Robert Draper: Weapons of Mass Delusion
Episode Notes
Transcript
The GOP has become a host body for some of the most radical voices in America, who spread disinformation and use increasingly violent rhetoric. And the party’s enablers don’t say a word. How are the Republicans going to get this to stop? Robert Draper joins Charlie Sykes.
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This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors and omissions. Ironically, the transcription service has particular problems with the word “bulwark,” so you may see it mangled as “Bullard,” “Boulart,” or even “bull word.” Enjoy!
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Good morning. Welcome to the Goldberg Podcast. I’m Charlie Sykes. Robert Draper has seen it all. I love this blurb from his new book, weapons of mass delusion when the Republican Party lost its mind.
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It says Draper has seen the good, the bad, and the ugly. He’s never seen it this ugly. Welcome to the podcast today, Robert. Thanks for having me back, Charlie. So the weapons of mass delusion, you know, there have been so many books written about, you know, the the various history of the Republican Party losing mine.
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I have one of them. But but you really have this focus in on this pivot point. It is the story since January sixth two thousand twenty one. This was not the book you thought it was going to be. Was it when you sign on to write this book back in December twenty twenty, you what did you think it was going to be?
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You you know what I mean? The assumption was Trump is defeated. Trump’s gonna go away. You thought you were gonna write about what? Yeah.
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That’s I mean, good question, Charlie. And I wasn’t sure. I just was anxious to see after Trump had lost in twenty twenty where the Republican Party would turn to next to to find new leadership. I didn’t expect that Trump would go to weigh altogether. But I did expect that there would be a concerted effort on the part of the GOP to find a new party leader and that there would be, you know, some manner of intra mural skirmishing within the party while that took place.
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But, you know, you’re exactly right. I got the contract in mid December of twenty twenty. Trump hadn’t yet conceded, but you know, most of his figured that he would. We certainly didn’t bank on what occurred a few weeks later, but it happened that I reported for duty basically to begin my interviews for this book on the morning of January the sixth twenty twenty one inside the Capitol and circumstances that unfolded unfolded before my eyes both inside and then outside the capital and needless to say, I came away from that experience with a very different notion of what this book would be, but I also figured that the stakes were so calamitous for the GOP that surely what had taken place at the capital would force them into a posture of introspection and penitence and a determination not to fan those kind of flames again. That as we know is not what occurred.
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And so I was there to witness over an eighteen month period the movement of the party towards a doubling down in in embracing the maga centricity of the party. And that’s
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an extraordinary story even for those of us the thought we’d already lived through this extraordinary story. And see, this book, weapons and mass delusion covers the eighteen months since January six, what you called the pivot point between this is not normal too. This is dangerous and it’s not going away. And I think that if if I could just at the heart of this book, is the recognition of how deeply ingrained this is in the party that the threat has gone way beyond Trump himself. Right?
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I mean and there’s a lot of in this book about, and I know a lot of the coverage in your other discussions have dealt with people like Marjorie Taylor Green who is certainly a weapon of mass delusion. But really, it’s the real danger is the fact that millions of Americans believe this, that it’s penetrated, it’s changed the nature of our politics. And so talk to me about that a little bit. And and how and how rapidly this has happened? Sure.
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I mean, yeah, that’s something that I did not fully
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appreciate when you’ve just described. Until I’m doing all those several months into reporting this book and traveling throughout the United States, going to Trump rallies, going as well to far right events and interviewing people within the party apparatus as well as grassroots activists in swing states like Georgia, and Arizona. And what was abundantly clear to me in a way that I wouldn’t have appreciated, you know, from behind my desk in Washington, was just how the stolen election had become central to mega theology because it really played into a larger belief, Charlie Vit, the Trump’s elector at the Trump’s base already felt like America was being stolen away from them. And so the election became not only a metaphor for that, but also confirmation of it. And then would lead and turn to other, you know, adjacent notions of other things that had been of liberties that had been awarded mask mandates and vaccines forced on to them.
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The the opening of the border to augment the great replacement theory and the persecution of peaceful patriots who gathered at the capital on January the sixth. I mean, all of these were lies, but they all play into each other. They all reinforce each other and they all reinforce most of all the notion, not only that they have been wrong in the Trump’s base, which I define as tens of millions of of Republicans, but also the the the people who have done this to them are incorrigibly evil. And this means not just the democrats who they call radical socialist or communist or whatever, but also the swamp, the deep state, the media, big tech, all of these forces have colluded and and basically are on the business end of what the mag constituency now sees as a sort of holy war. So speaking of
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the mag constituencies, Elise Jordan sat down with a focus group of Trump voters from Pennsylvania yesterday, and I think a lot of people who heard this or saw this on on NBC were were just blown away by it. I’m I’m guessing that none of this will come as a surprise to you, but let me just play one minute of her discussion of Doug Mastriano, who is the Republican candidate for governor in Pennsylvania. His role, he was one of the protesters on January sixth, and she asks this group of Trump voters whether they think that that’s a problem. Here’s what they had to say.
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Doug O’Shiano was at the intersection, and he was photographed breaching one of the restricted areas. Is that okay?
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Which area? Because I saw video where capital officers was taking away barriers and unlocking
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the corner of the call. So that’s I mean, I
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they opened the gates.
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So they shouldn’t
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be disqualifying for an elected official. That’s what I was supposed to say in January six. He
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didn’t strike anybody. He didn’t hurt anybody.
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And the only one that died was a protester there, not a capital killer.
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An armed female veteran would
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That’s the only one that
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died. That’s the only one who died.
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The
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police officer did die. No. Well,
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that is part of travel. That’s not that’s not on-site. By that. That’s because he shouldn’t have been a police officer. It was one woman.
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So
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what do you make though overall of January six? I mean, it was watching that footage. It was pretty disturbing, and we remember people throwing x for a minute, the walls, and it was, you know, it’s the capital. The most a lot like antique is actually a lot of the
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Except on a much smaller scale and look the same as the Blackbaud’s matter. Right?
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So, Robert, there is the complete, like, alternative view of January six. You were there. Could you possibly have imagined on January six, seeing what you saw, hearing what you heard, and eighteen months later hearing people say, oh, it wasn’t that bad. You know, basically, you know, Black Lives Matter and Tifa cops led me
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in. Yeah. I mean, I’m getting this sixth sense of deja vu listening to that. Because I’ve, you know, in my porting. I encountered people who would characterize everything just as as at least Jordan heard from that focus group.
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I did, you know, I I could have imagined what I saw, but none in the US, you know, maybe in other conflict zones. I’ve been in, like, Somalia or Libya. Or the Democratic Republic of Congo or Sudan. But not in the US, and you’re correct, Charlie. I certainly would not have guessed that this kind of on mass delusion would take place in which and you’ll notice in listening to that focus group how their how their rationales kind of migrate in a sort of zigzagging logic where It’s an ordinary tourist event, and people were allowed, and it was no big deal.
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But there was violence. But then violence, of course, had to be the work of n t for the no. N t for members have been arrested and charged. There are also, you know, the the belief that maybe the FBI set up peaceful protesters agitated them. Maybe this was crisis acting on the part of speaker Nancy Pelosi and others.
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And then, ultimately, that the people who are in the DC jail under indictment for January six related offenses are basically political prisoners. You know, this this is kind of like the twenty twenty election fraud thing where where you proceed from a basic belief that the election has been stolen and you and you throws a bowl spaghetti against the wall and and whatever sticks work. So, you know, that’s back when I started reporting, it was, you know, all of these dominion kinds of things. And then cyber ninjas was gonna uncover this in their Arizona audit. And when that failed to occur, the latest proof positive of elections after was denounced into Susan’s video documentary, yeah, two thousand mules, which also proved nothing.
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But simply because of its very existence, served as a kind of proof that something nefarious must have occurred. And and this is really a subset of of the larger delusion. I mean, the whole big
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lie about the election and about January sixth. I mean, it also applies to COVID, vaccines, pedophilia, and Tifa, all of this. Right? I mean, there’s just so much out there right now. Is there a connective tissue between all of that?
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Yeah, the connective tissue, I guess, two fold. I mean, one that America as these Trump supporters know it has been stolen away from them. And and that relatedly, there is an encompassing fraud that has been perpetrated on these Americans. And that fraud encompasses not just election fraud, but judicial fraud, medical fraud, media fraud, fraud of all types. And what this then requires is endless auditing, endless investigation.
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But in the meantime, while we’re getting to the bottom, of all of these instances of encompassing fraud, the truth is up for grabs, and the truth is whatever anybody says — Yeah. — is. And and this means now we’re in a state where Tellingly if perversely, former president Trump has created his own social media platform called truth social, where when he tweets out something that is called a truth, and we have members of the right wing media ecosystem with dubious names like one America network and real America’s voice. So has been an appropriation of the word and the notion of truth, and this has been enabled in many ways by saying that everything we intend to know to be true is false. Yes.
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Or well weeps. So what I I I don’t think we’re doing justice too is the granular nature of your porting. As as you as you described the scene on January sixth, I mean, there’s a lot of startling new details and a lot of characters in this. I want to just let people know that is just a hell of a story. Now, what I think is interesting is the way that you handle Trump and the relationship of Trump to these various characters into this larger phenomenon.
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Because you don’t treat Trump like he’s the puppet master of people like Marjorie Taylor Green, Paul Gossar or even Kevin McCarthy. They they have, like, developed that with their own momentum of awfulness.
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Sure. That’s right. Well, so so two different parts to that, Charlie. The first part is that Trump, you know, for all his authoritarian impulses, non nonetheless gives a lie to his own claim that I could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue and my people wouldn’t care. Actually, there is a truth to them.
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Maybe he could shoot someone and they wouldn’t care. But if he said, you know what? I actually want to appoint a couple of pro, Rovi waves, supreme court justices, that would be the end of his presidency. If he were to say, let’s do comprehensive immigration, reform where there was a path to citizenship, that would be the end. If if he ever made good on the discussion he’d had with senator Joe Manchin following one of the school shootings that we really need to do something about these terrible guns, that also would have been the end of his presidency.
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So he’s he recognizes the frailty of his power over his his constituents. And he is for them only so long as he sides with those particular issues. Okay. So that’s one thing. The two Polgosaur margetaler green and other avatars of the the maga movement.
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It’s certainly true that they have taken more than a page from Trump, but it’s also the case that in both the cases of Barbecue Taylor Green and Paul Gossar, that they’re more extreme than Trump, more shrill and what what they say and how they say it. And and particularly in Greens case, you know, someone who came out of nowhere as this Q and I obsessed affluent CrossFit gym co owner in in Georgia. To in spite of all of that, when a seat in congress and then one month into her tenure gets stripped of her committee assignments, where one might have figured that, well, that’s the end of Marjorie Taylor Green. She instead posted this monster first quarter financial report and since then, has outraised all the four of the two hundred and ten Republican members of the House. It’s an unheard of performance for a freshman, but that is only, like, one indicator of the level of influence that she has over the Republican Party.
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And, yes, it derives from her close association with Donald Trump. But most of all, it derives from her understanding of that base her ability to play to that bass and the recognition that as long as she is seen as the in house house warrior for the Magna based House leadership like Kevin McCarthy needs to placater? I mean,
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it it really also illustrates how the the center of gravity of power of influence in the Republican Party has shifted and because, I mean, she is a creature of that base as well. Right? I mean, That’s right. Right now, she doesn’t need to go to Kevin McCarthy to get the the source of her power. She knows that it’s that it is the ground up.
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It is the grassroots fundraising. It is, you know, the people who will rally around her. And that’s the political reality. So She’s a major character in your book. So is Paul Gossar?
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And and he do you tell some you know, for those of us that, you know, were exhausted by Paul Gossar, but you point out why we, you know, you cannot ignore him. You’re right, Paul Gossar responded to the horrific massacre of nineteen school children and two adults and you’ve all the text on May 24th, after first consulting the musings on a far right four chan message board. The shooter he concluded that day on Twitter was a transsexual leftist illegal alien, and everything in that claim was false. But as you point out, our leaders are highly unlikely anymore to be penalized for fact free statements. In fact, they’re far more likely to be rewarded for it.
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Yeah.
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I mean and and indeed GoSart was not penalized. He was, you know, in general extreme statements that are also fact free like that particular one by Golar’s. There is an incentive structure for making them in the form of online donations in the form of social media attention and in the form of being invited to appear at right wing events. But it’s also the case that Mcarthy recognizes that if he were to punish Gosar, all he’d managed to do is make a martyr out of him. So instead, when the democrats script Gossar of his committee assignments and centered him.
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McCarthy did a couple of things. First, he he warned Steny Hoyer of the House majority leader that there would be payback when the Republicans take back the majority if they do. In a form of Democrats being stripped of their committee assignments. In other words, I know that I believe what you did was wrong, so I’m going to do the same thing. Mhmm.
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And then and then the other thing is that McCarthy turned to Gosar and promised not only that when McCarthy would become speaker, that Ghosar would get committee assignments back, but that he would and this is an explicit thing that that McCarthy told Ghosar and told Marjorie Green, separately about her situation, you will get better assignments than before. So so they have actually been rewarded for their outrageous conduct.
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So you spoke with Marjorie Taylor Green. You talked to her about what she would expect to get from Kevin McCarthy. Yeah. Yeah. She said well, she said a few things.
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I mean, one of them is plumb committee assignments. She wants to be on oversight and on judiciary. Okay. And James And James right. Right.
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Yeah. Yeah. So and James comer, who’s likely to be the chair of House Oversight, has already said that he would welcome Marjorie Taylor Graham on his committee So there’s that. Also, she strongly expects, you know, and will push for the Republican majority to initiate impeachment inquiries against not only Biden, but several of his cabinet members. But she expected, you know, I think, you know, more broadly, Charlie, for McCarthy to be mindful of her policy objectives, which are quite out of the mainstream.
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And, you know, include, they’re not limited to you know, sealing off the border and prohibiting all immigration, legal or illegal — Oh. — for for four years. Christian
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government, prayer in schools.
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Yeah. Yeah. Right. All of that stuff and it’s and and because the argument that she made to me was, look, you know, I’ve told the Republicans in conference. I’ve told them this that when you guys controlled everything, twenty seventeen, twenty eighteen, you can get a damn thing done.
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Her her phraseology was you shit the bed. And then she said that, you know, it’s and that’s why I ran for Congress. You know, the the democrats were bad enough, but you guys just got rolled. And I’m not gonna let that happen now that I’m in Congress and I’m in a position of influence. So So she’s not only gonna get these, you know, plumb assignments and things of that nature, but that she fully intends to see her policy objectives enacted.
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And and if it requires an internal civil war within the Republican Party, she has said to me, I am here for that. I think she’s made
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that clear. You know, as you point out, we really haven’t paid as that much attention to the the the kinds of policy things that she’s been saying on a pretty, you know, on a pretty regular basis. And, you know, she, you know, she wants to ban abortion, she wants to eliminate all gun control, kill all climate change legislation put doctors in prison if they provide medical service to transgender youth. I am old enough to remember when Republicans would want to sideline or isolate someone like that. Instead, however, they are courting her.
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So J. D. Vance went out of his way to get her endorsement carried lake, went out of her way to get her endorsement. And so rather than sort of treat her as an outlier, the, you know, the mainstream of the party is saying, yeah, we we really need you and we’re not gonna push back against any
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of these ideas. Meanwhile, we we see some of the more rising stars, I guess, you could say, like, Cherry Lake. I mean, using the same kind of language that Margetailer Green has to suggest that the Democrats cuddle pedophiles and and want to place groomers in every schoolroom. I mean, the the notions that Green was promulgating from the outset, you know, and calling Democrats’ communists, for example, I mean, now you you know, the the NRCC has used this in its blast emails for fundraising purposes, you know, alluding to Pelosi being, you know, being basically communist friendly. And the notion of impeachment for Biden was something that she’d been pushing literally from the first day that Biden took office.
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And was greeted with eye rolls back then. Now you hear it all the time. So without in any way moderating her stances, they have become more central to the Republican Party’s rhetoric and policy objectives than seemed imaginable when she first came out of nowhere. You
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made a point on Twitter, you thought that was very, very interesting. Nancy Mace, who is a, you know, conservative congresswoman, who clearly despises Marjorie Taylor Green and has been in some pretty nasty fights with her. But but she uses her talking points now, doesn’t she?
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Right. She does. Yeah. And and those I mean, clearly, Mace is interested in getting out to her Mace in the first district of South Carolina. She needs them to be able to prevail and and, you know, a a pretty interesting, I’m not sure it’s a totally typed rice, but it’s, you know, it’s it’s it’s competitive.
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And and to get her base out, she’s she’s she’s she’s playing the pedophile card, you know, and and and talking about Democrats being soft on pedophilia and about protecting children. Very cute and on adjacent stuff. And quite ironic given that Nancy May absolutely loathe the margetela grain and the feeling is mutual and in fact Green told me for which I reported my book that she had in turn bad mouthed mace to Donald Trump who in turn then endorsed Mace’ primary opponent. So, you know, these two really can’t stand each other, but basically, here’s Nancy Mace taking a page out of Margetailer Green’s extremist playbook. So speaking of Cherry Lake, we just mentioned Cherry Lake in in passing here.
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You did an event
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with my colleague, Tim Miller, last week, And — Yeah. — and you both agreed that if Carrie Lake wins in November, that should be the odds on favorite to become Trump’s vice president unless Trump doesn’t run, in which case, You really think that Lake would be the odds on favorite to be the twenty twenty four GOP nominee. Has it really gone that far? That fact, when
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you’re talking about president Kerry Lake now? Sure. Sure. Yeah. We’re I mean, we’re talking about someone who is very, very gifted in front of the camera who possesses Donald Trump’s and Marjorie Taylor Green’s absolute shamelessness and who can articulate the most extreme messages and policy objectives, but really cal, members of the media, political opponents, etcetera.
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No. I think that she is the most polished politician, you know, political needle fight, certainly, that I’ve seen in a very, very long time. And and I frankly, you know, that I have always felt a bit skeptical about DeSantis as this rising star. I mean, you and I heard this about a guy, you know, pretty well Scott Walker. And and yeah.
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That that, you know, Walker just had it in the bag. I mean, he he was everything that conservatives wanted to see. But he was a crappy campaigner and, you know, I’m I’m not convinced of DeSantis. I mean, we’re seeing him with a Charlie Chris debate, you know, the other night. I mean, this guy is not polished, and I think that Carrie Lake would mop up the floor with him.
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So, yeah, I think that she is really a rising star, and it’s an interesting Right now, like, March or Taylor Green likes, like, a a great deal endorsed or a little campaign with her, etcetera. But it’ll be interesting to see if she does when and her star continues to rise, first of all, if Trump himself may be a bit concerned about that of being eclipsed by Carrie Lake. And secondly, whether Green will also see, like, as the VP competition that she’s very likely to be, and act accordingly. I mean, I will say this when green, that that’s far up. She she
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she
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only tends to, like, you know, go after people because she feels like a wrong person. She’s never seem to show any kind of jealousy towards a Matt and Gates or or anyone else who she thinks is in in their lane. It’s only when people have in her view wronged her. But that could change, you know, if Carrie Lake steals her thunder. Well, this is what’s
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so interesting because it’s always a dangerous moment for a political party when they have too much success, and it happens too quickly for some of these people. Because then, of course, those knives do come out. And I think it’s fascinating that you know, ability. Okay. So Kerry Lake versus Marjorie Taylor Green, are they gonna start to get jealous?
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What are they gonna think down in Mar a Lago here? Who’s gonna be dishing out the Aqua Research or DeSantis’ people gonna be putting up, you know, Apple Research on Kerry Lake. And and this is that’s why I think next year is going to be awfully interesting in Republican politics. Which leads me to speaker Kevin McCarthy. I honestly don’t know why he wants the job other than just sort of the muscle memory of you want power for the sake of power because that is going to be that’s gonna be a fucking circus.
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Howard Bauchner: Yeah.
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It’s it’s it’s, you know, not for nothing. Did Patrick McHenry who McArthur really wanted to run for majority of websites, I’m not gonna be a vote counter, you know, with this this this unheard of group of caps. I’d rather be Chairman of Financial Services. McCarthy on the other hand has coveted the speakers’ gavel for a very, very long time probably since he arrived and in DC. And, you know, someone close to him told me some time ago that, look, you know, McCarthy probably wouldn’t, you know, he’s not looking to be speaker of the house for eight years, you know, like like Nancy Pelosi or something.
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You might do it for a couple of years and then go on and make millions, you know, as a techie in Silicon Valley. But, you know, they never underestimate McArthur’s willingness to eat bowl full after bowl full of crap. And in fact, that’s literally, you know, a parable in the TV series, the wire that Patrick McHenry alerted McCarthy to basically about a mayor of Baltimore who literally asked to eat one bowl of shit after the election if that’s what the job is. And, you know, McCarthy has a capacity for doing that. Because, you know, he also in his own way possesses an absence of shame and is willing to do whatever it takes to maintain power.
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He’s no idea’s idea of a fearless leader. But I will say for McCarthy that that he’s he’s a good end fighter and he knows the inside game much better than say a Marjorie Taylor Green does. So, you know, the green may be able to use the Magna constituency to try and roll McCarthy But, I mean, in terms of McCarthy’s Machiavellian cunning, he already, you know, since has won the speakership, if if indeed they regain the majority, because Green and other members of the House Freedom Caucus don’t have anyone to put up against him. I mean, it’s either him or or or Nancy Pelosi again.
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You also zero in on the intellectual bankruptcy around McCarthy and and the the chapter that describes the House of Liz Cheney as fascinating minute first, Kevin McCarthy. I mean, Kevin McCarthy, you know, did a lot of flip flopping around in the beginning of twenty twenty one. Breaking with Trump and then running down to Mar a Lago, initially embracing Liz Cheney and then cutting or loose So tell tell tell me what happened there. How did that relationship
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go sour so fast? Yeah. I mean, that’s well, you know, I think it’s fair to say that McCarthy and Cheney have never been each other’s type. Mhmm. And that McCarthy always viewed Liz Cheney whereally as someone who it’s easy to forget this as recently as a couple of years ago was, you know, one of the absolute ascendant Republicans probably the most formidable woman in Republican politics.
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And someone for whom, the sky seeing the limit, speaker of the house, governor, president of the United States, vice president, any of these seem possible and McCarthy was well aware of that. And in fact, I I mentioned in the book that when McCarthy happened to be at some speaking event, and I think Chicago and and to questions from the audience that somebody asked about, you know, were there any other, like, Republican stars that that McCarthy could think of and and where he saw them going. He said, yeah, Liz Cheney should be a great secretary of defense. And and It was definitely McCarthy’s way of saying please don’t think of her speaker. But he he still saw it as best for his coalition, the McCarthy coalition to placate the establishment Republicans of whom Liz Cheney was a part and the Magna Republican, so who Martin Taylor Green was.
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But when push came to shove, so many conservatives bridal at how Cheney not only voted to impeach Trump from her position as conference chair and then made the announcement that she would do so again in our capacity as conference chair, but continued to denounce Trump and continued to say he had no place in their party. Then was an affront to so many Republicans that she ultimately lost a lot of her, you know, a lot of her standing within the conference. And McCarthy could see that and was just stepping on McCarthy’s message It was a constant distraction. He also felt in the February third two thousand twenty one special conference that was held to discuss whether or not to keep Cheney on as Republican conference chair that he had saved her bacon that day, that he had given the speech that saved the day. There is, by the way, no evidence that he flipped more than maybe one vote that day.
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But but that’s what McCarthy felt like. And he felt like Louis Cheney never never showed gratitude. Never was thankful. Instead, it was just a pain in the ass and and meanwhile, Cheney was disgusted by McCarthy going to Mar a Lago in late January to kiss the ring of Donald Trump. She thought that that was the moment at which the the party could have divested itself of Trump once and for all, and here’s McCarthy doing the opposite.
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So there was no love lost by the time that she was finally pushed out and now the two truly cannot disguise their loathing of each other.
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So let’s talk about the democrats. You know, you describe the somewhat fekless attempts by Democrats to push back against all of this madness. I guess because it is so much madness because you do feel like you’re taking crazy pills. Have the Democrats figured out how to deal with this new reality? I mean, it’s not that it feels like they’re playing completely different games.
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It’s completely different universes. Right.
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Right. I mean, it starts with, you know, one manner in which with which I sympathize with Democrats is that, you know, they like Republicans and like myself were inside the capital. Their lives were at risk that day on January the sixth. And that was in and of itself a traumatizing moment it’s easy to be re traumatized, not only when you go back to work on the same place where all that occurred, but also then go to work amongst Republicans who are in a state of denial about occurred or a state of revisionism about what had occurred. And and then you top that off with the fact that there are some Republicans who carry this kind of violence swagger to them talking, like, carrying firearms into the capital, using violent rhetoric and and and the democrats have been they’re frankly afraid a lot of them are of of the Republicans.
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On top of which, there are a lot of Democrats who just won’t do business with Republicans anymore. Or at least the Republicans who say that twenty twenty would stolen. They think that’s a, you know, a a corrosive lie to continue to promulgate and that disqualifies Republicans who do push that lie from being the kind of people that they wanna do business with. So there’s all of that, but I also think that, you know, the Democrats are look, they’re the party in power, so they have to answer for all of what’s taking place in America today, including inflation and other problems in the economy to mention Biden’s low approval ratings. And I think they have struggled to reckon with all of that while at the same time, you know, talking about the Republicans as a threat to democracy see.
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And I’m and I don’t you know, I think they’ve been frustrated that the average American is really, really concerned about economic issues and tends to view these first midterms into a president’s term as a referendum on the party in power. And, yeah, I think they’ve they’ve clearly struggled. And
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of course, we had the older story of all of the Republicans to rationalize why they can’t push back against this because, you know, you know, they may be weapons of mass delusion, but the voters support those weapons. And so you talk to many of them these famous anonymous Republicans who say that I can’t denounce them because then I’ll get primary at all, you know, it’ll, you know, I’ll go the way of Liz Cheney So And and if I did, I’d be replaced by somebody much worse like Matt Gates until you’ll be thanking me some day, Robert. Yeah. I can’t
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tell you how many I mean, you probably heard this a lot too early. Right? I mean, this you know, I I wish I had a dollar for every time. I did I’d be retiring this year and and and, you know, and there’s a certain you know, I can sympathize to a certain extent with that viewpoint. And particularly when it comes from someone like Peter Meyer, the freshman from Michigan who he didn’t sign on to spending all his time trying to lecture fellow Republicans say, a while trying to convince his constituents that the election was fair and not stolen.
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You know, that’s not why he wanted to come to Washington, and so he was desperate to turn the page on all this stuff. But the facts on the ground just made it very difficult to do that. And and I, you know, I guess, where I’ve had difficulty understanding these Republicans who who sort of mainstream Republicans who go to ground when the crazy talk, you know, ensues because they don’t wanna defy the crazy talk and risk of getting primary to defeat it is that so how how in your view then saying Republican, does the crazy go away? Yeah. Does it just really just, you know, does it just the wiggle of its own accord?
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I mean, that’s in theory that seems plausible. But for the fact that you’ve got tens of millions of people who believe all these lies that I cited earlier, principally among them that the election was stolen. And we now know the playbook that the different Republicans lose this or that election, they’re almost certain to challenge, you know, its fairness and and to alleged theft. And and they’ll have constituents who believe it. So washing out of the system, this kind of disinformation requires of, you know, sort of I mean, it may require a mass d programming, but in any event, the, you know, the the enabling in the meantime of it by simply just not talking about it or we’re still by saying, well, yeah, you know, people are concerned about our elections.
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You know, there’s a lot of people think something bad happened, and so I do, yeah, sure, audits. Why not? You know, is isn’t helped by things? Yeah. So, I mean, that does get to the question.
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How does this end?
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Is you you were on PBS the other day and said, you are are millions of people suddenly going to wake and stop believing the conspiracies. You know, it’s it’s just people become exhausted. I don’t know how it ends, but I I think, you know, again, one of the major takeaways I have from from your book is as you point out, the Republican Party doesn’t need Trump anymore. You know, we’re all focused on Donald Trump. What happens if Donald Trump doesn’t run or he’s indicted or eats too many big macs or whatever?
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Because he showed them a blueprint that they’re gonna run with that that you don’t have to get people who don’t like you to vote for you. Right? It’s easier to get people who like you to love you and then demonize the other side. Yeah. And then if you actually don’t win an election, you just claim that it was stolen.
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I mean, it’s a whole new ethos and you’re seeing talented, younger, Republicans running with it. That’s right. Yeah. Yeah.
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And it’s and and and you’re exactly right, Charlie, that that does not require any longer the assistance of Trump since he showed them the way and and and as as I mentioned before, we may very well be seeing Carrie Lake follow that path all the way to if she if she loses to down this rabbit hole of unfounded claims of election theft. That was there on her primary night when ballots were coming alight and there were some problems in one county with with with caring about since she immediately started saying what in the hell is going on and strongly alleging, you know, or strongly implying that that’s, you know, something malevolent was taking place here when it was nothing of the kind. And and so that’s one thing to be concerned about. But of course, the other thing to be concerned about is that when you are now just lying about the election and you are whipping up your base, but you’re also whipping them up and by demonizing the other side, simply saying they’re wrong or wrong headed or immoral, but that they are godless, that they are unpatriotic, that they are evil, that they are human scum, you know, describing them in the otherwise terms, then you really do run the risk of convincing your constituents that they are in the midst of a holy war.
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And and this is a holy war that at the moment is just has rhetoric as weapons. It’s not pleasant to have people call you and issue death threats and all that, but those are those are rhetorical, you know. Mhmm. Yeah. Mostly.
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That’s right. But we’ve certainly seen instances, January six being at present the hypothesis of these, of where actual physical violence broke out. And I really do fear that the continued use of this kind of rhetoric in a furtherance objectives as lame as, you know, rationing up their online donations with their social media influence. Could really lead to violent outcomes. Howard Bauchner: Yeah, I mean, that that’s
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the problem. You know, when you you weaponize what you call the politics of hysteria, You have no sense of shame. You’re weaponizing hysteria, and there are sometimes violent results. We shouldn’t be surprised by all of that. So I know you’ll probably get tired of this, but where does this end?
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What what is the boiling point? Because it strikes me that in this particular universe, you have to keep turning the temperature up. If it is a politics of Asterion outrage, you must always be outraged, you must always be hysterical. You never can allow people to go okay. Well, that was good enough.
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Now let’s move on. Let’s pause. Let’s be reasonable. Let’s be prudent. It always has to be increasing.
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Right? So as bad as it was before January six, it’s worse now. As bad as it is now, is it going to be worse six months from now? Yeah. I
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mean, as you describe it, Charlie, it it does sound like a flame so, you know, so craze that it might burn out, that, you know, kind of like the the wraps and the proverbial experiment who keep hitting the button that then gives them doses of cocaine that ultimately they’ll kill over dying. I hope that’s not what happens to America, but but it’s but I’m also not convinced that this just stops at its own accord, particularly when there’s now a whole cottage industry that supports that incentivizes this kind of crazy shrill and quasi apocalyptic talk. The only thing that comes to mind as to how this ends for the Republican Party is if these forces take power and do a miserable job of it to the extent that the public is revolted by it and finally turns the reins back over to the more sensible Republicans who say, okay, magical Republicans who’ve taken leave of their senses. We’ve done it your way. And now we’re all but finished as a party.
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We have sustained a succession. Election cycle losses, and now we’re gonna do it our way. But, I mean, it would require the broader support of the electorate. And I think that that comes only after failure. That’s the only thing that I can think of.
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I’m just saying that as an observation. I’m not saying it as a prescription or as a judgment. It’s but but at least as I contemplate the possibilities as to how we get out of this Adam Kinzinger was the one who, you know, first mentioned this me. So I just think we’re gonna need to lose a lot. Yeah.
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And once we lose a lot, then then, you know, the Republicans as a party will say, well, we’re about to cease to exist as a party. Unless we try something else, which requires coming to our senses. The problem is, of course, that losing
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a lot would have to take place over maybe three, four election cycles. So we’re gonna have to strap in. This isn’t going away anytime soon. Yeah. Because you’re right.
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I mean, the, you
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know, the the first election cycle, we already know what will happen while it was stolen. Know, we’re stolen and maybe they prevailed then and we have a constitutional crisis, but but they still prevail. And and then maybe they lose again and lie again. And again govern in confidently. You know, that’s so, you know, that there is the possibility, and I know that this is what Republicans have done in some, you know, in the cases Georgia with with the governor camp.
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Mhmm. And I think governor Ducey has tried to do this in in Arizona as well to promote these so called election reforms as a means of reinstilling confidence in the election system. And many of these supposed reforms address problems that didn’t exist at all. But at least, we’ll lend the appearance of restore, quote unquote, restoring election integrity. I think that that, you know, thus far, I’ve seen very little evidence that Republicans are buying it.
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They’re still, you know, we we know in our reports in Arizona, you know, people, you know, these vigilantes — Yeah. — who, you know, watching the drop boxes and we are wearing Kevlar and and so I I don’t that’s been, you know, one effort, but I’m not sure that that’s what’s gonna turn the trick. The
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book is weapons of mass delusion when the Republican Party lost its mind. It is an incredible riveting, urgent, immediate read Robert Draper, thank you so much for joining us on the podcast today. Thank you
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so much for having me on, Charlie. Appreciate it. The Bowler podcast is produced by
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Katie Cooper with audio production by Jonathan Seres. I’m Charlie Sykes. Thank you for listening to today’s Bulwark podcast, and we’ll be back tomorrow. Do this all over again. You’re worried about the
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