What Are Senate Democrats Doing?

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
Good morning everyone.

Speaker 2 (00:04):
I'm Susan Denas, the executive editor heerent Lincoln Square and
welcome to the Weekly Assignments and that's where executive producer
Sam ost Howd and I talk to you about what's
coming up on Lincoln Square this week, the latest headlines,
and what we can do the fight back against authoritarianism. So, Sam,
how was your weekend? I know you were busy hosting

(00:25):
a birthday party.

Speaker 3 (00:27):
I started my weekend with a house full of very
fancily clad thirteen fourteen year old girls. It was yeah, yeah,
we had a fancy dinner party, huh. And it was
very sweet and very fun, and I'm very glad that
it's in the past.

Speaker 4 (00:49):
Yeah, how was your weekend?

Speaker 1 (00:50):
I'm super relaxing, but I'm sure fun.

Speaker 4 (00:53):
Yeah. Yeah, it was very sweet and you got.

Speaker 1 (00:55):
To apparent solo as well throughout.

Speaker 3 (00:58):
This Yeah, a couple of half of us went to
the city, to New York to do some birthday shopping,
and the other half of us stayed stayed home and
had a great, nice little little Sunday or it was Sunday,
no Saturday. But yeah, now I get to have a

(01:19):
break during.

Speaker 1 (01:20):
The week, right with our very light schedule this week.

Speaker 4 (01:26):
Oh my god, Susan, we have so much coming up.

Speaker 3 (01:29):
We have we had just and I know we'll get
to this at the end, but we had five live
scheduled for today putting this one. Now it's four. We
had Stuart with Joyce fans, but that's being postponed. We'll
keep everyone posted when that is rescheduled, hopefully for tomorrow.

(01:49):
But yeah, I was like, whoa Monday starting big?

Speaker 1 (01:53):
Yeah, well it's a big week.

Speaker 2 (01:56):
I mean, so on our show in just a few minutes,
we're gonna be bringing on Brian datesman of the intellectualists,
in front of the show. He'll be talking to us
about what he's been working on. But first, I mean,
obviously there are always so many things that we could
talk about, but the big story really is Senate Democrats

(02:18):
caving on the shutdown. I mean, what what an absolute
bummer that was Yesterday. I happened to be coming back
from a work trip to Florida and I came home
to having to clean snow off my car, and let
me tell you, that was depressing, but not as depressing
as you know, the news on Senate Democrats just deciding, Hey,

(02:41):
we had this phenomenal victory on Tuesday. Let's blow it
and just depress everyone. I mean, you can't even argue
with that Fox News headline. Usually you know, you're like
hush please, But I mean they nailed it. That is
what happened. They came and they got nothing. They got
a promise of a promise, and so I mean, let's

(03:03):
let's definitely talk about what's going on here. And I
my my personal two cents is a lot of this
had to do with Trump's threat on the filmbuster, and
you have a lot of these moderate Democrats completely freak.

Speaker 1 (03:21):
Out and decide this was the time to give.

Speaker 3 (03:25):
I have so many thoughts on this. The first is,
you know, I was trying to write a description for
the show earlier today and it was like, you know,
we always talk about the messaging problems that Democrats have, right,
but I think it's possible that their messaging is exactly
precise their message. They they're the best messengers of all times,

(03:47):
because the message is we are feckless and weak, and
they write and they continue to message that so pristinely,
so beautifully.

Speaker 4 (03:58):
It is.

Speaker 3 (03:59):
Uh. Look, you know Andrew Watkins always talks about how
there's going to be suffering to get through this, and
that is true. But the Democrats just this capitulation is
I had. I just it didn't make any rational sense
to me, as it was like rabbit holing social media
last night, which I don't normally do on Sundays. I was,

(04:23):
I just I couldn't take my eyes away what is happening?

Speaker 2 (04:27):
Yeah, I mean, you know, I tend to be an institutionalist,
although you know, obviously there aren't very many institutions left,
you know, and so because I've covered the ins and
outs on government for so long, there are times where
you know, people who don't, you know, devote their lives

(04:50):
to you know, the obscure rules of your state.

Speaker 1 (04:55):
Legislature or the Senate.

Speaker 2 (04:56):
You know, it's you can say that them like, this
is how the procedure works. And yes, it's extremely frustrating,
but this is part of it. I mean, this is
a completely unnecessary cave. There's nothing in terms of trying
to you know, there's no there's no thirteen dimensional chess here,

(05:18):
there's no we had to do this for X or
y reason that maybe people don't understand this was a choice.
This was a group of senators who are not up
for reelection in twenty twenty six, and clearly Chuck Schumer,
the Senate minority leader.

Speaker 1 (05:36):
Blessed this even though he voted no. And let them
do this.

Speaker 2 (05:41):
And you know, I guess what I would say to
everybody out there who's frustrated, And I think that that
goes for just about everybody. It doesn't matter if you are,
you know, a left progressive, if you're a moderate dem
I think the frustration is pretty universal at this point.

Speaker 1 (06:04):
I would say this. Throughout Trump's second term, one thing
has been abundantly clear is that we the people are
the ones who are leading this fight. You know, at the.

Speaker 2 (06:16):
Protests starting in January through No Kings, none of this
was being led by your local senator or your governor.

Speaker 1 (06:25):
This was people rising up.

Speaker 2 (06:27):
And a lot of those people, you know, they start
to show up at the last No Kings protests on
October eighteenth, but they were like nowhere to be found
back during the summer. And you know, it's up to
us to leave this fight, and they're going to have
to catch up and they're going to have to listen
to us.

Speaker 1 (06:44):
The message that people sent on Tuesday was not hey,
we want you to give into the fascist it was,
we want you to fight them.

Speaker 2 (06:53):
And I would say to everyone as far as like
what to do now, and we'll get to you know
what our weekly assignment is. But just you know, these
are the people that we want to target. But call
your local representative and your center. It's always more effective

(07:13):
to call them being from the district. But by all means,
we can target these, especially if you were in these states.
Call these people on staff and tell them how you feel.
But beyond that, what we can do is I would
say put your money where your mouth is.

Speaker 1 (07:31):
Don't donate to those folks. Don't donate to the Democratic
Party writ large if this is what they are going
to do.

Speaker 2 (07:36):
If they're individual candidates that you personally support and support
your values, go for it.

Speaker 1 (07:42):
Use that money.

Speaker 2 (07:43):
Donate to your local food banks so that you're supporting
people in your community. Donate to organizations you believe in,
whether it's us here at Lincoln Square or other organizations
who are truly committed to fighting for democracy and fighting
for your values. Don't reward bad actors, and don't feel
like nothing can be done, even if you've been betrayed

(08:04):
by people who should know better, Because it's we still
have an opportunity to fight these people, and this particular
fight isn't over yet. There are votes left in the Senate,
and it has to go to the House. The House,
which by the way, Mike Johnson doesn't want to convene
because he doesn't want to he doesn't want to swear

(08:25):
in the new representative from Arizona and take a vote
on the Epstein piles.

Speaker 1 (08:30):
So there are still pressure points here.

Speaker 3 (08:33):
And so I have I want to add to a
couple of things that you said if I can find
the window I was looking at content here. So first,
just off the heels of this election that we've all
been writing about and thinking about and finding so much
inspiration from last week. You know, one of the signs

(08:58):
that I was really looking at from that election was
not that Democrats are finally doing it right.

Speaker 4 (09:02):
It's that the electorate is doing it right right.

Speaker 3 (09:05):
It's that we've found candidates that we can actually believe in,
and we're showing up because we're all from the bottom
up quite discussed from this. The The other thing is
that the Democrats have you know, I'm seeing all this

(09:28):
messaging now from Centrists who are saying, yeah, this was
a master's stroke by the Democrats, which is clearly again
their messaging problem. You know, it's like, clearly not a
master's stroke. But what they've done, you know, their messaging
is saying this was the moral choice because we're ending suffering.
But what they're actually doing is stopping short term discomfort

(09:51):
in exchange for long term suffering.

Speaker 2 (09:53):
Right, the Terroffs are still there, Ice is still terrorizing people.

Speaker 3 (09:58):
And they're not going to get the ACA subsidies that
they think they're going to.

Speaker 1 (10:03):
Yeah, Mike Johnson already told them to piss off.

Speaker 3 (10:06):
Yeah, and so that's what's gonna happen. But to your
broader point about the ground swell upwards in some ways,
and this is I'm Polly anish on this.

Speaker 4 (10:18):
I think.

Speaker 3 (10:20):
This capitulation could in the long term have saved democracy
because we it's been so brutally clear for the last
ten months that the Democrats at the top who are
running the party are not here for us, right, and
now it's become after a taste of victory last Tuesday, right,

(10:43):
where we did something not Chuck Schumer. In fact, Schumer
and Hucking Jefferies worked against people like man Donnie, right,
so they were standing in the way of the progress
that we want to make. Now it's become crystal clear
that all progress is number one on us at the

(11:04):
you know, the electorate, and number two totally fucking possible.

Speaker 4 (11:08):
We can do this. It is I don't know, this
is this is.

Speaker 3 (11:15):
An inflection point, and it may be the shattering that
we needed.

Speaker 5 (11:20):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (11:20):
I mean, if you look at the exit polls, and
I'd invite everyone to read Joe Trippy's column that we
ran on Friday, where he just goes through the data
like nobody else. The Democratic Party, their brand is still
in the tank.

Speaker 1 (11:36):
People hate the Democrats.

Speaker 2 (11:38):
Okay, So the victory on Tuesday was a vote against
Trump and his policies and a vote for what people
wanted to see. Now, the ringing endorsement of hey, you
guys are doing great, you know, And for Democrats like
Chuck Schumer to take a look at those results and
essentially tell their voters to go fuck themselves, he is

(12:01):
incredibly insulting. And I understand the huge instinct to crawl
under a blanket and to just not want to, not
want to, you know, deal with what's going on with politics,
and to believe in absolutely nothing.

Speaker 1 (12:18):
I get it.

Speaker 2 (12:19):
But our fight against fascism isn't a fight for you know,
trying to you know, give addaboys to the Democrats and
to trust humor.

Speaker 1 (12:33):
We're fighting against this.

Speaker 2 (12:35):
And honestly, if I am an establishment Democrat who's facing
a challenge in twenty six.

Speaker 1 (12:41):
I would be scared shitless.

Speaker 2 (12:43):
I'm standing here in Michigan. There is an open Senate
seat is Gary Peters, who's one of the people I've
interviewed a bunch of times. I like him personally, but
he screwed the pooch on this and he's not running.
There are three main comtenders on the Democratic side, one
of whom is a dual al Say who we've also

(13:04):
had on Lincoln Square. He is very much like a
Mondani Democrat endorsed by Bernie Sanders. A lot of people
think there's no way this guy can win. I'm telling you,
after what I've seen from Senate Democrats, I think that
Candonate like like his, like him, and candidates like him
have a fantastic shot next year. And if Democrats don't

(13:27):
realize that, they could be caught extremely flat footed. We've
been talking for years in the Democratic Party about like
when's the Tea party coming. And you know, year after
year you see a couple candidates and really solidly blue districts,
you know, like AOC in New York or Rashida to
live in Detroit, but they're not breaking through for like

(13:50):
you know, statewide races. I think that people are pissed
off enough that we are going to see that in
twenty six And so, you know, if Democrats want to
be more scared of their big money donors and crypto
and whatever and cave as opposed to listening to people
who actually vote, I think some of them are going

(14:10):
to find themselves in the receiving end in their primaries.

Speaker 3 (14:14):
Yeah, I mean, I you know, I know this isn't
maybe an old meme, but like the Republicans are afraid
of pissing off their base, the you know, the magabase,
and Democrats are afraid of pissing off the magabase, right.

Speaker 2 (14:28):
Yeah, they they there's the old joke, like Democrats hate
their base, you know, and Republicans fear theirs.

Speaker 3 (14:35):
Yes, yeah, and that's and that's the thing.

Speaker 4 (14:38):
And I think that we need.

Speaker 3 (14:44):
A fifty year plan to rebuild the party from the
bottom up.

Speaker 4 (14:49):
And you know, it was like it's just here we are.

Speaker 3 (14:56):
Yeah, and we we get to do this, and there
are organization in place. There's you know, media outlets like
Lincoln Square, there's Opium, you know, there's pod Safe guys,
all of these. We've been building these networks literally from
the bottom up, and we're all ready to go.

Speaker 4 (15:15):
We can do this.

Speaker 1 (15:16):
We can.

Speaker 2 (15:18):
Well, let's go ahead and bring in Brian. He is
still writing like a madman. I think since the last
time we talked to you've probably published a couple dozen more.

Speaker 1 (15:29):
Pieces, So we can't wait to have you on. I
don't know if you want to.

Speaker 2 (15:35):
Jump into this discussion before we talk about some of
your recent pieces.

Speaker 5 (15:40):
Well, Susan Sam, it's always nice to be here with
you all, and you all have been so supportive. Yeah,
I mean, I'm hearing the discussion here in the debate.
I think part of the problem here is that there's
a misalignment of incentives between the voters and the lawmakers.
The lawmakers, I think, particularly at the more senior level
who have been around for a while career, like Senate

(16:00):
Majority Leader Schumer, they have a certain understanding of Washington,
d C. That I think is maybe fossilized in their mind.
That no longer exists, all right, right now we are
in a true fight for our democracy. Now. The problem
is is that our institutions are not working the way

(16:22):
they're supposed to be, right, And one of the solutions
to this is voting right. And so when we vote
and we give our you know, the vote is are
the voter. It shows voter intentions, right. And you saw
how during this Senate, during this recent of off year elections,

(16:44):
did either of you notice how much larger the wins were,
particularly in New Jersey, particularly when we're talking about Mom Donnie.
Now Cuomo is not a Republican per se, but the
former governor of New York though he was, he did
get some rhetorical support from President Donald Trump, which may

(17:05):
not have helped him in a city like New York City.
And then you sort of but you look at the differences, right,
where were we one year ago as the United States?
You know, Kamala Vice President Kamala Harris. After the election,
many were surprised by the outcome. But then you look

(17:26):
at what happened the other day and you see the
margins of victory were almost ten points. They were at
average maybe five or six points greater than what the
former vice president's margin of victory was during twenty twenty four.
So you see, there's this enthusiastic voter base, and I
think it would probably behoove Democratic elites to listen to

(17:49):
their voters because the voters here clearly are unhappy with
how things are going.

Speaker 3 (17:56):
I want to ask you about that, because I was
going to ask you this to Susan. Who are these
Democrats listening to?

Speaker 1 (18:02):
Like?

Speaker 4 (18:02):
Where are they getting there?

Speaker 3 (18:03):
What weird social media silo are they in that they think? Like,
I can't even get my head around what problem they
were trying to solve long term by capitulating in this way.

Speaker 4 (18:18):
Who are they listening to?

Speaker 5 (18:20):
I think there's well, there's a couple of things. I think, sir,
there is a certain strand of Democrat that came out
who sees a bipartisan compromise as the sort of you know,
the almost sort of like the purpose of government.

Speaker 4 (18:37):
Right.

Speaker 5 (18:38):
But I think I think in general, though, I think
I think what the elites and the party have to
think about though, is is this the same Republican party
that they were dealing with in nineteen ninety five, right,
which was still an extreme party under a former House
Speaker KNW. Gingrich really who started I think this weaponization
of government frankly to thirty years later, there's a downstream effect,

(19:02):
all right, And I think that there has to be
a sort of streamline of expectations that there are certain
principles that if you're in public office, doesn't matter if
you're a Republican, Independent, or Democrat. There's certain values that
Americans expect our leaders to have. One is not to
weaponize food hunger. Right, So when you have people who

(19:24):
are hungry, right and right now, one on eight Americans,
so that's forty two million Americans are on food stamps, right,
what happens when they don't get food stamps? They're probably
not going to eat, right. That's a moral that's that's
really moral abasement for our democracy that in a country
that almost has thirty trillion or more in GDP has

(19:46):
people who are hungry. And so I think there is
a misalignment of incentives at the elite level where they're
not looking at what's actually the granular the sort of
macro and granular effects of this compromise. And I also
think that they unfortunately reinforce a stereotype that democrats are not,

(20:08):
you know, a wartime serious party.

Speaker 2 (20:11):
Right, And of course you know when it comes to
kicking forty million people off food stamps, this is a choice,
This is not a necessity.

Speaker 1 (20:20):
During this government shutdown.

Speaker 2 (20:21):
This was a weapon that Donald Trump employed and has
never been employed before. And you know, I feel like Democrats,
especially Senate Democrats, who you know, they they tend to
have been in Washington for a long time, they really
by default just take Republicans framing and work from there.

(20:44):
And so the framing is Donald Trump says I'm going
to starve people, and they're like, okay, well we have
to solve this problem, you know, instead of like why
are you doing this?

Speaker 1 (20:54):
You're the problem. Let's fight for something bigger.

Speaker 2 (20:57):
And I have to say, you know that stereotype about
the longer you spend in Washington, the more you end
up just talking to people in Washington and there's this
group think and you talk with your donors and you
think that that's reality, and you lose touch with the
people back home.

Speaker 1 (21:15):
It's absolutely a thing.

Speaker 2 (21:17):
And I think in this case we've it shows just
how deadly that can be for democracy.

Speaker 5 (21:25):
Yeah, go ahead, Ryan, go ahead, No, I Susan I
agree with what you're saying one hundred percent. I think
some of these senators may you know, possibly have personal
relationships with other senators, and which is understandable, and you know,
people want to make nice to be nice, right in
some ways. But I think really when you look at it,

(21:47):
what is when we're funding the government, what are we doing?
We're really making a statement of values?

Speaker 4 (21:53):
Right?

Speaker 5 (21:54):
And what is a promise for a promise?

Speaker 4 (21:56):
Right?

Speaker 5 (21:57):
It's not a real promise? Right? The promise to debate
a promise is not the same thing as actively doing
the thing you might be promising, right. And I and
these are very smart people, the Democrats. There's you know, lawyers,
and these are these are not I don't know, you know,
these are people with you know, educated whise have been

(22:21):
through the world. And so there's a reason why there's
a set in certain sense of disenchantment among the Democratic
base here because well, we've all lived through the last
ten years, if we've survived, especially after the pandemic, right,
and we all see what is happening right now. First off,
I think it's incumbent upon us to recognize that the
economy is not in a good place right now. We

(22:44):
also have to.

Speaker 2 (22:45):
Recognize when we put up Brian's story that we ran
over the weekend on how many jobs have been lost,
this is a fantastic piece.

Speaker 1 (22:56):
We're so happy to rerun it.

Speaker 2 (22:58):
Brian really breaks down all the numbers and it's pretty
staggering because really, if you're you know, looking at you know,
mainstream outlets, this story is getting lost and this is
this is in a way, this is the story.

Speaker 5 (23:13):
This is a story. This is the story. This is
a story because Americans, by and large, I think all
humans want security, food, housing, and not in their families
to be left alone, right, And sort of part of
that social bargain is that there's stability so that people
can have jobs and work and support themselves, right, go

(23:34):
to school, pay their expenses. Now, under the really unstable
economic policies of the Trump administration, that social contract has
I think doesn't exist, right because terroriffs, as we've known
for over one hundred years, are anti growth.

Speaker 4 (23:52):
Right.

Speaker 5 (23:53):
There are taxes and they're highly aggressive taxes, so they're
hurting the people that support the hurting the people who
you know, eighty something like seventy five percent of Americans
work paycheck to paycheck, and we need to think about that, right,
because when I don't, it's my belief that these this

(24:15):
tariff policy is really just the Unfortunately, the president, his
mindset is stuck in nineteen eighty five, where he believed
that Japan was going to take over the United States.
He keeps this sort of tariff mentality. The teriffs didn't
work back then. They don't work. The problem with tariffs
is that they usually are used to reward political supporters

(24:38):
to the expense of the greater economy.

Speaker 1 (24:40):
And it's what we've seen.

Speaker 2 (24:43):
And also I feel like that was a huge missed
opportunity for Democrats in the shutdown fight demand the end
to the tariffs. I mean, that's something that affects every
single person in America. And by the way, a lot
of Republicans would have a hard time voting against that.

Speaker 5 (24:59):
Yeah, but the Republicans that I think have capitulated the
GOP is not a real political party in the sense
that it was forty years ago. I mean, really, it's
a cult of personality built around President Donald Trump. President
Donald Trump, similar to Vladimir put and Anji Jimping, has
essentially gotten rid of any real potential adversaries for him

(25:20):
on the right right, and so what we're seeing, I think,
right is well, clearly the Trump administration, they have their
own ideas on how economies work. It's unclear. If it's
actually not unclear, it's actually quite clear that those theories
don't really match up with reality because we're seeing the outcomes,
and what reality is is consequences and outcomes. Now we

(25:43):
can't read his intent, right, but in the end we
could see sort of where things are. And right now
one point two million Americans have been laid off, unlike
previous downturns, so where they may fire people and then
high them in eighteen months when the cycle's over. This
is where it gets I think civilizational. And this is

(26:06):
the this is the conversation we've been not had, but
we really should have, is that what's gonna happen when
human beings can be replaced by synthetic intelligence that not
only can do the job better than us, but can
do twenty four to seven never ask the jointing union,
never asked for insurance, and so and really and so,

(26:29):
what we're seeing now, I believe is the beginning of
genuine technological unemployment where it's always existed. Right, So, when
we made the horse and buggy. People said, well that's
and there's the car, right, and the car comes and
they say, well, what's gonna happen to horse and buggy?

Speaker 4 (26:46):
Right?

Speaker 5 (26:47):
But that was linear creative destruction, right, because because people
ended up, you know, starting getting a new job doing
something here, the jobs being destroyed are outpacing the new
jobs being created, right, and the jobs being creative be
done by machines, right, and so you have you. So
we're at an inflection point and we're not having this

(27:07):
conversation do we have a safety net to take care
of people who are millions of people who might not
work right because they might not be needed. And businesses
are incentivized to invest in these technologies because they can
write off expenses in our taxes. Right. So there's a
I believe there's I don't know when it's going to happen,

(27:27):
but we're going to be hearing more and more about
the effect of technological unemployment. And that's sort of what
else kind of hinting at in that article.

Speaker 4 (27:36):
You know.

Speaker 3 (27:37):
Lately last week there was this big splash with I
can't remember the company's name, but they released that personal
robot or home. I don't know if you saw that,
Yeah I did. Yeah, they did a great piece on
it on hard Fork. But I kept thinking like this,
you know, this robot is meant to fold our laundry

(27:59):
and do our our dishes and all this stuff. But
when AI hits, that's the only thing we're going to
have left to do, you know, like we're that's what
they're going to be employed. We're just going to be
folding our clothes all day and now you've got a robot.

Speaker 4 (28:11):
To do that. What is the point of humans?

Speaker 5 (28:14):
Well, that's the that's really a central problem, right, What
happens when you live in a society that you're no
longer needed well, and.

Speaker 3 (28:23):
That you know, that separation from process and product and
and the separation from our own lives and all of that.
It feels to me like, uh, you know, you get
a sort of existential sort of dread and aimlessness and purposelessness.
And then you have organizations like the Proud Boys, and
you have MAGA and QAnon. All of these things fill

(28:44):
this meaning gap for all of us. Like unemployment has
these ripple effects that are bigger than just hunger and poverty.

Speaker 5 (28:53):
Right, absolutely, absolutely, I mean listen, economic dislocation, economic regression,
lead to macro effects, right, It leads to terrible things,
It leads to more crime, it leads to people unable
to feed themselves, and then there's all these downstream effects
that happened from that. So really it's in our interest
to keep centered of livings either, you know, it continued

(29:16):
to increase now I think I think here, you know,
to your point is the crisis of meaning?

Speaker 4 (29:24):
Right?

Speaker 5 (29:24):
Is that what happens when the job you've been doing
for twenty five years, they don't need you anymore because
you're obsolete, because they can get a computer to do
it for one tenth the price and edit you know,
it'll never complain.

Speaker 3 (29:38):
No, and you're you are faced with this this reality
that the past twenty four or five years of your
life you were actually quite expendable.

Speaker 5 (29:47):
And you were training your replacement the entire time, and
nobody cares. No one cares.

Speaker 2 (29:53):
I think a story that really slipped under the radar
last week with Sam Altman who said that he want
this giant bailout from the government because a lot of
the AI technology has not been producing for investors the
way that they've been hoping for. And he actually went
ahead and he has applied for some emergency relief, and

(30:17):
I think if that goes through, I think that could
be one of those inflection points, because you know, he
wants the government to fund mass unemployment for the rest
of us. So I think that's definitely a story for
all of us to be keeping a close eye on.

Speaker 5 (30:35):
If I could just say one thing, I mean, Susan
UTIs pressed on a really important point. I mean, think
about the economy right now. I'm seven companies called the
Magnificent seven, right, which you know Microsoft, You're think of
the big tech companies. Right, something like one third of
all economic growth is from those seven firms. It was

(30:59):
something some some number like that, and the S and
P five hundred. If you were to back out those
seven firms, the growth would be fairly one percent.

Speaker 4 (31:09):
Right.

Speaker 5 (31:10):
So we have an economy right now that is basically
running on. And we have an economy right now too,
unfortunately because of our tax policies in the last fifty years.
Is that the top ten percent of the the economic
pyramid fifty percent of all consumption, right. Think about that.
So if there's any because of that, if there's any downturn, right,

(31:34):
particularly that affects higher income or higher wealth families, You're
going to see that that ten percent when they cut back,
that's going to affect every everything else. And if you
have seven companies driving growth for US equities on the
S and P five hundred, and they're all interconnected, if

(31:54):
there is, if there is some sort of accident, doesn't
have to be intentional. People greedy make mistakes. You know
that we're essentially at the mercy of these seven firms
hopefully doing the right things and they're not being some
sort of uh uh, you know, possible negative news cycle,

(32:18):
because if there was, you know, our our economy is
sort of resting on these firms, right, And so that's
another question we have to think about, is do we
want an economy where all almost fifty percent of all
consumption comes from ten percent of citizens, right, because that's
it's unstable, It's naturally unstable and inequality. Eventually will it

(32:40):
will over time destroy civilization.

Speaker 2 (32:45):
Well, Brian, I so appreciate you coming back and talking
with us. You can see all of Brian's work on
The Intellectualist on substack, and Brian also tell us the
other ways that people can find you online.

Speaker 5 (33:00):
Okay, well, thanks, Susan. I mean, obviously sub sects great,
go to the intellectualists. If you go to u on
X formerly Twitter, you can find the intellectualists us there
under high brow and nobraw Facebook, We're on, We're there
and you know blue Sky threads and you know it.

(33:22):
Please check us out. We try to cover the stories
that other people's aren't, other other people are not covering.
We try to always give people the facts, so you know,
when you see our stories, you will see references and
see that there's a factual basis to the to the
statements that are being made. So we take that very seriously.
And it's only democracy can only survive with a healthy press,

(33:46):
So any support that can be given to the intellectuals
is always appreciated.

Speaker 1 (33:51):
Yeah, the Intellectualist is just a great resource, and we're
so glad that we are able to work with you
and have you on. Can't wait to talk with you
again soon.

Speaker 5 (34:02):
Brian, thank you so much, Susan, thank you, Sam. It's
always a pleasure being with you both.

Speaker 4 (34:07):
Thanks Brian, really great to have you.

Speaker 1 (34:12):
Well.

Speaker 2 (34:13):
You know, I don't think that I am exaggerating by
saying I think we have one of our best weeks
ever ahead on Lincoln Square. I mean, really just today alone.
Stuart Stevens is going to be on with Simon Rosenberg
with jah Lee and hopefully he'll be on with Joyce

(34:33):
Vance about her new books soon. And then we also
have a great show for anchor watch tomorrow with Bobby
Jones at seven pm. He'll be on with Lieutenant General
Mark Hurdling a great Veterans Day show. And also I
want to mention you are readers, are supporters, you are

(34:55):
the best. We did a call and asked are there
veterans us to honor?

Speaker 1 (35:01):
And you heeded that call.

Speaker 2 (35:03):
So please tune in tomorrow and this week we will
be honoring all of our veterans who watch and support us,
your friends and family.

Speaker 1 (35:17):
I think it'll be a really great tribute.

Speaker 4 (35:20):
It really will. It was like you guys delivered.

Speaker 3 (35:24):
We asked, and so many of you responded that we
we were like, should we turn the question to ask off?
Because so many of you came through. That was really
heartening and I feel like that is that's like when we.

Speaker 4 (35:42):
Started this whole thing.

Speaker 3 (35:43):
That was that's what we wanted, you know, this community,
this place where everyone felt like they were submitters, like
they were the ones who you know, were giving submissions
and taking part in being active in this conversation.

Speaker 4 (35:58):
And I say it all the time. I love the chat.

Speaker 3 (36:00):
And like, by the way, my wife looks and she's like,
why are you always looking off screen and I'm like,
I'm looking at the chat because I love, really like
being involved in that in that conversation.

Speaker 4 (36:12):
You guys are the best yeah audience ever.

Speaker 2 (36:16):
And I feel like this week we need that more
than ever because I know this is a time where
a lot of us are feeling really discouraged because we
have been let down by our leaders. But it's the
support that we have from each other. I think that
will help keep us going and help us in this fight.

Speaker 4 (36:35):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (36:36):
Oh, one other thing, you have Karine Jean Pierre on
First Draft on Wednesday. That's going to be like She's
been pretty controversial and I'm really looking forward to that conversation.

Speaker 1 (36:52):
She'd be really interesting. She has a new book out.

Speaker 2 (36:54):
Obviously, she was Biden's press secretary, has now said she
has left the Democratic Party and has maybe different reasons
than maybe some of us start thinking about today. So
I'm looking forward to that conversation. Also, later on Wednesday,
Katie than will be joining our own Rick Wilson, that
should be a great discussion as well.

Speaker 1 (37:17):
Yeah, yeah, great week.

Speaker 2 (37:21):
Okay, So the end things I feel like whenever there
is a situation like this where you feel really kicked
in the head, the best thing to do is to
take some sort of action. So these are your general
numbers where you can hit the switchboard for the US

(37:43):
House and the US Senate.

Speaker 1 (37:45):
Because the votes on a shutdown are not done.

Speaker 2 (37:47):
There is the first procedural hurdle that got done in
the Senate.

Speaker 1 (37:51):
They're not done.

Speaker 2 (37:53):
The House still has to come back. Mike Johnson really
doesn't want them to come back. So by all means,
call your congress person, call your senator. But more specifically,
Rick Wilson has the numbers of what he calls the
hateful eight Senators.

Speaker 1 (38:12):
I think we I don't know if you've got that
clip yep.

Speaker 2 (38:16):
So especially if you happen to be in these states,
because they definitely want to hear from you, if if
you were their voters, but even if not, give them
a call. These are the people who caved, the eight Senators.
Give them a call, give them a piece of your mind.
You'll definitely feel better afterwards, and then feel free join

(38:39):
us in the chat, tell us how it all went.

Speaker 3 (38:41):
Yeah, per Sephanie says screenshot people call. I appreciate that, Perseephanie,
always appreciate you. I also just want to forecast for
the week. The Epsteine files are still here, and there's
been some reporting that they're even worse for Trump than we.

Speaker 4 (38:58):
Than we thought.

Speaker 3 (38:59):
So that's going to be something to keep an eye
on as the shutdown perhaps winds down and Mike Johnson's
hand is forced.

Speaker 4 (39:10):
In some regards to bring.

Speaker 3 (39:11):
Back the House to get those votes to release the
Epsteine files. Anyway, we'll be keeping an eye on it.
I'm sure we're going to be talking about it a
lot this week.

Speaker 1 (39:20):
Absolutely.

Speaker 2 (39:22):
Well, thanks to all of you for tuning in. I
hope that maybe there was a little bit of Catharsis,
but remember our fight's not over. Make those calls and
stick with us on Lincoln Square because today we've got
just so many fantastic shows and we love seeing all

(39:42):
of you in the chat.

Speaker 1 (39:43):
So thank you, all

Speaker 4 (39:44):
Right, thanks all, see you next time.