Get That Money Zelenskyy!

Hello, everyone. Welcome the next level. I’m JVL here with my best friends, Tim Miller and Sarah Longwell of The Bulwark. Go and subscribe to this show. Hit the like button.

Give us five stars. And then when you’re done, go to the bulwark dot com slash events and sign up to come see us in Seattle or Sunny Los Angeles. We’re gonna be doing a live show in Los Angeles, California, in January with special guests Johnny Fabs of the Obama campaign. We’ll talk more about that later on down the line. But guys, this is supposed to be the Christmas getaway week this is supposed to be nothing happening.

And we are having one of the biggest news twenty four hour cycles of the year. We have the passing of the omnibus bill with all sorts of good stuff in it, like aid to Ukraine, and I believe we’ve passed the electoral count act finally. We have Donald Trump’s tax returns becoming public. Any day, we have the January sixth committee’s final report. We have Volodymyr Zelensky.

Arriving in the United States to meet with Joe Biden and address a joint session of congress. And all of this while the world is basically just trying to finish their Christmas shopping. What do we wanna go first on the wheel? Do we wanna go to tax returns? Let’s go tax returns first.

Sarah, tell me about Donald Trump’s tax returns.

So I don’t think it’s a huge deal because I do think the New York Times got a big chunk of his taxes, you know, somebody like black enveloped it to them a while back. And there’s already been an investigation into his sort of tax fraud where he inflates the value of things so he can claim them as bosses on his tax returns. And so he’s basically I mean, it has been, like, well established that this guy is a tax cheat. I think the question is like and it’s like it’s always the question of how to reporters, you know. What do you think the political implications of Trump’s taxes being released will be for his twenty twenty four campaign?

And my answer is just like it was before the January sixth committee when everyone’s like, what are the political implications of the January sixth committee? I was like, it depends on what they have. Right? It depends on what’s in there. If it’s more the same, right, if it is the inflated valuations, if it’s the fact that he hasn’t paid taxes, any, like, income taxes, and I don’t know how many years We already know that.

And that’s already been litigated and voters don’t care about it. Certainly not Republican voters. So the question is, is there, like, something new in there that is either criminal or provides new things to the narrative because the one way that I can see it making a difference. Is that, you know, talking about the focus groups. I don’t have a focus group pod right now.

We’re off. And so I’ll just tell you guys, we keep doing focus groups. Just did one yesterday.

Just for kicks, just for shits and giggles?

Because I’m addicted and and I I

She’s humping focus groups.

I can’t stop. And I really wanna know where voters are on Trump right now. Two time Trump voters. I actually can tell you a little bit more about that later if you’re interested. But on the point of when you just do two time Trump voters and you don’t screen for their intensity or their approval of him.

Right now, they are very interested in looking at other candidates besides Trump. They’re not that excited about Trump running.

Like Larry Hogan and Cristina?

No. I’m not. No. Is

that who they’re interested in, Sarah?

I have not heard those names come up very much unfortunately. Okay. But I have Mike

DeWine. Mike DeWine won a huge victory in Ohio. Are they interested in him?

No. No. He’s not good med. He doesn’t come up very often. You know, it’s all the scientists all the time right now.

I hope that’s shallow, but Well, the guy who’s just like troupe only he fights more. Gotcha. Well, don’t know. Fever is breaking. But

that’s not it. The reason that they’re down on Trump and they’re not even down. Right? They’re not trying to break with him There’s nothing in his taxes that are gonna make them be like, boy, you know what? I was wrong about Trump.

Like, now that that’s gonna happen. But the accumulation of his problems are are leading them to have a picture of Trump that he is not electable in twenty twenty four. They wanna win. And so their main concern about Trump is that he can’t build a big enough coalition to win. And so if the tax returns are just like another thing on top of the fact that bunch of criminal indictments are gonna come down Like, he is starting to seize under the weight, not just of the accumulated scandal, but also of the electoral defeats.

And they are all working to sort of minimize people’s citement about him. You

know, Sarah, this reminds me of twenty sixteen when the access Hollywood tape broke, Bill Bennett, called on Donald Trump to drop out of the race, which, you know, I guess, in a vacuum, you could see that as, hey, good for Bill Bennett, enforcing some moral standards. But the way he did it was, he said, he can’t win and can’t win and it’s a damn shame he can’t win so he has to drop out. So that’s really what this is is. Right? It’s like, oh, gosh.

They they done Trump dirty. It’s a damn shame that he can’t win, but he can’t. So I guess we need somebody else. There’s no, like, boy, this intersection stuff was really bad. Nothing like that.

It’s just Great.

Yeah. I know how mad it may but I and I I’m sorry to report that two time Trump voters are not going to tell you that they’re sorry that they supported him and that they are now out on him, like, that’s never gonna happen. And their only way psychologically for them to do this is not to just really grapple with him. Why they were wrong? It is to sort of move on to the next thing.

Right? Well, I like Rhonda Santos and he can win or I like know, there’s other people they like too, but they’re they’re looking for someone electable. So that’s that’s I think that everybody keeps being like, dude, the taxes. Could that bring them down? I mean, And maybe you could send him to jail.

I don’t know what’s in there, but, like, highly unlikely. And there’s multiple other indictments moving forward that are more likely to get to be serious trouble for him. Yeah.

If he goes to jail, it ain’t gonna be because of the taxes. Tim, do you have anything any thoughts about the taxes? And the thoughts about the corruption of the government where the IRS was not auditing him as required by nineteen seventy seven law. I think we’re just gonna say this is all just baked in the

cake. I’m a little confused because I did think that the reason why he couldn’t release the tax returns was because he was under the longest audit in history. Right? So he couldn’t release them while under audit. FALSE.

That was the original reason for not releasing them. And then it now turns out that he was actually the only president not under audit. Yes. That seems a little fishy. Yeah.

The tax return story has never really been one that got my dander up. Partially because I don’t really understand tax returns, and I’m not exactly even sure what’s in there. I waste money on an account until I concern himself numbers for me. So I don’t so I don’t even really know he sends me the final tax return, and I just kinda like giving the thumbs up. I don’t even really vet it.

If the IRS is listening to this, I I hope that that doesn’t give me problem. Not required to do anything, but I do sign it. But I he he he’s a professional. So I’m not exactly sure what’s in there. Do think that there’s still unanswered questions about his business dealings, particularly foreign entities, you know, particularly with the Turks and the Saudis and the Russians.

Right? And so additional information about cross party debts being carried, etcetera. You know, I think that there conceivably could be things worth knowing. And the tax returns, I’m glad that they’re finally out. I’m mostly glad that they’re out because it makes them sad.

And anything that makes them sad makes me happy. Particularly here at Christmas time. I think that it’s just nice to be in the Christmas spirit. Yeah.

Well, that’s the main thing about it, right, is that he just He’s been trying to keep people from seeing them for so long. Like a thing that other presidents have done voluntarily as part of the norms, which by the way are not laws, we’ve all learned. But the norms that that we have as a as a political culture of a president releasing their tax returns. He’s the only one who hasn’t done it, and he also has a lot of dealings with Warren governments that are worth knowing. And you know what?

If he wasn’t running again, I might be against it. Like, if they were gonna have legal proceedings against him for tax sheets, like, they should do that. But like making them public just to do it. I’m not sure I’d be I feel conflicted about doing that, but he’s running for president again. So, sorry.

Them’s the breaks.

I love your just kind of personal honor code, Sarah. And that’s something that I admire about you, and I appreciate, and I aspire to have, like, an honor code like that personally and I I do my best in some days I I succeed and other days I fail and just releasing private information about Donald Trump just to make him sad. Is something that does not violate my personal honor code even though it probably should. The interesting question, I think the most my briefest thought on on him we move on just kind of based on this conversation that I was having in Phoenix. It’s like come next March.

Come Memorial Day. You know, because he’s got a number of bad months ahead of him with additional indictments and investigations and, you know, Come March, come April fools day. Do Republican voters say, I’ve gotta come to this guy’s defense. These fuckers are coming for him again and I’m mad about it and I’m sick of it? Or are they like, he’s getting screwed again, but like, I just I’m I’ve had enough.

And I heard a little bit of both. In Phoenix. And I think that that’s not really a great sign for him to even hear, you know, some of that among the chorus of the corps. People that are paying money to go here, Carrie Lake, speak. You know.

So I think that is an interesting question. And and, like, the tax returns are kind of one more. Just

log on that fire. While this is happening, we also have the January sixth committee final report dribbling out. Right before we gone on, I started reading through the executive summary, which is itself a hundred and fifty seven pages. By the time we finish taping, I think everything will be out. Thank God for Liz Cheney, by the way.

Just like

these Democrats had to leak to the Washington Post that, like, Liz Cheney, didn’t wanna put their little addendum in their section in, and, like, she didn’t want she wanted to poke too much when Donald Trump. So I think fucking godless. Cheney was in that room where that executive summary would have been five hundred and seventy two pages and would have, you know, they would have had to acknowledge the minor failures of of a Nancy Pelosi’s, like, legal team, and like, you know, we would have had to investigate the capital police, and it’s like the capital police were doing the best that they could. Okay? Like, if you wanted to have a separate report on that, that’s fine, but we need something that people can digest that helps them to understand that Donald Trump is to blame, and probably even the existing document is too long on that front on the executive summary.

So anyway, another eight tiers for Liz Cheney as always here on the next level podcast.

So the executive summary opens with quotes from a number of insurrectionists, all of which basically amount to I am ashamed of what I did. I attacked democracy. I was a traitor, and I can’t believe I fell for this. That’s this is unparaphrasing, but this is what these, like, you know, a dozen people quoted, and this is this is what all of them say. And one of them says, Look, the president of the United States told me that the election was stolen.

I saw him say it on TV. What am I supposed to believe? You know what? That’s not crazy. And I I would say reading through this, a, It is an indictment of everybody who just thought that you could put a psychopath into the White House and everything would be fine.

Right? All the people were like, whatever, you know. It doesn’t you just put a psychopath in there would be fine. It is an indictment of all of the people who who knew better and who just sort of went along with it. Right?

The match slaps of the world and rich lowries of the world who, you know, you just you make excuses for them and nobody actually believes this stuff. And you just put it in the best possible light It’s all a game. It’s all a game. Right? And then it turns out like it’s To the the rubes out there, not a game.

There are people who take all this stuff totally seriously. And they went and did something really dangerous, which hurt a lot of people and ruined ton of people’s lives and got several people killed. And I gotta say reading it just It just makes me angry that the people who get punished here are the cannon fodder, the foot soldiers, and the people who, you know, like Donald Trump himself, who yeah. I’ve put in the squish who didn’t want to go and prosecute him. And I’ve turned around on that.

And but Dante seems the enablers. It’s the whole class of professional Republicans around him. Who enabled this to happen and it’ll walk away from this this absolute conflagration with nothing but more money in their pockets. That may be really fucking angry. Sorry.

No,

that’s good.

I didn’t even have a question in there. It’s our other question.

Yep. Well, you know, Jamie, I write so infrequently for you at the bulwark that I can remember for two pieces that I wrote post January sixth. One of them was hold them all accountable, and it was about and it used Bill Crystal, our friend, gave me this Lincoln quote, and it was something like should I prosecute the young soldier and not touch a hair on the head of the Riley agitator? And it was a piece about how all of these people who strung the capital were going to jail. They were getting legitimately prosecuted.

And this has always been my I get a lot of heat from my defensive voters. Even my defensive a sort of Trump voters. They’re like, they’re being lied to by people that typically I’m not saying presidents tell the truth, but like, that they don’t expect to tell unbelievable lies. Like, that the election was, like, serious people. Like, it wasn’t just Trump to the entire Republican Party.

Fell in line. Kevin McCarthy, everybody told them, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Election was stolen.

What are they supposed to believe? When

Tim Scott was asked about what is the election stolen, he wouldn’t say no. He’s like, well, I don’t know you’d have to talk to the president about that.

That’s right. Right? They just wouldn’t fucking say it. That’s right.

Tim Scott’s one of the good guys. One

of the better guys. Yeah. Because there’s a real relative scale here. But the and the other piece that I wrote was called, what did you think was going to happen? Like and it was it was this this idea of you take this liar and insane Superman who has no respect or interest in American norms and values institutions and only cares about himself and his ego.

You know, like, and you empower him to like, what did you think the end result of that was going to be? And so, yeah, just I agree with both of those things. And I suspect that Liz Cheney This obviously is a Liz Cheney fan podcast. But, like, I suspect Liz Cheney wrote a bunch of that executive summary, like, with her own fingers.

With her own blood.

Yeah. Like, I

think her own blood. Like,

I don’t think there’s, like, a bunch of Dip

their

quill.

I don’t think there’s a bunch of people. I mean, I think there are obviously lots of staff and lots of people who did a great job. But, like, I think that she has taken this committee by, like, this compliment neck and has been the one really directing things. And I think that she I bet that’s her. I bet that’s her voice.

I bet that’s her writing a lot of it. I think

that there’s good reason to believe that. I’ve reason to believe that beyond just what I suspect. But look, two things on this. I think that what is I’m so happy that’s how they led the executive summary. And this is the important And this gets to a little bit of what I, you know, wrote about, which I we already talked about on Monday’s pod, about the TBSA fest, about how there’s an element of it that makes me sad.

Right? Yeah. Like, there you know, I’m just looking around this room and, you know, there are people that know better. JBL, you already handled those folks. So I’ll I’ll move on to the people that don’t.

And And they’re all still doing this all over again. It was Cary Lake right now. And, like, and they’re giving Cary Lake fifty bucks for a challenge. And I saw Fox News headline this weekend that was, like, judge accepts, you know, Kerry Lake’s challenge to the election. And it’s like, well, wait, what actually happened was she she had ten filings.

Like, eight of them were dismissed. And and two, they’re like, okay. Well, we we’re gonna need to see more evidence from you. Right? And and Fox is putting a banner headline on the website that makes it seem like there’s some there’s a error there.

You know, she’s saying to the room, I’m gonna take this to the Supreme Court. Everybody’s cheering. I think that the good thing is that that is a much smaller fish than the president doing this. Right? And and so if you’re just looking at at math.

And, you know, if the president is fooling sixty million people into thinking that the election is being stolen and the country is being taken from us, then is it really that surprising that a couple hundred would resort to violence? No. Right? And so maybe if Carrie Lake hopefully is only tricking a million people. Right?

Like, there’s smaller pool of people for whom might be susceptible to violence and and maybe some of the most likely folks that have been subject to violence are are getting their comeuppance and getting their law in order right now. And so that that is helping the situation as well. But still, like, there’s other, like, real harms that are being done. And and the harm is being done is to the people that the fucking populace claim to care about. Yeah.

And, like, that is the thing that is just so heartbreaking and raging about all this. Like, that the victims of this, like the people that are in the front of that executive summary, who are going to jail when the real victims of people had died and the cops and, you know, our friends, Pen Ellen, like the the second order victims are the people whose lives are being ruined by this. We’re we’re having to go to jail because they they believe this bullshit And and the third order victims of their their family, and the fourth order of the, like, people on, you know, a fixed income, they’re spending fifty bucks you know, to to send into her stop the steel fund. Right? Like, all of these people are are the ones that they claim to care about and they’re getting fucked over by this.

And so I’m happy that they were centered in that in the beginning of this of this report, and that’s an important element of the report, not, you know, because it it speaks to that experience, but it also demonstrates why Donald Trump is responsible. You know? And, like, there’s an obvious reason that he’s responsible, and that he can get bogged down in all the details of this report. But, like, he’s responsible because he convinced them to be there. He tricked them to be there.

None of this would have happened without him. Right? Like, they weren’t just gonna violently overthrow the government on behalf of Mike Pence. Like, try to, you know, they weren’t gonna charge the capital. Had had Donald Trump just said, hey, you know, congratulations Joe Biden.

So that’s why they’re they’re important. The other thing that I’m interested in, you know, we haven’t seen all this, is just the the full transcripts, which I’m happy that they’re releasing of these interviews. You know, because other people will notice things and see things that will, I I think, yield more information. You know, as good as the people in the inside of this committee are leaking select things to the post and to whoever, you know, just open source always is gonna reveal more stuff. I mean, just this whole hic thing that came out yesterday the other day about how you know, OpEx asked people around Trump to promise to tell him to say, you know, we shouldn’t have violence and he refused.

Right? Like, that was another little data point that we didn’t know. Now we know because we’ve seen the OpEx interview. I think that there’s gonna be more like that as they kind of release all the material. So you

you made a point about the families. That’s important. I don’t know if you guys saw this few months ago, the Guardian did a long story about Stuart Rhodes’s kid — Yeah. — and how he basically escaped is abusive home. Right?

And this is this is the second order stuff. And then there’s a writing about this for the newsletter later this week. There’s a new paper out looking at COVID deaths. And you will be shocked to learn that the COVID death rate increased over time especially post vaccination availability among people with high school degrees and less. Right?

And it’s because these people are being fed stuff, which is toxic. And, you know, in the case of COVID, can result in their deaths. And I don’t know. I look at it and I think to myself, my god. The democrats pay political prices for being a little more hawkish on COVID because they’re trying to save the lives of people who don’t vote for them.

That’s not to me. It drives me crazy. I look

forward to that newsletter.

Well, you know, we’ll get the rest of the report. We have criminal referrals Let’s talk a little bit of predictions here because I I wanted to do twenty twenty three predictions late in the show. We’ll just do it right now. Because my my look ahead for twenty three is that the most important story will be the invisible primary.

And

that we’re gonna know a lot more about Trump’s viability as a candidate. And also his just his energy and his stomach to actually go out and fight a war again

over the

course of the next six to eight months, I think. And it is possible that the cumulative weight of all of this and his age and his sort of inability to roll himself out of Mar a Lago and go get in front of crowds and be energetic and up tempo. It’s possible that Trump, the guy is really finished. Which would be

amazing. There.

That’s my twenty twenty three prediction. Do you think that he’s gonna be finished? I think it’s possible. That was a little

kind of like Tucker Carlson’s remarks. That was sort of meandering and I couldn’t I couldn’t get to. Was that a prediction there or just a observation about a possibility? No.

The prediction is that the most important of twenty twenty three is gonna be how this invisible primary works out. And that one of the real possible outcomes now is that we find out over the course of the next eight months or so that he he doesn’t have it. And I think we’ll know that by the end of twenty twenty three. A little bit of a chicken and the egg

here because these two things are related. But I guess I would say the most important story is whether he gets indicted and what the impact of that is on the Invisalign primary Right? Because if he doesn’t or if he does in the, like, Trump organization overpaid, you know, didn’t report taxes since Right? But I if he if he gets big boy indicted for the referrals that came from the or sixth committee or from the Fannie Willis investigation in Georgia, that is, I think, the biggest story of the next six months is you assume that that is basically the window when it would happen nine months. Right?

And they’re not gonna do it three months before the Iowa clock either you could get right back into the — Right. — election issue. So that is a six to nine month thing. And I think that the question then is, okay, well, what is because I I don’t know any of us really think he’s gonna be behind bars. I mean, inshala, you know, who knows?

But but so then the question then is what is that impact on the rest of the electorate. Is that a radicalizing moment? You know, is that, you know, bringing people to his side? Is that everybody’s saying, okay, good luck with your legal bills pal. You know, you have a hundred and twenty million in the bank of our money you can use to pay for them, but we’re we’re gonna start to focus on DeSantis and and other stuff.

Right? Like, there’s an interplay between those two. So, Sarah, you just talked about a

minute ago. The idea of these people getting their information and they have Trump telling them that in twenty twenty that the election was stolen from them. And then what do we think was gonna happen? Do you think it would have made a difference if the main body of the Republican

Party for

Mitch McConnell and Tim Scott Glenn Young, all all of the people, the Rhonda Sandices. If they had all stood up and said, no. No. This is wrong. Joe Biden won.

He’s the president. Remember Mitch McConnell held off on even like, you know, shaking hands with Biden for weeks and weeks and weeks trying to hold out as long as possible. Do you think it would have made a difference if the main body of the Republican party had contradicted him? I do.

Yeah. That’s right. And Tim, do you? Yes. A difference.

I I’m interested to see if I agreed to the degree to which so it would have been a difference to what Sarah Yeah.

This is the point. It’s the difference between seventy percent of Republicans believing the election was stolen and thirty five percent believing that the election was stolen. And I’ll do my Republican triangle of doom, but, you know, that is the radicalizing triangle in which you know, if it’s just sort of that this is the the toxic and symbiotic relationship between the right wing infotainment media, the voters and Republican elected officials and how they radicalize each other. And if you have the elected officials, if you could break that triangle with one of the points. Which in this case is your offering as the elected officials, it diminishes how much you can radicalize, how far you can radicalize the party, And because all of the elected officials jumped on board, right, then a much more this, like, medium group of people.

The people who say in the focus groups I don’t know that it was enough to change the outcome of the election, but like, I definitely think something bad happened. I think that, you know, it was really shady. You know, that is less present. And you really just have your hardcore people who are devoted

to Trump and whatever Trump says goes. Can I ask my second question though? Because the second question here is then So what happens if he’s indicted? And the Republican party has to face a choice again, just like with this, stop the steel stuff. Do they back him and say, yeah, looks like it would jump to me or do strategic silence?

Or say, well, I don’t know, you know, I’m not gonna comment on this or or do they do what they should have done in November and December of twenty twenty? And say, yes, this all looks very, very bad. Because I think that makes a big difference in terms of evaluating how what happens to Trump practically within the Republican base. Yes? Well, here’s

the thing about this dynamic. And and I agree with your point about the shadow primary being incredibly important. And I agree with Tim’s point, that the indictments are incredibly important and how people respond to those are, the thing is, is like the timing of all those things matters. And that is a great deal. And it also matters.

Right? The the cadence of this is gonna be important because it’s also gonna matter who else is in the race. So the thing about the focus groups, right, that inherent tension is they’re not going to break with Trump. They’re not mad at Trump. They don’t think he’s bad.

They’re just shopping for an alternative because they don’t think he can win and they’re, like, kinda burnout on a schtick. They don’t hate it. It’s just, like, not as exciting as it used to be. And so, like, they’re kinda interested in, like, Does anyone else have some juice for me? Who else can make me, you know, send a tingle up my leg that’s new and interesting?

And and for the most part, that’s DeSantis. And so Right now, there’s a bunch of known unknowns. And they are things like who runs against Trump? And how early do they get in? Because if Trump gets indicted, if the indictment’s come down in January and nobody else is in, then all of the people are free to kind of side with Trump.

Right? They

can side against the deep state and they can say this is a witch hunt, but they can also say, but this is why we need somebody else.

Right?

Like, there’s, like, different ways that can they can handle it. Now, let’s say they’re all in and the indictments come down. Let’s say DeSantis is running, Yonkin is running, Sannu news running, Pence’s running, Christie’s running, Nikki Haley’s are all of them, but then they’re running against Trump. That’s really complicated for them. Right?

Because they know the voters are kind of on his side, and yet they’re looking for ins. They’re looking for ways to knock him down. I do think that just generally, these strategic silence seems to be the choice of most elected officials. Especially right now and especially I think for a while because what they want is somebody else to be for. Right?

The reason for DeSantis Media is that being affirmatively somebody else on the team. Because otherwise, you’ve decided against Trump with the deep state or you’ve decided against Trump with the democrats. You have to be Liz Cheney. But if you can be for Ron DeSantis, you are still on the team in good standing, and maybe you’re not so critical of Trump, but you’re like, and this is but this is why he has to step aside. Anyway, my point is that the, like, the cadence is gonna how people react is gonna it’s gonna matter sort of where we are in the gear and what’s happening.

This is the key. Insight into why nobody that matters in the Republican establishment will actually do what you’re suggesting there at the end. Gabrielle, which is, say, it looks like there’s a lot here. He should be held accountable for his actions. You know, we can never do anything like this again.

Right? Like, that’s the responsible thing to say. And, like, that’s the thing that only people who are on the alts are already out or in comic causey mode. Maybe that’s at the most closest to megaperson that could be is maybe a Chris Christie. Type, you know, in the in the race.

I I don’t I wouldn’t even I don’t even see us in a new new type doing that or a patents, really. I mean, patents just was asked about this on Fox. He does want him to be indicted. Right? And because of the reason that Sarah points out, because they’re all still doing the five dimensional chess about how to deal with him.

And still saying, I need his voters, so I can’t alienate his voters, so I can’t do anything that alienates his voters, sends me down the path to Cooktown with with the next level crowd. And so I can’t do that. So I have to do either strategic silence or do the, oh, I’m concerned about the DOJ. Is there a simplitization here? Or is there have we seen some inappropriate actions or, you know, there is a partisan attack, you know, not engaging on the details of it.

And that’s what they will all do again because they feel like they have to do it in order to move on from him. Or in order to move on from him without pain. Right? None of them have ever been willing to take any short term political pain to move on from him. And so they will continue to do the same thing that they always did.

And eventually, that’ll work. Right? That’s the thing. And we’re in year seven. So, like, obviously, obviously would have been better to pull the Red Court way back it acts as Hollywood or whatever and say they’re voting from Hillary and try to get rid of this guy.

There would have been short term political pain then. But that would have been the best thing to do. And obviously, the the second impeachment would have been your next real best option to do that. But eventually it’ll work. Maybe it’ll work this time, but but that’s the reason why they’ll do it.

Alright. Can

we move on to talk about Volodymyro? So excited about this. He is leaving his country for the first time since Russia invaded. And coming to the United States, he’ll be on the ground only for a few hours. He’s going to go first to the White House, then he’s going to go to Congress, he’s going to address a joint session.

Don Trump, Jr. Who is almost the exact same age as Volodymyr Zelensky, went on to Twitter and called him a welfare queen. He

did. Oh, yeah. When you

think about somebody

that’s earned every dollar that they’ve ever accumulated, you know. Not

senior.

Somebody that’s, like, got got the blisters on their hands, you know, built something from scratch. Right? A real capitalist. You know, so he’s never gotten a handout or a handup. Donald Trump junior as the person that comes to

mind. He’s a piece of shit. There’s a lot to talk about here. He is a piece of shit, but the the big thing is Is this a trap for Republicans? Because I gotta assume some sizable percentage of the party, you know, maybe it’s only ten House members, but maybe it’s forty of them, are coming around to where the voters are.

And the voter Republican based voters are really squarely about giving aid to Ukraine right And I don’t know how this is gonna work out honestly. Sarah? I

love this for the Democrats. This is this is the kind of thing that warms my little

We should say we love this for America.

Not just

for the Democrat, but we love this for America. Right. Honestly,

the Ukraine fight is really the purest distillation of the never Trump Republican and and Democratic. Totally. Totally

together. I mean,

this is this is our shit. This is the best. I’m

just like, Nancy Pelosi, wanna

move. You want him to do a photo op with Liz Cheney. Right? That if you get the Lindsay and Liz Cheney photo op, the Bulwark explodes. Supernova.

This is

her sweet spot Amanda Carpenter was saying this in the Slack where she was kind of like baller move by Pelosi. Right? And and it is like, they’re gonna vote on this Ukraine aid. You got a bunch of these dopey Republicans, the Matt Gates types who have decided to run this populist message that has been working. Right?

Like, they have seen the numbers tick up in Republican voters who do not believe we ought to be aiding Ukraine. This is how America first works in practical, which is, oh, no. No. No. It’s Why wouldn’t we help ourselves?

Why would we help this other country. Why would we give our tax dollars to this other country? Because at some point, we stopped educating people about how important it is. To have stable democracies over the all over the world, to not have dictators be able to just roll into those countries and take them over. You’ve got our flat out pro Putin technologists on the right now.

And there’s plenty of them tucker on down. But there is still a decent chunk of the Republican Party and this is as much as the Republican Party has basically given up everything in service to Trump in terms of principles. Like, the chunk of people who are still pro stabilizing democracy in the world is like still a meaningful chunk of the Republican Party. And so there are a lot of people who, you know, not just your Susan Collins, is actually much deeper than that. Like, Lindsey Graham, a whole bunch of people who want to welcome Zelensky, who genuinely will be moved by the idea of Zelensky coming here.

And like, while the money is on the table in the omnibus for support and he’s here, that’s bold and it’s awesome. I mean, he he hasn’t left the country. And for him to come here, and to to address the United States man, I can’t I can’t wait. I wanna correct

myself. I actually undersold the quote, Don junior called him an ungrateful international welfare queen. So, you know, that. Is that

because they suspect he’s gonna ask for more? I think I saw a quote somewhere where he said something like, he’s gonna say thank you, but it’s not enough. And I say You get it, Zelensky. You get

that bag. We’re sending Patriot batteries over there. Do you see this? Yeah.

Yeah. It’s a big deal. I’m sorry.

I still want America got to try to defeat dictators, brutal, horrible dictators. I still want that for America. This is

the clearest right and wrong issue and, you know, besides the Donald Trump election in, like, our adult lives. I I mean, it’s just side of the righteousness and the evil. It’s very easy to for, you know, those of us who are clear eyed to tell. I’m happy to give him Patriot missiles. I’m happy that we gave him ammo and not a ride.

And I I’m just I I was so pumped to see that he’s coming. I I agree. And I think that to answer your question, Jabil, it is such a trap because of exactly what Sarah said. And it’s not just among the leaders. Right?

Look, Republican voters are old. Okay? Republican voters are older, and they live through the cold war. And a lot of them still hate the Rooskies. And, you know, the five decades of cold war propaganda, you know, that not all of them have shaken that off.

Right? Some of them have, but not all of them have.

I would be very interested in the polling breakdown on this by age, honestly. Because I wonder if it’s the young nationalist right that is more pro Russia than the old boomer Republicans? And I didn’t hear

a single defense of Ukraine liberty in the world at TPSA. Nothing. I didn’t hear it from a one person I spoke to when I, you know, when I was as interviewed in the kids, I mostly just asked them like, what issues they cared about. None of them said that. And obviously, on stage, nobody is up there saying, send the Patriots, USA USA.

And and but you could imagine that in an alternate world. Right? So, like, the Benny Johnson thing that I that I wrote about that his presentation was mostly, like, supposed to be kind of the lighter fare. It was the memes and, like, you know, getting the kids excited. And and so it wasn’t that long ago where, like, a Benny Johnson type performance would be, you know, Hulk Hogan on a dinosaur waving the American flag and, like, you know, sending the new Patriots to blow up like the Russians, you know, and like Putin and like the little dolls to show that he’s like a little bitch.

Right? Like like that could have been or or probably can think not long ago. That’s not what they did. You know, the means are all about, oh, look at our border. Why are we giving money to Ukraine’s border?

To your point about Elon Musk, JVL, about how he’s just like kind of not really policy with any of these guys, but instinctually with these guys. That’s what he’s tweeting about. Right? Like, he gets he’s gotten sucked into that kind of younger nationalist meme ish you know, side of the party, funniest side here. I’m here at my parents house.

My dad asked me this morning, he goes, why are people so mad at Elon? I’m not I don’t under and what’s happening there. Everybody hates him now. And I was like, do I have the podcast for you? You can just tune in to the next levels, take over the Bulldog podcast you can fully up to speed on that.

So that is not the whole party though. And I think that what Mitch McConnell said today, you know, being very supportive of giving money to Ukraine and passionately so reflects a minority view, but a substantial minority view. And, you know, these are all the types of voters this is very neatly aligned, I think, with your anti Democratic Republicans are crazy. You know, Republicans have lost their minds, suburban voters. That rejected Kerry Lake and Doug Mastro out.

Right? Like, they they are all neatly aligned with where the Democrats are on this. They will be watching the thing tonight or watching the clips of it on Facebook. And getting a little chill and feeling pride. And and, like, the Republicans have put themselves on the wrong side of that one.

Yeah. Hell yeah.

America Hell yeah. Fuck them

up. You talked about the clear, right, and wrong.

Yep. There

is a gentleman on the Twitter’s Took us in. I don’t know if you guys have seen this, but we have what looks like the last prosecution of a Nazi that’s about to to take place over in France. Have you guys seen us? I’ve not seen that. We’ve got a woman who guys, just give me, like, two seconds to chase this down because it’s really good.

Okay. You chase this

down. I’ve got so we can get a little personal. This is a holiday episode. Right? So we don’t need clean transitions.

I have a new niece. I have a new niece that just happened to see there isn’t that exciting? It’s just happened three hours ago. Right. Of course, we’re taping this.

Yeah. I’m gonna go to the hospital right after we tape this. What a joy filled Christmas here in our home. We’re gonna have Zelensky tonight. We’re gonna have a new niece.

The nuggets looked fantastic last night against the Grizzly’s on live TV. I’m just unlike the anti JBLs there, I don’t do you watch it out my party or do you not watch it like you don’t read the tribe? I do it exactly like

I read the tribe, which is I watch it

fifty percent

of the time. You’ll wanna watch this

one because I tried to channel Sarah. I’m ending the year this year with just what a great year? What a great year. We’re doing nuclear fusion. We beat all the insurrectionists.

In Ukraine, things are going better than expected. We got a fiancee record, Liz Cheney showed us courage. Like, this was a great year. And so we’re gonna celebrate that with the new kids. That’s my vamping.

Yeah.

And I gotta say, you know, I hadn’t thought about this till you started bringing up what a good year it is, but I remember it must have been twenty twenty. It was twenty twenty. Where I was like super optimistic. Right? I was like super I’m like, we’re gonna bind and selected and, you know, we’re gonna get through COVID and all this stuff.

And then, like, twenty one was a disaster. It was just, you know, the Afghanistan was a disaster and delta, researched, and, like, no one was taking the vaccine, and we were all still getting COVID, and yank in one and and for isenia showing this backsliding, and we were seeing the the field take shape of all of these election deniers who were gonna run. And it was just bad. Yeah. My year end triad

in twenty twenty, if you can go back to read it if they just wanna feel better now was about how everything was the worst.

Yeah. I

was worried about how we were all getting addicted to the worst. That was like my New Year’s Meditation essay. That is great. And here we

are. And

this year

was excellent. By all measures of, you know, we finally did get to do all the this is for Tim now. All the face looking didn’t like anybody’s face. But, like, I gave a lot of hugs. This is a face look.

I gave a lot of hugs and and and and we were back, and I had to worn a mask. Oh, you know, like And you know what? I’ve got a lot of weird viruses. I’m sick again now because our immunities are all good. It’s okay.

That’s

freedom.

We did defeat all the election deniers. And Trump is heading into twenty twenty three, into the shadow primary, so much weaker than we thought he might be. Now this is a good one. One more little

optimistic note. You know that when in the article today, how I wrote about that gentleman is on a one way trip to cut town. Yes.

The young

guy at TPSA who I talked to who is like, you know, I just I don’t know if Carrie really this stuff is really right, and it seems like she’s faking it. She wants to be drunk, maybe. And I don’t I don’t really believe this stuff. And I guess friends were like, what are you talking about? And and so we became friends on Instagram, and he just sent me a message, read your article think you got this one mostly right.

I think we I

think

we might we might have

one recruit.

Got it. We might have won one recruit from the maga. Slowly, but surely it’s happening. That’s

a high effort audience development play. Yeah. Okay. So here’s the story. The Jerusalem Post has a story in what may be Germany’s final Nazi trial, ninety seven year old Ermgard Fueckner, has been found guilty for being complicit in over ten thousand five hundred murders at the Stutoff concentration camp.

Okay? K. Pretty clear, good and bad. Right? PASCAL Emmanuel GOBRIE — PAG.

— the ethics and public policy center retweaks this with what is the point of this? It is a religious exercise. Yes. Yes. We should.

Stand up for the rights of former Nazis who were complicit in concentration camp murders. That’s what the new right is.

That depressing JBL. There’s your new right. I’m gonna spin this as a positive. One of the other things, these assholes peg and these fuckers, they haven’t had their come up and see it. But a lot of people got there come up in this year.

There’s you know, a lot of those housekeepers did and this Nazi did and SBF did. And so, you know, peg suck it. That’s just lost what we call law and order a big guy. Alright. Before we get

out of here, any things for the holidays? Sarah, I was in I was in the city last night, as is my want.

Saw into

the woods. It’s a tremendous show. I mean, living in the center of American cultural heritage is really It’s just an amazing experience. I wish you guys could all could all live like this. JBL, literally, last night

he was like, oh, I can’t edit your thing until after eleven, and I was like, why? And he said, I’m in the city for a show. I was like, you go to the you go to more shows now than the get in the theater gaze on my Instagram. I get

texted. Every time he goes into New York and he just sends me, like, selfies or, like, last name is like a fan of the opera and just to make sure that I know a, because he claims he’s a New Yorker now. Right? I don’t know if you know the explanation of New Yorker now. I’ve heard

kids do. That’s what the real New Yorkers do. They send pictures of themselves in the city.

It it brought the Broadway show. It brought

the Broadway

show. Yeah. But also,

he’s just trolling me because he sees so many more musicals than I do. Right now.

And he seemed like a hundred musicals this year. Where do you find the time? You’re doing a you’re doing a newsletter every day. You got podcasts. You have seventeen kids.

Yeah. There you you’re coaching a a poor middle school women’s basketball team. Like, I got on this one. Are you sleeping? What’s a what’s a day look like for now?

I don’t I don’t sleep obviously.

But This is a hand to God the truth. From the time I got into the car last night, till the time I pulled into my driveway, it was thirty five minutes. It is as easy to go in and see a show as it is for Sarah for you to drive downtown to to the office. This

is what people that live and rest in always used to tell me about being a nicier thing. You say, you don’t talk to us.

Whatever. Right. Come

out visit me. We do have a barbecue And Tim, I think you’ll

agree with me. The people who live in Reston are not from DC. They don’t live in

DC. I do. I do. I do. I just gladly side with Sarah.

So

while you were looking up the Nazi, JBL, Tim might were talking about all the things that went bright in twenty twenty two. Mhmm. And

and we

forgot. We even forgot a bunch. Like, as soon as Tim said, women’s beside women’s back football team. I was like, oh, Britney Greinder came home. Like another huge, you know?

Great. Okay. So so JBL, Mhmm. You’re always dark, but come on, it’s been a good year. What can you get?

What’s your joy? What do what do you what happened this year that makes you happy? You

know, it’s been a great year, honestly. It’s been like, dude, this year everything is basically gone, like, five percent better than I thought it it could. Oh, god. Five percent

anything. Feel weird

to talk like that. Very strange. But it’s true. All

this bipartisan legislation, the the you know what, in this omnibus bill? The electoral count act is in this omnibus

bill. Because Joe Biden is an incredibly successful president who should run for reelection. That’s why. You know,

just focus on the

positive. That’s a different conversation. But the the electoral candidate, like, I I was not sure that there’s any way to get that done. And here it is. Know

Yeah. I didn’t even get to make it into my not my part. I already taped it. So it didn’t even get mentioned. It’s such a good year.

The good things happened that didn’t even make it to the good year roundup. Yeah.

You know what? Trump, it will make it much harder for any president to try and do again what Donald Trump did. That’s true.

Oh, yeah. Alright. Everybody hey, have a happy holidays. All of the all of the holidays. Enjoy them.

Have a good New Year’s. I hope that you guys are safe and get to me with all the people you love. Tim and Sarah. I love you guys. For reels for reels.

Merry Christmas. Hit

the subscribe button, hit the like button, come and follow us. And if you’re in Los Angeles or Seattle, come out and see us in January and we’ll hang out. It’ll be a really good time.

Or come down from the Bay or everywhere else to LA. Come down from anywhere. Californians. Yeah. Layton Hollywood.

Bye, everybody.

Merry Christmas. Happy out

is.