Chuck’s Commentary - Trump Is Exhibiting 25th Amendment Behavior + Why Anti-Corruption Could Be A Powerful Electoral Issue - The Chuck ToddCast

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (01:51):
Hello there, Happy Wednesday, and welcome to another episode of
the Chuck Podcast. So got another loaded show today. The
guest is a gentleman named Jeff Clements. He's part of
an organization called American Promise. They are an organization that
is campaigning a state by state to get I think

(02:11):
they're up to twenty three state legislatures right now to
approve a constitutional amendment that would allow for regulation of
the financing of campaigns. Essentially thanks to Citizens United and
thanks to the belief in our judiciary system that money
is speech that without a constitutional amendment, there really is

(02:36):
no law that will successfully sort of get through the
courts and pass muster in order to limit the influence
of money. I think the debate about the First Amendment
is I think we are having a debate about amplification
of your right to free speech. I think we all
agree everybody's a right to free speech.

Speaker 2 (02:56):
The question is.

Speaker 1 (02:58):
Who's got the right to amplify who should have access
to amplification? How does that work? If you will, And
it's pretty simple. Well, we go through it quite a bit.
As you know. I've one of if I have a
pattern of guests that I will that I will default to.

(03:19):
It is those that are looking to improve the infrastructure
of the democracy. I've had a conversation about open primaries
and how do we get rid of partisan primaries. In
this case, I think there is agreement that we've gotten
sort of you know, we don't know how to do
anything anymore in moderation, right, we take a little thing

(03:41):
and we go to an extreme, right. I mean we
do this in society all the time. We should pay
players in college sports, yes, but the system we created
creates all sorts of essentially absurdities in the market. Should
sports betting be open to all fifty states instead of
the state of Nevada? I think we thought, okay, that's fair.

(04:03):
How we've allowed this system to populate and sort of
consume the lives of some people is kind of out
of control, right, every we go from we have a
system that seems to only know how to regulate when
we let things go to excess, right, We don't seem

(04:25):
to know how to do it that way. So in
this case, I think we all know now money and
politics has gotten crazy. Just to give you a sense
of it. In twenty twelve, I had this idea at
NBC to audit the two presidential campaigns after the fact,

(04:46):
Obama and Romney. And my thesis was, this was the
first time that both campaigns each spent a billion dollars.
It's the first billion dollar campaign. Obama had a billion,
Romney had kind of just under a billion, but if
you throw in all the outside money, it was Basically
it was the first time we had a billion. To

(05:06):
put that in perspective. In two thousand, both Al Gore
and George W. Bush were within state, within the system,
which meant it was publicly funded general election campaigns. Bush
did not take public funding during his primary campaign, but
he did during his general election campaign. Basically, it limited

(05:27):
both sides to sixty five million dollars, so we more
than ten x from the general election in twenty to
twenty twelve.

Speaker 2 (05:35):
Well where are we today?

Speaker 1 (05:36):
In twenty twenty five, North Carolina is likely to be
the first billion dollar Senate race. So in twenty twelve
we had a billion. We had one campaign spending a
billion dollars, so it combined two billion dollars. And now
we're gonna have one singular US Senate race. They might
not even decide the balance of power in the United
States Senate. Okay, cost a billion dollars. So we have

(05:59):
gotten to absurd degrees of money. And I think everybody's
fine with small donors populating these things. You're not going
to see many people say that that's a bad idea.
It's the large donations. It's the anonymity of the large donations, etc.
It is the idea that an outside group can essentially

(06:22):
spend more than the two actual campaigns combined, and they
can decide what the agenda is, not the actual voter
powered campaign. So, you know, we have created a system
that is definitely in need of some sort of regulation.
Congress is actually tried, but the courts have said they're
all unconstitutional. So if that's the case, then there really

(06:43):
is only one answer on the on campaign finance, and
it is that is that's why if you believe in
term limits, well those have all been struck down as unconstitutional.
It was a big movement in the nineties. A bunch
of states past term limits for members of Congress. None
of them pass constitutional muster because once you put in
age required, you know, it's sort of that was the

(07:04):
only there was. The only requirement was age in the constitution,
and so they were not considered constitutional. If you want
term limits in, you're going to have to put a
constitutional amendment in. We have one constitutional amendment that has
to do with term limits. It's term limits for the presidency.
So there are certain things where the judiciary decided to

(07:27):
overrule the legislative branch. And when it turns when it
comes to campaign finance laws, the judiciary has written the legislation.
They are legislating from the bench. There is nobody that
passed a law wanting super PACs. There is nobody that
passed the law that wanted unlimited money in politics. Those
laws did not pass, they were interpreted after legal rulings.

(07:50):
And so I think the case to put in to
put this in and it's interesting and you'll hear I
don't think this is you know, this gets you know,
we get to the you know where each party on this.
But there's an argument for both conservatives and progressives that
you want to you want to you want a fair fight,

(08:11):
and the way we finance our campaigns makes it where
there is no such thing as a as a fair fight.
So that's the conversation. I kind of think we're we're, uh,
we're on the cusp, as I've said before, where we're
going to get more and more interest in doing this
with our constitution. Can we get thirty eight states interested?

(08:33):
Can you get Congress to pass a law anyway? We
go through all the mechanics of this as well as
the larger idea with Jeff. I think it's for those
of you concerned about that issue, I think you will
enjoy that conversation. I'm also going to have my top
five list, and for those of you looking for a
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(08:53):
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informed about the zeitgeist of the world and of America.
I hope my Top five list will do that for you.
But before we begin, I want to pick up on

(09:14):
something that I did it, you know, which is, you know,
we're in one of those moments where we're trying to
figure out does this latest outrage mean anything, And of
course the outrage being you know, Donald Trump's just horrendous
comments about Rob Reiner and his wife and the death

(09:36):
and the murder of Rob Reiner and his wife. And
you know, in some ways it's not a new debate,
right Donald Trump has put us in this position before.
Donald Trump has embarrassed us collectively as a country, collectively,
as a society, collectively as a human species. Right he
just this is what he does. And I know that

(09:58):
we've been at these moments before or where he says
something so outrageous, Well this, you know, nobody can survive this, well,
nobody other than Donald Trump.

Speaker 2 (10:07):
Right.

Speaker 1 (10:07):
He seems to be teflon don on just about everything,
but the reaction on this one he has been fascinating
because it seemed as if it was a bridge too
far for a lot of people. And what he did,
especially so soon after the Charlie Kirk assassination, so soon after,
so many on the right targeted anybody who said anything

(10:30):
remotely negative about Charlie Kirk, you know, in some cases,
got him doxed, got him fired, cost them jobs, And
then all of a sudden, we have behavior modeled by
the President of the United States that if anybody else
behaved this way in the workplace, they'd be fired. Of course,
he's done this multiple times, right, this is not the
first time he's done something that if any of us

(10:53):
did it, it would cost us our marriage, it would
cost us relationships, it would cost us our jobs, it
would cost us our cost us our you know, whatever,
our whatever place we feel like we are in society,
you know, we might be shunned, we might be ostracized,
and frankly, in some of the behavior you know that

(11:15):
is that is it's sometimes the only the only thing
we have. You'd be shamed, right, We know that the
real superpower of Donald Trump is shamelessness. It's fascinating to
see on the heels of this story because I'll tell
you what, really what I couldn't shake with the with

(11:37):
the Reiner story with Trump. As appalling as the first
tweet was, it was the second it was the second
time he dealt with it when he when he sort
of reinforced the tweet on camera. Because I actually think
that this space signal a larger, more alarming issue that

(12:01):
if we take seriously people's concerns about Joe Biden and
his loan term, then we need to start taking seriously
about whether he's all there and how quickly you know
you're going to it's going to sound like I'm trolling him,
but you know, at what point is his behavior twenty

(12:22):
fifth Amendment alarming type of behavior? Because think about it
this way, there's probably two things that may have happened
in between Donald Trump tweeting what he did on social
on his truth social platform and reiterating what he said
on camera about Rob Reiner. One would two things happened

(12:45):
or didn't happen, right, Either somebody said to him, perhaps
it was the chief of staff, Suzie Wiles. We're going
to get to her in a minute, but perhaps it
was said, hey, you know at the Reiner stuffs, they'd
be careful that didn't you know, I don't know what
you intended to say.

Speaker 2 (13:02):
It didn't play well.

Speaker 1 (13:03):
Why don't you you know, express just straight up condolences
and sort of, you know, move on, or nobody said anything.

Speaker 2 (13:16):
Either.

Speaker 1 (13:19):
Either potential outcome is alarming to me. Why is it
alarming because either he was told don't do it again,
and he did it anyway, and he is that sort
of stubborn that caught up in his own filter bubble,
that delusional, right, or nobody has the guts to tell him, hey,

(13:44):
this is not good. Don't do it, don't talk about it.

Speaker 2 (13:47):
Don't say it.

Speaker 1 (13:51):
That's so either way, you have to ask yourself, oh
my god, what's going on here? And for me, it
is a different Donald Trump, you know, I know. So
with Joe Biden, when you know, as folks started making
the case asking questions about whether Biden was the same Biden,
you would show Biden clips doing interviews in twenty fifteen,

(14:13):
twenty fourteen, even twenty sixteen, and you would see, my god,
that's not even the same Joe Biden as twenty nineteen.
That's it was my impression. I spent a lot of
time at Joe Biden in twenty nineteen and twenty twenty
before the pandemic, and I thought he had definitely slowed down.
It was the same Joe Biden, but an older version,
and he definitely seemed to lack the same energy he

(14:34):
once had. He wasn't the glad hander. He was certainly
a talker, but he wasn't as fast as a.

Speaker 2 (14:39):
Talker, you know.

Speaker 1 (14:40):
There was definitely And then the difference between Joe Biden
circa twenty nineteen and circa twenty twenty three was even
more so. But the real contrast was between the Joe
Biden that I covered in the Obama era and the
Joe Biden that I was covering for the one term
of his presidency.

Speaker 2 (14:56):
It was a big difference.

Speaker 1 (14:58):
So in some way the questions were natural, Hey, he's
definitely getting older, you know, the younger Joe Biden would
be traveling the country. Why isn't older Joe Biden traveling?
And it was you know, they never wanted to say
it was because he can't, or because he gets tired,
or because they don't you know, it was always some
other excuse and things like that. It was definitely some

(15:19):
form of a you know, you can call it a
cover up, but it was definitely, you know, it was
definitely some form of rationalization for why there is they were.
They were certainly concerned and sensitive to the age issue,
sensitive to the idea that he wasn't and they were
kind of always trying to push back on this idea
that he wasn't up to the child, up to the job,

(15:42):
or as energetic as he once was. With Donald Trump,
it's admittedly a little bit harder, right because you know,
Donald Trump has had erratic behavior for years. Right, this
is not new his erratic behavior. And so as the
title of my substack goes, how will we know? Right,
we had a clear idea that something had changed about

(16:02):
Joe Biden because his speech text had changed. His energy
levels were clearly different. He was you know, more spry,
he was walking, he was younger, you know, all those things.
There were physical changes that you couldn't ignore and the
public side, right some eight you know, that's why the

(16:22):
numbers were consistently in the seventies and eighties, you know,
which is why I've just sort of, you know, the
false narrative that somehow the media was covering this up?
What is there to cover up? Media was the one
asking pole questions. Do I think there were some within
the White House Press score that could have been more aggressive? Absolutely?
But I kind of think, you know, we you know,
it's not like the media didn't show the footage. It's

(16:43):
not like the media didn't let you know he was
taking the short staircase. It's not like the med you know,
media didn't show you him shuffling around and tripping over sandbags, things.

Speaker 2 (16:50):
Like that with trumpets. Admittedly a little harder.

Speaker 1 (16:55):
Right, you know, when you see him behave erratically, you know,
but this was a moment with the Reiner thing where
ten years ago, you know, Donald Trump is no more
or less narcissistic today than he was ten years ago.
But ten years ago he was still sensitive to what
the public thought of him, and he didn't quite live

(17:17):
in his own bubble is filtered bubble that is more
so today than he's ever had before. He's got surrounded
by yes people and sycophans, who don't want I don't
think want to present him with the with reality if
reality the only show him reality when reality looks good
for him. They don't show him reality when it paints
an ugly picture for him. And so he definitely seems

(17:40):
more detached from reality today than he did when he
first entered the political arena. But you know, the Donald
Trump of ten years ago, when a celebrity died, his
narcissism would put him, would sort of link him up.
He would say, you know I was in his movies,
or you know I was able. You know, he's most

(18:01):
and in this case with Michelle Reiner who took the photo,
who was the photographer for the Art of the Deal
photo that Donald Trump posed for back in the eighties,
you know, the old Donald Trump, the guy who was
you know, just as shameless, but in that sort of
I've got something to sell you shamelessness would have said, boy,

(18:21):
her career would have been nothing without me, Her career
wouldn't have happened without me. They in some ways that
would have been the normal. Oh boy, there he goes, putting,
making everything about himself, which he always does, but sort
of within his own weird semi positively, it would at
least try to say, hey, they were successful, but he

(18:41):
would try to take credit for their success. This time,
he's in this really ugly place right where he just assumes,
you know, because by the way, imagine like, you know,
he because there's another alternative here that he said that
because he feared one of his supporters did this, which

(19:03):
in itself is such a warped version of thinking. Right,
can you imagine that he actually said it because that's
what he thought was going to be the case, That
in itself is troubling behavior. But you know, he's an
eighty year old man, and any of us with older
relatives have experienced the older relative with no filter or

(19:23):
with less filter who doesn't feel like they have to
round the edges of commentary anymore, that they can just well,
it doesn't matter, man, Grandpa's got to be grandpa, grandma's
got to be grandma, uncle's got to be uncle. Ann's
going to etcetera, etcetera. But he's president of the United States,
and we don't know when he blurts one of these

(19:45):
bizarre things that he says in front of a world
leader that actually changes the nature of our relationship with
said country. These are things that should concern us and
if you were is you know, do we have and
given what we just learned with the Vanity Fair story

(20:06):
that you know, it's funny with the Vanity Fair story,
it sort of confirms everything that I'd been hearing about
the role Susie Wilds plays that she is try She
is the sort of the reality you know, she's the
reality check. But she's got a light touch, right, She's

(20:26):
kind of a she sees things the way most normal
people see things. But she's gonna let the process play
out and just clean up the worst messes, you know,
just try to try to steer a choppy shift a
ship through choppy waters. And you know, they've sort of

(20:52):
given up on the small stuff, and I think they
would put mean tweets under the category of small stuff.
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(22:47):
an alarming moment where you have to start the question
is he all there all the time? Is he so
consumed with himself? The fact that he can't concentrate all
the time? I bet the fact that in the Wall
Street Journal interview, he's doing an interview and then he
takes a call, and then the Interior Secretary, Doug Bergram,

(23:07):
wants to talk with him about remodeling the DC golf courses,
and you're what what And you're in the middle of
doing this interview. I mean, I appreciate that the journal
people told us about that. I mean, I think it's
a terrible look politically that he cares more about redesigning Washington,
DC's three public golf courses than he does about lowering
the price of electricity or lowering the price of groceries, right,

(23:28):
like you could those TV ads right themselves. But that's
also another sign of of sort of you know, where
you can't keep concentration, you can't keep focus that you're
sort of that you're erratic. Now again, he's kind of
been this way all the time, So it is going
to be harder. While it was easier us for us

(23:49):
to see sort of the the you know, we could
just see boy Biden used to be this, Now he's this.
That evolution of Trump is harder to fully appreciate because
he's kind of always been kind of outrageous, He'll always say,
but it was sort of it felt like it was
planned outrage in twenty fifteen, twenty sixteen, twenty seventeen. This

(24:12):
feels a lot more sort of unfiltered, unpasteurized, if you will,
on this front. But my point is is that for
all of those folks on the right that we're concerned
about whether or not the staff was running things, whether
it's about Joe Biden's faculties were all there, I would

(24:33):
argue the behavior we've seen of this president, particularly over
the last few months, given his age, given how quickly
this stuff happens. I mean, look, we are not getting
a straight story about his current health. You don't go
through as many he's had I think three annual physicals

(24:55):
this year. You get my point, right, That's what they
keep calling him, he keeps going back. They keep calling
a routine you know, you know, it's not routine going
back to the doctor more than once a year. I mean,
something out of the ordinary that they're concerned about the
fact that, you know, he seemed to tell us that

(25:16):
the last time he took a one of these cognitive tests,
there was an audience. That's interesting. Why was there an audience?
Why were there so many people observing this? What was
the concern? Were there more experts that were brought in?
It is, there is something different, and there is more

(25:43):
You can feel the sort of concern about I don't know,
you know, I'm not going you know, there's fear of
ever contradicting him. There's fear of pushing back at him.
There's fear of telling him news he doesn't want to hear.
These were all concerned that people had on the right,
in particular with Joe Biden in twenty twenty three and

(26:05):
twenty twenty four. So again, if you're looking to to
find out who's high on the hypocrisy scale of concern,
you know, watch the people that express the most concern
about Joe Biden's faculties. See pretty much everybody in primetime

(26:25):
on Fox News and ask them if this behavior were
at all being you know, if this were Biden a
second term of Biden behaving this way, I wonder what
the coverage would be on primetime of Fox right. But
in all, you know, snark aside, this unfiltered behavior is

(26:47):
alarming for either one of two things. One, he was
told this is not good and he still can't help himself,
which means he's got a self control issue. He's got
a staff so afraid of telling him bad news that
they won't do it, and therefore he was why he

(27:08):
ended up doubling down on this in the first place.
Whatever the answer is, neither is good for the country.
Neither is good, by the way, for the Republican Party.
And I'll ask you know, if JD. Van's and Marco
Rubio right, they're going to have to they want to
succeed this presidency, one of them does. Look at how

(27:33):
unhappy the voters are with the Democratic Party, even though
they're voting for Democrats right now. Right, we saw this
in Virginia, majority had an unfavorable view of the party. Well,
what's driven that? What what's driven that? Was this idea
that they all had their head in the sand when
it came to Biden in twenty twenty four. And there's
a lot of resentment among Democrats for how Democratic leaders
look the other way when there was an obvious, slow

(27:56):
motion train wreck taking place with the vot voters were
concerned about long before there was a debate between Trump
and Biden on June twenty seventh, twenty twenty four. The
voters have been pretty angry about it. You know, I
think if you want to know why there's such limited
trust in Chuck Schumer by fellow Democrats and Akeem Jeffries,

(28:20):
it's the entire Democratic leaders in Washington are just seen
as somehow they were in kahoots and they had their
head in the sand when it came to the Biden thing. Well,
these same voters are going to have the same reaction
if it appears that Trump progressively gets worse, his behavior
gets more erratic, you have sort of more you know,

(28:45):
enablers not wanting to either say something, and you know
we're finding out today. Look the few sober quotes that
Susie Wiles did give a reporter and this case a
biographer and Chris Whipple. She didn't like what it looked

(29:05):
like once they went public, and there's a fear that
the president can't handle any sort of criticism or analytical criticism,
or even just sort of acknowledging when there are tough
moments or when there are awkward things that happen in
the administration, which only serves to concern me that when

(29:33):
you really need somebody to step in, are they going
to be willing to do it? Are they going to
be willing to say, hey, man, the emperor has no
clothes here. We have got to acknowledge this. We cannot
continue to pretend this isn't happening. I think it's a
legitimate concern, and I think in some ways the president's

(29:55):
own behavior, the odd things he has said about his
own health, and then the erratic nature of what he
did with Reiner and some other folks. I think this
is a storyline that's only going to grow. And you know,
he's not getting younger, This is not going to get better.
This is only going to become more obvious. Look, we

(30:18):
don't see him travel the country, and I think there's
a reason for it. Right, just like with Joe Biden,
you got to ask yourself, boy, Normally in a president
in this situation would be traveling the country to try
to sell his agenda and he's not doing it.

Speaker 2 (30:31):
Why is that right?

Speaker 1 (30:34):
That is what began the conversation for folks who were
concerned about whether Biden was up to the job. Certainly
not up for a second term. He couldn't do the
job to self to sell his agenda in the first term. Well,
I think we've entered that same situation. And again, if
you were truly concerned about Biden because of his physical
ailments and not due to your own politics, then you

(30:57):
should be equally alarmed by the currents situation with our
current president and the situation that he's in. Now. All right,
before I go to my interview, I want to share
with you a poll that came to me via the
search Light Institute. Now, if you recall that may seem

(31:17):
familiar to some of you listeners out there, I had
interviewed the founder of search Light Institute, which is search
Light is the hometown search Light, Nevada is the hometown
of Harry Reid. Adam Gentilssen, of former Harry Reid staffer,
started this up and it's basically an attempt to try
to move the Democratic Party in a more pragmatic direction.

(31:39):
I wouldn't even say ideologically moderate, just more of a
mainstream sort of try to make the party more big
ten again between progressive in the center a little bit
and so. But they did a poll on corruption, and
why I find it interesting, it's sort of it was
sort of the question is what is corrupt? What do

(32:02):
the voters think is corrupt versus sort of what the
definition perhaps we in the media have, you know, you know,
when I say think of the word corrupt, I think
of like, who's ripping off taxpayers? Right? But what's interesting
is what the voters themselves view as corrupt. And they
asked a terrific question, and the question was this, if

(32:26):
you describe a politician as corrupt, what are you saying
about them? And then they offer, please select one that
comes closest to your view, and the number one answer
was not somebody that was stealing taxpayer dollars. It was
using public office for personal financial gain.

Speaker 2 (32:43):
Right.

Speaker 1 (32:43):
That could mean insider trading on stocks. That could mean
finding out that you're buying a piece of property that's
about to be zone for a government funded highway or
something like this, that somehow your net worth grows that
your own relatives get to start a lobbying business and
use your last name to get on a board, say

(33:06):
with a company in Ukraine, or they use your last
name to start a meme coin and you make money
off of the crypto market. Jeez, I don't know what
two families might might have qualified for that, but that
was the number one definition of corrupt. The number two
most popular definition of corrupt politician was this they change

(33:28):
rules to hold onto power instead of improving lives. Well,
basically that's re redistricting. They simply want to pick voters,
pick voters that they don't have to persuade. They pick
more voters that are already on their side, so they
don't have to do the hard work of representative democracy.

Speaker 2 (33:45):
Right.

Speaker 1 (33:45):
That was the second most popular. The third most popular
definition was they only serve wealthy donors instead of regular people. Well,
I just told you about we're going to have our
first billion dollar center rights. Do you think that ten
dollars donor to a Senate race as much as one
hundred million dollar or even the one the ten million

(34:06):
dollar donor I've had. I've had donor sources of mine
who only give six figure donations okay, which for just
about all of us, writing a check for one hundred
thousand dollars or more is a lot of money. Okay,
you know, that's purchasing a home type of money that

(34:26):
you write that to send your kid to college type
of money. And they're considered they're not considered big donors anymore.
They're just considered middle class donors.

Speaker 2 (34:37):
Okay.

Speaker 1 (34:39):
You know, a lawmaker will spend a lot more time
persuading that finding a ten one ten million dollar donor
then they will looking for one thousand, one hundred thousand
dollar donors because that's you know, it's the law of efficiency.

Speaker 2 (34:55):
Right.

Speaker 1 (34:57):
The fourth most popular is they let corporate influence overwhelm
the influence of voters. Arguably that's arguably the big donors.
And then in the single digits you have they trade
favors with lobbyists or special interests. They cater only to
the extremes that don't look out for everyone. What's interesting
is that none of the definitions were they steal money.

Speaker 2 (35:15):
Right.

Speaker 1 (35:16):
So the point is is that what the word you know,
and I it is what the voters think is corrupt
is fascinating, and I think that it is in some ways.
It is sort of like you're you're you're ripping off
the democracy, right. And what I appreciate about this about
where the donors are the voters are on this. Listen

(35:38):
to me, the donors the voters are on this, is
that they're a little more sophisticated on what's corrupt. They
say that, hey, that that corrupts the democracy, that gets
in the way of you representing the average person. And
this is a case where the voters are ahead of
the politicians, right. The politicians don't speak of corruption this way. Right,

(36:00):
they speak of corruption like breaking the law, corruption thinking,
because I think they're all afraid that if you define
corruption the way the public defines it, which is profiting,
you know, having you know, essentially personal financial gain while
serving in office, you know, trying to just stay into office,

(36:20):
always worrying about raising money, always catering to donors. A
lot of politicians, if you said, do you think that's corrupt, like, wow,
the system's corrupt, but I'm not, you know, they might
blame the system.

Speaker 2 (36:33):
They wish they wouldn't do it that way.

Speaker 1 (36:35):
But the fact that voters think this is anyway just
it's interesting and it also tells me that voters are man,
the pitchforks are out, the pitchforks are ready, and I
don't think.

Speaker 2 (36:45):
I do not think.

Speaker 1 (36:48):
Large corporations and the tech industry is aware of this
and is ready for what's coming. And I certainly think
leaders in both parties don't fully appreciate it.

Speaker 2 (37:00):
Here's another question that came through that I want to
share it.

Speaker 1 (37:02):
How well do you think government serves each of the
following groups? Okay, the very wealthy, eighty six percent said
they think government serves the very wealthy somewhat or very well,
eighty six percent. About businesses, all right, seventy four percent
say the government serves it serves businesses somewhat or very well.

(37:29):
How about racial and ethnic minorities, Well, guess what, Only
thirty six percent believe government serves them well. Fifty seven
percent believes they do not serve racial or ethnic minorities
very well at all, or not well at all completely
or not not well completely all. How about you personally?

(37:50):
You personally, that number is thirty is just under forty percent.
So this isn't one of those cases where well, I
think Congress is, but I like my member of Congress,
I don't think Congress looks out for the interest of
everybody else, but they also look out for me. Nope,
you know they most people think they they're served slightly

(38:12):
better in government than racial and ethnic minorities, but not
too well. And then when you throw out ordinary people,
that number is.

Speaker 2 (38:22):
That means.

Speaker 1 (38:24):
Three and four voters believe ordinary people are not served
well at all in some form or another by government.

Speaker 2 (38:33):
What it tells you is that there's a.

Speaker 1 (38:36):
There's an appetite out there for government reform, for democracy reform.
You just have to frame it in a way that
just say, hey, do you want government to serve you better?
This is why it doesn't serve you well. The system
is rigged against you, which I think the folks believe
the system is rigged against them. They just have yet

(38:57):
to find a politician that has sold them a struck
sure that makes sense and that they believe will work.

Speaker 2 (39:02):
Right.

Speaker 1 (39:03):
That I think is the missing piece here, right. Bertie
Sanders and a Donald Trump have convinced seventy percent of
America that the system's rigged against them. Okay, that's that's
the beginning. What there is an agreement on is whether
government itself is redeemable to do it, and whether it's
you're going to need a singular individual.

Speaker 2 (39:24):
That's what Donald Trump believes that.

Speaker 1 (39:26):
You can't the system can't be trusted to do it,
versus Bertie Sanders, who said, well, you got topend the
entire system, but then the system can be can be
can be trusted on this. Here's one more question to
share with you, just to show you.

Speaker 2 (39:44):
The definition of how.

Speaker 1 (39:45):
Much corruption do you think there is in the Trump administration? Well,
among independents, forty percent said there's a great deal and
another twelve percent said there's a moderate amount. So fifty
two percent said there's at least a great deal or
a moderate amount of coruption in the Trump administration. And
if you throw in the nine percent that say a
small amount, right, so there's only thirty nine percent says

(40:07):
that there's no corruption at all in the Trump administration.
All right, but guess what how much corruption do you
think there was in the Biden administration? Well, twenty eight
percent said there was a great deal, another thirteen percent
said there was a moderate amount, another twelve percent said
there was a small amount, Which means you had a
majority that believed there was some corruption. You only had

(40:29):
forty seven percent. So you have thirty nine percent believe
there's no corruption in Trump administration, and you have forty
seven percent believing there's no corruption. This is just among independents,
but a majority of independents believe there's some form of
corruption in the Biden administration. A majority of independents say
there's some form of corruption in the Trump administration. Look,

(40:49):
the point they're trying to say. I think the point
that Searchlight is trying to say is we look framing.
Framing reform issues through the lens of corruption might get
people's attention better. Right, if you talk about the financing
of campaigns through a through the prism of corruption. If

(41:12):
you talk about the lack of regulation of big tech
through the prism of corruption, if you talk about entrenched
power in term limits through the prism of corruption, you're
more likely to get an audience to listen to you,
and most importantly, you're going to be able to talk
to the voters who are the most skeptical of the

(41:33):
two parties right now, those that are self described independence
are no parties. So anyway, in this moment that we're
living in, right, we're basically, you know, we've got back
to back presidencies where we're not quite sure that the
actual president you know, is up to the job, you know,

(41:53):
has the temperament of the faculties to do the job
the way it needs to be done. You also then
have a growing coalition of voters that are believing the
system itself is rotting. And this is this Look.

Speaker 2 (42:09):
Yes, it's about.

Speaker 1 (42:10):
Affordability at home, and in order to speak to a
certain segment of voters, you're going to have to make
it about that. But connecting the struggle to affordability through
corruption is potentially a potent force. And I will just
tell you this. Anytime we've had big changes in election,
big midterm waves, there's always been an element of corruption

(42:33):
that has helped fuel it. You know, in nineteen ninety four,
we had members of Congress. We were just two years
removed from a check where members of Congress could bounce
checks without having a bank account. It was just weird
system where only Congress could write checks for money that
they didn't have.

Speaker 2 (42:49):
It was crazy.

Speaker 1 (42:50):
And if you want to know more about it, you know,
I'll go back on my time machine in a couple
months we'll talk about it. But but go take a
look in two thousand and six, there was sort of
the corruption of Jack Abramoff and Tom Delay was that
arguably in twenty ten and in twenty fourteen, Republicans were
using more of sort of the fear of sort of

(43:12):
the growth of government. It was less so less so
corruption fueling that one. But when you see for the
most our corruption usually plays role, especially when you see
a total flip. Right ninety four, both the House that
Republicans went, both the House and the Senate. There was this,
you know, movement for term limits, movement for against entrenched power.
You had the check bouncing scandal, et cetera. Two thousand

(43:35):
and six also saw both houses flip. In this case
it was Republican a Democrat, you know, the addition of
the Jack Abramoff stuff and sort of the takeover of
K Street.

Speaker 2 (43:45):
You know that had it.

Speaker 1 (43:46):
And I do think that is a potential potent force
here if if Democrats figure out how to tap into
it in a credible way. Right, It's important It's important
to note they think, you know, independence think Trump's corrupt,
more corrupt than Biden.

Speaker 2 (44:02):
But they also.

Speaker 1 (44:03):
Majority thought the Biden administration was corrupt too, So it's
not the easiest road for Democrats to go down. But
it will make sense if you're a new candidate, if
you're somebody without the baggage of a previous era, a
previous entity, or a previous administration. Do you hate hangovers,

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got my top five list. It is Wednesday to Top

(45:50):
five top estop and I thought i'd give you the
opportunity to give you maybe the Chuck Todd Holiday Book
buying gift guide, if you will. These are five books
that I think are worth reading this year. Doesn't mean
they are my five favorite books of the year, but

(46:12):
they were five books that I found informative, important.

Speaker 2 (46:16):
Or interesting or a little bit of both.

Speaker 1 (46:21):
So number five on that list is a book that
did not come out this year. It actually came out
a few years ago, and it's not a book that
got a lot of attention. But it is now a
book that I would recommend to anybody that works in
the world of finance or works in the world of business,

(46:42):
that they need to go pick up a copy in
the next few weeks and read. And it is called
The Drift, and it is by Kevin Hassett. So why
do I say you need to write this book read
this book? Well, this is a book that got very
little attention when it came out. He wrote this book
probably assuming he was never going to work in another

(47:03):
Trump administration. The book came out just after the twenty
twenty election. Kevin Hassett worked in the first trumpet. He's
one of the few people that worked in a high
profile position in the first Trump administration as an economic
advisor and has made it to a second Trump administration.
It's basically him. Steven Miller, right, and I guess Russell

(47:24):
Voight was was there, but more in a in a
lower capacity. But Kevin Hassett very well, maybe the next
chair of the Federal Reserve, and so understanding his worldview
and much of his worldview, he's sort of The point
of The Drift is he basically defends the Trump era,

(47:47):
defends his work with Trump and the Trump era. As look,
there may be a lot of things not to like
about Donald Trump the person, which he's sort of, which
he hinsid in this book, but that he was a
necessary correction for what was a drift towards socialism that
was taking place not just inside the Democratic Party but
in various institutions of academy and the media, etc. It

(48:09):
is how he frames his book. Regardless of whether you
agree with that framing or not, I would argue, if
you want to be a well informed person about understanding
where's the FED going, what does Hassett believe? How does
he interpret Trump's beliefs? How does he defend Trump? Kevin

(48:31):
asked somebody who sort of came up in the world
of the same world that Alan Greenspan came up through.
You know, he was sort of an acolyte at times
of green Span. So I think it is It is
as illuminating as any ex staffer book is going to be,
because what this book wasn't unlike say Pence's book or

(48:55):
John Bolton's book. It is it's a total evisceration of
Donald Trump. It is more of an observation. You know,
there's he takes pride. So it is not an antagonistic
book on Trump, but I think it's one of these.
I don't think people realized he wrote a book. It

(49:17):
didn't get a lot of attention. It's you know, it's
it's not the I'm not going to tell you it's
the world's greatest read, but I think it's an important read.
I know some of you listen to my podcast just
for you know, whether you love or hate the direction
I take this podcast. You were looking for usable information, Well,

(49:40):
I would tell you reading this book will give you
plenty of usable information to navigate a FED and a
central bank that could be run by Kevin Hassett. And
you get to get ahead of the game, get to
know the book before senators start asking him questions during
his confirmation hearing about the book. All right, so that's

(50:01):
number five. Number four is the Mark Twain book by
Ron Churnout. I enjoyed it for the most part, but
I'll be honest, not as much as I enjoyed his
Grant Book. I did enjoy his Grant Book more, but
I learned a lot about Mark Twain, and in some ways,
Mark Twain is arguably, you know, the closest thing that

(50:22):
we had in the nineteenth century to a quote unquote influencer, right,
an outsider and outside force who could who could stir
the pot of the country and could galvanize the country
on certain issues if he so chose. You know, now
we have a million Mark Twain's right. You know, would

(50:43):
today's Mark. Would Mark Twain himself be on YouTube? He
probably would. He certainly would have a Would he have
a podcast or would he be more.

Speaker 2 (50:51):
Of a monologue kind of guy?

Speaker 1 (50:52):
Right? Would he interview others or would he just simply
opine on a given day?

Speaker 2 (50:59):
But it's a.

Speaker 1 (51:03):
I enjoy sure now because he's what I do. The
best part of his books. It isn't just learning more
about the individual he's talking about, but he's just does
a great job of capturing the era as well. You know,
it's the little details, it's that stuff, trying to understand

(51:23):
the world that these folks were living in at the time,
not just trying to understand the psyche of them in
that moment. So but I think that Twain in some
ways the quintessential American, a model for so many, so
many of us, good, bad or otherwise just a it's

(51:45):
a timely it's a timely moment. It's timely, you know
it's it's timely. It's a wrong word. No, it's more
of a timeless biography, if you will. But I think
an important one, and it came out this year, so
I definitely think it should be on your gift liss.

Speaker 2 (52:02):
Number three is one that you may not be surprised.

Speaker 1 (52:05):
That I'm pushing again, and it's the right Thompson book
called The Barn. I don't know if it technically came
out this year or not. I don't think it did.
I think it came out last year. But as you know,
you know it's this first of all, it's just this
is a really just a great book to read. It
is if you want to write, what it's like to

(52:29):
read somebody who just is just better with words than
most people in your life are.

Speaker 2 (52:35):
That's right Thompson.

Speaker 1 (52:38):
And I love I hope you had a chance to
listen to the interview with him. Those of you that did,
I'm sure you've already bought the book. It is such
a compelling read. But the sort of the idea behind
the book, right that here was something that happened within
twenty five miles of where he grew up right. Emmett

(52:58):
Till killed in a barn just within essentially the same
neighbor you know, in the same larger community that he
grew up in, that right Thompson grew up in, and
he didn't know anything about it. It's amazing how little
of our own, a little of our local history. We
sometimes know the good or the bad history. And so

(53:19):
in some ways, reading the book, I hope a lesson
to hey, don't forget to look around where you live.
Don't forget to learn the history of your own neighborhood.
You may be surprised on how much you learn and
how much it may matter in the in the grand
scheme of things. So that's number three. Number four on
my list is one hundred and seven Days Kamala Harris's
memoir about her campaign.

Speaker 2 (53:42):
Look.

Speaker 1 (53:42):
I've spent a lot of time talking about the book
when it came out, but I did enjoy it. I
you know, we can debate whether this was good for
her future political career or bad for her future political career, but.

Speaker 2 (53:55):
Guess what it felt like. It was.

Speaker 1 (53:58):
Sometimes these memoirs are so dishonest art or they're honest,
but they're but they're sanitized. This didn't feel very sanitized.
This felt different, and you know, it's interesting about her.

Speaker 2 (54:12):
I was having this.

Speaker 1 (54:14):
Conversation with Crystalism and he said, you know, who had
the He asked who had the worst, best or worst
twenty twenty eight. You know, we both agreed that Gavin Newsom,
for anybody think about running for president of the Democratic side,
Gavin Newsom probably had the best twenty twenty eight. He
believes that Kamala Harris at the worst. I don't. I
disagreed with him on it. I understood the case saying, well,

(54:36):
you know, she made everybody mad, and it's true, right,
she seems to have she seems to have thrown a
few matches at a few of the bridges that she's
crossed over the years. Right then, maybe she burned a
bridge with Biden World, Maybe she burned a bridge with
Josh Shapiro, Maybe she burned a bridge with Mark Kelly.
Maybe she burned a bridge with Gavin Newsom. But there

(55:01):
was another part of me that was surprised at her
candor and she didn't play the type. You know, she's
been a politician that's been very careful over the years,
and she chose to be less careful in this memoir.
Is this a different Kamala Harris? Is this the beginning
of a different relationship she wants to have with with
her political career, a different way she would go about

(55:22):
running for office.

Speaker 2 (55:24):
The point is is that I think there's.

Speaker 1 (55:26):
A lot to learn about one hundred and scent about
sort of the state of the Democratic Party Circle twenty
twenty four. But I found it quite compelling, and it was,
you know, not a hard read. Especially you know, it
was sort of like it's like reading the director's notes
on a movie you already saw, but in some ways

(55:47):
the director's notes help you understand the movie even a
little bit better.

Speaker 2 (55:53):
I think you will.

Speaker 1 (55:55):
You're not wasting your time by reading this book. I
think there's something to learn the number one book, and
I'm in the middle of it now, but I think
it is absolutely consequential reading Sarka twenty twenty five is
a book called Fateful Hours. It is by Vulkar Ulrich
and it's been translated from the original German by a

(56:16):
gentleman named Jefferson Chase, and it is a new take
on the collapse of the Weimar Republic, the democracy that
was in place after World War one and before the
rise of Hitler. Why did it fall? How did it collapse?
What were the warning signs. There's a lot of commentary
about how democracies fail, how republics die. Well, this is

(56:42):
an example of a republic that died one hundred years
ago and in its place came made off Hitler. How
did it happen? How could such a modern westernized place
do this. Let's just say I have found it both
reassuring and arming, but most importantly it's eye opening.

Speaker 2 (57:05):
And look, I is the they must.

Speaker 1 (57:10):
Read article of the month that I gave you last
episode from the political quarterly of the Council on Foreign
Relations called Foreign Affairs, about this idea that we the
United States, have slipped from a democracy to something called
competitive authoritarianism. Let's just say this is a pretty good

(57:31):
companion read, and I think one that will round out.
You read all five of these books. Okay, you read
all five of these books, and I think you will
be as well informed and as ready for the political
landscape that we are all having to navigate going in

(57:53):
to twenty twenty six. So my five books, The Drift
by Kevin Hassett, The Mark Twain Biography by Ron Chernoud,
the Barn, the place where Ed Mattil was killed by
Wright Thompson one hundred and seven days by Kamala Harris,
and my number one recommendation book that you should be

(58:14):
reading going into twenty twenty six fateful hours, the collapse
of the wim Are Republic.

Speaker 2 (58:21):
So there you go.

Speaker 1 (58:22):
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Speaker 2 (59:31):
Chuck Ask Chuck. First question today comes from Jason in
NY otherwise known as New York.

Speaker 1 (59:41):
He goes, Hey, I really appreciate the bonus episodes that
you put out recently as political events have warnted, I
too believed that the Indiana GOP's rebuke of Trump and
Trump's revolting comments about Rob Reiner were significant enough moments
to call for quick reactions. Hope to see if more
of those in the future.

Speaker 2 (59:54):
Well, I appreciate it. Look, I go hot and cold
on that.

Speaker 1 (59:57):
I don't want to be I'm not you know, somebody
who's just chasing you know, I don't want to be
here quote chasing the news, if you will. But I
also think that that if I think I have something
to add and trying to add a perspective about how
you should think about a major event. That's when I
try to try to chime in on that. And I

(01:00:18):
think these were both significant events, and I think that
they're going to trigger larger discussions.

Speaker 2 (01:00:25):
Right.

Speaker 1 (01:00:26):
I think the INDIANAGOP rebuke is a reminder that something
that I've been sort of forecasting for the last three months.
I send you back to a sub steck I think
I wrote in late September early October, which the cracks
in the coalition were beginning to show. And then you know,
right after that piece, we've seen more and more examples
of it, right, whether it's Marjorie Taylor Green, whether it's

(01:00:47):
the Indiana Republicans, and YadA, YadA, YadA. So it is,
you know, it is part of this is just time, right,
No political movement has that I can think of in
our history, has been able to go more than more
than eight to ten years. And we're sort of we're
at the end, right, We're at the We're at the We're.

Speaker 2 (01:01:07):
At the beginning of the end. We're not the end.
It's not the end of the end, it's at the
end of the beginning. Okay.

Speaker 1 (01:01:12):
I think that's that we're past the end of the beginning.
I think we're at the beginning of the end, and
this is you know, it's everything is going to get
It's going to get worse for him everything. You know,
You're going to see the Republicans fracture a little bit
more the closer.

Speaker 2 (01:01:27):
We get to election day.

Speaker 1 (01:01:29):
So look, I'm not saying some new outside event that
none of us have thought of won't create a rally
around the flag effect. There's always there are always possibilities.
There's always the one percent, the two percent chances where
things go another direction. But on the trajectory we're on
and assuming sort of you know, events that take place

(01:01:50):
within the normal sort of set of expectations that we have,
this is only going to get more acute. And then,
of course, on the writer thing, I really think it.
I think there's a reason I'm framing it as a
do we need to be thinking about whether he's this
is the beginning of his own downfall of is just

(01:02:13):
his basic capacity. If you don't have a filter for
something like this anymore, what else is not going so well?
So I think this is one of those that we
needed this. This for me is a bit more alarming
because either staff was afraid to tell him this was
crazy or they did and he did it anyway, right,

(01:02:35):
And so these felt significant enough. So I appreciate you noticing,
but I promise you I don't want to go down,
you know, chasing every squirrel down that road.

Speaker 2 (01:02:48):
All right. Next question comes from Eric.

Speaker 1 (01:02:50):
From another question from New York. Given the competitiveness of
Ohio and Iowa US center races, do you think a
Democrat could win the Florida center race?

Speaker 2 (01:02:56):
Thanks?

Speaker 1 (01:02:57):
Eric, Well, look, all the ingredients are they are for
a competitive race. You have an appointed senator. The history
of appointed senators in general indicate that, you know, they're
the most you know, they're more vulnerable than even a
first term senator trying to seek reelection. Appointed senators, you know,
have the have the worst of all worlds, right they

(01:03:20):
they have the they're an incumbent without any of the
upside of incumbency. They only have the downsides of it.
So there's that, right, And Ashley Moody's you know, she's
not a well known political figure yet, but Florida's very expensive,
and that Florida Democratic Party is just structurally so far behind,

(01:03:44):
you know, shared Brown has an organization that these almost
turn key for Ohio Democrats. And even though that's a
state where overall the Democratic Party is in worshi Democratic
maybe brand is in worship in Ohio than it is
in Florida. Structurally, they're already more competitive Iowa be in
a smaller state. They have a very strong gubernatorial candidate

(01:04:04):
in Rob Sand That also helps it be competitive. I
do think that if the governor's race gets competitive, then
the Senate race will automatically start to get more competitive.
Keep an eye out on Jared Moscowitz. I think if
he ends up running. He's a member of Congress. He's
been on this podcast, he said. I asked him point
blank if he was thinking about running statewide and he said, well,

(01:04:26):
if they redistrict me and he would be among the targets.
And I do think Florida still might. I mean, I'll
be curious to see whether Indiana's rejection of redistricting if
it means the fever's broken. But if we do have
two more states that engage in this, it's gonna be
Florida in Virginia, one for the Team Red and one

(01:04:47):
for Team Blue. And we'll see what kind of We'll
know pretty quickly. I think Jared moscow It's could be
a very powerful Senate candidate if because he said, if
he gets redistrict he represents of northern Broward County southern
Palm Beach County, they could sort of make it a
bit you know already was only sort of a I

(01:05:08):
think a plus two Harris district. He could turn. It
could turn into something that he's buyinging. And he basically
said if if they go after his district, then he'll
probably just run for the Senate. There's a candidate in
there now, somebody who's a school board part of the
school board wars with the Moms of Liberty. It's an
organization on the left that went after Moms for Liberty

(01:05:30):
and somebody there. But you know she's got a You're
not going to get a financial commitment unless you get
a higher profile candidate. Moscowtz might be a high profile
enough where he could bring a decent a decent financial
following with him. But I don't think the Senate race
gets competitive without the governor's race being competitive, and that's

(01:05:51):
an open question. I do think that Democrats ended up
with two pretty good candidates in the governor's race, and
David Johny and Jerry dem One could argue one of
them out a run in the center race, that they've
got too many good candidates in the governor's race, not
enough good candidates in the Senate race. But we'll say,
but I do think it should be. But the cost

(01:06:15):
is it's so prohibitive. I think they're more likely to
spend money targeting Mississippi and trying to put Mississippi in play,
which is not as far fetched as you might think,
because five million dollars, you know, an extra five to
ten million dollars in Mississippi would have a huge impact.
An extra five to ten million dollars in Florida would

(01:06:36):
have minimal impact. Next question comes from tboor Shinto from Toronto.
He says, longtime listener watcher from Toronto here, I have
a possibly naive question about journalism in the US. Why
didn't reporters directly challenge the president when he makes inappropriate
offensive statements like the ones about Rob Ryner are calling
journalists stupid. Many in the media react on TV or

(01:06:57):
in print, but rarely pushed back to his face in
the moment. Why isn't anyone asked him directly why he
behaves that way, maybe using more polite language, just curious
why no one takes that shot. Thanks for all the
great insights. Well, I would argue in the first term,
we all did. I would ask him questions about it.
I confronted him directly an off the record meeting during
when he was president elect, basically saying when he name

(01:07:20):
checks our correspondence in the field, he puts their lives
at risk, He puts a spotlight on him in ways
that I believe he didn't intend, is how I put it.
But you know, there's a reason I think in Trump
two point zero why so many people in these same
positions that some of us were in have chosen not

(01:07:41):
to do it Because none of you know, nobody wants
to be fodder to help somebody else's social media following,
And so I think there's this belief that it doesn't
do what you think it's going to do, and if anything,
it only it only.

Speaker 2 (01:08:06):
It only puts you.

Speaker 1 (01:08:08):
In a position of having to debate the president, right,
which is you're.

Speaker 2 (01:08:11):
Just so it's.

Speaker 1 (01:08:17):
A lot of us don't want to be a story,
and we don't want to insert ourselves, not out of fear,
out of distraction. We don't want to be used as
a you know, I didn't like it. I always whenever
I got a whiff of a guest trying to use
an appearance to raise money to don't fundraise, you know,
I did my best to gum that up. There's a

(01:08:41):
fairly memorable back and forth I had with Ted Cruz
one time that it was clear he accepted the invitation
only to try to use me as an attempt for
political fundraising fodder. But the own of the conversation went

(01:09:01):
in such a way that he would have been a
self owned had he tried it. I didn't realize that's
what he was up to until about halfway through the interview,
and it was like, oh, now I know why you
came on. And it was just anyway it was during
the first impeachment. If you want to go back and
go find that back and forth that I had with him,

(01:09:22):
let's just say I'll just use three letters to give
you a hint about where the conversation went to JFK
and I'll just let you know and you can sort
of imagine where the where that part of the conversation went.
So I think that's the That's why you know, it
doesn't feel like it gets you anywhere, and it I

(01:09:43):
don't want to say journalists don't do it out of fear.
Fear is the wrong word. I think terms of it's
sort of like is it effective? Like ultimately, what is
our role? Is your role to get information out to understand?
I could tell you the private conversations I've had with
him about this. I'm like, why do you you know

(01:10:04):
you do that?

Speaker 2 (01:10:04):
You know?

Speaker 1 (01:10:06):
He he sort of has always viewed the press as
playing a part, like almost like the chorus and a
Shakespeare play, that we're all playing a role, and his
role is to go after the press. The press is
sort of that, you know, I've always equated it. He
sees us all as if you're familiar with the WWF

(01:10:27):
slash WWE And I have the reason I used WWF
is back in my day, it was the WWF and
it was a guy named the press person was a
guy named gene Okerland, mean gene Oakerland, and he was who,
you know, all the wrestlers picked on because he was
the press, you.

Speaker 2 (01:10:44):
Know, et cetera.

Speaker 1 (01:10:45):
And I always said that that Trump sort of viewed
us as mean gene Oakerland, that we were kind of
in on the joke, and he would say even say
things to me like, oh, this is good for your ratings,
it's good for your name. I d you know, it
only gives you more attention, it only makes you more money,
it only gives you or book deals. That was his
mindset about it back then. It's I think that's a
little more nefarious.

Speaker 2 (01:11:11):
But I don't, you know, what what do you expect?

Speaker 1 (01:11:14):
What do you expect him to say? Sometimes when you ask,
you know, I understand sort of like, you know, I'd
rather press him on why is he pardoning a convicted
drug Uh? Why did he pardon somebody who was convicted
of being a drug trafficker? Are you taking you know?

(01:11:35):
Did you know?

Speaker 2 (01:11:37):
Did it? You know?

Speaker 1 (01:11:37):
Why do you pardon your friends?

Speaker 2 (01:11:40):
You know?

Speaker 1 (01:11:40):
Why did you pardon you know, Henry Kuayer? You know,
I think there are other questions that if you have
the chance at a shot a question, because let's say,
you know, why did you say that about Rob Bryner
and his answer, I can tell you what his answer was, Well,
he attacked me first. It's always that's always usually his
defense when they came after me. You know, I wouldn't
have said anything had they not said this. You know,

(01:12:00):
he always says, I don't attack people, I defend myself,
so but I could, but I definitely you're right, there
is less of this in Trump two point zero because
many of us tried this in Trump one point oh,
and it didn't seem to go anywhere, It didn't seem
to didn't really produce an answer. You know, I think

(01:12:26):
there's a lot of people, and I'm you know that
listen to this podcast that want the press to express
the outrage that they have. But it's the equivalent of
punching your you know, punching a wall, a dry wall.
You know, you might punch a hole in the wall
and you might feel strong, but then you've got to

(01:12:46):
go back and patch up the wall, and what have
you really accomplished? You know, you can express your outrage
at him, he doesn't say anything satisfactory, and whatever he
says will outrage people who are already outraged.

Speaker 2 (01:12:59):
And so it's.

Speaker 1 (01:13:03):
You know, I think that's you know, I don't and
maybe that's not a satisfactory answer to you. I get it,
But you know, there comes a point of you know,
is there anything to be gained in understanding more about him?
Or are you just trying to go viral for yourself

(01:13:23):
right to Hey, look, I took on Donald Trump. Some
of us are not in the game of just making
this about ourselves, right, and so I think that's also
also plays a role on that front. Next question comes
from Adam w Any writes, I'm curious about your thoughts
on this. Affordability seems to be the central theme that

(01:13:44):
Democrats seem to be winning on. One of the sneaky
culprits of rising costs is the complete lack of competition
and various segments of the economy. Perhaps it is the
lawyer in me, but I don't understand why democrats haven't
begun at least bringing up the issue of breaking up
big monopolies. Thanks Adam w.

Speaker 2 (01:14:00):
So, you're right, I think that.

Speaker 1 (01:14:03):
In fact, I think there's going to be a fear
of doing that, but you know there's you know, I
think the the stuff that's popular is when you point
out how these monopolies are costing you money. And so
I just had a interview with an economist on my

(01:14:24):
newsphere show a couple episodes ago where we spent a
lot of time on the issue of surveillance pricing and
the fact that you have this. We have this phenomenon
these days of dynamic pricing, where basically the new goal
is to figure out, Hey, how do I maximize you know,

(01:14:46):
you Chuck Todd have a little bit more money to
spend versus you Jane Doe, who has less money to spend.
I want to have you both as customers. But I
you know you can pay more than Jane Doe. How
can I get you to pay more in Jane Doe
to pay me something? And I think that you know,

(01:15:10):
whether we've seen that airlines are thinking about going down
this road. There was a really good story and I
think it was the Washington Post about Uber and lyft
and how you know, on one phone, you know, based
on information they may have about you, the price is
one thing. On another phone, based on information they have
on the person who owns that phone, the price for

(01:15:32):
the same ride from the same location to the same
location is suddenly different. And how much of it is
based on what they think you're sort of Oh, I'm not,
I'm not that's too expensive for me versus that And
I think that's the type of of discrimination that will

(01:15:55):
really sort of, you know, middle class discrimination is when
the middle class grabs the pitchforks watch out right, like,
you know, when when the supposedly comfortable, you know, enough
to own a home, you know, have a couple, have
two cars, be able to afford kids college, all that stuff,

(01:16:18):
and they feel as if they're being taken advantage of
because they have a couple extra dollars, you know, the
middle and the upper middle class revolting. That's that's when
politicians sometimes finally finally start to pay attention to some
of these things. I think it's possible you will see

(01:16:38):
going after you know, tech monopolies on this, but we're
not quite there yet because I don't think the public
sees the evidence yet, right. I don't think we're you
kind of have to. The public needs to be a
bit better informed on this, and I think you're seeing
more and more coverage that's focused on so of how

(01:17:00):
consolidation in various industries has cost the consumer money. Now,
this is what I think has been the you know,
I think local media used to do consumer reporting a
lot better than national media, and the loss of local
journalism has really gutted the consumer journalism world. This is
where influencers, I think, come in, and this is something

(01:17:23):
that I think, if you know, I think trusted media
was higher when we had a lot more consumer reporters
dedicated to saving consumers money and from being ripped off.
And the lion's share of those reporters were on the
local level. So the gutting of local gutted out the
reporters that were providing a real service to average Americans.

(01:17:45):
And I think the you know, this is among my goals.
Why do I want to revitalize local news because I
think this is the biggest missing piece when it comes
to the lack of trust that we have nationally with media,
is we lost our local character references and they did
a better job worrying about helping people on a local
level than we have the ability to do on the

(01:18:07):
national level. And so I think if once we know
there's more reporting locally on scams and pricing discrimination and
things like that, which is where you're more likely to
see this, then you'll hit critical mass and it becomes
suddenly something that they want politicians to do something about.

(01:18:28):
All Right, The last question for today is going to
come from Dave, and he writes, is Chuck really enjoy
the podcast? Appreciate the mixture of politics, history, and college
football right on. Also love the guests you have for
interviews and all the information that comes from those conversations.
Can you tell us how interview prep has changed for
you from the shorter time limits you had to meet
the press to now being able to do long form
interviews on the podcast. Would love to hear some of
your thoughts on what you think makes a great guest

(01:18:50):
conversation on your show. Thanks and happy holidays. Well, the
biggest thing is just right just having more time it
means that I spend more time on a specific policy
idea that the guests may have in wanting to go four,
five or six questions deep on said right. In a

(01:19:12):
meet the press, if somebody who was rolling out a
policy proposal for your eight to ten minute interview, you
do one follow up, maybe you know, maybe a second
if it's you think it's really interesting to the viewers,
then you end up moving on. We don't have to
do that here, and that's you know, that.

Speaker 2 (01:19:30):
To me.

Speaker 1 (01:19:32):
Allows for some of the nuanced debate and we end
up what you get and what I think I'll tell
you. You ask me what makes a good I think what
makes a good conversation is when we end is when
you end up understanding all sides of an argument without
having me and the guests debate each other, because hopefully

(01:19:54):
I have asked a few of the let me ask
the perspective from the left, let me ask perspective from
the right, and needed depending on what their point of
view is, and that by the end of the conversation,
if you feel like that you would understand how this
issue would then get debated between sort of stereotypical left
versus stereotypical right, then I've accomplished something. Right then I've

(01:20:15):
given you a complete conversation that makes you prepared to
understand this issue no matter where else you end up
getting information about it. I think the best conversations are
when that when I kind of know them a little bit.
I think that always helps because they're more comfortable with

(01:20:38):
me because they know me a little bit. So I
think those make good conversation better podcast conversations. Obviously, I
do take a much less antagonistic posture because this is
you know, I always say this, you know it meet
the press. There was an expectation that this is an

(01:21:00):
accountability show, and this is where we're gonna you know,
you've got to you're test, you're testing your your beliefs
that you know, you're you gotta, you gotta, you got
to tell them, you know, you got to explain your rationale.
And it's devoted to a you know, single issue or
a topic or a couple of topics versus here where

(01:21:22):
I may have, you know, a large singular reason for
booking that guest, say, on the issue of how do
we open up primaries, uh to to all voters. But
it means we can meander around a little bit. But

(01:21:43):
it's also you know, not everybody can carry forty five minutes,
so you have to be mindful of that, just like
you know, some people are great ten minute interviews, terrible
thirty minute.

Speaker 2 (01:21:54):
Interviews and vice versa.

Speaker 1 (01:21:56):
So in that sense, you've you've got to you've got
to know. But it is I will tell you this,
there was only one interview, and I'm not going to
say who it is. You guys might be able to
figure it out by just listening. There's only one interview
where I felt like I ran out of questions before

(01:22:16):
I ran out of time. And ultimately that means we're
doing a good job of booking. Because I hope to
have the type of guests where we you know, an
hour is great, but believe it or not, there were
some questions left on the table. If there are no
questions left on the table, then probably the guest wasn't

(01:22:38):
quite worth the forty five minutes I may have spent
with them. But I actually think since I started this
podcast re upped this podcast on April, I could think
of only once that I sat here and I thought, boy,
I'm kind of exhausted from questions.

Speaker 2 (01:22:51):
I got to go.

Speaker 1 (01:22:52):
But I kind of if I finally go twenty minutes
with this interview, am I sending the signal that this
was a total dud?

Speaker 2 (01:22:59):
Right?

Speaker 1 (01:23:00):
It's like I almost didn't want to do I didn't
think that was fair to the person. So I wanted
to make sure I hit a minimum a minimum time slot.
My guess is I'm not I don't want to. I
don't want you guys to play the guessing game of
who it is. But it's usually pretty obvious when you
know somebody isn't working out. It's usually because they don't

(01:23:21):
want to answer questions, and you're like, well, why the
hell did you come on here?

Speaker 2 (01:23:24):
Right? What did you think this was going to be? Uh?

Speaker 1 (01:23:28):
And and thankfully, in some ways the format is self selecting.
Right if you if you're not comfortable sort of having
a conversation for forty minutes with me, then you're not
going to come on anyway. So in that sense it
can be self selecting. Look, I wish I've had there

(01:23:51):
are there are a few more Republicans that I've been
trying to get to come on that won't or haven't
said yes yet. Hopefully they're listening right now, And I
think I know why. Like it's not that they worried
about me. They just somehow think that their own voters
will that that that they only want to spend forty
five minutes talking to their to their base. They're not

(01:24:15):
interested in talking to swing voters, talking to independence, talking
to you the intellectually curious, And that's disappointing to me.
I think in it, I think once the Orange Man
leaves the Oval office, these people I've been trying to
get to come on will come on. But you know,

(01:24:36):
I know that in for some for some of these folks,
they don't want to They don't want to have to
not answer a question that they know is logical for
me to ask, which is just a disappointment, all right,
but this is the world we live in. Look what
Look what Susie Wilds just had to do. You know,
she had to put out an apology tweet for an
audience of one. And there are people that are always

(01:24:59):
looking to aggregate and cherry pick what somebody says. Hey,
you know Tom Cotton said this to Chuck Todd on
his Todd on his podcast. You know, and you know
that's just unfortunately the way things, you know, things get
weaponized on the on the stupid left and the stupid right,
which is right, We know right that it's those it's

(01:25:23):
those that are in the business of grifting you on ideology.
And these people exist on the left and the right,
my friends, that have scared off some of these folks
from from coming and swimming in the intellectually curious pool.
But hey, come on in, the water's comfortable and if

(01:25:45):
you're comfortable in your own skin, everything's going to be
easy on the Chuck podcast. But if you're not comfortable
in your own skin, then yeah, it's going to be
an uncomfortable forty five minutes.

Speaker 2 (01:25:57):
Hey, listen to another round of a great question.

Speaker 1 (01:26:00):
There's more, a lot more to come. I am also waiting.
I am curious. I've not gotten a lot of feedback
yet from you, specific feedback on where you guys aren't
prediction markets. I just would love an array of experiences,
the good, the bad, the ugly, you know again, non sports,

(01:26:22):
the prediction markets, through the prism of non sports everything else.
I'm very curious good experience, bad experience, you know, Are
you curious, are you nervous? Any of those things? I am,
Like I've expressed to you, I'm cautiously pessimistic about the

(01:26:43):
prediction markets and yet and keeping an eye on them
because somehow I have a feeling it's going to be
more impactful than we want to admit.

Speaker 2 (01:26:55):
Anyway.

Speaker 1 (01:26:56):
With that, I'm going to shut it down for another
twenty four hours, but I will be back in twenty
four hours, So thank you for listening until we upload again.

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Chuck’s Commentary - Trump Is Exhibiting 25th Amendment Behavior + Why Anti-Corruption Could Be A Powerful Electoral Issue

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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 - Trump Is Exhibiting 25th Amendment Behavior + Why Anti-Corruption Could Be A Powerful Electoral Issue