A.B. Stoddard: No One Feared Kevin

Welcome to

the Bulwark podcast. I’m Charlie Sykes. It is December seventh two thousand twenty three a day that will live in infamy. Kevin McCarthy is out, and Roger Taylor Green’s not taking this well. We’re gonna get to that in just a moment.

Also, yesterday, in case you missed it, we had a one on one with Liz Chaney who said some interesting things about her possible plans for twenty twenty four. I have some questions about all of that. And look, I am not gonna complain. About Time magazine selection of Taylor Swift as person of the year. Okay.

I like Taylor Swift. I I get it. I’m, you know, this is kind of a a parlor game, you know, to rip on on time magazine. Although they’ve kind of been on kind of a streak. I remember it was Elon Musk a couple of years ago, did not age that well.

But I have a different idea who should have been the person of the year. And because most of you had a life, because most of you had life and did not watch the debate. The four person Republican debate last night on News Nation, ABy Stoddard stayed up and took notes because she and I are gonna break it down for you We washed it so you didn’t have to a b. Good morning. How are you?

I’m good to be with you Charlie Sykes. Grumpy about watching the debate as I always am, round four, but always good to be with you.

Do you sort of wake up in the morning saying, where do I go to get last night back. I mean, it was just one of those. Oh, man. The yelling, the screaming, the insulting. And it’s all the undercard.

It’s all like, who wants to finish second. So can we just start with the highlights of all of this? Because I think one of the, more awesome moments was where Chris Christie spoke for all of America. When he slapped down Vivecramaswamy, I was gonna throw in the thoroughly obnoxious Vivecramaswamy, but my editor kicked in and said that would be redundant. So let’s just play.

One of the key moments, because a lot of things happen in the relatively short period of this sound bite. Chris Christie.

His reasonable peace deal in Ukraine, he may be clear. Yes. All the land they’ve already stolen. Promise Putin, you’ll never put Ukraine in Russia, and then trust Putin not to have a relationship with China. Let me tell you something.

That’s no reason.

That’s not my deal.

That’s I guess it’s exactly what you said. You do this at every debate. Don’t interrupt me. I didn’t interrupt you. Okay?

You say this. You do this. You do this at every debate. You go out on the stage and you say something. All of us see it on video.

We confront you on the debate stage. You say you didn’t say it, and then you’re back away. And I wanna say No. I I’m not done yet. Well, this now look.

Crowd turned against eBay here.

The fourth debate that you would be voted in the first twenty minutes as the most obnoxious blowhard in America. So shut up for harassment.

I’m gonna I’m gonna respond to that.

Else. We’re now twenty five minutes into this debate, and he has insulted Nikki Haley’s basic intelligence not her positions, her basic intelligence. She doesn’t know region. She wouldn’t be able to find something on a that his three year old could find. Look, if you wanna disagree on issues, that’s fine.

And Nikki and I disagree on some issues. But I’ll tell you this, I’ve known him for twelve years, which is longer than he’s even started to vote in a Republican primary.

Landed that one. And

while we disagree about some issues and we disagree about who should be president of the United States, what we don’t disagree on is This is a smart accomplished woman, and you should stop insulting.

Oh, man. I mean, there there were other moments Christie goes after Ron DeSantis for trying to dodge and weave around the question of whether or not Donald Trump was unfit as as usual Chris Christie was the only one who prosecuted the case against Donald Trump. So a, b, I was struck by a couple of things. I mean, number one, Chris Christie is a great debater. I thought this was his best debate.

But I also saw something kind of interesting. You kind of had did you kind of sense a little bit of a Christie Niki Haley Alliance there on the stage against the guy that everybody in that room hated?

First of all, I think it was clear that Chris Christie saw this as his last debate. He did a phenomenal job, not only because he’s the only one who tells the truth as you point out, but he listened to everything, everyone said, and was so quick to be able to come back and challenge them on it or declare his own position, which might have been an opposition. He was so engaged And the moment when he stuck up for Nikki Haley and then complimented her looked like this is Christie preparing to endorse her and help her down the road. That’s probably coming at some point. But he was tough on her.

He lumped her in repeatedly with these three timid people on the stage who refused to acknowledge the truth

Mhmm.

Who are making excuses for enabling, etcetera, about Trump, and he did not go easy. She did not get exempt from that and ask part of, like, the power of of Chris Christie’s not afraid, and he wasn’t gonna kiss up to anybody. And he he can hear things. When you and I are listening to Rhonda Sanchez, Erva Vake, it’s so upsetting and it’s so hard or it’s so awkward. That you you your mind starts to wander.

And Chris Christie never he is so sharp and his charm, the way, like you mentioned, that Ron DeSantis was trying to say, father time is undefeated, which is his way of saying Trump needs to go, and that’s why I should be the replacement for Trump. And when Christie challenged him, he was charming. He said, look, Ron, you’re fit. Of course, you’re fit to be president, and you’re only forty four. I’d love to be forty four.

You know, and he was he was just really incredible that way.

I have been feeling that a little, you know, internal pressure that he that he has the right thing to do is for Chris Christie to step aside and, you know, let Nikki Haley emerge. But my position has been no, stay in as long as you can. And last night, I thought vindicated that because if Chris Christie was not on that stage, nobody was gonna mention Lord Voldemort. Nobody was gonna go after Donald Trump. Nobody was gonna talk about his lack of fitness for office nobody was gonna make those points that he made.

They’re not gonna change the outcome. I I get all this. I get it’s the undercar. You know, blah blah blah blah blah blah. But At a certain point, these things need to be set.

People like Liz Cheney, need to step up and say these things. People like Bill Bart need to say these things. Chris Christie needs stand on stage and call out fellow Republicans and say, why are you so timid? Why are you afraid to say that that Donald Trump might be a convicted felon, you know, should not be allowed anywhere near the White House. So he should stay there as long as he can because he’s the only one who says those things.

That’s my son. Exactly. Everyone wants to pressure him to get out and help her out because his voters go to her unlike DeSantis voters who go to Trump. You know, last night was kind of a missed opportunity for Nikki Haley. She didn’t really yeah.

She showed that she could take a punch and all, but But I thought that she was going to have a speech prepared about why she is the best person instead of Ron DeSantis and why she’s, you know, gaining all his donors and supporters is because she speaks to this type of leadership blah blah blah. I thought she’d have a stump speech on why she’s surging, and she didn’t really have that. And and Chris Christie, I want him there for that reason like you described just to still this morning, Charlie, in a rage at the moderators for letting Vivec Ramaswamy say that Trump won the twenty twenty election or where it was rigged or stolen or whatever. And that January six was an inside job And Chris Christie didn’t even go after him. Chris Christie could have used his final, you know, moments to say, listen to this crop that we’re hearing from this guy who’s expressed that.

His VVAC doesn’t count. I mean, I I think that that was was one of the other sort of sub themes of this. This everybody decided that Vivek Ramaswami was just not worth a response. He was at the let’s scrape him off the bottom of our shoes because we stepped in, you know, after that, stupid moment where he Vivek has decided that he’s going to go full fever swamp conspiracy theories. Every bullshit conspiracy.

He’s going full qanon. And then, you know, and there were some of these smart pundits who were saying that, well, he’s doing the rational thing. He’s appealing to MAGa. He’s just made himself the most thoroughly disliked person. When he held up that sign, that stupid sign, Nikki Haley, you could tell He lost the entire crowd.

And then they asked, well, Nikki, do you wanna respond to this, you know, stream of bullshit you we just heard? And she said, no. It’s not even worth it. The guy is just not even worth our time. He’s not even worth our contempt.

So

And that was smart, and I know that you and I shouldn’t even be talking about him But strategically, he succeeded in absorbing the entire debate. Christy spoke the least. I think he spoke the most Yeah. And he’s a Trump plant, and he was there to make sure that Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis couldn’t actually battle. For second place.

So he’s irrelevantly relevant, relatively irrelevant there. Again, I would let’s let’s not actually go too far to pretend that this debate actually mattered all that much. And when you have Tom Fitten asking questions, I mean, this was this was the undercard of the undercard of the undercard. And pretty much a recognition that the RNC just doesn’t give a shit. I mean, it’s like we’re just gonna, like, you know, throw things out to new you know, we don’t need to diss news nation.

Anything else I mean, I I thought that Ron DeSantis was Ron DeSantis, but I almost, like, kind of forget him. I mean, he wasn’t terrible. I mean, nothing changes, but he wasn’t terrible. That’s the nicest thing I can say. You know?

No. That’s the headline that Ron DeSantis overprepared for this debate and he has done a lot of memorization, and he puberty blockers you know, Central Bank, digitized currency, something something Fauci and buckle up. There’s new sheriff coming to town. But the truth is that over time he has gotten better. I mean, that’s just the truth Yeah.

That that over time he’s gotten better. Again, it’s like, can you govern or are you just, you know, performing the show? And he’s never, as you’ve always said, gotten that it is a show, and he’s a disaster as a person. He can’t relate. People just wanted to finish this sentence and sort of go away.

I think he shows if you’re a Republican out there and you don’t want Trump. You know, you think this guy look. I mean, we all beat up on him, and he sort of has no he has no charm, and he’s like, it’s pathetic. But he’s competent. He has a record.

He could execute. He could govern. And again, he never should have run. You know, we’ve talked about it a million times, but I I was sitting there. Just like you thinking, Ron has put in a better debate performance with each passing night for what that’s worth.

I agree to you, by the way, about Nikki. Nikki didn’t didn’t have a breakthrough night. On the other hand, I think she might have benefited somewhat from Vivex obnoxiousness. It’s also interesting that, you know, she feels that she needs to move to the right on certain social issues in ways that they sort of lack a certain authenticity when when she was talking about, you know, eliminating all anonymity on the internet. I mean, did you really think about that for more than five minutes that where she was really going?

And then, of course, last night, she said that Florida’s don’t say gay bill didn’t go far enough. She actually so wants to attack Rhonda Sanders, for not being sufficiently right wing on this. I actually said that his don’t say gay bill didn’t go far enough because it only talked about gender until the third grade And I said it shouldn’t be done at all. That’s for parents to talk about. It shouldn’t be talked about in the schools.

Shouldn’t even just come up at all. So, I mean, this is kind of the race. Like, you know, you’ve taken this hair on fire culture war issues. Well, you didn’t set your whole body on fire like I’m going to. I don’t know.

It’s just interesting how much they know that this is a joke. When they’re up there at the undercard debate, they don’t even really try when someone attacks them. Like, it’s a Ron Nikki Okay. Forget the bank. But she’ll just go, oh, you’re lying about that.

She’s not actually feel really threatened by his attacks enough to make a full throated argument. Yeah.

Yeah.

She goes, that that’s not true. You know, maybe in Iowa, we’re gonna get down to a Charlie where they really are the last two people standing besides Trump, and maybe they really will be, you know, in a in a neck and neck debate with each other. But at this moment, she didn’t seem like she needed to stick up for herself with anybody last night.

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So would you like a little bit of a dose of analysis with your Shadden Freud or your Shadden Freud with your analysis. Kevin McCarthy is quitting Congress. Now this story is so fascinating the trajectory of Kevin McCarthy. I mean, think about what Kevin McCarthy, one year ago today. Okay?

What he thought his twenty twenty three was going to be like. Yeah. He’s thinking, oh, I’m going to be speaker, and I don’t know what how he thought it was going to play out. I’ll figure out how to get Marjorie Taylor Green to be one of my fanboys, and I can handle Matt Gates. And I will succeed where every other Republican has failed.

He’s got a five vote majority. So what does he do? He makes, you know, every single Ron DeSantis. He self gills himself. He’s that, Pam, that’s that somebody he’d ripped me on that.

He can’t self gouge yourself. He gets into the speakership by self gelling, making every possible concession. So his speakership begins with chaos and humiliation, and then months later ends in chaos and humiliation. He gets his portrait, I guess, and now he’s out of Congress altogether. Wow.

I posted in my morning shots newsletter a picture that covered that book Young UNns, the generational future of the Republican Party, you know, Kantor, Ryan McCarthy, hasn’t aged well, didn’t turn out well. So talk to me about, Kevin McCarthy and Kevin McCarthy, leaving, and his decision to leave I mean, that there’s a rational basis to quit after you’ve been humiliated, right, and made it relevant. But it’s a big fuck you to the house conference, isn’t it? Because now you’re down to what two vote margin and about to be a one vote margin. He knew he was doing this.

Right?

So the overarching theme of this is that there’s no leadership, and you can’t really lead without some level of fear. There’s no fear. So Kevin McCarthy was really good at scratching everyone’s back in the in the conference. And he ran around, raised money, threw goodies around, and he was super happy puppy, doggy guy, and super nice and he would text your mom on her birthday before you did and all those things, but no one ever feared him. He couldn’t actually threaten real retaliation, and he didn’t know how to use that in ways that Nancy Pelosi and Mitch McConnell have always been able to.

And so he loses his job. Yeah. Yeah. And now no one’s afraid of Mike Johnson, so he can’t lead either. And so Bill Johnson a Republican from Ohio is gonna lead to take university president position early in the year as you mentioned.

Wow. And with Kevin’s departure, the math is just obviously, the expulsion of of George Sanchez is just blowing up in their face. So so it really is, at this point, everyone is turning on everyone And there’s no it’s not that there’s no unity that the last tool that would be available is some kind of, you know, environment where if someone can get trump on the phone and and make you afraid. You know, we’ll just we’ll come and punish you for this in this way. No one believes it Everyone hates Congress.

They all hate each other, and they wanna leave just like Patrick McHenry just announced this week that he would leave. He’s not gonna leave before the end of the of the cycle, but when you’re chairman of the financial services and you walk away, you’re admitting that your confidence is about to go into the minority and some miserable shit show, and no one could chalk you into staying because you don’t care?

Well, and also you have to think okay. So I I I like the position. I like the power. I like the fact that I have the pin and all of that stuff, but I have sit in a room with some of America’s dumbest assholes. I mean, it’s just two years.

I mean, I can’t that they’re looking around going, So is it worth it? Is it worth worth to spend another two or four years sitting next to Lauren Bulwark and Matt Gates and and Paul Gossar and all of these folks? So to give you an indication of how bitter things are, so going back to to Kevin McCarthy, whose trajectory feels so completely inevitable and predictable. I mean, when he became speaker after the fifteen rounds, having made every single concession surrendered every part of his soul, to the bomb thrower element of his caucus. It was pretty easy to say that he’s the weakest speaker that we’ve ever had following one of the strongest speakers.

And that this serial humiliation wouldn’t end well. He kept shrinking himself, shrinking himself, shrinking himself into this position. And amazingly, he turned out to be an incredibly small man. Now the one thing that he did do that was effective, he kept the government open, which is what would cost him his job. But in the end, There’s Kevin McCarthy.

As you said, sort of the, you know, the puppy dog going around, you know, licking everybody’s hand saying, you know, can you put me back in? Maybe I will come back in. In the end, what is he doing? He’s shoving other congressmen in the back. He’s clearly deeply embittered about the role that Nancy May play.

He’s throwing out bombs about Matt Gates, but this decision to resign is really something, and you can tell how bad it is because Margery Taylor Green is really upset about it. Remember? Kevin McCarthy’s speakership is gonna be remembered for a lot of things, but certainly one of them is the way that he embraced and empowered Margery Taylor Green. Good on you, Kevin. That’s on in your record.

So she’s very unhappy. That her sugar daddy is is leaving. She writes. Do you see this this tweet here? I’m I’m holding up here.

Well, now in twenty eighty four, we will have a one seat majority in the House of Representatives. Congratulations Freedom caucus for one hundred and five representatives who expel our own for the other. This would be about the George Santos thing. I can assure you Republican voters did not give us the majority to crash the ship. Hopefully, no one dies.

Yes. Yeah.

Hopefully, no one dies because then it’s all gone.

It’s the best.

Yeah. George Santos leaves, Kevin McCarthy leaves say, Hey, Mike. Have fun. Enjoy yourself. Be a real shame if anything happened to your shitty majority here.

That is such a good point about. You know, Kevin McCarthy took the shine off of Marjorie Taylor Green. She went corporate. Like, she is so not the same person having sold out to the establishment and leadership. And she’s accused another member this week of physically assaulting heart.

I mean, the place is Another republic

of them.

Truly cannot make it up. Yeah. With each passing day, what they are willing to do to each other, say out loud, put on Twitter, and It’s not gonna end well.

And they’re not gonna stop. It is not gonna stop at all. I mean, no, there’s a couple of substantive questions that have to be asked here. I mean, number one, we know that they’re moving ahead with, impeachment of Joe Biden in part because, you know, Mike Johnson has to do it because that’s what the crazy caucus is absolutely demanding he does. So that’s that’s his C Way.

Right? He has no choice. He has to move ahead. This is what the base wants. And so that was gonna be a tough lift with a only a five vote majority.

A little tougher lift with a four vote majority. Even tougher vote with a three vote majority. What do you think? I mean, now that they’re down to two and one, are they still gonna go ahead with it?

Yes. I think they are, and I think it’s gonna pass because I heard my faller rationalized skin.

My faller. Okay. One of one of the normies. Okay.

Yeah. And so maybe Ken Buck is the only one who bucks the conference, and he is the only navy. I think that they have found a way to convince those guys that all they need to do is support the conference on an opening of an inquiry because things need to be investigated and Just asking questions.

Right. Right? It’s just opening the

And there’s the talking point about twenty four million dollars going to the family, and that’s suspicious. And so we just really need to find more out And that’s why I think it’s definitely I think Johnson’s gonna have that vote. And then that is the question of where they go from there. And that’s that’s a rough one. And I do think that it’s entirely possible that one of them just freaks out and follows Kevin out the door on, like, February tenth.

And Joaquin Jeffrey’s speaker. It’s just not out of the realm of the possible. That this impeachment thing becomes a box canyon that people flip out and that they literally torpedo their actual majority. Before the end of the cycle.

This is the the irony of this moment because everything that happens in our politics is now, irrational slash crazy. So this is one of those moments where the impeachment vote might buy some time for Mike Johnson that will benefit Mike Johnson because he’s satisfied, you know, the caucus the folks who, you know, hold the lead. But it also might benefit Joe Biden because Democrats are bored with him. They’re disillusioned. There’s a rally around factor.

And this is gonna be a clown car. I mean, the fact is that people hear these things about the twenty four million about the direct checks. When you actually start having the inquiry, I think, you know, Jim Comer is not ready for prime time. This evidence is not ready for prime time. Now maybe it doesn’t matter.

Maybe people don’t care about what the facts are. But it’s like one embarrassment after another. I mean, one day after another. James Comber, the chairman of the House Oversight Committee comes out with some screaming bombshell and smoking gun. And within two or three hours, everybody goes, yeah.

You misread the document or no. It was about a frock. It was not that. You lied about this. And so it’s one thing to sort of be doing it on the side, but I I just, again, you know, going back to our theme of this is not gonna end well.

I just don’t see how it does.

Yeah. I think that the Democrats, like you said, will be energized and sort of unite on this focus, they’ve got Hunter Biden offering to testify publicly and the Republicans refusing. Comer on the record, as you’ve said, bungling a bunch of revelations. Commer has admitted that after his first impeachment hearing, he doesn’t really want to hold anymore because the Republicans on the committee cannot counter the Democrats when they’re in that environment. The Democrats on that committee are way much more able than the Republicans are.

They have thin evidence, non evidence, and I heard lawler saying, you know, Russian oligarchs and I mean, all the Democrats have to do is tally up you know, the quotes from Don Junior or Eric in two thousand seven saying we don’t need to deal with American banks. We get most of our money from from the Russians I mean, talk about, you know, Jared’s deal with the Saudis. Yeah. Six hundred and seventy. I mean, there’s there’s no end.

There’s literally no end to the to the kleptopsies and the compromise and the corruption of the Trump family. So if the Republicans bring it, they are gonna get it. There’s no question. And I think the thing about Hunter is easy for the public to understand. Like, he wants to talk in public and they won’t let him.

You know, even someone who’s barely paying any attention to this, like, understands, like, that’s just PS.

I am gonna confess I worry about Hunter. I I mean, I understand, you know, the the love of a father for his son, but Hunter is, there’s a vast dark hole of sketchiness there.

Oh, great. I’m just saying if he’s willing to take questions and the Republicans are gonna say we don’t want You as a public witness.

Oh, that is a bad look. Okay. So let’s now switch a little bit back to presidential politics. As you know, I sat down with Liz Cheney yesterday. Her new but, by the way, her new book is just a blowout bestseller.

Yes. It’s topping the charts on Amazon Amazon ran out of books.

It’s amazing.

If you want it, go to Burns and Noble or someplace else. Those things that used to be known as bookstores to get the books, but this is getting a lot of attention, lot of sales. I’ve actually told a friends and family that You’re looking for, you know, Christmas gifts. You ought to give your significant others the influencers in your life. I mean, you could do a lot worse than to give Liz Chang’s book because first of all, it’s well written.

And I think she wrote it herself. I mean, it’s very well written, and it tells a very, very compelling story. But the one part that I wanted to bounce off you is the fact that, you know, she’s made it absolutely clear that she will do anything. Anything to prevent Donald Trump’s return to the White House. That the worst case scenario, the thing that matters more than anything else, is keeping him out of power.

And yet, she is willing to toy with the idea of a third party run. This is our exchange when when she met and I said, well, what is that about? Listen to her, and then I wanna get your because I’m not I’m not quite sure how it all plays out. So let’s just play Liz Cheney from the Bulwark interview yesterday. Before we get into all of this, and and and I wanna focus on the warning your description of what happened, how close we came, and what it might mean for next year.

But let’s just deal with the new cycle for a second, because I’m sure everybody else is asking you this. I know that you are committed to doing everything absolutely possible to prevent Donald Trump’s reelection that that is the worst case scenario. So talk to me about the speculation that you’re thinking about a third party?

Yeah. I mean, what I’ve said is I haven’t made any decisions yet. And the last thing that I will do is anything that help Donald Trump. You know, there are some people today who say, well, if you’re opposed to Donald Trump, then you need to automatically endorse the Democrat. And my view is I’m not confident at this moment that the Democratic Party, we don’t know exactly who the nominee is gonna be, but I’m not confident they can beat I think that it would be irresponsible at this moment, frankly, to say, we’re gonna put all of our eggs in in that basket.

They have to prove that they can defeat Trump. And I think it’s gonna take frankly more than that. So I think that we’ll know more in the next couple of months. We’ll see who the Republican nominee really is. We’ll see who the Democratic nominee is.

And I think all of us who recognize the danger that Trump poses will be able to make decisions and about what’s next.

So what do you think? Should Joe Biden run for reelection?

That’s up, obviously, to Joe Biden and and to the Democratic party. I I don’t wanna go down that path of giving advice.

What do you think?

I think that right now, we have a number of policy areas in which the Biden administration is failing to do the right thing, and and that is giving potential strength to Donald Trump. When you look at what’s happening on the border, for example, when you have, you know, even Democratic mayors and governors around the country saying this is this has gotta stop We cannot have the kind of lack of knowledge of who’s coming into this country that we have right now. I’m worried about where we’re headed on national security issues, for example. Fundamentally, we have to be able to defeat Donald Trump, and we can live with those those bad policies if we have to. But we can’t give people a reason to say to themselves.

You know what? I know Donald Trump is dangerous. I know that what he did was wrong, but He’s the lesser of two evils because he’s not. So I I think it’s incumbent on everybody to unite and ensure that we look beyond partisanship and vote in ways that we’ll make sure we maintain the republic.

Okay. AB. What is going on here? My bad that I I had a limited amount of time, so I did not follow this up because it’s not clear to me. Exactly how a third party helps this.

So what’s going on do you think? Because she’s not ever gonna be a spoiler. That the I have no fear that Liz Cheney will ever do anything, like, with the no labeled bullshit that might split the anti trump vote. So what is she talking about?

Right. When she said that, when she started with that, just like you, I believed her. I believed that she that she never wants to be boiler for Trump, and then this is not about her ego. She is right that on immigration and crime, the Democrats have given an opening to Trump, And that’s bears out in all the polling that I’ve written about, and you have two. And I think that she sounds like someone who is working mightily behind the scenes, probably in both parties to try to change people’s minds about these nominations and that she would probably like to be defending Gretchen Whitmer.

That’s what I think. And she was smart to not, you know, not answer your question about whether or not Biden should run. But she sounds like someone because she didn’t have a really reasonable answer for you, Charlie, who’s trying really hard to work every angle. It’s clear from our conversation with you. That she’s gonna try to get everyone to come out and publicly put up a united front and just re strengthen numbers to try to convince people that putting the republic before their personal policy preferences is necessary this time.

So I’m hoping from that answer that she won’t be a spoiler and that she is going to do what she can to try to convince people of how dangerous this looks right now. Because from the polling, she is right. She’s not convinced that Biden’s in a position to defeat Trump again.

I think you’re exactly right. I think that a a year from now, you know, in in November of two thousand twenty four, if it is Donald Trump versus Joe Biden, I don’t have any doubt whatsoever that will vote for Joe Biden to keep Donald Trump out of the white house, but she’s also recognizing that it is not a year from now. It is not November twenty twenty four. And that we may get to that point. But right now, I am with her on this because she’s very clear eyed that the main goal of twenty twenty four.

The one job that we have, the one overriding responsibility that we have is not the reelection of Joe Biden necessarily, but it is the defeat of Donald Trump. And if you focus Jonathan Last whatever it takes to defeat Donald Trump, It is legitimate to say at this point. Okay. Before I give a blank check to Joe Biden and the Democrats prove that you are the best way to do this because if there’s a chance that you are going to blow this election, that you are not going to be successful, then we need to think of alternatives. Now I don’t know how those alternatives work.

There’s something, something, something, how a third party plays out. I’m a little unclear on on Jonathan Last I think that’s the right formulation. I mean, I I suppose from just a realpolitik point of view by floating this out. She keeps her name in the mix. Right?

Politicians like to be mentioned. You got a book. There’s the possibility. She can keep moving, you know, a little bit of pressure on the one party, the one party that can prevent Donald Trump. To not say and do things that will cost them the election.

So I think that’s positive. So I understand that there are a lot of folks out there listening to us, our colleagues, who are just no. You gotta be with Biden. That’s gotta be Democrats down the line. We’ll wait.

I am not willing necessarily at this point to say mean, look, yeah, if it’s if it’s Trump versus Biden, I’m gonna vote for Biden. I get that. But what she’s saying is prove to me that we’re not sleepwalking into a Trump dictatorship because we’re on autopilot And because we think the Democrats and Joe Biden deserve a gold watch, because that’s not what twenty twenty four is about.

And I wanna just because this week, you know, you’ve tried to step back from the brink of gripping fear. And I’ve tried to find some bright lights

in You helped me on that.

Positive developments. We had more fake electric, positive developments in Nevada yesterday in Wisconsin. I think that at the same time, the first sign that I’ve seen that Joe Biden has acknowledged that he’s breaking out of his denial is his statement this week saying that he is willing to make big changes on immigration and acknowledging that that’s huge liability. I am heartened by that acknowledgement, and I am praying for an immigration deal on that military security aid because it really mitigates huge problems. So I hope that works out.

So I think Liz Trini is right to say don’t tell us that we have TDS and that everything’s fine and that that Biden beat this man in twenty twenty. We all know who look at the data that he barely beat him after Trump was responsible for hundreds of thousands of COVID deaths and all this other stuff.

Yeah.

And now after January six is the poll leader. And I think you’re also right that having stringing out the possibility that she might be a candidate guess her more TV and more opportunity to bash Trump, shame Republicans, and try to also kind of spook Democrats about their complacency. So It is effective so far, and I am in her debt. You know, I I just am so grateful for what she’s doing and for the the courage that it takes and that that she just named names and called people out and is disgusting to listen to. I haven’t read the book yet, but I will you know, I’ll look forward to it.

But it really is it’s a huge contribution to the cause.

So just a note on the stepping back from the brink, because I think there’s been a series of very interesting developments, and you encouraged me to do this with a piece that you had earlier this week. So that’s this doesn’t happen in a vacuum. One of the good things that is happening is that all of the alarm bells are being sounded when there is still time to do something about it. I think it is a magnificent thing that the Atlantic has voted an entire issue of the magazine to saying this is what a second trump term will be substanceively, not wringing their hands and playing eeyore and playing horse race, but say, let’s talk about the issues. This is what it means for NATO.

This is what it means for the courts. This is what it means for the climate. This is what it means for it is fantastic. The New York Times has also done deep dive into pointing out that Trump’s second term would not be the same as a first trump term. Axios today, you and I were talking about this before the podcasting people have not seen this truly amazing reporting, exclusive how Trump would build his loyalty first cabinet.

You think you know how bad it is? Forget it. You’re talking about Steve Bannon and Miller and Tucker Carlson and all of these folks being in the administration. So all of the alarm bells are sounding. The flares are going up.

But the flip side of that is, what do we do with that alarm? Does that focus attention? Does that energize or does it debilitate? And this is where I wrote about what Greg Sergeant columnist for the Washington Post. He said, listen, excessive fatalism can be very counterproductive.

I mean, these things are bad and they’re scary, but here’s the key word. They’re not inevitable. Inevitable is the key word. They are dangerous, they are scary. You should be alarmed, but do not be fatalistic about it and don’t give in to despair.

Because beginning to despair, you’re just gonna give up. That’s how democracies die. So one of the things that authoritarians like to do, and this is when he quotes Ruth Ben gia, as saying, part of the authoritarian playbook is to convince you that they are the party of destiny, that they are strong, that they are unstoppable to make you think you are weak and that they are much more powerful than they are. So they want you to think it’s inevitable. They want you to think that Donald Trump and Donald Trump tatorship is our destiny.

And what Greg Sergeant is saying is, no. And in part, it’s like, Could we just look around and notice that this has not been the story of the last four years? Yes. A lot of terrible things have happened, but we did mobilize. We did defeat Donald Trump.

There are millions of people who have decided that they’re not part of this. And as you pointed out a b in your story, the fact is there are lots of bits of good news. And I think that’s part of that that shtick of defeatism and Eorism, like, I’m being the realist that everything is really, really terrible, actually then leads you to ignore some of these positive developments that you highlighted earlier this week and they continue, don’t they?

Yeah. I I mean, I think that these fake elector prosecutions are very critical because it it means that regular Americans who are not politically informed or addicted or engaged are stumbling into these jury rooms and making decisions about real facts and right and wrong.

Yeah.

And this is likely to be more of a conversation next year because of Trump’s trials, you know, than we have faith in right now, which is that We think January six has been whitewashed and red pilled, and it’s over. But there will be accountability, and people will learn anew about just what these people plotted and executed and almost succeeded in. It’s just gonna be more in the conversation than it’s been. And I think that we just think that his, you know, coup attempt and the insurrection just died and it’s over. But it’s a real reminder that there is a rule of law that is being followed and regular citizens are engaged on this issue and will be more so next year.

So that is heartening to me. And I think that you’re right. This this thing about inevitability means that we lose our power to persuade. We can’t persuade mega voters.

Mhmm.

But we can suede people who are disengaged right now, and we can put our energy into that. This is really important. Please talk about it with your friends. Please read this Bob Cagan piece in the Washington Post. Please think about what it will be like months from now when Trump is the nominee and things, you know, roll into place.

And just trying to spend our energy instead of, like you said, despairing into talking to people, engaging, sharing information, sending that Atlantic piece around. It’s really important. There is time for people next year to look at things in a new light. And that’s what I think every time I hear about these fake electors being held accountable that it is happening around the country in these, you know, in these rooms. It doesn’t even probably get on the local news, but but it is so consequential.

And there are so many people who showed up at January sixth in Maga families who got in a shit ton of trouble. Their communities know that. Okay? They know what happened to these people. I think we tend to forget that when we look at, you know, what Musk said on Twitter last night that the after effects and the consequences ripple out further than I think we remember when we’re feeling despondent about Biden Trump general election match ups.

I think that’s a great point. And one of the reasons why I keep reminding people that, you know, you are not the crazy ones is also this massive gas lighting is is going on. People need to understand that, you know, part of this sort of rolling insanity is to convince you that all Americans are have gone crazy.

Mhmm.

And this this sort of, you know, fake, you know, realism that if we have to understand that Americans are know, it becomes so delusional and so stupid and so crazy that they can’t push back against us. I I describe that as okay. Manu go back a little bit theological. So the Catholic church says the despair is in fact a cardinal sin because it denies god’s mercy and ability to to push back against evil. Believing that the American voters can’t be trusted.

It’s kind of a sin against democracy because it denies any sort of faith or hope in democratic renewal that the American voters are gonna step Ganses. Okay. We only have a few minutes left here. So person of the year, I am not upset about the the Taylor Swift thing because I think Taylor Swift is cool. I think Time magazine is absurd.

I mean, have you read it lately? I mean, it is just it used to be the serious journalistic publication that’s decided, hey, let’s turn ourselves into just sort of a a vessel of star fucking. And, you know, I’m sorry. If it was up to you, who would you have chosen? Keeping in mind that historically before in the in the four times, the person of the year is is the most consequential person, not necessarily the best person, but the biggest change agent who has had the most significance in the last year.

I know the case for Taylor Swift, but let’s do better. Who do you think should have been the person of the year? Taylor Swift. I got somebody. No.

Come on. Come on. Come on. No. No.

Come on.

No. I would have picked her. I wanna hear your choice.

All of America wants to hear my choice. Yeah. K. Abie. Now close your eyes for a second.

Just just imagine the cover.

My eyes are closed.

Find out. Here’s the Time magazine twenty twenty three. The person of the year you opened the eyes, and it is Jack Smith.

I like it. I like it.

Jack Smith.

I like it.

Jack Smith, the first prosecutor ever to go after a former president of the United States, the man of the moment who has decided that he is going to vindicate our constitutional guardrails. He may not succeed, but just in terms of Think back on what’s happened in twenty twenty three. Nobody saw Jack Smith coming necessarily in all of these indictments. So I’m I’m gonna double down on the Jack Smith should have been the person of the year.

I like that, but the reason Taylor Swift is the person of the year is because she’s not just a force for good. She is a person of consequence. And when the Federal Reserve can credit you in single handedly with staving off a recession, that actually is a force for good. And we in the anti trump coalition, if you add up all the, you know, the things that really matter, that is one. I am a swift virgin.

I don’t follow her music. I don’t go to her concerts, and I did go to that movie two months ago, Charlie, and I was completely taken aback. It is in twenty twenty three, the most simple, wholesome, uncomplicated She grabbed her crotch once in three hours. She doesn’t even dance. The girls in the crowd are crying.

I mean,

it is literally the most only positive experience and she is so influential in such a good way. And I just don’t know anyone else in our culture that’s making a difference in that many lives. And actually helped us economically in a really tough time.

Okay. I have to see the movement. This, by the way, this this conversation here is why. AB Stoddard will be invited to lots of holiday parties and why I never get invited over

the course.

I’d be in the corner, but no. No. No. Jack. It’s Jack Smith and GB talking about, hey, no.

This wonderful thing. A, b, Stoddard, it is great to talk with you every morning. Helps with the post debate hangovers. I really, really appreciate it. Talk to you soon.

Thanks, Charlie. It’s always a blast.

Thank you all for listening to today’s Bulwark podcast. I’m Charlie Sykes, and we will be back tomorrow, and we’ll do this all over again. Boolberg podcast is produced by Katie Cooper and engineered and edited by Jason Brown.