0:01

Hello and welcome

0:05

to the Slate Political Gab Fest. March

0:17

21, 2024, the When is Government Speech Coercion edition.

0:24

I'm David Plots of CityCast. I'm in Washington,

0:26

D.C. Still in

0:28

my new home. That was pretty good last week.

0:31

So I stayed here. I stayed. The

0:36

mild chuckle was from John Dickerson of CBS

0:38

Primetime in New York City. Hello, John. Hi.

0:41

No, I was laughing because we've been

0:43

talking about the judicial fortunes of SB4,

0:45

which seem to go up and down

0:48

with the rising and setting of the sun. So

0:51

what if your living condition was the same

0:53

as SB4? You would be in a new

0:55

location every time we report it. Whoa.

0:59

John's previewing the show already. Not

1:02

previewing the show, just looking

1:04

bemused, is Emily Bazlone of

1:06

the New York Times Magazine and Yale University Law

1:08

School from Vermont today. Always

1:10

in New England, not in New Haven

1:12

though. Yeah, I found a reporting

1:14

trip to do in Vermont. Glad to be here.

1:16

Hey, John. Hey, David. This week

1:18

on the Gab Fest, March Madness

1:21

Supreme Court style. The Supremes consider

1:23

whether government speech is

1:25

coercion or when it might be coercion and

1:27

when it might be just persuasion. And they

1:29

also weigh in on SB4, Texas's new immigration

1:32

law. And we'll talk about

1:34

the ups and downs, the twists and turns,

1:36

the convolutions, the mobius strip that is the

1:38

state of SB4. Then

1:42

former President Trump is having a

1:44

hard time raising the hundreds of

1:46

millions of dollars he needs for

1:48

a bond to appeal one of the

1:50

judgments against him. Is he the victim of

1:52

an inflexible legal system? Or is

1:54

he the bond villain? Whoa. You

1:57

See? How Will you see what I did there? Whee!

2:00

The then met a new studies reveal

2:02

what we all already kind of new

2:04

which is it students lost ground during

2:06

coven they have not retained. It's what

2:09

can we learn from the new data

2:11

this out plus a cocktail chatter and

2:13

reminder. They. Were can be live with

2:15

you next week or those who can come

2:18

join us in Washington will be the Hamilton

2:20

here in Washington Dc on Wednesday, March twenty

2:22

seventh at Seven thirty. Ah, they're

2:24

still some tickets. Last please come

2:26

join us it's gonna be really

2:29

fun show John with center attacks

2:31

before today to same. Organ.

2:33

To make the so fun and we

2:35

believe him? Yes exactly. It was a

2:37

was like us as an asynchronous locker

2:39

room. Check your manifesting you're going to

2:41

yeah, that's actually that was early age

2:43

and so forth. So. We're

2:45

gonna go. You're going to go to

2:47

sleep.com Plus Gap as lives get tickets.

2:50

Join us on Wednesday, March twenty seventh,

2:52

Seven thirty here in Dc at the

2:54

Hamilton sleep.com/data slide for tickets. Heather

2:57

get off of nurse before we start the show and

2:59

one what you know but a story coming up a

3:01

little later from one of our partners. As a P.

3:05

A. Items that you fast. As.

3:07

You don't get reliable and relevant advice,

3:09

your business might miss out. So.

3:12

Whether you're looking to automate tasks or bed

3:14

a I in your business processes, as if

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he can help. To. Learn

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more Had to as a

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P.com/a I. Stick. Around

3:23

for expert advice on how to

3:25

embrace a I'd with confidence. The

3:28

Supreme Court. Usually. So language

3:31

so on. Busy was very busy

3:33

this week. They heard argument and

3:35

a pair of cases about whether

3:37

or when the government can speech

3:39

and when it shouldn't speak, and

3:41

then issued a temporary order allowing

3:43

Texas to enforce it's new harsh

3:46

immigration law. And order that was

3:48

superseded. Men may be superseded again and and

3:50

superseded and then had been preceded. And it's

3:52

just so complicated. But let's start emily, it's

3:55

with a speech cases so can you quickly

3:57

orient us to the to. government

4:00

speech cases, one of which involves

4:02

federal efforts to encourage social

4:04

media platforms to crack

4:06

down on COVID misinformation largely, and

4:08

the other involving efforts by New

4:10

York state officials to condemn the

4:12

NRA or condemn certain

4:14

things the NRA was doing as part

4:16

of its business. What are the main

4:19

issues in these cases? These are

4:21

completely separate cases factually, but they

4:23

both have this question about where

4:25

the line is between the government

4:27

voicing an opinion and trying

4:29

to persuade someone to do

4:31

something versus coercing them. The

4:34

first case, the lawsuit is

4:36

brought by a couple of

4:39

state attorneys general in Missouri

4:41

and Louisiana, and they have

4:43

this incredibly sweeping claim that

4:45

the government in trying to

4:48

tell the social media companies

4:50

about misinformation related to COVID related to

4:52

the 2020 election, that

4:54

the government crossed the line into coercion.

4:57

And there are all these emails and

4:59

other communications that have been released as

5:01

part of this lawsuit. And

5:03

the question is whether the

5:05

government's expressed views

5:07

about the dangers of disinformation,

5:10

even if strongly expressed amount

5:13

to coercion in a situation where the

5:15

government was not threatening some

5:17

direct action. So it wasn't like, oh, Facebook,

5:19

if you don't take this post down, we're

5:21

going to file an antitrust suit

5:24

against you. It was just like,

5:26

we are concerned about these posts.

5:28

Why aren't you doing anything? To

5:32

me, they're kind of incredible lawsuits. And

5:35

distressingly, the district

5:37

court judge who built

5:40

the record, who is a Trump appointee,

5:43

really seemed to have edited the

5:46

meaning of edited emails from government officials

5:48

in a way that changes their meaning

5:50

and makes them seem much more nefarious

5:52

than they really were. And

5:55

so the court was struggling with a record

5:57

that seems like it is in itself riddled

5:59

with misinformation. And that

6:01

part of the case, you know, look,

6:04

it didn't seem like there was a majority

6:06

on the Supreme Court for ruling in favor

6:08

of these states and their theory. But

6:10

the fact that the underlying record is

6:13

messed up is just like a troubling

6:15

sign. Adamus Do the justices accept

6:18

that the underlying record was messed up when

6:20

they were told it in briefs, presumably, and

6:22

that they might correct the underlying record in

6:24

whatever decision they issue? MELANIE I

6:27

mean, not really. An oral argument, it came

6:29

up mostly in questions with Justice Alito, and

6:31

he seemed to sort of be dismissive of

6:33

the problems that the Biden administration was raising

6:35

about the record. And that

6:37

was also distressing. Adamus And also, and

6:40

Emily, tell me if this is too harsh,

6:43

but he also seemed to be clueless

6:46

when he asked or when he said,

6:48

you know, what the administration was doing

6:50

is they were calling and pressuring and

6:52

having meetings about talking to social

6:54

media. Would they do that

6:56

with the New York Times and the

6:58

Associated Press? MELANIE The answer is, yeah.

7:01

MARTIN Yeah, yes, indeed they would. So,

7:04

so people like me have

7:07

gotten into professions to ask dumb questions because it

7:09

turns out dumb questions is all they have. I

7:11

understand why I do it. But as a judge,

7:14

like, aren't they supposed to, is there

7:16

a probative value to asking a dumb question or

7:18

was it just a dumb question? MARTIN It's always

7:20

the value to ask a dumb question. MELANIE

7:22

No, no, but the way the implications of it. MARTIN Well,

7:25

no, sorry, but the way he asked it,

7:27

it was loaded. Sorry, it was a loaded,

7:29

it was a dumb loaded question. In other

7:31

words, it was a question asked where

7:33

the clear answer he thought was no, they would never

7:35

do that in the New York Times. MELANIE

7:38

It led to a really interesting set of

7:40

exchanges because both Justice

7:42

Kavanaugh and Justice Barrett kind of chimed

7:44

in to say, wait a second, actually,

7:46

like, you know, and in Kavanaugh's case,

7:48

he was talking about having worked for

7:50

the federal government. He was like, yeah,

7:53

we did. Like, people do make

7:55

these phone calls all the time. And there was

7:57

even like a little joking about the Public Information

7:59

Office at the Supreme Supreme Court, I think what

8:01

was revealing, you know, sometimes

8:03

with Alito, you just feel like his

8:06

brain is marinating in the right wing

8:08

media ecosystem. And

8:10

so maybe it was elucidating for him

8:12

to hear that this is not actually

8:15

how, like the distinction he was making,

8:17

he said that the government was only

8:19

talking this way to social media companies

8:22

because the companies were subordinate. And

8:24

that just seems like such an

8:27

odd characterization of these incredibly powerful

8:29

international juggernauts. I'm

8:31

not going to argue the

8:34

upside down monkey here. I don't I'm not

8:36

like going to make a ridiculous claim, but

8:38

I do worry that in

8:40

a different kind of administration, the

8:43

government that is constantly talking to

8:45

social media platforms, a

8:47

government that has a history as,

8:49

say, Donald Trump did of, you

8:52

know, trying to retaliate against what organizations

8:55

he perceived as its enemy, it

8:57

might well be extremely dangerous. And if the

9:00

lines are blurry there, maybe we do want

9:02

to err on the side of not allowing

9:04

the government to talk to these organizations at

9:06

all. I mean, I'm not sure I believe

9:08

that. But if if one of the possible

9:10

paths we could go down is they

9:13

do talk, they are allowed to talk to

9:15

social media platforms or other organizations, but they

9:17

also have the veiled threat

9:19

behind them. Right.

9:21

Isn't the threat always that they're the federal

9:23

government? This is the

9:25

fundamental dilemma of disinformation and free

9:28

speech in our era. Right. We

9:31

see all this disinformation

9:33

blasting from these channels

9:35

that have some editorial

9:38

judgment going on, but also just

9:40

obviously like tons of content

9:42

from users. It's

9:44

causing a lot of harm. We're

9:47

uncomfortable with the government stepping in to

9:49

regulate it because of the scenario you

9:51

just posed, David, of like, you know,

9:54

nefarious censorship. Right. It was a perfect

9:56

phone call. Right. We also don't

9:58

know what to do about the social

10:00

media. companies self-regulating because they are incredibly

10:02

powerful and can be manipulated. And also,

10:05

they don't seem to be doing a

10:07

very good job. Note that

10:09

because of this case, just as

10:11

collateral damage just from its being

10:13

filed, the companies are not doing

10:15

all of the labeling and less

10:18

amplifying of false speech that they had

10:20

been doing. And so we're really

10:22

between a rock and a hard place. And

10:25

your concerns about this are well taken. I

10:28

don't know what the court is going to come

10:30

up with as a kind of clear line between

10:32

persuasion and coercion. If I call from the

10:34

White House, there's an implicit threat no matter

10:36

how congenial the phone call is. So

10:38

has there been any other case in which a

10:40

line has been drawn that can be looked to

10:42

as a possible model? I mean,

10:45

there's this old case about a bookseller and

10:47

the government ordering it to take obscene materials

10:49

off the shelves, and that was clearly going

10:51

too far. It's from

10:53

a different kind of universe. It's not

10:55

right. I mean, that's not really

10:57

what's happening. I guess one

11:00

thing I've been thinking about back

11:02

to the mainstream media examples, there

11:05

are lots of times, particularly in

11:07

national security situations, where the government

11:09

strongly urges the media not to

11:11

publish something. They're like, look,

11:13

if you say that people's

11:16

lives will be a danger or America's interests

11:18

will be harmed in some way. And the

11:20

editors always hear them out and they decide

11:22

what to do or not do. And nobody

11:25

ever suggests that the White House can't make

11:27

those calls. Well, except throw yourself

11:29

back to 1970 when the

11:31

Nixon administration is doing

11:33

this and is then going

11:36

to challenge the broadcast

11:38

license of the Washington Post Company

11:41

when broadcast license comes up for renewal. Right.

11:44

And then you have to have, you know, Catherine

11:46

Graham, the publisher then of the Washington

11:48

Post, staring them down and they went ahead and

11:50

it's seen as this brave moment. And

11:53

I think we have depended since then

11:55

on norms more than law to restrain

11:57

the government in that kind of situation.

12:00

And on a Supreme Court and on a Supreme

12:02

Court that stands on that side too. Yeah,

12:04

I just don't see how you could have

12:06

a rule where the government can't talk to

12:08

the social media platforms about their content moderation.

12:11

That just doesn't make sense. Although I do

12:13

agree that if you start having some kind

12:15

of like threat on the end

12:17

of the line, like an actual threat that

12:19

that would go too far. But yeah, actual

12:21

threat would go too far. The question is, is

12:23

it always implicit? But also in addition to having

12:25

more examples now of how a White House can

12:28

put pressure on

12:30

we have more national security instances

12:32

in which foreign companies use, sorry,

12:34

foreign countries malevolently use

12:36

social media to affect. So

12:39

it's not just in the state of pandemic,

12:41

there could be a compelling national security interest

12:43

to talk to national security to talk to

12:45

these social media platforms. Could you make the

12:47

standard compelling national interest? And then you just

12:49

debate about whether the nature

12:51

of the conversation was with respect to

12:53

a compelling national interest. I

12:56

mean, I guess you could try that. I feel

12:58

like that would be pretty hard for the lower

13:00

courts. Like is COVID misinformation compelling national interest? At

13:02

certain points during the pandemic, maybe it was. Like

13:04

I don't know if that seems hard to me.

13:06

Well, lots of people dying seems like you don't want

13:08

that in a nation. Well, sure. But then

13:11

it's like, okay, well, then every time there's

13:13

a health threat, does that count? It just,

13:15

that's very subjective is all. Well,

13:17

I mean, isn't anything going to be subjective? Well,

13:20

anything that depends on like carving out

13:22

a particular subject matter. And yes, anything

13:25

is going to be somewhat subjective, but

13:27

I don't like making it about a

13:29

particular range of topics. You would

13:31

say any, you would say government couldn't do this unless

13:33

there was a compelling national interest, which could be a

13:36

physical danger. Well, it would

13:38

always be probably a physical danger. And

13:40

then like, that's not about just COVID. It's

13:42

about anything where lots of people would be

13:44

harmed by this information coming out. That

13:46

seems squishy to me. Yeah. I don't

13:48

know what they're going to say. Yeah. I

13:51

don't know. I don't know. I mean, the NRA case,

13:53

I think, which was the New York case that was the second case,

13:56

the court heard argument that one, the justices did

13:58

seem to think that the New York. state government

14:00

had crossed the line. And now, as a case where

14:02

in the wake of the Parkland shootings, a

14:05

finance official for New York

14:07

was saying to private companies,

14:09

we advise you not to

14:11

do business anymore with the

14:13

NRA. And so, the ACLU

14:16

was representing the NRA and

14:18

was saying this was way out of line. It

14:20

is the government being coercive. And

14:23

then the lawyer for the state of New York was arguing,

14:26

well, no, like the problem that

14:28

the New York official was

14:31

concerned about here was like fraud

14:33

by the NRA and illegal conduct.

14:35

And so, she was allowed to

14:37

be warning companies. But that one

14:39

seemed more on the side of

14:41

coercion because should the government

14:43

be advising private companies who to

14:45

do business with? Like somehow that

14:47

seemed fishier. Well, I guess there's

14:50

a distinction between advising, generally

14:52

stating what NRA is doing

14:54

is a fraud and then specifically speaking to individual

14:56

companies and telling them do not do business. And

14:59

I don't know. And I didn't actually read the

15:01

details enough to know which line they were on.

15:03

Yeah. I mean, that was the question in the case. Before

15:05

we move on to the Texas case

15:08

and the Supreme Court's role, and I just want to note

15:10

how pleasant in a kind of

15:12

early 80s way it is to see the

15:14

ACLU defending the NRA. That's like a real,

15:17

it's like, oh, that's still makes me feel

15:19

good. Like go look at those civil libertarians

15:21

working for people they surely disagree with on

15:24

things. So that was, I liked, I enjoyed

15:26

that. So

15:28

John, it is, as you

15:30

were noting before we started talking, it's practically impossible

15:33

to follow the back and forth on the new

15:35

Texas law. But what

15:37

roughly is going on with this new

15:39

Texas law, which would allow Texas effectively

15:41

to have its own immigration policy independent

15:44

of the federal government. Texas passed SB4,

15:47

which would allow, as you say, Texas

15:49

law enforcement officials to, to arrest and

15:51

jail and return to Mexico,

15:53

even if they didn't come from Mexico,

15:55

people that are suspected of being illegal,

15:57

having crossed the border illegally this was

16:00

passed in December. The Justice Department filed a

16:03

suit, I guess, in January.

16:07

And then from then until yesterday,

16:09

it has been paused by the

16:11

courts at various different levels. Emily

16:14

can cite the various levels, which I think is

16:16

not unimportant here. Anyway, I made it all the way

16:18

to the Supreme Court where Samuel Alito, and

16:20

Emily can explain to me why it was

16:22

Alito. I guess he was in

16:24

his role as his circuit. He's a justice assigned

16:26

to that circuit. Assigned to that circuit. So each

16:28

justice is assigned to a particular circuit, right? Is

16:31

that why John Roberts ruled

16:33

on the Navarro case, too? OK.

16:35

So in his role as the justice

16:38

assigned to that particular circuit, he kept

16:40

pausing SB4, in other words, allowing

16:42

it not to go into effect. And

16:44

then on Tuesday night,

16:46

he said, nope, pauses off. It

16:48

can go. And SB4

16:51

was alive for eight hours.

16:53

At that point, it wasn't just him. It was all of

16:55

them. They all. Oh, right. And

16:58

they all weighed in, right? Yeah. And

17:01

the three liberal justices dissented from letting it

17:03

go into effect. Which Emily can

17:05

explain. So then it was alive for eight hours. And

17:07

then it was the

17:09

Fifth Circuit paused it. Yes.

17:13

And now it's on pause again. The

17:16

main argument, or one of the

17:18

main arguments, is whether the state of Texas is

17:20

overstepping its bounds on an issue that has always

17:23

been considered a federal issue. And

17:26

that is a federal issue,

17:29

among other reasons, because immigration

17:31

intersects with international treaties and

17:33

with obligations to

17:36

other countries, like, say, Mexico, but not

17:38

limited to Mexico. Obviously, lots of other

17:40

countries as well. Substantively, this

17:42

law is kind of bananas

17:44

in terms of precedent and

17:46

the way immigration and sovereignty. That's

17:48

a technical term. It is. So we didn't go to

17:50

law school. It's my favorite technical term

17:52

of late. It feels like it's coming up a

17:55

lot in the context of the Supreme Court. It's

17:57

bananas because we've just always had a good time.

18:00

had an understanding and

18:02

the courts have reinforced this over and

18:04

over again, that it is the federal

18:06

government that makes policy regarding sovereignty and

18:08

the borders. And the reason for that

18:11

is the supremacy clause in the Constitution,

18:13

the federal government

18:15

supreme over the states in

18:17

these lots of matters, especially

18:19

international ones. And also this

18:21

is chaos. Like in the

18:24

nanosecond when Texas was about to enforce this

18:26

law, and who knows, maybe they'll get to

18:28

try again. The question of how this was

18:31

actually going to work was completely unclear. So

18:33

Texas is going to make arrests of people

18:35

who cross into Texas. And then what? Because

18:37

Texas doesn't have the authority to deport anyone.

18:39

So they were going to hand them over

18:42

to federal immigration agents who

18:44

were saying like, no, we're not going

18:46

to do this. Like Texas doesn't get

18:48

to order the federal immigration authorities to

18:50

comply with its law. In

18:53

the wake of this brief

18:55

window of the sun shining

18:58

on the law, other states are now talking

19:00

about similar legislation. And from the point of

19:02

view of politics, you can

19:04

totally see why. I mean, Texas Governor

19:06

Greg Abbott has been getting lots of

19:09

exciting press about this. He seems like he's

19:11

standing up to the Biden administration. Immigration

19:14

seems out of control on the border

19:16

and he is taking this concrete step

19:18

to address it, et cetera. It's just

19:21

not, it's really hard to imagine how

19:23

we can have separate state policies

19:25

about a national and international

19:27

matter like immigration. And

19:29

you also have sheriffs in towns in

19:32

Texas saying, we

19:34

don't have jail space for any of this to happen.

19:37

Like we can accommodate 20

19:39

more prisoners. And obviously the flow

19:41

of migrants is considerably larger

19:44

than that. I assume that the Supreme

19:46

Court, when it eventually deals with this, will probably

19:48

not allow this law to go into effect in

19:51

part because of what you said, Emily, about how

19:53

there are now states

19:55

left, right, center, Iowa has

19:58

passed a law on this. The

20:00

Better Person or an Immigration Laws and make

20:02

it. There cannot be a patchwork of immigration

20:04

laws of country. It's just not. It doesn't

20:06

work. So I seen the Supreme Court will

20:08

will. Not allow this to happen

20:10

but it is. I mean as a political

20:12

matter I think God love Greg Abbott. He

20:14

has do and you're doing the Lord's work

20:17

for the Republican party because it is a

20:19

good look for the Republicans to have things

20:21

like this happening and it's a good look

20:23

for them to have judges and the by

20:25

the administration stopping them from doing this because

20:28

it is. It's this is politically I'm sure

20:30

extremely popular. Probably. They don't

20:32

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20:41

Do. Want to hear more from us after

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24:26

Donald Trump, as we discussed, recently lost

24:28

a civil case in New York, a finding by

24:31

Judge Engaron that his company had

24:33

committed a fraud against banks and

24:35

insurers by lying about valuations of

24:37

its real estate. That case,

24:40

which was brought by Attorney General, State

24:42

Attorney General Letitia James, resulted

24:44

in an enormous 400 plus

24:46

million dollar judgment against the Trump organization

24:48

and some behavioral penalties

24:50

for Trump and his kids as well. In

24:54

order to appeal that ruling, Trump needs

24:56

to post a bond of nearly half

24:58

a billion dollars, perhaps the largest such

25:00

bond ever required in a case like

25:02

this. James didn't have to give him any

25:04

time, but she ended up giving him 30 days to get the

25:06

bond backed by a banker and

25:08

insurer. But it looks like those 30 days, which I think

25:10

expire on Monday, looks like he's not going to be able

25:12

to do it. He's not going to be able to pull

25:14

it together. The major insurers have said they will not accept

25:17

his real estate as collateral for a

25:19

bond, and he doesn't have enough cash

25:21

or liquid investments to cover the bond

25:24

otherwise. But it's a kind of interesting

25:26

legal issue because if he

25:29

doesn't come up with a bond or

25:31

get it lowered, the Attorney General can start seizing his assets.

25:36

And he could declare bankruptcy to kind of get out

25:38

of this. He can still appeal. He can

25:40

still try to sort of get them to lower

25:43

the bond amount. But I actually

25:45

found myself almost sympathetic to Trump in this case,

25:47

and maybe you guys are going to talk to

25:49

me about telling me why I shouldn't be. But

25:52

Emily, where do we stand on this? One

25:56

of the issues here is that much of Trump's

25:59

wealth is in the the form of real

26:01

estate. So it's not cash and it's not

26:03

liquid. And the firms

26:06

that normally underwrite bonds like

26:08

this won't accept real estate

26:10

as the collateral. And so,

26:12

in that sense, Trump's

26:16

forms of wealth are a poor

26:18

match for this particular situation. It's

26:21

such poetic justice that a man who

26:23

lied about the value of his real

26:25

estate is now finding that banks and

26:27

insurers will not accept his valuation of

26:29

his real estate as collateral.

26:33

He's literally being hoisted on his own petard. The

26:35

banks and insurers are like, you know what? We

26:37

can't really value this in such a way that

26:39

we can assign it a value for the purpose

26:41

of this bond. And one reason we can't really

26:43

value it is because people like you lie to us all the

26:45

time about how much your real estate is worth. Well,

26:48

that's maybe a reason not to be

26:50

so sympathetic, right? Because of exactly the

26:52

dynamic you describe. The other question I

26:54

have about this, and this may be

26:56

my own ignorance, so I'm

26:58

curious what you guys think. Why

27:00

isn't it just fine that he has to

27:02

sell some stuff in order to pay this,

27:04

right? He's still worth over $2 billion according

27:07

to like Forbes or whoever is estimating

27:09

this recently. I understand

27:11

he would lose his shirt

27:13

on those sales. They'd be fire sale prices

27:15

because people would know that he was being

27:17

forced to sell. Why is

27:19

that supposed to be, like why

27:22

is sparing him that loss, the

27:24

driving motivation here that should make

27:26

us feel like this is deeply

27:28

unfair? Well, he's mixed

27:30

things. He doesn't want to do it because

27:33

it goes at the heart of his brand. So

27:36

that's the choice he's making, which

27:38

doesn't get into fairness. It's just he doesn't

27:41

want to sell that stuff at fire sale

27:43

prices or declare bankruptcy on the eruption he

27:45

could take because his

27:47

entire myth is built on

27:49

that idea. But I do think I'll take the fairness

27:51

point. Well, it's up to him. Well, but yes, it's

27:53

up to him. But when

27:55

you say tell someone, I mean, imagine this

27:57

was your house, like that you had to

28:00

sell your house at

28:02

a fire sale in order for you to

28:04

appeal a civil judgment against you that you

28:06

believe to be deeply unfair. Like is

28:08

that, would you think that that was okay for you

28:10

to have to sell your house? I mean, there was

28:12

a civil judgment in a court

28:14

against you, so you do owe that money

28:17

at the moment, but you also have this

28:19

right to appeal and to make the conditions

28:21

to appeal so onerous that you

28:23

literally have to give up something which is

28:26

precious to you and you have to, and

28:28

it's both embarrassing and hugely costly just to appeal.

28:30

It seems to me to be dangerous and unfair.

28:32

Well, that's a different thing, right? That's leaving him

28:34

the only option. But I mean, what other, how

28:37

would you structure it in a way that said, you have

28:40

to come up with this money unless coming up with

28:42

the money, you have to do it by any of

28:44

these methods. I guess you could protect real estate the

28:46

way they do in Florida. Well, what Trump's lawyers

28:48

are asking for is to reduce the amount

28:50

of the bond to $100 million. And

28:53

they're also pointing out that because his wealth is

28:55

in real estate holdings, it's not going anywhere. So

28:57

if the state of New York ultimately wins

29:00

the appeal, they'll still be able to

29:02

have everything, which I think is an

29:04

interesting argument. I mean, Ruth Marcus, friend

29:06

of the Gap Fest, wrote a good

29:09

column about this for the Washington Post,

29:11

basically taking David's side and

29:13

in terms of fairness. And so

29:15

Ruth's argument was that it is an example

29:18

of Trump derangement syndrome by which

29:21

she means like everyone

29:23

reacting to Trump in a way that's

29:25

distorting of behavior. She thinks

29:28

that Trump derangement

29:30

syndrome in this instance is

29:32

to require this gigantic bond

29:34

payment, which this person can't

29:36

pay. And then you go back

29:39

to David's argument, like, would you want to have to sell your

29:41

house to be able to appeal? I

29:43

can't decide whether I think she's right

29:45

or whether changing the rules and lowering

29:47

the amount is the example of the

29:50

system just contorting itself for Trump.

29:52

What's the interest in making sure he pays

29:54

even just to appeal? Well,

29:56

because if you didn't have these bonds,

29:59

then you could. could have a litigant

30:01

that's on the hook for however much

30:03

money who then sells off all his

30:05

property or just offloads

30:08

his wealth onto his kids as a way of

30:10

becoming what's called judgment proof, where you don't have

30:12

to satisfy the judgment. But couldn't you just

30:14

say you can't do any of those things in

30:17

the same way they say freeze your emails and

30:19

don't give them away when you're caught up in

30:21

litigation. You would say you can't make any sales

30:23

pending appeal. Yeah. Well, more

30:25

or less, that's one of the arguments that Trump lawyers is making,

30:27

is that he effectively cannot sell

30:29

his property anyway. Right. Well,

30:32

effectively or not, you could say, you don't have to

30:34

pay it, but you can't do anything to touch it

30:36

in this period. I mean, you make

30:38

a rule, not just an agreement. Yeah. And

30:41

they do have a special master who's overseeing the

30:43

Trump organization anyway, so they have someone in there.

30:46

I mean, yeah, that is a workaround.

30:48

And then the question again becomes, is

30:50

the workaround the fair way that the

30:52

system is providing due process, or is

30:54

the workaround accommodating someone who is refusing

30:57

to take a hit that lots of

30:59

other people take? Yeah, but I don't think

31:01

there are lots of other people who take it, in part

31:03

because there just aren't a lot of people like Trump, and

31:05

there aren't a lot of people who are as nefariously criminal

31:07

and misleading as Trump. And

31:10

most of the time, it's

31:12

sort of public organizations. There aren't that

31:14

many privately held organizations that have ended

31:16

up in trouble like this, which is

31:18

why the scale of the fine is

31:20

so out of whack with historic precedence on

31:22

it. It's just like he is kind of a

31:24

case of one. He's

31:27

sort of a case of one because he is wickedly

31:29

Trump, but it's also because his real estate

31:32

empire is different than

31:34

most other companies that end up in situations

31:36

like that. He's only a case of one in

31:38

terms of scale. I mean, lots of individuals

31:40

and companies have to post big bonds

31:42

that require them to take a haircut.

31:45

Yes. Well, I wonder what either

31:47

of you want to pass or how you think

31:49

this is going to end. I kind of think

31:51

they're going to end up in

31:53

a situation where he... I do

31:55

not think they're going to seize the Trump Tower, and I don't

31:57

think he's going to go into bankruptcy. I think they're going to

31:59

end up... in a situation where he is allowed to

32:02

post a lower bond with some constraints

32:04

on what he can do with his

32:06

real estate. I don't know, because we're talking

32:08

about the New York courts, right? I mean, ultimately,

32:10

the highest court in New York, which, confusingly, is

32:12

called the New York Appeals Court instead of the

32:14

New York Supreme Court, is going to weigh in

32:17

on this, and it's going to

32:19

be up to them. And they're like the

32:21

opposite of beholden to Donald Trump. And I

32:23

don't know how they'll see their interest in

32:25

enforcing rules of state law here. So

32:28

it's a really interesting question. So there's

32:31

New York values coming back to bite him. Before

32:35

we go, Trump also did have a

32:37

busy week, slandering Jews and Democrats and

32:39

migrants and valorizing January 6th

32:42

insurrectionists. He said,

32:44

migrants, some migrants are not even

32:47

human. That's great. Love it. Great

32:49

job, Trump. John, you have thoughts?

32:51

Well, I guess my only thought is that it

32:54

offered another example of slight Trump derangement

32:56

syndrome. He also mentioned that there would

32:58

be a bloodbath if he

33:01

were not in office in

33:03

the car industry because of Biden's

33:05

policies. And there was a lot of

33:08

concern about the use of the word bloodbath, suggesting that implicit

33:10

in that was the idea that there would be violence if

33:12

he weren't elected. It's not crazy

33:14

to draw the conclusion because he has,

33:16

in fact, suggested more explicitly

33:18

that there will be violence if he's not elected.

33:22

And implicitly, when he says things like

33:24

already that the 2024 election will be

33:26

stolen, he is stoking the feelings of

33:29

anger. But I guess what I always

33:31

am more concerned with in these instances

33:33

is what he actually says that is

33:35

unmistakable versus what needs literary interpretation. And

33:38

what was unmistakable is, as you mentioned, the

33:41

valorizing of the January 6th convicted

33:43

rioters over 1,000 have been convicted

33:45

or pled. And

33:48

the reason I think this is so important

33:50

is he's pledged to pardon them, what

33:53

he calls hostages on his first

33:55

day in office. And if

33:57

you think of three component parts of a healthy

33:59

democracy. One is the belief in

34:01

free and fair elections. The second is the

34:04

belief in the rule of law. And the

34:06

third is the belief in verifiable facts. He

34:08

has found a way to create a turducken

34:10

of offenses against all three of those in

34:12

this valorization of the January 6th rioters. So

34:15

he is okay with trying to overturn the

34:17

will of 81 million voters who voted for

34:19

Biden. He's okay with bouncing people

34:21

out of jail who've been convicted through the system

34:24

and the way the system works. And then he's willing

34:26

to do both of those things based on thorough

34:29

misinformation about what happened in the last

34:31

election. So it is in a

34:33

neat package, the full package

34:36

of the way Trump operates

34:38

and the way he would operate in his second term.

34:41

And there's no mistaking it. You don't

34:43

have to guess at what he means. He

34:47

said it quite explicitly. We're going to

34:49

take a short break, and we'll be right back with our

34:51

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36:59

The long-term impact of COVID

37:01

school closures was worse than

37:03

most of us feared for

37:05

America's school kids. According to

37:08

National Association for Educational Progress data,

37:10

it's data that is based

37:13

on testing done of fourth and eighth graders,

37:16

data that's been analyzed by the New York Times

37:18

and others, COVID school closures and remote learning just

37:21

walloped school kids, setting them back more

37:23

than half a year in math in

37:26

some cases. And it's learning loss that has

37:28

mostly not been recovered. The more time

37:30

kids were out of school, the more remote they

37:33

were, the more they lost. So,

37:37

John, this was extremely unsurprising to

37:39

anyone who has followed this issue,

37:42

the series of stories about this,

37:44

but it is so disheartening nonetheless.

37:47

It is. And the other piece was that

37:49

experts say that the extended closures did little

37:51

to help the spread of COVID, which there

37:53

was one hole in this, which hopefully you'll explain

37:56

to me, both of you. But let's before we

37:58

get to that. Yeah. I thought

38:00

what was interesting to me about the findings

38:02

was they weren't surprising, but

38:05

what was affirmed is that the worse off

38:07

you are, the worse off you're gonna be.

38:09

So if you lived in a poor neighborhood,

38:11

you were more likely to be out of

38:13

school longer and therefore

38:16

bore the brunt of greater learning

38:19

loss, except one

38:21

of the interesting things about places

38:23

that have pushed back and

38:25

recovered some of the learning loss, and learning

38:27

loss in this instance doesn't mean you forgot

38:30

how to do long division. It means

38:33

the opportunity you missed to learn more

38:35

during that period of time. So it's,

38:37

but what interested me was the idea

38:40

was where the communities

38:42

have been able to improve in

38:44

the period post COVID, and that

38:47

has largely poor

38:49

communities have been devastated during

38:51

that period, but not all poor

38:53

communities. And the curious thing

38:56

is what, and there's some preliminary

38:58

answers, about why in places like

39:00

Mississippi and Nashville and Alabama, differing

39:04

on math and reading, but why

39:07

there's been success, what it is that's the

39:09

mix of success and cannot be scaled to

39:12

help other places. The strongest

39:15

relationship to prosperity in any

39:17

measure, economic measure globally, nationally,

39:19

locally is human capital and

39:21

education. And so it is, I

39:24

think people get a little bit confused

39:26

or they diminish it when they say, oh, it's

39:28

just half a year, it's just whatever, it's just

39:30

a third of a year of learning loss, what's

39:32

the big deal? When you have

39:35

people who are worse educated, you get

39:37

fewer engineers, you get fewer nurses, you

39:39

get fewer people who complete a

39:41

college degree, you get people who are less competent

39:43

when they do complete a degree, they're less good

39:45

at it because they've just, there's a moment where

39:47

they had a chance to have

39:50

their brain filled and expanded

39:53

and set a fire, and it wasn't possible for

39:55

them to take it. And so it

39:57

will be a measurably poor. for

40:01

the country as a whole because of this. It's

40:04

not just that these kids,

40:06

you know, a few kids didn't learn long

40:08

division or, you know, learned it worse. It's

40:10

like there will be downstream impacts

40:12

that we will all feel that will be bad.

40:15

Yeah. Also, I care about all

40:17

the individual kids and families affected.

40:19

And you know, when

40:22

you go back to 2020 and 2021 and those

40:24

incredibly urgent, difficult moments

40:28

of decision making, I have

40:30

sympathy for the government officials and the

40:33

teachers unions that fought to keep the

40:35

schools closed and had a lot of

40:37

success, especially in, you know, blue cities.

40:40

The longer out you go from the start

40:42

of the pandemic, though, the more

40:45

it was actually clear that

40:47

the learning loss was going to be

40:49

significant and that the benefits in terms

40:51

of preventing the spread of COVID were

40:53

less likely to really help. You know,

40:55

in the fall of 2021, I

40:58

know I felt that way about my

41:00

own kid going to public school

41:02

in New Haven and our

41:04

system. And then certainly by

41:07

the time you get to the vaccines

41:09

and the, you know, little bit of

41:11

early access that teachers got and school

41:13

personnel got to vaccines that winter,

41:15

it started to be clear. And

41:17

yet there was just this like deep

41:19

set of fears, I think, especially in

41:21

poor communities, because there was more COVID

41:23

and more death in poor communities. The

41:27

whole thing is just kind of heartbreaking in

41:29

retrospect. And I do feel like it

41:32

is fair to ask questions about

41:34

the messages that some local government

41:36

officials and teachers unions were sending

41:38

that were kind of stoking the

41:40

fears as opposed to helping people

41:43

get ready to go back to school. You

41:45

know, one of the clear distinctions

41:47

that I saw in my own community was that

41:49

the private school kids were going back. Like

41:52

those parents were looking at the data and

41:54

deciding it was safe. And yes, they were

41:56

at less risk and they had better circumstances

41:58

to return to because because the schools

42:00

had more money at the time and were

42:03

better equipped. But to have that

42:05

disparity, it was really clear. Like I went to

42:07

a party in the summer of 2021 when

42:10

my kid had been out of school for many

42:12

months, as a public school kid. You

42:14

know, it's not my usual position in the world to be

42:17

like on the kind of disadvantage side

42:19

of a question like this. But I realized I

42:21

was with all these people whose kids had been

42:23

in private school and they'd had a totally different

42:25

experience of the year. And also if

42:27

they had been public school, might've

42:30

helped advocate for opening the schools, but they

42:32

weren't there. And it was just such

42:34

a stark reminder of these kinds of

42:36

inequities and how they can just like

42:39

boomerang onto people. To

42:42

your point, Emily, it was the American Academy

42:44

of Pediatrics in June of 2020 said that this

42:46

was causing harm and

42:49

schools needed to be reopened with safety measures in

42:51

place. I mean, just in terms of setting a

42:53

time for when this became more. Yes,

42:56

I remember that. Juliet Kiam came on

42:58

the GAP Fest really early on and talked

43:00

about how shocking it was to discover

43:02

there was actually no plan. You know, their

43:04

plans for starting water treatment plans back up

43:06

and making sure that, you know, that fire

43:08

services are maintained, but no plan for school.

43:10

We didn't treat schools as essential

43:12

institutions and we didn't treat

43:15

teachers and other school personnel as essential

43:17

workers. And we didn't celebrate their heroism

43:19

for going back. We told them they

43:21

couldn't go back safely or a lot

43:23

of blue cities did say that. Can

43:26

I ask you about that though, because the teachers

43:28

were the ones where whenever, I

43:30

would report on this, it would be like, well, the

43:32

kids aren't hurt and representatives of the teachers would say,

43:35

yeah, but it's the teachers who are in danger of

43:37

catching COVID and that's why we can't have school. Right,

43:40

except that when you look at the data showing

43:42

that it didn't really prevent spread, then that starts

43:44

to look really questionable. I mean, it wasn't, they

43:46

weren't being malicious, but they were wrong in retrospect

43:48

and they should own it. I think one of

43:50

the things that actually occurred to me is how

43:53

duped we were by remote learning,

43:57

the fact that the schools were able to

43:59

pull together Oh, everyone can go

44:01

to school. They're going to go to school on tablets. We're

44:03

going to make sure kids have tablets or computers. Everyone's going

44:05

to get it. And they're still going to go to school

44:08

fooled us. How would anyone

44:10

fooled by that? This part as a parent, I'm just

44:12

like, it was so crappy. No, I

44:14

mean, of course, yes, it was so obviously terrible. And

44:16

it was a mess. But there was this delusion that

44:18

kids are at school. And your

44:21

kid was there three hours a day,

44:23

and they were on a Zoom call.

44:25

And we all knew, especially for younger

44:27

kids, this is disastrous. This is terrible.

44:29

Pointless. It's so destructive. But

44:32

it was this trick

44:34

that people allowed themselves to kid themselves, that

44:36

their kid was at school. And one of

44:38

the things that struck me in reading about

44:40

this was Thomas Kane, who co-authored one of

44:43

the pieces of research here, which didn't rely

44:45

on NAEP scores, but looked at the district

44:47

level analysis. He cited this figure,

44:49

which I don't know where it came from, but it's so

44:52

precise. It goes to what you're saying, that there

44:54

was a view that you'd be able

44:56

to basically recoup 75% to 80% when

45:00

he cites some of the problems with

45:02

what actually happened was this belief

45:05

that somebody had that hybrid learning would have

45:07

been 75% to 80% as effective. And

45:10

they were just totally wrong about that. And

45:12

the specificity of that number made me think that

45:14

there was some education professor

45:16

out there who was making a

45:19

numbers-based claim that was wrong. It

45:21

wasn't just thinking, oh, this will

45:23

work. There was

45:25

analysis behind it that was wrong. It's also the

45:27

case, and other people have pointed this out. I'm

45:31

stealing this. Learning loss is only a

45:33

piece of it, the tested learning loss.

45:35

The kids were also desocialized. Communities

45:37

broke down. Community programs stopped working.

45:40

Networks that had been built up

45:42

in the peaceful time of pre-pandemic

45:44

times stopped functioning or collapsed. And

45:47

a lot of stabilizing forces, and

45:49

especially in the poorer communities

45:51

of the country, stopped working or

45:55

worked worse. And the price that we pay

45:57

isn't just, of course, lower test

45:59

scores. also more crime, more

46:01

mental health problems, chronic absenteeism, you

46:03

know, more teachers leaving the system,

46:05

worse public schools in places that

46:07

are that are already had not

46:09

good public schools. Big disaster. How

46:12

do we avoid it? Well, let's

46:14

turn to the sort of bright spots that John

46:16

pointed to at the beginning of the segment. There

46:18

has been a lot of federal money that has

46:20

gone to the schools in hopes of recovery. It

46:22

doesn't have a whole lot of strings attached to

46:25

it. So we're having a giant natural experiment looking

46:27

at how districts have spent the money. And

46:29

there are some indications that in

46:31

states that have lower levels of

46:34

inequality to begin with,

46:36

the recovery has been more even and better.

46:40

Kind of some surprising states like, you

46:43

know, not the usual suspects

46:45

for great strides forward, I think in a

46:47

good way. And then the other... Mississippi,

46:49

Alabama. Exactly, Tennessee, I think.

46:51

And then also some

46:53

indication that I think

46:55

that while there's like no quote

46:58

magic bullet, that things like high

47:00

intensity tutoring and more one on

47:02

one attention and maybe additional school

47:04

hours and days of instruction, and

47:08

like summer programs that are academic, but

47:10

the kids can actually bear to sit

47:12

through, that all those things are having

47:14

some impact. And that is a hopeful

47:17

sign. There is some like real recovery

47:19

going on in parts of the country. I

47:22

felt like the... And I'm really, I don't

47:24

know enough about weekly county Tennessee, but as you said... I

47:26

have been to weekly county Tennessee. I'll tell you anything you

47:28

need to know. Oh, good. You've

47:31

got a bunch of time there. Oh my God, this is

47:33

fantastic. So, and

47:35

then I'd like to learn about Vermont. Anyway, like

47:39

these pockets where, as Emily said,

47:41

and this is true, I think in

47:43

the improvement in scores in Mississippi

47:45

is that they've intensive tutoring.

47:47

The problem there is that you don't

47:49

have enough tutors to do the work,

47:51

but that they have found that intensive

47:53

small batch tutoring and that in weekly

47:55

county, it's interesting because it's lower income

47:57

and mostly rural. So it's not just...

48:00

just, you know, the hardest hit places. What do

48:02

you know about weekly county and why is

48:04

why are weekly counties math and reading scores fully

48:06

recovered? I couldn't tell you that. No,

48:09

it's a Northwest Tennessee. It's

48:11

in Western Tennessee. It's on there's a

48:13

lake where they filmed an Elizabeth Taylor movie, a

48:16

very shallow lake, right near

48:18

the Mississippi. A lot of ate

48:20

a lot of catfish. I was friends with

48:22

a guy named Roy Heron, who is a

48:24

Democratic state legislator from weekly county and I

48:26

visited him in 20 2004, I think, and

48:28

hung out with

48:31

him in weekly county and drove all around weekly county

48:33

in 2004. And the thing I remember is that Roy

48:36

was a Democrat and I bet a district that is

48:38

now I bet is like as red as can be.

48:41

But he ran and he was

48:43

running for state rep and there was

48:45

zero votes for his opponent. He got

48:47

every every single person who voted voted

48:49

for him. Nobody wrote in anybody else.

48:52

That was that was the thing that

48:54

surprised me. But I

48:56

don't know about the test course. Adding to

48:58

Emily's list, the school year you extend by

49:00

offering to pay teachers more just making sure

49:02

the teachers out there who are

49:04

like, Wait a minute, why am I going to work longer

49:06

but that the idea would be to pay

49:08

them more over the summer and then

49:11

this idea of the ninth grade is

49:13

a firebreak that you say basically, this

49:15

is a disaster and we're not going to let

49:17

it spread beyond ninth grade. And if by ninth

49:19

grade, you find these pockets that haven't been able

49:21

to recover on their own, then you focus intensive

49:25

energy there, which then leads me to my question about

49:27

this, which is think about all the crap we talk

49:29

about in the presidential race. This

49:32

is a huge problem, right? Poverty

49:34

inequality, the building of skills for

49:37

the precise reasons David mentioned are

49:39

should be huge national issues in

49:41

the conversation, whether you have national policy or not

49:44

as another matter. But in terms of turning our

49:46

attention to the things that are most besetting our

49:48

communities, this would be you think a thing to

49:50

talk about and especially after a massive pandemic with

49:52

this kind of learning laws that's going to have

49:54

the kind of generational problem. I

49:57

mean, we should be talking about

49:59

this all day long. And it's,

50:01

and we don't. So, John, you know,

50:04

one thing I often think about with this issue

50:06

is that often in

50:08

the world, liberals point to

50:10

conservatives having these blind spots

50:12

legit, right, and say that

50:14

they're not being like evidence-based

50:16

in their thinking and approach.

50:19

This is an issue where I

50:21

think liberals have a lot of

50:23

reckoning to do with their slash

50:25

our own blind spots. One

50:27

of the important moments in this is like

50:29

right around that time when, as you mentioned,

50:31

the American Academy of Pediatrics was talking about

50:34

harm, Trump came out as president

50:36

and said, we need to go

50:38

back to school. And that was

50:40

like a disaster because all of the, a

50:42

lot, not all, but many teachers, unions and

50:44

Democrats moved in the opposite direction. Like if

50:47

Trump was saying something, it had to be

50:49

wrong and they had to oppose it. And

50:52

you know, it's important to

50:54

make one's mind up about evidence

50:56

independent of who is advocating what

50:58

position. And I think that got

51:00

lost in that moment. Let's

51:04

go to cocktail chatter when

51:06

you're like having

51:08

a drink to overcome your derangement syndrome, any

51:10

kind of derangement syndrome that you have, Emily

51:12

Bazlawn. Maybe you have Vermont derangement syndrome. What

51:14

are you going to be chattering about? My

51:18

friend Rachel, who I'm staying with, gave me

51:20

a novel to read that

51:22

I've like gulped down in two

51:24

big gulps. It's called Small Game.

51:27

It's by Blair Braverman. And

51:30

it's about a kind of survival

51:32

TV show set up that goes

51:34

awry. You can tell

51:36

that in the first pages. And

51:39

it's just a good short, you

51:41

know, very consumable read. If you're

51:43

looking for a book like that,

51:45

I recommend it. Small Game by

51:47

Blair Braverman. I

51:50

already am writing it down on my book list. John,

51:54

what's your chatter? My chatter and apologies

51:56

for the banging going on next door.

52:00

banging. They seem to be installing

52:02

like one shelf a day. First

52:05

of all, let's cleanse the air with my

52:07

lovely encounter with Sid on the Upper West

52:09

Side, who is a listener to the Gap

52:11

Fest. I just wanted to say I had

52:13

him. He was very charming and

52:16

it's always lovely to hear from people who like the

52:19

podcast. And now to cleanse the

52:21

air further and remind us that

52:23

there are wonderful people in the

52:25

world, Mackenzie Scott just did one

52:27

of her annual donations. Basically, Mackenzie

52:29

Scott takes in applications from nonprofits

52:32

with annual budgets between one and five

52:34

million. So they they're not huge gargantuan

52:36

nonprofits. A lot of them are smaller,

52:38

don't have big names attached to them,

52:41

and they apply for money. And she

52:43

got 6,300 applications and gave away one

52:47

or two million dollars individually to 300 and

52:50

some odd. So it's not just that she's giving

52:52

away money. She has now given away 16.5 billion

52:55

dollars since divorcing Jeff Bezos, her former

52:57

husband. But it's the way in which

52:59

they do it that experts say is

53:03

so good. It allows lesser-known organizations to gain access

53:05

to the kind of money that might really help.

53:09

They provide unrestricted grants and then

53:11

step back, which allows people

53:13

to actually iterate and

53:15

innovate and, you know, hopefully do

53:19

good work. So I was happy to see

53:22

that happening in the world. Yeah,

53:24

God love her. I have very

53:26

three quick tires. One that happened

53:28

during this taping, which is the

53:30

best thing that can happen to you. You know

53:32

that feeling if you put out something for your

53:34

garbage or recycling, you're like, I sure hope they

53:37

pick it up. I sure hope

53:39

it gets picked during this. So my

53:41

new podcast facility taping area, I can

53:43

see my garbage being picked up and

53:45

they picked it all up. What was

53:47

it? Because we just moved in. Okay, you're

53:49

really chattering about your garbage getting in. Seven

53:51

hundred pounds of cardboard. It

53:54

was like all this cardboard that wasn't fully

53:56

broken down and it was like, oh they

53:58

took it all. Yay! Okay,

54:01

my other chatter really is I commend

54:04

for a downer, read Sarah Zong's

54:06

story in the Atlantic, DNA tests

54:08

are uncovering the true prevalence of

54:10

incest. Amazing story

54:13

in the Atlantic about how when people start

54:15

taking DNA tests, there is

54:17

a small fraction, still a pretty

54:20

small fraction of people who discover,

54:23

you can't discover it from your first 23andMe test, but

54:25

if you get a weird 23andMe result

54:27

and you decide to dig into it, you can

54:29

then figure out, oh my gosh,

54:32

I'm adopted, but my parents were

54:36

a brother and sister or a father

54:38

and daughter. And it's

54:40

now, it looks to be about

54:42

one in 7000 people and almost all of them,

54:44

it's a case

54:47

of, you know, that sexual assault or

54:49

child abuse is involved and it's just

54:51

awful. It's an awful

54:53

depressing story. Maybe that's information people

54:56

are better off without to be paternalistic for

54:58

a moment. For the most part, I think so. I

55:01

think so. Anyway,

55:04

very interesting story. Finally,

55:06

I have a great job at CityCast Open, a

55:08

great job and I could use you or someone

55:11

you know, we're hiring a director of finance. It's

55:14

going to be the person who is

55:16

going to help build

55:19

CityCast as a business. Like finance people

55:22

do modeling, they help set

55:24

strategy and a place like CityCast where we don't

55:26

have a lot of business experience, we've got a

55:28

great product, we've got a great team, but we

55:30

need help on the finance side. And if you're

55:32

somebody who is like hungry

55:34

to work at a really awesome

55:36

startup with a ton

55:39

of energy and where you'll get a chance

55:41

to grow in your finance career,

55:43

please reach out to me or tell

55:45

some friend of yours who fits

55:48

that profile. Just

55:50

email me at [email protected] or

55:53

check out jobs.citycast.fm

55:56

or maybe at citycast.fm slash jobs as you would

55:58

find it. Please, please, please, I

56:01

could really use a great director of finance. Listeners,

56:03

you have kept the chatters going.

56:06

And we have a chatter this week from

56:08

Joshua Weaver in Austin, Texas, Austin, where

56:10

CityCast is soon to be launching. Joshua,

56:13

what have you got to say? Hi,

56:15

Gabfest. My listener, Chatter,

56:17

features a Montana man with

56:20

entrepreneurial dreams to create a

56:22

freakishly large sheep. This

56:24

story is straight out of Jurassic Park. There

56:27

is a years-long international conspiracy, questionable

56:30

biohacking, and a seedy

56:32

underground market for exotic trophy hunting.

56:35

The story also raises interesting questions, like

56:37

why is it illegal to breed a

56:39

giant sheep, and is it

56:41

inherently immoral? Also, are

56:44

the Benegestra dabbling in sheep eugenics?

56:47

You can find the full reporting from the AP. Thanks

56:49

for listening, and until next time, have a beautiful

56:51

day. If

57:01

you've got a chatter, please email it to us at gappest.com.

57:04

That is our show for today.

57:06

The Gappest is produced by Shayna

57:08

Rock, who just soldiered through clearly

57:11

clear misery, clear cold misery to

57:14

make the show. So thank you,

57:16

Shayna. Our researcher is Julie

57:18

Hugin, who did not soldier through, but

57:20

she does have an awesome few glasses.

57:23

Our theme music is by the American Giants, Ben

57:25

Richmond, the senior director for podcast operations, and Felicia

57:27

Montgomery is the VP of audio for Slate. Please

57:31

join us on Wednesday here in

57:33

Washington, D.C., at the Hamilton. Take us

57:35

to slate.com/gappest live for our live show. It's going to be

57:37

really fun for Hamlet, because I'm the one that gets to

57:39

the same table. And we're

57:42

just seeing you. Oh,

57:53

thank you. How

57:57

are you? We're

58:01

gonna just soldier off for here. She's

58:03

just like, I don't really know

58:05

what we're doing here. Kate Middleton,

58:08

the Princess of Wales, Duchess

58:11

of Cambridge maybe, I don't even know.

58:13

She apparently had abdominal

58:15

surgery in the

58:17

winter. She vanished, she reappeared in a

58:20

Mother's Day photo. The

58:22

U, Britain has a different Mother's Day, that's

58:24

why it was a Mother's Day photo. That

58:27

photo, it turned out, was photoshopped. She

58:29

then did a social

58:31

media post saying, apologizing for photoshopping, and

58:33

saying she just liked to photoshop things.

58:36

They did not release and

58:38

un-photoshop photos, so we haven't seen a

58:40

legit photo of her recently.

58:43

And then she reappeared last week to do

58:45

some shopping. There've been no real

58:47

public explanations of why she

58:49

vanished, and there's been a lot

58:51

of extreme dismay with the

58:54

royal family for countenancing this line

58:56

in photos. Turns out that some

58:58

other photos that she was

59:01

in had been photoshopped as well several

59:03

years ago. So how is this gonna

59:05

impact the presidential election, Emily? Please

59:08

tell me, David. No, come on,

59:10

you gotta- Oh, I'll play. Play

59:12

along. You guys play. I just

59:14

like, yeah, it's the royals. Yeah.

59:17

It wasn't even my idea. I am not

59:20

blaming you. I went along with it. I

59:22

wanna hear your theories. I don't have one. Well,

59:25

I'll give it, I'll sally forward with a

59:27

dumb idea, which you can then use to,

59:29

or leap with your better idea. Well, first of

59:32

all, the reason, the way in which it affects

59:34

the presidential campaign is to the extent that everything

59:36

is up for grabs and everybody does it, and

59:39

nothing is real. And

59:44

for some people, there will be a kind of, I

59:46

bet, and now

59:48

I'm out on thinner ice here, but a

59:51

kind of nobility in this fake, like,

59:54

you know, and just basically the royals

59:56

can do no wrong. And therefore, if the royals

59:58

have done something, it is performed. not

1:00:01

wrong. And verily I say

1:00:03

unto you, if he be

1:00:05

not a knave. Anyway, so

1:00:07

that sort of lowers the bar

1:00:09

on misinformation. And since you

1:00:12

have one candidate who is expert

1:00:14

in and seeks innovation in

1:00:17

misinformation, you can imagine Donald

1:00:20

Trump using this or those who seek

1:00:22

to support him in some way that's

1:00:25

beneficial. Did I get close, David? That

1:00:27

was just a snippet from our SlatePlus

1:00:29

conversation. If you want to hear the

1:00:31

whole conversation, go to slate.com slash tap

1:00:34

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