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1:22

What's

1:22

up, Mobile?

1:27

Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.

1:32

I'm Perry Bacon. I'm

1:34

Jon Lovett. I'm

1:36

Tommy Vitor. I'm Dan Pfeiffer.

1:41

We have an outstanding show for you tonight.

1:43

Your Congressman, Morgan McGarvey,

1:45

is here. Your State Senator, Karen Berg,

1:47

is here. And

1:51

we are so lucky to

1:54

be joined by Louisville native, Perry Bacon, also a columnist

1:56

at the Washington Post. Alright,

2:02

let's get to the news. I

2:06

believe we have breaking news here. Oh

2:09

wow, wow. Major

2:13

shake-up in the Republican primary. Former

2:16

Vice President Mike Pence has suspended his campaign

2:18

for presidents. His surprise announcement

2:21

came at the end of his speech

2:23

to the Republican Jewish Coalition. He

2:25

said, it's become clear to me

2:27

that it's not my time. And

2:30

he called on voters to give our country

2:32

a Republican standard bearer that will,

2:35

as Lincoln said, appeal to the better

2:37

dangers of our nature. Little dig

2:39

at Donald Trump,

2:40

who Pence will now go from running against

2:42

to testifying against in the January 6th trial. Too

2:45

endorsing. You

2:48

know what the Republican Jewish Coalition said to Mike

2:50

Pence after he dropped out?

2:52

Terrible in such small portions.

2:58

You know what I mean? How

3:01

do you guys think this bombshell will change the race?

3:04

Dan?

3:09

I don't think it will change the race. Who's

3:11

going to get the Pence endorsement, the vaunted Pence

3:13

endorsement? I think what will likely happen is 0.6%

3:17

support in the polls will be divided up evenly among

3:19

Nikki Haley, Rhonda Sands, and Tim Scott. I

3:22

think Doug Bergam is making a move. Alright,

3:26

let's talk about, that's enough of Mike Pence. That's

3:29

more time than Mike Pence's campaign deserves.

3:35

Let's talk about Mike Pence's spiritual

3:37

successor, Mike Johnson,

3:40

the new Speaker of the House. New

3:44

Speaker of the House who thinks Noah brought dinos

3:46

on the Ark.

3:48

That's not a joke. He

3:51

fought for tax breaks

3:53

for a park right here in Kentucky.

3:55

You guys know.

3:59

Have you anyone been to the Noah's Ark? No

4:03

with the dinos? I gotta say yeah,

4:06

you think the dino? No, I look

4:08

we can debate whether or not the dinosaurs were on

4:10

the Ark, but He

4:12

was right to fight for those tax breaks

4:15

That's right

4:18

I'm just saying the museum was accurate All

4:22

right

4:24

So Mike Johnson he finally sits

4:26

down for a hard-hitting interview with

4:28

Sean Hannity We

4:31

learned in the interview that

4:32

Johnson doesn't want to keep the government open unless

4:34

Republicans get some policy concessions though

4:36

They're still fighting with each other about what those are

4:39

on the menu are massive budget cuts

4:42

immigration restrictions a national

4:44

ban on mailing abortion pills Johnson

4:46

also admitted that he doesn't want to

4:48

expel George Santos because Republicans

4:51

can't afford to lose the seat

4:53

He said he wants to change the

4:55

motion to vacate which makes him

4:57

smarter than Kevin McCarthy And

5:00

he told us a little bit more about

5:02

who Mike Johnson is

5:04

Someone asked me today in the media and they said it's

5:06

curious people are curious What does Mike

5:08

Johnson think about any issue under the Sun?

5:10

I said well go pick up a Bible off

5:13

your shelf and read it That's that's my worldview.

5:15

That's what I believe comments you had made both

5:17

in writing and advocacy for this group

5:20

about Homosexuality calling

5:22

it sinful destructive and

5:26

not supporting gay marriage Quote

5:29

no clear right to sodomy in

5:31

the Constitution you have been getting

5:33

hammered on this Yeah, and I want to ask

5:35

you about it. I want to know exactly You

5:38

know where you stand some of these comments were 15

5:41

years ago. I don't even remember some of them Do

5:43

you see in

5:45

Joe Biden a?

5:47

Cognitive decline and

5:49

if so, is that a danger to the country? I

5:52

do I think most of us do that's

5:54

reality. It's just not a personal slight

5:56

to him if in fact all the evidence

5:59

leads to where We believe it will, that's

6:01

very likely impeachable offenses. You know, that's

6:04

listed as a cause for impeachment in the Constitution.

6:06

You know, bribery and other

6:08

high crimes and misdemeanors, bribery is listed there

6:10

and it looks and smells a lot

6:12

like that. And I think the evidence, we're going to

6:14

follow the truth where it leads. We're going to engage in due process

6:17

because again, we're the rule of law party.

6:19

I want to thank my dedicated wife of almost 25 years, Kelly. She

6:22

spent the last couple of weeks on her

6:24

knees in prayer to the Lord and

6:27

she's a little worn out. It's

6:29

Mike Johnson.

6:33

Perry,

6:38

what's your early take on the Mike Johnson era?

6:41

I mean, just, I know we're trying to keep it light, but

6:43

when I just, we lost

6:46

McCarthy and we have a less experienced,

6:49

dumber, way more radical

6:52

speaker in all honesty. I mean, this is a sign of

6:55

how bad things are. This guy,

6:57

obviously I had not heard much about Mike Johnson

6:59

two weeks ago, but I, and I

7:01

don't really know. All I've learned about him is

7:03

that he is significantly more conservative

7:06

than McCarthy who was no moderate and

7:09

terrible to job in a lot of ways. So things

7:11

are bad. And also he's doubled

7:13

down on impeachment particularly, which it seems like

7:16

I, McCarthy did not seem

7:18

that invested in and maybe, I mean, if you're doing any

7:20

of you with Sean Hannity, you probably can't downplay impeachment,

7:23

but that's it. It looks like all

7:25

the things that we were, you know, the,

7:27

there was a lot of chaos, but also we ended up with the speaker

7:30

is going to try to do the exact same things

7:32

that McCarthy was that Matt Gaetz once

7:35

a speaker who's even more in Trump's pocket.

7:38

Also, and yeah, and

7:40

James Comer just said the other day too,

7:42

that like he doesn't know if he wants to have another impeachment

7:45

hearing and he's the guy that was like leading the impeachment

7:47

charge. Mike Johnson is talking about doing impeachment

7:49

now because the first one went so well. Yeah.

7:53

So he wants a better impeachment trial. Tommy Johnson

7:56

also said in that Hannity interview that he

7:58

respects the Supreme Court's

7:59

Decision that legalized same-sex marriage and

8:02

that he thinks abortion should be left to the states

8:05

even though of course he has long supported National

8:08

bans on both abortion and

8:11

same-sex marriage. What do you make of his comments

8:13

to Hannity?

8:14

So you know look I think he

8:17

he presents. Well, right? He looks like

8:19

a Harry Potter's older brother like a Friendly

8:23

English teacher who doesn't teach evolution or

8:25

believe in it But like he seems like kind of a nice

8:27

guy, but to Perry's point that he's a super super

8:29

conservative lawmaker He's a sort of white

8:32

Christian nationalist He believes there is

8:34

no separation between church and state as he

8:36

said there the Bible is his worldview

8:39

So when he says that there

8:41

shouldn't be a national abortion ban should be left to the states I

8:43

don't think we should believe that at all. I think we should

8:46

we should treat that as a comment made With

8:49

political expediency in mind the

8:51

same way all of Donald Trump's Supreme

8:53

Court nominees said they respected precedent Right

8:56

that Roe v. Wade was settled law now I

8:58

mean he's a smart guy and maybe

9:01

he will not try to advance wildly

9:03

unpopular things like overturning gay marriage

9:05

or 15-week abortion

9:07

ban while he's the Speaker of the House

9:10

and Democrats control the Senate and Joe Biden is in the

9:12

White House because he Knows it'll go nowhere, but it will make

9:14

his

9:14

moderate members take really bad votes But

9:17

you know like a friendly look in ideologue

9:19

is still an ideologue. I think you someone really should worry

9:21

about Yeah,

9:23

well he

9:26

It's very recently that he sponsored

9:28

bills on national abortion bans

9:30

he refused to vote for codifying

9:33

gay marriage as legal he Introduced

9:37

the legislation to make Ron DeSantis's

9:40

don't say gay law a national law

9:43

and expand it from schools to public libraries hospitals

9:46

Military anywhere that gets federal funding from the

9:48

government, so he's pretty extreme it if he had

9:51

a majority he'd probably do that stuff

9:53

Yeah, I I think there's

9:55

there are Republicans who got

9:58

into politics for a bunch of different reasons

9:59

messy coalition, the Republicans

10:02

that do the evangelical

10:05

shtick, the anti-gay shtick, but

10:07

their mission in life is deregulation

10:11

and lowering taxes for corporations

10:13

and rich friends. This

10:15

person has a genuine motivation based

10:19

around Christian

10:21

nationalism. If you go back and look at the speeches

10:24

he was given when he was running for

10:26

Congress, if you look at his work as a lawyer

10:29

before he was a public official, it is all

10:32

around advocating for these hard right

10:35

socially conservative views. He

10:37

advocated not just against gay marriage but

10:40

against legalizing

10:42

gay relationships after the Supreme Court ruled

10:45

in Lawrence v. Texas that the sodomy

10:47

laws in Texas were unconstitutional.

10:49

He wrote several pieces where he

10:52

excoriated the Supreme Court, said

10:54

that there was no right to basically against

10:56

a right to privacy and explicitly

10:59

saying that states should have the right

11:01

to discriminate against same-sex

11:03

relationships versus heterosexual

11:06

relationships. That he explicitly believes

11:08

that a state can outlaw gay relationships

11:11

because there is an inherent good in

11:14

heterosexual relationships that doesn't exist for gay people.

11:16

That was his view for many many years and he can play

11:18

games here and say, oh I

11:21

don't even remember half of the things

11:23

I've advocated for but I don't really

11:26

take him at his word. I do think this brings

11:29

into sharp relief what a Republican

11:31

trifecta

11:32

in 2025 would look like. You

11:35

have Mike

11:36

Johnson with these incredibly retrograde

11:39

views on reproductive freedom,

11:42

sexual relationships, same-sex

11:44

marriage. You have Mitch McConnell

11:46

who has advocated for a federal abortion ban

11:49

who in the early part of the century is one of the leaders

11:51

in demonizing gay

11:53

people in order to win the 2004 election with a bunch

11:55

of trumped-up bullshit

11:58

about same-sex marriage. And then you have Donald Trump,

12:00

possibly in the White House, who we know

12:02

will go along with all of these things because that's what

12:04

he did the last time he was in office.

12:07

You can pretend like, oh, he's this guy from

12:09

Manhattan, but he immediately

12:11

did the ban on trans

12:13

people serving in the military. He had used

12:16

the ... Or at least allowed his staff to use the

12:18

administrative state to make access

12:21

to abortion that much more difficult. He appointed three

12:23

Supreme Court justices who overturned Roe v. Wade. This

12:27

is, I think, something we are going to have to make a

12:29

huge issue in 2024 because it

12:32

is what is on the ballot now because of Mike

12:35

Johnson.

12:38

So love it. Johnson's

12:40

first order of business this coming week is

12:43

dealing with some House Republicans from

12:45

New York who will force a

12:47

vote to expel George Santos. He's

12:50

still in Congress. Yeah,

12:53

all right. Marjorie Taylor Greene will

12:55

force a vote to censure Rashida Tlaib

12:57

for speaking outside the Capitol at a rally

12:59

of activists calling for a ceasefire in Gaza.

13:02

And Congresswoman Becca Balant will try

13:04

to force a vote censuring Marjorie Taylor Greene

13:07

for about 40 different actions

13:10

and statements, including

13:12

public appearances with white nationalists and comparing

13:15

vaccine requirements to Nazism. How

13:17

big of a deal are all these votes and do you think they go

13:19

anywhere? I don't think they're

13:22

a particularly big

13:22

deal. Mike Johnson has already

13:26

poured cold water on

13:28

the Santos one, which is hard for him to do

13:30

because he barely can get above the table.

13:34

It's the error of the short king and I'm loving it. I

13:36

was going to say, it's interesting your attack on Mike Johnson

13:38

is height. That's where you're going. Yeah, that's

13:41

all it is. Do we have a choice for your own height?

13:43

Actually I've looked, I could not find anywhere,

13:45

because he's so unknown, we don't yet have

13:48

publicly available height information. But

13:52

he has short king energy. Like

13:56

McHenry. And as does McHenry. So

13:59

that's exciting.

13:59

I think that's... It's,

14:03

you know, there's an Apollyon movie coming out.

14:05

Being short is happening.

14:08

It's very right now.

14:12

So I don't think the Santos thing is going

14:14

anywhere, especially because you need

14:17

two-thirds the

14:19

house to expel, so I don't

14:22

see that happening. But the... But, you know,

14:24

stranger things have happened. These other resolutions,

14:27

you know, Marjorie Taylor Greene's resolution, I think,

14:29

goes after Talib for things that actually

14:31

there would be a majority in the house to

14:33

vote against, but then goes

14:36

way too far and calls her an insurrectionist

14:38

for participating in this peaceful event. So, like,

14:40

you know, I think that there is actually... Talib

14:43

has received a lot of criticism from

14:46

Democrats and Republicans for some of her statements

14:48

around what is happening in Israel

14:50

and Gaza, but this goes well

14:53

beyond anything related

14:56

to that. And then this tit-for-tat

14:58

thing with a Marjorie Taylor Greene resolution. I

15:01

don't... I can't imagine Republicans going

15:03

along with that, but past,

15:06

don't pass, it doesn't matter, really is the

15:08

sideshow to what is ultimately facing

15:10

Mike Johnson as speaker, which is the same dynamic

15:13

that fell Kevin McCarthy, which

15:15

is if a bill

15:18

to keep the government open is going to pass, it's going

15:20

to have to be bipartisan by definition, and these

15:22

people find that anathema

15:24

to their, you

15:27

know, whole vibe.

15:30

I sort of feel like the whole censure

15:32

thing has gotten a little cheapened, like once they did

15:35

it to Adam Schiff for basically no reason,

15:37

now it's like, you're censured. No, you're censured. Well,

15:40

the other thing too is like the tit-for-tat censure thing,

15:42

it's like, I think that there are people, there are even

15:44

Republicans that don't particularly like Marjorie Taylor Greene, but

15:47

they're not going to vote for a... They're

15:49

not going to vote to censure Marjorie Taylor Greene to get back

15:51

at the Republicans for the Talib

15:53

thing. It's like, hey, can we just, can we all

15:55

just chill the fuck out? Can

15:57

you just keep the government open?

15:59

government open you have a fun day we

16:02

just fucking go ham on each other per

16:05

admission it'll be a chance to see how

16:08

many republicans vote to expel

16:10

and i think the swing district republicans don't

16:13

want to defend phantos because who does

16:15

he seems like he's ballad of ninety seven law

16:17

so i think there will be a ten

16:19

from the number of republicans vote for that there

16:23

is a divided on the democratic side about what's

16:25

happening in gaza and i'd i wonder if the

16:27

number is higher than zero people who will

16:29

be uh... the congressman new jersey for example

16:32

who i think might be open to uh...

16:34

century to leave so i think the number is probably low

16:36

but i think it'll be interesting to watch in terms of

16:38

the divide in these two parties i

16:41

do think they're like like for both of these

16:43

johnson gives republicans the talking point which

16:46

is we should have to do process play out and people can

16:48

hide behind that and then on the margaret

16:50

tehla green point you can

16:52

just say something along the lines of look i have

16:54

strong disagreements but the idea of calling

16:57

this anything like the insurrection on january six like both

16:59

sides have given the other side just an easy

17:02

out if you have a from this thing if you're a democrat

17:04

you can criticize rasheeda to leave and

17:06

not for centuries for centuries that's

17:09

a move uh... and i think on the centers

17:12

is interesting because i think that was i don't think i'll

17:14

get two-thirds but he'll get a much i think a majority

17:16

because we'll get all the democrats like you said looking

17:18

at every republican all over all the new york republicans

17:21

they i mean it was a new york republicans who

17:23

introduced a really good yeah which is

17:25

interesting uh...

17:27

more importantly government runs out of money in a few

17:29

weeks uh... we've now heard from

17:32

mike johnson and somehow

17:34

it's republicans on the issue how

17:36

likely do you think it is we're headed for a shutdown if

17:38

not november seventeenth

17:41

i think that's when the government's out of money like in

17:43

and another month or so

17:45

i think it's a question of when that is

17:47

i think there is a chance that you

17:51

want me to just come in and say mike johnson's gonna solve the problem

17:56

well once you get him a phone book to sit on I'm

18:05

five foot six and a half.

18:10

I think there is a chance

18:12

that Mike Johnson

18:14

could delay this into next year. Republicans

18:18

are tired. Everyone's exhausted. He did propose

18:20

in his nomination speech before

18:23

he became the speaker nominee that he

18:25

was advocating for a short term extension so

18:27

the Republicans could pass appropriations

18:29

bills so that they theoretically have some

18:32

negotiating position in a negotiation with the

18:34

White House and the Senate. They actually

18:36

passed a couple of those bills in the immediate aftermath

18:39

of Johnson winning. So

18:41

I think there's a chance that maybe we get through the holidays and

18:43

then we have this confrontation next year. But at some

18:46

point, it's going to come to a head because

18:48

Mike Johnson cannot stay speaker and

18:50

extend, keep the government open at current

18:53

levels or at the levels of Senate, Democrats and Republicans

18:55

want and keep saying his job. So

18:57

at some point, there's going to have to be a fight over this, going to have

18:59

to be a shutdown.

19:01

Yeah. And all these Republicans,

19:04

some of the ones that I was doing McCarthy in the first place and

19:06

some other Freedom Caucus types, they want these

19:08

massive cuts. They don't like the

19:10

bipartisan budget deal that

19:12

McCarthy struck with Biden. And

19:15

so they're which already offered

19:17

some cuts. So they're already annoyed about that. They're

19:20

going to ask for more. And like,

19:22

I don't know, I don't know how Johnson

19:24

gets a bill through the House, even if he wanted to, that

19:27

doesn't have a bunch of cuts. But then the Senate and

19:29

the White House immediately rejects. I guess the question

19:31

is whether there's any appetite, even among

19:33

someone like Matt Gaetz to

19:36

go through the whole motion of a process again.

19:38

Yeah. Well, that's they might change the threshold

19:41

to to make it harder. Right. And

19:43

then also, there's the they can

19:45

kick this can down the road. One thing Mike Johnson is promising

19:47

is that they'll go to rather than sort of these omnibus

19:50

bills, but they'll go to kind of whatever department by department

19:52

budgeting, like the kind of the thing that the sort of the

19:54

Republicans in the House claim they want that actually Republicans

19:57

and Democrats have been doing together in the Senate, despite

19:59

what

19:59

been happening in the house, but even then you

20:02

lead to sort of, even if that were to take place, it's sort

20:04

of the promise of mini shutdowns or

20:06

sort of smaller versions of this fight over

20:08

and over again.

20:09

Another thing he's going to have to contend with, Tommy, the president

20:11

wants the speaker to pass a hundred billion

20:14

dollar aid package, most of it for

20:16

Ukraine, but also for Taiwan, Israel,

20:18

and some humanitarian aid for the Palestinians. What

20:21

have you taken from Johnson's comments on

20:23

those issues?

20:24

So the Hannity interview was interesting

20:27

and sort of a departure from where he's been before.

20:29

He told Hannity that he basically

20:32

has written a 14 and a half billion

20:34

dollar bill

20:35

that would be basically military aid for

20:37

Israel. And it sounds like that's ready to go. They'll

20:40

pass that. They'll send it over to the Senate side. I

20:42

don't know what the Senate folks will do about it. I don't know if

20:44

they're not going to want to divide the Ukraine

20:47

support and the Israel support necessarily yet,

20:49

but that'll get passed and that'll happen. The

20:51

Biden request for aid for the Palestinians

20:54

is much, much, much less money. It's a

20:56

hundred million dollars as opposed to

20:58

tens of billions of dollars. Unfortunately,

21:00

he and Hannity in that conversation

21:02

immediately started demagoguing that money, suggesting that

21:04

it would go to

21:05

terrorists and not to people who

21:08

are in week three of getting

21:11

shelled relentlessly and living in a

21:14

nightmare scenario. So I have less hope there.

21:17

On the Ukraine funding in the past, Johnson

21:19

has voted against support for Ukraine. In

21:22

this interview, he said, you know, we're not

21:24

going to leave

21:26

the Ukrainians hanging. We can't let Putin

21:28

prevail. So it sounds like he's willing

21:31

to allow a vote on a stand-alone Ukraine bill.

21:33

Will it be the amount that Biden wants? We don't

21:35

know. Could his caucus sort of upended

21:38

somehow,

21:38

I guess probably. But, you know, he

21:40

the things he was saying were better than where

21:42

he's been in the past. And then in terms of Taiwan,

21:45

that's a little harder to like divine. I

21:47

mean, I think the one thing that unites Democrats and

21:49

Republicans in Washington right now is

21:52

fear mongering about China

21:54

and especially for the sort of like far

21:56

right evangelical Christians. They're

21:58

particularly worried about like the. godless communists

22:01

taking over the world. So I suspect that

22:03

he will be in favor. Those are their words

22:05

on mine. I suspect he'll be in favor

22:07

of

22:08

support for Taiwan to help them kind of harden.

22:11

It's just like porcupine strategy things or get

22:14

all the weapons and things they need into Taiwan

22:16

before a Chinese invasion that

22:19

everyone thinks is going to happen at some point. So I

22:21

bet he will get there on the China

22:23

support, but you know,

22:24

it also remains to be seen. I have a speech

22:27

today where he said that across

22:30

our southern border with Mexico, there

22:32

are young, strong Chinese men coming

22:34

over the border. She said it's

22:36

Chinese men. Very strong, very young,

22:38

very buff, very virulent, coming

22:41

over the border. I'd be like, what? Love it.

22:43

Can you confirm?

22:51

Every

22:54

once in a while, Republican will just kind of

22:57

look, remember when what that guy, Steve

22:59

King was like, they're coming across the border

23:01

with calves the size of cantaloupes. It's like

23:04

they can't help but paint a vivid picture

23:06

of these just sort of rippling muscles

23:10

swimming over the Rio Grande to get into

23:13

the country. And Trump did produce Broadway

23:15

musicals or at least

23:17

he wanted to. So something to think about.

23:19

Last question

23:21

on Mike Johnson for everyone. Perry, do

23:23

you think

23:24

Democrats should make Mike Johnson famous? Like,

23:26

should he be a central figure in the 2024 campaign?

23:29

You know, I was thinking about this this morning and because

23:31

you all asked me about this and I it's

23:34

hard to raise the profile

23:36

of the speaker on some level. Like Pelosi was famous

23:38

in part because she was a woman from San Francisco.

23:41

I don't think that John Boehner was well

23:43

known by the average voter. But I think

23:45

I'm more convinced by what Dan said, which is like

23:47

you now have Johnson does

23:49

fit the kind of magga ultra

23:52

magga ultra ultra magga way

23:55

thing in a way that McCarthy really did McCarthy

23:57

at least seemed moderate in his persona.

24:00

on some level versus Johnson

24:02

has said every conservative

24:04

thing possible on every issue including

24:06

on the sort of cultural, anti-gay,

24:09

so I think in that way

24:12

it would make sense to sort of not maybe not necessarily

24:14

talk about Mike Johnson but talk about the idea

24:16

that the Republican Party is

24:19

going to be very radical if

24:21

it wins the if it wins the House, wins

24:23

the presidency and it sort of makes it easier

24:25

to Trumpify and to describe

24:27

the Republican Party in a sort of universal way. Just

24:29

think

24:29

about this as the most powerful

24:32

elected Republicans in the country wants to

24:34

ban abortion, ban gay marriage,

24:37

ban gay sex, does not believe

24:39

in evolution. All

24:41

across the board that is a very

24:44

people don't won't fully get that. He believes in evolution

24:46

he just thinks it happens in six days. And

24:50

again, again, dinos

24:52

on the ark.

24:54

Plus all the food they'd have to eat. And

24:56

where do they poop? Well here's something I've

24:58

never quite understood. What kind of dinosaurs were they?

25:01

What? Were they the little ones? The compies? So

25:03

having

25:04

looked at the actual... There were their raptors

25:06

on the other day. They have a whole, there's

25:08

a whole, listen, there's a whole like, you

25:10

know, what was it called? When

25:13

they wanted the earth to be the center of the universe they had the kind

25:15

of, they had the different circles

25:18

to keep complicated circles to explain

25:20

the more complicated circles because it didn't work. And

25:23

so they have like a complicated philosophy around

25:26

not different kind, like Tyrannosaurid

25:28

nids. Like there were there were dinosaur

25:30

families that were on the ark as represented

25:33

by certain kinds of dinosaurs. Here's

25:35

what I've never understood. I don't care what's

25:37

on that ark. When they get off the ark,

25:40

did a tiger not want to eat one chicken?

25:42

Because if that tiger ate one chicken, no chicken.

25:45

Dunzo. You know what I'm saying?

25:47

Like what did they eat for the first couple weeks?

25:50

What did the predators eat when

25:52

they got off the ark for the first couple weeks?

25:54

Or years? Takes years to make

25:57

new prey. Also what happened?

25:59

ultimately happen to the dinosaurs in this scenario.

26:02

Was it a double-decker arc? I

26:05

was just saying, the F-ed-o

26:07

deck, the F-ed-o deck, the Fiesta

26:10

deck.

26:12

Anyway,

26:15

I would just run the Mike Johnson,

26:18

Noah's Ark stuff. That'd

26:20

be my thing. I like it. Bring people in with that,

26:22

then talk about all those positions. All right, when

26:25

we come back, I'll talk to Kentucky

26:27

State Senator, Karen Burke. We've

26:30

transformed conflict into positive change.

26:39

We've united passion with purpose and helped turn discovery

26:42

into life times of learning. Kent

26:44

State embraces diversity

26:46

and welcomes all. With

26:48

respect, kindness and purpose in all we

26:50

do, these values guide us to

26:53

the future. With

26:55

respect, kindness and purpose in

26:57

all we do, these values guide

26:59

us

27:00

as we serve and support our mission and

27:02

the people we value most, our

27:04

students. Find your beginning

27:07

at Kent State University.

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28:16

Please welcome

28:19

the Democrat who represents the

28:21

26th District here in Louisville, State

28:24

Senator Karen Berg.

28:29

Hi

28:34

there. Hello, hello. Thank

28:43

you for being with us tonight. We are

28:45

honored to have you on the show. Well,

28:47

thank you

28:47

very much for inviting me. I really

28:50

appreciate it. So

28:52

you first won this seat back

28:54

in 2020 when the

28:56

district at the time was much more conservative.

28:59

You are now just one of seven

29:02

Democrats in the state Senate?

29:03

I think we're down to

29:04

six. Are you down to six? Okay, six. Do

29:07

you have any advice for

29:09

all the progressives in the red states

29:12

who are always asking us how

29:14

they can elect Democrats like you and

29:16

turn their states a little bluer?

29:19

Oh, okay. Yeah, I have

29:21

a lot of advice in that in that

29:23

regard. First of all, vote.

29:25

Vote

29:28

like it freaking matters

29:32

because guys, it actually does.

29:34

It actually matters

29:36

whether or not you vote.

29:38

And here in the state of Kentucky, we

29:41

have a real serious

29:43

problem with turnout. If we get 32%

29:46

of the electorate

29:49

to get out and vote,

29:50

we think we have done

29:52

a good job with

29:54

turnout. And that is really

29:57

the problem because people

29:59

on the... the right. I

30:01

promise you guys,

30:03

they are voting. They

30:06

are

30:06

voting. Life depends

30:09

on it because they think it does.

30:12

And then the rest of us who like would

30:14

prefer to go around

30:16

and not have to deal with this stuff. You

30:18

know, just go through your day to day life and

30:20

let's be normal people and let's not have to

30:22

worry about politics.

30:24

And then they don't vote. And

30:26

then all of a sudden you look up and we have really

30:29

bad

30:30

people elected in this

30:32

country.

30:39

Vote.

30:41

Vote. And the other thing I can tell you guys,

30:45

run for office.

30:47

I know that sounds like

30:50

such pie in the sky, but

30:53

it actually isn't.

30:55

What John Yarmuth told me years

30:57

ago is first of all, the closer

31:00

to home your seat is, the

31:02

more impact you will have on the people

31:04

around you, which means running

31:07

for school board, running for Metro government,

31:09

running for your local mayor, running

31:12

for elections

31:14

close to home, and then

31:17

running like I

31:19

did. Just put your name on

31:22

the ballot, guys. Get

31:24

out there, shake hands, tell

31:27

people that you care, ask

31:29

them to vote for you and they will.

31:31

And that is the truth. So vote

31:34

and run. Those are

31:36

the things that I have to

31:38

say.

31:42

You have been outspoken about

31:45

losing your son Henry. He

31:47

was a transgender rights

31:49

advocate who tragically

31:51

passed away by suicide last

31:54

December at the age of 24. I read

31:57

that he was the person who inspired

31:59

you to run.

32:00

What was he like?

32:02

Oh wow, what was Henry like? Henry was

32:05

a handful. Henry

32:08

had a heart. He

32:11

had too much of a heart. He was

32:13

one of these people that if he saw somebody

32:15

in a room who looked like they

32:17

didn't feel comfortable,

32:19

he would immediately go

32:21

up and he would immediately introduce

32:23

them to people and sit with

32:26

them and ask them who you are, what

32:28

do you care about, because he could

32:31

tell so intuitively

32:34

when somebody didn't feel

32:37

like they fit into the space they were

32:39

in. And that's because for so

32:41

long in his life,

32:43

he had felt that

32:45

way and he didn't want

32:48

other people to go through that.

32:50

My son was

32:54

big hearted,

32:55

big hearted, soft hearted. He

32:58

cared about this world

33:00

and he cared about making this a better place.

33:11

So Henry came out in 2012

33:14

at the age of 14. How did

33:16

the other kids and teachers

33:18

react and how did you and Henry handle

33:20

that experience?

33:22

Guys, this is a long, long,

33:24

long story. And

33:25

it depends on

33:28

the day,

33:28

it depends on the person, it depends on the situation.

33:31

For the most part, when my child came out

33:33

at the age of 14, he was

33:36

the first kid in his school who

33:38

had ever come out

33:40

as transgender. The school had never

33:43

had a child in that position before. And honestly,

33:46

we had

33:47

at the time

33:49

very few,

33:51

if any,

33:53

children in his class who were willing to

33:55

be openly gay either.

34:02

He came out to his classmates,

34:04

to his teachers, a couple weeks later to

34:06

me and my husband. Henry

34:13

honestly thought

34:17

that

34:21

he had gone to the same school

34:23

from kindergarten through 12th grade.

34:26

This was the beginning of 9th grade. And

34:29

he

34:29

honestly thought that once he told his classmates

34:31

and his teachers who he really

34:34

was, that

34:36

things would sort of just magically

34:38

fit into place. And people

34:41

would understand sort of

34:43

why it was that he had never really fit

34:46

in in the first

34:48

place. And that's

34:50

not what happened. Unfortunately, Henry's

34:56

first suicide attempt was

34:58

December of that year. He came out in September. December

35:02

of that year. And what he told my husband

35:04

and I at the time is that he

35:06

thought when he came out that things

35:09

would fit into place and instead

35:12

it just made it that much worse.

35:15

That he could no longer hang with the girls,

35:18

that the boys wouldn't have anything to do with them.

35:21

He had nobody to sit

35:23

with, nobody to talk to. And

35:27

he was very, very

35:30

lonely.

35:33

Some

35:35

of your Republican colleagues have

35:38

said kind words about Henry, have said they've learned

35:40

from you, but they keep voting

35:43

for these anti-trans bills. It

35:45

seems like their minds aren't changing. But

35:47

I imagine that there are parents out there who

35:50

maybe don't know any trans people and

35:52

they hear these Republicans saying that

35:54

all they're doing is trying to protect kids and

35:57

maybe they aren't sure what to believe. What

36:00

would you say to those parents?

36:06

It's a long

36:07

story. And it's

36:09

not actually a very pretty

36:11

story. It's a story about

36:13

politics. And

36:18

I may be a politician at this point, but I never

36:20

considered myself a politician.

36:22

I'm a doctor by training, and a

36:25

mother. That's how I

36:27

identify. But

36:32

really, what happened with this trans

36:36

youth movement was

36:39

that the right

36:42

and the certain organizations

36:45

on the right, like groups like the Alliance

36:47

Defending Freedom, which if

36:49

you all don't know about the Alliance Defending

36:52

Freedom, I think the New Yorker just

36:54

did an article on them last week. Mike

36:56

Johnson worked for them. Yeah,

36:59

Mike Johnson is them. That

37:01

is who we have now elected as

37:04

Speaker of the House. He

37:06

comes from a right

37:10

Christian nationalist

37:12

ideology that really

37:15

believes, believes

37:19

that homosexuality is ungodly

37:23

and is a sin. But

37:25

since they were losing politically

37:29

on gay marriage and homosexuality,

37:32

and they were losing politically

37:34

on abortion and a woman's

37:36

right to choose, but

37:38

what they found out about five, six

37:41

years ago was that this

37:43

issue about trans athletes

37:47

polled well. It

37:50

was polling at 70%. And

37:53

so they went with it because

37:56

they thought this was

37:59

their right. winning political

38:02

issue. Never mind that

38:04

they were attacking children. Never mind that

38:07

they were taking rights away

38:09

from parents to

38:11

decide their own child's

38:14

health care. Never mind that

38:16

they are literally invading

38:19

the most personal

38:21

of spaces that belong

38:24

between a patient and their family

38:27

and their physicians. They didn't

38:29

care what they were doing because if

38:32

this polled well

38:34

this was going to be their message.

38:36

And so we got I mean literally they

38:40

hooked up with physicians

38:44

who left standardized

38:46

medicine back in 2002. 2002 when the American

38:52

Academy of Pediatrics decided

38:55

that it was okay for

38:57

a gay couple to raise a child

39:01

these physicians broke off because they

39:03

felt that the homosexual lifestyle

39:05

was a moral

39:09

basis that they could not

39:12

under any circumstances accept. Some

39:17

basic ethical morality so

39:19

they broke off there's about four

39:21

or five hundred of them they have gone

39:23

around funded by the Alliance Defending

39:25

Freedom literally to

39:28

now like 30 state houses

39:30

in this country. It is quack

39:33

medicine. It is being supported

39:35

by Christian nationalists

39:39

who do not guys believe

39:42

in democracy the way we know

39:44

it. I point blank

39:46

asked a House representative

39:49

who sponsored House Bill 470

39:52

this last session. House Bill 470

39:55

in its face would have

39:57

any health

39:59

care provider.

39:59

who offered any

40:02

sort of affirmation

40:05

to a trans child, mental

40:07

health, physical health, any healthcare

40:09

provider whatsoever, automatic

40:12

revocation of your license,

40:14

automatic and permanent

40:16

revocation of your license for just

40:18

being reported that

40:21

you acknowledged a trans

40:23

child existed.

40:26

Existed.

40:28

And I went to her.

40:31

And I said, you know,

40:35

do you believe, do

40:38

you believe this? Do

40:40

you actually

40:42

believe

40:44

in separation of church and state?

40:48

And her answer to me was under

40:51

the appropriate circumstances.

40:57

And then she tells me that we don't

40:59

like these people

40:59

that testified because

41:02

they're Christian. And

41:05

I'm like, honey, 97% of the people in this

41:07

country are Christian. Being

41:10

Christian is not an

41:12

ideology that says that you have the right to be a Christian.

41:16

Being

41:18

Christian is

41:20

not an ideology

41:22

that says that you have the

41:24

right

41:25

to pass laws

41:27

to make normal

41:30

healthcare delivery illegal

41:33

because you're, you know, make sure that

41:36

the base that you're playing to

41:39

likes this.

41:49

You hear them

41:50

say that it's about parents' rights, but

41:52

I know that you introduced an amendment

41:55

to a bill that was in the legislature

41:58

where they... you

42:00

know, if a child wanted to be called

42:02

by certain pronouns, they said the teacher,

42:04

the bill would say the teacher doesn't have to call them by

42:07

those pronouns. And you added an amendment,

42:09

I believe, that said, well, they do

42:11

if the parents

42:13

say that they are correct. With a

42:15

note from a health care provider that

42:17

this was important to the child. And they wouldn't

42:19

vote for that. They wouldn't do that. No, actually, guys,

42:21

there are

42:24

good studies, good data, that

42:27

shows if a trans child

42:30

is affirmed in

42:33

one setting,

42:34

either at home, at school,

42:37

at church, one setting,

42:41

it can actually decrease

42:44

their lifetime risk of

42:46

suicide by up to 70%.

42:50

And what's interesting about

42:52

this data is

42:55

that it has to be

42:57

authority. It has to be school.

43:00

It has to be work. It has to be church.

43:03

Having your friends affirm you

43:05

doesn't offer the same immunity

43:09

from suicidality as

43:11

having somebody,

43:13

these children want to belong.

43:16

These children want to fit in.

43:20

So SB 150, which was this bill

43:23

that Max Wise

43:23

brought forward that basically

43:26

said teachers don't have to

43:29

use a child's preferred pronouns.

43:32

What that does is

43:34

go to the absolute

43:37

heart of that child's

43:41

identity and that

43:43

child's struggle to

43:45

belong and to fit in. It

43:48

is, in my opinion, simply

43:51

the

43:52

cruelest, cruelest

43:55

thing that you could do, much less

43:57

make it legal to do.

43:59

Yeah, and your point that

44:02

Henry and transgender kids

44:04

everywhere just want to belong, I think it's so

44:06

powerful because the

44:09

right is trying to let

44:11

people think that if there is

44:13

this culture that allows

44:16

kids to identify as transgender

44:18

and be protected and stuff like that, then kids

44:20

are just going to choose this. And

44:23

the spacecraft went on our

44:25

airways and said

44:27

twice,

44:29

I will eliminate

44:31

transgender from the

44:34

classroom.

44:35

Like, what does she mean? You're

44:38

going to take these children, first of all, being

44:40

transgender guys is not contagious.

44:43

I promise you, it is not

44:45

contagious, nor for

44:48

the most part is it something that's a phase.

44:51

Yes, there are tomboys.

44:53

Yes, there

44:56

are

44:56

girly boys.

44:58

Sometimes you grow out of it. Sometimes

45:01

you don't. But these are not

45:03

the children that are coming to their parents

45:06

and saying, I feel

45:08

inside, like

45:11

my gender is this.

45:14

It's a whole different

45:15

world. It's a very,

45:19

very small

45:19

percentage of the population.

45:22

It is not growing. People think

45:25

that because we're allowing these children

45:27

to express themselves, that somehow

45:30

we're promoting this. We

45:32

are not promoting this. The reason

45:34

that you see and you

45:36

hear more now about

45:38

transgender children than you did 10 years

45:41

ago, 15 years ago, the best analogy

45:44

I can give you is the same

45:46

thing that happened in the early

45:48

50s when we quit requiring

45:51

children to use their

45:53

right hands. The

45:56

number of left handed

45:58

students increased. increased exponentially

46:01

and

46:02

then leveled out. And

46:04

it's not that we were promoting them,

46:07

not that we were, it's

46:09

that they were already there, they

46:11

already existed, guys, and

46:14

we were letting them exist.

46:23

My last question, Senator Byrd, you've

46:26

had an unimaginably heart year.

46:28

You serve in an extremely

46:30

right-wing legislature, but you

46:32

are still here and

46:35

fighting as hard as you can every single

46:37

day. What

46:39

keeps you going?

46:44

Honestly, what keeps me going,

46:46

and this is the truth,

46:48

I believe in the goodness

46:51

of people.

46:52

I do.

46:54

Well,

46:58

I'm very glad that you're here and still fighting,

47:01

so thank you, and thank you for joining us. Thank

47:03

you. Dave

47:04

Senator Taron Byrd.

47:20

I still think the left hand is the devil's hand. You

47:25

should have been forced to use your right hand. Outrageous.

47:32

All right, back to the news.

47:34

So before we get to the 2024 campaign, you

47:37

guys have a big election here in Kentucky on November

47:39

7th. Just

47:41

one week from Tuesday, your

47:44

governor, Democrat Andy Beshear,

47:46

is at

47:50

least in the polls we've seen polling ahead of

47:52

his Republican challenger, Attorney General Barr. It's a race

47:54

where a lot of

47:57

the and

48:00

a lot of the debates have focused on the issue of abortion.

48:03

Cameron has long supported the state's current

48:05

ban, which makes no exceptions for

48:07

rape or incest. Though

48:10

he now says if the Republican legislature

48:12

sent him a bill adding those exceptions, he'd

48:14

sign it. Bashir

48:16

has vetoed abortion bans as governor.

48:24

Harry, there aren't too

48:26

many democratic governors left in solidly

48:28

red states like Kentucky. What

48:31

is Andy Bashir's secrets, and

48:33

why do you think Cameron has been

48:35

trailing him in the polls?

48:37

So I'll start, because I used to work at FiveThirtyEight with

48:39

the data website, with a very

48:41

sort of structural analysis, which is that the

48:44

last four presidents have mostly

48:46

been unpopular, like Bush is very

48:48

unpopular most of the time. Obama had some moments

48:51

of popularity, but up and down, Trump

48:53

very unpopular, Biden pretty unpopular, unfortunately.

48:56

But governors, for whatever reason, people

48:58

like their governor. The average governor's

49:01

approval rating is 57%. So

49:04

Andy Bashir is at 62 or 63, so

49:07

he's doing better than average. And

49:10

that's good for him, but I think people like

49:12

their governor, and I've been trying to figure out

49:14

exactly why, because some of the governors suck.

49:17

And the second point is, Bashir is a great last name to

49:19

have here in Kentucky. His

49:25

father was a two-term governor, a very effective

49:28

two-term governor, famously

49:30

sort of expanded Medicaid and was invited to the

49:32

State of the Union address when Obama was president. So

49:35

those are the two factors that have nothing to do with kind

49:37

of Andy Bashir, who his dad

49:39

was, and kind of that he's an incumbent governor. But

49:41

there are two things he's doing right, and

49:44

the first is he's good at the kind of, I feel

49:46

your pain kind of dynamic of he's good.

49:49

He's very empathetic, like if you watched

49:51

his press conferences during the pandemic, and

49:53

I know people here probably did, he was

49:55

just great at seeming genuine and

49:57

like he cared, like he wasn't like every other

49:59

person. politician when there's been flooding

50:02

or tornadoes or other things that have happened a mass

50:04

shooting here. He's always there, he

50:06

connects. If you talk to him, he's

50:08

you know either he's very good at faking

50:11

sincerity or he's very sincere I hope a

50:13

second, but he comes off well he just and

50:15

Daniel Cameron does not come off that way I don't think

50:17

so there's a sincerity factor that matters. And

50:19

another thing I would say about Bashir is as somebody who's pretty

50:23

progressive, I'll vote for Joe Biden.

50:25

There's been some great days with Joe Biden as

50:27

president. There are some days that I've not been as

50:29

thrilled, let's put it politely, but

50:33

with Andy Bashir he's rarely does things

50:35

that I disagree with I'm guessing it's

50:37

probably not gonna help his campaign that I'm

50:39

saying it that way but that's it

50:42

he's you know Kentucky's a conservative

50:45

state but he vetoes abortion laws

50:47

he vetoes terrible anti-trans laws

50:49

he doesn't do a lot of like punching

50:52

the left to show how moderate he's

50:54

not a joke like people call me about Andy Bashir I

50:56

have to tell them this is not a Joe Manchin

50:59

type this is a person who believes in the

51:01

right values and does the right things and

51:03

has been a governor I'll be very excited to vote for it. That's

51:05

great. That's good to know.

51:10

So Dan, abortion has been central

51:12

to this race. We'll be in Ohio tomorrow

51:14

where abortion rights will literally be on the ballot.

51:17

Do you think the results from these 2023

51:20

elections can tell us anything about

51:22

how big of an issue abortion will be in 2024 or

51:25

is it just is it hard to draw conclusions

51:27

from non presidential elections? I think

51:29

it's hard to draw conclusions from not presidential

51:32

elections like for example talking about Ohio

51:35

in 2022 the turnout in

51:37

Ohio was 4.2 million

51:39

in 2020 it was almost 6 million

51:42

so like that there's a huge gap there's a huge

51:44

difference between

51:46

midterm elections and general

51:48

elections here in Kentucky turnout

51:50

was about 20% higher in 2020 than it was in 2019 when

51:53

Bashir I but I think that there

51:56

it tells us a couple things that are informative

51:59

if not instructive. The first is

52:02

how salient abortion remains

52:05

more than a year after Roe. Like it makes

52:07

sense that abortion was top of mind in

52:09

November of 2022, only five months

52:12

after the Supreme

52:13

Court overturned Roe.

52:15

It was interesting that it did so well

52:17

that abortion was so powerful in the first Ohio

52:19

special election a few months ago. Will

52:22

it remain that way? Really interesting. But I do

52:24

think there is a powerful powerful symbolism

52:27

if Andy Bashir wins because here

52:29

you have the governor of Kentucky,

52:32

one of the most Republican states

52:34

by presidential choice in the country. The states that

52:36

Donald Trump wins by more than anywhere else running

52:39

on abortion. His first ad about

52:41

abortion in vetoing

52:43

anti-abortion bills in

52:45

debates fighting aggressively

52:48

against abortion bans. I think that should send a powerful

52:50

symbol to every Democrat all

52:52

across the country that abortion is not a blue state issue.

52:55

It's not a purple state issue. It's an issue that Democrats will

52:57

run on everywhere in the country.

53:00

Just

53:02

underscore in Kentucky.

53:05

I'll be honest with you when Bashir's staff came

53:07

out one of their abortion ads. I call one of his aides and

53:09

was like, you realize this is Kentucky, right? Are

53:11

you, what are you, you know, what are you thinking? And they

53:13

said, basically, you know, the dog has caught

53:15

the car, so to speak. Like the Republicans tried to ban

53:17

every abortion of all time for every everybody.

53:20

They've done this for a long time. Now they have an abortion

53:22

ban and even in Kentucky, the average

53:24

person does not want no,

53:27

you know, abortion ban in all

53:29

circumstances. Like it's been striking to see

53:31

here how much Bashir has

53:33

talked about abortion in this campaign

53:36

and how Cameron is nervous

53:38

about this issue. He sort of backtracked

53:40

into this whole aisle supports of exceptions.

53:43

That was not his view. His staff seems

53:45

very nervous about it. But I think again, this

53:48

issue has changed American politics fundamentally.

53:50

Yeah, we were canvassing today with Planned Parenthood

53:53

and we were,

53:55

shout out to them, not us. And

53:58

we were at doors and we were talking to...

53:59

folks who looked like,

54:01

let's be older white people,

54:04

who are saying I've never, because the

54:07

folks we were canvassing with from Planned Parenthood were great,

54:09

they were like

54:10

going all the way down the ticket. And there

54:12

were two different people said, you

54:15

know, I've never pulled like straight ticket

54:17

Democrat before, but this year I have to. And

54:19

it was clearly befelible. Yeah.

54:23

And a couple of people we talked

54:26

to like knew that Cameron

54:28

is pretty extreme out of abortion. Like that was something

54:30

that I already registered with them. And I want to ask this

54:33

just came to me. So no bad ideas to brainstorm.

54:35

But Dan Perry Louisville

54:37

played Duke today. Okay,

54:39

they won. The

54:42

Duke fans are known as Cameron

54:44

crazies.

54:45

Cameron crazy. Is there a thing there?

54:47

Is that something? Could be people

54:50

don't like Duke here. Yes, that is. So we can say

54:52

what's like a game to

54:54

you. Love it. Your thoughts.

54:56

What the fuck you're talking about? Working.

55:05

I just want you guys to say that. So I went canvassing

55:08

with love it. Tommy and Dan

55:10

were together and we went up to a

55:12

house. There was someone watching TV. They didn't

55:14

want to come to the door. Love it kept knocking. This guy came

55:16

to the door. He seemed pretty

55:18

Republican. Yeah. And he told us,

55:21

he's like, I know who I'm voting for, but that's all I'm going to

55:23

say. And then love it. Did the

55:25

whole spiel about Cameron and abortion

55:27

rights. And he said,

55:29

and he goes, okay, I'll think about it. And then love

55:31

it's like, I

55:33

feel like this interaction is not going well. What do you think?

55:35

And

55:38

he's like, I'll think about it. It was good. Here's the

55:41

thing. It was impressive. I don't

55:44

know what's going to happen. You've got the lady with the labradoodle.

55:46

We got a lady with a labradoodle. Uh,

55:50

whenever, whenever the conversation went a little awkward,

55:52

I just asked about a hot Brown. Yeah,

55:55

he did. He did. And

55:57

that really helps the hot Brown conversation.

56:00

All right, speaking of elections, with

56:03

just over two months to go until the Iowa caucuses,

56:06

Joe Biden just got a last minute primary challenger.

56:09

Dean Phillips, a 54 year old Minnesota

56:12

congressman with a moderate voting record who's worth

56:14

about $50 million. Phillips

56:16

says he mostly agrees with Biden, but that

56:18

he's running because of polls showing

56:21

that most voters think the president is too old to run again.

56:23

He launched with a short speech in New Hampshire

56:26

where he's now running this ad.

56:28

I'm Dean Phillips and I'm running for president

56:31

of the United States of America. And I'm coming

56:33

to New Hampshire to answer your questions. I

56:35

love New Hampshire. I spent my summers as a

56:37

kid in the White Mountains going to camp. Got

56:40

to canoe the Sacco River, learn how to fish,

56:42

learn how to shoot a gun. And it's also where

56:44

I learned to love my country. And that's

56:46

why I'm back as a candidate for president.

56:49

We've got some challenges, that's for sure. We're

56:51

going to repair this economy and we are going

56:53

to repair America as long

56:56

as we do it together. I'm Dean Phillips

56:58

and I approve this message.

57:00

I'm

57:03

from Massachusetts, but

57:05

New Hampshire is where I learned to love my country too. Same,

57:07

yeah. I couldn't learn to love it. I couldn't learn

57:10

to love it. Massachusetts, I had to go north. Who among us didn't

57:12

learn to love our country at summer camp? Summer

57:14

camp. I just, first

57:17

of all, if you close your mind and picture a

57:20

gelato nepo baby, isn't that what you picture?

57:27

You summered here? Come

57:29

on. It's just not a strong,

57:32

it's not a strong message. Well, I just think, look, there

57:35

are polls that show that Democrats

57:37

are interested in some sort of generic

57:40

alternative. And he's like, well, I'm some sort

57:42

of generic alternative. Yeah,

57:45

that's what it is. Tommy, what'd you think of Dean

57:47

Phillips' campaign launch? Speech, the

57:49

ad, the overall message, the whole vibe?

57:51

So he did a long interview with The Atlantic where

57:54

he kind of laid out his theory of the case and

57:56

why he decided to get in. And there were some things

57:58

he said in that interview.

58:00

That resonated with me. He's anxiety

58:02

about Joe Biden's poll numbers. He has concerns

58:05

about Joe Biden's age I feel the

58:07

same way. I'm concerned too. And

58:09

I think that like we shouldn't criticize anyone for

58:12

for talking out loud about

58:14

their concerns about the need

58:17

to win this next election because it is enormously important

58:19

but what I think is Frustrating

58:22

for me is just the execution

58:24

has been terrible because first of all, he

58:26

just waited way too long

58:29

You know, if you wanted to run and try to primary

58:31

the president you can't do it three months out It's very

58:33

very hard

58:34

to primary a sitting president in

58:37

any scenario But when you give

58:39

yourself only three months to build a

58:41

campaign raise money

58:43

get your name ID from negative that

58:45

vests to Net like touring

58:48

needs to be like it's gonna be really hard and which

58:50

makes me wonder like what is your goal here? Sir

58:53

because again in this Atlantic article Respectful

58:56

of you sir. I mean, it seems like a nice guy.

58:58

I'm not trying to be a dick to him like In

59:01

this in this article his campaign

59:03

manager is apparently a guy named Steve Schmidt Steve

59:05

Schmidt worked for George Bush John

59:08

McCain joined the Lincoln project left

59:10

the Lincoln project quit politics got

59:12

back into

59:13

politics now he's doing the Dean Phillips

59:15

thing and he said one

59:17

of his

59:19

Strategic imperatives or whatever is

59:21

to hire content creators in

59:23

six different time zones So they

59:26

can have the the Biden campaign Reacting

59:29

at all times and on edge and it's like, okay So

59:31

you've set up a campaign infrastructure

59:33

where you got in too late to get on

59:35

the ballot in, Nevada

59:37

But your plan is to fuck

59:39

with Joe Biden's news cycle every single

59:41

day for the next three months or so

59:44

That seems like

59:46

a setup where there's no chance

59:48

you're gonna win

59:49

But there is a great chance that you could

59:51

make it harder for Biden to tell a story about

59:53

himself and what he's done and for the Democratic

59:55

Party to

59:58

You know hit back on Donald Trump

59:59

when it's very clear he's about to be the nominee.

1:00:02

And so like, listen, maybe Dean

1:00:04

Phillips will catch fire. What do I

1:00:06

know? Maybe. I don't think that

1:00:08

like the progressive primary electorate is hungering

1:00:11

for a

1:00:12

extremely rich, nepo

1:00:14

baby as Lovett said, who's extremely

1:00:17

moderate.

1:00:17

But maybe they are, but I

1:00:20

think more likely than anything, it's just sort of,

1:00:23

he's kind of like a milk toast guy who's gonna maybe

1:00:26

cause some problems in New Hampshire and that's about it. I

1:00:28

think it's important to

1:00:30

dig into the origin story of the

1:00:32

Dean Phillips for President campaign, which is laid

1:00:34

out in this

1:00:35

very extensive article in the Atlantic, a

1:00:38

populist website available all throughout

1:00:40

New Hampshire for free. So. That's

1:00:45

where you go to find Democratic primary voters. You

1:00:47

go to the Atlantic. You talk to Tim Alberta. So Dean

1:00:49

Phillips has been

1:00:51

very public about his concerns about Joe Biden

1:00:54

and his electability.

1:00:56

And not that Joe Biden is too old to do the job, Joe

1:00:58

Biden is too old to win reelection.

1:01:01

It's been his point to date. And

1:01:03

at some point in mid

1:01:05

September, Steve Schmidt, current

1:01:08

podcast host, DMed

1:01:10

Dean Phillips. Be careful.

1:01:11

Don't trust the podcast host. DM

1:01:14

Dean Phillips and said, will you come on my podcast?

1:01:17

Dean Phillips did. Afterwards,

1:01:19

Steve Schmidt sent him an email that said, all

1:01:21

my friends who listened to the podcast said, something

1:01:24

to the effect of this guy has to be president,

1:01:27

which definitely happened. And

1:01:29

before that conversation was over, Steve Schmidt

1:01:32

had a job running Dean Phillips' presidential

1:01:35

campaign. So I'm suggesting

1:01:37

that perhaps not a lot of thought was put into this plan.

1:01:39

And we know this because he is on

1:01:41

the ballot in New Hampshire, a state that has

1:01:43

exactly zero delegates.

1:01:46

Yeah, that's a problem too. Because New Hampshire is

1:01:48

still gonna go first, even though the DNC

1:01:51

decided that South Carolina is gonna go first. So

1:01:53

they're gonna strip New Hampshire of their delegates if they go

1:01:55

forward with the primary, which they are. And

1:01:58

Dean Phillips is trying to take advantage of that. So

1:02:00

because Biden's not gonna be on the ballot in New Hampshire

1:02:02

So he's gonna try to win in New Hampshire Even

1:02:04

though he doesn't get any delegates and of course he's not gonna get any

1:02:07

delegates out of Nevada because he missed the filing deadline

1:02:09

for Nevada. Yeah

1:02:12

First of all does Just

1:02:14

a reminder that every member of every member

1:02:16

of Congress is just waiting for

1:02:19

Someone to say it's your turn to DM

1:02:21

them. Yeah, but we have one coming out

1:02:23

next Yeah President

1:02:27

company accepted maybe but but

1:02:30

but also how tall Dean Phillips is I

1:02:34

Honestly, I just think he seems like

1:02:36

a generic 510 He's

1:02:39

giving he gives off 510 energy but

1:02:43

but

1:02:45

You know, I look I I

1:02:47

read his campaign announcement speech with great

1:02:49

interest I read it because the full video is not

1:02:51

available on the internet I look

1:02:54

for it for like a whole video of his

1:02:56

campaign announcement speaking to Dan's point that

1:02:58

this thing was cooked up in a DM three weeks ago

1:03:01

No website. No website. There's no SEO

1:03:04

going on YouTube Google Dean Phillips You gotta because you

1:03:06

gotta scroll down make sure you're on the right Dean Phillips But

1:03:08

you could read the full speech if you're a playbook

1:03:10

subscriber You could read the video and the full

1:03:12

speech they released was in this

1:03:15

actually gave me like a pang of anxiety

1:03:18

Because they didn't release a transcript the

1:03:20

way a normal campaign would which is like a press release

1:03:23

They

1:03:23

just put out

1:03:24

the copy that was clearly for him to read

1:03:26

it was in the big font in the phonetic

1:03:29

Yes with the kind of spacing of a speech

1:03:31

first of all extremely generic

1:03:34

It's an insulting document.

1:03:37

It's a cursed text. I had

1:03:39

that. Did you love it? I had this urge when I was reading

1:03:41

the document Oh my god, yeah, yeah,

1:03:43

like we're track changes. This is so

1:03:45

fucking bland You can't just what are you doing

1:03:47

here? Like we need to be we need to be fed

1:03:50

and we need to be free and it's like it's

1:03:52

a lot of that It's like the 90 shit. It's

1:03:54

a lot of like Sentences that that

1:03:56

that that loop back on each other. But

1:03:59

the thing that's so insulting

1:03:59

about it is that there's no real argument in it,

1:04:02

right? It's basically, you're meant to read between

1:04:04

the lines that Joe Biden is

1:04:06

too old, we need an alternative, I

1:04:09

am that alternative. The problem with that

1:04:11

is he then goes and does these interviews. He

1:04:13

did an interview on Meet the Press,

1:04:16

and Kristen Welker's

1:04:18

first question is, what are some places where you disagree

1:04:20

with Joe Biden? And he's like, I'm not running against

1:04:22

Joe Biden. I'm running for the future. And

1:04:24

it's like, okay, that's a sentence a person can think.

1:04:28

But then when you put it on its feet, it falls

1:04:31

the fuck over because the follow up is, but that's

1:04:33

exactly what you're doing, sir. You're running against

1:04:35

Joe Biden. So where are there some differences?

1:04:37

Then he kind of fumpers around to kind of find some.

1:04:41

And the other problem with this is like, look,

1:04:43

he says in that interview, he said in other interviews,

1:04:45

he said it publicly that he's wanted there to be

1:04:47

an alternative to Joe Biden. This is not the

1:04:50

popular governor of a Midwest

1:04:52

state who's shown the ability to build a coalition.

1:04:54

This is a no-name congressman who's making references

1:04:57

to his subcommittee work as part of his

1:04:59

qualification. Hey. Hey.

1:05:02

What's the subcommittee's matter? I'm just saying,

1:05:04

it's not going to move the needle. Which subcommittee?

1:05:07

Who can remember? But it's

1:05:10

just like, he then redounds to this electability

1:05:12

argument. But it's like, who are you to make that argument?

1:05:14

Why do I have any reason to believe you, Dean Phillips,

1:05:16

a person who I Googled right after I Googled Mike

1:05:19

Johnson? Why

1:05:22

are you more electable than Joe Biden? He doesn't really have,

1:05:24

he doesn't have anything to say that's actually

1:05:27

a cogent-specific argument. Yeah,

1:05:29

Perry, what did you think of the speech? He did

1:05:32

like, I mean, and

1:05:34

Playbook picked this up, and clearly Steve Schmidt

1:05:36

told Playbook this. But like, if

1:05:38

you read between the lines, he sort of, he

1:05:41

dinged President Biden on inflation, border

1:05:43

security, crime. He said

1:05:45

he had a line about we're funding wars,

1:05:48

we're funding fighting more than

1:05:50

we are feeding. And he said, we,

1:05:52

the new generation, will rise not through war, but

1:05:54

through peace. Do you think he's leaning

1:05:57

into policy contrast? What is he trying to do

1:05:59

there?

1:05:59

I don't, I think it's a great example of polls

1:06:02

are useful, but it's clear if you look at crime

1:06:05

borders, if you look at what issues is

1:06:07

Biden weakest on, it's clear that he

1:06:09

looked at those issues and I'm gonna talk about these issues.

1:06:12

Dean Phillips is not known as a leading immigration

1:06:15

expert on Capitol Hill. It's more than, and

1:06:17

his whole campaign is Biden is

1:06:19

unelectable or like Biden is too old, people

1:06:21

don't like that and Biden might lose and

1:06:23

therefore I'm running, but

1:06:25

great candidacies

1:06:26

are actually not made purely

1:06:29

usually by polls at all. Like I

1:06:31

didn't support a Muslim ban or whatever Trump said,

1:06:33

but his candidacy did sort of emerge

1:06:35

sort of organically, Obama's candidacy

1:06:38

when I thought was great, emerged

1:06:40

from different things. He had something to say,

1:06:42

he was running for a reason, just

1:06:44

basing and grounding your candidacy on polls,

1:06:48

just usually doesn't work. I guess

1:06:50

the other thing I would say is, polls are

1:06:52

not as important as sometimes they are

1:06:55

argued and I think that parties, I think

1:06:57

are actually more important. What's

1:06:59

happened and I think it's really important is, there

1:07:01

are plenty of Democrats who, if they

1:07:04

started running tomorrow, if Gretchen Whitmer

1:07:06

or Raphael Warnock said I'm running president, I

1:07:08

would probably consider, I would probably vote for them myself

1:07:11

in the primary, but that said, they're

1:07:13

not doing that and I think it's worth considering

1:07:16

whether whatever the polls say, the people

1:07:18

who are actually Democratic candidates, actually

1:07:21

in charge of the Democratic party have decided

1:07:23

our candidate is Joe Biden and that's like,

1:07:26

no matter what, that's why the media is sort of struggling

1:07:28

with this, we're all sort of struggling with this, parties

1:07:30

have power, one party has decided, well,

1:07:33

one party, to be fair to them, Mitch McConnell is trying

1:07:35

to stop Donald Trump but the voters would prefer Donald

1:07:37

Trump, but in this party, the

1:07:40

voters are actually like Joe Biden, but even more the

1:07:43

viable candidates for president people might actually

1:07:45

consider are not running. And

1:07:47

I think Dean Phillips should have assessed that too, he's

1:07:49

not, there's no demand

1:07:52

for Dean Phillips and I think that's pretty well,

1:07:55

Tommy said he might not win, I'm gonna go further

1:07:57

and say, Dean Phillips will not be president.

1:07:59

And I don't think Gretchen Whitmer

1:08:02

and Gavin Newsom and the

1:08:04

other governors, popular governors, are not running.

1:08:07

Josh

1:08:45

It's

1:08:49

important to recognize that the Democratic Party does

1:08:51

not lack people who want to be president, who think

1:08:53

that they would be better presidents than Joe Biden,

1:08:55

probably. But the reason

1:08:57

that

1:08:58

Gretchen Whitmer and Josh Shapiro and Gavin Newsom

1:09:00

are not running is that Joe Biden

1:09:03

is incredibly popular with Democrats. This

1:09:05

gets lost.

1:09:06

Donald Trump's up by 60 points in Republican polls.

1:09:09

His approval rating is 77% among

1:09:11

Republicans.

1:09:13

Joe Biden's is 80% among Democrats. It's

1:09:16

just it would be incredibly hard

1:09:18

to beat him. And even in these polls that show

1:09:20

that two thirds of Democrats want someone else, 80%

1:09:24

of all those Democrats say they approve of Joe.

1:09:27

They have a favorable opinion of Joe Biden or approve of Joe Biden.

1:09:29

And that's a big deal in a primary.

1:09:31

Dean Phillips voted with Joe Biden 100% of the time.

1:09:35

Literally, according to 538,

1:09:38

Perry's former workplace. So it's like, sir,

1:09:40

you know, again, I

1:09:42

don't know why I'm so

1:09:44

respectful. This guy's vest is like half zipped

1:09:46

up. I'd be crazy. I mean, like I as a vest,

1:09:49

it sits from the top down and the bottom up. That's pretty

1:09:51

cool. Yeah. Like what we need to do

1:09:53

for the middle class. There we go. Oh, no. We

1:09:55

need to stop these zippers from the bottom up and the

1:09:57

top down. We need a zipper from the middle.

1:09:59

fuck out. If

1:10:03

I were a Democrat getting into the presidential

1:10:05

primary right now, I would run hard

1:10:07

to the left of Joe Biden on

1:10:10

Gaza or anti-war. I would like

1:10:12

pick an issue that I think that could

1:10:14

get the progressive left excited

1:10:17

and motivated and giving me money and

1:10:19

endorsing me. And Dean Phillips is

1:10:21

just pointedly not doing that. So it just makes

1:10:23

you wonder, what are we doing here? But

1:10:28

look, and again, I don't want to suggest here

1:10:30

that Dean Phillips' anxieties

1:10:33

about Joe Biden are unwarranted.

1:10:36

Who knows? We don't know if the polls are right or wrong. Yeah,

1:10:38

there's clearly reason to worry. But

1:10:41

looking at the polls worrying and then deciding,

1:10:44

going from that point to be like, oh, I should

1:10:46

just run for president. It's

1:10:48

a little bit of a leap. You've talked a lot about how you manage your

1:10:50

polar coaster anxiety in this podcast over the years.

1:10:52

I gotta do it. Dean

1:10:56

Phillips knocked some doors, buddy. You'll feel

1:10:58

better. Anyway, well,

1:11:00

that's Dean Phillips. We'll see if we talk about him again. Who knows?

1:11:02

Maybe we will. Maybe we will. He could be a guest on the pod.

1:11:04

He could be a guest on the pod. Yeah. You know what? If

1:11:07

he's going to like me, not you guys. Yeah. Well, yeah.

1:11:09

Well, yeah. Tommy will be calling him sir. I guess Tommy's

1:11:11

one of the good guests. Some of that faggy ice cream. Okay.

1:11:18

We'll be right back with Congressman Morgan

1:11:20

McGarvey. I'm sure he's going to be thrilled

1:11:23

to join us. I denounce

1:11:26

that joke.

1:11:34

We've transformed conflict into

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positive change. We've

1:11:38

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1:11:41

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1:11:44

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1:11:46

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1:11:49

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1:11:51

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1:11:53

guide us as we serve and support

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University.

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It's

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1:13:12

Please welcome to the stage a member

1:13:15

of the Bourbon Caucus, which is what John Favreau calls

1:13:17

himself after he's had a few of the babysitters staying all

1:13:19

the way till 10. It's

1:13:22

Kentucky's own Louisville born and

1:13:24

brewed and perfectly aged, Congress and Morgan McGarvey.

1:13:26

I'll give it up. It's

1:13:36

Kentucky's CEO. Thanks for being here.

1:13:43

Congressman, thank you for being here. We

1:13:46

left you Morgan! I

1:13:49

didn't know my parents were here tonight. Yeah. There

1:13:52

was no reason to take your shirts off. Now,

1:13:56

we would be remiss, Congressman, not to capitalize on your love of

1:13:58

bourbon. Frankly, it's just been that kind

1:14:00

of a week. So we're going to play

1:14:03

something we're calling drinks a fist. All

1:14:05

right? Here's how it works. Just casual

1:14:07

conversation. But if we ask you or you ask

1:14:10

us a question we don't want to answer, we just

1:14:12

take a drink. And as we do, we have a couple of Bourbons

1:14:14

up here that you're going to tell us about because you are the congressman

1:14:17

from Burbontown. We

1:14:20

have a couple of different ones. So I'll kick it off.

1:14:22

I just wanted to kick it off with just sort of

1:14:25

before we get to the nonsense. To

1:14:27

the nonsense. The house is a speaker.

1:14:31

They ultimately had Chat GBT create someone

1:14:33

with the prompt, what if Paul Ryan truly believed there were

1:14:35

dinosaurs on the all? Mike

1:14:39

Johnson popped out.

1:14:41

First of all, what

1:14:43

of any relationship have you had with him? And

1:14:45

do you have any observations as this chapter of Republican

1:14:48

chaos draws to a close?

1:14:51

So I'll be honest, I didn't know who Mike Johnson was.

1:14:56

And he's a colleague. You work with him. Hey,

1:14:58

it's OK. He doesn't know who I am either. But

1:15:02

there's a great thing in law

1:15:04

school when you were studying. They call it the reasonably

1:15:07

prudent person. It's a made up character

1:15:09

to decide if someone knows somebody a duty, if

1:15:11

they've been heard of that sort of thing. I view my

1:15:13

wife as the reasonably prudent person. And

1:15:16

hearing you guys talk about Dean Phillips, now we're talking about

1:15:18

Mike Johnson. When the Mike

1:15:19

Johnson thing hit and then Dean Phillips announced

1:15:21

for president, she actually looked at me and she goes,

1:15:24

OK, are you guys just making up members of Congress

1:15:26

now? I felt bad

1:15:29

too. So

1:15:33

I'm not on any committees with him. I

1:15:36

didn't know him at all.

1:15:37

I mean, but look, he represents

1:15:39

a very extreme part of their

1:15:41

party. I think it's an extreme part of their party.

1:15:43

I think it's a dangerous part of their party. When

1:15:46

you talk about national abortion bans, when you talk

1:15:48

about targeting LGBTQ youth, when

1:15:51

you talk about bringing that type

1:15:53

of extremism, whether it's on foreign policy or

1:15:55

domestic policy, it hurts people

1:15:58

in their daily lives.

1:15:59

So my hope

1:16:01

is that he

1:16:02

can rise above some of the things he has said

1:16:05

and done and lead the institution

1:16:07

as a speaker. But

1:16:09

if not, then certainly the

1:16:11

Democrats are going to be unified. We're going to continue to

1:16:13

fight what we fought for. And Perry, you said this

1:16:16

earlier, I think, too. It is going

1:16:18

to be something with which now we can run against. It

1:16:20

is a Donald Trump, Mike Johnson speakership

1:16:23

right now with that sort of MAGA element. And

1:16:26

so I think we're in a really

1:16:28

interesting time with the budget coming up. That's the first

1:16:30

big test of his speakership. Let's see

1:16:32

what happens.

1:16:34

Pointable.

1:16:35

Are these Kentucky Sox? They

1:16:38

are Kentucky Sox. Nice.

1:16:42

Nice. Those are cool. They are Kentucky

1:16:44

Sox. And appropriately for this room,

1:16:46

they're blue, which I thought was

1:16:48

a good thing to have. Now

1:16:51

we have three kinds of bourbon up here. This

1:16:54

is Old Forester 86 proof. Yeah.

1:16:59

This one is Old Forester 100

1:17:01

proof. This

1:17:05

one is

1:17:05

Old Forester 1920 prohibition style. So

1:17:09

thank you. You drink this one while

1:17:11

being very quiet. Which

1:17:14

one should we try first? So yeah,

1:17:16

definitely try the Old Forester 86 first.

1:17:18

And there's a reason for

1:17:20

this. First of all, when you're trying

1:17:22

bourbon, you want to start with the lower proof

1:17:24

and work your way up. If you start with the higher

1:17:27

proof, work your way down. Then by the time you get

1:17:29

to the last drink of like, what is this? Is this water?

1:17:32

So Old Forester 86, it is 86 proof. The 100,

1:17:35

obviously 100 proof. The prohibition is 115

1:17:38

proof, which is fairly hot for a bourbon.

1:17:40

So start with the 86. All

1:17:42

right. Glad we did this segment towards the end. This is good.

1:17:46

Now, when you taste bourbon, there's a right

1:17:49

way to smell it. Don't dip your nose in it like

1:17:51

a wine glass. If you dip your nose in it like a

1:17:53

wine glass and take

1:17:53

a big whiff of it, you're just going to get a whole bunch

1:17:55

of alcohol and burn those nose hairs. You hold

1:17:57

it right below. You actually breathe in with your mouth.

1:18:01

So

1:18:01

kind of hold up to your mouth and

1:18:02

not at

1:18:05

your chin love it, not at your chin. You

1:18:08

hold it up to your nose. You know, try

1:18:10

in here, you're trying. Good.

1:18:14

Good stuff. I like the 86.

1:18:17

It's a great bourbon.

1:18:20

I think

1:18:22

you can find it for about 23 bucks and

1:18:25

I think Old Forrester 86 is

1:18:26

just one of those bourbons that punches above its weight.

1:18:29

You can put it on the bar shelf, it can taste at a

1:18:31

mid shelf level at sort of that lower price.

1:18:34

I'm a

1:18:35

fan. How many members of Congress are in

1:18:37

the bourbon caucus?

1:18:38

Not enough. After

1:18:41

this week, I'll have more. I hope it's more. Look,

1:18:44

you know, obviously it's a bipartisan group. Andy Barr,

1:18:46

the Congressman from Lexington is the co-chair of

1:18:48

it with me.

1:18:49

Hey, not

1:18:51

for this segment. Shut

1:18:53

the fuck up. You

1:18:56

showed some respect. Is

1:18:59

it the Senate included

1:19:01

to you as Mitch McConnell? The Senate is allowed

1:19:03

to be there. They don't come over to our side as much. It's

1:19:06

a little bit uppity.

1:19:07

But we've done we've done two bipartisan

1:19:10

bourbon tasting since I've been there now.

1:19:12

The last one we had about 40 members of Congress

1:19:14

there from both parties, which is a good number. And

1:19:17

I mean, look, there's a lot of dysfunction up there. Henry

1:19:19

Clay, I think, is the one who said that bourbon

1:19:21

can lubricate the wheels of democracy. So

1:19:26

we're doing our we're doing our best.

1:19:29

I got that later. That's all

1:19:31

fucked up now. I'm

1:19:34

going to say what the content is.

1:19:37

You know, I have something else for you. What

1:19:39

Dean Phillips is five eight.

1:19:41

Oh, honestly,

1:19:45

honestly, thank you for telling us. I

1:19:48

I'm so confident because I have five ten

1:19:50

energy and you know what?

1:19:53

I got to say, I got to say it's classic five

1:19:56

ten guy to be like that guy.

1:19:59

That's it. That's the reason. That's it. All

1:20:05

right.

1:20:05

You know, they told me I'd have your chair and I was excited because

1:20:08

I thought it would be higher, but

1:20:09

no, it's the same as everyone else's. Wow.

1:20:11

Unbelievable. The same as everybody

1:20:14

else's. All right.

1:20:18

These

1:20:20

flustered people. The 100 proof is also good.

1:20:22

It's also good.

1:20:25

Next question. Lube

1:20:27

us up, love it. Come on. Well,

1:20:31

now I'm going to skip to a dump. Oh, oh. Nothing

1:20:35

on the cards, huh? What

1:20:38

is happening there? What cards do you

1:20:40

have? I've got a lot to get through. All

1:20:43

right. But as someone who's been vocal about gun violence, what are

1:20:45

your thoughts about Speaker Johnson saying that the problem is

1:20:47

in guns but the human heart? Are

1:20:49

you aware of any proposals for human heart reform?

1:20:53

And what is wrong? What do

1:20:55

you think is so bad about American

1:20:57

hearts compared to hearts in

1:21:00

other democracies? Is

1:21:03

it? Good

1:21:05

question.

1:21:07

All of them, no matter what, can buy a gun

1:21:09

anytime, anywhere they want to. And, you know,

1:21:12

the reality is we've got to have common sense

1:21:14

gun reform in this country.

1:21:23

You know, look, I mean, right here in Kentucky, we

1:21:25

had a mass shooting in April

1:21:27

that rocked our community. You

1:21:29

know, Louisville, I tell people Louisville

1:21:31

is it's the smallest big city

1:21:34

in America. And Perry knows this. Everybody's

1:21:37

one or two degrees of separation away from everybody

1:21:39

else. If you didn't know somebody

1:21:41

directly impacted that shooting, you

1:21:43

knew someone who did, truly. I

1:21:46

lost two friends in that shooting. I knew

1:21:48

several others who were shot. It happened

1:21:50

the Monday morning after Easter. And

1:21:53

what happened? You had a young man who had a long

1:21:55

history of trouble who went in six

1:21:58

days before and bought an AR-15.

1:21:59

walked out in 40 minutes with an AR-15

1:22:02

in rounds of ammunition, six days

1:22:04

later goes, kills five of his coworkers,

1:22:06

injures eight others, shoots a police officer in

1:22:09

the head with an AR-15 round. It's

1:22:13

unconscionable that we don't have common sense

1:22:15

red flag or extreme risk protection

1:22:18

laws that keep people safe from themselves

1:22:21

as well as others. It's amazing

1:22:23

that we can just buy these weapons of war that

1:22:26

right now in Kentucky you don't have to have a license to have

1:22:28

a concealed carry permit. That in our

1:22:30

hospital right here, Norton Children's Hospital in 2021, there

1:22:32

were 80 kids who came in

1:22:34

who were shot and 85%

1:22:37

of those kids shot were accidental.

1:22:40

That we're not talking about safe storage laws. I

1:22:42

think if you have an American heart you should

1:22:45

be talking about common sense gun reform

1:22:47

so that we can keep our community safe.

1:22:58

Let's go back to bourbon.

1:22:59

Now this is 100 proof

1:23:01

bourbon. We're

1:23:04

going up the...

1:23:06

Kicking it up a notch. Kicking it up a notch. Where's

1:23:09

the best place to smell this? Across the room. You've

1:23:14

already had a glass just drink it. But 100

1:23:16

proof obviously is 50% alcohol. Alcohol

1:23:21

the most it could be is 200 proof. So 150%

1:23:24

alcohol. It's

1:23:26

important to know what has to be in a bourbon. When

1:23:28

we talk about bourbon what has to be... Is this part of

1:23:30

your question? No, no, this is good stuff. To

1:23:34

be a bourbon you actually don't have

1:23:36

to be

1:23:36

made in Kentucky. Now all

1:23:38

of the good stuff is made here. And

1:23:44

truly 95% of the world's bourbon is

1:23:46

made in Kentucky. But it

1:23:48

has to be made in America.

1:23:50

It has to be in a new charred white

1:23:52

oak barrel. It has to be aged for at least

1:23:55

two years.

1:23:56

It has to come off the still at no

1:23:58

more than 160 proof into the...

1:23:59

barrel no more than 125 proof

1:24:02

and the lowest it can be bottled that is 80 proof.

1:24:05

So a basil Hayden is like an 80 proof

1:24:07

bourbon whereas we've got the 86 now

1:24:09

we're at the 100. It has to be at least 50% corn

1:24:14

and that's basically I think those are our requirements

1:24:16

there to be a bourbon. And so when

1:24:18

you're looking at an old Forrester 100 proof it's 72% corn, 18% rye, so it's got a higher proof,

1:24:26

a little bit higher proof right there at that sort of 100 proof

1:24:28

level but the corn gives it more of a sweetness

1:24:31

and so the rye is what gives it more of a kick

1:24:33

if you see more of a high rye bourbon which

1:24:36

I think makes this 100 proof old Forrester

1:24:38

really really approachable for what the proof

1:24:40

level is. I was gonna say it's like a hundred proof.

1:24:42

It's approachable. It is. It's

1:24:45

like a teacher that turns the chair around

1:24:47

and wraps that up. It's 100 proof but it's actually 5'8

1:24:50

and yeah.

1:24:55

That's good. That's good. Have you

1:24:57

always known all this shit or

1:25:00

do you learn this for

1:25:03

Congress?

1:25:06

No. This is like some deep knowledge

1:25:08

of the bourbon. You know look I mean a lot I think

1:25:10

a lot of Kentuckians do know a lot about bourbon.

1:25:12

A lot of people are proud of the bourbon. I know.

1:25:15

A lot of people do. People

1:25:17

know.

1:25:17

And I was in the state senate for 10

1:25:20

years before this and we really do a lot

1:25:22

of bourbon bills in the state legislature

1:25:24

in Kentucky as you can imagine. So you learn a fair

1:25:26

amount about it there.

1:25:28

Tommy I can't believe you didn't understand that being

1:25:30

coach or the bourbon caucus comes with real responsibilities.

1:25:32

I apologize. If I run for president

1:25:36

I'll campaign on that. That's pretty good. That's pretty

1:25:39

good. Now you're as you've been

1:25:42

fighting to the white the white

1:25:45

oak that makes the barrels. Yes.

1:25:47

It's what's happening with it because it's

1:25:49

not

1:25:50

the tree is in trouble. Yeah.

1:25:52

I mean this is one where you actually see Congress having a little

1:25:54

bit of foresight right now which is good. There's a white oak

1:25:56

regeneration bill bipartisan bill up right now

1:25:59

and it's a good thing.

1:25:59

You know, when you look at white oak, again,

1:26:02

bourbon has to be made in a white oak barrel.

1:26:05

And there's about an 80-year lifespan

1:26:08

to get that tree from plant to

1:26:10

where you're going to harvest it for a bourbon barrel.

1:26:12

And so we're looking down the road and going, okay,

1:26:15

we got to have enough white oak trees to make

1:26:17

sure not only can we have bourbon barrels, all the furniture,

1:26:19

all the other things that you use for oak. And

1:26:22

so it's one of those things that you see a Democrat,

1:26:24

Republican kind of coming together because it

1:26:27

can also be really good for the planet

1:26:29

as well as being good for business. And I think that's

1:26:32

kind of a cool thing.

1:26:35

Now, let's find out about this last one before we

1:26:37

get into the... This is the hottest of the

1:26:39

three. Old Forester

1:26:42

is... it was started in 1870. One

1:26:44

of the cool things about it is it was put

1:26:47

in a glass bottle by George Garvin

1:26:48

Brown and then sealed. And so this

1:26:51

is a time when it was before the Bottle of Embond

1:26:53

Act. Tommy

1:26:56

didn't wait for the explanation. That

1:26:59

was good stuff. The 120

1:27:03

was not very approachable. And

1:27:07

so in 1920 when Prohibition started, Old

1:27:10

Forester is actually the longest continually

1:27:12

sold bourbon under the same name in the same company in the country.

1:27:15

And in 1920, they're one of the few companies that got

1:27:17

a medicinal license. Had a long history

1:27:20

of having a good project, got a medicinal license, were able

1:27:22

to keep going. And they're used as part of one

1:27:24

of their series to honor that legacy. And

1:27:26

it comes in 115 proof because during

1:27:29

that Prohibition era as medicine,

1:27:31

a lot of the bourbon was a higher proof. You

1:27:33

get like a doctor's prescription. There's

1:27:36

like cream doctor's prescriptions for like

1:27:37

bourbon. Really? Oh wow.

1:27:40

Yeah, you could get prescriptions for bourbon. And you could also take the

1:27:42

grease off a carburetor. Now

1:27:48

when Old Forester did this, they were... It's

1:27:52

still pretty smooth. Well

1:27:54

this is why we tried it last, by the way.

1:27:57

Now go back and try the 86.

1:31:59

Bourbonism has exploded in Kentucky and

1:32:02

the reality is that you can't have bourbon unless you have

1:32:04

a barrel Where did you get the stones to make

1:32:06

up a word like bourbonism? Bourbonism

1:32:12

from bourbon itself you

1:32:15

have enough of it. It just comes out Still

1:32:19

thirsty song to drink. Yeah. No, you should you

1:32:21

should you should

1:32:24

I'm sick with it. I'm seeing with the 86. Well,

1:32:27

I you know, I've really settled on the hundred

1:32:29

I don't I don't dislike the hundred.

1:32:31

Yeah. No, I think the hundreds great. I

1:32:33

mean the the the 115 proof

1:32:36

stuff I think would be great after say a divorce or

1:32:38

something This is a

1:32:40

great. This is a great thing to drink

1:32:42

when there's you have nothing left to lose This

1:32:47

is the last thing you remember before you wake up

1:32:49

in a new city So

1:32:53

so a couple of things about about about

1:32:55

that higher proof one better

1:32:57

in an old-fashioned a

1:32:58

Good old-fashioned veteran old-fashioned to

1:33:01

better on the rocks Let it melt a little bit or

1:33:03

three one like it's a bourbon trick But

1:33:06

on a higher proof bourbon even if you just take

1:33:08

I know it's gonna sound crazy But if you take a drop

1:33:10

of water and put it in it, it'll totally

1:33:12

open it up just a drop What does that mean?

1:33:15

I've heard that before open it up what? Open

1:33:19

what up? What the fuck are you talking about? Yeah Do

1:33:21

you remember the face Tommy

1:33:22

made when he tried the 115 proof?

1:33:24

Yeah, you just don't make that face You're

1:33:26

not like a wimp it is Want

1:33:30

to do what you have a couple more on there for one of our

1:33:33

one of our I do fabric

1:33:36

if it meant saving crooked media

1:33:39

Would you show your feet in

1:33:41

discord? Show my feet. Yeah

1:33:46

Yeah, I Didn't

1:33:49

know you're into that that's cool Cool

1:33:53

cool We've

1:33:57

learned a lot about you love it

1:34:00

I know that

1:34:02

the bourbon caucus is something that Favreau

1:34:05

joins with a babysitter. So

1:34:08

do

1:34:08

you know the full names of

1:34:10

Favreau and Tommy's children? Do

1:34:13

I like, cause you guys seem

1:34:16

close. I

1:34:18

mean, I'm just, I'm new. I mean, look, Carly

1:34:21

and Lizette, dude, their middle names, that's

1:34:23

full name. Full name. I feel like they're

1:34:25

both something like Franklin.

1:34:28

You just say Mike Johnson. Yeah.

1:34:32

I don't think you need to know the middle names of our children, but

1:34:35

it's Louise for me. Louise, I did know that.

1:34:37

Harrison. Harrison. That's

1:34:39

close with Franklin. Final

1:34:44

question. It was the American statesman,

1:34:47

Henry Clay, who once said that

1:34:50

bourbon could lubricate the wheels of government. Was

1:34:52

he talking about having sex with a train? You

1:34:59

know what? I'll ask you, I

1:35:01

want to ask you a serious, let's ask you a serious

1:35:03

question to end this.

1:35:05

Delightful experience.

1:35:09

You need voicemails for your constituents,

1:35:11

who apparently are the only people on earth who like

1:35:13

voicemails. But you

1:35:15

have a democratic governor. You are the only democrat

1:35:18

in your delegation. What do you wish people understood

1:35:20

about running and winning in the South that

1:35:23

maybe some of our listeners don't understand? Yeah, I know. Thanks

1:35:25

so much. Don't overlook us.

1:35:27

Don't overlook us. I

1:35:36

know we're in flyover country,

1:35:38

but we have people here

1:35:41

who want their communities to be safe,

1:35:43

who want their kids to be able to get a good education,

1:35:45

who want to be able to have good, affordable

1:35:48

health care, who want to be able to retire

1:35:50

with some security and some

1:35:53

dignity, who care about the future of our community

1:35:55

and our country. And if we can

1:35:57

talk to them about our plans to be safe, we can do it.

1:35:59

to do just that

1:36:01

without looking down on them, then

1:36:04

I truly believe not only

1:36:06

will we listen, but we will find

1:36:08

some more common ground.

1:36:11

Congressman McGarvey, thank you so much for being here.

1:36:13

Thank you for taking us through these great bourbons. Thanks

1:36:16

for getting us drunk. Well, we consider

1:36:18

ourselves members of the Bourbon Caucus. Yeah. And

1:36:21

thanks for being here.

1:36:22

Thank you, guys.

1:36:24

One more time for your congressman.

1:36:28

That's our show for tonight. Thank you to

1:36:30

Congressman Morgan McGarvey. Thank you to State Senator

1:36:32

Carol Rowland.

1:36:33

Thank you to Holly Kiefer. Thank you all.

1:36:39

Hockey

1:36:43

America is a Crooked Media production. Our

1:36:45

producers are Olivia Martinez and David

1:36:47

Toledo. Our associate producer is Farrah

1:36:49

Safaree, writing support from Holly Kiefer.

1:36:52

Reed Charlin is our executive producer. The

1:36:54

show is mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick.

1:36:57

Jordan Cantor is our sound engineer and

1:36:59

audio support from Kyle Seglin and Charlotte

1:37:01

Landis. Madeline Herringer is our

1:37:03

head of news and programming. Matt DeGroat is

1:37:05

our head of production. Andy Taft is our

1:37:07

executive assistant. Thanks to our digital

1:37:09

team, Elijah Cohn, Haley Jones, Mia

1:37:12

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1:37:14

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