It was the highest personal positive rating
that he had ever recorded. That is already backed down
down to twenty nine on very positive, which is a

(11:04):
lot more in line with where he was most of
the campaign year. So he's still better. He still has
a better very positive rating in this second term and
from the second campaign than he ever did first. And
what that is is that that's the deepest space right
the twenty nine percent who say they have a very

(11:25):
positive view of him, they are with him through thick
and thin. It's another eleven percent say say somewhat positive.
So you're looking at forty percent that just feel very
positively about Donald Trump, and is approve ratings forty three,
So it's just really only there's only three. If you
just assume that the forty of the forty three feel
very positive about him, it means that there aren't people

(11:47):
that approve of that don't like them and approve of
the job he's doing. There are people that don't like
them and don't and approve of his goals of what
he's trying to achieve, but they don't like how he's
trying to get those goals. And again, this poll features
some interesting things that will get us there, but the
big headline of this poll really is that generic ballot number,

(12:09):
and let me go, and it is. It is astonishing
that Democrats have an eight point lead October of twenty
twenty five eight point lead in the generic Democrats at fifty,
Republicans at forty two. The last time they had gaps
anywhere over five points, let alone eight nine or ten,
was in the run up to the twenty eighteen midterms.

(12:32):
So you're almost seeing we are in a repeat. And
in fact, Democrats are plus eight right basically one year
out from the midterms in the generic ballot. In October
of seventeen, the same point in time, one year out
from the twenty eighteen midterms, Democrats were up seven points
in the generic ballot. So as you can see, we
are trending in almost it looks like in the exact

(12:54):
we are literally having a rerun, right, it's a rerun
of the Trump job rating forty three percent. The entire
first term is forty three point seven. He's sitting at
forty three percent one year before the midterms and Trump
one point zero. Democrats out a seven point le in
the generic. One year before the midterms and Trump two
point zero. Democrats have an eight point lead in the generic.

(13:15):
So there's on one hand you think boy, history is
repeating itself. But there is one giant difference between twenty
eighteen twenty seventeen, in twenty twenty six and twenty twenty five,
and it is the personal favorable rating of the Democratic
Party versus the Republican Party. The Republican Party is a

(13:38):
positive rating of thirty seven percent, negative rating of forty
six percent. The Democratic Party is a positive rating of
twenty eight percent and a negative rating of fifty three percent.
Let me say that again, a negative rating of fifty
three percent. They have a twenty five point gap, okay,
between positive rating for the Democratic Party and the negative
rating for the Democratic Party fifty three percent. In contrast,

(14:01):
Republican Party's gap is less than is not even double digits.
It's thirty seven percent positive, forty six percent negative, just
a nine point negative gap. Donald Trump has a larger
negative gap between favorable and unfavorable than the Republican Party does.
This is an important nugget here, okay, because I think
this explained the generic ballot gap quite well and what

(14:24):
the voter is likely what we're likely seeing with the
swing voter. And again this is really going to go. Well,
what you're hearing with these polling numbers and I'm that
I'm delivering to you is going to really does sort
of coincide really well with the conversations you're going to
hear from Rich tw you know, the qualitative research focus

(14:44):
group stuff versus the quantitative that I'm giving you right now.
But that massive gap, and just to give you an
idea of where we were in October of twenty seventeen, Okay,
at this part to the most recent numbers I can
look at here December of twenty seventeen. Then a favorable
rating of the Democratic Party was thirty three percent. The
net negative was thirty eight percent. Okay, so just a

(15:06):
five point gap, Just a five point gap. It's now again,
that was a five point gap essentially one year out
from the twenty eight twenty eighteen midterms. Look, we know
the whole country is a net negative view of both
parties Okay, that we know that a majority of this
country doesn't like either political party. But you had a
five point gap in twenty At this point in time
in twenty seventeen on the Democratic Party favorable to unfavorable ratio,

(15:29):
it is a twenty five point gap. Now, now let
me tell you the Republican number so you can get
some clear clarity on that Republicans net. In twenty seventeen,
they were sitting at twenty nine forty five. Okay, essentially
one year out twenty nine forty five, that is a
sixteen point gap. Here they are with an improved Republican

(15:52):
Party rating this time where their gap is only nine
points less than ten. So Donald Trump hasn't changed, but
the Democratic Party has changed and the Republican Party has changed.
But what's interesting is that there appears to be a
group of voters that feel more favorably to the Republican
Party then they do Donald Trump. Now you would say, hmm,

(16:16):
that should lead to some interesting decisions by Republicans who
maybe want to be seeking reelection in twenty twenty six
only are going to be dealing with two more years
of Trump and maybe want to seek distance. And of
course then you look at that base vote and the
devotion to Donald Trump that I showed you where essentially

(16:37):
to love Donald Trump is to approve of his job.
And they're the most important chunk of Republican primary voters.
So even though a majority of this country has a
lot more preference to generic Republican ideas versus generic Democratic
ideas versus Donald Trump, twenty right now, you can see
that the voters view the generic ballot question not as

(17:01):
a discussion between which party do you like better, the
Democrats or the Republicans. That is not the question, what Jude.
The reason that the Democrats have a large eight point
lead is that the question that voters are deciding between
is do you want Donald Trump? Do you want there
to be a check on Donald Trump? And right now

(17:23):
there is a huge desire for a check on Donald Trump.
There's a reason results matter more than promises, just like
there's a reason Morgan and Morgan is America's largest injury
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It includes cases where insurance companies offered next to nothing

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(18:07):
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Their fee is free unless they win. Here's something that

(18:31):
was fascinating that surprises me. The democracy issue didn't really
work very well in twenty didn't work very well in
twenty two. I know there's a whole bunch of Biden
people that want to spin that it did. That was
not why they won in twenty and in twenty twenty two.
It is hard to see that they won that way.
It was a disastrous democratic excuse me, Republican nominees that

(18:53):
allowed Democrats do not do as poorly as they ended
up could have done in a normal environment. Kamala Harris
quote closed with the democracy question. And yet those swing
voters weren't moved by the democracy question because in their minds,
they weren't electing a different Donald Trump for Trump two
point zero. In their mind they were electing a continuation

(19:14):
of Trump one point zero. But Trump two point zero
is not popular, and the single listen to this, I'm
going to read you the full question. When it comes
to deciding your vote for Congress next year, Please tell
me if each of the following is the single most
important issue in deciding how you will vote, a very
important issue, or only somewhat important. The single most important

(19:39):
issue to hit was protecting constitutional rights. Number two was
protecting democracy. Number three was cost of living, and so
that okay, healthcare was number four at ten, I'm trying
really hard to find an issue that benefits Donald Trump. Okay,

(20:00):
Number four was healthcare premiums. Number five was dealing with
the political violence in America. Okay, maybe that's possible. That's
a possible net to Trump it's possible voters on both
sides of the I'll see the other party at fault there.
Immigration and border security is also down there. Sort of healthcare,
political violence, immigration and border security all sat around the

(20:25):
same when you did the single most important. What's interesting
is that in twenty eighteen, the top two issues on
the single most important were healthcare and immigration. Here the
top two issues are protecting constitutional rights and protecting democracy,
which one might argue is the same thing. So do
you end up combining those numbers so you essentially have
half of respondents in some form or another, picking some

(20:48):
form of the structure of the democracy that really irritates them.
So now when you see that that is the number
one and number two issue, I've given you the fact
that the Democratic Party is more unpopular than Donald Trump
and more and popular than the Republican Party, and yet
Democrats are winning the generic ballot by eight points. Folks
don't like how Donald Trump is running roughshot over the presidency.

(21:12):
Let me give you a few more questions to give
you a little bit more, a little bit more issues
on this. So, for instance, they did a great question
here they said, thinking about President Trump and his administration
when it comes to the following issues. Is the Trump
administration living up to your expectations or has it fallen short?
And they tested six issues, border security, foreign policy, changing

(21:34):
business as usual in Washington, the economy, looking up for
the middle class, and inflation in the cost of living.
A majority believe that the Trump administration is so far
one year from the election, has so far fallen short
fifty three percent say they fallen short. And foreign policy
fifty six percent on changing business as usual in Washington,
huge huge red flag there. That's all those crypto deals

(21:56):
and all this sort of you know, pay to play issues.
Sixty three percent say he's falling short in the economy.
That is a huge driver in here. People do not
like this economy and you can feel it in this poll.
Sixty five percent say he's falling short and looking out
for the middle classt Row rut Row, mister Trump, and
sixty six percent say that he's fallen short on inflation

(22:16):
and costs of living just one issue. Do A majority
believe he has lived up to the expectations that they
had for his presidency. And I'm sure all of you
can guess the issue because I haven't.

Speaker 2 (22:25):
Said it yet.

Speaker 1 (22:26):
It is border security and immigration, fifty one percent say
he's lived up to expectations on that and that, boy,
does that tell you a lot. And to indicate how
much more trouble Trump and the Republicans are with the economy,
they did an issue test between the two parties. Republicans
lead on border security by thirty one points. They lead
on dealing with crime by twenty two points. They lead

(22:48):
on dealing with immigration by eighteen points. On the economy,
in September of twenty twenty three, Republicans led by twenty
one points between the two parties, and now their lead
is one one point. This is the worst showing for
the Republicans on this issue the economy since you guessed
it twenty seventeen to twenty eighteen in the run up

(23:11):
to the first midterm of Donald Trump. So as you
can see, oh more importantly, on the issue of protecting
constitutional rights, eight point advantage for Democrats on this. On
the issue of protecting democracy eleven point advantage for Democrats
on this. We ask those same two questions in September
of twenty twenty three, Republicans had an eight point lead
on the protecting our constitutional rights issue, and Republicans had

(23:33):
a one point lead on protecting democracy. Both of those
issues are moving towards the Democrats. Now, some of this
is natural. The party out of power is seen as
the one more likely to stand up for constitutional rights
than the party empower. Most people assume the party empower
is always looking for loophole or trying to erode rights.
Those that are upset feel as if the party out
of power is the one that actually cares about the Constitution.

(23:56):
And you could argue that we've seen this right. Members
of Congress care more about the Constitution when they're in
the minority in either the House of the Senate then
they do when they're in the majority.

Speaker 2 (24:05):
How do we know this?

Speaker 1 (24:05):
Just look at all the Republicans staying silent on the
unconstitutional way that Donald Trump is conducting his war against Venezuela,
because that's what he's doing right now. They have essentially
declared war with Venezuela without going to Congress, without getting
you know, with it. Now they claim it's not even
shouldn't even be subject to.

Speaker 2 (24:26):
The War Powers Act.

Speaker 1 (24:28):
The lack of interest among most of congressional Republicans in
protecting the Constitution on this issue, I think is what's happening.
It's not one issue here, it's a collection of it. Right,
They've he keeps losing in court. So there's there's usually
a headline about once a week where the federal courts
say Trump violated the constitution or the Trump administration violated

(24:51):
the constitution.

Speaker 2 (24:52):
Maybe it's on National.

Speaker 1 (24:52):
Guard trips, maybe it's on what what what they've been doing.

Speaker 2 (24:57):
With tariffs?

Speaker 1 (24:58):
Right, But and every it does seem as if every
week and these headlines. If you look at this poll,
and in some ways do I do I wish NBC
News would do the Heart macin Turth poll once a month. Yes,
that was the pace with which we did it back
when when we were a news organization that was a

(25:19):
lot bigger and going a lot big. Obviously, they're in
a different all of the legacy media companies are in
a different place and don't want to spend the money
that they once did. But interestingly, doing this poll six
you know, having a six month gap, you sort of
you can see the bigger shifts. Right, they're brighter. It's
not the slow erosion. You see the brighter. You see

(25:41):
the bright lines. And here's one more question. If you're
not sure, if you think I'm reading too much into
the issue of democracy and constitutional rights. Let me just
show you this one last question. Compared to past presidents,
do you think Donald Trump has done more to protect
the US Constitution, done more to undermine the US Constitution,
or he's been no differ than past presidents. Thirty one

(26:02):
percent said he's done more to protect. Remember that's the
super core base. Fifty two percent say he's done more
to undermine. Just sixteen percent say he's no different than
past presidents fifty two percent. Anytime you see a majority,
I've shown you how unpopular the Democratic Party is to me.
Anytime I see numbers in fifty plus, it means a
majority of whatever that number is is what the independence

(26:25):
split is, and it means self described independence are uncomfortable
with this, and this, this is this is I think.
So he's You've got an economy that isn't working for
a lot of people. Again, how do we know this?
Sixty one percent say they say their family's income is
falling behind when it comes to cost of living issues.

(26:46):
Only six percent say their incomes going up faster. Only
thirty one percent said saying they're breaking even So you
have nearly two thirds of the country say they're falling behind.
You've got a majority of the country saying the president's
undermining the constitution. It's you can now see the picture
where an unpopular opposition party can then be successful in

(27:08):
the midterms because we continue the same cycle we've been
in arguably since the second Obama term, which is we
continue to vote out what we don't like, and we
vote in unknowns. We're willing to try something different if
something's being pitched differently, we're sometimes willing to try the

(27:29):
same thing again, but this time with a different face.
So instead of Speaker Pelosi, this time it may be
Speaker Jeffreys. Maybe that'll change things, right, But we continue
to vote out. We are not voting in anything. We
are not voting in ideas we are throwing out. Is
that is what twenty sixteen was about. It was what
twenty fourteen was about, What twenty sixteen was about, what

(27:49):
twenty eighteen was about, what twenty twenty was about, what
twenty twenty two was about, what twenty twenty four was about. Yes,
I'm repeating all of those years to make this point
and drive it home, and here we go again. Everything
is being set up here now this doesn't mean Democratic
success in the midterms is automatically going to mean they

(28:10):
should be the favorite going into the general election in
twenty twenty eight. But what you see developing here is
is you have people don't like Trump's presidency. They don't
like how he's conducting himself. That is a huge issue
that is accruing to the benefit of the Democrats, even
though they don't necessarily have much confidence in the Democrats.

(28:31):
They prefer the Republicans on a lot of law and
order issue right as I was just detailing. So the challenge,
So if you're a presidential candidate and you're reading this poll,
your challenge is you're going to have to come up
with a positive vision. You can run against Trump and
be negative and succeed in a midterm. You can do
it and succeed in a California referendum in order to

(28:52):
get voter permission to redraw maps, change the constitution and
get them to do that. But it's why I don't
say this automatically translates to Gavenus and being the front
runner for to become the next president, because we are
going to want you know, I think any particularly a
Democratic nominee, is going to have to demonstrate that they
want to try something different, that they're not going to

(29:14):
be a stereotype Democrat that the voter seems to have
in mind. Now it's up to you, presidential candidate x
Y or Z or presidential candidate Joshaperrol and shapeer Wes Moore,
whoever else is going to jump into this thing. You're
going to have to find out. And this is what's
going to make the Rich Tyle conversation I think so
fruitful here and really sort of help you take what

(29:36):
I just told you in the hard numbers here and
the quantitative research and be able to understand sort of
why these swing voters are behaving this way. And ultimately,
the best politicians know, you've got to speak to the
swing voters first. Yes, you know, in some ways the
base is going to be easy to fire up. Donald
Trump is always taking the easy way out. So he

(29:59):
just governs to the base, caters to the base, because
it keeps a high floor, It protects him politically right,
it keeps him just strong enough to avoid getting thrown
out of office, to avoid getting thrown out of and ultimately,
because on cultural issues, the Democratic Party clearly is just
so out of sync with where the country is. It's
it's clear to me that between that and I think

(30:21):
some angry independences who blamed the Democrats for the second
Trump term, all right, you know, I certainly think that
that Joe Biden. You know, I think one of the
worst comments Gavin Newsom made recently that I think is
going to come back to bide him is when he
said that the Biden presidency was terrific. You cannot You're
not going to win swing voters making the case that

(30:42):
Biden's presidency was terrific. It may age well, but it's
going to age well the way Harry Truman's presidency aged well.
It took thirty years before people decided he had he
had a good presidency. It did not happen in two,
four or six years. Adelaie Stevenson wasn'trunning on the good
old days of Harry Truman, and if he did, he

(31:02):
was going to lose anyway to an American war hero
named Generalizmahower. So I would just you know, and so
when he said that, you know, I don't think Gavinuwsom
understands that there's a whole bunch of middle of the
road voters who simply wanted one thing from Joe Biden's
presidency to move the country in a direction so they
didn't go back to Donald Trump. And the fact that

(31:24):
that Donald Trump is back, there's always going to be
a chunk of voters that say it's Joe Biden's fault.
His presidency wasn't good enough, he didn't leave soon enough.
Whatever it is, there's gonna be different subjective reasons for it.
But ultimately, whether it's his policies, whether it was the
way he messaged or didn't message, get it, staying in
the race too long, all of those things right, And

(31:46):
that's why I think it's it is. I don't know
if being pro Joe Biden is good in a Democratic
primary either for what it's worth. So I don't I
admire the loyalty if he just did it for loyalty purposes.
But this is not where the voters are. This is
not where the voters are at all. In fact, I
think you can thank Joe Biden, Chuck Schumer, Nakim Jeffries,

(32:08):
the three of them together for the Democrats giant in
that negative problem. No, by the way, none of these
numbers are good for Jeffries and Schumer inside the Democratic Party,
because even though you have a good number of the
generic ballot for Democrats, it shows Democrats, the winning Democrats
are going to be running against Washington, running against the
old leadership of the Democratic Party. And yes, Jakim Jeffries,

(32:31):
you're going to be considered part of the establishment, not
part of the new wave of leaders not unless you
figure out a way to break out of this. And
I don't know if you can. I think it's hard.
I think it's difficult, and certainly it seems as if
you've been a bit risk averse in trying to establish
yourself as different from Schumer. But there's no doubt if

(32:55):
Jeffries is going to have a chance at being seeing
as a new leader of the party, he's got to
figure out how to separate himself from Schumer or Schumer
is going to have at some point do the party
a favor and indicate that you know, he's not he
doesn't want to coach next year, to put this in
coaching terms, since that's the.

Speaker 2 (33:12):
The coin of the realm these days.

Speaker 1 (33:15):
So with that, there's to me, there's where America is at.
What they think of the two parties, what they think
of this presidency. Where we're at one year from the election,
second election to Donald Trump, one year in with our
off off year elections coming Tuesday. Don't forget the election
night live stream on YouTube on X wherever you find me,
wherever you find Decision to s HQ, wherever you find

(33:37):
solicit we will be in all of those places simultaneously.
It's an election live stream for true political professionals and
political junkies. This is where it's happening. Go check it out.
In fact, this poll has indicated more people watch YouTube
than legacy television. Now, just think of that. That's according
to an NBC News poll, their own numbers. NBC is

(33:58):
indicating more people will watch YouTube before they watch legacy TV.
All right, are you public opinioned out?

Speaker 2 (34:16):
You might be a little bit.

Speaker 1 (34:18):
So this is a perfect time to take a pause
and let's go into the podcast time machine. Sorry, I
always want to say there's some sort of blue It's
sort of an old Scooby Doo thing in my head, right,
you know where there was who anyway, But here's the

(34:39):
subject matter. If you want to understand why US relationships
across the Western hemisphere remained so uneasy. You have to
go back to nineteen o three. That's right, we are
going back to nineteen o three, because it was this
week in nineteen o three that the United States of
America helped create a country.

Speaker 2 (35:02):
Called Panama.

Speaker 1 (35:03):
So, in fact, the title of this time cast Toodcast
time Machine segment, there's only one title you can come
up with, if you know, if you know me at all,
And I'll do a little shout out there to d Jones.
A man a planed Panama. It's everyone's favorite palindrome, and

(35:26):
in some ways it's America's favorite myth.

Speaker 2 (35:28):
Right.

Speaker 1 (35:28):
It's the story of bold leadership, big machinery, and destiny
carved through jungle and rock. But underneath this heroic narrative
is something darker. It's the birth of a pattern that
has defined US relations with Latin America for more than
a century. It's the moment when America learned how to
build nations the way we build infrastructure, engineered to serve

(35:49):
our needs first and there's later. And if you look
at our posture towards Venezuela at the moment, the mix
of moral intent and strategic control, it's hard not to
feel like.

Speaker 2 (36:01):
We have seen this movie before.

Speaker 1 (36:03):
But let's go back. Let's go through the podcast history
lesson of the day. At the dawn of the twentieth century,
the United States, of course, was emerging from being a
new nation to an empire. The Spanish American War. It
turned us into a global superpower, and global powers always
are looking to expand their power, to flex their muscle,

(36:24):
if you will. Two potential routes, and at the time,
we really really wanted to dominate shipping, and we needed
a route through, essentially from the Atlantic to the Pacific.
There were two potential routes to create a canal. There
was the Nicaragua and Panama. The French under Ferdinand de
les SEPs He's the guy that did the Suez Canal.

(36:46):
He tried Panama first, and he failed spectacularly. There was disease, corruption,
bankruptcy killed twenty thousand workers. The dream itself seemed dead,
but the French company that he had that did this
still held the rights to this little strip of land
in Panama. Writes that a smooth talking engineer named Philippe
Buna Verilla was determined to sell, so he lobbied Washington

(37:12):
relentlessly and found a willing buyer in President Theodore Roosevelt.
Let's just say, you know, we love Teddy, but he
was one enthusiastic imperialist. In nineteen oh three, the Roosevelt
administration cut a deal with Colombia, which then governed the
territory now known as Panama. That deal, which was known

(37:32):
as the Hey Haran Treaty, was named after the two
negotiators of the said treaty, the Secretary of State at
the time, John Hay and Colombia's envoy Tomas Haran. And
the deal was this. The US offered Columbia ten million
dollars up front it's a lot of money at that time, right,
and an additional two hundred and fifty thousand dollars a

(37:52):
year for a very narrow strip of land to build
the canal. But the Colombian Senate refused to ratify this treaty.
They wanted a better price, and they wanted more control
of the land. While Roosevelt didn't like it. He didn't
like that answer. He called the Colombians foolish and homicidal,
and he muttered that he was being dealt with by bandits.

(38:15):
So then Buona Verrilla, the French engineer salesman whispered a
different idea. Hey, mister president, what if Panama just stopped
being part of Colombia. So November third, nineteen oh three, Okay,
see where we're going here. It's this week, November three today, actually,
as this podcast is first airing, the anniversary of a

(38:38):
small group of Panamanian separatists declared independence. Within hours, US
warships appeared in the harbor, coincidentally blocking Colombian troops from landing,
and by November sixth, the United States recognized the new
Republic of Panama, and less than two weeks later, Roosevelt
got the treaty he wanted all along. But this time

(38:58):
the treaty was called the hey now, Varrilla Treaty, signed
by you guessed it, Bunaverilla himself, a Frenchman acting as
Panama's representative. Remember he was just a businessman that seemed
to own the rights to build this canal, and he
signs the treaty on behalf of this new nation. The
treaty gave the US sovereign control over a ten mile

(39:18):
wide canal zone in perpetuity, which, of course, eventually, during
the Jimmy Carter presidency, we would hand back, and Roosevelt
couldn't help but brag about it, right, he said, I
took the Smiths. It was at once a great feet
of engineering in human history, probably the greatest and one
of the clearest examples of America using its muscle to

(39:39):
redraw someone else's map. The Panama Canal opened in nineteen fourteen,
the world applauded, Latin America took notes. Now, this is
a little interlude I thought I would include. Is this where,
because I'll be honest, I was conflating the following. Is
this where? The term banana republic came from? Sort of
but not quite certain the era, So a quick history lesson.

(40:02):
The term banana republic actually comes from Honduras, not Panama.
It was coined by American writer oh Henry in nineteen
oh four, and it was in a short story collection
called Cabbages and Kings. He had fled to Honduras to
avoid an embezzlement charge himself, and he used the phrase
to describe a fictional country on Churia that was small, unstable,
and entirely dependent on American fruit companies, well, the United

(40:24):
Fruit Company, the Banana Company, if you will, a real
US corporation basically ran parts of Central America back then,
the so called Banana republics. That's how this all came from.
This United Fruit Company built railroads, built ports, even influenced coups.
The governments were nominally independent, but the real power lay
with the investors themselves. So Panama didn't coin the term,

(40:44):
but in many ways it embodied the idea because what
happened in Panama, local elite seeking power, foreign capital providing muscle,
and Washington enforcing the deal was the same exact three
step model that would define all of our interventions for
the next century. In last in America, Panama was the
first republic built to order, not for its citizens, but

(41:06):
for American commerce. Now you may be asking yourself, well, jeez, now,
I know why half of a Latin American ever trust
the United States.

Speaker 2 (41:14):
You know you do, don't you.

Speaker 1 (41:16):
So from that point on the region's politics became a
pendulum swing between dependents and defiance. You'd have one generation
strong man was the next generation's nationalists. You can trace
this oscillation back and forth, pro us anti us, pro
us anti us. We see it right now in Columbia.
Right now we have a president who won by being
a bit more distant from the US, the previous president
won because he was pro us And it goes back

(41:38):
and forth. We saw it in Cuba in the twentieth century, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Chile, Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil,
each cycle shaped by how America's good intentions collided with
its control instincts. It's the defining political rhythm of this hemisphere.
You know, are we the bad guys? Are we the
good guys? Do we care about the people or do

(41:58):
we just care about the resource? If you trust Washington,
your country may prosper a little bit. If you resent Washington,
you revolt, but you may suffer economically. So the canal itself,
in many ways, right was both the symbol and the
seed of this pattern. So let's fast forward twenty twenty five,
same story, sort of right, playing out right now with

(42:21):
different props. Venezuela, once one of the richest democracies in
Latin America, spent two decades spiraling under authoritarian rule, corruption,
economic collapse. Millions have fled. It's part of the huge,
the largest diaspora outside of any Right, there are more
Venezuelan refugees lately than any other country, creating refugees, people
are just fleeing this country. And yes, the desire to

(42:43):
help restore democracy is a real, legitimate and even moral goal,
but how we pursue this goal is going to be
a real test. We've used sanctions, covid AID, diplomatic pressure,
even lethal strikes off the Venezuelan coast justified. We're calling
it this anti narcotics mission when it's increasingly clear we
simply are trying to remove Maduro. The voters tried to

(43:05):
remove him and they couldn't do it. But we're not
making this the reason why we're doing it, right, We're
sort of we're Trump's He's creating. He's creating. We have
a drug problem in this country. We have a federal
problem in this country, but it's not from Venezuela. So
he's using what we really a real problem that we
have that's a derivative of Mexico and China and instead
using that as the pretext to go after Venezuela because

(43:28):
maybe he thinks politically he could never just sell democracy
as the reason to go help and get rid of Maduro.
So we do say it at times, right, our motives
or democracy, human rights, stability, it all sounds noble, but
our methods, unilateral enforcement, economic coercion. It reminds the region
of every time we've claimed to build something for them
that it mostly was about serving us, right, And how

(43:50):
does Venezuela end, right? Does it end with us just
simply wanting more access to the oil. Look at how
we go back and forth. We just want that oil,
more access to their resources. Are we in it for
the long haul to just actually provide independent democracy, not
democracy dependent on the United States, but true independence, true

(44:11):
independent democracy. But right now I do fear how we're
going about this is only reigniting the same cycle of
resentment that develops right and it forms these nationalist movements
that push out people that are pro democracy. So we're
here the same one hundred year oscillation is back. Leaders

(44:34):
run as reformers, they become populous, they start pro us,
they end a skeptics, every demagogue, every strong man from
Havana to Caracas, they've all learned to weaponize this history
to tell their citizens, you may not like me, but
at least I'm not them. I'm standing in between them
truly taking over this country. Right, at least I'm one

(44:54):
of you. And that's something that I think we've got
to be careful of as we essentially try to play,
try to play be cop here and how we're doing it.
If we're essentially lying about why we're there, which right
now we are with this drug pretext, it is not
going to allow for this to be as stable as.

Speaker 2 (45:15):
I think we think it is.

Speaker 1 (45:16):
So maybe here's the Palin Drum's other meeting. A man
a planed Panama. One man's plan, Teddy Roosevelt's built a
canal and built a century of contradictions. It opened the
world to trade, and it opened a wound in the
hemisphere that still hasn't fully healed. So if we want
a different legacy in Venezuela or anywhere else south of
the Rio Grand, we have to show that our plans
serve the region's needs, not just our needs, because until

(45:40):
we do, Latin America will keep reading our policies backward
and they will still see a man a plan Panama.

Speaker 2 (45:49):
There's your history lesson.

Speaker 1 (45:50):
For today and how the past is so connected to
the present. All right, and now let's get the questions,
ask Chuck. First question comes from Damien B. Chambersburg, Pennsylvania,

(46:13):
and Damien asks, I know we all hope that the
old guard of the GOP will show a backbone to Mega.
Do you think the recent comment by Ted Cruz and
Mitch McConnell condemning anti Semitism in the party and actually
addressing an issue we all knew was there since twenty
seventeen might be a catalyst for others to stand up
for more of the values and norms we know they support.
You know, most of these members better than their constituents.
Just curious if you think this is a blipper trend. Also,

(46:36):
hearing your Ojeron impression made me think of the TV
show Young Rock and the scenes where he was at
the U. If you haven't seen it, you need to
watch the one where he spends Christmas with Coach Ojeron.

Speaker 2 (46:47):
It's hilarious.

Speaker 1 (46:48):
I can only imagine and that look, you now know
why I have such a soft spot for Ojeron because
I consider my Miami boy. He's our Cajun, He's our Cajun. Kine.
If you will, I haven't seen Young Rock. I should
I should be more loyal to the Rock because of
his kingdom. I do have you know there is a rookie,

(47:09):
the rookie card for the Rock is a Bumblebee was
a Bumblebee set of Tuna cards was brought to you
by Bumblebee Tuna and it was in a perforated sheet
and you had, like I think I'm staring at it
right now, of the ninety one team and there were
nine cards in it. And I finally bought one for
about three hundred bucks that I didn't have a Rock Rookie.

(47:30):
And the reason was only about three hundred bucks because
these things go up really high. I was going to
grade it. I was all excited, and there was these
scratch like light scratches that you couldn't see in the
eBay picture that you could see in there.

Speaker 2 (47:41):
So I have it.

Speaker 1 (47:42):
It's sort of my one homage to the Rock, but
it's the Rock in his University of my uniform. It
is the Rock Rookie card, if you will. Before is
wrestling cards for anything else. The first actual card. And
these Bumblebee cards used to come in the programs that
you bought when you went to the football games. They'd
do them as inserts, and I have the one with
Mario Christabal. I never actually had the one forever reason

(48:04):
my mother would go to every game when I was
in college and she'd save the programs. But for whatever reason,
I misplaced the program that had the rock sheet in it.
But I do have the one with Mario Chris Ball
in it. Okay, but I digress. You asked the more
serious question, which is are we going to start to
see The answer is yes. And the thing is is that,
you know, I actually think we're seeing similar trends that

(48:26):
we saw on the first term. Now I know that
there are people out there going I can't believe more
people aren't outraged about X, Y or Z. But if
you look at guys like Roger Wicker, Okay, he's Chairman
of Senate Armed Services, Mississippi Republican, nobody is more. You know,
this is a guy who's who is a conservative all right,
definitely defines himself as a conservative, and he's very uncomfortable

(48:51):
with the way the Pentagon is mistreating Congress. He's got
a good relationship with the ranking member and Armed Services.
It's just that is not how that they've he's ever operated.
He knows that that isn't the way they operate, and
he's you know, he will put out joint statements with
the ranking members saying the Pentagon should be doing this
and should be doing that. You've had Mike Brownd the

(49:11):
Republican centator from South Dakota not named John Thune, who's
also done this every time and then and look at
the small group of Republicans that said no to the
to the filibusters. So it's you know what I always
want to remind people if if if you're looking for
Republicans to take up your issues and you come from
the left or left of center, that you're probably not
going to find.

Speaker 2 (49:31):
But if you're looking up.

Speaker 1 (49:32):
For Republicans that are uncomfortable with how far Trump's taken things,
you're going to find quite a bit.

Speaker 2 (49:36):
Right.

Speaker 1 (49:36):
Ted Cruz didn't like what Brendan Carr did on Kimmelin's
speech and how he threatened used Mafio so terms to
do that. You've seen this, this appeasement by the way
Heritage is now appeasing the anti Semitic wing of the MAGA.
And the thing is is this it is interesting to
see the condemnation right. Those of us who are not
stuck in the hard left or hard right unfortunately are

(49:59):
very aware that these anti Semitism wings of both parties
have existed for some time. I love it I have
a friend of mine who said, I didn't realize how
much of it was on the right. I knew it
was on the left. And this person was a conserv
is a conservative, and he goes, I'm now starting to
see it on the right, and I'm like, dude, I
was getting it from the right and the left anti
Semites from the very beginning. I saw it during the

(50:20):
rise of Occupy Wall Street and during the rise of
Mega and when Donald Trump came down that you know again,
I hear the words populism, and the first thing I
think of is here come the attacks on the Jews.
And it doesn't matter if it's right wing populism or
left wing populism, they all target the Jews first. It's
almost like it's like in the populist playbook at times.

Speaker 2 (50:41):
And so.

Speaker 1 (50:44):
You know, I am I think, and especially as the
second term sets in and he sits there, it's what
I said at the top, he said, sitting at forty
three percent, you have growing numbers of independents don't like
what he's doing with the democracy and thwarting the institution.
I just think that it's again, some of it may

(51:04):
feel like soft pushback, not hard pushback. Some of it,
you know, all of those things, but it's it is happening,
and I actually think this will just be a slow increase,
especially from a guy like Ted Cruz, who himself would.

Speaker 2 (51:16):
Like to run for president.

Speaker 1 (51:19):
And carve out and I think you'll you know what
it'll be really interesting is when you know, I know
that JD. Vance, you know, is sort of vary. He's
only one layer removed from the Tucker wing of the
anti Semitic wing of of that party, and and he's
you know, a bit more of an isolationist than Trump
ever was, and all of those things. Right, Somebody said
something that I actually agree with, which is the irony

(51:40):
is the least Maga of the MEGA people are?

Speaker 2 (51:42):
Is Donald Trump? Right?

Speaker 1 (51:44):
In some ways, the Mega is more pure than Trump
ever was with MEGA, but it also is why he
can move more than anybody else, and Mega doesn't get
upset as upset with him. It'll be interesting to see
when you start to see Ted Cruz will go after
Vance on things that he won't go after Trump on.
And that's what I would expect to start to see
more of in the next You're going to see more

(52:08):
of that, I think in the next few months, not
less of it next and it's particularly over the next
year or two, especially because Vance is going to be
the guy they all want to knock down a peck.
Next question comes from Bill as anyone conducted a focus
group just on independent voters on how they are feeling
about Trump, Johnson congressional Democrats are Republicans. I really am
enjoying your podcast and looking forward to them between now
and November twenty twenty eight. Well, Bill, we stuck your

(52:29):
question in here because now I look like I'm some
sort of prescient person, But the fact is I'm answering
your question. Hopefully you've just listened to the episode with
Rich Daal. This very episode that I answer your question.
We feature not quite what you were looking for, but
I would argue a focus group of voters that voted
Biden in twenty and Trump in twenty twenty four, and
the conversation I had with Rich here. These are I

(52:51):
just so you know, my goal is to have rich
on once a quarter. He is the way Mark Zandy
helps I think helps me and the rest of my
listeners understand where the economy isn't headed. I think he's
the least partisan voice you can find out there. He's
just a data numbers guy.

Speaker 2 (53:06):
He sees it.

Speaker 1 (53:07):
He's got, you know, a consistency about him. Rich Tile's
got the same he's sort of built the same way.
He sees this through a prism of what is not
what he wishes it would be. And rich is going
to become a regular contributor and a regular guest here,
and we're going to feature these these more of these
focus groups. So I hope I'm excited about it. Rich

(53:28):
is excited about it, and I you know, we didn't.
We sort of hinted at it in our conversation there
at the end, but we're we're going to try to
put together something a bit more formal. Michael T from
Chicago Rights always appreciate your insight. Almost all of my
national political news I get from you.

Speaker 2 (53:43):
Now that's a.

Speaker 1 (53:44):
Little bit of pressure, Michael. I'm going to have to
make sure I'm I'm not leaving too much stuff out right.
Question for you on shutdown strategies of them say they
need a deal on ACA subsidies before they open the government.
A Republicans say open the government and we'll talk. Why
don't the Democrats agree to open the government for a
week to give Republicans a chance to prove they will
negotiate in good faith. If the Republicans then refuse to

(54:04):
move on health care, the Democrats can refuse another bunch
of votes. Michael I would argue that's been sitting on
the table for Democrats to do for a while. Republicans
were only trying to keep the government open through the
third week of November. This is why I think they've
sort of made their point by the way government shutdown.
The one polling question I didn't include in the top
polling there from the beginning, So this is a good

(54:26):
time to make note of this in that poll on
the shutdown. This is one of those instances where how
you report the number will confuse. You may have seen
the NBC News poll say a majority blame Republicans more
than they blame Democrats. That is not how the question
was asked by the NBC News pollsters. Let me read

(54:49):
you exactly how the question was asked, and then you'll
realize why. I think there's a little bit of you're
going to have to let's be careful out there and
how you interpret the shutdown numbers. As you may know,
President Trump and the Democrats, this is the exact question,
and I think this will this is a good time

(55:10):
to talk about the shutdown question. And I know that
some of you may be listening to this now as
a standalone, quick little post either on Instagram or and
sort of Who's winning the shutdown? Is it the Republican
the Democrats. Here's what we do know. Everybody's losing. We
are losing the shutdown. America is losing on the shutdown,

(55:30):
and essentially we're mad at everybody. Okay, but here's the
exact warding of this question, which is why you can
be very careful in how you report this question out.
It has already been misinterpreted out there on social media.
You've probably seen numbers that say, hey, more people blame
Republicans for the shutdown than Democrats. Well, you can make
that case because of the way NBC asked this question,

(55:51):
which I think is a fair way to ask the question.
And who do you think is more to blame for
this partial shutdown? President Trump is a separate punch, demot
Republicans in Congress is a se punts or Democrats in Congress,
and then people volunteered President Trump and Republicans. So if
you add up all the Republican numbers. You get fifty
two twenty five percent say Republicans in Congress are to blame,
twenty four percent say President Trump is to blame, and

(56:13):
three percent volunteer did its President Trump and the Republicans
are to blame. That adds up to fifty two forty
two percent pick Democrats in Congress. So as you see here,
some people you know it is. It is one of
those cases where yes, you can say there are more
people blame a Republican entity. Collectively, Republican entities are taking

(56:34):
more blame than the Democrats. But it is this is
not apples to apples, and you have to be careful this.
We didn't ask is it a two way on this?
And perhaps maybe they should have asked a two way?
Do you blame Republicans more for this? Democrats? But it
is hard because the president is his own entity and
not just this president. Every president in some ways are
their own entities on this. Maybe if you asked a

(56:56):
fourth if I added a fourth punch here, I might
add per aggressives in the Democratic Party right, because there
are some on the right, just like there's some on
the right. I believe Trump is the cause that left
Trump is the cause of this some of the right,
I think believe progressives have pressured Schumer to do this.
So if I were to add a fourth punch, it
would be that it would be interesting to do that,

(57:18):
so you could see, is it an additional group of
people that would do that, or is it within the
forty two percent that blame Democrats that then would blame
the progressive wing of the party for pressuring the leadership
to do this. Bottom line is at some point, you know,
I do think this debate over snap benefits Democrats are

(57:39):
on the wrong. Are they actually have the power to
get snap benefits going tomorrow? Just open the government up
for a couple of weeks and make sure snap benefits
go through. That would be good PR two. You know,
it certainly would improve prove that. So look, I think
your suggestion is a terrific one. That's exactly the way,
And weirdly, the Republicans offered them this exit ramp. Now

(58:03):
we're getting so close to that end day. But either way,
I still think that's their best way of essentially trying
to have their cake and eat it too for the
short term. All right, one more question and then I'm
going to get into my Actually, I'm going to do
two more questions and then I'm going to get into
my college football rant. This comes from Forrest Listen with

(58:25):
some interest to your thoughts on the dysfunction and weaponization
of the Oversight Committee. Your idea of having the minority
party in charge is interesting, but would that fix the
weaponization or make it worse? Toochee instead, how about this
the committee is always fifty to fifty party split, but
the members are selected by the opposing party, so Democrats
would nominate a sign Republican members and vice versa.

Speaker 2 (58:42):
Thoughts, Hey, that's a.

Speaker 1 (58:46):
This is exactly the type of ideas that I would
love to see more of. We need to have. This
was a terrific idea for us. I think it's a
fascinating one. Right, let Republicans appoint the Democrats, Democrats appoint
the Republicans, and then they decide who the ranking and
it's an even number, so you can't do party line subpoenas,
so that anytime there's a subpoena, there's always a bipartisan

(59:08):
vote for a subpoena. I think this is a terrific idea.
This is one of those that you know when we're
thinking of how we all want to improve trust. You know,
it's sort of the trust but verifying mindset of government.
I don't trust anybody I want to, but I want
to trust people. I want to have a system where
I can find out if they're trustworthy, an accountability system.

(59:31):
This is a good one. You know, you're right. Maybe
if it's always a minority party that they get pressured
to be weaponizers all the time. This fix is a
great one. I'm sitting here trying to poke a hole
through it on my initial mind.

Speaker 2 (59:47):
Look at it. I can't.

Speaker 1 (59:48):
There's not a that's hard to poke a hole through
that one. That's a good one. Look, I think we
need to start putting together a list. And you know,
if I had the ambition to run for office myself
and lead this sort of we need to we need
to rehab America, essentially the American democracy, this would be
on my list of you know, you're looking for my
platform and how to rehab the American democracy.

Speaker 2 (01:00:10):
This would be one of the ways, you know.

Speaker 1 (01:00:12):
Because it doesn't have to be this exact idea, but
putting it out there, here's the model. If you've got
a better model, great, but right now, this is the
best model of this is I'd like to see a
similar version of how we dealt with the Justice Department
and how.

Speaker 2 (01:00:26):
We appointed people to the Justice Department.

Speaker 1 (01:00:28):
All right, last question for the episode, Andrew, Hey, I
grew up watching Me to Press with Tim after eight
thirty Mass every Sunday with my dad, and it has
become one of my favorite weekly traditions. My father got
very sick about fifteen years ago and passed away three
years ago. My wife and I are in the process
of fortidity treatments, and as excited as I am, I
am also terrified. I apologize for this deep question, but
I've often found some sense of contentment when you talk

(01:00:50):
about history. How things have been bad before, how this
is a repeat of the late nineteenth in early twentieth
century of the Robert barons, or how the fever of
McCarthyism finally broke. I guess my question is, as a
father of college age kids, do you worry about the
future as well? And as someone with a deeper knowledge
of Washington and history than myself, what gives you hope
that we find our way back? Thank you, Andrew, Well,

(01:01:11):
it is why I make all the historical comparisons, and
in fact, I you know, even today, you know, I'm
reminded thinking of Teddy Roosevelt's aggressive imperialism. You know, we
lie on It's essentially Teddy Roosevelt's one of those presidents
that's above partisanship, and yet Donald Trump's a huge imperialist.

(01:01:31):
Teddy Roosevelt would be all four going after Greenland, would
be all four trying to figure out how to have
more influence in Latin America. I don't know if he'd
go about it the same way Trump's going about it.
But the point is is that I think you had
I go back to this. Every election, the voters are
telling us something, and if you don't like the outcome,

(01:01:52):
it doesn't mean the election's rigged. It means the voters,
the voters have a deeper issue. And I think it's optimism.
And I hope you listen to the last episode. I
have optimism for a variety of reasons. One is our history.
We go through these moments and we get out of it.
The American voter, you know, sometimes doesn't act as fast

(01:02:12):
as maybe you or I want, but they eventually do
the right thing. That's why I like to quote Churchill
you know, the Americans will eventually be there after they've
exhausted every other pat that prevents them from being there.
I think I butchered it, but I butcher it all
the time to the point of everyone so all I
might stumble on the exact way he says it. So
there's that. The second reason I actually have some hope

(01:02:34):
is what I said last week at the startup, which
is with the the event I was at where there
was some people trying to figure out is there a movement?
Can we break up the duopoly? And the person noting,
you know, instead of looking at Donald Trump's elections as
this horror show, if you're on the left or worried

(01:02:57):
about where democracy is, actually should give the voters a
lot more credit. If the voters arguably going back to
Obama than the election of Trump, even the election of
Biden in between, they're telling us something. They want something,
They want some radical change. They want this system to
work differently, not the same. They're not looking for repair.
Barack Obama doesn't win. Hillary Clinton would have won. If

(01:03:19):
they were looking for repair. They were looking for reconstruction.
To borrow a word, you know, start over, knock it
down and rebuild Donald Trump, knock it down and rebuild.
These are not folks that we're looking for, you know.
You know Biden arguably was a president we were like, oh,
let's restore a little bit of order. So we can
try to go back to a more sensible way for

(01:03:41):
some form of restoration. But I don't know if this
is restoration anymore. But the point is make a compelling
argument for reform. And I think you have a voter's
electorate that has a heavy appetite for this. So I
am in a So that's why I'm long term optimistic.
This is not going to be easy. The next two
or three years are going to test us a lot.

(01:04:04):
But you know, the federal courts have been beaten Trump
up so much. The public's paying attention. You know, if
if this stuff were popular, then I think we'd all
feel differently. This stuff's not popular. The Constitution is still
more popular than Donald Trump. Democracy is more popular than
what he's been doing. So that's what gives me hope.

(01:04:26):
And man, you know what else gives me hope are
these college students. I teach at USC every other semester.
I've had some, and I see it in my own kids.
I see it with their friends and I get to
know them. They're they're these this next generation of college leaders.
They're pretty sophisticated, they're they're they're totally aware of how

(01:04:48):
screwed up the information ecosystem is. They haven't been brainwashed.
You know, we're all worried in our generation this somehow,
Oh my god, because we know people of our older
folks who are getting kind of brainwashed by the cable
news silliness or what they're seeing and on social media.
But younger folks aren't. They're taking matters in their own hands.
So you know, it's it might be louder and messier

(01:05:11):
than we've been used to, but I think directionally we're
going in the right direction. It's just gonna feel bumpy.
It's gonna be bumpy. I'm not gonna but that's that's
my story. I'm sticking to it, Andrew. But that's why.
And and in fact, don't you know, don't let this
discourage you from bringing another generation in.

Speaker 2 (01:05:34):
Let it encourage you.

Speaker 1 (01:05:41):
Now, let's talk some college football. As I said, it's
the first annual Todd Bowle, right, have a daughter Miami
and a daughter at SM It's not an SNU. So
we made it. You know, the whole family gathered. I
mom more SMU gear. Dad wore my Miami gear, sister
wore her Miami Jersey son wore.

Speaker 2 (01:06:03):
His SMU gear.

Speaker 1 (01:06:05):
So we were you know, and we actually our seats
weren't two of us were together to we rotated and
all that stuff. We ran into a few sets of
parents that had a similar situation. One kid at one school,
one kid at the other. So that was that was
that was fun for us to learn and find and
run into more more folks like that. But here we

(01:06:28):
go again with Miami. My son stormed the field. He
told me, he warned me. He said, he's got a
really close friend who's on the scout team and so
he was giving he was he was telling me they
had confidence all week that they you know, this was
an important game to SMU. And it's just a reminder,
right they SMU was prepared to play Miami. Miami was

(01:06:48):
not prepared to play SMU. Miami might have been prepared
to play a generic football team, but they did not
prepare to play SMU. They prepared to play a generic
football team. SMU prepared to play Miami. So that's sort
of coaching coaching distinction one, if you wanted to go
into those two things. The second, I think situation you

(01:07:11):
know here is it is obviously with Miami this is
fitting a pattern. But let me rant about the game,
the entire game, the offensive game plan, and coach Crystal
Ball's decision making. We're all about avoiding catastrophe. Everything was
risk averse. Early on. There was a short fourth and one.
I think we were on our own forty forty one,

(01:07:34):
but we you know, we just we chose to punt. Mistake,
you know, they got done to punt and then that
led to the interception that gave them the cheap score.
I mean, they had something like negative three arts rushing
at halftime, and yet we were only up ten to seven.
We couldn't score in the red zone every time we
were It felt like every time we were there, we
could move the ball when we wanted to. Carson Beck

(01:07:55):
had so much time it was ridiculous. That wasn't an
issue at all. But there was a lot of risk
averse play calls. You could see it the whole time
it was checked down. Carson. Now a big issue was
his favorite receiver was injured.

Speaker 2 (01:08:11):
CJ. Daniels.

Speaker 1 (01:08:12):
He's the guy if you don't know the names of
the Miami players. He's the guy that had that catching
in the Notre Dame game that became that went viral,
the one handed catch where he grabbed it and went down.
It is been Beck's favorite receiver is the one he
trusts the most. I think it's the one he worked
with the most all summer because even though our best
receiver is Tony, Tony is a true freshman, he was

(01:08:34):
seventeen and for the Notre Dame game he just turned eighteen,
but he was only there for fall camp. Beck was
working with CJ. Daniels basically the second he could start throwing,
so he developed a real rapport with him. Him not
being there, I could tell that was a problem. That's
the receiver when he's in trouble, when he wants to
go down the field, he wants to go to first.
Even though Tony's the guy you should want to always
get the ball in the hands of right. Look at

(01:08:56):
what happened when Tony returned the punt boy when he
didn't score. Worried we wouldn't know how to punch it in,
and sure enough, we didn't punch it in at the
end of the half. But again a risk averse decision.
We settle for a field goal. We could have kicked
a fifty four yard field goal. It was sprinkling for
about the first quarter and a half of the game,
and so it was a wet field and a wet ball,

(01:09:18):
and it seemed like Mario was nervous about seeing if
his kicker could hit a fifty It would have been
about a fifty four yarder, so he took a delay
a game and instead punted. But that's been the Whenever
Mario is in doubt, he chooses the path of least risk,
And the most egregious decision that he made was the

(01:09:39):
decision with twenty five. So here's the scenario. It's a
tie game, SMU kicks the tying field goal, Miami has
the ball, gets the ball back with twenty five seconds
left in the game. In one timeout, the SMU kicker
kicks it out of the end zone. So we're getting
the ball at the twenty five and Mario takes any

(01:10:01):
it is. I mean, here's the guy who at the
Georgia Tech game last year didn't know or two years ago,
didn't take the knee and ends up in this ridiculous
situation where it costs him the game. But in case
here the game is tied's is he worried Carson Beck's
going to throw a pick six in twenty five seconds?
And if that's what you're worried about, then we don't
have a championship team nor a championship quarterback. And that's

(01:10:25):
that's what's buried underneath this. This coaching staff doesn't trust
Carson Beck. If you're very carefully watched this.

Speaker 2 (01:10:33):
Offense, and I do.

Speaker 1 (01:10:35):
Whenever the Chips were down, the play calls are much
more conservative, their quick passes, if their passes or their
run plays. So there's it's clear that either one or
two things are true with the offensive coordinator, and I
have I'm not giving up on Mario and I'll explain
in a minute, but I have given up on Shannon
Dawson because here's a reality check. With Shannon Dawson's offense,

(01:10:57):
the more film, the more the offense is on fire,
the more our opponents are able to stop the offense
and slow us down.

Speaker 2 (01:11:04):
Pure and simple.

Speaker 1 (01:11:05):
We have the better athletes, we have the bigger offensive line,
but we're calling the same essentially. You know, we have
about ten ten RPOs, and it feels like they we
just rotate through the ten RPOs in some form or another,
and it's the same set of ten RPOs. There's no
there's whatever we ran in game two, like we added

(01:11:27):
some things from game one to game two, but whatever
we started running in game two is the same thing
we've been running in game six, games seven gaming. And
it's clear that there's no innovation on this offense. This
is not a visionary offense. You have a head coach
who's thinks this is the nineteen eighties, and you just
it's all about Jimmy's and Joe's, not x's and o's.
What do I mean by that? Jimmy's and Joe's. The

(01:11:48):
Miami teams of the eighties and nineties were simply bigger, faster,
and stronger and so even, and they actually still had
some better coaching. Offensive innovation for that time period was
a more innovative offense. When they were winning their titles,
it was because Miami threw the ball more than anybody
else did. Miami was running a pro style offense for
anybody in college.

Speaker 2 (01:12:08):
Was doing that.

Speaker 1 (01:12:09):
Miami ran a weird RPO during the Dennis ericson years
and I wasn't crazy about the offense, but it was
highly effective. Teams had a hard time stopping it. And oh,
by the way, he won not one but two national
titles and produced a Heisman Trophy winner in Gino Terretta
because of how prolific that offense was. And so Miami
in the eighties and nineties was on the cutting edge

(01:12:29):
of offensive play calling in college football. Even by twenty
oh one, there was some evidence of that that we
had a pretty pretty you know, but it was a
combination of Jimmy's and Joe's and we had half decent
x's and o's. Over the last twenty five years, we've
had a few great x's and o's, guys. Jed Fish

(01:12:50):
was an offensive coordinary. He's now the head coach of
the University of Washington. Do some of us wish he
were still our play caller?

Speaker 2 (01:12:55):
I do.

Speaker 1 (01:12:56):
Rhet Lashley was a terrific play caller at the University
of Miami. Do some of his wish he were still
our play caller and maybe head coach? Well now he's
at SMU. Shannon Dawson, I think cam Ward made it
seem as if Shannon Dawson knew was an innovative play caller.
Cam Ward was an innovator, and I realized that watching
Carson back yesterday and Kevin Jennings, the quarterback of SMU.

(01:13:17):
Kevin Jennings was a poor man's cam Ward, except he
was as good as I saw. Kevin Jennings had as
good of a game as cam Ward had in any
game last year with the University of Miami. He had
that side arm, He was accurate as how, he didn't
miss it open receiver. He threw in some tight windows.
He was terrific. And it is a reminder I think

(01:13:38):
now when you're looking at the broad top fifty of
college football, now, they're all spending about the same amount
of money. Trust me, SMU spent a ton of money
on their roster constructions. Miami, do we have better Jimmy's
and Joe's right now than SMU does?

Speaker 2 (01:13:51):
Yeah, damn right, we do.

Speaker 1 (01:13:53):
But when you're sort of within, but when you're not
that far apart, right, So the true different creators are
do you have the good coach on the field, which
is a quarterback, and do you have a good play
caller and good on in game coaching and in game
in sort of second half adjusted.

Speaker 2 (01:14:12):
SMU had the.

Speaker 1 (01:14:13):
Better prepared team, better game plan, better adjustments that were made.
They also had the better quarterback. We had the better
everything else. And it didn't matter if you have the
better quarterback than the better coach. And even if you're
if you're if you only have forty percent of the
athletes that the team you're you're playing does, if you

(01:14:33):
have the better quarterback and coach, you're going to win
fifty percent. You're gonna win half the time, You're going
to overperform, and you're going to win a lot. And
it's if you look at Miami's two losses, it is
to Brahm of a Louisville, a better play caller and
a better game prep prepare game coach, prepare than Mario
cristobaal and right lashly another one who just prepares for

(01:14:54):
one game better than Mario Christball.

Speaker 2 (01:14:57):
That's just a fact.

Speaker 1 (01:14:58):
Now, why am I not ready to give up a
Mario Christaball? Well, look, I live in the real world
and I can tell you this, and this is my
message to University of Miami fan football fans out there
who are frustrated with coach Crystal Ball. I struggle with
this question because I think this is a man who
loves this program, loves the school, loves the kids that

(01:15:19):
he recruits, and really cares. He does everything off the
field as well, if not better than most coaches in
the country. He's highly organized, great relationships with high school coaches.
He does all of this extraordinarily well. Again, much better
than some of these coaches that have had better performances

(01:15:41):
than him. The problem with Mario is he doesn't have
He's a risk averse guy, and he hires game planners
that fit his philosophy. And the fact is, Miami, you know,
scared money, don't make money. That's one of my favorite expressions.

Speaker 2 (01:16:00):
Right.

Speaker 1 (01:16:00):
This is why you do have to split eights when
you play black check, Right, no matter what, you just
do it because it's the right way. You know, it's
the only way you're going to make real money. It's
only where you're actually going to have an edge when
you're playing these things. The only way you're going to
have an edge in college football is you got to
be the guy that goes forward on fourth to one
just about every time unless you're inside your own thirty.

(01:16:21):
I would if I only if I was you know,
maybe thirty five, but if you're north of the thirty five,
you should always be going for an on fourth to one,
especially you have an offensive line like Miami's. But he's
extraordinarily risk averse, and he hires game planners that are
risk averse. And we saw it. He did this to
take a knee with twenty five seconds left. I just

(01:16:41):
I had lost it. I did, I was in the stands.
I lost it. I screamed. I was like, that's when
I tweeted Mario takes years off of my life. But
there's one other reality check that University of Miami supporters
need to understand. In every other instance where a frustrated
football program has gotten the coach fired, Freeze at Auburn
is the latest. But you've got Brian Kelly, you got

(01:17:02):
James Franklin, You've got Billy Napier.

Speaker 2 (01:17:05):
We can go on and on.

Speaker 1 (01:17:08):
None of those coaches were responsible for bringing the investment
to the program. Mario Cristobal. You know, Manny Diaz, who
a lot of people have noted has a better winning
percentage as an acc coach at Duke than Mario has
at Miami. By the way, Mario is seven to five
in his last twelve games. His acc record is putrid.

(01:17:28):
I mean it's Miami seasons continue to be screwed once
they get into conference play, and I go back to
the lack of innovation. I think the more Miami tape,
more Miami tape that teams see and can game plan too,
and can scout, the more likely they find ways to
slow the offensive down and beat our defense. We're just

(01:17:49):
too easy to prepare for as the season moves on, Right,
we do really well the first five or six games,
and this has been a consistent pattern until we have
enough on tape and teams that face us more often.
Your conference opponents all seemed to have no problems figuring
out how to You know it is you know when

(01:18:10):
we knew we had to get when when Manny got
rid of the offensive coordinator had before Het Lashley, it
was because we all could predict the game, the play
calls before they actually happened, and you just knew them
every time. Rahd Lashley was the first offensive coordinator Miami
had since shed Fish. And that goes back away where
I could where I didn't always predict the call run
versus pass, let alone, left versus right, et cetera, et cetera.

(01:18:34):
That's the sign of an innovative play caller. Shannon Dawson's
not an innovative play caller. And I think that Cam
Word's success masked a very vanilla offense. He makes it
easy for quarterbacks to learn because there's not many decisions
to make. But there was. There's just been no innovation.

Speaker 2 (01:18:50):
It is.

Speaker 1 (01:18:51):
Miami's offense is now super predictable, and that's why SMU
was so prepared to essentially play prevent. They just prevented
Miami from doing explosive plays and they just kept Miami.
You know, Miami is struggling to score touchdowns when they're
in the red zone. They're more likely to score a

(01:19:12):
touchdown when they're outside the twenty than when they're inside
the twenty. And that's just the lack of innovative play calling.
It's very predictable. The run schemes are all up the middle,
up the middle. And Shannon Dawson got his back up
when he was criticized about this last week, and sure
enough it hit again.

Speaker 2 (01:19:29):
Here we are.

Speaker 1 (01:19:30):
So look, the team was sloppy, made a lot of penalties.
By the way, these refs were atrocious to pick up
a flag that would have essentially given Miami another shot
at getting a first down and ending the game and
not having to get the ball back where there was
a holding and there was obvious passitor affairs.

Speaker 2 (01:19:48):
We all saw it.

Speaker 1 (01:19:48):
The referee that was closest to us saw it through
the flag, and then they just picked up the flag
with no good explanation other than these refs did not
want to give Miami another down. It was absolutely agreed.
And the second most egregious call was the roughing the
passer penalty when the player clearly it was a mess
of a whistle situation that the ref screwed up. And
because the ref screwed up, they punished the player, and

(01:20:10):
they punished Miami, and they caught, and they essentially gifted
the game to SMU. Except the reason why I'm not
going to sit here and absolve the Crystal Ball and
the coaching staff or the or the or the or
the team itself is they they put themselves in a
position where where bad ref calls could make a difference,

(01:20:32):
and they never should have been in that situation in
the first place. So, yes, the ACEC has a problem.
This is the worst officiating since that since the SEC's
that Florida. Excuse me that George Auburn game, which you
know Hugh Freeze is going to be muttering to himself
that if it wasn't for those SEC officials, he beats
Georgia and he's not fired today. And I think he's right.
And these ACC college football officiating is atrocious. It's not

(01:20:57):
just not as good as the NFL. It is unprofound.
You see these refs out there. Some of them are pros,
some of them are idiots. And we need if you're
going to allow college betting, if you're going to professionalize
college football, then every conference needs to spend a hell
of a lot more unofficiating and improve the quality of officials,

(01:21:17):
pure and simple. That was a s show of officiating.
It was terrible and it's been terrible all year. Anybody,
any ACC fan, and it doesn't matter.

Speaker 2 (01:21:27):
What team here, they're not good.

Speaker 1 (01:21:29):
They're just bad at their job period. Okay, but this
is no. It does not get to be the excuse.
And I do, like I said, I am. I think
Mario Cristabaal is the reason why money is being invested
in the University of Miami. So he's not getting fired.

(01:21:51):
But he needs to find a better offensive coordinator, and
he needs to own up to his that his philosophy
is too risk averse. You can't be in major college football.
You don't have you will never have the Jimmies and
Joe's to play that kind of of of coaching schemes anymore.

(01:22:11):
And there's a reason Miami sucks in November. The more
film that a team has on Miami, the easier time
they have to game plan. It's obvious. It's the obvious answer.
This is what this is me do an Okham's raiser here.
I'm not a football coach. I've done my level of
pee week coaching and kid coaching. I'm not going to

(01:22:34):
sit here and say I'm an expert at this. But
when you know, you know, and I'm and I'm well
aware when you know you know, and I'm well aware
that this is a very predictable offense. Again, I watch
a ton of it. So what needs to happen is

(01:22:54):
there needs to be a new offensive. We're gonna have
to have a new offense. I do worry that you know,
you get you know over time. You know, Mark, If
you look at the history of college football in the
twenty first century, There's only been three coaches who were
tenured longer than five years and won their first national title.
Jim Harbaugh won it in his eighth year, Dabo Swiney

(01:23:17):
won it in his eighth year, and Mac Brown won
it in his seventh year. Every other first time national
championship coach in the twenty first century all wonted in
either year four or less. Mario Christo Baal this was
year four. Next year's year five. He basically he's not
in the hot seat this year, but he's now in
the hot seat next year. If there's not a playoff

(01:23:40):
run next year, it's going to be time to move on.
Because what you worry about is that this becomes a virus, right,
which players are going, oh yeah, christa ball never wins.
It just sort of starts to feed on itself, and
it will cost you that one five star recruit that
you really need. You'll still get the great four star
recruits and you still get to be maybe as good

(01:24:01):
as Penn State, but Penn State never could break through.

Speaker 2 (01:24:06):
Right.

Speaker 1 (01:24:06):
You know, the joke is Crystal Ball is Spanish for
James Franklin, and that that's one of the running jokes
in Miami. Twitter but there's that's what he has to avoid.
He's and then you know, Oregon fans love to troll
Miami fans about this, right they they think they upgraded
when they lost Mario for Dan Lanning. They certainly have

(01:24:28):
better records to show for it. But I will say this,
Mario does have a small test for the rest of
the season. I am.

Speaker 2 (01:24:39):
I assume Miami is eight and four nine.

Speaker 1 (01:24:41):
They're going to lose one or two more games, because
now that it's over, we know two lost teams don't
acc teams aren't going to make it.

Speaker 2 (01:24:48):
Miami was example at a.

Speaker 1 (01:24:49):
Right if last year's Miami team didn't get in the
playoff as a tenant to team, this one isn't. Last
year's had the best offense in the country and didn't
get in this This team's not going to get in
as as a tenant two at large BED seven thousand
things have to happen for them to get in the
a SEC Championship game. While it's possible, it's it's not probable.

(01:25:11):
We're going to find out what kind of what kind
of motivator crystal Ball is, what kind of coach he is,
and whether these coordinators can be better game planners with
the rest of the season. If we can go ten
and two, then I think there there there is some
hope for next year. This is nine, three, eight and four,
which means say a loss to pitt lost to Virginia

(01:25:33):
Tech on the road, something like that, then I think,
you know, the hot seat begins immediately. Crystal Ball will
get one more year for sure, because again he's responsible
for this money. Right if they kept Mannidaz, the investment
that came in wasn't going to be there. There was
a whole bunch of people who love Mario in the

(01:25:53):
Miami Cuban community, in the Miami business community, who decided
they said they're going to give Mario every resource he
can to succeed at Miami. So he has every resource
he has. The only way Mario goes is if the
people spending the money in the program decide Mario should go.
And that is why you will not see any movement

(01:26:13):
this year on that front. Maybe next year, but certainly.

Speaker 2 (01:26:18):
Not this year.

Speaker 1 (01:26:21):
But I'll be honest, if I was Mario's boss and
he does not report the athletic director, he reports to
the people that write the checks, I would struggle with
this because the man loves the university.

Speaker 2 (01:26:31):
He's done.

Speaker 1 (01:26:32):
He's rebuilt every other part of the program that needed rebuilding.

Speaker 2 (01:26:37):
The problem is his.

Speaker 1 (01:26:37):
Game day coaching and his game day plaguing game planning.
If he needs to come up with a better plan
and a better result. Look, he improved coordinators on the
defensive side, so he deserves a shot at improving for
a coordinator on the offensive side.

Speaker 2 (01:26:58):
But he's probably got one year, all right.

Speaker 1 (01:27:02):
I didn't watch a lot of other college football. I
went from that Drowning my sorrows and terrific barbecue at
ten fifty Barbecue. That place was amazing that we went
to in Dallas. So yeah, I wanted to give him
a shout out. My daughter thinks the only reason Miami
lost is that the hotel we stayed at we actually
stayed on the thirteenth floor. They actually had a thirteenth floor.

(01:27:24):
I didn't think about it, but the minute she got
into town, she goes, Dad, why are we staying on
the thirteenth floor?

Speaker 2 (01:27:28):
This is terrible luck.

Speaker 1 (01:27:29):
We're in real trouble on Halloween night, we're on thirteenth floor.

Speaker 2 (01:27:32):
What are you thinking.

Speaker 1 (01:27:33):
I'm not a very superstitious guy. I'm not even a
little stitious, and neither's my wife or my son, but
my daughter was. And now let's just say, after this
debacle of a weekend, she will be that person that
if she gets to sign the thirteenth Florida Hotel, she'll.

Speaker 2 (01:27:48):
Say, you know what, I'd like to change rooms.

Speaker 1 (01:27:51):
And given how badly Miami played this weekend and totally destroying,
you know, perhaps getting in the way of Miami's homecoming
plans next week. I am going to the Miami game
next week. It is homecoming. My daughter's really involved in it.
I can't wait to cheer her on on that she
gets to do the smoke. I'm very excited.

Speaker 2 (01:28:11):
You know, I will say this. I know this, She's
now more than a little.

Speaker 1 (01:28:15):
Stitious when it comes to the third number thirteen and
staying in a hotel with the thirteenth floor. All right,
So with that, I'd love for you to share stories
about whether you would have stayed if you'd have been
assigned a room on floor thirteen and they actually had
a thirteenth floor. The Double Tree in Dallas actually allows
for third. You know, a lot of hotels go from
twelve to fourteen. They don't even have the thirteen so

(01:28:35):
I'll admit I have not been on a thirteenth floor.
Would you have changed rooms? Share with that with me
when you get a chance. And with that, I will
see you in twenty four hours for our live election stream.
It'll start two six thirty pm Eastern Time on Tuesday.

Speaker 2 (01:28:52):
I'll see you then

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Chuck’s Commentary - The Public Is Souring On Trump 2.0 + America’s Imperial Past Looms Large Over Venezuela